“Corin”
by Konnor Braden
Vah dashed through the forest, leaping over gnarled roots and the dense, low-hanging branches of the black oak trees that surrounded him. Arrows whizzed through the air, some flying past while others bounced, dampened but not harmless, off the shield he’d strapped to his back. He knew not where his path was taking him, only that wherever it led would certainly be away from the bounty hunters that pursued him. He’d chosen, aided by a few more cups of alcohol than planned, to sleep closer than usual to the city he’d chosen to camp near for the night. He must’ve been spotted overnight by the city’s guards (Snitches, as he’d begun to call the lookouts of the various towns he’d ‘visited’ on his travels), as he’d woken in the wee hours of the morning to the sound of blazing forestry and the angry, raucous shouting of the large group who now pursued him through these woods.
Distracted by his reminiscence, his foot caught on a particularly large root and he tumbled forward, landing hard on the uneven ground and sending his shield tumbling off into the brush. He was up as quickly as he fell, but he had to slow down; something had gone wrong in his ankle, and if he wasn’t able to stop soon and assess it, he knew this chase would be his end.
“Hey! Over here!!”
A high voice rang out from somewhere to his left. He peered into the woods, and for a moment he saw a flash of white and purple peek through the patchwork of dark green leaves several dozen feet away, then again, a few seconds later. He yelled back towards the direction of the voice, “Who are you?”
The voice ignored him. “Follow me! You’re headed for a dead end.” In the space of a second Vah weighed his options. What if this mysterious voice was a trap? One of the bounty hunters perhaps, or even worse? However, Vah doubted there could be anything worse than the fate that would befall him if he was caught. He decided to bet his life on the stranger’s advice and turned to his left, his ankle protesting sharply. He didn’t wait to hear the confused rage of the bounty hunters as they, unknowing of Vah’s detour, ran past him to discover a jarringly deep ravine, far too wide to cross and far too steep to descend.
Vah continued as quickly as his ankle would allow him towards the voice of his unnamed benefactor, hand clasped in apprehension around the hilt of his sword. After a few tense moments of pushing through the dense, prickly bushes and dodging more low-hanging branches, the undergrowth gave way to a small clearing. A young woman stood on its other end. Her hair was silver, like the lining of a cloud, and on her black, long-sleeve shirt was an insignia in deep purple of a balance scale, with a raven standing on each pan. He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could say anything she beckoned for him to follow her, then slipped back into the woods ahead of him. Vah paused for a moment, puzzled, but quickly moved to follow her. He had no idea where he’d found himself, after all. Any sense of bearing he’d possessed had been lost in his scramble to escape the bounty hunters.
They walked for a while in silence, focused on the undergrowth of the forest floor in front of them; Vah additionally was focused on the sword at her hip. He tried his luck once more at conversation, uncomfortable with the amount of unknown variables in his current equation. “Who are you?”
She didn’t turn around. “No one you’d recognize. Just call me Rai, ya? And you?” Vah paused for a moment.
“Corin.” At that, Rai glanced back at him from the corner of her eye, her expression unreadable. “Nice to meet you… Corin. So why’d you have a whole king’s brigade of swords n’ arrows after you?” Vah thought back to Winterbourne, the far-northern city in the country of Icenia where his days on bounty boards across the world had begun. Back to the blood on his hands that he couldn’t not dwell on for too long a moment, unless even he would be affected. “I was born poor in the Federation of Volterra, if you’s heard of it, and from a young age I’ve stole t’ survive. A few months ago the fuckin’ snitches finally caught me, and, of course, chased me outta the city. From then I’ve gone from city to city try’n to keep my head down and their bounty’s only snowballed since.” Not entirely (or even slightly, if he tried to be honest with himself, which he, of course, didn’t) true, but he cared more about seeming supportable than being honest. Rai smiled. “Oh? Funny coincidence, the city we’re headed towards, Exilus, is part of Volterra.”
Vah stopped in his tracks, inhaling sharply. A tendril of panic shot through him as he considered what this could mean about the woman walking feet ahead of him. Before he could move, though, Rai burst into laughter. She calmed down after a moment, turning back towards him. “Relax, Corin, relax, we Exilites probably hate the Federation as much as you do, if not more. They took over our city quite recently. We tried to fight back, but so many of our fighters, so many of my friends, were killed or captured so quickly… we never stood a chance. Those imperialist fucks.” She paused for a moment, looking thoughtfully back towards Vah.
“It’s funny that you ended up here, y’know. Or, fitting at least. Exilus was founded by exiles like you. It’s the meaning of our name, even: ‘The Exile.’” Vah sighed in relief. He could work with this. In truth, he could care less about the Federation but, if it meant he could sleep more than one night in one place and eat food unstained by theft in this city of “Exilus” that they were headed towards, he could hate Volterra with his whole heart.
After a while longer, the forest opened up into a sprawling plain. In the distance he saw what he assumed to be Exilus. The city was cut in two by a river (“the Kites River,” Rai told him as they got closer, “it’s named for how the river’s water rushed like a swarm of kites in a strong wind”), with one half on the west riverside and the other on a mid-size island in the river’s middle. Exilus wasn’t large, especially not by the standards of the many cities he’d found himself in, but what it lacked in size it made up for in iridescence. The buildings were made mainly of dark grey stone and the black oak wood of the forest the two had left behind them, accented by lustrous marble and amethyst. At the east end of the city, on the edge of the island, was a large but seemingly unfinished castle, made entirely of the same dark grey stones of the city but with much more amethyst and marble woven into its design.
Rai led Vah through the riverside portion of the city, giving him time to take in the city’s beauty as they went. “This is the residential part of the city. We have our food storage on the island so just follow me.” The bridge, similar to the castle he’d seen earlier, was made mostly of dark grey stone, or greywacke as Rai described it as they walked across. Amethyst was set into the bridge’s surface, in the same pattern of the balance and ravens as on Rai’s shirt.
They stopped in front of a large wooden building, four stories high. “This is our general storage. Food’s on the top floor.” They entered the building, climbing up three flights of stairs until they reached the door to presumably the fourth floor. Rai pushed upon the door to reveal what could only be described as a gold mine of food. Meats and fish hung on racks in the center of the room, and on shelves along the walls were bowls of apples, oranges, and many other fruits, including some that Vah had never even seen before. On the other side of the room a man stood turned away, hanging up another fish from the ceiling. He wore a light brown overcoat, and on the back he saw, once again, the insignia from Rai’s shirt and from the bridge. He opened his mouth to question its meaning, but before he could say anything, the man turned around, face lighting up.
“Oh! Hullo, Rai!”
He put down the hook and fish he was working with, striding across the room to greet the two. “And who is this?” Vah stuck out his hand, “You can call me Corin. And you?” The man took it, shaking his hand vigorously. “I’m Clajeo! Pleased t’ meet you.” Clajeo smiled, releasing Vah’s hand and walking past him towards the door.
Vah then remembered his confusion from earlier. “Pardon, but I’ve been curious since I met you, Rai. What exactly is that insignia on yours and Clajeo’s clothing, and on the bridge we crossed earlier?”
“It’s the crest of Exilus, our city. People know us now as simply a settlement of unstable sword-bearing types, but”–as Rai answered, Vah heard the click of a door locking behind him–”soon we’ll be known as the city that killed Vah.”
Before Vah could even process what she’d just said, before he could move, before he could even exhale his breath, Rai’s sword tore through his abdomen. “Funny how unaware such a famously ‘cunning’ man turned out t’ be. Clajeo managed to lift my sword off me, walk to the door with it and lock it all without you noticing.” Rai laughed softly and then sighed, shaking her head.
“You- you lied to me,” Vah gasped out. “I don’t- I don‘t understand. We both hate Volterra, they stay at the top when those like us don’t work t–”
“Don’t talk to me like we’re buddies just ‘cause we both hate the Federation. I know who you are, Vah. I know that you’re a manipulator, and I know not to trust a single morsel of what leaves your mouth. I hate Volterra ‘cause o’ what they did to my home. I doubt you even give two shits about them at all.” She glared down at him in disgust. “I knew why those bounty hunters were chasing you, y’know. I knew they would chase you into those woods, so I planned for this so that we would get that bounty instead of some stupid Federate shill from the mob. I realized, if I really wanted t’ get you, I’d have to outsmart you. And here we are.”
“Yo- you’re disgusting,” Vah sputtered out. “I hope the emperor himself comes to this pile of rubble himself and-” Before he could finish his sentence Clajeo ripped the blade out of his back, sending Vah tumbling to the floor. “Tell me,” he said, “did you ever think about the people you killed in Winterbourne? Did their deaths mean anything to you or was it all jus’ sport? Die quieter, please, if that’s all you have to say.” And so he died.
