The air in the Allbright's clearing was… Subdued.

Matthew Albright stood atop the platform that was to be the foundation for their house, and stared at the four walls that had been erected, but it was not the walls he saw but the images in his mind's eye that had been painted for him by Chief Clennais of the Starlight Tribe.

The fairies were camped out further into the clearing near the river now. Little campfires could be seen flickering in the dusk as night raced towards them. Below, he heard the sounds of his family preparing for the night. Lights were turned on, powered now by the solar panels he had set up earlier in the day. Alejandra bent over pots and pans on the campfire, making something that smelled absolutely delicious from the deer that Dinah had brought back.

The heavy clanging of Isabel in the forge reached his ears, as his eldest daughter labored to create new swords for herself to replace the–and he could admit it now–rather gristly mosquito-nose weapons she'd lost in the fight against the slades. He glanced down to see her glaring at the hunk of red metal on the anvil like it owed her money before wiping the sweat from her eyes and continuing to hammer.

Off to the side, Dinah and Olivia were cleaning the bodies of the slades, under the watchful eyes of Pennat, the fairy knight who had helped them clean and dress the deer before this. Apparently slades were chock-full of valuable alchemical ingredients, and their scales could be harvested to make strong armour and even weaponry.

But these facts all slid off of his brain. He heard the chatter of the people in the camp, but his mind could not process the words. All he could hear, all he could see, were the sounds and scenes from hundreds of years ago.

"What the hell kind of land have we come to," he sighed, tossing the hammer to the deck and scrubbing his hands through his hair. The little fairy's words echoed in his brain.

"It was a time of chaos, Lord Matthew, Lady Alejandra, Lady… Toraline. The Systems were dead and gone, the very earth was torn asunder, our leaders were destroyed in cataclysmic fire…"

"Are you okay, Toraline?" Matt asked, glancing over to where the fairy-sword leaned against one of the walls, silent.

"... I do not know," she said softly. Lord, she sounded lost. "I… Suppose I should have expected such things. After what Might—No. No, after what Caesar… After what Gaius did, and what we helped him do…"

Matt nodded, breathing deep through his nose and trying to keep his thoughts from flowing through the link they shared.

"The Tutorial Tribe… They had been our ancestors' allies under the flag of Caesar, but they had never truly been friends. How could they be? Our ancestors saw what they guided Caesar to do in the name of his Empire. It was known across the face of Seroco."

Matt heaved another sigh, then walked over and sat down beside the sword, leaning back against the same wall and reaching over to place a hand on her hilt. The roil of emotions that roared up into his mind from the touch almost made him withdraw, but…

He had sat up with Olivia for three hours when she was five and her pet goldfish had died. He had held Isabel in his arms when her first crush had broken her heart at the Freshman dance. And he had stayed with Alejandra every night through the shakes and the nightmares and the screams.

If he could do nothing else, he could withstand the outpouring of raw emotion.

And the link carried his own emotions down to the sword. While he had misgivings about it all, and wasn't exactly sure what to think… Well. He had spent years with a family actively trying to come apart at the seams. If there was one thing in the world he was good at, it was keeping himself calm and level in a crisis. And he felt that calmness flow back down into the sword, not crushing her emotions but shoring up her as she struggled.

"I am sorry, Toraline," he said after a moment. "No one deserves that kind of news."

"Do I not?" the bitter laugh that came from the sword surprised him. "Did I not help Gaius rip apart families, destroy homes, eradicate bloodlines? Is it not justice, Matthew Allbright, that not only do I die beside my lord, not only do I resurrect within the very blade that ended me, but I awaken to a world in which the very atrocities I helped Gaius perpetrate were then visited upon those dearest to me?"

"Our ancestors… They feared a repeat of the great calamity. And they sought… Justice. That is what the histories call it. The Tutorial Tribe had guided a Sojourner to the ending of the world. They could not allow such a thing to happen again.

"So they killed them. To a man. To a woman. To a child. They hunted them, and slew them wherever they found them, until none were left."

"And claimed the blade of my father as an heirloom to be passed down in your family."

"I… Yes."

"I see."

"I cannot offer my condolences, Lady Toraline. I have read the histories. I know what your ancestors did to mine–"

"They were not my ancestors. They were my family."

"Yes. And the blood of thousands of innocents was on their hands. On your hands. I am sorry, Lord Matthew. I had hoped to keep this from you, at first. I had hoped merely to be an ally to you and yours. But I… I will not lie, now that the truth is out. It is not our way. My ancestors waged a bloody crusade against the Tutorial Tribe to ensure that such atrocities would never again mar the surface of our home."

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Matt closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall, letting the soft evening breeze wash over him.

"... You have nothing to say?"

Matt considered his words for a long second.

"Your people did horrible things to Clennais' ancestors," he finally said, making sure to keep his voice devoid of censure or condemnation. "And, if I remember your story correctly, you had a direct hand in that as well."

"Yes," Toraline's voice was a small, fragile thing.

"And when they got the chance, Clennais' ancestors visited the same fate upon your people, calling it justice for wrongs done to them."

"Yes. And… I fear they were correct to do so."

Matt closed his eyes and let his mind work as he continued to send calming pulses into the sword.

His gut reaction was to tell her that the Starlight Tribe had been wrong, that their campaign of genocide in the name of 'justice' was perverse and immoral and that she had been grievously wronged. That no one, regardless of circumstance, should be subjected to such a thing. That it was always wrong.

And while he did believe that… Something stopped him from giving voice to those words. And he wasn't sure what it was.

"Do you regret helping Gaius?" he asked after a long minute of silence, in which his brain had been working overtime.

"I did not, before meeting you and your family. I believed I was helping further a great cause, and that in order to give rise to that cause, sacrifices must be made. But… Now? I do regret it. I have been thinking hard on the words you spoke. And though I hate the picture they paint, I cannot deny the truthfulness and accuracy of that picture. Gaius… Was a monster. And I was his faithful servant in all his dealings. As were those of my tribe, my clan, my family. The Starlight Tribe was right to… To slay us. It was justice."

"No, I don't think it was," Matt said, eyes still closed as he tried to parse through the feelings roiling in his gut. "Justice is not the wanton slaying of people who have wronged you." he paused for another moment, then opened his eyes as his thoughts started to coalesce.

"Listen… What you and the others who participated in Caesar's schemes did… It was horrible. And at the end of the day, maybe you did deserve some form of punishment. Maybe even death. To be called to account for your crimes, and then to have punishment handed down in a thoughtful and considered manner… That could have been justice.

"But… The Starlight Tribe acted out of fear and anger and pain. They lashed out without consideration. How many of those they killed had no choice in Caesar's schemes? How many of those they killed were children, innocent of all wrongdoing? Wiping out an entire people group for the sins of a few, or even of many… That isn't justice. That's just… Efficient cruelty."

"... Do you believe I deserve punishment?"

"I believe that punishment is a tool for correction," Matt said, on firmer ground now. "A child hits his sister, he gets a spanking, not because I'm angry that he hit his sister but because I am trying to teach him that hitting his sister is wrong and has consequences, and I am trying to teach him not to do it again. What I do not believe in is punishment as retribution. You slapped your sister, so now I slap you to visit upon you the same pain you gave her. I could go into the whole schpiel about why I believe it, but ultimately… It's part of my faith.

"You died in service to Caesar, Toraline. You have been imprisoned inside a sword. You've had your entire worldview turned upside down, and are coming to understand how wrong you were. Considering all this, Let me ask you this; do you want to change from who you were under Caesar?"

"I… I believe so. I cannot look at who I was then and convince myself that she is the person I should be here and now with you and your family."

"Then," Matt said gently, "it sounds like any further punishment would just be a heaping on of pain for no reason. You are already walking the path of redemption, you don't need more pushing."

"But… I still feel guilt over my actions. The Starlight Tribe, the world, was wronged by what I did. Should there not be consequences for me?"

"Consequences are part of the natural order," Matt said after a second. "They will come to you whether you want them or not. The Starlight Tribe's distrust of you, their anger at your ancestors, those are consequences. It sounds like what you're really after is atonement."

"Atonement…" the sword breathed the word out in a long sigh. "To make amends to those I have hurt… To seek to right the wrongs of the past…"

Matt waited as the emotions he felt from Toraline started to settle down, the mad whirling frenzy stilling into something more tranquil and steady.

"I believe I desire that greatly, Matthew."

"Then let that feeling guide you into your next decisions," Matt said firmly. "The past is in the past–even if it feels more recent to you. To try and dwell on who was right and who was wrong… Ultimately it doesn't matter any more beyond the lessons it can teach us. Here and now… we are people, struggling to get by in a world that's pretty much gone mad as far as I can tell. We can continue to hurt each other in the name of justice for past wrongs… Or we can rise above it and move forward, coming together and trying to better ourselves and our world as best we can."

Toraline was silent for a moment.

"Gaius… He dreamed of a world unified under his power and rule. Never once, that I can remember, did he ever suggest joining together. You truly are different than he, Matthew."

"Thank you," Matt said, smiling softly. Then the smile slipped and he took a deep breath. "And Toraline?"

"Yes?"

"Before you set about working on atonement and moving forward, there is one thing you should do first."

"I am open to all suggestions, Matthew."

"Grieve," Matt said quietly.

"... What?"

"Grieve," Matt said again, squeezing Toraline's hilt gently. "For what was lost and for who is gone. Don't just paper over it and try to forget about it. It is no weakness to mourn."

Again there was a long beat of silence that stretched on and on. The sounds of the camp drifted up to them, background noise to what was happening in the treehouse.

And then, slowly, Toraline began to quiver, and the emotions Matt felt through their link began to roil again.

Matthew Albright sat in the shell of his new home and gently held a sword to his chest like a toddler, and listened as Toraline began to quietly weep.

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