“But you trust me?” That was a surprise.
“You have no connection to me. I didn't request you, I wasn't assigned you. You've never been under my command. I suppose you could've been bait; you could be communicating with superiors right now. But I don't think so.”
“You don't trust the Inquisition?”
“I'm not stupid.”
“But you're their leader.”
Enkhaelen snorted. “In name only. I'm mind-blind. Anyway, the Inquisition has its own agenda. All I've done as its leader is keep it out of mine.”
“There are no other mages that you trust?”
“Not with my work, no.”
“And no non-mages?”
Silence. Then, flatly, “What do you think?”
Geraad remembered the portrait of the stern, silver-haired woman. “You're married. Were married?”
“I am.”
“Where is she?”
“Dead.”
Geraad blinked. “I'm sorry. How did she... No, I apologize, I shouldn't pry.“
“I killed her.”
Shocked by his bluntness, Geraad said, “You—“
“I made a mistake. I've made many mistakes, but that was my greatest.” Enkhaelen's voice was still flat, detached. “I haven't had much opportunity for making friends since then.”
“What about your daughter...?”
His shoulders stiffened. “Who told you?”
“No one. When we were in the Palace, you asked the priestess about her.”
A long moment passed in which Geraad stared at the man's rigid back, wondering if he'd crossed the line. Then, slowly, Enkhaelen's shoulders settled, and he said, “It wasn't a question. Just a snide reflex. They took her a long time ago.”
“Who?”
“Trifolders. Brancirans—Muriae, specifically. My wife's people. They—“ He sighed and made a sharp gesture with one hand. “I don't want to talk about it. Suffice to say that she— That both of them are long dead.”
“Is...that how you became a necromancer?”
“No. And what part of 'don't want to talk about it' do you not understand?”
Geraad swallowed his many related questions. Since Enkhaelen just sounded harassed and hadn't barred other topics, though, he tried, “Since then, you've just been working?”
“Pushing the boundaries of dalurvykhe takes time.”
Body-magic. “Hundreds of years?”
“Not exactly. I've had more time to think than I've had to work—which is good. I haven't always thought things through very well.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I fox things up, Geraad. I ruin all I touch.” Enkhaelen's finger stabbed the mirror, rattling it on its stand. “Sometimes on purpose.”
“...I don't understand.”
“The Emperor wanted to make his own minions. Take the job off my hands so I'd be free to design ones closer to his stellar locusts. So I made templates for the Palace to follow. Stick victim in, press into shape. I'd rather not be sidelined though, so I added...limitations. Flaws.
“Aradys doesn't care. He just keeps flinging people in and hoping some turn out useful. And he won't let me fix the templates, because the last time I did, I removed fertility from the controllers because no, I was not allowing them to have babies that clawed their way free. I told him it's not sustainable to have the females die every time, and he said fine, just restore fertility to the senvraka. But I refused and now he won't let me touch any of them.
“And then he has the gall to complain about the conversion rates. You saw what he and Rackmar are like. They want more specialists but they go behind my back for it because they distrust the ones I do by hand. Why? Because I make them independent, and they don't get the Palace euphoria.”
Geraad frowned. “What's that?”
“It's— Well, you know mind-shock?”
“Yes. From badly done conditioning.”
The necromancer chuckled faintly. “The euphoria is like that, but they get it when they think about the Palace or the Light, or come in contact with it. They tell me it's rapturous. The ones I hand-make don't get it much—and they just plain work better. But they're not the Emperor's ideal, so he just stuffs more hapless idiots into the templates and complains when they turn out wrong.”
Like the women and the bear-man, Geraad thought, guilt clutching him. He wished he could have done something—rescued them somehow, instead of cowering in his own receptivity.
But he had learned much from the experience, and hopefully it would help the others. Hopefully Rian had reached Cob, and they were planning their assault.
Meanwhile, it wouldn't hurt to learn more.
“You said 'stellar locusts'... What are those?”
“The Outsider's original people. Great big radiant creatures, like bugs but with faces and hands, sometimes torsos. Many types. He says he was trying to find them a new home—that the whole Portal and invasion was his attempt to save them. Never mind that they slaughtered their way through Lisalhan; no, they were refugees and we're the villains for closing them out.”
“What?”
“They're all dead, supposedly. That's why I'm making 'new' ones. But he's never happy. He says they need to be more wraith-like, but I can't recreate a wraith—it's just not possible here. They fell from a lighter realm and there is no method in this world that can replicate that.
“I've been a dalurvykhagi for centuries. I've bonded elements with flesh, woven biology from glass and light, reworked humans and skinchangers and wraiths until they were unrecognizable. I can create artificial spirits and deconstruct souls. But I can't forge anything as high and bright as he needs.
“He thinks I'm lying. He doesn't understand people or magic or limits, he just wants what he wants. And when I told him the world isn't light enough, he said he'd make it so.”
Alarmed, Geraad said, “We spread the Light because he—”
“Wants to change the world. Physically.”
“What...would it be like?”
Enkhaelen shrugged. “Hotter. Drier. I don't know much about where the stellar locusts came from, but I don't think it had water. The wraiths would be fine, but nothing originating here would survive.”
Geraad tried to wrap his mind around this. “Why us?”
“Punishment, I think. For closing the Seals against him. You'd be surprised how petty a greater entity can be.”
“How much time do we have?”
“Until he transforms the world?” Enkhaelen shrugged again. “It's slow going. He only has a small aperture. But I know he hides things from me, so while I think we have a few millennia, it could be mere centuries.”
Not my problem, then, thought the coward in Geraad. He squelched it. “If you disagree with him, why are you helping?”
“It's a nice distraction.” Enkhaelen's voice was wry. “We immortals need something to pass the time. Games and projects and wars and children... I crafted his son, you know. The Crown Prince. The Emperor delighted in him for years, but then he got bored. Wish I could say it was more than that, but no. So he shunted Kel to the army, shut down the Imperial Court, scattered the courtiers. Focused on our game. Except now he's gotten bored of this too.
“Next will probably be more projects like the White Flame armor. The Emperor isn't fond of it, but Rackmar supports it because anyone can wear it and become a soldier. It's an invasive encasement, sort of a step up from a bodythief's bracer: integrates with the nervous system, compensates for injury and deformity, absorbs energy, maintains homeostasis. You can put it on someone who's just had their heart torn out and they'll thrive as long as they keep it on. I'm proud of it. I just wish...”
He trailed off, but it was easy for Geraad to finish the sentence: I wish I wasn't working for these people. I wish I wasn't doing this under duress.
After a moment, Enkhaelen added, “It's not pleasant, but it's progress. And if the world does change, at least they should survive it.”
There we
re many things Geraad wanted to ask: Is there no way to turn back the Emperor's work? No way to escape? But he dared not say them lest the mentalists were listening. As much as he wanted to help, he could not do so if he got Enkhaelen caught.
So he switched from the Imperial to the personal. “How did you get involved in this?”
“I told you about the Ravager vessel.”
“Yes, but...you.”
Enkhaelen turned his head slightly, enough for Geraad to see his sharp profile and one cold blue eye. “You don't want to know me, Geraad.”
“Maybe not. I admit you're frightening. But it seems like you want to talk.”
“Not really.”
“Not even about...” Geraad flailed for some neutral topic. “Why you're in the Circle?”
A sharp laugh, and Enkhaelen turned his gaze away again. “What is there to tell? I wanted an education.”
“What? Just that?”
“Does it not seem like me?”
“Frankly, no.”
The necromancer waved a gloved hand vaguely. “I have ulterior motives. That's no secret. But when I...came back from my time away, the world was so different. This seemed like the best place to figure out how and why.”
“So you enrolled as a student? Or did you, um...”
“Steal someone's body?” Enkhaelen laughed. “I was wearing a corpse, but I didn't kill a mage for it. Sometimes corpses happen without my intervention. But yes, I became Morshoc Rivent.”
He paused, then said, “You understand, I was taught dalurvykhe by my great-uncle. Just him and me, alone in a tower—and then just me, after the Circle and the Trifolders killed him. I thought I'd be among enemies here, that I'd be infiltrating, fighting. But then I learned that the Inquisition had split off from the Circle, and I started taking classes, and...
“I suppose I got distracted.”
There was something almost like a smile in his tone, and Geraad's heart lifted. “You like being here? —Well, you must. You've been here over a hundred years now, and you're one of our great heroes. Er, several of our heroes.”
“Ugh. I don't want to hear that.”
“It's true. Rivent was important, but Mirrimane... Actually, he was rather divisive. Everyone appreciates Modern Consolidated Wardcraft, but I've been reading the old texts—“ He bit his tongue too late, but Enkhaelen showed no reaction, so after a moment he continued, “You streamlined it but you removed so much. I wish I'd known some of the styles I've read about. Do you practice them? Would you teach me?”
“Perhaps another time.”
“Of course, of course,” said Geraad, privately thrilled. He knew he should be wary, but the fact that Enkhaelen had been captivated by the Circle lifted a weight from his shoulders. Ever since descending into these depths, he had feared what they meant for his friends and teachers above. But if Enkhaelen just wanted control...
All options considered, he could accept that.
“I fell in love with Wards myself,” he said, turning again to his crates. He had quite the pile of bundled robes now, his hands moving automatically through the process. “I was sixteen. I'd been in mentalist training since I was ten, but it was boring—so many ethics courses. Can't do this, can't do that. Completely necessary, just dull.
“But we started sitting in on other classes to see what we might want as a secondary path, and I ended up observing an upper-tier Wards class. Hazard Reduction, I think, in the pre-military stream. They were doing disaster drills, and just watching them weather all kinds of assaults and dangers while covering others—I adored that. I wanted to be so safe that I could also safeguard the people around me. And my patron Count Varen approved of it. So even though I can see its flaws now, Modern Consolidated...I really respect it.”
“If you enjoy safety so much, why are you still here?”
So I can observe. So I can keep others safe. But mostly because— “You rescued me. I'm not afraid.”
Enkhaelen didn't react, and when Geraad glanced at him, he was back to tapping at the mirror. His motions revealed less frustration than before, though, and Geraad decided to take it as a hopeful sign.
If the necromancer could be influenced...
He smiled ruefully. It was a long-shot, but he could try.
*****
In the ensuing quiet, Enkhaelen tried to focus. The hawk in the mirror had yet to find Cob's trail, but when it did, the haelhene would follow. He couldn't let them interfere.
But something nagged at him about Hlacaasteia and that smugness in Caernahon's aura. About Geraad's cautious questions. He'd gotten caught up in his own rambling and now he couldn't remember what had hooked him.
What had he missed?
*****
Mariss waited impatiently for the scrying window to clear. She was using one of the haelhene's because hers—along with everything else she'd kept in her salt-walled chamber—had been washed away by the black water.
The 'window' was just a round protrusion from the deep red crystal wall, its liquid-like surface swirling with fog as it sought a connection at the other end. She shifted on her feet and grimaced at the way her boots squished; the leather was ruined, mandating a visit to the human lands for a new pair. Always distasteful. The stink, the clamor, the prying eyes...
She had nothing against humans, but why did there have to be so many?
The rest of her attire would survive, though her dress clung soggily and she had noted some sprung threads, some damaged embroidery. Her hand went to her torc, glad it was intact. The gem that dangled from it was a piece of the Hlacaasteia spire, allowing her to pass through its walls at will—as befit a student of Master Caernahon.
Her silver kin were not so favored. They had to dwell outside and do as they were told. She pitied them, but they did not express regret. It was not in their nature.
In hers, though. It frustrated her to be part human, to have these emotions. Her silver nails drummed an agitated tattoo against the frame of the scrying window, and it took great effort to stop.
So many questions plagued her. And where was her master?
A ripple ran through the chamber, drawing her gaze to the door forming in the far wall. The haelhene did not usually need such things; all the chambers in the spire were temporary, formed and collapsed at will, and she knew most of them were for her benefit.
The gap revealed four figures. They entered in silence, three hooded and masked as usual but the fourth in just its naked substance and a pair of grey gloves.
She squinted at it. Rarely had she seen a haelhene without its robe on, and this one mimicked humanity with some skill—its face androgynous but showing character, its flesh free of the intense crystallization that usually riddled its kind. A young one perhaps, soft and vulnerable without its shell.
The leader approached one of the extruded portal-frames while the others led the young one into the center of the chamber and pushed it down. It folded fluidly at the place where a human would have knees. Bracketing it, the others stripped off their white gloves to show hands more like rakes, all crystallized finger and no palm, then thrust them into the young one's back.
A liquid shudder ran through it, disrupting its features, and panes of glassy material suddenly cracked up from its sides like wings. As the two handlers continued to pull and twist, Mariss realized they were directly manipulating its dimensions—bringing forth the ones normally invisible to the physical world—and that it was resisting.
She frowned. She had thought all haelhene were allies, their efforts coordinated against the fallen ones that had been their kin. But this victim did not look fallen. Despite its shape, it was not at all fleshy, and neither bled nor vocalized like a flesh-creature.
A turncoat, then? It was an unsettling thought.
The two haelhene wrestled with the prisoner's dimensions for a while, until finally one of them jabbed fingers into its layers and drew out a long shard of green crystal. It regarded the object, then looked to Mariss, and she realized that it was a pi
ece of another spire—perhaps the cause of Hlacaasteia's defensive reaction.
“I'll take it,” she said, stepping away from the scrying window. It could wait.
The haelhene nodded and offered it to her. As she wrapped her hand around it, she felt a thrill of unusual energy slip under her skin, and wondered what spire it had come from. Did it belong to the haelhene or to the fallen ones?
Could she keep it?
The other haelhene withdrew a stranger object: a long piece of wood carved into a sword, with green inlays that pulsed faintly as it came free. Mariss held out her hand for that one too; she liked weapons, and it looked interesting. But before she could say anything, the haelhene took it in both hands and twisted, snapping it into splinters and sparks.
She let her hand fall, trying to erase the frown from her features. The haelhene were her superiors. She was not in a position to gainsay them.
For a little while longer, she watched them dig through the prisoner's layers, but they found only some portal stakes. Mariss requested those and again the haelhene permitted it, and she tucked them into her belt. Her own had been washed away, and this saved her the effort of forging new ones.
Finally the portal opened, and the two searchers hauled the prisoner up and through. She contemplated the empty frame in their wake, questions nagging at her. If it wasn't a fallen one—if it was actually a turncoat haelhene—what did that mean?
A prickle in the air alerted her to a connection, and she turned back to find the scrying window clearing. She moved quickly to touch it, keeping her other hand low—knowing instinctively that if she wanted to keep the green crystal, her master couldn't see it.
The image resolved into Master Caernahon's familiar crinkled mask, the scene behind him stark white as always. 'Mariss, my student,' he said in his mortal voice, and feigned a smile with his false mouth.
“Master,” she said, automatically mimicking him. He had tutored her in fleshy protocol as much as magic. “We had a disruption.”
'I have heard.'
Her lips compressed. Of course he had. Under that human mask, he was the ruler of the Hlacaasteia haelhene, and they reported to him regularly. No doubt he had been speaking with one when she tried to contact him. “Then you know about the sword?”
The Living Throne (The War of Memory Cycle Book 3) Page 47
