COBALT 7.1: YUNE LISTENS
“That is the purpose of wedding. To defy death with the promise of new life. To find one another in the shadowland by the bond that is willingly shared, the pact renewed at every instant, at every level of the planes. There is nothing more holy than the creation of the soul, and so there is nothing more sacred than this joining of souls.”
– from the Urdaithian Creed
“Seriously?” I furrowed my brow at the fairy. “I’m not even getting an augmented sense of smell.”
“Well you can’t blame me,” the tiny chap squeaked indignantly, flapping his wings to carry himself up into the ethereal breeze. “I did my best, you know.”
“I release you from my service,” I said with a wave of my hand. “Go, do whatever it is fairies do…”
“Fine by me,” he replied in a miffed tone, and floated off through the supernaturally-tall trees and their gushing spouts of gleaming sap.
I clapped my hands and sighed, then set off again in a random direction.
“She’s pretty hard to replace, eh?” my piggish, mouldy gremlin asked, trotting alongside me in his red, curly boots. “Zelurra…” He hissed wistfully. “She was a tasty little thing, wasn’t she?”
“I do not appreciate that kind of talk,” my bronze-skinned, nearly-naked sylph said from my other side. “The lady was trouble. And that was not her name. We are well to be rid of her. It is due to her and… her ilk that we fey suffer our poor repute.”
“She was trouble, sure, but useful trouble,” I said heavily. “I still haven’t found anything that lets me see and hear half as well as she did, and it’s been weeks – I thought I’d get used to it, but…”
“Here he goes again,” Zab grumbled.
“We do share your mind, Feychilde,” Avaelar said in a conciliatory manner, “much of the time at least. We have seen through your eyes. We are well-versed in that of which you speak.”
“Alright, alright.” I stopped walking. “I think we’re done here.”
“You do not mean –“ Avaelar began.
“It’s time. It’s no worse than a wraith.”
The sylph cast me a disappointed look. “Gilaela will not be pleased.”
“I’ll keep him asleep, don’t worry.”
“I should think so!” he chided me, then, with a sheepish look on his face, said, “Apologies, Feychilde. I realise that you require perceptions beyond those afforded mortal men – yet I cannot comprehend your thinking in this. To what power might I turn, should you fail to resist the blood-hunger? And are you not Feychilde? Are –“
“You do share my mind, noble sylph. You know those are my number one problems. Number one and two problems, I mean…” The way he’d phrased it got me bothered all of a sudden – like I could become an enemy to be dealt with rather than still being me…
I took a breath, then squared my shoulders. “And you should know by now, I can’t afford to make mistakes. If my pride costs even one life –“
He held up his hand. “I should not question. I bow.” Avaelar ducked his head at me, the most respectful gesture he’d yet graced me with… thereby making me feel even more guilty about this.
“Very clever,” I snapped. “Come on, let’s go back.”
I ushered them through the jadeway, back into the twilit graveyard at the shrine of Yune in Sticktown, and joined with them again. Next I brought forth my wraith into the space I occupied, accessing its weightless nature and adjusting it down to the bare minimum.
“I would request my own sojourn, if I would not be remiss,” Avaelar mumbled.
“I’ll stay!” Zab said.
Very well.
With only my gremlin for company, I found the gesture that beckoned my lone remaining vampire into the world from the Nethernum.
A line of purple mist expanded then receded, leaving behind a pale-faced, pale-haired guy with gaunt features, pursed lips, and Sticktown clothing on his back. He was five-eight or five-nine, ugly as sin with a potato-shaped head and a huge bald patch, yet his vampiric nature – the daunting eyes, the languid stance – remained encapsulating.
“How mad are you?” I asked in a level voice, speaking Netheric. “I know we haven’t had chance to chat – you did alright in Zadhal, though…“
“Master…” He replied in the same hollow tongue, yet I could catch the Sticktown accent nonetheless. He was looking uncomfortable, refusing to meet my eyes. “Master, please… Please let me go, I promise –“
“You aren’t being let go. You’re… having your utility increased, that’s all.”
“Utility?” It seemed to break through his mood, and he turned his lavender gaze on me. “Ain’t that posh-speak for sewage-work?”
“Your usefulness,” I amended myself. “You’re going to be my eyes and ears. I just wanted to… I don’t know…”
He stood incredibly still, as motionless and silent as a statue, regarding me with unblinking, piercing eyes.
“… find out if you were a great conversationalist,” I finished, and sighed again. “Fine. Get in here.”
I waved a hand as if to strike him, and as though he were an illusion my arm passed right through him, absorbing his substance into myself.
Go to sleep, vampire.
The sensations trickled over me.
The evening. It lived and breathed.
I almost felt that I could hear the grass growing, never mind the worms wriggling around in it. I could smell the rain, and the rot, and the winter mushrooms. I could make out the veins in the individual leaves that swirled in the shadows.
The feeling of strength, power, that I received from my satyrs when I joined with them was definitely missing. My musculature hadn’t been changed, nor my bone density – I could tell that much just by flexing my arm.
Nor did I find myself craving a cup of blood…
All in all, I was satisfied. I spread Avaelar’s wings and took off for Treetown, adjusting my tangibility as I climbed the cold air.
I’d been lucky with the vampire, it seemed – or had I?
Did my desire to get the perception powers of the vampire have something to do with it? If I spend more time, dwelling on what I want to get out of the relationship, will I get better results?
“Not got a clue,” Zab said instantly.
Zel would’ve known.
“She probably could’ve written the book on it.” The gremlin sounded like he was taking an inordinate amount of pleasure in my distress.
Even if you’re right, she wouldn’t have ever told me the truth about it, I thought back. She’d have let on about it before I picked you up, if she was going to… No, she was scared I’d figure it out – she didn’t want me to get her danger-sense, or conscious control of her future-sight…
“You can do everything I can do,” Zab commented.
Except the mind-scan – and it’s not like my illusions are as good as yours. Plus… sorry, Zabalam, but you’re a bit of a one-trick pony. Zel had a whole candy-bag of minor abilities…
She was a dangerous adversary – whatever she was, whomever she served. No one’s explanations made any sense of her betrayal, though. Sure, maybe a few of the sorcerers that went around with things like her inside them had ended up being disintegrated in Incursions. But she’d done what she could to keep me away from that level of danger – or was that just a ruse, lulling me into a false sense of security, only waiting till I ripened to let me be plucked? Could she really be in league with the dragon’s demons? She’d always made out as though she hated dragons… And she’d worked so hard to rid us of Tyr Kayn’s influence… Was it possible she just wasn’t aware Lovebright was one of her master’s plots, until it was too late?
“Oh man, just send me to sleep already,” Zab said.
My brief flash of irritation at the interruption and my wholehearted agreement with his proposition were enough to send his consciousness straight back to his home plane – exactly what was supposed to happen, when the eldritch was properly bound.
Exactly how Zel – whatever her damn name was – had given herself away.
I flew on over the Blackrush, over Oldtown. Off in the distance, my vampiric sight let me pick out the trees beyond the Whiteflood – my destination.
Zab was right. I’d spent too much time dwelling over the faerie queen already. There were so many other pressing issues. Everseer bothered me the most – the fact every murder she committed from now on was on my head – my failure to end the threat she posed, when I had the chance… But the Nighteye situation was probably just as bad. Lying about the druid to Fangmoon and Sunspring, and the poor old grouse they’d found who knew him – it stung… but I didn’t have the luxury of conscience. I’d gradually lessened my outward confidence that we’d find ‘Theor’ until Killstop made the timely suggestion in front of everyone that we give up. In secret she was doing her best to counter the cover, the scrying-shield which Everseer’s presence in his life had granted Nighteye, but the truth was that we were swamped. Bigger events were afoot, drawing our attention. The dragon revivification stuff loomed over everything, never mind the whole ‘twin archmage’ fiasco…
According to Phanar, Ord Ylon wanted Redgate to visit his lair. That could only mean Lovebright had manipulated Timesnatcher into correcting the flow of the future, so that the evil arch-sorcerer would end up heading to Chakobar. Which meant Tyr Kayn and Ord Ylon were colluding… and if Everseer was right, that they were serving the ancient dragon progenitors, Ulu Kalar and Mal Tagar… then it was entirely possible that they’d been working towards the resurrection of a whole host of long-dead wyrms.
Did that mean it was all over? Did Redgate’s demise spell the end of their plots? Or did it just mean Tyr Kayn found another sorcerer to take over his part of the plan? The Magisterium dispatched investigators to Ord Ylon’s lair, and their reports should’ve been coming in any day now. Either way, we would soon find out what there was to be discovered in the old wyrm’s tunnels.
This much of my speculations I’d shared with Killstop, my co-conspirator. Tanra was already keeping Nighteye’s newfound heretic status a secret for me, and I figured a little more Heresy couldn’t hurt now the damage was done. She hadn’t caught much of what Everseer said to me in that buried tunnel but she’d inferred a lot using her power, and, well… in for a penny, in for a plat. I’d explained what the super-diviner said, her reference to a Time of the Twins, a ‘Crucible’ of sorts. To her credit, she took the news that Mund was destined to be eaten by dragons extremely well, I thought, only commenting on the difficulty the monsters would encounter in locating enough sauce to go with their historic barbecue.
I wished I could be as lackadaisical about the whole thing. Wasn’t this the future that she and Timesnatcher both had nightmares about? It was strange that she seemed so carefree about it… could it be that she was simply covering her concerns with bravado?
But this was Tanra, after all. She was hardly predictable either.
Diviners, I sighed internally for what felt like the thousandth time in the last three months.
It was good to have a confidante, though. I couldn’t risk telling Em. I’d patched things up with her, of course, and now, just two days from the first of Yearsend, our relationship was better than ever, sort of. I’d meant to confront her, but how could I? I was being a hypocrite, and keeping the blood off my own hands meant nothing if I’d been facilitating those without such qualms. So, she’d killed people. Everyone I knew had killed people. The victims were heretics, mass-murderers… I let the moment pass me by, and after a few days it all just blew over. There was too much occupying our attention for me to stay fixated on one little thing anyway.
At the Gathering, Timesnatcher chose Stormsword to debrief the Maginox section of the heretic battle, and she filled-in those who’d stayed at Ryntol Wood on what they’d missed. There’d been a couple of new champions in the circle, too – Copperbrow, a very nervous-looking gnome wizard in a bronze robe and mask, and Ripplewhim, an even-more nervous-looking Sticktown enchanter clad in green and black. I noted their looks of relief mingled with horror when they started to recognise the magnitude of the events they’d only-just missed out on. When I caught up with Ripplewhim after the meeting ended he didn’t want to chat, and walked out of the Ceryad chamber with an expression on his (lower) face that said he might not be coming back.
Might not be allowed back, if what they’d told me about Glaif and Illodin were true. Without the heart of a champion beating in his breast, what would happen if he tried to enter again? Would the doors simply fail to open for him, or would he be unable to cross the threshold? Redgate had allegedly experienced no discernible issues entering the Tower, but he had put his life on the line for others… ostensibly, anyway. Would Ripplewhim do the same?
Not that I could blame the new guy. While Timesnatcher had elected to speak about the dragons and their purpose in front of everyone – about the twins, about the book the heretics stole – I thought it was a bad idea. The gossip and rumours started almost immediately. His words were half-truth and hearsay, full of uncorroborated speculation. I knew more than he did, for once. Until I found another book or some other credible source – and I was spending every scant spare minute I could scrape together looking – I had no way to tell him, or anyone but Killstop, about Everseer’s information.
Not without risking my neck.
I dropped down at Phanar and Kani’s garden; I could see the cleric and Ana already sitting at the outdoor table with Tanra and Bor, glasses and tankards in front of them. An anti-precipitation spell covered the garden with its faint, orangey glow. Phanar and Ibbalat were busy carrying bowls, filled with warm fruits and steamed vegetables, into and out of the open doorway, loading them up on a side-table. I wouldn’t have taken a group of adventurers for such expert chefs but over the last few weeks they’d been keen to prove me wrong – it seemed being out in the wilderness half your life meant you had to be self-reliant in the cookery department, not just in the practice of self-defence.
“Feybaby!” Ana called, looking up at me with a devious smile gleaming white in the centre of her narrow, red-brown face.
“Annoythta,” I grated, descending to the paved patio. The girl had a scandalous tendency to spot me when I was approaching, no matter how enwraithed I was.
“You’re almost late,” Kani chided, sipping her hot tea. She always had a bit of a brittle attitude with me – which was understandable, given what she and her friends endured at Redgate’s hands. “Where’s Storm?”
“She’ll be on her way.” I touched down, and instead of pulling out my chair I floated straight through it, only rematerialising and sitting down once I was on the table side. “I got caught up in Etherium. Interviewing fey is way more difficult than I ever expected. And trust me, if there’s one thing I know – it’s fey.”
“Fey?” Ibbalat said, raising an eyebrow at me as he manoeuvred through the doorway holding aloft a bowl of peaches that poured with steam. “What kind?”
“I’ll trade you, answers for one of them,” I said eagerly. My stomach was almost turning over with hunger all of a sudden. “I’m ravenous for some reason.”
“Gladly!” He grinned, and I could see the little wane-leaf in his teeth.
The mage sauntered my way, lowering the bowl so that I could reach in and grab one of the warm, soft fruits – the hot, spicy sauce they were swimming in made them extra-slippery and it took me two goes.
“Kind… fairy,” I said through my juicy mouthful. “Powers… perception. Bit of diviner be good.”
“You joined with a vampire instead?” Ana asked.
I noticed Kani straighten a little in her seat.
“Wha…? How?” I stared at the rogue in confusion.
She raised a finger to one of her canines.
I quickly swallowed, licked my teeth, then shoved my finger in my mouth, running it across my upper row.
She was right. The two teeth were longer, sharper.
“Daaaamn,” I said. “I wonder if I still have a reflection…”
“You do,” Tanra murmured.
“Well…” I felt a bit flustered. “Glad you caught it, Annoythta, rather than my brother and sister!”
“Just happy to be of service, O Mighty Liberator.” She nodded her head, smiling sardonically.
“Erm… it’s An-ath-ta…” Ibbalat intervened, looking in confusion between the two of us.
“You missed her calling him Feybaby when he arrived,” Phanar said, also stepping out the door, this time with a tray of fresh-baked bread. “I believe the rejoinder was well-deserved.”
“I bow to the lady’s brother’s judgement,” Ibbalat’s eyes twinkled, “and apologise to the eminent champion. As for this ‘Feybaby’ thing… I thought I was the one you called ‘baby’…”
He gave her his best puppy dog eyes.
“Oh – I didn’t –”
The rogue floundered, looking into the mage’s face, the glum expression he wore behind his beard.
“Never seen her lost for words before,” Bor commented.
“Pretty sure she didn’t mean it that way, Ibb,” I said. “Not unless she wants to fight Storm over me…”
I leaned back and put my hands behind my head. Bor chuckled.
“Eww,” Ana said, screwing her face up. “A sorcerer? I don’t think so. Not that I couldn’t take your girlfriend in a fight –”
“Uh oh,” Tanra breathed, laughing lightly –
“What is this?” came an echoing ripple from above.
Ana looked up, and grinned a little before calling:
“Storm… baby… I’m just sayin’, if I have to fight you when you interrupt Phanar and Kani’s wedding –”
“Vhat?” Em cried, descending.
“Hey –” Kani began.
“Ana!” Phanar burst out.
“– as you’re totally in love with him in secret –”
“This is nonsense!”
“I know.”
“We know.”
“– but your boyfriend,” the rogue glared at me, “got all grumpy –”
“Anathta,” Ibbalat said in a tired voice.
“I think you’ll find,” I remarked, “it’s pronounced An-noyth-ta.”
* * *
“Feeling like she stole your crown?” I asked Tanra a few minutes later.
“Don’t be silly, Feychilde,” the seeress replied, taking a gulp of her drink – two parts water to one part wine – without seeming to move her mask. “The girl could never be quite as corrosive as me. She can’t see the future.”
“Maybe that’s why you’re losing your edge,” I shot back.
“Think about it: I knew what she was going to say; I had about seven hundred ways to stop her, but I didn’t… I basically said it myself, didn’t I?”
“You’ve changed, you know?”
She cast an almost-guilty look over at Bor, currently engaged in an illusion-contest with Ibbalat.
“You make a good couple,” I said. “An enchanter… Aside from another diviner, I guess an enchanter’s gonna be your best option, right?”
“At least things are slightly unpredictable,” she said, still watching Bor, then loosed a little sigh. “And he is easy on the eyes.”
I joined her in following the ‘contest’. There was no real challenge in it for Spiritwhisper, of course – Bor was an archmage. He could’ve made glamours at least ten times the scope of Ibbalat’s. He was clearly holding himself back but that didn’t stop him pushing the adventurer to improve his craft – when Ibb created a flock of pure-white doves to flap around the small orchard of druidry-infused apple trees, Bor created some that actually shone like the moon. When the mage copied him, increasing the intensity of his doves’ radiance, Bor split all his doves in two, suddenly doubling the size of his flock…
I butted in, throwing out a half-baked illusion of my own, blurry grey birds descending out of nowhere, but they literally split the glowing doves with their sudden intrusion.
“Leave it to the experts, eh,” Spirit said with a grin.
Meanwhile, Em and Ana had been discussing ensorcelled weaponry as Phanar barbecued some sliced pork; when he started serving, Em came and sat next to me.
“She trying to get you to discount her some spells again?” I asked. Vampiric hearing hadn’t been required for me to notice the content of their conversation.
“She wants them for free,” Em said with a sigh. “Not just a one-time fireball – oh no, a full-on explosive sword. I tried to explain, how long that might take – for a wizard this would be the work of months – and even for me, I do not know how many days…”
“But it’d be soooo useful,” Ana said, sitting down across from us. “Come on, Stormy Baby… for me…”
She wheedled and pouted, which of course only made Em knuckle-down in her refusals.
“It’s not just that,” I said after a minute; “I’d have to draw you a full infinity rune if you were going to use it all the time – fireballs don’t have duration, they just happen, and that’d be a real drain on the binding… Full infinity runes suck, in case you didn’t pick up on that part – I haven’t even tried drawing one yet.”
“Seriously? You suck.”
“Anathta!” Phanar snapped, looking up from the smoking grill – Em’s mouth was agape, and I could see her eyes hardening to steel through the slits in her phoenix-mask –
I laughed loudly, before anyone could get too angry.
“Besides,” Ibb interjected, “a ‘full infinity rune’ – isn’t that, like, an oxymoron? What in the Twelve Hells is half an infin-”
“Who’re you callin’ a moron?” Bor cried, clearly putting it on.
Once the outbursts turned fully good-natured and everyone had taken their chance to be offended and their chance to laugh their ass off at someone, I caught Kani looking at me with a strange expression on her face. I hoped she was reassessing me in a good way, rather than taking affront at my stupid retort.
“Why can’t we see your faces, know your names?” the redhead asked after catching my gaze. “Redgate – he never told us, who he was…“
“We couldn’t read it, either,” Bor said. “Even his face looks wrong in your memories. Damn demons…”
“Timesnatcher’s been working on it,” Tanra supplied.
“I hope the information is of use to you, when you obtain it,” the cleric went on. “But even he showed us what he looked like – and he was our enemy. You – you are our friends, right?”
“Kani,” Ibbalat cut in, “they’re thinking about us leaving.”
“But, we aren’t –“ Kani began.
“We aren’t leaving yet, no,” the mage continued. “But we could, one day, couldn’t we? We might up and leave on a moment’s notice, and our anti-glamour pendants…” He nodded in gratitude to Bor, not for the first time, and the archmage just nodded back. “Their spells would fail eventually. There’s no need in them running unnecessary risks. You can’t forget the kind of people they fight on a daily basis.”
“I wish,” Em sniffed, finishing her glass of wine. “More like weekly.”
“But that doesn’t really make any sense,” Kani said, looking back at us – me and Em, Tanra and Bor. “You know each other’s names, faces, right? Well, what if one of you leaves Mund…”
I sniggered. Em pulled a face like she wasn’t quite sure whether it was meant to be a joke. Tanra sighed and Bor just stared blankly.
“What?” Kani asked. “What did I say?”
“It is their home,” Phanar murmured. “Think, Kani, what it took for us to leave Miserdell.”
It’s not just that, I thought grimly. I couldn’t say it, but I could think it: We – are – all – broken. It’s not that Mund is our home. It’s that each of us fully expects to die here before too long.
“We feel the same thing you do,” Tanra said all of a sudden, her voice severe. The winter wind whistled in the trees on the edge of the garden. “We know death approaches. We’re young…” She glanced at Bor. “Too young to die, but old enough to try our hands against theirs, and with what’s on the way… dragons, demons… None us expects to ever leave this city. Not without returning, anyway. Each of us is fated to make our last stands within these walls.”
We all regarded her in silence. The wind died down – possibly Em’s doing, conscious or not…
“The truth is, I can’t really see any of our futures… I mean, I can see too many, which just amounts to the same thing. We’re all tied up in this together. I don’t know if you guys are staying or going. So I’m going to trust my gut.”
Tanra reached up to her face, the motions deliberate, slow. “We may not be able to show our faces at the ceremony, but I’ll be damned if you don’t know what your wedding guests look like behind the mask.”
She removed her frowning face, displaying the crooked smile beneath.
“I’m Tanra. Pleased to meet you.”
We all followed suit, and the chill atmosphere lifted, like it was an enchantment being broken. I noticed Kani looking at me again, and this time I thought for a moment that I saw her eyes flash a deep amber hue as she glanced across our features. Then I actually saw the disgust diminishing as the seconds wore on, her distrust fading. She was relaxing. The next time she laughed, the timbre of it was deeper, more guttural.
Redgate really did a number on her.
She had used magic of some kind to give us the once-over, I was certain of it. I almost wanted to start a debate on the nature of divine spells, but I was loath to risk shattering the mood by saying something she’d take personally… that, and I was a bit scared about the answers I’d receive. The books to which I’d been exposed had hardly touched on the limits of so-called miraculous interferences… something about ‘deific extrusion’ and ‘planar cavities’, accompanied by extremely convoluted diagrams… The theory was beyond my grasp, and all I’d seen during Incursions was comparable to low-level battle-magic. The possibilities… did divine spells surpass archmagery, not just in efficacy but in scope?
I got sidetracked in my own thoughts, not speaking for a while, watching Phanar at work. When he started serving up, he said, “So, Kas, I see you eyeing this piece of pork. Is that the human in you hungering, or the vampire?”
I hadn’t even realised I’d been staring, but he was right, damn him.
“Vampire?” Em gasped, breaking my reverie. “Truly, Kas?”
I turned my face to her, bared my fangs and said laconically, “Mwahahha!”
Em poked me in the ribs then leaned closer, inspecting my new teeth with interest.
“You could not tell, Emrelet?” Phanar’s lips twitched, which for his impassive face was equal to at least a medium-sized grin.
“Even with her tongue halfway down his throat earlier…” Ibbalat murmured.
“I don’t know how you do it where you come from, mate,” Bor said, “but round here we don’t lick each other’s teeth…”
“Yeah, Ibb,” Ana said, “just shut up, will you?”
Ibbalat started mumbling at her like a mute, lips pressed together, shaking his head around – she put her arms round his neck to kiss him.
We ate. We drank. We had a night of good cheer.
Me and Em discussed buying a similar house – Kultemeren knew we had enough money. We could live near our friends… have a space together… And a few hours later, when I was stealing the demons off a cultist who thought he could go toe-to-toe with one of the city’s most-prominent sorcerers, I was just going through the motions, my mind still there in Phanar and Kani’s garden, enjoying the ambience and the feeling of comradeship, the dreams of the future.
The future I had to make present. I could buy a place with my girlfriend, a luxurious manor-house probably previously-owned at some point by another champion, long gone from this world… We could live together – we could bring all our families to live there – or keep it secret, keep it just for us…
Marriage? No. Surely, not yet… We were too young, weren’t we? We hadn’t known each other long enough…
But who knew how quickly it might all end, for any of us?
All of us?
If Everseer were to be believed about the ‘Crucible’ – what sounded very much like a year of torment, only concluding with the death of the city – we would would soon find out.
* * *
“Your head hurt too?” I asked Em as we walked in the snow the following afternoon. Undernight in Oldtown was teeming with people at the moment. Open-air markets had sprung up out of the cobbles, possibly literally in some cases, and it was loud.
She smiled. “A bit.”
We’d gone out in civilian clothes. Back when the weather started turning bad, we’d bought long, almost-matching coats, black leather lined with wolf’s fur; hers swept outwards as it reached towards the ground, while mine was hoodless with a high collar. Despite our garb, Em kept the warming-spell active on both of us, and as we strolled I’d managed to start sweating inside the leather.
“You should’ve come with me to Irimar’s this morning. Then your head would be hurting.”
She looked at me curiously. “Vot was it zis time?”
“Oh, he’d been trying to get some answers out of Henthae’s people about Ord Ylon – why the problem wasn’t dealt with by the Magisterium, and why it got left in Phanar and Kani’s lap for so long.”
She was still staring at me as we walked, so I continued: “Got to just love the system, haven’t you? See, Miserdell’s in Warthia, which is classed as a ‘minor territory’… which just means it doesn’t fall under the direct purview of any Seat of the Arrealbord. Its lord nominally owed fealty to another lord, whose own lord made not a penny from the place. In other words, no one cared – it didn’t threaten their assets, you see. Someone in an administrative branch just replaced the local governor when the taxes stopped flowing, and amended the expected figures for next year accordingly. It’s what they do when settlements go missing – dragons, demons, giants, whatever…”
“I understand,” she said, frowning a little. “Yet, vot of Chakobar? If zere voz a –”
I held up a hand. “Ah but the funny thing is, Ylon never actually struck anywhere in Chakobar. Plus, the house… House Daevon, that has the Lordship of Chakobar… they’re the thirty-first Seat. They’ve got no pull and they know it – they aren’t going to trade in any favours they’re owed without being sure there’s some material gains to be made. There was, after all, no hard proof that this dragon was an Ord – and everyone knows the tales of dragon-hoards are just exaggerations… right?”
She raised an eyebrow, half-smiling. We both had a very good idea just what our new friends had found in the lair.
“And when their representative was told the monster who destroyed Miserdell had his lair just a few days’ ride from Tirremuir, do you know what she said? ‘Let me know if there’s an attack and I’ll see what I can do’…”
“I suppose,” Em mused, “if zey reacted vildly to every rumour of a dragon, zey vould run out of resources very quickly. And if it vere not for ze actions of Tyr Kayn, ze Magisterium vould have done something once Phanar arrived in Mund, of zat I am certain…”
“I guess you’re right,” I admitted. “It still sucks, though. I get why no one seemed bothered when they first came to Mund – I’m onboard with the notion Lovebright was behind it – Tyr Kayn, I mean…”
Gods, why was it so hard to remember the real culprit? I didn’t feel scared, so why was my mind still shrinking away from the truth?
Because it was a dropping dragon, Kas, I reminded myself. And she made Lovebright real, whatever that means…
I shook my head.
“But it shouldn’t have even been allowed to get that far,” I went on. “No one cared, long before Phanar came here, before the enchantress –”
“Ve do not know how long she voz covering for Ord Ylon.”
She was right about that – the idea hadn’t even crossed my mind – and I nodded in agreement.
“True.”
“Ze bureaucracy – zis is is ze real problem, is it not? Ze system itself. Zere is no power for ze people.” Em waved at the crowds, people pushing and pulling all around us. “Our institutions have zeir hands tied by regulation, regulation designed by ze rich to further enrich zemselves. If ze Magisterium did not require a mandate from ze Arrealbord, zey could have skipped all ze lobbying and simply made ze decision to send a team of archmages straight to Miserdell…”
“Do you really think they would have, though?” I asked.
She gave me one of those looks, and threw it back in my face: “Do you really think zey vouldn’t have?”
I spread my hands. “It’s not like I know them – and I know you think you do…”
“It is zeir responsibility to protect ze Realm from creatures like dragons!”
“The dragon would’ve been long gone by the time they got the news, even if it was transmitted magically.” I shrugged. “Maybe it was, just like you said, too great a risk of resources. It’s not like they intervene when a country’s undergoing a food shortage and resorting to cannibalism, is it?”
“Zat is different!” She glowered at me, and I could tell I’d struck a nerve with that one. “Ze famine in Onsolor is hardly magical in origin – ze druids can only do so much, and –“
“It’s a political crisis. For people like Sentelemeth to fix, not us.”
“Or a… a spiritual crisis. Dark hearts tend to dark gods. I do not trust my people.”
“Alright, alright.” I cast about for something else to talk about. I didn’t want to send her into a depression spiral. “Say, do you think Jaid would like that dress? The purple one. It’s about her size, right?”
Em was smiling tightly – probably clinging to the fact she’d clearly just won the argument – and she crossed over towards the stall I indicated. I followed, shoving my way through the gap she made, and arrived just as she was running her fingers over the fabric of the dress.
“Hmmm.” She lifted the garment from its hook, holding it up against her body and smoothing down the material. “Right size, and she vould love ze colour – but ze cloth itself leaves something to be desired.”
“I’ll be ‘avin none o’ that!” cried the vendor, suddenly emerging from a knot of people on the other side of the stall. She was an extremely thin woman with long grey braids hanging across her left shoulder. “Tha’s the finest Amranian cotton, missy, an’ I won’t hear a word said agains’ it!”
“Sure you will,” Em replied, Stormsword’s accent coming through strong. “The fabric is coarse, here, and here – and was there really a need to hire a blind seamstress? Look at this stitching here – it’s already practically falling apart.”
I sighed, and stood by while Em dragged the skinny woman over the coals, driving away at least fifty percent of the customers crowding around the stall.
If Tanra could see you now, I mused. Some of the seeress had clearly been rubbing off on her.
“If Xantaire was here, she vouldn’t let you buy it,” Em said to me in the end, ignoring the woman’s latest retort and replacing the dress before taking me by the arm and leading me away. She’d been bargain-hunting with Xan at least three times over the last two weeks but she’d never shown me what they’d been buying, and each time upon their return to the flat they always broke out giggling for some reason.
“Anyvay,” she tugged me in another direction, “it’s Yearseve and you’re still shopping – and not even for your girlfriend! Vot am I going to do with you?”
“I don’t know, but I can get creative if you’re strapped for ideas,” I said eagerly.
“You vish!”
She kissed me anyway, and we stood there in the midst of the crowds for a few moments, bodies crushed together, this time by our own wills. I barely noticed the constant jostling.
When we parted I chuckled. “In any case, I’ve already got the twins more presents than they’ve ever seen in their whole lives… It’s their birthday, the fi-“
“Fifth of Yunara, I know,” Em cut me off.
“– so I always get extra now… Plus, I don’t think you’d be very happy if I was shopping for you – you think I’d dare leave it so late? And, trust me, I didn’t get yours off an Undernight market…”
Her eyes lit up. “Oooh, vhat did you get me? Just give me a clue –“
She didn’t really want to know. This was just part of the game, and we’d done the same dance half a dozen times this month.
“Which one of your gifts are you talking about, exactly?” I asked archly.
Her eyes lit up even brighter. “How many am I getting? Don’t you dare, Kastyr Mortenn – you tell me right now!”
“Now that would be simply unacceptable, m’lady,” I chortled. “I’m afraid you’re just going to have to wait and see, aren’t you?”
I tried moving away, but without using my powers to cheat I didn’t have a chance: she chased me and prodded me – begged me – held the lapels of my new coat in her small fists and stared imploringly into my eyes. It was only when she moaned directly into my ear that I actually collapsed in fits of laughter, unable to bear the heat of her breath on my neck.
Once we started getting dirty looks we left… well, once we started getting continual dirty looks, at least. We were only wandering for the sake of something to do on Yearseve, anyway – the actual gifts we each needed were long-since obtained and set-aside for the upcoming events.
“I’ve got an hour before I’m looking after the twins,” I mentioned slyly once we reached an almost-abandoned alleyway.
It took us about ten seconds to get our robes on – temporarily – then we were flying towards Treetown.
You could do a lot, in an hour.
* * *
At eight o’ clock there came the knocking at the front door I’d been waiting for; I was stuck in the bedroom, attempting without much success to persuade Jaid it was time to get under the covers.
“Come on, it’s us,” I heard Tanra’s voice from the other side echoing through the main room.
Xantaire let her and Bor in while I hurried up bed-time.
“Bed-time!” Jaid kept announcing in an insulted tone of voice. “It’s Yearseve – can’t we stay up just another hour?”
“Ah, but if you stay up too late Father Time won’t come, and then there’s nothing to open in the morning.” I attempted to grace her with a wise look. “Best to sleep early – look how dark it is out there already!”
“There’s not gonna be any presents anyway,” Jaroan complained, then he adopted an expression of shrewd superiority. “Father Time usually hides them under your bed, Kas, and this year –”
“No!” Jaid snapped. “Father Time is real. I know, I saw him once.” (Whatever night-time hallucination she’d once experienced I was unsure, but her continued belief in Arreath Ril’s Yearsend gift delivery system was a real heart-warmer.) Then, vehemently, she concluded: “I’m going to sleep. I want my presents.”
Thanks, Jaroan, I thought smugly.
My sister jumped into bed and, clearly without thinking things through, she rolled into the blankets until she was well-and-truly immobile.
“Riiight,” Jaroan said, then, with the heavy sigh of the world-weary, he sat on the bed beside her.
It wasn’t like I could tell him, was it? His presents were there under the bed, just covered with a touch of invisibility, courtesy of Zab.
“I shouldn’t be back too late,” I said instead as I put my things together. “Just a few drinks after, then the meeting, then I’ll be right back and in bed before Father Time arrives, I promise, Jaid.”
“Just cos your not patrolling, doesn’t mean you’ll be back early,” Jaroan grumbled. “I know what these things are like by now. Dreamlaughter will show up at last and, and just wreck everything –”
“Not if I’ve got anythin’ to say about it,” Bor said from the bedroom doorway.
I looked up, nodded to him.
“Spirit!” Jaid chirped, struggling out of the covers and sitting up. “Show me something.”
He stepped into the room, smiling, and gently brushed her forehead with his fingertip. She fell straight back onto the pillows as though she’d been rendered unconscious instantly.
Jaroan looked at him sceptically.
“She’s havin’ an awesome vision,” Bor answered the unspoken question. “She’s a fierce warrior-queen, in command of an army of animals, all of ’em drawn right out of her dreams.”
“Ooh!” My brother’s sudden change of heart had him leaning forwards eagerly. “Can you do me? Only, I’d be a warrior-king, and a, you know, regular army would do…”
“How’s about an army of fire-monsters?”
“Oooooh!”
The lightest touch of the enchanter’s finger was enough to put him out like a candle.
“Should I let them sleep?” Bor asked. “Like, right through?”
“Gods, man – I always thought enchantment seemed too good to be true, and now you’re telling me you can just put kids to sleep…”
“Eight hours? Ten? Twelve?”
“Parenting’s gonna be so easy for you, isn’t it?”
“Kas…”
I sighed. “If it wasn’t Yearsend tomorrow I’d have said at least thirty-six. Twelve’ll do… and I’m pretty sure Xantaire will be a fan forever if you pay her little boy a visit.”
He grinned, shrugged, and left the bedroom –
The moment he’d moved, Tanra was standing in the same spot.
“Come on, Kas,” she chided. “You’re getting as bad as your girlfriend. We’ll be late.”
I put my mask in my satchel. “Don’t be daft – we’ve got you. If anyone’s gonna get us to the shrine on time…”
Fifteen minutes later, we were standing in our champion outfits near the altar of Yune in Hightown. Em was at my side, my vampire’s essence once more feeding me enhanced sensory capabilities.
I wasn’t about to let anything happen tonight.
No one had publicised the event – indeed, it was supposed to be a private affair – but it wasn’t the kind of venue you could just book-out. The full moon falling on Yearseve was of course too good for the nuptial couple to pass up – and it had the added benefit of the cleansing at the Fountains of Merizet drawing away lots of potential passers-by. However, this was a posh area, and most of the people around here would have the money to afford proper healing. Therefore, a fair number of the passers-by had already stopped passing by, freezing in their tracks when they saw us, and it hadn’t taken long for the news to spread – a small crowd started to form, keeping a respectable distance from the proceedings. I had a number of things to say about Hightown folk, in general, but at least they knew how to behave themselves.
It wasn’t quite going to be the perfect winter wedding. The wind was biting and the snow wasn’t falling, but there was plenty of the white stuff on the ground and it didn’t appear to be going anywhere soon. It gave a satisfying crunch under my boots whenever I shifted my feet, looking around at what would’ve been grassy fields surrounding a lake – now a picturesque tundra ringing a dark mirror, the icy water’s black surface reflecting only the full moon.
The shrine of Yune in Hightown they’d selected for their ceremony was so dissimilar to the Sticktown shrine, it beggared belief that they were temples to the same goddess. Where I lived, ‘hope’ meant tens of thousands of gravestones, souls removed from this world to a, ‘hopefully’, better place. The altar itself was a simple block of marble and some flowers. Here, you could’ve been fooled into thinking it was a shrine to Wythyldwyn. Hope in this world was definitely the theme. The trees here hadn’t been abandoned to become gnarled and twisted, growing where and how they wanted; these ones were spaced in rows, each tree roughly equal in height and the span of its branches… Instead of moss streaming from trunks festooned with mushrooms, these were streaming with yellow ribbons, all marks of fungus and growth removed from their bark by druids.
The place was vast – two or three times the area of my shrine, I was sure, despite the fact the Sticktown shrine was the biggest patch of greenery in the whole north-end of my district. Here the cemetery-section was relatively tiny, but it was no more an afterthought than the decorations on the trees: instead of gravestones, tall structures were the order of the day – mausoleums and tombs and crypts, many of them looking so ancient they might’ve predated Sticktown even as a concept.
The altar before which we stood was a full rendering of the goddess. Her youthful face upraised, narrow lips parted in a slight smile, crowned with a five-rayed halo and robed in cloud – Yune was carved from what appeared to be a single pearl, standing a full twelve feet in height, garlanded in goldsprawn and rosemary. The statue’s value was literally inestimable. At its feet a number of vivid roses fountained forth from the soil; I couldn’t see or hear a single insect on their many-hued petals, and their lustrous scents were overpowering, dusty doors opening on hidden memories.
We four were the only official guests, the only people they’d really got to know since arriving back in Mund. The two ministers of the goddess stood off to one side as they conversed in low voices, a man and woman both advanced in years and clad respectively in robes of pale blue and pink.
Then they returned, groom and best man striding down on the airs from the night sky where they’d spent the last ten minutes – Em had superseded Ibbalat’s flight-spell with her own magic to ensure there were no accidents. If they were coming back down, that could only mean the ladies were about to arrive.
Phanar had eschewed traditional wedding garb, unless it was customary in his homeland to dress in full battle-harness and weapons at the altar. Ibbalat wore a fancy new mage’s hat and a blue-and-gold mage-robe in the finest cut I’d ever seen, all angles and swirls – and I knew some of the richest mages in Mund – hells, I knew the First Lady of Mund…
We turned to watch the arrival of the bride and her bridesmaid.
Kanthyre wore a gown white like the snow, bound tightly into its corset-like structure but not so much that she threatened to spill out the top. The lacy sleeves of the dress spilled down to the cleric’s feet, the cuff-hems just brushing the frosted surface of the ground, sparkling as they did so. Her face was hidden by the veil hanging from her tiara, the circlet’s sapphires gleaming fiercely on her brow, but they did little to mask or distract from her winsome smile.
My eyes widened when I saw the mace at her side, carefully covered and strapped-down.
Behind her, carrying the long train, Anathta was wrapped in a form-fitting dress made up of several diaphanous layers, Phanar’s cloak across her shoulders. Each piece of sheer material was a different colour, yet somehow the narrow gown wasn’t garish or muddy – it was like a slender mosaic of glass.
“See, that’s how you do it,” I murmured to Tanra.
To describe the elbow I received to the ribs as ‘swift’ wouldn’t be doing it justice.
Her and Spirit are a bloody good match, I thought, rubbing my side and wincing.
As the bride approached, suddenly music filled the air, a slow, melodious tune that seemed to ripple up from the very ground, as though the snow were singing, chanting a solemn, wordless hymn to the goddess. I looked at Bor, but his demeanour was one of curiosity… so this was the work of Yune herself? I remembered going to a wedding in my youth, with my parents – but I couldn’t recall automated music. There’d been a few guys with small harps, if memory served. Sounds out of the earth? I thought I would’ve remembered if that’d happened.
At the same time, me and Em made our gestures. The wizard brought the snow drifting down again in a gentle flurry; for my part, I put shields around the whole area, centring them on the space before the altar so that Phanar and Kani would stand within the very heart of protection. I’d read enough books to know the villains always struck just before two people got married – I didn’t think the adventurers had made any enemies yet, but it never hurt to be on the safe side. No one but me could see the blue shapes through which the snow was now billowing.
Despite his choice of armour for his wedding suit, Phanar performed the formal tradition of Realm marriage – once Kani reached his side he kept his eyes from her and slowly circled her, facing outwards, before turning to regard her, circling her a second time. As he drew to a stop he took her by the hand, then guided her, turning on his heel and keeping hold of her fingers as she circled him a single time. At last, niceties obeyed, they came to stand together before the altar.
The ministers moved to stand under the arms of Yune’s statue – the priest under her right arm, the priestess under her left. They went barefooted, and the roses about the statue moved aside, parting so that they could step unharmed into the thorny space.
The music faded away.
“From the darkness of yesteryear’s gloom steps a shadow brightening,” said the male minister. “From the rushes a wind shall be born.” He produced a good-humoured, boyish smile despite plainly being sixty-something years old. “We welcome Phanar and Kanthyre into the bosom of hope. May it be yours, everlasting, beyond this world.”
“From the heart comes the fire enlightening,” said the woman, her voice incredibly warm, gentle. “From the Shadow new selves be torn! We welcome Phanar and Kanthyre as they join their souls, bound by sacred oath. May their love be everlasting, the hallowed, unblemished pearl.”
They started going back and forth, priest then priestess.
“Yune, Lady of Peace, Destiny’s Door, we supplicate thee! Fill them with thy peace; lead them from anger and violence and into thine arms, where all might rest, and find understanding beyond enmity.”
“Entreat thy kin to watch over these, your faithful followers: bring them the blessing of thy father Locus, that they might learn from their mistakes, and thy daughter Belestae, that ill-fate might never befall them!”
“Under Brondor’s hand, fill their treasuries, bring them wealth overflowing,” the priest smiled at Kani; “under Wythyldwyn’s wing, heal their hurts, bring them life abounding.”
“O Joran, shield them as they walk in Kaile’s light! O Glaif, bind the vows they make in the freedom of Nentheleme’s sight!” The priestess slowly cast out an arm to the snow drifting, silvery in the moonlit as it coursed through the black night sky. “Tauremai, Queen of Winter, bear witness to this union made in the bosom of your time. Uphold it, for all winters to come, until Mortiforn takes them to his own. In the name of Urdaith, let it be so!”
I shivered, not at the cold. It was just… the inevitability of it all. Even at a wedding, the spectre of death raised its head. It was omnipresent. It weighed equally on us all, in the end.
Everyone goes through it. My parents went through it. I’ll go through it, and the twins will too… one day…
“Please, look into one another’s eyes,” the male minister instructed them.
The bride and groom turned to face each other. Ana helped Kani get her veil drawn over her head, trailing it back across her hair.
“Phanar of N’Lem,” he went on, “do you bind yourself to this woman, Kanthyre Vael, with willing mind and soul?”
“I do,” the warrior spoke huskily, breath steaming on the air.
“Until the earth sinks into the sea? Until the sea boils in the fire? Until the fire becomes smoke and the smoke passes away over the mountains of time, where only nothingness can follow?”
“I do.”
The female minister broke in: “Then the nothingness shall never come; for love brings hope and hope brings love, and new life shall be born out of every void, as Yune teaches. Kanthyre Vael, I ask you now the same. Do you bind yourself to this man, Phanar of N’Lem, with willing mind and soul?”
“I do.”
“Until the –“
I whirled, pointing, and Tanra flickered and vanished.
There was an impact on my shield – and what I saw amazed me.
Timesnatcher and Killstop, both of them now on the edge of the invisible barriers, knives in their hands – and Duskdown blurring up to me, a pink-purple shape streaking across the snow.
“Feychilde!” he growled as he slowed. “I need you.”
It took me a moment to process what was happening – the small crowd of onlookers vanished like a flock of pigeons struck by a hawk, screaming –
The very instant Stormsword raised her hands for the lightning, she shot off into the air, thrown beyond the shield’s borders with the others.
The ill-will… They wish harm… on my ally?
Spiritwhisper held himself very still – he’d clearly figured out what was happening, and didn’t want to get unceremoniously tossed beyond the dome like Em.
“Drop the shield!” Timesnatcher roared.
“Feychilde?” Ibbalat cried.
It made no sense, but the sunset-clad arch-diviner was still walking towards me.
“Stay calm, everyone,” I called over my shoulder. “Finish the ceremony!”
He is not interrupting this.
I heard the ministers behind me hurriedly finishing up, their voices tense with fear and perhaps a trace of disgust at what was going on, here on their hallowed ground. Meanwhile, I stepped out to meet the killer, staring at him – the stubble on his chin, the pressed-together lips beneath the mask of metal discs and crescents.
Another diviner. More trouble.
No. No more.
I hid the gestures in my sleeve as I spoke.
“What is it, Duskdown?” I grated.
“He’s doing it, right now,” he replied. “He verified Redgate’s death, and he found the demon – he’s planned this out – I can’t stop him alone –“
“Who’s doing what?”
“Your friend,” he sneered, “die –“
Timesnatcher’s strike went just over his head – the murderer ducked into a fighting-stance as the champion sped at him.
I couldn’t even follow their melee.
Killstop joined in, and the three of them went sprinting back and forth across the snow with such ferocity that they melted it, blades meeting in great crashes of light and sound –
Then they were tearing up the grass and sod beneath, as they criss-crossed their patch of ground, over and over, leaping and spinning at one another. Within two seconds they were little more than multi-coloured smears in a cloud of steam, even to me – I stood dumbfounded, staring at metallic rainbows that went buzzing and ringing across the air, sparks cascading from every contact like screeches from a vast violin. Each twist of motion they performed left behind a thousand imprints in the air, tiny time-frozen lightning-bolts stuttering through the fog, rippling in their wake.
“What can I do?” Em asked, descending back to my side.
I shook my head. “I don’t think we can do anything, here. Even you can’t hit Duskdown, not in that.”
“I could blow the fog away –“
“This is takin’ a reaaally long time,” Spirit interjected, sounding worried. “These things are usually over in seconds.”
“True,” I said. “But none of them wish me ill-will – I could throw them all somewhere, now, I guess? If it even works that way… And none of my demons can move anything like that fast, or –“
“Reaaally long, now!” Spirit blurted. “Call Doomspeaker! We might be able to bring in reinforce…”
Bor’s voice died away.
The colours, the sounds faded.
Behind us, I heard Ibbalat and Anathta clapping belatedly as the groom kissed the bride, while in front of us, I saw the body of the arch-diviner being dragged into the open.
The hilts of two knives had been left protruding from the robe, their blades buried in the chest cavity. The magic in them ran up and down the handles, moving into and out of the dying man, green tinctures of light pulsing through his innards.
I could see his face – his mask was missing. Duskdown was a human in his mid-to-late- thirties, heavy-browed but handsome, a somewhat receded hairline with short blond hair falling down his neck.
But half his head resembled one of Phanar’s peaches, his eye socket smashed, the skin already puffed up in a great reddish welt.
Killstop let go of his foot, and it fell limply to the ground.
Timesnatcher spoke in a low, thick voice, the words wrung from him.
“O Yune. Yune…” The champion went to his knees beside Duskdown’s comatose body, looking up at the pearl-carved statue of the goddess, eyes glimmering with tears. “Yune, Mother of the Mercies – I thank you. I thank you…
“You…
“You listened…”
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