And around him floats servs, odd ones. White. When were servs ever white? Then there is silence between them. The wind fluttering across the rigid, elastic trees, howling. Ivory feels the need to speak—Mother's voice advised against.
The first to speak gives up the leadership.
Maintain control. Always.
The silence breaks. "You have taken from me."
"You have given me," Ivory says, noting.
"Yes." He says, "And how easily can I also take it away from you. A simple gesture and you lose all that you have gained."
"Will you?"
"I have no reason to." He replies, "If anything were to happen, it would be by your choices. Yours. That is my gift. Your choice, accepted and honored with their consequences."
A delicate way to tell me not to break the contract. Ivory thinks, smiles, but he does not react to it. Unknowable if he did anyway. The brightness and all that. "I have no such machinations."
"Then speak your words."
"Ask your questions."
He is silent for a second. "Tell me of Nightfell."
She is muted. Nightfell? Why would he ask for that? A reason, surely. Is he not a part of that clan? A different clan that now breeds a different Order. Harder, yes, but not impossible. If so….A pause. Or he is lying—a deliberate attempt to mask his origins. I am from Nightfell, but I ask about nightfell, now she thinks I am not.
Ivory says, "What do you wish to know about Nightfell?" Narrowing her thoughts.
"It's mines." His light brightens for a moment. "What is in it? What lies there? What is underneath it?"
A diversion question? Ivory responds. "Nightfell is one of the greatest sources of Elitum in Eastos. This comes from their mines. That is it. Below it, I suppose, are more mines."
"I see." He says callously. "No more?"
"Yes."
He takes a span of silence, continues, "Tell me what the oral History is."
Ivory is stunned. So he can hear me, too? She maintains the non-motions, says, "It is a record of history passed down via the spoken word. Mouth to mouth. Highness to Highness."
"A secret."
Ivory stays silent. Allow him to marinate and create his delusions.
"I see." He hums. "Is Auwale part of this oral history?"
She is frozen. How often his words do that. Auwale? Mentation raises nothing for the name—at least, none for the oral history. But then, her knowledge's totality was that awarded by the simplicity of her rank. Beyond that, if any were to be known, only the Highness would be preview to it.
However, she sought to prove something. "I know nothing of Auwale from the oral History?" Let me give him something he doesn't ask for.
"Nothing?" That same cold baritone. "You know nothing of Auwale?"
Ivory accepts a silent moment, says, "I know of Auwale, the Patron saint of the greyJusticiars."
His light brightens for a moment, a pattern echoing from the expression. "A patron saint?"
He should know this? Ivory thinks. If he is a great Power hidden by Night, he should know such things…She says, regardless. "Yes. A simple matter of Order and identity."
"Explain."
Let me see. "The order of the greyJusticiars, like any of the 11 orders, has a patron by which their identity is derived from. Just like how the faith dictates the acceptance of a patron by which you may imitate their characteristics."
I wonder what saint he abides by.
"The same is applied to the Orders. Humans require familiarity to control and minimize casting risks to themselves fully. The identity creates a path to it. What to do, whom to correspond with. By studying the Specified Patron, they grow an understanding of it, how to become it, drawing upon greater amity from the symbols, reducing the casting risk."
"A patron like Taka?"
"That is of the crownBearers." She responds, drawing upon contradicting observations. His tone, although cold, suggested a certain lack of erudition. Is he indeed unaware of this, or does he play the role expertly?
"And who is the patron of the veilCounsel?"
Ivory is silent. Something is odd here…. "I do not know."
"Do not know?"
"Yes." She says, "Every clan hides its order. None may know of it. A breach and their secrets and weaknesses are learned by another." This, of course, was the truth in the specific context.
"As you say." His light kindles high, flaring. "Rules and Consequences."
"Rules and Consequences." Ivory repeats. "
This is his game, she guesses. He plays it with her. Words, lies. Even now, he keeps the true desires a mystery. What does he want? What does he need? What veilCounsel knows nothing of their Patron? None. That was the answer. So there was another. The true test of my supposed truthfulness.
What happens now?
What does he make me say?
"As you say, you know nothing of the veilCounsel."
"I did not say that?" The words escape her. Mist! "Hmm," She rumbles. Confusion growing. This is the thing he does to her.
"I see." He says slowly, "Tell me then what you do."
That covers a broad spectrum. Ivory considers. The terms stop her falsehood and prevent the retarding of information. He could know…This would be yet another of his tests.
Mist it!
"I know most of the symbols learnt at the vested rank of the veilCounsel."
His light brightens—a ring of radiant white. "Say them!"
Ivory sighs within, shows no such expression, and says, "After the first words are said, the total of controllable symbols is 12. Within the order, that is, as other symbols outside that can still be casted. Nothing of the opposition, however. This creates a certain discord. The dark stays from the light. Always." She takes a pause, adds. "Due to the symbolic effect, the casters of this order can see in the dark."
A subtle, dim hue over his light.
"The 12 symbols, as symbols, are events. I know five. Twilight. I believe, is the last, lingering hint of light before true darkness settles in. The symbols born in those moments are quick to fade. Casting, I suppose, requires speed." Ivory realizes a role unexpectedly taken: A teacher?
"At the fading light, the Dullness is one to fade as quickly. Symbols born as colors lose vibrancy and distinction in the fading of light."
A mutual existence…She thinks.
"The third is the chill, though this, I suppose, plays no role, as no such symbols can exist naturally in Enor. There is only night and the heat." She offers a smile. No reaction. "Creeping shadows. As the name suggests is the slow crawl of shadow, stretching out, drowning the landscape. Another that requires the slow fading of light. The fifth is the unseen depths." What a garish style of naming. She lampoons. "That is the feeling of the vast, unlit expanse. The endless unknown darkness, I suppose."
Breath warms her lungs. "That is all."
"As you say." He leans forward. "Good." A response, radiance dulling for a moment. "You have done something useful enough."
"This makes me a caster?" Ivory knows the answer.
Yet he says it. "Do you think the things you say are worth the power to bring them to reality?"
So he plays me…Ivory nods to herself, reminding: This is a game—a means to an end. Power. Throne. The highness cannot be a non-caster. War would be the outcome. High lords will rage over legitimacy, Saedon would be adorned with the mantle of highHeir. Never. Valor would be destroyed in such an eventuality. For that, she smiles. For that, she will stand as one with the unknown.
"Anything else?"
I AM takes a moment. "That is all." He says, "However, this meeting will be done again."
"When?"
"When I decide to come to your dreams."
So he does not fear whether or not Father learns of this. He is assured. Ivory knows danger from this realization…But she presses on. "I accept."
The world begins to darken, the flora blurring, the trees fading, as though cleaned into an expansive, eerie darkness. A moment, and all is gone, drowned into the familiar darkness.
I have learned nothing!
She gasps, head snapping up, figures around her, startling. cleanseWitches, dressed in those padded white garments of theirs. They step back. She is surrounded by an army of Excubitors; tall, imposing, clad in dark suits and crystal helms. Like a mirror, her face reflected off the shimmering heads of the guardsmen. Armed, she sees nothing outside their walls of flesh and muscle.
This stinks of Argon!
And he cuts through the barrier of men, somehow grander than them. A true storm. Cold gazed, arms crossed behind, donning the simple quilted side-buttoned suit. Black like metal. "Again, you were attacked."
Ivory pulls up the dark, glossy sheets. "Again, I was attacked."
There is silence between them. Nerve-racking. She breaks it. "Leaving was my ide—"
"The Aspirant will be executed in three days."
She snaps. "That will incur the wrath of the theocracy! They will attack! Will you have us killed by the plagues? Is Noctis not enough of a lesson?"
Argon's eyes are orbs of churning storms. "You must think me a fool?" Calm. Frightening. "You freed yourself? Distracted Nail, and somehow broke the symbol's sealing on your fingers."
Eyes drift down. The pale palm is complete.