“I said I’m done with it,” I say again. The man is as dense as a block of iron. “I don’t need it anymore.”
Bron holds my crutch in his hand. “We still have two days walk to reach Thyrion.”
“Yes. And I will walk. I am no longer an invalid, much to your displeasure, I am sure. We are wasting time. Let’s go.”
He will not argue with me. It’s not his way, but I wish he would. “Nyasha, tell him I am perfectly capable of walking under my own strength.”
She looks at me, a bit wide-eyed. They are both waiting for me to explode, but I expect more spine from the girl. After a moment, she manages it: “You have gained much of the necessary strength, but the terrain is still rough. It would be best if you waited until we reach the city.”
“I disagree. Leave it here. I never want to see it again.”
“I’ll carry it,” Bron says.
“Leave it, Bron, or I’ll use it to expose what little gray matter you have in that thick head of yours.”
Nyasha blocks my path. I knew she would fight. “You may attempt to walk some distance. It’s a good next phase. But as your physician, I insist that we keep the crutch.”
“You’re not my physician. You’re an orphan pretending to be an adult.”
I walk away. I hear the soft sandy scuttle of the crutch landing on the ground. Whatever else happens behind my back, whatever looks and whispered conversations, apologies and demands, I don’t care. I started this journey with one objective–to reach Thyrion. I’m going to do just that.
And after…?
One thing at a time.
* * *
For nearly three weeks we have traveled alone, Bron, Nyasha, and I, almost as if we were the only people left in the world. But we aren’t. First, we met those men in the foothills, who tried to rob and kill us. And now, more.
They stream from Thyrion. As we cross the dry plains, we see them heading east and west, around the mountains, away from the city. And we see others approaching, caravans and families and tribes.
Who are these people and what do they want? Where are they going and what do they hope to do? It is a strange thing to watch these hundreds of faceless men. I am at a loss for understanding them. Do they believe that somewhere they might find a place they belong? If there is no magic, there is no place mankind can call home. His home will be the grave.
That’s what I envision as we approach the city: that Thryion is dead, just as Jalseion is maimed, and that the lines of men and women are visiting the coffin to see the empty body one last time.
I am one of them. I have come to pay my respects, not to the city of tyrants and warmongers, but to the power it represented. Thyrion did not thrive because of the Kyzers. It thrived despite them. Thyrion grew and expanded like a living thing because of the well, because of the immensity of the life at its center.
I have spent days of my life examining the scientific data from Thyrion’s well. The measurements and readings were daydreams, vistas of wonder that filled my head and even, I think, my heart, with something like joy. I prefer my lab to the world, but if there was one place in all the world I would leave Jalseion for, that was it. Even scientists are apt to name their theories and discoveries with poetic turns of phrase, and I always thought the Heart of Thyrion was a good name, if only “Thyrion” might be replaced with something more suitable.
The death of a person is nearly inconsequential. (That is my belief, and I will beat my emotions into submission.) Death is inevitable. It is the primary law of the universe. Everything goes to nothing. Magic was the one hope. Magic alone existed without decrease; magic alone powered the known world new each day, and would have without end.
Life without end.
The nearer I come, the more I am drawn within myself. Bron and Nyasha disappear. The city vanishes. I am alone with my thoughts. The fog has risen in my soul, and the rain is falling.
Select often make motions with their hands when manipulating magic. It is not necessary. Strictly speaking, it is utterly useless. And yet, the mind is aided by the physical motion; to force a smile is to eventually create the emotion.
Or so they tell me.
And so as I walk, step by step, I let myself realize what I have let myself ignore.
I am walking to my own funeral.
* * *
We walk the main road, the people crowding around us. They chatter and gossip as if the city were not in ruins, as if this were the festival Nyasha always talked of. Even she begins to talk, reminiscing about a city that no longer exists. I hear laughter, crude jokes, snatches of song, whispered debate, inane gossip, political diatribes, all of it distraction. Unknowingly, they skip along the surface of the world, fascinated by minutiae, using atrophied intellect in ignorant bliss.
They irritate me. And, deep down, I envy them.
I’m too intelligent to be unaware of my own motives, too brilliant to be blinded to my own true state of being. I lie to myself continually, knowing that I do it and why I do it. I let my emotions take charge as often as possible, fully cognizant of my irrationality.
Self-awareness is a curse, and I have found my ways of coping.
The irritation smoulders. Nyasha blathers. Bron, in his laconic way, directs me here, there, as if I had no sense. We are to enter by the checkpoint to avoid suspicion. I am irrepressibly sad, and still the people yell and sigh and fling themselves on one another in stupid foolishness.
The line stops. We wait as the guards let people through at their own discretion. Miles of city by which to enter, and we’re stopped.
“They say the Kyzers are dead,” Bron says softly. “General Dracon is now Emperor. I’m not sure he uses that title exactly, but that’s what most of the people are calling him.”
“What is that to me?”
“The city is in turmoil. Dracon rules in name, but not in fact. The city’s splintering. We’ll have to be careful.”
“What’s new?” Nyasha says, trying to lighten the mood.
The sun is lowering and my legs are aching. People, endless people, moving in, moving out. I want my lab. I want my suite. I want to be alone.
We’re at the checkpoint. The soldier in the black uniform looks me over with searching eyes. A shudder goes through me. Men in black, in my lab–a man in black, taking my limbs, the work of my life. I step up to him. “Like what you see?” I growl.
“Step back. Now.”
“No.”
“Calea–”
“Bron, stay out of this.” I stare down the soldier. “I lost my arm and leg to one of you. Let me into your city. See what happens.”
“We welcome all people to Thyrion, the Great City.” The rote is paper thin.
“You’ll be sorry you welcomed me.”
Then I scream in his face. It’s a roar, a raging blast. He steps back, hand grasping for the sidearm he used to carry.
It feels so good.
Bron grabs my shoulders as if to hold me back. I might have attacked if he had not, though I only realize it after the fact. I am shaking. I burn.
“Can we enter?” Bron asks.
Of course we can. All the dead are welcome.
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