Kaplan’s soldiers had brought more than enough bedrolls with them from Stuttgart to accommodate the survivors of Dijon. They spread their bedrolls through the back of the nave while Bösch, being the captain of their company, and Reist, being the only woman of the survivors, shared a small room at the front of the nave.

Rob sat on his bedroll near the entrance to the church, Sauer inspecting his injured shoulder. “Just give it rest,” Sauer said. “It should heal quickly.”

“Thanks, Mr. Thomas. You’re a lifesaver, for real, man. When that Bean got me, I thought it had ripped my whole arm off.”

“It is no problem. I have treated much worse than dislocations. And please, call me Sauer.”

“You got it, Mr. Sauer.”

The rest of the survivors were deep asleep now. Schmidt wrote a letter in the dim candlelight, too anxious to sleep despite his exhaustion.

“So…” Rob said. “What brought you to Dijon?”

“The Empire hired me to study the disease from Paris. I thought it was going to be easy money, but I guess it was not.”

Rob laughed. “Are you some bigshot, then?”

Sauer chuckled softly. “I guess you could say that. I have been practicing for nearly three decades. Some of the highest ranking officials in the Empire personally frequent my practice.”

“Where are you from?”

“Nuremberg. And yourself?”

“Oh… Some small farming village outside Paris. You’ve probably never heard of it.”

“That is strange; you do not speak with an accent.”

“I’ve lived in the Empire for a while. I must’ve lost it…”

With a creak, the door at the front of the nave opened, Bösch walking out. He scanned the soldiers until he noticed Schmidt and began to walk over to him. “Barry… Can I talk to you?”

Schmidt looked up from his letter, glancing towards Rob who was still talking to Sauer about his accent. “Sure, what do you want to talk about, captain?”

Bösch looked at the sleeping soldiers, then at Rob and Sauer. “I think it would be best if we talked privately… It’s something I don’t think you’d want the others to hear.”

Apprehensively, Schmidt set his parchment down. He eyed Bösch, his face cast in shadow from the candlelight. Schmidt stood up and followed him to the front of the nave. He remembered his last conversation with Bösch months earlier and cringed at himself, though he was too tired to come up with an excuse to avoid the conversation that was about to take place.

They entered, Reist sleeping soundly on the opposite side of the room. Bösch motioned for Schmidt to close the door, and began talking as soon as he did. “I wanted to... thank you. Er, for saving me, back in Dijon. What you did was… very brave. Not just anyone would have the courage to ride back into battle, especially not against foes such as the Beans.”

Schmidt stood awkwardly in front of the door. “It’s nothing, really. Those other soldiers followed me, too…” He thought of Jakob. “Some even died. I’d say that they were braver than I was.”

“Yes, Barry, but you led them. You were the one that started the charge. If it wasn’t for you, I would have died.”

Schmidt paused. He knew that if he said the first thing that popped into his head, it would only make things worse. “Sauer was preparing to go back and—”

“Take the compliment, son,” Bösch interrupted, shaking his head. His tone was different now. Less uncomfortable, more stern. “I know it’s been hard for you, since… since your parents died. You’ve grown into a fine man, Barry. You’ve been doing an excellent job, taking care of Sofia and yourself, but I still worry about you. You think I haven’t noticed, but I have, son... I have. You’re not the same boy I knew back in Rohrdorf… You’re full of pain, sadness, fear, and you don’t know what to do with it all.”

Schmidt glanced around the dark room, avoiding Bösch’s eyes. There was a desk in the center of the room, papers and books strewn across the surface, much more than in any church he had seen before. He wondered if they were Bösch’s, or some poor priest that was forced to evacuate. Bösch sat down on his bedroll, looking at the floor.

Schmidt opened his mouth to speak, but Bösch cut him off. “You’ve lost a lot, a lot more than you deserve to have lost, but you haven’t lost everything yet. Sofia is waiting for you. She hasn’t seen you in years, and I know how worried she is about you. She writes to me, you know. I love getting her letters, finding out how she’s been.” He paused, and Schmidt could feel his gaze through the darkness. “She’s worried about you too, maybe even more than I am. This isn’t the time for you to fight, son. Go back to your sister. She needs you.”

Schmidt clenched his fists, angry that Bösch still thought he was a weak little kid. Bösch had given him this talk many times before, and he wasn’t going to hear it again. Not after everything he went through today, not after saving his life in some godforsaken field in the middle of France, not after watching so many people, so many innocent people, die helplessly in front of his eyes. Not after saving him over Jakob. He could still see the blood shining in the grass, the corpses flying through the air, the unnatural monsters lumbering towards him, ready to strike him down. Jakob’s shredded flesh in that pit. He could still hear the muffled screams of the dying soldiers, still smell the fresh blood of the soldiers killed by the abnormal Bean monster, still feel the fear, the overwhelming fear of knowing he would die if he made one mistake, hesitated for one second too long. The guilt of the survivor, the guilt that, less than a day ago, he wanted something like this to happen.

Bösch was right about one thing: he was scared. But that didn’t mean he had the right to lecture him about how he should help his sister, who he practically raised himself. He especially didn’t have the right to lecture him about when to give up and go home.

But here they were, Bösch lecturing Schmidt in a dark room in the middle of some tiny abandoned town he didn’t even know existed, one that neither of them would ever see again.

Bösch spoke just above a whisper. “Please, Barry... swallow your pride and go back to Rohrdorf. Why won’t you just let me help you? I can support you and Sofia, God knows I can, I’ve been telling you that for years. What I can’t do is keep watching you suffer like this, quiet and alone. You’re like a God damned dying animal.”

The emotions that he had tried so hard to hold back the entire day came out in a flood of rage. “Like you’re one to talk about abandoning pride! You left us to go fight in your idiotic campaign in Cologne! You left them to die, you know. Where were your generous contributions when my parents lay dying in their beds? Where were you—”

“Shut the hell up,” Bösch hissed.

“—when we buried them, when Sofia wouldn’t stop crying in her bed, when—”

Bösch shot up and moved towards Schmidt quicker than he would have thought possible, grabbing his shoulders and looking him directly in the eyes. He was crying. “Shut the hell up,” he said, barely above a whisper. “I know… God damn it, I know… I’ve made more than my fair share of mistakes in my life, but please, son, I’m begging you… let me do this one thing for you. You don’t have to forgive me. You don’t even have to pretend to forgive me. Just please, return to Sofia. If not for you, then for her. Barry... she needs you.”

Schmidt knocked Bösch’s hands off his shoulders. “I made my decision a long time ago.” He turned towards the door, but his hand stopped at the doorknob. There was a long silence between them. Bösch stood silently, his face wet with tears. Finally, without turning, Schmidt opened the door to leave. “And don’t call me Barry.”