by Andrew Rowe
Caelford was on the opposite side of the continent — the far west side — and bordered West Edria. They were concerned about being Edria’s next target after Valia fell, and had some border skirmishes on their own, so they provided us with advanced weapons during the war. Caelford’s powerful cannons had been a key part of how we were able to hold the numerically superior Edrian army at bay.
I waved a hand. “Sure. And I take it this had something to do with the Edrian forces massing at our borders?”
Vera nodded. “More than you realize. Caelford and Valia have been bracing for another Edrian push for decades. Our spies told us that the time for that assault is finally on the horizon, so we decided to accelerate the timeline on one of our most important research projects.”
Some sort of joint military research between our nations made sense. I nodded for her to continue.
“Our team was put together from some of the best each nation could offer. I was the least experienced, but I had a strong connection with the research subject.”
“The research subject was a person?” I frowned. “Echion, I suppose?”
Jin raised a hand to his temple, looking introspective.
Vera continued. “Yeah. I’m sure you saw the marks on his forehead. We were doing some... unusual research with him. We had a powerful enough group that we assumed we could keep him safe regardless of what we ran into. We weren’t expecting a visage.”
I folded my arms, considering. “Katashi or Tenjin?”
“Tenjin. One of the members of our group cast what sounded like an ordinary summoning spell, but Tenjin arrived instead of the summoned monster. Showed up with an entourage. Told us that what we were doing was extraordinarily dangerous, that we were dabbling with powers beyond our comprehension... that sort of thing. Commanded us to stand down and surrender. And, you know, I think we would have. Probably.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“His entourage stabbed him in the back — almost literally. One of ‘em put a hand on his back. Blasted a hole in his chest. Didn’t kill Tenjin, but it certainly startled him. I guess the traitor realized that a shroud doesn’t protect someone from attacks that come from inside the shroud.”
Jin bristled. “A visage could not be harmed so easily.”
Vera shrugged. “Just telling you what I saw. Anyway, that traitor — woman in a dark mask — kept pummeling Tenjin. The other member of the entourage went for us. Tall bastard, crazy good with a sword. Echion probably could have handled him, but our Summoner hit Echion with some kind of binding spell. Pinned him to the ground.”
I sighed. “This Summoner. Was that Elora Theas, by any chance?”
She tightened her jaw. “Yeah, that’s the bitch’s name. You know her?”
I thought back to the fight between Keras and the Council of Lords. Elora had tried to chain Keras down, probably with the same spell she’d used on Tenjin. Keras had broken out almost instantly.
I nodded. “Yeah. Or, I know of her, anyway. So, she turned on your group and helped the people who were attacking?”
“Yeah. It was obvious this was a planned ambush. Rochelle and Lawrence put up a good fight, but that swordsman was just too much. Must have been an Emerald. Even three Citrines couldn’t stand up against him. Tenjin was starting to recover, but then Elora laid into him with her magic, too. Managed to pin him down like she did with Echion, then that masked woman knocked Tenjin out.”
That... sounded insane. The idea of a group of humans managing to incapacitate a visage — even if they accomplished it through the element of surprise — it was mind-boggling.
Then again, I’d seen Keras manage to hold Katashi at bay in a straight fight.
And Tenjin was the Visage of Inspiration. He wasn’t known for his combat abilities. It was possible that he was considerably weaker in a direct confrontation than someone like Katashi would be.
Something she said earlier scratched at the back of my mind, though. “Why do you think Echion might have been able to handle the situation if he hadn’t been incapacitated?”
Vera winced. “You saw that mark on his forehead, yeah?”
I nodded and another piece of the puzzle slid into place. “You’re experimenting with making artificial attunements, aren’t you?”
Vera ran a hand through her hair. “Been doing that for decades. This was... a little more advanced than that. I won’t bombard you with theory, but the point is that Tenjin was right. It’s incredibly dangerous work.”
She paused, taking a breath, then continued. “We were bringing Echion into the tower to test him against monsters. We tried smaller tests at home, of course, but we needed something closer to real combat. If the test had succeeded, we’d have had a weapon that might have been strong enough to prevent a war.”
I could understand the logic behind that. In fact, I was very interested in the subject of artificially creating attunements myself.
If there was a way to give anyone power — and the power they wanted, not just what the goddess chose to give them — we could work toward a society with vastly better efficiency and quality of life for everyone.
Elementalist farmers could make rain for their own crops. Shaper blacksmiths could create tools and weapons with less effort and better quality results. Summoner couriers could teleport from place to place, saving tremendous amounts of time and effort.
There were already some people doing all these things, but most attuned were bound tightly to the military or similar pursuits. And, of course, only those people who were both wealthy enough to take the test and lucky enough to succeed managed to earn attunements. Most farmers never even stood a chance at getting one. Marissa’s family probably had to save up for years just to get her a shot at taking the test.
I could see problems with giving attunements to everyone, of course. The Judgments might have served as some sort of vetting process to determine who would be safe enough to carry one without causing harm to others, and the school education afterward served a second step in that process.
Moreover, two years of proper training meant it was less likely that an Elementalist would accidentally set a farm on fire or do something equally catastrophic.
I was optimistic that a society equipped to create attunements could find a way to make it work. It was something I wanted to research on my own, and if people were already succeeding, I wanted to know more.
The last part of what she said did bother me a little, though. Strong enough to prevent a war? Any individual attuned with that level of power was strong enough to start a war, too — or just cause tremendous damage. I’d need to find out more about that.
“What can you tell me about what you were doing with Echion? Why use a child?”
Vera shook her head. “I’m not going to get into that. It’s a deep secret for a reason. And before you chastise me for it, keep in mind that Tenjin wanted us to stop doing the experiments. I’m pretty confident Katashi wouldn’t want me spreading knowledge about them further.”
I shook my head. “Katashi seemed to want to kill Echion outright. Do you know why?”
Vera shrugged. “I can only speculate that Katashi was strongly opposed to what Echion represented. I doubt the visages are happy with the idea of artificial attunements in general.”
I nodded at that. “Can you tell me anything more about the tests you were planning to run?”
She winced. “I’d really rather not discuss anything that might make Katashi even angrier with me.”
That was pretty disappointing. I wanted to know as much as possible about these tests so I could understand exactly how they worked.
Maybe I could eventually devise safer alternatives?
More importantly, I had some pretty serious moral issues with the idea of testing experimental magic on children — but I didn’t have enough context to know what dangers, if any, the tests might have involved.
I shook my head. “Fine. We can talk about it more later if it becomes necessary. For the moment,
though, tell me what happened next.”
“Once Tenjin was out, we tried to fall back, but that swordsman was brutal, and Elora knew all our tricks. She was one of the strongest members of our group in the first place. That masked woman teleported out with Tenjin. That was the last thing I saw before the swordsman knocked me out. Then I woke up in a jail cell.”
I frowned. “Describe the swordsman.”
“Tall, olive skin, brown hair. He had a local accent. He talked with the other traitor and Elora a bit during the fight. Didn’t say too much, but it sounded like he was the one giving orders.”
That brought a couple people to mind. “Any chance it was Keras?”
She shook her head. “Don’t think so. Hair was shorter and lighter. Skin was darker.”
As it turned out, I knew an Emerald-level swordsman who met that description pretty much perfectly. Derek Hartigan.
And he was, of course, standing right outside.
This was going to be awkward.
I’d known from the moment that I’d seen Elora Theas on the list that there was a good chance Derek was involved, too. This wasn’t explicit confirmation, but it made the possibility much more likely.
Keras was still a possibility. Someone as powerful as he was could have had another attunement we weren’t aware of that enabled him to change his appearance. If he had a Shadow Attunement or something similar, he could have changed minor things once he ended up in that cell so that Vera wouldn’t recognize him. I kept that possibility at the back of my mind, but Derek was clearly the more immediate concern.
I put my thoughts together and replied. “Okay. So, Elora betrayed your group for reasons unknown. She probably summoned Tenjin intentionally... but if the goal of her and her compatriots was to attack Tenjin, why bother with all this?”
Vera twisted her lips as she considered that. “Not sure. I assume those two people with her were connected with Tenjin somehow and wanted his attention focused on something else, giving them a chance to attack while he was distracted. Or maybe it’s a political thing. Presumably, they escaped with an unconscious Tenjin — and then I ended up in that jail somehow, along with Echion. Maybe they wanted to make Caelford look responsible for Tenjin’s disappearance?”
I could follow that logic. “To drive a rift between Caelford and Valia. Yeah, that makes sense. Or just to get Katashi to focus his attention on Caelford and Valia while Edria is at our borders... If Katashi sends monsters to attack us because his brother is missing, that gives Edria a window to strike while our forces are defending the university.”
“That’s what I think’s probably happening: a couple Edrian agents trying to get Katashi to wreck this place while they invade. And by ‘trying’, I mean succeeding.” Vera cracked her knuckles. “Unfortunately, there isn’t much we can do about it.”
I tilted my head to the side. “Why not? We could go talk to Katashi. If you explain everything you just told me...”
She shook her head. “Two main problems with that. One, your own government has me under surveillance here. If I go anywhere other than my house or this office, I’m going to get arrested.”
I considered that. Elora is probably the one keeping Vera under observation. I’m a little surprised she hasn’t just had Vera arrested already — or just assassinated. Maybe Elora doesn’t want to bring this issue out into the open? I don’t know enough about the politics within the city’s leadership to speculate deeply.
I wish my mother was here. She might actually be on Elora’s side in this, if that memory crystal was any indication, but at least I could probably get some answers out of her.
Vera raised two fingers, continuing her explanation. “Two, I’m not willing to let Echion get dragged into this any further than he already has been. If I go to Katashi, he could use me to locate Echion here. I’m not okay with that.”
If Echion was already powerful enough that Vera believed he had a chance against an Emerald, I could see why even a visage might be concerned about him... and I could see why Vera wouldn’t want to give him up.
Jin spoke up, surprising me. Vera seemed startled, too. “We can get you into the tower without the government knowing. Your best chance to save yourself is cooperation.”
Vera absently scratched at the wall with her nails. “I’m still not willing to risk Echion suffering further.”
I shook my head. “Echion isn’t Katashi’s focus right now. Even if he was, I think we could convince him to make a deal. He wants his brother to be back safe. If we can convince him that this was probably an Edrian plot to conquer Valia, maybe that’ll be sufficient to turn his attention elsewhere.”
“I don’t like it. Too many uncertainties.” Vera shook her head. “I’m not going in there without a clearer plan.”
I scratched my chin. “What if we offered to teleport Echion to a safe place, where even Katashi might have a hard time finding him?”
“Can’t trust that you aren’t going to put him somewhere your own people are going to study him or hurt him.”
I considered that. “Katashi is going to come after you directly if you don’t go right now, and he’ll have an army of monsters with him. If what you want is to keep Echion safe, you want him as far from you as possible. What if we put him on a train back to Caelford?”
She rubbed her forehead. “I’d have headed back to Caelford with him by now if I could, but your government has people checking up on us. Tell you what, if you can successfully get Echion and my brother on a train to Caelford, and I’m satisfied that they’re not just going to be grabbed by your troops at the next city over, I’ll go with you to the tower.”
I vastly preferred this idea to trying to take Vera by force, even if we could accomplish it. If she cooperated, we had a better chance of talking Katashi down.
Unfortunately, this meant trying to arrange for Echion’s escape while in the company of someone I suspected was involved in the whole conspiracy. I needed to arrange this in a way that Derek wouldn’t find out where they were going.
I took a breath. “Okay. I think I can make this work. I have someone outside that can teleport us. If your brother and Echion are nearby, we can go to where they’re located and teleport a group of us straight to a train station. I don’t know what her range limit is, but she probably has enough influence to get Echion and your brother on a train without any questions being asked. Maybe even get you some fake passports if you need them. Give me a minute to make some arrangements.”
I turned to Jin. “Can you keep her company for a minute?”
Jin nodded in assent and I stepped back outside. I found the other three members of our group looking bored.
I turned to Professor Orden. “I think I’ve made sufficient arrangements, but I need to talk to you in complete privacy.”
Orden sighed dramatically. “Of course you do. Fine, fine, let’s get this over with.”
She went through her usual incantation, teleporting us into that strange void that she called a safe location.
“Well?”
I took a moment to gather my thoughts. “Okay. Long story short, she’ll go with us voluntarily if we put her brother and a child from Caelford on a train back home in a way where they won’t be discovered or stopped. Complication is that people from our government are surveilling them, as you already mentioned.”
Professor Orden chuckled. “You want us to bypass border security? Is that all?”
I didn’t know if she was laughing because that was easy or hard.
“Uh, she’d want to watch them leave, and any assurances that you could give that they’ll make it back to Caelford would be helpful...”
Orden rolled her eyes. “Give me a few hours and I can get them all the way out of Valia on my own. When we’re in the Unclaimed Lands, I’ll put them on a train. Do you want to come along?”
My curiosity said yes, but my stomach was very at odds with that instinct.
Ultimately, I decided on the responsible route, even though I knew I
was going to regret it when my seasickness kicked in. “Yes.”
“Anything else?”
I nodded.
At this point, I could have told her everything that Vera had just told me, but I knew that Professor Orden was a member of some kind of secret organization with an agenda of their own. I didn’t think she was involved, but I still didn’t completely trust her, either.
“She gave me a considerable amount of information about what happened in there and I have a strong reason to suspect that Derek might be involved in all this. I don’t think we should bring him along.”
Professor Orden’s eyes narrowed. “I’m going to need a little more than that, Corin. That’s a fairly serious accusation.”
I debated how much to say. “She witnessed Tenjin being attacked, but she wasn’t one of the people who attacked him. She described one of the attackers as a tall Emerald-level swordsman with short brown hair.”
Orden went still for a moment, and then shook her head. “That is... worrisome, I agree. I believe it would be wise to bring him along and see how he behaves, but I will take significant precautions. An Enchanter is always prepared for contingencies, but in this case, I will take extra care.”
I nodded. “I’ll be careful, too.”
Orden grinned. “I’m certain you will be.”
***
Two hours later, I stood outside a train station in the Unclaimed Lands.
It had taken ten teleports to get us here.
Professor Orden was waiting with Echion, Vera, and Aloras right near where the train was set to arrive. They were conversing about something, but I wasn’t paying much attention.
One reason was that I was feeling horribly motion sick. Teleporting with the concussion had been more painful, but ten teleports managed to be way higher on the nausea.
As I threw up into a nearby bush, though, I noticed something I’d never experienced — tiny droplets of water falling freely from the sky.
Rain.
I knew what it was intellectually, of course, and I was no stranger to water itself.
But natural rain? I’d never experienced it. I hadn’t realized that it would make the air itself feel wet, that it would make things smell stronger. Everything in the rain felt a little bit more present, more real.