Chapter 19: Gods
The carriage jolted along the Kingdom's dirt roads.
The wheels ground over loose stone, a monotonous creaking sound. Lucian leaned against the wall of the compartment and looked out through the half-drawn curtain. The morning light had climbed higher, washing the open fields in a warm yellow-green.
The further they got from the royal capital, the bleaker the view outside became.
The farmland was still there, but fewer people were working it. The occasional village they passed had low, dilapidated houses, the thatch on the roofs thin and sparse, as though no one had bothered to repair them in years.
The people standing at the village entrances wore ragged clothes, their faces blank, eyes tracking the carriage as it passed but seeing nothing in particular.
Lucian looked away.
He knew the state of the Kingdom — the nobility's exploitation, the hardship of the common people. But knowing it through text was one thing. Seeing it with his own eyes was another.
Those hollow looks were more convincing than any description.
The carriage continued on.
When Lucian looked out again, he noticed a group of people gathered at the roadside.
They were kneeling at the edge of a field, clothes ragged, backs bent, hands pressed together at their foreheads. Their lips were moving, soundlessly, over something. Sunlight poured down from above and drew their hunched shadows out long across the cracked earth.
"What are they doing?"
Lucian asked quietly.
A brief silence in the compartment.
The butler Aldred sat across from him, back straight, hands folded on his knees. That face carved by years showed nothing, his gaze resting somewhere in the middle distance.
He didn't answer.
Perhaps he didn't know either.
"They... they might be praying for a god to help them. Only a god would help them."
A small, tentative voice came from the corner of the compartment.
Lucian turned.
Siel was sitting there.
Still making herself as small as possible, knees together, hands folded in her lap. The posture was probably copied from Aldred just now. The pale grey dress wrapped neatly around her thin frame, the blue braids hanging at her shoulders.
Noticing Lucian's gaze land on her, her shoulders pulled in slightly and she immediately lowered her head. Those amber eyes disappeared behind her lashes, leaving only a small shadow of unease showing.
"A god?"
They're a little foolish, Lucian thought. A little pitiable too.
"There are no gods."
Which meant there was no one who would actually help them.
Siel's body gave a faint shiver.
But she didn't pull in on herself the way she had before.
"There are."
Her voice was still quiet, but steadier than a moment ago.
Lucian raised an eyebrow.
Siel kept her head down, staring at her folded hands.
"Lord Lucian..."
Her voice paused, as though she were gathering herself.
"And Lady Lakyus."
She raised her head.
Those amber eyes looked directly at Lucian. This time she didn't look away.
"Saved me."
She said it slowly, one word at a time.
"That is what gods are."
The compartment went quiet.
Even the grinding of the wheels over the stones outside seemed unusually clear.
Even Aldred glanced at Siel.
Little flatterer. She'd picked that up fast.
"What kind of god is that weak."
Lucian shook his head, something resigned in his tone.
"Lord Lucian..."
Her voice went quieter, but there was a stubborn seriousness in it.
"And Lady Lakyus. You are both very strong."
She paused.
"I will follow Lord Lucian forever."
Forever.
Lucian looked at her.
In those amber eyes there was only something close to pure, completely unguarded trust.
She means it?
He almost felt like laughing.
"Oh?"
His voice was light, the way someone sounds asking about something trivial.
"Then if I — your god — ordered you to die?"
The air in the compartment seemed to freeze for a moment.
Aldred's gaze shifted, settling on this six-year-old young master.
Siel went still.
That thin face went blank for a moment. She blinked, as though working through what the words meant.
Then —
"I would."
Her voice was quiet. Without any hesitation at all.
Lucian looked at her.
Those amber eyes were calm, the way someone's eyes are when they are stating a fact too simple to require any feeling behind it.
Not flattery.
Not performing loyalty.
She actually meant it.
This child...
He suddenly didn't know what to say.
"In that case —"
He spoke, his voice level.
"I order you, Siel."
Siel straightened slightly, like a soldier waiting to receive a command.
"Live. Properly."
Lucian turned and looked her in the eye.
"And —"
He paused.
"Real gods don't send people to their deaths."
His tone was entirely flat, the way someone sounds remarking that the weather is fine.
"Remember that."
Aldred's gaze rested on Lucian for a moment, then lowered again, settling back into its usual unreadable composure.
"Aldred."
Lucian spoke suddenly.
"Yes."
The butler's voice was as respectful as always.
"Turn around."
Lucian looked out at the barren fields beyond the window.
"Head for the Slane Theocracy."
A moment of silence in the compartment.
"But —"
The butler's voice paused.
He didn't finish.
"I order you in the name of Aindra."
Lucian's voice was not loud, but it carried clearly through the compartment.
"Head for the Slane Theocracy."
He looked Aldred in the eye.
Those eyes — clouded but still sharp — held his for a moment.
Then the butler inclined his head.
"Yes."
The carriage slowed and stopped.
The coachman's puzzled voice came from outside, then was cut short by a brief word from Aldred.
The horses moved off again, the wheels cutting an arc through the dirt as the carriage turned. Sunlight came in through the other window now and fell on Lucian's face.
He looked outside.
The road they had been taking was receding now. In its place, an unfamiliar road — heading somewhere else entirely.
Lucian looked away and leaned back against the wall.
The carriage moved on.
In the opposite direction from where it had been going.
He closed his eyes and felt the faint vibration of the wheels on the road.
His thoughts drifted far. Back six hundred years.
He thought he understood now why someone like Silshana would accept the title of god.
Six hundred years ago, humans kept like livestock had no choice but to survive under beastman rule. Silshana and the others had descended from above, saved a people with no hope, and built human nations from nothing.
With enormous power at her disposal, Silshana had held to her convictions for a hundred years, and in the end had died for the sake of the humans and the Theocracy she had built.
Perhaps Silshana could genuinely be called a god.
"Well done, Silshana."
Lucian opened his eyes and looked at the scenery passing outside the window. The sun was at just the right angle, the wind light, the distant mountains half-hidden in thin haze.
The corner of his mouth curved up.
"Didn't embarrass your old guild leader."
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