As Everard approached the gates of the Center of Truth dressed in his ratty pilgrim garb, the Silver Guards looked at him as they would a commoner, a pig, or a man. The sloping roofs of the slums that surrounded the Center of Truth glistened with morning icicles that would melt when the harsher sun came. Maybe they would be strong enough and sharp enough to kill him when they fell.

Mist, fog, dust, ash, it all became one and hung in a haze over the cracked rooftops, and drifted and clung to the bog-like alleyways of sewage and rot between the dwellings and the trees. Torches and candles burned dim and damp as the fog rolled in. No electricity burned in these homes, it was denied to them, kept from them, even while it was shown to them. It danced in glass on the ramparts and walls of the Center of Truth and great blue pyramid that overlooked the grim world. It was all the same as he remembered, as it had always been.

Words were carved into the rotted stone above the high gateway to Truth, words he’d been dared by resistance members to read, but never had the courage to look at.

Whether we hide from the dark or use the dark, we never become it.

Proverb Ten, Grandmother of Time

He stopped short in the damp to read the chiseled phrase, and only addressed the guards with a short nod after he was done.

“Good morning. I am…”

“What do you want pig?” the lead guard interrupted.

“I…” Taken aback at first, Everard had only to glance down at what he was wearing to understand. He’d made the choice this morning to venture out as his old self, as a real man. The guards did not recognize him, though he had walked past them just hours earlier to go into the old world market. When confronted with a person of his appearance, the unconscious trigger to lash out was built into these people.

“I’m returning from…” he started again. Everard felt their hostility, and that forced the stammer. He stumbled over his words and the sound of his own voice breaking boiled rage in his belly.

Before when he was nothing, when he shot back with a sharp tongue, or gave some smart word, he would have gotten a blow to the head, a crack from the spear or a few hours chained to the frozen fence in the center square. That was before, when he was nothing. Since Cassandra had found him those months ago, he had become something.

He felt a prickle of anger, too painful to ignore. He didn’t have to stand for this anymore, it was a past complication. He laughed to himself. He dropped his defenses, lulling them to lower theirs. He slouched back as a drunk or a pig would and cocked his head to the side. It had to be perfect. He squinted and closed his lips to a measured distance so that when he spoke, it came out in a drunk rasp.

“Right… I’m just a pig, and this is how you talk to pigs. But… I have a question. Can I ask it? The Grandmothers love proverbs... yet they burned the Bible…why?” he said, loud enough for all twelve of the Silver Guards to hear. He spread his skinny hands out, asking, daring them to make a response. Fear fluttered at his stomach in a wild rush, and they stared back in disbelief, unaccustomed to such a blatant challenge. Speaking the resistance motto to any agent of a grandmother was not advisable, let alone twelve of her chosen guard.

“You don’t even know what the Bible is,” the leader snarled.

“You’re right, I don’t know what the Bible is,” Everard agreed, "No one does. Commoners only say it because it makes Grandmothers angry.” Everard’s father had told him the Bible was a monument, a power the Grandmas had helped to pull down when they took control. Everard imagined a statue, taller than the great blue pyramid that guarded the Center of Truth. Well whatever it was, his father had said, It was good. And it is gone now.

“Why does it make you angry?” Everard asked, “You don’t know what it is either, any of you.” The guards bristled individually, each attempting to appear more insulted than the rest. They were flustered, weary even, but easily triggered. He could see it in the way they held their weapons. The stark confusion was being taken their desire for violence, and he was such a ripe opportunity.

The lead guard, acting as a spokesman before any of his fellows could take the position themselves, stepped forward.

“It is an affront to the Grandmother’s rule, to their charity…” the man started.

“It mocks her power…” said a female guard down the line, even louder.

“The Grandmothers have declared it unlawful. Are you challenging their rule, pig? By her goodness and grace you remain free of the horrors and the wastelands,” the lead guard said, his voice rising to the expected shout.

“How dare you!” another guard shouted from down the line. Everard smiled. He’d put this side of himself away for a long time, but the baiting came easily. He slipped into that old role, the one he had put aside a long time ago. The champion, the revolutionist, whatever it was, he channeled it again, if only for these few moments.

“I am challenging her.” They needed a sufficient reason to attack, which usually wasn’t much, but shock was all he received in this case. Maybe he was a little too bold in his mess making, even for such eager servants. Everard reached into the reserves of his strength, deep down in his guts where he’d buried himself, and stayed put. His body was urging him to freeze, to turn and run. Instead he poked a finger to the closest guard’s chest plate. The metal was surprisingly thin and weak and it bent at his touch. Everard withdrew his finger and the metal surface bent back into place, the illusion of strength undisturbed once again. He knew what he had to say. He sucked in his breath.

“Grandmother eats cricket,” he stated. Silence. But he felt it building now…

“I’ll cut out your tongue, pig!” the closest guard screamed and he struck out with his spear. Everard easily sidestepped the clumsy motion. Frustrated, the guard unsheathed a silver dagger from his belt and cocked his hand back to slash at Everard’s unprotected face.

The resounding clang of metal on metal broke through the attacker’s bloodlust as Everard parried the blade with the barrel of his silver pistol. Everard had practiced the move in his head a hundred times before, and now he had actually done it. It just felt right to make such a bold statement with such a bold object. The marks on the barrel could have been runes, writing, some form of ancient language or maybe just scratches from overuse, but whatever their purpose, the appearance of the five chambered pistol was enough to stop the guards instantly.

“I don’t challenge rules, because there aren’t any,” Everard said, “No one is in charge, not me, not you, not Grandma Truth, the reds, the werewolves or those monsters in the woods…” Everard whispered through his teeth.

The guards bowed their heads in submission and terror, completely broken. There was more he wanted to say that he had all of them listening, much more. Everard had never seen fear in the face of a guard, especially not one that was looking to him. It felt good, better than anything he had ever experienced in this town. He pulled back the safety on his pistol to see what reaction it gauged and the guard crumbled.

“I’m sorry… as one of Grandmothers Reds, you of course have the right to say anything… I had no idea…we did not recognize you.”

Everard shook his head.

“Neither do I,” Everard murmured. He clicked the safety back on. There was so much more he could say to these men, make them see and feel.

“Evan Red.” The voice forced his skin into a crawl and shiver. It came from behind him, but not close, and was spoken in a tone without anger. But it was enough. Like the gun, it held power beyond appearance. Everard turned. The pitted, scarred face of the man that faced him knocked out what was left of his swagger. He lowered his gun to his side. Hattamacker, the Insect Knight, Chief Bodyguard of Grandmother of Truth was not a man Everard intended to pick a fight with, ever.

“A red does not draw his weapon unless in the presence of his wolf,” Hattamacker said, "To raise your weapon to a human that carries no curse is a grievous offense. To waste silver on one is beyond foolish."

Everard tucked the gun away into its holster without a word of resistance. Hattamacker had no curiosity or understanding. There was nothing in that face, not the barest ounce of an emotion or the slightest indication of madness, and that lack of anything and everything was more disturbing than violence or anger.

"As it is your first day as a Red, I will hold judgment. Rules can seem odd to those who are used to living without them.” Everard could shrug off insults with ease, but he still didn’t like being struck down so easily in front of the guards he had just humiliated.

“No one calls me Evan,” was all he could come up with. Everard slapped his hand against the shoulder of the guard in a friendly sort of shove. “Even my friends,” he said with bravado he didn’t feel. The guard shuffled back into line. Hattamacker looked between the two of them. The scars on Hattamackers lips stretched and warped as he spoke, and Everard felt his insides curdle as he thought how much it must have hurt to have those scars created.

“Evan is your primary name. You forfeited your right to a surname when you entered the service of the Grandmothers. You will be until you are killed or released,” Hattamacker said. Everard stammered on as gamely as he could.

“I’ve come back to help the girl… the wer... not for the grandmothers.” He had to force himself to break eye contact. Hattamacker’s twisted, expressionless face chilled him, but he found he could look at it for an extended period of time out of repulsed fascination. His mind invented stories, horrific all of them, of how the face had turned into what he was seeing. Hattamacker raised a finger and shook it, cautious. The movement had more power in it than all twelve of the guards and their spears.

“Were… we do not use that antiquated term. There is nothing mystical or romantic about them. But Grandmother, in her wisdom, has seen fit to turn them, to use the wolves who are willing to pledge respect. So you are incorrect. You have come back to serve the Grandmothers, and no one else. Never forget that. Now,” Hattamacker said, concluding the conversation with that same twitch of his finger that Everard could not ignore.

“Put on your cloak, only wearers of silver or red may enter the Center of Truth.” Hattamacker gestured for one of his attending guards to step forward. And from the man’s hands, he took the folded cloth, vibrant as blood. With his free hand, Everard unwound the clasp on his old cloak and let it fall away. Red was all that was left. Faded, scarred, torn and patched and patched again around the hems, the cloak of the Red was dark and vibrant crimson. It was in no better or worse shape than the peasant coat garb he’d let fall to the dirt, but the color had been put into the hood and lining, imbedded in the fibers, not spilled or splashed by wolves or monsters. It was intentional, a statement, and that was true power.

Satisfied, Hattamacker twitched his head, and that was the only order he gave.

Everard looked back at the guards before following. Diminished or not by Hattamacker, Everard had no doubt they feared him. His anger and guts, so easily pulled up, just as easily died. These were not people taunt, he remembered. He angrily pushed at the pistol at his side, upset he had forgotten so quickly his delicate place in all this.

Together Everard and Hattamacker passed through the tall gates and headed into the courtyard. The girth of the walls was so great the passage into the courtyard was really more of a tunnel than a doorway. It went on and on in barely interrupted darkness. Lining the corridor walls were flickering orange lanterns encased in empires of illustrious spider webs likely as old as the electricity that clung to life in the cracked glass bulbs. Real light beckoned only down the line. The courtyard was free of trees and let ribbons of light fall down unhindered, and Everard breathed in the clarity once free of the damp of the stone.

“You retrieved your chosen gift from the old world market?” Hattamacker asked. Everard reached under his new cloak to the woven basket pack looped around his shoulder and tucked across his back. He jostled it and felt an unfamiliar rattle of newly purchased goods as they danced around in the empty space.

“Yes.” Everard could stop himself from looking back and marveling at the thickness of the wall, and he nearly stepped into Hattamacker as the man came to an abrupt stop.

“Did you use all the coin you were given to purchase the gifts?” Hattamacker asked. Everard’s jostled his pack again and heard the clatter of coins, a symphony he seldom heard.

“No,” he said after a few moments hesitation, deciding it prudent to not lie to this man. “Do you need it back?”

“No,” Hattamacker said. He marched forward again, leading into the light. He raised a hand and pointed to a pool of water with a raised ledge around it that stood at the center of the courtyard. The pool was cracked, and water trickled out sickly and ghostly from the stone. “Throw it there.” It was Everard’s turn to abruptly stop.

“You want me to throw it away? What if I need…” Hattamacker did not bother turning his head or stopping as he answered.

“You will want for nothing in Grandmother Truth’s service. Throw away the trinkets. They will only weigh you down.” Everard awkwardly slid his basket around so he could scoop out the handful of coins. This was more money than he had held in his entire life.

“This is more than just a trinket…”

“Silver is your lifeblood now. It turns your wolf back, gives you purpose. No other metal matters,” Hattamacker said.

“These are silver…” Everard started to say.

“But they aren’t bullets. So they are nothing. Not to us. Leave them.” Everard could not argue any further. He swallowed hard, and forced his hand to angle and let the metal pieces drop into the depths of the black water. A single coin, brown and green in color with a smudged engraving of some past monarch or god, stuck to the sweat of his palm. He shook his palm and the coin fell free and plopped down into the pool. It caught the dim sunlight, hit the surface and then slipped down into the dark to some place possibly deeper than he liked to think about. The water was so dark he could not tell how far it went. He hurried after the Insect Knight who had not slowed his pace.

Hattamacker lead down empty walkways and under boughs of green and brown trees, and all the while, a blue darker than the sky shown through the leaves and stone. They were approaching Grandma Truth’s throne room, the great blue pyramid. The metallic glimmer of the structure was too strong for any dimness or foliage to obscure. It rose higher than anything Everard had seen, and now that he was closer than he had ever been, he felt strength it radiated compared to the crumbling society he had lived in his entire life.

At long last they reached the base of a wide ramp that led up the pyramid’s entryway. Hattamacker halted.

“You are about to enter the presence of Grandmother Truth. You will wear the hood. You will carry your basket with your gift in your right hand, and you will hold your weapon in your left. You will present your gift to your wolf when I say. You will not speak until Grandmother has retired.” Hattamacker said. These were rules, not suggestions in any form. Hattamacker waited for him to clumsily raise his hood over his head and pull the silver pistol from its holster. His dead eyes scanned.

“Your word is all you have now. If you do this, you enter into the protection, and become protector of not just Grandmother Truth, but all of the Grandmothers. You hold up their ideals, become their hand, stretch from center to center, a symbol for her. There is no stepping out once you have stepped in. If you cannot fulfill your word, your life is without purpose and will thus be ended.” If there was ever a time to run away, this was it, he realized. Maybe Hattamacker was urging him. The knight’s words came off as more of a warning than anything to Everard. He could likely make it out the courtyard and through the wall. He could go, vanish into the trees and crawl back to the emptiness where they’d found him. Everard, felt his weight shifting, but reason stuck with him more than fear. He couldn’t think like this, not now. He just had to trust himself. He could survive this. Hattamacker flicked his eyes in a motion, urging him into a walk once more.

“Very well. Let’s go.”

The ramp angled to the right and stopped underneath an overhang. The blue metal armor of the pyramid here was the smoothest and strongest, protected from the weathering of the elements that slashed at the skin near the pinnacle of the structure’s peak. Sunlight glimmered between the trees and dotted the heads and faces of a dozen more guards. Hattamacker gestured for him to wait. The Insect Knight gave a single nod and the guards spread in unison to clear a path to a tiny doorway shrouded in red curtains. The female guard closest to the entrance swept aside the fabric and exposed the narrow, darkness that led into the beyond. She moved with reverence, and in absolute silence, and averted her eyes from the dark as it was unveiled. Hattamacker raised a hand for him to step forward, and Everard was all too aware of the clumsy echoes his boots made as they impacted the hard concrete of the ramp. Hattamacker stepped to the side of the door and looked inward, and Everard understood this as a direction to proceed. Everard placed his feet forward as softly as he could and moved into the remarkably small entry. He’d expected such a building to have steel gates wide as the ramp, maybe even studded with gold and coins like rumors had told. Darkness was all that greeted him.

His eyes did not adjust all at once, but he did not need to see to be able to tell there was open space before him. He felt it, a lot of it. A single crack in the armor allowed light in, and it shown down from above, at the very apex of the pyramid and bathed the entirety of the cavernous space in dim blue. Everard continued forward until the ground dropped away in a steep staircase that led down into the recesses of the structure. He’d always imagined stairs leading up when he had been on the outside. Rumors said Grandma lived near the sky, near the sun where it was pure and free, unhindered by the strangling of the trees. But he found it was darker here than any other dwelling he had ever been in.

His footsteps echoed and boomed in the abrupt silence until his feet finally made contact with something softer, a smooth, hardwood floor that covered this entire lower level. Hattamacker had not stopped him yet, so he continued to walk forward in the gloom. Shapes slowly materialized. In the center of it all there was a rising mass, a throne of sorts. A figure sat in the middle of this throne, Grandma Truth.

Hattamacker had not said if he was supposed to look or not, so he put aside precaution and gave into curiosity. He looked as hard as he could through the gloom, trying to see her. He could make out very little besides a shape. It could have been paper, he would never have known, there was no reality to it, no substance to suggest the power of the person he gazed upon. He was not underwhelmed, it was exactly what he had expected, more mystery.

His footfalls had been muted by the smooth floor to this point, and the silence was broken by an abrupt crunch with his last step. His boot had fallen onto something brittle, and crumbling. He knew this was when he was supposed to stop walking. His sweaty palm nearly slipped on the smooth handle surface of the pistol in his hand and he readjusted unknowingly as he fought down the nerves. All this time his eyes had been fastened on the small shape high up on the throne. His eyes flitted down now as quickly as he could move them. Leaves scattered around the perimeter of the throne, dead, crackling leaves. They were piled in a carpet thicker than on the darkest of forest floors. He shuffled back and uncovered a mere sliver of the wood underneath. He saw something, letters stamped into the ground, an L, entwined with a B. Maybe it was a family name, a symbol of power, Grandmother’s own initials even. He would never know, because he would never ask. Hattamacker cleared his throat, and Everard quickly looked up, remembering exactly where he was. This was not a place to think.

“Grandmother of Truth,” Hattamacker said behind him in a voice that echoed in the space and filled it. “Evan Red is here, to ask for your blessing. Can he approach?” The echoes of his words died away and Everard held his breath in expectation for an answer. The dark shape up on the throne raised a hand and then dropped it. This was the only response she gave. In some ways it was disappointing, Everard had expected words, maybe not thanks, but words of some sort. He shook away these thoughts. He was not here for her, he was here to survive. He had no business asking for anymore than he was given. Life was enough. He’d hated the Grandmothers and their rule his entire life. He did not need anything from her. He held on to that thought, but could feel it slipping. It was the power of the room, the rarity of this occasion that had him nervous, he told himself. He wasn’t here for Grandmothers favor. Hattamacker stepped up beside Everard and spoke to him now.

“We gathered you from the wild. You agreed to wear the red hood. Now you will face your wolf.” Hattamacker’s eyes had a way of being intensely dark and bright at the same time. The gleam and the depth magnified the alien in those eyes. Any words he said could have been terrifying, but the ones he did were worse than that. Everard forced his chin up and then down. Hattamacker took a step back to Everard’s shoulder and looked sideways into the darkness to a dim silhouette on the border of the leaves. Perhaps it had been there the entire time, maybe it had crept forward from the gloom just moments before. The figure was slight and wavering, and once he saw that outline, he could not look away.

“Proceed forward,” Hattamacker ordered the new shape. The single light from above filled the air enough to make her visible as she took the final step forward and cleared the dark.

At first, all Everard could see was grey. She wore a jumpsuit, stitched carefully and thickly to carefully match the curves of the body, cloaking it completely as a second skin. Then he saw dark hair, and pale skin, and pointed features. And though her eyes danced away from his, he saw the grey, reflective and stretched. He hadn’t seen her in over ten years, not since she had been a child, but he knew her. Almost nothing remained of that young girl, the one who had chased him, the one he had spurned, the one who had cried, the one he was afraid of. The vulnerability had been replaced by something much more deadly than beauty even. She was not beautiful, that was just a word. She was danger, plainly, and he had never been more afraid than in that moment, when Taya looked him in the eye.

He was going to die, and she was going to be the one, the wolf, that killed him.

Next Chapter: Taya