by Rosie Scott
“Not a fan of the name, huh?” Calder peels himself off the wall and pulls me in for a bear hug. “Too bad,” he goes on next to my ear. “If you don't join me for trips, you don't have a say.”
“Oh, for gods' sake,” I retort lightly. “I was there for the last one.”
Calder backs away with a smile. “Yeah, but I like guilt-tripping you.” He says a friendly hello to Cerin over my shoulder before he goes on, “You're not gonna believe it, love.”
“Try me.”
“I investigated the reports that say Glacia's reforming,” Calder informs me. “Searched around those waters for a while, but I finally found ice.”
I raise an eyebrow with intrigue. “Oh?”
“Yeah. It'll be awhile yet before it's anything substantial. For now, the glacier's only big enough to fart on one side and smell it on the other.”
Cerin bursts out laughing at Calder's description as he dresses behind me.
“Sounds like you'll want to hold it in, then,” I comment. “We wouldn't want to melt it again already.”
Calder snickers at my joke. “Tell me about current events, love. I feel like I'm missing out.”
“What makes you think there's anything to tell?”
Calder shrugs and motions down the hallway in the direction of the center of Seran University. “As I was walking in I saw Holter land beside Azazel on his tower like he was delivering a message. Figured something was happening.”
I frown. “Something may be happening, then. Holter's been out east.”
We aren't given much time to ponder. Azazel and Holter come around the corner down the hall, hurrying toward us. Azazel isn't holding his bow, so any threats must be distant. Holter's clothes are damp with sweat from a recent transformation, and he pulls his hair up into a ponytail as he walks.
As they near, I back into the bedroom and usher them in. Azazel and Holter exchange greetings with Calder as I pull my armor on over my underclothes.
“You're back early,” I tell Holter as I tug on a boot.
“I ran across a Fremont messenger who flagged me down just over the ruins of Whispermere,” Holter informs me. “Eteri has attacked Fremont.”
I stop in my tracks and glance up. “Are they invading?”
“Yes, and it's bad,” Holter replies. “They have taken Olympia. Queen Kirek launched a massive naval assault on all towns on the eastern coast. Reports say she leads the armies herself.”
“What gall,” I comment dryly, though I feel anxious for my friends in Fremont. If Kirek took Olympia, she is not only serious about seizing Fremont, but her intelligence over the years has grown. Olympia was hard enough to take over a century ago.
“I doubt I have to tell you that King Cyrus requests our aid,” Holter goes on.
“It's about gods damn time we had ourselves another war,” I reply, finishing tying my boot and standing up. “I've started to get bored.” I glance at Calder. “Will you join us for this one?”
Calder flashes an excited half-smile. “Of course.”
I lead my friends out of the bedroom and down the hallway, my mind moving a mile per minute as I plan. “Calder, I want you to prepare and gather our navies. If Kirek's navies are massive enough to attack every town on Fremont's eastern coast, I want ours to join Cyrus's in retaliation.”
“I suggest leaving Narangar's navy for defense, Kai,” Azazel points out. “It's possible Kirek will attack our western coast.”
“Agreed. We'll put Narangar on high alert.” I jog down the steps to the Seran University's main hall and leave out its giant double doors to the courtyard. Maggie stands tall beside Bjorn's old smithy, tying back her dreadlocks with a rope. Sitting against a wall beside her is one of her weapon inventions. In a small training yard beyond, a handful of soldiers are sparring.
“Will you want Evian with me or you?” Calder asks.
“I'll leave that up to him,” I reply. “Dear nephew likes being with me, but he also loves the seas.” I catch Maggie's eye and yell, “Maggie!”
“Aye, love?” The engineer wrinkles up her nose when the direct sunlight goads her to sneeze.
“We're going to war.”
Maggie finally sneezes, and then her face brightens. “Aw, hell yes.” She reaches out to grab the invention from the wall. It resembles Tyrus's hand cannon from long ago. “I finally get to test these babies in battle. How long do we have to prepare?”
“A couple of days,” I say. “Is that good for you?”
“Aye. Lets me get everythin' situated, like.” Maggie looks off toward the declining layers of Sera and says, “Wifey'll be excited. She's always wanted to follow ya into battle.” The engineer points to the trainees in the yard who have stopped sparring after overhearing us and stare at me with excitement. “Looks like yer armies'll be ready. Look at them cuties.”
As if on cue, one trainee yells out, “We're going to war?”
“That's the plan,” I call back. “Eteri has attacked Fremont.”
The soldiers cheer. I am convinced my armies are the most loyal in the world, but I give them reason to be. Chairel's people have more options available to them than ever before, and they have a leader who spends time with them and battles by their side. I devastated Chairel's magnificent armies in the War of Necromancers, but I rebuilt them to be the greatest and most varied the world has ever seen. People not only live longer and survive once-fatal wounds, but the masses clamor for war. Like me, they want it. Only through death may they have everlasting life.
Dissenters still claim this is immoral. But there will always be war; people will always find reasons to kill one another. As I scan over my friends and loved ones, all of whom haven't aged a day since the end of my great war so long ago, I can't find it within myself to care about the dissenters at all. Their opinions don't matter because many of my loved ones live longer and grow stronger due to my actions. Each foe I would have defeated anyway turns into power. With every life I leech and give away, I think of Nyx and how more empowerment with death magic could have strengthened her to survive her fatal fall. Many friends live, and many have died. I will lose more in the future, but I will take every precaution to prevent it and I will not apologize for doing so.
“Kai.” Chance jogs up to me from the courtyard gate. He notes the excited soldiers and my surrounding group of friends and asks, “What's the ruckus?”
“We're going to war, friend,” I say, slapping him on the shoulder.
Chance's eyebrows raise. “Who's the troublemaker? Nahara or Eteri?”
“Eteri,” I reply. “Fremont is under attack.”
“You want me to run Sera in your stead,” the god surmises.
“Absolutely. Are you up for it?”
“Of course,” Chance agrees. “You know I love walking around with my chest puffed out acting all important.” After I chuckle, he asks, “Should I inform Morland?”
“It couldn't hurt. They might stir up trouble at Eteri's border wall while Kirek's overseas.”
“Kai...” Chance hesitates. “I hate to say it, but I urge you to be careful and leave defenses in place in Chairel. I just received word of a terrorist attack in Nahara. Chasin Samara claims the Alderi are sowing unrest—”
“Of course he does,” I blurt. “Chasin believes the mere presence of Alderi sows unrest.”
Chance exhales shortly and says, “I just think you should consider the possibility of a war in the south. And if that happens, Nahara and the underground may request your support. When you choose to aid the underground, Nahara may declare war.” He hesitates. “Nahara's armies are massive and they are full of necromancers. Going to war with Eteri and Nahara is an intimidating prospect.”
An amused smile brightens my face, and I reach out to tug on Chance's lazy ponytail lovingly. “It is not intimidating, my friend,” I tell him, my tone as confident and courageous as it's always been. “It is exciting.”
I look over at my friends. My excitement must be contagious because they all are raring t
o prepare. As heart-breaking as warfare can be, once one has experienced its triumphs and tragedies it is not easily forgotten. It changes people with an unyielding iron fist for better or worse. For those remaining by my side, it only strengthens us.
“Come,” I say, turning to the seemingly limitless lower tiers of Sera. “Let us go to war.”
Series End Author's Note
That's the happiest ending I've ever written. Happy endings don't tend to provoke thought or inspire debate, so I usually avoid them. Here, however, an open ending works without undermining the philosophical themes and questions I raised throughout the series. Kai's quest for vengeance was a success, and the world of Arrayis will continue into a new era under the guidance of the most powerful and controversial historical figure to exist. Few characters died in this series compared to what I'm used to writing. My husband was convinced since day one that Cerin would meet a gory demise because I usually brutally kill off love interests. (Maybe he should run far from me! Ha!) I admit: killing Cerin just as Kai completes the quest inspired by the injustices committed against him sounds perfectly tragic, but I've written similar themes before and I don't write the same stories repeatedly. I decided before Fire was published that two characters had to live through the series to twist up my usual tragic formula: Kai and Cerin. Every other character's fate was either up in the air or they were planned casualties, so the fact that many made it through is a miracle.
In most fantasy stories, heroes fight against villains like necromancers. The necromancer is way more interesting to me. How does someone controversial end up in a position of power? That's the story I want to read! (So I wrote it!) My original intent for this series was for Kai to be a hero who goes insane due to breaking her mind at the tragic Battle of Highland Pass, thus becoming a villain who brings the world to ruin (by taking over everything, not just Chairel). Kai's loyal friends and supporters evolved from equals to fearful accomplices. A planned scene for the epilogue showed Cerin and Kai getting sexual, but Kai goads Cerin to say he fears her before she will return his affections because she became so irresistibly demented. This would have been an eerie ending where the most powerful person to exist was left in charge of a world forced to bend to her will. Thus, my original vision for the series was drastically different from what it became. Why did I change it? A standard hero-villain dichotomy isn't realistic or interesting to me. I believe in flawed people, not one-note goody-two-shoes and senselessly evil villains. I couldn't get through writing even a fourth of Fire with a benevolent main character. They're just so unbelievable, predictable, and dull. The moment I changed Kai into a morally neutral badass was the best decision I ever made. Not only does this make sense for a story about warfare—which by its nature is brutal and morally ambiguous—but Kai is now my favorite character in literature, and her story will stick with me until I am nothing but ash.
As an author, I love exploring a person's psyche and how it evolves over time and tragic circumstances. I am obsessed with warfare and its effects on people, culture, and politics. In my last series (The New World), I wrote about how a lifetime of oppression and war can cause the utter degradation of the human mind; in the Six Elements, I explored the opposite. Kai's journey throughout this series is fascinating. She starts out powerful but naïve in Fire and strengthens with each tragedy to become more intelligent, resolute, and fierce until she is even more of a badass by the end of Death. Kai is capable of the utmost loyalty and most brutal cruelties; in a sense, she is an exaggerated version of humanity. The difference between Kai and most people is that she can meet the harsh realities of war with decisions that are equally barbarous. Kai made necessary hard choices throughout the series that many of us could/would not have (taking part in the Great Glacial Flood of 423, invading Hammerton, killing her brother, etc.). Many don't have what it takes to make these decisions and survive warfare; thus, they'd fail where Kai succeeded. If Kai didn't make these controversial decisions, this series would have ended in failure four books ago. Instead, Kai trudged forth and met every challenge with the drive and brutality required of a war general and eventual ruler, and that's why she was so fun to write.
The Six Elements took so much work to complete, particularly in the short time in which I wrote it. A series this long usually takes years to finish, but since August 2017 I have worked around 100 hours a week on it. Everything was researched: medical injuries, reliability of architecture in unique environments, the ramifications of war events on culture and trade, the effects of elements on flesh/materials or in different temperatures and air pressure. I drew the maps myself and figured out the timing of events while considering land measurements, travel time, and delays. I designed certain weapons to make sure they could work (the scissor ballista from Air, Tyrus's alchemically-charged hand cannon/flamethrower from Life). You may not have noticed this attention to detail, and that's understandable! However, to immerse myself into this fantasy world, its pieces had to logically fit together. Things needed to be explained, pondered, tested and theorized. It is no coincidence that this series has many connections to real-world sciences, myths, and languages; not only was real culture, history, and science used in creating believable world-building, but the ancient lore of Arrayis demanded I stick close to realism. Even the magic system was inspired by my interest in thermodynamics (the science of relations between heat and mechanical energy). The Six Elements showcases many of my fascinations with science, mechanics, anatomy, and scientific progress/discovery.
In this respect and many others, the Six Elements may be an oddity in the fantasy genre. Admittedly, I don't read fantasy so I truly wouldn't know. Every personal grievance keeping me away from the genre is one I avoided here (whiny/weak-minded characters, character resurrection, no consequences for mistakes, stilted dialogue, "good" versus "evil," not enough gore, short or infrequent battles, unrealistic warfare lacking moral ambiguity and innocent casualties, no character deaths despite overwhelming odds, focus on defensive rather than offensive warfare, etc.). With the Six Elements, I set out to write a fantasy series that was absolutely perfect for my tastes, and I succeeded to an unhealthy degree; I'm so obsessed I've neglected my real life. I've reread this series dozens of times as of Death's release date because I just can't stop; these are my favorite books. It's a wonderful problem to have! What makes it even better? My fans, of course!
Fire almost went unpublished because I didn't think it was marketable. Many of my grievances with the fantasy genre are things other readers like; thus, I thought the Six Elements could be considered controversial. Whether it is or isn't is beside the point. This series found an audience of readers with mindsets like mine, and some of you are so passionate about your love for it that it keeps me writing like a madwoman. Having a strong and driven protagonist from the get-go intimidated some readers, and some weren't willing to consider thought-provoking themes. Thus, this story made many step outside their comfort zones and think and question, and isn't that the point of literature? Each contentious decision made for the characters, themes, and world-building in this series was necessary to tell the story I wanted to tell. I am so happy that writing about moral ambiguity—particularly in fantasy—has been such a marvelous success with lovers and critics alike. I write to entertain and provoke questions; seeing the Six Elements accomplish both is a dream come true.
To those readers of mine who love this series and have shown your support through reviews, fan mail, or website fan art/question submissions, you are awesome, and I am so grateful. Thank you for trying my unconventional stories. Since you took the time to finish the series, I can reasonably assume you enjoyed it. For that I am ecstatic, and I hope you'll stick around for what's next. The Six Elements universe has way too much work put into its world and lore to go stagnant. I have a few pending ideas for books inside this universe and out of it, so rest assured that new things are coming. In the meantime, check out my website for more goodies, updates, and tons of extra content.
With love and va
lor,
Rosie Scott (December 2018)
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