by Kody Boye
In one year, they would be leaving both Neline and the Globe Village behind.
He might as well enjoy his time while they were here.
Chapter 7
“Odin!” Nova called, then ceased his incessant yelling a short moment later. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Pull ups!” Odin laughed, pulling himself up onto one of the cottage’s metal bars, then swinging his legs up onto a second before he pushed himself into a sitting position atop it. “Why? What’s up?”
“Miko’s ready to leave.”
“He is?”
“Yeah, so get off there. We need to get going.”
“Ok.”
Odin looked down at the ground below. After a careful moment of consideration, he tilted his body back, grabbed the opposite bar, then slowly slid down the one he was sitting on until he had his hands on the bar behind him. He dropped down shortly thereafter.
“How’d you get up there anyway?” Nova frowned. “It’s three, four feet higher than you are.”
“I jumped.”
“I’m not even going to ask how. Let’s go.”
Laughing, Odin slid up against Nova’s side and followed his friend into the cottage. Miko, across the room, was stooped over his pack, pushing and rearranging it as he saw fit. He only looked up as the door closed behind them. “Hello,” he said. “Are the two of you almost ready?”
“I am,” Nova said. “What about you, Odin?”
“All I need to do is pack.”
“All right,” Miko said. “Get packed, then we’ll leave.”
At midday, after they’d prepared for the next part of the trip, they made their way through town and toward the gate that would lead them out and into the wasteland. Odin glanced at Miko, then at Nova, both of which wore their hoods over their heads. Nova’s mess of uncombed beard stuck out at odd angles and directions, as if forewarning of the hell they would soon be enduring come a few moment’s time.
We won’t be coming back here after this.
“Sir,” Odin frowned, unnerved by the lack of dialogue between them. “Is something wrong?”
“No,” Miko said, turning his eyes on Odin, then lifting them to the road. “And yes.”
“You want to share?” Nova frowned.
“It’s nothing the two of you should worry about.”
“We’ll be worried if you don’t tell us,” Odin said. “Sir—”
“She’s pregnant, Odin.”
Both Odin and Nova stopped. The Elf would’ve continued walking had he not noticed their sudden halt. “As I said,” he continued, voice nondescript and once more falling into its all-too-haunting monotone, “it’s nothing to be worried about.”
“But how,” Odin started. “I thought—”
“Gestation is different with Elves.”
“You were only with her one time,” Nova started. “You—”
“You should know better than anyone that it only takes one time for a woman to become pregnant with your child, Nova. You, too, are a married man.”
“I—” Nova stopped. He glanced at Miko, then at Odin. He eyes fell to the ground almost instantaneously.
“Sir,” Odin said, taking a few steps forward. “We should stay here. If she’s pregnant, you can’t just—”
“The child is not my responsibility. Besides—I won’t allow my squire to play caretaker to a babe when he has no need to.”
“But you said—”
“Did I ever say something, Odin?”
“No, but—”
“If a man is engaged with a woman for more than one brief time, yes, he should stay and be a father to the son or daughter he bears. But if there is only one time, and only one time, a man cannot help if the woman becomes pregnant.”
“Sir—”
“Do not question me further. I have made my decision. We are leaving both Neline and the Globe Village behind.”
Without waiting for a response, Miko started off, leaving Odin and Nova to stand there and consider his words.
“We can’t just leave,” Odin whispered, grabbing Nova’s arm. “If she’s pregnant, we can’t—”
“We can’t control what he wants to do.”
“We’ll tell him to stay!” he cried. “We—”
“I know how you feel, Odin, because I feel the same way. I can’t stay here though. My wife’s been waiting for me for far too long. I can’t make her weight just because some woman is pregnant with his child.”
“But Nova—”
“I’m sorry, Odin. He won’t stay, I can’t stay, and you’ll never learn how to be a knight if you stay here and take care of a baby.”
Nova took one last deep breath before shrugging his pack further up his shoulder and continuing down the street.
So, Odin thought, falling in place behind his human friend only when he felt himself capable of actually moving. This is it then.
This was the last time they would be in Neline—and, he assumed, the last time Miko would ever return.
“These are for all of you,” a young woman whom had introduced herself as a Gate Guardian said, turning and grabbing three thick, fur cloaks out of a wooden dresser before returning her attention to them. “The mayor’s asked that the three of you garb yourself in them before you leave.”
“The mayor is very kind,” Miko said, but didn’t reach out to take the cloak.
“He wants you to have them, sir. He’s asked me to keep you here until you do.”
The mayor sure is stubborn, Odin mused.
Considering the Elf had impregnated his daughter, the mayor was being awfully generous. Now if he had been the mayor, Odin wouldn’t have been so quick to impart gifts, especially to a man who had abandoned his grandchild and forever mark him or her as a bastard.
Not knowing what to do but not willing to reject the gift, Odin stepped forward and accepted one of the cloaks, drawing it over his already tightly-bundled body. Nova, too, took a cloak, painstakingly shoving it over his thick, furr-lined coat and pants before snapping the buttons together.
“Sir,” Odin said, looking up from his progress of securing the coat in place. “You should take one too.”
“The mayor’s asked for you too,” the young woman said, pushing the largest of the cloaks forward. “He had it custom made for your size.”
“Thank you. Please, give the mayor my regards.”
“He wants you to be as safe as possible,” the gate guardian said, crossing her arms over her chest. She turned her attention to the distant windows within the tunnel and let out a brief sigh. “As a gate guardian, I should warn you—the spring storms might be surging this time of year, especially considering how severe our winter has been.”
“You don’t think anything will go wrong,” Odin asked, “do you?”
“I highly doubt it, but I wouldn’t be surprised if something did. The mayor’s said the two of you are mages. How you crossed the land I’m not sure, but do as you did before and make sure not to wear yourselves out during your travels.”
With that said, the young woman nodded, then made her way to the gate, where she positioned herself along a group of other gate guardians before they began to slide locks, bars and gears out of place.
“We’ll go slow this time,” Miko said, sliding the second hood over his head just as a colossal groan began to reverberate throughout the interior of the tunnel. “I sent a message to the brothers some two weeks ago. The boat is on its way as we speak.”
The gate opened.
A storm of snow blew in.
In the days after they disembarked from the Globe Village they covered little ground at a time, going as slow as possible in order to avoid overworking themselves for fear of collapse from exhaustion or the chill. Not once throughout those moments, hours, or days did Miko push any of them past their limits, and not once did they travel during a storm or as night fell. It would have seemed, looking upon the darkened world, that there would be monsters crossing the landscape—giants, it could be sa
id, of snow and ice, melded together by old magic brought about by the destruction of the once-beautiful world and created merely to protect the land and what little happened to say there.
That night, Odin huddled close to Nova, as he had in days previous before entering the Globe Village, and watched Miko sit near the enchanted fire. The Elf pulled his hood back and let his hair fall across his chest, offering but the slightest smile when he saw Odin’s watchful eyes. “Can’t sleep?” he asked.
“No,” Odin said, shaking his head. “I mean, I haven’t tried.”
“Are you anxious to leave?”
“Sort of.”
“I don’t blame you. I’ve had enough of this weather myself.”
Responding with only a nod, Odin set his head on his arm and closed his eyes, listening only to the sound of Nova’s deep breathing. While only enough to drown out the majority of his thoughts, the sound did nothing to ease the worry of how Miko must have felt about the pregnancy.
Could I leave my child like that?
Though he already knew the answer, he entertained the idea of what he might do or how he might feel should he have to leave the son or daughter he would one day have. If war, duty, or honor called him away from his family, how would he respond to the pressure of not knowing whether or not he would ever see that child again? Would he cry, like most fathers of worthy status and kindness likely would, or would he remain stoic and ride on, despite the circumstance and the possibility that he may never return?
Thankfully, he wouldn’t have to worry about that for a long time.
Or at least for a few more years.
The kingdom required attention, not only for the unease between Ornala and Germa, but because he was training to protect it.
Does Nova feel like Miko does?
Regardless, it was the closest thing he had to relate Miko’s feelings to. The night he’d sent the message to Katarina, Nova’s tearful passion had struck something in him that he could’ve never imagined. He’d always thought that, because he’d been locked in a tower, that any emotions other than his own would be dull, blank slates devoid of color. Those gut-wrenching two years had molded him into a completely different person than what nature should have obviously intended for him.
It doesn’t matter.
No. It didn’t. In his mind, he’d turned out fairly well. Everyone had their flaws—why couldn’t he?
“You’re restless,” Miko said.
“Yes sir,” Odin said, opening his eyes to mere slits.
“Come. Sit by me.”
After making sure Nova hadn’t accidentally set his hand, arm or face against any part of his body, Odin crawled toward his knight master and pushed himself into a sitting position.
“Do you want to tell me what’s bothering you?” the Elf asked.
“Not really, sir.”
“All right. We’ll sit up then.” Miko draped an arm across Odin’s back and pulled him closer. He held this one-armed, half-embrace for quite a while, his breath easing in and out of his chest like some broken harp played by uneasy hands, before he sighed and asked, “Are you ashamed of me?”
“What?” Odin frowned.
“I asked if you’re ashamed of me.”
“Why would I…” He paused, resisting the urge to sigh when he realized what the Elf truly wanted to know. “I don’t have a right to answer that.”
“Are you ashamed though?”
“Sir—”
“Please, Odin—answer me.”
“I can’t answer that, sir.”
“Do.”
Do? Odin thought, trembling, the flame of unease burning within his chest so bright and hard it threatened to overwhelm him whole.
How was he to say that what he felt Miko had done was wrong—that, regardless of his actions, his merits or his intent, he had forcefully taken perhaps the most vulnerable thing from a woman whom deserved no harm or hill will? With that in mind, what, he wondered, could she possibly be feeling now? She carried within her womb an illegitimate child, a bastard whose father had run away and an individual whose fate now was held within her hands? Did she cry at night for the things that were taken, for the crimes committed, for all that was lost, or did she simply refuse to believe that what transpired was, in fact, happening?
Did she…
Odin swallowed the lump in his throat.
No. He couldn’t think about such things.
You know it might be true, he thought, this time unable to shake the feelings from his body. You as well as anyone should know that if a woman doesn’t her baby and there’s a mage nearby, all she has to do is—
“Odin?” Miko asked.
“Yes?” Odin replied, struck from his conscience as if he were a drum upon which the most unholiest of thoughts were played.
“You never answered my question.”
“I’m not going to.”
“You worry about me far too much.”
“It’s not hard to worry about you, especially after everything we’ve went through in the past year.”
“I understand, but you need not worry. Both of our scars have healed, my friend. Do you not realize that?”
“Mine were physical, sir. Yours… they’re something you can’t see.”
Miko said nothing. Instead, he watched him with the same unblinking stare that Odin had become accustomed to. For the next long, several moments, he stared into the creature’s eyes, unsure of what to do or say, before, at the same time, they both turned their eyes to the fire.
Outside, a bloody howl ripped through the calm silence of the night.
“We might be staying in here tomorrow,” Miko said, drawing the conversation into a different direction. “Would that bother you?”
“No. I’d prefer to stay inside where it’s warm than go out where it’s cold.”
“So would I,” Miko smiled.” Odin, I… I’d like to thank you for looking out for me.”
“You don’t have to thank me, sir.”
“Yes, my friend, I do. It’s in times like these that I’m thankful that someone is watching out for me, because if no one did, I don’t know what I’d do.
The following day brought them to the location of where they’d been attacked by the Kerma. A once-grand chain of hills, now lying in ruin, bore the children of rock and ice, jagged across the landscape and appearing as though a clod of dirt had been ground by a mighty hand and was allowed to fall wherever it pleased. Somehow—by either sight, memory or revelation alone—old wounds flared up along Odin’s thigh and hip, slicing unease throughout his body and forcing him to reach down and grip the hilt of his sword.
You’re there, he thought, sighing. “You really did a number on that hill,” he said, imagining the purple beam of light that his knight master had shot at the hills.
“I couldn’t believe it either,” Nova said. “You’ve really got a lot of power, Miko.”
“I was concerned about more archers. I would not necessarily destroy something so beautiful.”
“I know. You just wanted to make sure me and Odin were safe.”
Miko nodded. Through the fur hood and the cloak, the Elf appeared to be a Kerma—a lost, dying species afraid to show its true face. While one rotted in agony, slowly-but-surely decaying away, the other suffered in beauty, one so terrible it struck more fear than awe into the eyes of his beholders.
“You think they’ll leave us alone?” Odin asked, releasing hold on the hilt of his blade.
“I don’t think there’s any around these parts,” Miko said, pointing to the toppled remnants. “Unless they’ve somehow carved shelters through the ice, which I highly doubt they did, they’ve moved on.”
“We can take ‘em,” Nova nodded. “We’ve already proved that.”
“Let’s keep going. I don’t like being at a standstill.”
Neither do I, Odin thought, sliding up against his knight master.
Last year’s attack had been his first real test of power, and while he hadn’t escaped unharm
ed, he’d survived, a testament not only to his strength and prowess with his magic and might, but the luck he’d been blessed with either by chance or from some divine power. Something with as much magical power as that Kerma could’ve easily killed him, but somehow, someway, he’d managed to fend off the onslaught of blades and kill the chieftain.
In the distance, a mercury of blue cloud skirted across the horizon, trailing the far eastern sky. With it came lightning in shades of electric blue and hot pink, forewarning of a violent storm that would soon be headed their way.
“How long do you think until it gets to us?” Nova asked.
“Not too long,” Miko said. “Come, let’s keep moving. We want to cover as much ground as possible before we have to stop for the night.”
Outside, the world exploded in sound. The wind howled and the snow pounded against the exterior of the shelter, shaking even Miko, whom, while normally grounded, seemed to tremble in spite of the fact that they were safely within their frozen dome. Even his hands—which, for the past year, had showed little-to-no unease—shook, his knuckles popping and his fingers flourishing to the beat of some earthly sound.
