Chapter 10

The tinkling sounds of laughter and music retreated behind Myr and Iskander as the pair walked into a meticulous garden square, shielded from the bustle of the party by large, trimmed greenery. The night was still and peaceful, the silence broken only by the soft whisper of the swaying trees.

To one side was a carved wooden bench, and Iskander sunk slowly onto it.
Myr sat next to him, and the Maceday heir began to speak softly.

“Much has changed since we last spoke, Myr. Other players have begun to move, and events have been set into motion that I did not foresee.

“I do not know who, but someone is making a play for power. Nobles in Vanadell have been found killed and dismembered, powerful Spiritual Artists all; someone is trying to send a message, and someone with a great deal of power. A team of Inquisitors assigned to the investigation reported finding aura residues of Wyvern level at some of the scenes of attack.

“In his palace, the Serpent Lord has gone quiet, and Vanadell holds its breath to see how he will react to the threat to his vassals. To let such an affront go is to appear weak.

“Strife in Vanadell is good for our cause; attention will be focused on finding this killer, but that could have two effects on our own plan. It’s possible that our attack would be blamed on this murderer in the imperial city, and we can distance ourselves from any implication in the aftermath.

“Or it could be the final offense that the Serpent Lord can bear, and he will come down upon us with the wrath of a Lord. Do you understand what I am saying, Myr? I was planning on retaliation to our plan to be limited to Selyria’s forces and the Guild of Inquisitors, not for the Lord of the East himself to stir from his palace.

“Regardless, I am resolved to see this plan through to completion. I offer you this chance, and this chance only to withdraw yourself from our attack.”

Myr sat silently for a time, digesting the information Iskander had provided. A powerful assassin of the nobility in Vanadell? Such a person would be invaluable to his own agenda. The question of the Serpent’s Lord retaliation was a more difficult thought to consider. While he knew that a confrontation with the Serpent was inevitable if he truly wished for revenge, he would rather face him when he stood on equal ground, not be crushed like an insect beneath his foot.

Myr broke the silence quietly, “No, I’ll not run at the possibility of danger. I’m in, Iskander, just tell me what the plan actually is.”

Iskander smiled approvingly at his response, his eyes flashing green as the wards around them momentarily flickered, “I didn’t think you would falter, you are made of sterner stuff than that. I’m glad I was right about you, Myr. Very well, now listen well my friend, this is how we will topple this city….”

Myr shifted uncomfortably in his chair, causing Vell to shoot him a sharp, reproachful glance. The feast was going even more poorly than he had expected, brief spurts of awkward, stilted conversation with the nobles seated near to him giving way to even more awkward silences, and then the cycle repeated. At the other length of the table, he saw Alva and Linn chatting easily with an aged, noble couple, while Vell entertained a stern-looking high ranking Inquisitor. For the first time in many, many years, Myr felt completely out of his depth.

He had returned to the party after a few minutes spent planning with Iskander, whom now sat directly opposite from him against the other wall of the great feasting hall. A few minutes prior, the guests had been ushered into a vast room adjacent to the main entrance hall and directed to their seats at one of the dozens of tables arranged against the left and right walls. At the center of the far end of the room stood a lone enormous table, where the Regent and his favoured vassals would dine. The hall buzzed with conversation as the arrival of their host was awaited.

A clanging gong pierced the sound of conversation filling the room, and as one every head turned in search of the noise. A hush fell over the crowd of guests, as at the great entrance into the hall two members of the palace staff heralded the arrival of the man whom all now searched for, the Phoenix of the Great City of Selyria.

A lone man strode straight down the center of the hall, his walk slow and measured. The Regent of the city wore long, flowing blue robes which pooled at his feet as he walked. His hair was a stark silver, brushed back over his head, and his eyes stared unblinkingly forward, a storm grey to match his hair. To Myr, he looked unnervingly inhuman. His features were perfectly symmetrical and proportioned, and he looked like nothing so much as a messenger of the Heavens, the example from which all men were derived. When Myr extended his spiritual senses slightly, he felt only a void where the man’s spirit should be. It seemed someone of his power could so completely mask his power as to seem invisible.

Silence reigned over the hall for a time, before giving way to quiet conversation as the moment of tension passed and the rest of the Regent’s procession followed.

Myr watched the men and women as they entered the hall. Some were dressed in grand ceremonial robes, and others in militaristic outfits. They all walked with a grace and assuredness that suggested power, be it personal or political. After the first dozen of the Regent’s honoured guests had entered Myr felt his attention drift. That was, until, he saw him.

The cold of winter bloomed within him, gripping his heart with icy fingers and holding him frozen in his seat, not even breathing. A lifetime’s worth of nightmares and fears came back to him in a flood of remembrance, as Myr looked upon the man whom he hated and feared most in the world.

The years had seemingly left him untouched, and the figure walking casually towards the Regent’s table looked identical to the one that had haunted Myr’s mind for years. It was him, the man who had brought death to his village, the man who had controlled the flame that had consumed his family.

Burning rage struggled against the ice that froze him to his seat, and Myr sat rigidly, his mind urging him to move, to strike down the one who had taken everything from him, but his body made a child again, terrified and frozen.

After a moment that lasted an eternity, Myr felt both the icy fear and raging anger subside, and a profound numbness permeate him. His eyes tracking the soldier from his childhood, Myr raised his voice across the table to Alva, “Who is he, that man?”

Alva turned, following his gaze and nodded, “That’s Drac Maceday, he’s the commander of the City Guard. I’m surprised you haven’t heard of him yet.”

“Maceday?” Myr asked quietly, a sinking feeling in his stomach.

Alva frowned at him concerned, “Are you alright, Myr? You’re looking pale. Drac is a member of one of the main lines of the house, which makes him the uncle of your friend from earlier, Iskander was it?”

Myr just stared down at the table before him, “Right, thank you, Alva.”

A flash of hurt passed over her face, but Alva let him sit in his silence in peace, turning back to her conversation with one of the guests sat with them.

Myr felt a flurry of emotions tear through him; rage, betrayal, confusion, fear. Myr remembered the faces of each man who had been there that day, so that he could picture them as clearly as he could his own, but he had never encountered any of them in the many years since. Until now.

Every ounce of his spirit pushed at him to explode towards the Commander in a blaze of fury, but the rational voice in his head held him back, cowardly though it made him feel. To attack here would be suicide; the Regent himself was present, and regardless, to attain such an esteemed position this Drac Maceday would have to be powerful in his own right. No, the man would die, but only once Myr was sure that his death was guaranteed. He was not willing to risk bringing justice to this man at any cost. He had waited seven long years, and he would wait seven more if he must.

More problematic was the man’s relation to Iskander, and the strange feeling the knowledge sent through Myr’s being. He felt somewhat betrayed by the revelation, as if Iskander bore some sliver of responsibility for his uncle’s actions. This was, of course, completely illogical, as Myr well knew, but he could not shake the feeling. Likely, the Maceday heir did not even know of his uncle’s past, or perhaps it could even be one of the driving forces behind his own resentment towards the Eastern Realm.

Myr would raise the subject with Iskander, and if he didn’t like what he heard, he might suddenly find himself with two enemies to dispose of rather than one. The thought itself pained him; he had grown close to Iskander over the past months, and he felt he had an accurate measure of the man by now, but still, he could not count on him to sit idly if Myr made a move against Drac.

Myr withdrew even further into his own mind as the night progressed, the glimpses he caught of the Commander of the Guard dining at the great table of the Regent sending spikes of fear and anger through him. His spirit churned uneasily, torn between a desire for revenge and the profound terror the sight of Drac instilled within him. The others at the table made efforts to draw him into conversation, but each attempt was met with indifference. He noticed Vell watching him pensively, clearly wondering as to what had brought this change in Myr about. He hadn’t exactly been a paragon of social ease at the beginning of the evening, but now he was as a recluse.

To Myr, the rest of the night was a blur of images and sounds. He remembered nothing of the feast itself, save for that there were performances taking place in the interim between courses; Spiritual Artists who practised with wind aura performing great feats of acrobatics across the vaulted ceiling of the hall and flame Practitioners conjuring great images of light and heat that danced across the room.

The hours passed unnoticed by Myr, and before long he found himself sitting in a hall that was suddenly silent, the majority of the guests by now on their way back to their own dwellings, the dining hall now occupied largely by servants and cleaning staff, and a few stragglers who were either too drunk, or enjoying themselves too much to leave just yet.

Looking around, he saw that he sat alone at his table with a drunken merchant Vell had introduced him to earlier. Alva and the others had left already; he didn’t recall the when or how of their departure. Though his eyes seemed to gravitate away from the spot where he had sat, Myr guessed that the source of the upheaval of his night had long since departed, judging from the emptiness of the Regent’s table.

Sluggishly, he rose from his chair, and began to traverse down the great length of the hall to the courtyards beyond. The cool air of night met him as he stepped out of the Regent’s palace, its chilled touch driving some of the fog from his mind, and providing a strange sort of comfort. He had started the journey through the gardens and pathways of the estate when he felt a familiar spiritual pressure flare up near to him, easily sensed despite his complete lack of focus or attention to his surroundings.

Myr’s eyes swiveled towards the source of the disturbance his spirit had felt, and came to rest on the moonlit form of a man, broad shouldered and tall. Iskander.

The two young men watched each other in silence for a time, the veil of silence broken only by the whisper of tree branches. Iskander spoke quietly, evenly, “What has happened, Myr?”

With that, a rush of emotion surged up within Myr. Anger, hate, and beneath it all, an unending well of pain and anguish. He felt the urge to shout, to scream, to curse the Heavens for their inaction. He wanted to destroy everything around him, to bring an end to all this, to bring an end to Iskander.

Myr opened his mouth to speak, but only a strangled sob emerged. He began to shake desperately, his stomach heaving with great silent cries, the fear and suffering of the last seven years exacting their toll upon him.
Iskander lowered his head, silent, and the two boys stood in silence beneath the soft ethereal glow of the moon, one shaking, the other still. No words were spoken, no words were needed.

Myr spoke with Iskander for hours, until the first fingers of sunlight poked through the thin canopy of trees above his head. It had been Myr’s first moment of genuine, substantial connection with another person since he had lost his family all those years ago. Iskander had listened in understanding silence at first, and then quiet anger, when he learned of the great wrongs his blood had done upon the people of Fale.

Once again, Myr found himself surprised by the depths of Iskander Maceday. The other boy did not let himself be blinded by the bonds of family or blood. He saw the evil of Drac and considered it, weighed it, until he resolved to bring justice to fruition, no matter the cost. So it was that instead of a friend turning to an enemy, Myr found that the revelation only strengthened the bond between the two young Spiritual Artists.

And as the pain subsided, eased with each heaving sob, the two boys began to plot, to discuss, until their plan now contained a new element, a new hurdle to overcome: Drac Maceday must be made answerable for the crimes he had committed in the name of the Serpent Lord.

Beneath the hatching of their plan, hidden behind shared ideas and suggestions, an unseen force worked, forming bonds between the two men, tethering them to each other with chains of friendship and compassion. As this friendship, this trust, blossomed, Iskander revealed the details of his own plan, long kept close to his heart, long hidden.

Myr and Iskander parted long after the sun had begun to take hold in the morning sky, Iskander heading for the Maceday estate to search for information on his uncle. Taking down the Commander of the City Guard would be difficult in itself, even if the man wasn’t an experienced Wyvern, his skills honed from years of working with the Guild of Inquisitors.

Myr made for The Lonely Dragon; he needed time to himself to work through all that had happened. Besides, he had nowhere else to go really. Vell had given him the day off, instructing him simply to prepare himself however he saw fit for the tournament. It was doubtful that the next three days would have much of an effect on his performance in the tournament anyways, in fact, they might have even pushed him forward into Gryfon, which would severely complicate Vell’s plans for Myr to sweep the Tiger division.

That was not to say that Myr had nothing to occupy his time for the next three days. He and Iskander had compiled a list of tasks that must be seen to before their plan could continue, and he intended to set about them with earnest once he had taken a little time to think. There was much that needed to be done, much to prepare.

Some of the items on the list Myr had helped make would be quite difficult to complete in the time given. There were one or two rare enchanted items that were essential to the plan that still needed to be acquired.

Now that he was thinking of all that needed to be done…. maybe he didn’t need to take that time after all. A clear focus and goal helped dispel the last of the numbness and uncertainty lingering in his mind and his spirit flowed strongly, rhythmically, returning strength to his body in anticipation of a difficult task.

Myr grinned. No, he wouldn’t take that break. He had just recalled a particularly seedy purveyor of enchanted and spiritually-powerful goods operating out of the second tier. His fingers traced the curvature of the warm gemstone lying from a chain upon his neck, feeling the aura held within. Yes, that should solve the problem of acquiring those rare items. Somehow, he doubted that particular broker would be too quick to turn to the guard for help when Myr started to rob him. And rob him he intended.