Isavel stepped up behind him, watching closely. That strange, ancient building stayed put. Somebody had just been looking at it - and more likely than not, that somebody had been Ada.
Aren pointed at the building. “What’s this picture of?”
“I recently received a query about a conflict five hundred and twenty seven years ago. The query focused on drone movements during that period, and this location was the one in which the querier, Unknown, expressed the greatest interest. It appears to have been a focal point of drone activity at that time.”
Aren looked up at Isavel and cupped a hand around his mouth, whispering at her. “What’s a query ? I haven’t heard that before.”
Isavel stammered. “Uh, I guess it’s a question. Can we see where this is? On a map, maybe?”
“Yeah. Where is this on a map?”
The wall responded by showing them a vast, blotchy area of blues, greens, and browns, with white dots swarming around it. It looked uncomfortably close to a pile of garbage swarming with maggots. Gods, that was an unpleasant thought, and she barely understood what was going on here. This did not look much like the hand-drawn maps of the area she had looked at in Glass Peaks.
The machine’s voice remained flat. “This is a map of drone movements throughout the period. The location of that image is here.” An area of the screen flashed yellow, where most of the white pips seemed to have converged. “This location is fifty-three kilometers north by east of our current location.”
The longer she looked at the map, though, the more she began to figure what it meant. The shapes were different; the mountains and cities and islands seemed smaller, and the vast stretches of nothingness seemed larger. But it was still fairly clearly showing a coastline, and this ancient facility wasn’t far from that.
That ancient facility had to be the shrine. It had to be. “Aren, the machine said that this was a focal point for the drones during the Ghost War, right?”
Aren nodded. “I think so. Yeah. Machine, this is where the drones all went, right?”
“It was the only location to see sustained drone activity over several days, yes.”
Several days - it would have taken a while for the coders to seal the ghosts away. It made sense. This was it - she knew where it was, and what it looked like. “Thank you, Aren - this is exactly what I needed.”
“I can get a drone to lead you straight there. Would that be good?”
She beamed, leaning down to hug him again. “Yes! Thank you. That would be perfect. Thank you, Aren.”
He looked up at her, and suddenly he seemed serious, frowning. He rubbed his eyes as though they were sore, but he wasn’t crying. “Am I the Mayor now?”
“I - uh, I don’t know. I think so.” She had no idea what that would mean to him, though. Clearly this boy was the heir to his father’s legacy, but what did that mean now, for this night, for the coming days? She couldn’t even begin to imagine. “Aren, do you have any other family?”
“I don’t think so.”
“How old are you?”
“Eleven.”
She bit her lip. He was too young - some were still overwhelmed at that age. It was hard to know when exactly a body began to move into adulthood, unless a gift manifested. She didn’t want to put him in danger, and if he hadn’t outgrown his sensitivity he might well die within hours of setting foot in the occupied parts of the tower. “Do you know anyone who can take care of you? You need someone to stay here.”
“Can you stay?”
She looked down at that childish face, around at the subtle signs of wealth and safety all around her, wealth and safety utterly violated by the gaping, ragged hole in one side of the building. He needed someone, but she knew she couldn’t stay; she had a responsibility to her gods, to her people.
She also knew that a life of power and manipulation was too alien and unnatural for her, in the long run. But such was life of the Mayor - and, perhaps even, the life of the Saint Herald. One day, the war might be past and forgotten, and she might settle down for a life of peace and, dare she hope it, family. But that day was not today, not this month, not this year. It was far, far over the horizon.
“I can’t stay, Aren. I have people to take care of. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. Mom had a friend, Jari - maybe I can get a drone to find her and bring her to me.” He… sighed? Oh, gods, no, he was yawning. Suddenly Isavel realized why he was more despondent than anything. He was tired. He was still just a child, after all, and children still slept consistently every night.
Isavel smiled, almost giggling at the display. “You do that, but maybe tomorrow, okay? You need sleep. Let me tuck you in.”
He smiled. “Okay. Thank you.”
Up past a spiral staircase, across an indoor balcony overlooking the atrium, she found his room - it was filled with strange little ancient trinkets; dolls; plants. She had never seen so many things in a bedroom before. She helped him into a remarkably comfortable-looking bed, covered him in a blanket embroidered with the silhouettes of insects, and patted his head. He was asleep in minutes, but she stayed a moment longer just to watch. Just to steal a little moment of peace, now, from that far-off future she was waiting for.
As Isavel descended those stairs to the main level of the mayor’s home, she breathed a sigh of relief. Of all the things she had expected to find up here, a tired little orphan with a story of an angel and the power to help her was not on the list - and it was a great deal better than most of what was. It was like stepping into the gentle silence after a storm.
Isavel had no way of knowing what floor she had started on, so she kept going until she reached the very bottom. She found herself emerging into the lobby of the tower, where servants and guests alike were packing things up and and standing around with worried expressions. She looked around for familiar faces, and eventually found Sorn and Marea. They were standing together by the main entrance, and looked like they were in deep discussion.
She walked closer and waved at them, and when they noticed they smiled back. As she drew closer, though, she could tell that they both seemed a little nervous. Small wonder, given all that had happened that night.
“Isavel - you went up there?” Sorn sounded concerned. “What happened?”
“I’m not too sure, but I think the Mayor is dead. His son is in charge, and he’s going to send a drone to lead us to the shrine. He’s a sweet kid.”
Marea and Sorn exchanged confused glances, and Sorn responded. “That’s… well, that was easy. Not that I’m saying it’s a good thing that -”
She held up a hand. “No, it’s fine. The Mayor tried to stand in the way of the gods, and, well, I suppose that’s what happens to people who do that. Much as I hate to say it.”
The hunters nodded, but Sorn gave her an uneasy look. Had she been too harsh? Did she hate to say it as much as she said? Sorn was an adventurer, a fighter. Surely he understood the need to get on with things. She looked outside, into the cool early summer night, towards the northern watchtowers and the army she knew lay beyond.
The watchtowers. She remembered she had a promise to keep.
She looked at her companions. “Head back to camp. I’ve got some business to attend to first.” Fixing her eyes on to Sorn, she smiled. “I’ll find you when I’m there.”
“Do you need an escort?”
Escort? What a ridiculous phrasing. She shook her head. “No. It doesn’t feel like Hive is under attack. This was a targeted strike, not an invasion. Dangerous, sure, but... I guess I have faith. This isn’t the time for battle. Go on, I’ll be fine.”
Sorn’s concern scurried behind a look of respect that bordered on reverence. She wasn’t sure she liked that look, but it was growing ever more frequent. It was impersonal, almost servile. She grabbed his arm harder and shook him a little, trying to laugh at it.
“Stop being such a mother hen! Just wait for me in your tent, okay?”
He nodded sheepishly. “Sure thing. I’ll see you in a
bit.”
As the hunters left among the slow trickle of Glass Peaks soldiers leaving the city, Isavel turned her sights to the guard tower, making her way through the ancient stony city and its wooden undergrowth. As she walked, she looked up. High above even those towering structures was the ring - the crown of the world, the seat of the gods, more names still. She wondered if the gods were looking down on her now, watching. Protecting. Guiding.
She had to believe they were. How else would everything have worked out, so far, despite the efforts of those working at cross purposes? Despite her own fallibility?
A silent prayer. Can you hear me? But of course they could hear, and of course they didn’t respond. None here spoke with the voice of the gods, no shrines or angels or mystic walkers. Isavel did think she saw hints of change in the glimmering lights on the ring, though.
Before anything else changed, she had a favour to return.
She found Hail Sen in the watchtower, looking back into the city. In the distance the lights in the Mayor’s suite had gone out, but in the gap in the reflection Isavel could still see where the glass had been blown open. Hail turned around at her approach and bit her lip, bowing at the shoulder.
“Saint Herald, I saw something happen. Are you alright?”
Isavel frowned. “I’m fine. The Mayor… I think he’s dead.”
Hail nodded. “I saw the explosions, the dronefire. I figured something was wrong. Was it ghosts?”
Isavel leaned against the window alongside Hail, trying to piece it all together. It was an impossible task. “I don’t know. Sort of. I think it was more complicated than that.”
“Of course, Herald. Things often are.”
For a long moment she stood beside Hail and simply looked out into the night. She felt comfortable, and would have stayed and skygazed for longer, but she wasn’t here to spend quality quiet time with a stranger. “Hail, I promised you a favour earlier, in exchange for those clothes.”
Hail looked nervous, but she nodded. “Yeah. Yes. Can we go up to the roof?”
Isavel looked at the ceiling. All of this was built in the strange concrete of the ancients, something apparently able to last hundreds of years. It was sturdy enough, but why would Hail want to go up there? Hail didn’t look like the tricksy type, so she assumed it was safe. “Sure.”
She followed the guard up to the roof, where they were alone save for a few torches burning in the night. Hail sat down on the ground near the centre of the watchtower, staring at her feet. She took a deep breath, but she didn’t speak. Curious, Isavel sat down across from her.
“What did you want to ask me for, Hail?”
Hail looked up, blond hair hanging loose to either side of her face. “Forgiveness.”
Isavel blinked. “What?”
“I need the forgiveness of the gods for something I did. I can’t sleep without seeing it. Almost every night. I - I want the dreams to stop.”
Isavel looked up to the sky, to the ring. She couldn’t stop someone’s nightmares, could she? She didn’t have the slightest idea how to do that. Even the medics, whose gift could help soothe a troubled mind as much as any other part of the body, could not always stop something so deep - and not everyone let the medics touch their minds.
Still, she had made a promise, so she had to try. She reached out and took the Hail’s pale hand. “What do you need forgiveness for?”
Hail looked up, and her face paled a little. Her words were hard to hear, ashamed and hiding behind a mumble. “I used to be a raider. Down south, near Fogpoint. I killed people. Innocent people, sometimes.”
Isavel felt her own reaction as it happened, her hand wanting to pull away. She barely managed to stop herself, and it still jerked. Hopefully Hail hadn’t noticed. Isavel tried to keep her tone as neutral as possible. “Why?”
“I grew up in a village where I… well, it was a small village. I wasn’t especially good at anything, I wasn’t one of the funnier or prettier or smarter ones. I was kind of a nobody, and… I guess it’s hard for me to explain this, to you of all people. I just didn’t really have anybody. I was the village afterthought.”
Isavel pursed her lips. Years of being the odd one out - her olive skin, her strange-talking mother, her seeming lack of talents - were more familiar to her than Hail might think. She stayed quiet, though, letting Hail continue.
“I found a dead man in the woods once, and he had this relic.” Her eyes widened at the memory. “It was like a piece of glass, but there were moving images and voices in it, and they switched around when you touched it. There were just a few sets, but they were ancient. I could see the ancients in them, hear a few of their words.”
Hail sighed, looking to the side, as though the past were hovering over her shoulder.
“Suddenly all the others wanted to talk to me! They all wanted to see this thing , and it almost seemed like they cared about the person holding it, too. I felt like I was worth their time. But, you know, it was just a relic. It got boring eventually, and I wasn’t any funnier or smarter or prettier than before.”
Isavel nodded. Relics were curiosities, and some were powerful, but they alone could not remake a person afresh.
“So next time a merchant was in town, I tried to get a relic from him. But the only relic he had was precious, he said, and I couldn’t offer him enough to get it. So I stole it before he left. I showed it off, pretended I found it in the woods. It was some kind of light that could set things on fire if you twisted the top the right way. People were excited, they wanted to try, they liked me again. But… you can see where this is going, right?”
Isavel nodded again. She couldn’t quite, though - she didn’t see the bridge between this and murder. Her hand twitched in Hail’s, but she had made a promise. She would try to keep it.
“Eventually, I became the girl who knew how to find cool stuff. People started thinking I was brave or dashing or mysterious. And I’d give people private gifts, too, secret ones just for them. You’d be surprised how easy it is to get into people’s good graces or beds when you smile and give them shiny stuff.”
Hail looked down at her free hand, as though it held some relic right then.
“And sure, some of it I actually did pillage from ruins, but most ruins have been picked clean long ago - honestly, I think the stuff I found in ruins was left there more recently. Most of it came from grave-robbing, at first - in the south people bury their dead, we don’t burn them. But then I met a few others, some cocky types out of Fogpoint, and I started robbing traders with them. I’m a hunter - really useful to them. And when we visited villages with all these fancy relics in our pockets and around our necks, we’d tell people we were a party of adventurers, and they would treat us like heroes.”
Hail looked up again, and took a deep breath.
“Usually I was killing people from far away, of course. No need for a hunter to get their hands dirty. But one day I got into a skirmish. Some other raiders were trying to rob the same traders we were, and I got into a fistfight with one of them. I managed to get my hand on his face, and I… well. You have the hunter’s gift too. You can imagine what it… what happened.”
A half-dozen possibilities flashed before Isavel’s eyes, all of them ugly. She had never had to blow someone’s head off at point-blank range. Hail’s expression and tone of voice, though, told her more about what that experience would be like than she could possibly need.
Isavel cleared her throat. “So that’s what you see in your dreams.”
Hail whispered. “Mostly I see his eyes. He knew I was a hunter; he knew what was coming. They were grey. Going wide, kind of… sad.”
Hail shuddered visibly, like she was seeing a dead face in front of her right then. She probably was.
Isavel had never understood why people turned to violence against innocents, and even now, the story seemed so… mundane. Something was missing in her understanding. But Hail was here, now, with a dark past that was well worth regretting - and regret it she did
, it seemed. That had to count for something.
“And now you’re here - protecting people, guarding the city.”
Hail nodded eagerly. “That’s the idea. After that I stopped raiding, came north. Tried to forget, to change. I don’t think it’s working.”
Isavel wasn’t sure what to say. Plain forgiveness felt insufficient - those were words, and from Isavel, who had nothing to do with Hail’s story, how could they ever help? She kept her hand on Hail’s as she searched for an answer. Gods, she had to start somewhere.
“You know, I was never one of the smart or pretty or funny ones either, Hail. The cities are big and colourful, but you see me, my skin, my hair? My mother was from somewhere far south, but she lived in my father’s village in the mountains, and people in the mountains don’t look like this.” She bit her lip, remembering a great deal of unloved memoried. “I even thought about a geneforge once, but they’re so far away - and once you lose what you’re born with, it’s hard to get it back properly. It was too big a decision. I was ungifted at first, too, so I couldn’t really get into trouble. But if I had been born gifted, like you...”
She wondered about this, about the truth. Was her nature any different than Hail’s? Would she have resisted the temptation of violence, if she had discovered her gifts in a less spiritual fashion? Did being gifted, as a warrior or hunter at least, pull one towards violence?
“I can’t say for sure I wouldn’t have done the same sort of thing.”
Hail looked confused, like Isavel could never do any wrong. That impression shouldn’t set the tone.
“My village was destroyed. It wasn’t ghosts - just, well, raiders. And ever since then, I’ve felt cut loose. I… I don’t feel like I mourned them enough. Even my own family - but especially those around me, the neighbours and friends and relatives. They’re all dead, and when I look back and think of their faces, in that pile of bodies...”
She tried to look at those memories, but they were fading and blurring. Or did she just not want to see them? It had been a scant few months, at most, and it still didn’t hit her the way she thought it should.
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