The Second Life and Adventures of Benjamin Finn:
Chapter 9: In Which Fortune Turns and Turns Again
When at last I came to the understanding that it was I who had vanished from that ledge and not Wren I found myself standing within a garden fit for the most discerning of royalty, though the castle which towered over the grounds was most certainly not the home of Albion's fair queen. In point of fact, through all of my travels I'd never laid eyes on this place before though the vegetation, and the Demon Door which loomed beyond a distant pond, seemed to imply that I had been transported to some thus far unvisited portion of Albion. This in and of itself would have been enough to disquiet me – for Albion possessed only one grand palace for her monarchy – however the oddity of the situation was further compounded by the hues of my surroundings, which had been so severely muted that only the boldest shades retained any hint of their former brilliance; and within this silent, colorless world there was not a trace of life or animation, save for myself and one other;
The aged gypsy seer, Theresa.
My reaction at her appearance inspired no awe or apprehension as would have just days ago been the case. "Where is she?" I demanded of the enigmatic woman, no longer feeling a compulsory need to hold to proper courtesy with her; nor did I care exactly where I was or how I had reached this location, for it was no exaggeration that more unnerving things had occurred in my life of late. It was utterly impossible to conjure any form of concern for myself at that particular moment, not when I had been the only thing keeping Wren from plummeting into the chasm below her – and now I was no longer there to halt her descent.
"She is in no more danger than you," the presumably ancient woman replied serenely, "you will return to her soon enough."
"No more danger than me," I scoffed derisively at her revelation, losing myself to the hostility that I found I now bore the woman since our last impromptu meeting. "Right. Of course she wouldn't be. I'm not there to kill her like I'm supposed to, am I? You know that your timing is bloody ridiculous?" I took a step towards the shrouded figure, gesturing to our surroundings with the rifle still clutched, disremembered, within my bloodless grip. "Why now? Where the blazes have you brought me? No, forget I asked. Send me back!"
"The time was not of my choosing, I merely answered the call your actions initiated. And this place is the home of the Heroes' Guild of old," Theresa replied readily, infuriatingly paying no note of the fact that I had immediately retracted my queries and demanded my return, "or more to the point the guild as it appeared before it fell more than five hundred years ago. You were brought here for the same reason so many before you were. You are a Hero, Captain Finn."
"Bollocks." It was sheer verbal reflex that drove me to deny the statement instantly, even if every hair upon my body stood on end at her proclamation. While I knew the old woman to intentionally bend or omit facts when the need suited her, I'd never known her to out and out lie for anything. Not like this. My perfunctory denial seemed to have no effect on her, as it was with any of my previous outbursts or improprieties, as though I were merely a child too ignorant to know better. "Wren's the Hero of Albion. I'm just a soldier."
"And yet here you stand, in a realm only accessible now to Heroes. When you took hold of the Hero Queen's shirt you also took hold of the guild seal she wears around her neck," Theresa maintained in her usual unflappable manner, bringing to mind the hard object which had pitilessly bruised my palm as I had latched onto my floundering comrade. "At that contact the seal awoke that wellspring of power within you, locked away for so many years; just as it did Wren when she discovered her birthright. Just as another seal once did for your most renowned ancestor; Briar Rose." The patterned hood that concealed Theresa's head dipped vaguely and my eyes drifted down to follow.
"Briar…" the antiquated pistol within the holster caught my attention as much as her words. Briar's Blaster had always seemed an odd name for a pistol, but I had written it off as one Hero paying homage to another. And there were odder names still in Wren's arsenal; take the Chickenbane, for example.
"She was a Hero ahead of her time." Theresa accredited, seeming almost to convey an impossible personal knowledge of the long-dead Hero within her praise. "The pistol you carry is one of her collection. Wren no doubt could feel that it belonged more to you than her. That you wield it so effortlessly is not coincidence."
Albeit centuries dead and gone, Briar Rose was still known well enough to have her name grace pages within the Brightwall Academy. She'd been blessed with great talent I'd read, if annoying and egocentric, and second in marksmanship only to the Hero King of her era. "So that's what this is about?" I made a conscious effort this time to forgo with the insolence I had been displaying up until that point. "I'm a Hero. With magic and everything."
An unconsciously regal wave of the gypsy's hand drew my attention to a chest I was not quite certain had been there the entire time; and sitting inside upon a bed of red velvet was a leather gauntlet, larger than Wren's, though not by much. For a moment I could do nothing more than stare at the leather covering, the events transpiring in this moment slowly absorbing and becoming something quite near to reality for me.
"What does it do?"
"It will thrust enemies away. Customarily fire is the first magical ability taught to a Hero, as its nature is common knowledge to mankind, yet circumstances being what they are in the Veiled Path I thought a change in tradition was called for this time."
"Force Push." My muttered acknowledgement was nearly inaudible as I restored my rifle to its place at my back and slid my fingers into the gauntlet which so resembled the one almost permanently affixed to Wren, finding that the leather seemed to mold to me as though it had been crafted for my hand specifically.
"That is the spell's name. That you are so familiar with its function already is the only reason I have deemed it acceptable to breach standard initiation practices and grant you this gauntlet first."
Beneath the leather covering a tingle coursed through my flesh that originated not from the gauntlet but somewhere deep within me, and I found it strange that here was a sensation as natural and familiar as anything I'd ever felt before, yet I was only now experiencing it for the first time.
There was magic resonating within my veins, I no longer doubted this. "How do I use it?"
My eyes rose to find the gypsy holding out a seal identical to the one Wren was almost never without, and with more deference than I am certain I have ever exhibited for anything, I accepted the bauble, slipping its chain round my neck.
"You are a Hero of Albion, Captain Finn. Trust in that and let your instincts guide you."
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When the non-light flashed for the second time in that short span, I was once more maintaining a death grip upon Wren's shirt and pendant, her hands clamped tightly round my wrist whilst she called my name in a crescendo of panic. The fear in her eyes was palpable; one foot having slipped from the rock in the second it took for me to understand that I'd come back to the exact moment I'd departed.
Recalling the precariousness of our situation, I turned my attention back to the creatures which were presently maintaining a very real and entirely imminent threat to our wellbeing, raising my leather clad hand and, without knowing how else to go about wielding magic, decided to for once trust in what the blind seer had told me. Uncertain of the precise mechanics of the act, I chose instead to trust in the name bestowed upon a Hero's inborn magical abilities and focused on the act of willing the suddenly tangible power within me to intensify; gratified to feel it build against my palm until at last it seemed almost a physical weight bearing down impatiently against my arm.
Without considering what the ramifications of my actions could be if I had miscalculated, I obliged the sensation.
A concussion of incorporeal force sent black and gold bodies alike plunging back through the air, allowing me just enough opportunity to heave Wren to the comparable safety of solid ground with less deference than a sack of grain before setting loose another volley of the Force Push spell and robbing the descending horde of another few paces' advantage. At my feet Wren scrambled to her knees, the creatures at her back all but forgotten as she stared fixatedly up at me.
"You're a Hero?!"
"So I've been told!" My voice thundered oddly in that Heroic quality I'd come to expect from fellows of that – our – particular nature, as I reached down to swing my companion to her feet once more. If I had believed her to be light in weight before I was amazed at how unsubstantial she seemed to me now, having not recognized a physical transformation within myself until just that moment. "Get that bloody door open – I'll hold them off!"
There was of course no hope that we'd be able to kill them all, or even half of them if I was completely honest with myself. Wren's primary mistake had been in trying; no doubt some sort of ridiculous attempt at protecting me. Perhaps once I'd a bit more training and a few more spells at my disposal she and I could make a proper go of it if we ever got the urge for some completely daft sport. But for now if I could just keep them off of us long enough for Wren to work the door open the rest wouldn't matter. With my own guild seal tucked beneath my shirt there was no reason we'd have to cross this path out of necessity again, for now I was just as capable of Fast Travel as Wren, though I'd yet to actually make an attempt at the ability personally, and could in all probability secure an escape route for us in the event that she could not.
Adapting to my tactics, and giving me the eerie understanding that these things were capable of strategy, one of the creatures drew up upon my flank and just out of range of my spell. Yet the gauntlet required only the use of one hand, and with the other I drew the Swift Irregular against my unoccupied shoulder and afforded only a passing glance for aim before placing a bullet squarely between its eyes, an act which had taken even less effort that my pre-Heroic skills would have made simple.
Stone ground and crunched behind me, and when a rush of cool air assaulted my back I gave our pursuers one final magical blast to hold them at bay before flinging myself through the opening Wren held. Semi-darkness engulfed us when she released her hold and allowed the door to roll closed once more as together we listened in tense anticipation for the slightest hint that we were not alone. Moments passed in ear-ringing silence, the power withheld against my hand never diminishing as I held it ready to utilize in our defense should we prove to have fallen into hostile company, yet none ever came. With a sigh Wren broke the stillness, her Will markings dimmed and her eyes shimmered like silver coins reflecting moonlight when she turned to me.
With a glance I found – to my astonishment – glowing swirls patterned my skin, shining brightly enough to be visible through my clothes while casting a pale light onto my immediate surroundings and providing the source of illumination with which my fellow Hero's eyes shone. Even more astonishing was after all of the running and the wielding of magic, and despite the less than adequate night's sleep I had just endured, I wasn't even slightly winded; neither, it appeared, was Wren.
"When?" She asked and I, finding it easy enough to deduce what she asked of me, required no further clarification.
"Your guild seal was inside of your shirt when I stopped you from going over. I grabbed it by accident. The seer said that was the trigger." I shook my head, gazing at the ethereal markings adorning my limbs, at last able to pause and appreciate the magnitude of what had happened and the ease at which I had dispatched and distracted our foes only moments ago; a fete that would have been problematic if not unmanageable in my previous state. "And to think, all of those years I'd wanted to meet Heroes and all I had to do was look in a mirror…"
"Ben, what if this is it?" She breathed hopefully, and for a moment I did not follow – not until she clarified. "The weapon Theresa told us about? What if a second Hero is what we needed all along?"
I frowned, slightly dubious, but willing to hear her out. Theresa had said nothing about me achieving the status of 'Weapon' and yet the woman was not exactly known for being forthright except when it suited her timing. "How do you mean?"
"You needed to come in contact with my seal to activate your own abilities," Wren explained. "And without you there would be no second Hero to discover. We had to be together so that you could become a Hero."
"Makes sense I suppose," I mulled thoughtfully, seeing the login in Wren's proposition. "But why couldn't Theresa see that? What's so hard about seeing another Hero?"
"I don't think Theresa can see undiscovered Heroes," Wren admitted, "at least not without a 'trigger' as you called it. She didn't know my mother was a Hero until after that murderer had concluded it was either my aunt or my mother shot them in response. And she didn't find me until I took hold of mother's seal. It had been Walter who had suggested I could be a Hero. If Theresa didn't need a trigger wouldn't she have drawn you out sooner, such as two years ago? She's the one that pointed out Heroes are a dying breed. I think she would have sought more out if she knew of a way rather than risk the world on just my shoulders."
"You've got a point there." I allowed, willing myself to hope that maybe now, together, Wren and I would be strong enough to defeat the Crawler. Yet underneath the hope, the reminder of what Theresa had asked of me once the Crawler fell weighed heavily upon my mind.
Is this how I'm supposed to defeat Wren when the time comes?
Amidst my distracted turmoil, and without first requesting permission, pale feminine fingers stretched forth to trace my forehead and temples, no doubt following the strange lines decorating my skin. The contact pulled me from my contemplation and drew my attention to the woman kneeling before me, reverently engrossed in the path her fingers presently charted.
"Strange, isn't it?" I chuckled in a vain attempt to disguise my unease. I'd seen common folk marvel at Wren's brilliant transformation in the past; and am certain that I myself had also gawked at her once or twice like a village boy catching his first glimpse of the sea. Yet here in the dark I found it unnerving to realize that perhaps Wren might feel the same awe towards my elevated status; her forefinger passing over a whorl which circled my eye.
"I never realized how beautiful they are."
Though it was not intentional, the glow of my skin faded as if by cue, and still Wren's touch remanded, slipping down to skim over my jaw; no longer an admiration of my Heroic status but a noticeable display of some deeper affection that part of me yearned to accept despite the knowledge that I was not worthy of such regard.
So it was that the masochist within me gave coarse reminder of what it was I had just been contemplating before Wren's appreciation, and out of guilt I reached up after a moment to gently pull her touch from my skin.
"It's not safe here," I reminded her – reminded us – for indeed we knew only as much of our surroundings as what was previously seen from where we knelt after having tumbled through the door; engulfed now in the total darkness which I had allowed to overtake us with the fading of my Will markings, it was plausible that our safety was at greater jeopardy than it had been a moment prior.
The fingers between mine retracted with a start, and accompanied the scrape of cloth and leather against stone. "Right." Fire bloomed brightly in the blackness of our surroundings, just long enough for Wren to light the torch pulled from the thong at her hip, but not so swiftly that I missed the dejection painted across my companion's features. In the time I sat debating the wisdom in explaining the motives behind my hesitations, Wren had stood and begun to follow corridor deeper into the ruins, turning only briefly to give me a slight, wry smile and a shrug of her shoulders indicating that I should pick myself up from the floor and accompany her; and it was in light of that dogged attempt at flippancy that I chose to hold my tongue.
Beyond a small archway leading from the entrance, we discovered the temple to be nothing more than a single roughly hewn room, furnished only with what could be cut from the surrounding stone or brought within a travel pack and, despite signs that it was recently inhabited, completely devoid of life.
Yet it was what the former tenants had failed to take with them that vanquished all thoughts of good humor and rendered us as silent and bleak as the surrounding walls.
Atop a stone altar at the far end of the great chamber, ringed with a variety of candles, ornaments and symbols painted upon the cold grey surface, the desecrated remains of Sir Walter Beck lay where they had left him; his fine burial clothes hanging too loosely from the withered body of the once robust man, his medallions of state, enchanted sword and pistol remained in their scabbard and holster as well. Clearly those who took Walter from his resting place cared nothing for riches; they'd robbed his tomb for a very specific reason, and that they had left him behind meant only one thing.
It was too late. The cult had what they'd come for.
Damn. Morris what happened?
Boot heals echoed dully in the silent expanse as Wren slowly approached the platform; her trembling fingers reached out to touch one hand nearly skeletal now in death.
"Oh, Walter," her whisper was so full of misery I thought briefly she might begin to cry as she had the night he had died. With furtive jerks of her head she began to search the room, her face a tight knot of miserable concentration. "Help me find something to cover him. Ben!?"
With the exception of the clothes on our backs and the finery of Walter's funeral garb there wasn't so much as a scrap of fabric in the temple that I could see, save for one large black banner bearing the linear symbol of the cultist's medallion that I'd have sooner burned than allow to touch Wally. Finding no suitable alternative I quickly pulled my careworn uniform vest over my head and hurried it to the altar to cover Walter's near skeletal face and chest. Wren's agitation quieted somewhat, and she took the time to arrange Walter's hands upon his chest, tucking them from view beneath my garment. For a moment she stood there gazing at his body, her breath ragged with emotion so intense I could only guess as to the maelstrom that must have been raging within her.
"We'll come back for him, Wren," I told her, hoping she would understand; that I wouldn't have to fight with her on this. On the subject of Walter I had no doubt Wren would be willing to forego logic, and I was fully aware that as far as Hero powers went I was irrefutably ill equipped to compete with her if she chose to dig in her heals. "He'll be safe enough here for now – they've no further use for him. When this is over Walter and your mother will both go home where they belong."
It was only at the mention of her mother that Wren acknowledged the words I had been attempting to use as consolation; and to the reference of her mother she reacted far more vehemently than I had anticipated. "We have to find my mother before they turn her into-" her teeth gnashed audibly as she bit back the thought that required no words to project. "We have to go."
It took quite the effort to refrain from sighing with relief at her readiness to see reason and the reprieve I had just been given from the prospect of having to outmaneuver one who was undeniably my better in the Heroics arena. "Do you know where?" The question was redundant, of course, yet I had uttered it only out of curiosity for what lay before me. Wren was fixated now, wielding the sort of determination only one confident of her path and ready to weather any perils that journey held would possess; and I as the companion foreseen to accompany her would walk that path at her side.
Before me Wren's eyes flashed with a fire that had nothing to do with Will.
"Shadelight."
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So, I read a long time ago on Fable's Wiki site that Ben's affinity for the Skill Trait hinted at the possibility of Heroic blood. Ben is a whiz with a gun, and if you choose to believe his story of knocking out three hollowmen with one bullet, that's a pretty big indication that he's more than an average crack-shot. So it got me thinking for the longest time; maybe Ben IS a Hero and he just never encountered the right circumstances to confirm it. You know?
So 'thank you' to the person who posted the 'Hero Ben' hypothesis on the Wiki page and gave me a story to write, because that one little blurb is where this entire fanfic came from!