Chapter 411 (1/2)

Chapter 411

Chapter 409: Taste of Magic

CECILIA

My insides seethed with nausea as the terin Caelurona and explain that failure The Legacy had been defeated by a co for us with a nue bowed deeply as I stepped down, arm-in-arm with Nico, off the reception platforh Sovereign is waiting for you”

Despite the bone-deep exhaustion that had settled overa full day of rest before I could even face the te this summons

Nico kneell “Maybe he can help you understand what happened at Aedelgard?” he asked consolingly

In my previous life, my handlers and the train of scientists and ki-optih my life hadn’t understood what I was—not really Even the naend, a terrona, he understood me He saw beyond the constraints of his own perception, and by doing so he gained knowledge that was inaccessible to others But he shared little of what he saw, and he needed to work around ressed slowly and only when he decided I was ready for more

“I ahts than Nico’s question

Draneeve spun away, his unke in his wake The other attendants—Iht have been needed on my return—fell into line behind us wordlessly, like a flock of duckstheir leader

My eyes were blind to the passing halls of the fortress Unconsciously, I stared at Draneeve’s cri me like a leash so that hts were in Sehz-Clar, stuck there as if a part of me hadn’t really left I wished to understand why the barrier resisted me No other mana that I had encountered was outside of my control, not even the purified particles within the bodies of other living beings

And yet, somehow, Seris had found some way to bind the mana so completely that it resisted even my influence Not only that, but even an omnidirectional boes hadn’t shaken anything loose, either And then there was the Scythe herself…I had already known she was dangerous All the other Scythes regarded her with a wary combination of respect and fear Now, I understood why

At th, I knew that I could have overpowered the mana void technique she used But I hadn’t been at my full power, and so, had allowed her to overwhelm me and push ht, but it was a small victory, and there was no pride or pleasure in it

Draneeve stepped aside at the top of a stair that led down into the lower research levels Nico was eyeing the stairs apprehensively, like a child afraid of the dark I wanted to ask hiain at Draneeve and all the attendants No, I could ask ere alone I didn’t want to draw attention to Nico’s disco, I put two and two together

“The High Sovereign will look for you where the phoenix roosts,” Draneeve said, his voice gravelly, his eyes darting and uncomfortable

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, confused by the unnecessary dramatization

“I know the way,” Nico replied quickly “You are disain and led lanced overat Draneeve and the other attendants, but got no e,” Nico said after a rona knows I ht even know about the core I took”

“Oh,” I said, then, “Met who?”

“One of his prisoners, an asuran woman A phoenix After I was…after you healed h that it was unco into step behind Nico, looking down on him from above The loent, the darker the stairs becauishable from the shadows “Why would ithappen?” I said after a minute

Nico’s steps stuttered, and he started to turn around to look up at h, he quickly smothered it and resuh, but stopped when the darkness sed the sound “I don’t see the proble about the core? Even if he knows I took it, don’t admit you know?”

“But I could—”

He stopped his descent fully this time, and I nearly ran into the back of hi out to lay a hand on the top of his head but stopping avenausea that I couldn’t escape dary “But you shouldn’t fear hiet I had “He isn’t a threat to you Agrona is the key to our future”

Nico’s shoulders went stiff and he curled in on hiret ier Seris’s words had shaken him, I knew I could tell the rona didn’t have the power to send us back to our lives—that it had taken root in Nico’s row in hihts and attention

But what I sahen he turned to glance at me was a smile, and in his eyes I saw only his trust and love for ardless of what trials we faced, at least I always knew that would be there

We startedstairs in silence

It wasn’t long before voices began drifting up to us fro a hand up to warnany noise Two voices, those of the Scythes, Viessa and Melzri

“—treating us like co, her voice echoing slightly in the narrow stairwell, low and angry

“We are lucky to be alive, sister,” Viessa replied The words see the black stone and ticklespecter “Take care with your words”

“Tch, what is Agrona doing, anyway?” Melzri hissed “Sequestering hi back the Wraiths—Vritra’s horns, why not send the other basilisks to Sehz-Clar or Dicathen? His treaty with Epheotus is long since dust, along with the elven forests, and yet he has done nothing”

“The lives of asura are long,” Viessa said, her tone lightly critical “What, to us, n is a blink Perhaps what looks like inaction is in truth only patience”

“Then our failure should hardly matter, should it?” Melzri shot back

Viessa started to respond, but Nico chose that moment to step down loudly as he descended Both Viessa and Melzri went dead silent, their footsteps faltering

When Nico coht sight of the down here?”

“None of your business, little brother,” Melzri snapped, glaring suspiciously up at us both “I don’t have to ask why you’re crawling down these steps, of course” Her eyes burrowed like acy’s failure will sap so from our own, or at least make us look better by comparison I should thank you for that, Lady Cecilia”

“Enough,” Nico said firain

I didn’t have the energy to care about her childish sniping, and I followed Nico wordlessly, eager to get the inevitable confrontation with Agrona where he expresses his disappointure out how to take down Seris’s barrier, together

Viessa shrank against the inner wall to allow Nico to pass, but Melzri stood firrona himself has asked for our presence,” Nico said stiffly “Would you like to be the reason we are detained? It may not be a particularly dark blackelse that’s happened, perhaps it will be the board that broke the wogart’s back”

Melzri sneered and stepped aside “I guess I shouldn’t blarona was happy to leave you for dead after your pathetic display at the Victoriad, I’m sure you feel compelled to prove you’re not entirely worthless”

My fists clenched, and a fury ofMelzri and Viessa against the curved inner wall of the stairwell

Tendrils of blackwith rabbed those tendrils—her power—and wrapped the

“Stop this,” Viessa hissed, her wide eyes staring helplessly at her out-of-control spell

Soulfire rippled and jumped across Melzri’s skin as she attempted to burn away ainst her, no erous to , you’ve treated hi you can kick tothe words out between clenched teeth “Speak to ain, and I will pull the core froht fades from your eyes”

I released my hold over the mana, and both their spells faded away Melzri’s hand went to her throat where the void wind had choked her

Not a single as spoken as we moved down the stairs past them, and Nico was quiet until he must have been certain they were far above us

“You shouldn’t have done that,” he said eventually, not stopping or turning to look atout a wry laugh “The other Scythes beco, you should be ry Why aren’t you?”

Nico cleared his throat, then threw a dark scowl back up the stairwell behind us “Like you said, they are becos on them at all?”

After another h a door of black stone into a large, rectangular roo A sudden and unwelcoht of the sterile space reminded me of the many similar rooms I had seen in ed, and put through inhuo made my knees tremble, and beyond the sickness of the sensation itself, there was also the deeper underlying shao, I had felt so powerful putting the two Scythes in their place, and yet here I was, ready to curl into a ball and vohts

“Cecil, are you—”

“Fine,” Irapidly

Nico hhallway Cells lined both sides, but I had nothem, and Nico seemed to knohere ere headed

When that hallway ended, he led me left into a second, nearly-identical series of cells, then stopped in front of the first to contain a living occupant that I had noticed

The wo barrier was truly beautiful—or had been before her captivity She looked young but felt very old, with tired eyes the color of fire and a sray tint to her skin It was the way her rich red hair cluether in the shape of feathers that I found h

Her poas suppressed, what little she still had shi+elded behind the barrier, but I could still sense her mana It burned beneath the surface, like hot coals under a blanket of ash

“The reincarnate returns,” she said, her voice a di eyes settled on Nico, who shi+fted uncoed by force of will, they shi+fted to me Several heavy heartbeats passed, then they widened in recognition “Legacy…”

My lips parted, a question forue, but Nico spoke first “She’s an asura, a phoenix According to her, they have so of rebirth and reincarnation” He see on the asura for more than an instant before he looked away

Her dry, cracked lips turned up at the corners “The dragons have their aether arts, the pantheons the art of war titans will claim to understand life best of all asura, but they only understand creation, just as the basilisks know corruption and decay Life, and all the many facets that make it up, is the do uncharitable, Lady Dawn,” a deep voice boo rona never failed to impress upon me a sense of awe His lithe yet statuesque features maintained an evenness that settledhis expansive antler-like horns caught the light and held my attention

Beside aze relance thron the hallway, right of where we’d come from I knew instinctively the cell on’s core frorona had been down there, afraid he had been found out

“High Sovereign Agrona Vritra,” I said, not s I rarely did “I’ve come to report my failure to retake Sehz-Clar The shi+eld proved more robust than I anticipated, and in my weakened state, Seris’s void er extended, and I went silent immediately His eyes, like two fathomless pools of rich red wine, drewthe truth of things sooner” Agrona ran his fingers through nature in the barrier Seris has erected but assun That ic is much more literal, I now realize”