“The militia can offer you protection,” Dabiri said.
Jesse’s harsh crack of laughter caused a couple of goblins in front of me to jolt. “Drug running and a protection racket. No, thanks.”
Dabiri and the red-faced man glowered.
Smith wiped a hand over his face. “We won’t threaten you, Mayor Jesse.”
Now, Dabiri’s glower was for his second-in-command.
Jesse grimaced. “If you do, if you go beyond threats into violence, the trade with Justice ends. We’ll all lose then. But it’s worth the risk. I accept, Mayor Bataar. Memphis will be pleased to trade with you.”
“We’ll nail down the details after lunch,” Bataar said.
“And us?” Dabiri asked.
Bataar answered impatiently. “The town of Justice refuses your offer of trade and open communication. We grant you and your men safe passage back to your camp and ten miles beyond that. You will not be able to return.”
Our mayor had made the best decision he could for the citizens of Justice, but also in instituting a precedent that opened the door to the Faerene having contact with humans.
Dabiri scowled and jerked away as two rangers closed in on the four militia members.
Decisions had winners and losers. They drew lines in the sand, both dividing people, but also joining them.
The three humans from Memphis stood awkwardly together for a few seconds, their gazes clashing with the militia’s.
Then Smith saluted Jesse. “We’ll be in touch.”
“You can damn well bet we will.” Dabiri stamped out a step ahead of his ranger escort.
Smith’s expression went grim. He, at least, recognized the prudent path, and it wasn’t the one the general had chosen. Like my father, Smith had mastered the art of argument and negotiation: when you lost, you had to scramble for crumbs until you spied a chance to renegotiate. Smith would try again.
So would my father.
Neither would ever concede defeat or that they might be wrong.
If I intended to speak other people’s truths in writing This Is The Faerene, then I had to be honest about my own. With Callum the truth seeker beside me, and Smith in front of me, I acknowledged a truth that I’d been avoiding.
Being a parent, being my father, had only ever been a tiny part of Sean’s identity.
He didn’t get to pretend that it meant something more now that he could use me.
He didn’t get to make me feel guilty; any more than the three Memphis citizens let the militia’s antagonism prevent them from doing their best for the people reliant on them.
Bataar had mentioned that we’d entered the recovery stage. He meant that the apocalypse was over and that we should look forward with hope.
But for Dabiri and so many others, recovery meant regaining what humanity had lost: our technology; and, our sense of superiority, that we owned the Earth and could use it how we willed. In short, they wanted back the illusion of being in control of our own fate. No one was. Not even the magical Faerene.
But magic might provide us with some part of the answer. If Rory’s hypothesis was correct and the orb that ancient humans created was part of a system of unnaturally stable magic, and that it had weakened Earth’s shield, then by releasing it, maybe there’d be room for the Faerene to return more technology to humanity. Just having steam power back would make a massive difference to how human society rebuilt itself.
But for now, my concern was personal.
An open wound had to be cauterized.
I caught up with Sorcha as she left the town hall. After a couple of minutes of conversation and a searching look at me, she agreed to my request and wove back through the crowd to talk with Sabinka. I returned to the magistrate hall with Yana.
“Family,” was all she said, but it was enough. She yanked on my braid as a sister might before leaving me to carry out my decision.
I appreciated the show of respect. She wasn’t babysitting me.
However, she was probably hurrying off to tell Rory of my plans, which was not good. He should stay focused on preparations for hunting the thaumivorous grubs.
Entering the guard quarters, I bumped into Berre. He’d been head down, absorbed in something on his slate. I’d been distracted dreaming unpleasant dreams. “Sorry,” we said in unison.
He opened his mouth to add a comment, took in my expression, and closed it. He cleared his throat.
“I’m here to talk to Sean.” I thrust my hands into my jacket pockets. “Sorcha is getting permission from Sabinka to let him go.”
“Here in Justice?” he asked warily.
I bit my lip. The pain failed to counteract the sense of guilt and betrayal lodged in my chest. “No. Sean dislikes the Faerene, so he can’t want to stay here, and even if he does, I don’t think he can. He…I can’t trust him, not about his dealings with you, and if I can’t trust him, then other Faerene can’t.”
Berre pulled me into a hug, my head bumping his chin. “It happens in packs, too. Tangled loyalties. Stubborn family members.” He and Yana had suffered from that. They’d embraced the opportunity of Rory founding a new pack so fervently because of it. “You don’t love your father less for knowing when to let go.”
I hugged him back.
Sean wasn’t so understanding. “So you’re just going to dump me, out there, in hell?”
“Dad, you don’t trust the Faerene, so you can hardly live among them.”
He folded his arms. “I won’t go back to Fort Knox.”
“That was one option.” It was where Nils had found him. “Dabiri and his men are riding out of town now. If you don’t want to join them, I totally understand.”
He gave me his patented lawyerly frown. “I don’t think you do.”
“You thought they represented something of the pre-apocalypse world. The power of authority. But everything is still shaking out. They might dig in and acquire some city states or maintain their caravan network. But they can’t bring back the security you had in your previous life. Manhattan is gone. Your world is gone. What you choose to do in this new reality is up to you. Just tell me where you want to go.”
Abruptly, he looked old. His shoulders slumped and the tight line of his mouth slackened. “Would you really let me go? Never see me again?”
A Faerene magician like Nils could always find Sean again. Would I choose to ask him to?
I could have responded by listing who Sean had scorned: my husband and pack, Istvan, my adopted human family whom he saw as working class. We all worked these days. “Easy decisions ended when the Faerene arrived. Keeping you in my life means you’ll keep trying to manipulate me, and through me, the Faerene who care about me. And I guess that’s what makes this decision stark, though not easy. You’ve made it about who I’m willing to protect, and it’s them, not you.”
He sat on the bed and stared at the floor.
I rubbed my chest, pressing on the sternum and the pain tucked behind it.
“Where has civilization survived?” Sean asked his feet.
“I think you’d like Baltimore.” One of Istvan’s stops on his court circuit would be Chestertown, Maryland. The Faerene had taken it over. He’d mentioned that I should join him because Baltimore, close by, had emerged from the apocalypse with astonishing changes in place. Early violence had exhausted itself in a frenzy of destruction, only for the city to be resurrected under the direction of a Renaissance Faire group. They’d taken the Red Drake’s one-off mention of a Renaissance level technological era and rebuilt the port city to the trades and trading opportunities of that era.
“They treat it as a game,” Istvan had said, bemused.
Comprehension of what he’d meant, but hadn’t understood, had kept me laughing for a week whenever I thought of it. The people of Baltimore had embraced our post-apocalyptic world as a virtual reality game, complete with artisans, warriors, and magic. Although their notion of magic was seriously weird to the Faerene.
“They wave sticks in the ai
r.” As a dryad nymph, Radka found their stage-y use of stripped tree branches particularly bemusing.
What I told Sean was that Baltimore was stable. “And it has boats. You could find work there.” Plus, trade was sufficiently good that the city ran a surplus. Dad wouldn’t starve.
Moving stiffly, he rose and walked the couple of steps to the window.
“Dad?”
“I’m ready to leave, now.” He wouldn’t look at me.
“For Baltimore?”
He nodded, jerkily.
I walked out, leaving the door open, because Rory was there. Sorcha and Berre stood behind him.
“I’ll portal him to Baltimore,” Rory said.
I clasped his hand. “Should you be using your magic?” He might need it, tonight, to capture the grub. “There’s no rush for Dad to leave. I just…if he’d wanted to join the militia, they’re being escorted out now. But with Baltimore, it can wait.”
“It’ll be fine.”
“I’d rather go now,” Sean strode out of the room. He’d banished the dispirited weakness he’d shown earlier. Now, his gaze was pure challenge as he scowled at Rory. “Being locked up is a big clue that I’m not wanted.”
It was a big clue that he wasn’t trusted. If he couldn’t be allowed to walk around freely in Justice, and I had to ask Sorcha to check whether Sabinka had any more questions for him, he didn’t belong.
Berre interrupted Sean’s dramatics by shoving a bulging satchel at him.
“Outside,” Rory said. He opened a portal in the yard.
I hugged Sean awkwardly, hampered by the satchel and his attitude.
At the last minute he kissed my forehead. “I never thought your right path would be so different to mine. I do love you.”
“Bye, Dad.” Short words so that I wouldn’t cry. “I love you, too.”
He walked through the portal, turned and raised a hand in good-bye.
Rory looked at me, and closed the portal.
“I’m all right. I’m all right.” I flapped my hands at him, trying to ward off his concern. I wasn’t all right, but I would be.
Everyone retreated as I cried against his shoulder.
Chapter 12
Istvan crouched in front of the full bench of the Fae Council. They’d muttered a bit at his request for an emergency meeting, but had acceded to it.
There would be more than muttering when they learned the reason he’d called them together.
He glanced at his friend Piros.
Due to his great size, the red dragon had a position to the side of the assembled bench. He was the spymaster for the Fae Council; technically a member but also in service to them. He brought threats to their attention, and possible opportunities. Everyone took the success of the Migration seriously.
But Istvan expected his news to shock even Piros.
Some people responded badly to surprises, and that was why Istvan had Dorotta with him. He needed to identify threats against Amy. For himself, Istvan wasn’t worried. As a black warrior griffin of the Arani clan, he could protect himself.
Although political maneuverings weren’t his forte.
Amy’s instincts had been sharp when she’d suggested that Dorotta monitor the power plays underway in Civitas.
And now, Istvan was about to throw a chaos bomb into the mix, metaphorically speaking.
Fae King Harold opened the meeting, keeping proceedings briskly informal. “Why are we here, Istvan?”
“For me to provide you with information, an object, and a world-changing question. Or perhaps not world-changing. At any rate, the issue has changed from a some-day problem to one requiring your attention. At Tenger, a sea nymph town on the south eastern coast of the North American Territory, the kraken Xi asked for a meeting with me as the magistrate for the territory, but more importantly, as the Faerene magician in a successful human familiar partnership.”
“Partnership!” Quossa snorted.
Many among the Faerene were uncomfortable with the idea of humans having magic. The Migration had been undertaken with the belief that magic was unknown to humanity. Humans hadn’t been predicted to gain the ability to use magic for centuries.
Istvan ignored the prejudice. He teleported the orb created by ancient human magic into the room, and levitated it at chest height in front of him. The black orb shimmered.
The twelve members of the Fae Council accorded it their full attention.
“Xi gave me this orb. A kraken-ling, a youngster, found it in the ruins of a sunken city. It is magic, yet it was found in such circumstances that it must be a minimum of three millennia old. Likely more.”
Piros’s head snaked forward, and he wasn’t the only one to deduce Istvan’s meaning.
Harold stood. “You are claiming that this is a creation of magic from before the Faerene began monitoring Earth?”
“Yes.”
“You would have us believe that humans made this?” Aswani, a female dryad, demanded.
Istvan extended his wings a fraction. “Who else could have made it? I have not analyzed the orb beyond understanding that it is composed of layers of condensed magic and that it is stable. It was sealed away and the magic hiding it was, itself, hidden. If not for a kraken-ling’s curiosity it may have remained unknown. Xi gave Amy the orb. It is humanity’s. Amy gave it to me for safekeeping and to decide its future.”
He paused, deliberately. “A few days ago, when this happened, my opinion was that we didn’t need another problem or crisis, especially one that brought up the question of how we relate to humans. Rare human mages provoked an outrageous response from us. Yes, we have to protect the shield around the Earth and prevent the Rift from reopening, and we couldn’t trust untrained humans to use magic in a controlled fashion. But we lost a third of the human familiar trial participants to the vigil. Others died. Amy and Chen alone retained their magic. Two out of a hundred is an appalling result.”
“So you withheld vital information from us.” Harold studied the orb, closely. His green nose almost brushed it.
“The orb is magical. I am responsible for magic in my territory. My concern is that the orb is currently stable because it’s inactive. If we activate it, what might happen? Will all of humanity gain magic?”
The Orc Champion swore.
“Will a few humans gain magic and go crazy trying to comprehend the change? How will our rationing system for magic cope with whatever happens? I was content to let the status quo hold a little longer,” Istvan said. “But the thaumivorous grubs Nora and her team are investigating change the calculation.”
Harold resumed his seat. “How?”
“Because they’re the second magic-related occurrence that we failed to identify pre-Migration.”
The unicorn stallion Quossa took Harold’s place examining the orb. “The first being your human mages.”
Piros intervened. “Istvan resisted being bonded to a human familiar, if you remember? You had me pressure him into it as his duty.”
“Well, he’s certainly protective of his familiar now,” Quossa said. But the unicorn swished his tail and retreated back to the bench. “Which is the oath bond, I know. The orb is layered magic.”
“And potential trouble.” The Fae Council murmured their distress. One by one they examined the orb. None took too long.
“You’ll need to surrender it to a bunker for study,” Harold said. He wasn’t actually king in the sense of being a ruler as humans understood the term. He acted as the Council’s voice.
Istvan floated the orb down to the floor to rest against his right front paw. “That’s why I brought it to you.”
“Why now?” Piros asked. “Why does the discovery of the volcano grubs make such a difference?”
The Fae Council was composed of smart magicians. They had all doubtless made the logical leap as to the ideas pressuring Istvan. But for the record Istvan had to spell out his thinking.
“Because if the orb does hold the ancient humans’ memories, then there may be
information in there that we need. For a people to renounce their magic, they must have faced a serious threat. I assumed that it was one that we could easily counter. It may be. But five people are dead, presumably consumed by the grubs for the magic they channeled. We may need to risk activating the orb, and that’s a decision for you, the Fae Council.”
“The head of your magisterial guard unit is leading the team to capture the grub at Mount Redoubt, yes?”
“Yes.”
“Do you think the team is in danger?”
“I believe that between Rory and Nils’s ability with battle magic and the bunker scientists’ technology, they will achieve their goal of capturing a live grub.”
“Hmm.”
Quossa shook his mane. “Discussion is mere speculation. Time-wasting. We require more information. The scientists need to study the orb.”
“I deliver it into your keeping, Quossa.” Istvan floated it to the unicorn who was a scientist-magician of some renown.
“I accept it. In fact, I will personally oversee its analysis.”
“Thank you.”
Aswani raised a final question. “If we decide to activate the orb, and perchance as a human construct it requires a human to activate it, will your familiar do so?”
Istvan kept his wings tucked close to his sides and his tail motionless, conscious that he was ruffled. “Amy will abide by the Fae Council’s decision. She trusts me, and I trust you. If required, I will either guide her in activating the orb or channel her magic to do so myself.”
“Very well.” Istvan was dismissed.
Dorotta escorted him out, faking the role of bodyguard and fooling no one. The Fae Council had allowed her attendance for their own unfathomable reasons.
“Alligator River, North Carolina. The elven colony,” Istvan directed her tersely.
They exited Governing House and launched into the air, translocating to Alligator Neck and landing on an empty stretch of riverbank. It was the next stop on his court circuit.
“Your assessment?” he asked Dorotta.
She folded her wings, deliberating. “They don’t think the orb is important. That’s why there was little fuss about you withholding information about it.”
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