Chapter 75


    Compromise


    The next morning, Landryn left early in the morning to prepare for the War Council.


    Femira had to debrief with Garld in advance to tell her of the conversation she’d spied on between Prince Lukane and Lord-Marshal Mattice. It didn’t bother her hiding the information from Landryn. She trusted Garld and that he was doing what was best for Landryn… and for her. Garld wanted the information first so she would bring it to him for the decision on what to do with it.


    Landryn didn’t seem to have much concern about who saw him coming and going from Femira’s rooms. The subject of his wife was a topic the pair actively avoided in conversation. However he was always gone from her rooms before the servants arrived in the morning.


    Femira could get very accustomed to having servants. Unlike in the barracks, people brought breakfast straight to her door. They set the table for her, took away her worn uniforms and used linens to be washed. They even lit the fire in the hearth with the mornings getting colder as they approached winter’s heart.


    A pretty female servant in the red livery of the Tredain household held out a note for her. This was also a custom in the Pillar. People didn’t slip letters under the door, they had servants hand-deliver them. She recognised Garld’s signet on the wax seal and cracked it open. Garld wrote that he would be in his office in the Pillar for the day, and that she should report to him after her morning session with Daurond.


    Annali’s cousin had a tendency to sleep in late so Femira usually met with him in the late morning. As a result, she resumed her training in the early morning. Running the steps of the Pillar from base to top and then practising runewielding in the sparring yards. Today, however, she was hoping to get some time with a specific training partner.


    “Will that be all, my Lady?” the servant asked.


    “Actually, do you know where Vestyr’s rooms are?” Femira inquired.


    “Vestyr the Aeth?” The girl had an innocent tilt to her head.


    “Yeah,” Femira decided not to mock her by pointing out how many other people named ‘Vestyr’ were in the palace.


    “The eastern side of the Pillar, my Lady. On the twelfth.” Femira was on tenth.


    “Can you run a message to him?”


    “Of course, my Lady,” the girl pulled out a scribing pen and parchment and moved to hand them to Femira who waved her off.


    “Just tell him that I want to meet him in the sparring yards in an hour?”


    “The sparring yards. In an hour.” the girl nodded determinedly as she spoke. Something tells me you’ve forgotten messages in the past.


    The servant departed and Femira finished her breakfast of spiced eggs and cheese. A weird combination but it works. Although it’s no spicy rice ball. The food in the palace was remarkable. Sometimes Landryn would send for a servant in the middle of the night and freshly cooked food would be brought straight to them. It was ludicrously indulgent. A year ago, Femira had to steal from market stalls just to keep from starving.


    There was something she wanted to attempt before leaving. The task required a bit of open space, and her rooms didn’t have a balcony, so she pushed the furniture to the walls. This left just the plush rug in the middle of the room. Femira stood in the center of the rug, taking deep calming breaths.


    “Alright, let’s try this again,” she muttered.


    It didn’t take her long to get into a focused state. She pulled her edir inward, ignoring the reverberations of the stone walls, floor and ceiling. It was a state of mind that she found easily these days and was crucial for her runewielding. She listened to the beat of her heart and the hum of the eradite inside of her. They worked in harmony with each other since she had become soulforged.


    There was a new sensation in there too, however, something she could only sense when she focused on it. It was the erratic discord of the nythilium metal. She had other material inside of her too; a few ingots of steel which she always kept inside for emergencies. Stone was easy to come by so she never bothered to store any. The steel resonated with her edir, eager to obey her will. The nythilium, however, was aloof.


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    “What are you?” Femira whispered. The dissonant humming continued. She focused her edir on it and guided the nythilium through her body. It flowed where she directed it, first down to her feet, then back up again to chest and to her hand. Ok… so you’re happy to do that.


    She tried to impress the image of a simple dagger. She was immediately flooded with images in response. The images were just as perplexing as before. Shifting sands of scenes that whirled and never took focus. One moment there was a ship unlike anything she’d ever seen upon a sea of silver. Then creatures of shapes and sizes that defied all reason and logic. She stayed resolute on the image of the dagger but the nythilium stubbornly resisted.


    “Ok, let’s try something different,” Femira said and envisaged a simple fork for eating. The response she received was far angrier than before. A chaotic chorus of images flashing with red lightning


    “Ok, ok,” Femira held up her hands even though there was nobody actually there. She hoped that the meaning of the gesture might convey to the nythilium. What am I doing here? Was she really trying to communicate with a piece of metal?


    She remembered the details of Landryn’s armour. The hawk grasping a sword emblem on the breastplate. The shape of the interlocking parts on the pauldrons. She pushed the images forward and the vibrations of the nythilium quieted to almost a whisper. You didn’t like being armour? She sent forward more images of armour. The gilded plate of the stormguards. And then dragonhide jerkin that she’d worn when fighting the Kraglings. She tried to convey the images as questions, not commands.


    I’m asking you to be something like this… I’m not forcing you.


    The nythilium buzzed inside of her. Again, the images Femira received back didn’t make much sense to her. And then suddenly the nythilium burst out from her in a cloud of dark sparkling mist, the flecks of metal catching the morning sun through the window. The cloud swirled around her. Femira was aware that it was her edir guiding the nythilium. But the nythilium itself was deciding what shape to take. It was like dough telling the hand how to knead it.


    Femira felt the metal compact on top of her uniform, coiling around her arms and legs to form armour. She felt it wrap around her neck like a noose and her heart quickened.


    “Uhm,” she started, “maybe… let’s rethink this.” The coiling continued and then solidified, the last remaining whisps locking into place. What she was left with was the most bizarre armour Femira had ever seen. Impossibly thin braids of metal wrapped around her. It allowed for surprisingly easy movement as she tested a few steps and swung her arms around. A thick coil protected her neck but also made it hard to turn her head. A major flaw was that all of her vital organs were exposed, as was her head.


    “Ok, this is… progress?” Femira said, carefully. She could feel what almost felt like satisfaction from the nythilium.


    “You are alive aren’t you?” She wasn’t sure how to convey that in images to the nythilium but tried anyway. She portrayed the images of children running, fish swimming, birds flying in her mind. The nythilioum responded with grass and trees, clouds and water. Ok, those things are alive too right? Well maybe not water and clouds. But we’re getting closer.


    “What are you called?” She tried sending images of her own name written on paper and then of herself. Shifting black sands were sent back, the sea of silver and then a field of blue stars.


    “Humans call you nythilium, do you like that?” Again there were indiscernible images sent in response.


    “How about Nyth? Do you like that?” That’s a stupid name. It would be like calling me Hume. Well she liked Nyth and until it learned how to tell her it’s name it could stay that way. Nyth resonated in response and Femira took that for agreement.


    She tried again to create a breastplate sending Nyth the image of Landryn’s armour but the metal sent back the image of Femira wearing the coiled armour.


    “No, this won’t work,” she said, “all my vitals are exposed.” Nyth sent her the images of a bird soaring on the wind, of a tortoise shell perfectly in shape. Are you trying to tell me this is the most efficient? I can assure you it’s not. She sent the mental image of a blade cutting into her heart.


    “Armour,” she stated, “to protect me.”


    The shifting sands of images coalesced into an alien figure unlike any person she’d ever seen. It was a spindly form that reminded Femira of an insect. Or an insect in the shape of a person. The arms and legs were wrapped in the coiled armour, a thick gorget protecting the neck. The chest and torso were exposed as hers was now but the creature was impossibly thin. It was little more than a spine. The spine itself seemed to be able to rotate completely.


    “Well I don’t know what the fuck that is but humans have some pretty important bits around there,” Femira said. Nyth dissolved back to dust and reformed again, this time with the coils looping around her waist and chest. There was a sense of disgruntled compromise in its resonance. There were still key parts of her exposed but it was definitely a start.


    “Maybe let’s try a weapon again,” she sent the image of a dagger and the Nyth armour burst to dust and formed a smaller version of the double helix blade. A smaller version still being larger than a longsword.


    “You’re really sold on this helix shape aren’t you?” Nyth sent the image of the helix blade tearing through the maw of the Kragal.


    “I suppose I can’t argue with you there.”