As Zed leaves my office and the door shuts behind him, my heart—not hard, exactly, but calloused, if anything, after centuries of hardship and pain—breaks a bit. That boy is ... so incredibly sad. Lonely. He doesn't even seem to register it for the most part, either, which makes it worse. I've fought beside people a hundred times his age who aren't as sad as him.
I had felt him coming before Sarul—my closest cousin and member of the retinue I’m currently training—came to inform me, though I waited until my presence was specifically requested to react, as is proper. When I saw him—a lone Zenithal boy with striking silver feathers who couldn't have been a year outside his age of majority if he was a day, eyes haunted, talons covered in blood, wearing a ripped tunic spotted with viscera—I felt pity. I could tell he was strong for his age as soon as I detected his presence, but it wasn't until he was within the range of my Aura that I could tell that he was just ... destroyed.
"That boy needs a hug," I say aloud into the emptiness of my office. "And a friend."
He’d posed no real danger to me, and thus to the town by extension, so my hackles remained lowered despite Sarul's—all four members are various relatives of mine, though Sarul is the only member I regularly maintain contact with in that sense, so it has become a habit to consider the group as his—group's growing fear. I make a mental note to discipline them for that lapse in training later. Don't show fear to a possible combatant. It makes you look weak. I could forgive being afraid, as there was no way to hide that from Zed’s nose, but showing it? Unacceptable.
Zenithals are very dangerous as a baseline, especially to humans. At least until a human reaches a certain level of cultivation, at which point the benefits somewhat even out. Zenithals are the fastest humanoids before the age of majority, and they often lean into that as they begin growing in power. You would expect for such an advantage to be given naturally that perhaps their strength would be lowered to make up for the disparity, but in truth they are quite strong as well. Not as strong proportionately as they are fast, but stronger than the average human by every measure until their age of majority, upon which time they may begin cultivation in earnest.
Their senses—all five—are some of the strongest to be granted in general, not even just limited to humanoids. I can think of perhaps a dozen races out of nearly the thousand I know about, though I have been informed there are at least double that within the bounds of the Universe, that have a higher sense threshold than the Zenithal race, and only the Angurin of the far, far, far distant super-planet Grej are combat capable. The Angurin are a bipedal race of giants—Titans, really, given that the shortest of them are nearly forty feet in height—whose hearing is such that they can hear the very world turn around them well enough to determine the time of day.
I’m personally not sure how that works beyond Essence as the turning of the planet itself does not produce sound—a White-ranked Sergeant Major of the Drajoran Alliance, Bastion, confirmed this publicly at one point after having returned from an off-planet mission; there is no sound in space and the world turning would not sound like anything—but I’m no scientist. Maybe it’s some sort of friction with the Essence surrounding the planet causing a low frequency sound that only the Angurin can hear.
In any case, the Angurin somehow are able to hear that well without it overwhelming them and remain able to battle. Quite powerfully, as well. They are blind, even, though their biology more than makes up for what would be considered a hindrance by most on this planet.
I saw a depiction of one in the Kingdom once. Nearly seventy years ago, Benna and I were in the Kingdom for our friend’s bonding ceremony—she’s a member of The Children and, as such, do not marry the way humans do—and there was a story teller who, I imagine, followed the Path of Magic putting on a show with light. It was not the Illusion Concept, I could tell, though before a high enough advancement the differences don’t matter much.
He had been telling the story of Bastion and his mission to Grej some years before that and his encounter of the Angurin. Apparently they are intelligent enough to have a language, however, but not so intelligent that they’ve managed any form of complex societal functions. I didn’t stop to listen, though I did catch sight of the veritable monster he’d projected.
It was a mixture of light blues and purples, with spines along its hunched back and down its large tail which ended in three smaller finger-like appendages that hinted at it being prehensile. It’s legs were bent the opposite way a human’s might be with the knee folding back instead of forward, and the appendages that served as its feet were similar to the ones that adorned the end of its tail, three long extensions, though these held its surely incredible weight. They were wide at the base where they would have touched the ground.
Apparently these Angurin could leap with these, even under the massive strain of the gravity that would pull on them in addition to their body weight. Their arms were unnaturally long, pressing against the ground as would an ape’s, but they didn’t have hands, as such. Just flat disk-like things that apparently could grasp objects by closing up in a way that looked like a rose before it bloomed. Their faces were empty aside from a grotesque mouth which traveled in a straight line from one side of the face to the other that made it look like a puppet, and longer hair-like things that danced this way and that. The whole body was covered in smaller versions of those same hairs.
I shudder at the thought of coming in contact with one.
Ah, here I am going on a tangent of my own after having admonished Zed for the same thing. I chuckle lightly in amusement, though, because I would have told him hypocrisy is the privilege of the strong if he were to draw attention to an instance of me doing it. Alas, he did not witness such a thing.
Zenithals, despite not having the capability to hear an entire planet turn, can hear in a solid radius ranging from a few hundred yards at the least to a mile at the most around themselves, which tells me that Zed had definitely heard the interaction between Sarul and I, though I do not mind. I didn’t say anything that could be considered classified. They have an automatic affinity for air—which is part of why their hearing is as good as it is—as a result of their heritage and are born with a second one that is quite random. I would guess metal is Zed's due to the color of his feathers. Metal is not a common affinity.
As a result of this natural strength and speed, even without seeing him in battle, he might be physically on the level of perhaps Yellow-9, but until he learns to use his Aura, he's only a Red-1 despite that. This is partly why the ranking system is flawed and should only be used as a guideline for power and not a rule. He wouldn't be able to touch my shadow at his level of power. Sarul and the others, on the other hand, are Yellow-4 as far as their ranking goes, yet they would be more likely to hit themselves with a Spell than him. They would have been aware of this, even as battle-lacking as they are, which is why I do not blame them for their initial fear of him.
They would die inside of a minute. I doubt they'd be able to cast a single Spell before his talons, magically hardened and nearly indestructible unless by someone of a higher advancement, found their way to their throats. Zenithals aren't very common these days. They've been targeted for their "unfair advantages" by those jealous of their biology for generations, though that practice has petered out for the most part. They typically keep to themselves, as a result, so the assertion that a commune of Zenithals exists doesn't surprise me.
Velkor, the continent on the opposite side of the world, doesn't allow Zenithals in any part of its land, for example. I believe that it's a cry of weakness, quite honestly. Fear. If someone can beat you at your own game just by being born, regardless of how "unfair" the advantage is, then you weren't destined for greatness anyway. You're destined to be a whine-ass, though that destiny would have been realized as soon as you started spouting such utter nonsense. The answer is simple. Work harder, learn faster, be better. It's a weak Path indeed if someone can push you off of it simply because they exist.
In terms of ranking, I've been around Blue-1 by guild standard since about twenty years ago. I don't get to do very much battle outside of the Confluences so I'm much slower in advancing than I would like, but no one else in Esh is higher than Green-5 beside Benna who is Blue-9. You don't see me complaining about Zenithals simply existing. If anything, I want to fight them to use as a whetstone upon which to sharpen my strength. To push farther along my Path.
Benna isn’t here very often and, though I love a fight as much as the next girl, would much rather spend my time in her arms than at arms with her. Perhaps I can train Zed myself, if he wishes, so that I might eventually have a peer that can offer a challenge. I can teach him to use his Aura. To help him learn how to move his body in ways that compliment his nature. Maybe he could rapidly grow strong enough to reach Green-5.
Mevjuutir, Abenjiirin's disgusting father, is that Green-5 I’m referencing, unfortunately. It's all in Vigor and Resilience, though. No speed, no finesse, no beauty. Just raw power. He views a battle as a hammer does a stone, an obstacle to be chipped away through sheer might. He neglects the deeper meaning of battle, the intricacies of power, the graceful dance where every step choreographs victory and a misstep means death. It is a refined test, a measure of skill, demanding precision and mastery that Mevjuutir simply lacks.
When I was a Green, even just a Green-1, I could have bested him as he is now. It wouldn't even have been hard. I'd have suppressed him with my Aura—which is yet another rusty hammer in his poorly-fitted tool belt—slowing him down, and danced around his clumsy, oafish attempts at crushing me, striking with my bare fists until his blood became more of a garment than his clothing was. Until he was crying for my mercy. Until I heard the pitiful little moo that would come out of his throat like that of a calf not yet able to speak. Until everyone saw what a hypocrite he is.
He used to hurt Lyriisa, Abenjiirin's mother, before she died. What an 'honorable' man, right? He calls them all weak when he does things like that behind closed doors. I never saw it happen, not exactly, but I felt the way her soul shrank when he came near her, felt her fear. I felt the way the feel of his hands on her skin repulsed her. The way the sadness reached its peak when he was closest.
If there were other minotaurs closer to the Kingdom, I would have reached out. I would have asked them to do something. To help in a more concrete way. They have authority in ways the law itself can’t replicate for matters like that. They could have “stepped in,” as it were.
In the eyes of the actual law, I didn't have proof. Only my assertion that it was happening from what I had observed, which unfortunately is not proof. I could have interrogated him, had them feel his lies in his soul, but even then it would be seen as political overreach and the worst that would have happened legally was a veritable slap on the wrist. I feared what would happen to the two of them were that to happen.
Abenjiirin deserved to be free from him. He deserves to be free of him, of the weight his father's very life pushes onto his shoulders. Free from the expectation of the small enclave of their kind and their conservative views on the purpose of a minotaur. Free to be happy. Free to make clothing the way he wants. Free to be himself.
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Zed has that chance, too, now. He's been ripped from his home but now he's outside the scope of his family, whoever they were, away from whatever had caused so much sadness and loneliness in a child so young. It makes my blood boil, things like that. People who can hurt children with barely a bat of their eye. People who can scar someone so innocent, someone who has to rely on them to live, and then walk around like nothing is happening and that they’ve done nothing wrong.
I don’t know what happened to Zed, specifically, but something did. Something in his youth beyond the violence, beyond the words that caused his self-esteem to be damaged as it is. He’s no stranger to violence, be that physical or verbal. He’s a veteran of the concept of pain, even so young, barely an adult. It makes me ache to my very bones. I have no doubt he's seen the void of light a time or two in his life. But more than that, too. Something I wouldn't wish on anyone, even my worst enemies, let alone a child.
I’ve experienced souls who give off similar feelings, and I don’t like the implications that suggests. I dare not think about it, lest I overstep. It is his pain, his life. He must bare it, be that on his own or to another so they may help carry the weight. I sincerely hope he chooses the latter. He feels like a void, in a way. A presence who only happens to harbor a body, feeding on the emotions that biology produces and they’re only able to fight the pull so much. I want to help. I wish I could fix it myself. The cloying emptiness inside of him. His hatred for himself. It’s pronounced, quite heavily to be sure. Possibly because he seems to feel one thing at a time which drowns out everything else until another emotion happens to shove it out of its place.
He deserves to feel happy. He deserves to feel that someone is in his corner. He deserves to expect that he won’t be facing anything alone.
“If I could make my Path encompass every single child in this Gods-forsaken Universe, I would. I’d be the Goddess of Righteous Protection, stopping every child from experiencing things like this, protecting them from those who are weak enough to even think about harming them. I would make it so even the thought of harming a child caused agony, until no more men or women were abused by their partners, until the very last predator was expunged,” I say aloud, though I am still alone. It makes me feel better, in a way. To think about how I would protect them. It is my Path after all. Protection
I consider myself strong, mind and body, but I am also weak. I am weak because I am brought low by that pain, brought low by the desire to help those who cannot help themselves, because I am not powerful enough to ignore the rules of what the world considers the right course of action. I am weak because I am not yet a Goddess who can do whatever I wish with none but the other Gods to stop me. Oh they might try. Impropriety, rules, politeness. All drivel, all excuses. They can do more than they are. They don’t because of some silly checks and balances.
I would lay down my life to do what I think is right if I could help that many children at once, forcing a Divine Blessing onto each and every one, stopping those around them from wishing harm, stopping that harm from being enacted onto them. I would force peace, whether it was polite or not. Free will or not. Children are not objects to do what you will with. They are not owned even if you formed them within your womb. They are their own people. They have souls.
The joy in a child’s soul is one of the most beautiful things I have ever experienced. The way they experience the world is so pure, so innocent, so complete that I can’t stand it when that is dimmed. When someone does something that ruins it. It breaks my heart every time despite how stoic I am considered. Adults are one thing. I care for them, yes, and I will stop injustice where I can, but children are different. They have this innocence that gets lost along the way and it seems at times that the world wishes to snuff that as soon as possible, so why would you want to make it easier for the Universe instead of harder? Why would you want to be the cause?
A single tear falls down my cheek as I stare out the single window in my office, watching the people of Esh laugh and talk, watching the children play. I see families embracing each other and it makes me feel grief for those who don’t get to experience that. Those like Zed. Those like Abenjiirin.
Abenjiirin deserved better than he got. He deserved to live a life with his mom, away from his father. Unfortunately, fate had other ideas. I was at the ceremony celebrating her valor, her death rites. The day that the first parasite in his soul took root. I grieved for her, yes, as she was a friend of mine, someone I tried unceasingly to remove from the situation she was in to no avail, but when I felt the sorrow this boy was experiencing I cried. I cried even harder when he stood in front of everyone at her pyre, her body burning into ash behind him as is the way of his people, and told them he would miss the way she rubbed his horns at night while he lay in her lap, soothing him to sleep. He told them that she was his hero and he didn't know what he would do now that she was gone. That he just wished he could have gotten one last hug before she was gone, one last kiss, one last lullaby.
I resolved to be there for him, even if not as much as I would have preferred. I thought about killing his father that day. I thought about following him back to his home, tearing his head off his shoulders, and burying both pieces a hundred feet underground. He would get no pyre. He didn't deserve to be celebrated. He didn't have any honor to celebrate.
I remember the way Mevjuutir felt at his wife's death rites. I felt the anger. The anger that she had been so weak as to die. The anger that she had left him alone with a boy as weak as Abenjiirin. The anger that she had made him as weak as he considered him to be. The anger radiating as his eight year old son, barely to my chest at that point, cried about how much his mother meant to him, about how much he wanted a hug from her to make him feel better, about how much he missed her, while watching her body burn.
I hadn't known all of what his anger was about at the funeral, of course. I can't read minds. I'd heard it from his own mouth as he screamed at Abenjiirin after, admonishing the sobbing boy not an hour after he’d watched his own mother crumble into ash beneath that column of flames. He’d been so afraid. Mevjuutir never hit Abenjiirin, though. One line he didn’t cross, one thing for which I thanked the Gods every day. Not even they could have stopped me had he ever done that.
Benna had to hold me back from leaving our house, then, holding me tight to her chest as I shook with terrible, terrible rage. She'd said that Abenjiirin had lost one parent that day. He didn't need to lose the other, no matter how terrible he was. Plus I would be jailed for such an action, no matter how morally justified I would be. I didn’t care about that. I would have gone with a smile if it meant I could save him from that pain. But Benna simply asked me how many would I be able to help while in chains?
I hate that feeling. The feeling of being powerless. Very few reach the heights of power I have and still I cannot do as much as I would like, tied up in the bullshit that is the law. It works very well when it works, of course, and I am understating it when I say that it works quite often, but when it doesn’t, it really doesn’t.
So instead, as Benna held my shoulders to keep me from doing something I wouldn't regret but would perhaps get me killed in turn, I vowed that one day I would see that man dead. If not by my hand, then by some other event.
He will fall. I will make it so. The harm he has caused isn't worth his presence in this world, even if Abenjiirin is an adult now.
I still think about it. Killing him. I think about doing it openly, with my bare hands. Tiny human knuckles breaking his large minotaur bones. Hearing his large minotaur cries until he was just a large minotaur, dead. It would be so easy. To crush him. To make him feel how Abenjiirin felt growing up. The way he still feels sometimes, deep down, that bubbles up through the cracks when the tide of his joy is low. Helpless and afraid. I can taste it, even. I can taste the satisfaction I’d feel watching Mevjuutir’s body rotting in the middle of the street. Perhaps it is sadistic, but I cannot bring myself to care about that. He deserves it. Deserves to die. Perhaps not as much as some, but it is more personal for me in this case. Closer to home.
But I can't yet. Benna is right, if only politically. If I'm in jail, I wouldn't be able to do anything at all. No one would be helped the way I can help them now, directly or otherwise. I would be deposed, the minotaurs would rebel, though I wouldn't regret it for even a second once his body hit the ground. I would smile as the minotaurs came for me. My fists would meet their flesh as a boulder does a bush. They would crumple before my might and I would laugh as they dared defend that monster. As they dared continue hurting Abenjiirin like this. He deserves better. He'll get it one day, though.
“One day,” I say, hand on the glass before turning around, staring down at my desk as I remain lost in thought.
I hope that Zed sees in Abenjiirin what I do, even not knowing the things he’s gone through. I hope that they become friends like I know they can. I want for them what they want for themselves, though they don't say it aloud. They want connection, desperately. True connection. Not the passing acquaintances that life often sends your way. True, unbreakable friendship. Such different personalities but such similar desires, in the end.
Zed is quiet and reserved unless talking about something he's interested in. He exists mostly in his own head and is prone to catastrophizing, I noticed, even in the short time I experienced his company. He spent almost a whole minute spiraling. Spiraling into his own depression and obvious traumatic stress issues, which is why I mentioned the Healer of the Mind services here. They’re effective, to say the least.
Zed hopes that someone will see the way he hurts and help him fix it. He wants them to tell him they care about him on his bad days even more than his good days because those are the days they get to see him. He wants to be known, to be seen, but loved despite the flaws he sees in himself. He wants to be loved unconditionally and to see that love in a way he can't think his way out of because it'll be just that clear. He wants to give love with his presence and have that love be felt despite his introverted nature.
Abenjiirin, however, is outspoken. A ball of joy that bounces toward everyone who might be able to catch him, hoping they hold onto him for a bit before throwing him away again. He latches on quickly and loves the same. He smiles amidst the punches, hugs instead of lashing out, his heart his chosen weapon that he wears upon his knuckles. He would rather be hurt than hurt another because he knows how it feels. He doesn't wish that on anyone, even those who go out of their way to hurt him.
The people of Esh are largely caring. They do love Abenjiirin just as they love each other, but they still remain distant. It's not their fault, really. Abenjiirin is part of the minotaur clan, even if the clan itself doesn't treat him as such. They would be rebuffed because they want him to suffer. They want him to change. They want to make him hurt so that he, in turn, is willing to hurt. They don't understand that it isn't going to work.
The more they punch, the more they kick, the more vitriol they spill at his doorstep, the harder he works to make others happy. The less money he takes to make clothing. The more he does things like, after his father and him had a … disagreement, shall we say… he traveled to the orphanage, took each child’s measurements, and stayed up for a week straight to make them all a two entire outfits. Outfits they still wear to this day, in fact. I anonymously donated a few dozen gold ounces to Stitches after I'd learned of it.
I wish I could take in the orphans myself and show them the love they so desperately need, but my position requires an exorbitant amount of time. Time I wouldn’t be able to give to them no matter how much I wish I could. There will always be more of them needing that love, unfortunately. The Confluences, the very banes of happiness and stability, are torture inflicted upon us by the laws of the Universe. All we can do is keep fighting and keep using Essence, keep getting stronger, or else the Confluences will overtake us. The System helps but it doesn't do it for us. People die all the time as a result, leaving families broken and children parentless. I wish that it were different. I wish I could solve it and end the phenomenon for good, but Essence pools everywhere which means Confluences happen everywhere.
Except, apparently, wherever Zed hails from. I wish that he knew. If he did, I would travel there myself when Benna returned and make them tell me their secrets. If I happened to find the people that hurt Zed this badly that would be an added bonus the price of which I could extract from their flesh myself. I might even keep a feather or two as a souvenir.
If I weren't in my position, I would be kicking down doors and shoving my shiny purple boots up so many assholes they'd nickname me The Hole. But I am in my position. Benna is away until further notice, fighting some Blue-ranked Beast up in Mysaven, though I don't know what province. She couldn't say. The continent isn't as big as Drajora, but it's still quite large, so she could be anywhere for all I know.
She would have loved Zed. I can't wait to tell her about him.
Maybe she'll let me use minotaur pee again instead of water in his entre the next time Mevjuutir comes into the restaurant.
A girl can dream.