Chapter Four Hundred And Thirty Seven – 437
Zara reached out and fixed Felix's collar with her thin hands. "Remember to keep their gazes. They are used to the powerful lording over them, but all nobles are jackals. They will pounce if they sense weakness."
Felix brushed her hands away and Willed the Garment into proper shape. With a snap of rippling cloth, his formal jacket shaped up around his neck, dipping just at the front where a half-circle was cut out of it. The thing was made of a rich green fabricsilk he thoughtand embroidered up the sleeves and shoulders with elaborate vines and leaves. He'd been shown a number of formal clothing options by the mansion's servants, and Felix had just chosen a set at random, studying it a moment before copying it all with his magical clothing.
They were standing in an antechamber off of the inner sanctum of the Temple of Element Fire, surrounded by gilded finery, sculpture, and polished architecture. His honor guard surrounded him, blocking exits and windows, and beyond them were several Talons of the Fiend's Claw, all waiting on his orders. Closer to hand were his allies and friends, most of whom were pouring over a pile of dusty tomes they'd dragged with them from the library. Felix checked himself in a huge ten foot mirror again and nodded in satisfaction. "Good enough. Zara, you're describing literally everyone I've met on the Continent that had even a smidgen of power. I know how to deal with them."
"Hm," was all she said. "The Houses Voru, Wuan, Perevor, and Rellest command the greatest power in the city. They hold the reins of the Merchant's Council, setting prices for the city's goods and other such details. As such, they will be the one's to watch out for, and the ones who have the most to lose by what you plan."
"Which is mad, I don't mind saying," Isla chipped in from the side. She was wearing a diaphanous pink gown that faded into a dark purple at the flowing end of the skirt, while a set of delicate silver jewelry hung around her neck and down both of her arms and wrists. They looked more like avant garde armor than anything else, and Felix could practically feel the Mana radiating off of them. They were defensive measures, he was certain. "Your choice of Chancellor is sure to rile all of them against you. Why not choose among their number? It would lead to a smoother transition."
"Because I don't know them, and because I can't trust them," Felix said. He was tired of this conversation, one that had been repeated for the last six hours.
Isla scoffed. "And you know and trust this man? You only met him a few days ago!"
"Enough," Felix said, putting an edge to his voice and gaze. Isla opened her mouth to continue despite his glare, but she glanced at Zara and snapped it closed. "Thank you. Guys? Have you found anything yet?"
Off to the side, Pit lifted his head from a large atlas, dust clinging to the feathers around his beak. "You know I can't read, right?"
Felix rolled his eyes. "Just look at the maps and it'll update my Authority Screen. I wasn't really talking to you though, bud. Atar? Alister?"
His mage friends were also in the stack of books, piled haphazardly on what was once an altar of some sort. Alister massaged his lower back as he carefully turned another whisper-thin page. "No records of the ancient line of Yttin royalty. Yttin? Yttish?" He shrugged, clearly tired from the all-nighter Felix had kinda-sorta forced on them. "Either way, the old borders aren't drawn up anywhere."
"And there are no histories or records that reach back further than the last thousand years," Atar added.
Zara placed her hands on her hips, surveying Felix's outfit one last time before nodding. "I am not surprised. The victors often determine what is and what is not the history of a people. In this case, those words were crafted by the Humans that ruled Ahkestria after the curse was placed upon the Territory. I doubt they much cared about the Yttin's side of things. My apologies, Shaman Klzix."
"No apologies needed for the truth, Chanter Zara. Our fall was neither comfortable nor short enough for self-deception to survive in our hearts," Klzix said from within his ring of armed guards.
"Are we beginning soon? Dawn is just about upon us," Fiammetta pointed out from the side. She was dressed in a flowing robe of blue with a sash of bright yellow; colors representing Felix and her own core attunement, she'd said.
In fact, all of them were dressed up, with Zara's black chorister robes covered in a blue-green shawl, Atar and Alister's mage robes looking cleaned up and repaired. Even Beef had on a sturdy, quilted blue jacket and some flowing pants over his bovine legs. Vess too was decked out in a flowing set of robes cinched tightly over her white-enameled armor, leaving her limbs free to move. Her dark brown hair was done up in a series of thick braids, all of them drawn into a tight bun. Colored beads and ornamental clips were woven into her braids, blue and green and white and violet among them. Their vibrant color was particularly striking against her deep skin tone and dark eyes. Like everyone else, she seemed tense.
Vess peered out of the large double-doors. "The square is nearly filled with people. Did you send an invitation to everyone in the city? I see more than the nobility out there."
"I did," Felix said, shifting his shoulders a bit. The jacket was a touch tight across his chest, but the Garment quickly adjusted. "I need them all here. Everyone I can get."
"Hm," was all she said, and returned her gaze outside.
Is she mad that I missed our dinner? he wondered for the hundredth time. Maybe I can just check. Just for a second. The thought came and was snuffed out instantly; Felix still refused to use his Affinity on her. It was an invasion of her privacy...though he admitted he had no issues scanning his other friends' Spirits. He pushed that line of logic away, as well. I'll just talk to her...Later.
The only people who weren't immediately in attendance were Evie and Harn, and he knew why. "Alright. Let's begin."
The alabaster double-doors opened with a stentorian boom, and a flood of black-cloaked warriors marched outward. The crowd murmured and gasped, and Felix's Affinity caught snippets of strained vibrations as they rippled across the assembly. Row after row of the Fiend's Claw stepped out onto the raised landing before pivoting smoothly to the right and left, until they filled the double stairwells to either side. They were followed by an equally large contingent of Yttin warriors, all of them wearing chitinous armor, pale sea-green tunics, and bearing simple halberds. They stepped in concert with the Claw, taking up position right behind them, much to the crowd's surprise.
Behind them came Felix himself, flanked and trailed by his own train of friends and followers. He stepped forward, attempting to convey a sense of authority and solemnity. What he was attempting had to go off without a hitch, otherwise the whole city would turn on itself. I made the right choice, he reminded himself. The only right choice.
Felix stopped at the ornamented balustrade crafted of white stone veined with gold. The entire square outside the main structure of the Temple of Elemental Fire was composed of the same gold-veined white rock, though the veins congregated in swirling, circular patterns around the edges of the square itself. Felix could just make that out, barely, through the press of the crowd. It was easier, he found, than focusing on the many faces of anxiety, fear, and outright awe. He knew those were masks, especially on the more affluent crowd members dressed in finery and surrounded by retainers. Their weapons had been taken before being allowed to enter the temple grounds, but all of them had a way of standing that made it clear what they really were.
He flared his Affinity, sending it sprawling across the mass of people. As before, it was rippling with so many emotions that only chaotic noise was the result. Drilling down toward the nobles near the front, Felix could sense guilt and anger and more than a little envy, but it was scattered. Diffused by the sheer number of people and all of their strong emotions mingling in Felix's ears.
C'mon. Which one of you. He kept scanning, even as Zara stepped up and began talking. I know you're here.
"We are gathered today to witness history being made once again in Ahkestria," Zara said. Her voice was light and kind sounding, yet its impact reached every corner of the square and likely beyond. "Twice now the Autarch Nevarre has saved your people. Once when he defied the Master's Council and the Matrons of this Temple, all of whom had planned to sacrifice their own citizens to the Highest Flame. In his name, we defeated them, smote the Urge that sought your demise, and drove the Paladins of the Pathless that dared darken your skies. The second was when the Autarch personally battled and defeated the Grandmaster Kel'lyv, earning him the Authority to claim this Territory. Both of those events will be remembered in your annals for Ages to come, but today marks a moment of renewal and rejoicing. When the ancient meets modern, and tradition is upheld to bring forth a new destiny."
Zara turned to Felix and bowed at her waist, a motion repeated by his friends, while every single one of his warriors saluted, fist to heart. Felix stepped forward, and a raucous cheer took up from the back, where the common folk were located. He grinned, and at his side, Pit trilled in interest. He was tall enough to see over the railing, which meant his dark, armored form was easily visible to everyone else as well. A number of the retainers frowned, while still more among the commoners cheered.
Felix raised a hand, asking for silence, and it fell in stuttering stages. Then he raised his other hand, and in it he held the Crown of Ahkestria. This time, the strangled gasp came from the nobility.
"I see some of you recognize this. The Crown of Ahkestria, ancient artifact of the original, true rulers of this Territory. The Yttin." He grinned as more gasps and hissing whispers let loose among the audience. Chew on that, nobles. "With it, I choose Shaman Klzix as my Chancellor, to act in my stead and to be my right hands within this Territory.
Shaman," he said, gesturing him closer. Klzix took two steps forward, his face calm but his Spirit bubbling with unease as the barrier of Yttin warriors parted around him. Felix had practiced this next part, getting most of the words from Karys' somewhat rickety recollections. "Do you make this choice willingly? To take up Authority and responsibility for those under your care?"
"I do," Klzix said. The unease turned to a shaky euphoria as his eyes flicked outward to the crowd and back to Felix. "I have chosen to take up this burden willingly and without coercion."
Felix smiled, and he lifted the intertwined circlet of coral and crystal in his hands. "Then kneel, Klzix, Shaman of the Beastsworn Tribe. Kneel and"
"The light denies you! HUAAH!"
A flash of sizzling light blasted toward them both, but Felix threw up his arm, absorbing the hit and turning his sleeve to ash. A deafening shout ripped through the square, propelled from lungs so mighty that a few of the nobility were bowled aside. From that gap, dozens of figures poured through, all of them casting aside shimmering, enchanted cloaks to reveal thick, crimson platemail.
"Kill the monster!" their leader cried. "Kill them all!"
Blades of fire erupted just as panicked screams seized the crowd, yet before they could advanced much further they were met by Blade and Fist and Bone.
Chaos erupted.
The Claw clashed with the blazing swords of light while Felix's Shadows shielded the landing from a barrage of golden Mana bolts. "Enough! Go! Take down the Paladins!" Felix ordered. Lieutenant Errol nodded, but only half of his guard joined Vess and Beef as they leaped into the fray.
"My Lord! Take cover!" Errol threw himself forward as a flash of darkness descended from on high.
Time slowed to Felix's Perception as his hefty Intelligence and Mind kicked into high gear. He saw the darkness, identified them as thick arrows the size of spears, all roiling with a corrosive Mana that was a mixture of shadow and poison types. There were twenty of them, all fired from the rooftops around the square where he'd stationed a number of guards. Felix's senses spread, streaking across tiles and spires and parapets, feeling the dead...and the dire enemy that performed the deed.
Chthonic Tribute!
Felix flung out his hands and his Will at the same time, catching two of the massive black spears in his hands while the rest...the rest dissolved into harmless vapor and were devoured.
Lieutenant Errol blinked up at him owlishly from the ground, his arms still raised defensively. "Sir? Areare you alright?"
"I'm fine," Felix said, before growling and snapping the conjured spears in half. They crumbled to nothing. "But they won't be."
He focused on the Sworn, threading his awareness outward even as they readied for another volley. He could feel them, hear them through his Affinity, though every one sounded the same. That was the thread, the through-line between their false Bodies. A repeated refrain that connected them all to one another, and led all the way back to a belltower...behind and above Felix.
"Got you," he hissed, and he accessed his Authority.
Greetings Autarch!
What Song Do You Wish To Sing?
Sing the Song of Fallen Skies, he commanded the System.
He hadn't spent his entire time in the library the night prior after all. A good portion of his time had been finding and claiming the Seat and Seal of the Leviathan Depths. Felix raised his hand, and a complicated swirling pattern of light formed in his outstretched grasp. It was echoed above, in the churning supercell looming over the Territory, multiplied a hundredfold, layers upon layers of complicated sigaldry shifting and aligning all in an instant.
KRAKOOOM!
A blast of incandescent lightning hurtled from the sky, shattering the belltower with a single blow. Masonry and the copper dome of it detonated in all directions, but Felix tracked a form through the blinding haze. A figure on fire yet wreathed in darkness, jerked its arms.
Before Felix could react, a wall of aquamarine Mana flowed over the shaman and Zara, who had stepped forward. An arrow twice the size of the others had plunged into her shield, punching half its length through it before stopping. Felix met Zara's shocked eyes. "Behind you!" she shouted, just as a second arrow clipped him in the side.
"ARGH, fuck!" he gasped. "Sovereign of Flesh!"
Scales sprang up from his skin, shredding what remained of his fine cloth as it appeared. Felix grabbed at his side but the wound had already healed, and he deflected another massive arrow from the pain-in-the-ass Sworn. It clanged from his fists, unable to penetrate that, at least, even if he couldn't see them move. "Damn things are moving too fast. Evie!" he shouted, and let his Adept lungs loose. The air rippled from the force of it. "There!"
Cardinal Flame!
A pillar of red-gold flame appeared above the Sworn's dark shape, even when it dodged backward in an attempt to hide. Felix grinned as a single spike of ice shot up into the air in acknowledgement and turned back to his guard. "Get the Chancellor out of the line of fire. I'll shield you all. Go!"
"Yes, sir!"
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