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Arthur Leywin
The last ti I had stood before the masses, a blade in hand and a Vritra knelt weakly before my feet, it had been a declaration of utmost war. A ringing defiance against Agrona's taunts and massacres. An echo that said that we would not fall. That death laid a foundation of defiance and unity.
Viessa stared up at , eyes hollowly begging. She wanted so desperately to live, to have another chance. But when I spoke with her, all she ever wanted was more destruction. More despair to savor. She'd ended the lives of countless Dicathians in a dramatic attempt at genocide, all for what? For her to feel sothing?
She would receive no rcy. None from King Grey, nor from King Arthur. For all that I was the King of Second Chances, I would not allow rcy for my enemies to co at the cost of their future victims. So now, as I let Dawn's Ballad sweep through the air, relieving another Vritra of their head, I felt only grim resolve.
Thousands watched the display, grimly silent as Scythe Viessa's head rolled. I had given them a speech—one proclaiming our victory, true, but also reasserting that our enemy wasn't yet done. That though we pulled ourselves back together, Agrona Vritra still plotted across the ocean, wanting nothing more than our destruction.
However small, I hoped this demonstration would help the people of my country feel closure. If not on the entire war, then on the parts they had already lived through—because they would need to endure more to co.
I looked down at the blood staining Dawn's Ballad, seeing my grim, auburn features reflected back in them. Dusk's Claim sat heavy on my head as I allowed myself to visibly consider my actions.
"Hold to your fellows," I declared to the masses, looking into the recording artifact, "and be ready. You have already been so strong, and I must ask you for your strength again. This war is not over, nor will it be over for a very long ti. But I know this continent's strength: the valor in the hearts of every man, elf, and dwarf. I am honored to be your King, and so long as we fight together, I will give all that I can to see us to another day."
I stepped away from the recording artifact, nodding to Gideon to turn it off. I could tell that he wanted to ask sothing, but recent events had moving away already. I needed ti to think, ti to plan.
Lyra Dreide has been an invaluable asset, I thought, striding back through the grand hallways of Dicathen's flying castle. It was largely empty today. Now that the war had died down for the ti being, many of the nobles and administrators that constantly staffed this place were allowed to return to their ho cities. At this mont, my family was enjoying their ti at Xyrus with the Helsteas, unwinding a bit and reminiscing on the good old days.
A smile quirked the edge of my lips as I rembered sending them off, too inundated with work for the ti being to join them despite how I wished to. I didn't even have my usual sparring partners.
Regarding the Lances, Varay was using her absurdly detailed ice to assist Gideon in prototyping engineering designs, which helped accelerate our engineering montum manyfold. Olfred and Mica worked together to pave the way for more underground trains across Sapin, Darv, and the Beast Glades. Tess did regular shifts with the farrs north of the Sehz River, using her nature magic to help try and make up for the lost season.
And when she wasn't working with the farrs, she was doing another mission for , deep in the enchanted mists of Elenoir. With the power of a nascent, living forest, she wove sothing secret and powerful, hidden even from the asura.
But that left quite alone for the ti being, and though I had experienced so much loneliness as king, this was a new kind. It was an unfamiliar ache—one that knew I would see my loved ones again, but that it would be so ti. "Why can I not just visit them now?" this strange emotion demanded. "They're not far away, after all! Just drop what you are doing. All of this can afford to wait for a day. Maybe a week? Even a month!"
Yet my duties could not afford to wait, and so my heart yearned.
I miss Sylvie already, I thought, stopping before a glorious painting: one that had been commissioned at the formation of the Triunion Council nearly a decade ago now. Blaine Glayder, looking far younger, had a genuine grin on his face. Those shades of gray hadn't bleached his maroon hair yet, and he was clinking glasses with a gently-smiling Alduin Eralith. No trace of their eventual bitter animosity shone on their faces as an air of good cheer and fellowship radiated from the pastels.
A grin tugged at the edge of my lips as I saw Dawsid Graysunders utterly devouring a leg of so sort of turkey, laughing in tune with sothing that Priscilla Glayder had said. Unity and fellowship… It was more important now than ever.
Breathing in, I could almost sll the aromas in the painting. Hear the clinking of glasses, the low chatter of voices…
I should have dinner with my family soti soon, I thought, feeling strangely relaxed in this hallway. Mom hasn't cooked for in a while, and I know Tess would like to properly reintroduce herself to my family. I haven't had a al with the Eraliths in years, either. Not since I grew up in their royal castle.
My smile broadened as I imagined it. My father, laughing just like Blaine was in that painting as he clinked glasses with the elven royals. "Well, you certainly had your hands full dealing with my boy!" I could just about imagine him saying. My mother, her auburn hair like fire and eyes warm as a hearth, talking with rial Eralith about what a terror it had been raising such children. In her voice, I could almost hear it, too. "Arthur and Tess did what to all of your laundry?"
And maybe soti soon, Sylvie could join us again, too. Gramps as well… All one big, happy family.
I looked to the side, lifting my brow at the specter of Regis. His long, wheaten hair flowed in an unseen breeze, drifting on eddies of purple. The four elents of the mana spectrum didn't react to him at all, but the aether? The purple drifted happily about his crown, accenting the silver plate armor all across his lithe form.
"Can you eat at all?" I asked, considering the living blade. "Considering you're a ghost, probably not, but…"
If I were to have a family dinner soti soon, it would only be fair to try and include the spectral shade at my side. But he didn't really eat, did he?
"I am ford of the soul-shade of Aurora Asclepius and the blood of half a dozen others who love you truly, Arthur-Grey," he responded, still watching that painting. Our bond was not the sa as the one I had with Sylvie, and I did not know if he could read my thoughts. "I do not need sustenance, any more than a blade needs blood."
I nodded slowly, considering this. "But blades do need to be sharpened, do they not?" I answered instead. "You're a person too. I'm certain there's sothing we can do for you to make you feel welco."
Regis smirked wryly, golden eyes flashing in radials of purple. When he spoke, it was with my voice. "Sharpened… Yes. That is an apt description. But all I wish for is for you to…"
The living weapon suddenly trembled, the air around him warping as the aether resonated through the castle. He suddenly seed more. Even though he could never influence this world in the physical, I wondered if there was a place he did have dominion. That crown of glimring light atop his head glowed a pale white-gold, casting him in a halo of a rising sun.
The hairs on my arms rose, electric tingling racing along my spine as I stared, unnerved, at the fragnt of broken reality as he seed to co alight with energy. And even as it happened, I knew—deep in my mana core—that my words had sohow caused this change. Sothing in what I had requested, in what I'd felt as I'd said the words, had unlocked this change.
Regis' eyes drifted to the crown on my head, and his mannerisms beca far more serious. That sa expression he'd taken when I'd first offered him my hand stretched across his pale lips, one of realization. "It is so very strange, Arthur-Grey," he said quietly, distant gaze locked on so terrible battlefield. "I could not have imagined that this is what the World wished of you. A Mouth to Speak, Eyes to Watch, Blade to Cleave, and Crown to Lead. Always four cornerstones… Three to kneel, and one to stand above. The edicts to their master. Always four, but… But what is this, now? Though it stays above, what rises from below?"
Sothing in shivered, chilled by the cold in Regis' tone. "Regis, Regis!" I whispered-yelled, unnerved by the strange aura radiating around . That sense that—if I dared look into this living blade's eyes—I would witness that endless battlefield again, with the crown above. He had claid I was chosen for sothing when I had finally accepted my crown, but I still did not understand what was needed of . I moved closer, shielding my eyes from the blinding light. "What the hell is happening?"
All at once the light radiating from Regis' crown beca far too bright for to gaze into. I winced, the corona casting energy across the smiling faces of the painting beside . Sweat beaded on my skin, and the castle began to rumble. The hallways appeared longer and darker than they should have, my living weapon's cadence echoing over itself like layers of steel in a well-forged blade. "Four cornerstones to a path of Destruction, four cornerstones to a path of Creation. But now a Fifth rises, molding in determination. What could—"
The light fizzled, snapped, and then abruptly went out like a lightbulb shattering. The flying castle abruptly stopped rumbling as the spectral figure fell to his knees, breathing heavily. The crown about his head flickered and dimd.
I quickly approached the specter, feeling a surge of uncertain worry in my chest as I knelt in front of him. Questions and worries about whatever he had witnessed or whatever his words ant were secondary in my mind. All of this was set off by a few words, asking how the phantom could sharpen. "Regis, what's wrong? What was that all about?"
The specter remained kneeling, shaking slightly. "Arthur-Grey," he whispered in my own voice, "I do not know. I just know that… you have a choice. The Crown is… incomplete. Four cornerstones must lead to the fifth, the primordial finality. For Creation or Destruction."
The Crown is incomplete? I thought, Dusk's Claim suddenly heavier on my head. The matte-black tal was a crown of thorns, the spines digging into my scalp and constricting painfully. Four cornerstones?
And what was this Fifth? Regis had spoken of a Mouth, Eyes, Blade, and Crown. Sothing in the depths of my soul trembled as I thought of it, a resonance I'd never known forcing my mind away from those words.
"Here, let's get you up," I offered, worried deep inside. "We can talk about this in more detail later, right? For now—"
"Listen, Arthur-Grey," Regis seethed, trembling violently as he stared up at . The white-gold crown on his head brightened. He heaved for breath, as if fighting against a great tide alone. "Grey was chosen for the steel. Chosen for the tool. All that I am… Sylvia and Sylvie Indrath, Tessia Eralith, Aurora Asclepius, Toren Daen… They chose you for the broken boy. Rember."
Regis said he was my path to transcendence, I thought. He said that I was chosen for sothing. That this Crown was for a purpose.
I struggled to contain it all, to try and reconcile everything together. Since I'd beco king again, I'd grown accustod to a dozen different issues fighting for my attention, the stress of trying to prioritize one over the other slowly threatening to turn my hair gray. But for once, I really wished I didn't have cryptic, nonsensical prophecies swirling in the back of my mind.
"You're telling to be wary of this power that's chosen ," I whispered, aether swirling about my hands. I'd always felt that aether had a sort of… will of its own. A directive vast and unknowable that I couldn't quite trace. But what my weapon implied… "But I'm already subservient to it, aren't I?"
Like I was trapped beneath Kezess. Trapped beneath Agrona.
My thoughts were cut off by a mana pulse from my dinsion ring, a blaring urgent beacon pulling my mind in another direction. I quickly retrieved an item from my storage, my expression fracturing as I saw who had sent this ssage.
"Free yourself from the… restraints of your core," Regis whispered. His form beca a bit fuzzy as he stared up at , searching my eyes for sothing. "That is when you will learn more. Right now, I… I am tired. I suspect that ssage is very, very important. I will speak to you when I can."
I let out a breath as I watched the spectral figure slowly dissipate, my teeth clenching.
"You love to make my life difficult, Regis," I muttered, cataloging his words into the back of my head. Free myself of the restraints of my core. "I'm going to get answers from you later."
I shook my head as my weapon went strangely dormant, like a weight suddenly laid down in the back of my mind. Then, sensing the urgency of the ssage in the scroll in my hands, I rushed through the castle. Halls passed by at decent speed as I moved toward one of the council eting rooms.
I pushed my way into a small room connected to the main council chamber, swiftly checking my surroundings for threats. Green wind mana lolled about obliviously, laughing as it swirled in tune with my breath. Yellow earth mana tumbled along the floor, picking up speed and losing montum at rhythmic intervals. Here and there, blue raindrops of water mana danced with the wind, before falling down like a light shower. The red of fire was distant, except for where it clung to the torch sconces on the walls and drifted before the setting sunlight that lanced through the tall windows. The shadows danced across a simple writing desk as I slowly approached, unfurling the communication scroll in my hand.
And the aether, too—that effervescent purple—it did as it willed, inspecting like curious faerie-motes. It was almost childlike in a way, curious and intrigued by my presence. Conscious-yet-not, pervasive-yet-not, everywhere and nowhere. A paradox burning in my mind's eye.
But at the very least, I was certain I was alone. The little gem at the top of the scroll flickered, and I wondered at a myriad different possibilities for what was within. My contact with this specific spy was infrequent, but their information was critical to my future plans. I unfurled the scroll, my eyes tracing the ink. Especially because—
Every single mote of mana in the room froze as if caught by Static Void, my heartbeat stuttering in my chest. I scanned over the ink again and again, making sure I was seeing correctly. A single sentence.
"Spellsong lives."
But that was impossible. I'd seen the prophetic phoenix-blood's broken body. Seen him die. I'd been there, failing to save him after he had saved everyone I had ever known. Agrona had ripped him from this world in vengeance, and his body had been whisked away by the asura.
My hands clenched and unclenched, before I finally relinquished my subconscious hold on the ambient mana. I grabbed an inkpot and quill, before quickly scribbling out a response.
"Evidence?"
I waited tensely for a few monts, tapping my fingers as the implications whirled within . Phoenixes were rumored to be the masters of rebirth—and it seed increasingly likely that Agrona had brought Nico and to this world through so sort of knowledge from captured phoenixes.
"Continent in chaos, brink of eruption," a flowing, sultry hand wrote back. "Attended a eting of his old allies. Saw sothing—"
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
The writing cut off for a ti, and I got the sense my spy was considering what to write next.
"Unnerving," was what she finally decided to write. "Proof he lived. Not here, though. More importantly, there is a possibility."
Spellsong, if he were alive, would be in the land of the asura, wouldn't he? My heartbeat picked up in my chest as I leaned over the parchnt, a single bead of sweat tracing along my brow. I'd failed the man before. Even with all the power of a king, I hadn't been able to do right by my ally.
By the man who knew , gave everything for my world, and bled out on the stone for his trouble.
"Spellsong's arts can be channeled. There is a girl trying to teach others how to do it themselves," the pen asserted, ink appearing from nowhere on the communication scroll. "The Commander can be healed."
The scroll was silent for a ti, both of us individually processing the words present. I blinked down at the parchnt, feeling suddenly misaligned. Gramps… Gramps could be healed. Not long ago, I'd been trying to organize Spellsong's assistance in purging the corruption from his mana core in return for the release of Retainer Mawar.
That was when everything had gone so very wrong. And while I'd only increased funding and research into the Alacryan thods of corrupting beasts—in the thin, vain hope that we might find a cure—I'd slowly, painfully been losing hope. Every day, the old coot that had raised lingered in his bed. Living, but not alive.
Didn't Tess say she was healed by Spellsong once? I thought, writing back a feverish ssage. Sothing about the soul. This could be real, couldn't it?
"Learn everything you can," I replied, underlining everything. Even amidst my spy's other missions on the enemy continent, we both knew that this would rise high in priority. We both had reasons to wish for Virion's recovery, and I had faith in this agent to see her mission through. "Report back with—"
For the second ti that hour, the aether shivered under the weight of sothing new. Sothing different, angry, and shiveringly stark. The purple particles all seed to lash out at the mana nearby, banishing the other colors with a tyrannical, unnatural vindictiveness.
I was already moving, Dawn's Ballad shivering into my hand. I whirled on my feet, the parchnt forgotten as I sensed the nearby threat.
A familiar black cat sat in the doorway, cool and languid. Its tail swooshed back and forth like a trono, a paintbrush on the canvas of all human civilization. Eyes like a captured galaxy observed with cool arrogance.
"Hello, Windsom," I said, schooling my features. "What took you so long?"
The arrogant dragon had absconded with my bond, declaring he'd return to "ensure that I followed the path best for Dicathen." A thin veneer for, "I will watch over your shoulder and strike down anything that might threaten Indrath influence in the slightest."
The cat didn't speak, just tilted its head. The aether around vibrated, as if agitated by the dragon's very existence. It had never done that before.
Then Windsom's form fuzzed, then burned as it expanded. In a fraction of a second, a man in a sharp military coat, well-grood wheat hair, and an expression severe enough to weather away the mountains themselves stood before . Knowing the asura, he had the lifespan to do so, too.
"Arthur Leywin," the general said, brushing a bit of dust from his bright gold epaulets. Those eyes road across the slim study, looking for sothing to criticize. "Your predilection for informality will burn you one day."
My lip curled at the edge, and my eyes flashed. "I am a king, Windsom. I am Dicathen's law incarnate. It is my words that decide what formal and informal are. And today, my whims lean toward asking what took you so damn long, and saying that is formal enough."
The dragon was unamused as he glided into the study, his power trailing him like a subtle cloak. Long ago, when I had first t this asura, his very presence had served to make my heart clench in fear. After leaving his elixir shop in Xyrus, he'd ambushed while I was moving through teleportation gates, and I'd nearly passed out from his sheer presence.
His strength was still sweltering, easily beyond that of Cadell, my greatest foe of the past. But though sweat beaded a little along the edge of my brow, I could stand with my crown intact.
Windsom's eyes snapped back to , roaming up my loose clothing and lingering on my crown. I could almost sense him trying to inspect it, its very presence confusing and alien to him.
"I once thought you were similar to him," he muttered, his lip twitching. "It was what made you worthy of so respect, even amidst the lesser rabble. Your understanding of strength and doing what needed to be done set you above your peers. Even made you worthy of training within the land of the asura for a ti, honing that edge."
I raised a single brow, shoving my hands in my pockets. I walked forward, not even sparing the asura a glance as I strode past him, my cloak billowing. It forced the dragon to follow if he wanted to keep speaking, a subtle reordering of our positions of power. I walked out of the study, entering the grand eting hall that served as my throne room. The light of the setting sun danced through djinni-glass.
Would the ancient mages hate a dragon walking among the bones of their civilization? I wondered, gliding toward my quadra-elental throne. Streaks of every elent flickered through the crystalline structure like fractals. As I passed it by, I brushed my hand over the icy surface.
"Who did you think I was similar to?" I queried, striding onward, my hands locked behind my back. "Lord Aldir, I presu?"
If there was anyone the Grey within was most similar to, it would be the greatest warrior of the pantheon race. The way his emotions seed to erase themselves, cut away and utilized only when necessary…
"No," Windsom said smoothly. "You were most similar to Lord Indrath, King Arthur."
My steps ground to a halt abruptly. Slowly, I turned, peering at the dragon with a steadily rising wariness. Sothing in my mana core clenched—and I wasn't certain if it was from fear. I rembered my few etings with the Dragon Tyrant, the apathetic, sharp-featured man gazing down on high from a throne.
Apathetic. In control. Beyond and above all of it.
And in turn, I rembered sitting on the throne behind , gazing down at the councilmbers as though they were pawns in a ga.
"Were, Lord Windsom?" I asked, curious despite myself.
There was no wind to blow through the halls, but I could almost feel it. A whispered breath released sowhere in the aether, carrying secrets through the air.
"The events of this past war proved you different," Windsom muttered, sounding genuinely disappointed. "The traitorous Lance Wykes still lives, sequestered in a farmhouse. The lessuran Dreide whispers in your ear, and Olfred Warend—twice-traitor to Dicathen and Alacrya—is welcod back as a Lance. And now… Now you shelter lingering Alacryans in prisoner camps instead of wiping them out. Our Lord would not suffer enemies to live pointlessly."
Our Lord. Wisdom's eyes dared to try and correct him. Dared to say otherwise. But I could see the trap the dragon was laying, making justify myself to him. Justify my actions on standards he would set.
That was a battle I would only lose, but the ssage was received. Lord Indrath wants these people slain.
So I refused to take the bait. Instead, I caught on to sothing else.
"I wonder why Agrona Vritra is suffered to live," I mused contemplatively, tracing the agitated aether motes I could see. "I have spies in Alacrya now, feeding knowledge about the continent. And what they say is revealing."
"You have spies?" Windsom replied, seeming genuinely surprised by this. He searched my expression for any trace of a lie. "You move quickly."
Truthfully, the circumstances of this spy were far more providential than anything else. They'd taken initiative during the asuran attack on the Alacryan camp near Carn, following the refugees and smuggling themself back through their tempus warps to the other continent.
I shrugged. "I feel like you could have provided us with a little more knowledge when this war first started," I said, keeping my tone carefully neutral. I leaned against the side of my icy throne, crossing my arms as I stared at the asura. "Sentries, Casters, Shields, Strikers, Instillers… All that knowledge of their magics is extrely commonplace on Alacrya. Even the lowest backwater peasant knows the basics of mana, even if they can't use it themselves. Unless my sources of intel are even better than 'Our Lord's, then I've gathered knowledge not even he acquired."
Windsom's eyes narrowed as he received my subtle ssage. He had let Cynthia Goodsky die from her curse, the woman giving everything just to tell us that we had Scythes and Retainers to face. Not even the most common knowledge of the average Alacryan citizen. And now, information was no longer Kezess Indrath's monopoly.
"Your point, Arthur Leywin?" the dragon said, voice terribly smooth and devoid of any true intonation.
"The High Sovereign's entire society is on the brink of collapse after Toren Daen's little display. As far as I can tell, it's a perfect ti to strike. The Dominions are tearing into each other, riots are breaking out in the streets, and Agrona's scrambling to pick up the pieces. And in the anti, all their strongest mages are disappearing. Vanishing as if they'd never existed at all."
I favored the dragon with a raised eyebrow, aning passing between us. Lord Indrath had forsaken Dicathen once, dismissing us as incapable of victory against the Vritra. An elite strike team had attacked Taegrin Caelum, thinking the basilisk Lord's attention sufficiently diverted for a knife-strike at the heart.
They had failed, leaving us to fend for ourselves. So the question remained: why didn't Kezess finish this farce? I doubted he was willing to truly bet his chips on , especially due to how much I knew.
After all, King Grey wouldn't bet on , either.
Windsom stood there, eying contemplatively. I had the sudden sense that his facade of a feline was not as surface-level as it at first appeared. In those stars, I was being asured, batted between paws. I was prey that did not know it yet, and the cat wondered how long to keep the ga going.
"Agrona Vritra foresaw potential retaliation from the forces of Epheotus," he finally said, strolling toward one of the councilmbers' chairs. "He decided to act preemptively, destroying a piece of key infrastructure within Epheotus, where a few invaluable prisoners were being kept. That was what kept from eting with you again for so long: the basilisk's influence has been made known far more within the holand."
My brow wrinkled as I considered this. "A paradigm change, then? The war isn't just constrained to Dicathen anymore for you asura. You've been hit with a terror attack."
It was a startlingly good ssage for Agrona to send. I suspected that half the reason Kezess had been so willing to commit atrocities and paint the ground with blood was because Agrona had no true way to strike back yet. But if the High Sovereign sohow managed to land a strike in Epheotus, it sent a terrible ssage.
"You have every motive to work with us, Arthur Leywin," Windsom said, suffering calm. "Your constant antagonism to Our Lord's efforts to strengthen and secure your lives does nothing but diminish our unity."
Diminish our unity. An interesting thing to say from a dragon who had shattered civilizations beneath his talons.
"I will be frank with you, Windsom," I said, strolling toward the lingering dragon. I ignored his aura, the mana and aether beckoning to my call. "Your lord has done nothing but treat us 'lessers' as pieces on a board. Sothing disposable and unworthy of his faith. I am now their monarch. Their King. And I will not endanger them further with vague promises and inconsistent allies."
I stood barely a foot from the dragon, my crown absorbing every bit of light in the room. As dusk claid the horizon, lingering sunlight streaming through the window, so too did Dusk Claim this continent in my na.
Windsom's lip turned upward as my challenge rang through the mana. I could tell—he'd wanted this to happen, wanted to present myself like this. A show of strength was sothing he understood.
So when his influence seeped through the ambient aether to cast a spatial spell, utterly oblivious to its shivering rage, I was ready.
The four gems on my crown glead brightly as I fell into my penultimate manaborne state, all elents coursing through my body. And as my sense for the Light glead like a morning star in my mind, so too did I know the Shadow.
My will closed around Windsom's aether spell—so sort of teleportation weave, perhaps to take us sowhere he thought would be more advantageous—from two sides. Aether and mana both bit down like halves of a primordial jaw. For a mont, his will struggled against mine, trying to enforce the twisting of the world. But I'd caught him entirely off guard, and he was too confident in his waning dominion.
A second later, the dragon's control shattered into countless shards with the sharp clang of ntal tal. For the first ti in my life, I beheld the apathetic dragon's disgruntled shock as the implosion sent ripples of sound and power wafting through the throne room.
The gems in my crown shone.
"Let establish sothing, Windsom Indrath," I said, my voice a whisper loved by Wind and World both. "I will work with your lord. I will work with you. But I will not operate under threats and coercion."
I let out a breath, letting my forms drift away as I stood strong before the disgruntled asura. "So give sothing to work with. We both want Agrona Vritra beaten back, do we not?"
Windsom's wheat-gold brow twitched. He had lived for thousands of years, but I imagined this was a first for him. A lesser standing proud beneath asuran strength. He inspected my crown with sothing indecipherable, his aura stern as a mountain. "A king of n wishes to stand equal to a king of gods," he muttered, cool as ice. "You misunderstand your position, Arthur Leywin."
"You were the first to tell that the asura were not gods," I countered easily. "And no, I understand my position perfectly well. That is why I need cooperation, not threats."
The dragon and I kept our eyes locked, the shivering aether around us not even daring to spark. I thought I could sense sothing in that terrible crash of our power, a split-instant before everything had sheared. Like a word forever lost on the tip of my tongue, sothing in my mind tried to follow down that path of insight.
I pulled it away for now, too enraptured by this deadly duel of minds.
"The elf commander," he finally replied, seeming to settle like a stone at the bottom of a river. "You have failed in every venture to heal Virion Eralith, have you not? The healers of Epheotus would do far, far better. He need only be taken to Mount Geolus for treatnt."
Sothing in my heart seized, and I restrained the urge to clench my teeth. My mind leapt to what my spy had told not long ago: that there was a way to heal Gramps. A thin, desperate hope. But not definite.
I wavered like a stone balanced on a precipice. King Grey would have imdiately refused to grant the asura any sort of leverage—because as much as this was a potential gift of peace, it was a double-edged sword.
"And I presu he would stay in Epheotus?" I replied, pretending to think it over.
Windsom let out a sigh. "If you are so quick to suspect us of using a hostage, then your sight is limited, Arthur Leywin," he said with his characteristic arrogance. "He would of course be returned whenever he is healthy and hale."
My analytical thinking helped, here. As much as I disliked the conclusions I was reaching, that didn't an they were invalid. Because if there was anyone who could threaten my position as king—anyone that the asura would potentially try and use to oust from power—it would be the forr Commander.
I had centralized much of Dicathen's politics around myself, but the return of Virion—especially if heralded by a foreign power—would diminish my voice as the only one that could be obeyed.
But I had another route to healing the man who had all but raised . One that was a thin, vague hope… But Spellsong was the sort to pull through miracles, wasn't he?
"My scientists have made breakthroughs recently in understanding Agrona Vritra's corruption strains," I interjected, projecting my confidence. "I am certain the forr Commander will be healed soon, regardless of Indrath intervention."
I tapped my foot, looking inquisitively about us. I considered the greatest technology our enemy had, the one that had left every flank wide open across the continent, rendering nowhere safe. It was the Alacryans' tempus warps—even moreso than their complete and utter industrial dominance—that made them nearly impossible to fight. Impossible to predict or react to.
Gideon was making strides in preventing tempus warps from portalling in and out of certain locations—the Alacryan system of wards and shields were designed to stop such things—but his knowledge was imperfect.
"I need sothing that will help not just , but the entire war effort," I replied, inspecting the motes of aether as they curled about us like fangs and claws and swords. "I need to understand aether: space itself. If there is anything that can set the people of Dicathen above their oppressors, it is that understanding.
"My training in Epheotus was cut short," I said succinctly, favoring the irritated Windsom with a bit of a smile. "I think it's ti it continued, no?"
With those words—with that declaration—I closed a door to Gramps' recovery. Perhaps the best chance he had.
Windsom's eyes flickered, and I saw what asure of respect I had lost by being 'soft' slowly centing back into place. "You seek power to protect them all, even at the expense of a lone, miserable elf," he comnted, amused. "I underestimated you again, King Arthur."
Then he turned, his military coat flowing like living shadow. "Allow to converse with our lord," he said. Above all, I was unnerved by how he seed to think he had won our little exchange. "You will hear from shortly."
The asura strode away, carrying my decree with him. Carrying what might be the last bit of hope my first true ntor in this world had to survive. I watched him go, feeling cold.
Think Grey, I thought inside my heart, holding onto one more chance. And Toren Daen, if you help Gramps now, then I will be forever in your debt. Even moreso than I already am.
I had learned sothing of loyalty in this new ti as king. Spellsong's actions had earned from a different kind of loyalty: one of principle and repaynt. In a world of terrible suffering, good n who stood in the face of evil were rare.
I could not achieve my happiness—nor the happiness of Dicathen itself—so long as beings like these asura reigned. I spoke plainly of aligning with Kezess despite our interests, but I knew that it would not last. If the Lord of the Indraths had his way, I would either live my entire life as a king of this continent, a re puppet. Hundreds of years would pass, and then I would die. And if I ever tried to set down my crown?
The dragons wouldn't allow a loose end to roam about freely. So I needed a wildcard—sothing that couldn't be predicted or controlled. Sothing outside the constraints of these fated paths.
Once again, the wheel turned, the world spun. And the play turned to the break in Fate.
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