Heroes of an Unknown World: a novel by Ayize Jama-Everett

Author:Ayize Jama-Everett
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Small Beer Press
Published: 2022-10-14T18:50:53+00:00

Part Three

How do you tell the beginning of a thing? Or the end of it? Are there essential characteristics or is it just a feeling, a scent in the wind?

These damn Liminals and their plans. It’s hard to tell if they are starting something new, a liberation? Or just hastening the ends. Here, more than ever before, my efforts are shown.

As the Manna did its more personal work—a strange notion for the God of Connections—with the healing of one vassal, the preparing of its children for the toxic world of the Decimation, and the intentionally vague handling of the totem, I did what work I could to rectify the damage done by powers larger than myself. I confess to my courage being spurred on more by Taggert’s scion than from the man himself. Tamara was the one who elected to wander the gray roads with nothing more than a little luck by her side. And against demons birthed from her personal hells.

Never let it be said I was an enemy of Taggert. But friend? Was I ever his friend? Can you befriend someone who risks forgetting you whenever they blink? Better to just acknowledge him for what he is, War Master, General, Murderous Savant, Ally. And between him and the Alters, what choice would you have made? But let it also never be said that what I did, I did for him.

Samantha. There were worlds in which she was the Queen of the Horn, the Cushite Priestess that could not be stopped. In her own time, she survived the Liminal Shadow’s touch, the corruption named Nordeen. She came out the other side to provide succor to Taggert and his brood before they knew they needed it. Off her word, I helped form the two Liminal blades that call Taggert their home. Her words screamed across the Abyss, warning us of the Alters’ progress. It is for her that we would risk all. Samantha, pinnacle of the Liminals.

But first, the Nadir. Baron. Taggert’s brother. For that attack, I had to drop Liminals from the sky.

Eel Pie Island, U.K.

Taggert

This child does this type of lunacy just to get a reaction, I swear. Why teleport to Eel Pie Island Terra Firma when you can teleport two miles above and have a semi-controlled descent? I let her have what fun she can, but still . . .

“I’m getting sick of not flying,” I think to Tamara.

“Not yet,” she thinks back. “If I can feel them, they can feel us,” she tells me. Still, she’s looking down, wind fighting against his entire body; staring through the night clouds from this new angle as though she can see the whole world from this vantage and doesn’t like what she sees. Moonless, cloudy night won’t stop her from peeping everybody on the island. Can’t see her, but I know she’s biting his lips as the upward air pressure threatens to separate her upper and lower jaw. Bless Tamara for always scanning and thinking.

“You’re prepped for this. They aren’t,” I think to her.

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