"Are you an Asura? Will you eat us if we misbehave? Do you know any other Asura?" Radha had been getting bombarded with some variation of that question and several others by the children she had rescued. Somehow being thought of as a demon made Radha feel satisfied. Perhaps an Asura was what she had become after the Crafting. She tried not to think back to that moment, but its memory always threatened to take her back to the burning building in her mind. She had reassured the children that she wouldn't in fact gobble them up if they didn't listen to her, but part of her now wished she had maintained their delusion.

Once they had fully absorbed the reality that they weren't in danger of being eaten, neither by Radha nor by the wild animals that inhabited the frozen woods of Rudira the children had only gotten more persistent in their questions. She was grateful for what remained of the animals in Rudira, they provided her with food to eat and pelts to protect her from the worst that the weather had to offer; Being a walking furnace did her little good in the face of a blinding blizzard or pelting hailstorm. What her unnatural heat did now, was corral the escapees around her keeping them from wandering too far off in the snow. The kids mostly belonged to the same tribe, with light tan skin and clothes tie-dyed with plant inks, they said they were all Sowers except for the boy that had objected to Radha's intervention. His name was Imaan and his dark skin and braided dreadlocks belonged unmistakably to the Metal-Weaver tribe. Radha knew their features well. They belonged to someone she missed very dearly now. Someone she had to keep fighting for.

"Were you the only person taken from your tribe?" Radha prodded Imaan, breaking the silence between them for the first time in two days.

He was silent for a moment, stubbornly clinging to his grudge for a few more moments. Before huffing and nodding.

"I was the only one of age, and they needed someone to justify keeping my people in the settlement. I wanted to keep them safe and then you showed up ... if anything happens to them it's on you." He glared back at Radha, evidently still upset with her.

Radha smarted at his accusation, knowing full and well that there were consequences to agitating the peace. Her bones remembered the strikes of batons that came as a result of her struggling within The Facility. She knew that if she acted out everyone around her was at risk of punishment, but she was not the reason those canes fell on them.

"The Legion is who is responsible for what happens to your family Imaan. It's on them for taking your homes and building settlements in their place. It's their fault you have to conscript and fight their wars to ensure the safety of your family. Don't you see that?" Radha argued. And for a moment, there was a flicker of something in Imaan's eyes; but they quickly turned hard again.

"There's no point in fighting back against the Legion, the best we can do is work with them and keep each other safe. You're an idiot if you think you'll change that on your own." He grumbled before turning away.

Radha sighed and looked back at the kids following her.

"You don't actually believe that," Radha said before pausing to see if Imaan was paying attention. "If you did, you wouldn't have come this far with me, you'd've been looking for another carriage to take back to their city."

Imaan was silent for a while before grunting and picking up his pace to get some space between himself and Radha. Or at least that's what she thought, but then she noticed how the snow had begun to fade around the path they were taking being replaced by patches of grass and little shrubs, there were more trees without snow on their leaves bearing fresh fruit and the air had begun to smell of flowery nectar. Without warning the Sower children ran past Radha darting ahead to what Radha now realized was their home. She smiled, feeling real satisfaction at bringing these kids back to their families. She began to jog to keep pace with the running children but then stopped a thought crossing her mind. 'I can't stay here... they'll be in danger if I stick around any longer' Imaan's words came back to Radha, hitting like a crashing wave.

"Come on! Come on, you've gotta meet everyone!" Two Sower girls beckoned at Radha, scurrying up to her grabbing her metal hands and tugging at them.

Radha stood unmoving for a few moments, waves of familiar emotions rocking through her body. They came from a time before the flames and instinctively Radha pulled her gauntlets away from the two girls' hands. The echo of memory tried breaking past the roaring flames in her mind but it got caught up in the fire, swallowed by the heat and pain. Radha turned to leave and the two girls ran up in front of her with pleading eyes that looked so large that they might've popped out of their sockets if the girls tried any harder.

"Pleeeeaaaaaaseee" they both chimed in unison. And by the great flame and all its ashes Radha did not have it in her heart to let them down.

"Fine... I'll come with you but I can't stay long okay..." Radha said as sternly as she could manage but the two girls just giggled excitedly and tugged Radha along by her metal prostheses.

Radha let herself get pulled in by the Sower camp, she breathed in deeply and let herself indulge in the scents of fresh fruit and new blossoms. She could let herself have a moment's rest here, the knowledge that she'd have to leave soon loomed in the back of her mind but that meant that she'd have to make the most of what little time she had. The camp was lined with a collection of small tents that had been reinforced with clay and wood to make more permanent structures out of canvas and leather.

At the entrance of the camp, Radha was met by a group of older Sowers at the centre of whom there was a hunched-over old figure with long thin yet deeply rich black hair that fell in ribbons around their shoulders. They carried a walking stick that was a good foot taller than them. It was a gnarled piece of wood with several branches that had been shaved and polished, off of which several clay and glass bottles hung filled with tinctures, nail clippings, clumps of hair and other substances Radha couldn't decipher. Radha resisted the instinctive urge to kneel in a Legionnaire's greeting, instead, she joined her metal palms and bowed in greeting to the person she'd assumed was the tribe elder.

" You do not need to bow to me child, not after the service you've done for my people. rise with the strength of the great Banyan." The elder said in a voice far more ethereal than Radha was anticipating. It sounded like the whistling of the wind through the hanging roots of a banyan tree.

"I had to do something, I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I'd simply watched as these children were taken away," Radha said, affirming it to herself as well as the elder.

The elder trotted up to Radha and reached up to place a hand on her cheek... before pinching hard and pulling at the tight skin of Radha's thin and angular face.

"Ow ow ow!!!" Radha complained as the elder pulled her cheek.

"Look at this girl! She's all skin and bone and thinks she can fight off the whole legion." The elder creaked, sounding much more like the old person they were. It was hard for Radha to tell their gender from presentation alone and something about that felt intentional. "We've got to fatten you up before you set off again, I know a Walker when I see one, now come along, I'm sure you're hungry.

The entourage of Sower people that surrounded Radha erupted into laughter before ushering her and the elder towards a large tent. 'She called me a Walker...' Radha thought to herself as she was nudged into the Large tent-hut. That wasn't something Radha associated with herself anymore; it was the part of her that had lived before the flames, before the Facility. Now it felt so completely out of reach that being called one of them felt off...

"I... I'm not a walker, not anymore..." Radha muttered as she entered the hut.

The elder only smiled and nodded in response in the way old people did when they wanted to cajole their children when they'd say something outlandish, like 'I just saw a great sea snake in a puddle'. Radha was told to sit on a large circular mattress at the centre of which there was an array of clay dishes piled with fruits, bread and cooked meats.

"That's a lot of food... how" Radha gasped, amazed at the abundance of food that the tribe had assembled.

"The trees provide for us if we provide for them, child. The harvest was better this year than it has been in the past..." Once again the Elder's voice had changed to its ethereal sound. "As long as those spirits damned Legionnaires keep their hands off our land we can grow plenty more." And now again their voice transformed into that of a creaky old person.

Radha blinked and looked around at the rest of the people in the tent who seemed unphased by this constant flux.

"Do they always do that with their voice?" She asked, reaching out for a ripe-looking guava fruit.

The Sowers replied in a united affirmative and Radha nodded, wanting to question more but her questions felt unimportant compared to the hunger that had built up in her belly. She bit into the fruit and juice rushed into her mouth, the sweet tangy flavour exploding along her tongue.

For a moment she felt transported to a different time, fragments of old memories flickering in her mind, embers of old emotions blossoming in her blood. And a whole new appetite ignited in her stomach. She ate to her stomach's content and felt like a furnace that had just been topped up with firewood. Her heart yearned to eat more, to keep tasting the flavours of each fruit and dish but her stomach gave out first. Unexpected tears welled up in Radha's eyes and fell down her cheeks, sizzling away before dripping on the ground then her mind was ablaze again, the fires that had for a moment vanished returned setting Radha's heart racing. The other Sowers seemed to have shifted a step away from Radha and she looked around before noticing that her hair had begun to catch fire. Only the Elder hadn't moved, still sitting next to her. Radha took in a deep breath and then slowly let it out forcing the inner flame to recede.

The elder reached out a hand and placed it on Radha's shoulder and for the first time, Radha noticed that the hand was made of wood, or at least the skin seemed to have been replaced with tree bark.

The elder whispered "I know you mean to leave this place soon, Walkers never stay long, but please know that a daughter of fire will always be welcome here. Perhaps once you have stopped running, you will find the path to walk back here. But for tonight, rest and sleep with a roof over your head."

Radha could see a slight green glow in the knowing eyes of the elder and felt the weight of their scrutiny. It didn't feel like she was being appraised or examined for some malicious purpose, rather the Elder had somehow seen through Radha. They had struck at the longing Radha felt for a home, the aches in her heart for the comfort of a blanket or bedroll. Beyond that, they saw that Radha was running from something. It was hard to admit it in the face of Radha's staunch defiance of the legion and talk of pushing back against Rudira's oppressors but ultimately Radha had been running.

"I should get go-" Radha began, but she was cut off by the sound of fabric tearing.

Everyone in the hut including Radha turned to face the entrance whose curtain had just been unceremoniously ripped off by a gauntleted hand. Looking out the entrance Radha saw a group of legionnaires. 'Blood and Ashes! Already?!' Radha thought. She had known she'd be pursued, she shouldn't have stayed, she should have kept moving, kept running. She took a running start and launched off the ground, spinning and planting a kick on the legionnaire's chest, kicking them out of the tent into the soil-covered grounds around the Sower camp. She looked around to assess her situation, there would have to be at least a dozen or two legionnaires if they wanted to bring her in. Her best bet was to draw them all away from the camp...

Radha found the Legionnaire there she looked was currently getting up off the dirt and brushing themself off. She pulled off her helmet to reveal dark brown skin that seemed to have a metallic sheen to it and hair that wasn't even hair. It looked more like metal wires that had been braided into thick locks each tipped with a sharp spike.

"Still running into your problems feet first aren't you 29?" A frighteningly familiar voice taunted and Radha's heart sank.

"See, I told you she was in there, will you take me back to the Legion now?" Imaan's voice spoke from a few feet away. He sounded so distant to Radha who felt like her head was swimming.

'No NO NO! Not this" Radha's mind screamed. She could face a thousand Legionnaires, why did she have to face HER now? Imaan's betrayal didn't even register in Radha's mind it was too insignificant an issue in the face of what was in front of her.

"You'll see your due in time." The Legionnaire said looking to Imaan before turning back to Radha with eyes that looked to be coated in metal. "Speaking of dues, I've waited long enough for mine."