by Mark Albany
I moved back into the ruins alongside Braire. It wasn’t something I would have thought about. While it seemed like a good idea, I didn’t know enough about the implications to be able to judge if it really was or not. I did know we could all use some rest, and if Cyron was going to be licking his wounds, we needed to do the same.
As we reached our little camp again, I realized that Aliana and Norel were curled up together, both fast asleep. Aliana had eaten something but had apparently been too tired to finish it. I quickly knelt beside them, wrapping the bread and cheese up in the waxed cloth to preserve them. That done, I moved over to the other side of the camp, sitting down next to Braire.
“What’s the matter?” she asked, her voice soft and probing.
I looked over at her, wondering for a moment how she knew there was something on my mind.
“This bond we have,” Braire explained, anticipating my question. “It is not something I can explain. Human emotions are different from what I’m used to feeling, but after some time spent processing them, I can see that they come from a similar place as mine. And I realized there is something bothering you. I cannot promise to be the most sympathetic ear, but if you need to talk, I can try.”
I nodded. I wasn’t sure that anything I could say would help me process what I felt roiling just under the surface of my consciousness, but if something could help, why not try it?
“I was stuck in a moment of time with Cyron,” I said, my voice soft. “A bubble in time that allowed him to speak to me. He was trying to get me to turn to his side. I think he wanted it to happen in a way that would allow me to be his man without any of you finding out.”
“When was this?” Braire asked, leaning closer.
“A second before that massive explosion,” I replied. “He offered me riches and all kinds of power, and when he realized I wouldn’t be swayed, he offered me the power to bring the dead back to life. And he…he showed me my parents. I hadn’t seen them since I was very young, and I’d almost forgotten what they looked like. Seeing them again…”
I clenched my teeth, feeling hot tears rising in my eyes. I struggled to keep them contained. If there was anyone I didn’t want to seem weak in front of, it was Braire. I didn’t want her thinking that I had no control over my emotions, not after spending a day in battle proving her wrong.
I took a deep, shaky breath, brushing my hands roughly over my face, wiping at the few tears that escaped.
“Seeing them again made you wonder if you made the right choice?” Braire said.
I nodded. “When I refused, it turned out that they were some kind of evil spirits that had only taken the form of my parents, but there was a moment where I wanted to do it. I wanted to take his offer. Family has always been an important concept to me, something I lost as a child and wasn’t ever likely to have again. For a moment, I considered betraying you.”
Braire nodded, wrapping her arm around my shoulder and pulling me closer to her. It was a tender gesture, and one that she didn’t seem quite used to making.
“Thoughts occur to us all, Grant,” she whispered, and ran her fingers down the side of my face. “Impulses, wants, and needs all spring to mind regardless of what we might really feel or want. What matters, in the end, is how we act. You picked us over the thought of having your family back, Grant. That is the kind of sacrifice I don’t think I could ever make.”
I looked at her. “You don’t trust me less for having thought about betraying you?”
Braire shrugged, still stroking my hair. “No, but then, I never trusted you that much to begin with. Get some sleep, Grant. You’ll feel better in the morning.”
I nodded. We both laid down opposite Aliana and Norel, Braire settling down in front of me and pulling my arms around her. From the way her breathing changed, I could tell she had quickly drifted off.
Sleep didn’t come quite so easily for me.
12
I looked over the landscape and watched as morning dawned. Well, as it should have dawned, anyway. The sun was hidden behind a heavy layer of clouds, giving the everything a dense appearance, like it was caught in some kind of fragile twilight.
My sleep had been filled with dreams of my parents and the monsters they had turned into before my eyes. I had read enough history to know that there were a lot of people who were considered to be heroes until one looked deeper into their lives and saw that the mighty appearance they were remembered for was supported by lies and propaganda, a foundation that only stood because people needed heroes and didn’t much care where they came from. I was remembering my parents through the rose tint of nostalgia, and had almost thrown everything away for people who only existed as an idealized memory.
Just as the sun began to rise, turning the sky from black to grey, I heard the sound of rain starting to come down over the forest. A droning drizzle that made me feel sleepy and unwilling to move from the spot where I was wrapped in a blanket, trying to get control of my thoughts. The world was changing a bit too quickly for my taste, but I couldn’t help the feeling that everything I was doing here was making it worse. Or maybe it was better. I wasn’t quite sure.
I heard footsteps coming from behind me and I looked up to see Aliana moving toward me. She looked like her sleep had been deep and long, and as if she hadn’t quite fully woken up yet. I smiled as she sat beside me, wrapping her wing around my shoulders as she leaned closer to me, kissing my neck before laying her head on my chest.
“Sleep well?” I asked.
She smiled and nodded. “It was the kind of sleep I needed, I think. Just something dreamless and deep to help with recovering the power we used. It isn’t the most efficient way of helping us get our power back, but it is still satisfying.”
I smiled, reaching down to gently stroke her hair, letting my fingers toy with the base of her horns.
“You didn’t sleep well, though, did you?” she asked, looking up into my eyes.
“Yesterday was difficult,” I said. I’d told Braire about the why of it, and while it had given my feelings an outlet and had helped, it didn’t change the fact that I was still feeling guilty about what I’d thought about doing.
Aliana nodded. My bond with her was the strongest of the three sisters. I had been with her the longest, and she was the one who had stood by me through all of it. Out of anyone, hers was the one whose opinion I respected the most, the one I didn’t want to know about my moment of weakness.
She didn’t press me to talk. She knew something was wrong and that I didn’t care to share it at the moment, so she wouldn’t ask me until I was ready. I smiled, leaning down to kiss the crown of her head, nuzzling her gently as I leaned into her.
“It’s going to be a long day,” she murmured, tilting her head up to press her lips against mine for a moment before pulling herself to her feet. She offered me a hand to help me up, which I took after a moment of hesitation. As much as I was dreading facing the day again didn’t make the fact that I had to do it any less true. I took her hand and let her help me to my feet, groaning as I felt the bruises and aches from the day before hitting me harshly.
I put on a brave face, though, smiling and quickly gaining my balance as I looked around. Norel and Braire were both up, and with a quick spell, they started a fire to warm the area. Even at the tail end of summer, rain had a way of making everything seem cold and forbidding. A small fire was enough to make the whole situation a little better.
I moved back to our campfire, taking the time to eat some food. I wasn’t feeling particularly hungry but I needed to keep my strength up. My power needed to be working at full capacity. Norel told me once that leaving the power well inside me empty for too long would only result in an odd form of atrophy. I had no idea how connected it was to how muscles reacted when they weren’t used, but I had to imagine it was similar. My power was just an extension of who I was.
I looked up, seeing Gahar stepping into our little camp with a group of the other nobles that had been part of the fighting. T
hey looked like their night had gone about as well as mine had. They were human, and while they had seen war and battle before, they had never faced something quite as dangerous as the threat Cyron posed. It wasn’t difficult to realize that they were going to have some bad dreams, too. I gritted my teeth, seeing a very familiar haunted look in their eyes, quickly averting mine and avoiding looking at them. I didn’t need more reminders of what I had been dealing with all night. I had enough already.
I looked at the man, seeing the way Gahar was looking down at Norel, Aliana and Braire, almost ignoring me completely. There was a part of him that distrusted them, but he also knew he had to trust these women if he wanted to regain everything he’d lost in the battle that came before.
Or maybe I was just seeing things.
“The city is secured, my ladies,” Gahar said in a firm voice. “Our soldiers are currently in the process of consolidating the capital to make sure Cyron has no foothold, but the question remains of what we should be doing in preparation for when he returns. There is no question that he will return, and we must be prepared. Lancers who survived the battles are joining our ranks and helping train the civilians, and more than a few mages were sprung from the dungeons Cyron had locked them into. Our forces are being bolstered, but there is still much to do before we can stand against anyone of Cyron’s power.”
“We would be wise not to forget that Abarat is among Cyron’s allies as well,” Aliana said.
The three sisters got to their feet, and I followed their example.
“We need to speak with what remains of the gentry,” Norel said, in the voice I recognized as the one she used when she was taking control of a situation. “No decision can be made without every member of the gentry having their say. It’s their home, after all, as well as ours.”
I didn’t want to come off as contrary, but there were others who’d had their homes destroyed in the attack. They were trying to rebuild the city while the gentry were out here, making decisions. I was a little biased, of course. I refrained from saying anything as we moved out of the ruins.
The rain had been coming in a steady, drizzling stream and showed no signs of stopping. We moved quickly through it to reach the massive tents that had been set up for the men and their entourages to spend the night.
The rest of the members of the gentry were already assembled, telling me that Gahar might have maneuvered us to speak with them, but as I looked around at the three sisters, they didn’t look overly concerned and our bonded connection didn’t tell me anything different. They could have been hiding something from me, but at this point, what would be the difference?
“Setting up the city’s defenses is paramount!” one of the lords was yelling, turning red in the face as he hammered his fists on a nearby table. “Whether or not the city is made viable again is irrelevant until the threat brought on by Cyron and his goons is put to rest.”
“The people need to survive, regardless,” one of the others retorted. “There would be no point in setting up defenses only to have the people you claim to defend dying of disease and hunger. The reconstruction of the city needs to be the priority for both manpower and resources and building the defenses remain a secondary concern.”
I looked around, unsure which side to choose. If these people died of starvation and sickness, would that make their deaths any more meaningful than if they’d died at Cyron’s hand? I tilted my head as I watched Aliana, Norel and Braire take quick council, speaking quietly and in elvish so they wouldn’t be understood, before turning back to the council assembled in front of them.
“The people need to be sustained,” Norel said, her voice decisive and bringing silence to all the men assembled. “What is the point of walls if there are none to man them? There are resources and men aplenty for both tasks, and I say there should be a focus on providing food and shelter for those who put their lives at risk to retake the capital city. Building walls and defenses can be remanded to those men who are not required for the rest of the effort, since the city provides them with the resources they need. If there are any who disagree with that, they may voice their dissent now.”
I looked around, feeling the tension in the air and resisting the urge to reach for my blade as I watched a handful of the nobles contesting Norel’s words. I was surprised to find that none of them were doing it on the grounds of Norel’s heritage and elven features, but in fact because they thought the time would come for them to rebuild. Any losses sustained during this time of waiting would be negligible compared to the loss of life that would come should Cyron attack when they weren’t ready to mount a defense.
But in the end, they found themselves quickly coming to terms with the fact that morale was the greater issue here. Death by sickness and starvation would have a heavy toll on how well the assembled men would fight, regardless of how well the defenses were mounted.
The arguing quickly turned to which resources would be allocated for the building of housing for the civilians that had joined the ranks. These were men and women that had never touched a weapon in anger in their lives, and while they lacked the skill and effectiveness of the trained soldiers, they required just as much food and space.
Decisions were quickly reached, and messengers dispatched back to the city with orders to be laid out as location was reached. Over the length of the morning, I found myself being pushed to the sideline. I truly had no experience when it came to the logistics of commanding an army. While I had read a great deal about famous battles in history and the various problems the generals, leaders, and kings had faced when the time came to actually move their troops from place to place, my attention had quickly been drawn toward the grandeur and history of the engagements themselves. I had little to add to this conversation. After a few hours of remaining idle and silent in the corner of the tent, I went outside. The rain hadn’t changed much. It wasn’t more than a light drizzle, but the constancy made it rather miserable.
As I reached the ruins, I saw Braire stepping out of the rain as well, cursing softly as she shook the water from her hair.
“Is everything all right?” she asked, coming closer. “You seem a bit down, even after last night.”
“Last night was… Well, I’m still coming to terms with it,” I replied, forcing a smile to my lips.
“Why did you leave?” Braire asked.
“I’m young and inexperienced,” I replied as honestly as I could. “I don’t know much about fighting battles other than what I can bring to them with my sword and power. While there is a lot to be learned in that tent, I thought I might be better placed by preparing for the role I will play when the fighting starts. Meditate, train, and be more useful than someone who is learning at the feet of masters.”
Braire smirked as she came closer. “Not a lot of people would be willing to admit that they are unsuited for command. Young humans are usually arrogant to the point of difficulty.”
“I’m glad I break that conception,” I replied with a soft chuckle. “Why did you leave the tent?”
“I was worried about you,” Braire replied. “It’s not that I think you aren’t strong enough, but…”
“You don’t think I’m strong enough,” I completed her statement after her voice trailed off. “And while I don’t appreciate the thought, I do appreciate that you wanted to help.”
I closed the gap between us and wrapped my arms around her in a tight, if short, hug. I felt her stiffen in my grasp but after a moment, she relented and grudgingly wrapped her arms around me, giving me a quick squeeze before pushing me away.
“Stay strong, Grant,” she said softly. “And work hard on your training.”
“I was going to do that anyway,” I said with a cheeky smirk before moving deeper into the ruins. I could hear her heading back out to the tent, since she did know a thing or two about how armies should be run. I sat next to our fire, which was fading into embers, and closed my eyes, bringing myself into a state of mind that allowed me to meditate without wandering int
o the various emotions that had been tearing into me all day and night.
The time to handle those would come later.
13
It was late in the afternoon before the council drew to a close. The tent was pulled down as the various members of the gentry quickly mounted up, having their own tasks to attend to before the sun started to set. The rain had come to a halt a few hours prior but the clouds remained. The steady drizzle had left the ground wet and difficult to navigate with large numbers, delaying their departure for a few long hours. The sun was already setting, just barely visible as the rainclouds started to part, giving us a hopeful view of the colorful yellows, reds and oranges that were gratefully accepted after a long day of drab grey.
After spending another night in the ruins, the four of us decided that our time in this place had come to an end. We weren’t hiding anymore. We needed to be seen, we needed to be part of the effort to defend the city—and damned if we were going to do it from beyond the defenses. Thanks to the rain there was a lot of mud, which meant we were either going to have to portal into the city each time we wanted to join them, or trek through the tough terrain to get there on foot.
Aliana wanted to make sure she was holding as much power as possible in reserve for the actual fighting, which meant we needed relocate to expend as little time and energy rejoining the people we would be fighting alongside when the time came.
As morning dawned, we gathered our supplies and Aliana opened a portal into the city.
The first thing I noticed as we stepped inside was the changes the city had undergone over the day and a half since I had last been there. The widespread destruction was something that had stuck with me during my time away. As we returned, however, I saw that much had changed. The work of thousands of people trying to rebuild their homes after the attack was truly impressive.
While most of the buildings in the outer reaches of the city remained in a state of desolation that was indeed worsened when their resources were plundered, the inner city that had been retaken soldiers had been rebuilt impressively. The signs of destruction were still there, though, and it would probably be years before all the remaining scars were fully washed away.
