Hello and welcome back to that one story with a consistent update schedule.
Chapter twenty-four: Tyrant
A silence fell. Jack looked from Skotur to Brigul and back. With every word Skotur uttered, more questions rose in his head.
"Karthuul," he finally spoke. "Wasn't he an enemy of the Valkyries'? Wasn't he dead?"
"A spirit bent on controlling the Aether," Brigul said. "Whose defeat demanded too much sacrifice…"
"A creature capable of keeping the Blight in check," Skotur calmly said. "He kept the Aether in perpetual daytime, confining the Blight and its creatures to the Aether's darkest pits."
The Blight. The thing that created the Aether's creatures of the night, like Tempests and cockatrices. Jack remembered Skotur talking about that when she first brought him to the Sanctuary. He also remembered her mentioning that it was harmed by the sun.
"But Karthuul's dead…" Jack repeated.
"Dead…" Skotur said. "But only for a while. Better to bring him back under our conditions, rather than passively wait for his return."
"That's why the days have been getting longer," Brigul said. "Because he—or whatever's left of him—is growing stronger. Because of what Herskagul has been doing!"
"Is this why Herskagul got banished from Brexul?" Jack asked. "Because of this plan?" He glanced to Brigul. How did she not know anything about this before now?
"Yes," Skotur said. "The Sun Sect rejected her plan. When she tried to execute it anyway, she was exiled."
"This is madness," Brigul said. "She's really going to bring him back?"
"Under control," Skotur said. "We'll contain him and use his power for our own goals."
"And what goals are those, hm?" Jack muttered.
"How long do you expect to be able to contain him?" demanded Brigul. "Even if it's possible, it's only a matter of time before he breaks free."
"If so," Skotur said, "we'll have to fight him again. But it's a price worth paying."
"Lives? Freedom? Security!? Those are prices worth paying?! What you're doing goes against everything the Valkyries stand for!"
"But why'd you need me?" asked Jack. "Why'd Herskagul have me come with you on these missions? Why try so hard to keep me alive? Why even help me find that map in the first place?"
"She helped you because she appreciates your participation in Áhýdan's defeat. And she had you come with us because we wouldn't be able to bring the artefact without your help."
"Why not?"
She remained silent.
"Because the artefact's touch is harmful to Valkyries," Brigul growled. "Deadly, even. I always wondered why, until now…"
Jack glanced at her, surprised that she'd been the one to answer the question. "And humans don't have that weakness?"
"No, they don't."
So Herskagul had made sure Jack would survive because she needed him alive, should they actually find the thing.
He intently focused on not looking at the chest behind him. "Well, we haven't found it. How long does Herskagul expect me to stay?"
"She doesn't," Skotur said. "She had every intention of letting you leave once we recovered that map. Even without you, we'll find a way to get the artefact to where it needs to go."
Jack wasn't too sure about that. But the artefact was in the chest. All he had to do was take it out and deliver it to the Queen. There was no harm in playing things safe…
"I can't let her have it," Brigul said. "We can't let her have it."
"Why not?" Jack said hesitantly. "How else would you go about cleaning up the Blight?"
"Not like this!"
"That's not an answer."
She scoffed. "For all your usefulness in a fight, you're still human, and you think like one. Thinking anything can be controlled, compromising freedom and security to further your own goals!"
"I don't hear you coming up with any better ideas." Once again, he resisted the urge to glance back at the chest—the chest that contained the final piece of the puzzle. There was no reason to not just give it to Skotur. The Aether wasn't his concern.
Then again, if Skotur was telling the truth, he'd be taken to the portal regardless of whether he told her about the artefact. And resurrecting an evil spirit seemed extreme.
For some reason, he faintly recalled fighting a young Hunter in a cave near Ironhand.
Brigul growled and leveled her sword at Skotur, but Skotur shook her helmeted head. "If we fight, Brigul, Jack would be caught in the middle. Surely, for all your hatred towards humankind, you wouldn't want to risk his life?"
Jack turned to Brigul. He half expected her to attack anyway, but she actually seemed to hesitate.
"Remember how you disagreed with Herskagul's decision to let me stay in the Sanctuary?" Jack suddenly found himself telling her.
She remained silent.
"You didn't like it," he said, "but you didn't disobey her orders. Why is that?"
"Loyalty."
Knew it. "And don't you think that questioning her orders here might be… I don't know, disloyal?"
"Are you really lecturing me on this? You betrayed the Hunters. You left your friends to fend for themselves."
He shrugged, eliciting more creaking from his damaged armor.
He remained silent for a moment. He'd faced a choice like this before; Áhýdan himself had offered it, back in the prison. Jack had chosen to be selfless at that time…but that was because he didn't trust Áhýdan's promises to begin with. And because the Overworld had been at risk. His friends had been at risk.
He didn't believe Herskagul would go back on her word, but he also didn't have any friends in the Aether to care about. And he'd made enough powerful enemies as it was in the past weeks. He could at least avoid making more.
The memory of his fight with Tristan faded. He wasn't that boy anymore, audaciously challenging authority figures for some 'big picture' idea. His only goal now was to go back to Earth, no matter the cost.
"The artefact is in that chest," he said, gesturing to said chest behind him. "I didn't tell you at first because I wanted you to focus on finding the map." He glanced at them both, then turned, dropped his poleaxe and retrieved the sphere from the chest in question.
"That's it!" Skotur confirmed, her otherwise stoic voice little more than a whisper. She sounded almost reverent. "That's the artefact… We found it. Now we just need to bring it to the Sanctuary."
Jack nodded and turned to Brigul, whose face showed a mixture of shock and anger. Her gauntlets creaked slightly as her grip on her sword tightened.
"Let's go," Skotur said. "I'll take the map."
Jack handed her the document. He was reluctant to do so, but he needed at least one free hand for his weapon. He'd just have to trust her for now.
As Skotur took it, she whispered, "You made the right choice."
Jack said nothing.
The Valkyries proceeded to leave. As Jack kneeled down to retrieve his poleaxe from the ground, he took a moment to examine the many other things he'd taken from the chest. Most of it would probably be too big or inconvenient to bring—especially since he didn't have a scabbard—but two items in particular caught his eye.
Two knives, their blue metal blades gleaming in the dim light.
He took the knives and awkwardly lodged them between his armor and his belt. They might be useful at some point, especially since he couldn't use his axe as effectively now.
He rose and followed the Valkyries back to the entrance.
After taking the day to explore the floating island they turned out to be on—and to build up a tolerance for Andr's teleportation—the group decided to use the small cave that housed the Aether portal as a temporary base. Jack could be anywhere, and it turned out that hostile creatures roamed the Aether at night. They would have to start moving during the day again. Leaving the Stray behind had been the right decision.
Raulyn glanced to where the mobs and Hunters surrounded the fire. They still had some tension between them—neither the Hunters' past atrocities nor the mobs' earlier plans to betray them were completely forgiven or forgotten—but it was considerably less than before. They had spent a portion of the day letting the Ender teleport the Hunters around the island to build up a resistance to the side-effects, which was quite far developed for most.
And now, they were eating and sharing stories. Hunters and mobs were sharing stories.
Raulyn was not sure whether he should be relieved or worried; the Hunters had been taught all their lives to mistrust mobs for a reason, and now they just threw those lessons away. Maybe the Ender's actions—questionable as they were—had really united them. Or maybe it was their steadfast loyalty to Raulyn.
He let out a quiet sigh. Herobrine's letter had mentioned four people—Jack, Karles, Tristan and the Rogue. Karles had been found. So had the Rogue, though he had not been in the Aether at the time. That left Tristan and Jack. Were they also spirits, like Karles? Was this whole trip just a trick to have Raulyn learn of his true nature? If so, the mobs would be…displeased…to learn that Jack could not return.
One person was missing. Raulyn scanned the cave to see the Ender sitting in the shadows to the side, watching the group. Why was she not with them? Did it have something to do with her recent behavior?
She saw him look. With a sigh she stood up and walked over to the Hunters' bags that lay on the side, her torn black cloak swaying gently behind her. She removed a longsword from one bag, unsheathed it and performed a few one-handed practice swings.
"Try leading with the blade," Raulyn told her. "Not your hands."
She gave him a glance and swung again, following his advice. While longswords were mostly meant for two-handed use, her one-handed strikes were surprisingly swift and controlled. At least, as controlled as one might expect from a beginner.
"Footwork," he told her. "Keep your feet off at an angle; not on one line."
She did.
Raulyn sighed and stood up. He drew his own sword and assumed a stance. "If you insist on using a one-handed grip, keep your off-hand away from your blade when you attack, unless you want to lose fingers." He waved his empty hand—held low and to the side—for emphasis. "When you strike," he continued, taking a step forward and performing a descending cut with his sword, "ensure you will hit your opponent with the edge; not with the flat."
She nodded and assumed a stance of her own.
"And remember," Raulyn added, flowing into another descending cut, "the power you put into your strikes does not come from your arms, but from your entire body."
He stood down and turned to her expectantly.
She gave him a hesitant glance. Then she performed a strike of her own. Raulyn observed her form. She certainly seemed to take his advice, but her strikes were choppy, and she seemed to put a bit too much weight behind it, resulting in an overswing. However, Raulyn was not sure how much of a difference that would make when her powers acted as a safety net.
The other mobs and Hunters had taken note of the exchange. Their conversations had fallen silent as they watched the Ender perform more practice attacks. She ignored them.
"You want to look for him?" Raulyn guessed.
She stopped, glancing at him.
"And what if we find opposition?" he said. "Nonlethal force may not be enough to take them down. Are you prepared to do what must be done to achieve this goal?"
She remained silent.
"You seemed prepared to kill me when Flamma betrayed us," Raulyn continued. "Use that same mindset if necessary."
"Then teach me." She raised the sword. "Teach me how to use this."
"You want me to teach you now?"
"Just the basics," she clarified. "Better late than never, right?"
Raulyn looked her in the eye for a moment. Teaching a mob how to use a weapon? On any other day, he would have dismissed that idea as something only a sympathizer would do. He was a Hunter—no, he was the leader of the Hunters…
But I am also a mob, he reminded himself.
Finally he nodded. "Very well."