Fatefall - 2

Chapter 2 - Sage 

Still, if I had to do it all again, I would not change a single thing.

Sage should have stayed at the library and studied like the good boy his father thought he was. It would have spared him a fair amount of bruises and a throbbing headache. 

With his nose buried in a book, Sage startled when he felt a tap at his shoulder. 

“We’re going out for a drink, if you want to come,” Casey - one of Sage’s classmates - offered. 

Spotting the group of other boys gathered behind Casey, Sage’s first response was to say no. His father would kill him and besides, Sage tried to avoid his peers as much as possible. He had no reason to believe that Casey was extending this invitation out of kindness. 

But it’d been a rough night so far. A day of physical testing, all so Sage could try and fail to join the Golden Guard year after year, his muscles burned and the study session was only to avoid his father. Maybe his father would completely overlook the drunkenness and concern himself with Sage’s failure. Maybe he could actually enjoy himself for once. 

Which was how Sage found himself at The Midnight Palace, backed into a corner from which he couldn’t escape. 

“C’mon, rich boy,” chided Casey. “Play a round with us. Make a bet. Have fun.” On that last word, he waved his glass so hard that the drink sloshed over the side and soaked Sage’s clothes. So much for coming home without smelling like alcohol. 

“I think I’ll sit this one out,” Sage decided, shrinking back further into his seat. 

Rowdy people occupied almost every seat in the tavern, and the stench seemed determined to suffocate Sage. The bathrooms weren’t any better - he’d already tried to hide until the smell scared him away. And the noise … maybe it was the drink, but Sage could have sworn that everyone was screaming. Each voice pounded into his skull like a … like … Fates, he couldn’t even come up with a comparison. 

With Casey blocking one side of him and Wayne on the other, Sage couldn’t escape. And even if he could, ditching would make him the soft, rich boy they all thought he was. 

Casey threw his arm around Sage’s shoulder. Fates, he nearly vomited from the smell and the touch. “Poor, poor, Sage. Afraid to lose a simple card game? It’s not like daddy doesn’t have money to spare or anything.” 

“Fine,” Sage relented, only to spare himself the attention of the other boys. He pulled five marks from his pockets and slid them across the table, earning a few amused chuckles from the other boys. “Scam me out of my money. I don’t care.” 

“If you want in the game, you’re going to cough up a few more marks,” remarked Wayne with a snort.

Sage crossed his arms. “Everyone else paid five.”

“And? Everyone else indulges us in more than one game,” Casey pointed out, the humor draining from his voice as Sage didn’t budge. And then, before Sage could react, Casey snatched the glasses off the bridge of his nose. “I say these will work as payment, right, gentlemen?” 

Sage reached for his glass, but Casey tossed them to the table and the boys cheered. 

“How am I supposed to play if I can’t see the cards?” Sage argued futilely, earning a few more snickers. 

“Your advantage is that you’ve got the money to spare,” Wayne smirked, already shuffling the deck and dealing the cards. 

Sage glared at the blurry form of Wayne. “I think I like it better this way, anyway. I don’t have to see your ugly face.”

A sharp jab to the gut. “Say that again, will you? Nice and loud so when I rip out your throat, everyone has a reason to believe I’m innocent.” 

“What, so you all can be terrible to me but the moment I say one thing to you, automatically I get death threats?” He tried to force back his annoyance, reminding himself that they were all drunk and just trying to have fun. At his expense, of course, but what else was new?

“You’re a fast learner,” noted Casey. “Now let’s play.”

Sage sighed, but what could he do? He’d watched his father play enough games to know the rules and some strategy. One of the boys ordered another round of drinks and soon enough, Sage’s mind seemed too warm and fuzzy to function properly. The world turned to a blur of color. Still, the game kept him anchored to reality and before he knew it, he was winning

One game turned into another, and now that his glasses were returned, albeit cracked, Sage could play even better. He learned how the other boys played, and the drunker everyone got, the sloppier their game became until the rules were forgotten almost entirely. 

It took five games for the other boys to become restless with Sage’s wins. 

“Cheater,” Wayne grumbled, handing Sage another handful of coins. “You don’t even need the money.”

“Hey, it’s just a game,” Sage sighed. “Besides, I’m going to head home.” The glares told him to leave it at that. The alcohol whispered otherwise. “I’d like to say it was a pleasure playing with you guys, but…” He shrugged. “I prefer a challenge.”

The first punch came without warning. Sage doubled over, wheezing for air as his ribs ached from the hit. When his vision cleared, he was met with Wayne’s bright red face and the rest of the gaping boys. 

“Let him go home, Wayne,” Casey chided, laying a hand on Wayne’s shoulder. Wayne shrugged it off, cracking his knuckles. 

“Have you ever been in a real fight, rich boy?” he challenged, his eyes never leaving Sage’s. 

“I’ve been in enough to know I could beat you,” Sage lied. He’d fought, yes, but in organized fights at school where the mentors were careful to avoid major injuries. Wayne snickered and Sage’s confidence dipped as his head throbbed again. He really needed to stop getting drunk. 

Sage lunged forward, trying to get the upper hand. Instead, the whole tavern erupted into punching and kicking and shouting. He saw Casey out of the corner of his eye, trying to hold the other boys back.

A slam to his leg. Something sharp in his arm. He landed a few hits on Wayne. 

He’d never been a good fighter, though. Sage only managed to last a few minutes before darkness swam in his vision and the last thing he knew was Wayne stripping the money from his hands and tossing him into the street. 

Sage barely managed to stumble up the steps to his house before collapsing against the door. He ran a hand through his damp curls, finding them caked with blood. 

His glasses were gone and he was bleeding from a dozen cuts. He knew that tomorrow he’d be covered in purple bruises too, and the thought made him more sick. Sage rolled to the side and vomited into the bushes, narrowly avoiding his jacket in the process. A handful of curses swam through his dulled mind. 

“Sir?” 

Sage startled, his heart slamming against his rib cage as he blinked at the blurry form of Peter, the non-butler. 

“Sir?” Peter repeated, his voice a mixture of concern and humiliation. “Are you all right?” 

Sage gave him a shaky thumbs-up. “Perfect. Thanks for asking, Peter. You’re so astute.” 

Normally, he would have been kinder to Peter. Sage pitied Peter for constantly putting up with him, but the alcohol and injuries warred with his trained politeness. 

Peter frowned, his beady eyes inspecting every inch of Sage’s battered body. He almost looked like a chicken with his plump middle and beaklike nose. “Let’s get you inside, sir. Your mother was worried sick about you.” 

Wonderful. He’d hoped that his mother would be in bed by the time he returned home so she wouldn’t fret about him. 

“And father?”

“He’s in a meeting,” Peter answered and Sage exhaled a sigh of relief. “Can you … Are you capable of getting up on your own?”

No. 

“Yes.” Every one of his muscles protested the movement, but Sage eased himself to his feet. The world spun faster and he clutched at Peter for support, his knees threatening to crumple at any second. Pain spiraled up and down his limbs and Sage grit his teeth, pushing past it. 

Together, Peter and Sage half-shuffled, half-lurched into the house and to the sitting room, where Sage was ordered to lie down on the couch. 

“If I lay down, I don’t think I’m going to get up again,” he told Peter honestly, his eyelids already attempting to flutter shut. 

“Then you can explain to your father why your bloody corpse is staining his couch,” Peter grumled. “How badly are you injured?”

“I feel like I’m dead, but that’s probably just the cheap alcohol-”

“Sage!” chastised Peter. “You were drinking again?”

Sage snorted. “Don’t pretend like you weren’t like this at my age.”

Another frown. At this rate, Peter would look twice his age in less than a year. “I wasn’t.”

“Ah, that’s right, you spent your childhood trying to get my father’s attention,” Sage remarked with an eye roll. 

“Not all of us are born as rich brats,” Peter replied curtly. “Now, do I need to fetch a healer or not?”

Sage knew there was a deep cut where a knife had sliced open his arm, but he wasn’t worried about it. It would heal on its own and leave a sizable scar to remind him never to hang out with Casey and Wayne again. 

“Fine,” Peter mumbled, though he sounded wary. “I’ll grab some rags for you to clean up with. Do you want me to tell your mother that you’re home?”

“Wait until I pass out again,” Sage decided. That way he didn’t have to see her disappointed gaze or hear her sigh and complain about how her Ungraced son was nothing more than a burden. 

“As you wish,” Peter said, bowing his head and disappearing into the kitchen. 

Sage inhaled deeply, letting the air steal away some of his pain. He could feel exhaustion dragging him into its yawning mouth, but he didn’t dare fall asleep yet.

Not that he could’ve, even if he wanted to. His thoughts were consumed by imagining how his father would react. Once again, he’d be the useless son, broken by the streets and never quite measuring up. Did Sage really want to be enrolled in the academy that trained soldiers for the royal guard? No, if given the choice he would’ve much rather become a scholar of some sort. Maybe he would have studied the Fatefall, when all the Fates had been killed by the current king of Xegalla. Or maybe he would’ve studied Aecheral and travelled between the two kingdoms to combine cultures. 

His parents were two of the strongest Graced of Soul that Xegalla had ever seen, and yet their only son couldn’t so much as read someone’s emotions. Broken. Useless. Empty. 

He closed his eyes, all too aware that drinking and brawling and gambling would only worsen his situation. Sage groaned, rubbing his eyes. Maybe staying awake wasn’t worth it after all. 

Go to bed, he told himself. Deal with all of your problems in the morning, hopefully when you’re more lucid.

It seemed like a good enough plan to him. 

Sage staggered to his feet, placing one hand on the wall to guide himself down the hallway to a pair of double doors that had to be his room. His fingers fumbled with the doorknob, but then the door swung open and the room before him was most definitely not his bedroom. 

A dozen eyes found his and Sage’s whole body froze as he clutched the door with all of his strength. And there, at the end of the table, sat a regal, blonde man with piercing eyes that filled with anger as they took in Sage. Fates. 

He knew he was a sight to behold. Golden curls tinged red with blood, a swollen face covered with bruises, and a torn, grimy jacket draped over his shoulders. 

Sage wanted to die. 

He took a sheepish step backward, attempting to slip out and pretend he was nothing more than the ghost his father thought he was. 

“Sage.” His father’s voice was low, a deep growl. 

“Wrong room,” Sage slurred, trying and failing to loosen the tension. 

His father frowned, unimpressed. The other men at the table averted their eyes, focusing on the papers strewn about the large table of the meeting hall. They were probably meeting about the upcoming Tournament of Fates, which Sage’s father - along with these other wealthy men - would be sponsoring. 

“‘I’ll just be going now,” he announced, though it sounded pretty unintelligible. 

Some of the men glanced at Sage’s father, either annoyed or concerned that a boy covered in blood had interrupted their meeting. Sage’s father pinched the bridge of his nose. “What did you get yourself into this time?” He played the role of concerned father too well. Or faked it, at least. 

Sage glanced at the blurry forms of the other men. Surely at least one of them had a son who’d witnessed the fight and would rat him out for provoking it. 

He shrugged nonchalantly, leaning against the doorframe and nearly toppling over when his shoulder slipped. “It’s nothing.” His father blinked once. “Nothing I couldn’t handle, that is.” 

The man beside Sage’s father chuckled. “He’s a bright one, Franklin. Is he planning on participating in the Tournament? My son is looking for a Graced of Soul to complete his team.” 

Heat rose to Sage’s cheeks and he averted his gaze. 

“Unfortunately, I wouldn’t really consider Sage well-trained in his Grace,” his father lied with a false sigh. Yeah, because I’m Ungraced, Sage almost yelled. He’s lying to all of you! Only self-preservation kept him from bursting. 

“Nonsense. With you and Jackie as his parents, surely he’s the best of his age,” the man scoffed. Sage recognized him now as Bentley, Casey’s father. Of course. Hopefully Casey didn’t look terrible or Bentley might begin to suspect. 

Sage’s father shook his head and offered a small smile. “He’s determined to focus on his studies rather than on his Grace.” 

Yes, there it was. Casting the blame on Sage as always. 

“I don’t see the importance in Graces after Fatefall,” Sage replied honestly. “We condemn the Fates but worship their power. It all seems a bit hypocritical to me.” 

Never mind, his self-preservation was out the window. 

“Regardless, it seems my son is a bit under the weather at the moment,” Sage’s father interrupted before anyone could protest Sage’s blatant disrespect towards timeworn traditions. “Why don’t you head off to bed, Sage? Clean yourself up, too.”

“Of course, father.” He bowed his head and somehow - by some miracle - he managed not to fall flat on his face as he hurried out of the meeting. 

Sage showered as quickly as he could, unsure how much more consciousness he had left in him. His mind kept returning to Bentley’s offer for Sage to join Casey’s team for the Tournament of Fates. 

Designed to celebrate the Fatefall, the Tournament allowed Xegalla’s best Graced compete in a series of challenges created specifically to test their power. And, as an Ungraced, Sage would never be allowed to participate, much to his father’s chagrin. Sage didn’t exactly want to risk death that seemed to always follow the Tournament - whether accidental or otherwise - but the glory did tempt him. Sometimes. The times when he was drunk and irrational.

You can’t fake a Grace, he reminded himself. The qualifying rounds of the competition required a demonstration of one’s Grace in a one on one match-up. Even if Sage could convince someone to help him create the illusion of a Grace, there were unveiling ceremonies later on in the tournament. And while his Ungraced status was a secret to many, there were a number of ex-family friends who would willingly expose him if he was unmasked. 

The shower managed to wash away some of his aches and pains, and Sage climbed into bed not long after. Still, sleep evaded him. 

His mind continued to evaluate the risks. He could picture himself finally redeeming his name in his father’s eyes. He could see his classmates offering him respect in light of victory. 

Of course, there was also the constant threat of failure. The tournaments always punished the weakest people. Last time, the losers had been forced to board a ship and sail to Aecheral, which was practically a death sentence with their new religious orders against Graced folk. Surely this tournament would offer a punishment worse than thought. 

Glory or safety. Safety or glory. 

Ultimately, it was the idea of being stuck in this house forever, with only his father’s name supporting him that led Sage to believe his only course of action would be to participate. As the exhaustion finally began to set in, Sage had formulated a plan. 

He’d prove to everyone that the Ungraced were just as capable as the Graced. 

And he’d show his father that he wasn’t a failure after all.

Author's Note

This is only the second of five POVs that will be introduced in this story, so please let me know if anything is really unclear with the backstory/worldbuilding and I can try to add more detail in the next few chapters.