Chapter 18

  One cannot be expected only to succeed. Failure brings with it scars and lessons that should be cherished. Do not look down upon those who fail then, only offer them a hand so that they may try again once more.

  -Collected Teachings of the Exalted Sovereign

  Charon sat, breath heavy, seeing through dozens of different pairs of eyes all at once that were all connected to him. It took concentration to focus purely on his own set of eyes, only to see that his brother and his two companions were staring at him. With great effort he pushed himself to his feet; the bodies stood idly by without his commands. His brother was speaking to him but he didn’t quite register the words. He felt as if he was floating and sound was muffled as his teal eyes locked onto the bodies that were under his control.

  “Charon!” Phaidros called, finally snapping the older brother’s attention to him. Charon didn’t respond still; he knew what Phaidros was asking about. He wished it hadn’t been revealed like this but under that creature’s power he had panicked and couldn’t think of any other solution than to use it.

  The large zhuk was poking one of the corpses, which barely registered he was there. “Hello? I am talking to you, little human. How did your hands become swords? I am very curious.”

  Zenovia was just staring in silence, whatever thoughts she may have were hidden beneath her visor, but there was a cold intensity behind it that made Charon uncomfortable.

  “I…” Charon began, not sure how to explain what he had done. “I saved you,” he eventually settled on. “All of you.”

  “We had it under control,” the zhuk interrupted. They certainly didn’t, but Charon was still too dazed to argue.

  “How did you get the bodies to move?” Zenovia asked, tone curt.

  Charon hesitated, he could tell them everything, but it wouldn’t make anything better. There was only one thing he could do, tell the truth and hope that Phaidros would see reason to side with him. “Remember what I told you? I had found a way to fight alongside you.” He gestured around them all to the shuffling corpses. “This was it.”

  “Charon… look at what you’ve done to them,” Phaidros said, horror present in his voice as he gestured to the twisted configurations that were forced upon them by Charon.

  Charon opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again, he placed a hand atop his bag that held the book and took a step back. The corpses around him all began to shuffle towards him lazily. Before long they stood with Charon and turned to face the Ignited. “It doesn’t matter,” he eventually said. “I helped you all and I wasn’t even ignited. You should all be thanking me,” he said, an anxious laugh leaving him as he spoke. He looked to his brother. “I told you, I told you I would be ready when the time comes and I was. If I wasn’t here, you would have died. Now you’re alive, we all won, against a Shaped Beast at that. What does it matter how I did it?”

  More figures began to approach now, Ignited, of all different shapes and sizes clad in dark chitin armor, who had seen that the creature had been slain from the distance and came to check up on the would-be heroes. They were in their private channels because Charon could hear the clicking coming from all of their helmets. Phaidros only spared them a glance before taking a step towards Charon. “You did and I’m thankful for that, Charon… but this?” He gestured to the corpses surrounding him. “It… it isn’t right. It isn’t natural. Why don’t you release whatever hold you have on them all and we can speak to Suneater about what happened? They’ll want to hear about this.”

  That made Charon’s eyes widen and he took a step back, the horde around him beginning to shift restlessly. “I… I can’t. Suneater will try to take it all away. I know they will. Then I’ll just be Cindered again,” he explained, a frightened tremble in his voice.

  Up above, everyone noticed the sound of groaning branches as the giant tree that shifted above them all began to sway, side to side. Moments later all of the Ignited with their visors on saw the sigil of the Suneater in their display. “All Ignited. You must seize Charon at once. Subdue him, he must be brought in for questioning.”

  Charon watched as all gazes turned toward him. A few already began to move toward him but Phaidros quickly ran forward, putting himself between the Ignited and Charon. Dom moved to his side by instinct but Zenovia stayed where she was. “Wait! Sacred Suneater, just let me talk to him. I’ll get him to come peacefully, there is no need,” Phaidros begged.

  “No,” Suneater replied. “Every moment he is free is a danger to us all. Seize him.”

  The Ignited began to move in again and Charon backed up and away toward the jungle, placing the horde between him and the Ignited. He looked around frantically before spotting the corpse of the Shaped Beast.

  Phaidros had leveled his sword, Dom following suit with his hammer. Zenovia sighed. “Step aside, you two, this is for his own good. Whatever is going on the Suneater will make sure nothing bad happens to…” She hesitated as she glanced off to the side and watched as the Shaped Beast twitched and groaned before slowly pushing itself to its feet. Its single eye burning a bright teal color. It let out a wet-sounding hiss, blood drooling from its mouth and it made even the Ignited begin to back away.

  “Charon, wait,” Phaidros pleaded. “What are you doing?”

  Charon saw now through the eye of the beast, but this would not be enough. He was going to need more. He looked up to the soul of the beast still floating away into the sky and reached for it. The soul flew right back towards him like a bullet before coming to a sudden halt and hovered around him. With his other hand he willed his spear back into his hand. “I can’t go back. I won’t let you,” he said, bitterness in his tone. “I worked hard for all of this, just like the Exalted Sovereign wanted and because you all find it distasteful you wish to tear it away from me?” he yelled, anger rising in his weak voice. The horde and beast begin to growl. “No. I’m done being the bad omen of what you shouldn’t be or shouldn’t become.” He grimaced, stepping further away. “Phaidros, don’t let them take me, I don’t want to go back to how I was.” All Phaidros did was stare at him, wordlessly. He didn’t need to see his eyes to know how Phaidros looked at him, with that same look of pity that all the others gave him. Hope dwindled, he had his reanimated and the shaped soul, but he could not stop all of Dasos. So he did the only thing he could do—he ran, all of the bodies following after him.

  “After him, now!” Suneater’s voice called over the comms. The Ignited began to move, brandishing weapons.

  “I call forth the rite of vengeance!” Phaidros quickly spat into the comms, voice panicked. All of the Ignited froze.

  Zenovia finally approached, teeth clenched as she spoke. “Idiot boy, what are you doing?”

  Phaidros continued quickly. “My brother has forsaken the city and left it in danger as you said. I have a right to be able to fix this personally in the eyes of the Exalted Sovereign himself.”

  Dom put himself between Zenovia and Phaidros. “He has a point. This is a matter to be settled between family before it comes to the rest of us,” he said over the comms.

  Silence followed and like an angry shuddering of leaves, Suneater spoke. “Phaidros, you are to report to the temple at once. All other Ignited, you are to remain mobilized. Clear the Merchant’s District.” The Ignited quietly did as directed and Phaidros let out a small sigh of relief.

  Dom turned to Phaidros. “You will not have to speak to the Ideal alone, Phaidros, we are a hunting party and as agreed I will see this through to the end.”

  “But the beast is dead,” Phaidros said in confusion.

  “I believe we saw different things, as I saw it get right back up again and walk off with your brother.” Phaidros could hear the grin behind Dom’s voice. “Not often do we get a second chance to take on a challenge such as that. Besides, I want vengeance for my armor.” He tapped the destroyed sections of it, where chitin was already beginning to slowly fill back in with glistening white ever so slowly.

  Zenovia frowned. “You’ve made a mistake here, Phaidros, but if I can honor your father’s memory by keeping you safe then I will,” she said with a nod. “I just wish you didn’t let Charon off like that. We should have captured him then plead for Suneater’s mercy.”

  Phaidros sighed. “I just need a chance to talk to him one on one, this is my chance to do that. Otherwise who knows what Charon could have done or what they would have done to him.” The other two nodded. “Well, let’s not keep Suneater waiting then. I have a feeling the time table for this rite will not be nearly as forgiving as the last one was. “

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  The three re-entered the city. Dom, despite his injuries, was insistent on seeing this all through to the end. He was the only one who truly got hurt during the fight which in itself was a miracle and if he hadn’t then Phaidros would be dead for sure. The three made their way up to the stone temple at the base of the great tree where Suneater awaited them… or at least, the avatar of them was. The tree itself was the Ideal, but the person that stood before it was just an extension. Phaidros knew that, but without life sense he had never really thought much about it. Phaidros got a strange sense of dread when he looked into its potential and saw a similar ball of fire without a soul connecting it to the soul of the tree, which shone large and brilliantly like a small sun. It had the same shape as Suneater’s sigil, stiff branches of fire surrounding teeth devouring a sun. The fire within the person was white, as all ignited potential was, but after seeing what Charon had done he wasn’t so sure its origins were so honorable.

  Suneater spoke before they even reached the great root that it stood upon. “Just what are you thinking? Calling a Rite of Vengeance now of all times. Every moment that Charon is left to his own devices he endangers us all even further. To fight a Shaped Beast is one thing, but you now tread the grounds where the dead walk, beings beyond the touch of the Exalted Sovereign.”

  Phaidros reached up to his helmet and pulled it off to look into Suneater’s glowing eyes. “He’s my brother, Suneater,” he said with far more confidence than he felt. “I’m not going to just sit idly by and let the Ignited descend upon him like a pack of hungry wolves.”

  “Your brother,” Suneater repeated, tone picking up like a windstorm, “will invite ruin upon us all if it saves his pride.”

  Zenovia spoke up next. “You know what is going on here, Suneater. Phaidros will be facing his brother alone and he will need to know what he is going up against lest he die.”

  “I am considering letting that happen as punishment for the stunt you pulled in the Merchant’s District.” Suneater bit back before steadying themselves, taking a deep breath that sounded like a gust of wind. “Forgive me, the power that Charon used is ancient. I have remained watchful for it for eons, always knowing one day I would see it again, but its masters are patient beings. All it takes is one lapse of guard for it to slip through.”

  “But what is it?” Phaidros repeated, more insistent this time.

  Suneater sighed. “Vitaemancy, power over life and with it, death,” they answered. “It hails from the Amaranthine Planes, in lands where there are no stars and dead roam the lands eternal. This is not ‘Memory’ or where souls go to reincarnate. It is something else, something far more sinister. You need only look up at the sky to see it, to one as young as you all you might not even notice, but having lived as long as I have… I have seen the stars in the sky wink out one by one, each another world claimed by them.

  “As to why you have never heard of it? For your own good,” Suneater explained. “Charon must have received one of their books. Its power is great and mighty. It does not require the sacrifice of one’s self that potential does. One barely even needs to understand the power they wield to use it, to the book’s very design. If the public were to know of this ancient power, many would wish to seek it out, ignorant or uncaring of its cost.”

  “And what is the cost?” Dom asked. “So far I am only hearing positives.”

  “Slavery,” Suneater answered. “Oh it is a chain that extends far or a cage where you never even notice the bars. Yet by using it, you put yourself in his power. The power is borrowed and he may claim it at any time and you along with it. With potential, your power is your own, with no one being able to take it from you save yourself and your own actions. Yet such is life.”

  Phaidros’ eyes widened as he stepped forward. “Then my brother is in danger?”

  “Are you not listening, boy?” Suneater hissed. “We’re all in danger. You saw what it did to the Shaped Beast. It burned him yes, as if he had touched the metaphysical flame himself, yet now he hides away in the jungle, sapping the life from all around him and most likely growing an army. Not to mention the Shaped Soul he has now claimed, a soul that he may be able to bond to himself to gain the creature’s power.” Suneater pointed at him. “And now he has the time to do so, thanks to you. I plead with you to revoke your rite of vengeance and allow us to descend upon him now before he grows more powerful.”

  It felt odd that an Ideal was pleading to him for anything, but the rite of vengeance was something sacred. The Order of the Ignited was a religion and organization that prized self-improvement above all, to deny anyone a chance to do so was nothing short of sacrilege in the eyes of the Exalted Sovereign. “No,” Phaidros answered, shaking his head and speaking before Suneater could cut him off. “Doing so will only make it worse. If I go, there is still a chance to save him. The Exalted Sovereign tells us to not look down on those who have failed, only reach out a hand so that they may try and get up again. I will not deny my brother that chance.”

  Now Suneater’s voice turned pitying. “He does not want to get up, he wants to bury himself where no one can look.”

  “Then I will pull him out,” Phaidros answered, determined.

  Suneater sighed again. A moment of silence passed through the room before they finally replied. “You have till the sun sets tomorrow to bring your brother back, dead or alive.”

  Phaidros let out a sigh of relief, bowing his head. “Thank you, Sacred Suneater. I will not fail.”

  “You cannot,” Suneater replied. “And due to the severity of the task at hand, I will offer you assistance, so that should the worst come to pass and I am right, you will have a fighting chance.” They reached out a hand. “Your sword, give it to me.”

  Phaidros hesitated, surprised by the offer before he stepped forward, taking his sword and offering it to Suneater. The Ideal slipped from the branch gracefully before gently taking the sword by the hilt in one hand while the other gently rested upon the blade.

  They turned away from Phaidros and stepped back up onto the root before taking a knee and lifted the sword, head bowed. “All living beings have potential, we are able to grow and change as our life continues, what we do with it is how we shape the form it will take. An object is nothing without the hand that holds it. Thus, we determine the potential of every tool at our disposal. For a Shaped and beyond? This is literal.”

  A single branch curled its way down from the tree and into the room as it touched the blade. The length of steel burst into an ethereal fire that bathed the room in the light of life. “And so, I imbue your blade with a piece of me and my potential. From now on, your sword will devour all that stands in your way.”

  The three Ignited stood in awe of the flame in front of them. “A shaped weapon…” Dom muttered under his breath. “The greatest gift a Shaped can bestow, a piece of themselves upon another. You are truly blessed, little friend. I could only dream to one day hold such a fine tool in my hands.”

  They couldn’t see what was happening, but soon the flame began to die and the branch retreated. Suneater turned, the last essence of flame lapping at the air as the Ideal held the sword aloft. Where before the blade was straight edged and simple, now near the hilt were teeth like serrations with the blade hooking elegantly one way like a sharpened fang. They descended from the root to hold the sword back out to Phaidros by the hilt, “use it well. For all of our sakes. If you die, your brother will not be able to use it unless he is Ignited, so be at peace knowing that.”

  Phaidros gently took it by the hilt, feeling the heat of his soul extend to the blade in his hand as if it were an extension of him. When he switched to his life sense, he saw the weapon too as a length of fire with the silhouette of gnashing fangs in the flames. He then looked to Suneater and bowed deeply. “Thank you, Sacred Suneater. I am undeserving of such a gift.”

  “If you succeed, you do deserve it,” Suneater answered. “The Ignited do not idly give gifts to those who do otherwise.”

  Phaidros nodded, then looked to the others apologetically. “…I am sorry, you two, but this something I have to do alone.”

  Both Zenovia and Dom flinched at that, Zenovia speaking up first. “You cannot be serious.”

  “I just made a big deal about killing that beast a second time,” Dom complained.

  Phaidros shook his head. “I cannot have you die for my rite this time. This is between me and my brother.” He looked down. “You both will be needed in the defense should I fail and Dom will need time for his armor to recover and…” He looked up just in time to see Zenovia’s fist crash into his visor.

  It connected with a crack, making Phaidros reel back as Zenovia followed through with the punch, finger raised as Phaidros caught himself. “Nice try, boy. I had to leave your father to his fate once and he died. I’m not going to do that to you too. You can tell us to stay behind all you want but I’ll just follow you anyway, rite be damned.”

  Phaidros then looked to Dom, who shrugged. “I would punch you too but you need your helmet. I will not be going for your brother, I will be going for the beast. It is a good compromise, you see,” he said with a sagely nod.

  “But your armor—” Phaidros tried to reason.

  “Bah, the armor makes me protected but slow. A good hammer is all I need—and maybe pick up some drasil fruit from the medical bay.”

  Phaidros then looked to Suneater for help and they offered none. They didn’t want him to go alone either, and three was still traditional for the rites anyway. If Phaidros continued to argue Suneater would simply shrug their shoulders.

  Dom rounded Phaidros and slipped an arm over his shoulder. “You’re stuck with us, little friend. I am sorry to say. It is best you choose only the easy battles because if you thought fighting the Shaped Beast was hard, hah! You will be wishing that I let you die back in that fight.”

  Zenovia nodded in agreement. “Whatever your brother has in store for us… we’ll be ready, but we’ll leave him to you. It’ll be all on you to get him to stand down… please try to do that before those monsters of his kill us.”

  Phaidros looked at them all in disbelief for a moment before he sighed in defeat. “Alright, you both can come with me.”

  “We know,” they said in unison, pointedly.

  “…and thank you both, for standing with me through this,” Phaidros said. “It is nice to know that I am not alone here.”

  Dom laughed. “You are Ignited! You are never alone.” He pushed off of Phaidros’ shoulders as he began to make his way out of the temple. “Now come! We should not keep your brother waiting! From everything I have heard he is an impatient man.”

  Phaidros smiled at that, looking to Zenovia once and nodding, this time with more confidence, then the two followed after Dom.

  “Be careful, Ignited,” Suneater called after them. “For the powers of death will tear you asunder otherwise and we will have three more enemies we will need to contend with.”

  Phaidros looked over his shoulder towards Suneater, hesitating, then nodding before continuing on. It would not come to that, he would talk his brother down and he would lead him home. Charon had saved his life today, Phaidros would do the same for him.