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@dawno2008 thank you

@cassbeat hmmm, maybe you're right...or maybe you're wrong

Cold seeped into my feet as I climbed up the stairs to my suite. Four palace guards stood at attention there, holding their cutlasses in their hands. They bowed when they saw me. My tumblers rushed forward to open the walking gate. It was an art, how they managed to release the lock without once turning their backs on me. I walked through and then sent the tumblers to their beds. I did not need the escort in my suite. I barely needed it in the palace.

A visiting dignitary from the city-states of the Iyo empire told me once that my suite was the size of a palace of a monarch in his nation. I thought about the man and smiled at the memory of the night we’d spent together. Iyo was close enough to go visit, they were our closest neighbors outside the Nilun nations. No, I’d enjoyed his company but not that much.

A marble courtyard greeted me. The buildings in my suite were arranged around the courtyard. I had guest rooms in the building closest to the gate. There was a shrine, at the back of the compound, an entire bungalow that was a parlor, just for entertaining, a building with a kitchen and a dining room, and the biggest building, the pleasure chamber. There were over twenty rooms in that building, and I’d been told that my parents had kept it full of pleasure slaves. I didn’t even want to think of how they’d manage to see to all of them. I only had six pleasure slaves at the moment, including the Bono and the Nuri dancers. I had to think of what to do about those Nuri girls.

I looked away from that building and turned back to my personal one. It was a large bungalow with three rooms. Mede slept in one, Tiwo owned another, even though he had his own suite in the palace. Mine was the master. I walked into the building and headed straight for my room.

I opened the door and found a candle burning on my desk and a naked body in my bed.

He was a light sleeper. As soon as I walked in, he stirred. I closed the door and his eyes popped open. He sprang up.

“Revered.”

“Not tonight sweetheart.”

The slave climbed out of the bed and walked towards me. He stopped. “You’re bleeding.” His fingers brushed lightly over my cheek and an adorable frown fell over his face. “Someone hurt you.”

“He’s dead.” He blanched, and then reared back with his mouth agape. I rose my fingers to his scalp. “Your hair is starting to grow. How much longer?”

His gaze dropped. “The Imperial slave master told me the hair would be grown enough to see in a week.” He was silent. “I would stay longer, but my parents need me. I cannot put my pleasure over their needs anymore. I…”

I placed my finger over his lips. “Shh, you don’t need to explain yourself. I will miss you.”

He looked up at me and smiled. “I’m still here for one week.”

I let my hand trail over his flat belly, down to his lazy cock. “Yes, you are, and I will give you a sendoff to remember. But not tonight.”

“Let me take care of you,” he said in a rush. I opened my mouth to speak, but he forged on. “No sex, just a bath, some food if you desire. A drink perhaps?”

I smiled at him. “Thank you, I wouldn’t say no to a glass of palm wine, but I’m too tired for a bath.”

He bowed and walked out of the room.

My fingers moved to my temple and rubbed absently. I would miss the boy when he left, he had a magic tongue, and his stamina wasn’t bad either. I walked over to my dressing room. A few steps through this room and I’d be in the pool which palace servants kept full of nice, warm, water. I’d left the door open so that faint rays from the candle burning in my bedroom lit my way. I stopped in the middle of the dressing room and took off my tunic. Then I left it resting on the wide backless sofa in the middle of the room.

When I walked back into the bedroom, the boy was kneeling on the bed, holding a glass cup in his hand. I could see through to the milky liquid within it. He’d only filled half the cup, even though he knew I liked my glasses of palm wine filled to the brim. I sat on the bed and frowned at him. “I’m too tired to beat you.”

He smirked. “I know.”

I plucked the glass from his hand and downed half of its content in a single gulp. “I won’t be tomorrow.”

“Do you promise?”

I chuckled and emptied the glass. He took it from my loose grasp.

“Just leave it on the table and come back to bed.” I pulled down the covers, waited for him to climb in, then I climbed in and let him snuggle close to me.

Sleep came easily.

“Revered,” an angelic voice whispered into my ear. The voice was accompanied by light shaking. I groaned. How long had I been asleep? I opened my eyes and was instantly aware of sunlight drifting into the room. The servants drew back my curtains at the same time every morning. I sat up, careful not to disturb the boy sleeping beside me. Then I turned to Mede.

“What is it?” She wouldn’t have come to wake me herself if something wasn’t wrong. I focused my jumbled thoughts on the events of last night. The pieces came back to me like a slowly forming jigsaw puzzle. “Is it Tiwo?” I asked, once the full picture came into focus.

Mede stepped back. “It’s the slave he took to bed.”

I jumped up and marched towards the dressing room. “What happened?” I barked out. “Didn’t I tell you to watch them?” There were racks of clothes. I rarely dressed myself, but I knew enough of my dressing room to fetch a new tunic. I put the tunic on and Mede had still not answered my question. “Well?”

Mede kept her head bowed. “The slave hung himself from the balcony of your brother’s room.”

I stopped midstride. “What?”

“Your brother asked for privacy while he slept. Eghe and I waited until they were both asleep before leaving the room. We did not think that that would disobey your orders.”

“You could have just sent the slave packing when they were done.”

“Your brother wanted to sleep with him.”

I groaned and forced my feet forward. “And he hung himself?”

“Yes,” Mede bowed when I reached her, “he left a note.”

I walked out of my room without waiting to see if Mede followed. She’d follow. It didn’t make any sense. I’d expected the slave to make demands, to use his knowledge of what happened in the enclosure for favors, money, maybe even position. Why would he kill himself? I rushed to the stables. Tiwo’s suite wasn’t so far that I could not walk, but I wanted to get there as quickly as I could.

“Sandals,” I ordered. There were three servants in the stables when I walked in. They all stopped and bowed. The one closest to me found my sandals and knelt to put them on my feet. “Saddle two horses.” The other two servants rushed to prepare my horses. I turned to find Mede standing behind me. As soon as the horses were saddled, I jumped on top of one and rode out. Servants pushed the gates open. I tightened my legs around the horse, urging it to move faster. This wasn’t my regular horse, but it knew me well enough to pick up speed.

We made it to Tiwo’s suite in a matter of minutes.

I tossed the reins of my horse to a servant and rushed to Tiwo’s personal rooms. His were in a three-bedroom building, with the master bedroom on the top floor. I ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time, until I got to Tiwo’s room.

He was half dressed, in khaki bottoms, leaning against a desk, with a glass of juice in his hand.

“Tan,” he greeted. “How was your night?”

He was too put together. I glared at him, ignoring his carefree appearance. The window that led to the balcony was open and hanging from one of the rails in that bedroom, was the Bono slave.

“Pull him up.”

Eghe and Mede came to do my bidden. I’d been in so much of a hurry that I had not even seen Eghe standing by the door. I turned my back on them and faced my brother. His eyes held mine. He lifted the cup to his lips and drank. Tiwo’s attitude was wrong. I stopped beside him.

“Is that the note he left?” I gestured to the piece of paper on the desk.

Tiwo nodded.

I picked it up. There was a lot of rambling in the note about the tenet of verdure and how he’d broken that tenet by sleeping with another man. He was careful to explain that he’d consented to sex with Tiwo, and that he’d enjoyed it. It wasn’t till after he was done, that he realized how much he’d failed the Eyo masquerade of the Bono people. He hoped his parents wouldn’t be ashamed of him, but he’d done what he thought best. He rambled on some more. The note was perfect for Tiwo, seeing as it made sure to document that Tiwo was completely blameless.

I glared at my brother.

The note was a piece of crap.

“Leave us.”

Mede and Eghe left, taking the body with them.

“You wrote this,” I said, as soon as they were gone.

Tiwo’s eyes widened. He shook his head. “Sister, I would never…”

I slammed the sheet of paper onto the table. “Cut the crap.”

He sighed. He put the glass down, took a few steps away from me, and then stood with his arms folded. “That is not my writing.”

“It’s a very good attempt at not looking like your writing.”

“Let it go Tan.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“Let it go.”

“I swear on the masquerade, Tiwo, if you don’t tell me what happened I will have you tortured.”

He glared at me. Then he walked over to his bed and lifted his pillow. He pulled out another sheet of paper, an exact replica of the one that Tiwo wrote the slave’s fake suicide note on. He walked back and held the sheet out to me. “We bleeped. I fell asleep and woke up to the slave scrawling that.”

To his majesty, the Eze of Nuri, if you want to know what really happened to your fraternal uncle, the Oza you sent to Isan, meet me at…

I tore my gaze from the note. This was what I expected from the slave, but I’d expected him to try to get something from me. Was he going to use this note to blackmail me? I eyed my brother. “This still doesn’t explain why you killed a slave in my kingdom.”

He sighed. “I value the calling of service just as much as you do, Tan, but this slave wasn’t normal. When I touched him in front of you he flinched, as if he was repulsed, but when he came to my room last night…let’s just say I wasn’t the first man he’d been with.”

“So, you killed him for acting repulsed?”

“Tan!” He groaned. “I saw him writing that note and I tried to reason with him. I promised him wealth, I told him we could make him an Isan noble, I even said you would let him Bleep you if he wanted. Nothing I said got to him, Tan. He was set on sending the note to the Eze.”

“So, then, you killed him?”

He threw his hands in the air. “Don’t act like I’m a murderer! I didn’t kill him expecting you to come in here and cover it up for me. I told the slave that I wouldn’t let him do anything to hurt your reputation, or this nation, and he said I’d have to stop him. We fought, I pushed him, and his head hit the table. He bled out. That’s the truth.”

My eyes scanned his body, watching every feature in his face, every incline of his eyebrows, every blink of his eyes, every movement of his lips, every flexing of his hands. “You fought, you pushed him, he died?” I couldn’t help but notice that he’d taken the time to scrub his room clean of the boy’s blood.

His eyes held mine. “Yes, Tan, I swear.” He gestured to the balcony, and the rope the slave had been hanging from. “I panicked and did that because I thought it would look bad if the Nuri delegation found out that I killed the slave we told them I fought the Oza to defend.”

“What will I do with you Ti?”

He looked away. “I’m sorry, I was just trying to make up for the problems I caused with the Nuri. I thought I could reason with him. I swear Tan, there was something off about him.”

“No,” I shook my head, “there was nothing off about him. Because, if there was something off about him, then we may not have seen what we thought we saw with the Oza.”

Tiwo’s eyes widened. He shook his head. “It’s not possible Tan, I walked in on the Oza pressing his face to the ground while he thrashed around, screaming ‘abeg’. I told the Oza to release him, he refused. What other interpretation could there be?”

“None.” I ignored the voice in my head reminding me of what I’d thought about the Oza before that incident and the way he’d whispered those words into my ear, like he was desperate for me to remember.

“Let the suicide stand Tan. It’s the best thing for all of us.”

No. I could not fail my calling again. I was called to guidance, and the moment that slave accepted his calling to service, he became a child of Egbabonelimwin. Not to mention the fact that he was my slave. He was mine to protect.

“Mede!”

The door opened and she came in. They’d been standing outside, close enough to hear. I trusted them both with my lives. The tumblers were a special breed, their loyalty to the Oba was absolute.

“Revered,” she bowed.

“Send a message to our mother, tell her that we will be coming to Bono. Also, have someone find the boy’s family. He mentioned that they’re wealthy sugar merchants. We will be taking his body back to them.”

Mede bowed. “Yes, revered.” She walked out.

“You’re making a mistake Tan.” Tiwo muttered.

“No!” I snapped at him. “We will go to Bono and we will do the honorable thing and tell the family what happened. They deserve better than to think their son killed himself. We will pay whatever reparation they demand.”

“What if they demand my life?”

“You fought, so his death was an accident, they do not have the right to demand your life in payment.”

“But they have the right to demand reparation in service. Will you give me to his family as a serf?” His bottom lip shook. “Please Tan, just let the suicide stand. Please.”

“Don’t you understand? He forsook the Eyo masquerade when he answered his calling. To then kill himself out of shame for fulfilling his calling, it is an insult to Egbabonelimwin. If they think he affronted both masquerades, his family will not give him an honorable burial. They will be shamed by his death, Tiwo, we cannot let that happen.” I walked over to him and sat on the bed beside him. “We will go to Bono,” I said, pulling him into my arms, “and we will make reparations. I will not let anything bad happen to you, Ti, but we will make reparations.” I held him till his fears subsided.

3

The Nuri delegation filled one half of the enclosure. They were all men, they all wore white agbadas, and they all tried very hard to school their features into emotionlessness. No one but the palace guards and the royal family was allowed to wield weapons in the palace, but I could tell from how often the Nuris reached for their waists, that they were fighting men and that they wished for their weapons just then.

I let the gender of the delegates distract me. There were no women. I’d never been to Nuri, and I never wished to go there, but I’d heard of how they kept their woman. I imagined myself as a Nuri woman and swallowed down the gag reflex that thought invoked.

“For a slave,” one of the Nuri men spat out. There were thirteen of them, the total number of the Nuri delegation, excluding the newly deceased Oza. The man that made the comment stared at my brother and spat.

They’d tried, unsuccessfully, to find fault with the Oza’s death. They couldn’t blame me for rushing into a scene and defending my brother, and they couldn’t blame me for taking the life of one who’d attacked me and showed no signs of stopping – I’d edited the last part a bit, choosing to hide the Oza’s reaction to discovering my identity – the only fault they could find was in my brother starting the fight in the first place.

Tiwo stood tall. The both of us were of a height, and we both towered over the men in the Nuri delegation. He stood beside me, and so the only people who could tell how nervous he was, were the ones who could see the hands he held behind him, shaking. I was the only one close enough to see it. My personal guard, all tumblers, stood by my right and my brother’s left. There were seven of them, Mede included. We’d also summoned a number of our nobles, who lived at court. It put the odds strongly in our favor, with two Isans for each Nuri.

“Here, a slave is one who answers their calling to serve. It is an insult to our Oracle, and our Oba, to refuse an Isan slave’s ‘abeg’ cries. I would not be a person of honor if I did not intercede. It was your Oza who was in the wrong. He wore a mask to hide his identity while he performed the shameful act of raping an Isan slave.”

I groaned. Tiwo’s words showed how troubled he was by what he’d done. My brother was usually too smart to make the sort of blunder he’d just made.

All of the men in the Nuri delegation reared back. They gasped and then muttered amongst themselves, speaking in Nuri, and shaking their heads. The biggest one amongst them, pushed himself from the background and stepped forward. He pointed at Tiwo. “Me. Challenge. You. Fight.” He spoke the Isan words with a heavy Nuri accent.

Tiwo’s hands clenched behind him. He kept his face straight, but I saw his coloring change imperceptibly. He was starting to look a little grey.

I cleared my throat and the Nuri muttering stopped. Their gazes on me were insulting. They eyed me, and their lips pursed with disgust. The Oza was the only Nuri person I’d met who wasn’t instantly repulsed by the idea of a woman empowered to lead others, including men. He’d seemed decent to me, for a Nuri. But then, I’d also seen him attempting to rape a slave, so, obviously, looks could be deceiving. Perhaps he was just better at hiding his true nature.

I let the silence hang, giving the Nuri men the time to compose themselves. They may not like that I was a leader, but I was, and there was nothing they could do about it.

“There will be no challenge,” I pronounced. “We are deeply aggrieved by the crime that was committed here, against our person.” I pulled the corner of my lip backwards, drawing attention to my bruised cheek. My skin smarted, but I ignored the pain. “Our brother misspoke. Of course, he acknowledges that the Nuri people wear masks when they seek communion with the Ijele masquerade. The Oza was no doubt returning from prayer when he fell upon our slave. We sincerely regret that the exchange that occurred led to the loss of such an exalted personage, but the Oza struck us, which is a crime punishable by death.” I turned my attention to the man who’d tried to challenge my brother. “We understand that you will need time to return to Nuri and bury the Oza. We will send, with you, a formal missive to the Eze and moneys of reparation.” The Nuri men inhaled sharply, as if the suggestion that any amount of money could make up for the lost life, offended them. “If the Eze of Nuri does not accept our reparations, then he is invited to come here and discuss such matters with us in person.”

My Isan nobles nodded. To them it was a fair exchange, but the Nuris disagreed. Instead they bore the pinched expressions of people who’d just been insulted. It must pain them that there was nothing they could do. Of the three Nulin nations, Isan was the most powerful. We had the strongest armies, the fullest coffers and the most bountiful land. If the Eze of Nuri wished to declare war on Isan, when he was already facing the possibility of war with Bono, then he would be crushed by the combined might of both of our nations, and the Nuri delegation knew it.

Affronted though they were, they walked over to pick up the body of their dead Oza.

“Nuri. Isan. Fight!” The Nuri man who’d challenged my brother spoke. I ignored him. If he was stupid enough to think that his Eze would declare war on Isan, then he was simply foolish, and there was nothing I could do about that.

Then they dealt me the insult of turning their backs to me.

My nobles gasped.

“Stop!” They kept going but were forced to stop when they came face to face with the tumblers who’d rushed to block their exit. The Nuri man who’d issued the challenge seemed to be spoiling for a fight. He threw the first punch.

It was easy to underestimate the Isan tumblers, dressed in their red girdles, if you’d never had the privilege of seeing them fight. They were the ones, like me, who the Oracle had declared had a calling for motion, blessed with the same dancing skills as our Isan Egbabonelimwin masquerade. Men and women with this calling, trained day and night, for years, to turn their natural limber into deadly accuracy. They could throw a spear, or fire an arrow, from five kilometers away and hit their target. When they moved their body, it was as if they had no bones in it.

The Nuri man’s hand came forward and the tumbler, dropped his spear, grabbed the man’s hand and then turned him over his body, till he was on his back on the ground. Then, in a single motion, he rose with his spear, placed his feet against the man’s throat and the sharp point of his spear against his side. The tumbler turned to me for permission to kill the Nuri man.

“Should we order his execution too?” I asked, in a bored tone, “or will you show us the respect we deserve?”

“First you kill our Oza, then you insult us!” One of the Nuri men spat out.

“Your Oza struck us and we killed him to save our life. Would you rather he lived, and we died? Was that the true purpose of this visit? Did the Eze of Nuri send a delegation to kill us?”

The Nuri man who’d spoken stared at me with wide eyes. He was much older than I was, old enough for grey hair to form and mix with his black curls. I imagined he was in his sixties. He saw a woman of my age and his automatic response was to be belittling. What he didn’t understand was that I was neither young, nor a woman. I did not have the privilege of being those things. I was Oba.

“Well?” I snapped. “Did the Eze of Nuri send a delegation to Isan to execute us? Is this an act of war?”

Every person seemed to stop breathing. All the men in the Nuri delegation had turned now to face me. They were all much older than I was. A delegation like this would only be composed of elderly men. Age was one of the deciders of the levels in the Nuri strata.

“Of course not, revered, of course not.”

“Then let us remind you that you stand on Isan soil. You will not disrespect us and live to tell the tale.”

The man in the lead, the one who’d spoken to me, turned ashen. He bowed. “Forgive us, revered.”

“Leave.” I flicked my fingers in dismissal. Then I turned to the tumbler still waiting for permission to execute the Nuri man, and I shook my head. He stepped off the man’s throat and pulled his spear away from his body. This time, when the Nuri delegation walked out, they did it without turning their backs to me.

I turned to my nobles. “Thank you for bearing witness. You may leave now.”

The nobles bowed and then they backed out of the enclosure, leaving me alone with my brother, my tumblers, and the kneeling slave. As soon as the last of the nobles was gone, Tiwo dropped to his knees and threw up. I stared at the area of sand that was now soaked with the Oza’s blood, only then allowing myself to think about what we’d done. It had to be done. I’d lied. That lie, the one I’d told about the Oza attacking me, even though he knew I was the Oba, it ate at me.

Motion and guidance, those were my callings, and the first lesson my father taught me on the calling of guidance was honor. The lie of me taking the Oza’s life was not dishonorable, I had done it for my brother. But the lie of the Oza’s nature, acting like he was the sort to knowingly attack a leader in their own nation, discredited the Oza’s memory. I tried to tell myself that he was a rapist, and so he did not have any honor to erode, but it was my honor that had been affected by the lie.

I forced my mind away from it even as my eyes rose to the full moon. The spirit of Egbabonelimwin looked down on me, and I knew that my father lived on as a part of the masquerade. My gaze turned from the moon to my brother, who was still retching. I dishonored myself for him and I would do it again, just as I knew that he would do the same for me.

Perhaps our father had been wrong to keep Tiwo from war. He’d been so bad at fighting and it was not in his calling and so no one had seen any purpose for it. Now though, I couldn’t help but wonder if he would do better if he’d seen death before. I’d seen death, perhaps too much. Our father had started taken me to war with him, from the moment the Oracle declared my calling.

The night was quiet again. Tiwo had finally stopped heaving. I focused on him and noticed that the slave boy had moved over to him and was now soothing him. He’d cushioned Tiwo’s head on his shoulder, and ran his fingers through his braid with one hand, while the other hand stroked Tiwo’s back. My eyes narrowed. Could I have read the situation with the slave wrong? Had he reacted so strongly to Tiwo’s advances because he was interested and despised himself for it? I did not know and I was too tired to try to contemplate slave behavior.

I walked over to my brother and knelt by his side. “Let me take you to your room. I’ll spend the night with you in case you need me.”

He turned to me and smiled. His eyes had the wet look of one who’d either just cried, or was struggling against tears. He was about to nod, but the slave spoke up before he could.

“Please, let me take care of him, revered, I owe him at least that much.”

I frowned at the slave, then turned back to my brother. “Tiwo?”

He grunted. “I’ll choose a slave in my bed over my sister any day.”

The appearance of Tiwo’s wit showed that he was coming out of the haze that killing the Oza had put him in. I nodded. Then I bent to kiss his cheek.

I stood, then turned my attention to the slave supporting my brother. I stroked his neck. He closed his eyes and made a purring sound. I couldn’t help it, something about the slave just didn’t sit right with me. But it was Tiwo’s choice and I could not take that away from him. “Take care of my brother,” I said to the slave.

“Yes, revered, it would be my honor,” and he sounded like he meant it too.

I walked out of the enclosure and went far enough away that I wouldn’t be heard. Then I beckoned for Mede and Eghe, the tumbler who’d put the Nuri man on his back. “Stay with my brother. I don’t want him alone with that slave. I don’t care if that means you have to watch them Bleep.”

“Yes, revered.”

I turned my back on them and made my way to my suite with the rest of my tumbler guard marching behind me. I needed wine, not Nuri chapman, but heavily fermented Isan palm wine. My thoughts kept drifting back to the Oza as we walked the grounds.

Jugga trader, tell nunu, the doubles.

Did I care about that dying message? I remembered his voice whispering that in my ear, and how imperative it had sounded. He’d realized he was dying, and he’d whispered it to me. But why? How could he possibly think that I would be able to decipher anything he said? And why did I care? He was a rapist. Not in Nuri though. In Nuri, what he’d tried to do to my slave was the right of a free man of his strata. Slaves in Nuri were considered so low that their gender was determined irrelevant. Things that a free man wouldn’t consider doing to a free man or woman, he could do to his slaves, and the slaves had absolutely no choices in the matter. They took the gift of service and spat on it. I took that and added it to how they treated women, and then purged my thoughts of the Oza’s dying words. Hopefully, this would be a much-needed lesson to the Nuri.

I'll only be able to post updates once a week. I'm thinking this time (Saturday mornings) would be best

@cassbeat I see you found it already

@Tuhndhay Please tell Cala that it should not be angry with me. It was the imps not me, I didn't want sweet Cala to die

Okay, so I'm in the process of publishing awakening, and the last thing I need is an amazing book cover design. I'm going through different places to get different designers working on this, but I also wanted to open it up to you guys. I don't know if anyone on here is a graphic designer, but if you are and you're interested in working on this, please reach out with previous work done. If you're a good fit, we can put our heads together and come up with something great!

Ps. This is a paying gig

Thanks!

lol @Jackossky just out of curiosity, why is it hard to believe? But yeah, I am indeed a female

@tunjilomo yes, yes, yes I am

@cassbeat I am indeed back and with a new story too, though this one is quite different from anything else I've written so...

@movmentish no disrespect, but as tomboyish as I am, I have to turn down the bro knighthood in favor of my sis brigade sword and shield, lol

I've literally spent a good amount of time today trying to see if this story will violate NL posting regulations and then I just decided to just post. So, if for some reason during the duration of this I'm unable to keep posting here, and the interest exists, I've prepared my blog so that I can move the story over there.

Enjoy!

Jackossky:
Nice work bro. We're done with this, writing fantasy takes a very deep understanding and wow. It was worth the ride.


Ciao

I'm actually not a 'bro' but I do appreciate the comment. I'm glad you enjoyed it

2

It was cool for a midweek night, cool enough to enjoy an outdoor swim. I pulled my tunic off and jumped into the water. I waded through it, letting the coolness of the liquid seep through my skin. Midnight exercises were a rare occurrence for me, but tonight I had found myself in the gym, pounding my stick against Mede’s intransigent ones. The water wiped off the last of my sweat.

I swam around the edges of the pool in a single lap and then climbed out.

“Towel,” I said.

The rustling of leaves greeted my request. The stream was ensconced by palm trees and shrubs, two kilometers behind my suite of rooms. I glanced up and peered at the white moon. The Oracle taught that my ancestors all lived in that moon. We were descended of the Egbabonelimwin, the dancing masquerade, whose spirit lives on in the moon. When I died, I would join them and gaze upon the work of my descendants as the moon stared down at me.

“Revered?”

My lips tightened, my eyes narrowing at the familiarity of the voice. I did not like to beat slaves, well, I did not like to beat slaves who did not enjoy getting beaten. For this boy though, I could make an exception. I swiveled, hoping that my ears had been playing tricks on me.

They hadn’t. It was the slave boy from the hall, the one who’d been rude about spurning my brother’s attentions. It was his right to refuse my brother’s advances, but did he have to do it so discourteously? And these were the gifts mother gave me.

He knelt on the ground, naked, with his head bowed and his hands extended, palm up, holding out my towel.

I regarded him coolly. I should strike him, I should. I’d ordered him to make sure I never saw him, and he’d disobeyed me. No one disobeyed me.

I plucked the towel from his fingers. “From where do you hale?”

“Bono, revered.”

My hands froze in the process of raising the towel. That was not the answer I’d expected. His skin was dark, much too dark for the Bono, who of the three Nulin nations had the lightest skin. I’d thought he would mention an Isan village. Well, a slave from Bono, that would explain why he reacted to my brother the way he did. The Bono people saw all forms of homosexuality as unclean, and the act violated their ruling tenet of verdure.

My anger towards the daring slave lessened.

“And you came to Isan because?”

The boy kept his bald head bowed. “Service is my calling, revered, and Isan is the only nation I could find freedom in slavery.”

I sighed. It was the perfect answer. Perhaps not perfect for others, but perfect for me. Nothing was more enticing than a slave who luxuriated in service. My fingers, of their own accord, found the curve of the boy’s earlobe and stroked. He inhaled sharply and his breathing became erratic. My lips twitched.

“I did not know that the Bono sought their calling.” In fact, I knew it was the opposite. The Bono were ruled by the tenet of verdure. It was only in Isan that the tenet of calling was honored. It was due to that tenet that I was Oba instead of my brother. Tiwo was born a day earlier than I was. His older age made him, by Bono standards, fresher, and rightful heir. The fact that he was male would have made him rightful heir in Nuri, whose tenet of stratum put males above females. But the oracle proclaimed the calling of service and erudition for Tiwo. My calling was better suited for leadership.

My fingers trailed from his earlobe to his neck and he leaned his head slightly in the other direction, giving me better access. A glance downwards showed that he was already semi erect. When I ran the pad of my thumb across his face I felt the brush of trimmed whiskers. I stepped in closer, close enough that he could smell my arousal.

His eyes snapped to mine.

“Answer me,” my voice was lower.

He swallowed. “I am the eldest son of wealthy sugar merchants, but no matter how hard I tried, I failed in all ventures to further my parents’ wealth. Then I heard tales of the Isan way of living, of how following one’s calling helped one achieve their fullest potential, and so I visited the shrine of Egbabonelimwin and asked for my calling.”

“Do you want to taste me?”

His lips parted and I saw a glimpse of tongue. Would he dare stick that tongue out and run it along my folds without permission? I thought of how I would punish him if he did, and my arousal heightened. His nostrils flared.

“Answer me, pretty boy.” I wondered if he recognized the endearment my brother had given him. Then I tipped my leg forward and stroked him with my toes, till he hardened and a bead of precum poured out of him.

His tongue came out then, but only to wet his lips. “Yes, please, revered.”

That was all I needed to hear. I stepped back from him. He made a sound of protest and stared dazedly at me, as if he was suddenly unable to place his surroundings. “Please, revered,” he begged.

I liked begging.

I didn’t like him.

It wasn’t his fault. He was Bono, he’d been raised from birth with the belief that homosexuality was an insult to their Eyo masquerade. So, it only made sense that he’d reacted to my brother the way he did. What annoyed me wasn’t that he refused Tiwo, but that he’d been belligerent and scornful. A slave should know how to say no without being rude.

I spread my towel out on the grass and lay on it. Then I parted my legs and stroked myself.

“Please, revered, please, use me.”

I stopped and turned to face him with my wet fingers resting idly on my outer lips. “You insulted me when you insulted my brother,” I said, “until Tiwo forgives you, I do not want to see you again. The next time you come into my presence without my permission, I will not treat you so leniently. Now get out.”

He stared at me, and for a second, I saw the flash of something in his eyes. In that moment his gaze hardened, his jaw clenched, and his eyebrows pulled together. His hands tightened into fists and the muscles in his biceps flared. He had more muscles than I did, but I was taller, I was taller than most men. Even if I wasn’t taller, I would still be able to beat him. I wondered if he would dare attempt to strike me. I could see that he wanted to. This was the result of the Isan way of servitude. Our slaves made the choice to serve, we did not force it on them. It was their decision to end that slavery whenever they pleased. It was their choice and so they fought their own internal battles. I got more aroused watching this boy fight his. Then the moment passed, and he bent, bowing till his forehead touched the ground.

“I am grateful for your mercy, revered.” He crawled backwards, away from me, waiting till he reached the cover of the trees to rise. It was not a form of abasement I required of anyone. It was actually the kind of thing that a Nuri slave would do. That thought cooled my desire, but I kept my fingers where they were and rubbed languidly. My eyelids pulled together.

“Shall I fetch a slave to help you, revered?”

I smiled. “Why fetch a slave when you can help me yourself?”

Then I turned my head to the side and opened my eyes. Mede stood with her body facing me but her gaze respectfully averted. She was dressed in her tumbler uniform, a tight red girdle that extended from her neck to her midthighs. She held her spear in her left hand.

I chuckled at the effort she exerted to keep her eyes off me, and rose. Mede was on the list of people I derived no pleasure in unnerving. It was a short list with only three names: my mother, Tiwo and Mede. Once upon a time, I would have said that Mede and I were a hot Bleep just waiting to happen. She was thirty now, ten years my senior, but we’d been together since my tenth birthday, when the Oracle read my calling and my father named me his heir. She was my trainer, my servant, my guard, my tutor, my friend, whatever role I needed her to play, she played, except for the role of lover. I put on my tunic.

“It is safe to look now,” I drawled.

She turned and our eyes met. Ten years ago, when she’d been chosen as my companion, my heart had leaped at the sight of her. Her oval-shaped face, her curvy body, which she’d trained to a fatless perfection, her heart-shaped lips, her long lashes. I sighed. Some women were just made to be admired.

“Did you want something?” I asked.

“I saw Tiwo walking unaccompanied along the southern edge of the palace. I attempted to accompany him, but he refused. I don’t think he should be walking around unescorted when we have foreign visitors.”

I nodded. It was funny, I was the Oba, but Tiwo was the one that needed protection. My foolish brother could barely wield a cutlass, but that didn’t stop him from making enemies wherever he could. No Isan would dare harm Tiwo, but with the Nuri delegation in the palace…I’d hoped those Nuri girls would keep him distracted. I sighed and let Mede lead me away. She walked a step behind me.

“Did I mention that you look particularly good tonight?” I asked.

“I could say the same thing to you.”

I froze. Then I swiveled. Mede’s eyes bubbled with mirth. Mine narrowed. “Are you teasing me?”

“Can’t take what you dish out?”

“I usually follow through.”

“That Bono slave boy might disagree.”

“So you saw that.”

She nodded. “Interesting tactic, for one who’d disobeyed you. He’ll do it again. Men are hardheaded dolts.”

She didn’t like men. I knew enough of Mede’s history to understand why. “I’ve never had problems disciplining my slaves. I don’t think he’ll do it again, but if he does, he will regret it.” I turned and we continued walking. The night was mostly silent. We wove around trees and came across palace guards standing at several posts throughout the grounds. None of them were tumblers. They bowed, and I acknowledged them with a nod they couldn’t see with their heads bowed. But I did it anyway. My father had taught me to always acknowledge another’s service. By acknowledging their service, we acknowledged their calling, and honored our masquerade.

“Oga abeg!” The cry came from our left. We both turned towards it and ran. “Abeg!” the voice pleaded. ‘Abeg’ was a slave’s prerogative, it was their cry that the act of service being requested went beyond their calling. No Isan person would push a slave beyond that point. But this slave kept crying, ‘oga abeg’. I used my tumbler training and climbed up a tree. Then I jumped from that tree, to another, and then another, until I was standing close enough to see the tableau. It wasn’t just any slave being assaulted, but my Bono slave. A man in a white lace agbada, with a bag mask over his head, had forced the Bono slave to the ground and was climbing on him, deaf to his cries of ‘abeg.’

I looked down and cursed at the wall of thick shrubs beneath me and the lack of trees in the enclosure they stood in. I jumped back, to another tree, and then climbed down, jumping when I was close enough to the ground. I rolled to my feet and raced towards the wall.

“Revered!” I heard Mede screaming for me, “wait for me!” It was obvious that she’d chosen to discard her spear and climb the trees after me. I ignored her calls and ran towards the shrubs. I had to run around it to find an opening. Who’d designed this?

I stormed into the enclosure and found the slave boy kneeling to the side, heaving, while my brother fought against the masked man in the agbada. My brother had zero skill as a fighter. The masked man punched him across the face, and he fell. I ran to the man and pulled him backwards as he moved towards my brother. He was as tall as I was, which was rare, but he was bulky, much bulkier than me. His stomach was rounded and his arms and thighs big. He had the look of a person with muscles underneath all his fat. I aimed my feet at the back of his knees and kicked him, hard.

He stumbled. And then turned around to face me, swinging. He stopped when he saw me. “Woman,” he spat out. I saw his eyes narrow through the slits in the bag he wore over his face. “Get away!” he snapped. His Isan was heavily accented, but it was still clear enough to understand. He turned back towards my brother. I punched him in his side. Then he turned back to face me and sent the back of his left hand swinging towards my face.

I dodged his slap and punched him twice in his fat belly.

The man growled, giving me his full attention as I danced back, away from his swinging hand. He lashed out, I bent and punched him underneath his arm. His growling got louder.

“I do not fight women!” he yelled at me.

“Then I feel sorry for you.” I smashed my elbow into his face, exulting in the solid contact of my bones against his nose.

He yelled. He slammed his forehead against mine. The contact was hard, it blurred my vision and made me stumble. I caught myself before I could fall, but as I turned back to face him, I saw his meaty fist approaching my face. I reared back but not fast enough. The punch made solid contact with my cheek. I spat blood. He reached for the collar of my tunic and I ducked and drove my smarting head into his stomach. He grunted, but he didn’t stop. He absorbed the blow, grabbed my unadorned braids, and pulled. Then he shoved me to my knees on the ground and bent over me.

I could tell the moment he realized who I was.

His hand stopped, mid swing, and he froze. His eyes widened and I saw terror in his eyes, as if he realized the enormity of the mistake he’d made. He shook his head and his accented words came out pleading, “Revered…” Whatever he was about to say was cut off.

The rounded edge of a cutlass stuck out of his neck.

“Revered!” Mede came bursting into the scene.

Tiwo pulled his cutlass out of the man’s neck and he fell, taking me with him. I was crushed underneath the man’s bulk and wetted by his blood. “Jugga trader, tell nunu, the doubles...” he whispered into my ear and then he stopped speaking and I could tell that he was dead. The awkward slant of our bodies forced my head to the side. I pushed at him and then rolled out from underneath his large body.

“Tan?” Tiwo ran towards me. “Are you alright?” He extended his hand and drew me to my feet. Then he ran his fingers over the bruise on my face, where the man punched me. I was more concerned with the blood that had plastered my tunic to my body.

“Revered,” I could tell from the tone of Mede’s voice that something was wrong. Very wrong.

I turned around.

Mede had taken the mask off the man.

Suddenly, his reaction to seeing that I was the one he was fighting made more sense. He wouldn’t have struck me any further. He’d been pleading with me for mercy.

I walked forward and bent over the corpse of the Oza, the head of the Nuri delegation. This man was said to be as a father to the Eze of Nuri. I thought of what I would have done if someone murdered my father. My mind reeled with the political implications of killing such a prominent member of another nation’s royal family. He’d ignored a slave’s cries for him to stop. He’d insulted that slave’s calling and defied our governing tenet. By Isan law I had every right to kill him, especially after he attacked me. By Isan law I had every right to order his execution, but diplomacy mandated that I communicate with the Eze of Nuri before seeking such drastic terms. If I’d killed him in self-defense though…no nation could argue against that.

I turned to face my brother. Tiwo’s eyes were wide with shock and he looked sickened by the revelation of who he’d killed.

“I killed him.” I declared.

I turned my gaze on Mede first. She nodded.

“No,” Tiwo shook his head, “no, I did this. I will travel to Nuri, I will explain myself to the Eze of Nuri.”

“And he will kill you,” I snapped at him. “Slaves are less than nothing in Nuri. Their tenet is stratum and slaves don’t even fall on any level of their strata. He will not understand how you could kill a noble to defend a slave. I killed the Oza in self-defense. I ran into the clearing, I saw you fighting and then I took him on. He knocked me around, I found your cutlass and I shoved it into his neck. I killed him Tiwo.”

“No,” Tiwo’s eyes rounded on me, “I cannot let you…”

“Let me?” I cut him off. “I grant you a lot of leave but don’t forget that I am your Oba. You will obey me brother.”

His head hung. He nodded.

I turned to the Bono slave, kneeling to the side, his eyes soaking up all that was happening. Our eyes met and we shared another moment. I saw the surge of power that colored his features. The corners of his lips tipped upwards and his eyes shone in triumph, as though he was already planning all the ways that he could use this knowledge against me. Then the moment faded, and he bowed to me.

“Your brother saved me, revered, he fought for me when all I’d done was insult him. He had no reason to protect me, yet he risked his life to do so. I will not cause him any harm.” The slave’s words should have comforted me, but after the look we’d shared, they did not.

I turned my back on him and shifted my focus to the Oza’s corpse. “Fetch the Nuri delegation,” I said. It was Mede who left to do my bidden.

Jugga trader, tell nunu, the doubles.

The Oza had whispered those words to me with his dying breath. They made no sense. I massaged my throbbing head and waited for the consequences of this night to come crashing in on us.

1

The Nuri slave girls danced like cats in heat. Muscled thighs rubbed wet nether lips, and pebbled nipples brushed frantically against each other. Sharp notes from the drum master’s talking drum, struck in tune with their gyrations, accompanied by a chorus of half-dressed instrumentalists. They blew on flutes, slapped palms against shekere beads and plucked on metallic tines. The music was adequate. The drumming acceptable. And the slave girls quite pleasing. Watching the teasing of their oiled bodies, trained for this type of display, stoked at all my voyeuristic tendencies. My nipples stirred to life underneath my velvet dress. I leaned my head to the side and watched the entertainment. Their hips swung in alternation, one girl pushed forward, stroking herself against the other, and her partner retaliated.

Theirs was a special type of torture.

Their eyes were partially closed, and their lips slightly parted. They let out soft pants of arousal.

All around them, nobles lounged idly. Some had pleasure slaves of their own seeing to their needs. A cursory glance revealed bald slave scalps held in place over erect phalluses and between shapely thighs. I moved my hand slightly and my slave rushed to place a bowl of cubed mangoes within my grasp. The slave boy was new. He was all slim grace, with a sculpted chest and arms slightly bulging with muscles. His cock stood tall and proud. He, like everyone else in my court, seemed to be enjoying the dancing slaves.

I let my fingers toy absently with the yellow cubes in the golden bowl proffered. The slave boy’s eyes rose to mine. His lips parted and a red tongue darted out, sliding leisurely over his plump lower lip, leaving a trail of moisture in its wake. For a fleeting second, I wondered how that tongue would feel travelling up my thighs and lapping up the wetness starting to form between my legs. Then the moment passed and I plucked a cube from the bowl. I fed the slave, a small cube first. He closed his eyes and chewed slowly as if he was savoring every bit. Then his eyes opened, he stared up at me and blinked. I trailed the back of my fingers over his long lashes and fed him another cube. This time he sucked on my fingers as I pulled them out of his mouth.

I smiled and took my focus back to the dancing girls.

They were gifts from the Eze of Nuri, beautiful girls with honey brown skin, rounded curves and full breasts. They had the light skin and short, curly, hair of the Nuri people, much different from my people, the Isan, with our darker skin and longer kinky hair. Nuri slaves were allowed to keep their hair. They did not need to sheer their curls to show their servitude, the brand on their skin did that for them. These dancing girls were branded on their finely shaped buttocks.

The barbarity never failed to shock me. It was not that they had slaves, the Isan had slaves too, it was that their bonds of slavery were permanent. A brand like the Nuris fashioned could not be removed. A Nuri slave would always be known as one who’d been owned. In Isan, our slaves made a choice. They cut their hair when they wished to be enslaved and let it grow out when they desired freedom. Some did it simply because they felt it best suited their natures. They liked to be kept, they were told by the Oracle that service was their calling and they exalted in it. Some did it for a period of time for moneys earned, some in reparation for crimes committed, and some to gain political favor. But slaves could reenter society as free and have no permanent signs to show what they’d been. It was the civilized way of handling such business.

The thud of sandaled feet tore my attention from the dancing girls. I turned slowly to stare at the marbled steps that led up to the dais. Only my family would dare climb without first seeking permission. Tiwo smirked at me from a face that bore an eerie resemblance to mine. His long hair was braided like mine, but only two of his braids were woven with gems. He wore royal beads around his waist, neck, wrists and ankles. He was dressed in the Isan custom, with a velvet wrapper tied around his waist and his chest left bare.

The guards bowed to him as he walked by.

He ignored them with the cool air of an aristocrat placed far above their station.

He strolled up to me, bent, and whispered into my ear, “say whatever you want about the Nuri, their girls have nice tits.” Then he kissed me on my cheek and stood, waiting. Moments later, palace servants in khakis rushed up the dais, carrying a short leather couch. They placed the couch on the ground and descended the stage walking backwards, with their heads bowed.

No one walked with their back to me.

No one but my arrogant twin brother.

He turned his back on me, flaunting our customs with a casual disregard that drew gasps of outrage from my personal guard. They glared at him, but Tiwo was indifferent. I just shook my head. My gaze turned to the rest of the court. Tiwo’s presence had drawn attention away from the ardent labors of the Nuri dancers. Now the nobles frowned their censure at Tiwo, and by extension, me. It was a mark against me that I allowed him to disrespect me. What they couldn’t understand was that I didn’t care.

“Pretty boy,” Tiwo commented, his gaze was on the dancing girls not the ‘pretty’ slave boy who’d frozen up at Tiwo’s words. “Mangoes, boy.” He snapped his finger. The slave didn’t move. Tiwo’s lips tightened. He stared at me over the kneeling boy’s head. “Where did you get him?”

I passed a cursory glance over the finely scraped scalp. “A gift from our mother.”

Tiwo scuffed. “Who did she Bleep this time?”

“Tiwo,” I scolded.

“What? You know she only sends you gifts when she’s in trouble.” Tiwo’s gaze turned to the boy who still knelt stiffly. He hadn’t moved since Tiwo made his comment. Tiwo stretched out his hand slowly. I watched him out of the corner of my eye as he ran his knuckles across the side of the boy’s face.

The slave’s jaw clenched.

“Ah, I see,” Tiwo pulled his hand back, “my apologies.” His lips quirked in a mocking smile. “Will you feed me anyway?” The slave didn’t move. “No?” Tiwo shrugged. He bent forward and scooped out a handful of mango cubes. Then he draped himself back over the couch, his right arm tossed over the back and his left leg thrown over the armrest.

The slave’s jaw ticked. I tended to think of all male slaves as boys and females as girls. It just made it easier, and the ones I enjoyed seemed to like it that way. This ‘boy’ was at least four years older than Tiwo and I, old enough to know better than to openly disrespect a royal. Tiwo was like me, he found pleasure in both sexes as I did, and he was not ashamed of it. I was not perverse enough to share slaves with my brother, but I could not stand them being rude to him.

I flicked my fingers at the slave boy in clear signs of dismissal. His lips tightened and he glared at Tiwo. Then he fixed me with a doe-eyed stare.

“Do I not please you, revered?” he asked. His voice was like saccharine, sweet in a way that was sickening.

Tiwo tsk-ed. “My sister does not like to be disobeyed. You should leave before she punishes you.”

The slave drew up and rounded on Tiwo. He opened his mouth, but I cut him off. “Leave,” I snapped, “and make sure I never see you again.”

He jumped to his feet and hurried away, walking sideways.

Tiwo stared at his muscled backside and whistled. “Mother spoils you with the best gifts.”

Not really. It was just like her to send me a slave that was outwardly pleasing but whose character repulsed me. Besides, I preferred to play with slaves in pairs, like the Nuri dancing girls. Now those two were a matched set. They were so close to the brink, it was obvious in the frenzied way they stroked themselves with their thighs.

“Please put them out of their misery, Tan.”

“Softy,” I teased.

“I look at their fine derrieres and I am instantly aware of the brand that was used on them. Don’t you wonder how they came to be enslaved? Were they stolen from lives they loved and branded? Were they trained to torture themselves with their own sexual frustrations at the end of a whip?”

I turned to glare at my twin. “I could have done without those images in my head.”

He shrugged. It was easy to underestimate Tiwo, when he’d so thoroughly perfected the act of a spoilt, debauched, noble. But underneath that pretense lived a mind as sharp as my sword and a tongue as skilled.

I clapped my hands together. One strike of my palms and the music stopped. The Nuri slaves showed the extent of their training. As soon as the music ended, the hall filled with music of a different sort. The girls groaned. They alternated, high notes followed low ones. Then they bent backwards, their chests lost contact, and they arched, bringing those breasts and their standing nips to a mouth-watering focus.

All the nobles leaned forward, their attentions fixated on the girls who now stroked upwards and downwards, along each other’s thighs, in perfect synchronicity. Then their cries stopped alternating and mingled together instead, in a perfect blend that led up to a mind-blowing crescendo when they erupted in an orgasmic wail. Their chests rose and fell, and they bent even further back, and hung with their legs spread wide, exposing their juices.

“Wow,” Tiwo breathed out.

I stood and picked up my goblet of Nuri chapman.

The hall fell silent.

I turned to the high table on the right side of the room. The Nuri designation sat there. They were headed by an Oza, the highest rank of the Nuri peerage. The Oza that led this designation was the fraternal uncle of the Eze of Nuri. The Oza had served as Umeze, regent to the current Eze after his parents died. He’d been too young then to ascend to the throne. If rumors could be believed, the Oza had raised the Eze as a son.

“We are pleased by this gift,” I said, lifting my goblet, “and look forward to many more years of prosperous trade with the Nuri.”

The Oza stood and bowed to me. “The Nuri are grateful, revered.”

I took a sip of the chapman and let the alcoholic beverage burn down my throat. The liquor in it was light, a Nuri slight to my gender? I ignored the suspicion, sat, and beckoned the slave girls closer.

“You want them,” I said.

Tiwo’s hungry gaze turned to me. “They are yours,” he said.

I had been briefly aroused by their performance, a twitching of my nipples, a little dampness, but I shook my head. The perks of royalty had since left me too well sated. I was not so enamored with them that I would take them for myself when my brother wanted them more. Besides, Tiwo’s words still echoed in my head. If they’d been Isan slaves, I would know they were willing, Nuri slaves…who knew what they thought, or what they’d been sent to spy out in Isan court.

“I see no need to slight the Nuri, so I will excuse myself and take the girls with me. Wait a few minutes and then go to your rooms. They’ll be waiting there for you.”

Tiwo smiled at me. “They are yours, Tan, truly, I can find willing company easy enough.”

“I do not want them.” There was something about this visit from the Oza that did not sit well with me. The news coming from the Nuri-Bono borders these days were troubling. Stories of noble Bono children stolen by Nuri slavers and branded. The Bono people prided purity of the flesh too high to accept a slave as descendant of a noble line. Those children, once branded, were forever lost. There were whispers of a war brewing between our neighbors. The Bono bordered us on the East and the Nuri on the West. Their lands rounded the River Nulin and met at the rivers end, making them neighbors as well. In the event of a war between their nations, ours would be forced to pick sides.

The Isan and the Bono people were tightly bound. My father’s mother was Bono, my mother was currently remarried to a Bono, and chances were that I would marry the youngest Bono prince. If war broke out between the Nuri and the Bono, the Isan would side with Bono. I did not want two Nuri slaves, no matter how delectable, in my bed in the event that happened.

“Ah,” Tiwo said. At times it was as if we shared one mind. His eyes narrowed on the naked slaves who knelt at the foot of the dais. “Have no fear sister, I will take one for the great Isan nation, and suffer myself to coax their true nature out of them.” His devouring gaze scoured over their flesh. I scoffed, suffer indeed.

If it was anyone else, I would feel the need to remind them that the Nuri slaves belonged to me now, which made them Isan slaves, subject to our laws and our deference to the calling that bound them. But it was Tiwo, and my brother and I were of one mind when it came to servitude.

I stood. “Yes, I am sure fucking beautiful women will be a real hardship for you,” I teased dryly. Then I walked off the dais and left the hall, the Nuri slaves crawling silently in my wake.

This is a fantasy fiction story I'm playing around with (I put emphasis on 'playing', because I'm really just having fun with this, which means I'm not taking this as seriously as my previously posted works...which in all honesty may or may not affect how far the story goes, but we can have fun together in the meantime ). A couple things to note:

1) THIS CONTAINS ADULT CONTENT. If you are below the age of 18 please don't read I cannot be held responsible for spoiling someone's child
2) This is FICTION that contains characters engaged in SAME SEX RELATIONSHIPS (f/f and m/m in all combinations) if this type of material is offensive to you, please don't read.
3) To those who've read the Marked series:
This is in no way related to the Marked series.


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Copyrighted material
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Yup, @Ultimategeneral I am very much an introvert

tunjilomo:
I see two discrepancies you will have to take care of when revamping this book then, in resspect to that teleportation thing then.
One on page seventeen — when Calami teleported Monica to Musa. (Not very sure of this one.)
And when Calam and young Cala teleported from the Isle of brio to Lahooni.

There is also this one on page 4, when Musa said he buried Calam and Cala in the royal Okun.

Ooooh, thanks so much for pointing these out! I'll have to make sure I go over these in the editing

Rynne:
Uwlcm my dearest,looking forward to journey you to unknown world's again...thanks and God bless you real good....

Thank you! And I'm looking forward to journeying to those worlds again too.

tunjilomo:
Quick questions for one of my favourite author.
@Georgina,
Do you use nairaland for other things except posting your amazing stories?

You dedicated your first book to The Ones Who Walk Alone. Who are they? Do you consider yourself one of them?

Bye for now.

Thanks for that 'one of my favourite authors', you've made my head swell. I just use Nairaland for posting my stories yes. Lol, that's actually an interesting question about the dedication. So, the dedication for Crimson Night is actually geared towards Osezele (the protagonist). She's an introvert who doesn't speak much and doesn't have many friends, so in that sense she walks alone. But in general, when I think about people who walk alone, I'm thinking about people who are misunderstood, awkward, basically loners and misfits and yes, I do consider myself to be one of those who walk alone in that I am very much a loner and a misfit

tunjilomo:
Is it possible to teleport between two different ports using quicksand?

No, not at all. But, as we can tell later,from after Nebud siphoned Chuspecip's route, it is possible to use route to travel between ports, but it takes time to learn

Thank you all for the comments and the continuing interest, I took some time off NL, probably still taking some time off, lol. I will definitely let everyone know (probably through this thread or another one possibly opened in the future with everyone who commented here tagged in it) when the next books are available and how to get them. I'm still deciding what to do about reckoning/how to write that. NL has spoiled me a little, I've kind of gotten used to getting feedback as I write, and I'm not yet willing to give that up, so I might reach out to a few people to read reckoning with me as I write it...don't know yet where/how that'll be done. I'm still working on finishing the editing for Awakening, once that's done I'll share the link to wherever I publish it! Thanks again everyone!!!

And that is IT. This LONG story is over. I just want to say a big THANK YOU to all of you for coming along on this journey with me. I'm not going to lie, this has been the hardest story for me to write and honestly for me to post, but I'm happy that I made it to the end and I'm grateful to you all for the comments that kept me going when my insecurities and self doubt kicked in. Again, thank you all!

And for those interested in what comes next. Nebud and a number of the characters that we've met in this story are not gone. In fact, this is only the start for them. The attack on Nebud's palace is part of the prologue for the next book in the marked series (White Sight the Reckoning, the last book in the white sight trilogy). In the Reckoning we will be returning to the human world so the attack will be from the POV of the human(s) attacking. We'll see how that goes then.

I've had a few questions on the great war that led to the creation of the marked. During the writing of this book I decided more formally on the structure of the books, and so we will be going into that great war in the next fantasy story set which will be set in the fourth existence. We'll basically be picking up from where we left off here with Chuspecip trying to regain control of its portals. The last fantasy story (outside the marked series but set in the marked universe) will be in the supreme existence. That story will pick up from after the great war and go up to the creation of the ancestry. That will in part be Calane's story.

Now that this is done, I'm going to take a break from writing on NL. I have to work on preparing White Sight the Awakening for the official publication, and once that's done, I'll start writing the Reckoning. I think that this might be my last marked story on Nairaland...I feel like it's time to move the series off NL and focus on seriously publishing it, and all that, but I haven't made any final decisions on that yet...

Again, thanks so much for reading and supporting! I really appreciate it.

Part 27 aka The End
---------------------------

That was how you came to be Calane born into a short respite between the wars. You were the founder’s gift to me. It has been millennia now since all of this happened, yet I miss your sibling as often as I think about it. There is closure with Nebula though. I know what happened to it, I know how I lost it. But not you. That is what grieves me the most. I do not know where you are, and I write this in hopes that you are still in the spectral existence as Cantonia told me you were fourteen years ago.

It took me a year after Nebula’s death before I could take Chuspecip up on its offer. Sometimes I was hard to you Calane, because I knew the power that you had in you and I knew the war that was coming. We had twelve years together, only twelve, before the great war. Before you were snatched away from my arms. The great war ended and the kuwor created the marked in retaliation for our encroachment on the umani world. Umani soldiers to protect their existence. It gave us immortality. At the time there were many who praised the Kuwor for its gift, but now those same uspecs curse it. We cannot procreate, we no longer have new life. Not even Chuspecip could counteract the kuwor’s wish on this. But Churaya found a way. That cursed Chu, it found a way around the Kuwor’s mandate. Now we all want what Churaya created, the ancestry. The fourth existence got one, one umani from that ancestry, one umani through which they can now procreate. There are many in this existence who have sided with InCoSeM for a chance to gain an umani of the ancestry. For our existence, where new life is tied with death, those ancestry umanis could be the end to our immortality. There are many uspecs who crave such an end. Thousands of years is a long time to live. The Kaisers in league with InCoSeM plead with me to join them. I do not care for umani schemes and squabbles, I do not care to be a part of it. But I do care to get you back.

Perhaps now that you know my story you can understand better why I sent you to the pits of Hakute when I did. There was strength in you Calane, you reached your prime before any uspec ought to. You reached your prime before you’d turned ten. You had strength, but you also had weaknesses. You could fight but you could not take a life. You needed to be stronger, to be tougher, and that was why I sent you to the pits. I wonder if you could ever forgive me for this…I wonder so much now. I made mistakes but I did my best. I wanted you to be strong enough to protect yourself. I had to make sure that you did not end up like your siblings, gone too young. But despite my best efforts, the supreme existence, they took you from me. During the great war they stole you away. Perhaps it is my curse to never know the full love of my own flesh and blood. A few bitter days with my first offspring. Five years with my second. Then twelve years with my last, you, Calane.

I must be cursed.

But you live, Cantonia assures me of this. Cantonia says that you were sighted fourteen years ago in Hakute. I wish that the founder could confirm, but it has grown distant. It has been a thousand years since it last spoke to me. I go to the Isle of Brio but I cannot find it. I know it exists because the route it allowed me siphon from it still flares strong within me. But it is distant, away from me.

The supreme existence took you from me, I’ve always known that much, but I’ve never known where or what they did to you. Thousands of years and there was no clue, nothing. I wandered the standard existence in search of you, to no avail. If only I could reach the supreme existence and question the uras who took you from me.

I believe that you were indeed here. The memories I’ve seen from the uspecs who saw you attest to that.

I’d begun to lose hope that I would ever see you again until Mark found the imp. Mark found the female imp, newly dead in Hakute, where you’d last been seen. It was wandering about in a strange pink attire it called its school uniform. It knew details about you Calane, and it said it had seen you, and so I took it in, and at Mark’s insistence, I made it my osin. I let it siphon magic from me and Chike trained it to fight. The imp, my osin, it told me what happened to you. It told me of how you’d finally fought your way free of your ura captives and had used their magic to create a portal. The portals are all dead now, all save for the one that only you and I can walk through, those of Chuspecip’s line. My osin told me that you walked through that portal and you came back here. It said that its own mother helped you return. I read it in the imp’s memories. It had no pansophy, it could not have been lying. Its mother helped you when you were in the standard existence, its mother helped you find your way back. My osin told me that you went into hiding when you returned to the spectral existence, that you feared the uras where coming after you. Why did you not come to me, precious one? Did you think that I could not protect you? Who has more power in this existence than I do? Who could pose a threat against me? But you stay in hiding, my osin told me. It said that the magic you fear is one forged by the ancestry, by one umani ancestry girl in particular. It did not know the girl’s name and so I sent it with the power and the means to find out who this girl is.

Now my osin is dead.

It is impossible. They keep arguing with me. Fabiana, Chike, Mark, they tell me that it is impossible, that an imp cannot be killed. But they do not share the link that I do. I gave it my magic to siphon. If it had only been sapped, I would still feel it, and I would be able to restore it. It is an easy thing for me to restore a sapped imp, trivial. This osin Mark found, the one you were in contact with, the one I sent to find out the name of the umani girl who dared to keep you, my offspring, locked in fear. The osin is dead. I cannot feel it. It is gone. And that is my confirmation that the umani ancestry girl I seek does indeed have the magic that you fear. To kill my osin, the umani ancestry girl had to have come into the spectral existence. That would not be possible without ancestry magic of an order that has never been seen. It is the same magic that allowed the umanis I hear now to have entered my existence and then my port. Ancestry magic. These ones, the umanis attacking my uspecs and causing them to cry in pain. The umanis fighting my guards. I hear the clashing of swords and I imagine how easy it will be to end them. Route is especially good for this. But I chose to write this to you before I embark on the journey, I must go on now. I must find the umani ancestry girl whose magic killed my osin and whose magic keeps you trapped, and I must end its life.

“Master,” Mark’s soft voice pulled me out of my writing.

I blinked. With route it was always so easy to write, to transfer years of memories into pages in far less time than handwriting took. Now I stared at the marks on the parchment. I stood from my desk in my office and turned to face the imp whose cries of alarm had pulled me from my writing. I looked at the imp, with its eyes and its innocent face. Thousands of years had passed since I first met it in my hideout underneath my sire’s lab. Joy had been right, the blasted imp, it had known that Mark and I would bond.

“What is it?”

“It is just one umani, master, the green eyed umani is just one person.” Its voice was steady. I had long since trained away its shivering. This imp was a fighter now, it could be a merciless killer when I required it. It was also the only imp I allowed to siphon my siphoned route.

This information was baffling. “One imp tearing through all my guards.” I glanced at the belt around Mark’s waist and the swords in it. “I was going to intercede but now I think I will not. If my guards are weak enough to be hacked to pieces by a single umani, then they deserve their pain. It is not as if they can be killed.”

The imp frowned. “Master, you said an umani killed your osin. If an umani can kill your osin, then an umani can kill your imps and uspecs.”

I shook my head. “If it could, they would be dead already. The umani is only leaving them decapitated. This is a different umani from the one we are searching for. Let the umani come, I am waiting for it.”

Mark stared evenly at me. “It will be me who has to heal them all, won’t it?”

I smirked at it. “Stop complaining.” I infused growth and hearing into my ears, and I could hear the swords clashing. Could it really be just one umani causing so much damage? I could hear some of my best guards crying out. This was what happened when an uspec could not die, they grew lazy in their fighting. How else could a single umani tear through them?

An imp head emerged from my quicksand ground. Chike’s alarmed face froze on me. “You are letting the umani tear through us.”

I frowned at it. “Did you leave the fight to come here and berate my leadership skills?”

It shook its head. “I received a message from an umani named Ashanti. The umani sent an imp to us.”

“A commune.” I said. Commune killers could see into our world. Commune magic did come from the spectral existence after all, it only made sense, that when they took a life with that magic, granting us an imp in the process, they gained the ability to see select imps in our world. They thought they could see all of our existence, but they only saw what we allowed them to see. The imps they saw were imps sent specifically to be seen by umani communes. “What does this Ashanti commune have to say?”

“It sent greetings to you. Apparently your osin enlisted Ashanti’s aid in seeking out the name of the umani ancestry girl who’s threatening Calane.”

“And,” I asked, impatiently.

“And your osin found the umani girl. It was about to return to you with knowledge of the girl’s name but the umani ancestry girl chased it into this existence and slaughtered it before it could return to you. You were right master, the umani ancestry magic killed it.”

My jaw clenched. “What imp delivered the message?”

“One of Cantonia’s.”

If it came from Cantonia, I knew I could trust it. “Does this Ashanti commune know the umani ancestry girl’s name?”

Chike nodded. “Osezele Omorodion. That is the name of the ancestry girl who killed your osin and whose magic keeps Calane away.”

I turned my attention back to my writing to my offspring and I added one more line.

I am coming for you, Calane. Perhaps when you read this, we will be together. Finally.

Then I took my focus back to Chike. “Where is this umani girl?”

“In a school called St. Luke’s in Port Harcourt, the umani town that coincides with Hakute.”

“Then I am going to St. Luke’s.”

“Master!” Both imps called at the same time. “We are being attacked!”

“Attacked.” I spat the word out. “If, with route, you cannot end the umani who’s brought this chaos on us, then you deserve whatever it does to you.” I said to Mark. Mark could take care of the umani attacking, my priority was following Calane’s trail. I had to kill the ancestry umani girl, I had to get my offspring back.

“I do not know why I stay with you,” Mark replied, exasperated.

I grinned. “You are always free to go to Qatamejo.”

Both imps shuddered. It turned out that Qatamejo had not needed any help from me to fail. Too many imps packed in a single port. From what I’d heard, the port was rife with criminal activity, and there was only one place in the entire port that was safe. The Acropolis. I pushed thoughts of that cursed port from my mind. Qatamejo may have failed as the perfect imp oasis, but it had changed the position of imps forever in the spectral existence. Now there were many ports where slavery had been abolished, ports like Chiboga. All an imp had to do to be free was request to go to one of them. Even now, Chuspecip’s oath to Musa, even when the founder could not be felt, it still punished uspecs who tried to hold back imps who requested access to ports where they could be free.

“Do you really fear that you cannot face the umani?” I asked Mark.

It rolled its eyes. Mark was the only imp I owned who still had eyes. But Mark was also the only imp I trusted with route. I trusted Chike and the others, but it took an entirely different kind of trust to give an imp the kind of power I gave Mark. Its route was siphoned from me, but route was so powerful that it could easily be used against me, even when it was siphoned from me.

“That is not the point, master,” it stated prissily.

I chuckled. “Do not kill the umani, Mark, capture it. I am dying to hear what madness drove it to come for me.”

“Can I at least go and face it now? Or must I still wait till it reaches here?”

I made quicksand underneath myself. “Do whatever you please, Mark. You usually do.” With route I could teleport between ports without the inconvenience of the inter-port trail. It was tricky and hard to master the magic. It had taken me close to a hundred years to be able to teleport between ports. But I’d learnt. I took myself to the Isle of Brio, to the only portal left between our existence and the standard existence. I would find that umani, Osezele Omorodion, and then I would kill it.


====================================
THE END
====================================

“What have I done wrong now, Cantonia?” I asked as I filled my platter. The food smelled very good. I lounged on a bed between Matiu and Fabiana. Cantonia was opposite me, beside Gamble. Chike and Rita filled their platters and found lounging beds. I tossed a piece of fried sky fowl into my mouth.

“You abandoned your port,”

“It did not abandon its port,” Fabiana snapped at Cantonia. Those two did not like each other.

“That is what the nobles are saying,” Cantonia retorted.

I shook my head. “I needed time Cantonia.”

It muttered underneath its breath. I focused on my food.

“We’ve cleared the royal suites of all uspecs who aren’t in this room.” Gamble said. “And I found all the keys that Jukien had in its possession. It did not give those keys to nobles easily.”

“We’ll have to make permanent keys for you all.” I said. The golden tokens Jukien had were spent with each journey. My honoraria needed their own keys to teleport within the suite.

Cantonia cleared its throat. “I have the evidence, mighty one. Since you were nowhere to be found, I took the liberty of arranging a trial for all the guilty parties. They were found guilty, of course, and are awaiting sentencing at your pleasure.” I ignored the gibes in Cantonia’s words.

“How many?”

“Eleven nobles. Jukien, its two offspring, a majestic of a burg under its control, and the entire line of the dukes of the third metropolis.”

I frowned. “I expected more.”

“Many died in the war, sirga,” Gamble said.

“What should their punishment be?” I asked.

My nobles gaped at me. This was something I’d learnt from Calam’s tomes. It never considered sentencing in a vacuum. It sought the advice of nobles who thought differently. Calam was soft, it admitted it, it did not like to execute its subjects. So, it would seek advice from nobles who were not as soft as it was. I was different. Fabiana balanced me out, it was soft where I was not. And Cantonia knew politics, it would think of political implications which I was not yet well-versed in. I wished for Juke. Juke had been the best combination of all of us. Political, caring, but also unyielding when it had to be. It was supposed to have been the advisor I counted on most.

Cantonia recovered from its shock first. “Death.” It said.

I turned to Fabiana. “What do you think?”

“Fabin’s name would have been on that list if it wasn’t my sibling,” Fabiana said, “I find it hard to sentence others who committed a similar crime.”

“Of the eleven nobles, how many of them are older than Fabin?” I asked.

“Seven. Jukien’s offspring and two of the line of the third duke, are either of an age with or younger than Fabin.”

“The four young ones will go free, but they will lose their titles and lands. They are commoners now. Execute six of the seven.”

“Six?”

“Leave Jukien in prison.”

Gamble sat up. “But Jukien was the mastermind.”

I nodded, glancing down at my platter. “What is the best way to honor the dead?”

No one answered.

“Juke told me once that the best way to honor the dead was to find what they cared for most and see it brought to life. Juke cared for its progenitor, and for Juke, I will let Jukien live. It will spend the rest of its life in the gaol.”

Cantonia appeared flabbergasted. I turned to Gamble. “Do you agree?” Gamble was Juke’s best friend amongst my honoraria.

Tears filled its eyes. It nodded. I smiled. “I have three ports that need custodians, uspecs I can trust. I want to give them to you three.”

“Which three?” Fabiana asked, its eyes narrowing at me.

“You, majestic, Matiu and Cantonia.”

Cantonia was stunned. “Me?”

I nodded. “Yes, you. You’ve proved yourself to me Cantonia.”

It stuttered. “I don’t know what to say. Gratitude, mighty one. I will not let you down.”

“You will take one of Juke’s siblings with you, Cantonia. For Juke, I will give them a chance to reclaim their honor and their title. If the uspec serves you well, you may promote it as you see fit.”

It nodded.

“You will take the other one, Matiu.”

Matiu cleared its throat. “I am just a one-band noble, sirga, what do I know about being custodian of a port?”

“What do I know about being Kaiser?” I asked.

Gamble laughed.

“Sirga, I am grateful, I really am,” Fabiana said, “but I cannot accept. I cannot leave you.”

I sighed. I’d thought Fabiana would react this way. Honestly though, I was happy that it wished to stay. I needed Fabiana. I turned to Gamble. “It looks like the port is yours then.”

Gamble choked on a bun.

“Gratitude, but I must turn you down, sirga. I have no desire to be so high and lofty. I do not wish to be a custodian.”

I turned to Matina. “Well, Matina, that leaves you. Will you turn me down too?”

It stared at me. “You want me to be the Custodian of one of your ports?”

I nodded.

“But I am an artist.”

I chuckled. “Make the port an artistic hub then.” I said. “Take some of your line with you, make them dukes and let them advice you. You will not be alone.”

It frowned. “I always dreamt of making a small burg into an artistic haven.”

“Yes!” I ceased on that. “Do it to a port!” I was starting to see the beauty in art, at least the way Matina did it.

“What if I fail?”

“We will always be able to rely on each other, Matina,” Fabiana said, “none of us will let the other fail. If you need our aid, we are only an inter-port trail away.”

Matina smiled. “I would like the challenge, sirga. Gratitude.”

I turned to Gamble. “If a port is too much then how about a metropolis?”

“You want to make me a duke?”

I nodded. “I cannot think of anyone better suited to take over Juke’s line’s metropolis.”

It bowed. “I am honored, sirga.”

“Majestic, you will have to find me a new duke for the third metropolis.”

Fabiana nodded. “I will find you a loyal noble.”

The conversation was lighter as we finished off the rest of our meal. My honoraria would be breaking up. Three would be custodians of the plenum ports the founder had left in my care. They would have the highest authority in their ports and answer only to me. Gamble was a duke now and Fabiana was as it was before. It would not accept my promotion. I was grateful. Fabiana’s support and advice would be invaluable to me as I tried to live up to the legacy of my line. I rose.

“Where are you going sirga?” Gamble asked, it jumped to its feet. “I will accompany you.”

I shook my head. “I will go alone, just me and Chike. I will be back soon, then I will face the nobles and let them see that I have not abandoned them.”

Gamble reluctantly lay back down on its lounging bed right as Chike stood. We left the lounge together.

“What will I give you, Chike? I have given you your freedom, but you seem determined to stay. What do you want?”

It matched my stride. “Just let me stay with you and spar with you, that’s all I’ve ever wanted master.”

“Jukien and Salin have left their traces in this palace. I want to put you in charge of this place, Chike, I need you to rid these halls of all that aren’t loyal to me.”

“Of course, master, I will happily get rid of Jukien and Salin’s imps.”

We walked into the dressing room and I went to the coffer. I opened it with the key that had been left hanging from a pole above it. I pulled out the hard fog box which contained Juke’s scales. I took out one of those scales and wrapped it in leather.

I turned back to Chike with the scale in my hand. “I wasn’t talking about the imps. That I believe was Joy’s job and can still be if it wants it. I want you in charge of everyone that works in this palace Chike, imps, uspec servants, uspec guards, no one should be allowed to walk these halls if you don’t trust them.”

It gaped at me. “But I am an imp.”

I smiled. I’d accused Arexon of going eccentric but I was going eccentric too, putting an imp in charge of uspecs. But I trusted Chike, and all the uspecs I trusted already had jobs that they had to see to. This palace was important to me, I would not allow uspecs I did not trust to run it simply because they were uspecs.

“Will you do this for me?”

“Of course, master.”

I nodded then I made quicksand underneath myself and teleported myself to a hard fog prison.

Jukien lay on the small cot in the prison I’d once inhabited. As soon as it saw me, it jumped to its feet. We stood so close that a single swipe of the cyan scale in my hand could end its life.

“I will be moving you to a bigger room.” I said without preamble. “You will spend the rest of your life locked in that prison cell, but I will make sure you have all that you desire. Your offspring are free, forgiven of their crimes. I am sending them both to the plenum ports that are now annexed to Lahooni. If they serve their new custodians well, they will be promoted and may one day call themselves nobles again. You will be allowed to write to them and they to you.”

Once I was done delivering the sentencing, I waited. Jukien glared at me. “Do you expect me to be grateful?” it spat out.

I just eyed it calmly. “No.” I bent and placed the leather on the bed. Then I unwrapped it, revealing Juke’s neck scale. ‘That belonged to Juke,” I said, “it would want you to have it.”

Jukien didn’t move. It didn’t show any signs that it had heard me, it didn’t even so much as glance at the neck scale. I shook my head and teleported out of the prison cell.

I had sent myself back to the dressing room but found myself in a bubble floating over my palace instead.

Chuspecip in Chacip’s form stood beside me.

I looked down through the clear material beneath me. It showed me a splendid view of my palace and of the entire Acropolis. I saw the surrounding metropolis. I saw Lahooni, my port.

Chuspecip cleared its throat. “The other existences tried to invade mine.”

I turned to it. I did not know what I was expected to say. I already knew of this invasion. I was the one who’d stopped it, at great personal cost to myself.

“They were not just in league with the wrath of Sada, but with the plenum. The plenum gave them the locations of our portals into the standard existence and in exchange they told the plenum how to get rid of me, starting with trapping me in the standard existence.” It sighed. “I cannot let it stand. If I do, they will try again. I thought our separation would have been the end of the fighting, after all this time, they still seek to take what is mine. Churaya. Chuhisadan. The supreme and the fourth.”

I gritted my teeth. That was the first time I’d ever heard the name of the fourth Chu. I knew of Chumani and Churaya but no one ever seemed to know the last ones name. I felt there was something important to this, the fact that the Chu tied with Sada had managed to keep its name hidden.

“I will have to take back my portals from them, no matter the hindrances.” Chuspecip said.

I still wasn’t sure I understood where this was going.

It turned to face me. “If they try to stop me, I will fight. I must, if not it will be perceived as weakness. It could mean a war like nothing the joint existences have ever seen before. A great all-out war between our existences. I have to show them that I am not weak, that they cannot just take what is mine, or they will find other ways to try again.”

I nodded. I agreed. “But we are just recovering from our own war. Do we even have enough uspecs?”

“I will make more. Many more to replace the ones who died in the plenum’s war.” Its gaze fixed on me. “That is not why I came to see you.” The hardness eased from its eyes and I knew it would bring up Nebula. “The plenum Kaiser that led the invasion in Lahooni still lives.”

I gasped. “Are you sending me on another mission to bring it down?”

Chuspecip chuckled. “No, I kept it alive for you. It is locked away in one of the prison cells in your gaol.”

I frowned. “I do not understand.”

“It will be your next offer, for when you are ready to procreate again.”

I glared at Chuspecip. “Nebula cannot be replaced!” I spat the words at it.

Chuspecip sighed. “Of course not. Does that mean that you never want to have another offspring?” It stared directly at me. “If you do not, that is your choice, but if you do, know that the offspring I will give you will be the most powerful to ever exist. The plenum Kaiser is an irirakun of all five, which means that your offspring will be a kun of all five too. I will give it my lifeform, right from the moment of its birth, stronger than that which is in you. Do you know what that means?”

I shook my head.

“That means it will have route, Nebud. My lifeform combined with all the other types of magic, will give it route. No uspec has ever had route without siphoning it from me. Your offspring will be the greatest uspec to ever have existed. If you decide to procreate again, that is.”

I clenched my fists. Green fogs surrounded me before I could respond. I was teleported back to the dressing room, where Chike stood, waiting for me. I decided to push Chuspecip’s words out of my head. I walked over to a belt-rack and picked one of the golden belts. I wrapped it around my waist and shoved my cutlass and dagger into it.

Chike pulled aside the curtains, revealing a reflective surface. I stared at my reflection. I looked older than the last time I’d seen myself. I was an uspec in my prime now, with five golden armbands on each of my arms. I looked like a Kaiser. I made quicksand and teleported myself to the court.

I took a deep breath, steeled myself to face the nobles, and then I pulled the curtains aside.

A horn blew. I could not see the horn or even the uspec who declared,

“The mighty undead, Nebud, the Kaiser of Lahooni.”

Part 26
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The curtain to the hidden tunnel shook. I heard murmurs coming from within it. Three imps were inside, cleaning it out. Three who’d come with me from the Isle of Brio, Chike, Joy and Rita. With the exception of the imp with the eyes, only the imps from the Isle of Brio had come into this room in the week that I’d kept myself holed up here. The imps from the Isle of Brio had passed Chuspecip’s test, whatever test that was, and it had let them stay with me. I had not really taken the time to think of how trustworthy they must have been for the founder to leave them with me instead of sending them to Qatamejo.

I flipped the page.

I was seated behind my desk, bent over one of Calam’s tomes. It was the last in a series of instructional tomes it had left behind. These tomes expressed Calam’s ideals on leadership. It expounded on what it meant to be ruler of a port, to be the final authority. I liked reading them. They drew me closer to my sire, told me off its mind. There were no tomes from my progenitor in the hidden tunnel, only Kaisers had left their works there. My progenitor had died as an imperial. Just as my offspring had. The tightening that always accompanied thoughts of Nebula came on me, but it faded with time.

I pored over the pages with the eagerness of a ravenous beast suddenly let loose on a Kaiser’s feast. I wanted to know more about the uspecs of my line, the ones who’d come before me. The more I learnt, the more I wanted to know. The imps helped with that, they all had tales to tell of my ancestors, funny ones. It was odd how used to their company I’d gotten in the days I’d kept myself isolated from uspecs. They’d been with me on the inter-port trail, during my journeys to and from the Isle of brio, and on the Isle of brio, but I’d never really known them. I flipped through another page, my eyes darting over the black marks on the cream parchment. The parchment was well preserved, expensive paper made to withstand the ravages of time.

A soft thud followed a muffled whine.

I took my focus from my tome to the imp chasing after its bouncing marble. The imp with eyes. Its name was Mark. It sounded like Marc, the name of the bear I’d lost in Permafrost. Named after a friend who I’d also lost to the imps in the wrath. This Mark had so much suppressed energy. It was a child, thirteen, but it acted as my offspring had at five. Joy told me that uspecs grew faster than umanis. Umanis took years before they could make sensible speech, while uspecs took days. Umanis took years before they could walk properly, while uspecs were born on their feet, walking from the moment of birth. Umani aging was strange. The imp finally caught its marble and then it turned around. It had a huge grin on its face. The imp was almost always irritating, but that grin, that wide smile with mirth bubbling in its eyes. It reminded me of Juke in ways that made my heart stop.

“Sorry, master.” It ran back to its little stool by my desk. It didn’t sit, it stood and bent its head close to the tome I was reading. It couldn’t read the common tongue yet. It still spoke in the umani tongue, the common one I understood. I grabbed it loosely by the curly hair currently obstructing my view of the tome, and lifted its head up and out of my way. “What does it say?” it asked me.

I shook my head at the imp, released its hair and turned my focus back to the tome. The imp dropped to its stool and then continued playing with its marble.

“Do you want more candied fruits, master?” It picked up a bowl from the tray on the side of my desk and held it out.

I shook my head.

The imp couldn’t eat quietly. It made annoying sucking sounds when it tossed a piece of candied fruit into its mouth. Why was I enduring this little imp’s annoying presence? The imp had eyes, and streak-less skin. It did not look like an imp. It looked like an umani and I did not immediately distrust umanis as I did imps. It was imps who’d insulted me, imps who’d taken everything from me. Umanis seemed different in a way. Mark also had that eagerness to please and the big grin. Things that reminded me so much of how Juke had been when it was younger, on the inter-port trail.

It sucked noisily on another piece of fruit and whistled as it tossed its marble into the air.

“Why don’t you go somewhere else?”

It smiled at me. “Joy said that if I stay around you that we will become very good friends and that I will never have to be afraid of you.”

I took a deep breath and then let it out slowly. Joy. I found it hard now to yell at that imp. Not after it had cried with me over my offspring. It had helped me to find release at a time when nothing could pull me out of the darkness of grief. I resumed my reading and got completely lost in the pages. Reading absorbed me, it could make me deaf to sounds and sights around me. Time flew when I read, morning turned to evening and I had to remind myself to get up and walk about. I knew it was the same for Calam, it had said so in its tomes. Had I learnt this from watching my sire read?

“Master.”

My gaze snapped up. The orange light streaming in showed that it was still day. Chike stood in front of my desk. Joy sat on the bed behind it and the imp Rita stood beside Mark on its little stool.

“What is it, Chike?”

“The nobles need to see you, master, your honoraria especially. They are getting worried. With everything they’ve done for you, I don’t think they deserve it.”

I quirked an eyebrow. “Are you scolding me Chike?”

It shook its head and replied with a smile, “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

It was right of course. I’d only planned to stay here for a day at most. Once I’d seen that tunnel though, it had been easy to allow myself to get lost in the tomes.

“We can bring the tomes up to your suites if you would like Cala.” Joy said.

I should have forced the imp to stop calling me that by now. Every time I glared at it, it just shook its head and laughed. Imps.

“No, leave them here.” I rose up from my seat and looked down at the desk. Then I turned my gaze to Chike. “Ask my honoraria to wait for me in the Kaiser’s lounge. I will meet them there.”

“We will have food waiting for you. You haven’t eaten breakfast yet, and they may not have either.” Joy said.

I nodded.

“Maybe you should clean first, sirga.” This voice was an imp I rarely heard. Its voice was low, and it had a quiver in it. Rita.

I nodded again. Imps all around me, but I did not mind. These imps, Joy and Chike, I did not mind their company. Even if Joy stubbornly called me Cala, when no one else dared. I reached for my quicksand.

“Can I accompany you, sirga?” the imp Rita picked at its fingers as it spoke.

I frowned. Why?

“Rita is itching to see you properly cleaned. It says that you look like you need a good massage, Cala, and your ailerons do need to be polished. There is nothing we can do about your chest…” Joy paused, purposely ignoring my frown, “unless you will allow Asha to use pansophy to fix it?”

I shook my head.

It sighed. “Well, you need to present yourself as the Kaiser, not,” it jerked its chin distastefully at my body, “whatever this is.”

Chike let out a strangled laugh.

I eyed Joy. “Sometimes you really do go too far.”

It shrugged. “You know I’m right.” Its tone turned serious. “It is what Calam and Calami would have wanted for you, Cala.”

“I will have your blades polished, master,” Chike rushed in, awkwardly, as if it feared my response. “What shall we do about your coffer?”

I made quicksand and teleported us all out of the hideout. I took us to the entertaining room in Calam’s suites. My suites now, the royal suites.

“Wow!” Mark exclaimed.

The room really was extravagant. No wonder Calam had preferred its lab. I knew that this room fed more to the tastes of the uspecs in my line like Chamin. This palace was different from others I’d seen in that the Kaiser’s and imperial’s suites were altogether in the royal suites. There was no separation for our family. Nebula should have been with me running around this room the way that Mark did now. I choked on my pain.

“I can take the coffer to your storage room master and unpack it.” Chike said.

I nodded. “The key and tag are in the belt.”

“Come Mark.” Chike picked up the belt and the coffer followed after it. It was not until they left, the coffer trailing behind them, that I realized I had not even batted an eye at being separated from my weapons.

“I will go and see to your meal, and I will deliver your message to your honoraria.” Joy left.

I turned my back on the entertaining room and walked down painted quicksand grounds. The light here was a mellow mix of yellow and red. “Where have my honoraria been staying?” I asked the imp who silently trailed me.

“The noble Gamble has been staying in the court. The others, the nobles Matina and Matiu and the great Fabiana, stay in the duke’s dwelling in the Acropolis.”

I nodded. It felt good to walk. I had spent too much time cooped up in the hideout. My brain felt better for it, and my mood was certainly lighter, but my legs did not thank me. I would need to spar. A good session with Chike would leave me feeling a lot better. I walked into the suite’s cleaning room and drew up short.

It was better than anything I could have imagined. For hooni uspecs, this much okun was unbelievable. The entire room was built on okun. I walked in and stepped into shallow okun. It was shallow enough that only my feet were submerged in it. The massage beds and tables and desks were erected on the shallow okun. Then there were ponds, at least five of the largest ponds I had ever seen. One had fog suspended above it, thick fog. That would be the one with the bathing salts. There was a pond that was just okun, okun without bathing salts or scented stones. Then there was a canal that ran around the edge of the room with falling okun, coursing into it. A kute Kaiser could not have built a better cleaning room. It was magnificent and it was the largest cleaning room I had ever seen.

I smiled and then flapped my ailerons. I rose, flew to the pond with the fog and dove in. The bathing salts burnt my skin, but I luxuriated in the feel of them. I swam. One pond after the other, until it was time for the massage.

I slumped onto a massage bed. As soon as Rita’s hands touched my skin, I sighed. It really did have magic fingers. It must have spent at least an hour massaging me and polishing my ailerons. It polished my neck scales to, and buffed my tail. Then it rose and I saw satisfaction in its face. I dove into another pond.

Imps. These ones, the ones from the isle of brio, they cared for me. I’d learnt a lot about my ancestors from the tomes I’d read. They had cared for these imps, they’d mentioned them by name in their dairies. These imps had not just been servants, but confidantes. Calam spoke of Rita in its diaries of burdens that the imp lessened. It spoke with fondness of Chike and Calami. I thought of the nobles as I kept swimming. Cantonia had guilted them into listening to me, but it was able to because of my line. My line had left people behind who followed me out of loyalty and love for them. They were followed out of respect, not fear, and not duty. Alone, in the pond, swimming so hard that my breath came in short busts, I admitted my fears. I was scared that I would let them down, that I would destroy the legacy they’d built.

I climbed out of the pool and walked over to the canal. I swam a few laps around the cleaning room, before stepping out.

“There is dry fog in there, sirga,” it pointed at a set of curtains.

I nodded and walked into it. The fog was dry and hot. As soon as I walked in, the drops of okun on my skin dried off.

I walked out of the cleaning room, feeling like a new uspec. Chike stood with Mark in front of curtains beside the cleaning room. This was a dressing room. I remembered it vaguely. I did not remember all the accessories the room had. My coffer was underneath shelves. There were weapons here, so many different types of weapons, and this wasn’t even the palace armory. There were belts too, all golden belts. Some were metal meshes, some were short leather, some were so wide they were almost like the imp skirts. At the back of the room, there were sets of curtains. I turned around, and walked out of the room, I did not need weapons to speak with my honoraria.

I heard the footsteps behind me. “Are they in the lounge?”

“Yes master,” Chike replied.

I walked into the Kaiser’s lounge.

The room was as I remembered it from the night that Jukien had forced us to spend here, but it somehow appeared better. There was a large table in the center, which had not been there before. Large platters of food were set out on that center table and the uspecs in my honoraria sprawled on lounging beds teasing each other and laughing while they picked at their food. Joy sat on a lounging bed with Gamble and it said something to the uspec that made it laugh. It ate from its platter. Asha and Simon, who I still did not know which was which, sat together on a lounging bed beside Fabiana. They ate from the same platter. Matina said something that made Matiu snort and Gamble laugh. I realized then, that my honoraria had become more than just the uspecs who’d fought with me, it was the imps too. Chike who’d followed me into battle in Chiboga, and the other ones, the ones who’d stayed with my offspring while I was gone and gave it love and happiness that I had never been able to dream of as a child. I felt an ache when I saw this and remembered the meal I’d walked into in the Isle of brio, under the canopy tree. We’d had Juke and Nebula then. My chest tightened.

“Sirga!” Gamble was the first to see me.

As soon as it called out the honorific, all the conversation died down. The uspecs and imps stood and stared at me. The silence after the previous gaiety felt wrong.

Fabiana bowed. “Mighty one,” it greeted. I shook my head at it.

“Stop it, majestic,” I scolded.

“It is great one now, master,” Chike reminded me.

Matina chuckled.

I walked into the room, and three imps followed me. Mark appeared completely at a loss. We were speaking in the hooni tongue.

“Please sit down,” I said to them. “This feels very awkward.”

“You’ll have to get used to it, mighty one.” Cantonia said. It sounded dour. I eyed it.

“Gratitude Joy,” I said to the empty room. Then I stood up and walked over to the desk. There was a small, corked, bottle of fruit wine, resting on the tray. I stood it up and uncorked it. It was not fermented. I removed the covering from the tray and looked at the food inside of it. My stomach churned at the pleasant aroma. I had no idea what it was. I saw some sort of grains, longer grains than I had ever seen, and fatter too. There was a creamy sauce over the grains with an assortment of nama meat cubes. Sautéed vegetables graced a corner of the platter. There was a bowl of an unknown pastry dessert also on the tray. I took a bite of the food and for the first time in days, it had flavor. It tasted like food. Nebula would have loved it. My chest tightened. Juke would have loved it too. I thought of the meal the three of us had shared together. Juke had been like an older sibling to Nebula and as an offspring to me. I’d lost them both. My chest tightened, but after a while it eased.

Tears are a solace for the living not for the dead. I think that my way of honoring Binna is better.

Juke’s words came back to me then. Juke had died fighting for me, fighting for the imperial it believed in. And Nebula, my precious Nebula had died in this war against the wrath. How could I honor them? As soon as I thought on it, the answers came to me and I forced them away. Both ways made my stomach turn. Nebula had loved the imps in the Isle of Brio. I did not know if I believed in any special bond between imps and uspecs, but it had loved Halima. I was the Kaiser of four ports now, four powerful ports. I could destroy Qatamejo. I could allow them the sovereignty Chuspecip gave, but I could ensure that no other ports did business with them. I could make sure they suffered. The imps in the wrath who’d killed my offspring were there. It was what they deserved for killing my offspring. I could make sure that their port failed. I wanted them to suffer. But Halima was also there. Halima who’d cared for my offspring. How would Nebula want me to honor it? I knew. I had despised the imp, but Nebula had loved it. I had seen them play. I could not deny the joy that the imps in the Isle of Brio had brought to my offspring. Honoring Nebula’s memory would not be easy. I could never forgive those imps, but the founder’s promise kept me from avenging my own offspring’s death. I wanted to punish Qatamejo, to make sure the port failed. But that would punish the imps Nebula had loved too.

My throat tightened.

I would never go to Qatamejo’s aid. Never. But I would not influence other ports against it. It hurt me, it hurt me so much, but it was how I would honor my offspring. I would allow the imp it had cared for to live free. I would allow Qatamejo to be whatever Musa could make it. I would not interfere.

Wise choice.

I groaned. Chuspecip was back in my head. There was no green fog in the room.

I do not need green fog to reach you.

I stopped eating.

Do you still despise me?

I do not know.

You should know that the imps responsible for your offspring’s death have been sapped.

What? Had it not given its word to Musa that no harm would come to the Permafrost imps?

My exact words were, “Any uspec who tries to harm any of the imps in Permafrost will die by my will.” Any uspec. I know Musa’s heart, I always have. I knew its lover’s bond and read the sincerity of its heart in the green fog. I knew that it would do the right thing. Joy was right, Halima’s bond with Nebula would not allow it to see the ones who killed it free. It guided Musa in the right direction. It showed Musa that it had to punish them. Musa ordered the imps sapped. It punished the guilty and let the rest go free.

I clenched my jaw. What of the imps who’d killed Marcinus? What of the imps who’d spat at me?

What of the imps you sapped to gain entry into Permafrost? What of the imps you’ve bullied and beaten? Nebula was innocent, it did not deserve to die as it did. Justice has been done.

Justice has been done. A little knot in my chest eased. It was not much, but it had been done. How did Chuspecip know all of this? Had it not cut its bond with Musa?

It is still my existence, I watch. Besides, I must see Qatamejo established. I must enforce the oaths I swore to see all imps who wish to go there sent there.

You cannot sever your bond with Musa. It had not said it, but I heard it in its defensive tone. It was watching over that port. It would protect them. It loved imps. I thought of Nebula and I felt grief, but the tightening in my chest was like a twinge. Chuspecip did not answer my question. I picked up my fork and continued eating. The food tasted good, better than it had before. The imps who’d killed my offspring had been sapped. I smiled. Halima’s bond with Nebula. That made me frown. Chuspecip could not leave Musa, even after it had warned Musa it would. Musa had followed me, served me, done everything to bring Chuspecip back. That bond between them was real. Musa had never been mine, it had always belonged to Chuspecip. Somehow, that knowledge eased some of the betrayal, but it did not take the sting of it away. I could never forgive Musa.

Why could honoring the dead not be easier? There was only one thing I could think of that would honor Juke, one thing on par with the love and devotion it had shown me. It made my stomach twist and it removed the taste from the food I swallowed. I would not dwell on it until the time came to see it done. I ate heartily. I was still grieved, I doubted that would ever go, but I felt lighter. Juke had been right, it felt good to honor the dead. This felt better than tears. I was doing something hard for me, to please them. I sacrificed for them.

The dessert was sweet but not too sweet. Nebula would have liked it sweeter, with more nectar. The thought twisted my stomach, but it did not knock me down as it would have before. I cleared the platter and then drank all of the wine in the bottle. Then I stood up and paced the little room. My mind was churning with the things I had to do. Where was this secret compartment anyway? Curse that imp Joy for putting the thought in my mind. I made quicksand and teleported myself to the lab.

Two imps sat together between shelves of things I could not even begin to guess at. As soon as I entered, they both jerked around. I’d teleported right beside them. They were two from the Isle of Brio.

“Asha and Simon,” I guessed. Joy had told me of the imps who’d assisted Calam here.

They both nodded. There was a female and a male. “How can we help you, master?”

“I am not your master anymore,” I said as I looked around the lab, “I freed you.”

“What should we call you then?” the other imp asked.

I shrugged. “What are you two doing?”

“Getting reacquainted with our research journals. We were in the middle of experiments before…” it broke off.

“I want to learn all of this.” I said. I did not even know I wanted to until I said the words. I would make a new samu. This one would have no cure save for me.

They both beamed at me as if I’d told them they’d won a prize. “Of course, sirga. We will send you books. It is best to start with books. Two hours in the morning. Then we will plan some experiments. Starter experiments.”

“You will like them sirga.”

I nodded absentmindedly. “Not right now, I have other things to see to first.”

One of the imps, the male one, frowned. “You should start reading at least, a researcher reads a lot, sirga, and we cannot afford to let your education slip. There is so much you do not know.”

“Of course. Send the books to my room.”

“Which room?” the female asked. “The one under the lab, or your royal suites?”

“My suites.”

“So, you will be returning to the world then.”

“Your nobles are loitering the public parts of the palace eager to catch a glimpse of their new Kaiser.”

I glared at the imps and made quicksand. I teleported myself back to the hideout underneath the lab.

There was an imp behind my desk. Imps everywhere!

“Did I not tell you about Qatamejo?”

The imp jumped back when it heard me. It was the newly dead one, the one with eyes. Its head rose. I heard it mutter, ‘Joy said don’t be timid’ underneath its breath. It nodded. “I want to stay, master.”

Why did all these imps want to stay with me? I shook my head and turned my back on the imp. They had Qatamejo, wasn’t the whole point of Qatamejo that they could be free? I freed them in the Isle of Brio, yet they stuck to me. Now even this one wouldn’t leave.

“How old were you when you died?”

“Thirteen, master.”

One year younger than Musa. But Musa had lived in the spectral existence for millennia. This one was newly dead. My teeth gritted at the thought of the imp. I pushed it out my mind.

The imp started singing.

I turned around. “What are you doing?”

It stopped. “Singing, master.”

“Get out of here.”

It picked up the tray and scurried away.

Imps.

A hole was cut out of the quicksand wall before the imp reached it and there was an unfamiliar imp standing there. It bowed to me and then took the little one by the hand, guiding it down the tunnel. I frowned, thinking that strange, but I didn’t remark on it.

I walked back to the bed, sat on it, and waited for the imp Joy to return. I told myself that it was important to learn the locations of the hidden compartments, but the truth was that I was hiding from the nobles. I did not know how to be Kaiser. I’d almost started it by drowning them all in lit okun. I would have been an invader. What if I made a mistake, acted like a commoner instead of the uspec of the line they expected? I crashed into the bed and moments later I was asleep.

I woke from one of the most restful slumbers I’d had since I lost my offspring. My heart tightened at the thought of Nebula. There were imps sitting on the bed when I woke. Three imps.

The youngest one seemed to notice me first. Its gaze never quite locked on me. It pulled at Joy’s shirt and pointed in my direction, but its finger was off. Chike was the last to turn.

I sat up.

“I’m surprised my honoraria aren’t here.”

Chike smiled at me. “I thought you wanted to be alone, so I didn’t tell them where you are, master.”

“You are free Chike.”

“I know master.”

I shook my head. “They didn’t insist?”

“The noble Cantonia threatened to have me whipped. I reminded it that I was free, master.”

I smiled. “Gratitude.” I turned my attention to the youngest imp, the newly dead one with the eyes. It looked at me, but it wasn’t really looking at me. Its gaze was off. “You can’t see me, can you?”

It shook its head.

“In the first days our hearing is very good, remarkably so, but while we keep our umani eyes, we can only see the umani world. You must decide what to do with it master. It is…” Chike’s voice trailed off, “not comfortable to live as it does.”

“Then fix it.”

“If you have its eyes removed it will see the spectral existence.”

“Then do it.”

The young imp whimpered.

“It wants to keep its eyes.” Joy said.

When did imp problems become my problems? “Is there a way that this can be done?”

Chike nodded. “Instead of removing its eyes the pious ones can give it sight. It will be able to see both worlds and with time it can switch between which one it sees.”

I looked at the young imp hiding behind Joy. Then I turned my gaze to the older imp and I realized what it was doing. “You think I’m going to bond with this imp, don’t you?”

Joy smiled unapologetically. “You will bond with one eventually, why not this one?”

I should have told them to leave me. Why didn’t I? Something was happening to me and I blamed it on this damned quicksand castle. When had I become so lenient with imps? No, I shook my head, it wasn’t all imps. It was these ones. The imps who’d raised my offspring on the inter-port trail. My chest tightened at the thought of Nebula. I wondered if it would ever be possible to think of my offspring without feeling this pain. My gaze returned to the imps. The imps who’d chosen me over Musa and returned to Lahooni with me. These imps were worth leniency. The newly dead could be tolerated, I supposed. “What do you need to get it done?” I asked Chike.

“It costs two pieces of merit and we’ll need an uspec to accompany us.”

I sighed. Two pieces of merit. It was Chike and Joy making this request. Why not? It was not as if I did not have money to spare. I pulled two pieces of merit from my belt and gave it to Chike. “Ask Matina to go with you.”

The imp with eyes gasped. “It said yes,” it muttered to Joy, as if I couldn’t hear it.

Joy smiled. “I told you.”

“Thank you, master!” the imp with eyes smiled at me. I glared at it, but I knew it could not see me. Chike led it out. So, I turned my glare on Joy. It did not seem to mind.

It jerked its head to the desk. “I brought you breakfast.” It said, rising from the bed. I watched as it walked to a section of the wall beside my bed. It placed its hand on the wall and the wall turned into curtains. “I am the only imp with the key, but you and your line have it. Master Chamin gave me the key for the days it was too lazy to get up from the bed and rifle through itself.” Its words were reproachful, but it smiled as it said them.

I rose slowly and walked over to the curtains. I pulled the curtains aside and saw another tunnel. This one was lined with walls of shelves and the shelves were stacked with tomes.

“There are a few thousand pieces of worth at the end of the tunnel. That is the reserves that your line hides in the palace.”

I knew where the other reserves were, in a green room in the Isle of Brio. I turned to the imp. “Gratitude.”

It smiled. “You should eat. Reading is hungry work.” It whistled as it walked out of the room.

I walked into the tunnel. There were tomes, stacks and stacks of them. I pulled one out and had to blow off the dust on it. It was the epic of the second Kaiser of my line, Chacip’s offspring. I sat in the tight tunnel, underneath maroon lights, and read.

Part 25
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I wondered which uspec in my line had designed this room. Had it been Calam’s or had Calam simply discovered it and made use of it? It was a simple room, much too simple for a Kaiser. Everything in the room was of the best quality, but it was sparsely furnished. There was a bed, a bed with a hard quicksand frame and luxurious hard cloud foam. There were no holes for ailerons needed because of how comfortable the foam covering was. The bed was large enough to take two uspecs my size. There was a desk beside the bed. Every time I looked at that desk I saw Nebula. I saw it as it should have been, as I had been with Calam, in the few days I had gotten to spend with it. The desk was made of hard fog and the chair behind it was a simple three-legged fog stool with foam cushioning and armrests. The desk was empty. My coffer was also in the room, but only because it was chained to me with the tag in the belt I’d taken off. The belt now lay beside me on the bed. That was all the room contained. No okun. Holes built into the top corner of the room allowed for ventilation and a constant draft of drifting fogs. It also provided lighting to the room.

I tracked the passage of time through the light that streamed in through the hole.

It was still day, with the orange dots lighting the room, when an imp skulked in. I was not asleep, I hadn’t been able to sleep a wink. My gaze caught on the audacious imp.

It was not Chike.

“Get out.”

The imp froze. Its gaze turned towards me, without ever actually landing on me. Its look was slightly off. It was small, an imp whose umani life would have ended as a child, just as Musa’s had. It wore a cream shirt and leather trousers. It was a male. I wondered if the imp had a female imp like Halima. I despised them. The imp still had eyes in its sockets.

“Didn’t you hear me?” I barked.

The imp’s eyes filled with what I could only imagine were tears. I had not touched it, but it was crying.

“I was told to bring you some food.” Its voice shook and tears fell from its eyes. The high pitch of its voice said that it was even younger than Musa had been when it died. I was startled because the imp spoke in the umani common tongue.

“I do not want it. Now leave.”

The imp stared as if it could not understand me. I had to repeat my words in the common umani tongue.

Its legs shook. “Have I displeased you already?”

I groaned. What did this imp want from me? What did they all want from me?

“Have you heard of Qatamejo?” I asked.

The imp’s whimpers stopped. It shook its head.

“Are you newly dead?”

It nodded. “It’s been one week.”

“Do you want to be free?” I asked it.

It froze.

I turned around. “Go to Qatamejo. Tell all the imps. Go to Qatamejo and leave me in peace.”

The whimpers lasted for minutes and then it ended when the imp’s shuffled feet said it had left. An imp still with its eyes. I tried to remember what Musa had told me about that but I found that I did not care enough to exert myself. I just stared at the walls. It was over. After years of fighting, fighting in the pits, fighting for the eyes, fighting against the plenum. It was finally over and I had nothing but emptiness to show for it. I ached.

“You should not have frightened that poor child.” It was another imp. I could tell from the tone of its voice. It was an imp who was not Chike, but it spoke in the hooni tongue.

“Get out.”

The imp moved further into the room. I heard clanking sounds. I gritted my teeth and forced myself to turn. The imp was familiar. It was one from the Isle of Brio. A plump female imp who’d chosen to remain with me instead of going to Qatamejo with Musa. It was a fool. It had come in carrying a tray, the same tray that the imp with eyes had brought in. It placed that tray on the desk. The imp was better dressed than it had been in the Isle of Brio. It wore a yellow shirt and had some sort of cloth tied around its waist, made from a matching material as its shirt. It was no skirt I’d ever seen. It wore earrings now. The imp sat on the bed beside me.

“What are you doing?” Was it insane?

“Shh,” it said.

“I have hurt imps for saying much less to me. You are free. Get out of my sight before I change my mind.”

For a second it froze and then it seemed to be forcing itself to relax. “You are scary,” it said, “but Chike told us that your bark is worse than your bite. It said that underneath you are like Calami, and Calami was,” the imp broke off and sniffed, “Calami was the gentlest soul.”

“I am not my progenitor and if Chike told you otherwise, it lied.” My voice had gentled. Why? Because of the catch in the imp’s voice when it had spoken of Calami. Musa had wept when it spoke of my line. That hadn’t stopped the imp from betraying me.

“I had Caleb make your progenitor’s favorite meal.” The imp spoke softly.

I looked at the tray, but it was covered. Was this some ploy of the imp’s? Did it know that curiosity would force me to go searching out the food?

“Caleb was also one of us, one of the imps that returned with you. Me, Chike, Caleb, Asha, Simon and Rita. Caleb was Calam’s head cook. I managed the imps in the palace. Asha and Simon assisted Calam in its lab. Both of them have pansophy.” It giggled. “I think those two only came with us because of their love for that lab. Mad scientists.” It laughed. “Rita was a bath-maid, with magical hands. It can massage all your worries away.”

The imp finally stopped talking. I should have ordered it to leave. I wanted to. But there was something I wanted to know more. “Why did you come back with me?”

“Lahooni is our home. If you are half as good to us as your ancestors were, we will be happy. We do not mind you completely ignoring us, that is also acceptable.”

It was teasing me. I did not laugh. “You are free.”

It shrugged. “What is freedom in a world were imps are slaves?”

“Not anymore,” I stated, “you were there, you heard Chuspecip’s proclamation.”

It scoffed. “One port. For all the imps in this existence. No single port, no matter how rich, can hold all the imps in this existence. Besides, I am free now. As long as I remain with you, I will continue to be free. Unless you change your mind as you threatened to before.” Its empty eye sockets bore into my face. “Will you?” it asked.

I shook my head. “You all brought joy to my offspring’s life.” I did not know how deep my grief was. As soon as I said the words, tears filled my eyes. I tried to hold them back, but I blinked, and they fell. In front of an imp.

“Ula was special.” It said. “Just like you were when you were just born. So, filled with life and so much raw strength and power. It brought joy to us. It was just as you had been, just as you had been Cala. Laughing, playing with everyone.” the imp cried. It joined me in my tears. “If we could go back in time we would have kept a better eye out. We would not have let it leave. It had never tried to sneak out before. I am so sorry Cala.” It sniffled.

I managed to force my tears under control. I sat up in the bed and leaned against the wall behind me. The imp still cried. It wept into its shirt for my offspring. My little Nebula.

“It was not your fault.” I said.

“It feels like it.” It replied. “It feels like it was all our faults. I don’t know how the other imps could leave you, but I could not, not after you lost Ula. I could not.”

“Nebula was perfect, wasn’t it?”

The imp smiled at me. It wiped at its face but tears still fell from its eyes. “Better than you,” it teased. I actually found myself chuckling. “It would have outshone you.”

“I wanted it to.”

It nodded. “I know.”

I looked at the imp and I found the words pouring from my mouth. “I don’t know how to go on without it. Everything reminds me of Nebula. Everything.”

“I lost a child too, as an umani, my only daughter. She was all I had. I drank poison after she died.”

I understood. “I tried to kill myself. I couldn’t do it.”

“No parent should outlive their child. It is not natural.”

I stared at the imp. “Did you find your child when you came here?”

It shook its head. “I searched. Your ancestor found me right after I died. Master Chamin, fifth descendant of Chacip. That one was the absolute worst of your line.” It shook its head, but it had a fond smile on its face. Something about that smile made me smile too. “Lust, it imbibed it. In secret, away from Musa’s judging eyes. It was an imperial when it found me, a child itself. It would travel to visit friends with liberal progenitors and imbibe in lust with them. It found me on one of those lust trips and for some reason it chose to keep me. It said that it liked that I did not judge it. It was high and I had no idea what it meant. If I had known I would have judged it. Lust is the worst type of exploitation of our kind. Master Chamin,” it sucked its tongue against the roof of its mouth, releasing a clucking sound. “Reprobate. But it somehow understood my grief. It traveled to ports with me, it told its progenitor it was going on official diplomatic ventures, but it was all so I could find my child. After its progenitor died, and it became Kaiser, it learnt of your line’s bond to Chuspecip and asked Chuspecip to search for my child for me. My child did not come here after it died.”

“Tell me more.” I said, when the imp stopped talking.

It smiled. “Master Chamin was my bond. Did you know that the uspecs of your line tend to have that one imp they bonded with?”

I shook my head.

It nodded. “For Calami, it was Chike. For Calam it was Rita. Chamin was mine. Even young Ula had formed its bond with Halima.”

“Musa was mine then.”

It shook its head. “Musa was never yours. The bond I shared with Chamin, I could not lie to it, and it could not lie to me. I could not leave it, I could never leave it. Besides, Musa was always bonded with Chacip. Your imp is yours, it will never have been bonded with anyone else, and it could never leave you.”

“I cannot feel that way for another imp.” I said. “Not after Musa’s betrayal.”

“Another reason why I could not go with Musa.”

I gaped at the imp.

Its jaw clenched. “Musa saved the people who killed our sweet Ula.” It shook its head. “Musa will find things difficult with Halima from now on. You just wait and see. Halima loved Ula more than any of us, and we all loved Ula, you just wait and see.”

I could not believe in this bond that the imp imagined between Nebula and Halima.

“Halima spoke up for Musa against Chuspecip.” I reminded the imp.

“They have loved each other for centuries. I did not say that the love will stop, it will just be very difficult. You just wait and see. Musa should have asked for imps to be free and then it should have gone to that icy hellhole and killed the imps who killed Nebula. Not all the imps in the wrath, but the ones guilty. Musa was a fool.”

Musa was a fool. I thought of Nebula and grief flooded me. It shocked me to see that the grief was not as it had been. My chest tightened but I could still breathe. I could still live. The second realization rocked me. I could still live. I had smiled with this imp, and for a little while, I had known levity.

“I have never heard of imps and uspecs bonding.”

“Your line is special. Musa told us that Chacip told it that it carried it into this existence, in its own arms. That forged their bond. Maybe that changed your line.”

I frowned. “I do not want to bond with an imp.”

It laughed. “Will you eat now?”

I stared at it.

“If you finish your food, I will show you a secret compartment in this room.”

I eyed it.

“Master Chamin built this room. It came here for its lust trips.”

“Lust trips that you disapproved of.”

It shrugged. “I had to find a way to be okay with it. There are some imps who do not mind being watched when they are being intimate together, exhibitionists.” Its mouth twisted with distaste. “I made sure that master Chamin found those ones and that it treated them well. Never too much lust, and only when they were willing.” Its mouth twisted and being as intimately aware of grief as I was, I could easily identify the emotion in the imp. Then it smiled at me, a sorrow-twisted smile, and stood up. “Eat your food Cala.”

I glared at it, but it just chuckled and shook its head.

“How do you imps get around the palace without the keys?”

“There are doors in the walls. The imps that belonged to your line have the key in our identity. We can open them.” It proved this by touching a portion of the quicksand wall, and the wall went away, exposing a dimly lit tunnel behind it.

“What of the imps that belonged to Salin and Jukien?”

It shook its head. “Only your line has the key and only your line can give it to us. It cannot be taken away. You are safe Cala.”

Why wasn’t I annoyed with the way the imp kept calling me Cala? “I am not afraid.”

It smiled. “Of course not. Eat your food and you’ll get your treat.”

It began walking into the tunnel. “Wait.” I called out.

It stopped.

“You didn’t tell me your name.” It had told me the names of every other imp who’d accompanied me back.

“Joy.” It said. It walked into the dimly lit tunnel and the quicksand wall reformed behind it.

A space was cleared and Cantonia waltzed through it. It came to the front of the room, eyed Jukien dismissively and walked to me. It knelt on one knee in front of me. Then it stood up and whispered into my ear, “the next time you give me a mission how about you actually allow me to finish it before you go charging in and mess everything up. You should have reached out to me before you stepped into the palace.”

Cantonia pulled back and there was no trace of its criticism on its smiling face.

It turned to Fib and extended a hand towards the uspec. Then it pulled Fib to its feet.

“There is a very clear solution, isn’t there? Let us find other pious ones in this cult of the unsaid and see if they can decipher the message in the ring.”

Jukien glared at Cantonia. “I would be careful if I were you,” it warned.

“I was just about to give you the same advice.” Cantonia replied. “Quickly now, Fib,” Cantonia ordered, “fetch your elders.”

“No. This has gone on long enough!” Jukien snapped.

“Of course it hasn’t,” Cantonia retorted, “I only just arrived. If this is all a farce then you have nothing to worry about do you, Jukien? Surely you agree with me Prima. After all that the mighty Calam did for the uspecs in this room, after the oaths of loyalty you all swore. Could you really stomach stealing the throne from its heir?”

“No one is stealing anything!” Prima stuttered.

“Exactly. I am happy to see we agree on this. Jukien, give Fib the key. You don’t want anyone thinking you have ulterior motives in denying the information on Calam’s ring.”

“If it is Calam’s ring.”

“Only one way to find out.” Cantonia teased.

Jukien looked around. The nobles eyed the ring in my hand, Cantonia and then Fib. But no one said anything else. It scoffed and said, “no. I’ve had too much of my time wasted already.”

The nobles began to murmur.

“We have had many failings in the years since our Kaiser was killed, but I do not think that disloyalty to our Kaiser’s line has ever been one of them. If we allow Jukien to usurp the throne, as it so obviously wishes to do, then we would have failed in every aspect as Lahooni nobles.” Cantonia’s words fanned the flames. “When your offspring was poisoned, Prima, did the mighty Calam shrug and then give up? Did it not lock itself in its lab for days until it found a cure?” Cantonia turned to another uspec. “And you, Kinta, when your line was so thoroughly framed for a crime it had not committed, when every single uspec in this room believed in your guilt, did the mighty Calam give into what was easy and expedient? Or did it ignore all others, burying itself in discovery and research until it found a way to exonerate you?” Cantonia turned to face the room. “If this ring indeed has a message, what does it take from any of us to listen to it? Jukien has already usurped the throne, if you stay silent in the face of its injustice, you will be siding with a traitor. Are we all traitors now? Did the plenum remove all traces of the honor and nobility of Lahooni?”

The nobles’ murmurs grew to a fever-pitch.

Prima nodded. “You are right, noble Cantonia, we must investigate this thoroughly.” Then it turned to Jukien. “You have sworn to us together, and in private, of your love of the mighty Calam’s line. You have sworn that you are no Salin to usurp a throne. We gave you our allegiance because you swore to us that the last brio seeks to usurp Lahooni as Salin did. I know that you believe this Jukien. I know that if the last brio is truly Calam’s heir, then you would eagerly step down. We all know of your honor. Let us examine this claim thoroughly. I could not live with myself if I denied Calam’s heir its throne, and I know that you could not either.”

The nobles murmured agreement to Prima’s words.

Cantonia smirked at Jukien. “Well?” It asked. “Will you give Fib the key? Or will you show all of these nobles what I already know? That you are a traitor, a liar and a usurper?”

Jukien’s gaze on Cantonia turned cold. “You just ended your future in this port Cantonia.” It turned its back on the uspec, missing the eyeroll that Cantonia gave it. “I acquiesce to your requests.” It stated, then it very reluctantly pulled out a pouch from its belt, took two golden pieces from it, and gave Fib the tokens. The keys to teleporting within the palace.

“Run along Fib.” Cantonia smiled widely, seemingly at ease in the tense room.

A pool of quicksand formed underneath Fib.

Jukien glared at Cantonia, but it said nothing. I wondered what it was thinking. One thing was clear though, using magic to get my way would not have gone over well. The uspecs in this room, Jukien included, had their outer eyes filled. They had spectra. But not even Jukien, when it was at its angriest, had tried to use any form of magic. I knew fighting. When people quarreled, they fought, and the stronger uspec won. This politics was different. It was obvious though that using magic would have confirmed what Jukien had told the nobles, that I was a usurper, an invader. Fabiana had been right.

Fib returned moments later with a group of much older uspecs. Three were past their prime, two appeared soon to be. The oldest one slumped and had to make use of a cane to move around. They all wore the fraise of the pious, but they appeared to be of different orders.

Fib pointed at the ring I held and the oldest one extended its hand for it. I relinquished the ring.

These uspecs did not convulse as Fib had. They held onto each other and muttered words in a language I could not understand. I looked around the room. Jukien’s eyebrows were pulled together. Its hands clenched and then unclenched. It watched the pious ones. Other uspecs watched the pious ones as they hurdled over the ring, speaking their indecipherable tongue. Finally, the pious ones broke apart and the oldest one turned towards me. It was bent over, with wrinkled skin and a neck that had three scales precariously hanging on.

“Sit.” It ordered.

I frowned at it, but I did as it asked. I sat on the edge of the dais. It nodded at the two youngest in their group and they both approached me. I watched warily and did not feel panic until I saw their daggers.

Jukien smiled.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I demanded.

“Be silent and let them work. The truth of it will come out soon.” The oldest pious one scolded me.

I clenched my jaw. I could fight them, but this was my only chance at peacefully reclaiming my port. Even though they bore daggers that they rose to my neck. I trusted Calam. Calam had left a message in a ring that could only be deciphered by these uspecs. My sire would not have done anything to endanger me. So, I gritted my teeth and sat still while they peeled of two of the scales on the front of my neck. Then they rose their daggers and I remained calm when the metal edge dug into my skin. They went from the top down and peeled off a sliver of my skin.

“My god!” The oldest pious one exclaimed when the two stepped back.

Jukien’s eyes widened. “A trick!” it snapped.

The old pious one glared at Jukien. “How can that be a trick?”

“Appearance! Pansophy!” Jukien fired back.

“If the uspec planned to use appearance then why go through the trouble of summoning us? It could have peeled its skin off itself. We would countenance no trick, no deception with pansophy could fool them,” it tipped its chin towards the pious ones who’d peeled of my skin. “Do you question the words of the magistrate of the order of adjudication?”

The old pious one’s words were greeted with a heavy silence.

“Do you dare, Jukien?” Cantonia teased, its mouth quirked in a mocking grin. Jukien appeared very uncomfortable. I tore my gaze away from the uspec.

I still had no idea what they were talking about. It felt odd. I was in no pain, even though a layer of my skin had been peeled off.

“What is it?” I asked.

“The veins in your neck are formed into the sigil of your line, mighty one.” It was Prima who spoke. The fact that it had called me mighty one, said it all. “Forgive me,” its voice shook, “forgive me for doubting you.”

I exhaled lightly in relief.

Quicksand appeared underneath Jukien and its offspring. I made my own quicksand and felt the founder’s strength in the magic. A loud bang filled the room. The quicksand went away. Jukien would not be escaping. It glared at me.

“Mighty one,” the duke Prima called out, “last of the line of the rightful Kaiser’s of Lahooni.” It went on one knee in front of me and bowed.

Its supplication spurred everyone else. They all knelt. One after the other. Even the pious ones. Everyone in the room knelt and bowed to me. Everyone except for Jukien and its offspring.

“Rise.” I said.

And they did, they all did.

They rose and their gazes were fixed on me. I poked at my neck, but the skin had grown back. It was strange. I picked up my scales and lanced them back into my neck. The uspecs stared at me, expecting a speech. They had claimed me now, I was their Kaiser.

Green fog filled the room.

Uspecs gasped. Whispers of ‘the founder’ wove around. Jukien’s eyes widened. It showed fear for the first time that day. It trembled.

I felt a tightening around my arms. I looked down and saw green fog hands attaching golden armbands to my arm. If Chuspecip had done this earlier, no one would have questioned my claim to my own port.

It is better this way. They bowed to you of their own free will without intimidation from me. This is the right way.

When the green fog receded, there were five golden armbands on both of my arms and four on Jukien’s. I made quicksand underneath Jukien and its offspring. I sent them to the gaol, the prison Checha had locked me in my first time in Lahooni, and teleported the pouch of keys elsewhere. Then I took one look at the uspecs and formed quicksand underneath myself and my honoraria.

I teleported us to the royal suites. My rooms now. Finally, it was all mine. I felt no joy.

“Do you have the names of all the uspecs working with Jukien?” I asked Cantonia.

It nodded.

“We need evidence of their guilt too.” Fabiana said.

“I will get it.” Cantonia promised.

I nodded, suddenly feeling so unbelievably weary. The fight had left me. I’d won, now the energy was gone, puffed out like fumes. It was all finally over. I wanted more than anything to be able to share this moment with my Nebula. And Juke. It would have pained Juke to see its progenitor against me. Still, I wanted it back. And Marcinus. I wanted them all back, here with me to see my victory. Now that the fight was over, it took all of my energy just to remain standing.

I turned to Gamble. Then I picked up the pouch I’d teleported from Jukien’s grasp. I had sent the pouch of golden keys here, while I sent it to the gaol. I gave those keys to Gamble. “Find all the others that Jukien took. I don’t want anyone I don’t trust having access to this castle.”

It bowed. “Yes, mighty one.”

Mighty one. I was the Kaiser now. Crowned by Chuspecip, claimed by the founder for all the nobles to see.

I turned to Matina. “Find Chike and the others. They are free, make sure they remember it.”

Matina bowed. “Yes, mighty one.”

“Majestic,” it had been a long time since I’d called Fabiana by this nickname. Too long.

It bowed.

“See to the nobles. I am sure they have questions and worries and I’m…” I broke off. “I need some time.”

“Of course, mighty one.”

I made some more quicksand and teleported myself to a place that I knew it would take them a great deal of time to find. It was a little room hidden underground, beneath my sire’s lab. It had gone there whenever it wanted to be alone. I sighed when I remembered that Chike knew of it. There was nothing I could do about that.

I walked over to the bed and collapsed on it. Exhausted. Now that the rage that fueled me to defeat Jukien was gone, I found myself drowning in the despair of loss again. Nebula’s face swum in my vision. I groaned and screamed heedless of the loud, aching, sounds, because there was no one around to hear my grief.

Part 24
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The meeting was set to take place in the Kaiser’s receiving room, the room where I’d met Checha the last time I’d been in this port. Now Jukien sat on the raised platform, on a backless throne with two smaller thrones beside it. The uspecs who’d trailed it yesterday, the ones who’d called it their progenitor, sat on smaller thrones on each side of it. I stared at the three of them and remembered the last member of that family. Juke. Jukien had not even asked after its own offspring. It must have gotten news that Juke was dead, but if it did, I couldn’t imagine how. Maybe Fabiana. Fabiana was the only uspec in my honoraria who would have thought to send a missive to Jukien. I stared at Jukien and tried to see it as Juke’s progenitor. Arrogance was etched into the uspec’s features. It stared aloofly into space, with its hands placed on the armrests of its throne. Its carriage was noble. It sat straight up, not slouching in any way.

I looked around the room. There were some familiar faces from the night before, some of the nobles I’d seen in the court. They were watching me, but when my gaze caught theirs they either looked away, or stared coldly at me. Their reactions to me made it clear that they were on Jukien’s side. Where these the nobles who were in league with Darlin’s attack in the Isle of Brio?

No one stood behind us.

Matiu and Gamble stood on either side of me and Matina stood beside its older sibling.

One of Jukien’s offspring stood. That motion was enough to silence the murmurs from the noble onlookers.

“We are here today to finally put an end to these rumors of Calam’s heir’s survival.” It announced.

The nobles nodded and murmured their assent. I found the wording of the announcement very telling. Before the uspec could speak any further, another voice interrupted.

Fabiana strolled past the crowd of uspecs. It wore four golden armbands on its arms, the signs of a duke. It looked like it had returned to its family home and cleaned properly. Now it looked every bit the highborn noble it was. An unfamiliar young pious one trailed behind it. That pious one appeared to be of an age with Juke. It was skinny, like Matina, but it also had all of its outer eyes formed and filled. Its neck was covered with the pious fraise but its ailerons showed a good covering with cyan feathers. For the uspec to be this well developed when it did not have the bulk of a fighter, then it had to be quite skilled in magic.

Fabiana stopped in front of the raised dais. “This is a hearing to either prove or disprove a noble’s claim to the throne. Until the claim is disproved, great one, you have no right to sit on the throne.”

Jukien’s jaw ticked at Fabiana’s deliberate use of ‘great one’ the title of a duke, instead of the Kaiser it was claiming to be.

A charged silence greeted Fabiana’s words.

“You dare stand against me?” Jukien spat the question out at Fabiana.

Fabiana stared levelly at it. “This is a truth-seeking mission. Until the truth is revealed no one has the right to sit on that throne, least of all you.”

“It was I who saved this port!” Jukien screamed. “It was I leading the Lahooni troops to battle while you cowered on the inter-port trail. It was I fighting and loosing valuable soldiers and friends, your own progenitor included. Do not speak to me about rights! The fact that this port remains is thanks to me.”

“And the fact that this existence remains under uspec control is thanks to the imperial Nebud. Should it now lay claim to the entire spectral existence because it saved it?”

Murmurs rose and spread across the room like a wild inferno. It was amusing to watch Jukien’s jaw tick. Its hands clenched into fists resting on the arms of its throne, and it stared daggers at Fabiana. If rage alone could kill, Fabiana would be dead.

A plump uspec with pudgy limps and a round belly walked forward. It wore a light cloak, and had footwear covering the soles of its feet. This uspec had four armbands on its arms. It was a duke.

“Do you have proof of this claim, great one?” The fat duke asked Fabiana. It was short, its head only reached Fabiana’s shoulders.

“I have spent the early morning walking around Lahooni and visiting with you nobles.” Fabiana turned its back on Jukien, and turned to face the rest of the room. “Will any one of you pretend that you have not heard the tale of how the plenum was defeated? Will any of you claim that you did not witness the green fog storm that took the plenum soldiers from Lahooni? Can any of you say that you are not aware of the founder’s return? Will any of you insult me or your own lines by telling such a lie?”

The nobles looked to the ground, suddenly unable to meet Fabiana’s gaze. They murmured but I could not hear the words they said.

“Well, the great Jukien’s own offspring have born witness to the fact that the imperial Nebud is the last brio. And every one of you knows that it was the last brio who returned Chuspecip to this existence. And it was Chuspecip, not our great Jukien, who ended the war with the plenum and saved Lahooni.” Fabiana paused. It walked amongst the nobles and spoke with the grace of an orator. Its voice boomed when it ought to and then lowered when that seemed most able to take its point across. “If your argument with the imperial Nebud is that it abandoned you for five years, then you should know that it took five years for the imperial Nebud to return Chuspecip to this port.” It walked between nobles forcing them to look into its eyes as it spoke. Fabiana touched a two-band noble on its shoulder and then slapped one on its back. They both lifted their gazes and bowed to it. “If your argument is that the imperial Nebud went to Chiboga to give aid to the might Arexon before returning to Lahooni, then you should be aware of the fact that the plenum was close to siding with the wrath of Sada. Many of you may not know this, but the plenum was not the only danger we faced. While we uspecs fought amongst ourselves, the resistance group of imps, who call themselves the wrath of Sada, they joined forces with other existences and had begun the process of invading us.”

Astonished gasps filled the room. Murmurs rose but the murmurs where silenced when Fabiana spoke again. The further away it moved from me, the more I realized that there was something strange about its voice. Even when it was on the other side of the room, I could hear it as clearly and loudly as I had when it stood closer to me.

“If the plenum had joined forces with the wrath, we would have been bowing to imps right at this moment. The imperial Nebud went to Chiboga because Chiboga was where the bulk of the plenum’s forces where. If it had come to Lahooni instead, the bulk of the plenum’s forces would have joined with the wrath. The imperial Nebud fought until the founder came to finish the fight for us all. Then the imperial Nebud went to Permafrost, the imp headquarters, and put an end to the wrath of Sada and to the invasion, permanently!”

Fabiana’s voice boomed at the last part and nobles in the room cheered. A young one whooped. Many incredulous gazes turned to me.

“I have spoken with the founder. It is the mighty Chacip, the first Kaiser of Lahooni.”

The incredulous gazes widened.

“I have seen this with my own eyes. We all have seen the might Chacip’s appearance, we had seen replicas of it. Well I have seen it in the flesh, and I have seen it be a form of the founder. And I have heard the founder claim the imperial Nebud as an uspec of its own line. In the face of all of this evidence, who would dare question the imperial Nebud’s claim to this port?”

Murmurs rose.

“We are Lahooni!” Fabiana boomed. “From our first breaths we have been told that we are special for it, greater for it, and we have never known why. Now we know. We are a port that the founder made with its own hands. A port that the founder claimed its own. The founder was our first Kaiser and it left a line of its brio as our Kaisers, a line of its own blood. Made from its very self. We are Lahooni, and now we truly know what that means!”

More uspecs cheered.

“The founder itself claimed the imperial Nebud as being of its line. Who can gainsay the founder?”

Matina burst into applause. I did not think it was a conscious decision the clapping just came and I was surprised to see it picked up by a few. But not many, not nearly enough.

Jukien cleared its throat. “These are all claims, Fabiana, nothing but claims. We all know your devotion to the last brio. Really, no one can blame you if it has turned you into a liar for its cause.”

“Perhaps we should allow the imperial one to present its proof of its hereditary.” The fat duke who’d walked up to Fabiana spoke up. It eyed me speculatively as if it was taking my measure, deciding how much to bet on me. “While it does, I agree with the great Fabiana, it is not right for you to keep your claim to the throne. You should step down.”

The room descended into chaos. Some swore hotly that I had no claim and that Jukien was Kaiser, but they were in the minority. The majority actually agreed with the duke. I’d thought that they were all implicit in Jukien’s crimes against me, but if they were, they would not be so easily swayed. I was suddenly very grateful that I had listened to Fabiana and refrained from killing the lot of them.

Jukien rose and stepped down from the dais, its offspring trailing behind it. It glared at me as it walked past and then stopped on the other side of the new duke who’d spoken up.

The duke turned to me. “I am the great undead, Prima, duke of the fifth metropolis of Lahooni. We will hear your claim, last brio.”

It irked me how they were all so eager to accept that I was the last brio but not that I was Calam’s heir. Did they really not know that the two were not mutually exclusive? All eyes turned to me. I became the focus of the group of nobles. I reached for the ring in my belt and pulled it out. I rose that ring up, the dazzling blend of gold, red, and cyan shimmering in the soft glow of the room’s light.

“This is the ring that Calam left to me,” I announced. My voice did not sound nearly as good as Fabiana’s.

Jukien snorted. “It is a ring, we all see that, but how does it claim you are who you say you are?”

I gritted my teeth. Jukien smiled. The duke, Prima, the one who’d spoken up for me frowned and then shook its head. Its shoulders slumped as if it had just come to the conclusion that it bet on the wrong person. My summations proved correct when it turned to face Jukien and sniveled, “I was wrong, forgive me.” The nobles seemed to share Prima’s supplication to Jukien.

I looked at the ring, taking the time to study it, amid the murmurs of dissent. The ring had an inscription on the inner band. “Tahg nihm.” I read the inscription out loud.

“Minhat baghadit ghat mihn.”

The response came from an uspec who seemed as surprised to say the words as I was to hear them.

Jukien scoffed. “What is this new foolery? Won’t you and the uspecs of your line desist from this path before you destroy yourselves?” Jukien barked the question at Fabiana who stood beside the pious one who’d spoken after I read the inscription aloud.

I realized, belatedly, that the pious one was Fib. Fabiana’s youngest sibling. It turned to stare at Jukien. “The pious are above petty squabbles of politics and greedy, power-hungry, noble machinations.” It turned its attention to me. “My name is Fib,” it said, “you may not…”

I shook my head. “I remember you. Fabiana’s younger.” Would this be a loyal younger like Binna or was it a traitor like Fabin?

It nodded. “I am now of the order of adjudication, and I was recently initiated into Lahooni’s cult of the unsaid. The words you spoke are a calling cry to the cult. May I see the ring?”

I looked skeptically at the young uspec. Then I lay the ring in its hands. As soon as the ring touched its flesh, it began convulsing. It shook vigorously, as my offspring used to, and white froth bubbled in its mouth.

Nobles’ eyes widened.

“Surely you all see that this is some ploy between Fabiana’s line and the imposter!” Jukien spat out. “A secret cult of pious nobles? Nonsense!”

Unfortunately for Jukien, the nobles attention was fixed on the convulsing uspec. When Fib finally stopped convulsing, it was trembling. Films of sweat coated its body. It took a step forward, stumbled and fell to the ground. The ring rolled to my feet. I bent and picked it up.

“The code is too complex,” Fib said, panting, “I cannot understand it.” It shook its head. “I cannot understand it.”

Jukien let out a long, irritated, sigh. “How long are we going to let this farce go on?”

The duke Prima who’d spoken up in my favor before, now stood, completely at a loss. Its gaze turned from Fib to Jukien, then to Fabiana and me. It shook its head, shrugged and withdrew.

“I am still yet to hear a claim.” Jukien was winning, and it knew it. The nobles agreed with it. It all appeared too convenient. Fib was Fabiana’s sibling, and Fabiana was very obviously on my side. Fib could not be trusted. But what was that convulsion. “Is there any one here who believes that this imposter is Calam’s heir?” There was a threatening tone in Jukien’s voice.

Fabiana cleared its throat.

“We are all very aware of your feelings on the subject, Fabiana, you need not say more.” Jukien cut Fabiana off.

“Anyone beside Fabiana and them,” Jukien jerked its fingers dismissively towards the rest of my honoraria.

I looked around the room but none of the nobles spoke up. None sided with me. I reached for my lit okun.

“Of course, you do not want the imperial Nebud to take its rightful place on the throne. If I had tried, twice, to unsuccessfully kill the uspec, I wouldn’t want it being my Kaiser either.” The voice that spoke was dripping with sarcasm and it was familiar. Very vaguely familiar, but familiar nonetheless.

Jukien frowned.

The other uspec who’d been standing behind it walked forward. “We’ve all heard of the last brio. The last brio who waged war with the mighty Arexon against the plenum. If, indeed, the last brio is Calam’s heir, then why did it not come to fight with us against the plenum, instead of abandoning us? My progenitor is the only reason that the last brio has a port to return to and claim ownership of. I’m sure the last brio expected the mighty Arexon to reward it with a port of its own for its service during the war. It must have come here after the mighty Arexon refused its request. It failed to swindle the mighty Arexon and now it wishes to swindle the nobles of this great and illustrious port.”

Bitter curses were spat at me from the nobles in the room. The curses became jeers and then shouts for my removal.

I formed quicksand underneath myself and then teleported a few feet ahead.

“I can teleport within the palace,” I said, “surely that alone is proof.”

Some of the curses faded. A few of the nobles seemed swayed by my argument.

“A trick of the last brio,” Jukien said dismissively.

“I have the ring,” I said reaching into my belt, “the proof of my claim.”

Jukien shook its head. The whispers in my favor began to rise. I heard the positive mutters, nobles talking about Calam and oaths sworn. Jukien stopped shaking its head. “We will hear your claim.” It stated magnanimously, a statement that was met with a buzz of approval. “But not tonight. It is late, we will discuss this matter in the morning. Till then, I will grant you leave to repose in the Kaiser’s lounge for the night.”

“You will grant it to me?” I glared at the uspec.

It stared at me as if I was beneath it. “Yes, I will grant it. Guards! See the imposter to the Kaiser’s lounge.”

About ten guards approached us, with their swords held out in front of them Gamble pulled out its sword, eager to parry.

Fabiana walked up to me. “You can take this palace by force if you wish, sirga, but I would counsel against it. Let us take the night to rest after our journey. It will impress the nobles if you show restraint this way. They will learn of your great might, let them see your calm temperament.”

Calm temperament? Me? I gazed at Fabiana. Every instinct in my body told me to attack now and either kill or remove these people from my home. Why would Jukien ask for the night if it did not have a plan? It had a plan, I was sure of it. But Fabiana was the noble who’d grown up in this court. It knew politics better than I did. I decided to differ to it in this. I shook my head at Gamble and the uspec sheathed its sword, reluctantly.

“Okay.”

Jukien looked away as if my acceptance meant nothing. “You, imps,” it pointed at Chike and the others. “Go to the kitchen and see what scraps you can scavenge for your master.” Then Jukien pulled out a golden token from its belt and held it to the guards.

I reached for my quicksand before the token could trade hands and then I teleported myself and my honoraria to the Kaiser’s lounge. I could have taken us anywhere else in the palace, but I’d decided to take Fabiana’s advice.

The Kaiser’s lounge was like the court room with lounging beds scattered about. It had a small okun in the corner of the room and a fog desk with a thronelike chair behind it. I glanced at that chair and was suddenly filled with memories of my sire sitting behind it with me on its lap. As I had hoped to do with Nebula.

“Jukien will die for this.” I said the words simply.

“I will cut off its head myself, sirga, I’d have done it tonight if you’d only let me.” Gamble retorted, the last part said with a taunting edge.

I glanced at the uspec. It paced the room, storming around lounging beds. Then it stopped and kicked one. The rest of the uspecs perched on lounging beds.

“I don’t trust Jukien.” Matiu stated. “It has something planned.”

I nodded. “I agree.”

“Where is the ring?” Matiu asked, “the one you mentioned earlier.”

“I have it on me.”

“Good,” it nodded. “You should hold onto it.”

Gamble cursed and kicked at another lounging bed. Its anger on my behalf was oddly amusing. I walked over to a lounging bed and sat. My gaze kept trailing back to the desk and the chair behind it. If Juke was here, the uspec would have been able to say something to diffuse the tension in the room. My little Nebula would have stammered out an outrageous boast. I missed them both so much my heart tightened just thinking of them. I had to force myself to breathe. I could not let Jukien win.

“We will sit watch. One of us will remain awake at all times throughout the night.” Fabiana said. “Whatever Jukien is planning, it will not succeed.”

Gamble glared at Fabiana.

“Why did you not create lit okun, sirga?” Matina asked. “You could have taken the palace by force.”

“Yes!” Gamble agreed. “We should have taken it by force.” It glared at Fabiana as it spoke.

Fabiana shook its head. “You are both so young and so quick to rage. We are no more in the middle of a battle, Gamble, we are in our port. How would it look if the Kaiser’s first act was to kill all the nobles that didn’t agree with it?”

“It would teach them to fear it. Kaisers should be feared.” Gamble replied.

Fabiana kept its voice calm. “Nebud is the Kaiser of this port, it is the only one with the right and claim to it. It should not have to kill to take its port. That is what invaders do. Nebud is not an invader, it is Calam’s heir reclaiming its port for its line. The nobles in this port are not irrational. They have the right to their questions and indecision. They must respect their Kaiser, not fear it. Did you rush into battle because you were afraid that if you didn’t, you would die?”

Gamble stopped pacing. The frown faded from its lips and its eyebrows pulled downwards in thought. It shook its head.

“Invaders are ousted. When people live in fear, they seek to remedy that situation. That is not what anyone wants.”

Gamble sighed. It slumped onto a lounging bed. “How can you be so calm and rational in the face of the insult we were dealt?” Gamble turned to me. “You saved this existence at a high personal cost. How dare they treat you like this? I hate it! I hate them all!”

Matiu chuckled.

Gamble’s gaze shot to it. “Do you disagree?”

“I am no politician, but Fabiana’s words make sense to me. The Kaisers of this port have always been respected. Salin was the only ruler that stole the throne and it was only able to keep its hold on it because it had the plenum’s protection. Jukien, I fear, will not fare well. Let us be patient.”

Gamble looked away.

The room fell into silence. I glanced at these uspecs, my honoraria. Whatever else happened, I had somehow won their loyalty. My gaze went back to the throne and my thoughts returned to Nebula.

“State your business imp.” The brusque words were spoken by uspecs on the other side of the curtains that led into the room. Jukien’s guards, no doubt.

“Let the imp through!” A different voice called out.

“Yes, majestic one.” The gruff guard’s voice said.

The curtains were pulled aside, and Chike came in, pushing in a cart. It was alone. The uspec that had run towards Fabiana in the court walked behind it. The guards bowed to it. This had to be Fabin, Fabiana’s younger. I remembered there was another, Fib, but Fib would be younger. And from what I remembered, it was pious.

Fabin swaggered in wearing a huge smile.

I glanced at it and then turned my gaze to Chike. “Where are the other imps?”

It shook its head at me. “Jukien’s stewards said we have to work in the kitchen to pay for our meals. It only let me out to bring this…food…if it can even be called that.”

I took a deep breath and forced myself to keep my anger under control.

“How dare it!” Fabin exploded. “I will go and talk to Jukien. This insult cannot be allowed to stand.”

I shook my head.

Fabin fumed, but it obeyed me and sat beside its older sibling. I was happy for their reunion. Fabiana had already lost two uspecs in its line, I was happy that it still had this one.

I stood and walked over to the cart. The food was terrible. Stale bread and a large bowl of gruel. I had not seen food this miserable since my stint in the mines of Aurelion. At least those mines had good buns. These buns were dry and pressed flat. Yellow lines were visible on their surface, signs of slight rot.

“Even beggars wouldn’t touch this food.” Gamble spat out.

I looked at the uspec and found myself smiling a little. It was wrong about that. I had certainly eaten worse in the pits of Hakute.

“No plates or utensils?” I asked.

Chike shook its head. “I tried to get some, but the stewards wouldn’t let me leave the kitchen with them. They acted as if I was trying to steal the utensils.”

I picked up one of the stale buns and used it to scoop up greyish-brown gruel. The gruel had a foul odor to it, like food that had been left sitting for days. I put it into my mouth and almost threw it back out. It was sour and had a moldy bitter aftertaste. The stale buns were manageable on their own.

“We have grain and dried meat. Travel food sirga, please, let’s eat that.”

I agreed with Fabiana.

I placed the half-eaten bun back on the cart.

“I’m sorry master,” Chike said.

I watched the imp as it began pushing the cart away. “Stay and eat with us. I cannot imagine they’ve fed you any better in the kitchen.”

It looked at the ground. “The food was edible. Besides, I can’t stay, they have piles and piles of chores for us.”

“You are free Chike, I freed you and the others. You are not slaves. Did you not tell them that?”

It shook its head. “It would only have made things worse. The imps in charge are imps that Salin brought. Spiteful things.”

I remembered Musa’s story of how Salin’s imps led to it being castrated.

“Things will be better in the morning.” I promised.

It smiled at me, bowed and then pushed the cart out.

The rage I felt at Jukien continued to grow. I sat and took grain and meat that Matiu offered. I did not taste the food’s flavor. I tasted nothing but my rage at Jukien. It colored my taste buds bland. I imagined turning Jukien’s head into a ball.

One night. That was all the time I would give Jukien and the nobles to wizen up. After I presented my evidence to them in the morning they would either accept me or they would die. I did not come to Lahooni to fight another war, and I did not care what the nobles thought of me. If Nebula was still alive, perhaps I would have tried to do things peaceably for its sake. Without Nebula, I had no one to fear for. I would kill every noble in this port who was against me if I needed to.

I washed the food down with okun, then sprawled myself out on my lounging bed.

Gamble took the first shift watching during the night.

I did not expect to sleep. My mind appeared far too restless for sleep. But I did fall asleep. Sometime, between blinks of staring into a painted quicksand ceiling, unconsciousness slipped in.

Something woke me. I heard a call in my head, like the founder’s thunderous voice echoing in my thoughts and memories. But there were no discernible words I could hear just a call for me to wake. And so I did, I woke with a start and felt the cold sharp edge of a metal digging into my neck.

I opened my eyes and found Fabin staring down at me, its eyebrows pulled together and its lips set in a firm, determined line. Its eyes widened when it saw that I had woken, and it jumped back.

I sat up.

It scurried backwards. The dagger fell from its hands in its fright.

Blood trailed down the side of my neck. I stared at the uspec.

Its eyes were still wide. It had my ring on its finger. The ring that my sire had left me as proof of my inheritance.

I stood slowly.

It yelped.

Fabiana and Gamble jumped up immediately. Matiu rose more slowly. Matina slept soundly.

“What is it?” Fabiana asked, reaching for its sword.

I stared at Fabin. “Your younger sibling just tried to kill me.”

Fabiana’s hand dropped to its side. Its mouth hung open.

I stretched out my hand for the ring it had stolen. The uspec had the good sense not to pretend that it did not know what my gesture meant. It took the ring off its finger and dropped it gingerly onto my hand. I closed my palm and turned my back on Fabin.

“How could you?” Fabiana demanded.

“Jukien said it was the only way to save you,” Fabin replied.

I heard the shrill sound of a sword being drawn in haste. “I will kill you!” The voice was Gamble’s.

Metal rung against metal. I assumed Fabiana was defending its younger. We’d trusted Fabin enough to give it a time to stand guard. Fabiana’s younger sibling. I placed the ring into my belt and walked over to the pond. I sat by it, letting my feet sink into the liquid. The clashing of metal continued. I splashed okun onto my face.

“Stop!” I gave the order and the sounds of fighting receded. “Get your sibling out of my sight before I kill it myself.”

I heard the shuffling of feet. I washed the blood away with the warm okun. A few seconds later and I would have been dead. It didn’t matter how many times I saw it, it always caught me by surprise when I was betrayed by the family of people I trusted. First Auxa, then Marina, now Fabin. Was there no one I could trust? Perhaps I should have learned my lesson already. I rose and walked away from the okun.

Fabiana and Fabin were gone.

Gamble, Matiu and I spent the rest of the night awake, with our hands on the hilts of our swords.

Part 23
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As soon as I stepped into the Lahooni hangar I saw the ravages of war on the port. The desk at the front of the room had been hacked into pieces which were then shoved aside, probably to grant easier access to the plenum soldiers pushing into the port. Now the hangar was empty, almost deserted. Dust had accumulated on the flat pieces of the hard quicksand desk, scattered around on the ground. The soft foam ground was stained with the imprints of many sludge feet repeatedly trampling on it. The sludge was caked, hardened over the time that it had been left there, exposed.

“Why is there no one guarding the hangar?” Fabiana asked, irritated.

I glanced at the uspec without emotion and then took my focus back to the room. I walked further and my coffer slid on the ground behind me. The tag it was chained to rested securely in my belt, with its key, and my ring, the one I’d taken from Fajahromo’s finger. Not even thoughts of the uspec where enough to elicit an emotional response. I felt drained. Each step I took forward felt like an impossible task. I thought dispassionately about the food the others had tried to force me to eat while we journeyed back to Lahooni. I had refused it.

I walked between shattered pieces of the desk, towards the curtains and the pools of quicksand on the other side. I stood in the quicksand and was teleported into the commune road, or at least what was left of it.

I’d given Jukien the key to removing the form from the quicksand that made up the commune road, leaving only smog sand beneath. That had saved Lahooni from the plenum’s attacks for a while. But then the plenum had built a hard fog bridge over the pool of smog sand. It was the hard fog bridge that we stood on now. A part of my mind noted that I would have to repair all of this damage. I would have to see to the hangar and to this road. I would have to restore it to what it once was. I was back in Lahooni, back to claim it. But I was not excited or even eager to do it. I did it because Lahooni was all I had, it was the only place left for me to go. And my honoraria, or at least what was left of it, they deserved this, their return home. So, I’d brought them back, and myself with them. Lahooni was the only place that truly felt like home. It felt more like home than the slum I’d spent the majority of my life in. I really had no other home. Lahooni was it. I thought about the quicksand castle that awaited me and I found my feet drawing on the hard fog bridge. I’d dreamt of running around that castle with my offspring. I’d dreamt of sitting on my throne with Nebula on my lap. I would have sparred with it, made it into the greatest fighter that existed. But all of those dreams were gone, crumbled into dust, remnants of a happy life that had once been.

No other uspecs graced the plenum’s bridge. I stared down at the fog bridge. It was red, a deep red, like the fogs that drifted by us. The fogs in Lahooni were my favorite. They were warm, but not swelteringly so, and they just drifted, lightly brushing themselves against me and then departing. They moved slowly.

It was the early parts of night. Not so late that uspecs would be in bed, but late enough that the clouds shone their red beams without interruption from the daylight dots.

There were no sounds as we walked across, none save for the scraping of my coffer against the fog ground. Our feet met the hard ground in a silent caress, we wore no shoes. This was Lahooni, there was no need for footwear. I wore nothing on my body save for my belt. For the first time since I’d grown old enough to be easily spotted as irira, both of my features were exposed. My hooni neck scales shone a clear contrast to the green of my skin and my kute tail flopped against the ground.

There was something about the silence. It felt sad, as if the fogs themselves grieved for the destruction that the war had wrought. I echoed their grief, I echoed it deep down in my soul. In my bleeding heart. I thought again about the dagger I’d pushed into my skin and cursed the instinct that had forced me to pull it out. Nebula would not have wanted that. It thought of me as strong, and so I was trying to be. I was trying so hard to be the strong uspec that my offspring had died believing me to be. But I was so tired. I was exhausted from all the losses. The dead were metal chains around my shoulders bearing me down. I could have saved them. If I had only refused Juke’s company. If I had told Marcinus to return to Katsoaru with its junior cognate. Nebula. I thought of my precious little one and a howl of desperate anguish tore out from my throat.

I stumbled.

Pairs of green hands shot out to catch me.

“Sirga?” I heard the worry in Fabiana’s voice.

Our homecoming should have been a celebration, it should have been a triumphant march, but it was a gloomy procession. I swallowed and forced my legs to remain steady underneath me. Then I pulled myself from the supporting hands and continued my silent march. I would not walk into my port like a sick weakling. I would walk in with the strength Nebula had imagined I bore. Another strangled whimper escaped my lips. Fabiana was the only one walking close enough to hear it. It kept its gaze ahead, pretending as if the sound had escaped its ears.

I did not know how to survive this sorrow.

I tried, but my efforts fell short. I was just so tired.

“Sirga, where are we going first?” Gamble walked up to my other side. It looked as grim as I felt.

“My palace.” I said.

Its hands tightened around the sword in its belt. “Is that safe, sirga?”

“Of course, it’s safe.” Fabiana said. “The Kaiser has returned victorious. Why would it not be safe?”

Victorious? This was no victory. It was not defeat, but it certainly was not victory. I looked at my honoraria. Four uspecs out of a hundred that had departed with me. Six imps trailed behind us. All but Chike wore smiles on their faces. They had left Lahooni after my sire’s death. Chike was the only who’d left before. This was their first time back to a port they’d called home for centuries. I turned back around.

“I’m going to the palace. If there is any danger, I’d rather face it head on. The rest of you may return to your homes. I will call on you after I’ve dealt with whatever reception awaits.”

We were close to the end of the commune road now. Really, with the quicksand road destroyed there was no need to walk the road. We could have teleported, but the tradition remained.

“We are your honoraria.” Matiu stated.

Four uspecs left from one hundred. None smiled. We walked out of the commune road and I formed quicksand underneath us. My identity held the key to teleporting within the palace. There were other keys, keys that Jukien no doubt controlled. Would the uspec be living in my palace as Kaiser? It had to die. Jukien and all the nobles it had colluded with, they all had to die. There would be no peace in Lahooni until that was seen to.

The quicksand pulled us in and teleported us to a thriving court.

Uspecs lounged on beds placed in artful locations around the court. This was an entertaining room in the palace, an entertaining area for the Lahooni nobles. Some of them lay around tables playing games and throwing around money. Imps rushed about the room carrying heavy trays of food to lounging uspecs. They served the uspecs and continued about on their errands. Uspecs drank and talked loudly. They laughed. They were all nobles, there were no commoners here. All born nobles with golden armbands or made nobles with silver cloths. The aroma of fruit wines and savory meals invaded my nostrils.

Soldiers stood guarding the entrances to this room. They had not noticed my presence. It was hard to look at this revelry and imagine that there had been a war here only a few days ago. The palace was no worse for wear. I knew that the plenum soldiers had been unable to cease it.

A large group was gathered around my right. That group burst into a cacophonous round of laughter. Conversations continued. Nobles ate, lazily sprawled over lounging beds. An uspec tossed a dice onto a table and then laughed when it stopped spinning. Others grumbled and gave up their money. Some of the nobles were skinny like Matina, nobles that could not fight. There were a few that had Gamble and Fabiana’s lean musculature. I caught sight of three bannerets built like brawlers. A good number of the nobles were fat, round in ways that I had not seen uspec bodies. I realized then just how much of my life had been spent around fighters.

I had no idea how to breach this chaos or if I even wanted to.

Before I could make up my mind, a large horn sounded.

“The mighty undead,” a voice bellowed, and I prepared myself to become the center of attention. I poised myself for a speech or whatever else a situation like this demanded. Then the announcer finished, “Jukien, Kaiser of Lahooni.”

Something inside of me ground. I tasted bitterness in my mouth and flickers of fury came alive within me. It boiled in the pits of my belly. I’d thought myself beyond emotions, but I’d been wrong. My heart pounded weakly with rage. I should have listened to the others and eaten on the inter-port trail. Now, I had no strength for fighting.

Matina gasped.

Fabiana cursed.

Matiu’s eyes narrowed and its hands clenched into fists.

Gamble pulled out its sword and took a step towards the curtains that were being pulled open. I stopped it with a hand on its shoulder. I may be too weak for swordfight, but I was plenty strong for spectra. If I needed to, I could drown this entire room in lit okun and kill every one of these indolent nobles.

The nobles stirred. Those who’d been lounging rose to their feet and turned towards the curtains. They bowed.

Soldiers held open curtains I knew led to the Kaiser’s receiving room. Jukien marched out of those curtains with two uspecs walking behind it. It wore five golden armbands on its arms and the uspecs walking behind it wore four. Soldiers surrounded Jukien. The uspec was older than the last time I’d seen it, but it still had its bulk. It was in its prime, with the slightly muscular bulk of a sword fighter who dabbled in brawling. The uspecs who shadowed it had the lean musculature of sword fighters.

Jukien sauntered in, waving its hand lavishly around. Some uspecs straightened and rushed to fawn over it.

I clenched my jaw.

“Release me sirga, so that I can lop off that fool’s head.” Gamble swore. It said the words loudly enough to cause a stir and finally draw attention to our presence standing at the back of the court.

Uspecs saw us. They frowned at first and then their gazes stopped on me and their eyes widened. Some rose, others remained bowed. A space was cleared between us and Jukien, giving a clear line of sight.

“Precious one!” A loud voice rung out. The voice came from the direction of uspecs fawning over Jukien. It ran towards us. The uspec appeared vaguely familiar. It had all of its outer eyes formed and filled and a neck filled with shiny cyan scales. Three golden armbands graced its arms.

It ran to Fabiana and wrapped its arms around it.

Jukien’s gaze met mine. Its eyes narrowed. “Who are you? Guards!” it snapped. “Who allowed this person into my court?”

“This is not your court!” Gamble yelled. “This is the court of the Imperial Nebud. By what right do you claim to be Kaiser?”

Whispers of my name swirled around the room. Uspecs turned to face me. All stood now and their gazes bore into my flesh. Many looked on me with scorn. I imagined how I looked, fresh from the inter-port trail. My stomach was filled with scars from a whip. I heard whispers of my progenitor and sires names and whispers of ‘irira’ these were low, but they existed. I was tempted to drown them all in lit okun, but something stopped me.

Jukien’s gaze turned mocking. It eyed me slowly, its gaze racking over my body. “It is indeed the imposter. You had the gall to return.”

My jaw ticked.

“You know very well that the Imperial Nebud is no imposter. If it was an imposter, then why did you send agents to kidnap it for the fabled wealth of Lahooni!” Gamble yelled at Jukien.

The murmurs in the room rose to a fever pitch.

“Idiot,” Fabiana snapped at Gamble, “you do not just accuse a duke of such treason without proof. Where were you raised?”

Gamble eyed Fabiana hostilely.

I sighed, easing the tension in my jaw.

I cleared my throat.

I was surprised when that slight sound was enough to spread hush tones. These nobles apparently appeared eager to hear what I had to say.

“I have returned with the proof of my claim to the throne.” I stated simply.

Jukien’s jaw clenched. Its gaze narrowed on me.

One of the uspecs standing behind it walked forward. “I remember this uspec, it is the last brio.” There were nods across the room. “The last brio that tasked Lahooni to fight for the founder and then abandoned us for five years, only to return after my progenitor has successfully won the battle against the plenum.”

Murmurs of disapproval swept through the room. Uspecs looked at me and shook their heads.

Jukien smiled.

Well it's not done yet, but I guess there's enough info to hint at how it's going to end. There are five more chapters, I'm posting two today and the last three tomorrow. The last chapter is the epilogue that ties back into the marked series.

I should point out one thing though, while I am not Musa's biggest fan at this point in time, Musa is not responsible for the imps in the wrath kidnapping Nebula. I've learnt from this story how truly important POV is. Musa is an imp that is torn between two loyalties. It is tied to Nebud's line through Chuspecip and so it battled against its kind when it had to for Nebud's sake, to make sure that Chuspecip was returned. But it also founded the wrath. It founded a safe haven for slaves who'd been brutalized by uspecs. Musa has to play both sides it has chosen Nebud over the wrath in the past, this time it chose the wrath over Nebud. I believe it made the wrong decision, but I can understand why Musa felt it had to intercede for the imps. Though I cannot forgive the fact that it denied Nebud vengeance for its offspring. From Musa's POV though, consider that what it told the imps that attacked them on the inter-port trail about Nebud's bond to Nebula, was done, not so that they would attack Nebula, but so that the imps would see how fiercely Nebud would protect its offspring, and choose not to attack. It was trying to get the imps to leave without anyone getting hurt. Also, these imps in the wrath, the ones that Musa fought to save, are imps that it has known for centuries, imps that are like family to it. I can understand why it bargained for their lives, even though I feel like its bargain was not as smart as it could have been.

Now, regardless of how Nebud feels, Musa has served Chuspecip's line since its inception. It has been a slave to them, teaching each new uspec pansophy, tutoring them, making sure they grew into the line of Kaisers that made the port so wealthy. Did it do this solely for the benefit to the wrath? I don't think so, Musa has always genuinely cared about Nebud's line.

As for Chuspecip giving Musa what it asked for, well, I don't know, the way of the Chu is beyond me. But Musa has given a lot to serve the uspecs of its line for thousands of years, I think it deserved Qatamejo, I just don't think it deserved to have the wrath saved and there with it.

Just my two cents before the next (second to last) update

“I give you Qatamejo, the plenum port that once belonged to Katan.” Chuspecip’s words were followed by muted gasps of shock and horror from the occupants of the canopy room. Qatamejo was currently the wealthiest port in the entire existence. It was not ravaged by war. It was brimming with natural resources. Lahooni had grown wealthy because of the cunning of my line and their creations, not due to any resources.

Musa looked up. It gaped at Chuspecip. Chuspecip stretched out its hand and pulled Musa up to its feet.

“You are, as of this moment, the Kaiser of Qatamejo. If you desire for imps to be free in your port, it is within your power to make it so. And I make this declaration, any imp, in any part of this existence, that requests to go to Qatamejo must not be hindered. Anyone who tries to stop the imp from leaving, or reaching its destination, will die by my will.” Green fog swirled around Musa. I did not know what I expected, but when the green fogs went away, Musa looked just as it had before.

Musa’s gaze dropped. “You grew it back,” it appeared shocked.

Chuspecip nodded. “I know you wish to be intimate with your lover. I have given you spectra Musa, the magic of all five eyes. Pansophy you already have. Your spectra is solely yours, you can permit whomever you wish to siphon the magic from you. I have also removed all uspecs from your port and sent them to the other plenum ports that remain. The imps from Permafrost await you in Qatamejo.”

Musa blinked. “Why?”

I wanted to know the same thing. Why was Chuspecip always quick to reward those that cost me dearly? Marina who was in part responsible for Juke’s death now lounged as Kaiser of Katsoaru. Now Musa, this traitorous imp, would be Kaiser of its own port of imps, and any imp that as much as mentioned a desire to join those in Qatamejo must be allowed to leave. It had basically granted both of Musa’s requests. Chuspecip was so altruistic with everyone but me.

Chuspecip sighed. “I have cut you off from me Musa, I will no longer feel you as I once did, and I have no desire to anymore. But you served me well, and so I will not cut you off with nothing.”

It was displeased. Its tone made it clear that it was displeased with Musa, but still it gave it so much. I did not understand the founder.

Musa bowed, but I had known the imp long enough to know when it was sad. “I am so sorry master,” it said. It was not talking to me. “I am so sorry.”

Chuspecip nodded. “I know. Your port is now in your power to secure. The hangar is sealed, you may use pansophy to unseal it once you are ready to start allowing more people in.” It cleared its throat. Green fog surrounded the canopy room. I was helpless to do anything but watch. “Let all imps who wish to follow Musa to Qatamejo speak it now.” I imagined colored swirls came from the mouths of imps behind me. I saw the bright cyan of words that came from Halima and several others. There was red to. Chike was red. I didn’t know what the red meant. But when the green fog cleared, Musa and Halima were gone, along with several other imps. Chike remained.

My motion returned.

I looked around. Six imps remained. That was already six too much. I glanced at Chike and revised my statement. Five too much. I hoped these imps did not wish to accompany me back to Lahooni. Chike I would take, the rest I did not want.

“You granted mercy to Monachooni, Checha’s port.”

I nodded without looking at the founder’s face. It had given the imps freedom and wealth, a reward after they’d killed my offspring. Freedom and wealth. Our existence would never be the same again. Any imp that desired freedom now need only say Qatamejo and they would be free. I did not care. If I could remove every imp from Lahooni I would do it. I did not care where they stayed, as long as it was not close to me. I did not think I could ever look at another imp without remembering Musa’s betrayal and the wrath. The wrath that now owned Qatamejo. I despised Chuspecip.

Chuspecip sighed. It was in my head. I did not care, I did not care about anything anymore.

“Monachooni is free then, and Qatamejo now belongs to Musa. The last three plenum ports I give to you, Nebud, they will be annexed ports of Lahooni, from this point on, they are forgotten kingdoms and you are their Kaiser.”

Did it expect gratitude?

No, I do not.

‘Well, you can keep your ports, I don’t want them! If you want to give me something, then give me back the lives of the ones I’ve lost fighting your battles.’

I cannot revive the dead, Nebud. And the ports are yours. There are responsibilities that come with being of my line. I cannot entrust those ports to anyone else and I cannot promote any nobles in those ports to Kaiser after their rebellion. You must mind them. They are all rich ports. Combined their wealth surpasses Qatamejo.

What didn’t Chuspecip understand? All I wanted was my offspring back. I just wanted to play with it again, to hear its stammering speech. To spar with it. I had not even gotten to spend more than a month of its life with it. That was what I wanted, what I cared for.

Green fog enveloped me.

When the green fog cleared, I was kneeling in a very familiar room with green sludge. Nebula lay on the ground in front of me and Chuspecip sat beside me.

“The uspecs of our line are buried in quicksand in this room. They live on, Nebud, through the ones that come after, and through me. You are all a special part of me. Let us inter Nebula together.”

I pulled my offspring into my arms and rocked its corpse.

“Share this with me Nebud, please.”

“I spit on you!” I yelled. “Leave me to grieve in peace.”

Chuspecip sighed. “You wound me, Nebud. You wound me deeply.” Then it was gone, and there was a patch of quicksand left in its place.

I held Nebula in my arms, and I allowed myself to break down the way I couldn’t before. I wept. Hot tears rushed down my face. Pink tears splashed onto my offspring’s body. I cursed myself. Chuspecip didn’t care about me or uspecs. If I had let Fajahromo live the imps would have given me growth for Nebula. They would have bargained with me, used me to finish the invasion. The existence would have belonged to imps, but then Nebula would still be alive. What did I care who owned what as long as Nebula was alive? What did I care?

Pain and guilt threatened to overwhelm me.

I pulled out my dagger and stared at it.

Then I placed the sharp point on the wound on my chest. Tears streamed down my face as I pushed the dagger in. I did not want to live in a world where my offspring did not. I pushed and it went half of an inch into my skin. Far enough to bleed but not far enough to kill. What stopped me? I stared at my offspring’s face and I just couldn’t do it. There was no joy left in life for me, but the weakness of killing myself seemed like an insult to its memory. It had died thinking of me as strong. It had died thinking of me as powerful.

I pulled the dagger out and stared at the blood on the blade, then I placed the dagger back in its sheath on my belt.

“Thank you for not ending my line.”

I rose my head and found Chuspecip standing in front of me. I turned my gaze back to my offspring. My little Nebula. I carried it to the quicksand and placed its body on top of it. The quicksand pulled Nebula in and took it away.

I felt empty. I had no more tears to weep. The rest of my life seemed to drag on in front of me, like a weight I was forced to carry. It left a bitter taste in my mouth.

“I am returning to Lahooni.” I said.

Chuspecip nodded. “I have cleared the plenum soldiers out of your port. It is yours to claim.”

I knew I should have offered gratitude or at least a farewell, but I felt incapable of either. I just formed quicksand underneath myself and teleported myself back to paradise. I called everyone together and told them we were leaving. Much to my dismay, the imps chose to come with me. I was too tired to fight. I just led them out of the Isle of Brio. They were happy to be going ‘home’.

I felt nothing.

Part 22
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Gamble spoke into the silence.

“It was my fault,” it said. “We went looking for you in Permafrost. We were in a hallway when about fifty imps attacked us. I turned my back on Ula for a second, just a second, and when I turned back it was gone.”

Silence. Gamble spoke through tears. It wept brokenly and openly. It begged me to take its life. It told me that it did not deserve to live. All I could do was stare into the face of the offspring I’d so thoroughly failed. Was I cursed? How could this have happened? How?

“It was my fault master,” Chike spoke up, “I should have watched Nebula. When I didn’t see it I thought it had gone to one of its hideouts here. I didn’t know that it had gone chasing after you. I should have followed you. I should have known that it would follow you. I should have known.”

Silence. The silence was painful, I hated it. But I hated the words more. The imp and uspec taking blame for things they could not control. It was my fault. Maybe I should have been tougher, harder with Nebula, maybe then it would not have gone chasing me into danger. Or more accurately, I should have sent it away that night, I should not have let it stay till morning. But what if the imps had taken it during the night? What if they’d taken them all? No, my mistake was in killing Fajahromo. I should not have killed it. I should have let it live. They would have let my offspring live if I hadn’t been baited by Fajahromo’s laughter. They would have healed Nebula. They would have given it growth. Or better yet, I should never have left Nebula alone to go chasing after Fajahromo. I should have seen my offspring out of there safely before I tried to complete the founder’s mission. What did I care about an invasion? I cared so much more for my offspring. I was willing to give the imps whatever they wanted in exchange for a little growth. I would have given them this existence if they’d let Nebula live. Everything inside of me hurt. My chest was filled to bursting with pain. My hands roved over the cold, lifeless, corpse.

My Nebula was dead.

“We should march on Permafrost.” The cool voice came from the last person I expected. My gaze snapped to Matina. Tears streaked from its eyes as it spoke. “We should march on them with an army of mejo soldiers and with enough samu to destroy every single imp there. Then we should burn their hail homes to the ground. They must die for what they’ve done.”

I nodded. Those were the first words to make sense. Yes, I agreed. Those imps had to die. They had to be wiped from the spectral existence permanently.

“If that is your wish, I will see it done.” This time, the voice that spoke was one I knew all too well. Gasps filled the room, proceeded by whispers of ‘Chuspecip’ and ‘the founder’.

I felt its presence behind me and in me. It shared my grief. It had loved my offspring. It wanted vengeance just as badly as I did. I parted my lips to respond in the affirmative.

An imp voice spoke up before I could.

“You told me a few days ago that you owed me for the millennia of faithful service that I have provided to you and your descendants.” The voice was Musa’s. “You told me that I had only name my desire and it would be granted.”

I turned to stare at the imp. Chuspecip in its Chacip form stood a few paces in front of me.

It nodded.

“I am ready.” Musa stated.

Alarm bells went off in my head. “Musa,” I warned.

The imp ignored me. Its gaze was fixed on Chuspecip’s face. “I want clemency for the imps in the wrath…”

“NO!” I bellowed.

“and I want freedom. Freedom for all imps in your existence. Those are my desires.” It continued as if it had not heard me interrupt.

“Do not do this Musa!” I yelled. “Do not even think on it!”

It did not so much as glance in my direction. Its steady gaze remained fixed on Chuspecip. “I have made my desires known.”

Chuspecip shook its head. “I can grant the second, but not the first.” It said.

The knot that had formed in my chest, around my heart, loosened.

Musa’s empty sockets remained fixed on Chuspecip. “You will go back on your oath to me then.”

Chuspecip’s jaw clenched. “I said I would grant one desire. I have granted it.”

“Can I not choose the desire that you grant?” Musa asked.

My hold on my offspring’s shoulder tightened. The cold from that shoulder seeped into me. I looked at Musa and wondered if I had ever known this imp at all. It had been the one to lead the imps in Permafrost to kidnap my offspring. Had it convinced Nebula to follow after me? Perhaps it had not planned specifically for the wrath to kidnap Nebula, but it had told them things that they had no right to know. Now it was trying to bargain for their freedom. It wouldn’t dare! I would kill it first.

Chuspecip’s words were spoken slowly and evenly. The entire room was tense. Everyone stared, watched, waited. “Musa, we share a special bond, you and I. Think very carefully before you make your request. Abolishing the enslavement of imps is fair. I can make it a crime against me to own an imp, a crime punishable by an immediate death, death that I will ensure. I will do this for you and our bond will not suffer for it.”

Musa looked down. I sensed its acquiescence and I relaxed. I would never trust Musa again, I could not, but it was free. I had freed it already before this and now Chuspecip was freeing all imps. It would live. Far away from me if I had any say in the matter, but it would live. As long as it did not try to take away my revenge on those that killed my offspring.

Musa’s gaze rose. “I am personally responsible for the imps in Permafrost. I…” its voice cracked. “My desire is for their clemency.”

“Musa,” Fabiana called, “reconsider.”

Musa’s gaze remained on Chuspecip. “Will you grant it, or will you go back on your word to me?”

Fabiana gasped at its tone. This Musa, the one that would side with my offspring’s murderers. It was one I did not know. I reached for my dagger, ready to throw it at the imp’s neck, but Chuspecip stopped me. It placed a hand on my arm and shook its head. It was in my head, it knew my thoughts. I cursed it. It removed its touch and stood straight.

“I gave my word,” it said. “I will keep it.”

“What about me!” I yelled. “What about my sacrifices? What about my service? Is that for nothing! You cannot let my offspring’s murderers go free. I will not allow it!”

Chuspecip stared at me, but it shook its head. “I made an oath to Musa.”

I was about to speak, but I suddenly found my lips incapable of motion. I tried moving my hands but even these would not budge. Without touching me, the founder had removed my motion. It was route. I couldn’t move anything. There was nothing I could do but watch while I was robbed of my vengeance.

Musa bowed. “I am grateful.”

“You are a fool.” The founder’s chastisement came without emotion. “You have sided with imps who killed the youngest uspec of my line. Whatever bond we shared is now severed. Those imps will live, but life is the only thing I promise them.” It turned to me and I saw a flicker of anguish in its eyes before its look turned hard. “Any uspec who tries to harm any of the imps in Permafrost will die by my will.”

Once the judgement was pronounced, I knew it was over. I’d had nothing left to cling to, nothing but a chance at getting justice for my dead offspring. But even that the founder had taken from me. What more would it take? What more did I have to give except my own life?

This is not easy for me.

The founder’s voice echoed in my mind, like a memory, a shared thought. ‘But you do it anyway!’ I yelled back at the founder in my head.

Musa has served me faithfully for millennia. It has served your line.

‘It only served them because they gave wealth to the wrath and kept Permafrost running! Now you’ve seen it always cared more for those imps than it ever did for my line!’ I yelled back at it in my head.

Perhaps. But it did serve faithfully, and I gave it my oath. I will never go back on an oath given. No matter how much it pains me. This pains me Nebud, it pains me more than you can know. It pains me to lose Nebula. It pains me to feel your torment and it pains me to be severed from one such as Musa. I am pained, but I cannot go back on my oath.

“Thank you.” Musa said.

Halima drew in a shaky breath. It was speaking moments later. “Is that all that Musa deserves for thousands of years of service?”

Chuspecip’s cold gaze fixed on the imp that had been a bane ever since Animaon brought it to me. “What more should I give?” Chuspecip asked.

“You should grant both of its desires.” The impudent imp had the gall to say. “Imps should be free.”

Chuspecip shrugged. “Perhaps. But my love for a young, innocent, uspec of my line outweighs the grief I bear over the suffering of imps. Musa has asked more from me today than any person should ever be asked to give. Let the slavery of imps be its punishment for the reward it claimed.”

Musa dropped to its knees as if felled by Chuspecip’s words. I saw it in the founder’s face. It looked at Musa’s bent head and it relented. I knew it the moment it happened. I wanted nothing more in that moment than to be free of the founder’s presence. It lied. It loved imps, it could not help it. It was its mercy for imps that had led it to give Musa the money to fund Permafrost in the first place. Why did it not just abolish slavery instead?

Perhaps I should have. I made this existence with only one rule, that the Kaiser of each port would be the final authority there, not me. I did not want what the plenum tried to accomplish, a single existence ruled by one or a few. I intercede when I must, but I do not like to make sweeping decisions for all. It is my desire that you all decide how you live. It is part of the weakness you see in me, Nebud.

It cleared its throat. “For your years of service to me, Musa, I give you this. I give you clemency for the wrath and I give you a port.”

I groaned, or at least I would have if I could speak.

Part 21
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My head felt full, my tongue swollen and there was a dull pain in my chest. I opened my eyes and saw a palette of colors hanging above me. My ailerons were dug deep into something soft and comfortable. My gaze followed the lines of colors. I realized that they were fronds. Fronds of a canopy tree. And the ground I lay on was clouds. There was something very familiar about this place. My eyelids sluggishly pulled together.

I was in the Isle of Brio.

My eyelids slammed open and I jumped up.

“Sirga!”

The ache in my chest was not imagined. There was an ugly gash on my chest, right where I’d been stabbed. That gash hurt and I felt as if my heart was heavy. It pushed pain through my chest with each beat. But I was alive. Which meant that my offspring had to have lived too.

“Take me to Nebula,” I commanded before I even caught sight of the uspec who’d called out to me. It was Fabiana.

The uspec’s gaze dropped. It looked grim.

I frowned. What was wrong with it? Whatever it was, I would see to it later. I had to see my offspring first. “Come on Majestic, take me to my offspring.” I tried to inject humor into my words, but my throat was dry and the words sounded more like shrieks that had been scratched out than a sensible sentence. But it had been loud enough to hear.

Fabiana shook its head. “Sirga,” it began, its gaze still not meeting mine, “I am sorry, I did everything I could. As soon as we found the room I tried to heal it, but it was already too late, Nebula is…”

“No!” I bellowed. It could not be. I shook my head. It could not be. I thought of my offspring’s face, its young face smiling at me. No, I shook my head. I could not have survived when it died. It wasn’t possible. If Nebula was dead, I would feel it. I would know. “Take me to Nebula!” I ordered.

Fabiana’s eyes rose to mine and its eyes were wet with unshed tears. “Ula is dead, sirga. I am so sorry.”

“No!” I pushed myself to my feet. It wasn’t possible. Why was I so weak? I stumbled when I tried to stand. Fabiana had to help me. It reached down and grasped me around the arm. Then it pulled me up.

“The blade you were stabbed with was poisoned. The founder was able to heal you, but you will need to eat to regain your strength.”

Once I was standing, I shoved Fabiana away. I took a step forward and buckled under my own weight. Fabiana caught me before I fell. It supported me.

“Take me to my offspring.” I ordered.

“Sirga…”

“Take me to Nebula!” I snapped.

Fabiana nodded and then it led me out of the canopy tree. Cool hail chilled fogs drifted by me. Low clouds stroked against my scalp and my feet trudged through patches of quicksand and sludge. The sweet scent of the paradise surrounded me and I knew that Nebula lived. It had to. How could the air smell so sweet if it did not? A turtle rolled along my scalp when the top of my head intruded on another low cloud. Right as the mejo frosted beast lurched on my scalp a draco, the hooni frosted beast, crawled allover my feet. I knew it was a sign, a sign that Fabiana was wrong and Nebula was still alive. It was too beautiful a day and I was being graced by too many frosted beasts for a tragedy to have occurred. It just wasn’t possible.

I kept going, leaning heavily on Fabiana and ignoring my weakness and my pain.

Fabiana led me to a canopy room that I had never seen before. It was close to the smoke bears’ den. A loud trumpet broke my focus. “Marc,” I called out in a low voice.

“We did not have time to search for the bear, sirga.”

I felt another sharp tug in my chest. First, Marcinus, then Marc the bear I’d named after it, both lost to the wrath of Sada. But not Nebula, at least I had that to be grateful for. Fabiana pulled a frond aside.

The canopy room we entered was full. Every person in the paradise seemed to be standing there. Fabiana called to be excused. Imps made up the outer circle. Once we got to the inner circle, close enough that I could see the stem of the tree, I realized how truly unique this room was. It must have been where Nebula had done its lessons. There was a long extrusion from the stem of the tree. It was a rather large stem, with a two foot wide table that wrapped around it. Parchment was scattered around parts of the table.

I saw Matiu first. The uspec knelt beside its younger who’d been playing a very sad tune on its mbira. Matiu’s gaze dropped when it met mine. It nudged its younger sibling. Matina’s head snapped up, its gaze met mine and it stopped playing the achingly sad tune. Musa stood to the left with Chike kneeling on one side of it and its female imp Halima, kneeling on the other. Why were so many kneeling? Gamble knelt as well, in front of me. Matiu cleared its throat. Gamble turned around, saw me, and crawled away, opening a space for me.

I stopped moving.

No.

I closed my eyes.

The mbira had covered the other sounds. Sounds I’d been unwilling to hear before. The sounds of people crying. The sniffles, the whimpers. Gamble’s face. There had been tears on Gamble’s face.

No.

I didn’t want to open my eyes, but keeping my eyes closed didn’t help. I had caught a snapshot of it, and that snap was tearing at me. I opened my eyes and whatever strength had been in my legs went away. I fell. My knees sunk into the soft ground of clouds.

It looked like it was asleep. Its hands were folded on its chest and its eye was shut. It had a peaceful smile on its face. It wasn’t a wide smile, just a slight one, its lips just barely curved up.

“No,” the words came out of my lips but they sounded alien.

I reached for my offspring’s face. It was not moving. It did not flinch when I touched its cold skin. It was not breathing.

Something broke inside of me. Outside an animal raged. It howled loudly. I heard it and I felt a strange sensation in my throat. It took me a while to realize that the strange animal sounds were coming from me. Even then I couldn’t stop it. Nebula, my Nebula. I had failed it. The one good thing that had ever happened to me, the light in my dark and desolate world. The source of my joy. I had failed it. I had failed it. Five years, five short years. How could I have failed my Nebula so thoroughly? How could I have failed it? I didn’t deserve to live. How could I be alive when Nebula was dead? Was there no justice in this world? No fairness. I wailed but no tears came from my eyes just guttural sounds of ghoulish pain. The animal raged on until there was no more breath in my body. Then there was silence. An empty silence in an empty world that no longer had any meaning for me.

I frowned and then its gaze cleared. It wept. Its entire frame was racked over.

“It is you!” It screamed. “The founder sent you.” Fajahromo’s voice changed as if it was mimicking someone. “The founder has returned!” Then its voice returned to its own. “We were so close.” The voice changed again. “Just one more day with the fusion, just one more day, drogher, just one more day and it will be complete.” Its eyes fixed on me. “Who are you?”

I stumbled back. My grip on the cutlass tightened as I stared into the uspec’s deranged eyes. Was this some sort of trick? It wept like a baby and cradled the severed hand to its chest.

“Who are you? It is you! Nebud is here! The founder is back! It destroyed the effigy before the fusion was complete!” It bent its head to the side, “who are you?”

I blinked.

“You gave yourself to the effigy, didn’t you? It was never just a statue, that was why it appeared so lifelike.” I said the words to a blubbering fool that couldn’t respond. It just wept and screamed in pain. Killing it now would be a mercy.

I stared into the uspec’s face. Fajahromo. This was where its thirst for power had led it.

You must destroy the effigy first. Once the effigy is dead, the rest will come easily.

The founder’s words returned to me. ‘Once the effigy is dead, the rest will come easily.’ It had known this would happen. I felt cheated. Cheated of a good bout with my lifelong enemy. Cheated of the fight we should have had. I did not want to end Fajahromo’s pain, I did not want to end its life when it was nothing more than a blubbering husk. I stared into that face, frozen to the spot, my mind clouded with indecision. Fajarhomo had caused too much pain for the ending of its life to be a blessing. I remembered all the times I had tried, and failed, to kill Fajahromo. The ways that it had laughed at my attempts. Always making me feel lesser, foolish. I wanted it to be lucid when I ended its life. I wanted it to look into my face and know that I was the one killing it. I wanted to see the laughter fade from its smiling lips because it knew that I was the one responsible for its death. I wanted it to know that it had been beaten by me, Nebud, the uspec it had underestimated and thought so little off. This mad uspec kneeling on the ground, weeping, its mind broken, it knew nothing. I couldn’t even be sure that it knew who I was. It had sounded like it did before, like it knew exactly who I was. The madness set in only after I cut off its hand. Maybe the madness was a trick, a ploy? Maybe it was just weak and not mad, maybe it was acting to make me hesitate.

It was too weak to fight me, too weak to defend itself with spectra and so it had run into an equipoise. Then it had run towards me without skill, or without energy? What exactly had destroying the effigy done to it?

The curtains to the room we stood in were drawn open. Fajahromo’s cries stopped immediately. It looked into my eyes and I knew in that moment that its madness had all been a lie, put on for my benefit, to buy it time. It was weak, but not crazy. It smiled its twisted smirk and I rose my cutlass up. Then its eyes darted away from me, towards the cutlass. I refused to look.

“M-my ma-mater will k-kill all of y-you!”

My heart froze in my chest.

Fajahromo’s madness had been a ploy.

I turned my gaze from the uspec to the curtains. Five imps walked in, one was the high elder, two latched onto my offspring’s arms two sidled slowly towards Fajahromo.

That was when the laughter came. Fajahromo’s laughter of triumph. What was a hand? With pansophy and growth the hand would grow back. It had been too weak to fight me itself and so it had played me to delay me. I was the fool. I lowered my cutlass and brought my hand to my side.

“Please don’t hurt it.” I begged.

Fajahromo nodded. It was a slight gesture, a simple downwards jerk of its head and a dagger was poking out of my offspring’s chest, blood was trailing down the front of its body. The dagger was pulled out and my offspring fell.

“No!” I screamed. I took a step towards my offspring right when the imps reached the equipoise. Fajahromo laughed and tsk-ed at me at the same time. My offspring was not moving. The imps entered the equipoise.

I swung my cutlass and Fajahromo’s laughing head fell on the floor of the equipoise beside its body.

I ran to my offspring, but I’d known, from the moment I saw that dagger, I’d known. Nebula’s life was nothing to them, they’d kill it to distract me. I knew how Fajahromo’s mind worked. They’d probably thought I would be too distraught to kill Fajahromo when my offspring was bleeding. I knelt by Nebula and turned the uspec around. It was still blinking. It was still alive. They hadn’t meant to kill it then, they’d only been trying to distract me. That gave me hope.

“Give it growth!” I begged. The imps had pansophy. “Give it growth!”

“We were going to, before you killed the drogher, we had no intention of killing a child.” The high elder shook its head.

No. The pounding in my head got louder.

“Now, it is over, and you and your offspring will die for what you’ve done.” The high elder said. It pronounced the words with complete finality.

I placed my hand over my offspring’s wound and tried to remember all the forms of pansophy that Fabiana had said it mastered. “Take my growth,” I begged it. It was still breathing, its breath was weak, but it still breathed. “Take my growth,” I yelled at it. “Take my growth.” But Nebula just continued blinking wearily.

“Fabiana!” I yelled. “Fabiana!”

“Kill them both!” I heard the high elder order.

“Give it growth!” I begged. “I will do whatever you want, just save it.” I tried to take away their anger to soften them, but they were either emotionless or they’d imbibed emotion blockers. “Whatever you want.” I stated emphatically. “Just give it growth, please.”

It was still alive. I reached for my anger. I could teleport it out of this place and then call for Chuspecip. Chuspecip was watching! I pooled quicksand on the ground around us and just as I felt it tugging at me, I heard a bang. Tears spilled from my eyes. Someone had counteracted my magic, someone was fighting against me.

“You ended the invasion. There is nothing you have to give that we want.” The high elder spat at me.

The imp’s siphoned spectra was strong, it was skilled. How many centuries had it had to train in spectra that I was barely proficient in? But I had lit okun. How much time would it take to kill these imps and then teleport my offspring out? Did Nebula have that much time left? I had pansophy, I had not learnt it, but I had it. There had to be a way that I could transfer my own growth to Nebula. My offspring’s chest was barely moving underneath me. I did not know how pansophy worked, but I tried to reach for my growth. I imagined myself healing, I tried to imagine the sensation and then channel it to Nebula. I had the magic of pansophy, I had gotten it from Fabiana, I had it. I tried to channel my healing into Nebula.

A sword pierced through me. Someone pushed it into my chest. I felt it plunge into my heart.

I reached for my lit okun, while still trying to channel healing into my offspring, it was not getting stronger and the blood that filled my chest knocked out whatever strength I had. I fought desperately for the magic of pansophy I’d never learnt and for the magic of spectra to knock these imps out so that I could teleport my offspring away. None came. I was wounded. I coughed and blood spewed from my mouth and trailed down my face. I was dying on Nefastu in a place the founder couldn’t reach. Nebula was dying with me. I willed everything I had into magic. The drowsiness set in. I could not concentrate. I reached for my magic, but it kept slipping. I could not hold onto it. I fought, but my body was going down. My hand slipped off Nebula’s chest. It was still breathing.

“Give it growth!” I tried to beg. The words did not come of out my mouth, only blood did. I fell backwards and continued coughing blood. The last thing I heard before I died was the high elder give the order, “cut off its head!”

Part 20
----------

I held onto the invisible hand Gamble extended backwards as we weaved our way between the mob of frenzied imps. They seemed to be rushing in from the direction we tried to leave through, down dimly lit hallways. An imp brushed by me. I still had form so I knew it had felt me, but its gaze remained pinned on the area in front of it, madly dashing towards the tabernacle and the effigy I’d shattered. Gamble and I proceeded quietly. The further away we got from the tabernacle the faster my heart thumped. Was it really going to be this easy? We kept going. A set of curtains were pulled aside in front of us, two curtains made of a thick black material. Imps dashed in, running so fast that they did not even notice when they slammed into me. If they were not so distracted they might have stopped to wonder about their flailing arms slamming into seemingly thin air that happened to be obstructed by a substantive form. But they didn’t, and I was not going to point out their oversight.

The curtains was held open and the invisible arm leading me pulled through. I walked out into falling hail and shrunk inwards at the loud blare of horns. It was a raucous. We stood on some form of hail mountain top. Our height gave us a good view of a portion of Permafrost. Imps ran from all around their little abode towards the prayer cove. They yelled in harsh umani tongues I could not understand and ran en masse towards a dark alcove with a shattered effigy.

We moved out of the way of the curtains.

“I can use quicksand now,” Gamble whispered in Chang’s voice. I could not see it, but its hold on my hand was strong.

“Do it.” I whispered back.

Even I could feel the change in the place. It was as if the curse of Nefastu had been completely blown away. My pain came easily to me. Easily enough that I could create enough lit okun to drown every cursed imp in this place. After I had Nebula, I felt my worry plainly, worry that would give me the magic of the mejo eyes and allow me to burn this entire place in a crimson inferno. And there was sorrow. Floods and floods of sorrow coursing through my body. The fact that I remained standing was solely due to the fact that my offspring needed me. It needed me to be stronger than the grief of a friend lost. It needed me to be strong enough to endure the pain of Marcinus’ head cut off and left to rot on the ground beside a hail tree.

A flash of quicksand appeared underneath me and moments later I was being pulled in, sucked into the hail top of the mountain and teleported somewhere else, an enclosed space.

We appeared in a large circular room with a table and my offspring tied to a chair, its hands bound in front of it, with iron manacles. Matiu was bound in another chair beside it. There was no sign of Fabiana with Musa’s appearance or Matina with Li’s. Just Matiu and Nebula standing with three imps in the room. I heaved a sigh of relief at the sight of Nebula. Then I began walking towards my offspring.

A set of curtains just slightly in front of me, opened. Musa walked in with the high elder behind it, and…I staggered at the sight of my quarry. Fajahromo. Its eyes were opened wide.

“It is Nebud.” Fajahromo cursed. “It is. I told you imps to kill it! We only need its offspring. Curse you! I told you to kill it!”

Even from this room I could here the sound of the alarm bells blaring and the horns of warning that something had happened.

The high elder turned to look at Fajahromo.

I had never seen Fajahromo like this. It looked haggard. It wore none of its fancy coats, nothing to hide the fact that it was irira. It just had the four golden bands on its arms declaring it as a duke. The uspec’s harried gaze glanced around the room. I reached for my cutlass as I saw its gaze lock on me and then continue ahead unseeing. I pulled my cutlass out of its sheath. Just one swipe of the cutlass and the entire invasion would be over. They would not even see my attack coming. Robbing the blind. I pulled the cutlass out. Right as I did this, a chair creaked.

Fajahromo jumped.

“Flare appearance identifiers!” It screamed. “There is something in this room, I can feel it!”

I clenched my teeth together and reached for all the pain I had in me. I formed a lit okun underneath Fajahromo.

The uspec yelled and jumped backwards. Its gaze jerked around the room and then it ran out through the curtains. The lit okun hadn’t killed it. I cursed underneath my breath. The uspec carried Chuspecip’s lifeform and it was of the kute spectrum. It had too much luck.

Pink aerosols rose in the room and began to stick around my body, revealing my form and the cutlass I held in my head. The high elder opened its mouth. I reached for my lit okun again. The high elder was gone, teleported with quicksand before I could drain it. It was an imp, it would not have died from the lit okun, but it would have been knocked out. As the other imps in the room where when I placed my lit okun underneath them.

“Get Nebula to safety!” I yelled after Fabiana, in Musa’s appearance. There was another pink form revealed in the room, Gamble. “I am going after Fajahromo.”

Fabiana bowed and rushed over to my offspring. I spared a brief smile for my offspring and then watched to make sure that the manacles could be removed with pansophy. Once it was free and safe under Fabiana’s gaze, I dashed out of the room, through the same curtains that Fajahromo had run through.

The curtain led to a straight hallway. I ran down it, wielding my cutlass in front of me, and holding a heavy reserve of pain. Grief, could be sorrow, but it could also easily be pain. And I had grief, I had grief in barrels. I pushed a set of curtains aside.

Fajahromo was standing by a table, scribbling furiously onto it. As soon as it saw me, it stopped writing. Its eyes widened and the pen dropped from its fingers.

“It is you, isn’t it?” Fajahromo’s eyes glazed over. Its gaze fixed on me and it seemed to be speaking to me, but also not to me at the same time.

Spots of fog appeared, dotting the air around me but not with enough power to actually do harm. I had spectra but without Chuspecip’s aid, my spectra would not be as strong as Fajahromo who’d trained for so long. Still I fought with the magic. I reached into my fear and destroyed those fogs. I blinked at how surprisingly easy it was to get rid of the spots of fog Fajahromo had created.. Quicksand pulled underneath Fajahromo’s feet. Quicksand was hooni, it belonged to anger, and I was anger, I had a sacrifice of anger to feed it. I hoped that this time, like the fogs my spectra would be strong enough. I reached into my anger and the loud bang that filled the room was sweet music to my ears. The quicksand disappeared. I had defeated Fajahromo’s spectra!

I reached for my fear. The uspec may not be able to die with the lit okun, but it could with fogs. Spots of red fog rose, but the uspec was already running out of the room before I could drown it in fogs.

“Stop and face me!” I yelled after it. “Coward!”

It ran through a different set of curtains and I ran after it. This time the room it ran into had a dome of green fog in one side of it. An equipoise, I couldn’t believe it.

Fajahromo was standing in that equipoise before I could reach for my pain. I followed it in without hesitating. The uspec stood with its back to me.

“You destroyed the effigy,” it said in a small, shaky, voice. “You destroyed it. Now Chuspecip can come here and finish me the way it did to the plenum Kaisers on the inter-port trail.”

I did not bother correcting its misconception about Chuspecip’s access to this place.

“You have the founder’s magic in you. But under an equipoise, all uspecs are made equal.” It said the words as if in a trance, repeating them by rote, a pupil reciting its teachers lessons. It turned then and I saw two swords in its hands. It darted towards me and I jumped back.

There was something off about the uspec. I couldn’t place it. I thought back on its spectra and realized that there had been a weakness to the magic it used. I thought of the fear it had shown when it entered the room with my offspring. I had seen Fajahromo as a lot of things, but I had never seen it truly afraid. I had tested Fajahromo’s magic before, it was not weak. So why was the magic so weak this time?

I ducked a blow and then I turned and faced the uspec. Its sword swings were too wide. It fought callously. I knew Fajahromo, was this some sort of joke, a trick of the eyes? Fajahromo was not this weak. It was not this stupid or unskilled in a fight. Fajahromo was too smart to let me corner it in an equipoise. Perhaps Fajarhomo had traded places with another uspec. My eyes widened as the thought hit me and then reverberated through my head. That had to be it. Fajahromo had used my own game to trick me. This was not the uspec I knew, this was a crazy fool with Fajahromo’s appearance trapping me here to distract me while Fajahromo escaped.

The uspec dashed towards me again with its double swords flailing. It fought without skill. I cut off its right hand and the uspec jumped back. I would have gone after it, if not for the hand that fell to the ground. That hand that had a ring on it, a ring that was a dazzling blend of cyan, red and gold. The ring that sucked me in and urged me to pick it up, to wear it. It showed me visions of quicksand of an old uspec bent over a table, laughing. Strange sounds filled the room, sounds of wailing, sounds of a maniac crying. I bent down towards the severed hand and picked up the ring. I pulled it reverently off the finger it was on, and held it up. It was beautiful, dazzling, and as soon as I touched it, I knew it was mine.

If this crazy uspec was wearing my ring, then it had to be Fajahromo, but that made no sense.

I put the ring into my belt and walked towards the uspec. It was kneeling down. it had dropped its sword and was kneeling down, cradling the bleeding stump of the hand I’d severed. It wept and screamed. I had never seen a more horrendous sight. It blabbered as it wept, spittle and tears combining in an odd mix of pink and white.

I shoved Fajahromo with my knee and its gaze rose. It looked at me. There was something in its eyes.

“Who are you?” It asked.

Part 19
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We walked down the cave without speaking, until we reached the curtains. These curtains led to the quicksand portals that would carry us from the underground hideouts to the main level of Permafrost. Chang pushed the curtains open and held them open for me. That was strange, Chang never held anything open for me. “Chang considers himself superior to Sri,” I whispered to Chang. Chang nodded and then let the curtain fall before I was fully out. I caught it and held it open for Musa. Musa was the firstborn after all, it was deserving of the respect. I’d only ever had the honor of speaking with Musa once, when it had arrived a few months ago, sapping from the same breed of creatures that the uspecs had released on me. Musa saved my life, this one was harder to pass as fact. It was a lie, it made the façade of Sri crumble a little. I would have to do better. Musa smiled and nodded to me as it walked underneath the curtains I held open. It did not argue against having the curtains held open for it. But it also did not walk by without showing its smile of gratitude. The firstborn was kind and courteous to all, that was what mother always said. I kept Sri’s memories streaming.

As soon as the four us stood on the hard quicksand ground, it softened and pulled us in. A large pellet of hail dropped onto my hair and then rolled off. My hair was different from Musa’s. Were Musa had short curls, I had long strands. As soon as our presence there became known, whispers of ‘firstborn’ where carried around.

I almost frowned, but Sri knew better. Sri was not surprised by the sight of these many imps crowded together in front of the living lodges. It was used to it. Li and Chang had rooms in the living bunks, but because my mother was so influential, I had a room in her suite in the living lodges. My name was picked up too, in lesser notes than the firstborn’s. Chang frowned, it always frowned whenever it was reminded that I was the favored son of a powerful elder. It hated how easily power would come to me once the invasion was over. Mother had already been chosen to become the Kaiser of Damejo, and I would be duke of the first metropolis. Chang would be lucky if it even got to be a sovereign of a desolate burg. But Chang could fight, that would come to its benefit. Li was a bit slow, but it had fists like hammers. I swallowed, and hoped that no one tried to pick a fight with Matina-Li.

Imps continued to swirl around us. Sri reminded me that these imps were my brothers and sisters, the wrath was all one big family. Musa smiled. He stretched out his arms and smiled as if he was truly happy to be back. Of course people would see now that the rumors that the firstborn had forsaken us were all lies. How could the firstborn forsake us? How could it choose an uspec over its own kind? Lies, I’d said it from the start and my life was living proof. I cringed a little, had to do better with that lie. I remembered Musa saving me. Or rather, I remembered Chang and Li’s hands on me and forced Musa’s face on one of them. I remembered the infusion of growth, of health, the warm feeling in my chest when I realized that I was not going to be sapped, but I would instead live to see my mother again. The lies were harder, but I had enough of Sri’s memories to forge them into some semblance of truth.

“Sri!” Mother’s voice. I turned to the tall, plump, matron running towards me, dressed in the heavy cloaks of the elder and forced myself to smile. I was Sri. I let the memories flood me. Sri loved his mother. Sri had a beautiful smile.

I hugged my mother and she hugged me. I smiled. Hands the same complexion as mine cupped my face and brown lips pressed against my right cheek. “Sri! My son is alive!” Warm moisture trailed down my face, mother’s tears, as she held me in her tight embrace.

“What happened?” this was the voice of one of our three high elders.

“The firstborn appeared right when we’d given up hope and he saved Sri’s life.” Chang’s voice bellowed with confidence as it spoke. It turned to Musa and bowed deeply.

Musa’s smile was light. “I only did what I had to. We should speak.”

The high elder bowed. “Of course, of course.” It extended its hand towards the prayer coves and we all headed in that direction. Mother held me in a vice, cooing at me. She’d stopped crying. She was so pleased to see me that she just kept talking. Other imps walked around us, giving us a respectful distance. They pointed at Musa and gushed. Musa walked in front, with the high elder. He folded his hands behind his back and had an air of quiet authority around him. We trailed them. Li and Chang walked between us, behind Musa. I could not hear what Musa was saying because mother just kept cooing. I pulled back a little whenever it seemed she would get so close that our hips touched. I did not want mother feeling Nebud’s blades. She laughed whenever I did this though and called me her ‘little man’. We kept going.

When we finally reached the prayer coves, I excused myself.

Mother frowned at me.

“I want to give honor to the firstborn’s name.” I said.

Musa chuckled. “It is not necessary, Sri.”

I frowned at it and sulked as I’d done many times before. “I think it is.”

The high elder nodded. “If only more of our youths were as religious as you, Sri.” She inclined her head towards the painting of the firstborn. No one knelt in front of it. I extricated myself from mother’s hold and went to kneel in front of the painting. Mother watched me for a while, and then she followed behind Musa and the high elder, walking deeper into the cove. Li and Chang trailed them.

I waited till they were all gone before I forced Sri’s memories away. They were polluted memories transferred with pansophy, so it would take pansophy to remove, but I could still push them back and bring my own real thoughts and memories to the front of my mind. Once this was done, I wiped at the streaks of imp tears that I’d been forced to stomach. I remained as I was, kneeling and staring at the image of Musa on the wall. I did not know what prayer was, but as I stared on that image, I thought of the imp and the last time I had seen it.

I knelt on the hard ground and continued to stare at the image of Musa. My heart beat faster in my chest. It was not a delirious pounding, just a slight quickening. My emotions were returning, I could not stare into the face of the imp I’d once called friend and feel nothing. The emotions were stunted, but they came. Grief, grief in overwhelming tides. Marcinus’ head, cut off and left to rot on the base of a hail tree as a message to me. Its eyes, the blessed eye that the founder had gifted it, staring straight into me. They shouldn’t have killed it. They should not have killed Marcinus. I looked at the painting of Musa and I heard its pleas, the ones that it had uttered before I’d left the paradise.

Please, end the invasion, but do not harm the imps. If I ever meant anything to you, do not cause more pain to those imps than they have already been forced to live through at the hands of uspecs.

Musa’s words were played like the backdrop to the vicious images of Marcinus’ dismembered body parts. I hated Permafrost, I loathed the wrath and the imps who’d antagonized me so many times, but for Musa, for Musa perhaps I could have shown them mercy. Perhaps I could have killed Fajahromo and left the rest of them free, with this Permafrost as their home. Perhaps. But then they’d kidnapped my offspring. They’d killed Marcinus. I had not even thought to come with samu, I had come for Fajahromo, I had come to end its miserable life. Now I wanted to kill every imp in this place. I wanted to dismember them and place their body parts artfully littered around this home they claimed as they’d done to my friend. Grief, twisted and clutched at me, tearing at my insides, clawing to be let out. I swallowed down my desire to scream. They killed Marcinus. I clenched my jaw and glared at the image of Musa.

No one came. The imps that walked in walked by me. The ones that came to pray to their ‘firstborn’ gave me a wide berth. I just stayed as I’d been, kneeling in front of the painting and wishing that I had the power to destroy all imp life with a single swipe of a pen. I wished for the power of a Chu, the power to eradicate with a single breath. I did not have that power, but Chuspecip owed me. If it was not weak, Marcinus would not be dead! It owed me. And I was going to collect. I wanted them all gone! Every imp! The image of Musa came into focus and I gazed at it. Perhaps not all the imps. Not Musa. Even estranged as we’d become, I still could not wish for its death. Not Chike either. I didn’t really care about the other imps in the Isle of Brio, but they had been good to my offspring and so they could live too, but the rest of them could go. They’d already lived their lives and more. If Juke could not be reborn then they should not be either.

More pain and sorrow clawed at my gut. The emotions were stunted, but they ravaged me, and I had to fight with everything I had not to let the emotions show.

“Musa already sent them a missive from the Isle of Brio letting them know that Chuspecip had returned.”

The voice startled me. I almost jumped, then I reminded myself that I had asked for this. This was Chang’s voice. It was Gamble, without appearance, speaking to me. I jerked my head slightly, so as not to give our conversation away.

“They got the idea to kidnap Ula from Musa.” Chang continued to whisper.

The betrayal of those words stung worse than any pain I’d ever felt. I couldn’t fight the gasp of pain that escaped my lips.

“The night that they attacked on the inter-port trail, Musa told them that you would die before you let anything happen to your offspring. It told them that there was nothing you wouldn’t do for it. It also confirmed that the brio was hereditary and that if you died Ula would be the last brio.”

My jaw clenched but the pain eased slightly. It had not told them specifically to kidnap my offspring but it might as well have. This was what Musa had said to them in that harsh tongue I could not understand. This was the fruit of Musa’s words that night. I shoved all thoughts of Musa out of my mind, I would deal with the imp later.

“Do you know where they’re being kept?”

“Yes,” it whispered back. The closest imps were a few feet away, still we were careful to keep our voices low. “They led us right to them. The great Fabiana makes a very convincing Musa.”

I nodded and rose slowly. This was a path I was familiar with. I kept walking, going deeper into the dimly lit coves. My mind kept repeating Gamble’s words about what Musa had told the wrath on the night of their attack. I knew that it had not told them to kidnap my offspring, but it had shared more than it should have. Much more than it should have. The words twisted around in my head and I wondered if perhaps Musa had indeed wanted them to kidnap Nebula. It may not have given the order but it had told them enough. Why else would it tell them that Nebula would be the last brio if I died? Why would it mention anything of the brio to them? And why had it sent them a missive telling them that Chuspecip had returned? I thought of that missive and Fajahromo’s presence on the inter-port trail suddenly made sense. It had gone to the plenum already knowing that Chuspecip was back. The wrath had known and they’d sent Fajahromo to share the message. Which was how Katan knew that I was lying when I said that my mission had failed. They’d known before they’d questioned me, they’d already known the founder was back because Musa told them. Musa told the wrath. Musa betrayed me.

I forced my mind away from all thoughts of the imp. Why did it surprise me? It had lied about the wrath, lied to me, of course it would betray me for them. I had trusted too much in the imp. It wanted an invasion, it was what it’s imp friend Halima wanted, what it had urged for.

We reached the edge of the roped off corner of the tabernacle and I glanced at the imps kneeling in front of it. I could clearly make out the outlines of the effigy.

“This is easier than robbing the blind,” the invisible Gamble stated beside me, “at least the blind would put up a fight. The imps just led us in.” It chuckled underneath its breath.

I had no time for joy.

I pulled out the life-polluted blade in my belt and held it by the hilt. There was no draft in here, no drifting fogs, just still air. There were no imps in my way. Nothing at all to stop me from hitting my target. The appearance had been taken from Katan’s poisoned dagger, so I had no fears that anyone would see. But I threw it without wasting too much time waiting. I released the blade. Gamble was right, this was a lot easier than robbing the blind.

A loud bang filled the room. I had not expected that.

I reached for my quicksand, but none came.

“I can’t pull my quicksand, sirga.”

I cursed in my mind. I’d forgotten that Monica told me the last time I was here, that quicksand didn’t work in their coves. But I could feel my emotions. The stunting, the curse of Nefastu was gone.

“Take away my appearance and lead me there. We’ll go the way you came.”

Imps were already rushing in towards the tabernacle. Loud screams sounded. Black smoke trailed off from the shattered effigy into the prayer coves. Gamble removed my appearance and led me into the cove in time to dodge the giant imps, wielding large axes. A loud gong rang. Horns blew. Bells chimed.

We made our way, free of appearance, deeper into the coves.
No one stopped us. They were all too busy focusing on the destroyed effigy.