Tarrin turned that over in his mind. He didn't want to inconvenience the Selani, but he couldn't deny that having a Selani clan aiding in the defense of Suld would make a significant impact. The Selani were devastating warriors, and a single clan would be more than a match for entire armies of opponents.
"Alright then," he surrendered. "If, and only if, the Holy Mother commands it of you, I'll allow it. I won't disobey the Holy Mother either. She may not be my patron, but her symbol is branded on my shoulder, and I took a vow to obey her. I don't go back on my word."
"Then you are a dutiful son as well as a friend of the Clan, Tarrin," Denai told him with that charming smile.
"I will pray to the Holy Mother and ask for guidance," Var said, standing up and walking some distance away. Tarrin had no worry that Var would simply say what he wanted to say. Var was Selani. If Fara'Nae told him no, he would abide by that decision. His own motivations had no place in it. Tarrin was still a little wary of dragging the Selani into waht was purely a human affair, but he wasn't about to turn down any offers of aid. He would be insane not to accept Selani warriors. They were some of the greatest warriors alive.
"Jegojah, he thinks that the ki'zadun are in for a very bad shock," Jegojah cackled. "They hope to surprise the Sulasians with fell beasts and magic. Jegojah, he thinks that they will be the ones surprised, facing Sorcerers, Sulasians, Ungardt, Wikuni, Vendari, Fae-da'Nar, Druids, Arakites, Demons, and now Selani. Jegojah, he hopes to see the look on Kravon's face, yes, when the truth is revealed."
"It would be worth it, wouldn't it?" Tarrin chuckled. Jegojah was right. The ki'zadun had gone to alot of trouble to amass a frightening army of nightmares. Well, now the katzh-dashi were going to be facing that frightening horde with a wide variety of similarly frightening beings, beings feared more for their abilities than their appearances. The Vendari, the Ungardt, and the Selani were three of the finest races of warriors on the face of Sennadar, and they would be fighting on the same side, against a common foe.
Tarrin did want to see Kravon's face when he saw his worst nightmare take the field against him. To see a united world standing against his Demonic horde, an alliance of the best warriors the world had to offer.
It would be very much worth it.
To: Title EoF
Chapter 19
It was starting to get irritating.
Tarrin turned and twisted the manacle on his wrist, trying to get it comfortable. It had been itching too much lately. The fetlocks that grew on his arms and legs had expanded a little since they'd grown, extending from his forearm down to the base of his wrist now, and that meant that they were now growing above, under, and below the manacle. They itched, from the manacles pressing against the fur growing underneath them.
He'd been mystified by those fetlocks for a while now. Whenever his mind wasn't on other matters, he often looked at them, or combed them out with his claws. They weren't overly long, not long enough to reach the base of his paw when his arms were down. The fur of them wasn't long, but it was noticable, and rather thick. It made him look… strange. Not like the other Were-cats. Sarraya said that only the males grew fetlocks, the Were-cat version of a beard, and only after they had aged quite a while. Thean, among the oldest of the males, didn't have fetlocks. They set him apart from his own kind, the only Were-cat with that rather unusual decoration, a symbol of an age that had been thrust upon him unnaturally, a sign that he was no longer the village farmboy that had once occupied his altered body. In mind and soul as well as body, that Tarrin was long gone, vanished into the mists of the deepest corners of his mind, forever replaced by the dichotomous being that Tarrin had become.
It wasn't that they made him look bad. Quite the opposite, he thought that they made him look rather striking. But he understood what they represented, and that knowledge made him feel old. The trials of the past year had truly aged his mind and his soul, making him feel like he really was the age that the fetlocks represented. He just didn't feel young anymore. The fact that he was only eighteen, approaching nineteen, didn't seem to be real to him anymore. He had lived an entire lifetime in the last year. His true age was a lie, it was the age that he felt inside that seemed more correct to him than a date on a calendar.
Here he was, a rather naive boy from Aldreth, who was in the middle of forging an alliance of several different races, and he hoped one more, to defend his patron goddess from banishment. Here he was, a youth from a forgotten corner of the world, who had travelled halfway across the Known World in little more than a year, pursuing a mission that belonged in the prose of epic poetry. He he was, a boy who had left chaos in his wake, destroying, killing, trailing behind him evil forces seeking to stop him. Here he was, the implacable, merciless Were-cat who had assassinated the Emperor of the largest kingdom in the world.
The titanic enormity of that act hadn't occurred to him until lately. He had thrown the largest empire in the world into chaos, all done in order to use that chaos to secure the Book of Ages. And now he had left Arak in the hands of the Succubus, Shiika. Turned over millions of lives to the rather dark designs of a Demon. And he had no remorse over it. In his mind, Shiika would probably be a better ruler than the last Emperors had been. For now she ruled openly, with full knowledge of her heritage known to the people, and it would be her they would revolt against, not a puppet, should she run Arak into the ground. The problems before were that the domination she used to control her Emperors left them incapable of running the empire. Now, at least, they had someone competent. She wouldn't be a compassionate ruler, but Shiika was smart enough to what to do to keep her Empire running smoothly. Given the raw size of Arak, perhaps a pragmatic ruler was better than a compassionate one anyway. An empire of that size would be utterly unable to clothe, feed, and house everyone. Shiika had the mentality to make the hard choices necessary when trying to operate a kingdom that stretched further than the West did. Shiika wouldn't give a bag of gold to every street urchin, but she would stabilize things so those street urchins could find work to clothe, feed, and house themselves.
No matter what good he felt was coming out of the act, he remembered that it had been an act of impulsive emotion at the time. He wanted Shiika out of the way, and the most practical way to go about it seemed to be to kill the Emperor, to deny her the boons of her station. That he would immediately resort to such drastic measures said much about his own personality.
But he had changed over the months in the desert. He could admit that now. He had come to accept two new friends, Var and Denai, had found the strength in himself to control his feral nature when it was necessary. He'd never truly conquer it, but at least he had proved to himself that when he needed to, he could keep a reign on that side of himself. He had shifted his balance from the Cat back to the Human, allowing his humanity to again control the majority of his actions, just as it had before Jula collared him and began the sequence of events that had turned him feral. He could never trust a stranger again, or even feel comfortable around one, but he found that he could tolerate them again, listen to them, allow them the chance to prove themselves to him.
The sound of clanking pulled him from his reverie, and he looked up to see Jegojah showing Denai some of the motions of the style of swordplay he used. The Selani amazed him hourly with their almost blind acceptance of the Revenant, an undead being whose appearance would send humans into a panic. But the Selani were a very calm people, calm and open, and hard to surprise. They didn't see Jegojah as a threat, so they didn't fear him. They accepted Jegojah for what he was, even applauded such a strong desire to set things right, as was the reason Jegojah hadn't passed on with Faalken. Jegojah remained behind to avenge the torture he had endured, the loss of his honor, against the ones who had imprisoned him. The Selani found vengeance to be an honorable pursuit, so they looked upon Jegojah as a respectable, honorable being. That he was Tarrin's guest also allowed them to accept his presence in the desert. Denai was in good hands. Jegojah was a formidable foe, a warrior of the highest caliber, even without the magical powers that had made him a Doomwalker. Denai would benefit from getting instruction from one as impressive as Tarrin's old adversary.