Chapter 1472: Winterward

The Crimson Tide docks sprawled along the water in grey stone, black iron, and frost-stiffened timber.

The wind coming off the northern currents tasted of salt and the first edge of frost, and it bit through the woolen coats of the thousands of soldiers marching toward the water. The Sixth Legion mustered at the edge of the deep harbor, a sea of dark blue cloaks and silver armor that ran back past the warehouses and out of sight.

Rian walked up the wooden ramp of the vanguard flagship, his boots thudding against the pitch-sealed boards. He kept his hands deep in the pockets of his frayed black uniform coat and strolled through the scramble of quartermasters, sailors, and border veterans as though it were a market on a slow afternoon.

Baletta marched just behind him, counting the crates of hardtack and salted pork as they swung down into the lower decks. Han complained loudly about the freezing spray. Jalsket’s hair washed to a nervous pale blue as he stared up at the towering masts of the imperial warship. Beside them trotted Mr. Fluffy, passing for a large northern snow hound, his multiple tails squeezed into one thick plume of white fur.

Then the noise on the next boarding ramp died.

Rian paused on the main deck and turned his head to look back at the docks.

A procession of priests in the gold-and-white livery of El Fach’s Order was marching through the crowd. Armed legionaries stepped out of their path without being asked. The priests moved in a rigid square, and at its center, four heavyset wardens carried an iron-bound chest.

Leading them was Inquisitor Mourne.

She wore the severe white mantle of an Ascendant of the Church, and her face was arranged in perfect, pleasant courtesy. She did not look at the soldiers, nor at the ships. She looked only at the path ahead, carrying a small travelling case in one gloved hand, and the glass vials inside it chimed softly with every step.

The chest was forged from cold-iron and stamped with a dozen overlapping lion seals. It took four men to carry it, and the poles bowed their shoulders at every step. Even with his Shingan locked down, Rian could read the density of the metal.

’That’s not gold.’

It was the ledger.

Three hundred years of the eyes, the Church’s catalog of every surviving Asgardian and Nakhari bloodline, sailing north with the force meant to wipe them out. The chest went aboard the flagship under its priestly guard and disappeared into the reinforced captain’s hold.

High above the harbor, the bronze bells of the capital began to ring.

The tolls rolled out across the freezing water and marked the departure of the fleet. The citizens of Reimhold believed the bells rang for the Last Blessing, a prayer to the dying light of the Constellations.

Rian listened to the strikes roll in, one after another.

The city’s bells were ringing for Ul, the First Origin who had hijacked the system line. Reimhold was praying to a parasite.

’Well. At least the acoustics are nice.’

The anchor chains screamed against their iron winches. The flagship lurched, broke its tether to the capital, and began the long drift out into the open currents of the Crimson Tide.

***

The deck was bitterly cold by the time they reached open water.

Nyssira stood at the starboard rail, gripping the frozen wood so tightly that her knuckles had gone white. The Princess of Narthrowe had pulled her auxiliary cloak up high against the wind, but it was not the cold that had drained the color from her face.

She was looking at the armada stretching out behind them, a line of dark crimson and silver that ran all the way back to the river mouth.

Pam stood a few paces back, shifting from foot to foot, her hand lifting toward Nyssira’s shoulder and dropping again.

Rian walked over to the rail.

He leaned his forearms on the frozen wood beside Nyssira and looked out at the same fleet. He did not say anything. He let the wind whip past them and watched the dark water churn against the hull.

Nyssira broke the silence first.

It cost her. The Transcendent compulsion woven into her soul clamped down the moment she reached for words about her home. A thin line of blood trickled from her left nostril, and a tremor shook her shoulders, but she did not let go of the rail.

"This Legion is going to my home to kill people," Nyssira whispered, her voice shaking against the compulsion.

She kept staring at the ships with wide, glassy eyes. She knew what a fully equipped imperial vanguard could do to a starving northern valley.

Rian did not look at her. He kept his eyes on the grey horizon.

"Yes."

Nyssira’s fingers tightened on the rail until the frozen wood creaked.

"And you’re sailing with it."

"Then we’ll be there before they are," he answered.

He did not offer comfort. He did not promise salvation or make a speech about justice. He said it the way he might have read out the tide tables, and left the words between them on the freezing deck.

Nyssira let out a shaky breath and wiped the blood from her lip with the back of her glove.

She turned her head and studied the black-haired mercenary’s profile, as though it might hand her a reason to believe him. Then she turned back to the horizon, and her grip on the rail loosened by a fraction of an inch.

***

The Hall of Truth sat at the heart of the imperial palace, buried behind four layers of warding runes and a dozen checkpoints of the royal guard.

It was a vast, circular room of seamless black obsidian. There were no windows and no braziers. The only light came from the table at its center, which glowed with a faint, pulsing crimson.

Emperor Reshard stood over the table.

The Current of the Crimson Tide wore a plain robe of deep red silk. His face was unlined, and his white hair fell straight down his back. His crimson eyes glowed with the light of Truth Embodiment, and the obsidian walls gave it back like still water.

He did not read reports to learn facts. He read reality, and saw how every piece of it connected.

On the glowing table lay two sheets of parchment.

One was a charcoal portrait of Archduke Northern, drawn by the Order’s artists from Count Pyrrhus’s description. It showed a young man with white hair, ocean blue eyes, and a look of flat, unbothered arrogance.

The other was a rough pencil sketch of Rian the Mercenary, taken from the recruiting ledgers of the Sixth Legion. It showed a young man with black hair, dark eyes, and the exact same look of flat, unbothered arrogance.

Reshard reached out slowly with one pale hand.

He slid the sketch of the white-haired Archduke over the sketch of the black-haired mercenary.

The lines aligned perfectly. The jaw, the spacing of the eyes, the lazy slope of the shoulders. The Emperor looked down at the overlaid faces while the essence of the Hall shifted and pulled around him like a tide.

"Rian... Artemis," Reshard read aloud.

His voice was a low hum that carried through the stone of the floor. It was not a guess. The words settled into the obsidian the way a seal settles into hot wax.

Princess Ruya stood near the doorway with her hands folded at her waist.

She wore the dark, plain silks of the imperial spymaster. She had brought the sketches on her father’s orders, and she had waited without a sound while the Emperor stared at them endlessly in a way that made her silently furious.

Ruya stepped forward carefully.

"The Sixth Legion has just cleared the bay, Father," Ruya said, her voice quiet and steady. "He is currently aboard the vanguard flagship. Should we issue a recall before the prince reaches the northern lines?"

Reshard did not look up from the table.

He kept his eyes on the face of his tenth son, whom he was sure was dead, the anomaly now breaking the board in half from two directions at once. The corner of the Emperor’s mouth lifted by the width of a hair.

"No," Reshard answered. "Let him ride."