Morn, Sir of Febla: 33 Xiven

The brighter the mushrooms glowed, the more Orinel and Irinel bathed Urbana’s crying citizens in their pale light, the more the tension between Kayin, Dhekk, and Karsarath grew taut like a string instrument. Other than silent gestures and nods, they didn’t speak a word to one another. Kayin figured the between the physical pain from helping others and the exhaustion, it was better they never said a word in the first place.

The city suffered about two dozen injuries, and four additional deaths Kayin didn’t directly witness as a result of the panic and the initial attack of the peka clan. Every able-bodied person helped restore broken windows and patch up hurt children, with the aid of their Cigam or not. Flashes of light, proof of Cigam’s presence, lit the twilight brighter than any stars.

Kayin and Karsarath, without any special abilities to help in many other means, dedicated themselves to gathering the dead citizens and placing them onto the designated carts for them to be transported to the morgue.

The light of Harash dimmed, but still no one spoke above a murmur.

Someone walked along the main road with their hand out, and with little more than a quick gesture, the tops of specific wooden posts burst into a steady flame. Public city lights, Kayin realized with wide eyes. Tall torches to aid in nighttime visibility. That was a genius idea.

With more light to work, the city continued trying to repair what they had lost. Kayin opted to help Karsarath pull the peka carcasses into the main road, then hoisted them onto wooden slats for easier transport, or in this case, two of the carcasses onto a wagon. It groaned under the weight when Kayin finally hoisted the last leg up.

Even when the horses tied to the front began to move, they struggled with their quarry. The wooden wheels were pressed into the dirt and needed even more effort to be pulled to move. Kayin and Karsarath had to push from behind to jostle it out of its pit.

“Come on,” Dhekk urged once the cart wheeled away. “We have a job to do.”

Kayin wiped a line of sweat from his brow. Karsarath huffed out a sigh of exhaustion; he watched Dhekk carefully, as if expecting him to explode or—like promised, try to kill him. Dhekk didn’t look at him, though.

“Where have you been?” Kayin said through his panting. If it weren’t for the somber people asking for help, he would have collapsed to go to sleep long ago.

“Building rapport. Come on.” Dhekk waved his hand, then without looking at him, gestured to Karsarath. “You too. Grab the backpack.” Kayin opted to let Karsarath take care of that; his biceps still twitched from overexertion and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to physically grab anything anymore. And with the promise of even more work….

Dhekk led them back to the main stone road near the center of town, where buildings looked haphazard and squished. They paused in front of a scrappy, two story building made of wood with metal bars over the smashed windows, metal bars freshly-installed by, Kayin guessed, Dhekk; the door was open, light pouring out with the somber tune of a lone flute.

If he could spare the energy, Kayin knew his heart would jump out of his chest.

“We’re going in a tavern,” he recognized.a “Like a real tavern.”

“You haven’t…?” Karsarath went to ask a question, but let it die in his throat. He knew Kayin’s life story; he knew places like taverns and bars and restaurants were nothing but fantasies in places like Yatora.

Dhekk gestured to the open door. “In exchange for a bit of coin and a room tonight, we’ll be slicing peka. Come on.”

“Never cut peka before,” Kayin muttered as he followed the other two inside.

Turn, Sir of Febla: 33 Xiven

Was it really just a week ago that Kayin woke up in a cot, similar to this, staring at a stone ceiling of a prison cell? As he lay there, listening to the soft, rhythmic breathing of Karsarath in the bed beside him, Kayin frowned.

This was whiplash. Losing everything so suddenly, being thrust into this life where he slept on the forest floor more often than a bed, where his grumpy and cryptic companion was meant to mentor him into being able to handle facing off against the world’s evil emperor. If Kayin had, in fact, woken up and stared at his prison bars, he’d merely sigh and chalk it up to a long, tiring dream.

But his knee still stung from the scrape he got falling to it during his fight against a peka yesterday. The scratchy, wool blanket of the first ever tavern he’d slept in felt awful against his skin, but it was the only source of warmth here.

When Kayin sat up, he groaned at his muscles. His arms screamed, his hamstrings locked up. This was awful. Fighting and running was one thing, but the amount of physical work he did after to help everyone as best he could—back muscles he didn’t know existed ached.

“You ready?” came Dhekk’s quiet voice from the other side of the room. He sat on his own cot, tying up his boots. Kayin blinked at him, slowly, as if emphasizing how ready he wasn’t. Dhekk smirked at this.

“Are you going to tell me what you meant to yesterday?” whispered Kayin. “About what you said to the council, about the attack?” According to Dhekk’s expression, he must have genuinely forgot about that. The man tied his final knot and let out a strained sigh.

“Tidesa got the timing a little wrong, is all. Or we were too fast. The raid was supposed to happen before we got there.” Now that he thought of it, having Karsarath as their guide did shave off several hours of their travel time.

“It’s good we were here sooner,” Kayin said, his voice a little louder. “We helped people.” The thought of just showing up after, exploiting their grief—

Dhekk shrugged. “I don’t know if that’s going to help us if we’re seen all buddy-buddy with someone the Speaker of the Council blames for his kid’s death.”

“Seriously?” came a grumble from Karsarath’s cot. The man rose immediately. His hair stuck to his face, in the indentations from his pillow. His eye bags were even worse than Kayin’s. “That wasn’t my fault. I tried to help her.” As he wiped at his face, tried to tame his hair, Dhekk leaned forward, resting on his knees.

“So what’s this curse, then?” he challenged.

Kayin started to rub at his muscles, willing them to unlock from the night of stillness. Instead of engaging in their stupid argument, he got to his feet, pulled his shoes on, and began to tie them.

“I don’t have Cigam,” Karsarath said flatly.

Dhekk hummed. “And your family?”

“My mom gave up her Cigam—”

“I’m talking about fifteen years ago or so. What happened? Why did your sister leave?” His tone wasn’t exactly unfriendly, but it wasn’t one Kayin would appreciate if he was the one being interrogated, either.

Karsarath spoke through his teeth, “My Cigam didn’t present itself, my mom died, and my sister moved. My dad was already dead, so it was just me. So I lied about my Cigam and managed to get away with it until now.” Now, when he lost his sister, his niece he only met after her birth. Kayin ducked his head; he shouldn’t have, but he half expected Dhekk to apologize.

Instead, Dhekk said, “Was that such a hard explanation?”

“You’re impossible.” In a huff, Karsarath cast off his blankets and got to his feet. He shifted unevenly, clearly suffering from the same pain Kayin did. He didn’t groan or grumble in pain, just clenched his jaw and grabbed his shoes from under his cot.

Kayin cleared his throat. “I’m sorry about your family,” he murmured. “What, um, what did your parents die of?” It wasn’t his business, but he hoped maybe it would bring him to talk about them, maybe reminisce and be able to release a little of his grief.

“Themselves,” was Karsarath’s sharp reply. “I’m going to go find work to do while you figure out whether or not I ruined your plans.” Without his shoes tied, Karsarath grabbed his backpack and left the room.

Kayin sighed and cast a deep frown at Dhekk.

“I don’t even know what that means. You could have been nicer.”

Now, though, Dhekk stared at Kayin with—was that pity? The man chewed on the inside of his lip as he thought about what was said.

“Rumor has it, when you give up your Cigam, you’re giving up a part of yourself. Your will to live. Your passion.” He rose, then grabbed for his longsword leaning under the closed window to put it on. “They killed themselves, Kayin.”

Sore, sad—overall, the walk with Dhekk to the center of town was quite miserable.

Kayin’s feet screamed for more rest, and when they emerged into Urbana’s streets, it was too easy to see the pain that remained for everyone else here, too. As they walked along the main street, someone had placed bushels of flowers in one particular spot at the junction of another road. Another person added a single flower to it, wiped their tears away, and walked on. As Kayin and Dhekk passed by the crossroads, Kayin noticed a few deeply imprinted wagon marks and foot prints around the flowers. Was this the spot someone died? One of the victims of the mob attempting to escape?

His chest ached at the thought of everything that had happened. How many people lost their lives in just a week? Was it always like this? If there wasn’t a war, running people out of their homes and killing them in cold blood, was it peka raids? Freak accidents? Falling ladders, runaway wagons—suicide?

When Dhekk and Kayin reached the council building, a tall, red-haired man stood at the door with a notebook and pen in hand, and addressed them with thin lips.

“The wait is about two hours, with meetings being restricted to twenty minutes each. Would you like to put down your name and come back in about an hour and a half?” the person asked. Kayin stared, wide-eyed.

“This wasn’t the case yesterday,” he blurted.

The scribe scowled, looking down at him with a set of thick spectacles. “There wasn’t a hundred people in mourning yesterday.”

“R-right, I’m sorry.” Kayin folded his arms in front of his chest in an attempt to look a little smaller while Dhekk put his name down on the list.

“We’ll be back later,” he said through a sigh. “Guess while we wait, we’re fixing…that.” Dhekk gestured to Kayin broadly.

“Huh?” Kayin glanced down. Aside from some faint blood splatter, he looked fine. “These are your clothes.”

“Those stopped being my clothes when you sweat all over them.”

Utterly ridiculous.

The shopping trip, though, was necessary. Kayin had never actually been shopping before, so he just remained quiet and followed Dhekk around. There were whole rooms full of multiples of the same clothes in some stores, and in others, just stuffed mannequins modeling different fashions. Kayin supposed that the rest of the sizes were somewhere else, not displayed out for people to easily grab like other stores.

“We have a little extra spending money,” Dhekk said, more to himself. “Might as well get something that will last.” This thought led them to one of the stores that only had one copy of everything: a sort of clothier that specialized in sturdy farm wear. Or, it seemed, fashionable tournament getup. As they passed by one option of a long-sleeved shirt with reinforced leather joints, Kayin recognized it as the one Karsarath wore. Maybe being a trainer paid well. This store had less patrons, distinctly lacked the stench of sweaty commoners, and by at least what Kayin could see, stocked higher quality clothing.

“We’ll need a custom fitting,” Dhekk said once they walked up to a counter in the back. The shop smelled of the oil the elderly woman used to rub into the counter as she waited for them to approach, a tangy sort of mixture.

“Certainly,” she said without looking up. “Bring up your selection. Fittings are an additional twenty to the price on the label.” Dhekk physically recoiled at that mention, then turned to look at Kayin.

“You’re done growing, right?” he asked. Kayin gave a weak nod, though he wasn’t all that sure. “Convincing.”

“Um, Dhekk,” he said as they walked to the center of the store, “is that a lot of money? Do we have that?”

Dhekk shrugged, unbothered. “Don’t have use for buying much else. It’s fine.” So it was a lot, for just one set of clothes.

“When I was in Wakino, and they assumed I was, um, a slave, I said I was worth five wads. What’s a wad?”

Dhekk actually looked at him, smirking. He seemed almost impressed, but with how he laughed, it didn’t quite feel like a compliment.

“A coin-bag that can hold around two hundred coins. You think you’re worth a thousand coins?”

Kayin shrugged. “Oh. I just said five. They assumed.” So that was a lot, then, right? “So that’s a lot of money? I’m worth a lot of money?” Dhekk just shook his head and chuckled, and let the conversation drop in favor of looking at the various options around the store.

The one he hesitated at wasn’t dissimilar to Karsarath’s. First, a thick, woolen sort of fabric, long-sleeved. On the elbows and shoulders, the fabric seemed padded. Upon touching the fabric, Dhekk nodded with approval.

“Leather is sewn inside a pocket. Replaceable. Look.” He flipped the shoulder seam to show Kayin another lining of wool with the yarn knotted in a different direction; the smallest edge of a piece of leather poked out the side. “Protection on the inside, discretion on the outside.” That was kind of ingenious, Kayin thought. Less layers than what Dhekk had to wear. He was sure it was a pain to wear clothes, then leather, then more clothes on top just to hide the armor. And if Kayin had clothes like this yesterday, his knee wouldn’t have been scraped so badly.

“We’ll take this,” Dhekk announced when they approached the counter. The woman discarded her oil rag and glanced between him and Kayin.

“Alright, go on around the corner, put it on, and I’ll size it.”

Kayin hesitated.

“H-how long would that take?” he asked, grabbing the set from Dhekk. He wasn’t certain they were going to be here for that much longer, and they couldn’t very well wait on altering for a set of clothes. The woman blew a raspberry.

“Minutes, tops. If you’re the one trying it on, looks like it’s just a matter of taking fabric away. That’ll be a quick fix.” Right, Cigam. The extra ability everyone here had. With a nervous smile, Kayin nodded, grabbed the garments, and rounded the corner of the back to find a place to change.

They had run into Karsarath at another shop after Kayin had changed into his new clothes, coincidentally. Their new ally sat on a stool in the alleyway, using a whetstone against a few butcher knives. He glanced up to Kayin and Dhekk expectantly, but with nothing to report, Kayin just let him know they’d stop by on their way back to give him an update.

Dhekk and Kayin showed up on time, when they were expected. Still, they stood beside the closed doors of the inverted amphitheater beside a grumpy scribe who kept writing down names to more people that approached, giving longer and longer wait time estimates and turning them away.

When it was their turn and the scribe shut the doors to the council building behind them, Dhekk frowned at Kayin.

“What?” he asked as they made their way down the stairs. These new pants made it a little difficult to walk as easily as the last set did, but it was worth the reinforcements in the knees, ankles, and thighs.

“I don’t think things will be going the way we want them to,” said Dhekk as he gestured to the line of nine people sitting at the long table on the stage. Tempur was missing. He, of everyone, sounded like their biggest ally yesterday.

“Oh.”

When they approached the council, they remained silent for a good moment. With the obvious empty seat in the middle, it got a little more unclear as to what to do. Were they supposed to speak first, or were they supposed to be addressed? Was it different because Tempur wasn’t there, or because they had been seen before? But standing in front of the sea of gray cloaks grew even more uncomfortable than working in silence with Karsarath last night.

The woman at the end of the table, Constance, stood, her eyes tired and red.

“Your request has been denied,” was all she said before she sat back down again.

“What—” Kayin blurted, but Dhekk shot out a hand to stop him.

With a tense breath, he asked, “You will remain exactly as you are, here?” Kayin watched him look to every council member. None of them looked up from the table.

“Yes,” Constance said. “Yesterday was a clear warning.”

“We had a deal.” Dhekk’s voice, while calm, had an edge to it. “Does the Council break all its promises?” He had more to say, but Constance raised a hand at him.

“You had a deal with Tempur. Tempur is away, grieving his daughter. His daughter was lost to us in the sudden attack that happened, right after your arrival, you see.” Kayin felt his heart drop to the floor. It made him feel dizzy, lightheaded, after descending all of those stairs.

“We had nothing to do with that,” Kayin said breathlessly. Dhekk didn’t try to stop him from speaking this time. “We helped! We were faster than your own guards, took down three by ourselves—”

“If you’d like your identities to remain as we currently know them,” Constance interrupted, “which is that we currently do not, our conversations remain as random, cautionary, and improbable hypothetical imaginings.” That silenced him. Kayin and Dhekk exchanged frowns before Dhekk took a step forward.

“It is never too late to escape from under the thumb of Emperor Xiven. When the time comes, that is when you will truly make your choice.” With such a bold and brazen statement to chew on, the Council of Urbana physically withdrew from them at their table.

“Leave,” was the last thing Constance said before she pointed to the doors.

Dhekk and Kayin twisted around in unison to walk up the stairs, throats too tight to utter a single word. The council kept their silence the entire time they walked, until they went through the doors and let in the next person—an elderly man white-knuckling a hat and using it as a handkerchief to dry his tears.

“Um,” started Kayin tensely.

“Quiet.” Dhekk nudged him to move forward, but it was clear to Kayin that he had his head on a swivel, watching the metal-clad guards from yesterday. He sucked his teeth before saying, “Ah. Yeah, we need to leave.”

“What—?”

“They just called in the guards. We’re not welcome here, now.”

Out of the corner of Kayin’s eye, reflective metal armor shifted from standing in the shade of a building, to heading toward the double-doors from which they just exited.

“Are we going to be arrested?” Kayin asked.

“Not if we don’t cause trouble. We’re just going to leave. We’re done shopping.”

“And Karsarath—”

“It’s his fault they even blame us in the first place,” Dhekk spat.

“No, the timing was wrong. Karsarath helped. He helped me.” Kayin gestured to himself. “And even though you don’t care about anything or anyone, I know you need me alive, at least. So that should count for something. He’s coming with us.”

Dhekk grit his teeth as the only indication that he heard what Kayin said. When it came time to walk down either the main road to leave, or the one to head back to the markets, he hesitated, and Kayin took the opportunity to lead the way back to the butcher Karsarath served for now.

Thankfully, Karsarath was perceptive. Before they’d even approached him, he saw them, and exchanged the knives he’d sharpened for coins and met them part way.

“I take it from your entourage that we’re leaving?” he asked, gesturing behind Kayin and Dhekk. Kayin nodded. He didn’t even notice they were being followed.

“Pop quiz,” said Dhekk through a heavy sigh as they turned to make their way to the exit. “How many have been following us since we left, and how many have joined throughout our walk here?”

“Looks like two were just recruited to join when you turned onto this street,” Karsarath said, shrugging as he looked over his shoulder.

“I wasn’t asking you.” Expectantly, Dhekk turned to Kayin and stared.

Well, it wasn’t like they had very good luck today, anyway. So with nothing much left to lose, Kayin shrugged and admitted, “I didn’t know we were being followed.” At least the flabbergasted look on Dhekk’s face was a little entertaining.