by J. Levi
“This is how it’s going to go. I’m going to tell you bits of what I’ve learned for the safety of the duchess. If the rebellion wants the rest, you’ll get me those fucking schematics.”
His eye twitches in the dim lighting. I can practically imagine the steam billowing from his ears as he rages internally.
“Fine,” his word full of finality.
I tell him about the queen suggesting a visit to the duchess to an unknown individual. I make sure Kael understands the queen’s implication. He waits long after I finish, probably waiting for me to reveal more, which I don’t. Before he slips away into the night, he peers over his shoulder and says, “I hope this is worth it, Leluna. There will be consequences.”
It’s a warning, which only pisses me off more.
“Fuck the consequences. I expect those schematics tomorrow night.” I don’t wait for his retort as I slip back into the shadows of the tunnel and return to my torturous servitude.
9
Nova
“…Eridh the Punisher loathed the idea of offspring, his kingdom of Undheim being the only creation he deemed worthy. The god of death reveled in his realm of agony. But Lady Fate sought redemption against her brother and blessed Eridh with two children. Thus Sena the Meadow and Ayla the Moon were born. Eridh cursed Fate by taking his children to Midgard, abandoning them within the forests of free folk.”
– Sacred Six: the catalog of gods and goddesses 74 B.A.
I wisp the prince to a tunnel system underneath Hjornholm, a city for an acquired taste. It’s a fortitude of iron will. The dwarven-built city in the mountains is impregnable against ground sieges. The mountainous terrain is too narrow and unstable for large armies to march. Siege weapons are too heavy to tow up the narrow steeps. Hjornholm is the only city ruled through democracy rather than nobility. Of course, the city is still under Edonian command, but there is amnesty between the diplomats and the crown.
I’m rusty on my history lessons, but from what I’ve gathered by word of mouth and minstrel songs, Hjornholm used to be a small country in itself. As many kingdoms do, Hjornholm fell to the spoils of war by the humans who crossed the Azure Sea for land to call home. The humans cut off natural resources until the country weakened into a state of surrender. Many of the defeated dwarven clans fled Edonia, seeking home on distant shores. The dwarves that remained were treated less than poorly.
The city of Hjornholm just so happens to be a central hub for information depots. The dwarves built the city into the South Crown Ridge for more than just grit. There’s a network of thousands of tunnels barreling underneath the city labyrinth above. There are rumors that in an undisclosed tunnel route, one can travel into Orgard safely. The South Crown Ridge is too rigid and dangerous to navigate overhead. Not that anyone with a sound mind and clear judgment would have any reason to travel to a desolate place.
Orgard is the Southern kingdom ruled by the vylorian. There used to be peaceful animosity between Orgard and Edonia, but the Seventy Winter War waged a century ago, severing any benevolence between the dominions.
The dwarves sealed the trade routes in Hjornholm. The eastern ocean routes became a warzone for siege towers firing cannons at any vessel that crossed over an unmarked line separating the kingdoms. Neither side contested the western coast since sirens infest the waters. Thus, it’s called Siren’s Reef.
The sun is high enough that wisping into a street or alley risks exposure. Hjornholm is a hub for illegal activity, but cutthroats are the first to offer your head when you’ve got a price on your head.
The tunnels are narrow, dimly lit by ember shrooms that litter the cave floor. I reach a ladder at the tunnel’s end, climb through a wooden hatch, and into a clay hovel. It’s littered in Ishkarian rugs, Richtenfel wine bottles, and Ardar style furniture. I drape a carpet over the hatch after the prince crawls out.
I climb the stairs from the basement floor and enter the main floor, a loft lined with desks and bookcases, loose parchment and scrolls scattered across the floor. The window shutters are closed, but slivers of sunlight peak through the cracks.
I smile fondly. Some things never change. “Where are you, old fart?” I call out.
From under one of the desks, a ruffle of papers, books, and bundled carpet shifts as a dwarven man, older than the earth itself, crawls out. His glasses askew on his nose, his robes old and tattered but still practical.
“Nova? Is that you, boy?” He asks hesitantly.
“Yeah, Terran, it’s me,” I call out.
He shuffles through clutter and debris, rushes to my side and slaps my lower back because that’s about as high as he can reach, and if he slaps my ass, things will go sour quickly.
“Is Ricon with you? Please tell me that she-devil isn’t here,” he groans, peering around me as if Ricon and Leluna are hiding. He notices the prince and says, “Who’s this?”
“I’m the Pri—” the prince scoffs and tries to answer, but I interrupt.
“This is Cas,” I say, emphasizing my nickname for him. I tilt my head and roll my eyes toward Terran.
The prince doesn’t catch on because he proceeds to say, “What’s wrong with you? I’m the—”
I slap a hand over his mouth and pull him under my arm while I tussle his hair. He struggles, arms flailing, smacking at my torso.
“Forgive my friend Cas. He’s dense,” I say to Terran, who shrugs and walks to a desk.
“Do not use the P-word, for gods’ sake. I have no fucking clue who wants to kill you.” I whisper into his ear. He finally concedes, and I release him.
I turn to Terran, who’s pulling salted nuts from a clay jar before tossing back a handful, chewing with his mouth open. I resist the urge to slam his mouth shut.
“What can I do for you, Nova?” Terran asks.
Terran is the only runeologist I know, personally. After a fateful encounter with a prostitute, and by fateful, I mean Ricon paid for her services and didn’t tell me. I may or may not have offended her sensibilities, which resulted in the Madam of The Nasty Flute, a gentlemen’s club in Fondstadt, to hex me in runes. I was impotent for weeks until Terran could undo the rune magic.
I’ve kept him in on my tab for rune services ever since.
“First off, got any mirrors in the house?” I ask abruptly.
Terran giggles in a whiskey tune before answering, “I haven’t used a mirror in a century, my dear boy.”
Figures.
“Are you sure, even unused mirrors?” I ask, to be sure.
“I’m sure. Do you mind telling me what this is regarding?” Terran asks.
I sit at the desk next to him. The prince casually browses the dwarf’s collection of books and tomes. He seems enthralled in the texts, even though half of them are in another tongue.
“Don’t bother,” I say to him.
“I read and speak four languages,” the prince snaps.
Well good for you, know-it-all.
I turn back to Terran, who waits patiently for my impending request.
“What do you know about walking through mirrors?” I ask Terran, pretending to not be peeved by the prince’s attitude.
Terran smiles a bit, his bulbous nose and flushed cheeks scrunch his eyes into thin lines. He coos, “Drinking too much dragon fruit wine, Nova?”
“That was one time!” I exclaim.
After another fateful encounter that Ricon had no part of, with a different prostitute, I may have insulted his ego, which resulted in another hex of runes, that prolonged my hangover. Wisping while drunk was miserable. I ended up floating in the Richtenfel harbor twice before making it to land.
The Prince, who stopped his browsing, is now watching me with bemusement. I bet he’s starting to question my capabilities.
“Terran, can you not embarrass me in front of my guest?” I say to him in a hushed tone.
Terran, completely disregarding my urge for subtlety, belts out, “The Twilight Thief is shy?”
I’m not one to brag to strangers, so I casually shrug, and a combination of a high pitch assurance mixed with a growl peruses my lips.
Gods above, I am an imbecile.
I return my attention to Terran to move on from the subject, “Terran, I need runes that’ll prevent a mirror from becoming a portal.”
Now that the words pour from my mouth, I can see why I sound drunk to him.
“We have a fae assassin on our tails, following us through mirrors. I need runes to either stop him from coming through or trapping him.” I reiterate. Terran considers my request and shuffles through a doorway, leaving the room. I stand there, awkwardly and well aware the prince’s gaze is still lingering. I act casual, leaning back on the desk, propped on an elbow, and stare at the clay ceiling.
I whistle.
“You’re joking, right?” The prince barks.
“Usually,” I say casually. “About what?”
“There’s no way you’re the Twilight Thief of Rhenstadt,” he exclaims.
“The name is a bit posh. I didn’t choose it, mind you. The Rhenstadt tabloids are vicious little things. They never get the story right,” I casually banter. The prince continues to stare.
“The Twilight Thief has been around for ten years, at least! You would have been, what? Twelve?” He astonishes.
“Fourteen, actually,” I say.
The prince’s expression changes. At first, he scrutinizes me suspiciously, and now he gazes at me with admiration, I think?
“Growing up in the Little Loo wasn’t too bad but surviving off scraps barely got me by. So, I learned how to pickpocket. Small stuff at first. Turns out I’m really good at it,” I offer. The confession is unsettling, but the need to explain so he can understand is overpowering.
Banne’s balls, if Leluna could see me, she’d kick me in the groin.
Terran hurries back into the room with a pile of texts in his arms. He drops them on another desk and climbs onto a stack of books resting on a chair so he can reach the tabletop. The prince observes the dwarf rifle through the pages, intently. He must be a bookworm.
While they peruse the runic texts, I fiddle with spare parchment, folding it into intricate shapes. I make a crane and toss it through the air. It dashes and flips and pelts the prince in the side of his head. I whistle, twiddling my thumbs, feigning naivety.
After I slip into an exhausting half-sleep, Terran hollers and rushes his current book to my lap. I heave onto my side, hands cling to my groin where his book slammed into my family jewels. He bellows and slams a callused hand against my back.
Why are his hands so damn callused? He reads books for a living.
“What do you have?” I ask, still catching my breath.
“I can’t depict a way to trap someone in a mirror, not with the short notice. I can continue researching, of course. I’ll charge double my fee for the urgency,” Terran swindles.
“You, sir, are a crook, Terran. Double the fee? I say ten percent incentive on top of the usual fee,” I bargain.
I don’t know why I bother because he says, “I guess my services are no longer needed.”
He shuts the book and waddles away from the desk.
“Fine,” I growl in defeat. “You’re going to drive me to bankruptcy, old fart.”
“I’m sure you’ll survive. Just steal some more.”
I can’t help but laugh at the banter. I may not trust Terran as I do with Ricon or Leluna, but he’s still good company.
“These runes here, you see. Inscribe them directly on the glass. It’ll seal it from the mirror realm.”
“Do I even want to know what the mirror realm is?” I ask incredulously.
“I want to know,” the prince chirps.
“I don’t know much about it, I’m afraid,” Terran says.
“What about the Hjornholm library?” The prince asks eagerly. “I’ve always wanted to go there.”
“Another time,” I bark at him. The prince’s face falls, disappointed. I almost take it back and suggest we stop for a quick trip before coming to my senses. What the literal fuck. Do I feel bad about that?
“Besides, we don’t have enough time to get into The Repositories,” I explain, trying to soothe.
“Repositories?” The prince asks.
“Aye. The Purge culled anything related to magic. Scholars smuggled most of the contraband into an underground archive called ‘The Repositories.’”
The prince is mesmerized. I’m ready to leave before Terran breaks out his cobra shine, a very unruly concoction of his creation.
“Thanks, Terran. We’ll leave you to your research. I owe you. You know I’m good for it.” I turn to Cas. “Try not to vomit on my boots when we whisp.”
“Are you always this smug?” he retorts.
“Pretty much,” I say because I am. Cas takes my hand and, my magic seeps from my skin to envelop him until we wisp out of the Terran’s loft. We land in a supply closet that I know to be mostly unused in the healer guild halls. It’s a good thing because the lobby is filled with new patients who weren’t here last night. I pass through the corridor without a word and enter through the door to find Ricon lying there, asleep.
His face has more color, and his breathing is steady. There are faint trickles of blood peeking through the gauze that covers his shoulder. He’s due for a dressing change soon, I wager.
The prince falls into the room after, confused until he sees Ricon, and he gasps. He places a hand over his face and looks disturbed, borderline distraught.
Adna enters the room from behind. She’s dressed in her usual nurse attire compared to the nightgown I saw last night.
“I’ll kindly ask that you use the front door next time. I have half a dozen patients gossiping about two boys coming out of the supply closet together,” she chides. “I have a reputation to uphold.”
“How long?” I ask.
“Excuse me?” She replies.
“How long will he be asleep?” I ask.
“We had him in an herbal-induced coma, but we’ve removed those from his regime. He should be waking up soon with some lucidity. The body heals better while asleep,” Adna explains.
Suddenly, a roll of static pulses through the healer halls. The stagnant wave of magic is familiar, now I recognize it as putrid. The magic belongs to the assassin.
“Mirrors,” I say.
“What’s that?” Adna asks.
“We need to draw these runes on every mirror in here, now!” I command while shoving a scroll into her hand that Terran gave me. I run back down the hallway into the lobby, searching for anything reflective.
“What is going on?” Adna shouts from the hallway.
“No time to explain. Cover up the mirrors with those runes, or everyone here is going to die.” I know I sound grave, but I’m on the verge of a full-blown panic. Ricon or Leluna usually have a better handle on keeping their cool during these situations. Any time I’d start to panic, they’d bring me back down.
Adna heads my warning, calling her nurses to a desk in the lobby. She traces the runes onto scrap paper and distributes them with directions to inscribe every mirror. They scurry through the halls and out of sight.
“Now, what is happening? What have your invited to my hospital?” Adna scolds.
I wince because she’s right. I did invite this into her hospital. This place is supposed to be a haven for the injured.
“It’s a long story,” I offer, but Adna only scowls. “We had a job last night. Things went bad. An assassin tried to kill this one,” I say while jabbing a thumb at Cas.
“How do the mirrors play into this?” Adna asks.
I’m about to answer when deathly shrills echo from a hall where a nurse had disappeared into earlier. Followed by the cry, a raspy snarl vibrates along the tile floors.
>
“He can travel through mirrors,” I say under my breath. Adna rushes forward, chasing after the dying cry of her acolyte. I hold her back.
“She’s gone. If you go down there, you’ll die,” I shout.
Adna looks at me helplessly. I can see the pain in her eyes.
“Get your patients somewhere safe. I’m going to take him out of here. After we’re gone, inscribe those runes on anything reflective, even your gods damned metal spoons if you have to.”
I see the fear in her eyes harden underneath a sheen of tears as she nods tersely and ushers her frightened patients from the lobby. I look to the prince and say, “Go with her. You’ll be safe here. I’ll come back after I kill him.”
“I’m coming with you,” he says resoundingly.
I sigh before responding, “Can you just make this easy for me and listen?” The prince glares, unwavering.
Of course not.
“Stay out of the way,” I order, running through the hall, chasing the low snarls that shiver through the passage.
10
Merida
“…a new species of fae, though I think they are the ancestors of what has become vylorian. They vysai are creatures of night, keeping to the shadows and bedding underground during daylight. It is said they feast on living blood, though their hunger is never quenched with human blood. The vysai were mere myth until our archeology team discovered a burial chamber at the secondary digsite with vysai remains. The fangs measure nearly seven centimeters….”
– archeology notes from the western coast dig site, Orgard 465 B.M.
Thundering roars shake the obsidian tower with fervor. The ash-filled sky sways with forceful winds summoned around the volcanic basin. A few sheer screams echo after melding with the aching tumble of crust and magma. Far below the palace plateau, the city of Oriand twinkles with golden light from the blazing braziers and the eminence of magic.
I stand at the window, face pressed tightly against the iron bars. Mother sits beside me, humming a soft tune that always seems to calm my nerves. I peer down the obsidian tower, my neck craning to get a better glimpse of the castle grounds below. I see the outer wall, a wall-walk etched along the inside, steel-clad soldiers patrolling the walkways in unison.