Westhaven, Rowan Erlking [large ebook reader .txt] 📗

lieutenant nodded. “He didn’t realize what he was doing, did he? Not until it was too late.”

The boy blinked at him, staring without a thought in his head beyond keeping still so he would not upset the general.

Rubbing him on the head, the lieutenant smirked. “You have no idea what I am talking about, do you?”

He tugged at a white tuft of the boy’s hair then let go.

“If you want to be civilized, Boy, I suggest you continue to obey the general,” he said. “Civilization is the result of order. And order is the opposite of chaos.”

The boy’s eyes seemed to ask the question without the words escaping his mouth.

“What is chaos?” Chuckling, the lieutenant leaned back in his seat as the carriage clacked over the rails. The landscape outside continued to go by even as the summer sun beat down “Chaos is the craziness that magic and demons stir up.”

The boy opened his mouth as if to protest but stopped himself.

“Ha, ha! Ah, I see. You think of us as demons, right?” The lieutenant nodded, glancing at his companions. He leaned forward. “I’ll tell you a secret. We’re only half demon. And the demon part is not our fault. Our people are not from this world at all.”

Blinking, the boy still just stared. It wasn’t what his people said.

“I know you have looked up into the sky at the stars and the moon. I saw into your head,” the lieutenant said. “But did you know out there among the stars are worlds like this one, full of people, civilized and orderly people? Our people come from there.”

The child blinked again, still staring. From the stars? Impossible.

Nodding, the lieutenant said, “You don’t believe it? Trust me. This world is one of many. And this world is wrapped up in chaos.”

“This world shouldn’t even exist,” a corporal murmured and folded his arms, tucking away the playing cards.

The other corporals laughed.

“What do you mean?” the boy abruptly asked in a low whisper, especially since asking questions in the past often resulted in a beating.

All the men turned and looked at him. The boy braced to be hit.

But the lieutenant leaned in, checking to make sure the general was asleep. “What we mean is, this world is an impossible world. Unexplainable. Magical.”

The boy waited. They didn’t hit him. They had answered him, which meant they might say more.

Sighing, the lieutenant glanced at the others. “Look. You seem smart, so I’ll tell you. In all the universe, in all the worlds, there is no such thing as magic. Physics, yes. Strange phenomena with unique chemical reactions, yes. Magic no.”

“He doesn’t even know what physics is, Ben,” a corporal said. “Use simpler words.”

Nodding, the lieutenant tried again, peering into the boy’s eyes. “Magic, as you understand it, is not real and does not work anywhere else. In fact, this world does not move like any other world.”

“The world moves?” The boy just stared at him in confusion. This was definitely nothing like the stories he had heard.

“I give up.” The lieutenant threw up his hands. “How do you explain that this world is impossible to a primitive child?”

The general groaned, rolling over. “Tell him that science is magic on other worlds.”

The soldiers straightened up. The lieutenant stiffened.

General Winstrong opened one eye and glanced at the boy who was suddenly horrified that his master had heard him. The boy’s heart pounded in his chest as he wondered if he would be beaten that night.

“I am so sorry to disturb you, sir,” the lieutenant said, going faintly pale.

“Well, I’m awake now.” The general then turned to the boy and said, “Tell me, Boy. If you can remember, what do your people say is the beginning of this world?”

The general lifted his eyebrows as if to tell the soldiers to wait for the answer.

The boy knew that was an order. But it had been a long time since he had heard the story his people told. Too many years ago. In fact, he hardly thought about the past, only focusing on surviving the present. “I…I don’t—”

“Think hard,” the general said with that tight sound in his voice. “I will wait when you remember.”

“I can—” The lieutenant reached out towards the boy.

The general stopped him, pushing back the lieutenant’s hand. “Do not forcefully take it from him, Lieutenant. A memory like that needs to be worked on in his own head. You could drain him dry with your methods.”

Going white, the boy looked to the lieutenant and swallowed. He was glad the general had not allowed his energy to be drained again. Gazing down, he frantically searched his memory for a story his mother may have told him. Eventually, through the mire of buried dreams and dusty memories of the village on the peninsula, he drew it up along with his name as if it started the story.

“Kemdin,” he murmured aloud. Then he closed his eyes and recited. “Long ago there was nothing, and the gods—”

A corporal snorted.

Kemdin opened his eyes to look, but the general had glared at the soldier to be silent.

“And the gods of the four corners of the universe found this empty place and decided to claim it for themselves.” Kemdin closed his eyes again and recited what he remembered, recalling his mother’s tender voice. It was the kind that soothed when his stomach ached or the storm outside raged with lightening and booming thunder. A tear rolled down his cheek as he thought of her.

He choked as he continued. “The god Jodis of the north and Temis of the east and Klodil of the south and Hanin from the west met together in battle, though not one of them triumphed. And from their blood they formed the rivers, the oceans, the land and the mountains until the entire emptiness was filled. There they met and divided the land. Jodis is in the north, Temis the east, Klodil, the south, and Hanin the west. And whenever the people need them, all they have to do is call their names and ask.”

“That sounds like a spell,” the lieutenant murmured.

The general stared at the boy, then the lieutenant. “You know a spell?”

Tilting his head, the lieutenant replied, “No. Not really. Though I once found a pile of magician scrolls when I was serving in Ladis City. There was a magician’s guild there that we cleaned out, and I looked through them. One element was the same in almost every spell. They call on the four quarters of the earth and then make some kind of command.”

The general rounded on the boy, grabbing him. “How do you know spells?”

Ducking down, the boy trembled. “I don’t know spells! I don’t know spells! I only know the story!”

Lifting the hand to slap him, the general seethed through his teeth, spit flying. “Don’t you lie to—”

“I don’t think he’s lying,” the lieutenant cut in, his hands raised but not quite stupid enough to set his hand on the general to stop him.

General Winstrong’s nostrils flared. His face flushed. He was breathing hard with his old fury as he glared spikes at the lieutenant. “You don’t think so? Then how is it that you recognized a spell in that story? The boy is—”

“Just a child,” the lieutenant said, his hands still up. “And undoubtedly those humans told stories with magic spells in them. It is ingrained in their culture.”

“Culture?” The general appeared as if he would be sick. “Magic is not culture. It is darkness. It is ignorance. It is the filthy matter that keeps these humans in their savage state.”

“I agree,” the lieutenant said, nodding. “Perhaps I worded it badly. All I was saying was that it is what those humans teach their children from infanthood. The boy doesn’t know any better.”

That seemed to placate him. General Winstrong grunted then cast the boy a side look. “You saw that when you touched him?”

Exhaling, the lieutenant nodded, lowering his hands. “Yes, sir. He is as ignorant of magic as I am.”

The general lifted an eyebrow, wondering if the lieutenant was now hiding something.

With a smirk, the lieutenant cleared his throat. “That is to say, I drew no magic knowledge from him.”

That was enough. General Winstrong closed his eyes and folded his arms back across his chest, shifting to make himself comfortable in his seat again.

“I suggest,” the general continued with that dangerous tone of warning, “that you do not talk with my boy about magic, reading, or the state of the universe. The last thing I want is for you to confuse him more.”

The corporals glanced at the lieutenant who shrugged and gazed out the window. The boy had also averted his eyes, knowing that though he may have been the subject of an argument he was not a participant. Nothing but the passing foothills of the Semple Mountains covered in distant trees, waving grain, and grazing cattle was beyond the glass except for the occasional telegraph pole that ran along the train tracks. But the boy stared as if he could see through the mountains to the far north where he grew up, thinking of his name…Kemdin and how odd that it had been so easy to forget when everything else haunted him.

 

They arrived in Kalsworth that evening. It was a flat town, but the roads were paved. The people even had automobiles and bicycles. In fact, as soon as they walked out of the station, they hired a taxi and had him drive them to the nearest inn. There they paid for rooms and had the boy chained to a post just inside the yard where the keeper of inn had his own servants working.

The boy watched the people come and go from the inn through the slatted fence. It bordered on the yard and the road. He was out even as the gas lamps lit in the cooling summer air.

“His lordship wants another baked apple and some cider,” the scullery head called to one of the servants not far away. The light of the door shone into the yard.

A young man dressed in a snappy brown suit and a small apron jumped up and bowed to her. “Yes, ma’am.”

The woman then glanced at the general’s boy and shook her head before asking, “Have you eaten?”

Blinking, the general’s boy didn’t know what to say or if he should speak at all.

“Look,” she leaned on the doorjamb, “Your master isn’t here to object, and no one here is going to tell on you if you talk to us. So, have you eaten? You look starved.”

“I…I’m very hungry,” the boy said.

“What’s your name?” she asked, a smile spreading on her face.

He froze, trying to remember it again. “He calls me Boy.”

“I didn’t ask that.” Her smile was still small, looking amused more than anything. “You must have had a name before you came to work for the general.”

Blinking, he thought hard. Then he lifted his head, remembering it from the train ride. “Kemdin?”

“Kemdin what?” Her smile grew wider.

He blinked again, nodding his head. “Smith.”

“Ah.” She rose off the doorjamb. “Your father was a smithy.”

Kemdin nodded.

Grinning very wide now, she dusted off her apron and gave a sharp bow. “That means you like a hearty meal. I can bring you some potatoes, carrots, and meat. There is some left from supper.”

His eyes grew wide, staring at her.

She laughed. It was a nice sound, friendly, even though her eyes were blue and she was more of a demon than the general was. “Don’t worry. Your master is busy in the lounge discussing politics after already giving us strict orders to leave you alone here in the yard, securely chained. He won’t come in and check on you. Our porter gave him all the assurances that his orders would be followed.”

Blinking at her, Kemdin was puzzled. She laughed at that and walked indoors, leaving him to his confusion. The scullery head returned after several minutes, carrying a thick, fired-clay bowl brim with a stew of meat and potatoes with a few other vegetables inside. She