Chương 40: Part 40 - Signs and Portents

visit I dismissed the cultists at the foot of the mountain as ignorant and misguided. Today's encounter showed that they are still such, but as they have somehow found arms, armor and allies we cannot dismiss them so easily. On our next expedition I fear that we may be the ones dismissed. Every movement of my hands, every line of script we survey seems to carry double its weight now that I know this may be our last chance to perform the duty that is our birthright.

Damn these savages and their jealousy - they worship something far less perfect than they - Unattributed fragment, early Aejha script on unknown material. Royal archives (restricted), Ce Raedhil. It was dark in the control room, the overhead lights dimmed from their normal glare in deference to those who were sleeping indoors.

It was one of many small benefits stemming from Maja's increased leeway - she was now able to suggest courses of action rather than simply responding to requests, and had informed them that more granular control was possible. Arguably the lighting was less important than relaxing the authorization restrictions on the elevator and some of the interior doors, but Jackie wasn't wandering around the hallways.

The gentle starlight now filtering through the window, however - she cherished that as she lay in her makeshift sickbed, playing idly with Gusje's hair. Gusje had long-since fallen asleep, tired from a stressful day and profoundly relieved not to be the sole point of contact for Maja anymore. She muttered something in her sleep as Jackie carefully extricated herself from the bed, wincing at every shift of her splinted arm. Once upright she began to walk along the gentle curvature of the windows.

The control room was assertively quiet. For the first time the cavernous space felt every bit as sacrosanct as the Sjocelym claimed it to be. The valley below was midnight-black in the rare cloudless night, and in the far distance she could see the faint twinkle of lights that marked the Aesvain encampment. A muffled curse drew her attention forward, and she saw a figure hunched over near the corner of the room, turning a softly-glowing object over in its hands. She frowned and quickened her pace.

"Are you sure it's a good idea to mess with that?" she asked. Mark looked up from the tablet with an annoyed expression.

"It's not like we've got a spare," he muttered, keeping his voice low.

"Jesse can't even get close to the thing without it zapping him, and Arjun is distracted with Maja. I was going to try and unplug the crystal to see if that would let Maja fix it up again." She raised an eyebrow, noting the glowing crystal still in its socket.

"Not going well, I take it."

"Nah, it's really stuck in there," he said, frowning at the offending crystal.

"And it doesn't look like it's running down its charge at all, so we can't just wait for it to lose battery."

"You're not concerned that it's going to zap you?" Jackie asked.

"You saw what it did to Jesse. If it's defending itself then it might object to having the crystal yanked out." Mark sighed and scratched his head, letting the tablet drop to his side.

"Well, I figured that it didn't really notice me before, so I could just grab the crystal and be done with it. What's it going to zap me with if I've got its power source?" He shrugged.

"Turns out it doesn't really matter, the crystal is stuck in there pretty good. Even if it noticed me it doesn't seem like it felt threatened." There was a dejected note in Mark's voice, and Jackie walked over to lean against the window near him.

"What, you were hoping it would shock you?" she asked reproachfully.

"No," Mark replied, looking away.

"It's just-" He shook his head and sighed.

"I dunno," he said.

"We've got a lot of problems right now, and I'd like to be able to help with one of them."

"Hey, it's not so bad," Jackie said.

"I don't think I've done anything useful yet. Don't worry, I'm sure we're not done with the sort of trouble you can solve with a hammer."

"Don't sell yourself short," Mark muttered.

"Jyte said some things earlier that made me think a bit. Back in Sjan Saal - well, I guess I could have approached things differently, tried a different tactic here and there." He turned to look at Jackie with a somber expression.

"I could have listened to you and Arjun more. I think I was solving problems with a hammer well before Ce Raedhil, and it didn't have to be that way." Jackie straightened up and shrugged, looking back over the darkened interior of the control room with its scattering of sleeping forms.

"It got us this far," she said.

"I actually think I was holding on a little too much to Earth, in the beginning. We're not there, and we can't count on things working the same way - especially not where the Sjocelym are concerned." She put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed.

"Still-" The tablet lit up in Mark's hand, and he dropped it with a whispered curse. Both Mark and Jackie stepped back hurriedly to stare at the tablet as it lay on the floor, the screen already darkened. Mark cleared his throat, eyes wide.

"I'm not crazy, right?" he asked weakly.

"That turned on just now."

"Definitely," Jackie said, blinking at the hard-edged afterimage the screen had left in her vision. Mark circled closer to it and tentatively picked up the tablet. It remained inert. He turned it over once in his hands, then shook his head.

"I hate to say it, Jack, but-""It was me," she muttered, clasping her hands together. She could feel the acid thread of panic snaking through her once more, and she fought to keep her voice steady.

"It turned on when I touched your shoulder. It recognizes the - the things she left inside me." She swallowed, tasting bile, then held her uninjured hand out.

"Let me see it."

"I'm not sure that's a good idea," Mark warned.

"For all we know it could try to patch up the script that we broke." Jackie kept her hand out.

"Can't do that when the arm is still broken," she said.

"Besides, when she scripted the tablet she thought she'd be the one driving me around. I don't think it would be set up to hurt me."

"Yeah, but she was fucking nuts," Mark countered.

"Who's to say she didn't screw it up, or make it dangerous by accident? She was willing to kill Gusje to ride along with her, I'm sure she didn't think any differently about you."

"You're not wrong," Jackie said grimly.

"I'll drop it if I feel anything out of the ordinary, I just…" She swallowed and flexed her fingers.

"I need to know more about what she did to me. If part of that is tied up with the tablet, then I'm not going to hide from it." Mark hesitated for a moment before placing the tablet gently in Jackie's outstretched hand. The screen blared to life the instant she touched the case, shining the blue-white color of the sky where it touched the horizon. There were no images or text, even after Jackie tentatively prodded the screen with her finger.

"You good?" Mark asked.

"Any strangeness?"

"I'm fine," she replied distantly.

"Whatever it's set up for, I don't think I know how to use it. Maybe you have to be a crazy dead goddess to make it work." She frowned, turning it over. There was an odd buzzing in her ears, and the light from the tablet seemed to pulse.

"Wait, I'm getting something," she mumbled.

"I think you should put it down," Mark said.

"Let's wait until more people are awake-" His voice cut off, and Jackie looked up from the tablet in surprise. She was standing in a long gallery lined on each side with small alcoves. Cold light streamed in from above to cast harsh-edged shadows over the stone. A glimmer at the periphery of her vision made her look down at her right arm - healed, whole and unbandaged, but gleaming from fingertips to mid-forearm with an intricate tracery of lines that webbed over her skin like molten copper.

"What the fuck?" she muttered, holding up her hand to look at it. The air stole her voice away, deadening the sound to inaudibility. She took a few steps towards the nearest alcove, which was flanked with twin braziers that rippled the air above them despite holding no flame that she could see. Beyond them lay a pedestal, and atop that was a blurry, impossible mass that hurt her eyes to look at. It shifted amorphously, like a hole in her field of vision, but as she looked she could see faint patterns.

She blinked, feeling tears on her cheeks - and Tija's face was there, staring back at her out of the impossible nothingness with a serene smile. Jackie shouted in alarm and jumped back, dropping the tablet- -and found herself in the control room with Mark, who was looking at her with surprise and concern. The tablet lay between them on the ground, screen reflecting crisp points of starlight from beyond the window. Jackie's heart thundered in her ears, and she felt nauseous.

"What was that?" she rasped, staring sidelong at the tablet.

"What the hell just happened?"

"You tell me," Mark said, walking over to get a closer look at her.

"You were staring off at nothing for a few seconds, then you twitched like the tablet shocked you and dropped it on the ground."

"I saw…" Jackie said, trailing off as she struggled to organize the experience in her head. It was jumbled, like a dream that was sliding away as she woke. Her impressions were scattered, and more than anything she just saw that face, that smiling face. She shuddered and turned away from the tablet.

"I don't know what I saw. There's definitely something going on, though." Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"Do you want to see what Maja can find out about it?" Mark asked.

"No!" Jackie said, surprising herself with the outburst. She coughed and lowered her voice.

"No, I don't think that would be a good idea." Mark gave her a suspicious look.

"You sure you're all right?" he asked.

"You don't seem all right."

"I'm fine," Jackie said.

"It was just - really strange. I need to, ah." She blinked, then shook her head.

"I don't know. Let me think about it, see if anything shakes loose. But whatever you do - don't mess with that tablet any more. Just leave it until we can figure out more about it."

"You think it's dangerous?" Mark asked. Jackie shivered, her mind's eye tracing the outline of a high ceiling dappled with harsh light, the yawning space stretching off until it was lost in infinite depths.

"Yeah," she said, rubbing her fingers over her broken arm and remembering the web of fire.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's dangerous."

"That wasn't a good idea," Jesse said, giving Mark a reproachful look. The effect was somewhat diminished when the icy mountaintop wind forced him to squint and shield his eyes. It gusted fitfully for another few seconds before calming, leaving the two men standing alone on the rocky path up to the Sanctum. Mark scratched his head sheepishly.

"I mean, sure," he said.

"But Jackie wasn't going to take no for an answer. You've seen how she's been since she ran into Tija, she's not holding up nearly as well as she's pretending." He rubbed idly at his fingers, trying to massage away the chill.

"If she wants to face it head-on, do I have the right to stop her?"

"It's not just about how she's dealing with the attack," Jesse replied, shaking his head.

"She's uniquely vulnerable to Tija's scriptwork, since she's carrying some as well. If she was marked by another vinesavai then it might have a protective effect, since they would sort of repel each other. For two scripts from the same origin, however, they'd interact much more easily…" He trailed off with a troubled look on his face, his left hand sliding over to grasp his right forearm. Mark gave him a quizzical look.

"You okay?" he asked. Jesse released his arm and shook his head, turning away from another blast of chill wind.

"Just lost in thought," he muttered.

"In any case, we should keep Jackie away from the tablet until we've had a chance to look at it. If she says it's dangerous, then I believe her - Tija made it to destroy Eryha, and I bet she wasn't too concerned with collateral damage."

"No bet," Mark chuckled, leaning on his hammer. The Fragment's head shifted against the icy scree on the path with a soft clink. For several seconds there was no noise but the soft moaning of the wind over the rocks, toying with the sparse tufts of vegetation that clung between the rocks. Both men straightened up as one when a small glint of light flashed from below, just above the cloud layer. It took minutes more before they could see a line of dark shapes ascending the mountain.

There were nearly forty men, armored and cloaked in the same fashion as the two guards they had encountered when they first arrived. Mark and Jesse exchanged a glance, and as the ascending party drew closer they stood motionless in the center of the trail - Jesse with his hands loose at his side, and Mark with the Fragment resting head-down in front of him. They could tell when the others saw them, as there was a momentary pause in their climbing followed by a frantic ripple of activity.

Mark restrained a smile as he saw them form back up and resume their climb with renewed vigor. With all the recent chaos, the opportunity for a little fun was more than welcome. Zhevo shivered as another gust cut through the thick fabric of his cloak. Svota Qa had insisted that the group go up in full kit, and the already-strenuous climb had left them all drenched in rapidly chilling sweat. The man's face was as unreadable as ever, but Zhevo knew that something had him rattled.

It was an open secret at the garrison abbey that the last shift of keepers hadn't returned on schedule. That couldn't be the whole of it, though. Accidents happened. Keepers had died several times up in the icy holdfast, whether from exposure or accidental falls down the treacherous slopes. They failed to report in one day, and a larger group would be sent up after them - one pair to take over the watch, and the rest to carry any remaining bodies down.

It was rare that any trace remained, however, since the mountain liked to keep what it killed. Zhevo often wondered how many keepers lay strewn around its slopes, locked under ice and rock for all time. He shivered again. They weren't expecting to fight the mountain, though. They were armed for battle, but who could be up at the holy Sanctum? There was one way in, and one way out.

Patrols had been particularly tight on account of some fugitives, lately, but there was no way they could have slipped past their cordon. The walls of the abbey neatly blocked off the sole access to the foot of the mountain, so anyone seeking to ascend had to contend with the garrison or with sheer cliffs that beggared even the abbey's steep defensive walls. The line came to a halt suddenly, and Zhevo almost ran into the man ahead.

A ripple of confusion made its way up and down the file; he craned his head to look up. For only the second time in his life he saw the Sanctum's peaked ramparts towering over the mountainside. A flood of warmth flushed through him, and he felt excitement banish his fatigue in a flurry of rapid heartbeats. It wasn't excitement that had stopped the march, however. Someone pointed at a spot further up the trail, and Zhevo turned to look.

Two men stood silhouetted against the icy rock just slightly down from the summit. He frowned. His perspective seemed funny - they were still far away, but they seemed unnaturally close. Were they just very tall? He gripped his pike, staring intently enough that he missed the first shouts to reform the line and continue their ascent. There was a tension in the column now, and they marched as one. None kept strictly to marching pace on a climb like this, but with observers present…

well, even if he didn't know who they were, he wouldn't permit them to see the abbey's men in anything less than peak form. His boots slammed into the rock in concert with his squadmates, echoing sharply off the rock faces above. They were closer, now, and he could see the men more clearly. Jaa tseve, but they were tall! One was leaning on some sort of haft, shorter than his companion and with unnaturally pale skin, while the other was dark-complected with a sword at his hip.

Zhevo nearly missed a step as things began to click together in his head. It was no secret that the damned scriptsmiths had been braying about an asaarim lately, and he had heard that the man and his companions were odd in appearance. He had also heard that the asaarim's party had fallen out with the scriptsmiths rather suddenly, although the stuffy old carvers had been loath to divulge any details. And there had been talk of fugitives in the area…

Zhevo was sweating again, and it had nothing to do with the strain of the climb. They finally came to a halt several paces away from the two men. Between their stature and their position up the trail, they seemed to loom impossibly tall over their group. Svota Qa stepped forward and cleared his throat, standing with one hand on the pommel of his sword.

"You stand on land sacred to Maja," he called out, his voice admirably steady after the climb.

"Identify yourselves and your purpose." The pale man smiled broadly, waving one hand at them in a carefree manner.

"Hi, guys," he called down, his speech strangely accented.

"Around these parts they call me Mariq Ry. This here is my buddy Zhesi Ce Asaarim." A murmur ran through the line, and Svota Qa's second turned back to give them an icy glare as the abbot-captain responded.

"We had been told to expect you near our holdings, although we had thought to find you coming up from the lowlands," Svota called back.

"How did you slip our watch?" The two men exchanged a look before the pale one turned back to Svota Qa.

"I'll tell you how we got past your men if you tell us how you knew we were in the area," he said. Svota Qa hesitated only a moment before speaking.

"You carry a token from Ce Raedhil, an asu je ahetivat. They can be tracked from the city, although they only provide a bearing outside of its borders." What the pale man said next eluded Zhevo's ears, although he thought he caught the name "Sigu" spoken with exasperated tones.

"Well, thanks for that," the man called back.

"As for how we got past your men - we didn't," he replied, a smile curling his lips.

"We've never been closer than this to Draatyn Asidram, although I've heard nothing but lovely things about it." Svota Qa scowled, fidgeting with his sword.

"There were two men living atop the mountain before you arrived," he said.

"What have you done with them?" All of the levity fled from the man's face, and Zhevo saw his commander's grip tighten on his sword.

"Those two attacked us," the man said.

"Unfortunately, that didn't work out for them." Another ripple of unease ran through the column. Zhevo hadn't known either of the dead men well, but he was relatively new to the abbey. Many of the men on this expedition had volunteered specifically because they knew the keepers, and confronted with the plain admission of responsibility for their deaths the file was beginning to grow restless. The man saw it too. Something shifted in his stance, and his companion let his hand drift to the hilt of his sword.

There was an odd shift in the air, and suddenly Zhevo found his eyes drawn to the dark-skinned stranger despite his total silence through their confrontation. The air felt newly crisp, the colors of the mountainside sharp and clear.

"You admit to killing two of our brothers," Svota Qa shouted, squaring his shoulders against the odd pressure from the two men.

"You trespass on holy ground. Either of these crimes would merit death. Come with us willingly and it will at least be swift." The pale man's lips twisted into a smile.

"Friend," he said, lifting his hammer to his shoulder, "has anyone ever told you that you've got a gift for persuasion? Because if they did, they were lying." Svota Qa drew his sword, baring his teeth at the men.

"Mockery will not save you," he growled.

"Our blades are the instruments of Maja's will. He will-""Nah," the man said, interrupting Svota Qa mid-tirade.

"I hate to break it to you guys, but Maja's just not that into you." He grinned wider as a vein began to pulse in Svota Qa's forehead.

"Honestly, you're less of a group of favored servants and more just… annoying squatters."

"You dare," Svota spat, striding forward on a wave of outrage that swelled from the men behind him.

"You dare speak on behalf of Maja?" Zhevo felt himself moving on the tide of anger, felt it nibbling at the edges of his reasonable fear of the oddly large and confident men standing in front of them. It didn't matter if he was new, he was devout - and nobody would speak that manner of blasphemy- The pale man began to laugh.

"Me, speak for Maja?" he chuckled.

"Wow, no. Believe me when I say that nobody wants that. No, the new spokesman for Glorious and Shiny Maja is this gentleman right here." He gave his companion a pat on the shoulder and stepped back. The taller man drew his sword and held it in front of him.

"Maja," he said. His voice was deep and sonorous, and now that the sword's blade was bare Zhevo found his eyes drawn even more strongly.

"Please address the trespassers." There was a pregnant pause in which Svota Qa sneered and advanced further, only to stop in horror as a pillar of glowing light sprang up from the rock behind the two men. It seemed to knit itself together from sunsets and forgefire, shaping into the image of a man several times taller than even the two giants who had summoned it. He was handsome and muscular, clad in plain robes that nevertheless seemed fit for a king by mere proximity to His holy physique.

"You have displeased me," Maja rumbled, his voice shaking pebbles loose from the mountain. Zhevo felt his knees give out, collapsing to the rocky trail and bowing his head in sheer terror.

"Descend, and do not return without my leave." Zhevo was moments from turning to flee down the slope, decorum be damned - but then he heard the crunch of footsteps on rock and raised his head to see Svota Qa walking forward with a blank, mad expression on his face.

"This is a trick," he breathed, his voice high and panicked.

"We are favored of Maja. I will not allow this blasphemy-" The dark-skinned man pointed his sword directly at Svota Qa, and Maja's gaze followed. There was a blinding flash of light, a clap of thunder that Zhevo felt more than heard - and when his eyes cleared, what little was left of Svota Qa was tumbling out of sight down the slope. He did not wait for Maja to speak again. Zhevo sprang to his feet, dropped his pike and ran downhill as fast as his legs could carry him.