Sweet Rot
DAWN
Flux burnout kills. There are no degrees of burnout and no recoveries on record. Exposure therapy may reverse the process, but there’s no ethical way to test the hypothesis.
LORE TAVIS, ON THE NATURE OF FLUX, UNPUBLISHED
Blood dried stiff on Dawn’s sleeves, gunpowder caked in her hair. Every time she blinked, she saw flashes of violence. Fluxborn burning. Bodies in mud.
She couldn’t go back to the Fiddle like this. Couldn’t sit under bright lamps and pretend to be human.
She needed the noise to stop.
Lore had things for this.
She’d brought the horses back to Cannon’s, brushed them, curried them. Got them fed. Now Starfall’s stone walls glowed gold in the firstlight. Her boots crunched on gravel as she passed through the gates.
Lore’s people met her. Eased the coat off her bleeding shoulder. Led her to a basin of honey-scented water. Warm hands washed the blood from her arms. They pressed honey wine into her palm. Thick and golden. It burned down her throat and dulled the screaming in her head.
When the cup emptied, it was full again.
“You’ve done enough,” a girl said. “Rest a little.”
By the time they guided her down the corridor toward lamplight and cushions, her body had gone pleasantly heavy. Her bare feet left faint wet prints on the stone.
She woke hours later to colored light on her eyelids. When she opened her eyes, stained glass threw green and amber shapes on the ceiling. Her head was thick, her mouth sticky-sweet. Another full cup waited by her hand, and it went down easier this time.
Music and voices drifted from the main hall. Fiddles and low laughter. Dawn slid off the divan and padded toward the sound.
The hall was full of bodies. Half dressed, sprawled across cushions, wrapped in each other. Moans, laughter, the smell of sex and honey wine. Lore’s Rest Day ritual. Remember the sweetness you fight for. Not prayers. Not offerings. Just oblivion.
A woman with dark curly hair and glazed-over eyes tugged at her robe. Dawn stepped over her reaching hands. She needed to speak with Lore more than she needed release. She kept going. Took another swig of too-sweet wine before pushing the door open.
She expected more chaos, but Lore’s chambers were draped in shadows. No incense, no bodies. Just books and dust and a low-burning fire. Lore sat alone at his desk. Sleeves rolled up, robe half open at the chest. His dark hair was loose, falling into his face as he bent over a page.
He looked up as the door shut. Smiled.
“Don’t you look like hell,” he said with a nod to her wounded shoulder. She grinned. He was best when he didn’t twist words.
“You’re missing your own party.” She jerked a thumb back at the hall. “Thought you’d be out there, blessing the faithful with your gods-fearing cock.”
He chuckled. “Rest Day is for their enjoyment, not mine.” His pen tapped on the paper. “But don’t tell. ‘Prophet with ledgers’ doesn’t inspire quite the same devotion.”
“So it’s all an act?”
“Not all.” He tilted the cup in his hand, watching the gold liquid slide. “Life is painful, and my people work hard. They deserve release. If calling it sacred takes away their hesitation, then that’s what it is.”
“But you don’t believe any of that shit?” Dawn pressed.
“Sex is a tool,” he said. “Just like any other tool. No more holy than this glass of wine.”
She’d seen him on Rest Day before, accepting those acolytes’ devotion just fine. She always figured he enjoyed it.
“Pretty sure you’re doing it wrong,” she muttered.
“This isn’t what you came here for.” He eyed her coldly, bored with her judgment.
“Right,” she sighed, sinking into an empty chair. “I tracked the fluxborn. Enforcers are shipping them west like fucking livestock.”
She told him what she’d seen: the variety of fluxborn, the cages, the convoy bound for Haven. Lore listened without interrupting. When she finished, he sat still and closed his eyes. His eyelids fluttered as his focus slid somewhere else.
“Yes,” Lore said softly. “I see it. This is not the true gods’ work. It is men reaching for a power they don’t understand.”
“I have to stop it,” Dawn said. Her throat felt scraped raw.
“We will,” Lore agreed. “You’ve brought me the last key. We can depart soon.”
“Well, that’s not ominous as fuck.” She hated when he slipped into prophet mode mid-sentence.
“The scholar,” he clarified. “She is the one we need to open the gates of Valrotala.”
“Talia?” The girl’s name slurred a little on her tongue. “I don’t think she’ll join us.”
“She hasn’t chosen me yet,” he said softly. His eyes fixed on Dawn. “But she will.”
His tone didn’t sit right. “Are you threatening her?”
“She’s the threat,” he said. “Did you know her grandmother is the chancellor of Vaelis? Marionette Salaren sits on the Council of Five, Pentarchy leadership. The girl will inherit more wealth and power than you or I could stack in ten lifetimes.”
“You hate her?” Dawn had no idea he’d known so much about Talia. But then, he knew all kinds of things.
“I hate what she represents,” he corrected.
“I hate that a thousand children froze in the Lower City while she grew up with a warm bed and tutors and fancy books. I hate that I have to use the tools of the people who broke this world to mend it.” He sighed.
“But I don’t hate her. I don’t get that luxury.
She’s a resource. Resources are meant to be used. ”
“Does she get a say?” Dawn asked. “Or is she a shiny trinket for your gods? What? Tie her to a rock and throw her in the sea?”
His head tipped to the side. “I’ll give her a choice,” he said at last. “And I’ll make sure her other choices aren’t worth pursuing.”
What a load of crap. “You and the Pentarchy. You’re both the same monster.”
“The difference is I feed my people.” He didn’t sound defensive at all. Just matter-of-fact. “And I don’t lie about the price I’ll pay for their safety.”
The honey on her teeth felt sticky now, sour in the back of her throat. She pushed to her feet, backing toward the door. “You keep telling yourself that.”
“You’ll see,” Lore called after her in that same calm voice. “When she takes my path, you’ll understand why it was necessary.”
The midday sun caught her full in the face as she stepped outside. For a moment, Starfall looked perfect again—bees in the lavender, children reciting lessons, the smell of baking bread.
Then a teacher said, “Truth without obedience is chaos.”
The children echoed the words, steady as a heartbeat.
Dawn crossed the square. She saw scribes copying Lore’s sermons word for word, quills scratching in perfect unison. At the bakery, a man lifted a loaf from the oven and smiled up at Lore’s sigil above the door.
He was everywhere. She walked faster. Farther out, the air cooled. The cloying scent faded from her hair. Lore wasn’t a monster. It’d be easier if he was. He was a shepherd who cared for his flock and culled it with the same brand of love.
Dawn broke into a run, putting distance between herself and Starfall’s walls. She’d tell Riven tonight. They could warn Talia together, before Lore boxed her in completely.