Chapter 80: Chapter 80: The Night of the Seven Slaughters

Nay was dreaming about Los Angeles. She was walking on a boardwalk, except everything was gray and she was stealthed, invisible to the crowd, when she was awoken by a rustling and a strange feeling.

She opened her eyes and it took her a moment for her vision to adjust to the light. The campfire had been reduced to embers and her companions were prone in their bedrolls and sleeping. Quincy and Nom had dueling snores. When one exhaled, the other inhaled. There was movement to her side and as her vision came into focus she saw Ilyawraith, digging through her pack and fetching out her cheroots.

She noticed Nay looking at her and whispered, “Apologies. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Nay sat up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. She watched Ilyawraith walk out of the circle of light provided by the burning embers of the campfire. She got up and joined her mentor.

“Can’t sleep?” Nay said.

“Old memories, swirling around like vapors in my head,” Ilyawraith said. She got out her tinderbox to light her cheroot but Nay offered to light it instead. Nay cast Chef’s Thermometer on the tip of the cheroot and it sparked to life. Ilyawraith offered her a smoke.

Nay accepted, taking it. She lit hers off the tip of her mentor’s cheroot. She could see why Ilyawraith was addicted to these things. She even loved the twig-like texture of the little cigars. It was a pleasant tactile feeling and Nay found holding one between her fingers to be soothing. She took a drag, the tobacco inside burning, glowing red.

She exhaled. “Do you get lonely living at Ianthe?”

“Quite the contrary,” Ilyawraith said. “I find the peace and quiet to be a balm to my soul. I’ve had a whole lifetime of dealing with people and their little dramas.”

“Now, here you are again, amongst people and their little dramas.”

“Oh, this is nothing like I was referring to. This is potentially big drama that requires my attention. Besides, it allows me to train my pupil more. Though it does help that the food makes the socialization more bearable.”

“Do you have no one else out in the world that you are obligated to? Family? Friends?”

“I had a family once, long ago. They have all passed on from this realm to the next. As for friends. Well, my enemies took those.”

Ilyawraith took a drag and her normally white eyes were now pink, accentuated by the moonlight. The blue seaweed braided throughout her hair was turning green. As if her eyes and hair were reacting to whatever memories she was reliving in her head. She looked like a creature of the wind and sea now stranded on land, a stranger in a strange land.

“When we were still in Ianthe,” Ilyawraith said, “I told you that I would look into this matter concerning Jezabelle Childe, as you appear to have some type of vigor link with her or at least with the cookbooks she wrote.”

“My mysterious quest giver,” Nay said, exhaling smoke. “Did you find anything?”

“Forgive me for not being knowledgeable about Epicurist history. My responsibilities have always required other interests. And not to put the blame solely on me, but such history has also been the target of tampering, it appears.”

“Someone white-washing Epicurist history? You don’t say.”

“I told you that Jezabelle Childe was an opponent of what’s known today as the DMA.”

“The Delicatessa Marrow Authority. Yep.”

“She became somewhat of a thorn in the side of the early version of that. And as one of the founders of the cooking arts, Childe had fanatical supporters. At the time, most of the population leaned towards her stance on Delicacies and Marrows. That everyone should have access to the magic, not just those deemed worthy by some organization of spoiled power mongers and conniving bureaucrats. The conflict simmered to a boiling point and almost split the city in half.

“The history books will say that Jezabelle Childe eventually saw the error of her ways and signed with the council that believed such magic needed to be guarded and approached with wisdom.”

“But she didn’t, did she?”

“They knew that taking her captive and making her a prisoner would just enrage her supporters. Executing her would make her a martyr. This is where the line between history and reality gets blurry. It was clear that the best thing that could happen for their interests was her publicly siding with them. Or at least reaching some sort of understanding. A truce. But what if they could make her disappear while also making it seem like she came to an agreement with them?”

“They wanted to have their cake and eat it, too.”

Ilyawraith perked up at that. “Oh, that is a peculiar expression.”

“It’s a saying in my world,” Nay said.

“It’s a good one,” Ilyawraith said. “I like that. And it’s appropriate as well.”

She continued. “History says that Jezabelle left Delicatessa and retired to Yseros, a series of islands to the East. Ysero also happens to be my homeland. It was said Jezabelle retired and started a bakery and café on one of the islands, where she lived and cooked and baked the rest of her days.”

“Let me guess,” Nay said. “That never happened.”

“I know the archipelago well. It’s where I grew up and where my family lived for generations. One would think that such an establishment would be popular. A cafe and bakery run by one of the first Epicurists? People would know the place for the wonder of the food. It would forever occupy a spot in their memories. Even today it would be a landmark. It would carry a rich history. Yet, no one who lives on Yseros remembers such a place. And I can say with some authority there is no such place. This was the first discrepancy I found in the written histories that leads me to believe her true story has yet to be told.”

“There are others who must have noticed. Surely, word from Yseros must have reached Delicatessa.”

“Sure, I would expect those with astute minds would hear these whispers and then know the story in the history books to be DMA propaganda. For history is written by the victors. And today, the DMA is more powerful than ever. They practically run the Ligeia League. Delicacies and Marrows are regulated and controlled in ways no one back then could predict.”

“Except for maybe Jezabelle Childe.”

“Exactly. They’ve even gone so far as to have Monster Farms to breed and create new Delicacies and Marrows. And the divide between the classes has never been wider. If you’re poor and live within the League’s territory, good luck trying to become a Marrow Eater.”

“No one has tried to destroy the DMA?”

Ilyawraith laughed. “Declaring war on the power and might of the DMA? It’s suicide. Believe me, I speak from personal experience.”

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“You’re still alive, though.”

“But it’s cost me everything.”

Ilyawraith had smoked her cheroot down to a nub. She inhaled in the mountain air. “I miss the sea.”

“What was the Night of Seven Slaughters?”

Ilyawraith looked at her then, meeting her gaze. Nay saw melancholy and pain in those pink eyes. They glittered like coral.

“Quincy hasn’t told you about it?” Ilyawraith said.

“He said it wasn’t his story to tell.”

Her mentor’s lips upturned into a rueful smile. “He’s right. Although he’s in the story. Not for very long, but maybe the most important player. He’s the reason I survived the assassination and massacre of my sect.” Then her eyes cleared and she looked at Nay. “Apologies, our sect. I suppose I should stop denying it.”

“Denying what?”

“That you are the first new student of the Banshee Sect in a generation. I thought it would finally die with me.”

“I don’t know if I’m even a student. I’m like one of those people who sits in on a college class because I have a friend who goes to the school and I’m visiting them.”

“The Banshee Sect survives not just with me now, but you as well.”

“Yeah. I love that for me but I don’t know if you want to put that type of responsibility on someone like me. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve almost died here.”

“But you’re still alive.”

“Well, one day Quincy won’t be there to save my ass or my luck will run out. Whichever comes first.”

“By then you’ll be strong enough. You persevere.”

Nay shrugged. She wasn’t sure if she believed her but it was a nice thought.

“The DMA has hunters,” Ilyawraith said. “They’re the one who enforce their will on the population. If someone violates one of their laws or defies them, it’s a hunter who is sent out to deliver the message. To scare others on why ignoring the DMA is a bad idea.”

“They sound pleasant.”

“One day, at the Banshee Sect’s temple in Yseros, a young boy came to our gates. He had fled the Peninsula. Had snuck onto a merchant vessel to get to our islands. Because he was running from a ruthless pair of DMA hunters.”

“What law did he break?”

“None. If you believed in the ideas of Jezabelle Childe. But his mother was an Epicurist. He was dying of a disease. The Green Cough. His mother stole a Delicacy known for curing all sickness and disease and impurities once consumed. She cooked it, activated it and fed it to him. To punish her, the DMA was going to have her son captured and brought before The Iron Square in Delicatessa, where he would be publicly tortured and killed.”

“Jesus Christ,” Nay said.

“They wouldn’t help her save him from the disease. So the woman took matters into her own hands to save him. Her own flesh and blood. The child of her loins. She chose to cure him in the only way she knew how. And instead of showing mercy, the DMA decided to be cruel. You see the injustice?”

It was making Nay’s blood boil thinking about it.

“So the child appeared at the gates of the Banshee Sect. I let him in and gave him refuge. Weeks later, the pair of hunters tracked him to Yseros. They appeared at my gates. I lied to them and said I knew nothing about such a boy’s whereabouts. Sent them on their way.

“They called my bluff and chose to infiltrate my sect’s temple. So, claiming Yseros law concerning intruders, I killed them.”

“Were they powerful?”

“Against me and my sisters?” Ilyawraith said. “No. But the assassins they sent next were. They’re called The Seven Slaughters. The DMA’s best of the best. Or worst of the worst. The ones they send out if they really want to send a message.

“They’re seven Silver-ranked Marrow Eaters. No one knows their true identities. For all I know they’ve always lived in the shadows and only come out when the DMA wants to make sure there are absolutely no mistakes. And when they want to wipe someone off the face of the earth.

“Me and my sisters gave them the fight of their lives, though. I killed one of them, making them the Six Slaughters. Though in retrospect, it was a mistake. I should have killed their healer first. Maybe my sisters would still be alive today.

“But they were too much. They made the marble floors of our temple slick with blood. My mentor bought me time and urged me to flee. She didn’t want the sect to be completely wiped out. I didn’t want to do it, but if I didn’t, she would have died for nothing. So I ran.

“I was injured and close to death by the time I reached the docks. Quincy found me bleeding in the sand and hid me on the ship he was travelling on. On the passage out of Yseros, the healer in his group saved my life. And here I am today.”

Nay was stunned. She put a hand on her mentor’s shoulder. Ilyawraith looked at the hand on her shoulder, as if she was not used to human touch. Then she cracked and hugged Nay.

After they let go, Ilyawraith wiped a tear from her eye and lit another cheroot. “I wasn’t able to protect the boy. They carried out his sentence and made the mother watch. She killed herself soon after. The others assigned to her kitchen found that she had stuck her head inside one of ovens, on top of a tray of biscuits.”

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