The Awakening (The Fempiror Chronicles Book 1) Page 9

  Zechariah sighed. “After the war, Voivode had not yet perfected a cure to revert us to our former state, so we did the only thing we could do: we went home as Fempiror to rejoin our families and wait…” Zechariah paused and looked at David. David was simply looking at him, listening. “…or that was the plan.”

  “What went wrong?” David asked. After all, going home was his plan and as Zechariah pointed out before, the Felletterusk people were fully aware of their abilities and limitations.

  “Our family and friends didn’t understand our condition,” he replied. David rather expected that answer given how adamantly Zechariah was against letting him go home.

  “We frightened them. Some Fempiror were killed by people of their villages, some of them even by their own families, who thought they were of Satanic origin. Their favorite method, when they found out about the sunlight weakness, was to tie us to a post and wait for the sun to rise. After all, they reasoned, no child of God would be vulnerable to the sunlight that gives life to everything else. I remember hearing the screams of dying Fempiror as I escaped with others before they could come for us.

  “We hid in caves all huddled together until night fell and we could move again. Most of us weren’t willing to fight against our own people, much less our own families. These were the people that we’d fought to protect and keep. These were the people we’d sacrificed our lives for. These were the people that the Corelnesh were made extinct for. We couldn’t turn against them too. Not after what we’d already done.

  “But there were some that couldn’t handle the darkness any longer, so they chose to gaze at the sun one last time … as it destroyed them.” Zechariah’s eyes held a great deal of sadness in the heavy memories of what amounted to his youth at this point. It must have been terrible, indeed, to be so vivid so long after.

  David noticed that it was getting lighter. The first rays of the sun were barely peeking over the distant horizon. It would still be some time before it was fully up, but it was coming, and they were not at Cerebdim yet. He looked to Zechariah, who was looking off to the south. He steered the Levi-Cart right, and David noticed a town not too far away.

  “Is that Cerebdim?” David asked, hoping it would be since he did not relish the idea of burning to a crisp in the morning light.

  “Yes,” Zechariah replied. “I’ll tell you more as we continue our journey. Four hundred years of history takes time to tell, and I’ll only get through a small piece of it before this journey is over.”

  David nodded. He knew there would have to be more as references to Tepish and Rastem had not even come up in his story, but for now, he was anxious to get inside somewhere because the sun was rising. He looked ahead to find the town of Cerebdim closing in quickly.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Rastem Safe House

  Cerebdim was considerably larger than Hauginstown with an apparent division between business and residential sections as well as roads paved in stone. Zechariah steered the Levi-Cart across the grass towards a larger road that led into town.

  “So do we just ride through town in this?” David asked gesturing to the Levi-Cart.

  “No,” Zechariah said, “we go where we can unnoticed.”

  “Why?” David asked. “Why would you keep this a secret?”

  Zechariah stopped the Levi-Cart behind a building on the edge of town. He jumped out. David looked at him for a moment and did the same, leaving his hat on his seat. Zechariah opened a compartment at the rear of the Cart and removed a pair of long, dark cloaks. He tossed one to David, which David caught. David looked at the cloak and back to Zechariah, who was putting the cloak around his shoulders.

  The cloak fully covered Zechariah from head to toe when he pulled the hood up. He had put his arm through the cloak’s very loose sleeves, which were so long that they covered his hands. The cloak had a pair of buttons to keep it together in the front. Zechariah looked at David, who was still only holding his cloak.

  “That’s how we move in daylight, and unless you want to meet your end this morning, you’d best put it on,” Zechariah urged.

  “You didn’t answer,” David said.

  “So you’re going to kill yourself to force an answer from me?” Zechariah asked.

  David sighed and swung the cloak over his shoulders in the same manner that Zechariah had done. Zechariah removed a large cloth from the same compartment of the Levi-Cart. He tossed one side to David and together, they covered the Levi-Cart in this cloth that hung so low that it dragged the ground, but gave the Levi-Cart the appearance of a wagon that they had covered for some reason. In the early morning hours, it was unlikely that anyone would give them a second glance.

  They walked to the road a short distance away while Zechariah pulled the Levi-Cart easily behind him. The town consisted of simple box-shaped houses, most finished in light shades of brown. It was not an ornate town by any means, but it was beyond the simplicity that was Hauginstown. David walked beside Zechariah, his hands well inside the cloak.

  “Well?” asked David.

  Zechariah sighed. “The Fempiror are their own race of people, and as I’ve told you, humanity hates us for what we appear to be,” Zechariah said. He glanced at David, whose look said that Zechariah had answered nothing.

  “I admit there’s a measure of selfishness there. But at the same time, we’ve seen what humanity does with what it’s given, and this would be no different. We developed this and everything else we have because of our longevity which also affords us the wisdom to know how to use it wisely. Call it conceit or what-have-you, but if humanity wants this, then they can stop constantly developing and manufacturing larger and larger weapons of war and figure it out. Until they decide to stop killing each other, though, they’ll never progress. We earned this, and they will have to as well.”

  David looked at Zechariah a moment longer, but he could think of no response to this. He did not know that much about the world, so there was no way he could compete with someone of Zechariah’s age and knowledge.

  Zechariah looked from one building to the next. He appeared to be looking for something specific. David watched him for a moment before he finally had to speak up.

  “What are you looking for?” David asked.

  Zechariah kept his eyes on the buildings. “The Rastem Safe House is marked in the Felletterusk language and writing,” he said. “It looks like nonsense to most people nowadays.”

  “What is this safe house anyway?” David asked.

  “Just a place to stay the day without odd looks for sleeping the day away,” Zechariah said, “and so I can get some information about the current state of Erim. Here we are.” Zechariah pointed to a sign on the side of a building that looked much like the other buildings in town, including the windows. The sign had a series of unusual symbols that Zechariah understood, but David had never seen anything like them.

  “What does it say?” David asked.

  “Rastem feca usrasa,” Zechariah replied. He looked at David, who looked confused. “Do I really need to translate it?” he asked.

  David shrugged.

  “Very well,” Zechariah continued, “where did I say we were going?”

  “Erim,” David replied.

  “No, in Cerebdim, David,” Zechariah prodded.

  “A … Rastem safe house,” David recalled.

  Zechariah nodded. “Congratulations,” he said, “you figured it out.”

  David rolled his eyes. Zechariah walked around to the alley side of the building. He knocked on a well-worn spot on the wall, and after a couple of seconds, a door opened seemingly on its own that was large enough to accommodate the Levi-Cart. Zechariah walked in followed closely by David and the Cart.

  They entered a very large room with other covered vehicles sitting on the floor as well and more of the lights similar to those at Zechariah’s house hanging from the ceiling. David glanced back to the door and found there was someone sitting next to it dressed in the same style day travel cloak that they
wore, controlling its opening and closing. David noticed as the Fempiror was closing the door that there was a small, shadowed peephole that allowed this “door Fempiror” to see outside.

  Zechariah directed the Levi-Cart to an open space near another vehicle, lowered its short legs, and turned it off. As it powered down, it sank slowly to rest on its legs. The low hum, that David had long since tuned out, stopped, and David noticed how quiet the room was without it.

  Zechariah removed the cover and stowed it along with his and David’s day travel cloaks. David followed Zechariah who strolled confidently across the room to go through a door that led into the rest of the Safe House.

  They entered a sparsely decorated room with large wooden tables and chairs filling its open wooden floor. The same lighting system David had seen elsewhere lit the room, and he assumed this would be a trend with the Fempiror. The windows he had seen from the outside were covered on the inside so that they fully blocked all sunlight from entering the room and were therefore completely unusable as windows. Several Fempiror sat at the tables eating, drinking, and talking.

  Zechariah walked to a long bar-style counter adorning one side of the room. The Fempiror behind the bar appeared to be in his 50’s with a gray horseshoe of hair around his bald head, a bright friendly face, and a large build. He looked up at Zechariah and smiled.

  “Well, I’ll be,” the man said, “Zechariah, what brings you out of…where was it? Hauginstown, right?”

  Zechariah reached the bar and leaned on it. “Heading to Erim,” he said, “Same as always, Ildritch. I have more proof of the Tepish threat.”

  Suddenly, the discussion in the room around them grew deathly quiet, as if Zechariah had just said something awful. Everyone in the room looked to Zechariah – some subtle, and some not.

  Ildritch, the man behind the bar, leaned down to Zechariah and dropped his voice. “Now listen here, Zechariah,” he said, “they didn’t listen fifteen years ago when you came up with your reports of the threat, and twenty-five years ago, they got you removed. They didn’t believe you then, and they won’t believe you now.”

  “They have to listen, Ildritch” Zechariah insisted, “They must.”

  Zechariah glanced around and noticed that all eyes were on him. No other conversation was going on in the entire place. David did not know what they were talking about, but he was interested as well. Ildritch motioned Zechariah to follow him to the far end of the bar where they leaned in close to each other again. David moved closer to listen to them.

  “Ti sil atef esprültärsh runvajav, kaki anlandi,” Ildritch said. “Erim silnil hav ti sik.” And David could not understand anything else they said either.

  * * * * * * * * * *

  “It is a hopeless venture, my friend,” Ildritch said to Zechariah quietly in Felletterusk. “Erim is not what it was.” Ildritch’s decision to speak in Felletterusk recalled the old empire, but also served to exclude most of the company in the safe house common room. Even though Zechariah had told David that he needed to learn Felletterusk, he knew that most Fempiror who did not grow up in that country would not know it as well as those who grew up speaking it.

  Ildritch looked younger than a lot of the old Fempiror because he was not one of the original Fempiror at all, but one who was transmutated during the chaos that followed the victory over the Corelnesh. Zechariah remembered finding him before the sun could do its work one morning. Ildritch was only twelve at the time he was changed, but those few years would allow him to live much longer than Zechariah if they were fortunate enough to die of old age.

  “I have to do it,” Zechariah replied. “The Tepish must be exposed before they are allowed to take over.”

  Zechariah glanced around the room. Ildritch’s tactic worked; the room had gone back to their previous discussions. David stood near them, and Zechariah knew he would be unable to understand them at all.

  Ildritch nodded. “So be it,” he said, “Whatever I say will not deter you. Erim is beyond anyone’s reach now, anyway. Most Rastem avoid it. Your suspicions may be true, but it may be too late already.” Zechariah looked at Ildritch, concerned about how bad things had gotten. He had suspected the worst when he had heard of the edict out of Erim forbidding the use of the word “Tepish.” He knew the first thing he would do if he were going to take over would be to make everyone forget whatever it was they were supposed to be afraid of.

  “Discouraging,” Zechariah finally said in the common speech of the land. David would understand them again.

  Ildritch dropped his cautious attitude and cheered right up as if nothing had happened. “A room?” he asked.

  “Please,” Zechariah responded, following Ildritch’s lead to cover their prior conversation. If Erim was really so bad off, then his mention of the Tepish in this safe house might find its way back to Erim as well. He hoped that the council he had left behind could still be trusted.

  Ildritch retrieved a key from a rack behind him. He handed it to Zechariah, but as Zechariah took a hold of it, Ildritch leaned forward again. He whispered “Trust no one” quickly in Felletterusk before releasing the key and allowing Zechariah to head to his room. David followed him.

  “What was he telling you?” David asked quickly, but Zechariah was not going to answer him until they were in safer surroundings. Erim seemed more dangerous than it used to be, and he was to trust no one. What could that mean? Did he know something else? No, he would have said. Or maybe not. Many Fempiror did understand Felletterusk, so Ildritch saying as much as he did could be taking a big risk.

  Zechariah reached the door of their room and turned the key in the lock. David had not let it go yet and was still trying to get his attention. Zechariah needed to teach him some discretion at least. He held a finger up to silence David, and David was quiet as Zechariah opened the room door. He stepped in and David followed.

  “Things may be worse than I feared,” Zechariah said closing and locking the door behind them. “Nevertheless, we must go to the council and pray to God that they still work for the people.”

  “Who are these Tepish?” David asked. Zechariah had stalled on this part of his tale before, but David needed to know all of this to understand why Zechariah could not allow him to go home and why being here was so important. He still doubted the boy’s devotion, but that was also to be expected when he considered how young David was as well as his being transmutated recently. While the memory of the destruction of the home and country he had worked to restore was painful, this one was worse and represented an even greater failure.

  “They are an offshoot of the Rastem Order that fought against the Corelnesh,” Zechariah said. “In the beginning, they weren’t evil. They were just angry, and we all understood that.

  “The Fempiror of the war had two divisions: Rastem, which means wolf, and Elewo, which means owl. The Rastem were the larger of the divisions since we were the foot soldiers of the Fempiror. We used swords as our primary weapon and since we were stronger and faster than our enemies were, it was all we needed. We didn’t even need shields most of the time, but we wore these gauntlets on our wrists and ankles to defend ourselves when our swords were occupied. We performed all the offensive maneuvers that destroyed the Corelnesh, but we couldn’t have done it without the Elewo.

  “They were our specialists in covert operations to subvert the enemy from within. They didn’t use any weapons except their hands, though they did wear the gauntlets for defense. To see a skilled Elewo in action was something to behold because they used our speed and strength to a dangerous degree in unarmed combat. They liked to say the sword slowed them down.”

  “Where did the Tepish come from then?” David asked.

  “Out of the chaos that followed,” Zechariah sighed.

  “We all met together, the Rastem and the Elewo, after Voivode was unable to cure us and many of us had been killed by going back home. Our leaders talked for days on end to decide on a course of action. Each division had a different mindset. The Elewo deci
ded to wait out a cure in peace, away from the people who rejected them, and they left the meeting to us. Not one Elewo remained to see what we would decide.

  “The debate among the Rastem was awful. We were divided. We were all angry, but it came down to which of us were thinking clearly and which of us were too far beyond anger to care. Some of us felt we should continue serving as we had served before: protect the people from future threats. It was what we were made for, so that made sense to half of us.

  “The other felt we should take our revenge on these people and do to them as we did to the Corelnesh. After all, we had the power, and we knew they couldn’t stop us. They thought if we showed our power, they wouldn’t do anything to us anymore. To these, their own families became their enemy, and they didn’t care.

  “The Rastem divided into two orders from that day forward. Those that wished to continue in their duties to protect the people retained the Rastem name. The others that desired revenge became the Order of Tepish, which means bat.”

  Zechariah paused as he thought about that day. It was the war room of the Felletterusk military headquarters. They had a large round table set up in the middle of the room and as they left, he saw friends that he had served with leave with the leaders that we would call “Tepish” not long after. He remembered not knowing what they would do next and then wishing they had finished it on that day.

  “What happened?” David asked, interrupting Zechariah’s thoughts.

  “They moved faster than we could have dreamed,” Zechariah said, still distracted.

  He sighed and continued the story. “They formed quickly with a single mind and purpose. They changed their Rastem colors to red and black and emblazoned their body armor with a bat.

  “Like a swarm of locusts, they swept across the Empire, destroying everything in their paths – men, women, children – everyone who rejected them. The Tepish were convinced that even if someone hadn’t rejected the Fempiror, they would someday. Everyone became their enemy.