Elements of Change

Protection

Kammon startled awake with the taste of ash in the back of his throat. He threw himself from the bed, panting as his heart raced. He scanned the strange, dark room, but there was only Ezo sleeping deeply from the other side of the mattress.

He inhaled and let out a shuddered breath as he tried to calm himself. They were safe. The fear that clutched his heart was nothing more than the smoke of nightmares - the third he'd woken from tonight, and it would be his last.

Kammon found his boots left where he kicked them to the floor the night before. He grabbed them and stole away from the room. He walked out the front door of the house and carefully made his way barefoot a few feet before he stopped to pull his boots on.

Dawn wouldn't come for a few hours, but he had no desire to return to bed to repeat the horrors of his life. Instead, he wandered further inland. An unknown call pulled him down the north pass. He followed a small path that seemed well-walked.

The forest was quiet around him, but not unnaturally so. He stopped and closed his eyes, taking a deep breath to push the last of the nightmare from his mind.

He'd learned to do it years before, but tonight, he almost wished the nightmares remained. Now, he was just left with the press of the questions that kept forming around him.

He was the Calamity, the Harbinger, and trouble followed his footsteps. This was nothing like he'd faced before, though. Even worse, he was pulling Ezo into this with him.

"Where are you heading, Harbinger?"

He turned, fire dripping from his fists at the surprise of another person in the trees. Maggie held her hands up in front of her in a placating manner. "I didn't mean to catch you unawares."

He let the magic fall around him and let out a deep breath. "Are you in need?" he asked her.

"I was going to ask you the same. You left without a word to anyone."

"Yesterday, you were ready to chase me off your island."

"Yesterday, I thought the Calamity had come to cause trouble."

Kammon deflated. He wanted to be angry with the woman in front of him, but he didn't have the energy for it. It wasn't her fault, anyway.

"About the darkness..." he started.

"Yes?"

"You said it was with me before. Do you know what it is?"

"I don't."

Kammon looked down, closing his eyes to keep her from seeing his disappointment. "I didn't expect you would. If it were so easily defined, someone would have talked to me about it before now."

"Kammon, I told them about this when you took the Vow. Whatever faith you have in the Imperium, they have done little to earn it."

"I have no faith in them. There are people among them that I believe still want good, but the body itself rotted before I came along. I need to understand what's happening to me, though. I won't let this hurt Ezo, too."

"He loves you."

"He shouldn't."

Maggie laughed at that, but her smile was sad. "That man would warp the world to find you a way to fit in it."

Kammon didn't know how to respond to that. He was afraid she was right. Instead, he turned to walk further into the trees. Maggie followed quietly behind him.

He wanted solitude, but it seemed the healer wasn't done with him just yet. There was something under his feet, a trace of magic that demanded his attention, but it ran too deep to touch. It made his steps quicken, and his heart skipped a beat as he followed that need.