by Sever Bronny
Still sitting, he wrapped his arm around her waist and drew her near, then loudly quipped, “Shall we make out now?” and promptly received his own pelting of bread.
Even Dragoon Myrymydion made a speech, reiterating how proud he was that someone had the courage to stand up in the face of disbelief and bring the long-dead order back to life—and, from what he had heard, to do it on stage in front of the entire Solian nobility.
But the greatest surprise came when Mrs. Stone stood up at her place at the head of the table, clearing her throat lightly. A hush fell upon the table as the legend whom they had only known as a very old woman slowly swirled the contents of her cup. Her lightning-embroidered robe flashed silently, long chestnut hair curled behind her ears, face smooth and strong.
“Once upon a time, a young man swept into my life upon the winds of providence. He had seen much hardship in his fourteen years. He had fled a farm that had left him with a back full of scars. His former mentor—a knight, no less—had been murdered by the Legion, a tyrannical force that went on to burn down his village, among many others. His own mother—whom he never had the pleasure of knowing, for he had been but a babe when she had been forced to secret him away—had been murdered by his father. And yet he managed to make two wonderful friends of people whose own parents were murdered by that father. Together, they would go on to defeat that man in a duel that will echo through the ages.”
The girls beamed at Augum.
“But none of this could have happened had this young man before us taken after his father. Instead, one decision at a time, he distanced himself from the man’s actions, taking strides in the opposite direction, choosing courage over despair, mercy over disdain, and love over hate. These were not always easy choices.”
Augum thought of his rage, how it bubbled underneath the surface, as if his own father’s soul were within him. That rage battled with a peace that he longed for, a peace he had glimpsed while washing the feet of his enemy. But he knew that the battle within was far from over.
Mrs. Stone raised her cup and everyone solemnly joined her in standing. “On this day, Augum turns seventeen years of age, and I am beyond proud of the man he is becoming. I wish him the greatest of successes in the challenges to come. May he resurrect the ancient idea of chivalry and bring a new dawn upon a war-torn Sithesia. To Augum.”
“To Augum,” they chorused, raising their cups to him and inclining their heads.
* * *
After a long and garrulous and story-filled feast, the friends retired to their Leyan home. Sometime that evening, the Canterrans were expected to at last arrive from their silent pilgrimage. They were to step right into a Leyan council meeting and make their arguments, countered by Akeya, who would represent the friends and Mrs. Stone. Someone else was apparently representing the Canterrans, someone Mrs. Stone had said little about. The only hint she had given was that, upon accepting an invitation to Ley, “one left their sins behind in Sithesia.” It gave the group the impression that the Leyans invited people of all walks of life to contribute to knowledge, a principle that worried Augum. Would the Leyans therefore invite Emperor Samuel to Ley, granting him favor for his motto, Del servi o tei ancro balan—in service to the sacred balance?
Exhausted emotionally and physically from a long day, they each took a luxurious hot bath, then lingered together in the common room, discussing the morrow and ribbing Augum a little more, before wishing each other good night and going to bed.
Eventually all the lamps had been extinguished and doors shut and Augum lay in his bed, dressed in fine Leyan linen night garments. Yet despite knowing how big a day tomorrow would be, he couldn’t fall asleep. Part of his pilgrimage required him to share something, and so he quietly got up and opened the well-oiled door and snuck over to Leera’s door. He gave it a gentle fingernail tap and it opened a moment later. Without a word, she gently grabbed his night shirt and dragged him inside, quietly closing the door after them.
They were making out even before hitting the bed. And for a time, they enjoyed each other in silence, neither getting enough of the other. Only when they could carry things no further due to the limits of propriety did Augum gently clasp her hands and move her to rest by his side. She rested a leg on top of his and cuddled close.
“I’m afflicted by something,” he whispered into the darkness.
“Oh?”
“I feel a deep … rage … that explodes now and again. I’m … I’m ashamed of it, because it’s not very Arcaner-like. I don’t exactly know where it comes from. Maybe from all the bullying I experienced over the years. More likely though I think it’s from my father.” The mass murderer.
“Now that you have accepted him as your father again, he will always be part of you,” Leera whispered. “That rage will always be there, my love, as will your experiences. Your challenge is learning how to control it.”
He gaped at the darkness. He had confessed what had been on his mind, something he was ashamed of for some time, and yet she had so simply articulated just what he needed to hear. His father’s deeds would forever be a wound of the soul, something inescapable in his bloodline, in his memory. He would take her advice and try to learn to control it, though he once more recognized it would be a long struggle.
He kissed her forehead. “You are a wise woman. I am lucky to have you.”
“And I you.” She fiddled with the buttons of his nightshirt. “Will you promise me something, my love? Can we always divulge our secrets to each other?”
“Yes. Wholeheartedly.”
“Then here is one of my own. After all the ribbing, I’m scared that you will rush proposing to me.”
“And I was scared that you wanted me to hurry up and propose.”
She idly ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t. I want it to come naturally, when we are both ready. Even if that does take ten years. I mean that. And I want to remind you that either of us can propose.”
He couldn’t remember his heart bursting with this much joy. He turned his head. “It’s dark and I cannot see you,” he whispered, “but I can see your beauty even without light.” Her raven hair, her freckles, the gentle scent of her. “That portrait … it’s beautiful. Thank you. Thank you …”
She lovingly kissed him.
“Think I’ll lose another shield dim if I stayed the night?” he blurted, immediately adding, “I mean, just sleep beside you, nothing more. After all, we need a good night’s rest.”
“Of course not! The Arcaner code isn’t that prudish. Besides, you heard Myrymydion—they were freaks. And who knows if we’ll get another chance like this again. Endraga Ra scares me. It honestly scares me.”
“It scares me too.” He didn’t want to think about what lay ahead.
“We need to appreciate what we have right now. Like Esha said, this moment is all we have.”
He smiled. “That’s rather philosophical of you.”
“Yeah, well.” She shrugged, then pondered the matter. “You’d have to sneak out in the morning, though, otherwise we’d never hear the end of it—and it is scandalous. Can you imagine what would happen if Mrs. Stone found out?”
“Gods, you’re right, maybe I should just—” He started to get up, only for her to pull him back down.
“Don’t even think about it, mister.”
“Okay.” He ran a hand through her hair. “I can hear you grinning, you know.”
“That’s impossible.” She paused. “Wait, seriously, how did you know I was grinning?”
“I know your mischievous mind, Jones.”
“Oh, you—” and she kissed him again.
Var Io Balan
After one of the most peaceful sleeps of his life, Augum awoke alongside Leera, the pair entwined in each other’s arms, to the sound of Mrs. Stone rapping on her door.
“Time to get up, Leera!” Mrs. Stone barked, the sternness in her voice a fond reminder of times past when she used to bang on their doors with her staff. “Up, up, up, young lady!”<
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Leera feigned a disgruntled moan and Mrs. Stone moved on to rap at Augum’s door, snapping, “Rise and shine, Great-grandson, we have a long day ahead! Up, up, up, young man!” and then Bridget’s and Olaf’s and Haylee’s and Jengo’s—all without giving a sign that she suspected anything.
“Time to get up, young lady,” Augum whispered jestingly, playing with Leera’s ear.
“Let’s wait until the others go down first,” she whispered back, idly curling a lock of his hair with her fingers. “I wish I could always wake up beside you. Forever.”
“And I you.” He swallowed. “And I … I long for more.”
She squeezed him. “As do I. We will have our time.”
“We will have our time,” he echoed, and the pair cuddled under the blankets, simply enjoying holding each other.
Then an idea came to him. “Maybe there’s something in the codex that will allow us to, you know …”
“That’s … rather brilliant. Let’s, uh, make it a point of research.”
They snickered and pawed at each other.
After the others went downstairs, yapping about this and that, Augum snuck out of Leera’s room and hurriedly got dressed, breathing a sigh of relief when he joined everyone else downstairs and the only thing that happened was Haylee mussing his hair and saying, “No more teasing the birthday boy. Today we work!”
The morning proved a flurry of activity, with Dragoon Myrymydion and Mrs. Stone taking turns discussing pre-prepared subjects—even before breakfast. From Mrs. Stone they learned about some basic Leyan evocations, which meant that if a person invoked a law or custom the others had to respect it. And from Myrymydion, they learned about Arcaner pilgrimages. Augum, who followed along with his Arcaner codex open before him, asked specific questions about his own pilgrimage and received satisfactory answers.
“We shall have to fit your pilgrimage in around your studies,” Mrs. Stone said. “And certainly around our excursions into Endraga Ra.”
They arrived at the communal supper hall in time to see eight Leyan elders adjourn a meeting with the Canterrans. Augum recognized them as the millennials, for they were the oldest of the lot—many well over a thousand years old—and they composed the Leyan elder council, the governing body of Ley. Their skin tones varied in hue but all were metallic, hairless, and possessed the same black eyes. But these Leyans, unlike Myrymydion and Akeya, actually looked ancient, with wrinkled and blotchy skin, a shuffling gait, and hunched backs. Their style of dress varied as well. One old woman wore deer-hide and a hat with a pair of antlers. An elderly man had dark citron skin and wore a tattered shawl decorated with twigs, leaves and roots. Another old woman had avocado skin and wore a puffy-sleeved dress with a wide ruffled skirt. An ivory-skinned woman wore a queenly gown, and so on. But they were missing an elder—Krakatos, Mrs. Stone’s mentor, who was still away traveling the stars. None of the elders so much as glanced at the group of friends, as if such mortals were beneath their notice.
The meeting seemed informal, for the two groups had not stood in the customary circle used when discussing great matters. The Canterrans bowed and the elders teleported off one by one with quiet thwomps—all except one. He was gaunt, wore a black robe made from thick linen, and possessed the palest skin Augum had ever seen on a person—it was milky and almost translucent to the point of revealing all his blue veins, yet shiny metallic as well. He leaned on a gnarled staff and spoke softly to the Canterrans, who nodded along like eager puppies.
“What was that all about?” Bridget asked.
“I suspect we shall discover soon enough, dear Bridget,” Mrs. Stone replied as they took their places at one end of the same long table they had occupied the evening prior—and it was the only table with food laid out, meaning they had to sit together with their enemy.
Augum noticed that Gavinius was glaring at him with a loathsome expression. Something has not gone your way, he thought. But what?
As he had done the night before, Myrymydion politely withdrew Mrs. Stone’s chair at the head of the table, allowing her to take a seat, only to stand back up when the old man shuffled forth, leaning on his cane.
Mrs. Stone inclined her head. “Tyranecron.”
Bridget shot an alarmed look at the friends, but Augum was drawing a blank—he had heard that name before, just couldn’t recall when.
“Anna,” the old man wheezed, stopping before her, his shriveled form barely reaching her shoulders. “Var io balan so hath I invoked.” He spoke with the refined lilt of the upper crust of Canterran nobility, albeit with an old tongue flair.
“In what context?”
“Know this thou should, but then, thou hast not even lost thy hair yet.” He smiled. “Thou art young and I must be patient. As for context, it comes veiled in the subsequent invocation—sinna kiesteramorta.”
“The sins of the mortal world are left behind.”
“A waste of breath, Anna. A pupil of mine thou art not.”
Mrs. Stone nodded at the friends, who gawked from their places, indicating it was for their benefit and not hers.
“Ah, thine intrepid flock.” Tyranecron swept the friends with his black-eyed gaze, which yielded no empathy or compassion and reminded Augum of his father. “They are but mere babes. Watered-down echoes of the mighty Arcaners of the past.”
“Ah, but some of those mighty Arcaners of old were their age.”
“Wisdom I see not behind their eyes. Impetuousness. Youth. Imbecilic impatience. A proclivity for lust, their slouch evidence of a dearth of self-discipline.”
The companions straightened at the slights.
“These things I see, and little else. And although a formidable mentor they so do have, in the end, limited profoundly they will be by a dearth of ruthlessness. By a dearth of discipline. Behold my pack, for their blood roars in eagerness for the training that looms before them like the Cliffs of Edrael.” Tyranecron turned while Mrs. Stone and the companions glanced down the table at the Canterrans, who made a show of sitting rigid-straight, gazes boring into Mrs. Stone as if they had been told to try to intimidate her—except for Gavinius, who still glared at Augum, lip and fists curled.
“Indeed,” Mrs. Stone said in an unimpressed tone.
Tyranecron lightly tapped his staff against the floor once and Gavinius snapped his attention to Mrs. Stone. After staring at Gavinius a moment, the Leyan elder returned his attention back to his counterpart. “Anna, thou hast bolstered the motivation of my acolytes upon hearing that thou hast joined forces with naught less than a traitor,” he noted, ignoring Myrymydion.
But Augum suspected that was a strategic lie and that Tyranecron had commanded The Path Archons to act affronted.
“My old kingdom has betrayed the bounds of honor,” Myrymydion calmly began, “by rewriting the past to suit the present. A day shall come when that unforgivable slight upon the truth shall be righted, and the corrupt shall face iron justice. All lies incur a debt that will in due time be repaid.”
Tyranecron grunted in derision. “A humbling thing to behold, thy naivety is, Arcaner. Feast thine eyes upon my ravenous pack. I shall make them the fiercest of the fierce. Echo the jungle, they will, baying savage wonders of ruthlessness. Through their mighty veins discipline shall course like the raging rivers of earlier epochs.”
“Children trapped in men’s bodies,” Mrs. Stone replied. “Cultist puppet soldiers building a vapid empire on behalf of an intelligent but deranged madman with a twisted sense of worth and a corrupted sense of balance. There is no value to the empire of lies they are building.”
“Much brilliance hath been mistaken for aberration. Attyla, Takkus, Viviktus, Occulus—even Arinthian, dare I say. And now … Sepherin.” Tyranecron sighed as he turned back to her. “Del servi o tei ancro balan. Nary few mottos ringeth with such truth through the celestial ages, no? Thy misfit of a great-grandson hath reawakened something fusty, something none of thee as yet understand.”
“Evil has always tried to convince
good that it needs to exist,” Mrs. Stone countered, “that there needs to be a so-called ‘balance.’ It is nothing more than manipulation. A survival tactic. A ploy. The truth is, evil needs to be ground underfoot for a greater purpose.”
Tyranecron chuckled. “And what might that purpose be, Anna?”
“Progress. Balance yields no progress. Balance is a stale swamp. Balance is decay. This has singularly been the greatest mistake we Leyans have made. Even Dreadnoughts believed this, which led, in Sabella the Midwife’s opinion, to their demise.”
“A heretic jade who wailed as her feet did kick at the air most feebly.”
Mrs. Stone’s lips thinned. “You teach that age does not necessarily bring wisdom … or civility. Nor does your old silver tongue persuade or impress.”
“Grant I that thy youthful bleating hath stirred Leyan hearts in council moots, but aware those hearts be that thine eyes hath not matured to black, nor hath thy hair fallen free of thy scalp from wisdom, nor are thee near in thy quest in defeating the pernicious ambition within thine own Solian-damaged soul. In the end, thou, like arrogant Arcaners of bygone times, shall discover that the poison thou wishes to annihilate … is already within thee.”
“You voted with me,” Mrs. Stone immediately replied like a boxer trading blows. “The final result speaks for itself.”
“Indeed we seem to tread a path that may see the sacred library subject its treasures to hordes of uninvited mortals, but that path fails to account for the might of malignance.”
“I believe malignance to be correlated to a lack of education.”
“To the test thy theory shall be put.”
“And the results, once more, shall speak for themselves.”
“We shall see, Anna. This we shall see.”
Mrs. Stone tilted her head ever so slightly. “You are angry one of the judgments did not go in your favor. Alas, the fabled emperor must suffer a mortal death. He must feel it all so unfair.”