As I stand on this hill, fire-spawned wind and flickering orange light playing across my face, I wonder, is it true what the dreamers say? Are there really realms beyond ours, ruled by divine beings who reward their faithful with an existence after mortal life ebbs away? And if those realms really exist, do the people there mourn death as an end, as we do, or celebrate it, knowing there is a better place waiting?
If ours was a realm such as this, I know, I would be lying dead by my own hand next to you now, and we might perhaps have found each other in the eternity beyond. But my knowledge of the futility of the gesture stayed my hand. Instead here I am, standing on the hill above the city that killed you, which I burned as your funeral pyre.
* * * * *
My eyes stare at the blaze below, but my mind is looking back, searching my memory. I remember that first night I met you, though I paid you little mind at first. I was one of innumerable homeless wanderers that populates our world, stopping at yet another dreary, dirty inn in yet another in a series of sprawling, grimy burgs. I had my secrets, sure, but so does everyone. You were the night's entertainment, a singer simultaneously twanging something stringed while the guests ate and ignored you. I remember judging your music as a little above average for such a place before tuning it out, focusing on my plans: deciding how long to stay, and where to go next, as well as trying to judge my chances to find work.
That night I had one of my bouts with insomnia, and decided to sneak out of my bunk to walk it off. As I left the building, I heard singing, far more masterful than any I’d heard in a long time. You were reclined on the sloped roof, singing softly to yourself. I knew immediately that your performance earlier was intentionally mediocre. It was obvious why - talent like yours gets people noticed, and being noticed in a realm of wicked men never ends well.
I sat under the eaves for an hour, unmoving, listening, feeling the song perceptibly quell my churning mind and soothe the raging flames in my heart. Eventually you stopped, and I started to sneak back inside.
You knew I was listening, or heard my movements, and headed me off. Slim arms folded, oval eyes narrowed, you were at the stairs before I got there. I silently pointed back outside, suggesting that any conversation take place outside. At this you nodded. In the dim, dying light of the night's fire, we slunk back outside, not wanting to wake the other denizens of the inn. We were around the street corner before either of us spoke.
"Don't worry, I'm not going to ruin it for you..." I started.
"I know. If you were going to you wouldn’t still be here." In the moonlight your slight frame and pale skin made you look ethereal, the wan smile on your face complimenting. "You know why I do what I do."
I nodded. "You were born to do something, but to do it would mean peril, unwanted attentions, yet to deny your purpose would be to deny yourself. Yes, I know why."
You lowered your gaze then, and your words were near a whisper. "What is your talent, then? you know mine.”
I shrugged. Of course, I knew your situation because it was also mine. "Nothing so beautiful as your singing. I'm Keric, by the way."
"I’m Linya. Clever dodge, I must say." You meant how I avoided answering.
"Sorry." I shook my head. "Habit." I hesitated for a moment, then decided to show you my terrible secret. I held out one hand, and snapped my fingers, and a tiny flame appeared above it. I let the tiny light flicker for a moment before dropping my hand. "I was a warrior for my clan, before it fell."
Your eyes widened. "You weren't kidding. A real Wilder. I guess you guys aren’t extinct after all.”
“Not quite.”
“Don't worry. Your secret is safe."
"I know."
We shared a quiet, knowing smile, and after a few minutes more of relatively unremarkable conversation we walked back to the inn. You climbed back up onto the roof to enter the building from above, presumably to stagger our returns. My insomnia wasn’t cured, of course - my mind had something new to keep it busy.
* * * * *
Had I known the next morning what I know now, I wonder, would I have agreed when you asked me to take you with me, out into the world? I cannot think that I would have, knowing that less than a year later I would be avenging your death with wanton genocide. Best not think about that now, though. Again my mind’s eye gazes to the past to escape the terrible truth of now.
* * * * *
Of course, I did agree, after only a little persuading, to take you out of that town. You were optimistic, a trait rare in this world, and good at heart, rarer still. You were curious, wondering about what you would find traveling at my side. Despite my warnings, you believed that somewhere, there was a place better than your home. In truth, your home town was a good deal better than the norm of our accursed world, though I never told you that.
I wonder, too, how much you’d heard about the nature of being a Wilder. I suspect little, as you thought nothing of traveling with me. It was only later that the curse of my nature became apparent to you. In truth, it was not entirely out of charity that I brought you along - your music, I had noted that night, was able to soothe the worst of the Wilder nature, which lurks always in my heart.
Several days of travel from your home town, you saw your first glimpse of that nature. Until then, you likely thought little of my lighting campfires each night with a burst of flame from my hand. After what happened to the bandits that thought me easy prey, perhaps you had some idea of what it is like to be a Wilder.
They came at me as we were setting up camp, when you were off gathering firewood nearby, two hanging back with bows at the ready and the third approaching to make his demands. I had my blade, of course, but it would do little good against arrows. I made no attempt to draw it. I didn’t want to burn them either, partly because of Wilder tradition that fighting mundane humans with our talents was immoral, and partly because I knew that it was best to avoid attracting attention of any kind.
The leader, grinning wickedly, took visual stock of our supplies and belongings. “Yer money and yer food belong to us now, if ye don’t want trouble.”
I was thinking of a way to scare them off, but these demands I had no problem accommodating. Besides a few low-value coins I had no money, and I knew enough to hunt for food, probably even to better results than the dried provisions we had. I slowly, deliberately, pulled the coin pouch from my belt and tossed it to the brigand. “That’s what food I have. Just take it.” I pointed to a bundle I had just removed from my pack.
The man darted for the bundle, then backed away, only then noticing the second pack nearby. “Hey, where’s yer mate then?” He looked around again. “He got anything?”
“Out gathering firewood. And no, we are far from wealthy.” I hoped you weren’t going to be back until the men were gone.
They searched your pack, but found nothing to their liking. “Too bad. Boys, let’s go.” The man turned to leave. I breathed a sigh of relief, but it was short-lived. At that moment, you stepped out of the woods with a bundle of sticks on the far side of the road, surprised expression on your face. The bandits noticed.
“Ey, now what we got here?” The leader started for you. I headed him off.
“You got what you came for. No need to stay here. We’ve nothing left of value.” I knew, though, that the situation wasn’t going to end well.
“Ye got a pretty little thing like that, and ye say nothing of value?” The man leered. I felt the fires in my heart grow hotter, as I knew what he intended.
“Keric, what’s going on?” There was fear in your voice. I couldn’t usefully answer. The bowmen advanced, approaching where myself and their leader stood. Still the flames inside me surged higher.
“Let us be.” My voice was faint, hoarse, all I could manage, but the robber heard it, and laughed, advancing on you deliberately as his compatriots closed in on me.
That laugh is what killed him. Well, it was me who killed him, but his laugh finally broke down my struggling self-control. That, and the look of horror on your face.
The two bowmen burned first, as they tried to restrain me when I stepped toward their leader. Their pitiable, agonized screams as their bodies were reduced to charred ruin caused their compatriot to turn. The same fire which was reducing his allied to ash flickered in my eyes, and danced in my palms, so surely he knew exactly what he was up against. He backed away, giving you a wide berth, hands before him. He probably begged for his life, but all my anger heard was his mocking laugh, and all it saw was him grinning, advancing on you. My fire burned him too, only far more slowly. It was a full minute at least before he stopped screaming.
When the inferno in my mind subsided, I was standing over his twisted, smoking, charred corpse, and I was alone. The bundle of sticks you had been carrying lay scattered, as if dropped. I suddenly took note of exactly what I’d done to the leader and staggered away from the corpses, eventually falling to my knees and vomiting into the leaves at the verge of the woods. I never got used to the brutality I was capable of when I lost control, and I doubt I ever will. I have always considered it mercy that I cannot remember most of what happens when it happens.
You were gone, and I didn’t expect you to come back. You wouldn’t be the first travelling companion I’d scared away by losing control. I moved my pack away from the carnage, and bedded down for the night, lighting no fire. I didn’t want the reminder.
Some time later, I was roused by footsteps. I was surprised to see you stepping out of the woods (where you, I guessed, had been hiding nearby).
“I didn’t expect you back.” I sat up. You looked frightened, but not as much as I expected. “Thought I scared you off.”
“You did. But I came back.” you approached cautiously, as if worried I would lose control again. After an infinitely stretched moment, you sat down next to me.
“Linya, I was going to give them what they wanted. Food, coins, that is replaceable, and I have little enough. I didn’t want it to come to killing. But that wretch advancing on you... it put me over the edge.” I sighed heavily, staring into the darkened woods across the road. “I lost control.”
You didn’t immediately reply. I eventually turned to meet your searching gaze. If you were still afraid of me, it didn’t show. “I can’t promise that I won’t lose control again. I can’t even promise you that you are safe from it.” I looked away.
“I don’t expect you to.” Your voice was quiet, but strong. You seemed to have come to this decision before saying the words - in retrospect I realize, you probably made it before you came back. “But I have faith in you.”
Those words, which to my memory were the first of their kind spoken to me, awoke a complicated feeling in me. In part, I was grateful of your trust, and wanted to try my hardest to keep it, but also I was immediately afraid of betraying that faith. I’d been a loner for years, traveling with companions only occasionally for convenience or mutual benefit. To be trusted, in this world of selfishness and betrayal, was a unique feeling.
I suppose you saw most of that in my expression, and shifted closer to me on the hard, cold ground. Part of me wanted to run, certain I’d prove myself unworthy of your sentiment. For a moment, I tensed up, and nearly did run. After a moment of internal conflict, though, I decided not to. Not really knowing what to do instead, I put my arm around your slim shoulder, expecting you to shrug it off, to shudder at the touch of the hand that reduced three brigands to charred flesh only hours before. You didn’t.
In silence we sat for an interminably long time, or so it seemed. Perhaps it was only a few minutes. Eventually the moment ended, of course. All things do.
Story continues in part 2 (here).
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