A Binding of Echoes

by Kalyn Crowe

  15 - Passing Memories

  I followed Leyla back into the High Hall's lobby. A broad brass column towered three stories and disappeared through the ceiling. The cascade of stairways eclipsed it before.

  A Conductist stood outside an arch-shaped opening in the curved metal walls. Inside, the circular floor resembled a huge coin of etched silver. A set of matched, shoulder-high rails rimmed the platform but didn't touch the walls.

  "Good afternoon. What floor within the central tower?" said the Conductist as she slid open a section of the rail.

  Leyla tapped my shoulder.

  "Oh, sorry, yes, the twelfth, please."

  The Conductist pulled her mouth into a smile. "How many in your party?"

  "Just two."

  She bowed and held her hand out to the archway. "Please keep within the rails."

  Leyla and I stepped onto the silver floor big enough for six or seven people. The view upward challenged my balance, and I bumped into Leyla.

  She smiled and steadied me.

  A pale shaft of light ran vertically and lit the golden chasm the whole way up. Impossibly tall and perfect, as it faded into obscurity. Like a rip in the world.

  "Lady, please do look forward if you are unfamiliar with the lift system." The Conductist slid the section of rail back and completed a circle around us. "And again, do keep your hands away from the walls."

  I gulped and nodded.

  A petite figure in magenta trimmed invoker robes glanced around the corner. This Resistist gave us a single nod before doing the same to the Conductist.

  The Conductist then laid her hands on the outside metal and said, "Arvan khoyor üsrelt."

  I whispered to Leyla, "Twelve, uh, jumps?"

  She grinned.

  A vibrant green shot up the tunnel.

  "Yavakh." A different voice, the Resistist.

  Leyla mouthed the word 'go.'

  Magenta light wrapped around the floor's edge. In the next moment, it shot up the pipe.

  A mix of fear and excitement hit as the acceleration built. The floors raced by in a blur. Conduction's green seeped away, replaced by the magenta of Resistance. We slowed to a stop at a new arched hole in the tube.

  An unfamiliar Conductist peeked around the opening. "Welcome to floor twelve." He slid open the rail and bowed.

  I wobbled past another Resistist who held the floor in place.

  Leyla left the lift with steady, smooth steps. Her thin layered robes swirled around her ankles.

  I lifted the flap on my bag a little.

  Kepi looked up from the shadow with bright, wide eyes.

  I tried not to smile and said to Leyla, "Do we take it down, too?"

  She nodded and grazed my arm with a question on her face.

  "Oh, I'm fine."

  She patted me and pointed down a hallway full of identical doors.

  We walked on a stark white carpet over a polished honey-colored wood floor. Gold and brass lined and trimmed every doorway and corner. Beautiful yet dead. No displays of art, only expensive minimalism purveyed the central tower. With everything so uniform, I almost wondered if we walked in a loop.

  Leyla scanned the numbers on each door until we came to the resource library.

  Boxes of paper filled floor to ceiling shelves. Four carts of inks and pens rested to our right. To the left, a small table held stacks of paper.

  Conrad bent over it as he scribbled away with a pen.

  "Uncle?" I said.

  He looked up. "Good, you girls made it."

  "Were you worried?"

  "Always. Now then, did you learn anything interesting?" He blotted the paper he wrote on.

  I checked over my shoulder and shut the door.

  He nodded at both Leyla and me.

  I pulled up two chairs to his table.

  Leyla and I sat, and she rolled her scroll out by Conrad's stacks. "A handwritten note was on the back of the warrant."

  He put his pen down and stretched his hands. "What did it say? Could you tell who wrote it?"

  I said, "It was a note from Ansgar. He wouldn't sign off on the warrant and asked Bora not to either. We think my mother might have told him something, but he couldn't go to the rest of the Order with it."

  Conrad folded his hands on the table. "I see. That follows with him showing concern about your transfer. Then, he comes to me to ask and disappears in an attack." He let out a long sigh. "Was there anything else?"

  I looked at Leyla.

  She plucked a hair from atop her scroll. "Ansgar wrote it was like when the templars arrested my parents."

  Conrad slowly rocked his hands. "He worried about Philomena's safety perhaps. He never mentioned the note or any specific concerns."

  I said, "Did he have a reason to worry?"

  "They were friends, how close, I don't know." He sighed. "We had questioned the circumstances of the Voclains' deaths. Even after Formist confirmed the cause, I requested a Spiritist verify they told the truth. We had to accept the Voclains died of heart attacks in their cell." He glanced away to the stack of paper. "But with no witnesses."

  "What? How is that possible?" I said. "For them both to die of the same thing, at the same time, and have no one see? It's absurd, verified, or not."

  He sighed. "What would you have had us do?"

  I crossed my arms and fidgeted with my sleeves.

  Leyla shrank a bit with her hands in her lap, arms close to her body.

  "I can't explain it, but it is how our laws work — even my private investigation after showed nothing. What's more, we couldn't overturn the Voclain's heresy charge. They refused voluntary questioning. At that point, only passing an Inquisition would free them." He lowered his eyes. "And their family. We couldn't have known they would have brought in Eda." He quickly stopped.

  I reached over and touched Leyla's arm.

  She didn't react.

  I knew the feeling.

  Conrad said, "The Order requested the Chimeras. Abyss Chimeras. The council at least acknowledged it was inconclusive when a Formist found Abyss on them. They worked closely with Philomena, any Weaving or Anima traces weren't conclusive either."

  Kepi watched us from under the bag flap. She gave me a quiet, sad coo.

  He frowned. "I lead the largest investigative team in perhaps the world, but my friends' deaths are a mystery. Our enemy used Abyss as a blindfold and dagger."

  "I wish we could have found more," I said.

  He shook his head. "We can at least assume it isn't Bora, but she can still be trouble."

  Death certificates and letters to the families of the fallen hunters sat in a tall stack. The pile to his other side was more of the same but signed with a personal note on each.

  The hunters didn't serve in the war, they weren't allowed, but they still died in it.

  He leaned his bushy brows into his left hand and covered his eyes. With his right, he wrote another note.

  Such a task took a heavy toll on the hardest person. Especially when he received a similar piece of paper instead of his wife after the war.

  I gulped and said, "Conrad, it's not your fault."

  He immediately stilled. "You can't possibly know—"

  "I couldn't stop my mother, from whatever she did, from killing a party of templars, from dying."

  He looked up. "You were a baby."

  "And during the war, you were here. The Order wouldn't let you follow your wife into the Abyss Ring, and they forced her to go."

  He scrunched his eyes under his thumb and finger. "I could have followed after."

  I said, "She'll wait for you. She knows you have work to do."

  He took a deep breath. "You sound like your mother." He picked up the letter he worked on and said, "I never wrote one for you. For her death, I mean. Too young. There was no other known family."

  I gave him a little smile. "That's all right."

  He rubbed his nose. "Thank you."

  Leyla leaned her head on my shoulder. "You have a family
now, both of you." Her golden words reflected off of us, even the death notes. "And Conrad, we still have the letter you sent after my parents' deaths." She sat up and smiled. "He's not even required to write them."

  "Obligation through expectations shouldn't define everything we do. Honor and duty are sometimes two different things."

  There it was again, that shadow in the edge of my mind like a word known but lost, some silent voice screamed.

  "Meredith?" Conrad said.

  "Yes?"

  Kepi stared right at me, too.

  He leaned forward for my attention. "What is it?"

  "I not sure how to describe it. It's like I know something, but don't."

  He studied me but not with his usual steeled gaze. "You wore the ward within your mind your whole life. These past days are the longest you've been without one. Others have experienced." He paused, and our eyes met. "Phantoms for lack of a better word; sounds, distortions, after removal of the ward."

  I moved a stray hair from my forehead. "This isn't like that, this is."

  "Deeper." He kept his focus on me.

  Leyla touched my hand.

  Kepi pushed further out of the bag, and the charm caught the light.

  I stared at it and saw myself say, "Conrad, it's time for me to go to the office."

  He put his pen down. "Right then. I know I talked about Attunements and seals before. I didn't intend for you to risk walking through with the charm in hand. Ward or no."

  I said, "Don't worry, I won't go through a locked door shoulder first, I'll use the key. Once I figure it out, that is."

  He smiled a little. "You should know the seal encloses the whole office." He circled his hand around. "It's in the walls, the floor and ceiling, and a bulwark in front of the door."

  Leyla looked over, eyes wide.

  Conrad added, "There's Apex in it, so, oddly, Kepi can't pass through."

  She cooed in a crisp affirmative note.

  I swallowed.

  Conrad extended his hand on the table.

  I took it.

  He squeezed. "I didn't bring you here to die." He let go. "Family is more than blood. You'll have a life even if you fail, Nancy. Don't forget that. The induction paperwork, although put off, is still real."

  But I wouldn't be.

  I forced a smile and wiped my eyes. Conrad couldn't offer me a better option, but I knew I had to get in. "Where is it?"

  He pulled a sealed letter from his coat. "It's on the twenty-sixth floor of the second obelisk. This note is your excuse, Sybil signed it. We'll take it to a clerk and get her key all official-like. She was to take you before we knew she had to leave. I'll say I came along to make sure you found your way."

  I took the sealed letter.

  Then a knock came at the door.

  Conrad tapped the table near Leyla's scroll.

  It rolled up and slipped into the outer layer of her robe by itself.

  He opened the door.

  "Sorry to interrupt my Lord High Hunter." A slight man in vicar's robes who tried to look like he didn't sprint here stood in the hallway. "An urgent summons from Lady Second Templar Bora to discuss Lord High Templar Ansgar."

  "Of course. Give me a moment to collect my papers."

  "Certainly, my Lord." He didn't finish his bow before Conrad closed the door.

  "Damn it," he whispered. "Nancy?"

  I stood and audibly scooted the chair.

  He nodded. "Have your guide take you to the invoker wing and attend to that note. I'll meet you at the house after I finish having Bora chase me around."

  I strode to the door.

  "And Nancy?"

  "Yes, Uncle?"

  "Do be careful."

  I adjusted my hat and dipped my head as Leyla, and I passed the messenger.

  The splendor and polish of the High Hall felt less now. Each glare of light dulled with each scentless step taken. We entered a narrow hallway that rose and fell in even lengths. "Is this inside of the buttresses between the towers?"

  Leyla nodded with her hand and then pulled out her mundane paper. "Act lost, less suspicious."

  "All right."

  The buttress led into the angled tower between the central and the invoker wing. This path flowed in staircases and ramps but otherwise looked similar to the rest of the High Hall. Finally, we took one last stairway to a single door. It opened into a mailroom.

  "Are these on every floor?"

  She nodded.

  An invoker appeared from around the corner. "Ah, I thought I heard the door. What brings you to my little cave in the High Hall?" He chuckled.

  "We got a bit lost, but I have this note from Lady Durandus. My uncle said to present it to a clerk for a key; would that be you?" I handed it to him.

  He slowly took it. "Indeed, I serve as such." With his thumb, he cracked the wax and read it. His face transformed from skeptical to amused.

  I tried not to fidget.

  "Well, well, I greet you, Lady Nardovino. Forgive me. I had no idea who you were. It seems Lady Durandus requests you to receive her mail while she is away." His lips curled up. "Such a task for a sealed letter. Quite like her." He brought the note over to a small desk and stamped it. "Take this to the twenty-sixth floor of this tower, show it to the invoker there; she will give you a key to Lady Durandus' office."

  I took the letter back. "Office? Not a mailroom?"

  "Yes. High ranked invokers do not receive mail in rooms like these. They have slots in their doors where we deliver it by hand after tracing it for safety. I would imagine Lady Durandus wishes to avoid a pile at her doorstep."

  "Safety?"

  "Why, dear Lady, overloaded scrolls or vials would be very dangerous. Yet we take comfort such an item would require an ill-willed Apexist to imbue. The occasion for concern is, of course, quite rare." He smiled without a trace of concern.

  "I see. Well, thank you for your time, Lord Invoker. I'll waste no more of it."

  "It was my pleasure, young Lady."

  I headed for the door, and Leyla followed.

  "Oh, by the way, the letter also asked you dust while you are there." He gave me a little bow and motioned toward the other side of the room. "Also, might I suggest the lift?"

  The invoker office lift stood a quarter of the size of the main one, and on the diagonal. As we rose, my certainty sank. I didn't fear the possible injury from the seal, but what my mother left to find.

  Leyla tried to reassure me with a smile.

  We exchanged the letter for Sybil's key with the twenty-sixth-floor clerk.

  This new Invoker said, "Lady Nardovino, the note says only you may enter the office. Please make sure your vicar waits in the hall."

  "All right." Again I tried to act as Nancy would and led Leyla through the hallways.

  Her request I dust and that anyone else stayed outside made so much sense. It bought time and disguised a lookout. Clever.

  Leyla and I passed a few invokers, but overall, the floor seemed deserted.

  The invoker offices looked completely different from the rest of the Hall. Glass and curves created a flow to each doorway, and the hallways snaked and shimmered. Blue carpet streamed through the middle of pale wood floors.

  The smooth walls took a deep bend and led us into a circular dead end. On one side, red satin with little sequins and beads framed a polished wood door.

  On the other, the seal.

  So finely Woven, it appeared almost entirely white, but with an iridescent streak of teal. It domed over the real door and faded into the stone.

  A tomb for my mother's work, and now, I came to rob it. And I wasn't the first. A door-sized part of the masonry right of the seal looked newer than the rest. No wonder Conrad knew it traveled through the walls.

  Leyla stood near.

  I handed her Sybil's key. "If someone comes along, I'm dusting."

  She nodded and pointed at the seal, then raised her hand in question.

  "I've never seen anything like it." I scanned o
ver it again and said, "She certainly didn't want anyone to visit."

  Leyla checked the hall around the bend and came back with her scroll out. "Is it true she built this without anyone knowing, and right before she died?"

  "That's what I've heard." The seal's light spilled over us. I said, "Kepi," and set her bag on the ground.

  She peeked out.

  "Did my mother intend for me to come here?"

  She cocked her head and blinked, then disappeared back into the bag. After a moment, she popped out. The necklace and charm hung from her beak.

  I reached forward.

  She dropped it into my palm.

  My mother's voice said 'remember' again. This time so crystal clear, I nearly heard her breath after. I approached the seal.

  To my surprise, as I drew closer, it dimmed as if it were my own.

  Each Anima filament dipped and danced around the others into an impossible lace. Every strand's glow melded into the next. All present except Form — the teal shimmer came from Spirit without its opposite.

  Curious.

  For only a moment, I saw myself on the other side of the seal. My arm extended through it, the charm bright through my fingers.

  Leyla touched my shoulder. "Mere?"

  "Leyla, hold this."

  She plucked the charm from my palm.

  The seal immediately glowed, as it would if I walked away from my own.

  I held my hand out.

  As she placed it in my palm, the seal dimmed.

  "Do you see the light change on the seal?"

  Leyla squinted. "No, but you see something you don't trust, don't you?"

  With the charm, it looked perfectly safe. It appeared unlocked, simple as that, too simple. Leyla was right.

  Did my mother somehow make the charm interact with my Attunement to fool the seal?

  "Remember," her voice echoed.

  The trial was to get here, not to pass through.

  "Leyla, if you remember anything about your mother, what is it?"

  She scrunched her lips to one side and after said, "I suppose how she would sing even though she wasn't great. It was beautiful." Leyla blinked and looked away. "How she loved me."

  My mother saved me once when she couldn't even save herself. Perhaps that was similar to what Leyla said.

  So why risk my death here?