"It happens in three days." Finality in his tone. "After your coronation, the Aspirant is put to death. Damn the consequences." And he leaves, the wall of flesh sealing off the created space.
Again, she has been made a prisoner.
Hold on for now…She restrains the sigh. I'm coming, but first, I must keep my Clan from being ashed by the plagues. Power. It always comes to that. For my Coronation, I must secure it. For Valor and Kabel.
The sheet rips down the center, hands gripping both sides of the tear—her fault. Control yourself!
----
Merrin watches the fading of the female brightCrown, her features cleansed, blurring, carried by the invisible winds. Gone. Like a breath on glass, absent. Her seat remains, stone, high-backed, inspired by the Ardent visions of the throne room, or whatever such an exaggerated hall was.
In a brilliant red flora garden, he thinks of the avoided terror: the rageful caster that once stole his legs. This visit was a gamble, but a necessary risk. For knowledge, for standing. For control. Ultimately, useful details were acquired.
Order and Identity.
That explains the internal identity: the other self with its collective of caster knowledge. More instincts than facts, perhaps. He breathes a sigh. Twilight, creeping shadows, Dullness, Chill, Unseen Depths. Five of the 12 permitted symbols of the vested rank veilCounsel… Merrin rests his head on his nieve. This is purely a limitation, isn't it?
A means to cull the growth of wild power. Strange for BrightCrowns to desire such weakness. Not that he expected much from lowlander politics. Contrarily, Ashmen knew never to hold back growth.
What a carcass of a society brightCrowns were.
"Watch her as you always have." He speaks to the Ardent behind—strange creatures they were. Obedient, unintelligent, and mysterious. Attendees to the El'shadie. "My attendants."
He stands, feet crushing against the red flora. Hard. A false input of sensations. In truth, none of his creations were as real as they appeared. Some were, he realized, things he had pried in reality through the Greyworld. Internal familiarity. That was the difference.
For true, indistinguishable creation, he must know everything.
Omniscience.
A chuckle boomed across the parodic space, his head snapping back from the bout of laughter. What mistsense! Tears edge his eyes. "I'm really becoming a Heretic." A gasp wrenches from him. "How long before I stand before them, bellowing those words… Again."
"There's no way back from this, is there?" He washed his fingers across his face.
Now, he stands over the crystal queer lake, the pellucid liquid, beyond which is an expanse of vast forests, tall, elastic trees, big and strong. Reaching forward, grabbing the air, it rips, tearing through like a sliced curtain. Within the parted cut, a world of greyness, fierce storms, and darkness echoed. A high gate above the blackened clouds, eerily yet grandiose.
He steps through, feet pressing over the scattered beads. "My world." He takes to the air, wind whistling past his eyes. And floats above the world; below, he sees the tear across space, a thought, and it sticks together, like threads dragged in.
What a thing he has made.
A world within another, masked by a layer of painted illusion. A lie. The entire thing could be given that singular definition: pictorial, nothing of real substance. Outside the mountains created from the base knowledge of rock symbols, most shared the simple visual states. Eventually, substance could be sustained, but not now… That required knowledge.
Mentation moves to another—the vast mass of blackness; the mountainous, brittle gate. What a lofty thing it was. Just there, above the world, the forever mark of his deficient self.
Like the ring scar on his fingers, this was something deeper. Within, a silent passenger. A warning, perhaps… The taste of ash lingered on his tongue, welcoming, scent too. It reminds him of his origins. To them, be what they need; to him, be what he was.
Never revel in it.
For them, he needed the spear and shield. Power was the feasible means to freedom. His power. To dazzle them with miracles, gifts. The ways were required. These symbols, five as revealed by Ivory of Valor, were the path to it.
An expert VeilCounsel.
Maybe saving them with exceptionalism still exists… He wonders, the bird cutting through clouds like a blade through air. It plays. Every day, every moment, it enjoys the Greyworld more than its owner. The El'shadie.
Merrin considers what other El'shadies saw in this… "What were they like?" Eyes drift down. His fingers are pale, sunken. "What choices did they make? What would they think of what I do now?"
"Would they…."
The bird hovers down, wings flapping. "You're having lots of thoughts."
"And you said I should spend more time in the Greyworld."
"Now I contemplate whether that was a good thing." It perches atop his shoulders. "They are loud, annoying, those thoughts of yours. Be careful of them here."
"Is that worry?" Merrin cringes at the thought. "Because they can become events."
"Not necessarily." It shakes its wings, voice nearest to his ears. "Not all things become as they are said. You would have died many times if that were the case. It is not. But certain things, a bargain here, a conviction there. They shape. Words that shape. Words that change. These things have the greatest potentiality to become symbols—or events."
"All symbols are events." Merrin wonders about Moeash. Was his action also something of a symbol? Not his fault. Or was a symbol formed by the very reason and actualization of his wants?
It is maddening to think such things.
The bird caws; a boom into his senses. Startling. Merrin winces, cupping both auricles. "You do not have to be so loud."
"You are the loudest." It says, "And events do not become symbols… not in the imagined sense. An event is usually a collection of symbols. Meanings that, when combined, become the perceived world. A singular symbol defining a situation is rather exceptionally rare… In your world, at least."
"In my world?" The wonder is brief.
"Yes, in your world." The bird wraps its wings around him. "What a wheel you are."
Merrin tries to look at it, but can't as the creature rests on his shoulder. He tried, regardless, and ended up with a poke to the face. The bird cawed in laughter. "You are a repeating cycle."
"Break it then." Merrin has an idea.
"No…" It says, "Infinity can't always be broken from the outer; you are the other. The inner state that breaks away from infinity. That is your duty. You plan, don't you? A stupid plan to seek out the one rained by feathers."
The words strike into Merrin. "What do they mean?"
"You will learn it one day, I suppose. No, you know their meaning. You simply trap it in another wheel—a repetition of an unattainable desire. Find Moeash. Save Moeash. Find Moeash. Save Moeash." Its words are an obvious mockery—a rage-inducing thing.
"You offer no advice, bird." Merrin snaps, hates himself for it. "I will go to Moeash."
"That has always been your plan." It caws, opens its wings, and takes to the grey heavens. "Let me watch the outcome then."
A scholar to a soldier is a beast to another. Same with their tools, sharpened in the means available to themselves. This has always been the way of it. Imagine then, a hybrid of these two things. That, I say, is the caster. —Author unknown.
Merrin walks into a room, walls stretched high like blackened hills. Dark, elitum-plated, rippling like distorted lakes. A black space with lamps embedded in the base of the walls, tenebrous. Ahead lay a large cruciform, black, rain dripping down from an overhead oval hole, with lightning and thunder flashing through.
Below the cruciform stage, a man sat on a high stone, watching. Moeash. Dressed in mine rags. He is silent, his breath revealing nothing of the unknown data. Regardless, Merrin steps forward, observing the vast X. Odd that he returns here; the symbol of his ascension—the day of powering.
This was the moment he became El'shadie… the SunBringer.
"So you can also come here?" Moeash speaks suddenly, an echo of tone. "The… SunBringer can do everything."
A brief moment of silence, and Merrin stands behind him. The man-child, low on his high stone. "I was looking for you."
"You found me." Weird how confident he sounded. "Which is odd because I am still below the mines. So this is false. A dream, maybe."
"Was he also this intelligent?" Merrin replies. "Yes."
"So I'm dreaming," Moeash mutters. "I am dreaming, and the SunBringer has come into my dreams. Does that make you the DreamBringer, now?"
"The second time, you have given me a name." Merrin envisions a high stone. A moment, and it blurs beside Moeash. A flat rock of blended brown-red hues. He sits, siding the man-child. "How are you?"
Moeash sighs. "I don't regret what I did."
"We don't have to talk about that now," Merrin says. "I'm just glad that you're alive."
"I am alive," Moeash says, leaning forward. "And I still do not regret what I did."