The sun nipped at Nerluce's exposed nape, the hair that typically covered that slot of skin tied tightly into a top knot. It was an unusually warm day, perhaps the last warm day of the year. The heat intensified the stench of the apple orchard. The sweet tang of fruit entwined with the rougher scents of baking earth and fallen leaves. It would've been more pleasant without the addition of Nerluce's sweat.

He strained to reach one of the apples, balancing on the balls of his feet, arm fully extended yet his fingertips barely grazing the sly fruit's red and yellow streaked surface. Nerluce wasn't small for his age — a proud fourteen years — but he was on the lesser side of average. If only he was a little taller, a little older, he might be able to reach the apple...

Glaring at the apple did little to make it budge.

Traditional methods depleted, Nerluce took a few steps back to survey his foe. The apple wasn't high enough off the ground that it would be worth the effort of climbing the tree, but it was still too high for Nerluce to reach. That left only one option. Nerluce groaned, letting the apple know just how displeased he was and giving it one final chance to lower itself. It, being an apple, obviously did not.

So Nerluce charged the tree. His palm connected with the waxy surface of the apple. Delight mixed with rushing blood as he stumbled, narrowly avoiding falling on his face. It didn't matter. He'd gotten it. He'd actually gotten it! He couldn't contain his grin or his gasping breaths. This level of exertion for just one apple wasn't worth it — Nerluce was more accustomed to spending warm days napping in the sun, not running and jumping around an orchard — but who cared?

However, as Nerluce turned his captured prize over, he saw what had priorly been hidden by the angle in which the apple hung. It was spoiled. The smile fell from Nerluce's face. Whether this was the result of the elements or some creature taking a bite out of the apple before a human could, the result was the same. All that effort wasted on rotted fruit.

Unless...

Nerluce sunk his teeth into the apple's flesh.

Stupid? Likely. Even eating around the rotten bits, Nerluce could get sick. However, if he didn't eat the apple he was certain he'd get sicker. Nothing made him more nauseous than putting effort into a useless task.

With the apple picked and eaten, the tree was now empty and Nerluce's basket was full. His muscles cried in protest as Nerluce hoisted the basket into the air. It was a good thing that last apple had been rotten. If it wasn't, Nerluce didn't know if he'd be able to lift the stupidly heavy basket.

Nerluce staggered out of the orchard under the beady-eyed watch of the elderly and somewhat haggard woman who owned the orchard. Her name had been forgotten by everyone — even herself — long before Nerluce was born. She had no spouse, no siblings, and no children but all of Yusatsu called her Aunty.

Nerluce was no exception. As he passed, he greeted her with a pleasant, "Aunty."

As Aunty was an old woman — one with no money to afford such luxuries as glasses — her eyesight was predictably bad and her manners were predictably worse. "Boy," Aunty said. "Why are you here? I thought you'd run off hours ago."

"Aunty promised me an apple if I filled the basket," Nerluce said, setting the basket by her feet so that she could examine it. Aunty did with a scrupulous gaze, lifting one apple and turning it over in her hand. There was something maternal in the way she looked at the apple, scouring for signs of abuse. She would find none. Nerluce had made sure of it.

That morning, Nerluce had woken up with a desperate craving for apples and so naturally he had wandered into Aunty's orchard.

Nerluce had spent more than a few lazy afternoons making himself sick on apples plucked from Aunty's orchard, entwined in the branches of one of the trees as if he were the Empress lounging on Itoroh's golden throne. He might as well have been. They were both eating the same fruit after all. If anything, the Empress ought to be jealous of him. Aunty's apples — plucked straight from the branch as Nerluce commonly ate them — were much fresher than anything the Empress ever dined upon in her far-off northern palace.

"Boy," Aunty said.

It was the only warning Nerluce got before Aunty tossed the apple, which had apparently passed her inspection, to him. Nerluce fumbled but managed to catch it against his stomach. "Thank you, Aunty."

Aunty clicked her tongue. "You know I only told you to fill the basket to make you leave. Most children would have just stolen the apple and not bothered me any further." Aunty almost sounded disappointed that Nerluce hadn't stolen from her. Nerluce didn't understand old women. "Why are you still here?"

Nerluce shrugged and bit into the apple given. Truly, there was no fruit quite as sweet. "I did eat half of a rotten apple." Aunty narrowed her eyes to the point they almost completely disappeared beneath her wrinkled eyelids. Nerluce sighed and took another bite. "If Aunty feels so bad about exploiting a poor, naive boy, she could give me another apple. I won't complain. Or perhaps some wine?"

"Do you really think that one basket's worth of work is equal to a jar of my apple wine?" Aunty scoffed. "You could gather three hundred baskets and I still wouldn't consider it."

How cruel! Nerluce had known before he asked that it was unlikely, but Aunty didn't have to be so harsh. It would be faster to brew his own wine than to attempt to gather three hundred baskets of apples and even the idea of gathering one more basket was enough to make Nerluce feel faint.

For, at his core, Nerluce was a lazy creature. All he wanted to do was spend the last warm day of the year soaking up sunlight while eating apples and drinking wine — given he could get his hands on it — was that too much to ask?

Perhaps not because Aunty tossed him another apple, grumbling something like, "Shameless child." Then, more clearly she said, "You think they'd have enough coin to pay someone to teach lordlings manners with how high taxes were last year!"

Nerluce's smile faltered. So Aunty had recognized him. It made sense. Unless they were blind, any long-term denizen of Yusatsu would easily know what bloodline had sired Nerluce. Aunty's aim was too good for her to be blind and her age too great for her to be ignorant.

The realization settled, like disturbed dirt at the base of a stream and Nerluce found himself smiling, even wider than before. "Aunty ought to know that this lordling hasn't seen a single coin of those taxes. They go into the coffers and then off to the Tilican border. There's nothing left to purchase tutors with."

Aunty scoffed. "I've seen the robes your father dresses in, boy. I know exactly where our taxes go."

"And has Aunty seen the beast my sister rides? The price of feeding that thing alone is probably..." Nerluce trailed off as a cold feeling of dread settled over his chest.

Oh. Oh no.

"What's with that look on your face, boy?" Aunty asked.

Nerluce barely heard her at all. "I'm sorry Aunty, I just—" He choked on the words. How had he forgotten? "I have to go now."

With that, Nerluce turned and ran. How had he forgotten that Coam would be returning today? It was all anyone had been talking about for the past fortnight! Everyone was oh so eagerly awaiting his dear sister's return after her crushing victory at the southern border. It should not have been possible for Nerluce to completely and utterly forget.

Yet, somehow, it seemed he had!

To one side of the road, the unharvested stalks of a rice field grew thick and wild, giggling and tangling together like school girls. The place they suddenly shortened was abrupt and allowed for a peek of the water priorly hidden beneath the stalks' skirts. To the other side of the road, a sloping hill hosted a pattern of trees, their leaves interwoven. Green to red to green again with random threads of yellow and orange, as though the tapestry of the forest was made by an indecisive needleworker. However, Nerluce couldn't take the pleasure he normally would in these sights. Instead, he focused on the barren dirt road that would lead him back to Yusatsu and then back home.

A warm breeze came to meet him — the last, gasping breath of summer. The leaves hissed and clashed against one another with brutality and volume rivaling the clash of armies while the significantly cut rice stalks strained to once again whisper secrets in one another's ear. Carried on the tail of the breeze were several wind spirits. Their small, rotund forms were made of pure Magick and therefore were easily able to ride on the unseen currents of the sky.

Upon spotting Nerluce, the wind spirits broke free from the breeze. They hummed and tittered in delight as they tangled the loose strands of Nerluce's hair and dried the last of the sweat on his forehead. Despite his urgency to return, Nerluce found himself smiling. It was good luck to see spirits — or so Mother had once told him — and he needed all the fortune he could get.

The spirits were carried away with the next gust of wind and Nerluce hurried on. The trees gradually thinned and the watery rice farms met their banks. Houses appeared on what was priorly wilderness and farmland, like freckles on a child's cheeks after staying in the sun too long. People moved in clumps, carrying nothing and everything with them. Both they and the buildings increased in number as Nerluce entered Yusatsu.

It was a loud place on regular days but today there was a festival — a celebration in honor of Coam and the other soldiers' return — making it especially loud today. Merchants called out. To him, to the woman next to him, and to the man next to her. They didn't care whose attention they caught, just that someone's head turned. People bought and people bartered, going back and forth until they found an agreement.

Besides people and buildings, Yusatsu was cluttered with decorations. Lanterns were strung overhead and banners had been raised in bright, Hebikoti reds. The white snake of Nerluce's family glared down at him from on high, urging Nerluce onwards and giving him the power to resist all of Yusatsu's temptations.

On the other side of the city was the mountain path that led to where Hebikoti Palace. The path was steep and by the time that Nerluce reached the end of it, his lungs burned and muscles ached with overexertion. Unfortunately, Nerluce wasn't able to rest just yet.

Because the great red gates of Hebikoti Palace were closed. Of course! Why wouldn't they be closed? Whoever said that spirits were lucky ought to be flogged for such a lie!

Nerluce skirted around the palace walls finding a tree that was close enough to work. He climbed it with limbs shaking from exhaustion. He fumbled over the wall but thankfully came crashing to the ground on the other side of it, startling the flock of ugly, white birds kept in the garden into a screeching panic. Nerluce groaned and pushed himself up. He knew exactly whose garden this was — there was only one person in Hebikoti Palace who kept those birds — and he needed to leave. Now.

Trying to ignore the birds' obnoxious cries, Nerluce fled from his mother's garden.

Really, why did he have to fall into Mother's garden of all places? He would have preferred anywhere else. Well, almost anywhere else. Nerluce shook his head. Now that he'd returned unnoticed, all he needed to do was change his dirtied robes and then no one would even know he'd left. He couldn't afford to be caught having left the palace again or else Lord Father would certainly—

"Nerluce."

The voice was male. Calm and firm. Lord Father had never needed to raise his voice. His very presence demanded respect. Upon hearing that voice, Nerluce froze.

And it had started off as such a warm day.