Fate Undone: A Novella

Chapter II - Part I

II.

Anna found herself in a cold, dark place. The sweet smell came to her next. It was familiar, and nauseating. Her eyes were filled with tears, her cheeks were wet, and she tasted salt on her lips. In front of her, a spark emerged, growing brighter until it lit the narrow stone walls and the face of her father.

In the middle of the claustrophobic tunnel, he stood there, just as he had before. His face, framed by his steel cap, shone with sweat. He had a broad nose beneath his helm's guard, a heavy brow, and a thick black beard of curly hair, all of which were flecked with blood. The torch in his hand flickered, glimmering in his kind eyes and prompting shadows to dance over his armor and along the tight walls to either side.

"Anna, I'm sorry." His voice was so grave, but there was an urgency to it, too. "I really am. We must keep moving, though. The longer we stay in here, the worse it will be for us to get out of the city." He held out his gloved hand, and Anna felt herself reach for it without even thinking, entwining her fingers, sticky with blood, with his own.

This can't be, thought Anna. Her father pulled her along, down the black tunnel ripe with new death, toward the other torch waiting ahead at the slight bend. A fresh tear rolled down her face, following the paths that had been made by others before, and her body shook uncontrollably with fear. This is impossible. I was already here. I can't be here again. I've already lived this.

"Careful," said Abraam. He stepped over the crooked body of a girl, pulling Anna past with equal amounts care and urgency. As the torch swept over the figure, Anna shuddered. Her jaw trembled and she forced her eyes up. It was one of the priestesses, clad in ivory silk, soaked pink and red. "Just keep moving, Anna." They stepped over another girl, face down in a slick pool of her own. And then another, splayed out against the stones. Anna's foot caught and she stumbled, clutching for the cold wall with one hand as Abraam pulled her along by the other. "Just keep moving."

Anna's throat let out a shuddered breath. This isn't happening, she told her herself. It can't be. But the smell of blood in the air and the tight grip of her father's hand in her own was more than enough proof that everything around was all too real. The stone...could it really have...? Anna slid a hand down to her purse, beneath her empty scabbard, and felt only an empty sack of cow hide. Nothing was inside. The stone was gone. I'm hysterical. I'm in shock. That's all, isn't it?

When they caught up with Nikos and his torch—and Eleni standing beside him, cradling her right arm—they hadn't even passed the worst of it. Here, at the other end of the tunnel, a new light came to them all, shining a dull orange from above. Nikos led the way, doing so with as much respect as he could. There was a steep stairway leading up through a broken roof of shattered tile. Slaughtered along the steps were the other priestesses as they had tried to flee into the tunnel.

In Anna's mind, she could still hear them screaming behind her as she ran in the dark, hand in hand with Leandra...

Up the steps they went, stepping warily around the bodies and broken beams of rotted wood. The stone staircase came out through the floor and into the crypt, right beneath the temple. A splintered doorway to their left spewed orange light all over the place. The fires could be heard, cracking and whipping at the city above. The crypt's ceiling was short and its walls, where the ancient sarcophagi slept in their dusty slots, were the red-brown of clay. Dozens of squat candles were clumped together, frozen to the floor like still waterfalls of wax. Most had gone out; some were overturned and crushed.

Anna saw the bodies here, too. Not all were priestesses. There were three Eressian soldiers. Their red gambesons and black plates marked them as such. One was collapsed over a half-naked priestess, his modest helm split open from the back; another was pushed against the wall, slumped over himself; and the last was a mess from the neck down.

"I don't want to see this again," said Anna, her voice hardly more than a whisper.

"Be strong for me," said Abraam. He hadn't a clue as to the real meaning of his daughter's words. "It'll be behind us soon enough."

Abraam left his torch on the ground and drew his sword. Nikos did the same before he and Eleni made their way through the busted door, ascending the staircase beyond it, up into the orange light. As Anna was pulled along by her father, she fought the urge to look down but lost. Beside the man with the broken helm was Mother Dimitra. Her aged eyes, surrounded by wrinkles that could have been rays encircling the sun, were so wide; Anna thought she would blink, gasp, and shutter back to life. But those eyes only looked up, and not a sound came from the woman's dry, limp mouth. A few feet away was her cane, its pointed end bloody from the fight she gave.

Anna quickened her pace, pressing herself close to her father as they rose out of the crypt. The sounds were heard before the sights were seen: metal scraping against metal, stone tumbling someplace far off, the cries of anger and pain, and, somewhere in the middle of it all, the guttural bellow of nothing that was human.

Half the temple had come down. Large stones from the ceiling and walls made a maze out of a once wide-open space. The pews had been crushed in the fall; statues of candle bearers were shattered; shards of stained glass littered the spaces in between. A couple of Pasithians in their plates of overlapping steel added themselves to the mess. The fires raging out in the streets and along the rooftops shined in on it all, and their pulsing heat was given freely. Above, through the empty hole in the temple's gutted ceiling, the night sky was a sick grey, clouded with undulating smoke bearing a rusty underbelly.

"This way," Abraam said, pointing through the stones. "There's too many Eressians in the northern district. Our best chance is getting out through the Ivy Gate near the stable reserved for the Guard. I pray it still stands."

"I'll lead us," said Nikos. His own bearded face was nearly a reflection of his father's, though without the added lines of age. Neither of them showed the fear that Anna felt, but both of them—along with Eleni—had a shared anxiety in their bright eyes.

Abraam stooped down beside one of the dead soldiers and grabbed a sword from the ground. "Eleni, can you still use this?"

Eleni took the sword with her off-hand. "I can." Her right glove was saturated, dripping blood from a hidden wound somewhere further up the arm.

"Then follow Nikos closely. Anna, I want you beside her..."

I've heard this all before. Hysterical or not, I know I have.

"...and I'll be right behind you. I'll keep you safe."

Out in an alleyway adjacent to the corpse of the temple, an array of voices flew down from places far and near, bouncing between the standing walls, shouting orders and battle cries. Ahead, a street could be seen. A rider-less horse galloped past, its hooves ringing loudly. As Nikos led them to the street's edge, he held out a hand to stop. There was a row of squat homes directly across from them, their broken windows spitting with fire that curled up and caught on the rooflines. Dead soldiers—Pasithians and Eressians both—were scattered up and down the street. A few horses were with them, filled with arrows like some giant's grisly pincushion, as were other men and women that wore simple wool instead of hardened armor.

Nikos waved to cross as he jogged out from the alley. "It's clear. Hurry."

They made a small detour around the burning houses until coming to the next alleyway. This time they had to clamber over and under large hunks of stone that had fallen from the two buildings to either side. When they reached the other end, the sounds of distant fighting that persisted in every direction grew louder. Nikos stopped again at the alley's edge.

I know what's out there, thought Anna. She stood still, sandwiched between Eleni and her father. Nikos glanced around the corner, looking right then left before he only stared. I already know what it is. One of those monsters. But we get by it. A deep roar cut through the air, like a gale that shreds the trees. And a shriek followed: someone in the wrong place at the wrong time. Why do I know all this? Why am I here again?!

...

(Next part picks up immediately after.)

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