Chapter 569. Message from the Enemy

There’s a river that runs through the Deadlands. The same river that splits Eastonia in two. On the other side, mountains hug the horizon, blurring the view of Tarsian beyond. In the Deadlands, the river is… wide, but still. A large, lumbering stretch of clear water that weaves through the plains. 

Here, in the Roguelands, in what used to be a city called Twin Rivers, now nothing but a husk of what it was twenty or so years ago when Ryatt and Ella were young, that same river is angry and narrow, full of rapids and rock. 

Sydney stands beside me as I watch the water–the shattered ruins of bridges running across it at several points. 

And the rowboat fighting the rapids. 

Sydney straightens, narrowing his eyes at the group of warriors shouting at the few men inside the boat who are shouting back for help as the rapids send the boat lurching in a circle. The women on board scream–shrill and terrified. 

“There’s a child on that