Ursa failed to understand the weight of the Counsel's words. He hated them both. The revenge they'd enacted on the Protectorate was justified, but their plan to find the witch and install him as sovereign by the Warlock's side, had left a bitter taste in his mouth. On the day the Cimbran Isle changed its name, Ursa could no longer stomach their association.

Upon the stage of The Sirrup House, the events that led them there unfolded; at least as the public understood them. Fiepet stood in place as the witch gave his parting monologue, ascending into the heavens with a tearful and drawn out goodbye. He wasn't sure when the rope had been slipped around Cuttle's waist, but it was hard to discern what was hoisting him out of view.

The light dimmed, but just as the witch concluded his long-winded soliloquy, Stoat began his own. Fiepet was still not free to check on Delph; standing awkwardly on stage and awaiting another direction. As the light dimmed further and it seemed as though the act had finally reached its conclusion, Cuttle returned in another costume.

The audience booed, and Fiepet was left to wonder what had stirred such a change in them. Until Cuttle spoke.

"It is I!" he declared pompously, strutting around the stage in a menacing fashion, "Your great and powerful Protector!"

Another round of jeers, and 'the Protector' laughed maniacally.

"I have heard tellings, Enforcer Brox," he declared to the nonplussed Fiepet, "that my witch was stolen away by the traitors of Hofingrad! What deal must they have signed with the Prince in the west to conspire so against us?! Having already made miserable the people by taking their magic, I now turn to taking their lives!"

The audience voiced their disapproval, much to the Protector's delight.

"Not content am I in hunting down the men I hold responsible, I shall punish their innocent fellows to satisfy my lust for blood! Brox, hear my edict; every man, woman and child in Hofingrad shall be slain most violent, and their homes razed to the ground!"

"Such monstrous disdain for those you vowed to protect!" cried Vole, adopting a new persona beneath a thrown-on cloak, "You would have them killed, master? Why?! Do you suspect they harbor the witch..?"

"Of course not!" cried Cuttle with a laugh, "The witch is likely dead already. I only mean to have some fun at the expense of their torment!"

"Deplorable!" shouted a man from the crowd.

"Those poor people!" bemoaned another.

The overdramatics of Cuttle's Protector were not too far removed from the truth of things. Upon learning that the witch had disappeared so close to the capital, and under the watch of the enforcers no less, the retribution he'd sought was brutal. Punishing the soldiers who'd let the witch slip through their fingers was not enough; the town of Hofingrad was held to account.

Word reached them first only that the mission to the capital had gone astray, and that the witch had escaped. They'd no inkling that two of their number were on the run, or that another had been killed; they wanted to know above all else, whether their boys would still be returning with the full amount promised them.

The sight of the enforcers on the crest of the hill by Hafing's warehouse came unexpected. It seemed unlikely that the witch had run away, only to return to the place of its capture. A curious old man ventured to ask them what business they had come for, and was struck down in cold blood for his trouble. It took too long for the people to realize, the imminent danger awaiting them at the tip of the Protectorate's blade.

Running to warn, running to save themselves, it all proved pointless. No matter how fast, they were outrun and cut down at every turn. Their bodies slashed and bloodied, falling barely a handsbreath away from their homes, and the loved ones they had failed to protect. Where mercy did not find them, the war-hungry enforcers did. They tore apart Hofingrad, exterminating every living soul from existence. 

The timing was not coincidental. On the day of each new moon, the fishermen returned to port to see their families. The Protector had waited, that the enforcers could kill them all in one fell swoop. Defenseless, and trapped within a nightmare they couldn't understand. Their cries of confusion, their screams of pain; they echoed further than Forinstad.

Beyond the sea's horizon, it reached the ears of a father and son. That morning, the chubby youth had begged to prove himself on the ocean. His older brother had gone with glory on his mission to the capital, but wouldn't he be impressed to see him a sailor upon his return? Ursa was determined to have stories enough to rival Rel's journey to Velmund.

Worn down by Ursa's pleading, the father had reluctantly agreed to take him out; if only to spare his pregnant wife from their son's incessant whines. They'd been following a giant oarfish out to sea when a piercing screech from home resounded across the water.

"Did you hear that?" asked Ursa, "What kind of animal makes a noise like that?"

His father prayed it was an animal, but when the distant screams continued in pitches he feared he could recognize, he was left with no other choice.

"But the fish!" protested Ursa, when the boat began to turn.

"I'll get us closer that I might swim to shore, but you stay," said his father, "Stay on this boat until I come back to get you. Something isn't right, but I can't risk bringing you with me."

Ursa's fingers wrapped around his father's hand.

"Is it the witch..?" he asked, "Rel and the soldiers should have found it by now, how could it have come back?"

"I don't know..." his father replied, "But I have to find out. You stay here on this boat, no matter what. Do you understand me?"

With a fearful nod, and a promise made, Ursa watched his father tuck the bait knife into his waistband and slip silently into the water. It was the last time he would see another member of his family. 

The boat drifted out into the dark and lonely ocean where at last the screams fell silent. He waited. Just as he was told, he waited on the boat. Even when he ran aground having almost starved to death, he waited. It was fortunate the woman who found him was just as stubborn; refusing to let the boat become his coffin.

Each day she returned with food and water, forcing the little she could down his throat while his fingers maintained their grip on the gunwale. Eventually his voice returned, and in a whisper he asked for his father. He was from Hofingrad, he told her, and he was waiting for his father to come back and take him home.

Her heart near broke.

From that day on, the boy in the boat became the stuff of legend. Despite the immobility of his self-imposed confinement, Ursa's chubby frame was never filled back out. Convinced as he was that someone was coming, he wanted them to see how greatly he'd changed in their absence. 'Look father!' he would say when at last they came, 'See how long I have waited...? Look Rel, your slender waist is nothing on mine! And look... look mother... see how much chubbier the baby will be than I...'

Rumors abounded regarding the boatman's origin. A deserter from the west, a prophet from the north; there were even those that said his vessel resembled a kind once lining the harbor of the town the witch had cursed. Merit Fox had been the only one to hear him speak, and yet the old woman refused to share his secret.
 
Far beyond the limits of his forbearance, Ursa watched as the people came in droves to see him. He would inspect each face for signs of his father's likeness, suffering disappointment in every unfamiliar countenance. The people too, were dissatisfied. Those that thought him holy asked for blessings he would not give, and those expecting spectacle were forced to admit he was nothing more than an ordinary youth.   

Eating and sleeping on the little boat beneath the shelter Merit Fox had made for him, Ursa lay dormant until at last the pressure built too high.

"Are you stuck on that boat because you're from Hofingrad?" he was asked by a man determined to discover his truth, "And you won't set foot on land because you're scared they'll do to you what they did to the others..?"

Merit Fox wasn't there to silence him.

"Wiped out like vermin the lot them... terrible business. It's no wonder you'd be fearful of them finding you."

"The Maddening Witch..?" cracked Ursa's weakened voice.

"Well, the witch is surely the cause of it," said the man, delighted with the response he'd received from the mute curiosity, "So it's true then, is it? Is that where you're from? The sole survivor of the Hofingrad slaughter?"

The pain of waiting paled in significance to the pain of knowing. As though his soul was trying to escape the confines of his body, every inch of him felt near bursting to its breaking point. In ignorance he had the power to exist; but in truth he struggled to take a single breath. Tottering on the edge of oblivion, salvation arrived to pull him from the brink. 

"Who says he's the only survivor?" a distinctive voice demanded from beneath the shadow of his wide-brimmed hat.

While Pike vented his frustration on the man who asked too much, Min climbed into the boat, and held tight the youth he barely recognized. 

"Rel!" he sobbed, Ursa's body secure at last within his arms, "Rel, I'm so sorry..."

When Merit Fox came to bring his daily rations, the boy in the boat was gone. Laid upon the ground was a half-conscious stranger, cowering in fear as the agitated woman approached.

"Enforcers?!" she asked him quickly.

"No, I don't think so..." the stranger replied, "One of them struck me down most fierce, and the other coaxed him out. I couldn't see their faces but they left me alive."

"Did he leave here alive..?"

The stranger nodded. From what he could make out, the boy was screaming as they dragged him away from the boat. A scream was as good an indicator as any that there was air enough in his lungs. Satisfied that the stubborn brat was still living, Merit Fox gave the stranger a kick and ordered him to quit his dramatics and help her drag the boat back home.

Ursa's grievances were not so easily remedied.

For the two most wanted men on the Isle to maintain their low profile, they'd been forced to feed Ursa a tonic to manage his grief. Only then would Rel's little brother be calm enough not to draw unwanted attention. The years passed, the survivors of Hofingrad found their vengeance; but Ursa never forgave the witch for dragging his loved ones to their graves. 

And never learned to live without a bottle close at hand.

Wincing through the pain and ready to follow, the attendant's attempt to tail the drunkard was blocked by his master. Even if this was all there was, watching his figure disappear into the night, at least he got to see him once more before the end.

"We'll return to the Velvet Palace," the Counsel decreed, "Tend your wound and make haste your last. The end is near approaching."

Ursa expected they'd give chase on foot. Realizing he might not make it to his horse in time, he jumped atop a readied cart by the back door of the Sirrup House; cracking the reins and setting off at pace as its rightful owners called after him. Had he been more drunk they might have caught him, and had he been more sober, he might have noticed the bundled up body in the back of the cart.