Chương 278: Plotting and Pastry

All week running after a dozen projects: all the love interest quests, keeping up a facsimile of being a student attending school, keeping myself grounded with my friends, checking in on my foundry, updates to Lady Hanje, relaying messages to Septimus Ebonder, coordinating with the smugglers, researching temples, hassling Kralcit, building and iterating steam engines, stopping by for brief chats with Bruce, Petty, and Gedes- and of course, new inventions.

It's funny, lasers are surprisingly easy to make if you have perfect control over glass, corundum and electricity. There's a reason that Earth invented them long before they had figured out any real commercial use for them. Well, we've got motion detectors, analog rangefinders and I'm working on a point-to-point communication system. Even without electronic components I can do a lot with them.

And we're not going to have circuit-board computing any time soon, Nux, understandably, went bonkers for them when I showed him how they could be used to cut or burn. Now he's working on a void-powered megawatt laser cannon. It's kind of flattering: for a man who thinks only of violence, I'm the ultimate weapon. My life sure has taken some odd turns. I had other stuff scheduled for this Sixthday: I had been planning to take my friends out to a chocolate shop for snacks and cocoa.

But instead, Larianne and I are getting called out on the carpet to talk with "Uncle Septy". I am confident that he would kill me stone dead if he knew I even jokingly referred to him that way in my thoughts. Unlike most of my ongoing matters, he was impatient and wanted answers right damn now. So now we're going to meet the Marquis and his wife Rosselin for breakfast. And I've been told to keep my day clear. He does not strictly speaking have the authority to command me at his whim like that. I don't care.

He's got the highest combat stats I've ever seen and he can send ghosts that would make my death look like natural causes. I'm not saying he would kill me for annoying him or defying him. I'm just saying that it's so much easier to never find out. We all met at a nice little diner not far from the school. Close enough that we just took a carriage rather than dealing with the annoying downsides of portal transportation.

"He's my dad's brother," Larianne said out of nowhere halfway through the ride. With as little as she normally speaks, I wasn't even going to try to start a conversation during the ride.

"Well, one of many. Grandpa had a lot of sons. I'm lucky I had a whole county to inherit."

"His name means 'seventh', doesn't it?" I said.

"Is it unusual for seventh-born to inherit?"

"In every house but this one," she said somberly.

"Everyone else likes their primogeniture and eldest children, but Ebonder tradition holds that seventh-born are lucky. And powerful. About half of the marquises of Tumnassed have the same names. Either seventh son born or the seventh daughter born, either way. And the tradition seems to work. It's especially powerful when there's a seventh-born of a seventh-born. Uncle is a continuation of that. Extremely powerful caster."

"Stands to reason," I said, nodding.

"I wouldn't be surprised if he's the seventh seventh in a row, six seventhborn fathers ahead of him." Larianne nodded.

"Exactly. And how do you know that?"

"Because he's unbelievably strong," I said.

"I've run across enough powerful mages. Grand high masters and high grandmasters. None of them measured up, he's in a class by himself."

"And again," Larianne said, "how do you know that? He has never discussed this with you. You've never seen him use a spell. His abilities are one of our house's most well-kept secrets."

"Uh." She looked at me, visibly disappointed.

"Visions, right? You already knew when you first saw him. To all the other dukes and marquises and protectors you are deferential and polite. When you met my uncle, you looked quite frightened. Not respectful or wary, you looked at him like you would bolt if he moved too suddenly."

"I might have, if he had."

"And, so easy to get you to confirm it out loud. I am concerned by those visions, Princess. You know far too many secrets, I think you sometimes forget which ones are supposed to be secrets." I slouched down, annoyed, and dropped my chin onto my fist.

"All right, so I did forget that other people can't just perceive relative power levels. But it could be anything! He might secretly be a mana warrior, a sorcerer, a very powerful scrivener! I'm not going to give up the how and why, at least." She let me sulk a minute. Then she asked, "What's it like?"

"Which?"

"Power. Perceiving it directly." I chuckled.

"Not as dynamic as you make it seem. It doesn't work on everyone, noncombatants don't register, nor do people who I am personally very close with. It really only shows me people or things that might be a danger to me. But for those? It's pretty plain."

"Sounds like that would be hard to interpret," she mused.

"Nah. After the practice I've had, the signs are easy to read," I said. Like plain bold text, really. She was silent just a little longer.

"So, you can actually just look and see, that easily? You can look at someone and tell whether you can kick their ass or not, or whether they'd kick your ass."

"Usually." She did not hide her smile.

"This explains so much about you." I raised an eyebrow and unslouched.

"What does that mean?" The carriage rolled to a stop.

"Oh, we're here, let's not keep them waiting." She opened the door and let the footman carefully take her hand to help her down. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"What does that mean, Larianne?" I demanded.

"We're not done! We're gonna follow up on this!" The maîtresse d' looked as nervous as I felt. She looked freaked because there's a marquis in the corner table, and she was feeling the pressure. I was freaked because I was headed to have a chat with a man who is also a tactical nuclear warhead, and I've made it my business to get between him and what he wants to do. It's not my favorite position to be in. Larianne walked right up and pulled out her seat, so I did the same, pausing to bow slightly.

"Marquis. Marquess. A pleasure," I said, and started to sit.

"You're polite," Septimus said, "but I know full well that you had other plans before I called for you. Which, I know full well, was rude of me. So now you've shown me up twice. And that makes you the rude one. Now then, I ordered enough pastries to stuff a mattress, so eat your fill when they arrive. I ordered right away so we don't get interrupted too much. So you can tell me everything about the lich problem at your school. So come on and spill it. Time is liches." The woman at his side offered me her hand.

"Rosselin Ebonder," she said. [Marquess Rosselin Ebonder. Strength 23. Damage 23.] Sure, that figures. I accepted her hand open-palmed, with a nod.

"Marquess Ebonder, I am Princess Natalie Harigold of Meadowtam. We've met once before, at the dedication for the children's hospital. We discussed the growing season of greenhouse roses."

"Oh, yes! I recall now. Wonderful to renew your acquaintance." Septimus rolled his eyes up to implore the heavens.

"Now my wife makes me look bad. Everyone's so rude! Lianne, make sure you don't start."

"Lianne is Gaius's daughter," she said gently.

"I'm Larianne. Tiberius is my father." Rosselin patted Septimus's shoulder.

"You are quite hopeless, dear. But your family is very forgiving." Do they not know this man has enough power to sink warships? I was not comfortable like this. It's difficult for me to watch such easy familiarity with someone I know to be so dangerous. Which, honestly, maybe should tell me something about myself, since I have worked so hard to be powerful and at the same time lost the ability to be easy and familiar with my own family. Am I jealous of Septimus Ebonder?

"As to what you were saying, Marquis," I said smoothly, as I conjured an air barrier to dampen sound, "I confirmed that there's a healed-over thorn. And, I know exactly where. But, there's no way to get at it without removing it." Larianne fanned her fingernails.

"I suppose there's a way. Depending on where it is."

"Well, it's under her skirt, so that will be quite impossible," I told her.

"Wager?" she said sweetly, her nails clicking faintly. I've seen what she can do with those talons when she took them to frenzied fish-monsters. I've never even heard of a mana warrior that uses their own fingernails, but seeing her in action recommends it highly. There's some trick to that, I'm sure. But also I'm trying not to be too weird about this. It's occurred to me that this might be the most dangerous table in the whole of Hearstwhile.

I'm a sorceress that can do cartography-level damage, and I'm likely the weakest one present. But no, I'm not going to encourage her to use her crazy magic-murder fingernails to stab Belisa in the leg. Not even as a joke. The pastries arrived, and it was as plentiful as Septimus promised. They were brought out on trays that were mounded so tall that I could not see below Septimus's chin. While everyone else immediately dug in, I took the chance to start my briefing.

"The main limitation I'm working against," I said to the three Ebonders, "is that I can't follow her. There's a spell that keeps me from staying with her when she walks or knowing where she goes. There's a mental component, and more.

Over the past week I've tried shadowing her, I've put ink on her shoes so I could follow her footprints, I've put tracking devices on her person, I've set perimeters, I've hired go-betweens, I've done a meticulous floor-by-floor search of the premises using senses nobody should even know that I have, let alone safeguard against. And it gets me nowhere. My path gets lost, ink stops leaving a trail, tracking devices are disabled, perimeters fail, and nobody else I bring in seems to be faring any better.

There's a very, very powerful spell effect stopping me, something very comprehensive. That should mean a huge amount of sigils scribed, but I can't find any on her. I've searched her things, I've scanned her clothes, her shoes. This is not a simple sigil you could carve and shape, this would need special inks, but they're just not there! I am fully at a loss." Septimus had powdered sugar on his chin and cheeks, and he swallowed too fast so he could answer me.

"Then we're back to Plan A. Start tearing it all open until we find the hidey-hole." Larianne grimaced at him.

"Uncle, don't break my school, please?"

"I'll pay for them to fix it," he promised. Larianne did not stop glaring. He held her gaze. She did not relent. He rolled his eyes in annoyance.

"Fine! I won't break the school. Unless I really have to." Rosselin touched his hair and he calmed a little. I spent this exchange eating pastries because they really were very good. Some were fruit filled or had jelly, some had cream cheese and were deliciously savory. Some were sugar-dusted, but even the 'plain' ones were light and flaky and buttery and delicious. I bit into one that had pockets of honey mixed into it. Septimus lowered his eyebrows at me.

"You said you had this under control."

"Yes your lordship," I said.

"I'm all the way to Plan J, but this is still under control. And I'll need your help, your resources. We start on Oneday."

"Start what?" Rosselin said sharply. I evaluate these two. He's impulsive in the way of people so powerful that they can do what they want without hesitating. I respect that, I often show the same habit. When things are tough I plan and overplan, when things are easy I just blow through minor opposition without second thoughts. To him, all opposition is minor opposition. I can offer him a solution and trust that he'll happily bulldoze any problems away. But she's more measured.

And I'll definitely need her approval for the plan as well. It's weird how they parallel the king and queen, Vobel and Czoverenne. And yet they are so very different, so close and attentive where the royals barely acknowledge each other.

"Well, Marquess Ebonder, we're going to set a trap for a lich. And we'll use his own bait to do it," I said.

"The answer is patently obvious because it's the only answer left. Our only way into this mess is through Belisa, who can only be found in one place at specific times. At all other times and places she's completely out of reach. So, on Oneday, after seventh bell, I need you to kidnap Miss Roadaway out of my classroom."

"And the lich will come after her?" Rosselin looked unconvinced.

"I don't think he'll have a choice," I said back. I paused to lick cream cheese off my thumb.

"He's linked to her, like he's linked to every potential body that he's prepared. But unlike those corpses, he needed a tether to keep her alive. She's not in stasis like a corpse would be, so she needed different handling. The thorn, the tether, holding her in her current state. And that tether has learned to grab and pull. I've taught it how, and it's gotten pretty strong. And it gets stronger the more it's neglected. The tether pulls, and it pulls hard, trying to acquire a soul of its own.

Usually it tries to siphon me directly. But I am quite sure that if I'm not available, it will keep building pressure." Larianne paused, she was following me here. She had a jelly roll most of the way to her mouth when she froze and spoke.

"So, she'll pull the lich. His soul is connected to her remotely. If she gets too far, he'll be dragged to her."

"Bodily?" Rosselin said.

"If he gets dragged to her, we can set traps. Assign guards. Liches are strong, but if we can drag him into the open he's not stronger than all our guards and warriors and mages. He would be easily captured, destroyed." Septimus was staring at me. He was calculating. He had a question for me and he already knew the answer. This was a test.

"And," he said to me over steepled fingers, "what if he simply releases his current corpus and lets the tether drag his soul in? He would possess the girl, and that is the one thing we did not want to happen."

"That's before we understood what the tether is doing in her," I said with a grin. I steepled my fingers back at him.

"If he possesses her, this will be even easier."