Epilogue 3

I stared at him in disbelief. My jaw literally fell open.

I also found myself waiting, expecting the voice to appear in my ear to paint its own version of events.

Morningstar must have seen my reaction, must have seen the way my eyes grew unfocused as though I was listening for something.

He said, “It’s not there right now, is it?”

I said, “No…”

He said, “Well, the fucker might be. But it’s probably not. I know, when you were in the arena, the thing was constantly there, always chattering away at you about how special and important you are. It makes you think it will always be there, always listening, always poking its nose into your business. But I don’t think the little bastard is omniscient. I think it’s got other business to attend to. I think it spends time in your head, and time in mine, but I don’t reckon it can do both at the same time. If the little fucker isn’t here right now, chattering away at one of us, then I’ll bet it’s elsewhere.”

I felt as though someone were listening. I had the self-consciousness of someone who knows they are within earshot of a third party.

I said, “But it could be here right now, just waiting to see what we’re going to say.”

Morningstar grinned savagely. He said, “Yes, it could be. There’s every chance of it. But I don’t have anything to say to you that I wouldn’t let it hear even if it was babbling away at us.”

I said, “Did it come to you during your Choosing as well?”

He said, “Yup. But not at the start, like it did with you. It started talking to me during the fourth round of my Choosing. We do things differently in Indianapolis. We don’t have nobles the way the cities up here do. We have ‘em, but they don’t hold the kind of status they do in this region. We have more entrants in our Choosing, the numbers start a lot higher and boil down a lot faster. The voice came to me on the fourth day. Shit, I’ll never forget it. Kid, it was like I’d lost my mind. I was in the thick of the action. I’d been the favorite from day one, but things were going downhill, and fast. A bunch of the other real contenders had bunched together. They were going to take me out and then fight over the scraps. But the voice came to me then. Even though I thought I was losing my mind, I listened to it, did what it said. What else could I do? My turkey was cooked. I just said, ‘what the heck,’ and went with it. And you know what happened?”

I said, “It worked. The advice it gave you won the day.”

Morningstar nodded vigorously. “Yup. And the next day, and the next day. I spent my nights waiting for it to talk to me. I’d lie in bed, not able to sleep. I was just waiting for the voice. It took me a whole day to realize it was only when I was in the suit that I could hear it.”

I said, “And did it… did it make a deal with you too?”

Morningstar’s grin was fierce. There was something angry in him as we spoke about this, but there was also some kind of monstrous relief that seemed to be taking over him. He said, "Oh yeah, it did. I’ll bet it made the same deal with you too, kid. Wants you to grow stronger and stronger so it can set you free."

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I thought about it. I said, "If it’s been talking to both of us, then maybe it’s talking to other Griidlords too."

Morningstar shook his head slowly. "I don’t think so. I can’t say for sure, how the heck would I know for sure? But I don’t reckon it is. I don’t think it’s screwing with us when it says we’re special. I think it looks out for certain types. It told me it likes my brain."

I said, "It told me it likes mine too."

He said, "And did it tell you it would make all your dreams come true?"

I paused. Then I said, "I think it said it would make dreams come true for me that I haven’t even dreamt yet. Something like that."

Morningstar paced around me. He looked out across the fields. I joined him for a moment. The rough squares that made up the pattern of the landscape never failed to catch my eye. I thought through things during the brief silence. How many Griidlords had it spoken to? Was I in competition with Morningstar? I didn’t like the idea of that. I had grown quickly during the Choosing, but if you asked anyone who followed the exploits of the Griidlords, they would quickly tell you that this man was special. He was rapidly growing into a figure of legend that would be remembered in the histories.

Morningstar said, "Did you meet Joel?"

I said, "Yes, I met Joel, and Danefer."

His face reacted in obvious surprise. "Danefer, out of Miami?"

I said, "Well, yeah, he came to me like Joel did."

Morningstar grew distant as he stared across the fields. "I crossed swords with him once. I was very new to the suit then. We were fighting for an orb…"

I waited. The idea of seeing the real Danefer, the Griidlord, not the mad wildknight I had met, set my heart on fire.

Morningstar said, "He was something. I haven’t seen the likes since. The things he could do with his suit, the power he wielded. Nearly beat him, though. He made weird decisions, did strange things. I thought I had the better of him until damned near the end…"

Morningstar chewed his lip for a moment, then said, "So he’s wandering around like Joel is… isn’t that just a pretty picture. You reckon that waits for us too?"

I just waited. I didn’t understand what he was talking about.

He said, "Listen, it’s hard to talk when you don’t know if the voice is off elsewhere, or if maybe it’s just hanging about in the background, waiting to see what we’ll say. You know what that bastard is like, always playing you. I’m gonna let you in on a little secret, kid."

I waited. My mind was already awash with too much to contemplate. I wasn’t the only one the voice spoke to. This was revelatory. Yet, for some reason, I also felt like I begrudged Morningstar for sharing this connection with the Oracle.

He said, "The voice can’t reach you everywhere on the sweet green earth."

I said, "What?"

Morningstar nodded. "I know a place, underground, where it can’t follow. Don’t ask me how or why it can’t be there, but sure as hell, it doesn’t like when I go down there. It freaks the fuck out when I go down there. It can’t handle the idea that I could be getting up to stuff it can’t see."

I said, "That sounds like the voice, alright."

I still wondered if it was listening. The skin on my neck prickled with nervousness.

Morningstar said, "I got a convoy I gotta move along to North New York in a little while. You gotta go huntin' for old Sempronius. I swear, kid, I hope you succeed with that one, but you gotta know the odds are damned slim."

I said, "I know. I just have to try."

He said, "I get it. I don’t mean to rain on the idea neither."

Morningstar let a moment pass. An eagle lofted in the air in the distance. I wished my helm wasn’t folded back as I watched it wheel in the sky.

Morningstar said, "Why don’t we arrange to meet up in my little hidey hole sometime? After you attend to your business in Dodge."

He turned to me, that savage smile widening. "I’ll bet there’s a lot more we could say if we knew for sure it wasn’t listening. A whole shit ton more."

This marks the end of Book 1, but not the end of Tiberius's story. A Griidlord in full, now starts the next part of Tiberius's life. His chances for glory, love, friendship, war and peace really only begin on the next page.