Slumrat Rising

Chapter 103: Feeling Safe-ish

The ducks eventually decided they had had enough seeds and paddled off. The elegant wake behind them was as fine as ever a duck did make. The sunlight reflecting off the tiny ripples seemed to contain some blessed harmonies, silver flashes dancing in time with the world.

The little group just sat there a while longer, each letting their thoughts drift across the pond. Finding that calm moment within the chaos of their lives. Stillness is a powerful thing. It lets you really see yourself and the world. Easy to go blind when you are always on the move.

Truth shivered and pulled himself together. He could feel the change. He doubted he was any stronger or faster, or at least not much stronger or faster, but he was more solid. One step closer to the super-reality of, say, a duck.

Etenesh stretched. Truth took a look at her. Really looked. Tried to put away all his assumptions and hang-ups and general paranoia and just… looked at her.

She was tired. Truth could see it in her. She hadn’t been sleeping well. There was still a pain in her, though perhaps it was a bit less than it was before. She now had hope that the pain would ease, perhaps. And she was beautiful.

She was beautiful. He remembered thinking that Etenesh and Jember were both a bit above average in looks, but he was wrong. Jember was handsome, sporty, and charismatic. But Etenesh was beautiful in a way that simply avoided his words. She wound her beauty around him until it was all he could see of her- beautiful Etenesh, tired eyes and all.

He could only hold it for a moment- that little chunk of his life that was just Beautiful Etenesh, and it was enough that she was. But the moment melted like snow in his hand, running through his fingers and into the dirt.

She was beautiful, inside and out. He was a freak. A walking corpse. A man whose death was a blessing to billions and whose life could kill a world. Someone who, even lost in her beauty, held himself ready to kill her. Because she would turn on him. Everyone would. They would use him and turn on him and discard him the second a better deal came along.

That was the real horror of it. You could always try to make yourself useful. You could be useful. You could be doing your very best. The best you ever did. And if a better deal came along, you would be thrown away. Instantly. With the only regret being the time and attention required to shoo you out the door. Whether you gave it your all didn’t matter. It was just- is this a better deal for your boss? If yes, you were gone. Escorted away by security to make sure you didn’t damage the place you had poured the irreplaceable seconds of your life into in exchange for… what, exactly?

A woman as beautiful, rich, and smart as Etenesh had options. A lot of options. Better options than “emotionally damaged, paranoid slumrat.” For example, someone who could actually hug her. That was probably something women looked for- a person who could hug them properly. Not gingerly, worried you were going to break them, or they would suddenly bury a knife in your ear.

Etenesh finished her stretch, rolled her shoulders back, and looked over at Truth. When she saw him looking, she smiled. And the world returned to quietness and the warmth of the afternoon sun.

____________________________________________

Later, back at Temple Nag Hamadi, Etenesh and Jember drilled with Truth. It was an interesting challenge.

Etenesh had her spirit launching ice skewers at Truth. He could dodge almost all of them, and he found that, while they stung, they didn’t do more than that. Which was… interesting. He was fairly sure this spell was somewhere between a Level Zero cantrip and a Level One Ice Bolt. In other words, lethal to an unprotected mage. The benefits of body cultivation on spell resistance was starting to really show. Truth smashed aside a skewer and sprinted to close with the spirit. The spirit countered by raising a small field of spikes between Truth and Etenesh. Truth just grinned and hurdled them.

The spirit scoffed and launched a spray of skewers, trying to catch him in the air. Truth writhed, twisting and contorting as he crossed over the spikes. Most missed, thanks to his absurd reflexes and coordination. The ones that didn’t were either deflected away or ignored. With a flex of his gut, Truth landed on his feet and was in a dead sprint toward Etenesh almost as soon as both feet touched the ground.

Etenesh wasn’t going to make it that easy for him. The sclera of her eyes turned a gentle orange, like autumn leaves or the ocher earth of Siphios. Her formation seemed to swirl up around her like smoke, endlessly arranging itself into mystic geometries. Swarming clouds of darting lights emerged from those twisting formations, raining down on Truth.

Once again, he could simply shrug off most of the attacks, though Incisive warned that taking too many hits would be dangerous. So he pressed in, letting Incisive guide his cut. It wasn’t like there was a particular weakness to this formation. But the Tongue of One Who Speaks For God was no ordinary blade. Tool activated the bane enchantment in the blade, and a ward breaker spell formed around it. Truth smashed through the ward with brute force, coming face to face with Etenesh. Looking down into her hypnotic ocher eyes.

He gently tapped her with the flat of his blade. “Tag.”

Jember took that as his cue to launch a searing pillar of sunlight directly down on Truth. Incisive screamed at him to dodge, and he sprinted hard for the opposite side of the room. Jember had his formation up and running and had decided to favor fire. Or, perhaps, the blackbird with blazing red wingtips and long yellow claws that was hovering in the air over Jember had made that decision. Truth hadn’t seen Jember’s contract spirit before. It looked quite handsome and energetic. The bastard.

Truth rushed back and forth across the room, trying to break down the wards and tag the caster before the other got their spell up and they could team up and force him to yield. They had decided to stake tonight’s dessert on it. A serious matter, as the kitchen had been working hard to flatter the delegates with delicacies.

Jember was the first to quit, raising his hand and begging off. “I can’t! How are you putting up with the burnout?!”

“How do you have burnout? You are running formations and letting your spirit fight for you!” Truth yelled back.

“I’m going to add that to the list of things you say that I pretend I didn’t hear,” Jember muttered.

Truth turned and ran back towards Etenesh, who just waved him off. “If he’s out, you will just tag me faster. I’m with Jember on this- how have you not collapsed yet?”

“Merkovah knows what he’s talking about when it comes to building out my spells,” Truth admitted. “The Meditations make me much, much stronger and faster than you are used to dealing with and gives me the reflexes to anticipate and avoid a lot of attacks. Incisive takes that to another level, of course, but I have gotten used to using it more… lightly, I guess is the word? Not pushing the spell, just trying to get a feel for what’s coming in the next second or so. Less, even. Next few fractions of a second is plenty most of the time. Likewise, I only draw on the Tongue’s bane or the cutting portion of Incisive for a second or less, reducing the power draw.”

Truth shrugged. “Most of it is just down to muscle, speed, and a really good blade.”

Etenesh’s eyes still had that warm ocher filling their sclera. It was gently fading away, but it was still noticeable, and fascinating. Truth coughed.

“I, uh, also… want to apologize. I flipped out at you two last night when you were trying to show me something that… was supposed to be a good thing. And I flipped out, out of nowhere. I’m sorry. It brought up a lot of bad stuff. So. Sorry.”

The cousins looked at each other and winced. Jember took a deep breath, and Truth noticed a very faint glow around him. The ocher grew brighter in Etenesh’s eyes.

“We’re sorry too. We had no idea you had so much pain in your life. No idea. Though in retrospect, there were some things that really should have clued us in.” Jember shook his head.

“Your total indifference to what should be nightmarish situations, for one thing.” Etenesh’s smile took the sting from the words. “I may never hear the word “Ok” the same way ever again.”

“It was something about the… well the everything. They made up a whole noble story about who I was. Created this whole identity for me and then said that made-up person was a hero. Hero this, hero that, dedicated to a life of being a noble hero, cut away from all… family. Money. Stuff.” Truth gave up. He didn’t have the right words.

He sighed, dusting himself off. “It’s not who I was or who I am. You may have never met someone who spent more time thinking about money than me.” The last sentence came out more grimly than he intended.

“Your family?” Jember asked softly.

“Yes, my siblings. I’m sorry, I can’t say more. I shouldn’t have said as much as I did.”

“Can you tell us why?” Etenesh asked.

“No secret. It is better for the world if I died. So the person who should be dead is dead. And now there’s me. I’m still trying to figure out who that is. So far, the new me seems a lot happier than old-me. Things are going pretty good for new-me. But old-me might be dead, but he isn’t gone.” Truth smiled. The cousins didn’t quite wince.

“And you can’t contact your siblings because everyone needs to believe that you are dead?” Jember tried to smile back.

“Yes.”

“I prayed for your parents last night,” Etenesh said. The ocher in her sclera was quite bright now. Lovely, in an eerie sort of way.

“You prayed. For my parents.”

“Yes. That they would understand the misery they made you and your siblings suffer. That at some point, in this life or the next, they came to truly, truly know just how you felt.” Truth looked at her and thought he heard the beating of mighty wings. “I was amazed at how sincere I was. I said, “God, this is the world you have left to us. And I know you don’t care. But I care. And I believe in your almighty power. So please, do this. Make them understand.”

“No bargaining?”

“Anything I could offer is already his. I will not insult him for all that he despises us now.” Etenesh’s voice was sad, but there was a calmness to it that wasn’t there yesterday. “I will pray. I will beg. And I will walk on my own two feet and rely on the work of my own two hands and trust in the magic in my soul. I will walk a path that perhaps no one has walked before- a devout non-theist.” Jember shook his head and half chuckled. Truth just looked puzzled. What on earth did that mean?

“Don’t worry about it. I’m still figuring out what I mean. Can’t expect you to know. But I would like to try something if you would. Mr. Wells.”

“Alright?”

“I would like to walk with you. Do you think we could hold hands?”

“I have no idea. But I would very much like to find out.”

Etenesh’s hand was very warm.