The Legend of Eli Monpress(376)

“Of course not,” Eli said. “Who do you think you’re talking to?”

“Look,” Alric said. “I don’t think—”

Eli rolled over him. “There’s also the little matter of you threatening to kill me earlier. Considering you’re not even supposed to go near me, I think you should be more open to bargaining.”

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.”