Old Man Narshe stood his rooftop watch, feeling deep in his gut that it would be his last.
There had been no portent. The setting sun gleamed red across the waters off the Pravoka coast the same as they did every day, and at the same time to the minute. Those waters lapped the shore with their same steady rhythm, and the day's catch from them had been the same subsistent amount. The sea always yielded what the town needed and no more, as if it did not want them to perish, but couldn't be arsed to make them comfortable or prosperous.
Still, he could not ignore his own premonition. Perhaps it was because of the lack of portent—amid such an unchanging landscape, that small fearful stirring within him spoke as clearly as if he'd witnessed the Phantom Train itself.
Phantom Train? Where had that come from? Had he ever heard of such a thing? It seemed familiar...
"Hey there. You look lost. Are you all right?"
A young woman, wearing a ridiculous furry costume and a bow in her hair. She looked like she must be on her way to a dance recital. He blinked at her, confused.
"I think so. I don't—where am I?"
She gave a sympathetic smile. "New here, huh? Yeah, it's rough that way. Do you remember your name?"
He thought about it a moment, then shook his head.
"What about where you're from?"
"Narshe." It came immediately to his lips, though he could remember only the barest fragments of detail. A mine. A man wearing a scarf and turban.
"Well, Old Man Narshe, welcome to the world..."
Just then, something startled the Old Man back to the present. Someone was approaching the town. He doubted his eyes at first; they'd grown no worse in his time in Pravoka, but they'd not gotten any better either. As the figure drew nearer, though, he could no longer be uncertain. A woman, barely more than a girl, wearing red garments and carrying a saber at her waist.
His heart stirred with recognition. He knew this girl... or had. She'd worn a crown, some cruel thing denoting not majesty but servitude. The Old Man got to his feet as quickly as his stiff joints would let him, about to head down to the street to hail the Girl. But as he began to turn around, he noticed something that gave him pause.
The Girl was being followed.
A man, with bright blond hair and dark clothing, came into view at the edge of the town just as the Girl neared the main square. He carried an enormous sword across his back, a sheet of metal nearly as tall and broad as its wielder. His steps had the measured cadence of a marching soldier.
The Old Man's pulse quickened. He knew that whatever business these two had in Pravoka, it doubtless had everything to do with his forebodings. He would have to sound the alarm! The rest of the townsfolk would have no idea danger was brewing.
He rushed to the stairs, and heard the Soldier call out to the Girl, behind him. He could not make out the words, but it sounded like a challenge.
"This world has been remade many times," the priestess said. "There is peace for a time, but then the gods grow restless, and war begins anew. The ground beneath our feet is nothing but a game board, a commander's map in their mighty war exercises. The mountains are where they broke the continents and stitched them back together, the valleys where their titans fought and fell. We give thanks every day that we do not live in one of those times of strife. We pray that the gods take pity on us and stay their next struggle until another generation."
The believers nodded. The skeptics chuckled. Children told one another their own stories of gods and heroes. But Old Man Narshe just frowned, wondering. Something about the priestess's teachings resonated with him, like the sound of a foghorn rattling his bones.
The Old Man did not hear what transpired between the Soldier and the Girl, in the time it took him to descend through his house to the street. By the time he made it to his front door, shouted conversation had given way to terrible sounds of rushing wind and breaking glass. As he threw the door open, he saw the clouds above swirl together, the motion and sunset light turning them into a whirlpool of blood.
The Girl darted past him, a mere yard or two from his door. Her feet no longer touched the ground; she glided in the air as if skating on an invisible frozen pond. An instant later, flaming boulders fell from the sky, great cratered rocks the size of a man's body streaking down from that funnel cloud above. They struck the pavement in a row, five or six of them dotting the path the Girl had followed just before, throwing up a shower of charred debris. Old Man Narshe had to duck back into his doorway as shrapnel pockmarked the front wall. The Soldier rushed by, passing through the black smoke left by the meteors, his huge sword held high.
Old Man Narshe ran out, limping slightly. Something in his hip objected to how fast he'd taken those stairs. He took a route perpendicular to the way the Girl and Soldier had gone, cupping his hands to his mouth and shouting. "Fire! Flee! Everyone to the hills!" He wanted to ensure that no one would try to stay and watch the spectacle of the unfolding battle. Would they heed?
The Soldier came skidding backward into the square, pushed by a block of ice larger than the meteors that had been thrown against him. He kept his feet as the ice broke and fell away, then dove to one side, tumbling across the ground. Bolts of lightning scored the place where he'd stood. The Girl was above him, flying through the air, conjuring these elemental forces from thin air.
The Old Man ran from house to house shouting his warnings. In places, at least, people followed his instruction: men and women, parents and children ran out their back doors and climbed out their windows, running for the streets leading away from the battle.
He stole a glance backward, and saw something that made his stomach churn. The Soldier leapt into the air and brought his sword down in a mighty arc, striking the Girl directly in the chest. Narshe flinched, expecting a shower of blood, the Girl he thought he knew falling in pieces to the ground—but nothing like that happened. She cried out, yes, and fell, but her slight body seemed little the worse for wear from the blow.
Old Man Narshe shook his head. There was no time for wonder. He kept making his way around the square, headed for the house directly opposite his. The Dancer's house.
"I am Cosmos," the apparition said. "I have brought you here to impart a sacred purpose, to charge you with the life of my world."
He stood in awe, mesmerized by this divine presence in the form of a woman in a white gown. Yet somehow the goddess seemed distracted. Her words fell flat, tired, as if she'd said them a million times already. She spoke to him, a great honor for sure, but her mind was elsewhere.
"You will come to my world and be part of it. You will maintain its fabric with your presence. The god of discord, Chaos, works ever to tear it asunder, but your life will oppose his power. For this duty you have my eternal thanks.
"There is a price. You will not remember your home world, your previous life. My world is yours now, and your life is mine."
He fell to his knees. "Radiant lady, it is a wonder you grant me, but this has been my home all my life! Can you not take someone else? Or at least give me leave to say my goodbyes?"
Cosmos shook her head and turned away. "No. You are my Chosen now. These are the rules of this world."
"Ho! Dancer! Are you home? It's Old Man Narshe! You need to leave! Now!"
He cringed as a burst of brilliant light flashed against the front of the house. He looked behind him, and saw the Soldier illuminated by streams of energy emanating from his body, as if he stood amid a bonfire—but if the flames harmed him, he gave no sign. The Girl, having barely regained her feet after the previous blow, raised her hands calling forth a shimmering barrier between her and her opponent, but it was not enough. The Soldier struck, and the barrier blew to pieces like so many shards of glass.
If the Old Man had thought the earlier sword-stroke impossible for anyone to survive, this was a hundred times worse. As the Girl reeled, unable to fight back, the Soldier swung again and again, each time striking with greater force, his sword leaving contrails in the air of that strange heatless fire. Narshe lost count of how many blows rained down: a dozen? Twoscore? A hundred? They buffeted the Girl about like a bird in a storm. Finally, the sword lit up with a blue radiance, and the Soldier whirled it about in a last roundhouse of a swing that blasted the Girl across the square at breakneck speed.
She flew past the Old Man, again, close enough that he could have reached out and caught her arm as she passed, had he the reflexes and the strength. She collided with the Dancer's house, the impact unleashing a concussive boom.
The front door caved in as the Girl hurtled through it, and the entire front facade of the house tore to shreds, pulled inward and then blown out. Bits of wood and plaster pelted the Old Man, who threw up his arms to shield his eyes. He waited a moment, trembling, then dared to look again.
There was nothing left of the first floor, where the Girl had come to rest. Walls, floor, stairs, and furniture lay in an unrecognizable ruin. Most of the ceiling and the floor above was also gone, leaving only an island of wood at the far corner.
That sad little surviving platform held the Dancer, terrified, wearing her accustomed costume. Most of it, anyway; a bare arm stuck out where she had not yet slipped into the left sleeve. A damaged dresser behind her teetered and fell, crushing itself amid the rubble.
The Old Man looked behind him and saw the Soldier striding forward, no longer glowing, but confident and dangerous nonetheless. Narshe hesitated a moment, desperate for the Dancer's safety, but with no room to act. Sweating with fear, he steeled himself and turned his back on the Soldier, clambering into the rubble toward the Dancer.
"Hey! Lovely!" His voice cracked, coming out barely a croak, but she heard him. She looked toward him with fearful eyes. "You need to get down from there quick. Hop down, I'll catch ya."
"But—but you—" The Dancer looked at him, at the drop, at the Soldier nearing the remains of the front door.
"I did say quick, din't I? C'mon!"
Something stirred in the rubble. A plank shifted aside, moved from beneath. Then a hand thrust upward, groping about for a hold, and a creature hauled itself out. It was of the same shape and proportions as the Girl, but it was covered with feathers and a mane of billowing hair. It glowed with a reddish-purple light, and snarled wordlessly at the Soldier, who leveled his sword in defiance.
The Girl-thing rocketed out of the ruined house with unearthly speed, colliding with the Soldier and dragging him with her back out into the town square.
Old Man Narshe grimaced. "All right, Dancer, now's yer opening! Jump!"
The Dancer swallowed her fear, and jump she did.
Had Narshe been a young man, it would have been a daring and impressive catch, and he'd have strode away a hero carrying the grateful Dancer. But he was neither young nor a hero, and his catch was less than impressive. The Dancer leapt into his outstretched arms, and the collision bowled him over. He fell back onto the rubble, and pain ripped through his body as he fell. His hip, his ribs, and his back all crackled and went wrong. He gasped, vision flickering.
"Old Man! Are you all right?" Well, he'd succeeded at least. The Dancer stood over him in her concern, upright and uninjured.
"Heh heh. Nah." He smirked. "Now, let's not make a big mess of this. Go. Get safe. That's all."
She looked down at him, tearful. She could not carry him away, and he could not move on his own any longer. So she did as she was told. She bent down, kissed the Old Man's forehead, and fled, heading out the ruined wall toward where the rest of the Pravoka refugees were gathering.
Old Man Narshe sighed, and coughed, and hurt, looking up through the broken ceiling at the darkening sky. Something glinted in his vision—another spell launched by the nearby combatants? No; it hovered there before him, unmoving, a foot or so from his face. He squinted. It looked like a gemstone, a pale blue-green thing shining with an inner light. Magicite?
Where had he heard that word before?
He reached a trembling hand toward the crystal, and it faded from sight, blowing away in motes of brilliance like dandelion seeds on the wind.