Page 26 of Flamesworn

“We need to control the flow of battle, and these traitors have made it clear that they’ll target the Akti line first. We can’t risk it.” Evander sighed. “I’ll have to find them before the rota is announced.”

“I’ll do it.” Menelaus lay a hand on Evander’s shoulder. “Rest, old friend. We’ll need you at your best in the days to come. We are not so young anymore, are we? You aren’t the same young man who always had to challenge Stavros to another bout every time he pulled a fast one on you or Damian. Sometimes it was hard to remember you weren’t the oldest. You’ve always been protective to a fault, Evander.”

“You know me too well,” Evander said, the slightest smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“Well, we can’t have you waning now. Head in for the night, Evander. I’ll take it from here.”

Evander nodded, and Ares groaned as they were dragged into a training yard, where young soldiers stood before a board and wrote their names with a stub of chalk. Then they were in a room with two men who wept quietly while their children watched from the stairs—then in a city surrounded by stone formations that looked like giant people looming over the red clay—then on a field as the Beast emerged from the shadow, his iron mask gleaming.

The guardpost was to the west, based on the way the sand took a reddish tint as the mountain range between Staria and Arktos loomed over the horizon. Soldiers emerged from the buildings with none of the chaotic panic of the children in the training yards, bells ringing from the tower at the edge of the guardpost. The soldiers who followed the Beast were outnumbered, and Ares stepped closer, wondering if they might see a small victory for Evander’s people.

Then they saw it—the tide of the battle shifting as members of the guardpost turned on their fellow soldiers, joining the ranks of the Beast’s men. The Beast himself fought quietly and with brutal efficiency, like a clockwork puppet on a set path through the sand. The soldiers who fell before him died quickly—when his blade only cut a soldier deep enough to make himstagger, he paused to finish the job, beheading him neatly before the soldier’s innards started to spill from his stomach.

Ares followed the Beast as he cut a swath through the soldiers giving way before him. “Were you calling me?”

The Beast didn’t even flinch. Ares moved around him, watching as he struck an arrow out of the air with a slight grunt of exertion. He reminded Ares of Azaiah’s corrupted self, Death with no humanity, killing for the sake of it. It was like following a storm or a rockslide. Ares couldn’t even sense the rush of battle fever or the horror of death that gripped even the hardiest soldier in the midst of war. The Beast wasn’t a man in that moment, he was a blade, a weapon. Ares knew the feeling better than most.

“But who is wielding you?” Ares asked, as the tower at the edge of the guardpost started to burn. They could feel someone calling them again, tugging at their spirit. “Who set you loose?”

The Beast beheaded a soldier wearing the stripes of a captain, and Ares was wrenched sideways, appearing in the streets of Axon yet again. They could still taste the sweat and blood that lingered in the air of the besieged guardpost, but someone else was summoning them, and they staggered as they were towed away, helpless, moorless?—

A hand gripped Ares’ arm, and Ares stumbled, dropping to their knees. They were in the street, close to the dark house that Kataida used to share with her brother. They could feel their form shifting involuntarily, taking the shape needed by every person calling to them, hair falling out of their braid, lengthening, curling, twisting, uniform flowing over their body like sand. They looked up, feeling their flesh moving over their bones as they did, jaw going hard and sharp and vulpine and soft and round and pale as a white flame.

Kataida stared down at them, brows pinched, and her grip tightened on Ares’ arm.

“What’s happening to you?”

“Being called,” Ares said. “Can’t… stay still…the way I used to. You don’t have to hold me.”

Kataida’s arm jerked as Ares almost disappeared, answering a call to war in the distance. “Do you want to be called?”

Ares laughed hollowly. “I am called. I am wielded. I’m set aside. It doesn’t matter what I want, does it?”

“It matters.” Kataida grabbed Ares’ hair in her other hand, tipping their head back. “You should take your true form and hold it. You shouldn’t have to change yourself for everyone, or respond to every call.”

Ares frowned. “I don’t understand.”

“You don’t have a form of your own?” Kataida asked. “Something that isn’t what people want you to be? I thought your hair and your eyes were part of it.”

Ares shook their head. “Not always. My hair is black in Mislia. I am a creature of ice in the oceans of Diabolos. A creature.” They barked out another laugh. “Creatures don’t need true forms, do they?”

Kataida went quiet. Ares’ body shifted as Kataida’s hand slid up Ares’ arm and along their ever-changing jaw. Their mouth thinned and disappeared, lips re-formed in a different shape, eyes changed color with every blink. Kataida pressed a thumb to their lips and held them by the chin.

“You read Atreus Akti’s letters,” she said, “didn’t you?”

“I’m sorry I tried to make you love me,” Ares said. “You’re bright and beautiful, and I feel drawn to you, but that doesn’t mean you should force yourself to touch me or to use me.”

“I don’t want to use you. People aren’t there to be used.”

“I’m not people.”

Kataida slapped Ares, just hard enough to sting, and for a few seconds, Ares remained in one shape, breathing hard. “I’ve met other gods, you know. You’re still a person.” Her voice went low,a little hoarse, as though she were trying to push down a surge of emotion. “You’re allowed to have your own purpose.”

“I don’t know what that would be,” Ares said. “What should I look like? How do you?—”

“I want you to be whoever you are,” Kataida said, and Ares felt heat spring to their eyes.

“But I don’t know.”

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