Chapter 20 | Sephania
Sephania
Losing myself in the heat of my mates in the cold darkness is something I’ll never take for granted. There’s still a mission to be done, and I can hardly sleep once my task comes back to me.
Vallan and Garroway have no such issue. After our raunchy session where I managed to relieve my adrenaline and frustrations and power all at once, we find Antones and are given a small dwelling together to rest the morning and afternoon away.
The vampire and dhampir are out like snuffed torches within minutes. They’ll be like that for many hours. For me, it only takes two hours before my exhaustion has eroded and my previously sex-drunk mind has refocused.
It’s then I decide to make a reckless decision—something everyone knows I’m prone to do.
I leave the Firehold on my own.
The underground stirs with activity, as normal humans do in the afternoon hours. It’s much busier when I emerge from my dwelling, leaving my sleeping mates behind, and make my way through the labyrinthine corridors and snaking passageways.
First, I find a warmed underground spring to sit in, easing my sore muscles and body aches from the fighting and the fucking. I’m alone, naked, and feel entirely free, even with the roof of a cave above me, dripping runoff from the Nuhavian surface, the Floorboards.
The water springs are not new to the Firehold—they are how we bathed when I first came here—but Antones’ ingenious quality-of-life advancement is. Heated stones rim the pool to keep body heat close.
Moseying through the subterranean town for the exit ladder, I notice other changes Ant has made, impressed by each of them.
A network of interfolk and girls make dresses in a room, now with some boys mixed in.
That would have been forbidden in my day.
Antones was always a fashionable man, so this isn’t too confounding.
The training and swordfighting regimens are, as noted before, entirely mixed, integrated, and optional.
Old Endolf’s alchemical cave has been cleaned, redecorated, and now houses an educational school with some of the elder Grimsons teaching the younger flock.
Ant has partaken in new enterprises, such as in-house tailoring, leathermaking, and even smithing.
In my time, all tools were traded for, stolen, or bought aboveground. Now, everything is made here, which lets Antones spend his slim margins on better food stores and options.
He truly has made the Firehold a home, I muse on my way out.
Even with the madness happening on the Floorboards, underneath it all is prosperity, somehow, against all odds.
Though he is humble and not occupied with self-serving, I’m not sure I ever met a better man than Antones.
The Chained Sisters will be content here, I’m sure of it.
They’ll be welcomed—more bodies to do the work needed to keep this place running.
That being said, it’s no utopia here. Some of the same struggles I faced still remain.
There are no families because everyone here was ousted from theirs.
The orphans are no longer slaves, which is good, and they’ve created their own cliques and groups which act familial. But there’s lost love in these walls.
Some of that plays out with high rates of promiscuous behavior, even for the younger Grimsons.
They have no parental guidance. Which leads to high rates of pregnancy—whether wanted or unwanted—births, and stillbirths.
There is no dedicated childbirth wing in the Firehold, though I suspect some of the tutors in Endolf’s education chamber have begun to try and enlighten the youth. Maybe the Sisters can help with that.
Those issues exist even for the young members who have seen no more than thirteen or fourteen winters.
It’s a sorry sight to see, a plump girl who only comes up to my chest and has the smoothness of innocence on her young round face, full-bellied and waddling by through the corridor.
Surely there must be a way to stop this from becoming endemic.
In the past, Old Endolf concocted potions—blue in color, I recall—that, if imbibed, would do the magical deed of ending a pregnancy. It was not always painless, and it didn’t come without its own peril, but it was something.
They need a new alchemist, I realize once I reach the ladder and head up into the sunlight. Maybe once the Silverbood is finished manufacturing Silverblood, my mother can shift her focus to more altruistic pursuits that still help people?
It’s a thought I’ll have to throw on her. She’s never been as good with children or young people as, say, Iron Sister Keffa, but her maniacally focused glee with which she tries to craft things to change the world might actually do some good here.
My plan is to return to Kep’s basement, retrieve the Chained Sisters, and give them the good news. We might as well start the moving process now, in broad daylight, while the vampires are sleeping and the dangers on the roads are not as evident as they are at night.
It’s very easy for a flesh-trader to steal someone in the shadows and darkness. It’s harder to stop a rush of two-dozen women and girls from marching across the city to their new home in the sunlight.
The few grayskin and vampiress Sisters will have to wait until night to make the trek, but they can shoulder the burden easier, I ponder as my eyes touch sunlight above.
I’d like to see a lanky fucking sex slaver try anything against a fullbooded vampiress, no matter how frail she looks—shit that’s bright.
My eyes close with an instant wince as the sharp rays of sun greet me over the crack of the grate.
I shield my eyes and see yellow and red spots behind my lids.
It takes a full five minutes of staggering, stumbling under an awning of a shopfront, before I’ve acclimated to the torturous sunlight.
It makes me see I’ve become more vampiric the longer I’ve stayed with my men, and I chuckle at the thought.
I’m also growing pale like one, keeping only nighttime hours for so many months.
Nuhav during the day hides its horrid qualities well.
The scars of the riots from last night are being swept away.
The bodies hanging from gables and beams have been cut away and draped with cloth or dragged away.
The bazaar I used to steal goods from bustles with energy and a cloying blanket of dirt that makes me cough.
It’s old memories like this that make me feel sentimental about my homeland. I’ve been locked up in Olhav for so long, trying my hand at rebellion, that I almost forgot what it was like to be locked up down here.
In the past, at any stage in the first twenty years of my life, I would have never been able to freely roam the southern bazaar or the trade roads where the merchants set up their carts and tents.
Not only can those places be dangerous for younglings, with the cutthroat merchants, the cruel eyes of the flesh-traders all over, and the Bronzes watching out for any civil disobedience and often causing more of it with their simple presence.
More directly, I simply would not have been allowed on the Floorboards, unless it was for a task: charming coin from the commoners as a young girl, at the behest of the House of the Broken; a once-a-month guided tour from Antones keeping watch over me as a Grimson; the Diplomats sticking to the slums and shit-covered streets of the poorest districts, and going no farther than they had to.
I breathe in a fresh line of dirt and grime and stuffy air, choking and then smiling.
This is what freedom feels like, I suppose: grimy, sweaty, and hopeful.
Not having to look over my shoulder at all hours because there’s a target on my back.
That thought dims my mood when I realize there is a target on my back, just not here in Nuhav and not during the daylight hours.
I can’t forget who I am. No matter how innocuous this daytime stroll through Nuhav is, my mates have begged me to understand I’m too important to the revolution to just go wandering about on my own and putting myself in reckless jeopardy.
Gulping, I harden the breezy expression on my face and leave the bazaar, heading west toward Kep’s tavern and house where I’ll find the Chained Sisters.
I might be free, but they are still chained.
The Grimsons still live destitute lives underground.
Until all of that is changed, I can’t labor on this whimsical idea that I’m “free” or my job is done.
With a twinge of shame, I pick up my pace and march through the busy streets and loud throngs of people and workers going about their day.
I cross a town square, recall a shortcut through alleyways I once feared, and pop out along another street corner, blowing past a huddled audience with their backs turned to me.
Then I hear the voice speaking to that huddled mass, and my stroll slows as dismal memories sink into the pit of my stomach and physically claw at my heart.
“Brothers and Sisters, your alms are not for naught! Let it be known: For every sick, perverted mind roaming these streets, there are two minds to stop him. We cannot find enemies within our citizenry, for it is not the common man you disagree with!”
The words are met with raucous cheering. Clapping. Heartfelt tears from a large group of listeners.
My throat closes up. I’ve stopped walking completely. My eyes fill with a burning sensation and I flare my nostrils, slowly turning my entire body toward the voice and knowing what I’ll find.
There, at the end of the street, standing atop an overturned fruit crate and voicing his heraldry with the brisk afternoon sun bathing him in angelic light, stands Father Cullard.
The man who raised me, the man who ruined me.
His hands gesticulate as he speaks. Despite the griminess of the surroundings and the ever-present cloud of dust, somehow his habit is immaculate—a crisp white robe with blue sashes across either shoulder, and a golden mitre atop his bald, wrinkled pate.
The fresh garb and the holy hat tell me something has changed about Cullard. He has somehow scaled the ranks of the Trueheart sect he treacherously holds so dear, to become something greater than a mere “Father” and almshouse abbot.
Father Cullard has gotten himself a promotion. And now he’s espousing his talk of good deeds and dignity to anyone who will listen.
Unfortunately, there are a shitload of people who will listen.
The entire block is covered shoulder to shoulder with a happy, zealous audience.
They look at Cullard as if he’s a deity rather than a sinful, deeply flawed man who preyed on his young flock at the House of the Broken when I was a child there.
Cullard’s arm sweeps above and behind him, rolling back the wide cuffs of his sleeves to reveal pasty, skinny arms. Past the roofs of the nearby buildings, he gestures at the spires sitting in the background—the Temple of the True, only just visible from here.
His voice booms to the crowd. “Your salvation, as always, rests within the temple, my sons and daughters. Every donation aids us in bringing the scourge of the wicked flesh-traders to heel, and provides room and board for orphans and needy parishioners. With every offering, we are able to carry out alms to the needy, sick, and infirm. The Temple of the True is your home, as it has always been”—he makes a symbol of his faith across his face—“and that home is needed now more than ever. Do not turn your back on the True! Rioting and bloodthirst fill the streets of Nuhav. Man is pitted against man. The Bronzemen no longer protect but seek to harm their own people, turning against the very people who protect them! Us!”
That gets a particularly loud response from the crowd, no longer cheering but now angry and thick with vitriol in their voices.
“Down with the traitorous Bronzes!”
“Sack the bloody flesh-traders and their hubs!”
“Burn the vampires!”
There are so many vying missions here, it gives me whiplash as I listen to each voice rising above the crowd. And that, I think, is the point: Fill the audience with enough violent rhetoric, fervor, and fear to carry out the Truehearts’ deeds.
For Father Cullard to utilize his elevated position and thrust it upon the masses . . . it makes my blood boil. My heart squeezes with rage, and if I don’t leave this place soon, I’ll do something idiotic.
My teeth grind so hard I think they’ll crack. Because these people are not listening to an honorable, good-willed man. They are listening to a heretic in white robes and a sinner in a golden hat—a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
If only they knew the truth.
The mantra comes to me and doesn’t go away, repeating again and again. If only they knew, if only they knew, if only they knew.
I leave the block, rushing to shoulder past more people showing up, my head spinning, tears coming to my eyes as I yell, “Excuse me! Pardon me! Move!” to get out of the crowd that’s making me hyperventilate and lose myself.
Father Cullard’s echoing words haunt me down the street, and they make me realize the true purpose of his speech this afternoon.
“The Silverknights have taken the Oath of the True among their ranks, thus proving their loyalty to our righteous cause and the true will of the people of Nuhav! Join them, and join us!”
So, I think sadly, Cullard and Rirth have teamed up forces. With the military wing of the Silverknights combining with the religious fervor of the Truehearts, who is to say what devastation they could bring to my homeland?
If only they knew, I think again, this time regarding Rirth. He doesn’t know my past history with Father Cullard. No one alive really does, except Cullard himself and a few others who are now lost to me, such as Sister Cyprilis.
A disarming thought rides that notion shortly after, as I barrel into another district of Nuhav away from the tumult I’ve just left.
I should have killed Father Cullard when I had the chance.