35

The path to complete consciousness was cobbled by spells of agony. Ethos resisted the darkness, which crept perpetually toward him, soundless. It wasn't unlike being underwater, when even the closest sounds were distant; he was at great depths, crushed beneath inescapable weight.

Sometimes he'd see faces, above. He didn't recognize them, but the devastating grief in their eyes made it clear to him that he should have. He couldn't speak, couldn't think. His every function was lost to the pain, dumbed down to instinct and clumsy survival.

A ceiling was the first thing he saw. It was a fine ceiling. It gleamed in a way that only freshly-peeled timber did. Repairs, he guessed. Ship repairs. He could feel the craft gently rocking around him. 

An excruciating crane of the neck, lengthwise toward his feet, revealed fresh dressings across his gut. He tried to peel them back, to see, but stopped when even that marginal movement tore a sound of anguish out of him. He didn't move for several minutes, breathing shallow, scolding himself.

The cabin was plain, but the bed was comfortable. He couldn't tell which ship he was in. After discarding a few pretty awful ideas, he slowly inched backward and shimmied his shoulders against the headboard. From there, albeit in pain and unevenly slumped, he could see the entirety of the cabin. It was spacious and windowed from three different sides, furnished by an old weathered desk and a larger table for eating. There were smaller items throughout, books and knives and pelts strung about, decks of cards and empty glasses.

A Battlefrost rig, if the goods were any indication. Anouk's cabin. The bed seemed large for such a small person. Further investigation yielded a pewter pitcher on a bed stand; it shone in the natural light streaming in, just out of reach. Drily, he imagined that it was empty.

The door opened across the cabin. More light— it hurt to look directly at it, so he shielded his eyes until he heard the jamb fall back into place.

It was Peter. He looked worn out. Something had scratched up the side of his face pretty good. He stared at Ethos for a second and said, "Welcome back."

Ethos couldn't read his expression. A first. "You okay?"

"Aye, fine." Peter stooped to retrieve a document from the floor. He scanned it before setting it down on the table. "And you?" he asked. "How do you feel?"

"I'm sure you can tell just by looking at me."

Peter approached. "You have a good pother," he said. "She suffered all night over you. Wouldn't stop for anything."

"Did she follow us north?"

"Not quite." He took a seat in the bedside chair. Again, he stooped to retrieve something fallen. A glass, this time. He wiped it clean with the bottom of his shirt. "Alma paid her a visit," he said. "Just after we left."

Ethos frowned. "Why?"

"Dunno. That's all I got out of her."

"Where is she now?"

"About. Resting. About and resting. Either or." Peter took a moment to fill the glass. "Ozwell's been briefed," he went on, meaning Michael. "Doesn't remember anything, of course. Typical. Rhysa's acting pother on the blackhound, but Kacha wouldn't let her touch you. Hard to say if Ozwell would've allowed it. Trust issues. Everyone's tense."

"Are the soldiers cordoned off?"

"Aye, due west of the Heed. By the evergreens."

"What about Eadric? Has there been any sign of him?"

Peter held out the water. "Here," he said, and he watched Ethos drink, silent again. "He left a note for you. I have no idea how it got in my stuff."

Ethos wiped his mouth. "Yeah?"

"He wants to talk. Dawn."

"Dawn, huh." Ethos glared at the glass and asked, "Where?"

"Gael. It's a ghost town, a few hours out." Peter opened the bed stand drawer. He produced a sprig of oupir. "Take this," he said, an offering. "The worst is over. We need you mobile."

Ethos traded him for it. "The tono aren't safe here."

"They have nowhere else to go."

Problematic. "Tell Michael to take his men and leave," Ethos said. "There's no telling which ones are marked. I can't use them."

"They've all been disarmed."

"It doesn't matter. They're eyes and ears."

"Which makes them a risk factor."

"Obviously."

"Ethos." Peter sat forward, elbows on his knees. His bearing was more intense than usual. Firmly, he asked, "Are we on the same page, brother?"

"That's an annoying question."

"I can be more direct."

The cabin was horribly suffocating. Ethos pressed his back against the headboard. "Drop the act, Peter," he muttered, fighting spins. "This doesn't surprise you. The only thing you learned last night was Eadric's identity as Redbeard, and honestly— it's a good thing. We're back to square one. We get after his corpse and we set it on fire."

"He's your father."

"He's not. I don't have a father."

"You can't reject the truth just because you don't like it."

Ethos heaved a quiet sigh, eager to get away. "I'll talk it over with Pathos."

"Aye, do that. I'd like this all figured out before we leave for Gael." Peter saw his expression and smirked, hollow-eyed. "You're not going alone," he said. "Complain all you want about it."

"I will. I don't want you there."

"Tough shit." Big words, but he gave a nervous start when Ethos tried to straighten. He cleared his throat, caught, and averted his eyes. Too late to hide what wasn't and was. "I'm coming," he said. "You can't stop me, Ethos. I have every right. I'm involved in this whether you like it or not."

"You think you've done me wrong somehow."

Peter glanced back. "What?"

"Have you?"

"It's not important."

"I can't forgive you unless you tell me."

Peter's mouth formed a very hard, familiar line. "I really do hate you sometimes," he said. "I swear you're like this deliberately just to make it easier on me."

Ethos grinned. "I'm not that thoughtful."

"No, of course not." Peter rubbed his eyes, his face. He sank forward. "When Una died, it triggered a sort of reset," he admitted. "I know what she used me for in those final weeks, the position I put you in by not listening. I know you tried in your own way to stop it."

There was movement, topside— pattering feet. "Don't think about it."

"I can't just not think about it, Ethos."

"I forgive you. It's fine."

"Nothing's fine. You don't understand."

Ethos could feel a headache coming on. "Alright, explain it to me."

"You just make me so angry." Peter fell silent, but his pulse was loud. "I might have thought you deserved it a little," he confessed, and he took his face in his hands, head bent. "I know it's bad. You don't have to say it. Just— don't."

Honesty, Ethos mused. The sad, rare bird. "Maybe I tease you more than I should," he said, and he flexed his fingers, testing numbness. "I'll stop."

Peter quickly looked up. "No," he said. "Don't change."

Ethos managed a quarter turn. He stopped there on the edge of the bed to breathe and wait for the pain to hit him. When it didn't, he purposefully looked at Peter. "Try to understand," he suggested. "I'm not going to sit here having suffered a near mortal wound just to comfort you for occasionally feeling violent toward me. I get it and I forgive you."

Peter frowned in confusion. "It doesn't bother you?"

"No. At least not like you're imagining." Ethos waited for a roll of nausea to pass. "I forgive you," he repeated, and that would be that. "Now tell me where I can find Anouk."

Shiftily: "She's unavailable."

"I'm going to need you to expand on that."

"It's the tono. They have her." Peter immediately stopped him from rising. "Easy," he said. "She killed one of their elders. Some guy named Leemai."

"I know. I told her to do it."

Wisely, Peter neglected to comment. "They're afraid of you," he said, instead. "They say you can control them. There's talk of sealing you away like Alma."

Ethos scoffed at that. "They can't seal me. They have no power."

"It's true, then," Peter said. "You can control them— like Una controlled me."

"Similar." Ethos went to his feet. Peter didn't try to stop him this time. "The Battlefrost crew must be on the warpath," he said, stretching a little. "Any fights? Fatalities?"

"Not yet," Peter grunted. "Give it time." 

Ethos unsteadily went for the door; his wound didn't hurt, but functioning on oupir was always an unusual experience. He could hardly feel what his legs were doing. "Do me a favor and deal with Michael and the battalion," he said. "Talking to him makes my head hurt. Same with Rhysa."

Behind him, Peter asked, "What are you going to do?"

Ethos opened the door. Kacha and Alyce were standing out on the main deck beyond, bathed in the afternoon sunshine. They looked neither nervous nor eager to see him. Alyce approached regardless to hug him; she greeted him the same way Peter had— welcome back. Like he'd been off somewhere.

Ethos gave her a squeeze. Her hair smelled clean. "I'm sorry I pushed you, hero."

"It's okay," she grumbled, hidden. "Stupid monster."

Kacha murmured his name. She was the fine pewter pitcher, just out of reach, kicking off golden daylight. "We need to talk," she told him. "Is now a good time?"

Ethos nodded and patted Alyce's back, letting her know that she had to let go. Beside them, Peter scanned the main; there were ten or so men about their duties, three on the higher deck dead astern. He whistled at the latter and waved them down.

The two ships dwarfed the sprawling anchorage. Ethos admired the familiar shoreline as Kacha led him up to the vacated rear. The wind was stronger there, rattling lines and braces. He squinted out at the Oldden vessel; Nautilus, it read, turning broadside.

"It was metal, you know," Kacha said, to his left. "The Monolith."

Redbeard's ship, spearhead of the fleet. "Was it?"

"It was. Black clouds followed it."

"Storm clouds?"

"No. Something uglier." Sidelong, she traded a glance with him. "Perhaps that's why he ordered it scuttled," she said, only joking in part. "He sensed our revulsion."

With a frown, Ethos asked, "He sank it?"

"To the bottom of Onaga Blight."

He studied her face. "Did Alma hurt you?"

"No." Kacha folded her arms on the bulwark. She rested [MH1] her chin and sighed. "She'll come for you when she's done with Hans," she said. "You're to play your role against her."

"Prophecy, yeah? Isn't that why she killed the original?"

Kacha harrumphed. She peered up at him. "Alma was trapped for centuries," she said. "And she wasn't asleep. She was thinking in there; maybe wishing, regretting."

Ethos scowled outright. "Are you trying to make me feel bad for her?"

"No, you fool. I want you to understand her." Kacha looked back at the water, perhaps resigned to the mist and the madness. "She loves you in her own strange way," she continued. "I think it makes perfect sense to her, ending it. It's your misfortune."

"I don't execute people, Kacha."

"That's good. She doesn't want an execution."

Ethos felt the pit in his stomach expand. "What does she want?"

"Mutual destruction." Her gaze returned, dark and fond. "It's what she made you for."

Reminded, uncertain, he looked at the ground. "Kacha… about that, I— "

"He was a lovely boy," she cut in. "I was there when he was born. An archetype, possessing all the qualities desirable in a tono." Kacha touched his face. She smiled and laughed. "All except here. Such stunning blue eyes, so foreign. I'd never seen anything like it."

He stared, short on comfort. "I'm not him, Kacha."

"No," she agreed, and her smile spread. "You cry far less than he did."

Ethos wanted to kiss her, but she wouldn't have it. She'd scold him. Hands in his pockets, he turned around and leaned back against the bulwark. "You shouldn't have come here," he said. "I don't know how much longer I'll be around for."

She turned with him. "You're becoming a doomsayer."

"That's not what I meant." Ethos caught her eye. "What else did she say?"

Kacha glared at the busy Battlefrost rig, jaw moving marginally. She was grinding her teeth. "She doesn't know you like I do," she said. "She thinks she can get you to hate her."

"I don't feel anything in particular toward her."

"I told her it was impossible." 

"Everything's impossible until it isn't."

Kacha's eyes jumped back up to him; there was fear there, at depths. "She will incinerate everyone you care about if she thinks it will turn you against her. Don't be dismissive."

Hate. The time crook. The wasteful thing. Stealing priority when attention was clearly required elsewhere. Ethos forced himself to recall when Kacha had nearly met her end. Dripping and half-collapsed on the tub, he'd invented reasons for her stillness.

Ethos was the one to break eye contact. His fingers found the ends of her hair. "I'm still missing some pieces," he explained. "Someday I won't be."

"Fool," she said. "You're sure?"

"No." He mustached himself, weighed by her gaze. "But I never used to get angry, you know," he told her. "Envy. Fear. Shame. Remorse. None of it came naturally to me."

Kacha yanked her hair away from him. "Any exceptions?"

"Joy, I guess." Ethos paused, recalling several pasts at once. "That's more Ludo's opinion than mine," he realized. "I mean— I was just a kid at the time. I was too busy running around to give a hard thought to how I was acting. I didn't realize I was doing it wrong."

"You're more human than you give yourself credit for." Kacha was smiling again when he finally looked back at her. "You think we're all born with a grasp for remorse?" she tested. "We touch fire and learn of pain. We lose our way and learn of fear. These are things life's meant to teach us. All of us."

Ethos couldn't smile with her. "Why are you being so nice to me?"

"Fool. I'm always nice to you."

"But you should be upset with me. The way I behaved."

Kacha's eyes said it all. She squeezed his arm. "We were in a tight spot," she charged. "You were justified in your desperation to find out where you came from. Regret nothing."

He knew she'd scoff and call him a fool if he tried to apologize properly, so he didn't. Instead, he touched his bandaged torso and asked, "How healed am I?"

Suspicion narrowed her steady gaze. "Why?"

"Peace of mind. I'd like to swim." He almost laughed when she glowered at him. "That came out wrong," he said. "It's not for play, I swear."

She studied him disapprovingly. "You've taken your oupir."

"Peter gave me some. From the farm, I'm guessing. Does it matter?"

"Bah," she stormed. "You could worsen yourself without even noticing. Fool."

"I wouldn't be up and about if I didn't need to be." Ethos glanced out over the bulwark. The lake was calm down below, gleaming. He could feel himself being watched from the depths. "I need to go," he said, to Kacha. "Please stay with Peter."

She seized his hand before he could jump. "What are you planning?"

Her skin was cold. Everybody's was. Ethos stopped and kissed her knuckles, warmed them against his face. "I won't be long," he promised, and he hoped it was true. "Please don't argue."

"Are you saying please on purpose to avoid telling me what to do?"

"You might be resistant, but I know it hurts."

"Dumb fox. It hurts enough when you shut me out."

Ethos smiled; he enjoyed how easily he could make her heart race. "Some of the most powerful gods are stationary by nature," he said, meaning Harken. "I'll be far worse than a king of fools if I don't reach out while I'm here. Don't you think?"

Kacha seemed to understand. She gave a nod. "Be good," she said. "Be safe."

Ethos hoisted himself overboard. The fall was brief. His dive was smooth. It was quieter down there, blissfully so, but he knew the water was too cold to linger. In haste, he swam deeper, drawn by the pull, feeling his way through the reeds and the grasses. Snakes. Newts. Grubs. Worms. They channeled him through the gathering darkness, guiding light for even the blind.

The temperature dropped. The earth sloped beneath his hands. It was a plunging climb to the great below, a dive to the deep hereafter. Ethos quickly lost his center of gravity; he was ascending in a right-side-down world, losing oxygen, desperate for a merciful surface.

His first gasp for air was ragged and loud. The second, less so. Ethos drifted in silence among the pond skaters, eyes on the ceiling. Twice in one day. And it was moving, the ceiling— spiders and cave beetles, glittering, crawling. The water that had seemed so dark was carrying daylight, casting them all in glossy blue.

The embankment was in a similar state, mossy and swarming. Ethos struggled ashore, hands in a bed of centipedes; they were countless and of every known species, alive and creeping and up both his arms. He coughed once or twice and paid them no mind, grateful to breathe more than anything. 

His body felt unusually heavy. The atmosphere. He shook his hair dry and glanced around, noting in absence of light, the smell. The severed head of a massive statue was marooned some twenty paces away, turned on its side in the slurry of bugs and missing most of its face. Harken, presumably. Atop it was Harken himself, seated, cast in boundless grays of shadow.

"Son of Shima," the old god said. "Don't be afraid."

Ethos spat out the oupir. "I'm not afraid," he replied. "I'm angry."

"At me," Harken guessed, unsmiling and weary. "Yes. But you're also afraid."

His presence was a warm, dead weight; Ethos fought it and rose from the cavern floor, centipedes dripping off of his fingers. From afar, it was difficult to see the god clearly. Ethos asked him, "Are you aware of what's happening?"

"Answer. Creation with intent to destroy."

Ethos approached. The insects parted. "It's contradictory."

"Fallen gods turn on their nature. Alma's as much a beacon of despair."

"But I can stop the cycle of rebirth," he countered. "I can do to her what I did to Oubi."

"You failed with Oubi. Peter stopped you from ending his life."

"Peter won't get in the way this time." Ethos slowed at the dismembered head. Crumbs of ancient grimstone bit into the soles of his feet. "I can make peace with it, if it kills me," he said. "I just need to know that it's worth it, that I'll end it. That she'll die, too."

"But you don't embrace death."

"Do you?"

Harken's clanlike eyes were all he could make of the shadow; they were hooded, but bright, like they held a great inner light of their own. "Answer," he said. "Certain gifts come at a price. You may have the touch of death, but by nature you're designed to fully embrace the life you're taking. It's how your spirit maintains balance." He paused, briefly. Those gleaming eyes were ageless, filled with a calm sort of natural wisdom. "Alma is a compound soul of forty-one tono women," he settled. "She exists in eternal discord. If you don't die of the weight, you'll want to."

Ethos swallowed hard. He'd expected as much. "So be it."

"Still afraid. Still angry. Still Ethos."

Simple logic, very godlike. Ethos studied the weathered statue. "I never planned to return here," he muttered. "I think that's why I recreated it. To replace the loss."

"Gods favor the sure of heart. Hard questions beget hard answers."

Ethos squinted at him. "You know a lot about me."

"I feel responsible for you. You're clan."

"I'm not clan. I'm something else."

"You're something new."

"Something new?"

"Answer. Something unexpected."

"That's not an answer. Don't say answer if you don't have an answer."

"Answer. I caught you when you fell from the sky. I brought the life back to your eyes. I protected you. I kept you warm. I did this in spite of your dangerous nature." Harken slid from his own severed head. He was smaller even than Ethos, hirsute as the wild and bent with age. He was white-knuckling a staff intended for a taller creature. "You are clan, yes," he continued, quieter now, and it was his face that most resembled his people. "I feel responsible, yes. But there's blood in the soil. Too much blood. It follows you wherever you go and brings misfortune to those around you." He sold it well with his great, gleaming eyes. "You're unexpected. Something new. Hard questions beget hard answers."

Ethos glared back. "Are you the reason I don't remember the war?"

"Answer. You didn't exist during the war."

"Then what about my childhood?"

"You had no childhood."

Ethos felt his stomach turn. "Am I a real person?"

Harken finally cracked a smile. It was toothy, reminiscent of Ludo. "You're real."

"But I'm an imposter. A liar. Everything I am— it's all— "

"Endure. You can't change who you are." 

"But who even am I? Am I bad?"

"Bad? No. Nothing is bad. Not inherently. Not at its core. We learn bad. We implement bad. Bad needs an invitation."

"Then where's the delineation? Is bad still bad if it's for a greater good?"

"Answer. Bad is bad. Greater is ambiguous. The universe isn't interested in justification." 

"So it's the act itself that defines us— not the outcome."

"You assume we're bound by just one or the other."

"You can't be good if you're bad."

"Of course you can. It's the justification that's irrelevant." Harken didn't approach, but he might as well have. The pressure of him was hard on the knees. "Good or bad, right or wrong, concede to your decisions. Don't be the man who misremembers what he's done. We are indefinable creatures by nature, knots of energy dropped in a haunt, armed with weapons of choice and distinction."

"Choice," Ethos echoed. "I've had no choice."

"Prophecy can be cruel, yes. Carved out and irreparable. But the road right in front of you isn't set, and the choices you make to that end are infinite." For a brief moment, the silence breathed. "You were unexpected, yes," Harken reiterated, quiet again. "Hard questions beget hard answers. But nothing exists without good reason. Being born in someone else's image hardly exempts you."

Ethos didn't respond. He took a breath; it clouded his vision.

"Still afraid. Still angry. Still Ethos."

"A stolen name."

"And yet it's yours." 

Simple logic. "You're dying. I can tell."

Harken smiled once more. Always mild, always sad. "I thought you might," he said. "Everyone's gone, Ethos. Everyone but you and the grubs. I'd like my death to serve a purpose."

"So you want me to kill you. You're as bad as Alma."

"I saved you once. Don't leave me to fade."

Ethos knew the stakes. He couldn't turn down the help of a god, even one so close to death. "I've never assimilated with something like you."

"I'm nothing to fear."

"I've heard that before."

"Let us both be means to an end."