“If we are seriously going to consider putting you back in harm’s way, I’m not going to take any undue risks.”
“Sir, I… I didn’t think before I spoke in there. I don’t have a real plan. I’m not even sure it would matter if I did.”
She was watching me intently enough that I felt the need to bow my head just to escape her scrutiny.
“Wingard told me what he said to you yesterday,” she finally said.
“He did?” I spouted, looking up before I could contain myself. More calmly, I added, “Well, that was… just a friend being a friend. I’m pretty sure we have more important things to worry about.”
She looked unconvinced. “He seemed quite worried his words might affect your judgment moving forward.”
And there it was—the tiny flicker of irritation that was the first sign of life I’d felt inside all day.
So now Johnny was playing part-time soothsayer and reporting back to Glenbark on my mental wellbeing?
“Well,” I said, “I opened my mouth in there today, didn’t I? Clearly I’m not too rattled to spout off half-cocked bullscud plans.”
“So there is a plan.”
“No.” I scowled at her. “There’s just me, starting another war because I was stupid enough to think I could solve the world’s problems.”
Glenbark took a composed breath, preparing to deliver a no-doubt equally composed reply. And then she did something I’d scarcely seen before. She hesitated. But not in the way I’d seen her do on a few choice occasions, when circumstances had called for a particularly challenging decision. This was different. This wasn’t just the cogs turning in her head. This was her emotions bleeding through at the edges. Her ever-present defenses peeling away, layer by layer, until I almost felt as if it were just another human standing before me, and not the fearsome High General of the Legion.
It was Freya Glenbark as I’d never seen her, and I didn’t understand why I was seeing it even then.
She hovered there, hesitating, withering, until finally she sank into the chair beside me, her gaze fixed on something buried far away in her mental landscape. I watched her in the stretching silence, at a loss for what to say, or for what I’d even done.
“Do you think I’m afraid, Haldin?”
No, I wanted to say reflexively. Of course not.
How could she be? I’d never met anyone so fearless, so single-mindedly disciplined and composed under pressure. No one but Carlisle, at least.
And yet, as I looked at her, and as I thought about the way Carlisle must’ve felt on his final flight into Divinity, and about the way I felt now, I found myself slowly starting to nod.
“Yes,” I whispered.
She showed me the pained ghost of a smile. “I am terrified. But no one outside this room can ever know that, can ever so much as suspect it. The minute they do…” She shook her head, leaving the obvious unsaid.
I swallowed. “Why are you telling me, sir?”
She just looked at me like she expected I already knew somewhere deep down. And, on a more careful look, I guess it was kind of obvious, if I simply forgot for a minute who it was I was dealing with. She was telling me because, deep down, Freya Glenbark was human like the rest of us. Maybe she was tougher. More disciplined. More everything. But not enough to transcend that one simple fact of humanity, and the accompanying fact that, at some point, these things needed to be said to someone. To anyone.
And for some reason, she’d apparently decided I was that person.
“Wingard is right in a way, you know,” she said quietly. “Most of us have little choice in casting ourselves as the heroes of our own little stories. That’s human nature. But believing yourself the hero of something bigger, something that by all rational means should stand outside your circle of control… There’s an unmistakable danger in allowing yourself to fall for such a fantasy. But also, I think, an unmistakable strength. A strength I’m not sure one can find anywhere else. The strength I always thought it must require to take the weight of the world on one’s shoulders. But do you know what I’ve come to understand, in all my years of service?”
She straightened, rousing from her thousand-yard stare, but not quite looking at me.
I watched, silently waiting for her to continue.
“Sometimes,” she said, “the smallest things can be every bit as meaningful as the great heroic feats. Sometimes, the ordo who takes the extra second to calm one shaking greenhorn can have just as much impact as the captain who goes down with the carrier to buy his legion more time. Sometimes, both of them can share far more impact than the general who deludes himself into believing that he is the one to decide the day simply by merit of which plan he assigns a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ to.” She shook her head, rejecting the idea. “The smallest actions, executed at the right times, and for the right reasons, can be every bit as heroic as a defiant High General making a grand stand, or a young Shaper saving a full transport of legionnaires from certain death.”
She looked at me then—looked at me as she never had before—and I’m not sure if I felt twenty years older or she looked twenty younger. All I know is that, in that moment, I felt connected to her in a way I couldn’t rationally explain, like she’d shared a sacred part of herself with me. A part that might well take me years to truly understand, but that was no less powerful for it in the moment.
“I’m not asking you to be a hero, Haldin. I’m not even asking you to have the courage to do what you think is right. I already know you have it. All I’m asking is for you to believe in yourself, just a little longer. Believe in yourself, and in what we’re doing here.”
“Following my heart is part of what’s led us into this mess,” I said, dropping her gaze.
“Yes, and also a part of what’s given us hope through it, and what’s allowed us to overcome what well could’ve been a world-ending invasion. I won’t claim your actions have been without flaw, and nor should you. But that hardly means you’ve failed.”
“I know that.” Of course I knew that. But I also knew now that I’d meddled in affairs laughably far beyond my mortal—and admittedly naive—grasp, and that things were only going to get worse from here before they got better. Doubly so, I could only imagine, if I was actively involved.
“I just don’t know how to help anymore,” I concluded, opting to leave out the additional, Short of scrubbing lavatories, keeping my cursed demon head down, or flying off across the galaxy to confront Alton Parker’s problems instead.
Given the direction the conversation was taking, I expected she was about to tell me exactly what I should do to help anyway. Only, for the second time, she got that hesitant look in her eyes, like even after everything she’d just disclosed to me, she still hadn’t gotten around to the real thing she didn’t want to have to say out loud.
“Do you believe the Sanctum is evil at its core?” she finally asked.
I thought about my answer, making sure I meant it. “No. Not really.”
I wanted to, of course. This all probably would’ve been a whole scudload easier if I had believed it. But even beneath the foundation of lies, and after everything I’d been through at the hands of two High Clerics, it simply wasn’t fair to discount every other good deed the Sanctum had ever done, or every well-meaning believer who’d ever etched Alpha’s sigil over their breast.
Not that any of that made the answer less sour on my tongue.
Glenbark, at least, looked marginally relieved. “Nor do I,” she said. “I admit, my faith in Alpha has been somewhat shaken by what we’ve learned about the Sanctum’s origins, but I sense we are in agreement when I propose that an entire people’s worth cannot be so easily summed by the actions of a powerful few over the years.”
I didn’t particularly feel like agreeing out loud, so I said nothing, waiting for her to get to the point. She took her time.
“You said you don’t know how to help anymore,” she finally said.
“I just meant that—” I started, feeli
ng the reflexive need to defend myself.
She raised a hand for pause before I was faced with the awkward proposition of explaining what exactly I had in fact meant.
“Do you know why everyone considered your father such a stellar leader?”
That caught me off guard.
I studied her expression, looking for whatever test I expected must be afoot. “Because he was willing to do whatever he had to for his legionnaires,” I finally said, trying not to make it sound like a question. “Even if it meant pissing the wrong people off.”
She nodded. “That was certainly a large part of it. Undoubtedly the loudest, most widely observed part. But do you know what most failed to take note of once those heroic moments had passed?”
I shook my head slowly, curious as to where she was going with this, and not especially loving the feeling of being quizzed on my understanding of my own dad.
“Your father knew when to stand up for what he believed in,” Glenbark said, nodding. “That much is irrefutable. But what many of my colleagues seem to take for granted is that he also knew when to sit down and allow others to take up the charge, so to speak. It is a rare skill indeed.”
I thought about that, trying the idea on for size. It didn’t sound right at first pass. My dad had never sat back a day in his life. He’d worked tirelessly, without complaint. Every bit the ambitious, driven leader. Except I couldn’t deny that his ambition had always been a source of confusion for me.
For instance, I knew for a fact that he’d once turned down an offer to be considered for the seat of the retiring General Danton—a seat that most of his fellow officers would’ve killed for, and one that everyone had assumed would be his if he would only accept it.
I’d wondered more than a few times over the years why he hadn’t accepted that offer. Everyone who knew about it seemed to have had an opinion on the matter, though most of them did their best to avoid letting his son hear about it. Still, it’d been impossible to miss a mutter here or there at the time. He’d simply been afraid, some had said, scornfully. Or he’d obviously been hiding something. I vaguely remember a few of the older doceres, Mathis included, treating me oddly at the time. Not kindly, exactly, but... different. I’d never understood why. I’d even asked my dad once, I knew. Why he’d turned down the offer. Why everyone seemed so upset about it.
To my shame, I couldn’t even remember now what answer he’d given me.
So maybe Glenbark had a point about people taking that side of him for granted. If this was even what she was getting at.
“You mean because he passed up General Danton’s seat?” I asked.
She tilted her golden head in partial agreement. “Again, certainly the most bold example of his philosophy. But it’s not as simple as that.” She paused for a few seconds, searching for the right words. “For all mortal servants, the time eventually comes when the highest possible contribution they may make is to step aside, and to allow their legacy to flourish absent their guiding hands. If your father had pushed forward and become a general, if he’d tried to more directly impose his spirit on the Legion from a position of higher power, he might well have soured the many hearts he’d already touched, corrupting the foundations of his contribution. Or he might not have. That outcome was beyond his control, you see. And I believe he understood that. So instead, he showed the world his truth—brilliantly, decisively—and then he allowed them to do as they would, always continuing to serve, but never thinking to impose his beliefs on any who did not come to them willingly. Indeed, never thinking at all that he knew better than anyone else to begin with, only that he was dedicated to serving the world in a way that felt true to himself.”
She gave a sad smile, shaking her head at some thought or memory. “In the end, it’s not such a wonderful example, seeing as I truly believe your father would have made an exceptional general. But that hardly cheapens the honor and value of what he accomplished with his life. In a world that too readily derives discipline from power, authority, and fear, your father led by true inspiration. He was a great man.”
For a long time, I couldn’t do much more than stare down at my hands, turning her words over, trying to quell the longing ache in the back of my throat.
“Are you saying you want me to step aside?” I finally asked, pretty sure I already knew both parts of the answer.
“Not yet,” she said.
“But soon,” I finished, feeling the heavy weight of the certainty in my own words.
Because soon, no matter what else happened with the Sanctum and the Legion, and with the war on Shapers itself, I was probably going to have to face the fact that I was no longer welcome in the eyes of Enochia. Because I’d become too much of a liability. Because I’d scorched their collective nerves one too many times for the world to ever do anything but eye me warily from across a wide, empty room.
I searched Glenbark’s expression for any sign that I’d misread her meaning, not really expecting to find it, not really expecting anything but a look of grim apology in the face of the inevitable. But she didn’t look grim. Or apologetic.
She studied me thoughtfully, looking—if anything—mildly amused, silent respect brimming in her eyes. She looked at me like we’d already been through the worst of the scud, and now it was simply time to finish the thing, so that we might one day sit back and share an incredulous laugh over the fact that we’d somehow survived the journey to demons’ depths and back.
“You have more truth to show the world than possibly anyone in history, Haldin,” she said. “Hard truth. And while it’s possible, with time and care, that the magnitude of your service to Enochia might come to outweigh the fear—”
“I’m also the Demon of Divinity. And I always will be in their heads. Or in enough of them, at least.”
I’m not sure why I expected her to argue the point. I guess I didn’t, really. Whatever else she was, Freya Glenbark was not a light-handed scudspout. But a part of me still hoped that she’d correct me anyway. That she’d suddenly reveal the magical insight she’d been sitting on this whole time—the one that would allow us to set the records straight, end all of the wars, and give me my life back, once and for all.
But all I got was a sad smile and a tired sigh as she rested heavily back into her chair beside me, both of us staring at the blank display on the wall in companionable silence.
“You are the Demon of Divinity,” she finally agreed. “And here I am disclosing my deepest, darkest fears to a teenager who just so happens to be the most wanted man on the planet.” She shot me a sideways look. “Can you promise me you’ll remember that part next time you find your resolve waning?”
I opened my mouth to tell her I would, but nothing came out. I couldn’t even seem to nod. It was just too much in that moment. No surprise. Nothing I hadn’t seen coming from a hundred miles away. And yet in that moment I felt like a little kid who’d just found out his first hound had died.
“This has never been your fault, Haldin,” she said. “No more than it’s been mine, or even the High Cleric’s. What we’re looking at is the inevitable shifting after a thousand years’ building on faulty foundations. Perhaps events could’ve unfolded slightly differently. Perhaps the damage could’ve been better contained. But this conflict was always bound to happen as long as those in power were willing to lie to keep it.”
She looked at me, and I could see the innumerable layers of her armor beginning to pull back into place, marking the end of the rarefied moment of Freya Glenbark’s vulnerability.
“Agreed?” she asked.
I swallowed, and nodded.
“Good,” she said. “So tell me, then... What will you require for this half-cocked non-plan of yours?”
33
Dark Stars
It was a quiet night in Humility.
The air behind the Dark Star Tavern was as still as it was thick. Dark, too, almost like a small singularity had opened up and swallowed every scrap of streetlight and every sound of clinking
glass attempting to permeate the dampened space of our surroundings.
All in all, it was a great place for a crash landing.
Not that the landing itself was all that bad, really. With three Shapers in our free-falling huddle, there was more than enough telekinetic juice to go around—even with the extra raknoth in tow. It was more just the indignity of having to sneak into the city slums at all, acting like covert specter skimdivers, minus the glidesuits. Given the general haze of disgruntled irritation hanging in the air between me and my companions post-landing, I gathered we were all more or less on the same page there.
“This feels like the beginning of a scuddy joke,” Siren grumbled from beside her dumpster of choice.
“Hiding out behind a scuddy tavern like a pack of frightened rodents,” Garrett said. “That’s the joke.”
I felt more than saw him glance at Siren in the darkness, no doubt wanting to add that bringing her into the field when she’d been shot only yesterday was also part of this not-so-funny joke. She reached up and cupped his cheek before he could, sweetly and silently daring him to say it. He was too busy melting to her touch, as he always seemed to do.
It never ceased to weird me out, how cuddly the two ex-Seekers were around each other when either one of them probably could’ve killed a man for sneezing wrong. But then again, maybe I wasn’t in any position to judge, dragging us all into harm’s way just to find Elise.
I certainly wasn’t in any position to comment on the matter of braving the field while sporting significant injuries. My tender, splinted wrists were testament enough to that. None of us were quite crippled after a day-and-a-half’s intensive healing at the medica, but nor were we anywhere close to prime fighting condition.
Well, none of us but Alton Parker, at least.
I glanced at the raknoth’s silhouette in the shadows, half-expecting him to weigh in on Garrett and Siren’s exchange with some glib remark of his own, but he said nothing. Somehow, that irritated me even more. I looked around in the darkness for the thousandth time, resisting the urge to check my palmlight and create any unnecessary light. I would’ve felt the vibration from Elise’s message if it had come.
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