Tales of Midbar: Secret Priest

I couldn’t help thinking about Miandri that night. I was happier than I’d been for a long time.

The next day it was temple so we went there and then had lunch with Narblo and his family. He was married to a hipsickah and had two hipsick children. I managed to get Narblo alone and asked him about getting a contraceptive artifact. He said that was usually the woman’s responsibility and he’d talk to Miandri about it.

That evening, I went to my device club while Mum took Miandri to her Sorority.

All day people were telling me that I looked happy and, for the first time I could remember, I think I really was.

I took the bus home in red night and ran from the stop to the house to find white light shining from Miandri’s window (she was sleeping in what had previously been Egrindreth’s room).

A popular hobby in Pax, particularly among boys, was to collect and study “devices”, in other words machines, usually small things, that were mostly built before the Cataclysm. There were clubs for such things.

I went in and shouted, “I’m home!” like I normally did. There was no answer. Good! I bounced up the stairs and knocked on Miandri’s door.

She opened it a crack. She was wearing a dressing gown. She stared at me, for once not smiling and said, “I’m sorry, I think what happened last night was a mistake and we shouldn’t be alone again. I’m not predestined to be your girlfriend.”

“Why?” I asked.

She just closed the door.

I felt devastated, like the floor had opened under me and pulled me into a dark pit. I was nauseous and disoriented, although I knew exactly where I was. It was worse than the spell Mum used to subdue me when Attan urinated me. I started slouching away, unsure what to do.

I felt one of those bursts of power. This time it was right in front of me. I wasn’t really looking but an anavah materialized right in front of me and dropped a few centimetres to the floor. She took hold of my shoulders and said softly, “Listen, try to keep calm, focus on where you are! Do you understand?”

She was Egrindreth!

I was too miserable to say, “Fornicating gods, you can teleport!” I just looked at her feet.

She let go of me and marched up to the door of her former room and pushed it open. “It’s dangerous for untrained anavim to have strong emotions and you’ve just broken his heart! Now fix it! There’s only one way to do that!”

“He’ll be alright, it’s predestined,” said Miandri.

I turned round to see what was happening.

“She has the right to choose what to do with her body,” said Narblo’s voice.

I was walking back towards the room in a daze but that added some more confusion and a bit of anger to the mix. Perhaps I should have noticed the katchey vibes but they were probably covered up somewhat by having a katcheyah in close proximity.

“You’re in no position to take the moral high ground!” barked Egrindreth.

“Morals are just arbitrary,” said Narblo.

I walked into the room and turned to see Narblo sitting on the bed, naked.

“You’re both Benai Nibeyim aren’t you?” said Egrindreth. “I’m allowed to intervene if his life’s in danger so I’m ...”

“He just needs to open his mind to ...” Narblo started to say, spreading his arms.

Much as I liked Narblo, like all katcheyim, logic wasn’t his strong suit and his questionable reasoning could get annoying. This time it was extremely annoying!

“Child of incestuous rape!” I shouted and dived at him, swinging my fist for his face.

I wasn’t really thinking at that point but had I done so I’d probably believe things couldn’t really get much worse. They did! Narblo said a strange word and made an odd hand gesture. Egrindreth lunged in a direction parallel to me, also moving her hands in an odd way. I heard that weird grating sound you get when magic conflicts. You know, when somebody tries to use magic to destroy something that has a protection spell on it or something. Then it was like fireworks going off in my head and I felt as if I was moving a great distance in a very strange way.