The Book of Heroes

by Miyuki Miyabe

  The glyph flared brightly twice. She looked and saw that she and the doctor were enveloped in a ring of white light. The speed of their descent lessened. The doctor flapped his arm again, and the ring of white light shifted around them, until U-ri felt like she rode in comfort upon an invisible chair. They drifted slowly downward, the doctor steering them with occasional shifts of his arm.

  The wind-wall had passed. U-ri watched it recede into the distance. It had decimated what was left of Katarhar Abbey, yet that hadn’t slowed it down. It was like a giant black scythe, reaping the mountain beneath the abbey, sending trees flying into the sky, cutting down all in its path. An avalanche of stones covered the narrow road up the mountain. Trees, branches, and leaves swirled into the sky like dust in the wind.

  Dr. Latore’s feet hit ground first, followed quickly by U-ri’s, and the ring of light faded. The doctor stood firmly, bracing himself, but U-ri’s knees buckled beneath her.

  The rubble left on the mountaintop was as finely minced as if a giant had gnashed the whole of it between his teeth and spit out all he couldn’t swallow. Whereas before it had been possible to make out pillars and the remnants of walls amongst the wreckage, some internal decorations and fragments of furniture, now there was nothing but undifferentiated dust.

  U-ri shook some of that dust off her robes and looked west. The giant hands had utterly disappeared. A natural wind blew across the mountaintop, gently sweeping the dust away. The sun and the sky had both seemingly returned to normal.

  “Those giant hands became the very black blade of wind that swept over this mountain,” the doctor said. “I wonder how far they will go, destroying all in their path, before finding their final destination.”

  U-ri glanced at the doctor, then looked away. With a start, he put his arms behind his back, but not before U-ri noticed that his skin was returning to its regular color. His hands, once giant, were now shrinking back to their regular size.

  Once both of his hands were safely hidden within the sleeves of his black robes, he looked again at U-ri. “I too carry the venom within me.”

  U-ri nodded. She had figured this out some time ago.

  “I am sorry if I startled you. And I apologize for concealing it until now.”

  U-ri decided not to say anything. Then she sneezed. Fine dust drifted up from her vestments of protection. The doctor patted her shoulder, brushing off some extra dust.

  Then, much to her surprise, U-ri sobbed out loud. “Doctor Latore…will you die soon?”

  Dr. Latore’s eyes softened, and his mouth, twisted grimly with the knowledge of the curse he bore, lifted into a smile. “You have a gentle heart, U-ri.”

  She felt like she might cry again, even as she marveled at her own capacity to feel sorry for this one man’s fate when she had just witnessed the utter destruction of Katarhar Abbey and quite possibly that of the Haetlands’ capital city as well.

  “I do not know how much longer I have on this earth. That is why I have come here. I thought to spend what time remains to me helping others who must be suffering as I suffer.”

  Dust still rose from the ruins of Katarhar Abbey. Dr. Latore reached out again and brushed off U-ri’s shoulder. There was no distinguishing either of his hands from those of a regular person’s now.

  “I discovered my condition three years ago. At first, there was no discernible difference in my physiology. I had merely become stronger than the average person, able to lift remarkable weights with ease.”

  His transformation had soon progressed. What had begun as a gradual change turned into a rapid chain reaction of symptoms.

  “Now, when I use my strength, my hands change shape as you saw. I have no doubt that my legs will soon follow.”

  U-ri recalled how he had leapt from the mountain as the wave of wind descended upon them.

  The doctor nodded, reading her expression. “Even the king of beasts would envy my legs, it’s true.”

  “There’s a boy in Ash’s village named Udsu,” U-ri began.

  “Yes, I know of him. We have even met. So he lives there still? I have no doubt that he and his mother will have to leave before long. When the transformations become more apparent, it becomes increasingly difficult for the affected to live amongst the general populace—and they come to rely on a greater variety of medicines.”

  And in the end, Ash will bury them.

  “Does the transformation…hurt when it happens?”

  “Not in the slightest,” Dr. Latore replied, rubbing his hands together and stretching his fingers. “Though you do feel different. Wilder, you might say. Remember that I told you those infected with the venom become violent as they near the end of their lives. It is like that. I’m only glad that it is still within my control.”

  The dust finally settled. The air around them had begun to clear, until now there was no sign of the wind’s passage—as long as you didn’t look down.

  “There is no proper name for the transformations I and Udsu and others like us suffer. There are nicknames, like ‘springfoot’ of course, but no proper medical terms. That is because it is officially forbidden to talk about us or to mention us in the chronicles. Such attention would only serve to highlight the questionable pasts of our leaders. U-ri, if something is not given a name, not spoken of, and not recognized, then it does not exist. One could explain us away, saying that people like Udsu or myself are rare mutations, with no relation to the Haetlands’ history. Why name or recognize something so insignificant? In time we will all be gone anyway.”

  U-ri bit her lip.

  Dr. Latore continued, his tone even, like a teacher giving a lecture he had given a hundred times before. “We did not wish for our disease. We received our afflictions by sheer chance of fate. How it angered me before. How full of rage I was. But something happened to change my thinking. My body and short lifespan were not laid upon me because of some wrongdoing of my own, you see. They are merely the spoils of ill fortune. Yet in this world, there are those who have fallen prey to bitter fate through no other fault but their own.”

  U-ri whispered, “You mean like Gulg?”

  Dr. Latore nodded deeply. “Yes. Though I and Udsu might feel sorrow, pain, rage, even self-pity, we never need blame ourselves for what we have done. For we have done nothing to bring our afflictions upon us. Not so with Gulg. What he suffers now is his own doing. He knows better than any of us what his actions have wrought. No matter how much sorrow he feels, how much pain, how much rage, it all comes back to him in the end.”

  Thus, Dr. Latore explained, true pity and forgiveness must be reserved for those like Gulg. Not those like him and Udsu. “The same can be said of your brother. Only you, who truly love him, can truly forgive. You seek him now for this purpose alone: to forgive and to release him. This will bring you no satisfaction or consolation, yet still you must do it, for you are the only one who can.”

  While the doctor spoke, U-ri had unconsciously been rubbing the glyph on her forehead. Dr. Latore smiled, and gently taking her fingers, removed them from it. “I do not speak to you in this way because you are an allcaste. I'm talking to you because you are a little girl who cares for her brother. You understand?”

  U-ri gripped the doctor’s fingers back. She realized with a start that they were holding hands—and she realized that she could have sat with him for hours without ever feeling the cold.

  There was a loud crash from behind, and part of the mound of rubble behind them crumbled as a single panel of wood was jettisoned down the slope, leaving a small hole where it had been. Ash’s silver hair poked out of the hole. “Everyone still alive?”

  Dr. Latore and U-ri laughed. Ash’s head disappeared again, then his entire body burst from the mound. “What are you two doing, anyway?”

  “Is everybody below all right?”

  “Aye, that cavern is nice and solid,” the wolf replied, hands at his waist. His eyes went wide, surveying the damage around him.

  “Yes, I had hoped it would hold,” the d
octor said. Then, “Where is that mouse Aju?”

  U-ri gasped. She had completely forgotten about Aju.

  “Here, I’m here,” Aju squeaked from Ash’s collar. “What are you doing down there with the doctor, U-ri?”

  “What are you doing up there in Ash’s collar? And where’s Sky?”

  “He’s down below, calming some of the children. The cavern might have held, but the noise was something else!”

  Aju left Ash’s shoulder, walked down his arm, then hopped onto the ground, tossing his nose in the air. “I escaped by a whisker, myself. When I saw that wind coming in, you can bet I made for the cavern entrance as quick as I could.”

  “Leaving U-ri to her fate,” Ash noted.

  Aju’s ears pricked up. “H-hey, that’s not fair. I mean, I would’ve been blown clear off the mountain—”

  “Come here, Aju,” U-ri said, extending a hand. “Don’t you pay attention to what the cranky old man with the gray hair says.”

  “I used a mage-glass to watch what was happening above ground,” Ash said, turning to look at the western horizon. The red setting sun was large between the hills. “It was in the capital, yes?”

  Dr. Latore nodded.

  “I’m sure many of the towns and villages along the high road were not spared either.”

  “And Tato?”

  “No idea,” Ash said softly. “Either way, there’s nothing we can do about that now. We’re not in the business of tending to survivors. We must leave for the capital at once.”

  “Did you find out anything about Kirrick?” U-ri asked.

  “No, that’s why we’re going to the capital. Besides, I’d like to see what’s become of the place. That plan unsuitable for you?”

  Dr. Latore gently pulled on U-ri’s sleeve and whispered, “Don’t mind him. He’s irritated, and understandably so.”

  The two stood and walked toward Ash. “I have heard,” the doctor said as they walked, “that some of Kirrick’s personal goods—armor and weapons and the like—were buried by Elem’s gravesite in the capital.”

  “That story is accurate as far as I can tell. What’s more, it’s likely that more was buried there than just rusting metal.”

  “Does this explain the attack?”

  “It might.”

  “You know, I’ve been wondering something,” U-ri cut in. “Remember how Minochi was saying that Kirrick’s body had been divided into eight pieces? Well, I was wondering how the body was divided. I mean, there is the head, two hands and two legs, and the rest of his body. But that only makes six. What about the other two?”

  “Well, it ain’t pretty,” Aju squeaked, once again secure atop U-ri’s shoulder, “but my guess would be his eyes and his heart.”

  “But that’s three pieces, Aju,” U-ri protested, swallowing her nausea at the thought of taking out someone’s parts like that.

  “The pair of eyes are very small, so traditionally they only count as one,” Aju explained.

  “To borrow Gulg’s words,” Ash said, “the Book of Elem was the key to the Hero’s escape. From this we can infer that the Hero possesses Kirrick’s memory—Kirrick’s mind forms the core of the Hero. And the energy of the vessels filling it are what gives it form.”

  “Yet in order for the Hero to fully resurrect as Kirrick, it will require Kirrick’s corporeal body,” the doctor concluded. “It is the body in which Kirrick’s mind, and his fury, still reside.”

  It again occurred to U-ri that when they talked about this Kirrick as though he were some distant legendary figure, they were talking about Ash’s half brother. Thus she was startled by what the wolf said next.

  “Were I Kirrick,” Ash began, turning to stare with a stern face at the western horizon, “what would I want back first? What part of myself?”

  U-ri and Dr. Latore both looked at their own bodies—their hands, feet, and their chests with hearts beating within.

  Ash shook his head violently. “No, I’m a fool. There’s no point in playing guessing games, we’ll find out for ourselves soon enough.”

  “I would want my eyes first,” said a voice. It was Sky, standing by the ragged hole that led down to the cavern.

  “I would want to look upon the Haetlands as she is today with Kirrick’s eyes,” Sky said softly.

  U-ri realized she was holding her breath. Everyone was.

  Ash swiveled to face Sky. “Look upon it, then destroy it?”

  “You would have to speak with him to find out what he intends. You should know that better than any of us, Master Ash.”

  Sky stood straight as an arrow, his eyes fixed on the wolf’s. Gone was the meek, subservient devout. He put a hand to his own chest. “Let us go to the capital.”

  For a moment, Ash did not reply. The two looked at each other in silence, and a feeling of dread rose inside U-ri. Inwardly, she frowned at herself. This is a moment for action, not for cowering!

  The mark on U-ri’s forehead glimmered. Then she knew in her heart what she had to do—the glyph had told her, though not in words or images.

  “We fly to the capital,” U-ri said, giving voice to the glyph’s message. Then, letting it guide her, she knelt upon the ground and took her palm from her forehead, lowering it to the rock below.

  Where her palm pressed into the gravel, the rock began to glow. Lines of light spread from her fingers, brilliant bands, dividing and spreading as they formed a giant image of the mark she wore.

  “The glyph will guide us truly.”

  U-ri stood and motioned to Sky. He hesitated a moment, then ran to her, taking her hand.

  “Dr. Latore?” U-ri called out.

  “Yes?”

  “I bid you well. Please await my return here.”

  The doctor knelt amongst the stones and fragments of architecture scattered across the ground. He bowed his head and intoned, “May the protection of the Circle be with you.”

  Ash stepped inside the magic circle’s ring to stand behind U-ri. “No falling off this time, rat.”

  “Same to you!” Aju shot back, bearing his tiny teeth.

  U-ri took a deep breath and closed her eyes, feeling the energy stream from the glyph up through her entire body.

  They were flying once again in darkness. There were no glimpses of scenery such as they had seen on their first attempted trip to the Katarhar Abbey ruins. Just plain, uniform darkness rushing past.

  Yet there was a presence in the darkness, filling it. Some giant creature was there with them—and U-ri could hear the breathing of a thousand people, maybe more. And whispering and shouting, but much to her irritation it was all too distant for her to make anything out.

  She wondered why the trip was so different this time. Is it because the Hero’s strength is growing? The great creature’s presence was such that it drowned out all others. The darkness became thicker, more dense, until U-ri felt like a tiny fish pushing its way through a deep-sea current, the glyph upon her forehead her only guiding light.

  If this darkness truly does spring from the Hero, then it can’t be all evil. The Hero has a good side, after all.

  The Hero was true and just. A positive force in balance with the darkness of the King in Yellow—the other side of the coin. So there was no need to categorically fear the darkness, she realized. She would simply have to look through it until she found the light.

  And there was another thing she shouldn’t forget. Hiroki Morisaki was somewhere out there in this darkness. No matter how enamored he had become of the King in Yellow, no matter how unlucky his fate as the last vessel, U-ri was sure that his heart still yearned for the good side of the Hero.

  Maybe if I call to him…Hiroki!

  Again and again, she called out to him in her heart, as she had called him so many times before, when their lives had been more peaceful and happy.

  Whenever she called him, Hiroki would answer. Sometimes grumpily, with a “Now what?” or a “Not again!” But sometimes with true concern. “What’s wrong, Yuriko?” And sometimes the
y would laugh together. Other times, he would get angry on her behalf. They thought through problems together and worried together. They lived together, brother and sister. Why should things be any different now?

  I’ll find you soon, I promise!

  U-ri opened her eyes and came out of the darkness, onto the ground.

  “Whoaaa!” Aju squealed, clinging to her hair. “Where the heck are we? Why are we so high up?”

  He was right. It seemed they had landed on top of a rickety wooden frame of some sort, a good thirty feet off the ground.

  “We’re at a checkpoint,” Ash said, landing lightly on the structure beside them and looking down. “There are several along the high road to the capital. This is the watchtower at the first checkpoint from the city gates. We’re standing atop it.”

  U-ri spotted a wide, dusty thoroughfare beneath them. It went past the tower, winding off into the distance through brown hills. There were scores of people on the road. Some had stopped, their carts standing still, their horses stomping at the ground, looking up at them.

  “Which way to the capital?”

  She couldn’t see any palace. The road was full of people, though in places the clouds of dust hid them and the twilit sky from sight.

  “You think they’re refugees?”

  Everyone on the road was heading in the same direction. Some people seemed to have run from their homes with only what they had on and their children, while others led carts piled high with belongings. They were refugees. She had only seen them in movies before now, but these were definitely the real thing. U-ri felt the strength go out of her legs.

  Ash leaned from the edge of the watchtower and called out to the people on the road below, “What happened to the palace?”

  An old man shifed the weight of a large sack upon his back to look up. “Where’d you come from?”

  “The ruins of Katarhar Abbey. That wind passed through and turned the trees to sticks.”

  The old man’s face was black with soot. Even from their height, U-ri could see that not only his face, but his entire body, was covered in grime.

  The rest of the people had begun to move again. No one had time to wonder about groups of strange travelers suddenly appearing on watchtowers. The old man backtracked against the tide until he reached the foot of the tower.