by Tammy Salyer
They were left to lie on the floor next to the unconscious—Symvalline presumed—Akeeva.
“What are you going to do?” Isemay asked, wriggling to her side to better see Symvalline.
Instead of answering, she focused on her Mentalios lens, which, though tucked into the top of her boot, still channeled her thoughts and allowed her to direct the klinkí stones in her pocket. In her mental eye, she saw the stones’ cerulean hearts come alive as they eased from her garment. Rising to a seated position, she sent them speedily toward the two guards. They were both struck in the head, too fast to react, and the blows quickly had them staggering like drunken half-agers.
Directing the stones to the bindings on her wrists, she thought of fire, of cauldrons of boiling lava, of an inferno. The stones burned easily through the fiber bindings, and they fell away.
The two guards began staggering toward her and Isemay. Concentrating on guiding the stones to wound rather than kill them, she quickly unknotted her legs, rose, and with the bindings in hand, lunged toward the nearest guard. He was dazed and slow in reacting, and she quickly had his arms and legs trussed together. The other had recovered more and lurched at her with his weapon drawn. Much to her distress, she had to use the stones to hold him back. If he ever managed to transform back into his true self, he would be scarred, but she reasoned it was better than being dead.
Using hand cloths from the table and cords she ripped from the tapestries, she bound and gagged both guards firmly, immobilizing them. Thick blood oozed from their many abrasions, and they tried to shriek through the cloths, but they would not get free without help.
Quickly unbinding her daughter, she said, “Isemay, take this sword,” and held one of the guards’ weapons out to her. A sickening mix of pride at knowing Crumb had the skill to use it and dread at the fact that she might have to swarmed through her. “You remember your training?”
Without answering, Isemay stepped up to her, looking as if she had to force her feet to obey, and took the weapon. Though she was only sixteen turns, the Conservatum and Stave, who took pride in his skills at readying the inexperienced for combat, had been training her in the fighting arts since she’d been small.
Taking Isemay’s hand, Symvalline spared the two Deathless a sympathetic glance as she moved to the table and sat down. Their cold eyes watched them, but the men didn’t, couldn’t, move.
“Should we do something for her?” Isemay asked, pointing to Akeeva.
Should they? What Akeeva had wrought in this world, the atrocities she didn’t do enough to stop, the Verity she was sworn to protect but had willingly undermined, these were grounds enough to show her no mercy or aid. But Symvalline didn’t have it in her to leave the wretched woman crumpled on the floor in such a manner, like discarded trash.
“We’ll move her over there,” she said and pointed to a couch nearby.
With Isemay’s help, Akeeva was soon laid out, looking far too corpse-like with her skin now cold and pale, her eyes closed. She clung to life, thanks to her Verity spark, but barely. Symvalline, like Tuzhazu apparently, didn’t expect her to recover anytime soon.
She then went back to the book and pored over the fore-edge painting, a simple yet clever codex she’d previously, unreasonably, missed like a child novice in the Conservatum.
“You saw it too,” Isemay commented as she examined the painting.
With a distracted nod, she studied it closely. It was a series of pictures, starting at the base of the book, wrapping around to the edge of the leaves opposite the spine, and continuing on to the top. It showed the three moons lining up perfectly over the same tall tower drawn on other pages. The tower’s top bulged outward with a massive semicircular stone, painted a mix of pale red, blue, and yellow-white, like old chalk. The next image showed a column of light from the moons to the tower. The third showed another beam cascading like lightning through a darkened room and onto a prone human form with five smaller spheres hovering over it. And the final image showed the person, radiating golden light, standing beside the plinth it had previously been lying on. Elder Veros script beneath the form said, Mithlí Unshackled.
This is the secret that only Akeeva knew, Symvalline realized. The Cosmoculous is capable of breaking the Verity cage. Does this mean it can be done without the maker? Does the Cosmoculous somehow focus light from the Cosmos, like a great lens, powerful enough to overcome the wysticism that created the cage?
If her guess was correct, she now knew the secret, too. If she and Isemay could get to the Cosmoculous Tower at the Equifulcrum, they could release the Everlight and undo everything Tuzhazu and Balavad have been scheming to achieve.
Then she would be free from living for another age wondering if he’d been right, that their blood was on her hands too for selfishly attempting to escape and seek out her daughter instead of doing his bidding and creating a simple, nondeadly way to overcome his foes. No, I’m not going to let myself believe I bear any culpability in his corrupt schemes. I’ve seen his face, and his mind. He would kill them anyway. He wants to.
She turned to Isemay. “We’re going to get out of here. Be ready to follow me through the door. There are secret ways around the fortress that we’ll have to find.”
She brought the stones, once again, into action. Instead of hurling them into the wooden door and trying to splinter it piece by piece, Symvalline used finesse and, following Isemay’s example, hammered at a pin from the hinges of the left door until it came free. The door had no locking bar on the outside and fell inward, the entire process taking less time than she’d need to tie a sash.
They emerged into an even larger chamber, which was filled with the young, frightened faces of Akeeva’s adopted—or appropriated—children, and one very confused and strident mistress.
The mistress watching the children was drawing a breath to scream—but a hovering blue crystal directly in front of her eyes distracted her.
Symvalline paced to the woman. “Hertha, I believe? Please, madam, listen to me closely. I am not going to hurt you, or the children, or any other Minothian. I promise. I’m trying my best, in fact, to ensure you stay safe. Go sit in that chair and don’t move, don’t make a sound. Don’t resist or I won’t be able to keep my word. Do you understand me?”
The wiry, stiff woman, skin swirling frantically between a fern green and dull brown, nodded. She fell into the chair with a wheezy sigh. Symvalline was looking around the room to find something to tie her up with when a familiar voice said, “Lady Vinnric?”
She turned. Inder stood next to her.
“Hello again,” she said with a strained smile.
The boy smiled back in a much-too-old-for-him way. “Is that her? Your Crumb?” He glanced to Isemay, who dropped the sword she’d been wielding point-first to her side quickly.
“Yes, thank you. With your help, she is here now, safe. Or almost safe.”
“Why did you come back?”
“Inder, don’t speak to the foreigner!” Hertha chastised.
The boy gave her a haughty look. “But she tried to save Tulla. And the Archon was cruel to her for no reason. I saw it.” His voice challenged the tutor to disagree, and to Symvalline’s relief, she clammed up.
In her years of being a Knight, she’d often found friendship and alliances in unexpected places, but this young boy, a child from another realm, was without question the most unusual. Yet she would never be foolish enough to look askance at any ally, not at a time like this.
“Inder, can you do me one more favor? I need you to take my daughter through the tunnels and help her hide until—until this is all over. Tuzhazu is planning to do something that will put all of Arc Rheunos in harm’s way, and I am going to stop him.”
“Mum, no.” Isemay clutched her arm tightly. “I’m going with you. You can’t abandon me. Not again.”
She felt as if she’d been struck. Is that what Isemay thought? That she’d abandoned her when she’d stayed to fight the Minothians in the starpath valley? S
he stared into Isemay’s face, smooth and brown like her father’s, her eyes a pale blue, almost gray, like Symvalline’s. But innocent. Frightened. And nowhere near ready for this kind of conflict. The sacrifices one had to make as a Knight—why had she ever considered allowing her only child to follow this path? Why had she done it herself?
“Isemay, I’m not…not abandoning you. It’s for your safety. If something happened to you—”
“I fought to get here and find you, and I’ll fight to escape by your side, mum. I’m not a little girl anymore. This is my choice. Not yours.”
That anguished mix of pride and dread battled in her again. She wanted neither to win. She wanted to be back in Vigil Tower, sitting by the hearth, rocking the baby that Isemay had once been, with copper curls that matched her own. Feeling her warm, little weight in her arms. Sixteen turns had passed in the blink of an eye, making the seven-hundred-odd turns before it seem inconsequential, like they’d only been a trice in life until she could meet the baby she and Ulfric had created—but who was now no longer her little girl.
“All right,” she said simply. “We’ll do this together. Inder, can you show us the quickest way through the tunnels out of the hall and to the Cosmoculous Tower?”
Chapter Forty-Three
Ulfric could never have foreseen the uncommon, unique even, army now on the move through the Rheunosian labyrinth, not if he lived another thousand turns. The rolling, seemingly living rock that was vanguard, defensive ceiling, and rear guard for the Zhallah people was just the beginning of it. They were surrounded by a stone fortress that was alive and nimble and could be breached by nothing the Minothians had. It was the most powerful force Ulfric had ever witnessed.
The bruhawks remained aloft, though flew low in order to dive into the protection of the Churss if needed, and Ulfric would occasionally glance below him and see only a fraction of the people he expected to. This was due to the second unforeseen and amazing thing he bore witness to. It had taken him watching a woman disappear before his eyes, then reappear a few feet forward before he’d realized the Zhallahs, at least the women, had an extraordinary ability to cloak themselves from sight. This was combined with—as Salukis had explained to him—their ability to tender, to let the life of one thing flow through them into another, which explained how Salukis had been healed so quickly. And Ulfric had thought the men’s ability to fly had been incredible. An army that could move unseen and heal its wounded would be virtually unstoppable, even without an apparently impregnable shield of rock surrounding them. He imagined how differently the War of Rivening might have gone if the people of Vinnr had this ability, and it made him shudder. With these kinds of powers at hand, it was a blessing to all other peoples that the Arc Rheunosians were not a realm bent on conquering. Perhaps Balavad had even planned to overtake them because of these traits.
Inside the Churss, the atmosphere hummed in a subdued roar—stone on stone, rubbing, rolling, and often disassembling and reassembling in a new formation to plug small openings in their protective cave or to provide better platforms for the four to five hundred Zhallahs. The sound was constant, as if they walked along the floor of a raging river shoving boulders and stones along with its relentless current. If the noise hadn’t been a byproduct of a perfect war machine, he’d have plugged his ears—Urgo’s ears, rather—with cotton wool hours ago. But his wonder made it somehow tolerable.
Though—he’d have wagered his armor none of the Zhallahs would have approved of labeling the Churss a “war machine.” But the fact was, it was an engine capable of destruction at a level he’d only seen duplicated by the vastness of the force inside the bowels of Balavad’s flying warship. The way the Churss had easily crushed the gigantic gates of the fortress overlooking the Thallorn Valley was proof of it. No Minothian could have stopped them, and those who’d been assembled at the barricade for that purpose had wisely fled as the wooden doors had splintered and given way like dried leaves under the boots of a giant.
And the final unbelievable boon was how the Verity-infused Churss was able to move the Zhallah force much faster than they’d have been able to achieve on foot. Ulfric had been told it would take a minimum of two days to get through the labyrinth under the best of circumstances. But the flattest Churss stones assembled themselves into primitive platforms that were propelled by rounder stones rolling beneath, thus carting the Zhallahs along at speeds much faster than they’d have gone on foot. They’d reach Minoth’s Everlight Hall by nightfall, a full day before the triple-moon Equifulcrum was in syzygy. If their luck held, they would be able to stop Tuzhazu before he took control of the Minothians.
Watching the force below him, moving with speed and a steadfast sense of purpose, Ulfric began to believe they stood a chance of not only rescuing Sym and Crumb but of righting this world’s greatest wrong.
He had made such mistakes before.
Ulfric, are you near? Can you hear me?
He started at the sound of Symvalline’s voice. He’d let his mind wander for a bit, leaving Urgo to soar tirelessly over the moving Churss. If she was speaking to him through the Mentalios, then they were close now, very close.
My love. Where are you? Have you found Isemay?
Yes, and we’ve been captured.
He lost his focus for a split second, fear for them driving all thought from his mind. Urgo let out a low squawk, bringing him back. Where are they holding you? Are you injured?
It would take too long to explain everything, but we escaped. Tuzhazu has had word you’re coming, and he’s making preparations. He’s planning to fight, so you must warn the Zhallahs about what they may be facing. The regular soldiers carry only daggers and nets as weapons, but the Deathless are well armed with swords, and Tuzhazu has the means to create more of them. I’d say not more than a couple dozen, though.
Now listen, this is important. They are not responsible for what they do, and some of them were once Zhallah children, kidnapped and converted when they grew old enough to wield a sword. Something in the elixir Tuzhazu uses to transform them makes them slaves to him. They are without will or thought of their own, completely under his control. I think it’s the Fenestros he bears that allows this to happen. You must not kill the Deathless, nor should the Zhallahs. They are innocent too, no matter what they’re forced to do. And we must get that Fenestros from Tuzhazu.
One last thing, my love. Our klinkí stones are useless against him while he carries the Verity stone.
Ulfric swallowed the many questions he wanted to ask, hating not being there to aid his wife and daughter, just as he hadn’t been back in Vinnr. He was so tired of being forced to put his family second, his life third, and his duty first. He and Symvalline had tried to leave this chaos and strife behind and settle into a normal, peaceful life that they would build from scratch once they were free of their oaths. She would have gone back to being a healer, and he a lens maker. Preferably in Asteryss, but if they couldn’t find respite there, then somewhere else, a smaller village in Ivoryss or even Yor where they could fade into the background, growing older as they watched their daughter growing up. They would have been able to put aside the fear that they would see their child die of old age or illness or accident while they tarried ever on, ever in service to a maker who seemed to care little what they did or what they sacrificed on her behalf. But now, again, in another realm even, they were in jeopardy beyond measure.
And this time was worse than ever, because this time Crumb was a pawn, as well.
He pulled his thoughts together and urged Urgo to fly toward the front of the Zhallah formation. He wanted a better look at where they were.
We’re nearing the far gate of the Minothian labyrinth, he told Symvalline. I estimate we’ll be able to reach their stronghold before Hallumbrum, or whatever the mid of night is called here. Sooner, if we manage to overwhelm the Minothian forces. They have almost no chance against us, and they know it. Where are you and Crumb now?
He heard, or imagined he did, the r
elief in her voice when she responded. Good. We are going to the Cosmoculous Tower. If you can keep the Minothians occupied, I think I’ve found another way to break the cage holding Mithlí.
You what? he cried, and Urgo made a disgruntled grating sound in his throat at Ulfric yelling in his head.
During the Equifulcrum, the Cosmoculous crystal seems to channel the celestial light of the three aligned moons. Akeeva figured out that this light, if focused, can unmake the cage. If I can free Mithlí, it will end all Tuzhazu’s and Balavad’s plans. The peoples of Arc Rheunos will have their Verity back, and Balavad’s attempts at conquering them will come to nothing.
And what would happen to the Arc Rheunosians then? Ulfric wondered. Would their Verity seek retribution for this hubris, this betrayal? Would Mithlí even perceive it as such? There was absolutely no way to judge the Verity’s reaction, but leaving her shackled was to leave Arc Rheunos vulnerable to Balavad—and the rest of the Cosmos, too. If recent and long-past history were any indication, this would be worse than being once more under Mithlí’s sway.
And there was this new possibility—another way to free Vaka Aster from her own cage. Could we bring Vaka Aster here? Could we smuggle the vessel out of Vinnr?
He noticed with a cringe that he’d referred to his own body as “the vessel,” not as himself.
He promised Symvalline, I will do whatever I must to keep him away from the tower. And despite the possibility of this being another way of freeing Vaka Aster, Ulfric still swore he’d capture rather than kill the Archon. He needed all options to remain viable to save himself and Vinnr.
Urging Urgo lower, he had the bruhawk perch beside Deespora and her heartmatch, an older man named Alvar. “Deespora, we’ve almost reached the end of the maze,” he began, speaking again through his daughter’s memory keeper. “I’ve spoken with Symvalline. There’s something we should discuss, now.”
