Still 2 Days to the Falling

“Axe-break will change the game for you and the others.”

Jacob sat on a bench in the Tower Garden. I stood near him, too excited, too anxious to sit.

The old man groaned on, “I would love very much to accompany you and see you wield your new skill. But the adventure to Dodge was more than enough for my old bones for a while. I’m afraid if I spend too much time too far from the Tower that I’ll turn to dust.”

He cackled weakly. I just paced slowly. It had been Jacob’s wish to spend a private moment in the garden. The army readied itself beyond the walls. When the Falling began, the priests would tell us where the Oracle predicted the Orbs to descend. It seemed to be random and patternless, but it could be anywhere in the land. Boston was too distant from the center to be able to deploy its forces effectively if the Falling were too far. So our armies would march, under Footfield, and make camp more centrally.

Jacob said, “Use it wisely. Axe-break has a cooldown time measured in hours.”

I shook my head. “Then it’s barely any use. What is it? How does it work?”

Jacob said, “It’s a strike, like CUT. But it’s more use than you might think. You only need to use it once. Let the world know you have the skill—hurt, wound, or kill an Axe that comes for you, as Axes will for Swords, and word will spread. That much will take care of itself. Once it’s known that you have Axe-break, then they’ll need to consider carefully how to approach you. Axes will still come for you—they’ll still have advantage. They’ll know you only have one shot with the skill. But they’ll be more cautious. And their caution is your time. Time is everything out there.”

I nodded. That much was true. His words kindled the conflict in me. I wanted to go forth and amaze the world, but I felt terrible reticence at the idea of killing another man over Flows. The waste of it seemed impossible.

Jacob said, “I wanted to speak to you about the Entropy Storm that forged the fiend you fought in the Arena with Morningstar.”

My ears pricked up.

Jacob said, “It has long been my suspicion that the Entropy Storms are sentient.”

I raised an eyebrow. The old man smiled crookedly. “You won’t be the first to think me crazy. The two prevailing theories on the Storms are that they are either random events, like their meteorological namesakes, or that they move at the hand of the Oracle. I suspect the former is more likely to be true than the latter, but long years of study make me wonder if there’s not a third explanation. I think the storms move to the mind of another being altogether.”

I said, “Why? How would you think that?”

Jacob said, “History, mostly. Entropy Storms and great fiends appear too often at moments of great importance for it to be mere coincidence, which is to be sure. But their interventions don’t align with what I would perceive to be the Oracle’s intentions.”

I waited.

Jacob said, “I could start listing events, but the list would go on and on. At the end of the first battle of Dallas, Thrax Bonesaw was bested, wounded, and seemed to be facing certain death. It seemed there was nothing that could be done. The Free Men and their mighty Griidlords had broken the back of the Burghsman horde, had wounded or killed Bonesaw’s Griidlords. It seemed to be the moment that would define Bonesaw’s reign. The Alliance of the West against the brutal coalition of the East.”

I nodded. “Yes, but a Storm arose that stopped the battle. It saved Thrax’s life.”

Jacob said, “Do you understand the kind of consternation that event has caused in my circles? We priests study and debate the event to this day. It is an old stick that can be pulled out to bolster arguments on many sides of a divide. If the Entropy Storms are random, what would be the odds of the storm erupting at that moment? If the Oracle controls the storms, then why would it send a storm to save Thrax Bonesaw? The Great Warchief’s very quest was heresy—to bring down the Oracle and free mankind.”

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Jacob looked around furtively as he realized his voice had gained volume.

More calmly, he said, “But if there is another entity controlling the Storms, why don’t we know of it? Why doesn’t the Oracle speak of it?”

Slowly, uncertainly, I said, “There are other cults out in the wilds, other things are worshipped.”

The priest waved them away with disdain. He had a point to make. “The Storm that came under the arena… consider the timing. The location of it, the timing. Think about it, Tiberius. Have you ever heard of a Storm forming in an enclosed space like that?”

I thought about it. I hesitated. “There are some old, old stories.”

Jacob nodded happily. “What a pleasure it will be to have a Sword who reads. Yes, there are a few, just a few old tales that speak of similar events. Most are either apocryphal or clear fiction, but some would make an eyebrow rise with curiosity. And tell me, Tiberius, do these stories involve the Storms forming in the back room of a butcher’s shop? In the basement of a tavern in the wilds?”

“No,” I said. “They involve important people and important places.”

Jacob said, “So they are events that influence events, perhaps? Affect the king and thereby affect the people? You see what I’m getting at?”

I shifted uncomfortably. I said, “Partly, maybe, but not entirely.”

Jacob said, “An Entropy Storm formed in the basement of the arena while you battled Lance for control of the very suit you wear now!”

I said, “Yeah, that definitely happened, but I’m not a king or Thrax Bonesaw. I’m Sword, and I have every sense of what a big deal that is, but there are thirty other Swords in the land right now. There’ve been hundreds or thousands of Swords over the years. Entropy Storms don’t just pop out of the air for Swords.”

Jacob’s head was bobbing vigorously, his face delighted. I wanted to stop him—the withered column of bone and sinew that supported his big shiny head seemed too frail to bear such violence.

He said, “Exactly, my boy, that’s exactly my point.”

I screwed up my forehead. “I’m really struggling to see your point.”

Jacob calmed himself. He sat back on the bench and breathed deeply. I could see him gathering his thoughts. I’d seen him do this before. When he spoke about Entropy, or Hordesmen, or fiends for too long, he worked himself up and seemed to lose the ability to convey his thoughts.

Jacob started again. “My points are as follows. Entropy Storms and Great Fiends have an uncanny knack for appearing at great moments or to great people. Yes?”

I nodded.

“Despite the odds, history and legend would suggest that such events have occurred indoors on the rarest occasion, destroying buildings, killing people, spawning terrible fiends. Yes?”

I nodded again.

“When Storms have occurred in such settings, they have also appeared in the presence of great people, and if they really did happen, probably changed the course of history to greater or lesser degrees.”

“Yeah,” I said.

Jacob said, “And a Storm appeared in the arena as you fought Lance for the Sword suit, a Storm that generated something that, while not exactly a Great Fiend, was still a very rare and powerful creature.”

I said, “Yes.”

Jacob said, more slowly, watching me carefully, “And have you not done things that have either never been done or only rarely done through history? Did you not use the Footfield during the Choosing? Did you not grasp POWER during the Choosing? Did you not gain attributes during the Choosing at a rate unheard of in modern times? Are you not standing before me right now, a babe of a Griidlord, a wet month in the suit, at level 21 and wielding two skills?”

I nodded more slowly now. I suddenly didn’t like this.

Jacob said, “Could it not be that you are unique? That you are destined to be a great person, that the Storm was an intervention?”

I felt a chill in my bones. I said, “What are you trying to say?”

The old man should have seemed terrified or upset by his own words. Instead, his eyes glowed with the fire of his incessant curiosity. He practically hummed with excitement as he spoke about the possibility with eagerness instead of horror. “Does it not seem clear that some force out there, some force unknown but sentient and sapient and terribly powerful, knows that you are destined for great things? Or, if not destined, then capable of them? Does it not seem obvious that that dark thing, that wielder of the Storm, that Mother of Fiends, that destroyer of cities, was trying to kill you that day?”

I felt my blood freeze.

Jacob looked at me with unsettling eyes. “A God fears you, young Tiberius. It fears you so much that it tried to assassinate you.”