One day, he spied Tutor Balthus in the village market, and he approached the old man.

  “Tutor, I’m glad to see you’re well,” he said.

  Balthus seemed delighted to see him, and the two men embraced.

  “I am glad we could meet one last time,” he said, “before I move on to my next charge. The young lady has completed her education now, so there is little more for me to do here.” He gave Tybalt a wistful look. “At least, there is little more that I can be paid to do,” he added apologetically.

  “Forget about that for a minute,” Tybalt said, shaking his head. “The truth is, I have a problem a bit more pressing than education right now.”

  “What problem is that, young man?” Balthus asked.

  “My mother. She’s ill. It seems serious, but I don’t know the nature of the problem.”

  Balthus came home with Tybalt and looked at Viola over her protests.

  He confirmed that things were just as bad as Tybalt had feared. Or rather, worse.

  “Cancer, I think,” Balthus said, swallowing hard. “I’m so sorry. I have no idea how long she has, but it looks fairly advanced to my scarcely trained eyes.”

  “Thank you,” Tybalt said.

  The older man squeezed Tybalt’s shoulder in what was clearly intended to be a fatherly way. There was little more he could say that would be of comfort now.

  Tybalt, Balthus, Viola, and Sebastian spent the evening together, mourning the bad news.

  In the morning, without telling anyone, Tybalt rose and approached the Baron’s mansion again.

  This time, no one came out to greet him or ask if he was cold. That was fine. He rapped his hand on the gate loudly until he got a servant’s attention.

  “Can I help you?” asked the serving man, dressed in a russet robe.

  “I am the Baron’s bastard son,” Tybalt said in a low voice, conscious of people walking past on his side of the gate, on their way to other destinations. “It is very important that I speak with him.”

  “The Baron is unavailable, but I will take your message to the Baroness,” the man said solemnly.

  Tybalt waited at the gate for another ten minutes, during which time it began to gently rain.

  Finally, the servant came back out and opened the gate.

  “The Baroness and Lady Miranda will see you,” he said.

  “Thank you!” Tybalt exclaimed, trying to contain his relief.

  Things could still be set right. They would see him. His mother just needed the Baron to send for a healer. It would cost them some money up front, but Tybalt was willing to work until he repaid it, however long that would take.

  “We apologize, but we are unable to help you at this difficult time,” said the Baroness a few minutes later.

  There was an air of such coldness around her as she spoke that Tybalt felt the urge to rub his arms for warmth.

  “I’m not sure you understand the situation,” said Tybalt. He looked back and forth between the Baroness and his half-sister, Lady Miranda, as he spoke. He had just explained that his mother was dying, and he could not believe that, whatever their differences, his own kin—for so he thought of them, when he thought of them—could sit back and do nothing.

  “I must excuse myself for a moment,” said the Baroness. She rose and walked away, holding a blue silk fan close to her face. Tybalt thought he caught her smiling.

  But he focused on the daughter—his half-sister. He had always felt a connection with her. Romantic, spiritual, familial, or sexual, whatever it was, it was potent. He thought she must feel it too. For the connection between them, if not for some idea of propriety, he thought she might want to do something.

  He was so desperate that he did not notice at the time how the young girl he had met years ago had blossomed into a beautiful and polished young woman.

  Nor did he read the obvious indifference on her face. Rather, he refused to see it.

  “Miranda—er, Lady Miranda—you can’t agree with her, can you?” he asked desperately.

  “No, Tybalt,” she said. He had hope for a moment. “I think my mother was far too polite to you.” His mouth started to open in a confused gape. “She should have said that whatever happens to your used up whore of a mother is her own business, not ours. It is a shame that you feel you have some connection to this family, that allows you the freedom to approach our home so brazenly, in broad daylight. You must learn your place.”

  The words did not process effectively for Tybalt in the moment. They made no sense.

  He rose—with what intention, neither the Tybalt of that time nor the future Tybalt was certain. Then a hand grabbed him by each shoulder.

  Tybalt turned his head and saw the servant on his right and another, larger man on his left.

  “Time to go,” the servant said.

  They escorted him roughly from the property and shoved him outside the gates, then locked them behind him.

  The memory skipped to three months later, at the funeral.

  Viola had always kept to herself. She had seen herself as in some way apart from—and perhaps above—the other villagers. Whether consciously or otherwise, she had passed some of this on to Tybalt. Maybe she believed the same family lore as her brother Sebastian—that they were fallen nobility. They could not lower themselves by associating too closely with ordinary peasants.

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  But the result was that her funeral was a lonely one. Tybalt and his uncle were the only ones besides the village priest in attendance.

  As Sebastian wept into Tybalt’s chest, Viola’s only son stared stony-faced at the cheap coffin they had purchased when it was obvious the end was near.

  That was the moment when he vowed revenge on the Baron, the Baroness, and especially Lady Miranda.

  Referring to his mother the way she had did not actually harm anything in the real world, but it desecrated Viola’s memory. Now that was all Tybalt had of her.

  His memories flipped forward, to villages that his squad had sacked and burned, to people that Tybalt and the others had abused. Each time, he had imagined it was the Baron, the Baroness, or Lady Miranda that he was attacking and tormenting. It was only recently, as that hatred turned colder, that he had begun to truly despise his work with the Army. In the beginning, it had been an outlet for a tremendous rage.

  He returned to the present, staring the angel in the eyes, forcefully suppressing tears at everything he had relived.

  “So, you hate that family a lot,” the angel said.

  Tybalt nodded wordlessly, unable to speak, grinding his teeth. He could not be too annoyed at the angel picking through his memories so lightly. She was not the one who had called his mother a used up whore!

  “But do you have the desire to tear down the society around them?” she said. “Your personal revenge quest is fine as far as it goes, but we need something more than that to be your motivation.”

  “I don’t just blame that twice-damned Baron and his bitch wife and his cunt daughter,” Tybalt growled. “I blame the noble class that decided bastards and mistresses and commoners in general are worthless. And I blame the society that props them up. I’ve met a lot of people since I joined the Army. I did it the week after my mother died. I just didn’t want to see any of those damn people ever again—but no one I met has changed my view of basic humanity. I’ve realized the whole society is rotten. It’s all driven by classism. If you have a class, you have value. If not—” He barked a short, humorless laugh—“then you’re fucking worthless. And everyone is out for themselves, trying to succeed within that stupid, pointless system.”

  “Hm. You blame classism.”

  “I do,” Tybalt said bitterly, “which I should add also means I blame your god. After all, that’s the system the gods chose to rank humanity, right? Completely arbitrary class. To mock all our efforts at being virtuous or improving our stations. To make false distinctions among us based on an artificial power structure. To…” He wasn’t sure where he was going with this anymore. He was just angry and ranting. He wasn’t certain he even cared to argue for why he should receive this god’s favor anymore. His body and mind were still worn down from his long fight, and all the subtlety was gone out of him.

  “I think we can work with this,” the angel said brightly.

  “You think you can work with this?” Tybalt asked, choking off a laugh. “Did you not just hear what I said? About your god too? Is that not disqualifying?”

  He knew as he spoke that he might regret what he was saying later—he wanted power above all else right now, after all—but his emotions were too worked up for reason to control his actions as it usually did.

  “It could be, in other circumstances,” the angel admitted. “However, I think you are the man for this moment. I believe Lord Mudo agrees.”

  Tybalt turned his head and for the first time noticed that the massive god had at some point shifted his position slightly. It wasn’t much, but he immediately interpreted that to mean that the god was paying attention to him and to this interaction.

  Holy shit, he thought. What’s happening?

  “Above all else, Lord Mudo needs someone who is dedicated to tearing down the current status quo in your world,” the angel said. “Someone defiant down to the bone, who will persist even if the enemy capture and torture him, which is a real probability. Someone driven by an endless fire. The status quo is not the product of the God of Death’s design. The politics of the divine world are far too complex for me to sum it up briefly, but suffice to say, the God of War and the Goddess of Love have hijacked the world. All of Abadd is under a system of their making. And in the present era, they receive almost all the worship emanating from your world, which reinforces their power.” She locked eyes with Tybalt. “We need you to tear the existing hierarchy of Abadd down. Eliminate the system that feeds those two gods all of your world’s worship.”

  Tybalt was gobsmacked for a moment.

  Then he let out a quiet, sharp laugh.

  “That’s all you want from me?” he asked.

  The angel nodded.

  “I was ready to sell my soul for the chance to do essentially that,” he replied. “I was ready to suffer forever in whatever tortuous pit you prepared for me. But that’s what you want me to do? That’s the mission? Just tear down the society around me?”

  “Like I said, I think we can work with you the way you are.” The angel’s smile was a lot warmer now, and she winked as she finished her sentence.

  “You’re not going to ask anything more of me?” Tybalt asked.

  “Well, I personally would prefer it if you stop using the phrase ‘twice-damned’ that you seem to be quite fond of. The God of War and Goddess of Love subtly promote it as an acceptable blasphemy by the humans, as a way of making themselves seem to be the only gods, and it is implicitly disrespectful of the rest of the pantheon.”

  Tybalt was nodding along as she spoke. Change my language a little, got it. He resisted the reflex to compare the angel to Lieutenant Sperry in his mind, though the initial impulse was powerful.

  “And if you should feel moved to build a temple or two to Lord Mudo, in the event that you manage to tear down the prevailing religious orthodoxy, he would certainly appreciate it... If you accept this power, you will additionally be recognized as his high priest, and although a death god may not seem appealing to a mortal on the surface, he does have an important role to play in the natural order of things, safeguarding souls.”

  “He has my mother’s soul,” Tybalt said softly, suddenly realizing that key truth.

  “Perhaps,” the angel replied, “or perhaps she is already in her path of reincarnation.”

  “You don’t hold onto them,” Tybalt said, confused. “They’re not sorted into Kur and Valgard, with the remainder floating in the Yonder?”

  “Nothing in nature remains still,” the angel said. “The afterlife is a complex, multilayered place, which bears little resemblance to the stories humans tell about it, especially after the truth was corrupted by the Goddess of Love and the God of War. Still, even death moves slowly forward to produce new life. You could visualize it as a river that constantly flows onward, never truly standing still. And time flows differently with us than it does with you. She might have spent a century or a millennium here in the time that you have been mourning her. I hope you are not disappointed that she is likely unavailable to speak with you… If so, we might be able to pull her back—”

  “No, no,” said Tybalt hurriedly. “I already said everything I wanted to say to her. We had time. Weeks together, where we could express anything we needed to.”

  I never told her that I went to the Baron’s manor, he thought. I never told her how they spat on her name and—if I see her again, I don’t want that thought fresh in my mind. It would just spoil those last days together holding her hand and wishing her well on her journey. Find joy in your next life, Ma. I am who I am because of you.

  “Very well. Then you are ready, I think.”