The Beholden, page 8
Lindon glared at him. “I haven’t forgotten the old procedures. As it seems you have.”
“No, Master De Malena, you’re completely correct.” Juro shot a dark look at Anselm, who puffed derisively on his cigarette before reaching into his coat and extracting a narrow paper document. He handed it to Lindon, who unfolded it, angling his body toward Celestia. It was a letter of identification, but what Celestia noticed first was the alchemical seal, glowing at the bottom of the paper with a dark crimson light. It hurt her eyes to look at it for too long.
“Very good. Glad to see you haven’t gone rogue, Anselm.” Lindon folded the paper back into thirds and handed it to Anselm, who smirked at him. “Thank you, gentlemen. Now. What is it you wish to speak with me about?”
“A matter of grave importance,” said Juro. “The Emperor wishes to retain your services again.”
His forthrightness made Celestia blink. All her fears about arrests and wrong-doing evaporated away, replaced by a new fear, something harder to place. “Your services?” she asked. “But you’re retired!”
Lindon put his hand on her knee. “I’m sure the man is prepared to explain.”
“Yes, Master De Malena. My lady.” He dipped his head at Celestia. “The matter concerns our friends and allies in Eiren. They have noticed a dark occurrence on their shores.”
Dark occurrence. Celestia thought of Crell, eating his dinner like a proper gentleman, telling her of a dead boy walking toward him through the snow.
“The land is changing again. Dramatically.”
Celestia tensed. Changing? That seemed less concerning than what Crell had told her.
“It’s winter there,” Juro continued, “and yet beneath the snow, plants flower as if it’s the middle of summer.” Juro hesitated. Anselm just kept puffing on his cigarette, the smoke swirling thick around the ceiling of the drawing room. The scent was making Celestia woozy.
“If you’ll recall your history lessons on the Last War,” Juro said, “its beginning was marked by similar dramatic shifts in the Eirenese landscape.”
Celestia felt dizzy.
“They have mages,” Juro said, “who monitor the signs. And they believe these changes—” He did not look at Lindon or Celestia but off to the side, to one of the oil paintings of the forest hanging on the wall. “—are a portent. Of the return of Lord Kjari.”
The last part he said in one rushed breath. It was met with a numb silence.
“Lord Kjari?” said Lindon.
Juro nodded.
“Are the mages of Eiren aware the man has been dead for five hundred years?” He laughed. “Are they aware they won the war? How long have these mages been cloistered away, exactly?”
Juro shifted uncomfortably. Celestia felt some pity for him, that he’d been ordered by the Emperor to make such an absurd claim.
“Tell me,” Celestia said, making eye contact with him. “Do the mages have—proof of some sort?”
“These mages are specially trained to monitor for Lord Kjari’s return,” Juro said.
Lindon snorted. “Eiren,” he muttered. “It’s been five hundred years.”
“It’s one of many tasks they see to in the Eirenese kingdom,” Juro said defensively. “Passing down everything learned about Lord Kjari during the war. These are scholars trained to look for the subtlest shifts in the Aetheric Realm. They know far more than you and I. And these changes in the landscape, they aren’t natural.”
Juro took a deep breath, but Anselm interrupted before he had a chance to continue. “It’s not just the Eirenese mages,” he said.
Celestia blinked in surprise, but Lindon physically recoiled, and his hand squeezed at Celestia’s knee. “Don’t tell me you’re talking about—”
“The Starless Mages,” said Anselm. He smiled through his smoke. “Still so skittish about them, Lindon.”
Lindon said nothing. Anselm turned to Celestia.
“As I’m sure you’re aware, my lady, the Starless Mages have an—affinity with the darker magics.” His cigarette had burned down to an ember and he dropped it in the glass ashtray resting on the end table. The smoke still hadn’t dissipated, though, and it hung in heavy clouds in the room. “Lord Kjari’s presence affected the Seraphine during his reign as it did Eiren. Not to the same extent, of course. But the after-effects of his tremendous magics changed the composition of the water, the habits of the animals, even the structure of the Aetheric Realm itself.”
“And they’re seeing those same after-effects?” asked Celestia.
Anselm fixed her with a dark look. A beat passed. “Yes,” he said. “The Starless Mages have reported an unusual undercurrent in their magic. It seems to be affecting the Aetheric Realm.”
“Lord Kjari is returning,” said Juro. “There’s no point in debating it. And that puts the Emperor in a dreadful bind. Obviously he does not wish to fight for his seat, but there’s also the matter of our relationship with Eiren.”
“Of course,” said Lindon.
“If Lord Kjari does return, then the Empire must prove that our loyalties remain with Eiren, not the Dark One. We can’t afford to refight a war from half a millennia ago.”
Celestia thought of her studies on the Last War—a misnomer, of course, but at the time the world remained convinced that a war of that magnitude signaled an end to all wars to come. History had never terribly interested her, but she knew what all children of the Seraphine did: After the shattering of the Eiren peninsula into uninhabitable islands, the Eirenese blamed the infamous mage Lord Kjari. When Eiren marched southward to bind him, Lord Kjari gathered the nations of the south, before they were united as the Seraphine, to serve as his armies.
Millions of lives were lost in that war. It was said even now that Lord Kjari was a mage of immeasurable power, a consequence of unfettered magic. Eventually, he’d been defeated and driven away by some Eirenese hero, and the world set about the matter of repairing itself. The Academy was established to monitor all magic users. The Imperial family rose to power.
And now Eiren and the Seraphine were allies. These days, it was Aesri that was of concern, lurking in the west.
“What exactly do you want me to do?” Lindon asked.
Anselm reached into his jacket and extracted a cigarette case of burnished silver. He removed one of his cigarettes. Celestia moved to offer him a match, but he lit it with a snap of his fingers, some alchemist’s party trick that left the scent of sulfur on the air.
“Lord Kjari cannot rise again,” he said.
“Of course not,” said Lindon. “No one wants to go to war, like he said.” He tilted his head toward Juro.
“It’s not just a matter of going to war with Eiren,” said Anselm, “but of maintaining their allyship. We cannot, at this juncture, afford to lose them as—” A pause as he inhaled on his cigarette and then blew out smoke. “—as trading partners. Allowing Lord Kjari to rise shows bad faith on the part of the people of the Seraphine.”
Lindon was still squeezing Celestia’s knee. Lord Kjari! It was fanciful, this idea of him returning from the dead. A story told at the solstice festival, to send children shrieking and running into the darkness. But those men carried the alchemical seal of the Emperor. Celestia did not believe that they would lie.
“The Emperor sent us to you with an offer to return to his service,” said Juro.
“I’m retired,” Lindon said.
Anselm laughed sharply and inhaled the smoke from his cigarette. For a moment, Celestia wished she had Izara’s disdain for propriety so she could say something biting. Or at least scowl at him.
“He’s only asking you to complete this one assignment,” Juro said. “Not seeking to keep you on retainer, as he did before.”
Lindon tilted his head, and Celestia knew, with a sinking dread, that he was interested.
“If you accept our Emperor’s offer,” Juro said, “you will join with three Eirenese warriors to root out Lord Kjari and destroy him before he can gain control of the Seraphine a second time. You will be paid handsomely for your service, although neither I nor Anselm nor the Emperor himself can say how long this journey will take you. We cannot make any guarantees to your safety.” Anselm bowed at Celestia. “For that I must apologize, my lady. I am sorry to take your husband away from you, but it’s a matter of the Seraphine’s survival.”
Silence filled the room like the smoke from Anselm’s cigarettes. Celestia was dizzy. She dropped her hand to her stomach without thinking. She was so close to providing an heir to Lindon’s fortune and to Cross Winds both—what if she lost the baby, this small treasure that had taken her four years to unearth? She could only pray the Airiana wouldn’t be so cruel.
“That’s a big request,” Lindon said.
Juro bowed his head apologetically, but Anselm just sucked on his cigarette and said, “It’s nothing you can’t handle, so stop pretending to dwell on it. There’s no time for delay. The Eirenese warriors should have already arrived at the Imperial palace by now. You will need to leave today.”
This time, Lindon did respond. His mouth opened and closed like a fish.
“Today?” whispered Celestia.
“Yes, my lady,” said Juro. “We can’t delay any more than we already have.”
“May I talk to my wife about it?” Lindon asked, finally finding his voice. “She’s landed gentry, that gives her some say in matters of the Empire—”
“I’m aware,” said Anselm. “Else she would not have been allowed to stay as we explained the situation.”
Celestia felt hot. A matter of grave importance, Juro had said at the very beginning. One that would take her husband away from her just as she entered into a pregnancy. Her husband gone, her sister gone—
A dark villain returning to the world.
She trembled. Did she really believe it, this story about Lord Kjari rising to power again?
“Gentlemen,” she said. “Would you mind giving me a moment alone with my husband?”
“Yes,” Lindon said quickly. “Please.”
He was distracted. His eyes had a gleam to them, the same glean they took on whenever he told stories about his old adventures.
The two emissaries looked at each other. “Yes,” said Juro, “that would be fine.”
“But don’t take long,” said Anselm. “If we don’t have your answer before sunset, we’re riding off without you. Which,” he added, blowing smoke, “you know is ill-advised.”
“You’re our first choice, Master De Malena,” said Juro. “It would be difficult to travel to ask your replacement—”
Lindon waved his hand to stop Juro. “Understood. But please, let me speak to my wife.”
The emissaries both nodded, stood, and shuffled out of the room. Anselm’s smoke lingered on the air, sticking fast in Celestia’s lungs. She looked at Lindon. He had already made up his mind. She couldn’t even feel disappointed, because this decision was so expected of him.
“Please don’t die,” Celestia said.
Lindon laughed. “We all die eventually, my dear.”
“I mean when you’re on this assignment. Come back to us.” She laid her hand on her stomach and Lindon’s expression softened.
“Cellie, we can talk about this—”
“There’s nothing to talk about.” She wasn’t angry, only resigned, and her voice came out clear and earnest. “You had decided to go the moment they told you why they were here.”
Lindon reached over and smoothed a wayward lock of hair away from her face. “The flowers,” he said, “are a nice touch.”
“I’m glad you noticed.” Celestia turned toward the window. It looked out on the forest, shaped and molded by the De Malena family for fifty generations, long before Lord Kjari and his dark spells, long before the war that devastated half the world. “I can attend to matters here on my own. The forest workers don’t need you working alongside them, and I can bring in a property manager to aid with the technicalities.” She took a deep breath. “I’m quite capable of caring for myself, you know.”
“Of course you are,” Lindon said. “But the baby. You’re a noblewoman, not some peasant who can handle all manner of misery. You have to rest, or else the baby will come out all wrong. Anxious and worried.”
Celestia’s hand dropped to her stomach. “Yes, well,” she said, “the servants can worry for me.”
Lindon fell silent. He looked out into the drawing room, and Celestia wondered what he saw exactly. He was not a man suited to this drawing room and never had been, no matter how badly he wanted a nobleman’s title.
And of course there was the fact that his reasons for marrying her had not entirely been his own—but that was a secret she kept close to her heart. No one needed to know about her trip down the Seraphine five years ago, or her walk through the Lady’s enchanted forest. Or the promise of a debt.
“Go,” said Celestia. “If you need my permission, you have it. But I know this is what makes you happy.”
Lindon looked back at her. “You make me happy, too, you know.”
“Not in the same way.” Celestia leaned forward and pressed her hands against his cheeks. “I’ll be fine here, my darling, and all I ask is that you return to us.”
“I’ve always walked away safe after an adventure,” Lindon said.
“You don’t have to walk away,” said Celestia. “You can crawl back here on missing legs. I just want you to come home.”
Then she kissed him, a fierce and protective kiss. Most days, she didn’t know if she truly loved him, but today, in the smoky drawing room, a five-hundred-year-old threat looming on the horizon, she was certain she did.
Izara followed the rocky path down to the public entrance of the Academy. The path was steep enough that steps had been carved into the rocks years ago, and she had to be mindful of the moss that grew over them, since it caught the morning dews and made the path slippery and treacherous. The mountain dropped off only a few paces to her left, into an enormous gorge filled with mist and tree canopies. It was the most dangerous path at the Academy—the walkways between the dormitories and the classrooms were fairly level and much wider, with tall stone fences to keep students from falling to their deaths. But picking your way down to the public entrance was terrifying. Even after three years, Izara still felt dizzy and unsure of her steps.
She’d heard the theories, whispered at night in the dormitories, that the Academy purposefully set the public entrance lower on the mountain, accessible only by a slippery, narrow path, as a way of discouraging students from visiting the public square there. Izara could believe it. The square was their link to the outside world, however tenuous that may be—the postal service had an office, and brave merchants would carry up sweets and trinkets to sell. Occasionally the tailor from the nearest village, nearly two days’ travel away, would show up with bolts of fabric and a pair of shears, and students would rush down to the square for a chance to have coats and dresses and boots made, fine clothes to supplement the plain off-white uniforms of the Academy. Izara had no interest in clothes or jewelry—that sort of thing she left to her sister—but she had been known to brave the path for a chance at a box of bittersweet chocolates or sugared dolls.
Today, though, she didn’t expect to find sweets waiting for her in the square.
The wind picked up, damp from the rains in the forest below, and she tensed and straightened her posture. The stone steps spiraled down. She wasn’t close enough to see the gates of the square yet.
“Curse this wind,” she muttered, moving closer to the flat edge of the mountain. Dirt swirled out with the wind, and a few pebbles fell in her path. She kept moving. A letter was waiting for her in the square. A coincidence, she suspected, from the blood elemental magic she had worked in High Mage Papazian’s office last week. That magic had been haunting her, sending her uneasy dreams in the middle of the night. She missed her sister.
And now there was a letter.
It was a fluke that she even knew about it—another coincidence of the magic, most like. She had been applying some of her alchemical formulas in the laboratory when Nova and Heath came in, their arms wrapped around each other, giggling. They hadn’t seen her at first, and Nova pushed Heath up against the wall and kissed him, her hand trailing down to the belt of his trousers. At that point, Izara had chimed a stirring rod against one of her beakers, and Heath and Nova pulled apart, their faces flushed and embarrassed.
“Oh,” said Nova. “Hi, Izara.”
They lived in the same dormitory, although Izara had never been friendly with her. Izara wasn’t really friendly with anyone at the Academy.
“I’m working,” said Izara, and gestured towards her stack of formulas. The soothing algorithms of alchemy had been the only thing to help her forget Decay’s magic.
Nova grinned. “I’m not. By the way, love, Cas said they had a letter for you in the square. Lucky!” She’d grabbed Heath’s hand and pulled him out of the laboratory, and their laughter had echoed down the hallway.
A letter. Letters were a rare sight at the Academy. Izara had cleaned up her work and immediately set out for the square. She hoped the coincidence brought forth by her spell would be a positive one. Sometimes they were. Sometimes they weren’t.
The path twisted, revealing a flash of red up ahead—the gate. Izara sighed. Finally. She moved a bit more quickly now that the end was in sight. It was less steep here anyway. Izara passed through the gate and walked to the post office. It was strange to see the square so empty, without the bustle of students and the crush of merchants in their rickety, brightly colored carts. It looked abandoned, really, the sort of place haunted by ghosts.
The post office was a small clapboard hut sitting in a patch of pale grass. Izara stepped inside. Cas looked up from behind the counter, where he had been scribbling something on a sheet of paper. He was a student at the Academy, one of the older ones who had already begun to make his connections with the mage guilds of the Seraphine, looking for work. Supposedly that was why he tended to the post office, because he could build connections from behind the counter.
“I’m Izara De Malena,” she said, breathless from the hike down. “I was told you have a letter for me.”
