by Charles Dean
They had been using the main floor of the inn, the restaurant and bar portion of Ramon’s old tavern, as Augustus’s new church, and as he stepped down off the stairs, he realized that it was mostly empty. There were two chefs cooking up a breakfast storm in the kitchen, a bartender setting out plates and cleaning silverware and four patrons. Ling’s dad was there, as Lee had suspected he might be, sleepily sipping a beer at the bar. One of the other guests was the man whom Connacht had sent to fetch Lee, and he perked up as soon as he saw Lee walk downstairs. His eyes searched for a sign of Ling, the one who had blocked him from talking to Lee last time, and he seemed relieved when he didn’t spot her.
The next patron was a regular. He was a farmer in Satterfield who was paid for his trouble with a room and 3 fresh-cooked meals a day in return for supplying Lee’s new church with food. He used to have a wife to cook for him, but she had passed away in the mines while working as a slave before Lee had freed them and killed the Herald who imprisoned them there. Lee knew that it wouldn’t take long for the farmer to cook for himself and that his home was in perfect condition, but he suspected that the man just didn’t want to go back there and have to be alone, that he wanted to be around people.
The fourth patron was the one that stood out the most, even though she was just sitting quietly and staring down into a glass of beer, and she was the only one whom Lee didn’t recognize. Her arms were scratched up like she had tried to climb a barbed wire fence and fallen from the top-most strand. She had a misshapen, broken nose, she was missing a couple of teeth, and her skin was marred with dark bruises where it was cut. A surreptitious glance around the room told him that the bartender and the farmer were both watching her too.
When the bartender saw Lee, he put down the silverware he was cleaning and went over to him right away.
“I’m sorry to bother you, Lord Lee, but . . .” His voice trailed off as he looked over at the girl. “She insisted on being here. She said that she wouldn’t leave unless we forced her to . . . or unless she got to speak to you first.”
Despite her seeming persistence in meeting him, she hadn’t even so much as looked up when he came down the stairs. “When did she arrive?” Lee asked.
“Last night, a little after the moon started making its way down the sky again,” the man answered. His eyes darted between the mysterious woman and Lee as if checking to make sure that she couldn’t overhear what he was saying. “We tried to treat her. We called on the healing women to come and help her with her wounds, but she wouldn’t let us. She fought off any attempt to treat her, almost becoming violent, so we figured we’d end up hurting her more than helping her if we pressed the matter.”
“I see,” Lee responded, now studying the girl. She looked like a broken vessel more than an actual person, and he wondered if, somewhere in that break, her spirit had escaped and there was nothing left. It was the hollow, haunted look in her eyes that gave her away. It was more distant than he had seen in anyone in Satterfield before, even among the people he had rescued. “Well, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to meet her.” Lee added a “thanks” and patted the man on the shoulder to let him know that he had done well without wasting more words.
“Hey,” Lee said as he walked up to the girl, pulled out a chair and sat down next to her. “What’s your name?”
“I’m only here to speak to the Herald, Lee,” she responded, taking a small drink from the beer she was holding.
“So, if I weren’t Lee, you couldn’t even tell me your name?” he asked. He was slightly confused over the fact that she was so insistent on meeting him, yet she didn’t even know who he was when he sat right down next to her.
“I’m only here to speak to the Herald, Lee,” she repeated, clenching her beer tightly.
“What if I were to say that I am Lee,” he said as he looked at her face. She never would have been as beautiful as Masha, but Lee guessed she would have been very pretty before her face and body were marred by what looked like wolf or bear claws. The scars were deep and old, as though they had been put there deliberately and slowly, though some looked like they had only recently healed.
“I’m only here to spea--” She suddenly paused, turning to face him. “Are you Lee? Are you the Herald of Augustus?”
“If I am, what do you want to speak to me about?” Lee questioned, trying to understand what had happened to this woman.
“I’m only here to speak to--”
“Okay, okay. I get it,” Lee reached a hand over and rested it on her arm. She flinched away, but she didn’t retreat. He was a stranger touching her, and even though she flinched, she didn’t completely recoil or withdraw. She’s like a beaten dog, Lee thought. He started using his healing magic to patch up the still-grievous wounds that littered her body. “I’m the Herald known as Lee, and I’m here to listen to what you have to tell me,” he said.
The woman stared at her hands as Lee’s magic flowed through her, and her eyes widened in awe as her cuts and wounds stitched themselves together as if they were being sewed shut.
Keeping track of his mana expenditure had become second nature to him at this point, and he quickly tabulated what her level was based on how much mana it took to heal her. He was level 26, and he was able to heal 18 hit points per every 0.5% of his mana, but from this young woman’s health pool, it was clear that she was a much higher level. He didn’t know what her maximum health was, but she had to be over Level 30 if not close to 35. There was also a chance that she could potentially even be Level 40. Each level added 10 hit points, so just a bit of basic math told him this much. She’s such a high level . . . almost as high a level as Dave, the champion of Kirshtein, yet she’s in this state . . . He marveled at her, feeling a little uncomfortable around her now.
“You . . .” She looked down at her wounds. “You are just like I was told. You’re Lee! You’re the great Herald Lee!”
“I . . . don’t know exactly how great I am”--Lee withdrew his hand after healing her--“but could you tell me why you’ve come to see me? Was it to be healed?”
“No, no these wounds were deserved. You shouldn’t have taken them from me. These wounds were proof of my failure. You have robbed me of my failures. You have shamed me, but . . . but you’re here, so I can finish my mission now.”
“Mission?” Lee repeated the word, preparing to pull out his sword and shield as fast as he could.
“Yes, mission. I must tell you . . . She’s coming for you. She’s seen you. She knows of you. She’s watched how great and magnificent of a specimen you are from a distance, and she wants you. She’s coming for you. She will be here to collect you, but you shouldn't keep her waiting. She wants you. You should go to her. You should! You should go to her right away! I can lead you there. I can show you the way. I can take you to where she is. Come. Come on. Come, let’s go right now! We should go. Right now.” The young woman babbled on, repeating the same phrases again and again as she reached out and grabbed onto Lee’s arm, pulling him toward her.
Lee pulled back with all of his strength, resisting her with great difficulty as he stood up and yanked his arm free. “I’m not going anywhere with you. I have things to do here,” he said, and, as he spoke, the girl slid back away from him as well.
“No, that’s not right.” She shook her head, confusion evident on her face as she looked away from him. “Why are you saying ‘no’? Oh, it’s because you don’t know who she is. I’m an idiot. I’m stupid. I didn’t tell you who she is. It’s Meadhbh, the one true Phouka Queen, Herald of the Divine One. The greatest Phouka mother to ever shepherd a herd to glory.”
“I don’t care who she is. I have business to deal with. I don’t have time to go see her yet.” Lee threw the word ‘yet’ in there, hoping it would at least calm the crazy woman down. He kicked himself for letting his curiosity get the best of him when he could tell just by the way she stared off into nothing earlier that this woman was trouble and that she was crazy. The only thing that stopped him from pulling out hi
s weapons then and there and taking the last step to prep for a fight was that she hadn’t done it yet either. She hadn’t attacked him, and she seemed to want to keep him alive to meet this Herald of hers, so he wasn’t sure he had to fight.
She was such a high level, and she had so many battle scars, so he didn’t want to egg her on into a skirmish, which he very well might lose, until he had the advantage or at least a full understanding of his foe. Only a fool like Miller charges in to meet a battle without trying to get information on his enemy. Lee remembered all too well some of the frustration he had encountered because of his large Firbolg friend’s reckless proclivities during his first jaunts through the land.
“Yet?” She tilted her head, taking a step toward him. “Yet, yet, yet! What business is more important than Meadhbh? What business is more important than you two meeting?” As she spoke, she kept tilting her head further and further to the side. It continued winding around clockwise, well past the point where a normal human neck would have snapped, and her features started changing. The hairs on her arms and face and all across her body grew outward, tugging at her skin and at the fabric of her clothes as they morphed into long white feathers. The plumes on her hands grew longer and longer, quickly transforming themselves into pinions as her arms twisted and changed, forming wings in front of Lee’s horrified eyes.
What in all that is holy’s name is this? Lee stared in shock, the words choking off and dying in his throat as he watched the horror show unfold in front of him.
“Yet, yet, yet, yet,” she repeated. At this point, she had transformed from a five-foot, eight-inch-tall woman into a nearly six-foot-tall owl, her face almost completely upside down as she stared at him. She spit out the words, inches from his face and close enough that Lee thought she might stick out her tongue and lick him, and then her mouth elongated into a beak before splitting in half. “I will, will find you again. She will find you again. Yet is right. Yet is true. I. You. You will. You will come with us.”
Yup. Gonna have to kill her. But as soon as he pulled out his sword and shield, mentally preparing himself for battle, she pushed off against the floor with her massive legs and shot backward ten feet. Lee had his shield equipped and up in front of him in an instant, and the few other patrons in the bar all began arming themselves as well. Instead of engaging, however, she just shot away and burst through the wooden door, taking off into the skies, her wings continuing to grow even as she flew until they reached what looked like a twelve- or thirteen-foot wingspan. Lee chased after her, but by the time he made it outside, she was already so far away that he would have trouble shooting her with a bow and arrow.
“What in the hell was that?” Am I the only one who saw that? That’s not normal, is it? People don’t turn into animals, do they?” Lee wondered aloud as he walked back to the table where she had left her half-consumed beer. There was a piece of paper folded into thirds and secured in place by the mug she had set down when she stood up. “And what the heck is this?” He moved the beer aside and picked up the letter.
“She was a Phouka, sir,” the bartender said. “You can’t tell them apart from normal folk usually, just that they’re a bit taller than most people on average, but she was a Phouka.”
“A Phouka? She did say her Herald was the Phouka mother . . . Do you know more about them?” Lee asked.
“A bit . . .” The bartender seemed a bit skittish about the topic, and he kept glancing toward the door. “They’re . . . They’re usually nothing more than a horror story we tell to our children, but I have heard recently of Phouka sightings, and . . . I can’t believe they’re really here.”
“A myth? Wait, do they all transform?” Lee sat down in the seat that had just been vacated by the girl-turned-owl and signaled to the bartender with his hands that he wanted a beer before opening up the letter.
“Yes, my Herald, they all transform. It is their gift. They may appear to be strong and competent because of their gift, but they’re actually weaker, slower and dumber than most of the other races. The story goes that the weak and physically-failing outcasts of the world started gathering together on a mountain far north of here. They begged the mother goddess for a thousand days and a thousand nights at a shrine they made in her honor ages ago, and one by one, they were eaten by the animals that inhabited the forests of the mountain in the night. There was a group of merchants who traveled to the town in order to deliver food on a semi-regular basis, and eventually, they reported that there was no one left to carry goods to. After a search, it was confirmed that there wasn’t even so much as single soul still living on the mountain. So, naturally, everyone took the outcasts for dead, killed off by the wild beasts of the forests,” the bartender explained.
“But they weren’t actually dead?” Lee saw where this story was headed.
“No. Rather, the truth was found out a year later when a convoy was attacked. It was one of the same merchants who had brought them food several times out of pity, so he recognized what was happening. When the beasts emerged from the forests and slaughtered the caravan . . . Well, they spared only him. He watched the whole thing. He watched as the beasts morphed back into the very people whom he thought had been eaten after the attack and then as they picked up and carried the supplies away. He told everyone, of course, spread the word far and wide. But most people thought he was lying. No one believed him. But then, after a while, other merchants began witnessing similar things, and a few survivors reported the same.”
“So . . .” Lee looked down at the note in his hands. “You’re telling me that they were the weak and the lame of this world, but they were granted the ability to turn into . . . these creatures?”
“Yes . . . And the creatures they turn into are much more fearsome than their normal counterparts,” the bartender continued. “Not to mention, it’s said that their hatred of people, of the world, has caused them to be vindictive. People say that if your child is a bully or harasses other children often for their physical weakness, then a Phouka will come around and snatch him away in the middle of the night and kill and eat him. It is said that Phoukas haven’t forgotten the way they were treated when they were human and that they will come to strike vengeance against any who mistreats outcasts.”
“So, before her”--Lee pointed at the broken door--these Phoukas were more or less just a fairytale used to scare kids into behaving and treating each other nicely?”
The bartender nodded. “Yeah, I told my oldest about them when he was picking on a girl he liked out at the farm. I never really thought about them as anything more than an old wives’ tale, a good crutch for scaring kids into doing the right thing.”
“Well, apparently there’s more to them.” Lee frowned as he started reading the letter.
Ulchabhannadhbh, it is with great regret that I won’t be there to meet you when you return to our country’s summit. I am saddened that I must send you away as soon as you have returned, but the mission is urgent, and I am likewise too occupied at the moment to complete it myself. I need you, my most loyal and trusted right hand, to hunt down a Human male by the name of Lee. He has been spotted often in Satterfield and Kirshtein, and his exploits increase in number by the day. He is a Herald like myself, and even though he has just arrived in this land, he has shown abilities and growth far surpassing most of the other Heralds.
He is the one that I have been waiting for. Out of all the Heralds to reach this world, he is the one whose strengths perfectly match my weaknesses. With his abilities, and the powers he can grant others--with the powers he could grant me--I must have him. To this end, I need you to track him down and bring him to me. He is decisive and ruthless, and I have watched as he breaks all order and tradition and continues to hunt others and prove that he is the fittest and worthy of survival. He is the perfect specimen, so do not hurt him. Bring him to me safely, and if he does not come, notify me of his location. I will take care of him after I finish my mission.
Lee furrowed his brow as he stared at the
contents of the message. Great. As if my plate wasn’t full enough already, now I have to deal with a crazy cult woman after my powers. He folded the note back up and stashed it away in his inventory.
Connacht’s man had apparently been watching and listening, and he chose just that moment to approach. “If it’s not too bad of a time, I would like to discuss again whether you can make it to Kirshtein. We could desperately use your input at the next council meeting. As the only remaining Herald for the people of Kirshtein, and the only voice for Humans in Kirshtein, your presence would be an invalu--”
“Stop talking.” Lee cut him off, already tired of the explanation and the servant’s bootlicking. “I’ll go. Just stop talking about it.”
“Yes, your Holiness,” the man said, bowing his head. “Connacht will be ver--”
“I said stop.” Lee’s forceful tone silenced him on the spot. “Now, I’m not leaving until later today, so you can go ahead and prepare my accommodations in Kirshtein. If Connacht wants me at his meeting like some pawn he can use, then I expect him to cover some very nice room and board and make his presence available before the meeting.”
“But--”
“Don’t make me kill you before breakfast,” Lee said dryly and watched as the man opened and closed his mouth. “I really don’t have the patience after . . . that to deal with any more problems.”
“Y--” The servant looked like he wanted to say something again, but all that came out was a small yip. Thankfully, he decided against it and instead gave a weak, hurried bow before throwing a few coins on the bar and leaving through the broken door.
The bartender filled another glass with beer and set it down next to the one Lee still hadn’t finished. “Sorry if I am wrong to say this, my Herald, but I’m surprised you were so short with the man.”
“Your name is . . . Dewar, right?” Lee asked, downing the nearly-full glass he had only just started and pushed it to the bartender before pulling the new beer toward himself.