The Fates (Book I) - 2014 Watty Award Winner!

2.7 - Entwined

Some part of Clotho was enjoying it as well, if only because it was the first real conversation that she’d had with a human. Her initial words with Rider in the garden didn’t seem to count. That had been less than a conversation, while also so much more, it seemed to her.

“Why do you call him Rider?” she inquired.

He shrugged. The sack of loot was still slung over his shoulder, as if it would run away, were he to set it down. “It’s the only name he’s got. The only one he goes by, at least. Apt for what he does, no?”

“Burner, Destroyer, Sack-of-Shit might be better.”

He laughed, loud and hard. “Oh, he’s going to like your sharp tongue. Especially upon his…”

Clotho shot him a look that quickly silenced all such thoughts.

He cleared his throat, returning to less seedy subject matter. “The name suits him because he stands out for his riding, more so than for burning and sacking, since horses are rare in these parts. Which makes our way of life much easier—we never have to fear pursuit. As riders, we can outrun anything.”

“Except for fate.”

Chrysaor’s smile twisted down into a grimace, at that word. “Rider has a deep disdain for destiny. Contempt for fate, for all the forces of the gods. He disbelieves in anything beyond this life.”

“No wonder he’s so lost.”

“And who on this earth isn’t lost? Show me a man who’s truly found his way, and I will follow him. Till then, I ride with Rider.”

She couldn’t show him such a man; sadly enough, the only men she’d met so far were in this camp. Instead, she asked about the animals. “If horses are so rare, how did you come by yours?”

“Stole them some time ago from a settlement of migrants. A foreign race from far beyond the Aegean Sea, crossing into this country from the north and east, on the backs of these noble beasts.”

“Still noble now that they’re stolen?”

“I reckon so. Even if their riders aren’t.”

She smiled, a little. At least he recognized the ignobility of this way of life. Perhaps that was a start.

He recalled her earlier question, yet unanswered. “You asked how many drinks until they beg for it? A few, for most of us. For Rider, none at all. The ladies get drunk off his fine ass and his bay-blue eyes.”

Clotho sighed again. Despite her own blind fire, this all just sounded wrong. She could not bear how wrong it all sounded.

“You look disturbed. You shouldn’t be,” Chrysaor tried to reassure her. “We only bring those who are left with no family, once we pass through their lands.”

This sad attempt to rationalize ignited Clotho’s rage. “Their families die by your hands!”

“Only the fools who stand in our way.”

“In defense of their own homes—as if you could blame them?”

“It’s not about blame. Everybody’s a little bit guilty, a little bit innocent. People suffer and die from bad luck, not because it’s deserved. We’re born, and then we just get by, until we die.”

She knew that some of what he’d said was true. She wasn’t sure which parts, or in what ways. Probably because she hadn’t spent enough time on this mortal earth. Not yet.

She didn’t know how much more time here she could take.

“And get rich and get lucky, while we can along the way,” Chrysaor concluded as he stood to leave, sensing that the captive girl had nothing more to say. “Might as well, eh?”