Unknown - The Spirit Eater

Alric started to say something, then he looked away. “What do you want?”

“Oh,” Eli said, “just a tiny favor. Itsy-bitsy, won’t take but ten minutes of your time.”

“What?” Alric said, glowering.

Eli grinned from ear to ear and began to lay out his plan. By the time he was finished, Alric was ready to revisit the option of killing him.

Miranda sat on the edge of a broken building with Gin’s head in her lap. She kept her mind perfectly blank, letting her calm be an anchor for her terrified spirits. The demon had stopped screaming ten minutes ago, but it took longer than that to bring her spirits out of their panic after something like this. Deep inside, however, Miranda couldn’t help shuddering. She could still see the thing in her mind’s eye, the hideous wings reaching up to claw the sky. If that’s what it had looked like to her blind human eyes, she dreaded to think what her spirits had seen.

She had heard horrible stories of demons all her life, but not even in the most terrifying had there been anything like what she’d seen today. How could something like that even exist? Wasn’t the League supposed to keep this sort of thing from happening?

When her spirits were finally calm again, Miranda opened her eyes. The League men were moving around her, putting things back together, just as they had in Mellinor. They worked in pairs, walking down the destroyed streets putting buildings back together with a few hushed words and a wave of their hands. Slorn was still down in the crater working on Nivel’s seed with a pair of League men standing guard over him. Alric, however, was conspicuously absent. That bothered Miranda, but the League men didn’t seem worried. Maybe he was still dealing with the other demon? She bit her lip. That seemed like a lot for one man to handle. She looked north, studying the trees where the enormous creature had been scarcely an hour ago. The forest was deathly still now, but she could still see the monster’s shape above the trees, an aftervision burned into her eyes even when she closed them. Miranda sighed. She’d just have to deal with it for now. Things like this took time to fade away.

Anxious to be moving, Miranda left Gin where he was and walked over toward Slorn. The bear-headed man was handing the seed to the League men, who took it with gloved hands. One of them made one of their cuts in reality while the other put the seed in a black sack. When it was secure, they stepped through the portal, vanishing instantly. Slorn watched the space where they had been, his face distant as Miranda walked up to him.

“Did they make you give it up?” she asked.

“They would have,” Slorn answered. “But I handed the seed over of my own volition. I had learned all I could hope to learn from it.” He looked up, staring off at the snowcapped mountains. “That thing was never a part of my wife,” he said quietly. “Nivel’s soul has already been reborn. All I can do now is work to make this world a place that is worthy of her.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a sealed letter. It was quite fat, several pages, and sealed with a large smear of wax. Slorn hefted it in his hand, and then tossed it high into the air. It spun a few times, and then took off like a bird, soaring through the air south and a little east.

Miranda whistled, impressed. “What was that?”

“A letter for my daughter,” Slorn said. “Explaining where I went and why I’m not coming home. I’m not sure where she is, but the letter will find her sooner or later. Preferably later. I don’t want her trying to follow me.”

Miranda frowned. “You’re not going home?”

“No,” Slorn said, walking past her toward his wagon. “I stayed in isolation for Nivel. Now that she’s gone, there is much for me to do. The world is changing, Spiritualist, and not for the better. A great demon eats an entire forest and the Shepherdess doesn’t even send the Lord of Storms to deal with it.” Slorn snorted as he pushed his spent cannon under the now dry and empty barrels. “I’ve dedicated ten years of my life to studying demonseeds, and yet the League has never asked for my findings, nor welcomed them when I forced the subject. Their Shepherdess has no interest in how to make things better. She only cares to keep things as they are, even as her world crumbles around her. So I’m taking my work to someone who will care.”

“Who?” Miranda said.

“The Shaper Mountain,” Slorn said, climbing into the wagon seat.

Miranda’s eyes widened. She’d heard stories about the awakened mountain, but she’d never been there. No one had, except Shaper wizards. It was rumored they knew more about spirits than anyone, and if Slorn was an example, she believed it.

“Take me with you,” she said.

He looked down at her, confused. “Why do you want to go?”

“Because I hate working for the Council with jerks like Sparrow,” she said. “Because I’m sick of going back to Zarin empty-handed, and because I’m sworn to protect the Spirit World.” She looked north again, tracing the outline of the demon that was still burned into her eyes. “After this afternoon, catching Eli Monpress to save the Spirit Court’s pride feels almost petty.” She turned back to Slorn. “Let’s just say my priorities have taken a pretty significant shift in the right direction. If you’re taking your knowledge of demonseeds to the Shapers to make sure things like that don’t happen again, then I’m going with you.”

Slorn leaned back. “And what of your orders? What about Sara and the Council?”

Miranda rolled her eyes. “The Council can choke on its paperwork for all I care, and Sara can go back to her menagerie. The only command I follow is Master Banage’s, and he would tell me to go.”

Slorn smiled, showing his sharp, yellow teeth. “Yes, I believe he would. Very well, you can come if you like. I warn you, we’ll be moving quickly over hard terrain. I hope you’re ready.”

“Travel we can do,” Miranda said. “Just say the word.”

Slorn’s spider-legged wagon stood up with a creak, and he turned it back toward the cliff where his other wagon waited. Gin was already up by the time Miranda reached him, his long body pulled in a great bowing stretch.

“So we’re tossing our lot in with the bear,” he said. “Good. I like him much better than the idiot bird.”

“Glad you feel that way,” Miranda said, jumping onto his back. “Because we’re in deep now.”

“Like we ever do anything halfway.” Gin snorted.

Miranda gave him a friendly kick, and he bounded forward, hopping over the destroyed city after Slorn.

“There they go,” Tesset said, watching the ghosthound through a hole in the wreckage.

“You see?” Sparrow said. “I told you she would turn traitor.”

Tesset looked over his shoulder, but Sparrow wasn’t talking to him. He was talking to the ball of blue glowing glass in his palm.

“She is Banage’s little pet.” Sara’s voice pulsed through the orb. “I’d hardly expect her to do otherwise.”

“Well, what do you want us to do about it?” Sparrow said. “Eli’s gone, the Heart is gone, and now Slorn’s off to who knows where. Even if the Spiritualist hadn’t run off, this whole bloody mission would still be a disaster. I say we cut our losses and head back to Zarin before Izo finds us and sends our skins to Whitefall’s office as a warning.”

There was a huff over the orb that Tesset recognized as Sara blowing a stream of smoke into the air. “There’s no call for such drama,” she said. “And there’s no call for scrapping the mission. Honestly, you just got up there. Coming back now would be a waste. I want to know what Slorn is up to and what kind of mission he found to inspire Banage’s girl wonder. Follow them.”