A Perverted Path to Victory

Aurora Vesta

-------------------------------------

Though she had been a wealthy woman during her time as the head of her House, Vesta’s influence had never reached far beyond the walls of Hagos. She had visited the capital only a few times, each for large celebrations. She had seen the King with her own eyes on three occasions, and spoken only a single sentence to the man, when his royal person had visited Duke Bredock at the table she had been sharing with her liege. She considered herself a political creature, yes, but she had always been careful to remind herself that, when matters of Kings and Kingdoms came to hand, she had a very minor role to play.

High Admiral Whistling Ash of the Carrion Navy, sitting at the head of a long table within his Magecraft’s cabin, was nearly as far beyond Vesta as King Sporatos.

The accommodations were as luxurious as she had expected from the Carrion Navy. Chairs cushioned by richly-dyed velvet were wrapped around a lovingly crafted darkwood table, fine gilding swirling about the edges. A silken tablecloth was spread across its face, held down by silver candelabras and porcelain plates. Though the rest of the Carrion Magecraft was still occupied by its crew, she could hear nothing of their work. The room’s enchantments, so thick in the air she was surprised they were not warping the walls, muffled any undesired distractions. Though they had been stowed away in order to give room for the meeting, Vesta could see the light shadow where the cabin’s fine bed and heavy furniture had previously resided. She could not imagine what they looked like, nor what they had cost. Enough to leave her speechless, no doubt.

The dazzling opulence, of course, only worked to impress Vesta herself. Sara had not spared the room’s finery a first glance, much less a second one. Vesta had briefly expected Admiral Whistling Ash would hide the fine decorations, considering how well-known Sara’s humble tastes were, but that would be asinine. What would be the point? The man had arrived on a Magecraft paid for by his personal fortune, his bodyguard wielding a spear made entirely of blacksteel, and had an elvish archmage serving as his personal advisor. It would be an insult for him to ape Sara’s genuine humility.

It was well that his accommodations were so large, at least, because the meeting was populous. Vesta, Oddry, and Sara occupied the far end of the table head, opposite the Admiral and his numerous staff. The strange, ethereally pale archmage sat to his left, her waifish bones hidden within thick robes. Sara said that the woman’s appearance, with her ghostly skin and faintly red eyes, was likely entirely natural, unrelated to any facet of her status as an Archmage. Vesta did not know if she believed that herself. Archmages were more than human in some ways. In others, they were far less. Her personal familiarity with Garen had taught her much. Similarly, the fact that Tulian’s resident Archmage had spent the last week tirelessly bolstering the city’s magical defenses spoke to what he thought of the Carrion Archmage’s capabilities.

Conversely, the man standing directly behind Admiral Whistling Ash seemed rather unremarkable to the naked eye. He had skin a few shades darker than those native to southern Tulian, brown eyes, and black hair, which marked him— or both his parents— as hailing from the southeastern coast of the ocean, near the Locks of the Sea. He seemed to be in his forties, though she supposed he might have been having a healthy introduction to his fifties. The Admiral’s bodyguard, who she had never seen away from the man, was as normal-looking as could be. Were it not for the fact that he had been afforded a blacksteel spear, Vesta wouldn’t have spared him a second thought. Considering the weapon he held, however, and the fact that he had successfully kept hold of it… Vesta categorized him as nothing less than a hulking beast cleverly disguised beneath the skin of a mortal man. The Carrion domain held millions of citizens, hundreds of thousands of whom had served in their navies. Amongst all of them, this unnamed, nonaristocratic man had come to be the exclusive guard of a High Admiral. That meant something.

Vesta’s eyes wandered further down the table. Though Admiral Whistling Ash was the only person present with the authority to broker a binding agreement, that didn’t mean his followers were unimportant. Vesta had been introduced to most of them over the last few days of the Admiral’s stay in port. Magecraft captains represented his naval constituent’s interests, and he had a number of wealthy merchants, wizened archivists, and other, even more specific advisors with him. Vesta would have liked to analyze them each in turn, but they weren’t making that easy.

The man closest to the Admiral had thick wads of waxy cotton spilling from his ears, sticking out like the hairy tufts found on elderly cats. The woman across from him had a leather blindfold strapped tightly across her eyes, cloth padding stopping the material from cutting into her skin. The man beside her, unbelievably, had both, leaving him completely blind and deaf. In fact, the procession of Carrion representatives wore increasingly elaborate oddities as their seats neared Sara. She noted several had plugged their noses in addition to wearing blindfolds, while others were wearing heavy veils atop thick winter clothing, leaving no part of their skin exposed. The ones sitting closest to Sara, though their senses were not hindered, were both men who had the specifically peculiar appearance which marked them as eunuchs. No continental society she knew of created eunuchs, particularly those castrated before the body began to mature, as was clearly the case with these men. Bald, beardless, and almost entirely lacking in body hair, their soft voices struck Vesta as unnerving. She had only the faintest notion of what role a eunuch served in the few lands which did use them, and knew the Carrions weren’t among their number. They had been brought here at no small expense.

Sara had said that the Carrions were concerned about the Champion-altered influence she might hold over those she spoke to, but in Vesta’s estimation, the lengths they’d gone to in order to counter her gifts were preposterous. Sara’s gift for statesmanship came from the words she chose and the unyielding conviction with which she held her beliefs. The Carrions seemed convinced that she was some ignorant brute, capable only of bewitching, drugging, or seducing those she wished to manipulate.

Though I suppose she did seduce me, Vesta privately conceded, she certainly could not seduce an entire government.

Memories of secret parties held in sprawling Tulian cellars floated back to Vesta, where ecstatic bodies had shifted and ground against one another, caught in the thrall of Sara’s miasmatic lust.

Well. I think it would be rather unlikely she could manage it, at any rate.

Thankfully, Vesta didn’t need to be the one assuring the Carrions of that. She was here to take Sara’s notes, and, if necessary, inform the gathered parties of Tulian’s economic status. She sat to the right of Sara, while Oddry would be taking similar notes off to her left. They would compare their records after the meeting to catch any small inaccuracies. Beyond those limited roles, they were mere spectators.

When the last of the Carrion representatives had taken their seat, no time was wasted. Admiral Whistling Ash rapped his knuckles against the table, bringing silence to the cabin.

“Governess Sara Brown,” he announced, extending his hand towards her. “It was an honor to meet you through paper and ink, and it is a yet still greater honor to finally be holding this discussion in person.”

“Indeed,” Sara said, the lone word rolling warmly through the room. Vesta nearly jumped. It felt profoundly wrong to hear such an aristocratic tone from Sara. “I’m glad that my wives and I were able to convince you of Tulian’s potential.”

A storm of scribbling quills filled the room. Vesta and Oddry glanced at one another, baffled, as every Carrion advisor began to madly pen long sentences of cyphered text. Vesta and Oddry, meanwhile, left their hands flat on the table.

Taking notes on their subjective experience of hearing her words, hoping to determine if there is any spellcraft at work? Vesta guessed. It was the only thing she could think of.

“Your arguments were persuasive, true,” the Admiral said, “but it was the reports of your successes that were all the more compelling.” He chuckled in a kind, grandfatherly manner. “To draw the Jungle Empire from their seclusion is quite a feat! Our finest riverboat merchants have been trying to convince their leaders to build a coastal port for decades.”

“I’m aware.” Sara tapped her knuckles on the table twice, smiling. “Considering how well you’ve guarded the secret, I would have thought you had extracted just such an agreement by providing them the spellforms required to rapidly grow shipwood. But it seems that was some other deal, wasn’t it?”

Behind Vesta’s impassive face, sparks crackled. Shipwood-growing spells? To encourage life to grow more rapidly was impossible, else every field in every land would be tended by mages, not farmers. But if the Carrions had managed it, that would explain how they were able to maintain the size of their fleet—

And the rapid expansion of the southern jungle into Tulian lands.

Admiral Whistling Ash smiled ruefully. “I’m afraid that even that excellent bargaining chip was not enough to convince them to so thoroughly end their isolation. The elven kind, I am told, flatly refuse to be wrapped up in the messy affairs of the wider world.”

Vesta couldn’t help but admire the man’s unflinching facade. He showed no sign of surprise as Sara revealed her knowledge of what had to be an exceptionally well-guarded secret, and more critically, did not even attempt to lie. That already made him considerably smarter than a number of less-important diplomats Vesta had watched Sara engage with.

“They won’t have a choice, sooner or later,” Sara confidently stated. “The world grows smaller by the day.”

“Thanks in no small part to your efforts. Not so long ago, it was the Carrion imperative to bring distant lands closer together.” The Admiral shuffled a stack of papers, pulling a map from the stack. He glanced at it, then looked up at Sara. “How fares the jungle’s encroachment on your lands?”

“Halted. If I was willing to devote more resources to it, the progress could, of course, be entirely reversed, but I’ve had other priorities for the time being.”

Admiral Whistling Ash raised his bushy eyebrows. “Are you not concerned that the jungle beasts will occupy the territory in the interim?”

“No. Over the next several years, we anticipate a considerable number of surplus cannons to be available for non-military uses.” Sara smiled so kindly that Vesta struggled to accept her words were not the gentlest of reassurances, the sort offered to a scared child during a heavy storm. “Jungle beasts are terrifying, but by all accounts, being punctured by twelve pounds of supersonic iron is among their least favorite pastimes.”

Admiral Whistling Ash laughed loudly, slapping the table. “Ah, there she is! It’s good to see that the woman I wrote to so often is no less bold in person than she is behind the quill!”

His advisors, Vesta noted, did not share his enthusiasm for this revelation.

Relaxing into his chair, Admiral Whistling Ash waved at Sara.

“Go on, then. You’ve set too fine a bait to avoid biting. These surplus cannons you speak of— what is your price?”

Sara held out a hand. Vesta thumbed quickly through her stack, grabbed the sheaf marked with blood-red dots atop the page, and handed it to her. Sara glanced down at it to remind herself of the exact terms, then looked back up.

“For the initial five years following an outfitting of a Carrion ship with Tulian cannons, they must spend fifty percent of their time on anti-slavery patrols, twenty-five percent of which must occur on the border of Tulian territorial waters, as defined by the Salian Accords.”

Ah, the Salian Accords. Five decades on, and still they remained what many considered to be the greatest example of statesmanship ever achieved. Following Sinti’s Black Fleet and its annihilation of virtually every then-extant naval force, the Carrions had stepped in to provide order to the chaos. Back then, they’d argued, international cooperation was the only way to curb what would doubtlessly be an explosive growth in piracy. They’d been right, of course. The pirates had been nearly as brutal as the international fleets that had mercilessly crushed them. That the Kings and Queens of the day had failed to realize how much power was conferred to the Carrions by setting the precedent for all naval legal disputes to be handled in “impartial” Carrion ports had been their own fault. Who had predicted that a pirate fleet playing at governance would ever become so powerful? Vesta certainly wouldn’t have, had she been in their place.

“And the cost of cannons in currency?” Admiral Whistling Ash pushed. “Agreements for their use are all well and good, but bronze and cast iron are not cheap.”

Sara glanced at the paper once again. “As with prior agreements, they will be provided at cost, so long as you accept that my definition of cost includes strong wages, taxed revenue, and frequent adjustments to reflect market prices of raw materials.”

“Incentivizing Carrion merchants to provide you the cheapest possible materials, yes,” Admiral Whistling Ash nodded. “I find this provisionally acceptable, pending direct review of the contract’s exact wording.”

Sara leaned across the table, handing the paper she’d been holding to one of the eunuchs. Inevitable as it was, with her preference for low-cut shirts, the motion exposed the upper half of her breasts to the room.

If Vesta had spent even a single day less as a merchant and ambassador, she felt certain she wouldn’t have been able to contain her guffaw. The sight of Sara’s half-bared chest provoked two reactions amongst the advisors, so precise it could only be rehearsed. One half of them jerked their heads up and away, staring at the ceiling as their hands skittered out notes, while the other half showed no shame in jutting their necks up and about, adjusting themselves to keep their line of sight clear from their fellows. They stared unashamedly, writing as many notes in their journals as those who had looked away.

Definitely analyzing the effect Sara’s Champion status has on their thoughts, Vesta decided. But what is the purpose? Do they really think that she wouldn’t adjust her behavior to compensate for their testing?

Perhaps they had information Vesta lacked. The Carrions were not considered a scholarly people, their Magecraft work excluded, but their territories were incredibly far-flung. The moment Sara had appeared in the world, Admirals like Whistling Ash had likely sent out orders to gather every last text on Champions that could be found. Perhaps there were records that indicated a Champion of Amarat could not fully control their supposedly bewitching nature?

Whatever their motivation, a dozen men and women glaring daggers at Sara’s tits was an utterly absurd sight. That many of them had their ears stuffed with cotton, noses plugged, or were wearing full-body veils only enhanced the comic nature of it.

The eunuch politely accepted the paper Sara offered, passing it down the table for review by, if Vesta wasn’t mistaken, Admiral Whistling Ash’s second cousin, a man tasked with managing Whistling Ash’s investments within several densely-clustered western Carrion colonies. Sara politely thanked the eunuch, then, as she returned to her seat, feigned surprise at the stares.

“Really?” She raised a hand to her shirt, hooking a finger into the dip of the cloth. “If you want a look that bad, I don’t mind doing the meeting topless.”

Admiral Whistling Ash tiredly held up a hand. “That will not be necessary, Governess. I apologize, and can offer you only my assurance that I find these measures nearly as tiring as you doubtlessly do. If we wish the contracts made today to be ratified by the High Admirals, however, it is necessary.”

Sara lowered her hand, smirking at the rest of the gathering. “Sorry, boys and girls, but no show today. Your boss says no.”

The scribbling intensified.

“Now, as my primary economic advisor works to verify the terms you prepared for him,” Admiral Whistling Ash gestured to his second cousin, who had added cotton to his own ears as he read the paper, “I believe it best if we temporarily move away from the purely mercantile aspects of this meeting.”

“I don’t object to the idea. What did you have in mind, Admiral?”

Once again, Vesta found it unnerving to hear Sara speaking so respectfully. She couldn’t help but see that as a testament to the meeting’s exceptional importance. She categorically refused to believe that Sara actually respected anyone a tenth as wealthy as Admiral Whistling Ash. Actually, thinking further, she knew that for a fact; the wealth cap Sara had written into Tulian law was less than a single percent of Vesta’s most conservative estimate for Admiral Whistling Ash’s fortune. Sara felt the same disgust for this man as the ancients did the Dragons.

“Your ships,” Admiral Whistling Ash was handed new papers from an aide, which he set before himself without looking. “Specifically, your newly constructed and refitted military vessels. The copper plating you sheath their hulls with has shown remarkable effect preventing marine growth, an effect replicated in isolated tests. Yet Carrion coppersmiths have proved unable to produce copper plating of the required dimensions at an economical rate, and even our thickest sheets, once fixed to the vessels, have shown signs of rapid degradation.”

“You’re asking several questions, Admiral.” Sara leaned back in her chair and put her hands behind her head, stretching her neck from left to right. “Every solution has a cost. What do you want to buy, and how much are you willing to pay?”

That is a… rather utilitarian way to refer to the topic.

Vesta found herself surprised. In most diplomatic meetings, at least those that were progressing well, the conversation grew more friendly and indirect with time, both parties beginning to trust the other to not deliberately misinterpret their words. Yet having all but won several concessions, Sara was growing more brusque. A sign of failure, or a ploy Vesta couldn’t discern?

“Above all else, we desire knowledge of your manufacturing process for the copper sheets.”

“You can’t afford that.”

That provoked the first inarguably genuine reaction Vesta had seen from the room. Several of the Admiral’s more economically-oriented advisors bristled, while others curled their lips in amusement at what they could only assume to be Sara’s ignorance. They were clearly ignorant of Sara’s first rule for foreign trade: goods could be sold, but manufacturing was sacrosanct. She anticipated a future in which a nation’s ability to strengthen itself was wholly dependent on its ability to produce goods, and she was preparing accordingly.

“Purchasing of the copper plating, then,” the Admiral prompted.

“Is possible, but would require Carrion ships to be outfitted in Tulian harbors.”

Another rush of scribbling, this time from the more military-oriented of the Admiral’s advisors. By voicing this requirement, Sara had revealed that the method of avoiding copper plate corrosion had little to do with the material itself, and more with the method of its joining to a ship. Vesta felt certain that the Carrion’s own experiments had already told them as much, seeing as a test was as simple as seeing if a copper plate left in seawater degraded at the same rate as one applied to a ship, but the Carrions were clearly eager for any hint they could get. Even a ten percent savings in Carrion naval maintenance would save an unfathomable amount of coin.

And Professor Brown claims that copper plating can delay the time between extensive maintenance work by as much as ten years. How unfortunate that we cannot prove such a preposterous claim; they would pay nearly anything for that.

“Come now, Governess,” Admiral Whistling Ash chuckled. “We both know how impossible it would be for Tulian to outfit the entire Carrion Navy.”

Sara smiled sweetly. “Even if we could, we wouldn’t. After all, I can hardly imagine how much more your captains will pay when it becomes necessary to outbid their fellow Magecraft captains.”

Another genuine reaction was elicited: a sucking of breath through the teeth, quiet and hissed. Sara already had an international reputation for preferring egalitarian, non-mercantile trade deals. Tulian sold factory-produced swords and spears only to those willing to pass laws abolishing slavery, and even sold them at a small loss to those who were waging wars against those still practicing it. To so blatantly favor the wealthy, and to do so in such a callous manner, seemed terribly at odds with her prior decisions.

Vesta knew better, of course. And, apparently, so did Admiral Whistling Ash.

He rested a hand on his belly, tilting his chair back to help him manage a groaning stretch.

“Ah, have we come to that matter already, Governess? You know as well as I that it’s not possible for me to reform Carrion suffrage.”

What?

That hadn’t been what Vesta expected at all. When Vesta and Sara had discussed the sale of copper plating before this meeting, she’d thought Sara was motivated by her desire to rob the wealthy of their fortunes. Sara was confident that she could turn copper-plated hulls into a status symbol, driving the bidding war between Carrion captains into such a fury that they not only failed to save money, they actually lost it.

That wasn’t where Admiral Whistling Ash’s thoughts had gone, however, and if Sara was as surprised as Vesta, there was no sign of it. She smiled.

“But you have more influence than I’ll ever have, and we both know the inevitability of it.”

“Yes, yes, as if you need to beat it into my skull any harder.” Admiral Whistling Ash drummed his fingers on his stomach, his gaze locked with Sara’s for a long, quiet while. Finally, he straightened. “Your predictions for the Carrion Navy and its people are dire, Governess.”

“Almost as dire as your political situation.” Sara held out a hand to Vesta. “A map, please?”

Vesta hurriedly flicked through her papers, handing it to Sara the moment she found it.

“The Carrion Navy, as your people are justly fond of reminding others, straddles the ocean itself. History’s first Thousand-League Navy.”

Vesta glanced down at the map she’d provided Sara, convinced the woman had made some kind of mistake, only to find herself blinking in surprise.

It wasn’t the same map she’d handed the woman. Though the paper itself was still the same dimensions, its vague, inexpertly-scratched lines had been replaced by the most vivid illustration of the world Vesta had ever seen. Whereas most maps were penned only for local trade and thus depicted the majority of the ocean and its borders in the barest of lines, this map was exhaustively, almost impossibly detailed. Names of territories, cities, and islands were penned in so small a text that it seemed impossible any quill could have been so precise, and if the words had been even the smallest fraction more prevalent, the map would have been illegible. Instead Vesta was treated to, for the very first time in her life, seeing the ocean in all its breadth. From the Locks of the Sea to the Continental Wall, Sara had somehow turned Vesta’s paltry map into a masterpiece as artistic as it was an invaluable resource. That single sheet of paper could guide a ship’s captain through all the world’s known waters.

“At present,” Sara said, ignoring the astonishment rippling up the table, “it takes a common Carrion vessel over three months to traverse your domains from east to west, factoring in necessary port calls. True, a Magecraft messenger can do it in a matter of weeks, weather permitting, but that is still weeks, is it not?” Sara slid the paper forward, letting the others examine it. “Your colonies are growing more rapidly than your predecessors ever envisioned. They are no longer safe ports of call for your population of roaming vessels, but the core of an empire so expansive none of you can truly comprehend it. Your people haven’t realized it yet, but things have changed over the last decade, haven’t they?”

Sara brought her elbows up onto the table, resting her chin on her folded hands. All eyes were on her.

“The Carrion Empire— and that is what you are, because you’re not a Navy, not anymore— is primed for collapse. Trade has made your colonies too wealthy and too populous to be dependent on your Navy for defense. If they were attacked by a nearby power, they could hire enough mercenaries to blot out the sun, and that would only be necessary if their local population and militia proved incapable of throwing back the attackers. Considering the degree to which you have trained your people, that’s rather unlikely, is it not?” Sara put a finger on the paper, on the far right of the map. “Say, somewhere about here, a city rebels. And yes, I know your preferred nomenclature, but I think we both know you can no longer think of them as ports or colonies, can you? They are city-states unto themselves. But regardless. Say your Navy is dispatched to subjugate this rebellious city, yes? They’re fairly powerful for a single city, which means you will need to gather your forces. That will take months, so far-flung are they. And then, because there are no people in all the world more prepared to resist a seaborne assault, it will take months more to suppress the rebellion. You will succeed, of course. Your forces, so far as anywhere adjacent the ocean is concerned, are inordinately powerful.”

“But imagine,” she drew her finger left, to the west, further and further, until all present had watched her single digit travel across the entire ocean, “upon having heard word of this rebellion, another city decides to rebel. It would be an easy decision for them to make, after all. They know your forces are so distracted that any reckoning for the rebellion would take a year or more to arrive. And then,” her finger moved the slightest bit, to the nearest Carrion colony, “another city recognizes just how much more likely it would be for them to both succeed, should they simply join forces. And, well, it wouldn’t take much for others to follow suit by then, would it? On and on on, one after the other. I would know. My own home country, where I was born, was a colony motivated to rebel against the world’s most powerful navy. Our motivation was something as trivial as trade taxation. We won that war.”

The reaction of the gathered Carrion officers revealed something to Vesta. They were calm, quiet, and attentive. They didn’t appear shocked, and hadn’t protested a single point of what Sara was outlining.

This is their fear, Vesta realized. They’re too accustomed to the topic for anything else. They must have been gnawing on it for years, and it’s what is driving them to Tulian. Faster ships, better weapons, and a single source for them. One that no single Carrion colony or Admiral controls.

Sara’s hand pressed lower, fingers spreading, covering the sheet with her palm.

“How well have you controlled the production of Magecraft, I wonder? Yes, yes, they’re all produced in the Great Carrion Shipyard, but what of those who work there? Have you kept them all sequestered? Or have they worked for a time, years and years, only to retire to a different home, back to their cities, taking all their knowledge with them?” Sara’s hand began to close, slowly crumpling the paper. “The Admiralty’s monopoly on power is crumbling. You treat your people well, but is it well enough? How much would it take to tip the scales? How much coin do you think would be enough to tempt-”

“Stop!” Admiral Whistling Ash barked. Gone was the jovial, furry-faced man. His bushy brows hid his eyes in dark shadow as he scowled through the silence, holding out a hand. “Do not crush that paper, Governess. Your point is made without destroying such artistry.”

Sara relaxed her grip, but didn’t hand over the paper.

“Admiral Whistling Ash, allow me to be frank. I’ve allowed your spies to learn of our crystal communication network for a very good reason.”

That particular revelation made Vesta want to scream. The amount of effort spent, and the opportunities they had sacrificed, in order to keep that communication network secret… Gods! It took all her self control to remain silent as Sara continued.

“You need it very, very badly. In fact, you need a great many things from us, do you not? A Champion’s tacit endorsement of your Admiralty’s legitimacy is very high on that list. And Mr. Levaunt— you know the one, that parliamentary fellow your agents claim to have successfully bribed— has told you exactly what it would take to earn that from me. Elections, free and fair, local and national.”

Admiral Whistling Ash glowered at Sara. “And you know that it would never happen. This is not your democratic experiment, Governess, built from the ground up in the utter absence of a government. You are asking the Admiralty to voluntarily cede their power to the very people they now control. You say that rebellion is inevitable? How would that convince the Admirals to enact such a policy? They would be giving political control to the very ones who seek to war against them!”

Sara’s smile was bitterly sweet. “Not yet, they don’t. At this moment, your people are content. They are happy with the wealth provided by their participation in the Carrion Navy, and they have little interest in risking it. But the pressure is building.”

Sara finally lifted her hand off the paper. The Admiral snapped his fingers twice, prompting the nearest advisor to grab it and slide it down the table. He grabbed it exceptionally carefully, pinching only a corner. Admiral Whistling Ash wiped his hands on his coat several times before touching it again, carefully pressing it smoothly into the table. At his side, the Archmage scooted forward, pinkish-red eyes glittering with fascination as she inspected the page.

Sara crossed her arms as she leaned back in her chair. “If you start expanding the right to vote for the Admiralty to those outside the Navy here and now, within the next year or two, the people will be nothing but grateful. You’ll be ceding no ground, showing no weakness, because they will be acting without any kind of threat forcing their hand. The current Admiralty will be remembered as kind, benevolent rulers. Those who gracefully handed a better world to the next generation.”

Is this… is this not the logic that Sara explained to me? Didn’t she say that Admiral Whistling Ash had already accepted the inevitability of expanded Suffrage?

“The common people are incapable of ruling a state,” Admiral Whistling Ash growled. “They are ignorant of the difficult realities of governance, and, as you yourself warned me, are easily swept under the sway of a charming demagogue. The Carrion Navy fought and died to clear the ocean of sirens and their ilk, Governess. I will not be the one to implement the changes which will lead to another of their kind ruling our people.”

“You’re right, Admiral.” Sara stretched her hands overhead, then stood, bending forward to touch her toes, then standing and twisting, audibly popping her back. “The common people are easily influenced by a charming, charismatic figure. It’s terribly easy to imagine a world in which some pretty face comes in with impossible promises and angry threats, distracting all those stupid, ignorant, foolish peasants from paying attention to their true duty. If someone like that came along, wanting to ruin everything you’ve built, it would be a disaster.” Sara straightened, rolling her shoulders, and for the first time, allowed her lips to split into the genuine, toothy grin Vesta knew so well. “And since you all know that, I’ll ask each and every one of you a question that you can’t answer.”

The Champion of Amarat spread her arms wide.

“How long ago did you stop taking notes?”

All across the room, in every seat, even those occupied by the deaf and blind, heads turned down.

Quills were on desks.

Inkwells had been stoppered.

And papers had been left blank.

In a breathless whisper, someone swore.

Sara made for the cabin’s exit. Oddry and Vesta belatedly scrambled to follow her, gathering up their things as quickly as they were able.

When Sara reached for the door, the Admiral’s guard reached out, stopping her. Sara didn’t look the slightest bit concerned as his armored hand closed over her shoulder.

“These discussions are not over,” he told Sara.

“Of course,” Sara scoffed. “But you’ll probably want to call someone in to clean the piss out of all those chairs.”

At the head of the table, Admiral Whistling Ash— the man Vesta had thought was Admiral Whistling Ash— hung his head in defeat.

“We will adjourn,” the armored spearman said. “And continue discussions this evening. Alone.”

“That works perfect for me,” Sara said, pausing for a moment to blind the room with her dazzling smile. “After all, my city’s under attack.”

Silence.

A fist pounded on the door.

“Sir! Sir, an emergency!”

Admiral Whistling Ash released Sara’s shoulder.

-------------------------------------

Sara Brown

-------------------------------------

Sara blinked against the sun as she stepped onto the Carrion vessel’s deck, staring up at the sky. Her Blessings had told her a lot, but she still wanted to confirm. She opened a pouch and pulled her spyglass from its pocket, putting it to her eye.

Thirteen dots resolved themselves into a bitter sight. Twelve griffons flew in the wake of an enormous glittering wyvern, its verdant scales flickering in the sunlight. Coming in from the north, the massive creature’s wings were ceaselessly pounding, seeming too large by far to manage such a pace, but manage it they did. Sara got the impression that its wingbeats were lackadaisical, if anything. It was slowing itself down for the benefit of its griffon followers.

They must have flown in low. Hid themselves behind the terrain for as long as they could, then gained altitude at the last moment. They knew we’d be watching for them.

Admiral Whistling Ash joined Sara on the deck, quickly followed by a spew of exclaiming advisors, Vesta and Oddry among their number. The Admiral ignored the chattering of his crew, instead stepping up to Sara’s side.

“They are flying in from the north,” he noted.

“Sure are.” Sara closed her spyglass, jaw grinding. “Admiral Whistling Ash. In the interest of my own safety, I must ask permission to stay aboard this vessel for the duration of the coming raid.”

The man turned to her, eyebrows raised behind his visor. “I wouldn’t have bet a dull copper on you making such a request.”

Sara’s jaw clenched. “I promised my wife that I would spend my time as safely as possible while I was away. At the moment, that requires me being aboard this ship.”

“Ah.” Admiral Whistling Ash adjusted his spear, squinting at the encroaching Imperials. “I wouldn’t have expected either of your wives to squeeze such a promise from you. Though I suspect I know which of the two managed it.”

“Don’t think reading their words means you’ve met her, Admiral. I’ll give you that warning for free.”

He grunted in acknowledgement. Then, after a handful of seconds spent thinking it over, raised his hands and cupped them around his mouth.

“Carrions! We’ve Amarat’s Champion aboard! I expect you’ll defend the ship accordingly!”

A rattling chorus of “aye, sir!” made its way through the crew, though they didn’t stop attending their duties for a moment. The deck was a chaotic place, the trappings of peace being shoved aside for weapons of war.

“Admiral.” Sara wrapped her hands over the ship’s railing, looking out at Tulian. “Would it be a violation of hospitality to address my people before the raid begins?”

His head tilted, considering. “No,” he decided. “So long as it is one address only, before the fighting breaks, and no more follow.”

“That’s fine.”

Sara closed her eyes, taking a long, focused breath.

She hadn’t enjoyed that meeting. Hated it, really. Using her Blessings, all of her Blessings, was a disturbing sensation. It told her too much, let her see too far into another’s mind. She’d never been raised religious. She had never thought people had some unique, ethereal self, some pure soul that was independent of its mortal trappings. She’d always known, intellectually, that people were creatures whose actions were dictated by predictable, unchanging physical laws, the product of chemical arithmetic. She’d never had much of a problem with that, really. It was just the way things were. But, at Level 17, her Champion’s Blessings could pull the curtains back just a few inches too far. She could look at a person and see them. All of them. Every pore, every drop of sweat, every strand of hair, and then just a little bit further. Beneath their skin. She was aware of their blood vessels dilating, their innumerable muscles contracting and relaxing millions of times per second, all in response to the electrical impulses of the nervous system below their skin. When she had her every Blessing flaring as hard as she was able, she knew what someone was going to say before they said it. She could watch their mind’s command ripple down their neck, over their shoulder and into their arm, racing down to the fingertip it had been bound for, activating sequential strands of muscle fibers as the signal pulsed outward and outward, artfully managing an impossibly chaotic network. It was too much. In some ways, she’d been glad that her Levels had stalled. If her eighteenth Level took her another level deeper, what would she feel? Their neurons? Would every person she spoke to become as predictable to her as a lifeless machine, the illusion of humanity stripped away?

She didn’t know, and she hated thinking about it. That was the kind of shit that teenage edgelords thought they were so superior for, pretending that their disgusting apathy was a sign of some superior intellect. That fear was one reason, maybe the biggest reason, that she didn’t use her Blessings on the people she cared about. Maybe, just maybe, if that was the way she was heading, she’d be able to pretend that at least they were different. Maybe ignoring those powers, pretending they didn’t exist, would keep her grounded.

But the Blessings were too useful to avoid entirely. She had to break them out if she wanted to achieve everything she was working for. And moments like this were one of them.

Sara could hear the city. When the alarm bells had started ringing, their voices had risen, and they’d begun to shout, starting the chain reaction that would bring their words to her Blessing’s attention. She’d counted fourteen thousand unique voices so far. Most of the city had taken to the streets. She knew each of their names, faces, and far more about them than they ever would have wanted her to be privy to.

She could hear the 14th City Militia squadron yelling orders at the crowd of the outdoor bar they’d been drinking at after their duty, cursing and shouting as they tried to equip the armor they’d so recently discarded at the end of their long, hard shift. An experimental water main had burst beneath the Baker’s Street, and they’d been called to use their shields to physically block the high-pressure spray from knocking away the engineers working to repair it. It had taken three exhausting hours.

She heard a small crowd of children trying to break their way into a neighbor’s house, throwing their tiny shoulders against the door over and over again. They knew that the weaverwoman inside, the kind soul who had given them juicy fruits even in the dark days before Sara had come to Tulian, was so old that she couldn’t walk anymore. In a world with healing potions, that meant she was weeks away from death at the most. Likely days. But the children were determined that the day wouldn’t be today.

Chona and Tinvel were barreling through a crowd, using one of Chona’s wind spells to clear a path toward the hangar. Chona didn’t know it, but she’d just pushed too hard, breaking a man’s arm as he was knocked to the ground. When he saw who had done it, he bit back his yell. He wasn’t going to try and stop the city’s defenders from their work.

There were more. So many more. At first the city was gripped by a determined sort of fear. The tamed, practiced fear that came naturally to a people who had been preparing for an assault for a very long time. But then, as the wyvern drew nearer, the fear changed to panic. They hadn’t prepared for this. They hadn’t seen anything like this, had barely even heard of it. Near the university, the clanking roar of plane engines gave hope to some, but they couldn’t be heard everywhere. The fear continued to build.

She licked her lips. Admiral Whistling Ash had told her she was allowed one brief announcement. He’d said nothing about how much she could say.

Sara opened her mouth.

And spoke to everyone.

It was forty-seven different sentences, to be exact. Spoken simultaneously, at a calm, conversational volume, and perfectly heard by every single person she addressed. She gave orders to every single one of the city’s defensive squads, telling them where to mass and what weapons to use, and reminded them of the command hierarchy that had begun to fall apart in the face of such chaos. She told the harbor and street-level cannoneers to stow their ammunition and take up rifles, because they’d never be able to elevate their guns far enough to shoot a flying enemy. She ordered the wall cannons to load double canister and chuck the rest into wet stowage bins because yes, that wyvern could breathe fire, and yes, it was smart enough to target them. Why wouldn’t it, Sara asked the cannoneers? Everyone knew they were the most dangerous soldiers in the city, she assured them. Her orders to the infantry squads were similar, spoken in a snappy but jovial way, reminding them of the clay target shooting practice she’d ordered them to take up just a few weeks before in preparation for exactly this possibility. She ordered them to ignore the wyvern, whose scales were too tough for musketballs, but told them to make damn sure they claimed the griffons they killed, because those greedy bastards in that other squad would definitely try to take credit for all their hard work.

For most of the city, though, her words were simple, practical advice, and it was what she let the others around her hear.

“Everyone not involved in the city’s defense, you need to remain indoors and out of sight. If a fire starts nearby, join a bucket brigade and get it under control, then go back inside.”

And then, finally, she let herself shut off her Blessings. All the pressure, an entire city’s worth of voices, vanished. She sagged, relying on her grip on the Magecraft’s railing to keep herself standing.

Even with her eyes still closed, her Blessings gone, Sara could tell the difference. There were still shouts, but they were less shrill, and they were growing quieter, replaced by the rhythmic clank of armored boots. The city was in motion.

The attack was sixty seconds out.

Someone joined her at the railing. Sara opened her eyes, expecting Oddry or Vesta, only to be surprised by the pale face of that albino elf. Sara knew her name, of course, fake and real, but she wasn’t supposed to, so she didn’t let herself think of the Archmage that way. The elvish woman was staring at her with unabashed fascination.

“I was told that you had put little effort into honing your magics.”

“You were told a lotta shit, I’m sure,” Sara grunted.

The Archmage’s eyes glanced down, to Sara’s hands.

“I was also told that you had poor impulse control when it came to defending others.”

Sara looked down, too. The wooden bannister was creaking, magical sparks popping as the Carrion masterpiece fought her crushing grip.

A thunderstorm began to rumble as the Imperials overflew the North Star Fort. One griffon was struck by something that turned it into a bloody firework. The rest flew on.

Sara forced her hands to relax. Black soot covered her palms, and she became aware of a dull, fiery pain.

“Yeah. Well.” She sniffed as she swiped a forearm across her nose. “Not all your sources are dogshit, I guess.”

The Archmage retreated in silence.

On the far side of the city, Sara watched the first pair of biplanes lift into the air.

Griffons dove to meet them.

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!