Chapter 194 – Searching

The second time Mirian went into Persama, she went alone. She ringed Mahatan with detectors. The problem became clear: while it was still clear significantly more leyline movement was passing under the city in the late cycle, the amount of energy passing through the system pushed the leylines into new configurations hourly. The lack of a stable configuration prevented energy from pooling. Leyline detectors would be insufficient for narrowing down the location of the gate. The area she’d need to search was eight times the size of the area she’d have to search in Alkazaria. Still, she considered it the better candidate because she’d actually have a full loop to search it and there was no indication Ibrahim had a presence there.

She continued to read more about Atroxicidi and the Unification War. What she found interesting as she read was that the older texts, written just after the war, seemed to have a more brutal honesty to them. They all spoke of terrible atrocities on all sides. When cities were captured, there were riots and crackdowns, assassinations and executions. Swathes of farmland were burned, and the executions were often brutal, done to make an example of captured partisans and spies. Each faction had clear motivations and objectives, such as preserving independence, conquering a rival, or securing a critical resource.

The newer history texts told nothing of the sort. The war was a clear battle between good and evil. Most texts at least acknowledged the complexity, though she found one that read more like a child’s tale. The Unifiers were heroic, struggling against waves of vicious attacks, but succeeding despite the odds. The Separatists were brutal, as savage to their enemies as they were to their own soldiers. The entire tale was told like the Unifiers had intended to unite all of Baracuel from the beginning, even though that objective had only materialized near the end of the war after the Western Alliance had solidified its bonds and the factories they’d established had started to churn out spell engines and materiel in quantities that gave them an overwhelming advantage. Even then, the war had ended in negotiation, with Alkazaria being established as a second and equal Capital because the Unifiers hadn’t been able to push out east without their logistical tail being eaten up by raids and myrvite incursions.

As Mirian sailed south, she tried to remember what she’d learned in preparatory school. It had been as much a fairy tale as what she’d just read. Of course Baracuel would be united, because they were living in that reality, and so anyone struggling against that was painted as a fool trying to resist the inexorable tide of history.

And yet, the contemporaries of the time had seen no such inevitability. Even during the negotiations, many people seemed to assume it was yet another temporary truce and the continent would be ripped apart again as soon as the armies had recovered enough to take the offense on the field again.

Her third trip ended the same as her second had: in failure to locate any sort of Elder artifact. She did learn Mahatan did not have the same underlying layer of volcanic rock, which was curious. Perhaps its Elder Gate was more like Torrviol’s.

Mirian met with Liuan again to discuss her progress. She took a specially commissioned cutter ship from Cairnmouth across the Rift Sea, meeting the other Prophet at a small town at the mouth of the Ohyo River that flowed past Arborholm into the sea.

As she scouted the town, camouflaged and high in the sky, Mirian noted that Liuan Var had brought dozens of priests with her, though most were in disguise. The Church of the Ominian didn’t seem to have very good capabilities for divining runes, so Mirian suspected Liuan didn’t know how well she could detect unprotected rune sequences at a distance. Mostly, she was on the lookout for RID agents, since the Church didn’t have curse wands. Liuan had one, but she’d had one that first meeting too. It didn’t look like an ambush.

She flew back to her ship and pretended to disembark for the first time.

They met in the village’s church.

“Prophet,” she said in greeting, beneath a great statue of the Ominian.

“Prophet,” Liuan said. Their words echoed in the cavernous building.

The church was empty except for the two of them, though Mirian knew that several guards and priests remained outside, the priests in contemplative prayer.

“Did you try the Elder Gate?” Mirian asked.

“No. I’ve been busy here.”

She doesn’t trust me enough to go to either Palendurio or Torrviol, Mirian thought. “You were right. I wish I’d focused on the Monuments sooner. As I sent to you, the Gates are what are extending the cycle. If we can find more, we might find a way to regulate the leylines that doesn’t involve inventing two impossible technologies. How goes taking control of the Akanan military?”

Liuan sneered. “It would be much easier if I was already a part of the military, or connected with the RID. Still, it should be soon. Sylvester’s little gala is a good fulcrum point.”

Mirian got the sense that she’d already known about Sylvester Aurum’s party in Vadriach before she’d mentioned it in a letter. Though maybe not; as soon as Troytin started influencing Tyrcast and Rosen early in the cycle, it might have disrupted that event. Prior to that, she may have had trouble attending it undetected. “Have you learned anything about the origin of the leyline repulsors?”

“No,” the other Prophet said simply.

“And any other mysteries?”

“I said I’d let you know if I discovered any.”

Mirian stared at the other woman. “We should address the bog lion in the room. It’s clear you don’t trust me,” she said. “I’ll admit I have trouble trusting you too. I told you what Sulvorath did to me. The possibility that another Prophet will use their position selfishly is onerous.”

Liuan Var was calm on the outside. Her hands were clasped behind her back, and her posture was regal. Yet with her detect life, she could see that the hands she had clasped behind her were fidgeting. “Do you really expect me to believe that the Ominian Themself removed Sulvorath from the loops?”

Damn, Mirian thought. That was a sticking point for her. She would not reveal the spell she’d created to remove Troytin. It was too big a risk. But as long as she kept that secret, that would keep the schism between them open. “What other explanation is there?” she asked.

“That’s the question, isn’t it?” Liuan was silent, then she said, “How much do you know about Atroxcidi?”

Does she think I used Atroxcidi to remove Troytin? Or does she think Ibrahim did? “Very little. That’s why I’m so cautious. You?”

She made a ‘hmph’ sound. “I didn’t realize he was more than a myth before this started. I discovered a reference to him concerning a stolen relic from the Church.”

“One of the relics from the vaults of the Grand Sanctum?” Mirian asked. Is she trying to track those down?

“Relics that rightly belong to the true Church of the Ominian.”

Mirian looked at her. “I’m not going to argue religious doctrine. We’re beyond that. I don’t care who the relics belong to. But they might be useful for us. For this crisis. The Prophets would have lived lives far longer than a normal person, and what they used or made may have a link to the divine.” Relicarium was the other thing she was still reluctant to mention. But if Liuan had found another relic… As far as Mirian could tell, three of the relics in the vaults were forgeries: the Mask of the Fifth Prophet, the Staff of the Third, and the Ring of the First. If any of them were half as useful as the Holy Pages, they would be worth acquiring. “The relics also might help us understand what the divine purpose of the first loops were. We know what they did, but what were they trying to prevent? Something like this?”

“If I find any, I’ll let you know. There’s a secret society I’m trying to infiltrate. Though, the ones I’ve previously joined had forgeries. Poorly done ones, too.” Liuan paused again, looking toward the statue of the Ominian behind the altar. “Do you know how long the Prophets lived?”

“No,” Mirian said. “I did some estimations on how long each one of their loops would be, based on when they made their proclamations and how big a splash they were making in the history books. Of course, the First and Second lived so long ago, one can’t even estimate. Most of them had loops that lasted several decades though. This loop seems anomalous.”

“Indeed. I’ve researched the same. I found references to the Fifth Prophet. He must have been in the loops for at least a hundred years. And I think he spent far less time in the loops than the Fourth did.”

Mirian clenched her jaw. They were nearing the two hundredth loop. It was only a fraction of the amount of time that had passed for the others. “There’s a possibility that the five Prophets were not the only ones who experienced a time loop. Are you familiar with Sun Shuen, the sky-emperor?”

Liuan furrowed her brow. “I’ve heard that name before, but not for a very long time. My father must have told me about her. One of the old Zhighuan legends, yes?”

Thoughts that had been burning deep in Mirian’s mind came tumbling out. “Yes. She was blessed with a world aura and used that to bless all of Zhighua, renewing the empire. It made me wonder. History is an imperfect record of the past. How many Prophets were there, really? Imagine a Prophet emerging in Tlaxhauco before contact was reestablished with them. How would Persaman historians have recorded them? And then, by the time the Luminate Order contacted the Tlaxhuaco, religious doctrine had been established for two thousand years. Wars had already been fought about the truth of the matter. What Luminate Pontiff could possibly incorporate a new Prophet into the canon? There’s also the Cult of Zomalator that believes in a Sixth Prophet that the Luminates and Church never recognized. And the Isheer disagree with how many Chosen there were as well. But if we ignore that, we might be ignoring critical pieces of a grand puzzle.”

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Liuan was silent at that. “It has been bothering me. Why did the dream have so many of us before the Ominian in the Mausoleum? Why did that dream only occur once? Why did one of the Prophets stand when they should have continued to pray? I kick myself for not counting precisely. Four dozen at least, but how can there have been so many?”

Mirian’s heart pounded. She’d been there, in that dream so long ago. Kneeling with the rest of us. Hooded. She saw me stand. It was real. It was real.

The other Prophet continued. “Was it all the Prophets assembled, or was it just the ones from this loop? I wonder… if Sulvorath…”

But she trailed off.

“It’s been over five thousand years since the Cataclysm. Since the God’s War,” Mirian said. “You’ve seen the wall of fire in the stars. I think the Gates of Fire were real. Enteria burned, and only the Ominian’s grace protected it from annihilation. How many are here, at the precipice of annihilation, and how many were spread across time? Five thousand years. I’ve been trying to wrap my head around that number. It’s a long time. A lot of people have lived and died. If fifty people were placed across five thousand years… and yet, there’s still so much we don’t know.”

Liuan nodded carefully. “Why does half of the great tree burn?”

“Why did the sky rain anchors?”