Chapter 19 #2
But the main source of light came from the floor itself and a shallow pool of water that had formed in a bowl-like divot in the stone.
The water seemed to be lit from within, though as they approached, Nocren saw that it wasn’t magic in the water but another piece of quartz.
A much larger one than those capping the wards, and there through the designs of human hands rather than nature.
The bowl in the floor also felt off, too perfect.
Likely made with the help of an earth mage versed in stone shaping.
“Is that… the wellspring?” Calya asked, walking around the edge of the bowl.
Calya only had a surface level interest in magic, caring more about what it could do for Helm Naval than its greater role in the world.
She wasn’t particularly well-versed in the subject, but she’d never gotten the impression that her home was running short on magic.
A ley line ran through Central District, and the magic-born citizens of Graelynd seemed to draw just fine from what energy was inherent in the land.
The country served as a natural basin for the excess that flowed down from the Valley, and Calya had never heard rumors, substantiated or otherwise, of the threat of a drought.
If they were to have more magic, she didn’t know what a new surplus would mean.
“A poor imitation of one.” Nocren gazed around the cavern, visualizing the drawing he’d seen in the container and the space before him.
Calya gasped softly. She spun away from him, walking quickly toward the ramp on the other side of the cave.
“Calya.” She didn’t slow. Nocren cursed under his breath. “Calya, wait.”
She hurried up the ramp. By the time Nocren caught up, she stood before a long table set against the wall overlooking the cavern, where a window spanned the distance to allow full visibility. The glass held a faint aura of power, enchanted to withstand who knew what kind of damage.
“They did it,” Calya murmured, perusing yet another logbook, this one with clearly missing pages. The one she held between her fingers had the bottom half torn away. “I can’t believe they really tried to— Those arrogant assholes.”
But couched in her annoyance was a hint of excitement.
“What are you talking about?” Nocren asked. “Who are you talking about?”
“The Coalition.” Calya looked up briefly, a grim smile on her face. “They must know we’re close, that’s why… It doesn’t matter. I’ll nail them to the wall with this. HNE will be… Father can’t deny it this time.”
Alarm rang through Nocren’s head. There was something chilling in Calya’s words. No, not just the words but her tone. She sounded vindicated. And hungry. Oh, so hungry.
The warning intensified, and in his growing dread over Calya’s manner it took him a moment to realize it was the wind assailing him. Once sure of his attention, it whirled through the room, scattering loose papers left and right. Calya looked up, confusion narrowing her eyes.
Nocren didn’t let himself dwell over how right it felt, how sweetly his magic called to him when it came to her. How easily his defenses fell, his personal rules blown away like they were made of dandelion fluff, when the wind rose for her.
He stopped fighting it, allowing the magic to flow into his hands. What happens? he asked of the wind. Will she be safe?
He let his questions go, inwardly bracing for the wind’s message.
The pool surged. The water level was higher than when he’d seen it before, arcs of light breaking the surface like jumping fish. The water crackled as light flowed in through channels carved in the walls, the floors.
Unnatural, the wind whispered. Wrong.
Before Nocren could try and follow the potential fates tied up in those words, the image of the pool melted away.
It refocused, bringing a vision of Avenor standing on the deck of a ship, hands clasped in front of him.
He shook his head, the picture of shallow regret.
“I tried,” he murmured, voice distorted by the wind.
Coward, the wind seethed. Or was it Nocren himself?
Again, the scene changed without giving him the option of intuiting more from the vision.
The garden plots outside came into focus.
This time, the wards were dark, their quartz stones shattered.
The ground in the plots was not sandy and matte but dusty and gray.
As Nocren watched, a dully glowing line of moldy green crept beyond the confines of the bed, the ground for several feet on either side of the wood leaching of all color.
Change, the wind screamed at him. This time, the scene lingered as the wind let the impression of Change flare so bright in Nocren’s mind it burned. He blinked, as if clearing sunspots from his eyes.
Calya appeared in the scene, rushing toward the garden bed. She held several glass jars in her hands, and they tumbled to the earth in her haste as she knelt beside the bed’s wooden wall, ignoring how the wood was grayed and rotten. Perhaps she didn’t notice it at all.
Nocren couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. Was forced to stand and bear silent witness as she scooped the contaminated dirt into the jars with her bare hands. All the while, she muttered under her breath, “Evidence. Need evidence or they’ll never believe me.”
A presence loomed at his back, causing Nocren’s hackles to rise. He tried to turn his head, but the vision belonged more to the wind than to him, and it kept him still. He felt Avenor’s approach before finally seeing him as the other man stalked past on silent feet.
Calya gave no sign of noticing. A stack of ledgers had appeared at her side.
She had her pocket notebook in hand, writing a note as her gaze went from the jars she’d filled to the page and back.
Her lips moved, but Nocren couldn’t hear her words.
Only the sound of his own heart thundering in his ears.
She scribbled away, oblivious as Avenor kept coming. She didn’t see the rope that materialized in his hands.
The scene blurred once more. Calya and Avenor reduced to silhouettes, grappling with one another. Nocren thought he heard a scream, but then the sound of Avenor’s laughter filled his head. The vision began to fade, everything going black as all sound became one long, discordant note in his mind.
Change, the wind whispered a final time, its voice weak.
Eyes snapping open, Nocren staggered against the table, dimly aware of Calya’s hand shaking his shoulder.
“Lowe? Lowe! What happ—”
He shoved himself upright. “We’re leaving, now.”
“Leaving?” Calya repeated, incredulous. “But we just—”
“We can’t wait for Sor’vahl. We’re getting Orren’s men, the other mages in town, anyone. Everyone! We’re burning this entire site to the godsdamned ground before—” Nocren paused, halfway down the ramp before he realized Calya wasn’t with him. He beckoned to her. “Come on.”
She stood in the doorway, rigid with tension. Slowly, she shook her head. “No. No, I can’t, Lowe. I’m sorry.”
He stared at her, uncomprehending. “What are you talking about?”
“The Coalition is involved here. Involved in treason. I can’t leave before I have evidence.”
“Evidence?” he said, voice cracking on the word. “Calya, there’s a fucked-up wellspring having a meltdown, and all you can think of is your fucking career?”
“This is more than that,” she snapped back. “You’re not from Graelynd, you wouldn’t understand. But I have a chance, here. It’s the Coalition! Do you have any idea what it would mean— I can take them down, but only if I can tie them to everything—”
“I know plenty about them.” Nocren’s hands balled into fists. But he made himself loosen his fingers, though they shook with the effort. “I’ll be your witness, okay? Let’s go.”
“Your word won’t mean anything. You’re a Senti— Listen, their ties run deep. But if I can preserve some—”
“I saw what happens here if we stay, Calya.” Nocren slashed a hand through the air, leaving a faint trail of sparks. “Avenor. He gets away. You… he… If we don’t destroy this place, it—”
“Brint?” She sounded more confused than doubtful. But she shook her head, dispelling the flicker of hesitation. “You said they’re only possibilities,” she said quietly. Calmly. Without a hint that she’d given what he said the fucking care it deserved.
“No. No, are you listening? The wind’s been trying to warn me about this. About you, me, Avenor. About that!” He pointed at the fake wellspring. “I don’t know how to make you understand, but Calya, please, trust me. You have to come with me right now. I asked the wind, Calya, so would you—”
“I didn’t ask you to do it, Lowe. Not this time. You didn’t have to use the wind that way.” Her arms were folded across her chest, her gaze flinty. “And I don’t have to do anything. I’m staying, and I’m going to prove they’re behind this. Alone, if I must.”
“Listen to yourself. You’re one woman, Calya! You don’t have magic. I know the Coalition better than you think, and I know that they’ll just sabotage whatever you find. Your evidence won’t mean shit. It’ll be compromised, or they’ll have bought experts to discredit it. You can’t win.”
She stared at him. A shadow crossed her face. Disappointment. Maybe even true hurt. But soon, a cold mask settled into place. Disdain colored her voice when she murmured, “So much for believing I’d conquer the world.”
“Calya…”
She turned around and walked back into the observation room, slamming the door behind her.
Nocren reached it just as he heard the heavy scrape of metal and the clang of a bar settling into place.
He tried the door anyway, and was unsurprised when it didn’t budge.
He went back to the ramp to find Calya at the window, her face impassive.
“Calya, don’t do this. Please, come with me.”
“Go. You’re wasting precious time, according to the wind.”
He climbed over the ramp, wedging himself onto the narrow strip of rock in front of the window. “Calya, it isn’t safe. Avenor catches you, do you understand?” He pressed his palm to the window. “He’s going to fucking get you, and I can’t—”
“This is why we didn’t form attachments, ranger.” Her lips formed a sad smile. “So we wouldn’t care.”
“You care, I know you do,” he pleaded. “You care about me. We… We were—”
“We?” Her eyes closed for a moment. When she finally looked at him again, there was pain in their depths, but her tone was coarse. “There is no we. Did you think I let you in?”
“You and I”—Nocren’s fingers bit into the glass—“we’ve only just begun. You have a heart, Calya, and it’s mine, and mine is yours. Open the door. I’ll stand with you against the Coalition if that’s what you want, just—”
“My lack of a heart was never from loss,” she said quietly. “You think we’ve become something? That you matter? Your words cannot change me into what you’ve wished me to be.”
“Calya,” Nocren rasped, desperation becoming fear becoming a wild blend of anger. “Don’t be so fucking reckless. He’ll catch you and then—”
“You almost had me figured out right from the start, you know. The parts that mattered. Ambitious. Do not trust.” She placed her hand against his, the glass warming between them.
“But reckless? No. I’ve done the calculations, ranger.
It’s not recklessness, it’s personal risk, and I’m not afraid of it. I’ll take my chances against Brint.”
“I won’t,” he whispered. “Calya, please.”
Her fingers bent in the tiniest of waves. “We both said no sentimentality. I, at least, meant it. I’ll never love you back. Do you get that? We had a nice fuck, but the heart is never first.”
With that, Calya walked away, vanishing through a door in the back of the room.
Nocren pounded his fists against the window.
Kept going, yelling for her, until the enchantment in the glass came to life.
A loud hiss sounded, and sparks crackled along the surface, burning his skin and forcing him to stumble back over the railing.
Nocren fell to his knees on the ramp.
Calya never returned.