Chapter 6: Chapter 5: The Devout of Justice (I)

----The Wayfarer-----

Cai had never been far outside his hometown, and he certainly had never been to a place as crowded or confusing as Sallis Station. There were over twenty train platforms, and they were not laid out with any kind of logic that he could determine. To get between them required crossing a complicated series of stairways and tunnels, and if you took the wrong one you could wind up on the opposite side of the track you wanted. While the platforms were numbered, they were not in order, with platforms 1 and 2 being on opposite sides of the station. Cai tried to navigate the maze using the map guides posted periodically, but between the intensity of the crowd and his general lack of comprehension of maps he had yet to locate platform 12.

He found himself in another open breezeway. These could commonly be found at the intersection between the tunnels and were full of shops and eateries, making the station feel more like a town than a transportation hub. Cai had been told that Sallis Station was the central hub of the continent’s whole railway network, so it made sense there would be a lot of stores to cater to travelers from all over. But for Cai’s purposes, they only added areas of congestion for him to have to wade through.

As he tried to make his way through the throng to get to the other side of the breezeway, he found that the crowd was particularly thick around a circle in the center. When he made it close, he found out why: someone was putting on a performance.

The performer was a woman dressed in long, lacey silk strips, like red ribbons that had been wrapped around her form. They accentuated her curves and showed off enough of her dark skin that it made Cai blush. She danced in slow, fluid motions, twirling a pair of thin, curved swords with every step. As she spun, her long braided hair whipping around her, she tossed the swords into the air. She spun again, this time leaping into the air as she twirled, and caught the two swords as they descended before landing in a graceful pose.

The crowd applauded, but the performer wasn’t done yet. From a strap hidden on her waist she pulled three daggers before tossing them, and both swords, high into the air. She leaped after them, flipping once in the air before starting to catch the descending weapons. The daggers she caught with one hand, the swords in another. She caught the last dagger just before her feet returned to the ground.

Now the crowd was really applauding, as was Cai. Her coordination and balance were exceptional, probably better than anything he had seen even among the Wayfarers. The performer bowed, soaking in the admiration.

“Thank you all very much,” she said. “I’ve been Afi, of Toomba City. I hope you will continue to support me as I take my talents into the tournament. I want to become a champion worthy of your praise and attention.”

She was part of the tournament? Cai supposed that made sense. This was a central hub, and many of the competitors were going to have to pass through here. He didn’t know how well that performance of hers translated into combat skill, but he’d already learned it was unwise to underestimate his competitors.

Afi bowed one more time, then tossed an arm up above her. One of the silk laces around her arm flew forward, wrapping themselves around a nearby lamppost. She leaped and seemed to be pulled by the lace towards the top of the post. With a single kick she launched off the post, disappearing onto the rooftops of the shops. There was an appreciative awe amongst the crowd at the impressive exit. Cai was left wondering how she did that. There was something more than just pure athleticism in that movement.

While he was still thinking about it, he felt himself get shoved. A man in the crowd was looking at him with anger. “Hey, weirdo! Give me back my coin-purse!”

Weirdo? “What are you talking about?”

“My coin-purse! Don’t play dumb. You were standing right behind me, and then it goes missing. Now give it back.”

“You are mistaken. The only coin I have on my person is in my own pouch …” Cai felt along his side as he spoke and trailed off when he realized his own pouch was pissing. He patted himself down in panic. Thankfully, the envelope with his invitation was still tucked into the front of his robes, but his pouch was nowhere to be seen.

Around him, others were also patting their pockets and looking around. It seemed a number of coin purses, pouches, and bags had all gone missing. A murmur of confusion and anger began to rise within the crowd.

“What happened?”

“Mine’s gone, too!”

“Damnit, my entire month’s salary was in there!”

“It was that performer! She must have been distracting us so that her partner could rob us unseen.”

“That’s why she took off so fast!”

“Well then, where’s her partner!”

The man who had called Cai a weirdo pointed a finger at him. “It was him! I saw him doing it! While everyone was distracted by the dancer!”

The accusation was so absurd that Cai didn’t even know how to begin to respond to it. But as angry eyes began to fix at him, he realized he needed to say something quickly. “He is lying. I was robbed as well, and am just as confused as the rest of you.”

“Yeah, right.”

“We should shake him down, bet our coins will drop out of his robes.”

They were crowding closer around him.

“Everyone, please, let’s be calm,” Cai said, holding his hands out defensively.

His words were wasted as a man grabbed him from behind, trying to put him in a chokehold. Reflexively, Cai struck back with his elbow into the man’s ribs, forcing him loose with a grunt, before grabbing his arm and flipping him forward. His assaulter hit the ground hard and groaned in pain.

Cai immediately regretted the action. All that time spent practicing sparring had caused his body to react on its own. And now the floodgates had opened.

The men in the crowd came at him. Cai ducked under a punch before kicking his assaulter’s feet out from under him. Another strike to his side, which Cai deflected with the palm of one hand while striking out with the other, catching the attacker in the mouth and sending him reeling. Two men at either side of him lunged at once, and Cai jumped up and kicked in both directions. Both attackers took a foot to the chest and went tumbling back.

Cai’s body naturally fell into a defensive stance as he prepared himself for more attacks. The men in the crowd were more wary now, having seen what Cai could do. But they didn’t look ready to give up, either. They looked to one another, daring each other to be the ones to make the first move.

As if Cai didn’t have enough of a reputation as a troublemaker. If it got back home that on his first time in the outside world, he had started a brawl and beat up a bunch of people, Master Shui would have him cleaning outhouses for a month. He needed to get out of this before it got even more out of hand.

One of the men finally built up the courage to rush him. Cai caught his outstretched fist and twisted, locking his attacker’s body where he wanted it. Then he gave it a good kick to the sternum, sending the man flying backwards into the group. The impact sent a section of the crowd to the ground, giving Cai an opportunity.

He took it, rushing into the gap. One man was still standing and tried to grab him. Cai let himself go to the ground, rolling as he did, causing the attacker to trip over him and go tumbling face first. He broke the roll as he cleared to the edge of the crowd and popped right back on his feet before bursting into a sprint.

The sound of shouting behind him told him he was being pursued. He might be able to outrun them, but the area ahead of him was dense with people. If they came to believe Cai was a thief, he might soon find himser his arm and with his broadsword sheathed on his back, he walked into the village. Quickly, there were many eyes upon him. Not surprising, given they likely didn’t get many visitors out here. Though the way they looked at him was off in some way. It reminded him of a way a feral dog might regard a person: nervous, curious, and ready to bite if they got too close.

The scent of the fiend told him he was closer, but it was not in the village. He was also not sensing any fiendish pacts from the villagers, which he was grateful for. Drawing your sword on some peasant in the middle of the swamp was not a great way to make friends. But there definitely was a fiend nearby, and he intended to figure out where.

This close, the villagers may have had run-ins with the monster. Any information he could gather here would be useful, though the villagers were not looking particularly talkative. When his ears picked up the sound of a woman crying, he knew where to start. He found her sitting on the steps of a cottage, face in her hands, sobs flowing. Perhaps someone who had lost a relative to the fiend? Only one way to find out.

“Excuse me, miss,” Gulliver said. “I am Gulliver, Devout of Justice. I have traveled here on a mission of vanquishing evil and protecting people. Can I ask you what is amiss?”

She looked at him with befuddled, red-rimmed eyes. “Huh? You’re – you’re a Devout?”

“That’s right. I’m a Devout of the Order of Israfiel.” He held up the amulet that he wore around his neck which bore the Order’s symbol: a set of scales at balance, on one side of which rested a sword, and the other sat a book of laws. “I’m here to help with any dangers this village might be facing. Has something happened recently?”

There was a minute of silence as the woman tried to sort out her thoughts. “I – tried …”

“You tried what?”

As if suddenly realizing he was real, her eyes widened. “Please, you need to –“

A hand grabbed her by the shoulder.

“Go inside Isabelle,” a rough looking man commanded.

The woman lingered there for a second, giving Gulliver a desperate look, before finally doing as she was commanded.

“I’d appreciate if you didn’t speak to my wife any further, outsider,” the man growled. His voice was threatening, though his demeanor was withdrawn. His eyes spoke of a heavy lack of sleep.

“I’m here to help,” Gulliver replied. “Whatever is troubling you and your wife, I can deal with it.”

“Outsiders can’t help us with our problems,” the man insisted. “Now please – leave us be.”

He went inside and slammed the door shut, leaving Gulliver alone to plan his next move.

His alone time didn’t last long, as another, far older man approached him.

“I’m Martin, the chief of this village,” the old man introduced himself. “And you’re not welcome here. We are a self-sustaining community, and we don’t deal with outsiders. Particularly not ones such as yourself.”

Though he doubted it would get him anywhere, Gulliver still tried an introduction of his own. “I’m Gulliver, a Devout of Justice. I have traveled here on a mission –“

“I don’t care much for your titles, or what your reasons for coming here are. We used to look to outsiders for help. Begged for it, even, but when are cries weren’t being ignored, they were answered by the most incompetent fools to ever be given one of your fancy titles. So we learned how to take care o’ our problems ourselves. And part of that is keeping you fools away.”

Gulliver had heard similar speeches before, and seen the look that was on the chief’s face just as many times. In isolated villages, remote settlements, and towns on the frontier. So far from society that it was impossible to regularly patrol them, and where responses to emergencies were a long time coming. Gulliver didn’t blame the chief for his nihilism towards outsiders, but he did resent the additional difficulties that came from the attitude.

“Very well,” Gulliver said, pretending to concede. “But it was a long journey here. My horse needs to be fed and watered, and I could use a moment to check on my supplies if I’m to make the journey back through the swamp.”

The chief growled under his breath. “Fine. Tend to your horse then be on your way. If you’re still about by nightfall, you’ll learn that our tongues aren’t the only sharp tools we possess.”

Threatening a Devout so directly could itself be considered a crime worthy of the deliverance of justice. Some of the more stringent members of the Order might have already condemned the chief. But Gulliver was only really concerned with one part of the Order’s laws, the part that concerned fiends.

Things had just been made far more difficult for him in that pursuit. If the villagers had been hesitant to talk to him before, now they outright avoided even looking at him. Their leader had spoken, and they had no intention of defying him. As Gulliver went through the motions of providing Merryweather with food and water, he considered whether the quickest course of action would be to ride out in the swamp beyond the village to search for the fiend by scent alone. But this was unfamiliar territory, with great risk of him getting lost or sucked into the bog. He needed at least some kind of direction.

And there was only one villager who was likely to give it to him. He made sure he always kept the house that Isabelle had gone into in sight, even as he went to the well to fetch water, or as he made a show of measuring his trail rations. If she didn’t come out before nightfall, he might have to think up a more drastic action to get the information he needed.

Fortunately, it didn’t come to that, as a couple of hours later he spotted her. She left the cottage, closing the door softly behind her. Then she glanced around, checking to see if anyone was looking at her. Her eyes and Gulliver’s briefly met before she darted off. It was a bit more difficult for Gulliver to move without notice, but once he found a moment when no eyes were on him, he slipped away to follow her.

He found her behind a woodshed, pacing back and forth like a cornered animal. When she saw him, she became frantic.

“Please! You have to understand! We never wanted to give her up! We tried to fight it! When the chief came, my husband had his axe ready, but they pushed me down, and they grabbed my husband when he tried to help me … there wasn’t anything we could do! The chief kept saying it was for the best, for the good of village, everything would work out, but now you’re here …”

Gulliver held out a hand to stop her. “Take a breath. What has happened? Who did they take?”

“Our daughter,” the woman sobbed out. “They took her and gave her to the forest guardian, to take as his bride, but she’s just a little girl …”

“Where?”

“The guardian’s lair is a few miles north, following the shoreline along the lake and into the covered grove. There’s a cave –“

Gulliver did not wait to hear the rest. He was already rushing back to Merryweather, hoping it was not too late.orce the rules in a competition filled with egos – because trying to defy them is suicide.”

Cai was realizing just how little about the tournament before he stole the invitation. If he won, he’d have to undergo so kind of mysterious Lyris treatment and serve as an Officiator in future tournaments? He wondered if there were other duties his father had been referring to that he just didn’t know about yet.

Ju-Won was bouncing the pastry in his hand. “I bet his reflexes have become so enhanced that he can catch this even if it’s thrown at him while he’s asleep.”

“Uh – I’m not sure that’s a great idea –“

Ju-Won was already tossing the pastry. It soared through the air, a perfect tragedy…

And hit the Officiator right in the face. He startled and bolted upright, knocking his table over.

“What the hell? Who did that?!” He wiped bits of pastry from his face. “Someone wants to get disqualified before the tournament even begins, huh? Who was it?”

His eyes landed right on Ju-Won.

Ju-Won looked like a startled deer. “I – uh – I didn’t –“

“It was two kids,” Cai lied. “They were laughing about how you smelled, then ran off that way.”

“Damn kids these days,” the Officiator mumbled. “Where are all the parents at? Bah, forget it. Not worth the effort to track them down.”

He set the table back upright, placed some coins on it, then walked away, mumbling under his breath.

Ju-Won let out a sigh of relief. “Thanks. It would have been embarrassing to get disqualified already, do some childish notion I had.”

“No worries. Like you said, we got to look out for each other.”

“Yes. We do.” Ju-Won looked thoughtful. “It is my understanding that it is common for alliances to be forged in this tournament. Given we are of similar backgrounds, I believe we would benefit from working together.”

“I would like that. But …” Cai thought it was only fair Ju-Won had the whole story first before agreeing to an alliance. “I’m only really entering this tournament to avenge my father. A stranger came to my town and crippled him to keep my father from entering the tournament. I can’t just let him get away with it. That he was able to beat my father is proof that he is incredibly strong, but I still intend to steer my path directly at him. If you join with me, you might wind up having to face him, too.”

“I see. Then, more the reason for us to stick together. Anyone who travels into a Wayfarer community to do harm to its people is an enemy of mine. And with the two of us working together, we have a better chance than either of facing this foe alone.”

Cai nodded gratefully. “In that case, I am happy to be in an alliance with you. Let’s show them what the Wayfarers can do.”

With their alliance official and their meal finished, they made their way down to the platform. Platform 12, it turned out, required taking two different stairways and an out-of-the-way tunnel to reach. Cai wondered if he ever would have found it on his own.

“See? We had time to eat and still arrived with time to spare before the train arrived,” Ju-Won said.

Cai was going to agree with him, but was cut off by a woman’s scream. They both rushed to the edge of the platform and were shocked by what they saw.

A giant of a man, almost seven feet tall, with a body of pure muscle. He had wild red and yellow hair that surrounded his face like a lion’s mane. He was wearing gray rags that barely covered his form, and had chains wrapped around his wrists and ankles. And he bore the most glaringly malicious smile Cai had ever seen on a person in his life. It shook him to his core.

Which is why he was unable to act despite what he saw the giant doing – holding a woman over the railroad tracks. The woman struggled and screamed but couldn’t budge the behemoth’s sinewy arm even an inch. In the near distance, the train was coming.

“Please!” she begged. “Don’t do this.”

“Come on, don’t you want to go splat!” the giant growled. “You’re going to make such a beautiful mess! Look, it’s coming! The train’s coming!”

To Cai’s shame, his legs were locked. His terror in the face of this beast undid all of his training in a moment and left him shaking. He wanted to hide, but his body wouldn’t even let him do that.

But Ju-Won didn’t have the same weakness. He stepped forward boldly. “Unhand her. I won’t ask you again.”

The giant looked over at him and smiled. “Oh? I guess we have a volunteer. It’s your lucky day, miss. Seems someone wants to go splat more than you do.”

He tossed the woman behind him. She hit the ground hard but quickly scrambled to her feet and ran away as fast as her legs could take her.

Cai continued to be frozen.

“Well, come on then, little man.” The giant fixed that malicious smile on Ju-Won. “Train’s about to arrive. Don’t want you to miss it.”

Ju-Won dropped into a combat stance. One leg in front and extended, the other behind and bent at the knee. His arms were raised parallel to his legs, with his front palm facing up and his back palm facing down. Cai might have been excited to get a firsthand look at one of the forms for the Way of the Water, if he hadn’t been paralyzed.

The giant laughed, a boisterous, rugged hoot. “Oh, I love it when they try to fight back. Makes it so much more satisfying when that struggle slowly fades away as the life leaves their body.”

He started to walk towards Jin-Won, slow, menacing steps bringing him closer. Ju-Won’s form didn’t shift, ready for the first strike. The giant raised a fist high –

And it was grabbed before the punch could be thrown – but no by Ju-Won. The Officiator from the eatery stood between the two, one hand over the giant’s fist, the other pointed at Ju-Won.

“That’s enough, you two,” the Officiator declared. “I’m not going to have you embarrass the tournament by murdering each on the train platform. Keep it in your pants for just a little longer. When the tournament starts, you can kill each other. Until then, keep this up and I’ll disqualify you.”

Ju-Won rose out of his form, but kept his eyes fixed on the giant. The big man, on the other hand, didn’t seem ready to back to down.

“Well, you look like a tough one,” the giant commented. “Never killed an Officiator before.”

The Officiator didn’t look intimidated. More like annoyed. “You can take your shot at me if you want. But then something much worse than disqualification is going to happen to you.”

The train arrived, squealing to a stop behind the face-off. Nobody blinked. The giant still looked like he was considering taking on the Officiator.

“Stop this right now, Harren!”

A group of men in grey suits rushed onto the scene. The giant seemed annoyed to see them. They ran around behind him and grabbed the ends of the chains connected to his wrists and ankles.

“Whitestone,” the Officiator commented. “I guess this must be the convict you’re entering into our tournament.”

One of the grey suits nodded to the Officiator. “Sorry about that. We have a deal with Harren; he’s supposed to behave until the tournament starts. And we took some precautions with these enchanted shackles, just to be safe. But we made the mistake of letting him use the bathroom on his own, since we hadn’t had any trouble with him on the trip so far. He ended up slipping out the bathroom window – well, more accurate to say through the bathroom wall. We won’t be letting him out of our sight again for the rest of the trip.”

The Officiator sighed and scratched at his beard stubble. “Well, see that he doesn’t. One more screw-up and I won’t hesitate to disqualify him – and your company – from this tournament.”

“Understood,” the grey suit replied. “It won’t happen again. Come on, Harren. You’ve lost privileges to sit in the front of the train, so we’re going to into cargo car.”

Harren gave Ju-Won another smile as he was carted away. “I’m sure we’ll see each other again real soon, little man. Looking forward to picking this up then.”

“They really intend to enter a monster like that into the tournament?” Ju-Won asked after Harren was out of sight. “Do they have no shame.”

“Some people are so desperate to win control of the Lyris, they’ll do anything,” the Officiator explained. “Even enter people convicted of terrible crimes. Feel like we should have a rule about that – but I don’t make the rules, just enforce. Anyway, keep out of trouble yourself. I’d hate to have to disqualify you for getting riled into another fight.”

Ju-Won nodded.

Cai snapped himself out of his fear-induced paralysis and tried to pretend like he hadn’t been frozen for the entirety of the confrontation. “Uh – we should probably get on the train ourselves.”

“Right,” Ju-Won replied. “Let’s find seats and take some time to center ourselves. The competition will be fiercer than I had anticipated, and we need to be ready for it.”

Ready. Right. Up until a few minutes ago, Cai had felt ready. But after freezing in the face of that convict, he was no longer so certain. How could he fight if he couldn’t even move his legs?

He doubted the train ride would yield the answers, but he couldn’t turn back now.