“Wise advice.”
“Did you bring food?” She led him back inside.
“No, should I have?”
“Well, you know, it would have been useful. I’m buried in these books every night trying to find answers for you. I’m not saying I don’t enjoy the work, but a little time off would be nice. But, yeah, I know the end of the world is nigh and all that nonsense. So I keep working, but the brain can’t work on nothing, you know? So do you know where I can order food without leaving home?”
“Sorry, no.”
“Of course not. You don’t live around here. Because I live in the posh part,” she laughed, “And now I am just blathering. I’m tired and hungry. Either I get something to eat or I sleep, your choice.” She soon quietened down on seeing the serious expression on his face.
“What is it?”
“It’s Hades.”
“What about him? What has happened?”
“Nothing yet, but it’s a dangerous time, and we all need to be careful. The shards of Zeus’ crown could be discovered at any time.”
“How can they be found if he doesn’t know where they are?”
“The power of the shards is something we do not understand. They appear to want to be found, maybe by any Olympian in a hope that they can be returned. Zeus found them before, and he will find them again.”
“He will not find them here.”
His eyes lit up as if surprised by her words.
“You have a shard, here?”
“No, of course not.”
He slumped and sighed as if relieved.
“It’s somewhere safe, somewhere well out of reach. Somewhere Hades will never find it.”
He sparked up once more as if excited by the prospect, yet she didn’t understand it.
“What is it?”
Before he could answer the doorbell rang out once more.
“Sorry, hang on a moment. My door has never been so busy since meeting you. You certainly keep me on my feet.”
She rushed past him before he could say another word and tore open the door without any precaution at all. She felt safe with Aaron around the corner. It swung wide to reveal another familiar face, Theodosia.
“Hey, did you bring food?”
“No? Should I have?”
“It sure would have been nice. I’m starving, but hey, come in anyway. Welcome to the workhouse. Long hours and no sustenance is guaranteed,” she jokingly said.
Theo wasn’t sure how to take it and hesitated.
“Come on in!” Grace added in a friendlier tone to be clearer.
She swept the door closed behind her.
“I wasn’t expecting both of you this evening.”
“Both?”
They took the turn into the living room and found Aaron leafing through an antique book that had been lying on the coffee table. Theo paused. Initially excited, but the hair on the back of her neck went up. Something wasn’t right. She couldn’t explain why, but it felt all wrong.
“Grace, that is not Aaron,” she said sternly.
“What?”
“I don’t know how, but that is not our friend. I know it deep down, but also because Aaron is out of the country, and he won’t be back for days or weeks.”
“What are you talking about?” Aaron put the book down and stepped closer toward them.
“Stay back!” Theo shouted.
But he didn’t, and she noticed a large, sharp letter opener on the coffee table. It was shaped like a medieval dagger and had a blade several inches long, and of good quality. It was no tourist piece, same as everything else the doctor owned. She grabbed it and thrust it into Aaron’s chest, burying it all the way to the guard. Grace cried out in horror at the scene.
“Theo! What have you done?”
She rushed toward him to help as Theo stepped back to put some distance between them. Grace reached him as he was just putting his hand on the grip of the letter opener. She thought he was in shock, as he hadn’t cried out in pain or even moved.
“Get back!” Theo grabbed her and pulled her away.
“Theo, he needs help. What is wrong with you?”
“Look!”
Aaron was looking up at them with a smile, as if amused by the whole thing. He drew the blade out and tossed it aside as if it meant nothing to him.
“What? What are you?” Grace asked.
“Step aside, Doctor.”
Theo pushed her away. She erupted into a ball of light, conjuring up her armor and Olympian blade by her side. She drew the gleaming blade from its scabbard, and Aaron did not respond at all.
“What is happening here, Theo?” Grace was terrified.
“That’s not Aaron, and it never was.”
Aaron was still staring back at them with the glazed wide eyes of a madman. A moment later his body flickered and fluttered, and began to morph into something else. Grace gasped at what she was seeing, but moments later the figure before them was no longer Aaron at all, but a larger faceless figure, and finally morphed into Hades himself.
“Oh, god,” said Grace.
Theo held her ground, but she couldn’t help but feel the fear Grace was feeling, too.
“Run,” she said, “Run!”
She pushed Grace away, and she carried on going for the front door, as Theo swung for her dreaded foe. He dodged two strikes before stepping into her third. He took hold of her wrist and struck one powerful punch to her face that struck like a sledgehammer. He threw her across the room, and she crashed into a display cabinet. Glass and china shattered all about. Grace had just reached the front door when she heard the crash. Her hand reached for the latch, ready to run, but she hesitated and looked down at the sword in the umbrella stand.
Theo got back to her feet but was feeling the effects of the blow. She’d lost her sword and was a little disorientated from the impact, but Hades closed on her quickly. She tried to throw a punch, but his hand was around her neck in no time. She grabbed hold of his hands and tried to pull them away, but he lifted her onto her toes. She could no longer get any leverage against him at all as she began to suffocate.
Seemingly out of nowhere a blade crashed over Hades’ head and opened up a deep cut. He lost his grip and staggered back. Grace was behind him with her saber in hand. He looked furious and growled like a wild animal.
Theo was on her knees gasping for air, but her eyes locked onto the sword she’d dropped. She picked it up and rushed forward, thrusting the blade into Hades’ back. He let out a deafening shriek in pain as he twisted and turned and staggered across the room. Theo and Grace watched in despair but also hope. Hope that he was finished, or that at least the attack was over.
He drew out the blade and tossed it aside in disgust before turning to one of the windows. He ran at it and crashed through the glass. Theo rushed to the window ledge, but by the time she reached it, he was gone. All that remained was the scattered glass and blood. She reached down and picked up her blade, staring at the blood on it.
“How? How can Hades just come into my home, looking like Aaron, and I don’t even know it?”
“He can’t,” she replied as she studied the blood.
“What do you mean?”
“Hades is many things, but he is no shape shifter, and this blood, it is not of an Olympian.”
“What are you saying?”
“That we aren’t fighting Hades at all. It’s something else.”
Chapter 12
Aaron yawned as he stepped out into the training space for the fifth day in a row. Although his body was sore, he was getting used to the increase in pace and felt invigorated by it. He noticed Aldred leaning against a building nearby, watching the earliest risers begin stretching and preparing for the day. Aaron still had so many questions, and it seemed the perfect time.
“You have questions?” Aldred approached him.
“Is it that obvious?”
“We all seek answers and knowledge, all of the time. You have a few moments before you
begin training. Use them wisely.”
“Okay,” Aaron smiled, “When I came looking for you, I thought to find someone living in complete isolation from the world, living the old ways. Like the last tribes that remain out of contact in the most isolated parts of the world, but what I found, well, it was nothing like I expected. You have access to firearms, body armor, and so much knowledge about the outside world.”
“That is not a question.”
“Why do you still use swords? Why do you still train in the old ways?”
“The ability to use a sword extends one’s own abilities into many walks of life. Control over one’s body in all things can be formed in the knowledge of the old ways.”
“So, it’s not about using them in the real world, but tradition, conditioning, and control of the body?”
“Not entirely. Use of a dagger, a sword, a staff, and your own hands and feet are useful skills in this world. The bladed weapon may no longer be of use on the battlefield, but we do not fight on the battlefield.”
“Where do you fight?”
“Enough questions, it’s time for training.”
Aaron didn’t argue it and went over to a rack of training weapons. He took a dussack. He began working slowly through another of the drills as he warmed his body up.
“Not today!” Aldred said.
Aaron looked surprised. Ava had just reached the rack of training weapons when she stopped to watch what was unfolding.
“What would you have me do?”
“It is time to test how far you have come.”
“In a few days?”
“Indeed, it would not be enough to make a good swordsman from scratch, but you were no beginner when you arrived here. You had the knowledge of techniques required to go far. What you lacked was focus. The ability to best apply what you already knew.”
“How can that have changed in a few days of solo practice?”
Aldred paced up before him with a dussack in his hands. Aaron was upright and relaxed, with his dussack down by his side, waiting for the next command. But out of nowhere Aldred attacked him from behind. Aaron’s blade had come up to defend before he’d realized what was going on. He’d countered before thinking of a response. His blade stopped at Aldred’s neck, who had left it open for him to land his riposte. The dussack stopped within a hair’s breadth of Aldred’s neck. He was shaking with adrenaline but marveling at what he had done.
“Now do you understand? You came here as a competent swordsman, a swordsman who knows what to do and when, and why you are doing it. But to be great, the responses must flow thought your veins, so that each action is as easy as walking and natural as breathing. Now you’re starting to become what you had the potential to be.”
Aaron drew his hand back and just gazed at it in disbelief. He’d never moved so quickly or so naturally. He felt no fear, no stress, or pressure for what may come at him. He’d responded as if someone else were controlling him. He’d been worked so hard over the last few days he hadn’t realized what they were working toward or what was being achieved.
“Being a master does not mean knowing everything. It means being masterful at the things you know.” Aldred smiled, content that his new student had progressed just as he had foreseen.
“Was that the test?”
Aldred began to laugh.
“No, that was only for you to see how far you have come, so that you don’t doubt yourself in your next challenge.”
“Next challenge?”
“It is time for you to face a live opponent once again.”
“Wolfgang?”
“No, he is still far beyond you. But we will test you under a different kind of pressure. Not against a stranger, but against a friend.”
He was relieved, as he looked at Ava. They’d fought so many times it was the best news he could have had.
“Not her,” he added.
They both looked confused.
“Then who?”
Aldred pointed to a doorway where a figure of a man appeared dressed as one of the Brotherhood. A dark hood covered his head, making him a mysterious figure. There was something familiar about him and the way he moved. He stopped to draw back the hood and reveal his face.
“My god,” Aaron whispered, his eyes lighting up upon seeing Luca’s face.
He smiled in response.
“How did you get here? How did you find this place?”
“I didn’t. They found me.”
Aaron looked to Aldred for answers.
“You reached out to him, but not us?”
“Because he was lost and in need of a path. You found us on your own.”
Aaron groaned. “All that work, all that effort, and you could have just got in touch?”
“We all have a path to walk. This was yours.”
“I’d have been dead without them,” said Luca.
“What?”
“I went looking for trouble, and I found it. It almost cost me my life.”
But then it struck Ava, they must now know more than they were letting on.
“If he’s been here all this time, you must have known about Hades and the gods well before we arrived?”
“Yes.”
“Then why act surprised when we told you?”
“It was not about what we knew, but what you were willing to tell us.”
“So you wanted to know if we came here with honest intentions?”
“Yes. If you had come here to gain the knowledge of the Brotherhood under the pretense of joining us, while never intending to, you would not have made it out alive.”
“We were honest, and still you said we may not make it out alive?”
“Yes.”
Aaron couldn’t help but laugh. He could tell they were being serious, and yet had to make light of it.
“You’re going to let us leave, because you know this is a fight worth fighting. One that has to be fought.”
“Perhaps. Every day you spend here furthers the risk of your friends losing the war. We cannot make you a into god, but we can make you better that you ever were.”
It was a relief to him. That after all the tough love, they had been intending to do the right thing all along, so long as he remained honest and true.
“Then I am all yours. Command me, and make me the best version of myself.”
Aldred pointed to Wolfgang, each knowing exactly what the other meant. He took two steel dussacks from the training racks. They were in size and form just like the polymer trainers, but these were sharp and proper fighting weapons, despite how simply their form was. Wolfgang handed one to each of them, taking Aaron’s training sword from him, and leading the two of them to the center of the circle. All the others backed away. Aaron looked to Aldred for what he was expecting of them.
“Fighting an enemy can be a daunting task, but fighting a friend is worse. This will test your skills to the limit, and apply a level of pressure you cannot imagine.”
“I’ve trained with sharps before.”
“This is not training. This is a fight. You will fight for your lives, and will not stop until one of you is victorious.”
“You want them to kill each other?” Ava gasped.
“I want them to prove their worth.”
She looked distraught, but Aaron shook his head, gesturing for her to stand down. He had to believe in Aldred and the Brotherhood, or the reason for coming there was moot. He had to believe they had his best interests at heart, despite all evidence to the contrary. He wanted to tell Ava that once more, but he could tell she already knew and remembered.
“Fight until victory, do not hesitate. Until that moment, you are not friends. The man in front of you is an obstacle to you reaching your potential. An obstacle to you reaching a level that you can expect to win your war with Hades. Begin!”
“This isn’t the club anymore. If you want to get what you came here for, you won’t hold back,” said Luca.
He was cold and stern in a way Aaron had never see
n him before. He was a different man now. Not just from the experiences in the war against Hades, but whatever Aldred had put him through, too. He looked into his eyes and wondered if the same man was still in there. More worryingly, he wondered if that meant he’d have the same care for a friend’s life that he used to. Luca came at him first, aggressively, but not wild. He cut diagonally from high to low, and then the same on the far side. They were nothing more than opening cuts to test the water and look for his response. Aaron backed away from both, but Luca followed it with two low cuts, and he traversed away, making no contact with the blade at all.
Luca’s attacks were predictable and uninspired. That wasn’t his character at all, and Aaron doubted any practice the Brotherhood had given him would make him that way. It was an act, nothing more than a means to draw him in to making a mistake. Luca came forward once again with two cuts from low, and Aaron traversed away as before. This time Luca spun about and closed off the line, throwing a powerful horizontal cut for his neck in the direction he was using to escape the opening cuts. The ploy didn’t surprise Aaron, but the speed and precision with which it was conducted and how he transitioned did.
Aaron ducked under the cut with nothing more than instinct. It was not a sense of self-preservation, but a level of training encased in his very being. Aldred was right. He did need to make these actions as natural as breathing and walking, and he had. He’d never moved so smoothly and effortlessly. It felt more like a dance than a fight, and it was his turn to apply pressure. He thrust forward, but as Luca parried his blade, he turned his wrist and cut powerfully around to the head. Luca parried that off and returned with his own high cut. Aaron stepped out from it and returned a thrust at his face.
Luca cut against it with an ascending cut, but Aaron turned his blade and pushed down. Stepping in, he controlled Luca’s weapon by pressing down against the hilt and cut around at his face. He ducked under it and came back up with a cut from below. Aaron beat it down with a powerful suppressing cut and thrust forward. Luca stepped out of it and turned to reset them in their original positions, both unharmed. They knew they had to continue, but for a moment they took a breather and reassessed each other.
Fallen Gods II Page 16