19. [Uicha] The Prisoner (Patreon)

--DRAMATIS PERSONAE—

Uicha de Orak, a young man of no renown or loyalty, not so lonely anymore

Petra Reatz, a young woman of no renown, Orvesian Witnesses, a gift

Battar Crodd, Death Knight of the 13th Renown and Quill of the Orvesian Witnesses, deeply troubled by recent events

Hunn Megeer, Ritualist of the 3rdRenown, Orvesian Witnesses, new at this

***

6 Hazean, 61 AW

The village of Ambergran, North Continent

264 days until the next Granting

The days were getting hot but the nights brought a refreshing breeze. Uicha sat on the porch of his farmhouse, feet propped up on the railing in front of him. He let one hand dangle, idly scratching behind Parrot’s ear as the growing puppy slept. The boy breathed out a contented sigh.

If only his dad could see him now. Finally, Uicha had found some appreciation for the serenity of their land. Finally, he could sit here and just be, not dreaming of better places or stewing over how much his neighbors resented him.

Perhaps, a life of a captivity suited him.

“What are you thinking about?” Petra asked as she padded out of the house on bare feet.

The Orvesian girl wore a loose tunic that once belonged to Uicha’s mother—the flashes of pinks and oranges on the fabric went against the usual drab color scheme of the Witnesses. In the weeks that they’d been playing house together, Uicha had observed subtle transformations in Petra. She wore fewer ashes than she had when he first met her in the town square, and was down to just two stripes under her eyes at the moment. She had been letting her hair grow in and now had a dusting of auburn fuzz across her scalp. Uicha wondered if these changes were for his benefit, or if he was just an excuse for Petra to break out of her Orvesian shell.

“My mind is a total blank,” he told her.

“Mhm,” she replied, handing him a glass of chilled tea from the supply she’d brewed and kept cold in the basement.

“What? It’s true.”

Condensation dripped from the side of the glass and onto Uicha’s chest, his shirt unbuttoned and opened. His skin was still clear. No Ink on him. No loyalty.

Lovely evenings on the porch had not restored the swaying wheat stalk symbol of Ambergran. And nights spent with Petra had not turned Uicha toward the blackbird of Orvesis.

Petra settled on the arm of Uicha’s chair. He hooked an arm around her hips.

“I can see why your people settled here,” she said.

“Funny,” Uicha replied. “I never saw the appeal.”

“You’re lucky you grew up here. Lucky you’ve never had to see Orvesis.”

Uicha held his tongue. Because he had seen Orvesis.

But only in dreams.

***

13 New Summer, 61 AW

On that first day Uicha awoke, the Death Knight Battar Crodd, Quill of the Orvesian Witnesses, cooked him oatmeal. He seasoned the oats with brown sugar and set the steaming bowl in front of Uicha. The boy dug in ravenously. He felt like his stomach was a bottomless pit, like his body might collapse on itself if he didn’t stuff it full. After he devoured half the bowl in a few seconds, Battar slid it away.

“Slow down,” he said. “You’ll make yourself sick.”

Uicha burped against the back of his hand. “What happened to me?”

“I hoped you might tell me.”

Uicha edged back a bit as Crodd’s sharp blue eyes settled upon him. He’d felt so disoriented waking up on the floor that he hadn’t quite come to terms with the man being in his house, sitting with him at the kitchen table no less. The papers that cluttered the table—his parents’ correspondence and maps—had clearly been shuffled through. Crodd draped a hand over one half of the strange, hollow capsule that Uicha had discovered stashed in his wall. His fingers traced the rune grooves carved into the metal.

“I don’t know,” Uicha said.

“What do you remember?”

Uicha shrugged.

Crodd sighed. “Uicha, my young friend, there’s no point in being stubborn. I’ve read through the papers here. Did you know your parents were hiding this?”

Uicha shook his head.

“Do you even know what it is?”

“No,” Uicha said.

“No, you wouldn’t,” Crodd said. “But I have traveled a long way looking for it and done some terrible things to acquire it.”

Uicha fought back a smirk. He remembered discussing who was responsible for the deaths in Ambergran—Crodd or the gods—and the man’s obnoxious thought experiments. There was some pleasure in hearing Crodd actually admit to what he’d done.

“It looks empty,” Uicha said.

“Yes, thank you,” Crodd replied. “But was it always?”

Uicha’s stomach rumbled. He reached for the bowl of oatmeal and Crodd let him take it.

“I could extract the information I want from you,” Crodd said, and Uicha paused with the spoon halfway to his mouth. “You have felt what I’m capable of already. I can’t kill you, Uicha. But I can hurt you very badly and for a very long time. I would rather not. I would rather not invite… complications.”

Uicha raised an eyebrow at that. He detected something new in the way Crodd was looking at him. Almost as if he were searching for something.

“Tell me what that thing is,” Uicha said.

“Fair,” Crodd replied. “It’s an urn’chan. Do you know what that is?”

Uicha shook his head.

“Their creation is a lost art,” Crodd said. “An urn’chan contains a person who has died. Their memories, their power, their essence. Distilled down and safely preserved. Or trapped, depending on your view.”

The oatmeal suddenly tasted like cold mud on Uicha’s tongue. Like a sludge crawling up his chin and shoving its way inside…

“Who?” Uicha asked. “Who was supposed to be in there?”

“Do you know the name Kayenna Vezz?”

“No.”

“She was the first Orvesian champion chosen by the gods themselves,” Crodd said. “Before the first Granting, she was murdered by the jealous Orvesian king. There have long been legends among my people that Kayenna’s followers recovered her body and preserved her in an urn’chan. They hid her away and, when Orvesis was annihilated by Infinzel, her location was lost.”

“What…?” Uicha swallowed. “What do you want with her?”

“I want to witness her. I am the son of a historian,” Crodd said. “I want to know what she knew and see the world as she saw it.”

Uicha scraped his spoon down the sides of his bowl. He didn’t quite understand what Crodd meant and he didn’t care at all for Orvesian history. What did concern Uicha was the idea of some old lady’s spirit infiltrating his body, like something out of a ghost story. He almost confided in Crodd right then and there, but the memory of villagers disintegrating into clouds of ash stayed his tongue. He could not help this man.

“Too bad the thing is empty,” Uicha said.

“I think it opened for you,” Crodd said patiently. “I think the essence of Kayenna Vezz occupies you now.”

Uicha’s eye twitched. “You don’t know that.”

“You just spent five days on the floor without food or water, boy. You were in some kind of stasis.”

“Fine. I touched the thing when I found it and must have activated some defense mechanism. I don’t know anything else.”

Crodd smiled at him, like he was impressed with the lie. “I might have believed that. But I’ve been speaking to you this entire conversation in a dialect of old Orvesian and you haven’t remarked upon it once.”

Uicha’s mouth went dry. He heard it now, as soon as Crodd pointed it out. The harsh, guttural syllables that should’ve sounded entirely foreign to him, but somehow were not. Crodd must have seen the fear in his eyes because he put his large hand on top of Uicha’s.

“I want to help you,” Crodd said. “But you must tell me everything that happened.”

So, Uicha broke. He told Crodd how the capsule had opened of its own volition, how he had been frozen, how something like sludge had come pouring out, and how he’d caught a brief glimpse of a woman before passing out.

“Have you seen her since?” Crodd asked. “Can you sense her presence now?”

Uicha paused and tried to focus on himself. He attempted an inventory of his inner-workings, as if he could somehow feel the foreign essence lurking within him. He felt nothing except for brittle, like he’d just awoken from a bad dream. Uicha shook his head, feeling stupid for even trying.

“No,” he said. “I don’t feel anything.”

“If she visits again, you must tell me immediately,” Crodd said. “In the meantime, I am going to send for my ritualist. He may be able to extract her.”

***

16 New Summer, 61 AW

Crodd didn't have to tell Uicha that he wasn't allowed to leave. It went without saying.

Even so, Uicha decided to try. So much of his existence these last few weeks had been tied up in escaping this town that he couldn't just set the notion aside. He wanted to test the boundaries of his captivity.

There were Orvesians everywhere on his land, harvesting the fields and maybe even living in the bunkhouse. Uicha suddenly had a working farm again. The harvest appeared to be coming along apace. None of the Witnesses said anything to Uicha as he left the farmhouse and headed to the barn. Some of them, he assumed, were assigned to watch him. If they noticed that he had a small backpack slung over his shoulder and his mother’s scimitar on his belt, they didn't seem to care.

Uicha sighed when he got inside the barn. The horses were gone. The Orvesians must have taken Clipper and the others and put them to work. He would have to go on foot.

“Going somewhere?” a girl's voice asked from behind him.

Uicha turned to find Petra standing in the doorway. He recognized her from the town square, although at that point he didn't remember her name. Parrot the puppy danced around her feet, barking excitedly whenever she tried to pet him and scooting away. Petra had a pack of her own over her shoulder which she shifted awkwardly.

“No, I guess not,” Uicha said. “How's your head?”

“Healed,” she replied. Petra crouched and snapped her fingers at the puppy, which only riled him more. “I heard you named this dog Parrot.”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

Uicha shrugged. “It's what my mom used to call me when I was a kid. Just kind of came out.” He brushed by her, leaving the barn. “I'll go back inside. You can tell Battar I was just checking on my horse.”

Petra followed him, surprising Uicha when she shoved her pack in his direction. “Mind carrying that? My shoulders are tired.”

Without much choice, Uicha took the pack. “More bread and blankets?”

“My stuff,” Petra said. “I'm supposed to start living with you.”

“What?” Uicha stopped walking. “Says who?”

“Battar wants your condition monitored at all times. I'm supposed to take detailed notes about any strange behavior.”

“All I do is sit around. I think this ghost of his has moved on, if she was ever here in the first place.”

“Then my task will be easy,” Petra replied. She started walking toward the house. “Don't worry. I'm the best one they could've sent.”

In that moment, Uicha decided that was true.

Petra was a year older than him, funny in her odd way, easy to talk to.

It only took them three nights until they ran out of other things to do.

Uicha had never been with a girl before. The days were getting warmer and they had nothing to do but play cards and drink through the bottles of wine his parents had stored. Thinking back, Uicha was pretty sure she initiated. He didn't know what he was doing, but afterward she told him that her ashes would remember his performance and he decided to take that as a compliment.

***

24 New Summer, 61 AW

Uicha had been napping, but awoke when he heard Crodd and Petra speaking on the porch. Their words drifted in through his bedroom window on the afternoon breeze.

“He hasn't had any manifestations during, if that's what you're trying to ask,” Petra said dryly. “He doesn’t become someone else when he reaches the end.”

“Well, continue on as you see fit,” Crodd replied. He paused for a moment. “Actually, it might prove interesting if you were to become with child.”

“Oh, that would be interesting?”

“I don't mean to cause offense. But such an event might give the essence a fresh vessel to occupy.”

“There are limits to this arrangement…”

“Are there?” Uicha heard the ice creep into Crodd’s tone. “Take a walk through Ambergran and tell me again about limits.”

The conversation ended there, with Petra storming off. Uicha wondered if they'd meant for him to overhear. They were always testing him, watching him. Maybe that had just been a provocation to get him angry–to see if a burst of rage had any effect on the quiet spirit housed within him.

Uicha rolled over and closed his eyes. He pretended not to have heard and never mentioned the conversation to Petra.

In the nights to come, he was more cautious.

***

29 New Summer, 61 AW

The ritualist was the tallest man Uicha had ever seen.

Hunn Megeer stood seven feet high, all knees and elbows, and jittery long fingers. Uicha had been expecting some ancient sorcerer-academic like he imagined the ones from the Magelab, but the Orvesian ritualist was no more than twenty-five and bafflingly awkward. He had a way of bending down when he spoke so as to make himself eye level with his audience, and thus had developed a hooked posture that must’ve been hell on the spine. Hunn dressed like Crodd in a feathered caftan and black pants, although the pants looked like they’d been stitched together from two pairs. He had Ink and thus was the second champion of Orvesis who Uicha had met, although not nearly so many tattoos of power as Crodd.

The ritualist arrived at the farmhouse with a wagon of esoteric supplies and immediately set to work rearranging Uicha’s living room.

“I haven’t been able to stop reading since you told me about the boy’s predicament,” Hunn told Crodd. The ritualist knelt in the cleared space on the floor sketching out a complex pattern in chalk, while Uicha and Crodd watched from the kitchen table. “I would like to begin with a simple summoning and manifestation, an invitation to chat before we go kicking down the door, so to speak.”

Uicha could hear the eagerness in the ritualist’s voice. He wanted to experiment, but he also very much wanted Crodd’s approval.

“Failing that, we might consider a more traditional binding,” Hunn continued. “An exorcism, perhaps.”

“Fine,” Crodd replied.

“Is this going to hurt?” Uicha asked.

“Is…?” Hunn seemed puzzled by the question, or perhaps he was surprised that Uicha has spoken at all. He glanced up at Crodd, who shook his head in response. “No, it won’t hurt,” Hunn said. “At least not to begin with, I don’t think. I believe the cautious approach is warranted here. We don’t understand what would happen to the essence if you should… ah… expire.”

Uicha glanced at the door, measuring the distance and whether Crodd would be able to catch him. The death knight leaned into his field of vision.

“You want to be free of this, don’t you? Free of us?”

“I’m not even sure there’s anything to be free of,” Uicha said. “Nothing has happened…”

“Let us try a few more things, to make sure,” Crodd said. “And then, I promise, we will hire a boat to bring you to the Flamingo Islands, or anywhere else you could want to go.”

His grandfather. Uicha had told Petra about him. He could only nod in response.

And so, they made Uicha lay on the floor at the center of Hunn’s chalk drawing of a spiral within a compass. At each point of the compass, Hunn positioned a clay statue, each in the shape of a woman. He lit candles and burned spices that smelled like coffee. He spread a bit of lizard skin across Uicha’s forehead. It felt warm, and Uicha hoped that was because the skin had been in one of Hunn’s pockets.

Then, Hunn began to chant. He paced around the outside of the chalk circle, body bent low, so that the tips of his fingers grazed the floor. He spoke in sounds, not in words, and Uicha felt tickling power in every syllable—he could not understand the chant, but that knowledge felt just out of reach. The chant went in a rhythm, almost a song, and Hunn’s gangly hips jerked with every fourth beat.

This isn’t going to work, Uicha thought to himself. This is stu—

His eyes rolled into the back of his head.