Airlean Tales S2E29: Venarei Morben (2)

Sophie awoke as she always did: abruptly, unpleasantly, and with the fading tendrils of the vision dancing before her eyes.

Blood, bone, miasma so thick it stifled her lungs. Ghostlike pain radiated from her chest all the way to the tips of her fingers. She saw the mutilated face of Senator Rathos smiling with eerie glee at the hole in her chest; she felt the rage drop over her like a veil, the mana sing in her blood.

Then Sophie was returned to reality, and no longer seeing through another’s eyes.

She was lying on the grassy bank of the glade, the Mnemonic Pool’s glittering water casting pinpricks of light over lobed oak leaves. A distant pain vibrated at the base of her neck as she rose to her feet, shaking off the sway of blood rushing to her head.

Another senator turned. Another bloodline fading. Another withering branch to the dying tree that was the mythos of Atlantis.

The faint rustle of footsteps sounded behind Sophie, but it didn’t startle her. “Senator Rathos has turned,” she said brusquely, brushing soil clumps off her skirt. “Senator Xiphia has invoked her bloodfury in an attempt to combat him. We must hurry if we’re to make witness.”

“Soph.”

Sophie’s blood chilled as she turned. There was no smile on the too-red lips of her brother, no brightness of mischief in his too-big eyes. She had never seen such a grave expression on Soterios Ninotas.

“There’s something that needs doing first,” Soterios said calmly.

“More than hear the will of a senator whose bloodline sees its very end?”

“Yes.”

Simple enough. Sophie hiked her skirts and quickly followed her brother, who rounded one of the largest trees in the Glade and gestured with a hand. The body of a woman lay slumped against the gnarled oaken trunk. Her dress pooled around her in starry white. Glittering residue of the Pool still shimmered on the tips of rose-pink eyelashes and hair.

“Oh!” Sophie gasped, kneeling quickly by Karis Caelute of Airlea. She’d briefly forgotten about this woman in the commotion of her vision. “How long has she been under?”

“Enough to cause trouble.” She heard a pronounced sigh. “I swear, this woman. Always makes everything ten times more difficult than it has to be.”

Sophie pressed two fingers to the base of Karis’s neck. Her heartbeat fluttered arrhythmically, like torn butterfly wings struggling to keep aloft. She slapped Karis right on the cheek, hard. Her head only bobbed to the side, body limp as a ragdoll.

“Hm,” Sophie mused. “Her spirit’s thoroughly detached from her body. She might never wake up.”

Soterios groaned.

“Weren’t you the one who hated her? Why do you make a fuss now?”

“I hate no one, Soph. In fact, the foresight I offer to others without charge is but one example of my magnanimous nature.”

“But nobody asks for it.”

“This lady, however,” he said, ignoring her, “is the beloved of the Arbiter Sovereign’s heir. Terrible taste, to be sure, but the vice of a powerful man is often an inclination for questionable women. Should he know her in peril, he will lose all reason and abandon his post against the turned senators, leaving all to be ravaged by primordial magic until Atlantis is blotted out from existence. So yes, it is in our best interest to keep her alive. Or them apart.”

“You scried this?”

“I know men like him.”

Not a direct answer. Sophie studied her brother intently as he fussed over Karis to avoid her. Not for the first time, she felt the bloated, lazy burn of exasperation in her lungs, but she held back the sigh.

Why had the powers of the Minstrel been divided between them? Or at least, why couldn’t she have been the twin blessed with futuresight? The Minstrel had been gifted with two eyes—one to see through space, and one to see through time. Yet clairvoyance was not very useful. Sophie was often beset by sporadic images of families dining on stew, children in school, wives shopping at the market. Rarely did she glimpse anything of consequence. Meanwhile, Soterios hoarded kernels of the future like a rabid squirrel, passing out crumbs only through pranks and ciphers, if he passed them at all.

“Are you going to help me?” Soterios’s voice roused her. “She will die if you don’t, you know. I scried it.”

Sophie huffed. “I doubt that.”

But she knelt and she helped anyway. Because in the end, it didn’t really matter whether it was a prophecy. Soterios was her brother and her only companion, and if she could help him, she would.

Never wish for excitement, Yuden, Guildmaster Nicolina Cotton often said. It’ll always find you when you least want it.

She was right. For most people. But as Halcyon marched towards the brewing storm, he felt only the raging fire of resolve, purpose, maybe a bit of elation. Like the battle was calling to him, begging him to join. Maybe that was the secret. To never get surprised by excitement, you always had to want it.

Nicolina would call it being an addict. The head physician Thomys Privalt would call it a defense mechanism.

Halcyon would call it necessary, unless you know any other First Hunters waiting in line.

He picked up the pace as he approached the Armpit. Miasmic echoes of Rathos’s power were populating with more frequency, shadows flickering in the buildings like torches, backlit by the Warmonger’s choking braziers. He didn’t have long. Without an army to cull the echoes, Rathos’s influence was expanding too rapidly.

Halcyon fired his windsoles and vaulted into the Amphitheater. He expected silence, shadows, raw miasma. A domain evacuated and silent, waiting for the senators brawling underground to break to the surface.

The last thing he expected was a young warrior dancing among a crowd of miasmic echoes, long-tipped spear carving bright lines through the writhing shadows.

Her frame was small, maybe just the slightest cut above Azalea Fairwen’s. She bore no diakrin, nor ornaments on her helm like the senior warriors, but strips of platinum blue decorated the edges of her armor in featherlike shapes. The meaning of it was lost on Halcyon. The color and motif implied aerial fighting, but how could that be? Atlanteans had never been particularly interested in air combat.

The young warrior caught sight of him just as she carved through the last echo nipping at her heels. Her eyes lit up like stars, and her face broke into a wide grin.

“Lord Leventis!” she hailed cheerily. “Gods, about time! We were starting to think you’d miss out on all the fun.”

Halcyon balked for a solid moment. Kids. How was it always kids fighting the worst battles?

“Who are you?” he said. “Wait. Leventis—how do you know—”

“Third Pod,” the girl said. “Captain Mathias’s unit.” She tore her spear through the regenerating tendrils of an echo, scattering black mist over the stones. She turned to him with an extended hand, beaming. “The name’s Korone Phinou! What’s yours? Unless you like being called Lord Leventis, in which case, I’d say you’re suffering from a swelled head.”

He stared at the hand for a solid moment, speechless. The girl kept it extended.

Then there was a flicker of movement from behind her. Korone reversed her spear and thrust it without looking. The dark, bulbous form of a miasmic creature burst into wayward tendrils that floated aimlessly into the night.

“Hurry,” she urged. “In case you haven’t noticed, there’s not a lot of opportunities to shake hands on the battlefield.”

“Are you serious?” Halcyon said.

“Yes! Half of human connections is first impressions, you know. That’s what the Universitalis says, at least.” She frowned. “And you’re not making a very good first impression on me.”

He shook the damn hand. Were all Warmonger girls just unbearably audacious? He’d need a word with Xiph on the training regimen of her warriors at some point. They all severely lacked discipline.

Korone beamed again. “There! Now we’re acquainted. How can I help you, Lord Leventis? What do you need?”

“I…” He couldn’t keep up with this girl. “Has everyone been evacuated?”

“Yes sir.” Korone saluted with two fingers. “And the Warmonger army’s on pins and needles, just waiting for the word to throw themselves in. But the Prime Consul said they’d only feed the senator, make him stronger.”

Simon. He’d always had a good head on his shoulders, even in crisis. He was right. The time for chaff was over; only senior warriors would prove any help.

“Good,” Halcyon said. “Then you’re released from your post here. Board your Tidebreaker and get to the trench line.”

She gave him a strange look. “Why would I do that?”

“What, are you going to stay and fight?”

“That’s exactly what I was planning.”

“And be the Harvester’s latest snack?” He shooed her with a hand. “Off you go.”

Korone snapped her fingers. “Ohh, that’s right, you wouldn’t know—let’s just say that the Third Pod has grown. In scope, I mean, not in number. It’d be nice to grow in number. But even when the domina finds a new person worth her trust, which is maybe once a year at most, a previous one always ends up dying. Crazy, isn’t it? Now even though we’re the Senator’s most trusted, we’re called the Cursed Pod, because we can’t keep more than—”

“Can you,” Halcyon interrupted, “make this brief? We’re at war if you haven’t noticed.”

Korone pouted. “Yeah, alright. Third Pod is more like Senator Xiph’s personal unit, not a standard Tidebreaker pod. I’m a fighter, not a pilot. Don’t even know how to turn on a Tidebreaker, let alone steer it.”

“You could have led with that.” Halcyon turned quickly, his nerves prickling. He’d spent too long jabbering with this boundless ball of energy. How much strength had Rathos gained while he idled around? “Then get to the outer ring, and stay there. Cull the echoes. Keep Senator Vathalos’s strength down.”

“I can help fight the senator.”

Damn kids. “No,” Halcyon said, firing his windsoles.

He nearly collided face-first into the silhouette of a manta ray that swooped from the sky. Quickly, he twisted and fired his windsoles again, barely skimming under the belly of an all too familiar Tidebreaker. He landed off-kilter and glowered at the Tidebreaker, which slowed to a low levitate. Out stepped Mathias Galeus, still sporting bandages wrapped all up his neck and around his temple.

“You,” Halcyon said.

Mathias’s lips quirked. “Apologies, Lord Leventis. We’re not used to sharing the skyspace with…pedestrians.”

“You’re on bed rest for the next three weeks!”

Mathias gestured around him. “The streets are a warrior’s bed.”

Halcyon glowered, and suddenly felt a stab of sympathy for Guildmaster Nicolina. Was this how she felt when he flagrantly disregarded her every order? Like the urge to strangle him was barely held at bay by relief and begrudging respect? He looked at Korone, wondering if she had inherited her stubbornness from her own pod captain.

Marvel of marvels, the chatty girl was silent. Her head was tucked under her helmet, eyes trained on the ground, cheeks flushed pink.

Huh, Halcyon thought.

“Korone,” Mathias said. The girl’s head jerked up. “Where’s Euclid? Did he order you to move alone?”

The rosy tint in her face deepened. “I thought—I mean, he hasn’t—at least, I…uh…”

Mathias fixed her with a stern look, which seemed to make the poor girl melt even faster. “Speak clearly and keep calm, Korone. Don’t let your meek nature command your training.”

Meek?! Halcyon thought.

“Y-yes, Captain,” Korone replied, subdued. “I haven’t seen him yet.”

Ha-ha, he’s so slow, an old fogey just like you, she probably would have said if she’d been talking to Halcyon.

Mathias’s brows tightened to an even stricter look. “Then that’s worse. You’re not to do anything alone. Especially engaging the enemy.”

She bit her lip and stared at her shoes. “But…we’re the Third Pod, spears of the domina—”

“And was this a direct order from the domina?”

Guilty silence.

Mathias sighed, and his knotted shoulders slowly loosened. “You did well enough to clear the echoes here without sustaining injury. But no one is to fight alone. Watch for Euclid, and listen to his orders. The others will arrive at any moment. Fight together at the inner ring and do not split. Understood?”

Korone’s head shot up, eyes glittering. Halcyon balked.

“The inner ring?” he said. “That’s still too close to the senators. The last thing I need is more kids to wrangle, Galeus.”

Korone shot Halcyon an incensed look of flaming daggers that Mathias somehow did not pick up at all.

“Third Pod is different than you expect, Lord Leventis. We’re not only made of pilots.” He looked at Korone, who quickly ducked her head. “Call your mount. I need to speak with the arbiter.”

Mount? That took Halcyon aback. Surely she wasn’t going to charge into battle on one of the Warmonger’s prized oxen?

Korone turned from them and whistled—a sharp, singsong tone that seemed to pierce the clouds and made Halcyon instinctively flinch. That would be getting some unwanted attention. But before he could see what creature answered Korone’s summons, Mathias hooked an arm under his shoulder and hauled him a few feet away, dropping his tone.

“She was hoping you would come,” he said.

“You’re welcome,” Halcyon said wryly.

“No other arbiters survived.”

“You know how to make a man feel special.”

Mathias snorted. “That’s not what I meant. The Leventises have passed on, and they were hardly eager to leave lasting records of their coveted techniques.”

Halcyon’s sardonic humor evaporated into dread. “All the senators were aware of this, of course.”

“Yes.”

“So they passed new measures for handling a turned senator.”

Mathias was silent.

Halcyon gritted his teeth. “They did nothing? They knew this would happen one day!”

“After the fall of the Leventis Dominion, Xiph convened the Senate to propose new regulations for a senator’s discipline, which would replace the role of the Leventis family.” Mathias grimaced. “They could not come to an agreement.”

“They could not—” Halcyon barked a short, sharp laugh. “An unchecked senator can destroy the whole nation!”

“Aye.”

“And they ‘could not come to an agreement?!’”

“Aye.”

“So what exactly is the plan? Or is there none at all?”

“There is a plan.”

Halcyon felt a chill at the hard look in Mathias’s eyes. “That’s a terrible plan.”

“I haven’t told you what it is.”

“I’m not an idiot. Would she jeopardize the entire dominion, just like that?”

“In case you cannot tell,” he said tightly, “a turned senator already jeopardizes it plenty.”

“So two turned senators should fix the problem. Inspiring logic.”

“The plan was formulated,” Mathias said, eyes narrowing, “before we were aware that an heir of the Hunt survived and hid himself in a distant crevice of a foreign nation like a rat.”

Anger flared hot and heavy in Halcyon’s veins. “Oh, so I should have obediently sat around and let the Elect lop my head off.”

“There was precedent to seek asylum. You could have petitioned the Senate, sought higher protection—”

“As if anyone would side with a powerless child over the combined force of the Leventis arbiters.”

Mathias was quiet. But rather than indignation or barely controlled rage, his face was fixed in a muted, thoughtful look.

“What?” Halcyon snapped.

“Nothing,” Mathias said. He shook his head. “I only grieve that the corruption of your family raised you to believe that there was no justice to be found in Atlantis.”

Justice. Was there justice even now, as Halcyon beheld the senators embroiled in machinations of court politics, as miasma ran its rampant course, as soldiers continued to bleed and die for name and glory over a just cause? Mathias clearly believed in it. But Halcyon couldn’t see it.

He bit his tongue, knowing that his barbed words would only serve to divide. “How long before Rathos arrives?” he said instead.

“We don’t know. The domina ordered us to collapse the Armpit. They must be fighting through the rubble. Could be five minutes before they break to the surface, could be an hour.”

A tremor rocked the earth like a heartbeat underground. Mathias grimaced.

“Seems closer to five minutes. You’d best take Korone with you.”

“That girl? Galeus, this is the last place to put recruits through the fire.”

“You know,” came a clear voice from above, “you talk with a lot of brass for someone who’s only two years my elder.”

Halcyon looked up, and for a second, his mind couldn’t reconcile what his eyes were seeing. Because it seemed a pristine winged horse had leapt straight out of the storybooks—shining white coat, night-black hooves, wings flaring out in pearlescent, massive rays. And sitting astride the magnificent creature was Korone Phinou, spear in hand, a decidedly smug grin on her face.

“I introduce you,” Mathias said, his stone-cold expression belying the mirth in his voice, “to the last aer xiphator, the pegasus-mounted Skyblade of Atlantis: Korone Phinou.”

They were only halfway down the gullets when Sethis’s weight suddenly dropped off of Lilian’s back.

For a moment, she panicked. The platform they were on was hardly large, and the waters churned like rapids around them, little waves frothing at the dim cavernous walls. She turned quickly, her arms flailing for her cousin, because Asters forbid, if he survived this long through unspeakable corruptions only to die by falling off a platform and drowning, she would—she would—

She found Sethis’s blade leveled right at her throat.

Lilian’s gaze tracked the silver edge down to its source: Sethis himself, crouched on one knee, arm still shaking with even the slim exertion of holding up his sword—but his eyes were open and locked on hers, irises clear in their harsh green.

“Captain,” he said.

She felt the weight of betrayal in his labored, quiet tone. He never used her title.

“You know that was not your choice to make,” Sethis said.

Lilian bowed her head. “Your life was in grave danger, my liege.”

“You took the decision from me.” His gaze flickered off her. “Both of you.”

She followed his eyes to Simon, who was frozen at the edge of the platform. In a rare loss of composure, he was only gawking openly at Sethis, slack-jawed.

“It is difficult to describe the invasiveness of such a craft,” Sethis said. “How it spirits away your soul from your body, leaving your will trapped in a cage.” His voice hardened. “But is that not how you always have seen fit to treat me, Prime Consul? Keep me blind, keep me helpless. A pretty little decoration to show off to the rest of your senate.”

None of his words seemed to land with Simon, who only continued to stare.

“How?” the consul murmured. “You should be well under for at least another three hours.”

His foot shuffled forward, almost absently. Immediately, the point of Sethis’s sword swiveled to aim right at his chest.

“Try that trick again, and I cut off the hand you use to touch me.”

Lilian had never seen Sethis so upset—his eyes blazing liquid fire, his hand refusing to lower the sword against two unarmed persons. Should she say that she regretted going against his orders? No; that would be a lie. But she did feel a sting of remorse. She’d had no thought for anything but his safety, no objective but for any way to remove him from the premises. She’d never considered how each day in this accursed country had sought to wrest all authority and influence from his grasp.

A hidden marriage arrangement. Schemes from the aristocracy. Halcyon Yuden’s buried identity. Brutal dueling rites. A mana corruption taking over Atlantis. Monstrous senators.

Through it all, Sethis had been kept blind and unaware, left as driftwood tossed among roaring waves. Every day painted fresh salt on the same wound, and Lilian hadn’t even noticed.

Still, she stepped between him and Simon, placing her body right in line with his sword. Water lapped at the stone walls as the gullet churned around them.

“My liege,” she said softly, “there’s no need for weapons. Not anymore.”

Sethis’s brow twitched. “Swear, consul. Swear you shall never attempt that again.”

Simon was still examining Sethis with rapt attention. A glimmer of wonder lit up the golden flecks in his eyes. “I’ve never seen such a resilient manawell,” he mused. “Could there be true cleansing power in the bloodline of a Lunar—”

“Swear it!”

Simon finally startled, and he raised his hands placatingly. “No need to fear, Your Highness. That ‘trick,’ as you so call it, can only be done when your manawell’s defenses are lowered to me.”

“Then you did something to lower them.”

“Nothing of the sort. A manawell’s defenses are mostly the owner’s choice—or subconscious. You already know this. It is how patients choose to activate mana inhibitors when they desire treatment. It is also how the patient’s loved one can activate the mana inhibitors when the patient is unconscious.”

Sethis grimaced. “More vague explanations and redirection. How conveniently you dodge my actual requests, consul.”

“A situation may arise where I cannot accommodate such an oath, Your Highness.” Simon smiled placidly. “Better to live an honest life than to make impossible promises, no?”

“You’re not helping,” Lilian hissed.

Simon only continued, his tone unfaltering. “Had you stayed, prince of Airlea, you would only have died. What would that do to your delegation? To your kingdom? You know I speak true and that your guard captain made the right decision, but you refuse to accept it. Your life is of far greater value than you seem to comprehend.”

Lilian braced herself for the familiar arc of Sethis’s sword, but instead, the weapon lowered. A strange, tight expression carved over her cousin’s face, and it took her a moment to place: disgust.

“And what value is a life that does nothing to its conclusion, consul?” Sethis rasped. “All these sacrifices for the ‘Airlean throne,’ for the monarchy, for order and beauty and a return to rightness—what have they led to other than my country on the brink of ruin, ever awaiting a greener pasture that I cannot grant them?”

“You’ve not even ascended the throne yet, prince. You can’t already believe that your reign is doomed.”

“It is doomed!” Sethis barked. The waves of the gullet roared around him, as if in assent. “It is doomed if the one who ascends the throne made every choice that turned him coward, liar, and bystander. A person is made of their choices, consul, not who they wish they were! Wishing to be a good king grants my people nothing if I’ve only chosen to stand by, preserving my own life above all else.”

Lilian fought a smile. That was her cousin, Sethis Galen Lunaren. His every word lit a flame in the listener, a torch in the dark. She felt the wings of it beating in her chest, ready to soar. He didn’t know it, but he inspired devotion with speech alone.

Even Simon was affected. She saw it in how his gaze softened and turned distant, witnessing the colors that Sethis painted with his words. A skeptic of another nation was not immune to her cousin’s rampant charisma.

“The time has passed,” Sethis pushed on, “for eating and drinking and making merry in idle ignorance. Now has come the time to stand. I will return to the battlefield. I will take up my sword. And I will do all that is in my power to subdue Senator Vathalos.”

That snapped Simon back to clarity. “I would not advise that, prince.”

“Doubtless. I did not ask your advice.”

“Even were you to fight without flaw, you would contribute little to the fight against the senator.”

“Why is that?”

Simon paused, hands running idly over the platform railing. “A bit of a long saga, I fear.”

“You have as long as it takes to reverse this current and get us back to the surface.”

“Dying on foreign soil and leaving Airlea in anarchy would hardly make a grand contribution to this war, prince.”

“No need to worry.” Sethis looked right at Lilian. “That is what my captain is for.”

How badly she wanted to sit him down and tell him off for reckless behavior. But she could not count the fire in his soul against him. He would risk his life every moment he drew breath and he would bring grey hairs to her head—but so would he not be coddled; he would not hole himself in the throne room and leave others to fight his battles.

Was that not exactly why she had chosen him as her liege?

“Turn the current, Prime Consul,” Lilian said, a smile crawling up her face. “We’ve a battlefield to attend.”

Simon looked between her and Sethis, as if sizing up one of them to convince. He groaned. “You would waste all of Xiph’s preparations to bring you to safety.”

She was tempted to clap him on the shoulder. “From one retainer to another—preparations are all but fruitless with lieges like this.”

“Wise words.”

Simon delayed no further. His hand traced something in the railing, opalite veins gleamed, and the platform hummed a mechanical note as it reversed its course, churning down the way it had come.

Aer Xiphator. Skyblade. A vengeful warrior astride a noble pegasus.

The very name filled Halcyon with childlike wonder. It evoked legends of mythological riders, colors of white and glorious scarlet, images of death hurtling toward the enemy in a sea of brilliant wings.

The aer xiphatores were once Atlantis’s prized fleet of pegasus riders—but those were in the days before Tidebreakers, before the Severing War, before Atlantis had even sunk into the sea. Those were the days when Atlantis thrived in a seemingly impenetrable golden age, mythical beasts flourishing with humankind in land and sea and sky.

Now there were none. Well, there was one—and that was one more than Halcyon expected. He’d thought the pegasus long extinct. Yet one was before him, glossy with a pearl-white coat, mane flowing like silk. He would be overjoyed, except the one with the honored distinction of being the last Skyblade…was this sassy girl before him.

Korone grinned openly, twirling her spear with a practiced flourish. “Didn’t expect that, did you, Lord Leventis?”

Halcyon’s mouth spoke before his mind caught up. “It’s you?”

“I know. They definitely couldn’t have asked for a”—but then Korone noticed Mathias’s gaze on her and flushed—“m-more honored delegate. I’ll…do my best.”

She had definitely almost said cuter delegate.

“You’re the last aer xiphator?” Halcyon repeated, flabbergasted. “Why?”

Her lip curled a little. “Firstly, I’m not the last aer xiphator. Alright, well, maybe I am. But this isn’t the last pegasus. We’ve got nine, and that’s up from last century, when we only had six.”

That statement created far more questions than it answered, but time was not an ally. Halcyon expelled a deep sigh that felt as if it came from the pit of his soul.

“Fine,” he said tersely. “You can come along. The senator will infest the arena with echoes to expand his power. Focus on culling those. But”—and he looked at her severely—“you do not directly engage the senator. They are lethal. Do you understand?”

“Yes sir,” Korone said solemnly.

“Galeus. Now’s the time to convince your pupil out of an early death.”

Mathias was staring at them thoughtfully. “Korone may be young,” he said slowly, “but I can promise that she is a talented warrior. And her confidence seems to bloom under your instruction.”

Korone blanched a pure white. “Oh! Gods—that’s not—”

“Make good the name of aer xiphator, Korone.”

Mathias swiftly boarded his Tidebreaker, and without further fanfare, shot away into the night. To the ocean front, Halcyon realized. He looked at Korone, who was staring after the Tidebreaker’s trail, gnawing on her lower lip.

“He’d better not get the wrong idea,” she mumbled. “What if he thinks that I like you more? What if he thinks that I’m in love with you?”

That was her worry with two senators turned and annihilation on the horizon? “Don’t worry,” Halcyon said dryly. “You might not live to consider it any further.”

“You’re such a downer, Lord Leventis. Why do you always believe that we’re going to lose?”

“I’ll be fine. It’s you I’m worried about.” He turned and looked skyward. “Come. It’s time to set our initial position.”

Irene Cnidea Zorbea, Senator of the Lover, swished her wine in its glass with an elegant roll of her fingers, staring from her balcony into the waning lights. The fur shawl around her bare shoulders did little to fend off the evening chill. Music, laughter, and sonorous singing of Florenhost revelry wafted from the floors below in a saccharine perfume, but she made no acknowledgment of it.

She sipped at the wine and grimaced. Sweet and spiced, with a strong undertone of pomegranates. Fitting of her courtiers’ tastes. She herself preferred a stronger brew.

“Beloved One,” came a low, gravelly voice.

Irene heard sandals pad carefully around the cacophony of silks and satins and chiffon that spilled from her bed, which swallowed up half the room with dimensions that could—and probably had at some point—fit twenty men. Translucent fabric billowed in waves of dawn pink and royal purple and mottled blue, not unlike jellyfish reflecting the deep sea. They did nothing to conceal the massive vanity braced by gaudy golden swirls, upon which sprawled a veritable ocean of powders, paints, and succulent lotions.

“The disarray of one’s chambers reflects one’s mind, domina,” said the voice, disgruntled. “Perhaps you should consider a bit of tidying before tonight’s…guests.”

She smiled tightly against the rim of her glass. “What news, Felix? I’ve patience for little else.”

The footsteps padded closer, but stopped at a respectable distance of fifteen feet. Irene heard the intricate, metallic ring of clasps being loosed around a box. There was a light creak as a lid swung open. She knew that without a doubt, the case in Felix’s arms would hold an unspeakable beauty—glittering rubies, moonlike pearls, perhaps the hard sheen of diamonds. He was her personal jeweler, after all, responsible for creating and procuring her greatest pieces.

“As requested, Beloved One,” he said, his flat tone betraying no emotion. “A teardrop pendant fixed with deepest lapis lazuli and shimmering diamond accents, nested in white gold.”

Lapis lazuli. She frowned. Then he was bringing critical news of other senators. White gold. News that could not suffer the risk of being overheard.

Irene’s demeanor changed immediately. Like a curtain falling from its tieback, the furrow of her brow smoothed, her spine straightened, and her lips shot into a saccharine smile. No longer was there any sign of a woman named Irene Zorbea. Only the immaculate luster of the Ensign of Ardor, the Senator of the Lover.

“Well, I certainly hope it’s a marvelous showpiece,” she said loftily. “The paramours will be expecting no less for Florenhost.”

“They’ve not seen it yet, yes.”

She was the first senator to know? “Come then,” she said impatiently. “Put it on me.”

Felix obediently drew closer, the box jangling as he laid it carefully on a nearby dresser. There was a moment of silence—no doubt he had averted his eyes when he noticed that she was nude beneath the shawl. But professional integrity returned, and shortly, Irene felt the cold drop of metal on her collarbone.

“Our scouts have reported a disturbance from the Warmonger’s Dominion.” His murmur was low, scarcely an exhale on her neck. “We believe Senator Vathalos’s reckoning has arrived.”

Irene’s hand stilled. Then it swished again, watching the crimson liquid crawl up to the lip of her glass, but never splashing over.

“So soon. Poor Rathos.”

“The Airleans have been moved to the southern quarter. That would distance them from the Warmonger’s Tartarus Cell, which corroborates your theory.”

“But it makes little sense. Within the Tartarus Cell, Rathos should have had years yet. What would have aggravated his condition so drastically?”

“That we do not know, my lady.”

The pendant’s clasp clicked into place. His work finished, Felix stepped back.

“This may be an opportunity from the gods,” he said. “Will you pincer the Warmonger and be rid of the thorn in your side?”

Irene finally turned to regard him. His posture was studious and calming, his head contritely bowed. He was pleasing to the eyes—fine jaw, keen eyes, a body like sculpted marble glowing with a healthy sheen. As was expected of all in the direct service of the Lover. She was to have only the most beautiful of attendants.

Still, Felix would not look at her. He never had and he likely never would.

Irene turned back to the open balcony and set down her glass, her face impassive. “Summon the Night’s Devoted,” she said. “But no further. Florenhost is when Love gathers much of its potency, and my people need it now more than ever.”

“Yes, Beloved One.”

“And I shall go myself.” Her eyes shot to the large double doors at the end of the room that marked her tremendous wardrobe. “When a senator falls, the least he deserves is to be witnessed.”

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