Aela Ren’s scarred fingers curled around the leather-bound grip of the war scout’s sword. Slowly, he began to withdraw it from his chest. Bueralan watched in horror as the small man pulled the blade out of himself inch by inch, the steel slippery with his blood, but not enough that, when his hands could no longer reach the pommel, Ren hesitated to grip the slick blade. When he had drawn the last of it from himself, he let it fall to the floor, where the sound of the sword hitting the ground was shallow, as if it were nothing but a toy, its very composition material that would not harm a child. ‘Once—’ Aela Ren’s voice was rough, bestial, and he stopped, as if the nature of his voice was a truth he did not wish to hear. ‘Once,’ he began again, his voice returned to its normality, ‘I thought the gods had returned. It was towards the end of the war. The sea level had not yet risen. Churches still existed. I had not yet grieved for all that I had lost, and neither had those I knew.
