“They know who killed Phenos! They’re working with them!” Ophelia shouted, pointing at the two traitors, who flinched at her gesture. “They were planning to ambush Phobos!”

That seemed to hurt the prince more than his earlier shock. His eyes snapped to his men and he transformed; it was quick and intense, erasing violently any trace of his previous vulnerability. A dark look overcame his face and his jaw tensed; he squared his shoulders, hand automatically reaching for the sword that hung at his side. Ophelia swallowed nervously as the man turned into a beast and strode forward, past her, to face the two other warriors.

His back seemed to be enormous, his muscles bulging. It was clear he was holding himself back. “Spit it out,” he said.

“S-she’s l-lying,” Remulus trembled as he answered in a small voice. “S-she’s an Elysian… she’s t-tying t-to p-p-pit us against you…” Nobody believed him; it was a farce of an attempt, more out of duty to the situation than anything else. His voice petered out, unconvinced that it would go anywhere.

“Is Ajax on it as well?” Phobos barely moved the sword, and Remulus flinched. He went to open his mouth, when Ilmarinen suddenly fell on top of him, going for the sword on his side. It was barely an inch or two out of its scabbard when Phobos’ own blade came down to strike the would-be offender down.

It was so quick no one, not even Remulus, had the time to react. It sliced cleanly through Ilmarinen’s neck, making it seem like bone was cardboard and tendons were feeble strings. Ophelia’s own awakened abnormality made her all the more aware that something was different in this reality, and took her several steps away from her previous theory of time-travel. As much as she wasn’t an expert in such things, she’d watched enough crime shows and other macabre edutainment formats to understand that such things were not normal, at least back where she had been born in. Phobos could be a strong man but his sword was light, one-handed; executioners always used heavy blades, unwieldy and two-handed, coming down with the weight of a guillotine.

Who were they, really? And… who was she, in this world?

“Where are they hiding?” Phobos continued the interrogation, having kicked Ilmarinen’s head away.

“I d-don’t k-know…” the sword was brought up to his face, and he broke, “p-please, Lord Phobos! I only did it because I missed my family, I j-just wanted to go back!”

“We all have our sob stories,” the sword’s point left a cut down his cheek.

“T-the t-temple! Ilma said we’d meet someone at the temple, he didn’t say where they were hiding!”

“When are they expecting you?”

“This afternoon! I was supposed to bring back that person as a witness, and let them lead you into the ambush… I swear I don’t know any more than that, Ilma was always tight-lipped and I didn’t want to anger him…!”

“Remulus,” Phobos said coldly, and decapitated the man in the same manner as he’d done his ally minutes earlier, “may your body end as litter in a pigsty.”

A breeze rolled into the small allotment, impregnating itself with the tangy aroma of human blood. The beast deflated, having achieved its goal; the shoulders went down, still tense, breath coming in sharper, louder. Drop after drop slid down his sword’s edge, staining his leather shoes. Ophelia stood transfixed, her mind trying desperately to move her eyes away from the two heads in front of her. Yet her body betrayed her, caught as it was in the morbidity of it all.

It was curious; it wasn’t the first death was witness to after arriving in that world, but it certainly weighted differently in her mind. This one felt personal; she knew Ilmarinen and Remulus as anyone could know someone in a day, she was but a feet away as they were slain. Perhaps it was that in the night everything was covered under a blanket of unreality; in the broad daylight it all felt naked, exposed.

She felt Phobos move, and a shaky breath escaped her throat. Suddenly, the reality of it all overwhelmed her: like a sudden summer storm, heavy water drops punched through the dark clouds to fall like rocks against the ground, against her. The deaths, her journey there, the discovery of how unreal it all was. Would she better off believing she was in a dream she could not escape from? Should she rather ponder on how she had gotten there? Why had she come to that place in the first place? Should she cry for Ilmarinen, for Remulus? Or should she feel betrayed in account of Phobos? What about Phenos, his untimely death? Who were they to her, if not newly discovered acquaintances, in the midst of a drama she had nothing to do with? How was she supposed to feel, or act, in this new place where nothing made sense except as a script for a bad movie…?

She couldn’t breathe. Her chest contracted, mouth opened and trying its hardest to get air into her. She felt hands on her, a homely scent and thin bright hair tickling her cheek. “Ophelia!” Again, Felicia’s voice shouted her name. “Calm down, slow, slow…!”

A hand caressed the back of her head; once… twice… she slowed down, breathing as the hand went down and up, down and up, down and up. “Good, keep it going… slow…”

A scene from a movie that had brought up memories of her dad had seen her shed her only tears in the last few years. It was not something she was used to, anymore. The wetness in her cheeks was a foreign feeling, and the novelty of that feeling of relief made her almost light-headed, deflating into Felicia’s arms. It wasn’t sadness or fear or distress; she simply was overwhelmed by it all.

“Thank you,” she said in a small voice, hiding her face into the woman’s shoulder. “I… it was too much for me, all of this.”

The sound of Phobos’ blade hitting the metal fittings in the scabbard jolted her, and she stood up straight, almost in a panic. “Phobos…” Felicia’s voice had a hint of warning that was not enough to cover her anxiety.

“She’s an Elysian,” was his only explanation.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Felicia pulled Ophelia back into her arms, turning away from the warrior who had not yet sheathed his sword. “You can’t do this!”

“Stand aside, woman,” the beast had reappeared, his voice low and full of deadly menace. “I’ve sworn an oath. An Elysian I see is an Elysian I kill or die at the hands of.”

“She’s not an Elysian! What Elysian would speak Phrygian or cow-herder backwater iberian like a native?!”

“You’ve seen her use that witchcraft of theirs, what else could she be?”

“Byzantium!” Felicia cried out, and it felt like the world had stopped. “It all fits the stories, don’t you remember? The strange visitors with the dull hair, the weak bodies, the strange powers…?”

“Byzantium…?” Ophelia murmured, trying to bring her head up to look at her protector.

“It’s the other world,” the woman answered almost frantically. “The one where he comes from. The Elysian emperor.”

Ophelia found it strange that the name was familiar; although not an expert in European history, she knew at least about the Byzantine empire: that it had been a thing that happened, mostly. She thought that maybe that tenuous connection was enough to assume they were talking about her world for whatever reason. She didn’t really want to push the matter; there was little need to when there was a sharp sword nearby.

“Byzantium…” Phobos repeated to himself, and then clicked his tongue. The sound of a scabbard embracing its sword cut through the silence, as if to accentuate Phobos’ resolve. “We can talk about this later. I need to follow the trail of these rats.”

Ophelia let out a shaky breath as the man’s steps went past them. Felicia didn’t let her go until Phobos was out of sight.

“Let’s go back to the tavern,” the woman said. Ophelia stared into her eyes for a moment; her mind wasn’t quite able to process what was happening then. Like a broken record, her thoughts were stuck on that one word…

“You think I’m from… Byzantium?”

Felicia sighed. “I thought you were a rather odd one, speaking the way you do, dressing the way you do… it still seems a bit unreal to me, but I’ve heard the stories so many times from the sailors that come from the Elysian empire that I’d be a fool not to name a tiger when I see its stripes.”

“What do the stories say?”

“That the emperor of Elysium came from another world, and that world people called Byzantium. That he had a strange appearance, like you, and that he wielded incredible powers.”

Ophelia felt a strange sense of calm then; something had been laid to rest. “I suppose he never went back.”

“Oh no! He built the empire, of course, and fathered many children who became the aristocracy of the Elysian empire. Those are the ones Phobos hates so much, who the Phrygians called Elysians. And they inherited some of his powers, of course.”

“Does… Phobos really hate Elysians that much?”

Felicia smiled sadly. “They are nothing but invaders and usurpers to him. It’s a warrior’s pride, after all. Don’t take it personally, sweetheart.”

Ophelia wanted to correct her, but nothing could really hide the disappointment she felt at Phobos’ crude anger at her shared likeness with his enemies. She hoped, at least, that he was able to confront the conspirators that were after him. “Do you think he’ll be okay?”

“He knows that loyalty is a precious commodity for a crown prince; at this point, I think he’s tired of the repetition of it all. But there’s nothing anyone can do, is there? He simply has to deal with it. He’ll be fine.”