A Creature of War, Book 5, CH01

Welcome back, welcome back. Yes, yes, take a seat all of you. My, we’re drawing in quite the crowd today. I didn’t expect as many of your parents to listen to my stories. This is a little intimidating. No, no need to worry, I’m going to continue with it, but let’s give them time to bring more seats, we don’t want them to miss anything, do we?

So, last time, I finished with El and Vee confronting the end of the world they knew. Now it’s later, quite a while later and we—

What? Yes, I could start earlier, but that’s mostly society rebuilding in a few ways you’d know from your history books. They didn’t call it the Dark Times, but that is what it was. And this is LRK’s story, isn’t it? Not society’s. The next important point in his life comes much later.

I need to warn you, this story will chronicle something of a dark time in his own life. As I warned you at the start, our Lord Tiranis began his life as a man like us, and he was as fallible as we are. He wasn’t always the kind protector who looks over us today.

Now, is everyone ready? Good.

This story starts centuries after the world changed…

*

The devastation was vast. Bodies littered the field as far as El could see, and because he knew the field spread further than he could see, he knew the dead counted in the thousands. He didn’t know how large the opposing army had been. He no longer took part in the planning. He found too depressing to look at those plans as Vee decided how best to decimate the enemy.

Vee was good at that, as well as negotiating with the people who could use their protection. Could afford it. El didn’t like that aspect. They were soldiers; it was their duty to protect the people. As far as he was concerned, they shouldn’t charge for it, but they had an army to feed, and when the world changed, all those centuries ago, the infrastructure that meant he didn’t have to worry about where their food came from had disappeared.

In those early years El had taken part in every stage of running their army, it had been the only way he had to hang on to what he was, who he had been, and there had been a joy in planning a battle, going up against overwhelming odds and coming out of the fight bruised and cut, in pain, but victorious. And the celebrations he and Vee had afterward, once he was healed? Those made the other soldiers blush.

When had it all stop being enjoyable? A decade ago? A century? He didn’t know anymore. The battles and the years bleed into each other. He didn’t even remember when the world had changed, except by the vague term of ‘a few centuries ago.’ Somewhere along the way, he’d become tired of the fighting.

No, that wasn’t right. Not the fighting itself, of why they were fighting. This wasn’t about protecting anyone anymore; it hadn’t been in a long time, regardless if Vee sometimes found them people who paid to be protected. Most of the time Vee just accepted the money and didn’t ask who they were fighting, so they’d been on the side of the invaders far too often. The bull didn’t care who he was fighting, so long as there was fighting to be had, and El… tried to be happy for him. He tried to have that be enough to keep him going.

He tried.

He searched the field until he found Vee, in the process of bringing his sword on a dying soldier. Even at this distance there was majesty in the bull’s motions. He was an agent of death. A messenger of the Celeste, the people following the brand new religion said, raining death on those deserving. They were wrong. Vee no longer cared if they were deserving or not, only that he was paid to kill them.

Vee didn’t have to use a sword. He could kill with a thought. He could end wars by himself; bringing entire armies to their knees. The bull had tried that, in the early days. All that had caused was for those armies to join force and try to kill him, so he started hiding his power, killing with the swords, and using it only after the battle, to end the suffering of the dying. Other than their own injuries, El didn’t think Vee healed anymore. He only killed.

In time, he stopped using his power to end his enemy’s suffering, they didn’t deserve it, he said. It was a mercy he reserved for his allies. Not healing them, no, that was beneath him, simply making sure they died quickly. His enemies only deserved the sword. And Vee loved using the sword. As he grew more vicious, the soldiers who followed him did the same; cutting the throats of anyone too injured to flee.

El killed his share of enemies, even if his heart was no longer in it. He fought to win, and to do so meant killing those trying to kill him. He couldn’t let himself lose. Maybe it was his programming, his training, or that he still didn’t want to die. He didn’t know.

Vee approached and when the bull was close enough El forced a smile. Vee grabbed El and lifted him. “Wasn’t it amazing?” Vee kissed him hard.

El responded to the kiss, as he felt his body heal, losing himself in it. He forgot the fighting, the suffering he caused, the people who hadn’t deserved to die so the people who paid Vee could call themselves victorious.

For a too short eternity, all El felt was his lover’s lips against his, the tongue in his muzzle, the erection pressed against his groin. The love he felt for this man.

Vee broke the kiss with an evil grin and dropped El on the ground. “Now we celebrate.” He pulled off his armor as El laughed.

Vee was on him and for another short eternity he could forget all the wrongs he’d done in the name of this man he loved. When Vee was done, sated and exhausted. When the pain came back, El went looking for another soldier so he wouldn’t have to think about what he’d done, who he’d killed. They had been so young.

No one refused him. No one said no to having sex with their leader’s boyfriend, not the Anthros anyway. Humans still had odd beliefs about who it was appropriate to have sex with, but they were busy doing their own celebrating by then. They had won, so anyone having sex with them might gain some of that strength.

When the sun came back up, he found Vee in his tent and El curled up against him. “How many did we lose?” he asked, because he always did.

It started the night Vee woke up in terror and had yelled he would care for the dead. He’d gone through the names of the dead. And had made El promise to always ask, so he wouldn’t grow callous.

The bull laughed. “Who cares!” same as he had for decades now.

The question was what, a joke? He didn’t tell El to stop asking it, but he also didn’t care who died. Why should he? He said on the occasion El asked. This is war, people die. It’s the way of things. Sometimes, El reminded Vee of his fear, and the bull laughed at that too. He’d been young and naïve, he answered.

It had been a long time since El had bothered reminding him. He’d lost interest in that. Over the years El had lost interest in so many things. At least the sex remained, he thought as Vee pushed him on his back, and for another short eternity he forgot.

*

This was a different field El looked out on, and this time he looked over it from the parapet of a city wall. They had been defenders, and he felt a little better about the battle because of it. Still, the dead outnumbered the living now. He knew because each body was on fire with one of the living having to tend to a dozen of them to ensure they were completely burned. Burying them was too much of a hassle, and they couldn’t leave them to rot, the sickness from that would kill the city just a certainly as if they had been undefended.

In the light, El noticed figures in black stopping by each body. Keepers of the Faith of the Celeste, they called themselves. That religion wasn’t so new anymore, and El heard murmuring from those priests he didn’t like. Powers were bad. Not people who used them to hurt, the power themselves.

He did his best to ignore them. They’d die off like the other religions that had come and gone before now. But they had insisted the bodies needed to be blessed. Vee hadn’t cared, until they demanded they wait to burn them. Vee hadn’t listen to that.

El was naked and reeked of sex. He and Vee had done their marathon session, and he had been looking for his next partner, before getting distracted by the view. One of the guard sniffed and El smiled at her. He and Vee had gone at it with abandon. She smiled back and then they were doing it there, burying the feelings under the sex.

When they were done, he looked for the next partner. And the feeling intruded on his thought. More sex took care of it for a short period of times, but because he had to search for the next partners, the feeling had the time to become a decision, and once it was in his head, no amount of sex silenced it.

When the sun came up, he joined Vee in the house the city’s leader had given them to use, a large manor with servants and everything. Vee had laughed at it, but had quickly ordered them about as if they were more of his soldiers.

“How many dead?” El asked as always, thinking that if the answer was different, maybe he could reconsider his decision.

Vee snorted and roll his eyes, not bothering to say anything.

El didn’t say anything in return. The decision solidifying in his mind, but not sure how to broach the subject. After all, after this victory wasn’t the time.

Vee would understand. They’d talked about it, years ago, possibly centuries before by now, El wasn’t sure, but they had discussed what they would do on the day the fighting wasn’t enough anymore. They talked about moving on to other things, for a time, or forever, they’d never settled on that, but they had agreed that one day, they would want something different. All El needed to do now was see if Vee would come with him.

*

“Where have you been?” Vee called.

Another battlefield El looked at, this time sitting on the steps leading to the building the ruler of the city had lived in. Yet more dead, but not burned yet. The Keepers had demanded that Vee let them bless all the dead before they were burned, and enough of the soldiers had feared them more than the bull he had had to give in.

“I couldn’t find you last night,” the bull said, his tone a mix of playfulness and severity. “Are you growing bored with me? Do you prefer to have sex with all of them, instead of me?”

El shook his head. He hadn’t had sex with anyone. He’d washed alone, donned his clothing and walked the ruin of the city. The city they destroyed. The decision he’d been putting off for these last year had clamored at him, but he hadn’t been able to leave in the night. Vee didn’t deserve that.

“How many dead?” he asked, hoping against hope to get an answer that would quiet the decision.

“Why do you keep asking me that? Who cares? We won.” Something jingled and El looked up. “Here’s your pay. Since you weren’t in my bed when the messenger came with it, I couldn’t shower you with wealth.” He grins. “Should I do that now?”

El reached out. “I’ll just take it in the pouch.”

Frowning Vee handed it to him. It had a good weight to it. Vee’s army demanded top price. No one who paid it regretted it. El dropped it in his travel pack.

“What’s that?” Vee asked. “We’re not due to move out for another week.”

El didn’t look up. With Vee so close all he wanted to do was pull him down, rip their clothes off and let himself forget everything for one last short eternity.

“Do you remember when you talked about leaving this behind? You were wondering if there was more to life than the fighting.”

Vee laughed. “Of course there is. Sex and eating for one, and more sex. Definitely more sex.”

El wasn’t surprised at the answer. Until a few years ago he would have given the same.

The bull sat next to him, and El fought the urge to reach for him. “El, what’s going on?” his voice was filled with concern. He moved to place his arms around the lynx’s shoulders, but El shrugged it off. Just having him this close, being able to smell his earthy scent, the sex that still clung to him was making this difficult.

“I can’t do this anymore, Vee.”

“You have enough of partying?” the bull chuckled in disbelief and continued. “I mean that’s fine. You don’t have to take part in it. We can even stay in our house, just the two of us today. I found one that’s still in good condition.”

Ell shook his head. “It’s the fighting.”

“What do you mean?” Vee was perplexed now.

“Why did we come here, Vee? Why did we sack this city?”

“Because we were paid to do it.”

El stood went down two steps and turned. “We were paid to attack? Vee that can’t be what we’re about, can it? We are defenders. We were protectors.”

“El, we were made to fight. Who cares who we fight? I mean, what else are we supposed to even do?”

“Stop?” the lynx asked hopefully.

The bull laughed. “We can’t stop fighting any more than we can stop breathing.”

“How do you even know?” El demanded. “You’re so busy enjoying murdering everyone that comes up against you. Have you even tried not to fight?”

“Do you really think any of the others found peace when they abandoned us? You heard the same stories I did. They kept on fighting.”

“That was centuries ago. I think that if they kept on fighting we would have heard new stories, of gods or spirits joining wars. Unlike you, few of them have powers that can be hidden.”

“You haven’t heard stories because they’re dead. That’s why you don’t use your powers in the fighting, isn’t it? You don’t want them to turn on you either.”

“I don’t do it because I’d have to kill them to survive. I won’t do that just because someone’s afraid of me. They would do the same.”

“Okay, look I don’t know what’s gotten into you today, but talking about the others isn’t going to do you any good regardless of what happened to them.” The bull stood. “Come on. You don’t have to join in the celebration, but we do need to put in an appearance.”

El shook his head.

“El, what’s going on?”

The lynx let out a breath as he took the bulls hand in his. “Vee, let them have their celebration, let’s just leave. Just the two of us. Let’s go find a quiet place, let’s go find peace for a while. Don’t you think we at least deserve to find out if we can have peace?”

“I can’t leave,” Vee said as if it was self-evident, “I have responsibilities.”

El snorted. “You lead an army, not a research lab. Someone can take your place.”

“Are you saying I’m that easy to replace?”

“For that, yes.”

Vee narrowed his eyes. “What happened to you, El? Don’t you remember how important it is that the right person lead? What’s going to happen to them if I leave?”

El let go of the hand. He’d tried. He’d hoped, but hadn’t believed he’d received a different answer.

Vee squeezed El’s shoulder. “We really should get back. King Rodrick will be arriving before noon and he’s going to want to thank us for dealing with this pesky problem for him.”

El shook his head.

“Are you sure? You normally enjoy mingling with the rulers.”

“Really?” how had Vee failed to notice he hadn’t attended any of those in years now? All that happened was someone patting someone else’s back, proclaiming how in the rights they were because they won.

“Anyway,” El continued. “I don’t mean I’m not going to the celebration. I mean I’m not going back in there. I’m done with all of this. I need to find out what I am without all the fighting.”

“What do you mean ‘What you are?’ You’re my lover, my best friend, my right-hand man. You think I could have done half of this if you hadn’t been at my side?”

“Then come with me,” El said, hoping again. “Just for a while. You can rebuild an army if you find out that’s what you actually want, but you owe it to yourself. To who you can be if you’re not in the middle of all this. I owe it to myself.”

“No, I told you. I’m not leaving them to fend for themselves. They need me to lead them to victory.”

“That’s what I thought.” El sighed. “Then you’re doing that without me.”

“What?” Vee stared at him.

“I told you, I need a break. I need some time away from all this—probably just a few years. I’m tired, Vee. Tired of the senseless fighting.”

“You don’t—you can’t—” the confusion turned to anger and the hand on the lynx’s shoulder tightened. “No. You promised you’d stay at my side. The others all left, but you don’t get to abandon me, too.”

El called on the earth to harden his shoulder. “That was centuries ago, Vee. A different world. I’m not abandoning you. I just need time away. I will be back.”

“No.” The grip tightened and El felt it through the toughened skin. His lover could be so tender he tended to forget how strong he was. “You mean too much to me to let you leave. El, I need you.”

“If I was that important, you’d come with me.”

“No,” Vee snarled. “You don’t get to force me to choose like that. You made me a promise, you’re going to honor it.”

“I will come back, Vee.” The grip tightened again, and El winced before he had the time to harden his shoulder some more.

“I’m not letting you leave, El. You’re the only one I have left. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me without you to keep me grounded.”

“I haven’t been able to do that for years. Let go of me, Vee.”

“El, please, you have to stay. Fine. We’ll move the army now. Forget the king’s visit and his request to attack another town rebelling against his rule. We’ll go west, all the way to the coast. That’s going to be close to a year of travel and I hear there’s a church there that could use an army.”

“Right, and you go back to selling your services. Back to killing. I don’t want break between wars, Vee, I want a break from war. Don’t you get it, Vee? I can’t tell why I’m fighting anymore.”

“You’re fighting because you’re a soldier, El. Don’t question it, it’s how we were made.”

“That world died a long time ago, Vee. The lab’s gone, so are the scientists, the brass, even that country’s no more. I need to know who I am in this new world, and I can’t do that as part of your army. I’m sorry.”

“I thought you loved me.” The pain in the bulls voice almost made El reconsider.

He didn’t want to hurt him. But what would happen if he stayed, even at the periphery of the army? His resolve would break and he’d go back to suffering in silence. Or he’d explode and kill more soldiers in the process. He’d already waited long enough to act on his decision. If he waited, it might not be his decision to walk away from the fighting. It might be because he’d killed everything.

“I do, Vee. You’re the most important person in the world. That won’t change because I’m away. You’ll see that when I come back.”

“No.” Vee’s voice was hard, implacable. His hand tightened even more, but El had expected it. “You don’t get to come back when you promised you’d stay. We’re going back to the celebration, and you are going to sit there quietly while Rodrick visits and tells me where the next city is. Then, tonight, I’m going to explain to you just what your role is in this, do you understand me, El?”

The lynx pulled on more of the earth. He anchored himself in place. “Let go of me, Vee.”

“Didn’t you listen to me? You are com—”

The wind hit the bull like a battering ram. He flew to the other side of the wide stairs. He had El’s sleeve in his hand. El would have bruises in spite of hardening his skin. If he hadn’t, Vee would have ripped his arm off.

“I need to do this, Vee. You need to let me walk away from this. I hope you can understand why I need to do this. I will be back.”

“Don’t,” Vee growled as he stood. He threw down the ripped sleeve. “If you’re going to abandon me, never come back. I should have known you were no better than the others. I thought I could trust you.”

“Vee—”

“Get out! Go find out what you are without me, but when you realize you’re nothing, don’t come crawling back to me. We are done! I never want to see you again.”

El watched the bull climb the stairs and vanish inside the mansion. Hopefully, once he calmed down, Vee would see this was for the best, for both of them. And El would be back. A few years at most and he’d know where he stood in regard to all of this. Probably less than that, even.

Vee was right, they were made to fight, and that was what El would find out, he was sure of it, that without the wars he was nothing. But he’d know, and that was what he wanted. He wanted to face his next war and say; ‘I tried to walk away, I did what I could to be someone else, but this is what I was made for. This is all I know how to be.’