The Beginning After The End novel Chapter 473

Chapter 473

Chapter 471: Falling into Place

CECILIA

Everything was falling into place.

With shield generators keeping the dragons at bay, the Instillers were able to work freely and establish a ring of disrupting artifacts that worked to distort and interrupt the rift between Epheotus and Dicathen. While the shield generators protected us from the dragons in Dicathen, these disruption artifacts prevented Indrath from sending support from Epheotus, effectively cutting the two worlds off from one another.

The dense ambient mana of the rift itself powered both arrays. If Indrath were somehow able to stop the flow of mana, we had enough power in batteries to implement the next stage of the plan. And if that fails, the Wraiths themselves become the source of mana.

Instinctively, I waited for the judgemental evaluation of my thoughts from Tessia, who hovered near the surface of my consciousness.

‘You’ve already considered your justifications for why such a cruel act is necessary,’ Tessia said in answer to the spotlight of my attention. ‘All I’ll say is that you’ve come a long way, Cecilia, if you’re feeling guilt for your cruelty to these soldiers, since before now, you’ve only ever looked at them as tools.’

I bristled, but knew there was no point in arguing against the feeling of guilt worming its way through my guts. Not when the person I was arguing with was already in my head. It may be unpleasant, but that doesn’t make it any less necessary. Besides, it’s Agrona’s plan, and they’re his soldiers to do with as he wills.

I sighed even as the words formed in my head, knowing how it sounded. Regardless, I don’t need your affirmation.

‘And yet recently, you’ve been poking around inside my mind to see what I think more often.’

Your insight into these events is valuable, I admitted while forcefully pushing down the more honest, but also more embarrassing, reason for my behavior.

‘I’m glad you recognize this fact.’ Tessia’s voice, projected into my head, was even and without sarcasm.

Shaking off the brief but frustrating conversation, I returned my attention to my immediate surroundings.

The dragons continued their bombardment of the outer shield for another hour but stopped with the arrival of their leader. I recognized Charon of the Indrath clan by description: a big, bone-white, battle-scarred lizard with purple eyes and tattered wings. He spent some time conferring with the other dragons present, of which there were now many.

It’s almost like they’ve brought every dragon in Dicathen, I mused.

Eventually, Charon approached the barrier, flying in his dragon form. His wings beat slowly, and his voice issued from him as a bone-deep rumble. “The Legacy, chief hope of a mad basilisk, who has herself been convinced she is a god.”

I regarded him coolly but didn’t rise to his bait.

“Straight to the point then,” he rumbled. “What does Agrona want? He has captured the rift to Epheotus, but he cannot use it, nor can you hope to keep it, which means this is a bargaining tactic. Tell me your master’s offer, and I will confer with Lord Indrath.”

I raised one brow. “Don’t lie to me, dragon. Travel between worlds requires this rift to be accessible, even with your teleportation artifacts. You are cut off. The High Sovereign has no message for you, no request. You are irrelevant in this and all things.” From the corner of my eye, I saw one of the Instillers on the ground reviewing a message, his eyes darting to me every couple of lines. “Feel free to exhaust yourselves against the shields, if you must. Or don’t. The noise is as irritating as your efforts are futile.”

Turning my back on Charon Indrath, I flew toward the ground, feeling good about the brief exchange. It gained me nothing to have won the verbal spar, but I was already beginning to chafe at my role as stationary guardian of the impenetrable shield, and releasing some of that frustration as barbed words made me feel a little better.

“What is it?” I asked as my feet touched the ground.

The Instiller, who had watched me approach from the corner of his eye, swallowed visibly. “A dispatch from Scythe Nico.” He held out the magical scroll, which displayed the words written on a matched scroll in Nico’s possession.

I read through it once rapidly, then forced myself to go over it again, slower. “An emanation…powerful mana, sustained somehow, wrapped around a pocket of amethyst magic that can only be aether.” I felt myself frowning, struggling to comprehend everything that Nico had attempted to explain in the short message.

Grey hadn’t been at the Wall. As expected, he had carefully hidden his real location, even from his own people. The emanation of aether was interesting, though. The mana signature I sensed before the battle…

It was camouflage. A false signal that mimicked the presence of his bond and the distortion caused by aether could only be intended to disguise his real location, of course. And I was the only person on Dicathen that might be able to sense it. Unless he hides from his own dragon allies as well…

The dispatch then went on to detail the efforts in Vildorial and the Dicathians’ new weapon that had been revealed. A fusion of organic mana beast parts along with magical and mechanical components? I couldn’t picture what Nico described, but I felt certain that even Agrona hadn’t accounted for such a thing.

The ex-Scythe, Seris, had discovered a way to end the fighting in Vildorial and keep her people safe from the curse Agrona had hidden in their blood and their runes, but Nico expressed a strong sense of confidence that Arthur had not hidden himself in the city. Additionally, the ulterior objective—to capture the sister or mother—had failed, and Scythe Melzri had gone missing.

As I read through it all for a second time, my focus returned to the part about the aetheric emanation at the Wall.

Biting the inside of my lip, I wracked my brain for what else it could mean, but I could think of no other way to read it than my first impulse: Grey was calling me out directly. This conjuration was meant to blind me to his real location, and he intended me to know and understand that fact as well.

I found myself wishing Nico were here instead of just his note. I considered sending him a reply and waiting for a response, but I didn’t want to give him the impression that I couldn’t think for myself.

Besides, I already knew exactly what my mission parameters were. The real question was whether or not I would continue to blindly follow them. After all, the rift is sealed. I am wasted here.

There was little room to get away from anyone within the shielded area. The Wraiths flew in a perimeter, staring out at the dragons, just as pent up as I was, while the dozens of Instillers ensured the equipment continued to function perfectly. But I moved to a secluded corner and sank to the ground between two of the shield generators. Closing my eyes, I let my focus expand out into my surroundings.

The balanced flow of mana in and out of the rift no longer existed, leaving the atmosphere around the shield thick with it, though it was dimmed by the blinding presence of so many asuran mana signatures. But like before, I continued expanding my reach farther and farther, until my senses reached the Wall. There, I again felt the hint of his bond’s mana, as well as that telltale distortion that gave away a powerful source of aether.

But I didn’t stop there. Instead, I continued pushing, reaching, sensing even beyond the Grand Mountains and across the Elenoir Wasteland to the north.

As if I were Zeus looking down from the top of Mount Olympus, I saw the tide of mana as it moved in waves across the entire continent spread out before me. Breathless at its beauty, I eased my mind into that ocean, letting my focus be pushed and pulled not by my purpose but by the mana itself. I thought I already understood mana, better than anyone else in this world, but I’d never experienced it like this. I had no words to describe the wonder of the phenomena.

Do you still see this world as…fake?’ Tessia thought, her voice like a stone in the calm ocean. ‘Some kind of limbo that will cease to exist once you’ve returned to your old world?’

What?

‘This gift you have…you may be the only one in all the world who can see this.’ She was quiet, musing, then continued. ‘I look down on this and feel my heart break, knowing the turmoil and suffering happening beneath these vistas. It just made me wonder if the sight affected you…but what kind of impact can this have on someone who doesn’t believe in the reality around them, and more importantly of their effect on that reality?’

I didn’t answer, because the truth was I had no answer. I had used the thought of this life as a kind of temporary purgatory to soothe my own guilt at what I’d been asked to do, but I was not a child who had convinced herself that this world wasn’t real.

The thought brought me out of my reverie and firmly back to my purpose. I was no longer floating on the tide of the ever-moving surface of that ocean of mana, but instead I was fighting against it, pressing outward, expanding to cover more and more of the continent with my senses. The feeling of peace faded, and I was once again aware of the dragons massing around the shield, my tense soldiers and scientists filling the small space, and the dispatch from Nico in my hands.

As my untethered mind reached across Sapin, Darv, and Elenoir, I felt those places where the mana was distorted by aether brush against the surface of my senses. In each place, there was a strong presence of aether mingled with the mana signature of Gray’s dragon bond. Based on what Nico had said, each one was likely a conjuration, a shell of mana housing a core of densely packed aether.

The closest was the Wall, and after that an isolated place deep in the Elenoir Wastes. This, by comparison, was a tiny blip barely sensible against the gray emptiness due to the lack of atmospheric mana. The outskirts of the wasteland were like storms where new mana rushed into the void, but the interior of Elenoir was still nearly empty of it.

The third signal to appear was in central Darv, where I thought the Dicathian rebels’ refuge must have been, which was discovered after Arthur’s escape from the Victoriad. It was stronger and brighter than the Wall. Not by a significant margin, but the difference was clear.

Others became visible as well, near the city of Etistin and on an island off the south-eastern coast of the Beast Glades, and then more still as my consciousness expanded to contain the entire continent.

But most of these matched the Wall in intensity, and I quickly wrote them off as decoys. We already had troops moving in those areas, which aligned perfectly with where we’d seen increased military activity, and they would verify whether or not Grey was really in each location without help from me.

The signatures in the Wastes and in Darv, though, were different. One nearly hidden, the other burning brighter and stronger than all the others. Neither had been a focal point of Dicathian troop buildup or fortification, like the Wall had been. Both were far enough from civilization to avoid collateral damage if the locations were attacked.

And both, I knew from Tessia’s shared memories, were important to him.

The emanation I could sense from Elenoir was very close to where the capital city of Zestier used to be. He had lived there—with Tessia—for much of his childhood. And the buried village beneath Darv was where he went when the Dicathians lost the war, where he was reunited with his mother and sister after Agrona very nearly captured them.

Either Grey is trying to hide where he thought I wouldn’t be able to sense him—in Elenoir, where there is little mana to give him away—or he failed to perfectly replicate his own aetheric signature, which causes a stronger disruption in the mana than these false beacons he has created. Either way, he has made a mistake. But which direction does that mistake lean?’

I struggled to bring to mind everything I knew about Grey from our world and combine it with what I’d learned of him in his life as Arthur Leywin.

The ancient mages’ village makes sense, if Arthur was confident in his ability to disguise his real position, my thoughts continued. To provide so many false positives only to hide where his real signature couldn’t be sensed at all within Elenoir would truly be the act of a coward.

‘Arthur isn’t a coward,’ Tessia thought matter-of-factly.

And yet, either way, he hides while his allies fight and die to conceal his location, I answered.

Tessia soberly considered my words and didn’t respond right away.

I agree with you, I thought to Tessia, making up my mind. He isn’t a coward. But he is overconfident in his own abilities.

The moment I decided on a course of action, I was presented with another problem.

Standing, I left the meager cover of the shielding artifacts and inspected the smooth shield that wrapped around our location, extending high into the air to contain the rift. A secondary ring of artifacts projected distorting mana directly into the rift, preventing anyone from coming through from the other side.

But I was kept within the shield just as effectively as the horde of dragons were kept out. I could penetrate the barrier, of course, but doing so would expose me to Charon’s army, and would even momentarily open up the equipment inside to their attacks. That wasn’t acceptable. I ignored the fact that Agrona would definitely find my abandoning my post to be equally unacceptable; if I brought him Grey, however, I knew that he would forgive me.

I flagged down Lorcan, the Wraith assigned to support me and deliver my orders down to all the others. Scarred and pale with jagged, unnaturally shaped horns, Lorcan had an unpleasant look to him, but he was a real soldier. He lacked the self-importance of so many of the other Wraiths and pursued Agrona’s goals feverishly and without question. “Legacy?” he asked, his ruby eyes empty of anything except expectation.

“The situation has changed, and I am needed out in the field,” I explained perfunctorily. “I’m leaving you in command of the rift. Keep the Instillers on task and the shielding arrays functional, and I have no doubt everything will continue to unfold as predicted.”

If Lorcan was surprised, he gave no indication. “Of course, Legacy. At the High Sovereign’s will.”

I nodded in dismissal, and he returned to the air to go notify the leaders of each Wraith battle group.

Returning to the relative solitude between two of the shield artifacts, I sat down cross-legged and waited. It had been maybe thirty minutes since Charon had arrived and the occasional attacks against the shield ceased. I didn’t think they would wait much longer before attempting an assault with their leader present.

While I waited, I extended my senses out through the ground, feeling for where the shield emanated and closed off beneath us, as well as where the soil was softest. If I were to leave, I needed to do so unnoticed if I planned to search for Grey without being hounded by the dragons.

Five more minutes passed in relative silence, then all at once, the atmosphere outside of the shield transformed into a storm of mana, the air going white as if we were caught in the heart of a lightning bolt. The hair on my arms lifted at the charge in the air, and my skin was prickled with gooseflesh. The ground and sky alike split open as dozens of asuran spells crashed against the shield.

I took hold of the earth-attribute mana, and the soil flowed like water, allowing me to sink down into it. At the same time, I clenched tightly onto my mana, preventing even the tiniest leak that might be sensible as a moving mana signature. To more completely camouflage myself, I smoothed over any movement in the atmospheric mana that might provide some hint of my whereabouts to the sensitive dragons.

The noise of the battle changed from the sharp crack of thunder to the deep rumble of an avalanche. Earth-attribute mana projected me forward through the ground itself, which folded out of the way before filling back in behind me as if I were swimming through the hard-packed dirt.

The tangible force that made up the barrier loomed in front of me. Reaching into it, I took hold of a thread of that mana and pulled. Like the seam in stitched fabric, it came undone, and I passed through. I waited on the other side for a few moments until the barrier healed itself, powered by the constant pressure of the array of artifacts above, then continued.

Even with my nearly perfect control of mana, it was still more difficult and slower to part the earth and the network of roots woven through it than to fly through air. But since the dragons could range so far so quickly, and more were still trickling in from across the continent, I wanted to ensure I wouldn’t be detected, and so I flowed along deep under the ground for a long time. Dungeons and caves dotted the landscape of the Beast Glades, but I maneuvered around them rather than slow my progress further by going through.

‘If Arthur is really unable to defend himself, then he has no choice but to hide. And his friends—all the people who love him—defend him willingly,’ Tessia said out of the blue.

It took me a moment to connect her thoughts to our previous conversation. And do you? Really love him, I mean. I didn’t think I needed to ask, since our minds were connected, but Tessia’s emotions around Grey were complex and difficult to parse even when she wasn’t trying to disconnect me from them.

‘I have since I was just a little girl,’ she said after a very long pause. ‘He was my first love, I think.’

But now you know what he is. Who he is. That he lied to you the entire time you’ve known him. With all that baggage, can you still really love him?

‘I don’t think Arthur ever pretended to be anyone except who he really was,’ she answered slowly, forming every word with care. ‘I can only imagine how hard it must have been for him—the loneliness, the guilt of having to keep such a secret.’

He lied to you because he had to, I continued, my mental voice softening.

‘What other choice did he have?’ she asked. ‘I won’t pretend I understand what it means to build emotionally on top of all this. Is the love of a child real? Maybe not. But I know that I care for him, respect him, and want him to have a happy life after all this. If that isn’t a foundation for real love, then I’m not sure what is.’

Her words helped me give context to my own complex emotions. I feel pretty much the same about the lies Nico helped Agrona placed in my head. They were for a purpose, and Nico felt like he had to do that. It was for my own good, like Grey to you.