by Rachel Aaron
Eli gritted his teeth. Of course Miranda would see it that way. She would never understand what it meant to lose like that, to give up. And since Banage thought he was dead, she must, too, which gave more credence to the whole martyr story. The idea of Miranda spreading fabricated stories of his selflessness annoyed Eli so strongly that he completely missed what Banage said next.
“What?”
“I said I’m proud of you,” Banage repeated. “I’d thought you were lost to even the concept of responsibility, but it seems I was wrong.”
For several seconds, Eli just stood there, blinking. “What?”
Banage’s face darkened. “If my gratitude means so little to you, Eliton, you don’t have to accept it.”
“No, it’s not—” Eli stopped, dragging his fingers through his hair. “I just never thought I’d hear you say that.”
“I never thought I’d get the chance to say it,” Banage answered, his eyebrow arching into a skeptical glare.
Eli decided to leave it at that. Any more pushing and this bizarre world where both his parents said they were proud of him in a single day would surely shatter.
“So,” Banage said, clearing his throat. “The Shepherdess just dropped you here, did she?” He folded his arms over his chest with a glare. “What did you do, Eliton? It must have been terrible to make her so angry she’d hand you over to the Council.”
“I’m sure she thought it was,” Eli said, his voice snippy. “But I didn’t do anything except speak my mind.”
Banage made a disbelieving sound, and Eli decided it was time to change the subject. He wasn’t quite ready to throw away this strange new respect his father had for him by falling right back into their old ways.
“What are you doing down here, anyway?” he said, leaning back against the cold stone. “I’m used to jails, but they’re not the sort of place you expect to find the Rector Spiritualis. Did Sara decide it was time to get the family back together and have you kidnapped?”
Banage’s face fell, and what warmth there was in the room fell with it. “I am no longer Rector,” he said. “I refused to allow the Council to use the Spirit Court as a weapon, and for that I have been charged with high treason.”
Eli’s eyes widened. “But you were at Osera before the Council could send a fishing boat.”
“Because the Lord of the West asked for our assistance,” Banage said. “The Court fights for the good of the spirits, not because Whitefall is worried about his borders.”
Eli dropped his head and began to rub his suddenly aching temples. “No offense, but that sounds like a pretty small distinction to lose your office and go to jail over.”
“It is the small distinctions that matter, Eliton,” Banage said solemnly. “If we do not stand on our morals in all matters, small or great, then we are no longer moral men, and no longer worthy of the spirits’ trust.”
Eli sighed deeply. This was more like the Banage he remembered. “So what now? Will there be a trial, or did Sara just lock you down here and throw away the key?”
Banage gave him a flat look. “Guess.”
“Good old mom,” Eli said. “At least she’s consistent.”
“Actually, I’m pleased with the way things worked out,” Banage said. “Though I was named traitor and stripped of my position as Rector, there were issues I lacked the freedom to pursue as part of the Court. Now that I’m in disgrace, I mean to set things right.”
“Like what?” Eli said, genuinely curious.
Banage’s eyes drifted up to the darkness above them. “Do you know how the Ollor Relay works, Eliton?”
Eli arched an eyebrow at the sudden change of subject. “You speak into one ball, sound comes out the other.”
“I meant how it really works,” Banage said with an exasperated sigh. “How it moves sound like that?”
“No,” Eli said. “But that’s kind of the point of a state secret. Why, do you?”
“No,” Banage said softly, lowering his eyes until he met Eli’s again. “Not for sure. But before Sara and I were married, she showed me, just once, how she made a point.”
“She always was a show-off,” Eli said with a shrug.
Banage laughed. “At least you come by it honestly.”
When Eli refused to dignify that with a response, Banage continued. “You saw the tanks above us?”
Eli nodded. How could he have missed them? The cylindrical tanks filled the cave beneath the citadel like the eggs of some enormous insect.
“Each of those tanks is one Relay point,” Banage said. “Every Relay point is really three parts: two orbs, one that’s kept by the Council, usually by Sara, and another that’s out in the field, and the tank is the third part. It lies in the middle, connecting the other two. Words spoken in one orb echo through the tank to the other, allowing communication across any distance.”
“Come on,” Eli scoffed. “I’m no Shaper, but even I know that can’t be how the Relay works. For words spoken in one end to be heard through the other, the orbs and the tank would all have to be part of the same spirit, and that’s impossible. I mean, maybe if you were working with a very large, very strong water spirit and you were a Shaper with a deep understanding of Spirit Unity, you could possibly divide the water into three separate vessels and still keep it as one spirit for a few minutes, but it would never work long term. A spirit separated becomes two spirits. That’s a fact of reality. If you pour a water spirit into two blue marbles and a tank, you’re going to end up with three spirits. It’s just how the world works. Claiming otherwise is like saying rocks fall up when you drop them.”
Banage shrugged. “Then you tell me. How does she do it?”
“I don’t know,” Eli said. “It’s probably some kind of stupid trick. Or maybe she’s got a Great Spirit on the line.” She was egotistical enough to try it.
“She can’t,” Banage said, shaking his head. “No Great Spirit would let itself be used like that willingly, and the only Enslaver who ever kept one longer than a few hours was Gregorn. But whatever she’s doing, she’s hidden it very well. I’ve been looking into the Relay discreetly for years. Every time I came down here, I tried to question the tanks, but I never heard a thing back. It’s like the entire cavern is asleep.”
Eli remembered the strange, thick silence and shuddered. “Still, that’s good,” he said. “If they’re asleep, then you know she’s not Enslaving anything.”
“I almost wish she was,” Banage said darkly. “Enslavement is straightforward. Enslavement I could end right now. But I don’t understand what Sara’s doing, or how, and that makes me afraid.”
“If you’re so worried about it, why didn’t you stop her before?” Eli said. “I thought protecting spirits from abusive humans was what Spiritualists did.”
He stopped there, bracing for the explosion that always came whenever he criticized the Court, but Banage just ran his hand over his tired eyes.
“I’ve asked myself that many times,” he said quietly. “At first I did nothing because she was my wife and I was sure she’d tell me eventually. Later, I did nothing because I was furious and wanted to keep you away from her. And then, when I became Rector, I still did nothing because the Spirit Court needed the Council of Thrones. I have lived with this growing guilt for twenty-six years now, Eliton, but for all my excuses, the truth was that I still loved her. Despite everything, I couldn’t look at her without remembering the brilliant girl she’d been, and I could not bring myself to believe she would do something truly awful, even as the evidence of it became overwhelming.”
He stopped there, his face hidden behind his hand. Eli bit his lip. He’d never seen his father like this. Banage never got emotional. He shifted back and forth, wondering if he should say something, but before he could think up anything good, Banage resumed his story.
“When the Empress returned, I thought I’d found my chance at last,” he said, lowering his hand with a sharp breath. “The Council needed the Court desperately. I thought I fina
lly had the leverage to force Sara to open up. I thought surely, surely whatever she’d done to make the Relay couldn’t be so bad she’d risk losing the Court’s support during a national emergency to keep it hidden. But it was. Whatever secret she’s keeping down here, she needed it more than she needed me.”
He raised his head, and Eli was surprised to see that his father’s face was calm and determined. “But things are different now,” Banage said. “As Rector, I had everything to lose. Now I have nothing, not even the duty a husband owes to his wife. Sara and I have nothing left between us but the truth, and the truth, Eliton, is that there is right and wrong in this world, and even Sara with all her brilliance cannot escape justice forever.”
Now it was Eli’s turn to drop his head. “How are you still this arrogant?” he muttered. “Just because she won’t show you her experiments, you let yourself get captured thinking you’re going to shine the righteous light on her sins?” He glowered at his father. “Powers, old man, you don’t even know if she’s actually doing anything wrong. You just assume she is because she won’t share her secrets with you. Maybe she’s just tired of your lectures, ever think of that?”
“Don’t take that tone with me, Eliton,” Banage said, his voice full of the old warning. Eli nearly climbed the ladder right then just to get away from him. But when Banage kept going, his voice had softened again with that strange tenderness.
“You’re right, though,” he said. “Had I been a braver man, I would have found out the truth of the Relay years ago. But I was a coward. A coward and a fool, clinging to forsworn promises under the cover of duty.”
He looked at Eli, and his face broke into a sad smile. “One of my many failings, as I’m sure you can tell me. But though you call me arrogant, believe this. There would be no greater joy in my life than to find out I’m wrong. Wrong about the Relay, about your mother, about everything. That’s why I chose to leave the Court and let the Council take me as a traitor. I still hope to find out I’m mistaken, you see.”
“And what if you’re not,” Eli said, his voice barely more than a whisper.
Banage’s expression grew hard as iron. “Then I will do what I must, and I will do it myself. I owe her that much. Whatever wrongs Sara has done, I loved her once. And besides”—that sad smile returned—“she gave me you.”
Eli looked away and kept his mouth shut. The room fell into a deep, deep silence, punctuated only by their breathing. But Eli was never one for silence, and less than a minute later he couldn’t help but ask the other question that had been weighing on his mind.
“So,” he said, leaning back, “if you’re here, who’s running the Court?”
“I gave it to Miranda,” Banage said.
Eli gaped at him. “You what?”
“I had very little time,” Banage said in a measured voice. “Sara was coming to arrest me and I had to do something to keep Hern’s faction from—”
“You threw her to the wolves!” Eli shouted. “Miranda’s cut from the same goody-goody moral idiot cloth as you. They’ll eat her alive for trying to claim the title of Rector. Why didn’t you just leave it to some power-hungry Tower Keeper? Then at least you’d tie their lust for power to the Court’s preservation and Miranda would be free to keep helping Slorn or saving puppies or whatever other high-and-mighty missions you’ve lined up. But no, you just gave her the ring and sent her in, didn’t you? And she’s duty bound enough to keep charging straight ahead even if it kills her, just because you asked.”
He stopped and waited for Banage to get angry, but the former Rector just dropped his head.
“I thought about that, actually,” he said. “Miranda has family of her own, but I think of her very much as my daughter. I knew giving her the Rectorship would put her in danger, especially in times like these, but I had to do it for the good of the Court. In any case, even if I had appointed some ‘power-hungry Tower Keeper’ as you suggest, she’d never stand aside and let him turn us into an arm of the Council. Even if I’d ordered her to keep her head down, she’d fight all the way. It’s her nature.”
Eli rolled his eyes. That was certainly true. Counting on Miranda not to go butting her nose in where she shouldn’t was like betting on a bottomless boat not to sink. Still. “You should have been more careful,” he scolded. “She’d just lost a spirit. Couldn’t you have given her a little time off?”
“She wouldn’t have taken it if I did,” Banage said. “Miranda’s stronger than you think. She’ll do the right thing.”
“I don’t doubt that at all,” Eli grumbled. “What I question is her ability to not get herself killed along the way.”
“She’s survived so far,” Banage said. “Have a little faith in the girl, Eliton.”
Eli huffed and leaned back against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest as he stared up into the dark. They’d been talking for a while now. Well long enough for Sparrow to get bored and move on if he had decided to lurk. Time to get to work.
“Well,” he said, standing up, “lovely as this little father-son bonding session has been, I’ve just managed to escape the Shepherdess, and I don’t mean to spend my freedom rotting in a cell.”
Banage looked up. “What are you going to do?”
Eli smiled and held up four fingers. “Find Josef and Nico.” He folded one down. “Find out what the Shepherdess is up to.” He folded the next. “And find out how to get out of her way.” Down went the third. “First rule of thievery,” he said with a wink. “Don’t be a hero. Of course, before I can do any of that”—he wiggled the fourth and final finger at his father—“I’m getting out of here.”
Banage laughed out loud. “Impossible. Sara had this place put together specifically to keep powerful wizards under control. Look around.” He held out his arms, sending the flickering light dancing over the rough stone walls. “This rock isn’t part of the Tower. It’s a separate bedrock spirit, and it’s so deep asleep I don’t think we could wake it up even if we both stood here for days with our spirits wide open. So that’s the walls, as for the door…”
He pointed up into the dark where a silver gleam was barely visible in the candlelight. “It’s solid steel, Shaper-made, and deathly loyal to Sara. You’ll never get it open. If I had my rings it would be another story, but alone like this…” Banage sighed deeply. “The only way out is to wait for Sara to slip up.”
“Or Enslavement,” Eli said, craning his neck back.
Banage went rigid. “Eliton!” he cried. “Don’t you dare even think—”
“Relax,” Eli said. “I’ve never Enslaved anything, and I don’t mean to start now. I wouldn’t need to anyway. This looks pretty straightforward.”
Banage stared at him, aghast. “Did you hit your head on the way down? I told you, I tried everything. This is a wizard prison designed by the most brilliant wizard inventor of our age, maybe ever. There’s no way out.”
Eli laced his fingers together and stretched his hands, popping his knuckles one by one. “Just who do you think you’re dealing with?” he said, flashing his father an impossibly smug grin. “I’m Eli Monpress, the greatest thief in the world.”
And with that, he started to climb the iron rungs hand over hand, leaving Banage staring dumbfounded as he vanished into the dark.
Twenty minutes later, Eli was starting to wish he had been a little less cocky. He was hanging upside down under the circular door, knees looped over the second rung of the metal ladder for support while his hands ran over the door’s overlapping rings of polished steel. Each ring was fitted so tightly into the next he couldn’t get so much as a fingernail between them. What’s more, the door, though obviously awake, wasn’t responding to polite inquiries.
For a terrified moment, Eli had thought that he’d lost his touch. That Benehime had actually been right and the spirits really had paid attention to him only because of her mark. But then he’d seen the door twitch almost like it was turning up its nose after one particularly entreating prod, and Eli had come
to a new conclusion: This door was a jerk.
“Come on,” Eli whispered, careful to keep his back to Banage, who was waiting expectantly below. “I just want to talk to someone with some sense. Don’t leave me alone with him.”
The door pressed itself more firmly into the stone and began to emanate a silence so saturated with smug superiority it almost made Eli gag. He flopped back, dangling from the wall by his knees so the door wouldn’t have the privilege of seeing him fume. This just made the door cinch down tighter with a haughty clink, and Eli gritted his teeth. Yep, definitely a jerk door.
He was working up the will to try again when he heard the door tremble against the stone. Quick as a monkey, Eli dropped, swinging down the ladder to land at Banage’s side. The second his feet hit the ground, something hit the door with a resounding clang, and the metal swung open.
Banage stared at the opening door, and then his eyes flicked to Eli, wide with wonder. “You weren’t just bragging,” he whispered. “That was amazing.”
Eli shook his head. “As long as I’ve waited for such a compliment, I’m afraid that wasn’t me. Look lively, I think we’ve got a bird.”
As though on cue, Sparrow’s head appeared above them. “Sorry to interrupt family time,” he called cheerily. “I need Banage the younger. Quickly, please.”
Eli crossed his arms. “What’s my motivation?”
“Well,” Sparrow said, “if you don’t come up on your own, I can always go get Sara and let her think up a way to get you out.”
Eli grimaced. He had no interest in being on the receiving end of Sara’s creativity. With a long-suffering sigh, he shimmied up the ladder once more. Sparrow’s hands met him at the top, gathering Eli’s wrists together and deftly tying them behind him with a supple length of steel cord.
To Eli’s surprise, Sparrow wasn’t alone this time. Two guards in the Whitefall family’s personal dress stood a short distance away, staring at the surrounding forest of tanks with obvious discomfort.