I Promise You a Next Life, No Regrets

I was reborn on the eve of the bandit siege, the very night the whole village forced me to go and find my husband—the militia captain—in the back hills. My fists clenched, a cold laugh of refusal on my lips.

The Village Chief was sweating, his face pale as he jabbed a finger toward me. “Joan! Your man is the militia captain! The bandits are at our doorstep! If you don’t go get him back, do you want the death of this village on your conscience?”

I looked past him at the sea of terrified, angry faces. A cold hollow opened inside me.

On my conscience?

I’d already paid that price in my last life.

For that man, for this village, I died in the winter of my thirtieth year—shot through the chest by the hunting rifle of the husband I’d loved for a decade.

And all because the woman he truly loved was dead.

…

“Joan! What are you standing there for? Go!”

The Chief’s roar tore me from the bloody memory.

I lifted my gaze, letting it sweep calmly over him and the familiar-yet-strange villagers behind. Fear and accusation warred on their faces, as though *I* were the one about to bring ruin upon them all.

The corner of my mouth curled into a mocking smile.

“I’m not going.”

My voice was quiet, but it fell like a stone into a boiling pot, instantly stirring up chaos.

“What did you say, you heartless wretch?” shrieked the village gossip, a sharp-faced woman near the front. “Roger only went into town with the militia to buy you those pastries from the state bakery! Now the village is in trouble, and you won’t go call him back? What kind of heart do you have?”

I sneered inwardly.

Pastries. What a pretty excuse.

I’d believed it last time, too.

Back then, when news of the bandits came, I was three months pregnant. Without a second thought, I took the treacherous shortcut into the back hills—a path crawling with wild animals, steep and slick. I fell countless times, my body covered in cuts and bruises, but I finally found them before nightfall.

I found my husband. The boy I’d grown up with, the man I’d waited five years for to return from the army and marry.

He was standing outside the county cultural center with Nicole, the head of the Women’s Federation—the woman who truly held his heart. In his hands was a bunch of wildflowers.

As for the rest of the militia? He’d sent them off to wander nearby.

My arrival had interrupted his little romance.

He was furious, but I dragged him back anyway.

That battle was brutal. Yet because the militia returned in time, the village was saved.

Nicole, however—that delicate city girl—was snatched by the bandits in the chaos. By the time we found her, her clothes were torn, and she hung from a gnarled tree in a mountain hollow.

Roger lost his mind.

He cradled her cold body like a wounded beast.

He believed I’d killed her.

If I hadn’t forced him to come back, if they’d stayed in town, Nicole wouldn’t have died.

From that day on, he never spoke another word to me.

All his tenderness, all his guilt, went to the cold slab of stone over Nicole’s grave.

And me? And the child we couldn’t save? We became thorns in his side.

Until that day. The mountain passes were sealed by snow. He came home blind drunk, eyes bloodshot, and pointed that gleaming, polished hunting rifle at me.

“Joan,” he slurred. “Go apologize to Nicole.”

The cold muzzle pressed against my heart.

I could even smell the liquor on him, mixed with the familiar scent of Nicole’s rosewater.

So. He’d been visiting her grave.

So. He’d never forgotten her.

The searing agony of the bullet tearing through my chest swallowed me whole.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back here. Back at the moment before the tragedy.

This time, I wouldn’t play the great, foolish hero.

“You go find him,” I said, meeting every pair of eyes, enunciating each word clearly. “I’m not taking that back-hill path.”

Roger, and his precious Nicole—if your love is so earth-shattering, then face the bandits’ guns yourselves.

Don’t drag me down with you. Don’t drag all of Greystone Village down.

The moment I finished, the crowd erupted.

“Have you lost your mind? Roger’s wife, are you trying to get us all killed?”

“You always seemed so meek! Who knew you had such a vicious heart!”

“That’s right! Captain Roger treats you so well, and you…”

The accusations and curses crashed over me like a tidal wave.

I clenched my fists tighter, nails digging deep into my palms.

Treats me well?

Sure. So well that when I was pregnant, the woman on his mind, the name on his lips, was always someone else.

So well that for her sake, he killed our child. And then he killed me.

“Sis…”

A timid voice came from behind the crowd.

I turned and saw my sister-in-law, Dorothy—Roger’s younger sister.

A few years younger than me, her hair in two braids, she looked at me now with pure worry.

She was the only one in this family who had ever shown me a shred of warmth.

“Sis, are you feeling unwell?” She pushed through to my side, taking my arm and whispering, “Did… did my brother upset you again?”

Looking into her clear eyes, the ice in my heart thawed just a little.

“I’m fine, Dorothy,” I said, shaking my head.

Just then, a frantic, piercing gong sounded from the watchtower at the village entrance.

“Bandits! The bandits are at the pass!”

The crowd fell dead silent for a second before exploding into even greater panic.

“Quick! Close the Great Stone Gate!” the Village Chief bellowed, his voice shaking.

Greystone Village got its name from the two massive stone gates carved right out of the mountain face at its entrance—our ancestors’ final defense against bandits, incredibly thick. Once shut, they were nearly impossible to breach from the outside.

A dozen strong men rushed forward, straining together at the winch. The heavy gates groaned with a deafening *creak* as they slowly began to swing shut.

***THUD!***

The moment the gates sealed, the ground shuddered.

The world felt cleaved in two.

Outside: impending slaughter and pillage.

Inside: a temporary reprieve and endless dread.

“Take cover! Women and children, into the tunnels!” the Chief continued to direct.

The village’s network of tunnels, also passed down from ancestors, was extensive but cramped, meant only for the elderly, weak, women, and children.

Dorothy tugged my hand urgently. “Sis, let’s go to the tunnels!”

I shook my head, gripping her hand instead. “Dorothy, listen. The tunnels aren’t safe.”

In my last life, the bandits had used explosives to blow open the Great Stone Gate. Then they filled the tunnels with thick smoke, flushing everyone out.

Dorothy stared, confused. “Then… where do we go?”

“To the ancestral hall in the back hills. The ground is higher there, and there’s a back door we can escape through,” I whispered.

Though she didn’t understand, she trusted me and nodded.

Holding her hand, I moved against the current of people surging toward the tunnel entrances, slipping quietly toward the ancestral hall at the village’s rear.

Along the way, I heard someone wailing, “Where’s Captain Roger? Where’s our militia?”

“It’s all that witch Joan’s fault! She wouldn’t go get them!”

“When Captain Roger gets back, he’ll skin her alive!”

I kept walking, my resolve unshaken.

Skin me alive?

Roger, when you return, all you’ll find is a living hell.

And you’ll have built it with your own two hands.

I wonder if you’ll regret it then—regret abandoning your duty, abandoning the village that raised you, all for Nicole today.