Che’ell-Cressen

The Blood Pit.

Hovering up on high with the bearing of a vengeful Hecate, the Regent of Shalkar considered the frantic scene of her dearly deposed Evee below, desperately trying to revive the victim of her dear brother.

“Vestra, how can Elvia be a Favoured Fang?” she addressed the line of sight Message utilised by her hostess, finding that, somehow, her Divination interfaced with Svartálfar magic. “She cannot take on Matron Quar-Tath’s blessings. Our Yinglong would not allow it.”

“Her title would be a misnomer, but not its implication,” Vestra anzzswered with the same twisted humour carried by her earlier observation. “Which would be that the Vessel of the Yinglong must defend my Sister against challenges to her interests. I remain ignorant, however, regarding Phyr’s barter with Qila. Can the Regent clarify a curiosity of mine?”

“Perhaps,” Gwen said. “Ask away.”

“Be yourself and Sobel broodmates?” Vestra’s question made Gwen’s skin prickle. “The similarities you share are far greater than you and your male broodmate.”

“We are not,” Gwen considered her answer, then cherry-picked what was relevant to satiate Vestra’s confusion. “We were… Apprentices of the same Master. She was his wife, and I was his student. She murdered our mutual teacher in cold blood, destroyed our homes, and fled our wrath.”

“Ah. Now I know why Phyr has purchased the fealty of the Yinglong’s Vessel,” Vestra sounded immensely impressed, though whether at Sobel or Phyr, Gwen couldn’t tell. “Phyr’s Fang was your traitor sibling, and we may rightly assume that with his Master as Phyr’s ally, your ire will fall upon her domain. Therefore, Sister Phyr has chosen to inoculate herself against the incursion of one such as yourself by holding a favoured Vessel hostage. Simultaneously, as you have hostile intentions for Qila’s Sinneslukare, Qila is now defenceless when you take to the Vlos Vthath.”

“I see…” Gwen felt her veins grow cold even as her head wore a wreath of molten wrath. It was hard to think with so much going on, though with Sobel gone, she no longer felt so trapped by tunnel vision. “So in one fell swoop, Sobel has set Elvia as Phyr’s guard dog, while opening Qila to my assault, simultaneously performing an incredulous favour for our Mistress of the Long Night to cash in the future.”

“You read the Great Game well,” Vestra sounded immensely impressed. “But it isn’t strange for Qila to be blindsided. None of us knew of your history with Sobel except Phyr, who we saw had offered you her hand. Is this a Human thing?”

The handshake, Gwen had to confess, was just as puzzling to herself. We're all someone's creature. The woman had said without an ounce of shame or self-respect. To not show timidity was why she had taken Sobel’s hand. What she had not expected was that Sobel would materialise in her palm a tiny trinket—one that Gwen had immediately stowed in her Storage Ring.

“To be treated as an equal by a walking calamity like the Void-naśin, you must have felled many a foe as the Regent.” Vestra continued, her voice full of admiration. “I can just imagine the slaughter. It must have been glorious.”

Gwen held back a snort.

Slaughter? No. Shalkar was an act of charity born from necessity. It was the culmination of the desires of those who wanted to flee the hapless persecution of the powerless. It’s a shining city built brick by brick, stratum on stratum, by the grimy hands of sooty refugees who had nowhere else to go.

Unfortunately, these were sentiments that her hosts may find laughable, for she had seen what made the Svartálfar cheer and it certainly was not charity.

“Yes. The casualties were without number,” she reported back to Vestra with half-truths, playing up the Dark Elf’s expectations. “Vestra, may we speak later? Presently, I wish to address the Vessel of the Yinglong.”

“Be liberal. As my guest, you possess natural privileges that the unproven lack.” Vestra replied with munificence, though Gwen was certain her host’s uncanny emotions were performative and patronising. Having displayed such raw emotions when facing Percy, she had already created certain expectations, such as that she had weaknesses to be exploited.

Weaknesses like Elvia.

With Vestra’s disembodied voice willed away, Gwen was free to float in silence, with the artificial winds of Quar-Tath’s realm lifting the folds of her flowing-ink fabric.

But the crowd here wasn’t the Page-Three-loving press from London.

The metallic eyes of her audience were like the trailing gazes of Sand Wolves in the desertscape of Shalkar at dusk. They were not like her Dwarves, who saw her with gratitude and worship, nor her Rat-kin, who saw her with worship and wonder, or even the destitute in Forrestville, who watched her with lustful longing.

The gaze of the Svartálfar was distilled sadism and desperation.

Even with all her ideas, could these people be transformed?

Her Centaur had been a crude and war-like people, but they were the products of an existential war against the elements and the Elementals. Her Dwarves were stubborn, for they were exiled from home and forced to fight the very earth, its many monsters, and brain worms. Her Rat-kin were practical, for they had been literal sustenance, both for their Masters and each other, but she had never doubted they could be good people.

There was no shortage of water, food or shelter in the realm of Quar-tath.

The Svartálfar are a race for whom Marslow’s hierarchy had been secured since the end of the primordial epoch. Their natures had been nurtured for so long that it was baked into their Creature Cores.

Therefore, her question to herself was this—

Would they desire change?

But now was not the time to wax philosophical with the likes of Phyr, Qila, and Vestra, and how many more sisters were sitting in their spires, watching her naked anxiety and wondering what joy they could sap from her princely trunk.

With the limitless ceiling of dark foliage above and the finger-like towers all around her, Gwen knew she had only one purpose in Che’ell-Cresse.

To be not caught in the vague web of the Spires’ politics.

She landed not far from the hectic duo of Knight Captain and Knight Major, joined by Elvia’s floral Sprites. Kiki was its spritely self as always, not fully cognisant of the desperation around it but fully cooperative with Elvia’s efforts. Sen-sen, meanwhile, was wary of her approach, for it watched her with its black, beady eyes as she placed one peep-toe heel ahead of the other.

As a Magister well-studied in vitality, she could see that Mathias was no longer actively dying, but it didn’t mean the Knight was getting better. Elvia had already flooded the man’s body with vitality from Sen-sen and a Greater Restoration or three, but the young man wasn’t taking to her healing like he should.

The reason, Gwen knew perfectly well, was that mana conduits ravaged by Negative Energy, especially at the level of potency Percy afforded, inflicted necrosis on an Astral level.

Mana conduits were not blood vessels, for they occupied the same esoteric realm as a Mage’s Astral Body, or a Necromancer’s Soul Well, intangible manifestations given name through tangible phenomenon.

But could physical flesh mend phantom pain?

If Mathias were a Vessel of the Yinglong, perhaps he could have made it with the benediction of the Lightning Clan’s unique Essence, the very same that made Golos untouchable even by Void strikes.

But the man was a faithful mortal, the anathema of Dragons and Elves, whose Ordo called themselves Dragon Slayers in the past, and whose old magics still hold hostage the ancient heart of a Primordial Red.

“Gwen…” Elvia looked up, her eyes swollen and her face puffed with emotion. “Gwennie, Matty isn’t waking up…”

Gwen felt her heart soften—and yet, her lips grew cold and spiteful.

Evee.

Her dear, dear Evee was once again in trouble.

Once more, Elvia had bitten off more than she could chew.

“Here,” Gwen reached out and materialised a bottle of Golden Mead. “This should help Mathias with his condition.”

She had no idea if the Golden Mead would helpy. Rationally, it should, for Mathias was suffering from the same condition as her Master, for Percy’s Necromancy was learned from Sobel, who learned it from Henry.

God damned karmic threads… Gwen watched as, much to her surprise, Sen-sen intravenously applied the golden solution into Mathias.

Within a minute, the young man’s eyes fluttered open, pale blue and milky, grotesquely scarlet from the ruptured vascular systems that Elvia’s magic had neglected to heal. “R…Regent…”

“Matty, don’t get up,” Gwen commanded the man to stay put in his Sen-sen woven stretcher. We’re all victims here. She observed starkly as Elvia gave her Knight a relieved embrace. Victims of incompetence.

“Evee, I know this isn’t the best time to ask,” she tried to control the simmering anger in her throat. “But I need to know. What deal did you originally make with Qila? Why was Matty fighting in the pits, and why are you now in the same camp as Phyr? I’ve only just arrived here in Che’ell-Cressen, and already, shit had spiralled out of control.”

“Gwen.” Elvia looked up at her from below Gwen’s waist, her petite body immortalised by youth. When Gwen thought about it, it was amazing to her that the Elvia standing in front of her was near identical to the girl who had sung carols by the candlelight of Avalon’s shores. Even now, her Evee looked like a doll from a dream, her flaxen hair glued to her tear-stained cheek, her trembling lips pink and inviting, her eyes two voluminous crystals that would hold Gwen’s reflection in stasis. Comparatively, Gwen felt as though she had dragged her reborn body through nine circles of hell twice over. “I don’t think your Blessing is going to be enough. Mattie’s conduits—”

“Evee.” Gwen’s voice took on a tone of steel. “The Svartálfar are watching. Now isn’t cuddle time. Answer. My. Questions.”

“Regent— If there is a fault, let it be mine. Had I not been captured—” the older Knight beside Elvia made a move to intrude between them, but was discouraged by the menace the Regent of Shalkar exuded.

Elvia must have sensed her anger, for her friend straightened herself, leaving Mathias in the care of her ginseng and flower. “Gwen… Regent… I… we discovered the source of the Mer Phage.”

Gwen felt her ire subside a little. “Was it through Phage rituals? Pits and such?”

“It was!” Elvia’s voice rose an octave. “Just like we suspected in Shalkar.”

“One moment,” Gwen raised a hand. With a command, she expanded her double-glazed Shield in the shape of a dome, then infused the exterior with Void Mana.

“Can… can you do that?” Elvia’s eyes widened as darkness descended. “Won’t the Mistresses…”

“Let them complain to the Dragon Council,” Gwen pulled out the leaf-map given to her by Sanari, unfurling the enormous sheet by Mage Hands. “Do you recognise the geography here? Where did you see those pits? Even a rough location will do.”

“What is this…?” Elvia held the cartographic growth, marvelling at the texture and the detail formed from veins and capillaries. “Er… I think it’s… here? Maybe here…”

“Allow me,” the older Knight bowed his head before receiving the map with reverence. “I believe it is here, near the delta. I think Sir Tupac called it the Arica Coast. There’s a river nearby, called the Rio San Jose, which the Spaniards once used to transport rubber. If you travel up the river far enough, there will be a lake. East of the lake, you will find a section infested by the Wall of the Woods.”

“The domain of the Svartálfar should not have extended this far,” her Evee added solemnly. “Sir Tupac said that, from their records, deep Amazonia should have been four hundred kilometres away, not to mention we need to scale the Andes before we descend into their official domain.”

Gwen considered the map. “So, you were not nabbed in mapped Amazonia, but in an area said to be Amazonia.”

“Correct,” The old Knight nodded. “We’re not bold nor foolish enough to venture into Amazonia with just a strike team, especially with Knight Major Lindholm. We understand that she’s an incredibly important asset of the Ordo, for a multitude of reasons.”

Gwen slipped the leaf back into the storage satchel sewn into her inner garment, a necessity for the safe transportation of her Ilias Leaf and now her self-scaling map. “This is very useful information. Thank you, Sir…?”

“Smallwater.”

Gwen bowed her head, but her dissatisfaction remained unsoothed. “Evee, why were you beholden to Qila?”

“When we first arrived at Che’ell-Cressen, it was just me…” Her Healer quaked at the memory and her judgmental tone. “Mistress Qila said that we’re trespassers, and that she had refrained from killing the surviving Knights on account of me being a Vessel.”

“Of course, you believed her,” Gwen pinched her brows. “Go on.”

“I was left to watch the pit fights for long time, then one day, Mistress Qila appeared. She offered me a choice. To walk free and be forgiven and never return—or to serve her interests in the Blood Pit, whereupon she will return Mathias to me.”

“Let me guess,” Gwen felt like she could read the elder Svartálfar like a couplet, for the schemes of mafiosos everywhere tended to rhyme. “She then told you that you can make Mattie fight, and with every victory, she’ll give you a body back. However, if you lose, either you keep serving, or she nails one of your knights to the Spire’s outer wall until they bleed out.”

“We fought three duels,” her friend had finally picked up on the fact that Gwen was not her usual, oh my precious self. “Sir Smallwater was our first prize, but his Relic was tampered with, and his Spellsword was damaged as well.”

“To give Miss Lindholm some credit,” Sir Smallwater intervened. “Dame Qila had informed us that she is willing to aid us in eradicating theAdventists of Juche. She assured us, correctly, I assume, that the Blood Pit is how conflicts are resolved with minimum casualties in Che’ell-Cressen. If we win back our troop, and if our troop is successful in gaining enough favour from her and her patron, then we can Purge the Necromancers.”

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Gwen sighed, feeling exhausted by the innate good of these lawful types.

“With as little web as this, will I ensnare a fly as great…” she looked at her pitiful Evee.If there were Shakespeare in this world, maybe there would be less naivety when folk like Elvia faced the whims of beings who saw them as less than figurines on a battle board.

“What did you say to Qila to make her spare Mathias?” She continued her interrogation.

“Mistress Qila said…” Elvia seemed to shrink as she spoke out of guilt. “She said that if I agree to go over to Mistress Phyr, then Mistress Phyr will allow Percy to spare Mathias.”

“What did Qila get?” Gwen persisted. “For passing over her new favourite toy.”

“I… I don’t know.” Elvia hung her head.

Considering the circumstances, Gwen had a sneaky feeling she knew the answer. Phyr was a close contender to Qila, according to Vestra, probably thanks to Percy. With her arrival, it was unlikely that Sobel would stay in Che’ell-Cressen, for given enough time, she could bring the might of the Mageocracy, the Dwarves, her numerous allies, and, most importantly, Gunther.

Ergo, if Sobel was leaving anyway, why not trade her absence as a favour? This way, Phyr would receive protection from Gwen, while Qila was unknowingly disadvantaged, paying a phantom price for Sobel's decision to retract Percy from Phyr’s service.

Knowing the Ordo Knights and Elvia, expecting them to see through the ruse was like expecting kindergartners to play professional rugby against the All Blacks.

Still, her disappointment was immeasurable, for her friend’s foolishness had placed her on the worst possible formation in an already complex chessboard.

A part of Gwen wanted to scoop up Evee and take her away from all this.

But then what?

Lock her up in an ivory tower?

Put Evee behind glass, under lock and key in stasis, so that when the Regent of Shalkar had finally pacified the world, she would liberate her princess and live out their happy lives in the skygarden above Shalkar’s Tower?

Disturbingly, her mind suddenly turned to the flustered face of Slylth, so bookish and unsure, but immeasurably competent. If Qila had boxed Slylth in Che’ell-Cressen, either he would have burned down the house while claiming ignorance, or Sythinthimryr would have burst through the inter-planar roof, smote the Daughter of the Suffocating Dark, then told Quar-tath to go back to sleep.

Even Golos had his rugged charm. “We Dragons…” the former Wyvern would say while sipping a Golden Mead cocktail, chilling out with his flock of kids as they sat by the rails of Shalkar’s Sky Garden. “Bah—what am I saying?.

.. I have grown fond of them…these mortals below…”

Despite everything, despite the Ordo’s gift of Faith, despite the Yinglong’s gift of eternal youth, had the distance between herself and Elvia grown so far?

“Gwennie, I need to move Mathias…” Elvia’s high-pitched plea penetrated through the roaring thoughts running through her head. “He needs meaningful rest… and more Golden Mead.”

Gwen retracted the shield, attracting audible jeers around the half-cleared gladiatorial forum.

“Of course.” She lightly levitated herself, effortlessly taking to the air, ignoring the pleading eyes and their need for Sufina’s unique Essence. “Take care of Mattie. Do what you feel is right. I shall be preoccupied for some time, but rest assured, I promise you that everyone is going to go home alive.”

“Gwen—”

Her friend’s plea fell short, for Gwen was already a dozen scenarios deep in the events ahead. Ignoring the gaze and glares of her lilac-skinned audience, she made for the smallest of the Spires, the Spire of Silence, where her hostess stood on the ornate balcony, welcoming her home like an impatient lover.

A few Dimension Doors later, she was back on the balcony, safely away from the web layed out to snare her with the world’s sweetest lure.

“Welcome back, Regent,” her hostess’ long and slittered eyes regarded her with their pretty silver irises. “May we discuss how you would like to proceed? The Silent Spire isn’t all-powerful like our Sisters, but that’s precisely why we need each other.”

Gwen forcibly relaxed her taut body, adjusted her frock, then gave her hostess her best, most winsome smile.

“Thank you for the offer, Vestra. But I would like to speak to Quar-tath directly.”

Vestra’s smile lingered, but she could see the Svartálfar’s heart drop as she demanded to commune with the founder of the Che’ell-Cressen Hotel group, rather than deal with its managers. “I fear… that is…”

“I think there’s being a mistake. I am not a mere Vessel.” Gwen said without raising her voice, “I am a member of The Accord. I am the Guardian of my World Tree. I have walked in the old glades with my seniors, the everburning Sythinthimryr. I have sat with Lord Illaelitharian as we turned the Undead infestation into mildew and dust. I have guided He who Heeds to a satisfying slumber. I am she who bestowed upon Prideful Dhànthárian the stewardship of Deepholm. I have taken tea with ageless Tyfanevius in his grot as I assumed the mantle of the Prime Material’s Protector. I speak as the kin of Almudj, who is older than they who are ageless. Ergo, I may speak to your Matron.”

She paused for effect.

“You knew I shouldn’t be fighting in the pits,” Gwen allowed herself to tear the veil of ignorance that Vestra wore like a funeral shawl, revealing a white and trembling face fraught with shock. “The Matron of the Long Night’s dominion applies to Vessels, but not to beings like myself, isn’t that right? That’s why you kept emphasising that I was the Vessel of the Dreamer in the Well of the World.”

Vestra’s smiling face grew rigid. “You possess an awful imagination, Regent.”

All around them, the Spire Witches stirred into action, placing themselves at various vantage points.

“Perhaps.” Gwen motioned to both Strun and Lulan, who had already arrived by her side and were ready to break necks at the slightest offence. Mentally preparing herself to answer to a Black Dragon, she willed her Crow Skin suit to materialise around her body. The effect was unsettling, especially as the enclosure sheared her new dress, but that was the price paid when Shalkar’s best artificers spared no expense. “May I speak to the Matron now?”

“You are courageous… very courageous,Rivvil.” Vestra’s face was no longer smiling. From the barely visible split-lines on her forehead and her chin, Gwen imagined that a fully enraged Svartálfar would appear far more alien and arachnid. As far as her translation stone could attest, the Dark Elf had even let loose a derogatory slang for the low-born.

“Is that a yes or no?” Gwen made a casual gesture toward the pit she had just left, where Elvia was ferrying away her Knight. “I hope you’re not avoiding the answer by threatening me. If we fight here, who would benefit? Kill me in the name of Quar-tath, and the ire of my immortal allies would end your Spire. Assail me without your Matron’s blessing, and I will show you a slaughter the likes of which the Svartálfar has not seen since Sobel. Whatever happens, Qila will clap and laugh, while Phyr would sip her wine. Is that what you ensnared me for?”

As she spoke, her Aura of Desolation built itself with every syllable until it wrapped around her like an arrested whirlpool. For sublime beings who were effectively allergic to Necromancy and Faith Magic, the projection would have felt doubly repressive. Gwen had also wanted to summon Ariel and Caliban. Unfortunately, her Familiars were far too honest, and the combined assault from Ariel’s Dragon Fear and Caliban’s I am about to swallow your soul Fear might advance their circumstance far beyond her present desire to burn the Svartálfar’s meticulously woven web.

The Spire Witches drew their dusky spell daggers, some curved like scimitars, others jagged and cruel. Vestra’s silvery eyes glowed like a cat’s as the Essence in her body threatened to spill… until finally, the Svartálfar relaxed her shoulders.

“S'tharl hass!,” she informed the room. “All of you. SIT. Regent. Please be seated, as befitting of a guest.”

Gwen waited for their potential assailants to sit and make themselves scarce before she too sat, though she did not un-Klad herself from her armour.

“As befitting a hostess, answer me truly,” Gwen diluted her Aura of Desolation. “Can you grant me an audience with the Matron of the Long Night?”

Vestra’s chest, hidden by a ruffled layer of disorderly silk, rose and fell with the metronome of Gwen’s breath.

“I dare not,” the Dark Elf said at last, seemingly having reached some mental threshold. “Only Sinsura has that privilege, and she answers to no one. Petition as we may, the Matron’s habits remain unchanged.”

Gwen mentally calculated cycles to mean somewhere between a thousand to ten thousand Human years, for linear time was rare in the arboreal realm, and all she needed was the confirmation that Vestra would be her wedge.

“What does Ancient Quar-tath expect from her daughters?” Gwen asked.

“Tribute. Sacrifice. Amusement,” Vestra’s reply was filled with sadistic malice. “She who had consumed every competitor in Amazonia in the Primordial Age since the dawn of time will not be satisfied by anything else.”

Like mother. Like daughter. Gwen watched the Elf’s lips curl. Like Dragon. Like Vessel.

Sythinthimryr was haughty but dutiful.

Tyfanevius was a micro-manager and a meddler.

Illaelitharian was aloof and indifferent.

The Yinglong was sentimental and manipulative.

Dhànthárian was intractable but strangely down to earth.

And Quar-Tath? The Black Dragon was apathetic and sadistic. From the sounds of it, the Ancient Mythic was insensible to events inside her domain beyond the soap opera of performative cruelty exercised by her Vessels upon each other and their subjects.

But Dhànthárian had said that Quar-Tath had objected to Gwen’s claim on Deepholm, but did not pursue the matter when overruled by Sythinthimryr, Tyfanevius and Illaelitharian.

Would a Mythic who cared so little for anything… make that effort on behalf of a mere Elder Earth Dragon that had nothing to give her?

A sudden and elusive sliver of ice ran up and down Gwen’s spine.

She felt as though she was on the cusp of enlightenment, but lacked the enriched evidence to bring her conspiracy to fruition.

Sobel.

The Adherents of Juche.

The Sinneslukare.

A sleeping Mythic.

A horde of Undead Mer.

A World Tree.

There was a familiar pattern here. Her suspicion could not be shaken.

“Malakath.” She said suddenly.

Her hostess’s lilac-complexion turned pale as lilies.

“Was Malakath a guest here?” Gwen demanded, feeling like she had just grasped a vine of truth in the depthless dark of the Wall of Woods.

“How… did you know?” Vestra’s breath quickened, though she was quicker to hide her dismay. “But of course, you must have known him from Tryfan… He was their Arch Hierophant, after all. The infamous separatist…”

“So he was here,” Gwen affirmed her guess from the Dark Elf’s dismay. “Let me guess, he was the guest of Sinsura.”

“Master Malakath...” Vestra did not enjoy her line of questioning. “No. We shall not divulge his purpose, just as we have keep our present discourse private.”

“Privat—until someone’s willing to pay the price by murdering something of yours or someone else's in the pit,” Gwen observed drily.

“But of course,” Vestra’s face grew suddenly anticipatory. “Regent, will you…”

“No,” Gwen politely refused with a smile.

The Dark Elf’s face returned to that of a repressed frustration.

But Gwen could see the web now. The trap. As clearly as a Mon Calamari Admiral. The entire notion of sending her men to die in the pits was a scam. She would spend her time and effort here, chasing breadcrumbs while being constrained by Quar-Tath’s inconsistent rules of engagement. And for every fight she won, Elvia would be there, delaying her, making her agonise over pointless choices. She would find the truth eventually, but it would be too little, too late.

Spectre has offered the Black Dragon something, she knew this now.

Spectre has great plans for Quar-Tath, though she had no idea if the Black Dragon was a co-conspirator, an unwitting participant, or even a victim.

There was no reason to delay her plans because of the Svartálfar.

And if she ignored the Svartálfar’s web, then Elvia would be safe.

She was here to exterminate the Dwarves infected by the Sinneslukare.

She was also here to Purge the unclean infestation of the Necrophage.

She had no idea where Qila was hiding the Dwarves.

But Elvia paid with her freedom the location of the Undead Mer, and by extension, the Sinneslukare Lich who was manufacturing the Mermen Necrophage in a domain that was NOT Amazonia, and therefore not under the privileged ownership of Quar-tath.

Tryfan had sent her here because the Mageocracy’s navy could not reach the Chilean coast with its fleet for fear of infringing upon the treaty with the Americans or inciting Neo Tenochtitlán.

But she could.

She has a navy that rivalled nations.

She has numberless troops not affiliated with any Human interest.

Beast Tides occurred frequently in Amazonia.

Who was to say that the Followers of Juche couldn’t be unlucky enough to run into a Leviathan full of jibbering, fanatical Mermen with a heavenly-mandated hate for the enemies of their Pale Priestess?

How could Quar-tath blame others if such a travesty occurred outside her domain?

“Vestra,” Gwen resumed their conversation with an inviting nod, knowing now how she would pay Sobel back for her help with Percy. “Am I free to leave Che’ell-Cressen?”

The demand was so unexpected that her hostess was taken aback. “You would leave?”

“I would, and I would leave now,” Gwen said warmly. “Will that be a problem?”

“But your…” Vestra’s expression grew conflicted. “Your Knights… the Vessel of the Yinglong…”

“Who am I to infringe upon their sovereignty?” Gwen negated the contraction in her chest as the words left her lips. “They came here on their own. Someone told Qila where they were, and they were abducted unlawfully. Why? Be it Sobel or Malakath or some unknown Dragon on the Council, who knows. What’s done is done.”

“Will you not barter their freedom?” The Dark Elf seem bewildered.

“Will your Sister dare to murder the Yinglong’s favourite Vessel? Phyr now has Elvia, and whoever harms Evee will answer to He who Heeds. The question you must answer, dear Vestra, is where you see yourself.”

“Me?” Vestra was not responding well to her threat.

“Sinsura has Malakath. Phyr has Sobel. Qila has her dangerous toys and legions. I don’t know what you have, Vestra, but do you want me as your enemy when we could share the same goals? Shall I accost another Sister of yours in those Spires over yonder, and offer them the same?”

“They would never accept a Rivvil.”

“And you would? Out of kindness?” Gwen laughed as she stood, shaking her head in sardonic wonder.

The Spire Witches once more brandished their spell-daggers.

“I am a busy Regent, Vestra. We have a saying in my homeland, attributed to a Saint who transformed his nation from paralysis to independence. Be the Change you want to see. Now, what is your choice? Will you languish as the Seventh Sister, watching your daughters bleed in the pits until the world burns? Or will you be the Mistress that brings Che’ell-Cressen to its long overdue future?”

The Dark Elf stared, her bony shoulders trembling like a budding leaf.

Gwen readied her mind to unleash her Familiars at full combat capacity until, with agonising slowness, Vestra swirled the space beside them with her hand to create a portal, beyond which Gwen could see the familiar fork forming the headland where the Madre de Dios met the Tambopata.

“Che’ell-Cressen will never change, Regent.” The Dark Elf’s metallic eyes were glazed over with uncertainty. “Not so long as Mother sits in the centre of her web of power.”

“Maybe not.” Gwen willed Strun and Lulan to follow her. Pausing by the threshold, she turned once more to regard her agonised host. “But I promise that you will live to see your sisters fall. And if nothing else, rejoice in knowing that Che’ell-Cressen’s hierarchy is capable of change. “