Of the Mortal Realm

by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes

  The knock came on the door earlier than Umber expected, a little before sundown. Maybe Lydie was hoping to share dinner with them. Why hadn’t it occurred to him to invite her?

  Limbs heavy from too much blood-work, he opened the door cautiously, peering around it.

  The figure on the other side shoved it open the rest of the way with enough force Umber stumbled back, surprised. He opened his mouth to protest—

  And words failed him.

  Pale brown hair, like some shades of blond turned if they never saw sun. Soft blue eyes, a match to skin as fair and sun-innocent as his hair. Tall, broad shouldered, strong body under warm, practical clothing. Every line and plane and shade of that body was familiar, and seeing it here, now . . .

  The newcomer’s eyes widened when he saw Umber, and his expression brightened. He smiled widely.

  “I hoped it was you.”

  Without further talk, he stepped up to Umber and wrapped one arm around his waist, caressed his cheek, and tilted his face up to kiss him.

  Too sudden. Too unexpected. And Hansa was watching. Hansa wouldn’t understand.

  Umber tensed and managed to put his hands up between himself and the other man’s firm chest, but he couldn’t make his body further obey him so he could pull back or push away.

  The kiss started soft, but didn’t stay that way long, and the gentle hand on Umber’s chin became a tugging clutch at his hair. The man’s mouth tasted of blood, smoke, fine wine, and honey, flavors that would probably have disturbed Hansa but called to Umber with whispers of rough play and sex that could never be characterized as “making love.”

  A choked sound from Hansa broke through Umber’s deer-like trance. It was followed by the sound of a throat clearing, and Cadmia’s sharp query, “Umber?”

  He flinched at the sound of his own name. The man holding him pulled back and asked, “That what you’re going by these days?” Though he had broken the kiss, he kept his arm around Umber’s waist.

  Umber nodded, one silent move, almost a tic. “And you?”

  “Cupric. And these must be Hansa and Cadmia?”

  “And you know us how?” Cadmia asked coolly.

  “Terre Verte asked for a volunteer to go speak to you,” Cupric said. “I barely dared hope my—Umber would be the spawn in the group, but given their scarcity it seemed possible.”

  “Terre Verte?” Umber echoed, the closest to an intelligent response he could manage.

  “Oh, don’t look that way, my dear,” Cupric teased. “The Terre credits you all with freeing him. He means you no harm. He hoped you would take this as a good will gesture, but I see you’re taking it with your normal cynicism instead.”

  “He could have found a different messenger,” Umber said. Finally, he found the self-control to draw out of Cupric’s arms.

  “He could have, but I wanted to see you. I volunteered.”

  Reluctantly, Umber looked at Hansa, and saw the exact hurt and horror on his face that Umber had feared. Cupric either didn’t notice or else ignored the expression. He offered his hand to Hansa as if they were meeting at some kind of afternoon social.

  “Hansa Viridian, it’s an honor to meet you.”

  Hansa shook himself and pushed to his feet, but only to step back around the table, farther away.

  Cupric frowned at Umber.

  “Come now, surely your bond knows you’re not some kind of innocent Numen-spawn.” As if it might possibly help the issue, he added, “Oh, of course, you’re flesh-bound. I’m sorry. Don’t worry, Umber is an exception. Men aren’t my usual—”

  “Why are you here?” Umber demanded, before Cupric’s “comforting” words could drive Hansa from the room. Yes, the fleshbond could make Hansa more vulnerable to pressure from men like Cupric, but that wasn’t what had put the panicked look in his eyes.

  Cupric looked around, taking in each stony face, then sighed. The friendly teasing was replaced by an expression that was all focused business. “I met Terre Verte and Dioxazine in the mancers’ temple in the early hours of the morning.”

  “Good for you,” Umber snapped, when Cupric paused as if waiting for applause. “And?”

  “And,” Cupric replied, bristling, as if he had only then noticed their hostility, “we ended up having quite a long chat. That man has some crazy ideas—not that you’re apparently interested.”

  “Did Terre Verte send you just to say he means us no harm, or is there more to the message?” Cadmia prompted, not rising to Cupric’s bait.

  “He’s hosting a soiree of a sort,” Cupric said, the amused lilt back in his voice. “A social-political gathering, as he puts it. I’m here to officially invite you to join him.”

  The words were so far away from anything Umber might have expected from this man, who he hadn’t seen in as much as a decade, that he couldn’t find words to reply.

  Luckily, Cadmia once again responded. “Can you clarify what that means? Join him how?”

  Cupric finally looked at her fully. His brow quirked, a familiar expression that could still make Umber’s body tighten. “Terre Verte wants to organize a meeting of any and all individuals of power—small magic users as well as mancers. It will be held in two weeks at Amaranth Farms, which is also where he’s staying for the foreseeable future.”

  “How?” Cadmia asked. “How does he even expect to contact them?”

  “I know he’s gone to the mancers’ temples to talk to the Abyssumancers and Numenmancers, and that he’s sending messages with shades to try to reach the necromancers. I don’t know how he plans to reach the others, but . . .” For the first time, Cupric’s nonchalance appeared posed instead of sincere. “I suspect that, what that man wants, he gets.”

  “And what’s the point?” Cadmia asked. “Assuming he can get them there and they won’t just fight with each other, why is he doing this?”

  Cupric gave a dismissive half shrug. “Who knows?”

  “Someone will report it.” Hansa’s voice was hoarse as he raised that objection, but at least he had returned to the conversation—albeit from the opposite side of the room. “He can’t contact that many complete strangers and not have the word get out. What does he plan to do then?”

  “Again, I didn’t ask.” Apparently deciding his errand was complete, Cupric turned back to Umber with a slow smile. “As long as we’re here, let’s take a walk downstairs, shall we?”

  Umber’s throat tightened, stifling his response, before Cadmia interjected. “We were in the middle of something.”

  “We won’t be long.”

  “Yes, we would be,” Umber said. “And I’m needed here. And you’ve delivered your message. So it’s time for you to leave.” Each phrase came out stilted from a mouth that felt sandpaper dry. The effort it took not to reach for him, to follow him, to walk out that door with him and find some secluded spot like he had suggested, was dizzying.

  “Excuse me?” For the first time, Cupric seemed just as shocked.

  “You heard him.” Cadmia stepped up like a soldier, her tone frosty. “Go. Tell Terre Verte you delivered your message.”

  “I—”

  “Out!” Umber managed to snarl. “Now!”

  For a wonder, Cupric went. The dismayed expression on his face might even have been genuine.

  That just left Hansa.

  Even if he hadn’t been able to hear the rioting, self-recriminating thoughts slamming around in the guard’s overwhelmed, exhausted mind, Umber still would have recognized the way Hansa was desperately trying to compose his expression.

  “I’m sorry,” Hansa said. “I overreacted. What he said is true. I know you have other lovers.” He flinched, and corrected himself. “Real lovers. Ones you chose. I don’t have any right to . . .” He seemed to lose his train of thought there, as if he couldn’t put the rest into words.

  “Cupric is . . .” Umber hesitated, also at a loss. “Never mind. Cupric doesn’t matter. By the time he can go back to Amaranth to report to Terre Verte, we’ll have moved
on.”

  Chapter 9

  Cupric

  He threw me out.

  No matter where else Cupric’s thoughts traveled as he left the Fens, they kept returning to that one point.

  Umber threw me out!

  He would have stayed to argue the point if Terre Verte hadn’t emphasized that he didn’t want to anger Alizarin, Cadmia, and Hansa.

  The Terre had included Umber in the list, but he didn’t know Umber the way Cupric did. Maybe it was the Abyssi in him, but Umber liked to fight. When pain and blood were just another form of power, a good argument was a fine form of foreplay.

  It wasn’t a quick trip from the Fens, through the heart of Mars, and then farther north to one of the first large, landed homes outside the city, but Cupric still hadn’t entirely calmed when he reached the manor house late that evening. He paused outside the front door, trying to compose himself before entering. It wouldn’t do to walk into the prince’s presence still bristling with fury.

  But Umber had thrown him out! To avoid offending Hansa Viridian, of all people, the Quinacridone’s pride and joy. Oh, and the Sister of Napthol staring over his shoulder like an offended cat.

  The door opened in front of Cupric, and a preoccupied-looking Dioxazine nearly ran into him.

  “You’re back already,” she remarked, dancing out of the way before they collided.

  The Numenmancer crackled with power. Of course, she had spent last night in bed with Terre Verte. Cupric would whore himself out for that kind of glow, too.

  When he had first met Xaz, he had been prepared to dislike her on principle—she was a Numenmancer after all, and the Numini tended to be a rigid, moralistic lot who disapproved of his kind and all they stood for. But any person willing to say screw you to the Numini, bond with something as powerful as Xaz’s toy Abyssi Alizarin, go to bed with a man whose power blazed like the noonday sun, and wake up like a cat who got its paws into cream was all right in Cupric’s book.

  “The Terre made it clear he wanted me to report back,” Cupric said. He didn’t intend to disclose the more embarrassing points of the discussion, which he was still struggling to come to terms with.

  “True. We simply expected you to stay with them longer. I’m sorry if you felt hurried.”

  “Hansa took exception to my presence,” he admitted with a shrug.

  Xaz gave a sympathetic smile.

  “The Terre should be in,” Xaz said. “We have a new animamancer who thinks she can cast a fence around the property that will alert us if anyone unwelcome crosses it.”

  “An animamancer?” Cupric repeated, intrigued. He had never met one of the healers before.

  “She and another Abyssumancer came to talk to Terre Verte today,” Xaz said. “Separately, of course. They’re both staying on.”

  Of course they are.

  Cupric thought back to his own first meeting with Terre Verte—had it really only been that morning? He had been in the mancers’ temple. Cupric had listened to the man’s words, then suggested fatalistically that, if he really wanted to overthrow the Quin, Terre Verte somehow needed to get all the magic users in Kavet to work together. He had said it sarcastically. He had said it knowing it was stupidly impossible.

  Yet here they were, less than twelve hours later. Cupric wasn’t sure how Terre Verte had known the owner of this land and building was a necromancer. He had knocked on the door and, after a long conversation, the necromancer had turned over the main house for the Terre’s use.

  Cupric opened the door to that house now, then stopped, taking in the sight before him.

  The bite of Kavet’s early winter wind was replaced by the warmth and gentle teal glow made by orbs of foxfire—floating balls of pure power, which cast off light and in this case even heat. Silver magic frosting the windowpanes was the most likely reason the light hadn’t been visible from outside. The carpets were still the same, simple woolen weaves that had been there that morning, but under the glimmer of the foxfire and the silver mist of the windows, even they seemed elegant.

  The parlor was empty, which meant Terre Verte was probably in the master bedroom.

  Cupric had just lifted his hand to knock when he heard the prince’s clear voice call, “Come in, Cupric.”

  That was starting to annoy him—the Terre’s casual knowledge of seemingly everything, from who was standing outside his door to what was going on in the city. Nevertheless, Cupric bowed his head slightly as he entered. It was enough to avoid giving offense, and as far as he intended to go.

  Thus far, the Terre hadn’t objected aloud, though the first time they had been introduced—when Xaz had made it clear who the Terre was, and Cupric’s refusal to scrape and grovel had been most obvious—he had been able to see the annoyance in the prince’s expression.

  Now those aristocratic features were perfectly composed.

  “I take it the visit didn’t go as well as you hoped,” the Terre said.

  “No, but I delivered your message. They don’t trust you, and Umber doesn’t trust anyone, so I don’t know what you hoped to accomplish.”

  “Umber is justifiably wary around mancers,” Terre Verte replied. “If I can convince my sister to attend, I hope she can help assure the other spawn of their safety. Until then, it’s just common courtesy to keep in touch with Alizarin and the others.”

  The fact that Terre Verte had an Abyss-spawn half sister was one of many alarming and unusual facts the man had shared in their first long conversation about how they might be able to find allies in Kavet.

  “If they go to ground, will you be able to find them?” Cupric asked. The last time Umber had chosen to disappear, he had vanished from Cupric’s life like smoke.

  “I may not be able to find him, but we can find Alizarin easily,” Terre Verte said dismissively. “And while I would regret not having Hansa’s and Umber’s support, if they desire their privacy, they can have it.” He paused, and seemed to consider before speculating, “Though I don’t imagine they will stay hidden very long, unless they miraculously come to terms with the effects of the bond.”

  Little comments like that were why Cupric was staying on this man’s side. According to everything he knew, there was no power in Kavet capable of breaking the bond created by one of the spawn granting a third boon—and he would know, since he had researched it extensively. After all, he had been closely involved with Umber. He needed to know the risks.

  Every source he had ever found had made it clear the third boon made a permanent, magical connection. It could take many forms; no one knew how to control the outcome, which could range from a fleshbond, like the one Hansa and Umber had, to an all-encompassing physical, mental and emotional addiction that left the human partner a sniveling wreck, incapable of functioning outside the presence of his half-Abyssi bond-partner. The witch who had described the different types of bonds to Cupric had mentioned offhand that a strong enough Abyssumancer might be spared the worst effects, or might even end up the master in such an arrangement, but Cupric didn’t plan to risk it, not when the consequences lasted forever.

  Supposedly. Unless you were friends with Terre Verte, who seemed confident that, with a little work, he could learn how to break that bond.

  “I have another assignment for you,” Terre Verte said. Cupric drew a deep breath to keep himself from responding sharply to the tone of authority. Yesterday, it had been quite possible that he was the most powerful mancer in Kavet. He had been cautious, but never afraid. Then the Terre had strolled into his life.

  “There are two documents I would like to read. One is the Citizen’s Initiative One-Twenty-Six. The other one would be older, from before One-Twenty-Six was enacted, and I imagine would be kept wherever the Quin keep their more valuable—and private—records. It would be among the first documents written regarding the practice of sorcery in the city after Dahlia Indathrone came to power.”

  Dahlia Indathrone had been Kavet’s first President, which, if Cupric understood the history right, meant she
was the one who had taken charge when the royal family—Terre Verte included—had been deposed. The fact of that revolution less than a century ago was covered in every schoolroom in Kavet, but in accordance with Quin beliefs about the dangers of too much knowledge, the details were absent. As a schoolchild Cupric had known how many times Dahlia had been reelected, the name of the man who had briefly been President after her shocking and unexpected death, the exact year in which her son Winsor had been officially elected for the first time, and how he had passed a resolution declaring biennial elections unnecessary. Supposedly the people could call for a Presidential election at any time by gathering some number of signatures, but sparing that, Winsor stayed in power.

  Even now, Cupric remembered all those details, but he had never been taught why or how.

  “There are copies of One-Twenty-Six available in any library in Kavet,” Cupric confirmed. That weighty law was the one that had declared all sorcery punishable by death and created the guard unit by the same name to enforce it. “The second request . . . anything about sorcery would be in the private archives of the Quin monks or the Order of Napthol. I don’t have access to those.”

  “Hmm.” The Terre gave the matter a little thought, but not as much as Cupric would like before he said simply, “Find a way to get it.”

  “Find a way to get something the Quin don’t want me to have when I don’t even know exactly what I’m looking for?” Cupric repeated. “I’ll bring you a copy of One-Twenty-Six, but as for the rest, I can’t help you.”

  He wasn’t sure how much of the last sentence he said out loud, because somewhere in the middle of it, Terre Verte gave him that look. The one that said, “I could kill you, here and now, and I would lose no sleep over it, and no one would miss you.”