Woad Children (Challenger's Call Book 3) Page 4

  “Confirming the Challenger’s predictions. More power and Trials are necessary to gain further Right to Rule.”

  “Yay,” I said sarcastically. “But at least we have a game plan now.”

  “Yeah,” Breena said in a toneless voice, suddenly gaining a thousand-yard stare. “I get to train you some more. And now you’ve discovered three new types of magic you wanna learn about now, too.”

  It said something that with everything else going on, Breena’s training time with me still counted as traumatizing for her.

  “About that,” I began. “I was thinking that maybe you should delegate some of those lessons?”

  The little fairy blinked at that.

  “Wait, what?” she asked. There was almost a hopeful note to her voice. Almost.

  “I mean, I know I kept pushing my limits during training…”

  “Our limits,” Breena corrected. “You kept pushing my limits too, Wes.”

  “Yeah, and I’m sorry about that,” I admitted. “It probably saved my life though, given how I’ve won a number of battles by the skin of my teeth. But now that we have other experts here, maybe we should spread out the portions of training to different people. Like Virtus, for instance,” I said, bringing up the skeletal warrior that had been training the new citizens of Avalon. “I’ve actually sparred with him a couple more times, and judging by the bruises he’s given me there’s still a lot he can teach me. Let’s just leave the weapon and conditioning portion of training to him from now on.”

  More blinking.

  “Really?” Breena asked, and this time there was definitely a hopeful tone to her voice. “You’d be okay with that? ‘Cause that used to be the biggest chunk of training. Are you sure about that?”

  “I don’t know if it should stay the biggest chunk,” I said, rubbing the back of my neck. “Since I’m not trying to fix a disability anymore. But it will still be important and I think it would be easier trying to learn sword and axe-work from someone closer to my size anyway.”

  “That’s a perfect idea!” Breena screamed, flying off the dining table. “I love it!”

  “Great,” I said, unable to stop smiling. “And while I don’t think there’s a better expert on magic than you, I’m thinking Weylin, Eadric, and Karim can at least get me started in learning their respective magics. And if they turn out to be unnecessary, we can drop that part of my training anyway.”

  “I love it!” Breena shouted, flying around my shoulders. “That’s like the most reasonable idea you’ve had ever. Yaaay!”

  She hugged my neck, and her larger size actually made me stagger.

  Good job, FNG said in my mind. You made her happy. Keep treating her right.

  Yeah, I know, I thought back firmly, getting my balance back as my bonded familiar kept hanging off my neck. That’s important to me too. Speaking of which, it’s time to check on our other woman.

  CHAPTER FOUR: HERO’S DUE

  I left the dining room/great hall/whatever the hell I was going to call it and went to find Guineve. I found her in the kitchen portion of my two-story feudal mansion. It was probably the most advanced portion of the manor, given that Guineve had imported all of her cooking implements and cooking magic. It had marble-tiled floors, for crying out loud. As well as all manner of lovingly maintained cutlery, some kind of magic cool box where Guineve probably froze ingredients, and several fireplaces that had devices that were probably magical oven-cauldron hybrids. I had no idea what half of the objects were in this room and the one time I had dared to ask about them, Guineve had smiled and rattled off an explanation that went clear over my head, newly enhanced mind notwithstanding.

  Guineve was currently standing next to what I felt confident guessing to be an actual oven. Other than wearing an apron over her low-cut mist dress, she looked exactly the same, not even sweating in the warm room, with a wide smile on her face.

  “Hey Guineve,” I said as I walked in. “Are you busy right now?”

  “Not very, dear Wes,” the beautiful woman replied, stepping away from the dull red glow of her oven. “The cookies are baking, so I have a moment.”

  “Cookies?” I asked. “At this time?”

  “A few of the little ones keep waking up early with the same nightmare. So I’m going to have a batch of cookies ready this time in case they wake up crying again.”

  “Huh. I never thought of that idea,” I admitted, wincing as the dumb-guy portion of my brain spoke up. “I hope it helps.”

  “Cookies always help with little ones, dear Wes. But how can I help you?”

  “Well, I wanted to talk to you about a couple things. Can we start with discussing what went down today?”

  “Yes, dear,” Guineve answered, muttering an incantation and pointing at the oven. The red glow decreased very slightly. I saw the act, realized there was such a thing as honest-to-God baking magic, and then got back on track.

  I took a breath, and decided to be blunt.

  “Guineve, why did you kill a captive on your own initiative?”

  “I’m sorry, dear,” the woman calmly replied. “I wanted to save you some time by interrogating him for you, and I assumed you were going to give the order to execute him anyway.”

  “That much is true,” I admitted. Again, there was no way I could justify letting these guys live. I didn’t really have a prison to put them in. Not one that I’d trust. “But I wanted to be the one to make the call. It surprised me that you took the initiative yourself, and it left me a little worried.”

  “I am sorry, dear Wes,” Guineve repeated, and she seemed genuine. “I don’t want you to feel disrespected or undermined. I will be more careful in the future.”

  “Apology accepted,” I said, relieved that she was being supportive, and that her earlier actions stemmed from a desire to be supportive to begin with. I was also relieved that she didn’t seem to be doing it out of the same trauma Breena was struggling with. “I just need to have a lot of control over this process. I’m having a hard time killing these guys as is.”

  “Really?” the tall woman asked. “You don’t seem to hesitate in combat with them.”

  “No—” I shook my head—“combat is perfect. They have a weapon in their hands. They’re a threat to me and to others. I can be as brutal as I want and it’s completely justified. It’s when they’re helpless that I have trouble finishing them off.”

  That was true now. It hadn’t bothered me with Mr. Shepherd, until I actually killed him. That was when I realized that torturing the Malus Men didn’t give me closure at all. It just made me relive my own tortures all over again. I had mostly moved past that, but when they were helpless, something still nagged at me when I killed them, especially when I had to interrogate them first.

  “But you haven’t let that stop you,” Guineve noted, motioning for me to sit on a nearby stool. I had no idea where it came from. “You’ve been as efficient, or thorough, as you’ve needed to be.”

  “Only because I know what will happen if I let them live. They’re war criminals that have committed all sorts of atrocities, and since I’m in charge it’s my duty to make the call. And to be honest, part of me knows that I’m probably not killing them for good. But even with all that, even though they’re murdering scum, killing them as captives still bothers me.”

  “Why, dear Wes? Why should it bother you?”

  The question surprised me. I expected some sort of sympathetic affirmation from the mature woman. I wasn’t expecting her to probe my reluctance to slaughter an unarmed man.

  “It just should,” I insisted. “That’s a big rule on Earth. Don’t kill prisoners. Don’t kill the unarmed. There’s all sorts of conventions around this issue. It even dates back to medieval chivalry.”

  “I see,” Guineve said quietly. But I couldn’t read the expression on her face. “But tell me, Wes. Did they follow the same rule? Or did they murder you, and probably other prisoners they captured?”

  “They… probably murdered others,” I a
dmitted slowly. “My time in captivity is a little blurry, but I’m certain they’ve killed people they captured elsewhere, even if they didn’t do that at the dungeon I was staying at.”

  I didn’t need to bring up their killing of me.

  “How many of their victims were war criminals, dear Wes?” Guineve asked, somewhat sharply. “How many of the prisoners that they executed had committed any sort of crime? What about you, Wes? Did they hold court and sentence you first? Did they say you were guilty of any kind of crime that deserved death?”

  I snorted at that.

  “No. It’s ridiculous that any of their captives would already be war criminals. And they were just killing me for research on their own powers.”

  “Yes,” Guineve answered, and this time I could hear flint in her voice. “So why should you have any problem killing them?”

  That was a good question. But I still shook my head.

  “That’s different. If I adopt their ways, I’ll become them. And I’m having a hard enough time processing my rage as it is.”

  “So you feel just one step away from losing yourself,” Guineve said softly. Her gaze was still hard, however.

  “Maybe?” I admitted. “I don’t know what would push me over the edge. So I try not to be like them.”

  “So you are allowed to be treated worse than they are, dear Wes?” The flint was back in her voice.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Because you wish to be better than them, you suffer worse treatment, take more risks, and risk having even more trauma dumped upon you? Because of a handicap you are expected to maintain? That will somehow make you better than them?”

  The heck? I thought as I heard the tone in her voice. Am I actually having a fight right now with Guineve?

  Maybe you should just shut up and let her talk? Teeth butted in unhelpfully.

  “I don’t know what to tell you, Guineve,” I said instead. “But I have to figure out how to take the high road, or I don’t know what I’ll turn into. I just—”

  “Who taught you?” the tall woman interrupted me.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, still not keeping up.

  “Who taught you to think like this?” the raven-haired woman continued. “It couldn’t have been John. He was too wise and kind and good. Who told you about this ‘high road?’ The one where you are constantly suffering and the only one with expectations laid on you? The only one who gets punished for breaking a special set of rules, and taken for granted when you follow them?”

  I shrugged.

  “It’s just the way we’re taught on Earth. Heroes sacrifice. They fight with an unfair disadvantage—personally, I mean. It’s stupid to let others be endangered, and I try to keep that from happening.”

  “Of course.” Guineve nodded. “Go on.”

  “But the best heroes have it hard on purpose, because they know they’re just one slip away from becoming evil themselves.”

  It felt uncomfortable talking about this out loud. Partly because I had never really thought all of these beliefs through.

  “And there’s no reward for being a hero either, is there?” Guineve asked flatly. “After the hero has undergone all of that sacrifice? All of that trauma?”

  “It’s not supposed to be about the reward,” I added, still trying to think these subconscious impressions through. “I mean, in the stories, they used to find love and live happily ever after at the end, but now that’s been judged kind of chauvinist.”

  “Because no one on your world should fall in love with someone just because they’re a hero,” the stately woman asked, adding a raised eyebrow into the mix. “Why? Is that somehow a shallow reason?”

  “It gets derided as that by the critics of those stories,” I admitted. “So yeah.”

  “So heroes on your planet are expected to fight all kinds of unfair fights and make great personal sacrifices, all while being judged harshly for their slips, even being labeled as one step, just one slip away, from descending into darkness themselves?”

  Huh, FNG spoke up again. Sounds like she’s thought this theory through way more than you have.

  “…Yeah,” I finally said, ignoring the peanut gallery in the back of my head. “I’ve never really worked it out that far, but that sounds about right.”

  “I see,” Guineve answered. “Wes, dear Wes, do you realize what this means?”

  “Um,” I answered awkwardly. So far my Risen-enhanced mind and charisma really weren’t living up to expectations right now. “I guess my world has really high standards for its heroes?”

  “No, dear Wes,” the tall woman answered firmly. “It doesn’t mean that. It means your world has low expectations for those who are saved by heroes.”

  “Huh?” I asked. “Expectations?”

  “Yes, dear Wes,” Guineve answered. “Responsibilities that the world and people owe to the hero who saved them. The one who sacrificed and risked for them, and is apparently now only one step away from darkness themselves, and inexplicably no longer allowed to find love at the end.”

  “Oh,” I said, kind of impressed by just how stupid I had wound up sounding in this talk. “We actually don’t have any expectations for them. They’re not the hero.”

  “And if I’m not mistaken, good Wes, the heroes of your world are looked down upon for even having any expectations to the people they saved?”

  “Yeah, actually,” I answered, still uncomfortable. Dad had talked about that. ‘Don’t expect gratitude’ he taught me. But that had been a warning.

  “Tell me, dear, tired Wes,” Guineve continued. “After thinking it through, what do you think of your world’s view of heroes? Because it sounds like your planet views them as vessels to be used, and then discarded at the first convenience.”

  “That’s…” I shuddered, and then growled. “That’s right.”

  I had known that in the back of my head. I remembered Stell’s shock at seeing the names I was called. I remembered how quickly people had embraced the lies about my father. But for some stupid reason, I had felt like I never had the permission to actually verbalize that knowledge.

  “Worthy Wes,” Guineve continued, sounding much gentler now. “I will support whatever judgment you make. But do you truly believe that the act of heaping more impractical burdens on yourself will be the thing that saves you?”

  I had no answer for her, and this time I was smart enough not to try to give her one out loud. But my face must have told her that I didn’t have any better ideas.

  “Darling Wes, it is not up to you to save yourself,” Guineve said softly. “If that was truly the way, there would be no such thing as a hero. Real heroes let others save them, reward them, heal them. You making your own life harder; adding more rules you do not truly need will not be the thing that saves you.”

  “We’re taking a weird route in this conversation,” I insisted. “We were supposed to be talking about executing prisoners.”

  “We were.” Guineve nodded. “But now we’re talking about the obligations you feel you owe your former murderers. While not accepting that you are owed far greater obligations.” I felt her stare into me. “And that you need those obligations, hero Wes. They are not privileges you are expected to deny.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “I mean if you saw and understood just how angry the people of Avalon are on your behalf, you would have a far better sense of your own worth.” The tall woman turned from me, looked back at her glowing oven, then moved over to what I thought was the icebox.

  “They’ve all suffered too, though,” I replied.

  Why are we still arguing with her? Teeth demanded suddenly. I started to answer him, then realized I couldn’t.

  I… don’t know.

  “Young Wes, I am not talking about your torture and murders. I am not even talking about the disrespect you were given in the last two years of your adolescence. I am talking about the lack of recognition you received back when you were on Earth. The pitiful amo
unt of gratitude your world gave you would have horrified any local from the Woadlands, the Sun-jeweled Sea, even savage Pangea. The way they mocked your injury and family’s grief would have outraged anyone on Avalon’s daughter-worlds. Good Wes, people here would have driven your mockers out of town. They would have shamed them for abandoning your family in their time of need. The way you were treated on Earth was not normal. You are not one step away from darkness just because you have been disrespected, harmed, and ignored. You are merely someone in need of help and mercy. Just as you treat everyone here. And that is how you will survive, dear Wes. The care from those who value you. Not from merely heaping more burdens on yourself.”

  I shook at her words. I tried not to, but it happened anyway. As she stepped next to me, I realized I had been trying to do things on my own again. Like living on Earth had taught me to, because all but my closest friends had abandoned me, and even they couldn’t do everything for me.

  “I will say this again, my valued Challenger. You are not only fighting for us. We are fighting for you. As our hero and lord, and those two are the same, because heroes are always kings, whether or not they admit it. I am for you. The people you have rescued are also for you. Those you rescue on other worlds will be for you as well, because this is not Earth. You will not be taken for granted by entire planets. Not anymore. I have tried to help you know that you are not alone in this massive struggle. I will keep trying, until I finally get through to you. And so will the rest of Stell. Because you are our Challenger, good Wes. We cannot let you be taken for granted. You are too valuable.”

  As I kept shaking, she put her hand on my shoulder, and slid a mug into my hand.

  “The cookies are done,” the wonderful, beautiful woman said with a smile. “So I need to take them out of the oven now. If the children leave any, you can have some. But I think I need to let you reflect on what you have just heard right now. So I will give you a little bit of space. I am here for you if you need me, dear Wes. That will always be true.”