Bloodfire (The Sojourns of Rebirth) (48 page)

All of the pieces having fallen into place, Ortis collapsed to
his knees. He looked up at Catelyn, and saw the girl, the scrawny,
weak blind girl he had abandoned to a life of solitude and misery.
And everything he had done since the night of the Purge suddenly
made sense. He didn’t know, and he hadn’t recognized her until
now, but some part of him must have sensed this connection, must
have drawn him back to her.

Catelyn studied Ortis on his knees, curiously numb. She
saw Ortis struggling with some inner turmoil, and she was pleased.
But beyond that, she honestly wasn’t sure what feelings coursed
through her mind just then. Knowing that it was him, the man who
had left her there in the ruins of her family’s home. To die. To rot
like a discarded piece of meat. She wished to leap down and slit his
throat. To open his neck and be showered in his blood.

And yet, a part of her recognized that he had also done
something unfathomable for a man of his rank and stature in the
Empire. He had spared her life, when no other would have. He had
given her the words that had spurred her to defy Imperial dogma.
He had given her a chance to live.

She was here, because of him.
A war was being waged within her heart, and she felt
herself run through a full gamut of emotions; from hatred to
gratitude, from disgust to admiration. She didn’t know which
would win the battle yet, and so she chose to let the war rage
without her, and she sealed those feelings off and slipped on her
mask of ambivalence.
“Get off your knees, Ortis,” she commanded.
He looked up at her, his eyes bleary and red, his cheeks
wet with tears.
“Get up,” she barked.
He did as she instructed, and she stood on the metal
railing, then climbed down to the scaffolding below. She stood half
his height as she landed lightly, barely making a noise. She simply
pushed past him and walked toward the ladder down to the
ground level.
“Why are we here, Ortis?” she asked. There was no sense
in dwelling on what she couldn’t change. She would rather focus
on what she could. Ortis shook himself out of his reverie and
walked along the scaffolding and descended the ladder to stand
beside her. He remained silent, but he stuck his arm into the small
office, and she heard him flick something on one of the walls.
A rumble jostled her and she heard the grinding of metal
gears from somewhere nearby, behind the wall or floor, or perhaps
both. A line of light shaped like a rectangle formed around the flat
floor of the warehouse. Catelyn felt her breath taken away, as the
floor began to slide apart, revealing a sub floor and a pathway
leading to an arched gate, beyond which appeared an exit into the
spillway for the Belkyn Channel’s sewer system.
Catelyn dropped into the sub floor, once the warehouse
floor had finished sliding aside, and inspected the metal grate. It
was shut tightly and locked, but she had gotten into many homes
that were more secure than this. She reached into the small pouch
sewn into the waistband of her drawstring pants, and withdrew a
small leather bag. She opened the bag and slid out two thin metal
rods, each with a different shaped head, one pressed into a
flattened spoon, the other like a forked rake.
She looked behind her at Ortis, who seemed to be
recovering, but still shaken at the revelation that had just passed
between them. She set her thoughts about all of that aside so that
she could focus on her task, turned back to the gate and knelt
down before the lock. It was standard fare, and she inserted the
first of her lockpicks, maneuvering it into place, and then she
inserted the second, and focused her bubble on the lock.
Using the sensitive tips of her fingers to sense the
vibrations as she turned the lock picks, and her heightened hearing
to listen for the catching of the tumblers, she had the gate open in
five breaths. As she’d suspected, the lock was child’s play.
As the lock sprang open, she reached up and pulled the
gate outward. It squealed in protest as the hinges were used again
after sojourns of neglect and inactivity. She replaced the lock picks
in her leather pouch and tucked it back into her waistband.
She turned and looked at Ortis, who was in turn staring at
her with a peculiar expression. She ignored his look, not wishing to
explore the gulf that had now grown between them in the wake of
the recognition of their previous history.
“We need to wait for Silena,” she said, knowing that she
was stating the obvious but not sure what else to say.
Ortis turned away, and sat down on the edge of one of the
raised loading platforms to wait. Catelyn stared at his back for a
whisper, then she turned toward the door leading out the
warehouse, walked towards it and focused her bubble on the other
side. She heard no people in this part of the city, unsurprisingly,
though she was hoping that maybe she would be able to hear
Silena and her family approaching. They weren’t expected to arrive
for another few prayers at least, and Catelyn was not looking
forward to those prayers spent in awkward silence, alone with
Ortis.
She turned away from the door and looked over at him
again. He was sitting in meditation, his legs brought up and
crossed beneath him, his eyes closed and his breathing shallow.
She had seen him do this before, in the few days they had spent
together in his compound.
She knew that she would never be able to sit here for
prayers without thinking about what had just happened between
them, and she tried once more to make sense of the man and his
motives. She considered exploring into the sewer tunnels on her
own, but she didn’t want to be down in the dark when Silena and
her family arrived.
He appeared so calm to her, at least on the outside. But
she had seen the vulnerability in him. She seemed to bring it out of
him, though she didn’t know why. What was it about her that
ripped a hole in him? She nearly opened her mouth to ask, but
thought better of it, and instead continued to watch him in silent
contemplation.
He represented everything the Empire was, to her. He
defined it in a way that even the Emperor Uriel hadn’t, in her
mind. In the brief time she had spent with the Emperor and from
her conversations with Enaz in the holding cells, she had been able
to understand with certainty that Uriel was simply insane,
obsessed with his own destiny as though he believed himself a god.
Not that it excused his actions, but she could sense that something
fundamental was missing or broken in Uriel’s mind...the feelings
of ordinary people meant nothing to him; and were completely
incomprehensible. He was pure malice, incapable of the most basic
of human emotions.
Ortis, on the other hand, was not. She knew that he was
not insane. She had been a witness to his choices, and his crimes.
Ortis’ actions had been of his own choosing and that, more than
anything else to Catelyn, was symbolic of everything that was
wrong with the Empire. One madman, like Uriel, could never have
taken power, could never have exerted his influence over an entire
nation, without the conscious choices of thousands of others.
Ortis, and those like him, had propped up this madness as their
own, and an entire nation had paid the price.
Catelyn felt her blood running hot in her veins as she
looked at him, in silent thought. She wanted to take her dagger
from her belt and slit his throat as he had asked her to do. It was
exactly what he wanted.
Do I even need him anymore?
she wondered.
She considered how they might get through the sewers of
the Belkyn Channel, and through Belkyn itself, without Ortis’
knowledge of the city. She certainly wouldn’t have known about
this secret passage through the underground sewage network.
Part of her was still distrustful of the man as a whole, and
she questioned again that this was all some intricate trap to
ensnare her and Silena. But she set those thoughts aside as the
self-important delusions that they were. The Emperor had already
gotten what he wanted from her, and had left her to starve and rot
in prison. She had nothing left to offer any of them, except for the
satisfaction of killing her. But if that were their aim, they needn’t
formulate such an elaborate ruse to entrap her.
She fingered the metal handle of the dagger, considering
whether to end him here and take their chances, or to wait and
fulfill her promise until after it was clear that they no longer
needed him. Her hesitation raised questions in her mind about
whether she would actually be able to go through with it whenever
the time came. But that time was not now.
She turned and sat down on a relatively clean spot on the
floor, facing the door to the alleyway outside. It was going to be a
long day.

Three and a half prayers slipped by before Catelyn heard
the commotion from the streets outside which signified the arrival
of Silena and her family. She’d spent that time in silent
contemplation of her own, training her bubble to the area around
the warehouse, listening to passers by as they left their day jobs as
laborers in the handful of businesses that remained open in this
part of town, some headed for their homes, most heading for the
nearest tavern.

Catelyn heard the girls’ heartbeats first; like a pair of
excited fluttering birds, beating their wings against the cages of
their chests. They approached from the eastern street leading to
the warehouse. She wasn’t surprised to hear them in fear, and
wondered how much Silena had told them about what was
happening. She heard the footsteps and whispered encouragement
of Silena’s guard, friend and lover Erich shepherding them along
with kindness.

Catelyn had asked Silena about her status with regards to
Erich, when they had been stashed away in Ortis’ safe house.
Silena had answered somewhat dismissively, simply stating that
they each gained something from the relationship, but Catelyn
could read between the lines and tell there was more to it than
that, at least for Silena. But Catelyn respected her friend’s privacy
in the matter and didn’t press for more details. Catelyn was merely
satisfied to find that her friend was happy.

She heard Silena following behind Erich and guiding them
towards the warehouse. Once the four of them got within a handful
of paces, Catelyn stood and approached the door. She pulled on
the handle and the door swung wide, revealing herself to the four
newcomers standing in the alley.

“Catelyn!” The girls screamed and came running at her,
great big smiles on each of their faces. She immediately forgot her
despair and her conflicted feelings about Ortis, and felt her heart
swell as the two girls ran to her and she knelt down and opened
her arms to receive them. They ran into the warehouse, slammed
into her and clutched her head and neck tightly. Catelyn hadn’t
realized until this moment just how much she’d missed them.

She hadn’t known since the events of the past sojourn had
started, how much she could grow to care about people again. She
felt tears of joy trickling down her cheeks as she embraced the girls
and felt their warmth and their love. She was so caught up in their
reunion that she hadn’t noticed Silena and Erich had come inside,
until they slammed the metal doors shut.

Catelyn looked up at Silena, who was standing to the side,
watching the three of them with a smile and tears streaking her
own face. Erich, who Catelyn hadn’t really taken much notice of
before, stood to Silena’s side, his hand on her shoulder, a strong
confirmation to Catelyn that there was much more to the
relationship than simply business or even fun.

Catelyn’s heart filled with even more joy to know that her
friend had found such a thing in her life. She smiled up at the two
of them, then tried to disentangle Sera and Elexia from her neck,
but they didn’t want to let go. She laughed and reached out,
tickling them both under the arms and they giggled until they
finally let go.

When she had opened the doors, the girls had been little
more than streaks as they’d raced toward her. Catelyn stood, and
looked down at the girls, and they squealed in delight and happy
chatter when they saw her eyes and the healed flesh of her face.
Catelyn, in turn, tried to answer them as best she could while she
studied the twin girls and what she saw took her breath away.

Elexia and Sera looked healthy, well fed and glowing with
love, dressed in muted pastel colored pants and shirts. But what
took her by surprise was that both girls were barefoot and both
girls had begun growing out their hair. It wasn’t long, but it was
obvious that they were letting it grow, in clear defiance of the
Empire’s rule. She felt herself begin to sweat.

The girls were clearly taking after her in some fashion, and
she realized that if anything happened to the two of them because
they had been inspired to it by her choices, she would feel
responsible, and that made her more than a little uncomfortable.

Silena must have seen the look of discomfort on her face,
as she said “Erich and I tried to talk to them about their choice, but
the girls wouldn’t have it any other way. We have you to thank for
saving us the cost of shoes at least.”

Catelyn turned her gaze on Silena and Erich, still beaming.
Erich reached out his hand to shake hers, the same way
that Duncan had, and Catelyn took note of him as she reached her
own hand out to grasp his.
He was large. Everything about him, from the set of his
shoulders, to the width of his hands, was bigger than on anyone
else she had ever met, even Ortis. Ortis was heavily muscled, even
for a man his age, but he was also lean. Erich was simply thick,
down to his bones. He had brown eyes and a round caring face,
and Catelyn reached out and took his hand.
“It’s nice to meet you, Catelyn. Outside of business, that
is,” he said in a friendly tone. “And Silena mentioned your eyes,
but they’re even more amazing than I could have imagined.”
Catelyn wasn’t sure what it was that prompted the
reaction, but she instantly liked him. She smiled and returned his
greeting.
“Likewise. I’m very happy to meet the man that puts the
wistful smile on Silena’s face sometimes.”
She wasn’t sure if that was taking things too far, but it felt
like the right thing to do, to acknowledge their relationship up
front. Erich’s cheeks colored and he smiled sheepishly, and
nodded, squeezing her hand warmly. Her instincts had been
correct. She liked Erich immensely.
The girls were trying to get Catelyn’s attention, grabbing at
her shirt and asking all kinds of questions about where she had
been and what had happened to her, and telling her all about the
things that had happened to them since they’d become part of
Silena’s family. Catelyn knelt down again to hear how they got to
share a room, but they each had their own place to sleep which was
fabulous, and how they got to help Erich make their own clothes,
and that they ate lots, more than their first eight sojourns
combined.
Catelyn was amazed to see how animated and excited they
were, considering everything they had gone through. She shook
her head in amazement at how they had bounced back, and
imagined that she saw a glimpse of their future, a future without
the kind of pain and torment that they had endured so early. That
thought filled her with an immense joy.
The excitement was dulled when the four of them heard
the loud footfalls of Ortis’ booted feet approaching. Catelyn tensed,
waiting for a reaction.
The twin girls finally fell silent, looking up at the man in
his nondescript plate armor as he approached the group.
“We leave at sunset. Get some rest. You’ll need it,” was all
he said. He turned back toward the loading docks, but the girls
stood up and ran after him, blocking his path. He stopped, looking
down at them wordlessly.
“You’re Ortis, right?” Elexia said.
“We made you something,” Sera said, reaching into a
pocket of her pants. She unfolded something delicate, made with
paper that had been dyed bright red.
Sera finished unfolding it, and held it up to him. It was a
paper flower, big and bright and beautiful. Ortis simply stared at it
a moment, then reached a hand out as if to grab it, but paused.
“Go on, we made it for you. For helping our mom. And
Catelyn. You saved them. Mom told us all about it. My name is
Elexia.”
“Yeah, and I’m Sera.”
Ortis reacted with an intensity that shook Catelyn to her
core. Outwardly, his face betrayed nothing, but Catelyn could hear
the change in his heartbeat, could see the black pupils of his eyes
constrict. It was similar to the reaction he’d had to her on many
occasions. Finally, he took the paper flower, held it in his hand,
then folded it carefully, placed it inside his breastplate and said
“Thank you.”
The girls looked pleased with themselves and ran off to
explore the warehouse.
“Girls, be careful!” Erich called after them.
Ortis strode away to the corner where he’d spent the
previous prayers in waiting, and sat down on the loading platform.
She could smell and hear that something in him had changed
though. She didn’t know what, but it felt almost like...contentment.
Silena came over to Catelyn as she stood up and the two of
them hugged.
“So glad you made it,” Catelyn whispered.
“Me too,” Silena replied.
“Did you see this?” Catelyn said, pointing to the gate
leading into the sewer system.
Silena look past her, and down the dank hole and she
shuddered.
“I’ve never been much a fan of being under the ground.
Can’t even handle a basement.”
Catelyn smiled, trying to look reassuring.
“So, we can rest here awhile, then we’ll head out,” Catelyn
told Silena, reaching out and squeezing her arm. She looked over
at Sera and Elexia, and the two girls were taking turns balancing
on one of the loading platforms. “The girls look great.”
Silena looked at her and smiled. “Yes, they do, don’t they?
Being around Erich seems to agree with them. I must admit, since
they came to stay with us, I’ve seen another side to him. It’s been
illuminating.”
Erich must have heard his name or felt his ears burning,
because he stepped over to the two women. “What’s been
illuminating?” he asked Silena.
“Never you mind, young man. You just keep an eye to our
girls, yeah?”
“You see what I have to put up with, Catelyn? Constant
demands. It’s a wonder I can get anything done, what with three
women in the house, all telling me what to do.”
Silena clucked her tongue at him.
“Oh pfah, you stubborn man. You never listen anyway,”
Silena said, reaching out and poking his shin playfully with her
foot.
Catelyn smiled at the exchange. Despite the vast difference
in their ages, they seemed to have mutual caring and respect for
one another, and Catelyn was happy for both of them, and perhaps
a little bit envious.
Catelyn looked past Erich and toward Ortis. He was still
sitting, facing the open warehouse floor, watching the girls at their
play. She wondered what the man was thinking, but his expression
was unreadable.
“So Catelyn, tell us about your journey while we catch our
rest?” Silena said. Catelyn agreed and the three of them turned and
sat down on the ground, and she began.