The chief's hut was full to the beams. Mats and blankets were layered on the floor. The low, steady hum of whispered prayers wove through the air between ragged coughing and the occasional muffled sob.

A hearth of fire struggled at the far wall, its light throwing trembling shadows up the curved wooden walls. The air tasted faintly of smoke and boiled broth—comfort made thin by fear.

Clusters of villagers huddled in the dimness.

Two men sat shoulder to shoulder, palms together as one tried to steady the other's trembling hands, murmuring plans hushed tones: what to do if the Oni pushed this far, who to send for more torches, whether to send runners to check on the battlefront.

A woman crouched with her back to the wall, blanket pulled tight around her shoulders. Her two children clung to her underneath the blanket, cheeks flushed from the cold and their own tears. Now and then, one of the children would whisper too loudly, asking what was happening.

Imke and Isola, with Miron holding onto her brown dress, were conversing with each other about their sons being out in the field. Imke was the one consoling Isola.

All activity was taken down a notch when Kaede walked through. Conversations became whispers, heads turned, all in anticipation for a possible order from the chief's daughter.

With all eyes on her, Kaede simply waved and smiled. That simple action put everyone at ease. Even when faced with an relatively unknown threat, they had trust, they had faith, they had hope—all because Kaede did.

Kaede guided Edia down a narrow side passage of the chief's house, past a row of hung cloaks and drying herbs until they came to a low, curtained doorway.

Beyond it, a small chamber had been pressed into service as a makeshift infirmary: quilts were folded into pillows on benches, a kettle steamed gently on a brazier, and the odor of boiled herbs and disinfectant hung in the air. The light here was softer.

Herba, Briarstone's village doctor, moved with calm precision at a small worktable. Her hands were steady and efficient, carrying a tidy look of someone who had fixed more broken things than she could name. She had a woman seated before her, sleeve rolled back, and was wrapping bandages around a forearm where a jagged nick had taken skin and warmth away.

Her brow was furrowed but gentle. She threaded the bandage and tucked the end, then dipped a cloth into tea-thinned salve and smoothed it on with a practiced thumb.

Sitting back-to-back with Herba was Liam on two low stools. He had a guard crouched before him, shirt open where a rib bruise ached; Liam's fingers tested the ribs for fractures, his face concentrated into the focused lines of a man who had seen too many injuries to be surprised by any one of them. Tools—spoons, splints, bits of clean cloth—were stacked on a rough plank table within reach.

Herba glanced over one shoulder and offered a weary smile to Liam as she adjusted the woman's bandage. "I'm grateful there's someone else who knows their anatomy as well as you do." She said softly, voice edged with relief. "If it were just me here I don't know—I don't want to even imagine it..."

Liam returned the smile, small and a little droopy from his training, and answered in the tone of someone who kept steady by remembering the people who had steadied him. "I'm grateful I met someone like you, too. You move like you've been doing this longer than I have."

"It's a given love. You said you were twenty-four, correct?" Herba said as she tightened the bandage. "I'm a bit older, twenty-six. Also, I'm pretty sure your folks at Enohay don't have guards who train and inevitably get hurt everyday."

Liam snickered. "You're right on that front. Only competent person when it comes to fighting in Enohay is Himon. When it comes to my medical practices, my grandfather taught me a lot and left me the family's databook—something I study almost everyday." He felt for the guard's ribs one last time, then nodded. "No breaks. I'll set you to rest."

Herba's face softened in that quick, private way of people who trade confidences with hands full of work. "Then tend him right. I'll see to the children." Her eyes flicked to the curtained doorway as Kaede appeared, breathless, cheeks pink with the cold and urgency together.

"Herba! Liam!" Kaede panted, dropping into the small space between the stools. She put both hands on her knees, trying to look composed though the worry still hummed in her posture. "Thank you both—thank you for staying. I—" She swallowed, then brightened with the forced cheer of someone trying to be brave for others. "I just wanted to say—thank you. This must be… so hard."

Herba waved a patient hand, still working the bandage into place. "Being inside and mending is a quieter kind of hard," she said, almost teasing, "but I'd rather stitch than stand in the storm. At least here, my hands do something useful."

Liam's expression was earnest as he looked up from examining the guard. "Same. It's calmer here, but there are lives out there. Once I get these men settled, I'll likely go out and help where I can. Himon is out there, and I'd be damned if I let anything happen to him, or anyone else." He declared, his gaze sharpening as he pumped a fist in the air.

While Kaede couldn't see it, she could feel it—Liam's soulura, faintly exuding from him. It wasn't anything to brag about compared to Domitus or her father, but the fact he could call upon it at will at all was extraordinary. "Looks like my father whipped you into shape that fast, huh?"

Liam looked at Kaede with a confused look. Only for a split second though, as he then recognized the warm feeling in his fist, realizing he had called upon his soulura on complete accident—or rather, as if his body did subconsciously, readying itself for what Liam intended to do.

Giving a sly smirk, Liam brought his fist to his chest. "It was less your father, more Captain Domitius whipping me to shape—a little bit literally." He said with a slight embarrassed tone.

"Where do you think he got that bandage covering the bruised bridge of his nose?" Herba added.

Kaede's eyes brightened at the exchange and nodded, shoulders squaring as if she'd taken strength from Liam's words. She glanced down at Edia, then back at Liam and Herba. "If you go, be careful, Liam. Maybe even bring warmers and more hands if you can."

Herba set the last knot and patted the woman's bandaged arm before playfully slapping Liam's back. "We'll keep a few men patched enough to be out there to back you up. You do what you must, Liam. We'll keep the ones who come back from the field in one piece."

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Liam opened his mouth, but the moment stalled on lips when a new voice cut through the curtained hush—Clemens, breathless and frantic outside the door.

Everybody turned as one. The curtains whipped aside to reveal Clemens and Ryuu, dragging the heavy bulk of Sergeant Sinolto over one shoulder each like a rescued bundle. Sinolto's face was pinched white, sweat beading on his brow; he coughed a ragged, wet sound that set every head in the room upright.

A dozen of the guards present let out frightened murmurs. "S-Sergeant Sinolto?"

But no one was as horrified as Edia, her face becoming as pale as her father's at the sight of him. Kaede hugged and turned her away, trying her best to shield and comfort the girl.

Liam was already moving. He crossed the few paces from his stool in two sure strides and took Sinolto's shoulders, steadying the man. "What happened?" His voice tight but controlled.

Clemens, cheeks flushed from running, could only stammer out the beginnings of the story. "I—I don't know. He—He confronted the Oni like everyone else, he—he wasn't hit bad, not like that, but—" Clemens' words stumbled and fell away as Sinolto doubled over in another cough. He looked genuinely frightened now. "He just keeps getting worse. It...It kept getting worse while he was out there."

Liam acted before he could think too long. He reached for the hand Sinolto had used to cough—gentle but urgent—and asked him to turn it over.

Sinolto obeyed with slow, exhausted movements, his eyes fluttering as if he had to fight to focus.

When Sinolto's palm was revealed, a clean, bright pool of blood sat in the center, seeping into the creases and gathering as if it had welled up from beneath the skin itself. The sight arrested the room. For a moment even Herba, who had seen worse, made a small involuntary sound.

Liam's face hardened, the calm surgeon's mask snapping into place. He replaced Clemens under Sinolto's shoulder, feeling the man's weight and weakness like a living report. "Help me—onto the bed..." he instructed crisply. Ryuu didn't need to be told twice, already a step ahead of Liam.

Now with Sinolto on the bed, Liam moved with the quick, efficient calm of someone who has seen panic before and learned how to slice through it. He kept one hand on Sinolto's shoulder as he ran a practiced set of checks with the other: eyes, pupils, neck for swelling, chest for odd sounds.

Sinolto's breaths were ragged and shallow, each inhale working against a weight that sat in his ribs. His lips were a faint, chilling blue, his hands were cold to the touch. Clemens hovered at the bedside like a guilty sentinel.

"Where does it hurt?" Liam asked between breaths, voice steady but urgent.

"E-everywhere… Chest… Hard to breathe," Sinolto rasped. "Like…weights… Cold and dry inside my lungs."

Liam's jaw tightened. He listened, then closed his eyes for half a second—memory and training rearranging themselves into a hypothesis. Herbs got a bit closer, wanting to help, but not wanting to disrupt Liam's flow.

He then crouched lower and placed his ear close to Sinolto's chest, stifling his voice so only Herba could hear the plan. "It's the Oni..." he said, the words hissing between his teeth. "Not just the cold, it's something in the air."

Herba got even closer, dropping her voice as low as Liam's. "What do you mean?"

Liam played back his previous encounter with the Oni, how the wind howled, how the cold seeped into his very limbs, how he could feel something stabbing into his face, how he could see tiny glints of reflected light flying around—ice crystals.

The pieces clicked in Liam's head. "The wind carries microscopic crystals. They get inhaled and lodge in the lungs like tiny shards. That's why his breathing is heavy and his chest feels like a weight. The blue lips—hypoxia. The cold skin—shunting at the periphery. If we don't evacuate or protect those exposed, he'll get internal bleeding in the lungs or tissue death."

Herba's eyes widened; she'd seen frostbite and blunt trauma, but the idea of ice forming inside lung tissue made her pale. Only for a moment though, as her body and face then straightened, her surgical mask being mentally put on.

"Supportive care first—oxygen, prevent aspiration, keep him warm, and get anyone exposed away from the cold!" Herba said, swinging out her arm towards the guards in the room.

Most of the guards, including Clemens, perked up and looked to each other frantically, a bit confused. It was Ryuu and a select few others who understood the assignment and saluted, going to work.

Herba nodded and crouched, whispering into Liam's ear. "We have to warn the men out there: breathing that wind is lethal. If there's any way to filter air—cloth over mouths, torches to break the gusts temporarily—do it."

Liam didn't waste another heartbeat. He slid to his feet so fast that his stool scraped back, and the room seemed to lurch with him. "Ryuu Jr., where's Nini?"

"Main room, with Dama!" Ryuu shouted without even looking up. Liam spun and bolted for the curtained doorway.

Instead of the scramble he expected, Liam was met by stunned, bewildered faces. Villagers froze mid-murmur, hands frozen on cups and blankets. The room's chatter halted like a struck bell; eyes tracked the doorway and narrowed with confusion.

For a breathless second the only sound was distant wind, the faint drip of melting snow from cloaks, and children giggling. A dozen puzzled whispers rose like a small wind of their own.

Liam, panting, took in the tableau. The urgency in his chest made his expression sharper than usual and the inhale he took in to call for Nini. However, just as he was about to, he spotted her in the far corner of the room where all the children were huddled.

The group of kids were the origin of the childish giggling, and despite the situation, the source of their amusement was in the middle on the floor: Nini. She was on her back, her plush stomach fully exposed. The children pet and rubbed her all over, and Nini enjoyed every second of it, indicated by her legs kicking in the air.

But something was off. Someone was missing.

Where was Dama?

Liam took a step forward towards the group of kids, but then paused as he thought to himself. "I don't want to scare the children... But this is not good, where is Dama!? Mumu is with Himon, so if Nini is here, who is with him!?"

He snapped his head around, scanning the room like a man checking windows in a house on fire. His eyes sliced across bundled villagers, then landed on a hunched, guilty figure trying to slink away behind a cluster of villagers—Gus.

He was halfway through the motion when Liam crossed the room in two long strides and grabbed Gus by the shoulders. Gus froze, then his whole body went comically taut; his face shifted through a cartoon of terror into the kind of slow, embarrassed recognition that makes someone look like they've been caught stealing pie.

"Gus!" Liam barked, breath steaming in the cold air. "Have you seen Dama? He should be he—!"

Gus cut him off by flinging both hands up to his face and squeaking in a high, miserable whisper, "I—don't—want—to—fight—the Oni!"

Liam blinked at the confession, a rare anger akin to Koul starting to bubble up within him.

It was then an old woman patted his back. Liam turned to face her, crouching to her level. "Yes ma'am?

"Dama, is he the boy with green hair?" The woman asked, pointing at her own gray hair.

"Y-Yes! You know where he is?"

"I'm afraid he left a few minutes ago, slipped out when the guards came in..."

The color drained from Liam's face. He muttered, "Oh no," the words barely loud enough.

Nini heard the entire conversation, her mind taking a second to register what was happening as her legs paused midair. She then opened her eyes and looked around her, only to find dozens of smiling kids, but not one of them belonging to her favorite child in the world.

She then shot up, her body a blur before frantically looking around the room for Dama. As she did, the last thing Dama said to her played back in her head after they had entered the main room. "Nini, can you keep the children here entertained and protected? They could really use your help. I think I know a way to help in my own way as well..."

Nini dashed outside, cursing at herself for being so stupid to not realize the meaning behind her master's last words.

Outside, the world was a white racket: wind tearing across the square, snow stinging like thrown salt. Liam skidded to the front entrance behind Nini. "You don't know where he is either, huh girl?"

Covering his mouth, Liam began to search the porch, the yard, every line of the path into the village. The spot where Ryuu had been directing people now sat empty. No Dama. Only the wind and the tracks of men and animals half-buried in new snowfall.

"Damn it!" He spat the single, furious and rare phrase into the wind, then whipped his head the other way, scanning for anything he could use.

A torch came into view, sliding over his shoulder. First looking into the flame, Liam turned to see who held the torch revealing Ryuu.

"Ready when you two are." Ryuu declared, his eyes saying the rest Liam needed to hear.

-

Next: (Chapter 100) The Oni's Child Cometh

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