Chapter 26 – Festival

Chapter 26 – Festival

 

They wandered the City of Flowers hand in hand.

The roads of Elysium curved gently through the valley like ribbons of white stone, every path framed by bloom after bloom until the whole city felt as though it had been coaxed out of a dream. Boulevards lined with flowering cherry trees stretched before them in soft clouds of pink, petals drifting lazily through the spring air and catching in Seris’s golden hair. They passed beneath archways drowned in cascading wisteria, long lavender blossoms swaying overhead like perfumed curtains, the air beneath them rich and honey-sweet.

Flowers were everywhere.

They spilled from window boxes and climbed over trellises. They crowned statues, wrapped around lamp posts, and overflowed from painted ceramic pots set before every shop and home. Even the stone railings of the bridges crossing the narrow canals had been dressed in garlands of white and pale gold.

It wasn’t so bad, Liria decided.

As long as she could ignore her own face staring down at her from every decorated arch and festival banner.

As long as she could tune out the hymns praising Lady Liria drifting from temple courtyards and public squares.

Her ears burned beneath her hood.

How had they revised the scriptures to include her name so quickly? Was there a committee for this? Had there been meetings? Did scholars and priests sit around all night arguing over which miraculous deeds sounded holiest in verse form?

Liria very firmly reminded herself, for perhaps the seventeenth time since entering the city, that she merely resembled the Goddess.

That was all.

She was being ridiculous and self-conscious.

Seris, of course, was having the time of her life.

The little Saintess had not stopped looking around since they entered the city. Her blue eyes darted from one wonder to the next so quickly that Liria half expected her neck to start hurting from the effort. Every few steps, Seris would squeeze her hand or tug at her sleeve and whisper an awestruck, “Big sister, look!”

And every time, Liria looked.

A sea of humanity surrounded them, impossibly vast and impossibly diverse. Revelers had gathered from all over the world to attend Elysium’s great spring festival. Knights in polished silver armor strode through the streets with easy confidence, sun flashing off their breastplates and pauldrons. Mages in rune-inscribed robes brushed shoulders with farmers in their holiday best. Elegant merchants from the southern coast wore layered silks in jewel tones, while travelers from the northern highlands arrived draped in thick embroidered shawls despite the warmth.

Visitors from the magitech empires wandered the avenues surrounded by floating spellcraft baubles, little spheres and crystalline lenses drifting around them in obedient orbits. Some wore enchanted monocles or thin silver-rimmed glasses whose lenses flashed softly every few moments, recording sights and sounds into memory crystals tucked neatly into their belts.

Seris slowed to stare openly at one woman whose hovering orb projected tiny shimmering images into the air behind her as she walked.

“It’s making little paintings by itself,” she whispered.

“Mm,” Liria said. “Probably a visual archive tool.”

Seris looked up at her. “Can Seris have one?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Why not?”

“Because you would record every pastry you eat and eventually run out of storage.”

Seris gasped, scandalized. “That is a terrible accusation.”

Liria gave her a flat look.

Seris’s expression shifted. “…It is also true.”

A laugh slipped past Liria before she could stop it.

At the edges of her awareness, she could feel the faint hum of layered spatial magic reverberating through the city like a distant pulse. Somewhere deep in the heart of Elysium, the teleportation relay station continued its ceaseless work, transporting visitors from every corner of Eiravel directly into the valley.

So that was why.

It made much more sense now why every account of Lord Caspian in recent days had painted the same picture: a man running himself into the ground.

Liria frowned faintly. The man should really delegate more.

Then again, from everything she had heard, he seemed exactly the type to insist on personally overseeing every possible detail until his soul escaped his body out of sheer fatigue.

Beside her, Seris had gone completely still.

A broad-shouldered man with four arms was strolling through the festival streets with his family as though there were absolutely nothing unusual about it.

Well. There was technically nothing unusual about it.

He was almost certainly using a specialized magitech support harness beneath his coat, one fitted with articulated ceramic golem-limbs mounted to the back and shoulders. The two extra arms emerging over his shoulder blades were pale, smooth, and clearly artificial, but crafted with enough detail that they moved with eerie naturalness.

In his actual left hand, he carried an enormous stuffed teddy bear. In his actual right, a bouquet of fresh flowers.

And the pair of ceramic arms on his back held two cones of ice cream safely aloft, tilted at just the right angle to prevent drips.

Liria blinked.

Huh. She could detect a faint trace of cooling enchantment from several paces away. The arms came with refrigeration. That was… unexpectedly practical.

“But Daddy!” one of his children whined, bouncing up and down in protest.

“No,” the father said firmly without breaking stride.

His wife, walking beside him with a helplessly amused expression, bit back a laugh as the two children continued their campaign.

“Please?”

“No.”

“But the ice cream is right there!”

“And it will still be right there after you finish your cockatrice skewers.”

Both children groaned as though they had been dealt an unspeakable injustice.

The moment the family passed out of earshot, Seris grabbed Liria’s sleeve and pointed with urgent intensity.

“I want that, Big Sister,” she whispered, then looked up at her with sparkling blue eyes and clasped both hands under her chin. “Can you get that for Seris? Pretty please?”

Liria stared at her. Then, against her will, her imagination supplied the image.

Tiny little Seris.

Golden curls. Blue eyes. Soft white dress. Flower crown.

And behind her, a pair of enormous sculpted golem-arms swinging menacingly from her back like some horrifyingly adorable divine war machine.

Liria shuddered.

No. Absolutely not.

“They’re not good for you, Seris,” Liria said gently, brushing a lingering honey crumb from the corner of her little sister’s mouth with her thumb. “Those arms are heavier than they look, you know.”

“But they’re so cool,” Seris protested, pouting.

“They’re clunky. They’re inelegant. And they’re a waste of your talents.”

Seris blinked.

Liria tapped the tip of her little sister’s nose with a playful pulse of telekinetic force.

“Eep!”

Seris slapped both hands over her nose and stared up at her in offended surprise.

“Big Sister!”

Then her eyes widened, and after a short, thoughtful pause, Seris lit up so suddenly and brightly that she looked like dawn breaking over the sea.

“Big Sister!” she squeaked, all thought of the hideous ceramic arms instantly forgotten as she latched onto Liria’s arm. “How did you do that? Can you teach Seris too?”

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Liria sighed inwardly in relief. Crisis averted.

“Of course, dearest.”

She reached out and gently touched Seris’s forehead.

Direct transmission really was so much easier.

Now that Seris was no longer tainted by Vhal’s corruption, the process flowed cleanly and naturally. Knowledge slid from one soul to another like a stream of light, smooth and effortless. Liria had never been particularly suited for conventional teaching.

Seris went still for a moment, eyes unfocusing slightly as she absorbed the new Skill.

Liria waited.

A second later, she felt the faintest little ticklish pressure against the tip of her nose. Liria had to physically suppress a laugh.

Would you look at this little girl.

She slapped both hands over her nose and made a show of stumbling back.

“Ah! Seris, no mercy!”

Seris narrowed her eyes immediately.

“Don’t do that, Big Sis,” she pouted. “I know it didn’t work. You’re making fun of me.”

Liria failed to look repentant.

“Only a little.”

“Hmph.”

“But you did very well for your first try.”

She crouched slightly and drew Seris into a warm side hug. The child accepted it while continuing to face away with all the dignity of a deeply wronged princess.

“You just need practice,” Liria murmured, smoothing a hand over her golden hair. “Once you get used to handling the Skill, you’ll be lifting heavy things in no time.”

“Still mad at you.”

“Forgive me for a strawberry crepe?”

Seris’s expression did not change.

“Make it two and it’s a deal.”

Liria stared at her.

“You’ll get fat, Seris.”

“Hmph!”

The huff was so immediate and indignant that Liria nearly laughed.