It was strange to feel two opposing emotions at once.

Alarion, the boy, was excited, ecstatic. His father would be home for the first time in over a year. His heart was pounding, his hands were sweating, and he was practically bouncing off the walls.

Alarion the challenger was terrified. His father would be home, alongside Eloim. His mind railed against the idea, but his body was that of a boy filled with joy, even as he screamed inside his own head.

The boy was seven; at that age, a year was a lifetime. Months of absence had blurred Bas-Rhin's features, and the military had not been kind to his father. So much so that Alarion could not distinguish which of the two men on the winding path toward the house was his father. They both wore the powder blue uniform of the common Imurian enlisted, though one was in considerably better condition.

In the end, body language gave his father away, as did the curve of his smile and the wide stretch of his arms as the children rushed out to meet him. Alarion might not have recognized him, but he knew the man when he fell into that firm embrace.

His sisters cried, but Alarion had always been stoic. His eyes gleamed, and when he looked up, he saw that gleam reflected in violet eyes so like his own.

Up close, the older part of Alarion saw just how much his father had changed. The man who had left was broad in the chest. Powerful, if a bit pudgy. That strength had withered away, leaving a hungry core of muscle unburdened by fat. Bas-Rhin's features were sunken and exhausted, his uniform poked through with holes in a dozen places, his boots ready to rot off his feet.

None of those details had mattered to the boy, but now they spoke clearly about the struggles his father had endured and the lies he would go on to tell.

<You've grown. All three of you!> Bas-Rhin declared as his wife finally caught up to her children.

<That happens when you leave them for so long,> Nessa scolded, though it was clear from the break in her voice that her heart was not in it. <Welcome home.>

<Mm,> Bas-Rhin took her scolding in stride before he took her up in his arms. When he was finished holding her, the man looked at his daughters with a frown. <You've been causing trouble for your mother.>

<What? No!> Alarion's oldest sister, Atra, had her face pinched together in a sudden, confused scowl. When her father's displeasure did not relent, she immediately looked at her younger sister. <Aina, what did you do?!>

<I didn't->

<I'm teasing. Your mother says only the best of you,> their father interjected before the bickering led to something not so easily taken back. <And you, Alarion? You've been keeping your sisters safe?>

<Mm,> Alarion mimicked his father's earlier answer, though he was so energetic that it was less a nod than a full-body bounce. <Always. I've been keeping them out of trouble, too!>

Aina rolled her eyes. <Suck up.>

<Who's that?> Alarion asked, ignoring his sister as he gestured to the remaining adult.

<This is First Sergeant Eloim. He is a recruiter from the army who will stay with us for a few days. I expect you to be on your best behavior.> Bas-Rhin instructed before he offhandedly mentioned, <he'll be sleeping in your room while he's here, Alarion. You'll have to bunk with your sister->

<But->

<Alarion.> his mother ended the discussion with a single word as she moved to introduce herself to Eloim. <It is a pleasure. I will get things settled in the house, if you'd like to come with me?>

New guests came with new chores, and the children carried more than their share of that burden. The girls made up a new bed for their guest and a cot for Alarion while the young boy spent hours fetching firewood, water, and whatever else his mother demanded of him. By the time dinner rolled around, much of the excitement of seeing his father had drained away in the face of outright exhaustion.

Meanwhile, the dread inside his soul had only grown.

<So, what was the war like?>

<Young man,> Nessa said sharply from across a rectangular table positively heaped with food. <That is not appropriate table conversation. Or a question you should ask with such irreverence, for that matter.>

<It's fine, Nes. Boy his age is bound to wonder.> Alarion perked up in his seat as his father argued on his behalf. <Better he hear it from me. It was… boring.>

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<Boring?> Alarion asked.

Bas-Rhin glanced sidelong at his fellow soldier before he answered his son. <Yes. Very. Mind you, I don't have The Power, so I am nowhere near the front lines. I never fought with any Vitrians or their allies. Most of my day-to-day is simple labor. I cook, I clean, I build. Whatever menial tasks they need me to do. It is like being at home.>

<Glad to hear you think our life is boring,> Nessa said with a glimmer of amusement in her eye.

<Oh, Nes, you and the children are the part of life that isn't boring,> his father shot back with sickening sweetness, <I can think of nowhere else I'd rather build->

The words were cut short as Eloim loudly cleared his throat and sent a pointed look toward Bas-Rhin. The first sergeant was a man of few words. He'd exchanged a handful of pleasantries with Alarion's mother and some quiet discussions with his father, but he rarely spoke, and when he did, he was curt almost to the point of rudeness.

<Ah. Well, the point stands. War is a dreary business. I don't think I ever came within a league of a Vitrian during the whole affair.>

<Nor will you, if things go smoothly,> Eloim said around a mouthful of food.

Those words seemed to strike Bas-Rhin. Color drained from the man's face, and he shot Eloim a nasty look. If Eloim noticed the glare, he said nothing as he continued chewing.

<What is he talking about?> Nessa asked.

<I was hoping to talk to you in private. But since the cat is out of the bag… yes, an early discharge is possible. The crown is offering special dispensation to get farmers back to work before the whole damn army starves. If I can find two locals to take my place, then my term will end a year early.>

<That is->

<You're staying!?> Alarion cut his mother off, bolt upright in his seat at the sudden news, <really?>

<Nothing is set in stone, but… I am hopeful. Valressan's boy has already agreed in principle. They have too many mouths and not enough work to go around. So I've a few days to find another family willing to lend a hand.>

<It might still be a struggle,> Nessa's voice was cool as she leaned over to clean up a spill Alarion had made in all the fuss. <There are very few families with spare sons. The most recent round of recruitment took two classes instead of one.>

<You're probably right. But it would be foolish if I didn't try.>

<And no one ever accused you of being foolish,> Nessa said dryly, before turning her attention to Eloim. <Are you on leave as well, then, First Sergeant?>

<Business,> he answered without elaboration.

<The roads are dangerous alone, and if I find replacements, they'll need someone to guide them back,> Bas-Rhin clarified. <He'll be with us for at least a week. Likely longer.>

The adults ignored Alarion's groan of protest at that announcement and continued to chat amongst themselves. Shortly after dinner, the men dipped into the mead and the wine, a sure signal that it was time for the children to go to bed.

Not to sleep, only to bed. The spare cot was somehow less comfortable than the dirt floor of Alarion's basement home, which left the young boy tossing and turning well into the midnight hours. This gave his mature mind plenty of time to wander and to wonder.

Why had Lal Viren selected this day? The connection to the first two stages of the trial was easy to recognize. But that was a week away. Why make him live all of it? The other visions had been direct, to the point. Was he just supposed to stew in this? Was this time with his family meant as a curse? Or a blessing? Was there some secret that he was meant to find? True, he only saw and heard what his younger self had experienced, but so many things went unnoticed by a child's mind.

"Alarion-Talon-Valentina-Green-" he whispered in the darkness, as though the words could solve his woes. The mantra had helped during the drudgery of the daylight hours, a reminder that while he had no control over his body, he had control over how this ended.

Curiously, it was three days later when he awoke. Whatever message the Mother of Challenges was trying to communicate hadn't involved those intervening days.

Bas-Rhin and Eloim were gone by the time Alarion woke, which had become something of a pattern in the days that followed his father's return. The two soldiers left early in the morning and rarely returned before dark, much to the children's chagrin, who had their mealtimes delayed by hours to accommodate them. When asked what they were up to, the answer was always the same. Recruiting.

Each day saw his father more grim than the last. He hid it well, always smiling when he knew the children were looking. But there was a tightness to his eyes and a frown on his lips more often than not during his private moments. He was present with his family, the same loving father that Alarion remembered, but left to his own devices, Bas-Rhin spent his evenings whittling, carving, and polishing his handiwork while staring off into the middle distance.

Eloim was stranger still. As a child, Alarion had mistaken the man's silence and aloof nature as military discipline, but seeing him through more mature eyes, Alarion recognized a fundamental wrongness. He never smiled or laughed. He ate if you put food in front of him and spoke if you asked him a question, but there was no joy in anything he did, only cold practicality. His every motion and action was taken with rigid precision, as though unwilling to waste an ounce of energy.

There was tension between the two men and between his parents. Things that they said to each other when away from the children, or things that were unspoken entirely. Alarion got the sense that his father did not like Eloim, and even at a young age, the boy kept his distance from the soldier, always peering at him from around corners or over counters. Always quick to flee the moment those unsettling grey eyes turned in his direction.

Despite those insights, the day was no more illuminating than the first. That was, until the early hours of the morning.

"They are not signing anything!" Wood and plaster did little to muffle the fury in his mother's voice as she shouted from a nearby bedroom. "Have you lost your mind? Bad enough that you have that thing sleeping in our son's bed-"

"Ness, we don't have a choice."

"You mean you do not have a choice! Mothers, how stupid… special dispensation, Bas? Really?! You are a deser-"

Whatever else his mother had to say on the subject was stifled in a moment of violence. Alarion heard the thump of a body hitting the wall, the struggle that followed, and the hiss of whispers too quiet to make out.

He listened closely, pulse pounding in his ears, but there was no follow-up apart from the sound of footsteps. Eventually, the light from their bedroom window dimmed, then faded entirely.

Try as he might to resist, Alarion's consciousness fled with it.

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