“So did Arthur enter the sunken city, carried by his companions, and he and twelve of his knights and witches, that he chose for their great loyalty, came with him. And some of the Fey schemed to take him hostage. But the more honourable amongst them, and the human slaves who Arthur wished freed, warned him of the scheme, and the conspirators where killed by their slave-soldiers. And thus did Arthur arrive at the heart of the sunken city, at the fountain of youth.

Bran the Wise, The Conquest of Anwwn.

Tane Bayder, 15 September 1582 AAA. Trackford.

“Miss, there’s a few people at the door who want to see you.” The maid said nervously. Tane pulled herself up from her desk in her billet.

“Yeah, who are they?” she asked.

“Uh, a couple of women on horses? They both look like soldiers.”

Ah, what now?

She threw on her swordbelt, then marched herself downstairs, dodging past the family who owned the house. She knew names and faces, but beyond that they might as well be strangers to her despite the fact that she lived in their house.

Morgan was waiting for her at the door, alongside a Fusangese woman she vaguely recognized. Both of them were mounted and armed, though in civilian clothes.

“It’s those rituals, the ones you asked me to translate. They’ve got some interesting contents.” Morgan said, peering down at her from horseback, fully armed.

Tane made a noise halfway between a groan and a sigh. “I’ll get dressed and mounted.”

She sent Boudace scrambling to the stables at the street corner to get their horses, while she put on her buff coat and cloak and riding boots.

By the time she came out again, Boudace had their horses ready and saddled. Her riding horse was a small grey mare; her warhorse, a 16 hands high gelding, was stabled at the company quarters. If she was doing anything that needed a warhorse, she’d be visiting there anyway.

“This is Captain Feiyan, of the GCAF Frigate Shield Splinterer.” Morgan said as Tane virtually leapt into the saddle, gesturing at the airship captain. She was a classic aviator-short, wiry, tanned, hard faced, with a sheepskin coat and a cutlass strapped to her hip.

“And this is Captain Tane Bayder, 3rd Horse Guards Horse Grenadier Company. You can call her Cap.” Morgan said, gesturing at Tane.

“Only if you’re enlisted. Or Gryff.” Tane said. Morgan chuckled.

“How interesting are we talking here?” Tane asked as they began to ride for Dockside.

“Well, you guessed right, that was fair folk text all over it. Some of the other texts Mene found was Fusangese, so I brought Feiyan here in to have a look at it.”

“And what did they say?”

“They’re all about immortality, and ways to acquire it. He’s been looking at every trick in the book. Pacts with higher demons and archons to anchor the mind to the soul rather than the body. Rituals requiring the sacrifice of rational souls. Fusangese Qi cultivation techniques. Some Kemetic techniques for maintaining the unity of the five souls. And quite a bit on the Fountain of Youth. The one with the most notes is the mass death ritual.” Morgan explained.

Tane knew quite well how to use witches as another weapon in her companies arsenal: for suppressing enemy wards to allow small arms fire to be employed for maximum effect, for breaking open gaps in enemy pike blocks, for weakening incoming gunfire. The more esoteric parts of witchcraft were beyond her. She knew what she needed to know, however, and that was that the situation was very, very dangerous.

“The fountain of youth?” she asked, remembering stories her stepmother had told her when she was a child, of Arthur and his knights and the Fey they made war with, and how he was still out there, waiting for the right time to come out of the shadows and save humanity once again in its hour of need.

The fountain of youth, whatever it was, healed old wounds, halted aging, allowed the people who drank from it to recover from deadly wounds…

“When I duelled Traharn”-she was interrupted as Morgan muttered “why am I not surprised” under her breath-“I thrust him through the chest. He kept fighting and disarmed me.”

“Not that unusual.” Feiyan said.

“Yes, I know that part. What isn’t normal is that he wasn’t worried about the wound, even after the fight was over. He was joking while he pulled my rapier out of his chest and handed it back to me. I assumed he was just high off the battle rush and being a crazy fucking mercenary, but, well, if he’s obsessed with immortality and refuses to die…”

“Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, thrice is enemy action.” Feiyan said.

“Exactly. I was riding past his house yesterday, and saw him outside. Didn’t look to be in especially good shape, but he able to sit a horse, which is more than I can say for most people who’ve just been stabbed in the lungs. Oh, and his house is covered in anti-witchcraft sigils.” Morgan said. “He’s hiding something. I’m sure of it.”

“So he’s a bloody immortal witch.” Tane said.

Runs in the family, I suppose.

“Possibly. He could have a ritualist helping him, though.” Morgan said.

Come to think of it, probably more likely. Someone would have noticed if Traharn’s soul was that of a witch.

“Anyway, there’s worse. One of the rituals is, according to Morgan, some secret Fey thing that requires deaths to achieve immortality. Hundreds of them. They need the souls to lure in, bind and bribe some demon. One of the big ones. One of the smart ones.” Feiyan said.

Some primal fear of what could not be seen or retaliated against sent a shudder down Tane’s spine. Lesser demons and combat witches were bad enough, but the former could be dispelled and the latter killed. A greater demon, one of those that lurked in the infinite void of the Aether outside that which lined up with the surface of the earth, was a different matter.

“The patriot’s brigade has access to stolen counterair rockets.” Tane said, remembering a report she’d read of the highhome raid. “They can bring down airships. That would cause the hundreds of deaths needed…”

“When I was out at West Point, I ran into a trapper, Hans Draiger or something, who’d found the dead wyverns. He said he’d gotten an arrow from their body that wasn’t a militia or army arrow. Looked foreign. Now Traharn, he commanded Arluks, and a few of them are still horse archers, yes?” Feiyan said.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Yeah, I think the Arluks still use horse archers. Gryff told me about running into them in a skirmish in Valador once. I’ve never seen his men carrying bows, but I’ve only seen one or two of them and never fully armed.” Tane said.

It felt like a puzzle fitting together and falling into a pit of utter madness, at the same time.

They arrived at the winesink. Snowmelt meant that the buildings walls were positively dank, and there were still puddles of half melted slush lying about.

Sace walked up to her as quickly as she could without breaking into a jog. “What on earth is going on?”

“Absolutely nothing good.” Tane said. “Boudace?”

“Yes?”

“Go fetch Mene. Tell her it’s important and involves Traharn. Get your weapons before you go into the bog, though.”

She trotted her horse off.

“Morgan, call an officers meeting. Feiyan, I know you outrank me, but could you go warn Veulnor?”

She nodded and rode off.

How the fucking hell did this go from sharpshooters and witches to bloody immortal mercenary sorcerors lording it over a conspiracy?

“General’s here.” Sace said.

Veulnor stomped into the room, clearly annoyed, his aides and escorts marching after him, armour rattling. “What is it?”

Tane sighed. Explaining that an off-the-books investigation and a duel had revealed that a certain mercenary turned gentlemen was definitely a dangerous sorcerer and possibly immortal was going to be an interesting experience.

“Alright, remember Traharn Hast? Tall, moustache, former Arluk?”

“Yes?” Veulnor said.

“I had his house burgled in the course of trying to roll up Rhys’s cell. He had a safebox full of documents, including written rituals. Now, all of them have to do with immortality, and some of them involve mass sacrifice as fuel for a ritual.”

“So a gentleman has gotten himself mixed up in dangerous sorcery?” he asked.

“Worse. Traharn is connected to the Patriot’s Brigade. Controlling them, or at least Heveria via blackmail. And there’s evidence he was connected to the Highhome raids. Had his men involved in them, actually. I have the blackmail material now, I’ve turned Heveria and forced him to confess that Traharn was involved in weapons smuggling into Trackford.”

Veulnor rubbed his head. “Do you have proof of this?”

“Morgan, did you bring the papers?”

“Yes.”

“Well then, see for yourself. Some of them are in the Fair Folk’s language.” Tane said, as Morgan unrolled the most incriminating ritual onto the table and Feiyan began to read out the requirements for the worst of the rituals.

“A hundred dead in a moment” and “a death drawn out for thirteen hours” ranked amongst the sacrifices required.

Veulnor went pale. “This is very, very serious. I’ll have to send word to the Lord-Protector General.”

“No time for that.” Tane said. “He’s planning something. There’s letters from him I found in Brenna’s house that told her to stack the kindling, but not to start the fire. I reckon “starting the fire” means whatever bloodbath he’s planning to get those hundred deaths.”

“He was also probably involved in the wyvern massacre; there were foreign arrows recovered from the massacre, and he might have horse archers in his service. He probably has access to those counterair rockets and can bring down airships.” Feiyan added.

“There’s more. I used material recovered to blackmail Avon Heveria into talking. He says Traharn forced him to help smuggle weapons into Trackford.”

“Traharn needs to die or be arrested, and soon.” Morgan said.

“Exactly. Get a search warrant, raid his house, arrest him if he interferes. We could do it tonight, though I’d prefer to get the place scouted out.” Tane said.

Veulnor rubbed his balding head. “Why do you keep pushing your luck?”

“It’s too dangerous to leave him out there. Whatever he’s planning, he could have already done it, or be going to do it soon.”

“Oh, I know. It’s either leave him on the loose or risk the Carfani rioting when we they reckon we did a frame-up on him.”

“One option leads to an airship shootdown. The other leads to some riots. I know what I’d rather deal with.” Tane said.

Airship shootdown; at least I’m not trying to defeat the enemy without killing anyone.

“Mene’s here.” Boudace called from the doorway.

The witch stumbled into the room, her grey eyes bleary and her black hair tangled like she’d rolled out of bed. Probably because she had.

“Traharn’s… immortal?” she asked as soon as she entered, almost resisting the urge to laugh at the absurdity of it.

Tane guessed Boudace had given Mene a rather excitable account of events.

“Possibly. He certainly wants to be.” Tane said.

Veulnor twisted in his chair, sizing Mene up.

“Who is she?”

“Mene Callow. Thieftaker I’ve been working with. Yes, I know, can’t trust the locals, etcetera etcera, but she’s from Trarabac, been working with me from the start, and acquired those documents in the first place.”

She offered Mene a chair.

“What are we going to do with him?” Mene asked, glancing at Veulnor.

The general paused in thought.

“Are you sure we can trust her?”

“As much as I can trust anyone else here outside my company.” Tane said, remembering the blackmail material. It could be used, by the creative, to embarass Veulnor, instead of setting him on Avon.

Veulnor sighed. “I suppose we have to take risks sometimes. Serve a search warrant on him. I’m technically governor, I can get one written up.”

“And if the Carfani raise a fuss, reveal that he was blackmailing their beloved Patriot’s Brigade and up to his gills in illegal witchcraft.” Tane added.

“Christ-Horus. There’s nothing I can do?” Mene asked.

“Try and talk him down, when we move on him. If he puts up a fight, we’re going to have to kill him. He’s probably planning to commit mass murder; it’s too dangerous to do anything else.” Tane said. She was already thinking through ways to do it. Shoot him in the head or smash his leg bones, most likely.

“Then do it.” Mene said. “If he’s a monster, not just an arrogant thug, then do it. I’ve given him enough chances.” Her voice was suddenly hard, and her face barely betrayed any feeling.

“Your opinion?” Tane asked, turning to Veulnor.

“Try and take him alive, but if he resists violently, kill him.”

She could work with that.