Ken Scholes - Antiphon

She had told Winters that in time, the young, deposed Queen would find an appropriate response to what had happened to her last winter. On that day that Winters lost everything, Jin Li Tam had bargained with a devil and saved what mattered most to her.

Like Winters, she could not fathom what her response might be, and now, with the anger burned away, her fear moved toward sadness she could not afford to feel, and she tried to keep it at bay. Focus on what you have gained , she told herself. Life for your son.

She paused at the hidden entrance and the series of narrow passageways that would take her to Jakob’s room and then to her own bathing chambers, and turned again to take in the nightfall.

She tried not to think of her father and the scars that covered him, or of the mass graves she’d never seen upon that distant island, or of the orphaned children now nearby who bore the scar of Y’Zir over their hearts. She tried not to think of them and failed.

For all that I gained, I’ve lost as well. And for that, a response was certainly called for. But what response?

Wiping a stray tear from her cheek, Jin Li Tam begged an answer from the first star that poked its light through the dusky canopy of sky.

Then, she slipped into her home and pushed her fear once more aside.

Winters

Winters undressed by moonlight, her bare skin noticing the slight chill of her basement bedroom. She hurried into her sleep shift and then scuttled into bed, pulling the covers up quickly and gasping at the cool of the sheets.

Lady Tam had surprised her; she’d thought she was alone in the gardens but for the scouts who patrolled it. But she was glad to have seen Lady Tam and spoken with her, however briefly. She’d missed her and Jakob especially while they were off touring the Ninefold Forest. Rudolfo had offered to bring Winters along, but she had preferred the library.

Hiding underneath your mountain of books. Perhaps, she thought, but no more. Now, she knew that something had to be done. The light of blind, loyal faith in those evangelists’ eyes. And the self-assured tone that masqueraded as love, dripping from their voices. Her people were beset by wolves, and it seemed Rudolfo’s were now, as well.

He’d told her of Ria’s visit, and she’d felt her own mouth drop open in surprise. Then, he’d shared her message of the impending threat. Now she understood something that had perplexed her.

Ria had been in the Ninefold Forest when she sent the kin-raven. The violation of Rudolfo’s borders and home were handled with discreet precision. She’d even kept it from Winters, having her dismissed from the room with the others. If it had not been for Rudolfo’s trust in her, Winters might never have learned of her sister’s visit. Something about that bothered her.

Because of the message. Come home to me and joy. If she felt so, why not ask herself?

She felt the slightest breeze and started. The hand fell over her mouth quickly before she could cry out, and a calm voice whispered at her ear. “Be still, little sister.”

Winters struggled against the hand, then stopped.

“Much better,” Ria said, lifting her hand.

Winters waited, surprised at how unafraid she suddenly felt. She simply breathed, in and out.

“I wanted to see you before I left,” the woman said. Winters lay still, unable to find words. I must say something.

Winteria the Elder continued. “You would not recognize the Marshlands. Towns and schools are being built-each with its own Council of Twelve. Children are being taught the oldest ways and taking the mark. Settlers are moving into the river valleys around Windwir, and shrines are being built in the villages that were already there.”

She thought of the Tam children and their scars and imagined the same upon the mud-and-ash-rubbed skin of her people. Finally, she found her words. “You savage my people with heresy.”

“I restore our people to their prideful place as servants of the most high. And I meant it, Little Winteria: Come home to me and share this joy. Home is for the taking, and the advent of the Crimson Empress is at hand.”

Winters wanted to rage. She wanted to scream at this woman, lash out at her with fists and feet, but once more calm asserted itself in her and she poured herself into each breath she drew in, each she pushed out.

Winters said nothing.

After a minute, she felt the breeze again and saw the window open. Ria’s voice drifted across the room to her. “I’ve brought you a present. It’s beneath your pillow. Perhaps it will change your mind.”

Winters resisted the urge to reach beneath her pillow. Instead, she waited a full three minutes. Then, she crawled from the bed and closed the window, locking it. After, she lit her lamp and carried it to the table beside the bed. Reaching out a tentative hand, she lifted her pillow.

A small book lay beneath it, bound in leather. The cover bore no title, but it did look old. She put her pillow down and took up the volume.

Opening the book, she saw the title and remembered it instantly from the audience earlier. The Gospel of Ahm Y’Zir, Last Son of the Wizard King Xhum Y’Zir.

She read the first paragraph. The print was too consistent for a scribe and the pages too small for a printing press. Still, it was a familiar style to her, though the age of the paper made it seem highly unlikely.

This gospel, she strongly suspected, had been scripted by a mechoservitor.

Intrigued, she went back to the place her thumb marked and continued reading. Hours later, when she finished it just as her lamp guttered, Winters understood why her people had been so easily swayed. There was a beauty and a power to the story, made even more compelling by the miracles clearly predicted that she herself had borne witness to.

This gospel, she realized, was carefully crafted. A snare carefully set for her people. She had talked with Rudolfo enough to know about House Li Tam’s involvement in this, the secret network Vlad’s father had put into place, operated by his grandson.

Not just my people. The realization struck her hard, though she wasn’t sure why she hadn’t realized this all along. This snare caught them all. It took down the Androfrancines. It shattered the trust between the nations of the Named Lands. It created a strong, unbeatable army on the flanks of the New World and set Rudolfo and his family apart.

The age of the Crimson Empress was indeed at hand, and it was not a gospel that required faith. It was a message of something dark and terrible coming regardless of whether or not she believed it.

Tomorrow, she would take this book to Rudolfo. He would understand the rune marks of House Y’Zir, she suspected. And he would want to know what was coming. He would want to do what he could to prepare for it.

When Winters did finally slip into light slumber, she found her dreams were full of Neb, though he would not look at her or acknowledge her when she called out to him.

“He is in grave danger,” she thought she heard a voice whisper into her dream.

Alone in the Churning Wastes, her white-haired boy fled just ahead of those ravening kin-wolves that hunted him.

Powerless to help, Winters watched.

Petronus

Petronus paced his study and tried to shake the sense that something terrible was coming on the wind. Each time he looked out the window at the spires and towers of the Great Library and the massive city that spread out from there, he saw brief flashes of a plain littered with skeletons and felt the bite of blisters in his hands. He heard the distant sound of pickaxes and shovels working frozen ground and vaguely remembered a boy beside him, one with hair shocked white at the desolation he’d witnessed. But what desolation? Where?