Potenkiah, the deathgiver

Chapter 1.2

“I will transfer your last payment,” added the countess, wanting to avoid trouble in the future. She told herself the unexpected delay in her trip had been an advantage, for it had shown her the truth about her butler.

She carried her firstborn in her arms and with two flaps of her powerful wings reached the second floor.

“Activate dome,” she ordered the house’s environmental control center, and the transparent dome around the interior garden darkened. Something else the servant should have d-

What was she going to do now? In her outburst, the countess hadn’t considered that Kev Blaust was the last of their servants, the third to be fired that week. It would be impossible to find a replacement at that hour. Unfortunately, not everything in the house was speech activated. With the cook was on vacation, a houseguest, and an imminent trip…

On the way to her son’s room she saw her broken collection piece and a footprint on top of a mud stain. She cursed through her teeth, but she had put an end to the stupidity the servants showed lately.

“We’re here, skyling, I’ll fix you up,” she announced, lightly setting him down on pillows. “Would you like to open your presents?”

The boy nodded and the redhaired lady went to get ten colorful spheres and the first aid kit. She gave him a dose of a painkiller and dedicated herself to cleaning his scratches.

From the window came a rumor of protests, whistles and firecrackers.

“Mommy, what’s that noise outside?”

“Just another one of those protests, Nickie,” she mumbled in her melodic voice.

The boy watched her with barely restrained reproach. She was the only one that used that pet name, that made him feel like a baby.

“So make them stop.”

“I can’t, skyling. That’s how they show their fear. Did your dad explain it to you?”

“He was busy,” he lied, exploiting the emotional blackmail even more, which was the only way he knew for gaining more time with his mother. “What are they afraid of?”

“Honestly, they’re afraid that the Princess will trigger something terrible, can you believe it?” She tried putting it in terms that could be understood by a child her son’s age.

In all honesty, the rumors were so sensational that some believed the end of the world was coming. Apparently, someone had seen that the Princess’ feathers were an exceptional color, and consequently old legends like the Exterminating Angel and other old myths had been brought back to life. To make matters worse, some ministers from the Assembly of Representatives had irresponsibly hinted at the planetary media that the royal baby could be involved in the fulfillment of an old prophecy.

Madness, in the countess’ opinion, as if the ministers did not know about the so-called prophets that claimed to know the day and time of the great destruction, the legends, or the fictional holodramas with their apocalyptic undertones. Naturally, as the Crown had refused to make known their official statement or the contents of said prophecy, people believed they were actually covering up the truth about a catastrophic future.

“Is the world going to end?” the boy asked.

“No, skyling, no, no! The girl is a baby, only a few days old. What harm could she possibly do? Don’t believe everything you hear. Besides, making noise won’t help their cause. What they ask for is impossible: they want her parents to sacrifice her. Do you know what that word means?”

He did. He could already read and understand more than she thought he could; nevertheless, he shook his head.

“It’s like that time when your goldulp cub got sick, and we gave it to the doctor to make it sleep, so that it wouldn’t suffer anymore,” she explained.

“Ah, it died,” he stated, trying not to roll his eyes.

“That’s right. They want her own parents to sacrifice her, and that will never happen! If they love her as much as I love you…”

“Their noise annoys me, mommy,” he complained, stirring them back to the original topic.

“I know. Be patient, they will be gone soon.” The countess kissed his forehead. “I have to go now, skyling.”

Nicah was disappointed. There was always something or someone more important than him for his mother. He had gotten rid of the servants, but she was still busy with other issues… Sometimes it was a trip, other times it was his father. But he couldn’t get rid of him, could he?

Although his birthday party was still forty days away, he opened all his presents. There were simulation toys, a small remote-controlled airship, a portable sound system, an anti-gravity vehicle, a beautiful, ancient chess set, and a holographic camera with a blinking light. Out of all of them, the one that caught his attention was the ProCom G21: a small silver disk, barely larger than his hand. He touched the cold surface with a finger and the gadget issued a hair of light that captured his fingerprint, so that it could recognize its new owner. Then, three beams emerged from the edge and projected an arched holographic screen into the air. He was greeted by a sexless voice that called him by name and last name, without asking for them. Nicah noticed that there was still a tiny rubber egg, and a translucent disk -thin as an onion peel- in the package. The egg was a wireless earbud that he could place in his ear so that no one could hear the device or the speaker, should he use the gadget for communication. The disk was an external memory device. Nicah used a finger to touch all the objects around him and made sure the device worked properly. In the blink of an eye, it had found all of them in the information networks, identified their names, and seen the operation manuals. Then he connected it to the house’s artificial brain and it showed him the fridge’s food supply, he saved his parents’ ProCom numbers, disarmed the house’s security alarm, and drew a three dimensional model of the place where he could see the residents’ location, except for his uncle’s, labelled as a stranger.

“Too boring,” he mumbled to himself, and threw the ProCom into a corner of the room. Next, he lifted the holographic camera’s case and read outloud. “Nuclear battery, lasts a hundred beltas; for the good that will do me…”

He threw it across the room still in its package and curled up in his favorite couch, squeezing his eyes shut and pouting.

“I bet you would have preferred a fragmentation grenade, or at least a complete set of practical jokes, you cunning little fox,” he heard a few seconds later. He opened his eyes in time to see his beloved uncle Nonat, their guest, disappear from the doorframe. Well, that was not really his name, but it was the way he had called him the first time they met, and the name had stuck.

“So you saw everything, uncle,” he said, moving his fingers as if he were pulling from an imaginary trigger. “Now I’m going to have to sacrifice you.”

He dragged himself to his bed with a half smile. As sleep took him, his breath slowed down, and became deep and regular, and his face relaxed until it became truly angelic and innocent.