The power of the Way was weak here, where chaos thrived. Each fragment was a little pocket of order and energy, which could someday be combined once again into a new Iteration.
With Gadrael’s isolation gone, her information requests arrived from Cradle one after the other:
Lindon and Yerin, together, left Sacred Valley and went into the Desolate Wilds.
He was trained by a local Soulsmith in the very basics of the art.
They encountered the Transcendent Ruins, where they were the first to retrieve the treasure at the top.
Lindon killed a Highgold, initiating a rivalry with a young man named Jai Long. Good. Pressure would help him grow. His sister was more interesting: she would have met Lindon in a few more years, if not for Suriel’s interference.
The exact nature of their relationship would have changed depending on several factors, but the destiny between them must have been quite strong to survive Lindon’s divergence.
A minor point of interest, nothing alarming. Fate adjusted for such small variations as a matter of course.
After a few moments of reviewing her Presence’s predicted future for Lindon and Jai Long, Suriel noticed a handful of gaps. She reviewed the data, pulling up extra information, comparing the reports.
Finally, she found what her automated requests had overlooked.
The Arelius family.
A young Underlord had found Lindon and Yerin, adopting them, and taken them back into the Blackflame Empire for training.
Suriel frowned. That could be a problem. She was familiar with the Arelius family—or rather, their ancestors—and they hadn’t come anywhere near Lindon in any of her projections. Why would they? He was a weak child from nowhere.
She tore open a blue hole in the void, stepping into the Way: the power of order washed over her, soothing and empowering, soaking her body and mind in comfort.
Here, she was close to every Iteration of reality. She could get some answers.
Through her Presence, she reached out to Cradle, requesting information on Wei Shi Lindon.
[Significant deviations detected,] her Presence announced. [Entity Wei Shi Lindon has deviated from primary course. Any analysis of current conditions or projections of future activity will have a low degree of accuracy.]
She’d made a mistake somewhere, but a quick review of her actions found nothing to account for this degree of change. She’d altered his future, true, but she should still be able to call up information about his current status.
If her Presence couldn’t even connect to the fate of Cradle, then something was badly off-course. None of her assumptions were reliable any longer.
And all of her predictions were wrong.
Irritation growing, she requested general information about the status of Iteration One-one-zero.
[Iteration One-one-zero has deviated from primary course. Any relevant information will have a low degree of accuracy. Direct contact with Iteration is recommended to ensure precision.]
Suriel cut off her physical reactions before she could feel irritation, anger, and uncertainty.
Abidan were allowed a certain degree of autonomy when responding to a spatial or temporal violation, especially Judges. She was permitted to alter the course of many individual lives, so long as the fate of the world remained intact.
Nothing she’d done should have violated those restrictions. Even if Wei Shi Lindon defied all odds and transcended Cradle, it would only mean one more potential Abidan recruit. On a cosmic scale, that was virtually irrelevant. Cradle wouldn’t notice when he was gone.
Something else had changed.
The Hound Division would have seen this. She had to go back to Cradle and determine the origin of this deviation before—
An eyeball the size of her head popped into being in front of her. A human eye, in appearance: pure white sclera, black pupil, purple iris ringed with symbols like a Cradle script-circle.
It looked very much like one of her eyes, in fact, only larger.
[Judge designation zero-zero-six, Suriel,] Makiel’s Presence said, by way of greeting. [Please travel to the following coordinates. Judge designation zero-zero-one, Makiel, requests a meeting.]
Chapter 22
Years ago, when Renfei had first earned her way into the Skysworn, her instructor had congratulated her with these words:
“You’ll stop rebels, rivals, and runaway killers all over the empire, and you’ll do great service to the emperor. But somewhere, someday, you’ll run across somebody trying to revive the Path of Black Flame.” He’d chewed on a straw as he spoke, tapping the burned half of his face. “When the Blackflames return, that’s when you’ll really stretch your oath. Can’t help but wonder if you’ll fight, or if you’ll leave your honor behind.”
The challenge had hovered over her, unanswered, for twelve years. She had fought with the Kotai clan against walking sharks on the beaches of the Trackless Sea, executed exiled criminals trying to sneak in across the eastern border, and returned runaways to the Stonedeep Mines. But, though she had kept her spirit open in special vigilance, she had never encountered a Blackflame.
Until a week ago.
She and her partner had been patrolling near Serpent’s Grave, keeping an eye on the battle in the city with their spiritual perception. They wouldn’t interfere in the battle; a clan was well within their rights to pass judgment on citizens in their territory. But conflicts led to crimes, so they remained vigilant wherever swords were drawn.
Of the many things they sensed that night, one in particular had drawn them to Serpent’s Grave like flies to rotting flesh: the power of Blackflame.
The Arelius turtle, Orthos, was known to them. His madra had flared during the battle, which was to be expected, but what they hadn’t anticipated was a second source of the Path of Black Flame.
As they had for the past seven days, Renfei drifted next to Bai Rou over the dragon-bone city, dodging horned skulls and yellow ribs that clawed the sky. They flew on emerald green Thousand-Mile Clouds: the symbols of the Skysworn.
Over this week, they’d sensed occasional flares of Blackflame through the city, but not much they could track.
“South-southeast?” Bai Rou asked, his voice coming from the shadow beneath his broad bamboo hat. His great bulk was shrouded by a huge, heavy coat that covered him from shoulders to toes, and his eyes—his Goldsign—shone yellow from within the shadows over his face.
She extended her own perception and checked. Not a Blackflame, just a fire artist practicing. “No. Two more days, and then we confront the Jai Underlord.”
Renfei had come to her own conclusion: their mysterious source wasn’t a sacred artist at all. Rather, it must be a Blackflame weapon that one of the two Serpent’s Grave Underlords had unearthed for their battle. The hints they’d gotten since then were only the weapon being transported throughout the city.
They had planned to confront both Underlords once they had evidence of the weapon’s existence, but thus far, they’d found none. And the Arelius Patriarch had fled the city before the Skysworn arrived. That suggested a guilty conscience to Renfei, but she needed more than suspicions to pursue claims against a Lord.
So if they found no more trace of the weapon soon, they would take Jai Daishou’s testimony anyway.
Bai Rou wordlessly agreed—he was only twenty-eighth among the Skysworn Truegolds, while she was rank thirteen and a disciple of the prestigious Cloud Hammer School. While they were assigned together, her opinion would override his.
Deadly heat flashed in the direction of the great black mountain that loomed over the city, and she started to call its position to Bai Rou.