"Keep your eyes on the snow, Hina Mori, or you’ll drop the boy and the letter both."

I am writing this by the light of a tallow stub that has burned down to a black sliver, the flame trembling as the wind shakes the timber of the ruined watchtower. It is the third day of the march north, into the frozen wilds where the oak savanna thins to bare, skeletal trunks scattered like parkland debris. My body is a traitor; the fever that has been gnawing at my joints since we left the machiya rows now feels like a living thing, a rusted bird gun barrel embedded in my spine, hot and grinding. Command sent me to retrieve a deserter, a task they dismissed as a simple correction of weakness, but the man I was given to drag back is not a criminal. He is a conscript, no older than nineteen, carrying a letter from a sister dying in a quarantine bench in the south. I know the weight of such a letter. I know the weight of a brother’s silence. Three years ago, my younger brother, Kaito, died in service, his name scrubbed from the roster before I could even collect his boots. I could not abandon this boy to the cold, not with the memory of Kaito’s face so fresh in the delirium that has begun to cloud my vision.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌⁠⁠⁠‌⁠‍‌⁠⁠​⁠‍‍​​⁠​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‍​‍⁠‌​‍‍​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠‌⁠‍​⁠‍‍⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠‍⁠​​‌

The blizzard arrived at dusk, a wall of white that erased the horizon and the distinction between the world and my own failing mind. We huddled in the tower, the boy shivering violently, his hands raw and cracked, holding the paper as if it were a holy relic. I looked at him and saw Kaito, the ghost of my obsession superimposed on the stranger’s flesh. It was a dangerous trick of the fever, a blurring of duty and grief that I could not afford. But then I saw the patrol unit’s approach, their boots crunching through the drifts, and the illusion shattered. They were not here to rescue. They were here to silence. The letter was not a plea for mercy; it was testimony. It detailed the unjust conscription of the poor, the way the state auctioned off the bodies of the desperate to fill the ranks of the Clearances. I realized then that my order to retrieve the boy was an order to bury the truth. He remembered, too, one hundred and twenty-six of Lantern Yard — the kind of small thing a man carries for no reason he could name.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌⁠⁠⁠‌⁠‍‌⁠⁠​⁠‍‍​​⁠​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‍​‍⁠‌​‍‍​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠‌⁠‍​⁠‍‍⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠‍⁠​​‌

I hid the letter in the lining of my coat, pressing it against the skin where the fever burned hottest. The patrol leader, a man with a face like a stone wall and a shotgun with a rusted barrel, stepped into the tower. He did not speak. He simply raised the weapon, the muzzle low, aimed at the boy’s chest. The air in the room grew thin, the only sound the wind screaming outside and the looms of the distant plantation school, stopped, then one started, a rhythmic thudding that seemed to come from inside my own skull. I moved before I thought. I kicked the shotgun barrel away, the rusted metal scraping against my shin, and the fight began. It was not a duel; it was a scramble in the dark, a brutal, close-quarters struggle where the terrain was our only weapon. I used the rough timber of the watchtower, the cold stone floor, my own body as a shield and a hammer. I am a harpooner by trade; I know the geometry of a kill, the angle of entry, the moment of resistance. I drove my elbow into his throat, felt the cartilage give, and then I felt the bayonet slide into my side.

The pain was immediate and absolute, a white heat that replaced the fever’s dull ache. I fell, the bayonet still in me, the leader collapsing beside me, his eyes wide with surprise at the violence of the resistance. I could not stay down. I crawled toward the boy, my hand finding the letter in my coat, the paper damp with my blood. "Walk south," I whispered, my voice a rasp of broken glass. "Deliver it to the capital. Do not stop." The boy looked at me, his eyes wide with a terror that mirrored my own, and then he ran. He ran into the snow, into the howling dark, clutching the truth that would break the machine. He remembered, too, the Aldervane whalebone shuttle — the kind of small thing a man carries for no reason he could name.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌⁠⁠⁠‌⁠‍‌⁠⁠​⁠‍‍​​⁠​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‍​‍⁠‌​‍‍​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠‌⁠‍​⁠‍‍⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠‍⁠​​‌

I lay back against the cold stone, the tallow stub finally guttering out, leaving me in a darkness that was not black but a deep, bruised blue. The light was gone, and with it, the last of my strength. I tried to write one more entry, to record the final hours of my life, but my hand would not obey. The pen hovered over the page, the ink pooling into a dark, meaningless stain. I thought of the rooms we let to strangers in the machiya rows, the way they came and went, leaving no trace, and how I had always believed that service to the state was a way to make a mark that would last. I was wrong. The system does not care for marks. It cares for silence. The clock on the wall, stopped and wound, ticked once, a single, final note in the empty tower.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌⁠⁠⁠‌⁠‍‌⁠⁠​⁠‍‍​​⁠​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‍​‍⁠‌​‍‍​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠‌⁠‍​⁠‍‍⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠‍⁠​​‌

The boy was gone. I could hear his footsteps fading into the wind, a faint, rhythmic tapping that slowly dissolved into the roar of the gale. I closed my eyes, and the cold crept in, not as an enemy, but as a release. The fever broke, or perhaps it had never been a fever at all, but a fever for a truth I was too late to speak. My body was still, a silent witness to the injustice I had tried to correct, a sacrifice that the system would bury under snow and paper. The letter was south, moving through the dark, carrying the name of a sister who would never see her brother again. I was Hina Mori, a border guard, a harpooner, a brother. I was no one. The snow fell, covering the watchtower, covering the blood, covering the rusted bird gun, until there was nothing left but the white, and the wind, and the long, quiet wait for the morning that would never come.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌⁠⁠⁠‌⁠‍‌⁠⁠​⁠‍‍​​⁠​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‍​‍⁠‌​‍‍​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠‌⁠‍​⁠‍‍⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠‍⁠​​‌