The beastkin trained to be the first of those knights. Nathan created enough enchanted weapons and armor for the companies of beastkin that joined him, and they trained under Fei and Sunstorm.
Sen gave the other Champions looks of jealousy, wishing that she had her own subordinates. Nathan hadn’t found the opportunity to find many magic users, and knights weren’t a great fit for a spellblade. That meant Sen remained a lone wolf for the foreseeable future.
With so much to do, summer quickly passed. The weeks of fall began to pass by rapidly.
One day, Vera opened the door to Nathan’s office. She paused when she saw him reading a letter. He waved her in.
“You have a door for your office now, I see,” Vera said as she entered.
“I found that although an open door policy works well, I received noise complaints,” Nathan joked.
Vera rolled her eyes. “I’m can’t believe you didn’t have a door to begin with. Your Champions jump you at every opportunity they get. I’m surprised one isn’t on top of you right now.”
“Fei’s busy patrolling with some of the new beastkin,” Nathan said. “She’s showing them around the leylines. It helps if they know where they are, in case of an issue like last time.”
“Is that likely to happen again?” Vera asked with a grimace.
“Somebody disrupting the leylines in order to cause a demonic invasion?” Nathan considered for a moment whether to give a truthful answer.
In his timeline, the tactic became almost commonplace in wars between nations. By that point, victory was what mattered the most. Allowing a few more demons into the world mattered less than defeating the enemy in the minds of most rulers. Especially when so much of Doumahr was already controlled by demons. How could one or two more portals hurt?
He had thought that things were better in the past. How naive of him.
“There are many reasons to know where the leylines are,” Nathan eventually said. “Leyline disruption can be used to shut down the wireless, preventing us from communicating. If for any reason a binding stone is overloading with demonic energy, knowing the location of the leylines is important when demonic portals appear on them. That can happen even without disruption.”
Vera scowled. “While that’s worrisome to hear, you didn’t answer my question.”
“And for good reason.”
“So the answer is yes.” Vera rolled her eyes. “I’m beginning to realize that when you and Leopold are hiding something, it’s because that ‘something’ has a horrible answer.”
“That’s typically the case with most Bastion secrets.” Nathan shrugged. He rolled up the letter he had been reading and placed on the desk.
Vera pointed at the letter. “What’s that about? Anything important?”
“Not especially. Ciana asked me some questions about binding stones.” Nathan waved in the air as if to signify how meaningless the letter was.
“Ciana? Isn’t she in the capital?” Vera grinned. “Oh, I get it. She’s being a good little girl and sending you a letter every day, telling you all about her amazing adventures and asking you about her homework.”
“Must you?” Nathan groaned.
“The girl adores you. So yes, I’ll tease you endlessly. Especially given you already have three women crawling all over you any moment they get. Four, if you count the looks that Seraph gives you out of the corner of her eye,” Vera said.
“Seraph doesn’t give me any looks like that. Only exasperated ones when I take too long to review her paperwork.”
Vera shook her head but dropped the topic.
Vera wandered over to the window and looked outside. Nothing much was happening within the fortress, as most of the soldiers were out and about.
The fortress had grown to accommodate the many migrants flocking to Gharrick Pass. Merchants flowed through the pass itself, attracting people who wanted to make money from them. Nathan had lost count of how many times he’d expanded the fortress to accommodate them. Ideally, he wouldn’t need to bother. He’d let them expand outside the walls.
Right now, allowing that was dangerous. The distance between the frontier of the Empire and this fortress was still too small. Too many people might die if he didn’t protect them with fortifications.
“So, have you thought about your next move?” Nathan asked, breaking the silence.
“Well, there was a binding stone nearby. I thought that maybe I might finally become a Bastion, but a certain somebody claimed it himself. What a greedy man.” Vera gave Nathan a sidelong look, a cheeky smile on her face.
Nathan didn’t rise to her provocation and instead asked, “So you’re still intent on becoming a Bastion?”
Vera let out a sigh. “Ideally, yes. But I won’t lie that I am rethinking the idea. The Empire won’t accept me. Leopold knows what happened here. There’s no way I’ll ever become a Bastion while he’s in the Empire.”
“I wouldn’t count him out just yet,” Nathan said.
“Even if he changes his mind, there are still no binding stones available.”
“There are plenty of binding stones available. Just not nearby,” Nathan corrected.
“And that’s the problem. I’m not sure I want to leave Gharrick County.” Vera sighed again and ran a hand through her long red locks. “I grew up here. The next in a long line of sorcerers, all of whom have either used my tower, or practiced sorcery nearby. Inheriting that tower meant everything to me, once.”
Nathan waited, suspecting that she was building up to something.
“On the other hand, I’m not so sure I like chaining myself to the past like this,” Vera said. “I feel like I need a fresh start. A part of me wonders if that means abandoning my dream of becoming a Bastion, at least for a little while.”
“A little while?” Nathan asked. He didn’t like the sound of that.
Vera shrugged and avoided his gaze. “You helped me out of a difficult situation. No, let me be frank. I would be dead if it weren’t for you. If not at the hands of Sunstorm, then at the hands of Leopold. Becoming a Champion for a short while to repay my debt to you would be a pleasant distraction.”
Nathan closed his eyes and withheld a sigh. He had worried that it would be something like this. It seemed that his warning about a Champion being a one-way path hadn’t gotten through.
“You said something much earlier, back when we spoke in your tower, about how you like me because I told you more Bastion secrets than others. So, I’m going to tell you a secret that I really shouldn’t. One that—should Leopold ever find out that I told you—could have me tried for heresy,” Nathan explained.
Vera stared at Nathan. She seemed frozen in place. “You don’t have to—”
“Let me.” Nathan stared her down. “Remember when I mentioned that becoming a Champion was a one-way path? I meant it. Truly meant it. It’s not a metaphor. Accepting any Champion enhancement impairs your ability become a Bastion. Permanently.”
Silence reigned. Nathan waited to see if she would say anything. She didn’t, and merely stared at him in shock.
Eventually, she gestured for him to continue.
“While a gem is a permanent change, and can never be removed, even an enhancement limits your ability to become a Bastion,” Nathan explained. “The training enhancements in the academy have a relatively minor effect, which is why Champions can still back away at that point. But once a Champion accepts a full enhancement, their potential as a Bastion is crippled.”
“That sounds insane,” Vera blurted out.
Nathan kept his face impassive. “There’s a reason this is kept secret. There are a lot of implications to go along with it. The main one is that someone can be tricked or forced into accepting a Champion enhancement, and therefore prevented from ever being an effective Bastion. Another is that many people may avoid becoming a Champion, if they knew that meant they could never become a Bastion in the future.”
“It’s that bad?” Vera’s eyes narrowed. “Simply receiving an
enhancement has such a powerful impact that they cannot become a Bastion?”
“They can become a Bastion, but they’ll never be a good one. Or even a mediocre one. I’m doubtful that a former Champion could even create a duogem Champion,” Nathan said. “The effect is that severe. Even if they could, they could never create more than one or two duogems. And never a trigem. Not to mention that their ability to manipulate the binding stone would be far inferior to a true Bastion.”
Vera looked up at the ceiling. “Now I better understand why you and Leopold have cautioned Ciana so heavily about rushing into a decision about being a Bastion or a Champion. She wants so dearly to fight for you. I thought that she would sneak off to the battle at my tower. I even kept a lookout for her trying to sneak into any wagons or carts.”
Grimacing, Nathan looked away. He had conflicting thoughts about Ciana. He wanted her as his Champion. He adored her. The two of them had been close in his timeline.
But denying her the opportunity to become a fantastic Bastion—if that was what she wanted—was against his nature.
“She told me that tripe that you told her. Or at least, I thought it was tripe.” Vera grimaced. “About how someone can only be a great Bastion or a great Champion. I suppose it’s right. You can only be one or the other. Because going down one path ruins you for the other.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Nathan snapped. He sighed. “But I suppose it can be interpreted that way. I want her to make the right decision, as it’s not something she can rethink later. Even becoming a Bastion then becoming a Champion is hard.”
“Why? Does claiming a binding stone impact your ability to become a Champion?” Vera asked.
“Kind of. Binding stone connections are effectively permanent, so you can’t become a Champion later. More than that, a lot of the knowledge you learn while becoming a Bastion makes it difficult to be accepted as a Champion.” Nathan leaned back in his chair. “Truthfully, a lot of what Leopold and I are teaching Ciana are things that Champions usually never learn.”
In the end, Champions were weapons. Nathan did his best to never forgot that they were people. People that he was close to and cared for greatly.
But to the nations that funded and trained the Champions, they were powerful weapons.
One didn’t teach a sword the mysteries of the world. A sword didn’t need to know the ins and outs of politics, or what the implications were if they killed the person in front of them.
A sword’s duty was to stab whatever its wielder required it to stab. Champions were the swords of nations, in a way that Bastions could never be. A Bastion wielded Champions in the same way that a soldier wielded a sword.
Seraph was dangerous because she was a sword that knew how to wield other swords, and she appeared to think and act of her own volition. To Nathan, that made her invaluable.
To a nation, that made her terrifying.
No wonder so few nations allowed Champions such as her to exist. Nathan couldn’t help but find it interesting that both Narime and Seraph came from the Federation. Torneus stood as a common link between the two. Did he favor Champions that were more than simple, unthinking weapons?
Nathan wondered what it meant that Leopold was willing to teach Ciana the same things, potentially leading her down the same path as Seraph.
“So, in the end, I cannot make a temporary choice.” Vera let out a humorless laugh. “I want to help you and repay my debt, but doing so costs me too much.”
“If it helps, I can teach you what little I can about Bastions,” Nathan offered. “There are some things that I can’t teach you, simply because the academy has refused you, and I don’t want Leopold to murder me. But I think I have some leeway with him to teach you a few things. And who knows, maybe there’ll be a binding stone available later, when even Leopold can’t refuse you.”
Vera shot Nathan an appreciative smile. It faded the moment she thought he wasn’t looking.
After Vera left, Nathan glanced back down at the letter on the table.
He felt conflicted. Not just over Vera, but also Ciana and Seraph.
For Ciana, the reason was simple. He knew Ciana as a Champion. She might choose to become a Bastion, and he might lose her. If he intervened and pushed her toward becoming a Champion, he could make her his easily.
But with Vera and Seraph, it became more complicated than that.
His uncertainty was because he did not know them. His knowledge of the future did not include Seraph. Vera’s recorded history in his timeline was completely wrong.
Nathan reflected on these facts and realized that he had to handle these women the same way that he had handled things when he was younger. Not everything can be known, and not everything can be handled with a surefire plan.
Metaphorically, he stepped into the unknown.
Picking up a pen, he wrote a reply to Ciana. He sent the letter back to the capital, Aleich.
Then he turned around and stared at the black door behind him. He had one last person to speak to. The two of them needed to have a very important conversation.
Chapter 45
“So, did this turn out to be everything you dreamed it would be?” Kadria asked.
“I don’t recall having the chance to dream before you sent me back in time. So no, it hasn’t.” Nathan sipped his tea. It didn’t taste like anything he had ever drunk in his life. Part of it reminded him of the delicate teas that Narime sometimes served him. Those had been produced in her homeland—before it had been overrun by demons—and were an expensive delicacy.
He sipped the tea again. It tasted sweet. Strangely so, despite having no sugar or honey added to it.
“What have you done to this tea?” Nathan asked.
“Nothing. It’s oolong tea. With mangoes. I’m almost certain that you can’t get it here, but I figured you might enjoy it. Sweet things are rarer here than I’m used to.” Kadria drained her cup, and it automatically refilled itself, the tea appearing from nowhere.
Nathan had no idea what sort of tea she had described. He sincerely hoped he hadn’t been poisoned.
Looking around, he noticed that her void room had grown in size. Substantially so.
The bedroom was now more like a suite. Where it had previously been barely large enough to contain a bed, there was now space for a table and chairs. A doorway led off to what Nathan assumed to be a bathroom, although he hadn’t investigated it.
He didn’t know why Kadria’s void room had gotten larger. He suspected he didn’t want to know.
More importantly, some color had arrived in this otherwise lifeless void. The table and chairs appeared genuine and colorful against the black backdrop of this strange place. Nathan could see the grain of the wood, the threads that made up the upholstery of the chairs, and the golden straw color of his tea.
Everything else within the room remained an outline. He found the juxtaposition jarring.
For whatever reason, Kadria had chosen a table and chairs as the only colorful things in her room. Presumably so that she and Nathan could sit at them and talk. Whatever food and drink she summoned here also contained color.
“Do you prefer scones or tea cakes?” Kadria asked.
“Are those my only options?”
Kadria shrugged. “I assumed that you might prefer something from your homeland. Your actual homeland.”
She smirked, and a plate full of fresh scones appeared on the table. Steam rose from the baked goods. Large dollops of butter, jam, and clotted cream accompanied them in separate bowls.
“I still don’t understand how you’re doing this,” Nathan said, as he held a scone above his face. It smelled real. The tea had tasted genuine as well.
Food never felt, smelled, or tasted anything close to the real thing when created with magic. When a Bastion made food using a binding stone, it was bad enough to drive a man insane over the course of the day. Appearances could be replicated, but nothing else. Magically produced food was all nutrition, no soul.
&
nbsp; “If you paid attention to how I do things, maybe you could pick up a thing or two,” Kadria commented while smearing hunks of butter, jam, and cream over her scone.
Nathan quickly followed suit and tried not to stuff the thing into his mouth all at once.
It tasted delicious.
“This is the same as your binding stone magic that affects living things, isn’t it?” Nathan asked.
“More or less. The difference is that food isn’t strictly living, at least normally.” Kadria waved her scone around, sending crumbs flying into the void, where they became simple outlines. “The binding stone is part of the world. Magic is just as much a part of the world as anything else, despite the name. People call it magic because they don’t understand it.”
“That’s why we have magical science,” Nathan said. “To better understand magic.”
Kadria giggled. “Magical science. Such a silly name. You realize the term is an oxymoron, don’t you? Science describes how the world works, whereas magic is something that defies the way the world works. Your binding stones defy the natural laws of the world, at least according to normal science. In truth, reality is far more complex than it seems.”
“So I’ve gathered,” Nathan said drily.
Kadria wolfed down her scone. “Fine then. You didn’t have any dreams, but I know you had something in mind when I brought you to this world. How do you feel now that you’ve stopped the war? The Empire is safe, no demons are destroying it, and there is no massive wasteland stretching from the Gharrick Mountains to the Kingdom of Falmir. Don’t you feel like a hero?”
“Don’t patronize me.” Nathan glared at her. “I’ve stopped one war but started another.”
“But you did stop the war from your timeline,” Kadria said.
“And was that all that you sent me back here to do? I thought you even admitted that you’re working with me because you wanted to avoid the end of the world?” Nathan pushed.
“Perhaps.” Kadria toyed with a butter knife. “The invasion of Gharrick Pass was the catalyst in your timeline. When the Federation overwhelmed the Empire, it set off a chain of events that inevitably lead to destruction of almost every nation on Doumahr.”
Heretic Spellblade Page 38
