The Three Ouellets

[The International]

A long moment of silence passed in which the far off percussion of operating factories echoed throughout the city and served as ambient noise. Passing pedestrians only saw a kaleidoscope of multicolored rays coming from the streetlights. The two stealth ladies dwelled in the dark vacuum just beyond them. Lillian awaited her answer. “… Ludivine?”

“I’m thinking. “ She blurted out just as a local passed them. He jumped at the sound of a voice that had no body to it. His skin could have turned Raiaeran white. Ludivine poked her face into the light. Her eyebrows wrinkled as she attempted to find a sign. “Where’s Mom? We need to tell Vespasian. Come on.”

“Who was that man?” Lillian said as she followed Ludivine across the street. “I don’t remember seeing him before, and he looked weak, as though he’d been through something. Do you think he was-“

“Listen, bite size,” Ludivine abruptly halted in the street. She made sure to keep her voice down. “I’m an assassin, a seductress, and sometimes a thief. I’m not an information broker like my sister or a mastermind like my brother. When I have information I don’t try to make anything of it. I just relay it to someone like them. So when we go in there all we do is tell them exactly what we saw and heard. Nothing else. Got that?”

Lillian nodded bashfully and they started for the carriage once more. They entered through the black veil and sat across from a slouching Vespasian, who was cracking the curtain open to look through with his left hand, and holding up an orb of light with his right. He was supplying light to Maelle, who had a small sketchbook in her lap, in which she was inscribing an abstract design of feminine curves and floral shapes.

“That was quick.” Vespasian glanced at the two of them with a troubled look upon his face. “Maybe a little too quick.”

Lillian was surprisingly the first to speak up as she quoted the conversation between Esme and Ilyat word for word. Ludivine added what she could, but added that their mother wasn’t seen with them.

“You know what that sounds like?” Vespasian said as he looked to Maelle. “It sounds like this Ilyat knows about the transformation. ‘I look at picture, and next morning I am still self. I not change.’ Doesn’t that sound like someone who expects the benefits to you?”

“Yea, but it’s obvious he was Valinthe.” Maelle mumbled as she was mostly focused on her inscription. “Everything Dad was saying indicates that Ilyat has been gone somewhere for a long time and they had been working a long time to get him back.”

“Lu.” Vespasian sat up and practically stuck his head out of the opening. Even thought the townhome was dark, there was still movement inside. He could see where the light of the ever more dominating cerulean moon met the shadows of a moving figure. “You didn’t mention Mom. As far as we know she’s still in the safe house, right?”

“Right.”

“How about we go in there and ask her how old she is?” Vespasian said. Maelle dropped her pen, and Ludivine straightened up. Lillian was a smart girl. Stumbling across a plot to bring down Alerar wasn’t a coincidence, including her in the effort to stop it was risky, telling her that they were spies was pushing it, but what Vespasian just said was a roundabout way of informing Lillian of the most private family secret of them all. He glanced at the girls and rolled his eyes. “Oh please. We might as well tell her. She’s probably going to figure it all out by the time this is all over anyways.”

“Wonderful.” Ludivine said with a scowl. “Within a few hours a mere asset is induced as a friend worthy of such information by the baby of the family.”

“If you don’t feel comfortable relaying this information to me, I’ll gladly look the other way,” Lillian said from her corner of the carriage.

“You’re too intelligent. You couldn’t look the other way if you wanted to.” Vespasian glanced at his sisters, who were both staring him down with a razor sharp eye. “How else are we going to continue?”

A moment of silence dominated once again. Ludivine crossed her arms and dropped her head, allowing her sable locks to hide her face. That was her silent resignation from the situation. That way when the wrong decision was made she could at least escape partial blame. Maelle rubbed her temple and released a sigh of stress. Vespasian was right. There was no way of getting around it anymore. If Lillian was going to be an effective ally in this case, she needed to know more than what she knew.

As the eldest of the siblings, she decided to speak. “Our mother makes sketches for us that have transformative powers. They’re images of different races and ethnic groups throughout Althanas. All we have to do is look at them before we go to sleep, and when we wake up the next morning we are the person in the sketch. These transformations are not just skin deep. We change all the way to our core, and with that being said we take on the age of the person. One can fend off aging using these sketches to take them back to the age of the person in the sketch, thus allowing them to live longer than the oldest elves.”

“You ran into us at Ankhas while we were looking into the origins of our parents.” Vespasian took it from there. “Now if we look into the context of that conversation between Ilyat and our father, we could say that she was alive back when the Valinthe were around. Ilyat may have desired to be the beneficiary of her ability, which is limited to our mother’s loved ones. That’s a strong stipulation, because a person doesn’t have full control over whom they have love for, whether it be romantic or brotherly.

“So…” Lillian took a moment to process the information, probably not in a logical sense but in an emotional sense. “Your mother is more than seven thousand years old?”

The possibility wasn’t real until it was said. Ludivine emerged from her sable security blanket of hair, Maelle covered her mouth as her jaw dropped, and Vespasian dropped his head on the wall beside him. They all looked at Lillian, the purveyor of reality, no matter how unreal it felt.

“Seven thousand two hundred and forty three to be exact.” A familiar feminine voice came from outside the carriage. Alix Villeneuve was leaning against Vespasian’s side. She still managed to find a sarcastic twist to the epic situation. “I age fantastically well, don’t I? And you should guess your father’s age. Hint: I bagged me a younger man.”

“Ves!” Maelle hit his little brother in the shoulder. “You were supposed to be on the lookout. What the Hell?”

“You had him on the lookout? That was a mistake.” Ludivine said with the closest thing to a smirk on her face. “She was probably watching him while he was watching her. When he stopped watching, she moved. I do it to you guys all the time. I get it from her, even though I’m better at it.”

“My snot nose of a middle daughter is right, I’m afraid,” Alix budged her way into the dark carriage. “But we have more pressing matters. I need you three… you… four.”

“And here we thought you had everything under control.” Ludivine said with a sarcastic tone. She was learning from her mother.

“We did.”

“So you’re the government’s sleeper cell?” Vespasian said as he made room for his mother.

“We are, but there’s been an unforeseen turn of events. The enchanted diamonds were taken to several locations in the city where they’ve been used to bring back Ilyat’s clique.” The carriage was silent, a cue for her to elaborate. “The Valinthe built their lives around the unique ability of each individual, and often formed small teams of people who complimented each other called cliques. When applied to combat, a clique can be quite formidable. Ilyat, the man you watched leave with your father is Chieftain of all the Valinthe because his clique was the most dangerous of them all. They could easily take down a modern Aleraran unit, guns and all. The plan was to get all the Valinthe revolutionaries in one spot and plow them down with firearms, but that’s not going to happen now.”

“Let me guess.” Vespasian said as he slouched back. Almost immediately Alix grabbed him by his collar and forced him to sit up like a dutiful mother. He was twenty four years old and still felt like a child. “You gave your government contact the go and now there’s a scout following Ilyat wherever he goes, and since you’re a lowly Human, they’re not likely to hold off on the attack if you told them to.” Alix nodded. “So what are we going to do?”

“We need to intercept the rituals.” Lillian said with the utmost alarm. “Or at least stop the clique from reuniting.”

“That would be close to impossible, Ludivine Junior. Although the effort would be noble,” Alix made the effort to reach across the carriage to pat the librarian on the head. “I have no knowledge of the locations, and they’re probably complete already. Ilyat will be reunited with his clique within the hour.” The matriarch puckered her lips in contemplation. “I have one better though. The revolutionaries aren’t all heading to the ritual site until tomorrow. I say we head to the ritual site and face him with our own clique.”

“So that confirms it.” Lillian said with a confident bass in her voice that had never been heard before. “You’re Valinthe. How else would you know the location of the ritual site?”

“Smart.” Alix narrowed her hazel eyes as she nodded her head and folded her arms. “Are you sure you’re not one of my daughters? I’d be less motivated to kill you once this is all over if you were.”

Lillian straightened up in paranoia. Vespasian quickly alleviated the situation.

“She’s joking. She’s joking.” Vespasian said as he squeezed through. “I’ll drive. Mom, give me directions. In fact, why don’t you join me?”

“Why?” Alix said with an innocent look on her face. Vespasian shot a nasty look at her. She laughed as she began to move. “I was joking, wasn’t I?”

[Ataraxis]

Time had worn on since their departure from the city of Ettermire, and the shroud of night had long been dispelled by the morning’s break. The flatlands rolled along the frames of the carriage windows, an alternating panorama of grass fields and arid plains that could not escape from an endless and tedious cycle. With all the cautionary legends and old wives’ tales she had read on the region, Lillian had expected a smidgeon of flash and pomp from the fabled Fields of Khu’fein. What few disturbances in the fabric of time and space she had actually seen could be summed up to eddies in the skies, coming and going like swirling puffs of summer haze – hardly anything to warrant tacking to its name the age-old admonition that ‘many have traveled there, but few have ever returned’. From what she had seen thus far, death by disappointment and sheer boredom seemed the only possible explanation for that caveat.

Looking away from the window, the librarian fished into a small wooden box that lay on the carriage floor, feeling a cold breath emanate from its opening. With a gleeful smile, she produced from it a loaf of bread packed with slices of ham and cucumbers, wrapped in a sheet of kraft paper. Having kept her hunger in check since the previous night, she deservedly chomped on one end, although the bite mark had been so small it seemed the sandwich had merely been gnawed on.

“Whoa, careful there or you might choke,” Ludivine quipped in a melodramatic voice, a hand over her mouth in feigned concern. It was not long before she broke out of character with a snort, her laughter continuing as she heartily chugged from one of the glass bottles they had bought with the rest of the food. The ham sandwiches, of course, had been her own humorous suggestions.

“I have to say I was getting worried there,” Alix began with genuine worry, looking at Lillian with solemn eyes. “After seeing you fast for ten hours, I was beginning to think you just didn’t eat. That’s not healthy for a girl your age – for a girl any age.”

“I just,” she began sheepishly, averting her gaze from the Ouellets, knowing full well they would mock her for her reason. “I didn’t want us to have to stop on the way to the ritual site, is all...”

“And that’s very considerate of you,” Vespasian said from the front of the carriage, looking back through the open window that separated the driver from the passengers, his corner smile hiding none of his amusement. “Still, we’d rather have to stop a minute or two during the trip instead of having you faint once we get there.”

“A girl can’t live with a bird’s appetite,” Alix went on, the admonishing tone in her voice thickening with every second. “You might think thin is the way to go at first, but what men aren’t saying is that they actually don’t mind a little– ”

“Mother, please!” Maelle exclaimed from her seat next to Lillian, lifting her eyes from the parchment she was writing on for the first time in hours. “You’ve had this talk with both Ludivine and I, and I promise you, it’s still as gross as it was the first two times! Look, you’re even making Ves uncomfortable,” she continued, pointing to the cadet that seemed to shy away while he drove from his private section of the carriage.

“Bah, collateral damage,” Alix said dismissively. As she looked the girl down from head to toe, however, she did a double take, and resumed her inspection with a more appraising eye. “Although, if you look closely, Lillian… where it matters, you’re actually much fuller than I thought…”

“Okay!” Lillian cried out with a breaking voice, setting her sandwich on her lap before clapping her hands with a diversionary enthusiasm she had learned from Esme. “Let’s talk tactics, shall we?”

“Seconded,” Vespasian stepped in, glad to know he was not the only one made uncomfortable by this conversation. There was no doubt from the look in his eyes that he was dourly missing his father at this moment, trapped as he was amongst women with too much time on their hands, and not much to do with it. “Once we get to the ritual site – assuming we get there first – we’ll need to prepare as fast and as efficiently as possible. Making use of Maelle’s scripture is a no-brainer, but is there anything else we can do to put the odds on our side?”

“Could we perhaps try and destroy the bones? That would disrupt the ritual, if not ruin it completely,” Maelle suggested while still scribbling furiously on the vellum.

“I considered that option, but if what the librarian at Ankhas told me is any indication, then the twenty bones used for the gate are gigantic.” Lillian seemed lost deep in thought, as if racking her mind for any plan that could bring success to Maelle's proposition. After a moment, she knew it was in vain. “With that kind of size, I can only imagine they used the remains of an ancient dragon or some other such colossus. I doubt we’d even be able to move them, let alone break them.”

“I’ve got a question,” Ludivine interrupted out of the blue, her jade eyes lost in the skies. She was watching the clouds, puffy white brushes drifting from frame to frame on a canvas of pastel blue. “How did they bring back this Ilyat guy, or anyone from his clique, inside Ettermire? You said they could only do that at the ritual site.” While it was a relevant question, Ludivine did not seem to care much for an answer. The notion that she had brought up something that had not been discussed yet seemed to be enough for her, and so she returned to her cloud-gazing, sipping twice from her bottle before taking a long, hearty quaff.

“If you want to bring back ten thousand from the Anti-Firmament, then the ritual site is the only reasonable place to do it – not because there’s some intrinsic quality or magical imprint to the location itself, but because the extremely rare components are already there,” Alix answered, her previous motherly tone replaced with an unfamiliar gravity. “Like junior here guessed, the bones of an ancient dragon were used. You couldn’t even hope to find a live one seven thousand years ago, and even if they had, killing one was out of the question on top of being utterly impossible. Therefore, they had to use the only fossils Alerar had, found buried underneath L’Renor Harlilen. With that taken into consideration, wouldn’t you agree that it’s much easier to use the very same bones from the first ritual than to go around knocking on the doors of cataclysmic beasts, asking for a donation of their baby teeth?”

“So… you’re basically saying that theoretically, the complete revival could be done anywhere, but practically, the ritual site is the only logical candidate.” Lillian was taking it all in, rubbing at her chin as she did. “However, selective revival of a handful can be done anywhere with smaller bones, though even those were so rare that they could only find enough for Ilyat and his clique, who would in return tell them the exact location of the ritual and thus, the Bone Gate.”

“In a nutshell… yes,” Alix answered, saying no more. The atmosphere had dropped in the past minutes, and Lillian almost regretted not humoring the woman about her budding curves before. Almost.

“I’m glad we’ll be sleeping smarter tonight, but we still need a game plan,” Vespasian reminded them. “We know that Ilyat’s going to unknowingly lead Alerar’s strike force to the site, but if they don’t make it, we’ll have to buy ourselves some time.”

“You can leave that to me, son,” Alix whispered, the smile that stretched across her mouth bearing a cold and unforgiving quality like they had never seen before. “Ilyat’s going to want to talk to me, and I have my own choice words for him. In that time, take cover and do what you need to do.”

“Alright, then I guess all that’s left to know is… what powers does Ilyat and his clique have? We’ll need to know this in order to plan an effective counterattack, if necessary.”

“I’ll tell you, but you’ll need to sleep first. We still have quite a ways to go before reaching the ritual site, and everyone needs to be hale and hearty once we get there… and Maelle, I know you can’t afford a shut-eye yet, but your father will help you get through what’s to come once he gets there.”

“Why can’t we know now? It’d give us more time to devise a plan.”

“Because, Vespasian,” Alix retorted, harshly at first, but her tone soon quelled to an understanding softness that clutched at their hearts. “If I tell you now… you’ll never be able to sleep.”

No one spoke after that. Maelle was still industriously working on her scripture, but the anxiety in her amber eyes was now as clear as broad daylight. Vespasian had found nothing more to say, and had returned his eyes to the empty trail ahead; he decided he would take heed to his mother’s suggestion, once Ludivine was well-rested enough to replace him at the reins of the carriage. Lillian looked at her lap, no longer finding any allure in the meal she had put down, but she did her best to finish it without choking – she would need the strength. Ludivine, seeing that the girl was almost teary-eyed once done, handed her the bottle she had been drinking from. With a nod of thanks, she accepted it, and washed her mouth in one long draft. She almost spewed it all out when she felt the sting of malt prickle all the way down her throat, much to Ludivine’s mocking amusement.

And it wasn’t long before the alcohol made her woozy, and robbed her of her consciousness – Lillian always had been a teetotaler. In this instance, however, she had been grateful for that: with all of her worries, she never would have found the courage to sleep otherwise.

:::::

Somewhere in the Fields of Khu’fein was a range of small hillocks, some grassy foothills while others were bald patches of desiccated earth. What was not visible to the eye, however, was that many of them were arranged in a perfect circle that spanned far beyond what one could see. More than mere knobs, they were burial mounds, barrows not only for the bones of a millennial beast, but for the souls of myriad victims.

Lillian found a modicum comfort in the knowledge that sunset was over half an hour away: were it nighttime already, the ritual site would have done short work of her taut nerves. Here, the disturbances were greater than anywhere else in the Fields, and the girl was now very much afraid. The air seemed charged with dread and despair, and everywhere she looked, shadows danced at the corner of her eyes, vanishing like haze whenever she tried to focus on them. Every step here sent a chill through her blood, and she felt as if treading not upon a graveyard, but on a ditch where thousands had been left to die, piled upon one another to decay in gruesome unison.

They had arrived two hours ago, leaving the carriage far out of sight before walking the rest of the distance to one of the hillocks in the ceremonial array. With her help, they had managed to dig into the hill far enough to strike the tip of what seemed to be the rib of a titan, and Maelle had begun imbuing it with the glyphs she had worked on for the better part of a day. Looking to the center of the ritual site, about a hundred yards away from the Ouellet children, she saw Alix sitting near a campfire, no doubt to make her location easier to spot by Esme and, unfortunately, Ilyat. The idea of leaving her alone to deal with this did not sit well with Lillian, but they had no say in the matter. And so, they all waited in apprehension behind the steep hill, hidden from sight, until finally… they came.

A faint flash of ethereal light bathed the hills in a blue halo, and a silent rift tore through space. From it walked out a man she had never seen before, but clearly the one to have accomplished this feat of spatial transportation. The band of revolutionaries followed closely behind, far more numerous than they had been during their first encounter. Sullen-robed men and women were next to make their appearance, and those were without a doubt the sorcerers and priests upon whom the ritual would depend. At last, Esme walked out from the portal, followed by Ilyat and four of his fellow revived kinsmen. No longer did the chieftain hobble like an old man, and he stood tall and proud, taller than even Esme and with a fire in his eyes so bright and harsh it could have razed the plain to dust and ashes. Now freed from the shackles of the Anti-Firmament, he had been restored to his prior might and glory.

“I was hoping he’d still be crotchety like before… and they have a planeswalker? This… this is bad. That means whoever was on Ilyat’s tail will have lost track of him by now.” Lillian turned to Ludivine and Vespasian, dearly hoping for one of them to contradict her assessment of the situation.

“Dad… he must have taken that into account. He’ll have alerted the strike force, somehow.” Yet, as he spoke, Vespasian did not have the confidence he usually boasted. His words seemed to hinge only on wishful thinking… or, perhaps, faith. Lillian wished to believe him, but a lifetime of lost hopes had conditioned her to assume the worst. With fear tightening around her chest, she looked back to Alix, who had stood up to approach the arriving men and women.

There, at the very heart of the ritual site that had bound so many to eternal torment, the two met again. Ilyat gazed into her eyes, the inferno that raged within burning brighter than ever before... until Alix greeted him with words he had never expected to hear.

“Bonsoir, chéri.”

Translations
Alix: “Evening, darling.”

[The International]

“No need to continue, Alix.” A rather unremarkable Human man with glasses said from the Valinthe Chieftain's side. They stopped a good ten yards away from Alix. It was a gesture of suspicion in the Valinthe culture to stop exactly ten yards away from a person after making verbal contact. They no longer trusted Alix. He continued as he adjusted his glasses. “Ilyat has no desire to speak with you.”

“You're welcome, Sacha.” Alix said as she shifted her weight and crossed her arms. She was now a very different woman from when they knew her seven thousand years ago. Back then, she was full of fear, and she would have begged for forgiveness for not freeing them sooner. Now she had grown out of the habit of apologizing, and this baffled Ilyat and his four friends. “All of you. You're very welcome.”

“For what?” Sacha, the intellectual man with glasses said. He was the only member of the clique who could speak reasonable Tradespeak, but they all understood it just fine.

“For freeing you.” Alix' wide hazel eyes sent beams of rage towards the quintet of men.

“Your tone of voice. It is... It is not so polite.” A lithe man with plain white clothing and bright features tried to speak. His sky blue eyes searched for the proper words to say. “Lacks respect for superiors. You would suffer beating if we rule.”

“But you don't, Alain.” Alix said with a steady stance.

“Maybe we should all agree to disagree and get on with the ritual.” Esme stepped in, placing himself between the two sides. “The faster we bring your brothers and sisters back, the faster we can rule the world.”

“World domination was never our intention.” Sacha said with a plain sophistication.

“We just exterminate Elf.” said Gilles, a dark man with dreadlocks and silver irises.

“So instead of reviving megalomaniacs, I'm reviving racists? I was hoping for an equal opportunity destroyer here.” Esme said with a sly smirk. The others paused and looked at him. Piercing his confidence with their judgmental glares. “Joke! Joke! It was a joke.” He turned to the crowd behind him and shouted over the ambient hum of conversation. “I need all the sorcerers to line up along the opening of the arch. Complete the circle that the hills create. You, take the diamonds and spread them out evenly along the hills.”

One hundred yards to the east, Vespasian, Lillian, and Ludivine lay belly down on the emerald bed of tall grass. They were just at the top of the ridge giving them the ability to see what was going on in the center between Alix and the clique. It was when Esme ordered the orange robed men to take their positions that they found it necessary to move to the other side of the ridge.

“Smart. You know, they probably had the bones buried when they performed the original ritual too.” Vespasian said with a smile of admiration. Even in this dire situation he was able to appreciate the cleverness of others. “As far as I know nothing about it stipulates that they needed to be exposed.”

“You're probably right.” Lillian said as she rose and dusted herself off. She seemed just as light-hearted as Vespasian. “I don't think they would have fallen for the trap otherwise.”

“Vespasian!” Ludivine blurted out. Unlike the other two, she was taking the situation quite seriously. “We're getting dangerously close to confrontation, and you still haven't given us a battle plan.”

“I have everything together except for one person. The sylph.” Vespasian said as he put one hand in his pocket and one hand on his chin. He drifted of in contemplation. “We need to get him out of the way first, or else the match up for the others will be useless.”

“What do you have so far?” Lillian put a pale hand on Vespasian's shoulder, but quickly withdrew it. For what reason Vespasian didn't know why. “Perhaps I can help.”

“I have something that will attract and conduct electricity...” The spy said as he drew the Librarian's rapier. “You see what I'm getting at, right?”

“Yes. You need a means of disposal? Here.” Lillian stood close to the blade and held her hands around it. “I can make these webs highly reactive to powerful magic. You'll have to get away quickly.”

“That's perfect. Ludivine, you're going after the star mage. His ability takes time, so I figure with your speed he'll be forced into a defensive posisiton.”

“The tall one?” Now, the assassin smiled as thoughts of battle filled her head. “He won't know what hit him.”

“Good news,” Maelle said as she approached. “I saw Alerar's army on the horizon while I was setting up the last glyph.”

“That is good news. Lillian, you go after the Soul Man. You'll know who he is once he starts using his magic. Maelle, you're taking on the healer. Keep him occupied just like you did with Dad in Ettermire. I'll go after the sylph. We'll leave Ilyat to Mom, which I'm not entirely comfortable with.” Vespasian paused and went over the plan in his head. “Alright. Maelle, you come with me. Lillian and Ludivine, you stay here, and wait for Dad to give us the cue... Good luck, everyone.”

The four hundred yard valley of the Death Gate was a teeming mass of Human activity. Valinthe Revolutionaries of all shapes and sizes scurried about. The sorcerers took their places and began flexing their voices for the arduous chanting to come. Laborers ran along the inner ridge of the hills placing the diamonds equidistant to one another. Esme held the crown of the late Valsheress in his hand. It was completely without its luster now, for the enchanted diamonds had a tendency to infect everything around them with a natural luminosity. A small army of Human men hovered around all these activities with a watchful eye. They carried smuggled flintlock rifles, the very invention of the people who imprisoned their ancestors. The core of this teeming mass of activity, however, was very still. Alix, Esme, and Ilyat's clique stood and watched their servants go to work.

“I'm curious.” Sacha said with a monotone voice that could barely be heard over the commotion. “Seven thousand years? Did it truly take you that long?”

“Did anyone tell you about those diamonds? They were on the body of every King and Queen of Alerar until just recently.” Alix made an effort to get rid of her bitter voice. She didn't like cutting this so close, but she couldn't let her mark know that. “What was it like in there?”

“Stagnant. Painfully stagnant. We just floated about as masses of ectoplasm and ethereal mist, trapped in a state of blood lust. The passing ages only fermented our rage.” Sacha glanced down at his body. “I quite like the fact that we were permitted our original bodies without decay. I thought we would come back completely deformed.”

“That's only for the undead, zombies and the like.” Esme said as he paced back and forth with a lazy saunter. “You weren't supposed to be in the Anti Firmament in the first place. To bring you back as undead would be... cheap on the part of the Thayne.” The Patriarch paused for a moment. His body language straightened up like a hunting dog catching scent of the fox. “Do you hear that?”

The rhythmical drumbeat of two hundred feet was not heard, but felt in the ground below them. Sacha was the first to say it. “Marching!”

Before anyone could say another word a barrage of ruby and sapphire uniforms arose by way of ashen and olive flesh along the crest of the hills. They rose their rifles in a unified dance of destruction, and unleashed a clap of thunder upon the Revolutionaries. The bullets from these contraptions carried through the air with such speed that the eye could not keep up with them as they pierced the soft human flesh of the numerous rebels. Nearly half of the company of Humans fell before they could retaliate. Cries of agony and panic dominated the air as the Humans rose their weapons and retaliated with a volley of their own, but their lack of training showed. A considerably smaller number of the Dark Elves fell, but like a well operated clock a new row emerged and fired again.

“Non!” Ilyat roared. He turned to Esme with the face of an angry lion. "Non! Donne l’ordre de battre en retraite!”

“Pull back!” Esme waved to the nearest officer. “Pull back!” His command echoed throughout the makeshift army and they began to do so. The Humans sprinted with fear from a wall of bullets and upshot grass and dust.

“Sacha, amplifie Alain.” Ilyat's russet hair whipped around as he gave each member of his clique his orders. The weak man with barely intelligible common speech was a far cry from what was seen here. What would follow his orders was the reason as to why he was the Chieftain of more than ten thousand Valinthe. “Alain, débarasse toi de leurs armes. Stéphane, Gilles et moi engageront l’offensive.”

Sacha adjusted his glasses as he approached Alain and whispered a few simple words in the Sylph's ear. His sky blue eyes became as radiant as a pair of binary suns as a passing breeze lifted his form out of existence. A hissing swarm of deadly iron bees approached after another clap of thunderous fire came from the hills. This time they were all headed straight towards the quintet of men. Alix and Esme sprinted back with the Revolutionaries as Alerar's bullets struck the ground with a thousand tiny thuds. Not one of those bullets made contact with flesh as the quintet of Valinthe warriors were mere shades of colorless ethereal mist. A single bolt of blue hot electricity flashed into existence and leaped from one firearm to another, rendering the entire center column of Aleraran attackers completely useless.

A terrifying snake of incandescent phosphorous emerged from mouth of Gilles as he nonchalantly walked up the hill. A stray bullet from one of the other columns grazed through his muted silver cloth and cut his right shoulder. It was no matter. His pet, now as large as him and still connected to his wide open mouth struck at a retreating soldier on the front line. Its glowing fangs sunk into the Dark Elf's left artery. The soldier writhed in pain as he became the sacrifice needed to instantly heal Gilles' cut. The second row of blue and red clad soldiers stepped forward to save their brethren, but Stephane would cut their salvation short as his hands rose to conduct the invisible forces of gravity. With a quick swipe of the hand a dark ripple of reality swept the ground in a growing arc of fifty feet, and although it was a weak force, it was enough to cause the soldiers to trip over themselves and each other. Ilyat dealt the final blow. With the simple flex of his muscles and a baritone grunt the earth in front of him regurgitated itself like a parting sea, burying at least forty soldiers alive and exposing part of the massive bone gate.

The Revolutionaries cheered in the temporary glory of their ancestors. Some took it upon themselves to join the battle again, and the others soon followed. Ilyat shook his head as his descendants charged past him to take the fight to Alerar. These new Valinthe would have to be taught to follow orders. Within the chaos he failed to notice the four figures approaching from between the columns of Alerar's soldiers.

“Ilyat. Chéri,” Alix shouted as she caught sight of a few familiar faces. She and Esme were now standing behind them, well away from the danger of the war scene. Ilyat could hear the voice of his betrothed even beyond the loud exchange of volleys and the monotone humming of the sorcerers. He and his clique turned around to face her. “Laisse moi te présenter ma clique.”

Translations
Ilyat: “No! Order them to retreat!”
Ilyat: “Sacha, enhance Alain. Alain, go after the weapons. Stephane, Gilles, and I will mount the offensive.”
Alix: “Ilyat, darling. Let me introduce you to my clique.”

[Ataraxis]

Louder than the roar of gunfire, deeper than the ocean’s depths and reaching higher than the skies was the silencing boom of a supernatural song. Esme’s voice rode on waves of ether, chanting the ancient words to a sorcery of empowerment. The winds stilled, the stars froze, the earth shuddered under a solitary quake… and then came the silent light.

Their silhouettes were as solar eclipses, shrouded by darkness yet exuding halos so bright they threatened to blind those who dared look. Thus sheathed in light, they dashed toward Ilyat’s clique, plumes of dust and earth bursting behind their every charging step. Their paths diverged, and Maelle was the first the reach her target: Gilles, the man with serpentine eyes and a phosphorous tongue, who had sucked the life from his victims to recover from his own wounds. A haze formed about her slender form, the invisible aura she wielded fluctuating wildly as it was channeled into her palm, growing stronger with each fidgeting motion of her fingers. One explosive palm press was all it took to send a wall of heat towards him in a giant, crashing wave.

Seeing that the grass did not burn under its invisible advance, but instantly turned to ashes, Gilles only had enough time to abandon his offense, knitting his fingers together to form a swirling sphere of green smoke and sorcery about his person; he had erected the barrier just in time to prevent his own cremation. Unfortunately for him, he could do nothing else now, as defending himself against her onslaught took the whole of his focus: there would no more healing, no more killing.

As for Ludivine, her chosen target was Stéphane, the tall, gray-haired man with an air of unshakable serenity about him. Alix had told them that given enough time, he was the most powerful of them all, for he was not only the Valinthe’s most learned scholar in the knowledge of the universe, but also the only one whose power reflected a fundamental force that could reshape the world like no geomancer could ever hope to achieve. Thus, the fastest of them all had to fell him, and Ludivine was the only obvious choice for this monumental task.

The assassin zigzagged across the field, her speed enhanced by Esme’s song, fast enough to avoid the anomalies that were popping about the battlefield like mushrooms after a heavy rain. They were spheres of warped space, of heightened gravity, willed into existence by the simple pointing of Stéphane’s index finger. Ludivine could not afford her feet to touch any of those: she would be tripped by the gravitational differential, and that would make her vulnerable to something much, much worse. For now, all she could do was advance as best she could, finding any opening he would leave to get closer for the killing blow.

Lillian was upon the bald man with glasses that had first addressed Alix, Sacha. It was the same man that had somehow empowered his companions with whispered words, turning Gilles into an ophidian chimera and Alain, the nervous-looking youngster with striking blue eyes and frazzled blond hair, into a construct of wind and lightning. This Sacha was the most dangerous of them all, if only because he could make the strengths of his allies’ souls manifest in the physical world. As such, she had thrown her dirk, aiming for his heart as the sorcerous winds that slept in its glass core were roused awake and summoned to enhance its speed, buffet its flight and sharpen its edge.

The youngest of Ilyat’s clique, Alain, had seen the winds gather, had felt the surge of their power, and had smiled. His electrical body sizzled where he stood, and he shot a hand forward as the dagger soared. The motion of winds about its blade broke apart in chaos, only to be rearranged under his dominion: the glass dirk whirled about, cutting through the dusk sky like a boomerang on its return path. Lillian cursed, jumping out of the way in time to avoid the piercing blade as it stuck into the ground, hilt-deep. She bit her lower lip, chiding herself for having underestimated the range of his power: with such a powerful master of wind on their side, Lillian’s trademark weapon was rendered useless. As if that were not enough, he could still turn into a bolt of living lightning, and still had the power to phase his clique in and out of existence.

Lillian furrowed her brows, her expression one of dour resolve. If they were ever to defeat Ilyat's clique... the boy would have to die first.

“Aide-moi, Alain!” came the snake-man’s shout of frustration as he struggled still against Maelle’s unrelenting wave of heat. “Cette salope m’empêche de faire quoi que ce soit!”

“Entendu!” came the youth’s crackling, droning voice, syntonized as it was with the electrical oscillations of his body. Arcs of electricity tore across his form, and his vaguely humanoid shape was beginning to vanish as he prepared his second transformation into pure lightning. In that moment, Lillian, Ludivine and Maelle all gave a singular glance to Vespasian, who had remained on the sidelines… until this very moment.

Right before they heard the reverberating boom of thunder, Vespasian had tossed the Delyn rapier Lillian had lent him. The sword tumbled on itself, a feat only possible due to its masterwork balance, and when they heard the detonation, the sword had reached the path between Maelle and the lightning sylphid. Alain then cut across the field like a blue bolt, now too fast for anyone to even think of retaliating. As such, he had not realized until too late that there was rapier that now floated in the stillness of the air… that there was a slender length of metal now barring his path.

He felt himself sucked into the blade, felt the particles of his body uncontrollably drawn to the metal as they deviated to this new path of least resistance. It was a singular sensation to course into a solid object, but this he had done minutes ago to the firearms of the Aleraran columns, which had sizzled and burned under his high voltage. Yet, this blade would not submit to his power. Moreover, something else was strange about its make… upon its blade were webs of sorts, and because of their presence he felt his body fork between the two components: electricity within the blade, and the magic that bound him to this form within the spidery threads. And then, fearful realization dawned upon him.

“Putain de mer-”

First there was light, then a detonation that shook the very ground of the ritual site. The webs had been ignited by magic, and their unstable formula had made the threads extremely volatile. There was a scream of torture in the ether as Alain’s body was scattered across the field, the particles of electricity becoming blood and flesh once more. A mist of burnt fat and meaty droplets rained down on members of both cliques, and some shielded their eyes from pelting chips of carbonized bone. Along with his remains, the Delyn rapier clanged to the ground, seething with smoke and mist, but its innate resistance to magic had allowed it endured the shock.

“That’s one down,” Vespasian said with a smirk as he wiped a piece of Alain from his brow. Just as he spoke, the chants of the sorcerers that lined the circular array of hills had finally begun, drowning the battlefield in their ominous choir.

Translations
Gilles: “Help me, Alain! I can't do my job with this bitch getting in the way!”
Alain: “Gotcha!”
Alain: “Fucking shi-”

[Ataraxis]

With Alain dead, Ilyat’s clique had lost their trump card. Having been the fastest of the five, the sylph could provide each of them assistance in the form of lightning, and any attack that would injure them all at once could be thwarted by his ability to make his allies incorporeal. Next on the list, however, was Sacha. Truth be told, he was the most troublesome of the five: without his power to externalize the strength of his clique’s souls, Alain would never have been able to accomplish either of those feats, but the scholarly Valinthe was too well defended by his allies for him to have been their first target.

‘But things are different now,’ Lillian thought to herself as she dashed for the bald, bespectacled man. Her glass dirk was back in her hands, razor sharp winds dancing about the blade as she readied herself to unleash another squall. A great crescent wind burst from the arc of her swing, shooting across the field like a flight of sparrows, intent on shredding the skin from his flesh.

But Sacha did not move. He stood his ground, baring his crooked teeth in arrogance as he reset his spectacles upon the bridge of his nose. A sweep of the hand and a few whispered words later, the sickle wind seemed to crash against an invisible wall... until she realized that it had simply dissolved, as if the force behind it had lost all cohesion. It was then that Lillian realized this must have been some unforeseen by-product of his power. Somehow, he had weakened the resolve behind it, breaking what natural force had powered the gust of wind. With that in mind, the girl stopped in her tracks, maintaining a defensive stance as she established a new plan.

“Your know of Alix’ power, do you not?” Sacha began amusedly, swiping his thumb across his nose in an act of arrogance. “It is a joke, centered on lies and deceit. But me? My power is real.” He advanced slowly, matching with Lillian’s pace of withdrawal. “I do not hide the truth under veils and guises… I reveal it to the whole world. And what truth? That of your soul: the face of its strength… or that of its weakness!”

Just as he finished speaking, his whole body began to quaver. Before her very eyes, she saw Sacha become taller and taller, saw the pate of his head grow infested with black veins. Mist steamed from his eyes, and she realized in horror that his eyelids were melting shut. Blood dripped from the creases of his forehead, eventually gushing forth as they burst open like a fresh slit, revealing a cyclopean eye, a dark violet like stale blood save for its pulsing red iris.

“What… what devilry is this?” Lillian muttered breathlessly, her fingers curling tightly around her dirk.

She heard him begin to whisper, and she felt a chill course through her like an arrow shot down her spine. The unintelligible whispers multiplied, and she heard them louder and louder within her mind. The dirk escaped from her loosening grasp, and she fell to her knees, clutching her temples in pain, fearing that her sanity was poised to escape… until she heard it.

‘You walk unknown, you live unseen, yet an atrocious fiend you have always been.’

‘Those who know you, they fear your touch, others wonder whether there can be such.’

‘Cold and elusive, haunting and bitter, you are their enemy: the invisible monster.’

Her eyes blinked open, and she saw that the world had become sullen and grey. Lillian looked at her hands, and she could only see their shimmering outlines, for her flesh and bones were now transparent. A ghost. Under his curse, she had become a being of ectoplasm, trapped and helpless in a world that had rejected her existence. She could do nothing, she could feel nothing save for the dust of the battlefield coursing through the ghastly shell of her heart.

“Such weakness in your soul, it is a pity to watch.” Sacha had walked towards her, towering over her kneeled ghost in condescension, scoffing as he watched her weaken, as he watched her shrink into nothingess, forgotten by all. “You were so insignificant before, people could barely notice you… and now, no matter how much you kick and scream, they never will again. Ha! Isn’t it delightful?”

“As if we’d forget her,” he heard Esme speak from behind. Sacha evaded the rapier just in time, feeling only a nick at his sides. The Valinthe escaped, expecting Esme to assail him with a flurry of strikes, but the man had stayed behind. Before Lillian even realized his presence, Esme renewed his song of empowerment; yet, there was something more to it this time, as if she heard her name among the lyrics – as if it had been dedicated to her. She felt the darkness that had overwhelmed her mind recede, felt the warm light of Esme’s voice purge it of Sacha’s corruption.

She felt her body return, felt the muscles catch onto bone. She felt the pull of her tendons and ligaments, the pulsing of blood through her heart and veins. There was a new shimmer to her self, and only then did she realize that the magic was having unforeseen effects. “Esme… it looks like there’s one more thing your song has improved.” Her ability to absorb other powers… he had somehow enhanced it. After enduring the Valinthe’s curse of enfeeblement, she had made it her own, though she knew full well the effect was merely temporary. One try was all she had, and after that, hit or miss, it would be lost to her forever.

Her eyes saw the world very differently now. No longer was it sullen and cold, but a true canvas of clashing colors in the countless men and women that now fought in the Fields of Khu’fein. She could see into them, see the truth of their selves, the faces of their souls… and most importantly, she could now see Sacha’s in perfect clarity.

Sacha heard her begin to whisper…

He fell to his knees, clutching his head as he writhed left and right, so wracked it was with pain. Her voice flooded his mind, drowned him, choked him. As his sanity left his mind, he could finally make out her words.

‘‘You whisper the secrets exhumed by your Eye; you see them as truth, and there is the lie.’

‘Behold your true self, as your mind is laid bare: crippled and blind do you kneel in despair,’

‘And of your proud delusions nothing remains, but a sad little man who shambles in chains.’

As her words sank into his mind, Sacha began to shrink and shrivel. His flesh became wiry, his frame was thinner, and his skin was covered in senescent spots. He knelt there, crippled and malformed, his robes too large for him. His third eye struggled to stay open, as if chained down by the burden of the counterfeit world he saw, blind to everything else. What was left of him was a wreck of a man, cowering in his frailty, shivering from the assaulting cold. His limbs were as twigs, withered and fragile, the color of dust, while his face reminded her of an oily rag, used and wrinkled by the wear of a world to which he had never belonged. Seeing him this way, Lillian could not help but pity the man.

Blood spurted from his chest as Esme’s rapier slid into his spine, severing his vertebrae. Death was almost instantaneous. Lillian watched his body fall in mute disbelief, but she eventually shook it off: the Ouellet patriarch had saved her from committing this murder, as that had been her task. Outrage was out of the question: no matter what, she could only be grateful for his mercy.

Their eyes crossed, and they knew things were as they should be. After her silent thanks and his mute acknowledgment, they broke contact, and sped off in opposite directions: Esme for Alix, and Lillian for Ludivine.

[The International]

The chant vibrated through the tense atmosphere as an aural kaleidoscope of timbres that caused one's body to shiver. Esme's song of strength was now ambient noise compared to the massive choir's ominous summoning. The universe didn't hesitate to obey as the Anti-firmament leaked into their world. Its lifeless, muted state began to slowly spread across the sky above them like molasses.

The Valinthe Chieftain placed his right hand over his heart in a feeble attempt to quell its erratic pace as his left hand shielded his eyes from the rain that was his youngest brother. He inhaled deeply, taking in the scent of the fallen sylph's flesh and the sight of the fallen berserker's blood, then released a guttural scream of anguish. These attackers were as unconventional and as diverse as his people were, and they all held a familiar form in their faces. It was during that epiphany that time seemed to stop. They were the children of his betrothed, and in such a brief span of time he had experienced confusion, grief, and rage. He turned to see Alix standing in the distance with her blade in hand. She didn't look down. She didn't look away. She looked straight at him, and in that moment she silently confessed that this was all her doing. More than seven thousand years of fermented rage and bloodlust fueled his steps as he began to charge. Seven thousand years of fear fueled hers.

Stephane and Ludivine were at a stalemate. As the middle Villeneuve ducked, weaved, and rolled her way around the gravitational anomalies, the most powerful of the clique managed to keep a distance by steadily pacing back. It was a straightforward lunge that resulted in Ludivine landing flat on her stomach from the same gravitational trip line that did Alerar's finest in. She turned onto her back just in time to see the distorted space above her slowly descend. The feeling was unlike any other. It was as if the weight of the very air itself began to bear down on her entire body. Her limbs were not bound, but drastically hindered in movement. The assassin's head darted from side to side seeking a hole, a way out of some sort, but the escape came in the way of a simple reminder. Lillian's delicate voice reached beyond the cadence of gunshots carrying only two words... “The amulet!”

Ludivine glanced down at the green amber trinket attached to her neck. Its dark spots of age and the three horned beetle inside hid an amazing secret. A crooked grin crossed her face as a surge of unimaginable strength coursed through her veins and into her muscles. This invisible force that Stephane had pressed upon her was nothing more than a miniscule hindrance now, so the assassin immediately jumped to her feet and charged. The mage of the stars created every defense he could, but Ludivine passed through them like a curtain, each one of lighter fabric than the last, until her petite blade sliced through his jugular. She watched him drop with a satisfaction akin to a tigress having made a kill. That satisfaction was short lived as she noticed Stephane's life fluid ran gray upon the ground. The Anti-firmament was taking hold.

The choir of the Valinthe apocalypse had risen in volume and tone summoning the imprisoned army. All around silhouettes of lavender ectoplasm began to materialize and begin their walk back into the material world. Due to the conditions of the original ritual, it was assumed that the if these forms made it past the perimeters of the bone gates they would materialize. With that in mind Ludivine, Lillian, and Vespasian set out to cut their strolls short, sending blades through their figures and causing them to evaporate.

“Maelle!” Ludivine screamed. “Your booby trap.”

“Don't worry. It just needs more energy!” Vespasian said as he ran allowing his body to follow his blade through the purple material of several bodies, which in turn evaporated into nothingness. He halted and looked at his eldest sibling with concern. “Right, Maelle?”

Maelle was more than twenty yards away, but she could hear them clearly. She only responded with a shrug as she was occupied with a task of her own. Gilles, the dreadlocked snake man, was starting to fight back, cracking a flaming whip in the likeness of a snake in Maelle's direction during an ever increasing time lapse in between her own attacks. She was a negotiator, not a fighter, and it was beginning to show in her shallow breaths and weaker attacks. Eventually Gilles grew in confidence, and decided to strike the final blow. His jaw seemed to unhinge and open beyond anatomical possibility as an incandescent snake of monstrous proportion emerged from his mouth.

Within a split second it coiled, struck, and came within mere inches of devouring the young broker, but for some reason it stopped in front of her right index finger, which held at its tip a tiny ball of negative energy. Had the snake gone any further, the negative energy would have spread like a virus devouring it and its master. Gilles was at Maelle's mercy, but it was unfortunate that she couldn't spare any. With a hint of regret on her face she touched a fang of the snake. Its white body was quickly overtaken by a molten red rash that made its way back to the host, whose every orifice leaked of burning lava. He wasn't even able to scream, but that was Maelle's intention. Everything that had transpired in that duel was her intention. As the two exchanged blows she probed for he composition of Gilles' energy and changed hers to create a volatile reaction when the two came together. The conversion and the focusing of such energy took every fiber of her being, but killing someone took more.

The broker of nations dropped to her knees and hung her head to the ground as her stomach began to implode like a vortex. It was times like this that Maelle deserved the title of Black Sheep much more than Ludivine. She was the only one in the family that had such a physical and emotional aversion to taking a life.

“Maelle!” Vespasian screamed in between swings. “Help us take out the...”

“I've done my part! You... ugh...” Maelle's stomach emptied its contents out on the ground in the form of a bright beige soup of bread and meat chunks lightly sprinkled with salty tears of shame.

“You're right. You have done your part.” Vespasian stood up straight from his battle stance and nodded his head. He then looked to his mother and father. “I just hope they can do theirs.”

[The International]

Alerar had one less thing to fear. The revolutionary army, a motley force of humans armed with outdated rifles, was all but defeated with nothing but a few pockets of fighters. Without the power of the Valinthe clique, the Aleraran army's numbers and discipline slowly but surely wore down the revolutionaries. As the untrained Humans fired and charged, the Dark Elves had formed a shallow three row formation at the crest of the horseshoe hillside. The front row would fire then retreat to the last row to reload as the next row would step up and fire. This cycle continued without fail. It was simple, straightforward, and successful. However, the battle was not over. A violet mist of emerging Valinthe began to cover the field, and Alerar's two hundred could not fire quickly enough to stop the thousands of figures materializing into existence.

But a figure appeared in the center of the scene, where the lifelessness of the Anti-firmament took its hold of the last of the firmament. A direling of epic proportion, clad in the fur of Berevar beasts. Bjormund, the Guardian of the Death Gate, towered over the escaping Valinthe tribe with a claymore that far surpassed his great wingspan. The Thayne Legend looked over his subjects and did... nothing. For more than seven millennia thousands of souls who weren't even supposed to be there pestered the fatigued guardian with their very presence. The Valinthe had not been properly killed by battle, time or disease, they could not enter any other realms. He was all the happier to allow them to leave him in peace. To make matters worse, the sorcerers were numerous and spread throughout the field, and now that the gates were open they would remain so until the very last of them stopped chanting. To target them would take everyone off of the task at hand, which was keeping the Valinthe from making it through the gates.

Now that Ilyat's clique was defeated, the siblings and Lillian could focus on exactly that. However, Maelle was spent, and Vespasian was distracted. He couldn't help but notice that his father simply watched as his mother fought the Chieftain of the Valinthe. He rushed in to help.

“Stay back, Vespasian.”

The youngest Villeneuve ignored his father's order until a spray of fire crossed his path. Had he moved any faster, he would have been burned alive. Esme was serious. Vespasian turned to his father with a flared face of rage. “Help her, Goddammit!”

“She made me promise not to interfere.” Esme's ever calm voice failed to hide the look of concern in his eyes. “She wants to face him on her own.”

“Fuck 'on her own'!” Vespasian paced back and forth like a caged beast. He was in rare form, as was everyone else. “You can't see she's scared?”

“That's exactly what this is about.” Esme said as he watched Alix battle with Ilyat, who was now clad in armor of rock. The calm predator that had bested Ludivine the day before had been replaced with a hesitant fighter who sacrificed an opening every time she found one. Her combinations were short, her recoveries from the blunt attack of Ilyat's rock fists were slow. The Chieftain could have killed her a long time ago. This was punishment. “The only thing she's ever feared in this world was him.”

“Ah. Now I get it.” Vespasian said in voice matching that of his father's serenity. “Now I see why you and Mom have always been such distant parents.”

“Don't you dare...”

“Not bad parents. Just distant. I'm not going to try and put a finger on how long the two of you have been in this world, but the twenty something that we have pales in comparison. I do know one thing. The two of you are lucky to have made it this far on your own.” Vespasian stepped up to within inches of his fathers face. “Get it through your head that people, be it Elves, Dwarves, Humans, and even the Gods themselves, aren't meant to be alone. Burn me if you want. I'm going to help my mother – your wife.”

Vespasian turned away and approached the battle. His mother was now kneeling on the ground with a bloody lip, her sword was nowhere to be seen, and her clothes were ripped in various places, exposing the black and blue marks of a battered and abused woman. Alix looked up and made eye contact with him. Her eyes were no longer the piercing hazel blades of the greatest woman he knew. They were the tear glazed windows to a soul reduced to nothing.

“Son.” Esme said from behind him.

Vespasian stopped... and sent her a message in the form of a smile. Fear no more.

“I got this.” Esme passed Vespasian, and he could hear a familiar song quietly escaping his lips.

“Dad.” Esme looked back at his son. He could hear the joy in his voice. “Ilyat's armor is summoned together with sedimentary rock. There are lots of little cracks and crevices.”

Smart, Esme thought to himself. He was just going to go in there and fight, but now his youngest had given him a good strategy. Having built up enough song magic he stopped his singing and continued to approach Ilyat, who was making a deliberately slow walk towards Alix. A thick mist of ethereal spirits began to surround them. “Hey, Ilyat. I'm the one who's been making love to your woman for the last seven thousand years.”

Ilyat didn't understand much Common, but he knew enough to know what Esme was saying. The Chieftain changed his path and charged for the Villeneuve patriarch, who didn't even bother to unsheathe his sword or strap on his buckler shield. Esme ducked an attempted clothesline by the Valinthe and several swings thereafter. Like his wife, Esme was clearly faster than Ilyat, but all Ilyat needed was one successful attack to gain the upper hand. But so did Esme.

The opening came after an attempted jab aimed at Esme's left temple. The patriarch managed to get his forearm between his head and the rock clad fist, but the velocity and the jagged knuckles managed to cause his left forearm to crack. At the same time Esme's right palm had reached Ilyat's abdomen, which did no harm to the man behind the armor at all. What the palm press carried with it was a unique use of Esme's song magic, water touch, which instantly soaked everything he touched from within.

The water quickly did its work, multiplying and pressurizing within the summoned armor of a million rocks and breaking it to pieces. Ilyat stumbled back as white jets of water shot out of the joints of his armor like geysers. A roar of rage came from behind the violet veil of mist, and then came Vespasian swinging his rapier. He cut across Ilyat's exposed back causing a river of blood to come fourth. The Chieftain cried in pain as he turned to lay eyes on Vespasian, who then thrust his blade through the diaphragm just under his ribcage.

Ilyat fell back on to the ground and the remaining pieces of armor shattered in to thousands of tiny pebbles. The wound on his back added to the pressure of this body caused an unbearable stinging sensation all around, but he was too preoccupied with the ever shortening breaths he was able to take. It was as if his lungs were made of lead. This lad who fell him knew what he was doing.

He could have struck anywhere, a thigh to immobilize him, his neck or head to instantly kill him, but he chose a slow and painful death for Ilyat. All so that he could see Alix standing over him victorious during his last moment. She lowered down to get a closer look at him... Or was she allowing him to get a closer look at her? Her eyes were not that of a helpless animal fearing for her life. They were piercing hazel blades cutting deep into his pride. It was the last thing he would ever see in this world.

Alix stood and looked to her husband with her trademark smirk. “I wanted to defeat him.”

Esme shrugged and smiled. “In a way... you did.”

[Ataraxis]

An uneasy veil of silence had fallen over the battlefield when father and son dealt the killing blow. They had executed Ilyat, all for the sake of their family’s matriarch. The warrior chieftain had fallen to his knees amidst the granite rubble that had been his armor, gasping for breath, each inhale a storm of cold and arid pain. The fire in his eyes faded to the gutter of a candle; they glazed over, dark with confusion as the life left them. He was no longer the tall and proud man he had boasted to be; he had been reduced to a crawling husk, trembling from every limb, blood dripping from his quavering lip. And then finally, after a protracted time of suffering, it all came to a stop. Ilyat was no more.

The King of the Valinthe was dead.

The chants of the priests and sorcerers that circled the ritual site, however, did not cease. Even in the void left by their leader’s death, they went on for reasons unknown – perhaps out of duty, or simple loyalty to the man. Perhaps only greed for what they were promised. Whatever the case, they would not stop, and the purple hazes that walked away from the heart of the battlefield were approaching the small, hill-like ridges that delimited the seal currently entrapping the whole tribe of the Valinthe. Their features sharpened the closer they came, the violet blurs overtaken by static as demented eyes and twisted expressions blinked in and out of existence. In their faces, there was only madness.

“Maelle!” the rest of family screamed out, and even Lillian’s shrill and mousy voice had joined the desperate cry.

“Give it time!” the eldest of three yelled out in answer, hands still pressed against her mouth and midriff as she fought the creeping sense of death that had caught in her throat ever since she had killed Gilles. She was a broker, a negotiator, a grifter at worst – she could never stomach being a killer. Still, she did her best to push the dread away, if only to keep in touch with the reality at hand, and the impending sortie of ten thousand madmen. “Everyone get away from the hills!” she managed loud enough to be heard over the din of chatter and confusion.

Just as Vespasian thought of yelling that time was the one thing they were lacking, a sudden hum cut him short. It started low, coming from all sides, but it soon became a droning so shrill that every single person within the fields had brought their hands to their temples, clamping down with such intensity they threatened to crush their own skulls. Though it felt as if their eyes would turn to jelly, some had risked a glance toward the surrounding hills, to see the purple silhouettes of mist and static stop in their tracks… to see the several spots of light that shot out from the hilltops in rising pillars.

To see the blinding flash that tore through darkness.

Thunder struck from below, and the earth slipped from beneath their feet and knees. Blazing fire blotted out the night sky in towers of crimson and smoke. The heat was so intense they could feel its fuming breath from so far away. The several simultaneous explosions were not long to last, however, and soon a dry gale came blowing in from all sides. The chink of thousands and thousands of pellets surrounded them as bone shards rained from the heavens, painfully pelting their heads and skin like ice from a hailstorm.

The cries of ten thousand banshees tore across the fields. One by one, the ghastly silhouettes vanished in puffs and plumes of amethyst, sucked back from whence they came, disappearing into the earth upon which stood the Guardian of the Death Gate. They were siphoned away like murky waters down a drain, passing in between each soldier and revolutionary like a wind of death that desperately sought to clutch them in their intangible grasp. It was all in vain, and their heart-rending screams and millennial curses so vicious and petrifying that the weaker-minded had let their bladders go. Then, only Björmund was left, towering in the center of the battlefield, his tusks and giant claymore gleaming darkly in the lingering flames that now devoured the hills. His worn and weary face was crimpled with irritation, and the direling uttered a long, grunting sigh… and then he, too, vanished from the world.

The silence that followed was absolute.

The revolutionaries ended their struggle, lowering their arms as the Aleraran strike force ceased fire. Their gunfire had been consistently mowing through the ranks of the humans and Valinthe descendants for the better part of the final battle against Ilyat, but now, with the resurrection of the Valinthe foiled, their victory was incontestable. The dark elves rose in acclamation, their triumphant cries filling the night, and they raised their fists to the skies as their enemies sulked in defeat.

The rest of the Ouellet family had gathered around Maelle, who Lillian was helping to stand up. The eldest child had recovered enough from the trauma to face her parents and siblings, albeit with a wan face covered in a fine sheen of sweat. “Wow… Well, that… that was…” Esme began clumsily, fishing for the right words of awe.

“Brilliant,” Alix concluded with more confidence, though her tired eyes were as wide as her husband’s. “Brilliant work, Maelle. I genuinely didn’t know you’d come so far.”

“I didn’t, really…” she began without much commitment, still feeling feeble. “The glyph… I designed it to use the extra power that was weaved into the bones during the first ritual and the energy from the sorcerer’s incantations. They were basically big, magic magnets.”

“That sounds brilliant to me,” Lillian added innocently from beneath the much taller woman’s shoulder, as she had been acting as a crutch. Vespasian and Ludivine were quick to acquiesce, and it was with great relief that they all saw colors return to Maelle’s face.

“We did it,” Vespasian said at last, smiling with all his teeth as he exhaled a lifetime’s worth of stress. “We really did it.”

Ludivine hissed at her younger brother, staring him down with squinted eyes that gleamed like fiery jade. “Careful with what you say: there’s no wood to knock on.”

“I’ll have to agree,” Lillian said meekly, her eyes filled with a nervous shade of gravity and concern. “While not particularly superstitious, I am book-savvy.” They chuckled at that, much to the girl’s dismay – she had been serious, after all. Still, the laughter was quick to fade, and silence settled in awkwardly as the questions rose in their minds like warning flags.

“Mother…” Maelle began at last, the first to speak. “This, all of this…”

“I know, Maelle,” Alix answered lowly, solemnly. She met her daughter’s gaze head on, but it was obvious the matriarch was struggling not to look away in shame. “I owe you all an explanation…” She stopped at the first sound of an approaching commotion. The Aleranian strike force was rounding in the revolutionaries, and the squad leaders were approaching Alix and Esme, seeking to debrief with the spies. The whole sting operation had depended on them, after all.

“But not now… not here.”

[The International]

One week later…

The main deck of The International was saturated by the silver light of the moon and the golden light of the gas lamps around the table. The combination of the two managed to give a flattering hue to even the palest of people, like Lillian Sesthal, who was the only outside guest at the Villeneuve dinner party. She knew their real family name now, and she knew the real family business. The librarian had proven herself a trustworthy friend of the family, and so she was invited to dine with them to share a special evening. The table was adorned with delectable entrees from all around the world. It was a truly international feast, and the savory assortment of aromas held steady in their noses despite the salty sea breeze of Etheria Port. Normally, the table would be a circus of clashing dishes and utensils, loud conversation, and even a flying piece of food here and there. Tonight, however, it was a silent mausoleum filled with awkward spirits, and rightfully so. Esme and Alix, each sitting at their respective end of the long table, were going to reveal their past.

“Okay. This is ridiculous.” Alix said with a partially full mouth as she tossed her napkin on the table. “I at least wanted to wait until desert to do this, but you’re all unbearable. We will cure your anticipatory anxiety, and when this is done please don’t torture me with your silence.”

“Oh we won’t.” Maelle mumbled before she filled her mouth with a piece of salmon.

“I’m not sure how much you all figured out, but I was born to a Valinthe family more than seven thousand years ago in the mountains of Kachuck. My family was prominent – the equivalent of a noble bloodline in other cultures, but that didn’t change how I or any other woman was treated. You see how slaves are treated in Salvar. We were treated worse, subject to frequent physical and sexual abuse as a way to wear us down psychologically. That way our abilities, which were directly linked to our personalities, would generally be weaker than the men’s abilities. You weren’t a Valinthe woman if you hadn’t been beaten or raped. I was a victim of both… several times. My older sister was beaten, raped and left for dead in public by a handful of elders after it was discovered that she had manifested pyrokinesis. Lucky for me, my transformation abilities were not seen as a threat, but perhaps they were a manifestation of my need to escape. Most women who had survived this treatment accepted it. They even encouraged it at times. I was one of them, until the Alerarans.

“Their first approach was diplomatic, but self righteous. I was fifteen, and newly betrothed to Ilyat. ‘Give us everything you have and we won’t wipe you off of the face of Althanas.’ They said. We didn’t even know that the word ‘Althanas’ meant. But one thing stood out to me. Their women spoke out of turn, they wielded swords, and enjoyed the same luxuries as the men. Although they weren’t quite equal, the Aleraran women were damn close, so I used my ability to transform into a Dark Elf and infiltrated their society.”

Alix cracked a smile with wide eyes of wonder as she stopped to sip a bit of wine. “The freedom they had, the respect and the love they were entitled was amazing.” That smile quickly disappeared from her face, and her voice was that of a weeping child. “It wasn’t fair! It wasn’t fair to be born in such a Hell! I must have done something horrible in my previous life to deserve to be born a Valinthe. Either way I orchestrated an escape amidst conflict between the Valinthe and Alerarans. I even probed the women in my life to see if they wanted to join me, but none of them wanted to leave even as they saw what I saw. The Alerarans and Dwarves became more desperate since they were locked in a stalemate, and I became more desperate when Ilyat, my husband to be, requested a drawing. As you know, my ability only works for loved ones, and I didn’t love him. I barely even knew him, and as I grew more and more resentful of my Valinthe sisters, they too would soon discover through my ability that I had lost love for them.”

“So that’s when you decided to seal them away.” Ludivine said quietly. “You were behind the largest ritual spell in known history.”

“And that’s what Ilyat meant when he said he didn’t transform.” Vespasian added.

“I was just a muse. The Elves and Dwarves did all the legwork. And yes. He must have attempted to transform the day before he and his forces fell into the trap. I lured the majority of the tribe to the Fields of Khu’fein, and the trap was set. I watched as men, women, and children were sent to the Anti-firmament. I was then free to be who I wanted to be, but knowing the laws of nature I knew that it was possible to bring them back. They weren’t sent there by way of death, so they could return. I took the form of an Aleraran, created the identity…”

“Princess Izlav Elemmire Chath.” Lillian said as she nodded her head. Her plate, still mostly full, was now in the center of the table. She seemed to have lost her appetite for now.

“Princess by day.” Alix said as she reached for Lillian’s plate. If the Librarian wasn’t going to finish the dinner she would. “Spy by night. I found out that a Raiaeran agent managed to abduct a few hundred of the Valinthe and place them in a secret enclave.”

“And that agent was me.” Esme finally chimed in as he stood and slowly walked around the table. “I was that agent, and for the next forty years, your mother and I were mortal enemies. I was setting this enclave up in Corone as a kill switch. If Alerar ever attempted to attack Raiaera in a defenseless state, I would send these remaining Valinthe to free their ancient brethren. Your mother attempted to kill them all, men, women, children several times. I foiled her plans several times, although I didn’t know the nature of the tribe since such information was above my pay grade. One day circumstances forced us to have a civil exchange, during which she revealed the Valinthe and herself. I informed my superiors of the Valinthe tribe’s nature, but they knew and had sent me to do the job anyway. After several appeals to the then paranoid Raiaeran state, I decided to team up with Alix and eliminate the Valinthe refugees. Unfortunately Raiaera’s agents saw us coming and relocated them.”

“Somewhere down the line we fell in love.” Esme was now standing behind Alix with his hands on her shoulders. “She designed an Aleraran form for me; I faked my death then relocated to Alerar. As the Elves of that country became more and more dark, the two of us updated our forms to fit in, and that’s when we realized that we could cheat death by taking on the age of said forms. Eventually we decided to work for ourselves, so Alix faked her death. It was also convenient for me because I contracted a deadly disease in my original Raiaeran form, so I had to abandon it. That was around two thousand years ago.”

“So we were on the right path?” Vespasian said with a smile.

“I would say so.” Esme said with a smirk. “There have been more than thirty Internationals, and no. They weren’t all named The International. Then there was the miracle twenty six years ago. Alix rarely used her original form, the form you see her in today. This form was thought to be infertile due to the abuse she suffered at the hands of the Valinthe. She was confirmed pregnant in the body of an eighteen year old Valinthe woman, and the child was Maelle. Then came Ludivine, and then Vespasian. We never thought we’d be able to have children, at least not while Alix occupied her original form, but here you are. All the while we kept our ears to the ground… watching… waiting for one of Raiaera’s agents to trigger the kill switch. It was triggered around a month ago.”

“Now Ilyat’s been properly killed…” said Vespasian.

“A major disaster was averted…” said Maelle.

“And the Valinthe are virtually dead because we have these…” said Ludivine as she raised her hand and dropped a handful of diamonds on an empty plate. They were the diamonds of the Crown Jewels of Valsheress, and without them, no one could perform a ritual that large.

“And now the Valinthe are gone…” Alix said as she sat back with a look of relief on her face. “For good.”

A moment of silence passed before a teary eyed Maelle stood up and approached her father. She wrapped her arms around his waist as he kissed her forehead. Alix joined in the embrace, as did Ludivine and Vespasian.

After a moment of embrace Esme popped his head out of the huddle and looked at Lillian, who was awkwardly sitting her seat. “Get your ass over here, Librarian. You deserve this too.”

It took the encouragement of five others, but Lillian Sesthal reluctantly rose from her chair with rose colored cheeks and entered the fray with a plum smile. The Villeneuve family cheered as they rocked side by side with the ship.

“Now…” Esme said. “Eat fast. This food is getting cold!”

[The International]

Spoils
Thanks for following! We hope you enjoyed the read. If you did, then there’ll be more to come!

This here will be our little pool of spoils.

For The International

• Bonus XP, maybe? Or perhaps converting what GP gains I would get into XP? If not, that's alright.
• Also, any spoils requested by Ataraxis involving the Villeneuve family are permitted.
• Sitayamini Under Clothing – While at the Bottomless Pit, Lillian fashioned each of the Villeneuve children a crude but still stylish set of under clothing. Though not full-body, they cover the essential parts of their bodies (similar to the combination of a turtle-necked t-shirt and a pair of shorts). The weavings are made of Lillian’s trademark Sitayamini Silk, which were created at the strength of steel. This offers them good protection against slashing, slightly better protection against piercing, and no protection against blunt damage. She also tailored similar clothing for Alix and Esme as a gift.
• The Diamonds of Queen Valsharess – The centerpieces of the Crown Jewels of Queen Valsharess. Each member of the Villeneuve Family possesses one now. Using these, they can now communicate with each other telepathically no matter their respective locations on Althanas. They have enough for each member of the family, but spare ones for allies as well.

For Ataraxis

• Subdermal Cocoon – In order to protect her frail physique, Lillian developed over the months a network of extremely thin strands of interconnecting silk within her body. She basically weaved a layer of webs between her epidermis and dermis, thus giving her heightened protection her from slashing, though not quite as much against piercing damage. She is still just as vulnerable to blunt damage, however. Over her chest, the layer of webs also uses her thorax as support, allowing high-impact damage to spread out, though this would likely break all her ribs. It is the strength of her strongest threads (currently Dehlar).
• International Pass – As thanks for her help, and since she’s the only person who knows what the Villeneuve family truly does, Lillian can use the International as an NPC mode of transportation, as well as the Villeneuve family as minor NPCs so long as they aren't killed off (discussed with and approved by The International, as stated above).

Both

• Canon - we would like to request that this be considered for official Althanas canon, but only if you deem it worthy.