“It’s not the best, but it served well, I suppose.”
“YOU ARE JUST AS DEEP AS CAD WAS, NEVER MET A MORE SOMBER PHILOSPOHER IN ALL MY YEARS.”
“Didn’t realize philosophy and daemonkind went hand in claw. Or wing. Or whatever you had.”
It was an odd thing, but the daemon blade laughed in her mind. Odd because she now had a daemon talking to her through a dagger or if said daemon possessed a personality that bordered on facetious, she couldn’t decide. “BY THE PIT, YOU ARE JUST LIKE HER. DRY AND DROLL. MUST BE BECAUSE OF THE DESERT SAND ALL AROUND. DRIES OUT THE SKIN AND THE WIT.”
“Thanks?”
“I’D SAY IT’S A COMPLIMENT. BE WARY, THOUGH, I DON’T TEND TO GIVE OUT MANY, RUINS MY REPUTATION HERE IN THE VOID.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“I’LL MISS HER, YOU KNOW. WELL, BEING WITH HER IN THE WORLD OF LIFE. HERE IN THE VOID, I’M CERTAIN SHE WILL BOTHER ME FOR ALL ETERNITY.”
She smiled at the thought. Her mother and father, together at last, buried side-by-side at the base of what had once been the Regent’s Tower. Buried upon the place of her birth, of their home when the world had not been destroyed by the Fallen. Buried in the heart of the city that was everything to the three of them.
There was a sense of loss about her leaving behind the graves of Emre and Cadrianna Benld, a loss she couldn’t explain. She knew them both only mere hours, not even days. And yet, she felt she knew each her entire life. She understood the magnitude of their decisions, their trials. Fault them, she could not. Not them, never them.
It was in their blood. In her blood. A part of her heart would forever remain in Drenth. A part of her felt she failed them, failed to live up to their name. Perhaps this was the trial of heart Canlon Carr had told her of.
“You certain about this, Stray Cat?” Captain Neenah LeFleur asked as she sauntered up to the rear of Marrow’s Lover, “back to bloody Kalderim? A place I stowed you away from. Looks bad on me when Neenah LeFleur bloody brings back what was godsdamned stolen in the first place.”
“I’ll keep your name out of my mouth,” she said with a grin. “Don’t want your ego dropped a notch or two because of me.”
Neenah put her hands on her hips. “Godsdamned right, hear?” Then she softened, ruffling a hand through her shaggy hair nervously with an aura of sorrowful honey. “Sorry ‘bout your folks, poppet. I know you never knew them and all, but I had passing relations with that bikrome and if that buggering wench ran with Emre Benld until the end, then I’d wager that’s high praise indeed. Ain’t nobody worthy of Bliss like Her bikromes. Especially the daughter of the Golden bloody Throne.”
The bikrome in question sat upon the pilotbox, legs crossed, bi-colored gaze staring north. Toward Kanja. In Valeria Dunleith’s lap was a fragment of the Seal of Terris. Ashe still felt drawn to the piece, perhaps she always would.
“I know the woman behind Bliss’ gifts,” Cyan the Defiant said as the vicar placed his elbows on the ship’s rail.
The daemon blade called the Strix hissed. “VICARS, PFFT. OVERZEALOUS LOUTS.”
“She’s the one who placed you in my arms, Lil… Brynn,” Cyan continued, clearly not lucky enough to hear the Strix’s scorn. “One does not bring a wailing babe like you from the clutches of Lu Har without having a few screws lose upstairs or guided by the grace of the Pentax.”
“Lucky you, Cyan.” It seemed like everyone aboard was connected to her somehow. The Scattered Shards taught that the warriors of the Pentax would always find another. She had never put stock in such banal ideations, but it appeared she better brush up on her teachings from the Book of the Scattered Shards.
“How long to Kalderim, Captain LeFleur?” Cyan asked. He had not pushed for Ashe to return, but his aura had told her how relieved he was when she told him of her plans to return to Kalderim.
“Depends on the bloody Pentax… O, sorry, forgot you bug… er, you vicars don’t care for foul language.”
Cyan puffed a light chuckle, giving the orphan girl a nudge with his shoulder. His aura beat a soft crimson tint. Zenith’s cock, really, Cyan? “After spending time with this one here, I’ve learned to care less about things of that nature. Besides, when they’re as dashing as one Neenah LeFleur, even less so.”
Neenah’s face broke into a smile of gold and pearl. The captain’s aura turned from a curious yellow to a dark ruby. “Neenah LeFleur is a dashing one, isn’t she? Best smuggler in all the Mistlands, aye.” She gave Cyan a full once over. To her, “Not bad on the eyes, this one, hear?”
Ashe rolled her eyes. “If you say so.”
Inwardly, she was surprised at Cyan’s new outlook on life. Vicars were celibate in their devotion. But Ashe had learned of their escape from Gargantua. Needless to say, she hoped her old taskmaster might change. Perhaps the Defiant had learned a thing or two while chasing her. Maybe some good would come from it all. But then again, Cyan was basically as bland as a fallen log.
“You certain about this path, Brynn?” Cyan asked. She nodded. “It’ll be two years before you’re raised to the cassock because you ran. I don’t think Icterine the Unfettered will care for such things. I can talk to her, but my word might be for naught.”
“It is what it is.” It’s what she needed to do, for herself. She needed this, it was almost a cathartic reason, maybe selfish. But she felt it in her bones, this was the path to take.
“Brynn?” The girl turned to find the massive drakken, Lojen, standing almost nervously behind her. Ruane sat perched upon a crate, picking at something in her teeth with that longknife of hers. Beside her was the lapin, Wick. “I know my ward… your father, well, he did say you were to go to Kalderim, but I’m not certain he intended for you to… you know… go back to the Scattered Shards. I think he meant to go to Finn and Val’s parents.”
Finnus Dunleith hadn’t been topside since they had left Drenth. In fact, the entire trip back to the City of Sands, the Kanjan elfir had been quiet, which the girl had learned was a rarity for him. She had also learned he had been her father’s lover, and his death must have hit him especially hard.
But she had made up her mind, she would go back to the Scattered Shards and finish her training. With Lu Har and Solanine dead, the Imperium of the Fallen was no more. Drenth was free now, there was nothing left for her there. No reason to remain. It was time for her father’s victory to be celebrated.
“What of Eminence and the other Seals?”
“What about them?”
“You heard your father. Heard Lu Har even,” the drakken added. “The Pentax chose you. The Seals call to you now. Eminence awaits.”
“Bugger that,” she said. “Everything I ever wanted died in that Temple, Lojen.”
She glanced to where the Temple might have been situated in the Sea of Mist. The entire eastern sky was an emerald shade, only the eastern horizon. It was as if Zenith had taken a paintbrush to His heavens and decided to shade the east green. It was a peculiar sight, but she knew it was Mother Marrow’s aether, the Forgemistress had released her essence through the guardian vvyrm. Day or nightturn, it didn’t matter, a greenish glow illumined the east.
But Mother Marrow was now dead, Her favored terrisvvyrm guardians along with Her, one point of the Pentax slayed and ended. Who knew what that would do to the world. Would the world even know the truth of Her sacrifice or only see the death of the greater order of draconem? Not to mention the downfall of the aethecite mines. Even the bikrome hadn’t an answer.
The Hammer of Mother Marrow tugged at her belt. She felt the goddess’ aether within.
“You can’t just step off the path the Pentax puts in front of you,” Lojen continued. For as large as the drakken was, not to mention with his epic horns, he truly was a fastidious one. And if she wasn’t careful, one who might begin to grate on her. Which was why she needed to release him of his self-proclaimed duty to protect her in her father’s stead.
“Watch me.”
The drakken wardkeeper sighed. “Then to the Scattered Shards we will go. You are my ward now. I will follow you into the void.”
