Hungry Heart - Book #3 - Ch. 20 (Patreon)

Chapter One / Chapter Two / Chapter Three / Chapter Four / Chapter Five / Chapter Six / Chapter Seven / Chapter Eight / Chapter Nine / Chapter Ten / Chapter Eleven / Chapter Twelve / Chapter Thirteen / Chapter Fourteen / Chapter Fifteen / Chapter Sixteen / Chapter Seventeen / Chapter Eighteen / Chapter Nineteen 

Chapter Twenty – A One of a Kind Tiger

Toru looked around at all the unknown faces of the truth keepers, his mind filled with confusing thoughts. “So, I come from this house of tigers you talked about? What was the name again?”

“Olliandran,” Beanstalk supplied right away. “The proudest tiger house in all Eawirith.”

He had never heard the name, but still, his chest filled with pride. Throughout his life, he had been used to his condition, that of an orphan, a drifter, one without much to give, but without much to ask, either. And now, he was learning that he came from a line of tigers like no other in the entire world. “What are they like? The ones from the house of Olliandran?” he asked. “They must be very brave, right?”

Beanstalk smiled so fondly that his entire face changed. The light from the big forge made his face look as red as a tomato, but there was also a sort of light coming from within his tiny person that shone right through his eyes. “Yes, the bravest. The one before you, Pyre, yes, such a long time ago, oh, he truly breathed fire.”

“Pyre?” Toru swallowed hard. “Was he… my father?”

Beanstalk looked at him thoughtfully. “Tigershifters live long lives, indeed, but I don’t see Pyre in you. After he vanquished the evil, he retreated back to his seat of power, and as per his and your house’s wishes, we never saw him again or heard from him.” He walked closer to Toru and grabbed a strand of his hair, examining it at length. Midnight moved in, as well, gestured to come over by Beanstalk. “Midnight, do you see what I see?”

Toru let out a yelp as Midnight unceremoniously picked one hair and pulled it off.

“It’s white,” Midnight commented while holding the hair up for everyone else to see it.

A murmur of surprise moved like water through those present.

Toru leaned forward and stared, too. “Am I turning white? I’m not that old.”

Beanstalk laughed and hiccupped. “No, you’re not turning white. But,” he added with emphasis, “this means that either your mother or your father is by no means the same as the others before.”

“What do you mean?”

“The house of Olliandran must search for mates far and wide, but there are rules that must be obeyed. One of them is that the mate chosen must have flawless fur, nothing but orange and black, not a speck of a different color.”

“I’m not flawless,” Toru commented with regret that he didn’t hide too well.

“Indeed,” Midnight commented and turned toward the others, seeking their support. Only a few murmured in agreement.

“Why do you hate me?” Toru asked Midnight directly.

The truth keeper seemed taken aback by his assumption. “I don’t hate you. But purity is a trait of the house of Olliandran, and you’re not pure.”

He knew as much. He had been called names, all kinds, throughout his life, but never had it hurt as much as it did when Midnight said what he was saying to him right now.

“Not in that sense,” Beanstalk confirmed. “But--”

“But you don’t look a gift bug in the mouth, right?” Toru said with bitterness he didn’t conceal at all.

“You’re our tiger,” Beanstalk said. “We don’t care about those rules of pure blood.”

“Speak for yourself,” Midnight interrupted him. “Beanstalk, this is too important to give it into the hands of someone who’s not--”

Much to Toru’s surprise, Beanstalk gestured and made a whip of fire materialize from thin air. With a flick of the wrist, he sent the whip right across Midnight’s face, so fast that the air vibrated for some time after. Midnight caught his cheek, as surprised as Toru by the sudden act of violence, especially from someone who appeared to be nothing but kind-hearted.

“Go look into the fire,” Beanstalk ordered Midnight. “Repeat the creed until there are no tears left in you.”

Toru stared, utterly baffled, as Midnight just nodded, his eyes cast down, and obeyed without a word. He sat, legs crossed in front of the forge, and began swaying his body gently. To the earth and the moon, the tide and the flow, the stars above, and the souls below, we beg you, our master, come and release us, as we speak the truth, and the truth speaks us.

Midnight’s chant turned into a lulling murmur as he began to repeat the same words over and over.

“Maybe he didn’t mean it,” Toru said softly. While it did not look like a very severe punishment, the finality of Beanstalk’s words when telling Midnight that he should sit there until he had no tears left to cry made him pity the truth keeper.

“Don’t mind him. Midnight knows how important our mission is. And there’s a reason why I’m above everyone else down here. To keep everyone in line, while our wait is long, and our hearts grow soft.”

Midnight hunched his shoulders and trembled softly while continuing his sing-song declamation. Toru could only see his back, but he couldn’t repress the feeling that Midnight was suffering because of him. Not so long ago, he wouldn’t have cared, but Duril had taught him along the way why it was important to be kind. So, his feet moved of their own accord until he reached the punished truth keeper. He crouched by his side and pulling at his sleeve, turned it into a handkerchief of sorts, he began wiping away Midnight’s tears.

Midnight started at the touch and stared at him, wide-eyed. Toru could read truthful repentance in his eyes so, without another word, he stood to his feet and then offered Midnight his hand. “Take it,” he said.

“Let him complete his punishment,” Beanstalk said.

“No. I’m your lord and master,” Toru said. “I say he doesn’t get punished. I order you to take my hand,” he added, addressing to Midnight this time.

His hand was taken shyly, but he squeezed the other’s hand in his bigger one and helped Midnight to his feet. Everyone was looking at him without saying a word. “What?” he asked, unnerved by that silence. “Aren’t tigers supposed to be kind?”

“Not really,” Beanstalk replied promptly. “You’re the first of this kind of kind.”

“Well, I’m a one of a kind tiger,” Toru replied in the same fashion. “That’s why.”

Beanstalk seemed to hesitate before talking again. “Fine, Midnight is off the hook this time. But it’s going to fall on him to prepare you for the trip up, up, up.”

“I will be honored,” Midnight said eagerly.

“Why do I need to be prepared? I am ready to climb and punish the domestikos.”

“Your mission is not that easy, young tiger.”

“But he is the one who needs to get punished, isn’t he?” Toru insisted.

Midnight was already pulling at his sleeve, his attitude from before quickly forgotten. “I will make your skin shine golden, and no human eye will be able to see you.”

“I’ll be invisible?” Toru asked, excited at the possibility.

“We will be able to see you,” Beanstalk corrected him. “There are a few of us up there.”

“Really? What are they doing there?”

Beanstalk shrugged like it wasn’t important. “They chip away, they chip away.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Toru asked, more and more curious about what the others were all about.

“They steal and eavesdrop, they break and gossip.”

“That’s not very honorable,” Toru said, scrunching up his nose.

“The fortress is very powerful,” Beanstalk said, putting up his index finger, ready for lecturing. “We might be this small, but we do our part while waiting for the tiger.”

“And how is it going?” Toru questioned. “This sabotaging thing?”

Beanstalk sighed from the depths of his tiny chest. “It keeps us busy.”

Toru decided not to press it further. Whatever these tiny criminals were up to, they were on his side, and since he didn’t have his friends with him, he could use some allies, no matter how strange they seemed. On top of it all, Duril was up there somewhere, caught in the belly of the city, and it occured to him that he could ask Beanstalk to use his acquaintances up there to help him find the healer. “Are there really many of you up there? Do you think they could find someone if you asked them to?”

“The domestikos is not hard to find, but it is difficult to get close to him. His palace is a fortress within a fortress,” Beanstalk explained.

“I wasn’t talking about him. I was talking about someone else.”

“Who?” Beanstalk asked, examining him with curious eyes. “You haven’t yet been to the city, so how could you know someone already in there?”

“My friend Duril got in. He’s very smart and he writes very neatly,” Toru said. “The guards accepted him, but they sent the rest of us back.”

“I see, I see,” Beanstalk said with a thoughtful nod. “Is he a very close friend?”

“The closest,” Toru said, wondering if it was all right to tell the truth keepers about it all, about how much love there was between him and Duril, and Varg, and Claw. They had been expecting a lone tiger, someone capable of taking down a city on his own, and what they got was a different type altogether.

“He’ll smell of you, then,” Beanstalk concluded. “That means that the other Sakka up there will quickly find him.”

“Sakka?”

“That’s the name of our kind,” Beanstalk explained. “We didn’t tell you about it, right? So many things happening, so many things. Yes, that’s our name. When you see a Sakka--”

“It’s like you’ve seen them all?” Toru asked.

Beanstalk laughed wholeheartedly. It was difficult to imagine someone like that being capable of conjuring whips of fire out of thin air and exacting punishment on his brethren. “We’re very different, as you can see. We may look like we’re all doing the same things, but that’s not the case.”

“I didn’t mean it like that. You’re all keepers of truth, right? So that means that they will recognize me.”

“Yes, you are right about that. But don’t let them hug you too much. We’re big huggers, we. But tigers usually don’t let us hug them.”

Toru shook his head. Beanstalk’s ramblings were making his head ache. That said, he was a lot like Agatha, Elidias, and Shearah. “Are you a witch, too?”

“A witch?” Beanstalk’s large grin was splitting his face in two. “Nothing like that. Have you met a witch before?”

Toru puffed out his chest. “A few. And they talk strangely like you do sometimes.”

“Let’s not dally,” Beanstalk said suddenly, ignoring his words. Probably he didn’t like being told that he spoke like a witch. Toru didn’t intend to press the matter any further than that. And in all truth, Sakka didn’t appear as keen on weird talking as witches. “Midnight, start preparing Toru.”

Midnight seemed much pleased with the prospect and in quite a suspicious way. Toru let himself dragged away to a different underground room, which he quickly identified as a bathroom. There were mats on the floor, and a beautiful bath carved in white marble in the middle. The scent from before, the one that had made him travel so far, permeated the air, soothing the senses. He felt his body going slowly lax, as the warmth and the smell of tiger flowers began lulling him into a cocoon of safety. The most astonishing thing, however, was how tiger flowers floated through the air, without falling to the floor.

“Let’s get you in there,” Midnight suggested, pointing at the bath, from which steam rose.

Toru shrugged, not questioning whatever Sakka wanted to do with him, and began shedding his clothes. He climbed into the bath, and Midnight stood perched on the edge. He caught flowers from the air, rubbed them between his palms and then placed his hands on Toru’s shoulders and began massaging the crushed flowers into his skin.

“Is this what the preparation means?” Toru asked, enjoying the thorough job Midnight did. “I don’t see why Beanstalk would think it would be a punishment.”

Midnight laughed. “Thank you for what you did, young tiger. You set my heart true and on the right path again with just one gesture. You must be the one to save us.”

Toru remained quiet. When he had been forced to defend his position and his quest, he hadn’t doubted it for a moment, but now that everyone had such expectations of him, he didn’t know what to say or do. What if he wasn’t the one they were expecting? What if it just happened that he was a tiger, like the others before him?

Midnight continued to crush flowers between his palms and then rub them into his skin. “This task is long and arduous. I need to make sure that you cannot be seen by those who shouldn’t see you.”

“It sounds more like a punishment to me, not you,” Toru commented.

“Are you uncomfortable in any way?” Midnight asked and dipped his hand into the water for a moment. “Don’t you like it this hot? Would you rather have it colder?”

“No, the water is not the problem. But I thought that I would start to climb soon. And I’m not used to so much comfort,” Toru admitted.

“But I thought you were in search of it,” Midnight pointed out. “All the tigers of your house like to be prepared at length. They are a royal house, after all. It is befitting of their station to be given all the consideration and care we can offer.”

“What if I’m not from that house, after all?” Toru blurted out and regretted it right away.

Midnight’s hands paused on his shoulders. “That’s not true,” he said with conviction. “Is it because of what I said before? I was just blind--”

“It’s not because of you,” Toru hurried to put his mind at ease. “But it’s like I’m nothing like them.”

“That’s not true. You are everything like them. Well, maybe you are not as demanding and pompous as some of them. Especially the lady tigers,” Midnight said and laughed. “They can be quite the taskmasters.”

“Lady tigers? Do you mean there weren’t only male tigers who completed the quest before?”

“No. Once in a while, a female tiger will appear. Because they are educated to fulfill the quest from an early age, and because their somewhat weaker bodies need to be honed in preparation for the challenges ahead, they grow up to be more demanding than their male counterparts. Their lives are never easy.”

“Do you think any of them could have been my mom?” Toru asked quietly.

Midnight began to wash his hair and rub more of crushed petals into it, as well. “That would be difficult to tell. And it has been quite a long time since we have had a female tiger among us.”

“Do all the tigers from the house of Olliandran have to fulfill the quest?”

“Only when needed,” Midnight explained. “So, there could be many generations that prepare their young for it but without any need for them to march into battle.”

“What do they do once they realize that they won’t be called?” Toru asked.

“They start preparing the following generation. It is their noble task.”

“But don’t they have regrets? Do they just sit there, in their seat of power, lazing around all day?”

Midnight laughed. “There is no more diligent house in the world than Olliandran. I doubt lazing around is anywhere near what they do day by day.”

“Do you know where it is? This place where I must be coming from?”

Midnight considered for a while. “The place is hidden. The secret is not entrusted to anyone, not even to us Sakka.”

“Why is it like that? Why do they hide?”

“Their quest is essential for the survival of the world. Should they be discovered…” Midnight trailed off.

“But I didn’t come to you from there,” Toru pointed out. “I came from faraway lands.”

“That’s true,” Midnight admitted.

“So, what do you think happened to them? Something must have happened, right?”

“I don’t know,” Midnight said quickly.

“I understand that you cannot know, but maybe… can you guess?”

“I’d rather not,” Midnight replied. “Don’t worry about that right now. You have your quest laid in front of you, young tiger. Allow me to soothe your worries.”

Toru allowed Midnight to push him under the water and kept his eyes open to stare at the golden reflections. A story of tigers began to play in front of them, like one of those puppet theatres he enjoyed so much when he had been little.

***

Now that the meal was concluded, Duril waited patiently for Moth and Pie to finish washing the dishes and put them back in their cupboards so that he could start asking his questions. Finally, the two hosts sat back down at the table and looked intently at him. Pie linked his fingers and used them to support his chin, while Moth leaned forward and stared at him. Duril was beginning to suspect that Moth couldn’t see very well, and what some people might consider rude in his behavior was related to that and not some fault of character.

“Let us tell you about us,” Pie began while Moth continued to examine him with avid curiosity. “We are part of Sakka, the truth keepers here, in Scercendusa.”

“What is the truth you’re keeping?” Duril asked.

“A very important one. But we offered you something about us. Now, it’s your turn to tell us about you.”

“All right,” Duril admitted. After eating that filling lunch, both his spirit and body felt invigorated. His eyes fell again on the flowers in the vase.

“Do you know a tiger?” Pie began.

Moth turned his head toward his friend and scoffed. “Is this your question? You’re wasting a perfectly good question on something redundant. He obviously knows a tiger because he smells like one.”

“I know a tiger,” Duril replied, interrupting their little to and fro. “His name is Toru.” The moment he looked at those flowers, he found it impossible to lie.

“Toru,” Pie said with reverence. “What a beautiful name for a tiger,” he commented. “Have we ever had another by that name, Moth?” Moth shook his head, and Pie nodded with pride. “Moth has the memory of an elephant,” he praised his friend, but then laughed shortly. “With a memory like that, you’d think that we’d call him Elephant, or at least Phant, but you see, his ears are just so bad.” He laughed again, although Duril didn’t exactly understand what the source of his amusement was.

“Why do you care about tigers so much?” Duril asked.

“Is it his turn to ask another question already?” Moth demanded to know.

Pie nodded. “Yes. Make some tea. This is going to take a while.”

“There’s no need,” Duril said politely. “The meal was very satisfactory. I’m very grateful for your hospitality.”

“But tea makes tongues loose,” Pie argued. “Moth, make some tea.”

Moth was up and about without being told a third time. However, Duril could tell that he was all ears, attentive to their conversation, despite whatever Pie was saying about his hearing.

“I thought it was wine that made tongues loose,” Duril offered his take.

“You’ve never tasted our tea,” Pie pointed out.

“Does it have alcohol in it?” Duril asked, a bit surprised. These two didn’t appear to be the kind that would indulge in drinking spirits.

Pie laughed and patted his belly. “No, something better. It soothes the weary soul, our tea. Yes, it does.”

Duril was starting to think that anyone’s soul could become weary if too much time was spent in the company of those two. But in a good way, if that made any sense, and he wasn’t keen on finding any right now.

“So, what were you asking? Ah, why do we like tigers so much?”

Duril wasn’t completely sure that was his question verbatim.

“We like them,” Pie continued, “because they always save the world. The evil never dies, but it can be pushed back, and that is where the tigers of Olliandran come into play.”

“The evil? So is it here, in Scercendusa?”

“At the root of all the mortal sins and the reason why we need tigers to save the world,” Pie supplied very promptly.

Duril wasn’t entirely sure they were talking about the same thing. “Would you please tell me more?”

“No, because it is not your turn,” Pie reminded him.

Moth came back to the table with a tray on which three steaming cups lay. “Where did you meet Toru?”

“He came to Whitekeep, the place where I used to live before traveling with him and our other companions.”

“Whitekeep?” Pie and Moth exchanged a glance. “That’s very far away, indeed. What could Toru be doing so far from home?”

“Home? Do you know where Toru’s home is?”

Pie and Moth seemed to have lost track of whose turn it was to ask questions. “But of course. He belongs to the house of Olliandran, and they don’t live awfully far from here. Their seat of power is hidden from view, but they must live there because they can travel fast to here from there.”

“To Scercendusa, you mean?” Duril found all those details astonishing, to say the least.

“Now it’s called Scercendusa, but it has carried many names across the millennia. It’s always the same, always.” Pie shook his head. “The greed grows larger and larger in the hearts of humans until the evil grabs a hold of them and doesn’t want to let go. And then the tiger comes and sets the world right on its head. That’s how it goes. But only tigers from the house of Olliandran are meant for the quest.”

“Could it be that Toru is not of that house?” Duril asked. “As far as I know, he is an orphan.”

Much to his surprise, Moth and Pie gasped in disbelief. “An orphan?” Moth stared and him, blinking, as if he couldn’t understand the concept. “But the Oliandran cubs are taught from an early age how to handle peril and how to stand in the face of danger, unflinching. What could Toru have learned if he’s an orphan?”

Duril considered his following words carefully. “All I know is that Toru has traveled the world so far, guided by a special scent that only he could detect.”

“Do you mean, this scent?” Moth picked one flower from the vase and stuck it under Duril’s nose.

“I wouldn’t know. Only he could smell it,” Duril pointed out the obvious.

Pie suddenly grabbed his shirt and pulled it toward his face. He sniffed loudly. “My nose doesn’t lie. Moth, smell this.”

“Didn’t you say I didn’t have a nose?” Moth mumbled morosely but obeyed anyway.

Duril allowed them their strange inspection. “Do you think that Toru smells like an Olliandran tiger?” he questioned.

“There is not one shadow of a doubt,” Pie declared. “But an orphan? How came that to pass?” He let go of Duril’s shirt and placed his chin in his palm, drumming his fingers against his cheek. “In all truth, he should have been here for a while, and our brethren below have kept the forge going for some time now, but still... An orphan?” It was as if Pie just couldn’t wrap his head around that.

“His parents must have passed,” Duril suggested. “Could it be that he was entrusted to the orphanage where he grew up?”

“An Olliandran? In an orphanage?” Moth shook his head repeatedly like he couldn’t fathom such a thing. “It is impossible. Even if Toru’s parents did pass away, the house is not made up only of two people by far. Those next in line would have cared for him, and so on, and so forth.”

“Those next in line for what?”

“The head of the house. Toru should have been cared for by his relatives.”

“What if none were alive when that happened?” Duril asked.

Moth and Pie looked at each other. “Tigershifters are resilient, moreso than many other species, and especially the house of Olliandran. It is impossible for them to die to the last one.”

“Can’t you travel to this seat of power you are talking about?” Duril asked. “If the house is still standing, it will all be made clear soon enough, right?”

Pie pursed his lips. “One doesn’t simply travel to pay the house of Olliandran a courtesy visit. It is hidden from view for a reason.”

“So you don’t know how to find it.”

Pie shook his head. “We’re not allowed to know, so we don’t. The quest of saving the world is too important. The tigers of the house of Olliandran have always been adamant about never being followed.”

“And ruthless when their wish was disobeyed.”

Duril shivered slightly. Toru was brave and the greatest warrior the world had ever seen, but ruthlessness was not among his traits. “Maybe Toru is just not the one,” he said.

“If he’s not, what is he doing here? What’s his purpose? Other than having followed the scent of tiger flowers.” Pie examined him with curious eyes.

Duril sighed. “We’ve fought an evil as resilient as the sun and the moon from Whitekeep to here. He wanted to travel here in search of answers. We hope that the domestikos would be able to give them to him.”

“The domestikos?” Pie and Moth exclaimed at the same time.

“He must be in possession of great knowledge. There is no other place with as many libraries as Scercendusa,” Duril explained. “So far, we’ve only had fragments of myth to guide us. What we know is that the evil is far from vanquished. So we must soldier on.”

“Why do you keep saying ‘we’?”

Duril blushed. “I mean, it’s Toru’s quest, of course. Forgive my slip of the tongue. The rest of us just tagged along because... Because we love him,” he explained.

“The rest of you? Are there others like you with Toru?”

“No, not like me.” Duril didn’t know what they meant by that precisely. “There is also Varg, who’s a wolfshifter, and Claw, who’s a bearshifter.”

Pie seemed astonished by these revelations. “An orphan cub,” he began slowly, “a wolfshifter, a bearshifter, and a clever magic wielder...”

That was supposed to be him. Duril felt a small twinge of pride and shifted in his chair, awaiting Pie’s conclusions on the matter.

“Nothing adds up,” he exclaimed and threw his arms to the sides.

“What do you mean?” Duril asked.

“History tells us that it should all happen the same way, every time,” Pie explained. “Otherwise, how does it serve us?” It appeared as if he was talking mostly to himself.

“So, is it true that there has been another tiger before? Just like Toru?” Duril asked.

“Obviously, not like your Toru,” Pie replied. “And tigers. There have been tigers, not just one.”

Duril leaned back in his chair, surprised by that new tidbit. “What an incredible tale.”

“It’s not a tale. It’s history. Every few millennia, the world gets sick, so sick. It starts here, in this place. It poisons everything as the greed grows and grows, until it recognizes no lord or master.”

“And is that happening right now? Here?” Duril asked. “But Toru fought this evil far away from these lands.”

Pie fell quiet, so Moth stepped in. “Which doesn’t make any sense at all. The tigers know that the heart of evil beats here, and they need to tear it out of the chest of this cursed city.”

“How do they do that?” Duril asked, a slight chill making his hand tremble.

“They destroy it, of course,” came the prompt reply from Pie.

“Destroy it? But first, they drive the people away from it, don’t they?”

Duril received a look from Pie that told him pretty much that he was nothing but a lunatic.

“No, they are part of the evil that makes the city.”

“How could that be? Even the children? There must be children here, in Scercendusa, aren’t there?”

“Yes,” Pie replied. “But the evil must be destroyed.”

“Why with a sacrifice like this?” Duril realized too late that he was shouting. “And I’m not talking only about the children. There must be plenty of other innocents. Not everyone is bad.”

Pie shifted in his chair and looked at his friend for support. Moth shrugged his shoulders as if he couldn’t understand what Duril wanted, either.

“If Toru is the tiger you were waiting for, he is not going to destroy the city only to eliminate the evil from the world at the price of innocent lives,” Duril said with determination, making his hand into a fist.

“But he must,” Pie argued. “That is his destiny. A destiny fulfilled by generations and generations before him.”

“No.” Duril shook his head stubbornly. “Toru is not ruthless. He is kind.”

“A kind tiger?” Pie and Moth exchanged another loaded look. “What kind of tiger is a kind tiger?”

“A one of a kind,” Duril blurted out in frustration.

Pie and Moth appeared to consider his words very carefully. “Then he might not be from the house of Olliandran, after all,” Pie said.

“And still come here, drawn by the scent of tiger flowers?” Moth asked. “It is highly unlikely, don’t you think?”

“According to his friend the magic wielder here, when the chance to destroy the evil comes, he will not do it. Because of the kindness of his heart.”

Duril blinked a few times. “Toru will find a way. I’m telling you. He won’t leave things like that. He will vanquish the evil, but he will do it on his own terms. And why do you keep saying that the tigers before destroyed the evil? It looks like it revives anyway.”

Pie and Moth lifted their heads and stared at him, completely baffled. “That’s certainly one way to look at things,” Pie admitted, while his friend nodded in agreement.

TBC

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