The Third Nature -Book One of the Triad

Voyager fantasies by Lt Taya 17 Janeway

beneath the calm surface

The sky was dark over the Palace of the Eminence, seated in the hub of Algaroth's capital city, Licnok Moor. The gray light filtering through the turbulent clouds played upon the walls of cream and gold, the crystal spires rising hundreds of meters into the air, the trapezoid pyramids built like ziggurats. But the darkness and turmoil in the sky was nothing compared to the darkness and turmoil at the heart of the Preeminence.

For years the Empress had ruled. Not as many years as her predecessor but long enough for the discord and dissatisfaction to build against her. The former Empress had been even more corrupt, more twisted, than the current one was, but she had ruled the Preeminence with fear and an iron grip. This Empress was not so. She had not been forged in the heat of battle, and she lacked the control to keep the vast empire together like her predecessor had. The threads of fear and hatred that she wove amongst her subjects were not enough to keep them in line. They had banded together, conspired against the ruling House of Maldor, the only House left after the former Empress had crushed the rest into oblivion. And now they had consolidated themselves into the House of Ashkar, declaring war upon the ruling House. Led by the fierce Panizhe, the elite group of witches who fronted the Ashkari army, the rebellion had spread to every corner of the Preeminence.

The empire was crumbling. It was dying, torn apart from within by forces of discord and anarchy.

In her private throne room, Empress Nayrn Maldor stretched in her throne, curling up on the silk cushions in her feline manner. Her lithe figure and youthful features belied her seven thousand years, though her eyes, haunted and ancient, had beheld more blood and killing than any living being should. She was a magnificent creature, wielder of Purple Ice, a Warrior and schemer to the core. She studied the long, polished nails on her right hand, gazing at them with glittering yellow eyes while she considered her next move against the House of Ashkar.

There was a slight movement to her right. The young page girl, Calista, was fidgeting, obviously not used to standing still for long periods of time. She was a daer farther up north had given the child to the Empress several months ago, pledging their allegiance with the House of Maldor. As Eminence embodied, the Empress often received gifts of favor such as these from the various sectors. It was an unwritten rule that each of them had to present the Empress with at least one such gift within one season to keep her favor. Nayrn had been slightly disappointed with this one. Boys were so much better than girls; there was very little she could do with girls, except maybe for decorative purposes. The page girl stood uncomfortably beside the wolfchild, Nayrn's kin-but-not-kin, who was absently playing with her favorite tigress cub. Unfortunately the wolfchild had been no gift from a fawning supplicant, and Nayrn still bared her teeth at the very thought of the one who had cursed her with this burden. She was useless in courts, an unwanted half-breed, staying unobtrusively in the shadows. She Casted with Fire, for Yune's sake! Hence she'd elected not to train the girl in Casting, even though she was likely to be ranked as Scarlet. She would be an aberration in her courts. She was born an aberration, and would die one.

Beside the child, watching with detached interest were her favorite gifts for now: a pair of seraphim twins from Hayle, a girl and a boy with beautiful iridescent wings. Seraphim were reclusive creatures, xenophobes who shunned contact with most other races. In all her years, she had seen only one or two, and the twins fascinated her. They weren't old enough to learn to fly yet, but Nayrn had a few interesting things in mind for them when they did.

With an annoyed flick of her nails, she dismissed the young page girl. Relieved, the girl slunk off to the nearest exit, out of sight and out of mind. Instinctively, the wolfchild gathered up the large white kitten and followed her, as well as the silent twins. Now. Where had she been before the page girl had interrupted her? Oh yes, her operative in the daer of Maldor. She procured a path towards having one there several years ago when she sensed that that area would become a threat, and now her intuition was paying off. Now she had access to the most sensitive information passing through the Panizhe.

She smiled ferally as she considered her latest news. Emissaries, indeed!  She'd long suspected that there was something else written between the lines of the Auguries, but she'd never expected anything as ludicrous as the appearance of some wunderkind from another dimension to turn the tide of the war. But apparently things in this universe worked in a stranger way than they should have. She was determined to meet this Janeway her operative spoke of. It would be an… interesting encounter.

Yawning, she bared her sharp canine teeth. Like a ripening duka fruit, her plans were all growing, and would soon push the Ashkari over the brink of oblivion. She was sure of it.

Calista scampered down the ornately polished corridors of gray and yellow marble, finally coming to a stop in the archway of one of the great junctions. From where she was she could see further down one straight corridor, its windows opening to show the reddish-gray plains of Licnok Moor. She stopped to catch her breath, and was nearly run into by the seraphim twins and the wolfchild.

"Running again, Ashkari spy?"

The tone was mocking, but the words held no malice in them. Calista planted her hands firmly on her hips and scowled playfully at the lithe girl with the disconcerting amber eyes. "Well, you're following me, wolfchild."

The girl wrinkled her nose. Like her mother, she possessed the same feline grace and demeanor. Her brindled hair was cropped short, streaked with shades of red and orange, and she had sharper teeth and claws- and a sharper temper- than anyone else Calista knew. Yet she felt no loyalty, no kinship whatsoever to her progenitor. Part of it, she knew, was due to her bitterness about being overlooked in her mother's eyes. She was an incredibly talented Caster, but before Calista had arrived in the Palace she hadn't even the basic knowledge of Casting. But she had that innate sense of rightness, and she'd sought Calista out on the first day she'd arrived, lonely and friendless, Fire seeking Fire. She had known from the start that Calista was a spy, sent by Myriam. Calista Denadria Ashkar.  So they'd come to a compromise: if the wolfchild kept Calista's secret, Calista would teach her to Cast.

She was a powerfully talented Mage.

"Did you have to give something to your mother?" Falkner asked her, his bright blue eyes glittering in concern. "It's too early for the corridor to be deserted. Can't it wait?"

Calista shook her head. "I'm just uneasy, that's all." The seraphim boy put his hand supportively on her shoulder, and she blew air between her lips in frustration. She hated all these spying and stuff. It was scary, but her mom had trusted her enough to send her over. Thankfully Falkner and Falda, both fairly anti-Maldor themselves, had elected to help her. With their support, and the wolfchild's, they'd become a formidable power in the dark underground of the Place hierarchy, lording over the servants and attendants. By careful manipulation they'd managed to keep Nayrn and her minions unaware of their plans, no small feat for a group of children no older than eleven years old.

"The Empress has placed a spy in your mother's House," said Falda with certainty. "We must find out who she is."

Calista shrugged and ran her fingers through her hair. "No-one's come to the daer recently."

The wolfchild's lips curled. "You underestimate Her Eminence."

Calista folded her arms and turned from them to move closer to the curved window of tinted glass. She gazed out to the misty distance to where her home daer was. "Whatever it is… A spy in the village or not, I don't suppose this Emissary business is for real. It sounds too good to be true… But, all the same, I hope it's not a hoax."

The wolfchild scratched the tigercub's head. "I'd like to meet this Emissary person. She sounds… interesting."