NOVEL NEXT 7-1 - A Living Flame
There are many fascinating features of this world. From the eternal springs of Aillesterra to the Great Tower of the dragon god and a thousand everyday miracles of beauty. People rightly attribute these works to the gods, or perhaps the works of their angels. They largely know better than to think the wallows is anything but the desolation of evil incarnate, but there are yet still wonders with little explanation at all. The Ashfall Mountains are one such oddity.
Fire hot enough to melt stone, and yet there are valleys more fertile than even the Central Kingdoms can boast of. If any of the gods had laid claim to it, none would have any doubt that it was a sign of their mercy and their wrath, but none do. The mountains stretch between the territory of the goddess of seas and mysteries, and the shepherd of death, but neither claim to work infernal creation. Roma of Skaldheim, the wolf goddess of the moon, possesses the means, but she created a land of ice rather than one of warmth, for she is a greedy god who demands too much of her people.
Nowadays, the truth is known by the locals, but they speak little of it. The fire comes from outside the world. It seeps through breaches in the great wall Iono crafted, bringing wheel and woe in equal measure. Thus, the lords of Rackvidd were no strangers to the humanitarian plight of the mountain folk. There are few others able to suddenly purchase a shepherd's entire flock and give them enough coin to restore their smoldering village. This mundanity quite nearly led to the city's ruin, for no lesser steward, no scribe or lawyer, believed the terrified men who spoke of a living flame.
Wherever there are cracks in the wall, demons will find a way to pass through. No matter how they have to enfeeble themselves. This threat had only become more dire in recent years and the duty rested almost entirely upon Lucius' shoulders until I had my full faculties back. But, there was a day some time in the winter after his arrival in Rackvidd where it was not him who received word of a strange creature of living flame.
A rather politically confused son of a shepherd arrived in Rackvidd with no understanding that the Raymi family no longer ruled the city. He can hardly be blamed, for the council had not engaged in any iconoclasm lest they irritate Lucius. From simple observation, the revolution may as well have not happened in the south, except that he discovered no grift preventing him from meeting with Felicia vi Raymi. There were no unscrupulous guards with lies to tell about how terribly long the wait was for a citizens right of address to their lord, nor were there stewards to discriminate between the rich and the pastoral.
The palace was staffed with wastelanders who demonstrated little decorum but ironclad principles. There could have been no better ears to believe such a fantastical tale as a man who burned without end, whose flames refused to be put out and whose flesh seemed to regrow and rekindle. Their only delay was the questions they asked, jesting among one another about how to kill such a creature. Despite this, word was brought to Lupa, as she still was viewed with authority among the wastelanders, and by circumstance it was brought to Felicia.
To make matters even more confusing for the young man, the audience was held in the proper hall, and Felicia sat upon the throne dressed in black rather than her family's colors. The outfit couldn't be called a mourning dress, nor would such a dress have been appropriate so long after the death of her father. She was dressed as though she were about to ride out on an adventure with a skirt short enough for riding, leather boots, and more than a little steel hidden within the folds of her clothes. Naturally, so was Lupa as she stood in attendance as though a steward or a maid and heard him out.
"Another attack by Aillesterra?" Felicia mused as she worked her finger along a crack in the throne's arm.
Lupa shook her head. "An unlikely place to say the least."
The lad from the mountains cleared his throat, quite uncertain of his position when there were no guards in the hall to monitor him before the woman he thought ruled Rackvidd. "There've been no sign of foreigners, m'lady."
"This is the sort of thing Lucius has been dealing with all his life, isn't it?" Felicia asked, turning her head up to Lupa.
"At the behest of Acheliah, yes. I doubt the temples have any understanding of the matter since her absence," Lupa said.
"And he'll go off to fight some unkillable monster of flame? Is that it?" she asked, her voice rising.
Lupa watched the man from the corner of her eye as he shifted about. "Unlikely. He has an army to train. There'll be a dispatch of the Demon Corps."
The man cleared his throat. "I didn't say it was unkillable… I said we couldn't kill it. Surely the good knights of Rackvidd will slay it!"
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"You said it heals from wounds," Felicia said, frowning down at him. "That's the very same gift of the gods that Lucius has."
"Unlikely, Felicia," Lupa interjected. "His stigmata has never been seen before in hundreds of years. The ability must be more about the flames. I'm sure there will be a line of men volunteering to cut it down. We might have more trouble narrowing it down than actually dealing with the creature."
Felicia sighed. 'I still cannot tell if your people are civilized or merely tamed," she said, earning a click of Lupa's tongue. Then she put her attention back on the messenger. "I can assist with dispatching the beast, it seems, but I have no authority to assist with funds."
"Pardon?"
"News hasn't spread well, has it?" she asked. "I'm not the lady of Rackvidd anymore. There's to be a council which will oversee the city. I merely own the palace and nobody else is hearing the needs of the people."
Lupa stepped forward. "You must have passed an armed camp on the way to the city? The training grounds? Go there and tell them you're the guide for the demon corps. You'll take them to a fine feast. You'll be taken care of well enough," she said and dismissed the man.
"Don't you think you could have learned more from him?" Felicia asked.
"And what good would that do? I'm not going to ride out and fight it," Lupa said, turning up her hands.
The lady of the palace pushed herself to her feet and declared, "I think I will." The words left Lupa so shocked, she couldn't compose herself until Felicia had nearly left the hall. The two of them bickered about safety in a fruitless exchange all the way to the residential quarters of the palace. They passed by Aisha as well as Frederika playing with young Alexander in the protected garden, but they did not have to come close to know that they had no interest in joining the argument. Even the wastelander standing guard outside Lucius' study did not try to stop them from throwing open the door to drag him into the debate.
The boy was found asleep, or rather in the process of being awoken. Every bit the gambling lion, or the grapeshot juggernaut, or whichever bardic title had most recently been given to him, he still had limits and the thin cushions of a desk chair proved enough to claim him. Despite the slump in his shoulders and the recess of his eyes, he was still an imposing figure of a man. Before Felicia could apologize, Lupa turned her ire on him. "And just what are you doing to yourself, Lu?"
"Resting my eyes. It was only a moment," he said as he glanced to the ground beside him. In his hand, he had kept a pile of coins. It was a study trick I had taught him in his youth, but the plate they were meant to fall upon with a clatter had been missed. The silver talons were scattered across the floor boards and hadn't made enough noise to rouse him. "Has something happened?"
Felicia stepped forward and grabbed one of the reams of parchment before him. The calligraphy was excellent – typical of the wastelanders – but the vocabulary was rudimentary, jotting down disciplinary infractions from the recruits alongside performance reports. Despite her limited military knowledge, even she was able to see he was struggling to find squad leaders to organize his new army around. "Is this how you always handle your wars?" she asked, squaring up alongside Lupa to face him down.
"You know, women interrupting my work is usually…"
They stared down at him and waited for him to finish his statement. "Go on," Felicia prodded.
He grinned. "What brought you here? It wasn't my paperwork. Did I miss a meal?"
"She wants to get herself killed," Lupa said, nodding toward the shorter woman.
"That is not a fair portrayal!" she snapped.
"I'm just getting to the point!"
"Enough, please," Lucius said, holding up a hand. "I can't tell if you two are bickering or getting along. What has happened? Did somebody actually schedule the council elections?"
Felicia shook her head. "No, Faezel is still obstructing that. There seems to be a demon in the countryside though."
Lupa said, "And she wants to go see us fight the godling."
Felicia bristled as Lucius stood up. He walked around the desk, took the papers from her and sat against its edge. "You're asking to see a part of the world you can't ever come back from."
"You might have noticed that my life is tied to yours, whether I like it or not."
"I'm not asking Kassie to face these monsters."
"She's a flower. Spent her whole life under Acheliah's wing and almost got killed for it."
"Lu," Lupa interjected, "You're not seriously humoring her, are you?"
"Yes, I am. I was half her age when I made the same decision."
Lupa grabbed him by his shirt. "You were an abused child who couldn't be killed. She is going to end up doing something stupid that forces you to save her!"
He responded by wrapping an arm around her and pulling her into a one-armed embrace. "It's a good thing I can't be killed then," he said, defusing the tension in her as he turned his attention back to Felicia. "Besides, you already know too much to go back. You've seen Aisha's magic. How could I be surprised you want to see why it's needed? Not to mention you'll all be coming with me to Aillesterra, and there's hardly a difference between godlings trying to kill us and emissaries trying to kill us."
That caught both of them by surprise. "Us?" Felicia asked.
"All of us?" Lupa asked.
"A war will be safer for you than staying here. What's more," he said, slapping his free hand on another stack of papers. "I'm clearly in need of people I can trust, and I can't have Aria doing all the work, now can I?"