Paragons of Ether

by Ryan Muree

  “If you’re going to the Goddess, then I’ll leave with you. I’ll do the Ori’dhai with you.”

  “Why?” Emeryss glared at her.

  There was a pause. A stillness. A shift between them. She’d never demanded her mother explain herself.

  “If you have to do this,” her mother said, “to keep our family safe, then I want to help.”

  “But you never want to help me.” It had come out so easily. Emeryss dropped her chin a little after she’d said it. The younger, smaller Emeryss within her had heard how rude it’d sounded, but it was the truth, and she’d face worse things than her mother’s scrutiny. “Help is for the weak, for the old, for the small. You’ve always said—”

  “I’m going with you.”

  Emeryss had to fight from scoffing at her. “I can do this on my own.”

  “You want to die more than accept my help?”

  Yes.

  No.

  “Why do you assume I’m going to die? I’m stronger than I’ve ever been—”

  Her mother’s eyes narrowed. “You do not want me to come and help you?”

  No. She didn’t. “I—”

  “I’ll be packed in fifteen minutes—”

  “It’ll be dangerous—” She no more got it out of her mouth, and she’d regretted it.

  As if her mother hadn’t known danger. This woman had saved her children from undertows three different times. She’d built bridges and homes with her bare hands. She’d hunted great ridgebacks and survived starved winters, often giving her children the scraps and going without. Facing danger, facing the unknown, was etched into every fiber of her mother. Warning her about danger was about as good as trying to catch sea spray with a net.

  Emeryss took a nerve-calming breath. “I’ll be waiting at the eastern cliffside.”

  Chapter 8

  Lower Aurelis — Revel

  Adalai stood on the roof of a neighboring building across from the chaos.

  Advisor Ednor had just been attacked during his announcement.

  More rations on grimoires. Less for the average person. Emergency supplies only.

  The people couldn’t function on such limited resources. They wouldn’t survive. They barely were as it was.

  And here this advisor had just announced they were taking more.

  It was only a matter of time before the people claimed back some power, and it had been organized by the REV flawlessly.

  The attack was swift and from all sides. Ednor hadn’t seen it coming, and his shocked face had given away how ignorant he’d been.

  Never back the enemy into a corner, and he’d made enemies out of the people tonight.

  The REV had swooped in, taken him and his security team down… all live on the Messengers.

  No one would sleep easy tonight. The higher tiers would fear for their own safety and that of their families. The lower tiers would feel hope that change could happen.

  The whole thing was a mess while the leaders played them as pawns.

  But when the RCA had moved in, it was a massacre. And it still was.

  Fires erupted from the side buildings of Ednor’s manor. Screams and glass shattered the night. It was nothing to the scale of what she’d seen in Sufford in Ingini, but it left the same slight pang of regret in the pit of her stomach.

  Regret she wasn’t helping the RCA?

  No. Regret that everything had come to this.

  REV and civilians from inside the manor scrambled out as the RCA flames engulfed them. An explosion from the west building rocked the ground and sent Messenger crews fleeing in other directions. The heat was so intense she could feel it on her face in the cold night.

  The REV had done what they’d set out to do, knowing full well they could be killed. The survivors would be caught and harshly punished. All because they’d done something the king and his advisors wouldn’t be able to see—put hope in people. The REV had brought the people’s attention to the actual source of the problem, and they hadn’t even needed to go into Ingini to do it.

  But it was all in vain.

  She pulled her jacket tight.

  They could win this battle, and maybe the next one in a day or two, but never the war. It was almost pathetic for trying. It would fizzle out as soon as people forgot—too distracted by surviving and fighting to live.

  That’s why she couldn’t join them.

  What good was running off and dying for nothing? Some hope for another day? It wasn’t good enough. That wasn’t how they would get real results. They were stuck in this mess, and there was likely no way of getting out of it.

  She turned to Blink back to her street when a grunt echoed up from below.

  Down on the dark stone, a man had tumbled out of the bushes.

  He was bleeding from holes all over his body. Most likely tagged by a sleeper Caster. He’d die if left there.

  He collapsed face first and whimpered.

  She could help him. She could get him out of there. He was probably REV. Probably a nobody like she was, just trying to make it or trying to get out. From his clothes, it seemed he hadn’t been part of the raid, just caught in the middle of it.

  But she couldn’t save him really. He’d still be on his own, and worse, she’d have to get rid of him later.

  Eventually.

  She turned to leave again.

  “Hey, he’s probably over here,” a voice rang out.

  RCA were alerting others to his direction.

  Shit.

  She squeezed her hands into fists. Why couldn’t she leave well enough alone? She didn’t know the guy. It’s not like she owed it to him or something. But the RCA and Orr… They’d been so wrong, and this guy probably hadn’t done a damn thing wrong. He’d merely been in the way.

  She groaned, clicked her tongue, and Blinked down to the man face down in the street.

  His eyes had rolled back into his head. His mouth gaped open as air wheezed in and out.

  Shit.

  She hooked an arm around him. “Come on. Can you stand?”

  He had almost nothing left in him. He only moaned.

  “Here! Through the bushes, I think,” another voice called.

  She pulled him up higher and a little closer and Blinked him to the roof she’d been perched on. He choked when they landed, blood and saliva dribbling out of his mouth.

  Breathing was a good sign.

  “I need you to stand,” she told him, smacking his face around. “Can you hear me? Can you try to stand?”

  He was covered in ash and grime and was definitely not able to stand.

  Shit.

  He was lucky she’d taught herself to Blink without grimoires. Otherwise, she’d really be down in ether getting him all the way back to the healer on the corner of her street.

  He inhaled sharply, head tilted back. He had sleeper stings all over him, and that meant the poison was working through his body. Soon, he’d start seizing and his muscles would be too tight and rigid to move him at all.

  “Hold your breath if you can hear me.” She hooked her arm around him again and Blinked them out.

  Somewhere? — Revel

  Cayn wasn’t dead. At least he didn’t think he was.

  If he was, death sucked.

  It was painful and cold and…

  “Why do you think he was wearing that?” a voice whispered.

  Definitely not dead.

  He opened his eyes a little and found a moldy ceiling with paint peeling from the corners. Some parts had holes in it, but they only led to darker floors above. Below him was something that gave. Not quite a mattress, but not the stone street he’d remembered falling on.

  He tried to swallow, but his tongue stopped halfway, too dry and stuck to the roof of his mouth to do anything properly. His throat burned so much that when he tried to ask for water, it came out as a grunt.

  “Here.” A hand thrust a cup of water right below his mouth.

  He took it and scanned for his helpers.

 
A woman and a young man were staring at him. She had blue-green hair and wore a matching dark top and fitting pants. The other one was in ratty, torn shorts, a simple shirt, and a dirty cap. Not wealthy then, but definitely Revelian. He could tell by the way they stood. Their posture and confidence demanded too much attention and entitlement to be Ingini.

  He took a sip of his water, and then another and another, filling his warm throat and cold belly. “Where am I?” he managed through husky words.

  “Near Glint Street in Lower Aurelis,” the young man said. “I’m Koy, and this is Adalai. You’re in an abandoned building, so you’re safe here.”

  “I’m not promising anything,” Adalai said. “You have a fake arm. How’d a servant get that?”

  Cayn rubbed his eyes and went to sit up. The room spun, so he lay back down.

  “Careful,” Koy said. “Nag told us you had enough sleeper juice in you to take down a herd of sandcrawlers.”

  “What does it matter if I have a fake arm?” Cayn managed to ask.

  Adalai crossed her arms. “I can’t tell what ether you use. That makes you dangerous.”

  He looked down at the cup in his hand. “Well, I don’t know what to tell you.”

  “You won’t tell me what type of Caster you are?”

  He swallowed a few more gulps of water.

  She was waiting for an answer still.

  “Illusionist,” he tried.

  “Hol-shit,” Adalai snarled. “I’m an Illusionist. You could have Blinked your way out.”

  “I didn’t have any ether left.”

  “Nope.” She wasn’t believing him. “It’s professionally made. Advisors don’t care about their servants that much. Why you?”

  Cayn looked around and tried to sit up again, this time moving slower. “Because they wanted to.”

  “Why?” she pressed.

  “Adalai,” Koy whispered. “He just woke up. Nag warned you that he’s still healing—”

  “Because they wanted me to use my hands,” Cayn said, meeting Adalai’s glare with his own.

  She squinted her eyes. “For what?”

  “Sex.”

  Adalai’s expression wavered a little. She hadn’t expected that response.

  “Ohhhh…” Koy nodded. “That makes more sense.”

  “I was enslaved by Ednor and his wife as a masseuse and sex partner,” he said.

  Adalai made no movement. “Where did they find you?”

  He bit his lip.

  What was the point in keeping it from them? This Adalai would figure it out. She was piecing it together anyway. And what would it change if they knew? He was already at their mercy. Being balls-deep in Revel territory was bad enough. Them knowing where he’d come from after they’d saved him wouldn’t change much.

  “Halunder.”

  “Halunder is a training facility for the RCA,” she said.

  “Really?” He lifted an eyebrow. “I was underground the whole time being tortured. Kind of hard to see where I was.”

  “Whoa,” Koy said. “Tortured?”

  “You’re Ingini.” Her eyes glinted.

  A heartbeat or two passed.

  “That makes so much more sense.” Koy extended his hand for Cayn to shake. “We’re fighting to save Ingini like you and take our country back from the king.”

  “You are?” Cayn asked.

  “I’m with the REV,” Koy said, “and she is, too.”

  “No, I’m not—”

  “She is. She just doesn’t know it yet,” Koy said. “We won’t turn you in or anything.”

  The REV, like Julian, then. What had he told him to remember? “What’s the weather like in the otherworld?”

  Koy’s eyebrows got serious for a moment before they relaxed. “Oh, that’s right! Rainy. You know the REV?”

  “I know one of them.” Cayn motioned to Adalai. “I don’t know if I can trust her though.”

  She squinted at him.

  “Ignore her,” Koy said. “She has a hard time trusting people.”

  Adalai’s head tilted slightly. “What’s your name?”

  He swallowed. Should he give her his real name or a fake name? Shit, what did a name matter if they already knew he was Ingini? “Cayn.”

  Koy snickered. “Man, Ingini names are so weird.”

  Adalai’s chin turned just a tiny bit. “Cayn?”

  “It’s not a fake,” he said.

  Adalai tossed some of her vibrant hair over her shoulder as she paced. It looked sort of like those ether stains in landing zones when the light caught it just right. “What happened in that manor?”

  Cayn swallowed. “I knew Julian, Ednor’s chef. He was part of the REV, too. He told me they were about to attack, so when the REV hit, I made my way out.”

  “And Ednor?”

  “He’s dead. Both he and his wife are dead.”

  Koy cursed. “The rumors are true. They really killed them?”

  “The RCA were coming,” Cayn explained. “Cecillius was screaming for them to find her, so they killed her, and he died watching it.”

  “Shit,” Adalai said under her breath. “They should not have killed him, Koy.”

  Koy’s hands were on his head. “How was I supposed to know that? They don’t tell me that kind of stuff, and if you had gone to the meetings maybe you could have told them not to do it. I told you they need you.”

  “They’re doing things half-ass—”

  “I told you they’re doing things half-ass.” Koy waved his hands around. “They don’t have your experience.”

  Adalai clicked her tongue. “The REV can’t take down an entire government, and that’s what they’d need to do. They’re stupid jelts, and they’re all going to get themselves killed, and you with them.”

  “At least they’re trying something, Adalai.” Koy stuck his dirty hands in the pockets of his jacket.

  “He’s right.” Cayn gestured to him. “I’ve been trying to get home, reach family, and I would have been stuck there forever if the REV hadn’t shown up.”

  Koy nodded. “Exactly. How many others, Adalai? How many other Ingini are going to be tortured? You told me yourself you hate what the RCA has done.”

  “That doesn’t mean I have to help take down a whole government.”

  “One step at a time, Ada. That’s it.” Koy pointed to Cayn. “I bet he’d help, right? You’d help free other Ingini, too, right? I know you want to go home, but so do they, and the rest of us are stuck here barely making ends meet, dodging RCA in curfews in our own towns, rations so thin people are starting to go hungry.”

  Cayn propped himself up carefully, his muscles aching in too many places to think of by name, and leaned his head back against the cruddy wall. “Being Ingini, I know a thing or two about a class war. The poor lose every time. You get shoved down to the bottom of the barrel, you fight each other for scraps instead of the big dogs running the show, and you die a nobody.”

  Adalai’s eyes flickered to his.

  “Let’s all go to a REV meeting,” Koy said. “Cayn, you’re trying to find family, right? I bet we can get you in contact with more REV who can help.”

  Cayn wasn’t a hero, but moving forward was progress out. More connections with the REV meant more chances at finding Clove. He nodded to Koy.

  “See!” Koy clapped his hands. “They’re holding another one soon. You’ll see what I mean, Adalai, and then you can decide. Deal?”

  Adalai disappeared in a poof of magenta-colored dust.

  Cayn jumped.

  Her head popped up over the ledge of the nearest window. “I’m getting us food. I’ll be back. Don’t move.”

  “Is that a yes on the REV meeting?” Koy called down to her.

  “I don’t know,” she called back.

  Koy smiled at Cayn. “That wasn’t a no.”

  Chapter 9

  Great Library — Stadhold

  The events in the courtroom had weighed heavily on Grier.

  He was glad it had result
ed in what he wanted, but there was also disappointment that his countrymen had been so misinformed. It wasn’t good for Stadhold to be in the dark. They were complicit without a choice in the matter. That shouldn’t have sat well with any of them.

  He made his way toward the back corridors of the campus.

  His mother would probably scold him for his behavior. She’d tell him he was walking a thin line, that she’d never forgive him.

  And so, what? Let her. What did he have to lose?

  His family had lied or had been part of the lie. They’d moved to slow him down, to deter him from finding the truth.

  Let her come find him. Let her scream her head off and rile up their family against him. He had many more pressing matters that needed his attention—Avrist, Emeryss, and the Sigilist.

  He thumbed the sigil’s scar on the end of his finger, the rough edges of the skin.

  The Sigilist, Yggrav, was his best bet for answers about Clove’s sigil attempt.

  He passed through the Great Library’s skystone halls marbled with pink hues and out toward the bluff overlooking the Thundered Sea. The wind blew harder, colder, chilling his nose and cheeks.

  The Sigilist’s solarium sat at the end of a winding path at the very edge of the bluffs. Its glass walls and ceiling were clouded with years of salt and sea spray, making it too grimy to see through. Her humble, little hut was connected to the solarium behind it.

  He’d never come to Yggrav’s home like this. In fact, he wasn’t sure anyone had. Most kept their distance unless they had to face her during their weapon ceremonies.

  Stepping across the stone path to the glass door of the solarium, he knocked. A gust of air blew against him, and his fingers throbbed with a dull ache as he knocked again. The sea’s waves crashing below were only interrupted by the occasional seabird’s cry.

  He knocked a third time.

  “Why are you knocking on my solarium? I don’t live in there.” Yggrav poked her head out from the side of the building.

  She looked as old as the Librarian with few wrinkles and graying hair. Her pale skin, nearly as white as a cloud, glistened with purple swirls of sigils covering every inch of her face and hands. Her hair had been braided in sections and adorned with beads and shells. Her simple robes had been layered with woolen shawls. Her solid-white irises appeared to measure him up.