by Andrew Rowe
I don’t think I’ve actually met a princess before, and this isn’t exactly how I was hoping to do it.
Not now, Dawn. Please.
The soldiers — or, royal guard, I suspected — escorted us to the portal, then gestured for us to step inside.
I paused before walking through the portal, taking a moment to duck down and begin to gather up the Pale King’s regalia. The guards glared at me, and one moved to push me toward the portal.
He froze when the crown princess spoke. “I will allow this delay. The Wielder of Dawnbringer won his battle fairly, and he is entitled to claim his spoils.”
I turned my head toward the crown princess and nodded. “You have my gratitude for your understanding.” I slung the Pale Crescent over my shoulder, then tucked the other two items into my belt. It was awkward, but with a bit of effort, I secured them using the chain that held the three items together.
I glanced at the broken pieces of Xiaofan’s scythe. They were toward the middle of the room. I considered moving to retrieve them as well, but I suspected they’d be dangerous to touch, and I didn’t have time to figure out the necessary precautions. Instead, I simply said, “Please don’t touch the scythe directly. It’s extremely dangerous.”
The crown princess frowned. “It is a cursed weapon?”
“I don’t know, exactly. I think the crystal inside contains a portion of a spirit that may have possessed the wielder. It’s also damaged, she wasn’t actively using the magic from it. Now that the wielder is dead, it may be even more volatile.”
That was a bit of an over simplification, but I wanted to be concise until I had a better idea of how much I could trust the princess.
“Hm.” Edria Song waved to a couple of the guards. “Emerald-level containment procedures on the scythe. We will study it later.”
A couple of the guards went to do what she’d asked, and I felt a bit of relief that she was listening, at least.
The princess turned back to me. “Now, wielder, step inside.”
Then, finally, I walked through the portal as directed.
The area we appeared in was not a conventional prison cell, but rather a room with pitch-black walls and a series of stark white runes written on it. I saw no doors, windows, or other exits.
No guards followed us inside in the immediate aftermath. Instead, a moment later, the crown princess stepped in, escorted only by two others. Her escorts wore bright red cloaks, which probably signified some kind of significance, but I didn’t know enough to recognize it.
The portal closed behind them.
The crown princess sheathed Diamantine at her side, looking unconcerned with the weapons we still had drawn in her presence. “I apologize for the rude greeting and lack of accommodations. I had hoped to meet the other wielders under better circumstances.”
“It’s an honor to meet you, Crown Princess Song.” Ishyeal took a step back, and took a formal bow.
I offered a somewhat more limited bow. “How much of that did you see?”
“Straight to business, then.” She nodded to me. “All of it. We blocked the audience from seeing everything after your fight began, but I watched the entire thing. I considered interceding earlier, but you seemed to have things well under control.”
Sssh. Important people are talking.
I restrained myself from commenting on the redundancy of that, but she knew. She had to know.
Instead, I replied to the crown princess. “I appreciate your faith in my abilities, Crown Princess Song. Is there anything you could have done for her?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Is that such a concern to you? Did you know her?”
I shook my head. “Not personally, but I do not like to easily accept the loss of any life that can be saved.”
Ishyeal gave me an appraising look, then nodded. “He has a point. If you were watching, you had to know she was being controlled by someone. Why didn’t you try to capture her, at least? You clearly have the resources.”
The crown princess’ aura pulsed, and I felt an immediate change in the pressure in the room. Not enough to force me to move, but an obvious display of power nonetheless. “Gentlemen, I appreciate that you’re injured and recovering from a fight. I will remind you, however, that you are speaking to the heir to the most powerful nation on Kaldwyn and I will not have my decisions questioned. Even by other wielders.”
We tensed.
I didn’t care much for that sort of attitude, and I got the impression Ishyeal was taking it even worse.
The crown princess took a breath. “I am...sympathetic to your concerns for the fate of the dead, however, and I will offer a brief explanation. We have captured two of the agents of this Akadi in the past, and we have tried every power at the disposal of this great nation to cure them. All attempts ended in failure. Given how powerful these beings are, I knew that any attempt to interfere was likely to cost additional lives, and I regret that my position makes it irresponsible for me to interfere directly. Does that satisfy your concern?”
I nodded. “Yes, thank you.”
Ishyeal remained silent.
“Good. If that is handled, then, to business. I would like you to share with me anything and everything you are aware of in regards to these...things. Then, pending an investigation to confirm that you are not hiding some sort of involvement with them, you will be released.”
“What sort of investigation?” Ishyeal asked.
“A brief questioning with truth magic. Nothing dangerous, no torture. I have nothing but respect for my fellow wielders, you will not be held for long.”
Her emphasis on our position as “fellow wielders” was so repetitive that it was beginning to feel pretentious. While at first I suspected she was merely trying to make us comfortable, it occurred to me that it might also be the opposite — that she was reassuring herself that she was one of us. She had inherited her sword, after all, rather than earning it like I had.
Or, uh, however Ishyeal had gotten Soulbrand. I was still unclear on that.
Ishyeal seemed deeply uncomfortable with the whole situation, and I didn’t blame him.
“Will we be questioned together, or...?” I asked.
“Separately. It’s more secure that way.”
I turned to Ishyeal. “I’d like to know whatever you’re telling them, later.”
He smiled. “I’m sure you’d like a lot of things.”
I sighed. “I could help—”
“There will be time for you to discuss things with each other after our questioning is completed,” the crown princess interjected. “Now, if you’ll follow me, Master...Dawnsglow, was it? I’ll ask you your questions first.”
She waved a hand. A glimmering portal appeared next to her, with no obvious effort at all on her part.
I blinked. That was impressive. I’d seen plenty of teleportation over the years, but portals were hard.
From the way Ishyeal’s eyebrow twitched, I suspected he was pretty impressed, too.
“Fine.” He turned, giving me one final look. “Keras. We didn’t see eye-to-eye in there, but you did try to help me with that potion. And I know you were holding back, too. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Can we talk after this?”
“Another day. Don’t look for me. I’ll find you.” He nodded to me, then stepped through the portal.
I was a little irritated that Ishyeal wanted to delay our talk further, but at least an agreement to talk eventually was progress.
The crown princess and one of the two guards stepped through the portal, leaving me alone with a single guard.
She look
ed at me sheepishly, sighed, then said, “Don’t suppose you have any cards? This might take a while.”
***
I didn’t have any cards.
I did, however, have another idea.
I knelt down. “Going to use a bit of magic. Don’t panic.”
The royal guard raised an eyebrow at me. “That floor is heavily warded. I’m not sure—”
I pressed a hand against the ground, feeling the stone in my mind. I also felt the presence of essence flowing within it, no doubt the wards she was speaking of.
Reshape.
There was resistance, as expected. I broke through it. The wards flashed, and when I stood up, I had a Valor piece in my hand. I tossed it to the royal guard, and she deftly caught it out of the air.
“Hm.” She flipped it over, examining the piece more closely. “Nice detail, for such quick work. Yeah, we could play Valor. I’m Hannah, by the way.”
Something clicked in my mind. This was Hannah Meiyer, the Royal Executioner. I’d been looking forward to meeting her.
“Keras.” I extended a hand. She stepped closer, grabbing my hand. She had a strong grip. I liked it.
When she released my hand, I moved back to the floor, this time sitting. Making a Valor board was going to take some time.
We had plenty, as it turned out. Unsurprisingly, the “brief” questioning wasn’t all that brief at all.
That did give me some time to talk to Hannah, though, and to grow progressively more certain about a sense at the back of my mind.
I pushed a soldier piece forward on the makeshift Valor board, contemplating my approach as we chatted.
Hannah nudged one of her own pieces forward, bringing a priest into positon to take one of my knights in the next round. “So, I was on my third deployment down in the south west corner of the Unclaimed Lands, near the old Fire Temple ruins — you know the place?”
“I know of them.”
Hannah waved a hand. “Yeah, so you know they’re, like, supposed to be haunted?”
I’d heard a little bit from Reika about the other temples, but not a lot. “Some kind of...bird spirit, or something?”
“The ghost phoenix. And, I’m tellin’ you, I wouldn’t have believed it for a second until I found this feather. Just one feather...but my hand went right through it. And then I heard this sound. This awful, terrible sound. I’ll never forget it.”
I found myself forgetting my next move, enraptured by the story. “What did it sound like?”
She stared at me, her expression deadly serious. Then she said... “CAW!”
There was a moment of silence. Then we both burst into laughter.
I moved my Valor piece, probably incorrectly. It didn’t matter that much, and I was having a good time. And, unfortunately, I had a more important thing I needed to do than win the game. “Okay. More serious question. Have you been to the Earth Temple?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Haven’t been out that way just yet. Why?”
“Well,” I took a breath, “You know how wielders are supposed to visit the temples corresponding to their own sword.”
Hannah gave me an appraising look. “I suppose I’ll have to escort the crown princess there someday, then, won’t I?”
“Or just go by yourself.”
She stared at me. “You’re going to have to explain yourself.”
“Dawnbringer can sense the other sacred swords. I detected Diamantine as soon as the portal opened. I assumed, of course, it was the sword the crown princess was carrying. But I never stopped sensing Diamantine when she left.” I gestured at the seemingly ordinary sword at Hannah’s hip. “She’s holding a decoy. Or maybe she is a decoy, and you’re the crown princess, and you’re both under illusions to look like each other.”
Hannah snorted. “I’m going to give you credit, that’s a pretty good conspiracy story you’ve written right there. But I’m no princess.”
“I’ll note you didn’t deny carrying Diamantine.”
She moved her hands away from the Valor board and into her lap. Closer to the sword at her hip. That was dangerous. “You seem nice enough, Keras. Can we forget this line of conversation happened?”
“Maybe, but I have another uncomfortable one.”
“I liked you better when we were just playing Valor.” She gave me a pained look.
“We can get back to that, but I need you to answer something. My match was moved this morning. Did you set me up against Xiaofan deliberately?”
She took a breath. “Yes. Not me, personally, but we did.”
“...Why?”
Hannah gave me an appraising look for a moment, then shook her head. “Fine. I suppose you deserve to know this much, but don’t bring it up to the crown princess. She doesn’t know.”
I raised an eyebrow. “What, really?”
Hannah looked deeply uncomfortable, but continued. “We sometimes take actions for her best interests without her full awareness. Any royal guard would do the same, I expect.”
I wasn’t sure I agreed, but arguing that point seemed unwise. I took a breath. “Go on.”
“It got to my ears that someone named Akadi was a threat. Story sounded ridiculous, but I heard it came from you, and I knew you were the wielder of Dawnbringer. So, I tried to take it seriously. We looked into it. Several of us went to talk. Half of us came back.” She tightened her jaw. “We killed him, though.”
“And when you killed him—”
“No one believed that possession resh until Akadi came back wearing the body of one of my dead friends like a suit. And with a royal guard’s body, he was much stronger the second time.” She punched the ground. Wards flashed. Her fist went several inches into the stone regardless. “I lost a lot of friends that day. And that time, I understood the problem — but he caught us with our pants down. Sat up in the middle of the guard’s reshing funeral. We didn’t have anyone who could handle possession on-hand. We killed him again, before he could get close to the crown princess.”
My own jaw tightened. “Who’d he get next?”
“We...don’t know.” Hannah turned her gaze down. “We set up a checkpoint, no one in or out, until everyone was checked by a seer. He didn’t seem to get anyone else at the funeral. Even checked the crown princess, just in case. For a little while, we thought we might have gotten him permanently, but the murders continued.”
“And those were definitely him?
“Akadi and his followers. We caught two of them, like we mentioned earlier, but interrogation didn’t get any results. They’re seemingly immune to pain, probably because they’re not really the owners of the bodies. We eventually got an Abjurer in, and she was able to banish the spirits from their bodies — but the bodies just died, and the spirits escaped. The Abjurer said they walked straight through her spiritual wards without effort.”
“They’re shades, rather than spirits. Related, but different.”
Hannah raised an eyebrow. “How do you know about that?”
“Fought one of them before, along with two people who knew more about it than I did. I can give you more information. I wish you’d come straight to me about this.”
“We’re not in the business of trusting rumors from strange foreigners about other strange foreigners.”
I tightened my jaw. “Maybe you should be.”
“Maybe in this case. But you have to understand, people try to report crimes being committed by their tournament rivals all the time. It’s a common strategy for getting opponents arrested to try to keep them out of matches. A wielder doing that seemed unlikely, which is why we looked into it at all. But bringing you in on the investigation? Well, we know now that we should have, but it wouldn’t be common practice. You’re a civilian, and not even a citizen.”
“So, instead, you just manipulated me into fighting one of them directly.”
It wasn’t a question.
I expected a bit of shame or regret, but I didn’t see any. “We needed to know if you were working with them.
Watching that, I can say I firmly believe you’re not. We also needed to know if you had a better way of combating this problem than we’ve found, which it seems that you might.”
I shook my head. “Not really.”
“Oh? You telling me you couldn’t have killed that shade thing permanently, if you wanted to?”
I took a deep breath. “I could have done something similar to what Ishyeal did, sure. But that’s not a better solution.”
“We seem to have a disagreement on what ‘better’ means. Better, to me, means fewer deaths. What does it mean to you?”
“No deaths,” I said without reservation. “None.”
She snorted. “The wielder of Dawnbringer is an idealist. The four-year-old me would have been very pleased that you live up to the stories. The twenty-four year old thinks you need to adjust to real life.”
“I’d rather cut real life into the image I like.”
“I don’t know if I should find that comforting or terrifying.” Hannah shook her head. “Either way, you can’t save everyone.”
“No, of course not. But the moment I stop trying is when I truly fail.” I gave her a hard look. “And you should be working toward better solutions, too. Would you settle for ‘fewer deaths’ if one of these things possessed the crown princess?”
“That’s different.” Hannah folded her arms.
“It shouldn’t be.”
“Okay, idealist. What’s your brilliant plan for saving these people, then?”
I took a moment to think. “Consult experts on spirit and shade magic. Look at records of similar events.”
“We’ve done all that, obviously. I mean, maybe not the ‘shade’ thing, I don’t know what that’s all about.”
“Then you have a new angle to research, and so do I.”
If Wrynn was around...
“Do you happen to have access to summoning magic?” I asked.
“What, monster summoning? Sure, we could get a Summoner. Why?”
I shook my head. “Sorry, poorly phrased. Summoning a human. Like, uh, kind of similar to that portal that Xiaofan opened up, but for people.”
“Ah. No, that’s obviously tougher. Really hard to find relics or spells that work on humans. I can see if I can dig for something, though. Why?”
