by Davis Ashura
Jessira dismounted and turned to face Rukh. “Do you plan on killing them yourself?” she challenged.
“If I have to,” Rukh replied, wearing a dismissive smile. “Why? Are you feeling scared?” He knew he sounded like a jackhole, but right now, he didn’t much care. He was caught up with the need to inflict pain, a desolate and empty desire to hurt. It was a strange feeling. Bloodlust wasn’t part of who he was.
“Don’t be an ass,” Jessira snapped. “The women of Stronghold don’t cower behind their men. We aren’t frail flowers.”
Jessira was irritated with him—he deserved it—but even more, she was determined. He realized Jessira’s pride must have taken a beating on their journey to Ashoka when she’d been unable to defend herself. Instead, she had to rely on Rukh’s sword for protection. It must have been humbling for such a strong women.
“You aren’t frail," Rukh said softly. “Besides, it’s just one nest. I won’t get hurt,” he added in an offhand tone. It was the wrong thing to say. He sensed an argument brewing, and he sighed. “Fine. When they show up, tell me which ones you want to take. I’ll deal with the ones who are left.”
Jessira still looked annoyed. “Just don’t do anything too foolish. I don’t want to see you hurt.” She Blended more deeply, disappearing entirely from Rukh’s view.
During their journey so far, the Blends they had used had been thin, meant to be good enough to hide them from a perfunctory examination. The Blend Jessira now used was the deepest possible for her. It hid her entirely. It also required more Jivatma, and as a result, was far more taxing.
Rukh reached for her Blend and Linked with it. She was crouched near the corner of the rocks, sword sheathed, arrow nocked. She looked focused and ready.
“Now who’s planning on taking on the entire Nest?” he asked.
Jessira glanced his way and rolled her eyes. “Unlike some, I’m not stupid.”
Rukh grunted acknowledgement and settled down behind her as they waited for the Ur-Fels. Rukh studied their trail east but was distracted by Jessira’s close presence. Her cinnamon scent, her breathing…he eased away from her even as he told himself to pay attention to the job at hand.
Just then, she looked over her shoulder at him, an intent expression on her face. She gripped the front of his pants, just above a knee and gave it a tug. Rukh shuffled forward.
“The Ur-Fels should be spread out. This won’t be like the Hunters Flats,” she said. “Those Chimeras weren’t aware of our presence. These will be. They’ll be cautious.”
“What do you suggest?” Rukh asked, doing his best to ignore her hand resting still on his leg.
“Get the drop on them from above.” She gestured. “Can you climb the monoliths and circle around the Ur-Fels?”
“Cut them down from behind so none of them escape to warn the rest of their brethren,” Rukh said, guessing her plan. At her nod of agreement, he continued. “I can do it.”
“Be careful,” Jessira replied, staring him in the eyes. “I know how good you are, but you’re reckless.” Her hand slid down to his knee, briefly squeezing it. “I mean it.” She let go of his leg and faced forward again.
Rukh’s knee tingled from where her hand had squeezed it, but he forced himself to concentrate on the work at hand. He Blended as deeply as he could and swiftly ascended the rubble of bleached boulders and ragged stone monoliths. Upon descending to the other side, he ran parallel to where Jessira crouched and slightly diagonal to where they had been traveling. Rukh searched for a place to hide as he ducked alongside the gully formed by the snowmelt.
There.
Upon the wide shelf of a large, solitary stone, plinth-like in shape, sat a boulder. Behind it was a ledge, easily wide enough for him to crouch and remain hidden while he waited for the Ur-Fels. He climbed atop the monolith and hid, smiling in anticipation.
Soon enough, he heard the sound of movement. He peered over the top of the boulder. Here came the Nest. Fifteen of them, spread out in a line fifty yards wide. It was more Ur-Fels than he had anticipated. The original plan had been to allow the Chimeras to pass him by and let Jessira pick them off. The survivors would then be driven back toward Rukh, but with this many Ur-Fels, it wouldn’t work. The Chimeras wouldn’t run from Jessira. They’d attack.
Rukh would have to thin out the Ur-Fels before they came upon Jessira.
He waited as the nearest Ur-Fel approached. He was about to leap forward, but another sound came to him, a harsh guttural growl. A Tigon. Rukh looked for them and saw five of them crouched low, running on all fours from boulder-to-boulder. He frowned in consternation. The fragging cats changed everything. He had to attack with Fireballs. He didn’t see any other option.
Rukh just hoped this wasn’t an even larger hunting party than he and Jessira had initially expected. He scanned behind the Tigons and Ur-Fels, worried about Braids. No sibilant cries or hissing sounds of scales dragging across the ground came to him.
This was it then. Fifteen Ur-Fels and five Tigons. It was doable. Blended as he was, he could take apart half the Nest and most of the Tigons before the rest of them even realized they were being attacked.
Rukh’s face relaxed into slack lines of indifference. A gray film seemed to cover his vision. He could take on all the Chimeras. Kill them all, and even if he couldn’t, so what? No one was immortal. Bleakness settled over his heart.
Time to kill.
Rukh stood, sighted the closest two Tigons. Kill them first and piss off the rest. He threw two Fireballs, and two of the cats were cooked, screaming as they died. His bow was already ready, an arrow fitted even as the second Fireball screamed through the air. Rukh let loose and killed the nearest Ur-Fel. The nest quickly realized where he must be, and they converged on his position. He conducted more Jivatma, Shielding now. Arrows pinged off it. He held his Blend and drew more deeply from his Well. More Jivatma to speed up his movements. He leapt off the boulder and landed thirty feet away, behind an Ur-Fel. A slash beheaded the foxlike Chimera. Arrows took two more Ur-Fels, those closest to him, leaving him room to work.
Rukh heard Jessira’s scream of frustration. “Damn it!”
Eleven Ur-Fels and three Tigons roared as they raced toward where they thought him to be. But he’d already ghosted away.
As he battled, the darkness in his heart, the futility grown from all he had lost and given, blossomed. It seemed he had all the time in the world to kill these Chimeras. No sympathy for such creatures.
Several more arrows. Down went another Tigon and a couple of Ur-Fels. They thrashed about on the ground.
The hollowing of his spirit—he thought he’d come to accept the losses in his life, but he hadn’t. The emptiness called to him. It was as irresistible as a cold drink in a desert. So easy to give in to its siren song.
Rukh dropped his Blend, letting the Chimeras see him. There were but nine Ur-Fels and two Tigons left and they roared in rage. Two more Ur-Fels fell, arrows in their throats, before Rukh drew his sword. The Chims were too close for the bow, but not a final Fireball. This one took out three Ur-Fels who had foolishly clustered close to one another.
Four Ur-Fels and two Tigons against his sword.
It wasn’t even close. He darted amongst the Chimeras, dealing killing blows almost in passing. Disappointment filled him. It was all-too easy.
He almost dropped his Shield, wanting to tempt Fate to take his life. Thoughts cascaded through his mind. Why not? He was Unworthy, someone worthy of only death. The world wouldn’t care if he died. His passing wouldn’t even merit a footnote in the annals of anyone’s history.
The past five weeks, he’d been fooling himself. He’d gone through the motions of life because it was expected, because Jessira cared and wanted him to live, but all along, he’d known the truth: He should have died in the caverns of the Chimeras. It would have at least been an honorable death. Nothing he’d done since, even saving the lives of all those warriors…what did it matter in the end? Did Devesh approve of his action
s?
Frag Devesh.
Their God hadn’t done anything for Humanity in millennia. And he sure hadn’t saved Rukh from the ugly fate that had taken him from everything he loved and cared for.
His thoughts swirled into thicker and thicker circles of darkness.…
Jessira was there. She fired an arrow at the remaining Tigon, killing him. The remaining Ur-Fel spun around to face her, but she was Blended, hidden from his view. The Ur-Fel shifted his gaze from Rukh to wherever he suspected Jessira to be. Finally, he spun and made to run away. He took two steps before a foot of matte-black, spidergrass blade thrust through his chest, killing him. He gurgled out his dying breath.
Jessira turned to him, a look of fury on her face. Rukh reflexively strengthened his Shield. She looked mad enough to spit him on the spot. “What the fragging, unholy hells were you thinking!” she screamed. “You could have been killed.”
Rukh didn’t have an answer. He dropped his Shield and turned away from her anger, cleaning his sword on the fur of a dead Ur-Fel. His movements were mechanical. The reality of what he had done crashed home. What had he been thinking? Jessira was right to be angry with him. And he’d almost fought the final two Chims with no weapon at all. He flinched. The emptiness inside, so seductive a moment before, now filled him with horror. It was a yawning chasm leading nowhere.
When had he become such a coward?
He realized Jessira was still yelling at him, her features blurred. Her voice seemed to come from an immeasurably far distance, distorted and faint.
A hard slap rocked his head to the side. “You want die? Go ahead, but you aren’t taking me with you!” she shouted.
A tear slid down her face, and he reached forward and touched it wonderingly. Why was she crying? Seeing her pain broke a dam in him, and he shuddered. The world snapped into focus. Clarity returned. He could hear and see her again.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled, numb now. What a selfish thing he’d almost done.
Jessira stared at him, frustration evident on her face. She breathed out a sigh of disappointment. “I know this isn’t easy,” she said, “but it will get better. Just live until that time. Just fight it!”
“I should have died in the caverns,” Rukh muttered. “At least it would have been a warrior’s death.”
The anger left her face, replaced by dawning understanding and compassion. “Oh, Rukh.” She put her arms around his neck, pulling him close. “Promise me you’ll never do anything like that again,” she whispered into his ear.
Rukh worked to get his dangerously gyrating emotions under control before answering. “I promise,” he whispered before pulling away from her, breaking the circle of Jessira’s embrace.
Her face was filled with concern. “Will you be all right?” she asked.
Rukh felt like laughing. He had thought he was all right. He had no idea something so ugly as despair and tiredness of living had made a home in his heart. He’d been so busy pushing through: the expedition to the caverns, the betrayal of Lieutenant Danslo and the other warriors, the battle, the long hike back to Ashoka with days and nights of endless fatigue. And after it was all done: banishment. During the journey to Stronghold, he’d held in all his feelings, smothered them, let them fester until they came boiling out in a way which could have ended his life.
“I don’t know,” Rukh said. The sentiment was the honest truth. He didn’t know if he would be all right. Not now. Maybe not ever. Some vital spark seemed to be gone from his life. His purpose, his reason to exist—it wasn’t there.
“We’ll have to find you a different reason to live,” Jessira said, somehow guessing what he was thinking.
Incur the reckoning now or inherit the debt later. A pinprick pain followed by Tranquility or sloth followed by Self-flagellation. Those are the choices we all must face.
~Our Lives Alone by Asias Athandra, AF 331
Hal’El sat still. An open, unread newspaper was held in his hands, but his attention was captured by Varesea. They had spent an afternoon together in an unoccupied building in Stone Cavern, sharing the intoxicating rush of emotions they found only in one another’s arms. Hal’El could have lingered far longer, but duty pressed. It was then, after they had set aside their pleasure and got to work that Varesea had another attack.
He didn’t know how else to describe it. One moment she had been fine, and the next she was pacing back and forth, her movements harsh and jerky. She occasionally clutched her arms, grasping the fabric of her shirt, almost tearing it. She muttered incomprehensibly, but Hal’El knew what she was saying. “You aren’t real. You aren’t real.”
Hal’El watched in obdurate silence, his face wrought with worry.
The attacks had begun several months after the death of her husband, Slathtril, and were becoming more frequent. When gripped in the madness of such an episode, Varesea would imagine that the wife-beating bastard was still alive. In her mind, Slathtril raved at her, accusing her, berating her, and threatening retribution for what she had done. Sometimes Slathtril’s words were apparently so terrifying that Varesea would tear at her hair, screaming silently with eyes empty of thought. It was frightening to witness, and Hal’El wasn’t a man who frightened easily.
Varesea came to a stop by the cheap, pine table where Hal’El sat. She dug her fingernails into the surface, gouging out a small splinter. It stabbed her finger, raising a blot of blood, but she didn’t notice. Again, she paced.
In times past, Hal’El had tried to hold her, comfort her, soothe her, but it only seemed to make things worse. Varesea would scream gutturally at him, fight him, scratching, clawing, and biting. It was better to let her work it out on her own. And he certainly couldn’t take her to a physician. How? Hal’El wasn’t her relative, nor was he even of Varesea’s Caste. What excuses could he offer to accompany her? There were none. Varesea would have to seek help on her own, but so far she had refused to do so.
She was afraid she might have a delusional episode while seeing a physician. What if she spoke of her relationship with Hal’El or of the Sil Lor Kum? It was her greatest fear, and Hal’El was shamefaced enough to admit that it was his as well. On a selfish level, he was glad Varesea hadn’t yet decided to consult a physician.
So instead, he had to watch as the woman he loved struggled to maintain her sanity, all the while afraid she might kill them both during a fleeting slip of sanity. And he could do nothing to prevent such an occurrence. Whatever evil Hal’El might have committed in his life, killing Varesea Apter was one thing of which he was incapable. He loved her too much to see her dead by his hand.
The situation left him feeling helpless, another emotion to which he was unaccustomed.
And on an equally worrying note, Hal’El had concerns for his own sanity. Sometimes he heard whispers on the wind, sounds sensed rather than heard, gone before he could decipher the muffled words. What he knew was that they were voices, a man and a woman.
He could taste their hate.
Hal’El feared who they might be—Felt Barnel and the Cherid woman, Aqua Oilhue. He’d murdered them both, and the possibility that a part of their essences might have stained his mind left him cold with fear. What if Varesea’s fate was to be his own? The Knife stole Jivatma—of this, he was certain—but what if those who were killed by the black blade never truly died? What if they lived on in the minds of their killers, slowly poisoning them until they broke and lost their reason? It was a terrifying thought, but it also went a long way toward explaining why knowledge of the Withering Knife was so limited. Prior wielders of the Knife must have all died, killed by their own burgeoning insanity.
If so, could Hal’El ever risk using it again? He wasn’t sure. And even though the Queen had demanded he kill once more with the Knife, Hal’El was reluctant to do so. He feared what might happen if he did.
Varesea had finally stopped pacing—thank Devesh!—and flopped into the plush couch, the only other furnishing in the room other than the table and chairs. “Slathtril
vows to feast on your flesh,” she said before collapsing into a faint.
Rector Bryce studied the ledgers laid out upon the desk. The books were a record of all the materials stored and eventually shipped out from the warehouse in the Moon Quarter of which he had titular oversight. At first, he had been unable to make any sense of the accounts. The records were kept in an indecipherable language, and for a time, Rector had been sure his accountants had played a trick on him, passing on ledgers written in gibberish.
It hadn’t been the case, and perhaps Rector would have realized it sooner if he had actually tried to understand the accountant’s code when first confronted with it. Instead, since he had deemed such work to be beneath him, he had wasted weeks staring resentfully at the books and their notations, unwilling and unable to comprehend their contents. As time passed, Rector finally got out of his own way and began the process of deciphering the confusing mass of columns, rows, numbers, and shorthand scribbling. The logic of the accounting books slowly became apparent, and, to his surprise, the work became enjoyable. It was like solving a puzzle.
Materials were inventoried, both for when they were first placed in the warehouse and for when they were removed. Items were logged on arrival based on quantity, cost, and location and logged out when it came time to ship them. The information was updated daily by the warehouse manager and confirmed on the same day by one of the accountants. It was a simple, but efficient system of record-keeping.
Errors still crept in, but once a quarter, the warehouse underwent an audit of all the materials present within it. On that day, the ledgers were also updated, and any discrepancies were either cleared up or the missing items were deleted from the records. From what Rector had seen, such mistakes were few and far between. The men and women working for House Wrestiva were good at what they did, and per Rector’s inspection of the warehouse, rarely did even a single nail go unaccounted for.