One Word Prompts

Snow - Keres's Decision

Keres stood on top a hill looking down on a small town. Snow had started to fall around her again, fragile flakes landing on her heavy cloak's hood.

The town below was just one of many nameless hamlets that lay along the northern border of Lolyk. Residents of these places largely had three concerns: food, shelter, and demons. And, although they were as a rule, warry of strangers, if one proved they could do something about one of those concerns, one was usually welcomed. In Keres's experience, it wasn't a warm welcome--in this land only the food and the fires were warm--but it was a welcome all the same.

Keres had proof of her latest kill with her. Strapped to her back, she had the head of a demon bear. She'd leave it in the inn below in exchange for lodging and supplies. That was normally the job of the local adventurer's guild hall, to trade monster trophies for bounty rewards, but there hadn't been a guild hall in this barony for at least ten years. Or had it been longer since the fall of Alistair Keep? It hadn't been fifteen years yet, had it? It was so hard to keep track of the seasons in this unchanging land of ice.

And at the end of the day, it didn't really matter. Time wasn't going to change the events that had landed her out here. Time wasn't going to bring back the dead. Time wasn't something Keres cared about anymore. Keres could see only two futures for herself, whether ten years past, or twenty, or a hundred; either she would still be out here in the snow killing demons or she would be eight feet under.

She told herself that was fine. This was her fate, her punishment.

Her punishment for failing to protect her mistress.

Her punishment for failing to catch the killer.

For her blood.

For her birth.

Her friends would have told her she not to say such things, that she had nothing to be punished for. Once, she would have believed them.

Now, all she could hear was her stepfather's voice and the look of disgust in his eyes.

"You deserve this," he had said. How often? She didn't know.

And for every time he said it aloud, how many times had he not needed to? How often was a single glance enough to tell her with no uncertainty that was in his heart?

How often had he watched her from the top of the stairs as servants led her outside for beatings? How often had he reminded her she was not his daughter? That she was never to have the status of the duchess's daughter? That she would be an outsider wherever she went?

One didn't count the number of meals one has ever eaten, why would she count such daily occurrences like these?

The wind gusted around her, sending the snowflakes in the air into a riotous flurry and knocking her hood down. Her silver hair danced with the snow.

There would be a storm tonight. And more demons would roll over the border after it. They always did.

That was fine. If nothing else, she was good at killing them.

Wasn't that why they'd liked her, her friends? Because she had been their ace? Because no matter what monster they fought, she'd always been able to see them through to the end? Was always able to kill their way back to safety?

Wasn't that why Rihan sent her away, in the end? The Wandering Vagabonds, their adventuring party, were disbanded and done with Kat dead. What did he need killed anymore?

"This won't stand," Rose had told her. They had stood at the palace gates. Night had just fallen, and the snow with it. The decree had been written, to be formally read before the populace at dawn. For Kat's death, Keres Alistair was to die.