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Azune's first battle was quickly followed by his second and third and fourth. He didn't come so close to dying again, but the screams, the blood, the chaos and terror, were all just as bad as the first time.
The times between battles were scarcely better: then he was waiting for it to start again, and remembering how it had been before. Every twinge in his now-healed chest and shoulder was a reminder of how bad it had been, and how it still could have been worse. Every time he looked at Kattigan he remembered Teor's description of how he had looked on the ground, and the sight of all that blood matting Teor's fur, making it look as black as Cyd's.
There was nothing else in the world but war: escaping the last battle, preparing for the next. One night after he'd taken a piss at the freshly dug latrine trench and was walking back to his bedroll, Azune realized that he was crying.
He looked around for somewhere to hide, but there was nowhere more private to go in the camp. His bedroll was laid between Teor's and Kattigan's, and he couldn't cry in front of them, he just couldn't. There were people coming and going constantly from the latrines, the pickets patrolling the perimeter. But right in this spot, halfway back in the dark, he was almost, sort of, alone.
He crumpled down to the ground, covered his face in his hands, and let it wash over him, the awful futility of his second chance turning to nothing but blood and mud and screaming.
Azune was silent as the tears flowed—that was a lesson learned long ago—but he was still a solid object not far off the most direct path between the main camp and the latrines. He shouldn't have been startled when someone found him; he was only startled by the warm golden light and the tininess of the weight on his shoulder.
He froze, and then lowered his hands and looked, and Thimble jumped from his shoulder to the back of his hand and looked up at him, her face creased in sympathy. She looked younger than he did, barely older than he had been when he came to the Torn Banner to begin with. She had stayed the same, all the time he had known her; he had changed, like any mortal who would die someday.
Azune covered his face with his hands again, despite Thimble still perched there, and hoped she couldn't see him wishing it would be soon, just to get it over with. There wasn't going to be a third chance, not for him. Not one that would be any better than the first two.
He felt Thimble's small weight and grip leave his hand. He curled tighter into himself, but almost at once there were bigger hands on his shoulders, lifting him right off the ground. "Hey, hey, Azune, what is it? You got the camp shits? We can fix that."
Thjazi was holding him in the air, and Azune couldn't help uncurling, lowering his hands. Despite everything, he couldn't help being sure that Thjazi would have answers. Thjazi always knew what to do and where to go. He was so big, and so strong, and Azune's eyes always turned in his direction, whenever he was around. He met Thjazi's eyes, even knowing that Thjazi would see the tears still streaming from his, would know that he was nothing but a child even after his years of training; he should never have been allowed to follow Thjazi into battle.
"But we have to catch it quick, or the healers get overwhelmed," Thjazi went on, as though he hadn't noticed anything at all. "So if you've had a bad shit, you can't hide and be miserable alone, you have to tell someone at once, before it spreads. Is that what it is?"
Thjazi was still holding him in the air, perfectly steady, as though Azune weighed nothing; as though he could just blow away on the wind. But he was looking right into Azune's eyes, seeing him and somehow not seeing anything all at once. Azune couldn't help looking back, and couldn't help answering truthfully. He shook his head, the motion knocking a tiny sob loose from his throat.
"Hm, worse than that, then," Thjazi said, just as Thimble, glowing warm and golden, landed back on Azune's shoulder. On his left side, lighting up the mark that covered half his face, and Azune flinched from it though he knew Thjazi had never even seemed to notice it. Another thing he always saw without seeming to really see it the way anyone else did.
"Right, let's..." Thjazi looked around, and then set Azune on his feet, resting one arm heavily over Azune's narrow shoulders instead and guiding him farther from the main path, over to a tree that marked one of the perimeter patrol points. "Thimble?"
"Mm-hm," Thimble said, and the boughs of the tree bent down and the leaves on the tree began to shake, constantly rustling in a breeze that touched nothing else, so that they were a little shielded from patrollers walking by, the rustling covering their words and the boughs obscuring them from sight. It was the sort of signal that would let anyone else know they should give some space; Azune was a little bewildered at being important enough to have that kind of space made for him.
He let himself crumple then, falling to his knees and curling up among the hard roots, tucking the side of his face against the bark of the tree. Thjazi sat down gracefully, facing him, and set his hand on Azune's shoulder just below where Thimble was perched. "Come on now, what's the trouble? We need you, Azune, so I need to know how I can help."
He would say the same to anyone, Azune knew, and he meant it every time; he often spoke of how all of the Torn Banner needed each other. When Azune had only been in training, helping with camp chores, Thjazi had said it to him then, and Azune had known it was true: the latrines had to be dug the right way, clothes and gear had to be mended, and Azune's cantrip could do it better than anyone could by hand. Food had to be cooked and cooked well, to keep them all marching. It all mattered, every job, every part.
"It's just," Azune said, struggling to control his voice, to sound properly grown up and not like a squeaking child. "It's all—it's so awful. Just everything. Why—why even—"
Sobs caught in his throat again, tears blurring his vision, but he still saw Thjazi relax, his expression turning soft. "Hey, hey. I know. I know, it's hard. No one wants to be at war, you know? It's awful."
A tiny traitorous part of Azune—the part that dared to be furious, the part that had never been grateful and didn't know why he should—thought that it wasn't difficult at all for Thjazi, that he loved battle, loved fighting, that he'd started all this because he wanted to.
The rest of Azune, the part of him that smothered the other part, just felt warm in the glow of Thjazi's sympathy, felt immediately comforted just because Thjazi was here, speaking to him, and it hardly mattered what Thjazi said. It wasn't so awful, not really, not when he knew that Thjazi cared. When Thjazi was here. How could Azune want to be anywhere else?
"Our grandparents and great-grandparents freed us from the gods," Thjazi went on, bowing his head toward Azune's. "It's our duty to continue that fight—to free us from the Sundered Houses. We are meant to be free, all people are meant to be free. We bear this burden for those who can't join the fight—it is our glory, our honor, to be able to bear all the horrors of it, to take up the fight. We will know, when we are free, that we won that for all our people."
Azune nodded along helplessly, feeling that flame kindle in his chest again, the certainty that he was where he belonged, where he needed to be.
"That's how," Thjazi said, squeezing Azune's shoulder and giving it a little shake. "That's how we do it. We just remember that. If you need reminding again, you just come and tell me, right? I'm here for you, Azune."
Azune nodded, sniffing his nose clear and wiping his tears away. "I will. I just..."
Thjazi's attention shifted, and Azune realized a patroller was approaching. They didn't call out, but Thjazi gave Azune's shoulder another squeeze and with his gaze fixed out past the tree, he repeated, "Just come and tell me. I'm here," and then he was on his feet and gone.
At once Azune was alone in the dark again, that fire guttering into nothing. The place where Thjazi's hand had been was cold, and Azune curled his own hand over it, but it was nothing like the same. He let his head thump into the tree, let another sob shake him—and only then realized that there was still a light beside him, and the tree was still rustling, hiding him. Thimble was still on his shoulder.
She brushed a tear from his cheek, and Azune turned his face away, knowing it wouldn't be the last to fall. "I—you can—you don't have to—to—" He couldn't even say it, couldn't even tell her to leave him alone. He didn't want to be alone, didn't want to be back in the dark for real.
"I think Thaz didn't quite answer the question you were asking," Thimble said, leaning against his jaw to speak into his ear. "But I can try, if you want. I've turned against House Royce, you know? That means I've turned against the Golden Orchard. I'm an outlaw back where I was born. I can't ever really go home. It's scary sometimes, knowing that. Thjazi is mortal, after all. What if he gets killed? And war is just... it's horrible. I never imagined anything could be so horrible, back in the garden."
Azune's stomach hurt thinking of it. He'd heard Thimble tell stories of the Golden Orchard, of her long life before she left to enter Thjazi's service. The beautiful trees, the flowers, the sunlight that never completely faded, how even the rain sparkled with light. And she had given all that up, and might never see it again—might only ever live in a world with all the blood and mud and screaming, and all this darkness. A world with death in it—a world where someday Thjazi would die and take all that warmth and strength and goodness with him.
Azune sobbed. "I'm—I'm sorry," he gasped, not even knowing what he meant.
"No, no, don't be sorry, it's all right," Thimble assured him. "I didn't mean to say I've got it any worse than any of you—I just want you to understand that I understand, right? Because I do, I get it. Everything is so awful sometimes, you just wonder, why even try? Why even go on?"
Azune nodded frantically, feeling actually understood, a different little light sparking inside him.
"You have to look for it, okay?" Thimble said, still into his ear, telling him a secret, the secret he needed. "You just—you have to find it. It's different for everyone, I think, but you can find it if you look, you just have to know what you're watching for. Because it's still there, in the awfulness. I still see every day, the things that grow, the things that are beautiful, even when things are dying and things are ugly. I can still see the light when I remember to look for it."
"I just," Azune whispered. "The—the battles, and the—the blood, and—it hurts. It's going to hurt, it did hurt, it—"
"I know," Thimble whispered, leaning against his face like a hug—she must be lying right over his birthmark, but she didn't even seem to notice it. "You have to look for the opposite of the battles, the opposite of war. The people who love each other, the people who are kind. You can find them. They're here, they're all around you. It's what Thaz means, I think, when he talks about how important every single person is—he means, the reason to keep going, it's us. It's all of us. You can see it right in camp. The way people look out for each other, love each other, take care of each other. The laughs, the smiles. If you look, you'll see it, and then you'll know, okay? That's how you keep going. Because this is worth it: your friends, your comrades. We're worth it. And that can be enough, if you just keep your eyes on that."
"You promise?" Azune whispered, though in his mind's eye he was already shining that tiny golden light through his memories and remembering: waking up to Loza bending worriedly over him. Teor fussing over Kattigan, and Kattigan rolling his eyes like it annoyed him but letting Teor fuss. Thjazi's hand, warm on his shoulder, even if it was gone now.
"I promise," Thimble said firmly, and Azune felt the weight of it, the seriousness of it. Thimble was a fairy; her promises were never casual, and never meaningless. "If you keep looking for the good parts, you'll keep finding them. They're always there, just as much as the bad. And when all this is done, maybe there'll be more of the good than there was before."
"Okay," Azune whispered. "Okay. Yeah. I'll look. I promise, I'll keep looking."
"Okay," Thimble agreed. "Go to bed, now. I gotta go see what Thaz is getting into before he gets too far."
Azune nodded, and Thimble flitted off, the tree falling still as she went, the boughs rising again.
The next patroller coming around yelped and jumped back at the unnatural motion of the tree, and Azune laughed, seeing the silliness in it.
There was a part of him that wanted to choke down that laugh, wanted to apologize, to cower, but Casimir just laughed right back, coming toward the tree again. "Was that Thimble?"
Azune stood, wiping his face dry as he did. "Yeah, she was just... yeah. She's great, isn't she?"
"She's sure something," Casimir agreed, looking off in the direction she'd gone. "Imagine having one of your own, huh?"
Azune nodded. It would be something indeed, to have a friend like Thimble was to Thjazi—a friend who had a special nickname for him that no one else could use, a friend who could make up for anything he missed, anything he didn't understand. A little light, always on the way back to him when it wasn't at his side.
Casimir was already gone before Azune could reply, but he was patrolling; it was good that he kept moving.
Azune headed back to the main part of the camp and watched, as he moved through, and saw just what Thimble had told him he would see: friends joking together, comrades sharing food and gear.
When he found his bedroll, laid between Teor's and Kattigan's, Teor opened one golden eye and swept a look over him, then reached over and flipped the blanket back for Azune to get in. Teor had been waiting for him; Teor would have noticed if he hadn't come back. When he laid down, Kattigan rolled a little closer and patted his side, and Azune tugged his blanket up to cover his smile.
He wasn't alone. He wouldn't face anything alone. And the good was there, always. He only had to keep his eyes on that, like Thimble said.
Around him the camp was the same as it always was, and the next battle was coming as inexorably as ever, but Azune slept soundly, and dreamed of the rain that shed light as it fell.