THE REFORGED TRILOGY: BOOK 3 — HAMMER OF TIME
Chapter 20: Enassui
“It’s not about beauty. What’s important is the inspiration behind the beauty.”
– Ballad Avadain (232 PA)
Ballad stood in front of the scuffed little porthole window long after Kaellisem had vanished from sight. The glass city was beautiful, a shining jewel out of legend for a boy born on hard gray Prianus, but that wasn’t what arrested Ballad’s attention. It was the crowd that had turned out to bid farewell to the knights and workers on their way to Bherrosi. It was hardly all of Kaellisem, but the two hundred or so Arcadians who came to sing their farewells was a vision that would not leave Ballad.
He had fought with his parents — and those just like them — for years, trying in vain to convince them to make something, anything of their new home on Prianus. But the Arcadians were resigned to their fate, to the disease and death that ran rampant across the planet. Ballad’s own family never thought much of his desire to fight. Even when his younger sister, Aria, was raped and beaten to death by a gang of Prian boys, they would not raise a wing and sang sadly when Ballad did.
But Kaellisem wasn’t like that. Almost half of the Arcadians there were younger than the queen. Ballad knew that Xartasia was rejecting those fairies born after the fall of their homeworlds. Malla and Hannu talked about it often, always quick to assure their fellow squires how glad they were that Xartasia sent them away. Not that anyone ever accused the siblings of lacking loyalty, as far as Ballad knew. Hannu and Malla had been the first of Maeve’s guardians.
Her first Arcadian ones, at least. Logan Coldhand was truly the first, though. Back on Prianus, before anyone ever heard the name Kaellisem, Logan had been by the queen’s side.
Ballad couldn’t help but feel a little perhaps undue pride in his human friend. Logan had been so broken when Ballad met him in Pylos. But now he burned with purpose… If not with joy these days. Ballad glanced out of the corner of his eye at his commander.
Anthem had landed on the cargo hold’s worn catwalk and was organizing the Arcadian volunteers as they stored the canisters, boxes and crates they had collected to hold and then transport the sand they would take from Bherrosi.
The senior knight was admittedly handsome and glorious in his shining glass armor and twined blue and silver scarves. The wingless girl, Panna, stood next to him, reading something out from a datadex. Her hair was pulled back in a tail, not even trying to hide the surgically altered curves of her ears. Unconsciously, Ballad’s wings pulled close against his back. He couldn’t imagine giving up his wings. But despite the twinge of revulsion, Ballad had to admit to some admiration for the wingless fairy girl. Surrounded by her own natural-born people, it must have been hard not to question her decision, but she never seemed to. Panna Sul was always busy, always smiling as she worked.
“What is so fascinating?” someone asked from next to Ballad. The voice had what he always thought of as the old world accent, even though Ballad knew perfectly well that he was the one with a strange Prian accent. “You are staring.”
“Sorry,” Ballad said. He turned to find one of the other knight trainees standing at the airlock, holding an armload of collapsible shovels. It was the one with the strange eyes that reminded Ballad of a Lyran. “Syle, right? Let me help you with those.”
“Thank you.” Syle allowed Ballad to take half of the awkward load and secure it into one corner of the Blue Phoenix’s hold. “But you still have not answered my question.”
Ballad gestured with the tip of one wing at where Anthem and Panna worked.
Syle smiled. “She is pretty, even mutilated as she is. Or perhaps you mean our lord commander, Sir Anthem. He, too, is lovely. You would not be the first to think him so.”
“You mean Queen Maeve?” Ballad asked.
He caught himself scowling and tried to stop. Syle’s smile was just as wolfish as his eyes. The older squire rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and finished hooking an orange cargo net around the pile of shovels.
“There were others before our queen,” Syle said, lowering his voice. “I did not even realize that Sir Anthem survived the fall of Arcadia, and now I learn that he has spent the last hundred years selling himself to coreworlders.”
“Selling…?” Ballad asked. “You mean that he was a whore? Sir Anthem?”
Syle nodded and Ballad looked up again. Sir Anthem Calloren was a prostitute? It was hard to imagine, but he knew that plenty of Arcadians had turned to the sex trade on Prianus and all across the Alliance. It was honest work, if dangerous, and Ballad couldn’t hate Anthem for that. But Syle’s yellow eyes were narrowed.
“It is strange, is it not?” he said, echoing Ballad’s thoughts. “Sir Anthem is the paramount knight and consort to the queen herself, yet…”
Ballad could think of all too many ways to finish Syle’s sentence. Anthem had given up, sold himself and refused to fight until Maeve Cavainna commanded him to.
Ballad turned away with a frown. Anthem was training them to be knights, the first knights since the White Kingdom’s fall. Whatever else Ballad felt about the man, Sir Anthem deserved his respect for that.
But what about the queen? Was Anthem worthy of her?
Ballad’s thoughts weren’t comfortable — they tumbled heavily down into his chest and would not sit still. He looked for Syle, but the other squire had vanished into the crowd of busy Arcadians. Sir Anthem and Panna were gone, too, working elsewhere on the Blue Phoenix. Ballad stood under the swinging cargo net full of tools as the ship flew north over the desert.
“We’ll have to make more than one trip,” Panna told Anthem.
“If you say. I am here simply to keep you and your workers safe. Economics and industry are beyond me, I fear.”
“You’re the prince consort, Sir Anthem,” Panna said. She pushed her datadex across the table to him. “You represent Queen Maeve when she isn’t here.”
“You can simply call the queen for any decisions that need to be made,” Anthem pointed out.
Panna raised an eyebrow. “Yes, that’s true. But something could go wrong. Gripper insisted on staying back in Kaellisem, for some reason. So if the com system breaks, we’re on our own.”
Anthem looked a little alarmed at this idea.
“That would be a problem,” he said.
“And there’s more than that,” Panna told the knight. “You know what Maeve means to the people of Kaellisem. But without her on the Blue Phoenix, that’s what you mean to them.”
Panna waited for Anthem to sigh, to argue or to tell her that it wasn’t really that important, but the royal consort just picked up the datadex and began to read. His brow furrowed as he struggled to read the Aver, but Sir Anthem otherwise worked quietly. Panna blinked a few times and stood, not sure what else to do. She was so used to arguing with Maeve that this felt like cheating somehow.
Panna cooked up a bowl of noodles, offered some to Sir Anthem — who declined politely — and then went up to the cockpit to see if Duaal was hungry. The Hyzaari captain sat in Tiberius’ scarred old seat, eyes fixed on the clouds streaming by the Blue Phoenix. He actually jumped when Panna interrupted him.
“Bloody hells, woman,” he gasped. “Don’t do that!”
“Sorry,” Panna apologized. “I just wanted to know if you wanted some lunch.”
“Sure.” Duaal glanced back over his shoulder, down the narrow corridor past Panna. “Where’s Anthem?”
“In the mess. Do you need to talk to him?”
“God, no,” Duaal said. “Just making sure he’s not trying to call up Maeve.”
“Why not?” Panna asked. “He is her consort. Anthem will probably need to talk to her at some point during this trip.”
“Good luck with that,” Duaal said with a laugh.
Panna blinked. “What?”
“The external coms don’t work.”
“Why not? Gripper said everything was ready!”
“It was,” Duaal confided with a wink. “Gripper broke it before we left. And he can’t repair it while he’s back in Kaellisem, can he?”
“No,” Panna agreed through gritted teeth. “He can’t. Why under the bone heel of the Nameless would you do that?”
“Sir Anthem is going to leave Maeve and Logan alone for a few days,” Duaal said, sounding quite smug and satisfied with himself. “And I’m sure that we’ll run into a few other snags and delays along the way.”
“Like contacting Bherrosi air control without external coms?”
Duaal frowned. “Yeah, like that.”
Maeve watched the Blue Phoenix vanish into the wispy pink clouds with an unexpected weight in the pit of her stomach. She had been first mate and then a passenger on the old ship for almost five years. Not very long in the lifespan of an Arcadian, really, but so much had changed in those years.
When Tiberius first found Maeve on Stray, she had been struggling clumsily to slit her own wrists with her spear. And now she was queen of a city of her own people. Maeve had not touched any chems or even a narcohol bottle in over a year. The bounty hunter she had hired to kill her was her ally now, her friend and…
Logan stood between Maeve and the small crowd that had gathered to sing their farewell to the Blue Phoenix. Several of Anthem’s students had gone with the knight, leaving fourteen behind in Kaellisem. But it was the Prian with his mismatched arms crossed over his chest that held the little mob back from their queen. His pale eyes were cold and unyielding.
Maeve retreated from the relentless heat of the crimson sun and into the slightly cooler shadows of Kaellisem. She dismissed her remaining knights — led by Malla until Sir Anthem returned — at the door to her tower. Logan climbed the stairs beside her without a word. Sweat dripped down the back of his neck, soaking and darkening his hair. It stuck like damp feathers to his skin.
At the top of the tower, Dain was filling crystal bowls with some sort of scented oil while Verra struggled with a portable air conditioner. Both girls stopped their work and inclined their heads as Maeve entered the room.
“What can we do for you, Your Highness?” Verra asked.
“Nothing,” Maeve answered quickly. “I am fine.”
Despite her assurances, the Arcadian girls insisted on following Maeve as she went to the bathroom to rinse the sweat from her face. Dain offered to comb her hair and Verra suggested that it was time to polish the queen’s nails again, but Maeve declined.
“Duke Ferris would like to see you at ten,” Dain told her.
Suddenly, pointlessly preening her hair and nails didn’t seem like such a bad idea. Maeve sighed. “Did he say why?”
“His Grace mentioned an enassui,” Verra answered.
An enassui? Maeve had to admit that she was curious. That didn’t sound much like the tedious sort of thing Duke Ferris usually wanted to discuss. She checked the clock next to the window. Nine forty-seven. Ferris would arrive soon.
Maeve’s com chimed and Logan held it out. There had been nowhere to carry it in her dress.
Maeve pressed the worn button on the side. “Yes?”
“Hey, Glass. It’s Gripper.”
Maeve smiled at the little collection of metal and circuits. Yes, she had gathered that much.“What is it?”
“Um… Is Duke Ferris there?” Gripper asked, his voice flattened and tinny through the com.
“Not yet, though the girls say he wants to talk to me.”
“Well, I… need you to come look at something,” Gripper said. “You and Hunter. Both of you.”
Maeve looked at Logan, who watched her without expression. Dain and Verra hovered in the doorway, supervising the queen and her guardian.
“What is it?” Maeve asked. “What requires our attention?”
“Just a… thing,” Gripper said. He sounded nervous. “Out at the new tower.”
Maeve didn’t understand what Gripper needed, but didn’t want to dismiss her friend’s concerns. “I am sending Logan to you. I will join you as soon as I am finished with Duke Ferris. He wishes to talk about an enassui.”
“Enassui?” Gripper asked. “What’s that?”
“It is…” Maeve hesitated. Trying to explain Arcadian ways to non-fairies was like… like trying to tell them what it felt like to fly. They could almost understand. “It is rather like an opera. A story told in song before an audience. I have not heard one since the White Kingdom’s fall.”
“So this is important?” Gripper asked, crestfallen.
“Yes,” Maeve said.
“Oh.”
Feeling obscurely guilty, Maeve turned off the com and gestured to Logan. “You heard that?”
“I’ll go take care of it,” said the Prian hunter.
Maeve watched Logan leave, staring at the door long after Dain and Verra had scurried out of his path and the tall human vanished down the staircase. Dain asked if she wanted… something. Maeve ignored her.
Duke Ferris arrived a few minutes later, smiling broadly. Was it the enassui? Or was the old duke simply that pleased to find Logan absent? Maeve chastised herself for the thought. Duke Ferris’ first and only loyalty was their people.
“Good morning, Your Grace,” Maeve said, hoping that she didn’t sound as sullen as she felt. “The girls tell me that you want to talk about an enassui.”
Ferris turned his approving smile on the two handmaidens.
“Indeed so, a’shae,” he said. “There is a troupe here in Kaellisem composing a new one.”
A new enassui? Maeve blinked.
“I thought you simply meant a performance,” she said. “There has not been one in a long time.”
“No,” Ferris agreed. “But the enassuanii have a new idea. A story of you, my queen.”
“Me…?” Maeve asked. “That will not make for a very interesting performance.”
“Do not underestimate your importance, a’shae,” Ferris told her. “You are not only Kaellisem’s leader, but her heart. And all songs, as they say, are sung first in the heart. The enassuanii wish to speak with you, Queen Maeve, and better learn about you for their songs. May I bring them to you?”
“Yes,” Maeve said, torn between reluctance and excitement. “I would be happy to see them.”
For all its glittering sunset-colored glory, Kaellisem was still a small city and it took Logan less than ten minutes to drive across it.
Hyra or one of his singers could have paved the road in glass, but Xia had recommended against it. Arcadian glass was strong, but vehicles were very heavy and the sand beneath was far from stable. Shattered glass in the road was a recipe for trouble.
Logan found Gripper exactly where the young Arboran said he would be, standing in the meager but colorful shade of a half-built tower. The slender spire leaned at a dangerous angle. The endlessly shifting sands of Stray were not just trouble for the streets.
Gripper watched the road and waved rather limply to Logan as the Prian parked. The Arboran’s thick brown hide was wet with sweat and the big alien looked miserable.
“What’s wrong?” Logan asked when he had climbed out of the car and approached the new tower. None of the Arcadian workers were anywhere to be seen.
“Hey, Hunter,” Gripper said. His wide shoulders slumped and he sat heavily on the ground. “Glass isn’t coming out. She called just before you arrived. She’s going to be busy for the rest of the day.”
Logan nodded, unsurprised, and peered at Gripper.
“What’s wrong?” he asked again.
The mechanic wound his thick fingers together and sighed. “I asked all the glass-smiths to go away so it would be… you know… private out here. And with the knights gone, I thought that you and Glass could um… be alone.”
Stray’s hot red sun beat down mercilessly on the back of Logan’s neck. It was nothing like the small and distant star of his homeworld. This glowering red sun filled the sky and made the glass towers shimmer like impossibly tall flames. Logan sat down beside Gripper.
“This was a trick?” he asked. “Just to get Maeve and me together for a while?”
“Yeah,” Gripper admitted. “It was Shimmer’s idea.”
Logan combed his illonium fingers through his hair. He needed a shower. “That’s why Anthem is on his way to Bherrosi, isn’t it?”
“Sort of. There really are problems for Arcadians in the north, but I doubt anyone will notice the Blue Phoenix up there. Bherrosi is three times bigger than Gharib.”
It was silly, Logan knew. Gripper and Duaal were teenagers and their ploy was ridiculously juvenile. But Logan still couldn’t help wishing that it had worked. He closed his eyes and let his head thud back against the glass wall of the unfinished fairy tower.
“Do you miss her?” Gripper asked. “I mean, I know you just saw her, but…”
“Yes,” Logan said.
They sat together in the heat. Eventually, Gripper speared one finger into the sand beneath them and spoke.
“What do you know about this enassui thing?” he asked.
“Like Maeve said, it’s similar to an opera,” Logan told him. “It’s a traditional Arcadian format. They closely follow the five oathsongs, actually.”
Gripper cocked his wide head at Logan. “And you were studying them. That song that’s so popular in the city… You wrote that, didn’t you? For Glass?”
Logan nodded. “I mangled some of the words.”
“Does she know?”
“That the words were wrong? Yes.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“No,” Logan answered. “Maeve doesn’t know that I wrote it.”
“You should tell her, Hunter.”
“Why?”
Gripper didn’t seem to have an answer for that. He scooped up a handful of sand. It sifted out from between his fingers.
“I haven’t seen you with your guitar for a while,” he said. “Actually, I meant to tell you to bring it out here with Glass… but I uh… sort of panicked and forgot.”
It was Logan’s turn not to answer. It had been weeks since the last time he played. Only twice since Maeve had left him… No, that wasn’t fair. He was the one who told Maeve to do it. He had pushed Maeve toward Anthem’s open arms.
Logan stood.
“I’m going back,” he said.
“Why?” Gripper asked. “Glass will be working.”
“So will I.”
Sighing, Gripper followed Logan back toward Kaellisem.
“The fleet has reached twelve thousand.”
Xartasia looked up at Dhozo. The smooth black floor reflected her white silhouette, but the Glorious commander cast no reflection. The slick layer of nanites against his skin absorbed most light to supplement its power supply. Only one in a hundred photons escaped the nanomachines’ metallic surface. They were not actually black, but reflected so little light of any color that they might as well have been.
“Is that number sufficient?” Xartasia asked.
Dhozo shrugged his huge shoulders. The observation deck was plenty large enough to keep more distance, but he stood close to the little aerad queen, looming over her. Xartasia did not flinch or back away from Dhozo.
“I don’t know,” he rasped. “Until we actually go to Anzhotek, we won’t know how many of your aerads you will need. It could be ten or ten million.”
“There are not that many Arcadians in the galaxy.”
“Then I suggest we get the information, little queen.”
Xartasia turned away from Dhozo. Not out of any fear or even distaste, he suspected, but simply to enjoy the view. The black fleet had caught another small freighter. The crew had provided an all too small meal and Dhozo’s stomach ached again already.
Now the ship was being rapidly torn apart for metal and minerals. The fibersteel that seemed so popular in the old worlds was flexible but easy to tear. Zhyress and her team would restructure it into strong and thick armor, slick and black and invisible to all but the most sophisticated of sensors, the kind of instrumentation that this galaxy had not seen for millions of years.
“We will set course for Anzhotek, Commander Dhozo,” Xartasia said as the ship outside broke into ragged, disintegrating pieces. Even those dwindled swiftly away to skeletal struts and supports, barely visible in the darkness. “I visited that world once, years ago, in search of secrets. I did not ever think to return.”
Xartasia turned toward one of the silent knights that followed her everywhere. Unlike Dhozo and his soldiers, their armor was brightly polished glass. Too shiny, too visible. When the time came to fight, how long would these aerad knights last? They were slaves; bred to serve, not to fight.
But Dhozo was older and smarter than Orix. Underestimating Xartasia and her kind — as his young subordinate often did — would not put meat on the table.
Dhozo remembered the first time the old Projector had flared and opened in the forgotten bowels of the VSS Forge. Then the feasting that followed… He was just a junior engineer in those days, without enough rank to earn fresh meat. But Dhozo remembered the smell of blood, coppery and salty. It had been months since the Forge’s last kill and there had been near madness across the ship. The Glorious tore at each other in their desperation to get through the Projector, to hunt and to kill and to taste meat again.
Even after it was over and the Projector was closed again — shut down by an aerad operator on the other side — Dhozo never forgot that feeling of fresh, unprocessed wind on his face as he brought down aerads, dryads and nyads by the dozens. Nothing else ever tasted as good as that feast in the old galaxy.
Even after the closure triggered the emergency safety protocols to yank the Glorious back home, Dhozo became obsessed with opening the Projector again. He had studied the ancient technology every waking moment, poring over files so old that the computer no longer even indexed them. And when the gate opened again, he was the first one through.
But for all Dhozo had learned, it was not enough. He needed the information on Anzhotek.
Xartasia spoke quietly with some of her knights. They nodded and flew away to carry out her orders. There were fifty ships in the fleet and it would take organization to get them all to Anzhotek.
Fifty starships full of aerads… These fairies were thinner than the ones Dhozo had hunted a century ago, and many of them had diseases, but the commander’s mouth watered as Xartasia turned to face him again.
“You are staring,” she said in her musical voice.
“You are tempting, little queen,” Dhozo told her.
“Focus, commander. I would make a small meal. But the use of the Waygates will feed you for millennia to come.”
