Suggested Listening

"I don't know why you continue this resistance." A casual brush of his hand elicited a hiss through the clenched teeth of his half-sister. He dragged his gloved hand down Juna's jaw, leaving a trail of broken skin, cooked flesh, and smoke behind. "Then, you always were a little off. Perhaps the rumors are true, perhaps you enjoy my ministrations?" He moved down her neck, her chest, soon he'd crest over her breasts, the first overtly sexual step in this drawn out process.

He had no particular love of torture, nor any puerile interest in his sibling, but such was the burden of dealing with a rebellious city. She wasn't the one he was trying to break. If he was, he wouldn't have wasted time on torturing her. He was confident he could torture her to death a dozen times over without breaking her, but she wasn't the weak link in this chain.

"Stop!" Garit shouted, struggling against the magic-suppression bonds which held him. "I'll talk! Just leave her alone."

"Don't you dare." Juna gasped for breath. "There is nothing. He could do to us. That will compare to what I'll do to you if you talk." Her statement was made with utmost sincerity, for she hated nothing so much as a traitor. She glared, as defiant as ever, at her elder brother. "You may as well kill us now."

"Careful, I might take that as a challenge." A minuscule pulse of power heated the glove again. He would have to limit the damage, so that the healer could fix her before permanent scars were left behind, at least ones of the nature that numbed her flesh against further pain. He held little hope that this would be the session where the pair broke. They might try to pretend it, to feed him lies, but soon the lies would be dismissed and he would be that much closer to the truth.

"Elruin!" A soldier was wise enough to shout her name as he entered. Then he fell to one knee and kept his head bowed low. It was bad enough that people knew that he resorted to torturing his siblings, he would have preferred no one knew the method used. He had power to spare, but legitimacy would continue to be a struggle until Enge gave him his final acknowledgment. "We have a lead. It comes from Morks, but appears credible."

Juna's head tilted up just a little. Fear, concern, all were obvious to Claron in watching her features. She was the fighter, but she lacked the social finesse of her brother, and that was also part of why it was her that he targeted for torture.

That she seemed nervous suggested they might know something about the girl's movements, something which they feared morks might discover. This, more than anything, gave Claron confidence that this was the moment he'd waited for. "Uewatsu, to me." He braced himself for the wave of cold discomfort that came with rift magic. He waited, then grew impatient. "I meant immediately."

Suggested Listening

"I am an old woman." Her cane came through the hole in nowhere before she did. "Children these days, no respect for their elders." Her faded, tangled purple hair covered her face, and her black cloak covered most of the rest of her body, but the wrinkles on her hand showed she was of advanced age. "What do you need of me, my lord."

He ignored her sarcasm and disrespect. Let his siblings think whatever they liked, for they would never speak of it to the public. He turned his attention to the kneeling soldier, chosen for discretion as all his messengers were. "What did the morks reveal?"

"Little, my lord," he answered. "They claim they intercepted a message from a child necromancer, sent to Enrest. They claim to know where she's hiding, and her future plans. Two of their number wait there, for you to bribe them for the rest of their knowledge."

"Enrest?" Claron kept one eye on his siblings as he pretended to consider the situation. "They must have fled to dwarven lands, Sonhome is the most obvious possibility." They provided no specific tell, so he decided they didn't know the reason the girl was there aside the obvious.

"It will take some effort for me to open a gate for your armies of that distance."

"No, it would be a fool's errand." Claron knew of Sonhome's guardians, and had little desire to learn their capabilities. If the morks knew what Elruin's plans were, he had reason to believe the girl would leave the city at some point, or that he could use the knowledge to find her other allies. "Take me to Enrest."

"As you command."

Claron hated going through portals, and the stomach-churning distortions that came from moving from one place to another in the blink of an eye. He remained tall, proud, but had to take several seconds after his translocation to avoid losing the contents of his stomach. Instead, he took stock of the two morks waiting before him. One was old, scarred, a true veteran. The other was smaller, a female.

"You came." "Such power." "Unlike any we've ever seen." "But the child of ebon hair and purple eyes." "The girl who sings of death." "She who smells of grave soil." "She eludes you." "We can tell you where to find her." "We can reveal her secrets."

"Five head of cattle." Claron's patience for mork chattering lasted as long as it took for him to recover from the stomach-shredding magic he subjected himself to. "Fifteen more if your information reveals her exact location and plans."

The pair looked at each other. "Double it." "Yes, double." "Valuable child." "You need her." "You need u-rk"

Claron's eye socket burned as he called upon the magical artifact which held the will of his god. Before they could say another word, he had a hand on each of their throats, squeezing their larynges shut. "Here's an offer. How about if I don't execute the both of you for wasting my time?" He loosened his grasp.

"Northwest of Sonhome!" "They found magic!" "A way to escape from Engeval." "A magic portal." "They could go anywhere in the world." "They prepare even as we speak!" "No time to hurt us!" "Hurry hurry!"

"Cowards." Claron shoved the two beasts, each weighing more than a horse, away from him. "Uewatsu, does this sound familiar to you?"

The woman remained on the other side of the portal, but her voice carried through. "It is... plausible." A painful, interminable pause followed. "There are still old gates, damaged but functional. One lies in the direction they describe, but I know not how they learned of its existence. Few living mortals remember the secrets of the Isylan empire, I know of all of them by name, and not one has contacted the girl."

"Living?" Claron considered the claim. "What of the dead? This is a necromancer Enge has set us on a quest for, after all."

"I know little of the art, but I suppose it is possible," Uewatsu said. "Or perhaps the dwarves saved more ancient records than I had been led to believe. Here, let me show you the gateway."

Light shimmered in front of his face, as a one way portal was constructed in real time. Uewatsu's cooperation was unreliable at times, but her abilities were unlike any he had ever heard of before. Soon he was looking down upon an empty, all but lifeless patch of soil and rock. He recognized the black haired girl in a moment. She sat upon the ground, playing a violin.

Nearby, a dwarf worked on carving a stone which looked to have been dragged to the location not long before. A man stood nearby, erecting a wooden post.

"They're trying to lure me into attacking directly, playing on overconfidence."

"I do not see it," Uewatsu said. "Though I admit military theory was never a talent of mine. But do enlighten me, for the sake of scholarly curiosity."

"On the surface, it seems like they're unawares. Perhaps setting up for the ritual to exploit this portal." he said. "One step beneath the surface, you can see that the earth near the boulder was disturbed, freshly dug. I bet they hid a nasty surprise there. The pillar is at least half illusory, another weapon in disguise. And the girl's violin is a known magical weapon. She's not relaxing, nor is she engaged in active ritual, she's drawing power together for a battle."

"I see, clever."

"Imbecilic and transparent," Claron muttered. "I refuse to believe anyone who could elude me this long would make such amateurish traps. Which means these traps are meant to be seen, in order to hide a real surprise that I cannot see. How dangerous is this gateway?"

Uewatsu took her time to answer, as usual. "It's of little direct danger, so long as one is not fool enough to attempt to traverse the gate without a rift mage to guide the process. One might find himself caught between worlds, unable to return to this realm. A sailor lost at sea until he drowns in the waves."

Not for the first time, Claron questioned the wisdom of using Uewatsu's portals to move across his empire. Enge's empire, he reminded himself. "Interesting, and can they control the gate to capture or otherwise trick me into stepping through?"

"I can't imagine how," Uewatsu said. "Even a proper rift mage could not force the gate to move. Any being with such power could slay you in direct combat, without need for tricks and traps. And it's impossible to walk through a gate without attuning yourself to it first. A process that is both slow, and voluntary."

"Then the gate is their method to escape, if their traps fail," Claron said. "They hope to kill me, or if not then they hope to trick me into revealing a weakness they can exploit later. Can you track them through this gate, to the point were they exit?"

"With ease, but I hold my doubts that they shall ever emerge. Without power equivalent in strength to your own, they would never be able to fight their way through to the other side. There is but one fate for those who enter the rift unprepared."

Claron clenched his fists. He needed Elruin to prove himself to Enge, and it was never made clear what would happen should Elruin die without being properly sacrificed. Perhaps Enge would accept that as sacrifice enough, or perhaps he would be branded a failure and see his blessings stripped from him. It was not a gamble he wished to take while options remained.

The idea that the child acquired a power to rival his own was dismissed as irrelevant. If she had, then he had already failed in his quest and it would be better to die on the battlefield than wait for the day Enge grew impatient with his failure to get results.

"Open a voice rift to Renar. Now." He was the one Claron hated most, for his unfettered ambition. He was also the most competent of all the Ghosts of Sorvel, and the most well liked.

"My lord?" The man was alert, attentive, hungry.

"We found Elruin's location," Claron said. "She's attempting to flee using a source of magic similar to Uewatsu's. Are your men ready?"

"In your service, always." True, but only for the moment. Claron was well aware that the first thing Renar would attempt with Elruin would be to take the child to Enge himself, and perform the sacrifice first in the hopes that Enge would transfer the title of Chosen.

"Then go, and know that Enge is always watching." As am I. If Elruin's trap failed, then it would be a simple matter to wait for Renar's double-cross. If her trap succeeded, then Renar would die and he would step in once the trap had been sprung.