Ted Dekker - Mortal

“She died?” she said, glancing at Roland.

“The day before you did.” The impassive lines of his face expressed no empathy for the reference to Feyn’s own death at the hands of the very Keeper she now saw wending his way through the back of the gathered celebrants. Did he know she was here, the one he had so brutally cut down and then so carefully preserved? And if she were to come face-to-face with him, what would she say to him, or he to her?

She shifted, thinking of the scar across her torso. It itched. “And Triphon?”

“Killed by your brother’s Dark Bloods days ago.”

Triphon, too, she had met once, if only briefly.

The prince returned his attention to the ruins, making it clear he wasn’t waiting for any sort of a reply.

He had come to her earlier, calling her out from her yurt, saying that it was time. Janus, he had said, would have to remain behind. She could not mistake the lines of mistrust and displeasure etched into the Nomad’s face as she’d followed Roland into camp. She had not needed to be told that it was only Rom’s order that assured her any safety here.

Now they watched together as Rom moved across the elevated ruins to the tripod and carefully set the heart inside the soft leather bowl suspended between the wood supports. How strange to reconcile the naïve, impetuous man she had known with the leader who commanded such respect among these wild Mortals. The Rom she’d known had been a poet, an artisan who’d sung at funerals-the lowest kind of fare in the world of Order.

The man at the top of the stairs was a leader of warriors, majestic in his own way.

A man who had kissed her… tasted her…

He was also the enemy of her Maker and therefore hers as well.

Rom turned toward the gathering. He drew a knife from the sheath at his belt. “We remember those lost to us. We remember those who died. And we celebrate, proving with our lives that their blood was not spilled in vain!”

With his last words, he slashed the bottom of the leather bowl. A stream of blood began to flow to the ground.

Bodies were in motion once more, grappling for the sky, the names of Avra, Triphon, and Pasha shouted to the stars. They were fervent, these Mortals, she would give Rom that. Fervent… impassioned…

And as such, more dangerous than she would have guessed.

She glanced at the yurts to her right, each of them lit from inside, with fires burning in the pits outside. Children dashed from one dwelling to another, snagging food from the fires before running toward the cooking pits at the edge of camp.

Where was the boy? She hadn’t seen him anywhere in the crowd or on the ruin steps. He was the one, after all, she had been brought to meet.

She surveyed the assembled Mortals. These were only what… a thousand? Slightly more? But she’d seen the faces of the warriors and had noted their zeal, in such stark contrast to the icy discipline of Saric’s Dark Bloods.

“I can smell your calculation,” Roland said.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“It smells like curiosity. And ambition. And interest.” He turned toward her as he said it. She studied the high and hard line of his cheekbone. The broad forehead, the long, thick braids with their wealth of beading. The paintlike tattoo on his temple. A woman’s finger had painted it, she thought. She wondered what kind of woman kept the interest of a man like this. One as magnificent as he was deadly.

He leaned toward her as though to share her line of sight. “You’re counting what… five, six hundred? There are seven hundred. And twelve hundred of us altogether. Far less than your brother’s army; tell him that. But make no mistake.” He turned to gaze at her, his eyes both heavy-lidded and sultry. “March against us here and we will defeat you.”

A shout went up from the frenetic dancers and echoed through the crowd like a rolling peal of thunder. Feyn turned and saw its cause.

Jonathan. Leaping up the ruin stairs.

He was naked except for a loincloth.

His face was bare of the paint the other warriors wore, and his hair was adorned perhaps the least of any Nomad in the company, but no one seemed to care. The shouts of the throng escalated into a roar unrivaled yet this evening.

Rom embraced the boy, then stepped back, arms spread.

“Your Sovereign!” he cried.

The Mortals roared, a cry so forceful, so full of hope and emotion that Feyn felt tears well in her eyes. What power in this boy evoked such powerful expression, devotion, and loyalty from others?

The roar coalesced into a chant: Sovereign! Sovereign! Sovereign! Rom seemed to be waiting for the shouts to die down enough to speak, but the cry continued, unrelenting, rising impossibly. The Nomad beside her stood in stony silence.

Jonathan stood still, unpretentious, making no sign that he was embracing their praise or that he longed for it. Only when Rom lifted his hand did the last chants die down. He looked at Jonathan and nodded.

The boy faced them, silent for a few seconds. And then their Sovereign spoke:

“Do you celebrate the martyrs?”

Shouts of agreement.

“You celebrate their blood, shed for me. For the new kingdom, for the Sovereigns of the new realm to come. You celebrate my blood, given for you.”

Roaring agreement from the Mortals.

“Then you celebrate not only life, but death.”

This time, a confused response. They waited, anticipating more. And the boy gave it to them.

“Because that death brings life.” He beat his chest once with a fist. Now he leaned into words and his voice rose, nearly accusing. “You want blood?”

Cries, frenzied from the assembly. Next to Feyn, Roland frowned slightly. Rom glanced away from him, seemingly unsure.

Jonathan suddenly spun and took three long steps to the canvas bowl that held Avra’s heart. He dipped his hands into the bowl and scooped a remnant of blood out with both hands. And then he splashed it on his chest and smeared his face, his hair his torso.

The drumbeats drifted as if those responsible had forgotten to beat them.

Jonathan whirled around and raised both fists in defiance. “Death, for life!” he shouted. His teeth and eyes gleamed macabre white behind the mask of blood.

The crowd fell deathly silent.

But their Sovereign was not finished. He grabbed the canvas vessel and tilted it so that a fresh torrent of blood fell down over his hair and chest, darkening the flax of his loincloth to match the rest of him.

Even from where she stood, Feyn saw the mask of shock on Rom’s face. He made for the boy, then stopped, at a loss.

Jonathan plunged his hand into the canvas bowl, pulled out a bloody fist, and stared at his fingers. The heart which Rom had ceremoniously placed in the bowl bulged in his hand.

Gasps now, from those assembled. Feyn stared, stunned. The celebration clearly had taken an unplanned turn. Those in the throng cast about furtive glances as strange silence settled around them.

Was the boy drunk? Mad?

“He’s lost it,” Roland muttered beside her.

“For now…” Jonathan staggered forward, holding the heart high. He opened his hand and the heart fell to the ground with a sickening, wet thud. “Let the dead bury the dead,” Jonathan said.

Five paces away, Rom stared. The last of the drums stopped. The entire celebration had come to a standstill.

Rom laid a hand on the boy’s shoulder but he batted it away. When he spoke again, it was in a quiet voice:

“You won’t know true life until you taste blood.”

As though desperate to find something worthy of celebration, someone shouted agreement.

“You came for life! I will give you life! I will bring a new Sovereign realm!”

A cry rose, immediately joined by more. The drums returned as though relieved, like a heart stuttering back to life after arrest.