Apostate's Pilgrimage: An Epic Fantasy Saga (Empire of Resonance Book 3)

by L. W. Jacobs

  Then walked across and did her business, as she had actually needed to go too. Damn soup.

  “You need to be careful with what you say,” a voice spoke behind her.

  Ella started up, pants around her ankles, striking resonance. She spun in slowed time to find Nauro a few paces behind her. The ass. She dressed herself and dropped resonance. “You did that on purpose.”

  He shrugged. “You need to remember shamans are not regular people. If I want to approach without alerting you, I can do that. As could Ollen, or Credelen, or likely any other number of them. I don’t think they’ve seen through my deadened air, but there’s nothing I can do about your foolish attempts to draw information out of them. Asking for a trade?”

  Ella shrugged her coat closer around her. “I wasn’t going to actually tell them what we knew.”

  “Still, you’re playing a dangerous game.”

  “And it’s mine to play,” Ella said, growing tired of the man’s superiority. “You are not the only one invested in this, Nauro. Nor are you likely even the most invested in it.”

  “Never doubt my investment in this,” the shaman hissed. “I have waited decades for such a chance. Many times longer than you have been alive. And I doubt such a time will come again. So disagree with me on methods if you will. But never doubt my dedication to the cause.”

  “Easy words,” Ella said, glad they were being honest now. “We’ll see when it comes time to act.”

  “I will defend Tai to the death,” he said, voice still angry.

  “As will I,” she said. “Against anyone who threatens him.” Let him interpret that how he would. “Now if you’ll excuse me.”

  She left without waiting for a response, turning her back on the snake. Could Ollen be convinced to join their cause? Even Credelen would likely be better than Nauro. They needed someone to teach them shamanism—they didn’t necessarily need Nauro. But no, the risk of revealing themselves would be too great, with no guarantee the men wouldn’t kill Tai outright.

  Not that she didn’t think Nauro would too, if he decided it was in his best interests.

  Ella struck resonance well before she reached Ollen’s camp. The man would be watching for her, probably several of them would, so it would be better to slip out here, where it was still near pitch dark, in case her figure stuttered between where she started and ended her slip.

  The world slowed, and she walked quickly to the nearest fine tent, taking care to avoid brushing anything or anyone. Fortunately, most of the men were clustered around the central table and fire, though there were a few huddled around smaller fires here. Were these the actual laborers of his camp? Or evidence of divisions among their cell?

  No matter. She pulled back the tent flap and ducked inside, hating that she couldn’t bring in light. That would be obvious, a sudden flash of light from a tent flap that shouldn’t even be open.

  The inside was dark, a few low pallets and some heavy bags arranged against one wall. Ella went to the largest of these, not much more than an outline in the darkness—curse her eyes for not adjusting. If she were a shaman she could just use her uai stream to do it, most likely. She felt only clothes in the pack, and time was passing. How long before her pause out in the dark would be noticed, or someone would see the tent door flip rapidly open and closed?

  Cursing, she went out, closed the door and peered at the few men who could see her. They didn’t seem to be reacting. Good.

  She didn’t seem to have found anything either. Bad.

  She searched the next tent, and then a third smaller one, with similar results, cursing all the while at how much time she was taking. Finally, she had to abandon the project with nothing to show for it.

  Great spy she was.

  She ran back to where she’d struck, finding her mark in the dirt, and dropped resonance, then strode back to the camp. Thank Prophets timeslipping didn’t have any kind of after effect, like the breaks for brawlers or bends for wafters.

  “Everything alright out there?” Ollen asked, his mug refilled but otherwise looking just as she’d left him.

  Did he know? Was he implying something? Nothing to do but play it straight. Which was even harder to do knowing that Nauro was watching and judging her every word.

  Too bad for him. He wasn’t going to like what was coming next at all.

  Ella sighed, sitting back down. “If you can call freezing cold alright. My charge still behaving herself?”

  Ollen cocked his head. “I don’t think she’s had lager before. But considering that, yes. Her antics make for something interesting to watch, at least.”

  Antics meaning the way the girl was draping herself all over Avery, apparently. Prophets curse it girl, just hold off a minute! “Ah, to be young again. Tell me, Ollen, have you ever been in love?”

  He started. “What?”

  “Love. Have you ever been truly in love? Ready to give your life for someone? Felt you would give anything to make them happy?”

  He shifted. “I—well yes, I suppose, once or twice. Though it didn’t last.”

  She sighed. “Mine did. Until his heart gave out, that is. That’s why I’m here, to tell you the truth.”

  Ollen took a swallow of lager. “I’m sorry. What?”

  “My husband. He died three years ago, and ever since I’ve been obsessed with scholarship on the departed. It’s how I found Nauro’s work, honestly, attending a lecture at Landley-Hafyen. You’re a religious man. Do you think there’s any truth to it?”

  Delicately now, Ella, delicately. But not so delicately he doesn’t agree to give you a revenant.

  Ollen didn’t look particularly surprised, but then the man wasn’t much for showing emotion. She pitied his partner if he ever had been in love. “That would depend on the content of the scholarship, I suppose.”

  Oho! Here we were getting somewhere. “That’s the frustrating thing—there’s no particular area of study on the departed, other than religious texts. Instead I find scraps here and there, especially in the older tomes, as if the ancients knew more than we, but the knowledge was lost, or buried. But I just—I can’t get over the idea that there’s a way to contact him, still.”

  How did one become a ninespear? Who did they accept, and why? Surely the power-hungry shamans at the top would not want their underlings to be too ambitious. Perhaps a moneyed but lovelorn Councilate flimsy would be just right.

  Ollen shifted. “You know, the Achuri believe the voices we hear are ancestors, come back to guide them through life.”

  Ella gave an indulgent smile. “Yes. And the Yati think them saints, do they not? I don’t wish to cast aspersions on your Seinjial traditions, but I have never put much stock in all those beliefs. Voices in your head are like dreams, I say: interesting but ultimately meaningless.”

  Across the fire Marea giggled, Avery gesturing at something in the night sky.

  “And yet you want to contact your husband?” Ollen asked.

  “More than anything,” Ella said, making sure to sound breathless. Should she also mention how much money she had? Surely the man appreciated money, to keep Credelen around.

  The Seinjial’s eyes twinkled in the firelight. “What if I told you his spirit was still out there somewhere, likely searching for a new home?”

  No need to feign her excitement at this. Marea, stay sober. Nauro, stay back at the guyo. This conversation was going exactly where she wanted it to. “Do you really think so? That he’s still out there somewhere?”

  Ollen smiled. “I know so.”

  “How—how can you know?” Ella gasped, playing the fool even as she thought desperately through what his game was. Did he want sex? Information on their party? Or just to lord superior knowledge over her?

  He eyed her speculatively. “Tell me, Miss Aygla, what would you give to be with him again?”

  “Anything. That’s love, as far as I’m concerned.” That part was true, at least. Prophets, ancestors, and saints send she was never parted from Tai. Which was th
e whole point—Nauro was a danger to Tai, and she couldn’t counter it until she learned shamanism. Which meant she needed a revenant. A revenant this man could give her.

  For that? She’d give a lot.

  Ollen savored her words, swirling the liquid in his mug. “I have read of ways to contact the dead. To see them.”

  Ella gasped again. “Where? Which scholars. Point me to them, sir. I will pay you anything.”

  The Seinjial shook his head, silver hair clasp glinting in the firelight. “This knowledge is not in books. It is too dangerous. Too powerful. We keep it in our memories.”

  Her heart was beating fast. Across the table Marea gave a drunken giggle, and it was all she could do not to snap at the girl. Ollen had as much as admitted he was a shaman. “And how does one—get hold of these memories? Will you give one to me?”

  He sucked in a breath.

  Stains—had she gone too far? Had she said give one when she should have said teach them?

  The silence stretched. “I would desperately like to learn,” she tried again, worry welling in her stomach. “Whatever it takes.”

  But Ollen’s face had grown cold, his fingers white-knuckled around his mug. Stains stains stains.

  “I think you and your friend should go,” he said.

  “I’m sorry,” Ella said, struggling to act the breathless fop through her fear. “Did I say something to offend you?”

  He narrowed eyes at her. “I don’t know how to take you, Miss Aygla. But I think this has been enough for one night.”

  Fear and hope roiled in her belly. Had she tipped her hand? Play it cool, Ella. “Yes. Well, I think it’s likely time for Marea to go, at any rate.”

  Marea was understandably angry and resistant, and it was just the thing Ella needed to cover up whatever had just happened. Easy to fall into the role of chaperone, to make apologies, to use Marea as excuse for leaving.

  But it wasn’t Marea that had given them away, even stumbling drunk as she was.

  No, that had been Ella. The fool.

  22

  Ella and Marea weren’t halfway across the bowl when Nauro appeared in front of them. He was furious.

  “Look, I—”

  He grabbed her arm and the wind stilled, Marea’s wobbling gait pausing suddenly under Ella’s hand.

  Ella’s eyes went wide. “What did you do?”

  “The question is what did you do?” Nauro snapped. “This is nothing. A little twist of uai so we are both in slip, instead of just me. Marea’s outside of it, so she’ll understand nothing.”

  “You can do that?” Ella asked, dread forgotten for a moment in wonder.

  “Of course. You could too, if you’d bothered to explore your own resonance. It’s your higher resonance.”

  She shook her head. “Every time I try to use my second resonance, my uai just vanishes.” Though that wasn’t true—she had used it once, the day Tai saved her from the Councilate prison. She’d given him her slip somehow. Like Nauro was doing now.

  “That doesn’t matter. We don’t have forever, even with my uai stream. Do you realize what you’ve done?”

  Ella bit her lip, all her dread turned to defiance in front of this man. “Yes. I’ve done my best to give us an option, because you refuse to give me a revenant, and I don’t trust you as far as I can spit.”

  “And in so doing turned forty shamans against us,” Nauro said. “Do you have any idea what they’re capable of?”

  “Yes,” she snapped. “The same things Tai and I could be doing, that Marea could be doing, if you weren’t intentionally holding us back. Waiting for your chance to snatch whatever power we get at Semeca’s stone.”

  “Fool girl.” She had never seen him this livid. Good. She’d rather fight than pretend to be friends. “I told you I am committed to this. That I’d do anything to protect Tai.”

  “Right. Like you told me you were a member of the Cult of the Blood. Remember that? Or that you don’t have a revenant to give me when you obviously have the one you took from our attacker? Do you see now why I might feel protective of Tai? Or have a little bit of trouble trusting you?”

  Nauro’s mouth worked. “You wouldn’t understand. Sometimes lies are necessary.”

  “Well they sure as stains don’t do much to get people to trust you. You’d think you’d have figured that out, if you’ve really been alive a hundred forty years.”

  Nauro looked over her shoulder, but the world was frozen around them. “We don’t have time for this. If Ollen decides we’re too much of a threat, the only option is to run. Even I can’t defeat this many at once.”

  Ella snorted. They were in danger and she should feel worried or sorry but she just felt furious. “You couldn’t even defeat one at once. Or have you forgotten how close that attack was back at the pass?”

  He waved a hand. “Because I wanted to take his thralls, not just kill him.”

  “So we could all be taking thralls here, if it came to that. You know what I’ve done with resonance harmonies. What Tai can do with his natural resonance. Don’t you realize the talent you’re wasting, holding us back like this?”

  “I have already taught you far too much. Shamans are not made quickly.”

  “And the longer you stretch it out, the more indebted he is to you. The more he needs you. Why would you teach him quickly? When we get to the stone you’re going to need him to stay weak, so you can take the spear for yourself. Right?”

  There. She’d said it. His eyes went wide.

  “That’s what you want, isn’t it?” she pressed. “What you’ve tried to do for a century and a half, what your whole little organization is all about? Becoming a god, or a god of ghosts at least? And then you think we’re going to believe you when you say you’d give it up because Tai is special? You’ll drop us the moment you get the chance.”

  His face had gone white with rage. “I may not love him as you do, but Tai is precious to me. Worth giving up ascension for. What he’s capable of—it’s so much more than taking the power of one arch-revenant. He could take it all.”

  But all she heard was love. “No,” she said, “you don’t love him. So whatever your end game is, taking Semeca’s power or all their powers or whatever, he’s still just a tool to you. Well I do love him. More than I could ever love power, or some self-serving goal. He’s worth more than all that.”

  Her eyes burned, and she didn’t know if it was from anger or love or something else. It didn’t matter.

  “Then you should thank me,” Nauro said quietly, a gleam in his eyes.

  Ella frowned, taken off guard. “What? What do you mean?”

  He shook his head, the only thing moving in a frozen world. “You really don’t know, do you? The cost of slipping?”

  “I—thought it didn’t have a cost.” Though a voice inside her said that was stupid. That of course it had a cost.

  “All power has a cost, girl. Brawlers have the breaks, mindseyes get the mud. And slips?”

  Dread formed in her belly, hard and heavy. “Have what,” she asked, her voice near a whisper. But she already knew. “What do we have?”

  “Oh, I think you’ve figured it out by now. All the comments about your age? People’s confusion when you tell them you’re twenty-three, but you look thirty-five?”

  “No—”

  “Timeslipping shortens your life. Every second in slip costs weeks in regular time.”

  Ella stared at him in horror. “You’re lying.”

  “Am I?” He didn’t smile, but she could see his lips twitching, the bastard. “Look at your hands. Do they look as they looked a year ago? Do they look more like Marea’s or Marrem’s?”

  She couldn’t help but look. And yes, even in the dim light, they were aged. There was no denying it.

  She looked up at him. Of all the people to tell her, it had to be him. It had to be now. A barbed knife in the wound. “I’m dying?”

  He scoffed. “Most people are dying. But yes, every time you use your resonance
, you die a little faster than the rest of us. And I’m guessing you’ve used your resonance a lot since coming to Ayugen.”

  Pain clutched her—the pain of her own death, and the pain of leaving Tai. Of losing so much time they could have shared. She’d already wasted the first part of her life, and now she was losing the rest of it, just as she’d found him?

  “How much,” she asked, voice barely a whisper. “How much have I lost?”

  “Hard to say,” Nauro said, unaffected. “Ten years? Twelve?”

  Twelve years in the last few months?

  “So you see,” he said, unperturbed, “you should be thanking me. I am as dedicated to Tai as you are, if in different ways. And when you are gone, I will still be here to take care of him.”

  When you are gone. When all this is gone. When old age claims you too soon, and you leave your school and Tai and this life you just started building behind.

  It was too cruel, too much, too awful to bear. Ella ran from the man, weeping.

  23

  In the square you find at the end of this winding lane is the Statue to Porscetta, an unusual blend of old Yersh and Brinerider artwork. Rumored to be built at the time of the fourth expansion, it is a mystery how it got here overland, and who might have created it with such a blend of traditions. Either way, it is one of the best sights in this part of the city, and just a few steps on you’ll find a delightful old Yersh bakery. I recommend the lingwal tea.

  —Arenia Melthesan, A Walking History of Aran

  The mood in the guyo was grim the next morning. Ella had been up half the night crying with Tai, and he’d been wonderful but there was no taking the edge off the truth. She was already seeing him as younger than her, and couldn’t stop thinking about when she was an old woman and he still young, and would they even be able to have kids—

  And then they had stayed up even later talking as a group about what her slip-up meant. If they should flee in the night or stay and try to brush it off. They still needed to learn what Ollen knew, and there was more to be gained from their own attempts at the stone. Feynrick had been for leaving, Nauro grudgingly for staying, Tai and Ella willing to risk it, reasoning that Ollen’s party would have attacked already if they were going to. Marea had been passed out.