When Heroes Die

“Now, I know that you’re incensed, but your anger is misplaced. Claiming all of your material possessions to outfit my flying fortress cannot be construed as thievery, it is merely aggressive taxation.”

―Dread Emperor Inimical, the Miser

When consciousness finally returned to me, I felt as weak as a newborn babe. I was nestled in blankets, and my body was caked in sweat. I tried to muster my strength to climb out of bed, but found the effort beyond me.

So trapped as I was, I lay in bed and let my eyes roam over the cracked white paint on the ceiling. Max brought me meals, and time passed as I gradually regained my strength, while my mind reflected on what I had seen.

It was the Angelic Choir of Compassion, I was sure of it. Not the Gods. Even that had been enough to shake me.

It gave me an entirely new appreciation for what it was to be good.

I had known on some level that the Gods Above and Below were real, but I hadn’t truly understood what that meant. I had been treating them mentally like Scion, an all powerful alien species that for some unknown reason had decided that Earth looked like a good place to experiment. They weren’t that. Creation was their sandpit, but it was their sandpit because they made it. If Scion had shown up here, what determined whether he lived or died was how entertaining they found the shapes he made in the sand.

They didn’t need to care about him or anybody else, because they could erase it all and start over whenever they wanted to.

It scared me, but I knew with bone deep certainty there was nothing I could do about it. I didn’t believe the Gods were nice, even the Book of All Things didn’t really pretend they were. They made Creation to settle an argument between themselves. We weren’t actually people to them, just tools to determine the outcome of a debate.

One side was in favour of guiding people like a parent would guide their children, the other side was in favour of allowing them to guide themselves. At least, that was how I understood it. From what I had heard, some Angelic Choirs were much more heavy-handed in their guiding. Contrition allegedly favoured mind control and weren’t particularly keen on free will as a concept at all.

The memories of compassion slammed into me again. The smothering, all encompassing feeling of acceptance that I had been bathed in. Even now, I wanted it.

It scared me.

Part of me knew that I should be angry at them, that I should be treating this as being under the influence of a master effect. I wasn’t. That made me frustrated at myself for not being able to muster resentment against them.

It all came down to what they were.

The Angels weren’t hostile or malicious. I was convinced that they couldn’t even conceive of the idea of being hostile to begin with. Compassion was just what they were. Being angry at them because I made the mistake of looking in their direction would be like being angry at gravity for pulling you to the ground.

I didn’t know how to cope with it, or how much the experience might have changed me.

As I struggled to make sense of my feelings, the world continued to batter away at me.

Out, out, out.

The constant reminder that I didn’t belong here had bothered me before, but I had never outright resented it. That was coming to change. If I wasn’t returning to Earth someday, and I was increasingly sure that was the case, then I wanted to find a way to fit in. The sensation of not belonging had gone from unpleasant to unacceptable.

I wasn’t prepared to spend the rest of my life living in a world that kept telling me that I should leave.

Stumbling downstairs, I sat down between the others. Two days had passed and while I still felt unsteady on my feet, I was able to stand up. I had made the effort to clean myself, but it was just about at the limits of what I could currently do.

“How are you, Taylor?” Max asked, his voice laced with concern.

“Still feel weak,” I rasped, “but staying in bed was making me restless.”

“Further action on our part has been brought to a halt until you are deemed to have made a full recovery,” Roland said.

“That’s fine.”

“Taylor, can you tell us what happened?” Max was busy whittling away at a piece of wood with a knife as he spoke.

“I looked everywhere when I tried to scry, not just around us. In every dimension. There was just too much information for me to process.” I paused, deciding if I wanted to say more.

After that experience, I wouldn’t be experimenting with modifying my senses again in a hurry. I hadn’t found a way to enhance my ability to process all the information yet, and it was simply too much for me to cope with.

“I saw the Choir of Compassion,” I admitted, unable to keep the reverence out of my voice.

Both of the others stilled.

“Did they see you as well?” Max’s voice was hoarse.

“I don’t think they did, otherwise I’d probably be dead,” I replied.

“That is the most likely outcome of being under their scrutiny,” Roland agreed.

“Girlie, I think you really fucked up,” Max shuddered.

“It seems that way.”

“I do not believe there is cause to concern ourselves with them any further, should they choose to act, it is beyond the scope of our ability to respond.” Roland reasoned, “Furthermore, none of us are villainous in nature, the Angels should find no fault with our actions.”

It was a grim assessment, but likely the correct one. I didn’t like deciding not to worry about something because it was beyond my ability to control. Right now, I couldn’t think of a better option.

The topic changed back to our argument about Roland making decisions on his own. After it resolved, I made my way back to bed, too raw to do anything else.

A week later and I was no longer feeling like a walking corpse. I was still weakened, but I was able to contribute to the team again.

“Have we learned anything new?”

“My inquiries with the thieves into the possibility of acquiring magical texts have yet to bear fruit, but with regard to the matter of the disappearances, some progress has been made.” Roland drummed his fingers rhythmically on the table as he spoke.

“And what did you learn?”

“The heightened Watch presence within the city is as a direct response to our suspected villain. They have yet to apprehend the crook, but ever since their efforts to locate the ruffian began in earnest, the disappearances have ground to a halt. It seems the villain has gone into hiding.”

“That’s unfortunate,” I frowned.

I didn’t feel that way because I wanted more people to be kidnapped, but because it removed an easy method to track them.

“Why do you think that, girlie?”

“I could have tried walking around at night while you watched from a distance. Baiting out a damsel story like that would have been an easy way to catch them,” I explained.

Now that I better understood what I could do, I was reasonably sure I could put up a solid defence in a fight. While pretending to be a Princess again would be humiliating, it was one of the better Roles to choose. Princesses usually live to have happy endings, after all.

“I thought you two aren’t sharing sheets, now you want him to rescue you?” Max teased.

“Taylor and I are not-”

“We aren’t sleeping together, and I can rescue myself.”

The conversation paused for a moment as Max bellowed with laughter. It took a while for him to stop, but eventually a semblance of order returned to the room.

“Whilst the plan is sound in principle, it would not have worked in practice. Closer examination of the victims suggests that all of them were of Deoraithe origins.” Roland brought the discussion back on track, addressing my earlier comment.

That…told us something. I wasn’t sure what, but in my mind that ruled out slavers unless they had very specific tastes.

While it seemed like something that a reasonable criminal would do - go into hiding as a response to increased police activity - that wasn’t what I had come to expect out of the villains in Creation. I suspected that it meant the villain, whoever they were, had achieved what they had set out to do and had moved onto the next stage of their plan.

“What else has happened recently?” I paused, then clarified, “Noteworthy events only, not trivial stuff.”

“During your convalescence, one of the local museums was broken into, and a display piece was stolen. It is but a minor crime of no real consequence.”

That…sounded like a lead. Logically, there was no connection between the two crimes, but I was treating this like a story. Roland had lucked upon information relating to a museum theft as far as I was concerned, that meant it was connected. Logic could go sit in a corner, it had no place here.

“What was the piece?”

“A replica of Elizabeth Alban’s earrings were spirited from where they are housed in the Caith museum. According to my sources, it was not the genuine piece that was taken, those are still guarded under lock and key.”

Vaguely in my mind, I juggled the pieces around. Kidnappings, the theft of a display piece from a museum, the book on necromancy. If this was a story, then all of them were connected. I didn’t know what role the earrings played, but I knew one thing for certain.

If the villain needed them, and he had only stolen a display piece, then another attempt on the museum would be made.

“What could a necromancer do with the earrings?”

“As I am not a necromancer myself and only have the smallest understanding of the theory behind it, I cannot provide you with an accurate assessment. If we were to assume that they were after the genuine artefact, there is possibly a sympathetic link existing between them and their former owner. I am unsure on the exact specifics of what they would set out to achieve making use of that, however.” Roland expounded.

“Let’s assume that there is a connection, and that they will make another attempt at stealing the earrings. I want you to learn everything you can from the book, and we are going to keep watch at the location that the earrings are housed.”

It took some time and plans were made and then discarded in the process, but eventually we decided on a course of action.

Staking out the museum after the sun had set made for an unexciting task, but it was one I was well familiar with. The three of us had split up, although we were all in sight of each other. Each of us were on a different roof overlooking the museum, that way it was covered on all sides. They were close enough to me so that I could obscure them, and now all that was left was to wait.

It was the third night spent like this. The sky was clear, and the moon was overhead. It shone brightly, illuminating the building. Down below, the soft glow from the torches of patrolling Watch members could be seen. Idly, I tapped my fingers against the flat top of the roof I was on softly, my gaze locked on the structure.

Time passed.

Hours later, the guards had drifted off. It was close to midnight when something finally happened. A figure slipped towards the museum, then carefully opened one of the stained-glass windows. I let my eyes briefly flicker towards where Roland was sitting and manifested a brief flash of light beside him, then did the same for Max.

It was my agreed upon signal if I was the one to spot anything.

Focusing, I created bridges of force between one roof and another. In the dark, they looked like sheets dangling between the rooftops. The others crossed the bridges, making their way over to me. After previously straining myself, It took effort to do this much, but right now we needed to work together.

The others came across rapidly, arriving at my location minutes later.

“There,” I whispered, pointing as I did so.

The others looked where I indicated.

“Shall we move to apprehend the rapscallion?” Roland asked.

It would have been much easier to deal with this if we could just point the Watch at the problem and let them handle it without causing ourselves problems. Unfortunately, we couldn’t risk the attention.

“Wait,” I hissed, “let them take what they want, then let’s follow behind them. We don’t know if it’s our enemy, or an accomplice.”

I was reasonably certain if this was a necromancer, they would have minions that they would send out to do the dirty work, while they sat back in whatever lair they happened to have and cackled maniacally. After being monologued at more than once, I was starting to accept that was just how Creation worked.

I didn’t want to catch the minion only to then have to interrogate them, if following them back worked just as well.

“Girlies right,” Max agreed.

Roland looked unhappy, but we sat and watched as the theft took place. A quarter of an hour later and the figure started to make their escape, and we pursued them high on the rooftops. They made their way to a single storey flat roofed building near the southern wall, then proceeded to let themselves in.

We made our way across to the building’s roof, careful to remain silent. There was a member of the Watch on the walls above, and I had been told their abilities were beyond human. I didn’t want to put my perception field to the test against someone who was likely trained to see through effects just like it.

Cautiously, I made a small hole in the roof of the building and looked inside, there was nobody except for our assailant. They descended a set of stairs leading to what I guessed was a basement.

I focused on the building. I didn’t get the sense from it that I couldn’t enter. That meant the building wasn’t actually used as a building at all.

“This isn’t anyone’s home,” I hissed, “I can enter it.”

“Are we, following?” Max asked.

“If this residence is not actually in use, I propose that we give chase. They could not have trapped it, for in doing so they would render you unable to enter,” Roland suggested.

It made sense. If this place was defended at all, I wouldn’t be able to enter it.

“Give me a moment, I’ll get us in,” I whispered.

Buckling down under the strain, I reshaped part of the roof into an open hole, then fashioned a staircase of force leading down to the cracked brick floor below. The three of us made our entrance.

The entire place was a mess, with dirt everywhere and cracks in the walls. There was broken furniture strewn around, and stale bread left long since abandoned on one table. It was clear that it hadn’t been used as a residence in a while.

We still had not been noticed. We made our way towards the staircase quietly, careful not to disturb anything.

It was pitch dark below. I wasn’t certain how our assailant was navigating in the darkness, because I certainly couldn’t do it.

“Would it be wiser for us to manifest a means by which we can see and risk alerting our foe, or remain shrouded in darkness?” Roland queried.

I thought about it. In a story, if we stayed in the darkness, we would absolutely be ambushed. While our enemies would be alerted by the presence of light, we would see them as well.

“Max, make us a light,” I said in response.

A gentle, blue orb appeared behind me.

Following behind our quarry, we descended the stairs. They went down much further than expected. Despite how long it was, the passage itself looked recently excavated. Who would waste the time digging so deep, I didn’t quite know. After about a hundred heartbeats, the passage eventually flattened out again and then opened into a wide open cavern.

I gaped.

It looked to be the ruins of a city, underneath Caith itself. If I was to guess, it would be an older version of the city which had been buried by time. Most of it was buried under dirt or rubble, but parts of it were still navigable. Other sections had been cleared out.

Somewhere to the left, a draft wafted in. evidently there was another route leading down here.

A somewhat precarious route to the right was cleaner than the rest. The accumulated dust from presumably centuries of neglect had been moved aside. The figure we had shadowed could be made out ahead, less than thirty feet away.

Cautiously, we followed behind, veiled under my power.

That was when the first of the zombies showed up. From behind the ruins of what I guessed to be a smithy, a corpse shambled out. Unfortunately, it seemed like the stranger effect didn’t work on walking corpses, and they headed directly at us.

We started to pull back. The person we were following was still unaware of us and slipped away up ahead, but that was fine. There was only a part of this place which showed signs of use, following them would be easy.

The zombies continued to trail after us. Once I was sure we wouldn’t attract attention, I reached out to them and tried to snuff them out. It was easy to do. Easy, in the same way as trying to undo the effects of the Absence Demon. Whatever it was that animated these corpses, the world didn’t like it and was willing to go along with my attempt to see it fixed.

“Seems girlie was right,” Max muttered.

“Careful, we don’t know how many of them there are,” I warned.

We continued forward under the pale blue light Max provided, and were attacked twice more, before the cavern sloped down into a much better excavated rectangular chamber. The support beams holding it up appeared to be in good condition, and the room was swept free of dust. On the left, the exsanguinated corpses of twenty-two girls were stacked neatly in rows.

“What manner of monster could do something like this?” Roland asked rhetorically, disgust creeping through.

I walked up to one of them and inspected it closer. The rictus of pain their faces were locked in suggested the draining had been done while they were still alive.

“Is there an advantage to draining them while alive?”

“The heightened emotions could contribute to the effectiveness of a ritual,” Roland admitted.

I examined the room further. Opposite the corpses was a desk filled with papers. It was narrow and didn’t have space for three people to stand beside it.

“You two take a look at the desk. I’ll keep watch for trouble.”

It was much easier for me to kill zombies than it was for them, even as weakened as I was.

I turned away from the desk, keeping my ear out to hear what was said in the background. Directly opposite where we had entered the chapter was another path branching off. I wasn’t sure how likely it was that somebody came through, but I would keep watch for it.

“Careful, Roland, it might be trapped,” Max admonished.

A couple of hundred heartbeats passed and I spotted nothing unusual. The sounds of pages being flipped through was the only break in the silence.

“The necromancer appears to be making an attempt to mass animate the bones under the city, using the link between the blood of the victims as a reagent to fuel the ritual,” Roland stated.

“What are the earrings for?” I asked, not turning around.

There was a pause as Roland flipped through pages before he made to respond, “The pages here do not shed light on the matter, although the design of the ritual suggests that they are intended as some sort of spiritual anchor.”

“Could you safely interrupt the ritual?”

“With ample time to prepare, I am reasonably cert-”

Which was when an ominous chanting began to echo from further ahead.

Of course, we weren’t going to have time to plan properly.

I suppressed the urge to swear and was about to suggest we take a second to plan, when I felt a feint tugging at me from the world. It was as if something or someone was urging me forward, like the drag of a current in a river.

It took me a moment to realize, it was the pull of a story. We had followed through with the investigation and the villain was at the final stage of their plan. All that was left was the confrontation, where the heroes usually won.

I could have resisted the feeling. It wouldn’t have been hard either, although it would have been unpleasant. But…if heroes were the ones favoured by fate, why not go along with it?

“Let’s move,” I said curtly, “Roland, you deal with the ritual. Max and I will kill any zombies. I’ll also try to just kill them directly, even if I’m not sure if it will work.”

If I was in better shape, I was confident it wouldn’t be hard for me to do.

The three of us proceeded down the passage. It sloped to the right, before opening into a circular room. Unlike all the other rooms, this one was actually lit up. Lining the walls were torches, flickering weakly in the dark. At the far end, there looked to be some sort of monument.

In the middle of the room, was a figure clad in black standing on a raised platform, facing away from us. The platform was covered in intricate lines that looked to be painted in blood. They glowed ominously, purple sparks sputtering out of them. Hovering in the middle of the ritual, floated a set of earrings. The air seemed to warp inwards towards them as he continued to chant.

Beside them, stood the person we had been trailing. In the light of the room, I could finally make out what they looked like. It was a girl.

… And as he chanted, bones seemed to rise up out of the ground. They came together in the form of rotting skeletons, moving by magic alone. They spotted us almost immediately and started to approach.

Reacting on instinct, I tried to reach out and kill the necromancer. They rebuffed me. I staggered, before steadying myself.

The man didn’t react, continuing to chant. The girl, however, turned our way.

“Confiscate.”

The word rang out. As it did so, the ritual was snuffed out. It was as if something imperceptible had been added to Roland and taken away from the Necromancer. The man let out an inarticulate roar of rage.

“How dare you interrupt my ritual! Mirriem, see that they die, then I will complete the working.” He shrieked.

Roland paled, “The quantity of magic flowing through that ritual is more than I can safely contest for long.”

That put us on a timer.

Mirriem placed herself between him and us, then hurled a lance of darkness our way. With some effort, I contested it, dispersing the effect. Focusing, I started to snuff out the animated bones. Unlike the necromancer, there was very little resistance when I tried to change them. It was as if I was simply sweeping dust off of a table.

“Roland, stall the Necromancer. Max, deal with the girl. I’ll deal with the corpses,” I ordered.

I didn’t like being pest control, but it was much easier for me than them, taking less than a heartbeat each to do it. There were many of them, though, and focusing on them one by one seemed like a waste of time.

So I started to be creative. Focusing, I created a disc of force with a razor sharp edge, then sent it hurtling towards them. It scythed through a swath of them, then slammed into a barrier raised by the girl.

Unfortunately, the faster rate of corpse disposal did not seem to be worth the added exhaustion.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Roland trembling beside me. He started going through the motions of casting something, presumably making use of some of the power he had taken. A bolt of lightning danced from his fingertips towards our opponents. It slammed into a metal pole raising out of the ground.

A few smatterings of particoloured light shot back and forth between Roland and the Necromancer. I was too occupied with trying to snuff out animated corpses to follow what was going on.

I heard Maxime muttering under his breath, then ribbons of fire propelled from beside me, only to be dispersed with a gust of wind. Concentrating, I reached out to the girl and bludgeoned her with my memories of the fight with Scion. It was exhausting, but the attempt went through. She froze, then staggered. A moment later, two balls of fire slammed into her, and she went up in flames.

… It seemed like emotional attacks were more effective than I had expected them to be.

With no support left, it didn’t take much effort for the three of us to kill the Necromancer. His death did not put an end to the ritual, however, instead the magic seemed to pulse erratically. I tried to suppress it, it didn’t take much effort to do, but it was collapsing faster than I was cleaning it up. I feared some sort of explosion

“Roland, do something!” I called out.

I hoped that something related to his name would help.

“The text we acquired from the quaint shop contained details on how to properly disperse a ritual collapse, can you contain it while I manage the process?!” he shouted back.

I wasn’t sure how long I could keep the effect under control, but I tried regardless. Max joined in, taking the time to erect wards. The entire region of space within the area painted with blood had become a dancing mess of green and purple lights. They sparked erratically, pulling the surrounding air in towards them. I snuffed them out as fast as I could, but the rate they appeared seemed to be accelerating.

A hundred or so heartbeats later and Roland finished. The effect came to an end.

I walked towards the monument and started to examine the writing on it. It was written in a language that I couldn’t read.

“Anyone know what this says?” I asked.

Roland came over and looked at it critically.

“It appears to be a war memorial for souls who gave their lives in defence of Daoine when the Queen of Blades fought here,” he explained.

“So I was right, the Necromancer was in a graveyard,” I stated.

Both of them looked at me dubiously.

“What, I didn’t specify which graveyard he was in.”

The three of us started to make our way out.

The fight was almost anticlimactic, for all the work involved in finding the culprit.

And I found myself fine with that.

This was our first major encounter since the last time we saw the Artist, and in the time since our first fight with him, we had learned a great deal. We had a better grasp on stories, how they shaped the world and what that meant for us.

It was a fight against someone that seemed committed to hurting others, for reasons that we never even learned why, and in following a story it was relatively easy for us to win.

Despite how much the narrative driving Creation concerned me, it favoured the heroes. Sure, it was arguably a less earned win, but why should people that want to do Evil have a fair chance? I had seen enough people suffering for no good reason. I didn’t know why heroes were favoured in Calernia, but I was starting to find I liked it that way. After all, if people knew up front that Evil lost, they would have much less incentive to do it. That was the way consequences worked, right?

“Say, Roland, what are we doing with the earrings?” Max asked.

“Returning them to their owners would bring us under too much scrutiny. I propose that Taylor should take custody of them.” Roland replied.

I felt the light tugging of a different story as he spoke.

“Trying to give Taylor jewellery now, are you?” Max laughed.

“Those were a Queen’s earrings, right?”

“They were the property of the Queen of Blades,” Roland agreed.

“I’m flattered, but I don’t want them.”

Taking possession of a crowned queen’s jewellery would likely push me into a whole set of stories I wanted nothing to do with.

“Then I shall maintain possession of them until I find someone worthy to wear them, then,” Roland declared firmly.

There wasn’t even a part of me that doubted that he would.

Conversation died. I took a moment to stare down at the two charred corpses of the people we had killed. As I did so, I reflected on what I felt. Rather, I reflected on what I didn’t feel.

I knew that the Angels would have felt compassion for them, but I didn’t. They had performed horrific acts and earned their death in the process. Did thinking that make me Evil? I had come to regret what I did in the past with time, but never before had I considered the idea that I might genuinely be Evil.

When confronted with a feeling of compassion that deep, it was hard not to think about it. I had killed a lot of people and never felt empathy for them. Remorse and guilt, but I had never truly felt for them in the way that I had sensed the angels would.

Was I… Broken, in some way?

Maybe it was too high of a standard to hold myself to, but it didn’t change how I felt.

For a moment, I thought I felt a gentle tugging on my senses, as if from somewhere beyond Creation. It was like a subtle reassurance that no matter what, I was cared for regardless.

I shuddered.

Was the sensation real, or only imagined?

Or had the Choir of Compassion noticed me looking in after all?