With each passing day, questions fester.

While the Conclave initially denied any knowledge of the elections in Lumia, the illustrious regency now calls an emergency session to discuss the matter. Are we to believe that the scheming Houses were caught flat-footed?

No, dear readers, this represents one more source of duplicity from a Conclave of depravity!

The Conclave of Nobles Held in Regency Unto the True King met in the foremost symbol of Aure. Before Ruhum ever called itself a kingdom, the god of Fire took his hammer to the earth. Where he struck, there arose a grand statehouse of alabaster and gold, crowned by a stained-glass dome.

It still endured, unstained, in the modern day. The capital, Mel, rose around in its shadow, and the crowded streets choked every approach with traffic on busy mornings.

Like the Cathedral of Fire, this building withstood every onslaught of storm, hail, or blade. In one famous incident, a prank gone quite awry sent a cannonball careening into the glass dome; the shot bounced.

Known in this time simply as the Conclave, the statehouse functioned as the administrative center of both the religion and the Houses. It was divided into three wings: the west housed museum to Aure; the east administered the church (Inquisition not withstanding); between the past and future, the Conclave of Nobles guided the nation.

The noble assembly was a single grand hall, three floors tall, that hosted two galleries. The floors were tiled marble, and grand tapestries flanked grander windows. Though there was no permanent seating, a stage, a podium, and dozens of pews were neatly laid in waiting.

Each Lord or Lady claimed their seat according to a system of rank and pull arcane enough to drive a tax accountant mad. Meanwhile, the Auren priests claimed the second-floor gallery for their own, providing the religious attestation to the proceedings below.

From the third floor, commoners – including those who were once noble – squinted down at the game they could never play. Today, exactly a week after the rumors of elections first broke, that gallery groaned under the crowd. A score came to witness the drama as the Conclave met to debate the upstart notion of representation for the common folk.

Like most nobles, Alisandra arrived midmorning. She slipped from her car with a scowl on her lips and a navy shawl draped around her neck. She wore a traditional gown of white silk, cinched tight at her waist and cascading from her hips. A lilac flower rested behind one ear, and her hair twined down her back with as many waves as her dress.

She had been awake since the crack of dawn, preparing for Conclave. The drive from Lumia took three hours, assuming no cows on the road. The assembly could run until dusk, and the afterparty would drag well into the night. When all of that finished, she would have to endure the long drive home with nothing to see but wheat and stars.

‘Don’t worry, dear,’ Father assured me. ‘Your duties as House Lady will trifling – nothing but an excuse for the occasional brunch!’

Winding through the crowd, Sebastian caught her in that surly thought. “Do not scowl, great Lady, or the sky might dim. Look to the good fortune of life: I found a parking spot only two blocks away!”

She rolled her eyes. “Let us get this over with.”

They marched up the wide steps. The atrium within housed a procession of past heroes, though none of Aure himself. Foremost, of course, was the first true king. The figure knelt, arms upstretched to receive the sword of kings from an unseen Aure.

“Looking good as always,” Sebastian murmured to the statue, a rote greeting. Some private joke, never shared.

Alisandra ignored his muttering. “Try to be prompt this time? I rather dislike marching around the commons in these clothes only to find you chatting up the little old ladies and feeding the ducks.”

“As you will it, so mote it be,” the angel of witness intoned.

“It had best,” she groused. “The papers spent a week fretting over the ‘poor lost lamb Mishkan’ last time.”

She was quite young for a Lady; she could scarcely afford to allow the yellow media frame her as a child led by the hand by her own servants.

“The papers do not see you,” Sebastian reassured cryptically.

She scowled. If I ordered him to behave like a proper servant, would he? After a moment, she grimaced. Yes, and he would behave with such utter propriety I would soon fantasize of throttling him.

“Very well. Off with you.”

He bowed, formal and sincere, and departed to find the other servants. After all, a Conclave was a battleground for the servants every bit as much as the masters.

Yet the help lingered in the atrium rather than following the Lords further. By church decree, only the master of a House could render service within the Conclave’s stateroom – an artifact of a time when reading and writing were only for the gentry. The purpose faded, but the ritual remained.

There were other, more pragmatic reasons to forbid the Livery, but that was not a topic for public conversation.

Alisandra steeled herself and strode forward. She passed into the rainbow beam that spilled from Aure’s blessed dome, and she shivered at its touch. Aure was long vanished, but the light of his Works still rang with ancient power: a fire restrained, searing just beyond her skin, captured in the edge between light and glass.

He granted them refugee, and they sentenced him to godhood. Did he understand the hopes they would pile upon him when he saved the small folk of a fire-ravaged land?

Would she learn the answer when she found her own power?

Beyond the dome, she passed through the dark corridor into the stateroom. The Conclave rang with hundreds of voices, all polished smooth and sharp. The days of duels in the chamber were memory, and men in these days used letterhead when they drew blood.

She skirted the perimeter, mapping her path with care. This battlefield hosted plenty of dangers: the fortified position from which a group of old men chattered; the wide plains between aisles where a stray Lady might be hunted down; the shadowed recess where the cluster of Lords her own age lurked.

Try as she might to ignore such matters, Alisandra remained the unwed Lady of a fading House.

She might as well have been a limping rabbit to certain hungry eyes.

Today, they noted her passage, but none hunted. Perhaps they were full from a prior meal.

If her seat was based on her single vote, Alisandra would have been consigned to a far, dark corner. As the oldest House in Ruhum, she instead enjoyed the privilege of choice.

She chose her customary seat in the very first row of pews…the one beside the demon of Indulgence.

“The blue shawl again? Are you looking to generate a scandal?” Mirielle teased. She wore emerald, her gown cut chaste but sewn tight enough for attention. “One might think you sympathetic to Wave’s Lament in such colors.”

“You wear green. One might think you sympathetic to Deepbloom.”

“Perhaps,” agreed Mirielle. “But the Inquisitors should know better than to bite what they cannot swallow.”

“I do not fear the Inquisition,” Alisandra sniffed, smoothing her skirts.

“Then consider another form of danger.” Mirielle gestured idly towards the young noble men.

“There has not been a duel on the floors in decades.”

“We could stage one!”

Caught off-guard, Alisandra laughed. “With or without the Hand of God?”

“Oh, your choice.”

Would the Dome of Aure survive a proper hit? Alisandra banished that improper thought. This is another form of battle. Do not let Mirielle decide the flow of conversation.

“After all, you were kind enough to let Thea have a taste. When is my demonstration?” The demon bared her fangs sweetly.

Despite herself, Alisandra swallowed in chagrin.

Point: Mirielle.

The last nobles filtered to their positions. The Conclave counted three hundred votes, but only eighty-one Houses still claimed a voice. Those fallen into disgrace or bankruptcy watched from the third floor, silent, mingled with the commoners.

“If you wish to revive dueling, my dear, you should find a better House name. House Mishkan ruled in a time of peace.”

“Would you rather I war under the name Visage?” Alisandra challenged.

“Oh, you flatter me.” The demon wiggled in her seat. “I’ll happily buy that name off you if you are bored of this little game. I can offer you anything you desire…”

“Can you offer me Wave’s Lament?”

Mirielle flinched and jerked her chin dismissively.

Point: Alisandra.

Do not claim to own what you cannot touch, then.

“The Keeper of the Flame has arrived,” the young angel noted pleasantly, cupping her hands in her lap.

The wizened ceremonial priest hobbled to the podium, trailing a robe woven in fifteen colors of the flame. He grasped the gavel in skeletal fingers and slammed it sharply against the pulpit.

“May Aure above bless us on this hallowed day,” he intoned, voice wet with spittle. “Let us join together in the light of his Grace to follow the light of his Wisdom.”

“By his hallowed words, may we know the way,” all recited.

The Keeper launched into the traditional prayer, a long and rambling affair that prepared the Lords and Ladies to assume the burden of Regency.

Mirielle wagged her little finger, and a quiet note of music hummed about her like a cape. She sighed, slouched into the pew, and turned to Alisandra. “So. What do you think about the elections?”

The demon’s music extended to blanket Alisandra as well.

The angel spoke freely. “I blame you.”

“Thea helped.”

“What possibly motivated such impetuous insanity? You could spark a civil war!” The peasantry would not enjoy being toyed with like one of Mirielle’s little pets.

“Fear of action is such an angelic trait.”

“Confidence in the ego is quite demonic!”

“Stealing your father’s words only makes you more the child.”

Alisandra hissed through her teeth.

Point: Mirielle.

The Keeper brought his prayer to a rumbling finish, and a new priest ascended the dais for the sermon proper. He was young for an ordained priest, only thirty-five, and preached with vigor. Wild sweeps of his arm like a conductor punctuated every third statement, and he easily projected his voice into the hallways.

“That is Father Lucas,” the demon purred. Leaning close, she confided, “A candidate for mayor, it seems.”

“I see.” Alisandra sighed. “You founded the Inventors in Lumia, and now you see fit to throw the city into chaos for a little entertainment.”

“Still two steps behind, then.”

This is a topic of conversation that will do nothing but stroke her ego.

“What do you feel when you pass under the Dome of Aure?” the angel challenged.

The demon smoothly pivoted. “Nothing of note. Aure left little to offer a disreputable woman like myself.”

“Should you really speak of him as though he were gone?”

Mirielle arched an eyebrow. “They really have not told you?”

“Told me what?”

“Ask your father,” the demon drawled. “Perhaps he will even answer.”

Why do you hate him so much? He only tries to help.

The sermon continued. Father Lucas gesticulated and shouted, his cadence feverish and rhetoric showing no signs of ebbing. One of the older Lords snored in his pew, chin tucked into his crossed arms. The cluster of young men passed notes back and forth, comparing the girls.

“Or why not ask dear Sebastian?”

“He tells me that Aure has gone to join the Chorus.” Despite herself, Alisandra heard a note of petulance in her own voice.

The Chorus was yet another mystery of older angels.

The demon erupted into fits of laughter. “Oh, Alisandra, your expression alone is worth its weight in gold! Aren’t you too old for fairy tales?”

The Lady of House Mishkan gripped the pew tightly. The bench groaned, and small cracks radiated along the ancient wood.

“So, the Chorus?” she asked again through clenched teeth.

Mirielle managed to swallow her smug grin. “He’s dead, Alisandra. Dead and entombed undying.”

Alisandra scoffed. “We are eternal, Visage.”

“Oh? A girl of her twenties has determined her span to be infinite?” the demon mocked.

“You’re almost a hundred.”

“First, it is polite to round down,” Mirielle tutted. “Second, a hundred is hardly forever. Dear Alisandra, if angels are eternal, why are there so few of us?”

Father Lucas stabbed the air. “Aure, God of all heaven and earth, bless us all!”

Alisandra squirmed without a good answer.

“A terrible fate awaits us,” Mirielle said, and in this she spoke earnest. “Unless we change it.”

“Have you brought this up with the Archangel?” the young angel deflected, uncomfortable with this line of thinking. She much preferred the biting, mocking demon – a woman she could dismiss as petty and self-interested.

“Who do you think inflicted this truth?” the demon replied bitterly.

“He would not do such a thing,” Alisandra muttered, shifting away.

The demon offered a small shrug. “Believe what you will, Alisandra. You have the time to indulge in fantasy.”

They glanced in separate directions, equally dissatisfied, and let the conversation die.

The Conclave crawled along. After the sermon, they attended to bookkeeping. The privilege of voting came with the obligation to support the national budget. Each vote cost a flat fee, paid directly to the treasury, minus any exceptions. Exemptions included noble sons in military service, sponsorships, donations to charitable foundations, management of vital government industries, bribes to the treasury, especially loud whining about having to make payments, and bereavement of a cherished family member such as a truly beloved pet cat.

Alisandra registered her one hundred gold for one vote without fanfare.

Ten minutes later, Mirielle paid fifty gold for fifteen votes.

“It’s like you’re not even trying,” the demon remarked.

“My condolences on the loss of your snake.”

As this was an emergency session, the Conclave skipped many formalities, and the deliberations began after a short lunch.

The first speech was by one of the eldest statesmen. So old, in fact, that his own grandfather once met the last king in the monarch’s last days. He still referred to the Conclave as the Regency with complete sincerity. His forty-minute speech was easily summarized by his closing remarks: “Lords and Ladies of the Regency, it is our most solemn duty to shepherd this great nation through the muddy currents of the world, and we cannot place that terrible burden on the shoulders of the common man!”

Some brave soul on the third floor booed him.

Next, a corpulent noble with a cane who had evaded naval service as a youth spoke. “These upstarts cannot boss us around. I say we send the army right in! A few years of civil lockdown will clear their heads and show any other cities with rebellious tendencies what happens!”

“How much would we lose per day under martial law?” Alisandra asked the demon idly.

“Easier to amortize over the year. A rough estimate? Four to five thousand gold per year.”

“That would put a dent in the royal budget.”

“Additional conscription would be necessary to occupy Lumia itself. Lost tax revenue from the city would have to be found from the peasantry.”

“The people would revolt…” the angel muttered.

“And who would lead them, I wonder?” murmured the demon under her lashes.

“Tch.”

The speeches continued for hours more. The galleries slowly drained of people as the folk realized the final vote would not be today. Probably not this week! More nobles fell asleep, chins dipping into their chests like nesting birds.

As the sun began to set, the Keeper of the Flame ended the session with another wheezing prayer. His sharp crack of the gavel set the Conclave free and woke the snoring statesmen.

Alisandra stood, stretched, and waited with Mirielle while the other Houses departed. Two noble Lords hesitated near the exit, eying her, and she took that moment to engage Mirielle in a very obvious conversation.

“They’re just boys, Alisandra. They don’t bite unless you ask,” the demon teased.

“I still remember those two pulling my braids after finishing school.”

“If only you were an angel then, perhaps you could have punted one into the sea.”

The young angel rolled her eyes and turned to leave.

Mirielle accompanied, placing a hand on her elbow.

Just in time for the reporters, hovering just at the edge of the atrium, to snap photographs with their giant, flashing cameras.

“Oh, my. What if they talk?” Mirielle teased. “The gossip rags are already wondering when your House will fall, and now they see you walking with me?”

Drawing on her finishing school training, Alisandra maintained a small smile and banished thoughts of hurling Mirielle into the reporters like a bowling ball.

“Last year the papers invented a pregnancy,” she noted instead. After all, the former Lord Mishkan had surrendered his title, but the new Lady Mishkan did not appear at Conclave for three months.

Alisandra had needed time to acclimate to her new strength. Oh, she had shattered so much glassware in that first month…

“A Blooming is much like a pregnancy,” the demon mused. “You have shed the mortality of your birth and blossomed into something enduring and beautiful.”

Were that Alisandra actually felt enduring! She was an angel! Should she not feel holier?

There yet remains so very much I do not know. That Father has yet to share.

A nugget of resentment prickled in her belly, and Mirielle smiled privately.

“It was a story without the slightest proof. They could not even manage an unflattering picture of my stomach for proof!” the angel said, scanning the crowds for Sebastian. “It seems that truth is not a requirement for journalism these days.”

“Of course not. Truth is a spice, occasionally added, so that the reader does not notice the foul taste beneath.”

The demon released her hold on Alisandra, and the atrium somehow seemed a little quieter – a music just beyond hearing silenced. She strolled forward, one finger in the air.

A flock of Livery servants descended on the demon to satisfy her every request.

Sebastian, meanwhile, loafed against the statue of a long-dead Keeper of the Flame and chewed a fresh hoagie. He saw Mirielle approaching, set down his sandwich, wiped his fingers, and bowed until his ears were parallel to the gleaming floors.

The demon swept past him without a second glance, carrying her servants like a comet’s trail.

Alisandra watched her pass, and she felt an insight stir beneath the dome.

The demon, the schemer, cloaked in lullaby.

The servant, the pacifist, like dust beneath her feet.

Both of them are as they choose to be.

Light rang in her ears like a hymn.

Will I find that confidence of being one day?

Sebastian straightened, retrieved his sandwich, and crossed the atrium to Alisandra. “How was the Conclave?”

“Dull as dirt. Arguments continue next session.”

“Very good. You have of course accepted the invite with the Cecille sisters tonight.”

Which meant the long drive first and the festivities after.

“I’ll need to change then.” Last she wore the same gown to the Conclave and the afterparty, every woman for fifty miles had descended to offer the young woman fashion corrections.

“I have foreseen this need. Your new dress is in the trunk.”

“Truly, you are the Angel of Witness.”

“I have foreseen that the cost of the materials and design will come to six gold.”

“Angel of Witness and a spendthrift with an eye for bargains.”

“Your praise will warm me for days, good Lady.”

The crowd of journalists and sycophants clogged the steps of the Conclave, ever alert for hints of intrigue. House Mishkan, old and tiny, was well known to be in its twilight, and the angels returned to the car with minimal fuss.

Alisandra flopped onto the back seat with a deep sigh. Kicking her feet across the seat, she leaned back against the frame of the door. A buzz of power, not quite electric, ran through the metal. What should have been stiff Novian steel instead molded gently around her shoulder blades.

She set her hand to the inside of the tinted windows, and a small display flickered to life before her fingertips. Small, practiced flicks activated the air conditioning and the speakers. Another caused the seat to ripple and melt forward, becoming a bed as soft as down.

“I believe I will nap, Sebastian.”

Sebastian pulled the car into traffic. He pressed a button beneath the dash, waited a moment, and then fetched a tome from beneath his seat. Leaning back, he let the autopilot accomplish the work of driving and flipped to his bookmark. “Very well. I will wake you in a few hours.”

“No peeking on my dreams this time!” she warned.

She didn’t know that he had peeked; she merely harbored a nagging suspicion. Something about giant flowers and the sense of being watched…

“I would never dream of it.”

Rolling her eyes, Alisandra wiggled and squirmed free of her gown. She tossed the silk into a heap on the floor, pulled a blanket from behind the seats, and settled across the bed. Fully grown now, she could no longer sprawl lengthwise, and she tucked her knees to fit.

“If I asked Thea to remake our mansion the same as the car, do you think she would oblige?” Alisandra chewed her lip.

Sebastian flipped the page on the old tome, reading the ancient script as easily as a newspaper. “Thea alone holds the secret to liquid metal, Alisandra. The payment would be stiff.”

Why must we demand payment? the young angel wondered. We used to all be family, didn’t we? What drove this fracture so deep?

But she kept that question to herself.

***

House Cecille fell twenty years ago by vicious technicality. Each noble House was required, without exception, to maintain at least one adult of sound mind and body to assume the title or Lord or Lady. This was never an issue for large Houses, replete with children. For a small House, though, the matter of primogeniture dominated all other concerns. Marriage to an infertile woman or a bout of disease could rob the House of all it claimed.

The black market for remedies to such issues sustained many witches in the back alleys of Lumia. These remedies, unreliable at best, failed this House entirely. When the Cecille triplets were fifteen, three short years shy of a noble’s majority, their grandfather died. With no living relatives to assume the mantle, the sisters watched their votes, lands, and inheritance auctioned to vipers.

Standing at the edge of their estate, nestled in the shadow of the noble hill but no dimmer by electric lights, Alisandra pondered their history.

Perhaps the loss set them free.

Three teenaged girls with a bankrupt name sought and found new avenues of influence. In the dissolution of their noble title, they found freedom from the arcane spider web of laws and propriety that forbid many forms of commerce between noble families. They brokered; they arbitrated; they chaperoned.

The Cecille triplets established neutral ground, and they made sure to always collect a cut.

Now their ships clogged the harbor with Harvest grain for market in the south. Their agents established exclusive contracts with nations as far as the jungle people of the Verdant, offering Lumian textiles at steep discount. Their parties attracted every fashionable noble. Like the phoenix, they blazed anew.

Alisandra smiled to herself. In her father’s voice, she intoned, There is life after the fall, Alisandra, for those who would seek it.

The young angel wore her new dress, sewn for this occasion: violet satin, edged in gold, pinned in a careful arrangement at the small of her back. She kept the shawl from this morning, draped around her neck like a gorget.

At a party like this, she appreciated a bit of protection to the jugular.

As usual, Sebastian had vanished as soon as her dress was firmly pinned.

Adjusting her skirts, she followed the path of small stones through the gardens. Like most noble estates, the Cecille manor lurked far from the noisy road, and the path curved with artful care between patches of tulips and still ponds. The flowers sagged with the fading season, and the midnight air tended towards a chill, but a Harvest wind kept the humidity at bay.

She strolled at leisure, inhaling the season, and stopped often to watch the last butterflies of Harvest flitter among the flowers.

Violet and ruby, just like my dreams.

The same dream tonight as well. Giant flowers, a wagon ride, and a butterfly…

“Beautiful Lady Mishkan, why do you stare so forlorn into the night?” sighed a familiar voice.

Fragile recollections shattered, and Alisandra exhaled in quiet annoyance. “Good evening, Curia. How fares your father?”

Edmond Curia, a handsome and lithe young man with bushy hair and aggressively straight teeth, bowed to his prey. “The Lord Curia is in excellent health. He spares no expense in neither his business nor his castigating remarks about my general unfitness to inherit.”

She ignored his flamboyant self-pity. “And your mother?”

“On holiday somewhere warmer.” He flashed that wolfish grin. “Are you not cold? The season begins to chill.”

Alisandra arched one eyebrow. If this was his idea of a hunt, she would hardly bother running.

He hesitated a moment, recalculating. Then he stepped closer, just shy of intimate, and watched the butterflies. “Lady Mishkan, might I ask you a favor?”

“Oh?” Neither confirmation nor denial.

“A matter of some small embarrassment. One I have wanted to ask you for some months now.”

If he complements my eyes, I shall throw him into the pond.

Now he leaned close, daring much. “Alisandra, if I may…”

She met his eyes coolly.

“Can you put a word in for me with Mirielle?”

Caught off guard, Alisandra laughed lightly. “Mirielle?!”

The foolish pup wanted to sink his teeth into a dragon!

Edmond feigned a shrug. “Let no harm pass if you would rather not.”

“Your audacity is nearly as loud as your hair, young lordling,” she warned.

“You still laughed.”

“Perhaps I did,” she challenged.

“As long as I dare the dread Lady Mishkan, I may as well request a dance,” he replied.

She considered the option; she considered the man. Edmond was not a particularly egregious flirt compared to some of his brethren; his House was nearly as old as her own; he quite possibly stood to lose money on a match with the perpetually bleeding House Mishkan.

These things were not enough to sway her.

However, he had made her laugh.

“Very well. A stay of execution,” she said, offering her hand.

He graciously escorted her through the festivities to a small dance floor on the eastern balcony. While the main hall shimmied to raging jazz music, the young noble at least respected the limitations of Alisandra’s current gown.

They stepped into a waltz, matching step with the other couples. They were the youngest pair by a generation, most of their fellows on the main floor.

For all that wolfish veneer, Edmond wrapped his arm around her waist as though Alisandra would break.

“Shall I lead?” she asked, adjusting his arm to the correct position.

He grinned, sheepish now. “Tis such a traditional form of dance, I hardly have the practice.”

“Is that so?” she asked, twirling with practiced ease. “In my father’s day, the waltz was scandalous.”

“He is hardly that old, Lady Mishkan,” Edmond objected, plastering his wolfish smile back into place. His feet finally caught their rhythm, and he ceased crushing her toes with every fourth step.

“I suppose not.”

They completed the first circuit in silence. In the second, Edmond offered a few more morsels to lure his prey closer. "You sit with Mirielle every Conclave. Are you planning a coup?”

Must we talk politics in the dance? She sighed. Father would urge me to be charitable. At least Edmond does not feign concern for my House prospects.

Concerns that inevitably ended in a conveniently nearby suitor.

“I have known Mirielle my entire life,” she replied.

“Yet Visage no longer calls your own House mentor and friend.”

Is he fishing for House gossip? How tiresome. She mentally deducted points. “Visage and Mishkan have come to a disagreement on philosophy.”

What does it mean to do good? Is it to respect the wishes of flighty, foolish man? Or must he be saved even from himself?

The young man smoothly transitioned to a new topic. “And would you call yourself a philosopher?”

“Does a woman’s mind scare you?” she challenged.

“Not at all,” he replied, avoiding that bear trap.

“Then, yes, I would fancy myself as such.” She had spent most of her life arguing with Sebastian. That had to be worth a college education in annoyance alone.

“Wonderful.”

Edmond seemed ready to pivot once more, but Alisandra decided to dig a little deeper while she had him in her grip.

“How many men must vote to be equal to the judgement of a good king?” she asked, nudging his elbow back into position.

“Ah, a topical question. Yes, it is rather troubling how quickly the commoners have picked up on this sudden election. Such enthusiasm! Have we not provided for them? Does Lumia not shine?”

“You are against democracy?”

“This is hardly the time for an experiment in politics! Moros grows bolder by the day, Wave’s Lament wishes nothing more than to reclaim Novia, and even the Whistlers agitate for increased tolls. We need strong leadership in this time.”

“Then you are a monarchist,” she pressed.

“Yes, if we must make declarations as such.”

“Axioms,” she corrected. The terms of battle must be mutually understood. “Now, accepting your position, how much does your family contribute to the search for the lost king?”

Edmond coughed sharply and crushed her toes again.

“This is not about judgement,” she clarified. “My own family contributes nothing.”

This was a matter of public record, if any ever bothered to check, and so neither technically disclosed House secrets in this conversation – meaning that Edmond had no recourse if he should choose not to answer.

Clearing his throat, Edmond plastered his wolfish smile back on. “I must admit that House Curia is also delinquent on such payments.”

They began the third and final circuit of this waltz.

“A monarchist who needs no king, then.”

“The Conclave has been keeping matters well enough afloat for quite some time now.”

“So it seems,” the young angel agreed. “Certain temerarious scholars refer to our government as a Regency Republic now. A tacit admission that few seem keen on the return of the bloodline to which we are sworn.”

Like any pupil, Alisandra could not hear the echo of her teacher in her voice. She merely assembled pieces of her argument, one by one, with the attention of any builder. She did not hear her father in her words.

To his credit, Edmond saw the next step in both the dance and the battle. “Now a republic is not a democracy, Lady Mishkan. We are educated from birth to assume the burden of leadership. Would you have us be run by cobblers and carpenters? What does the seamstress know of trade law? Of the gold sovereign accord?”

“The seamstress knows that her gold note pays her way in every nation of the civilized world,” Alisandra agreed with a small smile.

Never mind that few would have the gold to spend. A non-Guild seamstress earned coppers a day, among the lowest of all wages in Lumia, and applicants to that Guild far exceeded apprenticeship slots.

“Exactly. Such agreements are only possible because the assembly is known. We may entreat directly with the Whistler chieftains and the Azure priestesses. Meanwhile, the common man is led by the nose to whatever outrage those foul yellow rags decree for the day! Would we have the gold sovereign accord if the peasant could nullify the entire edifice because of a single, odious clause? The accords would never have been signed were not each party capable of looking beyond their immediate circumstances!”

The gold sovereign accord included a number of radical stipulations. Most controversial was the clause requiring that any and all Inventions were the property of all mankind. An individual Inventor held ownership of his work for two decades. After that, any could use the design as they saw fit.

A clause that serves Mirielle well and the Inventors poorly, Alisandra thought to herself.

The young man continued at full speed. “And what of war? Would we shy from protecting our own borders and way of life for the faint weeping of peasant mothers?”

“Tis peasant blood that waters the ground,” Alisandra rebuked sharply.

Edmond frowned. “Forgive me. I do not mean to jest at war. But surely you must agree that the learned few are far superior to the churning masses. The common man does not know what he wants beyond lower taxes and higher fashion. He supports any who will promise financial fortune and despises any who speaks of fiscal rigor. Look no further than the corruption in certain Guilds for that!”

“Then no number of common men might eclipse the leadership of a good king?”

“Yes, that’s the right of it.”

The waltz ended with the thrum of a lonely violin, and they swirled to a stop along the balcony.

Alisandra released Edmond. “Very well. What of an evil one?”

The noble scion of Curia frowned in perplexity. “An evil one?”

“The good king dies, as all good kings do, and is replaced by a vainglorious son. The son ransacks the treasury for his own amusement, begins wars through his errant words, and uproots the order of the world with spurious commands. He respects no institution but his own vanity and makes examples of any who would defy him.”

“Then…though I am loathe to discuss such blights on our past…a replacement must be found.”

“Yet in that incident which we are loathe to discuss, was it not the village councils that maintained order while the nobility waged bloody civil war?”

Edmond colored slightly. “Alisandra, if I may, I do not understand the purpose of this inquiry. We have agreed that a good king is superior to democracy.”

Two worlds warred on her tongue: the finishing school matron with her warnings on decorum and her father ever searching for the truth.

Yet the dance was done, a spell broken, and a young noble woman was not to argue the sins of Ruhum past during the brilliance of a Cecille party.

Representation is a heuristic for accountability. A prayer that the weight of consensus will blunt the worst excesses of a mad regent. That spreading the base of power among the multitudes will force the king to seek popular approval. Is this protection worth the chains? When fickle masses demand continual alms and snag the bait laid by radio madmen, will we wish for a king once more?

Should we bind the good king’s hand so that the evil one cannot apply his boot?

“Yet the good king perishes, and his throne remains,” she said softly. For a good king is still mortal.

Edmond stared at her, clearly at a loss.

She forestalled him with a hand. “I apologize. I have tested this argument with my tutor innumerable times. I merely wished to hear what others might think.”

Recovering with aplomb, he bowed in a lithe sweep. “Certainly, Lady Mishkan. You show a concern with the proper form of governance that does credit to your lineage.”

Still, disappointment soured in her throat. Edmond entertained her line of inquiry for a waltz but no further. Was that the limit of his interest?

Many men would not entertain you even that far, whispered the finishing school matron in her head. Such unseemly discussion will make them worry they marry a bookworm!

What would that matron say about a girl who learned the ancient, lost runes and trained with a sword?

“Do you practice swordplay?” she asked – another challenge for this wolf pup currently tied one and one.

Blinking, Edmond tossed his hair. “Why, yes. I am renowned for–”

“Excellent. We should duel at some point.”

He gasped like a man struck.

“I have been having some trouble with my draw.” Alisandra mimed whipping free a foil.

“I…would be happy…to provide a few lessons,” he wheezed.

“Duels,” she corrected. “For no honors, of course. I normally duel my father, but he beats me handily every time.”

To be fair, her father held the advantage in hours practiced. Would her training avail her better against a mortal man? It could be fun to find out…

“I…am not exactly sure on the protocol for…” he mumbled, face slowly growing hotter.

Alisandra stilled, disappointment deepening. Protocol? Is that how you mean to woo me, son of Curia?

The wolf was but a pup after all, eyes bigger than his stomach.

Edmond might have stumbled into a faux pas, but he was saved by the approaching swish of a Livery maid.

“Please excuse my interruption,” the maid said with a curtsy. “The hostesses desire the Lady Mishkan’s graceful presence. Shall I carry her response?”

Alisandra raised an eyebrow at Edmond.

Edmond swept another bow – hiding his blatant relief. “I will dearly miss your company, but who can deny our lovely hosts?”

A stay of execution for the pup, itself executed with perfect timing, Alisandra thought. The Cecilles watch all that transpires in their walls, a family dethroned but not defanged.

“I hope I entertained,” Alisandra replied with a small, formal dip. Offering neither censure nor approval, she left the wolf pup wanting. To the maid, she said, “Escort me, please.”

“Certainly, Lady Mishkan.”

They swept through the bustling mansion. Though past midnight, the party continued at full blast. Jazz blared, servants refreshed the buffet, and the clusters of nobility gossiped like bored mothers.

Habit more than interest spurred the young angel to mark associations. If a young man of one House sat with a young woman of another, was that a tryst, a proposal, a negotiation, or a diversion? If the elders of two rival Houses played a game of strategy, were they passing the night with a bit of competition or playing a deeper conflict? The intrigue flowed faster than the wine, and both left a bitter aftertaste.

Two of the Cecille triplets surveyed the chaos from the ballroom balcony. Petitioners and beggars cycled to their table all night long, and Alisandra passed merchants on the stairs still waiting their turn.

The duo wore matching outfits: hobble skirts of black leather, loose blouses threaded with gold, and a treasury’s value in gems pinned into their blonde hair. A half dozen prim Livery maids flanked them, and only a single chair waited for their guest of the moment.

Nancy spied Alisandra at the top of the stairs. Youngest and most loquacious, she aired herself with a jeweled folding fan and beckoned to the free seat. “Alisandra! Welcome, welcome! How was the Conclave?”

Angela, the middle triplet, folded her hands over her book and offered a thin smile.

Alisandra accepted her seat in the crossfire and smiled in return. “Dull. The Houses who support the election will make their case next session, and a vote may come as soon as next week.”

“I do wonder if it will be close at all,” Nancy mused.

“A hundred ten votes firmly nay by my count, and probably about equal yay.”

“So many willing to experiment? Who would have thought the Conclave could be so progressive?”

“Representation has its uses,” the angel demurred. “There is a political calculus to city managers…and city budgets. The poor fool who accepts that crown will have masters both above and below.”

“A scapegoat?” Nancy hummed. “An unenviable position!”

Angela listened attentively, fingers covering most of the book. Almost inviting an onlooker to puzzle at the obscured title.

Though she could only spy one word, Alisandra recognized the cyan trim and gold embossing. The Ways of the Shepherd. Her father had a copy in the library, and she read it when she was twelve. It was a forbidden tome of witchcraft that explained in detail how to care for certain powerful beasts to be found in the jungles of the south.

Quiet Angela waited patiently, her fingers the lure.

Alisandra kept very careful control of her expression. Brows knit, mouth set, gaze firmly on Nancy. “The Conclave is ready for someone else to endure the incessant blame, I think. Let the journalists sink their yellow teeth into easier game.”

“The rags certainly do love spreading rumors,” Nancy agreed. “Its rather dreadful the lies they sell on every corner!”

Angela shifted her hands, picking at a nail with her thumb, and left more of the tome exposed.

Alisandra obliged this farce. “Angela, may I ask what you are reading?”

“The Ways of the Soul,” Angela offered. Both books shared cyan trim and gold lettering, though one was heretical and the other spent several hundred pages waxing poetic for Aure. The Ways of the Soul explained in excruciating detail why Aure deserved worship while the witchcraft and false miracles of southern traditions only misled.

“That was a difficult study,” Alisandra noted. “The book admits that our own admonitions of fire share the same origin as the elemental pledges of other lands, and yet Aure’s rites are held to be pure while the others profane.”

“A common point of confusion,” Angela assured. “The pledge of fire still exists in the heathen lands. The answer to this puzzle rests in Aure’s Grace. He knew and understood the heathen rituals of our world, and he sought to bring us enlightenment through our familiar forms. It is not the shape of the rite which lifts us from sin but rather the acknowledgement of his Grace within it.”

When I do it, it is not a sin.

The young angel smiled despite herself. Angela had studied The Ways of the Soul, a book as dry as hardtack, to prevent any anomaly in her little trap. “Your recall is amazing, Angela.”

“Thank you. However, it is rude to read at the table.” The middle Cecille sister slid the book under the table. “Would you like any food?”

“I would not mind a slice of your excellent veal.” No matter that her father promised she needed no food or rest as an angel. Her stomach rumbled with mortal regularity.

A few minutes passed quietly as Alisandra savored the veal. As she ate, she calculated.

I have not heard any rumors that the Cecilles dabble in witchcraft, but I could have missed the signs. Certainly, Angela is rich enough to afford such services. Perhaps she searches for heresy as blackmail?

In the days of the King, witchcraft was merely one art among many. Shortly after that line ended, however, the Auren clergy began a persecution that stretched into the current day. By Inquisition, the church elevated Ruhum from barbarism. Coincidentally, this purge provided the cover for the first House wars. Trade in spell and beast, previously legal, soon led to the downfall of two dozen Houses.

Given that House Mishkan has no other eligible heir, were Angela to discover evidence of witchcraft, she would be able to bend me to her whim. Else House Mishkan would face Inquisition and collapse.

Why had her father been so quick to retire his title? Mere days after she Bloomed, he dropped House Mishkan on her lap, and now she fenced with courtiers and merchants while he flew the skies in ease.

House Mishkan relied on her alone for survival.

She could not allow that legacy to fall into ruin.

Another maid approached as she finished the meal. “The noble Curia offers you a message.”

She accepted the letter and read. A long introduction waxed on her beauty and erudition; she skipped the entire block. The heart of the message said:

Lady Mishkan, I humbly invite you to an exploration of spiritual matters. At the hour of three bells, trusted compatriots and I will attend a highly recommended séance on matters ethereal. Should you find this offer interesting, I pray you will respond, and I beg your pardons for the forwardness of this missive.

A séance? She snorted. “Please inform the noble Curia that I am unavailable, and that I apologize for the inconvenience of my parting.”

“Very well, Lady.”

Angela Cecille sipped her wine, a hair’s breadth from eavesdropping.

Nancy glanced at her sister and smiled. “So many suitors these days, Alisandra. No wonder you’re famished!”

“Your chef is excellent as usual,” Alisandra complimented.

“Oh, he does alright. Nothing like the old one.”

Conversation briefly turned to children. Nancy bragged about her two boys, and Angela offered a few words about her baby daughter. In all likelihood, the children were raised by nursemaids and only occasionally trotted forth for motherly approval.

That children raised in such luxury should hardly know their parents… An old and well nursed pain stabbed Alisandra, and she suppressed it with well-worn reminders. Banish such bitterness, girl. You have a loving father. Is he not enough?

After a few more minutes of idle chatter, Alisandra retreated from the conversation with the usual promises to visit. She vacated the chair, allowing the next victim to step into the Cecille web.

As the angel rose, Angela Cecille replaced The Ways of the Shepherd back on the table – the trap reset.

Alisandra descended the steps quickly. Truthfully, she would rather flee the party entirely, but she had no idea to whence Sebastian had fled. Sullen pride prevented her from asking a servant to find him; she was no errant child to ask after her keeper! He was the one who wanted to play the majordomo!

Instead, she wandered for a time, accepting all conversation. Young women of her age (mostly married) invited her to a hot springs resort, and she declined. A shipping magnate pressed her for funding for an expedition into the uncharted seas, and she declined with a serious warning against such foolishness. A representative of the Livery Guild (once more) nagged her to hire the staff befitting her position, and she declined with blunt words.

By the second bell past midnight, she felt she had sufficiently presented herself to high society, and she retired to a quiet gazebo in the gardens with last night’s edition of the paper. Let her suitors brave a hedge maze if they wished to attend her.

Perhaps the wolf pup can learn to use his nose. Assuming he doesn’t huff too much incense at his little séance.

She shed her heels, kicked up her feet, and reviewed what new trouble the demons conjured. Naturally, the election continued to dominate headlines, and today’s paper ran massive biopics on each announced candidate: the bellicose Inventor Alva, the pious Father Lucas, the flamboyant Inventor Tura, and the industrious Guildsmaster Reed.

“Now he looks like a proper sort,” rumbled a voice rendered husky by decades of shouting. “The paper seems to like him.”

Alisandra lowered her paper and raised an eyebrow. “Considering you own this paper, I’m surprised they found any criticisms at all.”

Before her, Guildsmaster Reed crossed his arms. He strained at the seams, a brawler compressed into a gentleman’s suit, and smiled like a cage fighter. This displayed his missing canine, and he breathed through a nose smashed flat as a pancake. Few men would point out these flaws, however. A son of the tenements, Reed still harkened to the rules of that jungle.

“Nobody wants to hear a suck up,” he said.

“That explains why you’ve come to talk to me.”

He chuckled. “Mind if I take a seat?”

“Only if you don’t break the bench.” She slipped her feet back into her heels and pulled back her skirts to make room.

The guildsman lowered himself to the seat, and the wood groaned beneath his weight. “See? Sturdy enough.”

“Very well.” She folded her paper. “What may I do for you, Guildsmaster Reed?”

“Well, I figure we’ll sit here and chat about nothing for about twenty minutes to be polite. Then, we’ll move on to business.”

She glanced about. None of the Guildsman’s usual thugs hovered around.

“Just you and me,” he said.

“Then let us skip the pleasantries.”

“Suits me.”

“What do you ask of House Mishkan?” Please don’t be a marriage proposal. He smells like a sausage factory and sports more hair than a camel.

Reed’s former wives also had a tendency to die tragically not long after the marriage finalized.

He rested both meaty forearms on the table. “I need you to vote against the election.”

“Need?” Do you think to order me like a schoolchild? “You are pressed for a single vote?”

“I am assembling a coalition to squash this election before it begins.”

“An election for which you announced your candidacy.”

“Somebody has to represent the common man in this mess!”

Alisandra fixed him with a skeptical stare. “And what other Houses have signed to your proposal?”

“Enough.”

“What arguments do you offer?”

“It’ll be worth your while. Lotta contracts are opening up right now. Lotta money to go around.”

“You mean to buy my vote?” She grew less impressed by this conversation by the moment.

“Your House can’t even afford Livery services. You got your old teacher mowing your lawn in the mornings.”

“He enjoys it.” Sebastian was quite the horticulturalist, after all.

“Everybody knows House Visage is gearing up to eat your lunch. You need protection.”

She snorted aloud. “And you mean to give it?”

His face darkened. “My boys, they know how to do what they’re told, and they do it well.”

Alisandra leaned forward and clasped her hands, mirroring his posture. “I protect my House with my own hands. I do not seek shelter like a fledgling bird at the first sign of ill winds. Do you have any actual reasons why I should humor this proposal, or do you expect the implication of threats to cow me into submission?”

The guildsman grew steadily redder as she spoke, and his fingers shook by the end of her statement.

You have grown too used to your power, she thought. Too few still dare to speak their minds before you.

With deliberate power, he unclenched his meaty fingers. “You are not interested.”

“Quite assuredly not.”

“Fine. Your loss, girl. Don’t blame me in the future.”

Rising, he attempted to buck the table with his thighs, a power move thinly masked as an accident.

Perhaps such petty displays worked on the fragile noble women he usually bullied.

Alisandra pressed her elbows into the table.

His knees rammed into the oak, and the wood faintly shuddered.

“Are you alright?” she asked sweetly.

“Fine,” he grunted, masking his pain well.

Perhaps next you would like to arm wrestle an angel?

The guildsman limped from the gazebo without looking back.

She briefly entertained a fantasy that his goons might ambush her in the gardens. She had never fought a mob squad before.

Of course, nothing of the sort occurred. Reed would not leave such an obvious trail, or he would not have risen to such refined heights. There were other avenues of attack, easier to justify as coincidence.

She would have to double check the House ledgers tomorrow.

On that thrilling note, she hunted for Sebastian.

Naturally, he found her first. “Do you require something, Lady Mishkan?”

“Where have you been? I checked half the estate!”

“There was a lost puppy.”

She sighed. “Returned home now?”

“Of course.”

“Excellent. Then fetch the car. I’ve had my fill of Guild threats for the evening.”

“Ah, which Guild offered the pleasure tonight?”

“Reed. The election candidate. For some bizarre reason, he wishes the nobles to vote against the election he means to win.”

“I see. Well, then, I shall fetch the car.”

Alisandra returned to the gates, toying with her shawl. Behind her, the gala ebbed, and pockets of nobility drifted for their cars and the allure of a bed. Others would be heading to the private parties. From the wee hours of the night to the break of dawn, a lurid empress ruled in ruby.

“Shall we make for her palace, then?” joked a middle-aged man to his compatriot.

“Not so loud, my friend! Would you see the barbarians at the gates?” shushed the other.

“Half of Lumia attends that dream,” said the first.

“And the other half would ruin it for some silly notion of heresy!”

The duo shuffled into their car, a mixture of shame and anticipation warring across their faces.

Mirielle’s flock journeys, pilgrims hunting the moon on its way across the heavens.

Alisandra watched that car depart. Another pulled up, ready to take young men to their séance.

Edmond Curia was too polite to glance her way as he ducked into the car with his fellows. If the sight of her waiting at the curb exposed her excuse of availability, he would not call the bluff.

Too bad, wolf pup. You will not win me by the rules of hospitality.

The procession departed, leaving the sidewalk quiet and empty. That most curious loneliness swept over Alisandra – that sensation of being utterly alone in a crowded place. As though the world turned without her, and the night would stretch into its gentle mists forever.

For no reason she understood, she thought of Thea.

Is there an angel of night somewhere? Does she keep this feeling in her cloak and spread it wide over the world?

Abruptly, pain flowered in Alisandra’s belly, hot and queasy. She doubled over and instinctively counted days. Though she was supposedly a higher being, no longer subject to cycles of the moon, still her mind flew first to that most obvious reason for cramps.

The hot knives in her gut twisted.

She staggered into the driveway, hissing through her teeth. Her fingers pressed into her belly, and she found sharp wounds where no knife had touched her flesh.

The young angel stared a moment at the crimson stain across her nails.

For all that she trained for battle, she so rarely beheld her own blood. As a noble child, she suffered nothing worse than scrapes and bruises. As an angel, the blows of a training sword simply could not break her skin.

The pain radiated out from her belly button. As it burned, her blood seemed to glimmer from within – a flicker where there should only be dull crimson.

She became aware of a voice.

You are terribly sick, hissed a strange woman in her mind. A bad reaction to the food. You are terribly ill.

What nonsense was this?! Veal and wine could not lacerate her stomach!

You are terribly sick. This food must be poison. You need a doctor. You may need to miss the Conclave vote.

The voice hissed, sibilant and vicious, from beyond her own thoughts. Static buzzed under the words like a poor radio signal. Claws dug into her hair for purchase, and a reek like sewage filled her nose.

Light in her blood; Light in her sight. She perceived a tiny, charbroiled creature clinging to her side. Rotund as an infant, tailed and fanged, it clung like a spider and used its tail to jab her belly again. Through black, tiny teeth, it whispered someone else’s evil words. You are terribly sick. Isn’t the pain great?

She suppressed the pain as her father taught and grasped for the creature’s scrawny neck.

Her fingers passed through its body like a ghost.

It raked sharp talons across her hips, and fresh cuts seeped blood into her skirts.

Stumbling, breaking a heel, she could not remember what the books taught. Blind instinct took over, and her blood began to rage against her veins. Did this little skulker expect her to collapse and cry? Did it think itself safe beyond her grasp? Did it know who she was?!

Snarling, Alisandra reached for the creature, and her fingers crashed through the thin air into a place cold and distant. The chill nipped at her knuckles and froze the blood on her nails, but she caught the little bastard by the neck and squeezed.

The monster squeaked in surprise, clawing at her fingers.

“A little late to beg, you vile little imp,” she hissed. Though her books spoke of the creatures, they never mentioned the slick, chill feel of its pebbled skin…

It returned to the waking world, dragging her hand back as well.

Her grip was firm, her fingers slick, and her blood too loud in her ears to question what fueled her power.

Fury whispered of further secrets just beyond sight. Imps were stupid creatures, incapable of natural speech, and a Will lurked behind this voice…

Without asking if she could, Alisandra stretched her bloodied left arm and followed that tether home.

Iron cages. The smell of dung. A muttering and chanting woman.

She exerts herself through these creatures.

She has tasted their blood, and they hers.

Linked, extensions of her Will.

In a place of iron cages and darkness.

She followed those bindings, and she saw other servitors. Other dinner guests at this and other parties, their faces wracked by pain. They groaned and gasped, unable to see the monsters clinging to their backs.

The imps bit and clawed; the guests cried out in pain; they suffered but did not bleed. They were scattered beings, their nature spread across the spheres, and only the ephemeral spirit suffered this attack.

One in particular caught Alisandra’s attention.

A woman, pregnant, did not double over in pain like the others. Instead, she wept in silent, gasping terror.

Please be okay, sweetie. Mommy’s here. It will be okay, it will be okay, it will be okay… she prayed to any who would hear.

That imp sensed the meal in her swollen belly. It dug at her belly like a hungry cat, focused on the life within, but the mother drew the blows into herself at cost. A shield of love and sacrifice that would see both mother and child lost.

A high bell pealed through the vault of the angel’s mind. She rose, squeezing the imp’s bulbous head between her hands.

“You will not torment them,” she hissed. Not as she lived and breathed!

Let there be furious justice for these creatures. All of them.

She crushed the imp’s skull between her fingers, and the tethers rang with her Will.

Across the city, a dozen other little heads exploded. The nests shattered in a rain of metal. The power like a raging bull crashed into the chanting woman, lifting her from her knees and heaving her into the wall.

Those imps who died in the shadow realm dropped into the living one, their corpses smacking to the tiles. They oozed a foul, black blood that reeked of sulfur.

Screams of horror rose from inside the Cecille manor, and someone shouted for a priest.

The Inquisition would have questions with the morning light.

Alisandra squeezed the pulp between her fingers, daring it to move.

Tardy as ever, Sebastian puttered into view. He stopped the car before the young angel, rolled down the window, and noted, “Alisandra, you are covered in blood.”

She released the corpse, braced herself for the pain of movement, and straightened.

Yet she felt nothing; her wounds were closed. How…?

The air around her was hot as an oven, smoking in displeasure. Who…?

Was this holy power? How did she so easily grasp in fury what evaded her every day?!

For all her father lectured, there was so much about her own nature she still did not understand!

He peered at the headless imp. “I surmise the creature attacked you from the astral? What has happened?”

Her head began to swim unpleasantly. “A foul servitor. Witness if you want answers.”

His eyes glazed with a glowing fog and cleared. “Ah.”

She held her hand to the moonlight. Her blood no longer shimmered; had she imagined it?

Black blood completely covered her bodice. The cursed monster had exploded like a rotten grape.

“The scrolls should have mentioned the stink,” she growled.

“Perhaps you can embellish the descriptions,” Sebastian offered, waving her towards the car. “Tomorrow. An Inquisition would prove annoying tonight.”

“Agreed.”

She slipped into the car, and Sebastian fled the scene.

“Why attack me?” Alisandra brooded, attempting in futility to clean her dress. There would be no washing away this stain…

“I wish I could say this was the first such attack,” the angel of witness admitted. “You may consider this a sign: your opponents take you seriously as Lady of a House at last. Welcome, I’m afraid, to the world of witchcraft.”

***

The witch would not stand out in any crowd. She had brown hair, a brown dress, and hands worn thin by years of textile work. She passed underneath the shadow of the Cathedral of Fire each day with a clear conscience. Who were the priests to judge from their gilded halls what she did to survive? Their judgement could not follow her.

She now stared at the ruin of her workshop and the remains of her imps. One hand rested on her throbbing chest. Her ribs ached with every breath, and a thin trickle of blood ran from her hair.

That unholy force had blasted tempered iron cages to splinters, splattered bits of imp across the windows, and flattened ritual candles to wafers on the cracked concrete floors.

As though a great force erupted from the center of her ritual circle.

She knew in her marrow, true as sun and moon – had that power wished for her life, it would have had it.

Guildsmaster Reed rushed down the stairs into the dingy basement, a pistol in his hand, and stopped in bafflement at the edge of the explosion. “What in the hells happened here?!”

“They’re…they’re dead…” she wheezed.

Her ears rang, but there had been no sound when it struck.

Reed regarded the destruction for several long moments, finger on the trigger. Nothing moved, though, and he finally tucked the pistol into his belt with a shrug. “You witches kill each other’s pets all the time. Who is in need of a lesson tonight?”

The woman sought in vain for the words to describe what had occurred. How could she explain to a dullard like Reed? “They are all dead. The ones on order, the ones in the cages, the eggs!”

“Then get more. We have work to do!”

When the witch stood, the room swam. Every breath hurt, but the pain proved she yet lived. “This is foolishness. This is madness. What you see is impossible! I know the ways of the hidden beasts. I know the taste and power of their blood! None of them can attack in a dozen places at once! Not just one imp, not a ward or a witch, but an entire flock crushed!”

And that surge, ringing in her very bones…

“What is one spell or another?” Reed said. “You signed a contract!”

“To hells with the contract!” she spat. Her life had been spared; she would not survive the next such encounter.

Reed glowered.

The witch swallowed. If that ringing Will spared her life, Reed would not be so merciful.

“I will find the one responsible,” she placated. “That much I offer.”

“For breaking your sworn contract?” he rumbled, crossing his arms.

Frantically, she dredged for the last memories of her imps. Blood spoke to blood, oldest covenant. Let that link sing with the last memories of the dead.

At the moment of death, instead of a witch, all she saw was eternal, burning light.

She wobbled. If she could not provide a target for Reed’s wrath, she would never leave this room.

Which imp had been struck first by that overwhelming force? The runt of the litter. Sent to drive a young woman of an ancient House into convalescence.

“Mishkan. Some incredible power interfered with the torment of Alisandra Mishkan.”

“That brat?!” Reed snorted in surprise, rubbing at the bruises on his knees.

“That is what I see. Keep the fees. I will not stay.”

Now the Guildsmaster had to choose: did he let her flee? He could risk a loose end, risk a captive witch who might bring furtive ruin, or risk the outrage among his potential replacements for killing one of their own…

He opted for indifference. Shrugging, he stepped aside. “Don’t expect a penny from me.”

She fled the room, cherishing every pained breath.

Alone in the devastated basement, Reed shook his head. “So much for the might of witches.”

They so rarely lasted.

Still, he required the services of the most powerful occultists in Lumia, and none had yet met his expectations.

If House Mishkan has found someone stronger…

No wonder that cheeky brat thought she could smirk at Guildsmaster Reed.

“If Mishkan has found a big fish, I’ll just have to find a shark.”

He reached into his pocket and fished out a business card, mashed among a dozen others.

Let the truth Redeem you.

My name will be your key.

Donovan.