Cloudy Glass
The tunnels and corridors grew sterile as they left the demense farther behind. An oasis of life, such as it was, in the middle of an industrial complex. Beyond its borders, life was hard pressed to maintain a foothold.
Meep took note of the change, but did not quite understand it, did not let it concern her. She focused on watching their back trail and keeping an eye on Del. When necessary she opened locks that sealed various doors.
The area was not entirely deserted, sometimes they passed signs of life, but they never encountered anything. The closest they came was when they found a trail of slime that went into a hole in a wall. The slime seemed fresh enough that it was likely that whatever had left it was close.
They came around a corner and Meep had to stifle a gasp. Golden glass glowed with an inner light.
"Foundations of the buildings?" Mina said.
Meep nodded after a moment. "I think so."
"Then we have arrived."
"I had always wondered about the structure of the towers but had not thought anything would survive. They built well." Del had moved away from them and was looking around.
"Where do we want to go?" Mina asked Meep.
Meep took a crystal book from her pack and brought up the map. She looked around, checking the map and their surroundings. "That way," she told Mina, pointing towards one of the many corridors that ran under the foundations.
It seemed to Meep that the golden glass towers when they had still stood, had required a great deal more infrastructure than the rest of the city. That was the only way to explain the vast numbers of tunnels beneath them. Unless they were just a maze meant as a defence. She did find herself consulting her map more often.
Mina called a halt, before the entryway into what might be some grand meeting hall. She looked about as if trying to pierce the shadows. The lights illuminated the small areas of the floor and the various exits from the chamber, but most of the room was in darkness.
"Do we have another option? I do not like this." Mina looked towards Meep.
Meep pulled forth a crystal book and looked through the maps contained within. "Maybe, but," she paused, "we'd have to leave this area and circle around through the outer city."
Mina looked back into the shadows. "This is a choke point, or it could be. If anyone meant to protect this area, they would funnel everyone through here."
Del peaked around, looking into the room. Her eyes 'whirred', it was the only way to explain the sound, as if there were clockworks within them. "I see essence flows, but I don't understand them."
"Meep, get one of the flares out."
"Right." From her backpack, she took a wooden tube. Uncapping it revealed padding within that held a glass tube. Meep fished it out and handed it to Mina. Next, she removed two pairs of goggles with dark, smoky lenses. "We don't have any goggles for Del."
"I do not have need for such devices. My eyes already can compensate for such things."
"Lucky you," Meep said, and handed Mina a pair of the goggles before putting her own on. Made of Chiaroscuro glass, meant to protect the wearer's eyes from the sun and blowing sands out in the desert, they also were useful when dealing with sudden, intense light changes.
"Are you ready?" Mina asked.
"Good to go," Meep said.
"Please continue," Del told her.
It was hard to see, in the darkness with the goggles over her eyes. She saw Mina's shadowy form strike the glass tube against the wall and the soft glow that appeared within. Then Mina tossed it into the room, and a moment later it blossomed into a bright flash of light.
A vast portion of the room was revealed for a few seconds, as the flare was at its brightest. On the floors and walls and even ceiling mosaics made from white and golden glass made the pattern of a vast spider web, and clinging to the ceiling, terribly close to where they stood, was an enormous spider.
The light picked out the metal of its body, steel alloyed with black jade, though there were other metals, Moonsilver and Orichalcum, and jade of different colours. On the spider's back was the golden symbol of the Twilight sun.
The spider dropped to the floor, twisting to land on its feet. Meep had never seen a creature so big; the abdomen the size of a full-grown yeddim, the cephalothorax the size of an ox. And the legs just added to that terrifying size.
"You should..." Del said, but Mina had grabbed the woman and pushed her deeper back into the corridor as she and Meep retreated into it as well.
The spider started screaming. "Traitors! Usurpers! Trespassers!"
Meep thought that terrible, screeching voice was nearly as bad as the spider itself. She tore off her goggles, for the light was fading quickly, and scared herself for a moment as her own spiders had crawled down her arms ready for a fight.
Fleeing further down the corridor Meep thought they would be safe, for the vast spider could never follow through the narrow space. But it surprised her, for one of its legs, tipped in a razor barb the size of a great sword, reached in after and slashed at them.
Mina just managed to block the attack, but the force of it drove her back into the wall, hard enough to knock the wind from her. Meep leapt forward, lashing at the leg with her black window razor, drawing scratches across the metal, but not damaging it.
With a shuddering breath, Mina pushed the leg away from her and spun back, avoiding another slash.
"How are we going to get by that?" Mina gasped out.
"Well..." Dell said.
"Traitors!" the spider screamed, and its leg actually grew longer as another sweep drove them back.
"I've no clue," Meep said. "Maybe I can sneak by it, find a way to turn it off."
"Listen..." Del said.
"Usurpers!" the spider screamed.
"That might work."
"Listen you idiots," Del yelled, stepping between Meep and Mina. "Who do you think put that spider there?"
"Trespassers will die!" the spider screamed.
"Who cares?" Meep answered.
"No," Mina said. "On its back. Solars put it there."
Another attack made them retreat a few more steps.
"That is correct. Solars put that guardian there. So is its assigned task to attack Solars?"
Mina turned. "That would be unlikely."
"Oh no Mina, you can't be thinking of..."
Mina turned her gaze on Meep. "You are not telling me what to do, are you?"
Meep swore softly under her breath, and then, "No Mistress."
"Good." Her caste mark flared upon her forehead, bright and pure, and she turned towards the spider and started walking forward.
The spider stopped screaming.
The leg moved back as Mina advanced.
"It was a construct built for a specific task, it is a servant," Del told Meep. "It is a little like you."
Meep looked at the Alchemical Exalt, wondering if that was a jab, but then followed after Mina, worried the spider was about to attack again, that it was just playing with them.
Mina walked out into the hall.
The spider waited patiently.
"Trai... Usu..." The spider seemed uncertain, then screamed, "Abandoned!" and rose up above Mina.
Meep was two steps into the room when Mina called out, "Stop!"
Both Meep and the spider stopped.
"You have served well," Mina said, stepping closer to the spider. "I am pleased with you."
Meep watched, amazed, as the spider lowered itself.
"You have my apologies for making you wait so long," Mina said, moving closer to the spider as if she had nothing to fear. She put a hand on part of it's leading leg, heedless of the danger. "You have done all that was asked of you, and will continue to do so."
The spider lowered itself, like some obedient puppy, placing its eyes and pedipalps close to Mina. Mina reached out and put a hand on the black metal of the fang, metal that could only be Soul Steel. "Thank you my master," the spider said in a voice that was, now that it was not screeching, melodic.
"The Solars of old built well, it is quite an impressive piece of work," Del told Meep.
The spider moved slightly, turning its attention to Del and Meep. "Trespassers," it said, not quite screeching.
"No," Mina said, and turned the spider's attention back to her. "Meep, show it your caste mark."
Meep, as obedient as the spider, did as Mina told her.
The spider seemed to relax slightly on seeing the golden glow on Meep's forehead.
"The other is a servant, under our protection while with us."
"I understand Master," the spider told her.
"Maintain your watch in this place," Mina said. "Stop all but Solars and those identified to serve them."
"I will master." The spider looked at Mina for a moment, then shifted, skittered across the floor, disturbingly silent for such a large construct, and then up a wall. Lights bloomed around the spider, illuminating it until it reached a far corner where hundreds of things hung from the ceiling.
"Those that were captured by the spider, kept here," Del said.
Meep thought of all those dead bodies, hanging there over the ages.
"I suppose normally kept prisoner until authorities arrive," Mina said. "Effective, assuming they are checked up on."
Above them, the spider slashed open one of the pods, removed something golden from the interior, then spun new threads to seal the tear.
It returned quickly, bowing before Mina, presenting a golden and silver, grand daiklaive, set with a yellow gem that glowed with an inner light.
"This was used by a usurper who tried to pass by, claiming to be a Solar. He was only a terrestrial," there was anger in the spider's tone, "and I killed him."
"As was right," Mina said, taking the sword. "You will hold the rest until a proper investigation is carried out."
"Of course master."
"Good work," Mina said, and turned and walked away from the spider, towards an exit on the far side of the hall.
Meep followed, circling wide around the spider, catching up to Mina as she reached the exit. Looking back she saw the spider creeping up the wall.
"I almost feel bad for it," Meep said.
"That is an unnecessary feeling," Del said. "The construct is doing what it was meant to, and it has had its existence justified and authorised by one of its makers. To a construct, there is nothing that could provide more pleasure."
"It is good to know that," Mina said. "It seemed very loyal."
"As loyal as the Solars of old could build it."
"At least we don't have to worry about anything coming up from behind," Meep said.
The lift was operable but locked.
"I'll get it open," Meep said, taking a step forward.
"Why are you choosing to pursue a path that makes your life more difficult?" Del asked.
Mina turned to look at the Alchemical Exalt, curious.
"What'd you mean?" Meep asked her.
Del stepped forward and put her hand on a circular patch. "This is a caste mark reader. Do you think the Solar's of old wanted to carry keys with them everywhere they went?"
Meep frowned, looked at the tools her black suit had provided, then let them be absorbed back into the material. She stepped forward, looked to Mina, then made her caste mark glitter. She stepped closer to the place that Del had indicated, shifting up onto her toes. As soon as the light of the caste mark fell upon the reader, there was a soft 'click', and the doors to the lift slid back.
"Seems a little unfair," Meep said as she stepped through the doors.
Mina watched as Meep removed the knives and laid them out on the lift's floor, putting them down to assemble the map etched on their blades. "I think," she put a finger on an old realm character, "that this is the floor we want."
"That does seem likely," Del said, who had watched studiously as Meep worked.
Mina looked at the lift controls. "Then this button." She pressed it.
The doors slid shut and the lift ascended.
It did not take long to reach the floor. The doors slid open on a long corridor with many cross branches. Mina had placed herself in the front of the doors, ready for an attack, but nothing threatened them.
"What do you think Meep?"
Meep looked at the knives laying on the floor, then scooped them up. "I know the way. Let's go."
It was a maze, corridors branching and crossing, odd turns, and every part of it looking exactly the same. Mina remained on point, with Meep directing her in which turns they should take.
"Do you think that there are valuable items behind all of these doors?" Del asked, indicating one of the many vault doors they had passed.
"I wouldn't do it that way," Meep told her. "Most of the rooms I'd put traps in."
"That seems wasteful, to use space that way."
Mina wondered about the world that Del came from as she looked down one of the cross corridors. "We do not lack space."
"Yes, I suppose that there is that. A different paradigm."
Twice Meep laid the knives out, to make sure they were still on the right track.
"We're here," Meep said, stopping in front of a door.
Mina looked at the door, reaching out and putting a hand on it. "Does not look like a caste mark will open this one." She put the daiklaive she had been carrying aside, leaning it up against the wall.
"That's why we have this," Meep said, taking out the golden sphere.
"Does that provide a diagram of the lock?" Del asked.
"Yeah," Meep said, turning the sections.
"Does that mean there was no key?"
"Can you think of a better way to keep it secure?"
Del looked at Meep for a few seconds. "Interesting."
Meep looked at the sphere for a time, then the lock on the door. She turned the top of the sphere slightly and nodded. "Perfect."
Once she had placed the sphere on the ground, she went to work on the lock, slipping her tools into the mechanism. Minutes passed with her making tiny movements, small shifts of her fingers. Her caste mark, already glittering from earlier, began to glow by the time the bolts slid back with a loud 'thunk'.
Meep flexed her fingers and smiled up at Mina. "There we go."
"Good girl," Mina said, patting Meep's head. "Well, this looks like it is the end of it." She pulled the door open. It was heavy and thick, and Mina had to give it a hard yank to get it moving.
It was dark within until the door swung fully back and then lights came on.
"Foolish mortals," a voice echoed from within, "for daring to rebel against your betters... Oh, a Solar."
Mina had come around the door, pushing Meep aside, weapon ready, was brought up short by the last words spoken, and what she saw within. A tall man, gaunt, his body covered in what first looked like wounds, but were, in fact, tiny, toothed maws. He, for he looked masculine, was handsome, chest bare, clothed in a cape and a kilt. In his hands, he carried a pair of large, ivory knives.
Serpent-sting staff snapped out, Mina faced him.
He regarded her for a moment, but his gaze turned to Meep standing behind Mina. "Solar, I take it you have come to recover what is here?"
"Speak to me," Mina said as her caste mark lit up on her forehead.
"Two Solars," he said.
"Who are you?" Mina asked.
The being turned his full attention to her. "I was called to guard this place against the lessers who would dare to work against the actions of their betters. It was a Solar who put me to this task, it is now a Solar who frees me from it."
"You've been sitting in this vault for hundreds of years?" Meep asked, shifting around to get a better look. "You're a demon, right?"
It gave Meep a haughty look. "Five days ago I knew there was a possibility of this door opening, so I came. Only twice before has this happened. Both those times nothing came of it."
Mina noticed that Del had stepped away from the door, apparently not wanting to see the demon, or not wanting to be seen by it.
"The demands made of me end. I will leave."
"Who are you?" Meep asked, echoing Mina's earlier question. "I'm Meep."
The strange being smiled, a twist of the lips. "I am called Lucien."
Mina thought that was all he would say, and there seemed to be a lessening as if he was about to fade away, but he turned his gaze to Mina and smiled. "We share a similar hatred. If you would like to pursue it, give me six lives of the traitors we hate and call my name."
A moment later Lucien was gone as if he had never been there.
Del peeked around. "Demons," she said, shaking her head.
Meep moved into the vault, looking about, then stepped up to the table on which a single item sat. Lucien's presence had taken her attention away from the real reason they were there. Mina followed Meep in.
On the table was a rod, about the size of a man's forearm, made of Orichalcum, capped in adamant, covered in Moonsilver tracery.
"What is it?" Meep asked, poking it with a probe that extended from suit.
"Weapon maybe?" Mina suggested.
"That is a reality vault," Del said, excitement in her tone.
Mina shifted her attention to the Alchemical Exalt, wondering if the woman would now make a play for the reality vault, or whatever it was.
"What's a reality vault?" Meep asked, giving it another poke.
Del was starting at the device with open avarice but did not seem as if she was going to make a grab for it.
"I have never actually seen one myself," Del told Meep, "but I have heard them described in technical manuals. It is said that the Eight Divine Ministers have created such vaults in times of uncertainty, that if a reality vault were to be opened, it could restore all of Autochthon to the state at which the vault was locked. They are considered to be very difficult to create or use." Her voice had grown louder, excitement obvious. "To think that the Solars could fabricate such a device, truly they were amazing."
"So, we open this, and the world goes back to how it was?" Meep asked her.
"What? No, no, no, no." She shook her head. "That is very unlikely. Creation and the Great Maker have vastly different morphic levels. I doubt that even this city might be restored by such a vault."
"So what's it good for?"
Del said nothing for a few seconds, looking at the vault, and then, "I do not know."
"We know who can tell us what it is for," Mina said, picking up the reality vault. It was heavier than it looked but manageable. "Give me one of the bags and a strap."
Mina put the reality vault into the bag, used drawstrings to secure it, then used the strap to hang it over her shoulder. "Time to go."
Meep closed and locked the door behind them, then lead them back the way they had come.
Having made the journey once, the return trip was faster. They knew the lay of the land, as it were. In the spider chamber, Mina took the time to praise the construct and let it know that in all the centuries it had been on guard only twice had there even been the possibility that anyone would get by it.
The spider seemed quite pleased.
In the demense, they took the time to search amongst the roots of the central tree. While much of the horde, jade or glass weapons and armour, held little interest for them, they all discovered a few small things that caught their attention. Del found a pair of blue jade chakram that she remarked would be a little less obvious than her clockwork ones. Meep found a translucent, cobalt-blue sphere that she was sure was a hearthstone.
All of them took away a small fortune of silver and jade coins; discovered amongst the roots in rotting money pouches.
On the way out Meep saw a creature she thought was one of the fairies, grown three feet tall, wings withered at her back, and hair dropping to her waist. It made her wonder if the demense was replacing its guardian.
At the stairway that would lead them back to the subway tunnels, Del looked at the dead body of the beast that had attacked Meep and Mina earlier. 'All you needed was to show your caste marks, and it probably would have let you pass unharmed.'
She sounded sad.
In the tunnels above they parted company.
The vast, glass, breakwaters of Chiaroscuro were one of the primary reasons the city, even reduced to ruins, remained a vibrant trading port. Over twenty square miles of ocean was protected by the breakwaters; safe harbour in even the worst of storms.
Any day saw hundreds of ships sailing through the harbour: from the immense galleons and carracks of the Guild, and the warships from many nations, including the Realm, to small fishing boats.
Unremarked among the many ships was a single-masted, fifty-foot sloop, well appointed; a pleasure craft rather than a working vessel. Lights glowed from behind glass windows and portholes and lanterns were hung about the outside of the craft. Its sails down, the sloop anchored, it rocked gently in the mild swell of the harbour.
Earlier, as the sun had set, a jolly boat had carried two women out to the sloop. The few who chose to give that any attention had assumed that the master of the craft had sent for company.
In the sloop's cabin, Mina and Meep sat at a table while Tristan, wearing a black suit, though he had removed his jacket, poured them drinks, filling crystal tumblers with an amber liquid. On the table, amongst the glasses was the reality vault.
"Well then, shall we drink to a successful endeavour ladies?"
Mina picked up her glass, took a small drink from it, enjoyed the taste. She placed her glass down. "What did we need to find a reality vault for?"
"So you are aware as to what this is.?"
Meep put her glass down. "An Alchemical Exalt from Autochthon told us what it was."
"An Alchemical Exalt from Autochthon?"
"Did we stump you?" Meep asked.
Tristan smiled. "I cannot admit to knowing exactly what you mean, but I am aware of Autochthon, though I have never heard him referred to as a place."
"So what is Autochthon?" Mina asked.
Tristan topped up their drinks, speaking as he did so. "Autochthon was one of the Primordials who brought Creation about. He was one of the two Primordials who turned on the others when the gods launched their war against their creators. He disappeared long ago."
"Maybe back now?" Meep asked.
"I believe that were Autochthon to have returned to Creation there would be little doubt."
"And Alchemical Exalts?" Mina swirled the contents of her glass.
"That is beyond my knowledge I am afraid."
"Very well," Mina said and leaned across the table. "Explain this game of yours that had us fetch the reality vault."
"It was no game, let me assure you."
"You played this much like one, sending us chasing after a goal you were already aware of."
"Yeah," Meep said, "not very nice." One of her spiders had climbed down her arm and rested on her hand.
"I believe that you ladies are threatening me."
Mina leaned back. "Not at all, we just want you to know were are serious."
Meep nodded as she stroked her fingers over her spider.
"I will duly note your seriousness then. And I will tell you that I knew less than you seem to think."
"What did you know?"
He brushed his hands across his goatee. "That the Usurpation was successful is somewhat astonishing. Hiding it from the Solars should have been impossible, but with the help of various gods whose purview was such matters, and through distraction, it was concealed, until the day the trap was sprung.
"The Solars who were not at Meru, and who survived the attempts on their lives, which was a good number, were able to discern exactly what was happening."
He finished the contents of his glass and then poured himself another, offering refills to both Mina and Meep before continuing.
"In Chiaroscuro there was a Solar, an Eclipse Caste, a man very interested in justice. He put together the entire scope of the Usurpation from the clues he had, and he knew that the Sidereals had already put in place what they needed to escape justice. The Murder of a Celestial Exalt was and still remains a crime."
"How'd they avoid justice?" Meep asked him.
"They broke a star constellation, the Mask. Everyone knows what happened, no one can prove it."
"Oh."
Tristan nodded. "Knowing that the criminals would escape justice maddened him. He would not let it stand. He prepared something." Tristan put his hand on the vault. "As I told you, a secret is always the purview of Secrets, so the Eclipse told two people before his ultimate death. He sent messages of what he had done; one this his Lunar mate, the other to a Sidereal he trusted."
"You?" Meep held up her empty glass.
Tristan shook his head. "No," he filled Meep's glass, "but she held my Exaltation before me, and this knowledge came to me."
"What did you know?" Mina asked him.
"I knew that hidden under a field of golden glass was something that would bring all the conspirators behind the Usurpation to justice. I did not know exactly where it might be found beyond that. I did not know that it was a reality vault, and I cannot tell you what will happen when you open it." He paused. "You have not opened it."
"Not yet," Meep told him.
"What do you think will happen?"
"I think the truth will come out. I think that those who have hidden from their crimes will be forced to face the consequences of them. I think there will be a quiet civil war in Yu-Shan, one of assassinations and slander and political backbiting. So business as usual really."
He took his cigarette case from his pocket, fitted a cigarette into its holder and then lit it. "I think," he told them, teeth lightly clenched around the holder's stem, "that you are going to put true fear into the minds and hearts of a great number of powerful beings."
"Us?"
"This is, when all is said and done, Solar business. It is up to you to decide how and when to use it. The Lunar mate and I may not have agreed on much, but that was one area we came to a full agreement on." He blew a cloud of smoke above their heads.
"Whether the Usurpation was right or wrong, those who engineered it should have been willing to face the consequences of their actions. To put it simply, they need to face their punishment, and you Mina my dear, are the best person I can think of to assure punishment."
"Burn," Meep said softly in a sing-song voice.
"Oh Meep my dear, your bottom will be burning soon enough."
As if to change the subject Meep picked up the reality vault with both hands. "How long till those powerful beings know that we have this?"
"Hard to say for certain, I am a little surprised they are not currently aware of it. You have weeks, months perhaps, not years."
"This," she rocked the reality vault in her hands, "makes us a target, but it'll also keep us safe, 'cause they'll be afraid if they move on us that we'll open it."
Tristan nodded.
"So now we have to decide when to use it," Mina said, taking it out of Meep's hands. "How bad will it be in Yu-Shan? Will this weaken Creation?"
"It will be bad, but if I am to be honest with you, the gods that will most be involved in the political machinations that you will engender are the ones the least involved in Creation, and whose ultimate destruction or demotion would probably make Creation that much safer."
Mina nodded. "I will wait until it is tactically sound to use this then."
"Exactly as I would expect from a Dawn," Tristan said, and then lifted his glass. "Cheers."
Afterwards
Meep and Mina were character concepts that I had placed in Chiaroscuro, but other than a Dawn and a Night who were pals, I really did not know much about them.
When I got requests as parts of reviews from other stories to provide more background information on the Exalted world, to write something in Chiaroscuro and to introduce some Alchemical Exalts, this is what came together in my head.
Hopefully with Meep and Mina being a lot less setting savvy than the characters in my other stories I was able to better explain the world for those who were not familiar with it.
As a side note, Onyx Path Publishing has published the Third Edition of Exalted. There were some changes to the setting, but nothing significant in the area of Chirascuro and this story still is valid for the Third Edition.
Dragon Kings - The Dragon Kings were one of the early races of Creation, praying to the gods and the Primordials. Man sized, bipedal dinosaurs, they used crystals and plants the basis of much of their Technology. They joined with the Solar Exalted in the War against the Primordials for they, the Dragon Kings, worshipped the Unconquered Sun above all others. There numbers are few in the Age of Sorrows and most are animal minded brutes.
Primordials - These Beings where the ones that formed Creation and set it floating in a sea of Chaos. They were capricious beings, creating and destroying on whim. The gods would eventually rebel against them, creating the Exalted to fight on their behalf. Those that were killed became the Neverborn, those that surrendered were Imprisoned in Malfeus and became the Yozis.
Months of Wood and Months in General - The Calendar of Creation is a Lunar calendar where months are 28 days and there are five seasons: Air, Water, Earth, Wood and Fire. Each season has 3 months, the first month is Ascending, the second Resplendent and the third Descending. After the season of Fire is the 5 Days of Calibration which are not part of any season. Ascending Water is the coldest month of the year, Descending Fire the Hottest. The Season of Wood is similar to Spring and early Summer.
