AKI:

The truth stands alone. Only when our perspective shifts do we see that it wears myriad faces. Though solitary, the truth is never simple, never easily understood. Impossible, even.

My thoughts were many as I trudged toward the Academy, of the past and future, and of what I had to do to bridge the two. Someone or something led me through the streets of Discipulus unerringly, each step confident yet unnoticed.

"This is unexpected." The voice was warm. Inviting. "But very much welcome."

My gaze snapped up from the sunbaked mud. Around me stood the huts of the lower quarter. And there, framed by their ugly walls, was Zo. As always, fatigue hung off her like an old lover, intimately familiar with its embrace. It sank into her eyes, made less of that reassuring smile she wore like a uniform, and leeched the youth from her complexion. A lack of time left mud on her face, stains on her clothing, and a foul odor on her breath. What little wealth she allowed herself swathed her in rags, a strip of withered fabric wrapped around her head to tame the wild, uncut tangle of her hair.

Zo went onto her toes to get a closer look at me. "You look surprised to be here."

"I am," I admitted, "but pleasantly so." It took an effort of will to not flinch away from the foulness her proximity sent up my nose.

Zo cocked her head, a hint of playfulness in her reassuring smile. "Have you come here to give or receive treatment?"

"That presumes I meant to come here."

"To receive, then. Unfortunately, I have no Tunneller at hand to treat your madness."

Behind Zo, huddled in batches, were families of Muds clotted around figures who lay on laps or stretchers. Gaunt faces sang an off-beat hymn of blood-speckled coughs and moans of pain. The sight of them sharpened my recent contemplations—the bridge I sought to build was far grander than I'd been imagining.

Zo saw the smile drop off my face. She, however, was made of sturdier stuff than I; hers remained in place as she turned and beheld the suffering that awaited our ministrations.

"I shall bring in those who warrant a bed as you clear those waiting inside." Stoic though she was, her smile was absent from her voice.

I pushed aside the curtain of frayed cloth that served as a door. Inside the clinic, air thick with heat and the scents of sweat, herbs, blood, and something even more pungent flooded into me. If despair had a smell, this would be it. I walked further into the crooked infirmary of mud. The interior was dim. Light filtered through slats in the walls and danced across rows of makeshift beds. Some were no more than straw mats. Others, crates covered in threadbare blankets. All were occupied.

A child whimpered. The sound drew me in before I reached the back of the building, where I knew the most grievous of ailments awaited. I knelt beside her, brushed damp hair from her brow, and murmured worthless encouragements. Her eyes fluttered open, briefly.

I began my work.

The girl's insides were a mess. The entire length of her stomach tract cramped violently. The pain must've been horrendous. A look at her hoarse throat told me she'd run out of cries. Or perhaps they lay trapped behind her broken voice. I'd fix that, too.

A hand fell on my shoulder just as I finished healing the girl.

"Act for the heart but with the mind," Zo said. A reprimand. I knew others needed me more. My heart won that conversation. Ignoring a child in pain was often beyond me; the wordless rhetoric of my heart was too obnoxious to defeat with logic. "Survival is the aim. How is she?"

"Stable," I said, rising. "For now. Circumstances will inevitably drop her off at your door once more, I'm sure."

My gaze drifted to a boy in the far corner, no older than five cycles, his chest rising in shallow, uneven breaths, his fragile body cocooned within his mother's embrace. His skin was pale beneath a sheen of sweat, and his hands twitched with fever. His mother twitched for altogether different reasons. She stared at me with such wanting as to evoke another debate between my heart and mind.

"What happened?" I asked.

Zo didn't answer right away. She moved to a shelf and began sorting through jars, roots, powders, tinctures, all the substandard and mundane treatments she resorted to when my creations ran dry.

"Contaminated water," she said, even then dragging me further into the building and away from the boy my eyes refused to leave. "The tanneries."

I paced myself. Pauses allowed my sensus to endure, though each cast of my Surgeon Arts chipped away at me. Those first few were the hardest. I wrestled them back from the precipice of death, but just as each patient required less of me, my sensus and control diminished, and so the difficulty never lessened. In fact, my channels were haggard long before I reached the boy and his mother.

I stood stooped over his bed. His mother sat vigil at his side, rocking him gently. Her desperation sang to me: her mouth pressed into a firm line that hid her lips, while her eyes, hazel things luminated by unshed tears, pleaded with me for all they were worth.

"Bring him closer," I said.

With the reckless fervor of a mother on the edge of despair, she surged forward with the boy in her arms.

I raised a hand. "Gently. The illness has made your son fragile."

Abashed, she obeyed, laying him at the foot of the bed with reverent care, never releasing his hand. "Please," she whispered, her voice threadbare. "Help him."

I answered not with promises, but with purpose. I slipped my hands beneath the boy's damp shirt, set one open palm on his sternum, where I felt the faint flutters of his heart, and the other on the soft rise of his abdomen, where the muscles squirmed like a bed of worms. Fever clung to him like a second skin, an unhealthy warmth that spoke of sickness.

I drew in a breath, deep and steady, and summoned the last flickering remnants of my sensus. The sensus stirred within me, sluggish, like a river run dry. I pulled harder. It trickled forth, reluctantly at first, then with a slow, aching swell. The boy groaned. If he had the strength, he'd have screamed.

"Hold him still," I said, my voice strained. "He must not thrash."

The mother obeyed. She wrapped her arms around her son and murmured comforts to him, of health, of how serenity lay imminent if only he survived a few moments more. Her tears fell freely now, tracing silver lines down her cheeks. Unlike the tears, I doubt her words were for him.

I pressed deeper. The sickness fought back. I felt it, a dark, writhing colony waging war with ideas of conquest. It had been growing for days, perhaps weeks, feeding on the boy's vitality. Sweat beaded on my brow. I marched across the chasm between exhaustion and pain. Still, I held on.

Then, suddenly, the sickness broke. It flinched, faltered, and died wholesale. The worst was over. I exorcised the root cause—pesky creatures too small to see with the human eye. My work was not done; I'd continue until I had naught else to give. And so, I did. I'd healed half the nicks and tears the convulsions had caused when, at long last, I ran empty.

I stepped back. My vision blurred into darkness. I collapsed to my knees, breath ragged. I kneeled there on the beaten dirt for a good long while. My sight came back like a drawing—line by line, shadow by shadow. It was a while more before I had the strength to pick myself up and check on my work.

The boy lay still, his fever broken, his skin cool beneath my touch. He'd have more healing to do. Thankfully, time alone would restore what I could not.

The mother stared at me, hungry for answers but fearful of the questions.

"He'll be fine," I said. "Give him clean water and soup for a quarter moon."

She fell to the floor beside me, sobbing, and clutched my hand. I let her. The strength to pull away had left me.

"I," she began, but faltered, the words she found too insignificant to dig past the snot-filled blubber of her relief.

"I know," I said. "Think nothing of it. It gladdens me to find you care for your boy so deeply."

"He's my son."

"You'd be surprised how little that matters to some." I glanced down at the tight grip she had on my hand. "Now, if there is nothing else…"

"I'm—"

"I know."

"I doubt you do." No sooner had the words left her than her eyes widened in horror. "No. I mean… that's not what I meant. I—"

"Perish the thought. I bid you a good day."

The women bowed. On her knees. Head to the floor. I turned to leave. Only anger sat locked behind my throat, and she did not deserve its release. How was she to know such a gesture of thanks landed too close to worship for my liking?

"Been eatin' well, have ya?"

His voice felt hauntingly familiar, dragged forth from a past life, a time when I was not myself. The sight of him was stifling. Much as I had changed, he had not. Thin as a sapling, bent forward, his smile beaming at me. I took a step back. Memories assaulted me. The world had read my ruminations that morning and sent its forces to elicit all that I'd failed to consider.

"A hard diet and the occasional bloodletting." I raised a finger to my lips. "But shh, it's a trade secret." My mind failed to come up with anything more to say. Wit. Arrogance. A sudden will to appear unaffected. In that, I was the same boy he knew.

Roche transformed before my eyes. Not as impressively as Knite had done—his was a transformation so complete as to defy reason—but impressive nonetheless. Roche's back straightened, providing more height than was sensible. Chipped teeth became whole. Bedraggled hair fell into luscious locks.

"I can't imagine it's your blood that you've been letting," he said. "Not anymore."

"Cease your games, old man." Adeenas—or was it Helena?—appeared from behind him, dressed in the greens and browns of ranger leathers, Pinmoon, as ever, strapped to her waist. She watched me with her hawk-like gaze, unblinking eyes separated by a sharp nose. "I must say, however, you strike me as twice the boy I last saw. You must've razed a farm or two to have strapped on so much weight."

"Old Roche," I said. "You serve… him?"

The old man smiled. "Quick on the uptake, as usual, young Aki."

Helena's narrowed eyes took in the scene, saw the boy resting peacefully, the mother bowing at my feet, the eager gazes of those yet to be healed. "Come to play at being a god, have you?"

I snarled at her. "Watch your tongue."

"Or what? You'll have me sent to The Bridge? Order me killed? Bind me into slavery?"

Roche jumped in between us, hands out in gestures of peace. "Calm down. No need to come to blows. I doubt our… mutual acquaintance will appreciate us quarreling like disobedient children."

I placed my hands in my pocket. They were shaking. Signaling weakness to a possible enemy was ill-advised. "As long as she never again compares me to those filthy animals who call themselves gods, I shall relinquish my grievance."

Gasps rang out. Such words could kill those who heard them. Those who dared utter their semblance were promised a living hell.

Helena regarded me with a furrowed brow. "I spoke in haste. Forgive my lack of tact."

"What brings you to Discipulus?" I asked.

"A mission," Roche said. "One we hope you might aid us with."

"Can it wait?"

Roche tilted his head, bewildered. "Why?"

"Because I've just poured the last of my sensus into a dying child," I said, sharper than intended. "Because I've not eaten since yesterday morning. Because I hadn't slept the night before. Choose one."

Helena crossed her arms, Pinmoon glinting at her hip. "You always did have a flair for hysterics."

"And, as you've already admitted, you have a habit of letting your words outrun your thoughts."

Roche raised a hand, forestalling the verbal skirmish that promised to follow. "Enough. This isn't a social call, Aki."

I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. "Then come to me tomorrow. I shall help in whatever fashion I'm able."

"Able?" Helena asked. "Not willing?"

I sighed. "As I've told you before, he is my friend. I help my friends."

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"Without question?"

"I pity you for having to ask that."

"I envy you for thinking you have the right of it, though I certainly don't envy you for the day you find out."

"Are you trying to anger me?"

Helena smiled a roguish smile. "Perhaps."

"Save your tests for tomorrow. I'm too tired to bother deciphering them." I turned to Roche. "It is good to see you, Old Roche. Meet me at The Horned Ale tomorrow at noon. We'll catch up, and you can tell me about this task our… acquaintance has saddled you with." I clapped his shoulder and, try as I might to strengthen my gait, stumbled past him out of the infirmary, eager to find my bed, preferably without running into Brittle or anyone else likely to delay my overdue appointment with sleep.

"I ain't no horse," Roche called from behind my departing back. From the sound of him, I knew he was smiling.

***

Dusk. A low sun cast long shadows. The Academy loomed into view, ancient yet untouched by time. Soft lights hummed to life, preparing for the encroaching darkness. I clambered off the coach. Flakes of dried mud fell from my boots. No sooner had they crumbled off than a crisp wind carried them away as if the Academy refused to be sullied by Muds. If true, I wondered why it had tolerated some of the muck that dwelled within—whatever they thought of themselves, I doubt there was anything as unclean as their blackened souls.

Passing students glanced our way with aggressive frequency, their hushed whispers far from discreet. Word had spread. I was a godling. A Leaf. Lorail's son. The only man to have ever been considered such—all other male heirs were mere cattle, nothing more than stock for breeding or serving.

Cutting through the throng of returning students, my friends approached. They'd been waiting for me. I knew they would. Sil and Dako, in any case. Edon was unexpected. Malorey, I was certain, was already with Wiltos.

"How is he?" We were most of the way back to our dorms when Dako broached the question.

"Grief-stricken," I said.

"House Lorail? Really?" Edon was a new man, slim insofar as someone from his House was, clean-cut, straight-backed, almost regal. Almost. There was a feral sort of flavor to him, a wildness untamed but obscured. "I'd not have guessed you were cut from that cloth."

Dako chuckled. "Here it comes."

"Poison can cure," I said. "Death can heal. It is our—"

"—free will that renders them so, and so it stands to reason that the same free will might render our pasts and natures into forces of good." Edon finished. "You quote him as though you are one of his priests. Your obsession is quickly becoming tiresome."

"The path to sagacity—"

"Nope, absolutely not." Edon stepped away as if to escape. "Consider my last words unspoken."

"Given time," Sil said to Edon, "you'll become adept at circumventing such dangers."

"What do you know of it?" Dako said. "Except for that one time, you've not since taken a lashing or a lecture."

"Yet I've been present for many of yours. Consider me well-educated."

Dako paused to think, then gave a nod. "True enough."

"Wait," I said, "why is it my efforts to share wisdom are so unappreciated—nay, detested? You ought to—"

The words died in my throat. We'd entered our dorm's courtyard under the cover of a new night, where an unlikely gathering awaited: Samiel, healed and grinning; Brittle, annoyed; Ricell, a picture of calm; Lamila, haughty yet guarded; and a dozen others, some of whom I did not recognise.

Brittle strode towards me. The master of Pondus Arts, Leaf, and head of one of the Bainan houses possessed the strength and presence of an ageless sword, forever sharp, unmarred by centuries of strife and battle, thin yet utterly indestructible.

"You broke your word," she said. There was sharpness to even her words, though something tempered their sting, some softness to her usually steely eyes. "Do not do so again."

"I shall try my best."

Brittle nodded. "Will you join me tonight?"

"The hour is late."

"Not so late that we cannot squeeze out a productive turn of the hourglass."

"I'd be of little use."

"Your aid is not contingent on your sensus." Brittle's eyes narrowed ever so slightly. She was offering me sanctuary.

I shook my head. My troubles were an opportunistic lot. They'd lie in wait. Best I attended to them as soon as possible.

"May I be excused?" I asked.

Brittle nodded and went on her way. A tranquility born of calculation settled after her departure. The various people who came to see me assessed each other's worth. Ricell, short, diminutive, and visibly aged, won without contest.

"We must have words," he said.

"Now?"

He swept a bored gaze over the waiting crowd. "Tomorrow. My office. Daybreak."

"I shall be there."

"Good."

Lamila came next. Her uniform was singularly scandalous; the ends of her shorts ran from the tops of her inner thighs to the dips of her hips, a cut from collar to chest accentuated her cleavage, and her sleeveless tunic revealed yet more, showcasing slim, feminine arms that hid an unexpected strength. Milky skin reflected moonlight. Swaying hips stole attention much the same way carnage, death, or danger does. She smiled, knowing her effect on the minds of men and women alike.

My friends made to step forward, beckoned to be a living shield by Lamila's approach. I held up my hand. I did not need a shield.

Lamila circled me at arm's length, one finger tracing my chest through the thin fabric of my tunic. I did not move. Not when her vile touch brushed her Tunnels against my skin, not when she vanished from view behind me, not when her lips brushed the back of my ear.

"Let us reintroduce ourselves, uncle," she whispered, her words full of breath.

"I'd rather not," I said.

Lamila came back into view, pouting. Her finger traced back to the centre of my chest, and she leaned in, her lips poised like a threat. Still, I did not move.

"Why not?" she asked. "I'm delightful once you get to know me."

"We are enemies."

Lamila recoiled as if struck. "Whatever gave you that idea?"

"You are a Principle. But more importantly—"

"I see. You covet my position? This makes us enemies, does it?"

I shook my head. "Competitors. But that is neither here nor there. You disgust me, thus, you are my enemy."

"Are you certain you've duly considered your course of action?" Unlike all the emotions that preceded it, Lamila's scowl was genuine.

"Long before I even met you."

"So be it."

Lamila stormed off, her illusions shattered, her once-enticing uniform now made obscene without the color of her Tunnels and Paintings.

"Son of Lorail." Samiel's grin called to be returned. I obliged. "My father will want to know how you came to be."

"That is a mystery I have yet to solve."

"Perhaps we might indulge in finding the answer together."

"For your father?"

"Gods no. For something far more precious to me."

"Your curiosity?"

"Exactly so."

"Is that why you are here?" I asked. "To sate your curiosity?"

"Partially."

"Why else?"

"You do more than intrigue me, cousin. I find your company pleasant. This, despite knowing your strength exceeds mine, not to mention that you hail from House Lorail."

"And I yours," I said. "This, despite the threat of you dissecting me for my secrets or that dexterous tongue of yours that masterfully twists words into lies."

Samiel grinned. He made no effort to deny my accusation. "Breakfast tomorrow?" he asked. "You can introduce me to another one of those commoner dishes."

"If my friends allow."

"I'm sure I can win them over." Samiel headed towards the dorm's gate, waving goodbye at me with the back of his hand. "Tomorrow, then."

A squadron of students approached, a wiry fellow with hollow cheekbones and pursed lips at their head. His gaze remained on my feet when he spoke, the words soft, the tone submissive.

"May we have words, Sir Aki bin Lorail?" he asked.

"Au Farian," I corrected him. "Call me Aki. What is it you wish to speak of?"

The boy went to a knee, his right fist over his heart. The others followed his lead. "We wish to—"

"Stand!"

They sprang to their feet. Half their number nearly bolted. Their leader's face remained downcast, but I caught the terror in his eyes.

"Do you think staring at my feet is some sign of respect?" I asked.

"I am lesser. It is only right—"

"Damn you, look at me!"

The boy's head jerked up. His lips were quivering. "My apologies."

A hand fell on my shoulder. Behind it stood Dako. His expression was frozen. Emotionless. I sighed.

"What is your name?" I asked the boy, only then realizing I'd thought of him as younger. Much younger. We were of the same age. Odd, I thought.

"Efeleese," he said.

"Why have you come to see me, Efeleese?"

"To fall under your banner, if you'd allow."

"My banner?"

Dako's hand, which never left my shoulder, as if to feed me the strength to endure my anger, squeezed. He leaned in and whispered, "You are a Leaf now, Aki. We are expected to accrue a following."

"You have no such following," I said.

"Few are willing to pledge themselves to me," he said. "Besides, I have no need for a following."

"Nor have I."

"You do."

"How so?"

"Do you wish to relinquish your standing as a Leaf. Will you accept entrance into The Institute of War as a foot soldier?"

"What of you?"

"We will speak of me another time." Dako nodded at Efeleese. "This is a matter regarding you and your goals."

"I do not wish to be a god. Not master or superior or anything of the like."

"Merkusian was a leader."

"I am not Merkusian."

"You emulate him."

"He is, in a manner of speaking, a teacher of mine."

"And he was a leader."

"It is not in me to lead. There is too much anger, too many scars."

"Perhaps, but do you see anyone else who might fulfil his role? Anyone who's trying. Anyone at all?"

Knite came to mind. He was a prince. Once. Son of Merkusian. Capable. Strong. A leader, when the fancy struck him. But even he was not trying to be Merkusian. No, whatever his goals were, bringing peace and justice to his father's realm was not it. He'd take precautions for preserving Evergreen, but he'd never champion its existence.

And then it struck me. For all the time I had known, I had not known. Before then, I had been Lorail's son. My disgust stopped the thought there. But what did it mean?

I was Knite's nephew.

I was Merkusian's grandson.

"Do not lie to yourself, Aki," Dako said. "Lie to me, if you will, though I'd appreciate it if you didn't, but do not lie to yourself. You are here for a reason—grander reasons than revenge." Dako clapped me on my back, a smile breaking onto his face. "Speak your truth, Aki. For all our sakes."

Past and future. The bridge. It had grown colossal now. Larger than life. Larger than me. Someone had to lay the first brick, as it were. Was I the man to do so? Would my efforts collapse?

"Why do you wish to join my banner?" I asked Efeleese.

"You are a great—"

I shook my head. "Do not lie to me, Efeleese. I am not great. Not yet. Give me honesty. Any more lies, and we part ways, my answer to your request forever a no."

Efeleese stood up straight. His eyes, which had seemed to be on the cusp of slipping away, remained firmly fixed on mine. He had found his courage. "For lack of a better option, Aki."

"You are a Tripler?"

"A Seculor."

"Manar?"

He nodded.

"Leaf?"

He nodded again, then added a qualifier to his affirmation. "Barely."

I glanced back at the ragtag group—some Triplers, most Roots—and asked, "How did this group of yours come together?"

"For lack of a better option."

My eyes returned to Efeleese's. "Except you."

"Including me."

"What of Valen?"

"Your… perspective aligns more closely with mine," Efeleese said, finding a diplomatic way of exposing that his House's Principle was not as representative as he appeared.

"Very well," I said. "I shall consider the offer. It is late. Come to me two days hence. We shall share a breakfast and discuss the matter further."

Efeleese went to bow, stopped himself midmotion, and turned away.

***

Bare walls, a spotless floor, and a vaulted ceiling. All were translucent. Only a desk, a chair, and the man who called them his own occupied the room.

Ricell faced the back wall, his back to me. He watched the city of Discipulus from a vantage no one else possessed, observing what he could see of it: the roaring coliseum, the bustling spokes of the bay, the cheap homes creeping up the western hill, and the dark clouds that hung in the distance.

"This city has been my home for most of my life," he said. "Each time I see it, I feel I've travelled to a new place. I see the same walls, the same buildings, the same streets, yet they never feel familiar."

"That is because Discipulus is not your home."

Ricell stood and turned to face me. "Why not?"

"I've found that homes hatch from people," I said, "their presence lending warmth to their incubation."

"To some."

"To those who have homes. Some name their resting place a home. I think they make less of its meaning than it deserves."

He chuckled softly, the echoes dull and lifeless in the crystalline chamber. "Weakness is a luxury few can afford in Discipulus."

"In Evergreen," I corrected.

"You've seen the bay, bustling with life, so packed that every day a few men die from being crushed by crowds, all in the name of commerce. You've heard the Coliseum. Been there. Heard the call for death. You've walked the western hill. I've been informed that you visit quite often. Given where you grew up, I need not say more on their struggles."

I stepped closer until I stood beside Ricell, letting my gaze follow his. The city sprawled beneath us, alive, pulsing with traffic. Daybreak, and the coliseum remained packed from the night before, throbbing with noise and light and death. The bay shimmered in the early light, gulls circling above like scavengers. Smoke curled from the Alchemist quarter, staining the sky with sickly versions of every color, the purple of bruises most of all. And beyond it all, the clouds hovered thick and dark, as if forecasting a coming turmoil.

"There's a heart buried there somewhere," I said. "Beneath the grime."

"Beneath the want for survival," Ricell replied.

I pointed at the region just past the bay, a lush, walled city of its own protected by a dome of Zephyr arts that kept the rain and smell of the coast out of the privileged noses of self-important reprobates. "What do godlings know of survival? They are the grime I speak of."

"You are a disciple of Merkusian, are you not?"

"As much as one can be a disciple of a dead man."

"Have you read his fable about the farmer and his son?"

"I have."

"What lesson did you come away with?"

"To not judge indiscriminately."

"Have you perhaps considered that many godlings are exactly what they need to be to survive?"

I winced. Another had tried once before to teach me this very lesson. A version of it. Another who still plagued the recesses of my memories, the many tendrils of her influence stretching between who I was and who I am, mayhap going further, delving into who I wished to be.

A silence settled between us, not uncomfortable, but heavy with things unsaid.

"You still believe you belong here?" I asked. "That this place is your home?"

He didn't answer at first. His eyes were distant, fixed on something I couldn't see. "I believe I'm needed here," he said finally. "And sometimes, that's enough."

"Why did you wish to see me?"

"You've become a Leaf."

"So they say."

"So your mother says, and what she says is."

"Please make your point, Muddy."

"Old Roche and Helena are in the city."

I nearly toppled, stumbling backward from Headmaster Ricell. Instinct surged before thought. My sensus flared to life. I cast a lattice of matrices across the spectrum of the Arts. My skin calcified, a living armor. Power coiled in my legs.

"Steady on, Aki." Ricell stood with his hands clasped behind his back, posture relaxed, as though the tension in the air were an unfounded rumor. His gaze remained fixed on Discipulus, its sprawl of lights flickering out as the last of the night's darkness abated. "I'm a friend."

I didn't move. My stance was wide and grounded, my arms raised in a guard. I was ready for a fight.

"Whose?" I asked.

"Yours. And, for most of my life, his."

"His?"

Muddy turned to look at me, smiling. "Our elusive and enigmatic friend. Brittle tells me you've decided to call him Black. A fitting name. Better than many of the countless ones he's used since I've known him."

"I don't know who you speak of."

Muggy chuckled. "Very well. Back on topic, then. You are a Leaf."

"And?"

"Please bring Silani into your service."

The words struck me like a blow. "Why?"

"Because I can think of no other Leaf I'd prefer her to serve."

"But…"

"You are worried for her safety."

I nodded numbly.

"Another reason for my preference. But worry not, I have faith."

"In?"

"Our friend, and, by extension, you."

I looked down at my hands. They are larger. Uncalloused, for no marks could withstand the healing of my sensus. Stronger, every fiber of muscle and sinew trained by arduous repetition. But not strong enough. Not by a long shot. "I cannot protect her," I said. "I can barely protect myself. Gods, it was not long ago that it was she who was protecting me."

"You are a god, Aki."

I moved without thought. There was no greater insult than insinuations that likened me to those horrid beasts that called themselves gods. No, there was; Ricell's blunt accusation broke the frail resistance I'd kept up the last day and a half, and behind it came a surge of violence.

Ricell's body hit the far wall, cracking its hardened, crystalline surface. So quick was the passage of his flight that I saw none of it. One moment, he stood there, facing the transparent wall and looking out at the tall view of Discipulus; the next, he was bodily embedded in the wall.

"I am not a god," I growled.

Ricell peeled himself from the fractured surface, landed nimbly, and turned to face me, blood dripping from the corners of his smile. "Indeed, you are capable of protecting my daughter." The I-told-you-so grin dropped from his expression. "Please…?"

And just as suddenly as it had come, the rage drained from me. "I'm sorry, Muddy."

"Please."

"She's better off—"

"Chaining herself to another? Who?"

"I am not a god. There are no gods."

"True."

Baffled, I stared at him with wide eyes.

"Don't look so surprised. What I am not asking you to become myth, merely an approximation of that which Merkusian was considered. He wasn't crowned by the heavens. He did not earn the title by divine decree, nor by the strength of his power, but by the strength of his character." Ricell stepped closer, his voice low and fierce. "Be that man. Be the god who guards my daughter. Because soon, when she leaves my realm—likely never to return—I will no longer be able to shield her from the world's cruelty. I ask this not as a headmaster, but as a father. As a friend. And if my wishes do not suffice, do it for Sil's sake, for the friendship you share with her."

My head bowed, heavy with the weight of his words. I was undone—not by the call to godhood, not by the shadow of Merkusian. But because I always—always—stood by my friends.

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