Land of Arc, 1473BC

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The girl on the bed in the small house owned by a baker and a blacksmith lay wheezing in pain. It seemed as if the air she breathed wasn't the same as everyone else's. Most of her friends had categorized her sudden illness as witchcraft. It wasn't the only rumour spreading in the small village but it seemed the most reasonable one to her peers. After all, the girl wasn't foolhardy enough to contract any other kind of disease that can confine you to a bed so suddenly with her kind of upbringing.

The baker was well on her way to insanity with the girl's deteriorating health by the hour. Her predicament got worse anytime she dozed off at her bedside, only to be roused by the gasps from the child. She had long since abandoned her work at the bakery and though some people understood the grief that drove her to immobility, she was the only provider of good bread here. It wasn't surprising when her reputation was smeared with snide remarks of her daughter's purity a month into the bakery's closure.

The blacksmith, on the other hand, was always in his shop trying hard to eke out a living. This he did not just to feed the two women, but also to now try and acquire the medicine that had an insurmountable cost attached to it for the girl. He never made much as it was. Food had been readily available due to the bakery's running and his meagre earnings. Now he had to sleep hungry on most nights if his daughter was to live. Of course, his wife would eat nothing at all even as she looked physically deprived of enough sustenance. The daughter couldn't hold down anything she ate hence food had become a luxury all the same.

They lived in a small house, as normal as any other financially capable Arcian in the Kingdom of Arc. It was made of the woods from the Sage Forest. A forest believed to have been grown by Gaia herself when gods still roamed the earth long before man drew his first breath. The roof was comprised of red brick tiles the baker had made, having been the granddaughter of a mason. It gave the house a soft crimson glow every time the three of them sat in front of the house during a sunset. The wife's bakery was located fifteen feet away from the house. It was the first among many buildings that had soon been erected from the blacksmith's steady hands after his craft with metal was recognized. The steel walls and roof had the same structure as their house, only on a smaller scale. The kitchen was littered with many items he had crafted in his store that enabled his wife to create her delicious delicacies.

The sign was perhaps his greatest make for the bakery though. He used a rear kind of alloy that he was sure could withstand any kind of wear and tear from the elements. Alectra was the name of the bakery that gave them life and meaning, and their daughter, who gave them hope and love.

The blacksmith's workshop stood a few ways away from the house and was as simple a shed as anyone could fathom. Its four walls and roof were all made by his hands. Inside, a corner was allocated a cabinet to hold all the creations he had done. The second corner was where he did the metal works. The third corner was enclosed by two walls and served as his office. The final corner held a metallic table and his tools for working on the more intricate designs that required his artistic expertise.

It was a simple life the blacksmith lived. He was blessed with the love of his wife and that of his daughter. He couldn't have asked the gods for more. But now as he sat in Alectra's room, glancing from time to time at his wife crying herself to emotional numbness for their child's recovery, he wondered whether the gift had been a ruse.

"Nadiya ..." the blacksmith was saddened by how the baker's name sounded so alien to him. He hadn't called out to her verbally for almost three weeks now.

The woman lifted her head infinitesimally in his direction. If he was surprised at their lack of communication, she had altogether forgotten about it.

"Nadiya," he spoke with a bit more feeling for the words she needed to hear, "You must at least feed yourself if you want to live."

Nadiya fully turned her head to look at him and he would have regretted disturbing her grief if he didn't feel the same void in his heart. She looked completely spent, or rather her life tethered to Alectra's. Her brilliant and beautiful face was creased with lines of worry and fear. She was the most beautiful woman the blacksmith had ever seen. And even now as she looked closer to the Living Dead, he would still choose her over any other woman in the lands.

"What is my life... without her?" Nadiya spoke, her voice hoarse as a product of weeks spent mourning in silence.

"Our daughter fights to live. Would you not show her the same courtesy?"

Nadiya was always aware of the sharp mind her husband possessed. It was one of the many reasons she was drawn to the simple blacksmith when her father wanted her to be married into nobility. It had caused such a scene to her family, respectable and important as they were. A daughter of noble blood marrying some unknown commoner in the outskirt villages of their kingdom. A tragedy by every social aspect of their world.

But she was in love. And that was all it took to convince her that the blacksmith could give her things far better than money and power. Alectra was the best he had managed to date.

She made to reach out to him but he was already there beside her as if reading her mind. The love she felt for this man could not be rivalled by anything else. Perhaps only by that for her daughter, who in all essence had inherited the best of both of them.

And now here she was dying right before their eyes. How cruel were the fates to allow this of a soul that was so pure?

"I cannot live without her," she said as the blacksmith had held her close, "My heart... that is what she is to me."

The blacksmith knew this much to be true. He couldn't conceive a life past the death of both his daughter and his wife as well. But all the healers said they'd never seen the illness. If anything, they were mystified by what was ailing the girl in the first place. This was another reason for the witchcraft theory holding most stock to the people in the village.

At some point during the illness, the blacksmith had swallowed his pride and visited the Royal Palace to ask his father-in-law for aid. The endeavour was foolish, to begin with, and Nadiya was not surprised when the blacksmith came home empty-handed.

But he had a plan. A very ludicrous one but for Alectra and Nadiya, nothing was impossible for him to do.

"I am aware, Nadiya. I too have come to the conclusion that some lines must be crossed to save our Alectra."

Nadiya moved her head away from his chest long enough to stare at the blacksmith's resolved face. She knew what lines he spoke of. This was a conversation they had occasionally brought up these past three weeks without any real conviction.

"But it is forbidden by our laws..." her voice was no more than a whisper now as her fingers clasped harder on the blacksmith's sleeves.

It was the most heinous act set forth by all elders of Arc. It was only too simple to follow as well because the journey alone would surely cost one their lives, not to mention anger the gods to a point of no return. But the blacksmith was desperate. It was desperate men who had very little to fear from the gods.

Nadiya could feel the resolve already made in her husband's very soul. He was prepared for whatever fate met him, but he still needed her approval on the matter. He had vowed to her on their union that he'd only leave her if death took him. Death wasn't coming to separate them both but it had come for the one person that Nadiya could not lose, even if it meant breaking those same vows they made to each other.

"Then carry this with you," she disentangled herself from his embrace and went to open Alectra's bedside drawer. Inside laid a beautiful bracelet with gold carvings in the form of vines all around it. It had the Arcian crest, a burning flame surrounded by Gaia's domain in the background, stamped on its face. On the opposite circumferential side, it had the same emblem but this had an elegant 'G' drawn inside the fire. The blacksmith knew the bracelet better than anyone alive. He had spent almost a month on it for his daughter when she turned sixteen the previous year. The 'G' stood for the goddess Gaia, Patron of Earth, and one of Arc's five divine elements.

"That is Alectra's."

Nadiya didn't respond as she took his hand and fastened the bracelet on his wrist.

"You already possess my love and soul. Now you will have something to remind you of our daughter wherever the gods take you."

He looked at the bracelet once again and nodded his understanding. He would probably not make it through this journey with his life intact. He was about to delve into the world of magic. A world that all elders and wise men proclaimed to be the darkest kind. But they were the only ones who could revive one who was an inch from death. He was prepared for whatever fate was waiting for him in the Afterlife.

He longed to tell Nadiya how his heart bled for her and their child. How all that he did, and was about to do, was for them both. But he sensed that she knew this as her jade eyes glanced into his with the love and strength he needed.

"I adore you just as much, Tobias."