In the beginning, existence was but a giant sphere of Cosmite, the palest of rocks, the primordial stone. Cosmite gave birth to an inexorable will, countless facets of it, every single one the the All-Carver, all with a different vision of what the masterpiece of creation should be. Through strife and negotiation these particular facets, these tendrils and chisels, slowly carved their way into a convergence, reaching a consensus: some visions would end up dead and forgotten, gone to never return; some remain present on every fiber of the world. The one tentacle who wanted metallic plants settled for a single or a few tree species whose wood behaved like metal when exposed to heat. The one who wished for the sea to loom above the land settled for a sky the color of crystalline waters. It who wanted gravity got to implement the thing with very minor changes. And so, aspect by aspect, the All carver, the initial ball of Cosmite, modeled the universe out of itself, affirming or denying the countless whims of his fragmented existence. But for all the rules that governed chemistry, physics, and even magic, none of the visions that survived, that coalesced into the final creation, typified fairness as a guideline for reality.
In Ald’s fever dreams, however, the word came once and again. Never directly, but represented by its antonym. Whether when taken by shocking pain or during his few moments of horrid lucidity, the only word he could muster to describe his situation was “unfair”. Something white waited by his side. Dole, he knew in his bouts of sanity. Something warm tickled his skin. Sunlight, coming from the dome above, a crack of day in the darkness of the cave and its ceiling too smooth.
Using his shoulders for support, in one of his bouts of clarity, Ald inclined to look at his wound. There was nothing tied around his leg, and the trail of still not quite dry blood could be seen leading down to the cave’s entrance.
“You didn’t help me with the wound,” he protested with a smile. Being alive was a reward on its own, despite the pain, despite the white lady sitting by his foot, chewing on an aural lily.
“I preserved your life regardless of the blood loss, and then told the wound to stop bleeding. That’s all you need when you are Piteousness. I can save anyone, Ald. I could make the bat immortal, and let her be lonely forever. I prefer to not interfere. There are details of the carving I’d like to change, but I am not its author. Not even what I am doing now is my prerogative.”
Ald decided a stupid question was warranted by such a serious moment. If he had lost a leg due to following her guidance, the least he could do was mock her. “I miss my sword, would you be so kind to fetch it back?” he said, a few groans of pain interspersed among the actual words.
She who donned the form of a sister frowned in dismissal. “The sword? Don’t you think your lost something more important?”
Ald grinned despite the all-encompassing pain that spread upwards from his raw stump. “The sword doesn’t grow back. I never had to work to make my legs.”
“Well, now you will have to. Or do you intend to crawl all the way to Father?”
Ald let his head fall back to the ground. He closed his eyes, feeling the sunray lick his face. There he laid, next to Zaburanatea and the few edible items she had carried from afar. He would need an aid if he wanted to walk again in the short term, that much was indisputable. But he couldn’t engage in battle if he went for a crutch or a cane, that were the easier ones to make. They wouldn’t help him in climbing. And Felsians were not a society fond of using prosthetics —they generally used crutches or made do without the limb, if it had been a hand, until a new one grew—, so he had never made one for a sister or a brother. The closest he had fabricated was a metal leg for a pig that had been born with a deformity, missing everything below his left elbow. He remembered it fondly: he had even forged the far end to look like the pig’s hoof, carefully creating a cast of the animal’s healthy foreleg with plaster, then pouring forgewood on said mold and using this mirrored model to shape the final product by hand. It was in the days before the birth of Kali, and it had been more to prove to himself that he could forge a functional prosthetic for his animal than for the sake of said pig, who would have done well enough with a simple pegleg.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
He opened his eyes once more, focusing on the nearest wall too smooth and flawless to have been carved by water. “You made this cave,” he spoke softly, not as a question, but as a statement of faith. “You could have dug it lower, you could have spared me this loss.”
The masterwork decided to honor the name she wore when using ravens as a disguise. “On this rare occasion, I shall be direct: Any Felsian unwilling to give up as little as a leg is unfit for my plans. And so would be any that accepted this gift, this hideout, without complaint. I don’t need a bootlicker nor a coward.”
Ald rolled a bit to each side, as if to unglue his back from the ground, and scrambled with both hands against the wall, trying to get used to having only one leg as he clumsily positioned himself into a sitting position supported by the sun-warmed stone. “What or who will you ask me to betray? Is there a vile brother or sister whose blood I’ll need to shed?”
Dole turned her head and stabbed Ald with a stare of blinding ivory. “Yes, there’s a brother you may need to kill. Not all sons of Mother fell from the sky and landed close to Felsia.”
“But this one lives, and hates Felsia. Until now, I thought this whole ordeal was the making of your people, not of mine.” It could be seen in Ald’s eyes, the disappointment, and a twinkle of rage that from time to time was drowned by a pang of pain. “What could anyone get out of the fall of Felsia?”
“To hate Masterworks is to hate Felsians for some of my equals. To hate Father and Mother, for others, too. There are more Masterworks than living Felsians walking the lands, swimming in the waters, soaring through the skies. Some even took to seeking other worlds through the sidereal realms. Nine thousand five hundred and seventy-seven Felsians live today. Fewer will tomorrow. The world belongs to us, Ald.”
Ald took these words as an offense against reality, despite knowing she wouldn’t lie. He felt there was something inherently wrong in that last sentence she had uttered. “Why so many? They were supposed to be a rare occurrence!”
Dole sighed and shook her head, while feathers swaying from side to side as if hair they were. “Do I need to walk you through the math? How old is Felsian civilization?”
“About four millennia. We don’t have proper registries of the first generations.”
“Four thousand years is enough for millions of misshapen to be born. Very few of those were born degenerated enough to have lost the capacity to die. The unlucky ones, that’s us. Reality warps to accommodate our very existence,” She wove a ball of shadows and with a flicker of her fingers ignited it, causing blue smoke to crawl lazily along the cave floor. “But enough of that. Is in the best interest of most of your brothers and sisters for this one to die. I swear.”
Ald tried to reach and pat Dole’s shoulder, but pain coursed through him as he shifted position. He still felt his leg as if it was still attached, sometimes. With a grimace, he desisted and leaned back against the wall. “What value does this oath of yours hold, given you never lie? How are your promises different from your usual statements?”
Dole smiled and dissipated in a cloud of long, glossy dove feathers that were promptly cradled by a gentle wind, and by it taken to the cave’s entrance, where under considerate sunlight she reformed. “None for my clever chosen one. I shall bring you some materials to make a new leg. Feel free to eat the aural lilies until I return with the wood.”
“I am thirsty, not hungry,” Ald lied, for he was both.
“Cloudcries in ten minutes. The water is going to gather to your left, in that little depression on the ground,” she said before compressing her shape into a dove, gradually, and approaching the ledge with tiny hops.
“Unkindness!” Ald Called, making the dove turn her head, which wasn’t necessary, but years of dealing with Felsians had made her pick up some cues on bodily language to look less stiff and more attentive. “I dread the day that will come, the one when I find out what sort of atrocity you have set up to be committed by me. And I am willing to play my part, if it saves Felsia. Just answer me one question: are you sure your trust isn’t misplaced?”
“Such a cute question. My trust in you is as misplaced as yours in me. Take that as you will.”
Ald blew air out his nose and then inspired with a whistle. “Could you give me a straight answer for once?”
“Yes, if this one counts.” And then, the dove flew.