As friendly as Gwarim was, and as hospitable as all of Brantiir was, Leon and his companions soon took their leave—though Gwarim didn’t let them go until he finessed a promise from Leon to visit again in the near future and stay for longer. Leon was happy to make the promise, and when he and his party took their leave, he left Gwarim such an enormous pile of storm crystal that any voices objecting to his presence were surely silenced.
During their brief stay, Gwarim helped Leon arrange his continued travel. Despot Heron was first, and when Leon arrived, he found the man himself waiting to greet him. Heron was polite, if cold, and he was more than eager for Leon to ‘gift’ him an amount of storm crystal that, had Leon not had the ability to make it almost at will, would’ve surely been extortionate. He was even more eager for Leon to leave the moment Leon’s ‘gift’ was verified.
So, in the second trip through a Lumenite strand, Leon found himself in Basileus Gerhard’s land. Unlike Herod, Gerhard didn’t come out to personally greet Leon as he was handling business in his planes. As a result, Leon’s presence was somewhat awkward for the officials who remained behind, but that only encouraged them to speed him along to his destination.
A third river of golden Lumenite was conjured after Leon paid the appropriate price in storm crystal, and he and his companions found themselves stepping out of the Lumenite strand and onto one of many dedicated reception pads outside of Torn Sky’s city walls.
In all, it was a fairly rough day, spent mostly waiting for a new strand to be established so that Leon’s party could magically travel thousands of miles in seconds. However, in those few brief hours that Leon spent in the other cities, he was able to see with his own eyes the diversity of the Storm Lands’ geography.
Despot Heron was, much like Gwarim, based in a hot and humid region, but unlike the jungle that Gwarim was based out of, Heron’s lands were swampy and seemingly poor. His capital city certainly boasted considerable wealth, but Leon couldn’t imagine that much of it came from the marshes and bogs that made up the core of his Nexus territories. He imagined that Heron’s Nexus territory was strategically important mostly because it acted as something of a gateway through a tall mountain range that some used as the border between the civilized east and the wild west.
That particular mountain range all but demanded some exploration, however, as the caps were perpetually wreathed in storm clouds, and Leon was able to sense serpents flying amidst the hurricane winds that battered the jagged peaks and mountain lions stalking through the valleys and crevices. There were even a few creatures that he was able to sense in that mountain range that made it easy for him to understand why most who wanted to go east or west past the mountains either went around them entirely or through Heron’s territory.
Gerhard’s land was far less accommodating than even Herod’s swamps—he’d established himself deep in the interior of the Storm Lands, where the oceans were far, and water could be scarce where powerful mages couldn’t compensate. His capital city had been built on one of the few silvery rivers cutting through an arid sunbaked—or rather, Origin Spark-baked—desert, flat and dusty in all directions.
Thanks to water enchantments and the abundant magic power in the area, mages could establish themselves even in this most inhospitable region, the cities they built turning into green oases amidst the orange-brown expanse. However, not even Basileus Gerhard was able—or perhaps, willing—to fully tame the desert, as the dry, barren landscape was wracked by frequent dust and electrical storms that left this interior region mostly lifeless and desolate.
The reason why Gerhard’s territory was considered the border of the Far East despite already being east of the continent’s center was easy to see, as the desert he’d settled in stretched throughout many Lords’ domains, but out of all of the Storm Lands’ regions, only the Far West was less densely inhabited. The true eastern land, where the Storm Lands’ fate was decided, where the powers that dominated the Kingdom of the lightning mages were based, lay beyond it.
Leon finally laid his eyes upon this veritable land of milk and honey as he stepped from the Lumenite strand. Kamran’s capital city was, as could be expected, in a much more temperate and pleasant zone than Gwarim had settled. Hills covered in flowers and grass rolled into the horizon, many terraced into beautiful, stepped farms and hillside estates. The city of Torn Sky itself was a dense, though gorgeous, urban agglomeration, shaped like a ring around the titanic palace and storm that held it aloft in the city’s center.
North of the city was a huge sea, and not far from the northern sections of the city’s outer walls were steep cliffs that presented a formidable obstacle to conventional assaults. That sea emptied into several huge rivers that flowed southward, eventually joining extensive—and surely magically-made—fjords and channels that connected to the oceans south and east of the Storm Lands.
In fact, now that Leon was close enough to get a good look at it all with his magic senses, he could see that the Storm Lands, despite how much more densely inhabited the Far East was compared to the Far West, was still relatively underpopulated compared to its total land, and that land had been heavily carved up in ways that could only have been the work of ferociously powerful mages denoting their borders. Mountains, rivers, canyons deep enough to practically threaten to open into the Void outside the Nexus, and fjords thousands of miles long carved through the landscape all served to give the Far East a maze-like quality that had Leon feeling almost claustrophobic.
The Far West was certainly segmented with its mountains and rivers, but those were natural boundaries. Out here, the Basileis and Anakes that had been quarreling for eighty thousand years had broken the land up so that large numbers of people could only travel along designated routes, and armies could only try to attack through heavily fortified chokepoints.
The King in Leon, which caused him to see most geography in strategic terms, of how troops could move and arks could fly and supplies could be gathered, shuddered at the thought of trying to take so segmented and heavily fortified a place as the Far East with only military means—and that was before even factoring in the strength of the Lords that ruled this fertile, wealthy, and literally war-torn region.
Leon’s companions were quiet as they joined him on the Lumenite pad. So much moving around and so much dealing with bureaucrats at their other stopping points had all of their patience rather frayed, to the point that they were all eager to get this final leg of their journey over with.
Thankfully, seconds after the Lumenite blinked out, a group of about a dozen strong stepped onto the pad from an adjacent building to welcome Leon and his companions.
“Greetings!” the leading mage called out, his eleventh-tier aura shining valiantly, if vainly, amidst the whirling nightmare spilling from the bodies of Leon and his companions. The armored guards behind him, however, staggered slightly, and Leon could see them tensing and preparing for violence. None of them had achieved Apotheosis.
Most of the guards halted a dozen paces from Leon’s group, but the leading mage bowed politely, though not in a way as to imply submission, and stepped closer. “Welcome to Torn Sky. I apologize for the lack of a greater welcome party, but this is rather last-minute, isn’t it, Lord Demetrios?”
Leon’s lips twitched at the pseudonym. Justin had arranged this part, and Leon wondered if using the name of his Ancestor was some kind of joke to Justin.
“We’re in a hurry,” Leon said as he glanced at his companions and the golems behind them.
“Then it’s a good thing that your associates have taken care of most of the processing paperwork,” the eleventh-tier mage said with a knowing smile. “Follow me, and we’ll have you out of here in just a few minutes…”
Leon raised an eyebrow, but after a quick scan with his magic senses for any sign of a trap, he followed the mage into the processing building. Despite his worries, there weren’t legions upon legions of Kamran’s warriors waiting within, and sure enough, he and his people were simply shown through the building to the atrium, where Justin was waiting with half a dozen others, all clad in vibrant, but not quite bright, blue uniforms.
The man looked hale and hearty, though the look of hesitation that crossed his face the moment he and Leon made eye contact was impossible to hide. However, as Justin’s eyes slid from Leon to Valeria, his countenance immediately brightened, though he kept himself restrained.
“Your associates,” the eleventh-tier mage said with an expectant smile.
Leon thought he looked like he was waiting for something specific, and that thought was only confirmed when Justin came walking up, the shining smile of a slimy copper dealer plastered over his pale features. “Commander Willos,” he said, drawing the eleventh-tier mage’s attention. “Thank you for handling all of this for us; we’ll certainly remember your personal hospitality.”
Justin extended an arm, and Willos, his smile only widening, took it. Leon noticed a brief flash of light as something passed between them, and then they dropped their arms. It went so quickly that, had Leon not been a post-Apotheosis mage, he doubted he’d have noticed it.
“Safe travels, Magistrate Numerian,” Willos said to Justin. “Lord Demetrios, may you have a fruitful stay in Torn Sky.” His knowing smile didn’t shift in the slightest as he once again shallowly bowed to Leon and his companions, then retreated deeper into the processing facility.
“Welcome to the Far East,” Justin said once Willos was gone from the atrium. However, Leon was keenly aware that they were still being watched, and not just from the guards and desk workers in the large hall. “The transport I’ve arranged is waiting outside.”
Stiffly, Leon responded, “Let’s be on our way, then.”
Justin nodded, and without a word, Leon and his party exited the building. A transport awaited them outside, long and sleek, with a ramp already extended close to the ark’s prow, letting them enter without breaking stride. The interior was comfortable, if impersonal, and the pilot’s compartment in the back was separated from the main cabin. Two plush benches against the ark’s walls were the vehicle’s seating options, with the front of the ark being more open to allow for storing luggage and to keep the doorway clear.
Leon and his companions followed Justin inside, with Nestor ordering his golems to squeeze themselves up at the front of the ark to make as much room available as they could. Still, the interior wound up being a little cramped, and Leon found himself standing closer than he would’ve liked to Justin.
The ark was silent as the ramp slid up and the doors shut behind them. Leon and Justin stared each other down, neither having seen the other in person in more than two centuries and both having been perfectly happy with that state of affairs. Now that they were breathing the same air again, at least for Leon, no words seemed sufficient for the moment.
In that awkward silence, Valeria pushed her way past Leon’s arm and, with the kind of wide smile that she rarely wore in public, she threw herself into her father’s arms.
“Val,” Justin said warmly, and the awkwardness of the moment melted away.
“Father,” Valeria replied, joy lighting her face up better than any sun ever could.
They stayed like that for a single warm moment, and then Justin, with visible reluctance, let his arms fall from his daughter, and he pressed a finger to a small runic circle by the pilot’s compartment door, signaling the pilot to take off. A moment later, the ark began to rise from the ground.
“We’ll be in Antiochus in an hour or two,” Justin said as he sat down. “We’re fully secure in here. Even if the pilot wasn’t one of Tion Bey’s men, I verified that this cabin is completely secure.”
Leon slowly sat across from him, with Valeria and Cassandra sitting on either side of him. Nestor and his Paladins sat further down. He’d already given the ark’s wards a quick once-over, and he found the ark’s privacy wards sufficient for their purpose, if not up to his standards.
“How much time do we have?” Leon asked as he leaned back against the ark’s walls, letting the magic flowing through the walls hum pleasantly against his body. He felt the main thrusters engage as they reached the needed height, but the acceleration was much slower than he was used to, which made sense given that this ark was clearly meant for civilian purposes.
“Six days until we return to Torn Sky for our business,” Justin responded. “We’ll spend those days in Antiochus. Regulus’ estate is large enough to host you, and his servants are loyal and tight-lipped. I’ve been staying there myself, keeping my head down.”
“Nothing happen that changes our plans while we were traveling?” Leon asked.
“No,” Justin confirmed. “Everything’s quiet. Or as quiet as the leadup to the biggest festival of the year can be.”
Leon grimaced, unable to quite set aside his feelings at the ‘largest festival of the year’ celebrating the downfall of his Clan.
“My allies and I have been refining the plan,” Justin continued, letting Leon’s grimace go unremarked. “We’ll have time to completely memorize it, rehearse it, and iterate on it if needed.”
“Six days isn’t that much time if any problems present themselves,” Cassandra pointed out.
“We can adapt,” Valeria said confidently.
“We will be ready to do so, if needed,” Leon said. “I’d rather have defined contingencies for when things go wrong.”
“Not confident that we’ll pull this off?” Justin asked, the slightest wavering in his tone the only thing that ruined his otherwise self-assured tone.
“No,” Leon bluntly replied. He didn’t feel like he needed to elaborate as to why, and Justin didn’t ask for his reasons. Continuing, Leon said, “We’ll all understand what we’re trying to do at every step of the way. That way, when challenges present themselves, we’ll be able to adapt without ruining the entire plan. But we’ll need contingencies. Entrances and exits. Fallback options.”
“We have those,” Justin said. “Safehouses. Collaborators within the palace. I’ve invested heavily in ensuring that doors are opened and held open.”
Leon nodded, knowing that ‘investing’ was hardly a turn of phrase. Commander Willos was proof enough of that, as Leon doubted that his arrival would’ve gone so smoothly if it weren’t for Justin’s obvious bribe.
“And you have confidence in all of your contacts?” Cassandra asked, doubt coursing thickly through her tone. “This ‘Regulus’ isn’t going to promise us sanctuary for six days only to turn us in after three?”
“Regulus is one of my oldest friends,” Justin hissed. “He and I grew up together. My mother took him in when his parents were away on business. He ate from my table, and is as much a brother to me as I have ever had.”
Leon blinked, realizing in that moment that he didn’t truly know that much about Justin’s situation. He knew that the man had grown up in Antiochus and had first entered Kamran’s bureaucracy as a low-level magistrate in that city. However, his life before having Valeria had seldom been broached between them. As far as Leon knew, it hadn’t even come up that much between Justin and Valeria.
Before Cassandra could provoke any arguments with Justin, Leon asked, “How many contacts do you have in Antiochus?” Leon’s hand found Valeria’s as he spoke, and Justin frowned as his eyes shifted from Cassandra to focusing on the floor.
“Fewer than I would’ve had a century ago,” he said. “More than I would a century from now. My parents passed before Regulus and I left for Torn Sky. I had a few cousins remain behind. But they’re gone, now. A few descendants of theirs are still around, but it’s been centuries since I was last in the city, and none of my extended family from Antiochus ascended past the fourth-tier. More than a dozen generations separate me from even my closest relative in Antiochus. But… I still have a few friends. Regulus chief among them.”
“I look forward to meeting him…” Leon whispered.
Silence again descended upon the cabin as the ark sped over the hills, villages, and estates outside of Torn Sky. They’d reach Antiochus within a few hours, where they’d finally solidify their plan.
And in six days, they’d return, crash Kamran’s little festival, and steal away with his imprisoned ward while he was busy fighting Halbast out in the planes…
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Thank you to my Apotheosis-tier patrons:
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