The walls were decorated with fine tapestries, scenes of war and of rebuilding. Scenes of Calsar's coronation, the birth of his son.

Sif mostly ignored them; he had known his grandmother to make better work.

It was quiet up here, moreso than even Douglásc's room. He found himself thinking about Calsar, about what he had been doing while his son ran the castle, throwing extravagant dinners and hiring firing servants at the rate that he did. Did he just sit up in his room lounging in piles of jewelry and fine fabric? What had become of Callán's mother?

Douglásc had said that the bedroom was at the end of a long hall, to the right, in the dead center of the castle. So Sif followed this path.

There was a guard, but he was asleep, slouched over at his post and snoring.

How he would curse himself the next day, Sif thought.

He quickly ran by, sneaking down the narrow corridor, until he came to a door that was made of dark, fine wood, inlaid with gold.

He shifted into his human form, and opened it, but paused.

Should he really appear before Calsar nude? That felt undignified, and he didn't want someone he disliked so much to see him that way.

But he found that this door led not quite to Calsar's room- it instead opened to a small entryway, which had a step up to a wooden floor, the same as the houses in the village did. Several coats and pairs of shoes were strewn about; Sif selected a black cloak to cover himself with, and then locked the door behind him just in case.

The entryway led into an over-furnished living room, hearth blazing low, red rug on the floor. Tapestries. Fired clay ornaments in the style of his people's paper lanterns hung from the beams in the ceiling, inlaid jewels reflecting the languid fire. It looked as if a rich person had decide to graffiti Yrnhold's house and hoard chairs in it.

Sif's eyes flicked over each thing, over the vases and the clay ornaments, looking for a person, the shape of a person. But Calsar was not in this room.

He stalked across it carefully, stepping around half-empty wine bottles and discarded jewelry. There was, from the right side, another short hallway. It was as if part of a home had been condensed into just this suite of the castle.

Sif let a few strands of the light that formed his lance drip from his palm, anxious as he poked his head in the hall and looked around. There were two doors.

One of them was slightly ajar, so he cautiously reached out and pushed the door open further.

This room was cold, and held only a few mannequins, dressed in women's clothes and jewelry. They had faces painted on paper lantern heads.

Sif privately found this a little unsettling, and so he closed the door to the mannequin room and went across to the other.

Almost thoughtlessly, he let the lance form fully in his hand.

When he pushed the door open, he was immediately assailed with a sour, sharp scent, overlaid with heavy incense.

" Who's there?" a weak voice called out. "Callán?"

Sif did not answer.

When he walked forward, he saw more of the same expensive mess that had cluttered the other rooms.

But in the center was a large four-poster bed with a rich, dark red canopy, a fabric that Sif had never seen before in his life. Smoke oozed out of a censer next to it.

And in the middle, sunken into a massive mattress and a pile of fine quilts, was a very small and wizened man.

He was thin, wrinkled, his eyes clouded, his hair shock white.

Sif stood by the bedside and stared down at him.

" Callán? Is that you?" the old man asked again. His voice creaked like a broken door. "Why aren't you saying anything?"

This could not be Calsar. Calsar who had driven out the sorcerer Caedwghe, Calsar who had waged war on Sif's village, Calsar who had commanded his witchraiser to destroy and chase out all spirits in the land.

He was just a pathetic, sickly old man.

"Who are you?" the man asked, now sounding agitated. " Why are you here?"

All of the desire for vengeance was draining from Sif's body. He couldn't kill someone as lowly as this.

The old man struggled vainly to sit up, and shakily reached out towards him.

" Name yourself!" he demanded.

" You may know me by Hélna," Sif said. "If Helna's name has ever meant anything to you. But my true name is Relnsif."

" Oh," the man said, and he collapsed back onto his sickbed as if he was boneless.

Sif looked down on him.

" If you wish to kill me," Calsar said, "Then do it. I regret nothing."

He folded his arms across his chest, and clasped the amulet of his necklace in his hands.

Sif stared at him for a moment longer, and he felt something new and cold within himself. A sense of finality.

He knew that it was, most likely, not the right thing to do. He knew that he would hate himself for doing it. He knew that the people he loved would be disappointed in him for making this decision, if they yet lived.

But he killed Calsar anyway.

He sunk his lance into his chest, breaking the necklace and cutting through the old man's hands, cleaving his heart in twain.

And he regretted doing it as soon as he'd done so.

He regretted coming to the castle at all.

He stared down at the body in the bed for a moment. But it was just a moment, as he became aware of something changing around him.

The smoke from the censer became more voluminous, swirling around him; the torches in the wall sconces suddenly flared up. Sif was shot through with what felt like electricity, and the sickness in the air began to clear, replaced by a different smell, one he knew and could not quite place.

He withdrew his lance and pivoted to the door, meaning to leave quickly now that these strange changes were taking place-

Someone was standing in the doorway.

Sif realized he was frozen stiff, and could not move.

A tall and elegantly dressed woman half-bowed to him, and shuffled into the room.

She was followed by two others, and then a man.

This man was dressed in simple white clothes, and had dark blonde hair.

He looked over the bed, and then looked at Sif.

" Lida, what is this?" he asked the woman he was standing next to. "On this, the anniversary of the eightieth year of my champion's birth, I arrive to find him slain. And but a small, insignificant animal spirit has done it."

The woman dipped her head, feathers fluttering in her hair.

" I had not foreseen it, my Lord," she said apologetically.

The man sighed, still annoyed.

" It's no matter," he said. "What is one pawn for another? I can make do."

He turned to Sif, and took a few steps towards him.

" I hadn't heard of any new spirits forming on Holm within the past hundred years," he said, his voice steeled. " Who are you?"

Sif's throat felt dry; but he could talk again, so he answered. He feared what would happen if he did not.

" Relnsif," he said. "Shield of Helna."

The woman, Lida, nodded her head thoughtfully.

" Do you know of Relnsif, Shield of Helna, Lida?" the man asked, turning back to her.

" A regional cult," she said. "A few decades ago, they rebelled against Calsar, and most were slain. You remember, my lord, when Helna broke her boundary."

The man's eyes flicked back to Sif.

" Helna, of all people, took in a cat?" he said. "How funny."

" How funny, indeed, my Lord," Lida responded.

" Let us take it back with us," the man said. "I am in need of a new messenger. The histories can be rewritten if need be."

Sif found that he could move, now, but he was shepherded alongside the man and his attendants, the woman going back through the door ahead of them.

It did not lead back into Calsar's apartment; instead, it was as a tunnel of light.

Thus Sif entered the heavens.

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