by Peri Akman
The fish gently pushed him to the shore, where Cosime was.
Well, Cosime, and several dozen guards.
Quinn staggered over to them, hardly believing his own luck.
“What… what’s going on?” Quinn asked. Asim and Tsalir were nowhere in sight. A sinking sensation overcame him.
Uleyn stepped to the forefront, wary and slightly more beaten than the last time Quinn had seen him. “Serethen of Javier teleported into the temple, telling us she was sent by Dale of Javier to warn us of the upcoming problems.”
“Did Asim wash up here? And Tsalir?” Quinn asked, swallowing dryly.
Uleyn nodded. “They’ve been taken away too.”
Cosime tugged on Quinn’s coat.
He looked down at them.
“Where?” they asked.
Quinn stared at them in confusion until he realized exactly what they meant. Dale. Where was Dale.
He turned to the lake. They should be back by now.
“I don’t know,” Quinn admitted.
Cosime’s eyes grew wide. “But….” They trailed off, unable to finish the sentence.
Uleyn gripped Quinn on the shoulder. “We need to ask you some questions.”
Quinn took one look back at the lake.
He felt his heart harden. He couldn’t do anything about it. He couldn’t worry about it. He couldn’t add all the sadness up.
“What do you need to kn—” Quinn began to ask, but was unable to finish, as a sudden wave of nausea hit him.
He fell on the shore, spasming.
YOU CAN’T ESCAPE FROM ME, KID! the Light King roared into his head.
No. No no no.
His vision blurred. The last thing he saw before passing out was what looked to be Kay landing on the ground from several dozen feet above, Dale in tow.
He was expecting darkness to greet him, but honestly he should have known better. Instead, it was blinding light.
The Light King stood before him, clearer than ever, cloaked by his own brightness.
He was… round. Very round. In fact Quinn was pretty sure he contained his own miniature sun inside of him. His throne was made up of pure light, and monsters frolicked in the pits below.
It was similar to Kole’s experience, with one important distinction—Quinn was fully aware that in his case, it was only happening in his head.
Did you think I would just let you live AFTER MY WIFE TRIED TO KILL YOU? the Light King continued to roar.
“I thought you wanted me…” Quinn said, struggling to find the words.
I WANT MY WIFE MORE! I get to punish her for going back on the deal, but that does not involve you! You die! the Light King snapped.
Quinn felt like his eyes were about to burn up.
“No!” Quinn pleaded. “Please, don’t kill me!”
Ah relax kid, I ain’t a sadist. That’s my wife. You won’t even realize you’re dead, the Light King replied, as he reached out for him.
“Can’t I say anything that will change your mind?” Quinn said, trying to think as rapidly as possible. He refused to die. Not at the hands of some petty god.
Well, yes, but unless those words are ‘I am actually your wife in disguise, congratulations hun, you passed my test, let’s go to the sixty-ninth dimension for a vacation’ I can’t think of anything that would convince me otherwise, the Light King responded, oddly matter-of-fact.
The Light King wrapped his fingers around Quinn, when suddenly they were sliced away.
In front of him was Ser Hero, covered in white fur. They lunged, a sword in each hand, aiming for the Light King’s neck.
Whoah whoah whoah! I’m sorry but what the wife are you? the Light King sputtered, his booming voice thrumming in Quinn’s mental excuse for ear drums. He rose his hand and slapped Ser Hero away like they were a fly. Ser Hero went flying, crashing into the far distance.
Ser Hero stood and smiled defiantly. “I am Quinn’s Killer Instinct.”
Quinn stared at Ser Hero in shock. “What?”
“Oh, like you haven’t figured it out,” Ser Hero snapped, as they slowly returned to Quinn’s position. “It’s not like you ever summoned me to wash your clothes, huh? No, it was Ser Hero kill this. Ser Hero kill that. Well, I did that, and I will continue to do that, until no one is left to threaten you.”
“So you really are part of me,” Quinn whispered softly.
“Sort of. Unlike you, I am a hero after all,” Ser Hero said with a wink.
The Light King lightly prodded Ser Hero.
…Fascinating. You can summon this… thing so easily? the Light King asked.
“Oh, he can summon me far more than easily. Any time he’s threatened, I appear at the forefront of his pathetic mind. I suspect that within a year’s time, not even the Dark Queen herself could stop me from protecting him,” Ser Hero spoke like they always did, proudly and without irony. Only this time, Quinn bought into every word.
The Light King thought.
This is proceeding far better than I could have possibly predicted. Very well, I shall break the deal of the broken deal. I can’t wait to pit you against my enemies. the Light King grinned, and unlike the Dark Queen, he did have a mouth, with dozens of teeth, all canines.
Quinn felt himself begin to fall.
Well, begone with you, you have five years to grow your powers to my liking. I suggest you don’t waste it.
Chapter Thirty
Quinn woke up in a tower. He was in different clothing, he had been shaved, and there was a guard watching him intently.
Quinn tried to speak, but found his voice too dry to say anything.
The guard immediately jumped when Quinn began to make noises.
“You’re up! How are you feeling? Do you need anything?” the guard asked rapidly, more nervous than Quinn would have liked.
“Water,” Quinn croaked.
The guard nodded vigorously—and promptly left.
Quinn sighed. That was unhelpful.
A short while later, the guard returned with a small cup of water.
“Here you go!” the guard said, shoving it in Quinn’s face.
Quinn took slow, feeble sips.
His mind began to catch up to him. Kole had betrayed him. Any number of his friends (and Dale) could be dead.
He was now enslaved to the Light King.
Had that really happened? Was he sure it wasn’t some elaborate dream?
“I’d like to be alone for a bit,” Quinn said slowly.
The guard nodded and left the room.
The second the door shut, Quinn burst into tears. The past three months had been a lie. All a damn lie. All this time, he was being groomed for some ulterior motive. And it worked. They had escaped, but the ultimate plan had succeeded violently.
Quinn wiped the snot away from his nose. He summoned a tissue to wipe better. Then he summoned another.
The first tissue remained where it was.
He choked a violent sob. He could summon more than one thing now; how terribly late to the party.
He summoned a few items to test it as he sniffled. Three… four… well looked like it was working well.
They all disappeared, leaving a layer of snot on his blankets, as he broke out into fresh tears. Even now, even after all of that, his first instinct had been “man, wait until Kole sees this”.
His heart burned. He had loved her, he really had, like the parent he had never had. Others had fit that role, such as Teacher Tellack, whom Quinn had had a certain amount of affection for, but it wasn’t the same.
He hated that it hurt. He hated Kole for hurting him. He hated himself for even caring. It had only been a few months!
The sobbing continued for a while, until Quinn felt like he simply didn’t have any tears left. The next ten minutes were spent staring at the glass window across from him, trying to let his brain just turn off.
It was then that he was interrupted by a soft knocking.
“Come in,” Quinn croaked.
&nb
sp; Asim of Trell was at the door, with a tray full of food.
“Hey, Quinn,” he said softly.
“You’re alive,” Quinn stated.
“Yeah. Not in the best of shape, mind you. A lung punctured. Luckily for me, that doesn’t actually have the same effect as it does on most people,” Asim coolly explained as he set the tray down. “Eat.”
Quinn took the bowl of oatmeal and spooned it idly. “Is everyone else—”
“Tsalir is alive. They will take a few healing sessions to set all their bones back, but with Cosime there, it should be fine in a few weeks. They still have the infection, unlike us. Poor kid, they’ll probably never have their back work right again,” Asim said in a soothing voice. “Dale and Serethen are in critical condition. I haven’t checked on them yet.”
Quinn felt something drip into oatmeal. He wasn’t sure what it had been, but he hoped it was a tear. “Kole did that. To Dale, I mean.”
“Also to Serethen,” Asim said quietly.
Quinn looked up at Asim in confusion.
“She was able to explain her story more. She went to report Kole for misconduct. Turns out, Kole never was arrested. She wasn’t in any program. It had all been lies and forgery. Before Serethen was able to fill out the proper paperwork, she was attacked by a horde of demons. No guesses there as to what happened,” Asim said bitterly.
“It… it might not have been her,” Quinn whispered.
Asim gave Quinn a withering glance. “Kid, the sooner you realize that Kole was playing all of us, the sooner you’ll be better off.”
“That doesn’t mean she did everything,” Quinn contested.
Asim groaned and sat on Quinn’s bed. “Quinn… it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what she did, what she didn’t do. She lied to us. She set you up for some warped ritual. I don’t know who knocked Serethen out, but it certainly was convenient to Kole’s lie.”
“The Dark Queen is making her do those things, though,” Quinn protested. He didn’t even believe it, he just didn’t want to hear Asim being the one to call her terrible.
“I just said it didn’t matter!” Asim snapped, his eyes full of rage. “It doesn’t matter if she was bribed, threatened, coerced or hypnotized! She hurt you! She hurt us! And she is going to continue hurting us for as long as she lives! It doesn’t matter what the reason is; what matters is that people are going to die because of her!”
Quinn shrunk. Asim was right. That was the worst part. And in five years, he’d be the same.
He needed to tell someone. Or end his life.
No… he couldn’t. He didn’t want to. He was selfish, and he knew it, but above all else, Quinn wanted to survive.
“I’m sorry,” Asim said, his voice softer now. “I didn’t intend to yell at you.”
Quinn shrugged and took a spoonful of the oatmeal. It tasted like nothing. His hand trembled. Gods, he was helpless. Small, insignificant, hopelessly stupid.
“Quinn…” Asim began. “Everything will work out for you.”
Quinn raised an eyebrow at him. Go ahead, Wind Walker, tell him how it was going to be better. He dared him.
“Kay told me about what you can do. Summoning fast-acting homunculi like that is no small feat, Quinn. Within the year, you’ll be able to test for warlock. Then you can get the tattoo removed and Kole will have no power over you,” Asim assured him. “And if you don’t, believe me, I will pull every string I have to get you there.”
The words barely affected him. Oh joy. A year. A year where Kole could pop out of nowhere and order him to do nearly anything. Did he not realize how dangerous that was? What if Quinn ever met some important politician? What if he was tasked with protecting children?
What if it was up to him to save everyone?
A year was just too much. Asim probably knew it too, but was hoping Quinn wouldn’t notice, and be enamored by the idea of becoming a warlock by the age of sixteen. It would be unprecedented, to some extent.
But he didn’t care. He didn’t care about becoming a warlock. A stupid Sigil meant nothing. It just meant he’d be stuck doing jobs of whatever variety for five years until he withered away.
Quinn glanced at his hands.
White stripes across the backs of his palms, contrasting heavily against his dark skin.
He’d have to start wearing gloves. Or bandages.
The thought made him cough on his oatmeal as he tried to avoid sobbing.
Would it spread like the Dark Queen’s infection? Hard to say. He wasn’t about to start testing it on random people. Maybe he’d go find a bear to test it on.
Asim went to pet Quinn’s head, but Quinn reared back. Asim withdrew his hand and sighed.
“Also, we have a place to keep you if you want to stay away for a while. A warlock from the Shorne main city offered to house you. She said you knew her and her apprentice. Doctor Travitz and Sennta?” Asim asked, pausing at the names.
Quinn nodded. The news would have made him elated previously, but now he was just numb. It sounded like Sennta was out of his coma.
He wanted to be happy, but he couldn’t do it. His brain just couldn’t comprehend the emotion.
A forced smile spread across his lips, but it didn’t feel genuine. Asim didn’t seem too convinced by it either, as he just sat there in silence, watching Quinn eat.
“How did you not figure it out?” Quinn asked, finally.
“Excuse me?” Asim questioned, clearly confused.
“How did you not figure out there was something wrong with her? Her eyes and hair changed color. She was literally dragged into some different dimension. You just… what, assumed it was a fluke?” Quinn spat, tears beginning fresh.
He wanted to blame Asim for all of it, even though he knew he shouldn’t. For that split second, he felt better. It wasn’t his fault. He was the victim. It was all Asim’s fault.
“I wasn’t fooled, I tried to—” Asim stopped himself, and took a deep calming breath. “She told me a story. I believed her. I wanted to believe her more than anything, so I did. It was easier that way. Easier to assume she had been in jail. Easier to assume it had just been a powerful demon messing with us than the actual Dark Queen. Easier to believe her when she told me it was just side effects.”
Quinn felt his throat clench up. Well, now he just felt worse.
“Believe me, if I was given a second chance, I would never have let her leave the Academy. But there are no second chances. All I can do is express how deeply and truly sorry I am for failing you,” Asim said. His voice was choked and strangulated. It had that unmistakable refined air of rehearsal, but Quinn didn’t mind. It felt genuine. He had that same look he had had in Kole’s memory, actual legitimate sorrow.
“Are there demons attacking?” Quinn asked, abruptly changing the topic.
Asim nodded. “Yes, but not as many as we were expecting. The orb was destroyed. They have no spawning point.”
So destroying the throne had indeed been the key to that. Alternatively, it had been the outer orb, but considering it had had a monster slamming out of it, it couldn’t have remained stable for long.
Good. He and Kay had done it.
Asim stood up and stretched. “Do you want me to stay, or do you want to be alone?”
“Alone,” Quinn lied.
Asim nodded, and left without another word.
Quinn sighed quietly and ate. He wasn’t sure why he lied, but he had the overwhelming urge to do so. Just another mind problem in his life.
Ever so slightly, the wooden bowl reflected the glow from his tattoo.
Quinn’s eyes widened.
No!
“Don’t scream,” Kole muttered from the shadows of the room. “Not a word.”
Quinn began to hyperventilate. He looked down at his tray, and forcefully shoved it off the table, praying the clatter would get Asim’s attention.
Kole teleported to his bedside, and caught the tray. She had no walking stick anymore, but her leg was still clearly wounded. It
looked exactly how it looked in her memory, see-through skin, shriveled muscle, and blackened scars.
“Don’t fight back. Don’t even summon anything,” Kole ordered.
Quinn began to reach out to summon Ser Crystal Flake, but before he could, Kole grabbed him and teleported, Quinn in tow.
Suddenly they were at the roof of the tower, Kole holding Quinn up by his loose shirt, dangling him.
“Go ahead. Summon your monster. You’ll hit a murderous velocity before it can even blink at me,” Kole snapped.
Quinn began to hyperventilate. “The King and I had a deal!” he cried out.
“Oh, I’m not here on the behalf of the Dark Queen. I’m here on behalf of me, Quinn,” Kole said narrowing her eyes. The last of her skin had turned completely black. She really was an extension of the Dark Queen. Now the only thing that wasn’t black were the whites of her eyes.
Quinn dangled and flailed, desperately trying to hold on. The wind was forceful up here. Part of him hoped it was Asim, but he knew that was not the case.
Darkness swirled around Kole and gripped Quinn, dangling him in midair. He couldn’t scream, gods, he wanted to scream, but he couldn’t!
Kole took out a stick—the top half of her broken walking stick. She shook it, and a weird metal structure dropped out of it.
“You know, Quinn, now that you’re the Light King’s boy, you’re pretty hard to find. I had to shadow the Wind Walker until he finally went up to your room. Of course, before I did that, I conducted a minor robbery,” she waved the contraption in front of Quinn’s eyes.
It was too dark to accurately see what it was, but it seemed silver as it glinted in the moonlight.
“I spent twenty years asking for one of these babies, but I never got one. And after this, I’ll have to get rid of it. Can’t let the first public revolution start from the slave of the Dark Queen. No one would accept it,” Kole rambled. She smirked, and pointed the contraption at Quinn’s face.
“So, officially, consider this my last good deed,” she said, and a beam of energy shot out of it.