Arakiel and the rest of his party spend the next thirteen days inside the Djinnum Palace, a time which brought about several changes while keeping some constants.
The most consistent fact concerned their stay in the guests’ wing in which they spent most of their day safe for a few excursions to the other secluded gardens, the small oasis or an invitation from Jenaya.
These little trips usually helped combat the rather monotonous schedule they worked off of, although Arakiel welcomed any chance to learn for he most certainly wasn’t a natural-born leader and Sultan Zimraan’s advisors were capable men and if there was one thing he learned above all else, it was to direct the proper people to the proper positions.
He wasn’t the one who had to know everything. No, Arakiel was to assess others’ knowledge and judge whether or not their advice was applicable to the given situation.
Of course, everything he learned in that admittedly small amount of time was more or less a crash course, but unlike him, Akili and even Aisha had been schooled in the matters of warfare. Furthermore, the pair of jinnum siblings were well aware of their steadily growing troops and their capabilities while Arakiel only knew the rougher details. Roughly 300 warriors, roughly 30 mages and about 100 members to the impedimenta. The logistics and overall tactics were more or less handled by the two jinnum while Arakiel was to see to the overall strategy, although that time had not quite yet come.
Another constant concerned several different kinds of training which took up most of the afternoon, with the most important one being Ezekiel and Arakiel finally having time to work on their sigils and spellcasting in a safe environment. And there, it became increasingly apparent that Arakiel’s progress in developing and internalizing new sigils was much, much faster than Ezekiel’s, especially on the subject of fire and even air evocations and to a lesser extent, thaumaturgy and alteration.
Arakiel’s way of only needing to imagine the sigil in his mind after having created and learned it greatly helped in any practical scenarios and the more he trained with it, the more he leaned to guide the location where the sigil would appear, after which he only had to touch and direct it in order to evoke its effect. Now that he had the time and the resources to focus on the technique itself, it would only be a matter of time before it came naturally.
To add to this, it felt as though his spells were drawing upon less color to achieve a similar effect. When a dawnshard’s red had previously only fueled three small orbs of golden fire, he could now throw four and sometimes even five before all the crystallized energy was used up.
Meanwhile, Ezekiel more or less stagnated on this subject much to his frustration, especially since no one could properly explain why it was the case, although Aurora kept decidedly quiet whenever she was prodded. Granted, her relationship with Selene could be considered frosty at the best of times. It wasn’t that they despised each other, but they certainly didn’t like each other despite being of the same race.
The only difference that Ezekiel and Arakiel found between their seraphim was that the Selenyean princess was utterly unable to cast any spells even if her master returned some of her soul’s silver fire to her. The argent wasn’t happy about this whole affair at all, yet it felt as though the basis for their connection was an entirely different one when compared to Aurora and Arakiel.
On another note, the fact that Ezekiel constantly absorbed Selene’s fire without ever using most of it made him capable in an entirely different manner, for the slight boost in physical capabilities seemed to only grow the more soulfire one had inside. In this manner, Ezekiel had become comparable to a strength or agility focused combat class although he needed to actively direct Selene’s fire if he wanted to achieve maximum results.
And while Ezekiel achieved great strides of the path of a melee fighter, Arakiel advanced on the matter of spells, most notably on the fire and air front, with the latter one receiving two sigils which could combo nicely with his fire.
Meanwhile, Aurora figured out how she had accelerated Arakiel’s time back in the Boundary and although it cost an entire shard’s gold and then some of her own soul, it was an excessive power boost, although he undoubtedly paid for it with his lifetime every time she applied it. Despite this, it was a powerful tool to add to one’s toolbox, especially as the range at which Aurora was able to apply external enchantments to him seemed to have widened somehow. It was only roughly a 100 meters at best, but still.
Mellia practiced her enchantments on them, as was tradition and he was almost certain she had reached level 2 at this point, even if a mage wouldn’t know until they reached level 3, at which point they’d gain access to a new rank.
The first five ranks of any class could usually be rushed in a single year if the person kept at it, so it was to be expected, yet he felt as though his sister was more or less happy with the general situation overall. It seemed a little odd to say since she really should’ve had a party formed around her to foster her growth as her contributions to House Alexandrite would be monumental in the future. The main thing he had heard about Nature-Astral Enchantresses concerned their ability to eventually stall aging while the domain of rejuvenation lay in blood magic, which was widely frowned upon in the Five Eternal Cities given the way most spells had to be fueled.
A lesser kind of training, but still somewhat important concerned the conversion of their captives to actual obedient servants that could be trusted with a minuscule modicum of responsibility and while Ezekiel effortlessly turned the two younger daughters of Countess Muirne into happy little maidservants over the span of ten days, Arakiel personally took charge of their elder sister, although he did let Ezekiel guide him.
And while he had been a little skeptical at first given his past statements, he quickly found out that he had indeed been an utter fool or rather, a hypocrite. He knew the basics, of course. Every teenage planeswalker-to-be had read the Slaver’s Handbook, the standard introductory lecture, but after his disastrous first planeswalk, Arakiel had more or less given up on it. Back then, Marianka been there for him and afterwards, she had been all he needed. By the time the thought even crossed his mind again, he was well on his way to acquire Aurora, who had been an altogether different topic.
But right here, right now, he felt a certain connection to his younger, unrestrained self that had been so full of himself for his early accomplishments. Arakiel hated that part of his past, for his hubris had caused his downfall, but he also couldn’t deny that he had been thoroughly free and unshackled by anything back then. A youth who dreamed of two loving, gorgeous wives, their equally beautiful aurea handmaidens and a collection of exotic, alluring trophies that they had acquired over the course of their many conquests.
And while he was much older and less grand in his ambitions now, he could not deny that Nyanna made him feel emotions he had thought himself too morally pure for, which was a ridiculous thought in and of itself. After all, the morally correct action was to take whatever one may covet as long as one could get away with it.
Embracing this mindset again, Arakiel found increasing satisfaction and pride in steadily imposing his will onto the young sorceress who had not only tried to charm and seduce him against his will, but who had wanted to distract him to allow her brother to abuse or even rape Aurora.
This was all he needed to remind himself of early on whenever he found her rather unambiguous advances too tempting.
It was the first flaw he corrected through a mixture of strict punishment, mind games and little tidbits of reward. When it worked after several days, Arakiel learned to appreciate the subtle art of subjugation that he began to explore and apply judiciously. He had no interest in sleeping with Nyanna for now even though he appreciated her curves; instead, he was much more keen on getting the sorceress to submit to him in full. What came afterwards was a whole nother debate.
A more lighthearted constant remained his little sister’s complete and utter dedication to her manner of speech which Arakiel only found endearing at this point. He sometimes teased her which usually led to her ignoring him for a bit at which point he felt so awful that he gifted her something to make up for it. A little ritual that always lifted his spirits in a way that no one else could, for Mellia was his little sister and she did not reject him despite knowing all about him, even his many failures.
There were a few changes as well.
The first and most important one concerned Aurora, for whatever immortal influence happened to her was beginning to seriously affect her. When it had been an urge previously, she almost felt compelled to ‘greet the dawn’ she as called it and he initially didn’t mind ‘sharing’ the dawnshard with her.
He partially changed his mind since she always kept undergoing a massive surge of emotions which saw her in rapture first, only for the girl to become absolutely terrified and unable to do anything but cling to him as her body trembled like leaves.
Apart from the brief golden light and the gleaming, golden halos around her irises that persisted for a few minutes after her trembling stopped, there weren’t any obvious changes. She claimed to feel good, but couldn't say how or why.
As far as they could tell, it didn’t increase her amount of soulfire nor did it help her accumulate more over time. She was definitely absorbing something from the shards as they crumbled to dust afterwards, but neither knew what it was.
In light of this, he usually – but not always – ordered her to hand over the shard as she kept asking him every time. They could use it well for their training. Sometimes, the act led to a brief but ardent exchange of intimacies that rarely led to longer, much more passionate plays which he greatly enjoyed.
Most often, however, they ended up watching the sunrise together while cuddling and that happened regardless of whether he had shared or accepted her daily offering.
And yet, Arakiel couldn’t help but think that this directly connected to the words that she had spoken on the first proper evening. ‘Define the covenant’s nature’. He wasn’t yet certain what she meant exactly and he was also fairly sure that Aurora didn’t know herself. For now, he was only certain that it related to this action of ‘accepting’ or ‘sharing’ as she kept asking him every morning when she hadn’t done so while they were traveling.
For now, the accepted the dawnshards more often than not simply because he found it hard to stomach her clinging to him like her entire life depended on it.
But this was something he definitely needed to keep a close eye on and what Arakiel found so perplexing was that Ezekiel and Selene had nothing of the sort – and whenever he brought up the subject, Ezekiel merely deflected, claiming that he’d figure it out in time without going into detail.
Arakiel did not pry.
Another change concerned their attire and equipment, for the sultan had his people craft two sets of tailored, light to medium armor.
Arakiel got the lighter, more representative of the two sets. His dark-red colored brigantine had to feature a special kind of metal that had been embedded in-between the cured leather and the outside velvet, for it was surprisingly light for its sturdiness. His silken baggy trousers of a dark grey color also held some kind of thin, barely audible mail padding. The soft, cured leather gloves definitely were more on the ease-of-mobility side but the leather boots were sturdy and even featured little bits of extra protection.
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Ezekiel, on the other hand, got a full set of masterfully crafted lamellar plate mail which reached all the way down to his knees. In addition, he got a set of sturdy, perfectly-sized bracers, gauntlets and greaves in addition to a thick cap and a slightly pointed metal helmet with an attached neck guard. It was certainly heavier than Arakiel’s set, but the current nature of Ezekiel’s spell casting left him a better fighter anyway.
Both sets weren’t magical in nature, but they were of a very high quality and overall much more effective since the armor fit like a glove. Ezekiel ended up selling his old gear, even the artifact as it was a bit too large for him and he felt as though it hindered more than it helped.
In terms of weapons, Arakiel was given an ornamental curved sword made of the same dark metal as that of the Mirrorguard. It was said to possess unrivaled cutting power against flesh, cloth, leather and even bad-quality mail, although it’d do little against plate. The metal was fairly lightweight and since Arakiel couldn’t store it inside his Spatial Ring, it had to be contain traces of magic. A small curved dagger of the same make rounded out his equipment. He was expected to contribute in the fights, but from the position of a mage, not a fighter.
Ezekiel, by comparison, was given three weapons in the vein of a Mirrorguard. A masterfully crafted and weighted straight longsword, a halberd with a lightweight metallic shaft and lastly a small dagger in order to puncture through a fully plated Middle’s armor in case the halberd was restricted.
When it came to clothing, all of them – even the servants – received sets of tailored high quality velvet or gossamer silk, the latter of which were especially wondrous to behold on their female companions who could undoubtedly rival any of the jinnum females that walked these halls. In fact, Aurora, Selene and Mellia were putting them all to shame, but his aurea kept coming back to the layered wrap of gossamer sheets that Sahir had made for her as the cloak kind of fit every outfit.
None of their clothing had any true protective value, of course – but none of them were supposed to fight, unlike Arakiel and Ezekiel.
The last major change more or less concerned their shift in priorities, now that they had a relatively clear idea on how to proceed for the foreseeable future. The sultan could’ve killed them if he wanted to and if he was truly from Akh Karab, then he knew about Kalanaar and what kind of power they represented. He might’ve even recognized Arakiel’s House due to the nature of his color-changing eyes.
In that case, he might be much more open to negotiations than someone who was utterly ignorant of what a major plane, and an Eternal City especially, represented. Minor planes especially were usually recruiting grounds for exceptional individuals along with tributes in shards and some special goods it might produce. Lyktos, for example, had been a subject of a minor plane subjugated long ago by House Alexandrite – and now he was close to attaining divinity.
The loss of independence for a plane was unfortunate, surely – but being a tributary of a major plane had a lot of benefits as other planeswalkers – unless they were truly ignorant – stayed clear of it, allowing peace and prosperity to reign.
In light of this, Arakiel’s initial frustration with being outplayed lessened and instead, he began to accept the challenge head on, even if he was still a little afraid of actually leading the entire Smokeless Host. Back then, on his first planeswalk, he had also been the leader and a string of bad and short-sighted decisions had led to a complete wipe.
He could not let this happen again and he would not. He was older, wiser now and unlike last time, he had the maturity of accepting advice when it was needed.
Only absolute geniuses or madmen relied only on themselves. Now, with Arakiel’s time as a lone Traveler having drawn to a close, he would need to adapt.
And adapt he would.
Today, Akili and Aisha had come to visit again in the early morning hours just after breakfast in order to continue more or less seal the initial strategy that the Smokeless Host to would abide by. They met inside the green-marbled chamber that had turned into a sort of war room, with a map of the known political world having been unfurled on a table made of cypress wood.
On it, there were three major political powers which could be roughly summarized as the northern mountainous realm, the middle realm of lush forests and fields and the southern realm of savanna and desert.
The High Realm ruled by High King Nerigal stretched all across the northern hillsides and the chain of mountains behind which lay nothing but the true Boundary. It was a land of sparse vegetation, harsh winters but very high quality ore, rocks, stone and other bounties one had to strike the earth for. Its people were said to be stout, burly and proud individuals and although there was pretty much no direct contact with the south, tales of the norfolk’s strength, skill and valor had even traveled down here. Furthermore, it was said to be the oldest realm, although not by much and it had been the last to embrace the church of the Transcended.
The Middle Kingdom ruled by King Cahir and Queen Fodhla stretched all the way from the northern foothills to the southern savanna and was not only the biggest, but also the plane’s most powerful faction due to its sheer size alone. Its lush forests and abundant, fertile fields left it in a powerful position where the Middles could afford to feed a rapidly growing population that had simply outgrown everyone else. Its history supposedly stretched over two centuries back and while life there had its upsides, it was also an exceptionally stratified society of ruling nobles, processing burghers and toiling peasants.
The Middle Kingdom was divided into six duchies which were further divided down into 19 counties in total, three to each duchy. The land around the capital city formed its own county which was directly administrated by the ruling couple.
There were two duchies in the south, namely the duchy of Irialswell named after Duke Irial in the southwest and the duchy of Scitathswood, aptly named after Duchess Scitath in the southeast. Count Eremon had belonged to Duchess Scitath’s demesne while Count Filann’s lands lay on the border of the two duchies. He had been a subject of Duke Irial.
In terms of perceived size, the duchy of Scitathswood was a bit larger and widespread, but the capital city lay much further inland than Irialswell. Additionally, the southwestern duchy acted as the southern breadbasket while Scithathswood was more in the business of beer, livestock and high-quality timber.
In light of this, Arakiel decreed the initial push to be against Duke Irial in order to secure a large amount of food to sustain their army, which Aisha and Akili agreed with.
There was also a rather large river which acted as a natural border between Irialswell and its northern neighbor which would make it easier to spot potential retaliatory actions although the strategy was, for now, banking on most of the Middle Kingdom’s troops being concentrated in the northernmost Duchy of Amerginside, where the High Realm would most likely invaded.
Given the information he and Ezekiel had pried from Count Filann over one and a half months ago at this point, the duchy had already been attacked. There hadn’t been any more news on this front, however. For now. Arakiel considered it wise to not let this information slip just yet.
There was still a particular item he wanted to snatch from the count’s treasure chamber if they it still there. An old heirloom which might be a boon to Mellia. He found it unlikely, but if it had truly been a personal wedding gift by Queen Fodhla for the count’s deceased wife, it might just be possible.
As such, he proposed to attack and secure the town of Filannsforst which was a bit out of the way towards Irialswell, but not enough to raise suspicion. Besides, they’d need to conquer it eventually and Filannsforst was supposedly only secured with a palisade while the count’s keep watched over it from a nearby hill.
Without lots of troops, the people would simply retreat into the keep and then they’d be right where Arakiel wanted them.
With harvest season soon commencing in the Middle Kingdom, Aisha and Akili also pointed out that their time here in al-Aliriq was once again coming to a close. He had about three months to conquer two duchies and even getting there would take a while, so Arakiel wasn’t too surprised or dismayed about these news.
Instead, he began to question his advisors on the state of his army and whether it was well-equipped and ready to go.
Aisha reported that most of the logistical issues had been resolved with the help of the guilds. They had enough provisions to last them three weeks without any outside source and enough materials to equip every soldier with basic necessities.
Akili further went on to explain that the 360 mundane combatants they gathered for the Smokeless Host had been instructed into their duties and rights. These had been divided into two regiments of 180 each, with each regiment consisting of six companies which was further divided into five banners of twelve each.
For each regiment, there was one cavalry company, with three light and two heavy banners.
The rest were going by foot, with two companies of light skirmishers armed with spears, shields and short bows, two companies of medium footmen with decent protection alongside composite bows, shields and sabers with four total banners of halberdiers. Lastly, there was one company full of heavily armored infantry with curved two-handed swords called greatsabers alongside some large axes and more halberds.
About half of the captains leading the banner were some kind of Alterator. Earth was by far the most picked element.
This alone made for a decent number of mages, but the desert cities had further collected a staggering number of 41 mages to their mage corps, 10 of which were actual Evokers, mostly fire and air. The others had a decent spread between Enchanters, Thaumaturges, a few lone Alterators and one single Constructor. Earth and to a lesser extent fire were by far the most common elements, with some air splashed in while there were only two water mages, one Enchantress and one Thaumaturge. Surprisingly, there was not a single nature mage and when he asked why, Aisha explained that no true son or daughter of the desert would ever choose a path that was directly tied to the Middle Kingdom, who had more nature and water mages than anything else.
Despite this, Arakiel couldn’t help but be impressed, for it was a truly sizable number of people. When he inquired about the levels, he was told that most didn’t know their levels as there was only one permanent temple to the Transcended in al-Aliriq while many had just met one of the wandering priests in order to pick their class.
Nonetheless, practically every mage had already unlocked their second rank of spells and many of the warriors had been training for years, even if they lacked actual experience in warfare.
Only the cavalry and heavy footmen companies were accomplished raiders with Middle kills to their name. Everyone else sought to follow in their footsteps.
Lastly, a retinue of about a hundred would see to the army’s supply, mostly consisting of merchants and workers with some few spouses and supposedly some of the recently captured Middle women.
Most soldiers were keen of adding to that list, he was told.
With these issues out of the way, Arakiel inquired why they hadn’t yet marched out. He was given an answer that left him a little stupefied, for he would’ve thought that it’d be the first and most pressing issue to address.
Apparently, the other two cities of the desert had each sent a champion in order to challenge al-Aliriq’s leadership of the Smokeless Host and today was to be the day where a battle would be held in order to determine whether Sultan Zimraan’s first claim remained in place.
The two apologized somewhat awkwardly, claiming they didn’t know when to mention it. Furthermore, it really shouldn’t be a big deal as he wasn’t the one who would need to fight. He just had pick a champion on his own and if he chose Aisha, then the other two champions would immediately forfeit because both jinnum intended to dedicate their eventual victory to her in order to prove their merit and thus ask her and Adila out.
Arakiel inquired whether that’d damage his standing which Aisha immediately refused, but Akili did point out that he’d likely be seen as a coward for even choosing a woman in the first place.
This brought about a little argument between the two, but fact of the matter was that the people of the desert considered it a man’s duty to protect and care their women, not hide behind them. In the end, Aisha remained stubborn, claiming she’d accept either outcome while Akili offered to act as Arakiel’s champion.
It implied that he considered himself a superior fighter to Arakiel, which was most likely true since the man was a Double Fire Evoker who had access to third rank spells, meaning he was at least level 5. His sister was a Double Fire-Air Alterator, an actual ascendant.
It was unsurprising, for akh and their descendants were well-renowned for their affinity to fire.
Nonetheless, Ezekiel ended up throwing his hat into the ring, claiming that none was better suited to serve as the Lord Executor’s champion than his right hand man, which was true.
Nonetheless, Arakiel was a bit doubtful considering the strength of their enemies, yet Ezekiel confidently assured him that he shouldn’t worry about it.
After a brief but intense staring contest, Arakiel agreed, feeling as though his friend needed this to banish some of the doubts that had started to creep in over the course of the last thirteen days.