God Within Us

The patrons of the Dancing Bear looked from the street to the Khormchaks. Then, one man grabbed a fire poker from nearby the hearth, while another seized an empty bottle. Yesugei felt his fingers twitch involuntarily - Alnayyir’s arm began to move of its own accord, and it took his other hand to prevent it from lashing out as more men began to rise from their seats, grabbing for steins, bottles, anything they could get their hands on. Kargasha’s easy smile dropped, and he took a step back as the crowd silently pressed in, moving like sheep.

“Run!” Yesugei managed at last.

A bottle went sailing overhead, shattering loudly against the wall nearby as the three of them hurried for the rear of the inn. Yesugei kicked out a table towards the onrushing patrons, flattening the first wave of the crowd as Tuyaara fumbled with the bolt of the door at their back. A second bottle whizzed inches past Yesugei’s face, while a stool nearly clipped Kargasha’s head. The crowd began to shout, and the madness bled into the Dancing Bear.

“Don’t let them get away!” cried the herald from the streets, his eyes bulging out of their sockets. “Get them, or it’ll be all of our heads!”

“Go, go!” The door at the rear exploded open, and the three of them flew out headlong into the narrow alley, tumbling down the weathered stone steps. Yesugei’s vision blurred, narrowed - all he saw was the light down the end of the alley. When he stumbled out into the street, he saw the world outside the Dancing Bear had become a furious hell.

Smoke drifted from behind the rooftops, whilst beneath them, flitting between the alleys, a great mob roamed - coming closer and closer. The monotonous buzzing of the crowd gave way to individual voices, shouts of “For the Lightning-Lord!”, and “Down with the false idol!”.

“What the hell is going on?” Tuyaara gasped. A trickle of blood ran down her brow - whether from glass or her fall down the steps, he did not know. “A raid?”

Behind them, the rear door of the inn slammed open.

“A fucking riot, now keep running!” screamed Kargasha.

They moved more on instinct than any coherent thought - like wild animals fleeing the face of a wildfire. Before any of them knew it, they were surrounded by other people, terrified and screaming. Yesugei felt himself crushed into the stampeding mass, and both Tuyaara and Kargasha disappeared amidst the sea of faces. Run, keep running or be trampled.

He passed by more bodies - some lying in the gutters, others hanging from lampposts and signs. A woman fell to his left, shrieking as she was swallowed by the mob. Yesugei didn’t dare stop. He knew what would happen if he did - the same fate awaited anyone who stumbled. He pushed forward, trying desperately to catch sight of Tuyaara or Kargasha. But the crowd was an unrelenting storm of bodies, and he was no more than a speck caught in its gale.

The noise rose to a deafening roar - screams of pain, rage, and panic mixed with the sharp clatter of steel. In the distance the city bells tolled frantically, sounding the alarm, though the city was already lost to the riot’s frenzy. And through it all, the Apostle’s presence thrummed inside him. The tug of Alnayyir’s influence felt as though his veins were soaked in molten iron. Break free, Alnayyir whispered. Let me out, prince. You can't outrun this forever.

Yesugei clenched his jaw and shoved the voice down, forcing his way through the swarm. A sudden shift in the flow of the crowd dragged him sideways, sweeping him toward the mouth of a wide plaza. Yesugei tried to twist free, but the mass of bodies was unrelenting, carrying him along whether he willed it or not.

Yesugei stumbled as the throng spat him out at the square’s edge, gasping for breath. He staggered to his knees, his blistered arm shaking violently as the Apostle’s power roiled within him, seeking release.

It was then that he saw Khavel.

The terrified youth he had known at Yerkh was gone - now he stood atop an overturned cart, a torch held high in one soot-blackened hand, calling to the crowd with command. “Hold steady! Bring that wagon up! Don’t give them an inch!” His voice cracked through the night like a whip, sharp and urgent. A leader - as much as anyone could hope for in the madness.

“Yesugei?” Khavel’s voice wavered as Yesugei climbed up onto the cart beside him. Recognition flickered across the mason’s face, followed by a brief, disbelieving grin. “I thought you were dead! Those fuckers out there are screaming your name almost as loud as hers.”

“It came close,” Yesugei muttered, casting a wary glance across the square.

The men under Khavel’s order turned over wagons and crates, forming barricades that circled the open plaza like broken teeth, manned by ragged bands of peasants desperate to hold their ground against the advancing mob. Men and women armed with makeshift weapons—clubs, knives, broken tools—screamed curses as they fought with the savage fury of the cornered. Among the fighters on the barricades, Yesugei even spotted a handful of soldiers, their decorated armor forming a patchwork of wolves, bears, eagles, and other beasts of the world as they hacked and slashed at their own countrymen with reckless abandon. On the other side, the zealots pressed in from every side street, every alley, all of them chanting, "Down with the princess! Death to the heretic!"

“Who started this?” Yesugei demanded.

“Bastard priests.” Khavel said, his eyes flicking wildly between the nomad princeling and the barricades. “They’ve whipped up half the city into madness, killing anyone who spoke for Lady Vasilisa - or even looked like they followed her. But we can hold here, long enough until the citadel comes to help us…” He trailed off, uncertainty flickering in his eyes.

Yesugei’s gaze swept the scene, and his stomach knotted with grim understanding. The way the mob had forced them into the square was no coincidence. They were being herded. Memories of the nerge, the great winter hunts of the steppe, flashed through his mind—arrows whistling through the air, the frantic bark of hounds…the tightening noose of riders and soldiers, pressing the terrified beasts tighter and tighter.

Then, slaughter.

“We can’t wait for the citadel to come for us,” Yesugei said, pulling Khavel close. “Get every man who can fight. We’ll cut our way to the gatehouse ourselves.”

Khavel’s face paled, but he nodded. “I’ll get the fighters.”

As the mason leapt down from the cart, Yesugei turned toward the crowd. “Tuyaara! Kargasha!” he bellowed, though the roar of the panicked throng nearly drowned him out. There was no sign of them.

But then, through the haze and sea of faces, he saw a flicker of purposeful movement through the tide - Tuyaara and Kargasha, forcing their way through the panicked mass toward the cart.

“We’re here!” Tuyaara gasped, her face streaked with soot and blood. Kargasha followed behind her, his new sword already sullied up to the hilt with blood.

“We’re breaking through the east side!” he shouted, pointing towards the barricade that faced closest to the citadel. “Stay close, and don’t stop for anything!”

Kargasha’s grin shone wild and bloody. “About time!”

Then came the sound of shattering glass—a sickening chorus of bottles breaking against stone.

Yesugei’s heart sank as he turned to see streaks of flame leaping up along the barricades. Barrels of pitch smashed against the piled debris and carts, followed by the heavy whoosh of fire that pressed the crowd further in. Torches arced through the air, trailing fiery tongues through the dark sky before igniting the dried thatch roofs that bordered the square. One by one, every side street, every alley. Fire, fire everywhere.

It spread with frightening speed, licking up the walls of nearby buildings and sending waves of blistering heat across the square. Smoke billowed into the sky, thick and choking. People screamed, panicked, and with every passing second, the square grew tighter and tighter. Men and women crushed into one another, forcing themselves back against their countrymen as they scrambled away in their primal fear of the closing ring of fire.

Yesugei staggered, hacking against the acrid smoke. He couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe. His hand found Tuyaara’s shoulder, and she coughed, gripping Kargasha’s arm beside her. Both of them were bracing to fight, but there was no enemy to cut through - only terrified peasants and commoners. Only flame and fear.

“We’re going to burn alive!” Kargasha rasped, shielding his eyes against the rising inferno.

Yesugei clenched his fists, fury and fear burning equally in his chest. Through the searing heat, he felt Alnayyir’s presence stirring with growing insistence.

It’s over if you do nothing, prince! Alnayyir whispered, his voice curling through Yesugei’s mind like smoke through a crack in the stone. The fire is alive - more alive than they are. So seize it. Take it for yourself.

Yesugei's jaw locked as sweat dripped down his face, stinging his eyes. The flames licked closer, gnashing their teeth at the bodies that pressed against him. Even if Khavel could rally fighters to their side, the smoke was too thick to see the barricades clearly anymore—only glowing silhouettes of the fire and the distant shapes of the rioters howling and chanting from the edges of the square.

"Lighting-Lord, accept this gift in your name!" was the chant from the howling rioters all around. "Sacrifice! Sacrifice! Sacrifice!"

His heart thundered in his chest. The air was growing too thin to draw breath.

Do it, prince, Alnayyir’s voice came again, colder this time, cruel and soothing all at once. Remember your promise - you will carry me to the end of the world. And this is not our time.

And then, like a blade sliding free from its sheath, something inside Yesugei gave way. The resistance - the fear - shattered.

"Fine."

The Apostle within his heart smiled, and Yesugei spread his arms wide.

He reached into the flames—not just the ones before his eyes, but all the fire in the square, all the heat and rage that roared through the air.

The inferno flickered, as if drawing breath, and then it lurched, like a great behemoth rousing itself from sleep. The flames surged inward, sucking towards and above the nomad princeling like water caught in a vortex. Torrents of fire spiraled toward him, swirling from the barricades, from the burning rooftops, even from the bottles as they burst at edges of the crowd. All the fire in the square became his.

The flames coalesced into a storm, swirling high above the crowd in a great spinning column. Yesugei clenched his fists, and saw his gloves and the sleeves of his robe begin to take fire as his veins burned furiously with the Apostle’s strength - he felt himself shattering from the inside. With a shout that tore from his throat like that of a wild animal, he hurled the storm outward—away from the square, over the barricades, and into the ranks of the rioters.

A brilliant flash—then a whoomph that sucked the breath out of the lungs of every man in the crowd.

The firestorm detonated. A wall of flame swept through the streets, setting the zealots ablaze. Their screams were brief—swallowed by the consuming fire as they broke and fled in every direction, flailing, burning, scattering into the night.

For a heartbeat, silence.

Alnayyir’s laughter echoed in Yesugei’s mind, cold and triumphant. Yes, yes! Look at them run! Look at them burn! No different from their twisted ancestors, look at them scream!

Then the firestorm began to collapse in on itself, the last embers flickering away into the dark sky. Yesugei swayed on his feet, the power draining from him as swiftly as it had come. His legs buckled. He felt his heart stutter, as the Apostle’s presence pulled back into the depths of his soul like a retreating tide.

The world tilted. He saw Tuyaara’s face swim before him, her eyes wide with something between awe and horror. Then Kargasha’s hands were on him, strong and steady, catching him before he hit the ground.

“I’ve got you, brother,” Kargasha muttered, slinging Yesugei’s arm over his shoulder. “You did it. Now stay with me.”

Yesugei’s vision dimmed, blackness closing in at the edges. But just before he slipped into unconsciousness, he heard a sound—like a distant warhorn, rising above the fading screams of the rioters.

Khavel’s voice wavered high over the crowd, a shout of, “Everybody follow me! Follow me!”

Tuyaara’s voice cut through the haze, sharp with relief. “They’re rallying. We’re saved.”

Then the darkness took him.