E08 - Ch 37: The Spire

Sylvara stood on the jagged mountain cliff, her cloak snapping against the wind as she stared down at the dark city of Elduros below.

Still, she hesitated. She knew she could not dally. The Mother would be expecting her, but Sylvara’s feet refused to carry her forward.

Again and again, her mind scrambled to find a way out, clawing desperately for some hidden path she had overlooked. But there was nothing. Elas had her cornered. Somehow, he had unearthed her greatest secret, something she had buried so deeply she thought it would never see the light of day again. If he revealed it to the Horn, her ruin was all but certain.

Yet she could not fathom betraying the Mother. The thought filled her chest with cold, smothering fear.

A shudder ran through her. She had never fully realized until now, but she feared the Mother far more than she feared the Horn or Elas. Yet what choice was left to her? Whichever path she chose, she saw only death at its end.

An old thought, one she had long buried, emerged in her mind. Some existences just aren’t worth living.

She had thought that about the arcanaless farm boy. But now she thought him fortunate.

Despite it all, she was not ready to die. For a moment, she was not even sure why that was. Then she found it. Rage. It was still there, after all these years, stubborn but alive. She dared not direct it at the Horn or the Nyx. It would be like kicking a wave to hurt the ocean. But Elas… yes, perhaps she could direct it at him for putting her in this predicament.

Something stirred within her. It was her will. The first embers of strength and energy returned. But she knew she needed time to figure out the right course of action. She had to delay her meeting with the Mother, even if only by a day.

A savage grin flashed across her lips. With a sudden surge of arcana, she flung herself from the cliff. The wind howled around her as she twisted through the air, zigzagging down the mountaintop with controlled bursts of magic toward the sprawling city below.

The city of Elduros reached upward like an ancient dark forest. It had been built on the ruins left by the elves. The Spire was their greatest creation. It twisted upward from the heart of the city, its black stone dark with millennia of history. With a diameter of a city block and a height three times taller than a world tree, the Spire of Elduros was a living monument to the incredible intellect of an ancient race that had long gone extinct.

The city had been built around the towering structure, which in itself was a city of its own. Outside, human buildings were gathered around the Spire, feeding off the industry and wealth it brought. Inside was the domain of the Chandra, both its university and its headquarters.

The Spire housed the Conclave of Chandra’s arcanists, acolytes, and scholars. It drew knowledge and power-seeking aspirants from every corner of the world. The higher one lived within the Spire, the greater their status.

Of the Five Holy Conclaves, it was often said that the Helera were the richest and the Eshainen the strongest. But the Chandra were revered for their prestige.

Ascending the Spire demanded arcana, which in itself was a quiet show of power and wealth. The higher one lived, the more one would spend just to reach their home. Thus, to live in the Spire was to declare one’s station without ever speaking a word.

As a full arcanist of the Chandra, Sylvara’s assigned quarters were on the ninety-seventh floor. She rarely used them, preferring to stay far from the prying eyes and whispering mouths she knew infested her house staff. But perhaps it would serve her to visit.

She came to the gates of the city, taking the entrance for Ascendants to give her name and station to the guards. Elduros was one of the three largest cities in the empire, and it was heavily guarded by enchantments that prevented mages from circumventing its borders.

After being let through the gates, she narrowed her eyes at the looming tower, then drew a deep breath and spread her hands.

“Anemogamana.”

Arcana rushed out from her arcavoir, surging beneath her feet and all around her, lifting her skyward. Balconies, windows, and hanging gardens blurred past her in a dizzying rush.

She flew past rooftops and the low buildings of the city toward the tower until she was beside its walls, still climbing upward.

The flying spell was one of the most dangerous. It required delicate control that could not be easily mastered with the aid of a spell talisman alone. It was also an expensive spell to cast for long periods, and it had fatal consequences if one lost control of the spell or ran out of arcana.

But this was a short flight, and soon she spotted the terrace that belonged to her. She came over the railing and landed on smooth tiles with a soft tap of her feet as she withdrew her spell.

A serving girl with bright blue hair carrying a pot of tulips let out a gasp at the sight of her arrival.

Sylvara found that she remembered the girl’s name.

“High Mistress, y-you’re here!”

“Why wouldn’t I be here, Alta? This is my home, is it not?”

Alta flushed a deep red and nearly dropped the pot.

“Of course, High Mistress, I didn’t mean to suggest—”

“Enough. Draw me a bath. I’ve had a long journey.”

“Right away!” Alta bobbed another curtsy and fled inside, then she remembered to come back around and hold the door open for Sylvara.

Sylvara entered and then the girl was off again, running toward the bathing room.

Her quarters contained four sprawling bedrooms, a sunlit tea room, a study filled with rare tomes, a dining room, a small garden at its center, and two bathing chambers, all connected by ancient elven plumbing.

The servant in her bedroom helped her change out of her travel clothes. It was a girl Sylvara did not recognize. She noted the nervous dart of the girl’s eyes and deduced that her steward must have hired the girl recently.

Sylvara allowed the girl to help her undress, though she tensed when the attendant reached for the strap wound around her ribcage. The kingstone was hidden beneath her left breast, and a small knife was strapped on the other side beneath her right arm.

“Leave that on,” she said coolly.

“Of course, High Mistress,” the girl said quickly.

Sylvara dismissed the girl and went to the bathroom. The bath was ready by then, benefits of the elven plumbing, and she sank into the steaming water with a sigh. She closed her eyes and wondered if this would be the last time she’d enjoy such comforts.

A sharp knock at the door stirred her from her reverie.

“Enter,” she called.

“It is your steward, Varun,” came the muffled reply.

“Enter,” she repeated, more sharply.

The old man shuffled in. He bowed low, but Sylvara barely glanced at him. Varun had managed her household since she became a full arcanist. The man knew the extent of her accounts and assets, and that made her feel far more naked in front of him than her physical nudity.

“The High Governess Shavani has summoned your eminence,” he said, keeping his head bowed.

Sylvara looked at him then. She had made her arrival known at the gates, but to be summoned so quickly? It confirmed what she already suspected. Shavani had a spy among her servants. Perhaps it was even Varun himself.

“When?” she asked.

“The request seemed…urgent,” Varun said. It was his polite way of saying get your ass out of the bath and see her right this second.

“Fine,” Sylvara sighed, rising from the bath in a spray of water.

The serving girl from before returend to dress her in robes of bright silks embroidered with the sigils of the Chandra. She pushed the girl off when she spent too long trying to tie the perfect bow around her waist. She made the tie quickly and then headed out the door into the central courtyard of her floor.

The front doors of several homes wrapped around the great column that ran through the center. These homes all belonged to arcanists and were as high as the hundred and tenth floor.

Above that lived the masters and headmasters. The hundred and twentieth floor, the highest in the Spire belonged to the High Circle. It was where they met. Sylvara had been there only once. The day she became an arcanist of the Chandra.

Sylvara made her way to the central column where the lifts were. She stepped up to one that was not lit, meaning that it was not in use, and pressed her hand to the panel, using her arcana to power the runes that drew the lift to her floor. It arrived, sliding up the rails. It was a tall rectangle with a small step that could fit one person, but it carried two crystal handlebars with it. One led upward and one downward.

She stepped onto the small platform of the lift and gripped the upward crystal handle, pressing her arcana into it. Custom dictated that one could travel to their own quarters in any method they wished, but if they were to reach a floor above their own, the lift was the proper method of travel.

At the 112th floor, Sylvara stepped off the lift and into a courtyard that looked much like her floor’s. However, there were far fewer entrances here, for each home was much larger.

A servant stood at the entrance of the High Governness’s home and gave her a pointed look for arriving unaccompanied by a servant of her own. The servant wisely said nothing.

Sylvara was taken through a grand hall and down a corridor, then to a waiting room. After an hour of waiting, she was finally ushered into a lavish tea room. Seated at the jade table was a tall, handsome woman in her seventh decade. Her posture was proud and commanding. This was High Governness Shavani.

“Welcome home, Arcanist Sylvara.”

Sylvara did not bow. She did not smile. Instead, she waited until Shavani’s attendant left the room before she turned on the older woman.

“I don’t have time to waste playing grab-ass with you today. I need to see the Mother.”

A thin frown creased Shavani’s lined face.

“I called you here—”

“Who do you think you are to call me up here?” Sylvara said, her voice rising. “I’ve just come off a long mission. I need to see her urgently, not your ugly face.”

“And yet, you have not been summoned,” Shavani said calmly.

“So tell her I’m here and need to report.”

“What makes you think our Mistress does not already know everything you have to say?”

Sylvara leaned forward, her fingers curling into fists on the tabletop.

“Because I have yet to speak to her, you dimwit. Unless you know someone else with a firsthand account of this generation’s Dawnmere?”

Shavani’s silence was answer enough. She outranked Sylvara within the Chandra’s hierarchy, but within the Nyx, she was an equal Sister of the Tongue. The hierarchy did not segment beyond that. Their true position was measured only by the Mother’s favor, and if Sylvara truly had discovered the Dawnmere, her standing would rise.

“While you await the Mother’s summoning, perhaps you should share your findings with me,” Shavani said.

Sylvara barked a short, humorless laugh. “So you can spin my accomplishment before I see her? Fat chance.”

“So I know if I should interrupt her,” Shavani said.

Sylvara took note. The Mother was busy. Good. She could use that.

“Look, it’s important. She’ll want to see me.”

“Then tell me.”

“Eat ass,” Sylvara said.

Shavani gave no reaction. “Then I’m afraid you will need to wait.”

Sylvara made a show of seething, but inside she smiled. Her rival, in trying to delay her, had given her exactly what she needed.

Shavani took a sip of her tea. Then she said, “You’ve been gone so long. I believe a visit to the sanctuary is due.”

That was annoying. Shavani intended to keep Sylvara locked up before she saw the Mother. Perhaps to prevent her from going to another sister for help.

In theory, aranists were expected to spend several hours each day in ritual prayer. Few ever followed that theory.

“You’re messing with me,” Sylvara muttered under her breath.

“We sisters must keep up appearances,” Shavani said with a small shrug. “Only two of our kin sit on the Chandra’s High Circle. It is my duty to see you play your role. Despite our differences, it would do neither of us any good to have your identity discovered.”

She had a point. Before Sylvara’s departure, the Mistress of the Maw sat on the Chandra’s High Circle. She was as cutthroat a woman as they came in the Nyx, right up to the morning she’d woken up with her own throat cut. The murder was still unsolved, both by the Chandra and by the Nyx itself. With that one death, the Nyx had lost their majority control of the Chandra.

Out of all the Holy Conclaves, the Nyx’s control over the Chandra had been the tightest. At least, that was Sylvara’s understanding, but one could never truly know just how far the Nyx’s rot had spread.

“Just tell the Mother I’ve got plenty to report, will you?” Sylvara said, knowing even as she spoke that her words sounded weak. Perhaps desperate. As if she had much to explain.

“I will,” Shavani said with a smile that was far too sharp.

Sylvara spun on her heel to hide her own smile and stormed out of the room. Shavani was sure to delay her for as long as she could. Exactly as Sylvara had hoped.

She had bought herself some time. Now she just needed to figure out how to buy her life.