by Travis Bughi
Mariam lost the ability to speak as tears flooded her eyes.
“Sorry.” She took a few deep breaths, dabbed her eyes with the back of her wrist, and then started again.
“I don’t want to lose another child,” she said. “I wish that Nicholas would stay with me, but he is determined to leave. I’ve forbidden it, but I know he won’t listen. He’s already run away from home once, and if I don’t give him my blessing, he’ll run away again. Only this time, I’m certain he’ll never return. Whether he dies or he lives, he’ll hate me until the end of his days for trying to hold him here. One way or another, I’ll never see him again if I don’t accept this. But, I can’t . . . I . . . I just can’t.”
She paused a second, her voice failing her, and Takeo and Gavin bowed their heads. They shared a glance and then turned back to Mariam as she regained her composure.
“I . . . I would ask, I . . .” She took a long breath and let it out slowly. “I would ask that wherever you two are headed, you take him with you.”
Takeo and Gavin looked to each other again, only this time with surprise. Neither expected this, and neither had an immediate response.
“I’ve only just thought of asking you two,” Mariam went on, “but I believe it was meant to be. I’ve been coming to Emily’s grave every night, begging and praying for guidance. I’ve already lost Nicholas once, and I don’t want to lose him again. If he goes out there alone, I’m certain he’ll end up dead, enslaved, or amongst people I don’t trust. He’s already been enslaved once! Did you hear what happened to him in The North?”
She looked frantically from Gavin to Takeo, and Takeo nodded.
“So you know, then,” Mariam pressed, eyes blurring. “You know I’ve a right to be afraid. My baby boy was only saved thanks to his sister, and now she’s dead and will never be able to save him again. But . . . but you two . . . you were with my daughter. She trusted you, and so would I. Please, I don’t know where you’re going, or even if you’re going together, but just at least one of you, please, convince my son to join you. He’s set on leaving this place. You know him; he’s like Emily. He hates the Great Plains and wants to see the world. Please, I beg you, if he must leave, let me sleep knowing he is in good company. Please! I don’t want him to end up in chains again.”
Mariam’s voice caught in her throat, and she held her breath as if at the precipice of breaking down. Takeo turned to Gavin, but the knight looked just as lost as the samurai. Their eyes wide, they gaped at each other for a response. Mariam looked from one to the other, her face growing more frantic with every flicker until Gavin gave a shrug.
“It’s your call, Takeo,” Gavin said. “It’s your quest we’re going on, and I know neither Nicholas nor any of this family, really. I’ll back you either way. Like I said before, I trust you more than me.”
Mariam whirled on Takeo, eyes drowning with passion and pressing need. Takeo tried not to shrink under the gaze and held firm by staring at the barren dirt before him.
A part of him wanted to say yes immediately. He remembered how much he wanted Mariam’s respect and praise, how much he wanted to taste that unswerving love and devotion she held for her children. He’d wished for a family like that, and saying yes might grant him a moment of such affection.
However, it would be disingenuous, for there was a nagging still in his heart.
“You ask this of me,” Takeo said, voice just strong enough not to be caught away by the wind, “here of all places? Here we stand over your daughter’s grave, a monument to my failure to protect her as I swore I would, and you would ask me to do it again? You would trust another one of your children to my care?”
He wanted to go on, say more, but his throat swelled up. It was enough, fortunately, and Mariam looked to Emily’s grave as well.
“It’s obvious you blame yourself for my daughter’s death,” she said, “and also unsurprising. I’d blame you, too, if I didn’t also blame myself. Before Emily first left our home, I had the choice to put my foot down and stop her. I could have done it and earned her wrath instead of her death. Paul, too, he could have stopped her. If I must go further, even my mother shares blame in this for she was the one who took Emily from me so long ago.
“I guess what I’m trying to say is that if people can take the blame for my daughter’s death, you are not alone, Takeo. Sure, you were closest and swore not to leave her side, but you weren’t the only one capable of protecting her. Abraham, Adelpha, the other amazons, Nicholas, any of us could have said and done the same thing. We could argue ifs and coulds forever and ever, but I feel it’s best to make choices based on what I know.
“You protected my daughter. I remember the stories she told me when she returned, how you were at her side from Savara to Juatwa, Khaz Mal to The North, and then back to Lucifan. With your help, she escaped slavery, fought in a battle, and survived a winter in the coldest place on this world. Nicholas told me of how you tried to protect her in Lucifan, too, trying to dissuade her from seeing the rakshasa in disguise, insisting she have more allies at hand. Had my daughter taken your advice, she might still be alive today. So no, Takeo, I do not think my daughter is dead at your hand. I think that had it not been for you, she would not have lived as long as she did.
“As for Nicholas, I think the same. He told me of how you shadowed him when Fritjof fell, how he sought to end his life, but at every turn you were there to slay those foes that would kill him. You see, Takeo, you’ve already protected my Nicholas once. It is not so difficult a task for me to request that you do it again.”
Takeo’s eyes flickered to Gavin again, but the knight’s face was motionless. If Mariam’s speech had changed Gavin’s mind, he did not show it. Takeo would have the final word, and he sensed its inevitability.
“I was protecting Nicholas for Emily,” he said, “not for you.”
“Then do it for her again, if you must,” she replied. “The reason matters not to me, only the outcome.”
Takeo played at weighing the decision, swallowing and staring at the ground with a hollow gaze. It was in his nature not to take things lightly, yet his answer had been decided the moment Mariam had first asked it of him.
For Emily, he would do anything, even if the task was doomed to failure.
“I’ll do it.”
“Oh, thank you!” Mariam sighed. “You, too, Gavin. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you! Both of you.”
“I can’t guarantee anything,” Takeo said quickly. “He must come of his own volition. If he won’t be moved by my words, I won’t force him to come with us.”
“Not that we could,” Gavin mumbled. “We don’t carry shackles for ogres.”
“You’ll have time,” Mariam replied, darting a warning glance at the knight. “Nicholas intends to leave for Lucifan with Abraham soon, and I want you to join them. You’ll have at least a week or so to convince him. Now, come on. You two deserve a warm meal. It’s the least I can do.”
They left Emily’s grave the way they had come. Takeo followed last in line with lingering thoughts, regrets, and doubts belying his cold exterior.
The next I’ll see you will be in the afterlife, he thought.
As promised, Takeo and Gavin were fed. They were also given the option of bathing, although they would of course be required to draw their own water. Abraham’s career as a gunslinger had gifted a certain amount of wealth upon the family, and although they hadn’t bought new land or spent the money lavishly, they had purchased a few luxuries, such as a tub and comfortable beds. Gavin and Takeo took turns and rinsed away the layers of dirt and sweat that had caked onto their bodies for well over a year. Gavin said nothing to Takeo concerning Nicholas, and Takeo figured it was because he was either certainly against it or certainly for it, though he could not discern which and refused to break the silence first to find out. When night came, the Stouts revealed that, unfortunately, there was only one spare bed.
Both men refused it. Gavin said he wouldn’t sleep in a bed whil
e his comrade didn’t, but Takeo refused because the spare bed had been Emily’s, and he couldn’t bear to sleep in it without her. They bedded down on the wood floor, instead, with blankets beneath and over them. It wasn’t much different than sleeping on the ground outside, except the wind could only be heard rather than felt. They slept right up until a banshee’s screams awoke them.
There was no way to tell when it occurred. All Takeo knew was that when he awoke, the world was pitch black. Through the open windows, he heard shrieks so long and agonizing that he thought he was still in a dream until Abraham and Nicholas flew from their beds and sprinted across the house.
“Up, up,” Abraham whispered, looping an arm under Takeo and drawing him from the floor.
Nicholas hauled Gavin up effortlessly and slapped a hand over the knight’s mouth when he protested. A moment later, Mariam and Paul stepped from their room, holding each other tightly.
“Nicholas, the door,” Mariam whispered.
Nicholas released Gavin and rushed to the living room and opened a trapdoor in the floor. He disappeared into the darkness below, and Abraham, Mariam, and Paul quickly followed. Takeo and Gavin hesitated only long enough to hear another bellowing wail split the night, then they jumped into the darkness and lost all sight as Nicholas closed the door over them.
The banshee’s screams could still be heard through the wood and dirt, though they were muffled greatly.
“Try to get some sleep,” Abraham’s voice whispered. “But whatever you do, don’t make a sound.”
The dirt floor bothered Takeo little compared to the screams above. He was nudged between two bodies, one large and muscled that could have been Nicholas or Gavin, and another long and lanky that could have been Abraham or Paul. Takeo took the words to heart and attempted to sleep, and he wasn’t much disturbed if truth be told. Many families in Juatwa had similar trapdoors in their homes under which they would hide from all the dangerous things in the world. He’d hidden once or twice from prowling komainu, so hiding from banshees seemed a similar business.
The screams only lasted a few hours at most, but the family didn’t emerge until morning. Everyone took the night’s events in stride, Gavin included, with only a sigh and shake of their heads.
“The Dylan family actually moved,” Abraham explained over a morning cup of lukewarm water. “They were our closest neighbors, and they couldn’t take the number of banshees coming from all the senseless travelers from Lucifan. We’d move, too, if Emily’s grave weren’t here. I’m certain, though, that with every banshee comes one less person approaching to disturb us.”
“Two less people, actually,” Nicholas said. “Banshees don’t leave this world alone.”
Chapter 5
As requested by Mariam, Takeo and Gavin stayed with the Stout family for a full week until Abraham was ready to leave for Lucifan. His timing had to be precise, being as he was meeting up with a young woman who’d made a long journey. Her name was Adelpha, and she was the amazon queen, Emily’s best friend, the love of Abraham’s life, and if Abraham was right, the mother of his first child.
“If it’s a girl,” Abraham had explained over the week prior to their leaving, “I won’t see her until she makes the trip to Lucifan herself, which should be when she’s at least sixteen years old or so, or if I make the trip to Themiscyra on my own before that. If it’s a boy, Adelpha will have brought him to give to me. She promised. But like I said, this is assuming she got pregnant at all. We only spend a week together, once a year. I’ll find out soon enough.”
“Just curious, Nicholas,” Gavin said. “Why are you going? Are you worried your gunslinger brother won’t be able to handle himself?”
“Hey, someone has to be there to take on the thirteenth enemy.” Nicholas had smiled and shrugged. “But no, I wouldn’t miss a chance to see Lucifan for any reason. Also, then as always, I’ll be looking for a viking ship willing to take me on. I don’t much care where it’s headed, just so long as it’s away from here.”
Takeo had taken note of the words but had not broached the subject then. He had a feeling Nicholas would be more honest and easier to sway if his mother wasn’t around.
When they did leave the home, Nicholas was forced to endure a long and torturous hug in the arms of Mariam. She held him close, made him lean down so she could put her arms around his neck, and kissed his bearded cheeks while her own ran wet. Paul joined the hug, too, patting his youngest son on his massive shoulders, all the while saying how proud he was of the man he’d become. Nicholas, for his part, endured the attention.
“Mother,” he started, but faltered at his next words.
And what would you say next? Takeo wondered. Would you say that she acts as if you’re marching to your death, when you very well could be? Were you going to ask her to stop? Were you worried she was embarrassing you as if your pride was worth more than her sorrow? Would that I had a mother such as yours, I would have endured far worse to receive far less. No wonder Emily thought so little of you in the end.
“Don’t cheapen this for me, Nicholas,” Mariam said. “This is the goodbye I should have given you the last time you left. Who knows when I’ll see you again! If you won’t promise to return, then at least let me love you while I still can.”
“Mother,” Nicholas started again, a smile creeping across his lips this time, “would you just listen? What I was going to say was, well, I love you, and I will be back.”
His hug grew tighter, seemingly genuine now rather than forced, and Takeo felt warmth chip away at his icy heart as Mariam’s eyes spread wide in joy. She gave her son another big, wet kiss into his beard, and then let him go. Takeo made a silent note that, were it ever in his power, he would see this moment played out again. Mariam would hold her son once more.
When they were well away from the farm, the group of four young men had finally regained enough sense to speak.
“I haven’t seen mother kiss, hug, and cry that much since you came home last time,” Abraham said. “Wow, has she changed.”
“I still remember when a firm nod was the only emotion she expressed besides anger,” Nicholas added. “Now she cries more than dad. Sometimes even more than you.”
Gavin laughed, and Takeo’s lips cracked in a smile. Abraham’s cheeks turned a shade red, but he hid them beneath his wide-brimmed hat. For a moment, as Gavin’s chuckles died down, the only thing that could be heard was the wind, the crunch of tall grass, and Abraham’s spurs clicking.
“So, Takeo, Gavin,” Abraham spoke up, “I have to ask. Are you two traveling together, or do you just happen to be headed the same way?”
Takeo and Gavin looked to the gunslinger and then to each other in equal motions before frowning.
“Both,” Gavin said.
“Yes, both,” Takeo said with a nod.
“What in Valhalla does that mean?” Nicholas asked. “Where are you two headed?”
“Juatwa,” Gavin answered. “Our dearest samurai wishes to uncover the secrets of his past. I, too, seek the same knowledge, so as to better understand my enemy.”
“Huh, enemy? And secrets?” Nicholas squinted. “You have a secret past, Takeo? I thought a samurai’s history and lore were some kind of sacred knowledge, written in ink and passed down from parent to child.”
“Most samurai and royal families do that,” Takeo confirmed. “Nearly all, actually. My own parents might have done the same had they lived or been around long enough to tell me about it. I was actually raised by my older brother, Okamoto, in Savara. He never told me what history the Karaoshi name carries, but he acted as if we were fugitives until Ichiro Katsu took us into his army.”
Their conversation paused as they crested a hill and a gust of wind swept over them. Abraham nearly lost his hat, saved but by a quick hand to the top of it. Takeo’s hair spun wild and stuck to his thin lips. He spat it out before intending to continue, but Nicholas beat him to it.
“You never asked your brother about your parents?”
“I never spoke to my brother unless spoken to,” Takeo said with a shrug, “and no, he never told me.”
“What about other people when you got back to Juatwa?” Nicholas pressed. “Surely someone knew of your family, and you never thought to ask them? Why are you curious now?”
“Wow, Emily was right, you do ask a lot of questions,” Takeo said, shaking his head while Abraham laughed. “Yet they are fair questions deserving of an answer. There are tens of thousands of samurai families in Juatwa, some famous enough that most have heard of them, while others not so much. Mine must have been one of the latter because most people did not know the name until my brother and I started to carve out a place on the battlefield. Of those who did know me, they either hid the knowledge or avoided my brother and me. After so long ignoring my past under my brother’s guidance, it became easy to continue doing so once he was killed. I was too focused on the future, too focused on avenging Okamoto’s death, and then too focused on helping Emily.
“As for why now? First, both those tasks I stated are complete. Second, seeing your family rekindled the desire.”
Nicholas balked and looked to Abraham, but the gunslinger was just as perplexed and gave Takeo an inquisitive stare.
“Seeing the love and bond your family shares,” Takeo continued, “has pressed upon me what a family really is. I never had these things you seem to take for granted, such as a hug or even a firm nod. No mother or father ever told me I was important, and neither did my brother. I convinced myself I was important to Okamoto, that he cared for me, but thinking back on it, I cannot remember a single moment where he ever conveyed that to me. I think it’s possible I made it up. Now I seek the knowledge he refused to give me. I wish to know if, just maybe, all my life that led up to Emily and the angels had been a lie. And my good friend here, Gavin, travels with me so that, in the event that the truth destroys me, he can put me out of my misery.”
