His name was Eamon of Willowmere. Hero born from a farmer’s hearth, who rose to become champion of all the lands. Wielder of the sacred sword Bromeliad, forged in ancient days by legendary smiths long dead. Leader of the Daybreak Company, us chosen heroes who carve a path through history’s pages. He slew the Dragon of Ashencrown. He broke the curse on the Pelagan Marshes. He drove back the Grimalkin hordes of the Dark Lord Malkadaar. Monsters cowered when he passed through their lands, and the suffering rejoiced and raised their eyes when they saw his company come.
I found him dead in his tent, lying in a pool of his own blood.
For a moment, I didn’t believe it. Even just the night before, he’d been alive and well, so hearty and full of life that the mere thought of him dying seemed absurd. We’d sat around a blazing campfire, laughing and joking, as the moon rose over the mountains forming the northern rim of the world. Tsetseg, Scothaosta, Wybrand, and Isolde – the other four members of the Daybreak Company – joined in the revels in the center of our ring of tents. The next morning, we had hoped to venture out to continue our hunt for Eskuldur the Wyrm, sitting on her stolen hoard in the highest peak of this range. Tonight, though, this was where we stayed.
Tsetseg had stood, facing the gathered party, and raised a flask of liquor from her distant homeland. “I slew six wild boars in a single blow of my axe,” she’d boasted, “but only had the strength to carry back three.” I’d seen her perform incredible feats of strength before, but the catch roasting over our campfire was still definitely exaggerated. The bloody hunting axe at her belt, at least, proved part of her claim true.
Laughter echoed through the night, with Tsetseg’s booming voice laughing loudest. Somewhere in the distance, wolves howled as though they were enjoying the joke too. Even Scothaosta, ever-quiet, couldn’t help but smile under their billowing sorcerer’s robes. “Your mistake there was that your claim was too believable,” Wybrand answered. He leaned forward, facing her with a grin. “What about that time with the elk in Cinderwood? You’ve already proved you can kill far more than just a few boars.” That one I knew was true. “Though there’s no shame in showing off, after all.”
Eamon nodded. “Aye. We’ve all achieved incredible things, and slain some incredible foes.” He turned and gestured towards me. “Ruxla’s trick when we fought the devil-prince of Razad Keep, for instance.”
Tsetseg gave me an appreciative nod. “What about the Dragon of Ashencrown?”
“That was a team effort,” Wybrand said. Even as he spoke, Scothaosta looked uncomfortable, turning their cowled face away from the group and focusing on a vellum book spread across their knee. Eamon stepped away from the conversation, and went over to check on them. Our voices died down, for a second, before picking back up again.
The moon continued to rise over that fateful mountain night. Isolde the Rose, our traveling bard and artist, led the Daybreak Company in a raucous round of song. The melodies of six voices, undaunted by drink and exhaustion, danced through the evening air. After going through a good chunk of her folk song repertoire, Isolde hesitated for a moment, before digging through her pack and producing a piece of paper. “If you’re interested,” she began, “I actually have something new to share. There’s a piece I’ve been working on about some of our latest adventures.”
“Might I see?” Scothaosta stood and approached the group. “I’ll admit, I have never quite found the chance to read your work.”
Isolde handed them the paper. “I’d love to hear what you have to say. That said, I know the writing-“
“This is interesting,” Scothaosta said, curious gold eyes scanning her words. “Though these are certainly not the words I would use to describe Eamon’s-“
Eamon.
Memories cracked like a dry twig. Last night’s revels were over. I was standing here, right now, looking at his cooling corpse. I was usually better at dealing with blood and gore than this. I was supposed to be the Daybreak Company’s knife in the dark, who does dirty work and makes hard choices when no one else can. To an extent, that’s true. You can’t spend your childhood in the Dark Lord Malkadaar’s domain without getting used to death, and I’ve lived a violent life on top of that. The scent of Eamon’s blood crawling its way up my snout, though, was too much even for me. Once I returned to the present, dumbstruck, and put together what was happening, the first thing I did was scream.
That drew the others quickly. The Daybreak Company traveled light, these days. We didn’t bring beasts of burden or traveling companions. There was no one there but us few old hands at adventuring, who’d set up our circle of tents in the mountain clearing last night. I knew their faces by rote. We’d all saved each other’s lives too many times to count, over years spent journeying through the far reaches of the world. For a while, I half-thought we’d grow old together, or else die all at once. Or, if not that, then Eamon would outlast us all.
Wybrand Stormspear was the first to arrive, eyes already filled with horror as he surveyed the scene. “How?” he cried. “What happened? Who did this to him?” He leveled his monster-slaying spear wildly, pointing it around the camp like he hoped to undo all this by just stabbing something hard enough. I knew grief was hitting him especially hard – he and Eamon had been childhood friends, and the two of them had been the very first to found the Daybreak Company.
I heard Isolde the Rose before I saw her, calmly humming something under her breath. Her music stopped short when she looked into the tent, and she cried out in despair. “No, this can’t- We were going to-” Her voice broke, even as her eyes stayed fixed on the corpse. By contrast, Tsetseg took in the scene calmly, unfazed by the blood around her. She watched the shadows around us, hands on the twin axes on her belt, and let out a slow breath through her scar-laden nose. “May he rest well,” the self-proclaimed warrior princess whispered to herself. “And may his death not be in vain.”
After silence had almost begun to fall, Scothaosta Dragonblood stepped out of the shadows, leaning on a heavy walking staff. “No one broke my wards,” they announced, peering up from dark robes. They had journeyed to the Daybreak Company’s side from lands far to the west, and themselves claimed that their sorcerous might came from the Dragon of Ashencrown’s blood coursing through their veins. “The spell would react if anything, living or dead, had breached them. Whoever struck this blow must still be within the circle.”
Quietly, Isolde turned to face them. “Or- or something could have snuck past you. A monster, maybe. Some assassin.”
“That is unlikely,” Scothaosta replied. “I have encountered few beings in this world with the strength to avoid my wards.”
Wybrand pivoted with a growl of rage. “Is that all you have to say? Eamon’s dead, and you’re still worried about your magic?”
“What worries me,” Scothaosta continued, “is that the cause of Eamon’s death still lurks within our reach.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Wybrand advanced on the sorcerer, jabbing the butt of his spear into the dirt. “Are you saying you killed him? Do you want the rest of us dead too?”
Tsetseg turned to me. “What do you think, Ruxla? You found the body, and you’ve been silent this whole time.”
Amidst the tense conversation, I struggled to raise my voice. Even just getting a word out was challenging. “Arguing won’t help anyone,” I forced out. “We need to learn more first.”
“Explain,” Scothaosta said.
I cleared my throat. “Scothaosta said nobody entered or exited the camp during the night. That means the only people who could’ve killed Eamon are in the camp right now.”
“Only us, you mean,” Wybrand growled. “So how can we be sure it’s not you?”
“I didn’t kill him!” I stepped away from the rest of the Daybreak Company, curling my claws around a hidden knife just in case. “And if you’ll give me a chance to figure things out, I can prove it. Hell, maybe I can find out how he really died, too.”
Silence fell over the camp, and the five survivors stood in the middle of it. The thief, the warrior, the bard, the barbarian, the sorcerer – the suspects, all of us pointing fingers and assuming the worst. Finally, Scothaosta Dragonblood tapped their staff against the earth. An echoing thud drew all attention to the sorcerer, standing unmoved at the circle’s edge. “We will hear her out,” they finally said.
Eyes turned to them in surprise, but their voice remained unbowed. “Perhaps you distrust Ruxla at a time like this. But she was the first to find the body, and has refrained from throwing any accusations thus far. I trust her, I think, to seek the truth.”
“Now, Ruxla, speak,” they continued. “Where do we begin?”
Looking at Eamon’s body still hurt. Disgust at a scene like this – a gory murder, all broken bones and puddles of blood – was more of a human thing, but we Grimalkin could feel it too. The fact that I rather liked Eamon only made it worse. He’d been kind, for a human. That kindness is what let him take in a “monster” and a thief like me. While he lived, being in his Daybreak Company had been some of the best times of my life.
Aside from the corpse, Eamon’s cramped tent was mostly barren. He was sprawled out on top of his bedroll, face up on the linen blanket, with his few belongings scattered about. A marching pack of food and gear was tucked in a corner, along with his polished and folded chainmail armor. Above it, the fabric of the tent slumped down, knocked out of shape by a missing tent pole. Bromeliad, sacred sword of legend, leaned against the pack in a leather sheath. With its wielder’s death, the blade’s familiar light had gone out of it. It looked like it was mourning Eamon, as much as a sword could be.
Isolde was no great healer, but she knew enough of medicine to try and diagnose the wound. She knelt by the corpse, trying very hard to keep her eyes clear, and wrapped her hands around Eamon’s lifeless head. She lifted it up, drops of blood raining down between her fingers, and looked closely at the pile of gore that was once called his face. “One blow,” she whispered. “One blow.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Isolde’s eyes didn’t move to meet mine. She just kept staring, eyes wide, at what was left of Eamon of Willowmere. “That’s all it took. For all of his strength, all of his resilience, that’s all it took for Eamon to-” Her voice caught. “To die.”
I scrabbled across the tent, kneeling down to examine the body myself. Where Isolde was looking, his forehead was smashed open. It was broken deep enough to go through bone, exposing his brain beneath. Cracks and blood splatters spilled from that central point, out into a lifeless face wide-eyed with surprise. Even Eamon’s scattered brown hair was knocked away from the site of the blow.
“I think I see it,” I said. “One hit, perfectly aimed, right in the center of his head.”
Isolde didn’t reply. In her stead, silence claimed the tent. I couldn’t quite work up the strength to speak, although I saw answers to the questions I hoped to ask hanging on the tip of her tongue. Silence fell over the tent, except for the rustling of the morning wind and the cries of animals in the distant woods. All I could do was watch her slump, slowly, over Eamon’s cooling remains.
Wybrand and I sat around the Company’s campfire. It had burned out during the night, exhausting the last of Tsetseg’s firewood. All that remained was a circle of black-charred stones around a heap of pale ashes. The Stormspear refused to leave his weapon behind – he propped it up against the same rock he was sitting on, with panic and rage still visible in his eyes.
He spoke up first. “You’re still hunting for your mysterious killer. Isn’t that right?”
“I know you still think it’s me.”
“How can I not?” Wybrand’s hands balled into fists. “Eamon and I have been fighting the Grimalkin for years. And now he’s dead, by just the sort of subtle trick you’d pull, and you’ve declared yourself the heroic seeker of truth.”
“Eamon gave me a chance when no one else would. Human or not, I’d never want him dead.”
Wybrand snorted. “Just ask your questions.”
I figured this was about as cooperative as Wybrand was willing to get. Clearly, Eamon’s death had left him on edge. I knew he’d never quite trusted me – even so, though, this was a new level of anger and despair. “What happened last night? I’ll admit, I don’t have a full idea of what happened. I went to bed early, and stayed sound asleep until Tsetseg woke me up.”
“Of course you did. Gives you a convenient excuse, doesn’t it?”
“Well, who was up during the night? Weren’t you on guard?’
“The guard shifts were me, then Tsetseg, then you. And that’s when you found the body, isn’t it? When the rest of us were asleep?”
“I was, and you were awake before me. We don’t know when Eamon died. Surely you must’ve seen something after the rest of us went to sleep.”
“What, do you want an account of every tree I saw? These woods were quiet.”
I stood up and circled around the campfire, approaching him. Wybrand was a giant of a man, easily twice my height, but he still stepped back looking at me. “Look, Wybrand,” I growled. “Your brother in arms is dead. Eamon of Willowmere is dead! And if you have even the slightest hint about what happened, that could save the rest of our lives.”
The Stormspear made to throw a punch, for a moment – then stopped and sighed. “Fine, then, Grimalkin.” He spat. “I stayed up at sunset, walking in a loop around the camp a few times. Nothing came to bother us. If anything happened, it was after my shift.”
“Anything else? Nothing in the camp?”
“People were sleeping, Ruxla.” He put a hand on my shoulder, kneeling down to face me. “Unless you’re asking if I noticed your snooping?”
I moved back, putting distance between me and Wybrand. “No. I think I’ve asked everything I need to.”
The Stormspear and I stepped away from the dwindled remnants of the fire. Wybrand walked off with a huff, shaking his head. I snuck off quietly myself, meaning to find someone else to talk to, or at least to find a chance to get some fresh air. By instinct, I glanced behind me instead. Wybrand vanishing around a corner caught my eye, for a moment, but then it drifted to something else in the remains of the fire.
I doubled back and reached into the ashes. My hand came away covered in soot, but it pulled something out with it, not quite destroyed by the night’s flame. It was so badly burned, I could barely even recognize the paper. But it was paper, all right. There were a few words left on it, written by hand in a flowing script. I couldn’t read it. Honestly, I was barely literate – no school’s willing to teach a Grimalkin much of anything.
The rest of our band could read just fine, though. I’d just have to ask them, and hope the Daybreak Company didn’t have too many people telling lies.
The sorcerer’s face was silent beneath their cowl as I pulled out the burned paper from a spare pocket. Just as quietly, they reached out and took it from my hand. Their fingers, sharp and withered, nearly tore a hole in the scrap. They raised it close to the glowing pinpricks in the dark that showed their eyes, and it almost felt like the paper caught on fire a second time under their withering gaze. Slowly, Scothaosta dropped it. I reached out and snatched the withered paper back as it danced through the air.
“Little remains to read,” they answered. “All that has survived the flames is the name of Eamon of Willowmere, though even that is guesswork on my part.”
“Burned the night of his death, looks like.”
“Indeed. This handwriting is not my own, though too little remains to place exactly whose it is.” Scothaosta sighed, turning to face me. “Though this does make me wonder, Ruxla. Do you suspect me of having committed the murder?”
“I can’t rule it out,” I slowly said. “Everyone in this camp is suspicious right now.”
The sorcerer didn’t seem surprised. “Of course. For what it’s worth, while I know I have had differences of opinion with Eamon in the past, I did not wish him dead.”
“The Dragon of Ashencrown, you mean?”
Scothaosta Dragonblood drew back their hood for the first time I’d seen in days. Their scale-marked visage faced me with dimmed eyes. “I still miss it, some days. The strength. The flame. And yet-” They cut themselves off, barely managing to restrain a flicker of rage behind their eyes. “Eamon has not even been dead a day, and yet the Daybreak Company is already tearing itself apart over his loss. This was always going to happen, I think, someday.”
For a moment, I couldn’t reply. All I could do was remember years of Isolde’s wary glances, Wybrand cutting me off in conversation, Tsetseg’s muttered curses about “those damn gremlins” in the heat of battle. It had been Eamon’s voice that had stopped them, but not mine. Never mine. Perhaps things could have been different if I’d only spoken up. Perhaps I could have saved Eamon-
Scothaosta’s voice drew me back to my senses. “Do you have any other questions?”
“Aside from that,” I managed to force out, “there’s something else that’s been bugging me for a while. The whole reason you think the killer has to be one of us is because of your magic ward. You said that during the night, nobody entered the camp and nobody went out. Now, that only includes people, right?”
“My ward watches for any trace of vital energy. Not even the faintest shades can escape its gaze.”
“In that case, if someone were to throw something over the circle – something that wasn’t alive – would that set it off?”
“No,” they rasped. “No, it would not.”
“So if you let down the ward, then I’ll bet you we can find it somewhere outside.”
The sorcerer muttered something under their breath, and I felt a ripple in the air flow from them. My ears popped, the Grimalkin fur covering them standing on end, and a distant ringing echoed through the mountain clearing. On the edge of my vision, the glowing blue circle around the camp faded, until all that was left was a charred line in the dirt. “Search, then, if you must.”
It didn’t take me long to dig up the weapon after that. It landed in a thornbush, outside the edge of camp. Looking closely, the bush was clearly damaged, but it was too dark to see further into. I wrapped my hand in a scrap of leather to keep off the tearing thorns, then reached into the dense foliage, using a knife to hack away at the bramble and clear a path. It took a bit of rooting around, and I pricked myself a few times despite the leather, but I soon found something solid amidst the plant. With a hiss of triumph, I pulled it home.
The metal tent pole looked ordinary, and sat heavy in my tired hands. I’d used ones just like it hundreds of times when the Daybreak Company made camp in woods like these. If not for the blood and bone-shards on its end, I’d barely look twice at it. “But this is the murder weapon,” I muttered, turning the rod over in my head. “What else could it be?”
“It’s not an ideal weapon,” Tsetseg remarked, “but I could take someone out with this.” She waved the tent pole around in the air once or twice, giving it a couple test swings at a tree. I stood a safe distance away, just in case.
I couldn’t help but reply. “Did you?”
“Why would I?” The barbarian chuckled, despite the situation. “I had no grudge against Eamon. He led us well. I can’t help but wonder about the rest of you, though.”
“What do you mean? You sound like you know something I don’t.”
Tsetseg shrugged. “I’m good at spotting secrets. Did you notice the way Isolde looked at Eamon, for instance?”
“What are you getting at?”
“She was in love with him,” Tsetseg calmly added. “You could hear it in nearly every word she said about him.”
“I see,” I said, trying not to show my surprise. “Did you see either of them acting oddly last night, then? Or was anything else strange during your shift on watch?”
“There was nothing odd when I went on patrol. I just stretched my legs, watched for danger, and took some time to repair my gear. The camp was quiet. In the woods, a few wolves were prowling, but they didn’t come near us.”
“What would wolves want with us?”
Tsetseg shrugged. “I couldn’t get a close enough look to say.”
I stepped back, thinking this through. Both Wybrand and Tsetseg had stood guard, but neither of them had seen the murder – at least, as far as they were willing to tell me. Someone in the Daybreak Company had to be lying. The bard, the warrior, the sorcerer, the barbarian – one of us had Eamon’s blood on their hands. My brain kept running through the facts, again and again, until things finally began to click.
“Well, Tsetseg,” I said, “Thanks for your help. I think I know who killed Eamon.”
The sun was properly rising, by this point, though we couldn’t see much light through the clouds. Everyone left in the camp gathered outside of Eamon’s tent, pointing worried eyes at each other. We had weapons ready, just in case. Wybrand braced on his spear, digging its base into the mud. Isolde hid a crossbow beneath her cloak. Tsetseg fiddled with her axes as she watched the rest of the Daybreak Company around her. Scothaosta’s hawthorn staff sat ready in their hands, tall and proud. And in the front, I had a hidden knife up my sleeve, just in case.
“Speak, then.” Scothaosta’s voice reverberated through the morning air, commanding silence. “What did you find?”
“As Isolde showed me, Eamon was killed by a single blow to the back of the head. The killer hit hard enough to kill him in a single strike – no small feat, for a man as tough as Eamon was. Clearly, whoever did this was strong, and Isolde or Scothaosta… well, for all your talents, you aren’t.” Isolde reluctantly nodded.
“Whoever the killer is, they also left Eamon’s in his tent, so clearly the killer didn’t want to steal it. No, this was pure impulse.” My eyes skipped over the ring of adventurers, watching each of them for any sudden movement. “The killer must’ve grabbed the first object they had to hand and swung.”
Wybrand glared at me. “And what was this murder weapon, exactly?”
“The killer hit him in the head with this,” I continued, displaying the bloodstained tent pole. “They took a pole from Eamon’s tent. Then, once he was dead, they threw it past Scothaosta’s ward into the woods. The weapon wouldn’t be anywhere in the camp, but it’d still be out of sight. Scothaosta has explained their spell to us in the past, so anyone in our team could figure out that loophole. From there, the killer could’ve just gone back to bed, like nothing happened at all.”
Tense silence lingered over the camp as everyone processed what I’d said. Tsetseg and Wybrand both looked enraged, glaring at me and each other in equal measure. Scothaosta stood there, emotions hidden by their hood, while Isolde turned away from the conversation. Everyone waited for me to speak up. I’ll admit it – for all I liked to stick to the shadows, I was starting to enjoy the spotlight. You don’t get that every day, as a Grimalkin.
“This scrap of paper was left in the campfire.” I flourished it to the crowd. “Scothaosta said it wasn’t theirs, but that the handwriting was from someone they recognized, and that it had Eamon’s name on it. My guess? This is Isolde’s.” I gestured towards the bard. “Weren’t you showing it to us last night?”
Isolde nodded. “I wondered if I had misplaced it, somewhere. Yet in the chaos, after Eamon, I must have forgotten-“
“Just to be clear, Isolde. Were the rest of us featured in this song, or just Eamon and you?”
I saw her hesitate, working up the nerve to answer. “It was Eamon’s story, first. He founded the Daybreak Company. He led us to glory. I-” She turned away. “I thought he deserved that place of honor.”
I dropped the scrap of paper. Everyone’s eyes watched it flutter out of my hand. “Makes you wonder. Who here might take umbrage with that?”
As the paper slowly made its way to the earth, batted like a cat’s toy by a stray gust of wind, the heroes’ reactions played across their faces. Isolde closed her eyes and shook her head, while Tsetseg continued to watch the surroundings. Wybrand and Scothaosta, meanwhile, looked incensed – the spearman was clearly biting back a shout, while the proud sorcerer’s glare burned red beneath their hood.
“The killer read this, late at night, and cast it into the flames. It made them mad enough to go after Eamon, grabbing whatever weapon came to hand. If Eamon was the hero in this manuscript, the object of Isolde’s love, he had to die so the killer could steal his glory.”
Tsetseg narrowed her eyes. “What are you getting at?”
“Something you told me, actually. You said you saw wolves near the camp, while you were on watch? I heard them in the distance back when we first found the body.”
“I did. They weren’t enough to be dangerous to a group like ours.”
“The thing is, what drew them here? The scent of fresh blood from a dead body, I’m guessing. By the time you woke up and saw the wolves, Eamon was already dead. They smelled the blood, but looking at you -” I pointed to Tsetseg’s face, where her nose was broken beneath a mass of scars – “I doubt you could’ve smelled it.”
The barbarian looked at me and nodded, eyes stern. Her glare pivoted back through the rest of the Daybreak Company, commanding silence as I finished my speech.
“We know the killer was strong enough to kill Eamon in a single blow, using nothing but an improvised weapon. We know the killer was up at night, and struck sometime before Tsetseg’s shift on guard. And we know the killer did it in a fit of anger after hearing Isolde’s song.” I drew my dagger, pointing it accusingly across the circle of heroes.
“Well, Wybrand. What do you have to say for yourself?”
For a fleeting moment, Wybrand Stormspear’s eyes went wide with utter shock, and his mouth gaped like a fish out of water. Then his expression resolved into utter, piercing rage, and he brandished his spear at me. “Of course you’d spin a lie like this. Anything to get suspicion off of you, right, Grimalkin?”
I didn’t back down. “The facts line up. You’ve been eager to pin the blame on me all morning yourself.”
“You call these facts? You’re making up stories, and you’re worse at them than Isolde. This murder – all of this treachery, pointing fingers – this is why we never should’ve let you join the Daybreak Company!”
“Let’s be honest, Wybrand. You’re grasping for straws. When would I kill Eamon? How? You know I’m not strong enough to land a blow like that.”
“You’re a monster! Just some spy for the Dark Lord Malkadaar’s hordes!” Wybrand drew back to strike. “It’s all your fault-“
In a single fluid motion, Tsetseg grabbed Wybrand by the shoulder and threw him to the ground, cracking bone echoing from the force of the blow. Chains of blue light danced from Scothaosta’s staff and coiled around Wybrand like a serpent. Isolde leveled her crossbow, too, but her voice did more damage than any weapon or spell. “No, Wybrand,” she said softly. “This was all our fault. If only we’d listened to each other. If only we hadn’t been consumed with all this rage and spite against each other, since the day you and Eamon first picked up a spear and sword.”
Tsetseg grunted, twisting as Wybrand struggled and cursed in her iron grip. “Maybe that’s what you’d say as a poet, but we both know it’s Wybrand’s fault. He’s the one who chose to kill Eamon, not you or me.”
The withering hate in Scothaosta’s gaze, shining once again behind their hood, told a more complex story than any words. As always, in times of crisis, they had nothing to say.
Slowly, silence began to set in, and I finally took my chance to speak. “You wanted fame and glory?” Normally, Wybrand stood almost twice my height. Now, though, his prone form looked up at me, in all my Grimalkin glory. “Then this will be your legacy.”
His name was Wybrand Stormspear. For years, he had been the vanguard of the Daybreak Company and Eamon of Willowmere’s faithful right hand. None could count how many beasts and horrors he had slain, and the Free City of Altenai still held their honored hero in line for the throne. Monsters cowered when he passed through their lands, and the suffering rejoiced and raised their eyes when they saw his company come.
Now, all people remembered of him was that he had slain a man he once called friend.
Writer To Writer Literary Journal 