Hazahnahkah was still unsure of what Yurreth meant by “freedom”. The forest beyond the “gate” to Black Garden was just that; a forest. It was perfectly boring and harmonious, with nothing special about it. Trunks stood equidistant, their spacing so precise it could almost be measured by Hwayoung’s hand, and there was virtually no other scent than a freshly washed earth. Nevertheless, Yurreth was possessed to lead them through it at great speed, and they had closed the entrance behind them. Instinctively, Hazahnahkah felt that she was running from something. That they all were. But who would know that they were here? And who could penetrate the gate when they had taken his body, the “key” inside? Hwayoung had decided to lag behind the expedition, and Hazahnahkah agreed with this decision. It wasn’t clear what everyone stood to gain from betraying Knife’s dreams and following Yurreth. For all he knew, they could be ambushed again. Even Ysan seemed to be a deeply different woman than the one Hazahnahkah once knew. She had denied to have her arm healed by any of Yurreth’s servants who had mistakenly offered to restore her injuries from the battle with Knife. Even Yurreth was curious, and when the Rapscallion asked Ysan why it became even more mysterious.

  “Then what reason would I have to keep my Ramble’s water arm?” Ysan asked back jokingly.

  The bravado impressed Yurreth, but Hazahnahkah felt that this was perhaps a matter of pride. He decided it best not to offer to heal and reawaken past wounds. Their reunion wasn’t like he had imagined it at all, nor was this the worst of the difficulties he had to face right now. He couldn’t tell what she, nor anyone else who followed Yurreth, was thinking anymore. Hazahnahkah’s perception and sensory abilities were currently limited to the front of Hwayoung’s body. He couldn’t protect her with his Terrors as he normally could. “We really should be finding a way to restore ourselves,” he whispered.

  “You mean yourself,” Hwayoung whispered back.

  Hwayoung: Guilty 140/100 → Apologetic 160/100

  Ysan: Lamented 100/100

  Hazahnahkah flinched. This was his fault. It was true. It was not wrong for her to blame him or see his actions as self-centered. He looked at his old body, the blade, riddled with holes. “I imagined you would want me to pay rent if I were to stay.”

  “It prevents us from being separated. If I die as well, wouldn’t you be able to revive me?” Hwayoung continued through Hazahnahkah’s surprise, which was a quick-beating heart and a trip in her step. “Besides… Nazaki and Vrast come first. We can figure out whatever happens later, later.”

  “But is Yurreth looking for Nazaki?” Hazahnahkah asked.

  This question provoked Hwayoung to travel up the little serpent of carriages, cargo, and saddled beasts. Yurreth was all the way at the front. It was a narrow and traveling labyrinth of singing bells and swinging tapestries to get to her. Galfarys’ calused hand stopped Hwayoung halfway through. “What are you doing?” he whispered.

  “I wanted to ask Yurreth where she’s taking us and why we’re in such a hurry.”

  “None may speak to Yurreth at this time.”

  Hwayoung snarled. She pulled away. Hazahnahkah’s voice slipped out of her. “A fool would trust a traitor twice,” he replied calmly. “You’re lucky you’re alive.”

  “I am.” Galfarys prostrated himself formally, aware of who he was speaking to. “And so are you. If not for Yurreth, Vrast would have had us all.”

  Hazahnahkah was not going to review past losses. “Why did we close the gate when we entered? Where are we hurrying to? My new state in this girl has rectified any weaknesses I may have had before. There is no sword to lose, and no way to kill us so long as I am within her.” He lied through Hwayoung’s teeth with this, but this was the best way of discouraging any more possible assassination attempts and discovering the hard way whether or not he could self-revive from a human body.

  Galfarys’ eyes flickered with agitation. They were a murky white, then back to black the next. He jabbed a finger between Hwayoung’s eyes. “And are you even aware who you are inside? You are a danger to Yurreth—a danger to us all.”

  “What are you talking about?” Hazahnahkah asked.

  “Ask her yourself,” Galfarys said. “Ask who sold the souls of all the pantheon of Serpent’s Ramble to the Woman Painted White.”

  Hwayoung’s heartbeat had quickened. Whatever Galfarys saw in the girl, he must have been seeing correctly. Hazahnahkah growled. “What is he talking about?”

  Hwayoung growled back. “It’s not your business.”

  “You are my wielder. I am your business.”

  “No, you seized my body without permission…” Hwayoung realized she had stopped walking. Hazahnahkah could not let her pursue Nazaki until they addressed this.

  Ever since he met Knife in that closet, his life had been a night market of lies. He couldn’t let it go if Hwayoung had lied too. The girl who gave him his second name. The girl who taught him speech. The girl who first saw him.

  “I said let me go!”

  “No!” Hazahnahkah blurted. “You let me go! Why is your perspective more important than mine!?” He tripped. They tumbled down a grass slope.

  Yurreth’s servant rushed to their assistance, but Yurreth boomed overhead. She directed the caravans to continue without them for they had no time. Begrudgingly, not a single person resisted this command. Hazahnahkah and Hwayoung scrambled in the darkness of the woods, each trying to seize control of the other.

  “It’s my body!” Hwayoung yelled. “You have no right!”

  “I have all the right! This is all because you didn’t listen to me! Look at what Knife did to my body!” He raised the blade. “Look at it!”

  Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

  Hwayoung turned away. “I don’t have to listen to you! You are a sword!”

  So that’s how she really felt! Hazahnahkah fell quiet. All this time Hwayoung was just using him to reach and save Nazaki. Because she was in love with him. Because Hazahnahkah was not loved back. There wasn’t a single moment Hwayoung picked him up with any intention other than to help herself.

  Hwayoung: Apologetic 160/100 → Disillusioned 199/100

  Ysan: Lamented 100/100

  “I see… You didn’t see me at all.”

  This voice came from the sword. Hazahnahkah had never done this before, but he had never felt so betrayed before. There was a loose connection between him and his body, and it dangled by a torn thread. Nevertheless, Hazahnahkah didn’t care about getting back to it anymore. He didn’t care about much of anything. Maybe his entire life was selfish too, just like this girl. How could they share heart and yet be so divided? He projected his feelings onto the world, finding beauty in things that weren’t there. All of it was in his head. Maybe he really was destined to be alone with his thoughts for the rest of his endless existence. He was practically designed for it. He almost cursed his maker.

  Hwayoung could have her free will back. Hazahnahkah never wanted it anyway. He had just wanted to protect her, but now, more than ever, Hazahnahkah wanted to protect himself. He wanted to die. He hadn’t taken one step towards connecting with anyone or anything other than himself. Everything and everyone lied to him. Maybe Serpent’s Ramble was one big lie. Maybe that was why he could control it. He was alone in the universe, and Hazahnahkah alone was its master.

  Hwayoung wandered after her company like a shadow in silence, beneath and behind her company at the base of winding hills. Wherever Black Garden was in Serpent’s Ramble, Clest, the moon, and the sun all seemed to avoid it. The night was bright, but only because of the trees; their luminescence shed cherry and gold light upon the darkened lands and wind. It was pretty, but only because Hazahnahkah believed it to be. Nothing he had ever experienced went beyond his beliefs. It was… mundane.

  Eventually Hwayoung grew worried that Hazahnahkah had left her, and began asking if he was there. Hazahnahkah had no intention of replying. Despite this, Hwayoung began whispering her story, which the Sword really did not care to hear.

  “I knew I’d get here with you or without you,” she said. “But from the moment I saw you and December 11th from that cage I knew fate wanted me to complete my promise.” She paused, unsure if Hazahnahkah to ask her more.

  Hazahnahkah did not care. The only reason she was telling him this now was because she felt she did need him now. She needed him to find Nazaki. Nothing more. Nothing less. If she wanted to be honest with him. She is doing it only to serve her own pleasures, desires, and needs. She was doing what any other creature in Serpent’s Ramble does; doing as it pleases. Eventually, Hwayoung carried on.

  “I was the last real survivor of my village. That much is true. We worshipped you, Haz. We saw your power in our own. We saw ourselves in you because we were divine… or at least we were supposed to be. Galfarys wasn’t lying about how I sold the souls of the pantheon of Serpent’s Ramble. I sold the security of my city. A city with the oldest and most ancient Ramble users remained… and our security was named… you.”

  Hazahnahkah wasn’t sure how a city of people with powerful Rambles using him to protect themselves made them different from any other civilization in Serpent’s Ramble. If the girl was trying to manipulate him, she was doing a bad job. You must know someone to manipulate them, and depressingly Hwayoung did not seem capable of this. What she said only proved him right. Words were apparently pointless.

  “It started with Yurreth’s declaration of war. She came with technology and abilities that rivaled our Rambles. She destroyed our best. Few escaped her. Only those that followed Bankanzaku and Vikushak really. They all came after you. They wanted to take you and use you against Yurreth. But you were asleep. You couldn’t fight, even if you wanted to. It all happened so fast. And there was disagreement on whose side you would fight for before you had even woken. The legacies you carried were both bloodthirsty and benevolent, some wanted to trade you away. The only reason I took you was because I wanted you to find your sister. It was the only thing the stories had in common.”

  This surprised Hazahnahkah, for he had no knowledge of ever having a sister until he had met Knife. Hwayoung was either mistaken or lying. He decided to humor himself. “I did not know I had a sister until I met her in that closet.”

  “Not know or not remember?”

  Hazahnahkah supposed that was true. He didn’t remember much before Ysan. He had only wanted to find his maker. That was all. Now he didn’t want anything. “So you’re saying you’re a good person now? That you sold me so I could find my sister?”

  “No, actually… I wanted to find your sister myself. I wanted more power. I didn’t have a Ramble of my own and I had no hope of surviving an assault. Terrible rumors surrounded Bankanzaku and I was too scared to ever venture out and find him.”

  “I see.”

  “But it took me some time to realize that I wasn’t carrying you with me. I was carrying Vrast.”

  Hazahnahkah was connecting the confusion December 11th had with him and his sister earlier. He wasn’t sure what this had to do with him. As far as he was concerned, his sister was as good as dead… and should be.

  “It took me some time for me to figure out she was leading me on in my dreams, pretending to be you,” Hwayoung continued. “I was scared of her. So I connected with her. I let her in. Vrast told me I was the first person who ever wielded her besides the one who made you. I wielded her because I was afraid she’d hate me… she was… hateful.”

  “And who made us?”

  “I only know what Vrast showed me in dreams. I was her first dreamer.”

  Hazahnahkah’s curiosity was already getting the better of him. He tried to suppress it with the better part of himself, the hateful part of himself, the part he hadn’t known until he met Knife. He’d never wanted to be like her until now, and yet he couldn’t be. Even if he was alone he wanted to know. He wanted to discover.

  “So how did you come to find me?”

  “I never did find you,” Hwayoung said. “I only saw you in my—Vrast’s dreams. Even with her Three Confessions I had never fought before. Yurreth obliterated Elba and from its carcass made Placenta. She beat me but not before Knife placed me in some kind of stasis, dreaming of her dreams. Next I woke up, I was in the same cage you found me. Her goal was to save me and reunite with you, and of course, when she finally succeeded in Osayn, I gave her away.”

  “Why? Why would you do that—? And why didn’t you tell me you knew Yurreth was Maria?”

  “Because I was scared of her. Vrasst even more so. I have seen them in my dreams. I thought Nazaki could take away my misery like he had before, but instead he ran—” Hwayoung wiped her face, surprised. She blinked another tear away, and realized these weren’t hers.

  It wasn’t that Hazahnahkah had forgiven her, or that he pitied himself. His sister had surprised him in the worst of ways. She could talk to anyone she wanted, at any time. She had met, developed relationships with, and created so many pivotal events for so many people, and what she had decided to do with her power was to sow distrust and destruction. Since even before Ysan, anything bad that had ever happened to Hazahnahkah was Vrast’s fault. A new feeling had burgeoned in the sword.

  Hideous rage.

  They needed to find Knife. Hazahnahkah needed to destroy her.