Chapter Text
Builder:
The train hissed to a stop at the edge of the small station, and I stepped down onto Sandrock soil with the certificate still warm in my pocket. For a long time that had been my dream, a dream I couldn’t fulfill for years, because I was sick; but as soon as I was free of it, I did it. I studied, I prepared myself, even so, I’d failed the builder’s exam four times before the last one stuck.
My instructors always said I was great at building, bad at testing. Every previous attempt I’d frozen, convinced myself I was a fraud, and turned easy questions into disasters. But I couldn't quit, not then, so, the last time I’d breathed through the panic, answered every line, and walked out knowing I’d finally earned the title.
After that, I immediately applied for the builder’s position in Sandrock, it was the only place I’d ever wanted to be in, so, there I was.
I’d spent half my childhood there, trailing after my parents on trading runs. I remembered the town when the streets still bustled. I remembered Howlett’s easy laugh, the way he’d ruffle my hair and call me “little north star” because I was always staring up at the night sky instead of watching where I walked. And Logan, goat-headed, quiet, impossible Logan, who once spent an entire afternoon teaching me how to skip stones across the oasis until my arm ached and the sun bled out across the dunes.
I hadn’t been back in eight years. Life had a way of swallowing small towns and childhood friends whole.
As soon as we made it there, I got off and saw another woman with a handmade sign that had my name on it and a grin wide enough to rival the desert sun. She looked to be my age, eager and nice, so I approached her.
"Hi...I'm Lucy" I said, greeting her, I was nervous and excited at the same time.
"Hi, Lucy! So nice to finally meet you, my name is MiAn, I am one of the new builders along with you, I made it here a couple of days ago and thought it would be nice to meet you here, so I could show you to the guild.
The Commerce Guild, Sandrock was not a very notorious place, but their Commerce Guild garnered a lot of attention over the years, mostly because of Email, the woman that used to run it just disappeared and no one knew what happened. Yan was the man in charge, I had heard enough about him, he was not well liked amongst his peers, but he was still the one in charge, no one had valid reasons to ever remove him from his post.
"Oh, yeah, I would love that" I told her "But, can you show me to my place first, I need to refresh myself and store my stuff".
I knew most of the town, but a lot had changed and I wasn't certain where the old builder lived.
"Of course, I'm sorry, yes, follow me!"
She chatted the whole short walk to my new “home”, a sun-bleached shack, a patch of cracked dirt, and a pile of rusted machines that looked one stiff breeze away from collapse. I laughed when I saw it, because builders start somewhere, and in Sandrock, apparently somewhere was nowhere.
I put my stuff inside, and before I could even look properly around, she took my arm and dragged me away to the Guild, even though I knew where it was, but the building had changed a lot ever since.
"MiAn, stop, I can walk!" she ignored me and kept dragging me along to meet what I understood was Yan and Mason, the old builder that was retiring.
I vaguely remembered Mason, he was basically a hermit and rude, so we always steered clear from him. But Yan, well, he was new to me and light, I have never met a more obnoxious jerk than Yan. He was going to test my patience. I hoped I didn't end up punching him.
After that horrible meeting, I set everything up, including my new name and license for my workshop. I named the workshop on a whim "North Star Forge ", while filling out the forms at City Hall, the pen scratched the paper and the memory hit me all at once:
Logan, sixteen and already taller than his pa, pointing up at the first star burning through the dusk.
“That one’s yours,” he’d said, voice low like it was a secret. “Doesn’t matter where ya go. It’ll always be waitin'. North Star."
I remembered. It was the night he finally kissed me and told me he'd marry me one day. Of course he wasn't being serious, we were young and stupid, but I still remembered it. That memory got me through some of my toughest times, sadly, after that, life got in the way, and I never heard from him again.
I was still eager to see him again and his father, they were the warmest people around whenever me and my folks came to visit. Howlett actually taught me how to hunt smaller critters. Actually, we spent a lot of time together over the years, my parents came to Sandrock pretty regularly and a few times, I even stayed after they left. I'd stay with them or Heidi, Sandrock had been my real home ever since and that was the reason I came back, I needed to see them again, just in case, at least one more time, work with them, live with them...just in case.
I told myself I’d head out to their place the moment I set everything up. Surprise them, watch Logan’s eyes widen, then narrow in that annoyed, but pleased way he used to save just for me, hopefully they weren't too upset with me.
I always wondered why they never answered my letters or wrote back or even visited, but that was in the past, I had no time to dwell on it.
As soon as I was done, I headed their way, the house was locked up tight. Dust on the porch, windows dark. I left a note wedged in the doorframe
"Hey, North Star’s back. Come find me"and tried not to let the quiet worry me.
I left, running into Heidi halfway, near the saloon.
"Heidi, hi!"
“Lucy?” Her voice cracked on the second syllable, and when she hugged me I felt her tremble. “Peach, you’re really here. We've been expecting you, you know. When I got the news that you applied for the position, I was beyond happy. I'm so glad to see you again!"
"Yeah, it's honestly nice to be back...It all looks so different though"
"It does, Sandrock has had a hard time, that's why I decided to come back here, help my town grow"
"Hopefully I can help with that"
"Yeah, you will, I know you will...So, hey, have you eaten? I was on my way to the saloon. The food is still very good there, want to join me? Maybe I can introduce you to some people around"
"Oh, sure..I was actually looking for Howlett, but I didn't find him, maybe I can find him later"
"Yeah..."
She stayed silent after than and we made our way to the saloon, she introduced me to Owen, the owner of the saloon now, I remembered him too, didn't think he'd ever end up running the saloon, he was always away chasing skirts, stories and dreams, but he seemed to be well established and running it nicely.
We ordered yakmel milk and spicy noodles, and for a little while it was almost like old times, Heidi talking a mile a minute about structural integrity and load-bearing beams, me laughing at the right places. Then her smile slipped.
“I need to tell you before someone else does,” she said, setting her glass down too carefully. “It’s about Howlett.”
"What about him? Is something wrong?"
The world narrowed to the pulse in my ears, like my body knew something was wrong before she told me.
“There was an accident at the church a couple of years ago. Collapse. Howlett… he didn’t make it out.” Her fingers found mine across the table. “I’m so sorry, Luce.”
The air left my lungs in one slow leak. Howlett, strong, steady Howlett who could carry an entire yakmel carcass across his shoulders and still have breath left to tease me about my terrible aim...was gone.
I saw him everywhere for a second: leaning in this very doorway telling stories, whittling whistles for the kids, pressing a strip of jerky into my palm because “growin' girls need protein.”
I stood up so fast the bench screeched.
“What? How? Years ago?...Where’s Logan?” My voice came out scraped raw. “Heidi, I have to...he must think I abandoned them...”
Her grip tightened on my wrist. “Lucy, sit down. Please.”
I sat, the room felt like it was underwater.
“Logan was there when it happened,” she said, barely above a whisper. “They say… they say he caused it. Explosives. He ran, Luce. He’s been gone ever since. There are wanted posters up by City Hall. The reward’s high enough that half the desert’s looking for him.”
The words didn’t fit together right. Logan, who cried when we found a baby yakmel with a broken leg and carried it all the way home in his jacket. Logan, who used to leave poorly whittled wooden stars on my windowsill whenever my family visited. Logan, who once told me, quiet, fierce, at twelve years old that he’d fight the whole world if it ever tried to hurt me.
“No.” I shook my head until my braids whipped my cheeks. “That’s not, he wouldn’t...”
I was moving before I decided to, out the saloon doors, past Heidi calling my name, boots pounding the dusty street toward their house. I beat on the door until my knuckles split, shouting his name like volume alone could summon him back from wherever he’d gone.
No one answered. Of course no one answered.
After that, I wandered aimlessly, and I don’t know how I ended up at the graveyard. The sun was bleeding out turning everything rust when I found it. Howlett’s stone was simple, sand-scoured but new enough that the letters still cut deep:
HOWLETT: 43-96 "A true hero. Savior of the broken, weakened, and damned. No monster ever got the better of him."
I knelt. The ground was still warm. My palms pressed into the dirt like I could reach straight through it and pull him back, shake him awake, demand he tell me this was all some awful joke.
The tears came without permission, hot, furious things that splashed onto the stone and dried almost instantly in the desert air. I cried for the man who’d taught me how to make monster stew, just in case I needed it.I cried for the years I’d let slip by without a single letter after they never responded to the many ones I asked my parents to send. I cried for Logan, alone with this, carrying a weight I couldn’t even imagine.
And I cried because part of me, some traitorous, broken part, still believed if I’d been here, if I’d come back sooner, I could have stopped it. Saved them both.
I stayed there the rest of the day. When the stars came out, I walked back through town like a ghost. The streets were quiet; most folks were inside eating supper or pretending the world still made sense.
That’s when I saw it.
Tacked to the noticeboard outside City Hall, flapping in the evening wind: a wanted poster, edges curling, ink already sun-faded.
WANTED: DEAD OR ALIVE
LOGAN
If you see this man, do not engage: report immediately to the Civil Corps. Any information leading to the arrest and conviction of this vile perpetrator will be rewarded handsomely, in the sum of 100,000 gols.
His face stared out at me, older, harder, eyes that used to crinkle when he smiled now flat and dangerous under the drawing. There was the scar through his left eyebrow, the one he’d gotten when we were nine. His mouth covered with a mask, the same mouth I’d once watched say my name like it mattered more than anything else in the world.
My knees gave out. I don’t know if I made a sound.
I reached up with shaking fingers and tore the poster down. The paper ripped along the seams, loud as a gunshot in the empty plaza. I clutched the pieces to my chest, his face split in two now, just like everything else and stood there in the starlight, lost between the boy I’d known and the monster they said he’d become.
The north star burned overhead, cold and distant.
I whispered to it anyway, voice cracked and small.
“Logan… what happened?"