The Dark of Night (22)

I gathered the ether around me like the embrace of a long-lost love.

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I made my way down the mountain, pushed by a brisk wind at my back, and buoyed by the exhilaration of surviving the Mountain Folly, of still having access to my Art, and of sheer freedom.

Faced with the two other revelations, of the location of both my mother and brother, I needed time to ponder. 

In Agali, I was a fugitive. How could I possibly investigate my father's death in a nation of boundary magicks and farsending restrictions?

Mother had the answers to my questions, but after the disastrous visit to Agali, I was not willing to farsend into the unknown to join her in the South without warning and under unknowable circumstances.

Which left me with one available option.

It all hinged on my brother. I spied a place to sit and headed over to it. The Mountain Folly was far behind me, and the ether flowed freely.

I followed the connection to my brother, and quickly discerned that he was sleeping. Of course. He was much further west, and still under the dark of night.

I got to my feet and gathered the ether around me like the embrace of a long-lost love. I farsended. 

*

My fireplace was cold and bare, the room dark and long deserted. I conjured a light above my palm and took a few moments to just be myself in my own space.

I didn't indulge myself for long.

I realized the depth of my hunger and changed my plans. I farsended directly to the kitchen, knowing it would be deserted at this early hour.

I found fruits and pies and filled a plate with different delights.

I farsended back to my chambers, not because they were my destination, but because certain protections prevented me from farsending directly to that place without the aid of the Lanstone. At this level of the house, the four outer towers of Azillan all connected to the central tower, and I walked that corridor, eating as I went.

Crossing into the central tower, I felt the protections wash over me. I crossed the landing, passed the Chamber of Sleepers, and entered the Lanstone Chamber.

I settled myself into the "guest" chair, a place where I'd received countless lectures from my father. For this reason, among others, the form that flickering into existence, on the other side of the broad desk, had a face notoriously celebrated, equal in fame and infamy, a face that had not seen life for more than fourteen thousand years, the face of Azil.

My brother had mocked my choice.

A person's choice of Lanstone locutor is not set in stone, but I never had any desire to see the Lanstone as anyone else, not with all my brother's mockery and teasing, and not with all the lectures on arrogance and hubris I received from Father. For me, Azil, as the founder of the lan, savior of the whole Kinnon system of government, and originator of the Curse itself, was the only ancestor I ever needed to understand or wanted to interact with. I thought it a much more suitable choice than Alariyon's.

Azil leaned forward and steepled his fingers on the desk, the bizarre folds of the ancient attire shifting uncannily. "I did not expect to see you back here quite so soon."

"I didn't want to eat alone," I quipped.

"That isn't what I meant."

I knew that, of course. "Is Alariyon expected back today?"

"No, not for a few days. He's anxious to see you. Should I alert him?"

"I'd rather you didn't. What does he know about what happened to me in Agali?"

"Only what Ollyna's letter said."

"And what did Mother's letter say, precisely?"

The Lanstone told me, but it seemed too banal, too pleasant. I couldn't quite believe it. I yearned to read it for myself, but I knew how difficult that would be. 

I had other questions. "You didn't know about Agali? That I was farsending into a trap?

Azil — the Lanstone personified — looked away in apparent discomfort, as if he were real. I wondered at how much a man resided in his Lanstone. It was a kind of immortality, but surely an imperfect one. 

Azil said, "Before he left for Agali, Aranon gave me a number of very specific instructions. The relevant ones I will share with you.

"First, he forbade me from revealing any detail of Agali to either you or Alariyon."

"What was he hiding?"

"I couldn't say."

"You mean you can't say, or you won't say."

"I mean that I don't know."

"How can you not know? You're here in the perfect likeness of a man who died fourteen millennia ago. You should be able to tell me everything about his life, and his death!"

"Agreed. If not for the second thing. He had me sever his mental connection with me, although not the physical connection."

"What? That makes no sense! If there was an emergency, he'd be unable to farsend home to safety! Why would he do such a thing?"

"The third thing was that if something were to happen to him--"

"He knew he was going to die?"

"It seems he suspected the possibility, at least. If something happened to him, he fully expected Alariyon to send you to bring him home and find out what had happened. And if Alariyon didn't come to this conclusion on his own, I was to suggest it to him."

"Did he?"

"Yes. He knew his first duty was to Kinona."

"Hmmm. Good old Alariyon."

"The fourth thing is a message from him, that when you eventually returned, I was to tell you that he was sorry, and that he hoped you now understood."

"I don't. But he said the word 'eventually'?"

"He did."

"He knew what would happen to me. He wanted it to happen. Why?"

"I believe he expected you to find out the truth."

"Why not just let you tell me?"

"He was afraid."

"Of what? Agali?"

"Perhaps. All I know of Agali now comes from my connection to you and Ollyna."

"What about Grandfather? Did he go to Agali?"

"He did ... but there was a regime change there, and he was too busy with ... other things to investigate."

"Is there anything at all that might be relevant?"

"Only things that echo your own experience. The Agalins are highly adept at the Art, and they have peculiar ideas about some things. They were always cautious about foreigners, although they had ties in the South."

"The South? You mean, the Southern Continent?"

"Yes."

"What ties?"

"Kinship. They were invaded from the South more than three millennia ago. Their ruling class proudly claims to descend from those ancient kings."

Father had been afraid of what the Agalins might force him to do, and so prevented their ability to do it, even though that cut him off from safety.

He sent me into danger, deliberately. He knew what he was doing. I was expendable, and Alariyon was not. It didn't matter that Mother and I might be forced to do things by the Agalins. Or was it that Mother and I couldn't be forced because we didn't have access to what they wanted? Something that only the Lanarch of Azillan could provide them with?

The list of such things was very short.

Continue reading with Part 23.