Leroh held Clover's reins tightly and clenched his jaw. He was in more pain than he'd ever felt. Teela was clutching the back of his dirty tunic with both hands as they waited to depart, and the light contact against the skin of his battered back was almost enough to make him scream.
The Mantis had dismounted her long-legged stallion to help Yilenn climb up it. She went down on one knee, her tailored, flowy breeches offering a freedom of mobility typically unfit for a woman, then made a flat surface with her small hands for the siren to use as a sort of step, and instructed her on what to do to get herself up onto the horse's saddle. Yilenn looked slightly alarmed and kept looking back and forth between the stallion's back and the Mantis, as if deciding whether or not to comply.
"Go on, now. No need to be so afraid," the Mantis told her with a sly smile.
Leroh wasn't entirely certain of her intentions. Surely, if the siren wanted to accompany them, she could swim. Her kind was as adept at it as any other Sea creature, and able to travel much faster than a horse. It would have been preferable that she follow their path from the coast, he thought.
The enchanting woman finally reached a decision and lifted her pale blue skirts to reveal a leg. Her iridescent scales shone as lovely and perfect as they had before, but, this time, Leroh's attention was caught by another unusual detail that he hadn't previously observed. Her shoes, which might have been described as poulaines, were unlike any footwear he'd ever seen. He wondered if there might be a practical use for the ugly things, or if it were just the latest fashion among fancy folk. He thought poulaines were generally made of leather, but what she wore was constructed of a fine, embroidered fabric in dark blue. The toe elongated far past where the foot ended and curved upward but, different from what characterized the style, hers did not taper sharply at the tip. Her shoes continued, thick and wide, as they extended and bent in a soft upward curve. Leroh judged them rather horrible, but he knew the good opinion of a peasant lad was the last thing on a wealthy lady's mind when she selected her clothes.
Yilenn raised a scaled leg and positioned one of her strangely-clad feet on the Mantis's awaiting hands. They were both so gracious and beautiful in every movement that it looked almost like a dance when one woman slowly lifted the other to settle her gently atop the horse.
The whole process took longer than Leroh felt comfortable with, but he didn't dare to voice his concerns to the two predatory monsters. He kept quiet and waited, fighting to contain a groan of pain with every breath. Soon enough, they started to move eastward.
As they passed the outskirts of Okedam, Leroh again saw what he assumed to be the unsworn people stuck in the servant-ridden town. Many houses in that poorer area were abandoned and derelict, grime and growth coming to claim the buildings to various degrees. It was a devastating thing to behold. He could vividly imagine the families over the years, either fleeing to the nearby traditionalist communities, forced to renounce their beloved homes, or tragically falling to the Sea in one of two ways: caught unawares and eaten, or sworn to be eaten eventually in exchange for a better life. There was really only one outcome, with the Gods.
In sharp contrast to the streets near the harbor, few people lingered outside there. No children were in sight, and rightfully so. Parents and guardians would strive to keep those most vulnerable secluded and safe at all times, as was necessary. The miserable free folk still inhabiting Okedam would have grown extremely wary with time and experience, to be able to evade the danger so close to their doorstep, and Leroh knew the only reason they would continue to dwell there, against all caution, was extreme poverty. As he witnessed their harsh circumstances, he once more felt thankful for his place of birth.
From the corner of his eye, he caught sight of a woman reaching out from a window to throw a handful of small, red wildflowers to the steadily growing Wind. The light little things took up flight easily and got carried away in the breeze to scatter a distance away from where they'd been released. Leroh thought the act a random occurrence, until he saw how many of the lively red flowers littered the cobbled path ahead. Many more than that one handful.
A ritual or superstition of some kind, he thought.
They picked up the pace and rode at a tiring gallop for a while, putting a solid strain on their well-rested horses before night fell. They kept the ominous coast on their right side as they traveled in a straight line eastward, and the sound of the splashing waves on the shore provided Leroh with a constant reminder of the God who'd come so close to stealing the entirety of his life.
His left arm and that whole side of his back would soon bruise horrifically from that encounter, he knew. The Sea had first held him in his colossal fingers like nothing more than an insect, and that had been painful in itself. Leroh could not remember that entire sequence of events too clearly, however. His every instinct had flared up in a panic so all-consuming, so animalistic, that his brain was now refusing to conjure up the memories of what had occurred. He only knew he'd hung suspended in the air for an eternity, longer than that, begging to be saved. Against all logic, he'd wanted to survive, even when he knew his fate was decided, that no human could stop a God, he'd hoped with idiotic desperation to be spared so brutal an end. When the Mantis had caught him at the waist in a way that declared him as one of hers, claiming him in a way, Leroh had felt a flicker of hope so unexpected and welcome that he'd fallen into yet another spiral of emotions. Then the Sea God had flung him across the air, and he'd crashed against something solid. The pain that surged all throughout his left side from that hit had been immense, and Leroh suspected it would continue to trouble him for weeks, if not worse. At least, he told himself, the wounds were superficial. He was fortunate to not have been more gravely injured.
What he could not push out of his mind, however, was the moment when his sister had come to him to check on his health. Knowing Teela, he could be certain that she'd been, still was, completely unaware of how wretched and cowardly he truly was. She hadn't taken notice of how he'd hidden behind her in the face of real danger, how he'd purposely stayed quiet when the Sea God demanded compensation from one of them, hoping, deep within his dishonorable heart, that he'd take his sister and not him.
The light was rapidly dwindling around him, and Leroh was pricked with a jab of concern for their current situation. They were at risk of getting caught in the darkness of full night with no kindling or a safe place to set up camp. He opened his mouth to voice his distress, then closed it. Something strange was happening. Something was not right about…the weather? Was night coming too quickly? It seemed early for such sudden dimness. No clouds covered the sky, and yet the light of day was fading from one moment to the next, unnaturally fast.
"What is that?" Yilenn asked in her enchantingly melodic voice. The Mantis was also looking around apprehensively. "Something is wrong."
A burst of light drew his eyes to the horizon behind them where the Sun had been making its way down. What he saw there paralyzed him, his every muscle going taut and loose all at once. The Sun went dark.
Day turned to night in an instant, and their life-giving Sun transformed into a black pit of utter nothingness. The glowing circle of nurturing fire was gone. A thin ring of shining light was all that remained, encompassing what had been their source of brightness and warmth.
It was the end. All Leroh had known and loved, all that he was and had ever hoped to become, was over. It was the end of everything.
No one spoke a word for what seemed like years. What was there to say? Perhaps Leroh should have hugged his sister. Perhaps his sister should have hugged him. They all sat in complete stillness with their gazes upon their imminent deaths.
In a terrible way, it was glorious.
"Don't look at him!" the Mantis yelled, her powerful words piercing their silence like thunder. There was a horrific note of dread in her usually self-assured voice. "Stop! Teela! Do not look at the Sun. Look away!"
That succeeded at breaking her loose, and Leroh felt her movement behind him on the saddle as his sister twisted her body to the side to position her face away from the black hole that had yawned open in the sky.
"Leroh!" Teela shook him out of his trance.
He lowered his eyes to the dirt of the narrow path underneath him. Then he bent his head down. Before he could give any more thought to the life he'd depart, before he could say anything or even break out a tear of despair, another flash of light illuminated the world, and night swiftly dissipated into the dying light of twilight expected of that time of day.
They kept an uneasy quiet for a time. Leroh was shaking with inexplicable cold in the warm spring breeze. Then, Teela burst out with the words she could not hold in any longer. "Why did the sun do that?"
"Don't speak his name. Keep him out of your thoughts, too," the Mantis ordered her.
"Him? There is a Sun God?" she asked, as blissfully ignorant as a newborn babe.
"What did I just say, Teela? Yes, there is a Sun God. He is the ruler of Yriaa, and he's throwing a tantrum."
"What?" The question escaped Leroh's dry lips.
"I'd never seen him do that in my whole life. I thought it was a myth that the Sun could darken," she said.
"It has happened before?" this from Yilenn, who sat astride the black stallion with her arms around herself.
The Mantis replied from behind her. "It must have, for the story to exist. I wonder how many were blinded just now from his fit of temper."
"How can you be so disrespectful, if we can't even say his name?" Teela sounded angry, and Leroh felt a shiver rack his body. He could not grow used to his sister's open defiance of the vicious monster. She was the deadliest person in Yriaa, and Teela spoke to her less fearfully than she did their mother.
"I am God sworn. You are not." The Mantis bit out her response.
"Who are the Gods, then? If I am so vulnerable to them that I need to watch my words and thoughts, I need to know who they are, where they come from, how they can use magic—"
"No." Leroh silenced her. She was already a danger to herself and to him. The more information she acquired and the better came to understand the perils of the world, the worse she got. The moment Leroh had made the mistake of mentioning God servants to her, when he'd stupidly shared what the Mantis was with his sister, she'd become incensed, and that had resulted in his near-death at the Sea's hands. Teela had to be contained, for safety's sake, and answers only seemed to empower her.
"I thought we were going to die," Yilenn spoke in a weak murmur.
Leroh had, too. His hands still felt stiff with cold from the paralysis he'd experienced. He'd been, for the second time that day, absolutely certain that he'd reached the end of his life. He didn't know how to feel, now. He was stunned.
"What will the consequences be?" he asked in a trembling whisper.
"His servants will take the brunt of his ire. Don't concern yourself with it, boy," the Mantis replied, her sparkling eyes on him and her expression bitter. "You and I can do nothing about it."