Faith in a Storm

Alice hunkered closer to the rocky overhang, grimacing as a fresh torrent of rain washed down her back. She checked her cartridge belt again- wet ammo wouldn't stop this storm. The hair on the back of her neck rose, tingling, and she dropped into the gravelly mud, slamming her hands over her ears as a furious streak of lightning shattered the cliff side and swept away two wagon teams with a roar louder than any ordinance. Alice swept her sopping hair aside and looked at William prone beside her, missing when things had been simpler and lying beside her had been his choice of love rather than a necessity of war. She smothered the old feelings and scrambled to her feet, slipping on the wet stone. Peter and Fredrick hustled around the bend ahead of them, their green woolen coats dark with the wet.

“Definitely a Rainmaker boss, yep.” Peter patted the leather wrapped binoculars dangling around his neck. “Dug in there deep. Poked his head out to summon that last bolt there. Gotta glimpse.” Peter winced as another flash of lightning shook the hillside. Alice just made out the screams over the downpour.

“Nice work Peter, that is good Intel and confirms the General's suspicions that this is the work of a shaman.” William looked at his unit, his foundation, and nodded grimly. He tented his hand on the rock, the flow of water parting around each finger like upside down teardrops, like depressions in her skin, and breathed deeply through his nose. Alice wished she could pull strength from the land. She used to pull strength from him. She swallowed a knot in her throat and wiped wetness from her face.

Fredrick spat a dark stream over the side. “I reckon he must be strong to call a storm like this.”

“He must be the Conduit of a region with a pretty good population,” Alice said, “I'm surprised he'd go against the Conventions like this and risk the spirit, the lives, of his people. It's betrayal.” She turned her glare away from William before he noticed and wiped the rain from her face again.

William shook his head. “It might not be betrayal, maybe his Region are zealots and are fully behind him, all fighting this war…”

“The women and children are not fighting…” Alice interrupted only to be waved off by William. He used to care what she had to say.

“It does not matter. Technically, we are going against the Conventions too. We need to get to the top of this mountain and do what we were hired to do. We need to eliminate him before he wipes our employers off this pass.”

“But we’re homesteaders William, and we're all here,” she gestured at the four of them, her friends, her family. “If you die, it's only us who lose our connection, it's our choice, our faith.” A writhing wind surged past them, trying to skin them from the rocky face. Alice grasped her rifle in both hands, squinting down at the long line of soldiers below. The wind trampled a string of them and swept several over the edge.

The three men stood as one and Alice stood alone. Frowning, she slung her rifle over her shoulder and patted the butt of it reassuringly. It was her lucky charm. It had been with her since the start of this war, when the four of them had left their farmstead in the wilderness, their little piece of Land, where William, their Conduit, lead them, and they had joined up because it was right and because the money would help them survive. William had still loved her then.

After the next spear of lightning disintegrated a wagon, Peter leaned around William and looked up to the top of the mountain with his binoculars. Alice looked as well, grimacing at the treacherous terrain and she blew hot breath over her cold fingers, preparing for the climb. Peter slapped William's shoulder, and he waved the silent command, a two-fingered salute turned on end and rushed along the narrow pathway, trusting his People to follow.

When there were no more steps to take on the dwindling path, William leapt upward and grasped the soaking stone, pulling himself up to another ledge, never looking back. Peter posted up, one foot width filling the jagged remains of the path, and cradled his hands for Fredrick, boosting him up the two body lengths William had bounded with ease. Fredrick took a knee. With one hand he clung to the rock, and with the other he reached down to catch Alice's hand as she was assisted upward in the same manner. She mirrored Fredrick's pose and unsung her rifle. The two of them held the stock, stretching the weapon as low as possible as Peter jumped and grabbed it. He scrambled up, joining them. William was several bounds higher. His magic was tied to his Land, like all Conduits, but his, unlike this Rainmaker, was a physical sort of magic, wild, feral, and it augmented his body to do things beyond a regular person. He'd told her once that if they grew their homestead big enough, his connection would let him shift into animal forms. He'd never wanted such things before.

The rain pulled and shifted momentarily, a tidal wave dashing them into the rock. Alice struck her head and lost her footing as the rock disintegrated below her. Peter grabbed her right shoulder and pushed her back into the rock, arresting her motion and dousing her in a fresh rivulet of gravelly runoff. She squeezed his hand in thanks.

They made their way upward, pulling themselves up, trying to keep William in sight. Alice remembered the last time they had all climbed like this, basalt cliffs not far from the Region they had grown up in, a small town. They had loved the danger of it, the adventure, and the freedom. They had found joy in each other and after years they decided they were a People on their own and decided to carve out their own piece of Land.

The air and the rain grew colder the higher they climbed. The metallic earthy smell fell away as the moisture in Alice's nose started crystallizing. Her fingers took on a premature rigor-mortis, frozen in a hooked claw, and she had to watch each time she set it in place, testing her weight against the hold. Long shadows raced above them with each flash of lightning below making the accent look effortless. They continued on. William waited for them under a larger overhang. His coat steamed. Their breath floated like a haze before being whipped away by a rush of wind. Alice threw her ice claws under into her armpits to slowly thaw back into hands and succumbed to her shivering.

At a quiet command from William, Peter went back into the frigid downfall to look for the Rainmaker again. William stood tall and comfortable. The same look he had after any exertion. The last time she saw it had been after he had been dragged into a room by a giggling woman, naturally helpless against her strength. He didn't realize she saw until he came out a while later, striking this pose and lighting a cigarette in the common space. He'd said they had grown apart, that the world had so much to see and to experience. He'd said they could bring it back with them to their homestead. It, them. She'd forced herself to feel cold then too, icy nothingness, the rich smells of the tavern had crystallized to nothing then too. The alternative was too much to bear. He'd said to have faith, he'd always love her.

Her faith in him as their leader was why she followed him back out into the slurry of rain and sleet. As he bounded upward with ease it was harder and harder.

The storm continued to rage below them. Alice gritted her teeth wondering how many more men had been killed by now. Her fingers resumed their freeze as Peter, Fredrick, and she continued up. They were close to the top, the cliff face was sheer. The mountain rumbled and she frantically clung to the pitiful handhold she could barely feel and coughed out the rainwater she'd snorted up with her gasp. Fredrick and Peter similarly pulled themselves tight against the face. Alice looked down past her feet at the marching column below in time to see a huge swathe of the dim lantern lights be snuffed out. Something had changed. The wind charged around them, jostling and shoving. Alice wedged her gun into a fracture in the cliff and pulled herself up. She looked to Peter as lighting highlighted the tense muscles of his jaw. Highlighted how he squinted his eyes so tightly before looking upward, the glint in them reflecting the frustration and determination that she felt as well. A look that said once they reached the top, it would be over.

Peter gave Alice a resolute nod. He looked past her and shared a look with Fredrick. The air was thick. “Gotta be close.” Alice read it from Peter’s lips. She couldn't hear him over the wind and rain. Peter leaned back, hanging from one hand, and lightning struck, a white sun blazing from the metal rim of his binoculars blinding Alice. The thunder erupted inside her head and she clung to her rifle, cowering. A sharp clean smell was overwhelmed by burning wool.

The cold brought Alice back first. Her vision came next, but it was superimposed by a ghostly burn of Peter looking upward. Her ears were ringing and she didn't know if she could hear the rain. Peter and Fredrick were gone. She let the cold consume her. She had to get to the top. Alice climbed. she fought the icy rain and dashing wind, slamming her hands into cracks and holes, certain she was wounding them but unsure of the extent. Finally, she pulled herself over the final ledge, rolling through the water, headless of any danger.

William was grappling with another man. She watched as he ferociously threw the Rainmaker towards the edge, which would've sent anyone else to the death. The Rainmaker summoned an impossibly strong gust that supported him, setting him back on the rocky pinnacle. William dove aside as lightning struck. Alice crawled through the ice and propped herself against a boulder. She flinched as another bolt turned a puddle to steam where William had been moments before and Peter's ghost was made more solid before she blinked him away, willing the ice to her heart. William lifted the Rainmaker and dashed him on the ground and barked a laugh. Alice gritted her teeth. Peter and Fredrick were dead and William was laughing.

Alice drew a fresh magazine from her belt, the waxed canvas having done its job. She sighted on the battling men, waiting for a clean shot. William prowled up to the Rainmaker, a smile playing at the corners of his lips, like a cat toying with a mouse. The other man scrambled backwards. William lunged, fist cocked. The Rainmaker sprung his hand forward and released lightning directly from his fingers, a brilliant tether connecting their two forms. Alice squinted her eyes closed and caught a familiar whiff of burning wool as William fell to the ground. The Rainmaker stood and William rolled over, their positions reversed.

The Rainmaker raised his hand, fingers spread. Alice saw his fingertips start to glow with bluish white light and she took her shot.

Alice stood next to William on the precipice. She breathed in the crisp mountain air flavored by wet wool. She tasted blood in her mouth and spit. It was drying on her face from the cut on her forehead. The warming air and majestic view of neighboring mountains and forested valleys below doing little to warm her frozen heart. It would be a long time until that happened.

“It is a pity about Peter and Fredrick. They were good men.”

Alice looked at him in shock, her mouth dropping open. “They were our best friends, our family, how can you be so callous?”

“War is dangerous and many men are lost. We have to move on. It's a big world.”

Alice's eyebrows rose and she felt something shift in her, a tearing.

William's head cocked to the side, the picture of subconscious confusion. He'd felt something tear too. He was too disconnected to realize. He rolled his shoulders experimenting with the unease. He said, “Do not worry Alice, we will always love them. But someone else will come along,” and without another word he jumped from the precipice, faithful his power would get him down as easily as it got him up.

Alice jerked forward hand reaching, “Wait!” struggling from her lips. She paused, dreading another loss, and then looked over the edge. It was too late.