Far in the east of Muovea, nestled between a cluster of trees and a slow moving creek, is a farm. Whoever once owned it has long since abandoned it, leaving the homestead to creak in the breeze and slowly degrade under the rain. This is where the exiles hide. Barely an hour's ride away sits her mother's grand manor in the hills.

Alicia has no intention of ever returning to it, no matter how close she is.

Within the smell of must and the chatter that trickles through the walls, Alicia slumps in a chair, rubbing her eyes with her palms. Not only did she fail again, but on her tongue rests a plan so ludicrous that not even she wants to voice it.

Around the table she sits at, their ragtag group of exiles and rebels argue again. No one can admit defeat, but nor can they agree on how to save Muovea.

"I have an idea," Alicia finally says, lifting her chin as they all look to her once again. "But none of you are going to like it." Glancing at Oliver who stands by a window with his arms crossed, Alicia searches within his eyes the strength she needs to say what she must.

They're out of options and they're out of time. None of them have slept. They've barely even had time to eat. Desperation claws at her gut and she knows it claws at theirs' too.

"We use the Ghuls."

"How?" Lena asks, tapping her fingers on the table, the only one that isn't staring at her like she's lost her damned mind. And maybe she has. Maybe she left it beyond the walls, out in the wild where nothing made sense but everything was so, so simple. It's simple again; they use the tools they have at their disposal or they die.

"The duke was looking for a way to control them. So, we just have to instead."

"The duke hasn't been able to find a way to control them."

Alicia swallows and glances at Sam who sits in a chair by the table, glaring at the wood like it offends her. "Maybe because he threw away his key before he knew what it was."

Lena follows Alicia's gaze. "You're speaking from a hunch."

"The Faceless Queen was able to control the Ghuls and Samantha is a direct descendant of the woman."

The princess finally lifts her gaze, narrowed and cold as she looks at Alicia. "So is my brother."

"The duke already has him, yet for whatever reason he's trying to find you. He's already realised you're the answer to his question."

Kieran barks out a laugh. "So, let me get this straight," he says, shaking his head. "You want to form a plan off Traveller tales like they're all real?"

Spine straightening, Alicia glares at her brother. "Six years ago, Ghuls weren't real," she tells him before turning her gaze to the others in the room. Sam with fire in her eyes, Galya with her lips pinched together, Lena and Oliver both observing her as their minds turn like cogs in a clock, and her brother who was raised as she was but never wanted anything to do with the Travellers. "Six years ago the dead didn't walk. Six years ago Muovea was whole and those myths and legends were just stories."

"You're right," Lena says. "They were just stories, but people heeded them for a reason. Because in every myth, there is a seed of truth. We need an army, and we have one right beneath our feet. All we need is you." Lena settles her gaze on the princess.

Alicia holds her breath, watching an array of emotions pass across Sam's face. Her full lips twist, her nostrils flare, then she stands, her chair scraping against the floor. She looks at all of them, fists clenched at her sides. Then she looks at Alicia. "You want me to follow in the footsteps of a queen that drenched this land in blood just so she could build walls so high no one can climb them? Walls she could hide her monsters behind, monsters you're telling me to control?"

Swallowing, Alicia finds she can't reply. She's asking for too much. But then again, it's up to each of them to decide how far they're willing to go.

"Fine. I'll do it. Let's go get ourselves an army."

"We go at dawn," Lena decides and no one argues.

"Yeah," Oliver says, pushing away from the wall. "This is the fucking plan now, I guess."

Alicia finds Oliver by the bar beneath the apartment after the meeting and going their separate ways.

At dawn they go to the tunnels once again to journey into the catacombs of Ghuls that started this mess. To say she's nervous would be an understatement and seeing Oliver just shows he feels her same nerves.

Adorned in only a now wrinkled white shirt and pants, sleeves rolled up and suspenders dangling from his hips, looking like a dishevelled mess. His company is the bottle of whiskey before him and the quiet of the dark bar.

Alicia approaches with her shoulders drawn back, and when her shadow falls over him, the glass pauses on its way to his lips.

His eyes are dark as they take her in, greyer than she's ever seen them. His gaze tells dangerous stories, of beginnings wrought with suffering. He's barely said a word to her since she came back from the palace, since she escaped from the palace. He told her not to and she did anyway. If she'd been less prepared for things to go wrong...

She takes the glass from his hand and drinks the whiskey within, knowing the look in his gaze as though it shines in her own. They're both accustomed to losing people or people leaving them. Such wounds no one should have to bear.

"The grand duke killed my father, killed the queen," she says as she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. "That's why I hate him. Why do you?"

Oliver takes the glass from her hand, not meeting her gaze as he pours another whiskey for himself. "I worked with him during the war and I saw more than most," he replies in a voice rougher than weathered rock.

"We've all seen more than most, it's why we were exiled. We might die going back into that tomb tomorrow, and I have no idea why you're here."

Oliver leans back on his stool, gesturing with his glass to the stool across the bar from him. "I'm here because it was either let Sam burn this entire place to the fucking ground, or try to save what little is left of it," he murmurs as Alicia slides onto the seat, facing him fully and scowling at him.

"That's not what I asked, Oliver."

He looks at her from beneath his lashes, a cold glance that's icy considering the warmth he's regarded her with recently. "He threatened my family. He made me—" Oliver cuts himself off, his features twisting in a brief flash of pain before he draws in a breath and settles back into his mask.

It hurts her to see him do it and wonders if she's ever hurt him when she's done the same; refused to show her emotions like he'd use them as a weapon against her.

"There wasn't an escape. It was like I was back with the Ronavics. Just another tool for someone else to wield."

She places a hand over his drink when he tries to lift it again, willing him to listen to her as she speaks. "You're more than that, Oliver. You're much more."

His eyes rove over her face, but his passive features don't change. "I wasn't. Because I did what he asked of me. That herd of Greys coming towards us is from Igorek and Parshin, it's what we did to them in the war. You think we could have won that battle without cheating a little? I'm sure you know how fucked we were."

Alicia bows her head, lips parting as his words finally reach her and the reality of what he's beginning to tell her sets in. She wants to tell him to stop, that she doesn't want to know, but... she doesn't.

"The duke gave the order to send the Reaper's Curse into their armies and it was Warren and I who did it."

"Light," is all she manages to whisper, having it all confirmed feeling like a slap to the face.

Oliver laughs dryly, running his fingers through his dark hair. "The war that we should have lost has come back for retribution as I always said it should. The duke did what he did for Muovea, now he needs to question whether it was all worth it."

"You helped him destroy the whole fucking world," she says on a shaky breath, her eyes blurring with tears.

"It was either them or us."

She looks at him, studying the shadows of the Reaper that sink into the hollows of his cheeks, that shine in his eyes. "Those are the words desperate men speak when they have no other justifications for their actions."

Oliver just lifts his glass to his lips and drinks, not bothering to reply.

What man was he before the war that made killing countries seem like a plausible solution?

But doesn't she already know that? It doesn't matter who he once was, Muovea twists people into monsters.

Alicia knows she can't judge him, that's the Reaper's job. She can't judge him, otherwise she'll have to take a long, hard look in a mirror, and she's spent years avoiding looking her reflection too closely in the eye.

There's one defining difference between her and Oliver, between the wrongs they have committed. Oliver was fighting for his king and country, killing the enemy, or who they thought was the enemy. But Alicia can't say the same for herself. She was killing for money, for fame, for silks and glory that she didn't even want. She tainted her soul for a legacy that will never be hers.

Never have I ever killed an innocent.

She grabs the bottle of whiskey, taking a swig of it straight from the bottle, wrinkling her nose as she sets it back down. Her gaze is heavy as she glares at the scarred wood of the bar, waiting for the alcohol to settle in her stomach. "Do you regret it?"

Oliver takes a breath, letting it out slowly as he rolls the tumbler in his hand. "Every moment of my life."

"What did you do? Exactly?" She looks up at him, not wanting to know the answer but knowing she needs to get the facts straight if she has any hope of understanding.

"I travelled to Parshin with a group of other soldiers in the early months of the war. We were losing, the duke saw that." Oliver takes another drink, not looking at her. "So, he gave us vials of the disease, and we spiked the barrels of water that would be taken to Parshin's soldiers."

"What of Igorek?"

"The same thing, but a different group. Led by Warren."

"And that's why the duke exiled you? Because you knew too much?"

Oliver reaches for the bottle again, but Alicia drags it away, pinning him with her eyes until he sighs. "He didn't exile me." The words are spoken so quietly that Alicia almost misses them. But they sink in, and she can only stare at him, waiting for him to elaborate. "I exiled myself. The duke would have found me in the capital, he would have targeted my family, it was the only way I could get out after what I did."

"What you did? You mean help him?"

Oliver's gaze is distant and cold as Alicia studies him, silently begging him to make her understand. "After I did what I did with the Reaper's Curse, after Anika was killed because of me, I took a bullet for Sam in the trenches when they were ambushed." He pauses for a moment to drink, gritting his teeth. "That's when I met Yeong, the doctor in the Commons. She was the leading scientist in blood transfusions. Apparently, Sam's blood saved my life."

"So, you tried to die?" Alicia asks, her throat tight around the words.

Oliver's subtle nod is the only reply she needs to make her feel sick. "As I was being taken back to the capital, a woman came to me, said she could get me away from the capital, make sure the duke thought I was dead if I did something for her."

"What did she want you to do?"

The silence that descends has her heart aching. She looks at him as he twists his ring on his finger, his brows pinching together. "She wanted me to save people. I helped her rescue hundreds of refugees from Parshin, get them out of their country before the Curse annihilated them. She knew my history as a smuggler for the Ronavics." Oliver meets Alicia's gaze as her lips part. "Then I disappeared beyond the walls as the war ended. I was just another casualty in the fight. My family think I'm dead. The duke did too, and I intended to never come back unless he was dead, and my family were safe." He winces then, a wound opening within him. "There's no making up for the blood on my hands, but I did what I could." Oliver stands and reaches into his pocket for his cigarettes.

"Light," Alicia manages to whisper, wrapping her hands around the bottle of whiskey, suddenly realising that everything is much more complicated than she could have ever imagined. "Who was the woman?"

Oliver places a cigarette between his lips before speaking. "Lena Lisenka."

Alicia chokes on her breath and stares up at him as he lights his cigarette with his matches, shaking it out before he tosses it on the table. He tilts his head back, blowing out smoke as silence descends, thick with the words they don't say.

"Is there anything else you wanted to know since we might die tomorrow?"

"We're not going to die," she says, but she doesn't even believe herself. "We've been down there twice before and haven't died."

"How long until our luck runs out?"

Alicia tilts her head. "I thought you didn't believe in luck?"

He lifts his hand and trails his rough knuckles down her cheek, gentleness in his usually fierce gaze that tugs at her heart like nothing else can. "Maybe you're having an effect on me."

"I think you are too," she replies. She wouldn't be here if his own strength hadn't urged her forward.

A small smile tugs at the corner of his lips, but he drops his hand from her cheek and sighs, crushing his cigarette on the bar before brushing away the ashes. "We should get some sleep considering what we're facing tomorrow."

"Agreed," she says with a nod, meeting his gaze with a fierceness she feels deep in her gut. "And no more of this talk about dying, you hear me?"

"I made you a promise," he says, his voice rough as a line forms between his dark brows, "one I intend to keep."

"Let's just get this business done," she orders and brushes her fingers through the mused curls of his hair. "I can't lose you."

He doesn't reply, shadows forming in the hollows of his cheeks as he dips his chin. The weight of everything they've done these past few months is a heavy burden to bear, one she gladly shoulders with him. Together they'll get through this, and they may even make it out with something of themselves intact.

Alicia cups his jaw in her hands, smoothing her thumbs over his sharp cheekbones as she draws his gaze to hers. She then tilts her head and brushes her lips against his, the softest of touches that sends shivers trembling down her spine. He parts his lips, a breath of shock escaping them, fluttering against her skin like a whisper.

His lips are soft for a man carved from stone.

Oliver's skin is hot against her cool hand, a fire raging beneath his skin as her palm slides down to his neck where she feels his pulse against her. She applies pressure to the kiss, confidence bursting through her as his hand fists in the fabric of her shirt at her ribs, drawing her closer, off her stool to lean over the bar.

She's aware of everything and nothing in that moment, the taste of tobacco on his lips an addicting thing, mingling with the sweet whiskey they both share. He smells of clean linen and leather, the faintest scent of cedar embedded in his clothes. They hold there—seconds, minutes, she doesn't know—until she leans back, eyes still closed, breaths still twisting together between them. His hand lingers at her side, spanning her ribs. Heat coils within her cheeks and pools in her stomach as she opens her eyes and meets his gaze that flicks between her eyes and lips.

"What was that for?" he breathes.

"For luck, I suppose," she replies. Alicia then allows herself a smile, a brief moment of certainty. She's certain about him, and some days it feels as though Oliver is the only constant in her life anymore. The log that keeps her head from going under.

After everything he just told her, trusting him is as easy as drawing breath. He did what he did for a cause that was thrust upon him, and she knows the guilt because it runs in her blood too.

"We should sleep," she says, repeating his words from earlier.

He wavers for another heartbeat, his eyes steady upon her. In another life, they are nothing more than a man and a woman gazing at each other in the shadows. But that isn't this life.

In the next heartbeat, he steps back, the cold he leaves in his wake making her wrap her arms around herself. She stares at the bar before her as his footsteps sound ascending the steps into the apartment above.

Alicia presses her fingertips to her lips, the ghost of his warmth still lingering there. Tomorrow they might not walk back out of that tomb for a third time. There's a lot of things she regrets in her life, a lot of things she'd do over if given the chance.

Oliver isn't one of them.