33. HYRAN
33
HYRAN
They left Tomo in the field where he’d been slaughtered. Hyran knew he wasn’t thinking straight, wanted to run, wanted to abandon Taros to get Col away from this.
But it was Col who kept Hyran calm and grounded. The Conduit gently tapped Hyran’s arms twice, like a partner would do in close combat training, and Hyran released him immediately, regretting his thoughtless strength, so much greater than a Conduit’s.
Still, Col took Hyran’s hand, pointed to the path visible at the edge of the fields, and asked, “That way?”
It was the minutes of channeling that followed that calmed Hyran, that, and knowing Taros was probably more than a little helpful in a fight, going by how he was blades all over already.
The townspeople of Lowvalley had built humble roads that led to and from their little settlement, but the paths they used to get to their fields were no more than packed dirt. To the sides, they had marked stones, similar to how Hounds would mark out their seasonal paths and all the other paths they traveled.
One of the markers pointed out the lake you’d find if you took a left turn into the tree line. Colorful mosses had crept up the side of that marker, making it both beautiful and difficult to read. On a tree trunk further back, Hyran spotted the long legs of a yellow and black nitta bug. So normal. So quiet.
“I can see something ahead,” Taros whispered.
“I’m going to let go of your hand, Hyran.” Col gripped his gun with both hands, his movements sure, his posture stable.
He’s not going to run and hide. I don’t know if I like that or not . “That’s it. The town.”
They spread out as the path widened. Hyran had been afraid he’d find worse here, bodies mangled, faces forever lost, but there was nothing of the kind. He looked around, not quite yet daring to speed through the village and check.
“There’s blood on that window in the house on the left,” Col said, voice even.
“On the roof there, that solar panel is smashed. Could’ve been some weather event though.” Taros narrowed his eyes at the panel.
Hyran shook his head. “No. They take care of their tech. And—”
A rustling, clop-clopping from ahead made them all freeze. Col lifted his gun. Taros and Hyran both flanked him. An outsider dashed around one of the houses ahead, arms tinted brown and red with blood darkest at her hands. She froze.
“Stop there. Who are you?” Col shouted at her.
Hyran hissed and put a hand on his Conduit’s shoulder. “Don’t shoot. That’s Likkan. Li! It’s me. What happened?”
Li’s eyes were too wide, no sleep, shock, and she was trembling. Col lowered his gun, though he didn’t holster it.
“H-Hyran, ma? What is this, ma?” She shook her head. “I have to…I need bandages.”
She resumed her run, though it was more of a jog now, adrenaline having burned out of her. When she opened the door to Oolan’s house, the one on the left with blood on the window, Hyran headed after her, Col and Taros following.
“Li? What’s going on here, ma? What happened? Tomo—”
She was inside, digging through one of Oolan’s cabinets. Apart from being the mycologist, Oolan was their physician.
“I don’t know where Tomo is. We’ll go look. But probably dead.” She looked over her shoulder, turned back, grabbed more things from the cabinet. “Why do you bring these people, ma?”
“They’re friends. We—Li, what do you need? What do you need, ma?”
She froze. Just a second. Took another pack of bandages, turned on her heel.
“Time turned back and my father alive. That I need.”
She walked past Hyran, giving Taros and Col glances that were scared more than anything else.
She would have left them there, but after looking at Col and seeing him nod, they followed her.
“What the fuck happened here?” Col asked.
Deeper into the town, and small though it was, it became more obvious there had been a fight. The houses here were mostly wooden, and curling black marks along their walls indicated that a pyromancer had been here. Discolored earth, wet in some places, cracked in others, said he hadn’t been alone.
Here they saw blood on the stone paths, broken storage crates, scattered screws and tools as if from the mechanic’s work bag.
“They came. And they killed. We are not with them, the woman said, so why let us live, ma? Wasting space and not contributing. She said we were weak since we didn’t breed Guardians or Conduits here.” Li went past the well close to the center of the town, then turned left.
The building there, the Old House, was a gathering place of sorts, not really a restaurant or bar like Hyran would have understood it, the town was too small for anything like that, but it was the place where he had always been greeted and given a welcome, where they had shared food, drink, and news. It was where he had handed the shoes to Tomo, those shoes he had wanted so much, where the boy had smiled like a Guardian mastering his power.
Now, as soon as they went inside, Hyran could smell the blood and worse. So much worse, though he couldn’t put a name to the stench.
“I have bandages. You need this, ma?”
Li dropped her bandages on a chair. The room, almost square, had several tables, and right now, people were laid out on them, all of them hurt, some worse off than others. Apart from Li, Hyran recognized the mycologist’s apprentice, Sinex, and a young girl, fifteen maybe, the daughter of the mechanic. There were less than fifteen people on the tables. Lowvalley did not have many people, less than one hundred, and Hyran had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. Is this what’s left?
Sinex looked from Li to them. “I’m not sure. I can’t tell anymore. I should know these things, but I don’t know. I don’t know.”
Col pushed past Hyran, sliding his backpack off as he went. “Taros, you have a first aid kit with you as well, right? Hyran, check the perimeter, then get back here. Taros, first aid where you can. Everyone, my name is Coldis, this is Taros. We’re friends of Hyran’s and will do what we can to help you.” He looked at Hyran. “Perimeter. Go, now.”
So Hyran ran. Not everyone was in the Old House. He found Li’s father, the council head of this town, was laid out in the small plot that served as the memory garden here. Next to him were several others, the mycologist, someone who Hyran knew as a brewer. The sight shocked, not for the gore alone, and the gore was bad. There was a loss here, palpable, knowledge of decades, families broken, traditions Hyran had only an inkling of torn and disappeared.
It was a contrast, the mayhem visible in the state of the corpses laid out in front of the peaceful memory garden, dominated by large trees and saplings both, each having come from a seed that had gone into the earth with the unburned body of the deceased, to serve as nutrients.
Will they have time to select a seed for these people? Are there even enough outsiders left to dig the holes in the ground for their burial?
Hyran knew he didn’t have the time to spare for that. His Conduit had been alone for too long, and it was by far too dangerous here for Col to be unprotected. Yet, Hyran took the time to make sure there was no one hiding, circled, zigzagged, stood and listened, even if it was just for a few seconds each time.
He ran back to Col, and when the Conduit saw him, he came out of the Old House, his hands bloody.
“I don’t have the right training for this. I need to ask a favor of you.”
“What? Anything. I’ll take you back home. I can run back here and help as much as I’m able. I can take medicine and supplies and—”
But Col was shaking his head, and took Hyran’s hand to lead him back inside to Taros, who was emptying an injector into one of the people on the ground. The face was too swollen for Hyran to tell who it was.
“You are a doctor, ma? Your hair is a funny color. It’s really funny. Look, Li, his hair is funny.” Sinex was in his early twenties, smart, clearly in a situation no one should be in.
Taros looked at the apprentice. “No, and thank you. I color it. You’re really pale. Sit down.”
He said it firmly, and following some instinct, Sinex sat, or rather, dropped to his knees where he stood. Li was at the back of the single room, bandaging someone’s badly burned arm.
Col tapped Taros on the shoulder. “Do you know where the house is? Anandas’s. Can you show Hyran on the map so he can run me there?”
Taros froze, another injector in hand. “You’re kidding.”
“This is an order. Show him the house on”—he pulled a screen from his pocket. “Here. Show me.”
Taros looked at Hyran, then at the screen, and Hyran knew the other Guardian didn’t like the idea.
“Col, maybe if I take you back to Ferrea or even Argentea—”
“It would take too long, and there would be repercussions. Vaccines and general supplies we give, but we don’t help in situations like this. We don’t dispatch physicians. There are rules about this kind of thing, and the Municipal AI would notice if we break them. Anandas might help these people, and you can get him here.”
“It’s approximately there,” Taros said. He’d pointed out a patch of the woods not fully overgrown in the satellite image.
“Can you get me there now?” Col held up his screen to Hyran.
“This is not a good idea.”
Col reached for Hyran’s hand. “No, it’s not, but Hyran. Take a look around. I know you are a good person, because you ran to save my life during the Battle of Starlit Stage. All I’m asking right now is that you run to save these people, as many of them as we can. Please.”
Hyran looked at those eyes, blue and brown, the plea in them. For people he has never met.
Hyran nodded. “I’ll take you. Come on. Goggles, Col.”