Vassal

by Sterling D'Este

  Delyth reached out and put her hands over the healer’s. “Alphonse, I served Enyo out of duty to the people who raised me. She was nothing but a concept, intangible, unreal. When I met her, she was nothing like the just Goddess my people worshipped. I have seen her with my own eyes. I know what she is and what she is not, and it is my right to decide whether or not to believe as my people do.” She looked up from Alphonse’s hands, meeting the healer’s gaze. “I’ve already made my choice.”

  Something tentative and foreign stirred in her chest. Alphonse looked into Delyth’s ice blue eyes in confusion. How could she be willing to abandon her Goddess? How could she see Alphonse as someone worth setting aside a lifetime of beliefs?

  How could Delyth choose her? Alphonse was nothing. Even Etienne had seen that in the end…

  The healer’s hands spasmed slightly, gripping Delyth’s tighter. She wanted to believe. She wanted to see hope where there was none. She wanted to feel.

  But.

  “But I’ve already lost,” Alphonse whispered, ashamed of the truth of those words. “She— she’s too strong. Too powerful.” Her grip loosened.

  No.

  Hope was too dangerous. She couldn’t let Delyth hope even for a moment.

  “Etienne left because he knew the truth, Del. And he was right. I could never withstand Enyo. I can’t even stand up to Tristan, and he’s just a loudmouth rogue. I’m not like you. I’m not a fighter. I’m not…” She couldn’t even say the rest. Brave, strong, enough. She couldn’t even heal anymore.

  “I’m nothing.”

  ༄

  Delyth tightened her hands around Alphonse’s fingers. Why couldn’t she see herself the way the priestess did?

  Didn’t Alphonse remember the countless times she’d healed them all? How she’d brought them together with games and stories? How she’d faced all of the horrible things that Enyo had forced her to do and still somehow retained her essential self? How she’d loved Delyth after she’d proven herself a killer a second time over?

  Now, even broken, she was kind.

  The warrior shook her head.

  “There is more good in you than all these mountains, and that includes Tristan and Etienne and Enyo. You have held out against her so many moons… so much longer than anyone else possibly could. Trust yourself, Alphonse.”

  The healer’s eyes were glued to Delyth’s as if she were memorizing the lines of her face and the dark wings spread out behind her. Alphonse rocked forward on her knees, leaning across the distance to kiss Delyth, her mouth earnest. Warm and lingering.

  Delyth’s heart leaped. It felt as though the healer believed her, as though she finally understood what the priestess had known for moons. Alphonse was so strong. And together, they still had hope.

  Then, Alphonse pressed gentle lips to her forehead.

  “Run,” she murmured, her face tensed in desperate determination. “I’ll stay awake all night; when I fall asleep, she’ll be tired too. You could flee Delyth. You could escape this madness. You could survive and make a new life. A happy life, where no one calls you halfbreed or Cabot or anything but your name.”

  “No.” Delyth’s voice was hard and thick. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  She drew her wings in tight against her back, upset and trying to hold it in.

  Alphonse wanted Delyth to abandon her. To flee.

  “You can’t ask me to do that. I love you, Alphonse. I— I just learned that there was a way to stop this all along. I—” She sucked in a deep breath. “I can’t leave.” It was true. She would never willingly leave Alphonse, and there was another reason besides. “You heard my oath, Alphonse. If Enyo reaches her full power, then I will have to serve her.”

  Delyth pulled her hands back and looked down at the creases in them, at the rough hills of callus and the valleys between her fingers. If she was made to fight for Enyo, would she ever clean them of blood? “We have to try,” she whispered. “I can’t lose you.”

  Or me.

  ❀

  It was true… Alphonse had heard their bargain. What small piece of her heart that still beat had broken over it.

  Delyth was stuck. Nearly as trapped as Alphonse.

  But…

  “You already have the parts of me that matter, Del. My soul. My heart. My love.” As fleeting as those things seemed. “Enyo will just have my body…” The thought made her blood run cold. “I don’t want her to hurt you. If you—If you stay with her…” She’d make Delyth into a monster.

  “Please, Delyth.” Alphonse reached between them again, touching her paramour’s cheek, her shoulder. The healer’s hands were so cold now. Her entire body was. “Let me save you. I… I don’t know how to bind Enyo, Etienne is the only one who has that kind of magic, but I can save you. I can—I can stop this all…” Her words faltered, afraid to admit what had been brewing in her mind ever since Etienne had fled.

  The final choice she had. Her final act of defiance. If she was brave enough to make it.

  “Please, Delyth, you’re the only person I’ve ever loved. Please…” Alphonse swallowed, scooting closer, greedy for every connection she could make before it was all over. “Please let me save you, at least.”

  Delyth reached out to pull Alphonse the rest of the way into her embrace and wrapped her arms around the smaller woman. She was shaking, the leather of the wide sails of her wings trembling faintly behind her. “Alphonse… aderyn bak… what are you even saying? We aren’t out of hope yet, bykhan. I can get to the temple. Separate Enyo from her artifact. Find someone to bind her. We can still make it out of here. Together.”

  Alphonse very nearly choked on the pet name. That anyone had ever thought her precious enough to give a special name…

  Weakly she wrapped her arms about Delyth’s torso, turning to hide her face against her paramour’s neck. To hide in that velvet-soft darkness. One last time.

  “I love you, Delyth,” Alphonse replied, afraid to agree they would make it out together. Afraid to make promises neither could keep. But…

  To save Delyth, she would do what had to be done. She’d protect her friends and her home.

  “I’m glad,” she murmured after a moment. “I’m glad you chose me.”

  ༄

  Delyth pressed her cheek against the top of Alphonse’s tawny head and wept quietly, her tears disappearing into the healer’s thick hair.

  “I love you, Alphonse.”

  She no longer trusted her voice with anything else. Her throat was too raw, choked with pebbles.

  But of course, she had chosen Alphonse over the Goddess. It hadn’t really felt like there was any choice to make at the end.

  Chapter XXVIII

  Eighth Moon, First Quarter: Thloegr

  The morning bloomed bloodred, the sky molten oranges and pinks, golden rays piercing the starry purple of night and pushing it away.

  Alphonse had woken in Delyth’s arms and managed to keep her tears at bay to kiss her paramour one last time. She had dressed, fondly touching the folds of her veil still tucked in the bottom of her pack, then wrapped her journal in it securely.

  Secretly, she had stowed the journal in Delyth’s things and then left the tent.

  She watched her last sunrise, but by the time the fiery dome had crested the sky, embers replaced amber, and Enyo was reborn.

  She purred luxuriously and stretched, a mountain cat waking from a long nap. Ready to prowl. Ready to hunt.

  No one bothered with breakfast; Thlonandras and her basin calling to her brightly, summoning. Packs and tents were towed away, Calamity chiming cheerfully on Delyth’s back as Enyo started her climb. She was sweating by the time she reached the top of the minor cliff and hauled herself over.

  One hurdle down.

  “Did you enjoy your night, Ba’oto?” she asked, collecting pebbles and turning them over in her hands.

  “You know, I don’t think she did,” Tristan said, making a show of peering into Delyth’s face. “That isn’t the look of a
satiated woman. And I would know. Pity you paid so much, eh? I’d be asking for my money back.”

  Mindlessly, Enyo tossed the stones across the path, skittering and bouncing.

  It seemed a childish thing to do, to throw rocks—

  With a crack like splitting marble, a large pit opened where her throws had landed, exposing something that looked like a trapping pit. A hole dug into the ground, spears sunken deep into the earth so that when the beast fell in, it impaled itself.

  Enyo smirked. “It appears some of my trials are still intact…”

  ༄

  Delyth did not know whether or not to be glad that Enyo was walking the path rather than Alphonse.

  Already, she missed her lover fiercely.

  But the way she had spoken last night as though it was foolish even to consider hope. Let me save you, at least.

  Delyth shivered. She couldn’t allow Alphonse to sacrifice herself. She didn’t deserve it.

  But neither would she dignify Enyo’s question with an answer. The priestess just watched the rocks leave her hand, tumbling across the path until she triggered the bear trap. The ancient spikes within reached up to Delyth, open hands.

  She turned away.

  Of course, the path was lined with pitfalls. Enyo had called them ‘trials.’ Perhaps this was where the temple’s tradition of testing their warriors had come from. Enyo’s barbaric insanity distilled into a more reasonable, safer form. And more evidence of the temple’s comfortable ignorance.

  Behind her, Tristan had finally stopped laughing at his ridiculous jokes. “Guess we’ll have to be light on our feet.”

  “It is simple enough,” Enyo instructed as she started to walk down the trail, sporadically tossing rocks, as if she could not recall where precisely her traps were. “Don’t touch anything, watch out for snares and tripwires, and if at any point you hear a mudslide, run.”

  Her gaze flickered knowingly to Delyth, clearly expecting her priestess to save her should it come to that. After all, Delyth could fly.

  ⚄

  Tristan turned his eyes skyward and sighed.

  Fucking Enyo.

  Did things always have to be this difficult?

  He rubbed his face with his hands and pressed forward, sliding around the morose warrior with the ease of a mountain cat. This was going to be annoying, and all because Enyo had to prove to herself just how devoted her people were.

  It wasn’t as if Delyth was going to save him if anything happened. He didn’t have perky, bouncing tits or full lips.

  He huffed, scanning the ground for tripwires. At least he was quick on his feet. That ought to help.

  “Is the entire length of the path trapped?”

  Surely, it would have been enough just to do the ends. Enyo seemed to think about that, then pulled a face that was neither confirming nor denying this idea. “There used to be wild bears that Maoz would convince to roam these mountains…” He didn’t think she could have sounded more pleased by the thought. “Maybe you could convince them to leave us alone with your satisfactory techniques?”

  “Me?” Tristan put a hand over his chest. “But you are so educated on the subject, m’lady. I would only get in your way.”

  He glanced over his shoulder to watch Delyth folding in on herself, face stony but shoulders hunched forward.

  Hmm, it appeared that his jokes weren’t helping her mood.

  Tristan smiled. He would just have to try harder.

  “Though I would, of course, love to learn by -erm- demonstration.”

  She shook her head. “It’s much harder with female parts…” she trailed off as she peered around a tight corner of the trail. It had narrowed and was forcing them between two large boulders.

  Tristan followed her gaze, his sense of unease growing. Was there something behind those boulders? Enyo rubbed her hands together, as if in preparation, and then stepped past the behemoth rocks.

  And the air split with a crack.

  Of course, it was a fucking trap. And Enyo had forgotten about it.

  Above him, something dark and heavy was falling, too fast to bother finding out what. He bounded backward, stumbling to the path so that grit and rocks bit into the skin of his palms with jagged teeth. Was he out from under it?

  Tristan turned his face skyward, arm thrown above him for protection, to find that Delyth had not sprung away from the tree but towards it. She was in the air, her black wings straining, and the log pressed into one shoulder.

  She didn’t throw it so much as fall, angling her wings down the slope where she let go of the log. There was a long scratch across her cheek where some smaller twig had scored her.

  Tristan leaped up as though he had never fallen, dusting himself off peevishly.

  “Didn’t you design this path?!” he snapped at Enyo, his expression dark.

  Watching where the large branch bounced down the mountainside with regular thumps, Enyo only gave Tristan a scorching look before meandering on. “I suppose if you are too afraid, Tristan, Ba’oto and I could fly up to Thlonandras and leave you here?” she crooned, knowing full well he’d rather swallow his tongue than miss her regaining her powers.

  ༄

  Delyth just walked past the others when she landed, too tired to pay attention to their squabbling. They came across another pit triggered some time ago by the looks of it, and a felled tree. It seemed someone had caused a landslide because the path completely disappeared beneath a pile of rock, dirt, and debris. Perhaps the traveler was buried under all that stone.

  Delyth wondered what they had possibly been hoping to achieve in taking this path. There was nothing at its top but bones.

  Enyo had only snorted at the sight and climbed up and over the heap without a backward glance. Her cheeks were red from the sun, and she was panting, but her eyes were ablaze as if she could see her precious basin already. Feel its weight in her palms. For a while, they hiked in silence, and whatever surprises the trail held for them, Enyo steered them safely around.

  Delyth saw the temple first.

  It was less impressive than she had imagined. The cold, beautifully cut marble of the pillars had crumpled beneath the weight of the roof. The walls gaped open in places from the wounds time had inflicted upon them. Trees grew from its center. Lichen and vines splattered the stone, crept from the doorways.

  It was still beautiful.

  But also broken.

  The priestess turned away before either of the other two remarked on the distant temple. She dreaded reaching it. Dreaded the chance that she might fail Alphonse in keeping the artifact away from Enyo.

  Still, she would have to try.

  Beside her, Tristan had noticed the vista, his eyes wide. He whistled low. “They just don’t build that way anymore.”

  Enyo turned quickly to peer across the rock and boulder landscape to see Thlonandras. A sound escaped her throat. Raw and primal and somehow deeply, deeply frail. Fingers covered in dust and dirt came up to wrap about her throat tenderly as her eyes caressed her temple’s curves and edges. The sunlight gleamed in her tawny locks, and Enyo seemed to draw strength from the very sky itself. “Ma’oh,” she whispered.

  ⚄

  Tristan entered the temple beside Enyo, just as he would have in times long past, the two of them striding before any mortal followers.

  He smiled grimly.

  Soon those times would be possible once more. Enyo’s basin was finally within reach. No one stood in their way.

  When Enyo paused a few steps in, Tristan stilled as well, his lungs filling with crisp air. No other God’s temple had been placed so high above the common earth, so close to the heavens. Not even Tha’et, for all they were his domain.

  The interior was much like the outside. Worn. Damaged in part. And yet still, she stood. Strong against the elements. A testament to the artisans of the old world and to their devotion to the Gods they served. It was laid out simply, just a finely masoned stone floor at the center of which stood an altar, empty but
for a single, rough wooden basin.

  Enyo’s artifact.

  Tristan took another deep breath and turned to Enyo, just in time to watch Delyth step around her. The halfbreed took even, measured paces towards the altar, her eyes focused ahead and her face blank. She paused a breath standing before the bowl, no doubt bathing in the force that Tristan could feel brimming from the artifact even where he stood, feet away.

  So much marvelous power.

  Delyth picked up the bowl, her hands steady, obviously to bring it to her Goddess, ever the faithful priestess. Even now, when she stood to lose so much.

  Tristan had to hand it to Enyo.

  She had always inspired such devotion.

  The halfbreed turned around, her eyes moving from the basin to Enyo. Tristan couldn’t believe that her joy didn’t show through that stone facade. It was too great a moment to hide it. Even his grin was genuine for once, splitting his face and making mounds of his cheeks.

  Nothing moved for a long heartbeat. The priestess didn’t step forward.

  Instead, she did the unthinkable.

  Delyth launched herself through one of the crumbling walls and up into the sky.

  ❂

  A disastrous scream ripped through Enyo as she watched the warrior, her priestess, launch herself into the sky. The trees groaned, their roots straining with the sudden wind lashing at the mountainside, desperate to grab the traitorous whore and slap her back down to the earth.

  The mountain shrieked and rocks older than time shuddered, hasty to bow before her wrath.

  Enyo’s gaze burned brighter than the sun. Pure, molten gold. She flew out of the temple, watching as her winds battered the priestess and her basin, refusing to let her climb, to let her escape.

  Enyo would dash the bitch against the mountainside, splattered and nothing but bits of bone and gore. She’d dance through her remains and retrieve her basin, which could never be broken.

  Still, the priestess fought against the currents of air, mighty wings flapping, gaining inch by treacherous inch.

  Enyo snarled and turned on Tristan.

  “Give me your dagger,” she snapped, holding out that mortal hand. So useless. So pitiful.