Empires Always Fall Chapter Sixty-three: Zhe'ārani: Stand Our Ground
content notices: violence, guns, blades, past abuse, Zhe'ārani has a flat affect herself but she's also kind of demonizing Guodei for her flat affect + demonizing/dehumanizing her in general, referenced gender dysphoria, religion, battle, imperialism, vague brief body horror, grief, minor character death, killing, past major character death, friendship, family, defaulting to old hierarchy, touch, referenced conscription, guilt, referenced espionage & lying, allusion to torture, PTSD
Zhe'ārani jumped, startled as Guodei stepped out of the shadows.
That was something she had noticed, with the other former Initiates. With herself, too, sometimes. They had a tendency to lurk.
She crossed her arms defensively, subconsciously correcting her posture.
"I need to shave," Guodei stated, as if that was something Zhe’ārani had ever cared about or needed to know the schedule of.
"Okay?" she signed.
"So I need a razor."
"Go ask the quartermaster." Zhe’ārani did not have some kind of secret supply of razors. She did not possess any razors.
"I wanted to make sure you’re okay with me having a razor," signed Guodei. "My-" She gestured to her growing stubble. "You understand. But I won't do it if it would make you feel unsafe for me to have a razor, because this is your home and we are your guests."
Zhe'ārani rolled her eyes. Guodei did not need a razor to hurt her. Guodei was made specifically for hurting people and had multiple blades as permanent parts of her body.
"Why did you leave?" she asked.
"What?"
"Why did you leave the Temple?"
"I am- I was going to be a Lieutenant of Corysecli," Guodei signed. "My first directive was to protect the Vessel, carry out Corysecli's will, and uphold and respect Her Law. My second was to protect my cohort. I decided the second was more important."
"I wasn't aware you were capable of deciding anything for yourself," Zhe’ārani snarked.
"Ši Arroakhai Kjú, I have spent my whole life-" She cut herself off. "No. We're not going to do this, because I don’t want to talk about it and you don’t want to hear about it."
Part of Zhe'ārani did want to hear about it. To have Guodei explain to her why she was like this. To find out what had made her a hard shell with an empty inside. To know what exactly had turned her more weapon than person.
But it was private, and she knew it could never make her forgive Guodei for Qatriong. Nothing could.
"Go talk to the quartermaster," she signed. "I don't care if you shave. I'm not afraid," she lied. "You can even cut your food with a knife, if it pleases you."
"The child- Qonai said she wanted to be like me," Guodei signed. "I couldn't let that happen."
They stared at each other for a moment. Zhe'ārani slowly figured out what Guodei had meant she understood.
"If you want, like- hormones, surgeries, medical stuff," Zhe'ārani began. "Our doctor has connections-"
An alarm went off, lights flashing and sound blaring so loud that even Zhe'ārani could hear it.
Guodei jumped and drew her divine sword, proving Zhe'ārani's point about the razor not mattering. "What's that?" she signed one-handed.
"I don't know." Zhe'ārani slapped her hands over her ears. It must be new since the fire.
Since the last time the empire attacked.
Oh, no.
"I'm going to find the others," Guodei signed, just as Zhe'ārani's father came tearing down the street towards them.
She'd never seen him run so fast.
"Evacuate," he signed, before grabbing her arm and pulling her in the direction of the forest.
She stumbled, then dug her feet in and pulled her arm back. "What's happening?"
"We're being attacked," Rokhesh signed. "Come. We have to go. They're twenty minutes away at most and we need to be well and truly gone."
Zhe'ārani was done being pushed around. She wasn't going to lose her home yet again.
"Wait," she signed. "I have an idea. You go. I'll find you."
"Zhe'ārani, please," he signed. "I can't lose you again."
"I'll be fine."
"I thought you were dead," he signed, eyes glistening with tears. "For nearly two years, I thought you were dead. Please don't make me go through that again. I only just got you back."
"Daddy," she signed. "I'll be okay. I can handle myself. I think I can protect our home, and I only just got it back. Isn't that worth it?"
"Not if it costs your life."
"It won't," she signed, a promise she was seventy percent sure she could keep.
"It's not fair to ask you to do this," Zhe'ārani signed. "I promised you were safe here and this isn't that, but- There's not that many of them. I think we can do it. I… There's nowhere else for any of us to go," she added.
She bristled at the way they all looked to Guodei. We're out of there! she wanted to shout. You can make your own choices! You don't have to follow that hierarchy anymore! She doesn't deserve your trust!
But they didn't have time for that.
Guodei had put her divine sword away, so when she signed it was clear and fast with both hands. "This place has taken us in when no other would have." She tipped her head to Zhe'ārani in an unnerving half-semblance of a bow that made Zhe'ārani immediately feel dirty despite Guodei remaining on her feet.
Finding no argument from the others, Guodei snapped back into a commanding mode. "Abhaonai, Nesyue, Retmiq: there are hunting rifles in a locked chest at the quartermaster's. We need seven; find a crossbow or something else smaller for Zhe'ārani. Kjotar, take the child and go with them; when you have a gun, get her out of here and stay with her until one of us finds you. See if you can join the other people who left. Qonai, these soldiers will kill you if they see you, so you must stay with Kjotar. Kaelía, Līsandyr, you're with me."
Then it was just the four of them, Zhe'ārani and Kaelía and Līsandyr and Guodei. Guodei's continued presence somewhat ruined that of Zhe'ārani's friends.
Maybe because Zhe'ārani was no longer one of them, or maybe simply because Guodei knew she couldn't give her orders anymore, there were no instructions for Zhe'ārani.
"What direction are they coming from and how many?" asked Guodei as Kaelía bent down to look through a bag.
"From the Industrial District," signed Zhe'ārani. "Probably about… four dozen?" She cringed. Maybe this had been a bad idea and they were too outnumbered. One Initiate easily outmatched one conscripted soldier or probably even two, but… this wasn't even close to that ratio.
But.
"I'll need to stand on your shoulders," she told Guodei. She was, unfortunately, the tallest of them by far. Līsandyr was the next closest, but he would need his hands free to most effectively direct his magic, and he wasn't nearly as sturdily built in the shoulders.
Before Guodei could ask why, Kaelía unscrewed the top of a massive jar of silvery liquid and formed the liquid into a pair of long, solid daggers. "Anyone kills me and I don't kill them too, they can have a nice slow death from heavy metal poisoning."
Mercury. With how little Kaelía relied on her own magic, Zhe'ārani rarely remembered that she had the ability. Logē, the most magically skilled of the Divine Soldiers responsible for training them, hadn't given her the same kind of intensive focus as they did Zhe'ārani and Līsandyr- and that was good, Kaelía's points on the board had almost always been in the negative, and all more time would have gotten her were more negative points and more punishments and probably not any extra help and improvement. Magic required focus and patience and getting good at it required dedication, and Kaelía didn't really have any of those in that subject.
That jar, stolen from the Temple, had to have filled most of the bag.
"There's a pistol in here if you can hold it," Kaelía added, but Zhe'ārani shook her head. Her hands were too small for most things made for average adults, including guns.
They stopped to get her hearing aids on the way across the commune. She wouldn't turn them on until she had to, because it really was overwhelming to have that amount of auditory input, but they were going into an unknown situation and it was best to be prepared for anything.
Nesyue, Retmiq, and Abhaonai caught up to them with the guns a few minutes before they expected the soldiers to arrive. They had five. Zhe'ārani knew there had been a few more than that, but Kjotar had one and the evacuees had probably taken a couple. It was one fewer than they'd wanted.
Kaelía's mercury rested like shining vambraces over her forearms. Zhe'ārani wondered if it took more effort for her to keep it solid in one shape or to repeatedly change its form, given its fluid nature at this temperature. It must be painfully cold even through her thin gloves and sleeves.
"I fight best up close, anyway," she signed, the metal flashing. It peeled off her arms and into liquid blobs floating above her palms, and Zhe'ārani decided she probably couldn't focus on keeping it in one shape for very long.
"You're more vulnerable at close range." Guodei shoved a rifle into her hands, almost making her drop the mercury if Līsandyr hadn't been there to catch it. "You're shooting. I don't care that it's less exciting."
The sight of Kaelía holding a rifle sent an unexpected shudder through Zhe'ārani. An old memory, Kaelía's grin not yet made lopsided by scars, the gun loaded with paint but built to look and feel very real. Better start running!
She pushed it away and turned on her hearing aids. The first soldiers were starting to appear through the trees.
"I need to be above them now," she signed. "Līs- can you hold them still once there's more of them?"
Guodei dropped down to one knee and offered her hands to help Zhe'ārani up.
"He's not good at large scales," Kaelía snapped. "I can keep them back. You have ten minutes if you're lucky but probably more like five." She dropped the rifle and flung out a hand. The mercury followed in a very long, very thin line. "HEY!" she screamed at the top of her lungs. "SEE THAT WIRE? IT'S RAZOR SHARP AND IF IT GETS IN YOUR BLOOD YOU'LL DIE HORRIBLY SO STAY RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE!"
"Mercury's not-" Retmiq began, but stopped with a grunt when Nesyue elbowed him.
Guodei wrapped her hands around Zhe'ārani's ankles and stood. There was a wobble as she rose, and Zhe'ārani was hit with the sudden fear that Guodei's prosthetic leg would slip with the extra weight and she would fall.
She directed Guodei to put her on a branch of a nearby tree instead. It was almost as good a position and much more reliable and comfortable. A tree couldn't slip and no tree had ever betrayed her trust.
"Līs!" she signed. "Make me louder?"
He nodded and sent tendrils of gold magic her way as she imagined the shapes of the words she wanted to say.
She wasn't as good with words from her mouth. She hoped desperately that they wouldn't fail her now.
Līsandyr's magic wrapped around her throat and tingled as it sank under her skin.
"SOLDIERS," she said, and her voice was so loud it shook her. "GO HOME. YOU DIDN'T HAVE A CHOICE TO JOIN-" (Yes, they had, to some extent, but she needed to appeal to their preexisting beliefs for her magic to take hold.) "-BUT YOU HAVE A CHOICE NOW. YOU DON'T WANT TO DESTROY A PEACEFUL VILLAGE. YOU WANT TO GO HOME." If she squinted to focus her eyes, the group might be getting smaller. It was hard to tell with all the trees. "THIS PLACE IS DEFENDED BY A FULL COHORT OF ARMED DIVINE SOLDIERS-" (A slight stretch of the truth.) "-AND A VERY POWERFUL ELECTRON MAGE. IF YOU ATTACK IT YOU WILL DIE. YOU WANT TO GO HOME."
She so hoped her voice had even been understandable.
Kaelía's mercury snapped back towards her.
The number of soldiers that charged them was, definitely, less than the number that had originally been advancing on the commune. Maybe half the size. Still outnumbering them, but not as dramatically.
With a boost from Nesyue, Retmiq was quickly in the tree with Zhe'ārani. He climbed up higher using a few more branches Zhe'ārani couldn't reach and then unslung the rifle from his back.
Retmiq was an excellent shot.
Zhe'ārani looked away. She wanted to keep an eye on Kaelía and Līsandyr, but every time she saw an injury she felt like she'd been punched in the stomach and every time someone went down she saw Qatriong's still body in her mind.
There was a soldier right below her now. Even a single one getting through could blow up her home. It wasn't fair to leave the others to fight while she covered her eyes and hid.
She dropped a foot or two straight down from her place in the tree. The soldier went down as she landed on them.
She didn't hear the soldier's neck snap, but she felt it. It was over before they even hit the ground together.
Zhe'ārani thought of everything that a life was, and how she had just ended one. Just like that. Who would miss them. What they could have gone on to do over the next sixty years they wouldn't get, all the things they must have already done in the twenty or twenty-five years she'd just cut short.
She felt sick. How could the others do this so easily? How could Guodei have done it to Qatriong? How could anyone do such a thing to anyone else?
Why couldn't you have just gone home? she thought. I told you to go home. You could have gone home.
They were all happy with her. Celebrating. Everyone trusted the former Initiates now because they'd protected the commune.
"Hey, what's wrong?" Ghurvi'airra asked her. "Are you hurt?"
Zhe'ārani shrugged and shook her head. She couldn't talk to Ghurvi'airra about this. She would be disgusted, or she just wouldn't understand.
All that time at the Temple and she'd never killed anyone. Until today.
She wished Qatriong were here to tell her what to do. She'd have understood.
She had to make an offering for the dead soldier's soul. One for Qatriong too.
On the way to find appropriate food- something Qatriong would like, and… something else for the dead soldier, whom she'd never find out the preferences of, she passed Guodei, and all of a sudden she just had to know.
Guodei wasn't celebrating. She was just lurking. As per fucking usual. Blood in the creases of her hands and dead empty eyes and lurking.
Zhe'ārani had stopped hating her quite as much at some point. It came back with a vengeance now. She hated the way her shoulders tried to fix themselves around her and she hated the way her chest went tense around her and she hated the way she could always see Qatriong's blood on her hands even though it had long been washed away, and she hated the way Guodei never slouched or flinched or yelled and always just stared like she could see everything you didn't want her to, and she hated that no one else hated her even though Qatriong had been their friend too. It wasn't fair that Guodei could just take Qatriong's life away and rip Zhe'ārani's heart out and get away with it.
"I killed someone today," Zhe'ārani signed.
Guodei didn't say anything, just waited, and that made Zhe'ārani even angrier.
"It was awful! How could you do that to people? To Qatriong?"
"I don't know, Ši Arroakhai Kjú, because I'm a monster," signed Guodei. "Is that what you want me to say? Does it make you feel better if I was just born wrong?"
She hated how Guodei always said what other people wanted to hear. She hated how Guodei always knew what other people wanted to hear when Zhe'ārani could never guess right. "I want the truth!"
"Do you?" challenged Guodei. "Because last time I told you, you freaked out and started your own personal war against a millenia-old institution."
Zhe'ārani screamed in frustration and kicked her in the shin as hard as she could. It was the wrong leg. All she achieved was hurting her own toes. She hated that Guodei was so fucking impenetrable.
"Qatriong was a danger to the Temple," signed Guodei. "Would you have rathered I bring her in alive? Because that's what Gētnyx wanted, and she made very sure I knew that, but you know that Qatriong would never have allowed herself to be taken alive and questioned. She died quickly and privately. Would you have preferred to have watched her cry and scream and plead for her life as Gētnyx had me make an example of her to all of you? She was always going to die, and she knew that. She knew she'd be discovered eventually. And you know, I respect her for that, it was brave and she kept it going for an impressively long time before anyone started to suspect, but there is no world in which Qatriong both joined the Temple as a spy and survived. The best I could do was make it quick."
"I could have saved her!" She could have used her magic and- and-
"You could not have saved her," signed Guodei. "No one could have saved her, including me. There is a very long list of things I have to live with and I'm sure there are more to come. Look, I owe you so much, Ši Arroakhai Kjú, but I'm not- I'm not going to get on my knees and beg for your forgiveness."
"Good!" Zhe'ārani signed. "I wouldn't forgive you anyway! I never will! I wish she was alive and you were dead!"
None of that had made her feel any better at all.
Kaelía ran into her between the food hall and the shrine. She was celebrating. Celebrating so enthusiastically, in fact, that she collided directly with Zhe'ārani.
The impact dislodged her grip on the food. She burst into tears.
"Hey, be happy!" Kaelía signed. "We won!" She seemed to notice the spilled food when Līsandyr bent to pick it up. "You can get some more food. It's okay."
Zhe'ārani sat down on the ground and hid her face. She put one hand in her mouth. It was all just too much.
She shrugged off the stiff arm Kaelía tried to put around her. She didn't want to be touched right now
She felt Līsandyr's magic form a soft cocoon, separating the three of them from the too-much world.
They let her cry in silence. It was weird and awkward but maybe it was what she needed. Nothing was okay and she didn't want them to try to tell her it was.
When she eventually looked up, Līsandyr had cleaned up all the food and put it back on the tray.
She took her hand out of her mouth. "Līs."
"Yeah?"
"Is killing hard for you?" she signed.
He nodded.
"Is it always?"
He nodded again. "Usually."
"Soft," Kaelía signed, but in a way that seemed like she was maybe trying to be affectionate.
"I was going to make an offering for Qatriong." She didn't mention the soldier she'd killed. Kaelía would think it was silly.
Līsandyr nodded.
"Can you come with me?" she signed. "You don't have to do anything. I know it's not the same as what you're used to. I just… I just want company. Please."
Līsandyr nodded again.
"Okay," signed Kaelía.
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