by Andrew Rowe
Tristan laughed. “If it was that simple, I’d have left a long time ago.”
I’d expected that answer. I frowned, scanning the area again while I considered my approach.
Tristan frowned. “You’re being awfully quiet. I assumed you’d object more strenuously.”
I turned my eyes back to him. “I’m looking for traps.”
“This isn’t that sort of room. Not that I blame you for checking, of course.”
Thinking of Tristan himself, I wasn’t entirely certain I agreed. His appearance here could have easily been a trap in itself.
I turned my attunement on.
He registered as having a Sunstone-level aura. Ordinary for his age, nothing like monstrously powerful youths like Derek or Elora.
I nodded to myself.
He’s probably suppressing his shroud.
I took a few steps forward. “Before we discuss things any further, I should confirm something. How can I be certain that you’re Tristan and not an illusion or trick?”
“Ah, good, we’re getting to that part already. Shall I tell you another story about our youth?”
I shrugged. “A simulacrum could tell a story.”
“Ah. Nothing I can do is going to prove I’m not a copy of myself. I can, however, at least convince you that I’m something with Tristan’s memories, and not a trap by someone else?”
I folded my arms. “A bit of transference mana could test if you’re a simulacrum.”
Tristan blinked. “You want to hit me with mana?”
“It won’t hurt. Probably.”
Tristan sighed. “Does it even matter if I’m a simulacrum or not?”
“I’d really like to know. Someone else could control a simulacrum. Get you to say anything they want you to.”
“Humans can be controlled, too.” Tristan took a few steps closer. “Don’t you recall what happened to Derek?”
“You’re not exactly inspiring confidence by pointing out there are other ways you could be deceiving me.”
Tristan waved a hand dismissively. “Fine, fine. I’m not lying, though. It really is me. And you can run your little test.”
I channeled just a bit of transference mana in my hand, walked to a few feet away, and blasted him with it.
Tristan rubbed his shoulder, but he didn’t evaporate. “Satisfied?”
I shook my head. “Not yet. Give me your hand.”
“Why?”
“I’m going to flood you with purified mana to attempt to free you from mental compulsion, since you pointed out you could be controlled by someone else.”
Tristan laughed. “I suppose that wouldn’t hurt anything.” He reached out his hand.
And, for the first time in five years, I held my brother’s hand.
Then I bombarded it with mana.
Tristan made a perplexed expression. “That tingles a little.”
“You’ll be fine.”
I waited until I’d given him what I approximated to be about fifty mana before releasing my grip.
“That felt a little odd...but no, I’m not mind controlled, Corin. This is really me. Are your tests done?”
“Those parts are, at least. Now, tell me something obscure that Tristan would know.”
Tristan smiled. “A better test. Let’s see... I always hated my middle name growing up, because I thought it sounded like a girl’s name.”
“Val does sound kind of like a girl’s name, yeah. They should have gone with Valor. But a lot of people know about your middle name.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Like who?”
“I’m not feeding you more information. Nice try.” I folded my arms. “Tell me something about myself.”
“You were always jealous of my height.”
“Too generic. Anyone could guess that. Try again.”
“You were jealous of my swordsmanship, too.”
“So was virtually everyone your age and younger.”
Tristan pointed a finger at me. “Fine. Once, when you were about three, you stepped on an insect and it stopped moving. I explained to you that it was dead, and what that meant. You cried for the next hour. You were inconsolable.” He pulled a hand back to his hip. “From what I’ve seen, you haven’t changed.”
I glanced at him up and down. “You don’t seem to have changed much, either.”
“You’re wrong about that.” He turned his head away. “But if you believe my identity now, I suppose we can discuss more important things. I’m sure you have questions. Shall we start with some of the obvious ones?”
I nodded slowly, taking a breath. After all this time, it really was him.
Tristan, my older brother, was right in front of me.
I should have been happier. I should have been thrilled.
But he wasn’t what I’d expected. He wasn’t dead, or chained to the walls of a dark cell.
He looked...normal. Healthy. Safe.
I...didn’t know how to handle that.
I had so many questions I wanted to ask him. The first one that came to me wasn’t what I’d planned on. It just sort of slipped out.
“...why didn’t you come home?”
Tristan raised a hand to brush some unkempt hair out of his eyes. “That’s...sort of a complicated question.”
“I think I deserve an answer.” I shook my head. “I... Why didn’t you at least tell us you were alive? Mother, Father, and I... Everything changed while you were gone.”
Tristan shook his head slowly, a hint of sadness in his tone as he replied. “That wasn’t my choice. It wasn’t allowed.”
“Not allowed? By who?”
I found my hands balling into fists.
“Calm down, Corin. The simple answer is ‘Tenjin’, but there’s more to it.” He let out an exasperated breath, his expression somewhere between sadness and frustration. “I wasn’t expecting you to react like this. You seem almost upset to see me.”
I took a breath. “I’m not upset to see you, Tristan. I’m glad you’re alive.” My hands tightened again. “But when you first contacted me, you lied. I asked the Voice of the Tower if they knew anything about you, and you lied.”
Tristan hesitated for a moment, a pang of guilt playing across his features. “I just said that there were a lot of people who came through the tower, and—”
“Don’t play semantics. You deliberately deceived me.”
He nodded. “I did. I wasn’t ready to tell you. There were too many other things that needed to fall into place.”
“And you manipulated me into helping with that.”
Tristan furrowed his brow. “It wasn’t my first choice. But as I’m sure you recall, the first person who found the prison didn’t end well, and I had a limited time window to work with.”
“I...” I let my hands unclench. “You don’t know what it’s been like back at home without you.”
Tristan just shrugged at that. “I heard Mother and Father split up a few years ago.”
“That was just a small part. Father pulled me out of school. He was obsessed with ‘training’ me to be better than you, just so that I wouldn’t die in the spire like you had. It...wasn’t good for me, Tristan.”
Tristan actually laughed. “You think a little training is bad? You haven’t seen half the things I have, Corin. I’m sure that Father just wanted to help you be safe.”
“Safe?” I lifted up shirt of metallic leaves, and my own cloth shirt underneath.
Even with all the healing I’d gone through, and all the regeneration items, the scars from the blade of a dueling cane were clearly visible. “Does this look like he was trying to make me safe?”
“That’s...” Tristan shook his head. “I’m sorry, Corin. I didn’t know. But I’m sure Father was just trying to discipline you properly. You never were good at following instructions.”
Tristan smiled like it was an inside joke. Something that I should have been laughing at along with him.
I let my shirt sink back down, and I felt somet
hing in my heart sink along with it.
Tristan didn’t understand.
But how could he? He hadn’t been there.
He hadn’t seen it.
He hadn’t heard the shouting or felt the blows.
There might have been some “training” involved at first, but in the end, there had only been anger.
I turned my head away. “I can’t talk about this anymore.”
“That’s fine. It wasn’t what I thought you were going to ask about, anyway. I’m sure you have other questions.”
I nodded slowly, taking deep breaths to try to calm myself. “How are you alive?”
“Ah. Now that’s more like it.” Tristan smiled again, seeming pleased that things were going back to the script he’d prepared for. “When we grew up, they told us there were two outcomes to a Judgment. Succeed, and you earn an attunement. Fail, and you die. We always had legends about survivors, of course, but they were few. You latched onto them even before I disappeared. You didn’t want to believe the goddess would kill people just for failing some stupid test.
“The irony is that you were right in a way, but terribly wrong in another. It’s not that the goddess spares the failures, as you’d hoped. It’s that she does considerably worse.”
“Worse?” I felt my heart sink further.
Tristan’s smile faded. “You see, Corin, when I finished my Judgment, I met someone. A man appeared to me, and he told me something that sounded wonderful. That many of those who disappeared in the tower were still alive, serving the will of the goddess.
“He told me that he was one such servant — a Whisper. An envoy of Tenjin himself. And that I had been chosen as one of only a dozen candidates to remain within the spire to train and join his order.
“I knew even then that it sounded too good to be true...but I wanted to believe. And he told me that if I changed my mind, I would only need to stay in the spire for five years. I would be given an attunement — a powerful one, that no ordinary person would be given — and a new identity to use if I chose to leave.
“I asked questions. He told me about the basics of what we would be doing, and it’s much like a hundred scholars have speculated. People prepare rooms in the spire, change the connections. Prepare treasure and traps. It seemed reasonable, and I thought I could make a positive change if I stayed. Make the spires more efficient, less lethal. He assured me that others were already working to do the same. That the goddess wished to test us, not to kill us.”
Tristan shook his head.
“It doesn’t matter what the goddess wanted. She’s not paying any attention. Or, if she is, she doesn’t care.” He sighed. “The visages have been in charge for ages. And their interest isn’t in building humanity into something greater. It certainly isn’t in getting us to the top of the spires. The visages are just like any other petty despots. They have power now, and they’ll do whatever they can to keep it or expand it further.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that our society is built around a series of lies.”
His lips twisted into a sneer. “The ‘Tyrant in Gold’ rules the entire outside world. A lie.”
He turned his face upward. “The goddess watches over us and guides us on our path. A lie.”
He gestured to the whole room around us. “The visages do her will in the world, and help us to achieve greatness. A lie.”
“It’s all lies. The foundation of our culture is rotten.”
“We’re taught to avoid the world outside of Kaldwyn, but it’s not because it’s dangerous. It’s not because the Tyrant is in complete control. It’s because if we saw the other continents, we’d see other perspectives. Places that still oppose the Tyrant openly. And other lands where no one has ever heard of the Tyrant in Gold.”
“We’re taught that the goddess watches over us, but when has she ever intervened, for or against anyone? Selys may have existed once, but in effect, she’s as dead as the other gods. More so, perhaps. And if she does live? Look at her teachings. Look at how much is hidden from us. We are forced to worship her, and her alone.
“We are taught the outside world is dangerous, and few are even allowed to leave. People who know too much of the truth are kept imprisoned, as your friend Keras was, or branded to prevent them from speaking. What does that sound like to you, Corin? Because, to me, that sounds like the work of a tyrant.”
His words came faster and faster, almost hysterical. “But that isn’t even the worst of it. The visages are always seeking greater control. Perhaps some of them still believe in bits and pieces of the message that they espouse, that they will raise humanity to a higher standard.
“But look at their actions. When a kingdom — like Lavia, for example — grows too powerful? They smash it apart. When a culture clings too hard to old traditions that predate the coming of the goddess to these lands? They stamp them out. I’m sure you’ve heard that Edria had a visage marching with them during the invasion of Kelridge. Why do you think the other visages allowed that? Because human society has never been free.
“Their goal has never been anything less than the complete subjugation of our species. We are nothing but tools to them, game pieces to be played against the other visages in their struggles for dominance.”
I didn’t know what to say to all that. I pondered while he took a breath, and finally settled for a question. “How do you know all this?”
“Because I was a part of it, Corin. I was a Whisper. I worked for Tenjin directly. I learned the functions of the spire — and I watched hundreds, even thousands of people climb the spires. And I saw that as they rose higher, the challenges grew less and less fair.”
I held up a hand for him to pause. “Wait. I thought you were a Whisper of Wydd?”
Tenjin smiled. “That part came later. An offer came to do some work for the Whispers of Wydd. I accepted, of course, but remained in Tenjin’s retinue the entire time.”
I frowned. “Why?”
“By that point, I’d been working for Tenjin a few years, and I’d already seen the unfairness in the spires’ designs.”
“Unfairness?”
Tristan shook his head. “It seems humorous at first, when a room subverts expectations. It’s much less funny when a group of climbers does everything right, and everyone dies. Because they were set up to fail. I know this, because I followed orders. I helped build those unfair tests. I watched the results — until I could watch no longer.”
“But some people do reach the top...don’t they?” My voice was quiet, uncertain.
“Every few decades, perhaps. Someone who is exactly what the visage is looking for. Someone who shows the right loyalties. The right amount of faith in the goddess. Someone powerful, but easy to manipulate. Reaching the top of the spire has never simply been about being the best. It’s about being someone the visages believe they can use.”
Tristan smiled. “Your friend Keras, for example, would never reach the top of this spire. They know his goals, and they would not wish for him to succeed. It doesn’t matter how powerful he is; they’d simply put in a room with no exits.”
“That’s...” I shook my head. “Why wouldn’t they want Keras to reach the top of the spire?”
“Because they’re afraid of the changes he’d cause if he managed to find a way to speak to the goddess herself. That is one of the few things I actually agree with the visages on.”
I blinked. “Why? What would happen?”
Tristan folded his hands in front of him. “Keras plans to ask the goddess to do something active in the world. I don’t know exactly what it is, but if he succeeds in drawing Selys back into world affairs, it could be catastrophic. I’m not convinced she’s even alive, but if she is, it’s better for her to remain uninvolved in world affairs. That is preferable to a being with her degree of power that may decide we’ve all been a failed experiment.”
That’s a grim way of looking at it, but he has a point.
I wanted to believe that if
Selys was real, and she was made aware of our problems, maybe she’d make things better.
But I wasn’t the one who had been trapped in a spire of Selys’ design for the last five years. I could see why Tristan might be less excited about the goddess taking any further steps to intervene in human affairs.
If Selys was powerful enough to create the God Beasts and the visages, she was clearly much more powerful than they were, at least as individuals. If she didn’t like how a nation developed, would she simply wipe them off the planet?
I didn’t want to find out.
But I still had many other questions. “Wait. So, why switch allegiances to Wydd, then? They’re still a visage.”
“Knowledge. Forbidden knowledge, to be specific.” Tristan folded his hands. “I learned a great deal from working with the Whispers of Wydd. Things about the inner workings of the spires. The functionality of attunements. Monsters. Bits of information that could be used as tools to aid in my plans.”
“So, you learned these things...and what, started a revolution?”
“Ah, I wish I could take credit for such a thing, but no.” Tristan shook his head. “I’m relatively new to all this. People have been watching the terrors wrought by the visages for centuries. Planning. Paving the way for future generations to act. I am only one participant in this, and I am not even one of the leaders of the current movement.”
“How did you get involved, then?”
Tristan smiled. “Mother, of course.”
“Mother? She’s one of the people causing all this?”
He shook his head. “No, not exactly. Only in the loosest sense. She did not organize anything — that was already happening before I even was recruited into the spire. It started with Orden and her ilk, working within the Whispers, and other powerful organizations. They recruited high-ranking priests and government officials who knew the truth.
“No, Mother’s life changed when she reached the halfway point of the spire, and she was offered a deal.”
I frowned. “A deal?”
“As I said, the visages do not wish for anyone to reach the top of the spire unless they have the proper characteristics. Mother was powerful, influential, and dedicated. She had a singular goal. She would have pursued it to her dying day if she needed to.” He turned his head to the side. “But it was not to be.”