James A. Hunter
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Vigil's Valor: 32 – Homecoming
🕑 Added 2022-08-04 17:00:05 +0000 UTCWe rode into Wildespell around noon like conquering heroes, our spirits high, everyone excited to get back to the Citadel and hit up an altar. Berk, Colin, and Marina had all ascended to the Disciple Ranks and I’d managed to jump from Acolyte Bronze to Acolyte Silver. I had extra Ward Points to spend and Essence to burn, but best of all, I figured I finally had enough hard-earned cash to pick up a Legacy Scroll, assuming I could find one over at Relics and Rarities. Once I was done with that, I’d swing by the Steel Griffin and settle up with Pascow.
I owed that man some sweat equity and I figured it was past time to settle our accounts.
Unfortunately, our good mood didn’t last long.
Colin and I noticed it right away, but the others were quick to follow. Something was wrong in the city. The streets were eerily quiet and no one cheered for us as our horses clopped along the cobblestone walks. There were no people pleading for our benediction. No babies thrust out at us for blessing. Instead, the good folk of Wildespell averted their eyes and shrank away as we passed, recoiling and flinching like abused dogs. Just what in the holy hell happened here, I wondered as we wound our way closer to the looming fortress of the Vigilant.
A dark cloud had settled over the city like a mourner’s veil, and by the time we got back to the Stables we knew why.
“What do you mean, it attacked the Prince?” Kerra growled at a red-eyed Vigil standing guard outside the main entryway to the Citadel. That was new too. The Vigils pulling guard duty. It seemed everyone was on high alert.
“Three days ago, Justiciar,” the young man said. He gulped and shifted uncomfortably under Kerra’s unnerving gaze. Poor kid wasn’t much older than Berk, Colin, or Marina, which meant he was probably freshly ascended himself. “The Chaos Aberration attacked in the middle of broad daylight while the Prince was addressing a crowd about the killings.”
“Impossible,” she said, shaking her head. “No Morkta would be so bold, not even an Aberration. Especially not with a Vigil present.”
The guard licked his lips and looked like he might melt through the floor.
Kerra’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “There was a Vigil present, correct?” she growled. “It’s standard operating procedure to have at least one Vigil on rotation with the Royal Guard at any given time.”
“I… well, maybe I shouldn’t be the one to tell you,” he stammered. “I’m sure the Custodians—”
“If I wanted to hear from the Custodians,” she said coolly, “I would already be talking to the Custodians. Just tell me plain what happened.”
He gulped again then nodded.
“No Vigils were present, Lady Justiciar. As far as I understand, Vigil Garret was assigned the duty, but the Prince… well, he sent him away in protest over the murders. As I said before, Prince Andreas was giving a public address, calling out the Custodians for their apparent inaction regarding the deaths, which is precisely when the creature struck.”
“Tell me, did he survive the encounter?” she asked, sounding genuinely worried.
“Did who survive?” the young Vigil asked, trembling.
“The prince, you fool,” she snapped. “Who else? Did he survive or not?”
“Yes, Lady Justiciar. That’s the only piece of good news. The Royal Guard leapt into action the moment the creature touched down, but they never stood a chance. The Heir managed to escape unscathed, but it was a bloody massacre. Fifteen soldiers, all dead.”
Kerra’s face paled visibly by the word and her hand trembled slightly as she smoothed out the tabard that ran down the front of her armor.
“And what of the Captain of the Royal Guard? Sir Erling Rask? Did…” this time she was the one who faltered. “Did he survive the attack as well?”
The guard grimaced and shook his head. “I’m not certain, but I believe I heard his name listed among the dead. They’ll be honoring the fallen at a royal dinner in two days’ time, I believe.”
“I see,” she replied, but the words were quiet and oddly detached. “Thank you for the report, Vigil. I need to go speak to the Custodians at once.” She tossed her reigns to Bert. “Please see to my mount.” Jaw clenched tight enough to break steel, Kerra set off like an angry hornet.
Shit, shit, shit.
Something was wrong here. Kerra had ice in her veins. She stared death in the face on a daily basis and it didn’t even ruffle her feathers, but they were sure as hell ruffled now. I tossed my reigns to Bert as well. The young Vigil of Balance glanced between the me and my murder horse in wide-eyed horror. Darksilver immediately started to dance in irritation, snorting as it gnashed its teeth and pawed at the air.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he said.
“Nope. You killed a Lake Kraken,” I said, taking off at a run to catch up with Kerra. “You can handle a horse,” I called back over one shoulder. I darted through an archway, and I heard her boots reverberating off the stone corridor ahead. I picked up the pace, raced around a blind corner, and followed her into a narrow servant’s hall.
“Kerra, wait up,” I called.
“Go away, Boyd,” she said, not even bothering to look back. “This doesn’t concern you.”
“Agree to disagree.” I lunged and grabbed at her arm, pulling her up short. She spun on her heel and launched her body at me, lashing out with a series of rapid strikes while her lips pulled back into a snarl. I deflected each, batting away her fists, but refused to strike back in retaliation.
“You’re being unreasonable,” I said, backing up slowly as she advanced. “Let’s just calm down and talk through this. This isn’t like you.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” she snarled. But she deflated a little with every word, as though she knew deep down that what I was saying was true.
“Then tell me,” I said softly. “What has you so rattled?”
Finally, her fists stopped coming altogether. She turned, pressed her back against the wall, and slide down until she was sitting on the floor with her knees tucked in against her chest as though she were a small child.
I lowered myself to the floor across from her.
“Why wouldn’t I be rattled?” she asked, glancing up after a long beat. “You heard him. Fifteen good men are dead. Fifteen. That’s the most bloodshed Wildespell has seen inside its walls since the Hundred Years’ War. It happened under our watch, and it couldn’t have happened at a worse time. There is already tremendous tension between the Crown and the Citadel. An attack like this could escalate things into a full-blown civil war. And if something had happened to Prince Andreas…” she trailed off.
“Exactly what would happen?” I pushed. “I don’t see how it could be worse than Civil War.”
“Oh, it could be worse,” she said, tone darkening. “Much worse. Wildespell is one of the seven freehold cities that earned their sovereignty while fighting against Isabella the Ghostblood. Originally, Wildespell was an occupied outpost, but after the Duke Andreas Skovgaard marched his legion through a blizzard and held the Ghostblood army at the Rifthorn Pass for three days, the Monarch of Virtarun granted Wildespell its sovereignty—but sovereignty with conditions. Notably, the decree would be upheld so long as a blood son of Skovgaard sat upon the throne.”
“And?” I asked, still not quite seeing the whole picture.
“And Prince Andreas, fourth of his name, has no brothers and no heir. If he were to die it wouldn’t be civil war, it would mean a full out invasion from Virtaruns…”
Well screw me sideways.
That certainly opened up a world of possibilities. I’d dismissed the idea of a foreign enemy orchestrating these attacks, but that was starting to make more and more sense. The person with the most to gain from any given murder was a usually good suspect and suddenly that looked like a Virtarun operative. But how in the hell would someone control a Chaos Aberration? Was it possible there was a dark Warlock behind this whole shitshow? A dark thought suddenly occurred to me. Or what about someone who could look like a Chaos Aberration?
With the right Token, any Vigil with the Totem Transformation ability could appear to be a Chaos Aberration. What if the person behind this whole thing was a Vigil?
The idea should’ve been absurd. It wasn’t.
But what would a Vigil have to gain from taking out the Prince? Fomenting Civil War wouldn’t benefit the Citadel and neither would orchestrating an invasion from a foreign power. I was missing something important, but I wasn’t sure what.
Honestly, it didn’t matter. The damage was already done and right now I needed to focus on Kerra. She was hurting, I could see it in the unshed tears lining her eyes.
“There’s more that you’re not telling me,” I said, pushing away my dark thoughts. “This isn’t just about the death of some guards or potential political fallout. This is personal. You asked about one guard by name. Sir Erling Rask. Why?”
She visibly flinched when I spoke his name.
“Who is he to you?” I asked.
She didn’t answer for a long time.
Instead, she just sat there, staring at the floor, running a thumb over the lip of her boot. This time, I didn’t push her. Clearly, she was going through some heavy shit, and sometimes you just needed to sit and be quiet. To give people the space they needed to talk. To think.
“He was my brother,” she said after a time. “Or as close to a brother as I ever had.” She looked up at me and tears started to roll down her cheeks. “I’m not like them.” She waved a hand back toward the stables. “Berk, Colin, Marina. I didn’t grow up with a family or learn a trade. I was one of the bastards.” Her lips curled at the word. “I was the daughter of a whore that no one wanted. I don’t even remember my mother. My first recollections are picking through a waste bin outside of a tavern in the dead of night. I was maybe three or four.
“I always moved during the night. It was safer that way. Panhandling during the day would get you beaten or worse. Picked up and tossed into one of the workhouses. No one survived the workhouses, and those few that did weren’t ever quite right after. They’d come out missing arms or legs or eyes. Sometimes the damage wasn’t on the outside. It was on the inside.” She tapped at her temple. “But there was always damage. I grew up unwanted. In filth. In chaos. There were no rules on the streets, except survival.
“No one cared for anyone else. It was always about making it one more day. Not dying of cold or starvation. That or being killed by the other kids who called the streets home. Rask was different. He was older than me. Only eight to my three, but at the time he seemed to tower over me. He knew everything. Rask found me shoeless in the middle of winter.” She rubbed at one boot. “I had butcher’s paper wrapped around my feet and a burlap sack slung around my shoulders. I would’ve died of exposure that first year if not for him. He was like me, orphaned, abandoned, unloved.
“But he didn’t let it break him. Didn’t let it make him hard and mean like everyone else who lived in the slums. There was a light inside of him. He was the only one in the world who cared about me. We spent five years together. Scrounging for bread, running cons. Doing whatever we had to do to survive and take care of each other. Then, it happened.” She blinked. “The touch. My eyes changed and all of a sudden, the worthless daughter of a whore that no one wanted was a commodity. The Arbitrators came for me. I thought they were going to arrest me.”
She grinned.
“Can you imagine it? Me a lawless little savage? Well, I was. They dragged me here kicking and screaming the whole way. I was expecting the workhouse. The Citadel could not have been more different than the streets I’d grown up on. Here there were rules. Dorms. Training schedules. Everything fit. Everything had a purpose. Everyone knew their place. It was order. Stability. It was everything I’d never had. Rask followed me, of course. Trailed the Arbitrator all the way from Veradonia and managed to sneak into the city in the bed of a merchant wagon.
“You would’ve liked him, I think,” she said slowly. “He was a mischievous sort and had a penchant for doing things his own way. The Citadel wouldn’t take him in. He was too old and he wasn’t marked. That didn’t matter to me, though. We were kin. He’d helped me and I returned the favor. I’d bring him food from the mess hall in the evenings.” She paused, gaze distant as though staring into the past. “He was my first recruit, you know. At nine, I started training him. Teaching him how to fight with his hands and with a blade. I taught him how to read and coached him in politics.
“By the time he was eighteen, Rask was an orphaned street urchin who could read as well as a solicitor, fight better than a guardsman, and recite the epic poems of Vivyan like a scholar. He managed to make it into the Citadel Legion under his own merits and after I’d ascended, I pushed for him get transferred into the Royal Guard Corps. He made Captain after just three years, and he did it on his own. He was one of the best, kindest, most determined men I’d ever met. He was my brother and now he is dead. Dead because of me.”
The words were cold and rang out like a death knell, reverberating off the arched ceilings.
“That’s not true,” I said gently touching her elbow. “You can’t shoulder that burden. We all make our own choices, Kerra, and those choices have consequences. I died in the line of duty, but I don’t blame the recruiter who signed me up for the Marine Corps. I don’t blame the general who deployed us to Iraq. And I sure as shit don’t blame the Marines that were with me when that grenade went off.
“Just the opposite,” I continued. “Every step along the way I chose to be there, and I chose to jump on top of that grenade because I didn’t want my friends to die. Your brother? He died doing what he was trained to do. He died serving and protecting others. He earned his rest. Chose it and paid for it in blood. Don’t strip him of the dignity and honor of his sacrifice. This isn’t on you, Kerra.”
She nodded and raised a hand, scrubbing away the tears glistening on her cheeks.
“You’re right,” she said with a sniffle. Then she stood. “It’s not on me and Rask wouldn’t want me to blame myself. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t blame to go around. There was supposed to be a Vigil present, whether the Prince wanted one or not. Those are the rules and they’re the rules for a reason. Someone disregarded them and I intend to find out why.” She paused and looked down on me. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, there are some Vigils I need to have a friendly chat with…”
