by Jon Kiln
“You are here because I killed Vgar?” he asked any one of the three bear-masks in the room who would listen. He’d decided against saying anything like What happened to Vgar, thinking they might respect him more if he took responsibility for the killing. He didn’t care if they respected him, but it might cause one of them to make a mistake, to give Draken a moment’s leeway that he might make use of.
“No,” one of the bear-masks spoke, and Draken realized that this one was a woman. As long as he’d known about this shadow-enemy in the city, ever since Sula had first told them of the bear-masks, Draken had assumed they’d all been male. Behind her mask and clothes her frame was bulky like the other two guards. None of them were to be trifled with, at least not physically. “We are here because E’ghat commands it.”
“Now, here I would have thought you weren’t supposed to talk to me,” Draken said in a gambit to make her feel she must keep talking or risk ‘obeying’ his false rules. “Engaging the prisoner, eh, I’m pretty sure that’s a big no-no.” He smiled as he spoke, hoping to ignite rage in her, a further guarantee that she’d run her tongue.
“Nothing of the sort,” she said, her accent the thickest yet, almost obscuring her words. “We can talk as much as you please, though I can’t promise to answer every question you have. There is nothing that could be said by either of us to change the course of events as they must unfold.”
This last statement reminded Draken, as if any reminder were needed, that these were not thieves and crooks as he knew them. They were cultists, religious fanatics serving a long-dead god who had probably not existed in the first place.
“Who is E’ghat?” he said, believing his only hope of making use of this exchange was to cause her to say something she should have left unsaid. He’d try to keep their conversation close to its most vital veins—things like faith, weakness, doubt, strength. He glanced at the other two guards. One was grinding something with a mortar and pestle, the other kept watch at the door. Whatever their feelings might be about their compatriot taking Draken’s bait were their own. Judging by their body language, one would think they didn’t even know anyone was talking.
She said, “E’ghat is the god of bears.”
So, the rumors he’d heard were true. This god—this, false god—was not a god in the shape of a human. It was a chilling thought.
“But you are not a bear,” he said.
She might have smiled at this, but the low-light and the fact that her mouth was half-hidden by her mask made it difficult to tell. “No, I’m not.”
“Then why—”
“We serve the god of the bears because he will have us. He is the most powerful god that has ever lived. Other gods come and go, but not E’ghat. He was here, almost, since the very beginning. Your four-five gods enjoy the day of their fame because it amuses E’ghat to watch their influence spread, knowing in time he will crush them. Or perhaps he has some grander design we know nothing of. It doesn’t matter. E’ghat is the only god worth serving, and he, in his wisdom and cunning, allows a few of us to join in his worship even though, as you were so fast to point out, we are not bears.”
“Cunning?” Draken said, trying to find a comfortable way to sit on the ground and look at the woman at the same time. He didn’t want to give up the psychological advantage of standing. He was taller than the bear-mask woman by several inches. But he also knew he’d need whatever strength he could muster if he and Pul saw an opportunity to fight or flee. “So you think you might be pawns to him?”
“I know I am a pawn. Better to be a pawn for E’ghat than the highest prophetess of any other god. I—” but she didn’t get to finish her thought. The guard at the door called to her in a hushed tone, and she said, “Forgive me, Draken Wellstroma,” she sounded polite, as if she had an honest reverence for Draken. This was disturbing in its own right. “We must pause our discussion.” She went to the other guard, and Draken was left to his own thoughts.
A long time passed before anyone else came in. Draken found himself inexplicably drawn to some of the ideas the woman brought up. They disgusted him, but there was a certain appeal to them all the same.
Draken was grateful when these thoughts were interrupted by a commotion at the main doorway. He couldn’t see the action well, as a shadow from one of the buckets covered the scene, but there was a moment of violence. A yell, a punch, and then Pul was shoved into the light with Sula right behind.
“I thought you were smarter than that,” she said to Pul.
Pul’s face was covered in his own blood, and he collapsed three steps into the room.
Chapter 22
“Why are you stopping?” Jace said, his words slurred slightly despite the fact that he’d had only two watered-down mugs of ale. Draken didn’t feel even the slightest tickle from the alcohol he’d consumed other than the desire for more. That desire had been roused, and he knew from experience it would be a long time before it settled down.
“Look around,” he said. “They’re closing.”
Jace pulled himself from the reverie of absorbing Draken’s tale, and saw that it was true. Chairs were being stacked on tables. They were the final two patrons.
“You know,” Jace said, “I’d kind of hoped night would never come. I know we’ll be fine, but I’d rather not spend the night on the ground. We could get a room, but that’s half of the money I have left gone just like that. We could tell someone we’re monks, but I’m sure neither or us wants to deal with that mess tonight.”
“It’s okay,” Draken said. “We don’t have to sleep on the ground. Come on.”
Soon they were at the shaman’s house. She didn’t seem surprised to see them. Draken remembered her name was Kheda, and he was proud of himself for it. Names had never been a strong suit for him. With little fanfare, she saw them to one of her two sickrooms, where four empty beds waited for the monks to take their pick. Draken guessed that normally she would put them in the room with her other patients. He heard sounds of life from the other sickroom, but that she had her own reasons to keep them separated. Draken remembered his outburst, the moment she feared violence from him, and a pang of shame stabbed at him. These kinds of feelings were so common, however, he barely noticed it.
She also brought them two battered burlap pants and cotton shirts. They wouldn’t be recognized as monks now even by the most prying of eyes. It was convenient, but also disturbing to Draken, how she’d assumed correctly they wouldn’t want to be known as what they were, at least for a time.
She didn’t probe into their situation; now they were simply monks who needed a place to sleep, not patients to be healed. Soon the lights had been extinguished, and Draken didn’t even remember drifting off.
In the morning Kheda had left food for them. Hard cheese and even harder bread, but both of good quality. She herself was nowhere to be found. Draken couldn’t help thinking she didn’t want to talk to him. She’d been brought down by his cynicism and anger, his belief that he couldn’t return to the monastery, and that was before it had burned down. Having decided he was as beyond saving as he professed himself to be, she’d also decided to distance herself from him. He’d liked her. He’d admired her skill, and it saddened him to think she saw him this way, but he didn’t blame her for a moment.
After they’d eaten, Jace put a coin on the table, mumbling something about how they’d need to get some money soon, and they left.
Once out the door, just as Draken was about to ask where they thought they were going, Jace said, “We’re going to Figa, I’m afraid.”
“What?” Draken said, struggling to keep the sudden panic out of his voice. “I can’t go to Figa! You don’t understand! It feels like a long time since I’ve been gone, but I only disappeared from there eleven months ago. I’m sure everyone’s been gossiping about me, searching for me. I’m a celebrity in Figa.”
“You sure seem to think so,” Jace said, smiling.
“And it’s not only that. I have… debts there. Big ones. Th
e kind they put you in jail for.”
“I don’t know what to tell you. That’s where we need to go.” He started walking roughly in the direction of Figa. His manner suggested they’d get there by sunset, even though it was over a weeks’ journey by foot.
“And you know this how, exactly? Did Dramm-Teskata whisper it in your ear?” Draken said, catching up to the older monk.
“No. You did.”
“I did?”
“Draken, you strike me as a smart guy. Young, but perhaps wise beyond your years. And yet, you suffer from the same condition most people suffer from: the inability to see what’s right in front of you.”
“I don’t need more riddles.”
“Fair enough,” Jace told him with an apologetic grin. “It’s your wife.”
“My wife?”
“Pul burned down a monastery. He killed nearly a hundred monks. An unthinkable act even if he did convert to a new religion. You think he’ll stop at that because you slipped through his fingers?”
Draken still couldn’t wrap his head around what Jace was saying… not quite… his mind wouldn’t let him. He felt as if a huge weight were pressing down on him, a heavy package that, once unwrapped, would reveal a monster within.
Jace sighed and put a hand on his traveling companion’s shoulder. “It’s not your fault,” he said. “There’s just something about the human mind. It wants to protect itself from hard truths. Draken.” A pause, then, “Pul couldn’t get to you where you were, so now he has to draw you to him. There’s only one way to do that.”
And Draken got it. “Carella…” He took a deep breath. “I haven’t gotten to this part of the story yet, but I have two children as well. Twin girls.”
Jace shook his head sadly. “I wondered if you might. Not twins, I mean, but just children in general. How old are they?”
The pain of this question felt almost like a physical stab. Draken had run away from Figa for his daughters’ sakes, theirs and Carella’s, he’d told himself that a thousand times, but he couldn’t help feeling he’d abandoned them. “They just turned six last month. I wasn’t there.”
“It’s all right,” Jace said, trying to sooth him. “But do you see why we must go to Figa? They are not safe. It is the will of the gods and it is also common sense that we go to them. Funny how often those two attributes seem to go hand-in-hand.”
Draken nodded and without warning fell to his knees. Again, he had to face the horror of all he’d done to them, how booze and chasing women had ruined their family before it ever had the chance to really begin.
“Get up,” Jace whispered out of the side of his mouth. “Or pretend you’re praying or something. People are watching us, and I don’t think we can afford to make a scene.”
But for a moment, Draken didn’t think he could stand. What he wanted, what he really wanted, was to give up entirely. He wanted to die. So he didn’t have to face all that lay ahead of him. Instead, he forced himself to his feet.
“To Figa, then,” he said quietly.
“And in the meantime, you can get back to your story.”
But Draken didn’t dive back into his past straightaway. His heart and mind were too busy juggling emotions and thoughts. And anyway, he felt too conspicuous on the streets, where he’d just fallen to his knees so dramatically. They walked in comparative silence until they got to the city’s perimeter.
It was a fine day for fall, the mild weather at odds with the horror Merreline had witnessed just a day before. Draken had always preferred summer to anything, but this day was unseasonably warm and sunny, with only a hint of winter’s approach in the breezes that kicked up occasionally.
Nearly to the city’s gates, a formality of wood more than any kind of worthy defense, Draken opened his mouth to continue where he’d left off, and found himself oddly relieved to continue his story. His past was like a living thing inside him. Ever since Brother Keller had suggested he tell someone his story it had felt akin to a religious duty.
Chapter 23
In the days that followed their capture, while they remained prisoners of Sula and her entourage of some of E’ghat’s fanatics, Draken thought of his bride-to-be more than once. The fairest trophy he’d yet to add to his collection.
Was she worried about him? he’d wondered time and again.
He knew she’d be upset about their plans being interrupted, but did she worry about him? Certainly she wouldn’t think he’d skipped town on purpose. The arrangement of their wedding was not emotional enough to produce cold feet, and she must know that. Pul’s heart must have been breaking, but for the most part he remained silent as stone.
When he wasn’t thinking about Carella, or his career as a fighter, or what gossip must be circulating for him above-ground, his thoughts went to an unexpected figure: the god of bears. And as he thought about E’ghat, something very strange happened. Something Draken would later regret almost more than anything else in his life. He began to believe.
Sula had explained to him and Pul both how Vgar was like a missionary, searching the world for E’ghat’s scattered warriors. She’d shocked Draken by revealing the followers of E’ghat weren’t mad at all that Vgar had been killed, or even that it had been so unnecessary. She said Vgar had been fighting his whole life to have someone dispose of him in this manner—brutally, without mercy.
Draken didn’t want to accept what Sula was saying, but there seemed no getting around it.
E’ghat.
There was an elegance to it all, horrible, gruesome though it was. E’ghat was mounting his return to the forefront of the world’s worship, scattering the spirits of those that would serve him in its various countries with the skill of a hunter baiting a trap. These scattered souls were not bear-masks, but hidden humans who didn’t even know they were his agents until the bear-masks found them.
And Draken was a key figure in this. Physically gifted, which Sula said was a sign in all of E’ghat’s scattered ones, Draken was now a celebrity of no small clout. He could do more to further the work of the god of bears here in Figa than a hundred bear-masks lurking in the sewers ever could.
“But,” Draken argued as she finished her speech, the oil lamp casting enchanting shadows across her face, “I’ve always trusted Rada. I’ve felt his presence. His power.”
“Yes,” she said, “you felt his weak and foolish attempts to claim you. But you were never meant to serve him. E’ghat will not punish you for this, for you knew nothing else. And you have not always been feeling the pull of Rada. E’ghat has been there for you as well, when you needed him most. Also, haven’t you always felt you were destined for… more?”
Draken remembered what his father had told him on his deathbed. It was impossible for those words to not come flooding back to him now, not when he’d thought of them a thousand times since that day.
You know where you get your strength, don’t you? Only Rada could give a young man such strength.
But his father hadn’t known about E’ghat.
The astro-priests assigned your night to Shinna, but you must have been born under a broken sky.
His father had felt that the astro-priests were wrong about Draken, so he’d assigned the truth to the only god that made sense to him, Rada.
Not many people serve Rada these days. When my father was your age, there were many. But not now. I think it’s because there has been peace from war for so long, Rada is not needed as often. But I also think this means you are special.
What would his father say now? Would he balk at the mention of this ancient god he’d never heard of? Would he accuse them all of blasphemy? Or would his eyes open wide as understanding came upon him?
He will use you for a great purpose.
That’s what his father had told him. Could that purpose have possibly been meant to end at the arena? Could it be that all Draken was ever meant for was petty fame? Or could it be that the great purpose his father sensed in him was this, assisting the rightful god, the truest god, E’
ghat, to the throne of worship?
“So, that’s what you think I am? A warrior for your bear?” Draken asked.
Sula smiled now, and there was venom in it. “Yes. But you should know E’ghat is not a bear anymore than Dramm-Taskata is a woman.”
This quieted Draken momentarily. It was a harrowing thought. If his gods were the extension of the human-race, with the intelligence, goodness, and creativity of his kind, but much grander, beyond his ken, what might such a god of bears be like? He thought of a man and a bear, almost any bear, pitted in unarmed combat. Who would win? Why, it would always be the bear. Always. Would it be the same in a battle between a human-god and a bear-god?
The female bear-mask Draken had talked to the first day of his captivity came in, interrupting the conversation. She told Sula five hours had passed since it was exactly midday on the surface. This seemed to have some meaning for Sula, who excused herself without explanation.
In a minute she returned with Draken’s own sword and shield.
“That will give them something to talk about,” Pul said, laughing. The lightness of his brother’s mood startled Draken, and also he didn’t know what Pul meant. He looked at his brother quizzically. “Your weapons are missing,” Pul explained. “They must have noticed that in their search for you. What will they make of it?”
The female bear-mask came in on Sula’s heels. She had a two-handed long sword she could not have swung over her head without hitting the earthen ceiling.
“What’s this?” Draken asked.
“It is both a test and a treat.” She went to his side, handing him his beloved weapons. “I believe your conversion is sincere, Draken, and E’ghat believes because, like all gods, he can see into your heart. But not everyone has my faith. It’s not their fault. Vgar was not their father, and none had an upbringing in the faith to equal my own. They cannot be expected to believe as I do. They need proof.”
“Of what?”
