Hubert stalked amidst the seediest part of the camp, a region populated by sellswords and whores and predatory merchants, all waiting to pounce on an unsuspecting mark. Hubert supposed he must have presented a tempting target, with his silk robes, silver jewelry, and shirt of samite. He caught the gaze of a man who was eyeing his ring and smiled as the man wilted away. Being frightening had its advantages.

He had always been considered disturbing by his peers, by his own mother even. 'Why don't you go outside to play?' 'Why don't you smile?' 'Oh Goddess, why are you smiling, what have you done?' Those memories had not been so pleasant, especially now that his mother had passed on. But that was all in the past, he could not allow it to matter any longer.

He stooped as he entered the tent, a white tavern of sorts that had been set up in the camp of the dragon queen as the siege of Mereen dragged on. He had been here before. The wine was of mixed quality, either cheap swill imported en masse by some profiteer or else excellent dusty bottles liberated from the cellar of a wealthy magister.

He doubted either would matter to the man he had come to meet today.

"You came," Jorah Mormont said, his slight slur showing that he had already been drinking for some time. "I was not sure if you truly meant to come."

Hubert sat down across from him at the table and leaned in. "You're a man of consequence, Jorah, and you have the Queen's ear. Why should I turn down an invitation?"

Jorah sniffed and fed himself a stab of beef. "Because you hate me."

Hubert smiled, "True. But I've worked with worse than you."

"Pah. Judge me all you like. I'm here to learn your true intentions."

"You do not believe that Lady Edelgard is sincere in her attempts to reform Yunkai in the good Queen's name?"

"Your Lady is a nobody from nowhere. How could I possibly trust either of you?"

Hubert frowned. "I do not wish for us to be adversaries, Mormont." The man was a dullard, but he had the Queen's ear, moreso than any other advisor. "I am sure that as two men of resources, we can come to an understanding."

"No," Jorah said. "I'll not be bribed. Not against my Queen's protection, and not by you."

Hubert's eyes tightened. The man was truly loyal then, a true follower of Daenerys, but… how? When he so clearly did not follow the young queen's vision and had only been with her a year? Had she promised him something truly precious? Did she have blackmail?

A thought occurred to him. He smiled. "I confess, you leave me in a difficult position. We have told the truth as best we are able-"

"Sorcery gone awry, leaving you in a strange land." Jorah scoffed.

"-and I hardly know what to say. If you will not believe the truth, am I to lie? Our land has many sorcerers who are capable of great feats. You have already seen what I and Linhardt and Flayn and Dorothea are capable of. Can you truly say it is impossible?"

"Even if it is true, what then? Who are you, really?"

Hubert chuckled. "Are you asking to get to know me better?"

Jorah quaffed his wine. "What of it? We're in a tavern aren't we?"

Ah, now the conversation turned. The man doubtless sensed the growing friendship between the Queen and Lady, sensed that Daenerys had begun heeding Edelgard as much as himself. Jorah was adjusting his position, to retain his influence in the Queen's court. He wanted them for an ally rather than an enemy.

Hubert swilled the wine the waiter had poured for him. Dark red, almost black. Wine from Astapor, taken as spoils, nearly a century in the bottle. The flavor tasted of smoke and felt like velvet as it trailed down his throat. He savored the sensation a moment, then returned to eye contact with the man across the table.

"Let me tell you who I am. I am the son of the manager of the imperial household, a man you might call a majordomo or castellan. When I was seven my father told me I was to protect and serve Edelgard with my heart, mind, and soul…" His voice trailed off.

"And?"

"...And so I have, and so I always will," he said simply. "There's nothing more to say. I am nothing beyond that."

Jorah leaned in, his breath hot with alcohol. "I think we understand each other then. It is the same for me. With Daenerys. I will follow her through all seven of the hells and then run myself through with a sword if she demands it."

And you respect her wishes so well that you oppose her at every turn and treat all the other advisors with contempt. You do not obey your queen, you seek to rule her.

"It would be best," Jorah continued, "if we could see eye-to-eye in the future. The Queen has enough enemies outside without facing fights within."

"We have not sought to antagonize you."

Jorah waved his hand dismissively. "I have only offered wise counsel to the Queen, nothing more. You cannot begrudge my mistrust of you and your Lady. I only ask that you come to me before speaking to the Queen, so that we can truly understand each other. I have the Queen's ear, and you would rather have me as your friend than as your enemy."

Hubert resisted the urge to laugh. The knight's intention was clear: He wanted to force Lady Edelgard to go through him to get to Daenerys. He wanted to close her off from Daenerys' throne, to make her a lesser partner within his own faction. Ridiculous. The very idea was insulting. Lady Edelgard would serve Daenerys while she was in this foreign land, while it suited her own purposes, but she would not be made subservient to some roughspun country hick with only the most basic understanding of politics.

"I am sure," Hubert said, "that as the Queen's loyal servants, there cannot be any true bad blood between us. So long as we are united in supporting her goals."

"Your Lady claims to have a noble vision," Jorah continued. "But what is her real purpose here?"

"Back at that again? Do you think it so impossible that someone would share your Queen's goals?"

Jorah's face reddened with heat. "I cannot believe you outright, not yet. No one is as good or as generous as my Queen. No one."

"Certainly not you."

A vein pulsed in Jorah's forehead. "Good people get taken advantage of, get thrown to the gutter after being despoiled by lesser folk. I need to be there, to keep her alive, to guard her, to protect her from false advisors…."

"Who of her advisors are false? Me?"

"You-"

"I am an evil bastard, yes, but by your own admission so are you. Come on now, let us be honest with one another. You want to retain your position. You want me to agree to come to you before I come to the Queen. You want the Queen to trust you and only you."

"I am the only one who can be trusted!" Jorah's voice was hardly above a whisper but it was as panicked as a scream. Something flickered in the man's eyes, something that Hubert could not entirely place. Guilt? Shame? Pride?

"The Queen disagrees," Hubert said simply. "We don't need your support, Mormont. My Lady shares Daenerys' vision, supports her in it, and unlike you, I obey my Lady. You need to consider that perhaps this queen who you so claim to love is your queen and is deadly serious about the business of chain-breaking. She will not love you forever if you continue to oppose her in this..." Hubert chuckled into his wine. "...If you continue to oppose us in this. Whatever misplaced affection she has for you will run out eventually, and then you will be left out in the cold."

Jorah's face twisted in anger, and Hubert half-expected him to lunge across the table and attack him. His left hand hovered above his knee, pulsing with dark magic…. But Jorah did not attack. He merely sat there, seething.

"I thank you for the wine," Hubert said simply, emptying his cup. He arose and left the tent, a broad smile creeping over his face as he left.

"I'm not so naive as to suggest that what Solon did to us was impossible," Linhardt stated as they climbed down the stairs of the Great Pyramid of Qaggaz. "But there's no basis or precedence for it! The power of the spell signifies that Dark magic was employed. That much, I understand. The dark is visceral and powerful and dangerous. I understand the appeal of such arts to those as unscrupulous as Solon, but using it to move a body through the higher dimensions, as we were? Ridiculous. All modern theory holds that such an effect can only be achieved through white magic, the polar opposite discipline."

Flayn listened as best she could. Linhardt had been rambling on this topic ceaselessly for days now, and though it was interesting... She was thinking more of the audible *crunch* that had sounded as Solon finished the incantation, his hand deep inside the chest of his subordinate. He had… crushed something. Something brittle and breakable. The spine? Or the heart? She felt tightness in her chest, as though hands were closing around her heart. She and her father and all her uncles and aunts all had hearts of stone, hearts that would make… that sound if they were to break under pressure. All her family had been killed, except for her father and a few others. All of them had… had been taken. Butchered and used for parts. Many had been accounted for over the years, but many more remained lost.

Had one of the crest stones, the hearts been found by Solon and Kronya? Had Kronya embedded a crest stone in her chest by some foul process? Had Solon destroyed it to gain the power he needed to cast that awful spell? Would her friends require another crest stone to get back? Would… would they require hers? The thought was most distressing!

"So you see my issue!" Linhardt continued. "It's completely unprecedented, my study materials use an entirely different foundation of magic, and I'm not even particularly adept with Dark Magic. I would ask Hubert for assistance, but he's too busy with diplomacy." Flayn smiled. Linhardt said that word like it was a curse.

"I'm sorry that you have to suffer in this way," Flayn said. "But perhaps this is a cause for joy as well! I do not think you would be grateful for Hubert's presence if he were here."

"Perhaps not."

They had come at last to the pyramid's base, where the stairs widened and then gave way to a great plaza with pillars on each of the corners. No merchants or tradesmen gathered here, only the lame and the blind, beggars and orphans, nearly five hundred souls. The imperial soldiers had attempted to corral them, keep them away from the stairs and from the main path through the plaza into the city, but they were too few and the seething mass of unwashed humanity. Flayn had walked through this plaza a dozen times by now and the numbers grew with each passing day.

"Don't worry milords," one of the guards said, "We'll keep them off you. You'll pass through without any greater inconvenience than the smell."

"No, wait," Flayn said, stepping forward toward the crowd. "I am Flayn," She said, trying to speak as loudly and forcefully as she could. "I am an advisor to the Captain-General and keeper of the archives. If you all have a request to make of the Captain-General, I will hear it now."

A man whose legs had been cut off beyond the knees hobbled forward, prostrating himself before the steps. "Wise Mistress," he said, his force raspy and dry. "In times past we would come here to partake of the generosity of the great Yezzan, to eat his bread and drink his water. He would send… nurses among us, caretakers… but with the fall of the city…"

The man stopped, but Flayn could fill in the rest. Throughout the past month, Edelgard had been consolidating her power in the city, setting those loyal to her over important institutions. Flayn and Linhardt managed the scribes of the city, Ferdinand was given charge over policing the city and training the militia, Edelgard herself had taken charge over a court of half a dozen of the least objectionable Wise Masters…. But in the end, there were a thousand things that needed doing and only nine Black Eagles. Beggars, even five hundred of them, could fall through the cracks so, so easily.

"I will speak to the Captain-General," she promised, "Food is scarce in the city, but we will do all we can."

"Wise Mistress, we are but humble worms in the light of your generosity," the beggar paused uncertainly, "But we also have others among us. Some are sick, others were injured in the fight, in the riots. We do not only need food, but we also need medicine, we need healers… We are only worms, Wise one, but still..."

Flayn nodded. "Linhardt, could you go on without me? I think that I may be here a while."

He raised an eyebrow. "I can't get much done without you. Besides, if you're going to do what I think you're going to do I would just as soon watch."

Flayn smiled, then turned back to the gathered crowd. "People of Yunkai!" She yelled, her voice sounding tinny and weak in the wind. "I bring to you the gifts of the Goddess in the name of the Saints Seiros and Cethleann!"

With these last words, she raised her hands toward the sky. Goddess, she breathed, Mother, hear my prayer and visit these, the most unfortunate, with your power. She stood there a moment, in deep concentration, and then…. The answer. Power. Radiance. Her heart felt light in her chest, light and bright as the sun. She was open, she was empty, a conduit for the power of the Progenitor, which washed through her and over her without stopping or slowing, rushing out to the masses before her like a sparkling wave.

The effects were immediate. Gaping sores closed over instantly, lame men stood on previously-weakened legs… all around the plaza, tiny miracles of healing took place as the light of the Goddess washed over them.

Flayn sustained the power, sustained the magic. So many at once… but this was nothing. She had done this before, in the old war, and those injuries had been more severe than any of these. She was not so strong as she was then, the fire within her had diminished considerably, but she could do at least this much.

The magic faded at last.

"It truly is astounding," Linhardt said, "the difference between you and me, in terms of raw power. At first, I thought it might be because you had a major crest of Cethleann compared with my minor crest but… I have seen others with major crests of Cethleann, and they would not be capable of something like this."

Flayn giggled. She did not bear a crest of Cethleann, she was Cethleann, and all those who bore her crest, Linhardt included, only shared in the smallest fraction of her power. "Perhaps my crest is even more major than theirs."

"Ridiculous," Linhardt replied, smiling, "Such a thing has only been proposed as a hypothetical. But I suppose you have piqued my curiosity, I..." he paused. "...Oh dear."

The denizens of the plaza had prostrated themselves as one before Flayn. She felt lightheaded, she did not know what to say. Seiros, no… Rhea would know what to say. Father would know what to say, but Flayn had been raised away from the church that Seiros had built, and she had only a layman's understanding of their liturgy, their doctrine. She knew the ways of the goddess, but not how to articulate it, how to express it.

"Do not bow to us," Linhardt stated, stepping forward. "We are but the Goddesses' messengers, empty vessels who purvey her light. Pray not to us, but Sothis, the Progenitor."

He turned aside to her, smiling that lazy smile of his. "Surprised I could remember the liturgy? I didn't sit through all those services for nothing." He paused to yawn. "We really should be going. They still need food and water and more dedicated treatment." He paused. "This relates to what I observed earlier. The people of this city have no conception of white magic. It's not even different in the way that the white mages of Brigid or Almyra are different, it's just… not present. From what I hear they think that Edelgard is some sort of deity because her crests heal her as she fights. It's bizarre."

Flayn nodded silently and followed him through the crowd. The people were all around them, touching them, pushing in against the guards who surrounded them… but Flayn did not mind that so much. She only wished she could do more. "The Goddess bless you," she said, as one man bowed to her. "The Goddess watch over you," she said to another.

But as she left, a thought formed in her head, a thought that would not lie still, but grew and grew and bothered her more and more.

"Linhardt," she said, "Did you say that Edelgard's crest healed her?"

"Yes. Dozens saw it at the fight by the gate including many of our own. She did not have any magical items or assistance so it must have been the crest. It's most remarkable because-"

"-because her crest of Seiros doesn't heal!" Flayn replied, finishing his thought. The crest of Seiros, which had been in Edelgard's family for a thousand years, granted strength, resistance, personal energy… but not healing. Did Edelgard possess a different crest? Had some sort of magical ability been given to her?

Flayn felt almost giddy! So many new experiences in this new world!