“She’s snoring,” Sap said softly, sounding amused as we walked beside Horseshoe.

I glanced at the source of the quiet noises, though couldn’t see her face. Liora was lying down forward on Horseshoe, in the saddle, sleeping away. It was a little after sundown, and since it had been rather warm today it was now starting to get a bit chilly. The kind that made the young saint cover herself with not just her cloak, but a firm blanket too. It hid her from view, since she had covered herself with it, but it wasn’t thick enough to block her soft snoring.

Although I walked right next to the horse as to make sure the girl would stay safe as she slept, I didn’t really need to. I had secured her to the saddle once she started mentioning she had wanted to take a nap. And the horse, though young, was continuing to prove itself to be a very calm creature. The kind of calm that made it perfectly easy to trust the young sleep upon it as she slept.

“She sleeps a lot, Vim… is it a saint thing, or a human thing?” Sap asked, her voice quiet.

“Both. For now. As she gets older and better settles she’ll slowly become less human. For now though she likely needs more sleep, food and all else than a typical human girl her age would need,” I said.

Sap hummed as she nodded, understanding. “Root seems to sleep a lot too. I don’t remember the others sleeping as much when babies; father says it’s because of her wings. Her flapping them all day tires her out faster than those without.”

I smirked at the owl that had wings herself. “He’s right, to a point,” I said. Honestly the extra energy used up by the wings should be counter-balanced by the mere fact that Root was so thick-blooded compared to her more humanoid siblings… but I let it be.

Sap sighed as she stopped leaning forward as to look at Liora. “A lot of kids lately…” she mumbled.

“Hm…? Root, Fly, this one and…?” I asked, wondering who else she was speaking of.

“Just them…? That’s a lot,” Sap said with a matter of fact tone.

Ah… right. To her, a loner who went years and years without ever seeing another person, three children in a short few months was likely a lot…

“Does it make you feel like having any yourself?” I asked.

Sap tilted her head at me. “Me…? Hm…”

Oh…? She was actually considering it. Interesting.

“Maybe… but not right now. Especially after hearing all the drama between everyone,” she said.

“Drama?”

Sap gestured lightly at me. “I mean, like my family… and what my mother said was happening in the Society. By the sounds of it, trying to find a mate would be as annoying as molting. Don’t know if I want to have to deal with that,” she said.

I smiled softly at her statement, but deep down was a tad sad to hear such a thing. She was basically saying that, thanks to her family’s drama and all the drama she’s heard from her mother concerning the Society, it was too difficult to find a partner… and thus was not going to even try.

That made me feel like a failure, in part since it was my fault the Society wasn’t in a better position. “Well… I can’t disagree that it’d be difficult… but a lot of people have shown up, and more will continue doing so, you might find it won’t be as difficult as you think here shortly with them all arriving,” I said.

“Hm…? Oh you mean the ones coming back from the other lands…? Aren’t they all a bunch of church-folk?”

“Not all of them, no. I’d say about half are, but the other half will be more like you than you’d think. People thick in the blood and whatnot,” I said. “A few even had wings, though I don’t think I saw an owl…” I added as I thought of Tressi’s group. What had they been, actually…? Some kind of smaller birds, I think…

Sap hummed as she pondered my words, and then she shrugged. “Maybe. We’ll see,” is all she said about it.

That was probably the best I’d get, likely… “Could ask Renn to look for you, too. That’s part of the reason she’s helping settle this new location, she plans and hopes to make a place for people to meet. Like an inn for people looking for partners,” I said.

“What, a marketplace of love?” Sap asked, amused.

“Something like that. I’ll be honest I’m a tad worried it’ll end up like…” I went quiet as I realized I had completely forgotten about that temple in the east, until now.

“Like what?” Sap asked, interested.

I sighed as I nodded. I’ll need to let Renn know, she’s going to be upset that I’d forgotten until now. “A long time ago there was a small village, a temple, to the east. Near the Crypt. It was a place where people could go to… well… mate. Not to find partners, but to have children. It was basically what Renn wants to make, just minus the love aspect,” I said.

Sap chuckled at that. “Odds are that’d work better than Renn’s idea,” she said.

“Maybe. We honestly don’t have as many members anymore who view life in such a way. A consequence of so many finding faith,” I said.

“I don’t have faith and I’m not someone who’d do that,” Sap said, sounding offended.

“Didn’t mean it like that, Sap. Was just saying,” I said.

She studied me for a moment, and then smiled. “I say that, but honestly I’d probably not be too against it. Especially if I can’t find anyone half-decent,” she said.

See? “Weirdly I’d not be too surprised if Renn would be okay with it too,” I said.

“Huh…? Even though she has you?”

I frowned at her for a moment, before I realize she had misunderstood me. “I meant she’d be okay running a place meant for such a thing. Not that she’d partake herself,” I explained.

Sap nodded. “Right… I can see that. She’s kind of like mother in that way, isn’t she? Old school.”

Rather she was not the type to stop, or judge, someone for wanting a child even if not in a more traditional way. Even if she found it odd, herself.

A small snore drew my attention, and I watched Liora shift ever so slightly. For a tiny moment I expected her to wake, even if partially, but she just went back to snoring.

I was glad she was getting rest, and doing it in a way that still allowed us to travel. We were still a couple days away from SilverCreek, the town where Renn was, and it was starting to really grate on me.

I wanted to see Renn. To make sure she was okay. And…

“So, Vim…”

I blinked and glanced the other way, to the winged lady next to me. “Hm?”

Sap gave me an odd smile as she clasped her hands before her, as if to start twiddling her thumbs. “Mother says Renn’s caught up in bad stuff. Dangerous stuff,” she said quietly.

Frowning at that, I slowly nodded. “Yes… sadly, yes. She has.”

“Can I do anything? For her? To help?”

Oh…?

Studying the owl, I found her staring apprehensively at me in a way that was very unalike her mother… yet at the same time, just like her. She bore a look of utter willingness, while at the same time being a tad shy and hesitant all the same. It made her seem younger than she was, and…

“Thank you, Sap… I appreciate the offer,” I said gently, humbled.

“I’m not offering to help you, Vim…!” Sap said with a smile.

Right… “I know. Still, thank you. I… honestly don’t know what to do about it. The danger she is in is something that I’m not even sure I can protect her from… or if anything can protect her at all. But I’m thankful to know I can rely on you all the same, if needed.”

“It’s that bad…? Mother just said she was getting involved in prophecies and stuff,” Sap asked, sounding worried.

“It is… I might one day send her to your nest for safekeeping. If I do, I’d ask you to linger on those branches during such a time, if you’d be willing. As to aid your mother and father in protecting her too,” I said.

“Hm…? Sure. Not sure how any harm could come to her there, with mother protecting her, honestly, but sure,” Sap said.

Sadly a lot of harm could come to her. Rather easily too…

I sighed softly as I tried to not think too deeply about the gods or their threats. “Honestly it’d make me feel a lot better if she’d abandon this silly town and stay with you or me… but I just can’t bring myself to tell her such a thing,” I said.

Sap didn’t say anything as we walked, and I realized I had likely said something a tad out of character. But I wasn’t lying.

I’d been avoiding the fact, but the truth was… I didn’t want to be involved in Randle’s new location. Helping him set it up? Sure. I did that all the time. But staying there afterward…? Not to mention that meant Renn would linger there without me, when I had to leave…

“So your rules even extend to your own life, Vim?” Sap asked.

“Of course they do…? Kind of the whole point of them,” I said, assuming she meant my rule of free-will.

Sap hummed at me. “Mother has always said it’d easier to break the sky than it is your rules.”

“My rules are very easy to break, thank you very much,” I said, defending myself.

She chuckled at me. “You know what I mean!”

I nodded. “Also…”

Then, I felt it.

Stopping, I turned and watched Liora twitch. A different kind than before. One that was just… a tad off. As if she had just sneezed, or something. Yet she hadn’t. in fact, she had gone completely quiet.

“Vim…?” Sap kept walking for a few steps, but eventually came to a stop too. The horse, Horseshoe, proved again how dutiful and smart he was as he came to a stop as well. Even though no one held his reins. His ears fluttered as I felt divine power come… and then go.

Then Liora sat up and the blanket slid off her, falling to the ground.

Sap fluttered her wings for a moment as she went to pick the blanket up. Before she could even get her hand on it, I watched Liora’s glowing eyes… go out, as if she had just blinked the glow away… then it returned with ever more power than before.

She was having a prophecy.

By the time Sap picked the blanket up and stood back up, the prophecy was over. Liora’s eyes returned to their normal glow… and she blinked as she found herself awake.

“Hm…” she frowned at herself as she then yawned, stretching her arms in the process.

Whatever dream it had been… must not have been too bad. She looked upset, but more so over the fact of being awoken than anything else.

“You didn’t sleep long, Liora,” Sap said gently as she went to brushing off the blanket. It likely hadn’t gotten too dirty, since we were walking upon short grass, but it was kind of her to do so all the same. It proved she’d be a good mother, once she decided to become one.

Liora breathed in after her yawn, and was about to say something but another yawn attacked her. She made an odd noise as she yawned again.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Once done she reached up and rubbed her eyes. “I had a dream…” Liora said softly.

Sap tilted her head at her, but then realization dawned on her. “Oh! A prophecy…!? Really? Just now?” Sap’s wings fluttered as she stepped closer to Horseshoe, both to return the blanket to Liora and because she was now fully interested.

“Careful,” I warned the two.

Sap flinched, her wings squeezing shut as she did… and then she glanced at me and glared.

I ignored the very Lilly-like look and stepped forward, to step up to the horse as well. “As you know, Liora. As we’ve talked about, only tell me if…” I started to tell her, in hopes of stopping her from absentmindedly talking about something I didn’t want to hear.

“But it’s about you, Vim,” Liora then said, cutting me off.

“If… what? Me?” I asked, caught off guard.

She nodded and frowned at me. “It was… definitely,” the young saint said with a nod.

“I assume with Renn…? Or…” I felt my knee pop as I shifted.

Liora frowned at me and shook her head. “No…? Just you and your mother.”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Sap frown. She knew, as many did, that my parents were dead. Gone. Forever.

So… “Me and who’s mother…?” I asked, and didn’t like the dry mouth I suddenly had. Maybe she had misspoken in her tiredness. Maybe she had meant to say her mother, or maybe…

The young saint’s frown deepened as she turned a bit me to face me. “Your mother…? At least that’s what you called her? You called her mother and then…” Liora lifted her hands, to being to gesture something… but I stopped paying attention.

Raising a hand to quiet her, and the world, I closed my eyes and quickly forced myself to think rationally.

She had to be misunderstanding something. Who did I call mother? Was there anyone in the Society who I called such a thing…? As title or moniker? Maybe a joke…? Maybe someone who recently gave birth in that moment in the future, who I teased by calling mother…? Or…

“Um…” I heard Liora’s voice, but didn’t want to.

Again saints bring me nothing but headaches…

“Liora… Vim’s parents are dead. Are you sure?” Sap asked, her gentle voice calming my heart that was about to thump in anger.

Lowering my hand, I kept my cool as I watched Liora frown at Sap… and then consider her words. She spent a moment to ponder, and then slowly shook her head. “No…? Maybe not…? But he did call her mother, definitely, and she…”

“Stop!”

The horse was the one to flinch this time. I stepped forward, to save Liora if she fell, but hadn’t needed to. Sap had done it for me, she had reached up and grabbed Liora off the horse as Horseshoe bucked and ran forward.

I groaned inwardly as I watched the horse run a few hundred yards off, then slow down and come to a stop. In the process the blanket and a few other little things had fallen off him, but thankfully Liora was fine. She was now in Sap’s protective arms.

“Vim…!” Sap yelled at me, rightfully so, and then went to put Liora down.

“Are you okay, Liora?” I asked as I stepped closer. I had shouted, a tad too loudly, and so this was all my fault.

“Um… I think so? You’re really fast, Sap, I didn’t even realize what was happening and was already in your arms before I could blink!” Liora praised Sap with a huge grin, as if what had just happened had been fun.

Sap sighed with a soft smile at the young girl, and then turned to look at me. “Really Vim, you should know better.”

Yes. I should. “I’m sorry… you two okay?” I asked the two again.

“Yes, Vim. As is the horse… I think,” Sap said as we all looked to it. It was staring at us from where it had stopped, as if wondering why we were no longer walking beside it.

While Sap and Liora studied the horse, and it us, I instead studied the little saint.

Was this a scheme…? A ploy…?

I’d not think that Liora herself would do such a thing… not at all. The girl was gentle hearted, and a tad too honest for her own good. But… she could easily be led astray by things she didn’t understand… such as a prophecy that she didn’t fully comprehend…

Many saints did such a thing. They interpreted what they saw in one way, and one way only. Their own views. They could not comprehend what they didn’t know. It was why so many were gotten wrong. Because they simply couldn’t understand what they were seeing half the time. Not necessarily because they were stupid or anything, but simply because they lacked a certain skill set or even a proper education. It was like when I had to teach someone of this era how electricity worked. It was harder than it sounded, especially for…

“Liora,” I got the saint’s attention as I stopped myself from thinking too deeply about insignificant things. I knew the only reason I was doing so was to avoid the issue ahead of me. I was basically running away.

I couldn’t do that.

Not today.

Not now.

Not until they were all safe.

The saint turned around to look at me as I stepped forward and knelt down next to her. She was tall enough to meet me eye to eye while I was on a knee, so I stayed there.

Without her even realizing it, she reached out and grabbed Sap’s hand. The owl allowed her to take it, and even stepped closer to her… as if to support and protect her. Even from me. I glanced upward, and met the glare that was staring down at me. It told me all I needed to know.

She had a lot more of Lilly in her than she realized.

Looking back to the saint, I breathed in a bit to steady myself… and then nodded. “I need to know this. Tell me what you saw, please.”

Liora at first looked offended, as if hurt that I’d say such a thing after yelling at her over it… but in typical young-girl fashion she simply sighed and nodded. “Promise not to yell again?” she asked.

I nodded. “I vow it.”

“Hm…” she hummed as she studied me, and then nodded again. “Okay… we were in a house. One that was warm, because it was snowing outside so a lot of the fireplaces were burning. You were being yelled at, by Renn, from the other room… something about a broken bed,” Liora started.

Sap chuckled at that, but I ignored her.

“Then the front door opens… and this lady walks in. You get weird, and say mother to her. The lady frowns as she looks around, and then…”

“What does she look like?” I asked, interrupting her.

Liora blinked, but then focused. “Um…” she looks up at Sap, and points at her. “About her height. She has a lot of hair, all tied up and stuff with ribbons and bows…”

The world went still. Distant… as my eyes unfocused. “What did she say? Do?” I asked, my voice sounded… empty.

“She…” Liora started to say… but then went quiet.

I blinked, bringing the world back into focus… and found Liora staring at me oddly. She startled, as if being caught at doing something bad, and then quickly spoke. “She said you screwed up!” Liora yelped, and then nodded quickly… as if I was interrogating her and she was doing all she could to attest she spoke truth.

I… screwed up…?

“That’s all she said…?” I asked, feeling a bit relieved.

“And then she…” Liora lifted a hand, and with almost uncanny accuracy swiped in the air… in a familiar motion that couldn’t be made up by anyone who hadn’t seen it before. “And then I woke up.”

“Huh…? What’s that?” Sap asked as my eyes narrowed.

“You woke up…? How so?” I asked. That was a short prophecy… unless she was omitting something that might be one of the shortest prophecies I’d ever…

“Well… something really bright blinded me. Then I thought I got this weird feeling, as if I was getting hurt all over but it also tickled, but then before it got worse I was awake, and…”

She died.

Looking down, I clenched my hand onto my knee… squeezing it so I would not break anything around me.

Liora just dreamt of her death.

My mother showed up. Said I had screwed up, and then… what?

Killed everyone around me? Or killed me, and in doing so killed everyone else too?

No… I needed to first question her existence in the first place. My mother was dead. I had seen her death. Held her in my arms as she faded. True death. The kind that not even gods returned from. So… What?

A copycat? Maybe a god took her form, as to get close to me and catch me unawares…? I’d seen gods take other forms before, but never had I seen one do such a thing as that… but… it could be possible. Was, possible, possibly…

Though even if one did such a thing… would it even work…? Could I be caught unaware so easily…? One would not only have to take my mother’s form, they’d have to perfectly mimic her mannerisms… and then of course her power. It was so unique. So obvious. I’d recognize a fake in a fraction of a moment… right?

But…

My mind went numb… until I squeezed a tad bit too hard, and broke something.

“Uh… did he just…?” Liora’s voice became audible again as my mind started to work once more. As it did I felt the pain of a busted knee.

“I think he did, yes,” Sap said softly, sounding unsure of herself as she did.

“Was there anyone else there, Liora? Did you recognize or see anything else that stood out to you?” I asked.

Liora stood up a bit straight and she frowned as she shook her head. “It was a nice house…! I think it was bigger than any I’ve ever been in, and like I said it was snowing… the snow was even up to the windows! And…” She pondered for a moment then nodded. “I think Renn was cooking something. I think I smelled food. And I think there were other people there too, but I don’t remember seeing or hearing them,” she said.

“Then she shows up…” I said, continuing her story.

“Then your mother shows up, says you screwed up and… I woke up,” Liora said with a frown and a head-shake.

“Isn’t your mom dead, Vim?” Sap asked gently.

“Yes. Very dead.”

“You… you called her mother, I’m sure of it!” Liora said defensively.

“I don’t doubt you, Liora. That’s not what I’m saying… just… let me ponder this a moment…” I said with a small smile to her.

“Also you hurt your knee,” Liora said with a point to it.

“It’ll heal.”

The young saint didn’t seem to believe me as I again pondered the possibilities.

A god showing up, pretending to be my mother… to attack me while off-guard.

Or she completely misinterpreted the event, and I had said a different word and mother was just what Liora had heard and understood. Was the word mother in another language…? I spent a few moments to consider all the languages I knew, and searched for one amongst them… and honestly didn’t find any. A few were possibly close to it, but… not enough to feel exact.

Maybe she had viewed the past somehow…? But if so why was Renn in it? Or maybe she had mistaken another’s voice for Renn’s… after all, she’s never actually met Renn before. She’s only seen and heard Renn in prophecies, not in real life…

But…

What if…?

“Vim…?”

Taking in a deep breath I slowly stood. My knee made noises, popping and cracking, as I did but I ignored it. “I need to… think about this. Thank you, Liora, for telling me. I’m sorry for startling you and the horse earlier,” I said gently as I reached over and patted her gently on the head.

“Mhm…” Liora didn’t say anything. She simply nodded and accepted my thanks and apologies as I glanced down the road. The horse was still there, but now grazing. At least it hadn’t ran off.

“Come on, let’s grab Horse before he runs off again,” Sap said as she tugged Liora away.

“Horseshoe! You keep forgetting the rest!” Liora said with a laugh.

“Does it matter…?”

“That’s his name! He’s a horse, calling him that is mean!”

“Yet calling him horseshoe isn’t? That’s something he wears right? A shoe?” Sap teased the young saint, talking lightly as they left me behind.

Watching them go, I found them going blurry again… as I pondered hard and deep.

She had to be mistaken.

Surely.

Somehow.

But…

I could probably have asked her to describe my mother better, but I hadn’t needed to. The mere mention of a lot of hair, which was braided and covered in bows and ribbons, had been enough. In all my many years, I could count on two hands the number of women I knew who did such a thing… and my mother had been the most dutiful of it. I had used to complain when she had made me braid her hair every morning, I had found it silly that she had made me do it by hand when she could just snap her fingers and have it done in the blink of an eye, not to mention it would have been done far better than I ever could have done so.

She usually had dozens of such bows and, what she called pretty little hair crowns, in her hair. Plus her saying I had screwed up was also something very like her. And it of course could have meant anything… I screwed up all the time, and have done so terribly on many occasions… So…

Was it really her…?

Or…

Rolling a shoulder, I glanced upward… at the sky.

I felt no one. Nothing. Or well, I felt two things. Three if I was being very specific. I felt Liora. Her divine connection to something that shouldn’t exist. I felt Sap, the heart gently throbbing inside of her. And I felt the horse, which was now huffing at the pair who was disturbing it from its grazing.

Around us I felt more life. Trees. Small animals. Maybe a large deer or something like it behind us, a few hundred feet away.

But other than them…

I felt no one else.

No monarchs. No gods. No divine power.

But that didn’t mean such power wasn’t here. If it was weak enough, or distant enough, even I couldn’t feel it. That didn’t mean there wasn’t foul play at work, however. Not to mention, whether I wanted to admit it or not… the gods had obviously found a way to hide their divinity from me. Per havoc’s existence, and what he said about them hiding from me all this time. That meant I had to entertain the idea that there was a possibility that they had found a way to keep me from sensing them… but if so, what had been the purpose? “A fake prophecy, maybe…?” I wondered.

As far as I was aware the only gods who could do such a thing were ones who had made the original bloodline. Just as a god could not modify a monarch that wasn’t theirs, beyond outwardly. They could kill other creations, and affect them with spells and abilities, but could not take control over them. Could not modify them on a molecular or spiritual level… not unless they had been the original creators. It was why some gods had fallen to other monarchs, because they had been made by superior gods. Ones more powerful than they, and thus unable to handle them…

So… was one of them alive, still…? One of the originals?

“Usually I’d say that’s impossible…” I whispered as I thought of the three gods who I knew for sure had made the bloodlines of saints.

They were all dead. At least, so I believed…

But what if, like Havoc…

No… if I was willing to believe that possibility… why too couldn’t I believe my parents, my mother, was also alive…?

“Because then…” I went quiet as my heart began to hurt. The kind of hurt that made me angry.

Surely not. There had to be a different solution to this puzzle. I needed to think rationally.

Especially now. If anything just to ensure I didn’t accidentally kill those around me.

There’d be time for death later. Once I got my hands around the source of all this discord.

Sooner or later… I would, after all. I always did…

Somehow.

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