by T. A. Miles
“I apologize for the lateness, but there’s been an urgent discovery,” Irslan explained.
Konlan’s expression faltered. Honestly, he looked exhausted. “Urgent in what way?”
“My uncle has taken his leave of his prison, for one,” Irslan explained. “And for another, it would appear that his past communications with the Vassenleigh Order were corrupted.”
Konlan frowned with interest. “Corrupted?”
Irslan nodded. “Either that or he’d abandoned his senses.”
His friend seemed to consider the information for a moment, then invited Irslan to accompany him from the parlor. Irslan went with him through the shared door which led to the study. Along the way, Konlan said, “You’ll forgive me for pointing out that I believed it was established that your uncle had abandoned his senses. That was why Tahrsel put him away.”
“Yes, yes,” Irslan said, somewhat wearily as he was now tired of considering the possibility. “To protect others and himself, but we both know there was some retaliation involved on Tahrsel’s part.”
“We do?” Konlan replied, and it surprised Irslan a little to hear that.
“Well...” Irslan hesitated, particularly as they came to the study chairs and his friend passed a look over his shoulder that seemed to suggest there was nothing to discuss on the subject. Still, Irslan insisted, “Yes.”
With a mildly vexed quirk of the lips, Konlan invited him to sit.
“Konlan,” Irslan began.
His friend gestured to the chairs again, insisting that Irslan take one, which he did, but not without an irritated frown of his own.
“Something to drink?” Konlan asked in the process of going to get one.
Irslan shook his head while he contemplated his sudden feeling of antagonism in his current situation, but he accepted the offer anyway with a simple, “Thank you.”
Konlan set about pouring them each something. He waited until he had completed the task—perhaps to give Irslan a moment to compose his thoughts—before speaking again. Bringing the glasses over and handing one to Irslan, he said, “Your uncle is escaped.”
Irslan accepted the drink and the statement with a nod.
“You’re beside yourself now with a sudden sense of inaction,” his friend said next, drawing Irslan’s gaze up to him. “You’ve put off doing anything on behalf of your uncle—by his wishes, no doubt—for the last twenty years, but now he’s active again and you wish to be as well. You feel remiss for having not acted sooner.”
Irslan considered Konlan’s assessment. Of course, it seemed perfectly reasonable. Setting his drink aside, Irslan said, “But it’s more than that. I’ve read his journals.”
“Journals?” Konlan inquired, not quite as lightly as it seemed when he punctuated the inquiry with a sip from his glass.
“Yes,” Irslan continued. “He’d left several for me to discover. Why he didn’t have Stacen simply give them to me immediately, I...”
“Stacen?” Konlan interrupted. “That quiet, odd fellow under your employ?”
Stacen’s manner was irrelevant, Irslan decided and dismissed the question with a simple nod. “He was under instruction from Vaelyx to present the journals to me...apparently whenever the time was considered appropriate. Or maybe the instructions had been pending until Vaelyx lately made good his escape and was able to properly relay them.”
“Or could it be that Stacen is involved in some conspiracy of his own?”
The suggestion caused Irslan to audibly scoff. “Stacen? The man’s been a friend of my family since I was a boy.” As he spoke the words, Irslan regretted their parting earlier and hoped the man would come back when circumstances had quieted somewhat. Thinking about it, he was certain that Stacen would have gone to find Vaelyx, as his loyalty had begun with Irslan’s uncle and father. Perhaps he should have simply dismissed the man, then followed him.
“How much do you actually know of him?” Konlan persisted.
Irslan dismissed the topic. “No, Konlan. I firmly believe that you’re mistaken in that. Whatever conspiracy exists in this city, a man like Stacen is not the instigator, nor is he a danger. I refuse to believe that.”
Konlan surrendered with a shrug and a space of silence.
Before that silence could carry too far, Irslan said, “In his writing my uncle seemed to believe that you made yourself an obstacle between him and Tahrsel.”
Konlan looked at him, and it was in that moment where his gray-green eyes sat directly with Irslan’s gaze and his mouth tensed just so…and where he blinked, looked elsewhere and deliberately swallowed some of his drink that Irslan realized the statement had been made experimentally. He’d seen what he wanted to see. He felt like he had new vital information of some kind, but he was unsure how to decipher it just yet, or even what he should do with it. In the extended stillness that passed, he wondered if he’d really only succeeded in offending his friend, and if he should leave.
“Your uncle and I,” Konlan began, holding Irslan to his seat, “have never seen eye to eye. I will admit that to you now, Irslan. You know that Raiss and I are family. I’ve always looked up to my cousin and as a very young man I wanted to become like him—stern and determined, yet adventurous and charismatic. From the perspective of a very young man, I felt that Vaelyx stepped in and stole my cousin from me, who was like a brother. I have to say that it poisoned our relations somewhat.”
Irslan listened patiently, believing that he was hearing truth from his friend. It made him regret what he said to some extent, though this was something he now felt that he should have heard long ago.
Again, Konlan lifted his shoulders. “But Raiss never disregarded me. He appointed me with station and has always listened to my concerns.” He gestured to Irslan with his glass. “Our concerns. For Indhovan...for the Islands...for peace and a prosperous future.”
“Which my uncle was also after,” Irslan pointed out.
Konlan nodded. “Yes, but he served the Old Kingdom. He was an Alliance informant first.”
Irslan failed to see how that mattered at first, but reminded himself of the isolationist theories of some of his fellow activists. “You also welcomed the Vassenleigh Order’s agents,” he said. “You admitted at our last meeting that it was time to reach outside of our local resources and accept help willingly from the priests.”
Konlan seemed to hesitate with the way he nodded and said, “I did.”
Somehow that offended Irslan. “Why do I feel as if you’re not helping them?”
With halting abruptness, Konlan threw his glass onto the floor and shouted, “I am doing all that I can! I want them to get those demons out of this city! If you don’t care to believe me because of some toxic notion your servant has put under your skin, then you can get out of my house.”
Irslan had never seen his friend erupt like that. He wished he knew what was actually unnerving him. He wished he believed that they shared the same stress...but he didn’t. “I’m trying to repair our mistake, Konlan. At some point, we’ve failed to do what we set out to do. We tried taking matters into our own hands. We’ve been dwelling on a bridge between the past and the future and we’re not letting anyone across...we’re hindering their passage with our stubbornness and our ideals that are—whimsical folly!”
He put volume into the end of his statement as Konlan began shaking his head in argument.
“No,” Konlan said squarely. “We’ve been utilizing tradition to forge a path into a mature and reasonable culture for all of us. The only way that this war will end is if we step away from our reliance on the precise thing priests and demons have been fighting over.”
“Our souls?” Irslan replied, which seemed to halt Konlan in his thoughts. “I know what’s at the core of all of this. And now I wonder why I’ve been acting as if I don’t. Sadly, I feel as if I’ve been confused, willingly, by my own wont for progr
ess—for personal progress, away from the depressing fact that my father and uncle both gave their lives for this war. That should have emboldened me...given me the drive to be an active part of the Alliance, but instead I’ve tried to exist with one foot outside of it as I allowed myself to be lured away.”
“You’re speaking nonsense,” Konlan decided. He drew in a breath and resumed the poise Irslan had always known him for. “It’s late. You’ve made a jarring discovery about your uncle and you want to help him. It’s understandable. Go home and rest, Irslan.”
Irslan hesitated to be dismissed, but at the same time he believed it would be better if he left. Something in Konlan’s behavior and his attitude—the attitude he’d always had and which Irslan had never thought to study or question—instilled distrust and a sense of betrayal that was just beginning to sting.
The pier was less abandoned than the city proper. The sort of business that went on in relation to the ships was apparently not to be halted by suspicion, or even blatant evidence, of demonic activity.
Vlas stood at the end of the dock with Imris nearby, watching the dock workers and ship hands tending to their affairs as men and women who understood time as a commodity over a luxury. Vlas and his own peers had a similar understanding. They slept when they could afford to and not until. Granted, the priests’ understanding of years was much different.
His eyes caught one group with particular interest. He was certain he may have recognized a face or two from Konlan’s meeting among a handful of men lingering beside a ship of considerable size. He just began to consider what they may have been up to when someone caught his arm while walking past.
“This way,” came the unmistakable voice of Vaelyx Treir.
Vlas turned as the man’s touch directed, watching him for a few paces before looking back to meet Imris’ gaze. Silently, they communicated their mutual intent to accompany their unlikely guide and did so.
“This area seems awake,” Vlas noted aloud.
“It always has been,” Vaelyx answered, tossing the words succinctly over his shoulder. “All the easier to find victims.”
Yes, it would be.
“I noticed men preparing to board one of the larger ships,” Vlas said next. “Would they also be headed for the Islands, I wonder?”
“On a ship that large, they’re going further,” Vaelyx answered. “Up the coast maybe.”
Instantly, the idea sparked a hope in Vlas that the governor may have been sending reinforcement north after all. Or perhaps some of those still allied with the Old Kingdom were taking the care and initiative to act on their own.
Still, Vlas loathed the idea that men would be going into the situation completely uncounseled on the present circumstances. Though it happened frequently. They couldn’t be everywhere at once and they weren’t able to be present for every action soldiers and their leaders made. It was much easier when they made some attempt to communicate, however.
Ceth and Ashwin had coordinated advisors and informants everywhere they could reasonably situate them, yet the front demanded most of their attention. They’d had to abandon other tasks, such as actively searching for the Ascendant. There were times when Vlas believed that everyone except Ashwin had long ago given up finding any remaining blood relation; that they had either been entirely killed off as a bloodline or they’d diluted themselves to such a degree that they would no longer stand out to anyone looking.
Vlas had to wonder himself if they wouldn’t simply be called to their station—if it was indeed a station they were meant to have—the same as priests were. Ashwin had always assured him that it was different with that family, because they weren’t priests themselves...they were a family in tune with the Spectrum in a unique way, as if the gods intended them to be custodians of the power in the physical world in another application, not as practitioners of magic, but as observers and mediators. Mediators between ordinary humans and priests or between the gods and everyone else, Vlas couldn’t be certain. It was a subject he didn’t often allocate any time to considering.
The matter was set aside yet again when Vaelyx stopped at the edge of a narrower dock looming in the shadow of a stone wall. A solitary vessel that could easily be manned by one person sat tethered to a pole, which also served as a roost for a night fisher. The bird scarcely shifted its position when Vaelyx moved past in hopping down into the boat.
And now Vlas had to pause, at least for a moment. He’d never been on the water. He’d barely been in the water, for that matter, beyond bathing.
Imris, on the other hand, moved readily to the edge of the dock and idly accepted the hand Vaelyx offered when she stepped aboard. She turned around when her feet were placed and extended a hand to Vlas. He looked at it, and at her, and at the boat. The vessel could have been smaller. Capsizing wasn’t a concern, if he truly had a concern at all.
It was in the midst of debate that Vaelyx stated in the most mundane tone conceivable, “We’re not getting there any faster with you stood on the dock directionless as a liberated crustacean.”
Vlas couldn’t even begin to picture the reference made, or himself in that moment.
When Imris offered her hand again, he took it and stepped down. It was a longer step onto a surface that was not entirely unsteady, but that wasn’t steady at the same time. His grip on Imris’ hand firmed enough that she felt it necessary to bring her other hand to his side. He assured her with a tight smile that he was fine and ignored the casual look of questioning and perhaps some impatience on Vaelyx’s face.
“How far away are the Islands?” he asked their host.
“It depends on which one you’re going to,” Vaelyx answered, gathering up the mooring line. “The one we’re headed to...we’ll arrive in about a couple hours. It sits closer to the coast, the first stepping stone of nine that form all of the Islands together.”
Vaelyx looked at him, his heavy brow lifting with that casual effort that, on closer inspection, signified that the man was actually very tired. “What’s there has already been found,” he said ominously. “You’re going to help me bury it.”
Vlas looked over at Imris, who was already looking at him, that tone of severity and dissatisfaction in her uniquely colored eyes. He shared the sentiment.
Sixteen
The descent was testing Korsten’s arm strength. Probably not Merran’s so much, with Endurance as one of his prominent talents. Looking up into their combined Lantern glow at his partner, he saw him moving along at an even pace, showing no visible signs of strain. In moments like this, Korsten better understood Merran’s long-standing role as an active hunter for the Vassenleigh Order. The man was damned near inexhaustible.
Korsten looked down again into darkness. He felt as if they’d traveled the length of Indhovan’s waterfall by now, if not further. He understood that his mind was probably exaggerating somewhat, given the circumstances, but that didn’t quell the sensation of a bottomless hole boring through the earth beneath him.
With a sweeping hand gesture, he guided his Lantern down. He anticipated watching it descend as Merran’s had earlier—until he couldn’t maintain its light and had to draw it back up. When the glow actually expanded against a surface he felt a mild surge of relief. “There’s a landing,” he announced for Merran’s benefit.
They continued down in silence. At the bottom, Korsten stepped off and away from the ladder, keeping his Lantern near his hand while he looked about the space.
The walls were roughly carved rock in an uneven cylindrical shape. It seemed to serve no purpose in its featureless simplicity. He could feel air moving through the vertical passage, however, so there must have been an outlet.
As Merran was hopping down onto the stone behind him, Korsten’s Lantern passed over a squared archway. Korsten directed his attention to it and received an acknowledging nod, followed by Merran returning his gaze upward the way they had come.
/> “Energy flow is strong here,” Merran observed. “We may be able to use that to our advantage.”
“How?” Korsten asked, looking up first and then at his partner, whose expression so rarely revealed anything that he wondered sometimes why he even bothered. Except that he knew too well that he had simply come to appreciate Merran’s face in all of its stoicism.
“If we could utilize the increased flow to augment a Fire spell, it would potentially incinerate the vessels,” Merran explained.
“And potentially leave us with a pit full of disembodied demons,” Korsten pointed out. He couldn’t say he liked the idea. “We don’t know enough about the vessels and whether or not they’ll be strengthened by destroying them. They’re peculiar, but they’re not bloodless. It crossed my mind that these odd forms could be crafted somehow of something inanimate, but it wouldn’t serve the Vadryn to occupy something that didn’t sustain or nourish them. A hollow shell would be tantamount to occupying a log, save for the mobility.”
Merran looked at him, listening in the way that Merran did; with a very precise silence that let one know he was hearing every word. His eyes narrowed as he contemplated those words and he eventually gave his gaze to the opening far above them once again. He was reshaping his plan.
Korsten allowed him the time to do so, though he did want to remind him of one thing that confirmed the fact that the demons’ vessels were a source of physical vitality. “I can feel their movements.”
The demons had found many avenues which paralleled the path above. As he and Merran guessed, they had found a point of convergence and were doubled back to intercept. They would find this place soon. It was an advantageous place—Merran was right—with only one exit and the entrance relatively narrow.
Personally, Korsten would have preferred it if they could have lured the demons in and sealed off both ends, keeping them until they had a better understanding of what their opponent had devised in these vessels that were neither human nor animal, but that still lived. A Barrier would be difficult to cast at both ends, without trapping one of them inside and that, of course, could only be disaster.