A Dragon's Tale Ch. 47

The dragon huntress had a slightly faraway look in her eyes before refocusing on Beth. "I found my way to where I needed to be; a busy street, but not too busy. One that had much traffic during the day and almost none at night. It was going to be cold that night; the wind which blew in from the desert was always cold at night. I stayed on that street all day begging for scraps like I had been told to."

"Why were you begging?" The blonde asked.

"Patience." The raven-haired woman replied. "Patience is always important. I begged all day, just as I had been told to. Then around twilight the street traffic dried up. The crowd of people slowed to a trickle and eventually stopped altogether. The street was deserted, and once it had been deserted for a while I retreated to a nearby blind alley to wait."

"Wait? Wait for what?"

"Patience." Kendra repeated. "With all things, patience and control." The dragon huntress got an almost amused smile on her face that was nevertheless mournful. "Patience and control; they drilled that into us. Patience and control." She said it almost like a mantra.

Beth opened her mouth to ask what came next, but Kendra caught her eye and stared at her for a moment.

Then she understood.

Patience and control.

She stilled her questions, guessing that Kendra wouldn't answer unless she had patience. She waited... and waited... and waited. She shifted on her feet several times but didn't speak. She got the distinction impression that Kendra would make her wait longer if she spoke, so she just waited... and waited.

It was several long minutes before Kendra spoke again.

"That was how long it took." She said. "That's how long I waited for a man to look into the alley and see me. I was a scrawny, dirty, badly dressed 11 year-old girl just like the Aldmiri wanted me to be. He had kind eyes, I remember that. Or at least I though they looked kind. He had brown hair, a lopsided grin, and he looked like he felt sorry for me."

Beth opened her mouth to ask what happened, but Kendra caught her eye again and the question died on her lips. The dragon huntress didn't look stern, but suddenly Beth didn't feel like she should ask.

How did Kendra do that?

"He came closer and asked if I needed help." She continued. "He asked if I needed food or a blanket for when the night got cold. I didn't reply; I was told not to. I did sort of nod, and he came closer. He was within arm's reach, but he didn't reach out. He just stood there offering help to an eleven year old girl. Do you know what happened next?"

Beth shook her head.

"I killed him." Kendra said, almost without emotion. By her tone you might've thought she was telling Beth what she'd eaten for breakfast or her favorite idle pastime. "He stepped close enough, and before he could react I drew this dagger."

Suddenly, Kendra had a dagger in her hands.

Beth gasped.

She hadn't seen Kendra draw it and had no idea where she could've possibly hidden it. Her eyes went wide as her heart jumped into her throat for a moment before she remembered that this was Kendra; she would never hurt her.

The knife's slender blade was about seven inches long and came to a wicked point. It looked deadly in the thrust, and the blonde vaguely remembered Selene had once described something similar that she'd called a "Fairbairn-Sykes" commando knife. It looked like an assassin's weapon, if there was such a thing.

"I slid this dagger into his chest before he could react." Kendra said, again mostly without emotion.

"You stabbed him in the heart?" Beth whispered once she'd found her voice again.

"Yes, but I was aiming for aortic artery just above his heart. I missed." Kendra shook her head. "He tried to fight me off, but he couldn't because I was wearing these." She tapped her forearms where the blonde knew her strength-enhancing vambraces were. "He did manage to get the dagger out, and I got his blood all over my clothes."

Kendra looked directly at her. "I was an eleven year old girl covered in the blood of a man that I had just killed... just murdered."

Beth stared.

She had still been playing with dolls when she was eleven. She couldn't even imagine going through...that. She couldn't fathom going through it at that age either. She couldn't wrap her mind around it. Her biggest concerns had been what dresses she was going to wear, her brother teasing her, and other things that seemed entirely silly right now.

"You... you stabbed him in the heart?" Beth repeated, her brain having trouble wrapping her mind around an eleven year old girl doing that.

"Yes, but again I was aiming for the aortic artery just above the heart." Kendra replied, her tone calm and even. "Do you know how I knew where that was?"

Beth shook her head.

"Because my trainers had shown me a few months prior."

"Like, in a drawing?"

"No." Kendra shook her head. "They brought me and the other trainees into a room, then dragged a man in. He fought them, but they were too strong. He fought them while they brought him in, he fought them when they threw him on the table, and he fought them as they strapped him down. The entire time he was pleading for his life."

Beth stared, her brain not able to comprehend the story her fellow wife was telling. Her brain almost refused to accept it.

"Then the instructor stabbed one of these daggers into his skull." Kendra showed the teen her dagger again. "I remember how still he was after that. It was eerie. His eyes were open and unblinking, but vacant. Then the instructor started cutting. He showed us all the places that men were weak, where to thrust, where to cut, where to..." Kendra swallowed hard and closed her eyes for a moment, then looked at Beth again. "But that wasn't the worst part. That wasn't what kept me up at night."

"What did?" Beth asked almost automatically, not wanting to know and yet wanting to know at the same time.

"You first." Kendra replied. "Tell me what's keeping you up at night."

Beth stared at her for a moment.

"Believe me when I say that whatever you've done, I've done worse." Kendra said with a calm and resolute sincerity that frankly unnerved the blonde teen. Kendra wasn't boasting, apologizing, or even rationalizing; she was simply stating a fact.

"He..." Beth felt her eyes start to get watery as a lump formed in her throat.

"He what?" Kendra asked without judgement.

"He... that first mage, he..." The blonde teen blinked and wiped the corners of her eyes as the lump in her throat got bigger and the knot in her stomach got tighter. "He... he asked if I was an angel." She blinked several times and tried to remember to breathe. "When I told him I was one of Ethan's wives, he... his eyes went wide and he asked me if Ethan really was a prophet."

Beth bit her lip and looked down. "I nodded."

"Beth, you still haven't told me what's bothering you." Kendra said gently. "I promise I won't judge, and I guarantee that I've done worse."

"He... he didn't think that Ethan was a prophet." She didn't lift her head. "What if that man was innocent? What if he thought Ethan was just a criminal and that he was hunting a criminal?" She was having trouble forcing the words out. It felt like that lump in her throat had expanded to the size of her head. "What if I helped kill an innocent man?" She hesitated. "Innocentmen."

Kendra took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I think there's something you need to know."

"What?" Beth whispered.

"There are only a few kinds of people in this world." The dragon huntress began to explain. "First are the wolves. You know them; you've met them. People like Lord Delmar, Lady Ekthros, Lord Farbrottan, and that magistrate in Arcanum, just to name a few. They are the people who prey on others without regard to the moral cost or who they hurt in the process."

Kendra leaned up against the railing and looked out across the hills of Ivernia as she continued. "Then there are the sheep. The ones who are easily led and easily manipulated into believing -- and more importantlydoing -- what the wolves want. These are both the victims and enablers of the wolves. They mostly are hurt, killed, or victimized by the wolves, but some let themselves be pushed into helping the wolves, even if they aren't wolves themselves."

"That's a bleak outlook." Beth pointed out.

"There's yet one more category." The dragon huntress countered. "That category is the sheepdogs. They are just as strong as the wolves, they are just as dangerous as the wolves, and they are willing to fight just as fiercely as the wolves. In fact, the sheepdogs are exactly like the wolves in every way except in one crucial difference. Do you know what it is?"

Beth nodded, the answer being rather obvious. "They protect the sheep instead of trying to hurt them."

"Our husband is one of those rare sheepdogs." Kendra nodded. "Now, which category did those mages fall into?"

"The sheep?" The blonde teen replied after several moments thinking about it. "I don't think he was evil, but he certainly wasn't protecting the rest of the sheep." She cocked her head to one side. "But wouldn't that make him a victim?"

"Was that soldier who survived ambushing us in Dotmier a victim?"

"Only kind of." Beth admitted. "He... well he was forced into it, but he was willing to kill us even when we hadn't done anything wrong." She then hastily added. "But he was forced into it."

"And that's the problem with sheep." Kendra turned and looked at her, her elbow still on the railing. "They aren't wolves, but they will help the wolves if pushed. And if someone is helping evil men do evil things..." The raven-haired woman let that hang in the air.

Beth bit her lip.

Kendra's logic made a certain kind of sense, but she didn't like it. She didn't like it one bit. "It just doesn't seem right to put people who aren't actually malevolent into the category of 'evil men'. That just doesn't seem right to me."

"If someone murders a man, what do we call him?"

Beth felt her shoulders slump and she joined Kendra in leaning on the railing with a sigh. "A murderer."

"Does the reason matter?"

"What about self-defense?"

"Self-defense isn't murder by definition." Kendra replied. "Murder is when you intentionally kill someone without reasonable cause. Regardless of the motivation, someone who commits murder is still a murderer, isn't he?"

"Well, yes." She conceded. "But the motivation does matter."

"Yes it does." The raven-haired women replied. "But if someone intentionally murders an innocent woman, we still call him a murderer regardless of the motivation."

"So... the men I helped kill were murders?"

"No, but they were in the middle of trying to commit murder." Kendra looked at her. "It's not radically different than if they were charging an innocent person with a sword. Remember, about two dozen of them tried that exact thing during the battle last night. We tried running from them, we tried warning them, and they knew that we were innocent. In the end, they were intentionally trying to kill us even though they knew we were innocent. They might not have succeeded, but they tried."

Beth frowned, not liking where this was going. She couldn't say that Kendra was wrong, but she still didn't like it.

"But they weren't trying to be wicked." She finally said.

"Ah, but there's a difference between malevolence and wickedness." The dragon huntress replied. "The wolves are malevolent, and malevolent men are always wicked. However,not all wicked men are malevolent. The sheep who chose to cave to pressure and do wicked things aren't malevolent, but that doesn't mean that they aren't wicked."

Kendra averted her eyes. "I was that way once."

"When you tried to kill Ethan?"

She nodded.

"You aren't anymore."

"You're a sweet girl Beth." Kendra gave her a small smile, but it faded quickly. "I'm not. If you didn't realize this from my story earlier, then let me make it clear now; I'm a cold-blooded killer. I've never been malevolent, but I have been wicked... just like the men you helped kill."

"Wicked but not malevolent." Beth frowned thoughtfully.

It made sense.

The men who'd attacked them certainly didn't seem like they were wicked people by nature. It seemed like they were just following wicked orders. They weren't malevolent, but Beth could no longer deny that they were... well, that they had tried to do wicked things even if they failed.

"You were deceived though." Beth said. "That's the difference between you and them. You thought you were doing the right thing, while they knew they were doing the wrong thing."

Kendra gave her a pained smile. "Like I said, you're a sweet girl."

"You don't agree?"

She shook her head.

"But I think it matters." The blonde pressed. "You were trying to do the right thing, or at least what you thought was the right thing. They weren't. They were willing to do evil while you were trying to do good. That seems really different to me."

"That's kind of you to say." Kendra replied, and the blonde noticed that she still wasn't exactly agreeing.

"Oh." Beth cocked her head to one side as something occurred to her. "You're a sheepdog. You thought Ethan was a wolf and you were trying to fight him off as a sheepdog fights off a wolf."

"We weren't talking about me." Kendra said, and Beth couldn't tell if she was deflecting or not. "We were talking about men who are malevolentand wicked, versus men who are wicked without malevolence. The former are wolves, the latter..." The dragon huntress trailed off, her look and tone both indicating that she wanted the blonde to finish the sentence.

"The latter are wicked sheep." Beth sighed, not liking this at all, but unable to disagree. "It never occurred to me before that someone could be wicked without being malevolent."

"It doesn't occur to many people, but I've seen more of the world than most." Kendra replied. "I promise you, some of the worst deeds imaginable were perpetrated by sheep acting under orders from wolves. Eventually, some of those sheep become wolves themselves." She sighed. "But many don't; many remain wicked sheep listening to the orders of wolves. I do believe that Taloni had an excellent quote from the Book of Light about their fate."

Beth nodded, then recited. "Do not walk the path with the wicked, lest you be caught up with them in their sins and their judgement falls on you as well."

"The men on those airships weren't intentionally trying to be wicked, but they were certainly walking the path with the wicked and thus deserved their fate. Ethan even gave them a chance to repent; to turn away from their wickedness before it consumed them. They didn't, and received the due penalty for their wickedness."

Beth looked at her. "It almost sounds like you're quoting the Book of Light."

Kendra shook her head. "No, but I am intentionally emulating its language. The Aldmiri wanted us to have a moral core to our actions, so we were educated in the Book of Light too."

"Moral core?" Beth's jaw dropped. "They had you murder someone when you were eleven!"

"They said he was guilty, though I was never told of what." Kendra shrugged, and Beth couldn't read her body language or facial expressions enough to know what she thought about that. Perhaps she was unbothered, perhaps it bothered her deeply and she was concealing it. The blonde truly couldn't tell if it bothered Kendra.

It bothered Beth though.

A lot.

The very idea of an organization sending an eleven year old girl to kill someone was just... just... She shuddered. She had a hard time believing that they could ever be on Illuminar's side. That of course led her to another question.

"Are the Aldmiri wolves?"

Kendra's face was unreadable as she replied. "Sometimes the line between wolf and sheepdog is... less clear than we might wish."

"That's not an answer."

Kendra looked at her for a long moment. "How do you feel about what you did yesterday now?"

"You're avoiding the question."

The dragon huntress almost smiled. "Yes... but so are you."

The blonde realized that Kendra wouldn't answer the question, so she turned her mind to the woman's question.

How did she feel?

She really wasn't sure.

She knew she didn't feel perfectly better, but she didn't feel as bad either. She had seen men die right in front of her before and while she hadn't liked it, they had all been wicked men, like those at Gonorran's camp. But if the men that she'd helped Ethan kill yesterday were actually wicked men and not innocent...

Hmm.

She didn't feel as bad about that.

Not good, but not as bad either.

They hadn't been malevolent, but apparently someone could be wicked without being malevolent. She had never really considered that before and didn't like it. She didn't like that someone could do wicked things -- become a wicked person -- without wanting to. She had always thought that wicked men were that way on purpose.

What if they weren't?

Or, what if some of them weren't?

What if Kendra was right and the soldiers who followed Lord Farbrottan were wicked not because they wanted to be, but because they followed wicked orders without refusing them.

Hmm.

It made sense.

She didn't like it, but it made sense.

She thought about it for several minutes, turning it around and looking at it from various angles in her head. Kendra was right there next to her the entire time. She didn't speak, or ask more questions, or ignore her either; she was simply there. For some reason, that was comforting.

Beth finally spoke after thinking about it for some time. "I think I feel better, but I don't think I could call myself 'good' just yet."

Kendra gave her a pained smile. "I know exactly what you mean."

"You have scars that aren't on your skin, don't you?"

She nodded slowly.

Beth frowned and slowly nodded too. "Well for what it's worth, I don't mind that you have scars. I wish you didn't have to carry them because I know they bother you, but you are a beautiful person to use all the pain you've suffered to help me. Thank you; I won't ever forget it."

Kendra swallowed and got a pained smile on her face. "Thank you, and you're welcome."

Beth smiled, then spoke again. "I don't think you know this, but I've been trying to figure out who I am. You know, as a person."

"Oh?"

"Yes." Beth nodded. "I don't know exactly who I am, but now I know part of who I want to be."

"Which is?"

"I want to be a sheepdog." The blonde teen said firmly. "I don't know if I am one, but I want to be one."

Kendra smiled. "There's one way that you can tell a sheepdog from a sheep every time."

"Oh?"

The dragon huntress nodded. "When a sheepdog sees someone in trouble -- even a stranger he's never met before -- he can't help but intervene. It's instinct; sheepdogs just can't help themselves."

Beth smiled. "Like our husband."

Kendra nodded.

Beth's smile widened as something occurred to her. "Or like you when you rescued Anthiel and Taloni at Gonorran's camp?"

Kendra hesitated for a moment, then nodded her head in concession.

"Thank you for being a sheepdog." Beth said, then offered a hug. Kendra took it and the blonde gave her a tight squeeze.

She didn't feel entirely better, but she did feel better. She really needed to think about this more and she doubted that she would settle herself about it anytime soon. However, now she had a way to think about it; a perspective that she didn't have before.

As their hug broke, Kendra appeared to be looking over the blonde's shoulder at something. Beth looked as well, and saw that Alana and Rachel had finished enchanting a round shield for Selene and were now attaching the regular leather travel bow prototype to the wooden board they were using as a form.

"I think I'll go see how they're enchanting the travel bow; it looks really interesting." Beth said.