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For several minutes, Ollie hung suspended in darkness, tormented by the lingering pain of his horrific wounds and the sight of Lord Owain standing over him with a mocking smile on his lips as his blade pierced Ollie’s chest.

Slowly, at a pace that felt much, much slower than any of his previous recoveries, the blackness faded away, leaving Ollie’s body restored, though his clothing had been replaced by the simple tunic and breeches that he’d worn in the real world when he first began his vigil.

"Well, Ollie," Ashlynn’s voice called out while the aspiring knight and witch shook and trembled on the ground of the blood-soaked battlefield. "Do you accept your results as the best outcome you could achieve?"

"This? This is the best I could do?" Ollie said bitterly through clenched teeth.

"Dying on Owain’s blade, along with Milo and Harrod, is the best that I can hope for?

" Ollie said, turning bloodshot and tear-filled eyes on the vision of Ashlynn kneeling next to him.

"And Owain walks away from this without a scratch on his body? "

"How can I accept this?" Ollie asked, gesturing at the bodies strewn across the battlefield.

The sight of Harrod alone was enough to pierce his heart, but when he glanced at the slumped figure of Milo, who had all but adopted Ollie as a member of his own family, he felt like a claw made of ice was squeezing his chest. "How could anyone accept this? "

"Many brave knights would accept this," the vision of Ashlynn said, holding out a hand and waiting for Ollie to take it. "Ollie, come with me and take a look at what you’ve achieved with your death."

Slowly, Ollie clambered to his feet without the help of Ashlynn’s hand. Part of him wanted to snap at her, to let him try again, to get on with things so he could figure out where he had gone wrong in his latest attempt to pass the trial, but he forced himself to hold his tongue.

Closing his eyes, he took several deep breaths as he reminded himself again and again that this was both a lesson and a trial.

If Lady Ashlynn wanted to talk to him about this moment, and if the trial had failed to bring him back to the beginning again, then there had to be a lesson in all of this mess somewhere that he was meant to learn.

Thus far, many of the lessons he’d learned had been the most heart-wrenching, painful moments he’d ever experienced, but he couldn’t deny that he had grown from each and every one of them.

"All right," he said, opening his eyes and looking at the vision of Ashlynn before him. "Let’s take a look."

"This will hurt," Ashlynn said, taking one of his hands in both of hers and holding it firmly.

"But the first step is counting." With a wave of her hand, the thick mist vanished, revealing the entirety of the gruesome battlefield all at once.

"You can either count your friends or your enemies, and I will count the others. Which do you choose?"

"Friends," Ollie said around a lump in his throat. Now that he could see the entire battlefield at once, he realized that there were many, many more bodies than he’d thought. So many that for a moment, his head swam, his face turned pale, and he felt as though the world had tipped sideways.

"Take your time," Ashlynn said as she steadied the flame-haired young man before he could fall over. "This won’t be easy, but I believe you can do it."

"I’m fine," Ollie insisted, shaking off the support that the vision of Ashlynn offered and walking over to Harrod’s body. Kneeling next to his fallen friend, he reached out to gently close his eyes, rolling the horned soldier onto his back in a position that almost looked like he was sleeping.

Despite the fact that he knew it was a vision and that the real Harrod was still alive, likely watching over him along with Milo in the village, he couldn’t bear to see his friend lying in a heap where he had fallen after Owain pierced his chest with a sword.

"One," Ollie said numbly as he stood, moving to Milo’s crumpled, lifeless figure to do the same for him that he had done for Harrod, closing his eyes and easing him into a comfortable position for his final rest. "Two," he whispered.

Again and again, Ollie repeated the ritual, walking to each member of his hastily assembled army in turn.

Sometimes, he searched around the area until he could find a severed limb or treasured weapon, returning them to rest along with the warrior who had fallen in the battle that he’d so confidently planned.

How long it took, Ollie couldn’t say, but after what felt like an eternity, the vision of Ashlynn caught his hand before he could leave in search of more of their fallen.

"That’s it, Ollie," Ashlynn said softly. "That’s all of them."

"That’s it?" Ollie said, blinking in confusion. "But we, we had nearly three hundred and fifty men. I, I only counted one hundred and nineteen of them."

"Exactly," Ashlynn said. "Some people would condemn you for losing a third of your men, but you know full well that a hasty assault would have resulted in everyone’s death in the inferno of the Inquisition’s Holy Flames. This new plan of yours saved two-thirds of your men’s lives."

"But a hundred and twenty people still died," Ollie said stubbornly. "One hundred and nineteen good friends and villagers... and me. And for what?"

"For what?" Ashlynn asked, blinking in surprise.

"Ollie, even though you personally fell, you also caused the death of nine out of ten of the Inquisitors, and the remaining one may still perish from his wounds.

The curse of the eternal sun is broken, and the price the Inquisition paid is so high that they are unlikely to make an attempt like this ever again. "

Suddenly, the view shifted around them, and Ollie found himself standing once again in the center of the village, only now, there was no burning sun hanging in the soft, velvety night sky.

Only a tiny sliver of the moon was casting its pale, silvery light as a cool evening breeze caressed the grasses and gardens of the village.

"You died, but all of these people will survive, and many more besides," Ashlynn said. "Isn’t that worthy enough?"

"But Milo died," Ollie said, walking to stand beside the entrance to Old Nan’s burrow where he’d recently spent several days learning how to carve protective amulets.

"I, I didn’t keep Old Nan’s son safe, and now she’s lost them both to Owain," he protested.

"And Juni has lost her husband. My witchcraft wasn’t strong enough to keep him safe. "

"But it was strong enough for him to kill several Lothian soldiers, and a knight," Ashlynn pointed out. "In fact, because of your protection, the Lothians and their vassals paid a steep blood price in this battle. Nearly four hundred of them died, more than three times the number that you lost."

"It may not be the ending you wanted," Ashlynn said, stepping up beside the grieving young man and turning him around to face her.

In the pale moonlight, her pale blonde hair drifted lazily on the wind, and her simple skirt and tunic looked perfect and pristine, far too clean for the blood-soaked world that Ollie had just come from, as though she somehow stood apart from the world of lesser, mortal beings.

"It’s an ending that saved the people you swore you’d protect," she said. "An ending that killed the people who inflicted pain and suffering on your villagers. An ending that preserved the lives of enough of your soldiers to pick up your burden after you’ve fallen and cost the lives of enough of Owain’s soldiers to stop him from pressing his assault. "

"So, even though you died," she asked softly. "Isn’t this an ending you can accept?"