365. Nesēmus
Chancellor Blackwood frowned, but kept his voice low, so that his words would not travel. There were people rushing in every direction, though after Liv’s brief speech any trace of burgeoning panic seemed to have been replaced by determination.
“I wish you had spoken to me before locking down the waystone,” he said. “The city is stuffed to the brim with all of the visitors who came here for Archmagus Loredon’s funeral, and they were all expecting to use that stone to leave today. There’s going to be a lot of frustration and anger, and it’s going to put a strain on our infrastructure.”
“If there’s been any time at all, I would have,” Liv assured him. “I’m not here to make your life more difficult, and I apologize if I have. But with that thing attached to the stone, any incoming transport could leave people dead or wounded; and any outgoing passage might drag it along with them. We can’t take the risk.”
“Particularly not with the revelation that Ractia can cast through the waystone network,” Sidonie said, forming the third point of their triangle. “We’ve never seen her do it until now, which makes me think there has to be a limitation of some sort, but figuring out what could take years of study and analysis. Honestly, I think we have to assume that every active waystone in the world is currently a point of vulnerability.”
“And the easiest way to close that vulnerability for everyone is to strike her as soon as possible,” Liv concluded, though she wasn’t quite as certain. None of the other waystone had been smeared with blood in an offering to Ractia, after all. “I’ll be relieving some of the pressure on the town shortly, Chancellor. As soon as the culling mages are packed and ready to go, we’ll take them to Bald Peak, to muster there.”
Blackwood raised one hand to stroke his bushy beard. It was even more wild than normal: Liv imagined that he’d rushed out of bed without taking time to oil it or brush it out. “How many tethers do you have available?” he asked.
“Sidonie and I,” Liv answered. “Keri, my cousin Miina, and Kaija, the head of my guard. Akseli, another of my personal guards. Unfortunately, most humans without Elden blood never develop the mana capacity to do it without using a fairly substantial mana stone battery to help, which means someone like Arjun doesn’t usually bother.”
“That isn’t very many,” Blackwood pointed out.
“It’s enough to take sixty or seventy people, if we cram them in close,” Liv said. “That will have to be enough. And then once we get to Bald Peak, we’ll have to figure out how to actually get up there.”
“I have a few thoughts on that,” Sidonie said. “But all of this is also on a timer. We don’t know how long it’s going to take for her machine to be ready. We can’t afford to take days or weeks to figure things out.”
“One step at a time,” Liv said. “Once we leave, I’d suggest you speak with the captains of some of the ships in the harbor. I’m sure they’ll be willing to take on passengers to the other coastal cities, for a fee. I imagine the price of horses is going to spike dramatically, as some of these barons begin looking for ways to get home.”
“Speaking of,” Sidonie murmured, and motioned with her chin to a knot of approaching men and women, all dressed in the sorts of fabrics and jewelry that only Lucanian aristocracy could afford: golden rings, chains of office, and jeweled swordhilts. At the center of the group was the young king Lucan.
Chancellor Blackwood rather smoothly rotated himself to open the triangle, and offered the monarch a bow. “Your Majesty. I was just discussing the guild’s next steps with the two archmages here.”
Lucan gave the barest nod to Blackwood and Sidonie, and then inclined his head more deeply to Liv, in a gesture that she returned. “I’m surprised the guildmistress isn’t here.”
“She took most of our students back to Bald Peak last evening,” Liv explained, “after the funeral. It was either that or let them camp with the culling mages down on the beach.”
The king glanced at the nearby waystone. “I’m told you shut down travel in or out of the city?”
“Travel by waystone,” Liv explained. “It’s too dangerous at the moment.” To Ghveris, she quite specifically did not say out loud.
“And your intent is to take most of the guild and mount an assault on –” Lucan waved a hand at the line of fire stretching across the sky. The eastern horizon was growing lighter with the approaching dawn, which somewhat lessened the bizarre effect produced by that stolen light. “Whatever that is?”
“Ractia,” Liv said. “And now that we know where she is, we can finally finish this.”
Lucan glanced to his crowd of hangers on. “A moment of privacy,” he said, and the young barons and baronesses of the kingdom stepped back to give him room. “My great-uncle taught me to avoid giving commands that I wouldn’t be able to enforce. I won’t pretend that I can stop you from doing this, so instead I will support your assault. You have, quite literally, been fighting the Lady of Blood since before I was born. What do you need?”
“Anything you can do to help Chancellor Blackwood avoid a panic here,” Liv told the younger man, after thinking a moment. “In all honesty, I expect this to be over one way or the other quickly enough that you won’t be able to get back to Freeport in time to do anything.”
“I suppose there’s something liberating about that,” the young king said, with a sigh. “But I can’t say I like feeling helpless.”
“We were all helpless, at one point,” Liv said, as she caught sight of Keri bringing Rei and Rianne through the crowd toward her. “And there will come a time when you have the power to protect someone else. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
Rianne’s eyes flicked to Liv for a moment before being drawn inexorably back up to the strand of fire stretched across the sky. “What’s happening, Mama?” she asked.
“We’re going back to Bald Peak, dove,” Liv said, keeping her voice as calm as she could. She’d certainly had plenty of practice doing that in her time as queen. “Stay with your father for a moment.”
She rested her fingers on the hilt of the stormwand, drew it, and pointed it down at the sand beneath her feet. A column of ice rose up beneath Liv, lifting her into the air until she stood with her feet at eye level for everyone who had gathered on the beach.
“There are six people on this beach capable of taking a group to Bald Peak without using a waystone,” Liv shouted. The gathered culling mages turned to listen to her, the murmur of many voices in the crowd dying away as all their attention focused on a single point. “All of them are going to raise their hands right now.” She lifted her own wand above her head to make an example, and a quick scan of the crowd showed her that Keri, Sidonie, Miina, Kaija, and Akseli had all done the same.
“You need to be touching one of these people to come with us,” Liv continued, “so you’re going to have to crowd in and fit as many people as you can. We’re all going to appear on the waystone, so this is going to have to happen in turns. Archmagus Corbett will go first, and then groups will follow every count of one-hundred. I will be last.” She almost asked whether there were any questions, but years of teaching classes and running a government had taught her that would be a trap. Instead, she simply commanded, “Those who will be using a Tether, spread out and get yourselves a bit of room. Everyone else, find a place to squeeze in. If you can’t find a place, back up. Those staying behind can help King Lucan and Chancellor Blackwood keep everyone safe here in Coral Bay.”
Liv shaped her column into a set of precarious-looking frozen steps which lasted just long enough for her to descend, and then she let it crumble away behind her. “Come with me, dear,” she told Rianne, and took her daughter’s hand.
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“Isn’t Daddy coming with us?” the girl asked, looking between her parents desperately.
“We’ll travel separately, but arrive in the same place,” Keri promised her. “Go with your mother, and we’ll all be home in just a few moments.”
“Leaving!” Sidonie shouted.
Liv glanced over to see a swaying, unstable mass of mages all clustered around her friend. Most of them had a single arm stretched inward, standing up on the toes of their boots, and the entire arrangement looked liable to fall over at any moment at the first person unlucky enough to lose their balance. A flash of light washed over Sidonie and the people around her, and then they were gone.
“Counting down,” Miina shouted. “Let’s make sure they have time to clear the waystone, people. One-hundred. Ninety-nine…” Unlike Sidonie, Liv’s cousin and lady-in-waiting had put herself at the head of her group, most of whom didn’t even seem to be touching her at all.
Liv couldn’t help but furrow her brow as she tried to figure out how Miina was going to accomplish the transport. She was just about to open her mouth and ask when her cousin caught her eye, winked, and gave her a grin.
Miina spread her arms out to either side and let herself fall back, where the crowd around her – nearly entirely men, Liv now noticed – caught her and lifted her into the air. Perhaps two dozen hands each found a place beneath her body, carrying her weight all together, and then at the shout of “One!” the entire group vanished.
“Our cousin is ridiculous,” Liv grumbled to her daughter.
Akseli began counting, and Liv took a moment to look back at where Wren stood next to the enormous, pulsing structure of blood, bone, and flesh that Ractia had rooted to the waystone. She raised her hand in a gentle wave, and the huntress waved back. Then, a third flash lit up the predawn-shore, and Keri began counting.
Liv pulled her eyes away from the friends that she was leaving behind, and instead examined the group of people who’d gathered around her. Unlike with the others, not a single one had reached out to put a hand on her – but Arjun was there, and Harold of Bexbury, and even, to Liv’s surprise, Karina.
“I didn’t realize you’d come,” Liv told the Iravatan woman.
“Some of us had to camp down on the beach,” her former student remarked, with a grin. “I thought I’d hitch myself to your wagon for a ride back.”
Liv nodded, then turned to Arjun. “Are you certain you’re coming? I thought you might want to stay with Wren.”
“I think there will be more people who need me where you’re going,” her friend said.
Out of the corner of her eye, Liv saw Keri’s group flash out of existence.
“Alright, it’s almost our turn,” she said, looking from one face to the next. “Everyone find somewhere to grab on for a moment, and make sure you don’t push up against my daughter, please.”
The culling mages hesitated – whether because Liv was an archmage, or a queen, she couldn’t have said. But Arjun and Karina reached out for her immediately, and that seemed to reassure everyone else. For Liv, it was intensely uncomfortable: she couldn’t recall the last time so many people, especially so many strangers, had touched her at once, and they all loomed over her so that she couldn’t see out from the middle of the group.
“Kaija’s gone,” Arjun told her, and she gave him a grateful nod. She hadn’t even seen the flash.
“One hundred,” Liv said, and the entire group counted down with her. When they reached one, she whispered: “Nesēmus.” Mana poured out of Liv’s body, and light swelled to consume the world around her.
☙
Liv stumbled on the white stone, and Rianne clung tightly to her hand as the mages crowded around her stumbled, trying to catch their balance. For a moment, she thought that she might fall, or that one of them would bear her down to the ground, but then all of the hands dropped away, one after another.
“This way!” Keri was shouting, from somewhere off to the left where Liv couldn’t even see him yet. “Clear the stone!”
Only once she was alone with her daughter, even Arjun and Kerina giving them a little space, did Liv feel like she could actually breathe. It didn’t help that she’d spent nearly two full days outside of a rift, and the experience was already beginning to wear on her.
“Stay by me,” Liv murmured to her daughter, and then she walked off the stone. She trusted her husband to get the culling mages organized, and to coordinate with Soile to have the army ready to move. Those were all things that she didn’t need to be involved with, personally, so she walked over to Miina.
“I’d like you to take Rianne up to the palace,” Liv told her cousin. “Get her settled in there and come back down.”
Miina narrowed her eyes. “So long as you don’t leave without me,” she demanded.
“No one’s going anywhere immediately,” Liv said. “But children have no place in what we’re all about to do.”
“That’s true enough,” Miina grumbled. “Alright, little one, come with me.” She reached out for Rianne’s hand, but the little girl threw herself against Liv’s leg and wrapped both arms around her mother’s body.
“No. I want to stay with Mama.”
Liv sighed, and bent over to unwrap her daughter’s arms. “I need to go take care of something, dove,” she said. “And I need you to go up to the peak with Miina, and not cause her any trouble.”
Rianne tilted her head back just enough that her face was no longer buried in the skirting of Liv’s armor. “I hear what people say. They say you’re going to fight. I don’t want you to.”
“Are you scared?” Liv asked, and after a moment, her daughter nodded. “That’s alright, love. I’m a bit scared too. But that isn’t going to stop me from what I have to do, you understand? Daddy and I will be back just as soon as we can.”
“What if you aren’t?” Rianne asked, and Liv could see that she was beginning to cry.
“That might happen,” Liv admitted. “And if it does, your grandfather will take care of you, or Uncle Matthew and Aunt Triss, or even Cousin Miina. You won’t be alone, no matter what happens. And I promise that I’ll do everything I can to come back.” She pressed a kiss to her daughter’s forehead, scooped her up, and gave Rianne a big squeeze before passing her off to Miina.
“Come along,” Liv’s cousin said, and walked away quickly, before the girl could begin sobbing. Liv found that she was clenching her fists, and made an effort to relax her fingers.
“What do you need?” Arjun asked.
“You to watch over me while I go take a look around,” Liv said. She sat down on the ground, crossed her legs, and rested her hands on her thighs. To her surprise, Karina sat down next to her.
“Just like when we become an adult, right?” the other Elden woman asked, and Liv nodded. “I thought you decided this was too unpredictable for military use.”
“It is,” Liv admitted. “But we need to see where she is and figure out a way to get there, and we need to do it quickly. Are you certain you want to come along? She’ll be able to see us, if we get too close to her. I’d bet half the Alliance treasury she’ll be able to attack, too.”
“No bet,” Karina said, straightening her back and taking a deep breath. “You ready?”
Rather than answer, Liv took a deep breath, held it, and closed her eyes. She let Aluth stir at the back of her mind, and feel all of the currents of mana surrounding them. There were so many mages, not just around the waystone but the students at the college, as well. The waystone had been used six times in quick succession, at an exorbitant cost. On top of all that, they were right at the edge of the shoals which pulsed around the base of Bald Peak. There was plenty of ambient mana swirling about the area.
“I’ll make certain no one bothers you until you return,” Arjun said, and his presence was a comfort.
As her father had taught her to do many years before, Liv exhaled, and allowed her spirit to slip out of her body. She could feel Karina next to her as they rode the currents of magic up, up into the sky above the valley. Dawn was breaking around the lower slopes of the eastern mountains, painting the world in shades of orange, pink, and purple.
When she’d sought Keri, Liv had followed the mana down from the ring which circled the world. This time, she climbed up, always up, past the ring and its crumbled, damaged debris field. The strand of fire that linked the sun and the moon was as clear as a well-trodden road through the forest, and Liv followed it, dancing around the light and the heat which could not touch her spirit.
With Karina swirling in her wake, Liv chased the path of the splintered sun down to the gray surface of the moon, and to the Vædic ruins sprawled out below like some child’s toys.