The Second Coming

by David H. Burton

  Brahm heard a heavy thud beside her. Lya was collapsed on the ground. Behind the girl, upon a chair, stood the stubby man she saw with the beer earlier. He gripped an iron pot in his fat little hand.

  Brahm knelt to grab Lya, feeling for the back of her head. She was relieved to find it undamaged.

  “Imp, I should have known it was you. The beard does not suit you.”

  He took a clumsy bow. “It's been a long time, my lady.”

  White Feather looked at Brahm and then back to the tall man at the door, a look of disbelief on his face.

  The captain marched forward, staring down at her.

  “Brahm. Not a joyous reunion, is it?” He looked at Lya. “Well, I see you have our runaway. God has smiled upon me this day.”

  Diarmuid and White Feather held knife and dagger. Brahm's mouth was agape. In all her years, she never thought she would be faced with this.

  Mason.

  “Brahm,” Diarmuid said with a slow, cautious tone. “Is this who I think it is?”

  She gulped down a knot in her throat. “Yes. It's my brother.”

  Chapter 19

  Brahm came to, her head pounding. The sounds of rushing water inundated her ears, as did the steady creaking of wood. Above her, beams crisscrossed the ceiling, and she traced their path to the smooth curved walls of the ship in which she found herself imprisoned. Her head throbbed as she sat up, but it was no more painful than her rope-bound wrists and ankles. They itched and burned.

  She rolled to her side. Both White Feather and Diarmuid lay close to the wall, unconscious. Lya was not in the room with them. Brahm listened to the groaning of the ship, and her mind sailed through the memories of what had happened.

  Her brother had become much better with a sword than she had ever thought possible. After a short skirmish, he disarmed Diarmuid. And White Feather had been no match for nine Confederation Guards. She closed her eyes as the memory of it stung. She had been useless, barely able to stand, let alone fight. And in that fucking dress, without weapons, she might as well have knelt at her brother's feet. She still felt the pain from the blow he had dealt to her at the back of the head. She remembered the look in his eyes when he had struck her. It hurt him to capture her, but the pain that lingered in his eyes was from the wound she had inflicted when she left his side so long ago.

  She looked at White Feather. As she stared at his long frame huddled on the floor she wanted to reach over and touch him.

  He shuffled and rolled towards her.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  He groaned, and nodded. “You?”

  “I've seen better days.”

  His eyes hinted at anger. “He's your brother?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your brother is Captain of the Confederation Guard?”

  She sighed. This is where it would get painful. “Yes,” she said, “but he wasn't always. He used to be second in command to me.” She braced herself for a torrent of anger.

  His eyes seethed for a moment before he spoke in a low hiss. “So the rumors were true. You used to be one of them.”

  She swallowed the knot in her throat. “Yes.”

  “And to think I … to think … did Gray Wolf know?”

  Brahm nodded. “She took that secret to her grave.”

  “Is it also true you killed her and Two Moon's family?”

  Brahm shook her head and her eyes welled up. “No. I could never have harmed her. She died trying to save Two Moon's family. I begged her not to go with them that day, but they left before I woke. I tracked them to find the wolfen over Gray Wolf. They fled as I approached. Two Moon came out of the woods later to find me kneeling over her dead body and those of his slain parents.”

  “How do I know you're not lying?” He turned his head away. “Does anyone else know?”

  “Diarmuid, Gregor, your mother, and now the Hoyaneh.”

  His face reddened. “Were you planning on telling me?” His voice was low, disappointed.

  The tears ran. “I thought the Hoyaneh would tell you before we left.” She paused, trying to find his eyes, but he averted his gaze. “I’m sorry. I should have told you long ago.”

  He sat in silent disapproval for a time, and Diarmuid stirred. His face was cut and bruised. Mason had shown him little mercy.

  The pepper-haired man groaned. “Ugh. I feel like hell. Are you two okay?”

  Brahm nodded and dried the tears on the shreds of her dress.

  White Feather remained silent.

  “Where’s Lya?”

  The sound of footsteps approaching set them all to silence. Keys rattled outside the door. It groaned as Mason opened it. A young man followed him with a small pail and rag in hand.

  Mason looked them over. ”Clean him up,” he ordered, and the youth ran to wash the dried blood that was caked to Diarmuid's face. His eye was swollen and angry. When the young man finished, Mason ordered him out.

  He walked the perimeter of the hold, his polished knee-high boots clacking on the wooden floor. “Traitors are tried before the High Court and hanged if found guilty. Brahm, your former service to the Confederation may gain you some sympathy, but treason is punishable by death. I am sorry I found you. I hoped we would never meet again. I have no desire to see you hang, but justice must be served.” He struggled to keep his face without expression, but sorrow lingered in his eyes. He adjusted his jacket and flicked something off his shoulder.

  She remembered being like that once. It was her whole life, everything she stood for. She was so principled and so regimented then.

  Until the night she met Sephirah.

  “Where’s Lya?” she asked.

  Mason continued stalking the perimeter. “She will bear witness to your trial so she can remember the price of rebelling against the Confederation, then we will make her one of our own. I've heard interesting things about her abilities. She'll make a good addition to our ranks. We hoped to take that brother of hers as well, but it was not him waiting in the bushes like Breland had hoped. He made a grave error in letting you out with those Hunters, but his actions have been redeemed.”

  Brahm was stunned. “You let her go as bait?”

  Diarmuid's eyes raged. He fiddled with the bandage on his arm. “Paine would be of little use to you.”

  “It does not matter. The Senator has ordered him to be taken alive. His usefulness will be determined later.” He paused for a moment. “What is interesting is how once you took their mother, I now have the daughter.”

  Brahm's brave look slipped into one of disappointment.

  “Did you think I wouldn’t know?” His eyes were unreadable. “You haven't told her, have you? You haven't told her how you killed her mother? How you led an ambush against a band of half-breed rebels and Haudenosaunee, and killed them for conspiring against the Confederation?”

  Brahm hung her head as White Feather's eyes bored through her. The ship's creaking grew louder.

  “Brahm, you shame me. I thought you had at least maintained your integrity. Did you lie your way into Haven?”

  “No,” she said. “Haven knows.”

  “And they still took you in —the Wendigo? And your Haudenosaunee friends; it would seem they didn't know.”

  White Feather turned his gaze from her.

  “They know,” she muttered.

  “And what about the girl?”

  Brahm’s shame was a weight around her neck. “I have not told her.”

  Again the ship groaned and tilted to the left. Brahm adjusted her position to keep from sliding.

  “You killed fifty of our people.” White Feather's voice was coated in rage. “You killed them all. Our people. And the children you stole in the night.”

  Brahm nodded her head, her stomach reeling. She felt nauseous.

  Mason rose. “I must leave you now.”

  Brahm left her head hanging on her chest as the sound of Mason's boots stepped out the door. She never felt so alone as she did in that moment. She hated hers
elf for who she had been, for what she had done, and for those she had killed. And all the children she had taken who now had become the Hunters that terrorized them.

  Diarmuid slid over to her. “Tell him everything.”

  How many times would she have to relive this? When would it be over?

  She sighed. “When Mason and I were young, our parents owned a vineyard outside New Memphis. We were sent off to a Confederation school at a young age. We were taught how witchcraft destroyed us in the Witch Wars and how we should turn in all those that wielded it. They were a menace to be destroyed.

  “In time, both Mason and I showed great physical prowess and one of the instructors decided we should be taken for training. Our parents were thrilled. So, most of our time was spent learning to become the best of the Confederation Guard. What we didn't realize was we were continually being fed Confederation propaganda. I can see it now, but couldn't see it to save my life back then. I suspect Mason still doesn't see it.

  “Eventually I became head of the Guard, and Mason was my second in command. Our network of spies told us of a secret meeting that was to take place between Haven, the Haudenosaunee and the Lastborn. We suspected for some time they were planning on waging a war against the Confederation. It was rumored they brought with them a weapon of incredible power, but we never found it after they were vanquished. We came upon them in the night and killed many in their sleep before they had a chance to raise an alarm. I stood as their judge and executioner.”

  White Feather hung his head, his eyes moist with pain and anger.

  “Among those present was a woman who stood to face me. She had Lya’s eyes and dark hair — her mother. I drove my sword through her before she could summon anything to aid her.” Brahm kept the rest to herself, remembering the feeling that seeped into her as the woman gripped her with hands of iron, smearing her own blood on Brahm's fingers and face. She could still taste her blood and the words she had whispered still haunted her.

  My soul to your soul. We are one, Soul Runner.

  If the woman was capable of forcing her own soul into Brahm’s, what else was she capable of? Could she eventually take over her body?

  “I cannot tell you how sorry I am,” she said, pushing the thought from her mind. “I was another person then.”

  She looked to White Feather. “Gray Wolf forgave me and my past. Though I do not deserve it, I ask the same of you.”

  White Feather continued in his silent rebuke.

  The ship groaned and Brahm's head sagged. Her shoulders heaved and guilt streamed down her face in tears that dripped into the dark violet of her torn dress. Strangely her second soul was not screaming. Instead Sephirah’s soul held Brahm’s in her own and they wept together.

  Chapter 20

  Cherry clouds streaked the late evening sky, and a Confederation ship set sail from the docks. A Firstborn Lord, or what was left of him, watched as the seed of his love drifted south along the currents of the Mississippi. The wooden ship slipped through the waters, like his sanity through his fingers.

  Seventeen. Seventeen. Seventeen.

  He shook his head, and pulled his hood over his black, matted locks. In some dark recess of his mind, he remembered his former life. Dïor, heir to the throne of Valbain. He thought of the woman he had loved, of the woman he had sacrificed everything for. His throne, his power, his life. His heart was tainted with her loss.

  He thought of the child she bore him, and he watched as the babe he once held in his arms sailed downriver.

  I will find her trail again.

  He had tracked them since he was freed of the Westwood’s grasp; his daughter and the dark-skinned woman.

  The same woman that butchered my Sephirah.

  He thought back to Sephirah’s death, and how he had failed to save her, how he had been powerless to stop it. His bitter heart twisted with agony.

  Seventeen. Seventeen. Seventeen.

  He shook his head again, and watched as the ship sailed on. He recalled his ill-fated journey through the Westwood after Sephirah’s death, no longer fearing what the half-breeds and mutants of Lindhome might do to one of the Overlords of Valbain; no longer afraid for his life. For what was life without Sephirah? And in that despair, the Westwood had taken him, knowing him for who he was, and had probed him for endless years.

  Seventeen. Seventeen. Seventeen.

  Seventeen years the Westwood tormented him, reaching with its sinister claws into the depths of his soul. It had sifted little from him. He had refused to let Sephirah’s death be in vain. He held out, with a resolve he never thought he had. And it was while trapped by the Westwood, lost in the agony of time that he had sensed his daughter’s blood spilling on the ground, rekindling something within him. He recognized her power and for the first time in seventeen years hope dangled before him. Yet the Westwood had sensed that hope and mocked him. It would have her, it would take her, it would make her its own.

  He also felt the boy, Lya’s half-twin. And he perceived the Westwood’s loathing and insatiable desire for him as well. Dïor shuddered. That was just before the Westwood devoured Lindhome. It had been his chance to escape and he took it, using the Westwood’s own power to slip through its grasp. For days afterwards he wandered and when he had stitched up what was left of his unraveling sanity, the trail of his daughter was more than a week old.

  Dïor sniffed at the air, the musty smell of his own hair tickling his nose. The trail had taken him far, north of Lindhome and then south once more. He followed through marshes and swamps where he cavorted with the undead and half-men that dwelt in their depths, he swept past towns and villages and through the remains of the Confederation camp where he heard rumor of the Westwood moving — a dark curtain of death and despair that prowled the land. Through it all his thoughts dwelt upon his daughter.

  He thought perhaps the Westwood might come for him; it hadn’t taken everything from him, but that thought was brief. He knew it hunted much bigger prey than he. The Firstborn Lord chuckled, wondering how the Lastborn would fare against the Westwood now that it was free.

  No matter.

  Dïor’s attention turned as Confederation soldiers approached. He slipped into the shadows, becoming one with the darkness. The Hunters passed, failing to notice him, nor sense the darkness that shrouded him.

  Kill. Kill. Kill.

  His fingers danced along the handle of the dagger that hung at his side. Yet he let the Hunters pass, and focused his attention once more on the sailing ship.

  Lya.

  He stirred from the shadows and slunk into the forest, following the Mississippi.

  I come for you, my child.

  ***

  Brahm sat on the deck of The Lady Maiden, the wind stroking her bare scalp. Lya sat next to her, in lighter chains than the ones that shackled Brahm to the rigging. Mason must have assumed that she posed little threat to him.

  Her brother stood behind them as guard, his gaze never meeting hers. His anger was still palpable. She faced back to the water, his rejection taking more of a bite from her than she thought possible. She felt his shame of her, but she held her head high.

  His shame is not mine.

  Lya was absent with her thoughts. Mason had informed the girl of Sephirah’s death; something Brahm had wished he had left for her to do. He obviously felt it his duty. Regardless, Lya asked to join Brahm on the deck and for some reason Mason was inclined to oblige.

  Lya had shown neither kindness nor cruelty, but Brahm accepted her company as a good sign. The guilt of it bore through her heart. She considered telling the girl the rest of the story; about whose soul resided with her own.

  Perhaps it would ease the guilt.

  She held her tongue.

  White Feather was another matter. He distanced himself from Brahm, refusing to even look at her. Where the guilt and shame from Lya tore open her heart, White Feather’s rejection ripped it to shreds.

  Lya briefly clutched at her chest. The pain was not readable on he
r face, but her eyes hinted at something other than the calculated look she usually carried. Whether it was pain or not was another matter. That made Brahm think of Lya’s brother.

  She did not lean over, but looked from the corner of her eye. Mason was some distance away, now talking with Breland. She spoke through her teeth. “Your brother, would he be able to help us? You are twins, can you call to him?”

  Lya shook her head, a slight movement. “Even if I could reach out to him, he is weak, useless.”

  Brahm tried not to wince at the cold words.

  Mason’s boots thumped the deck behind them. She overheard his words. “…we are a day’s journey from New Memphis. We disembark to head northeast to join the rest of the army.”

  New Memphis.

  There were two ports at which to cross the Mississippi easily, where it flowed its thinnest at fifty miles wide. The rest was treacherous. Brahm figured the army must have gone north to cross.

  Strange, she thought. The northern crossings were ill used by the Confederation and how they were going to catch up to the army was something of a mystery. It would be a long walk, indeed.

  Mason appeared briefly hurt as he stared towards the direction they sailed. Then he uttered something she never expected.

  “Why did you leave?”

  He shifted behind her, the sound of his boots clicking the deck.

  Brahm answered, as if eager to tell him. It was cleansing.

  “I was sent to investigate a rumor about a Missionary that was attacking the Hunters and leading witches to Haven. We knew about the Missionaries, but there was one who was better skilled than most; one who seemed able to call the wild things of the forests for aid. It was thought Haven had a new weapon to fight the Hunters. So I went to find out for myself.”

  A squawk and fluttering of feathers turned her attention. Brahm rolled her eyes.

  Stupid gull.

  Yet she recognized the opportunity, and opened her mind to its thoughts. The images and instincts spilled from its simple mind — flashes of a hooded darkness skirting the trees, something akin to the Westwood. She sensed the gull’s fear. She then gave it a message to relay to the Haudenosaunee, to alert them of her situation. The white bird squawked once more, and she remained open to its thoughts as she continued with her story.