Killers, Traitors, & Runaways

by Lucas Paynter

  No one else was around, and so Zella was the first to greet him. She walked up to Poe, pensive, for she’d never met a new god before. He looked her over, studying the runes carved into her body, glowing through her clothes. Poe took Zella’s arm firmly, but not painfully, and unraveled its coverings, exposing several engravings.

  “I still cannot read them,” he concluded as he wrapped her arm back up. “But nor do they cause my eyes pain.”

  “You are changed,” she confirmed. Even in his weariness, Poe exuded a strength which Zella could not hope to approach. And they were alone. “You have petitioned for my death more than once. You have the means to realize it without contest. No one could stop you.”

  Poe looked Zella in the eyes, then shook his head apologetically. “Once done, it could not be undone. I wouldn’t.”

  She stepped aside as Poe labored past her. Einré was standing in the archway, pleased with what she saw. “You’ve become.”

  Poe glared at her irritably. “You could have warned me of what I was to face.”

  “Could I have?” she asked. “Growth is my domain—the flourishing of seeds to life, of youth to age. How does your domain intersect with mine?”

  He had no answer for her.

  It did not take long for the others to gather; Flynn had sensed Poe the moment he’d returned, and soon it was the seven of them standing with Einré in the throne room. She sat on a throne of roots and leaves that had long overtaken the original monarch’s chair, one leg crossed over the other.

  “You have changed,” Flynn confirmed when he saw Poe. Like Zella, he scarcely seemed to believe it.

  Poe voiced no response, only nodding as he drew the Angel Edge. While he held the blade out at length in demonstration, Einré began to snicker. “Something amuses you, Einré?” he asked. There was no reverence left in his voice; they were equals now.

  “No, no, it’s just…” She seemed to be fighting to suppress her mirth. “Airia’s was bigger. Comically so.” Poe shared none of her amusement and sheathed the blade. As Einré settled down and wiped a tear from her eye, the tone turned more serious. “With this first step concluded, the real labor now begins. Airia Rousow should have been your tutor, but Taryl has removed her from the board. I will do my best to teach you, but you must be taught without being trained.”

  “The fuck good’s that gonna do?” Jean asked.

  “It may one day save his life,” Zella countered. “My father possesses many years of experience. Even bound, he has bested several gods who dared challenge him.” She looked to Poe and affirmed, “You would not have a chance if you rushed in to face him.”

  “Your father was not bred a warrior,” Poe countered. “And my inaction will bring no change where it is badly needed.” He looked then to Einré. “If I cannot hone my endowments through practice, what good are they?”

  “Expressing your divinity will alert the Reahv’li to your presence,” she said. “They may not strike right away, but circumstances on Terrias may change while you are in training. We cannot chance you being caught before you are ready.”

  “And what is ‘ready’?” he asked. “Yetinau Gruent had decades of familiarity with what he could do and it did not save him. You possess many more, and yet you hide on this vine-choked rock. You should thank me, Einré—my actions could soon free you from this prison.”

  She grew flustered at his insult. “One mistake, and all this will be for nothing.”

  Flynn cocked his head as he stepped up, studying Einré. “You don’t seem confident. In your ability to train him, or in Poe’s ability to handle the task at hand.”

  “Whatever her confidence speaks of, the facts remain,” Chari cautioned. “Rushing stands foolhardy.”

  “I don’t deny it,” Flynn concurred. “But will there ever be a good time to strike?” He looked back at Einré. “You’re right: the situation could change if we wait, and circumstances might become less favorable, not more. Taryl remains tethered—a year from now, he might not be. Better to fight a bound man than a free one.”

  Einré studied Flynn skeptically. Despite allowing him into her home, Zella knew she had come no closer to trusting him. “What do you have to gain from hurrying toward this conclusion?”

  “I set out on this journey to see Airia’s trinity made right. I need to see this done.”

  “If need be, I shall set forth without your blessing,” Poe said. “Even as a man, I possessed skill with a blade few can match.”

  “Skill which did not protect you when we were pinned between two armies,” Chari reminded him.

  “My awareness is greater than it has ever been,” he replied. “There is no longer any attack one can make that I cannot intercept.” Poe turned to Einré. “And though it is murky, I can sense Terrias. Taryl Renivar waits, his head desperately clinging to its neck. I shall soon separate them.”

  Einré rose, shaking her head. “Please, no … if you are to be foolish, at least be foolish in the right way.” She called out, “Ellis!” and her attendant appeared in the doorway. “Fetch the key.”

  “Key?” Shea asked.

  “Rousow, Kwarla, and Renivar clashed in the nearby city of Cordom, centuries ago,” Einré said. “When their battle came into the grand cathedral, Airia opened the way to Terrias to prevent the loss of further life.”

  “Yeah, we’ve heard that song before,” Jean said. “What of it?”

  “The way she opened left a remnant,” Flynn concluded before Einré could answer. “One that I can breach. Except … I only sensed two pathways in Cordom: the one we entered from and the one we left through.”

  “My boy-servant and I took great pains in recent decades to conceal this pathway,” Einré explained as Ellis came in with an old iron key. “Even I would be unable to sense it, were I standing right underneath it.”

  “Underneath?” Chari asked suspiciously.

  “The old cathedral was demolished in the wake of their battle, and rebuilt elsewhere in the city,” she replied. “Many homes grew in its place, and situated perfectly in the attic of one…” Einré paused to hold out the key, “…is that forgotten way.”

  Zella watched, expecting Poe or Flynn to reach out for the key. But it was Chari who snatched it from Einré’s hand, to the surprise of her companions.

  “This is mine,” she said in disbelief.

  “No, it—wait, it’s your what?” Ellis stuttered.

  “I think you’re mistaken,” Einré started.

  “Study closely,” Chari hissed as she pointed at the head of the key. “It reads Jerhas.”

  “So it does. How odd.”

  “What was the Mystik of Growth doing sneaking into my home, stealing my attic key?” she demanded.

  “Oh, that wasn’t me,” Einré said dismissively. “That would be the work of my boy-servant.”

  Chari’s ire caused Ellis to shrink out of the room. Poe turned to Chari and placed a hand over hers; her temper cooled and she released the key so he could study it in earnest.

  “This is the key to destiny,” he stated. “It feels as though it should be weightier.” He grasped it tightly, then tucked it into a pouch. “I shall take my leave then.”

  Poe turned to leave the castle, but was caught promptly on the shoulder by Flynn. “We’re going with you.”

  “Taryl Renivar is a foe beyond you all,” Poe warned. “We have seen what he can do.”

  “As your companions, you can extend a measure of protection to them,” Einré advised. “They can never do what you are able, but you can shield them from the harm Renivar’s divine prowess might cause.”

  “Might as well see this shit through,” Jean said with a shrug. A chorus of agreement echoed from the others, save Zella, who stood back, head bowed in silence. Yet she would follow along, as she always had.

  “What of you, daughter of Renivar?” Poe asked.<
br />
  And then, it all hit Zella. It wasn’t about following the others and seeking their protection. It wasn’t about a quest to even the scales her father had helped upset. The concept of Poe assassinating her father moved from abstract to a very real possibility, and even for the terrible price he’d asked her to pay, she couldn’t bring herself to hate him. It would have been easier if she did, for she knew the surest way to make things right would be to end the Living God.

  Zella took great care to avoid eye contact or do so much as nod. All she said was, “It must be done,” and that seemed enough for the rest of them.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Last, Lonely Night

  The ocean waves were gentle that evening and provided safe passage to port. What Chari wouldn’t have given for a storm, to wash up on some deserted island. It seemed ridiculous to think, but she dreaded going home, even for a night. She kept her head down to avoid counting the remaining minutes, and did not notice when they arrived. Flynn’s hand intruded in her line of sight as he stood above her, one foot planted on the docks, ready to pull her up.

  Chari looked back to Ellis at the sails, then over to Einré, who seemed agitated by her reluctance.

  “Will you be returning to the Isle?” Chari asked.

  Einré shook her head. “My duty there is done. Staying in one place can be dangerous so long as the Reahv’li still hunt gods.”

  “And if we need to find you?” Flynn asked.

  “I would not wish to be found, least of all by the likes of you,” she told him. Einré stood up to address Poe, who stood on the dock with the others. “You’ve been afforded one chance to make things right. Do not waste it.”

  As Ellis said his farewells, Chari knew it was time to return home. She took Flynn’s hand and he pulled her up to the dock, and the sea of trees that was Cordom rose before her, a dark forest of candlelit windows. She couldn’t see its famed cathedral from here, but knew it wouldn’t remain hidden for long.

  As the longboat disembarked, Chari strengthened her resolve—the sooner they got where they needed, the sooner they could leave.

  “Yo, remember that first night we met?” Jean asked cheerfully. “Told ya we were fuckin’ sailors.” She gave a jovial laugh. “Ah, those were the days…”

  Chari didn’t like remembering that night. It wasn’t for the arrival of her friends, who had enriched her life in then-unimaginable ways, but how she’d felt hours earlier—the way she’d seen herself reflected in the Inquisitor’s sword as she’d studied it in the dead of night. Back then, it had seemed the only way to escape the secret hell her life had become.

  “But for the smallest changes, Cordom seems as we left it,” she said aloud, then shook her head and admonished herself. “Of course it would be. It has not been even a year. Little would likely change in such time.”

  “We do not leave for Terrias until daybreak,” Poe said. “Is there some place you wish to visit while here?”

  “No.” Chari had only pondered Poe’s suggestion for a moment; in it, she’d climbed the tallest trees bordering Siehron Manor and scoured the windows through her rifle’s scope. Inquisitor Thunau would pass one eventually and, since her departure, Chari had become an adept sharpshooter. “It’s better if I pass through as though I were never here at all.”

  “You’ll be okay?” Flynn asked.

  She smiled, and nodded back at him. “I’ll endure.”

  As they passed from the docks into the city streets, they had to keep their voices low—the hour was late and the guards were on patrol. Chari expected to return to her home and find it ransacked by the church following her disappearance. But it stood quiet on the street; doors shut, curtains drawn.

  It was like she’d never left.

  At first, she reached into her robes out of instinct, but realized she’d abandoned the key somewhere long ago.

  “I got this,” Jean said as she shoved her way to the front. She clasped a hand over the lock and it rattled low and fast until the handle gave way. The hinges creaked with rough familiarity as the door swung open.

  “Inside, swiftly,” Chari urged, taking care to ensure the door was shut before lighting the candles.

  Dust had settled on her undisturbed property, blanketing the books that lined her wall and coating the withered flowers her laity had left the day before she’d vanished from Cordom. This silence brought an ache with it, an acceptance that her presence had perpetuated a system she wished no part of, and that her absence changed nothing.

  “Thought you’d be at least a little happy to be home,” Zaja said.

  This brought an ironic smile to Chari’s face. “You’ve suffered my dismal recitations. Would I be welcomed back? Almost certainly. But would joy escort such a homecoming?”

  Zaja nodded, understanding. “If I returned to Quema, they’d probably chain me to the bed. I’m sure my family’s worried sick.” She grew downcast, but went on. “How they kept me, though, it wasn’t living. It was just keeping me alive.”

  Chari stroked Zaja’s cheek to comfort her, and her friend smiled back at her. She then took her leave, exhaustion catching up with her, but there was one last task she wished to attend.

  Across from the living room couch was a door, the only one in the house the wall of books had been allowed to obstruct. Chari knelt down and began moving the stacks aside, that the door might be fully opened with ease. It should have taken only minutes, but she slowed at times to survey familiar titles. There wasn’t the luxury of time to settle in and read, however much she wished for it. It had been so long.

  A pair of hands came down in her peripheral to help move one of the stacks. “I take it this is the door that hides our way?”

  “Zella,” she acknowledged. Still kneeling, Chari brushed her fingertips across a book’s painted surface. “My attic is a place where I buried things that haunted me. Instruments of my family’s legacy, articles of my prescribed ‘faith.’ Oddly fitting that something else be secreted away here as well.”

  Zella seemed pleased with this. “This is a historical site. My father’s confrontation with Airia Rousow and Kayra Kwarla culminated just meters above us. It’s a little humbling.”

  Chari rose back up, her legs stiff. “It’s disquieting. Still we reap the aftermath of their discontent.”

  Zella’s pleasure faded. “Are we obligated to carry that weight? Whatever Einré has suggested, I doubt there’s much we can contribute in what’s to come. What if we were to part ways here?” The question came with an eager, excited turn. “Let Poe finish the mess himself?”

  Chari’s eyes pierced Zella’s; there was more she wanted to say to the person who had contributed so little in all the dangers they’d faced. “I would not remain on TseTsu a minute longer than necessary.”

  Zella was taken aback by the harshness of her response. “I’m sorry, I–I didn’t mean to suggest—”

  “I know.” Chari breathed out, found the doorknob. It did not turn. “I stood for years on an altar and kept silent while speaking. I prayed inwardly that there were no gods and left to find that beings very much like them exist. Even now, we seek to depose one tyrant while leaving the throne vacant for a possible other.” She turned to Zella with fierce determination. “I despise knowing a supposed god could dare preside over me. If my involvement allows any chance to undermine that system, I would not miss the opportunity.”

  For her zeal, Chari knew Zella must think her mad. Her breathing had become ragged in her ranting and as she calmed herself down, Chari was overtaken by a fierce yawn.

  “You’re courageous,” Zella said as she hugged her.

  “I spent my whole life scared.”

  Her agitation toward Zella had subsided, and forgiveness found its way in easily enough. They’d endured too much together to carry a grudge, and it was only reluctantly that Chari said goodnight. There was something apologetic in Zella’s smile that w
ould stay with Chari through the night, though she wouldn’t understand why until morning.

  * * *

  For the momentous day that awaited, a sense of restlessness pervaded Chari’s home. There weren’t accommodations enough for everyone, to start—only one guest bed was available, as well as a sofa in the living room. One of their party had recused herself from the discussion of bedding arrangements entirely; it was by the window that Poe found Jean leaning, peering out the curtains.

  He considered approaching her at first. But Jean had no love for his company and, looking back, it was hard to blame her. If he could return to the day they first met, calm his own bloodlust, would they be better friends?

  Poe had already learned he could not change the past. Still, he found himself caught in it—as suddenly as he was surrounded by them, his companions were gone. The house was empty and the time had changed. As he walked through, it seemed the same, until he found the guest bedroom.

  Jean and Mack were asleep, and time itself slowed around him to dwell on this one moment. Jean was on the right side of the bed, sleeping on her side with her back turned to Mack. Her friend, meanwhile, was sprawled across the left side, both arms hanging out. There was less than an inch between the bare skin of her shoulders and Mack’s curled, waiting hands.

  They shared the space out of habit, necessity, and between them Poe saw two shades of the same tale: for Jean, her best friend lay beside her, secretly lusting after her. Mack, meanwhile, waited for the moment she might subtly shift in her sleep, brushing against his fingers as a fleeting tease to what he one day hoped to have.

  But Poe knew how the story ended. Even if they found each other again, there would be no happy ending. Jean had rejected the one-eyed boy, and left him on another world. There had been no outpouring of emotion, no secret yearnings brought to the surface. Out of pity, Poe reached out for them.

  And suddenly, he found himself in the present, his hand on Jean’s shoulder. She startled at his touch, looking back in ire.

  “You needn’t keep watch,” he said.

  She studied him for a moment, then looked back out the window. “Seems like someone oughta. Pissed off the guards last time. Fuckers’d probably love another shot at us.” Still, Jean thought for another moment, then pulled the curtains tight. “Shouldn’t ya be snoozin’ by now? Big day tomorrow.”