A Gathering at the Fort

The buckle was frozen shut. My fingers were stupid, numb things, fumbling with the stiff leather strap of a boot I didn’t recognize. The cold bit right through the borrowed wool stockings, right through my skin, and settled deep in my bones. It was a cold that felt ancient. Around me, the world was too loud and smelled wrong—woodsmoke, roasting meat, damp fur, and something sharp and metallic underneath it all. I was supposed to be on a virtual tour, headset on, sitting in my climate-controlled learning pod. But the scratchy wool tunic against my neck was real, and the snow soaking through my strange moccasin-boots was real, and the towering wooden walls of the fort boxing me in were very, very real.

My breath plumed in white clouds. I pushed a strand of hair out of my face, my bare fingers instantly aching from the exposure. That’s when I heard the shouting. It wasn't the happy noise of the festival-goers skating on the frozen river or the merchants hawking their wares. It was angry. Sharp and brittle in the frozen air.

Two boys, not much older than me, were squared off near a stack of firewood. One was solidly built, with pale hair sticking out from under a wool cap and a face red with fury. The other was dark-haired, leaner, with eyes so intense they seemed to burn. Even from a distance, I could feel the heat of them. They were arguing over a toy. A little wooden soldier, painted red, clutched in the pale boy’s fist.

"It is mine! My father carved it!" the dark-haired boy spat, his voice a low growl. His French was different from the kind we learned in the immersion sims, thick with a rhythm I couldn’t place.

"You dropped it, Louis," the blond boy shot back in English. "Finders keepers. Ask anyone."

Louis. The name hit me like a physical blow, knocking the already thin air from my lungs. I stumbled back a step, leaning against the rough log wall of a cabin. My history files spooled open in my head, unbidden. Images, dates, facts. Louis Riel. That burning intensity, that unshakeable certainty even as a child. This was him. And if this was him, then this place, this time… it wasn't a simulation glitch. It was something else. Something impossible.

This was a nexus. My teachers always talked about them in hypotheticals. Tiny moments, small arguments, that spiral out into history-defining events. A squabble over a toy between a Métis boy and a settler's son. A seed of resentment. I watched them, my heart hammering against my ribs. Thomas—the English boy must be Thomas—gave Louis a shove. Louis didn't budge, just stared, his hands clenched into fists.

I had to do something. The thought wasn't a choice, it was a command. If I was here, there had to be a reason. I could fix this. I could stop the fight, smooth the crack before it split wide open.

I pushed off the wall and crunched through the snow toward them. They didn't notice me until I was standing right beside them. They both stopped, turning to stare at my strange, thin coat and my terrified face.

"You shouldn't fight," I said, my voice coming out as a weak puff of air. It sounded stupid. Childish.

Thomas scoffed. "And who are you? Go away."

I ignored him, looking only at Louis. Those eyes were even more piercing up close. I had to give him something. Not a lecture, but a tool. A warning he could carry, something that would make him more cautious, less… fiery. Something that would save him from the gallows waiting at the end of his life.

"He's not your real enemy," I whispered, my voice trembling. I took a step closer. "Listen to me. You have to be careful. More careful than anyone."

Louis’s brow furrowed in confusion. "What are you talking about?"

I leaned in, the words feeling heavy and dangerous on my tongue. "It's not about what you say. It’s what they will hear. Your enemies… they will always, always twist your words against you. They will make your truth into a lie."

The silence that followed was absolute. The festival noise seemed to fade into a distant hum. The anger drained from both their faces, replaced by something I hadn't expected. Fear.

Thomas took a shuffling step back, his eyes wide. He looked from me to Louis, as if I were some creature Louis had summoned. He wasn’t looking at a rival anymore; he was looking at something foreign and dangerous, something that consorted with strange, whispering girls.

Louis just stared at me. The fire in his eyes hadn't gone out, but it had changed. It was no longer the hot flame of a boy's anger. It was a colder, more watchful light. The dawn of a deep and terrible suspicion. He was looking past me, past Thomas, as if seeing the ghosts of future betrayals I had just named into being.

Thomas dropped the wooden soldier. It fell silently into the soft snow. He turned and walked away quickly, not looking back.

Louis didn't pick up his toy. He kept his dark, haunted eyes locked on me for a long moment, a flicker of fear and something like calculation in them. Then he, too, turned and walked away, his shoulders set in a new, rigid line.

I stood alone in the sudden quiet. I hadn't stopped a fight. I had ended a childhood. I had taken a simple argument about a toy and poisoned it with the paranoia of a man's future. I hadn't mended the crack. I'd filled it with ice. The little wooden soldier lay forgotten in the snow, a promise of a war I had just helped to start.