The roiling void that was his shadow flowed across the battlefield, smothering cries and hiding troop movements from desperate eyes. He watched through the cloud as the other side tightened their lines, waiting for a rush of soldiers to emerge from the darkness. Instead, a volley of arrows caught them from the side, keeping them confused and static as the knots of fighters near them fell, shouting unheard for reinforcements.

The applications of his darkness in battle seemed endless, even if he mainly used the same tricks. Blind, separate, surround, surprise, or even retreat unseen when the enemy was too numerous to engage safely. It was no wonder that he’d been undefeated in his campaign. Enemy commanders could do little against someone who could hide the flow of battle.

Corinth sighed and turned away. This would seize the last shore-holdings of the Commodores, and the islands would revolt without the supplies and luxuries brought from the mainland. Conten had assured him of it. Politically, his old mentor was more snake than person, with drawbacks and benefits both.

Really, this endeavour would be written in stone if it weren’t for the University mages. You’d think striking the very foundation of their lives and rending the magic away from it would cow them, but apparently not. They rebuilt a half-mile down the road and were back to demands within a year.

He could smother that over time by giving favour to meek researchers, offering power in exchange for loyalty, and breeding out resistance as their ranks died off. One generation of turnover and they’d be an establishment tuned to his will. He could do it, if he weren’t dying. Quite an annoyance, that.

But it wasn’t a surprise in any sense. He’d limped away from the confrontation on the rooftop with high hopes, but the limp had never faded. After taking Myranel – Corinth, now, a confusing state of affairs – he’d started to feel itches under his skin, and every city thereafter had taken its piece from him in return. His hands were arthritic, fingers forever bent to hold the constructs that granted him his power, and he was hunched from sunrise to sunset. His vision had even started to blur, distant objects refusing to come into focus unless he shrouded his eyes in black mist. That would have consequences, he knew.

Still, the islands would hardly need his impetus to join the fold, and from there he was functionally without enemy. The leaders surrounding his small empire had been making overtures since he’d savaged the first real army to stand against him. With the Commodores gone, he could turn east at last.

Corinth limped into the command tent, a room filled with maps he didn’t need and advisors he mostly ignored. Standard military practices had been routinely discarded in favour of magic and trickery. The only person he wanted was at the back, sitting on a small chair as if conserving his energy for the battle they would now fight.

“Conten,” Corinth said, “the holdings are ours. We will be returning to the capital to plan the next push.”

“Could we have a word without the crowd, then?” Conten replied, deliberately raising his voice. “There are a few things I think are worth mentioning about the north before we go.”

Already they were the only ones staying still; by now people were past giving him what he wanted, and instead actively sought to please him. He wasn’t sure he wanted to have this conversation, though. He had no intention of going north, and he was sure Conten knew that. He frowned, but held his tongue until the last person scurried out. Obvious discord was no better.

“What needs to be said now that couldn’t be on the road?” he asked.

Conten blinked, and Corinth was sure the man was picking his words carefully. “Now that the coasts are claimed, I think it’s worth discussing what you intend for the near future.” He paused, but didn’t seem surprised when no answer was forthcoming. “Worth discussing, that is, because there are likely to be some problems.”

“What kind of problems?” Corinth asked through gritted teeth. He’d rarely seen his mentor so cagey, and this push was not an issue he wanted trouble on. He’d been laying the groundwork for eastern action for nearly five years, in one way or another.

“Let’s begin with the logistics. The last report given by your Scouts was they were approaching one hundred and fifty miles of paved road a few months ago. At that point they’d still found no signs of inhabitants, nor any rivers or lakes flowing eastward.” Conten was already relaxing in his chair, he noticed, having launched right into a lecture. “From this the scouts infer that the land, though mostly flat, slopes slightly upwards to the east. If true, we’ll be unlikely to find any easier mode of passage than paving the length.”

Corinth nodded. They’d hoped for an easier way, but ground-based convoys had always been likely. “Well, what’s the issue then?”

“The issue is that the scouts haven’t seen any significant change besides more arid land and fewer clouds as they’ve progressed. No weather that indicates mountains or even large hills, no obvious cloud patterns… They aren’t sure how much supplies will be needed, or what size convoy.”

“Is that just the summers? We’re nearly into winter, is it still so dry?”

Conten frowned and looked away. “There hasn’t been any change worth mentioning.”

Corinth let the silence hold for a moment. Something about the old man’s posture felt wrong. “Nothing to note, despite the seasons. You said that report was months ago, but what news has there been since?”

Conten’s lips twitched. “There hasn’t been any.”

Slowly, the implication the man was dancing around started to sink in. “Conten,” he said, speaking softly, “where did you send my scouts?”

Now the grin started to spread, revealing teeth one by one. “North.”

Corinth drew his blade of glass, marred now by a few notches in the blade, but still capable of cleaving flesh if the need arose. “I think you should explain.”

“Let me start with a point that should clarify a few things.” The lined face had lost its smile, and his eyes were dead as shadow. “You took my University from me, and that debt has never been forgotten.” He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, by all appearances uncaring of the world around him.

“Your expedition to the east, to learn about the culture your mother came from and find your answers? I’ve done everything I can to deny you it, along with the other two of your Trifecta. The University will never be given free reign to research again, not under your rule or divorced from it. None will forget your wars of magic. So we’ve had you craft a nation strong enough to defend it, while embroiling you in enough conflicts that you may never leave. Not now that you’re known so widely as the empire’s power on the battlefield.”

Conten let the silence linger, waiting for some reaction from him. Slowly, Corinth sank the dirt floor, heart heavy with the implications of what Conten was saying.

“So the negotiations with our northern neighbours?”

“Deals either refused or so hard-bargained to be more tribute than trade. A few whispers let slip about your decision to send the Scouts northward bound those who thought they could endure alone. I daresay your rule will make a coalition of worthy opposition; more than any lasting peace, certainly.”

In his chest, Corinth felt his heart slow beat by beat. A helplessness was washing through him, one not felt for years. Not since the days of the candles and endless failure. He remembered cast iron in his hands, burning until his they ached with the heat, but never alight, not for him. He remembered walking the outskirts of the University’s stone walls and wishing for the power to mould this world. And within the apathy, he felt that same kindling anger rising, the madness that would consume the world rather than accept that terms may be dictated to him. He laughed, thin and reedy, and felt more broken than the wrinkled man sitting in from of him.

Corinth rose from the dirt, forcing his joints to move through the pain and stiffness. “I’m cornered then,” he sighed, brushing a hooked hand through his hair. “You’re right, I’m not sure I’d make it to the east even if I set out today. But that doesn’t mean my work is done, not yet. It just means I get to make one last gamble.”

He looked at his mentor, the body position crafted to imply fearlessness, but saw the trembling in his hands. Corinth watched it worsen as the ink rolled down his sword, shadow mist wafting outwards like morning fog. He could imagine the heartbeat racing, a muscle desperately pulsing with death postponed. He raised his sword, and reached out to the only thing of importance in the room.

His hand rested lightly on the glass maw, his last gambit. “Hide,” he whispered, and for the first time the roiling shadow within it faltered. Before he could blink, the glass was just glass, crystalline and clear. He brought down his sword and the construct shattered.

-

Corinth sat in the workshop, watching jewellers sift through the chest of glass shards. He’d asked for them to set the pieces by the hundreds, every type of jewelry given a grain of the maw. A fragment of a fragment, a shred of a god’s will.

He turned from their precise toil, making beauty from the smallest of things, and set to his own piece of art. This was less precise but no less subtle, and he had an inkling that the two combined would cause some heartache long in the future.

In his bent hand he held a quill, dipping and scratching at the parchment with painful lethargy, but he felt at least one copy must be made by his hand. To make something of import, there had to be a corresponding sacrifice of time or effort or pain. And slowly, painfully, he made one.

This empire we have built, I will not be leading for long. But while I may pass from these battlefields into the hands of our gods, know that our purpose remains beyond me. Know that there is more to be done.

In the years to come we will face grave threats, armies that seek to oppose us and heretics that desire to cast down our gods. Through these trials, we shall trust in those who gave us the tools to forge this nation: the University of Derudt shall go on, an institution to arm and support our soldiers before all else. The Speakers, Strivers, and Seekers, the Fateweavers and Grievers, the Growers and the Bleeders; though some are known above the rest, it is magic that will lead this empire and guide it, and all who practice it must be revered.

For this reason, I leave to the care of the Trifecta my sword. They are the caretakers of my empire, leading through wisdom and forethought until such time as one who can wield it emerges. When a sword edged in darkness rises atop their steps, then will our next leader have come.

And I leave with a warning to those who shall come to be: let yourselves not grow complacent. Our grasp will not falter so long as we strive, and miracles may lie in other lands as we have found them here. Expand, conquer, and search; our future is ever further. Let all who live within these borders know.

So it must be.

-Corinth

He looked up from the page, scrawled writing barely legible. He’d have to have the scribes dictate their copies to him before they were sent out to ensure the wording matched.

His mind rolled through the steps he’d have to take, the precautions, and the means to his ends, but he cut it short. There’d be time to worry later. As he looked down at the page, he felt laughter bubbling up, wry and full of satisfaction.

“That should set some wheels in motion,” he muttered to himself, and slowly walked from the room with the parchment in hand.

And a scant few months later, he died.