Amalyse couldn’t help but stare down into the enormous canyon. It yawned wide, a seemingly depthless chasm where the darkness clung far too close to the surface. Though, that could be attributed to the fact that evening wasn’t far off now.
“Are we all here?” the thin, bald man from the Ordorian clan asked.
He had been elected as the interim spokesperson for the Archnoble clan. With all their leaders either dead or incapacitated, and with the ones in power refusing to accept Avathene Stannerig’s leadership via marriage to last the Clanmaster, they had chosen to represent themselves as a committee.
“I believe so,” the Stannerig Clanmistress said. The slightly disheveled state of her rich robes and the obvious missing jewellery didn’t diminish her beauty. “Well, almost…”
Amalyse looked around. The survivors of the final battle were here, as were the contingents from the various other clans. An old man from the Tarciel clan was here, along with two others Amalyse had seen before. One of them was the woman with Rieren—Silomene.
The other was a slightly older, severe-looking man she had seen with the Clanmistress before.
Rollo was here with Amalyse, though he wasn’t paying much attention to proceedings. It was simply a matter of formality. There were a few representatives from some minor clans as well, those who swore fealty to the Archnobles and were often no more than offshoots.
What looked like officials from Falstrom were present as well. Wealthy merchants, important dignitaries, and other such figures. They had only come here, over a day after the battle had ended, because everyone had ensured the danger was truly over. The battlefield was no place for civilians such as them, but no one wished to miss the determining of the Shatterlands’ fate.
Well, no one, save Rieren.
For a few moments, Amalyse had dared to hope that Avathene was indeed waiting for her best friend. For, arguably, the person who had saved the Shatterlands and had allowed them all to meet here.
That wasn’t the case. Instead, the man who eventually joined them was one Gorint Malloh, an important official for the Archnobles. Amalyse had seen him in Falstrom once or twice. He wasn’t alone, however. It would have been odd for the Clanmistress to wait just for him. No, the real last attendee of their meeting was a Masked Avatar of the Forborne Emperor.
Things immediately turned tense. Several people shifted, murmurs rose and fell like ocean waves, and a few people even briefly grasped their weapons.
Amalyse understood it. An Avatar… from what Rieren had said, the one that had visited Lionshard Sect had been targeting her closest friend. He had even admitted that the imperial court was in league with the gods. So, of course, the presence of one here set everyone on edge.
She frowned at Avathene. The woman had seemed so fair. So clear-headed with her heart in the right place. Why in the world was she working with someone like the Avatar? Was rebuilding the Shatterlands’ relationship with the imperial court worth entertaining an Avatar?
“What is the meaning of this, Clanmistress?” the Ordorian spokesperson asked. “Not only did you decide to hold the meeting in this god-blasted battlefield, you also dared to invite an Avatar?”
Instead of the Clanmistress, it was the Avatar herself who spoke. “I assure you, my good fellow, that an Avatar does not need invitations. But fear not, I will only intervene if necessary.”
The spokesperson blanched. He looked like he was about to say something he would dearly regret, but Avathene spoke before he could make the situation any more fraught than it already was.
“Let us speak of actual matters,” Avathene said. “You are still intent on denying my rightful rule of the Ordorian clan, yes?”
That was a good ploy. She was redirecting his anger from the presence of the Avatar to her audacity at thinking she could rule over both the Archnoble clans in the Shatterlands.
Amalyse certainly understood the Ordorian clan members’ apprehension. The only one who had oversight over more than one clan was the Emperor himself. For someone else to lay claim to multiple clans’ seats of power, especially that of Archnoble clans, would set a dangerous precedent.
Though, it was ironic. The best way to show their disapproval of the Emperor for their treatment by the imperial court would be by letting Avathene be Clanmistress of both clans.
Unfortunately, they were more concerned with their own greed and claims to power.
“Of course,” the spokesperson said, receiving some approving nods from his fellow clan members. “We cannot let an Ordorian scion run our clan. That is preposterous.”
“Your claim to the seat through the bond of marriage is flimsy at best,” an old woman said. “We will not let our great clan be subject to the whims and desires of another clan.”
Avathene tutted. “I would always treat the Ordorian clan as an equal to the Stannerig clan. Though, I suppose I cannot force you to believe that. Even if I promised to relinquish the Stannerig clan’s seat, you wouldn’t accept me. However, that leaves you with no one qualified to run an Archnoble clan. I am afraid not a one of you is strong enough for the position of Clanmaster.”
That was also true. Even if they decided to vote among themselves and prop up one of their own as the Clanmaster, it wouldn’t work. A Clanmaster needed to be strong enough to protect the clan from any grave threats, and none of them could hold a candle to Avathene.
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If they all refused to accept her as Clanmistress of the Ordorian, she could simply invade the Ordorian clan and take it over by force. This meeting was to prevent that more than anything.
Something Amalyse agreed with heartily. All this fighting and sacrifice shouldn’t result in just another war. She hadn’t given her blood and her time just for another unending series of battles to tear the Shatterlands apart.
That was also, as Amalyse suspected, part of why the Avatar was here.
“Are you threatening us?” the spokesperson asked quietly. More bristling, more hands going to weapons, though no one was dumb enough to draw any. “The Ordorian clan is more than self-sufficient. Unless you intend to end six centuries of peace for your ambition.”
One of the merchants cleared his throat, though the portly man looked uncomfortable at needing to speak up. “We are in a time of upheaval, my lords and ladies. I would dearly implore that we not descend into any further bloodshed.”
“I wouldn’t be ending any peace at all,” Avathene said. “The lion does not set the forest ablaze to kill the ants. It only stomps out the anthill, while life goes on peacefully for the rest of the land.” Her eyes sharpened. “Besides, I am not the one who began this conflict.”
“We didn’t either!” the spokesperson said. “It was that—that monster. And the Banishedborn.”
Amalyse had heard the reports. She’d been one of the ones to start a part of them, after all. Along with the other survivors of the battle, she had given a true account of what had happened in the battle against the Dreadflood. While much of it was surprising and intriguing for various reasons, there was one piece of information that had truly stuck out.
The Banishedborn who had appeared at the end had been a citizen of Falstrom.
Amalyse hadn’t been apprised of all the following details that came about from the resulting investigation, but she had picked a few things up. The Banishedborn had been posing as some sort of tavernkeeper, running a local establishment that the former Archnoble Clanmasters had liked to visit. They had been close to the tavernkeeper, according to other frequenters.
Naturally, the conclusion came to the fact that they had been influenced by the Banishedborn to enact their horrid plan to murder their own children in order to reclaim their positions as Clanmasters.
Then, it turned out that Mercion Ordorian was already being manipulated, and by an Abyssal too. From what Amalyse had heard, it was Rieren’s doing.
Amalyse shook her head with a sad smile. Of course, it was Rieren who had revealed that.
Before arriving at the battle, she had attacked Mercion in the middle of a meeting between the two Archnoble clans, and with Gorint Malloh’s help, she had wounded him enough to reveal the Abyssal’s corruption within him. It had apparently been blatant enough that even his most ardent supporters hadn’t been able to deny the obvious Abyssal influence.
So now, they had taken Mercion away. Amalyse wasn’t sure where, but she was pretty certain he was under heavy guard while he recovered from the wounds he had suffered. Rieren had been smart enough not to kill him outright.
“That only lends credit to my side of the matter,” the Clanmistress said. She was clearly resisting the urge to rub her temples. “If you are incompetent enough to end up working with Abyssals, if you only end up following the very ones you despise, then your entire movement is nothing but a sham. Ones such as you would only lead you clan to ruin.”
The verbal lash made the others gasp. Avathene was clearly done holding back. Her face might look pristinely neutral and diplomatic as ever, but she was nothing if not entirely exhausted by her dealings with her political opponents.
It was having an affect too. Most of the other attendants were now looking approvingly at the Clanmistress. They all recognized she had a strong point.
Amalyse smiled. Avathene had almost secured victory, just as she had known the woman would. Powerful, determined, and clever, Avathene was an ideal Clanmistress. Oh, if her mother had seen this display, she would have lectured Amalyse on how to be a proper scion for weeks.
All poor Avathene didn’t have going for her was her failed cultivation never allowing for further power, and that failure had cost her health dearly.
The spokesperson desperately looked around for allies but not even his own clan members would look at him. And then his eyes landed on the Avatar with a desperate avarice. “You—you dare claim the high ground.” He turned back to Avathene with an attempt at a glare. “When you work with their kind? When you can never be strong enough to stop them?”
He pointed a daring, accusing finger at the Masked Avatar.
Avathene frowned. “Be careful of how far you go.”
The warning went unheeded. If anything, the spokesperson turned even more livid. “We all know you intend to whore yourself out to the Emperor. That’s how he gets his bastards, doesn’t he?”
“Mind your tongue,” the Avatar said. The words were brisk, polite, without a hint of anger, but the threat was clear all the same. “I will overlook it this once, but take care.”
“Ha! Take care, she says. You can blame me for my Clanmasters being influenced by Banishedborn, and you can blame me for following my scion who was apparently being controlled by an Abyssal. Yet, I cannot blame you when you are cooperate with one who is no less worse, who works hand in glove with the very ones who nearly destroyed us all?”
The last bit was almost shouted. It had the desired effect, because in the end, he wasn’t wrong. Amalyse had been there when the Gravemark Puppeteer had informed them all that the imperial court had been infiltrated by the gods and their Banishedborn.
With the Emperor and the imperial court acting hand in hand, it was nearly impossible to argue that the Avatars weren’t influenced by the gods too. There was proof of that anyway. After all, the Avatars had been roaming the Elderlands to round up, apprehend, and, if needed, eliminate those who had stood against the gods in the previous timeline.
That was why Rieren had been one of their primary targets. Still was, as far as Amalyse knew.
Despite the accusation, Avathene held onto her equanimity with ease. “If it is true, then we will cease cooperating with the Avatar. As of yet, we haven’t verified such rumours—”
“Rumours!” The spokesperson turned to Gorint Malloh. “Tell us, Malloh. You were the one who led the investigation. You were the one to discover the truth about the Banishedborn in the tavern, and the one who showed us that young lord Mercion was being controlled by an Abyssal. Likewise, you’ve known about this Avatar’s business all along, haven’t you?”
Amalyse tensed. The situation was turning more and more precarious. With the spokesperson’s challenge, neither Avathene nor the Avatar could simply disregard his question without appearing weak. It was all up to Gorint Malloh.
He was silent for a while. Even his eyes were closed, his face pinched in thought as though he was weighing which words would cause the least commotion.
“Speak!” the spokesperson barked. “The longer you withhold the truth, the more you tacitly admit that I am right!”
He could have lied. He could have decided to side with the Clanmistress he so favoured and things would have gone smoothly enough. The spokesperson would have lost and Avathene, backed by a Masked Avatar—and thus, the Emperor himself—would have ascended to controlling two Archnoble clans here in the Shatterlands.
Except, there was one more interruption they hadn’t considered just yet. That even Amalyse hadn’t foreseen.
Silk walked up from behind Gorint Malloh on silent footsteps, clamping a hand down on his astonished shoulder to make him flinch. She was smiling brightly. “Yes, let’s tell everyone the truth, shall we?”