by Kalyn Crowe
The seal's diameter spanned wider than our table, more than twice my height.
My feet started to slide as the amount of Abyss increased faster than my Apex.
The creature pulled me toward it via the laws of Anima's balance.
Ansgar ran to my side and knelt. He hooked his arm around my waist.
I stood firm.
He looked at Conrad, then me. "Old friend, what have you done?"
Conrad said nothing.
The Abyssite stopped the spew of acid. Its body was empty and thin again.
My arms, my concentration, both buckled under the acid.
The creature stalked around the seal.
The filaments sent shivers of little impacts down my fingers and arms in reaction to the acid.
Kat said, "She'll be spell sick soon, do something for Zirore's sake." She carefully touched my wrist and whispered, "Amidral."
Suddenly, my strength returned. My seal thrummed.
Kat stumbled and sat down by Leyla, who held her shoulders.
Ansgar said, "I'll drive it back. Let go of the seal when I'm clear. Then get out. Meet in the square." He let go of me.
In his place came a surge of fear, but I said, "Be careful."
He let out a cry and hurdled forward at the Abyssite.
Conrad pulled up Kat and Leyla and ran for the front door.
Ansgar's brilliant sword flashed.
The Abyssite back-peddled. It crushed bones and splashed in bubbling blood.
Ansgar dodged acid puddles and drove the creature across the lobby. A pile of rubble on the far side marked a hole in the wall to the outside. He shouted back, "Let it go, run."
The building shook again; stones fell not far away. It would collapse in moments.
The creature and Ansgar disappeared through the wall.
Conrad waited by the door. He outstretched his hand. "Don't die on me now."
The only direction away from him and Ansgar's escape was back into the building. I prayed no one was still inside.
I let go. The seal dissolved in the reverse direction it had formed and freed Abyss acid into the HQ.
I held Kepi, still in the bag, tight and ran for Conrad. My legs felt liquid.
Outside, people shouted and pointed at the HQ. Even out here, musty, rotten reek filled the air.
The horrid acid made stone sizzle and smoke as it gnawed at foundations. Any protective imbuements sparked and faded.
Leyla grabbed Conrad and pointed at the bakery.
He didn't seem to understand.
Kat said, "I'll go. It's the natron, Leyla?"
She nodded with her head and hand.
"The stuff you use to neutralize acid, it's baking powder?" I said.
Conrad watched Kat run to the bakery. "That's right, good thinking." He patted Leyla on her shoulder.
She smiled.
He looked at me.
"This is my fault." My fingers shook as I pointed to the HQ. "All that acid. I let it loose, what if someone was still in there?"
He cradled my hand in his. "Did you choose for this, make it happen? Summon that monster?"
Leyla put her arm around me.
"No," I said. "But."
He let go. "Don't think such nonsense. Any danger here is not your doing." Conrad looked up at the central tower, and then he searched the square. "Do either of you see Ansgar?"
We scanned around. No Abyssite either.
He said, "The High Templar won't forget you saved him."
"If I did."
He checked his handbow and holstered it.
Leyla pointed.
A few groups of beleaguered hunters moved among the vicar and shops. Led by Kat, the first collected and treated wounded near a tailor's. The other spread powder while the last stood guard in the square.
She seemed fine now, but that stumble wasn't like her. And she helped my sickness, but that wasn't possible, what trinket did she use?
A giant man emerged from the bakery and carried sacks. Not Ansgar.
Conrad gazed up the middle roof tower. A crack formed through the mortar. "It's going to collapse." He jogged toward the group of people. "Zirore, no one has set the beacon. Leyla, go. Show Nancy."
She grabbed my hand and ran for the thin spire in the center of the intersection we passed before. Her fingers traced along a seam in the otherwise smooth surface. She pressed, and a little door popped open under her hand. It revealed a dial set with the six Source colors.
She pulled it out, gave it a full turn, and then twisted Abyss blue to the top. As she pushed it back in, and the spire's glass top radiated in a matched color.
Then Leyla pointed up at the HQ.
The break deepened, and the crack of stone rang out.
We hurried and moved any stragglers away. The square appeared as a snow-lined village, but this was an avalanche.
Before us, the HQ toppled into itself. Some pieces like the forward roof tower hit the square. Its death echoed off the road, off of the Rays.
Conrad scanned the rubble. His expression like a gravestone, sad, and stoic. "My office. My home, and not only mine."
Hunters ran to the HQ with more powder
He jogged over and stopped them. "More could fall. Wait until everything settles. Find any more survivors. Find the High Templar. Use caution."
Hooves pounded up behind us, the templar from last night, Gunnar. He arrived on a decorated horse and reined in beside Conrad. "Is she all right?"
"Yes, she's tending wounded near the sewing shop there. I don't see your apprentice."
"I sent him to the Hall."
"What for?"
Gunnar tried not to twist his face in surprise. "To ensure your delivery arrives, sir."
Strange and stranger still was his timely arrival.
Conrad narrowed his eyes. "The Faragos took it before the attack. Ansgar is missing. Did you see him on the way in?"
"No. Apex above." He leaned on the saddle's pommel. "And not the Faragos, either."
Conrad frowned.
Gunnar matched the expression. "Let me check on Kat, and then I'll search behind the square for Ansgar."
"Get to it."
He dismounted and ran toward her.
Their mouths moved in conversation, but I couldn't make out the words. Leyla might have, but as I understood it, lip-reading never proved very reliable.
Silenced individuals like Leyla generally only accepted Sign or spoken conversation. Like anyone else, they wanted people to talk to them, not around them. Still, rumors spread some less savory people trained Silenced orphans as spies.
I looked at Conrad. Maybe some well-meaning people did, too.
Other templars, hunters, and even invokers came in response to the beacon Leyla sent up. Conrad made arrangements for his wounded to stay in the High Hall's hospital.
Gunnar returned with Kat and said, "High Hunter, I followed an acid trial from the building. Boot tracks big enough for Ansgar followed."
"Good, and?"
"And then both disappear."
Kat said, "We need a Formist. I don't have anything for it."
Conrad's chest rose and fell slowly. Each breath pulled his expression into more of a knot. With an audible sigh, he pulled out a pipe from his belt.
He filled and lit it. "Any good news?"
Kat raised an eyebrow at Conrad's pipe. "No."
Leyla tapped Conrad and pointed at me. She put her hand on her chest then moved both like she smoothed an invisible tablecloth.
"Do you think Eda will mind me taking the guest room?" said Conrad.
She shook her head.
"Good. Nancy, Leyla says you can sleep on her floor. If you don't mind."
"Sounds great." Ten orphan girls in single beds existed as the closest thing I ever experienced to a sleepover.
Kat crossed her arms. "Should we post guards?"
"You've done enough," he said.
"I'm fine."
"You're pale, even for a north-lander." Conr
ad smiled.
She glared.
"Fine then, as for the guards, don't post any formally. Also, request a surplus of bolts from the Armory."
"Right."
"Good then, I'll set any spare sets of eyes around for Ansgar and our attacker."
Gunnar furrowed his brow. "Shouldn't a post be set at the Voclain's?"
"I wouldn't worry about the Voclain house, lad." Conrad eyed me.
"Fine. If you'll excuse me." Gunnar left us and walked over to where a makeshift search and rescue team formed.
Conrad sighed at Kat. He pulled on his pipe again. "Did he ask how you survived?"
"No."
He deflated and frowned. "I'm sorry. You've done excellent work, get the request for those bolts in, and get some rest. I don't want to pull rank."
She rolled her eyes. "And you're smoking again?"
He mumbled and added, "And eat some real food." He capped his pipe and put it away.
"Yes, sir." She smiled if only slight. "When I can." She tipped her hat. "Girls." She walked away and left on Gunnar's horse.
Everyone kept their heads so well in the face of all this chaos. I tilted my head upward and sighed. The ordeal stole more of the day than I realized, but we would at least see another. I hoped that was true for Ansgar, too.
Smoke, or something like it, still rose from the Hunter HQ rubble. A jagged navy line darted through the sky.
Conrad, Leyla, and I stood alone. I reached into the bag and felt Kepi breathe.
"What now?" I said, and not to anyone in particular.
Kepi sighed.
I looked over at Leyla and down at the scorched hem of her dress. We needed to work faster, someone knew, or worried, about our plans.
I said, "We'd better check on Eda."
12 - Strange Pairs
We left the rubble behind and hurried back to the Voclain's.
Eda greeted us at the door.
She gave us dinner and listened to our story. After, she helped me cover Leyla's floor with a fluffy heap of blankets and pillows.
Kepi rolled herself into a blanket hollow and popped out her little beak.
Eda leaned over. "These appear sufficient should you need to hide."
I sat pretzel style in a nest of my own. "Are you sure you won't need any of these?"
"Perfectly. Conrad was content to sleep in a chair downstairs with his coat over him even after taking the guest room." She chuckled and then sighed. "I am grateful you saved them, Meredith."
"But…"
"Old bricks and dead bones are all you damaged."
I hoped so. "Still."
"Ansgar will turn up." She rolled one of her lenses between her fingers.
I fiddled with a tassel on the pillow near my leg.
"He will keep your secret when he does."
"Why would he?"
"Aside from your saving his life?" She sat beside me. "Do you know Ansgar's story?"
"I've only heard the High Templar is a grand war hero. Leading from the front and that sort of thing."
She neatened her layered skirt. "While that is true, Ansgar Sawyer has also suffered. More than the loss of part of his leg."
Kepi watched from her blanket cave.
I tilted my head. "From what?"
She said, "Loneliness. Guilt."
I crossed my brows.
"Namely, he lived alone. The Order became his only family after his own died within the forests north. He swore to uphold the virtues of Zirore as the devoted did in the past, the lonely monks of the northern mountains. Vows no one takes anymore."
"I see." I pulled a blanket over my shoulders.
Eda helped me. "It surprised us that he led the team who pursued when the Lady Travere fled with her unborn child." She sighed.
I said, "He seemed more understanding than that."
"While someone like Conrad could afford to be a maverick, Ansgar had only his duty. I should add, he never found Lady Travere. Unlike him. He ended the search after the East claimed they found her dead."
"He didn't investigate that claim?"
"No. Travere signed the Concordances for peace with the East around the same time. Two years after his mother fled. A year after he replaced his father as High Lord. In preparation for the Abyss war." Her voice trailed off as she looked away.
"You said this was unlike Ansgar?"
She turned back. "The man never failed a pursuit. I wonder if he questioned for the first time our Order's purpose."
"Or why he served a family who destroyed itself."
Eda squinted at the scar on her wrist. She slid her sleeves down further. "Is what the Traveres went through different from Zirore locking away her daughters?"
I said, "If that happened, Zirore probably regrets it."
"Perhaps so does our High Lord, he was only your age when it all happened. Expectation and the Theocratic Council bound him then as it does now. And yet, he overlooked Ansgar's failure to find his mother."
I hugged my legs and set my chin on my knees. "I wonder if my mother regrets anything."
"Of course she does. She was an exemplary woman — the kind of person who does not happen on accident. Only recognizing their mistakes and changing course shapes such a person. One can not accomplish such without looking back and regretting."
I closed my eyes.
"However, the weight of regret will hold you back. Learn, but move on."
I looked at her. "That seems too easy."
She laughed a little. "Moving forward is the most difficult thing in this world. Hoarding pain, cloaking yourself in what the world has supposedly done to you, is easy. The mire is comfortable for many."
"But sometimes bad things really are out of your control."
"This is true, but your reaction is not. How you seek justice is not either. One can choose to crumble under the weight of the world, or use it to become stronger for those who can not." She turned her arm over and looked at her scars. "Your mother told me something once." She folded her hands. "A spider who builds her web above a swamp risks falling into the water, but she will catch the most flies." She stood up. "Be brave."
I bowed my head and looked back up. "Thank you for talking to me."
She dipped her head, "anytime you need," then paused by the doorway with her necklace in hand. "If my recollection does not mislead me, your mother attended the prestigious college in the North around the time Ansgar did." She glanced at the window and then left down the stairs.
I blinked at the space where Eda once stood. She felt Ansgar's involvement meant something.
I nestled my forehead on my knees and shut my eyes. A light floral scent surrounded me. I wore clean pajamas, but my clothes sat in a heap on the floor.
I moved over to the pile. It smelt of the day, horrible. I laid the hunter jacket over my arm and scooped up my pants and shirt with the other.
Leyla bounded up the stairs in her pajamas — pretty even in a loose tunic and pants.
She said, "I can put those in with mine if you like." The gold letters lit her face and hair.
"Oh, I don't mind doing them myself. If you'd show me where?"
"Don't be silly." She took them from me. "This is Pinnacle."
I followed her downstairs and into the back. A washtub glowed green and rotated back and forth.
"It's a Conduction washer. We still line dry out this door here, but this is one perk of being an established vicar like Eda." Leyla put my clothes in the swirled, soapy water.
"How often do you have to get it recharged?" I said.
"Only around once a month, and Eda brings the crystal with the imbuement in herself."
"A crystal?"
"It can discharge an imbuement. Like Kat's charms sort of, or well, basically exactly like them." She did her silent giggle.
"So, an Apexist recharges them?"
"Yes, it works the same as a normal imbuement. In this thing's case, a Conductist casts a repeating rotation invocation. Then the Apexist sucks it up and stic
ks it into the crystal." She pointed to a socket within the dancing tub.
A glassy green tube glowed within.
"See, that's the invocation crystal. Eda starts it up with a touch and a word." She withdrew her hand and looked down. "I can't because you have to say the trigger word out loud." The sparkle of her eyes dimmed a little.
"Leyla. I'm sorry about that whole conversation with those Farago people, before the attack."
"Don't be. People can be awful, but it's on them, not me." She sighed. "At least Eda wants me to remember that, to be strong."
"You are. Your table idea today and the baking soda, both under pressure, you're great."
"I don't know about that."
"You stayed calm in the face of monsters today." I blushed a little. "Abyssites and Faragos can't shake you."
She hugged me.
I blushed a lot.
We headed to bed, and Leyla fell asleep fast. Kepi, too, went right to sleep in her blanket cave.
I didn't. All the events, the details, even the washer, played over and over in my mind.
I rolled over and near smothered myself in my pillow. After a few minutes more of mental thrashing, I found myself in a forest clearing.
A few feet away lay a black sword in the bright green grass. No, it was a huge black feather.
Its sheen faded as the sky grew dark.
I reached down for it and saw my clothes. I wore a stark white invoker robe, with puffed shoulders, ribbed body seams, pleated and pressed, more elegant than even Sybil's. No color marked the trim. But then blue, yellow, and red splatters bled through the fabric.
The colors felt wet. They made my fingers smell of the sea, the sky, and copper? I pulled my hand away. Blood covered me — blood from below, above, and in-between.
All the light drained away, and I stood within the darkness, but not an empty one.
A faint whisper came from above.
"Who's there?" I called out predictably.
More and more intangible voices. Breaths and flutters of movement added to the first whisper until they became a single noise — the thrum my seal made before.
Then nothing. Total silence.
A strange voice entered my mind. "Is that you?" it called in almost an Abyssite howl, but musical and feminine. "Have you come for me?"
I stretched my fingers upward, the tips grazed hard, leathery shapes with ridges and curved edges, shields. No too large. Scales?
