Memoirs of a Fallen God

Chapter 21

I awoke to the sound of weeping. The insistent, nerve-wracking sobs of a grown man in a pain. I opened my eyes and sought out the sound; it was dark, but I could make out the form of a man on a cot across the room. He appeared to be sleeping, weeping even as he snored. Strange.

I tried to sit up but a sharp pain in my head stopped me—that and a firm, familiar hand. Galore sat in a chair by my bedside, his face illuminated by the glow of a bedside candle.

“Slowly. You took quite a beating out there.”

I settled my head back on the thin pillow, for once happy to follow instructions. “How long was I asleep? What happened?”

“A few hours, no more. You dropped like a rag doll after the shaman shook you off his back. Luckily for you, so did he.” He hesitated, his eyes bright with sudden focus. “Something happened there, yes? When you threw yourself at the shaman. I felt…something. A shattering, like glass upon a wooden floor. What did you do?” His eyes were very intent. “What did you see?”

“I…” How could I possibly explain? I didn’t even know what had happened, really, or if I’d really done anything beyond act like a suicidal fool. Even if I had, I couldn’t really put it into words. Lines of power? Ropes of magic only I could see? Priest or no, he would think me mad. “I just…it was going badly. I had to do something.”

“You did something, of that I have no doubt.” He eyed me strangely, but after a few tense moments the suspicion drifted from his eyes. “We will speak of it later, then. When you are better rested.”

I swallowed back a sigh of relief. Then another thought occurred, every bit as worrying as the one before. “Is everyone else…did anyone….are they all okay?”

The priest leaned back in his chair. “As well as can be expected, considering the beating they took. Sleeping, now. Jeer somehow contrived to come through without so much as a scratch, and Rove was never in any real danger, off in the distance as he was. Saintly had a broken rib and a nasty cut to the head. Tore had some burns. He’ll scar. Spanner….” A sudden, unexpected grin appeared on his face. “Did you see him? Who would have thought it? He stood as firmly as a true Acolyte. Rarely have I seen an uninitiated take to the blessing so well.”

His grin faded, replaced with the familiar hard line. “In any case, he is well. They are all well, now. Turkus saw to their healing. Tonight they’ll sleep the sleep of the dead, and they’ll be eating double for their next few meals, but by tomorrow morning they’ll be up and ready to move. In a day or two they’ll be fully recovered.”

“Shouldn’t I be exhausted too?”

He shrugged again. “No more so than any other fool would after a sound thrashing. Turkus refused to heal you. Another oddity to hang around your neck. I called upon him, I said the right prayers, made the proper challenges, invoked the correct rituals…”

“And?”

“And the God of Battle laughed. And did nothing.

“Laughed?”

“Like a tavern drunkard at a bawdy tale.”

“What…what does that mean?”

He shrugged. “I have no idea. That you’re funny, I suppose. Something about you surely amuses him. In any case, it turned out you didn’t really need it. I worried when I couldn’t rouse you, but it seems I worried over nothing. Perhaps that is why he laughed.”

I nodded, but even as I did I could still recall that lingering chuckle echoing in my head after Turkus refused to bless me with the others, back before the battle. Turkus knew something about me, something that I did not. And it seemed to amuse him greatly.