“So what can I do then?”
“You have to make amends to them,” she said. “You say that all of these problems were caused by the people conspiring against you? So expose the truth and destroy them. As long as your enemies exist, they will continue to poison others against you. Stand up and take back what is yours. Then you can begin to recover what you’ve lost. But as I told you, you will fail unless you have thrown away any fear of worthlessness and loss first.”
“Easier said than done,” said Adam.
“Is it really? Think hard, Legend. Find what it is you fear to lose the most. It should be fairly obvious to you. Once you’ve found out what it is, you must let go of it before it can be taken away from you.” She focused her gaze on his, her eyes clear and piercing as the glint of light off of a blade. “By tomorrow you should be on your way to Khanka to find the help you need there. Diatyallah will stay here, and I assure you she will be kept safe.”
Adam had expected that their conversation would return to this sooner or later. From the moment they arrived in Erebia Village, Baraluneska had seemed intent that Dee was there to stay. Dee, on the other hand, had never wanted to come back in the first place. She had followed Adam out of the ruins of the palace for a reason: she wanted to help him restore things to the way they should be. Now that they had a chance to stop and think, Adam was really beginning to wonder if that was the right thing for Dee.
He had taken her with him to save her from the attack on the palace. It was true he wanted her to stay with him, but the primary reason was to keep her safe. Now she was safe, and not only that but she was home with her own people who cared about her. It was the place where she belonged, a place she would never have left if not for the mistakes of an imprudent wizard. Who was Adam to take her out of that, and for what? Oracle wasn’t likely to end their pursuit of him just because he’d left the palace. In time they would come after him again, and that meant endangering Dee. The very thought weighed his heart down, and it was clear that once again Baraluneska had already seen what Adam only later discovered.
“I agree,” Adam said, keeping his head down. “Please keep her safe.”
Baraluneska nodded. “I give you my word. Will you tell her what you’ve decided?”
“I’ll wait until tonight, after the celebration,” Adam said. “I may not wait until morning to leave given the urgency of my situation. But I will tell her. I can’t just walk away from her as her master did.”
“You are certainly wiser than Amadeus, Legend,” Baraluneska said. “I am truly sorry that this must fall on you. Diatyallah seems to have a penchant to drawing herself into tragedy.”
“That’s why I hope she can finally have a normal life by staying here,” Adam said. “You’ll tell her the truth about her master as well?”
“As I should have done four years ago,” the old woman said with a sigh. “I only hope that she will forgive us.”
Adam stared at his reflection in the murky tea sitting in front of him. He saw a doubtful man of uncertain fortune. “You and me both.”
“Good morning!”
Dee’s cheerful voice moved through the air like sweet melody as Adam and Baraluneska returned to her home. It was midmorning by then and Dee was already awake and full of energy. Adam found that she had changed from her typical clothes to a fine robe that seemed just a bit too long for her. Her lengthy hair, usually flowing free down her back, was tied in a rare ponytail that kept her tresses neat and secure. Her spirits also seemed to be much higher now as she grew accustomed to being home again. Adam smiled as he greeted her, also noting the length of the robe that covered her bare feet.
“It’s one of my mother’s robes,” Dee explained. “All of my clothes from before I left are too small. I had quite a growth spurt in the time I’ve been gone.”
“Your bust has grown as well,” Baraluneska added, causing Dee’s face to flush red as she crossed her arms over her chest.
“Baba!” she shouted, turning her eyes away from Adam.
“Well it’s true,” said Baraluneska. “You’ve grown into yourself well, Diatyallah. You should be proud to have such a beautiful body. One day you’ll be as old and wrinkled as me and long for the days when you had such youthful beauty.”
“Oh, hush, Baba,” Dee said. She glanced back at Adam, who was looking very out of place. “Did you two have a productive talk last night?”
“Productive is one way to put it,” Adam said.
“Your friend here has many troubles, Diatyallah,” Baraluneska said. “I warned you about getting involved with men like that.”
“Well that’s why I’m around to help share the load,” Dee said. A bleak smile appeared on Baraluneska’s face as the old woman turned away.
“I suppose you two would like to talk things through for a while,” she said. “I’ll leave you be.” Baraluneska went to the door and closed it quietly behind her as Dee turned her attention to Adam.
“She must be starting to like you,” she said. “Usually Baba never lets me alone with men. She’s always been very protective of me.”
“It’s not a bad thing for a grandmother,” Adam said, leaning against the wall. “So how are you feeling?”
“I’m fine,” said Dee. “Why do you ask?”
“Well yesterday you were doing just about all you could to keep us from coming back here. Are you alright with being back home?”
Dee shrugged. “I suppose. Things are better than I was expecting. I figured everyone was going to be on my case about not having my master with me when I came back, but nobody said anything, not even Baba. The only one I seem to have let down was myself. I don’t know. Everyone’s happy to have me back, and now that I’m here I realize that I really did miss it. But part of me still feels bad, unfulfilled I guess. I was supposed to come back with my master and everything would be like it used to be, and we’d both be happy together.”
She frowned and crossed her arms. “But he’s given up on coming back. If that’s really what he wants, I should accept that and try to be happy for him. I know he’d just want me to be happy.”
Adam clenched his fists. He wanted to just tell Dee the truth so she would stop worrying about how she’d failed him. He knew doing so would only compound the bad news he would already have to give her and held his tongue. Baraluneska would let her know the truth soon enough.
Dee blinked as she saw Adam at odds with himself. “Oh, I’m sorry, Greg. Here I am going on about something as silly as that when you have so much worse to deal with. Did you ask Baba if she could volunteer some of our mages to help recover the palace from Oracle?”
“I don’t know if that would be such a good idea, Dee,” Adam said. “Your people aren’t soldiers, and I can’t ask them to go off and fight for something they have no stake in.”
“Well it’s important to you, and you’re important to me,” Dee said. “So they could have a stake in it.”
“I’d just as soon leave it up to them,” said Adam.
“Alright, well who else could help us?” Dee asked, cupping her chin as she thought. She gasped. “Oh no, the Creator! How could I have forgotten about him? We never found out what happened to him in the palace. Do you think he could have gotten things under control there after we left?”
“There’s no way to know for sure,” Adam said. “Like I said back at the palace, though, I don’t know how much we should count on him.”
“Do you think something could have happened to him?” Dee asked.
“I don’t know, but don’t you think it’s odd he never came after us? Even if his intent was to stay out of the conflict, he has no problem showing up to tell me how badly I screwed things up. But he’s been nowhere to be seen.”
“This is so unlike him,” Dee murmured. “What if he’s gone off to get help? Like he did with Cody?”
“That was a situation where he wasn’t able to do much of anything to help,” Adam reasoned. “In the Other Universe, he shouldn’t have any limitations.
There’s no reason he couldn’t just put an end to everything and restore order if he wanted to.”
“But he wouldn’t just abandon us,” Dee said.
Adam wasn’t so sure. He hadn’t told Dee that the Creator had called for his resignation just before Oracle’s attack began. It was reasonable to think that in the grand scheme of things, leaving him to twist in the wind would accomplish the Creator’s wishes just as much as him stepping down from the throne. A cruel possibility arose: what if the Creator had been involved with the bombing and the destruction of the government? It coincided with his wishes, and explained his lack of help during the crisis and in Adam’s current situation. To do so would be a true act of malevolence, and as upset as he was with the Creator, Adam couldn’t accept such a conclusion. Besides, the plan would have put Dee in danger as well. The Creator would never allow any harm to come to her. Adam hoped that he would still feel that way after Dee had turned her back on him.
“I don’t know what the Creator’s planning,” Adam said. “I hope that he’s working on a way to help us. Until he shows up, we’re going to have to hope that the Khazaki will be of some help.”
“If that’s what you think is best,” Dee said. “So when are we leaving for Khanka? It’s still quite a ways away, but there’s a ferry at the river on the other side of the mountains, maybe a day’s walk. It could get us to Khanka in another day. If we leave soon we could probably catch the earliest ferry by the time we got to the river.”
“I didn’t plan to leave until tomorrow,” Adam said. “After everything yesterday, I’m realizing I could use a day to recover from all of it. Besides, there’s a celebration going on tonight, isn’t there?”
“Yeah, that’s true,” Dee said. “But it’s not too important if you thought it’d be better to get to Khanka as soon as possible.”
“If it’s all the same, I think I’d like to take the time to rest. And you should be able to enjoy your homecoming celebration.”
“Well, they’re probably not going to celebrate too much once I tell them I’m going to be leaving again with you tomorrow.”
“Listen, Dee—”
Adam was cut off by a loud, frantic tapping at the door. “Hold that thought,” Dee said, sliding by him to open the door. Two women close to Dee’s age posed behind the door, a red head and a slightly shorter brunette, both with hair down to their shoulder blades. As the girls caught sight of each other they all squealed aloud with an excited frenzy that startled Adam. Dee jumped through the door frame to embrace her visitors who returned the affection as all of them jumped up and down like girls half their age. Adam turned his head in a curious manner as he observed the bizarre change in Dee’s behavior.
“By the Creator! How are you?” the red head said as she pulled back a little.
“I’m great!” Dee replied. “Wow, you two have hardly changed a bit. How are you?”
“Eh, you know, same old troublemakers,” the brunette said. “You must have changed a lot though. Getting out to see the world and all.”
“Well, maybe a little,” said Dee. “But I’m pretty much the same as when I left.”
The red head peered past Dee and saw Adam puttering around in the room behind her. “Hey, is that the guy you came back with? He’s cute. Is he your boyfriend, Diatyallah?”
“Wow, an exotic boyfriend from a distant land,” the brunette chimed in. Dee stamped her foot.
“He’s not my boyfriend!” she whispered in an angry hush through her teeth. Behind her, Adam realized that the women were now talking about him and looked over. Now the two strange girls were gazing at him with entranced eyes. Dee cleared her throat louder than necessary and moved aside to give Adam room to enter their circle.
“Girls, this is Greg Lathane,” she said, keeping up with the personal pseudonym she had given him. “He’s the King of Magid. It’s a country that covers a whole planet. Greg, these are my best friends from the village, Taman and Pollus.” She gestured to the red head and the brunette, respectively. Both of the girls smiled and gave a short bow. Adam gave them an awkward wave followed by a simple “hello.”
“Wow, a king,” Taman said. “That’s so very interesting. Do you have a castle and servants and everything like that?”
Adam was unsure of how to answer that, but Dee jumped in for him. “He certainly does. I’ve been staying at his palace for the last nine months now.”
“No way!” Pollus exclaimed. “I’m so jealous. Does that make you a princess or something?”
“No, of course not,” Dee said. “I was staying as a guest at the behest of the Creator Most High.”
“What!” Taman jumped in. “The Creator Most High asked you personally?”
Dee put her hands on her hips as she relished in her accomplishments, which she had forgotten were really quite outstanding. “Oh, yeah! In fact, I’ve been serving the Creator personally for nearly two years now. He and I are like this.” She crossed two fingers.
“You’re joking!” shouted Taman.
“Yeah, Diatyallah, meeting a king I can believe but the His Holiness, Creator Most High? Do you have any proof?”
“Ha! Do I have any proof?” Her arrogance faded in an instant as she realized that she had no way to prove her service to the Creator. She turned to Adam. “Well, Greg here is close to the Creator. They used to be one deity but they split off a few thousand years ago. He can vouch for me.”
The girls gawked at Adam, more wide eyed than they had been when Adam was just the man that Dee had come home with. He didn’t know what to say, and he was starting to grow uncomfortable.
“Does that mean you’re a deity, like the Creator Most High?” asked Taman.
“Yes,” Adam said with hesitation. Even if they were Dee’s friends, he would have preferred to keep his identity hidden as much as possible while he was moving under Oracle’s radar. “And Dee’s telling the truth. She was serving the Creator before she came to stay with me.”
The girls seemed blown away, and not just by Adam’s defense of Dee’s claim. “You call her ‘Dee’? No way!” Pollus said. “I didn’t think anyone beside Amadeus called her that.”
Taman jabbed Pollus in the ribs with her elbow, prompting a cry of pain from the brunette. She saw Taman shooting her a glare and Pollus realized her mistake, looking at Dee with sympathy.
“Sorry, Diatyallah,” Pollus said.
“Oh, no, it’s fine,” Dee said, gripping her arm.
“I know he’s probably a sore subject with you,” Pollus said, prompting another elbowing.
“Dummy!” Taman scolded her. “If you really think that, then don’t bring it up!”
Dee smiled weakly, doing her best to make it seem that she wasn’t bothered. Adam felt the room becoming tense compared to the joyous energy the girls had exhibited moments earlier. He cleared his throat and stepped up, a bold move for him.
“So you two were Dee’s best friends growing up? You all must have a lot of catching up to do,” he said. “It’s looking to be a nice day outside, so why don’t the three of you walk around the village and get reacquainted?”
Dee raised her eyebrow at him. “Well I wouldn’t want to just ignore you, Greg.”
“Think nothing of it,” he said. “You’ve been stuck with me all this time, so I’m sure you wouldn’t mind getting some quality time with your friends. Besides, I need to make some travel arrangements anyway.”
“Are you sure?” she asked, but Taman moved in and wrapped her arm around Dee’s neck in a playful hold.
“He’s right, you need some girl time!” said Taman. “Plus we want to hear all your travelling stories. You must have a million of them.”
Dee gave Adam a look of concern, but he nodded to her with a smile as if to tell her it was alright. She acknowledged him with a nod and broke free from Taman’s grip. “Alright, let’s go! You two will have to bring me down to the bakery. Oh, I’ve missed it so much!”
“Only if you buy us some sweet breads,” Pollus said. �
��It’s your turn to get them. I remembered even after all these years.”
“Oh, come on! I don’t have any village money!”
“Diatyallah, I have a feeling you’ll be getting a lot of special treatment around here for a while,” Taman said, skirting Dee out the door and into the street. As the three headed off to explore, Adam found himself letting out a sigh of relief. He was no good in situations like that, but he had managed to have some success. Of course, he had also managed not to tell Dee that he was leaving without her. He let his head thunk against the wall, knowing that he was only putting off the inevitable task that was going to let her down, whether now or later.
On the south face of the mountain, Dee, Taman, and Pollus were perched on the edge of a ridge overlooking the valley below. All three were enjoying sweet bread rolls filled with jam that they’d gotten from the village baker. As Taman had figured, the treats were given to the girls on the house by the baker, an old Gatti family friend. Catching a view of the endless sea of fir trees in the valley while snacking on sweet rolls was a common activity for the trio during their teenage years. Now Dee was happy to indulge in the experience again as she shared stories with her old friends.
“So what happened to the Huukup warriors?” Pollus asked before taking another bite of her roll.
“They went back to their village,” said Dee. “They wanted to spread the word among their people that not all humans should be feared or hated. I never got the chance to go back to that part of the continent, so I don’t know if anything ever came from that.”
“Seems kind of idealistic to me,” Taman said. “The humans and non-humans have been at each other’s throats for centuries. It’s going to take something pretty big to change that.”
Dee reached into the pocket of her robe and pulled out her silver pocket watch, letting it dangle from its chain. She watched her reflection move as the watch spun about and caught the glint from the sun. “Maybe, but it all has to start somewhere.”
Taman sighed, kicking her legs as they dangled over the side of the ridge. “That’s what I need to do. I need to get out of this village and go explore the world. I mean, there’s so much more out there than what we have here.”
Fallout (Tales of the Other Universe Book 2) Page 16
