When Thuja gave the sign to rise, Dracaen once again assumed pride of place and addressed the rebels. “Kalina!” he called out, loud enough to startle her. “You must reach out to Genevre. You must call to her. You must ask her to bring Ilex and Melia back to Flaw dimension.”
Kalina could not respond. Perhaps the absence of the Dragonblood Stone was affecting her ability to process information. Had she heard Dracaen correctly? Had he suggested that Genevre was in contact with Ilex and Melia? She grimaced as she realized that once again he had withheld information from her. Or perhaps she had simply not thought to put the pieces together. Genevre had trained with the Rebel Branch under Ilex and Melia’s mentorship for decades. They had likely remained Genevre’s outside world contacts — her means of access to knowledge about Council dimension. Then the entire plan became suddenly clear. Dracaen needed Ilex and Melia to open the breach. If Kalina wanted to survive, wanted to be able to make the choices she had so urgently anticipated just hours ago, she would have to comply.
She stepped forward then, not because of Dracaen but because of Thuja. If Thuja could sacrifice herself for the good of all dimensions, then certainly Kalina could play her part.
Santa Fe — Summer 1914
Before Ilex and Melia appeared with Saule on Genevre’s doorstep, Genevre had been sitting at her dining table rolling a fragment of the Dragonblood Stone back and forth over the wooden surface as if trying to imprint the wood with the stone. She had no intention of damaging the table or the fragment; her movement was merely an unconscious nervous gesture. Her fingertips burned slightly. At first, she wondered if the sensation had been caused by the antique cinnabar ink in which the fragment had been hidden. It had, of course, coated her fingertips when she fished the fragment out of the thick paste. Its stains still lingered. But no matter how often she had had cinnabar or vermilion inks on her hands and fingers in the past, she had not once experienced this reaction. She realized shortly thereafter what this unorthodox sensation meant: the Dragonblood Stone itself had been compromised. Remota Macula.
Frightened, she held the fragment tightly and thought through her options. At first, she contemplated going to the stronghold portal ground that she had used last year with Thuja and Larix. She could sit on the nearby bench and wait for a rebel to emerge. But even as she began to gather belongings for the trip, she realized the futility of this plan. She doubted any of the portals to Flaw dimension would still be active under the circumstances. This realization made her fear for everyone within the dimension. The entire Rebel Branch may well be trapped, all portals rendered inactive the moment the Flaw vanished from its cavern. Of every rebel she had ever known, she, of course, feared most for Kalina. How could Genevre have abandoned her daughter yet again? She should have remained in Flaw dimension and attempted to create another child as companion to the first. Yes, she would have had to watch the second child’s homunculus twin die, as she had her first created son. But Kalina would have had a sibling with whom she could create the most potent alchemy in the universe. Surely, together, two alchemical children would have a better chance of restoring the Flaw than one child alone.
Perhaps she could seek out Ilex and Melia. They in turn could seek out one of their Council contacts. They hadn’t spoken to her in months — since the day she had finally told them the truth about creating an alchemical child with Dracaen. But Genevre’s desperation called for equally desperate measures. Perhaps she could convince them to set aside their misgivings. Despite their anger at both Dracaen and her, they must nonetheless care about others within the Rebel Branch. They had, after all, worked with various rebels over the years. Would they not be willing to save their rebel colleagues from being trapped within Flaw dimension? Would they not be willing to help Genevre save her daughter even if they had shunned her for the very act of creating Kalina? Had they not mentored Genevre for decades — trained her to be one of the best outside world scribes the rebels had ever known? Perhaps the intervening months and the removal of the Flaw would together convince Ilex and Melia to forgive her. Genevre could only hope they would seek her out in order to attempt to save themselves and others. Why would either of them want to risk becoming One with everyone when they could barely stand being one with each other?
Genevre jumped, alarmed. She heard a noise outside just as she also received a startling jolt from the Dragonblood fragment. She stood up, manoeuvred the fragment into the hemline of her skirt, and moved towards the door. Instead of extinguishing the lights, she lit another. She wanted to ensure that whoever approached would realize she was home. She heard footsteps. As the people moved closer to the house, she understood that her hope had been met. Ilex and Melia had come to find her after all.
She unlatched the door and ushered them in, surprised to see that they were not alone. The stranger was named Saule. She was a Lapidarian Scribe of the Alchemists’ Council. Apparently Ilex and Melia had been friends with her for years and had arranged to meet outside a temporary portal in Santa Fe if the Council ritual was successful. They had spoken in detail on the walk to Genevre’s. They now had a plan. They required Genevre’s assistance to breach Flaw dimension. More specifically, they required her Dragonblood fragment. If used together with the fragment carried by Ilex and Melia, they may be able to be transported through a temporary portal. If successful, if they managed to open a portal to Flaw dimension, Saule would help the rebels breach Council dimension.
Genevre stared at Saule. She did not look like a Council traitor. Then again, what did she expect a traitor to look like? After all, Genevre had not changed her own appearance after being accused of treason by the rebels.
“Where do we begin?” Genevre asked. “Even if our fragments are able to work together as a means of transport, we have little time to scour the country for a temporary portal ground.”
“We need not seek portal ground. We need only to remain outdoors with our fragments in close proximity to one another,” said Ilex.
“I don’t understand,” said Genevre. “Can our fragments create a portal now that the Flaw in the Stone has been removed?”
“No,” replied Ilex. “We can only assume the rebels themselves will attempt to contact those whom they know possess fragments of the Dragonblood Stone in the outside world — the only bits of the Stone that now remain in the aftermath of the Remota Macula. If they call to us, you should be able to hear.”
“Dozens of fragments exist in the world. Will they call to each inheritor individually?”
“No, Genevre,” began Melia. “Only a certain call could be successful at this time of crisis. And only you could be successful at hearing it.”
“Why would I be chosen to receive the call — an outside world scribe who purposely abandoned Flaw dimension? Perhaps you—”
“You are the only possible one, Genevre. I have come to understand as much tonight,” said Melia.
“You are the only possible one,” repeated Ilex. “The cry can hold only one intention, one element that will allow it to break through dimensional space.”
Genevre looked closely at Ilex, whose face fluctuated rapidly with that of Melia. She then focused on Saule, who wore a pained expression that reflected their apprehension.
“What element?” Genevre asked, turning from Saule to Ilex and Melia once again.
“The cry must be pierced through and through with love.”
“Dracaen does not love me. He merely needed me, time and again.”
“And once again, Dracaen needs you. But he will not be the one to call to you, Genevre. He would have no reason to believe you would answer. Only one person loves you enough to seek you out. Only one person can forgive your abandonment.”
A shiver overcame her. Genevre now understood what Melia was avoiding uttering in Saule’s presence. She understood too that Ilex and Melia had forgiven her. Without her ability to hear the cry, they could not enter Flaw dimension no matter how many Drag
onblood fragments they possessed. No one in the world would be able to hear Dracaen call across dimensions. But, without doubt, Genevre would inevitably, eternally hear a cry from her daughter.
Flaw Dimension — Summer 1914
“I am the Blood of the Dragon!” called Dracaen, fists clenched, wrists crossed.
“I live as the Flaw in the Stone!” replied the rebels, uncrossing their wrists, holding their fists up, parallel to their shoulders.
Kalina opened the gate in the wrought-iron barrier that had surrounded the Dragonblood Stone. As the gate clanged shut behind her into its locking mechanism, she shivered. Now the barrier surrounded nothing at all — an empty space that left no trace of its former sacredness. Kalina stood in the centre of this absence to perform a task that, according to Dracaen, she alone could perform. All usual portals had been sealed the moment the Dragonblood Stone had disappeared. Thus were the rebels trapped within the rapidly faltering Flaw dimension. Thus had they been condemned to death by a Council who sought their own eternal salvation.
To survive, she must do as Dracaen instructed. To save all dimensions, she must save herself. She was, after all, the remaining link to the Dragonblood Stone. Her veins coursed with its blood. Sanguine essence, sans Quintessence, Sanguinessence. On Dracaen’s signal, she would call back Genevre. The alchemical daughter would cry out to her creator. Genevre — should she be listening — could re-enter Flaw dimension through her fragment of Dragonblood Stone and its connection to her alchemical child. With her, she must bring Ilex and Melia, the only pair bound through the conjunction of Dragonblood and Lapis. Together, the alchemical child born to the Flaw dimension, the scribe born to the outside world, and the mutual pair conjoined within Council dimension would provide the trinity: the sulphur, the mercury, the salt; the three worlds required for the Breach of Blood, for victory in the Third Rebellion.
Kalina breathed slowly, attempting to calm herself. The rebels gathered around the perimeter, hands forming a barrier of flesh and blood along the railing of iron. One after the other, each of the rebels began to hum, low and droning. When Dracaen himself added his voice to the mix, Kalina lay prostrate on the newly exposed ground. She placed her hands, palms down, above her head. To Kalina, the surface under her fingertips and forehead felt like a soft, tender wound freed too early of its scab.
The droning turned to chanting. Sanguinessence! Sanguinessence! Sanguinessence!
“Mother!” Kalina cried. “Mother! Mother!”
Releasing their hands from the railing, the rebels reached for the pots of water filled earlier from the cavern pools. One by one, they tossed the water onto Kalina and into the dimensional wound within which she lay. Setting down the water pots, they each reached for a handful of soil, mined the day before from the hills above the quarry. Kalina felt the earth fall in shards against her back, dry and heavy after the cool water. Next drifted the leaves and petals, gathered that morning from the stone pathways that snaked through the garden. And, finally, the fire — small, fragile embers carefully chosen, collected from the furnace with tongs forged in the molten lava of the deepest pits.
“Mother! Mother! Mother!” Kalina cried.
The earth beneath her rumbled. It then shook so fiercely that Kalina feared the wounded ground would open and devour her. When it stopped, she slowly rolled over and sat up. Her head spun. A hand reached down to help her to her feet. She regained her balance and looked at the people who now stood with her. Genevre had answered her plea. But she was not alone — she had brought not only Ilex and Melia, but someone else.
“Tell me who you are,” Kalina demanded of the woman.
“I am Saule, Lapidarian Scribe of the Alchemists’ Council. I have carried my pendant for three hundred and eighteen years. I am here to aid the Rebel Branch, to join the Third Rebellion, to open a portal to Council dimension, to restore the Flaw in the Stone.”
Council Dimension — Summer 1914
As the Council Elders reconvened to develop a plan of procedure, Cedar waited in the Scriptorium with a few Lapidarian Scribes and Readers. She wondered vaguely why Saule was not yet present, but reasoned that she had wanted to spend as long as possible with Sadira. Those two had been virtually inseparable for the past decade. Amur, meanwhile, had evidently been standing by the fountain for a while when Cedar arrived. Certainly, she could not deny his diligence or faith. He looked at her then, and she wondered if pendant proximity had allowed him to notice her brief focus and praise. Under normal circumstances, such proximity would not be so potent, but the Vulknut Eclipse created far from normal circumstances. What would Ruis think if he knew Amur desired her? What would she do if she and Ruis and Amur had hundreds of years ahead of them?
Within half an hour, the Elders arrived. Azoth Magen Quercus distributed a list of tasks. For two days, every member of the Council would work in various ways to prepare for Ascension — sanctifying ritual objects, preparing the scrolls, shaving the dust from the Lapis, mixing the inks, distilling the Elixir. Even the Junior Initiates carried out the symbolically paramount job of cleaning the Scriptorium and the main Council chambers. Not a minute was to be wasted, not a detail forgotten.
At one point, as Cedar ironed the precious sheets of the sacred crystalline parchment for the Azothian final inscriptions, she mused that her fellow alchemists reminded her of worker bees. She longed then to visit the lavender fields, to share one last time with Ruis the emotional intimacy she should have been more clearly focused on earlier. Sheet by sheet, she became more agitated by this notion. How could she have let her mind wander at such a critical time? Now, no time remained. Her love would die or be absorbed or become part of the One. She would no longer be herself. And Ruis would no longer be hers alone.
In her reverie, Cedar left the hot press too long on one particular sheet of parchment. The slight but sudden acrid scent startled her. She lifted the iron immediately and gazed at the sheet. She then glanced up and around the chamber. No one appeared to have noticed her error. She alone was responsible for the parchment sheets that would be sewn that night into the ritual scroll. Setting the iron aside, she lifted the burnt sheet and held it up to the window — but the light was dull, almost nonexistent. Still, the fire from the kilns revealed no visible scorch mark.
“Hold it above the flame of a Lapidarian candle to be certain,” said Saule.
Saule had startled her, appearing from nowhere at Cedar’s side. Her error with the parchment had been witnessed by someone after all. Cedar walked to the small alcove near the fountain and withdrew a candle and holder from the third shelf. Saule followed her. They stood together as Cedar lit the candle. Cedar then stood still. Her task had been simple, but her mind had wandered again. In front of Saule, she did not want to shed light on her carelessness.
“Give me the sheet,” said Saule. Cedar could have refused. After all, they were both Lapidarian Scribes and Cedar had more years of experience. But such matters of hierarchy mattered little in these final days relative to the tasks at hand.
Saule held the parchment above the flame. Cedar sighed. The sheet was visibly darkened with a scorch mark — a shadow visible behind a section of crystalline fibres. “The Flaw in the Parchment,” said Cedar, attempting levity while strategizing a means to create a replacement for the invaluable and virtually irreplaceable sheet. “If we work together to scrape the Lapis, we should be able to duplicate—”
“The parchment is fine, Cedar. You need not replace it.”
Cedar balked. Her lips quivered as she opened her mouth to protest. But she saw something then, when she looked at Saule. She saw something that she would never be able to confirm with certainty afterward: a flash of amber within Saule’s eyes. If they were to use the marked parchment the Ascension might fail. Such was the probability if an imperfect object were to be used in the presence of the perfected Lapis. In the aftermath of failure, an investigation might lead to Cedar’s role. In turn, she could
be punished or erased. Yet here was Saule. Here was Saule informing Cedar with a glance exchanged that she knew the parchment was flawed and that she condoned its use. Saule wanted the Ascension to fail. She wanted someone in whom to confide, someone with whom to conspire. Cedar thought of Ruis once again. She thought of the future she could share with him — the leisurely days in the apiary. She then blew out the candle, took the sheet from Saule, and walked quietly back to her station.
For the entirety of the third day, Azoth Magen Quercus read aloud the Scribal Scrolls. Upon completion of the eighteen pages of recitation, he would begin again. Every five recitations, which took approximately three hours, he would allow himself a break, during which time Azoth Ailanthus or Azoth Kezia would take a turn at the eighteen-page oration. Now, in the final hour at the end of the final recitation, Quercus set down the scrolls, raised his hands into the first position of the Ab Uno, and eloquently recited the Mundus Subterraneus key. If all had gone well during the entirety of the Vulknut Eclipse up to this moment, the Azoth Magen would be subsumed by the Lapis, and Final Ascension of the entire Alchemists’ Council would be imminent. Cedar held her breath in anticipation, listening to the final digits of the key as if to an outside world countdown. But instead of ringing in a new year, death would toll. The shadow on the parchment crossed her mind.
The moment he uttered the final syllable, Azoth Magen Quercus was gone. No Sword of Elixir required. No final words of wisdom or farewell. He simply no longer existed, his body having disintegrated into a fine dust that floated through the room, noticeable only in the shafts of moonlight filtering through Scriptorium windows. Azoths Ailanthus and Kezia sank to their knees, hands in the second position of the Ab Uno, heads bowed. Shortly thereafter, the entire Alchemists Council was on its knees. They too, along with all of Council dimension, would soon be dust — mere particles, fragments of their former selves floating eternally in the vast absence of absolutely nothing. The shadow had made no difference at all, Cedar realized as her knees protested in discomfort against the cold stone floor. Such was the pain of her existence in these final moments of her mortality.
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