COP S2.8 To Kill, or Not to Kill
In all my escapades, I’d never had to go to such extremes.
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Previously on…
Lyn and Asher think they figured out a way to defeat the Demeid, but don’t have any idea how to actually do it. Tass, Mise, Asher, Steffan and Lyn met to discuss what to do.
Steffan’s question hung in the air. It was a good question.
In all my escapades, I’d never had to go to such extremes. Yes, I’d handed out a bintinn with death as a consequence, but only twice. Steffan was the second and sat there alive in front of me. As far as I knew, the first was still alive, too. Hell, I didn’t even really know if the bintinns would work, anyway.
I wished I could have read Steffan then, but the cottage wouldn’t allow it.
Tass finally broke the silence, his forehead wrinkling as he spoke to her. “I think we do what we can. I’d prefer to save someone.”
“Yes,” Mise said. “Killing should always be the last option.”
I had a terrible feeling. What had I actually agreed to?
“Someone should pay for making those ruins look ‘friendly’.” Steffan had a bitterness in her voice.
“I’d wager they have already paid dearly, though they may not know it.” Asher maintained a deep look of sympathy, and touched Steffan’s knee.
Her face softened and she turned away.
We filled the next hour with similar awkward moments. Fits and starts to plans that fizzled under their own uncertainty. Asher’s hidden wisdom didn’t have any specific clarity on how to handle the infected. He only had his skill in healing them as best he could.
“Look,” I said, “it’s clear none of us really know what to do when we find whatever it is, or whoever it is, that’s trying to get people to the ruins. We aren’t warriors. I can fight, I know Tass can fight.” I resisted the urge to give Steffan a questioning glance as I suspected she couldn’t fight. “But I’ve only ever done so defensively. And even then only enough to escape.” I hated the conclusion I’d come to, but I could see in Tass’s expression he already agreed. “We can investigate. I can do my thing, track down the patterns of whoever is around those ruins, but if we’re stepping into an actual battle, we’re going to need help.”
Asher shook his head. “We can’t let this knowledge spread.”
“Uncle?” Tass had a look I hadn’t seen before.
“Asher is right. But so is Lyn.” He leaned toward Asher. “They’ll need some kind of protection.”
The healer opened his mouth, but Mise cut him off. “Beyond the fryn. As you’ve said, they are unpredictable. We don’t know how they’d respond to a threat,” he waved his chin in my direction, “other than to block the Demeid in at least some of the infected. They’ll need someone as a protector. Someone with non-magical fighting skills.”
“No,” Asher grabbed Mise’s hand. “I need you here.”
A visible struggle appeared on Mise’s face. Shadows of a past emerged. His jaw hardened and his usual jovial smile and gentle appearance faded. I’d seen such changes in people before, but usually only after I’d read them and their true character emerged. I didn’t need to read Mise to know he was more than I’d seen in the few days I’d known him, now that his hidden emotions lay so clear to see.
It was only a moment later when he clasped his other hand over Asher’s and his face relaxed. “No, it can’t…I can’t…not again. But I can help. There are a few of us left I trust enough to look after them. And at least one would have reason to support the cause.”
“If you trust them, then I will trust they will help. But the details…the portals, and who makes them, must be kept secret.”
“Agreed.”
We all nodded along with Mise. Even Steffan. Asher must’ve told her at least some of the parts I’d left out of my story, or else she was just being agreeable. That would’ve been way out of character.
“So,”—I felt the need to summarize—“Mise will contact someone to come be our token warrior, then we will head to the ruins to see if we can find who is behind making them friendly-like. We don’t want to kill them if we can avoid it, but let’s assume our warrior friend will incapacitate them somehow. Do we bring them back here for you, Asher? Or somewhere else?”
Tass cleared his throat. “I can do what I can. If they are working around the ruins, it’s likely they are too infected, too dangerous to bring here.”
“And I wasn’t?” I asked. “The Demeid literally broke through all this protection and showed me how to free it while I was sitting in this chair.” I wasn’t sure why I was arguing with him, but it seemed a valid point.
“We didn’t know, did we? You insisted on coming and it wasn’t until you were here that your condition became obvious. Plus, if the fryn hadn’t approved, you’d never have been allowed inside.”
“Hmm. Then maybe we let the fryn decide what to do with them. We both have them hanging around. Surely we can get some sense of what they want.”
“You can’t count on that,” Asher reminded me. “Unpredictable.”
“I hate not having a plan.” I slapped my hands on my knees and stood. “But there isn’t any point in sitting around arguing when we don’t have any idea what we’re going to find. I trust my ability to read what’s out there. Tass’s too. We’ll work it out as we go.”
Tass stared at me for an uncomfortably long time before nodding. “I hate not knowing too. Our goal, though, should be to save whoever we can.”
“Seems to me it comes down to choosing between saving the world, or saving some tralt. The world is more important, right?” Steffan tilted her head in such a way as to make it a statement and not a question.
Her use of the vulgar term tralt didn’t phase me. My father had yelled it at me as I walked away from him and all I knew in favor of my magic, but it apparently shocked the others into silence. So it came down to me. “The same could have been said about you a couple of days ago. Or would the rule not apply to you?”
Her face flushed. “I wasn’t a threat. I was going to die.”
Asher reached out and touched her arm. Her body relaxed again. “We don’t know what would have happened once the infection took hold. Yes, you would have died, but that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t have been a threat.”
Steffan’s face screwed up, and she pulled away from Asher as if his touch scalded her.
“It’s true. More than once…” He looked at Mise. “The Demeid is capable of horrors that are hard to imagine. When you see them…it brings home the fact anything is possible.”
I didn’t want to imagine the anything he’d seen to make that statement. The horrors from my dreamed encounter were enough. It was time to redirect the conversation. “How long will it take to get your warrior here?”
Mise looked up. “Not here. If you’re going to the ruins, I can ask them to meet you just south of Hofton.”
“How long?” I didn’t want to be impatient, but I also didn’t want to sit around in the magical vacuum of a cottage for too long. And if I stayed too long in the cave, I worried I wouldn’t want to leave.
He stood up and glanced between Asher and Tass. “He isn’t far. Give me a few hours to find out if he’ll help.”
Out the tea door he went, leaving the four of us around the table. I couldn’t sit back down. I needed to do something, to get started on our plan now that we had one. Whether Mise found us a non-magical warrior chaperone or not, we had to go. And if Steffan was coming, we needed to come to an understanding. “Can we talk, Steffan?”
She didn’t look up. Her eyes flitted in my direction, then to Asher.
“Tass, I have some things I want to show you before you leave,” the healer said, standing and gesturing to the tea door.
“Of course.” Tass followed behind him, leaving my fellow castini and I alone.
Finally she turned toward me, looked me up and down, then got up and went to sit on her bed.
I took up position on my bed, just a few feet across from her. And waited. I’d gotten the impression from Asher she had something to tell me, but it looked like I was going to have to do the work. A niggle of irritation writhed in my chest. “Why did Harry send you to find me?”
“That’s what you want to talk about? Is everything about you?” She rolled her eyes and dropped back onto her bed, her body so stiff the tension leaked into the room.
She had to make things so hard. “You know,”—I walked to the edge of her bed—“I saved your life by bringing you here. I’d think you could at least tell me why the hell you were following me without being, without being so difficult!”
My fryn appeared in front of me, a subtle hum emanating from them as they swirled in their slow dance.
The irritation left me.
Steffan’s body relaxed.
I resisted the urge to compare the fryn’s ability to manage emotions to Steffan’s ineffective, downright backwards, emani magic. It wouldn’t help, and they’d made it so I didn’t have the energy to put into insults.
“Look, I don’t know your story other than you’re a castini like me. I’d like to know. Beginning with why you were in Kenuport looking for me, or waiting for me, or however it came about.” I swallowed and looked off to the side. “And I’m sorry for being, well, being me when we first met and whatever role I had in you getting cursed.” Those weren’t words I often said. I made it a policy not to apologize on principle. Not unless I did something wrong on purpose, which rarely happened. I did seem to have a knack for doing a lot wrong without meaning to. At least I was realizing that with the help of the fryn.
Going back to my bed, I saw my socks laid out. At least I thought they were my socks. They were the same size and color, but cleaner and less worn than I remembered. “Huh.” I sat and put them on.
“What?” Steffan turned her head towards me.
“My socks. They were missing and now they’re back looking cleaner than they were when they were new.”
“So?”
“It’s strange. They weren’t here when I first sat down.”
“Ugh. Of course they were. You just missed them. But that’s right, you’re too perfect to have missed something so obvious.”
I wondered why I was trying. And then decided not to. Asher was more reasonable. Tass, even, was more reasonable. Convincing them she shouldn’t be part of our little adventure seemed like an easier task than talking to her. She hadn’t even accepted my apology. Without a word, I put my boots back on, grabbed my bag, and headed out the cave door.
Next episode on Saturday May 3, 2025.
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