Tessia Eralith
The gardens of the Royal Palace were finally starting to bloom again as winter reluctantly loosened its grip on the Elshire.
The last remnants of snow had completely melted into the dark, rich soil, and in their place came the first tentative shoots of green—small, fragile, but insistent.
I knelt among the flowerbeds, the morning sun warm on my back, and let the peace of it settle into my bones.
For this, today, I was tending to the flowers, obviously with Coco on my shoulder. Her tiny claws gripped the fabric of my dress, her weight a familiar comfort, and her golden eyes watched my every movement with that strange, too-intelligent attention that I had long since stopped questioning.
"Coco, pass me some of those seeds," I said, pointing to a bag of Lominels—my favorite type of daisies. "And don't eat them!"
Lominels were daisies that were even whiter than other types of more common daisies. Their pistils were yellow like the rays of the summer sun, bright and warm and impossible to ignore. In a garden full of them, one could even be blinded by the amount of light they reflected.
They were also delicious when eaten in flower salads, though I suspected that was not the primary reason most people planted them.
Coco brought me some seeds she had picked with her small robin-talons, her beak closing around them with a delicate precision that always surprised me.
I took one and placed it carefully in the soil, pressing it down with my thumb, then took another and placed it not too far away from the first, but neither too close.
Gardening was about balance, about understanding the invisible needs of things that could not speak. The seeds could not tell me how much space they required, but the earth could.
I continued this for all the seeds Coco brought me, my hands moving in a rhythm that was almost meditative.
Then, I took a watering can and gave the seeds a drink, the water pattering onto the dark earth with a soft, rhythmic music.
After properly watering the soil, I applied some of my mana, using plant magic to stimulate the seeds, to encourage them to sprout healthily when the time would come.
The magic flowed from me easily, naturally, the way water flows downhill. It was not the flashy, dramatic magic of combat or courtly display. It was something quieter.
When I had planted the last of the Lominels—making a whole rectangular plot of the gardens that could still be seen from my room's window filled with them—I stood back up and hummed, satisfied.
The plot was neat, orderly, the seeds nestled in their beds like children tucked in for the night. In a few weeks, they would be a sea of white and gold.
Gardening was my favorite hobby when I did not attend social events in Zestier or engage in other court life activities. Well, that and spending time with Corvis.
There was something about being in the soil that reminded me of being with him—the quiet, the patience, the way things grew best when you gave them space and trusted them to find their own way.
Speaking of which...
"Coco, go check on Corvis," I said, brushing the dirt from my hands onto my apron. "He was feeling unwell yesterday, and he was not at breakfast this morning. So, go!"
Coco chirped and did as I said, launching herself from my shoulder with a flutter of wings that scattered a few fallen petals. I watched her go, a small red and grey shape against the pale spring sky, and I felt the familiar ache of worry settle into my chest.
Corvis had been strange lately. More than strange. And yesterday, when Alea Triscan had brought him back to the palace, his face had been the color of old parchment, his hands shaking, his eyes distant in a way that had nothing to do with the room he was in.
Corvis had to take me on an unraveling. He had said so himself, had promised to bring me and Alwyn Triscan—his best friend, and also the one who had taught me how to awaken as a mage. The world was small, I supposed.
I would need to bring Corvis some flowers, I decided.
Flowers with their beautiful colors and pleasant smell were always able to brighten anyone's day. For that, I had taken gardening lessons from the many gardeners of the Royal Palace and the other Sister Houses.
Every noble family in Elenoir had one or more useful secrets about gardening and plant magic as a whole. And if just by sharing a tiny bit of that expertise would grant favors from their Princess—at least in their eyes—then they were more than happy to share them all with me.
I walked the paths of the gardens in search of flowers Corvis might like. The gravel crunched beneath my boots, and the air was thick with the scent of damp earth and the first, tentative fragrance of early blooms.
"Roses, lilacs, peonies, orchids, tulips..." I murmured, listing the possibilities as I walked.
I observed the many flowers that were already blossoming, thanks to the richness of the soil of the gardens and the abilities of our gardeners and plant mages.
The roses were still tight buds, their petals pressed together like hands clasped in prayer. The lilacs were further along, their purple clusters heavy with the promise of fragrance. The peonies were barely more than green knots, but I could already imagine the explosion of pink and white they would become.
A young gardener I had never seen before in the Royal Palace caught my eye.
She had long, light beige hair collected in a sophisticated braid that ran across her whole back, and she was crouched as she tended to the plants, though she was clearly struggling.
Her movements were uncertain, her watering can tipped too far, sending a stream of water directly onto the petals of a bed of early tulips.
"Not like this!" I exclaimed. I crouched beside her and showed her how it was done, my hands gentle on the watering can, my voice patient despite my frustration. "Do not water the petals. If you are going to use mana, use it on the roots too."
"Your Royal Highness!" The girl—probably fifteen, the youngest age someone could be hired in the Royal Palace—exclaimed, her cheeks flushing a deep crimson. "Ehm, yes, sorry... I did not mean to make a mistake."
"Yes, of course you did not mean it," I said, a little dumbfounded by her apology. "Have you understood how it is done?"
"I did," the gardener said, and I saw the determination in her eyes, the same determination I had seen in my own reflection a hundred times.
"Your name?" I asked.
"Erikiah Melibon, Your Highness," Erikiah said, and she ducked her head in a bow that was almost comically deep. "Thank you for helping me."
"You used plant magic," I observed, studying her mana signature with the practiced eye of someone who had been trained to see such things. "What stage are you?"
"Solid orange," Erikiah replied, and there was a hint of pride in her voice, despite her obvious embarrassment.
"Interesting," I said.
She was a stage above me—I was at the dark stage of the orange core—and yet she had been struggling with a simple spell. Perhaps she was new to practical application.
"Would you mind helping me find some flowers for my brother? He has been unwell, and I want to brighten his room."
"Certainly, Your Highness," Erikiah replied, and her smile was genuine, warm, the smile of someone who had been given a chance and was determined not to waste it.
Corvis Eralith
Alea kept quiet after everything that happened yesterday. She had been hovering at the edges of my awareness all morning, a silent presence in the corridor outside my room, her mana signature deliberately muted but unmistakably there.
But she did not speak, and that was comforting. I did not have the energy for questions I could not answer, for lies I did not want to tell, for the careful construction of explanations that would only crumble under scrutiny.
I lay on my bed, feeling the effects of the Cravenite's toxin slowly ebbing.
The poison was still in my system—I could feel it in the ache of my joints, the fog in my head, the lingering bitterness at the back of my throat—but I did not feel as if I had just come back to life again.
I turned my head. On the bedside table to my right sat my storage ring, its metallic band catching the morning light that filtered through my window.
Inside, together with my wand-cane and Finn's crossbow, there was a Vaultlamp containing a Djinn remnant: Avicenna Artira of Ramdad.
A consciousness that had survived the genocide of its people, that had drifted through the Truce-Waters for millennia, that had been waiting for someone like me to wake it.
I reached for the storage ring, but Berna gently blocked my arm with her left paw. Her green eyes were fixed on my face, searching for something I could not name, and through the bond I felt her worry—a deep, persistent ache that had not faded since she found me collapsed over my desk.
"I do not have the C-Pill anymore, girl," I said, and my voice came out rougher than I intended. My mouth was dry, my lips cracked, and there was also a jug of water that Mom had placed on the table earlier, the glass beaded with condensation. "And I wanted to take some water too."
Berna lifted her paw and permitted me to take both the storage ring and the glass. I drank deeply, the water cool and clean, and I felt it wash away some of the poison's lingering grip.
I summoned the Vaultlamp from the storage ring, and Avicenna greeted me immediately.
'Peace to you, Oh Justiciar.' His voice was the same—old and wise, calm as the Truce-Waters that had cradled me through my last death. 'Good morning, good afternoon, or good evening—whatever the time is in the world right now.'
"It is morning," I informed him, and I glanced at the window, at the pale light that was just beginning to strengthen.
'Oh, the light of Mordain bathes the land once more after its turn in the dance between him and Elenoir.'
"Could you explain what you just said?" I asked, curious about the culture of the Djinn.
The more I learned about them, the more I understood about what had been lost. And the more I understood, the more I realized how much we had been robbed.
'With infinite pleasure, Justiciar.' Avicenna's voice warmed, the way Grandpa's did when he was about to tell a story he had told a hundred times before. 'We, the folk of calm currents, called the sun and the moon Mordain and Elenoir.'
So that was what he had meant when he spoke of Mordain yesterday. The Lord of the Asclepius Clan, the Phoenix who had defied the Indraths, shared his name with the sun. That was not a coincidence. It could not be.
"We call the moon Elenoir too," I said. The Kingdom of Elenoir was named after the moon of this world, after all. Every elf knew that. Every child learned it before they learned to read.
'Some things never change, it seems, Justiciar. My people and yours share something: the name of Mordain's wife.'
"Oh," I murmured, and the word felt too small for the weight of what he had just revealed. Mordain's wife. The moon. A fairy tale that had survived the genocide of an entire civilization, passed down through millennia of elven history without anyone remembering where it had come from.
'It was a fairy tale my people used to explain the cycle of day and night to our children,' Avicenna said, and his voice was lighter than I had heard it yesterday. 'The sun Mordain and the moon Elenoir danced together, lending each other the stage, and as thus creating the night and the day.'
If Mordain was the sun and the Lord of the Asclepius Clan, then who was the moon? The novel had never explained if Mordain had a wife or any sort of companion. It had never explained much about the Phoenixes at all, except that they were hiding, that they had defied the Indraths, that they might be allies if I could find them.
As I was about to ask another question, I heard a familiar tap-tap-tap on the window. "Coco" was there, perched on the sill, her golden eyes fixed on me with that strange, too-intelligent gaze. She greeted me like she always used to, with a small chirp and a tilt of her head.
Berna tensed. I felt it through the bond, the sudden alertness, the flicker of something that was not quite hostility but was not quite comfort either. But she remained where she was, in the center of the room.
"Coco," I greeted, and I made to open the window.
The movement required mana to augment my body, to keep me from feeling too much strain, and I gritted my teeth against the ache that flared in my muscles.
The disguised Asura hopped inside, brushed against my hand in that familiar gesture of affection that had always seemed so ordinary, and then she halted. Her golden eyes fixed on the Vaultlamp in my hands, and she started to hop around on my mattress, panicked, circling the lamp and chirping in alarm.
"It is alright, Coco," I said, keeping my voice low, steady. "Avicenna is fine."
Coco stopped. Her golden eyes—which only now I fully realized how deep they were, the deepness of a god who had lived longer than Elenoir, Darv, and Sapin combined—stared at me in disbelief.
Avicenna had told me he could speak to me because I was the Justiciar, and that he could not feel anything else other than my voice when I spoke to him. He could not see Coco. He could not sense her. But she knew what a Vaultlamp was.
Coco chirped, lowering her head, and I saw the weight of centuries in that small gesture.
"We will speak when we go to a dungeon," I said. "Is that fine with you?"
Coco nodded. Her agreement was clear, but I saw the hesitation beneath it.
Without knowing if I would go to the Truce-Waters or the Warworn Rapids if I died and REtrocurrent activated, I was not ready to gamble on speaking to Coco now.
Without counting that I did not have a clear and easy way to kill myself either without the C-Pill, which I would need to find another Cravenite to make a new one.
"We will talk another time, Avicenna," I said. Coco stared at the Vaultlamp with an intensity I had never seen in her, her golden eyes unblinking, her small body still as stone.
'Sure, Justiciar. Speaking with you has been, once again, very entertaining and illuminating,' the Djinn said. 'Until next time. For whatever you need, I will share my knowledge with you to the best of my current capabilities. Peace to you.'
Peace to you too, I echoed in my head, and I felt his presence fade as I returned the Vaultlamp to my storage ring.
I sighed, and Coco chirped, looking at me with a worry that was clear in her eyes. A worry someone would not have if they saw you as lesser. Windsom's gaze had assessed me as a useful asset, a tool, a pawn for his Lord and a step for his climbing of Kezess Indrath's court.
But Coco—whoever she was, whatever she was—looked at me like I was something worth protecting. Something worth worrying about.
I petted the little head of the robin, and despite being an Asura, she gladly accepted it. The mystery of why she had never formed a bond with Tessia was finally resolved. She was an Asura. She could not bond with a lesser. She could only watch, and wait, and hope.
Speaking of Tessia, a knock sounded on my door.
"Corvis!" Tessia shouted from behind the wood, her voice bright and impatient.
"Berna, could you open the door?" I asked, and Berna did as I said, raising a paw to move the handle.
Tessia burst inside, ignoring Berna's tongue on her face as she immediately launched herself onto my bed. She landed with a soft sound made by the bedframe, her momentum carrying her across the mattress until she was right beside me, her teal eyes sparkling.
"I brought you a present!" she exclaimed, and she produced a bouquet of flowers from behind her back.
They were colorful and full of life, a rainbow given flower form. My sister smiled widely as she moved the bouquet a little, gesturing for me to take it.
"Thank you, Tessia," I said, and I meant it. "You should not have."
"Idiocy!" Tessia said, crossing her arms with mock indignation. "I do what a sister must!"
It was useless to argue with Tessia when she was like this. It was like speaking with the bark of a Watchful Willow—impossible, immovable, utterly certain of its place in the world.
"Sure," I said, and I took the bouquet, inhaling the scent of the flowers, letting their colors brighten the gray morning.
Tessia looked at me, arms crossed, smile wide, Coco on her shoulder, legs folded on my bed as I put my storage ring back on the bedside table.
Her teal eyes seemed to shine with a natural light, like the moon and a name sprouted in my mind: Lunar Goddess.
That was what the students of Xyrus Academy had called Tessia in the novel. I had never understood it before, not really. But looking at her now, with the morning light catching her hair and her smile bright enough to chase away shadows, I understood.
Tessia often spoke to me about the moon and how much she liked it. She would point it out to me on clear nights, would tell me stories about it that she had made up herself, would declare that when she was queen, she would visit it someday.
And a sudden, childish thought bypassed my control and was spoken before I realized it.
"I will bring you to the moon, Tessia," I said.