Peculiar Soul

Chapter 77: The Parts Important to the Apple

Chapter 77: The Parts Important to the Apple

A man came upon the Great Shield laboring in a mountain pass, breaking rocks that had fallen upon the trail. He stopped, for the path was still blocked, and gave the holy man his greeting.

How odd it seems, the man remarked, that I should chance upon the Shield of Men as he is breaking stone asunder. Is not your power in solidity and strength? How can you bend your soul to destruction when it does not give you this power?

The Great Shield paused in his labor to respond. There are two truths, he said. The strength of the stone, and the strength of my fist. Both are true, and valid, and my soul upholds them both.

How then does the stone break, but your fist remains whole? the man asked.

The Great Shield picked up another stone, holding it within his mighty hand. My soul upholds both, he said, but my mind is the arbiter of truths. I may choose which is true, and which must yield. This is the power of the divine, which raises us above mere nature.

The man recognized the sound of holy truth and sat to watch the Great Shield exert his truth upon the mountain.

- The Book of Eight Verses, the Verse of Union. (New Kheman Edition, 542 PD)

A jolt startled Michael awake. He sat upright in his seat, looking around; he saw only trees and patches of low grassland outside the trucks windows.

Sorry, Unai said, steering the truck around a particularly egregious divot in the road. It appears Saf has let their road maintenance slide somewhat.

Michael snorted. Theyve been distracted, he said. I suppose its forgivable, circumstances being what they are.

Unai spared him a glance. Nonsense, he said. Roads are the arteries of civilization. As with men, obstructions and blockages are disastrous to the health of a state. He returned the truck to the center of the roadway with an indignant sniff. Its mismanagement. The sign of a diseased society. All of the roads in Mendian are beautiful, well-paved and clear of debris.

All of them? Michael laughed. What, do you check?

There are reports, budgetary allocations in the Batzar. There are no better metrics of a countrys health than its annual budgets. I attend every- Unai paused, then settled slowly back in his seat. I was accustomed to attending every major session of the Batzar, he said.

Michael felt the pain ripple out from the older man, low and insistent in the manner of a scabbed wound. He felt the urge to reassure Unai; Michael would be the next Star of Mendian. Unai would be welcome, valued - able to return to some semblance of normalcy.

He stepped back within his mind, examining the impulse as it passed. It would have been a superficial reassurance, a blind reaction to the pain. Michael breathed once, deliberately, and considered. Antolin said that you used to work for the Batzar itself, Michael said instead. For their Foreign Directorate?

Unai nodded. Before I was ensouled, he said. I served a tour in the military in my youth, did a few years in the border forts. In those days the Zuzendaritza answered to a Mendoza - old man Karlo, not his idiot son. He shook his head. My commanding officer was one of their cousins, distant relation. He asked if I wanted something more challenging than watching trees and rocks for idiot Esroun trespassers, and I said yes.

Was it? Michael asked. More challenging, that is.

A smile plucked at Unais lips. Oh, yes. You must understand that Mendian is a neutral country. That means that we dont intervene officially outside of a few narrow scenarios. The batzarkideak have their personal business, though, and if some of that happens to advance the interests of Mendian - well, one can hardly blame a country for the actions of a few zealous patriots.

One certainly can, Michael noted, grinning. But one would have to catch said patriots in the act, first.

Just so. Unai slowed for a curve in the road, squinting as the turn splashed low sunlight into his eyes. The continent was a mess, then. Esrou made its armistice with Saf when I started my tour; from an outside view it seemed like a good thing. My first years in the Directorate showed me what it was - a play by Saf to consolidate their gains and focus on the Ardan front.

He glanced at Michael again, his face sombre. We were in a panic. Mendian had planned on keeping the fronts as long and chaotic as possible to bleed Saf dry. The next decade was spent trying to shore up the failing Daressan state, handicapping Saf where we could and funneling resources through intermediaries. He frowned. But we failed there too.

Michael nodded, his head sifting through half-remembered passages from books about the War. What happened?

Saleh Taskin, Unai replied. He received his soul as an infantryman, very young. For most of the early War Saf only had one of the Eight - Sever. Smoke had been lost for years, its bearer in some far land or living quietly. When Taskin gained it, he invigorated their attacks, gave them a renewed fanaticism. He grimaced. The Batzar was frightened. The Safid now had a direct counter to the Stars power. It was why they said yes when Ardalt asked them to turn Jeorg Dreschner into an asset.

Huh, Michael replied; he had not expected to hear Jeorgs name arise as a part of this particular history. They intended for Jeorg to fight Saleh?

Unai made a noncommittal gesture with his hand; the truck lurched over a rut in the road, though Unai quickly seized the wheel to steer it back on path. Michael heard muffled cursing from the soldiers in the back.

The Batzar may have intended that, Unai said, smiling faintly, but if they did, they failed to impress their intention on Her Radiance. She was a student of statecraft and animetry from her early tenure, and she taught him what she felt would most improve Ardalts ability to fight.

Michael frowned, the rest of the narrative following from what Jeorg had relayed. That didnt work out quite as she intended.

It was effective enough, Unai sighed. The Ardans fought, and better than we expected. There were concerns about their heavy use of obruors, but not to the extent that we felt compelled to intervene. Indeed, I spent much of the sixties in Rouns, posing as a merchant; the Batzar fed information on troop movements and convoys to the Ardans as a matter of course.

You make it sound like the two countries were nearly allies, Michael noted.

Unai snorted. Hardly, he said. I doubt more than a handful of batzarkideak knew what old Mendoza was doing. It worked, though - all too well. What they lacked in singularly powerful souls they began to make up in the quality of their rank and file. Over the next decade the Ardans fought the Safid to a standstill. They began to gain ground. Taskin made them pay for every footstep, but he couldnt reverse their momentum. They were prepared to march on Imes in seventy-one; Safs Sever led her men to stop the advance.

He looked over at Michael. She fell, and within a week the Institute announced that they had secured the soul for one of their own, an Assemblymans son.

Friedrich. Michael blinked. That is not the story my tutors gave me. I distinctly remember hearing that he received it in single combat.

Against Sever, while unsouled? Unai raised a pitying eyebrow. The quality of education in Ardalt-

Yes, yes, Michael said tiredly. Im increasingly aware of this. He shook his head, then looked out the window. Trees whipped by in their irregular huddles. He stuck his hand out the window, letting his fingers carve through the buffeting air.

Its odd, he finally said, to tie together these grand events from history with the faces of people Ive met.

So theyre practiced mutineers, she deadpanned. Wonderful.

Michael looked out over the camp, watching the men trudge about their business. They dont measure up to the Mendiko standard, its true, he admitted, watching as Zabala loomed over another soldier struggling to set up his tent. But they turned against their masters because of me, at least in part. They wanted a change, and fought for it. Its the same spirit that I imagine you looked for in your own partisans.

Sobriquet wrinkled her nose. I suppose, she said. For a few moments she sat quietly, watching the men go about their work.

Clad in drab Mendiko off-duty wear, they looked less like soldiers and more like a band of oddly-similar wage laborers playing at military tasks - which was broadly correct, Michael supposed. Aside from Zabala and perhaps Lars, their reasons for soldiery were limited to temporary circumstance; even then, they had rejected their Ardan colors for Mendiko.

And now, they were in Michaels service. The thought struck him with uncommon force, racing around in his head unpleasantly while the camp went up around them and fires were lit. He was jarred from his contemplation by the savory smells of dinner reaching their peak; his stomach reminded him of more immediate concerns.

Sobriquet had wandered, leaving him in his musings, so he walked to join the lengthening line. It was only seconds before the man ahead of him looked back to see who had joined their queue. The way his face paled would have been comical, though the humor of it failed Michael in the moment; he quickly became the awkward focus of attention.

A moment later, the men shuffled aside, an obvious invitation for Michael to step past them towards the stew.

It was intensely uncomfortable, and Michael felt the urge to raise his hands, to motion them back into place, to protest that he would wait in line for his share along with the others. He let the impulse pass, listening to the still evening air. There was the old, familiar fear. It was disappointing, but expected; Michael had long-since stopped being troubled by it. He could not even say it was unfounded.

Beneath that sharp note, though, there was more. Uncertainty, tension, and something nebulous and bright - hope, perhaps, or expectation. Men with a void where some rote sense of patriotism or duty had once lain, now seeking a new direction.

Michael did not want that; it was nearly painful to consider himself usurping the mantle of Michael Baumgart, Heart-Eater, this fictional man that all too many Safid and apparently Ardan soldiers had crafted tales of. It reeked of arrogance, of presumption, of behavior that was all too similar to the example set by his father.

Yet this was what he did not want; the men still stood waiting for him to take his stew first. Michael did not think for a moment that Zabala had any real antagonism towards these soldiers, only a species of paternal exasperation - yet the antagonism was there. The soldiers sought it, expected it, seized upon it like a drowning man clinging to a buoy.

Michael walked down the line with a measured pace, passing the waiting men to stop in front of the stewpot. It smells delicious, he said. Whats in it?

The man with the ladle dropped his gaze. Nothing proper, he said. Just salt pork and potatoes, milord.

Please, its just Michael. Sounds perfect for the weather. Michael held out his bowl, waiting while the man ladled a generous portion. Thank you.

Of course, milord. The man ducked his head again, then raised it fractionally. I dont mean to overstep, but some of us - the men, milord, we was talking

Ghars ashes, man, Im no lord - just ask your question! Yes? Michael said, raising an eyebrow.

We was wondering where were headed, the man said, sounding mortified even as the words left his mouth. And, ah, what the pay would be.

Michael looked back down at the man for a long and lingering moment, until the cook flushed and turned aside muttering words that he could not make out. It was a cold and emotionless glare; Michael only realized this after he had delivered it for quite some time, having been distracted by his utter lack of prepared answers to those questions.

He forced his eyes up and over the men, who were all turned to him in anticipation. Michael forced his breath in, then slowly out.

I probably should explain what were about, shouldnt I? he said. Its quite simple. A man has taken Stellar, the Star of Mendian. Im going to find him and reclaim the soul for my own, and I need a company of good men to assist in the search.

Blank stares answered him; one mans mouth hung comically open.

We may be going as far as Saf, Michael said. And the search may take some time, although I hope to finish it before the years end. As far as pay- He looked over at Sobriquet, who had almost managed to suppress her laughter. I understand that many of you wish to remain in Daressa now that hostilities have concluded. Service buys you residency, as well as enough money to establish yourself comfortably.

Sobriquet made a sour face at that; the men murmured appreciatively.

How much money? one called out from the back.

I have no idea, Im not even sure what the exchange rate is- One thousand livres. Sobriquets eyes flew wide; Michael winced internally. Half paid upon return, half paid after a years uneventful residency. There were some grumbles at that, but Sobriquet nodded grudgingly.

Think it over, Michael said. Any man who doesnt wish to take the job is free to travel with us to the next town and depart freely, with a full pack and no obligations.

More grumblings. One man in the back stepped forward - Michael recognized him as the one who had tried to strike Zabala. You expect us to fight Stellar? he asked.

Michael held eye contact for another long moment, although this answer bore very little thought. Obviously they werent meant to fight Luc, that was Michaels task alone. But they knew Stellar, had seen that souls power, and the fear that whispered through them now was far stronger than it had been before.

The protesting voice within him fell silent. Michaels misgivings, his doubt - it all remained, but it was irrelevant in this moment. It wasnt what these men needed. Michael shifted his sight to look at himself from their view; he saw a man with a serious, calm face, its eyes half-cloaked in shadow. But - just a man.

That will be my fight, he said. And mine alone.

The soldier scoffed, tilting his head back skeptically. You can fight Stellar? he said. By yourself?

Michael lifted his face into the light, looking at the one who had spoken.

But youre more than just a man. You have a soul, which looks to your mind to understand certain truths. Free your mind

Michael let his soul expand out gently, calmly, floating on the evenings light wind. The air stilled, the grass ceased its whispering. Michael watched with a soldiers eyes as the man by the cookpot became something more, something with eyes of mirrorlight and a voice of command.

But the voice did not speak; it had done enough of that. Michael closed his eyes, listening instead, letting his sight drift back inwards. His soul followed a moment later, lingering to caress the grass, the stunned soldiers, the quiet apple trees, each with their own secret collection of paths branching out and infinitely forward.

He opened his eyes and grinned at the soldier who had spoken. Well, he said, I suppose well see. Michael nodded at the soldier serving stew, then took a bite from a small, perfectly-ripe apple in his other hand.

It was delicious, as he knew it would be.