Bloodfire (The Sojourns of Rebirth) (46 page)

Looking at her hands and arms, which were similarly
already covered in soot and dirt stains, she realized that, in truth,
she could use a full bath. She didn’t expect to have the opportunity
to stop for such a luxury before she reached Belkyn proper, nor did
she hold much optimism that such a thing would be ranked very
high on the list of priorities for Ortis. She supposed that if the
price to pay for his cooperation was a little dirt on her hands and
feet, then she could handle it.

She crossed from rooftop to rooftop, feeling the variety of
surfaces under her feet and relishing the thrill of dancing with
danger along the eaves and ledges of the Seat’s tall buildings. Now
that she was able to see again, it reduced some of that pure
adrenaline response of wondering whether her bubble was sending
her off into some barrier she had failed to detect, or off into empty
space or something similar. But her ability to predict a whole new
direction with her eyes once more greatly increased the speed at
which she could move, and Catelyn spent the first prayer after her
departure sprinting as fast as she dared along the edges of
buildings.

It had made her heart race faster than she’d ever believed
possible that it could beat, and she felt it was a fair trade for the
uncertainty that had fueled her excitement before. Now that she
could see the streets below her, she could tell just how high up she
was, and that too filled her with feelings of exhilaration.

It was not all fun for her though. She was spending that
time also thinking about how the six of them would manage to
cross through Belkyn, and pass out of the Grand Gate to the wider
world beyond. She thought about Silena and her family, Erich and
Sera and Elexia. She didn’t know how any of them were going to
survive, nor what awaited them outside the Walls, but Catelyn had
to admit that for once, the uncertainty of the unknown that waited
for them was, in this case, better than the certainty that they would
never be able to live within the Walls in safety again.

And then, there was Ortis. As she leaped to a rickety,
damaged and slanted roof, she shifted her weight subtly, dancing
on the edge of a rotten wood slat. She pictured Ortis prostrated
before her, his arms stretched wide, as she drove his dagger
through his neck. The thought of it filled her with disgust, but
she’d made him a promise. She hadn’t seen any other way to get
him to agree to help them, and although she knew he deserved
death and worse, she still had no clue why he had become so
fixated on her being his executioner.

She didn’t think she would be able to get out of her
promise to him, but she still raced through the possibilities in her
mind, trying to think of a way. She thought that she could simply
abandon him once they reached Belkyn, or even at the Grand Gate,
if she weren’t also going to be traveling with an older woman and
two young girls.

Ortis would almost certainly hunt her down for failing to
uphold her part of their bargain. Silena hadn’t asked Catelyn what
had changed her mind on the matter, but she was happy that the
agreement had been struck. Catelyn knew that Silena wanted Ortis
dead more than anyone, although she knew that her friend was
even more concerned with getting the girls out of the Seat and
starting their lives over outside the Walls.

Catelyn realized, as she skittered across graveled slate
tiles, that she had never once asked if the five of them would travel
together, or whether Silena would wish to take her family to a
settlement, or try to find an abandoned farmhouse somewhere and
make a go of it on their own by living off of the land. Catelyn
hadn’t really even thought about her own long-term plans outside
the Walls, most likely because she didn’t think much of their odds
of getting out alive.

In the back of her head, Catelyn recognized that this effort
of theirs might simply be an elaborate form of suicide, but the
wheels were in motion now, and she would simply have to go
wherever the wagon rolled.

Something that Enaz had said in those last days before he
had clawed his own throat open came bubbling up to the surface of
Catelyn’s thoughts. Some of those memories were muted, and
indistinct enough that she questioned their authenticity, but she
remembered how he had spoken with such awe when he had told
her about seeing the city of Freehold.

Everything she knew about that place was from one of the
books on history that she had read as a child, and according to the
book, that city had been destroyed and abandoned long ago. Enaz
claimed to have seen the walls of the city, and nothing about how
he had described it indicated that the city had been destroyed. But
she also knew that his words had quite possibly only been the
ramblings of a man approaching his imminent death.

This question also reminded her of something her father
had once told her. She’d asked him once about some trivial bit of
information that she had read in one of her books. Something so
inconsequential to her that she couldn’t even remember what it
was now, but that had confused her as a child. She had asked her
father whether the fact in the book was true or not, and he’d
responded with patience and kindness, as usual.

“Catey, books are written by people, like you, me or your
mother. The good ones try their best to tell the truth, just like we
do. But there are books that lie too, just as people sometimes lie.
One of the things you’ll need to learn as you get older is to tell the
difference. To be able to tell when people, or books, are lying.”

Catelyn believed that her father and mother had always
told her the truth, even when it wasn’t pleasant. But there were
times when Catelyn wondered whether what she knew, what she
had been taught, both by her parents and the books they had
provided for her were always telling the truth. What if Freehold
hadn’t been destroyed, as the books said? What if Enaz had been
telling the truth, that the city still stood, or had been rebuilt?

She remembered Enaz’ last word, scrawled in his own
blood on the stone wall of the cell where he had taken his own life.
Free.

As she approached the place where she was to meet Ortis,
her plan long term plan for her life outside the Empire solidified in
her mind. It might seem like a fool’s errand, but truthfully, she had
no other plan, and so she made the decision that if she somehow
survived to see the world outside of the Walls of the Empire, she
would make her way toward Freehold, if for no other reason than
to see with her own eyes, the fate of that fabled city.

She landed on the rooftop above the warehouse that Ortis
had chosen as their meeting place, and when she looked to the
west, through the pre-dawn gloom she could see her next
destination; the Belkyn Channel, leading off towards the city itself
and at the far end of that, the Grand Gate.

Catelyn could feel the pull of the outside world on her, like
an invisible rope tugging at her waist, eager to release herself from
this prison. She climbed down from the rooftop before the sun
rose, and entered the red brick building Ortis had described to her
before they had left his compound.

Catelyn had never been to this part of the Seat before, and
it was unlike anything she had expected. Most of the buildings
here were intact, but long abandoned. The building she stood in
now did indeed look to have been some type of warehouse, for
there were massive empty bays, the floors strewn with detritus
from sojourns of neglect and the walls lined with broken and
barren loading platforms. Catelyn tried to imagine how big the
wagons in the Before must have been, to have needed such space
for their loading and unloading.

The place smelled strongly of mildew, and the floor was
covered with a thick sheen of oily dirt, and no tracks could be seen
breaking the residue, indicating that no one had been here in a
very long time. Her first instinct at seeing the building was that
Ortis had chosen well. She scouted the place, careful to not leave
any tracks of her own, at least on the floor where they would be
obvious, but choosing to climb onto some metal railings and
balancing her way across the room, turning it into a game of
flitting from railing to railing and crossing the large open room
towards a smaller office room without once touching the floor.

She smiled at the victory when she landed at her
destination, reveling in these small challenges she set for herself.
As she reached the small office room, she predictably
found it in a state of disrepair, and mostly barren, but for the
splintered remains of a wooden desk that had long since been
broken down for burnable firewood sojourns before. She began to
feel a sense of confusion and wariness at the utter lack of any place
for a small group of people to spend the night, and began to
question her initial instinct as she returned to the warehouse floor.
This place is abandoned, but that’s its only strength. Why
would Ortis choose this place to stay? And where is he?
Catelyn’s paranoia around trusting Ortis resurfaced, and
she started to wonder if this wasn’t some sort of elaborate trap.
Looking up, she saw metal scaffolding and expanded her
bubble. She neither heard, nor smelled anyone nearby, and she
climbed up a small ladder into the rafters above the warehouse
floor. The metal beneath her hands and feet was covered with a
green patina, some of it flaking away at her touch. She made her
way to the corner of the warehouse, and found a spot high up on
the scaffolding which gave her a vantage point to all the points of
ingress, and removed her pack. She retrieved the lone blanket she
had left with her, and placed her pack down on the metal
scaffolding. She sat down on her pack gently, making sure that she
was comfortable and the pack would be secure, then pulled the
blanket over her.
From below, she figured that she would look like nothing
more than a pile of debris, and as she remained still, waiting and
watching for the others, her eyes began to grow heavy. She stifled a
yawn, and felt sleep tugging at her, pulling her down into its warm
embrace. She fought to keep her eyes open, to remain vigilant, but
the truth was, she was feeling safe here in her perch. And between
that feeling, and the warmth of being under the blanket, she could
fight her tiredness no longer, and her eyes drooped closed.

Catelyn, ten sojourns old, ran headlong through the
streets, scuffing and scraping her skin on rough stones. Her
stinging feet were bleeding. Behind her, she could sense the other
children catching up to her.

She was blind again. Catelyn’s heart raced, in complete
panic. She had to get away.
She reached for her bubble, but this was before she had
learned how to form it.
She was stumbling in the dark, literally.
She felt something slam into the side of her head. A shoe,
thrown by one of the children pursuing her. She fell to her knees
hard, the pain causing her to cry out.
Over here!
she heard one of the children cry.
She heard the feet of dozens, in pursuit of her, gaining
ground as she tried to crawl away on her hands and knees, which
were now bleeding as well. She tried to speak, to plead with them
for mercy, but no recognizable sound escaped her. And then she
realized why.
She had no tongue. Inside her mouth behind her teeth, all
that remained was a vast absence and the salty iron tang of blood.
She spat out a gob of blood and moaned. The footsteps stopped,
gathering around her. She was surrounded.
What’d you say, Barefoot?
one of the children shouted in
her ear. She recoiled from the screams of the mad child at her side.
Lookit, she’s tryin’a get away.
She’s stupid. She can’t go anywhere.
Catelyn knew they were right. Another blow on the side of
her head, and inside her head she felt dizziness fighting with the
pain of her feet, her knees, her head, and the acrid foulness as gobs
of her own blood continued filling her mouth. All of these
sensations, in combination, threatened to overwhelm her.
Then from out of nowhere, a familiar voice. This one older,
rougher, and cold as ice.
You’re useless now.
The words awakened something deep inside and she
changed. She was no longer a child in her dream. She stood now,
clothed in bloody strips of her thieve’s garb. The voice froze her
heart, and sent chills throughout her entire body.
You’re useless now.
Her heart sank and she shivered as
the words were repeated.
It wasn’t the words themselves that caused her anxiety.
She had long ago come to terms with that proclamation, and had
proven it to be the lie that it was. No, what had frozen her heart
was the voice itself, and as she replayed the memory in her dream,
she felt the voice stab out of the darkness of her past and into her
like a dagger through her heart.
I believe in the Empire. This isn’t a fatal wound. If you
are strong enough, you will live and become something hard, and
cold. You will become a benefit to the Empire. If you are not, then
you will die and the Empire will be stronger for it.
Six sojourns may have passed, but she could hear him
now, as clearly as if he were standing right in front of her. The
voice had changed in tone, but not that much. She cursed herself
that she hadn’t made the connection before, but now it was as
clear as anything she had ever understood.
Her recognition of the identity of the speaker of those
words sent her spiraling out of her dream, and she awoke on the
scaffolding, and put her head into her hands, a silent scream
reaching up from inside, strangling her voice with one word
poisoning her tongue.
Ortis.

Ortis approached the warehouse from the street, watching
for any observers, particularly Imperial soldiers. He saw none. He
wished for this all to be over. He had reluctantly agreed to the girl’s
terms, but she’d made it clear that she would not do as he needed
her to do. Not until he did something for her first. Again, as so
often happened when his thoughts turned to the girl, he was
overcome by a sense of confusion and self-doubt. And in the end,
her Will had won out.