Father-Mother sat silently in their tent, listening only to the gradually dying braziers of azure flame that flanked them.

Their eyes had been closed since making it back to their prayer mat. They had silently offered a final blessing to the Great Spirit before crouching with great pain in a pose of grim meditation. Their reverie was broken only by the raspy, fragmented breaths from their mouth – remnants of the pain radiating from their open wound. Their eyes had opened only once since their coming – seeing the crimson snake uncoiling from their belly to pool on the floor and the room growing ever darker. It was like a spectral entity was quietly snuffing out the light of the candles.

"To end," they said to no one. "Like this."

The words caused a groan of pain to shiver up their gullet, yet they swallowed the blood that congealed there in a great lump.

No visions had come since they returned from the site of the battle-that-was-not. They concentrated on the flames, willing them to take flight and take the body of this Elder with them. But no pictures swam within their head. No music played to please their ears. There was only the gradual shift into nothingness. Into a world where only the dark remained.

Then they heard it: the flap of their tent opened, and someone walked inside.

Those feet were strong on the earth. They tread the sands like one born within them.

Father-Mother opened their eyes, though they did not gaze upon the visitor's face.

"So," they said. "You have come."

The girl said nothing. She simply stood there, her toes touching the pooling blood of her Elder.

Father-Mother fingered the blade in their sleeve. But though their will was strong, the strength to let it fly was simply not there. Their fingers fumbled and shook like the legs of a newborn calf. The futility of the situation was almost laughable.

"How shall you do it?" they asked her, breath growing heavier. "Shall my head leave my shoulders first? Or shall I be flayed in the marketplace, my entrails draped around my neck?"

Only then did they hear the girl's voice.

"You wish to die, Father-Mother?"

There was power in that tone. Something tinged with primal rage. Father-Mother knew, then, that she had grown strong.

"You always did ask pointless questions," Father-Mother chuckled. "I, your enemy, sit here defenseless. I, the architect of all your pain, lay before you, debased and defeated. Your traitor brother saw to that. And you have come to finish the work begun by his hands."

They felt their whole body shake, spurred on by their own words. The world beyond waited. They would die a warrior's death, and the Great Spirit would still accept them.

"So how shall you do it, Rain-Born of the Snake?" They asked. "How shall you walk the final step of your path?"

They felt the girl lean in close, and they shut their eyes abruptly. They could not look at that face that had so haunted their dreams in countless visions of a future that now would never be.

"Why?" Was all she asked. "Why have you done this?"

Father-Mother's eyes refused to open. They would not look at that face.

"You ask that?" they spat. "Fate is cruel, Rain-Born. We thought it was always a web spun by a spider, wracked by the winds, yet always solid. Immovable. Our eyes saw the thread under our feet, we read the signs, and the Hanakh danced to our commands. But they were never truly our words that the people followed. So long were we focused on the threads of Fate that we never saw the true webspinnner."

"Callisto," Rain-Born said.

Father-Mother grinned, tasting blood bubbling on their lips.

"We obeyed the visions that swam under our eyes. The threads that led to freedom were there, dangling before us, waiting for our feet to but trip upon the proper path. Freedom from this world – this dry, desolate, discarded wasteland. You have seen it now, snake. Does it please you to know it?"

When the girl said nothing, Father-Mother grimaced. The girl mocked them openly, like the disobedient wretch she was. The snake that refused to die.

"I go to my ancestors," Father-Mother groaned. "I will follow them to that which waits beyond, and I would take both tribes with me if I could. I would choke the children in their cribs, I would slay their mothers as they slept, and I would battle with the hordes of both clans that came to offer their retribution. This world must die, Rain-Born. It is not one meant for us. We belong among the stars. Our kingdom is that of the heavens, not of the sands!"

Father-Mother coughed up the torrent of bile that could no longer be contained in their throat and smiled triumphantly at Rain-Born. Though their eyes were still closed, they knew she was watching. Thinking.

"So do it, girl," they goaded. "Sink your poisoned teeth into the heart of your Elder. Complete your treachery and deliver me to the world beyond."

When the girl still did not reply, Father-Mother grew impatient.

"Do the fangs you have grown catch your tongue?" they asked, becoming enraged. "Why do you say nothing, girl?"

"I was thinking," Rain-Born finally replied. "Someone else said something very similar to me, not too long ago."

There it was: the drawing of a blade. Father-Mother heard the sheathing of metal, perceptible to their ears even as the life drained from them. They braced, and only winced slightly as the object came crashing down.

But the death blow did not come.

Instead, they heard the cold metallic sound of a solid item hitting the ground.

And they opened their eyes, seeing the canister, tracing the letters, and feeling their spirit sag.

Callisto lay before them.

"I promised you, my Elder," the girl said. "I would find Callisto within the Iron Forest. And I would bring it to you."

Father-Mother looked at it with the final ounces of ferocity left in their soul. It was something that they should know, and yet try as they might it conjured no memories. This pitiful thing was their mysterious mother, come back to witness her child's end.

So entranced were they that they barely noticed Rain-Born rise above them and give a quiet sigh.

"I cannot offer you the gift of death, Father-Mother," she said. "You may have given me the gift of life, but that was one thing you did not see with your own eyes. You were given a destiny to follow, not a life to live, and so I cannot take that life which has never belonged to you. Instead, I give you your webspinner. The architect of both your pain and mine."

Father-Mother reached out a hand to touch the dried blood on the canister, smearing the grainy letters with their own life-fluid. Knowing that inside, it was empty.

"It may spin the webs," Rain-Born continued. "And it may set the path, but it is our choice to follow it or turn away, towards a path of our own. I chose to deny it. What will you choose?"

Now Father-Mother did raise their withered head to look at her. The face they saw seemed a little more aged, weathering the burden of sights seen and lives ended. They expected to find sadness beyond words etched there, and yet instead there was still youth in those tattooed eyes. Her braids still fell over her shoulders like the dream catchers draped outside the tent. And just like those mystical objects, her face betrayed wisdom in its pattern.

It was a face that had been burned into the Elder's memory since the day they held the child in their arms, knowing that this one had a strength of spirit beyond all who had been born under the dying sun of this world.

"You are human, Father-Mother," she said. "Let your time on this earth end as one."

"Kill me," they said suddenly.

Rain-Born turned away.

"Kill me!" Father-Mother roared.

"It is not the path I have chosen," Rain-Born said from the tent's flap. "If you desire freedom, you must grant it yourself."

The Elder watched Rain-Born leave their tent without ceremony. Once again, they sat alone, accompanied only by the dying fires that cast their meager shadows up the walls. They looked at the tiny spray can and suddenly began laughing – a hoarse, unnatural sound that they could not remember ever actually partaking in. Laughter rang in their solemn tent for the first time since they could remember opening their eyes and knowing the destiny that stretched out before them and their people. Now, they were doing something they were never designed for. Their creator sat there, quite innocuous, and bore witness to its child acting out a desire that made no logical sense, not when their own life ran red down their stomach. Yet, laugh they did, with wild, radical abandon. They laughed till their throat was parched.

Then Father-Mother's face turned to the bowl of Harma-Durr still simmering beside them. It was very same tainted liquid that Quiet-Storm had supped from.

All it took was one quick motion of their arms, and the grisly potion was done.

A faint smile crept across their lips.

"Rain-Born," they said with the quiet breath of the departing. "If I had never sent you out there, if you had stayed here among us, would you have ever stood before me with such might?"

Before their eyes closed, they took the bottle of Callisto in their hand and chuckled.

"Was this...your plan...all along?" they asked.

Then the last, empty can of Callisto in the world fell from their grip. No more coughs or sputters sounded from Father-Mother's throat. No more sounds of pain at all.

The flickering flames that had been their constant companion finally went out, leaving the first Elder of the Hanakh shrouded in darkness forevermore.

...

The winds that she knew belonged to her home kissed her cheeks.

She watched the fractured tree beside the village from the tip of the highest rock of the Great Canyon. She was looking, as she used to look, for any signs of growth on the remaining branches. But nothing remained there except the scars the lightning had left.

"The things we miss are a mystery even to us," a voice said from behind.

Rain-Born smirked and turned her head to see Ragged-Brow. Ever the expert at creeping up on unsuspecting prey.

"It is strange, brother, she said. "For as long as I can remember, it was that same power that struck this tree that I desired most. I imagined myself harnessing it, raining death on our enemies, and setting the Stalkers in the canyon on fire."

"We all shared the same dreams, sister."

Rain-Born shook her head. "No more."

Ragged-Brow looked at her first in surprise, and then slowly a smile crept across his face. "No more."

He sat beside her as the day slowly turned, and inky patches of twilight shone from above.

"It will take time," Ragged-Brow said after some minutes of mute contemplation. "It will take time for people to see their once-time foe as their neighbor. Hanakh and Guthra may have peace, but even the word of a God cannot so easily change the hearts and minds of men."

"Pressure and time," Rain-Born whispered.

"What was that, sister?"

"Nothing," she smiled, starting to break from her rhythmic Hanakh dialect. "Just something a chatty little demon told me once. Come to think of it, he never did say thank you for those meatballs."

Ragged-Brow double blinked, several times. Despite herself, Rain-Born savored his confusion.

"Your words are touched by those of Okku," her brother said with an exasperated sigh. "How can a mere mortal such as I commune with one who walks with a patron deity?"

"Just try taking a walk with him in private for two minutes," Rain-Born replied. "He has a way of rubbing off on you."

Behind them, the 'Great Okku' was delivering another sermon to the tribe – a carefully articulated dialogue on the benefits of mounted combat. Working together, it would not be impossible for both the tribes to tame the canyon Stalkers for use in the defense of their now combined domain. The villagers listened intently, some groaning in disbelief, others enthusiastically praising the ground the God walked on. But they were listening, that's what counted.

Both he and Rain-Born had discussed his next series of lectures: the wonders of irrigation and crop-rotations as ways to aid the ailing Hanakh farmers and their fields. With the cooperation of the Guthra and the establishment of free trade, there would be plenty of opportunities for both materials (and ideas) to flow.

He was booked to give another two sermons today, and had a birthday party to attend at 17:00.

Rain-Born smiled as she heard him clear his throat in the most exaggerated way possible.

Beside her, she heard Ragged-Brow do the same, almost mimicking the great God's exact intonation. She held her laughter in as best she could.

"With the Elder's death," he said. "The people will crave leadership. Okku is above us – but humans should be governed by one of their own."

"We agree on that," Rain-Born nodded.

"I want you to know that I shall follow you to the ends of the earth, my El-"

"Wait!" Rain-Born practically screamed. "Me?"

He looked as though she had slapped him with force.

"Who else?" he asked. "You are the hero returned. The woman who walked with Gods out there in the depths of the Old World. The dangers you have faced others can scarcely imagine. The people will flock to you."

She cast her gaze back out over the endless expanse of dunes and desert sands, feeling the wind, thinking over her brother's earnest words. Then she took a long, deep breath, and smiled at him.

"You call me brave, brother, but you are too quick to kneel. I may have faced the monsters of the deepest Deadlands, but I never once looked upon the being that held my chains and released myself with my own hands. I needed much help before I realized how wrong our old way was. You figured it out all on your own."

Ragged-Brow, ready to protest, stopped himself as he saw the weariness etched on her face. Behind them, some Hanakh farmers were staring at the pair with mute fascination. As Rain-Born turned, they quickly bowed and retreated. She sighed.

"Have you not heard how they whisper of me already?" she asked him. "I return home as a hero now, but there are those who shall remember that I was once just a brash girl sent on a quest she was supposed to fail. They know I am not who I once was. In time, they will come to see me as a stranger. I know it. They will look at me the same way you do when you hear the words I speak now and know that I could never again sit under that tree out there and dream the dreams I once did. Back when the world was certain, and small."

Realization overcame him, and he gripped her arm suddenly. No longer did he push his impulses down to the deepest part of his being. Now he let himself be wholly known.

"You don't mean..."

"Yes, brother," she said sadly. "I have returned to free the tribes from a path of ruin, but I cannot stay. There is a world beyond this place that holds secrets from us, and dangers that we must be prepared for."

Images of Jespar's bunker flashed through her mind like lightning bolts. Hanger bays brimming with black dragons ready to ignite the world anew might still be waiting, their pilots biding their time. With the death of their scarred warrior, she could not tell what the next move would be of the Old Ones still out there – those who bore the deathspitters, or their scientists laboring with unholy magicks.

"I will not leave our fate to chance," she said, determination resolving in her head. "I will find a place where we can be safe from all who would harm us. One day, maybe we will finally be free of the dangers Callisto has wrought, and on that day there must be an Elder who can stand with the tribe to lead them to that place. One who knows the value of true freedom."

She took Ragged-Brow's hand in hers.

"Brother," she said. "It must be you."

He sat without saying anything for some time. Then the clouds of disbelief began to move from under his eyes. She could not know if he took her statement as a command, or simply as an endorsement of his character. Yet she believed he understood, as only he could, the importance of her words.

"I have led warriors, sister," he said. "Never farmers, or those of the Ash – the spirit wanderers. Equally your new way of peace still perplexes me. But I see the merit in what you have begun. If this is my destiny, then so be it."

"It's not your destiny," Rain-Born said. "It's your decision. Is this what you want?"

He smiled at that, realizing that maybe part of him was still enslaved to the tyranny of Father-Mother and their manipulated visions. He had taken the first step on his new path of understanding himself and the world. Many more steps were still to come. He would stumble and fall, but he would right himself again. In time, he knew he could live a life he could say he was proud of.

"If I am to be Elder," he said. "I would have you stay with us, at least until we know and accept the new way you have laid in the sands beneath our feet."

She flashed a smile back at him. "I would have it no other way, my Elder."

Both warriors stood as the sun set on the wind-blasted dunes and echoes of Okku's sermon rang in the air.

"A new day is coming for us," Ragged-Brow said. "It is...exciting."

She looked to her brother and saw that, indeed, he genuinely was excited. It was like a child's joy had possessed his features. He could finally breathe a sigh of relief, before the hard work of building a new world began. The new hope that had entered his mind was why he was the right choice.

"I wanted to tell you," Ragged-Brow suddenly stuttered. "Even when the Elder told us you were dead, I prayed for your return. In my heart I believed you would come back. This world is better with you in it."

She was the one who gripped his arm this time. She pressed down on his soft skin with the firm salute of the House of the Snake.

"Thank you, brother," she said. "Trust your heart, trust your beliefs, for they are yours and yours alone. They are what will make you a great Elder."

His hand flew to his side, seized by sudden excitement. He drew his ceremonial knife from its scabbard.

"Then let us make our pact in blood," he said.

"Easy!" Rain-Born chuckled beneath the setting sun. "How about we make it a verbal agreement?"

...

"Thus speaks Okku, so Okku's words reach us!"

"Praise Okku!"

He wished these Hanakh would give it a rest. His head was spinning.

"Praise Okku! White Wolf ascendant! Walker of the wastes! Companion of the One-Born-Under-Rain"

Yeah, yeah, OK. Hold up, he was her companion? Who's the God here?

"GREAT OKKU SHALL LEAVE YOU NOW," he said. "BUT THINK UPON YOUR PRAISES! YOUR GOD HAS FEELINGS JUST LIKE ANY MAN, OR WOMAN"

He didn't stop to see the confusion on the face of his flock. Instead, he entered the little tent they had prepared for him, circled his bed three times, and flopped down like a wounded soldier, seeing the thin beams of light trickle through the holes in the canopy and play on his tattooed body. He'd never thought he'd suit them, but these stripes really were quite sharp.

He heard his tent flap open and barely contained his irritation. Why not play it up? Gods were furious blokes, right?

"Who dares interrupt the slumber of the Great Okku?" he demanded.

The visitor stepped forward, and he was forced to roll onto his side, lest this was already an attempt on his life.

"Speak, interloper!"

And when he looked up to see who it was, that's when she decided to answer him.

"Is that any way to speak to your traveling companion?" Rain-Born laughed.

He sniffed and began scratching behind his ear.

"You know what they're saying?" he said. "They're saying that I was your companion on our journey. Like where does that come from?"

"Oh yes," she said. "I forgot the part where you did all the work while I stood and smelled the flowers."

She flopped down on one of the pillows that adorned his floor, and he sat up to face her.

"I see this life suits you," she sighed as she reclined. "You practically own every pillow in the entire village."

He pawed at his fluffy throne. "Not quite a silky velvet duvet, but I guess a God could do worse."

Rain-Born watched him stretch out, relaxed. He was taking what down time he had. His celebrity status had gone to his head, as she knew it would.

"You'll be happy to know that the clan is about to swear in a new Elder," she said, watching the swaying dream catchers that lined the roof.

"Raggedy-boy took the position, eh?" he asked. "Looks like your plan's coming together. But...what happened with the big boss? You finish the job?"

"There was no need," she said. "Father-Mother was a victim of the great deceiver just like the rest of us. I think till the end they thought I would fail.

"Huh," he sniffed. "Well you sure proved 'em wrong. I guess you could say: they never saw it coming."

Rain-Born wheezed a heavy sigh, ignoring the joke. "In the end, the Elder chose to leave this world. Wherever they are, I hope they find the peace they longed for."

"Hmpf," he snorted. "Good riddance if you ask me. And come on, the least you could do is pity laugh at my jokes. We talked about this."

"When you've heard them as much as I have, they tend to lose their punch. I fear the day when the children of the Hanakh will grow up telling the same jokes I put up with during our quest."

"You know you love it," he said, admiring his crimson tattoos. She watched him with a strange mix of joy and trepidation.

"You like them, don't you?" she asked.

"I admit it," he replied, beginning to strut around the room like the star of one of the "movies" he told her about. "Pretty fly, right?"

She sat up and hugged her legs, just watching him proudly showcase his stripes. She touched her own snake tattoos and smiled to herself.

"I'm glad," she said. "You make a great Okku."

He suddenly stopped in his tracks and sat back across from her.

"Yeah," he said. "I almost forgot. That ain't my real name, is it?"

She shook her head slowly.

"What'd you say it was again?"

"Jespar."

"Yeah," he replied. "That's it. Weird name. You'd think I'd remember something about it. I mean, sure, it fits me more than 'Okku', but at the same time I can't say for sure that its mine, get it?"

"Have you remembered anything else?" Rain-Born asked quietly.

"Aside from all the stuff you told me? Nothing. I wouldn't even have believed half the shit you spun if you never showed me most of it on the way here. Jogged my memory, I guess. Can't believe I made it through all that and came out OK."

"I never doubted you," Rain-Born said.

"The only thing is," he said with a puzzled look. "In some of my dreams I see stuff I can't quite make out. It feels like I'm surrounded by these big gray walls, people barking orders at me, dudes with guns and cigs running around with their fingers up their asses. And I'm just sitting there watching all this shit go down, and I'm miserable."

Rain-Born looked at him intensely. His eyes were someplace far away.

"But there's someone there that saves me," he continued quietly. "This chick with blonde hair that stays up late and talks with me, parties with me, then finally gets me out. But after that, the dream ends, and I'm left wondering who the hell she is. I know she was real once, but I can't even picture her face. When I try to, it's like a bunch of colors merging together – colors that make me vaguely happy – and yet I just can't fit them together. I know she's important, yeah? I feel it. But I can't see her."

He looked down, dejected for a moment. Rain-Born said nothing.

"Sorry," he sighed. "Got all philosophical up in here. Guess those fancy speeches we prepared must be going to my head."

"Her name was Nicole," Rain-Born said.

She saw his eyes were focused on her now, and she knew she couldn't just leave it there.

"I never knew her," she said, carefully choosing her next words. "But she meant more to you than anything. There was a time you would have given your life to carry out her wishes."

"Me?" he said, hanging on every word. "Wow. That was the kinda guy I was? Never knew I had it in me."

Rain-Born said nothing. Instead, she stared at her feet, watching the lights streaming in above them run across her newly painted toes.

"You OK?" she heard him ask.

"A lot is changing," she said. "Even you."

She knew he was different from the moment he appeared again before her on the top of the Iron Forest's tallest tree. As his eyes adjusted to her sagging, blood-soaked body, she had collapsed from the exhaustion of seeing the impossible come to fruition.

The first question he'd asked when she woke up was "What's your name?" Then, "What's mine?"

It had felt like a long journey home explaining the world to him, and his new role in it. She knew his mind would wander to the past, even as she longed for him to consider only his future.

But it was hypocritical of her to keep his old life from him. Even now, as she had on their return, she wished him to just be that same dog she knew back when she found him in the canyon.

Once again she was so wrapped up in her own thoughts that his sticky tongue's kiss on her cheek caught her off guard.

"You know what's funny?" he said with his old chuckle. "When I try to remember that chick's face, sometimes it doesn't just disappear. Sometimes it's replaced with another one – all tattooed and fierce and proud. Your face, Rain-Born. You smile at me and I'm happy."

She wiped his spittle from her face and hugged him suddenly, spur of the moment.

"That tells me something," she whispered.

It told her enough.

At that moment the tent-flap flew open, and Ragged-Brow peeked his head in. Seeing his sister embracing the great white wolf made him instantly regret his decision.

"Uh, apologies," he said, bowing low. "But the clan are waiting to greet their heroes. Some emissaries from the Guthra have gathered to see the new sermon. It would be wrong to turn them away."

"Ugh," Jespar sagged. "You really know how to kill the mood, big guy. But hey, who am I to argue with the Elder, right?"

Ragged-Brow bowed his head again before turning his eyes to Rain-Born.

"They wish to see you too, sister. You are as much their hero as the God-wolf is."

"We'll be right there," she laughed. "Their Elder will just have to get them ready for us."

Ragged-Brow exited with a smile on his lips, and now the wanderers of the Deadlands were left staring at each other.

"Y'know, the only question I have is this," Jespar said. "What to do with ol Callisto now? We went all that way to find it, seems a shame to just leave it in the Elder's tent."

Rain-Born mused for only a second before answering.

"Take it outside and bury it in the sand," she said. "That's the dog thing to do."

"Oh, come on!" he protested in her arms. "It's your quest-treasure! Don't you wanna at least hang it on your wall? Use it to trap flies or something?"

"It might have been what I was sent into the Deadlands to obtain," she said. "But it wasn't the real treasure I found out there."

"Aw come on," he laughed. "You're gonna make me fucking blush. Anyway, shall we head out, Chief?"

She looked at him like he'd stabbed a kitten.

"What did you just say?"

"Oh sorry about the profanity, gal. Like they say: can't teach an old dog new tricks."

"No, no, no," she sputtered. "The last thing."

"What?" he asked. "Chief? Dunno. I like nicknames, and it just sorta feels right to call you that. Whadd'ya think?"

She smiled and wiped the small tear that cascaded down her eye.

"Yeah," she said. "It's perfect."

Both huntress and talking dog walked out the tent together, she opening the door-flap for him to strut through and bask in the sun and cheers of the crowd waiting outside. She watched him go, wagging his tail relentlessly, and hung back for only a moment as the tribesmen gathered. She knew there were trials still to come as they walked down this new path they had only started to pave. In time, more memories may return to him. Slowly, he could recover knowledge of his old home where the remaining denizens of Callisto's world waited in the dark. But that was a turning point that lay far beyond them, and with Father-Mother gone their future was no longer set in stone.

Rain-Born looked at the people – Hanakh and Guthra both – who crowded round and sang their praises, looking for guidance on the new path they traveled. But in truth it was one they would forge together, working with time and this world rather than against them. She thought of her own journey through fire and mist, knowing nothing and finally finding the truth of her being. But try as she might, she could not convince herself that she would go back, take her childish form by its hand, and show it the way to the treasure she sought. For in every beginning, it does not matter that we cannot see the end of the long path that we tread. What does matter is that we choose to plant our feet in the sands, sun on our backs, and face the dangers and wonders that come with each rising light of day.

Then we continue walking.

...

Author's note:

If you've made it this far, you've seen that what began as a quest for a young girl ended up becoming the journey of two unlikely friends, and the beliefs that nestled in their own disparate minds. Even I couldn't have predicted what form the mid-sections of Callisto would take. I started out writing thinking I knew exactly where Rain-Born was headed, but every time I tried to take her in a certain direction, something stopped me and told me she (and her cheeky companion) deserved more than just a treasure-hunting romp.

Maybe that's part of writing: knowing where your story will go, but not quite knowing how you'll get there. That's why I want to thank you, reader, because without you following me through these chapters, I couldn't have completed my own writer"s journey, and seen Rain-Born and Jespar through to the end.

So thank you, from me, and keep telling me what you liked, what you disliked, and sharing your own worlds with me. Because although this story has ended, we're all walking our own paths with our characters and with our lives. And if nothing else, you've got to enjoy the journey.

- J. S Boyd @TraversingtheDark