Collected
Chapter 14
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It was often that life threw curveballs at people, putting them in situations they wouldn’t have ever thought would happen to them. But this was one of those magical times where, for once, that was arguably a good thing.
Kamali gawked at Avrom the Collector, his figure inspecting the city that the Fervent Indulgent planned to take over, and create for themselves a new base of operations. His body felt too vivid now, Kamali sensing the little twitches of his muscles and the pressure of his fingers, clasped against the elbows of his folded arms. The way his lips turned up, how his eyes narrowed with a sense of solemn resolve.
War?
Beastmaster die!
Such surprise! Drastic measures being taken?
I’m dreaming. The Collector’s too much of a coward to fight the Fervent Indulgent head-on, this must be a dream.
Fight! Destroy monster-maker.
Dream all you want, Vern, but we’re here. The Collector’s taken our words seriously.
Freedom. We will free!
Purge!
The other spirits were in a clamor, Kamali fortunate at all to pick out any one of their statements. She couldn’t blame them. “You listened to what I said?” she whispered.
Two souls rolled into the fingers of the Collector, red and blue each. He plucked both out of himself, the forms of Dahlia and Myra manifesting before her. Where Dahlia landed gracefully, the far less prepared Myra stumbled and tripped over herself as she fell onto the ground.
“Been a long while since I got to touch grass,” muttered Dahlia, before giving the Collector the stink eye. “Some nerve you have, Avrom.”
“Separating you from young Myra seemed inappropriate. Would you give me some space?”
It was half a command, Dahlia scowling as she and Kamali found themselves parting to either side. The Collector walked past, Myra staring with wide eyes as he knelt before her. “We have not spoken yet,” he told her in a soft voice. “I would apologize, but those won’t mean anything to you, I reckon. I am Avrom, the Collector. Have you heard of the name?”
The little girl quivered, but managed a nod. “Avrom—” warned Dahlia.
“Let me, Dahlia.” The Collector let out a sigh. “I will make this brief for you, little Myra. You know what I did to you when fighting Beastmaster, yes?”
Myra averted her gaze. “Y-you,” she mumbled, “you saved me.”
“I took your soul. Hurt you.”
“Saved me.” The child gave a tiny shake of her head. “Better you than h-him. You’re k-killing him?”
The words stunned the Collector, as much as it did for Dahlia and Kamali. Only now did Kamali realize Myra’s quivering wasn’t simply out of sheer terror at the Collector — Spirit Empathy told her it had more to do with being overwhelmed than anything. “No,” the Collector eventually said, also averting his own gaze. “I fear I cannot quite manage that feat. Beastmaster isn’t someone I can easily defeat.”
Myra bit her lips, a pained noise in her throat. “But,” the Collector added, “I owe you a favor, little one. It was not within my right to imprison you within me, not without asking first, and it certainly wasn’t right to take your life as I had. And when I wrong one of my spirits, the least I can do is attempt to make up for it. You wish the Beastmaster was gone?”
It was a bit of a brainless question. Something steely flashed within Myra’s eyes, but Kamali felt the anguish that steel was meant to hide. “He did bad things to D-Daddy and Mommy,” she mumbled, doing her best not to sniff. “He’s a monster. At least y-you try not to be.”
Something in the Collector’s heart seemed to melt and grow tender at the girl’s words. The body was the opposite, however, his fist tightened into a merciless death grip choking the air. The girl gave the littlest of nods, and it was all the Collector needed to see, his resolution etched into stone.
“He will perish then,” he stated. “Or failing that, I will ruin everything else for that cur.”
“You’re serious.” The words left Kamali without her thinking, the Collector twisting to face her. “Oh my goodness, this is happening.”
Culling, culling!
Will spill fiends’ blood!
The Broken were raving, all united in their hate against the Fervent Indulgent. “I value my immortality, Kamali, make no mistake about that,” the Collector said. “But I also value the spirits I’ve imprisoned. What good is an eternity spent with an unhappy family, after all? My mind would break from their apathy.”
He faced the city. “Myra deserves this. Curse it, a lot of spirits deserve this. What kind of hypocrisy is this, that I’d let a blighted foil of myself that leaves souls to scream in silence, trapped in a monstrous body no longer their own, walk away freely? I’ve already garnered his ire anyway, and possibly the rest of the Fervent Indulgent — better that I make the first ambush before he can.”
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Kamali couldn’t help herself. Her Spirit Empathy searched within the Collector’s heart, trying to make sense of this sudden change of attitude. And she caught on to a tiny little detail the Collector had been keeping to himself. An emptiness, buried deep within himself, that he yearned to fill up.
Her talk of purpose had struck a nerve. Avrom didn’t seem to like how he didn’t serve a point in the world. Was it a sore spot? Had Charon prodded at him a lot on that front before? The thought of Charon made Kamali scrunch up her brows for some reason, though she wasn’t sure why.
Dahlia clutched Myra’s arm as she returned to her, wonder written into her face. “This is quite unlike you,” she told the Collector. “You usually settle for smaller, more basic ways to appease your spirits. Risking your very life to return a favor? Are you well?”
Kamali could feel a slightly manic smile crease the Collector’s face. “Well?” he said. “Dahlia, I think my mind’s breaking down. The intensity of recent events has been getting to me, and my spirits’ anger toward me only exacerbates it. That immortality I’m chasing after?” A pained laugh left his mouth. “I might not enjoy it for long, if I don’t do this. You see a fool chasing after being a hero, but I only see a dangerous but worthwhile necessity to pursue.”
Something was definitely nagging at Kamali’s mind now. Frowning, she made use of her Academic Role for the first time since she’d become a spirit, trying to wrack her head. Her Role helped with memorizing and recalling details, along with understanding concepts — but right now, she was failing to figure out what was bugging her. Had something happened? Something about the Collector’s behavior made her feel unwell—
“Does it now?”
Avrom the Collector was intently staring at her. Dahlia too, one of her brows raised. Kamali looked between them and a confused Myra, not enjoying the sudden spotlight.
“I-I don’t know?” Kamali shook her head, considering she might be overthinking things. “Maybe you’re being too reckless with this? Have you thought this through?”
“A little. We’ll only get one shot at taking out Beastmaster himself, or else he’ll be able to inflict fatal damage to my spirits.” The Collector rubbed his head. “But his mount can sniff me out easily. Earl might get a good blow in if he’s quick enough? Bah, maybe I’m not thinking this through. I haven’t even considered how the local guards and Lord Terrence might fit into this puzzle, they’ll complicate things if they get wind of my presence here.”
That wouldn’t do. Halting Beastmaster’s plans was very much something that Kamali wanted, but not if it only amounted to throwing away the Collector’s life, and hers by extension. Still, the Fervent Indulgent would take quite a bit of time to reach Elystra City, she imagined. They should have time to plan this out — and plenty of spirits they could work with. She could practically feel the eagerness from a small yet notable amount of the saner ones, and from a great deal of Broken too.
Already, she was getting a few ideas in her head. They just needed to figure out how to make them come together. “Why don’t we do some testing, away from the city walls?” she suggested.
It was a little too uncomfortable, she found, being able to feel every little movement that let the Collector grin a toothy smile behind his mask.
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It was dawn.
A night had been spent in the forested area a healthy distance away from Elystra City, where Kamali had helped the Collector devise a plan for ruining the Fervent Indulgent’s attempts to take the city. And hopefully, to take down Beastmaster while they were at it. She waited within the prison of the Collector, watching everything closely. A small row of spirits did the same around her, a group of fighters prepared for what was to come. Non-combatants sat further away, having their own space on the large rock island.
The Collector had been standing watch for a while, atop one of the shadowed, decorative overhangs of the city’s central citadel. Gardens, courtyards, and lavish houses and buildings stood behind him, and in front, a sprawl of humbler houses, marketplaces, and the occasional slums. A terrible silence held the city hostage, a swarm of guards lining up all over the main walls in wait. Some guarded the citadel walls, but not many, and none had any reason to look up at the little nook where the Collector was hiding.
“They knew the Fervent Indulgent were coming. Kept all their soldiers in reserve, didn’t bother sending any to help Virala and Gordius Town.” The Collector dryly spat. “There’s Windblades here, I can feel their souls inside the citadel. Lord Terrence couldn’t be bothered to dispatch them and stop Beastmaster from making more monster fodder for his invasion, huh?”
Kamali had never known much of the Lord herself, but there was always somebody in Virala Town with a few underhanded comments to quietly make about him. He had a general lack of interest in caring for the neighboring towns he ruled over, leaving them to handle issues like banditry and invasive monsters all on their own. Eseelis Village had been on the fringes of his land — they never had a reason to expect anything from their supposed ruler, other than the occasional tax collector.
She turned to the fighters, finding Earl chief among them, along with the fire mage spirit. A black spirit as well that Kamali assumed was the one that could cloak the Collector, making him invisible. Freya was somewhere on the side, sitting with her legs drawn against her chest and her head laying on her knees. Her eyes were unfocused, but she seemed more reasonable before, if still a little out of her head.
“Beastmaster, coming?” she had told Kamali earlier. “Will help then. Must finish the cur.”
She wasn’t fighting. The Collector couldn’t do that to her. But she was insistent, so she was here.
Myra was beside her. Also not fighting. But like Freya, she had been bafflingly insistent. Dahlia stayed close to watch her, Freya tightly clutching the girl’s hand. Myra’s eyes had a hollowness to them, but they stared outward nonetheless, seeing as the Collector saw.
The other combatants spoke quietly to each other, assessing the situation as well. Kamali found herself curious as to what drove them to do this — not everyone with combat abilities had joined, too afraid of possibly joining the Broken if things went wrong. Charon wasn’t here either, though that had more to do with him just being nowhere to be found. Which very much bothered Kamali for some reason, but she couldn’t put her finger on why.
She would’ve asked those who were fighting about their reasons, but alas, these faces were strangers to her. And for all her defiance with the Collector, Kamali was still an introvert deep down. Attempts to speak only left her tongue-tied. If her Spirit Empathy was anything to go by, though? It was partly out of a need for excitement, something worthwhile to do. But far more importantly, because it was the Fervent Indulgent, arguably the most vile of the Four Horsemen. A stain upon the earth.
Warbled, noisy voices cried out, and Kamali forced a smile at the masses of clumped-up Broken floating over the sea, mostly shrouded by the purple mist. “Strange that the Broken might have a purpose for once,” the Collector commented. “Never would’ve considered their use!”
Rude! Am very useful!
Use us! Break the evil.
Nerves were getting to Kamali. It was surreal, really. The Collector had gone to war, and she was participating in it, even if she herself wasn’t directly fighting. Her inner cockroach still squirmed in protest, but Kamali brought herself to ignore it. It was fine. This was a good thing to do. The right thing.
Yells hollered, and she refocused her gaze, alert. A warband was appearing on the horizon, grotesque in appearance even from such a far distance. The Fervent Indulgent were like a tide of corruption, swarming forth with a rotten hunger. The Collector observed with a growing hunger of his own, one borne from something more primal than his need to eat souls — a furious kind of hunger that needed blood. Kamali could feel it within him, and within the Broken, united in their seething. A similar, if more refined rage amongst the saner spirits as well.
It was dawn. And their enemy had come.