Lovu

  A lone tree stood atop a small hill in the distance. When it first came into view on the horizon, they had been walking for almost an hour since the mad dash.

  Before that, all they had seen was dirt. Most of it was rough tilled earth made muddy by the summer showers, but occasionally they crossed smaller strips of packed earth lined with stone borders. According to Topal, they were paths that marked the boundaries of different farmers’ fields. When Lovu suggested using them instead of tracking through the mud, she dismissed his idea in no uncertain terms and the conversation ended there.

  That was why the hill stuck out like a sore thumb. Not only was the tree the highest thing in sight, but the ground beneath it was also covered in a thin layer of short, vibrant grass. Lovu’s legs screamed at the incline until he caught up to Topal at the bottom of the tree, looking up at its limbs far above. The gardens in the Lords’ Residence were filled with trees and other exotic plants, but they all paled in comparison to the monster before him. From his guess, it would take ten Lovus linked hand in hand to fully wrap around it and its lowest limbs were nearly twenty feet in the air.

  “Take a minute to rest,” Topal said as she started rifling through the pouches on her belt. He dropped to the ground immediately and would have likely fallen asleep then and there if she hadn’t caught his attention.

  In a single leap, she cleared the first five feet of the trunk, clasped onto it with her hands and started to skitter upward. It reminded him of the small lizards that roamed around Lavote, climbing up smooth marble surfaces like it was nothing. Also like those lizards, she was gone in an instant, disappearing into the branches far faster than Lovu thought possible.

  He watched in awe, barely catching brief flickers of movement through the leaves. For a few seconds, he lost her entirely before he heard a heavy thud land on the far side of the tree.

  No!

  The air left his lungs as he was back in the Lords’ Residence, pinned under Sir Wangom’s body. His limp body had made the sound as it hit the ground. His heart raced as images of Topal’s crumpled corpse just out of sight raced through his mind. He wanted to run to her and check, but he was frozen in place, just like before.

  No no no no no!

  Then Topal landed beside him, kicking off of the tree trunk at the last second, turning her fall into a roll that ended with her firmly on her feet. Seeing her should have been a relief, but his heart was still pounding. He couldn’t force the images from his mind or even open his mouth to speak. While he spiraled, Topal walked out of view and returned again with a large sack.

  “Damn, I knew you were out of shape, but to be panting that bad you must…” she said absentmindedly as she rifled through the bag, but her voice trailed off as her head slowly turned to him. “Oh, come on!”

  Even though her words reached his ears, they sounded faint and distant. He could barely hear them over the thud of the arrow piercing Sir Wangom’s skull. The clatter of Sir Itkilmo’s armor hitting the ground. The tear of Akil’s sword cutting through an unnamed soldier’s throat. The crunch of their head crushing Tama Foyrlimang’s face in. They looped in his mind until they drowned everything else out. Frozen in place, he relived every brutal second, praying to Fam’e for time to move forward – to leave those moments behind – but even her warmth felt miles away.

  All he felt was cold.

  Cold?

  It wasn’t an unpleasant chill, but a refreshing one. Like a cool drink on a hot day or turning over a pillow on a stifling summer night. It started on his fingertips as something tickled across them before slowly spreading. The nightmare faded away and although his chest was still pounding, he was back in the shade of the monstrous tree. At his side, Topal was holding his hand and running it through the grass beside him.

  “You back with me?” she asked bluntly.

  “I… I think so,” he panted.

  “Good.” She dropped his hand unceremoniously and returned her attention to the sack, pulling out a small bundle of cloth. Inside was a mix of dried meat and cheese which she took part of before passing it onto him.

  The pain of hunger had faded from mind through his desperate efforts to keep moving, but as soon as food was laid out before him, it roared back with a vengeance. Last night, he had intentionally skipped high tea because he wanted to save room for dinner with Akil. The last thing he ate was a light lunch, so this was the longest he had ever gone without food. He eagerly tore into the meat, only to gag. It was slightly sour, like it had started to go bad. He turned to warn Topal, only to see her eagerly tearing pieces off of her own hunk without thinking twice.

  Perhaps it’s just a Scar recipe…

  Under other circumstances, he would have politely declined, but his stomach refused. Forcing himself to eat despite his body fighting every step of the way, he finished everything she handed him. While he wanted nothing more than to relax, the visions that had overtaken him were still at the edge of his mind, pushing to take hold again. If he let his mind wander, he knew he’d just end up frozen again.

  “What was that?” he asked, breaking the silence.

  “The visions you were having?” she said without looking his way, busy swapping out the pouches on her belt with others from the sack. “A foma.”

  “A what?”

  “Foma. You know, like a vit,” she said and the pieces started to fall into place.

  Vit were evil creatures that roamed the wildlands outside of major cities – Kumam’s spawn. He had only ever heard stories but always imagined them as beasts. Swinging his head around, they appeared to be alone.

  “Did it… sneak up on us?”

  This time, Topal looked at him in confusion. “I guess that’s one way of putting it, but it’s not one of the ones you can see.”

  “There are different kinds of vit?”

  “Obviously,” she said, but he still didn’t understand. With a sigh, she continued digging through the bag but at least kept explaining. “There’re a bunch of different kinds. Some you can always see, some you can sometimes see, and some that you can’t. Foma are invisible, but they sneak up on you when you least expect it and force you to relive violent memories. I assume you saw some bad shit last night before you ran into me?”

  Stolen novel; please report.

  “You could say that…”

  “Was it your first time?”

  “I’ve seen dead people before,” he said, plucking at the grass by his side. “I’ve given people their last rites and performed funeral ceremonies in the temple, but…”

  “But they were dead or dying before you got there. This was your first time seeing someone really die, wasn’t it?” He nodded through grit teeth as the visions threatened to rear up again. “Foma are attracted to people right after fucked up shit, especially if its their first brush with death. You’ll probably struggle with them for a while, but their grip fades with time. I’m just sorry your first attack was in the wildlands instead of the city.”

  “I thought vit didn’t go into cities?”

  “Nah. Highways and cities are safer than the wildlands, but not untouchable. Vit with physical forms don’t really get near them, but the invisible ones can still get in. If they do, they’re usually weaker though, so it’s still better than nothing.”

  “I see. So are foma afraid of grass?”

  “What?” she half asked, half laughed, causing him to blush in embarrassment.

  “I just mean… you were making me brush the grass and that brought me back here. Is that a trick to scaring them off?”

  “Oh…” she said, her busy hands freezing for a second. “No, you can’t really scare them away, but you can bring yourself back to your senses by focusing on something real. It can be a feeling, a sound, a smell. Anything really. The grass was just the easiest option under the circumstances.”

  “Good to know,” he said, making a mental note of that for the future. “Any other vit I should watch out for?”

  She turned to him for a second, her eyes prying at his. “You’re asking a lot of questions. I thought Advocates were supposed to know things?”

  “Fam’e says that we are all students and teachers to each other. There are many things I do know, but there are far more I don’t.”

  Her gaze seemed to relax at that. “There are too many to go over, so for now just don’t look backward if we’re on the run again.”

  “A wikva!” he exclaimed, recalling her words from earlier. “You mentioned it when I looked back, but I didn’t understand what you meant. Is it another vit?”

  “Yup. If you’re focused too much on where you’re coming from, they pull you back toward it. Stop and take a breath before you look back next time.”

  “Noted.”

  “Now that’s enough rest,” she said, shoving everything back into the sack. “I’m gonna hide this again and then we’ve gotta get moving.”

  Without waiting for a response, she slung it over her shoulder and started climbing. A groan escaped Lovu’s throat as he pushed himself to his feet. A moment later, she dropped down beside him again and he finally got a good look at what she had changed with her equipment – she now had a sword and knife strapped to her belt with a bow latched onto her back.

  It was illegal for anyone other than Honors to carry weapons in Hangkiti. Knives were commonplace, but you could easily be arrested for holding one in public unless its purpose was clear. Bows were less common, but still allowed for hunters. Swords were outright forbidden. He had more or less assumed that Topal was a Scar up until then, but seeing proof of it so plainly made his blood run cold.

  “It’s gonna be another four hours that way,” she said, not acknowledging his reaction. “That’s when we’ll hit forest and finally be able to take a real break. That should be enough space to make sure anyone following us loses our trail.”

  “Following us?” he asked, but looking backward, he realized just how obvious their tracks were. Her footprints were subtle but still completely visible and his long dragging steps practically drew a line directly to them.

  But… we made it out of the city. Surely they wouldn’t follow us this far, right?

  New fear overwrote his apprehension over the weapons.

  Topal, on the other hand, was completely unbothered as she fiddled with a tinder box to light the end of a bundle of herbs. As soon as the tip caught fire, she started wafting the trailing smoke over herself, then turned to do the same to him. As soon as she finished, she snubbed out the fire on her palm, then bowed her head and pulled out a stone coin to press to her lips. It was obvious enough that she was praying and performing some kind of ritual, but it looked nothing like any Lovu had studied.

  “Mother of your cruel night, your children seek refuge in the cloak of deepest moonlight,” she said, barely loud enough for him to hear. Finally, a full body dread washed out every other thought. The prayer was new to him, but one thing was unmistakable: the Mother of Cruel Nights was one of Kumam’s epithets. “Guide our feet to move unseen and lead our pursuers astray.”

  As she finished speaking, she pressed the coin to the sole of one foot, then the other. Finally, she turned to him, knelt down, and held out a hand, signaling him to lift his.

  “I-I am not sure I’m comfortable-”

  Instead of dissuading her, his protest only drove her to act for him, forcibly lifting his foot and touching the coin to it. From that small point of contact, he felt ice spike up through his body and his breath turned to mist even though it was balmy and warm. Just as quickly, she dropped that foot and swiped the other, fully knocking him onto his ass and causing his lips to chatter. Then, she walked down to the base of the hill, poked a small hole into the mud, and buried the coin inside. As soon as she did, the chill vanished, his cold sweat the only reminder that it existed in the first place.

  “That should cover us,” she said, walking back to him and offering him a hand up with a glare. “Next time, don’t interrupt me. That shit’s expensive and I don’t feel like wasting it.”

  “What did you just do?!” he asked, frantically looking at the undersides of his shoes, but there was no noticeable difference.

  “Just a little trick I picked up to cover our tracks. You should know how it works. Advocates do the same shit.”

  “We most certainly do not! That was a prayer to Kumam. Do you want to bring ruin down on our heads?”

  “Different god, same thing,” she said, waving him off dismissively.

  “No it is not!” he said, putting emphasis on every single word. “Advocates serve Fam’e, the goddess of benevolence and peace dedicated to protecting and serving humanity. Kumam is her wicked sister who acts only to tear down her siblings’ work. Everything she does is meant to force us back into the dark ages of fear and chaos. You are actively calling out to her and drawing her ire!”

  “Look, I don’t know what your deal is, but you can relax,” she said, walking away. “I’ve done this plenty of times and it always works. I’m not going to bring ruin down on our heads or whatever shit they taught you in the temple.”

  “If you do it that often, it makes sense why you’re spending your days hanging around rivers of poop. You insist it won’t harm us, but look where that has gotten you.”

  Her back was to him so he couldn’t see her face, but he could feel the air grow stiller. Like a boulder on his shoulders, the silence pressed him down into the earth. When she turned, her face was a flat smile. It reminded him of certain Lords he had met before – a solid mask meant to politely refuse any emotion.

  She walked back toward him until she was standing just inches from his face. Every instinct told him to move, but the weight wouldn’t let him. He was just as helpless as when Tama loomed over him.

  “My life has always been this way. I’ve spent my time around rivers of poop ever since I was a child, long before I had even heard the name Kumam, let alone learned how to call on her. Do you know why?”

  Lovu carefully shook his head, worried that any wrong movement would cause the stillness to break.

  “Because I was born there, just like my parents were. I have spent my whole life trying to leave that river of shit only to be slapped down every step of the way. Do you know who was doing the slapping?

  Another nervous shake of his head.

  “People like you,” she said, firmly poking him in the forehead with the fingers she had used to dig the hole moments ago. Lovu could feel the cool smear of mud clinging to his skin but was too scared to wipe it away. “Lords, nobles, merchants, Honors. I have a story for each and every one of how they personally shunted me back into the shit. But sure, keep telling me it’s some magical lady’s fault because she’s pissed at her overachieving sister. I’m sure that’ll help you sleep better at night.”

  “That isn’t-,” he said, swallowing heavily. “I didn’t mean to cause offense. It’s just-”

  “Just nothing,” she said, turning away and walking off. “I’m doing this because I know your Lordly friends will pay handsomely once they have you safely in hand. I don’t need your approval or pity, but don’t question my methods again unless you’d rather go wandering through the wildlands on your own. Now come on.”

  Without another look back, she started the trek through the muddy fields. The pressure left Lovu, and he could finally feel his breath return, but his mouth just hung open.

  I didn’t… That wasn’t my… You don’t understand…

  He worked his jaw to find the right words to fix what had just happened, but not a single one felt right. Instead, he bowed his head and followed after her, stepping out into the sea of brown ahead of them.