Last Life

THE PERFORMANCE WENT DOWN even better than I had anticipated. A few technical innovations, a couple explosive mixtures, bright paints, a few decent musical numbers, tricks with the light, and (of course) plenty of acrobatics — and the crowd of highborn nobles were standing there, staring at the collection of novel theatrical tricks in open-mouthed amazement. As I watched Princess Adèle’s reaction — and that of Carl behind her — I realized that all my efforts and investments in this project had been well spent. The excited looks on their faces were already reward enough for me.

I also liked seeing the pensive look on Kiko’s face, and (in particular) the salty expression on the Duke de Bauffremont. I had lots of questions for those two, and I fully intended to ask them at some point in the future. First, however, I would need to finish the job for which I had engineered the whole enormous spectacle in the first place.

I had seen Helga and Baron de Levy at the festivities. The nisse had told me that my friend Jean-Louis was in the capital, and that he had visited the Fox Den back when Valerie and her indefatigable aunt were still running the place. According to the nisse, Prince Louis’ perfumer had been greeted at my mansion with open arms. He had spent several hours regaling the women with tales of his adventures up north. He had mentioned the Prince and Princess’ upcoming wedding, and also said that he had come to Herouxville as escort to a cousin of Princess Astrid. It turned out that the two of them were on their way to see me, in order to bring me an invitation to the wedding, but that a strange twist of fate within the capital’s bureaucratic machine had caused them to get stuck in Herouxville. It wasn’t hard to guess who was behind that particular snafu.

During the performance, I kept one eye on Helga, watching for her reaction. More than ever before, she reminded me of my dear Thais. Her icy mask had dropped away, giving way to an almost childlike sense of wonder. I actually felt a pang in my heart for a moment when I saw the familiar features of my long-departed sister. The spectacle dragged on for a bit, and when it finally wrapped up, I caught sight of the northern warrior’s face in the audience once again.

By the way — the evening’s performance had turned the entire Brisot family into superstars. As such, I felt pretty confident that several of the temporary stagehands we had hired to help with our mechanisms and special effects would soon become a permanent part of the crew. The avalanche of requests and invitations that poured down onto the Brisots from all the noble houses in the capital would fill their schedule to the brim for the coming year, if not more. And considering that I still had a few more interesting ideas and set designs to share with them, my companions probably wouldn’t be enjoying much leisure time in the coming years. I knew that they would make enough money not only for a small home in some southern province, but probably also for a nice capital-city mansion, should they choose to buy one. They would just have to learn to do everything correctly. I knew that Monsieur Brisot, with Michaela by his side (she, after all, was the most cool-headed member of the family), would follow my instructions and learn to pull off the same tricks we had done that evening.

The crowd thronging the stage after the performance was so huge that it actually distracted me from the task at hand, albeit only for a moment. The nobles — people who, lest we forget, tended to remain keenly aware of how they were acting in the presence of their ruler — rushed first and foremost to surround Jean. The big man had played the Tiger King, and he didn’t really know how to react to all this attention. He simply stood there, nodding his thanks for the congratulations and praise. People told him that he had gotten thoroughly into the role, and portrayed the powerful figure of a ruler with natural talent. This was all said loudly enough that the man on the ACTUAL throne would have been able to hear it.

At first, I had been planning to write Princess Adèle into the script; Bridget would have been perfect for the role. That would probably have catapulted the young woman to fame instantly. Alas, we didn’t really have enough information on the King’s granddaughter to make that plausible. Whereas Carl’s situation was largely common knowledge, and the basics of it were widely known, Adèle was something of a challenge. For example, nobody even knew what creature she had drawn during her first game of “choose your animal.” Whatever the case, though, Bridget had to deal with the musical accompaniment for the entire show, so she had plenty to occupy her time even without a supporting role onstage.

The audience next directed its attention to the beasts; for obvious reasons, Fox didn’t get much attention at all. They didn’t even seem to notice me. And that only made sense. No official position had been staked out at that point. Carl still hadn’t shown his opinion about my character, one way or the other. So people were being careful not to show their own hands; they didn’t want to come down on the wrong side vis-a-vis the King’s own position.

That said, there were a few people whose attention was obviously riveted on me. Kiko began pelting me with questions, as he was accustomed to doing. Thankfully, I was able to hide behind my assumed identity of a simple circus performer who was way out of his element, and I simply stammered back frightened, awestruck answers that made little to no sense. In the end, the jester just spat and turned away, before dissolving into the crowd of nobles around him. Inside, I had to laugh. It would have been funny to see his face if he had learned who exactly had been entertaining them that night.

Several more nobles came up to me after the jester left, but that was about it. And this lack of attention was exactly what I needed. I had been keeping my eye on Verena the entire time, hiding among the set pieces and waiting for an opportune time to go talk to her. That opportunity came sooner than I had imagined it would. She left the garden shortly after the performance, escorted as always by two of the King’s Shadows.

I waited for a minute, then activated invisibility and took off after her. I wasn’t afraid of any negative reactions from the series of witching charms that protected the Palace. After my adventures in the underground temple and my communion with the place of power, I had learned to identify things which I had only ever been able to sense very dimly before. Sometimes, this heightened sensitivity approached the level of instinct.

My Seer’s gift had grown exponentially more powerful, and I had a much easier time “counting” the components of the runic web that was wrapped around the Royal Palace.

I had time to study the Palace’s magic in some detail, and to my surprise, I realized that some ancient magic — obviously not something created by the aurings, but just as powerful — was connected to the King and the Princess. Or rather, to the small talismans that they were wearing around their necks. So they weren’t just protected from infiltration by first-born and the true gifted; it seemed likely that the runic magic in the Palace would kick in the moment Carl or Adèle found themselves under any kind of attack. Interestingly, they were the only members of the Royal Family who had such amulets.

The Palace’s magical defenses didn’t react to my manipulations with lilac mana at all. Which wasn’t surprising, I guess, given that I had already seen both the Astlandic and Vestonian strykers summon small clots of such mana from their crystals within the Palace grounds.

But this mysterious ancient magic even ignored black and gold mana. Before long, I had a pretty good guess as to why that was happening. It all had to do with Carl’s wound. There was still a small amount of black mana inside his energy system; it had simply been locked in place by the golden mana from my elixirs (which Lord Gray had passed on to the King).

Anyway — I summoned up some lilac mana from the bruts I always carried on me, then went off to follow Princess Verena at an unhurried pace. The farther I went, the more acutely I could feel the powerful emanations of combat magic from the strykers. Something was obviously happening up ahead.

My heart started beating faster, and I sped up. It was a good thing I did, too... After jumping out from behind a corner into the hallway that (according to both smell and the energy trail in the air) Verena and her escorts had just walked through, I froze for a second and took a careful look around.

I smelled the blood before I saw it.

Within a second, my scan detected two bodies cooling behind one of the heavy curtains lining the wall. Judging by the remnant emanations of lilac mana in their energy systems, they must have been strykers. I quickly peered behind the curtain. So it was: they were two of the King’s Shadows. The killers had taken them down with two short, sharp blows. Only an avant could possibly have taken out two mediuses that quickly. Naturally, there were no bruts left on their bodies.

All of this took no more than a few seconds. My heart skipped a beat as I rushed for the door, behind which I could hear a series of muffled sounds. It opened easily, and I flitted in across the threshold.

There was very little light in the room: only two barely-flickering candlesticks on either side of the door, and the grayish light of the moon coming in through a small window just below the ceiling. Even that light, however, was more than I needed.

There were five people in masks: two standing near the center of the room, two keeping to the sides, and one more who had moved deeper into the room along the wall. Four women. One man.

I recognized Verena’s familiar energy structure lying against a wall. Judging by the series of actions I walked in on, I had arrived almost at the last second, when the would-be victim would have already lost all hope. The strykers were moving with admirable coordination, like a trained battle group. Lilac mana was coursing through their bodies.

I was right. The one out in front was an avant. Unfortunately, attacking them from behind wasn’t going to work. I simply wouldn’t be able to finish them all in time. The avant would reach Verena before I could do it. That left no choice but to draw their attention onto me.

A lunge — and suddenly I was standing right in front of Verena. I could see a look of doom, even indignation, in the young woman’s eyes... Stopping between her and the killers, I removed my mask.

And... Well, you should have seen the looks on everyone’s faces.

“My friends,” I said. The sound of my voice startled Verena. The strykers tensed up and glanced at one another. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but you’ve already failed your task. That said, I do have one piece of consolation for you. You’re correct about one thing: this is certainly going to hurt a lot.”

Without a word, the Astlandic strykers began to close in on me. And no — there was no doubt in my mind that they were Astlanders. The energy systems of the four women were vaguely familiar. It now made sense why the noblewoman sitting next to the Queen had required so many ladies-in-waiting with combat abilities. Otto had decided on a radical solution.

I wouldn’t have been surprised if another group of assassins was attacking the recently-arrived Astlandic Marshal at exactly the same time. If so, that group would have a significantly more difficult assignment. Lord Gray, whom I had seen in the crowd of nobles at the show, never took more than a few steps away from the Astlandic Marshal, and he also had several bodyguards of his own to boot.

“Greta.” The avant’s voice was dull and muffled. Without any further sound, one of the “ladies-in-waiting” hurled a dagger at me.

Time seemed to slow down. I snatched the blade out of the air with ease and “returned” it to its owner with a lightning-quick flick of the wrist. The strykers hadn’t considered an acrobat from a circus to be a real threat; they hadn’t even given a thought to activating their magical shields. As such, the blade slammed into the mage’s throat and threw her body backward.

The mercenary let out a muffled, gurgling croak as she writhed awkwardly on the floor. Blood was streaming into her bulging, fear-crazed eyes.

The avant reacted first. I saw him pull mana from a large brut, wrap himself in a magical shield, and prepare for a lunge. The others were just reaching down to their crystals as he did so.

In response, I just shook my head silently, before shooting several dozen tentacles of golden mana out of my reservoir. For just a moment, the room was filled with blinding light. Verena, still frozen on the floor, actually had to cover her eyes with her hand. Apparently, she was watching everything using her Seer’s gift.

The eyes of the avant and the other mercenaries widened with horror as the long, flexible, translucent tentacles sank into their bodies, right in the places where their most vital energy nodes were located. All four of them rose up slightly onto their feet, arms spread helplessly to the side, like a bunch of marionettes being held aloft by their strings. The golden appendages sank into the mages’ lilac crystals and blocked the transfer of mana to their energy systems.

A glow of pain and horror danced in their eyes. The weapons dropped from their hands. Their heads tilted back ever so slightly. And then their bodies wrenched into violent convulsions. I think the whole scene was made even more terrifying by the fact that it all happened in near-total silence. Not counting the soft rustling and scraping coming from the mercenary with the slit throat, of course, who was still writhing about in terrified agony on the ground.

Within a minute, the strykers’ hearts started to stop, one after the other. The avant lasted a little bit longer, dying a few seconds after the others.

“And that’s the end of that,” I said as I recalled my golden tentacles.

The slain assassins crumpled to the floor, which caused Verena to jump and let out a muffled squeak of terror.

I turned to face her, then took off my fox mask and greeted her with a bow:

“Good evening, Your Highness. I hope you’ll forgive me for taking so long to liberate you. I must confess — you, my aunt, and my sister gave me quite a thorny problem to solve. I actually had to learn to act to get out of this one.”

With that, I held out a hand to Verena and helped her to her feet. She just stood there, mouth open, staring at me in amazement. Although she accepted my help without a murmur.

“I see you suffered a little injury,” I said, pointing to her neck. “May I?”

Still silent, Verena just nodded. Moving with deliberate slowness, I formed a healing spell from red mana and laid it gently against the girl’s neck.

As the web sank into her energy system, a sigh of relief escaped from Verena’s throat.

“Oh, Most Luminous Mother!” She whispered. Tears welled up in her eyes. “Is it really you, Maximillian?!”

“Yes, Your Highness,” I smiled with a slight bow of my head.

Verena was about to reply, but I cut her off as gently as possible: Thɪs chapter is updated by novel[f]ire.net

“Please forgive my bluntness, but the Royal Guards will be here any minute. If you want to get out of the Palace, we need to hurry. We need to come up with a long-term plan of action.”

As I spoke, a mixture of joy and disbelief flashed into Verena’s eyes. She even leaned forward a little bit; at the last second, however, she seemed to catch herself, and took a decisive step backward.

“There’s a small niche in one of our wagons. You could fit inside, and...” I was still speaking, but I trailed off in mid-sentence as I noticed Verena’s reaction.

“Your Highness?” I asked.

Verena sighed heavily and began to speak. Quietly at first, but growing louder and louder as she gained confidence with every passing word.

“Maximillian... Oh, Luminous Mother! How hard it is to do this! Max... I... I... You saved me again.”

She glanced around the room. There were tears streaming down her cheeks. And I had already begun to guess what she was talking about.

“I can’t leave. Do you understand?” She said, looking me in the eyes as she confirmed my assumption. “I know you risked your life to get here. And I will never forget everything you’ve done for me... But I can’t... I can’t abandon the people who’ve placed their trust in me. Not now. For the sake of my family’s memory... Their deaths cannot be allowed to go in vain. I can’t simply forget who I am. The blood of the ancient Kings flows through my veins. I mean, becoming a fugitive again? Abandoning my subjects and their hopes? No... I can’t... If I follow my heart and run off right now, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”

Verena stopped and waited for my reaction.

Abyss take it, I thought! So much effort — all for nothing. It seemed Verena wasn’t a prisoner after all, and everything that was happening in the Palace — the arrival of Conrad V’s supporters, the calls to overthrow Otto II, talk of a campaign into Astland — were all things that she was taking part in voluntarily.

“Are you sure?” I asked. “This is only the beginning, after all. Otto won’t stop. A hard, bloody war is coming. Thousands of people will be killed.”

“Yes, I’m sure!” Verena replied, with her chin held high. “It’s my duty as a future Queen to care for those people, who work to overthrow the man who usurped my father’s throne!”

Inside, I was a little bit awestruck. Where, I wondered, was the shy, calm Verena who used to love spending her days in the library? And all those conversations about a life far removed from politics...

Wow, I thought... Carl and the rest of them have really put in a lot of effort brainwashing her. Although actually, what am I talking about? Verena’s right. She’s a Princess. She was born to rule. And honestly, it doesn’t matter what kind of ruler she’ll become. She’s going to ask a lot of common people to die for her cause. A whole hell of a lot of them.

“Well,” I said. “As you wish, Your Highness. I respect your decision. I’m sure you’ll be a just and wise Queen.”

“Max...” She whispered, taking a step forward. Her delicate hand came to rest on my arm. “For the last year, we’ve been hearing reports of the battles you’ve won. With a soldier and commander like you at our side, we’ll have a much better chance of winning this war. I — “

“I need to go, Your Highness,” I said as I gently backed away from her. “Do me one final favor. Lie down on the floor next to that wall and pretend you’ve lost consciousness. When they wake you back up, tell them you were attacked and you passed out, and that you have no idea what happened after that.”

Then I shrugged and added:

“And I’m going to have to take all the bruts from these bodies as well. They might have traces of my mana on them. As I’m sure you understand, I’m going to need to remain in my Margraviate for some time. I’ll ask you in advance to forgive me for the unpleasant sight you’re about to see.”

The entire time, Verena was looking at me as though she were trying to peer into my soul, but I was careful to remain professional and conceal my feelings. Our paths were about to diverge. She seemed to understand that, and it seemed to upset her quite a bit.

“That’s it,” I said about two minutes later, as I slipped the last brut into my pocket. “I sincerely wish you luck, Your Highness. May the gods protect you. Farewell.”

“I will be praying to the Most Luminous Mother for you, Monsieur,” Verena replied firmly. “Farewell...”

I could see that my behavior was making her sad, even dejected. But that wasn’t my problem anymore. She had made her choice, and I had made mine. I was already walking out of the room when I suddenly felt faint emanations from some foreign source of power. Whatever it was, it was obviously some sort of witching magic. Presumably, Verena was trying to run one more scan on me before I left, using her Seer’s gift. Heh, I thought... Good luck.

I stepped across the threshold, and was about to close the door behind me when I suddenly felt a familiar vibration against my chest. For a second, I thought it might be a figment of my imagination. But alas... It was a real vibration, and I felt it again as I stood there thinking. One more golden brut had chosen a master for itself.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I whispered to myself, already feeling doomed.

I slipped my fox mask back onto my face, activated invisibility, and flitted back out into the hallway.