Aryu smiled. “Of course there is. It’s about my friend. My friend and him.” He motioned to the resting Esgona, whom he’d by now identified. While this long discussion had been going on, he had selectively chosen to ignore him. As long as he didn’t wake up, Aryu didn’t have to go through the painstaking process of fighting with him and explaining all that had happened in his unconsciousness.
“I’ll listen, sir. Ya’ve earned tha’ much from me.” Nixon looked on, interested.
“I assume you don’t want him tagging along with us?” Nixon nodded. “Help me find my friend. He can’t be far now, and until I see proof otherwise, I refuse to believe he’s dead. We find him, explain it all as it’s been explained to me, and leave the two to do as they will, likely go north to the Great Range I’d guess. I’ll accompany you until our task is finished and your answers found, but I want your promise that you will let me return to them and continue as I was before you ever showed up, never to be bothered by you and your threats of death ever again once we’re done.
“You should know that I am beside myself with anger and sadness right now, Nixon. But the reality is that my friend and I can’t just destroy this inhuman army. Time with you, one who’s seen so much, might just help me come up with a plan on how we can.”
Nixon thought it over briefly, but the answer seemed clear to anyone in his position. “It seems a fair deal, Aryu O’Lung’Singh. Agreed.” He rose, walked over to where Aryu was sitting, and spat in his hand; sparks and sulfur flying forth just as they had done days earlier with the old man in the bar. His hand extended, his face determined, chiseled from solid rock.
Aryu met his huge hand, finding it hot, but not so hot to pull away. They shook hands, the fire blazing to life behind them as they did so. The deal made, the mission clear, and the moment locked forever in stone. Aryu smirked, the first hint of a smile in days.
“Wha’ is it, Aryu?”
Aryu shrugged. “My home is destroyed, the weapons of the Old have returned, my best friend may be dead, my parents are lost, my greatest childhood enemy is steps away, and you, a holy hitman who may be able to help me make it right, came to me needing my help, so long as you don’t kill me like you’re supposed to.”
Nixon frowned. “The Lord works in mysterious ways.”
Chapter 8
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What’s in a Name?
Aryu didn’t know if the deal was a good one or not. From the brief stories Nix had told him, his missions could take years to complete. Aryu was not going to wait that long. He was currently under the notion that finding a woman named Crystal, an Embracer who lived long before year Zero and seemed to have a history with Nix, would be the first, and hopefully last, step in the quest.
The notion was misguided for reasons even Aryu could see plain as day. Was she alive? Even if she was, Nixon described her as a recluse; a woman locked in a self-imposed prison to the east of here, deep into the lands that he feared.
The clarity of tragedy was his primary reason for why he had made the deal with Nix. This was a creature of power. One who had lived for years learning and gleaning information about all kinds of enemies and situations. Aryu was not a man prepared to battle an entire Army of the Old, and he doubted Johan would have any ideas so grand as to defeat them. Nixon was a creature of the ages. He had seen these kinds of things before. Perhaps he could help Aryu find a way to defeat the monsters currently ravaging his homeland.
At the very least, he had guessed he could pick up something useful by being around him. It was a helpful thought in very unhelpful times.
Nixon agreed that they could do nothing until the sun rose again, at which point they would return west to find Johan. If he had followed the plan, Aryu knew where he’d be.
The big man tended to Esgona, careful not to upset him or wake him before his mind was ready to do so. “He ‘ad a ‘ard day too, I’d wager. He jus’ doesn’t know ‘ow ‘ard yet.”
Frankly, Aryu didn’t care. He’d never been high on Esgona’s personal favorite list, and the feeling was more than mutual. He couldn’t say he wished Esgona hadn’t been saved, but he was closer to that awful feeling than he’d like to admit. Esgona’s disrespectful treatment of him after his return was as close to unthinkable as he could get. Esgona, wounded or not, had not completed his Quest. Aryu had. Aryu earned his manhood with each step. Esgona had only earned shame.
Aryu tried to explain this to Nixon after giving up trying to get some rest. Nixon didn’t seem to care about such things, at one point even going so far as to call Aryu’s quest an “unnecessary attempt to prove one’s self in the eyes of others.” He didn’t understand. It was the way it had to be, if for no other reason than to shut others up about his damn wings and prove he was as much a man as any that had come before him.
“It’s not the journey tha' makes the man,” Nixon had said finally. “The sooner you people would realize tha' tha better I’d say. So ya learned t' start a fire, fight fools and look within yerselves fer some kind of maturity ya didn’t know was there. Wha' was out there in those mountains tha'
