Chapter 35
THIRTY-FIVE
Years ago, when Iseult and Safi had first begun training with Mathew and Habim in Venaza City, it had become quickly clear that the girls’ methods for absorbing information were different.
You’re two ends of a scale, Mathew would always say.
Safi needed to listen while doing; she couldn’t sit still, but as long as she had something to keep her hands busy—like blades to oil or dishes to scrub—she could absorb most information given to her.
Iseult, meanwhile, had to write everything Mathew and Habim ever said.
Everything. She would scribble and scratch so fast, she’d break nib after nib.
Her handwriting would be illegible to anyone but herself, and she would miss entire phrases in her attempts to scrawl down what she thought, in the moment, seemed like the most important part of a sentence.
Then later, she would read over everything she’d written … and she would write it all down again.
Safi always thought this was a colossal waste of time, and Mathew always insisted Iseult should simply listen and write later. Only Habim had had sympathy for Iseult, and he would often repeat phrases two or three times until he could see she’d written down the necessary words.
Iseult had always wondered why she needed the extra steps and extra agony.
Was it because lectures were always delivered to her surrounded by Threads?
So, although she could hear the lessons and information launched at her, she couldn’t absorb them when emotions were battering her too?
Or was Iseult’s brain simply built differently than Safi’s, so Threads or not, she would always need more time?
Either way, the Raider King could not have given Iseult more perfect circumstances for learning: she had access to information, she had an inkwell and a quill, she had a place to write down everything she discovered …
And she had time. Hours in which to let her logic rise to the surface and stasis claim her body completely.
The world outside was quiet; what few Threads were nearby drifted harmlessly like kelp in the tide.
What Iseult discovered was this: Leopold’s notes and ideas were accurate.
Not perfect, but near enough, and certainly more accurate than any of the intelligence on Eron’s table.
But the sheer scale of the operation—Leopold had failed to capture that. The Raider King’s operation had roots dug in across the entire continent, so the numbers clustered around Poznin were nothing compared to what could come and what would come if the Raider King called.
He had Red Sails and Baedyeds, he had Purists and Nomatsis, he had smaller raider factions and criminal organizations tucked in shadows. Anyone who’d ever made themselves a target of the empires, he had recruited.
Yes, there were clear areas of setback in Ragnor’s sweeping plan: in the Sirmayans, where the monks had ultimately won against his raiders. In Nubrevna, where he’d never gained a foothold. And Cartorra, where Hell-Bards had stood strong against his attempts for advancement …
But the other two empires were not so resistant.
Marstok, destabilized by Habim and Mathew’s coup, was ripe with anti-imperial minds.
And the Doge of the Dalmotti Empire had written to Ragnor himself—assuming the wax seal on the letter Iseult found was authentic—to open communications regarding continental dominance in the Witchlands.
It was breathtaking just how many people the Raider King had found either sympathetic to his cause or hungry to stamp out Cartorra and Marstok. It made Eron’s twenty-year plan seem childish in comparison.
He is the greatest strategic mind of the last millennia.
Ragnor Amalej. Aeduan’s father. A Nomatsi widower who could have killed Iseult when his raiders caught her … yet had not.
More food was delivered to the tent. Iseult sensed the approaching Threads, so she had ample time to hurry to the cot and curl as if asleep.
She waited for the person to place the tray on the floor beside her.
She let them stare at her for several moments, feeling as their Threads burned first with an almost hateful curiosity … then melted into confusion.
Yes, I am the dark-giver, and no, I’m not very much to look upon.
They left. Iseult wolfed down the food—more hot, meatless stew, this time with hard bread for soaking.
Then she returned to Ragnor’s desk and resumed her work.
There was so much to study; this wasn’t merely a welcome into his home, so much as everything handed on a porcelain platter and wrapped in a pretty bow.
The man was creating an empire all his own.
And although Iseult didn’t understand how, he clearly had a plan for cleaving all the Wells newly healed by her and Safi. The Earth Well first. Then the Water Well. Then Aether, then Fire, and lastly Void—which his notes indicated he knew the location of … but did not have access to. Yet.
“How?” Iseult kept murmuring as she read over his sketches of Noden’s Gift on the southern coast of Nubrevna. Arrows pointed to an approach point, and circles showing where he had people to aid him. “How will you cleave all the Wells?”
Nowhere, in all these notes and drawings, could she find her answer.
And somehow, this open question was more chilling than any revelation that had come thus far.
Ragnor could not be deterred. He was a spider that kept going even as its legs were snapped off.
He had lost three Wells, yet he hadn’t abandoned his cause.
He had lost his son to the enemy, yet still he fought on.
Why did you falter? Why did you fail?
Iseult knew the answer was because she wasn’t like Safi.
Because she couldn’t let only instinct guide her.
But now, in this long, long pause, Iseult had learned her opponent, had learned her terrain.
So now she could choose her perfect battlefield, target the heart, the brain, the king at the center of it all.
Yes, it might be a trap, but if Ragnor could keep going with his legs cut off, then so could Iseult. For Safi, for Aeduan, for all of the Witchlands and the Moon Mother sleeping below.