Deep Echoes

  ~~

  Hours later, Maya and Applekill were still in conversation. They had settled on the floor at opposite ends of the Summoning Room for their talks, facing each other and leaning against the walls.

  “So, that 'dive' was–” Maya asked.

  Applekill interrupted, not for the first time finishing her sentence. “It was you tapping into your stream of energy, a constant emission everyone sends when they feel strong emotions about something that isn't an object. It took you to... well, I don't know how to describe it. Your dream interpreted it as an ocean, right?”

  Maya nodded, and then coughed. That dead taste returned to her mouth, bitter and sad. She wiped her tongue across her plain robes and, for a moment, saw darkness in her saliva. The vision quickly faded.

  She must be tired.

  “It took you to this 'Spirit Ocean,'” Applekill continued, not having noticed Maya's momentary shock, “where the insubstantial Spirits live. They call themselves Thoughts and...”

  There was a knock on the door. It was Nephilim. Her breakfast was ready.

  Maya looked at the door, surprised. “I can't believe it's morning already,” she said.

  “Do you want me to disappear?”

  “Why?”

  “What happens if the drunkard is awake and he sees me? It might ruin his training.”

  Maya nodded. Though he looked healthier, stronger, she didn't know what stage his development might be at and couldn't stand the thought of causing him more pain. “That makes sense Applekill. How do I recall you?”

  “Just hold your sword and think of me.”

  At the end of her sentence, Applekill was gone. Maya sat for a moment, looking at Applekill's absence, everything that they had talked about running through her head. So much had changed that evening alone. Most of all Maya herself.

  The knocking echoed through the Summoning Room again. So Maya stood and answered the door. “Morning Nephilim, how did you sleep?”

  “Fine, thank you,” he replied, looking away from her. “You... might want to get dressed...”

  She looked down and coloured: she had forgotten she was still naked from the night before. “Oh, I... yes. Breakfast's in five minutes?”

  “Yes, in five minutes,” he replied

  “Good.”

  Nephilim turned and jogged away, much faster than necessary. And he was blushing, crimson splashed across his handsome face. Maya loved seeing him so flushed, so human. She had to laugh.

  But it wasn't just Nephilim's embarrassment which cheered her: it was knowing she wasn't alone, that there was someone truly on her side. She looked down at her sword, left casually aside whilst Applekill had answered all of her questions, and wondered if Applekill were there, waiting. Maya thought she was. And that she would be watching too. Maybe she was drained with the first effort of appearing, or maybe Maya's hollowness at a whole evening of discovery and conversation was affecting her, but Maya sensed that Applekill would now appear whenever she wanted. They were tied together, her and Applekill, whatever happened. And Maya couldn't have been happier with that.

  35

  Chain had always found waiting inside the Bureau torturous: firstly, the Bureau had the least comfortable chairs in Aureu, as though to ensure your discomfort when you waited on them; secondly, there was an eerie quietude to the place, an absence of sound that suggested the outside world had disappeared; and, finally, they didn't heat it like they did the other parts of the Cathedral, so you either sweated on the outside world or shivered inside.

  That morning, Chain was awaiting news of her placement, her destiny... What path Sol had set her upon. It had been a longer than usual testing period for her, born of... the circumstances she'd found herself in and she was impatient to hear the results.

  But Chain maintained her discipline. She sat straight and still as the day passed with only her shaking knee hinting at her feelings.

  There was nothing happening in the Bureau that she could distract herself with. No one had cause to speak to the mid-level Clerics who handle Contegon assignments this early in the morning, and such people rarely left their offices. All she had for company were the long, plain halls, the aching silence, and the vicious cold that made her ears numb.

  To occupy herself, she remembered the previous night. Wasp had asked, when it became clear her mind was elsewhere. “What's wrong?”

  She'd sighed. “I'm... I guess I'm nervous about what my assignment is going to be.”

  “You're hoping to get away from me then, to flee the vile creature who has ensnared you so?”

  “Naturally,” she'd joked. Then her tone turned serious. “But with the rumours of trouble to the west, I want to be placed there. I just hope that this... stuff with the Heretic doesn't affect my chances of being put where I ought to be.”

  He had arched an eyebrow. “So you're trading one creature for another?”

  “For dozens, thank you.”

  Wasp had laughed, and Chain had joined him. It had felt good, most time she spent with him did, but it hadn't assuaged her doubts. If she were placed to the East or, Sol forbid, amongst the Gravit Mountains' mining communities, then the Bureau didn't trust her. Even when she'd said goodbye to Wasp that morning with a tender kiss, she worried that Sol's absolution had not been pure.

  “Contegon Justicar?”

  Chain looked up, almost used to her new name. A middle-aged Cleric was leaning from his room, tall, overweight, and bald. He was a red robed sausage with a bad-news smile.

  “Would you come in, Contegon?” he asked. He sounded warm, but it was artificial and practised. Chain's heart froze in place, expecting the worse.

  Standing with her now-solid heart, Chain entered his office. It was tiny, cramped. There was a small seat opposite a worn and dying desk, so she sat in it and found it uncomfortable in a whole range of interesting new ways. Ignoring the protests of her back, she waited for the Cleric to take his seat, give his news.

  The Cleric flopped into his seat. His rolls of fat wobbled and settled as he leant forward onto his desk. “Well, Contegon Justicar, these certainly are bad times. The Disciples have relentlessly hammered away at both Fronts, and Aureu has never needed protecting so dearly as she does now.”

  She didn't gasp. She didn't wail. She didn't moan. That she didn't react at all was a testament to all of her training and proof how poor the decision they were making was.

  “Aureu?” she asked, holding her voice as calm as possible.

  The Cleric nodded and gave her another false smile.

  “They might as well just retire me now...” she thought.

  The Cleric then went through the expected script, reassuring her that it was vital to protect the Guardian and the people of Aureu, congratulating her on her hard work in getting this far and telling her to “report back here to begin protecting us all.”

  It was... almost demeaning. A member of the Advanced Squad should only be posted to Aureu if the Disciples were actually tearing down the city's walls. But this was the will of Sol. She had to accept it. Chain was to be a stay-at-home.

  “Thank you, sire,” she said as they parted, swallowing her bitterness.

  Chain turned, and his painted-on smile faded like an illusion. The Bureau's lack of trust would not break her. She promised herself that. Back straight, face blank, she left with pride.

  The thought of wasting away in Aureu dared not grace Chain's mind. Instead, she went straight to Wasp's home for some perspective and some comfort. The gate guards nodded to her as she passed into Sol's Greeting. She ignored them, feeling that acknowledging them, agreeing to some small covenant of equality, would be a tacit acceptance that she deserved being stationed in Aureu.

  The guards didn't notice the snub. They were used to being ignored by Contegons.

  Onto the Circumference, she could see Wasp's manse. Wasp said he was still grieving when they first met, and this was true: his father, a strong and proud man, had died just a week before Chain had graduated. Hence W
asp having inherited the Merchant's ticket to her lunch. He now owned this enormous empire, which, apart from the odd hiccup, seemed to run itself along with the grandest house in Aureu.

  It made Chain smile to imagine him treating the big empty house the same way he treated any opponent: try to gain an upper hand, undermine its power, and come out on top. His living as close to the Servants as possible showed that he was fighting it. Because, for all his posturing, he hated his own company.

  This smile remained, defying her mood. It would be good to see Wasp again, even if they'd only parted hours ago. He would bring her equilibrium.

  Wasp's front door gave a satisfying thud when she pounded it. Wasp answered himself, which surprised her. He was wearing a bewildering array of smart and painfully scruffy clothes: a tailored black jacket with a pock-ridden shirt and walking shoeless beneath loose, dark trousers.

  “Oh, it's you. Shouldn't you have used the Servants' Entrance?”

  “I bet you say that to all your superiors,” she replied. Their sparring was okay now, felt right after that first night of honesty. Until Sol rose, they had talked, just talked, and she had grown to understand him. Maybe even love him. And that feeling had only increased since.

  Wasp stepped aside, and she entered. They embraced and Chain wrapped her arms around him and rubbed his back hungrily.

  “Hey,” Wasp said, breaking the kiss, “what's wrong? You're acting like you're in heat.”

  “In heat? You wish. I thought you were a man of higher pursuits, but you bring this all down to... sex. Pitiful.”

  Wasp shook his head, their games not suitable for once. “Seriously, Chain, what's wrong? Widows lose their children and wear happier expressions. Wait, is there something you've been hiding from me? Are you in fact a widow?” He leant down, inspecting her for signs of a former marriage.

  Chain giggled, and then sighed. “It's my assignment: they've stuck me here, of all places.”

  “And Aureu is a bad thing?”

  “Besides being stuck with you?” she jested. Then she sighed again. It was proving to be a mournful day. “It shows their lack of faith in me. The Disciples won't get through to Aureu, they'd have to wade through hundreds of Shields, Contegons, Artificers and whoever else is out there doing the real fighting. The stay-at-homes are the worst fighters, Wasp, the problem-makers or those approaching their Rest. And I'm none of those things. Before you question my 'shallow' convictions, I know Sol has a plan for me, that all this happened at his behest... but that doesn't change anything. I'm still viewed as, as... lesser. I was told that I had been cleansed of my mistake and yet it bites back at me constantly...

  “And I hate her for doing this to me. I hate the Heretic.” Surprised at her own strength of feeling, she spat down at the carpet, expelling her disgust momentarily.

  Wasp looked down at his carpet, then at her. “Poor Like, she'll have to clean that up. You know, she'll be so confused.”

  “What does a Servant have...?”

  He held up a hand. “Like is deeply devout, I'm told. She treats Contegons as small, walking gods. Seeing you has made her heart sing. She tells me I should marry you, make up for my sinful nature by loving a Contegon.

  “Yet she will find your spit on the floor. She'll know it's not mine, I was beaten half to death, then shouted the rest of the way for less whilst growing up. So were the other Servants. No, she'll know it's yours... and it'll upset her. I can try to explain why you did it, but she won't understand: all she knows it that her walking god spits on the carpet. Now, she isn't as intelligent as you or I, so she may try to explain this away, saying something like 'Sol wills and I do,' but that doesn't change the fact that she can't understand what the object of her worship does.”

  Chain smiled. “You don't have a Servant called Like, do you?”

  Wasp waved a hand at her. “No, of course not. I wouldn't have someone so dull working for me. My allegory holds true, though.”

  She slapped him on the shoulder. “Why, with your lies and haughty, moralistic tales, you really know how to treat a girl.”

  Wasp grabbed her and pulled her close. “Show me a girl, and I'll treat her right.”

  “Hmm,” she said, going in for a long, deep kiss, “that sounds like fun.”