commander

three one five

Nala

I collected the horses from the barn and got Aurora situated, her wrists still tied. We rode dead south for an hour before I recognized one tree. It was the oldest tree known, and had withstood the cleansing fire of a rebellion three centuries ago. I had played near it when I was a child, but was never allowed to touch the tree. It was rumored to be poisonous.

I stopped the horses to check on Aurora, and to see where we were going from here. "Go towards water bowl and continue from there." I jumped off my horse as she finished the words water bowl. When I was little, I often found hiding spots away from the prying eyes of my bodyguards, making them look like fools.

I had a treehouse just a few feet away from the water bottle and had directions to get to the bowl from the fire tree. An arrow was carved into nearby oak roots, and the water droplet I remember etching so long ago. Beside it was the degree, a sloppy four and six with the small circle in the top left.

I headed forty-six degrees to the right of north and continued on for half an hour, finally seeing the opposing side of the mouth, with the singular red tree on the other side of the river. I was in the right place, in the center of the three towers.

The crow looks down on war. I played the phrase over and over in my head but it just didn't make sense.

The crow looks down on war.

What crow? Was it a hunting ground, and crows just happened to stalk the area? Or was it farmland? Were the crows physical or metaphorical?

Looks down? Were they physically above my head, flying in search of food. Was it metaphoric? Were they disapproving of . . . war?

What war? The ten clans were at peace, there hadn't been a war for millennia.

The horses trotted slowly, uncomfortably moving Aurora to readjust her position every few seconds.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, the platform from where one of my hunting stands had once been, the tree branches were cut and a large stone crow with a cocked head was suspended by three long ropes connected to the towers. I jumped off of my horse and walked near the crow, which was twenty feet in the air, and traced the crow's gaze to point at an odd pile of leaves that were clumped artificially. At this point in the year, all leaves had been blown away, to deteriorate.

I pushed aside the leaves, which were all sewn together, and bolted on one side of a hatch. The hatch was constructed of wood that had been cemented around the seams, making it very sound to withstand such brutal weather in such an open spot as the Towers. I quietly lifted from the cement handle to reveal a staircase into a warehouse-type room, with a vaulted ceiling reinforced by thick wooden beams and bricks. Tables with large blueprints and plans, family trees spread across twenty tables. In the corner, Torra sat tied to a chair, and my heart practically stopped beating.

I ran back to the horses and grabbed the sword out of the bag connected to the saddle. It was still sheathed, in order to make sure I wasn't killed in the process of rescuing my lover. Aurora looked horrified as I approached her,  but I quickly clarified so that she was not scared. That's the last thing I wanted.

"We're going down there. This sword will be to your neck but still sheathed. The moment you make a move against me, you'll have a blade pierced straight through your fat neck." I let her off the horse and put the sword against her neck as she walked forward to the base. She descended perfectly, her dress lifted enough that she wouldn't trip, morale ultimately neutral.

The seventy men and women inside the base didn't notice our presence until Aurora spotted a single woman. "Do not move. Any of you." She announced loudly. They all turned to look at her. "Put your hands on your head. Now, Eliza, you untie the boy." Aurora said and nodded her head towards Torra. I tapped her neck with the sword. "The man." She corrected and I grunted in approval.

I dropped the sword, putting it around my chest. Everyone in the room went for any form of weaponry they had, but Aurora silenced them immediately.

"I will be taking Torra back to Lanca for conferencing. No one will follow us. This is not an act of war. This is retaliation. Aurora had made a deal for me to marry her clueless son while I was pregnant with another man's child!" My voice echoed the room and everyone gasped. "It's alright, though. The child will never be born after all." I looked throughout the crowd and they seemed even more horrified, but Torra gripped my hand and held it tightly.

It felt so nice to just this casual intimacy, for us to have this little bit of a normal relationship.

Torra pulled my hair back and whispered in my ear. "We need to get out of here. These people are crazy." I turned towards the stairs, taking two at a time just like him. We shut the door and looked for something to jam it with, but instead left it as it was, and decided for speed and distance.

I set the one horse free. In the event they tracked us, the second trail would confuse them. We both climbed on top of the horse and rode off to the burning tree for directions to Lanca. Torra sat behind me, holding me tightly. I think he understands how emotional this entire day has been for me, spilling probably my most private memory to Aurora.

After riding for almost an hour, I saw the white tree to the left of me. I steered the horse towards the tree and stopped when the horses finally came close to the ashy oak. I jumped off the horse, and Torra came closer. He scaled my attitude and body language as I skipped over the roots, looking for the one with the directions to Lanca.

Finally, I found a small root with a giant 'l' etched into the ashy wood next to the numbers three, one, and five. I checked my compass and recognized the single dash that would take me to Lanca. Instinctively, my fingers traced over the numbers and letters, reminiscing of life before my arrest. I was so naive, yet so stubborn. I refused to believe in Ana, she couldn't be proven. Much like how I refused to believe other things. I finally started to believe people when my mother was gone, just as Elliot said daily for a year.

My fingers were still redrawing the numbers when Torra kneeled down next to me.

"Are you okay?" He asked with a worried expression. With all this man has been through in the past week alone, he still makes sure I am okay?

"Yeah." My voice was raspy from not speaking for so long and quivering because it was an obvious lie. I couldn't even hide it.

"No, you're not." Torra told.

I looked up at him from the roots of the tree, not wanting to further lie to him. I simply nodded my head and looked back down at the compass. Torra took the small metal trinket from my hand and pocketed it. "Was it the military base? Or was it the . . ." Torra couldn't even finish the sentence himself. After all, it was also his child when I lost it.

"The baby." It felt so odd to speak those words, to acknowledge that I had killed a child, that I had killed a baby.

"Yeah?" Torra asked, trying to decode the abundance of emotions and thoughts in my brain.

"I'm sorry." I admitted, and the words were foreign. They didn't roll off the tongue the way 'Torra' did. I never apologize, not genuinely at least. Torra is the only person to ever receive a legitimate apology from me.

"Don't be sorry." Torra smiled sympathetically.

"No, I am." I started, tears already filling my eyes. "I dumped you for no reason, lived in agony, found out I was pregnant, and still decided to keep you in the dark. You didn't even know I was pregnant until I was getting that—that fetus ripped from my body!" I shouted, but my voice was so weak.

Before I could even continue ranting about how fucked up I am, Torra pulled me into him for a hug. I sobbed into the top of his jacket as he gently rubbed my back. I wiped my eyes and collected myself, fixing my hair and wiping my eyes. Torra stood, then helped me to stand so we could both mount the horses. I climbed on, then Torra, riding to Lanca so that we could end this.