MAEWYS
Ash and dust cling to the stagnant air as a heavy fog of war, the remnants of fervent battle lines crashing into each other for extended periods of incredible violence. Soldiers push and press against each other, trying to drive through or encircle, but exhaustion takes hold after a scarce few minutes. The young soldiers pull back to the disdain of their elders. The Ordo Melikinara would not permit retreating, but the Elemnists aren’t here to play soldier.
The greater Ordo Elemnata has taken a vow of neutrality, for people like them would tear the world asunder by its very atoms with their Elemnistry should they get invested in nationalist ideals. Those unsatisfied with the Ordo or its subdivisions are free to depart at their own discretion. Their masters will welcome back the world-weary and rebuild them. And for those who seize power, the Ordo Melikinara bears down on them, wiping them and their name from existence.
Maewys is a member of the Ordo Melikinara, brought to the city-state of Lemlat as part of the Intervention Order: Selmnen Curt had left the Ordo Epicularo and established himself as dictator. Maewys, proficient in blood and bone, serves as a medic from the sidelines. With the dust in the air obscuring the line of fire, she and the other combat medics rush onto the field and drag the wounded back to safety. The Ordo Melikinara allied themselves with Lemlat’s neighbors, pushing them to war to dethrone the rogue Elemnist at the helm. It’s how they operate: they will not fight wars but they will heal the wounded and, when the opportunity presents itself, they will snuff out the Elemnist threat.
A cannonball punches a hole through the dust, screaming past Maewys as she drags a much larger man toward the relative safety of the base camp. It crashes into the ground behind her and explodes, knocking her forward and peppering her back with shrapnel and jagged rock. She hisses in frustration, a lock of flaming red hair falling out of place and dangling in her line of sight. If the shrapnel hit anything vital on the wounded soldier she’s dragging, then there’s precious little time left for him. Maewys, despite her proficiency in blood and bone, cannot resurrect the dead.
The ashen fog sits thick around her, but the cannonball blows open a window. The resulting explosion cleared out more of the obscuring fog, and the Lemlati forces surged forward. Maewys hisses again and holds out a hand, feeling the surrounding dust. She mastered dust as her first element, effortlessly filling the gaps in her cover with a surge of atomized dirt and stone.
Before she can return her attention to the fallen, the first Lemlati soldiers breach the fog of war. He freezes there, mouth locked open in a silent battle cry, dark eyes wide and black from the terror that guides him. Still a young boy, no older than fifteen, his military garb clinging to his scrawny frame and the buckles and tassels shiver as his thin muscles tremble. He holds a spear, a diamond-shaped tip trembling forward from the effort it takes to keep the weight up, unlike the new-fangled weaponry the veteran soldiers carry. They carry miniature cannons, front-loaded weapons that launch projectiles with the force of packed explosives. Even now, Maewys can hear the shots ringing in the distance, projectiles whizzing overhead, too large to be dust.
Her first instinct is to pull a bone from her charge and ram a shaped dart through the boy’s throat. Master Guaro made her promise him she wouldn’t do that again, so Maewys had to fall back on her second instinct. The dust between her and the Lemlati boy forms a connection she can feel with her Elemnistry. With her mastery of blood, she can stop his heart right then and there. But a sensation makes her feel sick to her stomach. He has an aneurysm in his brain, ready to burst. During more peaceful times, Maewys would travel from city to city with her Ordo and treat conditions like this for free. She could do it now, move the aneurysm to his leg and clot it, the pain of the procedure knocking this boy out of the battle. He’d lose his leg if he wanted any hope for survival, but at least he’d live.
The Lemlati soldier finds his courage, screaming out with a hoarse and cracking voice as he charges at the Elemnist with his spear leveled at her vitals. His battle cry turns to anguish as Maewys pops his aneurysm. He’s dead before he hits the ground.
Maewys continues dragging the wounded back to base camp.
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“If we can use your Elemnists to breach the walls, this war would be over in no time,” says Raishen Cor, the acting general against Lemlat. “Take the city, so you can reach Selmnen.”
It’s been the same conversation since Maewys arrived at the frontline. Raishen wants to command the Elemnists, and Master Guaro shuts him down. She tries not to let his handsome features, his tall build and dark skin, sway her from what she believes is the right course of action.
“My answer remains unchanged, General Cor,” Master Guaro responds. Guaro is an older man, middle-aged with graying hair and a face chiseled with deepening smile and frown lines, and—it seems to Maewys—his brow locked in a permanent furrow. He’s busying himself with overseeing the medics, ensuring that the younger and less experienced Elemnists don’t kill their charges, when Raishen bursts into the tent with the same old strategy.
“Oh, come on, man!” Raishen snips, frustration boiling. “Just think of the lives you can save if you let me use your talents.”
Master Guaro rubs his temples. “Consider the lives at risk, if you can. With a mere thought or touch, Melikinaran Elemnists can kill. It would be a slaughter to the upper city.”
“It’s a slaughter now,” Raishen counters. Countless men perish, gaining only five paces daily, and the situation will deteriorate as we near the walls.
“And then they’ll run out of black powder and men to sally forth,” Master says. He steps toward Maewys as she resets the broken bones of a Lemlati prisoner. “While your numbers swell with the soldiers they so callously throw into the meat grinder.” It’s a strategy Master Guaro is fond of, showing the enemy his side is the better side and turning them against their overlords. It coincides with his golden rule of mercy before violence.
Raishen throws up his hands in frustration and storms out of the tent. And thus ends Act Fifty-Seven of the tale Master Guara Versus General Cor. Gurao kneels across from Maewys, watching her trail her fingers across the battered skin of her patient in silence.
“How are you holding up, Maewys?” he asks after some time.
Maewys keeps to her work, but says, “I’m down to half a jar of hot honey, and weevils got in the bread again. Other than that and killing a boy, I’m doing just peachy.” A low, rumbling laugh comes from the Master Elemnist and Maewys looks up, confused. “You’re laughing. Why are you laughing?”
“If I don’t laugh,” Guaro says, brushing aside a tear from his cheek, “I think I might cry.” He sits back on his knees, a sad-looking smile on his face. “I’m sorry that the Ordo Melikinara is not what you thought it was.”
Maewys wished to join the Ordo Corvinet once she came of age, but Zacaer objected. Barring Ordo Corvinet, Ordo Melikinara is the only one traveling the globe. The choice is simple: either stay in the same city-state until she dies or learn under the Ordo Melikinara until she’s killed.
“It’s dust all the way down,” Maewys sighs. She opens her eyes, met with a curious look on Guaro’s face. “It’s a saying my old Master has. Olohne would say that, meaning it’s all the same to him.”
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Master Olohne, an elder of the Ordo Elemnata, is infamous for claiming that all the elements controlled by Elemnistry are dust on a fundamental level. Dust mastery enhances mastery of other elements. And those who master dust first often control more elements over all. On average, Elemnists have two or three available and can create additional ones by combining them. Maewys has five: lightning, wood, blood, bone, and dust. Olohne’s critics and detractors claim he’s jealous that, for the first half-century of his life, he could only control dust.
“Yet now I can bend lightning,” he would say in response. “All is dust, I tell you! It’s dust all the way down!”
Maewys deeply misses the old coot.
Master Guaro stirs her from her remembrances. “I’d rather not see you ground into the same brooding paste that plagues Ordo Melikinara. I’ve a new assignment for you, far from Lemlat. The city of Nuaranth has caught the attention of Ordo Corvinet.”
Maewys sits up straight, her work already completed. In her mind, Ordo Corvinet means Zacaer and the chance to see him again. Her stomach turns to knots at the prospect.
“The Ordo Labrythyne has gone silent,” Master Guaro says. “The situation in Nuaranth has already been troubling at the best of times, the relationship between the native Bright Casters and Shadowarchs being as it is.”
Bright Casters, masters of light, and Shadowarchs, masters of darkness. Maewys doesn’t know too much about them, but the stories she reads often tell of an inimical dichotomy between the Light and Dark.
"As much as I'd like to pick up and leave for Nuaranth,” Guaro pinches his brow, “Lemlat still needs Ordo Melikinara. And I’m needed here to ensure Raishen doesn’t weaponise my Ordo.”
“So why me in particular?” Maewys asks. While she has a more fantastic range of elements under her control than her peers, she doesn’t consider herself remarkable in other aspects. She doesn’t even have a Demesne, the actualization of the self and Elemnistry; her will made tangible through the elements she uses.
“Among my pupils, you alone have yet to build your Demesne,” Master Guaro says. Maewys shrinks at the acknowledgment of her mediocrity. Elemnists develop a Demesne when they come of age. It’s one requirement for leaving Ordo Elemnata for the other sects, but not a hard and fast rule. Failing to build a Demesne by the age of twenty raises a few eyebrows. Maewys is twenty-four.
“I hope whatever you find in Nuaranth will draw out that latent power.” Master Guaro’s brow unfurrowed for the first time since Maewys met him. “So you can return to us a complete woman.”
Maewys nods. The order is obvious: find out what happened to Ordo Labrythyne and build her Demesne, or else leave Ordo Melikinara.
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“There are only two ways to enter the city of Nuaranth,” Ephel says. “Through the port by sea or by train from Atwurk.” Maewys glances at the Espreth, a glittering crystalline orb that drifts lazily in the air by her head. Ephel is the size of a small melon, its thin glass skin stretched taut over a molten core of rock and stardust. Espreth’s are ancient relics from a forgotten age, often found in old burial mounds and desperate for purpose. Ephel is one of the few dozen the Ordo Melikinara has in stock and serves as Maewys’s lifeline toward her superiors, her means of remaining in contact with them and their means of monitoring her.
“Neither of those is an option,” Maewys says, “hence all this walking I’m doing.” She gestures to the broader landscape, the shallow rock valley of red pillars and cloudless blue skies. The cities alter the nearby land for cultivation, stone ground into soil and gravel to grow their staple crops and pasture livestock, although fish is the game of the common man. The land between city-states, however, is all but barren rock desert. Hardy plants grow in shady outcroppings near pools of milky water. Occasionally, birds of prey screech overhead. Even more rare than their screeching is their bombardment against filigree rodents that nest in cairns and gravelly patches. The only real danger is thirst, but Maewys uses her Elemnistry to draw the hazardous dust from the milky drinking pools.
“I thought this walking was for your health.” Ephel likes to think they’re funny.
The Espreth arcs around in front of Maewys like a massive floating eye. “Those are the only two options for getting into Nuaranth,” it repeats. “The city cuts into the seaside cliff. Forty-story walls encircle its urban perimeter and thirty-story walls encircle the farmland. The Nuaranth Garrison comprises nearly a seventh of the population at a quarter of a million bodies, and they have patrols extending beyond the farms.” Maewys stops walking. “You have two options: ship or train.”
The Elemnist crosses her arms and furrows her brow, eyes squinting closed. “Neither is conducive to getting into the city unnoticed.” Maewys rubs her temples. “But it’s easier to stow away on a train than by ship.”
“If my memory serves correctly,” Ephel says, “then there should be a set of tracks North East from here.” Ephel’s memory is never incorrect.
Maewys follows the Espreth toward the railroad, steeped in thought. Alerting the Garrison isn’t the worst thing. People enter and exit cities illegally daily. But having a wanted poster will complicate her mission. With the apparent disappearance of Ordo Labrythyne, advertising herself as an Elemnist seems suicidal at best, and she can’t rely on Ordo Corvinet to drop their air of conspiracy just for her sake. She’s grateful that Elemnists don’t bear badges of office or rank, such as staffs or distinctive headwear. Belonging to the errant Ordo Melikinara means even her clothing is a nondescript pair of sturdy boots, rugged trousers, and a rather thick coat. Temperatures in the red rock valleys can turn from blistering hot to freezing at the turn of day. Maewys much prefers being prepared over being comfortable.
“How do you know so much about Nuaranth?” Maewys asks as they approach the gravel set rails. “Ancient history, I understand. You witnessed it. But you’ve spent the last, what? Eight years with Master Guaro? And I don’t think he’s ever been to Nuaranth.”
“Although the current administration destroyed the Espreths living with the Ordo Labrythyne,” Ephel responds, “there are still several Espreths under the ownership of the city patricians and nobility. They are, unfortunately, forbidden from telling me too much about their masters and their city.”
“So everything you just told me about Nuaranth could be nothing more than propaganda?” Maewys arches a skeptical brow.
“It is a distinct possibility.” Ephel stops in their tracks, floating in the air with lazy ease. “We have arrived. The next train should pass by within the hour.”
Maewys sets down her pack and sits on it, making a circling gesture at Ephel with her finger. Ephel’s core changes color, darkening and growing opaque, spraying out a thick mist from an unseen orifice and surrounding them. The red mist disguises the two as an amorphous boulder. From a distance or at speed, they should be indistinguishable from their surroundings. All the while, Maewys fished out her jar of hot honey, drizzling the spiced nectar over a hard biscuit and taking a voracious bite.
Manpower is used to drive the train from Atwurk to Nuaranth, its engine turned by the hands of several dozen pairs of engine men. Each team operates a pump that turns the driving wheels, with more men being added relative to the load they’re hauling. Train cars are wooden to save weight, making them susceptible to Maewys’s Elemnistry.
As the train arrives, Ephel shivers to thicken the fog into dust and connect Maewys and the outside wood paneling. With a surge behind her eyes and a flex of her throat, Maewys teases out a thick, tuberous root from the wood and latches onto it, snatching up her bag before being ripped off the ground. It’s easier to have the wood place her on the roof than to climb up, and Maewys sets herself down on the rumbling cloth roof. Ephel is already beside her, not reacting to the wind that whips through Maewys’s tied-back red hair.
The Elemnist observes her surroundings; the terrain blurring together as she travels at speed across the barren wastes. More engine cars break up the length of the train at regular intervals, betraying the sheer size of the mechanical beast. Cautious as not to raise the suspicion of any passengers in the train cars below, Maewys walks across the sturdy ribbing that the cloth stretches over. She walks down the length of the train, leaping onto the engine cars as they come, Ephel following alongside the train.
“We are about fifteen cargo cars in,” Ephel says after some walking. Maewys nods. Their speed drowns out her voice, but the Espreth faces no such constraints. She climbs down to the wall, clinging to the ledge, and pries open the wood with her Elemnistry. She swings inside, landing with a roll, and seals her opening once Ephel is inside.
The cargo car is unlit, the only light source being the gaps in the wood planks and Ephel’s luminous form. Stacked wood crates form narrow corridors and alleyways to traverse one end of the car to another. Maewys keeps to the walls, fearful of a patrolling guard making their rounds through her cargo car.
“Alright, Ephel, get in the bag,” Maewys says, holding up her pack.
The Espreth floats obstinately in her face. “I’m not doing that.”
“You’re too bright,” Maewys hisses. “If someone walks in here, they’ll see you for certain!” Ephel remains floating out in the open but wordlessly sinks into Maewys’s waiting bag. She flips the flap closed and settles in for the long haul.