Chapter 12
Kaitlyn Carter
Something fell on top of her parachute as the grappling hook launcher materialized in her hand. Kate yelped, thinking it might be one of the Ladies coming after her. It dropped directly on top of her, collapsing the parachute and accelerating her fall. She struggled and beat at it with her brand-new grappling hook gun for a moment before she realized that it was Eric.
They were falling, halfway to the buttressed rooftops of her palace already, no more time for a parachute, going too fast now for the grappling hook idea. Think!
She concocted no viable solution, not in the half second in which they fell. Making a big trampoline or a giant marshmallow right below them seemed like the next best thing, but she couldn’t see, the parachute was all around her, no time to let it dissolve, and in her disorientation she couldn’t even tell which way was up.
She braced for impact and held fast to Eric, who seemed unconscious.
Something grabbed her. She felt and heard a powerful low buzz, a rapid thrumming. She knew that sound! The surrounding pressure increased, pulled her up, slowed her fall—
The rooftop knocked the air from her lungs, but she didn’t hit it full speed thanks to whichever Theian had slowed their fall. It was a sloped tile roof; she and Eric bounced off and began sliding. Something stopped them from sliding.
Kate let the parachute and grappling gun dissolve into mist around her and be washed away by the rain. Shlushluth was there, proving that his great size was not all for show. “You s-s-saved us!” she declared, heady from the exhilaration. He bowed. The rain beaded on his pure white fuzz, making him look jeweled all over.
She checked for broken bones as she turned her gaze up to where the Ladies were. They weren’t out of trouble yet! Not even close. Two Ladies! If even one of them was as tough as Lady Chains, she and Eric had to figure out how to run away fast.
But something was happening up there, something not all that loud but very flashy and bright. It illuminated the clouds and turned all the rain into lines of flashing brilliance.
“Eric!” She reached over and shook him with one hand. No good. Out like a light.
Something shrieked far overhead, a sound that made Kate clap her hands over her ears while Shlushluth dropped low against the purple tile rooftop.
“L-l-lllet’s go,” she said to Shlushluth, her voice soft and urgent. He nodded, turning to peer down over the rooftop.
A balcony jutted out not far below. Shlushluth, while not quite a strong enough flyer to actually carry either of them, was able to lower both Eric and Kate gently down to the colorful tile of the balcony. His wings made a pleasant thrum in the air, like a very deep sustained note. Kate tried to think about where they were. She had been to this part of the palace before, though not this exact balcony. She knew how to get down to the main area. But where to go after that? Were there any secret escape tunnels? Maybe. Probably! But she didn’t know where they were.
“W-wha-w-what sh-should we do?” she asked the big white moth at her side.
His big dark multifaceted eyes glittered at her from dozens of angles, apparently undisturbed by the beads of rain running down them. Was he looking at her? Eric? Up above, to the platform? Everywhere all at once? “Safety,” he said. “Come to our home.”
“B-b-but the Ladies might c-come and w-wr-wreck it!”
“No cost too great,” he replied.
Kate looked back up. Whatever had been going on up there had stopped. Maybe the Ladies were coming to look for her and Eric right now!
She gestured for Shlushluth to follow and hurried in off the balcony. The big moth followed with Eric in his arms. What had happened to Eric? Kate took a moment to check his pulse, open his eyelid, make a flashlight and see the response of his pupil. She was no doctor, but she thought he was just unconscious. Though he might catch cold, all wet like that! She made a blanket and wrapped it around him before she led Shlushluth down into the palace.
Flitch found them as they crossed the main hall. The bright little butterfly zipped down from somewhere above, terribly excited. But she was always terribly excited. She darted around them, a fluorescent green and orange streak, babbling and tripping over her words.
“What is it?” asked Shlushluth.
“The Ladies! The door! The storm! The sky! Safe! It’s safe!”
“S-safe?”
Flitch flicked back and forth in the air. “Safe! The Ladies are gone!”
“G-g-gone?!” Kate shared a look with Shlushluth. (Or she thought she did, anyway; it was hard to tell.) “W-w-where?”
Flitch didn’t reply. She made a series of soaring loops in the air.
A new set of voices became audible from a side hallway—the very place one would enter if they came from the main tower. But it wasn’t the Ladies.
“Goodness me! Assassins! Well, really. I say, this really does quite little to reinforce my faith in the Governance, if you take my meaning.” The voice was merry, even jubilant.
“Quite, dear.” The other voice sounded tired, dreary. “Is this the way?”
“Positively! I say, but wherever’s the chap that opened the door?”
“I’m sure I’ve no idea, Elmer.”
Two figures entered the hall, and Kate recognized them at once. Though she had never seen them, Liz had described them thoroughly. Elmer Sky, short and fat and cheery, with ruddy cheeks and a dark moustache. Amelia Shape, a tall glum scarecrow with a thin pointy face. Both of them dripped water all over the floor, but neither seemed to mind. Elmer wore a brilliant blue ten-button suit with shiny silver trimmings, complete with top hat (also blue), though it all looked a bit singed around the edges. Amelia sported a dull grey overcoat from shoulder to shoe, splattered with something black as soot.
“Ah!” Elmer exclaimed, pausing dramatically upon entering the room. “Behold, Amelia!”
“I can see them, Elmer.”
Elmer approached Kate. He bowed low in a surprising display of agility for his size, and he swept off his blue top hat in an elaborate swooping gesture. Where the blue top hat arced through the air, a brilliant rainbow briefly followed before dispersing like dust. “Elmer Sky, at your service!” he declared.
“And Amelia Shape,” said the other, coming up next to him and giving a far more restrained nod of the head. She looked Kate over critically. “You seem all right. It shouldn’t scar, I imagine.”
“S-scar?”
“Your burns, dear.”
Burns? Only at the moment, thinking about it, did Kate remember that she had been swept off the platform by fire. And now that she thought about it, her hands and arms hurt. She looked at them and saw red welts.
“No call for worry, dear,” Elmer reassured her. “You’ll be right as rain in no time! Eh, Amelia? Right as rain, Amelia!”
“How is he?” Amelia indicated Eric with only her eyes.
“Oh! F-f-fine, I think. J-just p-pa-p-passed out!”
“A spot of rest ought to do the trick, I should think!” Elmer declared. “Once we get him dried off, of course.”
Kate nodded slowly. She needed some rest. She could feel her thoughts being slow, getting all gummed up! But first, “W-wh-what happened?”
“To the Ladies?” Amelia sighed as though she could hardly be bothered to think about such tedium. “You are safe for the moment.”
“Fear not, fair maiden!” Elmer suggested. “We have been assigned to protect you!”
“B-but where are they?”
Amelia raised a thin, pale hand to tap her sharp jaw in thought. “Where did they go? Elmer?”
Elmer shrugged, which for him was an entire theatrical production involving his hat, his coat, and his moustache. “Oh!” he declared. “You’ve got some of her on you, dear. Just…” He pointed out something at the back of Amelia’s neck. Amelia reached back and with evident pain extracted something dark and flat. It squirmed in her grip like a giant two-dimensional leech before being vaporized in a sparkle of bright lights. Flitch, somewhere above, squealed in delight and/or horror at this display.
Something Elmer had said a moment ago suddenly registered. “Who assigned you t-to protect us? L-l-lord F-friend?”
“Well no,” said Elmer, “though he’s a right good old chap, that one! No, it was Lady Hearts.”
Lady Hearts. Bleeding God. Green text.
“Sh-she is on our s-side,” Kate whispered to herself.
“As is Lady Wings,” said Amelia, who apparently had keen ears. “Paths and Stars haven’t been ordered to kill any Heroes either.”
“Not that we’re terribly concerned about all that,” interjected Elmer. “We’re with you, the Heroes! We care not a jot—nary a fig, I say!—about what the Ladies or Gods say.”
Kate found, to her shock and embarrassment, that her lip was quivering. She was about to cry! It must be the tiredness, she thought. I’m tired. It’s been a long day.
“Oh, poor dear,” said Amelia. She stepped forward and put a hand on Kate’s shoulder. Kate surprised her by going in for a quick hug. It was like hugging a skeleton with a bit of padding.
Amelia did not return the embrace, but neither did she stop Kate. “You must be tired,” she said.
Kate stepped back, tried to wipe her eyes as sneakily as possible, and nodded. “C-can you t-t-take care of Eric?” she asked. “Th-there’s something I need to d-do first.”
She thanked them again as they took Eric away to put him to bed or whatever. Then she thanked Shlushluth, and Flitch, and Thlytri who had been watching the whole thing from another tower. Thlytri said that it was hard to see exactly what happened because of the rain and all the lights, but Amelia Shape and Elmer Sky came through the door and fought the Ladies and made them disappear.
Kate messaged one of the gods (sorry, Eric!) on her way back to her room. What she really wanted just then was a hot bath.
KC: hey!
KC: are you there?
FI: I am here! I am!
FI: what happened?
FI: did it work? Are you okay?
FI: wait for me a minute, I am going to grab your book again
KC: my book?
KC: hello?
KC: I just wanted to thank you, Fiora!
KC: you told Shape and Sky to come help us right?
FI: okay I got it!
FI: now I am running, hold on
FI: I am fast!
FI: hee hee!
FI: they will not find me here
FI: you are okay!
FI: I think
FI: it looks like you are okay but I do not really know what kind of thing you are so I cannot tell for sure
FI: are you okay?
KC: I’m okay!
FI: yay!
FI: I did send those two to help you! I did!
FI: they are kind of like humans too, right?
KC: I guess?
FI: they look like you
KC: what do you look like?
FI: like a frog
KC: a frog?
FI: I am green, and small compared to everyone else, and my crystals grow in my hair
KC: I’m pretty sure frogs don’t have hair OR crystals :P
FI: I can jump really high up!
FI and I can talk to anything that is alive, and I can do this
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
KC: do what?
But Fiora didn’t have to answer that, because Kate, now drying off in her room, felt tingly all over her arms and face. Thousands of tiny green sparks danced around her, pulsing with light like radioactive dust motes. And her skin, which had been hot and painful with the burns, cooled as though caressed by a soothing breeze. After a few moments, only a faint pink coloration like a mild sunburn remained where before there had been angry red welts.
FI: see?
KC: that’s amazing!
KC: thank you so much!
FI: hee hee!
FI: I could do a lot more if I was there in person
FI: that is as much as I can do from here
KC: wait
KC: can you SEE me?
FI: kind of
Kate, on her way to the bathroom, did not find this comforting.
KC: what do you mean ‘kind-of?’
KC: can ANY of you see me?
FI: imagine someone describing you and things around you
FI: that is what I can see!
KC: the description?
FI: yep!
KC: weird!
FI: sure is
FI: woah!
KC: what?
FI: you made a door!
FI: you did!
FI: I am just looking back in the book
FI: wow!
FI: you are so cool!
FI: you and that other human
KC: you can see that?
FI: I am seeing it now!
FI: “and their music was electric!”
FI: hee hee!
KC: that’s what I was thinking!
FI: him too probably
FI: that is how it is when you make a door!
FI: that was your first door! Congratulations!
KC: <3
FI: what is that?!
KC: it’s a heart!
FI: it does not look like a heart
KC: that is true :\
FI: <3
KC: :D
KC: speaking of hearts...
KC: why are you called the Bleeding God?
FI: let us just say
FI: it will be hard for the others to read the part where I healed you just now
FI: but more importantly!
FI: what about that other human?
KC: Eric?
KC: he’ll be okay
KC: thanks for asking :)
FI: no no no
FI: I mean
FI: you two were so cool fighting the monster cloud thing with music!
FI: are you mates or something?
KC: oh, no!
KC: I mean, no, it’s not like that
KC: we are just friends!
FI: sorry I do not know how it works with humans
FI: I just saw you touching your hands together
FI: but you do not have stars, do you?
FI: so maybe that does not mean anything
KC: are you really a god?
KC: REALLY really?
FI: I do not know how to answer that
FI: I guess so? In your Narrative?
FI: it is weird though
FI: because
FI: Oh no!
KC: what?
FI: Jeronimy!
KC: ?!?!?
FI: hee hee!
FI: no! I am angry!
FI: I just read what Jeronimy did!
FI: he tricked you and blew you up!
KC: oh yeah
KC: Eric stopped it though :)
FI: but it still happened!
KC: ...it did?
FI: it is right here!
FI: arrgh!
FI: I am so sorry
FI: I am!
FI: about all this
FI: they will not listen to me, Kaitlyn Carter!
FI: even if Acarnus is right
FI: and he is always right
FI: but even so, even if this is the only way, it is NOT OKAY
RA: AH
RA: HERE YOU ARE
FI: go away Rasmus!
FI: I am not talking to you, remember?
RA: PLEASE, FIORA
RA: WE HAVE BEEN OVER THIS
RA: I DO APOLOGIZE FOR THIS, HUMAN
RA: ER...ISAAC?
FI: It is Kate! Kaitlyn Carter, and I should be apologizing for YOUR behavior Rasmus!
RA: CALM YOURSELF, FIORA
RA: YOU ARE MAKING THIS MORE DIFFICULT FOR EVERYONE INVOLVED
RA: INCLUDING YOURSELF
FI: we can not do this Rasmus!
FI: I know you do not want to!
RA: MY DESIRES ARE OUTWEIGHED BY MY RESPONSIBILITIES
RA: YOU ARE AMONG THEM, FIORA
RA: MY RESPONSIBILITIES, THAT IS
FI: maybe I do not WANT to be your responsibility!
FI: maybe I would rather die than have a murderer as my shield!
FI: ...
FI: Rasmus?
FI: wait
FI: no, I am sorry, I did not mean it! I did not!
FI: please...
FI: he is gone
FI: I should go too
KC: okay <:(
FI: I am sorry about Rasmus
KC: that’s okay! My friend said he sounded kind of nice?
FI: nice?
FI: I guess
FI: he is like a tree that is big and safe when all the rest of the world is sinking and dark and scary
FI: he is my storm and my shield
FI: and he does not want to hurt you because he is GOOD but he is listening to Acarnus instead of me because Acarnus is really smart and I am not
KC: well I LIKE YOU
KC: <3
FI: I like you too! I do!
FI: I will try really hard to fix this, okay?
FI: I will
KC: oh, one more thing before you go!
FI: what?
KC: Princess Zayana of Meszria
KC: do you know her?
FI: !!!!!!!!
FI: she is my best friend!
FI: well, one of them
FI: how do you know her?
KC: we talked a while back
KC: for me it was days but for her it was months ago!
KC: is she okay?
FI: she is here!
FI: she is!
FI: she has not been paying attention to the rest of us because she was busy with another book, but the guy in the book just died and I think maybe she liked him because she has not been talking much to anyone and wants to be alone
KC: oh no! who died?
FI: someone called Jacob Hollow
FI: he is with birds
FI: I could go get her!
KC: uh, okay!
KC: is she a god like you?
FI: yep!
FI: the Mirror God I think, which is weird because she is blind!
FI: kinda
FI: I will try to find her!
FI: it might be a while though
FI: this library is huuuuuge
KC: okay!
KC: thanks!
KC: bye!
FI: goodbye!
FI: <3
The Mirror God? Kate suddenly remembered where she had first seen Zayana: in a mirror! And that was the god connected with Lady Stars, which explained why Isaac was still safe.
But wait. Zayana hadn’t looked like a god. That didn’t matter much; gods could look like anything for all Kate knew. But when Kate replayed their conversation in her mind, and remembered all the texts Zayana had sent over what from Zayana’s perspective was months…she had talked about a dying world, an escape. She had been a princess, a real princess, not a goddess! And most of all, she had been in the Museum! Would a god of this Narrative be confined to the Narrative?
She thought about these things as she drew a hot bath and slipped in for a long, drowsy soak. She tried not to think about how one or more of the “gods” could potentially be “sort of” watching her.
And when she stumbled into her bed, she was asleep almost as soon as her face hit the pillow. And she didn’t dream at all, not even the dreams of falling that had plagued her ever since coming here.
