Chapter 658: News Reaches The West (Part Two)
"If I desire your silence," Answaen said in a voice that was colder than the mountain air. "Then I will command it. You have come, tell me everything you have learned."
"It, it’s difficult to know much this soon," the messenger said, hoping that his explanation wouldn’t be taken as an excuse. "Messenger birds can only carry so much, and the distance is great. Still, there are a few things that we have learned. Rumors, but I will confirm them soon." Seeing that the Immortal Ancestor had no intention of speaking, the messenger continued to report what little he’d been able to learn.
"There is a rumor that the Eldritch Lady of the Vale of Mists defeated Hamdi, High Lord of the Tangled Wood, and that she took one of his progeny to use as her herald," the messenger said. "There is also a rumor that the Eldritch Lady of the Vale assembled an army vast enough to encircle High Fen City and that she led that army into the High Pass."
"So the Harbinger of Death is still playing games with the humans and fighting them with armies," Answaen said dismissively. "I do not see why Master wishes to possess her so badly when she refuses to unleash her power on her enemies. But she should know better than to break her teacher’s Blood Guardians, so I doubt it was her who killed my brother."
"What other rumors have you heard?" Answaen asked. "I do not believe that you only heard from a few spies in the High Fen."
"This," the messenger said helplessly, trying to lower themselves even further into packed snow atop the mountain. "I do not know that these things mean anything, Immortal Ancestor. The Mother of Thorns is said to have taken in new witches," the messenger said. "And the Thistle Witch was seen with the Eldritch Lady of the Vale of Mists. There is... there is also a rumor that the Lady of the Vale has taken a witch as her seneschal, but I have no proof of this."
For several minutes, Answaen said nothing as she drummed her sharp claws on the icy armrest of her throne, losing herself in thought as her mind wandered back to conversations that had taken place decades ago.
The Thistle Witch... the last survivor of the Glimmerwing Clan and an assassin so deadly that the Fangs of Death felt compelled to add her to his collection of lethal tools. Her escape had been one of the few things capable of rousing Shubnalu’s fury in all the centuries Answaen had served her Master.
"Wait," the Frost Walker vampire said as she fit other pieces of what the messenger had said together. "Did you say that the Harbinger of Death took a seneschal? She took a witch for a seneschal?"
"I, I can’t confirm that she took a witch for her seneschal," the messenger stammered. "But the report was very clear that the Lady of the Vale’s seneschal arrived in High Fen City ahead of her Mistress and that she had the power to strike several bargains on her Mistress’s behalf. I, I will have more complete letters in a few weeks time when the couriers arrive," he offered, hoping that his answer would satisfy the Immortal Ancestor.
"If the Harbinger of Death has challenged a High Lord, then she has grown stronger than she was a hundred years ago when the Vale nearly fell," Answaen mused. "But if she has taken in one of the Mother of Thorn’s witches as her Seneschal, especially if she has taken the Thistle Witch as her Seneschal... I will have to report these matters to Master soon."
"Learn what you can in a month’s time," Answaen commanded. "By the next new moon, I don’t want to hear about rumors, I want to know the truth of things. And find out if the Eldritch Emperor is still acting like a turtle in the Thousand Spires."