Suggested Listening

"Aight, so here's the deal," Scratch said from his perch in the dead mork's eye. It had been dead from day one, else he couldn't have marched it into the nonviolence zone without losing control. Another of his many, many secrets. "Lissa says they ain't gonna do a thing to help."

"What? Why!" Erra stepped forward, almost put her hands on the monster, then stepped back. She didn't know it was dead, nor what might provoke it to wake up in spite of Scratch's control. "Lissa was always a friend to us."

"Yeah, you don't hear what's going on in the streets." Scratch leaned back, as if sitting in a hot tub, instead of a dead monster's eye socket. "Half the city's convinced Claron's a god, some are saying he's a Scion of Enge."

"That's absurd!" Erra shouted. "He can't be! How do the Truthsayers not see it? How is he not cast out for heresy?"

"Near as I can tell, he never claimed to be a god or scion. Whenever anyone brings it up in his presence, he says he's nothing more than a servant of Enge. Which doesn't refute the godhood theory, but doesn't support it either. Entek na Arila. Which they eat up like the colon leeches they are. Besides, who's going to cast him out? You are the only person in the city with the power to scratch him."

Erra looked away in shame. "I can't. I'm... I'm not a warrior. I don't know how to use Lyra in battle."

"You don't need to," Scratch said. "She can rip his head off on her own, then we can take turns shitting down the neck-hole. Well, you can, I'm somewhat limited in that department."

Elruin reached her hand over to touch Erra's arm. "It's okay, you don't have to fight. It's better if you don't."

Erra looked back, a doubting but hopeful look in her watery eyes. "How do you know?"

"I felt them fight, before." Elruin's voice dropped to a whisper as she remembered how their collision drove her to the ground in pain. "I don't know who's stronger, but Claron wasn't lying about the city being destroyed if they fight again. Everyone else will die."

"We better listen to her," Scratch said. Everything had gone as he'd planned. "She's Revealed, makes her the expert on gaging magic power. Besides, she knows a lot more about the sarite shields than I do. She's helped fix them before." He propped his little necromancer up without a single lie, or anyone realizing that was his goal all along.

Erra looked at the necromancer in a new light. With Lyra around, it was sometimes easy to forget there was a host of beings between normal people like herself, and godlike powers like Lyra and Claron. "You know how to fix the walls?"

"A little," Elruin said. "I helped on the farm where I grew up. Before they tried to feed me to morks."

"That is messed up." Erra gave a small, self-deprecating chuckle. "Look at me, moping about as if I have problems. Overnight I went from a slum girl wondering where my next meal was coming from, to controlling more power than most queens. People would, have, killed to be in my position."

She stood. "I'm going to take stock of my so-called kingdom. I guess that makes the two of you my Archmage and spymaster, officially."

"I can help with farming, too!" Elruin offered.

"I guess it wouldn't hurt to have some variety to our diet," Erra said. "But unless you know a way to carry seeds in for us, there's nothing to farm here. Maybe Grandmother can help us with some wild herbs, but I'm afraid that's all we have for now."

"I'd love to help, but I'm notably lacking in bodies that can cross the barricades." Scratch left out the part that if he tried to carry seeds, they'd be killed in minutes. "But as your spymaster, let my first advice be the following: never hire advisors who are more loyal to each other than they are to you. Elruin's one thing, but more regents have died that way than I care to name."

"How many of them had Lyra?"

"None that I know of, but plenty had something just as good. Claron reminds me a lot of one that I knew personally. To make the story short, she learned the hard way that when people lick your boots, they're looking up your skirt for a place to shove the knife."

Erra considered that pearl of wisdom coated in Scratch's usual coarseness. It didn't strike her as too different from some of the drama that happened in the camp, especially where romantic entanglements were concerned. "That is something to consider. Thank you."

"As I float," he answered back. He watched Erra walk away, then chuckled. "When you do things right, nobody can be sure if you've done anything at all."

"I don't get it."

"I'll explain when you're older," Scratch said. "But while we're here, got a message through to Lemia. She's got a way to get us back and forth, but there's one small problem. She can use it once, one way, some sort of teleportation trick that'll get plugged right away. She can get you out, or get some supplies in, whatever you need. Up to you if you want to waste it by telling Erra and getting those seeds, but I say we keep it for an emergency. Eating tree grass never killed anyone, I assume."

"What's happening at the school? Is Lemia safe?"

"Yeah, she says she's keeping her head down and her eyes open. Smart girl, keep her around, never trust her. Seems like her classmates are terrified, and some have committed suicide. Also, one of the teachers was arrested, official charge was hoarding wealth, but Lemia thinks they're looking for some big secret or something. She has no idea what."

Suggested Listening

"I think I can answer that question." Light and magic warped, shimmered, then unwarped. Calenda stood there in civilian clothes, appearing tired but in one piece. "He's hoping our city contains a clue to how the sarite shields in Engewal were designed. Even with his power, he can't break the capital's defenses without a long, protracted, bloody siege."

"Cali!" Elruin jumped up, to give the older girl a hug. Her lifesight revealed numerous injuries old and fresh in her elder sister. "Where have you been? Are you okay? What happened? I tried to save you! I'm sorry!" She started to cry.

"Back away! She's an enemy agent!" Elruin stepped back due to Scratch's warning. She tried to bring up her magic to defend herself, but the power of the peace field prevented it.

"Are you really Cali?" Elruin didn't think her lifesight could be fooled that way. Hiding from her notice was different from creating an illusion that could make someone else look like her.

"I knew it wouldn't take long for you to figure it out." Cali slid her sleeve up, to reveal an intricate magical ink pattern on her arm. "To make my own long story short, this is a slave bond. I'd give you three guesses, but you should only need two."

"I'm going with 'not Claron'," Scratch said. "This doesn't come across as his style. And I bet you don't want to hear congratulations on your marriage."

"Lord Garit?" Elruin took the time to study the markings as they spoke. She had little experience with mind magic, but it was a very complex script. One which she would like to study, to apply to her dollies some day. For now, she was distracted by the sense of betrayal she felt toward the twins.

"I'm sorry!" She rushed back to Cali, to hold her and comfort her as best she could. "I tried to save you! I tried so hard, but there were so many and I was tired and!"

Cali stroked the back of her head, hesitant but gentle. "I know. I know you tried. Everything will be alright, I promise."

Elruin clutched Cali harder. "I'm going to find him and make him cry forever!" She wasn't sure how, she knew she didn't have the strength to do so, and even if she did the nonviolence aura made it impossible to imagine how she might accomplish her goal.

"Don't be too harsh on him," she said. "He did it, in part, to save my life. We both want Lord Claron gone, and so long as we're both alive, we have a chance to make that day come. He hasn't forced me to do anything I didn't want, except the vows themselves."

"Which brings us to why you're here, right, Sis?"

"I'm under orders to do everything in my power to get Ell to leave the shelter, so she can be sacrificed to Enge." Calenda forced a smirk. "If that sounds familiar, it's because they based the whole thing off the last time this happened to me."

Elruin squeezed even harder "I'm so sorry."

"It's not your fault," she said. "I think I would have stumbled into something like this sooner or later anyway. Garit's wanted me since we were children, and I... may have taken advantage of that fact once or twice. This was his chance, and he took it, but if it wasn't now it would have happened some day. Let us focus on taking advantage of this disaster. Based on the last time this happened, the best way to convince you to leave is to be completely honest with you."

"That is the most ridiculous loophole," Scratch muttered. "It can't be real."

"The spell's a sloppy expansion made under imperfect conditions stacked on another sloppy spell made under imperfect conditions. The fact that it functions at all and hasn't driven me insane is a mystery. Or maybe this is normal when it comes to mind control magic. I've sometimes wondered why nobody ever built an army of enslaved soldiers."

"Not saying I trust you, but let's start with the obvious question. How much of that Chosen of Enge propaganda does Claron believe? I'd like to know if he's a dangerous fanatic or a dangerous liar. Can't deal with one the way you deal with the other."

"I don't know," Cali admitted. "From what I understand, he was never all that devout, but that was before he died and received that artifact. Whatever happened then is the key to all of this. I can tell you that his artifact is the real deal, however, a true Treasure of Enge, with all the power and prestige it implies. Anyone Enge deems unworthy will die upon touching it."

"So he's got Enge's left testicle to replace his eye?" Scratch scoffed. "Ain't the first to glimpse beyond, then come back crazy. Or get hold of powerful artifacts to the same result. A double-whammy could break even a strong mind."

"What I can't explain, is that Enge usually operates through the priests, or the obsidian pillars. He's never sent messengers before. He wrote notes. The smart decision might be to escape, then march to the Throne ourselves. We can ask Enge directly if he wants Elruin sacrificed."

"Which, if he does, puts us right there where you can push her into the volcano, huh?"

Calenda sighed. "It would fulfill the slavebond, true. Or it will be revealed that Enge never wanted Elruin sacrificed, and thus break the slavebond. Either way, I'm free."

"Which I'm sure Claron is waiting for. If we get past him, we all die on the march up a mountain of monsters," Scratch countered. "Myself excluded, maybe. It's a terrible, terrible idea. Even if we do make it to Enge, if the volcano wants toasted necromancer for dinner, he can climb into his own hole and die! The gods may have power and knowledge to spare, but there's nothing special about them. They have conflicts and wars of their own, they fear death, more than one has even pulled themselves back from death as I have. If a god wants to kill Elruin, let him come do it himself."

Elruin stared at Scratch for a moment. This was the first she'd ever heard of a god becoming undead, or for that matter dying. It was something she'd need to consider in the future.

"And violence isn't possible, so I can't try to drag Ell out." Hands trembling, Cali pushed Elruin back. "I'll leave now, recover, and come back in a few days. Maybe I can think of a way to convince you to come out by then."

As her two friends argued, Elruin was busy studying the runes. She had a way to save Cali, but she wasn't certain Cali would want it since it meant she would have to die. Even then, the means Elruin would need to use to bring her back would horrify her adoptive sister, savior, and best friend.