Heretic Spellblade - Ch6

Chapter 6

The grand hall of Aleich’s palace held the same overwrought appearance as always. Three levels of balconies spanned the length of the gargantuan hall, all overlooking the oversized throne constructed of steel, glass, and granite at one end. Nobles sorted by status into each level when the Imperial Diet sat, allowing the wealthiest and most prestigious archdukes to look down on their inferiors.

The spring Diet had sat a month ago and the summer session wouldn’t sit until at least July, so the upper levels remained empty. Nathan barely spared them a glance as he teleported into the hall with his Champions and the Twins.

When he appeared, entire squads of Royal Knights shot toward him, weapons raised. They stopped dead upon recognizing him. After saluting, they quickly returned to their patrols and guard duties.

A small army of Royal Knights packed into the hall. Dozens formed up by the front gate, while just as many protected the entrances that led deeper into the palace. Although the cascade didn’t threaten Aleich or the palace, the risk of an assassination attempt or coup during the chaos couldn’t be disregarded.

The failure of the Royal Knights to prevent former Emperor Gorthal’s abduction during the civil war would remain a sore point for decades, Nathan suspected.

Before Nathan could move anywhere, a dog beastkin Champion trotted up to him. A pair of amethysts shined from her chest.

“Lord Nathan, I take it Waier is safe?” Kara asked, her long dog ears giving her a dopey appearance that didn’t match her keen mind at all. “The Spymaster said as much, but Seraph wanted confirmation from you directly before removing it from our concerns.”

He gestured toward one of the hall’s exits. Kara slipped next to him, earning her a dirty look from Fei who shot to his other side and wrapped her arms and breasts around Nathan’s left side. A snort escaped Sen while the Twins made crude gestures.

Kara simply rolled her eyes and ignored her friend, which somehow annoyed Fei more.

The two beastkin were old friends. They’d met in the Champion Academy, but Fei had become Nathan’s Champion and recruited Kara as her adjutant later. Despite Fei’s vastly superior position in Nathan’s circle, her actions toward Kara could only be described as “competitive.” Not that Kara seemed to return them.

“We repelled the Messenger invading Waier, although I’ll need to brief everyone on what happened,” Nathan explained. “I take it Reine is unaware of what happened in the portal?”

Kara nodded. “She could not see inside it and has been busy assisting us with deploying Champions and soldiers to portals with greater needs.”

“Any breaches?”

“None so far. Our portals are all safe, but the risk lay in those controlled by other Bastions. One of Tharban’s portals nearly fell—a mystic fox was only just able to teleport Vala to the portal seconds before the demons reached the binding stone.”

Stopping dead in his tracks, Nathan tried to process what he’d heard. He ran his fingers over the bridge of his nose. “You don’t mean Narime, right?”

“No.” Kara grimaced. “She’s awake now and has returned, but… I believe you should meet her yourself. The foxes whisked her away to their territory to heal her, and I genuinely didn’t think we’d…”

She looked away and ran a hand through her hair.

“I understand, Kara. We’re lucky that Narime survived and that the mystic foxes lent their aid so swiftly,” he said.

Damn, he felt exhausted.

On the other hand, the fact the foxes had chosen to openly support him was an unexpected bounty. They always gave off an unapproachable aura. Much of their race and their secrets had died with the Federation in his original world, due to the ferocity of the demonic invasion.

Kara led them throughout the palace’s corridors. Far fewer knights lined them than he expected after seeing the hall. When defending Prophet’s Hope against Artemis he’d left a large contingent here for good reason, so this meant Seraph had deployed them to defend other fortresses.

More than during any other crisis, Nathan realized this was the one. The cascade that might trigger the beginning of the end, much as Siv’s breach at the Gharrick Mountains had led to the inevitable collapse of his old world.

He’d been on site when Siv breached this time, ending that before it even started. The breaches around Mortiswatch had been stopped before they became too troublesome, aided by Thanatos’s ineptitude.

But this time? Three separate nations faced Messenger invasions at the same time. Two elite Messengers had attacked back-to-back. Nathan and his Champions had been exhausted before the crisis even started, due to Artemis’s attack. Fyre was nowhere to be seen, unlike prior attacks. And Falmir capped off the problem by invading Trafaumh.

“I think your boss wants to win,” he muttered to the Twins.

“No shit, Sherlock,” Maura said.

“Did you realize that before or after he hit you with the undead kitty and Bauer at the same time the horse slut is busy?” Laura added. “What was it that scruffy asshole said when you confronted him? The titty prophet would throw a huge tantrum after losing three times? Well, our old boss is just as fucking petty, and you’ve shit on his plans a bunch of times as well.”

“Do you seriously think he even knows anything about me?” Nathan asked.

The Twins looked at each and frowned.

“No clue,” Laura admitted.

“He’s never been unaware of shit going down. And he cut you out of Atlas’s information for some reason.” Maura scratched her head. “But even if he doesn’t care about you, he’s losing. Siv said it herself, right? Usually he flattens a new cycle like a billion times before there’s any trouble. But you’re just hitting homerun after homerun. So he’s cheating like fucking crazy.”

Once again, Nathan felt at a complete loss due to the nonsense that escaped the Twins’ mouths. He also knew better than to ask them to explain further, so simply nodded.

Kara began to walk forward, then stopped and bit her lip. Her dog tail swished once as she looked off into the distance.

“Um, Narime’s not the only person who’s awake,” she said quietly.

The stares of the other Champions bore into him. Nathan knew exactly who Kara was talking about and what she was suggesting.

“Let’s pay her a visit. Then take me to the command room,” he said.

Kara nodded, a whisper of a smile on her face. Then she trotted off, forcing him to catch up. Fei finally loosened her grip on Nathan’s side as her ears drooped.

Once downstairs, they went into one of the multi-purpose guard rooms set aside for the knights. These rooms served as barracks, mess halls, or even sparring halls in poor weather.

This one had been turned into an emergency infirmary. Row after row of makeshift beds contained wounded knights, almost all of whom were beastkin women. A variety of healers walked along the rows, including a multitude of mystic foxes. Unarmored knights crowded around their friends and general chatter filled the room.

At least the room sounded lively, rather than a morgue. When he’d left Prophet’s Hope after Artemis’s attack, his soldiers had been struggling with hundreds of wounded verging on death.

“How are they all here?” he asked Kara quietly.

While he could teleport around, most couldn’t. The gateway at Prophet’s Hope had been deactivated and the cascade knocked out the rest in the area, preventing easy teleportation of the wounded.

“The foxes brought the critically injured here for access to healing supplies,” Kara said. “Much of their territory was cut off as well, but some of their villages weren’t. It was easier for them to use the gateway in the palace to ferry supplies.”

Nathan nodded. He knew that some of the foxes lived near Castle Forselburg, south of the Spires, which had been on the cusp of the cascade’s impact.

In the far corner lay the woman he came to see. Ciana, a duogem Champion and unicorn beastkin that had acted as Nathan’s bodyguard for years. She’d died to protect him in his old world and nearly perished fighting Artemis. Her long platinum-blonde hair splayed out beneath her instead of being neatly tied up in her typical high ponytail. A simple tunic covered her body instead of her Royal Champion uniform, and made her lithe figure and modest bust apparent.

A pair of wolfgirl knights kneeled next to her, chatting with bright faces, even as Ciana held what looked like a handbound book against her chest with one arm.

Her only arm, in fact.

A bandaged stump poked out from the left side of her tunic. She’d lost it defending Nathan against Artemis.

As Nathan crossed the hall, a hush fell over it. He regretted that his presence immediately silenced the pleasant atmosphere of the knights chatting to each other. Remembering his position, he made sure to check up on other royal knights. Given the sheer number fighting under him now, he couldn’t hope to know every one of them.

Yet he recognized more than he wished he did. Some were lieutenants who had joined as fresh recruits back when he’d first fought the Federation for Anna years ago, and had risen in rank alongside him. Their faces flushed and eyes glowed when he spoke to them by name and wished them well.

Some possessed wounds too grievous to ever fight again. Healing magic accomplished many miracles, but restoring sight or missing limbs remained beyond it. Others appeared to almost be fighting fit already and he knew that the hard part would be keeping them here.

Finally, he reached Ciana. For some reason, the book had vanished and the wolfgirl knights slipped away with smirks.

The moment he got close to Ciana, an onslaught of emotions barraged Nathan’s senses. Relief, love, and intense despair. Her face betrayed none of the latter as she smiled brightly up at him.

“You’re back! And safe,” Ciana said, leaning up in her bed.

“You don’t need to sit up,” he said, worried about the emotions pouring across their mental link.

For much of the past year, Ciana’s emotions intruded on his mind. He’d learned how to block them out but when she felt deeply emotional, he found it impossible. Supposedly, the link worked both ways.

“I’m fine, Nathan,” she chided. “The healers have done everything they can. I’d already have joined Seraph but Alice ordered me to stay here.”

The sour expression on Ciana’s face made her thoughts on that order clear.

“I gave that order, and Alice only repeated it,” he said drily. “You need to rest Ciana. All of us do.”

“You’re not resting,” she muttered with a dark expression. Her iridescent horn glowed with a deep darkness. “Are you heading off to fight off another Messenger? Or defend Trafaumh now?”

“Hopefully not.” He ruffled her hair and she leaned into his touch, pushing one of her horse ears toward his fingers. “I mean it. So long as the Empire isn’t on the cusp of a breach, we’re resting. Trafaumh will need to fend for itself for a night.”

“A night…” Ciana looked to her left side bitterly, then back at him. Her smile returned, if a little dimmer than usual. “Can I join you when you go to the control room?”

He almost said no. But that feeling of despair amped up to an almost overwhelming level.

Given the topic, Nathan knew exactly why Ciana felt that way. Losing an arm meant retirement. Especially in battles as difficult as fighting Messengers. He refused to send her to her death if she lacked an arm and couldn’t muster her full strength.

Ciana knew this was the end. He should as well, but had refused to face that fact so far.

Almost his entire life, he’d fought with Ciana’s shield in front of him.

“If the healer confirms that you are fine, then yes,” he said.

Ciana’s face lit up like the sun and she practically bounded out of bed. Fei, Sen, and Sunstorm shot to her side, but mostly in an attempt to force her back into bed.

A futile effort due to Ciana’s gems. Fei was the only member of the trio to possess a strength enhancement and it paled compared to Ciana’s power. While Ciana officially held an endurance enhancement, she borrowed Nathan’s strength and speed, and was therefore one of his strongest Champions. If she wanted to, she could send her friends flying.

Before she did so out of frustration, Nathan summoned a healer. Several, in fact, as even the mystic foxes shot over the moment he showed any interest.

Ciana hadn’t lied. A mystic fox gave her a clean bill of health, save for the missing limb.

“I’ve already given Seraph a comprehensive medical report,” the fox healer leading the infirmary explained after taking him aside. “This is the first time since Kurai we’ve needed to deploy like this, so we’re a little rusty, but I believe we’ve done the best we can.”

“I’m more than happy with the help you’re providing. I hadn’t expected this much.”

She bit her lip. “That response tells me that we’ve held back for too long. No matter. Be sure to speak to Narime soon, Lord Nathan.”

“Of course. Given her wounds—”

“Not about that. Although I’m sure she’d love to see you.” A smirk rose to the fox’s face. “Rather, there’s something of great importance that she needs to talk to you about. Something that I suspect our clan should have approached you about months ago.”

Ominous.

After Ciana dressed in her uniform—with some help from Fei—they walked to their original destination: Alice’s bedroom.

- - - - -

Commentary: Kara was this random character I introduced in a side-story, that got some minor screentime in Book 3 for Fei characterization (and to handle the growing bureaucratic stuff). Now she's a reasonably important secondary character, to the extent that I'd forgotten that Nathan never completely brought him into his confidence.

The fallout of the Artemis fight is cropping up here. Narime nearly died and Ciana lost a limb, to say nothing of the psychological damage it might do. One of the benefits of opening with action is that it gives some breathing room to meditate on the characters and what happened at the end of Book 5, which is necessary. The longer it's put off, the less impactful it will be (because people will forget or wonder why characters are caught up on something that happened hundreds of pages ago).

This does mean there's a lapse in pacing between the start and the march on Trafaumh. I'm trying to introduce minor points of conflict and keep the tension alive by making the potential danger clear. But there's no perfect solution here, in my opinion.

If Nathan doesn't take the time to deal with some of the aftermath, people will be annoyed that he's putting it off. Why isn't he talking about X issue? Why hasn't he gemmed these characters? But if he does everything, then the pacing slows to a crawl. I slowed down Book 5 a lot, probably lost a ton of readers who got bored because Nathan hadn't murdered enough people by Chapter 15, and there's still more stuff that crops up with each major event.

Part of this is the scope of the plot and number of characters. The Artemis fight affected everyone, particularly with the aftermath. Ciana lost an arm, Narime nearly died, Sen is using a strange power, Fei met her alternate self, multiple Champions are frustrated at their weakness, and there's a massive cascade ripping through the world, causing reactions from several factions. Epic fantasy is epic for a reason. Although I'm doubtful I'll ever attempt something like this again.