Vitiosi Dei (Heritage of the Blood Book 2) (26 page)

That was why it took him a moment to realize that Master Orsoe had just asked him to come forward and help her demonstrate how the latest maneuver worked. Realizing that he had not been paying attention at all, he tried to remember what his body had been doing only moments before. By the time he made it to the front of the students he thought he had a pretty good idea about the way that the encounter would play out based on the movements his body had been making. It only took him ending up on his back twice before he executed the move correctly and dropped Master Orsoe to the floor. He had no illusions about his success as no doubt the wiry Half-Orc had a dozen ways in which she could have turned the move back around in her favor, but because it was a demonstration, she let the move play out like it would against someone without her experience.

“Nice work, Shawnrik,” she said aloud as he pinned her to the grass. In a much quieter voice she added. “Think of it like you are going into a fight. You are either going to overwhelm her immediately and everything will work out, or she’ll punch you in the gut and it’ll hurt for a while.”

It took a moment for him to realize that she was talking to him about his nervousness. He simply froze, looking down at his surprisingly helpful Instructor.

“Alright, get up,” Master Orsoe said in a louder voice. “We’ve got work to do.” She winked at him with the eye that wasn’t facing the students as he helped her to her feet. “Get back in line.”

The rest of the class went by much smoother for him, and his heartbeat had normalized to something more akin to its usual tempo for this type of exercise. While the advice was barely different than some of the things he had been telling himself for the past day, its source had managed to surprise him enough to divert some of his thoughts away from what he was about to do. He realized at that moment that he owed his Instructor a debt of gratitude.
It goes to show that you can never guess which person might give you that little boost you need at the perfect moment.

When the class was dismissed for the day, he kept his eye on Olivia. Normally they would all gather together and walk towards the dining hall as a unit, but his mind kept telling him that she might disappear if he looked away too long. His fears were rendered obsolete as she and the rest of the girls began to converge on him. Shawnrik realized a moment later that Verrian was standing beside him.

“Wow buddy, you got it bad. I hope you manage to ask her this time, because disoriented Shawnrik is not a very fun guy to be around.”

“What? Verrian, I’m not…”

“Right,” Verrian laughed. “Then it’s ok if I just tell the girls that you have decided to take Olivia to the dance, then.”

Shawnrik’s eyes went wide at the thought. “Verrian…”

“I’ll tell you what, my friend, if you don’t manage to ask her by the time we get to the dining hall I’ll do just that.”

“Do what?” Vivianne asked, as she was the first of the girls to come into earshot, although if either of the boys would have thought about it they might have realized that Syranna more than likely could have heard their whole conversation, if she had a mind to.

“Oh, nothing,” Verrian said, accepting the arm that she held out without thought. “Shawnrik was just telling me he had come to a decision.”

“Oh do tell,” Rebecca said, taking his other arm.

“Sorry ladies, not my secret to divulge.” He started walking towards the dining hall before he turned his head and mouthed one word to Shawnrik.

Yet.

Motivated by his friend's ultimatum and his Instructor's wisdom, Shawnrik decided that prolonging the situation wouldn’t be a benefit to anyone. Olivia, Sara, and Syranna were only a few steps behind Vivianne and Rebecca, Shawnrik took a deep breath and held it for a moment as the young women approached.

“Oh, someone is serious today,” Sara said giving her cousin a pat on the shoulder as she passed. “About time,” she whispered.

Syranna looked between him and Olivia quickly before squeezing Olivia’s hand quickly and running to catch up with the rest of the group. Shawnrik swore he saw a slight frown on her face as she passed. He didn’t have long to think about it, however, as Olivia took his arm and turned him around in the direction their friends had gone. She was smiling, but something told him that she was nearly as nervous as he was, which didn’t make sense to him.

“So…” Olivia started to say at the exact same time that Shawnrik began to speak.

The pair laughed, some of the discomfort they were both feeling melting away. Shawnrik continued when it became apparent that she wanted him to go first. “Listen, I don’t know what I’m going to be doing a few years from now, likely it isn’t going to be anything safe…”

“Shawnrik,” Olivia said. “Are you asking me to marry you?”

“What?” Shawnrik stopped in his tracks for a moment before he noticed the light of mischief in her eye.

“Well, if you aren’t asking me to marry you then it doesn’t really matter what is going to happen years from now, or even months from now.” She squeezed his arm. “What matters is where we are right now, and what we do with the time we know we have.”

Realizing she was absolutely right, Shawnrik smiled down at this wonderful young woman who managed to confound him entirely from the moment that he first met her in the wilds south of Stalwart. “Alright then, I was wondering if you’d do me the honor of accompanying me to the Winter Dance.”

“Why Shawnrik, I was beginning to wonder if you even liked me.” She squeezed his arm, letting him know she was messing with him.

“Of course I like you; I have just never had to deal with anything like this. The first time I met you was my first real interaction with any girl my age who didn’t look at me like gutter trash.”

“I assure you that the young man I see before me is anything but gutter trash,” Olivia said sliding her hand down into his. “I can tell you where you are going to be years from now.”

“Really? Some sort of premonition?” Shawnrik joked.

“Nothing as serious as that,” Olivia said, her eyes telling him not to joke lightly about such things. “I can tell you because I know the type of person you are.”

“Alright, what will I be doing a few years from now?”

“Protecting,” Olivia said, as if that was all the explanation that was needed.

“Protecting?”

“That’s right. You will be protecting your friends, and protecting people who have no one else to stand up for them.”

“That’s a tall order for a guy who had to have his friend sacrifice his freedom to keep everyone safe,” Shawnrik said, moisture forming in his eyes. The high opinion that Olivia seemed to have of him mingled with the feelings of helplessness that he had felt when he found out what Victor had done were more than he was used to dealing with.

“Hey,” Olivia said, pulling him to a stop. She stood on the tips of her toes and cupped his face with her hand. “No one ever said that you were the only person that gets to protect people. You will never be able to control every situation, but you will do everything in your power to try, and that is what will make you a man to be reckoned with. Wherever Victor is, I’m sure he is fighting with everything he has.”

Abandoned Mine

“Come on little guy, don't you give out on me,” the boy said, cradling the nearly still furry body in his arms. The creature’s condition had grown steadily worse throughout the day, and it had begun to lose control of different parts of its body. He had done everything he could trying to help his furry companion, but he had no idea how to treat something like this.

Each beat of its heart was coming slower than the last. Caring for the animal was starting to take its toll, and exhaustion slowly took hold of the boy. He fell into a deep slumber, his dreams coming at a frantic pace, one after another in high speed. He saw people and creatures he had no name for dying in more ways than he thought possible. There were rooms full of the dead and dying, people sick from every known disease, and more than a few unknown. Hundreds of successful treatments and thousands of failures flew by in a maelstrom of sickness and grief.

How long he laid there stuck in a myriad of painful memories he didn’t know, but after a thousand lifetimes they started to slow down, some part of him having found what it was looking for. Once the memories died out, the pain began. It moved through each and every fiber of his small form. Then the heat came, as if every muscle and vessel in his body were on fire, being purged of the foulness that had taken control. The pain slowly receded but the heat remained, hot, but no longer unbearably so. His limbs twitched, and he looked up and felt a moment of confusion as he saw his own form lying prone next to him. It took him a moment to realize that he was no longer in his own body; his consciousness now inhabited the body of his small furry friend.

Thank you.

It came more as a feeling much more than actual words, but its meaning was clear. With the thought came a gentle push.
Go back.
He realized that somehow he had taken control of this small form, and that realization made him sick. Instinctually, he knew that what he was doing was wrong, but he also knew that his little furry companion would have died without his intervention. The boy understood that he had burned out the toxin that had been spreading through the creature’s body, but how he had accomplished it, and why it worked were still beyond his knowledge.

Finding an open pathway back towards his own body, he began to withdraw his consciousness from his furry companion. Before he was completely withdrawn, however, one more message was sent to him. It was a stream of connected thoughts. A much younger version of the furry form before him stuck his nose into an ant hill only to get bit and then swarmed. Slightly older now, the little guy came upon a mass of writhing snakes and almost got eaten for his curiosity. Lastly, an image of him digging in the snow, and finding a scorpion den. It only took moments for the scorpion to shake off its hibernation and spring to the attack. The fight that ensued was short and vicious, and ended with his furry companion ripping off the scorpion’s tail and running away. It all coalesced into one final thought.

I am Troublefinder.

Opening his own eyes, the boy first noticed that the fire was lit and had burned down to coals. He felt odd for a few moments, as his body worked differently than that of Troublefinder. Looking down he saw a pair of bluish gray eyes looking back at him. They seemed slightly different than they had earlier in the day, but he figured that was just the firelight messing with the colors. Troublefinder sat on his haunches, his tail wiggling back and forth in rapid succession.

“Hey little guy, that was some day, huh?”

In response, Troublefinder licked his hand and cuddled up next to him. Throwing a couple more pieces of wood onto the coals, he wrapped his arms around his new companion. For some reason he felt drained, and the steady breathing of Troublemaker lulled him into a blissfully dreamless sleep.

Month: Midwinter

First Secondday

Freeport

Stewart Cantel was cold, tired, and pissed off. He had spent the last three Eightdays running around Freeport, always a step behind the Doppelganger and its royal prisoner. During that time, he had been exposed to the harsh realities of this thriving trade city. Freeport was corrupt to its very core. As High Commander, he had been privy to reports from the city, but those reports had been seriously lacking.

Criminal organizations controlled most of the city, heavily extorting any of the businesses that wanted to stay on the correct side of the law and providing ample opportunity to thrive to those who had a more flexible moral compass. He had uncovered more instances of slavery than he was comfortable thinking about, the majority of which were young women being forced into prostitution. Every time he thought he had uncovered the worst that the city could offer, it managed to surprise him once again with its level of malfeasance.