Chương 126: Chapter 112 - A Ridiculously Bad-Timed Problem

++If I took the time to flay and dismember everyone who defied my will, I would simply never get anything done. ++ - From the writings of Isabel Vornholt, 'The Great Lich'. 1, 891 A. E. I had told Aryqatan to ask away, and she did just that. She did so, and she did so far less relentingly and far more pointedly than Nu'chista. I had often found that the people most disadvantaged in Garamon's society were the most frustratingly competent. Or diligent, at least.

Aryqatan was clearly less sure of herself than she tried to seem, but she was aware of how to conduct this debriefing. This did not mean that she was skilled at getting the information she sought, however. There must have been someone in this army who was, there were too many men for none of them to possess such experience, but something was keeping the Demigods from taking advantage of that resource. Paranoia perhaps.

They suspected me, a Baron's daughter, and in their limited view of humans must have imagined that the less noble of us were all the less trustworthy. Hilarious. As amusing as this oversight was, it did not relax me enough to be negligent about my answers. I was still painfully aware how precipitous my position in Orapathaqi's garrison was, especially with how unhelpful I had been already.

My reports of Sethira's position and activities would already be yielding no fruit, and the longer they continued to do so, the more time and resources they wasted, the more suspicions against me would build. I wished I could have interrogated Agrian more on my way here, but that would have delayed me in answering Aryqatan's summons. At the moment I could not afford to offend the Demigods at all.

And it was not like speaking publicly with my brother would do much good anyway, if anything it would just cast doubt on why our stories lined up so perfectly. Besides, most of the things he had said, I had already figured out or heard myself by now. I simply needed to be careful. Aryqatan did not relax as she continued asking me. Some of her questions were ones I had been asked already, but rephrased or placed in a different order, clearly to trip me into giving a different response than before.

A lich's intellect was more than enough to avoid these traps, but I did not like that the Demigod had thought to set them. She really was far trickier than her peer. But not as tricky as me. Or at least not tricky enough to elevate suspicions into enough certainty that she could justifiably murder the child of a Baron. Perhaps I was fortunate not to have been born into a magician family after all.

"Alright, I will note this down, you're free to go for now," Aryqatan told me. Her voice had a note of irritation to it, which made me decide to make myself scarce fast. She was more reasonable than Nu'chista, in that I did not think she was likely to strike me down in a fit of rage if pushed too far, but that did not make me eager to try her patience any more than was necessary. I was swift as I headed away from her, pushing my body to move as fast as it could without the use of overt magic.

Apparently frivolous spellwork was considered impolite at best in Garamon, and dangerously irresponsible at worst. At least when there were witnesses. This social restriction would prove disastrous, because it delayed me in returning to my apartment by precious minutes. Enough so that I was still a good league or two from it when I felt the rush of magic that signified my guardian fae had been unleashed by an intruder. I reacted to that with magic, of course.

When I came to my apartment, or what was left of it, my first reaction was dread. I did not like this, usually I was the one to inspire that in others. Thus the name. But it could not be escaped now. The building was in tatters, one third of it blown clean apart with the rest looking gutted and burned. People were already swarming outside like ants on treacle, and I saw Garamon men among them. Magicians as well as ordinary soldiers. That more or less forced my decision.

I would have liked to be less rash, but there was simply no room for caution and patience anymore.

"NO!" I screamed, rushing towards the building. A man grabbed me, then another, strong arms holding me in place.

"Let me go!" I screeched.

"I need to get mother's locket, it's still in there, let me go!" They did not of course, not until a pulse of illusion magic made their hands spasm right open and freed my path forwards. I shot myself into the air with a burst of force and called on my shield charm to ward off the heat and smoke as I landed inside. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it It was not actually as bad as it looked.

Certainly not comfortable, but I imagined the average man would be able to walk around for at least a few minutes without dying. That did not mean I was going to undo my shield of course, I was very fond of this dress I was wearing. I was also very fond of my laboratory here, but I had already made peace with the fact that it was beyond saving now. I waded through the apartment and drew nearer to it, not surprised to find that my former workstation was the source of most of the blaze.

The air heated as I approached, heated enough that a blast furnace would only match the temperature if I held my hand inches from the molten metal. Were it not for my shield, the tears would be sizzling on my cheeks, my hair would be ablaze, and I would rather more closely resemble my old body still trapped in the Depths after a brief few minutes of exposure. Inside the lab, it was worse. This was no natural fire, I had collected certain alchemical substances which, evidently, had caught flame themselves.

At parts the curling fire was green or purple, at others it had the unique colours of magic that I remain unable to describe. Those latter areas, even I avoided with my shield. Fortunately, I was not here to salvage anything, and did not need to draw too close. I just needed to destroy any evidence that might damn me to a less friendly interrogation than the ones I had been enjoying so far. Heat was doing some of that for me, but I needed to add force to the mix.

I sent out explosive missiles that flooded the room with burning, supersonic debris, embedding it in the far walls or else striking my shield to shatter into dust. I conjured acid to drizzle down over the remnants, then ran lightning through what was left, and then managed some half-formed mimicry of my old disintegration spell. I threw out every variety of magic I could think of and stopped only when the flames of my laboratory stopped feeling magical themselves.

And when I felt another, more powerful presence approaching. When that happened I dropped down to my knees coughing and let the hands seize me, dragging my form from the apartment and out into the street. It was Nu'chista of course, either closer or quicker to respond than Aryqatan had been. He must still have been near the other side of Orapathaqi when the fire started. Remarkably fast.

"What in the world were you doing?" the Demigod snarled. People were around us, I saw through my peripheral vision. A roughly eighty-twenty split of Garamon soldiers and Estalian natives. The former were not nearly as numerous in the city as a whole, but were probably far less scared of being seen near a fire by the army.

"I…needed…" I feigned another coughing fit, if only because it made an excellent excuse to pause and think rather than answering right away. Unfortunately I came up with no better story than the cover I had already planted as I rushed in. I hated being forced to act quickly, it undercuts essentially every advantage of immortality.

"Locket, there… I had a locket in there, it is gone now," I finished weakly. The Demigod loomed over me like he was a guillotine blade waiting to fall. I could see him twitching, wavering. He had changed. My contact with Nu'chista had been fortunately limited since my return, and that had been deliberate on my part. The way he had reacted, and the orders he had started giving since, spoke of a deep-seated and unshakeable paranoia. The sort that led people to do stupid, self-destructive things.

It would not help me if the man who killed this new body suffered political consequences for it. Not even if Nglaru himself chose to devour his wayward servant to regain the power exerted in creating him. What would happen to me if that was done, I wondered. Would I be obliterated fully, unable to reform with my phylactery's connection interfered with? Would my spirit be snatched back into the Depths and cut off from the world for another eternity?

Pondering that almost made the long seconds before Nu'chista replied feel shorter.

"You have an answer for everything, don't you?" he asked me. It was not, I suspected, a compliment.

"Forgive me your Divinity," I croaked.

"I do not know what you mean." I was getting a bit old for the 'little girl' performance that had gotten me out of so many problems in the past. Fortunately, misogynists tend to see little girls in any woman up until the age of thirty. Unfortunately, Demigods are rather less bothered by gender than the mortals they lord their powers over.

"Save it," he snapped.

"Come with me. Call on your magic and you die instantly, we're going to get to the bottom of this and it won't be by listening to you explain everything this time." I felt my face burn. Around me, I was keenly aware of Godtouched sneering and magicians grinning. This was all too public for my tastes, and every damned syllable Nu'chista said against me was effectively another year spent building up my career. But I could do nothing about it, just nod meekly.

"Of course, your Divinity. I would not dream of defying you, please lead the way." Magicians were not of the Gods, and however useful we were, useful enough that Garamon still kept us around all these long millennia later, we were still not the equal of those whose powers came directly from the divine. Less controllable, less easily manipulated. Less known.

The Gods of Garamon had long ago felt the burn of trying to handle a willful magician, and now I was experiencing the consequences of teaching them that lesson first-hand. I got up off my knees and followed the towering Demigod as he led me from the scene. My gut felt like it was about to drop out of me as my mind whirred. Best case scenario, if I was not found guilty of anything or extrajudicially killed in some fit of temper, I was still looking like a setback to my political career and marriage prospects of…

Oh dear. Perhaps of an entire human lifespan.