Callian, son of Rufais, of House Ildanach
A loving son and faithful lord
Taken from us far too soon
I stood in front of the massive pillar that served as tombstone for the royals in the crypt under the Manor. Many of the great cities of Ilyessa, particularly in the North, were built on the remains of ancient civilizations from before the Purge, which gave them the added benefit of a network of underground areas that just needed to be cleaned out a bit to make them usable again. It was fairly common practice to use them as crypts, and Ildanach was no different.
Callian was entombed next to his mother now, the medals he had won hanging above the alcove where his stone coffin now rested.
Medal of Honor for the Battle of Lorni River
It was one of several, but it was the highest commendation he had received. We had fought together in that mess. He had been quick to take control, the fastest to absorb the information that I was telling him, where so many others had simply been shocked into inaction by the treachery. He’d taken charge, shored up the defenses, and he’d let me do what I did best.
After the battle, most, including myself, but Rufais in particular, had been more than willing to afford Callian all of the praise for the battle. He had been under no obligation to share it, particularly not with a former mercenary who had just joined the ranks and wore the mask of a heretical faith, yet he had. It was his word with Rufais after that battle that had started my reputation that would grow into something I could leverage to allow me to work as I worked best, avoiding procedure and rules.
Without him, it never would have happened, and I probably would have moved on from the city just a few months after arriving. I doubted I would have put up with the politics of the place if I hadn’t been able to operate slightly outside of them.
Callian was the only reason I had still been here. He’d been brave in battle, honest and true, and he’d been brave outside of it, remaining my friend even with Dahl here.
And I had been too late to help him.
“The assassins are all dead,” I heard someone saying.
“They were on their way to his father’s chambers,” another voice chimed in, quiet but audible, particularly in the echoing confines of the crypt. “He got in their way.”
“Stalled them long enough for the guards to come, killed two himself,” someone else said.
“Good man.”
“So young.”
“True tragedy.”
“No other heirs.”
I nearly scoffed. It hadn’t taken very long for people to turn to the political aspects of the death, not long at all. It had been less than a week since the intrusion of the murderers, less than a week since Callian had fallen. We were all here now, after the official funeral, to pay our respects.
“My lord, I understand this is a difficult time,” one of Rufais’ advisors was saying, walking alongside of him, and I quickly moved to the side and out of the way of the tombstone, clearing the way for Highlord Ildanach, “but you cannot keep the Aeron Ambassador in the dungeons. We have no evidence that he was involved with the assassination attempt–”
“It wasn’t an attempt!” Rufais snapped, loud and angry, every other voice in the room falling immediately silent. “They killed my son!”
I winced slightly in sympathy. I may have hated the man, but no one deserved to have their children die before them. Also, he was almost undoubtedly right about Aeron being to blame, evidence or no. The Ambassador had been stalling on the negotiations– it was easy to recognize in retrospect– so that he would be here to let in the assassins upon their arrival. I wondered how long they had been planning the traitorous route, if it had been in the works since the moment he had shown up on our doorstep.
Still, with no evidence, it would be Rufais who would be brought up before the Chantry for violating the House Codes if he kept the man and his retinue prisoner for much longer. Grief would only provide an excuse for so long.
Rufais stormed away from his advisor, who looked shaky and nervous, no doubt somewhat fearful for his own head if he continued to speak the truth to his angry, sorrowful, and already half-mad lord. Rufais stopped before the pillar inscribed with the name of his son, and simply looked at it.
He stood staring for so long that some of the surrounding crowd began to shift uncomfortably, those on the outer edges of the mass turning and leaving as quietly as possible. The room seemed to be held in a suspenseful stasis as Rufais looked silently at the pillar next to the box that held his son’s dead body.
Finally, he stirred and turned, without saying a word, to abruptly start walking back through the crowd.
And then he saw me.
His face turned beet red, and I recoiled a bit on instinct even before he started speaking, “You. You! You are to blame! He considered you a “friend”, had advocated for you, and what did you do? Run off and hide! Some hero you are! You were never anything more than a coward and a charlatan!” Rufais accused me.
I said nothing, honestly didn’t really care, although admittedly this was not going to help me in my own personal areas of problems right now, particularly since he was doing it in front of a crowd. It didn’t really matter though. His son was dead, and I hadn’t been there. I would have been mad at me too.
“You and your kind,” he hissed, and that I cared about a little bit more. “You killed his mother, and now you take him too!?! Is there no end to your bloodlust, the curse that you’ve placed upon me and my family? I never should have let you set foot in my city! You’re a curse, a hex, a disease upon my House! My precious Elivyra, my boy….” Rufais’ voice lost strength, cracked slightly, but then the rage returned and he walked directly up to me. “I will see to it that you pay,” he promised me, spat at my feet, and then stormed away.
From somewhere in the crowd, Hector walked up behind me. “You good?”
“He lost his son, Hector. He can yell at me all he wants if it helps,” I said quietly.
Hector seemed a bit surprised by the response, but only for a moment. “And if he does more than yell?”
It was a fair possibility, especially considering how he had reacted with the loss of his wife. Temporary madness after loss was something it seemed we could expect from the man, and considering he had now lost them both, I wouldn’t have even been surprised if it were less temporary. Expecting rational decisions that took into account the state of his military should he lose me wasn’t something I felt I could hope for at this moment. “The Guildmasters won’t let him doom the House,” I said, though I wished I were as confident in that as I sounded.
Ennis had declared three to be with me, two against, when it came to the most important industries and Guilds, but that wasn’t when Rufais was publically blaming me for the death of his heroic son in front of crowds of people.
“I hope they can stop him,” Hector said, clearly feeling the lack of conviction, and then he paused. “I mean, I’m sure you’ll be fine regardless.”
I breathed a faint laugh and patted Hector lightly on the shoulder before walking back up to the stone pillar.
“Don’t you think you should find somewhere else to be, heretic?” someone spat at me, but one person out of the crowd being swayed by the words of an angry father wasn’t too bad, nor concerning.
I tried not to let it concern me as I looked at the inscription again. “May the ravens bear you safely to your resting place,” I said softly.
With my piece said, I turned and left the crypt entirely.
It was raining outside, fittingly, and I tugged my coat around me a little tighter, though it did fairly little against the wet.
The tank was in front of the Cathedral again, Ennis’ tank, and I wondered if I should tell him my theory. I worried that he would try to take action, or even just dismiss it out of hand. I needed him to trust me and be patient, but despite his pledged support, I knew that accusing the Church of something like this as a Turyn was an appearance from which even Ennis would probably want to keep a fair distance. Maybe I could convince him to let me look into his logs without telling him why.
The investigation had been put on a sort of hold during the clean up from the attack, but now that Callian had been laid to rest it seemed like the normal order of things was picking back up, and even with the looming threat of another Skirmish starting up, this time with Aeron House, the rotting corpses in the bog next to the graveyard were still at the forefront of my mind.
“It wasn’t your fault.”
I didn’t jump, but it was a closer call than I would have liked. “What are you doing here?” I asked in surprise. I rarely saw any of my team in the Inner Ring of the City; they liked to keep their heads down.
Ehud shrugged. “I roam. I found someone who I think was a kidnapping victim.”
“We found quite a few corpses who were kidnapping victims,” I said, perhaps with a bit too much snark.
“Alive, Captain,” Ehud scolded lightly. “She’s a Surgebinder, name of Erendi. Had an interesting story.”
I looked at him sharply, the thick rain making him appear hazy and ghost like in his all black clothing, even though he was only a few feet away from me. “What kind of story? Where is she?”
“She found me,” Ehud said, and when I made an appropriately surprised sound in response, he nodded in agreement. “Apparently she has a lot of ties in the Outer City, and a lot of overlapping ones with my own. Heard I was looking into the disappearances. She didn’t say much to me, seemed nervous, but she wanted to schedule another meeting, somewhere private.”
“You think it’s a trap?”
“Not sure, but at the very least I’m going to show up.”
“If you need backup–”
“I don’t want to spook her. She’s smart.”
“Has to be if she managed to find you,” I noted.
Ehud nodded. “Yeah. Anyway, from what little I got from her, she noted they were professionals. Says her Surge was the only way she escaped.”
“She’s in the Outer Ring?” I asked to confirm. “Not affiliated with the Chantry at all?”
“Not from what I could tell.”
“Surgebinders outside of the Chantry aren’t terribly common,” I reminded Ehud, even though he knew that. “It could be a trap, if I’m right about them.”
“I thought about it, but you didn’t see her, Captain. I don’t think she was lying. There was real fear in her eyes.”
“Yet she sought you out anyway?”
“Sometimes people do the right thing,” Ehud said wryly.
“Not frequently enough for me to count on it,” I rebounded before taking a breath and letting it out in a short sigh. “You really don’t think backup is a good idea?”
“I really don’t.”
“Then I trust you,” I decided, “but you give me a time and a deadline for meeting back up with us. If you don’t make it–”
“Then I expect you’ll come riding in like my very own personal cavalry,” Ehud said wryly.
I smiled at him and then gave him a serious look. “Don’t take any stupid risks. Surgebinders are powerful.”
“Ah, now you sound like the Chantry,” Ehud said teasingly.
I made a disgusted face. “I take it back; be as careless as you want with the person who can manipulate the elements through dancing. It’s a wonderful idea.”
Ehud laughed. “They don’t really dance, you know.”
“I’ve actually never seen one in action,” I said mildly.
“Really,” Ehud said in surprise. “Never in your military days?”
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“In action,” I reminded him with a sharp smirk. “Trick is to kill them before they can dance. They’re always so squishy.”
“Flesh is like that.”
“That’s why people wear armor.”
“You have to know the slivers interfere with their abilities,” Ehud said, looking at me out of the corner of his eye.
“There is traditional armor that exists.”
“It’s clunky; interferes with movements too.”
“I thought you said they didn’t dance?”
Ehud rolled his eyes at me. “It’s not… dancing. There is movement. Mostly in the arms and hands, little bit in the feet. It’s more like an exercise or a stretch. Less speed and movement than a dance, though I guess it is dance-like.”
I hummed.
“Did you really not know that?”
“I don’t know why that’s so weird,” I said defensively. “Lots of people haven’t seen a Surge in action!”
“Yeah, but we learn about them. In traditional study courses?”
“.... ah.”
“Captain?”
“You honestly thought I went to traditional study courses?”
“I assumed,” Ehud said, surprised. “Do Turyn not do– they probably have different ones.”
“Yes.” It wasn’t really the point, since I wasn’t raised Turyn, but I somehow hadn’t realized that Ehud didn’t know that I’d been orphaned at seven. I’d just assumed it was common knowledge among the soldiers, or at least among my team, but I supposed I should have had considerably more faith in Hector. The stranger thing was that I was nearly positive that Rufais knew, and it seemed like the kind of thing he would want to spread. Unless he thought it would help my reputation?
It wasn’t terribly important regardless, and Ehud was looking at me a bit oddly, so I redirected the topic, “I’m surprised you did, honestly. Somehow didn’t figure you for a traditional study courses kind of guy.”
“You mean you figured me for a street rat?” Ehud said mildly, smirking faintly.
I shrugged and didn’t deny it. “You do seem to encourage that reputation.”
Ehud conceded the point with a slight nod. “I used to sneak in.”
“To study?”
“Yeah.” Ehud shrugged and smiled at my incredulous expression. “I liked to learn. I would– I was quite small, and there was a ventilation system that let right out into the main study room. It was warm, and I could hear the classes. I spent a lot of time there when I was a kid.”
“You didn’t get burnt?”
“Only once or twice.”
I snorted slightly and shook my head a bit fondly.
Ehud grinned. “What about you, Captain?”
Well. Walked right into that one, didn’t I? Ehud was smirking at me in a way that said I wasn’t going to be weaseling my way out of answering the question. “I did not hide in vents in order to eavesdrop on classrooms.”
Ehud picked up his leg and splashed water at me with his foot.
I yelped slightly, jumping back, and then looked at him, stunned.
“You weren’t raised by the Turyn, were you?”
I sighed. “No. I spent a little while with them when I was younger, and then went off on my own.”
“How young?”
“Young.”
“Captain–”
“It’s really not your business,” I pointed out mildly.
“Dahl going to try to have me thrown back in prison cause he’s got a grudge match with you?”
“It’s possible,” I admitted.
“Then at least tell me if you were a street kid or not. It’s been bothering me since you walked into the dungeons and offered us an out.”
I breathed a laugh. “If I tell you, that’ll be worth going back to jail and probably hanging for me?”
“I was going to hang anyway,” Ehud reminded me. “I’m grateful for the extra time.”
We looked at one another for a moment, and then I sighed in resignation. “Yes, I spent about a year and a half on the streets of some city in the West. Truth be told, I never found out the name of it, and I’m pretty sure it doesn’t exist anymore, since Akuma’s Expansion.”
“I knew it,” Ehud said with a grin and then nudged me with his shoulder. “Good job, making it here.”
I blinked at him. “You too.”
“I was going to be hanged for murder.”
“Like I didn’t have lucky breaks on my way.”
Ehud breathed a laugh. “Fair enough.”
We simply stood there for a moment before I said, “When’s your meeting with the Surgebinder?”
“Tonight.”
“We’ll all meet up at Hector’s inn, like normal, before you leave.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’ll see you later then.”
Ehud nodded, and I started walking.
My boots were sloshing in the rain that was growing heavier as time continued on, the atmosphere and sky dark with clouds blotting out the light of the suns. The road was muddy, and I tried to stay off the well traveled streets to avoid the splashing from any carts or wagons as I made my way back to the outer ring. I spent most of my day trying to rectify the fact that I didn’t know anyone out there, as I had been with my free time since the attack.
The people weren’t friendly, and they didn’t trust or like me– perhaps even less now that Callian was dead, as I had more than one person ask me if I were working with the assassins themselves– but I was slowly making progress with some of them.
When the sun started to set, I was at the inn where we often met. It was quieter, more somber, and more empty. It had been every day of the last week or so. I took my normal seat between Hector and Ehud, the last to arrive, as it seemed often was the case.
“Ehud told you all what’s going on?” I checked.
“That you’re letting him go off alone to meet a Surjeshi and we’re supposed to be fine with that?” Tola growled at me. “Yes, he mentioned!”
“And did he also mentioned that I tried to talk him out of it?”
“I honestly didn’t get the chance,” Ehud said wryly, “as they all started trying to talk me out of it too loudly and all at once. You know, I didn’t figure this group for being the type to buy into all the Chantry propaganda about rogue Surgebinders.”
“Oh, so they don’t form cults dedicated to creepy goals like resurrecting the dead Ascendants and returning their physical forms to this world to rule it as tyrants?” Tola demanded.
“Probably not all of them,” I said mildly.
Tola glared at me so hard I was fairly certain he was trying to kill me with his brain.
“She has information that will help us,” Ehud said firmly.
“She says she has information that could help us. I’m not saying she’s a cultist like Tola,” Jehu began, “but it’s hard to imagine a Surgebinder here in this city that doesn’t report back to the Chantry.”
“Like it’s hard to imagine there being a Turyn Captain here?” Ehud pointed out.
“He has a point,” I said, firmly enough to forestall most of the objections, or at least the loud ones. “We’re going to let him do this, because he thinks it’s going to help. But, first, Ehud. Where are you meeting this person?”
“Along the outer wall, behind the third factory line.”
“And how long are we giving you before we come to save you and murder everyone who gets in our way?”
Ehud shook his head, smiling slightly. “Three hours.”
I turned back to the others. “There. Is that satisfactory for everyone?”
There was a fair bit more grumbling, but no one actually raised a counter.
I turned back to Ehud. “You’re on the clock.”
Ehud chuckled, finished his water, inclined his head to the rest of us, and left.
There was a moment of silence at the table before Jair offered, “Cards?”
I shrugged and glanced at Hector, who shrugged back, before answering, “Sure. Not like we have anything better to do for the next three hours.”
Jair dealt and we started the game.
“I heard Rufais went off on you in the crypt,” Tola commented as he arranged his cards.
“That was just this morning; it’s already getting around?” I didn’t know why I was surprised. Of course it was already everywhere. Our disagreements hadn’t been especially public in the past, so this came out of the shining violet sky to everyone else.
“I doubt there’s a person in the city who hasn’t heard it yet,” Tola said with a chuckle.
“You enjoy watching me get in trouble, don’t you?” I asked, mostly rhetorically.
“Well, it’s nice to see you in the same boat as us is all,” Tola said with a bit of a colder smirk.
Tola didn’t like me very much. He’d taken my deal, and he’d honored it since the day he’d shaken my hand, but he didn’t like me personally. I was fine with that, generally, although right this moment it was a bit irritating.
“I’m calling your bluff,” I said, in reference to the game. It was a slightly bigger chance than I normally took when playing this, but I was still sure the odds were in my favor.
The fact that Tola scowled a moment later, showed his cards, and went out of the round was admittedly pretty satisfying. He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair.
“The fact that you can beat me at cards doesn’t mean you can beat the Inquisitor.”
“Tola,” Hector said mildly.
“No, he’s right,” I said. “In fact, that was something I’d been meaning to bring up– I talked to Ehud already, so there’s no need to wait for him. The High Inquisitor is almost certainly going to be coming after me. I definitely can’t count on Rufais to protect me– or any of you. Some of the Guildmasters are with me, and I’ll leverage that as well as I can, but when he comes after me, he’ll almost certainly come after the rest of you too. If any of you want to take your chances on going back on the deal we made, or even want to try your hand at running for the border, I wouldn’t blame you. Don’t tell me if you’re going to try the last one though, if you wouldn’t mind.”
“I could smack you,” Will said suddenly.
I turned and blinked at my normally fairly quiet second-in-command. “Will?”
“You think we’re just going to abandon you cause you made some more enemies?”
“This isn’t the kind of fight a sword is going to get us out of.”
“Then be more creative,” Will challenged me, smiling slightly. “Either way, if they’re going to be stupid enough to take you down, I’m going to be right next to you, spitting in their faces, when they do.”
I smiled at her gratefully. “That’s probably very stupid.”
“So was agreeing to fight for you; it’s worked out for me so far.”
I smiled more broadly and then turned to Jair.
“I might run,” Jair said, “but not from Dahl, and definitely not from Rufais. Not a chance.”
“As I recall,” Jehu began, “we agreed to follow you as our captain. It’s been a little bit since I served in the military officially, but from what I remember, that kind of service didn’t entail permission to run at the first sign of trouble. I’m not going anywhere you don’t lead. Captain.”
I nodded to Jehu and then turned to Tola, arching an eyebrow.
“What?” the gruff older man said harshly. “You think just cause I don’t like you means I’m going to go back on my word out of fear of some goat-faced pretentious moron with delusions of godhood? I’m not going anywhere, just to spite his pompous face.”
I grinned around at them all.
“Ehud said the same, I assume,” Hector said, smiling at me.
“Close enough,” I agreed. “You’re all a bunch of morons.”
“Obviously,” Will said with a grin, “we’ve stayed with you this long.”
“You had us set explosives on our own side two weeks ago,” Jehu reminded me.
“And then led a whole six people into battle against half an army,” Jair added.
“My primary weapon is a bloody skiff,” Will said wryly. “We’ve gotten used to the crazy.”
“Well. I kind of hate to do this after all the wonderful things you all just said,” I started, and then laid down my cards, “but I’m pretty sure I win.”
Laughter rolled around the table intermixed with some cursing from Jair as we all passed our cards to the next dealer.
“You didn’t ask if I was with you,” Hector noted in an undertone.
“It’s a lot less likely they’ll throw you in jail because of me,” I said mildly before turning to look at him. “You know I won’t blame you if–”
“I’m going to stop you from finishing that sentence so I don’t have to punch you,” Hector said dryly.
“Cause I’d win the ensuing fight?” I teased, grinning.
“Hey, it’s been a while since we fought. I’ve gotten better.”
“I’m sure you have.”
“See, now I’m going to have to fight you.”
“What? I said I believed you.”
“But you’re still sure you’d win.”
“Well, yeah. You’d have to get more than a little better to make up for–”
Hector smacked me upside the head, and I broke off, laughing.
“But anyway,” I picked back up, “If you want to leave and desert your oldest friend in his time of need, then I suppose I would be magnanimous enough not to hold it against you.”
Hector scoffed, though he was smiling. “Well, even though you’re being so gracious about it, I’m afraid I’ll still have to refuse.”
“You sure? This is a one time offer. If you try to desert me any time in the future, I reserve the right to be a whiny brat about it.”
“Oh, so like normal?”
I laughed again.
The next hour and a half passed similarly, with banter and games, a much needed evening of levity after the seriousness of the past few weeks.
Ehud came back early, soaked through to the bone and not looking particularly happy.
We immediately stopped the game and scooted aside to make sure he had room at the table as he made a beeline for us.
“Everything go okay?” I asked.
“She didn’t show,” Ehud said tersely. “Waited an hour. Would have waited longer, honestly, but someone saw me standing there and asked if I were waiting for someone. I knew him, at least well enough, so I described her to him. He said he’d seen her just earlier today, sometime in the afternoon. He’d seen her being arrested by the guards and none other than the High Inquisitor himself.”