(THOB) Chapter 122: The Incarnate (Patreon)

Ezril crossed the expanse of the tribe, by-passing the tents as he moved. Shade’s attention twitched at his movement while a boy watched from a tent far removed from the wolf with a focused intensity. The child was no more than his tenth summer, and though he thought himself hidden, Shade was just as aware of his presence as it was of Ezril’s. He passed Olufemi where he sat tending to his Sunders without a word of acknowledgement even when his brother looked up at him. Eventually they would have the talk that was long overdue, and unlike the one he’d had with Darvi, he knew it would be void of platitudes.

But for now, he had more pressing urgencies to attend to with Helva.

The elderly woman’s tent was far removed from the settlement, and though she was rarely consulted, Ezril often wondered how she made the long trek into the village every day. It stood in a sequestered region at the base of the settlement. Blackened and unkempt on the outside, it was the smallest of all the tents he had seen since his arrival.

It was not his first time seeing it, but he had no doubt it would be his last. However, it would be his first time stepping into it. Certain she would be within its refuge, having seen her head in its direction after Terimoth had been delivered into the tent of the healers, he pushed on.

Pushing the flap aside Ezril stepped in without announcing his presence. A mask hung from the beam that held up the tent, sequined in the prettiest gems he had ever seen, this included those that adorned the necks, fingers and wrists of the great lords and ladies of Green Horn and Ardin.

The inside was more rheumy than the outside, and Ezril found himself wondering if anyone else ever came into the tent, at least to render it clean. The tarp laid over the ground had patches of grass sticking out from every crevice either born of age or courtesy of some residue or the other disgorged from the sea of trees tightly packed behind the tent. A sort of protection serving her safety, it seemed.

Ezril was surprised to find Salem seated to his left, legs crossed, on the tarp, and speaking with Helva who sat on her tattered mat placed on the ground upon which she no doubt slept.

“Young Antari,” Helva called to him and he heard the excitement in her voice. “This one, this one right here,” she wagged a finger at Salem, “he seeks so much truth and listens far better than you. Perhaps my life would’ve been more interesting if he’d been the one to wash up into my care.”

With good reason Ezril wasn’t the least bit surprised. He turned to Salem who was yet to take his attention from the tribe head.

“I fear he’s promise is wasted on your priesthood,” she finished, solemn.

“Brother,” Ezril addressed Salem who now turned his attention to him. Ezril was unsurprised to find it baleful. “May I have a moment with the elder.”

Without a word Salem rose, and offering Helva his thanks, he left them to their privacy.

“That one seems especially angry with you.” Helva chuckled.

“Perhaps.”

“That said, it is a shame I couldn’t offer you more than I have.”

Ezril’s gaze narrowed. “You offered me more than enough. My life, my health, my strength… Peace.”

“But I could only offer you a taste of it. Not all of it,” she said. “I saw the way you and your priestess reveled in it. At a point I felt it might have been part of your father’s bargain. Not to save your life, but to give you a new one. If that was it, then I have failed.”

Ezril moved closer, taking a seat where Salem had just been. “My brothers do not know my priestess lives,” he whispered, “and I would like to keep it that way. If it’s not asking too much, I plead you give her the life you would’ve given me.”

Helva studied him. “You would leave her?”

Despite the woman’s tone, he knew it was not a question. “It’s for her own good.”

Helva shook her head. “The love for a woman often leaves men thinking themselves capable of anything to protect her,” she said, her voice frail. “It compels them to do things with no room for morality. First to their fellows, then to others, and soon, they come to think it justifies every sin they commit in its name.” She watched him now, a lesson in her eyes. “Even a sin against her.”

“It’s for her own good,” Ezril repeated half in response and half in an attempt at convincing himself.

“Perhaps.” Helva straightened, all solemnity gone from her voice. “Perhaps not. But when she learns of your departure, she will follow. And before you ask that we stop her,” she added, silencing him when he opened his mouth, “I doubt anyone of my men will be capable of stopping Rin’s vessel when she puts her mind to such a thing.”

Ezril’s teeth clenched in his mouth. It was all he could do to stop his jaw from going slack, but his eyes gave away his surprise. A possibility of feigned ignorance trampled, he approached the topic. “How many know?”

“Just a few of us,” Helva answered. “Myself and those old enough to still remember what we were taught.”

He took it to mean herself and a bunch of people too old to move around, for she was the only person her age he’d seen wandering the settlement. If she knew enough to know about old tales of ancient gods and believed them enough to tell Lenaria was the vessel for a goddess, then maybe there was more she knew. Enough to give him answers. Too late to mask his thoughts Helva asked: “And what would you have me answer?”

“That obvious?”

The old woman nodded. “You, young Antari, keep your emotions closest to your heart. I dare say, you are a difficult one to read. But whatever it is that troubles you must be important for it to show. So ask, and I will give you an answer, should I have one.”

Aware of the incongruity of what he considered, he took her up on her offer. “What do you know of the Immortal Aegis.”

“Immortal’s Aegis,” she corrected. “And I believe I have already told you this story during your earlier days with us.”

“Not that one.” Ezril shifted where he sat, adjusting so that he drew nearer to her. “I mean if a person is addressed as the Immortal Aegis.”

Helva thought a moment. “And when was this?”

“A while before I came to you people.”

“Well,” she mused, “there is a prophecy that has survived the millennia. One of a child born to the night. Every god has a vessel born to them in every generation, be it a gift to them of Vayla or a gift from mankind, no one knows. However, there stands a god whose vessel is neither born in every generation, nor a gift from any. It is said that his vessel is a curse on Vayla and man. Its arrival, unpredictable and heralding of Vayla’s end. This god is referred to, in prophecy, as the Incarnate. But this boy of prophecy, this immortal Aegis, is destined to face a possible end to the cycle. A child guided by the Uncrowned king and under the protection of the Immortal, he will face the Incarnate in battle.”