Chapter Text
The tavern wasn’t busy—quiet chatter filled the air, sure, but not nearly enough to cover their conversations and so the group sitting around the table muttered about crops and the weather with a flask of beer sitting in front of each. They met there every other night, using the noisy bar to hide their conversation from prying ears—tankards banging against the tables over hushed murmurs of floor plans, wenches distracting those who grew curious with hushed promises and sly hands.
Their operation was well hidden. Certain villagers allowed in, others kept out at all costs.
It was housed in a small town, and, on this quiet night, was why all four of them took notice of a new resident stepping through the door.
Techno’s hand slips to the hilt of his sword, Wilbur’s eyes flashing gold before settling back to brown. Tommy taps the table with his nails in a frantic pattern and Phil rises, hands folded behind his back as he moves to alert the bartender. Niki steps around the back, a glass of gin sliding onto the counter in front of Wilbur before she struts to the traveler. He holds a sword and is dressed in black silk overcoat with blood red dress pants—the colors of the kingdom of Manberg.
Shit.
Brown eyes flick to their table, narrowing. Wilbur straightens, a sharp grin playing on his lips. Techno turns away from the Manberg spy to eye Wilbur, fingers flexing against a rush of power.
Tommy thinks they can all feel their powers pressing against their skin—flowers threaten to bloom along his arm and he holds the vines back with grit teeth and clenched fists. Phil seems to be in a similar boat, nose wrinkling and hands clutching at his cloak.
Lady Earth longs to protect him with her life, shields made of blooms and swords made of branches. He can’t call upon Her now, not so close to the spy. He gnaws at his cheek.
Niki greets the Manberg traveler, attempting to lead him to the bar, but he turns away and beelines for the empty table next to theirs.
Phil sits back down. Wilbur tracks the man with his eyes, sipping at Niki’s gin.
“I sold out yesterday,” Techno offers, ignoring the presence near them. “‘Had to shut down m’stall early.”
“Really?” Wilbur hops on. “I thought you had plenty that morning.”
“Yeah,” Techno grumbles. “Me too.”
“Hello, fellas,” the Manbergian interrupts. His voice is high pitched and, when Wilbur turns to regard him with dark yellow eyes, he realizes the traveler isn’t just a traveler—the emblem of royalty’s guard is pinned upon his breast. “I hope you wouldn’t mind if I asked you a few questions? Guard’s duty.”
Wilbur tilts his head. “Of course, officer.” The guard pulls his chair to their table and Tommy digs his nails into the palm of his hand. Phil shifts uncomfortably at the close proximity of bad.
“Now, you four are good, honorable citizens, are you not?” he asks and all four nod, no hesitation. Tommy hides the urge to laugh behind a cold mask. “The king has heard… rumors about this village. Rumors about a rebellion. You wouldn’t happen to know about that, would you?”
“A rebellion?” Phil asks, shock layering over his expression like an acid, sickeningly fake. The guard grins.
“A coup,” he hisses. Brown eyes drill into Techno’s emotionless stare and Wilbur smirks at Tommy behind his back. Tommy grins.
“Oh my Prime, sir, your coat!” Tommy yells. The guard turns to Tommy in alarm, missing Wilbur sending a spark of flame to the back of the coat. Light flashes from the black overcoat and then flames are licking up the material. The guard jumps up, panic dancing across his face. He spins in a circle, patting frantically at his coat. Tommy chokes back a giggle, glancing around at the unimpressed customers around them. Niki stands behind her bar, hands on her hips as she grins.
The fire divides into strips, criss-crossing against the back of his coat, then sizzles out at a point just under the guard’s neck. Left behind, charred into the silk, a perfect star remains, with a triangle burned in the center. The man’s head drops to the floor with a swipe and a thud, Techno standing over it with a sword poised in the air, pointed to where a head should be. The body falls forward, leaving, for all to see, the symbol on the back of the man’s coat.
The symbol of the Horsemen’s Rebellion.
Two Years Prior
The town is fucked.
Wilbur knows this, the leaders know this, and the generals know this. Still, women desperately weave together flags and men gather their weapons—anything to give them any inkling of a chance against the invaders.
The commune that Wilbur lives among has been under attack for nearly three years. The kingdom invading their commune had been relentless, with waves after waves of brute force and weapons far above what their town had the materials to make, and now most of the commune had been conquered. Wilbur’s town, while having the smallest chance when backed by other villages, was completely and utterly fucked.
It was only a matter of time before the kingdom broke past their barriers.
The timer for their demise comes to an early stop, however, on Wilbur’s 24th birthday. He doesn’t celebrate it. He spends the morning at the market, bartering spare food for a knife, when the town’s church bell begins to ring. It rocks back and forth, loud clangs echoing throughout the town.
Wilbur stares at the bell, perched atop the roof. Its incessant ringing’s purpose was unmistakable—the near-constant shouts outside the wall turn gleeful and the men around him turn towards their makeshift weaponry room, a bakery, and the women run back to their homes to gather their children.
Wilbur stands in the middle of the street, like an idiot, and then lunges for the knife he’d been trying to buy. The merchant says nothing and snatches a sword from underneath the booth.
Slowly, a crowd of armored men and women form. The town didn’t usually allow women into their military, but in preparation for the inevitable invasion, they’d had everybody above the age of sixteen train for battle. Wilbur doesn’t push to the front, like some, but he doesn’t slide to the back, either. It doesn’t take long for the first soldier to throw himself over the wall. He’s quickly struck down by one of Wilbur’s fellow soldiers—oh, how the town used to be full of artists and musicians—but three more replace it. The eerie silence is suddenly filled with screams as the first of their men fall, then the streets are flooded with foreign soldiers and Wilbur has to jump away from a sword.
He jams his knife into the shoulder of someone wearing black and red. He spins around to parry a blow from a dagger, kicking at his attacker’s groin, and as the soldier falls, Wilbur watches in petrified curiosity as his neighbor falls to the ground beneath a soldier. Her blood spills onto the cobblestone, pooling beneath her white blouse.
Wilbur stumbles back in shock, mercifully left alone by the enemies, and manages to make it to the edge of the battle. He leans against a brick wall, eyes trained on the corpse in the mounds of fighting bodies—Wilbur knew people would die, but it changes things to see his own neighbor fall to the sword of another person.
She had kids.
Wilbur doubles over. Blood runs between cracks in the cobble from the massacre feet away from him, and oh Prime, Wilbur had killed someone today. Prime, how he wants to burn this whole town down.
Heat presses in on him and he’s certain it’s from his imagination, but then he looks back up at the bloodbath just outside his hiding spot—and Prime, how could he freeze, when his neighbor with children had just given her life, her children’s mother, in a desperate bid for freedom from their invaders—and is nearly blinded by a massive wave of fire.
The flames dance in the dark sky and Wilbur finds himself forgetting about the deaths just past the wall of heat, distracted by the beauty of the incandescent force. He feels drawn to it in an odd way and he wants to step closer, step into it, he’s certain it’s whispering at him to save me, save us, but another part of his head digs his heels into the ground. He grits his teeth against the pulling and pushing of his mind and muscles.
He stands there for a long time, debating, resisting. Eventually, all that remains around him is the blazing heat and soot-stained frames of buildings. Bodies line the streets and there’s more enemies than not, although no one he recognizes remains standing.
Scratch that, no one remains standing.
Shouldn’t they have guaranteed at least some survivors if they planned to light the town on fire? Wilbur steps onto the street. His shoes squish onto the cobble, blood puddles soaking into the leather. He looks down to the man at his feet. He wears black and red, and Wilbur clenches his fists at his side, and-
The body lights on fire.
Wilbur trips over his feet in an effort to get away from the heat, then he steps on another body, and that one bursts into flames, and he trips again, and then he’s laying in a puddle of blood so he screams.
The flames dance along the streets, gliding towards him, and the embers light the bodies around him.
“Save us,” it whispers. And Wilbur, surrounded by the blood and bodies of his fallen soldiers and the dancing flames, vows to do what it asks as he collapses to the ground, body struck with the weight of the heat.
Two Months Later
The war the empire has been waging had only been fought for a few months before the civil war began brewing. With the spread of Manberg into neighboring communes and city-states, Prime had been being brought further into the people’s lives. Phil, a devout believer in Eurus, did not appreciate the religious services organizer throughout the city. There seemed to be a preacher on every street corner, now, asking Phil for money towards the church.
Phil… was admittedly a bit harsh with those particular people, so it isn’t much of a surprise when, atop a mountain with a gentle breeze running through his hair and a slow stream of one-sided conversation to Eurus, someone interrupts his prayer.
“Phillip Za,” someone announces, and Phil turns to find the lead reverend of the Church of Prime standing behind him. Royal guards flank him, swords gripped between white-knuckled fingers.
“Reverend,” he acknowledges. Despite the curdling fear in his gut and the winds picking up slightly, he stands still and confident.
“You haven’t attended a service in quite some time.”
“I don’t attend services for a false god.” The guards shift, focus flicking between Phil and the preacher. Phil takes a bold stance, one the guards have likely fought against in their conquering of nearby tribes and lands.
The Reverend takes a moment to observe Phil. Judging eyes rake his frame and Phil suppresses a shiver. Eventually, the Reverend motions towards Phil. The guards step forward and so Phil steps back.
“I was hoping the tales were not true. May Prime have mercy on your soul,” the Reverend tells him, forlorn, and the Manberg guards advance. Phil trips backwards, but he’s on a cliff—there’s not much room to retreat. Any white flags are blown away, left in the footsteps of the Reverend atop Eurus’ hill. The civil war has been brewing, but it has barely started when Phil is cornered in his efforts to save himself.
“Let your ‘god’ save you now,” a guard snarls. He lurches forward and gives Phil a firm shove. His body moves away from the hand before he can process, and then a foot behind him finds no purchase in the dry grass. He’s falling, a weightless magnet in his body that drags him to the floor. Wind whips around his face.
There is no honor in his demise. There is no bloodied sword, no glorious battlefield and no sacrifice for the unworthy. Just a guard, and a hand, and the wind.
Phil doesn’t remember hitting the ground.
Four Months Later
Techno has long known the terrifying unknown called the ocean. As long as he could remember, he was sword fighting young boys on piers with sticks and sneaking onto ships against the orphanage head’s wishes—not that she really cared, a night on a ship meant one less mouth to feed, but Techno had a way of soothing the toddlers that she appreciated.
There were many names for the ocean; Nepthys, Tears of Life, the El Rapids territory, and the harsher ones: the Depths, Abyss, and Death’s souls. To Techno, she had always just been home.
He grew up on the decks of trader ships, doing chores for the Manburg explorers and hitching rides with the El Rapids crew. No one in his village was surprised when Techno managed to convince a trader to take him as a probationary crewmate.
What did surprise his village was when joyful, kid-friendly Techno arrived back in the village a year later with deep-sunken eyes, scars across his body, and a new hatred for Manburg. He returns for materials and convinces the Captain to recruit one of his childhood enemies, Squid.
Life on the sea is both rough and exactly what Techno needs. The structure and labor of the work on the crew was perfect, even if his cheeks were a bit sunk in and his scars pulled at his skin late at night. Squid is obviously hesitant, but it had been their dream to navigate the ocean since they slept in the same bed at the overcrowded orphanage. He followed Techno onto the deck and led him through the storms and droughts. Techno is not greater than Squid, Squid is not greater than Techno, and they share a hammock in the Berth, just as they had in the orphanage.
Techno only takes on the leading position when their captain dies and his crewmates thrust the title of pirate on him. Growing up in the coastal villages, Techno holds a healthy amount of anger towards the thieving bastards of the sea—but the death of Deo, their captain, to the hands of Manburgian traders had sparked a new flame of hatred only tamed by the deaths he brought in revenge of his captain.
Techno quickly rose ranks. More battles are fought and more of his crew dies, but still, Squid stays with him until, eventually, Techno holds the title of captain and Squid of his first mate.
They make a name for themselves. They gather up new crew members from each port of rebel villages that they stop at, gaining advice and information from the dockhands at each stop. Their crew of pirates turns into the beginning of a coup and Techno leads them all into battle, taking shelter in villages in return for protection from Manburg.
Then the famine hits.
Manburg catches on. Guards in disguise are sent to burn the crops of coastal villages. Fertile land turns ashen and a natural drought has the rivers receding. Techno and his crew are stranded in the sea, guards occupying docks and blocking off the only strait that leads out of the cove, and the only food on board is a stock of potatoes and the poisoned fish—for the poison of the guards had seeped into the water.
Techno’s crew is dying.
He eats the least out of the crew, prioritizing the fit men who could man the deck. Their stock grows short. Squid finds two men hanging in the berth. Techno watches three more jump ship into the poisoned waters below.
The once fit pirates wither into weak, bony men. Techno can see his ribs. Squid’s cheeks are sunk into his face. One of Techno’s men doesn’t wake up one morning, body curled into his empty stomach.
Techno hates that he can’t provide. One by one, his crew dies. Hanged, starved, or fights; it doesn’t matter. It’s Techno’s fault.
“You can’t blame yourself,” Squid tells him, late at night in Techno’s quarters. A single potato rests between them, raw, split in imperfect halves. Techno gives Squid the larger piece.
“The stores are beginning to rot,” Techno says instead of responding. “We’ll either starve or die of infection once they’re finished.”
“Techno,” Squid sighs. “Please.”
“What do you want me to do?” Techno snaps.”My men are dying and here we sit, splitting a potato and talking about blame.”
“Self pity won’t fill your stomach! Grow up,” Squid snarls.
“Nothing is filling our stomachs! We’re all going to die, Squid, and even if we muster up some edible fish, our clean water is running out.”
“Oh, so I suppose we should just cry until then? I joined this crew to fight, not shy away from danger in favor of starving ourselves.”
“Fuck off my ship, then!”
“Fine!” Squid pushes himself away from the table. Techno crosses his arms, disbelieving, but Squid simply storms out of the quarters and out onto the deck. The door slams shut behind him and Techno sighs, tension leaking out of his body to make way to a weary resignation.
He’ll die on this ship.
It takes Techno longer than he’d like to admit to realize that Squid actually left. He’d hitched a rowboat and lowered it into poisonous waves, grabbing the last of Techno’s potatoes and taking all but one of Techno’s remaining men. Edward remains, a tall, thin boy with black hair and sun-worn skin.
“Captain?” Edward whispers, when Techno leaves his quarters and notices the missing rowboat and his first mate.
“Techno, Edward. It’s too late for such formalities.”
“Techno,” Edward amends. “Are… am I going to die?”
Techno doesn’t respond. He looks out across the sea, to the land covered in red and black soldiers. The sky is gray and blue clouds billow to the west. Beside him, a young boy’s voice cracks into a sob. Techno’s eyes squeeze shut. He pulls the boy to his side, wrapping an arm around his shoulders as he guides him to sit on the deck.
“I’m scared,” Edward pleads and Techno hugs him tighter.
“It’s okay,” Techno whispers into greasy black hair. “You’ll be okay.” Edward curls into him as Techno’s hand wraps around the dagger at his hip. “It’ll all be okay, Edward, I’ve got you.”
Techno’s hand shakes when he brings the blade up to Edward’s neck. He uses his free hand to pull Edward’s face into Techno’s chest. His breath shudders. Techno plunges the knife into the side of Edward’s neck.
He doesn’t feel a thing, Techno knows, but the gurgle of blood as he slides the blade out of the neck of the young boy brings fresh tears rolling down his face.
Starvation was a painful way to go, and not one Edward should have had to experience—now he won’t.
He died in his captain’s arms.
Techno sobs, blood coating his muddy poet shirt, and throws the still-warm body off him.
He’d let his crew down. Those that survived had left and Techno had killed the one foolish enough to stay.
He stumbles to the side of his ship. Thunder rumbles around him, blue clouds moving quickly to the sea Techno was trapped in.
Techno doesn’t know if he passes out from fear, regret, or hunger, but the last thing he sees before he falls to the deck is his blood-stained hand steadying himself on the bulwark of his beloved ship.
One Month Later
Tommy doesn’t do much besides think, now. He isn’t given company—hasn’t, for a long time. Even his brother, when sent to leave Tommy food, only scoffed at Tommy’s quiet, desperate attempts for acknowledgement.
The day had arrived, and Tommy was still too busy trying to figure out what went wrong to put any effort towards an escape. Not that there was any way to escape.
No, he would not escape. He was going to die today.
His wrists are bound behind his back, rubbed raw by the tough rope that’s looped up his arms. It pulls at his shoulders awkwardly, muscles drawn tight, but Tommy doesn’t mention it, even though he’s fairly certain that his servants would adjust it.
His Gentlemen surround him, even now, tidying his clothes and hair. One of his advisors stands nearby, accompanied by two guards. They wait by the doors that, in just a few minutes, will open and seal Tommy’s fate. His Gentlemen know nothing of why Tommy has been sentenced, only that it was a direct order from the king and that, ever since, Tommy has been shut in the dungeons.
His Gentlemen know nothing but claims of traitor and witch, but Sam still kneels at his side and slips a warm hand into Tommy’s. Another hand brushes greasy hair away from his eyes, and Tommy must squeeze his eyes shut to prevent tears from spilling onto his cheeks.
He’s so cold.
“Sir,” someone demands, and the warm hands pause before slipping away. Tommy blinks open his eyes to see Sam walking towards one of the guards. They look to where Tommy kneels on the cold ground, then yank open the thick wood doors. Light floods into the chamber and all but two servants scatter. Sam and Wisp remain, and while Wisp leans down to help Tommy to his feet, Sam shoulders back a guard who attempts to grab at Tommy’s bindings.
Wisp links Tommy’s arm with his own and Sam waits a step ahead of them. He glares at one of the guards, but Wisp mutters something that Tommy doesn’t catch over the ringing in his ears, and Sam steps back to sandwich Tommy between the two men.
Their official title was Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber, but to Tommy, they’d always been far too similar to his dreams of a dad.
He’s walked out of the castle between his two loyal servants. Commoners crowd the streets, held back by knights, and a hush falls over the gathered citizens at his exit. He can practically smell the pity of the mothers that cradle children to their chests. Tommy raises his chin, schooling his expression into the well-worn mask of an emotionless prince.
The distance between him and the headsman’s post simultaneously looms in front of him and is far too short. Each step thuds against the cobble and he takes a moment to mourn the nature that used to thrive where the king had cleared out for the castle square. He wasn’t around when it was cleared away, but he’s seen the way the woods outside the castle walls are thick and dark and knows it must have been the same where their castle was built.
It takes only a few moments for him to reach the steps of the headsman’s platform. He hesitates, Sam exhales sharply and it spurs him forward. He steps up one step, then two, and then he’s at the top and looking over a sea of heads.
Sam’s arm leaves his. His eyelids flutter shut over stormy gray eyes, body malleable as clay to Wisp’s careful guidance. He’s led to kneel on the edge of the wood. Dry leaves flutter around his knees, crunching beneath his servants’ feet.
“Theseus Innet,” bellows a herald. He flinches. “Charged with crimes of treason and witchcraft, sentenced to execution by the axe.”
Gasps echo throughout the crowd. The confused faces below switch fast to terror. He isn’t sure if it's because of him or his father. The king stands behind him, he knows, watching over the execution with cold eyes and a colder fist.
“Prince Theseus,” the king says, and it's quiet but it still rings out amidst the silent crowd. “Do you have any final words to your former people?”
Former people, former because Tommy betrayed the kingdom. He betrayed them, and now he has a chance to say one last thing to his people, and he knows what to say.
He’s spent the past weeks doing nothing but thinking in the solitary dungeons below the West wing, and he’d had little to think of. He knew what he was going to say. So, as his father looms over him and his two most loyal men stand watch, he raises his chin and announces, “thus always to tyrants!”
Someone shouts in approval below, but guards quickly squirm through the crowd to reach them. Tommy doesn’t get to see what happened, just the shuffling of hesitant citizens as Wisp places a gentle hand on his chest to support his weight. He leans forward, only flinching when his cheek first touches the block.
The executioner’s platform is raised from the crowd, supported by a lone half-destroyed tree. The planks were supported by the remaining yards of the trunk. Stuck through the top, used for executions, was the top of the trunk—slits along the pale wood, bark splattered with dried blood.
The dead tree lays cold beneath his cheek. He closes his eyes but a tear slips out, pooling onto the wood. If he strains his ear, he swears he could hear someone gently telling him he’d be okay with his family, but that made no sense. His family were here, beside him and in the crowd, and there would be no okay after his father orders the swing of the ax.
He doesn’t want to see his father, but he pries open his eyes one last time to find Sam. Gentle green eyes are filled with tears where Sam is guarded by a knight. The older man musters up a small smile, comforting despite the horror in his gaze. Tommy smiles back, but a nod from his father in his peripheral wipes it away. Hot tears don’t get the chance to do more than pile up along his eyelashes before there’s a whistle. Sam’s mouth opens in a silent scream, frozen in front of Tommy’s eyes as black and red flood his vision.
It is only at dawn of a cold, autumn day that the elements awaken.
It starts with a hush, fire swelling in their confines of torches. Bonfires flicker into the wind, higher than before. There’s a breeze turned to a gust, fire blown out of its cage. The clouds swell and an East wind whistles through bricks and trees. Streams overflow. Farms, wrought by drought, are suddenly filled with life’s liquid. Blooms gush where dried, yellow leaves had wilted, and withered flowers standing vigil at the tombs of dead soldiers crawl up their post, gravestones riddled with vines.
It is not an apocalypse.
It is not an apocalypse, but where four men wake—surrounded by a town of decay, at the base of a sacred cliff, washed up on a shore, and buried six feet under—there is only a promise of revenge.
The Horsemen have arrived.