As the Prophet’s voices echoed, fading with each moment, another sound grew stronger. As if in the moment before a great drawing of breath, it echoed from the deep and carried to his ears.

A heartbeat.

The Heralds scattered at the sound, taking wing on shrieks of ecstasy as they twirled and writhed in feathery columns stretching toward the sun-stolen sky.

Another beat, louder.

The faithful stared up, their mouths splitting open in broad, toothy grins. Their eyes quivered in the rising starlight, as though they might add their own joyful salt to the sea.

Another.

The Shepherds dropped their jaws open, exposing sharp teeth as they howled some ancient hymn that went unheard, rising to the surface on bubbles that popped soundlessly.

Another beat, loud and clear as if it were that of the Mouth’s.

And he felt himself smile to hear it.

The water called to him and he obeyed, sliding in. It embraced him like a family that would never leave him, never deny him. He swam silently upon its tide towards the distant prison of earth and air. He swam, sliding through the waves as a world of dark flesh, dark eyes and glorious faith moved beneath him.

He swam, dipping his head below the surf.

And through it, he heard the Father calling.

ACT TWO

Seventeen

The Aeons’ Gate

Island of Teji

Summer, pleasantly so

One of the more sobering realisations I have stumbled across since I first picked up a sword is that society, at least as we know it, does not exist.

Of course, I’m actually a little disappointed to put it down on paper. After all, I had rather enjoyed the ideas behind civilisation: linking together against common enemies, joining like-minded trades and arms for mutual prosperity, the coalition of many single gods for the benefit of all and, of course, the keen urge to keep one’s neighbour close so that, when he finally did knife one in the kidneys and steal one’s sheep, at least one couldn’t claim they didn’t see it coming.

Regardless, my most horrific discovery has been that society is nothing more than a series of carefully calculated choices based solely around economics. That’s it. No like-minded philosophies, no common gods, not even healthy distrust made it possible.

Just gold and greed.

Any other thoughts I’ve had about this were quickly banished once I arrived on Teji and was subjected to the curious company of the Owauku. As far as I’ve been able to tell from as far as I’ve been able to understand their language, Tejiwas a thriving trading post, as Argaol informed me … once, anyway.

Humansused to live here. That much is clear by what has happened to the locals. I’d seen some of the more remote societies on the outskirts of Toha when we first began looking for the Aeons’ Gate, as Miron originally hired us to do. They tended to have both a keen distrust for me and a keen intent on putting something sharp in my guts.

Or an arrow in my shoulder, as the case may be.

The tall, tattooed lizardmen … they’re called ‘Shen’, the Owauku tell me: raiders, scavengers, generally as uncivilised as one would expect loincloth-clad reptiles to be. Of them, I know not much else, save that the Owauku have driven them off. They’re gone.

So they tell me.

The Owauku … are friendlier than most. Almost too much. They offer us freely their meat and drink, at least what passes for meat and drink, but with the subtle gleam in their eyes that suggests something would be appreciated in return. That gleam, anyway, is what I deduce from the times I can stand looking in those giant melons they call eyes. They do this … thing … where they look at me with one eye, then look at something else with the other, and they keep moving in different directions and …

Never mind. It’s too disgusting to recount. It does make one yearn for the company of the Gonwa, though. Those taller, bearded things that I saw in the forest apparently share the village with the Owauku. I can’t imagine why; the Gonwa are tall and stoic where the Owauku are short and spastic. The Gonwa are reserved and distrustful where the Owauku are almost offensively open. The Gonwa only look at me when they think I’m not looking at them, and sometimes with murder in their eyes, while the Owauku look at me …

No. No. Disgusting.

The point is that the Owauku have and love and the Gonwa lack and loathe everything one might find in a city: gambling; smoke, in both cigar and hookah form; alcohol, from their own making; and various other sundries and goods remnant from when humans still traded with them. The little ones adore the idea of trade, and constantly ask us if we have anything to put forth in that regard.

What they think we have, I really can’t even begin to wonder. They’ve already taken our pants …

Anyway, as I was saying, the idea of everything important being driven by economics does not apply solely to society. In the age we live in, it’s become a healthy substitute for instinct. If something costs more to get than it’s worth, then it’s not worth the effort. It’s that easy.

And, with that in mind, I’ve decided to follow my instincts …

And give up.

I’m through. I’m through with everything. I don’t want to have anything to do with Miron, with books, with bounties or monsters or netherlings or demons ever again. Especially nothing to do with books. I nearly lost all my companions, and did lose at least one, searching for the stupid thing.

Once, long ago, that thought wouldn’t have seemed so bad. But … that was before. Before I stopped fighting, before I put the sword down and had a chance to breathe. It wasn’t by choice that I stumbled across this realisation. On Teji, there’s nothing to fight, nothing to kill, nothing to worry about killing me.

And … I find that I kind of like it.

Without anything’s entrails to spill upon it, I find myself doing a lot of walking on the ground instead. I spend most of my days walking down the beaches with Kataria, listening to her tell me about the various plants, shells and driftwood we find. At least half of the stuff she spews, I’m certain she’s making up, but every time I feel like accusing her, she smiles and … looks at me.

Notlook looks at me, but … looks at me, like I’m something she wants to look at. She stares at me, not in the way that suggests she’s looking for something beneath my skin, but like my skin is fine as is. She stares at me and I don’t mind. There’s nothing screaming in my head.

I’m … not hearing the voices anymore so much.

I’m even starting to remember my old life, before this all happened. I can remember my family. Not their names, but their faces, the colour of my grandfather’s beard, the feel of the calluses on my father’s hands, the smell of the tea my mother brewed in the morning. I can remember cows I’ve milked, dogs I’ve fed, barns I’ve swept …

All while I’m around her.

It’s not all great, to be perfectly honest. I still dream, and when I do, I dream of flames, of big blue eyes without pupils. And while I’m at ease with the Owauku, their taller, bearded friends, the Gonwa, eye me with distaste. Perhaps they knew, at one point, I planned to kill them? I don’t see why they would take offence at that, really. I didn’t know them at the time; it was going to be a perfectly honest killing.

And … I’m still hearing the voices.