RE: Monarch

Chapter 17. Everwood XII

The massive demons gut rose and fell.

Impossible. I had watched it die, destroyed from the inside out. Yet it drew breath. I reached to draw my sword. Maya held an arm out, stopping me.

"Speak, demon, or be forever silenced," Maya commanded, her eyes hard.

A black eye the size of my hand opened. "Our apologies to the master," the demon said. "Gratitude, for freeing us from that foul things employ." Again, the voice was not audible, just whispered in my mind like errant thoughts.

"Oh?" Maya challenged. "Such manners, from the infernal creature that dared lift a hand to one of the chosen?"

"We had no recourse." The demon pleaded. Its body continued to rise and fall in deep, labored breaths. "Our master ordered it."

"From what I recall, your master offered it." I said, crossing my arms, "As a boon. And you had no predilections otherwise."

"So, there was vermin scurrying in the dark that night." The demon looked displeased.

Maya nodded. "Once I return to the enclave, I will tell them all I witnessed here. The hellhound legion will be decimated. It will take decades to recover from the culling."

"Perhaps we may offer a trade? The key to defeating our master?" The demon said with barely veiled panic.

Maya held the amulet aloft. "The usefulness of that leverage is limited."

"He called for you, before he died." I said, unable to hide my hate. "He said, where is that big useless bastard, then croaked."

The demon tried to stand and fell over, coughing. "The great and powerful Barion was killed? By two infants? How unsightly." He cackled out a weak laugh.

"I would not judge him too harshly, as you are about to share the same fate." Maya stepped forward, her hand glowing.

"Wait." The demon shimmied away from her.

"I am done waiting," Maya said.

"We offer you a blood oath!" It shouted, its voice echoing desperation in my mind.

Maya hesitated. "You would bind yourself to me?"

I didnt like the sound of that in the slightest.

"Yes. To you and your line." Its massive form struggled upright, still resting prone on its haunches.

"What is your name?" Maya asked.

"This one is known as Kastromoth the Pitiless." The demon said.

"Give us a second big boy." I pulled Maya aside.

"What is it?"

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"I know youre a little more familiar with these things than I am, but you cant seriously be considering this?"

She blinked. "Of course I am considering it. A blood oath is rare. At most, demons offer a writ of indentured servitude. I am just trying to decide how to impress upon him that if you were to wind up dead, it would be as if he murdered one of my people."

"Thats- wait. Why me?" I asked.

"Because I am about to insist he bind himself to you, rather than me."

All the blood left my face, and my palms suddenly went clammy. "Why the hells would you do that?" I hissed. Maya seemed confused by my reaction. In the background, Kastramoth looked between us, head bobbing back and forth like an oversized dog.

"My reasons are multifold. First, it would guarantee you protection, once we part. Second, it would repay some of my debt. Thirdly, he is not mine to begin with."

"You brought him down!"

"And you killed his master, making him yours by proxy." Maya insisted.

"He eats people!"

"Yes. Most demons do. Its a preference, not a requirement." Maya turned back to the oversized elk, now sitting in an oddly tamed pose. "As part of our deal, demon, if I forbade you from subsuming human flesh, would that be acceptable?"

" Yes," Kastramoth said.

Maya turned back to me. "See?"

"He hesitated, and hes pouting!" I pulled at my face, suddenly feeling as if I was losing my mind.

"If you do not want him, I understand," Maya said seriously. "It just feels like a massive opportunity to squander." From behind her, Kastramoth widened his eyes and cocked his head, tongue lolling out.

If I was holding something I would have thrown it. Instead, I flipped him the raven. "Oh fuck off! Youre not cute! No part of you is cute!"

I swear I heard him whine.

What Maya was saying made sense. If she officiated the bindingwhatever the hells that even meantI might actually believe the thing wouldnt harm me. Truth be told, given what was likely ahead of me I could probably use the power. But it wasnt about that. It was about those teeth. About the monster that ate me always being close at hand. It tore chunks off of me-

"I am sorry, Cairn." Mayas compassionate voice interrupted my thoughts. "There is more to it, isnt there?"

I nodded, looking away.

Maya sighed. "Very well. Ill end him, then. Well need the flame to make it permanent." She walked towards him, hand held out at her side.

Wasnt this what I always did? Prioritized comfort and what was easy over everything else? How many opportunities had I wasted in my first life? How many chances to be better, be stronger?

Still, the teeth. It would drive me mad.

Perhaps there was a compromise.

"Wait," I said.

"Did you change your mind?" She cocked an eyebrow.

"Not exactly." I held my hand out. Maya placed the anchor in my open palm. I studied it. It housed an intricate spiral pattern of white gold. Such a beautiful, innocent object to be tied to something so hideous.

"Ifand only ifyou can be sure. If the oath guarantees it will not turn on the binder. And, if, and only if, theres no chance of it getting loose and wreaking havoc" I looked up at her, "I want you to have it."

Maya took the amulet back slowly. Her jaw worked silently. "It is too great a gift, Nilend. This is a greater demon. The value alone would be worth more than some family treasuries. If you were to sell it-"

"I dont care about money." I said quickly, before realizing how privileged it made me sound.

"You actually mean that," Mayas voice was raw. "If I take this, my debt to you grows. And it will no longer be just my debt, it will be my familys as well.

I closed her fingers around the amulet. "As far as Im concerned, Im entrusting something dangerous I cannot make use of to someone who can. That incurs no debt at all."

Maya rubbed at her eyes furiously. "Very well." She lifted herself up and squared her shoulders. She turned and approached the demon. Kastramoth shifted between his hooves, seeming to sense a decision had been made. Maya held the amulet high. Though the sun was behind the clouds, it shone brightly. She spoke in a voice as commanding as it was cold.

"Pledge yourself to me."

They conferred in the demonic tonguewhich hearing it for the first time sounded frighteningly eviland at the end of it, Kastramoth bowed. The amulet glowed and the elks form slowly faded from existence.

We returned to the house and cared for the children. I found myself in awe of them. After all they had endured they could still laugh and chatter excitedly. I made them flat cakes doused with syrup, which they practically inhaled and begged for more. Occasionally, a child would grow sullen and quiet, retreating into themselves. Maya would approach them and whisper something in their ear, and the child would nod. With great care, she would bend down and touch their forehead. I recognized the same immediate relief I had felt.

She had kept them sane, all this time.

Of the group, only Lucius seemed continuously dour. I dropped another flat cake on his plate, and he glared at it, as if the cake itself interrupted his reverie.

"Where is home, Lucius?" I asked him casually.

"Kholis." He stabbed into the flat cake with his fork, tearing into it.

The name rang a bell. It was a few days to the south of the capital. An agrarian town if I remember correctly, ruled by a rather troublesome Duke. Ah. So thats where I knew the name from.

"Strange."

"Whats strange?" Lucius challenged.

"That Barion would abduct the son of a noble. Most who prey on children tend to stick to orphans, or children of commoners," I said.

That rebellious fire in his eyes dimmed. "The Duke is not fond of me. He had dealings with Barion, and Barion did not like the results of those dealings."

I stirred at that. This was the first Id heard of Barion being connected in any way, even if the link was tenuous at best. "Does your father have the talent?"

"The Duke," Lucius said the title correctively, "calls it dabbling. He has a fascination with the dark side of magic. Im guessing thats what connected him with Barion in the first place and got me into this Elphion blasted situation.

I frowned, "You seem to know a lot about this."

Lucius shrugged. "I read his mail. They talked about all manner of things before their relationship went sour. It was fascinating, though most of it went over my head."

"Do you remember what they talked about?"

"My memory isnt so good lately," Lucius said dryly, pointing to a section of scarred skin where the skull had fractured. I winced.

"They had a seal they always used," Lucius said after a moment, "That much I do remember."

"Just a second." I went into what used to be Barions study and returned with a piece of paper and a pen. "Mind sketching it out for me?" Lucius gave me a considering glance, then nodded.

I wasnt sure what I was looking for, not really. But the one thing that had been made clear to me since the first time I died was exactly how little I knew of the world around me. That needed to change quickly and thoroughly. If there was a rogue group of mages operating underground, committing atrocities under my fathers rule, I needed to know all there was to know about them, so I could eventually put an end to them. Lucius finished the sketch. He was decent with the pen: the symbol was an upside-down butterfly, impaled by two diagonal swords.

"Why a butterfly?" I asked.

"Whats the word for when they change? When a caterpillar goes into a cocoon?"

"Metamorphosis?"

"Yeah, that," he said. "Theyre obsessed with it."

"Huh."

"Buncha weirdos," Lucius added with a scowl, not seeming at all bothered to be categorizing his father under that statement. I chuckled.

"Where do you hail from?" Lucius asked. "Seems only fair you answer, since youve been picking my brain dry." Mayas ears perked up.

"Whitefall."

"Capital city. So youre a fancy city noble."

"Hardly. My family plays a minor role in politics at best," I said. It wasnt entirely a lie. For the most part, when something wasnt in need of stabbing, my father took a back seat and let more experienced men lead the country.

"Military or mercantile?"

"Military." That was true enough. I was tiring of this game, however, and took the finished page off the table, tucking it in my bag. "Thanks for this." Lucius looked over towards Maya, a warmness in his gaze, then back at me. He didnt have to say it. No one trusted a noble less than a noble.

Once the smoke had cleared, the children went outside to play. Judging from how sickly pale their skin was, it had likely been a while.

The immediate issue was getting them home. I had assumed my father sent search parties out to look for me, but knowing him, the opposite was just as likely. Hed see it as some twisted coming of age quest. The upsidepossibly the only upside of what had happened up until now was that my choices were limited. All at once, the magnitude of everything came in to strangle me. I needed to get stronger. My fire was an excellent start. Even at the apex of my strength, before Lillian was abducted and I let everything go, I doubted I could have stood toe to toe with an enemy like Barion. But what did stronger look like against an enemy as interminable as Thoth? I could train from today until my coronation, and still get swept up in the storm of her invaders.

So, allies. But where to start?

The elves would be a hard nut to crack. They had been fairly isolationist before we gave them a reason to recede even further into their strange, reclusive tendencies. It would be hard to pull the dwarves away from the southern mountains. And the infernals were likely to suspect I had stolen their magic and blame me for what Maya had called "The great division."

And of course, there was the whole part where I was a child just over five feet tall. I remembered the height vividly because I stayed there for a while, not getting the final few growth spurts that pushed me a hair over six feet until later into puberty.

Regardless, I needed to go home. There were a bevy of reasons, but most of all, I wanted to see my mother and Annette with my own two eyes. From there, I would try to convince my father that there was a war coming. That was a hard ask, but no one loved war more than Good King Gil. It wouldnt be completely unfounded, either, as there was the attack on the caravan on the way homespeaking of which, I hoped Uncle Luther was alive and heeded my advice.

My mood soured at that situation. I had run away and left him. Would I have died if not? Probably. But all cowards have excellent justifications for their actions.

Perhaps, I could claim to see visions? There were a few big events coming in the next few years. If I established veracity and made my claim early on, sure, Id be mocked and laughed at, but as things started happening as I predicted, it would give me much better leverage when it counted.

Of course, that was assuming everything followed the same timeline. Which so far, it hadnt. If time functioned the way it did for Percival in the Chrono-Spherea work of fiction, yes, but give me a break, it's not like I could draw from any actual accountsThoths simple act of stopping the Caravan and waylaying me would have massive and unforeseeable consequences. How much had everything diverged? More importantly, why had Thoth changed it? How had she changed it? Who the hells was she?

"Any deeper in thought and you might fall in." Maya stirred me from the whirlpool of reflection, sitting down on the log next to me. Eliza was running from Victor, laughing, taunting the older boy, though it was clear he could have caught up to her if he really tried. She followed my gaze to them.

"We did a good thing," Maya said.

"Yes, we did."

"Are you ready to have our conversation now?"

I bit my lip. I needed to get this out. Waiting was just going to make everything worse.

"Maya, Im not who you think I am"

I trailed off, catching a glimpse of movement in the forest. A group of a dozen rangers bearing my fathers sigil emerged from the broken treeline. The search party had arrived.

And my time was up.