by Ivan Kal
She leaned back in the chair, and closed her eyes. The last time she had been in this room, she had been speaking with the King. The King…who was now dead. She wondered what he would think about them wanting to make her Queen. She had never been supposed to rule—she didn’t know the first thing about being a leader, and she had told them as much.
“I don’t know first thing about ruling,” she repeated tiredly.
“You will have advisors,” Master Jeressi told her. “For now, if Tourran is to survive, we need to show the world that we are still strong. Perception matters. And with you sitting on the throne, it would send out a powerful message.”
“I am supposed to serve Tourran, not rule it.”
Master Jeressi chuckled. “If you think that sitting on that throne isn’t a form of that service, they you are sorely mistaken.”
Kyarra opened her mouth to argue some more, when a knock on the doors interrupted her. A guardsman took a step inside and looked at Kyarra.
“My lady.” He bowed his head. “The emissary from the Mages Guild is demanding to see you again.”
Kyarra’s face scrunched up in distaste. “Tell Master Galera that I will see her later, when I have the time.”
The guardsman nodded and left. Master Jeressi turned to look at Kyarra. “You really should speak with her. The Mages Guild is powerful.”
“I am not unconvinced that they had nothing to do with the Lashian attack. They were attempting to capture me—they could’ve made some kind of deal where the Mages Guild got my fragment. They’ve been after it for centuries.”
“We have no proof of that,” Commander Atiok said, and some of the people in the room nodded in agreement. Afterward, everyone lapsed into a silence. Kyarra stood and walked over to the window, looking out over Tourran.
For the entirety of her life, she had wanted nothing more than to leave the city, to be somewhere else, to be someone else, anyone else. And now, when she was finally free, when she could go wherever she wanted, she found herself trapped here by her circumstances. She couldn’t abandon Tourran and its people, no matter how little she actually interacted with them. Tourran was her home, she knew, no matter what. She glanced at Vin, who was looking at her with his piercing brown eyes. The Arashan were still a threat—they would most certainly begin building their gate. She remembered her vision of the armies standing at her back. As Queen, she would be able to reach out to other kingdoms, would be better equipped to convince them of the Arashan threat.
“Very well. I accept.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
ASHARA
The next few days following the coronation, Ashara found herself put to work helping organize the acclimation of the city to its new reality. They had started increasing the numbers of the guard and had sent messengers to the east calling for more mercenary armies to come to Tourran. They were not going to assume that the Lashian Empire was going to take their defeat lightly. They had also sent messengers to intercept the mercenaries that the King had summoned before his death, ensuring that they knew that Kyarra was going to honor their agreement—which meant that in about a month they would have enough troops to defend the pass, should the Lashians attempt to breach it.
Kyarra had likewise decided to send a powerful message to the Lashian Emperor. Both in a form of a letter, telling him in scandalously bold wording to stay out of Tourran’s business, but also one with magic. She had redirected and formed a massive storm that would ravage the Lashian western shore—the Eternal Soul was not someone who was going to take their actions quietly.
Ashara and Vin had both been given writs of nobility along with estates in the city and lands out in the valley, taken from those nobles who had betrayed the city. The two of them had been acting as part of Kyarra’s inner circle, along with Master Jeressi, Commander Atiok, and Lord Haris Olos. Not that they had that much to contribute—Vin was always training, and Ashara ran Haris’s merchant house while he worked to bring as many nobles as possible to Kyarra’s side. Her little nudge seemed to have given him enough confidence to speak to others, such that he was actually pretty good at it.
Then, a week after that, Ashara finally managed to goad Kyarra into organizing a gathering. It was important for the city to know that they were both in control and prepared for any response from the Lashian Empire. Ashara even had a dress specially made for the occasion. The invitations were all to the nobles loyal to Kyarra and those who were on the fence, along with wealthy merchants. It would be Ashara and Haris’s job to convince them that Kyarra had everything under control.
At the gathering, Ashara moved through the mass of people effortlessly, making small talk and telling stories of Kyarra’s battle with Ming Li—a bit of theater and exaggeration was necessary to give hope to the people. But soon enough it became tedious, and she moved to a quiet corner from where she could watch the gathering without being bothered.
She noticed Kyarra and Vin standing in the middle of a group of nobles, with their elbows entwined. Vin looked very dashing in his strange clothes that he had fashioned based on his people’s style of dress. Its colors of black and blue contrasted with the white and blue of Kyarra’s dress. A pang of jealousy hit her then, at seeing them together.
“They do look magnificent together, don’t they?” a voice from her left said, and she turned to see the golden-eyed noble she had spoken with before. Again he was wearing the same red-and-black clothes.
He kept his eyes on Vin and Kyarra. “The heroes of Tourran,” he said, almost mockingly. “Those that defeated the monster and saved the people.” His eyes turned to look at Ashara and he raised an eyebrow.
“They did do those things. Of course that they would be called heroes,” Ashara said quietly as a shiver run through her.
“But there is no mention of you in the praise of the people. No mention for the one who helped organize the troops, who made sure to spread the word quietly to the population, so that they could hide away,” the man told her.
“I don’t need such adoration,” Ashara said.
“Don’t you?” he asked, his eyes seeming to pierce right through her.
She glared at the man. “Who are you?” she asked even though fear gripped her.
“I? I…am a gambler,” he said with a grin.
Ashara got a strange feeling then, and she noticed that a strange quiet had settled on the hall. She turned, only to see everyone motionless, looking as if they were statues. She took a step back from the man. “What did you do?”
He ignored her question and instead turned his head toward Vin and Kyarra. “Those two, they are giants. Powerful, driven, with souls capable of anything,” he said, as he turned to look at Ashara. “Don’t you want to be like them? Don’t you want power like theirs?”
“I don’t want power,” she whispered shakily, tasting the lie on her lips. But everything that she was screamed at her to get away.
His grin widened. “Ah, but we both know that that is not true.”
“What do you want?”
“I simply want to offer you that which your heart desires most.”
“You don’t know what I desire most,” Ashara bit out.
“Oh, but I do,” he said and turned to look at Kyarra. “Do you really think that she will choose you? What do you have to offer her? Vin, at least, has power in his own right. You are nothing but an ordinary person compared to them. They will cast you away eventually.”
“They won’t. I am their friend,” Ashara said, to herself more than to him.
“They are humoring you, keeping you around as a pet, almost. Giving you tasks that could’ve been given to those far better at them than you.” He sneered. “You are nothing but a curiosity. It is only a matter of time before they realize that they don’t need you. See how they fit together, how much in common they have?”
“No.” Ashara shook her head as she pressed her back against the wall.
“I can give you power. I can make you their equal—even their better.”
His gold eyes held her in place.
“I don’t… I—” Ashara tried to continue, but found herself unable to. Deep down inside, she believed in everything that he had said. “But…what would I need to do in return?” she whispered.
The man grinned. “Nothing! I have no desire to force you to do something against your will. I have no price. I only offer you a chance for something more—what you make of it is up to you.”
Ashara opened her mouth, and then closed it. She could feel the power coming from the man now, and it made her tremble with a fear unlike anything she had felt before. For a moment, she was going to say yes—but then she shook herself. She couldn’t explain it, but deep down she was certain that to accept would mean betrayal of everything that she was. This man unsettled her deeply. And Vin believed that she was better, he told her that she had a soul as bright as a star. “No,” she said finally.
The man looked disappointed, but then shrugged as if it was no matter to him. “As you wish. But if you ever change your mind, you need only whisper my name.”
Ashara swallowed hard. “And what is your name?”
The man gave her a terrifying smile. “My name is Khalio.”
Ashara blinked and the man was gone. At the same time, movement returned to everyone around her. She cast her gaze to Vin and Kyarra, only to see them laughing. She searched the room, but there was no sign of the man.
EPILOGUE
Vanagandr walked into the small bar in the city of Ten Thousand Fires—a silly name if anyone asked him, but people rarely did—and made his way across it to a table at the far end. He took a seat across from a figure wearing a cowl, and sighed.
“I had forgotten how much I hate this place,” Vanagandr said.
The person across from him removed her cowl, revealing a young-looking human woman, who stared at him. “The upper plane has made you soft.”
“It’s good to see you, too, Hessra,” Vanagandr told her. She gave him a droll look, which he ignored, and he spoke again. “I’m surprised that you knew I was here.”
“Of course I know—all the courts know by now. You are not nearly as tactful as you might think. The games of the lower plane are not the childish games you play up there,” she told him.
“Oh, I know. I wasn’t trying to be tactful. I just wanted to have some fun.” Vanagandr grinned, showing her his teeth.
“Well, you succeeded in making enough of a ruckus that the Court of Seven Hearts wants me to give you a warning.”
“Oh? What kind of warning?”
“One to leave and to go back to your home. The lower planes are not a place for gods like you.”
“Huh. I expected something more colorful.”
“Oh, trust me, it was colorful. I censored it for your benefit.”
Vanagandr laughed. “Don’t worry—I’ll go. I don’t even like this place, reminds me too much of the mortal plane.” He shivered at the thought. “But first, I need some information.”
Hessra sighed. “What do you want, Great Wolf?”
“I want to know anything that you can tell me about Khalio and what he has been doing recently.”
Hessra grimaced in annoyance. “I knew that idiot was going to bring you assholes on our heads with his experiments.”
“Experiments?”
Hessra shifted, and then looked him in the eyes. “He’s trying to generate anima by tapping into world-cores directly.”
Vanagandr frowned. “That is why he had been conquering worlds?”
“Don’t know, don’t care,” she said dismissively. “All I know is that he started doing some experiments a while back. Got an entire planet’s worth of darji followers brainwashed or something. Haven’t heard much since.”
“You didn’t care enough to find out?”
“What do I care about the fates of a few worlds? He can have them, as far as I am concerned—as long as he doesn’t get greedy and hit one of my prime worlds, I don’t care. And why are you asses interested in this in the first place? It’s not like he can actually threaten you, not even with all that power.”
It was Vanagandr’s turn to shift uncomfortably, and Hessra caught it. “Ah…I see. They don’t care. You aren’t here on pantheon business, are you?”
“No,” he said.
“Hah!” she laughed. “It’s Sao Ban, isn’t it? Fool can’t help himself. Always meddling in other people’s business.” She shook her head.
“He thinks that Khalio is a threat…not just to the pantheons, but to the courts as well.”
Hessra laughed. “Oh, I like Ban, but he’s always going around spreading stories about the ends of time. Been so ever since Mother died, and yet here we all are.”
“I know, but this time it seems different.”
“Different how?” Hessra asked, her tone belying her curiosity.
Vanagandr regarded her gravely, his voice becoming deeply serious. “This time I think he is right.”
* * *
Khalio stepped through the rift between the planes and entered his realm. The skies of his realm churned with red anima—a side effect of his experiments—but Khalio found that he quite liked it. He walked through the great obsidian gate and entered his fortress. His minions moved aside as he passed and made his way towards the lower levels. Quickly he reached his vault. And once inside he made his way between ancient weapons, artifacts of great power, and other trinkets he had collected over the years. The gods of the upper plane and their pantheons might have access to their gods-wells, but with weapons in this vault Khalio was more than a match. It made him chuckle in amusement to think at the arrogance of those from the upper planes. Just because they’ve devised a way to store and combine their power does not make them greater, yet they always act superior. Fools, they know nothing of what all of us truly are. They don’t even understand their own power. They are only pretenders, he thought to himself.
Finally he reached the last room of his vault and entered. Inside were his most important possessions. The far wall was dominated by a large crystal, and inside of it suspended in the crystal was a body. Studying it he couldn’t help but wonder in amazement at the stroke of luck that had brought the small low-magic world and the mortals inhabiting it to his notice. Simple chance had allowed him to crack the mystery he had been working on for countless ages.
He glanced to the side and looked at the pure-white crystal suspended above a pedestal. “Such a simple thing,” He spoke to the crystal. “And I would’ve never discovered it on my own. How those mortals did, is beyond me. But I guess that that was the point, wasn’t it Mother?” Khalio shook his head, then glanced at the body in front of him, the original body of Kai Zhao Vin. “You should not have kept that from us. Even though I know that you were afraid…”
He studied the body for a moment or two, then looked back at the orb. “It would please you to know that Sao Ban is trying to stop me. He thinks himself some great puppet master, carrying that seer’s journal with him everywhere, nudging people along.” Khalio reached into his pocket and pulled out a small brown book. “It’s almost as if he doesn’t realize that there are more seers that just the one he found.” The anima inside the orb spun gently as it always did. There was no change at his words, of course. He was speaking to the sliver of the Lifebringer, not someone who could actually respond. But Khalio was certain that what remained of her could hear his words.
“It doesn’t really matter,” Khalio said. “He can play his games, and I will play mine. I know the truth now, I have found the path to true Godhood.”
Thank you for reading!
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Other books by Ivan Kal:
Rise of the Empire series:
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Olympus
Sanctuary
Out of the Ashes
Warpath
Inheritance
Onslaught
What War Had Wrought
Hand of the Empire
Conquest—Coming soon!
The Eternal Path series:
Eternal Soul
Book 2 – Coming soon!
