The Council assembled before the Ominian. Jherica had their eyes on Mirian. Liuan had said to watch her for oddities, which they were happy to do. They didn’t trust Mirian.

“My initial assessment of the loop is promising,” Mirian thought to the group. “As you no-doubt noted, I included the spell for removing a temporal anchor with the focuses. Is everyone prepared?”

“We are,” Liuan said.

Thoughts of assent echoed through the grand chamber. Not even a stir of wayward emotion, except from Celen. That was one of the reasons Jherica liked him. Everyone else seemed to be experts at self-control. They appreciated how genuine Celen was.

They looked to Mirian. Any moment now, she’ll demand we go first.

There was a burst of light from Mirian’s chest. The dream rippled.

Mirian’s dream form began to dissipate. A feeling of intense concentration swelled in the room. “I still feel Them. Weaker now… but…” A feeling of joy mixed with grief moved through the room.

Jherica felt uncomfortable. Why was Mirian acting this way? They remembered her being like this before, but then, as the time loop had kept going, she’d become crueler and more domineering.

There was another flare of light as another needle began to manifest in the Ominian.

“If any of you need assistance with your temporal anchor, let me know,” she thought to the room. The thought came weaker, and her form more insubstantial. That was interesting. They’d thought the anchors were purely the only connection between them and the Ominian. Of course, when it came to the Elder Gods, there was still so much they hadn’t understood. Even after all this time.

Jherica was also trying to do the calculations in their head. The time between Mirian’s release of her anchor and it appearing in the Ominian—how fast had the needle moved?

Xecatl spoke up next. Jherica could feel the exhaustion rolling off her soul. She would have only just woken up from her memory transfer with Ceiba Yan. “It’s done,” she said. Her soul flickered, but also stayed steady. A few moments later, another needle manifested on the Ominian’s form.

Zhuan was next, though as soon as the light flared from her chest, she vanished.

Jherica looked at Liuan. This isn’t how she’d said things would go. A feeling of doubt wormed through them. 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

No one moved.

Then the mood in the room began to shift. Jherica began to feel a cold rage emanating from Mirian.

“Your plans of domination are over now,” Liuan said.

Then the anger turned to sorrow. “After all these years… I thought we had finally found unity. Friendship. A path of peace. Did you really wear a mask all that time?”

“Opposing you required subterfuge because of your power. Now that you’ve offered to step down from your throne, though, we accept. Enteria will see peace now, instead of your tyranny.”

Sorrow turned to pity. “You don’t even believe that. I thought we’d resolved our differences, but you never did change philosophies. But your argument of the need for humanity to fall under the rule of a benevolent ruler isn’t very convincing to the rest of us, so you’re projecting it on me. Putting on a show for the others, as if they can’t see right through you. Who is it that you haven’t convinced yet? Celen? Jherica? Ibrahim?” Her soul-form turned to Gabriel.

Gabriel radiated indignity. “Hey, don’t look at me! I’m not ditching mine until everyone else does. I’m sure as hells not going to let someone else get away with this.”

Ibrahim, on the other hand, seemed to have no emotions at all. “I should have never stopped fighting my war,” was all he said.

Jherica still felt confused. Something was wrong.

“If you truly care for the people of Enteria, then I ask all you do is step aside. Let me construct my project in peace. No one needs to die,” Mirian thought.

“Except for the Akanans you’ve already slaughtered,” Liuan thought. “If you want peace, then lay down your weapons.”

“That’s always the demand of empires, isn’t it? Submit or die. Then the slaughter comes either way. The Gatelings were right. If even the Elder Gods in all their wisdom had to fight to learn how to live in peace, perhaps this was always the intended lesson of the Ominian. People don’t learn from the epidemic that was prevented, or the war that was never fought. Perhaps—”

Then abruptly, she flickered and disappeared.

Jherica felt worry slipping from Liuan, despite her control. “Ibrahim…” she began.

“Don’t try it. I kneel to no one but God. None of you will extract my anchor, and you’ll get no blood from the stones you squeeze. If there is to be one Prophet left, it will be me. Not you.” A stir of anger. “You were there when my wife and I renewed our wedding vows. After all this time, have you really no humanity?”

Something passed between Gabriel and Liuan, and then Gabriel also vanished.

Jherica was about to speak, but then suddenly found themself shaken awake. Briefly, they were disoriented. This wasn’t their room. Then they remembered: they were in Mercanton. They’d held a celebration here at a mansion Liuan had requisitioned. Celen was in the other room. Liuan was…

Liuan was there, standing in the door, wearing the Mask of the Fifth Prophet.

“Liuan, what’s going on? Mirian sounded completely different than she normally does.”

“You’ve misremembered. She’s manipulating your memories. Only the Holy Mask prevents her from being able to do the same to me. I can undo the spell she’s put on you though.”

Jherica’s eyes narrowed. They embraced their catalyst and focus. Like hells they’d misremembered. But they were an archmage now. Liuan was just—

Then her aura flared, and they felt the power radiating off her. But that was crazy! They’d held contests of strength, and Liuan had never once beaten them. But they felt their connection to their implements severed as curses bound up their aura.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

“You’ve misremembered,” Liuan repeated calmly. “But I’ll fix that.”

The next curse rendered Jherica unconscious.

** *** **

Captain Rodain and his strike team approached Torrviol in total silence, their six airship skiffs moving through the night like stygaltan owls. The crew was nervous, and rightfully so. What they were about to do was a clear act of war.

But Baracuel had struck first. There’d been the attack using the Divine Weapon on Ferrabridge. Then, just two days ago, Baracuel had assassinated hundreds of people. Whether that was the weapon or some sort of covert action, the RID was still scrambling to find out. The kind of power the weapon was capable of was terrifying. It and its operators needed to be put down.

No wonder the Ominian had blessed them with a Prophet.

Now, they were about to attack a town that had two full-blown archmages. He’d heard of Archmage Luspire, but no one he’d talked to prior to their departure from Arborholm had heard of this “Mirian” person.

Their only boon was that both archmages should be asleep, and in the same tower.

They brought the airships to a hover a few hundred meters from Torrian Tower. Beyond the tower, though, something caught his eye. Is that…?

It wasn’t what he expected. The Divine Weapon was… in the academy square? In front of all these people? Even though it was night, he could just make out people walking around it, unconcerned. It seemed like there was a faint light inside the strange sphere. He squinted. Had someone just walked into it?

Something felt off. But he wasn’t one to question orders. Whatever was going on here was beyond his pay grade. He had a duty to Akana, and they needed to strike before someone noticed the dark shapes hovering in the sky.

“Skiff three and five, opening shots lined up on the fifth floor. Hit those windows. Skiff four, be ready for the follow-up,” he sent through his remote whisper spell. He sent his orders to the other group a moment later.

His heavy coat helped with the chill of the night air, but he could feel it prickling at the sweat on his brow.

“Fire.”

Four magitech guns boomed out as they sent fireball shells into the building. The explosions shattered the peace of the night and the targeted rooms began to glow like the inside of a forge. He looked through a lens spell at the tower.

“Team two, adjust firing angle one degree starboard. Fire.”

The second rounds flew towards the tower and—

Captain Rodain’s eyes widened.

A figure had emerged from the tower, hovering in the air as she emerged from the hole, the harsh light of the flames reflecting off an intimidating looking cuirass. She didn’t look like a Baracueli. She looked like something out of an ancient legend; wreathed in fire, her dark hair blowing in the wind—and her eyes blazed like the fires behind her.

She held up a hand and the follow-up shot shattered against it.

“Fire at will!” Rodain commanded.

But it was too late. With a gesture, every single person on the skiffs was lifted up into the air, then pulled towards the woman.

A moment later, the skiffs behind them erupted in flames—each spell engine simultaneously catching. Rodain smelled smoke and felt a sting on his aura as the fossilized myrvite burned. The skiffs began to fall from the sky, but something caught them. Surely not this archmage. She’s carrying six crews, levitating, and maintaining a shield! At that distance… it’s not possible!

“Hmm. That’s Specter’s old trick. Liuan put soul marks on you, and they triggered an ignition sequence when you were removed. That’s annoying. I could have used those ships intact.”

Rodain struggled against the spell binding him, but he couldn’t reach his wand. The flames behind the archmage were snuffed out, and the smoke condensed into little balls that she dropped to the ground below. She set the group of soldiers down in the room, though kept whatever force shackle spell she was using on them. The wands, pistols, and spellbooks at their sides suddenly were pulled away and left in a pile. Then something the archmage had just said struck him. She knows the new Prophet? Looking around the room, it seemed impossible that Mirian—and this could only be Mirian—hadn’t died. The artillery shells had hit.

Now that he was closer, though, he could see the cuirass and robe she was wearing in more detail. A Tyrcast spell engine had fewer glyphs. His mind reeled at the sheer complexity of it. Where had artifice like this even come from?

“You’ve been deceived. Liuan Var seeks to kill the other Prophets. I imagine she lied to you about the nature of the magical eruptions in Akana Praediar?” She shook her head. “The more things change…”

Then she vanished.

Rodain looked at his fellow soldiers.

“Captain… what do we do?”

He was at a loss for words. They had several plans concerning follow-up strikes or escape orders. There were several buildings they were to have bombed. They had a retrieval team waiting just off the coast, ready to refuel the skiffs. They had expected to die—they sure as hells hadn’t expected to be captured.

Something washed over his aura, and Captain Rodain shivered. It wasn’t his arcane sense that had triggered, it was something else. Something deeper.

“What in the five hells is that?” another of his soldiers asked. All of them had their eyes drawn towards the other room, the one that had Luspire in it. Surely they’d killed him at least. The seconds ticked by, and the pressure they felt spiked, then gradually lessened.

Mirian suddenly appeared again, this time, with a ragged looking Archmage Luspire. “They’re disarmed. Some parts of the skiffs may be salvageable. I’ve already used remote speech to alert them. I won’t be able to stay here, so you, Cassius and Molnier will be in charge of the defense of Torrviol. I have preparations to make all over Enteria.”

Archmage Luspire was shaking. “Yes, Prophet. I’ll deal with them.”

He’s not even burned. There’s not a cut on him! How?

“Introduce this group to Idris and the other spies. That might help them see reason. If not, as prisoners of war, you can assign them heavy labor. Barricades and trenches, I’d say. Torrviol will need a lot of them.”

Archmage Luspire turned to the soldiers. Even he looked scared by the power this archmage was displaying.

What in the five hells is happening? Rodain wondered.

** *** **

Mirian went through the Gate and alerted Xecatl and Ceiba Yan to the developments. Xecatl could send the follow-up message to their allies in the archipelago, and she would handle her own defense of Tlaxhuaco.

Then she changed the coordinates of the Gate Palendurio, even as she ordered Eyeball to sink the Torrviol Gate back down into its protective underground room. The Gates would become priority targets for any of the traitor’s forces.

She’d already had Pontiff Oculo proclaim her, but now the military response needed organizing. She’d return to Torrviol in a few hours, then fly to prepare Cairnmouth next. As she flew, she focused on the ring on her finger.

Meu had just reached his destination. She closed her eyes so she could better concentrate. The drake matriarch at the entrance was the same basic construct as the cat, and Gaius’s constructs were designed to recognize each other. It wouldn’t harm him until her father checked the front door. Then, she would have him scratch her messages out.

That she, Xecatl, and Liuan still might be able to use remnants of their connection to speak in the Ominian’s dream was a blessing Mirian hadn’t counted on.

Briefly, she let herself grieve for the loss of what could have been. It didn’t need to be this way.

This was the worst-case scenario that she’d planned for: four Prophets opposing her. However, there were openings that she hadn’t anticipated. Something had been off with Jherica and Celen. Liuan had done something there, she was sure of it. Ibrahim wasn’t committed to either side, and he was also predictable. Gabriel was claiming non-alignment, too, but she knew him too well to believe that nonsense. The man was never unaligned. She wasn’t sure why he’d chosen Liuan, but it didn’t ultimately matter. That he would already be wreaking havoc in Urubandar while Liuan Var ordered the Akanan navy to harass shipping meant that the easiest logistical route from Zhighua would be unusable. With Ibrahim consolidating power along the Southern Range, and Baracuel engaged in war with Akana, there’d be additional bottlenecks with the northern route, along with labor and material shortages as both were requisitioned for fighting. He might not actually aim to take Alkazaria or Falijmali, but she had to assume he might try.

That meant they would be opening up the route from Benansuo to Mayat Shadr that she and Zhuan had planned in secret. That meant it was time to call in a special ally.

First, she’d mobilize the armies.

Then, she’d call on that old friend.