“Yet Parsana has undermined the peace treaty… It has given shelter to the disobedient disciples. We have turned a blind eye on the matter for so many years… But now, it has taken in Tirad, the greatest criminal of Oxan and the Saviour Ship!” Mart shouts, tearing up the peace treaty paper and throwing its pieces into Armina’s face. Armina is trying to object but Lealy can’t hear her. The crowd starts cursing Mart, but his soldiers leap towards them making them silent. Armina says something that makes Mart mad. He spits in her face and kicks her knees forcing her to kneel. Ashid and Pejhan try to comfort her.

“It doesn’t matter! Helping a fugitive escape is worse than taking him in! Tirad is no ordinary fugitive! He has burnt to death the poor refugees of the Oxan harbour; he is the killer of sea people… Now listen very carefully! Tirad has gone from your ship to Atlan and we are going to revenge the deaths of our brothers and sisters by invading Atlan and making them pay for it,” Mart says and points to the soldiers to keep the crowd quiet.

“We know that not all of you were involved in Tirad’s escape! We are going to give you a chance to prove your innocence! Anyone who declares to be innocent must come with us and fight alongside our soldiers. We have enough boats to take you all with us. And whoever stays behind, will die!” Mart finishes his speech. Lealy can’t see Armina properly, but Mart strikes her with his gun stock. The Parsana crowd moves towards the ladders, mostly women, children and the elderly. The remaining men and the Parsana guards attack the soldiers with knifes and start fighting. Lealy makes her way through them towards the cabin entrance. The fighters’ roars resonate in the corridors. Lealy rushes to her cabin, she is scared and feels dizzy. All this is Tirad’s fault, if had stayed and proved his innocence or had given himself in to the Circle, none of this would happen. She should have followed him to Avij and made him come back and stop all this bloodshed. But she didn’t have the courage to face him, scared of finding out he was indeed guilty of the crime. She preferred to stick to the possibility of his innocence.

There were other truths that she was afraid of. She preferred to think Ashid and Armina were wrong about Tirad’s marriage to Dalia. Whenever she felt down, she would think about Tirad and the hope of seeing him again one day, but not the way Armina had portrayed. If she accepted that Tirad was living with Dalia, she had nothing to look forward to. She already doesn’t have any hope and this false dream has made things worst. She had postponed her trip to Avij, giving herself many excuses, at first sailing in the stormy weather of the rain season was dangerous, then she needed to save more coins and at the end, she had patients that she was committed to take care of. She had heard the Saviour guards had raided Avij many times but hadn’t found Tirad. She was no longer sure whether he was on Avij or not? Why waste the trip? She had given into all the excuses and uncertainties to stay and stop looking for him. Now it is too late. She has to stay with Parsana defenders or join Mart’s army. It is finally time to choose! Fighting against Mart’s army had only one outcome: death! She already knows Armina, Pejhan and Ashid are dead among many professional healers of the ship. The sick patients and the curing hands of the healers that have never fought to kill cannot fight back the soldiers. They will all die, easily before nightfall!