War of Men

by Rhett C. Bruno

  “So, you’re not going to kill Sora, but you have to kill the goddess inside of her?” Lucindur said. “What do you plan to do?”.

  “Yeah,” Whitney said. “Please tell me you had some time to think on your teleportation over here.”

  Sigrid feigned a lunge at him, and Whitney staggered back.

  He held his chest as he caught his breath. He’d seen so many horrible things, enough not to be afraid of much. But something about immortal beings who feed on blood always got to him.

  “Can you tell your apprentice to stop doing that?” Whitney said. She traced his back with her index finger, causing him to shudder. When he whipped around, she was no longer there.

  “She’s learning the true nature of men,” Kazimir said.

  “She’s playing with her… food,” Whitney amended.

  “Can you two focus for one minute?” Lucindur asked, stomping on the wood floor.

  Just then came a growl. Two eyes appeared over the railing. He heard Gentry whisper something incomprehensible, then Aquira swooped down at Kazimir. It’d been a long time since Whitney had seen her so furious.

  Her throat swelled, then fire lanced out at Kazimir. He drew one of his many knives just as fast, spun and pulled up his cloak, dispelling the flame. Aquira slashed the side of his neck on her way by. Sigrid, with impossible speed, moved to defend her master, and swatted Aquira so hard, she cracked the floor upon impact.

  The little wyvern didn’t give up. Then, Whitney remembered that the last time she’d seen Kazimir. he’d been immensely more evil. Aquira reared back and blew flame again, searing the side of Sigrid’s face and heating the metal of her muzzle.

  “I knew he couldn’t be trusted!” Tum Tum shouted, leaping over the staircase banister, warhammer raised high and already crashing toward Kazimir’s head. The upyr caught the dwarf by the hand and slammed Tum Tum down. Simultaneously, Whitney dashed in front of Aquira before she razed the entire pub.

  “Enough!” Lucindur bellowed. She strummed a hard chord on her salfio and, as if by magic, everyone stopped. “I never wanted to use my ability, and now, for you, I have, and all you want to do is argue?”

  She stared straight at Whitney. He looked from side to side. “Me?”

  “Yes, you,” Kazimir added.

  “Get off me, monster!” Tum Tum snarled. He shook free, then ran across the floor to a crate that’d caught fire from Aquira’s spray. He swore as he patted it down with a tarp he’d pulled off another.

  “I’m so sorry, Mr. Whitney!” Gentry said, at the top of the stairs. One step down and he froze in his tracks. The way Sigrid ogled him, like he was a fattened hog—that would have given young Whitney nightmares forever.

  “Back upstairs, Gentry,” Whitney said.

  “Yes, child. And take that infernal beast with you.” Kazimir regarded Aquira, who dug her claws into the floor and snapped her jaws.

  “I know what you must think, girl,” Whitney said, “but he’s here to help bring back Sora. Do you remember her—Sora?”

  The wyverns head cocked, then she stopped growling.

  “Yeah, exactly,” Whitney said. “We need him. She needs him. It will all make sense soon.”

  Her ferocious glare lasted a few seconds more, then she flapped up to the bottommost railing post of the stairs. Sigrid watched her every move, and Aquira perched to glare at all of them. It was like being surrounded by misbehaving children, Tum Tum included.

  “She understands?” Kazimir asked.

  “I think so,” Whitney said.

  “Interesting.”

  “Now that everyone is relaxed, I’d like to hear the upyr’s plan,” Lucindur said. She crossed her legs and sat, her instrument laid across her lap.

  “You don’t have to be a part of this anymore, Lucy,” Whitney said.

  “I opened your minds to each other through Elsewhere, and a blood pact was made on a goddess. I think if any creature under her command overheard, I’m already very well involved.” There was no missing the frustration in her tone, as if Whitney could have predicted any of this. He was a thief—the fact that he was the greatest in the world notwithstanding—and now people thought he was supposed to know everything?

  “I have no idea how to destroy Nesilia,” Kazimir admitted.

  “So I did all this for no reason?” Whitney asked.

  “I didn’t say that,” Kazimir said. “I believe I know where to start. But it won’t be easy.

  “Never is,” Whitney said.

  “Please, Kazimir. Enlighten us,” Lucindur said.

  “We must go to the Red Tower. Inside, there is a pool.”

  “The Well of Wisdom,” Lucindur offered.

  “Yes. If there is anywhere in this world that can tell us how to separate the two, it is there. She and Iam exiled many of their kin during the God Feud. The Well does not forget.”

  “That tower was abandoned long ago,” Lucindur said. “How do we even know the Well hasn’t dried up?”

  “If this realm yet stands, the Well is not dried up. And no… the tower has not been abandoned.”

  “How do you know this?” Lucindur asked.

  “It may not appear with luster as it once had, but I assure you… I can feel its power even now. My people, the Dom Nohzi and the Mystic Order… they are two sides of the same coin. Their blood, calls to my kind. If the Buried Goddess can be stopped without taking Sora’s life, our only chance is in that tower. So much began there.”

  Whitney stood and clapped his hands. “So, let’s go. I have a boat just outside.”

  “I told you, it won’t be easy. Balance must be maintained. Nesilia is likely already aware of your plan, and she is not going to lie down for it. Have you noticed anything strange lately?”

  “Strange how?” Whitney asked.

  “The mortals have been all but pounding at the doors of our Citadel. If they’d had eyes to see beyond the rocks and trees, they’d have already found it. The goddess stirs, and so do the minions who serve the darkness she seeks.”

  Lucindur and Whitney exchanged a worried look. “The grimaurs,” they both said.

  Kazimir tilted his head.

  “Last night, we were attacked by grimaurs,” Lucindur said.

  “In Panping?” Kazimir asked, eyes narrowing.

  Whitney pointed to the boards on the wall. “Just beyond there.”

  “This is not good,” Kazimir said. “I knew this place smelled… off.”

  “Hey,” Tum Tum remarked, still tending to the damage.

  Sigrid began speaking again, but the muzzle kept it unintelligible. Kazimir raised a hand to quiet her and said, “Nesilia is gaining power once more, and if we are not quick to act, the world will be overrun.”

  There was a crash upstairs, followed by a scream, sounds of struggle. Aquira snapped to life and swept up to the main level.

  “Gentry!” Whitney shouted as he rose and darted for the stairs. When he reached the top, he froze. Gentry stood, bloody sword in hand. Aquira landed on his shoulder, embers flaring around her mouth, but she was too late. The boy stared down at a figure in dirty, red robes wearing a white mask, a red teardrop painted on the left side. The attacker gripped a knife, hand still twitching.

  The front door was ajar, and beyond it, the sound of chaos reigned. Whitney ran and stopped in the doorframe. Beyond the front patio, more red-robed figures frolicked through the streets, laughing and rioting, all wearing those infernal masks that Whitney hoped never to see again.

  Nesilia’s cultists had come out to play, and where they played, the world fell into ruin.

  X

  The Daughter

  Gentle waves lapped at a tiny beach carved into the rocky coast along the mouth of Trader’s Bay. Mahi crawled, feeling the black grains of sand scraping her knees. Every breath was a struggle. Fighting in Tal’du Dromesh never lasted long but real war… she now understood her father when he called it a ‘test of endurance.’

  She flipped onto her back, struggled to prop
herself up with an elbow, and observed the watery battleground. The fog had lifted, but thick pillars of smoke still swarmed as the slowly sinking warship burned, passing the fire to other damaged ships and debris.

  It wasn’t Mahraveh’s intent, but the strait would be blockaded by the debris for a long time. Only three of her own ships survived the onslaught of Drav Cra longboats, and none of the Glass Kingdom’s had. They were piles of charred and split wood poking through the water like an archipelago of destruction. She saw the Shiva among them, just a torn sail flapping in the wind.

  Longboats slid onto the beach one at a time, Mahi’s people covering them like barnacles, even hanging off the sides. Their victory had been found in numbers. The reinforcements from Winde Port had provided a scare, but the Glassmen couldn’t maintain their formations on the shaky decks of sinking ships where they were so clearly unaccustomed to sea battles.

  In the end, Mahi’s fleet may have been in shambles, but her army wasn’t. And her main concern was eased when she saw Afhem Tingur being helped off a longboat onto the beach alongside his men. She couldn’t afford to lose her most potent ally, not yet.

  The warriors began to celebrate as more and more of them reached black sands. They hollered at the battleground, calling upon the love of the God of Sand and Sea as so many tributes of life sank to the depths. All that death would become a haven for fish and coral—a new reef. The creatures of the sea would grow and feed the Shesaitju—a cycle of life offered by a merciful god.

  Mahi whispered a prayer as she let the wet sand fall through her fingers in clumps. Then, she spotted Yuri seated alone on a rock. Really, she heard him first as he hacked and coughed uncontrollably. His fine robes were in tatters and sopping, his gray hair a wild mess. And his hands… they shook like a man who’d never seen battle before, like a proper Glass Lord who’d stay seated safely by his coffers while sending good, young men off to war too many times to count.

  Mahi wanted to spit his way, but instead, found herself overwhelmed with pity.

  It’s not his fault the Glass made him this weak, she thought.

  She stood and approached. “Thank you, Lord Darkings,” she said, leaning on her spear like a crutch.

  He peered up at her, forced a nervous smile, then continued to stare blankly out at the devastation while he returned to his coughing fit.

  An army is only as strong as its weakest warrior, Mahi reminded herself. Another of her father’s innumerable lessons, even though he had no intention of her forsaking her duties as a woman and turning to the sword.

  “Many more would have been lost without your early warning,” Mahi said, moving into his line of sight. “Maybe I underestimated you.”

  “As if I care how a child estimates me,” Yuri grumbled and turned away.

  “This child is all you have.” She tracked with him, and her arm shifted in a way that made her shoulder burn. She clenched her jaw.

  “You should really have that attended to before we continue,” Yuri said after a short pause. “It was an astounding victory, but remember, it is only the first, and now we’re without a fleet. Nearly one thousand of your army is dead.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Setting straits ablaze may be your specialty, but numbers are mine. We’re still in a good position, but unless Nahanab is a massacre, you’ll need the support of more afhems to fight further.”

  “What if they just… leave?”

  “Who?”

  “Your pe—the Glassmen,” Mahi said. “What if we steal their taste for battle and they give up; let us go.”

  “When I knew the boy-king—Pi—he was tainted, bloodthirsty, willing to lock the Caleef away, as you well know. But children are malleable, and I’ve been away too long. So who knows how he is now? Look at you.”

  “What about me?”

  “When I first saw you, I thought you were useless.”

  Mahi could feel her face turn to stone.

  “Now, wait—wait,” Yuri said, stern. “First impressions aren’t always the most important. Let me continue. I wondered, ‘This is the child the legendary Muskigo Ayerabi—the Scythe—has sent us after?’ However, you’re more than a complete waste of life, which is better than I could say for my own flesh and blood who can’t even properly rescue a frail Sidar Rakun.”

  “Are you saying he’s dead?”

  Yuri rolled his shoulders, and his gaze lilted toward the ground. Mahi didn’t know him well, but he was always confident. Always scheming and purporting that he was steps ahead until now.

  “Frail does not mean dead,” he said. “However, I truly, have no idea. It’s been a long time for them not to have been sighted. Knowing my son, they were probably murdered in their sleep by bandits and left on the roadside to rot in the sun.”

  “Do all Glassmen so hate their own blood?” Mahi asked.

  Yuri sighed. “Not all.”

  “I want the truth. Was he ever actually with the Caleef?”

  “Do you really think I would sacrifice everything I have on a lie? Look at me, girl. Sitting on a beach in rags, covered in blood from battle.”

  “It’s not your blood,” Mahi remarked.

  Yuri ignored her. “You think this is where I expected to be as my life dwindles toward its inevitable end? Hitched to a girl fighting her first war and a son whose own daughter fled to Hornsheim rather than be associated with him? Whether or not Bartholomew lives, my good name will die with me.”

  “Good name…” Mahi laughed. “Yuri Darkings, why are you here? You’ve done enough. When my father is free, I’m sure he’d be happy to provide you a home and protection until that day…” She was going to say, ‘until the day the Current takes you,’ but he was pink, no matter his supposed loyalties. “…when your life does, finally, end.”

  Now, Yuri scoffed. He stood, threw his arms up, and walked away. As he went, he declared, “Like I said, not a complete waste of life.”

  Mahi hurried after him. “What are you talking about?”

  “And here you go, chasing me along like a dog in heat.”

  “I only came over to thank you!”

  Yuri whipped around, face red with anger. As if materializing out of the air itself, warriors flocked to Mahraveh’s side, just as they had earlier. Bit’rudam appeared and stuck out an arm in front of her, his teeth clenched like he was about to tear into Yuri’s throat.

  “More men rushing to your aid. Your father will grant me asylum. Your father will drive the Glass Kingdom away. Until you children stop needing us, you’re just anchors. You are an afhem, same as he is.”

  Mahi pushed Bit’rudam’s arm out of the way and stepped forward. “And what would you have had me do?”

  “Be something fresh, because Iam knows I’ve seen enough of the same damn men die and be reborn. The warlords, the idealists, the lunatics. Your father fought his illegal war. He had the entire world holding its breath, and then, he failed like every other worthless rebel since time began. I’ve watched how your people work. I’ve noted every detail. That is what I do. It’s my greatest skill. Your father never lost, until he did. But you haven’t.”

  “My father has accomplished more than you ever—”

  “Don’t even finish that. Because all your father has accomplished is on the battlefield, and unless you people realize there are other routes to greatness besides spilling blood, you’ll always have nothing more than this small corner of Pantego. Great as Muskigo Ayerabi may be, he brought death to many families in the Black Sands who wanted none of it. The Shesaitju will never follow him as your leader.”

  “The Caleef leads our people,” Bit’rudam said.

  “Gods and powerful men…” Yuri’s lip twisted. “Is there anything that holds us back more? You want to defeat the Glass Kingdom? To take back the Black Sands for your own? It’s about more than burning down churches and winning one battle. You need to earn their respect.”

  “I thought you supported this war?” Mahi asked.

  “I do.
” Yuri sighed. “I do. Ignore me. It’s just—you just remind me of someone I knew. Someone who failed me before she could make her mark on this world. She would have been on that ship, headlong in the fray as well.”

  “It’s where an afhem belongs.”

  “You belong alive, Mahraveh al’Tariq,” Yuri said, voice soft. “Not fished out of the water by a failed politician.”

  “He’s lost it,” Bit’rudam whispered to Mahi in Saitjuese. “I’ve seen it. Men in their first battle, losing their heads like they’ve been baking in the desert.”

  “I’ve lost nothing!” Yuri snapped, in rough, but understandable Saitjuese. Mahi’s eyes went wide, along with Bit’rudam and all the soldiers around her. Yuri sneered. “Yes, that’s right. I’ve been here long enough, and I’m a quick study. I hear it—all of it. And I am still here.”

  “Well, perhaps this is where you should stay,” Mahi said. “Watch over this beach so nobody can get behind us.”

  “Gladly.” Yuri pushed by a warrior and reclaimed his seat on the rock. “Just you don’t get yourself killed with that shoulder. Beat the bastards and let them run. Don’t give chase. Sir Nikserof Pasic is crafty. I’ve watched him train. Don’t let him draw you in, even if he uses your father.”

  “Afhem Mahraveh, we found a passage!” one of her warriors shouted down from a rift in the cliffside.

  Mahi stared at Yuri while the Glassman made himself comfortable. The man perplexed her more than anything, but kernels of truth always seemed to come from his advice. She couldn’t help but wonder what woman he could have possibly known that would have been like her. She’d never heard of any pink-skin female soldiers. They kept their women locked up tighter than even her own people.

  When she turned away again, her shoulder pain flared up, and she had to lean on her spear. The shaft wobbled until Bit’rudam steadied it.

  “We must seal that, my Afhem,” he said. “Come. Sit.”

  He led her to a piece of driftwood near where a camp was being set up to hold the supplies they’d been able to salvage. A group of wives and daughters trained in the healing arts were there, helping mend minor wounds. It was where Mahi belonged, or where she’d always been told she did. She couldn’t imagine a turn in her life that ever would have led her to washing blood rather than drawing it.