Book 3 of Flame Sea
CHAPTER TWO
…
Ijesh
Flame Sea Territory
Blood splattered across the stage of the caverous, cliff-built theater, whipped by the crimson-stained blades gleamed golden in the light coming from the oil-filled braziers. Ban gritted his teeth against the pain, surging forward to try to catch his attacker on the point of his blade. He missed, but the movement opened his wounds.
Common hardened iron instead of the light, strong, rare golden of faeshiin, Fae-metal, the youth wielding those wounding weapons faltered. Seeing the deep cuts he had caused on the tall warrior fighting him, Nadj blanched. Cuts which buckled his opponent’s legs, having severed his quadriceps rather deeply.
“Don’t falter, Nadj!” the female of his three two trainers ordered, stamping the butt of her staff against the stone flooring. “He’s still a danger to you!”
Ban certainly strove to be. Ignoring the pain, the kneeling, bleeding, tattooed male lashed out with his long arms, slashing at the teen’s leather-covered legs. Yelping, Nadj managed to simultaneously skip back and deflect the blow with a clang from the clashing blades. The tip of Ban-taje’s sword did scrape along his leathers, leaving behind a paler scratch on the smoke-tanned material. It would not, however, have badly injured the youth if he hadn’t diverted the blow; Ban was delivering most of his blows with the flat of his blade, not the edge.
However, he was relentless in striking hard, and swung aagain.
“Would—you—stop?” Nadj hollered, bashing his blade with each word. “…Flames take you! Surrender!”
Hissing ferally through a disturbing, toothy grin, the tattooed, black-haired man shuffled forward on his knees, leaving smears of blood from his open wounds. He ignored the pain of them as thoroughly as Nadj ignored the pain of his scratches and bruises, lunging with quick cuts.
“He’s not going to stop, Nadj,” Bargo, the youngest of the three trainers called out.
Like Seda, the youngest of the three trainers stood off to the side, out of immediate danger of the two combattants. So did the other seven of their pupils. Actually, the students of Krue-taje’s advanced combat class sat on benches, each of them having gone through a similar hard fight. No longer winded but still a bit sweat-soaked, they recovered from their bouts with Ban.
The unstoppagle outworlder shuffled forward awkwarldy but swiftly on his knees, chasing down the last of the eight young warriors despite his terrible wounds.
Tears streaking his cheeks, Nadj tried to get out of the way, and found himself nearly skewered again. Finally, the youth accepted that the man who could not die, would not die. Teeth bared, he stabbed with the dagger in his off-hand, puncturing his foe’s throat. He ripped the blade out again a split second later, all while parrying with the short sword in his main hand Ban swinging his own dagger inward, to try to counterstab him in the side.
More blood gushed out in a white-hot line of terrible pain. This time, the kneeling, bloodsplattered male jerked, choked on a burble of liquid red, and keeled over. Thudding into a puddle of his own blood. Sobbing, Nadj dropped the dagger from his left hand, though his right still clung to his sword.
Bargo shifted his hand to his own short iron sword, watching the twitching death of their volunteer. If Ban’s death took too long, if the student refused to give a suitable death-blow, it would be a kindness for one of the instructors to step in and finish the job—a kindness for Ban, and a mark against the squeamish pupil.
Older and wiser, Seda held up her hand, cautioning him to wait. Just a dozen heartbeats passed while Ban bled out in spurts, consciousness fading. Then he twitched one last time. His own blades fell from his grip, finally surrendering the weapons under the force of his own death.
The other seven pupils eyed the fallen male with worried looks. Some of them moved their lips, silently counting heartbeats. Half a dozen beats after he died from the shock of massive blood loss…the body and the blood smeared over the floor, all of it flared. Enough of it had been spread around, that everyone winced away from the rather bright flash.
An instant later, the dead man reappeared on his feet, alive and whole, clean and clad in the same sandals, leather shorts, and matching black-dyed vest wrapped around his tattooed chest as he had been wearing before he died so gruesomely. His skin, virtually scarless, looked a few shades lighter than before, allowing the colorful tattoos inked under its surface to be more easily seen.
That lighter skin color did not surprise anyone; they all knew by now that he “reset” to his original condition, to the moment when he had first been cursed immortal. It was only when he lived for several months, or even years, that he developed the deep, suntanned brown endemic to most of the people living in the desert lands surrounding their home.
Without hesitation, the man named Lord Death in the tongue of the Flame Sea Tribe, closed the distance between him and the crying teen, and gently pulled him into a hug. “I’m fine,” Ban-taje comforted him. “I cannot be permanently killed. You did not actually harm me for long. It’s okay…”
“I can’t… I c-can’t do this!” Nadj sobbed, clinging to the tall human. “I thought I c-c-could, but I… I j-just can’t!”
“That’s okay, too,” Ban murmured, holding the shaking seventeen year old. He looked over at the seniormost of their trainers. “…Well?”
The figure that sat in a comfortable chair at the far end of the bench of students would have been the oldest being in the auditorium, if Ban had not been there. Far older than Bargo’s twenty-nine years, or Seda’s thirty-five, Krue had seen nearly four hundred years so far, roughly a fifth of a typical Fae lifespan. For a quarter millennia, he had studied the various combat skills of his kind, striving to perfect his place as a Fae Gh’vin, before being assigned to the pantean of the Flame Sea.
Because of the uniqueness of this world, how the anima-magics of the universe and the effects humans had on the Fae, the need for a contingent of Guardians had been deemed vital. Krue would have been the leader of dozens of specially skilled combattants, and had been sent ahead of the rest in order to assess this realm’s needs and provide proper protection for the Fae who lived her, and the humans they lived among. That contingent had never arrived…which meant Krue-taje had reluctantly decided he needed to instruct the local humans in how to be efficient, effective warriors.
“…Not everyone is suited to be a warrior,” Krue stated. Rising, he approached the two combattants. The scales of his golden faeshiin armor scraped and clattered softly, almost musically against each piece when he shifted upright, but once vertial, he moved so smoothly, his armor made no sound. “Not everyone can stomach the necessities of countering violence with violence, or the demands of war.”
Nadj, pulling free of the Death Lord’s embrace, sniffed and tried to hold himself upright. Tried to look strong despite his trembling. He could not, however, look up enough to meet thos ice-lemon eyes. He had the light gold eyes and golden curls of someone with partial Fae blood, the brown skin and muscles of his human side, but at that moment, none of the grace that often came with that combination of lineages. Not when he trembled so hard, he shook between sniffing breaths.
Krue-taje stopped to Nadj’s right, flanking him across from Ban-taje. “Nadj. There is no shame in not being a warrior at heart. This is why we practice upon Ban, with his permission. Killing changes a person. In someone who is good at heart, this is a painful lesson, because it changes the warrior, leaving unpleasant memories in the wake of each fight. And many who think they can take another life often only encounter that choice, and its cost, in the midst of actual peril. Those who freeze or refuse are often cut down by the ones they fight.
“But with the aid of Ban, you have the chance to see what you are made of without permanently ending another’s life. You have not actually killed anyone,” the Fae Gh’vin soothed. “He is clearly alive and unharmed, no matter what we do to him. No permanent damage has been done. If you wish…you may retire from your obligations as our student.
“You will, however, continue to practice with your bow and your sling, your spear and your knife. You have shown no hesitancy in killing animals, whether wild or domesticated,” Krue added. “You will still be expected to stand guard-watch over the valleys when your time in the rotation comes nigh.
“Now, go sit with the others, and accept comfort from them,” the Fae stated, lifting his chin a little. Unlike most of his kind, his hair did not flow down his back; even Ban had longer hair than his. Though to be fair, Ban’s straight, black, waist-length locks had been reset alongside every scrap of skin and drop of his blood. “You are not yet dismissed. You still did well, despite your misgivings and hesitations. Sit among them, accept comfort, and ponder whether or not you are suited to become a warrior of the Flame Sea.
“If your answer upon reflection is no, there will be no reprisals. If your answer is yes, your training will continue. Either way,” Krue offered, “I will always remain available to listen to your concerns and your fears. I, too, once struggled with the rightness versus wrongness of ending another being’s life.”
Nadj sniffed and frowned at that. He blinked, confused, before blurting out a question. “Then why do you do it?”
“Because if the only people who know how to fight and harm and kill other people are the ones who enjoyfighting and harming and killing, then no one will be able to stop them. Beings who are good must sometimes take up unpleasant duties in order to save the lives of others,” Krue instructed. “Evil people often think their cause is good and right and just…but Evil will always be quick to blame and quick to judge. Evil is reluctant to help, loathe to give without getting in return.”
A faint scrape and slap of footsteps on stone pulled Ban’s gaze off toward the risers. Or rather, to one of the tunnels under the arcs of seating rising up from the dais where they stood. A shadow, elongated from the daylight beyond, bobbed and wove as its owner walked into the theater.
“A-And good?” Nadj asked, sniffing and rubbing his nose on his forearm.
“Good is quick to help others, even without recompense,” Seda instructed. Like Nadj, she had the golden hair of her mother’s father, Éfan-taje, though she bore the green eyes and paler, merely suntanned skin of her paternal grandmother kin. She wore fitted bits of oil-hardened leather for armor over clearly muscled limbs, in her prime despite having given birth to five children so far. “Good is slow to judge without solid evidence.”
“Ah, yes, the morality of the Fae,” a tenor male voice drawled, palpably amused. “Good is such-and-such, and evil is so-and-so, and the choice between the two is quite clear…”
Nadj bristled, turning to frown at the red-haired speaker. “The choice is clear between the two!”
‘Of course!” Udrin exclaimed, touching his spread hand to his chest, still clad in the finespun linen his sire’s kin were able to import from other realms. “Isn’t that just what I said? I just said that,” the Dai-Efrijt drawled, flicking his other hand outward. The gesture was Fae, the words in their letter were in agreement…but that tone, drawled just so, subtl mocked those words in their spirit. “I swear, half the time no one ever listens to me. Well, Krue-taje, I am here to report to you for fighting practice.”
“You’re early,” Krue replied, his expression a calm mask.
Udrin flipped his hand again, and shifted over to sit on the lowest tier of curved benches. “Then I shall watch. What is today’s lesson, anyway?”
“We…we had to kill Ban,” Nadj admitted, strengthening his voice. “It…wasn’t easy.”
“Oh, nonsense,” Udrin dismissed, arm twitching. He fluttered it in dismissal, humming an odd little tune, then gestured. “Anybody can kill Ban-taje. The trick is making him stay dead.” Tilting his head, Udrin studied the tall, tattoo-covered male speculatively. “I do admit that—theoretically, of course—it would be fascinating to try each possible method, experimenting in a methodical, carefully recorded manner. Perhaps a way could be found then?”
“Longer-lived beings than you have tried, and failed,” Ban stated flatly. “They always fail…and I always ensure they never start again, once I get annoyed.”
The red-haired youth twitched his hand again, then danced his legs a little, lifting and lowering his knees. “Yes, yes, whateve—”
“Udrin!” Krue snapped, cutting him off. “Be respectful. Watch in silence, or leave. This is not yourstudy hour.”
“…Of course, Krue-taje,” the redhead amended, bowing slightly. “I will be quiet now.”
Krue didn’t sigh or roll his eyes, or show any other sign of impatience. He did let his gaze linger a moment on the teenaged newcomer, then turned back to the curly-haired youth. “Take your place among the others, Nadj, and remember my words. We will now continue the remainder of today’s lesson with a point-by-point dissection of Nadj’s fight against Ban.”