The Demon Lord Is An Angel
Chapter 117: Returning Home

Chapter 117: Returning Home

As they walked in silence, towards the dawn, Amarena suddenly spoke.

"They fought hard, admirably."

"I wish I had been there," Kir replied after a long moment.

"Your regret means nothing. You could have made a difference, but that is not what happened. To dwell on such is to wage an unwinnable fight with yourself," she said. Then she added, "Do not ask a Wrathian for coddling, Heresy’s Son."

Kir felt tears well up in his eyes. He felt angry. Angry at himself for forgetting Stella. For not knowing just how swiftly Brooker would send the adventurers out to do his dirty work.

He regretted not killing the man even more now. For a few moments, he imagined turning around and flying back to the outpost. Leveling it from afar with magic, no matter the pain or cost...

"Your wrath is strong," Amarena interrupted his thoughts. "Cold, like mine... You are much closer to your zin’ai than when we last met..."

Surprise bloomed in Kir. The word was strikingly similar to the words ’person’ and ’love’ in Japanese, but there were other coincidences of language he’d encountered before. "Zin...ai?" Kir asked.

"It is a concept from Ayther, is it not?" Amarena looked up at him, having long since shed her war form, but Kir remained in his.

"Not one that I know," Kir replied.

"I knew a warrior, in the city of Tartarus. A Myoken woman who fought in one of the arenas. Human, I think. She told me much about this world." She took a long breath. "Zin’ai is... a spirit. The spirit of who you can be. The closer you get to it, the more you embrace it, the more yourself you feel. The further away, the more it will scream for your attention... and she said it could even manifest, becoming another self inside you that fights for control."

To Kir it sounded like a mix of pseudo-spiritual "best self" advice merged with misattributions of schizophrenia... but he wasn’t about to tell Amarena that. Her beliefs were valid, even if he wasn’t quite in the mood to hear about them.

He decided to change the subject.

"Amarena, the village we’re going to is where I grew up. I can try to vouch for you, but I doubt it will make a difference to them. Mostly I avoided anyone from the village, and-"

"I do not need your help," she said. "If any of them or all of them wish to challenge me, they can do so. I promise to only kill those who are true warriors."

"That’s not the issue..."

"You wish to avoid a fight. Do you not understand that battle is how we grow? That it is the key to evolution amongst demons; so why do you not embrace it?" She looked at him.

"I can’t just fight for nothing," Kir said. "And I have people I care about."

"If you care about them, should you not grow strong enough to protect them?" Amarena asked.

Kir remained silent. Of course, he’d tried to grow stronger for Rainier and Kordia’s sakes and his own. He just didn’t... It wasn’t his fault that his chosen path had been so thoroughly disrupted.

"You are soft," Amarena concluded. "Even if you seem closer to your zin’ai, you lack strength-"

"I seem to recall having plenty of strength when defeating you," Kir snapped back. Was she trying to piss him off?

"Strength of self," Amarena finished. "And when we fought, I had spent a week without sleep. I am rested now. I will not make the same mistakes," she looked at him with challenging eyes.

"You and I can sort things out after we get to Darlbridge," Kir said.

"Do you intend to march there in that form?" she asked, returning her eyes to the trail.

"If it will keep us safe-"

"Why do you not admit that you are stuck?" she asked. "I can sense it in your emotions... the way you deny your wrath."

"How?" Kir asked.

"It is perhaps the only good thing I got from my incubus father," she answered. "And I... saw you, with your familiar. The strangeling. You did not revert until she had drained you." As she admitted this she looked off into the woods, her voice varying in a way that suggested embarrassment.

Kir facepalmed.

He could feel his face burning from embarrassment at having had an audience for his escapades with Stella. After a long breath he mastered himself enough to ask "Can you teach me how to change at will?" he asked.

"That depends on how stubborn you are... I’ll admit that I was in a similar situation to you once. My mother, Leviathan, left me in my war form for weeks until she finally taught me how to master it. If you want to enter your village, I suspect we don’t have that amount of time."

"I can take some steps to get out of it; by exhausting myself, basically," Kir said.

"Then do so now. This is not the time when I can teach you," she gestured at the bodies in the cart.

By the time Kir managed it, everyone else was awake.

Noir woke with a start, which made Sam jump, then cry out in pain as they tried to move their injured arm. Stella was pushed off, and she landed in her demon form. Kir could sense she was about to complain before she saw the bodies and bit her cheek to stop herself.

With very few words, Noir confirmed that Kir was tired before changing places with him in the cart. Sam exited with him, and Amarena called a halt so that the others could take care of their business and get stretched.

Stella flapped her way over to Kir and came to rest in his lap.

"I tried to give them good dreams," she said. "It’s something gnosinians can do... I wasn’t very good at it."

Kir could feel she was tired, despite having slept. He nodded slowly. "Thank you," he said, before letting himself drowse.

Kir went to sleep to an orange morning sky, and awoke to a yellow evening one.

"Kir," Noir said, shaking his shoulder. "We need you up."

His voice was even flatter than usual.

Kir crunched upright. Looking around he saw that they had arrived at a familiar set of hills and fields.

He never had reason to go to the south side of the village, but he could recognize the small church and the pub that doubled as an inn. The town was unchanged.

Hopping out of the cart, he led the group the final distance into Darlbridge. Stella sat in the cart, disguised as a human with red hair and pink eyes.

No one was there to stop them. But as he led them through the village square, someone called out.

"Keep going, demonkin. There’s no rest for you here."

Kir turned to see a woman holding a basket of laundry. As soon as she saw his face, the look on hers changed to one of recognition. "You’re Bridget’s boy. What are you doing back here? I thought you were in some fancy school."

"We’re on break," Kir lied. It would be true soon enough, probably by the time he returned to Norneau. But if that was the case, he would just spend his time fulfilling his promise to destroy the Syndicate.

"Hmph. Keep your demonkin friends out of town," she said.

Kir nodded and turned away. He didn’t feel like dealing with her or even learning her name. Not when he already had a place to stay... and burials to perform.

A few other villagers stared out at them from their porches or workplaces as the group passed.

Amarena’s presence went unchallenged, but Kir doubted anyone in the village knew enough to distinguish true demons from demonkin. She stared back at many of them, her challenging gaze melting even some of the most hostile glares. Kir was grateful that it kept attention off the bodies in the cart, which they’d hidden with the capes and a cloak from the deceased adventurers.

A quarter hour’s walk past the village and they arrived at Bridget and Darlae’s house.

As soon as he saw it, an overwhelming sense of nostalgia rose in Kir. It seemed smaller, which would have made more sense to him if he’d left when he was little... but so much of his world had changed in only five months.

Unlocking the wards was painful for him, but he knew Bridget’s formula and was confident he could power a new ward on the way out, though it might knock him out to do so. In any case, he let Sam, Noir, and Stella inside to refresh themselves while he attended to what needed to be done.

On the side of the house that was away from the town, Kir went to the hill where his childhood swing had been. It was still there, now overgrown with creeping vines, but the place was the best marker he could think of to lay Caroon and Namosa to rest.

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