14 Broken Legacy #2
“A scant step away from the Void.”
“I’m no scrawnier than you, Syvr.”
“And what have you done to your hair? Look how short it is! Can you even braid it?”
Before Antal could protest, Syvr pinched a strand of hair between their claws, frowning at it with funerary despair. A grave offense. No greater violation of daeyari personal space. When Antal batted their hand away, Syvr snickered.
Antal flinched at the unexpected urge to laugh with them.
Old habits were the hardest to strangle. He’d known Syvr since his antlers were velvet stubs. His father’s loyal kezri, a cunning spy.
But for as long as Antal could remember, whenever Syvr had returned from trips to far-off Planes, they’d brought back gifts for him.
Toys and smells from other worlds when he was a child.
Stories as he’d grown, some of the fondest memories Antal had of home, those nights sitting with Syvr in a quiet corner of his mother’s garden, talking and laughing until his father’s latest chastisement felt a little farther away.
Antal had no siblings by blood. He’d had Syvr instead.
“You’ve been gone, what, fifty years?” Syvr appraised Antal with a softer grin. “You look well, Antal. How is the Winter Plane treating you?”
The words didn’t slice like Ixli’s. No dripping condescension like Avroz. They were the first daeyari who seemed genuinely interested in the answer.
Like the others, Syvr had never visited in fifty years.
But in Antal’s time on the Winter Plane, the governor’s office had occasionally received odd packages addressed to the Lord Daeyari.
Dried flowers. Glowing crystal. A bottle of silver wine.
All subtle enough to slip beneath Avroz’s attention.
Antal had never known what to make of the gifts, whether the reminders of home were meant to ache or console.
He wanted to smile back. Merciless Void, he wanted to enjoy the company of a single friendly face in this wretched place. Syvr was…
Avroz’s spy. Of course they knew how to put anyone at ease. Antal clung to the guard he’d let slip. Foolish, to trust anyone beneath his father’s hand.
“The Winter Plane has been surprisingly murderous of late,” Antal said, flat.
“Fair enough. You should have seen Qirza’s face when you sent Verne’s head back in a box.” Syvr’s tail flicked, thoughtful. “I never took you for a ‘head in a box’ kind of daeyari.”
A necessity, with his territory neighbors watching. “Was Qirza angry?”
“At opening a head in a box in the middle of the council floor?” Syvr grinned, as if delighting in the memory. “Possibly. But Verne started it. Why would Qirza be angry at you?”
“Everyone is angry at me.”
“Don’t be dramatic. Just because Ixli’s been scoffing enough air to produce her own storm system. What did you say to her?”
Antal tensed. “Nothing.”
“Ah, yes. ‘Nothing’ typically has that effect on people.” Syvr’s tail swished amusement.
Antal grimaced, painfully aware that saying nothing was the root of the problem.
“So that’s one,” Syvr said. “Not unexpected, if we’re being honest with ourselves. Who else is giving you trouble?”
Antal looked pointedly at Avroz—who also, pointedly, hadn’t looked his way again.
“Well…” Syvr gave a resigned exhale. “You know how he gets, one-track mind and all.”
“I don’t expect to be invited home again anytime soon.”
“Don’t say that, Antal. With his Pilgrimage coming up? He’ll have you back, I’d bet my right antler on it.”
A shudder shot up Antal’s spine.
“His… Pilgrimage?”
“He’s been talking about it more,” Syvr said. “Planning. Soon, I think.”
Antal’s cold fiercened, creeping into the Void-spun marrow of his bones.
History said that, after Veshri’s death, he’d held his energy intact within the Void, traveling the Shattered Planes for centuries before discovering how to weave a new body. Even now, no daeyari knew where to find Veshri, his path wandering Void and Planes alike.
The Pilgrimage was a tradition expected of all daeyari, at the end of their first millennium. A journey to venture as far as possible across the Shattered Planes, to discover new worlds and, if deemed worthy, intersect Veshri’s path.
Avroz was early in his ninth century, not unheard of for Pilgrimage, but still uncommon. Far sooner than Antal had expected.
Syvr’s tail flicked. “Has he… not spoken to you about it?”
“No. He hasn’t.”
It hit Antal like claws in his gut. Like bone chipped against his teeth. How in the depthless Void had he not thought of this? So focused on immediate dangers—Verne’s coup, rebuilding Thomaskweld—he’d set aside this older, looming threat.
The Pilgrimage was part tradition, part population control for a species that didn’t die of age.
Daeyari almost never returned from their journey, some choosing to end their lives in honored combat against aedari upon the Contested Planes, others vanishing to unknown reaches of the Planeverse.
A part of Antal should feel relief, the prospect of his father far away.
But Avroz would have to relinquish his seat on the Daey Celva.
All he’d ever wanted was for Antal to succeed him on the council.
On the meeting floor, all but one pillow had filled.
Miro, a daeyari of over a thousand, had retired recently, gone on his own Pilgrimage.
Antal had received the message months ago, a notice to all territory lords that a new council member would be elected soon.
He’d thought nothing of it. He’d assumed Avroz’s Pilgrimage was still decades, a century off.
But Avroz wouldn’t have to gamble giving up his own seat first, if there was an open spot already. He wouldn’t risk waiting for another vacancy when his Pilgrimage was close. He could nominate Antal, vote while he still held influence, retire after the job was finished.
Fuck. Fuck.
His father hadn’t called Antal back for a lecture. Avroz truly meant to bring him home.
“What’s wrong?” Syvr asked.
“Nothing.” Antal’s claws scraped his thighs.
Syvr’s eyes narrowed, studying him too closely.
“We will begin,” announced a voice from the meeting floor below.
Antal exhaled in relief, spared Syvr’s scrutiny when Qirza stood from her pillow.
At her command, the amphitheater silenced. As packed as Antal had ever seen it, the gallery filled with red eyes and antlers. He forced his father’s Pilgrimage aside, a later problem, his focus needed for this meeting that could decide the fate of his territory.
Qirza appraised her assembly with head high, shawls draped like quicksilver off her shoulders.
“The Daey Celva has gathered to discuss suspicions of an aedari upon the Season-Locked Planes.” Silence in the audience.
“Our initial investigations suggest these suspicions to be true.” A ripple at that, hushed voices and growls.
“Tonight, we will discuss what information has been gathered and agree on a plan forward.” She resumed her seat, cross-legged on the cushion.
“I open the floor. Rel bids for first speech.”
The scowling daeyari sat with hand raised. At Qirza’s permission, he stood. “The evidence is undeniable. I visited one of the sites on the Spring Plane, smelled the aedari energy. This is unacceptable, so close to the Twilit Plane. The creature must be found and—”
“Thank you, Rel,” Qirza interrupted smoothly. “We will hear all information first, then decide on action. Who will speak next?”
Clawed hands raised all around the circle.
The testimonials played out, reports of faint scents masked by fire, but no more substantial leads. As the council spoke, unrest murmured in the gallery.
Syvr leaned close, voice low. “This aedari business is what brings you back? Not my peerless company? Pity.”
“Two instances in my territory,” Antal returned “And there have been others?” Syvr would know.
Their tail swished against their pillow. “A handful of scents all over the Seasons, too weak to track. The council is scrambling.”
That was, indeed, the energy on the council floor.
Forced calm at first, but as Qirza shifted the conversation to proposed action, tensions simmered.
Caution, some council members argued. If an aedari scout had made it this far, it must not be alerted that the Twilit Plane was so close.
A widespread hunt would betray their urgency.
“They’re afraid,” Antal observed.
“For good reason,” Syvr agreed. “You’ve never seen an aedari?”
“No.” Antal had spent his travel years well within the daeyari-controlled worlds, not venturing into the Contested Planes where skirmishes with aedari were more common.
And those Planes were becoming more dangerous, Avroz had said. Antal considered his father’s antlers, the missing point on a back arc.
“He lost a piece of antler,” Antal said. “When?”
Syvr’s tail flicked. “About… a month ago.”
“Just a month? Were you with him? Was Ixli?”
“We went out at the request of a territory lord, an aedari sighting just this side of the Contested Planes. Far enough from here to not raise alarms too high, still too close for comfort.”