”Well, this is a proper mess...” Noir muttered and stared out of the window after hearing what the inquisitor had managed to gather in the past day. “The picture is clear with your explanation, but does it help? I do believe we can undo the changes to fate, and by that, I mean convince Lady Saga to do so – but there are… caveats.”
“So I’m not getting out of confronting Tekhelet, I take it?” Iris sighed, already resigned to her fate.
“I’m afraid not.” The crow shook his head and glanced at the necromancer’s reflection in the window. “To break or mend fate in this manner is extremely dangerous. To a person unaffiliated with us, it is a certain and painful death. The scribes, like us, are able to meddle through our own unrecorded actions, but we do not decide, we record. The only one able and authorized to mend and tweak what has already happened or steer the moment directly is Lady Saga. But luckily, objectively speaking, this is but a small tweak in things as far as all of fate is concerned, so setting things straight would be hardly an effort to her.”
Iris had already caught up on the less than delighted tone of the scribe. “But?”
“The mortal she has paired herself with can not withstand that much, even with Lady Saga’s aid.” Noir explained clearly unhappy about what he had to share. “The option to simply repair this now is there, but at the cost of a painful death to the owlfolk. It would also still leave this Tekhelet character outside your walls, as a potential problem without an answer.”
“We’re not doing that.” The necromancer immediately declined the idea of sacrificing Holly.
“Then your desire should be to bring the moment as close to what it should be, to minimize the alterations required.” Nodded Noir, considerably more enthusiastic about the plan B. “As you have deduced, you are here as a substitute, so what would be the duty of the original, is now left to you. Go where she would have, do what she would have. In more detail, this would mean face Tekhelet, with the crown on your head.”
Iris tried her best to follow the logic. “And that will allow this Lady Saga to work her magic and return things to the way they are supposed to be? Without hurting Holly?”
“We certainly hope so.” Noir smirked but with a hint of uncertainty in his voice. “Do what you were brought here to do, and the correct necromancer will be ushered forth from the forgotten legends she now belongs in. I can not claim to know how long this would take, so expect some need to defend yourself once the confrontation has begun. Vinca and I will do out utmost to assist Lady Saga and to hasten the process, but the fate is a fickle thing. Even if the tip of your quill steers it, blocks still need to fall into place, actors must play out their roles and only then can the curtain be lowered. This should also not be considered a method free of any cost. Mending fate will push all those who are trying to escape theirs into their trajectories…”
“I trust that I can handle myself for a time, no matter what this Tekhelet turns out to be.” The inquisitor stated, slightly feigning confidence but feeling a small surge of heat in her that made her words almost feel true. “Would you mind if I talked with Periw- with Vinca for a moment? Then there is also the matter of the crown – I don’t have one.”
Vinca placed his hand on the necromancer’s shoulder. “You should rest up; we can talk once this this play is over.” He said reassuringly, either having some confidence in the capabilities he knew Iris to have or faking it extremely well. “About the crown, don’t worry about it too much. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that there are no coincidences in this world of ours. You may well end up with one in your lap by the morning.”
“Expertly said!” Noir agreed. “We should leave you here to rest, as it is you who has the lead role come tomorrow.”
As if on cue, Iris could feel the fatigue from the constant tension of the day suddenly be unleashed on her. The weightless wings on her back suddenly felt like they were made out of metal, as did her eyelids. Perhaps it was the calming knowledge that there was now some actual reasoning and thought behind her plan and she wasn’t simply flying to her death blindly, or the relief of finding at least one of the missing inquisitors unharmed – even if Vinca showed no interest in coming back to Mournvalley. However, weirdly enough, though she had spent the entire day running around, trying to unravel the sudden mystery she had been forced into. She didn’t even remember when was the last time she ate, though for some reason she didn’t even feel hungry, or thirsty for that matter.
“Yeah… I guess I could use a nap now that you mention it.” She agreed and sat down on the bed. “Only a couple of hours though. I want to be out there as soon as the sun rises, ideally before.”
With a knowing smirk on his face Noir scribbled something into his notes and nodded before exiting the room with his companion and returned to the kitchen, where they had their own mission trying to convince Holly to hand over her book for inspection and repair.
Thinking about everything that had happened during the day, she couldn’t help but to wonder if the missing necromancer’s days were always as packed with such a random assortment of activities, or if it was just consequences of her being shoehorned into a place she didn’t really belong in. Suddenly she remembered that she wanted to talk to Emilia about the weirdly involved stance Sylvia had taken in the plan against Tekhelet and forcibly got back up from the bed. She hadn’t seen the priestess at all during the day, and with her being untouchable by necromancy now, it was impossible to tell where she was. The inquisitor decided to check on the room she and the innkeeper shared, just on the off chance the priestess happened to be there. She quickly made her way out of the room and past the few rooms between hers and the first one by the stairs. Pressing her ear on the door, she couldn’t hear anything inside.
“Miss Emilia, would it be possible to talk for a bit?” The necromancer asked and knocked on the door.
The rustling of metal armor on the other side of the door confirmed that the priestess was indeed inside, but after a few steps towards the door, she had stopped entirely, followed by silence.
“Miss Emilia?” Iris asked again.
“I’m sorry… Can this wait?” Emilia finally responded from the other side of the door. The exhausted tone she spoke in made it clear that now was probably not the best time. “I would like to think for a while longer…”
“Oh! I understand! Don’t worry about it.” Iris said as reassuringly as she could, not about to bother the person who had already taught her so much about Sylvia and gods in general. “It was nothing important. Is everything alright in there?”
“Yes, I just need some time. Thanks…” The priestess sighed and returned to wherever she had been before. “I’ll come find you.”
With that, Iris returned to her room and finally allowed herself to succumb to the exhaustion. She laid down on the bed, tussled and rolled around for a few minutes before moving back to the spot on the floor she had gotten so used to. Taking out the last candle in the drawer by the bed and sticking it to the mound of wax, she lit it and almost immediately found a peaceful position to rest in – and for the first time in a few days, fell asleep comfortably wrapped in her wings.
“Iris?” A familiar, commanding voice snapped her awake again.
The necromancer looked around, only to see the stone walls of the throne hall of Mournvalley. Her disorientation immediately suggested that something wasn’t normal about the situation. It didn’t quite make her realize it as the dream it was, but she was in no danger of mixing it as reality, especially because she already knew what would happen as it unfolded in front of her.
In an otherwise empty chamber, she stood in front of the throne, before the new Empress of Mournvalley, Coquelicot. The empress was visibly uncomfortable lounging on her throne and spun her crown on one of the fingers of her many arms instead of wearing it on her head. Her new position had hardly added to her already daunting presence, and if anything, the fancy robes that had replaced the red inquisitorial ones took away something from her menacing look. One by one, on that day she had asked the members of her new inquisition to step forwards to officially grant them their new position and whisper some small bit of advice or reassurance only to them – until only Iris remained. The heavy door behind Iris slammed shut as the second to last inquisitor left to carry out their duties and left her alone with the empress. Something each and every inquisitor besides Maya were still somewhat afraid of.
“To be entirely honest with you, Iris, I had no idea what to do with you until this morning. Your brand of necromancy is frankly confusing, you are a weird person, and it’s almost like you lack something to be an inquisitor to begin with. The others had fairly clear motivations and uses to their eccentricities, but you… you’re mostly just weird.” Coquelicot said once she saw that Iris was paying attention again. “You don’t have the raw strength of Teal, Maya or Sapphire – not directly anyway. So enforcer roles are out. You don’t have the keen intelligence or wiles of Cobalt, Cyan or Celeste. Which leaves you mostly out of politics as well. Duke works better on his own, though you are a bit sneaky and get around with those wings of yours, so espionage might suit you, but Duke was the obvious choice for it. This all left me very puzzled, so much so that I even considered just releasing you of your charge.”
Though she already knew each word by heart, it still made her nervous to be analyzed by Coquelicot to such a degree.
“What would you suggest I should do with you?” The empress asked and stopped spinning the crown, contemplated putting it on her head but instead hung it from a decorative knob on the throne.
“I’ll do what you need me to, doesn’t matter how menial.” Iris responded.
“And that’s the thing I eventually realized!” Coquelicot exclaimed and clapped all three pairs of arms once. “You are a blank slate. The others all possess motivations that would in right circumstances turn them against me, perhaps even Mournvalley itself. Motivations they might well put before their duties and abandon their posts when the going gets rough – and believe me, going is about to get very rough. Not little Iris though. That is what sets you apart from the others. We could be waist deep in shit and you’d be by me, wondering if you were doing something wrong instead of thinking being an inquisitor might not be for you.”
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Iris wasn’t sure if she was being complimented or called simple. “Thank you… I guess?”
Coquelicot stood up and started to pace around Iris as she spoke. “But that doesn’t really narrow down what to do with you. Then it suddenly struck me as I was sitting in this dumb chair, in these dumb rags and with this dumb circlet on my head – instead of being out there fixing the mess this country is in or even just tearing apart the enemies we have. This castle is my cage and etiquette my chains. So, to project my will on this world in a way that matters, I will do as the gods have: you are to be my saint.”
Iris frowned. “Sa…saint? How would that even work?”
The empress stopped behind Iris and put one pair of her hands on Iris’ shoulders. “We’ll find out, won’t we? There are dozens of inane deities that have done less to this world than I, hundreds with less followers than I, thousands that are less feared. What manner of monopoly would those worthless fools have on saints? Kings and queens have always had their champions and chosen ones, I’ll have a saint, and there’s nothing they can do about it.”
“Pretty sure gods can do something about it, with all due respect of course.” Iris fairly pointed out.
“They’re welcome to try.” Coquelicot laughed out loud. “The last time this place had a living emperor, it didn’t go all too well for them – and I would aim to break that old record.”
Iris chuckled awkwardly to not appear entirely without confidence. “What is it that I’m supposed to do to begin with?”
“You are to be the extension of my will upon this world, but… better than I am.” The empress said, pausing to think her words for a while. “No matter what, I am still a product of the old Mournvalley, of the red inquisition. I have lofty principles I myself can’t follow, ideals that so often are moved aside when force works as an answer. Try as I might, I can’t change this, not for the better anyway. So, it falls upon your perky young shoulders to uphold them where I fail. Your only purpose is to do what is best for all necromancers, this includes me, you, your peers, the citizens of Mournvalley, those who are yet to be born… even the little shit in Valor.
“In no small part thanks to me, our kind are the villains of stories told by parents to scare their children… and I don’t want that to be my legacy as a ruler. For each valiant knight saving the princess, each wise sorcerer driving back the horrors besieging a village, for each kind healer selflessly aiding those who suffer – should there not be a necromancer standing among them? Though I might be a lost cause myself, I refuse the idea that we as a whole are born evil. So, I leave it to you. The others will be ordered to look to you for answers, and I need to you guide them towards a better future for all of us. Travel the world and learn what good we could do to it, as my saint, be the hero in the stories of those who need help.”
Iris hadn’t heard such defeat in the voice of her ever so mighty leader before, and she certainly hadn’t even considered that something so big would be trusted to her. She had woken up that day, expecting to get given some unimportant support position and had even remained a bit suspicious of the role of saint after hearing it, thinking it might actually be a subtle mockery of her uselessness, but there were no hints of lies or trickery in the way Coquelicot spoke. This clearly meant a lot to the empress, who was obviously struggling with the fact that she herself was incapable of doing what she was ordering Iris to accomplish. The monumentality of the mission left Iris wordless as the skeletal arms slowly wrapped around her.
“I understand that this is more than a lot to ask of anyone, and I know that you’re already doubting yourself, but I would not make you shoulder this if I did not think you could do it. Use the strengths of others as you see fit where yours are lacking, learn what drives them and figure out how to best use them for the goal I’ve set for you, keep them in line and keep them working together. We can’t regress back to the old ways, and I don’t trust myself with that at all. There are still battles left where my strength is needed in, but I will keep my influence over the inquisition minimal, and with Alice gone, the responsibility falls unfairly on you.” Coquelicot whispered, even when there was no one else to listen to her, nor did the thick walls and doors of the castle let anyone eavesdrop.
“I… I’m not sure I can do all that.” Iris hesitantly admitted.
“I know you’re not, but I am. If for no other reason than because I order you to, and you would not leave an order unanswered.” Coquelicot reaffirmed her inquisitor of her task. “But no saint will go to work without a gift, so mine wont either. I may not be able to dish out divine blessings, but knowing how you and your powers work, there is something that’s not too far off.”
The empress bit into her lower lip and wiped away a drop of blood with the thumb of one of her skeletal arms. Staring the red smear for a while, she reached around Iris’ head and pressed it against the inquisitor’s lips and left behind a bloody stain before letting go of her and shambling back to her throne.
“Are… are you sure about this?” Iris uttered, trying her best to resist licking her lips.
“Yes – but I would appreciate if all of this and whatever you learn was left between you and me.” Coquelicot sighed and leaned back on her seat of power.
Hesitantly, Iris allowed the metallic taste into her mouth, but didn’t have the time to prepare for its effects. Usually, what she could feel through her unique talents was subtle, but as soon as the blood touched her tongue, a wave of all-consuming rage washed over her. At first it felt entirely rampant and without a target, but as the inquisitor took back the control of her emotions, she could tell much of it was a flimsy veil over self-loathing, betrayal and failure. It was downright miraculous how little of it spilled over the usually dignified and calm exterior of the empress, though those close to her could often feel the tension she brought into the room with her. For well-trained necromancers, the way her powers manifested as a constant aura that tested the might of anyone even remotely close by served as a hint of the turmoil within her, but the extent had been a complete secret to even the inquisitors. Of the betrayal she couldn’t tell much about, but it had obviously been someone close to the empress, much closer than even Iris or her teammates. As the more intense emotions Iris could derive from the blood ran their course and began to fade, they made way for more hidden ones – sometimes even secret to the person themselves. In Coquelicot’s case, the rage faded into a soul crushing sadness and regret, barely bearable to the inquisitor and only hidden because of the intensity of the hatred before. Not used to such emotions, Iris fell on her knees and waited for them to pass by trying to keep her breathing in check and constantly reminding herself that they weren’t her own feelings.
“Is… is everything alright?” Iris asked worriedly when she was finally able to get back up.
Coquelicot responded with a calm tone that didn’t show a hint weakness or lack of determination, if anything, the opposite. “Nothing is, and worse will come.” She warned, but it felt as if it wasn’t about her own situation, but something the inquisitor should be wary of.
A sudden thunk from the floor above woke Iris up from her dream. Being an always vigilant inquisitor, she immediately got on her feet and surveyed the situation, but all she ended up finding out was that the occupant of the room above must have fallen off their bed, but continued to sleep soundly on the floor, unbothered by the impact that had startled Iris. Quickly losing the details of her dream from her memory, she gazed out through the window at the clear starry sky over the city. The full moon illuminating the snow-covered rooftops seemed oddly intense and even larger than usual, but lacking a point of comparison, Iris wasn’t able to tell if that was truly the case. The sunrise was still a while away, though the more determined business owners of the city had already started preparing for the day to come and the lights of their lanterns shone through the display windows along the streets. Going back to sleep after such a rough wake up wouldn’t have worked anyway, so Iris sighed and turned away from the window to leave the room, hopefully not for the last time ever. After a quick trip to the baths to freshen up by washing her face, she slowly made her way downstairs, stretching her back and wings on the way. Taking the lay of the land with her powers, she could tell that the tavern downstairs was empty even before she made it there, and Rosie had yet to get up for the day, but Holly, Gilbert and the two scribes were still in the kitchen.
The scribes had managed to get the book from Holly at some point during the night, and were contemplating on ways of fixing the tainted pages when Iris entered the room. Gilbert, who clearly hadn’t slept during the night was keeping an eye on the situation and calmly twirled his pipe while deep in thought, seeing the necromancer, he nodded to greet her.
“Breakfast!” Holly declared as her greeting and started stacking ingredients on a slice of bread, as it was her job on every night. The final result was a generous stack of vegetables and slices of some kind of a spiced sausage neatly arranged between two slices of soft bread. She then pushed it as well as a cup of juice on the table towards the necromancer. The whole operation took a good while, as the owlfolk seemed to be very particular about the way things were placed on the sandwich.
“Thanks.” Iris muttered, pulled up a chair to the table and accepted the offering – though she still didn’t feel at all hungry. The meticulous work put into the sandwich seemed to have paid off, as it was definitely one of the better ones she had eaten.
“Are you ready for your part, Iris?” Noir asked without looking up from the violet stain on the book.
“Still need the crown. Turns out, sleeping didn’t help with that.” The necromancer snarked.
The crow chuckled. “Did it not?” He quizzed and pointed at Holly, who reluctantly pulled out something from a bag under her loose clothes.
Carefully placing it by the ingredients, the owlfolk revealed a delicate circlet crafted out of a silvery metal and pieces of bone. Iris immediately recognized it as the piece the blacksmith and his muse had shown her several days ago. Even simply looking at it filled her with dread and sounded alarms in her mind to avoid touching at it, and she remembered the feeling from back then too, but had been largely occupied by Armaata’s presence to have remembered the crown before. Though unpleasant to be around, it was hard to deny that something with such an ominous aura was perfect for a white one.
The inquisitor covered the crown from her view with her arm. “Am I supposed to just not question why she has something like that?” She asked, expecting to get a half-assed answer about fate or some such unverifiable nonsense. “No matter what this Lady Saga of yours is, this is getting to be a bit much.”
Noir shook his head. “Lady Saga has nothing to do with this, nor does fate, as you’re no doubt suspecting. This Violet Sect acts outside of fate’s designs, and so, out of our records entirely. What you are witnessing is her father, the night itself, expending one of its most precious weapons to answer the threat he has foreseen ages ago – and fulfilling a promise.”
Iris scratched her head and recounted the names of gods taught to her by Emilia. “Ciel? You know what? Sure! Why not! I’m just going to go and fight Tekhelet now, if that’s alright with everyone?” She rolled her eyes, picked up the crown as if it was a wet sock and tucked it under her robes for safekeeping. Ultimately, the reasons behind such things hardly mattered, and more time she was allowed to thing, the less confident she would get.
“We have no further preparations we can make beforehand, so the decision is yours. Vinca and I will begin mending the tome once you leave, Lady Saga will correct the course of fate once it is safe to do so.”
“Should I come along? There has to be something I can do.” Gilbert asked, eager to get up from his seat, no doubt feeling fairly useless as the only normal person in the room.
“Keep an eye on whatever these two are up to.” Iris said and pointed at the scribes. “Make sure no harm comes to Holly.”
The old adventurer sat back down, understanding the reasoning despite being disappointed by the outcome. “You stay safe too.” He nodded.
Iris finished her hopefully not last meal, glanced at the scribe she knew as Periwinkle, who nodded back at her, thanked Holly for the sandwich once more and left the room before hesitation would start to affect her actions. All she needed to think about now was Tekhelet and how to survive however long was needed.
“What do you think of her chances? Have we doomed her poor soul?” Noir asked from his companion as soon as he heard the inn’s door close.
“On the contrary.” Vinca laughed. “Iris gives herself about a tenth of the credit she deserves. I’m more worried that this Tekhelet being won’t last long enough for us to fix things.”