"factious dissents, cracked down the middle"
WHAT IS THIS WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WHAT DO YOU HOPE TO ACHIEVE WHY ARE YOU HERE WHY ARE YOU ALIVE
Life was all she had left. She wasn't about to throw it away.
YOUR SURVIVAL OFFENDS US YOU ARE DESECRATOR YOU ARE TRAITOR YOU ARE MURDERER AND YOU ARE VILE YOU DESERVE DEATH
She never intended to do it. Never intended for any of it. She just... wanted things to change.
YOU ARE A TOOL A WEAPON A KILLER AND WE HAVE SEEN THESE BEFORE THESE TERRIBLE WEAPONS AND WE HAVE CONDEMNED THEM TO DESTRUCTION TO KEEP THEM FROM EVIL HANDS
A tool? No. No, she was a person, a person, she was a Dragon Rider and-
NO LONGER YOU ARE ALONE AND YOU WAIT FOR RELEASE FOR YOU KNOW THERE IS NO SALVE FIT FOR YOUR WOUNDS
She had dared to hope. Was that so wrong? To hope for better? To make right the very things she'd done wrong?
YOU PRETEND THIS CHANGES THINGS YOU PRETEND YOU HAVE ACHIEVED SOMETHING BUT ALL WE SEE ARE A LOST CHILD AND A KINSLAYER
"Then you are blind," Formora whispered, eyes shut as the barrage of minds - so many minds - crushed her own thoughts almost to bursting. Her head pounded; pain bloomed at her temples and it threatened to crack her skull apart. "There are others, nearby."
HE IS DEAD
"Enduriel is not the end of it. There is-"
ANOTHER
An all-encompassing will tore away the pitiful remains of her mental defences and ruthlessly picked through her consciousness, stomping through memory after memory.
YOU ARE RECKLESS YOU ARE A TORMENT YOU ADDLE AND YOU MEDDLE
A band of pressure settled around her lungs and she gasped in the stale acrid air, Cuaroc's grip on her hair tight and painful. His sword was pressed against her neck. Blood trickled from where it bit into her skin. All it would take was an ounce of exertion and her life would be cut away. All it would take was one slip and she would be beyond this world. And Cuaroc - his mind was at the forefront of the barrage-
-and he very much wanted her dead.
But he was not alone. And the others - though they were seemingly built of hate the scaffolding of their loathing was founded atop a bedrock of reason, no matter how skewed.
A STRANGER AN OUTLANDER FLANKED BY EYES LIKE NEEDLES HE IS WRONG HE IS UNFAMILIAR HE IS OTHER THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS IMMORTAL ALL THINGS MUST END FOR TIME IS THE RACE THAT CANNOT BE WON IT IS PREDATOR OF US ALL
But he believed otherwise. As did Elisabeth. She'd sworn it. Formora had just wanted to pretend otherwise, to write it off as misdirection and broken belief. But the Scorn, they were dead and deathless and they haunted her as they did the island; they were impossible but they were real. It wasn't right. It wasn't natural. And it threw her entire understanding of the world to the wolves.
BUT TIME HAS NOT CLAIMED HIM YET AND IF HE LIVES HE IS POTENTIAL HE IS OPPORTUNITY HIS SHELTERED WORLD IS OURS TO OPEN
The pressure abated by a fraction. Cuaroc's sword lifted away. Formora coughed roughly, clearing her airway, and she croaked, "What would you have me do?"
YOU ARE A TOOL YOU ARE MARRED BY CRIME AND DISASTER AND YOU ARE BEYOND MENDING BEYOND RETRIBUTION BEYOND REDEMPTION BUT YOU MAY BE USED AGAIN
"I won't-" she started to say
but
the
pressure
returned.
YOU WILL SERVE YOU WILL SUMMON AND YOU WILL GUIDE HIM INTO OUR EMBRACE YOU ARE A VEHICLE FOR OUR DESIRES AND YOU WILL MANTLE THEM AS YOUR OWN THIS IS YOUR FINAL SERVICE AND THIS IS HOW YOU ATONE
No. No, she was no one's slave. Never again. Never.
YOU WILL DO THIS
She would tell him what they intended, she would shout it to the world before they took what little she had left, Formora swore this-
YOU WILL NOT REMEMBER TO DO SO
No
they
couldn't
She felt the breeze on her skin. Titillating birdsong chimed in her ears. She listened to the scratch of worms and grubs beneath the soil and she heard the distant lull of the swishing sea riding against the sandy shores. Formora opened her eyes, her lungs filling with clean woodland air, and she found herself in the midst of a forest of Vroengard. Alone. There was a sword sheathed by her side, her sword, but her shoulders bore not the weight of her packs, her bags, Agaravel and the silvered stone.
Where-
(Find. Speak. Spire.)
What-
(Find. Speak. SPIRE.)
How-
She frowned, she looked around, she realized her situation, she saw the dimming light of early morning and for a moment she feared the bite of the beast's monstrous blade. Only... the beast was incapacitated, was it not? She'd been promised as much, by strangers from afar - and yet the mere thought of Elisabeth and her oaths invoked the image of Doru Araeba, the feeling of anxious fear knotting in her stomach, the cold sensation of unclear dread. A moment of terror overcame her and she did not understand the reason for it; she heard the echoes of muffled voices, loud and dominating, and little beyond it. But... there was more. There should have been more. There was something in her head closed off from the rest and it felt like PURPOSE, it felt like direction-
Only that direction was muddled. She felt like a compass without bearing, lost at sea - one moment sailing towards the horizon, the next drifting without a lick of wind. It was the strangest sensation and she sensed it was something to be mourned. To grieve after. To fight for, though she knew not where to take her sabre. Something was missing from her, something important, and her present dilemma was an intricate part of it. Why was she in the forest? That was a question worth asking. Where were her bags, her things, her companion and her charge? The last she recalled was...
Was fleeing from the villa, choosing to live after all. A pack of Scorn milling around it. The hoarse yell as the stranger - Ikharos was his name, Ikharos - taking the fight right to them, wielding fell magics and strange weapons with vicious fervour despite the grievous injuries dealt to him. She remembered her flight, the panic and the fear and the dismay, but there was something else - and it was blocked to her. Barred from her memory. Muffled by walls she could not remove.
What... was this?
A rustling noise and a deep thumping broke her out of her mystified reverie. Formora glanced up, around, and she reached for her sword - only to behold, some many yards away, a greatly unfamiliar creature emerging from the thick underbrush. It was large - tall as a Kull and meatier besides, with stocky and powerful limbs attached to a barrel-shaped torso. It wore armour of unfamiliar make, metal and reinforced cloth covering it from head to toe save for its arms which were conspicuously bare and bulging with thick muscle and sinew. Its skin was a pale brown, though mottled with spots of black, and about its shoulders its padded hide bore spots that she suspected were marks of ritual scarring. Most curious of all it had but four fingers on each hand, massive and strong and tipped with nails filed into claw-like points and etched with a variety of unfamiliar sigils. It looked at her with as much surprise as Formora herself felt, though the extent of its expression was unreadable, for all she could see through its helmet - complete with engravings of steel fangs and bestial horns - were a pair of glowing eyes.
"Ur'garruz Acrius," it grunted deeply, making it sound like a curse. It lifted a weapon not unlike those used by the Scorn, by Elisabeth, by Ikharos and his cyclopsian thralls and aimed it at her. Formora went still; she'd seen the velocity of the projectiles those weapons fired. The strength. The accuracy. The effort - or lack thereof - it took to fire them. She let go of her sabre's hilt, leaving it sheathed by her side, and held her hands out loosely.
"Don't," Formora said softly.
It simply stared at her, then touched the side of its ridiculous helmet with a free hand. "Ko shabu'uto, mar'nara ur," it barked. "Muri'ir toratu, kaur-" It paused. "Berra'arg, muri'ir. Kauras." The creature straightened up, free hand falling back to its weapon, and it glanced pointedly at Formora's sabre. "Sha-oasta. Sha. Sha."
Formora cautiously unclipped the scabbard and allowed it to drop to ground - feeling a part of herself go with it. "I am cooperating."
"Ye-es," the creature replied in mangled common speech, startling her. "Cooper-erate. Sha'kounu." It motioned to her. "Llllle'eg. Leg. Ki-r-ick, kick."
Kick. It wanted her to... So be it. Formora pressed the end of her boot under the scabbard and measured the distance, then applied just enough force to kick it halfway between them.
"Goo-oo-d," the creature told her, its deathly grip on its weapon easing.
"Who are you?" Formora whispered, but either it hadn't heard or didn't understand for it did not react in the slightest. No, it simply watched her and waited - and the reason for it soon became apparent when she heard the sound of heavy footfalls as another pair of near identical creatures appeared behind it. Along with a smaller, nimbler thing - something a little more familiar, if only just.
Formora cursed under her breath and closed her eyes.
(Found.)
They had cleaned the foreign vessel out since her prior departure. The scent of blood and rot was gone. The rug built into the floor was soft to the touch and free of the marks of struggle that had stained it upon her last visit. Formora was sat on the couch set against the wall of the open room and her hands were clasped together in the open - as requested. The thing that called itself Indilic was situated by the side of the low table, spine straight and pallid head bare, and its hands were subtly splayed out by its side as if ready to let fly dangerous magic. Its eye burned orange, a black Y cutting across the glow; strange as it may have appeared, Formora could read its suspicion and wariness well enough. It evidently did not trust her and made no attempts to hide it.
The feeling was very much mutual.
At last Ikharos appeared from the rear of the vessel, holding in one hand a steaming pot and with the other a mismatched collection of ceramic cups. He set the latter out at random, pushing each towards either Indilic, Formora or his own spot, and then placed the pot in the middle of the table. The scent of it was... softly fragrant. Warm. Relaxing. Not quite the blend of tea she knew to expect from the lands of the Broddring Empire or her own people, but close enough that the differences were largely inconsequential. Ikharos poured them each a generous serving before collapsing back into his luxurious armchair. He looked... different. Paler. A touch thinner as well, though it surely hadn't been any great length of time since she'd last encountered the man. His garb was different too; he wore a set of trousers woven from a cuffed blue material and soft dark shirt beneath an equally soft jacket with some pattern of checkered green and black squares. His hands were free and much more of his neck was bared; his fingernails were painted, Formora observed, with deep black polish and beneath his throat bobbed the edge of a tattoo as he sipped from his ridiculous rainbow mug.
Formora warily wrapped her hands around her own drink, privately exulting in the heat of it permeating through her skin, though before she could sample it something on the side of the cup caught her eye. She turned it towards her and frowned; right there inscribed on the navy side, in bold white, were the words RESPECT THE BEARD.
"Something wrong?" Ikharos asked, his voice rough but rested.
Formora turned her cup around for his benefit. To his credit he cracked a small apologetic smile, though it lasted no more than a moment. His eyes quickly lifted from it and found hers, too hurriedly by her mark.
"Just a trinket," he explained flippantly, a forced casualness. "Someone thought themselves funnier than they were. Ignore it."
Formora closed her eyes and raised the cup to her lips. The tea was... refreshing. Neither too strong or too light, and it suffused in her the warmth of something akin to home. It was a luxury and she basked in it for as long as she dared, in the simple pleasure of being alive to enjoy it.
"So," Ikharos said with a note of finality.
Formora laid down her cup. "I-"
(Spoken.)
"No," he quickly said. She paused, momentarily taken aback, but his expression was tight and pointed. "I would really rather you refrain from talking right now. I know how it sounds, but... just for our comfort. Until we're sure."
Sure of what? Of her feebleness? She wasn't so defenseless, Formora mused, even if surrounded and cornered, but then that was the concern, wasn't it? They feared her words - because, as she recalled, they likely had no language of power to call their own. Not for how they'd reacted when she'd invoked her mending spells; not for Ikharos's confusion when confronted with her magic.
If that was so, then their caution was for naught; it would but have taken a trained thought to manifest the very spells they feared she may let fly, no speech necessary. A dangerous thing, a reckless thing, but given a drastic lack of options it was feasible. To her credit Formora considered it, but... there was much at work that she knew she couldn't account for. The magic they wielded was reason enough, strange as it was.
Ikharos reached into a breastpocket along the front of his checkered green shirt and planted a peerless silver coin on the table, sliding it across the laquered wood surface. He left it in front of her; on the upward face she noticed a star with a sapphire in its centre, and when Formora warily picked it up she discovered the etching of a swooping kestrel on the opposite side.
"We're going to ask you a series of questions," Ikharos said slowly, measuring his words carefully. Did he think that because of the power of her voice, his own lent himself an imaginary weakness? A preposterous thought, though he was odd enough that she almost believed it of him. "You'll answer with that. The star means 'yes'. The raptor equates to 'no'. Am I clear?"
Formora looked him in the eye but his gaze was guarded and she knew not where to find the key. After a moment of consideration, she nodded.
"Fantastic," Ikharos murmured. He glanced at Indilic and the one-eyed creature leaned forward, bracing one hand against the table's edge while the other lurked by its hip. Its orange eye flashed and Formora saw... a shape? A small bracket of colours crossed the lens of her sightand she experienced a sensation, a feeling.
Then the creature called Indilic spoke. But not aloud; it spoke in her very mind, words hurtling out of nonspace and rattling her foremost thoughts. You are alive. You are biological, mammalian, warm-blooded and liveborn. This is known. This is the truth. Say it is so.
After a moment's hesitation, debating whether or not to eject the foreign presence from the parameters of her guarded consciousness, Formora twisted the coin so that the star was displayed.
(Spire.)
Indilic didn't react in the slightest. It scarcely moved at all. You are alive. You are physical, you are conditioned and constrained by time; you began at a point in the past and you will inevitably end in the future. You are limited. You are real. This is known. This is the truth. Say it is so.
Mortal? Everything it said was true in one capacity or another, but Formora took issue with it. She rebelled against the very thought of it! Death was a master, it was universal, but even in her deepest dread and darkest despair the void at the end of all things - it found difficulty latching into her belief. She knew she would die, but the mere concept of it was foreign, removed, something outside and external, a logic that didn't mesh with her own rational existence.
But when it came to the coin she found, curiously, that she could only turn the star up. As if there was a force exerting itself subtly into her will, guiding her to absolve from deception - an unspoken parallel to the ancient language. And that... was frightening.
Indilic and Ikharos took note of her answer. The latter leaned back, no longer so tense, but the former didn't ease even a fraction. You are self-directed, an entity of independent thought. You are captain of your own vessel and capable of rationality; the concept of will is ingrained in your being. This is known. This is the truth. Say it is so.
For the present. It had not always been so - but that was not the question. Formora stiffly answered an affirmative and left it at that. However, it didn't go unnoticed. Indilic's eye shifted slightly and its voice intensified, grew louder. You are mass and you are mind but you are not a bastion. This may be known. This may be truth. Say otherwise.
She... couldn't. Formora felt a feeling like shackles around her wrist and she could turn the coin the way she wanted, no matter how vehemently she willed it. Sweat beaded on her forehead and a spike of fear lanced through her heart.
You are a fortress but your walls have been bombarded, your gates have been broken, your holdfast has been breached. This may be known. This may be truth. Say otherwise.
It was impossible.
Say otherwise.
She couldn't.
Your name is Formora. This is known. This is the truth. Say it is so.
Yes, that- No, no that was not her only name and far from the full truth of it, the parts that mattered were lost to time and change and worse.
(Spire.)
Say it is so.
Her pulse pounded in her ears.
Say it is-
(SPIRE.)
"Stop it!" she shouted, gasping for breath.
The voice fell silent. Indilic stood up, quick as lightning, but Ikharos was close behind - as fast as an elf with the reflexes to match, touching the cyclops' arm briefly with the tip of his fingers. "A moment," he said tensely, and the two retreated into the rear of the vessel. A door slid shut behind them, muffling their footsteps.
In their absence Formora strained to gather herself, to retake control over her will and her body. Her grip tightened so hard around the coin the kestrel must have engraved itself into the skin of her palm. Oh how she wished for the reliable grip of her sabre, the relief of a weapon to defend herself with. They'd taken it, of course. The hulking giants that seized her; they'd taken all the weapons on her person and even then they'd marched her in at the end of their handheld projectile-throwers. Too large to overpower, too many to overcome, too sharp to escape. They'd caged her. Caged. Like she'd feared, she'd dreaded, she'd sworn to never fall for again.
The door opened. Indilic re-entered, walked past and without looking at her ducked out of the vessel. Ikharos strolled in after the creature and, with more grace than his human appearance inferred, retook his favoured perch. He leveled her with a thoughtful look, one framed with a hint of regret and overabundance of frustration, and said, "I'm sorry."
Formora's brow furrowed and she blinked.
"I am," Ikharos clarified. "We just had to be sure."
Sure of-
"But it looks like you aren't a dragon. Nor one of their, ah, shells. Right now anyways." His lips pressed together thinly. His expression was so severe she almost missed what he said - and the preposterous nature thereof.
"A dragon," Formora scoffed, feigning deadpan disinterest - when all she wanted was to sneer, to bare teeth like a rabid animal and make him understand tenfold that which she'd just endured, to return the favour with interest. "I. A dragon."
To his credit Ikharos didn't laugh. He didn't oust it as a poor jest or a slip of word. He treated it with all the seriousness one would bring to the subject of a Shade or maybe a Scorn ghoul, something deserving of it, and she didn't know whether or not to laugh at him for it. "I'm not about to risk it. I hope you understand, given all that's transpired between u-"
"I don't," Formora bit out. "I don't understand."
He regarded her with a moment's confusion, though it abated quickly. "Then you're several grades more fortunate than I."
Fortunate? Now there was the jest she was looking for - only he didn't realize it, the poor fool. Victims to ironic happenstance, the pair of them.
"You can speak freely now," Ikharos said apologetically. He was watching her. Watching for a reaction. "Seems a little late, but I reckon we're safe."
Safe? No. She could still kill him in one breath. Just one.
And then likely die as his colossal and mystifying entourage fell upon her in their seeming droves. There had been a great number of them outside when they'd marched her through. Far beyond her means to evade or even combat. Not as she was.
"And I'd like to encourage that," Ikharos continued. "Us. Talking. Because it looks like you're a little confused. You are, aren't you? Some things aren't adding up. Some things still feel a tad... wrong. Don't they?"
Her frown deepened.
"You can play the disgruntled bystander all you like, but please consider answering my questions. It'll be easier - and kinder - on us both."
"Why?" Formora asked quietly, simmering beneath the surface.
"Because an addled mind is hell to cope with - speaking from experience there," Ikharos said with an odd note of measured sympathy, "but at the same time I need whatever you can't tell me."
"If I can't tell you, how are we supposed to discuss it?" Formora questioned, bewildered.
Ikharos shrugged. "Devil's in the details. We'll get through it. So... what's this about your name?"
No. No, they were not discussing this-
"Because Elisabeth made it out like Formora is your real name," Ikharos continued. "Is it not?"
"It is," Formora said defensively.
"My Optus isn't so sure."
"It is. Älf er iet nam." (It is my name.)
He stilled. There was an air of aggrieved surprise around him, dampened by caution and polite regard. "Please," he said quietly, the promise of something unpleasant lurking beneath a delicate facade. "Please don't do that."
He wasn't fond of her language - of her magic. For some reason she found the irony too rich to pass up on, and the corners of her lips turned up; she was far from comfortable with his own either and in seeing her reflection she found amusement in their own little stalemate of discontent. "If that is your wish," Formora said with faux sweetness-
But Ikharos's gaze narrowed further yet. "Or that."
"Or what? What is it you could mean?"
He opened his mouth. Closed it. "Forget it," he grunted, reluctant and unhappy - defeated in some small way, some hidden meaningful fashion. "Are you willing to talk?"
"Of what? What is there to discuss?"
"The dragon."
Formora's heart skipped a beat and she fixed her smile in place lest it betray her inner turmoil; what oh what could have happened, what could he mean, surely not... "A dragon?"
Ikharos looked at her. He looked at her with grey eyes filling once more with indigo and his gaze betrayed nothing but stern determination. "Elisabeth said you were in possession of a dragon."
"I don't-"
"Cut the bullshit. We noticed what you were carrying. Took us a bit, but we caught on. It's dead, isn't it?"
Agaravel. They knew of Agaravel - and Agaravel alone. Elisabeth's warning rebounded within Formora's mind and she steeled herself in response, her smile thinning to a pressed line. "What is your question?"
"Do you remember where it is?"
Where Agaravel was? "No. I don't." Why couldn't she? Why? What had happened to her? Why couldn't she remember?
"Was it with you when you were captured?"
"Captured?" Something in her mind twinged, thoughts scattering, and Formora privately winced beneath the sen- (SPIRE) -sation. Confusion reigned over all else, coupled with a rising unease. "By your forces?"
"No. By Cuaroc."
Cuaroc? Why did the name ring so familiar? Why did it ache to repeat it, to scour her memories for mention of it? Why did it feel like a veil had been laid over her very self and only now was she lifting it up to stare into the light? "Who is Cuaroc?"
Ikharos blinked with surprise and stared at her. Formora found herself at a loss; what had she missed? "What?"
"Who is Cuaroc?" Formora firmly repeated. "I don't recall-"
"The dragon's done a number on you, hasn't it?" Ikharos paused, leaned forward. "What's the last thing you remember?"
(Spire. Spire. Spire.)
"You."
He blinked again.
"I remember you," Formora said softly. "I remember... running."
"Ah." Ikharos's expression hardened. "The moment you left us to die."
"You survived."
"It wasn't a certain thing. But it certainly set a precedent, didn't it?" Before she could ask what that meant, he carried on. "So you run with the dragon and... that's it?"
"That's all I can recall," Formora reluctantly explained.
"Mm. So little more than a day ago - goodness, it hasn't been long at all, has it?"
Not long? Formora stirred with shock. A day? An entire day? How? Something had happened, she was certain of it, but she just... couldn't remember. She couldn't. And it was beginning to pain her to try.
"I imagine it was trying to cover its tracks," Ikharos continued. "It would have been simpler to kill you, but... I think it prefers you alive."
"Agaravel would not do that," Formora hotly retorted. "She could not."
He raised an eyebrow. "So it has a name?"
"She has a name."
"Look, I don't care. I don't care for whatever game Elisabeth is playing at, I don't care for this place, and I certainly don't care to humour a dragon's predatory vices. Do you know where it is or not?"
"No," Formora replied coolly.
"Do you know where it could be?"
Perhaps. "No."
Ikharos eased back. "I don't believe that. I'm not fond of threats, but the alternative is a return to Indilic's methods-"
"I will kill it if it dares touch my mind again," Formora warned. "That is a promise."
He regarded her curiously, expression schooled into a visage of calm. "You're in our custody. Your actions endangered lives already."
"And saved yours."
"Which is entirely why I insisted on simply asking you questions first rather than let the Flayers have their run of your innermost thoughts. They can be brutal when they mean to. I've oft had to contend with it myself; it's never a pleasant experience. You're unarmed, you're under our arrest, you're presently within our camp. I don't doubt your creativity, but the moment you raise even the notion of violence against them, my Psions will make you hurt for it."
"You are too squeamish," Formora murmured. "You shy away from surety."
"I rather think I'm considerate. You may have saved my life, even if you forsook me to the Scorn, but all's well ends well. So - just to ride out the last dregs of that consideration, where might this dragon be hiding?"
"I don't-" Formora started to say, but Ikharos suddenly stood up, interrupting her.
"What?" he demanded sharply. Only... he was not looking at her. Instead his head was tilted slightly, as if listening to a voice whispering into his ear. "Repeat... Understood. Recall the Val, pull Threshers forward. Arrange a Phalanx formation. Repeat? No. No, negative. She... I see. Acknowledged." Ikharos grimaced and his eyes briefly shone violet. "Prepare acausal bindings, Vex-grade if available. No, she-... No. It's simply an approximation. Understood. You have the camp." He straightened and glanced down at her, eyeing her dubiously.
Formora evenly met his gaze and returned it. She said nothing. Neither did he. It wasn't long before the other creature, Indilic, returned. The moment the creature was situated across from her Ikharos snapped into action, a blur of frenzied movement as he retreated into the rear of the vessel only to re-emerge moments later clad in his armoured robes, helmet tucked beneath his arm. He raised his boot up onto the edge of the low table and slid a curious knife into a sheath along his calf, then strapped another series of smaller weaponry along the sides and back of his waist. The very last thing was a strange implement he pulled from seemingly thin air, a linear contraption swathed in a ragged grey-brown cloth with a stony blade at one end and a cavity in the centre, wherein a series of steel rings engraved with unfamiliar runes rotated about a pulsing mass of black matter. Ikharos slid it over his shoulder where it inexplicably stuck to his back.
"Gah'rashnu," he said to Indilic - adopting a strange accent when doing so, not so different to the grunting speech of the giants outside. Ikharos spared her another look, one strained with discontent. "Get up. We're going."
Formora stood. Indilic did not. She slowly walked around the table - and frowned when Ikharos, quick like his other weapon, produced her own sabre, scabbard and all, out of twinkling light. He withheld it a moment, then pressed his hand around the part where the end of the scabbard met with the blade's guard. When his hand moved Formora saw a layer of blue-ish crystal affixing the scabbard in place. Only after another moment of inspection did Ikharos hold it out. Formora took it cautiously, but when she tried to delicately pull her scabbard she found it stuck fast.
"That will release when I will it so," Ikharos told her. "If we're confronted with Scorn or worse, I won't begrudge you your protection, but I won't allow you to injure my Cabal."
Though it irritated her to no end (and reassured only for the fact that her magic remained unfettered), Formora fastened the sheath by her hip. "Where do you intend to take us?"
Rather than answer, Ikharos ducked down through the hatch leading outside the vessel. She felt Indilic's pointed gaze searing into the back of her head before giving in and following IKharos through - out into the light of day where the cloying smell of ash and oil dominated the senses and her eardrums rattled with the shouts of hurrying giants. Equipment clattered and howling beasts bayed; there was an air of urgency about the gathering. The beaten soil was pounded into mud underfoot, still wet from recent rainfall (the night prior, perhaps? She couldn't recall), and even her mind was barraged by the glancing sensations of flinging thoughts - thoughts that shied away from her own consciousness the moment their owners noticed her. Everywhere she looked she saw more of the cyclopses, the giants, even strange hulking hounds with scaled skin and bladed contraptions affixed to their backs. All of them, even the beasts, made way for Ikharos as he marched through the chaos. Many of them, or at least those standing upright, braced fists against their chests in salute. Paradoxically, Formora received only stares as she passed them by.
It was only a few moments until they were through, hiking up a brief slope and passing by the gleaming bones of a fresh carcass picked clean - and Formora stalled when she realized what it was: a grown Nïdhwal, large enough to swallow a horse whole. Its ribs bore marks of gnawing and many of the smaller bones were missing; even its collection of teeth were diminished, the jawbone whittled by steel knives to chip its teeth loose.
"How did it die?" Formora asked in a low voice. She did not know whether it was sympathy or simply misdirected grief that she felt for the sea beast, but she felt something all the same.
Ikharos scarcely glanced at it - though she spied a flicker of discomfort. "It... bit off more than it could chew," he explained stiffly. He stopped suddenly and turned to her. "Are they a common sight?"
"Nïdhwalar?" Formora questioned.
"Nid... say that again?"
"Nïdhwalar."
Ikharos's eyes narrowed. "Is that what you call it?"
"That is what they are," Formora stiffly revealed. "It is the name that falls to their race, should they take one."
"... I don't get it."
"It is their name in the ancient language."
Ikharos regarded her curiously. "That's your paracausal dialect, correct?"
"I do not know what you mean."
"That makes both of us." Ikharos clasped his hands behind his back. "So this is a... Nïdhwalar did you say?"
"Nïdhwalar is many," Formora corrected. "A Nïdhwal is but one."
"Ah. The former is the plural noun, the latter the singular?"
"Yes."
"I see." Without warning he turned on his heel and resumed his march. Formora schooled her expression and walked after him, finding little difficulty in keeping the pace he seemed so determined to set for them. They stopped at the edge of the camp where the body of another steel construct waited. It was brighter than Ikharos's vessel, painted in shell blue and dark gold, and it stood perched on a set of relatively small insectoid legs as opposed to being lodged halfway into the ground. Three giants stood beneath one of its short stocky wings, one sitting on a crate and the other two standing guard, cradling weapons in their meaty hands. One of them, Formora noted, had tusks protruding from ports on their elaborate helm, as long as her forearm and filed to a sharpened point. The owner watched them approach, staring right back at Formora, and snorted with deep derision.
"Ala'ughr," it grunted. The other giants chuckled.
"What did they say?" Formora questioned Ikharos.
He slowed to a stop and, without looking at her, said, "Tuskless girl."
An insult then. Formora frowned, but the giants ignored her. The one on the crate held out a slate with a glowing glass screen and pointed to a line of unfamiliar letters. Ikharos leaned in, took hold of it and studied the runes. His expression hardened. "Oh you fool..." he muttered angrily. "Fucking Brays."
"Is this about Elisabeth?" Formora pressed.
Ikharos looked at her briefly, considering something. "Yes," he said at length, and bitterly at that. "She's since decided to make it her life's mission to ruin mine."
"What has she done?" A thought struck her. "Does she have Agaravel?"
"The dragon?" Ikharos pursed his lips. "I hope not. No, I don't think so. She's smarter than that. The smartest person here." He passed the slate back. "Makes her the most difficult to work with too." He glanced at the giant. "Pull them back. I'm not losing more pilots."
The giant slammed its clenched fist to its cuirass with a clang. "Varghu'ar ur."
Ikharos made a fleeting gesture with a flick of his hand and walked away. She begrudgingly followed, growing more frustrated by the second. They stopped back near the remains of the Nïdhwal. Ikharos stood with his arms crossed and his gaze fixed towards the horizon hovering above the ocean. It was not long before she discovered why; a pair of objects began to manifest a great distance away, growing larger as they rapidly closed in. Very soon Formora could discern their similarities to the blue-and-gold vessel they'd only left and she watched, transfixed, as the newcomers announced their arrivals with metallic howling, a din that shook the very air around them. The airborne ships were quick and massive, and they rapidly slowed to a stop the moment they passed over solid land. They were fatter than the other vessels, with wider bellies, and as they settled down on the bare earth those bellies opened with a dozen hatches on each side. A sparse handful of giants disembarked and began ferrying equipment out.
"Where do you come from?" Formora whispered. "Across the sea?"
Beside her, Ikharos shifted. "I think we've already covered this."
Another world. Another world. It beggared belief, but looking at them, looking at all they had to show for themselves... Formora began to wonder. But even so... "You're preparing for something. What?"
"We've talked about this too."
She looked at him and she felt... nauseous. "War."
"Yes."
"With the Scorn."
"Yes."
"And whatever else opposes you."
Ikharos turned his head and met her eyes. He did not smile. "Yes."
Formora withheld the urge to step back. "And Agaravel?"
He slowly turned back to the skyships. "We'll deal with the dragon one way or another."
"She doesn't deserve your spite."
"I won't argue on the subject."
"Then why am I here?"
"Would you rather remain with Indilic?" Ikharos asked curiously.
Formora set her jaw. "No."
"I thought not." He inhaled deeply. "So you have no idea what Elisabeth has gotten into?"
"No? I don't know her."
"Neither do I, but it hasn't seemed mutual on her count. So she never said anything about the witch?"
"The witch?" Formora frowned.
"The Hive sorceress. Agnisia."
The nightmare in ivory. Skuldu's terrible progeny. "Nothing explicit," Formora admitted. "We scarcely spoke of... of it."
"So she's just given into her worst impulses," Ikharos muttered. "Arm someone terrible and point them the way of worse."
"Has something happened?"
"Oh nothing - except maybe she entered the witch's tower and now the whole place is lit up on spectral sensors like a Dawning tree. Scorn are about to swarm the surrounding area. So she never alluded to anything like that?"
Formora shook her head, utterly lost. "A dawning tree?"
"Forget it," Ikharos muttered. He looked up as a giant and two cyclopses approached, garbed in their own ornate armour. The latter pair struck Formora as familiar; she reasoned they were likely the creatures whom had accompanied Ikharos and his Indilic to her villa prior to the Scorn attack. All three carried weapons, those same ranged constructs, and they each spared her a wary look.
"This is Ellecta," Ikharos said, gesturing to the cyclops with the violet eye. He turned to its compatriot. "And this is Yu'uro. They're Flayers. I believe you've met them before."
"What is your point?" Formora questioned, growing frustrated. The giant growled but Ikharos held a hand up for silence.
"And this," he said at last, "is Faer'o, Colossus of Al'targ. I'm transferring you into their custody."
Custody. What a disgusting, vile word. Formora's face twisted with anger and she made no attempt to mask it. "I'm not yours to keep."
Ikharos turned to her, coolly, and crossed his arms behind his back. "Yes, you are," he retorted. "We'll discuss your future when we're done with this mess, and I'll be sure to take your prior actions into consideration, but for now you will comply to the best of your ability. This is non-negotiable." He paused. "Any attempt to harm or hinder anyone in my company will be met with harsh retaliation. I don't advise trying to flee either."
"I am not your creature to cage," Formora snapped.
He ignored her. "They won't kill you. But they won't be gentle either. Try not to force their hand."
"Why am I here?"
"To convince Elisabeth to stop poking the hornet's nest," Ikharos replied harshly. "She was looking for you. Now that we've found you, I intend to put an end to this charade." He shifted and walked away. Formora considered pursuing him (making an escape), but the Flayer Ellecta raised their weapon before she could even think to act on it. Formora held out her empty hands helplessly, near shaking with fury. The other Flayer, Yu'uo, circled around her and took up position opposite Ellecta. Neither of them said a single thing, though she could all but hear sibilant whispers treading around the edges of her consciousness - a psychic discussion through charged mental channels, a concert of two.
"Ala'ughr," the giant - Faer'o - rumbled. It sounded like a living avalanche, its voice was so gravelly and deep. It rested its colossal weapon against its plated shoulder and motioned with its other massive hand for her to move. "Advance."
Formora looked at it. Dared it to make her.
"Advance," it growled; not an avalanche, no, it had the voice of a dragon - if dragons could physically speak.
Reluctantly, bristling, she did as she was bid. Hating them, and herself, all the more for it.
A brigade was mustered, scores of giant warriors marching in unerring synchronisation through the forest five abreast and twelve ranks deep. They were accompanied by muted scaled hounds and one-eyed wisps darting through the trees on either side. A trio of aerial ships trailed overhead, belching flames from the tips of their wings and tails. In the press of it all Formora had lost track of Ikharos; the host was led by a newcomer, a giant larger than all the rest, with tusks longer than Formora's own arms and heavy steel wings upon their back. They carried a straight-edge cleaver with a molten bite in one hand where the other was gloved and fitted with a heavy slab of metal atop their bracer, seemingly not unlike a dwarf's Ascûdgamln in function. They set a hard pace, filling the woods with their disquiet venture, and the crack of so many boots on solid earth left Formora's ears ringing.
What struck her most unnervingly, though, was that she heard not one giant speak from the moment they had begun their trek inland. Not even a whisper. That relative silence, save for the din of their passing, spoke to her of a different sort of menace, more than even their towering, powerful frames suggested; it informed her of a grizzled existence, a grim outlook, a familiarity from king to pauper with military procedure. And that, to her, was near as frightening as the weapons they bore and the machines they employed.
Far into the day they marched. Not once did they stop. Formora was escorted at the rear of their formation, a single row of towering shieldbearers behind her, and the Flayers stalked forth on either side of her; they were lean creatures, with all the liquid grace of her fellow älfya but none of the beauty. Their statures were bowed and constricted beneath the suits of form-fitting armour. While their helms bore none of the fangs or tusks of the giants, Yu'uro and Ellecta were crowned with strange metallic horns over their heads, the alluded significance of which mystified her. Was it a mark of station? Of birth or fealty? Likewise the giant Faer'o, tuskless and colossal, carried the gilded mark of a standard on his back from which flicked the draping cloth of a company banner, depicting golden beasts and fractal axes set before an emerald sea. Was that the emblem of their nation? Or something more particular?
By the time their pace petered out Formora calculated that they had crossed from the south of the island to the northwestern coast - a significant distance for any force to tackle, mortal or otherwise, though the giants bore little sign of fatigue. The setting sun pierced through the trees to their left and Formora spied sparse clouds above; a beautiful, idyllic day ruined by circumstance.
(Spire.)
"Viridae-α1," Ellecta said suddenly in its warped voice, sounding neither male nor female in her estimation and far from natural. "Conform to our deviation."
Yu'uro smoothly stepped out of formation, the massive shieldbearers allowing them to pass, and Formora followed after a moment of confusion. Ellecta and Faer'o both followed her out. Wordlessly the violet-eyed Flayer gestured eastwards, up a gentle slope where the foliage was sparser and the view wider. They did not stop until they had reached its summit - upon which Yu'uro engaged their odd weapon, forcing its barrel to extend by a significant margin. Faer'o set up with their back to an ancient oak and Ellecta remained close at hand - close enough that, even with their head turned towards the northern horizon, Formora could feel the gaze of their minds upon her.
Down below the host of giants continued onwards, soon disappearing from view. Formora tracked their progress by sound and calculation alone to the edge of the forest, where the treeline gave way to a windswept headland where rested a lonely old lighthouse. The floating vessels of the giants remained where they were, held in reserve over the flush blanket of leaves that blotted the woods from the heavens above, seemingly riding on surfs of verdegrass chaos.
"Why are we here?" Formora asked lowly, insistent if cautious.
Slowly, Yu'uro lifted an arm and pointed to the treeline - from which marched the silhouette of a single slim figure. A human one. Ikharos himself. Formora watched as he strolled out into the open and stopped halfway to the lighthouse, only to hold out his arms and shout. His voice carried far enough, but all the same she had to strain to hear. "-isabeth!" he cried out. "Elisabeth, enough!"
From the lighthouse there was no response. No movement, no sound. Nothing to indicate anything still remained within, if ever there was.
"You've gone too far this time!" Ikharos continued, growing angrier. He stepped forward; he approached the abandoned building, a blade manifesting in his right hand, and he drew something else with his left. The light of dusk seemed to coalesce around him, flooding the edges of his form until he cut a personable beacon in the halflight - the shape of fury manifest as man.
And then, without warning, he stopped.
(Spire.)
He lowered his weapons.
(Spire.)
And the sky - it grew dark. It grew dark because, with a wailing roar, the blade of a god fell out of the sky and caught on invisible strings; it was the knife she'd seen before, the dagger of some unfathomable entity forged to cut through the heavens, the selfsame weapon that had torn Ikharos and his giants and all the dead things to follow straight from the stars, throwing them down at her and Enduriel and all of Vroengard. A murmur of surprise and alarm overtook the Flayers next to her, the giant at her back.
"Ketch," Ellecta said.
It was impossibly large, a thing cut into the shape of a makeshift dirk with a bulbous eye hanging off its rear haft. The body of it was coated with peeling tan paint, pockmarked with rusted steel and spots of etched black stone. An eerie light thrummed from beneath its belly, directly overhead, and to compensate for the sheer din of it one of the Flayers screamed with their minds the notion of ducking, averting one's gaze, GET DOWN.
(Spire.)
But Formora, unprepared, bewildered, far from understanding, stubborn to the end, she didn't do as instructed. The light glowed, the blade-vessel bellowed-
And all, for a moment, turned white. Her retinas burned. Her vision faded and the pain of fire ate it away, rendering her eyes blind with heat. She staggered back, cupped her face, frantically whispering words of benevolent magic as the shock gave way to agony. Too bright. She couldn't see. The sight of it had seared itself into her memory, dominating all else until she could see no more.
"Waíse heill," Formora gasped. "Waíse heill. Waíse heill." (Be healed, be healed, be healed.)
Her vision returned to her, stinging, and with reluctance she opened her eyes, fueled by the fear of what else might follow. And when she did, she found, to her horror, a much changed landscape. The air stank of ozone, like the aftermath of a lightning storm, and the noise of it echoed yet in her ear, but it was what she saw that shook her so - or rather what she didn't see. The entire headland... was gone. The sea rushed into the sudden ashen gulf. Of the lighthouse, and Ikharos himself, nothing remained. Nothing but a rising cloud of glowing moths, spawning from receding radiant lacerations in the very air. They rose up up up towards the dagger-
But the bladed vessel dipped away, tipped forward, voided the sky above and lurched forth like some great groaning beast. The flock of ten thousand moths fluttered after it. Although some, as Formora saw with a sinking feeling, descended towards the forest. Towards the giants.
And towards herself.
The Flayers took up arms beside her. They fired bolts of energy from their weapon, catching the moths at the forefront and popping them with bedazzling displays of charged power. Down from the woods more projectiles sprayed, tearing the canopy above the giants' host with fire and steel. It strained her hearing and Formora winced for it; she ducked down, ducked back as Faer'o themself levelled their own weapon and she covered her ears as they opened fire, spewing forth missiles faster than she could keep track of.
But the blade! But the vessel! Where-
(Spire.)
Where was it-
(SPIRE.)
(SPIRE. SPIRE. SPIRE.)
A hand closed around her arm and tugged her up; Formora found herself facing the featureless visage of Ellecta and she stared into its purple eye. It said something but she could not hear. It leaned forward, towards her-
VIRIDAE-α1! they bellowed with their very mind, the shout overcoming Formora's every other thought - save one that scratched and writhed and pounded at the walls of her buried consciousness, teetering over the edge of understanding but held back by invisible shackles.
"Moraeta's Spire," Formora said with a voice not her own, masked with unfamiliar urgency, sharpened by alien concern. Something died inside, some vain hope of escape - not the illusion of freedom, but control over one's self. "We must go to Moraeta's Spire."
Ellecta looked at her quizzically. Then, after a brief moment, pulled her down down down the slope after them, almost too quick for her to keep up. Someone was yelling. The giants were still shooting. The moths above were getting closer, close enough for her to hear them shriek. She heard the pounding of heavy footsteps as Faer'o and Yu'uro both frantically descended after them.
They all but fell upon the host below. Shields were raised and weapons were aimed skyward, but there were beasts enough to intercept them, to surround them with barking maws full of rending teeth. Only a terse order from some burly warrior spared them a grisly mauling, though it may as well have never happened so far as the Flayers were concerned, for Ellectra dragged her through the regiment, wended them amongst the press of shuffling bodies heavy enough to crush them with a single misstep, and burst out the other end to where the winged giant was bellowing orders, to where other officers were speaking quickly and frantically into small squad devices, to where against all odds Ikharos was picking himself over the edge where not twelve yards away, beyond the screen of glowing shields, the forest floor gave way to scorched cliff. The man limped his way over, fascinatingly unscathed, and with one bounding leap he took to the air and hung there, holding his hands aloft with his fingers spread to the blanket of moths darting down upon them. Lightning flashed from his fingertips to the nearest spectral invertebrate.
And it was as if fire had caught to oil, the lightning he cast danced between moth after moth, chaining between them with each eruption of pale magic until the sky itself was nothing but a canvas of bursting insects. In it she saw-
(Find the prospect. Speak your magic. Draw him to Moraeta's Spire.)
She was down upon her knees, shaking, and whispering words not of her making. Ikharos was kneeling before her in all his gaudy garb save for a helmet, and what contorted his features was a dreadful sort of sympathy threaded with suspicion, buried beneath a layer of ash and soot. The winged giant overshadowed them both, no longer yelling, and the Flayers stood silent at her back, but it was still too loud, still much too-
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Ikharos roared.
All at once there was silence. Beautiful, precarious silence. Formora closed her eyes and she leaned into it, speaking still but not hearing herself. She fell into it, into the haze, and when she looked out again he was holding her shoulders.
"What did you say?" he asked in a low, quiet voice that did little to hide his alarm.
"Moraeta's Spire," Formora gasped, finding herself once more. "You have to enter Moraeta's Spire."
He stared. He stared because it was something worth the incredulity. "What do you mean?"
"I don't know," she admitted weakly, exhausted, faint under the weight of it - the crushing pressure of a will not her own. It was the feeling of subjugation and Formora withered beneath it.
He let go. Stood up. Glanced to the Flayers, then to the giant by his side. "They aren't here," he muttered darkly. "They've moved on."
"The Ketch-"
"I know. It has to be tracking them." Ikharos looked back down at her, his gaze unreadable. "The witch is purer than I. No Darkness to blanket her trail. They're looking for her. They don't care about us anymore."
"They will steal our glory from beneath us," the giant grumbled, framing it like something scandalous - something utterly taboo. Formora did not know what to make of it. She didn't even make the effort to try. Not with her thoughts compromised. Not with her voice stolen and what remained of her own freedom hollowed out. Something had reached inside and clawed out all that was good, scraping her clean of the things worth fighting for.
She hated it.
"Elisabeth might be counting on that," Ikharos grunted. "I pray she is."
"She is a traitor-"
"We'll see." He lifted his eyes and raised a hand, holding a knife in a clenched fist. "We march on the city!"
A ragged, bloodcurdling roar rose from the giants, deafening her even to her own heartbeat. The Flayers sang soundlessly, chanting in tandem with their cyclopsian cohorts until a wave of noise, physical and mental, caught her, enveloped her, drowned her. It was more than she could bear. Formora shifted with keen discomfort, flinched when hands pulled her back to her feet, and forced herself still when she found herself level with Ikharos. He nodded past her and the Flayers nudged her on; the giants fell into position behind them and the noise of their march thundered for miles around, threatening to crush her underfoot.
Ikharos leaned in, almost conspiratorial, and he said to her in a rough voice scraped raw by adrenaline, "I'd like whoever's in there to tell me about this Spire. I'd appreciate it very much."
Formora closed her eyes... and she heard herself begin to speak once more, unbidden.
AN: As ever, hugest thanks to Nomad Blue for editing!