Bayne

“Hey, can you get me something to eat? I’m starving.”

Bayne looked up from his work cutting opals to the boy Emperor glaring down at him from the golem’s cockpit. He seemed to be feeling better after a good night's sleep inside the golem. He was certainly noisier and more demanding.

“Why dontcha come down and get something yerself?”

“Because I don’t think I can leave this thing without getting sick again.”

Bayne thought perhaps he just thought he couldn’t leave the thing. Like a canary in a cage, sometimes when you opened the door, the bird still didn’t fly away.

The Emperor and his insecurities were not his problem, though. Bayne had work to do, upgrading as many power generators as possible. Opals were hard to come by. He ignored the boy and went back to his work.

“Hi Bayne.” Ivy appeared with two plates of food. She set one down in front of him and scrambled up the golem one-handed, carrying the other.

“Thank ye,” Bayne replied, remembering his manners. “And the boy’ll thank ye, too. He’s been complaining for the past hour.”

“Thank the gods!” the Emperor cried, snatching the plate from Ivy as she squeezed into the cockpit. “Oh, this looks so good!”

Bayne picked at his quail and grimaced at the sound of the boy scarfing down his food.

“This thing is amazing,” the boy told Ivy between noisy bites. “Have you driven one of these? This here controls the arms, and this here controls the fingers...”

“I know,” Ivy cut him off.

Bayne smiled. He remembered the day she’d driven one. The day she’d saved him from falling to his death.

“And I think the magic dampening qualities of the golem are helping me with whatever the crystals did to me,” the boy went on between bites. “I haven’t felt this good in a long time. Even before the crystal garden swallowed me up.”

“That’s not why,” Ivy said quietly.

The boy stopped chewing. “What are you talking about?”

“Right before the attack on our camp, I saw Kenji Zamora sprinkle something onto a plate of food. I thought it was his food, but now I think it was yours.”

The Emperor exploded into a tirade of expletives. Bayne shook his head and set another shard of opal aside. The terrible things people did to one another. How did Kashur and Yelora expect them all to come together when they couldn’t even get along inside their own factions?

Ruthie’s voice came to him, soothing. We’re not perfect, none of us, but we’re all capable of doing the right thing.

The right thing for Bayne right now was to get these golems upgraded. The transformers would stop the golems from consuming so many crystals, and, after the siege, they could be used to heal the lands. That was Bayne’s contribution, and he felt a warm little place inside his chest when he thought about it. Ruthie would be proud of him.

Collecting up the pieces of opal, he headed deep into the camp, seeking out golems. He was greeted with smiles and hellos and claps on the shoulder as he did. It seemed everyone knew who he was. All the attention made him uncomfortable, but he liked it at the same time. A strange juxtaposition of feelings, but Bayne was getting used to strange feelings and being okay with them. While being holed up in his workshop was a calm, cool, safe sort of feeling, this was a warm and chaotic one, but pleasant, somehow, just the same. Like a shot of spiced wine on a winter’s evening.

“Hullo, Bayne?”

He lifted a hand in a wave to the young dark-skinned Dwarf with the auburn beard, and kept moving towards the next closest golem. The lad fell into step alongside him.

“I was hoping to speak with ye. I’m an engineer, too. The name’s Rufiyor. I’m the one who developed this here magic dampening technology.”

Bayne halted so fast the lad almost plowed into him. He stared at the box in the young man’s hands. “It was ye that invented that tech? I’ve been wanting to meet ye! What a feat! How’d ye do it?”

The boy’s gaze jumped back and forth from the ground to Bayne’s. “Magic is energy. I took a close look at it. Found a way to cancel it out. Energy is made of waves, after all.”

“Waves! Brilliant!”

The boy fell quiet and Bayne wondered if his outburst had been inappropriate. “Sorry about that,” he said, turning away and resuming his march to the next golem.

“No, I’m sorry.” The young Dwarf did a funny hop-skip motion to get in front of Bayne. It forced Bayne to stop. “I’m a little awkward sometimes, especially when I meet new people. My name is Rufiyor.”

“Ye already told me that, lad.”

“Yes, I know, but see.,,” He raised a fist to his dark red beard and coughed. His fingers were long and slender, graceful. Familiar.

Bayne’s heart thumped.

“But see that hasn’t always been my name. I was born—”

“Dayne?”

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

The young Dwarf pressed his lips together and nodded.

“Dayne?” Bayne said it again. The lad nodded harder.

Bayne’s hands felt tingly. His feet, too. And his chin. What was he supposed to do? What did the lad want him to do? A hug seemed out of the question. Bayne had abandoned the boy after all, when he was just a bairn.

But here he was. He’d approached Bayne. The secret was out, and yet they were both standing three feet apart, staring at one another like the other was a ghost.

Ruthie’s voice whispered in his head.

Yer the grown one.

Children need love.

Just be honest. What’s the worst that could happen?

Bayne let his bag of tools and opals drop to the ground. He reached across the three feet of space, grabbed Dayne by the shirt sleeve and hauled him into a rough and stiff embrace.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered into the auburn curls. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so very, very sorry.”

No arms came up around Bayne’s back. He realized that would’ve been impossible because Dayne was still clutching the square bulky dampener that was now pinned between their two stomachs.

“Err, this isn’t really necessary,” Dayne finally said, his voice muffled by Bayne’s shoulder.

A stab of panic shot through Bayne. He let go and stepped back.

“It was nice, though.” The tiniest smile tugged at the edges of the young man’s mouth, and like flecks of quartz coming to life in a dimly lit cavern, all of the similarities began to show themselves. The long, slender fingers were Ruthie’s. The color of his skin and eyes. But there were things that were Bayne’s, too. The unruly curls. The caverns under his eyes that gave him what Ruthie used to call that poor waif look. The stiffness. The awkwardness. Had he passed that along to his son, too?

“Did ye have a good childhood?” The words were pouring out now before Bayne had a chance to check them against the Ruthie in his head. “Did they treat ye well?”

“I had a lovely childhood,” he said quickly.

“And ye didn’t feel... different?”

He chuckled. “I was different. I am different. But it’s okay.” His eyes crinkled the way Ruthie’s always had. “It’s not a bad thing to be different.”

“Ye—yer not angry with me?” Bayne choked out. The camp bustled around them and yet Bayne felt like the two of them were on a raft, spinning in a whirlpool.

Dayne looked down at the ground. “I’m not sure how I feel exactly.” He held out the magic dampener. “They said ye’d need one of these, and I said I’d bring it to ye. Didn’t think much past that point. My mum says sometimes it’s better to just do and not think so hard about it. Otherwise, ye can get stuck thinking and never do.”

“Wise woman, yer mum.” Bayne took the dampener. “Yer other mum, she was wise, too. She used to tell me similar things.”

He looked up. “She did?”

“Ah yes.” Bayne sighed. “I was a useless lump without her. I am a useless lump without her. But sometimes I hear her voice in my head.” He tapped his skull. “Then I know what to do. Sometimes.”

They shared a chuckle. Then a pause.

“So, should I show ye how the dampener works?” Dayne said finally. “Then ye can show me how yer crystal zapper works?”

Bayne's chest felt warm and pleasantly heavy. “I call it a transformer, but crystal zapper is a better name.”

Dayne grinned. “My workshop’s over here.”

***

The sun had long been set when Yelora and Kashur returned to the little campsite Bayne had set up. The golem, with the Emperor inside the cockpit, was in a seated position, legs splayed open like a huge metal doll. It was the only way to keep from having to constantly shout up at the boy. Ivy was curled asleep beside the fire, but woke up when Yelora settled beside her.

“We’ll be leaving soon.” She smiled at Ivy when the little girl looked up at her, bleary eyed. “You all need to focus on staying safe. There will be a battle raging here.”

“Aye, and I’ll be fighting in it,” Bayne said.

“Me too!” called the Emperor.

“Who will look after Ivy?” Kashur asked. “Has there been any sign of our little Elemental friend?”

“None,” Bayne said. “But she’ll be safe in a golem with me.”

Yelora nodded, although Kashur looked unconvinced. “Remember, when we bring the gates up, you charge through right away with your golem,” the Elf Queen said. “We don’t know how long before Mol Morin’s forces will shut them again, and we need as many of us inside as possible. I’ve been able to make contact with some Elves who haven’t yet been captured. They’ll be waiting to join the fight.”

“Understood,” Bayne said.

“The magic dampening of the golems won’t help you against the Goblins,” Kashur warned. His gaze flicked to Ivy.

“I won’t let anything happen to her, Summoner,” Bayne said. “I promise ye that.” And he meant it.

“It’s time for us to be on our way,” the Elf Queen said, laying a hand over Kashur’s glove. “I’ll send a hawk when we’re in position.” She stood, pulling Kashur up with her. “Keep an eye on the Sentinel, Bayne. I don’t trust him.”

“Aye,” he replied, although he wasn’t sure what she expected him to do. Bayne was just an engineer, not a military leader. And he was probably the worst of the bunch at sniffing out signs of trouble.

Kashur turned to Ivy. “I think there’s something in your ear.”

She seemed to have warmed to him somewhat during their ride here, her mistrust of him fading. She stood and tilted her ear toward him so he could pretend to pull something from it. In his palm wriggled a little blind mole.

“It’s real this time, not summoned,” he said as she gasped and scooped it from him. “So be careful.”

She smiled and stepped back as he and the Elf Queen pulled their dark hoods over their heads and disappeared into the night.

Three hours later, Yelora’s hawk soared in and landed at Bayne’s feet. The message attached to its foot was brief and definitive. Bayne flashed his ruby light three times to the western side of the camp and saw their three emerald flashes in return.

It was time. He woke Ivy and helped her into their golem. The Emperor was already awake, eyes red-rimmed but steely. Bayne and the Emperor each had their oversized weapon—a golem—and something for close quarters combat as well. If a goblin got inside the cockpit with them, it would meet sharpened steel.

A low shell whistle cut the night, and the first five arrows flew across the no man’s land in front of the Elven stronghold. They hit their marks and fell, taking five Goblins with them, all plummeting like seabirds from the top of the metal gates and hitting the ground to spill their poisonous blood.

Then the night came alive with war.

Yelora had said not to try to breach the wall, and the Imperial and Dwarven forces listened, instead drawing out the bloodthirsty goblins and picking them off as they squealed and scrabbled their way across the battleground. Meanwhile, Bayne and the rest of the drivers moved their golems into position, ready for the moment when Kashur and Yelora opened the gates. Dayne, or Rufiyor as Bayne needed to remember to call him, and his team lined up behind the machines, their magic dampeners in place, for surely the Wizards would be the next line of defense. It was all going as planned with very few casualties on their part. Then, a figure sauntered out onto the stone wall overlooking the no man’s land.

Mol Morin.

It was almost comical the way Dayne’s team aimed their dampeners at the Alchemist with terrified precision. But Mol Morin’s hands remained still and clasped in front of him, as if he were a priest rather than an Alchemist.

“Imperial and Dwarven friends!” he announced, his Blood Mage at his side. “I have a proposition for you.”