Tenmu woke to see Isobu already gone. They had preparations to do. Tenmu went to the infirmaries. They still had their duty. A duty in the great body of Amali that was expected fulfilled. Soldiers had just returned home from an expedition to the north. A scouting campaign, but they apparently had an encounter with foreign forces. The men had been wounded rather grotesquely: appendages bit off, by what seemed to not be animal teeth, it matched the bite-marks on their punctured skin. Bones in legs and arms that seemed to have been constricted until broken. During their treatment of the wounded, they glimpsed visions of their trek. They saw what they had seen. A dying land of ash and dusk. Ruins of glorious places crumbling. Walking corpses writhing with decay. Chanting priests in torn robes. Flesh-eating mobs-

Tenmu opened their eyes with a jolt of horror. They had seen visions before from soldiers venturing into the fallen lands of Lyria, but nothing like this.

Even so, their mind was elsewhere - with Isobu.

Then, riding past them outside; soldiers in white and blue, led by a general in gold and brown. A messenger burst in through the door.

“All able-bodied soldiers, all hands of the empire; you are needed at Tembe Field. Ride swiftly!”

It was noon then.

They wanted to run after them, see them on the fields. But they were now bound by duty to tend to the wounded.

As soon as they were done and there were no more soldiers to be tended to,  Tenmu ran for Tembe Field. As they ran, they could hear the songs of faraway. Their message echoing around in their mind. Tembe field was still far away, but their united voices could still reach them. Tenmu could hear the hoofs of the warhorses rushing to Tembe field. Their thundering got quieter as they got further away from Tenmu, but the song from their friends got louder as they neared.

Tenmu kept running. Their feet becoming numb and bloodied. They were still a long way from the fields, when the songs came to an abrupt end.

Flashes of sensory invasion came upon Tenmu: A thundering of hoofs. Scream, of zeal and terror. Clashing of metals. The crack of bones, the gushing of blood. Cries for help, silenced. Over and over. Tenmu ran. They ran for so long. Even after silence came over them, they ran for Tembe Field.

When they finally reached an outlook over the fields, the fight had been over for a while. They collapsed there, the soles of their feet torn and legs paralyzed with fatigue.

They woke up in their mothers' chambers inside the palace. It was evening then. They had been tended for by a team of healers. Their legs and feet had been given the smoothest of cremes and then clad in soothing wrappings dipped in rejuvenating oils. Their hair smelled like an old memory. A wreath of lilies.

“Leave us” their mother’s voice commanded her attendants, as a general would their soldiers. She then turned to Tenmu, and then, in that same tone, with just a hint of the mother slipping through: “What did you do?”