The World Awakening

by Dan Koboldt

  “I think that went well,” Veena said.

  “Yes. Almost surprisingly so,” Richard said.

  They strolled through the lamplit gardens in the center of the palace, shadowed by Tukalu guards, en route to the wing that housed the palace-within-a-palace, the residence of the Valteroni Prime. This was a freestanding castle in the courtyard near a miniature stone plaza. It had its own walls, its own staircase, its own wide terrace and schooner-shaped structure. A copy of the massive building in miniature. Veena found it a bit pompous, even for Valteron. Richard himself hadn’t seemed to notice.

  “When did you figure out that the gateway had magical origins?” she asked.

  “As much as I’d like to claim credit for that, it was Moric’s breakthrough. I didn’t believe it until he showed me the sketches from the Enclave.” He sighed and shook his head. “What I would give to spend just an hour on that island.”

  “Maybe when this is over.”

  He barked a laugh. “They’ll continue to dangle that in front of me like a carrot in front of a donkey. I imagine I’ll never go, unless I somehow manifest the ability.”

  “Like Quinn did.”

  “That would be nice, wouldn’t it? How long do you think he’s had it?”

  “He didn’t say. Frankly, I have trouble telling where the illusions end, and the real magic begins.”

  “I feel the same way.” They crossed the little drawbridge across the moat to the miniature palace. Richard stooped to cross beneath the points of the portcullis. Two of the Tukalu positioned themselves at the foot of the bridge, while two others jogged around to cover other access points.

  Veena didn’t often get private moments with Richard. She had to make this count. “I don’t think you should go with them.”

  Richard smiled. “I really have no choice. Alliance or no, the Valteroni army will have trouble taking orders from the Caralissian nobility.”

  He meant Anton, who’d stepped up to command the army of mercenary guards that marched under the Caralissian flag toward Nevil’s Gap. For the first time in almost a generation, not a single cask of Caralissian wine was en route anywhere. The greatest sacrifice we’ve ever made, Anton called it, to the wry amusement of most others in the coalition.

  “Even so, we’ve no idea what kind of weapons CASE Global will bring to bear. You’re too important to lose.”

  “No one is too important, when the future of this world is at stake.” He always had a grandiose response to her cogent arguments. It was like he sat around thinking them up for future conversations.

  “I’m worried about Valteron, too. They need their leader.”

  “They’ll have something better.” He made a flourishing bow at her. “The legendary Dahlia.”

  “I wish I shared your confidence in everything. My part especially.”

  “You’ve learned so much in such a short time.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “You’re ready.”

  “What if no one listens to me?”

  “They’ll listen. They’ve seen what you did in Tion, not to mention Caralis.”

  “I wish they believed in me half as much as you did.”

  Richard didn’t stop in his sitting room as he usually did. Instead, he opened the door to the inner chamber. The bedchamber. A place she’d never been, even as his top advisor. He went in. She bit her lip and scurried after him.

  “No one knows your potential as well as I do.” He looked back at her and smiled. “You’ll go far here.”

  “Richard.” She reached out and grabbed his arm, making him face her. “I may not have another chance to tell you this.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. And everything,” she said.

  He smiled. “That sounds like a contradiction.”

  “When we came back to Alissia for the second mission, everyone had a reason. Do you know mine?”

  “You’d fallen for this world, just as I did.”

  “That’s part of it. I love being in Alissia.” She took a breath. “But not nearly as much as I love sharing it with you.”

  “I feel the same way. You appreciate this world as only a fellow scholar can.”

  “It’s more than that. For me, at least. Is it for you?”

  A cloud passed over his face. “There’s something I must tell you.”

  She eased a bit closer to him. “Tell me.”

  “When I discovered this world, when I saw its potential, I knew I had to devote my life to studying it. As part of that, I promised myself I would never let personal relationships get in the way of the work.”

  Now you tell me.

  “But I broke that promise,” Richard said.

  She put a hand on his arm. “It’s all right.”

  “You don’t understand, Veena. I’m the Prime of Valteron. Personal entanglements only make me more vulnerable.”

  “They make you human, Richard.”

  He shook his head. “I wish I’d been strong enough to resist. For the sake of Alissia.”

  She gave his arm a squeeze. “You can tell me.”

  “I suppose I can. If there is anyone who should know, it’s you.”

  Here it came, at last. Veena closed her eyes and inhaled slowly, to calm her too-fast-beating heart.

  “I’m in love,” he said. “And have been for a while. Years, in fact.”

  This was hard for him. She could see it, but she still had to hear it for herself. “And with whom are you in love?” Say my name, she thought.

  “A Landorian woman.”

  Veena opened her eyes and broke free of her reverie. “Excuse me?”

  “We met on my second year as head of the research team. I knew right away to be careful with her, to conceal her existence from the company.” He smiled at her. “I didn’t count on your cleverness. Comparing my journals to the travel logs, looking for a pattern of disparities. A bright flashing arrow to her hometown.”

  What was he talking about? The only person she’d tracked in that fashion was the witch in that little valley, the one who’d captured Veena, Quinn, and Julio with her intoxicating smoke. “You don’t mean Iridessa?” The woman certainly possessed a certain allure, but she had more years on Richard than he had on Veena.

  “She’s a firecracker, isn’t she? I suppose I could do worse for a mother-in-law.”

  Mother. In-law. The meaning of the syllables sunk in with excruciating slowness. “You’re married? To her daughter?”

  He laughed, his eyes still distant. “Hard to believe, isn’t it?”

  She was such a fool. “Almost impossible.”

  “We have a child together, too. A son. He’ll be fourteen in the spring, and I hardly know him.”

  “I feel like I hardly know you.”

  “Touché. I hope you understand the need for dire secrecy. But by the gods, it feels good to share this with someone I can trust.”

  She should have seen it, should have known. It was all falling into place now—the way he’d kept himself distant, his blindness to Veena and how she felt about him. His desperation to escape into this world and save it from the threat CASE Global presented. Now, at least, she understood why he’d so blithely ignored her clear devotion. Why he’d politely refused her countless unspoken invitations. He wasn’t married to his job. He was just plain married.

  Strange, how that gut-wrenching revelation shifted her worldview a full ninety degrees. “Thank you for sharing this with me, Richard. I should go.”

  “Of course. I didn’t realize how late it was,” he said, still totally blind to the crushed woman before him. “Will you come to see us off tomorrow?”

  All of her mistakes and missteps were laid bare before her. Maybe it wasn’t too late to correct some of them. She owed it to herself to try. “I’ll think about it.”

  Chapter 31

  Barred Doors

  “My biggest problem is knowing when to give up.”

  —Art of Illusion, October 20

  Quinn trudged back down to the guest w
ing of the Valteroni palace, his mind still spinning with troop numbers, attack plans, and Moric’s magical theories. A soft footfall behind him announced the presence of a Tukalu escort. He hadn’t even thought to wait for one. It was Alethea again. It’s like I keep winning the Tukalu lottery.

  He slowed to let her catch up. “I must be pretty important, to draw the best Tukalu warrior so often.”

  “That’s one way to read it,” she said.

  “Is there any other way?”

  “Maybe you have a tendency to need more supervision.”

  He laughed. “Is that what Richard thinks?”

  “The Prime doesn’t make our individual assignments.”

  So it’s more of a personal interest. “Good to know.” He decided to take a different angle. “How did you fall in with him, anyway?”

  “He came to Tukalu himself, years ago. More recently, he sent his ambassador. The one called Dahlia.”

  Also known as Veena Chaudri. “And she hired you?”

  “She negotiated an agreement,” she said.

  Finally, a hint at the origins of the odd relationship between Valteron and the Tukalu. “You provide your services, and he provides . . . what?”

  “A number of things. But primarily, independence for our island and its people.”

  He glanced back, because that almost sounded like a joke, but her face was serious. Hopeful, even. “Are you not independent now?”

  “Tukalu is currently a protectorate of Valteron.”

  “Really? I’d never have guessed.” He didn’t add that granting independence to an already self-sufficient region cost Holt very little. In return, he got some of the best fighters in Alissia to serve as personal guards. The guy is a goddamn genius. And bravo to Veena sealing that deal. She’d certainly been busy since turning her coat. “You said you got a number of things in return. What else?”

  “Nothing I can share with you.” She gestured ahead. “And here are your chambers. Bar your door, as we can’t spare a guard tonight. I want everyone rested for tomorrow.”

  “No problem. See you at sunrise.” He went in and pushed the door shut behind him. He’d barely unbuckled the sword-belt when she knocked on the door again. He yanked it back open. “Can I at least take off my belt before I—” and he trailed off when he saw it was Jillaine. “Oh. Hey.”

  She locked eyes with him and he couldn’t move. She advanced through the open door and let it swing shut behind her. “Before you what?”

  She moved close to him, filling the world with the scent of roses. So close.

  He eased back a step or two, just to give her space. It seemed like the polite thing to do. “Bar the, um . . .” His mouth was having trouble forming cohesive words. “Door. I’m supposed to bar the door.”

  She curled a finger without even looking, and the bar slid home. “It’s barred. Do you do everything Alethea tells you?” She advanced on him again, and her eyes glittered with the promise of violence.

  Uh-oh. “Whoa.” He held up his hands. “She’s just a friend.”

  She slid between his hands. Grabbed the front of his shirt and kissed him. A long, lingering kind of kiss that made him dizzy.

  “What am I?” she whispered.

  “So much more.” He pulled her up against him.

  Chapter 32

  The Brother

  “Preparation and vigilance offer more protection than force of arms.”

  —R. Holt, “The Dangers of the Other World”

  It took Logan six hours to row to shore in the tiny skiff Ralf and Snicket put him and Mendez in at crossbow-point. No food. No water. Just the clothes on their backs and the little bit of gold that Logan kept hidden about his person. Not even their goddamn swords. That’s what I get for turning my back on thieves I had to threaten to work with us in the first place.

  Still, it wouldn’t have happened if Kiara had listened to one damn thing he said to her in the past month. Don’t move the troops by sea. Don’t engage the Valteroni fleet. Turn and run, when you know you’re beaten. She always put the mission first, no matter the consequences. No matter whose family she had to hold at ransom.

  Mendez was heading south toward Valteron City, and planned to reequip at a CASE Global hidey-hole near Bayport. Provided that Holt’s little game of sabotage hadn’t spread that far north yet, of course. Within a day of parting with Logan, Mendez had already “borrowed” a sword and a horse, according to their last chat before going radio silent.

  Sneaky bastard.

  Logan had no such luck on the two-week trek northeast across New Kestani. He hated not having more than a knife to defend himself, but he hadn’t had a chance to nab something better. Even the tiniest settlements here were on high alert and distrustful of strangers. After the third village denied him refuge for the night, he no longer bothered to try.

  Only the little monastery from the peace-loving Friars of the Star let him stay a night. They even gave him a hot bowl of soup to eat, and were kind enough not to ask too many questions. Logan felt bad about nicking one of their robes.

  Now, as he crouched between two dark boulders and surveyed the Kestani encampment in the vale before of him, he was glad he’d taken it. A hundred and fifty tents, give or take, stood in neat rows along the floor of it. Soldiers crouched around the bright-burning cook fires between the rows, sharing a midday meal. He marked about seventy-five men, most of them armored, each with a sword or mace on his belt. Beyond them stretched a massive dirt-and-pike wall that ran from one steep mountainside to the other, blocking off the entirety of Nevil’s Gap. An equal number of men stood on duty along the wall or manned the double-cart gate where the road came through and continued down into Felara.

  Kiara wasn’t kidding when she said they’d closed the border. The gate was closed, and the complete absence of travelers heading to or from suggested it had been for some time.

  This is the only way north, too. “Damn.”

  He wouldn’t chance the Landorian route through the mountains again, at least not until they did something about the smugglers that controlled passage—especially since he had no more money to bribe his way through. The only other way into Felara lay more than a hundred leagues to the west, practically to the coast of the ocean. Logan didn’t want to lose another two weeks. CASE Global would already be in panic mode when they lost contact with the fleet. Who knew what orders Kiara left behind, in case she dropped out of contact. And if the executives thought Logan played a role in her death . . .

  No. I won’t think about that.

  He just needed to get there, make sure his family was safe, and explain what had happened.

  Going by sea would have been faster and avoided the Gap, but Logan vowed to never chance the Alissian seas ever again. Not after watching Kiara battling her sister, and then letting his hired hands get the drop on him. He tugged the robe on, and tucked everything in so no one would get a glimpse of the flexsteel armor. He couldn’t hide the boots, so he smeared them with mud on the walk up to the Kestani camp.

  He drew the hood and slouched as he walked. Kept his eyes on the road, too. If any soldiers crouched around the cookfires noticed him, they said nothing. He made it all the way to the central gate before an officer stepped out to bar his way.

  “Where you headed, brother?” He had a long mustache, dark-oiled in the Kestani style, and his uniform was spotless. Not even a snowflake on it, and they’d just seen a blizzard.

  “North,” Logan said. “North, in search of peace.”

  “The last place you’ll find peace is Felara.”

  “Unfortunately, that is not for me to decide,” Logan said.

  “I’m sorry, brother. You’ll have to go a different way.”

  Logan wrinkled his brow, as if confused. “Has there been an avalanche?”

  “No, but the Gap is closed.”

  Hoofbeats sounded, and the soldiers on either side of the wooden gates pulled them open to admit a party of four riders in Kestani uniforms. A patrol, most lik
ely.

  Logan watched them dismount and lead their horses away toward the stable at the western rim. “It looks open to me.”

  “If we don’t send out patrols, we won’t know when the next attack is coming. The Gap is crawling with Felarans.”

  “The conflict between you is disappointing.” Logan let the officer chew on that for a moment. Got a comeback? Didn’t think so. “But it doesn’t concern the Order.”

  “Are you armed?” the man asked.

  “No.” He figured he had to sell it, so he added, “My wits and my faith are the only weapons I need.”

  “That may not be enough. The Felarans are desperate.”

  “What can they take from me?”

  “Your life.”

  They’d left the gate open after the horses came through. The soldier tasked with closing it had stepped over to warm his hands by the nearest fire. The second he came back, the gate would be shut, and then Logan would have no shot at getting through. What would Bradley do? That was easy. Bradley would do what he wanted, and ask for permission later.

  “I appreciate the warning.” Logan stepped around the officer and walked toward the open gate, which was thirty yards distant.

  “Brother, wait!” the officer called after him.

  Logan kept walking. “Peace will not wait.”

  The officer strode and grabbed him by the arm. “You’re a dead man if you walk down the Gap alone.”

  “All men die.” Logan looked pointedly at the man’s hand on his arm, and frowned until he lifted it. “Perhaps my time has come.” He turned on his heel and kept going.

  “Stop, or I’ll signal the archers!”

  Logan didn’t dare stop. “And have them shoot a Brother of the Star in the back?” he called. “That’s what Felarans would do.”

  He strode through the gate without another word. Not rushing, not slacking, just keeping a steady pace. Straining his ears to hear what the officer did next. Bracing himself to hear that order given. He wouldn’t run for it, even if they did. Running was a sign of guilt. He was not guilty. He was a Brother of the Star, and he had somewhere to be.