Peculiar Soul - Chapter 43: A Problem of Identity

Chapter 43: A Problem of Identity

I have been asked before what I believe my legacy will be, which I maintain is a nonsensical question. Every man should live as humbly as the least important beggar, and as nobly as the hero whose path it is to save the world.

Who could tell me which I am? Even if I think myself one, in the moment of my death I may find myself the other. Do not live for legacy, nor for purpose. Master being the beggar in moments of privation. Master being the hero in moments of need. Live each moment as perfectly as you are able, for no one knows what the next may bring.

– Saleh Taskin, On Reclamation, 687

The people crowded around the Caller, pleading for his help – but he only shook his head. It was not his help that was required, he told them. Greater eyes than his were required to see the path forward through the darkness.

So in tempest and drought, heat and snow, the people followed him as he bent a track through the wild country. Not all had the will to follow. Many hundreds dropped to the wayside and passed from memory, as is the fate of all who abandon their path.

But some few remained, struggling through hardship to stand with the Caller as he approached the far dwelling of the Seer. The door opened before they had come within reach, with the Seer beckoning them within. A feast had been laid before the travelers, bursting with bread and beer and every kind of meat.

Michael looked with discontent at the last of his ration pack, tearing off another flavorless mouthful and chasing it with a swig of water. He brushed the crumbs from his fingers and turned to the next page of the book.

When the people exclaimed at the feast, the Seer smiled and said that their coming had been etched into his soul since the first day of the world. No matter which path they walked, in time they all found themselves at this moment.

The Seer’s gaze turned sorrowful, then, as he looked at the grand table. The people saw that there were far more places laid than they could fill. When they asked the Seer who else might come, he shook his head and told them that many who would have come were lost amid the tangle of their path, diverted from it by weakness or malice.

At this last, the Caller drew himself up with indignation, asking who would bring malice against a righteous man who sought only to walk his fated path. The Seer cast his arm out towards the darkening sky, proclaiming that-

“You going to stay up all night reading?” Sobriquet asked, sitting down on the floor beside him and leaning against the wooden wall of the shed. It was neither their most or least comfortable shelter on this trip; it did, however, have walls and a roof. Amira had led them on a grueling, tortuous course from Siad, avoiding their planned stop for that night out of an overabundance of caution.

Michael wasn’t sure if this shed was an ‘official’ Safid safehouse or if he was an unwitting squatter on some poor farmer’s land; most of their party was too tired to care by the time they arrived. He had thought himself the only one awake, and raised an eyebrow at Sobriquet.

“Didn’t feel like I could get to sleep,” Michael said, his voice low despite Sobriquet’s veil; it felt somehow profane to speak at a normal volume among so many sleeping bodies. “What’s your excuse?”

“I had this troubling feeling,” she said, “this premonition that someone was going to lie to me.” She gave him a reproachful look. “Which appears to have been entirely correct, since you just did. You don’t want to go to sleep because you’re afraid of what might happen.”

Michael bit back on the impulse to deny the accusation. “If you mean I don’t want to roll over in my sleep and burn down the wooden building that we’re all sleeping in – yes, you have me figured out.”

“You do realize that Amira’s soul doesn’t work on sleep?” Sobriquet asked. “That it in fact requires your assistance with sleep and proper nutrition so that your heart doesn’t explode in your chest?”

“I’m aware,” Michael sighed. “It doesn’t stop me from worrying. I’ll go outside and sleep some distance away from the shed – in a bit.” He let Saleh’s book drop to his side and ran his fingers agitatedly through his hair, looking out over the others as they slept. Eventually, he turned back to Sobriquet. “He wasn’t a bad man.”

“Waldeck?” she asked. “Michael, good men die all the time. Better men than he ever was, men who never said an unkind word or raised a hand in anger. If being good could keep you from death, more people would try it.” She settled back against the wall, giving him an appraising glance. “This isn’t about how he lived. It’s about you gaining his soul.”

Michael grimaced. “Not just that,” he said. He held out his hand towards Sobriquet, palm open.

She looked at it askance, then sighed and twisted to bring her good hand to bear. As her fingers touched Michael’s, Sobriquet’s eyes widened. Vincent’s flame did not rise as readily as Clair’s, whether for lack of familiarity or the man’s residual stubborn nature; what Michael could manage was evidently still enough for her to feel it.

“Ghar’s blood,” she murmured, her hand tensing for a moment before she lifted it and settled back against the wall. Her face turned thoughtful. Sobriquet’s emotions were whispers to Michael, inflections of wonder and concern amid the grief that still haunted her every breath.

Eventually she turned to look at him once more. “You think it’s going to keep happening,” she said.

“Why wouldn’t it?” Michael said ruefully. “I asked for it. Every step of the way, I asked. To try to save Jeorg, when he was dying, then Clair.” He laughed, letting his head drop down into his hands. “Damn me, I even asked for the soul in the first place.”

Sobriquet looked at him with an odd expression, her interest sharpening at his last words. “Asked?”

He raised his head to look at Sobriquet, feeling her sudden focus. “In the Institute,” he said. “My father would bring me there to try for a soul when there was a battle on the continent, have them whip me, crush me in a box, hold me over coals. Ten visits over a span of a few years, and on the last one my father stepped in to whip me himself. He’s a scalptor, a strong one.” Michael’s gaze wandered out into the darker corners of the shed, and Sobriquet pursed her lips.

“That doesn’t sound pleasant,” she said quietly.

Michael laughed, sharp and humorless. “I died,” he said. “I saw the void for the first time, the oblivion that’s waiting for us all. There was just me, the void and a – river of souls, all the ones waiting for a new bearer. Just before the dark claimed me, a soul offered itself up. Form soul, I think, something mid-range. I’m not sure what it was, I didn’t take it.”

He shook his head. “It seemed pointless, to just go back to my father – the man who had just killed me. So I said no. I asked for oblivion instead, if life had nothing better to offer.”

Sobriquet had gone very still. “Asked who?”

“Nobody. Anybody.” Michael shrugged. “But there was something. It heard me, it – Ghar’s bones, I could swear it was laughing at me. I woke up and I was back in that damn room. Me and my new soul.” He let his head drop back down for a moment, then looked up with a silent question on his lips.

The look on Sobriquet’s face was answer enough. “That was the rest of it,” she murmured. “The secret.”

“I was afraid you would say that,” Michael sighed. “The secret you called vast, one that has never been known before in this world. That touches everyone.” He clenched his fists – then, with an effort, relaxed them. “You asked me if I thought it would keep happening, but I think you know the answer already.”

She pressed her lips together. “Michael-”

“How many?” he asked. “There’s a gap between where I stand today and the scope of that secret you saw. How many dead to fill that gap?”

Sobriquet shook her head. “My sight isn’t that precise, and it doesn’t predict the future,” she said. “Besides that, you underestimate the reach you have now. You bear two of the Eight and have crossed paths with the rest. One could argue that you’ve already risen to the level I saw.”

“One could argue,” Michael agreed. “But would you?”

There was a long moment of quiet while Sobriquet’s thoughts ran in small, clockwork motions. She sighed and shook her head. “No,” she said. “No, I doubt that Vincent will be the last death that marks you.”

Michael sighed and let his head thud back against the wall. “I figured.”

Silence returned to the room, broken only by the noise of Sobriquet rising from the floor and stepping away. Michael turned his sight outward, to the night – then frowned as he heard the rustle of cloth on his other side.

“It’s not easy,” Sobriquet said, sitting down and letting her own head come back to rest against the wall. “My view of death is perhaps not the same as yours, but I’m no stranger to it. My home, my parents. Friends, neighbors, comrades.” She paused, a painful pulse of emotion rattling through her. “Family.”

She paused for a moment, breathing deep, her fingers tracing over the mottled scar on her cheek. “You lose pieces of your life. The wound disfigures you, leaves a stranger in your place – sometimes one you don’t recognize, or even particularly like.”

There was another pause. Sobriquet’s fingers touched the back of his hand, lightly. “But it’s still you,” she said. “It never robs you of that. Clair helped me remember that, when it seemed like Sobriquet was all that remained of me. The death, the – indifference. She never lost sight of me, amid it all. To her I was always Sera.”

An incongruous smile found its way onto Michael’s lips. “I noticed that,” he said. “Always catching herself at the last minute.”

“She never really gave up on the past,” Sobriquet sighed. “I think somewhere in the back of her mind there was this hope that we’d all go to sleep one day and wake up back at home, with Maman and Papa waiting for us downstairs. My sister fought for Daressa as much as any of us, but – only ever for the first piece we had lost.”

Sobriquet looked up at Michael. “We were both wrong, she and I. She never saw the change, and I never saw the constant. I am Sera, and Sera is Sobriquet. Both true. Just as you are many souls great and small, and whatever else remains of Clair and Vincent – but always Michael, in the end.” She squeezed his hand once, then stood up.

“Get some sleep,” she said. “You need it, or you wouldn’t have forgotten that Embers need light to make heat. You’re perfectly safe at night.”

Michael blinked. “Ah,” he said. “You have a point.”

“I try,” she laughed. “Goodnight, Michael.”

He nodded. “Goodnight – Sera.”

Michael managed to wring a few hours of sleep from the night’s remnants before Amira roused them for their compulsory breakfast. It passed quickly, and by the time the sun had pierced the trees overhead they had set out.

They did not travel far, stopping before mid-day at a Safid camp that stretched away across a green, grassy meadow that had been churned to grey mud within its boundaries. The officer at the gate nearly fell in his haste to genuflect before Amira, who returned an amused nod without breaking stride.

“This is where I leave you,” she said, guiding them at an unhurried walk through the rows of tents. “I’d happily take you the rest of the way, but Esrou would react poorly if I were to be discovered within its borders uninvited – again.” She smiled, giving the distant countryside a fond look. “A pity. We have an understanding with certain people that will allow you to reach Esonne, and from there you may travel by rail down the coast to Sau.”

She looked back at Sobriquet. “Be wary between Sau and the gates of Mendian. It is one of the few places that Ardalt will feel sure of finding you, and you will not have my aid. It would be a pity for you to come so far only to stumble at the last steps.”

Sobriquet inclined her head. “We’ll keep our eyes open,” she said. “Thank you for these past few days, Shield. It has been – instructive.” She extended her hand to Amira, who shook it with an easy grin.

“And thank you for your companionship, Seeker,” Amira said. “May we both be better, when next we meet.” She turned to Michael. “And you, Caller.”

He took her proffered hand; her grip was surprisingly normal. “Please give my thanks to Saleh for the book,” he said. “And thank you, for your help. I hope that our next meeting will be as pleasant.”

Her hand tightened on his as she leaned in, her voice dropping low. “Find the truth of yourself in the north,” she purred. “When we meet again I would see your utmost.” She released his hand and brought her fingers to her lips, then her forehead – then turned, walking away without another word.

Charles walked up to stand beside Michael, watching her leave. “I’m happy for you,” he said quietly. “You’ll make beautiful babies, if you survive.”

Michael gave him a flat look. “I think you misheard her,” he said. “I’m fairly certain she just promised to kill me.”

“Perhaps you both misheard,” sighed Sobriquet. “Quiet for a bit, I think this gentleman coming over is our next chaperone.” She turned to smile at an officer who bowed deeply to their group, coming up with his hand shading his eyes.

“Great Seeker,” he said. “Great Caller. I would lead you to your crossing, if it please you both.”

Sobriquet smiled. “It rather does,” she said. “Lead on.”

The man began to walk without another word. At one of the tents, very much like the others in its row, he turned and held open the canvas flap. They filed in only to find the tent empty, save for a rough wooden staircase descending into the ground.

“A tunnel?” Sobriquet asked. “Does this go all the way under the Esroun lines?”

The officer licked his lips, glancing at her. “My apologies, Great Seeker – although the Great Flame directed us to help you cross, he also specifically wrote that-”

Sobriquet waved him off. “Yes, yes,” she sighed. “I’ll stop asking questions about military infrastructure, I was just curious.” When the officer did not move, she quirked an eyebrow and gestured towards the stairs.

The man fairly leapt down into the darkness. Michael bent to follow, descending the wooden stairs until he stood in a surprisingly spacious tunnel, wide enough for two men to walk comfortably abreast. It was similar in construction to the tunnel they had traversed at the Ardan front, and Michael found himself wondering if the Safid had a surplus of talented artifices, to have tunneled so extensively.

A cool wind blew from the far end of the tunnel, heavy with the scent of soil and damp stone. The officer fetched a lantern from a box by the stairs, lit it and gestured for them to follow.

“Quietly, if you please,” he said. “The Esroun sometimes have auditors on station.”

They walked for what felt like hours, passing by junctions and small rooms as they went. Some of them held crates, while others were empty or showed long paths stretching off into the dark. The Safid were as industrious in peace as in war, it would appear. Michael’s immediate impression was that if hostilities between Saf and Esrou were ever to resume, the Esroun were in for a rude surprise.

At last, the officer slowed; the hallway came to an end in front of them, a ladder and hatch leading upward. The officer took the first few rungs and knocked lightly on the underside of the hatch. Michael heard footsteps before the hatch opened, a portly man’s face peering down to take them all in.

“Come on, then,” he hissed. “Be quick.”

One by one, they climbed up. Michael was the last to ascend; he was surprised to find himself in what appeared to be the back room of a hardware store. The officer and the portly man were conversing in low voices next to some crates. After a moment, the officer handed the man a bag; Michael heard the clink of coin as it disappeared into a pocket.

He offered a similar bag to Sobriquet. “Some local currency for the train and sundries,” he said. “The Great Flame wishes you luck. He also wrote to tell you-” The officer licked his lips again. “His note said only ‘Until tomorrow.’ I apologize, but I do not know-”

“It’s all right,” Sobriquet said, giving him a tight smile and taking the bag. “I understand. Thank you for walking us over.” She tucked the coins away and straightened up, looking at the room’s two doors. “Which way to the train station?”

“Out the rear door and to the left, then down the street.” the portly man said. “And if anyone asks-”

“I’ll assume you sold us out and describe you in exceeding detail to the authorities,” Sobriquet said, smiling at him. “So I suppose we’d best hope that doesn’t happen.”

The man paled and took a step back, darting an outraged look at the Safid officer, who stared at Sobriquet in confusion. She turned and walked out the door, beckoning for the others to follow.

When the door had shut behind them, Michael turned to her. “What was that for?” he asked. “He just wanted us to pretend we didn’t see him.”

“Probably,” Sobriquet said. “But you heard Saleh’s note. Next time we meet we’ll probably be trying to kill each other.” She smiled back at the closed door; raised voices came from within. “And I make a point of irritating my enemies where I can. Come on, let’s not waste time – I doubt a town this size has many trains to choose from.”

Michael followed her, bemused, and found himself emerging from an alley into a broad, dusty street. Aside from a cart and a few men loading it, there was nobody around. The train tracks lay past the buildings opposite them.

It looked like any of the small towns Michael had seen on the continent thus far, somewhat anticlimactically, although none of those had boasted a train. The difference mainly seemed to manifest in a proliferation of wagons hauling goods to and from the station, and in the number of bars and brothels he could spot openly plying their trade on the main street.

The station itself was modest, a low building with a clay-tile roof that huddled near the tracks. Sobriquet nudged Charles, whispering a few words in his ear; he nodded and took the bag of coin from her hand.

He walked up to the station office with a disconcertingly-pleasant smile. “Good day,” he offered cheerfully. “Six, north to Arenga.”

A man leaned forward to peer at him from behind the window, then grunted. “There’s one heading out shortly,” he said. “Seventy-two liards in total.”

Charles nodded and upended the bag in his hands, then affected a worried expression and rooted around in his pockets for a few more coins. Michael had to applaud the theatrics; he was sure there had been at least twice the coin in the bag as Charles now held, but the station agent would now remember him as nearly penniless.

On the platform, with his ticket in hand, Michael exchanged a glance with Vernon; the auditor shrugged and smiled, sitting on a bench with his hands laced behind his head. Emil, too, took his ease.

Michael looked around. There were few people in sight; some blackened workmen were shoveling coal at the far side of the tracks while a small knot of soldiers sat on their bags further down the platform.

He looked at the soldiers, though he did not turn his head – they were Esroun, clad in drab grey with gold piping on their collars. After a moment’s observation he realized that they were slightly drunk, and likely younger than he was.

It was strangely odd to watch them – soldiers, like so many others he had seen, but not from a country embroiled in war. He had always thought the Esroun armistice foolish; Ricard had grumbled his condemnations of it whenever the topic arose. Now that he was actually in Esrou he saw what it had bought them.

The soldiers were happy, relaxed, free of the dread and stress that hung over Ardan soldiers like a cloud. Some of their cheer derived from a flask of spirits they were passing around, admittedly, but the difference was stark.

He looked over and saw Luc watching them too, his eyes darting sideways in furtive movements when he thought they weren’t looking.

“How does it feel?” Michael asked. “To be back in Esrou, I mean.”

Luc blinked, seeming mildly startled to be addressed; a moment later he shook his head. “It’s just another country,” he said. “This place, here – it’s nothing like what I knew. Even if we went to Tenouf, I don’t imagine we’d see the parts of the city I remember.” He looked out toward the tracks, his eyes tracking them into the distance. “Some people are born into a bubble, yes? Nobody outside sees in, and nobody inside sees out. They live and die in it.”

Michael nodded, pursing his lips. “Maybe you could go back someday. Learn how to use your soul to heal, help some of the people there.”

“Why?” Luc asked.

The two men exchanged an incredulous look.

“Why?” Michael asked. “I’d have thought you would want to help them.”

Luc’s eyebrows drew together; after a moment he shook his head. “You don’t understand,” he said. “Nobody can help them. Those people, they’ll never leave the slum they were born into.” He plucked agitatedly at the wrappings over his hands.

“I thought the same thing, once. That the doctor had helped us, lifted us up from our misery.” Luc shook his head. “That he was raising us well to balance injustices from his own youth, or some similar notion. That wasn’t it at all, though. It wasn’t until he died and the Ardans came that I realized.”

He smiled at Michael. “They put us on a boat, sent us to the front. Three of us died the first day in the camp, and do you know what the others said? Not that we should find a way out, or that we should take care of each other to make it through. No – they talked of finding someone to save them. And I knew then why the doctor took boys from the orphanage.”

Luc spread his hands, palms opened to show the dirty, ragged cloth within. “Because that is where you find empty people. We weren’t the control group because we had no souls, we were the control group because we were never going to get a soul. Each boy in that group had endured suffering past anything the white-shirts had seen, but it’s not suffering that draws souls. It’s hope. Hope that you could overcome the moment, if you but had the strength.”

Michael blinked, taken aback at Luc’s melancholy tirade; he could feel the conviction and sorrow rolling off of him in waves as he spoke – and always, always the fear running underneath. “You have a soul,” he said. “Do you think you’re so worthless?”

“I have a soul,” Luc agreed, holding up his hands, fingers splayed. “But I didn’t earn it. I thought at first that it had passed to me because Claude had cared for me, but I couldn’t – I can’t believe that. Watching you, I began to think that the doctor had changed me. I thought he had changed both of us.”

He gestured to Michael, smiling despite a pain that nearly blurred Michael’s vision. “But the other day, when you took that man’s soul – I realized that I was wrong. The doctor didn’t give you anything. You didn’t need him to be – what you are.”

“Nobody needed him,” Michael said darkly. “Not me, and not you. Whatever brought that soul to you was yours alone.”

Luc laughed and shook his head. “You’re wrong,” he said. “But wrong in the best way. I don’t have anything this soul would have wanted. It came to me because of you.” A train’s whistle sounded from far down the track, and Luc turned to look at it. “If the change comes from you, and not the doctor – maybe there’s some hope for both of us after all.”

He turned the rest of the way to watch the train as it pulled in, leaving Michael feeling somewhat lost. The feeling persisted as he followed the others up the step and found a seat; the cramped car held only benches, however, and the proximity of the other passengers made him reluctant to pursue the topic further.

With a sigh, he pulled Saleh’s book from his pocket and flipped through it for the page he had last read.

At this last, the Caller drew himself up with indignation, asking who would bring malice against a righteous man who sought only to walk his fated path. The Seer cast his arm out towards the darkening sky, proclaiming that his visions had been plagued of late by one such.

This man, the Seer said, felt nothing but envy when he thought on the perfection of the One. He burned with covetous greed at the sight of the divine in others, and that greed begat madness in his breast. With lies and base treachery he drew travelers from the path, ripping out their living hearts to swallow whole.

In this way the man grew powerful, glutted on the stolen fragments of the divine. Heart-eater, the Seer named him, shouting it under the sky for all to hear. Heart-eater, he who sought to supplant the divine.

This last passage was underlined in a heavy pen. In the margin there was text in Saleh’s hand, reading: the Ardan Speaker aspires to his path.

Michael closed the book once more and slid it back into his pocket, letting his eyes stray to the window. The train had not yet begun to move, and all he could see was the empty expanse of the platform.

“Problem?” Sobriquet asked, leaning forward to crane her head over his shoulder. “You just – learned something, I can tell.”

Wordlessly, Michael withdrew the book from his pocket once more. He opened it to the flyleaf, letting Sobriquet see Saleh’s message exhorting him to find himself in its pages – then turned to the page he had read. Heart-eater, the Seer named him…

Sobriquet looked up from the page, her eyes meeting Michael’s.

“Ah,” she said. “Somehow, I don’t think that’s what he had in mind.”