webcrawl/APGTE/Book-1/tex/Ch-005.md.tex

\hypertarget{chapter-5-role}{%
\section{Chapter 5: Role}\label{chapter-5-role}}

\begin{quote}
``\emph{Where have all the good men gone? Graveyards, mostly.''}

-- Dread Emperor Malevolent III, the Pithy
\end{quote}

Running struck me as the better part of valour in this one.

The first undead I'd put down had been a bit of a pushover, sure, but
there were more coming out of the water every moment and fighting in the
muck was going to get exhausting. I wasn't sure what would actually
happen if I died here, but Black's last words were probably as much a
real warning as sarcasm. One of the shamblers got close enough to reach
for my arm but it was ridiculously slow -- small favours -- so I hacked
away at the head with a two-handed swing. The flesh and bone split like
an overripe fig and the thing went back down to wherever the Hells is
had crawled out of, sinking into the water. I flicked a glance at my
back, grimacing when I saw that even those few moments had been enough
for the rest of the bastards to gain on me. \emph{There's gotta be
fifty, at least?} And the swamp seemed intent on continuing to
hemorrhage undead every time I blinked, so I definitely couldn't afford
to get bogged down. My mouth still tasted like scum water so I spat to
the side as I pulled my way up onto the stump, looking for a way out of
this mess -- somehow I had a feeling that climbing up a tree and closing
my eyes wasn't going to cut it.

The structure in the distance still stood in the same place as earlier.
It was shaped like a tower, I thought, though I couldn't see how high up
it went. What I \emph{could} see was that the hill it stood on was
outside the swamp and currently lacking my zombie friends. It was
probably a trap, I reflected, but still better than getting pulled apart
by a horde of moaning imbeciles. There was a flicker at the edge of my
sight and I almost flinched: something was trying to catch my foot. The
edge of my sword caught the wrist halfway there, though, and I blinked
in surprise at the undead recoiled with a shriek. I\ldots{} shouldn't
have been able to do that. I was quick, but I knew exactly how quick I
was -- I'd learned it anew with every fresh set of bruises in the Pit. I
was familiar with the hateful little moment when you saw a hit coming
but knew you wouldn't be fast enough to block it, and this was one of
those. But instead my body had reacted immediately, with no heartbeat
between the realization of the need to move and the movement itself.

``Name,'' I whispered, a little awed.

I wasn't even the Squire yet, wouldn't be for a while if I'd understood
the gist of what Black had said, and already I could do things like
this? No wonder heroes were said to take on entire fortresses filled
with soldiers without a second thought. \emph{No wonder villains take on
entire groups of heroes.} Silhouettes were already rising up ahead,
littering the way to the hill in an attempt to keep me surrounded, so I
jumped back down into the swamp and got moving. The zombie who'd almost
caught me had been entirely silent: it had emerged from the waters
without a sound and given no warning before striking. Adding to that the
fact that it had tried to slow me down instead of kill me? It meant that
they were getting smarter about this. The longer I stayed here, the
harder it would get. \emph{It also means my soul is being kind of a
bitch about this}, I grunted to myself.

I pushed through the muck as fast as I could. Even here was only
ankle-deep, so I was a little quicker than my pursuers -- though not by
wide enough a margin to get comfortable. Another one rose from the mud
to my right so I ducked around a tree to make a little space. I would
have looked rather ridiculous, I imagined, if anybody had been around to
see me. Even pushing myself I was barely as quick as someone taking a
walk on solid ground and the slow-witted undead were only a threat
because of their number. Not exactly the kind of struggle you wrote epic
poems about. I managed for what seemed like an eternity to avoid any of
them before realizing that I was playing into their hands: I was going
through more effort going around them than I would actually getting into
a fight, as the rivulets of sweat running down my neck were already
proving. Spitting out one of the grittier curses I'd overheard down at
the Docks, I squared my shoulders and rammed myself straight into the
knot of shamblers barring the way ahead.

I rammed the tip of the short sword into the throat of the closest one
and it came free as I wrenched the blade out, but the other two were
already on me. What looked like it might have been a woman at some point
sank her teeth into my arm and I hissed in pain -- I knocked her loose
by hitting her temple with the pommel of the sword, struggling to keep
the last one away with my free hand. The zombie gave, though several of
her teeth remained stuck into my flesh. Could you get an infection from
a Name vision? Gods, I hoped not. Cutting away the reaching arm of the
last undead was the work of a pair of measured swings as I ducked around
the woman trying to bite me a second time, and then the way was clear
enough for me to push through. There was a fallen tree a little up a
head that allowed me to put more distance between us when I climbed up
on it, though the wood was wet and the footing tricky.

A glance at the hill up ahead told me I was maybe halfway there, so I
gritted my teeth and got back to work without taking a moment to catch
my breath.

The bite wound on my arm throbbed, and that clinched my decision of not
getting into any more fights with knots of them. I wasn't used to
fighting with multiple opponents, and I couldn't afford to take a wound
every time I ran into a pack. I stuck to hacking down lone undead as I
ducked and weaved through the trees, always keeping an eye on the hill:
the last thing I needed was to get lost in this godsdamned swamp. I took
a scrape on the face when one of them jumped out from behind a tree,
fingernails clawing as I rammed the sword into its chest. It was light,
but I'd been very lucky it hadn't been higher up: I'd fought with blood
in my eyes before, and that was always a messy business. The closer I
got to the hill the thinner in the ground the undead became. Less and
less knots, and then they stopped rising entirely. By the time the water
had turned into mossy wet earth, there were none in sight. Dropping to
my knees, I leaned up against a tree and took the chance of closing my
eyes for a moment.

Gods, I was exhausted.

The Pits hadn't been like that at all. I'd only ever done one fight a
day, and they'd never gone on this long. The opponents had been more
dangerous, but they'd never ground me down by sheer force of numbers. If
I'd slipped up even once, down in the waters, it would have been over.

``Fuck me,'' I whispered. ``Weeping Heavens, I hope the Good twin isn't
going to make this a fight.''

I pushed myself up and waited another few moments to catch my breath. I
was close enough to get a good look at the hill now, and the tower on
it. White stone, though not a kind I recognized, and it kept going up
higher than I could see through the top of the trees. Hopefully my soul
wasn't enough of a jackass to make it so I had to walk up sets of stairs
covering that height, though considering the kind of shit it had been
putting me through so far I wasn't exactly counting on it. The way out
of the outskirts of the swamp was quicker now that the ground was mostly
solid: I took the long way around a handful of ponds just in case there
was anything lurking in there, but to be honest I was too happy I wasn't
being dogged by the burning undead horde to really complain about the
tediousness of getting out of the bog.

My first surprise came when I finally got out of the trees: the tower
kept going up. All the way into the sky, and then it connected to some
sort of sprawling city that covered the gloom for miles. The whole thing
was upside down, with the tallest stone spires looking to me like they
should be falling down any moment now. Just looking at the thing was
putting back the itch under my feet that I'd associated with my old fear
of heights. Even as I continued closing the distance I could barely see
where the stones making the tower started and the next one began: it
would have appeared to be made of a single block of rock to anyone not
taking too close a look. There was a yawning doorway squat in the middle
and a pair of armoured knights stood by it, perfectly still. The suits
of armour were empty, I saw as I got closer, made of what looked like
silver. I raised a brow at that. Silver? That was the stupidest thing I
could think of to forge armour with, except maybe gold -- it was soft
metal, any halfway decent blade would cut through. The halberds they
were holding were steel, though, and that was another story entirely.
Warily, sword still in hand, I kept an eye on their weapons and hazarded
a step between them. Immediately the halberds came down, barring my way
in.

``Well,'' I mused, ``so much for the easy way. There'd better not be an
endless flood of you fellows inside, because I'd like to believe my
godsdamned \emph{soul} is a little more original than that.''

``You don't need to fight them,'' a voice interrupted me. ``You just
need to leave that\ldots{} \emph{thing} outside.''

There was a woman standing just past the doorway, and for the second
time I got to have a look at an older version of myself. No scar on her
this time, and she wore pristine white robes instead of armour. Her hair
was cut short in a way that had never suited me but looked fitting on
her: her face was more mature, the cheeks thinner and her nose not as
prominent. She was also currently glaring at my sword like it had been
used in the murder of her extended family.

``Yeah,'' I informed her flatly. ``I'm not handing that over. Not when
you've got your little friends there with the halberds.''

My new doppelganger frowned. ``I have no weapons, and they'll stay
outside,'' she replied.

``And I'm supposed to take your word on that?''

``If you want to enter the tower,'' she told me, and I recognized the
tone she was using.

I'd used it quite a few times myself, when I was letting a potential
threat know I wasn't going to budge on something. Was it worth the risk?
I didn't know how hard to put down the knights would be, and I wasn't
exactly at my best right now -- the throbbing on my arm where I'd gotten
bitten was a constant reminder of that, never mind the weariness in my
bones. The bog-bitch had called this one the ``Good'' twin, though, so
maybe taking a chance was the way to go. Still\ldots{} Moving quicker
than I'd ever thought I could, I impaled the closest knight through the
breast plate, pinning it to the surprisingly soft stone behind it. I
stepped away, hands raised in peace, as the other one raised its
halberd.

``Weaponless, see?'' I told the other woman with a smile.

The older double frowned but conceded the point with a nod, stepping
aside as I entered. The inside of the tower was empty except for a
single seat in the middle of the room: old gnarled wood, light brown and
well-polished. Not that it felt that way: the walls were covered in
colourful mosaics. They depicted daily scenes from what I recognized to
be my life -- lessons at the orphanage, evenings at the Nest, even
fights in the Pit. The tower walls went all the way into the distance,
ending in a breath-taking view of the city I'd glimpsed earlier from
above. The itch came back, but I pushed it down with the ease of
practice: that particular fear was one I'd already mastered, and I had
no intention of allowing it to crawl back into my life. Past a certain
point the walls were still blank, I assumed to make room for the rest of
my life. I squinted as I tried to make up one of the scenes higher up I
couldn't recognize, but the lighting inside wasn't good enough. I did
have a guide, though.

``That one,'' I asked pointing at the object of my curiosity. ``What
does it show?''

The other girl shot me an unimpressed look.

``That time you peeked at Duncan Brech through the cracks while he was
changing,'' she said.

I chuckled. ``And that warrants an entire scene? He's not \emph{that}
good-looking.''

Good Twin didn't seem to share in my amusement: she ignored me and
headed for the chair, claiming the seat gingerly and leaving me to stand
around like a supplicant. I sighed. And here'd I gone, foolishly hoping
that she wouldn't be as much of a pain as the other one.

``So,'' I grunted, ``out with it. Before I stabbed the other one she
took issue with how `soft-hearted' I was. What's the axe you've got to
grind?''

``The axe \emph{we} have to grind,'' the double corrected calmly. ``All
that you see here, all that you've been through so far -- it comes from
you. We're voicing your doubts, nothing more.''

``That makes me responsible for the bloody zombies, then?'' I muttered.
``That's a whole new level of self-loathing.''

The white-robed girl smiled mirthlessly. ``You have this belief that
nothing worth having can be had easily. Your adventure in the swamp is a
reflection of that.''

Interesting, but not what I'd come here for. If I'd wanted to be
lectured, I'd have taken a seat in the Matron's office and told her I'd
been fighting in the Pit.

``Fascinating insight,'' I told her flatly. ``Changes everything. I
don't suppose that's enough to knock off this part of the dream?''

A flash of anger went through her eyes, and I was almost satisfied I'd
gotten anything but condescension out of her.

``One would hope you'd take the fate of your \emph{soul} a little more
seriously, Catherine Foundling,'' she thundered, her voice echoing in
the empty tower.

``I would take this seriously if I thought what I learned here meant
anything,'' I replied, taking delight in remaining calm in the face of
her anger. ``But it doesn't. It's just a chore I have to get done before
I return to consciousness and move on with my life.''

``Yes,'' she spoke, forcing herself back into a semblance of serenity.
``Your life. As a villain in service to the Dread Empire of Praes.''

I frowned. ``That was always the plan,'' I reminded her. ``Now I just
get to skip a few steps by having a Name instead of slowly climbing the
ranks in the Legions.''

``If you don't understand how taking up a Role changes everything,'' she
said, ``then you are a fool. You are binding yourself to Evil. To uphold
its laws, champion its cause.''

``Not to put too fine a point on it,'' I grunted, ``but the Empire's
laws are the \emph{only} laws, at the moment. And let's not pretend I'm
going to champion anything I don't want to champion, because if you're
really part of my soul you should know better than that.''

The doppelganger leaned forward, a fervent light in her eyes. ``There is
another law. The one you were taught at the House of Light. Do good.
Uphold right. Protect the innocent, fight for a righteous cause.''

``You want me to be a hero,'' I realized. ``That's\ldots{} I don't think
I even have the words to tell you how \emph{stupid} of an idea that is.
Let's forget for a moment that my body's in near proximity to at least
two of the Calamities, though that should be enough in and of itself.
Heroes try to ``liberate'' Callow all the time, Idiot Twin. \emph{It
doesn't work}.''

I took a step forward.

``They try, maybe stir up a town in the south, and then they \emph{die}.
Assassin gets them, or the Legions, or Hells I've even heard Black put
down a few himself. \emph{Some don't even make it into Callow itself
before they get caught}.''

``You're already here,'' she replied. ``You know Laure, know your
people. All they need is someone to raise the standard, and they will
rally.''

``They'll riot,'' I corrected. ``And they'll be dispersed. Then I
imagine my head will look mighty righteous, spiked alongside theirs over
the city gates.''

``That's your answer?'' she growled. ``It'd be too \emph{hard}? Too
hard, not to become another tool of the Empire instead of doing the
right thing?''

``I'm all for doing the right thing,'' I replied flatly. ``As long as
it's not also the dumb thing. This isn't a story, you twit. We're living
this. If we fuck up, real people are going to die and we'll die with
them having accomplished \emph{nothing}.''

``Better to accomplish nothing than to accomplish bad things,'' she told
me.

And that was where we split apart, I realized. The other one down in the
swamp had thought that just killing everyone who deserved killing was
going to be enough, but that was a child's way of thinking. There were
always going to be more people like Mazus, more petty tyrants drunk on
power and greed. Just removing them wasn't enough: you had to change the
system behind them, the machinery that let them rise so high in the
first place. This one, she thought that just being Good was enough. That
because you were doing the right thing you'd win, in the end, and the
villains would be sent packing and everyone would rejoice. That wasn't
what happened, in real life. Sometimes you couldn't beat Evil, and the
only way to change things was to be patient and clever.

``Doing nothing is worse than being Evil,'' I told her, striding
forward. ``Getting people killed because you won't compromise is worse
than being Evil. I'm going to change things -- maybe not all of them,
but enough. And if that means getting my hands dirty, I can live with
that. I don't have to be a good person to make a better world.''

She opened her mouth but I was already upon her and my fingers closed
around her throat.

``No,'' I growled. ``You've said enough, and \emph{we are done here}.''

--

For the second time in two days, I woke up in a room I was unfamiliar
with.

Hopefully the passing out wasn't going to be a staple of my tenure with
the Empire, because it was already starting to get old. The bed I was in
was more fit for a family of four than my own meagre frame, and by the
feel of it I'd been tucked in under actual silk sheets. \emph{Well now.
Long way from the orphanage aren't we, Catherine Foundling?} I sighed
and allowed myself to luxuriate in the feeling of them for a moment,
laying back my head on the pillows and refusing to open my eyes. I
felt\ldots{} surprisingly good, actually, except for the dull throbbing
where I'd gotten bit during the dream. My senses felt sharper, like I'd
just gotten a really good night's sleep instead of gone through a Name
vision of dubious symbolism. After a few breaths the novelty of it faded
away and I pushed myself up, startling the servant tidying up by the
window where the sun was filtering in. A young man, Callowan if the skin
tone was any indication and wearing the palace livery.

``Lady Foundling,'' he bowed, looking like he'd gotten caught with his
hand in a jar full of honey. ``A thousand apologies, I did not mean to
wake you.''

``Lady Foundling,'' I repeated, somewhat bemused. ``Fancy that. If I'd
known all I needed to become a noble was stab someone in a dream, I'd
have done it a while back.''

The servant looked rather alarmed at that, though he took pains not to
let it show too obviously. ``Lord Black left orders that he be informed
as soon as you woke, my lady,'' the man said, keeping his eyes fixed to
the floor. ``I beg your leave to do so. Clothes have been laid out for
you by the bath.''

A bath? \emph{Didn't expect to sink into the lap of luxury this soon
after going bad, but I'm not complaining.}

``You,'' I gestured vaguely, ``go and do that, I guess.''

The servant excused himself again and left the room after a bow, closing
the door behind him.

``Lady Foundling,'' I repeated, chuckling to myself.

The title seemed more like a bad joke than anything else. Foundling
wasn't a real name: it was what they slapped next to an orphan's name on
the ledger when they got dropped off. \emph{Like putting a coat on a
pig.} The siren call that was the mention of a bath got me on my feet,
sliding off the bed with another small sigh of pleasure. I really needed
to look into getting sheets like those, if I ended up settling down
anywhere while I was the Squire. I padded to the window on bare feet,
shedding the now sweat-soaked shirt I'd been put to bed wearing and
dropping it on the floor. I'd never taken to wearing breast bindings:
wasn't curvy enough to need them, since whichever of my parents had been
Deoraithe had cursed me with their typically slender frame. \emph{My
parents, huh.} It'd been a while since I'd thought about them. I had no
idea who they'd been -- were, for all I knew -- since the House for
Tragically Orphaned Girls didn't keep records for me to break into. I'd
been dropped off a little after the Conquest, though, so probably not a
dead soldier's child.

The view out of the window was lovely, looking down straight on a
well-tended garden of sculpted hedges and exotic flowers. There were a
few gardeners already at work, but I didn't really care if one of them
got a look through the window: there'd been little enough privacy in the
dormitories that I'd gotten over that sort of shyness long ago. I ran
pensive fingers against the window panes, enjoying the way the coloured
glass turned my fingers green and red. \emph{Imported, has to be.} The
Glassblower's Guild didn't do work like this, so it was likely from the
Principate. The servant had mentioned my freshly acquired teacher's
instructions that he be told when I woke, so after a moment I moved
towards the doorway facing the bed. I'd never had a chance to use a real
bathtub before, so I wanted to make the most of it. The other room was
all panelled wood and white marble, with a large pool in the middle that
appeared to be a Miezan bath. \emph{Huh. Didn't think those got popular
here before the Praesi came.} I dipped a toe in the water and found it
just short of boiling. I raised an eyebrow: hopefully there was a spell
involved in keeping it at that temperature, because otherwise it would
have been an outrageous waste of wood.

I slipped out of the trousers and threw them out the doorway. There were
marble benches under the water so I slid in on one and rested my back
against the edge of the bath -- it must have been built for people
taller than me, because it came up to my neck. The warm water felt like
the best thing in the world, after the last few days, and I dunked
myself in just to feel it wrapping up around all of me. I emerged a
little ways off and came to face with a handful of small glass vials.

They were clear so I could see they were full of salts and oils: I
grabbed the closest one and took of the cap, bringing it up close for a
whiff. Something herbal. Lavender, maybe? I'd never really taken an
interest in herbalism. I shrugged and poured a little over my back,
rubbing it in and spilling some in the water for good measure. A few
moments later I was positively reeking of the stuff, so I'd likely been
a little heavy-handed. I dunked myself back under the water to rinse it
off before deciding that was quite enough indulgence for the day: the
promised clothes were on the other side of the bath, neatly folded, so I
paddled in that direction. I hoisted myself out and grabbed the cleaning
linen laid out next to them, eyeing what I'd been provided curiously.
Thick leather breeches, made from the skin of an animal I wasn't
familiar with, and a white woollen shirt. The new addition was the thick
padded jacket that looked like it would reach to my knees: I'd seen
Sergeant Ebele come in wearing one, a few times. She'd called it an
aketon -- legionaries wore them under chain mail to prevent chafing.
\emph{Looks like I'm going to be getting armour soon.}

It was surprisingly easy to put on, designed to I could tighten the
laces in the front without anyone's help. I supposed it would have been
a little absurd for the Squire to require a squire of her own, I
reflected with a snort. When I came back to the bedroom it was to find
there was another occupant: Black was lounging on an ornate chair by a
Proceran \emph{bureau} I hadn't even noticed, idly flipping through a
book. He raised an eyebrow when he saw me.

``It suits you,'' he commented.

``It's summer,'' I grunted back. ``I'm going to cook alive.'' A moment
later the memory I had of him resurfaced and I pointed an accusatory
finger. ``You -- you jackass. You stabbed me.''

He seemed to ponder that for a moment before shrugging.

``Only a little bit,'' he replied.

I'd never wanted to deck someone in the face more than I did that man in
that moment. ``That's what you're going with?'' I growled. ``\emph{Only
a little bit?}''

``If the fact that you're not screaming and bleeding out of your eyes is
any indication,'' he mentioned, ``then it was a complete success.''

``That was an option?'' I asked faintly. ``You could have mentioned that
before.''

``Yes,'' he admitted frankly. ``I could have.''

Fucking villains. Even if I was technically one now, \emph{fucking
villains}.

``Just to make sure -- the swamp and horde of undead, that's normal
right?'' I asked, seating myself at the edge of the bed.

His eyebrow rose even higher. ``Swamp? Unusual. I went through a
labyrinth myself, though I'm told the experience tailors itself to the
person going through it.''

Gods, it was kind of depressing that the best my soul could come up with
was scum water and zombies when it came to Name visions.

``I'd consider it a good thing that your experience was rather martial
in nature,'' he told me. ``Your Name's abilities are likely to be
related.''

``Well, that's something at least,'' I grunted. ``I'm not feeling all
that different, so I'm guessing that means I'm not the Squire yet?''

``About halfway there, as much as these things can be measured,'' the
green-eyed man said. ``There's other contenders, but none of them should
be quite so far along.''

``Other contenders?'' I repeated.

``Close your eyes,'' the Knight instructed. ``Focus. You should feel
something in the back of your mind, like someone watching you.''

I obeyed. For the first few moments there was nothing, but after a while
there was\ldots{} a sensation. It wasn't like he'd said, more like an
itch that wasn't quite on my skin but still belonged to me. I frowned
and tried to push the feeling, and suddenly it unfolded on me.

``Three others,'' I said, opening my eyes. ``And some fourth thing
that's not quite the same.''

He hummed in agreement. ``Try to keep your finger on the pulse of that
feeling as much as possible, from now on.''

I frowned. ``Why?''

He smiled. ``Because as of this moment, they all want to kill you.''