Hello once again Steemit!
I put the wrong tags in my original introduceyourself post, so please read the first post I made before reading this chapter. The original post contains my introduction and the prologue to the novel. You can skip the prologue if you like, as it is set many years before the beginning of the story.
You can find the introduceyouself post here.
Spawn of Seron - Part 1
Valens used his elbow to shield his eyes from the pestering sun, then turned around and and lay on his stomach instead. The heat was really chipping away at his alertness, magnified in part by his black outfit and in part by the fact that he was as close to the sun as the city’s rooftops allowed him. The cloak and cape were needed to conceal his identity in case someone unexpected showed up, moreover they made it harder to guess his age. It was better to appear older than his sixteen summers for what he was about to do. He hated to be doing this during the day, but the damn priest left his den so rarely that it would be another month or two before Valens got to try again.
Hands and feet secured on the crumbly stone, he pushed himself up and peered over the edge of the flat rooftop. The street three floors below looked like a dried out river; footprints and wagon trails littered the surface, many signposts and stalls were still out, beckoning customers to come in and take a look at the wares. All this lay practically undisturbed for years. The buildings, being almost entirely sandstone, for stability’s sake were built as closely together as possible, which made ventilation a problem but at the same time protected the shops from the seasonal winds. Nowadays there were no merchants anymore, and no customers. Just snakes and a small population of rats that survived on Gods know what.
‘Help!’ Came somewhere out of sight, followed by a few more loud, inarticulate yells. That was the signal for Valens to get ready, although it sounded a fair bit more panicked than usual. Better come quick then.
Just as he straightened up, two figures rounded the corner and in a breakneck pace continued towards the street he had been staring at. Tulley had gotten quite good at luring the target to the right spot in the short time they’ve been working together. Valens didn’t know whether to feel proud of his young protege or worried about how reckless the boy has shown himself to be.
Valens slowly settled down again, this time letting his feet dangle in the air as he sat on the ledge, that he only now noticed, was part of a carpenter’s workshop. As soon as the boy, and a much larger figure chasing him, could be seen between his sandals Valens pushed himself off. A gust of wind hit him as he descended, cooling his body. Despite the speed everything seemed slow to his senses, he watched Tulley halt exactly at the place they discussed, pretending to stumble. The large man dressed in priestly reds hovered over his victim, the fact that he was completely out of breath didn’t stop a dumb grin from appearing on his face. If he only knew how screwed he was.
Valens channeled the power into his legs, bracing for the impact of landing. This trick was something he’d practiced a few times now, it proved to be quite intimidating - falling from the sky with a skull-splitting rumble, sending sand clouds flying away from you. Followed by a menacing pose it could be as effective as any magic. ’Stop right there, filth!’ he shouted mid-air. ‘I..’
The rest of his battlecry was left unsaid, as the end of Valens’s cloak caught on the carpenter’s shop sign. A wooden depiction of hammer and saw, it cracked but held. In any other situation Valens would have admired the superb craftsmanship. The trajectory of the fall changed drastically, sending the wanna-be hero into the gaping hole of the shopfront.
‘What the fuck?’ Asked the priest. ‘So there’s two of you little thieves, innit?’
It smelled great inside the workshop. Wood was as rare as gold in the desert climate of Salderra, so the scent of sawdust in the air made Valens think of wealth and nobility. The memories of his childhood flooded his mind but he waved them away. Luckily he still landed mostly on his feet, so barring a few scratches, he was fine. Alas the dramatic entrance was now ruined.
‘We aren’t thieves,’ said Valens, stepping outside. ‘We are a tool of fate, used to equal out the scores. And today your fate is the noose, Father Kormac. The souls of the people you murdered in cold blood are stretching their tiny arms towards your neck and..’
‘Who? What are you on ‘bout?’ Asked Father Kormac, giving the cloaked figure a confused, yet angry look. ‘The name’s Barrion.’
‘I.. huh?’ Valens hated when his train of thought got interrupted. ‘You sure you aren’t a priest of the Six? Any funny tattoos on your chest? Maybe a habit of sacrificing young children to your God?’
The man, apparently not Kormac, didn’t grace him with an answer, instead he crouched and put his beefy hand on the collar of Tulley’s dirty shirt, then lifted him up in the air. Tulley, who had lay on the cobbles with his eyes closed all this time, finally came to his senses but put no effort towards freeing himself.
‘Put me down at once, fool,’ he said, an offended expression on his face. ‘Do you have any idea who you put your fat fingers on? I am the escort to the most powerful man in Salderra. Unless you want the Spawn of Seron himself to take your soul away and let your empty body wander the streets of Salderra for an eternity you will release me this instant!’
Somehow the words of the helpless boy shook the thug, Barrion, more than Valens had anticipated. Perhaps invoking the name of the dead God of the city still made people uneasy or Tulley’s act didn’t seem as ridiculous to others as it did to Valens. Instead of strangling Tulley outright, Barrion put him down as asked, but didn’t let go.
To attempt a rescue, Valens needed to move at least a few feet closer. Blasting both the thug and the boy was too dangerous.
‘This was a misunderstanding,’ said Valens, trying to buy some time to think. ‘We aren’t bandits, never mind my outfit, we were just looking for a certain fellow. Your outfit happened to bear a resemblance to his, a simple coincidence, nothing more. Please, you can have whatever was stolen from you and we’ll go our separate ways. Deal?’
‘Aye, or I could grab the both of yous’ and get a reward from the Inquisition,’ Barrion excitedly swayed his arms as he spoke yanking Tulley back and forth. ‘I seen those posters around town, I reckon they would trade a man in a black hood for at least a hundred therims. Whaddya think I should do?’
Before Barrion could make good on his threats, Tulley, probably tired of waiting, took matters into his own hands, or better yet - teeth. He clutched the arm of his captor and bit into his wrist. The man cried out and briefly lost his grip on the boy’s shirt. Tulley had only a second, not enough to attempt an escape.
A second was all Valens needed though. He changed his stance, putting his right foot forward and pointed his right index finger at the man’s abdomen. ‘Push,’ he whispered. The intention was what really mattered, but saying it out loud helped to focus the channeling on a specific goal. A barely visible line of white light shot out of his fingertip and hit Barrion in his left shoulder. The heavyset man spun around and crashed headfirst into the closest wall as if struck by a running mule. He crumpled to the desert floor and stayed still. The flash appeared and was gone in a blink, the aim was off but it worked nonetheless. Valens lowered his hand and breathed out.
Tulley, who was wisely prone on the floor, picked up his head. ‘That was it?’ He asked, patting away dust from his clothes. ‘Last time you almost blinded me! This won’t do at all. You wouldn’t even scare kids with this. Can’t you make it sound like a lightning strike?’
Valens walked over and checked the defeated man. Barrion was breathing but knocked out cold. There was indeed a tattoo on his chest, but not a symbol of any of the Six Gods, just a few patterns and something that looked like a bear.
‘Channeling is completely silent as far as I know,’ said Valens dryly. ‘I panicked and spent most of the power during the fall. Completely squeezed now. You got the wrong guy anyway, Tull. How did you make an innocent man chase you all the way to these outskirts? Larrion forgive me for loosing this evil of a boy upon the world.’
The boy looked almost glad at being scorned. ‘Just so you know I followed your instructions exactly!’ He said. ‘A man in red robes, with a tattoo on his chest, coming out of the Church of Seron after the morning mass. He wouldn’t react to the mentions of Kormac’s crimes so I had to resort to more direct methods.’
‘This poor guy just happened to wear a red shirt and tattoos all over his body. Not to mention he is young. Father Kormac is at least sixty.. Sometimes I feel like this is not the best way to go about what we are trying to do. Which is probably useless in the first place by the way.’
‘Well, I wouldn’t say today was completely useless,’ said Tulley, a devious smile creeping onto his face. He reached into his pocket and produced a small wallet, packed to the brim with coins. ‘We still got his therims.’
Valens frowned. ‘So he chased you to get his money back? How drab. No originality whatsoever, didn’t I teach you anything?’
‘I stole it without him even catching sight of me. Waited for him to be alone, then tried to sell the wallet back to him for five therims. You should have seen his face.’ Pride just shimmered from Tulley’s face.
‘Alright I take my words back, that was pretty daring,’ said Valens, giving his friend a hand. Their smiles mirrored each other, not dulled by the recent failure. ‘Now let’s get out of here before he comes to.’
‘Do you think he’ll remember the name?’ asked Tulley.
‘Spawn of Seron? It actually made quite an impression on him, I think, but considering how hard his head hit the bricks I wouldn’t count on him remembering his own name. Sorry Tulley, your fame will have to wait.’
‘You know it’s more than just that,’ said Tulley. ‘You are one of the few remaining channelers in the world. Probably the only one who hasn’t gone mental yet. People should know about you and be sure that you are one of the good guys.’
‘Assuming other good guys exist,’ whispered Valens. Tulley nodded, silent.
As they entered the more populated part of Salderra Valens took the black cloak off and checked his belongings. The newfound wallet, a knife and a book of prayers he stowed away in a small shoulder bag, then reached under his shirt to check the most important thing in his possession. His fingers curled around a familiar shape, he felt the calming coldness of iron under the cloth. A key, the kind they print for maids and kitchen staff to sneak in and out without making eyes of their betters sore. Likely just a trinket, opening some insignificant door, but it mattered the world to Valens.