The Unseen

by Gregory Blackman

  “And who does the sultan take his orders from?” asked Korine, all too eager to repeat previous events. “Don’t tell me Kaffrika plays marionette to the boney puppeteer fingers of Otto Lyon. Or is it the ports of Pire that weight your pockets?”

  “Where in the nether realm is it?” Akbart bellowed. He was visibly enraged, and couldn’t ignore Korine’s attempts to antagonize him further.

  Korine’s eye was nearly swollen shut, but still, she summoned the courage to speak, and said, “It’s up your rancid, corpulent ass—!”

  The sultan struck her again, and again, until she could neither speak back in defiance nor speak at all. She swung there, motionless, to wait for her inevitable end once all four companions had been reunited. Korine was many things to many people in this world. Most of them were unpleasant things, but it was an unpleasant world and she had to make of it what she could. If that meant bending the rules whenever the opportunity presented itself then that’s what she would do; ruffled feathers be damned. Only now she wasn’t it a position to do anything.

  “Don’t play games with me,” Akbart seethed. “I want the stone. I want it now.”

  “There’s nothing left to give,” Dashe lied. He wanted to speak the truth and tell of the crimson stone tucked into his secret pocket, but when the subject reached his lips, he found himself unable to speak on the stone or how it got into his pocket.

  “I’ll do it,” the sultan said as he drew his curved blade. “Each and every nail on your precious lady friend’s toes will come off in bloody stumps unless you give me what I want—.”

  A chill filled the room and brought an icy vapor to the sultan’s breath. He backed up immediately, his stare locked on his prisoners, but his mind far from this dank cellar. “It’s too late, too late for us all. The Unseen have arrived.”

  “Wait,” said a confused Dashe Kol, “who has arrived?”

  As the words left his mouth, the door to the chamber opened and two men in black robes descended to their depths. Their faces were shrouded despite any light source that dared to penetrate their black hoods, and while there were three other people in the cellar, their attention never wavered from the young adventurer with the secret stone in his pocket.

  “Forgive m-me, chosen ones,” stammered the sultan, noticeably shaken by these two men. He was ruler to a great many peoples, from a great many lands, but not even he could withstand the ethereal stares of these men. “I wasn’t aware you would be here so soon. I-I was just about to obtain the object in question.”

  “Your usefulness comes to an end for tonight,” the smaller of the two men said with a gloved hand raised to separate them. “Retire to your palace. Make no mention of what you found in this room. If you accomplish these tasks then we may have use for you in the future.”

  “What about the two others?” the sultan asked. He was relieved to be alive, fearful that might not be true for long, but still he pressed his employers for more. He wanted this to be over, and it couldn’t truly be over until this group had come to an end. “There are still two dwarf slaves at large.”

  “Slaves?” the larger of the two men asked. “We care not for slaves. We care barely for you. Leave now, before our patience wears thin and we find the chains for another.”

  Akbart Yutpan held a position few in the nonaligned nations could equal, and the armed forces fewer could match, but even the sultan of Kaffrika couldn’t command the men he had identified as the Unseen. He made haste for the steel hatch of the cellar, sure to close the door behind him as swiftly as he could.

  The larger of Dashe’s dark assailants didn’t watch the sultan depart this discussion, but he didn’t start until the door had closed and their foretold meeting could be had in private. He looked over to the female prisoner, unconscious and still dangling in mid air. She wouldn’t be a problem on this night, or any other.

  He took off his right glove and made his way to Dashe. His hand was gnarled, burned to the tips, and yet he held it high without reservation and used that hand to grab hold of Dashe’s face, where it stayed, flesh upon unseemly flesh.

  All of a sudden, a slight earthquake in lands afar brought a rumble to the damp cellar. It went almost unnoticed by Dashe Kol and the lifeless Korine Dorset, but not the shorter companion to the man with the burned hands who quickly turned to his other, and said, “The sleeping giants awake.”

  “And so, the song of ash begins,” replied the burned man as his hand slid from Dashe’s face to his secret pocket, “with this artifact it shall end on a note most fortuitous to our order.”

  He pulled the blood stone from the adventurer’s pocket without a relieved sigh or a hearty laugh. He knew the stone would be his in time and he knew how it would happen. This wasn’t a chance meeting and his stone wasn’t stolen by a man devoid of fate. The Unseen were meant to lose the blood stone at the eleventh hour. They were meant to find it in the hands of this unscrupulous young man. What they weren’t meant to do was use the stone and the powers bestowed upon it.

  “The Age of Man comes to a close,” the burned man said to his dark cohort. “Man will know pain, and they will know it well. They will rally against the green tide and fight back against their prospective oppressors, but man and their armies of steel will wither against the fiery wings of legend, and they will burn. Oh, how they will burn.”

  It took several cycles and one too many adventures, but Korine Dorset and Dashe Kol had run out of luck. They hung there, helpless, and their only friends in the world out of reach and out of time. They were the lost ones. No one would speak their names. No one would know they were gone, and soon, no one would know they existed. Not if the two members of the Unseen had their way.

  “All will know,” the burned man said as he looked upon his newest bruised, beaten souls ready and waiting for him to finish, “be they man, elf, or unsightly dwarf, and they will know it well. Only those that fly the banner of the Unseen will survive the Age of Ash.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Shadow Brokers

  Gregory Blackman

  The Ashen Court

  It took more than a high king to rule an empire. Under their high king, the ashen court held sway over the three kingdoms of man, assisted in the development of holdings, even cultivated their laws. It was the highest aspiration of every noble, every diplomat, in the world of Amor. Simeon Lyon knew the court well. Since he was a child his father had ordered him to watch their many proceedings, a dull affair he was ill suited for, regardless of how many times he tried to tell that to the high king. To the merchant bazaar he would often retreat, where the faces were friendly and the bellies were full of spirits.

  Simeon strode into the castle with the marshal, Mantas Varg, by his side every step of the way. It turned out the castle was a much livelier place in the night when the servants and slaves were free to roam the halls without a high king to around to scold their every action. They made many twists and turns throughout the sprawling fortress and climbed stairs all the way to the top except for the peaks of the high king’s private chambers. That was the right afforded to the ashen court and the men that sat around its storied table.

  No sooner than the iron arches of the ashen court opened did Salamander step towards the prince and the marshal with his slithery arms wide apart, as if they were the oldest of friends. One couldn’t blame Eindride Salamenka for this, at least not entirely. He was the spymaster, after all, and it demanded he consort with his enemies on a daily basis. Perhaps, to a man such as this, Simeon and he were the old friends he believed them to be.

  “It’s good of you to come, my prince,” said Salamander with an eager handshake. “I only wish there was more time to bring you up to speed.”

  “Oh, why don’t you leave the prince alone, Salamenka?” asked the marshal as he saved the prince a further awkward encounter and hurried him to the round table of the ashen court. “He’s just arrived. You’ve got plenty of time to make him regret that decision.”

  As the marshal of the ash
en court, Mantas Varg was accustomed to the plights of the weak and the unfortunate. He was, however, unable to help with their cause. He was to look towards the external threats, the ones the high king deemed to be his exclusive task. For the last decade that had been the Wild Lands, an untamed sea of green that only the reclusive elves could inhabit. He had sent thousands off to die. All to kill the few hundred elves they happened to come across. It was a noble position, meant for righteous men. That’s what made Mantas so good at his job. He had neither of these qualities.

  Mantas Varg didn’t sit alone at the round table made from the same ashen stone the court took its name from. There were six of them in total. To the right of the marshal sat the chancellor, Barclay Forrester, a man of wealth and heritage. He was a rotten old crackpot in his late sixties, early stages of dementia written all over his face. He was the diplomatic tie to the rest of the kingdoms, but since the three kings had been cut off from their high king, it was a position that required little as of late. When he wasn’t mumbling into his lap Barclay would often shout his nonsensical ramblings to the others in the court. Since those in the ashen court were appointed for life, the chancellor held a position that would remain his until a timely or untimely end.

  Beside the chancellor sat Holleder Eremis, self-proclaimed genius and the only positive thing to come out of the South Halls. His skin was as black as the nether stone itself, his posture concaved and hard to gaze upon, and his hands without a callous in sight. He was the high king’s steward, the money man, and while Holleder had never worked a laborious day in his life he was no slouch with the coin. He sat upon his chair, crooked smile to go with his crooked spine, boney hands extended towards the prince who had taken a place at the table.

  Then there was the lord spiritual, the only man in the empire with the authority to rival the high king. Anton Lightbringer, alone, spoke for the Four Pillars of Man in Amoria Major, a religion founded in the old world, brought to the new world by way of the sword. Because of the power and prestige, those awarded the position fell under the high king’s banner. Someone Otto could trust to speak his truths and his truths alone. He was a radiant man with the long golden curls capable to sway lesser minds of their own accord. The kind of man a high king could use to turn the poor and the deprived into poor, deprived loyalists who now crowded the many barracks that loomed just outside the city walls.

  There was the one notable standout for the prince, someone who had always captured his interest and imagination from a young age, and the last person to hold a seat at the court. This man wasn’t quite a man, and yet, he had been one longer than even the deranged chancellor. His name was Gideon Drusek, admiral of the ashen court, and since the age of thirty he had been nosferatu. That was over three hundred cycles ago and today the man reborn in Gangreal, Consorta, found himself one of the most prominent positions a man could have. In cycles past he commanded a mighty fleet of vessels. Warships the prince couldn’t help notice on his return voyage as they lay stranded upon the shores, unmanned and without a single sail to mast.

  “Aric?” the aged chancellor asked. “Aric, is that you? Why, it’s been cycles since you’ve graced this court.”

  “No,” said Simeon with a shake of his head. “It’s me, Simeon.”

  Barclay Forrester tilted his head sideways in disbelief, looked as deeply into the eyes of the prince as his own milky eyes would allow, and said, “No… that can’t be so. Simeon Lyon is a rude, spiteful young man who’ll one day find himself in the dungeons if he gets lucky, beheaded if he gets justice.”

  Simeon took the old coot’s words for what they were, misinformed, and continued to the first free spot at the table. He stood behind the chair, impatient, and waiting for something to bring this meeting to order. Mantas pulled out another ornately carved chair for the prince and tried to dust it off as best he could before the rude, spiteful prince sat down.

  “Where’s my sister?” asked Simeon as he looked over his shoulder at the marshal. “I wasn’t aware you’d taken to the spymaster’s nasty habit of promising falsehoods.”

  “She went to the magi district,” said Gideon, his vampiric fangs bringing a unique accent to his speech. “We expect her back shortly. There isn’t much time, after all.”

  “She left the castle?” Simeon balked at the unfamiliarity of the words. “What sister would this be? And what’s all this talk about there not being much time? If there’s one thing I know it’s that this isle will outlast us all. Time is the one thing we have of plenty.”

  The court stirred about their chairs and cast an uneasy gaze that seemed to pass through the prince. It wasn’t until the lord spiritual, Anton Lightbringer, spoke up that Simeon noticed anything at all. Through pursed lips the lord spiritual turned to the prince, and asked, “How about we let the princess explain for herself?”

  Simeon spun around to meet Celeste’s gaze. She stood underneath the doorway, hand rested against the iron arches, haughty smirk pressed on her royal face.

  “Now, now, dear brother,” said Celeste as she strode into the court. “Do you still believe me that shut in little girl you knew growing up? I am, however, afraid this reunion between blood has come at a poor time. We have much to discuss and little time to see it through. You’ll forgive me if I get to the point?”

  “I will,” a suitably impressed prince said.

  “How big of you,” Celeste responded.

  She dumped some maps and scrolls onto the ashen table. The other council members were quick to abscond with the treasures, which they perused with the utmost attention before they passed it to the next in line. She waited for the court to go over the documents, all the while her eyes stayed locked on a brother that didn’t appear to recognize his only sister.

  “You all know of the second age,” Celeste said to a readied audience, “but what do you really know about it? The Age of Fire, a time before mankind, but not completely forgotten to the passage of time. The elves and dwarves ruled what would later become both the kingdoms of man and the nonaligned nations; two mighty empires that stood a world apart from the rest of Amor, or so they thought. There are many theories on what happened in those ancient times, but from what the magi have gleaned from the scrolls it would appear that ravenous green skinned monsters descended upon the land and set fire to everything they touched. And when the elves and dwarves finally thought the tide had turned in their favor the monsters unveiled the most horrendous of weapons.”

  The room waited in silence for the princess to continue, but when it became apparent she wasn’t going to start up again, the table erupted in allegations.

  “What are you holding back from us?”

  “Come on, tell us what happened?”

  “It was werewolves, right? The whole thing stinks of werewolves. I always knew they were demon spawn.”

  “Now, now,” said Celeste with a wave of her hand. “We don’t know exactly what happened, but it burned this isle white and broke two empires in the process.”

  The table knew the princess had finished, but this time not one person spoke, nor did they murmur. They let her words sink in and their spirits plummet. The tower of the magi knew it walked a precarious line within the empire. To make claims such as this without doing their due diligence would be both imprudent and dangerous for the magi that uttered them, knowing well the blocks weren’t far behind if their words proved false.

  “This is preposterous,” Simeon said. He pushed back from the round table and lifted himself from his chair. “You bring me here on the account of fables? What you’re speaking are bard’s tales, nothing more. The truth is we’re not certain as to what sent the elves and the dwarves into a freefall. They don’t even know! Not the ones we’ve bred into slavery, at least. All we know is this isle is ashen and it’s been the anchor for unfounded information ever since.”

  Celeste grabbed him by the wrist, her delicate hand wrapped tightly around his to prevent his departure, and asked, “Then why are some of its many interiors made o
f stone with the texture of steel? One can even see the line where the fires ceased to spread upon a doorway, an archway, on the Ashen Isle? What do you call that, brother?”

  “I would call it conjecture,” he said with condescending eyes, “at the very best.”

  Sadness lurked behind the eyes of Celeste, something with roots deeper than her wayward brother. She let Simeon slip through her fingers, though even he could see it pained her greatly.

  “Princess,” said Gideon Drusek, “I must inquire as to the locations marked on these maps, one of them in particular.”

  “Yes,” said Celeste, sullenly, as if she already knew both the question and the answer. “That’s correct.”

  “Six locations across the entire continent,” muttered Anton Lightbringer into his clerical collar. “What are the chances one of them would be there?”

  Simeon Lyon had enough of the secrecy that permeated the room. He steeled himself to his sister’s apparent grief and stormed out of the ashen court.

  “You know,” Simeon said as he turned back to face the court, “I didn’t have to come, but I did. I didn’t have to sit through my sister’s scary story, but I did. Now you speak as though I’m not even in the room, talking about mysterious locations of interest that hold little interest to me. Tell me, members of the ashen court, why should I care? What dare happen that the kingdoms of man can’t handle?”

  Chapter Twelve

  Shadow Brokers

  Gregory Blackman

  The Slumbering Giant

  The armies of the high prince moved from the ancient and knotted forests to the plains, though their high prince was not there to lead them. That role was left for another to fill, one of questionable experience, yet irrefutable conviction. That commander was Cylena Barst, promoted that fateful night when the elves attacked. Vyers was summoned back to the ashen court by his youngest brother and left in the middle of the night with a half dozen soldiers in his entourage and a nasty disposition. He did not want to leave his troops, his people, nor did they want him to leave. It was a demoralizing loss. A loss that stung to this day, regardless of the miles they had put behind them.