Green Eyes

“My lord! My lord!”

Viceroy Brutus heard Lord David’s muffled shouts as he slowly regained consciousness in his icicle cocoon. Tapping into the special strength he had been given, he unleashed a burst of heat that melted the ice, freeing him.

“Are you alright, my lord?” David grabbed him as Brutus felt his legs wobble.

Sucking in a deep breath, the Viceroy steadied himself. “I’m fine,” he snarled to David.

For the most part he was. He was soaked to the bone and chilled but other than that, he was physically fine. His pride, however, was another matter entirely.

“If I may be so bold, my lord, but could you assist us with getting our men out?” David very cautiously requested.

Brutus looked around. The courtyard around him was filled with dozens of perfect soldier ice statues, all within roughly a hundred-foot radius of himself. Dozens more soldiers were busy trying to carefully chip their comrades out without killing them. Some had already been freed and were being helped off to the barracks for medical attention.

“We have more important matters to attend to,” Brutus indifferently replied. “Such as the Navi’s rescuer.”

“About that my lord,” David visibly winced, “we have a serious problem.”

“That he is no mere mercenary?” Brutus finished. “I am well aware of his true identity.”

“But that’s impossible,” David replied in disbelief. “He’s been dead for twenty years! You killed him yourself!”

“I shoved him out of a five-story window and we assumed he was dead,” Brutus corrected. “But his body was never found. Now we know why.”

“What are we going to do?” David asked.

“Do?” Brutus looked at him savagely. “First we’re going to figure out how he managed to practically walk into your prison!”

“I have no idea, my lord,” David was stumped. “My guards had strict orders not to let anyone other than Blood Guard into the keep. And you yourself gave the orders to the prison guards not to let anyone, even me, into the prison.”

“Indeed, it is a mystery,” commented Brutus eyeing him suspiciously.

“Are you saying that I let him in?” David felt cold dread seeping into his bones. “I swear to you on my life that I had nothing to do with this!”

“The traitor Max lived under your nose for 20 years, the Navi grew up in your own backyard, he returns to Kalashon here two months ago, and now the Navi escapes out of your dungeon,” Brutus counted off. “Either you are a traitor or the most out-of-touch lord in Kalashonian history. Neither option is good, lord David.”

David gulped. “I will do better my lord,” he promised. “But I swear to you I am no traitor.”

“There is one way to find out for sure,” Brutus turned full towards him.

David’s eyes went wide. “No my lord, surely there is another way!” he pleaded, falling to his knees before the Viceroy.

“I have a Navi and a challenger to the throne on the loose,” Brutus snarled. “I don’t have time for ‘other ways.’”

Before David could react, Brutus firmly grasped the man’s head in his hand and squeezed. David struggled violently for a moment, but Brutus held fast as he closed his eyes and murmured a few words. Screaming, David convulsed and seized as Brutus tore his memory and thoughts from him, examining them. Satisfied, Brutus released his grasp, letting the comatose lord fall to the snow-covered ground.

“It seems you are innocent, lord David,” Brutus said laconically. “A fool, but a loyal fool. Pity.”

“My, uh, lord,” a Blood Guard skidded to a stop in front of Brutus.

“Yes, what is it?” demanded the Viceroy. “I haven’t got all day.”

“Uh, right,” the soldier couldn’t take her eyes off of David lying limp on the ground. “Some soldiers found someone in the prisoner’s cell. He seems to be the person that let the mercenary into the castle.”

Brutus cast a glance down to David and shrugged. “Unfortunate for him you didn’t come sooner,” Brutus replied casually.

“What should we do with him?” asked the soldier.

“Put him in his bed and attend to him,” Brutus replied. “Let him live out his days in a never-ending nightmare. But first, you have a prisoner to show me.”

“Right, this way, my lord,” the soldier held out her hand.

*******

“Uhhhhh,” Selene let out a long groan as she slowly came to. She felt just as awful as when she woke up in David’s dungeon the first time. Headache, stiff joints, dry mouth, and aches literally everywhere.

“Welcome back to the world,” she heard Jared dryly comment. “I trust you slept well?”

“What?” she blinked heavily as she tried to sit up.

“I trust you slept well,” Jared repeated in his typical monotone. He was leaning against a log across a fire from her, casually polishing his sword.

“I guess,” she mumbled, trying to clear the cobwebs. “What time is it?”

“About four hours or so past sunset,” Jared replied. “You’ve had quite a nap.”

“Where are we?” she queried looking around. Wherever she was, it was completely unfamiliar. Not that she could see much; the dim firelight only illuminated a few trees in their immediate vicinity.

“Fifteen miles southwest of Lakeside,” Jared supplied, “about fifty yards north of the Trickling Creek, in the heart of the Ra’anan Harosheth, or Green Forest. This should keep us safe from the Viceroy and his minions, at least for now.”

“The Viceroy?” Selene questioned before it all came rushing back: the day in the ruins, her father, the fire, the torture, the escape. “That was all real?”

“Quite real,” Jared confirmed. “And I must admit that was quite an impressive display. Oh, that reminds me,” Jared reached into a pocket and produced Selene’s necklace. “This is yours,” he said, handing it to her.

Mechanically Selene took the necklace from Jared and stared at it blankly. “Then my dad is really dead?” Selene asked quietly with big green eyes.

Jared set down his sword and looked at her with his deep blue eyes. “Yes,” he said simply. “I am truly sorry Selene, but for what it’s worth, he died a hero’s death.”

“No,” Selene shook as the memory pushed itself to the forefront of her consciousness. “Brutus destroyed his mind and then his body as if he were killing a sheep. There’s no honor in that; my dad couldn’t even run away.”

“He died protecting you,” Jared told her. “You were everything to him, Selene. I cannot think of a more honorable death for Maximilian ben Luther than that.”

Selene wiped a tear off her cheek with her sleeve, noting she was still wearing Mallon’s filthy uniform. “I don’t understand, Jared,” she struggled to maintain control over her pent-up emotions. “Why did Brutus kill him? What does he want with me? How is my skin perfectly fine after he light me on fire? I should be dead! How did I burn my house down? How did I shoot ice from my hands? What am I?” Selene exploded, a wild look of pure desperation creasing her features.

Jared remained silent for a long minute. “Let me guess,” Selene snapped. “You’re not going to tell me? Or, it’s someone else’s job to tell me.”

“No, I’m going to tell you, if you’ll be patient,” Jared replied evenly. “I’m just not sure where to start. The answer is rather complicated.”

“Oh,” Selene calmed down and waited for Jared to sort his thoughts.

“Do you know what a Navi is?” he finally asked.

“No, not really,” she shook her head. “I mean, I’ve heard the name, but I don’t know what they are.”

“When this world was first created, the Creator made four great houses that would oversee the people of the world,” Jared explained. “Originally they were supposed to be one nation with the Kalashonians at their head, but that is another story. Anyway, the Creator made another special group of people to be a conduit from him to the world as a way of maintaining balance between the houses: the Navi, which literally means ‘prophet’ in the ancient language.

“The Navi are kind of the unofficial fifth house,” Jared continued. “But unlike the other houses, theirs is not dependent on lineage or nationality. Navi can and do come from anyone and anywhere.”

“If being a Navi isn’t hereditary, then how does someone know they are a Navi?” Selene queried.

“Because they bear a special mark from the Creator in their eyes,” Jared answered. “Those from Beth Har have red eyes; Beth Yarack, blue; Beth Shemesh, golden; Beth Esther, violet; and the Navi…”

“Have green eyes,” Selene finished, putting the pieces together. “So I am a Navi,” she said, getting a nod. “What does that mean, being a conduit?”

“Part of it means being his agent of setting right wrongs that no mortal can do,” Jared replied. “Towards that end, Navi are gifted with special, supernatural powers that are supposed to be used to make the world more like the Creator intended it.”

“What’s the other part?” Selene prodded.

“That I do not fully, or even partially, understand,” Jared shook his head. “There is a spiritual side that only a Navi can comprehend and thus only a Navi can explain.”

“So being a Navi means I have superpowers?” Selene looked at her hands. She didn’t feel particularly powerful. If anything, she felt rather weak from what she had gone through the last 30 hours or so.

“Clearly,” Jared raised an amused eyebrow. “After all, you did torch your house and turn half of David’s men into icicles.”

“Oh, right,” Selene remembered, although she still had a hard time believing that she had done that. “What else can I do?”

“I don’t really know,” Jared shrugged. “Navi have different powers depending on where they are from and there hasn’t been a Kalashonian Navi in 150 years, although according to the stories, Kalashonian Navi are particularly powerful. Apparently your repertoire includes fire, ice, and accelerated healing.”

“If I’m the first Kalashonian Navi in more than a hundred years,” Selene questioned, “what is Brutus?”

“Brutus is a sorcerer, which is very different than a Navi,” Jared clarified. “A Navi’s power is part of her nature. Navi are created with it and therefore it is natural power; supernatural compared with the rest of us, but still natural. A sorcerer’s power comes from selling his soul to the Adversary.”

“The Adversary?” Selene interjected.

“The Adversary is the Creator’s, well, adversary,” Jared answered. “The Creator is the author of life, beauty, and order; the Adversary seeks only death, vileness, and chaos. They have been locked in struggle since time immemorial; this world is another in a long list of battlefields.”

“So back to Brutus,” Selene returned.

“Ah, yes, sorcerers,” Jared recalled. “As I was saying, a sorcerer’s power comes from the Adversary and is therefore unnatural power. It is out of sync with the created order of things and therefore is by nature chaotic and destructive, like its source. Sorcerers are servants of the Adversary and thus reflect his character. So in a sense, I guess you could say that sorcerers are Navi. More accurately they are the Adversary’s poor imitation of Navi.”

“I guess that explains why he wants me dead,” Selene surmised. “My mere existence is a statement against everything he is.”

“It’s far more complicated than that,” Jared sighed.

“How?”

“Brutus doesn’t want to kill you, or more specifically the king doesn’t want to kill you,” Jared explained. “Brutus was going to break you and then train you to use your powers for him and his, or the king’s, purposes instead of the Creator’s.”

“Oh,” Selene remembered what he had said to her in the dungeon, involuntarily shuddering at the memory. “But why go through all that trouble? If anyone can sell their soul to the Adversary, wouldn’t it be a lot simpler just to kill me and have people convert to the Adversary if you need minions?”

“Yes and no,” Jared replied. “Yes, in the sense that it would be simpler but no in the sense that it would be easier. Remember the fundamental difference between your power and Brutus’s: yours is natural; his is not. As a result, his power is more chaotic and unpredictable and therefore ultimately weaker and potentially self-destructive. Yours is not: it is stable, reliable, and therefore stronger. If someone could break a Navi into being their slave, they would possess the most powerful weapon in the world.”

“But if something went wrong, you would have a very powerful enemy,” Selene pointed out.

“True, which is the complicated part,” Jared agreed. “But the flipside is that you are not that easy to kill, as you have discovered.” Selene had momentarily forgotten that she had been a walking 3^rd degree burn twelve hours previous and was now the picture of health.

Selene sat in silence for several minutes as she digested all that Jared had told her. So much of her life suddenly made sense. It explained why she never got sick and never scared. It explained why she always saw other’s needs. It explained why she had never fit in, always seeing something more than just the little town on the lakeshore.

“Why didn’t my father tell me?” she finally spoke. “I’ve spent so much of my life believing that I was cursed or that something was wrong with me when the opposite was true. I don’t understand why my father never just explained everything to me.”

“The same reason he left Jermelek despite being a rising star in the court and the same reason he died,” Jared answered. “To protect you.”

“From what? Brutus?” Selene asked.

“Brutus has always been Manasseh’s right hand, something Max knew very well,” Jared expounded. “He knew that if Brutus or Manasseh ever found out about you, that they would never stop hunting you until they either broke you or killed you. If you grew up to become a Navi, then you would be a serious threat to their power. And so just before Manasseh took the throne, he took you and disappeared into the middle of nowhere and kept your secret safe for 20 years.”

“But why didn’t he tell me?” Selene wondered.

“For most of your life, you have been a child who wanted nothing more than to be accepted by her peers,” Jared analyzed. “And for your entire life, you have been the reject, the outcast, the misfit. Can you honestly tell me that you could have resisted the urge to tell people the truth, maybe even show off some of your powers to get them to accept you?”

“I’m smarter than that!” Selene snapped.

“Are you?” Jared raised an eyebrow. “You were willing, so you said, to give up your virginity to a man that didn’t like you just to feel accepted and wanted for once. And Selene, this secret is like your virginity except with bigger ramifications because once you let it go, you are never getting it back. How long do you think it would take before that tidbit reached the king? And what then?”

Selene had to admit that Jared had her on that one. She didn’t know if she could have kept a secret like that, given what she had considered giving up to feel wanted, especially when dealing with derision and ostracism day after day after day.

“Well the secrets out now,” Selene sighed, shifting around to make a recliner out of the snow bank. “So what do I do now? I have no family left, no friends except you and you’re in the same boat as me, no one I can rely on at all. I can’t go anywhere in Kalashon without being recognized. I have to the Viceroy looking high and low for me. Am I to live as a fugitive in the forest the rest of my life?”

“If you want, I suppose,” Jared allowed. “But I had something else in mind.”

“Oh?” Selene was curious.

“Your father made me swear to protect you and I shall,” Jared informed, “so if you have nothing else, remember you have me. And I can take you to a safe place for Navi.”

“There are others like me?” Selene was suddenly very excited. “I’m not alone?”

“Sort of,” Jared cautioned. “You are still the only Kalashonian Navi that we know of, but there are dozens more Navi from all over the world. And they have a place they call home: Jerel.”

“Jerel?” Selene sounded out. “I’ve never heard of it.”

“Not surprised, it is a very old city and not terribly important anymore,” he shrugged. “In its day, Jerel was the greatest city in the world and the capital of the Kalashonian Empire. At the center of Jerel was the temple to the Creator and that is where Navi had their residence. Some called it the Academy; others the Navi Temple.

“The point is that Jerel was the center of Navi activity in the world and, even though much of the rest of the city has been abandoned, the temple and the Navi are still there. There you will meet experienced Navi who can really educate you on your powers, your responsibility, and the spiritual stuff that goes over my head.”

Selene’s head was singing. There was a place in the world where she would be normal. She could make friends, fit in, be respected. Maybe even there was a Navi man just for her. The possibilities were endless.

“How long will it take us to get there?” she asked excitedly.

“At least six months” Jared casually replied.

“Six months!” Selene exclaimed. “That’s forever!”

“Hardly,” Jared snorted. “Selene, we have an entire nation looking high and low for us, so we have to be extra cautious which will slow us down.”

“So what’s our route?” Selene queried, worried, annoyed, and excited all at the same time.

“We’ll follow the Trickling Creek down to Beth Isaac and catch a boat ride down the Great River to Endor. From there we’ll take the Ammonite Road into Ammon, cross Ammon and then get to Jerel just inside the Esthorian Empire on the shores of Moon Lake.”

“Oh,” Selene tried to work out a map in her head. “Wouldn’t be easier to go east on the Great River instead of west?”

“No, because we’d have to go through customs, something that we would both miserably fail at and then have two nations hunting us down instead of only one,” Jared condescended.

“Trust me,” he continued. “I’ve been dodging guys that want me dead for twenty years. I know the best route for us.”

“Maybe we could work on my powers too,” Selene offered, almost unable to wait to light something on fire.

“Maybe,” Jared concurred, though seemed less than enthusiastic about the idea.

“So what’s our plan now?” Selene asked, noting that the snow was beginning to fall again.

Jared looked up, blinking away the flakes. “We rest here,” he said. “This snowfall will obscure our tracks, so we can breathe easy for a day or so. I suggest that at some point you change clothes.”

“Into what?” demanded Selene. She didn’t like the revolting uniform, it was ugly, didn’t fit, and hadn’t been washed in way too long. But still, it was all she had.

“Into this,” Jared tossed her a leather bag. Selene opened it to find some of her clothes inside.

“Where did you get these?” she asked in awe.

“You packed them the morning we left,” he reminded her. “I grabbed them with everything else when I came to rescue you.”

“You planned on running the whole time,” Selene concluded. “That’s why you wanted warm cloths packed and me up so early and stuff. You planned on this.”

“I planned for the need of running away,” Jared corrected. “Something I was dead on about, I should add.”

Selene acknowledged the point with a shrug. She was just happy to have some woman’s clothes to be in.

Jared dimmed the fire and unraveled his furs. “I suggest you get ready for bed,” he told her. “Because this is the last good rest you’ll get in a while.”

Selene knew he wasn’t joking.