Solvi stared in disbelief at her companion, eyes flicking from the urns to the hill with confusion permeating every pore. It was only when she took a closer look at the hill that she understood its significance. Aligned presumably with the sunrise and sunset, two doors were built into the base of this hill. Walking over to spy into the entrance, the Orsan saw a rusted iron gate sealing the entrance. Behind it, carved shelves with an uncountable number of bronze urns in various shades of green. It wasn’t a hill but a burial mound. Returning to Mara, she saw the necromancer gently lift two urns from their resting place. She met Solvi halfway, indicating to the rusted gate with a nod. With some direction and muscle, the Orsan opened the way to the mound.
“Why were those urns out there?” Solvi asked in a muddle as she passed the ranks of deceased ancestors. She noted that her grasp of elvish was getting better. With a satisfied smirk she identified a few names and the dates they had lived. Curiously, several were elvish approximations of non-elvish names such as her own.
“If you die particularly young, you’re given to the holding vault. There, it is believed your ghost can talk to the other ghosts. You get to experience some small amount of the life you would have had.” Mara answered as she walked through the dim interior of the tomb. With a flick of her hand, a light sprang to life as the darkness became too oppressive to see by. “This vault only has room for two hundred people. And it’s been here way too long for so few.” The elf continued as she entered the main room of the complex. Solvi had been right as another corridor led to the outside world opposite them. The carved shelves lined a circular room, the oldest of individuals featuring only elvish names. Solvi began to struggle with some though, as the elvish became more archaic. “This place is special. It’s a consecrated for all people, not just elves. Though the funerary rights had to be the same for it to work, so the legend goes.” Mara grunted as she laid the urns upon an alter that had been chipped free of its rocky confinement eons ago. Solvi could just about recognize the carvings of Arawn and Sirona’s symbology. How ironic that the two should be associated when their antipathy brought cataclysm to the world.
“You speak as if it’s not certain.” Solvi observed her roommate’s preparations. She’d taken a different totemic object, made of bones all the same yet unique. It was circular, constructed of ribs and ulnas and painted with some dark substance. It seemed to be some form of invocation totem, if Solvi’s faulty memory was any indication. The web of dark strings that normally held it together had been modified with two finger bones hanging amidst them.
“Well modern theory states that when you die, your soul is transferred to the Palace of Judgement in Annun. Ergo, Lyra and Edmund couldn’t possibly be here. Unless they’re ghosts. Which means they’re almost certainly angry.” Mara sighed as she looked to the urns, placing the totem between them. She took the zeffi on each and wrapped a strand of the strings of her totem about the aulind ring at the end. With the physical aspects of her ritual complete, she looked over at Solvi. “So, in the vain hope that their spirits are still here and can be conjured without a justifiable fury, I threw together a new spell. Here’s hoping I don’t pull us into Annun!” The necromancer hedged cheerily as she placed a hand on the totem, which ignited with spectral blue flames.
The light snuffed itself out immediately. In the twilight that followed, the darkness grew to grasp them all the tighter. As they sat in the pitch, they strained their ears for any indication that Mara’s spell hadn’t worked. The scent of musty air and loam told them that they were not in Annun but tension grew regardless. Solvi heard it first; the distant sounds of raucous laughter that grew louder by the moment. When Mara detected that they were not alone, she huddled close to the tall woman. Slowly, light began to manifest about them in dim blue tones. Oddly, the laughter was accompanied by music and chatter. The light began to shape itself into vague humanoid shapes that undulated and swam in the air like a heat haze. From this mass of souls, this glimpse to the other side of death, two figures emerged from opposite ends of the room as if walking from the walls. As they walked through the darkness, they cast a brighter and brighter light until suddenly they dimmed to sharp definition. They stood before their respective urns before one of the figures sat jauntily against the alter, her arms crossed.
The other figure was an upright-looking young man with glasses gracing his ethereal nose, a short crop of hair atop his head. His pointed features and peach-fuzz beard had not changed as he fidgeted with his waistcoat, tucking his shirt in as if he’d shown up to dinner half-dressed. Once his suspenders were snapped in place, Edmund looked to Mara with a boyish grin and curious eyes.
Lyra was dressed in the clothes she’d died in, a picnic basket set at her feet as she looked over Mara with a cautiously appreciative air. She looked to Solvi with a challenging expression as she slid a lock of now spectral hair behind her ear. The Orsan could see why Mara liked her. She was a pretty young woman to be sure but the intelligence and fire in her eyes were, for want of a better phrase, Mara’s weakness.
“Seventy-two years!” Lyra’s ghostly form exclaimed. Her voice echoed and was distant, like many others of her kind. Her face was not accusatory. On the contrary, it was disbelieving, almost amused by Mara’s antics. “She explodes the barrier between life and death in our faces, struggles in the hospital for a few weeks then leaves us for decades without so much as a how do you do.” The woman chuckled towards Edmund, who regarded the pair with an understanding but exasperated expression. It was going to be like this, then. “Honestly though Mara I think we got the best deal out of this. Look- infinite food!” Lyra teased as she leant down to her picnic basket and pulled a loaf of bread from within it. She took a hearty bite and cast it over to Edmund, who struggled to catch it before hugging it to his chest.
“She probably feels guilty about it, Lyra.” The bespectacled boy offered as he tore free a considerably daintier portion for himself. He then rummaged for a slice of cheese from their miraculous picnic basket. Solvi looked at it with a bewildered expression. Ghosts normally had something of themselves from life, but she didn’t think picnics were all that important without a gullet.
“I do. More than you’ll ever know.” Mara agreed with her friend, voice coming from the back of her throat as she looked down in shame. She saw a flicker of blue light below her chin for a moment before Lyra’s irritated grunt brought the mage’s attention back to her. She stood far closer now, her hand poised just below the mage’s jaw.
“Look at you. Mara the Martyr at it again. It was an accident.” Lyra sighed, placing her hand on the other elf’s cheek. Her smile was gentle, reassuring before it suddenly fell away with comedic speed. “Unless you’re here to confess you intended it to happen. In which case, I’ll find a way to reach across the barrier to strangle you. It’s thin enough.” The ghostly woman teased. A weak laugh escaped her lover, more hysterical than anything. She seemed preoccupied, but the comment on the barrier did not escape Solvi’s notice.
“That wasn’t what you thought fifty years ago.” Edmund reminded his friend through a mouthful of cheese, attracting a dangerous look from her. He quickly swallowed and held up his hands. “What I meant to say was that you struggled at first with accepting what happened. I believe the words ‘messing with things she shouldn’t’ escaped you one particular winter.” The would-be chemist attempted to soften the blow, but it did little to stop the pouting from his ghostly friend. She looked to Mara with an apologetic expression, only to find an understanding mage staring back at her.
“I thought messing with things you didn’t understand was something of an elvish pastime.” Solvi jested with a snort of laughter at the antics going on before her. She’d expected tears, tantrums, pleading bargains. But Lyra had somehow diffused the entirety of Mara’s planned speeches in a few short sentences. She was almost jealous of the spectral elf’s talent. Though the look the pair were giving her now was in equal parts gratifying and worrying. “What? Elves think they have all the other races figured out. We have a few opinions of our own.” The Orsan questioned defensively before she leant against the doorway. The two seemed to dismiss her after that, once more finding each other’s eyes.
They talked for some time, Edmund and Solvi occasionally trading stories of their lives. As a young man, Edmund was surprisingly experienced as his father had been an itinerant preacher. He relayed stories of far-off lands and peoples Solvi had never even heard of. Across the Prismatic Ocean and the continent that lay there, a peculiar species of four-armed people with three eyes kept a fortress island the size of the Orsana Isles. While Solvi was amazed at these tales, Lyra and Mara had retreated to a quiet corner to reminisce and catch each other up on their respective lives. Or death, in Lyra’s case. But soon enough, as the ghosts enjoyed their ethereal picnic and the sun dipped into the passage, the pair had to rise to their feet.
“Time’s run out, Mara. Your spell only lasts an hour.” Edmund reminded his friend. He and Lyra began to walk to their respective urns, standing on ceremony as they waited for Mara’s input. “We’ll probably not be this way again. It was nice to meet you, Solvi.” The young man inclined his head to the Orsan, who returned his politeness with a warm smile. He then noticed Mara and Lyra staring at each other with conflict in their eyes. With a sigh he supposed this part was inevitable.
“Don’t make a habit of this, alright? We’re dead. And we should stay dead. But at least your gifts gave us a chance to say goodbye.” Lyra ordered before her voice softened at the memories of their brief time together. The necromancer tried to garble out some form of bargain, a mention of resurrection. “Imagine what the world would be if we just undid the laws of nature. What’s passed is the past and you cannot change it. Edmund and me? We’re at peace. We came hoping you’d find some of your own.”
“It’s not fair. You should have a full and happy life.” Mara sighed in a voice thick with remorse.
“We did have full, happy lives. We didn’t have the longest lives, to be sure. But you’d think an elf would realise that life isn’t measured in years. It’s measured in experience. I lived more in twenty years than you have in ninety-two.” Edmund spoke with a matter-of-fact tone, his customary bluntness cutting through Mara’s regret like lightning through a storm cloud. She looked at him with a tearful smile, thumbing them from her eyes shortly after. “When you die you better have some decent stories for us.”
“Because if you come down here again with nothing but moping and getting duped by some dullard fantasist, I’ll kick you back to the land of the living until you do.” Lyra added with a passionate punch of her own hand. “Oh, and because I know you’ll ask, me and Edmund are of one mind on this. Send the duplicitous sod to the deepest, darkest hole you can. Because if he thinks persistence is the key to victory, he hasn’t met the Orsana.” The woman added with a cheeky wink at Solvi, who glowered in return. Though she had to concede the elf made a good point.
“You two had every right to be angry. To curse my name.” Mara laughed, relief suffusing her voice as she looked towards the steadily decreasing sunlight of late afternoon. Soon, there would be no more time. She turned to the pair with a shuddering breath, chin held up against the sorrow. “Go back to your party. I’ll join you soon enough. Though why you’re not in Annun, I’ll never know.” Mara waved the pair goodbye, curiosity evident in her voice. Edmund and Lyra looked to each other with sardonic smiles before looking to the necromancer with the glee of a child who knew a secret.
“Mara, the whole world is Annun. We were always here.” Lyra snorted with laughter. The reason for their mirth became clear as the necromancer’s confusion manifested, and she started making demanding questions toward the vanishing pair. Rather than even attempt to answer, Edmund and Lyra walked back to the indistinct party that surrounded them. Edmund paused to grab his cheese from the alter, saluting Solvi with two fingers as he walked past with it held in his mouth. Mara was left to fume in frustration as her mind tried to parse the meaning of their cryptic message. Annun is everywhere? Preposterous. To be sure nobody knew its exact location, but the world was already where it was. There wasn’t room for another.
As the two left the vault, Mara placed the urns of her friends within it. She took the totem from her robes and laid it between the two once again. This time for commemoration. Solvi followed her companion with a thoughtful expression, the contents of which only manifested as the pair began their journey back to the sanlater. They were most likely late to lift off given the time they’d spent talking.
“You know, she really knew how to handle you, that Lyra.” Solvi observed as they passed along the treeline rather than through the grave groves. Mara gave her an inquiring yet dangerous look as she ducked under a bridge that ran over a stream that coursed through the town. Another hideaway that only the children of the settlement would know. “What? You tend to blame yourself a lot. Especially with Renaud.” The Orsan suggest with a slight echo due to the tunnel. Mara stopped for a moment, seemingly thinking before she continued. It was only once they climbed the steep grassy verge to the paved streets that the mage answered.
“She was right. Rochefort’s right, you’re right. I couldn’t have prevented him.” Mara sighed as she looked towards the distant figures of her party. She then turned to look at Solvi with a grave expression, one that she’d worn far too often in recent days. “But I will have my answers. And if they’re unsatisfactory, you can do with him as you please. It shouldn’t fall to just me.” The mage commanded with such gravitas that her companion was momentarily surprised, eyes widening. She gripped her weapon firmly and nodded then indicated towards the party, who were already shouting and summoning them to leave. Easthelm awaited.
The journey to the fortress city was tense, where even the crew seemed on edge as they shared glances whenever Mara walked past. Perhaps that was simply her unusual appearance. Her stomach knotted whenever she considered how close her confrontation with Renaud was. There was only one place he could possibly be. It felt like destiny, a deterministic path both were doomed to walk. But the mage knew that to be false. It was far too convoluted to be a plan. This was merely the inevitable conclusion of who they were and the trials they’d faced. Fred had joined because he hated the authoritarian, Solvi because she loved and protected her. Twitcher for their memories of Mira. Arthur was human- he didn’t get the option of ignoring the momentous events before them. Renaud, a creature forged of that hatred born centuries ago, now languished in the one place he had left to him where he felt safe.
“If y’ keep pacin’ you’re going to walk a hole in the ship.” Fred’s voice interjected once Mara completed her third revolution of the lower deck. He then noticed the totem she’d constructed grasped before her, its eyes now dimmed. “Oh yeah. Yer thing. Wha’ was it meant to do?” The skitti asked as she paused in her pathing to look at the furry man.
“It’s an invitation. Small pockets of radiant energy dispensed to spirits who fulfil a contract.” Mara explained to her friend, who looked at her with a sceptical look. Thinking he didn’t understand, the mage thought for a few moments. “It’s essentially vendor of ghost food. If they do what I ask, they get a treat. I asked them to look for Ardan.” The necromancer explained. She’d given them four hours to do so. Whether they found him or looked for the allotted time, they received their pay. Mara was hardly going to renege on the dead.
“Weren’ we doin’ that? Or did you wanna get rid of us?” Fred asked with a twitch of his whiskers.
“Well, ghosts can see the spirit rather than the body. He can’t hide from them. But on the off chance he was too weak to use illusions, I wanted living eyes on the field. And I didn’t want you to see me as an emotional wreck. Today’s been…a day.” Mara expounded before her weariness overcame her. The day had been one of the most taxing of her life and as the sun began to move toward the horizon above them, she became all too aware that it was far from over.
“When y’ get to your bed tonight, you’ll feel like yer tired as a thirty-six-hour shift. But it’ll be over. An’ the new day’ll be better for it.” Fred looked out of the porthole pensively as he ruminated. He’d spoken as if the words were not his own. “Brother Gangrene said that t’me. Right afore I lost me eye.” The skitti recalled. Through his eye, Mara could faintly hear the echoes of artillery shells long since passed. The smell of choking yellow gas as it rained down around them.
“Gangrene didn’t take your eye, did he?” The mage gasped. “The spell I cast can regrow it. You don’t have to endure his punishment anymore.” She added with a hopeful air. The temples were ruins and so nobody had discovered her miracle yet. It wouldn’t take long and once the people knew the magic wouldn’t last. She should have made it a permanent addition, she thought with regret. Then again, without the Crook that may have been certain death.
“Gangrene didn’ do nothin’ to me. Not personal-like.” Fred eased his fretting friend before soothing his twitching tail. “This was shrapnel from an Idharan bomb. An’ it’s who I am. ‘sides, I’m probably a better shot with it!” The revolutionary ribbed her, doing his approximation of a wink before snapping his overalls against his chest. He looked to the slowly growing grey blur in the distance against the roiling sea. “I don’ get soft often. But if I knock on the black door, you be’er believe it was worth it. I’d die fightin’ these bastards any day o’ the week.” He scratched his chin contemplatively as he thought about what could be his final battle. Though as an experienced fighter, Mara knew he’d take a dozen of Ardan’s puppets with him.
The two of them walked to the prow of the ship as they talked further, the mage explaining her plans in detail as she did so. She needed to prevent Renaud from teleporting, and she had several methods of trapping her errant mentor. The main problem was that such methods were expensive. She would be relying on them to engage any flesh and blood defences. Helpfully, Twitcher arrived with a plate of food for the pair considering they’d not eaten in the day like everyone else. They took one final once over of Fred’s rifle, passing it back to him with satisfaction. The Elysian had returned to dual arm swords. They’d edged their blades with a strange pink-gold substance that not even Mara could recognize, which they took great pleasure in. It was apparently a confounding agent for many of the more commonly used protective charms. While their swords could not shear through armour, a single scratch of the blades would remove the protection from magical effects. Both Mara and Fred grinned wickedly at that, the skitti man checking his ammunition with gusto.
“Gotta ask though. These leadwits don’ mind sendin’ you to the dark. Why’re you so concerned for ‘em?” Fred pondered aloud as the mage finished explaining the extent of spells, she now had access to. Had she and Armin found his spell book, she would be considerably more formidable. It had the secrets to some of the most dangerous and pernicious necromancy developed in the last few centuries. That said, Mara could now do things that many commoners would consider terrifying.
“I couldn’t handle the guilt from accidentally hurting people. You think I could handle being an actual soldier?” Mara replied in a frivolous tone. Both Twitcher and Fred cornered her with their stares. Ah, this was one of those questions then. The mage attempted to give serious thought to it. There was no moral or ethical principle that forbade her from defending herself. Then she remembered the night in the graveyard, the Herald’s euphoria as he incited her feral side. “Fine, have it your way. Before, I refused to kill them because I saw them as just wrong. People who could be saved. Then the Herald happened. And he got to me. Ever since then, the knowledge of that part of me has stayed my hand. I’d be just like them. Deciding who lived or died based on conviction alone.” She explained in an oddly neutral tone of voice. Fred recalled reading of the Herald’s little speech at the opening of his trial. How Mara had almost savaged him, that he’d merely been defending himself. He’d assumed that their alleglet of a friend was incapable of such things.
“Even if y’killed twenty of the bastards, y’d be nothin’ like them.” Fred affirmed with a grasp on Mara’s shoulder. “Too many talks from the comfor’ of their fireplace. They thin’ figthin’ the guy with a gun to yer head is jus’ as bad. But not wantin’ to let yerself be as cruel as ‘em is alrigh’ by me.” The revolutionary approved while Twitcher’s robotic eyes seemed to drift off into their memories. Mara was thankful that there were no further inquisitions. It had been a painful truth learned through hardship.
“Mira once said that every drop of slaver blood corroded the chains of her comrades.” Twitcher suddenly recalled with their eyes losing focus briefly. “She said this before burning Kornan. I did not know it, but this was when my Mira left. The Herald of Ruin took her place after that. I do not know which of them said it.” They considered with a certain gravity. Mara understood Twitcher’s pain in that regard, now. To see a person, you cared for melt away only to be replaced by a cruel tyrant. Perhaps the tyranny had always been there, hidden under a mask. Or perhaps it had simply been borne of a good heart, broken by the world.
“Which one do you think she was, deep down?” Mara asked in a quiet voice. Twitcher simply shook their head, a sigh escaping their synthetic throat. “You’re right. We can’t really know for sure. The privacy of our own minds is a curse to those who’d know us. A blessing the rest of the time.” She then looked towards Easthelm, which now rose from the coastline as an impressive city walled in stone carved with markings of protection. The craters carved into it by invasions twenty years passed still remained there as silent testament to the one city that never broke. Aside from the redoubt of Yanhelm. That impenetrable city had existed in some shape or form since before the Elysian empire. But Easthelm had seen the waves of countless navies dash themselves against it. It had been ruled by a single noble family stretching back centuries and its current overseer apparently matched her forebears’ reputations. Lady Eris Fairbrooke, business magnate and military strongwoman who’d hunted pirates for sport in her youth. Mara had made this city her second choice for her presence. The Lady would tolerate no elvish supremacy nonsense while she yet drew breath.
As the sanlater began its small ascent to the cliffs that stood between them and the city, the rest of the party emerged from below decks to see their destination. Arthur strained his eyes as if he might glimpse Renaud from their perch. He needn’t have bothered for as the sanlater came into land upon an admittedly shabby-looking docking station, thunder rent the air. Automatically, the crew and party both inclined their heads towards the sky which had been clear but a few moments ago. Now, a rumbling anvil of black clouds began to form over the city in an unnatural pall that cast sheets of rain over the entire settlement. Mara reached forth a hand, her irises swallowed by the blackness of the rest of her eye. Her face broke into an inconceivable smile. The crew looked at her as if she were mad as a stern wind began to batter the flagging ship. It made landfall just as Rochefort came upon them, eye trained through a spyglass on the city below them.
“What devilry is this?” He asked with a flustered tone. “With this going on we’ll be grounded!” He shot over his shoulder at the helmsman, who nodded to the navigator. Rochefort shuttered his glass and turned to the grinning Mara with a slow dread building on his features. The necromancer’s three eyes regrew their irises as they slid over to meet the captain’s unnerved countenance.
“Best batten down the hatches, Captain. It appears my dear sora had the same idea I did. He’s dying to speak to me. And he’s not letting airships fly until he does.” She explained as she headed towards the lower decks where they could disembark. Solvi raced behind her, grabbing her shoulder and whirling her about as she hit the flattened soil of the landing zone.
“Why are you grinning like a lovestruck schoolgirl? He might be baiting the snare.” Solvi demanded as her companion looked out over the city. The Orsan followed her gaze to spy in the older district of the city a corpulent tower that reminded her of Elys somewhat. Though by its timber frame and white-washed walls, it was of human construction. She knew not how old it was, only that it was considerably older than the buildings around it. She didn’t understand, looking at Mara’s expectant expression with confusion as the party joined them.
“He’s fortified himself in the one place he feels safe. He hid under their noses in a ruin that nobody dares to tear down.” The mage chuckled as she began her decent down the stone steps that ran switchback along the cliff face. The party merely followed in bemused silence, Fred taking stock of the tower with his rifle’s scope. Another gift from Twitcher’s tireless hands. He spied through it the tower’s many windows and thought it more like a giant circular palace than a traditional tower. Its timber frames must be reinforced with something. They couldn’t hold that much weight, surely? His scouting slid upwards to a slate roof stocked with enough dark-feathered birds to set Fred’s teeth on edge. There were four large windows big enough to spy movement within. Figures he could barely make out talking, gesticulating. Were they angry with someone?
Arthur pulled Fred back. He looked down to see a stomach-hollowing drop and thanked the cleric with a relieved tone. Mara stood on the staircase below them, shouting that they hurry. It was wise advice as the storm that Renaud had seemingly generated began to expand over to the cliffs. Soon enough, those without cloaks or coats were soaked through. Solvi offered to bring Mara under her cloak as she once had but the mage refused, appearing to revel in the feeling of rain on her skin.
“How does he even know you’re here?” Arthur shouted over the thunder and percussive downpour. There were no people to gawk at Mara as she walked through the streets, many cowering in the quaint corridors that held up the overhanging buildings. Easthelm had run out of land long ago. Now, they built upwards in hopes of finding space in the sky.
“If I were him and I saw an Idharan ship land outside my hiding place without a tip off, who else would I think it was?” Mara shouted back to the man, laughing with a mixture of nerves and something the cleric could not quite place. It sounded eager though.
Soon enough the group found themselves before the monolithic stone curtains that surrounded the tower as its walls. Two huge rusting iron gates hung ominously before a courtyard that had a cracked and overgrown mosaic. Mara’s historical knowledge told her it was the coat of arms belonging to Bernard Blackwing. There were no Army members in sight, not even in the alcoves of the adjoining buildings. They hid behind the great wooden door emblazoned with two snarling allegs as door knockers. Before them sat the lair of their final adversary. Mara announced their arrival with a thunderous detonation, blowing the gate lock clean through. She strode through like a woman possessed. Soon, Ardan would face his judgement.
Solvi stared in disbelief at her companion, eyes flicking from the urns to the hill with confusion permeating every pore. It was only when she took a closer look at the hill that she understood its significance. Aligned presumably with the sunrise and sunset, two doors were built into the base of this hill. Walking over to spy into the entrance, the Orsan saw a rusted iron gate sealing the entrance. Behind it, carved shelves with an uncountable number of bronze urns in various shades of green. It wasn’t a hill but a burial mound. Returning to Mara, she saw the necromancer gently lift two urns from their resting place. She met Solvi halfway, indicating to the rusted gate with a nod. With some direction and muscle, the Orsan opened the way to the mound.
“Why were those urns out there?” Solvi asked in a muddle as she passed the ranks of deceased ancestors. She noted that her grasp of elvish was getting better. With a satisfied smirk she identified a few names and the dates they had lived. Curiously, several were elvish approximations of non-elvish names such as her own.
“If you die particularly young, you’re given to the holding vault. There, it is believed your ghost can talk to the other ghosts. You get to experience some small amount of the life you would have had.” Mara answered as she walked through the dim interior of the tomb. With a flick of her hand, a light sprang to life as the darkness became too oppressive to see by. “This vault only has room for two hundred people. And it’s been here way too long for so few.” The elf continued as she entered the main room of the complex. Solvi had been right as another corridor led to the outside world opposite them. The carved shelves lined a circular room, the oldest of individuals featuring only elvish names. Solvi began to struggle with some though, as the elvish became more archaic. “This place is special. It’s a consecrated for all people, not just elves. Though the funerary rights had to be the same for it to work, so the legend goes.” Mara grunted as she laid the urns upon an alter that had been chipped free of its rocky confinement eons ago. Solvi could just about recognize the carvings of Arawn and Sirona’s symbology. How ironic that the two should be associated when their antipathy brought cataclysm to the world.
“You speak as if it’s not certain.” Solvi observed her roommate’s preparations. She’d taken a different totemic object, made of bones all the same yet unique. It was circular, constructed of ribs and ulnas and painted with some dark substance. It seemed to be some form of invocation totem, if Solvi’s faulty memory was any indication. The web of dark strings that normally held it together had been modified with two finger bones hanging amidst them.
“Well modern theory states that when you die, your soul is transferred to the Palace of Judgement in Annun. Ergo, Lyra and Edmund couldn’t possibly be here. Unless they’re ghosts. Which means they’re almost certainly angry.” Mara sighed as she looked to the urns, placing the totem between them. She took the zeffi on each and wrapped a strand of the strings of her totem about the aulind ring at the end. With the physical aspects of her ritual complete, she looked over at Solvi. “So, in the vain hope that their spirits are still here and can be conjured without a justifiable fury, I threw together a new spell. Here’s hoping I don’t pull us into Annun!” The necromancer hedged cheerily as she placed a hand on the totem, which ignited with spectral blue flames.
The light snuffed itself out immediately. In the twilight that followed, the darkness grew to grasp them all the tighter. As they sat in the pitch, they strained their ears for any indication that Mara’s spell hadn’t worked. The scent of musty air and loam told them that they were not in Annun but tension grew regardless. Solvi heard it first; the distant sounds of raucous laughter that grew louder by the moment. When Mara detected that they were not alone, she huddled close to the tall woman. Slowly, light began to manifest about them in dim blue tones. Oddly, the laughter was accompanied by music and chatter. The light began to shape itself into vague humanoid shapes that undulated and swam in the air like a heat haze. From this mass of souls, this glimpse to the other side of death, two figures emerged from opposite ends of the room as if walking from the walls. As they walked through the darkness, they cast a brighter and brighter light until suddenly they dimmed to sharp definition. They stood before their respective urns before one of the figures sat jauntily against the alter, her arms crossed.
The other figure was an upright-looking young man with glasses gracing his ethereal nose, a short crop of hair atop his head. His pointed features and peach-fuzz beard had not changed as he fidgeted with his waistcoat, tucking his shirt in as if he’d shown up to dinner half-dressed. Once his suspenders were snapped in place, Edmund looked to Mara with a boyish grin and curious eyes.
Lyra was dressed in the clothes she’d died in, a picnic basket set at her feet as she looked over Mara with a cautiously appreciative air. She looked to Solvi with a challenging expression as she slid a lock of now spectral hair behind her ear. The Orsan could see why Mara liked her. She was a pretty young woman to be sure but the intelligence and fire in her eyes were, for want of a better phrase, Mara’s weakness.
“Seventy-two years!” Lyra’s ghostly form exclaimed. Her voice echoed and was distant, like many others of her kind. Her face was not accusatory. On the contrary, it was disbelieving, almost amused by Mara’s antics. “She explodes the barrier between life and death in our faces, struggles in the hospital for a few weeks then leaves us for decades without so much as a how do you do.” The woman chuckled towards Edmund, who regarded the pair with an understanding but exasperated expression. It was going to be like this, then. “Honestly though Mara I think we got the best deal out of this. Look- infinite food!” Lyra teased as she leant down to her picnic basket and pulled a loaf of bread from within it. She took a hearty bite and cast it over to Edmund, who struggled to catch it before hugging it to his chest.
“She probably feels guilty about it, Lyra.” The bespectacled boy offered as he tore free a considerably daintier portion for himself. He then rummaged for a slice of cheese from their miraculous picnic basket. Solvi looked at it with a bewildered expression. Ghosts normally had something of themselves from life, but she didn’t think picnics were all that important without a gullet.
“I do. More than you’ll ever know.” Mara agreed with her friend, voice coming from the back of her throat as she looked down in shame. She saw a flicker of blue light below her chin for a moment before Lyra’s irritated grunt brought the mage’s attention back to her. She stood far closer now, her hand poised just below the mage’s jaw.
“Look at you. Mara the Martyr at it again. It was an accident.” Lyra sighed, placing her hand on the other elf’s cheek. Her smile was gentle, reassuring before it suddenly fell away with comedic speed. “Unless you’re here to confess you intended it to happen. In which case, I’ll find a way to reach across the barrier to strangle you. It’s thin enough.” The ghostly woman teased. A weak laugh escaped her lover, more hysterical than anything. She seemed preoccupied, but the comment on the barrier did not escape Solvi’s notice.
“That wasn’t what you thought fifty years ago.” Edmund reminded his friend through a mouthful of cheese, attracting a dangerous look from her. He quickly swallowed and held up his hands. “What I meant to say was that you struggled at first with accepting what happened. I believe the words ‘messing with things she shouldn’t’ escaped you one particular winter.” The would-be chemist attempted to soften the blow, but it did little to stop the pouting from his ghostly friend. She looked to Mara with an apologetic expression, only to find an understanding mage staring back at her.
“I thought messing with things you didn’t understand was something of an elvish pastime.” Solvi jested with a snort of laughter at the antics going on before her. She’d expected tears, tantrums, pleading bargains. But Lyra had somehow diffused the entirety of Mara’s planned speeches in a few short sentences. She was almost jealous of the spectral elf’s talent. Though the look the pair were giving her now was in equal parts gratifying and worrying. “What? Elves think they have all the other races figured out. We have a few opinions of our own.” The Orsan questioned defensively before she leant against the doorway. The two seemed to dismiss her after that, once more finding each other’s eyes.
They talked for some time, Edmund and Solvi occasionally trading stories of their lives. As a young man, Edmund was surprisingly experienced as his father had been an itinerant preacher. He relayed stories of far-off lands and peoples Solvi had never even heard of. Across the Prismatic Ocean and the continent that lay there, a peculiar species of four-armed people with three eyes kept a fortress island the size of the Orsana Isles. While Solvi was amazed at these tales, Lyra and Mara had retreated to a quiet corner to reminisce and catch each other up on their respective lives. Or death, in Lyra’s case. But soon enough, as the ghosts enjoyed their ethereal picnic and the sun dipped into the passage, the pair had to rise to their feet.
“Time’s run out, Mara. Your spell only lasts an hour.” Edmund reminded his friend. He and Lyra began to walk to their respective urns, standing on ceremony as they waited for Mara’s input. “We’ll probably not be this way again. It was nice to meet you, Solvi.” The young man inclined his head to the Orsan, who returned his politeness with a warm smile. He then noticed Mara and Lyra staring at each other with conflict in their eyes. With a sigh he supposed this part was inevitable.
“Don’t make a habit of this, alright? We’re dead. And we should stay dead. But at least your gifts gave us a chance to say goodbye.” Lyra ordered before her voice softened at the memories of their brief time together. The necromancer tried to garble out some form of bargain, a mention of resurrection. “Imagine what the world would be if we just undid the laws of nature. What’s passed is the past and you cannot change it. Edmund and me? We’re at peace. We came hoping you’d find some of your own.”
“It’s not fair. You should have a full and happy life.” Mara sighed in a voice thick with remorse.
“We did have full, happy lives. We didn’t have the longest lives, to be sure. But you’d think an elf would realise that life isn’t measured in years. It’s measured in experience. I lived more in twenty years than you have in ninety-two.” Edmund spoke with a matter-of-fact tone, his customary bluntness cutting through Mara’s regret like lightning through a storm cloud. She looked at him with a tearful smile, thumbing them from her eyes shortly after. “When you die you better have some decent stories for us.”
“Because if you come down here again with nothing but moping and getting duped by some dullard fantasist, I’ll kick you back to the land of the living until you do.” Lyra added with a passionate punch of her own hand. “Oh, and because I know you’ll ask, me and Edmund are of one mind on this. Send the duplicitous sod to the deepest, darkest hole you can. Because if he thinks persistence is the key to victory, he hasn’t met the Orsana.” The woman added with a cheeky wink at Solvi, who glowered in return. Though she had to concede the elf made a good point.
“You two had every right to be angry. To curse my name.” Mara laughed, relief suffusing her voice as she looked towards the steadily decreasing sunlight of late afternoon. Soon, there would be no more time. She turned to the pair with a shuddering breath, chin held up against the sorrow. “Go back to your party. I’ll join you soon enough. Though why you’re not in Annun, I’ll never know.” Mara waved the pair goodbye, curiosity evident in her voice. Edmund and Lyra looked to each other with sardonic smiles before looking to the necromancer with the glee of a child who knew a secret.
“Mara, the whole world is Annun. We were always here.” Lyra snorted with laughter. The reason for their mirth became clear as the necromancer’s confusion manifested, and she started making demanding questions toward the vanishing pair. Rather than even attempt to answer, Edmund and Lyra walked back to the indistinct party that surrounded them. Edmund paused to grab his cheese from the alter, saluting Solvi with two fingers as he walked past with it held in his mouth. Mara was left to fume in frustration as her mind tried to parse the meaning of their cryptic message. Annun is everywhere? Preposterous. To be sure nobody knew its exact location, but the world was already where it was. There wasn’t room for another.
As the two left the vault, Mara placed the urns of her friends within it. She took the totem from her robes and laid it between the two once again. This time for commemoration. Solvi followed her companion with a thoughtful expression, the contents of which only manifested as the pair began their journey back to the sanlater. They were most likely late to lift off given the time they’d spent talking.
“You know, she really knew how to handle you, that Lyra.” Solvi observed as they passed along the treeline rather than through the grave groves. Mara gave her an inquiring yet dangerous look as she ducked under a bridge that ran over a stream that coursed through the town. Another hideaway that only the children of the settlement would know. “What? You tend to blame yourself a lot. Especially with Renaud.” The Orsan suggest with a slight echo due to the tunnel. Mara stopped for a moment, seemingly thinking before she continued. It was only once they climbed the steep grassy verge to the paved streets that the mage answered.
“She was right. Rochefort’s right, you’re right. I couldn’t have prevented him.” Mara sighed as she looked towards the distant figures of her party. She then turned to look at Solvi with a grave expression, one that she’d worn far too often in recent days. “But I will have my answers. And if they’re unsatisfactory, you can do with him as you please. It shouldn’t fall to just me.” The mage commanded with such gravitas that her companion was momentarily surprised, eyes widening. She gripped her weapon firmly and nodded then indicated towards the party, who were already shouting and summoning them to leave. Easthelm awaited.
The journey to the fortress city was tense, where even the crew seemed on edge as they shared glances whenever Mara walked past. Perhaps that was simply her unusual appearance. Her stomach knotted whenever she considered how close her confrontation with Renaud was. There was only one place he could possibly be. It felt like destiny, a deterministic path both were doomed to walk. But the mage knew that to be false. It was far too convoluted to be a plan. This was merely the inevitable conclusion of who they were and the trials they’d faced. Fred had joined because he hated the authoritarian, Solvi because she loved and protected her. Twitcher for their memories of Mira. Arthur was human- he didn’t get the option of ignoring the momentous events before them. Renaud, a creature forged of that hatred born centuries ago, now languished in the one place he had left to him where he felt safe.
“If y’ keep pacin’ you’re going to walk a hole in the ship.” Fred’s voice interjected once Mara completed her third revolution of the lower deck. He then noticed the totem she’d constructed grasped before her, its eyes now dimmed. “Oh yeah. Yer thing. Wha’ was it meant to do?” The skitti asked as she paused in her pathing to look at the furry man.
“It’s an invitation. Small pockets of radiant energy dispensed to spirits who fulfil a contract.” Mara explained to her friend, who looked at her with a sceptical look. Thinking he didn’t understand, the mage thought for a few moments. “It’s essentially vendor of ghost food. If they do what I ask, they get a treat. I asked them to look for Ardan.” The necromancer explained. She’d given them four hours to do so. Whether they found him or looked for the allotted time, they received their pay. Mara was hardly going to renege on the dead.
“Weren’ we doin’ that? Or did you wanna get rid of us?” Fred asked with a twitch of his whiskers.
“Well, ghosts can see the spirit rather than the body. He can’t hide from them. But on the off chance he was too weak to use illusions, I wanted living eyes on the field. And I didn’t want you to see me as an emotional wreck. Today’s been…a day.” Mara expounded before her weariness overcame her. The day had been one of the most taxing of her life and as the sun began to move toward the horizon above them, she became all too aware that it was far from over.
“When y’ get to your bed tonight, you’ll feel like yer tired as a thirty-six-hour shift. But it’ll be over. An’ the new day’ll be better for it.” Fred looked out of the porthole pensively as he ruminated. He’d spoken as if the words were not his own. “Brother Gangrene said that t’me. Right afore I lost me eye.” The skitti recalled. Through his eye, Mara could faintly hear the echoes of artillery shells long since passed. The smell of choking yellow gas as it rained down around them.
“Gangrene didn’t take your eye, did he?” The mage gasped. “The spell I cast can regrow it. You don’t have to endure his punishment anymore.” She added with a hopeful air. The temples were ruins and so nobody had discovered her miracle yet. It wouldn’t take long and once the people knew the magic wouldn’t last. She should have made it a permanent addition, she thought with regret. Then again, without the Crook that may have been certain death.
“Gangrene didn’ do nothin’ to me. Not personal-like.” Fred eased his fretting friend before soothing his twitching tail. “This was shrapnel from an Idharan bomb. An’ it’s who I am. ‘sides, I’m probably a better shot with it!” The revolutionary ribbed her, doing his approximation of a wink before snapping his overalls against his chest. He looked to the slowly growing grey blur in the distance against the roiling sea. “I don’ get soft often. But if I knock on the black door, you be’er believe it was worth it. I’d die fightin’ these bastards any day o’ the week.” He scratched his chin contemplatively as he thought about what could be his final battle. Though as an experienced fighter, Mara knew he’d take a dozen of Ardan’s puppets with him.
The two of them walked to the prow of the ship as they talked further, the mage explaining her plans in detail as she did so. She needed to prevent Renaud from teleporting, and she had several methods of trapping her errant mentor. The main problem was that such methods were expensive. She would be relying on them to engage any flesh and blood defences. Helpfully, Twitcher arrived with a plate of food for the pair considering they’d not eaten in the day like everyone else. They took one final once over of Fred’s rifle, passing it back to him with satisfaction. The Elysian had returned to dual arm swords. They’d edged their blades with a strange pink-gold substance that not even Mara could recognize, which they took great pleasure in. It was apparently a confounding agent for many of the more commonly used protective charms. While their swords could not shear through armour, a single scratch of the blades would remove the protection from magical effects. Both Mara and Fred grinned wickedly at that, the skitti man checking his ammunition with gusto.
“Gotta ask though. These leadwits don’ mind sendin’ you to the dark. Why’re you so concerned for ‘em?” Fred pondered aloud as the mage finished explaining the extent of spells, she now had access to. Had she and Armin found his spell book, she would be considerably more formidable. It had the secrets to some of the most dangerous and pernicious necromancy developed in the last few centuries. That said, Mara could now do things that many commoners would consider terrifying.
“I couldn’t handle the guilt from accidentally hurting people. You think I could handle being an actual soldier?” Mara replied in a frivolous tone. Both Twitcher and Fred cornered her with their stares. Ah, this was one of those questions then. The mage attempted to give serious thought to it. There was no moral or ethical principle that forbade her from defending herself. Then she remembered the night in the graveyard, the Herald’s euphoria as he incited her feral side. “Fine, have it your way. Before, I refused to kill them because I saw them as just wrong. People who could be saved. Then the Herald happened. And he got to me. Ever since then, the knowledge of that part of me has stayed my hand. I’d be just like them. Deciding who lived or died based on conviction alone.” She explained in an oddly neutral tone of voice. Fred recalled reading of the Herald’s little speech at the opening of his trial. How Mara had almost savaged him, that he’d merely been defending himself. He’d assumed that their alleglet of a friend was incapable of such things.
“Even if y’killed twenty of the bastards, y’d be nothin’ like them.” Fred affirmed with a grasp on Mara’s shoulder. “Too many talks from the comfor’ of their fireplace. They thin’ figthin’ the guy with a gun to yer head is jus’ as bad. But not wantin’ to let yerself be as cruel as ‘em is alrigh’ by me.” The revolutionary approved while Twitcher’s robotic eyes seemed to drift off into their memories. Mara was thankful that there were no further inquisitions. It had been a painful truth learned through hardship.
“Mira once said that every drop of slaver blood corroded the chains of her comrades.” Twitcher suddenly recalled with their eyes losing focus briefly. “She said this before burning Kornan. I did not know it, but this was when my Mira left. The Herald of Ruin took her place after that. I do not know which of them said it.” They considered with a certain gravity. Mara understood Twitcher’s pain in that regard, now. To see a person, you cared for melt away only to be replaced by a cruel tyrant. Perhaps the tyranny had always been there, hidden under a mask. Or perhaps it had simply been borne of a good heart, broken by the world.
“Which one do you think she was, deep down?” Mara asked in a quiet voice. Twitcher simply shook their head, a sigh escaping their synthetic throat. “You’re right. We can’t really know for sure. The privacy of our own minds is a curse to those who’d know us. A blessing the rest of the time.” She then looked towards Easthelm, which now rose from the coastline as an impressive city walled in stone carved with markings of protection. The craters carved into it by invasions twenty years passed still remained there as silent testament to the one city that never broke. Aside from the redoubt of Yanhelm. That impenetrable city had existed in some shape or form since before the Elysian empire. But Easthelm had seen the waves of countless navies dash themselves against it. It had been ruled by a single noble family stretching back centuries and its current overseer apparently matched her forebears’ reputations. Lady Eris Fairbrooke, business magnate and military strongwoman who’d hunted pirates for sport in her youth. Mara had made this city her second choice for her presence. The Lady would tolerate no elvish supremacy nonsense while she yet drew breath.
As the sanlater began its small ascent to the cliffs that stood between them and the city, the rest of the party emerged from below decks to see their destination. Arthur strained his eyes as if he might glimpse Renaud from their perch. He needn’t have bothered for as the sanlater came into land upon an admittedly shabby-looking docking station, thunder rent the air. Automatically, the crew and party both inclined their heads towards the sky which had been clear but a few moments ago. Now, a rumbling anvil of black clouds began to form over the city in an unnatural pall that cast sheets of rain over the entire settlement. Mara reached forth a hand, her irises swallowed by the blackness of the rest of her eye. Her face broke into an inconceivable smile. The crew looked at her as if she were mad as a stern wind began to batter the flagging ship. It made landfall just as Rochefort came upon them, eye trained through a spyglass on the city below them.
“What devilry is this?” He asked with a flustered tone. “With this going on we’ll be grounded!” He shot over his shoulder at the helmsman, who nodded to the navigator. Rochefort shuttered his glass and turned to the grinning Mara with a slow dread building on his features. The necromancer’s three eyes regrew their irises as they slid over to meet the captain’s unnerved countenance.
“Best batten down the hatches, Captain. It appears my dear sora had the same idea I did. He’s dying to speak to me. And he’s not letting airships fly until he does.” She explained as she headed towards the lower decks where they could disembark. Solvi raced behind her, grabbing her shoulder and whirling her about as she hit the flattened soil of the landing zone.
“Why are you grinning like a lovestruck schoolgirl? He might be baiting the snare.” Solvi demanded as her companion looked out over the city. The Orsan followed her gaze to spy in the older district of the city a corpulent tower that reminded her of Elys somewhat. Though by its timber frame and white-washed walls, it was of human construction. She knew not how old it was, only that it was considerably older than the buildings around it. She didn’t understand, looking at Mara’s expectant expression with confusion as the party joined them.
“He’s fortified himself in the one place he feels safe. He hid under their noses in a ruin that nobody dares to tear down.” The mage chuckled as she began her decent down the stone steps that ran switchback along the cliff face. The party merely followed in bemused silence, Fred taking stock of the tower with his rifle’s scope. Another gift from Twitcher’s tireless hands. He spied through it the tower’s many windows and thought it more like a giant circular palace than a traditional tower. Its timber frames must be reinforced with something. They couldn’t hold that much weight, surely? His scouting slid upwards to a slate roof stocked with enough dark-feathered birds to set Fred’s teeth on edge. There were four large windows big enough to spy movement within. Figures he could barely make out talking, gesticulating. Were they angry with someone?
Arthur pulled Fred back. He looked down to see a stomach-hollowing drop and thanked the cleric with a relieved tone. Mara stood on the staircase below them, shouting that they hurry. It was wise advice as the storm that Renaud had seemingly generated began to expand over to the cliffs. Soon enough, those without cloaks or coats were soaked through. Solvi offered to bring Mara under her cloak as she once had but the mage refused, appearing to revel in the feeling of rain on her skin.
“How does he even know you’re here?” Arthur shouted over the thunder and percussive downpour. There were no people to gawk at Mara as she walked through the streets, many cowering in the quaint corridors that held up the overhanging buildings. Easthelm had run out of land long ago. Now, they built upwards in hopes of finding space in the sky.
“If I were him and I saw an Idharan ship land outside my hiding place without a tip off, who else would I think it was?” Mara shouted back to the man, laughing with a mixture of nerves and something the cleric could not quite place. It sounded eager though.
Soon enough the group found themselves before the monolithic stone curtains that surrounded the tower as its walls. Two huge rusting iron gates hung ominously before a courtyard that had a cracked and overgrown mosaic. Mara’s historical knowledge told her it was the coat of arms belonging to Bernard Blackwing. There were no Army members in sight, not even in the alcoves of the adjoining buildings. They hid behind the great wooden door emblazoned with two snarling allegs as door knockers. Before them sat the lair of their final adversary. Mara announced their arrival with a thunderous detonation, blowing the gate lock clean through. She strode through like a woman possessed. Soon, Ardan would face his judgement.
