What is most selfish? he asked himself. To think of my companions, or myself? Should he stand by those who had been there for him, or turn his back in an effort to soothe his own soul?
Flynn walked a mile to find Jean, who had gone down a faceless pathway to dangle her legs from the precipice of eternity. There was no way out from the temple here, though Jean couldn’t have known that. Flynn felt a rending wound in him as he neared though, and suspected a path had been there, once. He pictured Airia, running, frantic to close every route that might be known to her enemies. Desperate, out of breath, and drawing everything she had to collapse each tunnel before another might cross through it. Jean sat idly, and didn’t even look as he settled down next to her and dangled his legs alongside her own.
“Long drop,” she commented after a few minutes. “Ain’t it?”
“You’d probably die of starvation before you hit the bottom … if there is one.”
“Skirtin’ close to trouble, then?”
Flynn chuckled. “As though we haven’t gotten used to that?”
“Yeah,” Jean smiled back, but the warmth between them faded quickly as she looked him in the eyes. “Flynn … you ain’t takin’ her story seriously? Are ya?”
What they’d been told seemed farfetched in a world so grounded, so bleak—even among people whose gifts seemed absurd. Flynn answered honestly. “I think I want to.”
“Come on,” Jean pleaded. “Ain’t this all just a bit fuckin’ weird to ya?”
“Completely. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be true.”
Flynn had mulled over the ways to manipulate Jean into joining—appealing to her lonely nature and reminding her that she was wanted and needed in what was to come would do the trick, if it came to it. Else, Mack’s willingness to follow this path might goad her into doing the same. Putting manipulation aside, he opted for honesty.
“You don’t know everything I’ve done … but you know enough. I have too much to answer for, and whatever I do, it will only ease my burdens, not set things right.”
Jean had not let the things he’d confessed slide. Both knew there were matters between them left unspoken for the sake of their friendship, and still more sins Flynn had yet to own up to. As his friend, she was resigned to that fact. “Yeah … I know. And truth be told, I ain’t lookin’ to cut paths with you just yet. We got this far together.”
Flynn smiled at her. It was honest—not conjured forth to please the other party or satisfy some later agenda—and he wanted her to know it. For the dangers to come, though, it wasn’t enough. Her heart needed to be in it.
“I won’t hate you if you leave. And it’s not like I wouldn’t plan to see you again. You saved my life. I’m not going to just forget that.”
She thought about it all for a moment: hard and genuine. “I don’t wanna be afraid for my life anymore.” She chuckled grimly. “And I know if I get caught in this shit—”
“Then just walk away. I won’t ask you to—”
“Hell, man, I can’t just do that.” Jean laughed. “I don’t ditch my friends.”
That was enough for Flynn. Whatever threats and dangers may come, he wouldn’t be facing them alone. Though he’d have braved it alone if he’d had to, it was better that he didn’t. More than his need to set some small part of his soul right, he was grateful for the company. And more grateful just to have friends.
*
Flynn and Jean made the long walk back to the temple’s center together. Two last pieces of fruit hung from the tree Airia had grown some uncertain days prior. Flynn pulled both down, tossing one to Jean and momentarily cradling the other in his hand before sinking his teeth in.
As before, he heard Airia’s book shut in response. There was something different this time, less intrusive surprise and more the conclusion to a lengthy deliberation. Perhaps brief, for Airia, he considered—she was by her own admission much older than the four of them combined.
“HEY, GUYS!” Jean called out to the others.
Chari came down from the library, apart from Airia who was moving at her own pace. The former hurried, and Mack came jogging out from one of the other nearby corridors. As Mack approached, Jean wordlessly tossed him her fruit, partially eaten. Flynn gave Chari the other half of his own and, understanding, she began to consume it. They would not linger much longer, and needed all their energy for whatever came next.
“Your time has expired,” Airia said. “You are free to stay a while longer, but I will give you nothing more.” She smiled. “But it seems you four are ready just the same. Mayhap my hospitality was not in vain?”
“What do you need us to do, to find your successor?” Flynn asked plainly.
Airia’s smile faded to solemnity, having waited so long to hear those words spoken so decisively. Whatever disappointment she had initially felt in the mortals before her had since ebbed.
“I am beholden to you.” Her voice broke a little. “A dozen worthy have died while I waited, unable to reach them, unable to send for them or another to guide them. But no more. Not after this day.”
“So you’ve got someone in mind then?” Mack asked.
“I have spent years at a time tracing the flow of life in the cosmos,” Airia said. “And years before I found sign of a boy named Poe who has the spark. He would be a man now and, so far as I know, he still lives in the World Between Heaven and Hell.”
“So what’s the name of the world?” Jean asked.
“The World Between Heaven and Hell,” the one-time goddess reiterated. “That is the literal name. It is a smaller realm of the cosmos, the domain of a quaternity of gods who reign over the absolute forces.”
Airia gestured toward one of the corridors, one from which Flynn had felt a pull at his spirit for the past several days. Already the walk promised to be much briefer than the one that first led them to Airia’s sanctum, and Flynn stifled an urge to run ahead and open the way.
“You may conduct approaching him as you will, but it is paramount that he be brought to our side. There may not be another qualified to become the God of Eternity in time to restore balance if he fails.”
“Why him?” Chari asked. “Why does this man rank when none other among us qualifies?”
Airia was silent for a moment, then conceded at last. “There are answers even I do not have.” She said nothing more.
The remaining walk was brief, and Flynn was still distant when Airia neared the pathway’s terminus. Sure enough, the way between worlds split and howled, pulling at them all.
“There is no conduit in my domain that reaches the World Between Heaven and Hell.” Airia raised her voice above the conduit’s cries. “This path will take you to Oma. When you arrive, move fast. Seek shelter. Kill what creatures you find and wear their skins.”
Mack gulped. The message was clear: Oma would neither be hospitable nor friendly and would engender little such emotion in return. Jean zipped up her jacket while Flynn did the same with his vest, wishing now that his shirt hadn’t been shredded and abandoned in the Inquisitor’s torture room. Chari tightened her beads, and Flynn worried about her ornate sandals, not meant for harsher weather. Mack buttoned up his shredded aloha shirt, which was much the worse for wear. They hardly looked the heroic bunch, armed with bludgeon and claw and an empty rifle.
“You will be safe while traveling between worlds,” Airia told them. “There are no senses that can discern the opening of rifts between forgotten ways. But I warn you that men of Poe’s caliber draw attention to themselves far more readily. Be careful when you near him; be careful when you take him.”
“And if he doesn’t want to be taken?” Flynn asked, wondering what Airia’s plan B was.
“He must be.” The spark of life itself seemed to surge in her eyes as she told Flynn, “That is why I am entrusting this task to you.”
As his friends passed through the way, Flynn realized then that Airia knew him for what he was, more for the man than the monster he appeared to be. There were things
about himself that he wanted to ask, things he doubted she would share so lightly. She had a use for him. It was a job. This “Poe” was not the first person Flynn had been asked to find, nor the first he would have to convince to do something they, left to their own devices, would not wish. But it was not a job to satisfy the bent or perverted desires of some degenerate, but rather one that might bring some good back to worlds desperately lacking. More important than the consequence was the personal reward—the chance to bring some relief to Flynn’s burdened soul.
Flynn passed through the way after his friends. He expected that Airia had walked away without wasting a breath, for when he recovered his senses on the other side, the way back was gone.
Chapter Ten: Something Blue
Bitingly cold winds blasted Jean, making the blood rush to her face, forcing her to squint in the flurry that pelted her from the moment she touched the Omati air. At least the snow had cushioned the fall; she’d been expecting a graceless arrival and rough landing.
It took a few moments to find her senses, after the rude departure from the neutral climate of Airia’s sanctuary. She crouched, and her digits chilled as she plunged them beneath a foot of snow. Below that, she felt stone, a comfort that made the unknown ahead a little easier to brave.
Flynn slid down behind her, stumbling but maintaining his footing. At Jean’s best guess, whatever ledge the gateway had once stood atop had long since crumbled away. She hoped not to trip on some errant piece of it while moving forward.
She turned her attention to the tundra ahead. Masses of stone stretched across the world of Oma like ropes, as though someone had cast a giant net upon it. There were no trees, no visible mountains. Just an erratic crisscross of stone banded with ice and snowfall. The skies were gloomy for miles all around, but there must be better days, she figured. Can’t be snowin’ all the time, can it?
Flynn moved purposefully past her, shivering. Underdressed though he was, she spared him no concern, knowing his body was built for a place like this. He helped Chari, who’d been crouching in the snow, to her feet. Jean felt more worry for her. Those torrid days on TseTsu were all she’d ever known, and there it had been easy to sweat.
Only the tough would survive here.
Mack got to his feet and waved cheerily. “A little nippy, isn’t it, Jeannie?” He had to speak up to be heard over the bellowing winds.
“My tits are frozen solid, but otherwise I’m great!”
Mack, taking her too seriously, slid out of his aloha shirt and held it out to her, “If you’re still kinda chilly—”
Jean caught him by the arm, stopping his offer. “Keep it. I’ll be fine, man. Really.”
In her grip, his arm felt warm enough, but they hadn’t been here long. Mack didn’t so much as tremble, though like Chari, he was dressed for warmer days. She studied him in concern, uncertain whether Mack’s gifts were just staving off the discomfort of the cold or actually keeping him warm. Jean’s throat turned dry for fear that her best friend might suddenly drop dead without warning.
Nearby, Flynn had hoisted Chari upon his back; her arms were draped around his neck and her legs trembled under his wooly arms. Snow dragged against her shins as Jean approached them, lifted Chari’s rifle, and slung it over her own shoulder—to lighten Flynn’s load, and keep the cold steel from bouncing against Chari’s skin.
“Like the lady said,” Jean echoed Rousow’s advice, “we gotta get shelter fast.”
“We should go straight ahead,” Chari shivered, her toes curling from the cold.
“Why? You see somethin’?”
“N-no, but look,” Chari glanced back, up where they came from and down to where they’d landed. “Where the portal faces, wh-where we’re facing now. S-somebody did, o-once.”
Jean wondered a bit just what that might mean. Hardly seemed a guarantee, when some god or whatever could have just swung by to sightsee. Flynn offered no disagreement, so the next passageway was probably in that direction anyway. If it was between moving on, or sticking around long enough to get hypothermia …
Jean started walking with a resigned, “Whatever ya say.”
*
The wind fought them. The earth fought them. Broad though the pathways were, three pairs of legs moved nearly single file. The snow curved at the sides, and they knew the ways were not flat. Even so, the gales yanked them capriciously, while the icy stone below could quickly turn as treacherous. Though she kept steady as she could, the white web before them was numbing, and Jean felt her senses slip, if only for a moment.
“Jeannie! Snap awake, Jeannie!”
Jean had nearly walked right off the side. Mack was holding her by the hand, and she dangled off the path’s edge. Solid ground was over a mile below, all rock but for the snow piles that had formed throughout.
The fall would kill her for certain, and the adrenaline woke Jean up, for a time. Yet the trek went on longer still—over an hour with little progress. Distantly something shimmered, straddling the massive gap between roads.
“Shiny,” Jean uttered dumbly.
On they marched, desperately hoping that it meant refuge. The path dipped and the snow rose, almost up to their waists. Jean’s head hurt, and her ears and nose were numb with her cheeks not far behind.
“Mack,” she grabbed him by the shoulder. “Do I look okay?”
Mack scrunched his face, not ready to lie. “Yer lookin’ a little blue.”
His warm hand touched her cheek and she wanted to hug it close forever. She’d stopped thinking about why he was warm when he shouldn’t be. Cruelly, he pulled away as they caught up with Flynn and the near-comatose Chari. Fed up, Jean paced to the front before they could cross onto the next bridge, blocking them from passing.
“Back it up, all of ya.” She rolled up her sleeves. A good jostle should be enough to clear the walk, she figured. She found the earth below, the surrounding snow doing no favors to her already numb digits. The tension in her swollen forearms built and the pulse fired through—the place shook; the stone creaked. The topmost layers did fall, sloughing off as though from the back of a wet animal. There was still too much in her way. It wasn’t enough. Frustrated, she pulsed harder.
“Jean!” Flynn yelled, his voice hoarse, “Ease up.”
The stone beneath her buckled. Much of the snow fell away as the massive chord bowed, broken loose on her side. Instinctively backing up, she crashed into Mack and they both bowled over. The bridge ahead cracked and dipped but did not drop all the way, slipping a few feet lower and hanging inclined.
Good enough.
Jean was ready to climb down and check things out, but Flynn grabbed her shoulder. Too exhausted to argue, he only shook his head. It was enough to make her stop. Embittered, she muttered “Pussy,” before turning her back to him and heading for the long way around. Their optimum path was no longer an option, and she knew she had just kept them in the cold a while longer.
She clenched her hands inside her jacket pockets as the cold seeped through her boots, numbing her toes. Her exposed skin felt raw from the hike, hot as the frost bit at her. Nothing she wore was enough for a journey like this, and the only mercy came when the blizzard eased.
Eventually they reached their destination: a domed plate, like glass, installed in a gap of the stone net blanketing Oma. As they drew closer, they saw that there were several plates like it. Reiterating for miles, they shielded a faded city far below. The glass was thick and fogged, but they could see no fires below, nor any other sign of life. Jean didn’t really care; shelter was more important than making new friends. She cursed Airia for dumping them in this arctic chill.
“Oooh, shortcut!” Mack jumped onto the plate before them.
“Mack, wait!” Jean stumbled, trying to catch him before he went too far, lest the glass break beneath him. Too slow, too late, she fell forward atop him. While Mack wobbled, Jean slipped and slid, down into the space between the snow-covered ground and the glass. Mack finally lost his footing and fell b
ackward a moment later, landing headfirst next to her. The back of her pants was soaked. Whatever the glass was made of, it didn’t seem to chill easily. The snow upon it had melted, leaving a thin layer of water too slippery to cross.
Flynn reached in and pulled her back to standing, and she helped Mack in turn.
“There should be a way in somewhere around here,” Flynn reasoned. “They’d have had to be able to get people up here to install these plates and maintain them.”
“That’d be nice,” Chari said sleepily, through chattering teeth.
Jean’s sodden pants made the cascading winds even colder. Shivering obscenities, she slid her jacket off and wrapped it around her waist. The cold metal spikes pressed against her flesh and her chest froze, but her shirt was at least dry and she had coverage where she needed it. While the others trembled or slowed from the winds, she flipped off the sky and marched on.
Amidst the field of domes and bridged earth, they might have missed their way entirely had Flynn’s shuffling foot not caught on something. He tripped, crashing into the snow with Chari on his back. She cried out, startled more by the impact than the torrent of snow melting into the poorly insulated fabric of her garments.
“F-Flynn … get up,” Chari said, crawling in under him to help get him standing. He tried to rise, but dull from the march, had to stop midway and wait for his strength to return.
“Sh-shit,” Jean dropped, brought down by the cold before she could find the strength to help her friends. She placed her hands on the ground once more, ready to take a chance and blow the snow around her away. What she found below was not earth but metal, and the vibrations she felt told that it was thin, and the space below was empty.
“Mack!”
After kicking the snow away, Jean found the handle and pulled, even before Flynn could pick up Chari and clear her off the hatchway. Either frozen or jammed, it resisted even when Mack joined in, the skin of their palms sticking to the cold grip.
Outcasts of the Worlds Page 22
