After the battle, a heavy silence settled over Konti like a shroud. The mob—which had just hours before been calling for blood—had seen the skirmish on the wall. Even more terrifying was what they’d heard of the battle beyond it, their imaginations filling in the gaps of what they couldn’t see with the most frightening horrors imaginable. When Deirdre ordered the gates opened in the aftermath, a few brave souls even ventured out to witness the battlefield for themselves. What they saw there did little to disperse the nightmares they had conjured.
Enough blood had already been spilled to slake their thirst. Enough blood had been spilled to drown them in it. Perhaps the army wasn’t forgiven, but few of the crowd had any appetite left for violence.
Unfortunately, that did not mean the survivors of the Sixth Army could rest. Those healthy enough to do so labored with shovels, digging mass barrows for their fallen. Others worked to drag the twisted and mutated flesh of the abominations into massive bonfires. The smell was repugnant, but if left to rot it would only get worse and poison the locals to boot.
Daniel sat alone on a hill that the battle hadn’t quite touched. The earth was dry of blood, and the grasses hadn’t been trampled. He stared at the soldiers as they carried out their grim task.
He felt numb in both body and soul. He wondered if that reaction was normal, or if there was something he should do. Some way to express the significance of the day’s tragedy. So many people had died. They deserved something, didn’t they? They had mattered, they’d been heroes. Why hadn’t the world stopped turning for them?
But time marched on. Their bodies were thrown into pits and covered with earth, leaving only a series of low round hills to mark the spot.
Daniel gingerly cradled his injured hand, wrapped in fresh bandages. One of the army healers had offered to see to him, but he’d told them no. The magic wouldn’t work on him anyway. It was just as well; the healers were stretched to their limit as it was. Most of the common soldiers would need to spend some time healing the old-fashioned way too.
He scowled at a murder of ravens circling above the battlefield. He’d been afraid that the scavengers would descend en masse to pick apart the bodies of the fallen before the soldiers could bury them, but so far they’d held back, probably waiting to claim the unprotected scraps left over when the soldiers gave up.
Arnica and Taur had gone back into the city with the governor. The necromancer especially had been reluctant to interact with any of the living soldiers. He didn’t blame her.
Footsteps padded up the hill behind him. He fought the numbness, summoning the motivation to turn his head and see who approached. It was Dira, the priestess.
“You,” he said.
“Yes,” she replied, “me.” She settled next to him, crossing her legs and sitting in the dirt. She wore a peasant’s dress of rough homespun cloth. From her appearance, he would never have guessed her to be a priestess, or anything other than a normal citizen. “How have you been, Daniel?”
“Guess,” he said, gesturing to the battlefield with his bandaged hand.
She grimaced. “I am sorry.”
“Not sorry enough to help. But let me guess, you couldn’t even if you wanted to?” Daniel said. Maybe it would have been wise to show the priestess of death some respect. At that moment, he didn’t care.
“Daniel, I did want to. The abominations are no friends of Veil. She would have stopped this, but there are rules…”
“Rules from your goddess?” he asked.
“Rules that bind my goddess,” she replied. “Daniel, the pantheon’s influence should not be understated, but direct intervention carries risk. To act openly invites retribution.”
“What ‘retribution’ would Veil invite just by opposing the abominations?” Daniel asked. “You said they’re unnatural, right? Then the other gods in your pantheon should be on the same page.”
“They should be, yes, but immortal beings can hold grudges for a very long time. Others would get involved because Veil involved herself, seizing the opportunity to strike while her power was exposed. The paths of death are nearly unassailable, but emerging from them in such a dramatic way would make the goddess vulnerable. There is a reason she prefers to act through intermediaries.”
“Like you,” Daniel said, picking up a pebble and tossing it absentmindedly down the hill.
“Or you,” Dira countered, “should you accept her offer.”
Daniel sighed. Bracing his good hand against the ground, he slowly rose to his feet, wincing at a headache that he’d developed in the hours since the battle. “I’ve heard that mortals who get caught up with gods tend not to fare too well.”
“An unfortunate truth,” Dira admitted, making no move to stand. “But the same holds true for all who take it upon themselves to act. Passivity draws few adversaries, but accomplishes little in the end.”
“Then maybe the world needs more passivity.”
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“Passivity wouldn’t have saved Rhud,” she said.
Daniel clenched his good fist, looking away from her and down at the barrows. The sun was setting now, though the fields were still illuminated by the massive pyres, stacked high with the abomination remains. The first of the burial mounds had been finished. One of the ravens descended to alight atop it.
Daniel watched, worried for a moment that the soldiers had carelessly left the layer of earth too shallow. But the bird didn’t dig down, searching for food. It just perched there, a tiny sentry, quickly blending into the shadows as the sun sank below the horizon.
“What would have saved Rhud, then?” Daniel asked the priestess.
“What they needed didn’t exist yet, not anywhere in the world,” Dira said. “The abominations brazenly rebel against the laws of nature in myriad ways. They were locked away for a very long time, but the threat they pose could be delayed no longer. They can be opposed mundanely, but Veil has identified only one means of unravelling their corruption directly.”
“Me,” Daniel said, suddenly feeling cold.
“Yes,” Dira said. “You. You can choose to be passive Daniel, but that is still a choice. Few would envy your condition in this world, but it comes with certain… opportunities.”
Daniel crossed his arms nervously, wincing as his sleeve brushed the tender flesh of his injured hand. The bandages that had minutes before been fresh were now ragged and thin, like ancient papyrus. He would need to replace those.
“And what is my condition, exactly?” he asked, turning to wave the hand in front of her face. “Magic rejects me, and every time I start to get comfortable, something around me rots or crumbles. Why? What am I, Dira?” He’d meant to sound demanding, but his last question came out sounding more like a plead.
Dira rose gracefully to her feet, gently taking his injured hand with both of hers in a way that reminded him of his mother. “You are an enigma, Daniel,” she said. “You are nearly the same as a soul from here, and yet completely incompatible.
“Magic suffuses everything, including the matter around us, and it is alive. Sometimes, it’s just dormant. But it can wake up, it can interact. It’s responsive to the world around it, to passion and emotion. When you awaken it and it tries to interact, you violate the patterns it has come to expect, and it loses its identity. It decays.”
The explanation reminded Daniel of something from his chemistry classes, of chiral and achiral molecules. Identical in structure to each other without being superimposable, like left and right hands. Certain organic processes couldn’t use the achiral molecules, despite the fact that they had the exact same composition as their mirrored counterparts.
Was he the equivalent of an achiral soul? Incompatible with life in this universe?
“So there’s no way to stop it,” Daniel said, “I’m just a wrench in this world’s well-tuned cosmic machine.”
“Maybe,” Dira admitted, “or maybe not. You’ve described yourself as a cancer, but maybe you aren’t. Perhaps, as with the abomination today, you could be a defense against the cancer. A protector.”
Daniel considered that for a second, then frowned. He’d made the cancer comparison with Arnica and Taur. He didn’t remember using that phrase with Dira.
“How did you know that?” he asked. “How do you know so much about me? And you found me the first time within hours of entering the city. How?”
“I told you; your presence creates ripples. For an interested party, finding you is not difficult,” she replied, releasing his hand.
“Do those ripples tell you everything I say?” Daniel asked, voice rising. “How does a priestess know this much?”
Dira’s even expression did not waver. “Patience,” she said. “You’ll get answers with time.”
“No,” he said, “none of that, because I can give an answer right now! Your goddess has made an offer, and I say no. I’ll make my own choices and do what I see fit. I won’t work for someone who spies on me.” Daniel turned and began to descend the hill, walking as briskly as he could manage.
“There may come a time,” Dira called out, not pursuing him, “when you reconsider that decision.”
He ignored her, refusing to turn around as he approached the city. The guards manning the gate recognized him, despite his stained and torn uniform. They saluted, and more than a little fear was apparent in their faces.
They had seen what he’d done. They’d seen him touch the creatures which had melted into piles of dead flesh. Daniel had offered no explanation at the time or since.
They probably thought he was a sorcerer of some kind, a downright terrifying one at that. Though still not as terrifying as Arnica. Daniel remembered her ritual. Her keening song, the unravelling of her friend’s soul, and the way she’d barred the gates of death.
Without her intervention, the battle would likely have been lost. In mere moments every dead soldier had risen again, ignoring their mortal wounds to rejoin the frantic melee. She’d evened the playing field, but in doing so had made monsters out of the Sixth’s soldiers. They looked at her with no small degree of trepidation after that, and Daniel couldn’t blame them.
“Sir?” A city watchman approached him, saluting. Daniel recognized him as Captain Vymes, who had been with Deirdre before the battle. “I’m to escort you to the governor,” he said.
“Lead on,” Daniel waved away the salute half-heartedly, “though I would have thought she’d be resting by now.”
“You and me both, Duke,” Vymes said, cracking a smile. “She swears she hardly needs it, but just between us, she’s mistaken.”
Daniel let out a polite chuckle, appreciating the soothing normalcy in how the captain treated him. “So what now?” he asked the guard captain. “Are things all right with the Sixth?”
Vymes sighed. “They’re smoother than before, but not as much as I’d like. We’ll probably have communication from the capital too, after a battle like that. What effect that’ll have is anybody’s guess.”
“How long will that take?” Daniel asked. “The capital is pretty far, isn’t it?”
“Depends. Governor Deirdre sent messenger birds. It could take weeks for them to get there, for the imperial council to draft a response, and for them to send it back.” Vymes scowled then. “On the other hand,” he said, “the imperial armies supposedly have sorcerous communication channels. I don’t know much about those, but I don’t trust ‘em. Those imperial mages could report anything they want, and we’ve got no way of knowing the truth of it.”
“Expecting trouble? I figured that would mostly be behind us,” said Daniel.
Vymes shrugged. “That’s your world Duke, not mine. But expecting the worst is part of my job.”
Daniel cursed internally, realizing the man was right. Deirdre would probably want his help with this sort of problem in the days to come.
She had seen what he’d done with the abominations up close better than anybody. Was it worth telling her the truth of the matter? That he wasn’t Telann, just Daniel? He considered this, but despite his best efforts couldn’t banish his worries. The governor knowing who he was might make things easier, but if it went poorly she could end up rejecting him. Deirdre didn’t seem like the type of woman who appreciated being lied to, and Daniel had outright told her he was the Duke
He had already risked angering the goddess of death. Alienating powerful allies wasn’t a habit he wanted to fall into.