In a move quicker than lightning, the soldier had her grandmother encased in vines, pulling them continually tighter until her face was blue, her air stolen from her. The other three soldiers made no move to intervene, no move to save a Matriarch of Solace’s line, instead looking on with a vicious sort of savage interest.
“Wehadorders to bring you to Lord d’Refan alive, but I think he’ll forgive us this transgression. You did kill one of his . . . preferred Mages,” the red-haired soldier growled as the Earth Mage willed the vines tighter.
“He . . . is . . . no . . .lord,” her grandmother spat as vines wrapped up her chest and circled her neck. “Only a monster . . . a Warlord . . . would . . . sanction . . . this.”
The soldiers surrounding her chuckled darkly as the vines around her neck slowly tightened.
“Any last words, witch?” the Earth Mage purred, violence coating every word.
The girl’s grandmother glared daggers at the Mage before spitting in his eye. The soldier growled an almost animalistic sound before tightening his palm, the vines pulling taut with the motion. Her grandmother’s eyes grew wide, practically popping out of her head, and her face turned an impossible shade of crimson. All the while, her gaze never left the girl, hiding in her corner on the side of the house.
Eventually—much sooner than the girl expected—her grandmother sagged against the vines, the life leaving her eyes, her gaze still trained on the girl. The soldiers released her from the vines with a noise of disgust before a Fire Mage—the tall red-haired man—set her grandmother’s body on fire.
The girl was still frozen in fear, her feet glued to theground.
Run!
The voice inside her head was her grandmother’s this time, or at least the girl thought it was her grandmother. She hoped it was. The reminder jolted the girl back to her senses, and she took advantage of the distraction her grandmother had provided to carefully navigate her way across the main entrance toward the corner that held the hidden door. The fog of terror lifted, and suddenly the sights, sounds, and smells of what was happening to her village were all-consuming.
She smelled the burning of wood and flesh as Elemental Mages set fire to homes and businesses alike, careless of the fact that people were trapped inside. The smoke burned her eyes and ash fell in her hair like snowflakes, coating the ground around her and making the air thick and hard to breathe. The acrid smoke was so dense that it covered the afternoon sun, shading the entire village. As she snuck around the house, she heard the desperate screams of men, women, and children as they were butchered and burned alive.
The girl whirled to her left as the sounds of flesh slapping flesh and the unmistakable tone of male pleasure filled the air. A broad soldier lay atop a woman, his sword stuck into the throat of a man, pinning his corpse to the ground. Blood spilled from the wound in his neck, saturating the earth and creating a puddle that stretched to where the man’s wife lay face down on the ground, tears tracking through mud and ash on her cheeks as she stared woodenly at her dead husband. Her hand reached toward his, but his fingers were just out of grasp. Every few seconds, her fingers would reach further toward her husband as her husband’s killer thrust brutally into her from behind.
A Pleasure Mage stood nearby, his face contorted in a grimace as he pulled the Essence of both the soldier’s pleasure and the woman’s pain and funneled it into his waiting Vessels. One Vessel—a strikingly beautiful woman with olive skin and long braided black hair—had her eyes closed, teeth clenched, and fists balled as she absorbed the Essence of pain while the other Vessel—a huge, hulking man—was eliciting soft moans, just barely restrained from touching himself, as he absorbed the pleasure Essence. The girl was disgusted that the Mage wouldfeedhis magic off this display, especially when the Mage and his Vessels didn’t look much older than her.
The soldier found his release in the woman beneath him and stood, his dick still half-hard and wet from his release. Errant streams of cum dripped onto the woman’s exposed back and into the ends of her long white hair. The woman didn’t move, just continually strained toward her husband. The soldier pulled his sword from her husband’s neck with a noise that was simultaneously slick and grating, and swiped the tip of it across the dirt, cutting the woman’s fingers off at the knuckle.
The woman opened her mouth in a scream that was never voiced as the soldier drove the already bloodied blade into the base of her skull. Her mouth was frozen in her scream, eyes wrenched shut as her soul was ripped from the world. The soldier removed the blade from her neck and wiped it on the back of her kaftan before sheathing it once more at his side. He, finally, tucked his cock back into his pants, but not before pissing atop both of the corpses beneath him.
“Sometimes a good piss is just as pleasurable as a good fuck, eh, Lex?” the girl heard the soldier say as he smacked the chest of the Pleasure Mage standing next to him. The Mage stumbled and mumbled something that was inaudible to the girl, but the soldier barked a laugh before stalking away in search of his next victim.
The Pleasure Mage tipped his dark-haired head back and closed his eyes, seeming to gather himself before he, too, turned and followed the soldier. His Vessels, now recovered from his channeling, followed behind like the good dogs they were.
The girl finally ripped her gaze away from the carnage, remembering the words her great-grandmother had spoken while in Solace.
She must find the hidden room. She must not stop until she does so. And she must remember what happened here today.
The girl took a shaky breath and set her mouth in a grim line, pushing the memory of the soldier and the woman to the back of her mind. She did not have time now to process, but her memories would inevitably wait for her in Solace.
Her hands tremored as she finally reached the corner concealing the door. She shakily pressed on the little round carving of a sparrow, which released the small door with an inaudiblesnick. The girl glanced around, seemingly remembering her surroundings, before sneaking through the gapand into the secret tunnels that ran through the perimeter of the main house.
The girl pulled the door shut behind her, the darkness taking over and muffling the sounds of death from outside. Enough light trickled in from gaps between the walls to illuminate the way forward, and the girl found it easier to focus on her task once she could no longer see, nor hear, the crimes happening outside of the tunnel.
The girl made her way quickly through the tunnels, her hands outstretched to either side, feeling the bumps and grooves of the mud wall to her right and the wood-slatted wall to her left. In what felt like no time at all, the girl reached the point where the tunnels branched. One would continue along the perimeter of the main house, one would lead her down to the basement which housed the Seeing Rooms, and one would lead her to the main chamber of the house. The girl took the second option, descending the worn stone stairs into further darkness. She kept her hands on the walls as they narrowed and became solid cold stone—more for balance than direction. The girl, due to one of her many lessons, knew these tunnels like the back of her hand and could, quite literally, complete this journey blindfolded with her hands behind her back.
The girl moved quickly, making sure to keep her steps silent and sure, even though she was certain no one on the other side could hear her. If there even was anyone on the other side. She hoped, perhaps foolishly, that some of her people had chosen to hide in various corridors and rooms within the main house once they heard the chaos outside, rather than running into the fray. But the girl knew that was a fool’s hope. Her people were connected through Solace and lived that outwardly. There is no way that they would’ve hidden while their families and friends were killed—the death of her grandmother and what she witnessed with the husband and wife earlier were testament to that fact.
The girl’s footsteps were sure as she descended further into the dark, finally reaching the last stone step and finding footing on the worn and packed earth of the lowest floor of the main house. The darkness was even more oppressive down in the depths of the main house, but the girl moved with a quick assuredness that spoke of familiarity. If there was any chance of saving her people—or what remained of them—from the fate outside these walls, she would take it.
She felt along the earthen walls until she came to a shoulder-height wooden latch a few paces down, built into the left side of the wall. The girl pulled the latch out from its place and pushed it up. The barely audibleclickas the latch unlocked the wooden faux panel that would lead into the Room of Knowledge was deafeningly loud in the quiet space, and the girl paused, hardly daring to breathe, listening for any indication that her movements were detected. After a few moments that felt like forever, the girl cautiously pushed the panel open, revealing the Room of Knowledge.
It was more of a cavern than a room, in all honesty, and the name of the room always confused the girl.Why not just call it the Cavern of Knowledge?The roomhadstarted as a room millennia ago when her people first came to the Valley. Legend says that Solace raised the mountains and grew the forest to protect her creation after the Sundering, and as their community expanded and time passed, so did memories and futures. Most of these memories and futures were recorded in some physical form and placed down here for safekeeping, a backup if Solace—both the goddess and the place—ever fell. As that knowledge grew, so did the caverns.
The girl’s heart thundered in her chest, threatening to expel from beneath her breastbone as she quickly glanced around the room, searching for intruders, or any signs of life. Satisfied that no one was there, she turned and quickly pushed the faux panel back into place with a slightly audiblesnick. The panel, when closed, looked like any of the walls surrounding the space—all were coated with a variety of markings that depicted the rise and fall of various civilizations and peoples. Most Keepers couldn’t read the ancient inscriptions—as time went on, some knowledge had to be sacrificed in order to preserve the minds and sanity of the Keepers as a whole. The girl guessed that she would be able to understand those drawings as soon as she ascended to the ranking of Matriarch. Her family line was the only one left with the ability to hold all memories and all futures, as the burden was shared between generations.
The girl shivered as she remembered her great-grandmother’s words. Soon, she would be theonlyKeeper of Memories.
And then she would die.
