Gentle looked up from the vellum pages he was working on to see who had interrupted him. What he saw did not surprise him. He had been expecting this visitor for quite some time. Ever since the news had reached him of the losses at Avalon and Katabatic.
�And you, Shadow, you have grown old.�
The man who stood before him was no stranger. His grizzled beard disguised a scar which Gentle himself had given him. Years before, in another lifetime. A lifetime Gentle had been spending the last five years trying to put behind him. A lifetime he was now trying to put down on paper that others might learn from the past.
�I know why you are here. But I am an historian now, Shadow, not a warrior. I refuse to kill another Tribesman. There is too much blood on these hands already. Perhaps my work will stop the bloodshed. It will never make right what I have done, but someday��
Gentle�s gaze shifted from Shadow�s icy blue eyes to some place far beyond sight. Some distant future where Tribesmen no longer killed each other for sport.
�The time is now, Gentle. There is a new adversary. It is not well known, but Avalon and Katabatic were not Tribal battles. The Horde has returned. We face the �Derms together. ALL the Tribes, as one. But the battle is not going well. The transport ships are bringing back less wounded now. Less wounded and more dead.�
Gentle�s eyes refocused on Shadow�s.
�What do you want from me?�
�We want you to lead a group of Veteran Tribesmen��
�I said I would not kill again!� Gentle�s voice did not raise, but the cold glare he shot at Shadow was as violent as any spinfusor disc.
�You would not lead them into battle, old friend.� Shadow�s own gaze softened the blow. Like the battle tactic Willow-In-Wind, his visage softened, bent, to absorb the attack. He thumbed the scar beneath his beard. �You would instruct them, and they would instruct others. As you taught me. So that we might work together to defeat the Horde.�
�My armour no longer fits.� The tactic worked. Gentle�s eyes, too, had softened.
�That armour is built to withstand full-on �fusor blasts. It can withstand your gut. Now put it on.�