Vassal

by Sterling D'Este

  He looked down at the book and ran a hand back through his hair. “I suppose it might have some stabilizing effect on the rest of the incantation, but I doubt it. Still, we should include it just in case; the academy does advise against altering spells you aren’t extremely familiar with. And it’s so small. Just a prick of the finger. You’ll be able to heal us both without trying.”

  Etienne smiled at her reassuringly and carefully set both the bowl of herbs and the dagger in the circle’s center. “Are you alright, Alphonse? I’m certain we can do this.” He held out a hand to her in an invitation.

  She had the precise and dismal sinking feeling that she had already stepped off this cliff. That she was already falling but didn’t know it yet. No one to catch her. Alphonse slipped her hand into his and nearly stumbled as they entered the divining circle. The hair on her arms stood up.

  “Let’s just get this over with,” Alphonse murmured, holding her free hand out for the incantation she needed to recite. It was in the old tongue. She wasn’t fluent in the dead language, but any mage within the academy knew enough of it to get by, so many original spells were written in it.

  Alphonse could hear her own heartbeat within her ears as she looked down at the page, at the lines that would unlock this memory. The word for memory in the old tongue was a vague translation, as she recalled. A few hundred years ago, to remember was to relive, to make past experiences real again. If only for a time. And so in modern dialects, the word ‘memory’ was quite different from old.

  She recalled her language master expounding in great detail how crucial nuances were sometimes lost in translation.

  Wide eyes flickered to Etienne one last time as he stepped back to his side of the circle, not needing the book since he had likely memorized it all.

  Perhaps it was her imagination, but Alphonse could have sworn a chill traveled down her spine.

  ✶

  Etienne took a deep breath. His heart was racing away in the same haphazard gallop that preceded all of his discoveries. It was like nervous energy driving him on and on, always to the next, biggest triumph. Now, his long fingers actually shook with it as he raised them to grip the pendant that hung perpetually from his neck. He borrowed some of the energy stored there and lit the herbs in their basin with a thought. Soon, thickly scented smoke drifted in thin tendrils throughout the room, giving the already flickering chamber an even stranger ambiance as the rush of magic rose within him.

  With another deep breath, Etienne closed his eyes, gathering his thoughts for the spell. Then, he began to recite, the ancient language rolling smoothly off his tongue in a rich tenor. The candle flames around them responded immediately, dimming and flickering more wildly, as though a breeze rushed through them. When he finished, they stilled but did not brighten. Etienne nodded to Alphonse, a cue for her to begin reading the next portion. The girl’s voice was soft and timid in the cavernous space, but Etienne did not hear her falter. She had always done well at recitations, and some part of him that was not entirely focused on the ritual swelled with pride.

  The next portion was a little more difficult as the two had to speak together, but Etienne began slowly, watching Alphonse’s lips move and bobbing his head in rhythm. As one, they finished the spoken incantation, her soft voice mingling with his. Half the candles sputtered out, and the bowl of herbs ceased burning with the last dripping word, smoke rushing back into the basin from which it had come.

  Still trembling, Etienne pressed the dagger’s tip into the pad of his thumb until a single, ruby drop welled beneath it and fell into the sigil below. He shuddered and leaned across to pass Alphonse the dagger to do the same.

  ❀

  Without intending to, Alphonse gripped the dagger’s blade too hard. Not a drop of blood, but an entire spattering from her sliced fingers fell onto the designs below. She was shaking so much that her control was wholly shattered. Wincing, she watched the smoke, which stayed contained and yet alive, dancing beneath the basin’s lip.

  Would the memories appear before them as a painting?

  Instill in one of their minds?

  Be spoken aloud as a story being told?

  Could they—

  Alphonse’s racing thoughts screeched to a halt as the temperature in the room dropped suddenly. A near-silent explosion sounded within the bowl, reverberating through the room, through their very bones. Even if she had wanted to run, Alphonse found herself rooted to her spot. Frozen with terror.

  The smoke writhed and burst out of the bowl, spreading to cloak the entire circle with its noxious smell. The healer’s eyes burned, and tears slipped down her cheeks when something stepped out of the smoke.

  It was human in shape, but not in appearance. Long supple limbs, contours, and valleys identified it as female, hair rippling down its back in living waves. But its skin. Its face. It was terrible to behold.

  Eyes as dark as night, pupilless and foreign, looked over Etienne and Alphonse. Sinful lips pulled back in a triumphant smile, cunning and merciless as it lifted its hand to examine itself, uncaring that it was completely nude.

  Why would it care? Its body was the epitome of perfection.

  Its skin was like molten rock, slate grey on the surface, with cracks of lava red, orange, and yellow, thrashing beneath. It’s very flesh was alive.

  But even as Alphonse saw this, she could also see through the creature. It wasn’t corporeal. Wasn’t whole.

  A memory?

  The creature seemed to realize this at the same time Alphonse did, for that smile turned to a snarl, and the glorious, beautiful, ghastly being turned towards Etienne.

  “Eet tein karak Enyo ahoint?”

  The voice that came out of that memory was even worse than its appearance. Alphonse clapped her hands, one still bleeding, to her ears to try and drown it out. To no avail.

  Sharper, again, the creature repeated itself, stepping towards Etienne in a demanding manner.

  “Eet tein karak Enyo AHOINT?!”

  That voice was the crashing of an avalanche and the screaming of wind through treetops in a storm. It was the slither of scales against stones and the cry of an eagle.

  “Who— what are you?” Etienne stammered. “Tell us of the Old Gods, of your origins!”

  Alphonse actually moaned in terror as the creature snarled at the boy’s demands. Glowing from that fire within, it stalked over to Etienne. It was nearly as tall as he, and it peered into his face with unblinking, cold eyes. It scanned each and every inch of his face, neck, shoulders, torso, pelvis, and legs. It snorted.

  “Monan.” It seemed an insult, and the creature cruelly laid a burning hand upon Etienne’s chest, above his heart, in dismissal.

  Alphonse could see that shadow hand and could see Etienne through it, and yet steam and smoke were rising from its touch. The smell of cooking flesh.

  The healer gagged.

  The creature turned from Etienne, careless that it had just marred his skin, and those terrible, pitiless eyes landed on her. Alphonse gasped and jerked back.

  “Etienne!” she cried, unable to escape the circle as the creature stalked closer. It was giving her the same careful studying it had given Etienne. Would it burn her too, in retribution for disturbing its slumber? They never should have tried this ritual.

  Whatever it saw in Alphonse, it nodded, reaching out that same fiery hand.

  “No,” Alphonse gasped, even as those phantom fingers stroked her cheek. Alphonse closed her eyes, waiting for the searing pain to strike. Instead, all she felt was pressure and a warm caress.

  A blinding flash of light, even visible through her shut eyes, burst through the room. And then all was quiet. All was dark. Each and every candle had been burned down to the very base, melted and disfigured.

  The blood, their blood, was gone. The creature had disappeared, taking the smoke along with it.

  Alphonse let out a trembling sob, crumpling to her knees.

  Stumbling steps echoed against the stone floors as Etien
ne rushed to her side. Alphonse felt his hands brushing carefully against her face, his fingers trembling as he pushed aside her veiled hair, checking to make sure she was alright. Only she was not alright. Not at all. His breaths were rapid and irregular as Etienne cradled her to his shoulder. She heard his shaking voice above her head.

  “I’m sorry, Alphonse. I’m so, so sorry.”

  All Alphonse could do was weep against him, her entire body shaking with uncontrolled sobs. When she was finally able to pull away, the healer held her own cupped hands over his horribly burnt chest, the flesh blackened and revealing layers of fat and muscle below.

  Tears continued making their way down her cheeks and dripping onto the floor between them as green, soft, light radiated from her hands over Etienne. She knit the skin together carefully, repairing the nerves and muscle until he was whole.

  Sniffling, she removed her hands to reveal a scar, the mark of that hand over his chest, bright red against his normally alabaster skin. Even if Alphonse had wanted to erase the disfigurement, she couldn’t. Whatever magic the creature possessed insisted, fought her every which way of the healing…

  He’d be marked forever.

  In truth, perhaps it was best that Etienne have a reminder of the cost of ambition and curiosity.

  Swallowing, Alphonse found her voice to be weak and hoarse, barely able to speak. “I’m going to bed,” she croaked, lifting her amber eyes to Etienne’s face for one breath before darting away. Tears still slipped out of her eyes without her bidding.

  Chapter II

  Fourth Moon, Waning Crescent: Thloegr

  On a cliff above the valley where she had spent her entire life, Delyth watched the sun rise. The world around her was hushed, in that quiet breath of time when the animals of the night retired to their dens, but before the day’s creatures began to stir. There was a bustling town waking far below her, visible as a square scar cut into the green and white patchwork of the valley, but she couldn’t hear it from here.

  Here she was absolutely alone. Free of the stares of villagers and priests alike. Free to let the cold wind of a mountain spring send her dark braids streaming behind her. Free to stretch her arms high and her wings out to either side just as far as they would go. Here, it didn’t matter how much space Delyth took up.

  But it couldn’t last.

  In the town on the valley floor, there stood a temple, stone-walled and ancient. It was by far the tallest building, and from its center, there rose a tower, blunt as an old tooth. It looked down upon everything around it from slits in its uppermost room, a room that held an old, wide-mouthed bell.

  When the great bell tower rang out that morning, Delyth heard its peals even from her distant perch.

  She had heard the great bell only a few times in her life. Twice, it had rung for the old seer, Cerys, and visions of a rapidly approaching future marked by gods not seen in hundreds of years. Once, it had rung out of desperation, a call for aid when the village was attacked by raiders.

  Either reason was enough to send Delyth leaping from the cliff face, her dark wings cupping air with the snap of tightening leather. She did not love the people of the village. Many were cruel and fearful of her since the raiders’ attack years ago. However, she had been raised by the warrior priests and priestesses of the temple and would protect them with her life, either from human enemies or future calamities.

  The road leading into the village was bare. No warriors of the temple or of roving bands dotted its grey dirt surface. She didn’t hear the sounds she associated with an attack— shouts and the stamping of booted feet. Perhaps the bells rang for some news from the temple? It seemed odd, though. Seer Cerys had passed the year before, and there were no others to take up her mantle.

  Delyth folded her wings neatly along her back and straightened her shoulders with the air of someone soon facing an enemy, for all that she was only walking into the town where she lived. It was a point of pride that she would not let the stares and whispers of the others that lived there affect the way she carried herself. She was near six-feet tall and well-formed. She would not stoop for them.

  She noticed the grimaces of the few who saw her step onto the main thoroughfare, though most of the villagers attention was blessedly turned away, to the commotion of followers flocking to the temple. Delyth took her place among them and swept towards the great stone building, ignoring the dingier shops and residences along her way.

  The temple itself was brimming with voices and the slap of boots against stone. Armored warrior-priests stood alongside healers and acolytes. High priests raised their voices above the din in argument, but their leader, High Priestess Anwen, the Voice of Enyo, stood silent on a raised dais in the center of the main worship hall. Her hands gripped the long, brutal blade that had hung from the mounts behind her for as long as Delyth could remember. Anwen searched the faces of those gathered, and while Delyth watched, their eyes met, honeyed gold on blue. When she turned away again, the halfbreed shuddered.

  It was difficult to tell what could have occurred to stir up the temple’s inhabitants so, but as Delyth began to pay more attention to the voices around her, she picked up a few common phrases: Calamity, the call of Enyo, Cerys’s visions coming true at last.

  Unease rippled through Delyth’s belly, and she pulled her wings tighter against her body. She had little idea of how the priests could know that the events Seer Cerys had spoken of were unfolding without the seer herself to tell them, but she supposed it wasn’t her place to know. At heart, she was simply a warrior, destined to serve the Goddess with her strength rather than her mind. Still, she thought it must have something to do with the great, black blade clasped in Anwen’s hands, dark even against the warm brown of the High Priestess’s skin.

  Delyth shouldered her way closer to the dais, many of the priests and acolytes alike moving out of her way to avoid brushing her skin. As a whole, they were less wary of lepers, but she gave no indication that she had noticed.

  She’d gotten about to the middle of the room when High Priestess Anwen raised an arm. The slight woman had to prop the sword against the stone in front of herself to do so, as though it was too heavy to comfortably hold in one hand. It took a bit of time for the farthest away to see, but soon everyone had turned towards the back of the room in a wave of silence and uneasy faces. Delyth shifted and rested her hand on the space where her folded-steel dagger should have hung, belatedly remembering that she had not brought it with her when she’d left that morning. It was a senseless habit, anyway. This was not the sort of danger that could be addressed with blades.

  With the followers eyes upon her, the High Priestess dropped her hand and looked out across them, her expression serene.

  “Last night,” she began, her voice carrying clearly through the room, “Calamity, the sword of the Goddess Enyo, fell from its place upon the wall, burying itself blade-first into the mortar between stones. All who touch it can feel the blade’s hunger.” She paused, as though giving her audience a chance to wonder at just what this could portend. Delyth’s own sense of dread grew, worming through her chest like the roots of some creeping vine.

  “Our Goddess lives,” Anwen said, and the room again erupted in chaos.

  ⥣ ⥣ ⥣

  * * *

  Delyth slept fitfully that night, so she did not wake before dawn to slip away for a few moments to herself. Instead, she still lay on her belly beneath leaden wings when a brisk knock woke her. She pushed herself up groggily and answered the door in the simple breast band and trousers she had slept in.

  A wide-eyed acolyte stood in the doorway, small and narrow-shouldered. She had red hair that she’d pulled back from her freckled face, and she was looking up at Delyth with her mouth slightly parted. The halfbreed crossed her arms over her bare stomach.

  “Yes?” she said gruffly, uncharacteristically bad-tempered from lack of sleep.

  The girl seemed to shake herself. “I’m to take you to the High Priestess.”

  D
elyth blinked in surprise, her sleep-addled mind struggling to keep up. “What— I… One moment.”

  She slipped back into her room to tie on a clean, sleeveless jerkin and pull on simple boots. It took her two tries to get her belt fastened correctly, her fumbling fingers belying her anxiety. Delyth had only ever spoken to the High Priestess in passing, just one of the few hundred followers she presided over. It was too strange, too soon after the wakening of Enyo’s sword.

  Now dressed, Delyth hurried to exit the room, overturning a small bedside table in her haste. She didn’t pause to pick it up, instead opening the door on the now somewhat alarmed acolyte.

  “Alright then,” she said and managed not to slam the door behind her. The acolyte wisely didn’t ask questions, but turned to lead the way—not to a private chamber, as Delyth had expected, but to the great hall in which the High Priestess had made the address before.

  The room was emptier than Delyth had ever seen it: on the far end, just before the dais, the High Priestess stood along with her Chief Swordbearer, leader of the warrior-priests, and her Chief Mender, leader of the healers. Between them and the door, halfway down the long room, was a rough, wooden table flanked by five heavily armed warrior priests. In the center of the table lay the sword of Enyo.

  The table was notched and the guards ruffled as though they had just come from fighting. It didn’t make any sense—warriors didn’t draw steel in the temple, but the wary manner in which they watched her approach told another story.

  Delyth halted several feet away and slightly to the left of the rough table, as though uncertain of her right to approach it. She was close enough to see that the High Priestess and her seconds had been in the midst of some heated discussion, but they broke off before she could glean the nature of what they were saying. If anything, seeing them argue only made her more apprehensive. They had never presented anything less than a united front before.