First Angels

by Guerric Haché, Keezy Young

  She had to concede that. “So much about her is… suspicious. Maybe you’re right - I shouldn’t put too much stock in her words.”

  Venshi nodded smoothly as she kept apace. “I am relieved to hear you see reason, child. That shrine must be destroyed for the natural order to be restored. This is the truth.”

  “I’m sure you’re right.” Be that as it may, though, Isavel was growing tired of talking, and she wasn’t keen on continuing to exhaust herself trying to piece together the Ada puzzle. If only she had asked… well, they might have ended up having to fight. She didn’t want that. “Venshi, you can return to Mother Jera. I’ll lead for a bit.”

  Behind them followed the disorganized mess of the army, and its trains of equipment and supplies. Hail was at the forefront, almost looking like a leader if she hadn’t been such a devoted follower. Venshi made a sighing sound. “Very well, Saint Isavel, Herald of the Gods.”

  There was a peculiar stress on the title. Venshi had nothing more to say, though, and let herself drift back into the crowd.

  And so Isavel marched ahead, alone at the front. She shouldn’t be trying to figure it out - she should focus on walking forward - but she couldn’t help but wonder. What had led Ada to work with the ghosts? It was clear that this was happening, and she realized in a horrible moment that she had no reason to believe that Ada was not actually a ghost herself. There would be no way to answer that question.

  In fact, the more she thought about it, the more she realized that might explain a great deal. The coders, and now Venshi, had nothing but bad things to say about Ada - and yet the Ada that Isavel had met seemed entirely pleasant and strangely magnetic, if slightly rough around the edges. Possession by a ghost - a ghost who was trying to lie to and manipulate humans - would explain the disparity quite neatly.

  And how else would she have such an expansive knowledge of ancient technology and relics? Venshi had said, after all, that some of the ghosts were thought to be ancients themselves. That might just be the best possible explanation.

  Ada must be a ghost.

  Isavel was suddenly startled out of this realization by two men stumbling out of the woods, wearing turquoise armbands. She raised her palm nonetheless. Anybody could be a ghost, armbands or no.

  “Herald!” They put up their hands, as though in surrender.

  “What?”

  “We - our attack on the ghost walker failed.” The blue-haired one was stammering, as though in shock, “But we saw something incredible.”

  She turned to see the army catching up, and she pointed them forward. “Tell me what you saw.”

  “The ghosts have a flying relic, a great thing of massive power, greater than a dragon in size.” The dark-haired man was gesturing to the sky, but the blue-haired man shook his head and cut him off.

  “It’s worse than that. It has wings made of skylight, barely visible.”

  Isavel felt the hackles rising on her neck. She had heard of wings made of midnight before, invisible wings as well - whose wings were these? “How did you see it if it was barely visible?”

  “It shot at us! It killed one of our pathfinders, and tore up the forest. I - we ran away before it could kill the rest of us.”

  “I see - thank you. Please tell Dendre Han, he’ll want to know. The dead - were they your friend?”

  They blinked, and after a moment the blue-haired man answered, looking at his feet. “Ny cousin.”

  She walked up and briefly rested a hand on their shoulders. “I’m sorry.”

  They looked up at her with gratitude far out of proportion to the weight of her words. She walked past them, keeping moving in the hope the army would do the same. Wings made of sky, protecting the ghosts. Killing the mayor. No doubt carrying Ada to the ancient facility where they had last met, too. Isavel needed to know what the gods were planning, but no answer was evident. If a ghost had made Isavel a target, why not kill her outright? Why toy with her, appearing again and again like some kind of rival? It made no sense.

  There were sounds in the distance. Snapping, crackling, rustling. The sounds of movement. Isavel slowed down, raised her shield, and spoke to those she heard behind her.

  “They’re waiting for us. Keep your eyes peeled.”

  “We’re attacking?” It was Hail.

  Isavel nodded, without turning around. “We need to reach that mountain as soon as possible, Hail. We can’t wait.”

  “Herald, you’re trembling. Are you tired?”

  Hail wasn’t wrong. Isavel had been drained by everything that had happened since she had woken up, and even before. But she needed to make sure everybody kept moving. She needed to keep going.

  “You can rest, Herald.”

  Isavel turned to look at Hail and wondered, again, why the woman was following her like this. She sighed. “How? We need to move, and there could be enemies up ahead.”

  “All the more reason for you to rest. You’ve been fighting and on your feet all day, and you didn’t sleep well last night. If you want to accomplish the will of the gods, being exhausted isn’t going to help.”

  Isavel looked up to the sky, the ring peeking through the clouds here and there. “What do you suggest?”

  “Whatever you know is best.”

  Isavel sat down on her knees. There was a brief pause in the movements and footsteps behind her, so she turned and waved them past. They hesitated for only a moment before continuing onward. Nobody bothered to ask her what she was doing, kneeling as though about to kowtow to the gods. Perhaps it seemed an entirely normal thing for a Saint or a Herald to do. Hail stood by her, still and quiet, her eyes on Isavel’s back.

  She watched as people walked by, leading horses and hovering weapon platforms, dogs and haulers. They gave her a wide berth. Why? They were normally fawning over her. What was it about their hero, knelt down and quiet, that made them avert their usually constant attention?

  The ways of others were strange, and Isavel was starting to feel like she might never understand them again.

  There was a strange moment of silence - not true silence, but noisy silence. Isavel heard voices, footsteps, the breeze in the trees, the gentle hum of ancient relics, but her ears picked up nothing important or notable. It was as though there was nothing worth hearing. She might finally be feeling just how tired she really was.

  But she had slept through much of the night. Why was she still tired?

  She finally did kowtow to the gods. She pressed her forehead against the cool grass, in a gesture she hadn’t performed in many days, and held the position. She searched her mind for the part of her that followed their divine will, and found it in the shape of her life, in the curve of the mountain path that led her through the crags and gullies of her world. Whatever had come naturally to her so far was a part of that path, and her failures were stumblings of recklessness as she tried to stray from it.

  Mountain paths didn’t always lead anywhere. Isavel knew that people had wandered the mountains to the north, or to the south, for weeks or months and never found a way out. To the west was the coast and the ocean, and to the east was a vast wasteland of howling winds, tall grasses, wandering caravans - but those were only two of the four directions. Which way was this path leading? Was she headed to a lush and vibrant coast, or a wasteland? Or would she never stop wandering at all?

  The gods did not speak to her. They rarely did, and even when they did their words were not usually what she hoped. They did not show her the way, but simply pushed her further along this winding path.

  She wanted to know where she was going, but it seemed she was fated to ignorance, at least for now. She wanted to know why she was here, and where her gifts had come from, but again it seemed she was fated to ignorance. All that was left was the present moment, the present concerns, and the need to put one foot in front of the other.

  Isavel had lived and died under the gods’ watch, and now she lived again. Surely the gods would continue to take care of her. That was the conclusion she kept
coming back to. But why was she so tired? Why couldn’t she keep fighting, forever, if that was their will?

  Sounds up ahead made their way into her ears, shouting and shooting and the wingbeats and roars of dragons. They were distant and far-off, beyond her reach or concern. She tried to focus on the gods, on their presence permeating the world, guiding events around her.

  She saw Ada’s face. Her eyes, a white flare around a nearly black iris, swept back towards her temple like open wings. A broad and pale face with golden undertones. Her jaw set, feet planted in the ground, a shard fallen from the sky and dug into the earth. It stirred something frantic in Isavel, fleeting but vital memories of a future yet to come. The gods kept putting this person in her life, again and again - why? Why were they so clearly enemies, and yet somehow not?

  She understood the old stories of the gods, the ways they tested their followers. Was Ada a test for her, a rival? Or... Was Isavel a test for Ada, perhaps? Was her life hollowing out because it was no longer needed? That thought terrified her. The gods would take care of her, even in death, but she didn’t want to believe they would do so much to her only to have her play a fatal role in someone else’s journey.

  Ada would allow the ghosts to cross into this world. She would help them do so, claiming to protect the afterlife from destruction - as though such destruction were possible. As though the gods would allow it. As though death without afterlife were even conceivable. A person’s mind couldn’t simply stop, not without dreams or thinking or feeling in some way. So Ada, it seemed, was either insane or lying.

  Isavel hoped they didn’t meet again.

  She watched patterns swirl in her mind, a dance of blades and shots through the air, fire splashing against ancient ruins, the spinning of a watcher’s plates as it grew and attacked. There was a swirl in everything, a curve, a whorl of dark and pale joining and separating. A whirlpool of light and shadow, swallowing her sight.

  Something happened. Someone was tapping her shoulder.

  “Herald?”

  Isavel slowly lifted her head up, rose back onto her knees, feeling stiff. There were footprints everywhere, but there was nobody nearby except Hail, staring at her with concern. Isavel found the sun somewhere unexpected behind the ring.

  “Was I... sleeping?”

  Hail shook her head. “No. But it has been some time since the last of the army has passed.”

  Isavel looked around, confused. It couldn’t possibly have been that long. “Are you sure I wasn’t sleeping? I feel like it’s only been a minute.”

  “You were praying to the gods. Not very loudly; I couldn’t hear clearly. But praying.”

  “Praying?” It was rather more likely that she was muttering in her sleep.

  “Yes, Herald. Unless... you were communing with them in some deeper way.”

  Was such a thing possible? She certainly hadn’t received any guidance. “Maybe. Hail, I thought I heard fighting up ahead.”

  Hail looked ahead, biting her lip. “I saw some flashes, but I don’t really know what happened. I think they’ve moved on.”

  Isavel stood up and immediately felt tired again, wavering on her feet. She reached for her pockets to find rations, but was empty. “Do you have any food?”

  “Of course.” Hail handed her a food bar, simple nuts and fruits cooked into an easily portable form. Isavel took a bite and chewed, looking around. Those now gone had worn a great path into the woods, but she was tempted to go sideways instead. Something about the water in the distance called to her.

  “Did anyone stop to wake me?”

  “I wouldn’t have let them.”

  Isavel’s smile was weak. “Hail, you’re too dedicated.”

  Her self-appointed bodyguard said nothing, watching her with her cool blue eyes and a concerned smile. Isavel stood up, looked around, and found the west was calling to her - the sea. It wasn’t far, and soon they had left the army’s tracks behind.

  Whatever it had once been, Isavel found herself walking, stumbling, strung along by the scent of salt and seaweed until they descended a short drop down to a simple rocky beach. Not far from them was a solid, angular outcropping, something ancient long since forgotten and abandoned. Just like everything else in this old world.

  She walked up to the water, tiny crabs scuttering away from her feet, and let the cold ocean lap at her toes. She smelled the salt here more than she had in the cities, its notes not overwhelmed by humans and animals and food. She looked up the shore to this ancient port, or whatever it was, and started walking towards it. Hail followed in silence.

  “Have you always been a devout follower of the gods?” Isavel asked her. “Even in your days as a bandit?”

  Hail’s brief silence was palpable. “No. Not until the dreams. That was when I knew I had crossed them, and needed to repent. Otherwise... What if the afterlife was nothing but those dreams, over and over again? All my mistakes played before me, endlessly.”

  Isavel looked over at the bodyguard. “Is that what you think happens after death?”

  “I don’t know. It’s been so long since anybody communed with the dead, it’s hard to know what to believe. There are no shamans anymore.”

  Isavel smirked. “I died, remember. I don’t know if what I saw was the final place, or if it was just… the crossing. But while I was dead, I walked the realm of the ghosts.”

  Hail blushed. “And you did it again, I heard, even as you lived.”

  “Yes. It was my duty.”

  “You have a role to play in the gods’ plans.”

  Hail said that as though it was the same thing, but the notion made Isavel uncomfortable. She had a duty to fulfil, certainly, but her role… It felt diminishing, somehow, to think that her entire being was dedicated to the service of a single role. Even as it also felt like a creeping reality. Perhaps believing it would help her find peace.

  “I’m tired.” She nodded towards the ruins. “If there’s shelter in this place, I need to sleep. Actually sleep. Can you keep watch?”

  “Of course, Herald.”

  She flinched internally a bit every time Hail said the name, but there was no point in asking her to stop. This was what Isavel had become, and to insist on her birth name was… anachronistic.

  The ancient pier was dominated by a mound of soil and concrete rubble, overgrown with dense scraggly plants, that didn’t look much like a building. Still, Isavel had seen enough of these to know it was a ruin of some sort. To her satisfaction, there was a door leading into one of the sides, and they opened it up to find the hallway beyond had collapsed just a few meters in. A red panda chirped and squawked when it saw them, so they stood aside to let it run away before entering.

  It was hard ground, but Isavel didn’t care. She lay her head down and fell asleep almost immediately. There was darkness, nothing, and she wasn’t even aware of it. Then there were faint glimmers of awareness, and she saw things - motion, colour, but strange in ways that would have violated her sense of reality if they hadn’t all seemed so utterly normal.

  There were drones in the sky, and they were talking to her, saying things she couldn’t hear, or perhaps wasn’t paying attention to. People were looking at her, staring at her, through her, as though there were a fascinating empty space exactly where she was standing. What was wrong with them? She shook someone and he backed away, but he didn’t understand what was going on.

  She left them, climbed a tree with her blades, and at the top she found the ring. It was huge and flat, and she hauled herself onto it and saw the vastness of the Earth below her. There were voices on the wind, but when she turned to the sky to find their source, all she saw were sharp eyes in a pale face, framed by black hair and pale pink lips. A fire burned behind the face, an inferno to envelop the world.

  As she woke up, she was briefly aware of memories of the dream slipping away. In a dazed mockery of wakefulness, she was convinced they were worth remembering, and tried to replay them in her mind, but each moment of the dream decayed an
d rotted into a mulch of impressions that slipped through her fingers, and soon everything was gone. Isavel was left with the sense she had just forgotten something important, with no idea what it might have been.

  Then she realized that Hail was lying down behind her, facing her back and with a curled hand nestled against Isavel’s neck. She was snoring lightly. It was dark, and Isavel heard the sounds of rain outside. Sleep always seemed much shorter than it really was. She spent a moment in the darkness, her bodyguard’s body shifting slightly.

  She knew what she had to do. She had not been given the gift of the medic, or of the walker, or any of the other, more mythical gifts. Everything she had become was a weapon of war. Weapons were not returned to their holsters until their job was complete.

  She stood and stepped over Hail, who stirred awake.

  “Isavel?”

  Isavel stopped, for a moment, watching and hearing the drizzle smattering into the seawater just beyond the shore. She saw shapes out in the salt, round little dog-like heads heads poking out of the water, catching a breath and looking around for a bit before diving back into the deep. Others emerged elsewhere, though she couldn’t tell if they were the same after the dive. But dive they did.

  She took a deep breath. “We need to go, Hail. The ghosts are waiting.”

  Hail rose up and nodded. “Yes, Herald.” She was looking at her with something like care, and it unnerved Isavel enough that she looked away again.

  There was no way of knowing how far the army was, but she knew she could follow them, the smell and the footprints and the snapped branches. Isavel dove into the forest. She would find them, and she would put an end to this. She had to. She had no choice anymore; the gods had thrown her in this river, and now she had no choice but to swim. And maybe, if she made it to the end, she might resurface something new.