“I am probably the most powerful mortal spellcaster on the planet by a fair margin,” I informed them calmly. “Unlike this world, I come from a place with a fully developed magical tradition, and intensely specific knowledge on how to fight the undead. Releasing this knowledge here has allowed the people to start making immediate headway against the Shroud, and to start preparing for the world without it.”
Two sets of golden eyes were glowing as they stared at me.
“My daughter is the most powerful spellcaster in the world!” Morningfire promptly shouted in delight, clapping her hands gleefully, her smile absolutely radiant. “You will keep the name of Morningdark, of course, and you must teach your family this magic of yours!”
I lifted an eyebrow at that, definitely not expecting those words. She went on, “We will contact your uncle and his children, too, of course. And then,” her happy smile narrowed down to a breathlessly cold scowl, like a furnace about to explode, “we are going to hunt the bastards that did this to our family down to the ends of the Earth, and beyond!”
Well, I certainly couldn’t refute that, and ruefully reflected that, ignoring the fact that I could stomp all of them with one hand tied behind my back, I was now the baby girl of this family... and Morningfire was still my mother, and a Nuavan, who were not known for holding back on their emotions.
I might not have the emotional bonds, but there were still bonds, and I wasn’t the type of person to just burn those things for no reason.
“Instruction and advancement will require large amounts of murderous combat,” I warned them both. “The targets will definitely deserve everything you can do to them, but Azaia can confess to the sheer nastiness of it.” Said person promptly nodding hard in agreement, and sighing.
“They are horrible,” Azaia agreed. “But Master Traveler has shown me so much... “
“Tch!” Morningfire interrupted. “You are family. What is this Master stuff?” My eyebrow lifted higher. “She is your sister, and you will address her as such. You will address me as Mother, as is proper, but your sisters are Azaia and Brigette, or Wind and Flame, as you prefer. They will address you as Traveler or Dark,” she stated simply, as if the matter was already set and done, and the great looming mountain of propriety simply could not be overcome.
“Flame, you will immediately file a Leave of Absence in response to the simply traumatic experiences you have had, and if there are any questions from your superiors about such a thing, you will direct them to me.” Her golden eyes flared hotly, and the most feared fire Sorceress in Europe promptly buckled, nodding quickly. Those eyes snapped back to mine, and seemed to consider things for a moment as she studied me, and I didn’t give any ground at all.
“We will be going with Azaia on this training of yours, my dear Dark,” she declared firmly. “What do you need us to do? We will be completely ready to join you by tomorrow.” And if Flame wasn’t, she wasn’t going to say anything.
Well, the woman was definitely an elemental force of will, clearly very, very used to getting her way, and also very protective of her family. I found myself more amused than impressed, as I could push back at her very easily, and probably shock her with how firmly, too.
She had also promptly adopted me into that family without blinking an eye. Perhaps it wasn’t unusual, as she hadn’t truly known her real daughter or what had been made of her, and what I was doing stirred up all her joys and passions as a mother and a Nuavan.
“There are some videos you should watch, to get caught up properly... Mother,” I acquiesced, which only seemed to delight her more. “You will also have to get a Blessing from me, and get soul-drained down to a Three.”
Her rising expression faltered. “A Three?” she gasped, hands going to her chest. “Are you serious, Dark?” she couldn’t help but protest.
“Deadly serious, Mother,” Azaia promptly spoke up. “Unless you’d like to be stuck at Nine for the rest of your life.”
Her fine lips worked for a moment, and managed a delicate frown. “These must be very important videos,” she sighed at last. “What about this Blessing? This sounds exciting!” Her eyes lit up again.
“That should perhaps wait until you have seen the videos, Mother,” I replied calmly, pulling out a couple thin Tablet computers from my Masspack for them. “Azaia, if you could help them with these?” I asked politely. Yes, the model was actually called Tablet, alluding to historical methods of storing data.
“Of course.” She took them both from me swiftly, moved in between her mother and sister to hand over the devices. Her mother looked at it curiously, having no idea what it was, while her sister hesitantly began to touch it and bring up its Vaccine-style operating system. The software hadn’t changed that much in the last eight years...
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I exited the room while they began to find and watch the videos off Heavenbound Hall’s website. No need to distract them from the presentations, and it was going to take them a while to get through it all.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Legion was waiting with eternal patience, and remained silent until the door closed behind me. “I would have liked to hear you Sing at that tribute,” they admitted quietly. “Second-hand is not quite the same.”
“I understand you were in a bit of an excitable situation at the time, and Heavenbound Hall has this odd reputation of going outside the law to do the right things, which many parties in older nations look unfavorably upon.”
“I understand the mindset,” they said with a sigh. “Of course, telling them that Commander Morningflame had been recovered safely from the Deadzone, along with the wife of the Spanish ambassador to the European Council and several other people of note, proved to be a most influential diversion.”
“Odd that.” I tapped my crossed arms in thought. “It appears my family will be occupied for a short time, and it is simplicity itself to return when I need to.”
“You seem somewhat bemused,” Legion nodded, rising to their feet and looking down at me in consideration.
“Well, Morningfire is certainly not anything like the image I had of her, and since she hasn’t been herself since basically a day or two after Elrii was born, that is not surprising.” I could only roll my eyes. “She has just come off being the Consumed form of a Warlock, and finding out her newborn daughter is dead and replaced by a fully grown Wizardess of fantastic power. She’s either fantastically resilient or desperately looking for a coping mechanism to help her get through the trauma. Possibly both.”
“A suitable amount of intense physical and magical effort would be an extraordinary distraction, for certain.” Legion paused, thinking. “She does not have a Blessing yet. She truly has no idea who she is dealing with, does she?”
“No.” Which would be a nice surprise on its own, and who knew what after that? Finding out I was also the most powerful and widely-spread Monarch in the world was also going to be something...
“You want to occupy some time?” Legion asked blandly, only a hint of an edge to their voices.
“When you can Teleport around the world, it is utterly remarkable how easy it is to triangulate in on something.” I flicked up a Holo of the globe, and oriented it precisely to their facing. “Where is that certain someone you want to visit again?”
They lifted their right arm and pointed precisely. The globe spun, and a red line arced across it, cutting right across America, I noted. I popped up the major cities there, and my Lived-Line.
Perhaps it was telling that the pointing line was crossing through Memphis, Tennessee.
“Let’s cross an x,” I murmured, taking their hand. Magic swirled, and I delivered us smoothly all the way across the Atlantic and half of America, to alongside a road in southern Illinois where we’d passed on the way to Mexico. During down time, I’d had Sleipner race me to the nearest section of my Lived-Line, as I hated not being in Teleport range. Going all the way back across the ocean in the blink of an eye, the shadow of Natural Renewal passing by with the rolling dawn, was nothing at this point.
We stepped onto the access drive over the ditch there, away from the traffic passing by on the road. It was still night-time here, six hours behind, naturally enough, but it was a main highway, so there was still traffic.
My Holo came up, and Legion pointed. A red line came out, and crossed the other in Memphis, Tennessee.
Legion’s eyes were very intense, but they shook their head slowly. “If we go with you, she’ll naturally be alerted and instantly Teleport away. She has unlimited ability to do so. You won’t be able to catch her... will you?” They cocked an eyebrow at me, knowing better to make an absolute statement out of that.
“It’s better to just use psychology. You said the first thing she’d do is Teleport away, fearing you’d sense her?”
“It is most likely. She knows she is not our equal in combat, and we are not required to act with decorum to her after...” They trailed off, and shrugged, although their eyes glittered.
Getting Hell-whipped and Scarred certainly counted as provocation.
“The Teleport range of Intrinsic Abilities is limited by line-of-sight from surface to surface under the Shroud. The curvature of the Earth means that it is much, much faster to Teleport from a high area with great line of sight to the horizon than it is to make multiple jumps in the same direction.” I looked at The Map, which was incredibly detailed about the place, and put a finger down on the northeast of the city. “The Global Divination System transmission tower extends up over a thousand feet, which is a thirty-plus mile jump range. If she wants to get away as fast as possible, she’ll jump there first, and then to another destination. It’s ten times faster than heading to any location in range.”
“So, we are being used to flush her from cover.” Their eyes glowed, but didn’t release light.
“Especially if you immediately starting Riding the Light in her direction.”
“And so, you only need to beat her to the tower,” they noted, their knuckles popping as they flexed, remarkably loud. “What do you intend to do with her?” they inquired.
“This might be a bit presumptuous, but I was going to give her to Shvaughn.”
They looked away, frowning for a long moment, then closing their eyes. “Shvaughn has been waiting a very long time to catch that bitch. She will rip her apart and take everything that is hers, as she helped so many others do. You have a reason for this?”
“Mmm. A Geas for her to never Grant a Pact. Which leaves a Pact Grantor of two very popular Pacts for Hell around that they aren’t going to be able to replace when it is time. Only one primary Grantor of a particular Pact to a world, you know.”
They blinked. “Ah. And that succubus queen has the same arrangement with the two Heart Pacts...”
“Yes. You aren’t going to just burn her dead. You’re going to refine her, leech her, and hold that spot, which between the two of you should prevent any more Hungry and Poison Heart or Kiss Pacts from happening on this world.”
“Ah, we were expecting to burn her, as we did the Burning Veil Grantor,” they nodded slowly. “Can we even contain them?”
“What’s your Sealing Level at?”
“Eight, I believe.”
“I think that after I Feeblemind her, Enervate her, Curse her six ways to Sunday, and Dolor her into submission, it’s not going to be much of an issue, but you should get it to Nine. You’re not going to be feeding vivus to the Land all that much while you Purify her, but it should be worth it.”
“What do they look like in their natural form?” they asked, trying to remember. I flicked up a holo of a lilitu’s eyeless face, long tail, cloven feet, and rather slender but oversized clawed hands. Oh, and another set of horns. Their eyebrows rose. “A tail and no eyes. How wonderful...”