With a final huff and heave, the city guards drew Thalion's body out of the well. They turned him over. Valerius sunk to his haunches to examine the corpse. He noted the single blade-entry wound that sundered his soul from the earth. Valerius looked away to beckon the guards holding Roderic. They forced him over as Roderic thrashed in their custody.
"Did you see who slew this man?"
Roderic tilted his head back and launched a glob of spit near his boots.
Valerius glanced at it, then his gaze flew up, his eyes of frigid steel fixed on him with a cold stare that could freeze one's blood. "This nobleman is one of the primacy." He rose to his full height, casting him under his shadow. "His kin would expect their pound of flesh. And the nobility would demand the suffering of the one that slaughtered one of their own."
A tremor of fear made him squirm.
Valerius shrugged his stag-like shoulders. "Take him."
The guards swiveled him around and Roderic released a banshee-like scream.
"Wait."
The city guards rotated him back around. His shoulders curled from the weight of his shame. Once he extracted the information he needed to condemn Gallagar. Other scoundrels were sent to the gaols, but Roderic was being transported to the palace. Valerius made his way to his lone stallion, only to capture a glimpse of an all too familiar face. Gallagar. And before he could register his intent, he was already barreling towards him. Only mere seconds from him, Gallagar rounded a corner. Valerius followed, only to emerge into an empty street. Any trace of him vanished like smoke in the wind.
Valerius paused. He turned his gaze skyward.
Gallagar plummeted, his figure rushing down at him and sending them both crashing to the ground. Gallagar scrambled to his feet, only for the raring wolf to pounce on him. Before he could draw his weapons, Valerius rendered him unconscious with a single blow.
~
Valerius threw Gallagar down on the ground in front of him.
The king, his advisors and the High Mage were assembled in his high-ceilinged bureau. The king bade them all to abscond with a flutter of his fingers. They bowed and departed, sneaking glances of Gallagar rising to settle on his knees, his hands bound before him. His hair, like burnt umber, clung to his face.
Zephor observed. In his grasp, he held the Starweaver, his staff crafted from the sacred wood of a moonlit oak. Its surface bore an elaborate design of swirly wrought filigree laced around the shaft. The king, with a cold mastery of his emotions, regarded his Crown Guardian with contempt.
"What is the meaning of this?" he demanded, presiding over the head of the table. The fabric of choice seemed to absorb the ambient light, rendering His Majesty a silhouette against the grandeur of his sanctum.
"A fraud, liar and killer, my king," he said, presenting the litany. "You have been deceived." Valerius's boot stomped on his back, pushing Gallagar's face towards the ground. "This man, the Electus, the supposed embodiment of all that is righteous. He is a realm-renown mercenary. He killed Thalion Elowen, a man of noble birth, the one who pulled gem from stone. I have a queue of witnesses who can collaborate on the timeline. And a fellow ruffian of his, Roderic, whom our savior requested to conceal his crime. He is willing to testify against him if need be."
Gallagar dropped his head, muttering a curse, a pinching of eyes like he was in pain.
"His ploy of deception was to keep him from the gallows." Valerius's hands twitched, itching for violence. "This gross miscarriage of justice will not go unheeded." His whetted words meant to impale Gallagar's back. "All I ask is to be the one to take this fraudster's head."
"Enough," the king said like a father bored with his son's antics. "No harm will come to him."
Gallagar's head rose sharply.
"No man nor king will silence what destiny has decreed."
"He is a murderer," he barked back. "A scoundrel with no regard for life or law. You would see this treachery go unpunished?"
The king rose from his chair with an agility that belied his age.
Valerius reminded himself of his place. He dropped to a lunge, bowing his face to the ground, falling in league with the kneeled scoundrel.
"For better or for worse, the gem rests in his hand. For reasons beyond our comprehension, the gem chose him, and unknowingly, he chose the gem. Whilst you dither about ethics, rifts around the realm widen, threatening more than just one life that has been taken."
The king slowly returned to his vacated seat.
"His day of judgment will come. If not in this life, then the next." His adorned hands gripped the arms of the chair. "His failure will be all of our deaths. Come dawn, you and the entire regiment will set adrift to Verlax. This is beyond you, and even he, Valerius. The realm hangs in balance. Let not the scales slant towards our demise because of senseless in-fighting."
Valerius trembled from the cold fury unfurling through him.
He glanced at Gallagar sideways, aligned with him, glimpsing his devilish smirk.
~
"At least I look the part."
"How does it feel?"
Gallagar stepped out with his head down, still examining himself.
"Like it belongs to someone else."
He eyed the vambraces adorned with filigree reminiscent of gilded winds that clung to his forearms. The iridescent breastplate, as if forged by celestial steel, encased his torso with an ethereal embrace. The slim plating melded well with his lithesome form. Midnight blue with his shoulders enameled with gilt feathers. But it was the heart of the breastplate that held the most profound mantle—a cavity, an empty space at the center of his chest, designed to cradle a singular power.
"It belongs to whoever is worthy."
Zephor held the gem in one hand and the Starweaver in the other.
"One of many attributes none would accuse me of."
He came to him, holding gem to chest. When the gem was nestled into its designated space, the breastplate responded with a resonant hum, as if the armor itself acknowledged the presence of the Sunshard; a sacred bond meant for fiber and flesh. His own short swords secured to his armor.
Zephor met his gaze. "Your dismay is fear of failure to prove yourself worthy."
Gallagar freed a humored breath, looking away momentarily. "At every turn, death awaits me. All I know is that if the realm's fate truly rests in my hands. We're already dead."
~
Two imperial airships set a course to Verlax. Silhouetted against the indigo arras of the heavens, the elite warriors stood like eagle-eyed sentinels along the breadth of the primary deck. The metallic hull kissed by the pale glow of a thousand stars. Dark clouds stirred, swirling with ominous energy, an ever-looming threat. Even the night winds whispered a warning through the aether.
Valerius, Elysia, and Blackthorn sat together, the glow of lamplight revealing what they wished the shadows could conceal. Zephor circled them in a meditative state as he spouted arcane incantations. Within the delicate lattice of the staff's design, light seeped into the symbols and sigils intertwined, pulsing with every utterance.
Zephor stopped, and the light guttered out. His index finger ticked against the shaft.
"Whooo will join me?"
All eyes snapped at Gallagar. He stumbled into view, stripped bare with nothing but his breeches. And a dribble of vomit on his tattooed chest, bearing the talismanic emblem of an ancient order. He had a flimsy grip around an uncorked bottle of a fermented drink much more potent than ale.
"A toast to the end of days," he slurred with a mirthful snicker.
His heavy-lidded stare fell on Zephor. "Will you partake with me, Zeph?"
Valerius rose to his feet and peeled away into the darkness, disappearing somewhere on the ship. The last two glared back at him. Gallagar feigned a serious look, trying to hold himself upright. His drink sloshed inside, and a few droplets flew out. He arranged his expression in the face of searing scrutiny. He wobbled towards them, nearing dangerously close to Blackthorn.
"I've been sneered at by better men." His breath was capable of curdling flowers. "They're all dead now."
Blackthorn launched to his feet with enough force to knock Gallagar off balance and onto his glutes. He released an irksome, belly-busting laugh that even made Elysia turn away from him.
"I meant it as noo threat." His arm swayed as he used the bottle to point it at them. "Death comes for us all. Tends to h-happen, when you shove the realm into the same hands that killed the man who was meant to save it." His head tilted back to bellow another delirious laugh. "And still expect him to wield his power. Desperate fools."
His eyes rolled back, and his back slammed against the deck. The bottle clattered beside him, spilling the last of its contents. Zephor sent Blackthorn an imploring look that made his anger flare. Blackthorn marched over to him and scraped the saviour of man off the floor. He threw him over his shoulder and went to return him to his private cabin. When he reached the inside, firelight only illuminated further disgrace. Many more bottles lay empty and scattered on the wooden floorboards. Blackthorn went over and dumped him onto the single bed. Gallagar groaned and flopped over onto his stomach. Blackthorn's steps stuttered before he turned to see his warped back. The landscape of his flesh was an expanse of untold suffering, disfigured with something far more lethal than blade or fire. Patches of acidic burns that were too coordinated. Systematic. Torture.
Blackthorn's eyes flicked to his twitching face, fitful even in sleep. He receded and left.