Chapter XIV: Loss of Innocence
As the sun sank below the waves, they set out in search of Elian’s house. It didn’t take them long to find the place; the sign proclaiming “Geron’s Boat Repairs” was painted an obscenely bright shade of red and Elian himself leaned against the stone wall of the shop, casually smoking a cigarette.
“What’s that white smoky stick in his mouth?” Ifaut asked Sansonis. “Do you think I can have one too?”
“No. It’s a very bad habit to get into,” he said knowingly. Even now the smell of tobacco smoke set his heart racing, and he hadn’t smoked one of the wretched things in years.
Elian noticed them approaching and ground out the remains of his cigarette on the road. “Glad to see you could make it,” he said and turned his eyes towards Stefi. “And this must be your friend. I can see why you wanted to go back and look for her.” He winked and Stefi felt a shudder run down her back. Something about him made her uncomfortable, something she couldn’t quite place.
Elian opened the front door and led them through a workshop. Sawdust lay in a fine layer on the floor and the scents of many freshly cut woods hung in the air like an exotic, heady perfume. Small boats in various stages of repair lay scattered like wounded animals, holes gaping or entire sides missing altogether. He opened another door at the back of the workshop to reveal a dim, twisting staircase.
“You don’t think I live in there, do you?” He laughed at his own joke and led them up the stairs. Cédes trailed Stefi with difficulty, nearly tripping several times on the narrow stairs.
Eventually they came to a small bedroom containing three single beds. Its one window looked out over the darkening sea. Black clouds, pregnant with rain, crawled up the coast and threatened to engulf the moons.
“Looks like rain,” Elian said in a tone Sansonis recognized with unease: a kind of perverse pleasure at something yet to come.
“Well, I’ll leave you guys to it,” he said and left. Stefi waited until the sound of his footsteps had disappeared before she spoke.
“You know, there’s something about him that gives me the creeps,” she said and held the ferrets close.
“Same here,” Sansonis said. “He did seem awfully keen to give us somewhere to stay. Maybe he thinks he can get more money out of us.”
“And us more fish out of him!” Ifaut, of course.
Rhaka took up position beside the door. “I shall keep watch,” he said, his gaze never wavering from the doorway. “You all get some rest.”
“But there are only three beds,” Ifaut pointed out.
Sansonis stretched out beside Rhaka and rested his head on the Otsukuné’s flank. “Then I’ll take the floor.”
“But… you’ll get cold!” Ifaut said. “We could squeeze in together.” She sat down on the bed, suddenly realizing how small it was. It could barely accommodate her and was so short her feet hung over the end. “Well, maybe not.”
Stefi helped Cédes, who had since reappeared, into a bed and finally went to her own with Gemmie and Maya.
I don’t like this, Gemmie said.
“It’s all right,” Stefi said and stroked Gemmie’s fur, “I’ll protect you, no matter what.”
Sometime during the night Sansonis felt Rhaka stir uncomfortably beneath his head. Something was wrong.
“What is it?” he whispered so as not to disturb the others.
“Something perturbs me. It has just dawned upon me that perhaps this young man knows more about you and Ifaut than he made known. Can you be sure that she never revealed her true nature during her… mishap?”
“Yes.” Sansonis sighed. “If her hat had fallen off or something, she would’ve mentioned it.”
“Would she?”
Suddenly it all clicked into place. Why Elian had been so friendly. Why he had offered them somewhere to stay despite them being total strangers and Sansonis a Kalkic. Why he had so readily taken Sansonis’s money. The memory of the wanted poster in Joven sprang to mind.
“We leave. Now!” Sansonis shouted and tore the blankets from everyone’s beds.
“Please… just a few more minutes…” Stefi said in her sleep.
“No time.” Sansonis shook the sleep from her then roused Cédes and Ifaut.
The Otsukuné and Kalkic filled them in on what was happening. All the while Ifaut stared at her feet, making odd hiccupping sounds.
“Yeah, my hat came off, but only for a second. I didn’t think anyone would’ve noticed in the confusion,” she choked out, wracked with guilt.
“Clumsy Furosan,” Rhaka growled, but he made no more threatening moves. He knew it wasn’t her fault. At least not entirely. The girl invited trouble.
“If I may interrupt,” Cédes said quietly, “it is of no use blaming her alone. We are all at fault. We all chose naively to accept Elian’s offer of accommodation.” She felt for her pack and staff and readied herself to leave. She stood quietly where she was for a moment.
“Bother. It appears that due to my aroused emotions I am unable to conceal myself,” she said as calmly as if a little rain had interrupted her walk. “Extra precautions must be taken.” She reached into her pocket and removed her stone. Its light cast a sickening red glow about the room, creating straggly shadows that clawed at their owners’ feet.
Rhaka led the way back down the stairs. His ethereal glow pierced his dusty coating and the darkness, while the light of Cédes’s stone illuminated the rear; moonlight and sunset.
I’m scared, Gemmie said, her voice shaking.
I’m not, Maya said confidently. Just let me at him! He danced angrily on Stefi’s shoulder and bared his teeth.
“I think it would be better for you two to hide,” Stefi said and deposited the two inside her pack. Maya protested angrily, spouting graphic and quite unrepeatable threats.
When they reached the workshop door that led out to the street, Stefi tried the handle. Locked.
“Now what?” she asked as panic rose in her voice.
“I got us into this,” Ifaut said. She shifted all her weight onto her left foot, raised her right, then lunged forward. The wooden door burst outwards with a crash, its lock destroyed.
“But it doesn’t look like I can get us out of that…”
At least two dozen armed men stood in a rough half-circle before the boat repair shop, some with short swords drawn, others with crossbows leveled, and all facing two Furosans, a Kalkic, a human, and a supposedly extinct Otsukuné.
“I sense much hostility,” Cédes said nervously. With the light of the moons now completely obscured by clouds, only her stone and the dim streetlamps provided light to see by. She was glad, if only for a moment, that she couldn’t see what was happening. It gave her less of a reason to be afraid.
Ifaut eased a shaking hand towards her sword’s hilt. “Do we fight?”
“No,” Rhaka said, “we cannot run the risk of harm coming to Stefi. I believe they may only wish to imprison us. Furosans and myself are worth more alive. For now.”
One of the men stepped forward. He was dressed, like all the others, in a deep blue uniform of leather and metal plates. A scar ran through his permanently closed right eye and a sneer of hatred spread across his battered face.
“Sol-Acriman military,” Sansonis muttered, his voice heavy with loathing as he clenched his fists so hard his fingers cracked.
“What do you want, Garash?” Rhaka barked. If anyone had still thought he was a regular dog, that pretense was now long gone.
“Told you we needed a muzzle,” Ifaut hissed.
“I mean, ‘woof woof’,” Rhaka said. His eyes never left the man with the scarred face.
“An Otsukuné?” The man laughed haughtily. “Perhaps I hadn’t done as thorough a job as I had thought!”
“Then come closer so that I may claim your other eye!”
Seeing the man, Sansonis felt the horrible, uncontrolled darkness covering the light of reason in his mind, just as the moons had been blotted out by dark clouds.
“The Kalkic,” the scarred man said and jerked his head in Sansonis’s direction. Another man approached from behind, removed a baton from his belt, and struck Sansonis’s head with a sickening crack. He collapsed to the ground as blood began to spread through his blue and brown hair.
Seeing her kamae reduced to a bloody heap, another crack sounded in Ifaut’s head: restraint yielding to anger. She leapt forward and let out a crazed scream, drawing her sword and sweeping it upwards in the same movement upon Sansonis’s assailant. He fell without so much as a shout.
“Ifaut, enough!” Stefi shouted and seized Ifaut’s arms. With difficulty she managed to restrain the struggling Furosan and haul her away from where Sansonis and his assailant lay unmoving.
Ifaut let loose a torrent of obscenities in her own language, tears of anger and sadness streaking her face as Stefi pried the sword from her fingers. She let it fall to the ground.
“Thank you for your assistance,” the scarred man said and leered at Stefi with his one eye. He struggled to make himself heard over Ifaut’s din. “For aiding in the subduing of this crazed monster, perhaps I may be able to help reduce your sentence. But the law does take a dim view on those who associate with Furosans. And an Otsukuné too.” The man shook his head and tsk-tsked mockingly.
“I did it so she wouldn’t kill you!” Stefi spat at him as Ifaut collapsed, sobbing and dry retching into her arms.
The man shrugged and, adopting a well-rehearsed voice, spoke again. “For the crime of associating with Furosans, as outlawed by Kardin 10:77, and an Otsukuné, as outlawed by the same passage, I hereby place you under arrest. Perhaps you should feel reassured that their charges are much more serious… and with no promise of redemption. Karick IV may yet pardon you.”
Defeated, Stefi hung her head low and could do nothing but drop her staff and resign herself to her fate. As she and the others were led away in chains, she caught a glimpse from the shadows of a familiar face illuminated for a second as its owner dragged on a cigarette. It was smiling.
‘I’ll kill you,’ she thought angrily, ‘if Ifaut doesn’t tear you apart first.’
With no protest Stefi and her friends found themselves shoved and thrown into a squat brick building that passed for Valraines’s prison. Stefi and Cédes were forced into a cramped cell barely big enough for one, while Ifaut and Sansonis were placed several cells over. The ferrets were still in Stefi’s pack, which lay against a far wall with the rest of their gear. Rhaka lay unmoving, chained and muzzled to the bars outside Stefi’s cell. Unfortunately, Ifaut was in no state to appreciate his predicament.
“Ifaut, how are you and Sansonis?” Stefi called out when the soldiers had at last left.
“Bad.” Ifaut sobbed and made a sound like she was vomiting. “Sansonis won’t wake up and… and I killed someone…”
“It’s okay,” Stefi said, although she herself wasn’t convinced by her words. “You did what anyone would have.” What else was there to say? Yes, you killed a man in anger? How can you live with the consequences of such rashness? Instead, she changed the subject. “How’s Sansonis holding up?”
“Not good, he’s barely breathing. The bleeding’s stopped but-” She was interrupted by another fit of dry retching, tossed about in a storm of nausea and grief at the abhorrent act she had just committed.
Stefi fell back onto the stained mattress that passed for a bed in her cell. Just last evening everything had been going so well. Everyone was happy. Now, thanks to one traitorous loser, they were in prison, some in worse shape than others.
At that moment Rhaka climbed to his feet and strained at his chain like a dog on a leash yearning for freedom.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” Stefi said, but the Otsukuné didn’t seem to hear.
He persisted as the muzzle pressed painfully against his face.
“Wait!” Stefi said as she realized what he was doing. “We need to find the keys, right?”
Unable to speak, Rhaka nodded in reply.
“Who better to steal keys than natural born thieves?”
She called out to the ferrets, and after a minute they managed to slip from the pack and through the bars of Stefi’s cell.
I should have known, Maya said bitterly once Stefi had explained where they were. Now what?
“I need you and Gemmie to find the keys so we can get out of here.”
What does it smell like? Gemmie asked, eager to help.
“Smell like?”
Yeah, we can hardly see anything in this light.
Stefi peered out into the gloom and spotted a desk against a far wall. “I don’t know. But if they’re anywhere I bet they’re on that desk over there.” In the light of the lone spluttering lantern she could barely make out anything.
One small problem, Maya said. Ferrets can’t climb. Or fly.
Stefi sighed and rolled her eyes. “You had no trouble stealing things back home.”
But- Maya began, only for Stefi to cut him off.
“Either find a way or make one!” she nearly shouted and placed the two ferrets on the stone floor.
Challenge grudgingly accepted, Maya said, his voice betraying a meaning quite the opposite.
So, Gemmie said once the two ferrets had found their way to the desk, what’s a keys?
It’s like an eggy pie with no top, Maya said. Popular things back in the Farān pub, you know. But I don’t see how a wannabe pie will get us out of here.
Keys… keys… keys… Gemmie said to herself. No, I’m pretty sure it’s that shiny stone Lady Cédes carries.
Maya thought for a moment. It certainly doesn’t look like food, he said. But it is shiny. That’s good enough. Now, how to get on the desk?
He and Gemmie circled the legs of the desk and its lone chair like sharks tormenting prey, occasionally standing on their back legs and stretching their slinky bodies upwards. They were still too small. Even if they could lift each other they’d barely reach halfway up.
If only we could fly... Gemmie said.
Wait! That’s it! Maya said and scurried over to Rhaka. He clambered up the Otsukuné’s fur and perched on the scruff of his neck. Stefi!
“What are you doing up there? This is no time for playing!”
Tell Mr. Doggy to run towards the desk as fast as he can! he said as he bounced around in the thick fur.
“Umm, Rhaka?” Stefi said. The Otsukuné tilted his head in her direction. “Maya wants you to run towards the desk.”
Rhaka simply nodded in reply, too defeated to even think about doing anything else. He climbed to his feet and took off at a fast run. The chain halted his advance, snapping him backwards and jerking his head around.
Maya, unlike Rhaka, kept going. Propelled by Rhaka’s sudden stop, the ferret hurtled through the air like a tiny brown missile until he hit the desktop. He spun wildly as his feet skittered on the slick surface and knocked various articles to the floor as he swept across like a crazy broom.
Hey, watch out! Gemmie said as she narrowly avoided being hit. She scampered to the relative safety beneath the chair. You almost got me with a bunch of jingly metal things! The real keys, of course.
Who cares about them? Maya said, caught up in the excitement and wonderfully chaotic crashing noises. I found the keys! he said triumphantly. He nudged the red stone before him with his nose. It’s heavy!
He nosed the stone a few more times and watched as it tumbled off the edge. It clattered to the ground, undamaged.
I see it! Gemmie squeaked and bounded up to the stone. She tried to grab it with her mouth, but the smooth, flawless surface afforded no grip. Thinking quickly, she wrapped her front paws around it and scooted backwards towards Stefi.
We got the keys! she said proudly, at last nudging the stone to Stefi’s foot.
Stefi sighed. “Keys? This is a stone. Didn’t you see any jingly things? Those things are keys.”
That’s a keys? Gemmie asked, quite bewildered. Maya said it was food.
Stefi
sighed again. “He’s thinking of quiche.” She picked up the stone and handed it to Cédes. “Can we use this to get out?” she asked as she carefully deposited it in her palm.
“Why yes,” Cédes said and gave an uncharacteristic smile. “This should be an opportune moment to put the skills I have learnt to a practical use.” She clutched the stone tightly. It flared, burning with an intensity matching only Ifaut’s earlier fury. She breathed deeply, then suddenly her eyes burned bright, more ember-like than usual, as if her determined spirit that had long lain smoldering was kindled with the fuel of hope.
“You… you’re on fire!” Stefi stammered as a burning aura surrounded Cédes’s body.
“Do not fear. It shan’t burn you. Now, could you please place my left hand upon the mechanism that the keys would normally release?”
“Okay.” She took Cédes’s right hand, the one with the stone.
“No, dear heart, my other left hand.”
Stefi did and placed it over the keyhole to their cell. “You still feel cold!”
“Of course. The flames of the elemental Raphanos burn only what I wish. Its nature is destruction, but I must never think that it may be truly tamed.” A white-hot light enveloped Cédes’s left hand and in a moment the lock was reduced to a puddle of glowing liquid metal. She slid the door open proudly.
“Amazing,” Stefi said. “I’ll let the others out.” She jogged over to the desk and picked up the real keys. “Cool,” she said with a childlike grin as they jingled in her hand. “I hoped they’d be in a big ring like this.” Wasting no time, she unlocked Ifaut and Sansonis’s cell. As soon as the door opened Ifaut practically flew into her arms.
“Thank you,” Ifaut gasped hoarsely.
Stefi noticed her face was dirty and streaked with tears, and Sansonis’s dried blood coated her hands.
Just then Ifaut looked down and saw Rhaka. “I’m sorry, Rhaka,” she said and began crying again. “This isn’t what I meant about a muzzle.” She removed his muzzle and chain and buried her face is his fur. It was so soft and warm, and the smell was reassuring somehow, like Sansonis’s. She wished she could just sleep, sleep and wake up much later to find that this was all just some horrible dream.
Rhaka turned and licked her face. Yes, he thought, the young Furosan was trying at best, but he knew her heart was in the right place, her emotion genuine.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t wake Sansonis up,” Ifaut sobbed as her tears soaked into Rhaka’s fur.
“Worry not. Perhaps now we may be able to rouse him.”
Everyone crowded into the cramped cell where Sansonis lay motionless on a dirty mattress, his chest barely rising and falling as he breathed. Despite their best efforts, including shouting, shaking, and ferret nips, he wouldn’t move.
Finally, Stefi spoke with a defeated voice. “Looks like we’ll have to carry him out of here.”
Ifaut nodded and, as carefully as if she were handling a newborn child, she managed to sling her kamae over her shoulder. “Let’s get out of here,” she said through gritted teeth.
The Fieretka hurriedly retrieved their gear, and once more the ferrets were forced to take shelter within the depths of Stefi’s pack.
“All right, listen up!” Stefi linked her free arm with Cédes, who still clutched the flaming stone of Raphanos in one hand and her staff in another. She tried to instill her words with confidence, with a tone to rouse their defeated spirits. All she found was a weight in her stomach. “Thanks to that creep Elian we’re wanted criminals.” She spat out the last word. “From here on out, things might get dangerous. First of all, whatever happens, look after each other. That goes double for you, Ifaut.”
The Furosan swallowed hard and nodded vigorously, trying to regain her composure.
“Second, whatever happens, meet up inside the forest where we came from. And third, don’t go dying on me.”
No one laughed.
“Once they realize we’ve gone there’ll be hell to pay. I’ll get Cédes out of here. Ifaut, carry Sansonis. Rhaka, make sure those two get out of harm’s way then come back for me and Cédes if we need help. Everyone got that?”
“Yes,” several voices said in unison.
And what about us? Maya asked.
“You’ve played your part. Now just sit tight in there and try to act like good luck charms.”
Taking the lead, Rhaka led them through a maze of twisting corridors and other cells, sniffing out a route that would take them out unnoticed. At length they came to a large iron door. Stefi unlocked and opened it, leaving the ring of keys dangling in the lock.
“I never thought I’d be so relieved to see a dark and cloudy night,” she said as she breathed in the cool, refreshing sea air. It made a nice change after the oppressive atmosphere inside.
“It smells like rain,” Cédes said casually. “I hope we do not get wet.”
Before they could enjoy their new-found freedom, a shout from the way they’d come shattered the stillness and jolted them back to reality. It was quickly joined by more voices.
“Company,” Rhaka said.
“Okay. Go.” Stefi shut the door and locked it, then tossed the keys onto the roof. “That’ll buy us some time.”
She turned around and, pulling Cédes with her, ducked into a side street and was gone.
“I guess it’s just us now, dog-face,” Ifaut said, a smile flickering across her face. Then in a second she too had vanished, carrying Sansonis into the shadows.
“What way are we going?” Cédes panted as she trailed Stefi, working her legs so unaccustomed to running.
“I don’t know,” Stefi said as they came out of the dark side street and into the gloomy pool of light cast by a lamp at a crossroads.
Just then she heard a shout and looked up to see soldiers, similar to those that had arrested them before, hurrying their way.
“But we’re not going that way!”
Stefi ran off again, weaving into alleys and ducking behind stalls or whatever else she could find. But just when she thought she, Cédes, and the ferrets were in the clear, another group would catch sight of them. There was no time to rest.
Then, when an exhausted Stefi and Cédes thought they could keep running no longer, they found themselves pursued yet again.
“Don’t… they… give up?” Stefi panted and veered off into an alleyway. She was barely managing to hold Cédes upright. She leaned against a brick wall, breathless and with legs on fire, using her staff for support.
“Okay… Say… dees?” she said, unable to draw breath enough for more words.
“Yes, but I fear I may not be able to run any farther,” she said. “If I become a burden, leave me behind so that you might escape.”
“You already know I can’t… won’t do that,” Stefi said. “That’s-” She cut off her sentence abruptly as another group of soldiers rounded the corner and saw them.
They turned and ran again, only to come to a sudden halt a few seconds later.
“What is it?” Cédes asked.
“Dead end.”
Cédes felt her heart drop into her stomach. It lurched like she was about to be sick. Very sick. “Perhaps… perhaps that name is befitting of our fate,” she said mournfully, making a final attempt at humor despite the dire circumstances.
“No…” Stefi said, shaking her head back and forth. “No… there has to be a way out. There just has to.” Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. Tears not for herself, but the innocent ferrets and Cédes.
“Do me one last favor,” she asked Cédes as half a dozen soldiers approached cautiously yet confidently, like hunters approaching a wild beast caught in a trap.
“Anything,” Cédes answered.
“Hold me.”
Struck by her friend’s display of fear, Cédes could do nothing but obey.
As Stefi quivered in her arms, Cédes did her best to comfort her despite her own fear. She stroked her human friend’s hair with one hand. It wasn’t about to end here, was
it? Like this, holding the one human who had befriended her so unconditionally, who had changed her perceptions of a whole race, and who had vowed to find a way to make her see the beauty of the world once again?
“No…” Cédes hissed through gritted teeth as the flood of terror, the flood of adrenaline and fear, trickled out and was replaced with a torrent of something completely new. Rage. Seething. Roiling. Rage.
“I will not allow it to end like this!” she screamed, startling even the soldiers, and pushed Stefi aside. She clenched her fists about her staff and stone, and a blazing, crackling ball of fire erupted and enveloped her left hand completely. She held it in front of her. The soldiers took several steps back.
“My only crime is being what I am. Her only crime, showing compassion for another.” As she spoke her red eyes flared menacingly, causing the soldiers to retreat further.
“How does it feel to be the ones fleeing now?” she taunted, her voice dripping with malice. She raised her flaming hand and pointed it towards the clouded sky as a terrified yet awed Stefi watched.
“Ers… Fosan… Sikernin… Yarun!”
A blazing circle appeared on the ground about her, encompassing her and Stefi in its circumference. Fiery symbols within it, their meaning unclear but their very nature magical and otherworldly, scorched the stones that lined the road.
Cédes let loose the fire from her hands with a flick of her wrist. It soared upwards, casting a bloody, unearthly glow over Valraines like a dying sun; a ghastly red in the starless night. As it rose it momentarily lit up the undersides of the heavy storm clouds so that the heavens themselves looked to be aflame. Then it was gone.
Cédes, still blazing with fury, smiled in the direction of the guards as their footsteps drew closer once more.
“Now what?” Stefi asked nervously. Despite Cédes’s relative control over the flames of Raphanos, sweat was pouring off her. She only hoped the ferrets could stand the heat inside her pack.
“Now, dear heart, you run.”
“What? I’m not going without you!” Stefi tugged Cédes’s arm. Cédes shrugged her off.
“Raphanos is coming, gorging himself on my rage. I am losing control,” she said, her voice rising nearly to a scream. “Run!”
Stefi nodded resignedly. “If there really is a god, I hope he will be with you,” she said and took off, skirting about the soldiers who barely noticed her.
“There is,” Cédes whispered, “and she just was.”
She struck the ground with the end of her staff and a great boom like a thunderclap resounded through the air and shook the ground. Far, far above Valraines the clouds were rent apart as a burning mass tore through the still night air, falling towards the town like a meteor. A scream of terror arose from the people of the town as what looked to be the end of the world hurtled towards them.
On the edge of the forest, Ifaut laid an unconscious Sansonis on the ground. She raised her eyes skywards towards the object bearing down on Valraines, on Stefi and Cédes.
“I hope they’re okay,” she said quietly, again close to tears. She stopped herself as she realized she needed to be strong for Sansonis’s sake as well as her own.
“As do I,” Rhaka said from her side.
The fire slammed into the building that had blocked Stefi and Cédes’s escape, tearing it apart in a cloud of smoke and flame and casting a hail of flaming debris upon the surrounding area. Cédes stood unmoving, unharmed, as cinders rained down about her.
From the remains of the building arose a form several times taller than Cédes, four legged and animal-like. Dark flames danced across its burning body as tongues of fire lashed the ground, devouring anything they chanced upon and leaving only ash. The soldiers, deciding that they really didn’t want to pursue this Furosan any longer, fled.
“Now, Raphanos,” Cédes said, “you may be gone.”
The burning beast looked down at her, its eyes two dead coals. Nothing.
“Can you not hear me? Be gone!”
But Raphanos, the embodiment of Feregana’s flame and one of the five elemental guardians, either didn’t hear or chose not to. It was too glutted by Cédes’s own flames of rage: they fueled its fires, kindled its own desire. Cédes’s rage incarnate.
“R-Raphanos,” Cédes said, “you may stop now.” Her rage gave way to fear, the fear of destruction and hurting someone who wasn’t involved in this mess.
In reply it unleashed a roaring ball of flame from its great mouth and reduced a house a short way off to kindling and splinters. Then Phastus’s words rang in Cédes’s head. Its nature is destruction. Always remember that.
“No, this is not what I wanted!” she shouted as tears formed in her eyes. “I just wanted a way out, to protect Stefi!”
At that moment a peal of thunder sounded and the clouds let forth their burden of rain, a heavy, pelting downpour that only a storm born from the sea can bring.
The flaming Raphanos looked up in alarm, its blistering body hissing as raindrops pelted it like thousands of tiny arrows; one not enough to harm it, but many enough to certainly cool its temper.
Cédes turned towards it, almost in pity, as she heard it let out a pained moan and sink, hissing, to the ground. “Now that cold rain has washed away your hot rage, and mine also, please be gone.”
Then, in a flash that even Cédes could feel on her eyes, Raphanos was gone. All that remained were the dying flames of its rampage, no, Cédes’s rampage, and a woman’s wailing rising above the falling rain. The sound of despair reached Cédes’s sensitive ears. It bore with it the realization that she was the cause.
With her composure regained and emotions forcibly checked, she veiled herself and stumbled through the driving rain towards the source of the sound, using her staff for guidance. Her robes, weighted with water, dragged through the dust and sand now turned to mud. But she didn’t care. What if someone was dead because of her? What if, to save Stefi, others had to die, other innocents?
After a few minutes of feeling her way through the unfamiliar streets she found the source of the wailing. It was a woman sitting amongst the rubble of what had once been her home. Cédes stood beside her and reappeared.
The woman gasped at the sudden appearance of a deathly pale figure beside her. But she didn’t scream or cry out. She merely spoke. “Please, help my daughter,” she said and led Cédes further into the wreckage. “You can save her, can’t you, spirit?”
“I shall try.” Cédes spoke softly, knowing all this pain was because of her.
The woman guided Cédes so that she knelt down and placed her hand on something soft and warm. Cédes ran her hand across the young girl’s body, a girl little older than she was when her sight had left her, until she came to her stomach. What she found made her fiery blood turn to ice. A jagged spear of wood jutted from the girl’s stomach. The wound oozed blood with each rapid heartbeat.
“No…” Cédes said, barely audible. “What have I done?”
“You can’t help her, can you?” The girl’s mother sobbed, her face as ashen as the remains of her home.
“No. She is gravely wounded. All I can do now is ensure she makes it safely to the Bridge.”
“Then please, Miss Spirit, do what you can.”
Cédes groped around until she found the girl’s hand and squeezed it softly. The girl, her strength fading, returned the gesture with a weak squeeze of her own.
“Are… are you an… angel?” the girl gasped as she stared wide-eyed at the strange being before her. To her young eyes, how could this beautiful creature be anything but good, anything but one of Kardin’s angels?
“Yes,” Cédes said, her voice remarkably calm. “I am here to help you find peace.”
“Then… if you’re an angel, where are your wings?”
“An angel of death has no need for wings.”
Cédes felt the life leave the small girl’s body with a shudder, the departure of a soul destined for the Rainbow Bridge that divides life from death, this worl
d from the next. The soul of a young girl who would never come of age, would never grow to experience her first love, nor have a family and a daughter of her own. The realization that she had just ended a life struck her with full force, shattering her innocence into tiny shards and staining her hands with blood that would never come off.
Then she wept.