Reborn From the Cosmos

When Fey was a girl and her family lived in a big house with plenty of food, she dreamed of having a bigger yard. She didn’t mind their cramped house or sharing a bed with her older sister; she didn’t like the quiet and the nights were always warm. Her only complaint was that their yard was too small for chickens. Her best friend, Peony, had a pretty red chicken that sat in her lap and let her play with it, which Fey thought was so much cooler than having a dumb dog. She wanted one desperately, but her mother said that chickens needed their own little house, and they were three steps away from the street.

Then her father died.

It had been centuries since hunting was considered truly dangerous. At the time of Harvest’s founding, an expedition into the wilds surrounding the first cities could claim dozens of lives; the great manabeasts that called the land home before humanity took hundreds with them during their subjugations. Yet, the profession still claimed many lives. It was rarely those with well-trained magic or powerful bodies, but those were not the only ones needed on a hunt. Carving up a beast required expertise and some hunters hired porters to carry their loads.

Her father had been both, making him a favorite. He came from a long-line of hunters that never left a mark on history. While he had no stomach for fighting, his knowledge and ability to protect himself gave him an edge over the competition, just enough to ensure steady work. An edge he was too confident in.

Everything changed the day her father returned in a box. Fey was too young then to understand the problems of adulthood. She idly complained that they didn’t have meat as often and whined when her mother stopped giving her money for treats when they ran errands, but she never thought to question the reason why.

When her brothers started leaving home more often, she lamented her lack of playmates and the empty places at the dinner table. She dreamed of her old home, filled with a comfort she’d never thought she’d be without.

One day, her eldest brother didn’t return for dinner. A team of hunters didn’t bring him back in a box. Instead, a man with a smile like a snake flanked by two of the biggest men she’d ever seen brought a gambling debt that they had nothing to do with but were somehow responsible for.

Two more brothers disappeared; one cutting himself from their problems and the other cut down by the claws of a manabeast. The snake man returned, but there was no money. The house became unbearably tense and Fey learned to worry about the future. Her second eldest sister woke her in the middle of the night and stroked her hair, whispering everything would be alright; Fey knew better, but a part of her wanted to believe.

The next morning, the snake man returned. Her sister went with him. Fey never saw her again.

After that, her mother forgot her problems at the bottom of a pipe. Fey wished they would talk again. Or that her mother would look at her.

It didn’t take long before different men with predatory smiles took the house and the rest of their possessions. Another sister hastily married an older, mild-mannered man. Fey was offered a small spare room. For a time, things improved, and she trudged through a monotonous life doing odd jobs for scant coin, her biggest dream having her own corner of the city.

Then her brother-in-law entered her room in the middle of the night. When her sister was drawn by the commotion, he told her it was the drink, though Fey couldn’t smell a drop on him. Her sister needed to believe. Fey couldn’t stay.

As the years passed, her dreams withered, becoming so small and thin she couldn’t distinguish them from her most basic instincts. She had to do risky things to fill her stomach, but she knew one day they would be her end. Despite her feet carrying her all over the city, she felt like time had stopped and her life was frozen with it.

Until the day she met The Grand Summoner.

She didn’t know of the group when she entered the tavern on the arm of her date; she could have cared less about the man, only that he represented a free dinner and a warm bed. Given that it was a bar in the MZ, Fey expected a meeting of degenerates, perhaps a few illegal but harmless pastimes.

Callan Atkinson was no degenerate. He was tall, well-spoken, and sure of himself. She assumed he was a caster; he immediately disabused her of that notion, claiming he was inept with numbers, the most basic skill needed for magic. He was a man from humble beginnings, but he thought he could do ambitious things. He thought he could be more.

Incredibly, he thought they all could be more.

Fey would have truly walked away there and then if he said it would be easy; she had learned not to trust empty promises. Everything had a price. Something Callan knew as well.

He didn’t ask them if they wanted to change their lives; of course they did. He asked them what they were willing to give. What they were willing to sacrifice.

He asked them if they would bleed for it.

Fey dropped the arm of her date and stepped forward. She would bleed. She would do anything.

Callan extended his hand. She took it. Time flowed. Life moved.

If she knew then that it would end with her kneeling beneath a clear blue sky, caged, and surrounded by her comrades as they all awaited the executioner’s blade, she’d do it all again. She’d forgotten what it felt like to be alive. The Grand Summoners gave her everything: the power defend herself, the body she always wanted, wealth, and purpose.

Fey loved Callan. She believed in him. She believed that the Grand Summoners could change the kingdom. Maybe the world.

She was torn seeing her love caged in the dirt like an animal; her heart instinctively leapt for joy when she saw him being dragged toward her by two uniformed guards, but it sunk as she remembered that they were marked for death. Worse, he was placed before her. She would have to watch him die.

He was less than a shadow of himself, curled up in the dirt. Callan took pride in himself, always cared to put his best face forward. She had never seen him with scruff covering his chin or in dust-covered clothes. She had never seen his gaze on the floor.

“Cal,” she called. Several heads lifted at the sound of her voice, but most immediately dropped, their minds consumed with their own dilemmas. The eyes she wanted to see didn’t rise to meet her own.

“Cal. I’m here. At least…at least we’re together.”

His head slowly came up; Fey leaned against the bars of her cage as their eyes met.

“Fey…”

“I’m here. I love you.”

He stared at her for several heartbeats, but all too soon, he turned away, back to the ground.

“It doesn’t matter now.”

Something inside her flinched. She knew. He had never said the words before, had never told her they were anything more than sharing lonely nights. But she thought…she hoped, at the end…

She didn’t know what she hoped but it involved more than a dismissal.

Fey didn’t have long to dwell on it. The guards returned, more than a dozen. Instead of another prisoner, they escorted people in faded formal clothing, peasants playing at being in power. The guards busied themselves preparing the killing ground; one of them covered their face with a dark mask while another prepared an axe, sharpening its head. There was no crowd and no pomp. They were to be slaughtered like livestock.

Fey had accepted her fate, but she still winced when she saw an earthen chopping block rise from the ground. She turned her attention to the pretenders; they gathered in front of Callan’s cage. Fey couldn’t make out many details, but she caught a woman’s voice when she focused.

“—famous. You’ll be the first person condemned to death by the laws of New Quest and executed by one of her guards. You might even make it into the history books once the city employs a few scribes.”

“And what about you?” Callan’s voice had regained some of its energy in the face of a challenge. Despite everything, Fey’s lips twitched into a smile. She always admired his resilience in the face of a challenge. It was rare to find someone willing to rail against the impossible. “Are you someone who will be remembered?”

“Oh, you can bet I’ll be remembered by the only one who matters. Which is why I’m here.”

“You’re here to watch these dogs obediently spill blood.”

“Oh, I’m looking forward to that, and that’s certainly why my future colleagues are here, but no. We’re talking because the foolish interrogators left out something crucial. They didn’t ask you about your connection to the lady of the city.”

Fey shivered. She had heard many things about Lady Tome. Had seen more; when the great purple beast the noblewoman controlled brought down the city, Fey had wondered, just for a moment, if the world was ending and everything would fall to the creature. She never wanted to meet the woman, no, the monster responsible for it being unleashed.

“What connection?”

“Come on. The Hall has trained summoners for years and nothing, but not even a year after our lady shows up on the rock, your group appears. Of course you’re connected. And yet, she’s served you up to test her new system. That’s worse than disposal. She helped you, but you did something, and now she wants you gone. Which, I must say, is very stupid of you, Mr. Grand Summoner.”

“That woman has done nothing for me!” Callan growled. “Everything was done by me! I built the Grand Summoners! I was going to change everything!”

“You?” the woman purred as the group laughed. “You want me to believe that a son of a carpenter who has never done anything and never showed a lick of vision suddenly became a competent summoner without any intervention? Someone guided you. Someone who could still have plans for this city. I want to know who.”

“Ask the saints.”

“Are you sure you want to take that attitude with me? Your death doesn’t have to be quick and painless.”

“Hah! Do your worst.”

The woman laughed. “Well damn! You called my bluff. Unfortunately, the law prevents dragging this out. You’ve been tried and convicted. You’re going to die and that’s it. Legally, you’re untouchable to all but the executioner. And as I happen to be very fond of these laws, I don’t dare break them. But…you should really tell me everything.”

“Why?”

“Because whoever is behind you, they’ve abandoned you. They used you and now they’re going to get off. Are you fine with that? Being the only one who suffers? The tool? The punchline of a bad joke?”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t I? I’m going to make a few guesses. I’m guessing…your benefactor got you started. Told you about summoning. Maybe helped you get that fine beast you’ve been parading around, hm? A taste of power to make you crave it and a bit of legitimacy to impress the empty-headed morons that flocked to you. And then they disappeared, leaving you to your fuck-ups. Do I have it right?”

The woman wouldn’t know but Fey had spent enough time around Callan to know when he was hesitating. Normally, it meant he was gathering his thoughts. She didn’t know what it meant now.

“It wasn’t like that.”

“No?”

“She helped me. She believed in me.”

“She, huh? Then the flaming garbage that was your little organization was thought up by two minds? I don’t know if that makes it sadder. Maybe you sabotaged one another? Was it a contest to see who could ruin you first?”

Fey grit her teeth as she heard a body slamming against bars. She hated to see him treated like an animal.

“You think I don’t know what you’re doing?” Callan spat. “I’ve been looked down on my entire life. But I did something. I’ve spread the truth. My name will carry on. Change is coming and it’s carried in the hands of summoners.”

“That much we agree on. Ah ah. Unfortunately, I don’t have all day to ask questions. Our guard captain is rather strict.”

“Who are you?” Callan shouted as the crowd parted. Fey got a clear look at the woman taunting her beloved leader…and found an ordinary woman. She was tan and wiry, suggesting someone accustomed to working in the sun. Shoulder-length brown hair was tied back by an old scarf and her clothes had several patches.

She was the most common of commoners. Someone Fey could have had a drink with in the city’s seediest bar or slept beside in the common room of a dodgy inn. No one who should be in a position to pass judgment.

“Me? I don’t like giving out my name. You know, when you’re important enough, you don’t have to introduce yourself. People find out who you are.”

The woman turned and Fey met her gaze. She smiled, lopsided and carefree. An expression that didn’t belong at an execution.

The nameless woman winked.

Fey struck her cage, making the bars rattle, but she was not so far removed from her past self that she could break them. All her efforts served was the woman’s amusement, who gathered the crowd and directed them to the side of the killing field.

Fey slumped against her cage. Her eyes found Callan again, his head bowed and his shoulders taut.

She closed her eyes, but she didn’t let her mind drift off. She didn’t need to dream; her memories were enough.

Fey left the mud, her mind living in better times.