> A man chanced to walk beside the Caller on the road one day. At first the man held fear in his heart, and did not speak in the Caller’s presence. The Caller’s kind voice calmed the man’s fear, though, and soon the two were talking as old friends while they walked.
>
> The man noticed that the Caller would stop to inspect the trees at the roadside, speaking to them with words that no man could hear. They grew strong and tall at his urging, and the man felt the light of the divine touch his heart.
>
> But the Caller also stopped to speak with fallen trees, and rotting stumps, and all manner of dead and decaying trees. This confused the man, who could at last no longer hold his tongue. He asked the Caller why he spoke to the trees that could not heed his words.
>
> The Caller smiled at the question, and said that the living trees only were so because the others had perished. “Trees and men share a fate,” he said, “in that they die for a cause. Some to provide shelter and security, others for comfort and sustenance. Others still for no obvious meaning, though what they leave enriches the way for those who follow. Our duty does not end with death. In many ways, it is only then that we may begin to see how well we have fulfilled it.”
- The Book of Eight Verses, the Verse of Growth. (New Kheman Edition, 542 PD)
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Michael opened his eyes to darkness. It was not the inky totality of the void, nor was it the suffocating blanket of an Ember’s soul. It was a comfortable, close darkness, broken only by the quiet flickering of a candle. In the dim light his eyes saw wood stained by pipe smoke and the slow attention of years.
It was Jeorg’s cabin, though there had never been a room such as this within its walls. Michael was not sure that he was in a room at all, for the details of his surroundings seemed to blur and twist in the half-light. It was too big by half, insubstantial and fluid.
The only fixed point was the candle, which burned with a chill radiance that Michael knew all too well. He stared at it for uncounted moments, watching the subtle twists of the flame lash out against the shadows.
“You seem surprised,” Jeorg said.
Michael pulled his gaze away from the candle; the old man sat in a chair against the wall, his face visible in the flaring light from his pipe as he drew a breath.
“I suppose I am.” Michael sat up in bed, facing Jeorg. “For - a few reasons.” He began to say more, but stopped as his mind began to retrace the horrid details of the day. He saw Luc’s tear-streaked face, his hand reaching down to touch Leire on her cheek, heard the quiet gasp of her death. “Ghar’s ashes. It doesn’t seem real.”
“Easy to confuse real with normal,” Jeorg grunted. “But reality seldom cares about that. Only the unreal bends to your preference.” He nodded to the fluid walls of the cabin - then chuckled, shaking his head. “At least for now.”
The scene of Leire’s death hung before Michael’s eyes still, so clear that it seemed she was in the room with them, lying on the dark floor - a conspicuous absence looming over her where her murderer had stood. “I just don’t understand,” Michael said.
“That’s not new,” Jeorg snorted. “Plenty you don’t understand. This, you don’t want to understand.”
Michael frowned. “I don’t think that’s true,” he said. “I do want to, I just-” He paused, then shook his head. “I thought I knew Luc. I thought he was my friend, even if we had our differences. Now I find that I didn’t know him at all.”
Jeorg raised an eyebrow, taking a long draw on his pipe. “Differences,” he said. “An understatement. He feared you would break the world, and him along with it.”
“He’s always feared souls,” Michael protested. “I thought he was coming to terms with his fear. Using his soul for good.”
There was a pause; Jeorg began to laugh. The force of it bent him forward in his chair, and when he rose back upright his eyes were twinkling with tears. “And he’s come to see it your way,” he chuckled. “Pushing past his fear and doing what he thought was right.”
“You’re saying this was my fault?” Michael scowled - first in irritation, then in troubled contemplation. “Am I saying this is my fault?”
“Every man acts on their own,” Jeorg said, still chuckling. “And no man acts in isolation. It’s hubris to take all the responsibility, but folly to deny that you influenced his path. You’ve felt it more keenly each day; your actions ripple outwards, touching lives in ways you cannot predict - or control.”
Michael nodded slowly, swinging his legs to the side of the bed to sit fully upright. He did not speak for a long moment. When he raised his head, Jeorg’s smile had faded.
“He could have told me about Gerard’s soul,” Michael muttered. “Of everyone in the world, I would have understood.”
Jeorg drew on his pipe. “And yet here you sit, complaining that you do not understand.”
“I sincerely hope that I’m not this effective at irritating others,” Michael sighed. “I know why he kept it secret; I tried to do the same. But to kill Leire-” His eyes strayed to the lone candle, still broadcasting its chill light. “It’s her, isn’t it?”
Though shadowed, Jeorg’s eyes glittered with reflected light. “It is,” he said.
“How?” Michael asked. “Her soul passed to Luc.”
“He got what he took,” Jeorg grunted. “Did you ever tell him there was something more?”
Michael blinked, thinking back on their conversations. “I don’t know that I ever did,” he admitted. “But it still strikes me as odd, to think that the two pieces could split - or that she would find me at all. Based on our last conversation I thought-” He looked at the candle again. “I thought I’d have to destroy her.”
A smile crossed Jeorg’s lips; he rose and walked to stand beside the candle. “So did she,” he said. “Age makes us inflexible. Closes off options. But each of us can change.” He nodded to Michael. “You convinced Jeorg to step outside his narrow world, before the end. Let him find something he had thought lost.”
“I could never convince Leire of anything,” Michael muttered.
Jeorg smiled, then stood to pick up the candle; the flame swayed with the air’s gentle currents, flaring brightly against the shadow. Its light showed more of the mercurial room - a darkened window, bedposts, and a low wardrobe. Atop the wardrobe stood two tiny figurines, modeled after dancers in Mendiko dress. The candle’s shifting shadows caressed the dancers, lending them an aspect of sinuous motion.
“We never convince anyone of anything,” Jeorg said. “Only offer another view. The change must come from within. From without - the change becomes violence.” His smile faded. “Remember that, when you see Luc again.”
Michael raised his eyebrow. “You seem sure that we’ll meet.”
Jeorg regained a portion of his smile, then shook his head. “You heard him,” he said. “There is nowhere so distant that your paths won’t cross. If there was, he’d be there.” Jeorg looked at Michael, his eyes glinting with reflected candlelight. “But he wants balance, and that means two weights on the scale.”
He placed the candle upon the wardrobe. The shadows behind the figurines deepened, the space between them lost in darkness; to Michael’s eyes, they seemed to step forward into an embrace.
Jeorg smiled, turned-
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Michael’s eyes slid open. His heart was pounding, clothes drenched with sweat under a thin sheet. He recognized the cramped metal construction of the airship, the antiseptic smell of the medical bay; he let his sight drift up, not much cherishing the thought of actually moving at this early juncture.
The quiet of early morning stretched through the space, and even though the airship still hummed its usual tone of distant clamor, there was a solidity and weight to the silence that Michael had not felt before. It was solemn, sorrowful - funereal, in point of fact.
Sleep fled, and reality asserted itself. It had happened, all of it. Leire’s flame burned impossibly alongside the growing chorus in his chest, while her soul was far beyond his reach.
He tried to sit up, only to pause as he felt something shift across his stomach; he turned his sight around to look and found Sobriquet’s arm laid across him, her hair splayed out across her face as she slouched forward in her chair at his bedside.
Michael felt a warm, painful swell of love; it was almost enough to distract him from his own appearance. He had kept his hair rough and short as best he could during his time on the continent, growing increasingly-used to the scruff of beard on his chin. The hot glass that had imprisoned him had robbed him of every scrap of hair, even his eyebrows.
There was a distracting and unfortunate resemblance to Saleh, now.
His skin appeared whole, though; there was no trace of the burns that he remembered from his chaotic, narrow recollections of Luc’s escape. He brought his free hand up to pass it over his scalp - and paused.
Michael studied Luc’s hand where it sat affixed to his arm. He had long since ceased thinking of it as some foreign violation of his person; most days the sharp line at his wrist passed beneath his notice. Today, though, it troubled him.
Thoughts began to stir restlessly in his head, chief among them - how? Michael berated himself for not asking Jeorg the question during his dream, but in the fluid realm of his thoughts it had not seemed as pressing. It had happened, clearly; acceptance did not require understanding.
His waking mind was less sanguine about his lack of knowledge. He stared at his hand, flexing it idly. It would have been Leire that he asked, if she were here. She would have been enthralled by the question, monopolizing Michael’s time while she made him recount every half-recalled memory from his time with Spark.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Now she only burned within him, inscrutably mute alongside all of the others. Michael was surprised at the upswell of feeling that struck him as he contemplated her loss; he did not even particularly like the duplicitous, irritable old woman. When he contemplated the space left by her passing, though-
Well. Perhaps it yawned so impossibly wide because there was a good chance people would ask Michael to fill it.
He sighed and lowered his hand to caress Sobriquet’s hair. She made a soft noise and turned, then raised her head; Michael felt the gentle thump of relief and happiness as her eyes crinkled in a smile.
“Good morning,” she said quietly, sliding up to kiss him.
After a short, memorable span of time had elapsed, Michael smiled up at her. “Good morning,” he replied. “Sorry if I worried you.”
“If you want to apologize properly, stop rendering yourself senseless,” she muttered, straightening her hair as she settled back into her chair. “Sometimes it feels like every week finds you face down in the dirt.”
Michael snorted. “I don’t aim for it. Life conspires to place me there.” His smile faded. “What have I missed?”
“Chaos, as you might expect,” she sighed. “The Mendiko were shattered at Leire’s death, even as Antolin pushes them to the west. I suspect he’s rushing to occupy them with something other than distraction. The armor columns left Imes before first light; the Safid have fallen back to Agnec. It’s two days for the ground forces to make the transit if they’re not opposed, and so far that seems to be the case.”
“Agnec,” Michael muttered. “I’m not familiar.”
“No reason you should be. It’s a regional capital, but not a large one. It’s been under Safid control even longer than Imes. I’ve been helping the Mendiko scout it as best I can, my sight-” She pursed her lips together. “As best as we can tell, the city has been turned into a fortress. Trenches, embrasures, artillery.” Sobriquet shook her head. “You kept saying that Saleh wanted one final battle to decide everything. It looks like he’s chosen the location.”
Michael hummed softly. “I should talk with Antolin,” he said, pulling the blanket off of himself. “Find out where-” He paused, looking down; Sobriquet raised an eyebrow.
“I should find some trousers,” Michael amended. “Then talk with Antolin.”
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They found the grand marshal in his usual spot on the bridge, staring out the forward window at the vast sweep of Daressan countryside laid out before them. Michael had worried for Antolin’s health during the fighting in Imes; the man before him now looked positively gaunt, his eyes red and lined with dark circles.
Those eyes turned to fix on Michael as he entered, muscles working beneath the dark stubble covering Antolin’s jaw.
“You’re up,” Antolin rasped.
The grand marshal beckoned him to the side. There he turned and looked at Michael, his sunken eyes fever-bright. “I have heard several stories from yesterday,” he said. “Now I will hear yours.”
As much as Michael had expected the question, Antolin’s tone took him aback; it was crisp, almost curt in its brevity. “I - ah. I was eating with Vernon in the mess,” he began. “He heard Luc and Unai arguing, he said it was growing heated. We hurried over. When I arrived I didn’t see either-” Michael paused, his thoughts stumbling. “Unai. Nobody has mentioned him since I woke, is he-?”
“He is - well enough,” Antolin said. “He is the one who healed you. Continue.”
Michael gave Antolin a curious look, but the grand admiral said nothing. “I didn’t see either man when I arrived. When I entered the room, Luc used the glass from the walls to trap me.”
Antolin’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing.
“After that, he went to the other room and brought Leire, also wrapped in crystal. She was unconscious, it looked like she had been struck in the head. He used his anatomens soul to kill her.” Michael felt the stab of pain from Antolin, though it did not register on his face. “He took her soul. He was emitting enough light that I was able to heat the glass and break free, but by the time I reached the ground he had escaped.”
Sobriquet glared at Antolin. “And he was in no state to pursue anyway, if that’s your next question. He could barely stand-”
“Did you know?” Antolin asked, his eyes fixed on Michael’s.
“Did I know - what, that Luc bore more than one soul? That he could take them from others?” Michael struggled to keep an incredulous edge from his voice, almost succeeding. “Did I know that he planned on murdering Leire and stealing Stellar? Is that what you’re asking?”
Antolin held Michael’s gaze. “Did you?” he asked.
“No,” Michael replied; he felt an edge of Stanza in his voice, lent by anger and frustration. “I most certainly did not know, any of it. What I did know about the link between Luc and I, I shared with Leire. If she thought something like this was possible, I imagine Luc would have been in one of your cells, kept safely asleep until old age took him.” He took a step forward, staring at Antolin. “Do you have anything else you want to ask me? Say it plainly.”
The grand marshal’s eyes left Michael for a moment, flitting to the side; Michael swiveled his sight fast enough to catch one of Antolin’s staff give a short nod. He recognized the officer as Antolin’s personal radioman, secretary - and verifex.
Michael turned his sight back to Antolin and raised what should have been an eyebrow.
Antolin sighed, the hard edges bleeding out of his face. “I’m sorry, Michael,” he said. “We had a very limited view of what happened in that room. I had to ask, and I had to be sure.”
In his peripheral vision Michael saw everyone on the bridge relax slightly; he felt some of the brooding tension dissipate as hands came up from holsters and away from consoles. One man carefully lifted his fingers from a small metal box, sliding a switch cover closed and setting it down on the table.
A small chill bloomed in Michael’s stomach: everyone in this room had been poised to attack him at Antolin’s word. It spread further still as he felt the palpable relief from the officers. It was not the happiness of men who had cleared a colleague of wrongdoing, or who had avoided a scuffle. They had all been prepared to fight him on Antolin’s command.
To a man, they had expected to die in the attempt.
Michael avoided examining all the ways in which that revelation made him uncomfortable, instead turning his attention back to Antolin. “Any other questions?” he asked. “Don’t ask me how it’s possible, because I don’t know.”
“Do you know why?” Antolin asked. There was a fracture in the man’s voice, slight but unmistakable.
After a moment, Michael licked his lips. “Not really,” he said. “I know he was angry at me for using my soul, and at Leire for pushing me onward. He told me that I would destroy the world if Stellar came to me.”
Antolin grunted. “So he means to keep it from you?”
“That, yes - but I don’t think he’ll hide it away. He wants to prevent conflict, specifically the sort of conflict that resulted in tragedy for Imes.” Michael shook his head. “Whether that means going after the Safid or us, I couldn’t say.”
The grand marshal seemed to be aging with each passing moment, whatever fire kept him upright dimming. He turned to Sobriquet. “How is your sight?”
She made a face. “Still cluttered,” she said. “It had been growing worse for days, but I didn’t notice - I thought it was residual chaos from the attack on Imes. What Luc did introduced - disorder into the world. I can still see, but fine detail escapes me.”
Antolin nodded wearily. “It’s not unprecedented. Your account matches what I’ve heard elsewhere - and my own experience. Auspices are the worst-off, they’re nearly useless. Most can’t see to the end of the day anymore; even our best in the capital don’t claim more than a month’s sight, and what they see is - eromena. Madness. Chaos, as you said.” He rubbed at his eyes. “At least we still have spectors. I’m trying to steal as many as I can from civilian intelligence, but I doubt we’ll get more support from home anytime soon. The Batzar has lost their will to fight.”
Michael blinked. “What does that mean for us?” he asked.
“In the short term, nothing,” Antolin replied. “But if we should falter in our advance, if the Safid delay and bleed us as they mean to, I expect that the Batzar will declare itself content with liberating Imes and seek to end the conflict. There is a significant faction that holds our duty to find and contain the Star of Mendian as paramount over all other tasks.”
“That would doom Daressa,” Michael protested. “Surely they have to know that. The Safid would regroup and roll back over the country within a year, this time without Ardalt to oppose them.”
Antolin gave a short, bitter laugh. “Oh, they know,” he said. “But they don’t care. Leire’s authority was the only reason we were given leave to begin this operation, and even while she still lived there were those in the opposition who sought to undo it; now that she is - gone…” He paused, his jaw working soundlessly for a few beats.
“Now that she is gone,” he continued, “the Batzar will look for any opportunity to reclaim peace, and will not be swayed otherwise until the Star is safely back within Mendian’s grasp.”
Michael exchanged a glance with Sobriquet; her face showed only glimpses of the worry and strain that Antolin’s words had provoked within her. “How do we convince them to continue fighting?” he asked.
“We win,” Antolin replied. “Cowards they might be, but the batzarkideak at least recognize the utility of beating back the Safid; if we give them no reason to doubt our efficacy they will likely raise no objection to our continued operations within Daressa.” He scratched at his chin. “In the long term, though, we must obtain the Star of Mendian. The people expect this duty from the Batzar above all others, and opinion will turn against them if they do not pursue it.”
“It seems as though the two tasks are aligned,” Michael pointed out. “We can’t very well seek to capture Luc without a presence on the continent.”
Antolin turned to him, mild incredulity on his face warring with a dark, bitter spite. “Capture?” the grand marshal asked. “We will not capture him. All Mendiko forces will be instructed to kill him at any cost. The soul will pass to you, as it was meant to.”
There was nothing Michael could say to those words; his inclination was to protest that Luc should be captured, but there was no reason for it aside from sentiment. Whatever he had been, Luc was now a murderer, a demonstrably unstable one with one of the most powerful souls extant.
Luc was beyond saving.
Michael examined the thought as it intruded unbidden into his mind. After another moment, he reluctantly acknowledged its truth. He did not want it to be so; he knew Luc acted from fear, that he bore Michael no particular malice. He was reasonably certain that Luc still considered himself Michael’s ally, in fact.
But good intentions did not excuse the direction Luc’s path had taken. He had killed, and the nature of the soul he had stolen ensured that he would kill again. The responsibility lies with the will who could have prevented the harm.
“You’re right,” Michael said. “Of course. I’m sorry, I just-” He shook his head, looking out towards the window. “Yesterday he was my friend.”
“Yesterday, Leire was mine,” Antolin replied, looking stonily up at Michael. “I understand that you held compassion for the boy. It was admirable. Now it is something else. Think what you will, but I would not voice such thoughts aloud. There are already those who whisper that you had a hand in Leire’s death. Those whispers will echo all the louder if you voice sympathy for her murderer.”
There was a chilling certainty to his words; Michael felt giddy nausea as the alternate perspective he offered finally clicked in his head. Leire was dead shortly after her very public falling-out with Michael, who was alone with his friend in her room when she was killed.
It was not mere caution that had led Antolin’s entire staff to the brink of violence with him; by any reasonable estimation Michael looked incredibly guilty. He paled, looking out the window - then turned back to Antolin.
“I’d welcome your advice,” Michael said.
The grand marshal met his eyes. “I value restraint,” he said. “I feel that the mark of a civilized nation lies in its ability to solve problems within the law’s bounds, using violence only when there is no other option.” He pressed his lips together. “And I see no path forward other than the application of violence. We must quickly and efficiently deal with the threats before us, or we will find ourselves at their mercy. Saleh Taskin and Amira Ghabbas must die. Luc must die.”
He held Michael’s gaze for a moment longer, then turned to look forward from the airship. “So my advice, Michael, is to kill them all.”
The ripple of leashed pain and anger that emanated from Antolin nearly staggered Michael with its ferocity; he blinked and shook his head to clear it. After a moment he turned to Sobriquet. She was already looking at him, her face grim; she nodded.
Michael licked his lips. “I told Luc once that not all conflict was evil,” he murmured. “That sometimes it was necessary. It seems I was right.” He looked at Antolin, then extended his hand.
The grand marshal looked at it for a long moment, then clasped it with his own. Michael shook it once - then tightened his grasp, letting Leire’s flame rise to cold prominence within his chest.
Antolin’s eyes widened - then closed, moisture beading at their corners. Michael released his hand and took a step back. The bridge quieted; more than one officer paused to look at the grand marshal as he swayed on his feet, sucking in a long, shuddering breath. The moment passed as quickly as it had arrived, his eyes reopening with a sharp clarity.
“I had not hoped for - reconciliation,” Antolin rasped. “Nor, I think, had she.”
“Nor had I,” Michael sighed. “But here we are. You should rest, Antolin.”
“So I should.” He gestured to one of his officers, who gave him a sharp salute; the man’s eyes turned to Michael next with no small amount of gratitude, and a small nod of acknowledgment. Michael watched as Antolin turned without further comment and walked off the bridge, his officers parting to salute as he passed.
A sudden wave of exhaustion crept over Michael as he watched the grand marshal leave. “I should rest,” he muttered.
“We all should, before Agnec,” Sobriquet said, threading her fingers through Michael’s own and squeezing. “We’ll need it.”
Michael had no reply. He turned towards the window, watching the Daressan countryside slide past in its inexorable, inevitable march.