A camp was set in the woods. Eris felt two disparate worlds colliding: her time with Rook and Aletheia, and her time with Robur. Very separate in her memory until then. She knew they had met after the defeat of Lord Arqa, but only briefly, and they had never camped together like this, like adventurers on the road, gathered around a crackling fire outdoors. Then there was the matter of her condition. She did not know how to break the news to this boy. Perhaps she wouldn’t need to.
“How did you find us?” Aletheia said after they settled. She changed the bandages around her leg.
He stared awkwardly for a moment. There was nothing smooth or easy about his explanation; it was slow, staccato, and although every word seemed to be chosen with great thought, he lacked any eloquence. “I was in the city at the time of the attack. The next morning I visited the wounded to tend to their burns, when I heard that the Duke of Korakos had been the one to slay the demon. I understood this was Rook.”
“Did you learn what was done to his body?” Eris asked.
“I believe the Archon was to hold a funeral, but I departed that day in search of you. I was very concerned for your safety. I heard rumors you were staying with Rook in his castle, but when I visited, they were upset to see me.”
“What did you tell them?” Eris said this with her voice low, cautious, and nervous to hear the answer.
“I said I wished to speak with Eris and that she would know me by my name. They sent several guards to instruct me to leave. When I pressed as to why, I was informed you were wanted for summoning the demon.”
“What?” Aletheia sputtered.
Eris did not make any cry. Instead she felt a twist in her heart. Another betrayal from Khelidon. “There is more to this story.”
He nodded. “This man—Khelidon—said you used a demon to destroy his brother after you failed to control him. You had him ensorcelled with the help of Aletheia, but Khelidon broke the enchantment when he realized…what was occurring. When I learned this I used a spell I learned in Darom to detect the recent events around the Keep, and with Supernal Vision I discovered this in a river…”
He reached into his backpack. There, wrapped in linen, protruding out from its top, was Lord Arqa’s sword. Eris sighed to see it follow her.
“We discarded it intentionally,” Eris said.
Robur frowned, as if this didn’t make sense, but he set the sword down and continued, “I knew you and Aletheia were together, so I asked in nearby villages if they had seen a tall woman and a younger girl traveling together. That led me here.” He hesitated. “Why did you summon the demon?”
Now Eris did cry out. She gasped. “Do you jest to ask this?”
He stared at her. “No,” he said.
A scoff. “I did not summon the demon! Do not tell me you believed the story Khelidon told? Do you have such little opinion of me, after all we have done together?”
Robur considered this all with an even hand. “It did not seem improbable that you might…summon a demon, if the situation demanded it. But I did not believe that you had ensorcelled Rook. I never saw any sign of that with Supernal Vision when we traveled together.”
“What a relief,” Eris sneered. “I did not summon the demon. ‘Twas an agent of the Seekers, or so I believe. We encountered Lukon again some months ago and defeated him; this was their escalation.”
“I see.”
“But that’s what we’ve been doing,” Aletheia said. “Where have you been?”
“I stayed in Arqa as the people returned. We discovered remedies and spells for curing many of the plants diseased by the vampire’s magic. It was very interesting to do what I could as the land returned—there were very few organisms that survived the trials of the clouds, but those that did soon colonized much of the desert. I am not certain such a phenomenon has ever been observed. I have been considering writing a treatise—”
“What a stimulating topic,” Eris said.
“But what did you do?” Aletheia asked.
“Oh. I treated many injuries and helped bury the dead. As things returned to normal I became friends with an alchemist, and I assisted with the animals, and aided the midwife in matters of—”
“The midwife?” Aletheia interrupted.
“Well—yes.”
“Delivering babies?”
He nodded cautiously. “I have learned several remedies when, in conjunction with healing spells, can soothe the pain of childbirth…”
Aletheia looked at Eris. Eris looked at the fire. She shifted uncomfortably, better concealing herself. It was unavoidable, but she didn’t want to discuss it with Robur. He—would not understand.
“Will you tell him?” Aletheia said to Eris.
She glared at the girl. “I do not know what you mean.”
“He’ll find out eventually. He can help you—”
“I do not need his help. Or anyone’s help. I am well alone. And if he did not notice already, he is not likely to notice in the future.”
Aletheia shook her head. Then to Robur, “Eris is pregnant.”
Eris clutched her face. She cringed to hear the words, less now for her own sake and more for imagining what others would think. She wanted shock and disgust. She craved surprise and horror.
Instead, Robur reacted not-at-all. He only said, “I see. Are you well? Would you like me to examine you?”
There could have been no worse response. “‘You see?’” Eris echoed.
“One villager I spoke to mentioned you might be with child, and I thought I noticed it when I saw you standing earlier.”
“…so you are not surprised?”
“No.” He said this as if the question itself were alien.
“Why not?” Eris was offended. “When you departed my company did you—expect this to happen to me?”
“No.” The same intonation.
“Then—gah! You are a buffoon!”
“I don’t understand,” he said. “Is something wrong?”
“Of course something is wrong! Did you think I wanted to be with child now? Or ever? Have you met me? Do you think I suited to be a mother? Does this not upset you?”
A moment. Then he shrugged. “The timing does seem odd. I am curious why you chose now, or why you chose such a thing at all, but it does not seem especially strange—”
“‘Chose?’” She was practically screaming now. “You think I ‘chose’ this for myself?”
Another innocent look. “Didn’t you?”
Aletheia giggled at this. Eris was furious; she buried her face in her palms again. All she could think to ask was, “Are you aware of how children are conceived?”
Robur looked slightly embarrassed. “I—do not have much interest in such things…”
“You have helped deliver children and yet not wondered how they get to be where they are?” She had been without this boy’s particular lunacy for over a year and a sudden re-immersion was doing much to drive her mad.
“I believe men are involved…”
“Allow me to illustrate, you idiot. Rook and I laid together. Likely near the end of Spring, five months past. He took pleasure spilling himself within me, and that seed took root in the form of what will one day become a disgusting, sniveling, revolting, irritating, loud, obnoxious infant, which shall climb out from within me once grown. There was no ‘choice’ involved. The child was an accident.”
Robur considered this as if it were all new information. His cheeks went red. Eris’ cheeks were also red, but from fury rather than embarrassment. “I knew you spent nights together, although what precisely you did to be so loud I was never certain. Why did you allow him to…take pleasure in…doing this…if you did not want the child?”
“Because I also took pleasure in it, you—we are done with this discussion. If you wish to learn more, we may hire a prostitute for you in Telekhasmos. Or perhaps Aletheia may show you, and you will both be made far less appealing to vampires for it.”
Aletheia and Robur glanced at each other with confused disgust. Eris turned away. She was very angry—she didn’t know why. Robur was simply being himself. Maybe because, when expressed in such terms to a man with such alien instincts, the pointless stupidity of love was elucidated clearly. Why had she slept with Rook? For what purpose? Because she couldn’t help herself. And now the price would be eternal.
Aletheia tried to change the topic. “…if you managed to find us,” she said, “Khelidon’s men might be able to. Or the Seekers. If he’s blaming you for the Kynigos—even the Archon might send knights after us. We could have the whole city hunting us down.”
That iced her rage over. Aletheia was right. Eris nodded. “Yes. We are not safe anywhere.”
“We could return to Darom together—” Robur suggested.
“I would sooner give birth to a cutlery block,” Eris said. “We will not return to Darom.”
“Then where do we go?” Aletheia asked. To Robur: “Do you have money?”
“Yes, some, that Jason left with me.”
“But likely not enough for three adults,” Eris said. “I do not know. I do not know where it will be safe.”
“Didn’t you have plans, for after you left?” Aletheia said. “Where were you going to go?”
“Seneria. Everything I seek is there. Across the Slagpile Mountains. But that is impossible now. It is not safe—” she almost said for herself, in her current state. She refused to think anything of the kind, however, and instead said, “For anyone. We are not ready for such an expedition. I…also intended to travel north, to the forests of Voreios, at some point—we would be well-protected from the tendrils of Katharos there, but making the journey will be difficult on land.”
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Aletheia reached out for Eris. “Do you think you can do it?”
Eris hated being treated like that. “Yes,” she hissed. “I can do it. Worry more about your injury than my stomach, Aletheia.”
The girl fell silent after that.
“You are wanted in Nanos,” Robur said. “And Rytus. And Aletheia is wanted in Sam’al. And we are all wanted in Erimos. Now you are both wanted in Katharos, and likely word will spread throughout the rest of Koilados. Veshod is not very remote—there may be risk of bounty hunters there.” He nodded. “The only options seem to be leaving Esenia, visiting Seneria, or traveling to the remote reaches of Voreios.”
“We cannot leave Esenia,” Eris said. “My business here is not yet concluded. And we do not have the resources to charter a ship. Nor should we; a port is where we are most likely to be recognized, for news travels as swiftly as wind atop the ocean’s waves.”
“Then Voreios is our only option,” Aletheia said. “Right?”
Eris sighed. That was a long way to travel by land. Farther than she had ever walked in her life on a single journey. Now she would make it while pregnant. She did not understand how parents came to love their children, for she hated what hers had done to her already.
For the rest of the day they reminisced and caught up. Telling stories. Remembering their adventures. Aletheia shared the details of what had happened in Katharos, and Eris explained their time in the dungeons of Pyrthos, the manaforge, and Pyraz’s transformation back to human form.
By the time it was dark and they had made plans to set off north tomorrow, Aletheia jumped to her feet.
“Here,” she said. She handed Robur her necklace. “What do you see?”
He stared at the locket now in his hands. “It’s a locket.”
“Open it!”
He fumbled with the lock for a moment, then finally pulled it ajar. He frowned as he considered the two mirrors before him.
“What do you see?” Aletheia said.
“I recently cut my hair,” he said. “Did you notice? It is very short now.”
The girl frowned. She looked to Eris for assistance, but Eris did not want to play.
“It’s enchanted. What do you see?” she asked again.
“See?”
“It shows you the future. Different futures, I mean, in each mirror.”
He looked between the mirrors again. “I only see my reflection.”
Aletheia snatched the mirror back into her hands in fear it might be broken, but she seemed soothed over to see it. “Are you sure?” she asked.
Robur nodded.
She offered it to Eris. “It still works for you, right?”
Eris did not want to see her ‘future’ at this moment. She gestured the girl away. “Perhaps Robur forges his own path, and thus the mirror has nothing to show him. Or perhaps he does not have a soul.”
She looked at him with a raised eyebrow. That would explain a great deal. But whatever was wrong with Robur, it was a defect of the mind rather than the spirit. Excepting that he was a magician, he was a mundane young man.
“In any case,” she leaned backward on her roll, “I do not care. Your locket is a bauble. The future it shows is ever-shifting. ‘Tis useless. I have seen a dozen versions of myself come and go through its reflections.”
Aletheia considered this. “But your options are always changing. When Rook…was here…it could show us all together. But now it can’t. It can only show you with your son. Obviously it doesn’t know the future, it just—helps us see what we really want, by showing it to us.”
Yes, Eris thought. Alone, beautiful, powerful, cruel, merciless, and child-free—when last she looked in the mirror, one reflection did indeed show her what she really wanted. Why it bothered at all with a second future she was not sure.
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Aletheia sat on a log near a pond. Robur was perched over her, probing, cleaning, examining her wounds. Both had become dangerously infected twice, and twice had a spell been used to clear away the rot. Her bicep was painful but soon to be recovered. Her leg still oozed and bled. She could barely walk. To her credit she did so anyway, and without complaint—but after two days afoot she could go on no farther.
They discussed medicinal remedies while Eris leaned against her staff. She was exhausted. She did not sleep well lately. Her clothes chafed against her. Her ankles ached. She felt bloated and heavy. This would be a miserable journey.
The only mercy, she considered as she looked into her murky reflection in the pond, was that she finally looked pregnant, rather than simply fat. When she stood up straight her back maintained its arch and her frame still kept its slender silhouette. Her features were thin. It was only from the side…
Obsessing over these things was unhealthy. She never used to obsess over such trivial details. She rarely thought about the Manawyrm, even as it threatened to kill her. She did not understand why this far more mundane process occupied nearly every thought.
The answer was obvious. While the Manawyrm threatened her life, it never imperiled her beauty.
As for the next thought: was it better to be looked on and thought to be fat, or to be looked on and thought to be with child? Earlier that same year she would have regarded both with equal scorn, but seeing as how now even she could suffer this misfortune, her opinion had softened somewhat—although not much—on the sinfulness of the latter. As for the former, Eris maintained she never would be fat herself; it was unforgivable. Better then to be pregnant. At least it was feminine. The more she became used to it, the less she found it ugly, too.
“Please, lie down,” Robur said. He helped Aletheia off the log and to the detritus beside it. Then he administered a tincture to her, followed next by a salve to her leg, and finally a spell Eris did not recognize. The girl yawned—and within moments fell asleep.
“What is this?” Eris asked.
“A healing draught,” he said. “She must rest while it works. It is very tiring, and drains the stomach.”
“You have been busy learning the healer’s trade.”
“I—was sincere, when I said I was not certain I was meant for the life of an adventurer.”
Eris sighed. Then they would have to wait. Her mind buzzed with exhaustion. She closed her eyes. “How long?”
“Several hours.”
“Then we are going nowhere today. The sun will fall soon.”
She collapsed to the ground. Some time later, Robur asked, “Do you feel well?”
“What?” Eris asked.
“I am curious how you are feeling.”
“Do I seem different to you?”
“Well—not in demeanor—but you appear tired, and yesterday you seemed ill.”
“Yes. I am also fat, in constant pain, endlessly hungry, and I can feel a creature attempting to break out of my stomach whenever I attempt to sleep. These things will get worse as the year progresses, I believe, yet all is not so bad as it was last month. Are you surprised to hear it? Have you forgotten what we discussed?”
“No. I thought I might be able to help, however.”
An anvil fell onto Eris’ head at that moment. She suffered a flashback: a memory grabbed her by the throat and dragged her back through time, to her last conversation with Robur in the halls of Keep Arqa. She played through what he told her, and what she had told him then and the next day. She remembered how she felt when he told her he would be leaving—the surprise, the shock, the feeling of betrayal, and the sudden realization that treating her friends poorly could have consequences.
For Robur was a friend. He had only her interests in his heart. He maintained his compassion even as she tried again and again to drive him away. Why she couldn’t know. She would never act this way. But then she wasn’t a defective puppy. She was just—a brood cow, resigned to slavery to biology, reduced to nothing more than a normal woman.
Perhaps she was defective in other ways.
Suddenly her desire to berate him waned. She felt a tinge of guilt for being so cruel to him over the preceding days. She had made progress coming to terms with Rook’s death and her pregnancy, but she was still very angry, and she took that anger out on those around her. That was a mistake. Robur did not deserve that.
And even if he did, she should still be careful—for treating him as he deserved might make him leave again for good. That was not what she wanted.
“I…would be grateful,” she managed, at great pain. “But this malady is an internal one. I doubt there is anything you can do.”
“May I examine you?” he asked.
If it were any other man in the world who asked it, she would have denied him on impulse. At least in the abstract. The truth was more complicated; the truth was that she found herself desperate for a man’s touch, that every night she dreamed of Rook’s lips, desperate for the release he could bring. Somehow the thought of her current state did not bother her, or disturb her—it made her only want him more, and to such an extent she might take any man she could pretend was him for a single night. She needed the distraction. She had always found so much comfort in his body, and now, in his departure, she found she needed it more than ever—what sick irony that was.
Her desperation was such that she might have even considered Robur suitable prey, were it not for his maintained disinterest in girls. Eris thought he surely preferred men, but had come to the conclusion over time that he lacked any carnal impulses at all. What a sad life.
All that meant she spent a long time coming to the conclusion that, were anyone to examine her other than Rook, Robur was the ideal candidate. She relented.
“Very well,” she said. “Do what you will.”
More guilt flooded through her as he used Supernal Vision and began poking, prodding, pricking, and examining her figure. She remembered all this boy had done for her over the years. More than anyone else. Maybe even more than Rook. She truly did not deserve it. She was incapable of treating him well.
She closed her eyes and looked away as he stared at her uncovered belly. Some moments later he said, “The child is challenging to detect through your Essence.”
“‘Tis not challenging to detect. I can feel it with me endlessly, so easily I have begun to mistake it for myself.”
“You’ve become very powerful since we defeated Lord Arqa.”
“I have always been very powerful.”
He hesitated. “I mean to say—you have become more powerful…your command of magic has grown.”
“There has been cause for practice. So? Is there some conclusion you have drawn by staring through me?” She looked at him again and watched as his eyes went out.
“Yes. The child is a boy.”
Eris sighed. “We knew this already from the locket. What of my symptoms?”
“Oh. I—you appear very healthy to me. The child is quite large for its age, but you possess an ideal gynecoid pelvic structure to facilitate birth. I do not foresee any issues.”
This word ‘birth’ caused her great discomfort. But she understood his meaning to be midwife language for the undeniable fact that she possessed an ideal wide-hipped feminine figure. Rook had been right after all; it seemed there was a purpose, a function to the seemingly useless things that got in the way and yet nevertheless made her beautiful to men.
“I knew this already,” she said. “What of my symptoms? Can you rectify them for the journey, as you suspected?”
He frowned. “If you believe the timing is inopportune, I was taught how to concoct abortifacient remedies with several common herbs…”
He trailed off as their eyes met. Eris’ expression showed malicious contempt. He melted like an icicle beneath the torch of her glare, backing up an inch. There was sudden fear in his look.
“…I cannot think of any other way to ameliorate the symptoms of pregnancy. You said you did not want him…”
“It will be carried to term,” she said. She did not look away. “If you cannot do as I ask, then this conversation is at its end.”
He nodded. Suddenly desperate to flee. But he didn’t. Instead he said, “There is one malady—beneath your Essence, that I can detect with Supernal Vision.”
“What.”
“I…was not certain if it was the child. I have never encountered a magician who is pregnant before. I am not aware if he will be born with an Essence of his own.”
“It will be mundane,” Eris said, although she was not nearly so certain as she sounded. “Magicians cannot be born.”
“That is what I thought, but…” He paused. “I believe it is a hint of a demon. It reminds me of Lord Arqa’s Essence, but—”
Eris groaned. “‘Tis the sword, you fool. You brought it back to us.”
“The sword?”
“Arqa’s sword. It is cursed. I used it…after…Rook had…” In an instant a fit of tears descended onto her. She had never cried in front of Robur, despite so many injuries and so much pain, but now she couldn’t help herself. She stopped talking and closed her eyes and covered her face with her cloak. She managed to contain herself after a few sniffles. “Rook used the sword to slay the Kynigos. I used it to slay two knights who came after us thereafter.” Her voice quavered—not of the memory of slaughter, but at the memory of that terrible night. But she was strong after that. “It is cursed. That is why I discarded it into the river. It works its way into the mind and controls it when one is not careful.”
Robur nodded, saying, “Perhaps we could bury it here, in the woods. It is unlikely to be found here.”
Eris took a moment, but agreed. “What—what is the manner of its hold on me? You can see it clearly with your spell, yes?”
He used Supernal Vision again. Several minutes passed in contemplation. “I believe it is weak. I am not certain it was present at all until today. Such a curse is likely caused by exposure; you will be freed if we leave it here.”
“Then that is what we shall do.” She lifted herself to her feet. Her balance was terrible and she wobbled for a moment, but Robur steadied her. He was at least two inches taller—still three inches shorter than her—and it was strange to stand beside him now. “Thank you,” she whispered.
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They dug a hole beneath a tree.
“You should rest,” Robur said. “I can do this.”
“I will not be made an invalid,” Eris said. “I will dig.”
So she did, at his side, until they were as deep as they could go. Eris tossed the sword within—and the process began in reverse. The sword was buried in its scabbard four feet underground. As they sat down next to the slumbering Aletheia, Eris was forced to speak her mind.
“…when I was in the grips of my struggle with the Manawyrm,” she said, “you offered to teach me Supernal Vision.”
“Yes,” he said. “I believe you said detecting magic was beneath you.”
“So it is. Yet so also is carrying children, but some things seem to happen despite our desires. I…when I refused your offer, it did not occur to me that there might come a time when we did not travel together. I realize that you do not belong to me; you are a man, now more than before, and you may do as you desire. But still, I—‘twas unexpected.”
“I—”
“Wait. Allow me to finish. Please. So long as we remain together, and ‘tis not easy for me to say this, and I know you are enjoying every moment of my supplication, but—so long as we remain together, it would mean much to me if you could teach me Supernal Vision. And Arcane Abrogation.”
He nodded. “And if I refuse?”
Eris scoffed. “Surely you would not?”
He smiled. “No. But—there are several spells I would desire to know in return.”
Now Eris smiled back. “Very well,” she said. “We have at least four months yet before our lives are ruined and I am forced to depart. Let us make a trade.”