If the Blood Beauties spoke the truth then Odessa’s village would be annihilated. She would defend her home to her last breath, but if Odessa could she would return with as much power as possible.
Odessa stopped in the middle of the street. Her decision was made. She was going to return home, but Abigail had to return with her. It was the only way to salvage what all had been lost in Myrus.
Immediately, Odessa turned around and began to walk back toward the Senate House. It hadn’t felt like a long walk, but when Odessa took notice of the landmarks around her she was farther out than she had originally realized. It would be well after dark by the time she returned. Her own safety wasn’t her biggest concern, but she shouldn’t have left Abigail down a guard. Even though she was angry at Abigail that did not excuse Odessa from the duties she had sworn.
After the sun had fallen past the horizon the streets of Myrus were still filled with the cries of people in agony. Odessa dodged and pushed her way through crowds to get on with her journey back to the Senate House.
Up ahead, the crowd was unsettling the night and the hum of the Cate and Willems. People were shouting. There were screams and cries for help. Odessa slowed down her pace. She tried to see the situation ahead of her, but it was too dark to tell what exactly was going on. The crowd up ahead was in constant movement. People were being pulled through the mob. She could see heads bobbing up and down as they crossed the streets through the crowd, their hands waving in the air.
Odessa looked over. She could go around the crowd. The detour would add another block or two to her return home, but ideally she wouldn’t run into any trouble. The people of Myrus were going stir crazy.
She began to turn to her left to head down another street before she got too close to the rumbling riot forming. Odessa caught a glimpse of the lady from earlier. The basket in her arms was empty of the sticks she called torches. For a quick second, it looked like the woman smiled at Odessa with red teeth and a sign of recognition. Odessa tried to get a better look at the woman, but it was too late.
Another rush of people came from behind Odessa. She didn’t see them coming and was quickly consumed by their numbers. Odessa’s pace quickened to keep up with the rushing mob and not get trampled. They were on course to join up with the crowd up the street.
Fires were beginning to emerge in the crowd. People were lighting up the torches that were sold by the woman. They danced in the air and scared away the insects that swarmed around the city.
People cheered for the moment of reprieve from the Cate and Willem bugs. Odessa kept her head down and her eyes open. The crowd was slowing down as they got closer to the main mob with the torches. People were yelling all around her. She couldn’t make sense of many of the words being screamed. People started pushing past Odessa to get deeper into the crowd. Others were getting pulled against their will by men with torches.
“The fire will save us all!” shouted one of the men farther into the mob. He held a torch high in the air and waved it around with the rhythm of his words. “We will burn away all that the Tcher whore has brought to our city. Emperor Nikali will only welcome us once the city has been purged of the enemy!”
Many in the crowd cheered for the man’s words. Odessa tried to mimic the actions of the people around her. They pumped their hands in the air in unity.
Then the man began to speak again. He brought his torch closer to him. His eyes stared into the flame. Never once did he blink. “It is too late for many of us, but I will show you the way. I will show you salvation.”
The man took the torch and moved the flame up and down his left arm. He cried out in both pain and pleasure as the fire began to burn through his skin.
“The pain is leaving!” the man shouted. “Yes! The pain is gone!”
The crowd cheered at the man’s revelation. The fire burned away the pain of the Tcher Touch. Odessa stood frozen in fear and anticipation. She knew what came next.
Then the man took the torch and began to place it on several spots across his body. The flames caught on his clothing and began to spread quickly all around him. “I will be free. And so will all of you! It’s glorious!”
Then the panic started.
The man was consumed by his own flames. He stood for a moment hollering out in ecstasy at his relief. Then he fell to his knees, before finally following to the ground motionless.
People in the crowd screamed. Some tried to run away, but they were stopped by others in the mob. The torches started to lower into the crowd of people. There was no escape. The fires caught on to people’s clothing and spread from there.
Odessa turned and struggled to fight her way out of the crowd. Fires were springing up all around her. People were screaming, laughing, crying, and everything in between. She stepped over one person already succumbed to the flames of salvation.
Bodies were dropping to the ground as the fires continued to jump from one person to another. Nobody knew which way to go. The more panic that filled the area the less anybody was able to escape. People collided with one another sometimes with fire, sometimes without. Some of the luckiest were trampled by the rush of the mob.
Odessa pushed forward. She shoved two men down that were in her way. Nothing was going to stop her. She stepped directly onto them to get a footing and advance a few more feet closer to the edge of the crowd. Fires were getting closer to her from behind. She had to speed up if she was going to outrun the spread of the flames.
Then Odessa felt a hand grab hold of her arm. She looked back to see a man holding her arm in one hand and a torch in another.
“I can set you free,” he said through crazed eyes and missing teeth.
Odessa jerked her arm forward dragging the man closer to her. She struck hard with the palm of her left hand. She slammed into the man’s jaw. He released his grip on both Odessa’s arm and the torch then screamed out in pain. Odessa smiled under her garb, taking just a bit of pleasure in the moment.
She turned to put her focus back on the task at hand: escape. But again she felt hands grip her robe. It was more violent than last time. She could feel the man’s hands cut into her scalp straight through the cloth.
Odessa twisted hard on the balls of her feet. She let the man rip away the robe from her back in order to get free from his grasp. But the man left with more than her robe. He was also able to take with him Odessa’s silk veil that she typically wore.
Her head was completely uncovered. She was knelt down on the ground from her move to escape. She stared up at the bloodied faced man with her robe in his hands. His look of anger turned into shock then back to anger.
“You’re one of them!” he shouted.
But before he could say another word, Odessa pounced. She forgot about her attempt at escape. She tackled the man to the ground. Even without a weapon Odessa was deadly. She struck his throat to prevent him from screaming for help. Then she drove her thumbs into his eyes. He was dead in seconds.
Odessa scrambled to grab her robe, but she looked up. The fire was almost on top of her. She had to move. The veil had to be abandoned.
She took a moment. One deep breath was all she needed, and a quick glance at the crowd. She had to escape.
Two people covered in fire were rushing toward her from behind. Odessa did not let them touch her.
She rushed forward into the crowd like a charging animal. She cut through the crowd where she could or she simply plowed them over. If she died here then her home was doomed.
Finally, Odessa broke through the end of the crowd. She leapt into open space and continued to run. There were still people behind her running for their lives as well.
The fire would not stop. She watched as people with torches began to leave the crowd and race through the city. The Myrus saviors were looking for anyone with the Tcher Touch to set free.
Odessa kept her pace as she ran through the streets. She ran past people getting caught by the fires of the extremists. The chaos was spilling down every street of the surro
unding area.
An alley to Odessa’s left was still dark. No torch had made it there yet. She turned and ran straight into the darkness. The smell was putrid. It was one of the waste alleys that had formed since the plagues started. But Odessa did not care. There was nobody running in the alley. There was nobody catching on fire. There was just her and the safety of the cover of darkness where nobody could see her or her face.
Francesco de Seres watched the fires burn over the cityscape of Myrus, but he paid no attention to them as he and his personal guards made their way through the streets.
They were far enough away from the chaos in Myrus that the streets were clear. They had no obstacles as they made their way to Seres’ last duty before fully committing to Ellen’s plans.
Before Seres could bow to Nikali he had to make his peace with the Suraya. Up ahead, Seres and his men approached the former Myrus jail and current headquarters of the revolutionaries.
Chapter 78
By the morning, smoke still hung over Myrus. The streets were littered with burnt bodies within a five block radius of the original chaos. A handful of people hobbled through the wreckage of the previous night. The fight was drained out of them; their torches were long burnt away into cinder. Some walked proud of themselves. Others held their heads low, ashamed of the deeds they could not get out of their heads.
As the sun rose over the horizon, Odessa emerged from the shadows of the alley. She walked slowly into the light still unsure of the situation around her. Despite the screams going on around her throughout the night she still managed to fall asleep. Her back was sore from remaining crouched in a corner for so long. Her head hurt, and the sun blinded her eyes.
After all the turmoil from last night Odessa forgot that her hood and veil were gone, ripped away by one of the crazed believers in Nikali. She looked all around for anything to use as a new hood, but garbage was the only thing on the ground, scattered amongst the charred remains of Myrus citizens. Odessa would have to do without for the time being. She considered herself lucky enough to have survived the night. That was enough.
To replace the hood, Odessa loosened her hair from the grime of smoke and fire. Then she used her fingers to comb her hair forward to cover her face from the sides. If she kept her head down she could use her hair as blinders while she walked. It wasn’t perfect, but it would be enough to walk through the early morning streets.
The walk back toward the Senate House was unusually quiet. Odessa was still deep inside of the war zone that broke out last night. She was not bothered by anybody within that area. It did not surprise her. She had picked up what looked like the remains of one of the torches. Odessa held it in her hand and walked with a purpose through the ashes of the dead.
But once she was out of the wreckage there was still silence on the streets. The fire could have scared people into staying home that morning. But the Cate and Willem bugs were even scarce as well. That could have been due to the fires. As twisted as it seemed, Odessa had to admit that the extremists could have been right about the fire. It helped.
But something was wrong, and Odessa could not put her finger on it. It wasn’t just that people weren’t on the streets. Something else was missing.
Odessa passed several more streets with the feeling never going away. The farther she got from the fiery scene from the previous night the more people started to fill the streets. The mood was somber. Several men and women were brought to their knees crying as they realized family members had not come home that night. Cries of grief and pain echoed throughout the streets as the news of last night’s events started to spread. Hundreds died last night and there would be no way to truly learn who all was massacred.
Then it finally hit Odessa. She stopped in her tracks and looked all around her.
They were gone.
Myrus citizens surrounded her, but that was it. There was nobody else. Then the rest of Odessa’s senses began to kick in. It was quieter because they were gone. The Cate and Willem bugs drowned out much of the sounds of the city, but the sounds of the people were still always there, just under the noise. People never notice it until it’s gone.
Odessa broke out into a run. She turned away from the Senate House. There was something else she needed to check. Odessa needed to be sure.
Her sprint came to an end at the Myrus watchtower that connected to the city walls. There was nobody stationed outside to stop her from going up.
The spiraling staircase to get to the top was usually a daunting task for anybody looking to go to the top, but today Odessa did not even give it a thought. She rushed up the stairs taking two steps at a time.
Her legs burned, but she pushed on. There was no time to delay. The final steps were upon her. Odessa ran harder than before. She burst through the entry way, nearly knocking down the closed door.
Even from the doorway, Odessa could see the reality of the situation. Her eyes widened from the gripping fear that was developing.
They were gone.
The horizon was clear. The fields were open. The Myrus army was gone.
Odessa stood at the window of the watchtower looking out over the boarder of Myrus. Where once was the Myrus army defending its city from any oncoming danger was now nothing. Not one soldier remained outside or even inside the city. They had all abandoned their posts.
Strategy and situations started to race through Odessa’s mind. They must have left in the middle of the night. The fires were a distraction. But by whom? Had Nikali attacked in the middle of the night as well? Odessa still did not know all of the powers that Nikali was capable of. Arcan was far more immense than what anybody had believed and Nikali was on the threshold of it all.
There was too much to process. Odessa could not wrap her head around the idea of who benefited from the army abandoning their city.
Then rage burned inside of Odessa as she thought about Seres. She knew he was the key. There was no other attack last night. It was simple. It always was. Seres had abandoned them all.
Odessa screamed out into the skies over Myrus.
They were vulnerable now. Nikali could attack at any time. They weren’t even safe inside the city as last night had proven. Myrus was on the verge of total collapse.
But there was still the Suraya. Another adrenaline rush flickered through Odessa as her last bit of hope sparked to life. The Suraya could take charge. It was time to rally the secretive group and put Abigail in the place of power they had always dreamed of. With a second wind, Odessa got back to her feet and charged down the stairs toward her next destination.
The Suraya’s base of operations was never anything fancy to look at. They had to stay discreet over the years in order to remain hidden. Odessa had only been to the headquarters the one time, but it was enough to remember the location. A brief bit of doubt swelled her thoughts. She could be walking into nothing. The location could have been a feint and the Suraya had abandoned the spot shortly after Abigail’s visit.
Or worse, the Suraya could have abandoned the city just as quietly as the Myrus army. If they were in cahoots with Seres then there was a chance they were all gone, leaving Abigail to fend for herself.
That sense of faithlessness started to creep back into Odessa from last night. If Abigail’s passive attitude was the cause of these turn of events was true then there was nothing left to do but retreat back to her home.
The building was just as quiet as the rest of Myrus. The entryway was dark. Odessa looked around with the little light that spilled in through the windows. She found a small lantern and kindle.
“Hello,” she called out deeper into the building. There was no reply. With no other options, Odessa lit the lantern and began to walk further into the base of the Suraya.
The décor had not changed from what Odessa could tell. As she walked through the hallway that she had walked before she peered into every doorway that she could. There was nobody present.
Odessa’s fears of the Suraya leaving Myrus as well were beginning to grow
stronger. The building was silent and still. Every step farther into the building left Odessa with more dread. Nobody was home.
Finally, Odessa approached the war room that Abigail and she were taken to in their first meeting. If nobody was inside then all hope was lost, Odessa thought. She would have to retreat.
Odessa cracked the door open. The light from her lantern seeped in and began to reveal the silhouettes of people sitting around the conference table. Odessa was relieved to have found the Suraya, at last.
Her easement was enough to ignore the fact that there was no light in the room other than her lantern. “We need help,” she called out. “The Myrus army is gone.”
There was no reply from the Suraya.
Odessa walked up to the table and the lantern revealed the truth. The Suraya were all dead.
Every member’s throat had been cut. Their faces were frozen in a scream of pain.
Odessa dropped the lantern and fell to the floor along with it. Both she and the lantern crashed to the hard floor with a loud thud that echoed in the silent room.
That was it. There was nothing left to do. They were on their own in Myrus, a city that had been driven mad with plagues and despair.
And it was all thanks to their former ally and now betrayer, Francesco de Seres.
Seres and his now stunning lover, Ellen, sat comfortably in their carriage on their way to the Eluan capital. They were accompanied by Anita of the Red Cast. She sat quietly on the other end of the carriage staring out the window. She had barely said a word since joining with Seres outside of the city.
Once the order was called for the Myrus army to begin their march away from the city Ellen’s condition began to go into remission, just as Nikali promised.
The carriage led the marching army across the main roads of the Eluan Empire south toward their destination. It was on Nikali’s request that the army did not try to hide their journey to the Capitol. Emperor Nikali wanted the rest of the world to see that the last of the resistance had joined the fold.
Eluan Falls: A Whisper of Fate Page 36
