Unbound-Chapter Nine Hundred And Ninety Three – 993

A trio of Chanters bearing a pale banner preceded the group, entering through his white stone door before spreading outward into the laboratory proper. Felix had been expecting a mere handful, but what followed was a veritable procession of robe-clad men and women across a spectrum of Races. Goblins, Orcs, Dwarves, Humans, Gnomes, and even a few Elves were among their number—there were no restrictions to joining the Cantus Sodalus, save that they were proficient with the Chant and dedicated to their cause.

It was the latter that always gave Felix pause.

The Chanters were a mysterious organization that were, at their root, supremely benevolent. The Cantus Sodalus were a remnant of the Sorcerers of the Fallen Halls—a name that referenced the Empyrean Halls, a piece of the Lost Nymean empire. Their purpose was to protect the Grand Harmony and prepare the world for the Ruin’s advent. So far, they’d done a shit job of both.

Not entirely their fault, Felix allowed. The Hierophant had persecuted the Chanters across her empire, and he had no clue how they were treated beyond, but he doubted it was any better. They were rabble rousers at their heart, upsetting the Powers That Be was their baseline. It was why he got along with Zara and Tzfell and Laur…none of whom were in the procession below.

Mauvim and her inner circle was another story.

Speaking of…

The old woman walked in, flanked by a great many others, all of them clad in heavily inscribed robes layered over with dull steel breastplates. More than two dozen of them marched into the laboratory behind those pale banners, which Felix now noticed bore the glyph for “Book” and “Song” combined into a fluid symbol that resembled nothing so much as a series of three concentric circles.

None of the Chanters looked up at him, except for Mauvim. She stepped forward slowly but steadily, the clack of her knobbly cane resonant on the Fiendstone steps.

“C’mon up then,” Felix called down.

A few of the Sorcerers below gestured to the alchemists, and one by one the apprentices stood up and left the lab. Felix clenched his jaw. He hadn't given the Chanters the Authority to order his people around, and those apprentices were doing important work. But he let it be. This meeting wouldn't take long, either way.

“I suppose I’ll take my leave as well. Call me if you have need of me.” Aenea gave him a nod before leaving with her own people through a secondary door Felix hadn’t noticed. When it opened it revealed a short hallway marked by smooth tile and thick tapestries. Another, more elaborate door was at the other end.

“Does she have a set of quarters here?” he muttered to himself more than Karys. “That’s unfair.”

“A perk of the interim Alchemical Master.”

“Bah. Interim is right.” Aenea was doing him a favor by running the lab for him—Felix didn’t have the time or attention span necessary to do the work at the moment. After the Ruin, however, was a different matter. “I’ll get that back once this is all over.”

Karys bowed his head. “By the grace of gold, let it be soon.”

The clacking grew louder as Mauvim ascended the spiral staircase. She was spry despite her decrepit appearance, and she made the journey in less than five minutes. She wasn’t even breathing hard. Six others flanked her as she stepped onto the lower section of his Master suite, three to either side, with their hands folded neatly into their voluminous sleeves.

Mauvim squinted up at him. "You have returned.”

Felix didn't answer. She and the other Chanters squirmed beneath his gaze.

"I suppose congratulations are in order.” She coughed into a gnarled fist. “You've entered the devastated Territory against my wishes and my counsel. And yet you emerged victorious.” Mauvim nodded to herself. "That alone is a miracle beyond anything I can understand."

Felix folded his arms. The old woman's lips twisted into a grimace that stretched her ancient face.

"Ocalla Marzul. She is alive," Mauvim finally said.

"She is.”

The old woman’s mouth screwed up, as if she’d sucked on a lemon. “And she has absconded with the core of the goddess Noctis."

The Chanters with her were studiously stoic, but that particular bit of news made them all draw in a breath. She wasn’t sharing everything with her inner council.

Interesting.

"And you are to take it from her.” Felix said nothing, but Mauvim nodded to herself again. "This is good. You have proven yourself capable of the impossible. Such a thing should not be beyond you, Emperor."

"Why the change in tune, Mauvim?" Felix asked. "It can't just be that I was successful. I've been beating long odds for over a year, and that's afforded me none of your confidence. Why now?"

"You assaulted Amaranth and faced down Ocalla personally, despite my warnings. You succeeded, weaving a path of devastation, and while Ocala answered in kind as I knew she would, her tactics were beyond my understanding. To pull one of the moons from the firmament?” Mauvim leaned on her cane, the knobbly length flexing. “I knew of her strength, but to accomplish such a feat is beyond mere strength. Yet you overcame her, even so. And in the aftermath, you sailed once more into the breach against my earnest judgment…and brought Amaranth back from the brink.”

The woman unveiled her Spirit, but it wasn’t a flex. To Felix, it sounded like a wounded dove. Confused and scared even as it tried for flight again.

“You operate in a realm beyond my knowledge, Emperor Nevarre. Like Ocalla, you move in ways I cannot anticipate. I…was wrong to doubt you.”

As nice as it was to hear the apology, Felix wasn't entirely sure how to feel about it. Like Isla before her, Mauvim's eternal quest for control was persistently the most grating thing about her, but it was reliable. Now, she was just offering up her belly to him? It didn’t make sense—unless he’d really shaken her.

What had she heard, exactly?

The woman continued speaking.

“While I was wrong about your capabilities, my caution was not without merit. I have heard reports of what you saw within that broken Territory. The world itself undone.” She shuddered, and her Spirit slowly closed, veiling itself out of politeness more than duplicity—Felix could hear through her thin walls, and she knew it. “It sounds harrowing.”

“It wasn't fun, no.” Free of his anger and quite a bit of his stress, Felix no longer disagreed with Mauvim’s objection back in Gharion. He’d taken all of the Unbound into danger and it had been foolhardy to say the least. Still, they would have likely fought to come with regardless and they’d all returned stronger for the experience. “You seem very well informed about what happened in Amaranth. Which one is your spy?”

“No spies. Beefhammer has told Isla and nearly half the Imperial Palace what occurred.”

Karys sighed and Felix grinned. “Then you know about their accomplishment.”

Mauvim straightened, as did the Chanters at her side. “Yes. An Omen Path for every Unbound. Already my people have asked to catalog their strength, but they've all refused. As is their right.”

She didn’t sound particularly happy about that.

“However, I do not need measurements and system notifications to sense when someone has reached a new echelon of power. Every one of the Unbound is changed. I can hear them, like a strident chorus returning from a valiant battle. It lingers in the air in their wake, a crescendo without end. It makes me nervous.”

Felix’s grin froze. “Why?”

“Because such power has been wielded before. Time and again, mortals have reached great heights, sometimes all at once, and every time the Ruin has laid them low.” Mauvim tapped her cane three times against the tiles. “The Song of Exile.”

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“The array?” Karys asked. “You mentioned this before. You still intend to use it on the Ruin?”

“That is our aim, yes. As we’ve stated before, however, there have been setbacks. Gaps in our knowledge, our power, and Skills to affect a working made by the ancients. My people have made certain strides toward adapting its sigaldry, but the banishment cannot yet touch the Ruin. We…I have pressed the Cantus to their limits in order to understand the array’s innermost workings, but have only succeeded in driving our faces into a stone wall. Until the early hours of this morning. All at once, a new breadth to our potency arrived on gilded wings.”

Eyes narrowed, Felix watched a ripple of what could only be exultation move through the Chanters.

“Once you united the full Hierocracy beneath your banner, our Authority took a leap by association.”

“Really? How?”

“Yes. All citizens of your empire should have felt its effects, especially those that hear the refined chords of the Grand Harmony. Moreover, the Cantus Sodalus has sworn an Oath to you and by extension your empire.”

“All Oaths are dissolved. That shouldn’t matter.”

“The Oath only froze our Intent in place, it did not generate it. Our convictions to aid your efforts have not faded, your Majesty. That our Authority expanded at all should be proof enough of that.”

Felix leaned over the workbench, as if a better vantage would let him peer into their heads. “Okay, let’s say that’s true. How does that help you with the banishment array?”

“Fiddling with vast sigaldry that touches on the Realms involves more than knowing the right shapes and Intent. It requires an Authority that can reach past the Corporeal. Not many possess such power, and certainly not I. Yet when you expanded the reach of your empire, our Authority deepened. Not by a great deal, but enough that we could push the ritual just a touch further—to see just how far we have left to go. It is a vast gulf, but not an insurmountable one.” Mauvim set her shoulders, drawing herself up until she was an impressive five and a half feet of crone. “This is why I've come to you today, Felix Nevarre. It is high time that the Cantus Sodalus gives you our fullest support.”

“Like I said, I already made you swear Oaths.”

“Yes, and as you’ve pointed out, those Oaths have withered away upon Siva's death. If I wished, I could betray you with no consequence to my foundation.” Felix tensed and she lifted a hand in clear apology. “I seek a deeper connection, Emperor.”

The ancient woman dropped her cane. It clattered to the tiles, almost loud enough to drown out the heavy thump as Mauvim dropped to a single knee. The six Chanters beside her mimicked her motion only a half-heartbeat behind, yet their eyes did not meet Felix’s as hers did. “Upon this Mind, this Spirit, and this Body, I swear to put all of my support behind you, Emperor Felix Nevarre, First of His Name. I swear to follow both the letter and the spirit of your Will in order to protect this world from Ruin. If I break this faith, I shall die a thousand deaths as my power is torn free of my mortal frame, and I am cast low.”

It wasn't as all-encompassing as far as Oaths go, but even if it had, such declarations didn’t matter any longer. Without Siva to empower them, they were simply words.

So why then, did Felix feel a heat against his chest?

It coiled against him, a visible distortion that burned at him just beyond his vision. There was no pain, only phantom sensation, as if it existed somewhere that wasn’t quite real. The distortion was there, extended between his chest and Mauvim.

Adamant Discord.

Felix’s eyes flared blue and just like that, the distortion unveiled itself. He could see its convoluted length. Name it.

A Bond of Fealty.

Adamant Discord is level 149!

Just like that, more sprang into his vision, as if the naming was a summons. Adamant Discord insisted that they’d always been there, hidden outside of his awareness, disguised as normal lines of pale blue. They were nothing quite so simple. Thick and braided, they were corded with gold, crimson, and deep earthen hues. One of them extended from Karys, another poured from the side door where Aenea and her people had retreated. Others, thinned by distance, extended into Elderthrone and even farther.

Felix touched the Bond of Fealty, inspecting its heft. It was distinctly different from the Bond of Fellowship in ways he couldn’t name, but also familiar in ways he could—whereas the Bond of Fellowship was a loose allegiance, this was stronger. More purposeful. Weighty with significance.

Mauvim glowed at the other end of the Bond, her Spirit fully unveiled again and her rheumy eyes unwavering. Felix met them, undaunted. "If you do this, you will be asked to do things that you find crazy, dangerous, and unwise.”

“I am aware. The Ruin is upon us, your Majesty, and it has been made clear that only you have a back broad enough to carry all of our hopes."

What could he say to that?

“I accept your fealty.”

The Bond finalized, braided force locking into one another with a bloom of lightning. Thunder followed, a basso retort beneath a chorus of harmonies that swelled around each of their heads in a cascade of gold. Felix’s eyes burned a brilliant blue with irises of gleaming red-gold—and were answered in kind by Mauvim's own. She gasped as blue suffused her vision…before she sagged, clearly exhausted.

Smoothly, her attendants caught her by the elbows and helped her back to her feet. The woman leaned heavily on her knobbly cane, an expression of shock writ large across her face. "This power—" She lifted a hand as if she saw something there none of the rest of them could. She looked up at Felix in wonder. "What is this?"

"Payment for your faith in me." Felix could feel the Bond between them strengthen as power flowed from him to the old woman. Not a great abundance, a mere trickle compared to the ocean he held at bay. He could feel hers as well. The Bond of Fealty was a two way connection, similar to his Links. The old Chanter peered through it, seeming to catch their braided Bond with her rheumy eyes.

"It's strong…the sea of it," she said. Her hand twitched, forming a shape Felix recognized as a basic defensive ward. “Beneath it all…the vast and hungry shadow—” She jerked away with a ragged gasp.

"Don't go poking too deep," Felix warned. "I don't think you'd like what you’ll find."

"I shall refrain from doing so." She gathered herself, adjusting her robes as her Spirit calmed enough for her to veil it once more. "I thank you for accepting my fealty.”

Felix inclined his head. “Is that everything?”

"One last item. You seek out Marzul's heart, yes? I told you I knew her well a long time ago. I know her Mind, though her Spirit is clearly twisted beyond reckoning."

"And?"

"And I would give you advice. She is desperate. No matter what I've heard of her stealing the heart of a goddess, she cannot hope to ascend, not as she is.”

“What does that mean?”

“She is a Paragon, but her personal power was bound to the light. To the Pathless. When he died, it squandered much of her strength.”

Felix grimaced. “If the woman I fought was reduced in strength, then I'm glad we killed the Pathless first.”

“Indeed. She was also drawing Authority from her Subordinate Seals. With both of those sources gone, she is still a Paragon, but it is a Chimera made of paper. But one that bears the core of Noctis.”

Lies! She Was A Thief!

Quiet Beast!

Mauvim was still talking, unaware of the outburst. "—might be, but I would bet my left eye that she cannot access more than the surface of its power. While great, it is not Divinity. Given enough time, however, she may find a way to bridge the Broken Path. Already you’ve allowed her days to gain a lead on you, and even now you will take glasses before you even dispatch the least of your forces. It is untenable.”

“And so your advice is…?”

“Allow us to accompany your army south. As much as Zara has tried to teach the Chant to your people, they are woefully ill equipped to handle a mustering of the Grand Harmony—as Ocalla’s near Divinity must be. We can cut through the dross surrounding her flawed ascension, and perhaps we can provide an opening your army can take advantage of."

It wasn’t a bad argument, but Felix had long since decided to keep the Chanters at arm length, only inviting a handful to any important engagement. To have all of them in one place would be an incredible benefit, so long as he could trust them.

Karys cleared his throat, the sound like a handful of loose bolts in a tin can. “How long before you can expect a working banishment array? Do you have all the resources you need for it?”

“Days, if not weeks, as things currently stand. We do not have everything that might be useful. Full access to your resources—with supervision, of course—will help us. Most importantly, however, is our connection to the Realm itself. That will require a stronger conviction than we have thus far established, and to that end I ask that all of our Chanters swear the same fealty as I have.”

“That’s…” Felix leaned forward against the low wall, staring down at the old woman. The other Chanters still hadn’t stood up from their kneeling positions. “All of them?”

“Leaning upon your Authority is the key to our design. I am sure of it. Are you opposed?”

“I…suppose not. The fealty I can approve. As far as the rest, I’ll speak to Zara and Karys. They’ll let you know.”

Mauvim bowed again, as deeply as her bent back allowed. “As you wish.”

Felix was impressed. He hadn’t sensed even a blip of irritation for putting Mauvim’s pupil above her in the pecking order. That alone filled him with a swell of hope.

Maybe this banishment has better legs than I assumed.

Below, Mauvim took a half-step forward—as if she wished to climb up the steps to Felix, but restrained herself. "We are all of us bound together on this Path toward Ruin. Stand as our shield, Nevarre, and we will provide you with the blade to slay the heavens.”

“That is a bold claim—” he started, but the woman’s voice resounded in the laboratory.

“Then let me be ever bolder. Even if we die,” she said, and her people knelt—every single one of them in the levels down below. Mauvim’s eyes flared blue-white. “We will see that the Continent survives. Such is our service. Our choice.”

Felix lifted his hands and flared Adamant Discord as braids of Bonds appeared before him. “And all choices have consequences.”