> I note that at this point in my address, many of this body’s members have suffered a deficit in their attention. I can hear conversation, see wandering eyes as I look out over the floor of this dignified house.
>
> I would ask you gentlemen, and you know who you are - do you not recognize the import of what is happening to this country? Does its significance fail to register with you on some level? It is perhaps my failure as a speaker that I have not conveyed it properly, but I will attempt to do so.
>
> Ardalt desires power. This is not an evil in and of itself, no, for all nations require some modicum of power to survive. But what troubles me, and what has become increasingly apparent as these long years unfold, is that Ardalt desires power as its own end. Not to protect its people or to safeguard its well-being, but to accrue like a miser hoarding coin.
>
> Power cannot be an end unto itself, gentlemen. We have sacrificed what we should not in our pursuit of strength and security. I urge caution, here at the precipice; there are things we must not do if we are to remain men. Lines we must not cross. I fear an Ardalt of ravening beasts, having burned our trust and brotherhood to fuel the engine of our progress.
- Stanza’s Complaint to the Assembly (excerpt), 671.
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Michael moved to stand over where Zabala had the struggling guard pinned to the ground, the other guards milling nearby in consternation. He had worried for a moment that they would intervene to help their comrade, but the man on the ground was in obvious distress; his eyes were wide with mindless panic, rolling and twitching while his breath came in incoherent grunts and gasps. He could do nothing against the iron grip of a fortimens, though. It was perhaps not as extreme as Michael’s newfound strength, but still far beyond what an unsouled man could contest.
As he drew close the afflicted soldier’s eyes locked onto him. The image of a boar lying helpless on the forest floor flickered through Michael’s mind, helpless and terrified. Quickly, Jeorg’s voice urged.
He laid his fingers gently across the man’s brow. The soldier stiffened as Stanza rushed forward into his body, grasping his mind, laying bare the raw and bloody wounds that had been papered over with a thin facade of normalcy. Michael frowned as he saw the shape of it form before him. This was not the devastation wrought by Spark or the brutal suppression of Ardan obruors, but a near-surgical excision. The man was mostly whole. Absent their prodding he would likely have never noticed the loss.
Before him lay a pleasant meadow, save for a hole gouged from its center big enough to swallow a cart - or, Michael supposed, a Mendiko truck. He bent to lay his fingers upon the bare soil of its rim, closing his eyes. Images flashed before his vision; he saw a child playing in a small patch of grass behind a house, walking to a crowded school with a group of laughing students, growing tall and strong as the child became a young man.
The soldier was from a small farming community west of Goitxea, where fields squeezed between the rocky shores of the strait and the towering mountains behind. He had loved it there, but yearned for novelty; when a recruiter stopped by to extol the excitement of military life, he had left with barely a second thought for the rolling fields of his home. Michael saw trembling fingers sign the soldier’s name to a roster - Patxi, named for his father.
The excitement quickly yielded to endless training and drills, of course, but those came with their own sort of joy. Patxi grew strong, relishing the camaraderie and competition with his squadmates. Then came news from Goitxea: the Star of Mendian had descended to address the Batzar for the first time in his memory. The Gardener and the Whisperer had come north from the continent, and Mendian would venture south in return - to Daressa, and to war.
There was fear, of course, but Patxi quickly found that the continent was more of the same from home. He was with the military police, not tasked to the front lines, and his days were occupied with endless patrols or the tedious business of logging supply shipments. One truck rolled up, shining terribly-bright in his memory, a man jumping from the front with a smooth greeting in Mendiko. Patxi sighed and got up; he was the guard on duty. He returned the greeting, walking towards the man with clipboard in hand. The stranger’s eyes were oddly bright-
A hitch in the smooth flow of memory nearly jolted Michael apart from Patxi’s mind. He was touching the wound, now, and Patxi’s agitation was mounting with every passing moment. Michael called upon Stanza, bolstering the paths that he had just traced forward as they extended into the missing pieces of his psyche. There was pain, and fear; a storm buffeted the meadow, wind and thunder crashing around him.
The strength of the reaction surprised Michael. Holding Stanza firmly around the wound, he sent Spark questing outward to peer at the foundations of the storm. There was a structure there that struck him as odd, a pattern to the violence. He strengthened Stanza’s grip on the injury and watched the storm intensify in turn.
His curiosity turned to indignation, and no small amount of disgust. Not content to merely tamper with the man’s mind, the faceless Shine had buried self-destructive violence there as well; Patxi’s aversion to touch and his spasmodic attempt at suicide both stemmed from this sickening graft lurking just below the surface of his thoughts. The grass of the meadow hid a deadly rot just beneath, a trap for anyone seeking to undo the damage and learn the truth of the Shine’s meddling. Even now, it chewed away at the struggling remnants of Patxi’s mind. The Shine had anticipated everything.
Everything but Michael. He marshaled Stanza and Spark in a close duet, channeling his anger until all around him seemed gilt-edged and clear. “Winding, wending, neverending,” he said, his voice resonating across the rotting meadow. “Broken paths desire mending.”
The air shivered, the broken pieces of Patxi’s mind drawing close together; Michael turned his eyes on the tumorous violence that had been hidden within. “Soul devouring, overpowering, rot gives way to cleansing, scouring.”
Spark flared bright, bereft of Michael’s usual doubt; if there was a use for this soul, then here it was in shining clarity. The unnatural rage and fear fell away under his focus, leaving only the broken, bleeding man beneath. Michael wrapped him in Stanza’s warmth. The paths of his life extended tremulously forward across the broken ground.
“Broken mind so sorely used, feel the peace that is your due.” Michael extended his hand, spreading his fingers wide. “Rise once more, reclaim yourself and stand as one reborn, renewed.”
He felt the changes take hold, taking a breath of the clean meadow air before letting his eyes slide open. Patxi sagged in Zabala’s arms, unconscious and breathing softly. His face was covered in sweat, scratched and dirty - but peaceful underneath.
Michael stood. “You can let him down now, he’s not in any danger.”
“Is that meant to be reassuring?” Zabala grunted, not releasing his grip. “Respectfully, jauna - what the fuck is going on?”
“He was the one that booked the convoy in,” Michael said, nodding towards the unconscious guard. “They had a Shine with them, who made sure he didn’t record their entry.” His brows knit together. “Then gouged it from his memory, and left violence there in case anyone went looking for traces of it.”
Emil’s eyebrows went up. “Sophisticated,” he said. “That’s beyond anything I’ve seen before.”
“That’s at least two souls working in concert,” Sobriquet said. “A dediscator to take away the memory and hide their tracks from me, and the Shine to do the rest.” She gave Michael a piercing look. “Ardans?”
He shook his head. “Mendiko.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Mendiko,” she repeated. Silently, her veil wrapped around them. “And Lekubarri owns the truck.”
“I know that name,” Michael frowned, his memory turning back to the problem now that the moment had become quieter. “From the Batzar.” He remembered a tall, thin man with a neat beard, one who had-
“Ghar’s blood,” he muttered, the implications of what he had seen settling leaden and suffocating around him. His mouth was suddenly dry; he licked his lips before continuing. “Now I remember. He spoke in Leire’s favor after her speech.”
“It’s not conclusive by itself,” Sobriquet cautioned him.
Michael shook his head; he might have felt anger, but instead inside him he had only a dull, empty fatigue. “I grew up amid politicians, I know how these things work. Do you think that Leire prepared her speech, knowing that she would be opposed, and simply hoped that someone else would speak in her defense? Does that sound like her?” He raised his eyes, looking at Sobriquet. “Or would she pick a key ally and let them know in advance? Someone reliable. Someone she could count on to get things done.”
Zabala’s face went pale; Sobriquet turned to look back towards the airship.
“I knew she was too fast to volunteer her denial,” she muttered. “But, still - this is dangerous, Michael.”
“We’re all dangerous here,” Michael said. There was a ripple of anxiety from those around him; he looked up to see Sobriquet and Zabala giving him odd looks.
“What?” he asked. “Are we going to pretend we don’t know? That those five men guarding Galen didn’t die?” He gestured irritably at Patxi. “Are we going to ignore him?”
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Sobriquet raised her hand in caution. “We don’t know anything yet,” she said. “And even if we found our proof, what then? Can the Star of Mendian be punished?”
She paused, letting the question hang in the air. “This war we’re in moves by her word alone. Our place here exists largely because she demanded it.” She nodded her head towards Zabala. “Look at him, and tell me the Mendiko would do anything to chasten her.”
Michael turned to face Zabala; the fortimens was staring wide-eyed, pulsing a fear beyond anything Michael had ever felt from the man. He lowered Patxi gently to the ground, then stood.
“How about it?” Michael asked. “If I’m right, she killed her own soldiers. Lied to our faces about it, too. You know she’s capable of it.”
Zabala shook his head, his lips pressed into a thin line. “I can’t have this conversation,” he muttered. “She’s the Star of Mendian.”
A cool emptiness blossomed in Michael’s chest. “And that’s enough?” he asked.
Zabala brought his head up sharply, his eyes narrowing. “We take oaths,” he spat. “Three oaths. To the country, its people and the Star of Mendian. Every soldier here spoke those words. I’d like to think most of them meant it.”
“And this doesn’t bother you?” Michael asked, walking over to kneel besides Patxi.
“Of course it fucking does!” Zabala snarled. “I don’t want to see him lying there, or think about the dead men at the jail. I trained with Etxarte for years, and he’s dead now too. Even more I never met died taking this city, and more still will die taking every shitty fucking corner of this country.”
He glared at Michael, then Sobriquet. “But the Star of Mendian wants Daressa free, so here we are. That’s the job. Mendian lives in peace because sometimes it fucking doesn’t - and we all knew signing up that we could be the ones called on, if the need arose.”
“It seems to me that dying in battle carries a different feel than being murdered at the Star of Mendian’s command,” Michael said. “If she is your commander, she should have your trust. Do you really think it’s the same, dying like this instead of facing an honest enemy?”
Zabala shook his head, some of his ire fading. “It’s not,” he admitted, gesturing to Sobriquet. “But she’s right. You’re assuming a lot, and even if you find your proof and it is the Star’s orders that set this in motion - then those men died by one Star’s command in the name of protecting the next, even if they didn’t know it. It’s unpleasant, it feels wrong, but it’s little different from Etxarte in the end.”
A small, sad smile crept onto his face. “Or me. Only difference is that I lived, but we both know it could have been me.”
Michael felt numb, Zabala’s voice sliding over his ears in muted tones that seemed only half like words. Sobriquet’s hand settled on his shoulder and squeezed gently.
“I’m sorry, Michael,” she said. “There’s no answer you’ll find that will hold Leire to account, and even if you did-” She looked away, then towards Zabala. “If you break her, you break Mendian. Daressa can’t survive without their help.”
He jerked away from her touch, steeling himself against the spike of pain the withdrawal provoked. “So it’s fine, then,” he said icily. “Leire gets to do what she wants, as long as she frees Daressa in the bargain?” He turned to face her; the expression she wore for once matched her emotions, anguish clear in her eyes.
But beneath the pain, steel endured. “I’m not saying what she did was right,” Sobriquet said quietly. “Only that there is no way to punish her for what she did without also condemning all of my people to death or erasure under Saf’s rule.”
Michael stood quietly as time slid by around him, stewing in a morass of his own thoughts. Eventually, he looked up; Sobriquet was still looking at him with concern writ plainly upon her face, pain and fear sounding in strident chorus.
But - not the usual fear that emanated from all who knew the truth of his soul. This was fresher, clearer, tinged with worry and guilt and a slew of smaller, fractured feelings that swarmed close around it.
He listened to what they were saying. Spark did not give him any inherent ability to understand the emotions he felt from others, and they often grated in strange, foreign ways upon his mind. It took time and familiarity to know them for what they were.
Michael knew no heart better than hers. Her fear resonated with him - the fear of having to choose, to walk down one path and leave all the rest behind. There were many paths forward from here; for a brief, dizzying instant he saw gilt-edged images of his own form walking away from here, alone.
There was temptation down that path. Sera’s refusal to take his side unreservedly was like a knife in his chest, burning hot with each heartbeat. It kindled anger in him, resentment - but alongside that he felt her pain. There was a twinned knife that she bore, for this rift between them. He could insist, and deepen it, taking the solitary path, or-
He let his breath out slowly, the tension bleeding out of his shoulders. “Okay,” he said. “You’re probably right.”
She stepped forward, hugging him tightly; Michael let his arms settle around her in return.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, her voice muffled by the embrace. “It’s not right, but I don’t see another way. I wish I had a better answer.”
He pulled back, managing a smile. “Maybe we don’t need an answer,” he said. “But I have a question we could try instead.”
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They sat in the airship’s observation area in silence. It was only Michael and Sobriquet, quietly watching the Mendiko base disassemble itself around them. The army was a massive, complex construct of men and machinery, but it moved with a singular will.
“Not long now before we’re on the move again,” Michael observed. “To Imes.”
Sobriquet nodded. “Imes,” she repeated quietly. “It seems unreal. Just a month ago I thought this day would be years in the making.”
Michael squeezed her hand, but said nothing in reply. The door behind them swung open; they heard quick footsteps.
“This is not a good time,” Antolin said. “We’re scouting along our advance route; my soul is crucial for guiding their movements. I can’t stay for long.”
“That’s fine,” Michael said, rising to face the grand marshal. “We wanted to let you know the results of our inquiry into Galen’s abduction and death.”
Antolin raised an eyebrow. “Oh?” he asked. “Quick work. What did you find?”
“That they infiltrated the base through the north gate by posing as a supply convoy,” he said. “They disguised their tracks by manipulating the gate guard with their souls - a dediscator to wipe the man’s memory, and a Shine to drive him towards suicide should anyone come looking too closely.”
The expression on Antolin’s face grew steadily darker as Michael spoke, and by the end he looked ready to spit upon the decking. “Barbarity,” he said. “Were you able to learn anything about the perpetrators before he killed himself?”
“Oh, Michael stopped him,” Sobriquet said, rising from her own seat. “And healed him. That’s how he was able to find out that the men who attacked the base weren’t Ardan or Safid.” She paused, watching the anger on Antolin’s face shift to consternation.
“They were Mendiko,” Michael said. “Dispatched here from Estu shortly after Galen’s capture, aboard one of Lekubarri’s trucks.”
Silence returned to the room. Antolin’s face had gone expressionless after Michael’s first sentence, but beneath his quiet mien Michael felt the storm raging - anger, sorrow, loss. He remained silent and let it play out, even as the noise of another door opening heralded Leire’s entry into her enclosure.
Her eyes found the three of them, narrowing as she sat in her chair. “You had something for me?” she asked.
“A question,” Sobriquet asked. “Have you communicated, directly or indirectly, with batzarkidea Lekubarri since the battle for Leik?”
Antolin slowly turned to face her. He said nothing, but Leire’s eyes lingered on his face for long, quiet moments. Eventually, she looked back to Sobriquet.
“You hold a terrifying amount of power for someone so young,” she said. “Both of you. It may be just as well that my time is ending.” She leaned back in her chair, then gave a small nod. “I arranged for Galen’s death, via intermediaries.”
Michael blinked, taken aback despite the flare of anger her words provoked. Words warred within him unsaid; when he finally spoke his voice was low and rasping.
“Why?” he asked.
“You know why,” she said. “We all saw your death pass rather too close for comfort during the battle. Considering the stakes, I decided that it would be best to obtain a measure of surety.” She folded her hands in her lap. “You said yourself that you had determined to kill the man, in the moment. It was-”
“I had to watch him die,” Michael said. “I had to excise what was left of Galen from my mind and cast him into the void.” He took a step closer to Leire. “Do you have any idea what that felt like?”
Leire pursed her lips. “Not pleasant, I’m sure,” she said. “I told you that you would have to grow accustomed to that; his was hardly the only soul you will receive through affinity born of hatred.” She nodded towards the window, and the soldiers packing their gear. “I daresay it may be the norm before this campaign is through.”
“And you think this justifies everything?” Michael demanded. “Necessity above all?”
“Survival above all,” Leire retorted. “Your survival, and Mendian’s. I told you before that it was all that matters. I don’t care a whit about your opinion of me. You may damn me or revile me as you wish; every breath you draw to curse my name is one that I have now secured for you.”
There was a long silence after she spoke. Michael did not trust himself to speak amid the rising anger within him. It was only when Antolin stepped forward that he realized not all of that rage was his own.
He stood ramrod-straight before Leire’s seat, his shoulders square and his head high. “Does the Star of Mendian have a preference as to what I should tell the families of the five men who died when the prisoner was abducted?” he asked. His voice was cool, his eyes looking directly ahead at the foot of Leire’s seat.
Michael looked higher, and saw the flicker in Leire’s radiant soul. It was only for an instant, the briefest of interruptions in that blazing, deadly halo. Something shattered, keened - and then was gone, masked behind the light once more. Her face betrayed no sign of what had transpired save for a tightness around her eyes.
“I do not,” she said quietly. “I trust my grand marshal in this matter.”
“And I am your grand marshal, Your Radiance,” Antolin said. He raised his head at last, looking her in the eye. “No less - and no more.” He held her gaze, saluted, and walked from the room with a measured pace.
Eventually, Leire turned back to Michael. “I hope that as the years pass and you grow in power, you remember what it was to be limited,” she murmured, her voice thick and hoarse. “To content yourself with unpleasant solutions because you could find no better path forward. To be - less than perfect, even as perfection is demanded.”
Michael took another step closer. “Are you asking for my forgiveness?” he asked.
“Your understanding,” she said. “I am on your side, whether you want my aid or not. I have placed all my hopes in you.”
There was another pause; Michael nodded. “I do understand you,” he said. “I understand your fear.” He walked to stand up against the wall of her enclosure, his own face reflecting back dimly from its surface; he looked through it to meet Leire’s eyes.
“There are things worse than death,” he said quietly. “That is the truth that gave me my soul, that I was forced to remember when you pressed Galen’s soul upon me. To exist in ways that twist and warp what you are meant to be is only torture, so I want you to listen very closely to what I am about to say.”
He looked her in the eye. “I imagine we have affinity between us by now, enough that you will pass to me when you die - your soul, and what remains of you along with it. If that remnant of you is the same woman who betrayed me, who murdered those men under guise of help, who lied to my face about it-”
Leire half-rose from her seat, frowning. “Michael-”
“If that is still you, on that day,” he said, speaking over her, “then there will be no way to reconcile with that remnant. I will not accept those things within me. That conflict, that division, will burn between us until I am forced to cast you into the abyss - just like the man you murdered.”
He walked forward until he could stand no closer to the glass, the barrier melting away in his vision and leaving only Leire. “Sofia once told me that only an informed choice is a choice,” he said. “She was right about that. So choose, sometime before you die. Decide if you aspire to something better than bare survival no matter the cost, or if the concept is so foreign to you that you would rather cease to exist entirely.”
Michael took a step back, then turned towards the door; Sobriquet had not moved, watching him with an inscrutable stew of emotion that he could not pick apart. She met his gaze with a small nod, though, and moved towards the exit to the room.
They walked out arm in arm. Behind them, Leire said nothing as the heavy bulkhead door yawned wide, then slammed shut once more.