The Beginning After The End (TBATE) - Chapter 463: Not Without Cost

Chapter 463: Not Without Cost

ARTHUR LEYWIN

Thick blades of deep green grass bent under my steps as I walked beneath the charwood trees outside of the Hearth. My thoughts were heavy and grounded, keeping me grounded as well. A mental shroud separated me from Regis and Sylvie; I wasn’t ready to have anyone else’s thoughts in my head just yet, needing some time to digest everything that had happened.

Everything I had learned, from both Kezess and Mordain, cycled through my head again and again. There were too many disparate paths to hold at once, and I was lacking too much information.

Leaves rustled in a low branch, and a fuzzy creature that could have fit in the palm of my hand shuffled along the underside, clinging to the bark with sharp claws. Its moon-silver eyes inspected me without fear. Despite its cute appearance—something of a cross between a flying squirrel, a lemur, and a bat—I could sense the condensed mana in its body, enough to classify it as an A-class mana beast.

After sniffing around for a moment, the mana beast vanished back up the tree, drawing my eyes along the wide trunk of the towering charwood.

“If only our responsibilities were proportional to our size, then I could leave all this to you, couldn’t I?” I said aloud, the words mostly nonsense spit out by my overtaxed brain.

I watched idly as the scuttling creature made its way around the tree, dislodging a leaf several feet above me.

As the bright leaf fluttered down like the burning ash of a bonfire, I imbued aether into my new godrune. A soft warmth radiated from my spine, keeping me grounded as I felt my cognitive abilities speed up several times over. The information I’d received and problems I now had to solve were laid out like a deck of cards, clear in my consciousness even as my mind split into several threads of thought at once.

Chul had faced off against Cecilia—nearly paying for that encounter with his life—but I had been able to heal him. Not only that, with the mourning pearl, he wouldn’t just recover but his underpowered core would likely become stronger than before.

I had two remaining mourning pearls. I didn’t know why Lord Eccleiah had given them to me, but as all the events and conversations of Avhilasha’s returning ceremony connected to each other, I grew certain that he had anticipated the events of the ceremony itself, with his interest and “innocent old uncle” act just that. He knew more than he was letting on—perhaps even had some hint of future-sight about him. After all, Kezess had said specifically that dragons rarely experienced the kind of visions Sylvie was now having.

Which meant I had been given three mourning pearls for a very specific reason, and it would be up to me to decide when and why to use them, knowing that to save a life, I potentially condemned another in the future.

With the crown of violet light burning from atop my head, out of sight but still very much visible in my mind’s eye, I understood exactly why such a thing was so valuable and rarely used in asuran culture.

Parallel to these thoughts, I held another line for Cecilia.

Her presence in Dicathen was a larger problem than I’d at first considered. Perhaps, with the assassination of Charon having failed, they’d sent her to finish the job, but if that was the case, I didn’t see why she would be lingering around the Beast Glades. It was just as likely that Agrona had decided to target Mordain, so Cecilia may have actively been searching for any sign of phoenixes when Chul stumbled right into her.

Despite Mordain’s pacifism, the phoenix presence was both a wildcard and a potential threat to Agrona’s plans. It had worked in Agrona’s benefit for some time, as Kezess had indicated that the number or strength of the asura present in this world had—for a reason I didn’t yet understand—been a barrier to his attacking Agrona. Now, however, Agrona may have decided the risk was no longer worth the benefit.

But the most likely scenario was that Cecilia was searching for the way to Epheotus on Agrona’s behalf. I lacked the information to devise a solid theory about exactly why, although, under the effects of King’s Gambit, my mind immediately speculated on several different possible reasons, each equally likely. Even still, I couldn’t be sure of anything except the fact that Cecilia was the most dangerous piece on the board, and her presence was a disruption and a danger to everyone on the continent, even the dragons.

But Cecilia had been trying to cover her tracks, even staying out of the fight against Chul, which meant they didn’t want us to know she was here. Either they were afraid of placing her on the front lines—because she would become a target or, maybe, Agrona didn’t have full faith in her—or there was a chance that what she was doing could be interrupted. Having been caught by Mordain, it was plausible she had already retreated out of the Beast Glades, or from Dicathen entirely. Even if she was still in Dicathen, I couldn’t pursue her without potentially sacrificing days or even weeks to hunt her through the Beast Glades, and there was a significant probability even then that she could evade me. She had a clear advantage: she knew what she was doing, while I did not.

Still, I couldn’t let her potentially roam free throughout the continent. Charon would need to be warned and a patrol of dragons set to scouring the Beast Glades.

As more and more new threads appeared, each new thought weaving into the tapestry of congruent ideas, I sensed a subtle itch—the uncomfortable sensation from my core left by the wound Cecilia had given me with my own aetheric sword. I focused on it, and like insects scattering under a light, the itch seemed to shiver along each of the individual threads of my thoughts.

I stop channeling King’s Gambit, shaking off the strange sensation. The leaf, which my eyes had been tracking in its flight, fluttered past my nose, then continued its way to the ground.

My mind seemed cluttered and muddy, my thoughts out of focus. I had to force myself to stand straight, and found my fingers digging into my chest, scratching at the core-deep itch that had already subsided.

It took some time before I could shake off the effects of the godrune and focus on my surroundings again. The creature had returned, creeping even farther down the branches, and was eyeing me hungrily.

Letting out a deep breath, I let my mind return to the state I’d been in after waking from the keystone. My feet left the ground, and I wobbled slightly. Instinctively, I pulled on the insight I had gained and drifted up a few feet, slowly growing accustomed to the sensation. Then, with sudden speed, I launched past the little mana beast, through the outstretched branches and fire-orange leaves of the charwood tree, and high into the air over the canopy, letting the feel of wind through my hair help to clear the last of the godrune’s cobwebs from my mind.

Unlike flying with mana, which was simply a matter of raw power and control gained by transitioning to a white core, the ability to fly with aether had been triggered through my insight into King’s Gambit—or rather, some part of my journey to gaining insight had advanced my innate understanding of the interplay between the physics of this world and the atmospheric aether to unconsciously defy gravity.

The effect was the same: by projecting myself through the atmospheric aether, I was able to use it to push me up into the air and fly. But there was a lot less atmospheric aether than there was mana, and it was unnatural both in feeling and visualization, like discovering a muscle I’d always had but had never used. When I pushed up, I flew, the aether pushing me even as it slipped aside to let me through.

I looked back down at the trees. From below they had looked like towers, but from so high, they were diminished. Watching the wind move the forest canopy, I noted a sense of drawing down as some subtle aftereffect of King’s Gambit left my system. I’ll need to be cautious when I use this new power, I thought, noting the way it made me feel afterwards.

Despite the weight of everything resting on my shoulders, I couldn’t help but smile as I shot out over the trees and banked south, gauging the direction of my destination before leaning forward and flying away over the treetops, the wind heavy and moist as it blew over me.

And so, as I pushed myself to fly faster and faster, projecting a strong aetheric intent to ward off any of the more powerful mana beasts that might decide to take a shot at me, I released the veil over my mind and reached out probingly for Regis and Sylvie.

‘He returns,’ Regis’s voice sounded in my head almost immediately.

‘Your thoughts are murky, Arthur,’ Sylvie followed up. ‘What’s happened?’

I quickly explained everything that had happened since Chul’s healing

‘For someone who seems to have just won the “get shit done” lottery, I’m not sensing a lot of positivity here,’ Regis said with his usual charm.

I may have discovered a power that will let me think several things at the same time, but what I really need is the ability to be in several places at once, I thought. Barring that, I need answers.

Regis, who had stayed with Oludari and was now at the flying castle, guarding the Vritra’s cell, brightened. ‘Does that mean you’re headed this way? I’d trade all the busty demon lady’s in Alacrya to get out of here. I think I might be bored to death.’

‘All of them?’ Sylvie chimed in, the mental projection of her voice tinkling like a silver bell.

‘Well, not fair Lady Caera, of course,’ he answered defensively.

I shook my head. I’d say you got along with the aether centipede best of all, wouldn’t you? Now, changing the subject…

The act of flying itself was exhilarating, and Regis and Sylvie helped to lighten the weight of my many-layered worries, making it go by even faster. Still, with so many thoughts occupying my skull—and my ability only to process one thing at a time without King’s Gambit active—I was relieved when the tall walls and peaked roofs of the flying castle came into view, looming out of the fog like a giant bird of prey.

The distortion field that had once hidden the castle was long since disabled, and two large dragons—one gleaming like sapphires, the other the dull green of mossy rock—circled around the exterior. It took them a moment to notice me, as I lacked a mana signature for them to sense as I approached, but when the green dragon saw me, both banked hard and flew swiftly in my direction.

“Halt, who—ah, the lesser with golden eyes,” the sapphire dragon said, beating her wings to stay in place. “We were told to expect you. Follow me.”

Wheeling around, she flew to an open bay door—the same one that Sylvie and I had so often used to enter and exit the castle during the war. As I landed behind her, she transformed, her body shrinking to reveal a statuesque woman with pearlescent hair and armor the same color her scales had been in her dragon form.

“Come, I’ll take you to Guardian Charon and the prisoner,” she said stiffly, her deep-blue eyes, which were speckled with glittering white motes, studying me warily.

“I know the way.” I strode past her, heading for a nearby hall. “Has there been any trouble?”

She hurried so she was walking just behind and beside me. “Some of the scouts came upon a forest fire, likely the sight of an intense magical battle. But we found no source.”

Acknowledging her with a nod, I searched automatically through the castle, sensing the powerful mana signatures radiating strength. Charon and Windsom were deep in the bowels, where I knew the prison was: the same prison that had once held retainer Uto and Rahdeas, the traitorous dwarf who helped Nico infiltrate Dicathen under the persona of Elijah.

I didn’t think of Elijah often, and I didn’t allow myself to do so now. It was too strange—too painful—to know that my closest friend in this world had never even existed, but rather had been a figment of Agrona’s twisted mind.

In all, I sensed five other dragons besides Charon and Windsom, as well as the familiar signature of an asura of the titan race. I didn’t know what Wren Kain would be doing there—he should be back in Vildorial, finishing the project he and Gideon were working on—but I would find out soon.

As I made my way down through the castle, my escort and I entered into a wide hallway that brought me up short. The memory of my last time in the castle surfaced with a sudden violence, and I recalled bodies scattered over the floor, half trapped in the rubble that had crushed them.

It hadn’t really occurred to me earlier, but this was my first time returning to the flying castle since then. Since Cadell.

“It’s been repaired,” I said out loud, speaking to myself.

“Yes,” my escort said stiffly. “This flying castle was in poor shape, and it required significant work to make it fit for dragons of the Indrath clan.”

I brushed my hand against the restored wall, a pang of indignation bubbling up at the thought that any traces of Buhnd and all the others who had fought and lost their lives here were gone.

Reaching the prison level, my dragon escort allowed me into the locked and warded dungeon but did not follow me within. In the guard room on the other side, I found Charon, Windsom, and Wren Kain waiting for me. Regis, I could sense further in, keeping an eye on our prisoner.

Charon regarded me with clear interest. “Ah. Arthur. Windsom has been filling us in on your journey to Epheotus.”

“Too bad about the young dragon,” Wren said, his tone empty of any actual sadness. “Of course, her clan will receive more recompense for her death than the combined families of all the lessers that battle destroyed, so I suppose there’s that.”

I searched Wren’s gaze, looking for meaning in the dark eyes half hidden beneath his greasy, drooping mane.

My expression must’ve given away my thoughts because Wren gave a sharp laugh. “Charon invited me to speak to the basilisk.”

“I didn’t know the two of you knew each other,” I responded, looking to the scarred dragon.

“Oh yeah, Charon and I go way back,” Wren answered with mock pleasantry. “He’s not bad…for an Indrath.”

Windsom glared at Wren, but Charon only chuckled.

“Anyway, I’ve been helping—trying to help the dragons make sense of Oludari, but he’s been purposefully obtuse since you left.” Wren crossed his arms, an action that made his hunched posture more exaggerated. “For a supposed genius, he sure does come across as a lunatic idiot.”

I considered this. The fact that I was pitting the word of a lunatic basilisk who had every reason to lie and manipulate me against the lord of all the asuras—my ally—wasn’t lost on me. But then, I already knew I couldn’t take anything Kezess said at face value either. Every conversation with him was like a match of Sovereign’s Quarrel, except I didn’t necessarily know what the objective of the game was. With Oludari, it was much clearer.

“That’s unfortunate, but nonetheless, I’ve come to speak with Oludari.” I met Windsom’s otherworldly eyes. “Then, per my agreement with Kezess, you’re free to transport him back to Epheotus.”

Expressionlessly, Windsom replied, “Ah, and here I feared you’d spend weeks, if not months, beating around the bush as you lessers so love to do. I am glad to see you being sensible for once, Arthur.”

When I didn’t reply except with a cool stare, Charon cleared his throat and gestured for me to follow. He led our group into the prison itself, which was empty except for a special cell that had been redesigned specifically for the basilisk. Oludari was chained to a wall with his arms held out to his sides, rune-covered cuffs of dull metal binding him at both wrists and ankles, and around his throat. When he shifted, his corkscrew horns clattered against the warded stone behind him.

Seeing me through the small, barred window of his cell, he gave a wide grin and his lips began to move, but I couldn’t hear the words until Charon sent a pulse of mana into the door and eased it open.

“—to save me from the boredom of these dragons,” he was saying, the first half of his words inaudible within the warded cell. The affected grin slipped as his bright eyes burrowed into my own. “So then, human? Have you come to your senses? Am I to be returned to my homeland and offered the protection of the lord of dragons?”

Noting his unsubtle addition of protection to his demands, I stepped into the cell and looked around.

Regis was curled in a large ball on the hard stone of the floor. His eyes opened lazily as I looked down at him, and he winked. “I’m with the basilisk on this one. Please save us from the boredom of each other’s company.”

Oludari clicked his tongue. “I rather thought you more interesting than the rest of these self-important asura. Heartbreaking that you do not share the sentiment.”

They let you stay in the cell with him? I asked Regis, probing his mind for his experience of the last couple days.

‘They haven’t “allowed” me to be present for the interrogations,’ Regis sent back, carefully avoiding looking at Windsom and Charon behind me. ‘But they’ve complained loudly and often about how unreasonable and “insane” Oludari is.’

You don’t think he’s insane?

‘Something something fox and the hen house,’ Regis thought blandly.

Stepping up close to the chained Vritra, I let my gaze sweep across him, lingering on the shackles. “I have spoken with Lord Indrath, and he has agreed to allow your return to Epheotus as a prisoner. But the specifics of that return—how long you linger in our world, a target for your High Sovereign—are left up to me. Your future hinges on you answering my questions, fully and without any games.” I paused, letting him digest my words. “I haven’t forgotten my previous threat: preventing Agrona from getting his hands on you is still my priority, and if it makes more sense to kill you than send you to Epheotus, I won’t hesitate to do so.”

Windsom shifted behind me, but Oludari was impassive, answering only with an understanding nod.

I would have preferred to question him further without Windsom and Charon present, but I didn’t give them the power to refuse by asking, as I already knew their answer.

Crossing my arms, I widened my stance and made a show of mulling over my words. I knew what I wanted to learn, but extracting the information from Oludari without making either him or the dragons suspicious was a delicate operation.

“Why does Agrona want to take over Epheotus?” I asked after several long seconds passed. “What is his goal in it all? Simple revenge against Kezess and the others of the great clans?”

Oludari frowned slightly, his eyes tracking quickly across my features. He seemed to be puzzling something out in his head. Finally, he said, “A good question, for what reason would the High Sovereign need control of Epheotus? To be surrounded by asura of the other races, many older and more magically powerful than he? To return to our homeland would, I imagine, be Agrona’s worst nightmare. He has not spent these last centuries surrounding himself with lessers and lessurans without reason.”

He paused, his gaze now flicking to the two dragons behind me. “Whoever told you this is, perhaps, attempting to distort your view of the overall picture of this conflict. The greater conflict between Agrona and Indrath, that is.”

“Foolishness,” Windsom scoffed. “Of course Agrona is attempting to return to our homeland. There is no other reason to wage war against Epheotus as he has done. His entire effort in forcefully taking Dicathen was simply to set the stage for the larger conflict, as we know well.” His tone was stiff, almost forced.

Raising my hand for silence, I glanced over my shoulder. “I’d like to hold off on the extra commentary. I need to focus.” Preparing myself for the flood of stimuli, I activated King’s Gambit.

In Oludari’s eyes, I saw the light swell around me, gathering and fusing until a many-pointed crown of pure radiance was hovering just over my hair, turning the pale blond to a bright, glowing white.

The crease of his nostrils whitened as they flared, and his pupils, focused entirely on the glowing crown, dilated a fraction of an inch. The skin around his eyes wrinkled ever so slightly as he squinted against the light.

The air shifted as it pressurized through a gap in the stone somewhere, and a few strands of Oludari’s unkempt hair waved. “There is a leak in the stonework somewhere.” My voice had a hollow quality to my own ears as it was filtered through the mind-enhancing aspects of King’s Gambit both as I spoke the words and again as I listened to them vibrate through the air.

Beneath the smells of dust and stone, and more subtly, the distant flora of the Beast Glades, Oludari had a metallic, ozone burn to his scent, and the faintest trace of nervous sweat. Charon smelled of old leather, blade oil, and the blood of a fresh kill, white Windsom scented himself with some kind of flowery perfume that couldn’t quite hide the distant, earthy fragrance of Mount Geolus.

‘Ugh, why am I suddenly smelling myself? And why do I smell like brimstone and cinnamon rolls?’ Regis projected, shaking his head slightly as my gondrune-amplified thoughts flowed freely between us.

Behind me, I sensed Charon turn to look at Windsom, whose brows furrowed and jaw tensed as he glared at my back.

“You said before that Agrona is attempting to concentrate power. That he knew something. That this knowledge is connected to the layered dimensions that make up this reality. You said you’d tell me everything you knew.” My words thrust at him like the tip of a spear. “If my current understanding is flawed, then correct it.”

Oludari’s eyes seemed to…flex, as if he were forcing them into place, preventing them from flicking past my right shoulder to Charon. “Of course, your majesty,” he said, attempting to layer thick amusement over his voice, likely to hide the tension now gripping his throat and making his words come out strained. “Yes, as I said, he seeks power. Not to become a warlord and rule over Epheotus, but to consume everything. Like the world lion, he would eat even his own young—the people of Alacrya—for dominance. But only after he has scoured Dicathen and Epheotus.”

I compared his words and tone to what he’d said and how he’d spoken previously, dissecting meaning and timbre as I established a baseline to establish truth versus the lies.

Regis had sat up, and his eyes wobbled, going crossed. ‘Nope, can’t—oh, this is horrible. I think I’m going to blow chunks…’ His mind disengaged from my own, a barrier forcing its way between us. I could feel the wall’s edges, the cracks within it, and knew I could punch through if necessary, but there was no need to force Regis’s engagement with the conversation, even if his perspective might help broaden my own.

Somewhere far off, I felt Sylvie’s mind similarly shield itself. The effects of the godrune don’t extend to my companions, I noted.

“As much as I would prefer not to be a victim of such planetary cannibalism,” Oludari continued, “I do think it is extremely amusing that you so gladly hold the dragon’s tail, letting Lord Indrath drag you along wherever he wills, considering his own crimes are just as great, are they not?”

“Watch your tongue, Vritra,” Windsom snapped, taking a step forward threateningly as Oludari spoke ill of Kezess.

I felt the desire to frown but cut it off before the expression could manifest. There was a heightened quality to Windsom’s voice, an edge that suggested…a premeditated response?

“Tell me more about these layers,” I said to Oludari, holding Windsom at bay with the quickest of glances over my shoulder.

Oludari’s tongue dragged across the back of his teeth, and his fingers tensed, but he held them back from twitching. He had a high level of self control, physically, an ability that had previously not presented itself when he was held captive by the Wraiths. This suggested a deeply ingrained fear of physical harm to his person or even death. And, although tense, he was not currently afraid for his life. “You yourself come from a different world, correct?” he said. “You have a different kind of magic there—ki, I believe I was informed. But neither of the other reincarnates could channel ki when they came to this world, because it is a different type of magic than mana, requiring a different atmosphere and biology.”

Wren adjusted his posture, causing a muffled clink from inside his coat, like two links of a chain bumping together.

Oludari spoke faster as he continued, leaning into the story he was telling. “Another world. An entirely different structure of magic. Imagine it. The people of Alacrya are often limited to a single spell and its variable forms, the people of your continent just one element of mana. My own people can control all four primary elements, but only through the lens of our own understanding, which you call the attribute of decay. The dragons can wield pure mana and toddle about with their little aether arts, whereas the djinn wrote with aether like they’d discovered the native language of reality.”

He let out an awed sigh, as if he had just said something profound. I noted the pattern of him telling me only things I already knew, and as I did, I felt the itch again. It wasn’t in my core, but crawling along the thread of thought itself, deep in the folds of my brain.

“These are the layers I spoke of: mana, aether, even ki. Perhaps there are other types of magic out there as well”—the pitch of his voice modulated very lightly, and his eyes repeated the tense-without-looking flex from before—“but regardless, Agrona has never been satisfied with the basilisks’ lot in life. Why would we only be effective in utilizing decay-type mana arts when we should have it all.”

This explanation didn’t align with his previous statements. Tangential and perhaps even true, but nonetheless an obfuscation.

“You have been enemies with Kezess for a long time. You’re aware of what happened to the djinn. Tell me, what do you think Kezess’s overarching goal is?”

Windsom’s scowl was audible. “Arthur, this isn’t an appropriate line of questioning—”

Oludari snorted with amusement, interrupted Windsom. “He’s playing ‘King on the Mountain,’ obviously.”

“This basilisk is attempting to confuse you and pit you against Lord Indrath,” Windsom said, too quickly. “I would recommend you do not engage with him further.”

This time I was more certain. His words may not have been scripted, but they were premeditated.

Several tangled threads of thought wound around each other, and each one amplified the skittering, buglike itch that was vibrating out of my core and into my mind. The itch was being echoed from each simultaneous thought, no more than a slight irritant by itself, but the longer I channeled King’s Gambit and the more simultaneous threads of thought I activated, the more intense the sensation became.

Charon cleared his throat, and rested a hand on my shoulder. “Arthur, perhaps we should take a break. You seem…strained.”

Some sign of the growing irritation must have leaked through onto my expression. I clamped down on the parts of my brain responsible for both the purposeful and subconscious movements of my face and body, forcing my pulse to slow, my expression to soften, and my every breath to come out calm and level.

“Windsom, why did you give Ellie a guardian bear?” I asked suddenly, following a new thread as I continued to hold the others.

There was a hesitation, a change in his breathing. I turned my head a few degrees, aligning my ear to better hear the micro-changes to his bearing that would normally be drowned out by everything else.

“I was trying to make you comfortable so that you’d leave your family. Even then, I knew how protective you were. Enough to forgo the experience of training in Epheotus if you were too worried about your family.”

An honest answer, I gauged, but he’d had to decide first how truthful he was going to be.

“What will Kezess do with Oludari when he’s returned to Epheotus?” I followed up quickly.

I heard his response, but I didn’t worry over the words themselves, instead listening to the tone, the cadence. But it wasn’t truly Windsom I was focusing on, but rather gauging the intensity of Charon’s interest as we shifted topics.

I waited, letting the silence linger well beyond the point of discomfort, watching and listening to everything the three asura did, even cataloging Regis’s micro-movements.

For the first time, something broke my concentration, and my thoughts stumbled: the itching was more powerful now, like a swarm of ants gnawing on me from the inside.

But I was certain: Charon had made some kind of deal with Oludari. The Vritra’s answers were specifically designed to obfuscate certain facts. He would be returned to Epheotus and rewarded in a way I couldn’t duplicate.

Shifting gears to ensure I covered the other essential topic before I could no longer keep the godrune active, I asked, “The Legacy…before, you suggested she wasn’t a weapon, but a tool. Cecilia is the key to Agrona’s absorption of mana directly from the other Sovereigns, but not only that. He seeks to unlock new powers for himself. Tell me, will she survive this process?”

A coy smile played across Oludari’s face. “Are you asking about the reincarnate or the vessel?”

“You’ve been paying attention. You consider yourself intelligent, which means you’ve planned for the worst.” I suppressed a shiver and had to forcefully hold my hand back from scratching my sternum. “How would you fight back against the Legacy if she came after you?”

Oludari raised one brow, his mouth parting slightly in surprise. He thought for a few moments, but his eyes never left my own. “Complete mastery over mana. No core, so her entire body acts on and reacts to mana. And she is incredibly sensitive to mana—which, I think, can be turned against her. She isn’t terribly creative, and so doesn’t make full use of her strengths, and she is mentally weak. If one were to overwhelm her senses and put her on her back foot, send her reeling, she would not quickly recover.”

As Oludari spoke, a new thread of thought broke away, forming into an idea, fledgling and dangerous but irrepressible.

I needed to delve into the fourth keystone to solve it and gain the aspect of Fate, but if what Mordain said was true, I might be trapped in it for an unknown length of time. Agrona had consistently proved to be several steps ahead of me, and I had no idea how many spies he might have in Dicathen. I couldn’t simply trust that my absence would go unnoticed, and I had to accept that my use of the fourth keystone represented a dangerous moment for Dicathen. With Cecilia already on our shores pursuing an unknown goal, it would be the height of foolishness not to prepare.

But I could simultaneously protect against an incursion targeting me or Dicathen while I was vulnerable and ensure Cecilia was neutralized, at least temporarily, at the same time.

I asked a couple of follow-up questions, careful not to give away too much to either Oludari or the dragons, but was quickly reaching the end of my ability to withstand the itch, which came in the form of thousands of bugs crawling under my skin, amplified by every layer of my woven thoughts.

When I was done, I turned wordlessly and swept past the dragons and Wren, leaving the cell and marching down the hall beyond. Only then did I release my hold over King’s Gambit, when no one would see how my face fell or the cold sweat that sprang to my forehead.

I felt Regis’s mind return, touching my own tentatively, then recoil again. ‘Hey, chief, you going to be all right?’

I’m fine, I sent back even as I powered through the godrune’s aftereffects. By the time I reached the prison entrance, I felt at least able to speak without slurring my words, and I stopped and waited for the others to catch up.

“A waste of time,” Windsom said simply as he joined me in the outer guard chamber.

“Unfortunately, I have to agree,” Charon added, outwardly chagrined. “I had hoped you’d be able to get more out of him, when you activated that…spell?” He paused, looking at me questioningly.

I almost responded honestly, the words on the tip of my tongue before I swallowed them back down. Instead, I said only, “I’m satisfied. Kezess is expecting him, and I’d like this Vritra out of Dicathen as soon as possible—right now, in fact. There is no reason to tempt Agrona into some effort to reclaim him, regardless of my earlier threat.”

“Agreed,” Windsom said, looking to Charon for confirmation. The scarred dragon nodded his acceptance.

Wren, who had listened thoughtfully throughout my questioning, especially once the conversation turned to the Legacy, had come to stand beside me. “I’m needed back in Vildorial. Are you heading there as well?”

There were several parties I needed to speak with in the Darvish capital, but most of all I wanted to check in on Ellie and Mom. “I am,” I agreed.

“We’ve repaired some of this fortress’s functionality,” Charon said from behind me. “Including the teleportation devices, which were thankfully not destroyed entirely by the previous fighting. Vajrakor has also seen fit to relocate one of the long-range teleportation frames from western Darv into Vildorial, allowing us to move more quickly between strategically important locations.

“I can understand the convenience, but that’s a big risk,” I noted.

“All precautions have been taken to ensure the security of the city and its people,” Charon assured me.

I nodded, acknowledging that this was the dwarves’ decision to make. I wasn’t their ruler.

He continued to speak about the infrastructure changes they’d made around the largest of Dicathen’s cities as I led the way through the repaired hallways to the teleportation chamber. Despite the fact that they kept the artifacts deactivated when not in use, there was still a single dragon guard in place over the chamber, but they moved aside at our approach. Windsom and Charon stopped outside the chamber as Wren and I stepped through the wide doors.

Memories flooded my fatigued mind, and an uncomfortable but nameless emotion gripped my stomach like a fist, twisting it. I saw, as if reliving it again for the first time, as wounded soldiers limped or were dragged from the room while I searched face after face, looking for the Twin Horns and Tessia. Tess had returned, but my parents’ old friend, Adam, hadn’t.

“Arthur?” Wren asked as he nearly bumped into me from behind. I had stopped cold without realizing it.

“Fine,” I muttered, experiencing a strong sense of déjà vu as I faced Charon. “I’m going to need you to coordinate with a large operation soon, but I need time to plan out the finer details. Will you be here or in Etistin?”

Charon looked around at the castle. “I have decided to stay here and make this our base of operations for the moment. It is close to the rift, and the teleportation array allows us instant access to most of your continent.”

Nodding, I quickly explained what I’d learned about Cecilia’s presence, leaving out everything about Mordain and the phoenixes and instead making it sound like Chul had been scouting on my orders when he was attacked, and I had learned everything from him.

Windsom’s frown deepened as he listened to my explanation, but he kept his thoughts to himself.

Charon, on the other hand, hung on every word. “That explains the site of their battle, then. I will ensure the guard on the rift is increased, although there is no way she should be able to locate it, if that truly is their goal.”

I provided some suggestions on what to watch for and a few details about my previous battle with Cecilia, then Wren and I bid the others farewell, and we activated the teleportation portal and set it for Vildorial.

The continent rushed by around us in a blur as we were near-instantly shunted from the eastern Beast Glades to the very heart of Darv.

Over a dozen heavily armed and armored dwarves and a dragon in her humanoid form guarded the portal on the other side. They scrambled for a moment when we stepped through, but all quickly recognized Wren and myself, and we were allowed by without trouble.

“When can we expect you to come review progress on our experiment?” Wren asked, stopping where our paths diverged.

“Soon,” I said, glancing behind me to the gates of the Earthborn Institute. “How long until you can have battle-ready prototypes in production?”

The titan’s brows rose behind his unkempt bangs. “There are already prototypes, but each one is individual, as are the…” He glanced around suspiciously. “Wielders,” he finished slowly. “It’ll take time to stabilize additional units.”

I felt my jaw clench and unclench as I considered my answer. “I can give you two weeks.”

His eyes widened, and he gazed down through the ground as if seeing his project through the stone, housed far below Vildorial in the deepest tunnels where prying eyes wouldn’t stumble upon it by accident. “Barely enough time to find new users, much less train and design…”

“We need as many as you can have ready,” I said, reaching out my hand to shake his.

Instead of taking my hand, he held out something that he’d been hiding behind his side, and I jerked my own hand back as if I’d been burned, staring at the object.

“Charon’s people found it in the rubble. When they realized it was asuran-made, they collected the pieces.”

Held loosely in his grip was the handle of Dawn’s Ballad. About an inch of the blue blade remained, gray and jagged along its shattered edge. “It wasn’t the best thing I ever made, but I thought you might want it.”

Gingerly, I took the handle, turning it over and looking at it, overcome by the dizzying sensation of seeing a dream suddenly manifest in the real world.

Then Wren held out a small box. When I took it as well, he opened the lid to reveal gray shards within: what was left of the blade.

The smallest hint of a wry smile turned up the corner of his mouth. “I know how sentimental you humans can be.”

“Thank you, Wren,” I said simply, staring down at Dawn’s Ballad, or at least what remained of it.

He shrugged and turned away. “Come find us soon. There are quite a few things to discuss if you want a two-week turnaround.”

By the time I pulled my gaze away from his gift to say something, he had vanished into the steady stream of traffic moving along the highway that wound around the edge of the massive cavern.

My feet carried me blindly through the institute’s gates and along its halls until I arrived at my mother’s door. As I reached up to knock, the door eased inward to reveal my mother’s hopeful face.

She looked caught off guard, almost as if she had been looking for me but hadn’t expected me to really be there. I could see the weight of a thousand words hanging on the tip of her tongue, and could practically imagine the scolding she would give me about Ellie’s state when she last returned, and with only Chul, no less.

But just as quickly, the tension and frustration melted away, replaced by motherly warmth and a sad sort of joy. She gave me a warm smile. “Welcome home.”

***

Mom snorted as Ellie recounted one of her many conversations with Gideon, and her hand covered her mouth in embarrassment.

Ellie burst out laughing, then purposefully mimicked Mom’s accidental snort. Mom threw a bread roll at her head, but Ellie caught it out of the air and took a big bite, looking extremely pleased with herself. The following laughter lasted for a long time and felt like a washcloth scrubbing my spirit clean from the inside.

“So, Ellie, I’ve been wondering,” Mom said, and my sister tensed, no doubt expecting some sort of ambush question. “You’ve never had a normal life, not since you were just a few years old. When your big brother saves the world and everything goes back to normal—whatever that is, really—what do you think you’ll do?”

“Become a housewife,” Ellie said without missing a beat.

Mom and I both blinked several times in silence as we struggled to digest this information. Boo, who couldn’t fit in the kitchen and was watching Regis jealously through the door as my companion scarfed down a plate of leftovers, turned his head nearly on its side as he gave Ellie a challenging stare.

Ellie giggled and shook her head fiercely. “Oh, I’m kidding! Gosh. No, I think…” She hesitated, her eyes losing focus, and then a little smile curved up the corner of her mouth. “I think maybe I’d like to be an instructor in mana arts. At Lanceler Academy, or maybe even back in Xyrus. That would…kind of feel like going home, you know?”

We chatted for a while longer, inventing increasingly silly scenarios about what we would all like to do when the long war finally came to an end and Dicathen was safe. Mom settled on writing a book about my exploits, claiming she would be a rich elderly widow as she rode the coattails of my fame, while I assured them both I would retire, take up potato farming, and invent french fries.

And yet, all throughout dinner and the conversation my thoughts lingered on Dawn’s Ballad, my conversation with Oludari, and the foundations of the plan that had started to form in the back of my head.

As the small talk petered out, a comfortable silence was left behind. Buttressed by this silence, I withdrew the remnants of the sword from my dimension rune and set them on the table. Mom and Ellie both watched curiously. Mom recognized the handle first, looking up at me with quiet surprise.

I gave her a small smile as I opened the box and dumped the gray, broken pieces of the blade out next to the handle.

Regis lifted his head to see over the edge of the table. “Ooh, are you going to use Aroa’s to repair it? You know, I’ve secretly been hoping this would happen.”

Smiling contentedly, I swept the blade pieces back into the box, set it on the table, and set the handle on top of it. “No.”

The broken blade, I realized, had been the turning point for me. Up until that battle, I had always come out on top in the end. My belief in the inevitability of victory had been as sure as if I’d seen it in a vision. All of my training, all of my quest for the power to protect those I loved, it all came crashing down, shattered along with the azure blade of Dawn’s Ballad.

Repairing the blade wouldn’t undo my defeat or the long series of consequences that followed to define the world we now lived in. I glanced from Mom to Ellie, then to the wall, where a charcoal drawing of my father hung. Mom’s eyes followed mine, and her hand reached out to settle on my arm.

Ellie let out a world-weary sigh that sounded much too old for her. “I can’t wait for this stupid war to be over. To rebuild our homes, to live peacefully—where our biggest worry is what clothes to wear on a date…”

I raised one brow, regarding her seriously. “Despite the fact that I’d rather wrestle twenty Wraiths with my arms chained behind my back than watch you get ready for a date, I promise, El…I will do everything I can to make that future happen.

“But I’m going to need your help again to do it. And it’s going to be dangerous.”