Chapel Orahamm's Blog, page 13

Life of a Librarian: Ch 6

I found myself in a small four-foot by four-foot by six-foot box of a room when I finally woke up.  I guess they figured that by confining me to a small enough area that I wouldn’t be stupid enough to invoke anything that would take up too much space.

“You are awake, Ms. Oppenheimer?” a male voice grated over the static-laden speaker in the ceiling of the room.

“And hungry,” I grouched.  My stomach was pinching.  I had blacked out for who knows how long.  I needed to stop making that a habit.

“Well, you’re going to have to deal with that for a little while longer,” the voice buzzed.  The electronics crackled and snapped.  Maybe they were trying to torture my ear drums.  If it was on purpose, they were doing a pretty good job of it.

“So, what’s a Shifter?” I asked the speaker.

“Something exceedingly rare, Ms. Oppenheimer.  In your case, we’ve never seen it,” was the reply provided me.

“Have I gone insane?” I asked.  I was able to just barely find a comfortable way to sit down.

“You were not done Phasing when we tested you and accelerate your development.  You were complaining about being left in your last room for three days.  That was to allow your mind to finish Phasing before testing to see where you topped out.  You were not finished Phasing when we let you out,” the man answered.  At least they were being kind enough to actually talk to me about this.

“Is Claude okay?” I asked.

“Why do you ask?” the man asked, a bit of surprise in his voice.

“He was pretty nice to me, and I wasn’t really playing fair.  I might be locked in a little box at the moment and hating the fact that you’ve all done this to me, but that doesn’t mean I can’t still have, you know, morals,” I said.  I knew I was being a little underhanded in guilt-tripping, but hey, whatever was going to see me out of this box and into a food line.

“Yeah, he came out of it and is doing fine.  He’s taking a couple days off,” the static cracked.

“So, what do we do now?” I asked.

“We’re just trying to evaluate your psychological stance before letting you interact with anyone or anything,” he answered.  It occurred to me, while he was talking, that I could just recite an old nursery rhyme about a set of pigs having roast beef.  Bam, I had a plate of divine food in my hand.  Oh, god, that was the best meal I think I had ever had.  When you are starving, that first meal, whether it be flour paste or caviar, is always the one that you will remember best.

“I see you are capable of still Reading out what you need while in there,” the man noted.

“Am I not supposed to?” I asked, devouring the juicy, tender, savory meat like it was going out of style.

“Do you not have a headache?” the man asked, cryptically.

“Well, the static on your mic or this intercom really does suck.  You should see about getting a better electrician.  Other than that, I’m fairly used to having headaches when I haven’t eaten consistently.  Low blood sugar or something like that.  It’s an easy thing to fix as long as I can eat something,” I answered.  I was filling in blanks, though, that they probably had something going on to be giving me this headache.  It felt different than when I was low on food.  It wasn’t skull-splitting, but it sure was close to migraine level.

I heard a jingle at the door to my box of a cell.  It creaked open, and the light from outside was blinding.  I blinked up, feeling like a bat caught in high beams.

“I’m not really supposed to do this,” a male voice whispered.  I looked up to see a guard reaching a hand down to help me up.  I waved the plate of roast beef away, and it immediately disappeared.  I grabbed his hand and allowed the man to pull me to my feet.

 I followed him down the hall.  We walked for what felt like an hour until we hit a pair of doors labelled Reference Library.  He motioned me through the doors and locked them after I went through.  I dropped my head against the door. At least I wasn’t in the little box anymore.

I breathed out a frustrated sigh and decided to survey my new domain.  It looked like a massive legal library.  Tight, almost never opened binding reached far enough back that I couldn’t see the end walls in either direction.  I could be lost in here for the rest of my life and never find the exit.  I contemplated staying at the door, in case I really was placed here for that purpose.  My curiosity, though, got the better of me.  I wondered just how far the library could possibly reach and what kinds of books were on the shelves.  It was a reference library, after all.

I started out down the walkway, deciding not to delve too deep into the racks, always keeping near the wall that led back to the doors.  The shuffle of my socks on the carpet was all the noise of the tomb-like sanctuary until it was broken, three hundred rows in, by a scribbling, scratching sound.  I slowed, my adrenaline pumping.  For all I knew, they kept the minotaur in this labyrinth.  

“Jeb, is that you?  Can you go find me that book by Mintz on astral projection?  I want to see if it correlates with this one,” a familiar, male voice asked.  I peeked around the corner of the stack to find a plate of long platinum blond hair tied back with a brown rubber band.  A tight black shirt gripped hard muscle.  A pair of dark denim jeans bunched over bare feet.  A sword leaned against the table.  I quickly and silently Read out a pair of hand knives, all too ready to duke it out with the cotton candy clown of death all over again.

“Jeb?” Simil asked again, turning around.  Startled, he glanced at the knives in my hands before my face.  “Thaddeus?” He grabbed the sword hilt, blade flashing under florescent lights.  I stepped back, knowing that I could probably lose him in the stacks.  He unhanded his sword, and I eased my posture.

“What are you doing in here?” Simil hissed.  I wasn’t entirely sure if I really wanted to talk to him.  I wasn’t too thrilled to find out I had been left in here with him.

“A guard brought me here.” I let the knives vanish on a bid for neutrality.

“A guard?  No one was supposed to let you out of there,” Simil snapped.

“Well, he brought me here; not like I was trying to sneak out.” I leaned against the far stack, forcing Simil to turn around to look at me.

“You’re not going to flood the place or something, are you?” He stood.

“You’re not going to make it rain blueberries and teacups are you?” I crossed my arms over my chest to hide my need to pull my binder off my ribs and get some air in my lungs. I couldn’t remember how many days had passed since I’d been able to take a shower. The best I’d done in that locked cell was hand washing my undergarments and hoping they’d be dry in time for whatever was going to happen to me. I’d gone well past how long I could wear my binder. A headache was building and my chest was bruising and raw.

His lips thinned.  “So, you’ve been informed of the Mad Hatter.”

“Claude mentioned it before my quizzes.” I found a stinging spot on my left side and was not keen to let the stiff polyester touch it again.

“Claude’s trying to get over the fact that you almost drowned him,” Simil admonished.

“Claude seems like a nice enough fella, but you guys are the ones forcefully keeping me down here,” I countered.  I felt bad for Claude up to a point, but I wasn’t about to go all Stockholme syndrome on this guild.  Simil stared at me silently, waiting.

“What’s a Shifter?” I sank to the floor and leaned against the end cap of the stack. Drawing my knees up, I shoved my thumbs under the hem of my binder where Simil wouldn’t see. “Also, where’s a shower and a laundromat?”  

Simil gave me a second, considering his words. “A Shifter is an individual who can do almost the impossible in the guild.  They can Read out stories that they have memorized.  Most can only do it as long as they recite it out loud from a visual aid.  Most have to have an unReading verse that is actually spoken.  You, however, are one in very few who can Read out a story without having to say it and unRead it without having to recite a full line.  You are what most normal people would look at and think was a true magician.  Merlin was a Shifter,” Simil supplied.

“And what becomes of these rare Shifters?” I prodded.

“They become Simils,” the man’s voice warbled.  I let that sink in. 

“You are the first female-born Shifter I’ve seen; not to bring up what seems to be a tender topic, Thaddeus, but trying to be accurate,” Simil broke the awkward silence.

“There have never been female Simils before?” I asked.

“Very rarely – they are referred to as Deweys,” Simil answered.

“So, you’re a Shifter, and that’s why the guild uses you like a guard dog?  You can do what I can do?” I fought the prickle behind my eyes. If I persisted with the skin rawness and the tightness, it wouldn’t take much for a panic attack to set in.

“At least I have enough training not to go unBound,” he sneered.

“unBound?” I had a feeling I knew what that meant.

“Readers are able to bring out things by way of their emotions.  Sometimes, if a Shifter is emotionally pushed too far, they can go unBound, which is when they can pull off more Readings of higher levels.  It can have a pretty nasty backlash, though.  You really do use up a lot of energy on your brain generating something into reality.  unBound can also happen if you overRead.  If you have a limit of say, four readings – what an average guild member can manage, and you push yourself to five, you can go unBound.  You just become emotionally unstable and not yourself.  Most guild members though, if they go unBound, can’t Read out anymore while they are in an unBound state, so they don’t really cause chaos; they just end up having a nervous breakdown of sorts.  I must admit the guild does not have very good guidelines in managing individuals who Phase later in life.  It happens, but not frequently enough for it to be more than a once-every-other-year or so thing.  Frequently the guild deals in kids at about the elementary school range, and they are treated much differently.  Their parents are contacted, and the kids are enrolled in a guild-run private institute where they can be trained in Reading and managing their abilities.” Simil motioned for me to take a seat with him at the table.  I looked at his hand skeptically, wondering if it was really that safe to sit so close to him. I didn’t really want to. It meant rubbing at open wounds.  I decided it wasn’t going to matter too much.  If we had to, we could conduct a war between Shifters.

I slid into the seat across from him. It would be harder to swing his sword with the table between us.  He had quite a pile of rather old astrology and alchemy books laid out on the table.  Most of it was written in a script of late English that I couldn’t read well enough to understand the context.

“It’s probably a blessing to the guild that you are not proficient in more than English,” Simil commented.  He had noticed my glances at his books.

“I’m not sure it would have been a good thing if I could either,” I conferred.  Just because I had this new ability, didn’t mean I liked it.  

“Most Shifters are found when they are in elementary school and are trained to be able to read quite a lot of languages to a point of proficiency so as to have the most potential for the guild.” He started closing up the books.

“How are you able to read stuff and not have, you know, Peter Pan come flying out of your books?” I motioned to the texts.

“It takes time to learn how to block off your emotional attachment to the content of the book.  Fiction probably isn’t as fun that way, but when you allow your emotions to muddle in with what you read, well…you know what happens,” Simil shrugged, making piles.

I stared at him, rather openly and unabashed.  He stared back.  He looked familiar to the extreme.  It was confusing to no end.  The eyes and the hair were really throwing me off, though.  I didn’t know anyone with blond hair the length he had his, or a man with a pink and a black eye.  “Why do I know you?” I asked, finally willing to make a fool of myself.

“Probably because you went to school with me,” Simil blinked.  

I stared at him, searching his face. I made for a shot in a nostalgic dark. “Wyn?” I asked, still trying to accept the complete change that had taken over.

“Took you quite a while to see it, huh?” He dropped my gaze to rub at a shoulder.

“Sylwyn-fuck-what’s-your-last-name? What happened to you?” I shot from my seat to get a closer look before checking myself and sitting back down.

“Aethelweard.”

“Aethelweard, thank you.”

“I’ve been with the guild since I was four. Got to go to a college of my choice, but then I had duties to the guild, and things happened, and I ended up being made the guild’s acting Simil for this branch.” He motioned to his two-toned eyes.

“Does the Chair know that we knew each other? That gonna get you in trouble?”

“Not yet.  I will have to tell them soon, but they are busy, as always.  Because the Chair isn’t even informed of Shifters’ names – it just isn’t of great importance to them; they didn’t realize that we’ve spent quite a bit of time together already.  I must apologize for the treatment you received in the courtroom and during the last few days.  I must tell you also that, by the fact that I ate the Mad Hatter, I do have split personalities now.  If the guild is in danger, the Mad Hatter tends to rise up and muck about with my actions.  I cannot tell you how sorry I am about the whole sword thing.” He cast an angry glance at the sword in question before warning eyes came back to me. “But we have to be careful to keep everyone safe, you have to understand that.”

“What do you mean by you ate the Mad Hatter?” I was not touching that sword as a topic.

He glanced away from me, shifting restlessly.  “You have an idea of how to project your emotions outward to the world and bring out something you Read, right?” he asked me.  I didn’t really get it yet, but I had a decent enough grasp to nod my head.  “There’s a type of reverse process to it, where you actually build the thing you read inside of yourself.  You run a deep risk of going unBound permanently, but if you can manage not to, you “eat” the experience.  That emotion you built up so heavily manifests sort of inside of you.  If it’s a character from a book, it’s like inviting them to occupy a space in your head.  You willingly develop a second personality.  Simils are almost always provided with a strong-willed character that is different from their normal personality.  The guild does try not to repeat characters.  We’ve been through so many.  I’m kind of at a loss as to why they chose Alice in Wonderland this term.  That book is such an l.s.d. fest; it was rather a dangerous move.” He twisted his fingers on the table.

“You get that Ph.D. you were after at least? I’m assuming you got your Masters. I had that set of gap years taking care of Uncle Tad for mom, so I’m a bit behind, but tell me you at least got there.” I wanted to pull him from that guilty look he had climbing all over his face.

“I’m over here telling you about this fantastical thing about books becoming reality, and you’re asking if I got my Ph.D.?” He snorted, covering a smile before it could escape into the wild. “You haven’t changed much.”

“Been trying to change a lot, really. Not as much as your mismatched eyes, but if eating Atticus Finch would mean the rest of the Chair getting my gender right, I might just go along with being an apprentice Simil.” I leaned back in my chair and set my ankle over my other knee to regard Sylwyn with a teasing smile.

“When’d you finally come out, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“About a month before Uncle Tad and mom died.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t think that pain’ll stop any time soon, but Uncle Tad really got a kick out of me wanting his name for some reason. Said it was so old-fashioned that it was probably better for me to have grown up with my deadname just so I could survive to finally use it. Bullies or something like that. 

“Mom. I don’t think she ever fully got it, but she tried. When I got mad at her for not getting my name or gender right, she pointed to the fish and told me his new name was Herbert and had me try that for a couple weeks. Thing died before they did. Power went out at the house ,and the pump stopped working. I slipped quite a few times, even when I was really trying. Anyways, I ‘laxed a bit with her. She gave birth to me after all; she and Uncle Tad had called me my deadname the longest. She tried harder when she saw me make an effort with the fish. I think she just wanted me to be a bit more patient and to know that she really was trying. Anways,” I drew up my shoulders if only to put the feeling behind me, “Thanks for making an effort. I’d rather a sword to the neck and my pronouns used right than to take tea with someone calling me my deadname.”

Sylwyn rubbed at the back of his head sheepishly. “Not sure thanking me makes a lot of sense here, Tad.”

“Deus. That was the arrangement I made with Uncle Tad. That I’d be Deus, and he’d be Tad while we were all together. I’m not sure about hearing it from others yet, but if you’re looking for a shorter version than Thaddeus, I’d like Deus, Wyn.” I offered.

“Deus then. You asked about a shower, maybe a change of clothes? If you absolutely promise you will not set fire to the building, I can see about getting you somewhere to change. Come on. The books can stay here for the night. I’ll come back to them in the morning.” He rose and sheathed his sword.

“What will they do with me now?” I followed him down the stacks.

“Depends on what you do for them.  If you work with them, they will most likely put you in line to become a Dewey or a Simil. I guess you’d want to be known as a Simil, but I don’t know if they’ll call you that, sorry.  If you work against them, they will come at you.” He grabbed his shoes off a random shelf as we passed by and paused to tug them on.

“And you?” I asked. “Also, why were your shoes on a shelf?”

“I can try my best to help you overcome this challenge.  As it stands, you are the least of the Chair’s concerns.  Though a rare shifter, what the Chair is after right now is answers to the disappearance of Chyril,” Sylwyn stumbled while tugging on a shoe, and I caught him before he could tip a stack. He was denser than I thought he’d be, and my breath caught when I realized he was also a full head taller. 

I snorted. I hated being stuck short. I wanted his height. “I never did get to meet her.  I take it she’s someone in the guild?” I straightened out my shirt after he let go.

“She was part of our antique metaphysics manuscript research division.  When she disappeared, she was in the midst of looking over a series of legends on spirit-based creatures from China.  One of the manuscripts disappeared with her.  Though it was not worth as much as many of the manuscripts we have here, it still could become a problematic document if it fell into an anarchic Reader’s hand,” Sylwyn pursed his lips.  

Goosebumps ran their way up my arm and neck.  This didn’t sound like a good thing. “Spirits?”

“It was a prelude to the Shanhaijing,” he supplied.

“I’ve never heard of it.”

“The Shanhaijing itself contains within it a series of geographic descriptions for finding mythical creatures, such as serpents large enough to consume elephants whole, or the more famous nine-tailed fox. Crap, hold up, I need to deal with some of those books I left out. Thought I could leave them, but…” He lead me back to the table and started piling them up in an ever increasing percarious tower.  “Here, carry this for me would you?” He handed me his sword.  

Good lord, I didn’t know just how heavy those things could be.  The fact that he could easily manoeuvre that thing like it was plastic was intimidating.  “Jeez, where did this come from?” I hefted it to keep it from dragging on the floor.  It was at least half my height, though now that I actually had to admit it, it was more like 3/4th, but I don’t like saying I’m short.  

“It’s a degen I pulled out of a 15th century military arts manuscript that was discovered near the Rhine last year,” he said nonchalantly.  I blinked at him.  Just how many languages did he know?  I sighed, knowing there were just too many questions I would be asking.  “What does the prelude contain?” I allowed myself to ask.  Snakes were becoming a reoccurring theme recently, and I figured that was probably a more important question at the moment.

“The prelude contains descriptions of the various gods that have companions and command these spirits.” Sylwyn opened up one of the books from the shelf and slipped one of his texts into it. 

The book from the shelf was nothing more than a box I realized.  I looked around me.  The books in the library weren’t just new, never before read manuals.  They were all boxes to keep the old texts safe.  The library suddenly felt even larger than before, if that was possible.  “Gods?” I continued to follow him.

“And when those are let loose, we end up with some seriously big problems, not just for the Guild.  You know how much the Guild pays various governments just to keep quiet to cover stuff up?” He turned to me, his pink and black eyes drawing at my soul.  

I felt like a deer in headlights. “I don’t know anything about you, do I?”

“No, but I hope we can get along well.” His smile could have been endearing or a threat, and I wasn’t sure which one to pick.

Chapel Orahamm (C) 2022-2023. All Rights Reserved.

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From the Author

Hi,

Sorry if it looks like I’m not posting as frequently as I was. I had five books that were completely finished. Those ones went up first, and I didn’t want to waste time scheduling them out for months. I had done that on my previous site, and one of my readers who came back over to this site had already gone through that waiting, and I didn’t want to do that to them all over again. So, I just dumped a bunch of chapters all at once.

I do have Subgalaxia scheduled out. That one is a finished book, but it was one that hadn’t gone live yet before I switched websites, so I figured that one would be alright to schedule out.

The other books that are taking me longer to post are not done. Life of a Librarian, Firefly Fish, Skull Dansuer, The Feather on My Scale, To Be Guilded, The Warden’s Cabin – those ones I am still working on. I post whenever I can get a chapter done. Sorry about the inconsistency there.

Honestly, I’m not sure if I want to try to make those ones fit the 27-30 chapter rule of a standard book, or just take my time in developing a long-ranging webstory. Firefly Fish could do that pretty easily, and I want Skull Dansuer to be an epic in the same vein as Wheel of Time or Fellowship of the Ring – chunky, in-depth, a deeply built world. Warden’s Cabin and To Be Guilded are just supposed to be smut books, but I’m finding it hard not to actually get into world and character-building. I guess I prefer for my erotica scenes to be built on established relationships. It’s not like I can’t write short story erotica, but almost every time I’ve done that, it reads like the characters have known each other for years, rather than a one-night stand.

Do you have any opinions? Do you mind if some of the webstories just kinda sprawl, have arcs, go on for weeks with no serious rising and falling action to reach a drastic conclusion? I don’t know where I’m wanting Firefly Fish to go. I’m just exploring the concept of a merperson world; there is so much to explore.

Don’t forget, at the bottom of each chapter, I have a ko-fi button and Amazon wish list links if you’ve been coming along this journey and want to show a bit of support. I keep the stories free to read because I’m terrible at advertising, but I’d still love to know that you’re getting some enjoyment from the reading from maybe a nice comment or a trinket here and there?

Chapel

Firefly Fish: Ch 23

NSFW: EROTICA

“This mean I need to find you another shole?” Saeesar slipped into a current that sent us away from the Gulf and Karis’s nesting ground.

“Well,” I hedged.

“I wonder if you like sweetwater eel.” He twisted his head in what I would equivalate to a cocked eyebrow.

“One from your home waters?” I had never had eel, salt or fresh.

“I remember some vaguely near a place called Samut Songkhram. The name sticks with me, it was a place my mother would tell me about, but I can’t say if I remember it, or just remember her talking of it. But, we have to go far to get there. We’re going to take this current down near where Tlanextic comes from and use that current to send us across the expanse to the other side of the world.

“Why go that far? We can take the canal. We’re aiming for Southeast Asia, right?” I stalled his movement.

“Canal? What canal?” He dodged a school of slow-moving black fish.

“The one the humans built about fifteen, twenty years ago, Bet-tah,” Tlanextic explained from behind us.

“It goes through the land?” Saeesar rolled to his back. Tlanextic swam faster to float over him while they carried on their conversation. He told us to ignore his wound in favour of letting it stop on its own. The red haze had stopped a few miles back, like he predicted it would.

“It and their large boats do. They raise and lower the water in these massive pools. It lets them move the boats up and over the land all the way from this ocean to the one on the other side. Marin’s right; it would be faster.”

“Will they see us?”

“Not if we keep to the shadow of the ships. Not like humans bother seeing us as anything other than fish anymore anyways, Bet-tah.”

“You’re not wrong about that.” Saeesar’s fins deflated in what I estimated to be a sigh. “To not have to travel near the ice realms, or through the storm seas,” Saeesar daydreamed.

“All it does is send us through a different ocean. I can’t tell you if the other side is worse or better for going past the Horn, but I know of some of the Antomnous who use the canal to seek out warmer oceans as the currents change with the sun’s passage.”

“That will put us quite far, though, from your siblings, Marin. Did you not want to meet with your progenitor? I would think there are questions you would have for him, if anything to have a community of those like you?”

“I think, at this point, I’m just going with the flow. Seeing what the next current will bring. Maybe that’s how I find my place in the Antomnos.” The farther from Grabble I went, the less anxious I was to find my place in life. The less I felt I needed to become something. Maybe because I had been labelled a Grim Reaper for want of a better word. Artist wasn’t quite twisted into my thread of fate like I thought.

The channel hurtled us out of the desert and into a thick conglomeration of low shelf reefs that we followed along the edge of what I assumed to be Mexico. Saeesar and Tlanextic corralled squid for me when I could no longer see Antomnous from fish. I hoped that as I matured into this world I would be capable of determining my food sources when I was hungry. The sunset against the ceiling of water above us and I stared in awe at the pink and gold shimmering waves while the Bet-tah and Eagle Ray argued over what would be best for sleeping arrangements that evening.

A sudden silence drew my attention from the fractured sunset to the two large creatures staring at me. “What?”

Saeesar’s fins were fully fluffed, and he’d curled himself up to hide enough behind them that it reminded me of when he first gave me a dowry of pearls. I bemoaned myself, having realized that I had left the messenger bag full of gems back in a crevasse near the arena.

Tlanextic dug an elbow into Saeesar’s ribs. “Ask him before we have any more issues with creatures interfering.”

“Alright, alright.” Saeesar pushed away from Tlanextic.

“Not alright. If he gets bitey with other creatures interrupting you two, then you need to get this thing figured out.” Tlanextic chastised. “There’s plenty of space around here, or there’s rivers up along the beach edge if you insist on sweetwater, Bet-tah.”

My ears turned warm as I realized what Tlanextic and Saeesar had been discussing. I pushed off of my coral seat and drifted over to the two. Saeesar caught onto me as the waves pushed me into him. “I-um, that is…” I stuttered.

“You are concerned?” Saeesar’s glance crawled up the lights on my arms.

“I-“ my voice strangled as I failed at trying to explain my predicament with Tlanextic staring at us so openly. “Privacy?” I whispered, barely louder than the wake of the waves above us.

Tlanextic’s eyes got wider at the comment as did Saeesar’s. Shrugging, the Eagle Ray waved a hand toward an outcrop of reef covered in purple and red mounds. “I’ll be sleeping over there whenever you two figure yourselves out.”

“Did I say something weird?” I still couldn’t get my voice to come up above a hollow whisper.

“Well, no, not entirely. Most mating displays are out in the open, but that’s not to say some of the Antomnous don’t find their own burrows in the recesses. I take it you would rather not enjoy each other in the reef as you are?” Saeesar draped his fins around me until we were cocooned in frills of black and thin white stripes.

“Human culture, or at least what I was raised in, was pretty modest. Not something we saw of each other. The most I’d ever seen of anyone naked before the dynllyr was the lingerie drawing in the Sears catalogue at Christmas. Other than livestock, watching anyone have-have-have-” I couldn’t say it.

“Then, what of a private channel in one of the rivers Tlanextic mentioned? Or a cave? Would something like that do? You seemed keen at the island near the council?” Saeesar offered options.

“I’m still keen, just not entirely thrilled with having other creatures see me. I’d take a river over a cave. Last cave I was in, you disappeared.”

“Then let us find a river.”

“You insist on these garments.” Saeesar’s fingers feathered across the waistband of my trousers.

“It’s what I grew up with. It feels weird otherwise. I know it’s not common in the Antumnos, but it’s what I prefer,” I stuttered, aware of his proximity, aware of the driving need that’d been pressing at us from every side.

“Are you sure you want this, Marin Goranich?” Saeesar whispered, his fins wrapping protectively around me as his fingers trailed, finding my belt buckle. He fumbled it.

I snorted, blowing bubbles in a mimic of his laugh. “Here, let me help.” I pulled the pin from the belt hole and the buttons on the fly, assuming he probably had little experience with its method. I stalled. Tingles ran under my skin as my heart jumped in my chest.

“You’re singing and scared?” Saeesar carefully unwrapped himself from me, the cool water outside of his protection raising hairs on my arms.

“A bit of a thing from growing up.” I hesitated.

“Whatever makes you comfortable,” he reassured.

A moment to think, and I peeled myself out of the wet material, letting it float past Saeesar to settle on the riverbed. “You make me comfortable. And I did agree to a dowry.” 

Saeesar ducked at my mumbling, his fins fluffing in his version of an embarrassed blush. Naked, I floated, flicking wrists and feet through the water to keep me level with him. Slowly, waiting for my cues, he approached, fingers climbing from my hips, along my obliques, to my shoulders.

I melted into his touch, letting him drag me to his chest. My rising desire pressed between us. He nibbled along the edge of my collarbone, a hand trailing from my shoulders to my waist. Electricity snapped across my senses as his thumb brushed along my tip. Muscles tensed down my back.

I wanted to watch. I wanted to see his expression. I wanted to disappear to the sensations.

Finding my perch, knees squeezing his sides precariously, I slid my hands through his hair. His tail wrapped and twisted, nestling me further into his hold. I had wanted this moment for years. “You’d take an old Bet-tah fighter? When you could have anyone in the seas or land?” Saeesar followed the flashing of my lights, kisses splashing across my arms and chest.

“I’m choosey that way.” I eased to his intensity, sucking in hellfire as he encircled my length. Kneading into his shoulders, I ducked to kiss him. “And I’m choosing you.”

Tension eased from his frame at the admission.

“If you keep playing, though, I’m going to be done well before you get to the first act.” I laid a cautioning hand over his to stall his movement.

“Sorry.” He loosened his grip.

“Don’t stop, but…” I trailed, waiting for him to catch up with what I wanted.

“But?” he blinked, lost.

“Maybe I should have asked what a Mate Claim actually looks like for Bet-tah?” I pulled on the vestiges of my patience before I found heaven. It wasn’t going to take much. “Is there an instinct for this with you?”

“Do you want me now?” his voice cracked at my question.

I nodded, heat swamping me from ears to fingertips. Every light dilated, casting our dark stone fortress into sharp relief. Stunned, his lips parted as he stared at my reaction in fascination. I took that moment to kiss him, testing his tongue with my own. “You fluff, I light up.”

He hesitated at the interaction, careful with my insistence. I drew away to let him catch himself. “You’re like playing with lava,” he admitted, his nails dragging along my shoulder blades to watch me arch into him.

“This is driving me crazy.” My gasps were turning into flutters.

“How so?” He ran his nails along my hips.

“There’s something for Krakens, or maybe it’s just me, but I…” I trailed off, scared to admit to the intense desire I had to test the skin along his trap.

Tiny bubbles emitted from Saeesar’s gills as he ducked. “Your Mate Claim is getting to you? Your songs are not so subtle at the moment. I’ve set mine already.”

I furrowed my brow in confused surprise. We hadn’t done anything yet.

Another patter of bubbles. “They’re along your shoulder blades, and your…um…what are these?” He ran his fingers across delicious points of heat and electricity on my hips right below my obliques, sending me throbbing. Another gasp of hellfire, and I wanted that heat to take me higher. I bowed to the sensation, resting my head against his chest in a desperate bid for a moment of understandable calm. 

“In me,” I whispered past that desperation.

“What?” Saeesar twisted, fingers trailing down my chin so he could see my eyes.

I turned mute at the question, suddenly embarrassed. I wanted to feel him. Around me. His protection. His warmth. I wanted all of him all at once, and my voice refused.

“If you’re sure?” Saeesar shifted his tail until I was wrapped within his fins, weight pressing against my sensitivity.

“I’m sure of having you; I’m not sure why I’m desperate to nibble on you. I don’t want to eat you. It’s not the same feeling as when I’m hungry or protecting myself. What is this?” I tensed, digging fingers into his shoulders at his pressure.

“You going to be alright with me?” He eased up. 

Shifting one of his hands to my hip over his red mate claim, I encouraged him to help the transition. “Gently. I won’t break. Just…” I drew in a searing breath and tried to relax for him.

“Asked Pursha, while you slept, about mate claiming Kraken. I wasn’t sure what to expect. She said most will leave suction or hook marks if they have tentacles. Some are known to bite a piece out of their mate. The scent is supposed to be different from them claiming food. I can only hope that holds true with Pucah Kraken children. At the moment, I’m willing to take that risk just for the look on your face right now.” He took my direction, and heat seared through me as I finally relaxed to him. He waited as I adjusted and caught my breath in the sweet water. “As you said, you’re wanting to ‘nibble’ me?”

Swallowing, I shifted, wanting a bit of movement. “I would find it problematic.”

“You keep wig-wiggling like that; we’re both going to be experiencing problems.” Saeesar met my movement and drew me closer. “Do what comes naturally to you. We’re still learning.”

I let temptation override me and drifted to the scattering sparks. I had looked for that close intimacy for years, expecting never to feel hands holding me as I found the edge of paradise. What I had not expected was gentle warmth, protection to catch me when I fell, to support me when I rose. Heaven was a pale comparison to the paradise I found in Saeesar’s rhythm. Matching his intensity, I found myself drawn to leaving innumerable marks across any part of him that came within my reach as we wrapped around each other.

His nails bit into me as he found his edge and skimmed along it for what felt like an eternity. Pressure built in my base and the edge I had hoped to ride along with him came crashing down, leaving me sensitive to his persistence and finding the edge again well before the white crescent had created reflections in the watery ceiling above us.

Catching moonshine for breath in that cool river, I smirked at the after-effects of our Mate Claim. A flair of phosphorescent blue marks ran from his neck to his side fins, circling across chest and abs. They glowed faintly in the dark compared to my own lights.

“I’m inclined to apologize, but that was really good.” I ducked, losing count after fifty round teeth marks across his surface.

    “You gonna go all bitey on me every time we do that?” He twisted himself around to try to see all the rings.

    “Uh…maybe? I mean, well? You did say something about being spotless way back when we first met. I think this probably resolves that, don’t you?” I hoped for humour. “Do they hurt?” I pulled up the charm I had thought of to heal Taigre’s wound to spread across a patch on his left side. The blue marks didn’t fade. “Oh, crap.”

    “Panicked singing, Marin Goranich.” Saeesar chuckled, pressing my hand to his skin. He tucked me into his embrace and ran a hand across the overly taut skin on my stomach. “They don’t hurt, and they don’t have the same smell like with Karis and Leviathan. It must be your way.”

“Your marks are red, though. Why are mine blue?”

“I’m not entirely sure. Think Tlanexit might know?”

“Maybe.”

“You all right?” He asked after the face I was making.

“Tender.” I rested a hand over his to still his caressing.

“Your songs have questions.”

“I look like a pregnant goat. This gonna go down? It’s…I don’t want to make you feel bad and say it hurts, but my skin’s stretched, and it’s pretty sore. Won’t mention what else is sore. That comes with the territory of a mini-jack and Clydesdale.”

“Might take a couple days?”

“What did you do?”

“Mate Claim?”

“That’s the stripes.”

“I mean, our fluids are sticky, if that’s what you’re asking about?” A dawning light flashed through his eyes. “This isn’t normal for humans?”

“Not even normal for land beasts, at least not livestock I’ve been around.”

“It’s that way with most Antomnous. Those that lay eggs and those who birth live young both have this kind of consistency. I am just much larger than you and should have taken care not to have you deal with all of me.” Saeesar’s fins told me he was ashamed.

“Husbandry lessons on merpeople. Not what I thought I’d be doing in my twenties, but here we are.” I rubbed at the bridge of my nose.

“Humans are not hermaphroditic by nature, yes?” Saeesar’s question caught me off-guard.

“Hermaphroditic?” It had been a long time since I heard that word.

“Able to switch their reproductive ability and sex-marking characteristics to fill in an empty niche or for purposes of courtship?” Saeesar’s fins were comfortable to lay into after our enjoyment of each other.

“No. Not that I’ve ever seen. There are those who are mentally born to the wrong physical body. I heard of them from my father when he met someone of two-spirits when he went to a trading post. But they can’t physically transform themselves. Clothing, hair styles, modified voice pitch, those types of things are what help them designate who they are.” I pushed at the side of my stomach, willing that tautness to abate. “Kraken?” Trepidation pattered around my heart as I fully understood where Saeesar was going with his line of questions.

“Sharpear Enope has a capacity. He and the male children sometimes have glands that females utilise, but otherwise, I’m not sure of any of the other Kraken.” Saeesar’s relief was almost palpable.

“Alright, so this is just gonna be a bit inconvenient with our love-making and not have me producing a million tadpoles, then, right?” I blanched at the sudden imagery.

“I- I don’t think so?”

“Is this the way of it with all Antomnous couples who mate outside of their clans? Having to figure out what version of screwed you are after-after ehem, screwing?”

He squeaked in a give-or-take way. “Haven’t heard of this ‘screwing’, but the imagery is enough for me to understand. Yeah. That’s pretty much the way of it.”

“If I was to do this to you…?” I let the statement hang.

“Some females of the Bet-tah clan can become male with the right motivation, but I already am male, so, no, I don’t think we would have the potential for children if I was instead to have you in me.” Saeesar stuttered, his fins going fluffy and flustered. “Humans give live birth, and Bet-tah lay eggs, and I can’t lay eggs, so I don’t think we have to worry then?”

“Probably something we should have talked about before I went all bitey on you, but that’s reassuring. Not doing things again until my stomach stops hurting, though, yeah?”

Saeesar nodded mutely, his fins going from fluff to pin-straight to fluff again as waves of embarrassment and shame switched places. I leaned into his hold, curled against his chest, and listened to water pass through his gills. “Wasn’t saying it to make you feel bad. Just setting up a bit of a boundary so I don’t get myself hurt. I didn’t think I’d ever find someone to-to-to.” I coughed. “To enjoy an evening with. And I did. I enjoyed this and want to again.”

He held me tighter, nuzzling his face into the top of my head. “Never thought I’d be so thankful for a storm as I am now.”

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Subgalaxia: Ch 12

Fane walked briskly through the hallways.  “Do you want to go outside?” Ishan offered, wondering if closing themselves into their bedroom would be the best idea for the man.  Fane paused to look up at the platinum-blond man. He was lost and cold. He pulled Ishan to him and buried his head in the blond’s shoulder.  “God damn it, I can’t take anymore today,” he mumbled.

Ishan wrapped his arms around him and held him, waiting. He leaned his cheek on Fane’s head and closed his eyes, feeling the man tremble beneath him.  “Cuddle?” Ishan asked gently. Fane nodded his head, exhausted. “All right, let’s do that then.” Ishan pulled him to their room.

Ishan turned the key in the lock and let them in.  Fane went to the little window and turned the shades to close off the room in a soft dim grey.  Ishan went and rummaged around in the footlocker at the end of their beds that they had pushed together.  He pulled out a soft t-shirt and a pair of thin cotton pyjama pants and tossed them to Fane while he pulled out his own matching set that they had been provisioned with.

Fane walked over to the little shelf at the end of the room and unloaded his micro-arsenal into tidy rows.  It was all the armaments he had when they went through the portal, and he wasn’t about to turn them over to the armoury here.  He shucked himself out of his boots and cargos and pulled on the pants and t-shirt. He fell back against Ishan’s chest as he pulled him into a gentle hug.

“I would never do this to my own children,” Fane bit out, the tremble coming back into his limbs.  Tears broke behind his eyes.

“Shh…it’s okay.  We won’t let them do that.” Ishan rested his head on Fane’s shoulder, letting Fane entwine his fingers with his.

“He has my sequence; he’s taken my blood.  He could clone me and have someone on the ship surrogate it without me knowin’.” Fane turned into his prince.

Ishan drew in a breath and let out a sigh. He didn’t have a response to that fear. 

“I have practically no memories because of the operations.  I can’t even remember my own sister or parents. I can’t imagine even thinking of doing that to a child… or another person.  I couldn’t think of someone doing that to you, or Bern…” Fane hiccuped.

“Come on,” Ishan gently pulled him to the bed.  He threw back the military-grade cotton sheets and wool blanket and pushed Fane into the thin mattress.  He pulled the sheets and blankets up around him, bundling him into a little cocoon before climbing in with him and bundling himself into a larger cocoon around the man.  Fane rested his head on Ishan’s arm, lost in his thoughts. He looked up to Ishan’s worried face. “Close your eyes and sleep a bit.” Ishan kissed his forehead. Fane nodded agreement, finally beginning to thaw out.

Pitch black coated the room in gloom. The bed trembled, the spring protesting.  Ishan woke to Fane tossing. He rested a hand on his chest. His bodyguard’s heart was pounding, and a cold sweat soaked his shirt.  Fane sat up and began pulling himself free of the blankets, his body shaking. “Everything all right?” Ishan asked tiredly before fully realizing Fane’s terror.  “Easy, easy, here,” he soothed, helping free Fane from the cocoon of sheets and blankets.  His hair was dripping. Ishan touched Fane’s arm gently. Fane looked up at him, glassy horror burning in their depth. His heart was beating hard and he was fighting to bring air into his lungs.  He pulled futilely at the collar of his shirt. Ishan grasped his hand. “Fane?” he called, trying to bring some clear focus into his eyes, “Fane, I’m right here. You’re safe. We’re right here,” he chanted quietly.  Night terrors. The man wasn’t awake.

Fane didn’t mean to. He wasn’t even awake for it. He still couldn’t control it. He plunged both Ishan and himself into the void. Terror rolled across Ishan’s skin and embed itself into his chest. A cold sweat broke out across his back as he drew in shaky breaths.

He looked up into the dim cavern.  Fane was pulling against his restraints, fighting to get away from the grasping tentacles that smeared acid across his skin, leaving angry red patches to blister.  The harder he pulled, the tighter the wires wound about him, the more blood dripped, the angrier the creature below him cried out.

Ishan’s feet froze him in place.  He couldn’t run, he couldn’t hide, he couldn’t fight.  The creature continued its climb, its suction cups laced with backward-facing barbs hooked into Fane’s skin.  The thin, whiplike tentacles, too many to be anything related to an earth creature clung to the wires, using them to pull itself ever upward.  The clear waves did nothing to hide the terror beneath them. Deep under surface tension, a massive beak was pushing its way upwards. Ishan couldn’t comprehend its immense size, but knew that it was still a long way under.

One of the tentacles wound itself around Fane’s neck.  Fane cried out as it squeezed down, barbs puncturing. The sound slashed across Ishan’s heart, pulling him into action.  He ran forward and climbed the beast’s appendages, slipping on the ooze. His hands burned and ached from the acid.  He felt like his skin was on fire. Disregarding the pain he knew it caused Fane to pull on the wires, he levered himself up until he was face to face with him.  He wrestled with the strangling tentacle, but he couldn’t get a purchase, couldn’t dig into the bloated skin. “Knife! Knife, damn it! Fane, where’s one of your damn knives when I actually need it for once!” Ishan yelled.

 “Gu…p…ah…” Fane tried to speak beyond the stranglehold.  His eyes watered. He couldn’t focus.

Thunk.

The knife Ishan had given him back in the palace fell down from the void above, bouncing off the tentacle and skittered into the rat’s nest of wires.  Fane fought to get a hold of it, but it kept slipping. It fell through the wires out of reach. Ishan snatched it before it could plummet into the depths. He slammed it home into the tentacle, slashing and hacking at it. The creature cried out at the sudden retaliation.  It pulled it’s appendage away, wanting to be away from the crippling attack. Ishan pressed his advantage, sweeping across the dripping limbs, slicing off barbs and probing tips.

The creature splashed back into the pool.  The surface rippled and roiled at the sudden descent. Fane coughed and spluttered, trying to draw in a breath around a swelling throat.  “Fane!” Ishan spun to the man.  

“-rince.” The man’s eyes glittered with more tears as he coughed and wheezed.

“Oh, god, Fane! I’m so sorry.” Ishan rested his head against Fane’s, wishing he could hug him through the jumble of wires. 

Fane trembled beneath him, his coughing easing. “Why are you here?”

Ishan looked down into his eyes.  He swallowed as his heart started to return to a normal rhythm. He smiled gently, “because you called me.” He gently kissed him. “I thought you were going to die.” Ishan allowed the shock to finally hit his system.  

“Feels that way every night,” Fane murmured.

“This is the nightmare that woke you up in the armoury?” Ishan asked.

“It comes when I sleep.  Sometimes I can wake up before it starts eating me. Sometimes it takes a lot longer.” He shifted, trying to settle the wires into a less painful position. 

His futile attempts drew Ishan’s attention. “These are coming off,” the man growled.

“I don’t know what’ll happen if you do that, Ishan!” Fane protested.  He couldn’t protect him like this.

“Don’t bloody care.  You’re not going to be some Prometheus for a giant calamari roll.” Ishan studied the various knots and hooks that he could readily access from where he rested on the wires.  He didn’t feel pressure as he sat on them, and they didn’t strain under his weight. Fane still held to the golden rope tightly. That was the only one that was not directly attached to his body by some kind of invasive means.  “How long can you stay under like this?” Ishan turned his attention back to Fane’s face.

Fane trailed his sight along the cavern.  “As long as the creature doesn’t eat my chest, I usually can stay under till then.”

“Not happening again.  I’ll go in after that thing if it comes down to it,” Ishan hissed as he spotted a particular hook that showed less strain than the others. “We’re starting here.” Ishan pointed to the gleaming barb in Fane’s bicep.  Fane pulled as hard as he could on the golden rope, taking strain off the hook.  Ishan forced the needle sharp keel hook out, knowing that as he did so, he was hurting Fane more. Fane fought to not flinch, but the grunt in the cavern let Ishan know that what he did was not pleasant.  The wire pitched away from the wound, like the last one, lining up near it at the edge of Fane’s touch.

“Can you keep going?” Ishan asked.  Fane bit down on his lip and nodded his head.  The sparks that burst across his nerve endings were better than the acid of the creature.  They at least told him he wasn’t dying. “What about this?” Ishan asked, noticing one of the loop piercings on his chest had gone slack.  “Try it,” Fane hissed. He was going to make friends with pain that night. Ishan poised the knife above the skin that had grown around the ring.  He flinched with distaste. He glanced up at Fane. Fane drew in a breath and nodded his head, and closed his eyes. Ishan sliced across the skin and pulled the ring free.  Blood flowed readily from the wound. Fane bit down on his tongue, willing himself to not scream.

Ishan wasn’t sure how many hours had passed.  The creature had been quiet. He had freed Fane of several dozen of the hooks and smaller, less invasive piercings.  The massive loops supporting Fane’s shoulders taunted him. The ones that worried him the most, though, were the bolts and chains that held up his thighs and his forearms.  They had to be buried in his very bones.

“Prince?” Fane called after Ishan, grunting as another hook came free from a spot under a rib in his back.  He sucked in a burst of pain and waited a second for the stars to stop flashing in his eyes. Ishan had moved to another.  “Ishan?” Fane pressed a little louder, twisting to look at the focused man. Another barb came free. The man was becoming methodical.  Fane floundered, reaching for the blond.  

Ishan looked up.  “You all right? Do you need me to stop?” He drew a hand along Fane’s cheek, his brows knitting.

“Are you doing ok?  You’ve been at this for a while. I know Bern said that he can’t keep up communication like this for extended periods of time.  He gets hungry and exhausted,” Fane asked Ishan, worried for the man. He was almost asleep on his feet.

“I can’t just leave you here like this, knowing that creature is waiting to come back,” Ishan gritted his teeth.  He still didn’t know how to free Fane completely.

“You’ve released me more so than I’ve felt in years, Ishan.  It’ll be ok. You need rest.” Fane smiled up at him weakly. He, too, was ready to leave the cavern.  He wanted to be awake and away from the nightmare. Ishan drew in a deep breath and sighed. He didn’t want to leave Fane strung up, depending on the slicing wires.  He glanced up at the golden rope, and a thought occurred to him. “You need at least this hand free.” Ishan trailed an index finger across Fane’s palm. It was the one that he had watched directing wires while Fane was working through his shooting practice.  “But you can’t defend with this one in your other hand.” Ishan studied the rope.  

“Don’t take it away, Ishan.  I can’t.” Fane held even tighter to it, scared of being without it. He couldn’t quite understand why it was so precious to him that he would protest leaving it, though.  

“It doesn’t need to go anywhere, but…” Ishan trailed off, reaching for the loop.  Fane didn’t want to let go, his arms trembling at the thought. Ishan pulled gently, the loop descending from the void, going slack.  He took up the bight and pulled it under Fane. “You’re gonna need to let go for at least a second, Fane. I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.  Hold on to me if you need to, but I’m getting that hand of your’s free.” Ishan pulled the rope experimentally. It took Fane a second to trust Ishan.  He fought with himself. He didn’t want to let go. It had been his anchor.

  He finally allowed the length to slip through his fingers.  He felt hollow and unsecured, the remaining wires taking his weight once again.  Ishan worked quickly. He pulled and twisted until he had formed a respectable line chair that fit beneath Fane’s butt and back, running the strand  up on the other side to meet in the middle above Fane’s head. He looped the end into the bight, creating an elegant figure eight and stopper knot. He tugged on the length experimentally.  The knots held. Fane relaxed into the makeshift swing. He smiled. The weight of the massive loops in his shoulders and the bolts in his thighs relented. He breathed in deep. He hadn’t realized how tight his chest had been for years.  Tears drip down his cheeks. Even if none of the other hooks ever came out, he could really breath. He looked up, startled, when Ishan shoved the handle of the knife into his empty hand. “There, now skewer me some sashimi by the time I come in here next.” Ishan  kissed his boyfriend.

Fane smiled against Ishan’s lips. “I think I might just deep fry it.” He pushed them out of the void.

They returned to the room, the sun already burning through the window, telling them it was almost noon.  Ishan blinked down at the surprise in front of him. He reached out a tentative finger, tracing along the ringlets that pooled around them in waves.

“Rip Van Winkle much, sleeping beauty?” Ishan whispered, amused. 

Fane opened his eyes to look down at his lap, waves of soft peach colored hair crossing his palms.  He looked up, startled. He hadn’t seen his hair that long in years. Not since Melody died. He swallowed the thought, the memory, the firestorm that flowed through his brain, unlocking a torrent.  “Melody…” he whispered.  

Ishan couldn’t hide the surprise on his face.  “That’s something to get used to,” he breathed.  Fane’s sclera were black, the irises an iridescent silver.  The pupils reflected back red light as they shifted to focus on Ishan’s startled face.  Fane blinked up at him, not sure what Ishan was seeing. A few blinks later and his eyes had returned to their normal grey blue.

“I can probably cut it off,” Fane muttered. Maybe Ishan didn’t like long hair on other guys.  

“Can you see differently when your eyes do that?” Ishan asked, not noticing Fane’s comment.

“Do what?” Fane drew in his brows, confused.

“Your eyes. They go silvery when you’re doing your frost thing, but they were black, well the white’s were black and they were reflective.  It was cool. Spooky as fuck, but cool.” Ishan brushed a thumb along one of Fane’s bottom eyelids to see the pink.

“I didn’t notice anything different,” Fane met Ishan’s eyes.  The room had looked normal to him. “You don’t mind my hair?”

Ishan picked up an end of a lock and flicked the edges gently back and forth between his thumb and forefinger.  “No split ends. Probably longer than mine and mine took years. Teach me your trick next time,” he teased. He fell back into the mattress, dragging Fane on top of him.

Fane straddled him, leaning in to kiss him. “Thank you.” He nibbled down Ishan’s neck.

“Feeling better?” Ishan asked, warming to his view.

“Much,” Fane smiled nostalgically.

“Good!” Ishan hugged him.

“I finally remembered my sister,” Fane swallowed, pulling back to sit up and pull his hair out of his way.  Ishan looked up at him expectantly. “I remember my home, where I grew up, what I used to do as a-a teen.  That report from the base got some stuff wrong. I still have fuzzy spots. I remember the lady who taught me to read.” He pressed the heel of his hand to his eyes, trying to restrain rain from falling.  Ishan pulled him to his chest and rubbed his back.

A knock at the door disturbed them.  “You guys gonna make it to lunch some time today!?” Sophia called through the door.  She sounded miffed. Fane groaned and rolled his eyes. Ishan stifled a laugh. “Coming!” He called out as Fane helped drag him out of the bed.

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Subgalaxia: Ch 11

Corbin, Sophia, and Bern showed the young man with the wolf and Hana to a room that was being used as the medical area for the facility.  They left Fane and Ishan to attend to the other wolves in the cafeteria. The group regarded each other with unease.

One eased from the lineup after a long show down to approach Fane carefully.  His ears flipped back softly, a whine escaping him. Where had the golden wolf gone?  “What do you want?” Fane asked, taking a step back, checking his periphery. How had he lost that wolf?  The wolf in front of him sat down and turned to one of the others.

“Maybe they’re hungry?” Ishan asked as he eased over to the kitchen, putting a counter between himself and the beasts.  Fane watched one’s tail flip once. The creature was a dark coal grey with a massive white starburst running from his chest up and over the left shoulder.

“Uh…” Fane backed up a step.

One of the female wolves rubbed herself under the coal grey wolf’s muzzle.  She eased past Fane and out the door. Fane followed her path with his eyes, his attention split.  The other female followed her lead. Fane glanced at Ishan. He turned back to a pair of naked men standing in front of him and no wolves.  The Glock was up and the safety clicked in the quiet of the room. Ishan dropped a spoon on the metal counter, the ring reverberating.  “Woah, jeeze,” Fane cleared his throat.

“Food sounds good, but a pair of pant’s’d be better,” the thinner of the two men stated. Asian, his black hair hung to his shoulders. He was built like he spent time in the ring. The brown haired Caucasian next to him had to have been a running back, triangular, most of his bulk in his chest and shoulders.  “The girls went to hunt down Sophia to see if she can get them some clothes.” The brunette sat down in one of the chairs with complete disregard for modesty.

“Ishan…?” Fane’s voice wobbled.

“Fane?” Ishan asked.

Fane licked his upper lip nervously.  “What exactly did you and Bern do to my head?” he asked.  He could feel heat creeping up his neck, his hands trembling.  The tips of his fingers were burning with the chill that came with his frost.  The two men cast a glance at each other.

“I’m seeing the same thing you are, Fane.  So unless this is one really big hallucination, they’re real.” Ishan turned his back on the men.  He meandering about the cabinets and put a pair of pots and pans on the burners of the stove. The three at the table watched his nervous movements as he pulled ingredients and measuring cups from drawers and shelves.

“We don’t swing that way, man. The ones that do are holed up in the medical ward.” The running back waived off Ishan’s kitchen meanderings. 

Fane threw him a cold glance. “The fuck you mean by that, new comer?”

The man laid a finger at the side of his nose. “You belong to him, don’t you.” The man pointed Fane to Ishan’s back.

Ishan spun, a kitchen knife in his hand.  “He doesn’t belong to anyone and if you wanna keep what’s between your legs, don’t insult him.” The brown haired man put up his hands, opening his chest up wide in a non-confrontational stance.  He had haggard wounds across his chest and the stripes were caked in dirt and blood. They had been in a fight that day.

Fane tilted his head, looking down on the man sitting across from him.  “We are dating, if that’s what you meant.” He eased into a chair across from the two.

“You’re a Shaman.” The thin one’s voice was a deeper octave then what Fane could recall it being, and a soft accent lilted his vowels. Fane took pride in learning a person’s mannerisms, but these two were fluid. 

He could not catch up with their metamorphosis. He raised his eyebrows at that proclamation and chuckled.  “Dude, I ain’t no witch doctor. The best I got is murderer.” He smiled slyly, allowing the silver to flash through his eyes, plunging the room into frost. Thin whisps of ice coated the windows and table tops in sparkling ferns. The humidity crystallized, dropping across their skin.

“Pure Blooded Red Hare.” The running-back sucked in a breath of reverence, his voice going low, his accent thicker.  Fane placed it as an Eastern Block accent. He would have to listen to it longer to make an educated guess as to which country they were from.  He tracked the seeping fog. A gear clicked.

“Hey, Ishan?” Fane called.

Ishan busily hid behind his counter, working at the stove.  “What’s up?” he called back.

“Mind coming over here for a sec?” Fane asked.

“Well, you blew out my pilot light, so can’t really cook at the moment till I find where Corbin put the lighter,” he grouched as he came around the counter.  He focused on Fane solely, refusing to acknowledge the men sitting across from him. “What’s up?” he stood next to him.

Fane motioned him down. He traced a hand gently around Ishan’s neck, his thumb brushing the hollow beneath his earlobe behind his jaw, allowing possession to cross his own features blatantly.  This was his first time doing it without Bern, but he knew he needed the quiet, lest the beasts across from him knew what was going on. “I don’t know what is going to happen, but I need for you to not let go of me in case I screw this up,” he whispered into Ishan’s mind.  Ishan met his eyes, startled at the intimacy of the path. Ishan nodded and moved up behind Fane, his hand at his back between his shoulders.

Fane launched himself across the table at the running back, his speed a blur.  The large man didn’t have time to jump away. The thinner man came up as defense, fangs barred and dripping, but fell away from the gun pointed at his heart.  Ishan kept his hand at Fane’s lower back, now that he was reaching across the table. The prince eased up to sit on the table, transferring the gun to his own hand.  Fane took the rest of his weight on the table and turned all his concentration to the running back.

They dropped into the black inky fore-void before finding themselves trapped in Fane’s cavern.  The wolf landed softly on its feet, sniffing at the liquid of the pool. His hackles raised. He bared his fangs at the pool as the tension flicked and slithered.  His form shifted to that of a thickly muscled man, a touch shorter than the person who had been sitting out in the cafeteria. He was older, looking to be in his late forties, or early fifties, with grey streaks running through his thick hair.  The running back, who had dropped in clumsily next to the wolf, glanced over at the man, surprised to see the wolf transform.

The space was rank.  The taste of copper was heavy on their palettes.  The running back stood up in the room, his skin crawling.  “This is not good. Shouldn’t have made him mad.” The brown-haired man turned to the other man, the one who had been a wolf.  The wolfman was ignoring him, staring up into the dark. The younger man followed his sight up to the individual strung up in the wires, cold eyes watching them.  The world dissolved, and they fell back into their own bodies.

Fane collected the gun from Ishan and flipped the safety as he eased his way back into his chair.  “So, what’s the wolfman’s name?”

The man hitched a breath, trying to regain his sense of place.  “My name is Dietrik, Shaman.” The low voice permeated the room, the man bowed his head to the table.

“And your human?” Fane demanded.

“Alexander Deck. We did not mean you ill will, Shaman.” The man kept his head to the table, a shiver running across his shoulders.

“I’m no Shaman, Dietrik.” Fane dismissed the man.  He turned his eye to the thinner man. “And you are two individuals in one body too, I’m to assume, along with the other wolves.” Now that he was getting a hold of the situation he was calming down.  The frost dissolved off the window panes.

“My name is Benjamin Pak.  I go by Benj. My wolf is Heinrich.  The two who just left are Zola and Sun Hee, Dietrik and Heinrich’s mates reside in their bodies.” The thin man followed Dietrik’s lead and bowed where he sat.

“Hana and the gold and white wolves?” Ishan pressed.  He eased his touch from Fane’s back and went to move away from the table.  Fane brushed a trailing finger along Ishan’s hand as he left.

“Nat carries two wolves within him.  We cannot lose him now. He has Sven, my Father’s second in command, and Tereza, Cashia’s mate.  Yeller has Cashia. Hana has Sylvi, Sven’s mate, Shaman,” Heinrich filled him in.

“Father?” Fane raised an eyebrow.

“Dietrik is my father,” Heinrich elaborated.  Fane’s eyebrow went farther up. “Deck and Benj may share a close age range, but Dietrik is my father, Shaman,” he explained respectfully.

“Why do you insist on calling me Shaman,” Fane asked, getting real tired of nicknames.

“Respect for who you are, as we call the man named Bern a Healer.  When we were of our own form, many years back. We are much older than you can possibly imagine us to be. There were Shamans that resided in the valleys, in the deserts that bordered our hunting grounds.  They were members of a fierce tribe. The tribe kept Red Hare and White Horses, the Shamans and the Healers. They were special to the Emperor there. They succumbed though to the desert. The fine blowing sand affected their lungs badly,” Dietrik explained.

“Eand’s got no desert like that,” Fane protested, confused.  Bern had told him the Red Hares had been part of the Fyskar tribe many generations back who had helped guard the wall against the Romans.

“Never said our territory was on the Isles.” The wolf’s eyes flashed in the human face.  Fane motioned for him to elaborate. “I’m speaking of the Shamans of the Bai, those living in what is now Shan Hai Jing,” the wolf supplied.

“All right, what are you talking about?” Ishan walked over, shoving a pair of plates filled with cheese sandwiches in front of the two men.  “I’ve been out in Xianjing, and Fane, from everything I know of him and the DNA sequencing Corbin has ran on him, is most definitely not Han.  Not sure if he relates to the red-headed mummies up that way -” Ishan shrugged and sat down next to Fane, glancing at him curiously. Fane’s brain was frying all over again.  He had just gotten his head wrapped around the fact that the two men sitting in front of him had wolves inside of them and that he could randomly drop people into his subconscious without assistance.

“Bern also called me a Red Hare.  He calls himself a White Horse of the Fyskar. What does Eand and China have to do with each other?” Fane asked the two wolves.

The wolfmen glanced at each other.  They rolled their shoulders. “Fyskar is not a name we recognize from our upbringing.  The Bai or those who kept the White Horse; the ancient Bai respected the Red Hare and the White Horse.  Red Hare were special members of the tribe, those that protected the White Horses, that protected the herds, as they liked to say.” Dietrik bit into his sandwich.

“Are you talking about the Baima of Tibet or the Baima temple of the White Horse?” Ishan pressed.  Fane blinked, lost on the conversation.

“Neither, though there are legends that say an old White Horse of the Bai guided the first Bodhisattva through the valleys to establish a practice in the hills of Zhong.” Heinrich picked at the food.  The group fell into silence while the two wolf men gorged themselves.

Fane was the only one to not flinch when a knock came at the door frame.  “How’s he doing?” he asked, not turning to see Corbin leaning against the metal. 

“He’ll make it…barely. Sophia has her team working on him now. He’s been intubated and has a machine breathing for him right now.  Reconstructive surgery might keep both his lungs working. He’s…he has internal bleeding and they are prepping him now. She’s got him on monitors.  Bern says that one more good blow would have ruptured his kidneys. Yeller has a pair of broken finger and has had them splinted until the swelling goes down enough to set them. I’ve sent Yeller and Hana to the staff commissary to pick up clothes for everyone.” Corbin made his way into the room. Deck and Benj’s faces fell into worry. “I was told to have you two show up to the infirmary to have your cuts looked after and to have you get clean.” He shifted into a seat across from the two men.  

They hurriedly finished off their plates and took them up to the counter.  They glanced back at Ishan, uncertain what to do with them. Ishan waived them off.  Corbin sighed and pointed out the door. “Infirmary’s down through that corridor, hang a left at the bathrooms and go right at the second hallway.  Follow it to the end. There’s a door with a massive red cross on it, can’t miss it,” he directed. The two men nodded their heads and shifted. It was an amazing transformation to watch as fur pushed through their skin and their bones popped and shifted into a new position.  The wolves lopped out of the room and down the hall.

Fane turned to Corbin who was watching him steadily.  “So, you’re a godfather?” Ishan asked amiably.

“Never thought I’d get called on to godfather a college student.” Corbin rubbed his head in his hands.

“Could be worse, could be kids,” Fane mused.  Corbin glared at him. “What?’ he asked, not sure at what that look meant.

“You’re joking!” Ishan cried indignantly.

Corbin burried his head in his hands.  “…’parently all the misses are carrying…” He breathed a sigh of frustration.

“And we have to get a bird in the air in how many weeks?’ Fane pressed.

“Five,” Corbin conceded.

“Are we going to be responsible for taking care of a litter of…puppies..children…wolflings while in space?” Fane slid farther into his chair.

“If we take them,” Corbin nodded.

“Is there any reason not to take them?” Ishan demanded.

“Sophia doesn’t know if we can freeze the girls and the babies stay viable.  They are apparently quite close in term considering they have a different gestation rate because of the wolf hybrid thing going on.  At least, that’s what one of the girls said.

“Sophia said she’s uncertain of attempting a live birth in space though…” Corbin poked at the swirled frost on the table, melting points.  Ishan shoved a cup of coffee into the man’s hand and sat down next to Fane. Corbin nodded his head in gratitude and downed the tepid liquid.  The scientist drew in a sigh, looking into the bottom of the empty cup. “We have to get Nat stable before we can even start thinking about the girls. For now we’ve got bunks that the group can sleep in.  

“Talked to the young man, Yeller, for quite a time when Bern and Sophia stabilized Nat.  The human side of them are from up in Oregonia. College age kids from a town that hadn’t been wiped out from the drought and the war. Yeller’s a music major and bilingual in English and Irish. Deck was going in for business.

“Benj is molecular biology – which I know Sophia would be keen on.  Sun Hee was starting in on a physics degree, so that’s workable. I can probably apprentice her to Teslanoviach.  Zola’s dual majoring in animation and computer science. Thought she could create a new physics engine with Sun Hee for gaming.  She’d do fine behind a computer terminal. Hana posed as a veterinarian technician with little training. Bern said he’d take her under his wing and teach her medicine. Nat’s certified fluent in French with a goal of international translation – he’s able to speak Irish with relative fluency because of Yeller.  He wanted to get certified in Russian and Chinese next spring. Yeller said that he’s picking up Croatian from the wolves most likely. He’s apparently a fast hand at it. If Nat’s able to come out of coma that is.” Corbin shrugged. Ah, that explained the Eastern block accent, Fane though. “He could probably help with translation work if we have some language programs downloaded for him to work through.

“Kid explained how they got into the situation they are in now.  I think they, at least the wolves, would be a descent security squad for us, but it’s not like we really need much security in space. They apparently sought me out to have the wolves removed from them, but I don’t have a single clue how to do that,” Corbin confided.

“You’re about to set the largest spaceship on earth out into space with over five hundred cryochambers and three hundred functioning personnel.  There’s going to be a need for at least minor security. Guess the girls could have the kids in space. Not like we aren’t going to end up with a few pregnancies on board anyway amongst the personnel.  I want to see three hundred people not get it on for a hundred years.” Fane leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms.

“With some luck it’ll only be a hundred years if you can jump us far enough ahead,” Corbin nodded.

“What’ll happen when I’m too old to make the jumps?” Fane sat up to put his hands on the table. He pushed at the ice, melting wiggly circles across it.

Corbin mulled that over.  He pulled his shoulders up and shook his head.  “We’ll have to just hope that we can make it the remaining years.”

“Did you figure out exactly what they did to me?” Fane asked.  Ishan slipped his hand into his.

“The relay seems to only work on you because of what you are.  I looked through the files from the fourteen others before you.  They fit very similar profiles, at least from where they got the men: body composition, age, weight, height, nutritional state. They repeated it over and over again with very minor variability between each case.  Then you came along and they got a read on the relay and started focusing on you explicitly. They noted that you have amnesia most likely related to the surgery.” Corbin filled him in.

“So, I’m a one-off anomaly.” Fane looked up at the ceiling and scrunched his nose at the thought.  The amnesia wasn’t news for him.

“Not necessarily a one-off.” Corbin got up to refill his cup.

“What do you mean by that?” Fane called after him.  Corbin poured the burnt brew into his cup and buried his nose in it to draw in the scent.  He turned to the two men and rested his hip against the counter, watching them.  He took a sip, thinking. “I don’t think you’d like it.” The scientist shifted his weight. Fane raised a sceptical eyebrow at him, waiting for him to elaborate.  “Possible cloning. If you had children, they could maybe do the same thing,” Corbin explained.  

A chill swept up Fane’s tendons.  Ishan rested a stilling hand on his arm, aware of the frost spreading up Fane’s skin and across the table.  Fane rose quietly. That swamping sense of screaming pressed through his muscles, creeping from the ground up to wrap around his bones.  His blood sang to him. He swallowed, stilling the rage that burned just behind his eyes. “Ah’m gonna kip. Ret’ink yer wor’s ‘fore ye see me ‘gain.” Fane walked out of the room, Ishan trailing after him.

Chapel Orahamm (C) 2022-2023. All Rights Reserved.

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Firefly Fish: Ch 22

Peeking out of the cavern’s entrance, I had hopes of both seeing no one, and seeing someone, anyone who might be able to help me. From the dim lighting across the nesting ground, I assumed it was at least daytime hours, maybe noon. That gave me a limited time to find where the arena was without raising an alarm amongst the grounds. No one else knew I was here, other than Pursha, and I didn’t know where she had been taken off to.

I could sneak. I could bite someone and hold them hostage. I could just stride through and act like I had a chip on my shoulder. Options spread out before me in trying to find my courtship mate. Gritting my teeth, I chose a path. Carefully I snuck away from Karis’s cave and into the middle of the nesting grounds where I ditched my cover in a crevice. Slinging my pack across my back, I pulled my best Arahon impression, puffed up my chest, and made like I owned the place, but with a touch of slightly lost.

A mid-sized dynllyr, smaller than Pushra, but still larger than Saeesar was the first to notice me. “Are you supposed to be in here?”

“I was told there was an arena and a contender that I should see.” I waved to the channel above the nesting grounds.

The dynllyr deflated, shoulders sagging. “Council idiots. Can’t even give proper directions. Let alone to a Puca chi-child.” The dynllry recoiled, realizing what I was.

“Not here to eat anyone, just bored and wanted to see a bit of sport.” I shrugged. As long as he didn’t draw attention, this was going to be cake walk.

“Right. Well, that’s not something we get very often. I heard the Pack was half a day from here. I guess you got ahead?” He motioned for me to follow him.

“A bit. I had hopes of getting a better seat. Brothers and sisters can be rather annoying when you just want to enjoy a show, know what I mean?” I let the smile drip.

“Do I? Twenty-three of them, and they all have nests around me. Can’t get a word in at family dinners. I don’t even know why I try.” He hovered to let me keep up with him. My shoulder protested swimming, and the boxes of pearls and gems sat heavy on my back, keeping me tethered to the ground.

“Sounds complicated.” I tried for fine bubbles.

“Good time for you to be catching the event today, Kraken child. Karis brought back a prisoner from the Yuchatan. He went out there to find his son, got that resolved, calf’s back home, but anyways, he captured this big old fella and brought him back to have the Bet-tah go after him. Should be an awesome match. Barely saw the guy when the guards brought him through. He’s an Eagle Ray, even the Bet-tah’s got to struggle with this fella.”

I bit my tongue, willing myself through this conversation. I needed to get to Saeesar and see if the pattern I’d come up with would work. “Sounds to be an interesting match-up.”

“I can only imagine what a match-up would be like between a child of Puca and the Bet-tah; know what I mean?” The dynllyr’s bubbles were starting to irritate me.

“Oh, the thought has crossed my mind, but it wouldn’t be worth putting the arena into chaos. Don’t think the Overseer would much appreciate having a feeding session descend on his contender, right?”

“No, Karis would be angrier than a white shark missing meal time. Guess that won’t be happening. Love to see someday, though.”

We kept up this droll conversation as I hopped and jumped across crevices and boulders, following the dynllyr further through the nesting ground to what looked to be an outskirts area.

“What was this event to celebrate anyways? Just a prisoner acquisition? I heard there was something going on and to go see it, but I didn’t stick around to find out. Had to get out from my older brother’s crabbing for a bit.” I reiterated, reaching for relatable.

“We do get some seasonal events, celebrating the migrations and such, but this one’s special because Taigre came back safe after that last storm, and Karis was excited to check this match up; that’s all I know. Maybe there’s some star alignment or something. Never much cared about that. Just who gets eaten.”

“Eaten?” I tried to keep my voice from hitching.

“Well, dead more or less. Bet-tah hasn’t lost a match yet where he didn’t come out victorious. Fast little eel fang. I bet this Eagle Ray’s going to take him down a couple notches this time. I can feel it. Been getting cocky recently and let the Overseer’s calf get injured on his watch. Deserves it.” The dynllyr sneered.

My lights flashed, drawing the creature’s attention. “I’m just excited to see this now. It’ll be interesting.”

Walls of coral and rock stacked around a natural depression the better part of a mile wide helped shield the noise of the gathering crowd from the end of the nesting grounds. “This’d be it.” The dynllyr nodded toward the chaos. A shallow bowl in the middle of the large and small sprawling bodies designating a fighter’s ring.

“Thanks. Looks like it was probably better for me to come on my own, if only to not have to try to find a seat for all my siblings. Hope you get a better family dinner soon.” I knew my smile was tight, but I was struggling to keep from grimacing at the situation.

“You too.” The dynllyr left me to go join a different set of similarly coloured creatures making their way into the ring. There was no observable method to the madness. No barker or ticket collector. Then again, with no built-in economy, there was no barter or noticeable trade to be had. Having walked through the nesting grounds, some farmed algae for personal use, but not all. There were no livestock pens of a kind. I didn’t see much in the way of cooperation for gathering of supplies. What value was being gained in this blood sport? I couldn’t come up with a reason by my human-raised morals.

I held to the outside of the arena, watching, waiting. Circling it once took longer than I would have liked, but still, no move on with the match. Eventually, I settled on a tall rock outcrop near the ring to hold out hope the procession of Antumnos creatures would stop, and this event would get on with itself.

A creature, a differently coloured merperson from the children of Llyr entered the ring. A call close to that of a saxophone settled the noise. “My fellow bretheren!” The creature shouted, swirls of reds and purples bursting across its skin.

A raucous shout returned the creature’s summons.

“Are we ready for a new battle? One to beat all? The Bet-tah has held on fast to his spot yet, but will an Eagle Ray tame his dark attitude?”

The call back shook my bones, setting all my lights swirling. A couple dynllyr took notice, but returned to their entertainment.

A large merperson with a type of rubbery winglike feature that fell from his upper arms to connect back to his torso was escorted by several small dynllyr from a rock near the edge of the ring I had not initially realized was a cave. Looking down, a bubble of hope formed in my chest that what I sat on was one of these caves. An outcrop a third of the way around the ring from me instead produced Saessar and a guard of his own. Head hanging and fins limp, he didn’t look like he was aware of his surroundings.

I scrambled to my feet and ditched my messenger bag into a crevice in the mound I stood on. The announcer built up the crowd, drawing out cheers and boos for both sides. Red rings throbbed in my vision. Whatever the creature said, I had lost all interest in trying to understand this situation any more. Antomnous individuals were dissolving into regular sea creatures.

By the time I had realized the match had started, I was halfway through the crowd, and the Eagle Ray had a chunk of his wing on his left side missing. A shadow flashed past the larger creature, his cobbly features twisting in confusion and pain. Tail poised, he fought to follow the billowing black and white fins circling him.

My skin itched in watching this grotesque feat of strength. Between midway through the ring and finding my hands wrapped around Saeesar’s wrist and the Eagle Ray’s, I would never be able to say I could remember that journey. My spots had gone grey, hidden in that moment of sudden silence that descended on the ring.

“What is the meaning of this?!” A massive dynllyr from off to the side of the ring shouted. That was a voice that I would always remember. He pushed forward until he towered over us.

I barred my teeth. “You got in the way of Mate Claim.”

Saessar’s fins loosened, his wrist going slack in my grasp.

“You here with me now, Saeesar?” I glanced for his eyes, which had finally gone from blood-lust glass to cognizant.

“Mate Claim? What Mate Claim? I see no marks!” The great dynllyr bellowed, grabbing for me.

“I wouldn’t do that.” I let my lights blind everyone close to me.

“Pucah’s child.” “The Pack!” “A Kraken-child!” The roiling of bodies as creatures rushed to escape the ring rippled around us.

“You must be Karis,” I stated flatly.

“And you must be the Kraken child Taigre was telling long tales about.” The merperson regarded me with wary disdain.

“I’m the one claiming the Bet-tah. You’re the one who had a Keeper charm cast on him. So, now we’re going to have a conversation as to who is about to have an issue with who.” I tugged on the Eagle Ray’s wrist to see if he was ready to stop throwing punches. The creature settled carefully to the sandy bottom. “I won’t bite you if you don’t give me reason.” The massive black eyes staring back at me in a haunted expression blinked.

“Keeper charm?” Some creatures who had not yet found a quick avenue of escape started whispering.

“What Keeper charm? That’s against code,” Karis chuckled, brushing my words off like flecks of dust.

“Tell me how a child of Domnu has lived in these waters for well over a century then, Overseer. Well past the time he should return to his own nesting grounds, return to his own territory, take up the mantle his overseer father left behind for him.” His smell was that of pork roast glazed in maple syrup. My lights were playing up and down my arms and chest as my fixation rose with my cold anger. “Tell me here and now. Give me a reason not to mark you for death for stepping into my Mate Claim.”

The ring of watchers settled into their wallors, the only sound the echo of whales in the distance. Karis’s eyes, round in anger or fear, wandered between Saeesar and me. “You can’t just take my contender like that; you have no authority over me!”

“You think you have authority over me?” I released Saeesar’s wrist and floated up to sit on his shoulder.

“I – “

“You think you have the right to abuse my Mate?” I pushed.

“I-“

“You think you have the right to hit your ex-Mate?” I hissed, launching for the creature as protests erupted around the ring at that little revelation.

Karis backed up as I gained on him until we were eye to eye.

“You see, Karis, I came to help your son. Now though, maybe I should mark you like I marked him for trying to drown me. What do you think? Do you want that hanging over your head for the rest of your life? Wondering when one of my siblings will smell you and decide to turn you into a pile of bone?” I slipped a hand around the span of one of his gill covers, flicking at the red frills to irritate him. “Say one word, and I will, Overseer.”

I finally identified the look in his eyes. Terror.

“Do I have your attention now?” I let my teeth gleam.

He nodded.

“Good. Sit there and shut up.” I kicked his chest and pushed off to rocket back to Saeesar. The Bet-tah caught me before I could collide with him.

“Now. To see if this idea of mine will work,” I muttered and drew down the memories of the charms from the night before.

“What are you doing, Marin?” Saeesar stared at the wheel of red and white symbols spinning in my hand, his fins going pin-straight.

“Hoping.” I encouraged the symbol into a larger wheel and layered another set of notes along the edges. “Grit your teeth.” I turned the disc and pressed it into his chest. If it hit like my Breath hit me last night, he might pass out, and I really would be depending on my bite to keep me alive with Karis so close.

A gold charm pushed out of him, like I was replacing it. He gasped in pain, and thin stripes of white crept through his pitch-black fins. Saeesar grasped my shoulder, and I knew he wasn’t going to pass out, but he was going to get close.

“Keeper charm,” whispers around the arena told me what the gold charm was that I had released from him. A sigh of relief eased out of me while I waited for Saeesar to stop trembling.

“But no one’s ever released one.” “How?” “I’ve never seen one before.” “What was that charm?” “The Overseer had a Keeper charm?” “What else has he done?” “So, the contender wasn’t here because he wanted to fight?” “Algae scum.”

Anger rippled around the arena as the tides turned on Karis.

Saeesar’s grip loosened on my shoulder. He drew in a deep breath and straightened himself out. Catching my eye, he nodded. I returned the motion and turned to the Eagle Ray. “You’ve got a chunk out of you and probably need someone to stop the bleeding. I’m going to say you can go home. That something you want?”

“You saved me from an untimely death. I am at your mercy, life bound to you who saved me, Pucah Kraken child.” His body vibrated as he bowed low.

“And I would have you return to your home waters. Is that not something you are capable of doing?”

Karis tried to interrupt, “but-“

I turned and launched for him. Biting down on his shoulder, I took a chunk out of him and dearly wished to feast, but knew this wasn’t the time. Swallowing roast flavored meat, I frowned at the dynllyr and ran the back of my hand across my lips to displace blood.

“You bit me!”

“I told you I would. I told you I would if you said one word. And you did. Now. Do you want me to continue or are you going to shut up, because either way, you’re a dead fish.”

The creatures around the arena scrambled over each other in a panic. “The Overseer’s been bit!” “Pucah Kraken!” “Get out.” “Hide!”

Karis sank to the arena floor in shock, and I returned to Saeesar and the Eagle Ray.

“You bit him?” Saeesar whispered in panic.

“Told him I would. That was how mom raised us. She said something once and told us what the repercussion would be. If we ended up doing the thing that ended up with punishment, well, that was that. We didn’t get an opportunity to push back because she had a spine of steel like that.

“Now, Eagle Ray, you going home?” I returned the conversation Karis had interrupted.

The poor creature had lost all colour he possibly could.

“If I was not life bound, I would.”

“If I said you weren’t life bound?” I pressed for this headache to end.

“But I am. You stopped him from killing me.” He pointed to Saeesar, fingers shaking.

“You would follow me, knowing the creature who tried to kill you is my mate?” I posed.

“It didn’t seem like something he wanted to be doing. If he really had a Keeper charm on him, that is.”

“Then are you insistent on following me?”

“Yes. That is what it means to be life bound.”

“What will you do?”

“Whatever it is that you ask of me.”

“What’s your name?”

“Tlanextic, Pucah Kraken child.” The shake in his hands were getting worse.

“Are you nervous of me or is it blood loss that is making you tremble so bad, Tlaxtic, Textic, Tla- help.” I stumbled over his name. I had never encountered that sort of string of consonants before.

“Tlanextic,” he said slower, “it comes from the ancient humans who used to live near my nesting ground. It means light of dawn.” His trembling slowed as he was given time to explain and realize that I wasn’t some all-powerful being.

“Tla-nex-tic,” I carefully rolled through each sound until he nodded, and a curtain of fine bubbles told me he was amused at my inabilities.

“You did just bite that dynllyr. No Antomnous being would willing say that seeing something like that didn’t fill them with dread. You. Are you cold-blooded or just pissed off?”

“Oh, pissed off. Not at you, not at too many creatures, but Karis is up there on the list, that and some creature with a giant light on the top of her head, but we’re not getting into that right now. You will follow us then, Tlanextic?”

“To the edge of the sea and to the shallows of the glacier pools, Pucah Kraken child.” He nodded.

“My name is Marin. Nice to meet you,” I held out a hand and waited. He stared at it in confusion. “Maybe that’s not what all ya’ll do, is it?”

“Is what?”

“You don’t shake hands in greeting,” I observed.

“Is that what you do in your culture?” he asked, hesitatingly reaching forward to grasp mine.

I gripped down firmly and shook it once before letting go. “It is. Came from men showing that they were unarmed in a moment of meeting another.”

“How strange.”

“Indeed. Now, shall I leave the dynllyr and we get out of here, or do I eat him?” I turned to watch the creature’s eyes hollow with that threat.

“I want to see home.” Saeesar wrapped himself around me to keep me from moving toward the ire of my being.

“Then we go to your home. My siblings will come after him sooner or later, and though I’m now famished, I’m not entirely comfortable yet with fully eating someone while they’re still alive.”

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Fyskar: Ch 27 – Final Chapter

Eoin breathed a sigh of relief. The moon shown a brilliant, mesmerizing white. Stars blinked and sparkled in the night sky, a trailing band of white and pink clusters stretching from one edge of the tall walls to the either. A warm breeze shifted the large leaves of the palm trees. He stepped into the water, warmed by the sun through the day. The pool was encased in a small courtyard. Planters of pungent flowers hung in alcoves and sat in corners, perfuming the air with their intoxicating scent.

Fearchar slept soundly under soft sheets. Seonaid, drinking from a little cup of qahva, sat on a porch overlooking the pool. She stared out on a foreign night, marvelling at the clarity of the sky.

Eoin allowed the thin material of his silk robe to drop away from him as he stepped further into the sweetly scented waters of the pool. His hair floated away from him as he relaxed into the depths. His ring gleamed on his finger.

His Flath crown, now to be worn as a permanent addition to his wardrobe, glinted as the water reflected moonlight onto it. His Righ crown had been tucked away to be used during formal ceremonies. A bandage wrapped around his arm above his bracer where he had cut himself for the ceremony. Qasim and Vanora received the messages for the Forest willingly, wolfing down the blood-drenched meat. He would fly them in the morning after he had conducted his family’s burial and provided them with the message.

His sons would be arriving in a few days. Vasili promised to help teach Eoin how to work with his lump of gold to make Callum and Albin’s torcs. He would melt down the chain, lock, and key he was presented with at the ceremony and incorporate it into the torcs. It gave him time to mix the hair oil and powder and blend the ochre for the tattooing ceremony. Mirza had promised to send sketches of the bodhran to his instrumentalists and have one set for the ceremony.

Fearchar and Seonaid were going to begin training them in what should have been their native tongue, though Mirza was sceptical after hearing Eoin drop into a rough brogue. Amina and Tau were still around to talk to the children in their first spoken language, though they had plans to travel back to establish Egret’s Nest once more when the rainy season passed. A private tutor would be on retention in the palace to continue their studies in Mirza’s tongue.

Mirza’s father, thrilled that the physician had returned to care for two of his own sons, was astounded to discover the man who had occupied his palace for almost half a decade was a king. He had looked over the deed, as Mirza had done. The document was stored in the treasure room, promised to Eoin that they would be returned immediately if he ever needed it.

He had been provided with a plot within the family graveyard he would use to bury what little remained of his family. The last Fyskar king would see to their Walk with the rise of the morning sun before the day’s brighter festivities. Leaning back against the edge of the pool, he counted the brightest stars in the sky. Eoin would see his family whole upon his death. He could not ask for a better outcome.

Fearchar and Seonaid were assigned to serve as Eoin’s council. That was the best he would be able to explain between both sides of the group. He had been given new chambers farther in the palace, closer to Mirza’s residence with a pool shared amongst the block of apartments the court’s princes resided in and the upstairs room in which Fearchar and Seonaid were now living. He would leave them that evening after his bath to quietly make his way to his prince’s chambers.

He floated in the warm water, the blue of the indigo seeping at the edges. He enjoyed the quiet of the night and listened to the croak of frogs in the trees. He breathed a sigh of relief as tears escaped his eyes. His children were safe. He was where he now understood home to be in this phase of his life. His journey was over. It had taken him ten years and travelling across the world twice to find it.

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Fyskar: Ch 26

“My father will not be amused. We should be in the hall waiting for his arrival. Is the bird necessary?” Mirza motioned Eoin, Seonaid, Fearchar and the servant through one of the many rooms leading away from the feast. “You and your flock.”

My partners are essential to this. If you’re going to let me take my rightful title of Righ through my own ritual ceremony in front of your father, I will have my teachdaire anam. It does no good to announce my position if my people in the Forest are not informed of the ascendancy.

“Tau refused to allow anyone else, including me, to take care of your menagerie. I have raised raptors since I was old enough to wear a glove.” Mirza pointed to a door that led them through a series of prep rooms and kitchens. Women skittered away from the group, bowing as they passed through.

A young woman in a plain brown dress waved meekly at Eoin. You’re back, Niloofar!

Good evening, Sarai. He greeted her. He turned his following comment back to Mirza. I must remember to bake Tau bannock when I get the chance to infiltrate the kitchen this week.

“You’ve used the kitchens?” Mirza paused to stare in horror at Eoin, flicking a glance between the physician and the woman.

What? I’m a respectable enough cook. I miss my food some days. I may not have the same ingredients here as I am familiar with, but I can make passably customary meals when I need that taste. Eoin pressed through to the remaining door and opened it onto the stables and smithy.

“And you know the staff?” Mirza’s voice darkened. He flicked his wrist, sending the servant running to the stables and the aviary and mews beyond it.

Eoin walked further into the shadows, away from prying eyes, before pulling the giant to the wall of the stables. “Don’t go alluding to things you know I have not done. I’ve lived here for five years and have to communicate somehow.” He opened the memories in his void to the early mornings spent sitting in the palace kitchens teaching the young girl how to cook his native foods and speak to him. Theirs was a platonic relationship of teacher and apprentice. She had taken up with Amina to learn how to care for Eoin’s medicinal garden as a supplement to her cooking. Eoin dropped the prince out of his void and let go of him.

Mirza bowed his head. “I’m sorry. That was unfair of me.”

Since my husband and wife died, you have been the only one I took up with until I returned to my homeland, and you know it. I must find ways to communicate with the staff if I am to achieve anything in this palace. It’s easier to work with those interested in learning, and the young tend to be it. Now, where’s Qasim? Eoin pulled on his leather gloves, cinching the wrist tight with the button.

“Where you last left him. Tau has joined me on my hunting trips to let Qasim stretch his wings. He has been a boon. I am thinking of having him shifted from working the gardens to managing the aviary.” Mirza followed behind Eoin. Eoin stalked into the aviary at the far outer corner of the stable walls.

Ask him what he wishes to do. He is my family, and you have left them to me. He will be given the freedom to choose to leave if that is what he desires.

“As you say.”

He was a good chief. He managed the garden staff well up to now. Taking him away from people to handle animals may not be something that he will excel at. Having the diversion from the tedium is probably why he has been so good with the birds.

“And you brought a new one back with you? When did you have time to capture it?” Mirza sent the servant to obtain a pair of perches and furnishings the bird would need. Eoin stalled the fleeing servant, signalling for a doubling of the materials.

I captured her as an eyas eighteen years ago. Eoin glanced into the mews, searching for his charges and checking on the other tenants.

“Tau put it opposite of Qasim’s.” Mirza pointed to the offshoot in the mews where Eoin kept his precious charge. “You said her. Does she have a name?”

Vanora. Eoin handed a spare gauntlet and hood to Fearchar.

He fumbled, catching it before it hit the ground. “Laird? Vanora’s never taken to me.”

“Was transporting her back difficult?” Mirza asked over his shoulder.

The Daleroch, when they took the property, kept the mews. I don’t know what they did to the poor thing. She has been badly mishandled. I’m honestly surprised she has survived as long as she has with those bastards. The months getting back, even for travel, have improved her disposition tremendously.

Eoin stopped in front of the stall opposite of the one Mirza was peering into. He whistled low to the perched bird. The creature’s head went up, its eyes dilating as it searched out the familiar noise. Eoin clicked and whistled a set of short quiet notes. The bird ruffled its feathers up and let them fall down before sidling along the stick it was perched to until it was next to the bars. Eoin rested his head against the bars to look down at Qasim.

“He responds to your whistles.” Fearchar moved closer to Eoin to admire the golden eagle. The beast was smaller than Vanora, but not by much. Eoin nodded, a nostalgic smile touching his lips.

“I thought you needed the female?” Mirza protested as his physician slid into the stall. Eoin raised an eyebrow at Mirza. There were times when his hands were bound. Mirza quieted at the look as Eoin commanded the bird through a series of whistles and clicks until it was safely perched on his hand. He motioned Fearchar to ready his hand. Fearchar squared himself, offering his arm as a perch. Eoin whistled once more. Qasim shifted and ruffled his feathers before collapsing them and launching from his owner to the redhead. Fearchar stole himself from flinching as the massive creature sailed to him and landed. He rolled his hand up until the bird balanced on his thumb. He mimicked what Eoin had done with Vanora many times and slid the hood over Qasim’s head, leaning over to draw the accordion braces with his teeth. The hood on, Qasim settled on Fearchar’s hand.

Seonaid waited at Vanora’s bay with Mirza. Eoin motioned Fearchar out to wait as he situated his eagle on Seonaid’s glove before motioning them out of the aviary. They emerged and took the direct route through the servants’ quarters to the formal halls to wait outside the throne room door.

“What are we doing with the birds, Laird?” Fearchar asked, checking the tethers once more.

I must have a messenger for my rights. It will take my tale to those in the Woods to let them know of the news that a new Righ has taken the throne of the Fyskar.

“I don’t think I understand. This is your heaven, yes?” Mirza asked.

You could think of it in such a term. These are my way of communicating with the dead of my clan. They are integral to every clan gathering, marriage, birth, death, and the ascendancy of the throne. I will fly them tomorrow after my family’s burial to take the messages for me.

Two pairs of servants and Eoin’s guard rushed into the room with materials in hand. The guard carried his massive antler crown. One team of servants carried a tray of meat, candles, a knife, and the seagull wings. The other held Qasim and Vanora’s perches.

“Ready?” Mirza asked, motioning the servants and guard into place. The servants with the food and paraphernalia were first, followed by the servants with the perches. The guard, followed by Eoin, Seonaid, and Fearchar with the birds behind him.

No. Bile rose at the back of Eoin’s throat. He’d be sending a message to his father that he had finally taken his rightful place amongst the Fyskar. It was not an easy feeling.

“Do you have everything?” Fearchar whispered, touching a free hand to Eoin’s naked back.

“All I have are stories of how this was done for my father. Bernard never explained all the intricacies to the wards. I will make do with what I can remember.”

Mirza left them to enter the chamber with the deed and a sheet of Eoin’s formal title and meaning of the titles. He greeted his father. Eoin shifted nervously as he listened to the man describe him to the court. The doors opened to the glitter of candlelights and faces. A space had been made at the foot of the throne for the ceremony. Eoin stepped through the threshold to take his place as Righ of the Fyskar.

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Fyskar: Ch 25

They entered Eoin’s chamber. It was a fourth the size of the prince’s, but comfortable. His pharmacy lay in the room next door to it. He had allowed Fearchar and Seonaid a peek inside. A year since he had seen the inside of those two rooms, and memories flooded him with a sense of loss and need. Most of his herbs would have to be harvested all over again, but it was worth the sacrifice. His short apothecary cabinet rested on the desk. He’d restock the materials the next day.

Fearchar and Seonaid stared around in awe at Eoin’s bed-chamber, twice that of their own house they had left back on the isle. Rugs and pillows covered the bench in myriad colours and patterns. The grate of the window repeated six-pointed stars and squares with intricate bevels and floral cutouts. It overlooked a courtyard with trees and fountains, leaving the chamber cool and sweet-smelling.

Eoin approached the chest stacked on his old clothing trunk. He caressed the swirled carving as he opened the box once more. He pulled from it the leather folio and held it out to the prince. Mirza took the folio and carefully extracted the document. He read through the long sheet slowly. “This land size…” Mirza paused a moment, rereading the dimensions once more, the descriptions of the hills and the coastline, the included docks and pastureland. “It’s larger than the mountain region of my father’s domain,” he breathed out, looking up at Eoin in awe.

Land is nothing without people if one is to rule as sovereign. Eoin shrugged and turned back to the chest.

“I’ll have it stored in the treasury room when we leave here,” the prince muttered. “Your children will surely want this one day.” He slipped the velum sheet back into its leather protection. 

Eoin nodded and sighed before turning back to his trunks. I need to speak with your musicians. I need a bodhran made. He pulled from the chest his white robe and shook it out. Retrieving a long straight staff set with a small hook in the centre from the second room, he slipped the robe over the wood and hung it on a peg, pulling wrinkles from the wool.

Mirza approached the garment, fingering the embroidery along the edge. “You need to find that key first,” the prince muttered in his ear. Eoin glanced at the man before he continued pulling out his kilts. Tossing pillows from the bench, he laid out the immense length of fabric, trying to let the textile relax its creases. “I’ll have a servant take it to the washroom and have someone there straighten it for you.” Mirza approached the fabric.

Really, you don’t need to do that, Mirza. Give it a couple days to air, and it’ll stop being wrinkled. Eoin, unsettled at the action, stood back as Mirza gathered the robes and kilts up.

“You’ll need it for tonight.” The man turned to him.

It’s already night. Eoin pointed out the dusk.

“Just sunset. Even more reason to hurry. Where’s your key?” the prince demanded. Eoin took a step back at the snap and looked around for his duffel. It was sagging beneath a mound of pillows. He rifled through the pack. Near the bottom, he found the strip of leather he had tied the necklace to and pulled it out to show the prince. The man held out his hand for the tiny instrument and ring. Eoin dropped it into Mirza’s hand, a fleeting grimace running across his lips.

The prince looked over the ring, curious at the etching. “It’s like your…” He looked up at Eoin and then looked again. “Where’s…?” The prince touched Eoin’s collar bone, right at the centre of the torc.

“It’s my signet ring, a symbol of my position, same as that document, the crown, my tattoos, my hair. I left my husband and wife’s signet pendant at his grave.” Eoin touched the vacant spot where the prince rested his finger.

“I’m so sorry, my little White Bird. Truly I am,” whispered the prince. Mirza turned and disappeared out the door, calling to a guard.

Eoin popped his head out to witness the guard dash down the hallway. He shrugged and walked back into the room. Before he could protest, a hand settled on top of his head and pulled his crown from his white locks. He looked up at the prince, confused. Mirza?

A servant appeared along with Vasili in his long red robes and squat cylindrical hat. Mirza placed the mass of white wool in the servant’s arms first. “Get this straightened, immediately. Find as many servants who won’t ruin it and get it done, now. Bring it back before the guests start arriving!” He sent the servant running from the room.

Guests? Eoin demanded.

The prince ignored him. Instead, the giant turned to Vasili. He held out the crown to the man along with the key and the ring. He grabbed Eoin’s chain and directed him over to the jeweller, thrusting the chain into the man’s gloved hand. “Get it polished, all of it, and the spare smaller crown he has in that box. Be careful with anything you touch. You have until that servant gets back,” Mirza demanded, walking out the door.

Vasili nodded to Eoin with a happy smile. “So, you have returned! Did the mask work well? My boy was too happy to prove himself on that stitching, and I must say the tip was a joy to manipulate,” the man greeted. Eoin nodded, not entirely sure what was going on anymore.

“Seems I must be delicate with your parcels, Niloofar. Would you mind finding the crown Mirza mentioned?” The man released his charge. 

Eoin bit down on his lip to still his desire to curse and turned back to the box, pulling out another wrapped package. Seonaid took the oiled hide from him as he unwrapped a smaller circlet with a deep v incised with birds and fish. The physician handed it to Vasili, who studied it with fascinated appreciation before laying it aside. He reached for Eoin’s chain once more, going for the lock.

“Eoin?” Fearchar asked, coming over to size up the jeweller. Vasili glanced at the muscled redhead, initially dismissing him before the man’s hair intrigued him. He dropped Eoin’s chain and approached Fearchar. Eoin’s bodyguard backed up, his eyes going round. “Who’s yer friend, Eoin?” Fearchar circled, keeping his back from getting pressed against the wall.

Eoin pointed at the bracers. Made, he signed quickly.

“Woah, woah, woah, nae happen’ snipe! Ah ga’ me own.” Fearchar shoved his leather archer’s bracer in the man’s face. The man glanced at it. His eyes went round, and he grabbed it, flipping it this way and that, intrigued with the carefully embossed knotwork scrolled across the dark leather.

“Shite, le’go ye maimy bastard.” Fearchar tugged his hand out of Vasili’s grasp.

Vasili turned back to Eoin. “A quick polish, Niloofar?” the man smiled, no ill will in his eyes. Eoin nodded, puzzled. “All right, all right, come, sit. This will take some time; we must hurry, mustn’t we?” Vasili pulled his chain, dragging him to the bench and forcing him to sit down. Seonaid scuffled away as the men sat down, ignoring her. Vasili pulled from his thick belt a small bottle and a large soft cloth.

“What’s happening, Fearchar?” Seonaid whispered to her husband. Fearchar shrugged, not entirely sure.

“They speak strangely, Niloofar. Henri would have loved to have seen them. I’m sorry to inform you that he passed away in his sleep three days before the Festival of One Hundred Rubies,” Vasili supplied reverently for the dearly deceased. 

Eoin held back sudden tears. He had hoped to introduce Fearchar and Seonaid to his mentor and tutor. Sniffling, he wiped at his eyes. He’d never share a pot of gavheh with the man again. Vasili nodded his head sympathetically. “Tomorrow is the beginning of Nowruz already.”

Eoin stopped him from another monologue with a series of signs. It’s Chahar Shanbeh Soori? Is that why we have everyone here already? I’ve lost complete track of the seasons.

Vasili nodded, catching the gist of Eoin’s rapid signs. “Yes. We’ll get you nice and shined. Henri was blessed by a priest Mirza had brought in. He was buried in the way of his Huguenot brethren. You should visit him in the morning before the rest of the celebrations begin.” Vasili turned to the chain to polish.

Eoin sighed, trying to reign in his scattering emotions. He nodded deferentially. Are his flowers still growing?

Vasili pondered the question. “I believe they are. Tau and Amina kept your medicinal beds in good stead while you were gone. They may have transferred them to your garden for you.”

If they are there, I’ll take a few clippings of his bear’s ear to his tomb.

The smith paused a moment, waiting for his own betraying emotions to abate. He turned to the odd pair the physician had returned with. “You brought them with you?” Vasili moved the conversation away from the well-loved translator. Eoin nodded. His hands were quite close to being tied with the red-robed man rubbing the bracer vigorously, stamping down his ability to talk.

“That’s nice. You were always busy here. It’s good that you have proper help now. Was your journey pleasant? Did you get to see the ocean? I’ve never been to the seaside. It sounds wonderful. Oh! What about a ship? How far did you go?

“You were gone for so long. It was making the prince restless to the point of madness. He couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep. With both you and Henri gone, he wandered the halls at night. Outright startled the cleaning staff more than once.” The man spoke as fast as a flock of birds.

Eoin blinked. The language was not entirely rusty, but Vasili’s accent was heavy enough as it was, let alone when he got to really talking.

The man continued his tirade of commentary and questions as he finished the bracers and the bangles, not waiting for the physician’s reply. Eoin had explained what he could to Fearchar and Seonaid while he had his hands free from the man. Vasili moved to Eoin’s torc, sweeping his hair off it. “Oh, my! What became of that lovely fish pendant of yours? It looks quite strange with it not hanging here.” Vasili touched the empty spot between the terminals of his torc with a gloved finger.

Buried it with my family, Eoin replied.

“Buried what, Eoin?” Seonaid asked. She sat down next to Vasili, allowing Eoin to work around Vasili’s frame a little easier.

My husband and wife’s pendant – their seal. I left it back at the grave. I had found it before I got shot. I hung it on my torc. He had to fight tears that he had promised himself he was done shedding.

Vasili continued polishing quite happily. Nervously, he pulled from his belt a small pouch and dropped it in Eoin’s hands. “I always liked that little pendant. It seemed to fit so well. I played with a few spare blanks that I had lying around while you were gone. I thought it might make the prince feel better to have something to remind him of you while you were away, but I never got the courage up to give it to him.” Vasili tried to hide behind his work by taking up yet another piece of precious metal to buff.

Eoin shook the pouch until two tiny thumbprints sized flakes of matched gold fell out. He held one up to look at it in the fading light. Within the engraving sat a long-billed bird on a pond with a blooming water lily. He smiled at the image. It would have made the prince happy.

“Do you want them?” Vasili offered. Eoin nodded, handing the man the tiny pendants. “Well, all right then! Hmm.” Vasili looked at the thin gold necklace that had the key on it and pursed his lips. “You had yours on a good thick leather that could take the wear. A bit thin, if you ask me. Seeing as you sleep in the thing, it would inevitably break.”

Vasili pulled out another leather pouch and produced a pair of crimps to begin pulling the chain apart. Eoin held up his bracers, the thicker chain flashing. Vasili contemplated the loops for a moment. “It’ll make your reach shorter?” the man explained. Eoin shrugged. “If you are sure?” Vasili unlocked the chain and proceeded to pull a short length of links off, relocking the chain. With a bit of work and more than one good poke to the throat and a bruised clavicle, Vasili hung the pendant between the torc’s terminals. Eoin touched the flake, a waiver of a smile kissing his lips. He would give Marduk the other charm later.

Finished polishing Eoin’s immediate jewellery, Vasili turned to the crowns he had carefully set on pillows. “It is quite well done.” He admired the wire wrap of gold before carefully working over the massive antlers and lengths of gold suspended pea-sized freshwater pearls and beryl. The ornate carvings repeated in patterns of swirling triangles and horses.

He turned from the oversized crown when its gleaming surface cast gold spots across the lattice and ceiling and moved onto the smaller crown that Fearchar and Seonaid were familiar with in Eoin’s void. Waves and seagulls flew along the thick wires. “It has been within your family long?” Vasili asked.

Eoin nodded, thrilled to hear the appreciation in the jeweller’s voice. He wasn’t sure how old the crown was. It had been passed down from king to prince. His father had told him he couldn’t list how many years it went back. It had been used before the creation of the deed. His father had loved the shapes on the crown and had decided to establish Eoin’s own torc off the patterns. Vasili rubbed at the gold gently, cleaning oil from creases. With painstaking detail, he buffed scratches from its surface and made it gleam once more.

The man turned to the signet ring. “Cruder carving, and much wear. This is older than your necklace, is it not?” Vasili asked as he looked over the small band.

The ring was provided to my many times great grandmother after assisting Donnchad mac Crinain’s wife and children. My many times great grandfather received the land rights for helping Donnchad achieve a relatively peaceful kingdom. Eoin explained to Fearchar and Seonaid and nodded for the benefit of Vasili.

“That is old,” Seonaid gasped, surprised the ring went back to before the great crusades.

The evening was fully set, and Fearchar had been forced to light the small oil lamp by the time Mirza returned with a harried-looking servant. The servant held a pair of white bolts of fabric, having wrapped Eoin’s kilt and robe about straight pieces of wood.

“Wonderful, Vasili. You always do beautiful work,” the prince commended the jeweller. Vasili, finished with his polishing, presented the antler crown and ring to the prince and bowed his way out of the room. The servant looked about, wondering what he was supposed to do with the fabric. Eoin held out his hands for the bolt. The servant, too happy to be relieved of his duty, handed it off, bowed his way from the room, and dashed down the hall.

[image error]“What else do you need?” the prince asked quickly.

“Need? What is going on, Mirza?” Eoin touched the man’s arm. Mirza’s emotions were in an excited tizzy of fear, anticipation, and joy. “Marduk?” Eoin pushed again.

“We are having a banquet for welcoming you home. My father and brothers will all be there. Your young charge has been looking forward to your return for the better part of a year now. I want to present you to them as a fellow king, as royalty, as you are. This feels ceremonial, don’t you think?” The man asked, excited. Fearchar pushed into the void, curious as to what was going on. The prince turned to him. “You know how to help get him ready for a ceremony, right?”

” ‘e i’nae my original clan, sire.” Fearchar shook his head. “If Ah had an example, maybe?”

A slew of memories crowded the glade in Eoin’s void with a wide variety of costumes he had worn through his lifetime. The chaotic jumble stifled all progress. Eoin stepped back from the pack, his heart threatening to constrict the space. 

“Calm thyself, Laird,” Fearchar eased his hand on Eoin’s arm. “Eoin, enough, ye’ll blister us. We can get ye put together. Easy. Think. Yi’ve got yer kilt ‘n yer robe. ‘s there anythin’ else ye’d need?” he asked.

“That entirely depends on everything!” The man paced in the void, his heart thumping against his rib cage. Anxiety mounted. Another hand pressed in on him. Seonaid emerged into his void in time to be overwhelmed with various ceremonial images flashing through Eoin’s head.

“Seonaid, d’ya ken? Prince is presentin’ ‘im ta the uppities t’night,” Fearchar explained quickly.

“You have the most bizarre way of expressing yourself; you realise that, right?” the prince mused, staring at the redhead in befuddlement.

“Aye, ‘e’s rough ’round te gob, but,” Eoin shrugged, still fixated on the images he was flipping through. 

Mirza turned from his physician to Fearchar in horror. “What have you done to my physician?”

“Yer leannan, Mirza. Eh, scared ‘im, made ‘im mad, fecked ‘im, ‘elped ‘im kill aff a ‘ole clan. Dare ya, go make him screamin’ mad. Wait till he star’s cursin’ ye out. His burr drops a’ octave.” Fearchar smiled sweetly.

“Burr?” The man studied his physician as though he had grown a second head.

Eoin turned a mischievous glance at the giant. ” ‘side the point, Mirza. Could ‘a tol’ me ye’re having a party before pouncin’ me. Ye want me dressed? From my homeland, or when I served Egret Nest or yer’s or somethin’ of all it? Someone needs to get out; I can’t handle all three of you in here at once.” Eoin pointed out the warping of the void.

“Keep my lass. She’s more fashionable than me,” Fearchar bowed out.

Eoin turned to Seonaid. “Ye ‘ave anythin’? he was desperate.

“I-” she looked around at the images, startled. She had not anticipated this to be the extent of the conversation. Eoin wiped his face and squished his mouth. He turned from image to image before turning back to Seonaid. “All right, calm down. Don’t panic. We can get you put together in short order. What are you planning for him to do, Mirza?” She turned on the giant.

The giant glanced down at her for a second before moving his eyes away to stare fixedly off in space as he replied, “I had planned on explaining that Niloofar is a king of his people. He did say he had never realised he had ascended from being a prince. Is there a ceremony for ascending to the new title? I was going to present him his crown in court along with the deed with his royal title; that way it would be clear to my family and the servants. I was going to unlock those chains formally. I can have Vasili remove the bracers and the bangles.”

“Nae, leave the jesses. They’re fine where they are. Let me think.” Eoin pondered the images floating through his brain. One stood out more prominent than the others: his wedding day as he handfasted with his husband and wife, his father acting as ritual-bearer. A much younger Eoin had on his pure white kilt and white robe. His soft white cuaran and bright red tassels were not easily replaced. He would go barefoot instead. Stunning against this white costume was his chest and face. Blue spirals and intricate knots had been finely painted across his skin. Vanora clung to his black gauntlet, her wings outstretched. “Symbols, all of them. Long life, good luck, fertility blessings…each knot has meaning. Took through the honeymoon to wash the blasted stuff off. Osla practically bathed me in an ale cask to get the stain off. It got on everything.” Eoin traced a symbol in the air, letting it glow for a moment before fading. Thankfully, the wool had not come to harm from it, giving up the dye rather quickly, as did his hair.

“What is that?” the prince asked. “Can we use it?”

“Woad, which doesn’t grow here, and I used my entire supply consecrating my clan’s grave, so that’ll need to be skipped. I brought home seeds with the hope to grow myself a patch. I will need it for my sons.” He motioned the image away.

“You left indigo and brushes in your pharmacy, did you not? Would that work?” His prince persisted. Eoin turned to look the man up and down. The thought had not occurred to him to deviate from the methods of his homeland. It would take forever to paint on, though.

“Is it only for marriage?” Seonaid asked.

“Nae, well, depends on the intent. Births were signified by painting an opening for a spirit across the brow and nose after their seventh day of life. I mean, there are ones for battle that I am aware of, though Fyskar didn’t raise blade in any battle since the time of Briuis. Funerals for those who died suddenly or violently, we would rub the bodies in ochre and paint the blue spirals to help the spirit journey. Elders who passed on gently were coated in blue. I never saw the ceremony for ascending to Righ, but my father shared with me his memory of when he was crowned. Most are for communicating with the spirits and statements of family and place,” Eoin conceded.

“Show us,” Mirza demanded.

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Life of a Librarian: Ch 5

I waited for Claude at the base of the stairs.  I didn’t know if I was slotted for more quizzes, or if I could go, but I knew that I wasn’t going to wait very long to find out.  I may not have memorized a lot of books, but I could at least remember enough quotes to raise a bit of chaos.  Claude came tumbling down the stairs after me, having been caught off guard from my exploit with cotton candy death clown’s sword.

“Well, Claude, I believe I’d like to visit with the Chair.  They will apparently have been watching this whole spectacle on some kind of camera,” I commanded, motioning him towards the door.  He eyed me, suddenly wary.  I quirked an eyebrow at him.  “What’s up?” I asked, acting like everything happening was as normal as the moon rising after the sun setting.

He gulped, trying to place what was wrong with this situation outside of the major issue that I was walking around unattended.  “Why do you want to see the Chair?” He led me out of the chamber.

“You really want to know what I have to ask the Chair?  You sure?” I asked, smiling, skipping down the hall backwards, just out of reaching of his stilling hand.

“What are you on about Ms, ehem, Thaddeus?” Claude asked when I was halfway down the hall, basking under a halogen light.  Have you ever been drunk on power; on a knowledge that you could turn your situation on its head and watch it fall to pieces just to do it all over again?  I was so smashed at that point.  I knew at that point that the Mad Hatter Simil knew nothing of crazy.

“This: All the names I know from nurse: 

Gardener’s garters, Shepherd’s purse, 

Bachelor’s buttons, Lady’s smock, 

And the Lady Hollyhock.  – Stevenson if you have to ask Claude,” I spouted off The Flower by Robert Louis Stevenson.  The whole hall was covered in a thick carpet of herbaceous bordered gardens, filled with flitting butterflies and birds.

Claude stopped his advances, finding himself sinking a foot deep in plant matter.  He looked up at me, terrified.  “Oh…shit…” his eyes turned round.

“You’re lucky I have the entirety of Poe’s works memorized,” I smiled slyly.

He lifted his wrist to his mouth.  “Emergency in ward W3 out front of the quizzing arena.  We have a Shifter.  I repeat, we have a Shifter.” Claude kept his distance, his hand outstretched.

“Oh, now, Claude, is that really necessary?  I did ask for you to take me to the Chair after all,” I laughed, speaking forth a warm Mississippi water flow to lay on a little raft from Tom Sawyer.  His outstretched hand had me vaguely interested.  He apparently wasn’t sure of whatever I was doing.

“Thaddeus, please unRead this and come with me peacefully.” His colour had gone a grotesque mottled green.

“Blight of all hard works on land and river, return to your sun flow,” I motioned, and the water evaporated, leaving the hall a little cleaner I thought.  I tip-toe danced over to him, seeing the anxiety flash across his face as I approached.  “So the Chair is wrong?” I slid up behind him, around him, just to dance away again.

“What is wrong with you, Thaddeus?  You weren’t like this when I got you this morning.” Claude looked at me petting a little white rabbit with a large pocket watch.

I glanced up, my eyes flashing death.  “Let’s get something straight here, Missuer Claude.” I waved away the rabbit, not even unReading it.  I didn’t think Claude could look any more sick, but he succeeded. I sidled up to him, so close that I could see him tremble.  “First,” I paused for dramatic emphasis, watching a bead of sweat drip down the side of his face, “for the sake of saying it, who wouldn’t snap after four days of this bullshit?” I jumped back as I heard a clang of metal slash through the ceiling tiles of the hall.

Simil crashed between Claude and myself, his sword dropping to point at my chest.  I could feel a malicious smile slide across my face.  I considered just a set of words from Akatsuki No Yona, and a small hand dagger immediately found a home in my groping palm.  My next thought flashed to Rick Riordan’s works, and a Roman shield clamped itself to my left arm.  Simil’s sword bashed down harshly on the wood and leather, shocking my shoulder.  Black spots flashed in my eyes.  “Snakes, why did it have to be snakes?” I smiled maliciously, repeating one of my favourite lines from Indiana Jones.  The entirety of the hall suddenly became a slithering writhe of serpents.  Simil lept back from a deadly cobra, taking its head off, and several others on his way.

“Simil, what do we do with her?  She’s…she’s” Claude had reached his limit as he sank to the floor.

“Oh, poor man…should I have been nicer to him?  You know, like giving him some food after three days of jail time, or neglecting to chain him in front of 300 people, or letting him hold his cat and fall apart?” I snapped out, venting my anger.  Simil ignored the outburst, standing guard over the unconscious man.  “Begone oh vile creature that spreads upon the burning earth, for I am neither giver, nor taker, but watcher who deems necessary a levelling of this blight,” I waved away the snakes with the same line that I had used to get rid of the pythons in the education room.

I knew I was giving up my advantage by doing so, but I was spent, and I knew by the black spots wringing my vision that it wasn’t going to take long for me to join Claude, sprawled on the cold polished floor in a slump.  Tears blurred my vision.  “I just want answers.  I just want to go home,” I yowled.  I heard a clatter, but didn’t look up from the spot in the floor that my vision had centred on.  I felt arms wrap around me, holding me close, the warmth easing me into a grand blackness of dreamless bliss.

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