Chronicles of a Falling Empire [Bloodstained, Bloodshed]

Life plays the game, the cards she plays
are more than cards, she trades away
the souls of those she will not keep
Death takes them all, and reapers reap.

"The Soul Trade," Verse seven

I leave Lord Lefe's mansion confused, overwhelmed, and disheartened—how am I supposed to obey my lady when Bardic was adamant that playing the mirror game is a bad idea? Brid Naya'il wants vengeance against the most powerful man in L'Anglimar, and I have no shot at taking him down singlehandedly. I don't want to lose my mind—or my life—but I swore myself to Lady Death. With all that Killián is doing for me, it's not a vow I intend to break.

I'm not going to die anytime soon, I decide. I'm going to graduate from L-DAW. I'm going to be a good soldier—a great soldier—for my people and for the realm. If Brid Naya'il wants me to take down Audrin, I'll do the best I can and go down swinging. What choice do I have?

I return to Colçon's tower to get my assignments from the academic lanistae. I find Lanista Brodrick—who teaches Introduction to Survival—in his office on the third floor.

"You didn't miss much—I was sick last week and canceled classes," he tells me. "Know how to pitch a tent? Build a fire?"

Lancers pitched the kip I shared with Linden on the frontline, and I've never so much as touched flint. "No, sir."

"Learn by the end of Veneer Week and you'll be caught up," he says, and that's that.

Pierre-Marie (Warfare Tactics, Military Leaders of Lore) has more to give me.

"We're through the first fifty years of the never-ending war," she tells me. "I'll need three essays from you, and a make-up test on battles and skirmishes can be scheduled once classes resume. Do you have access to a typewriter?"

"No," I say, not even certain what that is.

"You can check one out from the Knowledge Center—that's the library next to the castle keep," she says. "Big building, fancy stonework, phoenix gargoyles out front—you can't miss it. First essay should be five pages on a titan of your choosing. Second should be outlining the first four generals of lore—Yosif, Aleric, Adelia, and Médéric the First. I want their major accomplishments and shortcomings in detail. Page length doesn't matter as long as you get all the facts. Lastly, another five pages on critical territories in the realm and how to best defend them. The metallite mines, border cities, lodes in the Córdoba foothills…that sort of thing. Any questions?"

For Introduction to Military Science, Lanista Velma also assigns me a five-page essay, this one about present-day rank structure and leadership in Lady Death's guard. Now thoroughly panicking about the amount of schoolwork I need to complete in a week, I head to the Knowledge Center to get a typewriter and some research materials. As Pierre-Marie told me, the building is impossible to miss. Dwarfed by the size of the castle keep, it's an impressive building nonetheless—the sandstone blocks are arranged in an artful tower, and the phoenix gargoyles are taller than I am.

I enter through the double doors and find myself surrounded by bookshelves on all sides, which stretch all the way up to the second floor. I approach the matron's desk and introduce myself, then ask if I can check out a typewriter.

"Better to use one here—they can be found on the third floor," is her response. "They're pretty heavy."

She's an elderly woman with graying hair and royal blue robes. The sigil of a spider is embroidered on her chest, signifying she's faculty at Lady Fate's Academy of History. There are six universities in the First Circuit—Lady Love's Academy of Science, Lady Death's Academy of Warfare, Lady War's Academy of Healing, Lady Hope's Academy of Art, Lady Fate's Academy of History, and Lady Life's Academy of Spirituality. They're all hard to get into, and equally hard to graduate from—if you're a royal you're guaranteed entry into at least one of them, but it's a crapshoot for commoners. I wonder which family she's from, if any.

I decide to start on the essay about a titan until it's time to go to the di Vivar palazzo for dinner.

"Do you have any books on Marix?" I ask.

"Titan lore can be found on the fifth floor," she says. "We do have a section on the seventh heir, but it's not large. I'll show you."

I follow her up the winding staircase, past four landings that encircle the perimeter of the building in a square shape. Each level is packed with bookshelves—there are more texts in this building than I knew were in existence. I don't know much about publishing and distribution in L'Anglimar, but if I had to guess, this is probably the biggest library in the realm. Just being inside it feels like a privilege.

When we get to the fifth floor, she turns sharply left and leads me down a narrow aisle. To one side is a railing that looks down over the rest of the Knowledge Center—the matron's desk looks like a dot from up here. We pass four shelves dedicated to King L'Angly, four to Yosif the Great, and another three to Vandame. Poussin, Baumé, and Leclère get two each, and Marix's section is crammed into a corner of her block. The matron kneels on the floor with great difficulty, wincing.

"Bad knees," she says.

"Sorry for troubling you."

"No trouble. Here. Most of these books are on the triplets as a unit, but we shelve them with Marix because Vandame and Baumé have enough texts to their names. This one might suit your purposes."

It's entitled Seventh, and it's by Aminder Darkbloom. I check the publication page and find out it was only written about two years ago—Pierre-Marie can't possibly penalize me for being out of date. I thank the matron as she gets to her feet, and she nods in my direction.

"Leclère's second journal might also benefit you," she offers. "The two went undercover in a Xobratic base—they got close during that time, not that having an ally did him much good in the end. Want me to get it for you?"

I think back to a conversation with Osyrus in Bathune. "I thought Leclère's journals were considered fiction to scholars."

Her lips purse. "The accuracy is debated."

"I probably shouldn't cite it in an academic essay."

"Depends on your lanista."

"Do you know Lanista Pierre-Marie?"

She bobs up and down on the balls of her feet. "Brilliant lady," she says, "but I don't know her stance on teenage diaries. Still, it wouldn't hurt to check it out."

"I'll take it, then."

Once she's found the book, I head down to the third floor with my texts. The typewriters are laid out over several tables—I count eight of them. The matron teaches me to insert grasspaper and set the margins using knobs on the side. She places my hands on the keyboard, gives me a brief lecture on how to use the correction fluid, and leaves me to my work.

I page through Seventh. It's not a long book by any means, but it gives me a grasp on Marix's backstory. He and his siblings were born in the Xobratic realm and were allegedly sired by the God King himself, although Aminder Darkbloom has a footnote that this may have been a rumor started by Baumé. Their mother was a farmer, and she only had enough money to send one of them to school—Vandame was picked as the best and brightest of the bunch, and the other two remained on the family farm until they were sixteen. At this point they left for L'Anglimar and arrived in Bathune, which was the capitol of the "lower territories" at this point in history. They met L'Angly and Yosif, who quickly recruited them into the revolution. Betraying all ties to their home nation, they signed the Withdrawal Dictation when L'Anglimar first sought independence.

Marix, who's been silent up until this point, speaks in my mind as I begin to skim chapter three.

I hope you know this is deeply uncomfortable for me.

"Excuse me?" I say aloud. A girl in white L-LAS garb looks up from a neighboring table, her fingers poised over the keys of a typewriter.

Imagine if someone wrote a book about your life, and then you had to read it with someone else's eyes. Even with thought-speech, he sounds petulant, annoyed. The inaccuracies are astounding.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

I close my eyes and rub the back of my neck. Like what?

For starters, Vandame was stupid as a rock until he went off to school, Marix complains. He wasn't the best or the brightest—he was simply Mother's favorite. Also, we were fourteen when she evicted Baumé and me—the woman was insane and probably died not long after. No mention of that in your precious novel.

"If you're not going to be helpful, you can stay quiet," I mutter, and continue reading. Vandame rejoined his siblings as soon as he graduated from school, and the three of them—along with the other four heirs—were taken to the bunker where the God King survived the end of days to "pursue unions with their Ladies." Aminder isn't clear about what that entailed, so I close my eyes again and ask Marix.

He doesn't respond.

After they exited the bunker, the revolution began in earnest. At 17, Marix commanded one of Yosif's prides and took the Lilun Crossing through the Córdoba foothills. His troops killed 500 men while outnumbered six-to-one and took 300 prisoners—Aminder is frustratingly vague about how this was accomplished. There's a brief chapter on Marix's time undercover in the Xobratic capitol of Vallatoria, and one that's briefer still on his return. He was poisoned—likely by Baumé, the book says—the following spring. That's it.

So much is omitted. The words float around my head like clouds, not coming from myself but within me just the same. You'd have better luck writing about Yosif. The battle-hungry fool must have 1,000 texts to his name.

I want to write about you, is my response.

There's a pause, then…find a washroom.

What?

Just do it.

My head starts to throb, a weak twinge behind my temples. Frowning, I leave the books next to the typewriter and head down the spiral staircase to the first floor. The washroom is in back, behind a row of shelves that have all been labeled "Lady Love."

Several stalls line the room, along with a sink and a cracked mirror. An ominous feeling in the pit of my stomach, I pause on the threshold.

Go to the mirror, comes Marix's thought. Grasp the sink and meet your own eyes in the reflection.

Anxiety and excitement mix into nausea, and I grasp my stomach.

Are we going to play the mirror game?

A strange sensation, almost like gurgling, fills my head—Marix is laughing at me.

I would destroy you, he says. I'm giving, not playing.

I go to the mirror and grasp the sink. My reflection is nothing special—brown skin, dark eyes, shoulder-length hair that's falling out of the tassel. There's a scratch running down my left cheek—I wonder how I got it. Staring into my own eyes is weird and uncomfortable. I wait for Marix to speak, but he stays silent. At last, boredom gets the best of me.

Should something be happening? I ask.

You're not high, he says. It helps if you're high.

So my friendly thought-voice companion is now encouraging me to do drugs—what would Akeeva say? I don't have any malloweed, and I'm not sure I'd take it even if I did. Inebriation is something I generally try to avoid—I don't like to let my guard down.

We need to get you into the time web, says Marix.

How?

I don't know how to do it without a pipe.

That's not helpful.

Shut up. He sounds frustrated. I'm thinking.

There's a pause, and then…call on Lady Loss.

I swore myself to Lady Death.

Yes, and we're all in dithers about the desertion. He sounds amused now—the gurgling sensation is back. Loss is still your lady, for better or for worse. She's claimed you.

That's ridiculous—

I call upon the name of Loss. The thought-voice is commanding. My Lady, guide us through Fate's web.

A tugging sensation in my gut, and then falling. Blackness descends around me, and then flames explode from within. I'm on fire, I'm torching the Knowledge Center, I'm burning. My skin blisters and boils, and I open my mouth to scream.

Then it's over.

I'm standing on top of a grassy hill, wildflowers of pink and yellow clawing at my ankles. Mountains stretch up around us, snowy peaked and breathtakingly tall. Three young boys are playing in the green nearby, rolling and tussling in the dirt. Two are identical, slight of build, with blond hair and blue eyes. The third is larger, both in height and stature, and he pins one of them to the ground and cuffs his ears.

"Baumé," says a voice behind me. "He always played too rough."

I whirl and find myself facing a boy about my own age, maybe a few years older. His features are Elvin and delicate—pointed ears, fair skin and hair, and sapphire eyes that seem to twinkle in the rising sun. He's taller than me by a good four inches, with lean and sinewy muscle. When he smiles, his canines are unnaturally long and pointed.

Something about him doesn't look human. My pulse jumps into my throat.

"Marix," I say.

"This is the beginning." He looks at the boys roughhousing in the grass, sounding disgusted. "Much less interesting than the end."

The hill disappears from around us. We're in a one-room flat not unlike the one I lived in on L-Street. There's a floormat, a coalpot perched upon a spindly table, and not much else. The same man who stands beside me writhes on the floor, grasping at his throat. Marix cries his mother's name. Thrashes. Pisses himself, judging by the stain on his crotch. Baumé looms over him, a hulking behemoth of a man in the same black leathers I'm wearing, feathered cape clasped at his throat.

"You fell to sloth," he says. "To your Lady's sin, you are damned."

"Brother," Marix screams, eyes bulging, jaw unhinged. He reaches for Baumé, who shakes him off, wrinkling his face. I move forward as if to help him, but a hand on my arm stops me.

"There's nothing you can do," says the Marix who stands beside me. "The venombeast toxin has already taken me. Let it work."

Watching him writhe is a terrible sight.

"Why did you bring me here?" I demand.

"Would you prefer to see battle?" he asks, and then the Córdoba foothills rise around us. Troops stretch around on all sides, the ground is red with blood, and the air sings with clangs as steel meets steel. A rippling shriek pierces through me, an awful, inhuman sound.

The ground splits open, and the creature that rises from the depths is monstrous and deformed. Leathery wings carry her to the nearest chain-linked fighter, and two taloned hands wrap around his throat. They squeeze through flesh, blood, and bone, and the next thing I know she's ripped off his head as if his neck is made of butter. The shriek comes again and then she turns to face me. Her face is the most horrific thing I've ever seen. Angular and black, both serpentine and distinctly rat-like, with dripping mandibles and an unhinged jaw.

"Lady Loss in her truest form," Marix says beside me. "I conjured her twice, and I paid the price both times. Run, little soldier, if you know what's good for you."

I can't run—I'm frozen to the spot. The demon lunges toward me, wings expanding, and the second before her talons wrap around my throat I'm burning again. The fire is within my lips, on my tongue, exploding out of my hands and feet and mouth. This time I really do scream, and the next thing I know I'm staring at my own sweaty reflection, no trace of flames around me. Alone.

The washroom door bangs open. Billi hurtles through, bistaff in hand. We stare at each other for a moment, equally shocked to see the other.

"Sorry." She clips her bistaff to her back. "I…ah…know this is the men's room. Thought I heard a scream."

All I can do is pant.

"Are you okay, Ko?" She shifts from foot to foot, looking deeply uncomfortable.

"Marix," I breathe, although I'm not sure if I'm calling upon him or offering an explanation.

You're fine, comes the voice in my mind. That was fun. Thanks for the trip down memory lane.

"What's going on?" Billi asks.

My throat bobs as I swallow. "I think I just played the mirror game."

That was not the mirror game, Marix informs me. I gave you a taste—a sniff of secrets buried within the time web. That's all.

Billi lets the washroom door swing shut behind her and approaches, peering into my eyes. Her hand finds my own, and she gives it a squeeze. I know she's trying to be comforting, but I don't like being touched. I pull away, drop my gaze.

"That's a dangerous game, friend." Her voice is quiet. "Father doesn't play at all—I suspect to keep mother from finding out about his many torrid affairs while on combat tours, but that's neither here nor there. What were you doing inside the time web?"

"I wanted to find out more about Marix."

"Learn anything interesting?"

I shake my head.

The washroom door bangs open once again, and Rowan enters. Billi steps back. Rowan's face twists into a scowl, and he looks between us suspiciously.

"Am I interrupting a moment?" His voice is snide. "Careful, Sabilli—you're sure to catch something."

"Eff off." She raises her chin, defiant. "Find a good book for the spring hols?"

"I'm not loaning you my reading list," he says. "Get your own, and here's a helpful hint—you won't find a text worth reading in the men's lav."

"Git," she says, and stomps past him. The washroom door slams shut behind her.

Rowan walks toward a stall.

"Helpful hint for you, Whoreson," he shoots over his shoulder. "Go back to L-Street before that dame's father catches you sniffing after her, or you'll wash up on the banks of the Rivière Rugueuse missing your fingers and your man parts."

"Thanks for the tip," I say, and go back to the third floor. I have some time to work on my essay before Bardic's dinner party.