Chapter 629: This Person Called Tamar

The city left them alone. They left the city alone. It was a balance that had held for years.

Benjamin had been told all of this by Erica the day before.

It seemed like the perfect place a rat would like to hide.

It was the obvious conclusion once someone said it out loud. The kind of conclusion that made you wonder why you hadn’t seen it sooner, so they decided to go in person.

***

That morning, they set out with Katana.

She had announced, with the careful pride of someone who did not want to keep asking for favors, that she intended to buy a sheath for her new sword.

Benjamin had already done far too much, so she reasoned she would handle the rest herself.

She met them at the gates of Erica’s manor, Fudō resting against her shoulder in the early light.

The dark blade with its thin gold lines looked almost ordinary until the sun caught the temper pattern and made it move.

"How was your night, Katana?" Benjamin asked as they started walking.

His voice was easy, the residual fatigue from the sword-crafting mostly slept off.

"Ahaha, I had to sleep with Eric." Katana scratched the back of her head, the motion sheepish.

A faint color still lived in her cheeks when she glanced at the sword. "I failed to heed your advice and swung the sword in the air. It severed my bed."

[Really?! Well, I would say it held back, considering the amount of magic it should have... But how does a sword hold back again?] The thought turned over in Benjamin’s mind as he glanced at the unusual weapon.

Dark metal and gold veins, and the quiet sense of something that was paying attention.

He filed the question away for later. There would be time to find out what Fudō was actually capable of.

For Benjamin, the fact that it hadn’t cut Katana in half was probably a good sign.

"When we are free, we’ll go for practice in the woods," he said. "To test how far the sword can go."

Katana nodded.

***

Their steps never stopped.

The road away from the manor was quiet at this hour.

Erica’s home sat well apart from the denser parts of Thaad — still inside the walls, and under the city’s protection, but removed enough that the morning felt different.

The air was cleaner here, and the noise of the city was a distant hum rather than a constant presence.

The walk from the front gate to the first real concentration of people took the better part of an hour.

The land around the manor was open enough that the morning wind moved freely. Trees stood in loose clusters, their branches still and patient in the cool air. Distant roofs only began to appear after the path had wound through several low rises.

It was the kind of separation that felt intentional. Close enough for convenience, far enough that casual visitors thought twice.

Benjamin walked with his hands clasped at his back.

Something about the previous evening kept catching on the edge of his thoughts, like a name half-heard in a dream. He couldn’t quite grasp it. Every time he reached for it, it slipped away.

"Ah, yes." He remembered it fully and turned his head toward Erica. "Eric, did someone come to visit yesterday before I slept?"

"Hm? None that I remember." Erica’s answer was calm, almost idle. The morning light caught the edge of one pointed ear as she glanced over.

Her expression was relaxed and untroubled. "After Katana’s room, you simply disappeared to your room and dropped like a rock."

"Is that so?" Benjamin put a finger to his lips, the gesture automatic.

His puzzlement was genuine. The memory was soft-edged and unreliable, but the impression remained.

It lingered in his mind like a scent he couldn’t place.

"It felt like Tamar was here last night." The name left his mouth casually.

And Katana flinched.

The reaction was small but unmistakable. A sharp, full-body tightening — shoulders lifting a fraction, spine going rigid, the hand on Fudō’s hilt closing harder than necessary.

The movement was enough to draw both Benjamin’s and Erica’s eyes at once.

She kept walking, her eyes stayed fixed forward, and her feet continued their steady rhythm on the road.

But the color that rose in her face was impossible to miss in the clear light.

"Is something wrong?" Erica asked the blushing young-looking woman.

Her voice had a mild concern. Her had noticed the flinch but not yet the reason for it.

The light cut across the snaking trail in long, pale bars. The sun had climbed high enough to clear the treeline but not high enough to burn off the coolness in the air.

The plain field on either side of the path moved in small waves under the breeze, green and gold shifting together in slow, restless motion.

The scattered trees threw thin, shifting shadows that stretched and contracted with every gust.

"N-No! I was just excited about the journey!" Katana raised her fist like a cheerful kid.

Her arm shot up, held for a beat, then dropped back to her side. The blush on her face refused to fade, remaining high across her cheeks and ears like a stain that had settled into the skin.

Fudō rested against her shoulder, the dark blade and thin gold lines catching the sun whenever she shifted. The light danced along the temper pattern, making it move and shimmer, never quite the same from one moment to the next.

[[What journey...?]] The same thought moved through Benjamin and Erica at the same time.

Neither spoke it aloud, and they kept walking. The trail wound ahead without urgency, the manor already far behind them, the denser parts of Thaad still more than an hour away.

The silence between them was comfortable enough, broken only by the sound of boots on packed earth and the distant call of birds.

"By the way, Benjamin, who is this individual, Tamar, and what is she to you?" Katana finally quit the eccentric shaking and asked.