“You are not dead yet. But if you keep leaving your guard open like that, not even your Gift will save you. You had way too many thoughts in your head,” the woman smacked Fionn in the head with a bamboo stick. “Now sit, my student!”
Fionn obeyed, sitting with crossed legs.
“Master?” Fionn exclaimed. The woman in front of him looked like Hikaru, his teacher. She had been a former demon hunter from the Kuni Empire and friends with his parents. Hikaru, along with his mother, had taken on the responsibilities of his training when his father passed away. She trained Izia as well. But one day, Hikaru simply left without saying a word and never returned. It was months after her disappearance that Fionn claimed Black Fang from the depths of the lake, and wielded it to defend his town from Horde raiders. That fight motivated him and Izia to join King Castlemartell’s army.
But there was something off with the woman sitting on the rock. It was the way she kept smiling at him. Hikaru might have been a dear person to him, like a second mother, but she rarely, if ever, smiled.
“Wait,” Fionn said, tilting his head to the left, examining the person in front of him. “You might look like her, but you are not Hikaru. Who are you?”
“Does that matter?” The woman’s smile grew wider. For a second she looked menacing.
“Yes, I don’t like being tricked,” Fionn replied, standing up. He wasn’t in the mood to be intimidated by some spirit.
“Interesting choice of words,” the woman said, laughing. She stood up and changed into what Fionn assumed, was her real shape. It was a tall woman, taller than Fionn, with red and black hair held back by a tiara. Her eyes were big and of an emerald green color. Her skin color changed with the light. She wore silvery plate armor with feather-like engravings worked into its surface. Over that, she wore a cape made of red and black raven feathers. Her ethereal beauty complimented the aura of ancient wisdom that she emitted. Fionn could see a certain resemblance to the freefolk. The colors, the raven motifs… all of it fit with the legend. Now he was actually scared. Because if he was right, he was in the presence of the patron deity of his people.
“Are you… are you the Trickster Goddess?” Fionn asked. Goosebumps ran across his back and a knot formed in the bottom of his stomach. A spirit, a demon, he could deal with. Coming face-to-face with the most revered goddess of his people made him nervous.
I guess this is how Asherah must have felt, he thought.
“Asherah was more curious and less of a dunderhead,” the Trickster Goddess looked curiously. Fionn felt as if her gaze was piercing his true self. It was unnerving. “Yes, I hear your thoughts. This is a place for the mind and the spirit after all. I admit that Hikaru is right, you are not that dumb. Maybe just too stubborn for your own good. Now, take a seat before I hit you again in the head.”
“Sorry, it’s not every day that you meet one of your deities.” Fionn sat down once more in the grass. “So you know my master. Do you know where she is?”
“Curious that you are more concerned about her than about yourself. But yes, she is fine, let’s say that she has been taking care of family business for the past century.” The Trickster sat down again on her rock. “She gave me two messages for you: one, if by some chance you manage to get out of this alive, go and look for her.“
“And two?”
“That you need to take the final step so you can truly complete your training.” The Trickster smacked Fionn again in the head.
“Oww!” Fionn rubbed his head. If he was dead, why did the pain feel so real? “Can you stop that?” It wasn’t helpful when Hikaru did it and certainly was not helpful now.
“I would, if your skull wasn’t so thick as to stop you from actually getting my advice inside it. Now, as I was saying, you need to take a final step to finish your training.”
“Which is?” Fionn asked, half confused, half frustrated.
“Become a master,” the Trickster replied with a face that pretty much said I thought it was obvious, you dunderhead.
“No,” Fionn said, meeting the gaze of the Trickster with defiance.
“What do you mean by no?” The Trickster was taken aback. Fionn guessed that not many mortals defied her. But when it came to this topic, he wasn’t in the mood to change of opinion.
“No. I won’t do it. Not anymore. Not again.”
The goddess just stared at him. Her head tilted to the right, as if she was examining, judging him and waiting for a more elaborated answer. The unnatural eyes of the goddess made the whole thing feel a tad unnerving.
Fionn sighed.
“For starters, I’m lousy at teaching. Also, being a teacher is a bad job in this business of helping people. Odds are that you will get killed by distracting the bad guy so the rookies can escape. You know how many legends go that way?”
The Trickster laughed at that last comment.
“I find it amusing that you say that, given your current predicament. I mean, you did exactly that. For being a warrior famous for being smart, you are disappointing me with your lack of self-awareness. As for those legends, they are just that, legends, not an actual account of reality. And you of all people don’t have much excuse about the dying thing.”
“My point is that me being here proves that I can die. So there is not much point in asking me to teach someone if I’m already dead. Unless you want me to come back to haunt them as a ghost.”
“The thing is, smartass, that you are not dead. Yet. Let’s say that this is a teleconference I set up given that you left your innards all over the floor of my Maze. Now, you will be dead if you don’t teach those kids and insist on doing things alone. You can’t win a war alone.”
“It has worked fine for me so far,” Fionn crossed his arms.
“Tell that to your belly,” the Trickster pointed her stick towards his stomach. “Or the Dragonking.”
“That’s a low blow.”
“I’m not here to sugarcoat things,” the Trickster explained. “I’m here to do my job, which funnily enough is the same job you should be doing: teaching.”
“Last time I tried, it blew up spectacularly and I ended up creating a monster.”
“Technically, your last time was when you taught Sam how to defend herself. And while she is a capable fighter, she could have been better. She can be better. The Dragonking saw that and taught her what you should have.”
“I was trying to keep her safe.”
“She’d have been safer if you’d done your job and trained her properly!”
“You don’t mince words, do you?”
“No.”
An uncomfortable silence set between them. Fionn averted his gaze, instead focusing on a very interesting blade of grass.
“Ahem,” the Trickster said, breaking the silence.
“Look, I don’t want to do it.” Fionn looked at her. His heart was beating hard inside his chest. He would have preferred to be anywhere but there. His bones ached. If he didn’t know better, he would say he was suffering a panic attack. He wasn’t prone to having panic attacks; he had faced monsters, great fighters and strange beings. Then again, this was not a common situation. “Byron is my fault. I made him the monster he was, and is. I was too trusting, too green, and too blind to see that I was not ready to teach forms of combat that combined too well with the Gift. Doing that does nothing but make you a monster.”
“Hikaru taught you the same forms when you were a kid and you didn’t have the Gift. What’s the difference?”
“I don’t know. What do you want me to say? That she believed that I was a good person?” Fionn felt his eyes welling up. It was hard for him to admit this, but he had been contemplating the issue for years now. “Well she failed. I’m a bad person, a lousy one. I have hurt many people because of her failure. I have killed many. I made countless mistakes and paid a high cost for them.”
“Being a f
allible person doesn’t make you lousy. And it certainly doesn’t make you a bad person. You are mortal. And let me tell you, even gods make mistakes. That’s why Life is full of parallels, to give you a second chance. Those kids waiting for you? They are your second chance.
“Why are you dragging your feet?” The Trickster looked at him, tilting her head to the side. It was hard to decipher what she was thinking. “I know you are stubborn, that’s why you can heal your injuries quickly, because your body refuses to accept them. But this is ridiculous. Be honest with yourself. Why?”
“Because… because I’m afraid of failing again!” Fionn yelled at the top of his lungs. “Or worse, succeeding and creating another Byron. I don’t want to lose anyone. To lose them. Because they remind me of them…”
“Of Izia and Ywain?” the Trickster said, with a soothing tone.
“Yes. I trained Byron because I considered him a friend and that cost me Izia and my family.”
“Last time I checked you had Sam.”
“I trained Ywain and it ended badly for him,” Fionn said, not hearing her comment.
“He actually had a decent life, you even met his great grandson.”
“I can’t do that to him again. To them.”
“Do what?”
“To fill their heads with ideas of becoming heroes. It will ruin their lives.”
“Like when you were a kid?”
“Yes. Being a hero.”
“Doing the right thing is never easy,” the Trickster said sagely.
“It will ruin their lives.”
“You don’t know that. And it is their choice in the end.”
“Well, I’m taking that choice off the table.”
“You can try, but it won’t work. They will do what they believe is right. With or without you. Look.”
A mist wall formed between them. Images appeared in the mist, like a movie. Fionn saw Gaby jumping on a rock and hitting a Lurker with her blades. She kept slashing at the Lurker in an emotionless frenzy. Fionn heard Sam asking her to stop, but Gaby didn’t seem to be listening.
“What’s that? That look in her eyes. I have never seen it.”
“It’s called the Ice State, a very powerful, very addictive trance-like state taught by the Sisters of Mercy. The more Gaby uses it, the more she will get trapped in it, till she becomes cold as ice, emotionless.”
“If that is so risky, why is she doing it?”
“She is fighting to save Sam and to save you from the Lurkers. Why? Because she is a good person. Because it’s the right thing to do. Because maybe she has feelings for you? She is doing exactly what Asherah did to save the freefolk: risking everything for those she cares about. For you. So don’t dare to cheapen her choices.”
“Please, stop. You can break it.” Fionn extended his hands towards the vision and for a second, Gaby turned her head towards him. It was as if she could see him. Her eyes returned to normality. Fionn couldn’t hear what she was saying, but saw her smile. The vision disappeared, leaving him and the Trickster.
“It’s clear that you need to go back now. As you saw, they need you and your guidance. You really need to think about what we discussed here.”
The raven came back, this time picking him up by the collar of his t-shirt. It lifted him from the ground and took him back into the weird space.
“I will think about it, but I don’t make any promises.”
The raven flew away with Fionn at an incredible speed for a bird that size. Fionn passed out once more. He could now clearly hear a familiar voice calling to him.
“Why do I have the feeling that you are gonna forget this whole discussion? I need to knock more sense in you.” the Trickster told him as he was being pulled away.
“You can try,” Fionn yelled at the distance.
† † †
Fionn opened his eyes again, but this time, instead of seeing the ghostly vision of his master yelling at him, he saw Gaby’s face with blurry eyes. She was saying to him words that he couldn’t make sense of and was smiling and waving at someone outside his field of vision. Then a ringing noise came to his head and he felt dizzy, almost ready to throw up. His vision cleared, a prelude to an intense wave of pain that flowed through his body. The pain was followed by a feeling of extreme heat. Faint specks of light floated around him. His healing abilities were back and working overtime. He could feel the broken bones in his sternum, legs and arms placing themselves in their right places and fusing together. When that happened to his shattered skull and chopped ribs, he felt as if his head was going to explode, and he gasped for air.
He righted himself and tried to stand up, but Gaby and someone else held him back. His hand was reaching instinctively to the place where Byron had stabbed him. It hurt as Pits, a burning sensation waved through his belly. He could feel his enhanced healing working. He might heal fast, but the pain lingered.
“I don’t feel well,” Fionn mumbled, his throat coarse and rough.
“That’s what happens when someone has to shove your innards back inside you to save you,” a voice to his left said. It was a sweet voice. The same voice that called him back from that strange place. It was Gaby.
“Keep him down or the stitches will open again and the healing won’t work,” a voice to his right said. It took him a few seconds but he recognized it as coming from Sam, and he smiled.
She is fine. I’m glad, Fionn thought. Once the ringing in his head subsided, he could make out what Gaby was saying, while Alex kept him seated and Harland examined the stitches.
“You need to rest, Fionn. You are pretty banged up and you are healing slowly,” Gaby indicated. “Well, slow for you at least.”
She was smiling, but her eyes looked red. Had she been crying? Fionn wondered. Fionn noticed she had bruises on her arms and a slight cut on the left side of her neck. A close call with a blade without a doubt.
“Your guts are still bleeding and not healed totally, Dad,” Sam appeared in his sight. She had a split lip and a bruise on her forehead. Out of everyone, she seemed to have the least amount of injuries. “Oh, this?” She pointed to the bruise on her forehead. “A little encounter with the Lurkers.”
“Lurkers?” Fionn asked. “Those things are dangerous. We need to move.”
“You need to rest,” Sam said, pushing him back. “Don’t worry, Gaby got rid of them.”
“She is right about your guts, though. We don’t want to pick them up. Again,” Gaby said with a deadpan expression. Fionn wasn’t sure if she was being honest or just pulling his leg, but judging from the burning on the lower side of his abdomen, the truth may be somewhere in the middle. He turned around and saw Alex, who sported bruises and cuts on his left arm. He was breathing slowly, which meant injured ribs.
“Your injuries. Were you also saving me?” Fionn asked Alex.
“Nah, we got these when we crash landed. I miscalculated something with some explosives and… look, it’s a long story. And not the important one here.”
“You got me worried man,” Harland added, offering him a bottle of water. Fionn saw Harland’s bruises on his face and a bandage closing a cut on his left eyebrow.
Fionn tried to remember what had happened. His mind made a blurry recollection of the destruction of Ravestone, the death of the Dragonking and his fight with Byron. Then everything went blank. A shiver went down his spine because of the memory. He also remembered parts of his out-of-body experience, if he could call it that.
“How long was I gone? And how far was the fall?” Fionn asked in a raspy voice. The water was clearing his throat.
“Long enough for them to find you,” Sid replied, his voice sounding far away. “You know time is tricky to measure here. About the second, I can tell you it was almost two kilometers. It’s lucky that you started to heal during the fall or you would be a pizza now.”
Gaby and
Sam glared at Sid with disapproving looks.
“What?” he asked. Sid shrugged. He was cleaning his hands with a greasy rag. “Look hooman, I’m glad you are ok and I’m sorry for being a humbug, but we need to fix the Figaro if we will ever have hopes of getting out of here.”
“He is right,” Alex admitted. “While you heal, there is nothing else we can do but fix the ship.”
If what Fionn remembered was right, the last time he saw the Figaro, it had been hit on what he assumed were the engines and was descending at a worrying speed. The fact that all of them were alive and apparently in one piece made him feel slightly better.
“I can help with the ship and you know it,” Gaby mentioned, a tad annoyed.
“I know and I really could use your help because Alex keeps frying the fuses when he touches them, but none of us have a damn clue about first aid or how to keep someone alive, besides you,” Sid replied a bit sheepishly.
“We need to keep him awake,” Sam added. “Hits in the head heal slower and he could suffer memory loss.”
“Ladies, don’t worry, I’m feeling better and this time my liver will stay in its place. I can sit a while and keep talking to you while you work on the Figaro, so you don’t have to worry about my head. I promise,” Fionn moved into a reclined position, using a rock as a rest for his back. “Besides, it is not the first time I’ve been impaled.”
“Not funny, Dad,” Sam said, clearly not amused.
Gaby and Sam joined the rest who were trying to repair the ship, whose hull was riddled with holes. Fionn tried to rest. Usually, the effectiveness and speed of his healing ability depended on the level of damage suffered and how much energy he had left. This time, it had been pushed to the limit and he felt spent.
Fast healing or not, it hurt. He wasn’t a pain addict, and thus had never tested his abilities to this extent. He knew he had survived the Light Explosion and Longhorn Valley and it hadn’t been a pleasant experience. While his skin healed the burns, the pain had lasted for weeks. But that had been his ‘first death’ and the process always worked differently for everybody. Of those he had known with the Gift, only he and his friend Sophia had kept the initial healing abilities.
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