As a small apology for being so inconsistent lately, we’re going to push through a number of posts in short order over the next few days to catch up to the intro for Chapter Three which mistakenly posted this morning. It’s been moved back, but not for long. Thanks for sticking around, everyone! It means a lot. – Ian

By the time the boat had made wharf at the city’s main harbor, Kintere had all but forgotten the previous night. He had not planned to be so angry with Mireya, nor had he planned to leave himself exposed to the Curia’s ministrations. He found, though, that he was glad of both. Mireya kept to herself as the ship weighed anchor at the small encampment down the coast from the burning city of Yeun, leaving Kintere and Blackfang with a longboat to themselves to cross to shore.

“I don’t envy you your position, Kintere,” Blackfang huffed in the tongue of the jungle. The language drew curious looks from the sailors manning the boat’s oars, but afforded the pair some measure of privacy.

“Why not? I go with my friends to a place where my past means nothing.”

“You’re a fool. Your past follows in your shadow, whether others see it or not. I, however, remain a hunter. Attensah will make of me the greatest warrior this world has ever seen. Let the elders call me tainted then, when the grime of my captivity is washed off by my deeds.”

Kintere envied his friend that optimism. Blackfang – Kienor, as he had been known before he took the mantle of hunter – had always been of a single mind. Like the arrows he favoured, the hunter walked through life with a purpose Kintere envied.

“My father will certainly not consider you tainted, Kienor. Your captivity was not within your control. What you’ve told me of this hooded one – clearly he is a Weaver, a Dweomercrafter such as those you now go to study with.”

“And yourself, Kintere. Where I go, I learn the ways of war. Where you go, who knows what knowledge awaits? I hope your thick skull allows some in.”

Kintere smiled.

“Still, you’ve chosen well in your friends,” Blackfang admitted, screwing his eyes to narrow beads and glaring out toward the boat which carried Mireya and Rhayd. “That noble, he must be a force when he puts his will to something.”

“If he is, I’ve not seen it. He rarely makes his will known clearly, if at all.”

“There is a great steadfastness in him,” Blackfang insisted. “I don’t think anyone has seen its shape yet. The girl comes closest, though. I’ve seen them fight. She knows just where to cut him to reveal the heartwood beneath his rough bark.”

“She knows that skill for everyone she meets,” Kintere agreed.

The boats made land, all twelve issuing forth a frenzy of sailors and land workers as the cargo from the longboats was removed. The small group, headed by Curia Thryche, made their way off down the coast, away from the mess. Kintere kept to the rear, ignoring the occasional glance from Mireya where she walked beside Thryche and Rhayd. He wasn’t ready to talk to her yet.

“He’ll be here soon,” Thryche said suddenly, stopping to stare out at the ocean.

“Who will?” Rhayd asked, crossing his arms in a gesture Kintere knew signified annoyance at Thryche’s continual cryptic behaviour. He didn’t blame Rhayd at all – the man was wearing on his nerves as well.

“The master of Attensah,” Thryche answered. “Jeeder Legaeta. Head of the King’s Elite.”

“I’ll get Thryche,” Rhayd volunteered. He was gone by the time Mireya turned her head to offer to go in his stead, leaving her on the deck alone, surrounded by now-panicking sailors, with only the gruesome sight of the burning city to keep her company.

Immediately, she tried to focus on something other than the city itself. Yeun was built into the side of a mountainous island, so much of the city was visible even from a distance. Buildings far larger than any in Penance sprawled up the sides of the delta, standing three or even five stories tall, some of them nearing the size of the Court building and two, one on either side of the delta with a huge bridge between, were each the size of the entire ducal estate.

And it was all burning to the ground.

Shortly, Mireya found herself surrounded by familiar presences, and abandoned her scrutiny of the city to find Rhayd, Kintere, and the Curia all at her side. It took her a moment to find Blackfang as well, wrapped as always in his hunting clothes, lounging like a cat against the rear castle. His eyes were cold, but anything else was impossible to tell through the burnoose hiding his head.

Rhayd was livid, that much Mireya could tell by looking at him, and Thryche was studying him – perhaps the two had had some harsh words below decks. Kintere was a blank slate. Never, since she had known him, had Mireya seen the man so calm while still awake. He was always giving something away with his eyes. Now, however, he looked more like Blackfang, with his jaw set tight, and his normally expressive eyes taking in the city of flames as if it were a threat. Perhaps it was.

Mireya caught Rhayd’s eyes, as he turned away from the city. He nodded – he saw a question there that she was unwilling to speak.

“Edvard knows what happened to the city,” Rhayd said, folding his arms over his chest. “But he’s refused to say.”

“I did not refuse,” the Curia corrected, pointing a gnarled finger at the young noble. “Don’t mince words. I told you it would do you no good to know what the cause was. There’s a difference.”

“It’s no help to is either way,” Mireya said meekly, drawing a confused look from the Curia. “We’re going to land there, aren’t we? Hadn’t we best know what we might find when we do?”

Blackfang laughed, drawing all eyes to him for a moment. The tall hunter shrugged, shaking his head.

“The girl’s right, master Thryche. For all we know, the dreaded xul are waiting in Yeun to take us all back to the underworld.”

“Bah,” Thryche spat – clearly, Blackfang had backed him into a corner. “There are no xul in Yeun.”

“But there were,” Kintere said, continuing his vigil on the city. “Two or more days ago.”

“Why so precise?” Rhayd asked, turning his own eyes on the city again.

“These flames are old, it’s the stone burning now. All the wood has been gone for at least a day. That’s why there’s so much smoke, and so little fire. Most of the city’s people are gone. If you look south, along the coast, you can see a small harbor where the other ships who have come in since the fire began have put in.”

“Impressive,” Rhayd breathed, obviously frustrated he hadn’t seen that himself. Mireya chided herself for the same feeling – she had focused so thoroughly on the city, she hadn’t even thought to look along the coast.

“Master Toralyon surprises us again,” Thryche said with a laugh, rapping Kintere on the back with his cane. “Yes, the xul were here. It seems their raiding has moved further than expected. And yes, those boats are the ones we were here to meet. This attack was clearly timed with knowledge that weavers from the schools were coming to collect new students. I expect that your classes will be quite thin, thanks to this. But you’ll be going to the places you were assigned. I can see the flag of Jinda on one of the boats.”

“And of Attensah on the other, I assume,” Blackfang chimed.

“Yes, and of Attensah. You’ll find your assignment quite to your liking, Kienor. The hunters of Attensah are second to no other.”

“Then I shall make myself chief among them,” Blackfang rasped – but Mireya thought she was the only one who heard. She met the hunter’s eyes for a moment, before looking to the others, only to see they had turned their gazes back to the city and its flames.

Nothing is ever easy.

BONUS EPISODE

In apology for the massive delays I’ve had the last week, Leila and I got together to make sure we could leave you all with something special over the weekend to say thanks for sticking around and putting up with the delays. So thanks, guys! This week’s going to be tense! – Ian

Dawn. A dull and inauspicious one, at that – dark clouds broiled with malcontent overhead to match the steel sea, white caps boxing at the sides of the boat, wan fingers of pink crawled across the sky. The night had felt endless, Mireya had asked herself question after question, the answers as distant as land. Now, with dawn marching relentless toward the boat, Mireya made her way to the deck with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Scratchy, cheap wool. Few of the crew were moving about yet, but those who were moved with an urgency that clearly betrayed their wish to make landing as soon as possible. Perhaps the deck was not the best place to keep out of the way. Making to turn back to the murky oppression of below decks.

Except there was Rhayd, wrapped in that awful cloak of his from neck to jackboots, leaning against a grain sack beside the entrance to the below-deck cabins. His eyes were obscured by the dark rings about them, hair a disheveled mess. He, too, had clearly suffered a sleepless night.

“He told me he spoke to you as well,” Rhayd said simply, his eyes not deviating from whatever mote it was in the middle distance he had focused on.

Of course the Curia would talk to Rhayd, she would be stupid to think she’d had his sole attention, that his words had been just for her. The bitterness shouldn’t show, trying to call it back from her face. If there was one thing she’d learnt it was holding back her feelings, forcing her tone into the familiar dusky indifference. Drawing the blanket further around her shoulders – the dull fabric draping her like a sack. She narrowed her eyes, pursing her already narrow lips in an effort to bite back a response. Better to remain civil, this early in the day. Instead of making a remark she knew would just start a fight, she turned away to lean on the rail just beside her.

“He?”

“He has plans for us all, it seems.”

Mireya turned her head to look down at him, managing to do it whilst looking down her nose. It was a look she gave Kintere often enough, usually when drunk and proclaiming his undying adoration. Rhayd had just said something as stupid.

“I don’t think they’re plans, not so much as the only way he can see to hold back the tide he knows is advancing.”

Rhayd shook his head, his eyes sinking shut as he leaned back against the wood of the rear castle.
“They’re plans, at least insofar as they apply to me. You and Kintere, you get to progress, move forward. Me he wants to drag back into the past along with him.”

Mireya blew an errant strand of hair from her face, trying to un-hear the words, to erase the sinking despair in them. She recognized that tone of indignation all too well – had heard it from her own lips far too often.
“For the first time in my life, I know the truth today,” Mireya said at last. “Last night and every night before that, I thought I knew the truth – or at least what I could have learned when Auss would not let me learn more than he found convenient.”

Instantly, she found she was uncertain of the curse in her tone, tried to divert it with a toss of her hair and a change of her posture – but realized it would mean nothing. The toss was too harsh, the jut of her hips too exaggerated. Too late now.

“You’ve progressed every day of your life since you were eight, since the Curia created an Ioun Stone for you…Last night I found out they existed.” Really, all he needed was her understanding, but she couldn’t give it easily to him, not him, with her revulsion and scorn.
Rhayd blinked, brows knitting together.

“An Ioun… Oh, right, the testing. I never understood the point of one of those things – he wanted me to light it up somehow, but it wouldn’t shine. I could make it brighter, change its color when he had lit the stone, but I failed that test. And a number of others after. I assume you passed his challenge, then?”
Mireya rolled her shoulders, folding her arms under her breasts – again, a gesture lost to exaggeration, and she found herself frowning again. How did he manage to put her in such a foul mood with so few words?

“How can you pass something if you don’t know it’s a test?” She knew it was the wrong thing to say, but something lit inside her, and she found herself mimicking the mockery in his tone. Casting needles at him as he did at her. “I don’t think this is about us though, about Kintere, or me, or even you. We have these rare talents…Whatever they are, and it is for us to do what we can to do what is right. Even if it means doing things we may not want.” The strength of the words surprised her, all the disjointed thoughts that had run through her head over the last evening had come together. “No-one talks of the truths, just the stories that victors tell to make it all sound finished and themselves sound brave. I’d rather the dirty truth – would you?”

“I’d rather knowledge. Any knowledge, as long as its true, to having any decision made in my best interest without my allowance.” The first thing he had perhaps ever said which meant he agreed with her.

“So what makes you think you will not be moving forward?” Finally, the beginnings of a straight question.
But then he laughed, though it could barely be called that. A chuckle of desperation, perhaps.
“I will be moving backward. My role in all this is to take up the work that Edvard is doing, under his replacement. After three years away and uncountable days of immense training and study, I am to return to Ckuien Penance.”

So that was it. Plans. Mireya shrugged off the wool blanket, turning to face him properly at last, leaning back against the rail.

“Last week, my life was working in the Inn, that was all I could foresee and yet, here I am, on the way to a future that was not planned. The Curia told me that we would learn together, you, Kintere and I…Whatever the next years bring, your role will be defined by you and ultimately….By things not even the Curia can control. War may come, Rhayd.”

“My future, just as yours, will be defined by my abilities. Like it or not, Mireya, we are spiraling toward something of cataclysmic proportions. The work that is required in Penance is vital to our survival of this. And I am the best suited to it. That is why I am angry. Not because Edvard has forced anything on me, but because I know why he chose to plan the way he has.”

“Then we had best be ready” An easy roll of her shoulders, the hint of a smile on her lips. Not polished, not comely, just…A girl, with the weight of the world on her shoulders. At least, that’s what she hoped he saw. “Ready to use our abilities to the best they can be, if they define us then we need to shape them. These abilities, whatever they are…These are the only things we truly have that can’t be taken away. I can’t do anything else.”

“None of us can do anything else,” Rhayd agreed, sharing a weak smile with her for a moment, before turning his eyes to the ship’s crew, their bustling to prepare the ship for landfall. “Tomorrow, we’ll be on Lockwood isle. Everything will be new. Rhayd Khalenn the noble won’t exist. Nor will Kintere Toralyon the Namari tribesman, nor Mireya the serving girl. We’ll all be replaced. Rhayd, Kitere and Mireya. The exiles.”

“We’ll just be students, Rhayd…Everyone there, we’re all the same, all children of a changed world where more and more of us are born to be more than we should.” Again, echoing the Curia. “We’ll still be the people we carry inside though, Rhayd. You more than most I’d guess. You’ll still be a noble, I’ll still be known as a whore and Kintere will still be a tribesman who’ll bass heads at the first provocation. Everything will be different, but we can’t be new.”

“I won’t be known as a noble,” Rhayd demanded. “Kintere won’t tell anyone. Nor will you. Nobility is looked down upon, and I’ll have none of it. My family name can’t be known.”

“But you’ll still be a noble. Denial and untruths or not.” She looked down her nose at him again, the woman barely about his chest in her boots, and was made aware of how silly her haughty posture was as he stood, eyes narrowing at her words. “Being known as one or not, we’ll still carry it with us. I won’t tell anyone anything, Rhayd…I’m not here for socializing, the secrets you want to hide are as safe with me as my own.”

“As safe as the port of Yeun, perhaps,” he said cryptically, nodding to the fore of the boat. “Look, smoke.”

Mireya turned, her eyes widening first at his words, then at what she saw. Land, coming over the horizon. There was smoke, indeed, though that was almost an understatement. Where the land broke across a wide delta, the skeletons of buildings could barely be seen. It must have been a beautiful city, straddling the wide river the delta was at the end of. Now, however, the port of Yeun was ablaze, its light, and its great column of smoke, straining toward the sky as if to blot out the sun rising behind it.

“So she is opposed not only to Kahlus, but to Rahrin as well?”

“Correct, young one. She played the two of them against each other when Maredran was born. Rahrin she pushed to build something of the limitless potential she and Kahlus had created. And to Kahlus she gave the challenge of unending watchfulness.”

“Leaving Rahrin feeling as if he is owed no thanks for our crafting, and Kahlus caring for children not wholly his own.”

“You see the world far more clearly than I did at your age, Rhayd.”

“I believe I am barely beginning to understand. Surely there must be some recourse for Kahlus and Rahrin against Nieri.”

“Yes. We are that recourse. In our crafting, a bargain was struck, under the watchful eye of the Grandfather. None of the divine may directly interfere in our nature, our doings, or our destiny. They can but provide some hints, some aid in the form of talent such as weaving – be it dweomercraft which is the realm of Jag Har’Oah, or negation which Rahrin controls, or others which have perhaps not yet been discovered. They can also nominate, in a limited way, those who are to become Empyrean, their agents upon Maredran, to act in concordance with their plans more directly than others.”

“And it is these Empyreans who bear names such as Melyr’Oah has taken for himself? The names of the messengers of the gods?”

“Again, yes. The Empyreans are often easily recognized. Their contact with the gods makes them otherworldly, they often have unnatural skin tones, hair colours, or eye colours. And, uniformly, they are among the most talented and puissant of all dweomercrafters, no matter which of the gods choose them as a messenger. The last known, more than a hundred years ago, was also the world’s most powerful recorded Arcessitor – a creator of new beings. We do not know of a correlation between talent and nomination as Empyrean, but there are trends in the records.”

Rhayd shook his head, brows knitting in a frown that was too persistent to school his face from betraying.

“Why are you telling me this, Curia? What are you directing my attention to?”

Thryche nodded slowly, turning his eyes to the ground for a moment. The churning of his thoughts was almost audible above the creaking of the boat and smacking of waves against the hull.

“We are entering a time of increased confusion, Rhayd. The knowledge I have is disappearing, one morsel at a time, because so few these days are being schooled  in the methods and arts of the Curia. There is one at the schools – he will be your instructor, actually, as well as Kintere’s and Mireya’s. He is being groomed as the next Curia of the north. I can only hope he has enough time to take on the role, that the war does not prematurely end his training. He is young, for a Regulator, but especially talented, and not a reader of many books. You are, Rhayd, I know you study far beyond your scope, given the opportunity.”

Thryche looked at Rhayd, his eyes glazed with unshed tears, the hard light of a painful knowledge hiding behind them.

“My time is too short to remain and instruct a fledgeling Curia. I would like you to take the chance at Lockwood to learn every piece of knowledge that is available to you, and the amount will be significant. I would like you to learn, to become the studied one, the educated rogue.  To step in behind Frost, and become his Arbiter. His second hand, the shield to his sword. And, in time, to return to Ckuien Penance at his side, and finish the work which I began there sixty years ago.”

Rhayd hadn’t slept well at all. After the shock of having to catch that idiot girl, his weak left arm had refused to let him find a comfortable position for more than five breaths before it began to ache again. After spending half the remaining darkness oscillating between a half dozen positions, he finally abandoned the hard bunk he had been assigned and made for the deck again, opting to relieve the on duty marine, much to the relief of the sailor. Not only had he been scheduled for an over night watch, but he would be forced to unload the cargo once the ship docked at Yeun as well, so even a few hours of rest was welcome. Rhayd may have been pressed to aid in the unloading as well, but with his arm as sore as it was, he was glad to have the excuse of watch to keep him from participating.

At least the ocean was calm. The last time he had been on a boat, there were storms. Waves, at least as tall over the rails as he had been then, took three of the crew manning his father’s ship as it fled Keen Rimmor during the exile of the nobility from that accursed city. Rhayd had paid attention to the distress of the crew then only to keep his mind from the pain of his shattered arm. Now, he found that a thought of the child he had been then, a spoilt fool unconcerned with his surroundings, left a bad taste in his mouth.

So he watched the serene ocean, seemingly for hours. To the south-east, the great rings of Jag Har’Oah began to break through the horizon, sending streamers of green light across the water toward the boat. It had been years since Rhayd had seen the luminary rise without the baffle of the sun to ruin the experience.

“Grandfather’s quite spectacular out there all on his own, isn’t he?” a voice rasped from behind him.

“Why do you call Jag Har’Oah grandfather, Curia Thryche?”

Rhayd turned, leaning himself back against the gunwale with his arms crossed. It was a pose he adopted to appear unconcerned, but in this case it had the added benefit of cradling his injured arm against him, affording him some relief from its constant stinging pains. The Curia had settled, quite silent until he spoke, on one of the upturned rain barrels near the ship’s central mast, leaning his chin on the pommel of his exquisite cane.

“Because that is what he is, Rhayd. The father of Kahlus, lord of the sun, from whom Maredran was born.”

“If Jag is the father, who was our mother?” Rhayd mused, cocking his head to the side.

“Ah yes. Her. Well, you know Jag Har’Oah of course – though to simply call him Jag would be a misnomer. Jag, in the ancient tongue simply means great. It is his title. Great Father of the Light. Kahlus means simply That which Lights the Day.”

A nonsense answer. Of course the translations of the names of the divine were little more than place holders to explain their essence. Rhayd had grown accustomed to the Curia’s circular logic long ago, and was used to asking very pointed questions – inwardly he cursed himself for letting the Curia redirect him so easily.

“And Rahrin is the bringer of order, the outsider who imposed structure upon the world,” the young noble countered, giving the rote answer to the quotation from his own notes.

“But you didn’t ask about Rahrin, did you young lord Khalenn?”

“No,” Rhayd agreed with a small, wry smile. “I asked about the consort, whom is so rarely spoken of. I don’t even know her name.”

“She has no proper name, Rhayd. None of them do. Names give a power the gods are unwilling to part with. That is why many of their messengers adopt names suiting their purpose. Soon, no doubt, you will come to hear news of the war in the south, and the name Melyr’Oah will cross the lips of those reporting in hushed tones. That one is a mercenary, a warrior who sold his focus to the Dornan army, much to our surprise, because he is a weaver. The name he has chosen, also, is a surprise.”

“What is its meaning?”

“Melyr’Oah has come to be understood as a derivation of ‘yash mel iyr oah.’ He who is bane to the light.”

Rhayd grimaced. Even for a heretic who took on the sort of name reserved for divine messengers, this one was filled with poor omen.

“What of this mercenary’s real name? What do the king’s spies say of him?”

“Very little. They know he is called the white knight, among the Dornans, and is known as a heretic weaver. He also brought with him a cadre of fifty other like warriors, led by a man known as Uru Oazing, of whom nothing is known, as he remains hidden at all times under a burnoose. A plague of poor names, however. Uru Oazing was the name of the last known prince of the Harbour Nation before its dissolution and occupation by Dornan armies five years ago. Oazing himself was hung on a pike outside the harbour proper. ”

“A plague of imposters with bad senses of humour, more like.”

Thryche laughed, shaking a finger at Rhayd, his aged eyes dancing with youth for a moment.

“Ah, you know not of what you speak, young man. And you’ve let yourself become sidetracked once more. Ask the question you wished an answer for. But this time, ask it properly.”

Cursing his own lack of cunning, Rhayd stared out to the north-west, away from the rising rings of the great grandfather. There, dimly glistening red like a cast out lion hunting scraps, sat Rahrin himself. Small, compared to Jag Har’Oah, the god Rahrin was none the less a constant companion of the night, seeking solace from the sun, Kahlus, with whom he held an eternal enmity.

The proper question came, as they often do, without thought.

“We have the grandfather who was begotten. The father from whom Maredran sprang. And the bringer of order, the outsider. The missing piece of this puzzle is the mother, who must be counterpoint to the father. Nowhere in any of our study has there been record of a divinity in the domain of darkness, of night. It is so rare, to have a real and lasting darkness. So. What is the nature, if not the name, of the mother goddess?”

“That, Rhayd Khalenn, is a very enlightened question.”

Thryche stood from his barrel and strode – without the aid of his cane, Rhayd noticed – to the gunwale against which the young man leaned, coming to mirror his stance, crossing his arms over his chest. They might have made an odd pair, diminutive young noble and tall, aged weaver, had there been anyone else to see them aside from the crew, who couldn’t be bothered to care about passengers.

“The name we have come to know her by is Nieri. Derivation of ‘Ne iyr aih.’ She who destroys order.”

Edvard Thryche sighed, some visceral measure falling from his shoulders as he did so.

“The need for my counsel is dwindling because talent is rising, Mireya. Your very existence is proof that soon, the judges – that was the old name for us, we who assess talent and give knowledge where it is necessary – are a dead tool.”

Thryche tapped the glistening yellow-and-indigo stone in Mireya’s hands with a thin, crooked finger.

“For exactly the reason that trinket is useless now, I will soon become the same. The trick of the Ioun Stone was discovered twenty-seven centuries ago. It was originally a fruit, borne by the Ioun tree, deep in what were once the forests of Dorna.”

“Dorna, the desert? The home of the tribes we warred with for the last century?”

“The same,” the Curia nodded, folding his hands in his lap. “The Ioun stones are amplifiers. They act the same way as the lens atop the Ducal palace in Penance did, keeping the city lit an extra hour when the sun falls below the horizon. The stones, when a Dweomercrafter forces his power through them, cause that weaving to be so much more than it could have been alone. Now, however, since the Ascension, that has changed.”

“The Ascension,” Mireya interrupted, not quite following the Curia’s path. “You mean the war, thirty years ago?”

“I do, yes. I mean the events which led to the war becoming known as the War of Ascension. The same which caused your kind to be born, so that my kind might become trivial.”

“My kind,” the girl spat, shoulders hunched against the sudden chill of his tone. “You can’t possibly blame my birth for a change in how weavers are trained!”

When he sat silent for a time, Mireya began to regret her outburst. She drew her eyes up from the precious indigo-and-gold stone in her hands to look at master Thryche.

He was simply smiling. As if she had made a joke she wasn’t aware of.

“Ah, my dear, that is just what I am trying to say. Your talent, though I am not equipped to judge its nature, I can tell is one of a few dozen rare abilities not oft seen in the last centuries. And you are not alone. Rhayd and Kintere I can assess, and their talents are just as rare, if for different reasons than your own. If the Ascension had not happened, you could not have been born as you are now. And, thus, I could not be as happy to retire upon my delivery of you as I am.”

Mireya blinked, having to force herself to close her lips. The words almost sounded like relief! How could someone so powerful be so relieved to not be needed any longer?

So she asked.

“But Curia Thryche,” she began, speaking slowly, to keep her words as true to her thoughts as she could manage. “You silenced the entire Court. You have power I can barely imagine. How could a simple battle, even a war, change so the state of things in the eyes of the Gods that children may become your superior in any way?”

Edvard Thryche did not laugh, but there was laughter in his eyes as he reached out to pluck the Ioun stone from Mireya’s trembling hands.

“Lady Maran, I am but a simple soldier. I was at the battle of Merdol, thirty years ago. It is where I found this stone, my old friend. You see, the Ascension was not an accident. Many have been told that the island of Merdol cracked because of the battle on its southern coast, because of what the Grey Man, Grevault Anginock, did to the Dornan armies there. That he turned the beach to glass, and birthed the race of Xul we have come to know as the Glass Men.”

“But that isn’t so, is it?”

“No. Anginock did break a law of the divinorum, yes, but it was not he who heaved the isle into the sky. No. The duke of Merdol, Ansolen Lemiticron did that. The war began over his disappearance, it’s true, but long before he vanished, Lemiticron had more than three thousand Ioun Trees brought from various places across the face of our world, and transplanted their seeds into a vast garden about his keep at the centre of Merdol’s chief city, Skan Merdol. The night of the Ascension, every one of those three thousand and more trees bore its fruit, died, and began to rose toward the sky, taking the keep and half of Merdol island with them. Do you know what the generals of the opposing armies found when Merdol keep floated away, Mireya?”

She was nearly too incensed to ask. It was too much, to be hearing that all of the knowledge she had about the history of the war that she had scraped together had been false. Auss had lost his arm at the battle of Merdol, she had been told. Thryche was telling her that everything her grandfather had said was a lie.

“Chains, Mireya. Vast, unimaginable chains. Someone, or something, had burrowed under Merdol keep in preparation for the bearing of the Ioun trees’ fruit, and had built a support structure for the keep underneath made of thousands of stone and crystal chains to hold the keep in place. It still hangs there now, I’m told, angry and black with Xul crawling all over it, tethered to what is now the sea’s floor by hundreds upon hundreds of great, shining stone chains.”

“This was an unkind story, Curia,” Mireya found the breath to say after a moment.

“Yes, my dear, it was,” Thryche said with a sigh. “I think perhaps you should go for the evening. I must sleep, in preparation for the landing tomorrow. I will tell you more, as time becomes available, if you wish.”

Mireya nodded and stood, numb from the neck up it felt like. She looked at Kintere, sleeping fevered on his bed, the welts on his back already showing signs of improvement.

“I think I should like that,” she decided out loud, much to her own surprise. “Nothing, clearly, is as any of us have been told.”

Mireya left. She spent the remainder of her night in her bunk. But she did not sleep.

Mireya’s hands shook, the orb cupped in her palms as she settled herself back onto the sofa, bringing her legs into a serpentine coil. Forgetting the sway of the ship, the sickness in her stomach, just watching the yellow veins wind over the globe.

“You didn’t know, before you paid for me…You couldn’t have known that this would happen. When I was eight I was exposed to a tap room, to serving food and cleaning tables…” Talking to him, but looking at the orb.

“I didn’t know. I had a feeling, however. I had no reason to know, until we visited the Duke’s Court. Do you recall when I made the room still? When weaving, projecting one’s power, those with talent feel like mud, compared to the rest being water. You, Mireya Maran, feel like granite.” He sighed, patting her shoulder softly. “So I purchased the debt from Auss, and now you go to Lockwood Academy at Jinda island with your friend Rhayd, to learn how to use that talent.”

“He’s not my friend.” The retort snapped before she has thought about it, a bitterness in her tone. Shying away from his touch as it hurts, backing herself further into the corner of the sofa. “How much is my debt, Master Thryche?”

“Does it matter? Auss has what he wants. You have your eventual freedom. The course of study at Jinda is three years. After which you will have a profession, a stipend as mighty as mine most likely, and the knowledge with which to decide what, exactly, you want out of your life.”

He tilted his head to the side, reaching out to tap the Ioun Stone once.

“I’ll accept one of these in return, when you are through with your studies.”

“I want to know what I was worth to my Grandfather.” Mireya was happy that Thryche’s expression showed he saw no vanity in the words, just sad acceptance. “You didn’t have to pay him anything, I was going to come with you anyway, from the moment I was invited. You wasted your money, Master Thryche and garnered an enemy of him, he kept muttering about it. About Jinda…He was livid.”

“He wouldn’t have been so livid if I had simply informed him you were coming with me. I asked him what he thought you were worth – it was far too low. That man has needed a lesson taught to him for years. But he is not an enemy worth note, a small fish in a small pond. He didn’t value you nearly enough.”

Mireya studied the shimmering stone for a moment more, resigning herself to ignorance as she had so often before.

“What will it be like, Jinda? Studying…I have never studied. What if I am behind everyone else.” Fixing him with a calm stare, Mireya pursed her lips. “I thought, at first, that you had paid like everyone else, then I thought perhaps you had need of more staff at the school. Only now, Balthas’ blazing pit, now I’m truly scared.”

“I was illiterate until I was five years your senior,” Edvard said with a small chuckle. “I wouldn’t be too worried about it. I’ve seen to it that you and Rhayd are placed under their finest instructor, an old student of my own actually. I suppose Kintere will be as well, though he was bound for Attensah. Too late for that.”

“Rhayd won’t care for that….My having the same tutor.”

A sweeping statement, letting her eyes drift back to the globe, tracing the golden lines. She felt the discussion was over, the rocking of the boat was returning under her seat. Needed something to focus on. Attensah. The sailors in Penance had spoken of the place as if it were cursed, talking about the war-magi from that school and their dreadful staves. Mireya shuddered to think of Kintere learning to be such a violent instrument.

“Kintere’s not going to leave us, is he? He’s my only friend.”

“No, Kintere and I had a long talk about this before he succumbed to the pain of his wounds. He goes to Jinda. I had decided on Attensah for him because of his… Unique talents. But he would learn nothing there, I see now. There is potential in him, vast potential. But it is locked behind so many layers of self-loathing – no. He needs what his new instructor can give him. Just as you and Rhayd do, as well.”

“Potential is nothing. It’s the way it’s shaped. How many more have talent but are never seen and waste a life. The keys to potential are different for all of us, I’ve seen many things, learnt many things…But what if we never find the right keys? ”

“I cannot say,” the mage sighed. “There are only eighteen Curia left, after the last war, and confidence in our work has become so… Lacking, lately, that I am certain the process may be retired all together. With the Academies as they are, there is little need to dispatch tutors about the kingdom to ensure the gathering of talents. Arbiters find, test, and relay those with talent to the academies. The art that Curia possess is dwindling.”

“Why?” Simply a question, but truly interested in his answer.

Mireya knew she should just go back to her cabin, but there was too much noise at the bottom of the hull, the scent of sweat and musk and the unfamiliar crowded cells. Just rocking, endless rocking. Unsteady, the delicate ash-haired blonde wavers towards were Kintere stormed earlier, his slamming of doors hard to forget, he was never angry with her. Pausing outside to tidy her shirt and straighten her hair before knocking, building confidence so badly knocked. The tumble on deck had made everything hurt so much more, her back stinging as she leant against the wall.

The door was open, just a crack, letting out strange indigo light. There was a voie inside – not the incoherent rambling of a very drunk Kintere, but something softer. The generous, calm voice of Curia Edvard Thryche.

“Come in please,” he said, sounding quite close to the door. “I’ve been waiting.”

“How’s Kintere?” She had to fight to keep her voice steady, relying on old tricks from her former life to keep her trembling at bay.

“He’s asleep,” Thryche said softly, sucking at a long stemmed pipe, a heavy mug of some steaming sitting in his lap. “The duke’s guard were rougher on him than he’d like to let on, but he’ll survive.”

The man himself lay on his stomach, face buried in the small pillow under his upper body. His back was a hatchwork of cuts and scrapes. And whip lines. Mireya watched Kintere sleep for a moment, the rise and fall of his chest, eyes glistening at the sight of him, the thinning of her lips as close to an emotion as her face will stray.

“He always does things the hard way.” It never failed, did it?

“So do you. Both of you will learn, given time.”

Mireya was quiet for a moment, pausing to digest his words. So still as to be carved from marble, all milky cream and alien eyes that suddenly lift to bore turquoise holes into Edvard’s face.

“How much money did you pay for me?”

That caused the aged mystic to raise an eyebrow. “Why?”

“I want to know what I was worth.” The same tone that was thrown at oily patrons, untouchable and aloof as she takes a few steps closer “And to know how much I would have to pay off before I am finally free.”

“You hold no debt to me,” he said with a smile, tamping out his pipe and taking a sip from his steaming mug of whatever. “I purchased the debt that Auss created. He named his price, and I doubled it – it would not have mattered what he named, I would have paid double just for the pleasure of seeing his face when I refused to tell him why I wanted you.”

“Your pleasure wasn’t mine.” Mireya hugged herself, trying her best to make her frown audible as she perched on the sofa’s arm, as far away from the Curia as possible. “He was so angry to have been bested by you. Still. You have paid for me…One more in a line of so many, only…You are the only one I fear. Because you bested Auss Maran.”

“Me?” the old man muttered, his face wolfish in the dim, indigo light. The light glimmered for a moment, and only now is its source obvious – above Kintere’s back hovers a small sphere of what appears to be porphyry water, suspended in a cradle of light. “Bring me that, will you?” Edvard says, indicating the sphere by way of his pipe stem. “And I’ll explain.”

Mireya ’s white as a lamb, her eyes wide and shimmering in the light. Long muscled limbs untangling themselves with confusion. Fetch a light? How silly. Timid, uncertain as she advance on it, expecting something. Fingers ran over her flaring hips before stretching to touch the globe, breath held. The globe settled in the bed of her cupped palms, the sphere warming in colour as bands of sunny yellow overtook the indigo. Mireya’s own skin became sickly pale in the yellowy light as she advanced back towards Edvard quickly.

“That change is why I bought your debt,” Edvard says softly, patting the sofa beside himself. How careful he is to refer to her debt, not her self. “When Rhayd was eight, I created one of these for him. It’s called an Ioun Stone – it’s a weaving of the mists sensitive to those who have talent at shaping. It’s a reactive tool in its entirety. Changes colour when interacted with by those who can weave the mists. Those who cannot, their hands pass directly through the stone itself inhindered by its presense.”

“What’s wrong with your arm?” Trying to draw the conversation away from her, away from Kintere, away from this whole damned ship. Hauling herself up, hissing softly between her teeth at the pain in her ribs. Trying to find some common ground.

Rhayd wrung his hands, pressing right thumb to left palm in a massaging motion. “When my family was leaving Keen Rimmor, I was about… Two seasons old. A wall fell on me, last one standing in my parents’ estate. Killed my mother, who was carrying me. Broke my shoulder in a dozen places. It’s never been as strong as my right arm. Never will be, either.”

“I don’t remember my mother…” She didn’t even know her name. “My wrist was broken when I was small…Well, I was a clumsy child…But then, I’m sorry for the pain it must cause you. That arm.”

Rhayd visibly worked up a half dozen responses. It’s nothing. Never mind. This doesn’t make us the same. But none of them seemed to fit, so he settled for a simple “Thanks,” instead, as lame as it sounds. “I don’t hate you, you know. That wouldn’t make any sense; I don’t even know you. I just get so frustrated with Kintere sometimes, and I don’t want to see him dive off into tribal life again. It was bad for him, Porphigaul made it bad for him. In a way I’m glad we’re all getting away from Penance. I think we all need it very badly.”

“I’ve got an unguent for pain and swelling in my bags if you’d like me to fetch it for your arm.” Watching him with her large shadowed eyes, set so fey in her ethereal face – no wonder Auss had trouble claiming her, she looked so alien to the peninsula folks. Shivering in her skin, she wrapped her cloak tighter around her body – the thing threadbare like most of her clothing. “You shouldn’t worry about Kintere and I, there will never be anything in it…I’m not in the market for anything. Besides, I am not the girl he thinks and he doesn’t love anything but his idea of what I could be, he wants to save me and I’m saving myself.”

In later hours she’d curse herself for being so open with this pompous prig of a noble, a man who’d scorned her, cursed her and watched her like she was dirt under his heel. For now though, it was a chance just to talk – to be heard “I don’t care if you hate me, if you loathe my face and curse my body – you’d not be the first, nor the last I’m sure. But you’re right, I’m glad I’m leaving, the only other way out of here was in a wooden box. Now I’m gone, I’m never, ever, ever, going back – I’d die first.”

“Vehement denial is a powerful force,” Rhayd muttered, shying a glance at Mireya with a rueful smile. “All going well at Jinda, we may be field mages or even Regulators someday. Don’t be surprised if you’re stuck going back to Ckuien Penance eventually. Just as I’m likely to see Keen Rimmor, despite my family’s reputation there. There are some things we just can’t avoid, much as we’d like to.”

Even as he pained to glance at her, the girl faced away from him, eyes distant and out to the dark seas – watching the stars cast desiccated reflections that dimple at the waves catch.

The young noble grunted, closing his eyes and lowering his head.

“Such as our reliance on others. Yes. I think I’d appreciate that salve, thank you. Stiff and useless is a bad combination for travel.”

“There isn’t just a place though is it, ‘there’ is an emotion, a place in time and the person we were then.” She found she was reminding herself that she didn’t like him, that he wasn’t her friend.

Reminding herself, as his eyes closed and his head dropped, that she didn’t care for another that was suffering, even as she watched his closed expression and the way the wind buffeted his hair and cloak.

“Reliance isn’t the same as dependence, Sire.” A mark of respect, no different than she gave to any patron of her Grandfather’s inn.

“No titles,” the young noble corrects, narrowing his eyes slightly as he watches his erstwhile companion stand and turn away. “When we were in Rimmor, father was Duke Khalenn. Now, he’s just a mercer. And I am even less.”

“The salve isn’t anything like you’re used I’d believe, it was a…” Fighting for the word “…Tip, I suppose, from one of the…” She shouldn’t have even started to speak, cheeks stained prominent pink, usually she’d be able to say all manner of things without such a silly colour rising, but she was rapidly learning the true tally of her shame.

“I’ll fetch it.” Turning away suddenly to hide her embarrassment, to cover the unexpected sheen of tears, Mireya folded her arms close in a defensive posture, stooped a little.

A sigh kept her still, rather than running to the safe hole of the cabin, such a soft sound. There was no violent reaction, no reaching for her, no pawing hands or raised voices. Controlling her emotions in that pause, forcing them back into the iron-clad chest they’ve been designated too.

“Penance wasn’t been the first place my family settled after Keen Rimmor,” Rhayd offered in a seeming non-sequitur. “After we left Keen, we tried to settle in Absolution. There was no place for a displaced Duke there. So we continued North. Rhayd and I weren’t even walking yet – it was just my parents and my elder brother. Mother told me they spent ten years on the run before settling in Penance. And even then, all father had left was one small chest. He set himself up as a mercer, managed to scrape up a few contacts. It wasn’t until brother came of age that the business took flight. He and Porphigaul and Auss made my family prosperous again. Rhayd and I remember nothing else. Mother was content. And father drank himself to death.”

There’s a pause, the young man lost in history, staring across the mirror smooth water, the storm having passed far enough away that it’s influence was on memory only.

“Sometimes moving on is the best thing. We’re lucky to be doing so now. It’s necessary for all three of us. But sometimes staying on the move is even worse. And it’s often hard to tell the difference.”

The story, his voice so lovingly buffeted her way by the wind, giving her time to re-gather her composure, the winding tale he seemed to be speaking to himself drawing her back to his side until she’s looking out at the same waves he is, watching the receding storm even though she hears the same distant thunder in his voice. In the pause between the shock of his admittance about his father and the hope of the future her fingers grip the rail just a little tighter.

When she finally turned her face to him with the aurora of her hair wild from the storm framing eyes that seem to glow with the memory of tears, there’s a small rare, almost there, smile on her lips. The beautiful bow like a flower on the most winter of days.

“Thank you for sharing…” For sharing the advice, his story, the evening, the journey, she didn’t clarify.

Leaning to touch her lips to his cheek in an unexpected gesture, before leaning back down and turning towards her cabin “I don’t think I ever realized that I’m not all alone, we all are, in so many different ways….” Again she trailed off, giving him a searching look over her shoulder. “Unexpected.” Before moving off, swaying hips and flowing hair, only the slightest limp in her step.

The young noble stayed pressed to the rails for a moment after Mireya’s sweet gesture, uncertain what to think. She wasn’t at all what he expected. Then again, he wasn’t exactly as he’d like either.

“Any time,” he whispered to no one, glaring at the portal to below decks with almost feverish confusion. What was he missing? Before she had gone three years ago, Rhayd had told him to watch out for someone, but she hadn’t been certain who. Someone close, she had said. Someone he would come to care for. At the time he had thought it to be Kintere – the bumbling oaf he found himself custodian over. It had fit for a while, with the two of them relying on no others but themselves. But now, their ship dancing over the waves toward Jinda, Rhayd wasn’t so sure.

Could it be Mireya? Rhayd couldn’t fathom that – the details of his sister’s prophecy suggested defined masculine energy. But then again…

No. No, Mireya didn’t fit. He was worried about her. He’d have to watch her closely. But for now, he’d have to find some way to put himself to sleep.

He recalled a large bottle of wine hiding in the bottom of his locker in his cabin, and for once the world began to look like a better place.

They had sailed the following morning, on the first tide of the day out of Ckuien Penance. With so little time to reconcile themselves to the journey, Mireya found she was already missing the small, comfortable spaces of the Sword and Shield, and that she did not like the open ocean one bit. It turned and changed angles far too quickly, and even with Kintere’s sparse advice – keep your eyes on the boat, stay low to the ground and so on – she found her eyes drawn to the far-off horizon, which eventually meant she would loose her previous meal into the depths and be forced to go and scavenge for food once more. The first day had passed slowly that way, as had the second and now, at the end of the third, she finally found she was nearly accustomed to the constant swaying. She had been just unsettled enough around noon to refuse Kintere’s further aid, which had sent the big man lumbering down to the depths of the hold, where he had stayed for the duration.

Now she was watching the night, arms wrapped around a narrow waist, curling into her flaring hips. The rough blanket around her shoulders scratching her skin, but it was nothing compared to the sting of the salt-waves on her face. The short delicate framed wraithlike figure stood at the front of the boat, lit by the pale light of the stars to look like a ghost, hair a milky streamer. She was well aware that her appearance was the only thing men paid attention to. Even now, she could feel the eyes of the night crew on her back as they steered the long, wide boat toward its destination, the transfer port at Yeun.

“Tough to sleep in these winds,” Rhayd’s voice rumbled from behind the girl. He stood feet akimbo, arms folded neatly over his chest, that long, crimson cape of his snapping like a banner hanging from his shoulders, his russet hair obscuring his face with the aid of that selfsame breath of the storm. “I keep trying, and I keep failing,” he added after a moment, as if his unease were some kind of personal attack.

“I didn’t curse your slumber…” In case that was his first thought – she knew how little he thought of her, how scornful his eyes would be when she turned. “I haven’t even tried…The motion makes me feel like if I close my eyes I’ll fall off the world.” Actually, the fight with Kintere, the silence of the afternoon save for the come-on of sailors – then the storm. The jolt of the boat into the trough of a wave made her hiss with a jolt of pain – so delicate she lost her balance and went tumbling towards thee sodden deck.

In a flash the young noble was there with a steadying hand for Mireya’s shoulder, knees skidding on the deck. Instinct is a strong force. After a moment’s confused frown and recovery, the man coughed and grimaced. Mireya whimpered at the jolt of his hand, a tiny animal sound of pain that she bit back even as she jerked out of his touch as if his fingers were electrified – spinning to face him as she backed herself into the corner of the rail for safety. Like some sort of wild fey trapped on the deck, sodden through by the spray, cloth clinging to her comely frame – fragility and comeliness combined. Apparently catching her had placed a large strain on the boy’s left shoulder and he was forced to cradle the arm to his stomach.

“You’re out here and Kintere’s been locked away all evening. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out something’s up.”

“You should be relieved, he’s finally seeing me for what I am…The way everyone else sees me. The way you see me – I told him to ask you what I was…I’ve heard you have colourful phrases.” Attacking with her voice, fighting off her usual terror of him.

Rhayd huffed as he collapsed to the deck, shuffling back against the rail and closing his eyes against the twinge in his arm.

“Kintere knows what you are, just like I do. But I don’t think you do, Rey. Our self-image is seldom as on target as we think. We all have flaws, but they’re almost never what we think they are. Tere will be fine, he just has nowhere to blow off steam here, that’s all.”

Mireya reached for him, to try and cushion his fall – she ’s not heartless, but she reached for his sleeve and not the cloy of skin “I’m what do you call me? Oh yes..Auss’s whore, something like that. Isn’t it?” She could feel the sneer grow as she forced her eyes to fix onto his face “I’m surprised you’ve not suggested Kintere use his coin to buy off his steam on me….Isn’t that what you normally suggest?” For so small, delicate a thing – shivering and wild, she was hissing at him like a trapped cat. “Thanks to you I’ve been groped and accosted by ever sailor on this ship….”

“And they’ll be dealt with,” the young noble whispered, cracking his eyelids open. Not a threat, nor a promise; a statement of fact. “I don’t think you understand just how loyal Kintere is. Half the crew is already frightened of him, and the other half will be if they’re smart by the time we hit Yeun. No one will see it, but he’ll deal with them. Your trip from Yeun to Lockwood will be quiet.”

“I don’t care about them…You don’t understand single thing about me, you’re as blind as Kintere is…He sees me as pure as snow, you see me as a scarlet whore….You all make me sick, all of you men. You don’t know me, my life…I don’t need a man to defend me. It’s laughable”

“Maybe Kintere’s defending himself,” Rhayd argued. “He’s not nearly as naive as you think. He’s one of the most observant people I know. He just chooses to ignore just about everything that he doesn’t like at face value. He chooses to ignore your… Previous predicament, as I do not, because it doesn’t suit him. I hate that about him. But it’s his way.” The young man stretched out his arm, wincing as he did so, flexing gloved fingers – always those gloved fingers, just that left hand – and moved to stand at the rail, elbows hunkered against it. “I’ve got better things to do than argue semantics.”