Why did you do that?
"Kill me if you must wizard, but they deserved it after what they've done to me, to my siblings."
I won't kill you, but you need a place to channel that rage appropriately.
"And where would that be?"
I will show you a better path. -- Anon Guest
Some fates are worse than death. Some crimes deserve death. I survived the first. Committed by the one who did the other one. There's a god of justice, but he never listened when I called on all of them for help. No. I could never rely on divine intervention. Not to spare me. Not to end her.
I had to do it myself. I was the only one I could ever rely on.
I escaped her grasp. I learned how to use what she'd done to me for my benefit, not hers. I learned other ways to fight. I learned ways to win. And only once the cold justice was served... did a god finally turn up.
Wraithvine. The only living deity who still has technically mortal flesh. Nobody's really tried to kill hir, but I had a decent try at it. Pity for me that ze's a Wizard who's been around since the beginning of the world. If ze didn't know all the magic, then it was because ze hadn't invented it yet.
Ze had me suspended in mid-air, silenced and immobilised. Ze also had the most disappointed expression on hir face.
"Speak the truth, and I will help you."
I had the power of words at last, but I still couldn't stab hir like I wanted. I unleashed a string of curses, but reached the truth, "You bastard! Where were you? Where were you when I needed you? When I was crying for every god and helpless and needing years ago! Where were you, you spawn of a shitheap? Where were you?"
Now ze looked disappointed with hirself. "Oh. Another one I missed. I regret that I am only capable of being in one place at any time. Would that I could learn a way to be in several places at once. How many years since you first suffered. Do you know?"
"Since I was four," and then I named the sum of my misery. All the crimes I suffered. All the horrors I witnessed. Why that nightmare deserved to die. In excruciating detail. I had to tears left to shed about it. Only fury remained.
"Now that she's dead, would you spend your anger on the next monster?"
"Yes! I will hunt them all down and paint the fields with their blood!"
"Would you rather be certain that no more monsters like her ever rise again?"
"Destroy them before they start? Smother them in their cradles?"
"Not precisely. Merely arranging things so that nobody ever becomes a monster."
I stopped struggling. "Doesn't sound nearly as satisfying, but if it saves others... I'll try it for five years."
[Photo by Lloyd Newman on Unsplash]
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