In a World without God

Under Edulis’ blade, hypocrisy and false authority crumbled, becoming smaller than a pebble in the river and scattering like garbage.

People rushed out of the mansion to investigate the commotion; some shouted, but they all fell silent as they surveyed the scene.

The glorious gates of the esteemed Le Fay family were nowhere to be seen. The thick dust rising from the debris made it difficult to guess the original structure.

A boy stood in the center of the rubble, sheathing his sword and smiling. Someone finally noticed him and called out.

“It’s him! Cursed bloodline! A descendant of Ygraine has defaced the gates of the glorious House of Le Fay!”

Ed had destroyed the gates with just a few strokes of the sword. Thick marble and molten iron had been used to decorate them. The strongest wood from the northern coniferous forests of the continent had been chosen for the bulk of the door. How could a descendant of a witch, who couldn’t even use Magick, destroy it so thoroughly?

The people gathered murmured amongst themselves and looked around to see if there was another cause. Some wondered if there had been a landslide.

Then Kishi shouted, “That’s right! This bastard broke the gate. I saw it with my own two eyes!”

An old man with graying hair approached Ed and asked, “Is what he says true? You broke down the gate?”

Ed was calm. He answered as though the man had simply asked if he’d eaten lunch.

“Yes, I did.”

The crowd became enraged.

“Let’s kill him! Let’s hang him in the square!”

“Let’s burn him! Let’s chop up his charred body and use it as fertilizer!”

“Let’s cut off his limbs and put them in a cattle pen!”

Ed laughed. He remembered Ygraine’s words and could still hear her voice in his head:

“Captain Bosha, you always think two or three moves ahead, but that’s it. You never look four or five moves ahead. You don’t look far enough, which puts you in danger.”

He wondered if Ygraine would have told him the same thing right now, but even if he could see ten moves ahead, Ed would still have destroyed the gates.

That is Bosha’s way.

***

Ygraine always said to love people. No matter who throws stones at you or runs at you with a knife, wrap your arms around them in love.

Bosha frowned every time he heard those words. Once, in a fit of rage, he had snapped at Ygraine.

“Don’t tell me I should love the parents who threw me out?”

“You should love them,” Ygraine replied.

“Ha! How lovely of them! Giving me every opportunity to become demon food! Who wouldn’t want to grow up with that kind of opportunity!” Bosha had scoffed.

Ygraine ran her slender fingers through Bosha’s hair as if soothing a young boy.

“If you look at the world with hatred, Captain Bosha, your heart will always be burned by the flames of hatred. They will consume your heart and soul and eventually take control of your body.”

“Yes! That’s me. That’s my life.”

“No. You are not driven by hatred.”

“Is that right?” Bosha had stared into Ygraine’s eyes. Ygraine nodded.

When Bosha thought about it, Ygraine was terribly stubborn; she had never once backed down when arguing with him.

“Only when you strip away the hatred and fill the void with love will you realize who you really are.”

Ed remembered Ygraine’s words now, in the present. He knew there was a lesson he could take from them.

What is my true self? I still don’t know, Ed thought.

He was a sight for sore eyes. Whips had torn at his flesh. It was cut so deeply in places that the bone was exposed. His blood pooled on the ground below his feet.

After Ed tore down the gate, the House of Le Fay ordered him to be captured and punished. The family demanded that he be crucified, nailed through his hands and feet to a crucifixion frame, and displayed in the center of the town square, outside the Le Fay estate. The cross was built with a stone embedded in its center, made of a special ore that drew Magick towards it and disrupted its flow, preventing Ed from using his own Magick to escape.

Ed looked at the crowd surrounding him as they threw stones at him, spat at him, and swung whips at him.

“Those eyes! Look at those burning eyes! Can those be the eyes of a twelve-year-old boy?” “He must be the embodiment of the witch Ygraine! He should be burned at once!” someone in the crowd cried.

“Yes!” others agreed, and they began to look for a way to build a fire.

As one of the men reached for a torch, the oldest of the group shouted for them to stop, making his way toward the front of the group. He stopped in front of Ed.

“Stop this instance!”

The man starting the fire stopped and turned to look at the older man.

“Why? If this bastard is the embodiment of a witch, it is only right that the people see him put to death! The descendants of witches must be put to death by the descendants of heroes!"

Voices of agreement rose up once more from the crowd.

The older man spoke up again.

“Bandage this cursed child. Put some water-soaked bread in his mouth and somehow keep him alive until the Day of the Saint! Yes, he should die, but not by our hands. It must be done the way it has always been done. Put away your fire. He will receive the slow death he deserves, and it will send a clear message to all descended from the witch!”

The crowd murmured amongst themselves. Then, they slowly obeyed.

Do they know what they’re doing, throwing stones at a twelve-year-old and whipping him? They claim to be the descendants of heroes, Ed thought to himself.

Foolish and ugly. He wondered if Bosha looked as foolish and ugly in Ygraine’s eyes when she first met him.

Ed opened his mouth to speak and shouted at the departing crowd.

“You all are swallowed up by lies, blinded by hatred!”

The people stopped and looked back at Ed before and began cursing him.

“Shut up, you cursed one!”

“The witch incarnate is about to curse us! Plug his mouth!”

Ed chuckled and opened his mouth again, though it contained no curse word.

“In the name of the Goddess Lutea, I forgive you.”

***

Even the most beautiful people can smell rotten after days on the battlefield in full military regalia, but not Ygraine. After marching for three days without washing or sleeping, she still smelled good, like a spring breeze carrying the scent of wildflowers or fresh, sweet fruit.

Why doesn’t she smell like sweat? Bosha had thought. It was the first thing that made Bosha suspect Ygraine might not be human.

Now Ed thought that he, too, could smell Ygraine’s sweet scent. It wafted through the air so close and as strong as when Ygraine had embraced Bosha.

Ygraine?

Ed wanted to call her name out loud, but the words wouldn’t come. The enraged crowd had severed his vocal cords.

“To speak the name of a goddess with a filthy mouth!” they had shouted at him, furious.

After his vocal cords were cut, Ed lost consciousness. He didn’t know how much time had passed. It was hard to open his eyes. It was painful to feel the wind blowing across his wounds. But there was something else. Something felt different.

Is Ygraine… nearby?

Ygraine used her Magick in a very unusual way. When Ygraine’s pure white Magick flowed through someone’s body, even large wounds healed quickly. While normal healing Magick could only stop the bleeding at best, Ygraine’s Magick could restore the body to complete health. It was Magick that could not be duplicated.

People said that when Ygraine used her healing magic, it felt like being embraced by a mother. Bosha didn’t know what a mother’s embrace felt like, but he guessed it was a very comfortable and warm place. When Ygraine’s Magick flowed through him, he felt so cozy he could fall asleep.

Now, that same feeling was enveloping Ed. His pain slowly faded, and he could feel the flesh tingling where the whip had exposed his bones.

Ygraine!

She said they would meet again, and Ygraine didn’t lie. She came to Ed to fulfill a promise and to say what she had not been able to say to Bosha before he died.

Ed’s heart soared. The belief that somewhere in this world, Ygraine existed was the driving force keeping him going in this shitty world.

Ed concentrated all his strength on opening his heavy eyelids, determined to see Ygraine again.

Finally, the landscape came into view. The sun had long since set, and in the distance of the dimly lit square, Ed could see the remains of the gate he had smashed. He looked around desperately for any sign of Ygraine. But there was no one—not Ygraine, not anyone.

It can’t be! Surely, this smell is Ygraine’s!

Then Ed realized. The source of the scent was emanating from his own body.

The pure white Magick, the Magick of Ygraine, was circling his body. It did so of its own accord, regardless of Ed’s will.

While the stone bound Ed’s Magick, Ygraine’s Magick flowed as it pleased. The stone didn’t seem to affect it at all.

This is… what the hell?

Just as Ed tried to figure out how the Magick could work, he heard footsteps approaching through the night. They were headed straight toward him.

***

“Kurzina, it’s getting late.”

Kurzina’s father opened the door to the chapel and looked in on his daughter. Her long black hair was tied back and covered with a shawl, and her hands were clasped together in prayer.

“Is something troubling you? You’ve been praying for a long time today?” he asked.

“Father,” Kurzina turned to him and unclasped her hands, her face etched with deep concern despite being only thirteen years old. “I keep… having doubts.”

“What do you mean?”

Kurzina’s father was surprised. She was the most religious child in the Le Fay family, preferring to read the Holy Verses than socialize with her peers. Kurzina admired the Goddess Lutea more than anyone else. What could be troubling her?

“The boy said earlier that he forgives us. Forgiveness is the closest thing to the goddess. How can the scion of a witch speak of it?”

“That’s because he’s a witch. He is trying to deceive us by mimicking the words of a goddess.”

“But…” Kurzina was not convinced. “The Goddess Lutea has spoken. To think only of love. To love your enemies, to embrace them. But we threw stones at the boy, whipped his body, and cut his vocal cords.”

“Oh, Kurzina, my sweet daughter, the Goddess Lutea would not forgive the descendants of the witch. The child is the embodiment of a witch, so it is only right that he should be punished. You must not feel sorry for him. Punishing the witch is the right thing to do as a descendant of the heroic Bosha.”

Kurzina knew her father was right. The witch’s offspring deserved to be punished. She knew this in her head, but accepting it in her heart was hard. The sight of the boy covered in blood haunted her. Was that really what the Goddess Lutea wanted?

Later, as Kurzina lay in bed, sleep would not come. The boy’s face and words kept echoing in her mind:

“You are all swallowed by lies, blinded by hatred.”

“In the name of the Goddess Lutea, I forgive you.”

Unable to sleep, Kurzina got up and left her room. She sought out the chapel again, for it was the only place she felt at peace.

As Kurzina crossed the hallway to the chapel, a cool night breeze blew through an open window that led to the garden.

It was then that Kurzina smelled it, a new scent mingling with the night air. She’d never smelled such a scent before on the grounds of the Le Fay manor. It smelled like milk mixed with honey, like sun-dried wool, like being wrapped in her mother’s warm embrace.

Kurzina remembered something she had read in the Holy Verses.

A thousand years ago, the Goddess Lutea had defeated the demon Ereshkigal. It was said that Lutea took on human form for a time, leaving behind the scent of the celestial flower Delua, and fresh grass grew wherever she lay.

Kurzina had tried hard to imagine what scent the Delua might have. As she caught another noseful of this new scent on the grounds, carried by the wind, she felt sure that this was precisely what the Delua would smell like based on the scripture's description.

Instead of going to the chapel, Kurzina changed direction and began walking towards the source of the smell.

It was easy to follow the smell but hard to accept its reality. As Kurzina got closer, the scent became even more empowering. She looked up and finally saw its source.

It was the bloody boy hanging in the square.

Grassy vines grew from the base of the cross and wrapped around the frame. The floor was stone, so grass should not have been able to grow here, but flowers sprouted from the cracks.

Kurzina looked up at Ed. She stared for a long time, her mind racing, before finally opening her mouth to speak.

“Is this a miracle of yours?” Kurzina pointed to the grass. Ed slowly lifted his head just enough to see who had spoken to him. Though his mouth was impossibly dry, he managed to talk.

“A miracle? You see a blade of grass grow and call it a miracle?”

Kurzina’s jaw dropped in surprise. She thought the boy had had his vocal cords cut, but he was speaking to her clearly, which should have been impossible—another miracle.

“What…” she stumbled over her words. “What is a miracle, then?”

Ed lowered his head, unable to stare at the young girl before him any longer. He closed his eyes and remembered another conversation he once had with Ygraine in his past life as Bosha:

“You’re a saint, aren’t you? Can’t you perform a miracle? Let’s cause a landslide and wipe out the enemy.”

“Captain Bosha, you call that a miracle?”

“Yes? Isn’t that a miracle?”

“Not at all. A landslide is simply a rogue outcome of nature. It has nothing to do with miracles.”

“What? A landslide is ‘merely’ a mishap?”

“That’s right. A miracle is…”

Ed finally spoke up, replying to Kurzina’s question, paraphrasing the words he’d heard from Ygraine.

“A miracle is happiness shared with others, the ability to find joy together. Being able to cry with those who are sad is a miracle. Forgiveness drives out hatred, and love takes its place; that is a miracle. You are a blinded child consumed by falsehood. A child who does not know miracles. Do you see nothing but a mere blade of grass before your eyes?”

Kurzina’s expression hardened.