Of Truth and Beasts

On the rocky shore, south of Calm Seatt and high above the foaming waves of the bay, the night air shimmered. The outline of a tall shape slowly began taking form.

A dark figure garbed in a flowing robe and cloak shifted and swayed. Then it twitched and jerked, as if writhing in pain. No face was visible within the pitch-black pit of its sagging cowl. One arm rose, and its sleeve slipped down, exposing a forearm, hand, and fingers wrapped in black cloth strips.

Sau’ilahk came into consciousness amid the agony of Beloved’s anger. And only then could he scream. Heard from afar, the sound would have been a sudden shriek of wind.

As he became aware of himself, startled that he had not ended in Beloved’s embrace, he realized he had returned to the world of the living. Turning, he searched to see where he was. Calm Seatt spread before him with a multitude of night lamps illuminating the city. He did not know whether to feel rage or gratitude.

The last he remembered was being trapped by the Stonewalkers as Wynn burned him to nothing. And yet he had returned to the edge of Beloved’s dream. In the punishment for his failure, his disobedience, he wished he had perished instead.

But Beloved would not let him die.

Now fear and suspicion clouded his every guess.

Sau’ilahk had believed that he could control his own fate—that he could tease and twist the hints to his salvation from his god. A thousand or more years past, at end of the great war, Beloved’s thirteen “Children” had divided into five groups. Each group had been given one of the Anchors of Creation—the orbs, so called by the ignorant few who had now learned of them—and the Children had dispersed to the ends of the world, taking the orbs into hiding.

Sau’ilahk, highest of Beloved’s Reverent Ones, its priests, knew only this much, and not where those five journeys had ended.

But as reward for his own service, he had asked for eternal life, for his beauty to never end. Beloved consented, and then cheated Sau’ilahk with a twist on that promise’s words. Sau’ilahk’s body decayed, but his spirit remained. He received his eternal life, but not eternal youth.

All Sau’ilahk wanted was the Anchor of Spirit. Through it, he could have flesh and beauty again. Yet his search had proven fruitless through the centuries, until one pitiful little sage uncovered words penned in ancient texts by three of the Children. Wynn Hygeorht was his one hope to force Beloved to fulfill what had been promised. Through her, he would learn the long-lost paths of the Children and the resting place of the orbs.

He had believed that he was manipulating Beloved into assisting him, but Beloved had raged over his recent failure, his destruction, in the underworld of Dhredze Seatt ... and Beloved had punished him.

And yet now, here he was just outside of Calm Seatt, Wynn’s home.

Follow the sage ... to your desire. Serve, and she will lead you.

Sau’ilahk whimpered, a sound like breeze-ripped grass. He cowered down, feeling dormancy threatening to take him at the sound of his god’s demand. Then his mind began to clear of terror.

Perhaps the texts were not the true answer? Perhaps Wynn Hygeorht’s interpretation of them was the key? Was Beloved using him again, or did they share the same goal?

Sau’ilahk did not know. But if Beloved knew his desire for the orb, the Anchor of Spirit, then why else would his god return him to the world?

He floated on the cliffs south of the city, watching its lights. There was fear, doubt, suspicion, and one more emotion fought against these, almost as strong as the desire for flesh.

Revenge against the sage.

She had been the cause of his suffering, or at least of his continued failure. Once flesh was within Sau’ilahk’s reach, once he satisfied his god, he would show Wynn Hygeorht a glimpse of the torment Beloved had given him.

Chapter 4

The following night, Wynn waited on the docks, watching a wide, three-masted frigate anchored in the bay. Shade continued to glower at Chane, who stood a few paces behind them. The dog’s jowls quivered, revealing her teeth.

Nothing about this night had been easy.

When Wynn had left her room that evening, Chane had been waiting for her in the keep’s courtyard. Before she could do anything, Shade charged him, snarling, with hackles raised. She terrified two passing apprentices as she backed Chane against the northern building.

Wynn had tried over and over through memory-speak to explain what Chane had done and why. Either Shade didn’t understand or didn’t care; she knew only that Chane had attacked Wynn.