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I learnt.
I learned to look to the others for a moral code, studying the sense that seemed innately within them of right and wrong, and I followed it, constantly adjusting for all the many caveats and exclusions that shifted and changed with the circumstances and relationships between the people involved.
For example, lashing out at Old Nicky, who liked to lure young kids into his front room so as to touch them, was sanctioned, if not encouraged. I felt that pressure around my neck as we sank our boots into his sides when we found he’d managed to get my mate’s three-year-old sister inside his room, intervening before he’d done any damage. It curled tighter, twisting inside my head with each vicious strike, wanting more when the old man finally started coughing blood. But when the older kids held up their hands, holding the rest of us back, I did as I was told. There was a time for fun, there was a time for those quiet moments where you connected with others, and there was a time for violence, as long as it fit within the narrow, shifting confines society endorsed.
Then it was all taken away.
I looked down the rows of Volken as I walked towards Lonan and the Great Wolf. It had been several of them that had come to my mother’s door, seeking me. Yet more had knocked on every door of every farm and establishment when they didn’t find me. We’d watched them, safely hidden behind bushes or holed up inside barns, wondering what the hell they wanted, right up until the point people started getting hurt.
I’d known this was going to happen. I’d woken up from a dream that left me horrified and strangely thrilled, the chaotic fragments my mind held on to showing me all the ways the Volken were going to hurt my friend Greg’s mum. I hadn’t paid too much attention to it. I’d always had weird, adult dreams, where people did that strange naked wrestling thing that Greg’s older brother and Jean’s older sister used to do when they thought no one was looking, or where blood and brains were splattered with gay abandon, like my own primitive experiments. I’d shrugged it off as I always did, just assuming whatever strange twist lived inside my mind was active again for some reason, and my best bet was just to ignore it.
I shouldn’t have. We were all clustered up inside Greg’s tree house, a flimsy construction if ever there was one, when the Volken attacked his mother. His parents had opened the door to find five Volken warriors standing there, then one grabbed Greg’s dad by the collar and dragged him out, holding the massive bull of a man, even though the Volken did not look as strong. I remembered the burn of the red crystals on the Volken’s glove as he held Greg’s dad, the stones doing little to stop his shouts or her screams.
We’d stiffened as one when the first cry cut through the peace and quiet, all of our eyes and ears trained on what was happening, a small sound of protest coming from Greg’s mouth. One of the older boy’s hands went to Greg’s shoulder blade, and I remembered the feeling of comfort that brought when I was upset, so I mimicked the gesture. Then the Volken brought his fist back, lining it up with Greg’s mother’s face.
Slipping from the pile of my friends, spidering down the ladder with the broken steps, and walking towards the house was one of the few truly altruistic things I’d done at that point. It had felt good, right, up until the Volken took me away and beat me into the shape they wanted. I felt some of those same feelings now. My hair flowing over my shoulders, my steps sure and true when I felt it the least, the knowledge I was doing the right thing, despite wanting to turn tail and run. My life had been one long chaotic stream of weird visions and horrible impulses that I’d struggled to make sense of, but I could see now. It boiled down to this.
He’s coming for me, Branwen said inside my mind. Her connection with me had come at puberty and had gone a long way to protecting me from the twisted bullshit of the Volken, despite all their attempts to brutalise me otherwise. He’s going to kill everyone here until he’s strong enough to come for me.
I know, my love, I said in return. And I’m going to stop him.
The Volken didn’t notice me as I made my way to the front. Stupid and unthinking, they were as they always had been—overgrown babies allowed full reign to indulge every impulse on anyone who didn’t wear a black uniform, and sometimes even with one. Somehow, this all-powerful culture of men was missing something that even the simplest farmer on the outskirts knew—that violence was an unstable surface to build a culture on. It had its place, to police the members, to make sure the strong did not ride roughshod over the weak, but not like this. As they all joked and roared and cheered for the massacre they believed was coming, not once did they consider that they might be the victims, rather than the perpetrators.
I watched Lian take his place beside Max, an eerie juxtaposition. It was like looking into a mirror. Gods knew how often he’d stood beside me, whether I wanted it or not. As the seer, I was his favourite, before Max had come. Naked, clothed, we’d spent a lot of time using the exact same intimate body language. So when Lian made a small gesture, his eyes roaming around the edges of the cavern, I knew it held weight.
I looked around me as I kept walking, my view of the periphery constrained by the excited Volken, but I had a fair idea of what was coming.
“The pincer movement is always advantageous, if the terrain and conditions are in your favour,” Lian said, reclining naked in front of his map table, a fine sheen of sweat covering his golden skin. I nodded, mopping up the blood and the cum that came from being in an intimate space with him. “If you have the numbers, the right conditions, you create a killing box,” he said, and then pushed the little figurines he used to represent different soldiers until they surrounded the enemy column.
I looked at the board with a nod, the words ‘killing box’ all that stuck in my mind. It supplied a disturbing array of imagery from that presence in my mind I now knew was Lonan, some I’d even been participants in, but I brushed them to one side. One had to, to survive in Leifgart. Instead, I memorised the formation, something about it attracting my eyes before submitting to Lian’s persistent fingers as he tugged me closer and down between his legs.
The most vicious of stabs plunged into me as I saw some of the Volken approaching the women. They shrank back, forming a tight, then tighter circle as they struggled against the chains. The women strove to shove the children behind them, but eyes darted upwards to where the Great Wolf’s eyes now looked down on them. A single drop of saliva formed and then fell from his jaws onto the floor below, sizzling when it hit the stone. My eyes found Arelia’s, as they always did. Across the banquet hall, breeding pen, across space and time, it often felt. This time, they were wild with fear and something much more familiar—defiance.
The ground rumbled as the women’s cries grew louder, their fear, their anger, all food for Lonan, and therefore, the Black Wolf. The god’s eyes flashed a brighter red, as did Lonan’s, a grin splitting his face. The Volken approached, probably fancying that they did so like predators, but what kind of apex carnivore faced down a prey pinned and hemmed in? There was no hunt, no skill there. The women had been defanged and declawed by Volken society into a package that made them the most vulnerable. It was as if secretly, they realised what a threat the women were, that they would have no means to master them without institutionalised subjugation.
Change, I said inside my mind, despite never having the bond with Arelia that let her hear me. Change and become the beast I know you can be.
This was the refrain humming in my head as I began to run, as I saw the Volken jockey to be the ones to first lay into the women, as I saw my Kiralee push forward, her green eyes blazing. She shouted something at them, that whip of a voice forcing some of the closest to stop, even for a moment, much to the amusement of the other Volken. The stilled were shoved and pushed until they shook my daughter’s command off. I enjoyed that momentary pause, where they looked down onto a tiny girl and felt it, the most foreign of Volken emotions—fear.
Then I heard the shouts.
There were few apart from Lian that enjoyed a special position wit
h Volken society. Sandoz was the Chancellor of the Exchequer, little more than an overly powerful civil servant, but he controlled the funds we generated and distributed them for the greater good. Malafen took the horde on campaigns, leading the troops once they got clear of Leifgart, expanding our empire, taking new slaves and bringing them back. But it was Lian that maintained law and order, as the Volken saw it, within the walls of our city. He trained the young soldiers, tearing the boys from their mothers and installing them in the barracks.
It had been his hand that had pinched down on my shoulder when I had come into the city as a screaming, crying boy, when I had mastered my first fight sequence, when he led me into his private residence to discuss my visions. He’d tried to make me one of his personal guards, a misleading enough name, as they did little to protect the lord and were more the unofficial police force within the city, not that there was much law and order to maintain. Rather, it was just Lian’s will. So, when I saw a few of them move, carrying the larger crystals the elite used, I was not surprised.
The Volken’s attentions dropped to their spears as the crystals began to glow red. A common enough thing, especially at this time of the year. It was a two-way power flow, from the Volken to Lonan and back again, so they didn’t suspect what was coming. I put my hand around mine, felt the heat against my skin, before yanking it free from my neck. Then I felt the pull. Not as strongly as the Volken host, who went to their knees, something I’m sure they were unprepared for.
Including those around my daughter. Her green eyes glowed with an inner fire as she watched them go down, a reddish tinge creeping in. Did she imagine she had created this? I couldn’t have wished for anything more, but as I ran down the gap left between the rows of now prone Volken, I saw Lian’s elite step forward, crystals in hand. What had once been a network joining all men together, now became a net to ensnare them with.
I saw the White Wolf’s pack, gleaming like the sun as they ran down into the cavern. They wouldn’t be in time to save the day, but they would save the women, of that I was sure. I put on speed now, feeling the drag on my limbs, my body moving more due to mechanical force than any momentum I’d built.
So close, my love, Branwen said.
I know.
