“Is everything all right, Hovom?” Torsten asked.
“I just got word from Taskmaster Lars. He says you want me to get a team of Shesaitju to retrieve the glaruium armor we disposed of?”
“Yes. Is that a problem?”
“No, it’s…” he paused. “That doesn’t seem crucial right now.”
“Our Shesaitju allies won’t be here forever. There is no metal more durable. We’ll need it.”
“My Lord, are you sure it’s wise to—“
“Nesilia is gone. She can’t control it any longer. The sooner we believe in that, the sooner we can go back to how things were.”
“No lack of faith intended, but I don’t think we can.”
“Faith is not what’s in question here,” Torsten said. He let out a breath. “I’m tired of being afraid, aren’t you? One day, there will be a King’s Shield again, and a King to shield with it. And they must be as unbreakable as they ever were.”
Hovom considered it for a moment, then struck his chest in salute. “Yes, my Lord.”
Torsten returned the gesture. “And Hovom.”
“Yes, my Lord?”
“Mahraveh told me your chains worked well.”
His features darkened. “Not well enough.”
“We wouldn’t have survived if not for your work, Hovom,” Torsten said. “You have my gratitude. Whatever comes next, I plan to ensure that you have a seat on the Royal Council.”
“I… I…” Hovom struggled for words.
“No need to say anything, my friend. You’ve served in the shadows of the castle for long enough. The shield was nothing without its armorer.”
Hovom’s crooked lower lip started to tremble, then he bowed his head. “Thank you, Lord Unger.”
“You’ve earned it.” Torsten gave him a pat on the arm, then continued up the West Tower to the living floor. The halls were a mess. Doors had been bashed in by angry goblins. So many were dead—guards and hiding noblewomen, handmaidens, and Shesaitju women and children. Stolen jewelry and treasures. Still, the rest of the city had gotten it far worse.
Torsten made his way to a room at the far end. The door was open a hair, and Torsten quietly entered. Dellbar the Holy was on the bed where he’d been since Whitney ripped the Brike Stone out of his trembling hands. He still breathed but hadn’t woken since.
“Still in the dark, my friend?” Torsten said, sitting down beside him. “I hope it’s peaceful in there. She’s gone, Dellbar. The goddess whose followers took everything from you, she’s finally gone.”
He rested his hand upon the man’s chest, feeling his meager breaths. “Pantego needs you, Dellbar. We need—I need... to know if Iam is still watching over us.”
“He is.”
Torsten glanced up and saw Lord Jolly leaning against the doorway with his one arm. He’d suffered some bruises in the battle but had somehow survived the chaos in South Corner. Torsten had heard how the ambush failed, and the naval forces descended into a mad brawl beneath a smog of smoke. They’d held out long enough for Whitney to make it to the water, and that was all that mattered.
“How are you so sure?” Torsten asked.
“You can still see, can’t you?” He gestured to Torsten’s blindfold.
“I suppose.”
Jolly entered the room and sat on an empty bed across from him. “He’s here, Torsten, smiling down on all of us. After so long, it seems we finally ended the God Feud.”
“And how many died in its name? How many died, because He couldn’t love Nesilia?”
“Sometimes, love doesn’t look like roses and sweets,” Jolly said. “Perhaps, in these dark times, the best love Iam could have shown her was to let her go for good?” He sighed. “Either way, Torsten Unger, there’s enough blame to go around.”
“We couldn’t have stopped this from happening. Nesilia was right about that. She was inevitable. Whether she arrived now, or a hundred years from now to torture Pi’s great-grandchildren, she would have come. I think that’s what Dellbar realized. The darkness was always coming, no matter how hard we fought to drive it back. Wiping away heathens and mystics in the name of Light… we always had to face the monster He made.”
“There was once a monster you and I shared love for,” Lord Jolly said. He scratched the stump of his lost arm. “Perhaps, our Lord, Iam, is more human than any of us ever cared to think.”
“Like our great King.”
Jolly grunted in agreement. “Still, that we’ve endured has to mean something. And all those people out there, burying dead loved ones, cleaning up a ravaged city that was the only world they knew… they need something to hold onto.” His features darkened, and he looked to the floor. “My home is gone. I need something to hold onto. Some hope.”
“I know. I haven’t had the opportunity to say how sorry I am.”
“Don’t be. We won. That’s what matters. And maybe, just maybe, Nesilia is the liar, and she and Iam were nothing. Maybe she made herself a monster all on her own.”
Torsten nodded. “Maybe,” he said out loud, but he knew deep down it wasn’t true. He’d seen and heard enough by now. Witnessed enough to know that evil was created, not born, and it rarely happened on its own. Ever since the moment Whitney ended her, Torsten felt different. He couldn’t quite explain it, almost like a weight was lifted from him.
He so desperately wanted Dellbar to wake so he could ask him. So he could find out the truth he felt in his soul—that Iam was gone—really gone—from this plane now, having given everything to right his wrong of a bygone age.
“If not, all we can look to do now is follow in his footsteps,” he continued. “To right our wrongs. To fix Pantego, and make it a brighter place. That’s all the faith I need.”
Lord Jolly chuckled. “Righting wrongs? Where in Iam’s name do we start?”
Torsten couldn’t help but let out a small laugh as well. That was quite a question, one with too many possible answers to imagine. Closing the breach to Elsewhere and rebuilding Panping would be a good start. Training knights and priests to go out into the world and hunt down the demons still in possession of bodies. Finally restoring Winde Port, better than ever. And now Crowfall, too. Giving Mahraveh her Kingdom back. Finding a way to repay Brouben and the dwarves for arriving to help a people who had banished them to caves and mountains so long ago.
“Where to start, indeed,” Torsten said.
“I think I have an idea,” Lord Jolly replied. “Those people out there haven’t only always placed their faith in Iam, but on this castle. On the Crown. I know the battle has only just ended, but the throne can’t remain empty.”
“How do you name a King when all the Kings are dead?”
“How did Autla get his crown? Let me tell you. He declared that he was chosen and put it on his own damned head. Those who bowed first, fill Old Yarrington. Those who never did? Well, my ancestors got brought into the Glass another way.”
“More war,” Torsten lamented.
“Not if we make the right choice.”
“And what choice is that?”
“The late King Pi selected his Royal Council. They may be young, inexperienced, hell one is a dwarf, but certainly, that means he entrusted us with the power to decide. The Nothhelms are gone, Torsten. There is nothing we can do about that besides move on.”
“I’m guessing you don’t want the crown?” Torsten asked.
“No,” Lord Jolly muttered after a long pause.
“Why not, you? Your lineage traces back to the old Kings. Oleander trusted you. Pi trusted you. The men who laid down their lives along the waterfront, they trusted you.”
“Alas, Crowfall is where I belong, Torsten. I’m needed there now, not here.”
Torsten let out a low growl of frustration. “You couldn’t just make it easy, could you?”
“Nothing about this is easy, but it’s our duty.” He leaned forward, placed a hand on Torsten’s shoulder, and gazed straight into his blindfold. “I know who it would be if I had
my choice.”
“Don’t start, Kaviel,” Torsten scoffed. “I was born a Glintish street rat.”
“Raised by Liam himself to knighthood to be the first of the Unger name. You led our armies when we needed you most and defended this city against things no other King ever even imagined possible.”
“All I’ve ever done is fight. Fight to live. Fight for Liam, and Iam, I… that’s not what Pantego needs anymore. If only Pi were still alive. He understood what it meant to bring peace.”
“But he’s not.”
“That’s all too clear.”
“Torsten, what if the fight to rebuild our world is the greatest we’ve ever faced?” Lord Jolly asked.
“Then I will gladly face it, in the name of our Kingdom,” Torsten said. “I serve, waiting for the day that there is no need for a Master of Warfare or a Wearer of White. War is all I know.”
Lord Jolly exhaled, then stood. “Well, if not us, then who?”
Torsten couldn’t deny that question had crossed his mind a few times since the battle ended. He knew it was impossible to leave the throne of the Glass Kingdom empty for long. Without a proper King, all the lords and cities who’d pledged fealty to the Nothhelms would break away after the dust settled. The empire Liam and his fathers had carved out would fall to pieces, to one day be put together by another conqueror in another series of wars.
Even if everyone got along and played nice in the wake of so much death, that was as inevitable as Nesilia had been. And as Torsten strolled through the halls of the castle that night, he hated that all he could think of were the wars to come, when the greatest he’d ever known had only just ended.
Wind howled as he stepped into the Throne Room, the ceiling broken apart. Fragments of glass still littered the grand carpet, which unfurled unto the throne’s dais. It was torn and stained with blood that would never come clean. And the throne itself was ruptured—cracked down the middle with the left half in pieces.
Salvation lay upon what was left of the seat in three pieces. There was no crypt to return it to. It’d take years to dig out the caskets and the bodies buried by Nesilia and Sora’s fight, if there was even anything left of them when they were found. Perhaps that was Nesilia’s greatest revenge, to bury the most prominent followers of Iam as she’d been for so long. Liam’s broken sword and a few other weapons reforged with silver were now all that remained of more than a thousand years of Glass Kings.
Torsten knelt before the throne and slowly reached for the sword’s handle. He winced as he pictured the events leading to its breaking. Nesilia, slaughtering so many people until Rand Langley came and took up the blade himself. Now, he was gone too. Not a soul had heard of his or his upyr sister’s whereabouts since the end of the battle, and Torsten supposed they never would.
Both deserved blame and punishment for what they’d done. Rand had betrayed and killed men of his own Order, his own King, Lucas… Torsten had yet to be able to find the young Shieldsmen’s parents after the battle, but their shop had burned down with most of Dockside and South Corner. He had to hope they’d turn up somewhere. Sigrid, his sister, had murdered Queen Oleander and who knows how many more before Nesilia took control of her and killed thousands.
Nothing could ever redeem all the evil they’d been behind. Yet, Torsten couldn’t help but wish that they found somewhere quiet—a shack by the water somewhere, fishing together… happy together. Finally, at peace. He knew he shouldn’t—Lucas and Oleander deserved better—but he did.
A man and his upyr sister.
“Would you have sent an army after them to the ends of the earth?” Torsten asked of Liam as he raised the broken sword. “Or would you have let go, forgotten what was done, like you did with Sora?”
The wind whistled in the silence that followed, playing gentle melodies on the broken glass above. He wasn’t expecting an answer, he never did, even all the times he visited the crypt to speak with his King. However, he usually felt something other than emptiness.
He closed his eyes, again picturing all the Shieldsmen who’d died right behind him. He saw Lucas, head chopped off by the very traitor who’d wielded Salvation and saved them. The world used to be so simple. There were Iam’s faithful, and then everyone else. Now, there were too many shades between for Torsten to count.
Feeling a phantom tear upon his cheek, Torsten rubbed his face. “Why couldn’t it have been me taken?” he asked, voice cracking. “Why them?” Not even out loud did he say, “Why him.”
It was silly. In truth, he’d barely known the thief, but somehow, he’d become a trusted ally, if not a friend.
Torsten had been strong during the rebuild, firm with his orders, always standing proud. But here, alone, the weight of so many dead finally hit him. He leaned on the throne, the blindfold sliding off his seared eyes and up over his bald pate.
“Sir Unger, are you all right?” came Lucindur’s soft, melodic voice.
It startled him.
“I’m fine,” he replied, mustering the most composed tone he could manage. He adjusted the blindfold and straightened his back. “Just thinking.” It sounded like a question.
“About?” she asked, stepping forward.
“Everything. About Kings lost, and who should sit upon this throne now that they’re all gone.” He wasn’t sure why he spoke so plainly with her. She wasn’t a member of the court, not even from Yarrington, but she had a calming presence that made him feel she was worthy of his trust.
“Well, uh… I don’t know anything about that,” she said. Her hesitation told Torsten all it needed to. She was lying. She knew about Sora’s true origin.
Torsten didn’t press her further. Instead, he placed the broken sword down and pushed off the throne to rise to his feet.
Her features were bright, like she’d fully recovered from her exertion, though her eyes were puffy. No doubt from crying in a way Torsten’s lack of eyes didn’t allow. Whitney’s death hit the whole group hard. Tum Tum worked through it by helping the other dwarves. Lucindur, by staying in the castle and repairing her instrument. And Sora… Torsten had barely seen her. She’d spent days down by the water, staring—probably wondering, as Torsten did, why not her? Maybe she hoped he’d swim to shore as if nothing in the world was wrong.
Torsten cleared his throat and said, “You look well.”
“I’m feeling better,” she said. “You have my thanks for allowing me to stay here. I know there are many out there who only wish to be so lucky.”
“Without you, they’d all be dead. We’d all be dead.”
The corners of her lips curled into a frail smile. “Like each of us, I did what I had to. I didn’t choose my powers.”
“Yet, you saved all of this with them. The Kingdom owes you a debt it can never repay, Lucindur of Glinthaven. You can stay as long as you like.”
“I… thank you, Master Unger.”
“Please, just Torsten.”
“Thank you, Torsten.”
They both looked to the floor for a few seconds, then Torsten regarded the salfio strapped to her back. “Is it working?” he asked.
“It is, yes. Thank the heavens a string didn’t break this time. Though, I’d very much wish not to have to play again.”
“That would be an injustice to this new world we are forging.” Torsten swallowed back a suddenly dry throat. “The song you played when Nesilia was here. It was quite beautiful. I’d love to hear it again sometime, without all the…” He looked around, grimaced. “Well, you know.”
“My mother taught it to me, who learned it from her mother, and so on. I’m not even sure what it’s called. Passing down songs through generations is a right of passage amongst the Glintish.”
“Is it? I’ve barely been there.”
“You should visit sometime.”
“If only I could.”
This time, Lucindur looked around the devastated room, and her cheeks went a shade darker from embarrassment. She likely realized, as Torsten did, that it would
be many years, maybe decades, before all Nesilia’s damage was undone.
“Will you go back?” Torsten asked.
“Yes,” she answered. “My daughter’s there. And I don’t think there’s much use for Lightmancery any longer.”
“Maybe not, but there are thousands of sad, homeless people outside these walls. Your music might ease their suffering, if you’re willing to keep playing.” He stepped up the dais, beside the throne, and pictured better days. “I used to hate when troupes and bards came through.”
“Oh?”
“Oleander loved the distractions. Liam liked it when they were about him, until he couldn’t care for anything at all. But I hated them. I never understood it. Why invest in make-believe, when a cathedral and Iam’s grace were so near?”
“I suppose that’s one way—“
“I do now, though,” he said, interrupting. “I think you should stay for a little while. Bring your daughter. Play your music across the city and give Whitney the flamboyant funeral we know he would have wanted.”
She chuckled. “Well, that’s just it. Whitney wouldn’t want anybody crying, but when I play this instrument, it brings out emotions and memories I can’t control. There are so many dead. So many lost spirits. It would only make them more downcast.”
“Maybe, that sadness is exactly what they need to feel.”
Lucindur removed the instrument from her back and studied it. She ran her finger along the frets, plucking once as if to test it. The pitch was perfect, at least to Torsten’s untrained ear. The sound echoed across the empty room. Torsten could feel it in his bones, and he staggered back into the throne, his hand stopping on top of Salvation’s grip as he braced himself.
Clearly unaware of the effect it was having on him, Lucindur started to hum and play softly, that same song from earlier, and Torsten found it impossible to move. She wasn’t lying. His heart grew heavy, and he longed more than ever that he could shed a tear, even just one. That he could let the pain out. With one hand, he pushed the enchanted blindfold up, the only way he could earn the sensation of closed eyes.
In a flash, he experienced it all—every moment in this room. From the good, like when he was a young ward to Sir Uriah, looking at the tall ceiling as if it were the most amazing thing he’d ever seen—which it had been—to stealing glances at Oleander during parties or meetings. Being knighted by Liam himself a few feet away from the throne.
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