Revolutionary Veins

by Rey Balor

  “She asked for her spica?”

  The Queen looked to Roam.

  All at once, his ferality transformed, and tears wetted his cheeks.

  “Ol… No.”

  Without waiting for another moment of distraction, Claymore swung the hilt of their sword and knocked him unconscious. They moved forward, uncertain if they meant to secure or kill, but the Queen regained every semblance of control that she had lost in light of his temporary escape. Excitement glowed from her.

  “Keep him alive, my love. We’ll need him.”

  Chapter 33: The Wilds

  “Remember, and live on until purpose is no longer there.”

  Death’s Lament, 52.34

  ARISTA:

  Fear — bitter to the tongue, rotten at its core. Red, yellow, orange… Bright, bright colors that blended where they should never touch. Illias — yes, cling to that name: Illias, Illias, Illias Rivers — felt an explosion behind his eyelids, a desperation in every cell. Fear — turning the chains around him to steel, to diamond, to a singularity that he could not imagine. He was in a room he could not remember walking to. He was in a place he knew he hated. He was standing to his feet once more despite it all. His movements were restricted. Fear — robbing him of his senses, turning quickly to something much darker.

  Red, yellow, orange… The sun had never been this burning before he came here, but it shone with the brilliance of a nova. Grayness did not help smother how strong it was against him. With fingers spread wide, he shielded himself from the rays, but could anyone fully block out the power of fusion? Itch, itch, itch: something was crawling beneath his skin, and he couldn’t part from it. He hurt; she hurt; it never ended. What have you done, stars; what have you done? He flew to the sun; her wings melted, destroyed before either got close. Stars, you wouldn’t take her from me, would you? Is this punishment for this selfish crusade I fought? I saved those you forgot, stars. You took so many, but you can’t have her. You’ll have to beg for my forgiveness, stars.

  Prayers were the only coherent thoughts that would form, and he prayed to every deity he had heard of — Death, most of all. The others were stubborn in their resolve, but Death always visited, prayed for or not.

  “You’re safe now,” he whispered, but Olena was not there to hear. How many times did he say those words? He could not promise such a thing, but he couldn’t seem to say anything else. The phrase became sticky on his lips. You’re safe now, he said; the stars looked at him and laughed. Safe? She’ll never be safe again. Someone draped their arm around him, and it was only then he realized his knees were shaking. Collapse, little wolf; accept your cage.

  “Your work is miraculous, Lady,” the Queen spoke beside him, giving his shoulders a small squeeze before she pulled away. She was yellow, yellow, yellow, and she wore a different kind of war paint with her too-pink lips and painted cheeks. Illias, Illias, Illias swung his arm towards her. It was a weak attempt that was brushed aside. Squinting, he tried to focus on the scene around him, but a film covered his eyes. It was impossible to see anything but a blur of colors. Red, yellow, orange…

  “We’ll survive this, spica, heart and body,” he tried again.

  Another voice answered, deep and shaky. “It’s true then? The woman is his birthmate?”

  “What a delightful turn of events, yes? Perhaps I’ll award the scout for bringing her to me — to think I wanted to condemn her all those years ago, when she would go on to bring us our biggest prize,” the Queen mused. “My darling, fetch the woman. We have much to discuss.”

  Illias stalked forward a few steps, hunting for those who turned a peaceful people to war. Soon, his heart sang. Soon, we’ll truly be free. Someone gripped onto his arm, halting him before he could travel too far.

  “Don’t,” Caliana Sekhon warned. “You’ll make it worse, Illias Rivers.”

  “Coward,” he muttered. “They’ve got…”

  “They’ve got your spica. Messin’ with things I don’t understand. The best you can do is cooperate. They’ll throw you in a cell, but you’ll live,” she whispered.

  “No, no… They can’t hurt her. Promise me you won’t let them.”

  “I can’t promise you nothin’, Illias Rivers.”

  “I’ll get us out. Just please… Let me do it. Let me. I’ll do it… I swear. I won’t hurt anyone as I go. We’ll leave. We’ll get out of here.”

  She paused. “I want the ole Queens destroyed. The walls are gone, and they should follow. You do that, and I’ll look the other way when you do what you plan.”

  “Aye.”

  He focused on the Queen again, catching only one of her questions. “How long until he’ll need to return to you, Lady?”

  “You saw how unstable he is,” came the weak response, syllables slurring together. “It’ll take a good long while before the dearie’s ready to be left off his leash. You can hang the threat of the birthmate over his head, but it’s not enough. He’ll snap back to normal in, I’d say, another two hours at the most. He’ll remain a shell until then. He needs the full operation first, and we need them both alive for that.”

  Blue, blue, blue — his favorite color may have been blue, but he knew there would be red on his hands soon. The way they spoke, as if he could not hear them, was the height of arrogance. He did not even care that they meant to leave him and Olena alive; there were worse things than death, after all. Something pounded his skull, but it was not enough to stop him. He blinked rapidly, trying to rid himself of the unfocused scene around him. Biting his lip until a burst of blood came into his mouth, he could only lock his attention onto one soul: the Queen herself, returned to her throne with brilliant gold resting on her head.

  Illias spoke once more, even as they continued to ignore him.88 The chains around his wrists and ankles chafed his skin, but he pulled against the binds nonetheless. They thought they could chain him! “You’ve done so much… The lies, the deaths, the games you play… It should be you begging us for forgiveness, not us begging our god — not us begging the stars.”

  The Queen tapped her fingernails against the arms of her throne, and the clicking noise seemed far too loud in the expanse of the room. “How disappointing. I do believe he wants to kill me still.”

  “Why did you do this…”

  “Oh my, and he’s trying to start a conversation? He didn’t even properly greet me — didn’t bow, didn’t name me Queen. For a diplomat, he is far lazier than I would have imagined.”

  “Your people trusted you…”

  The Queen scoffed. “You talk and accomplish nothing, dear wolf. I grow tired of it. Your birthmate will be here any moment. It seems she has information she wants to tell me. We’ll see what you are truly made of when she arrives. After all, you may live with someone for decades — centuries, even — and share in every meal, relish in every thought, talk until your throats are sore, but it is only when you hold them over the volcano’s edge that you truly meet them. We’ll meet you both today, and then we may talk of peace.”

  “Liar.”

  She laughed, and it sounded like a coming storm. She laughed, and he hated.

  SPICA:

  They came for her.

  Olena was waiting.

  Instead of fighting, Olena followed along, even allowing them to bind her hands. She was docile, with gaze averted to the ground. The two guards kept their weapons in their hands, one with a thin sword and the other with a warhammer. She was calm. They traveled down the spiral steps of the prison, exiting into the courtyard. It was almost night outside, and Olena sucked in the air. There was no sign of Ranger, but in the distance, she could hear the calls of a crowd. If she was lucky, it would become a mob.

  They weren’t in the courtyard long. The guards led her into the castle and down the length of a long corridor. A massive set of doors waited at the end, and there was only one place they could lead. Olena nearly grinned.

  The doors to the throne room were ornately carved, but their beauty did not phase her. It
was an illusion, masking the terrible things that were allowed to happen. Under the guise of gold, the monarch was allowed to drag itself upward as it simultaneously pushed others beneath its feet. It all took place because their sparkle acted as a distraction.

  The doors opened, and she saw them all.

  The Queen sat on a throne, yellow hair piled onto her head. Her blonde locks were curled around a miniature ship, resting soundly in a sea of hair. The ship was the most violent shade of orange Olena had seen. The Queen wore a sheer red gown that rippled as she leaned forward to drink in the newcomers. Olena did not miss the greed in her expression. Beside the Queen, a large guard stood with a sword by their side. Olena could not tell if they were male or female; their expression was stony and nothing else. A bloodied woman in a wheelchair sat behind them, glaring at all. She rolled closer upon Olena’s entrance.

  Illias, her dear Illias, was chained before the Queen. Another woman stood beside him, arm around his waist to hold him up. For as bad as he looked in the prison, it was little compared to how he appeared now. He seemed frail, and for a moment, she didn’t think he recognized her. When recognition came, he had the nerve to try to smile.

  “I thought you promised me you were alright, brother,” she called across the room.

  “And here I’d thought you came to keep me safe,” he returned.

  The two guards that escorted her remained by Olena’s side, but she believed she could take them, once she got her hands on a weapon. It was only after they were given a nod from the Queen that they stepped back. She would have to take them down fast, if she and Illias were to escape.

  She was about to move when two more guards entered, dragging Ranger between them.

  Chapter 34: The Citadel

  “Death is present in the first breath taken.”

  Death’s Lament, 59.6

  The brightest of Claymore’s memories could be traced back to that brief instant in which they had a birthmate. Towering over the other children from a young age, Claymore lumbered in the streets with a fake sword, but whenever they reached the others in play, they could see genuine fright reflected back. Their size was not a method of protection but a cause for alarm, and the awkwardness of their limbs weighed heavily with every swing of their fake sword.

  When the weight of others’ fears grew too strong to bear alone, they curled atop their straw bed in an attempt to be as small as possible. “If I’m small enough, I’ll blink out,” they had whispered to their straw doll. They were cracked, even when they were small, but where their cracks existed, Dove was there to fill them. He sprawled out beside them, and in his high-pitched child’s voice, he would sing the same songs his mother sang to him when he felt frightened.

  In their birthmate’s voice, Claymore found a protector. They had never believed themself to be strong, but his voice filled them with a lightness they had never known. The wooden sword they carried inspired fear, but the soft songs were a promise they could inspire far more as well. They could protect and shine as Dove; the pair were fashioned to complete one another. Why should they both not shine?

  In his death, their question was answered. When looking at a binary star system, one could never see two points of light. There was only the brightness of one, and after he faded, they had no choice but to find another brightness. The Aegis offered a solution. Oblivion had been given to Claymore to fill the void, but they hardly recognized Oblivion anymore. Dark streaks traced along the blade, staining the silver metal an almost black color, and the awkwardness in its grip was far more reminiscent of that wooden sword from childhood.

  Two images swam before Claymore: one of their childhood world and one of the reality that encroached around them now, with a pair of birthmates reuniting in a way that was so foreign and yet so intimately familiar. The Queen had brought forth Roam with chained hands and ankles, and although he swayed slightly beside Caliana Sekhon, the instant he caught sight of his birthmate, strength returned to him. Caliana tugged on his binds to keep him in place, but Claymore was not concerned about him. They saw the chaos alight in the one called Khalsa.

  When Claymore had been left alone without Dove, they felt a similar chaos erupt in themself. The bind between birthmates was a beautiful, damning thing. With a soul both in one’s body and another’s body, an individual could live twice a life — experience twice as many emotions, love twice as hard, find company even in dark places — but when that other was snatched from one’s side, it cracked an individual. It made them incomplete; it made them a weapon. Claymore knew that turmoil well.

  The captain could smell the desperation in the air, and they moved closer to the Queen, ready to place themself between the two women should the need arise. The Queen rested her hand on Claymore’s back, brushing her thumb along their spine in soft reassurance. Claymore was stone-faced as they watched the wolfling woman stomp the heel of her boot into Maul’s foot. She followed it by immediately smashing the back of her head into his own to force him to crumble. Falchion moved forward, but she elbowed him in the stomach just as quickly.

  The scout, Ranger, stepped back from the scene, holding up her hands in surrender, but when Shishpar abandoned her side to help the others, she knocked his legs out from under him with ease. Glaive gripped onto Ranger tighter, looking toward Claymore for command. They had none. Caliana watched with a mixture of amusement and disgust, and after a word to Roam, she quietly slipped from the room.

  Still bound, Khalsa sprinted forward with the strength of a much larger force,89 and the Lady of the Pillared Land could only throw herself over in her chair to avoid a collision. The Lady’s glasses went flying as she sprawled onto the ground. The wolfling paused for a fraction of a moment, uncertain whether to finish her kill or reunite, but the moment passed and she was moving to her birthmate. Tightly, she gripped onto the collar of Roam’s tunic, desperate to see him safe.

  “I heard your heart crying, Il. I heard it, and I’ll keep it safe now. You and me, aye? Just as promised.” Quieter, Khalsa said something else that no others could hear. She brushed Roam’s hair from his face, running her hands over him to look for wounds. Whispered threats made Claymore more nervous than loud proclamations, but the Queen was leaning forward, absorbing the pair with a critical eye.

  Despite the torment he had been put under, despite the betrayal that still flickered in his gaze when he glanced toward the Queen, Roam smiled. He leaned some of his weight onto his birthmate, and from a distance, Claymore could see the tears wetting his cheek. The exhaustion, the hate, the despair — it all was lightened when the pair were beside each other. It hurt Claymore in a way they could not begin to articulate, for they knew it was what the Queen wanted. She smiled.

  The Lady of the Pillared Lands struggled to right herself, a shadow of her former self. Claymore nodded for Shishpar to assist the woman. Her side was staining red once more from where she had been stabbed by Roam hours ago, and Claymore wanted to ensure it did not happen again. They wanted to leave as well, but they could no more leave the Queen to her plans than they could abandon their warm memories of a birthmate long ago. No, they knew now that this could not be love, nor was it obligation. This was destiny, centuries in the making; this was the collision of two galaxies, pulled together by the sheer, incomprehensible force of gravity.

  Shishpar escorted the Lady away, and Claymore allowed themself to relax. The other Aegis still stood in position throughout the room, but each was on edge. Glaive had her eyes on Ranger, Falchion watched the embracing wolflings, and Maul’s gaze did not waver from Claymore. Duty, he seemed to speak, over all else. Claymore wanted to say so much and wanted to promise even more, but they were nearing a conclusion they could not speak aloud — not yet. They looked between the Queen and the birthmates, between their possible future and their definite past. They did not ask what would Death do, what would the Queen do, what would Dove do; they asked what they should do. Their tongue stuck to the roof of their mouth with the answer.

  “Claymore,
give me your sword,” the Queen commanded.

  Claymore so rarely allowed others to touch the polished blade. All emptiness that had threatened to swallow them after Dove’s death had been transferred to the weapon. To allow another to wield it was giving them a power over Claymore’s very soul, and they did not want that. They did not want it! There was the truth they could not yet speak, and it blazed. To do all that they had done and decide it was not best… They stared in wide-eyed panic at Alycia Cromwell, the rose of the world.

  As if sensing their hesitation, the Queen continued, “You still hold steadfast to Death, and it is for Death I do this now. Grab the girl, and I’ll prove my words to be true. Life and Death are interconnected, are they not, my love?”

  Claymore did not move. They looked down to their weapon and back to the birthmates. The pair clutched onto one another, but they were certain where they stood. What was Claymore? The Queen did move. She reached to Claymore’s side and pulled Oblivion from its sheath without permission. While the blade had grown awkward in Claymore’s grip, it seemed eerily natural in the Queen’s delicate, soft hold. Claymore felt empty without it. They felt free.

  Although the Queen’s steps were silent with the long drape of her sheer gown gliding along the floor, the steps still seemed to ring with a purpose that terrified Claymore.

  “Hand of devotion, spirit of Death, do you accept this offering?” As the Queen said the words, Claymore bowed their head, and the length of their hood shielded them from view of the others. It was only in the shadow of the fabric that they felt secure. Here, none could see the disconnect occurring between what they meant to happen and what truly unfolded. None could begin to imagine the guilt wracking their expression and the way their resolve crumbled when their dark hues met the hazel eyes of the unforgiving Queen.