“Where are we going?” Izzie demanded Colt to tell her, “What are you doing?”

“You are my second in command,” Colt turned on her, “That does not give you the right to speak down to me,”

“I merely ask since we haven’t stopped riding and the men are in need of rest. They’re falling on their feet!”

“We’re not resting because of your little friends back there,” Colt jerked his head over his shoulder, motioning to behind them in general.

Izzie blanked.

“What? You didn’t think I believed you were on your own, did you?” Colt started to laugh at her, “I’m not stupid. You’ve been a part of that group fighting us as we eradicate this plague. Kill a few to save a thousand,”

“You believe that?” Izzie stared at him, “What if one of those few had the cure to the plague?”

Colt cocked an eyebrow at her, “These low-born peasants!?” He scoffed and Izzie felt it hit her as she had been a low-born peasant, “They can’t even read! They believe that God has done this to them rather than their own disease and crowded villages. They brought this on themselves,” Colt told her with finality before he kicked his horse forward and left her behind with the foot soldiers.

“Oh,” Colt called and turned back to her, “And we’re going to the capital, in case you wanted to know,”

* * *

“Where the hell are they going?” Iagan cursed in his thick Scottish accent as he consulted the marks in the road and the signs.

They were stood at a crossroads and three of the four directions would make sense for the army to take; there were villages in every direction. But the fourth direction was nothing but fields and forests.

Were they regrouping? Injured?

No one knew but Drystan had other things to worry about; every fibre of his being wanted to find Izzie and snatch her away from this Colt man but there was an even bigger danger closer to home.

Dawn.

She was withdrawn, went off in the middle of the night when she thought them all asleep and had known her way through that forest, where the bogs and snares were, whilst the rest of them were helpless.

Had she been through it before?

Drystan should give her the benefit of the doubt since she had saved his life when she shot that highwayman but something about her needled him.

He didn’t know why he hadn’t picked up on it before; maybe because he was too busy trying to figure out Isadora.

But not anymore; if she was a plant by the enemy then he couldn’t have her posting their location to Colt and Isadora every time they changed course and tried to catch up with them, or else, Drystan would never get her back.

Dawn was currently slouched against a tree, acting bored by the entire mission, whilst Iagan, Dermott and Jarred argue about which road to take.

Now was the opportunity to talk to her; walking forward, his hand resting on his sheathed sword, he called out her name.

Dawn turned to face him, her expression changing from bored to concerned in an instant.

Drystan opened his mouth to say something when Iagan shouted his name in a hurry.

Looking at his friend he saw him drawing his sword, his eyes fixed firmly on something behind him which, when Drystan turned to look, found was a hobbled over peasant, using a stick to keep himself up right.

Before Drystan would have offered help but now, as he looked closer, he also drew his sword and stepped back until there was a safe gap between them; Dawn shrieked slightly and jumped back.

For he was infected.

“Stop there!” Jarred shouted at the man who indeed did stop; lifting his head to look at them and Drystan had to grind his teeth together to keep from vomiting at the sight of the man’s face.

A hood had been covering him but the moment he looked up, his eyes squinting painfully against the sun, they could clearly see the infection. Boils of all sizes were over his face and the back of his hands, the skin that they could see, some had burst with pus oozing down his face whilst other leaked blood.

Jarred beside him lifted his arm and placed the cloth under his nose to keep from breathing him in.

“P- P- Please” The man’s chest was racked with coughs as he tried to speak and Drystan felt pity for the man, “K-Kill me,”

Everyone shared looks with each other at the request from a dying man; he knew none of them could touch him.

Drystan remembered back to the village when Isadora had killed that young woman who was dying; it was merciful, Drystan realised.

He shared a look with Thomas; who looked traumatised and upset by the man, before he turned to Dawn and gave her a small nod, “Do it,”

“You can’t-” Thomas stepped forward, reaching out his hand to the man but Drystan pulled him away.

“Do you want to die!?” Drystan shouted at him in a hushed tone, “I didn’t bring you all this way just be felled by this disease,”

“He’s a human being; just like you. How can you kill him?” Thomas begged him and Drystan was increasingly getting the feeling that he was not up to being in the real world.

“He’s in pain,” Drystan reasoned with Thomas, “There’s not cure and he’s not getting any better. He will be dead either by tonight or tomorrow; would you rather it be painless or torture for him?”

Thomas said nothing because he knew Drystan was right; Drystan nodded to Dawn again and she armed her bow.

It was over in a second and the man fell to the floor in a heap.

Iagan came forward and slapped Thomas on the shoulder in a comforting act that he wasn’t used to, “If we’d let him live he’d just infect someone else;”

Thomas shrugged him off and walked towards the dead man; Drystan wanted to stop him as he crouched beside the body but Jarred stopped him.

Drystan could only watch as Thomas picked up a handful of soil and started to recite the burial prayer and sprinkled earth over the man’s body.

They didn’t have the time to bury him.

“Why bother with that, Thomas?” Dawn told him as she placed her bow back over her shoulder, “He’s dead, he can’t hear you!”

Everyone stared at Dawn in shock and hatred; Thomas was one of them whether they liked it or not and that was what he believed in.

Iagan growled and took a step forward but Drystan interrupted him and pushed Dawn back against a tree trunk, gripping the collar of her cloak in his hand.

“Now,” Drystan threatened Dawn who was more than shocked at his sudden attack, “You’re going to tell me why you were sent to become one of us! Who do you work for?”

“Drystan!?” Dawn shrieked in shock and her voice was suddenly becoming very irritating, “I don’t work for-”

“-Jarred!” Drystan called and behind him, as if on cue, Jarred tore off a strip of his shirt and walked over to the infected man and wiped up some of his infected pus and blood on the cloth, careful not to touch himself.

“Now, either you tell me what your mission it or good old Jarred here is going to smear that over you and I bet it wouldn’t take long for you to become one more of the infected masses,”

“Drystan, you wouldn’t,” Dawn whimpered, her eyes not leaving the smelly goo that was on the cloth, “I mean, I’m not working for anyone!”

“Wrong answer,” Drystan sighed, “Jarred?” He murmured and Jarred stepped closer, “Think about this Dawn, soon your pretty looks that you care so much for will be covered in boils and dirt and-”

“-Alright!” Dawn confessed, “Colt sent me to infiltrate you and keep an eye on you. Now get that away from me,” She growled.

Drystan nodded to Jarred and he threw it onto the floor away from them whilst Drystan let Dawn go and she slumped back against the tree trunk in relief.

“What have you told Colt?”

“Only that we’re following him,” Dawn confessed, “He has a carrier pigeon that we use to communicate,”

“Who are you to him?” Iagan asked him, Thomas re-joining them.

“I’m his second in command,” Dawn stood straighter and spoke to them as if she had authority over them.

“Not any longer,” Dermott grinned, “It seems Colt finds you expendable. That position has gone to Isadora,”

“That cow?” Dawn scoffed and Drystan snapped; storming forward he shoved her back against the tree, using his forearm to strangle her.

“Don’t speak of Isadora like that,” Drystan growled at her, “Or else I’ll do worse than simply infect you with the plague,”

Dawn stared at him with fear in her eyes before it turned into something else; enlightenment.

“You love her,” Dawn whispered and Drystan pushed his arm harder into her throat; if she could talk then he wasn’t doing it right but her words still clutched at his chest like a vice.

Did he love Isadora?

“You’re going to tell us where they’re going. And you’d better hope that you’re still useful to Colt or else we have no more need of you,”

“I- I-” Dawn motioned to her throat and Drystan eased off so she could speak, “They’re going to the Capital. Colt wants to see the King,”

“The King?” Iagan questioned with confusion, “Its suicide! The guard will cut him down,”

Dawn shook her head, chuckling to herself, “Oh, you have no idea do you?” Dawn laughed even harder, starting to annoy them all.

Even Thomas.

“The King employs him,” Dawn chuckled, “He’s the King’s secret army.”