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screechthewriter · 3 months

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Firestorm | a god of war fanfic

part three of four:

When Kratos arrived in town, he was greeted by more stares. They seemed genuinely surprised to see him alive. He ignored them, limping past and back to the old man’s house.

The Blades would return, he knew. When they did, he would bury them, recover, and move on. The plan had not changed. He would simply avoid going upriver.

Or perhaps downriver, if the beast was moving that way.

Maybe it would be better if I stayed away from the river entirely.

He was checking the injury again when the old man returned. There was someone else with him—a man who was only just starting to go grey. He seemed wary about being in the same space as Kratos. Kratos had planned to ignore him, assuming that he was some guest of the old man’s, but...

“My friend here was hoping to have a word with you,” the old man said.

“No,” Kratos said immediately.

“You haven’t even heard what he wants to say.”

Kratos glared at the old man. “Answer me this: has anyone survived that beast before?”

“You would be the first to engage it in direct combat and live.”

“Then I know what he wants. He views me as their best chance of defeating the beast and wants my help. The answer is no. I have other matters to attend to.”

The old man hummed quietly, then turned back to the visiting man. They had a brief conversation; the meaning of their words was lost to Kratos, but the conversation went on far too long for Kratos’s liking. Eventually, the old man spoke again. “Have you determined how you will be navigating the river?”

“I will not be navigating the river.”

“If you defeat the monster, there are those in this town willing to take you anywhere you wish to go. Free food and passage." The old man tilted his head slightly. "I can promise you, whatever you're running from, you'll outrun it faster on water than by foot."

Kratos stood, so suddenly that he should have collapsed from either pain or a rush of lightheadedness. The thing that kept him moving was his rage, a sudden stab of it coursing through his body at the old man’s words. "What concern is it of yours what I am running from?!" he snarled.

The visiting man cowered. He may not have known Kratos, known what he was exactly, but from the look in his eyes, he knew exactly what he was looking at. Something powerful. Something monstrous.

The old man, though…

Next thing Kratos knew, there was a wooden staff pressing against his chest, right over his heart. The old man stood much closer, blue eyes calm on the surface, with something...different underneath. Not fear, not anger...authority. He spoke first to the visitor, causing the other man to flee. Then…

"I will not be spoken to with that tone in my own home," he said calmly. His tone held the same authority of his eyes, calm and unconcerned. Kratos recognized it from his days in the agōgē. The teachers he feared and respected most were always the calm ones. The men who did not need to raise their voices to make their positions clear.

He might have hated hearing that tone here and now, from some mortal old fool he barely knew. But despite himself—despite all his other urges to the contrary—he could not bring himself to speak. Hear what he has to say, whispered some buried part of him, the young footsoldier of long ago. Just listen.

"You're right, Greek. It is none of my concern what you are running from. At the end of the day, I will continue on as I have regardless of whether you live or kill yourself. But…" His eyes examined Kratos's face. "...why is it so difficult for you to believe that I am simply being altruistic? Has there really been no one who has helped you with no hope of reward?"

Lysandra. Atreus. Orkos, to a degree. All dead. Kratos's mouth felt dry at the memories of them. Two gone by his hand, one lost to cruel fate. He could not even speak their names aloud.

"It is, of course, your choice. I cannot force you. Only remind you that you are in an unfamiliar land and could do with making some allies." The old man finally stepped back. "And ask yourself what you're really running from while you’re at it."

The old man's gaze slid from Kratos to a corner behind him. Kratos did not have to ask. He knew from the throbbing pain in his leg, the sense of foreboding gripping at his skull.

The Blades were back.

Kratos walked over to them, picking one up. It fit perfectly in his hand, comfortably, as if the hilt had molded to his hand. A vision flashed before his eyes: walking back to the river, driving the blade into the beast's skull, slashing its gut and letting the entrails spill out.

The blood…

Lysandra's blood, Calliope's blood, so much blood. He could already feel it on his skin, mixing with their ashes. The beast was just a beast, he knew that, but he had not used these weapons since Olympus. Had not fully tasted his rage since he destroyed his home. He buried the Blades like he buried his rage because if he tasted blood again…

Would he stop?

"Your people do not want the help of a cursed man," Kratos said.

He picked up the other blade and walked out the door. The old man did not follow.

It was foolish of him to stay outside, Kratos knew. The heat of the day still made him sick, and his leg would heal faster with rest. But he could not bring himself to go back. He sat in the meager shade of the rocks and stared out over the town, and the river just beyond it.

The river that could bring him either freedom or damnation.

Loathe as he was to admit it, the old man had a point. He had travelled south with no real plan, nothing on his mind except escaping his past. Instead, he was hunted, battered by the environment, and no closer to finding peace. Perhaps running from the Blades, running from himself and his darker urges, was to be his eternal punishment. Perhaps he should learn to accept that. That did not mean he had to bring further hardship on himself. He could find more efficient ways to run. Better ways.

Perhaps this river was one of them.

It is only a beast, Kratos told himself. His hands clenched and unclenched into fists. You have killed many like it before. It is an animal to be hunted. You do not have to…

You won't…

But could he really tell himself that? As much as he wanted to believe it, he didn't know if it was true. It seemed whenever he tasted blood, he couldn't stop. Man or beast, did it matter? Especially when the beast was as strong as this one?

He sat there as the day cooled. Even the lowering heat was not enough to soothe his mind. Eventually, when the chill turned from a comfort and to a nuisance, he returned to the old man’s home. The old man said nothing to him. Only continued scratching away at his tablet.

“...what’s so important that you have to write it down?” Kratos asked, despite himself.

The old man smiled slightly. “A great many things,” he said.

Kratos should not have been so annoyed back a lack of conversation, but something about that smile made him feel mocked. It was possible that was not the old man’s intent, but it was enough to make Kratos go to bed without saying another word.

Or at least, he tried to. Kratos had been sleeping lightly of late, his body rousing him every time there was a potential threat. There had been little to threaten him in this village aside from the beast, but he kept waking up. At the sound of strange birds. At the sound of a dog barking. One time at the sound of a cat that perched in the window and hissed at Kratos when he glared at it. Once, he thought he heard singing, crying...sounds he thought he recognized. But when he stepped outside to listen closer, the language was foreign to him, the tune unfamiliar. The crying baby not…

He stepped back inside and covered his ears until the weeping stopped.

When he slept for the final time that night, he dreamt of Sparta. Not in ruins, not aflame, for once, but whole. He was young again, darker-skinned, his forearms unmarred. Atreus crouched next to him, perpetually adjusting his grip on his spear, as he always did. "Personally, I think this is deeply heroic of us," he whispered. "Not at all stupid."

The boar had been destroying some nearby farmland, and nearly killed at least two helots that they knew of. There had been talk of organizing a hunting party, but when the beast had come too close to Kratos's land for his liking, he decided to take matters into his own hands. His only concession had been letting Atreus come--although he said letting as if he had any choice in the matter. The other Spartan would have come even if Kratos had told him not to. He likely would've had to knock the man unconscious and tie him up to keep him away.

"We'll be the talk of the town. Lysandra knows how to prepare boar, right?"

"There won't be any boar to prepare if you don't stop talking." Kratos elbowed Atreus in the ribs, as gently as he could. "You didn't have to come."

"Don't be stupid, of course I did." That slight grin Atreus wore before battle was as familiar to Kratoas as his own face. "Not that I think a simple boar could take the god of war, but…"

Wait.

No, that wasn't how the day had gone.

Kratos sharply grabbed Atreus's shoulder, half-expecting the illusion to peel away, revealing Athena, Ares, the Furies, Zeus. It was a trick. It had to be. So many had worn the face of his wife to try and appeal to him; using his friend was not out of the question. But there was no flash of light, no shift in the other man's skin; when Atreus looked at Kratos, it was his face, not some mask tearing away to reveal a sharp sneer and malicious eyes. It was just…

"You all right?"

But how? He'd been dead for years.

Then again, the dead did not seem to stay dead. Not in his mind, at least.

"Are we going to kill this thing or not?"

Kratos woke up then, his hand cramping as if he had been grasping a spear too long. Kratos carefully flexed his fingers. The ache faded quickly.

The dream did not.

Kratos tried not to dwell on dreams. They were, at best, mere nonsense, and at worst, a tool for his past to mock him. But this did not feel like a mockery. It felt like...

“You couldn’t have spoken to me sooner?” Kratos growled quietly.

He expected a clever remark from the old man, but it seemed he had already left from the day. It was only once he was sure he was alone that Kratos added, more softly, "You always were a fool."

Atreus did not appear to speak to him as Athena often did, but Kratos knew what his reply would have been. You continue associating with me, αδελφός. I think that makes you at least twice the fool I am.

He wasn't wrong about Kratos being a fool. He was just wrong about the reasons.

The sun was rising. The heat of the day would be intolerable soon. Kratos contemplated his options. Remembered the boar hunt. It had gone smoothly; they had not exactly been hailed as heroes, but people were grateful the beast was finally dispatched. He had not lost himself to anything.

There had been a time when he could fight without the Blades, without his rage overflowing into something monstrous, but he could not remember those days. It had been so long since he had ever thought not to use them. What had happened to him? Had his deal with Ares scarred him so greatly?

Or had he simply grown too used to the power they gave him?

Is there another way?

He wasn't sure. But, as he watched the sunlight outside grow harsher, he started to wonder if it was perhaps worth the risk. He thought of contingencies. If he fought the beast far enough away, if there was no one else around, no other targets to turn his rage on should it consume him…

He could live with himself if it were just the beast. But only if there was compensation.

And only if he did not use the Blades.

As he contemplated this, he heard a familiar voice outside. The old man was speaking to the younger woman. As always, when Kratos left the house and approached them, she glared. Kratos ignored her. "Can they guarantee me passage upriver or downriver?" Kratos asked.

The old man's expression did not change, not even to twitch into a smug smile. All the better; Kratos would have changed his mind out of spite if it had. "They can."

"Hmm." Kratos looked to the other side of town, towards the river, and sighed heavily. "I will need a weapon."

This town was too small for a large armory; Kratos would have to make do with what little they did have. Spears he knew well, and while the curved blades of their swords reminded him too much of the Blades, he knew they would suffice. So long as I do not try to throw them. "If this beast is anything like a regular hippopotamus," said the old man as he watched Kratos select his weapons, "it will be most active at night. Not entirely inactive during the day, as you know…" He glanced down at Kratos's leg. "Are you sure that will not hinder you?"

"It's fine." Even with his fitful sleep, it had healed well enough—not entirely, but enough. He would not let it slow him down. "Are you saying I should seek it out as soon as possible?"

"It's what I would do, for whatever that is worth." The old man was writing again. By now, the scratching sound was familiar to Kratos. "Have you killed something of this size before?"

"Killed bigger." It was a statement of fact, not a boast. "Why have you been helping me?"

The question had been bothering Kratos for some time, but if he was going to ask, now seemed the best time. He was sure the man would claim altruism again, something Kratos wasn't sure he believed, but instead…

"I have a talent for arbitration and you seem like a man in conflict," the old man said. "Sometimes a second set of eyes can make a problem clearer, but...you seem like a man used to doing things on his own."

For better or worse, the old man was right. Even when he still had living friends and family, they had to pester him to accept help. The phalanx only holds if everyone works together, Atreus had told him once. Admit it. You need me.

Of course, they'd been talking about Kratos's courtship of Lysandra at the time, and Kratos had been quick to point that out. In hindsight, the wider sentiment did have merit, just...not in that situation.

Perhaps things would have gone differently if you'd been there, old friend.

Kratos gritted his teeth, trying to push back thoughts of the past. "I don't think this is a conflict you can help with."

The old man chuckled. "Oh, I wouldn't be too sure about that. You haven't met some of my friends." He scratched one final symbol into his tablet before meeting Kratos's eyes. "If I offer you some advice, will you at least listen?"

"Hmm...fine." He had a feeling the old man would tell him whether or not he wanted to hear it. At least this time, he was asking first.

"I have a feeling that whatever it is you are running from was not always there," said the old man, "that there must have been a time in your life before it. Take that as proof that it will not remain forever. Things may never be as they were, but…" He shrugged. "...the worst of it can pass, if you find a way to make it so."

Kratos did listen. He even considered the words.

He just as quickly pushed them aside, because he did not have time for the thought. He had to focus on other things. On what it would take to kill the beast.

Kratos did not say anything as he left the space, but as he did, he caught sight of the old man smiling slightly. As if he thought he'd somehow scored a victory.

Old fool, Kratos thought.

He tried to ignore the fact that the words had taken root around his heart. Clinging to it. Whispering a lie he'd never been able to make himself believe.

It will not remain forever.

It certainly did not feel that way.

#fic: firestorm #series: will the circle be unbroken?#god of war #depression cw #suicidal ideation cw #hallucinations cw

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