Vassal

by Sterling D'Este

  Tristan sighed and leaned back, rolling his eyes. “Lucky us. The mouse is back. Did you like our dance?” he teased. “You were most… stimulating.”

  Alphonse blushed, as she was certain everyone would have expected. She remembered the dance. But she also remembered how elated Enyo had been, how comfortable she felt in Tristan’s arms.

  The way Alphonse felt with Delyth. Most of the time.

  She glanced up through thick lashes at Tristan, trying to figure out what it was the rogue had that the Goddess felt so at home with. He was strong, and she could tell he was handsome, even if not to her taste, but he was arrogant and…

  Well.

  He wasn’t truly afraid of Enyo. And that was something neither Delyth nor Etienne could claim.

  “I would say the same of you, but I think Enyo did most of the work,” Alphonse murmured. The insult came out softly, nearly sounding like a compliment.

  Alphonse heard Etienne snort and watched as Tristan let a slow smile spread across his face. “So long as you enjoyed it— So do any of you have any other ideas for entertainment in mind? I’m certainly not going to fight through this snow today.”

  Alphonse glanced towards the cave mouth, and the precious shield Enyo had been thinking about destroying. Indeed, the storm seemed to have died down, but now, snow was piled up at the entrance, across the road, weighing down trees…

  It would be desperately difficult to get through.

  But it was summer, despite Enyo’s tantrum. The sun would come back out, and without further clouds and snow, the ice would melt, and travel would be smoother. Perhaps in a day or two.

  She felt her stomach grumble and settled her hand over it, silently commanding it to shush. “I suppose we could continue the storytelling contest.”

  Delyth tucked her wings in close and repositioned herself by the fire. Beside her, Tristan nodded. “Of course, we already know who’s won the contest, but I suppose we’ll have to hear from others before it can be made official.”

  Etienne rolled his eyes. “Do you ever listen to yourself? It's obnoxious.”

  They were going to get into it again if someone didn’t stop them. “Are you ready to tell your story, Alphonse?” Delyth asked.

  “I— well. Alright. I know a story.” Her own story. She resettled her skirts and folded her hands in her lap, waiting for the boys to quiet down.

  She had thought quite some time about what story to tell when her turn came, and so Alphonse had decided on the story of her first patient, one she treated without consulting other students or being told what to do by her masters at Moxous. His care had been handed to her alone, and his recovery had been one of her greatest achievements.

  Thinking it a good story, one that would uplift everyone’s spirits, Alphonse felt comfortable enough to share it, though it was a bit personal.

  “Healers being trained at Moxous must study for years before being tested. And tested again. And then even more after that. The art of healing is sacred and precise, and so the masters at Moxous ensure only the best practitioners receive their first set of marks.” She indicated her brow, which glowed faintly in the limited light of the cavern. It might have seemed like Alphonse was bragging, but only the truth poured from her lips.

  “One of the last tasks a healer in training may receive before being granted their mark is to care for an ailing patient, of unknown illness, entirely on their own. This, of course, is more than a test, for another life hangs in the balance. And if you fail…” You didn’t just fail your studies, but another being who was relying on you for help.

  “Brande was my patient. He was one of the Cabot. In Ingola, we have people who have been changed or gifted with traits unlike humans. Not many, and most of the sea-loving sort. He was one such individual and had come from one of the port cities to look for work.”

  Alphonse folded her hands, eyes gazing off in the distance as she retrieved her memories of Brande. He had skin that looked wet all the time, and teeth that were sharper than normal. His fingers and toes were long and partially webbed, and his nails were sharp. He must have been a tremendous swimmer, but Cabot were not popular amongst Ingolans. And so despite all the ships and docks, he hadn’t been able to find steady work. He thought coming to a larger city like Dailion would increase his odds.

  “The healers at the free healing wards across the city didn’t know what caused his illness, and so they sent him to Moxous for the masters to take a look at. Those masters must have thought his condition not so complex because he became my patient.”

  At first, she had been slightly afraid of Brande. With his silky skin, shark teeth, and long, strong fingers. Eyes that blinked too much, saw too much…

  But as soon as she laid her hands upon his chest and felt the pattering of his heart, she knew he was just another patient that needed healing.

  “I worked with Brande day in and day out. We would start one course of treatment, and see progress, only to find him waning the next week. I studied and studied and found every text I could on his kind. On Cabot.” Sadly, there had been very little written. It seemed not many cared about the health and welfare of Cabot in Ingola. The few texts she had found were mostly due to Etienne’s stubborn hunting. Her gaze shifted to her friend. Her heart faltered at the hurtful words hanging in the air between them. He, of course, knew this story.

  “I lost sleep over it, stayed up many nights with him, watching his wasting body and drying skin. I feared I would lose him. And it seemed so terribly unfair. Not because I would be dropped from Moxous and my own career as a healer set aside, but because from all that I had learned about Brande, he was a very nice man. And he shouldn’t have had to die because a student could not heal him.”

  At that time, Alphonse had begged, begged her Masters to step in. To help Brande.

  They had told her it was her task and her task alone.

  She had come back to Brande’s room, to find him breathing weakly on his cot. He had lost so much weight. His skin was cracking no matter how many baths and lotions and salves she smeared over him. No matter how much magic she poured into him…

  “I asked my masters, but they reminded me of the traditions of Moxous. I had to heal Brande on my own. I came back to Brande’s room, and I’ll admit I was disheartened. I sat beside his bed and held his hand. Sea Cabot have those webbed fingers…” She smiled fondly at the memory.

  “I was weeping.” Of course, she was crying! When was Alphonse not crying? “And my tears fell on his skin. And much to my great surprise, his skin began to glisten and shine as it had before. Just where my tears fell. And then I realized: Salt! My tears were made of saltwater, and his people hailed from the coast. Brande had thought just bathing daily in freshwater would be well enough, but as it turned out, he desperately needed saline. I was so relieved I cried more, which only made him all the better.”

  “Once bathed in brine, his health quickly returned. Brande was able to leave in perfect condition, and I earned my marks.” Alphonse had thought the point of her story was to never give up on yourself.

  But she had wondered, in her darker moments, if there was a more nefarious undercurrent to the happenings at Moxous. Had her masters truly had such unerring faith in her ability that Brande was never actually in danger?

  Or perhaps, they had seen a Cabot and known that if she failed, it would be no significant loss to Ingola? That his life was expendable because he was not what they found valuable?

  Alphonse hated to think of her masters that way, but…

  She smiled a bit. “That is my story.”

  ✶

  Etienne smiled a little sadly as Alphonse’s story came to an end. He remembered the days in which she had struggled to heal her first patient. It had been stressful for both of them; her desperate to ease the man’s pain, him scouring through old archives to help.

  The struggles of that time were tiny in comparison to what faced them now—to the task at the temple. He shuddered and glanced at Alphonse. They had ch
anged so much. And not particularly for the better.

  Across the fire, Delyth was staring at Alphonse with wide eyes, her face drained of color. “In Ingola, I would be a Cabot?” she asked, her voice hushed. “There—there are others who are not exactly human?”

  Tristan snorted at this. “What, did you think you were the only one?” It was clear that he thought she was ridiculous.

  “I’ve never met another,” she shot back.

  Etienne wondered what that was like, but shook his head after a moment. He couldn’t imagine being the only one like—like that. Then a curious thought struck him: How did she learn to fly?

  Was it the sort of thing you were just born knowing how to do, or did you need someone to teach you? Had she learned by trial and error? He resolved to ask her if he ever got a chance.

  ❀

  Alphonse nodded slowly in sad realization. Delyth had truly not known any of her own kind? She had said she was raised in the temple, but for some reason, Alphonse had thought there would be other priestesses with wings and mighty swords.

  “Yes. Cabot simply means… mixed.” Well, actually, it meant something a bit more derogative than that, but the effect was the same. Not fully human. They were rare, but not unheard of. Dailion certainly had a handful that she saw regularly.

  Brande had been the first she had touched and interacted with on a personal level, but…

  “I’ve not seen any with your wings before, but I’ve heard of many different types of Cabot. Some who swim, some who can breathe underwater—well…” She wouldn’t get into all of the different kinds.

  Alphonse’s heart whined in pain for her friend. She now lived that life. Alone. One of a kind.

  “I’m sorry, Delyth. I didn’t mean to tell a sad story…”

  She should have just told the story of the time she accidentally transfigured Etienne’s hair into a blooming bush of roses, and he had to walk around for a day and a half with butterflies and hummingbirds chasing him down for a drink.

  ༄

  Delyth supposed Tristan was right. It had been ridiculous to think of herself as the only one. After all, she had to have come from somewhere. Only, she’d heard stories all her life of the monstrous creature that must have been her father. She had never thought there might be people like her. Ordinary, wonderful, working, struggling people.

  And the idea that not only were there others but that there were many different kinds… She struggled to wrap her mind around it. She wanted to meet them, to find them and join them and learn more about them. She wanted to be seen by people who would understand not only what she was but part of what she had gone through. Almost like… well, family.

  “It's not a sad story,” Delyth said slowly. “It was a happy one. You saved this Cabot man, even if… if he was not popular amongst most Ingolans.”

  In her mind, Delyth saw Alphonse’s face looking up at her in the dim light of their tent. ‘Do you think I am not strong enough to stand by your side in such times?’ she’d asked.

  The priestess was sorry she’d ever questioned Alphonse.

  “I— Well, Delyth, do you want to tell a story?” The healer looked decidedly uncomfortable with the attention focused on her.

  Delyth let her eyes drop back to the fire. She wanted to tell a happy story as well, one without any bloodshed. When the right one came to mind, she smiled slightly. The pain that used to come with memories of that time had faded to a sort of bittersweetness.

  “I was late the day I was to be made priestess.”

  She had woken up that morning in a small copse not far from the village proper. It was a balmy spring day, the trees above whispering morning gossip through green leaves, the rough blanket below her a thin barrier from fervent earth.

  And there had been Tanwen, of course.

  They’d fallen asleep naked, as entwined as the roots of neighboring trees. Delyth’s head rested on the clan girl’s shoulder. Tanwen’s thigh pressed between the halfbreed’s legs. Both were soft with sex.

  Delyth had just lain there for a time, drowsy and content, until the memory of what they had to achieve that day came rushing back to her.

  “At the temple where I was raised, warrior trainees were permitted to try for the rank of priestess every year, starting at sixteen. We called the series of tests `Y Treialon.’ The Trials.” She looked up from the fire at Alphonse. “I was eighteen the first time I was permitted to run.”

  Although Tanwen could not be made a priestess, she had begged leave to participate, to test herself. No one turned her down. Tanwen was slated to rule over her clan one day. But despite her obvious eagerness for the Trials, the clan girl had made getting up and dressing that morning all but impossible, pressing kisses to Delyth’s body even as she tried to clothe it.

  When they finally arrived, they were both panting and red-faced, their hair disheveled. They only just made it before the start of the first Trial, trailed by the disapproving glares of their elders. Tanwen had been too rapturously excited to care, dismissive both of the older warriors and Delyth’s fretting.

  “The Trials were composed of three parts. The first was an obstacle course of sorts, a trail that ran into the surrounding mountains, pitted with traps and leaps and climbs. I was never strictly prohibited from flying, but I refused to do so. I didn’t want to finish only for someone to claim that I could not qualify.”

  Delyth and Tanwen both had sprinted from the starting line at the call to begin. All who finished the Trials made the rank of priestess, but it was a point of pride to complete them first.

  “We—That is myself and—and an old friend, finished this first Trial quickly. The second took more care. We had to find a route through an area guarded by older warriors. Detection meant failure.”

  In the nights before the Trials, that was the part that had kept Delyth up worrying. She was not stealthy by nature: her height and massive wings made quiet crouching awkward and uncomfortable. The Trial itself had proven less difficult than she’d imagined, however.

  “It was less a test of stealth than one of cleverness,” she continued. “We paused for a time, hidden in the trees, and worked out the pattern in which the patrols walked the field. Then, we simply went through where they were not.

  “The final contest was a test of skill. We had to fight a number of warrior priests, older and more experienced. They were just supposed to test us, to let us pass after we had proven ourselves, but each I met seemed to fight me with their full strength.”

  Delyth remembered little about this point of the Trial except for her anger. They had tried to keep her from their ranks, tried to force her to back down. Delyth, who had lived and served at the temple every day from the time she could walk.

  “One by one, I fought through them. Tan—my friend, gained ground ahead of me. Those behind us began to catch up. I could not bear to let them pass me. I had to be first. I had to prove beyond any doubt that I had earned my right to walk as one of them.”

  She swallowed. Though distant now, the longing to be accepted by the other warrior priests was heavy in her chest.

  “I threw myself forward with renewed vigor, fought with abandon. And finally, pushed through the last of the priests. My friend reached the end before me, but she was the only one.”

  Tanwen, eager and exhilarated and careless, had thrown her arms around Delyth as the halfbreed finished. In some ways, it’d been the beginning of the end for them, but at the time, she’d only felt victorious.

  “I was made a priestess of the temple at Glynfford that night.”

  Her name had been called first, in the end, as Tanwen could not take a place among them. The feast had lasted hours, her memories of it jumbled from excitement and alcohol. She’d danced. Heard her name called. Slipped into darkness to find Tanwen’s mouth, honeyed from mead…

  It had all changed so fast after that.

  ❀

  Alphonse had listened raptly as Delyth spoke. She found herself staring at the priestess unwavering
ly and even leaning forward, looping her arms about her knees to rest her chin atop. To the healer, this was the best story because Delyth had claimed her rightful place in the temple through nothing more than her own will and determination. Years of hard work and dedication. Alphonse had only found a cure for Brande because she was weeping in defeat.

  And Tristan had been greedy in stealing from those dragons.

  But Delyth… She fought for the rights they should have given her in the first place.

  Her lips trembled in emotion, and Alphonse struggled to find the words, a way to express what she was feeling and thinking.

  She coughed, hastily wiping her eyes on her skirted knees before trying.

  “Is that when they gave you Calamity?” Her voice was partially choked with raw feeling.

  ༄

  “No, aderyn bak,” Delyth said. Her eyes searched Alphonse’s face fervently. Was the healer upset? It had been meant to be a happy story. “I wield Calamity only so that I might protect you. I received the sword a little more than a week before we met.”

  At her side, Tristan yawned, wider and more noisily than necessary. “How sweet,” he drawled. “The little halfbreed fighting her way to acceptance.”

  Etienne just looked thoughtful. For once, he didn’t take the opportunity to snap at Tristan. “How did they know then, that Enyo had been summoned?”

  Delyth did not particularly want to share just how… sentient the sword was. If Enyo found out that the priestess had been using Calamity to track her, she might make it impossible for Delyth to continue doing so. Instead, she told them a half-truth.

  “The temple had a seer named Cerys who received visions of Enyo’s coming. I was chosen because I could handle the sword without becoming a slave to its bloodlust.”

  At the time, Delyth had been proud of this. Now she wondered if it wasn’t simply because the same bloodlust coiled in her own breast, fighting for release.

  ❀

  Alphonse shivered at that. She couldn’t remember what it felt like precisely, to hold Calamity, but she did know how dearly Enyo loved the blade. Desired it.