Vaela edged towards Hermit and he made no movement to knock her back with his staff. She closed into range and swiped his head. He leaned out of the way–an almost lazy motion–but her stick whizzed past him. He casually kicked her backwards.
The breath burst from her lungs from the impact and she stumbled back. He hadn’t kicked hard enough to actually knock her down, just enough to rebuff her. She rubbed her chest and glared at him. Hermit scratched his face. “What? Did that hurt?”
She snarled and prowled back to him. “Yes, of course it did.” She swiped at him and he raised an arm. Her stick rebounded off his forearm with a smack, but he didn’t so much as flinch.
“Why?”
She paused, lowering her shield slightly. As much as his ho-hum manner annoyed her, he had a point. He was letting Shadow Flow through him–and wasn’t getting hurt.
He nodded to her shield. “Ditch that old thing. It’s just a crutch.” He whipped his staff at her head and she raised the shield over her face. No impact rang out. A moment later, his staff snapped under her shield and into her ribs.
She cried out as pain lanced into her and stumbled back. As she lowered the shield, Hermit’s stupid smirk was revealed. Oh, how she’d love to beat that off of him…
She reached inward to the Shadow treading within her. It slipped through her grasp and she clenched her teeth. Hermit meandered up to her, taking his time. She wrestled the Shadow into submission and it writhed in her will’s grasp like a wild animal.
Hermit extended his staff until the tip was just a finger’s width from her shield. “You wanted to know about the Twisted, huh?”
Vaela grunted and forced the Shadow to flow through her. It felt more like she was stretching a piece of dough out, drawing it in all directions to extend through her body, all the while its essence thinned.
Hermit tapped his staff on the rim of the shield. “Well, let’s see. First, there’s Malleus–the Hammer.” He darted forward and slammed her shield to the side. She shouted, her control over the Shadow evaporating. She struck at his head, but he ducked under her arm and drew his staff back. Her entire body tensed as she sensed the coming blow, even as she tried to twist out of the way. Hermit’s staff smashed into her stomach, doubling her over. The air exploded from her mouth and her diaphragm spasmed, refusing to draw breath in. Hermit circled around her and patted her on the back. “He’ll crush you, then Burn you to ashes.”
Vaela reeled away from him, wheezing in a small breath. She braced against her knees, shield and stick gripped loosely. Her diaphragm released and she gasped in. As she straightened back up, her abdominals rebelled, recoiling from the pain and forcing her to hunch. She glowered at Hermit and charged back in. Before she got close enough to hit him, he raised his staff, held like a spear, and she shied back. His staff jabbed into her shield, hard enough to partially turn her, and she retreated. With every step she took back, he came forward with another strike. She jumped back and peered over the rim.
He crept forward, the tip of his staff at eye-level. “Then, we have Stapes–Light of the World.” His staff shot forward and she jerked the shield up. The impact knocked her back another step. Hermit circled towards her shield arm and, as she pivoted, he dropped his staff to the grass and raced in. Her stick rebounded off his shoulder and he grabbed the edge of her shield. He flung it away, her arm jerking out to the side with the force. Hermit grabbed Vaela by the neck and threw her to the ground. He stepped on her wrist before she could raise her shield back up. “She’ll expose your every weakness.”
Vaela smashed her stick into his ribs. It rebounded harmlessly and he walked away, releasing her arm. She rolled back to her feet as he scooped up his staff. Dammit, it wasn’t fair. Nothing hurt him. And who was she kidding with her stick? If a direct hit from Adyr’s Ice Blade had barely scratched him, he probably didn’t even feel Vaela’s attacks.
Invulnerability aside, he was just too good. It didn’t seem like he moved fast, but he was always just out of reach.
Across the field, Adyr and Surah exchanged controlled hits. Every few strikes, Adyr pointed to some part of Surah’s body–his foot or his head or his grip. He’d nod and make an adjustment. He was learning.
Vaela gritted her teeth and forced her attention back to Hermit. Anger burned inside her. She’d already laid on the ground in defeat today. She would not wallow at Hermit’s feet. He sauntered over and waved his staff in the air. “And finally, there’s Inky. Incus, if I’m being respectful.”
Vaela shut her eyes, closing out his voice and smug face. Deep inside her, the Shadow roiled. She gathered her strength and wrested it into her control.
Hermit drew nearer, his feet crunching through the grass. “Incus… the Anvil.”
She couldn’t Flow the Shadow through her body. Not like Hermit could. Not like Adyr could with Ice. One day–but not today. The foreign Power bucked at the confines of her will, threatening to break free. Too wild. Couldn’t tame it.
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Hermit stepped up to her, neither of them making any attempt to strike the other. He guided her shield down with his staff and poked the tip over her heart. “He’ll bleed you like the sacrificial lamb you are.”
Fury flooded her senses, pounding from her heart. No. She wouldn’t bleed. Wouldn’t be bled.
His staff drew back in a backswing, his arms tensing as they readied to ram it into her ribs. Veala’s eyes jolted open. She was no lamb.
She shoved the Shadow through her body. The staff jabbed into her chest, directly over her heart. The pressure rocked through her, the Shadow writhing under her skin as it bore the impact. The strike pushed her back a step–only a step.
Vaela let out a shout and thrust her arms over her head. YES!
Hermit swept her legs out from under her.
“Agh!” She fell on her back, the blue sky smiling down on her. “Dammit, Hermit!”
He leaned over her, blotting out the sky. “Not bad, kid. But you know, you’d still be dead. Can’t go celebrating in the middle of a fight.”
A crack rang out from across the field and Vaela sat up. Surah held his branch, now broken through the middle, and Adyr rubbed her arm, apologetically. Hermit turned back to Vaela with a grin. “Guess my team won again.”
She rolled her eyes. Her chest ached as if lightly bruised and she touched the skin. It was tender. But who cared? “Ha!” She pointed her stick at Hermit. “I did it, though. Wrestled that slippery Shadow to take the impact for me.”
“True, but Incus isn’t going to politely stand by while you try to get your Power to behave.”
She strode away and led them back to the horses. “It’s a moot point. The Hammer? The Light of the World? Seriously? The Anvil?” She snorted and shook her head. “Why do they have such dumb names?” Surah and Adyr joined them and Surah tossed the broken halves of his branch aside.
Hermit climbed back onto his saddle. “I don’t know–but you’re right to think less of them for their idiotic titles. Unfortunately, our guys have even dumber ones.”
Vaela clambered up into the saddle, flopping onto the horse with as much dignity as she could. “Oh yeah? Like what?”
Surah and Adyr climbed onto their horses–gracefully, of course. Hermit pulled his mount in front of all of theirs. “Well, there’s the Beast, the All-Seeing, and the Inappropriately Handsy.”
Surah burst out laughing and Vaela groaned. She stabbed a finger at Hermit. “Please don’t tell me that Jace is…?”
Hermit grinned and turned away, nudging his horse down the road. “You’ll see–or rather, feel–for yourself.”
Adyr and Vaela rode next to each other, letting Hermit pull ahead a short distance. Adyr nudged her horse close to Vaela’s. “How is it that he knows so much about the Twisted and Created?”
Vaela shrugged, watching Hermit bump along as he rode. “He’s a Shadow Spinner–he’s been all over the country and knows lots of stories. It’s his trade.”
Adyr fiddled with the reins and the churning of hooves on the road filled the air between them. She was quiet, as if something disturbed her. She brought her horse even closer to Vaela, until their legs almost touched. “Don’t think it’s strange? For a simple storyteller, his Power is…”
Vaela drummed her fingers on the pommel of the saddle. It had occurred to her. How many times, just in the past day or so, had she been shocked by Hermit? His raw talent at Timura’s ceremony, well, maybe a grizzled Shadow Spinner who’d been at practice for a few decades could have done the same. But his fighting ability–against the priests, against Adyr, against Kaverlna. And his Power. To weather such destruction and barely bat an eye. Yes. It was strange. “I… he’s full of surprises, that’s for sure.”
Adyr hunched down, partially turning away from Hermit, her voice low. “The Church teaches us of their enemies.” She glanced at Hermit before turning back to Vaela. “The greatest of all of them is…”
“Is who?”
“The Dark One. The Lightless.” Her eyes bored into Vaela’s. “The Shadow Lord.”
Chills ran down Vaela’s spine. In the front, Hermit’s head had slumped down, his body staying relaxed in the saddle, even asleep. Vaela hugged her arms around her stomach. Hermit wasn’t some great warrior. He was a vagabond, a troublemaker. He was Hermit. She licked her lips. “That must be someone else. You heard Hermit talking about Shadow Spinners, like they’re all descended from some noble lineage. Oh, and besides”–she straightened up, her chest releasing some of the tension it held–“Hermit barely even cares about the Church. We only went because I dragged him there.”
Adyr looked troubled, still. “Maybe. But he did go to the Church. And he fought Kaverlna, called her Incus. No, more than that.” She shook her head, blonde hair whipping around her neck. “Spoke as if he knew Incus. I’ve thought about it since then. It was like he’d met Incus before.”
Vaela’s heart sped up again and she leaned towards Adyr, shifting weight to her left leg slightly. “Well, as I said, he’s been around a lot. Maybe this delusion of being Incus is common in the Church of Blood.”
Adyr swallowed hard and shuddered. “It was more than delusion. It was like, possession.” She looked behind them, Xufont completely out of sight. “Whatever happened to Kaverlna, she was not herself.”
Vaela’s left leg burned from leaning her weight on it. She’d seen that dead priest’s body, slit open on the table. What Adyr must have seen. Pure horror. Vaela stretched out and patted Adyr’s leg.
Adyr gave her a small smile. It faded, her face serious again. “In the Church’s legend, Incus has come before.”
“There, see? So maybe Hermit ‘met’ him then.”
“A thousand years ago.”
Vaela blinked and drew back, settling over the saddle. “You’re not saying he–Hermit–is one of the Created, are you?”
Adyr breathed in and exhaled heavily. This was clearly what she’d been leading up to. “I-I genuinely hope so. Because the Church has a central tenet.”
Vaela’s mind flashed back to the portrait of Incus she saw. Bloody heart carved out, knife in hand. What had Kaverlna said? “Incus is one of the Created. He’s supposed to come back to Dome one day.” Okay, so they believed that had happened. At least Kaverlna certainly did. “So?”
“They say Incus will come back and guide humanity to salvation, to the Peaks.”
“Wait, now, see? If he’s come to Dome before, then why hasn’t that happened?”
Adyr stared at Hermit’s back. “He was stopped. By the Twisted.”
Vaela’s blood ran cold. Timura’s ceremony played through her memory. The Twisted monster erupting from Timrua’s body. Vaela squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head, trying to clear it. No, this was crazy. Hermit was just Hermit. They weren’t on some great quest, just a journey to see the world. Finally, she would get to see the world.
And Hermit would guide her. He was a nuisance, a thief, and a scoundrel. A liar, a trickster… and her friend.
He certainly wasn’t some special Being. He wasn’t one of the Created. Not one of the Twisted.
Was he?