Sebastian nodded calmly as he finished her sentence, “The connection between the emperor and the land.”
“Are you saying this is what you inherited?” Ciardis asked.
He nodded. “The moment the ceremony was done.”
“No wonder you looked so dazed,” she said, crossing her arms in sympathy.
“It was worth it,” he said seriously.
Ciardis’s gaze changed and then she asked, “So this is why you don’t fear Maradian?”
“It’s more than that, Ciardis,” Sebastian said as he ran frustrated fingers through his hair. “It’s a way to go up against the blutgott. It’s a way to defeat her.”
Weakly, Ciardis said, “And we need all the help we can get.”
Smiling in satisfaction, Sebastian replied, “Well, we certainly have it now.”
It was like a personal joke only the two of them got, but for the first time in a few hours Ciardis Weathervane felt hopeful. They weren’t just going off on some harebrained scheme to activate the ley lines. They had a key power at their beck and call and with the two things together, maybe even with a certain collar of Diamis as well, they stood a chance of winning this.
After a moment Sebastian opened up again. “So you see, especially in regard to Maradian, you have nothing to fear.”
Face resolute, Ciardis stepped forward and took both of his hands in hers. “Then let’s go talk to our former emperor and make sure that he knows the same.”
Sebastian looked at her askance.
Ciardis threw up her hands. “I know you know that you have this power, but does he? Does he know you could obliterate him with the blink of your eyes? If not, he should.”
“Woah, calm down, calm down,” Sebastian said while gripping at her at the waist. “We’ll make sure he knows that if he tries anything, we’ll be there to stop him.”
Ciardis laughed as she raised her hands to grip his arms. Then she leaned closer onto his chest and said, “We won’t just tell him. We’ll put the fear of the gods in him, because the moment he steps out of line he won’t have a second longer to live and I will gladly be the one to help put him back in the abyss he belongs.”
Sebastian chuckled. “There’s the Lady Companion Weathervane I’ve come to know and love. She’s not afraid of anything.”
Ciardis didn’t say anything more, she just kept leaning on his chest and listening to the soothing rhythm of his heartbeat. All the while she made plans. She knew one thing already though—she wasn’t ready to go on this mission until she was certain Maradian was putty in their hands and they weren’t playing his games. She needed to see his eyes. She needed to be sure.
12
It didn’t take them long to return to the cliff where their previous arch-nemesis waited.
When she got back, Ciardis noticed that Maradian looked a little the worse for wear. For one thing, there were bruises on his face. Bruises that were conspicuously the size of a daemoni prince’s closed fist.
Other than that he was still on his knees, but bound. Bound in heavy ropes of chains that had Ciardis wincing in sympathy at the thought of anyone bearing their weight. They looked thick enough to dock a small boat with and had to weigh at least fifty pounds. But Maradian didn’t let it break him. Or indicate any discomfort. If anything, he looked pleased.
She had to give the former emperor a hand there. Until the moment he had died, he had a way of manipulating even unfavorable situations into his favor.
Reluctantly she walked forward with Sebastian by her side, to stand judgment in front of the man who had made her life a living hell for far too long to count. To think, she had come to the imperial courts a wide-eyed and impressionable ingénue. Now she returned jaded and wary. But that is what it took to survive in Maradian’s sphere of influence. It was the way he had liked it. It kept the nobles at each other’s throats and kept the powerful off-balance enough that they couldn’t band together enough to stop his edicts from going into effect.
It was a brilliant ruling strategy—for the sitting emperor, at least.
For the successor, not so much. Sebastian had inherited a fractured court with sycophants and opponents who didn’t trust each other, let alone him. Everyone who walked what had once been the gilded hallways of the palace, which now lay in ruins due to the battles that had taken place in these same halls, was now a potential enemy at best.
Gulping as she stared down at the man who had caused such internal self-destruction she felt bile rise in her throat. But she wouldn’t let it release. Besides, they weren’t here to talk about Maradian’s past crimes as a ruler, although she would have loved to put him up through a mockery of a trial, the same way he did her mother. But she hadn’t and she couldn’t now. They needed him for one thing and one thing only.
So as she studied his face, she wondered how he’d react. React to the knowledge that Sebastian, his abandoned nephew, had consolidated his power and stepped up to rule. React to the fact that they had only revived him in order to enact a long-arcane ritual, one instituted by an empress from the Initiate Wars. One that they weren’t even sure was possible to recreate.
One that required him to sacrifice in death as he never had in life.
For Maradian’s part, he looked around at all the triumvirate’s faces with interest. He was silent, even contemplative. It unnerved her. Ciardis was sure she reeked of contempt. Sebastian’s face was stiff with barely controlled anger. And Thanar was giving off an attitude of broad indifference—she could tell by the slouch of his shoulders.
But the emperor didn’t really seem to care. The smirk that emerged on his face in fact said he was delighted. At being alive again or the sheer misery it must have taken in their lives to bring him back—she wasn’t sure. Probably a little of both.
Kneeling and shackled the emperor shrugged as best he could.
“So tell me, why am I here?” the emperor said in a cloying voice. “Because I did die. There’s no doubt about that.”
Ciardis stiffened and spoke, “For your services.”
“Services,” Maradian said in a mocking echo. “What services would that be? Don’t tell me my dear nephew has already made a mess of imperial rule, has he?”
Sebastian said coldly, “Not so much that, Uncle, as a need to do something you’ve never done.”
Maradian looked at Sebastian with dark interest and said, “And what would that be?”
“Sacrifice in the name of your people,” Sebastian said simply.
Maradian shifted on his knees as he apparently adjusted his hand. When Ciardis raised a handful of lightning quickly—certain he meant to try to escape, he almost flinched back. Almost.
Instead Maradian gave an uneasy laugh. “Be at ease, Companion, I was just trying to get more comfortable.”
“You don’t deserve comfort,” Ciardis snarled. She was still upset at the fact that they’d been forced to raise the maniac who had sent her friends and family to an early death in the first place. To see him talking, laughing, and enjoying himself was just proving too much for her to bear.
Fortunately Thanar understood her distress all too well.
Putting a calming hand on her distrustful shoulder, the daemoni prince said, “He’s bound tighter than a spring chicken sold at market, Ciardis. He can’t get out. He can’t use his magic. His only option is kneel and walk before his betters.”
Ciardis stiffened but she dropped her hand and let the lightning merge back into her mage core. She didn’t want to. She had to.
“As I was saying,” Sebastian said with a voice filled with authority, “you are here for one reason. To sacrifice. In fact, you will have a very special starring role. You will be the light that starts the fire.”
To her surprise, the only thing Maradian did was laugh as he said, “And what do I get in return?”
“A torture-free life,” Ciardis snapped. “Because I can assure you, we can get what we want from you just as well after an hour or two of one-on-one time and some broken bones.�
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With a wry shake of his head, the only thing he could move without jingling chains, the bound emperor tsked and said, “You need to get better with your threats, little companion.”
“And why would she bother to do that?” Sebastian asked.
“Well, Nephew,” the former emperor enunciated slowly, “because it seems that you in fact need me.”
“We do need you,” Thanar said coolly. “But we don’t necessarily need you speaking.”
They all heard the inference in that cold sentence. Cutting his tongue out would only be the start of Maradian’s worries in her eyes, though.
He’d already died fast; let’s see how he likes dying a slow, agonizing death, she thought ruthlessly—all sympathy for the unnatural circumstances they were putting these ley line loyalists through, gone from her mind. Facing him, anyone would be devoid of sympathy. He just made it so hard. Even bound in chains and on his knees as he was.
Maradian’s mocking gaze snapped into a scowl. “How about some respect for your ruler?”
“Former ruler,” said Sebastian stepping forward to fill the divide between the three of them and Maradian. “Now let’s talk negotiations.”
Maradian shrugged and said with a pitiful look, “That’s all I’ve been asking for.”
Before Ciardis could haul back and slap him for his insolence, Thanar dragged her a few steps away.
She whirled on him and shouted instead, “He’s dead. We’re alive. We have the upper hand. He’s in shackles.”
“Yes, I know,” Thanar said quietly.
“Then you also know,” Ciardis said without even bothering to lower her voice, “that he owes us some respect.”
“Not us,” Thanar huffed.
“I beg your pardon?” Ciardis gasped.
Thanar grasped her shoulders firmly and forcibly turned her back to look at Maradian and Sebastian.
In her mind, the daemoni prince said, This is not your battle. Let the boy handle it.
Ciardis snapped back, He’s not a boy.
As she watched Sebastian lowered himself to Maradian’s level. If was a display of respect, if not trust. Of course, she didn’t think Maradian deserved either, but to each their own and how Sebastian wanted to deal with his relative was on him. Especially if he was, as she’d ardently stated, a grown man. She at least had to acknowledge that.
But so did Thanar, she thought grumpily.
No, he’s not a boy, Thanar acknowledged mildly. He’s the emperor who must stand up to the man who, until now, has made his life a living hell. Let him handle it.
Shrugging off Thanar’s grip, Ciardis said, “Still, he needs us.”
She charged forward. This time it wasn’t the daemoni prince who halted her progress.
In a clipped tone she heard Sebastian say, “Back away. Now.”
She almost thought she misheard him, but when he turned to look over his shoulder Sebastian had a determined look on his face. And he was clearly looking right at Ciardis Weathervane. Not his guards, who’d appeared through the doorway sometime after they arrived to see Maradian kneeling in chains, but her. So she did as he requested. Moving back and back until the conversation could only be observed. Then she watched, occasionally looked over at Thanar, and then shifted her attention back to the two kneeling emperors—one current and one past. She was itching to get back into action, but she couldn’t and it had taken everything in her to agree to step aside, even reluctantly so.
As they begun to talk, Ciardis only heard a snippet or two of what they said.
At least one portion of the conversation had her wanting to fry Maradian where he knelt. But again Thanar held her back from defending Sebastian’s honor…and her own.
So she watched and listened as more conversation evolved, particularly when Maradian made no effort to be quiet about it.
“You let a daemoni kill me, boy,” Maradian crowed with mockery. “You are no man.”
Anger and pain screwed up Sebastian’s face until she was afraid the fisted hand he held tight at his waist would go straight through Maradian’s face. And she wouldn’t stop him.
The emperor was alone. Thanar and Ciardis weren’t at his back.
No one was coming to his aid. Verbally or physically. But that’s the way Sebastian wanted it. He had to be more than just a companion’s fiancé or a friend of a demented daemoni. He had to stand on his own two feet and she realized that as well.
I’m late to the party, but I’m not out of the game, Ciardis thought wryly.
And she noticed that perhaps slowly, the former emperor was noticing as well as he watched his protégé with a strange look on his face.
Chained and bound, Maradian couldn’t have been more helpless. But the angle of his shoulders and the pride on his face suggested something much different. That it wasn’t he who was bound and chained. It was his successor.
After studying Sebastian queerly for a moment, the last Emperor of Algardis threw back his head and laughed. A long, laborious guff of mirth that had Ciardis and the entire compliment of guards at her back on edge even from a distance.
Then again, maybe Maradian just doesn’t care, Ciardis thought dryly. She wouldn’t put it past him.
Besides these weren’t the actions of a cowed man. Not at all. Still Sebastian persevered on. Never once turning to look over his shoulder or getting upset in the face of Maradian’s tactics.
Instead it was Maradian who grew more and more silent. As if the mirth and laughter from before had been nothing but hot air, bravado mistaken for advantage.
When Sebastian finally returned to their sides, the former emperor’s face was even a bit pale.
When Ciardis could stand it no more, she demanded, “What happened?”
The young emperor said in a serious tone, “You know…I’m not entirely sure.”
Thanar scoffed and said, “Well if you’re not going to tell us—at least now I can leave.”
Sebastian gave an irritated wave of his hand and said, “We got what we needed. That’s all I can say. But now that I know you have plans Thanar—where precisely are you going, Prince?”
Thanar narrowed his eyes but there was nothing he could say, he had given away the fact that he had plans. They hadn’t pried it out of him.
So Ciardis and Sebastian waited patiently for him to answer the question.
Reluctantly, Thanar said, “I am heading into the field. I might even get some food while I’m there.”
Ciardis couldn’t help it. She grinned; she was hungry too.
“And?” demanded Sebastian—clearly not getting the joke.
Rolling his eyes, Thanar continued, “And by the time I’m back, the rest of the cohort will have arisen and will be ready to be transported to the ley lines to do their part in this process.”
“And just what will you be doing out there while we’re here seeing to preparations?” Ciardis demanded—fire in her eyes.
Thanar looked at her and said simply, “Taking care of what we should have done all along.”
13
“Meaning what?” Ciardis asked in exasperation.
“You know what? I don’t really care,” Sebastian said frankly. “As long as you’re not stabbing us in the back.”
“Impossible,” said Thanar.
“Now that is entirely debatable,” Sebastian said dryly. “If we need to send Raisa away with the Kasten ship, situate everything for the fight to secure the city with the rebels, make sure the palace defenses are reconstructed, and find the person who holds the collar of Diamis, how are we to get all these things done?”
Ciardis thought hard, but Thanar answered first. “The first two, you two can take care of while I’m gone.”
Ciardis shook her head in disbelief as her jaw dropped at his casual announcement.
“And the other one?” said Sebastian in frustration.
It was quite clear which one of the remaining two he meant even as tension spread throughout everyone.
She wished it was
a bit more pleasant but Thanar had thrust this on them without discussion and now it was the only thing they could focus on. Even the nobles who had made their way back seemed to be finding every excuse in the book to stick around and eavesdrop on a lightning turn of events—from casual conversations on the brightness of the moon to out-loud musings on just how old the mausoleums that surrounded them were.
Only the incredibly curious or the incredibly insane chose to stick around in a crypt when they had a reason to leave. Ciardis Weathervane chose to think of the eavesdroppers as an amusing medley of the two. Unfortunately, in this matter there was no fun in being the talk of the town. They needed to get this settled.
It wouldn’t do for gossip to spread that the three bound soulmates were bickering. Not on the eve of one of the greatest battles this empire had ever seen. They couldn’t afford to have any cracks in the seams.
Exasperated, Ciardis asked, “Will you at least do something useful while you’re gone?”
“I intend to,” Thanar said smoothly, hidden depths flashing in his eyes.
“Meaning?” asked Sebastian slowly—while clearly trying not to reach out and strangle the daemoni prince. Which would have been detrimental to both their health, because Ciardis would have beaten them to it.
“I’ll be taking care of our collar of Diamis problem as soon as I leave here,” Thanar said with his eyes in a feral mood. “I’m not leaving Seven behind to stab us all in the back while we face down this god. I know creatures like the councilmember far too well, and they always show up when you least expect it. Then I might just find the Shadow Council.”
Ciardis’s eyebrow raised high in surprise. “The Shadow Council? It’s been a long time since we spoke of them or even heard from them.”
“Not precisely true,” Sebastian said with a frown. “They did leave instructions with the Duchess of Carne to find us before her untimely death.”
“Yes,” Thanar purred. “And it was she who betrayed us.”
“She did profess until her dying breath that she hadn’t actually done so,” Ciardis said.
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