Chapter Two

  In the early days, when they had just met each other, Achin had drowned Mer in a sea of books. Stories, journals, letters, textbooks — what didn’t they talk about? There was something many of them had in common, though. Magic.

  “It just denotes a faculty we all have,” Achin had lectured. “Just like you can see, smell, or read, you also have magical sensitivity. Will, talent, and understanding — the three pillars mages stand on. Anyone can learn magic, but how far would their physique aid them, how long could they keep at it, and how much could they expand their capabilities?”

  Mer’s book smelled new, and he would rather the book told him all this in its tiny, intoxicating voice, but Achin pressed on.

  “Magic does things to people. The oldfolk didn’t realize this in time, or perhaps they didn’t care. They loved their elements too much, and in time became like them. The merhumans grew scales, the birdlings became light and brittle, and the volcanics became hard and slow.”

  “The newfolk, however, did not even have magic at that time. Oldfolk ruled civilization, and the newfolk stayed holed up in their central forests, only coming out to help trade between their neighbours. Their magic grew slowly, with observation, experimentation, and constant innovation. They developed it deliberately, even when it took a lot of pain and determination — and what they came to realize was magic was actually attributeless. It could be fashioned for any purpose and mixed with any element one wished. Time and ideas were bigger obstructions than nature.”

  “But they still had plenty of those, and humans — the newfolk — became masters of magic, having scaled unimaginable heights of power and built deep institutions that let them forge together a far-flung empire. Set in their ways, the oldfolk stagnated, having no reason to leave their ancestral lands or develop new magic. Their magic became external. They could only command the elements at hand — water, earth, air, or fire. Incredibly powerful, but simple and predictable. Humans, on the other hand, grew their magic capacities, devised new magic techniques, and created magic appliances that could be used by almost anyone, empowering their society. The development of mass schooling was the last nail on the oldfolk’s coffin, since human children could now learn magic at schools — by using appliances at first, then internalizing the skills into their bodies. Human mages were now walking magic weapons, far more sophisticated than anything the oldfolk could accomplish.”

  “But you,” Achin had said. “What are you? I have observed your kind for thousands of years, but never have I seen anything like you.”

  What did it matter? Mer just wanted to read. He was interested in what the book told him of, not about what he was.

  “Mer, listen to me,” Achin’s voice had sharpened suddenly, and his eyes had turned into those empty tunnels again. “Look at me. When someone finally figures out what you are, and even if they don’t, if they still stand by you — that’s your lifeline. Don’t lose it.”

  Mer didn’t care. Whether he had a lifeline or not, it was always coming to this, he thought, standing under the glinting sun in the dusty courtyard, facing ranks of baffled, uneasy soldiers. If it was always going to happen, he would rather Achin had rambled a bit less and let him soak in the book’s glow a bit longer.

  1.

  The commander of the soldiers was a handsome fellow, but he let it all be covered up by a jungle of facial hair. “Sir, are you alright?” he shouted at the mannequin-prone Unug, who had left their earthly company a few breaths ago.

  “He is not,” Mer could sadly confirm.

  “What happened to him? Why does he look like that?”

  “I had to kill him.”

  The soldier’s hand immediately went to the hilt, and a corresponding darkness formed below Mer’s right palm, coalescing into a sword.

  “Unug was a vile man,” Mer spoke clearly. “Gratuitously cruel, with a secret ego feeding on the suffering of others. I don’t claim to have ridden the earth of all its evil, but he was not a man worth leaving another trail of blood behind, don’t you agree?”

  “Call a village medic,” the soldier ground out, “Seize these two, and send a message to garrisons Leva and Ova.”

  “Commander Limbope,” Mer called out, making him stop and look. “You wouldn’t listen to me, would you? You’re too proud. Too disciplined. You have seen too much value in what you represent. But is Unug worth it? Is Unug it? Please, think about it.”

  The man faced him like a statue, all while three of his soldiers circled around. They came at Mer awfully out of sync, albeit with admirable gusto, no doubt looking to knock the sword from his hand. It ate their steel instead, and also took away one’s thumb. It left a strange, black stump where flesh used to be, and in time, blood trickled from it to splatter on dust.

  There was no waiting for orders this time. With a great cry, ten of his comrades snatched themselves from the mass and ran at Mer, murder in their eyes. Mer exhaled, took a small step forward, and then vanished — or at least, that’s how it would look to them. He reappeared behind one man, adding to his charge with a sword through the back. Then he popped up in front of another, so close that the stunned man didn’t even notice running through Mer’s sword. Slash right, block left, pivot and cut off the legs, stand up and thrust through the chin, get out of the way, trip, stab through the back — Mer became a storm each of them could only see once. The soldiers became more and more confused... and desperate. Still, none of them thought to run away. Instead, they yelled as if their survival solely depended on Mer going down, and as if sheer voice could ever keep the darkness away. Was it a cry of sheer courage or the alarmed braying of animals facing slaughter? Either way, Mer had to cut and cut and cut without a pause.

  A soldier had climbed onto a wall and now targeted Mer with a magical rifle. “Archmage!” someone screamed. “Devil!” someone else gasped. The bullets disappeared into Mer as always, and he smiled at the man, hoping it would instill the sense to flee. Instead, Mer’s opponents spat onto the ground, dropped their weapons, and came at him with their bare fists, as if sheer physique could do the job.

  It was time. No one could leave the courtyard now, or Mer would never have a moment of peace in life. He stood still, because he respected their determination, and ignored them as hands and legs disappeared on contact. Someone was screaming. They didn’t have to. They had done nothing wrong. The least Mer could do was give them a nice dream as they went, and his darkness was there to do his bidding, as always.

  One man stood when nobody else did. His legs trembled and his sweat had become a yellow veneer by then. And yet, Limbope looked him straight in the eye and mouthed his words: “You, you stand on a courtyard of the Empire; you butcher its soldiers. The gate was always available to you. How dare you ask us to leave?” Mer ignored them.

  “Tell me, was Unug really, really worth it?” he asked the commander in a voice more tired than the hands that snatched his life away.

  Gollum was drenched in blood. Blood of his doing. Mer knew what he had done, but he didn’t want to turn and look. So they shambled out and came upon the village streets in broad sunlight for the first time. Every window was closed and curtained, every door coldly locked as if the village didn’t want to look, either.

  Gollum took him to a rare stone building with big windows, very close to Unug’s lair. Jhorka’s Lounge — the signboard shook as Gollum banged his fists on the door. He banged for three minutes before the door opened, revealing an aging woman in a shawl, most of her hair dirty silver.

  Gollum moved in soundlessly and took up a seat. Mer noticed his hands slightly shake — not a lot considering all he had seen. Jhorka kept the door open until Mer followed him in.

  “What have you done?” she asked Gollum — part resignation, part exasperation.

  “What have I done? What have I done? What did any of us ever do, Headwoman? Why do our young ones disappear from the rivers every Unity Day? Why must two out of every four fish we catch go to Suva, unpaid? Why must another fall through Unug’s bottomless throat? Why can’t we walk down our own roads and sing festival songs when it’s the rainy season? Why can’t we —”

  “It’s not about YOU, you idiot!” Jhorka burst out. “What will we do now? Where will we go? There are women and children. People who are too sick and too old to move!”

  “No, Jhorka. It’s not about me. Look.” Heads were starting to appear where there were closed doors. A few children were venturing about curiously — probably orphans. Some men were about to go into the courtyard, pulled by the strings of some ghastly attraction, despite knowing they could never unsee what they were going to see.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Let them decide. Nothing like this has ever happened. If you want to hand me over to those city folks, do that. I am here.”

  “As if that would change anything,” Jhorka said, resigned once again.

  2.

  It was a long time till evening fell. They had made neat piles out of the bodies by then, with Unug sitting in front of the rest, as if before an invisible desk. They had also lit a fire requesting parley with the headmen of Ova and Leva, the sister villages. Apparently, it was a common enough occurrence for the signal to be abused by a headman, typically wanting to get drunk with his brethren, that the garrisons wouldn’t think much of it.

  The air stifled inside and scintillated outside now, a complete inversion of the day. Mer felt so tired that he could sink into the wooden table, even as he hunched closer on his elbows. It was Gollum who was speaking:

  “We had a dream when we were children — my brothers and me. We'd launch off on an exploration from Suva.”

  “But you can’t do that if merhuman ships face triple the tariffs of human ships, can you? They want us to keep fishing for them, though. But a proper ship? That takes a charter, and which human paperbug would issue that to a merhuman poorer than three hundred pounds of fat?”

  “We all want things,” Mer commented.

  “But Archmage —”

  “I am not one.”

  “Mer. Mer, think about it. It’s you. I didn’t want to live yesterday. I probably still don’t! But a string of words, said by you on the boat — that’s all it took to change me!”

  The darkness laughed at Mer. If he could stand up and stomp away, he would have. If only he weren’t so tired... How dare Gollum say it was all because of him? It was his power. Power existed to be used. It was always coming here.

  “Mer. Help us, Mer. I’ve decided. Merhumans are made for great things.”

  Someone started singing then, and soon, everyone in the crowded lounge joined. It was some song about forgetting, and the rain covering the sun, and the merhumans waiting through it all, loving the rain as well as the sun. Only Gollum did not join. He kept looking at Mer, eyes shining with tears.

  “What do you want, Gollum?” Mer asked him.

  “I... I don’t know. Just, I want to breathe fully my last years. For her. For myself.”

  “I am not a mercenary, Gollum.”

  “Then be one! You’re a wall, Mer. I also realize that now. People are trash, you said so yourself. So just be our wall and keep all of that away.”

  “Why you? Is what I’m guarding all pristine clean?” he asked him, even though he didn’t remember ever saying those other things.

  “Because... because, my friend,” Gollum said while looking down, “it was always coming to this. What else could you do? You have power, and you’re here now.”

  The door flew open then, and two fat men in very garish apparels strode in. “Gollumson Festerkind!” they said, holding open their arms.

  “Lastson Festerkind, the headman of Leva, and Onlyson Festerkind, the headman of Ova,” Jhorka explained as Mer took a seat by her and Gollum disappeared into his elder brothers’ voluminous arms.

  “Those names — don’t tell me...”

  “Yes. Gollum should have been the headman of this village, but he would hardly leave his old Sherry since his wife died. I am his brother’s wife. No, he has left us, too. It’s been three years.”

  “Is it hereditary, then? The position of the headman.”

  “Not really, no. But the Festerkinds are three of a kind. To be headman with one of them around would just be putting egg on one’s own face.”

  “Excuse me —,” said a burnished man, stopping before the dancing Festerkinds. “That’s long enough for a reintroduction. We’ve sorted out the bodies and the damage. What next? How are we going about this?”

  “That’s Noshed,” informed Jhorka. “He used to serve in the army. Rose to captain even as a merhuman. Left because he allegedly missed his village. And that,” Jhorka pointed at the lubber Mer had last seen sleeping as a co-passenger on the boat, now under Jhorka’s bar. “Is my useless son, Nineh.”

  “I recommend we say it was a magical incident,” said Onlyson.

  “And what about the wounds?” asked Gollum.

  “Indeterminate enough to be caused by anything. Tissue too damaged to tell steel from fire, ice from blunt clubs. What was it, really?” Noshed eyed Mer with suspicion.

  “We could claim it was the magical capacitor they maintained. Clearly didn’t maintain it well enough,” said Onlyson.

  “Except, they will investigate it, and do so very deeply. A hundred deaths in one place. No witnesses. Has anything like this ever happened?” said Noshed.

  “True. My body still shivers when I think of it. One hundred garrison troops and a coastman, lined up like cattle in a pen. I don’t know how they’ll react. I don’t think they know how they’ll react. Nobody has ever seen anything like this,” came Lastson with a far-off, wondering look.

  “Don’t call him coastman. Unug was a pig,” interjected Gollum.

  “And yet, he was one, Gollum. This is not going away,” said Jhorka. “Say, why don’t we all go away? Maybe we could get a move on before they realized, disperse in all directions? Life wouldn’t be sweet, but we’d be safe.”

  That was the sensible option. Hardship and submission — but that was life. That was how they had lived all along. Strangely, though, even though everyone agreed internally, not one soul moved. After a beat of ten breaths, Gollum said a quiet, firm, steadfast “No.”

  “Then we take it to them,” said Noshed.

  “With what? We have no arms, no rations, no training,” said Lastson.

  “Maybe... we could turn to Emre? Surely they will want to help rebels from the empire?” Jhorka proposed.

  “And what? Take a ship and become pirates?” someone scoffed, even as nobody touched the burning word — rebel.

  “Stop licking one boot just to pick up another?” Gollum said.

  “What about Suva? Could we contact someone in Suva?”

  “Suva merhumans?” Lastson sniggered. “How is that lot any better than Mr. Unug here? They’d sell out their kids for a permit.”

  “Not all humans are like Unug.” “How could you say that?” “Who are we to say anything?” “What could we lose?” “What do we even have?” “Don’t tell me that. I’m the first one to...”

  The discussion went on for a long time, until even the fly trapped in the lantern had fallen asleep. Just like the flame, it had not found a way out. What was decided was a mixture of all three plans. Noshed would gather the youngsters from every village, especially the ones with a knack for magic, and form an armed band with them. The village women would put together their jewels and rainy-day savings so said arms could be bought. The remaining villagers would blame the crime on the band, and accept whatever punishment came their way. The band would serve the archmage and help merhumans in distress everywhere. The chosen ones were vehemently opposed to this, but the remainers convinced them the risk was greater for those who left, as whatever punishment befell the remainers was sure to be token only.

  All that notwithstanding, they were all asleep now, and Mer had nobody to listen to. He stood up, wrapped a blanket around Jhorka’s crouched form, and slowly slipped out onto the night. Normally, he would have had to guess, but he was lucky today — the village had only two roads going out. He picked the wider one first.

  The first village was quite large — at least a thousand people in it. Paradoxically, there were only thirty-five soldiers. Perhaps the location played a part. Mer didn’t sense a single mage among them.

  He gave them all a nice dream, simultaneously pleading with the grey owl eyeing him from its perch to keep silent. Only seven of them woke up. Only one got to the door before the darkness got them all, coating them all over and making their limbs evaporate in silence, one by one. The last one limped out of his house, only to find Mer leaning back next to the door. He opened his mouth, but the owl chose that moment to hoot and fly away. The man was still standing there, mouth open, when Mer left, pocketing his chain tag.

  He had to walk all the way back to Gollum’s village after that, and then take the other road, and walk for another hour before he reached the last village. It was smaller, maybe housing only three hundred merhumans. There were forty-seven soldiers here.

  There were also two mages, furiously making love when Mer shouldered into the room. They reacted instinctively, threatened by a presence they couldn’t track. The male threw the bedsheet at Mer, which he dodged. The female made a blast of wind that hit him from behind, propelling him forward. The male had caught ahold of the bedsheet again, and he threw it like a loop, catching Mer on one leg, toppling him over. Darn bedsheets and those who used them. The female jumped on him and punched him so hard that he blacked out for a bit. Then he was grabbing her shoulders, pouring his darkness into her. Her eyes turned ocean dark and she screamed at her partner: “RUN!”

  The male gaped, then bolted through the door. Tsking, it took a moment for Mer to stand back up on wobbly legs and follow. It would be a mess if he started rousing others. There was a wash of heat above his head when he stepped out, and Mer blocked with his right hand, making an orange fireball sputter out. He raised his hand again, wonderingly, but it wouldn’t stay up. He was too tired, and his body couldn’t keep up anymore, even as the darkness stayed hungry as always.

  The male sensed it and came forward. Mer doubted he was in the mood for asking any questions. An orange glow encased his hand, and he pointed it at Mer, the fire turning fatter and fatter, raring to fly at Mer’s head. Instead, the hand behind it started to disappear. First, the nails went away. Then the tops of the fingers, then the joints, and lastly the palm. The man stared uncomprehendingly, as if caught in a dream. Mer was the one half-dreaming, though, and he turned back, not lingering to watch those eyes captivated by their own erasure.

  He had to go individually for each soldier, then, since his body couldn’t handle more of the darkness. It involved a lot of walking, a lot of sluggish blows, and quite a few social faux pas. Mer let his body do the hunting — the darkness, even when asleep, led him like a dog after a bone — while he himself thought of happier things. Like getting back. Sitting down. Not having to walk anymore.

  The sun was up and red when he finally got back to Jhorka’s Lounge. Everyone had woken up despite the mulch-filled night. They sat worried around the long table, not saying anything, cheeks forming more lines every minute.

  Mer walked in like a sack of snow and wooden wheels, pretending not to notice their evident relief.

  “Where were you?” Gollum cried as if he was Mer’s lost grandfather.

  “I couldn’t help but overhear you lot last night.” He tried to smirk.

  “So?”

  He opened his fingers, and tag after dangling chain tag toppled out of his palm onto the table. Almost a hundred, plus two red badges given to mages of the expert rank.

  “You were right,” he said to Gollum, “It was always coming to this.”

  “This village doesn’t have a fixed name, right?” he said to Jhorka. “How about we name it Onsoona? Just as a joke.”

  “Now, fetch me your young ones, especially the smart ones, the hardy ones, and the skilled ones — magical or otherwise,” he said to Noshed. “And get ready. It’s going to be a tough, tough road ahead. None of you are going anywhere, but I would be lying if I said the cost would be anything less than unbearably heavy for you. Even I couldn’t do that.”

  “Oh, and everything that happened today, Lilek did it. Not me, not you. Lilek did,” he said as an afterthought.

  “Lastly,” he addressed everyone, “Don’t call me up before three. After that, we’re going to have a long chat.”

  Then he walked right up to the bar, crossed over, and tumbled right atop the still-snoring Nineh, drifting off into a different kind of darkness.