Last Echo preview chapter 4: The Streets of Oldfort

Hugh and the others didn’t try to disguise or conceal themselves when they arrived at Oldfort— much the opposite.

Rather than wait for the gangplank to be lowered, Hugh built a ward bridge to the pier with the Crown, and the four of them crossed above the crowds, Mackerel flying about their heads.

Hugh felt utterly ridiculous, but he kept his shoulders straight and his gaze forwards.

When they landed back on the ground, he didn’t return the Crown nodes to his tattoo— instead he set them orbiting in a halo behind his head. The mana drain was minimal enough that he could sustain their orbits indefinitely, even in the painfully thin mana of Highvale.

It wasn’t the utter aetheric aridity of Emblin, but Hugh would be happy to leave here, get back to somewhere with more normal aether. Even the alien aethers of Apoptis, Kemetrias, and Limnus hadn’t been so uncomfortable, outside of the whole aether sickness thing. 

When they set out into the crowd, Godrick took the lead, not bothering with his usual politeness. People usually got out of Godrick’s way anyhow, but this time Godrick moved at a pace where they practically had to jump out of his path.

Even with their warlock pact clouded to prevent emotional leakage between the four of them, Hugh knew Godrick felt terrible about being so rude, but it was all part of Sabae’s plan— as was Godrick carrying his gravity hammer slung openly over his shoulder.

Sabae, likewise, was openly carrying her spear and buckler— the buckler magically adhering to her back, and the spear adhering to the buckler. She was also swirling breezes around her, at the highest sustainable level she could maintain without draining her reservoirs. Which wasn’t much, but it was enough to toss her hair around and send dust flying out into the crowd every so often.

Talia was being considerably less dramatic than Hugh had anticipated— he’d been expecting her to be flashing knives, tossing around dreamfire, maybe threatening random passerby, but instead, she just walked confidently down the street.

She was, however, flaring her tattoos bright enough to cast a blue glow even in daylight. There was apparently a low-mana function built into Clan Castis tattoos specifically for lighting them up for intimidation purposes.

Part of Hugh suspected that he’d never actually learn all the different functions of Talia’s tattoos— not even just the functions that worked, that hadn’t been ruined by her lack of a flame affinity.

Mackerel, unsurprisingly, drew more attention than anyone, just by being himself.

Hugh had, at least, told Mackerel not to hurt anyone, and to avoid any serious property damage. 

And all that attention-grabbing activity?

It worked.

Hugh felt every eye on them, ranging from irritated passersby to hopeful merchants. They were hardly the only attention-grabbing mages wandering about, but the Sican tree-mage with living wood armor and the Tsarnassan aerial messenger didn’t snag nearly as much attention as they did.

The only ones not focusing on Hugh and his friends, so far as he could tell, were the pickpockets, who were using the distraction to go after other members of the crowd, using both their fingers and thief cantrips.

Hugh understood Sabae’s reasoning on a logical level— the more attention they drew to themselves, the higher they made the risks for anyone attempting to move on them. With all eyes looking their way, surreptitious attacks were just about impossible.

Of course, if someone was bold enough to attack them publicly, the extra attention wasn’t much of a defense. Staying hidden would still have been a smarter move, but they’d blown that already.

Despite understanding the plan on a logical level, Hugh still hated it.

All this public attention was an absolute nightmare for him.

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Oldfort itself was one of the most crowded, hectic cities Hugh had ever encountered, and it was far less orderly than the other Highvale cities they’d passed. The architecture seemed to climb and grow over itself, until Hugh could hardly even make out the great terraces it was built on. Stairs were more common than streets, and few walls were left empty— the residents of Oldfort seemed intent upon covering even vertical surfaces with market stalls, statuary, and the like. 

Houses jutted from the sides of inns, bridges to nowhere crossed above markets with residential districts atop them, and restaurants jutted far over cliff edges to taunt gravity. Great towers rose up from lower tiers, but rather than being topped by crenelations and siege equipment, were topped by public parks accessible only by bridge from the tier above it. Twisting mazes of aqueducts descended from the upper tiers of the city, carrying not just water but freight barges as well, moving at terrifying speeds down the steep water channels.

Oldfort was smaller, both in population and size, than Lothal or Zophor, but it felt far more alive, as though Highvale had tried to shove a half-dozen cities into a single location.

Above all the chaos and bustle loomed the Highfort itself, the greatest of Highvale’s oddly-named wall forts. They were, by and large, roughly cubical, which hardly made them walls, but the name apparently came from some old folk story. There was little grace or beauty to the fortress— it was a hulking, flat-topped behemoth of dark stone, bristling with siege engines, dragons, and soldiers. Its top loomed far above the snow-line, though mages kept it free of snow and ice at all times. 

There were no seams or joints, nor even any flaws in Highfort’s stone— it was the product of thousands of stone mages over hundreds of years. It could withstand assault from the mightiest of great powers for days or weeks— and indeed, it had. Even an earthquake mage like the gorgon queen would struggle to breach it. The whole city’s population could shelter inside if need be, though certainly not in comfort.

Talia led their group through the maze of streets, alleys, stairwells, and hallways, only pausing a few times to ask street urchins for directions. 

To Hugh’s surprise, his girlfriend led them not to some seedy tavern or mercenary recruitment office, but to a wealthy, heavily manicured neighborhood. They got quite a few puzzled or even offended looks from the well-dressed passersby, and Hugh found himself feeling even more self-conscious, but Talia didn’t even seem to notice the looks.

She led them straight to, of all places, an art gallery. Even Mackerel started behaving himself the instant they entered the gallery— for the best, because even with their ridiculous funds, Hugh doubted he could afford to pay for anything inside if Mackerel damaged it. Immense landscape paintings lined the walls, and sculptures stood in tidy rows, all gorgeous and obviously expensive, but they were the least of the gallery’s contents.

A great glass tube contained thousands of levitating gemstones, all flying about like a flock of birds or school of fish. An enchanted clockwork apparatus built entirely of dragonbone produced eerie, ever-shifting tones— not quite musical, but not like anything else Hugh had ever heard. A quartz crystal twice the size of Godrick held a perpetual illusion of a ballroom dance, each of the tiny moving dancers inside visible in perfect detail.

Hugh found his attention especially drawn to a frame of rods and wires in the shape of a bowl, inscribed with dozens of intricate wards, all suspending various pigments in the air above the bowl, moving around in an endless whirl of color.

“Welcome, Miss Talia!” a voice called, and a tall, thin gentleman strode over to greet them.

“Sterran!” Talia cried, and wrapped her arms around him.

Hugh had never seen anyone quite like Sterran. The man’s robes and hair were fussy and precise, nothing untidy or out of place about him. If it weren’t for his color choices, Sterran would have fit perfectly into the most staid and boring of wealthy establishments.

Sterran’s color choices, however, were what set him apart. 

His robes were eye-gougingly yellow, with brilliant scarlet spellforms embroidered throughout.

Even as Hugh watched, the yellow shifted to a pale green, and the scarlet to a rich purple.

“To what do I owe this pleasure?” Sterran asked Talia, after they stepped back from their embrace. “Are you interested in browsing our new works? It’s been, what, almost three years now?”

Talia gave Sterran an exaggerated grimace. “Sadly, I’m here on more boring business.”

Sterran sighed theatrically, then spun and gestured at them to follow.

Hugh and the others all fixed Talia with stares.

“What?” she asked. “Just because Clan Castis lives way up in the mountains doesn’t mean we don’t appreciate art.”

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Sterran led the group to the back of the art gallery, then up a spiraling staircase to a rooftop balcony. The view of the Stoneknife River far below was gorgeous, but Hugh couldn’t help but notice the sheer amount of privacy and defensive wards around the balcony.

Even for a high-end art gallery, this degree of magical defense was a bit unusual.

There were even temperature wards— none of the chill of winter’s end in the mountains penetrated onto the balcony, and Hugh could have easily been persuaded it was a balmy spring day.

Sterran didn’t dive right to business, instead pouring them all tea as his robes shifted through the color spectrum. Once their tea had cooled enough to drink, however, Sterran turned immediately back to business.

“So, what do you need today? Weapons, discreet mercenaries, poisons…?”

Hugh’s eyebrows raised at that, and he exchanged surprised looks with Godrick. Sabae, however, seemed totally unfazed.

Talia shook her head. “Nothing so difficult, just information.”

Sterran smiled wickedly. “Oh, child, there’s nothing I sell more difficult or valuable than information. Especially if you need it gathered in a hurry.”

Talia slowly sipped her tea, then smiled back. “Oh, I suspect you already have this information, and likely have already profited off it.”

Sterran rested his chin in one hand and leaned forward. “You’ve piqued my interest.”

“We need the location, attendees, and all other information you have about the upcoming meeting of the Coven and their allies here in Highvale,” Talia said.

Sterran tried to keep a straight face at that, but even Hugh picked up on his moment of surprise.

“One would think you already had possession of that information, given your family’s involvement,” Sterran said.

“We’ve… been away,” Talia responded. “Rather far away, in fact.”

“Do tell,” Sterran said.

“Are you offering us an information trade?” Sabae interjected. “Because I have to warn you, the information you’re asking for is far more valuable than the information you’re offering.”

Sterran gave the scarred girl an appraising look. “I don’t believe we’ve been introduced.”

“Sabae Kaen Das,” she said.

Sterran didn’t look even remotely surprised at that, and Hugh was certain he’d already known her identity— all of their identities, in fact. He just stared silently at her while drumming his fingers on his teacup. 

“As curious as I am, I have some rather expensive habits that need paying for,” Sterran finally said. 

He turned to Talia. “You have room— just barely— on your family’s line of credit for this information.”

“Barely?” Talia asked.

Sterran smiled. “Several of your brothers passed through here not even a week ago, and made quite a few purchases.”

“Art, or your other offerings?” Talia asked.

“Art,” Sterran said. “Mostly.”

Talia sighed, then nodded.

“Very well,” Sterran said. “The Coven and its allies are meeting in the demesne of Pitas the Younger.”

Hugh called Mackerel over to him, and began to jot down information in his pages as Sterran spoke.

As he did so, Hugh hoped that Sterran’s relationship with Clan Castis would be enough to keep him from selling information about them.