Fortress Al-Mir

Prince Cedric Valorian Lafoar stood with his hands clasped behind his back, staring out to sea from the tall tower of the Cliff manor. The early light of the Mon morning gleamed off the glassy surface of the calm ocean. Clouds, high and wispy, did little to diminish the light.

It gave him a clear view of the three dozen ships spread out around the Cliff harbor in a defensive arrangement.

None of the ships were even half as large as one of the Eternal Empire’s warships, but they didn’t need to be. They were mostly for show, demonstrating to the citizens that they were well protected. Their other purpose was troop and material delivery.

When the Duke had stopped the King’s army at the borders to make his ill-conceived alliance with the Evestani without their interference, the King had not simply sat around doing nothing. Sensing a rebellion of some manner, he had recalled a portion of the soldiers, leaving some to watch the border, and loaded them up on these ships to secure the Duke’s seat of power. They were supposed to have arrived with Cedric but the weather had delayed them and he had never been one to wait around.

Their original purpose was a moot point at the moment. Lady Katja handed over control of the city with hardly a word of protest. It was… unsatisfying. If she wasn’t going to fight, why was he even here? He could be on the other side of Mystakeen, leading the charge in person. The whole situation left him feeling like he had wasted his time. Like they were wasting his time. Katja was hiding something—because of course she was. It was obvious the way the eggshells she walked upon kept cracking. But she wouldn’t bare her fangs. She wouldn’t show her claws. She bowed her head, said the right words to ingratiate herself with him, and waited patiently for the opportunities she wanted.

Cedric had half a mind to push her, to find out just how far he had to go to get those claws out.

Katja was lucky that more interesting targets existed to occupy his focus and attention.

“Staring out at sea again? One expects action from you, not idleness. You aren’t going soft as your age advances, are you?”

Cedric didn’t turn to face the light and innocent voice. “Mags. You shouldn’t be here.”

“I shouldn’t be anywhere. But I am. Thanks to your beloved Jewel—”

A rage erupted deep within Cedric’s chest. He whirled around, hand snapping out as he moved to grasp the cheeks and jaw of the creature. Only to find himself frozen upon turning and seeing what was behind him.

The princess pulled back, her heart-shaped face going pale at the sight of him. Her eyes sparkled with a deep, expressive blue as she fluttered her long eyelashes. The long, flowing hair cascaded down her back in soft waves of rich chestnut. She looked… frightened. The playful quirk of her lips was nowhere to be seen, replaced with a slight opening of her mouth.

It was her. Again. She was there, in front of him, looking as beautiful as the day he first laid eyes upon her. Heart aching, his hand slowly dropped to his side.

“Ced?” she asked, her voice light and innocent but filled with an air of trepidation. “Are you alright? It’s early. You should come back to bed.” Her fingernails, painted solid black, tapped together with a nervous clicking. “We can… do that thing you like.”

His eyes followed the movements of her fingernails. Her black fingernails. One flaw was all it took.

Cedric’s hand shot out, grasping her face. With a wrench of his wrist, he ripped his Jewel’s face straight off.

The flesh came apart in long, sinewy strands that clung to his fingers like sticky tree sap. A waterfall of blood erupted from the gaping wound, cascading down Jewel’s neck and staining the pristine white of her nightgown. The body melted apart, crumbling in on itself until it was nothing more than a compacted pile of meat, bones, and flesh.

“I’ve told you to leave her alone,” Cedric snarled.

A deep, hearty chuckle echoed off the coned tower roof.

Cedric turned again, hand reaching out, only to pause once again.

His father stared back, face lined with age. Hard, steely eyes met with his. “You’ve let that woman live,” the King said, voice dour.

“She’s cooperating,” Cedric said.

“I’ve spied on her, seen her meet with that mercenary commander everyone is talking about. They plot against you, you know? She grew tired of stealing gold and has turned her sights on stealing the entire kingdom. From me.” Cedric’s father shook his head. “A thief and a bandit to the core. The only cure for the likes of her is a short drop from a long rope.”

“It… isn’t necessary.”

“But it would be fun, wouldn’t it? Remember the look on that count’s face when he realized there was no hope for his little rebellion? You were far more willing back then. What happened to you? You’re no fun at all, anymore.” The King’s eyes widened as he emphasized his words, with his mouth splitting into a too-wide grin that showed off too-sharp teeth. “Or are you wanting other kinds of fun with her?”

The King melted away on his own without any contact from Cedric. The bloody mess left behind let off clouds of steam in the chill morning air. Cedric tried to turn around but a pressure on his back kept him facing the bloody mass.

“Her body is shapely,” a low, seductive version of Katja’s voice whispered in his ear. Hands snaked up and over his shoulders. Dark arms with tattooed black stripes crossed over his chest. “She likes the pleasure as well. Shares her bed with her men—and women—more nights than not. If you just ask…” Those hands moved up and the long, black fingernails caressed the underside of his chin. “You could have a new princess to replace that little Jewel of yours.”

Cedric gripped one of the hands around his neck, squeezing it until he heard bones crack and crumble. “Mags,” he hissed through clenched teeth. “Why are you here?”

A fully nude Lady Katja sauntered around Cedric, managing to hang off him the entire time. The bent angle of her crushed wrist didn’t bother her in the slightest. “I’ve been asking myself the same thing,” she said with a pout that didn’t fit on the former bandit’s face. “Why am I here? You promised me the blood of your enemies dripping off my skin. But look.” She ran a hand over her chest. “Completely dry. I’m bored. I’m so bored it is threatening to break our little contract.”

It was useless to try to decide if the creature was telling the truth. The contract shouldn’t have such an easy hole in it. Yet, if there was a loophole that she had seen, leaving things as they were was dangerous.

“The Eternal Empire has a cutter out in the waters a league away from shore, watching our movements. Go have your fun with that.”

“Another warship?” the nude Lady Katja said. She shook her head in disappointment. “You can’t keep giving a woman the same gifts over and over again and expect her eyes to light up with the same excitement as the first time. How about that girl? I won’t even break her completely if you want to use her after I’m done. It isn’t like humans need all these arms and legs and hearts, right?”

“You destroyed the first ship in the blink of an eye. Go have fun with this one.”

That only made her pout grow stronger, probably more at her last quip being ignored than at his suggestion. Letting out a disappointed hum, she flashed him a quick smile. Then… disappeared.

“My lord?”

Cedric turned to find a fully clothed Lady Katja standing at the stairway leading up onto the tower proper. A part of him was tempted to reach out and rip her face off. This wouldn’t be the first time Mags had sought to trick him like this, usually in an attempt to break some clause in the contract.

He managed to restrain himself.

“Sorry to disturb you and…” Katja looked around, face poised and serious but with an air of confusion. “I thought I heard you speaking with someone.”

“Musing to myself,” he said, narrowing his eyes as he looked around for any sign of Mags. The creature was gone. For all he knew, she had never been here in the first place, still stuck in her warded carriage. He shook his head, disguising his glance about by looking out to sea once again. “Did you require something from me?”

“I received a letter from Arkk of Company Al-Mir. He says he has a plan for forcing the invaders out of Mystakeen for good—he has a solution for the Golden Order’s avatar—but not the manpower to carry out the plan. He requests a joint operation with men under my… my command, your command, White Company, and any other free company that is still intact.”

Cedric closed his eyes, very much doubting the wording of the last line. “How soon? How many men, exactly?”

Katja hesitated in answering, looking down at a paper in her hands. “He… proposes… meeting in person to discuss further details would be best.”

“Does he now,” Cedric said, his tone flat as he looked back over his shoulder.

Katja didn’t manage to suppress her grimace. Cedric wasn’t all that surprised that the letter didn’t have all the information needed. If what he had read and heard was true, this Arkk wasn’t qualified in the slightest to wield the influence and power that he did.

“Very well,” Cedric said, dismissing Katja with a short gesture. “Send a return letter inviting him to Cliff for discussions.”

“Of course,” she said, bowing and backing down the steps.

“And, Lady Katja?”

She paused, looking up at him from several steps down. She didn’t look afraid. Was that good or bad? Mags wouldn’t like it. But, despite making good points on occasion—when it suited her purposes—he tried to avoid doing things Mags liked.

“Good work,” Cedric said.

The beginnings of a sly smile touched the corners of her lips. It only lasted a moment before she bowed again and ducked fully out of view. That left Cedric narrowing his eyes, watching the stairwell for a long moment.

Perhaps Mags was right about her.

“I’d love to break her,” Cedric said, watching the stairs. “Twist her little lips off her face.”

Cedric looked to himself, fingers flicking to the black fingernails on his hands. Something about the way he spoke rubbed against the grain. “How would you hold up against that so-called avatar?” he asked, ignoring the call for violence.

Cedric looked to Cedric, flashing a maw filled with sharp teeth. “No clue. Never encountered one before. No matter what, it’ll be fun to find out.”

Cedric frowned at Cedric before clasping his hands behind his back and turning to face the sea. He didn’t say a word.

“Ah, but the little fortress keeper? I have encountered their kind before. They’re always so arrogant. Watching the glow in their eyes fade as their confidence amounts to nothing is… most entertaining.”

“He isn’t our enemy.”

“Yet,” Mags said, voice dropping a dozen octaves behind Cedric’s back. “But don’t worry. I can fix that. You just leave everything to me…”

Cedric turned, a protest hanging off the tip of his tongue, only to find himself standing alone at the top of the tower.

“Do you think he didn’t get my message?”

Darius Vrox looked up from a tome he was in the midst of modernizing for proper reading. He slid his reading glasses down to the end of his nose, looking out over the top rim at the so-called archivist who was lounging across one of the nearby desks. She was on her back with her dark red hair spread out around her head, hanging off the edges.

Lyra Zann, if that was her actual name, had become something of a fixture during the study sessions Darius engaged in. She was the High Librarian. Within the library, not even an inquisitor could claim authority over her. Not without cause. With everything she had told him—and had shown him, especially in that little hidden segment of the library—he could certainly find cause.

As she turned her head to face him, a silver glint shined in her eyes despite the lack of any light in the room that might have caused it.

No. Finding cause to accost her wasn’t going to turn out well for him. And it wasn’t like her presence was unwanted. She was knowledgeable. She didn’t necessarily know everything that he wanted to know, but she would know which tomes held the answers he sought.

“I warned you that he is a simpleton,” Darius said. “His greatest attribute is his luck with, perhaps, a secondary ability toward charisma given the forces he has managed to amass in the short time he has been active.”

Lyra let out an elongated hum as she brought a finger to her chin. She tapped a few times with the white, almost glowing nail. “Perhaps another revelation for the oracles is in order. I wanted to cloud the true intentions of that prophecy as some individuals in the Abbey are likely to be sharing information with undesirables, but if he isn’t going to understand… Or maybe I should just try a more direct route.”

Darius narrowed his eyes. The Ecclesiarch was supposed to lead the Abbey. It was he who supposedly received direct revelation from the Light. The oracles were there to assist, granted their information-gathering abilities through hard work and training, though they nominally acted more as clairvoyants than seers. Yet here was Lyra, the unassuming librarian who hadn’t left the library in years if Darius understood the rumors correctly, casually suggesting that she could give out visions on a whim.

Darius wasn’t a fool. It was one thing for a librarian to have access to a hidden trove of books. But he and Sylvara had been doing research on avatars, purifiers, and the ways they used their powers. He could connect the dots as easily as anyone with a modicum of cognizance.

He didn’t want to admit it, however. If the avatar of the Light really was sitting across from him…

The implications were unsettling. Both in that he wasn’t sure how he should act—thus far, treating her simply as the archivist was working well for him—and in that her existence here meant that their side of the conflict could have had a powerful force behind it if she had just left the library.

The previous war with Evestani that had ended a little over thirty years prior had been before his time. He had barely been born at its conclusion. Had it also featured avatars slinging powerful spells at each other? None of the historical records he had come across mentioned great beams of golden light or winter-time assaults throughout the Duchy.

Lyra was watching him again, her eyes glinting with that impossible silver light. It was like she was looking through him.

Darius turned back to his book, pushing his reading glasses back up the bridge of his nose. Another historical record of war, this one from centuries past. A great war that left such a mark on the land that the scars still remained in the form of the wastes the Beastmen Tribes now occupied, west of Evestani and Mystakeen. He had never heard of the war before coming across this book, nor had he ever questioned why the Beastmen Tribes occupied a wasteland beyond the simple fact that nobody else wanted the territory.

“We signed a treaty.”

Darius jolted. Lyra wasn’t draped across the desks any longer. She hung over his shoulder, looking down at the book he had opened.

“To stop something like that from happening again, The Eternal Empire, the Golden Order, and the Abbey all signed a treaty that none would use such tactics in future conflicts. Any future disagreements were to be fought through the hands of mortal men and the magics they could wield, nothing greater.”

“It would seem the Golden Order has forgotten the treaty,” Darius said after a short breath. “Unless you are suggesting that those golden rays capable of leveling large swaths of land are mortal-level magics.”

He hadn’t seen the magic used in person. Sylvara had. The picture his fellow inquisitor painted of the situation was far and beyond what even purifiers like Agnete could accomplish.

“Magics that mortals can wield,” Lyra corrected in a chiding tone before she continued. “Technically, the Golden Order is not assailing the Abbey in this current war. They’re after Arkk and, perhaps more specifically, the being of the Stars at his side.” She paused, donning a wan, humorless smile. “Of course, if the Abbey were harmed or even wiped off the face of the world as a side effect of this conflict…”

“Loopholes,” Darius said with a scowl.

“Don’t sound too upset. Loopholes benefit everyone if they’re positioned to take advantage of them. Purifiers, for example, are mortal men wielding higher-level magics. Were it not for the Abbey’s policy of… nurturing purifiers, the war thirty years ago could have ended far worse for us.”

Darius raised an eyebrow. “What stops our enemies from using that same loophole? Or were their purifiers simply weaker than ours at the time?”

“That,” Lyra said with a chuckle, “is an accomplishment that I cherish. It is all about knowing the natures of your opponents when writing out loopholes like that. The Gree… The Golden Order would never make use of purifiers. They are run by an envious, jealous, and utterly insecure individual who sees everything as threats. The Eternal Empire has a similar problem, except it comes in the form of pride.”

“Knowing is half the battle,” Darius said. He decided to not comment on the implication that Lyra had written out part of the treaty.

“Knowledge is the most important thing in this world of ours,” she countered with a grin. “Wisdom comes in at a close second. Which,” she said, smile turning to a frown, “is why it is so disappointing that I haven’t received any response from your boy. Did he even pay attention to the words? And now he is off galivanting through the land of darkness? No signs of wisdom or knowledge there.”

Darius considered for a moment. “I told you about him, but I know Arkk. Perhaps if I were to write out some suggestions..?”

Lyra Zann put on a small smile, looking at him as if she had expected him to offer all along. “Lovely. Let’s get started then.”