Chapter 53: Hand in Hand

Assets in the Strait have observed large Mendiko convoys traveling by both air and sea to the port of Estu. At a minimum, the observed quantities of aircraft exceed our estimates for Mendiko strength by thirty percent, and estimated troop totals are at least ten-thousand.

Initiative Parasol teams shall convene in emergency sessions to discuss the strategic implications of this shift. At minimum, this allocation of forces represents an unprecedented commitment for a punitive expedition. In the worst case, Mendian has mustered a sufficient force to escalate its reasonably-achievable objectives to the seizure and retention of land.

Evacuations from the continent will be halted while this new development is analyzed; at minimum, forces on the continent may be needed to execute a holding action to allow the most-valuable assets still present to withdraw in order.

As with all Parasol briefings, these emergency sessions are mandatory. Personnel not making use of the campus dormitories are advised to do so for the duration of these sessions, as the districts between the campus and the Assembly compound have been placed under military control; regular transit north of Versbacherstrasse is not feasible at this time.

- Institute Circular #3516, 16 Gleaning 693.

The sun’s trailing edge slid behind the top of the airship’s shell, leaving Michael standing in a cool, shadowed blot on the airfield. It still glinted warmly from the silvered exterior of the Mendiko airplanes, spilling out of the base’s hangars while they waited for the artifex corps to finish their construction of temporary shelters.

Michael was continually amazed by the speed at which men and materiel poured into Estu. It had been a scant week since Leire’s airship arrived at the forward base; in that time Antolin had coordinated a massive influx from north of the strait. The aircraft had come first, filling the sky with the buzz of their engines as they swarmed inland. It would be a few days yet before Mendiko ground troops arrived from the port - Antolin had made an offhand comment about their armor being difficult to transport, though Michael had seen none on the base’s soldiers thus far.

The marshal had made his headquarters on the airship, out of deference to the local commander and his desire to stay close to Leire. There were no facilities in Estu that could safely house her, and it was apparently her custom to use the airship as a mobile base of operations while traveling.

A melancholy had gripped her as they drew closer to the continent, her enthusiasm over Michael’s interrogation waning until she sat quietly, pen in hand and eyes fixed on the land below. She had dismissed him shortly afterward, and had not summoned him again until a full day after their landing.

Since then, they had met daily in the mornings. The odd mood that had gripped her before had gone, but there was a shift in Leire that Michael found hard to characterize. She was listless yet focused, her diatribes still leavened with wry humor but lacking a passion that had shone through every moment with her in Mendian.

This morning, Michael had broached the subject; he asked her if she was well. She had laughed in reply.

“I haven’t been well in years,” she said. “If ever.”

There had been no response that came to mind, so Michael had made none; Leire laughed again at his discomfited mood.

“You’re worse than Antolin,” she chuckled. “I’m not dead yet. Think on it: when are we ever truly well? When I was young and healthy? My mind was under-ripe, scrabbling to gain purchase while I tried to find myself in a changing world. By the time I found my peace, my body had begun its slow decline. There is never one perfect moment when you are at your best - nor should I want one, for life afterward would be a dreary thing. Without improvement in some measure, you’re dead long before you stop moving.”

Michael flexed his hands slowly, walking down the grass at the edge of the airstrip. Leire’s parting words had bothered him all day, working round in his mind in restless circles until they had driven him out of their barracks to wander aimlessly in the evening sun.

He had changed in the past several months, doubtlessly. Michael could not deny that he had far exceeded the terrified young man who had fled Calmharbor with Vincent. Whether the change constituted an improvement, however - that was another matter entirely.

The strength he had gained in his soul was at once a boon and burden, closing away as many options as it presented. The sun would rise shortly enough upon the day where he set out with Mendiko troops for war, standing alongside Leire as she rained down a twin spectacle to the disaster he had witnessed at Leik.

Michael looked up at the airship again, letting out a slow breath. A flash of light caught his eye from the side, and he turned to see one of the artifex crews standing alongside a hangar; Charles was there, moving his arms in wide circles while streamers of metal flashed sunbeams across the tarmac.

Curious, he walked over, shaking off the gloomy reverie that had seized him in the airship’s shadow. Charles saw him several paces distant and flashed a toothy smile in his direction.

“Lordling!” he called. “Good to see you out among the common folk.”

Michael lifted an eyebrow. “You seem to be having fun.”

Charles laughed, then clapped one of the Mendiko artifices on the shoulder. “These fellows were just showing me how they work Mendiko metal. Look at this!” He flashed a ribbon of thin, silvery metal in front of Michael’s face, twisting it into an elaborate spiral. “Some alloy they made for their airplanes, titaniozko - something, I can’t remember. Light and strong, it moves as fast as I can will it.”

He guided the ribbon through a looping arc before it settled back on his arm, forming his familiar bracers. They clinked with a high, clear tone as Charles waved to the artifex crew, who shouted something back in Mendiko and retreated laughing back into the hangar.

“Nice, these Mendiko,” Charles said happily, spinning one of the bracers on his forearm. “You couldn’t buy this for a horse in Daressa, and they just let me have it.”

“Might be something to do with your connections,” Michael said. “Look at you, leaning on your position for personal gain - we’ll make a proper aristocrat out of you yet.”

Charles snorted, though he couldn’t hide a quick flutter of alarmed guilt; Michael suppressed a smile.

“How did you spend your day, milord?” Charles asked. “Reviewing the troops? Grand strategy sessions? Sleeping?” He raised an eyebrow. “Not sleeping?”

“Meeting with Leire,” Michael sighed. “Then with Antolin. Same as yesterday, and the day before that.”

The artifex nodded. “Makes sense,” he said. “They’re looking to put you in charge eventually, so they’ve got to patch over all of those holes in your education.”

“Perhaps,” Michael said. He frowned. “But I get the distinct impression that they mean to use the coming battles as both test and lesson. They speak casually of thousands of Safid dead, in their plans - and then alter the manner of those deaths so that I might observe and learn.” He failed to suppress a shudder, his jaw clenching.

Charles drew a thin trace of metal from his new bracers, twisting it around his fingers in an elaborate pattern. “Those men were dead long before anyone here decided it,” he said. “The Safid put them in Daressa, to hold her people captive. If it wasn’t the Mendiko, it would be Daressans who snuffed them out. This is only quicker.”

“Killing soldiers counts for nothing, then?” Michael asked. “They’re still men.”

“There are no men while the War continues. They’re just waiting for their time to die.” Charles shook his head. “I like that you try,” he said. “Truly. You remind me of Gerard, years ago. He would sulk at night, agonize over some young soldier who cried out for his mother as he lay dying.”

Charles scuffed his boot on the ground. “And then the Swordsmen burned his hometown. Retaliation for some raid, they never bothered to explain themselves. We had seen them work before; we knew that they didn’t kill clean. He knew. And - he lost something, something you haven’t lost yet.”

There was a pause. The sun yielded further still, slipping off their skin. Cool evening air danced fitfully above the warm glow of the tarmac beneath. Finally, Charles reached out to clap Michael on the shoulder, looking into his eyes with an unusual intensity.

“He would tell you to hide that piece of you, if he were here. Put it away for a happier time. Don’t waste your pity on men who have forgotten what it means.” Charles held his gaze for a moment, then straightened up; a mild embarrassment buzzed from him as he averted his eyes.

“I’m going to wash up before supper,” Charles said. He turned and walked away without further comment, leaving Michael standing alone at the edge of the airfield.

After a few moments more, Michael resumed his walk. He thought of Gerard. The man had talked to him calmly about his hopes for after the war, laughed with him, sat late around the fire as they traveled - but all Michael could remember of his face was the uncomprehending stare as he watched his arm drop to the ground, his life’s blood wetting the dust at his feet.

There was no soul within Michael to mark his life, high or low - only that face, etched deep by furious penstrokes of memory. Luc’s eyes widening as he felt Gerard’s cooling skin, the dim ache in Michael’s chest that had vanished as quickly as it came. A quiet, pointless death.

Had Friedrich been right? He had taunted Gerard, calling him a corpse with the dream of life. Michael saw the void in his mind’s eye; it sat patiently at the end of time for all men - waiting for their dream to end.

He stood alone until the air turned chill and the first stars began to glimmer overhead; the low rumble of Mendiko trucks approaching from the west broke his reverie. A long column of them approached from the strait-side port, canvas stretched over benches full of troops and equipment. Michael watched the golden headlamps of the convoy slowly file into the base, then shook his head and began to walk back towards the headquarters.

This was bigger than just him. Thousands of men would work to secure the future of millions. Many would die no matter his actions. He could not stop it, nor even change the course of this giant machine lurching to life around him. He could only try to keep pace, and safeguard what humanity he could.

Michael passed the base’s hospital as he approached the headquarters, his pace slowing as he saw Unai emerge from the door - and then Luc behind him, the younger man talking animatedly with a Mendiko soldier. The soldier was grinning from ear to ear, and extended his hand; Michael was surprised to see Luc return the smile without hesitation. His gloved hand shook the soldier’s own, and he turned to walk back to headquarters along with Unai.

“Luc!” Michael called, jogging to catch them up. He waved as the two men turned to look at him; Luc’s face still bore an infectious grin. “I take it lessons went well today?”

Unai gave a gracious nod. “The young master is quite talented,” he said. “There were a few compound fractures from a training accident today, and he set them all perfectly without assistance.”

“I had a good example to follow,” Luc said, his cheeks noticeably red even in the dim evening light. “Unai has been wonderful.”

Michael grinned and threw his arm around Luc’s shoulder. “Don’t sell yourself short,” he said. “Remember, I’ve had my lessons with Unai too, but I’m hardly at your level.”

“Given more time for instruction, I’m sure the young master will achieve competency,” Unai said, favoring Michael with a glance. “I feel confident that the young master is able to address simple abrasions by now - with adequate supervision.”

Michael coughed. “He means to say I’m still a hazard. You’re healing people, Luc, you’ve got real talent for this. I think you’re going to be able to do a lot of good in the coming days.”

Luc’s expression sobered. “I suppose it’s naïve to hope I won’t be needed,” he said. “There will be lives in the balance.” His eyes shifted away; Unai stopped walking to look at Luc.

“I am sure the young master will find himself adequate to the task, when it arrives,” he said. “I shall excuse myself from the conversation, it is time to see to Her Radiance.” He bowed his head to both of them, then turned to walk away.

Michael gestured to the valet’s retreating back. “He thinks you’ll do fine,” he said. “Unai hasn’t struck me as one for empty praise.”

“He’s only seen me here,” Luc muttered. “He didn’t see me freeze when Clair was dying. He didn’t see me hesitate and watch as Gerard bled.”

The mention of Gerard’s name roiled Michael’s thoughts once more; he forced a smile onto his face. “None of us blame you for that,” he said.

Luc gave him a skeptical look. “You think not? Sobriquet blames me for Clair, and Charles for Gerard.”

“Charles is angry at everyone,” Michael sighed. “And Sera - she knows it wasn’t your fault. I’ll remind you that I did worse than nothing when Clair was hurt. I-” He held up his hands. “I probably hastened her death, when I attempted to heal her. If there’s any fault to be found, it’s in us for not developing our gifts more, before there was a need.”

“So you agree after all,” Luc said, his face twisting.

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“We both shied away from the potential of our soul,” Michael said. “We both made decisions to keep it hidden away because we feared what it could do. But I’ve come to realize that hiding it isn’t enough, because there will be times when you could have acted - times when you were the only one who could act, to stop some evil out in the world. I don’t think we were wrong to fear we might do more harm than good.”

Luc held up his hands, examining the gloved palms before turning them over to reveal the stylized tree embroidered on their backs. “I know this soul is capable of great harm,” he said quietly. “I feel it, a hair’s breadth away. Whenever I touch someone I walk a knife’s edge. It frightens me, all the time. I’m not the sort of man who should have this power.”

Michael laughed, squeezing Luc’s shoulder. “I say the same thing - but the more I meet people with powerful souls, the more I realize that none of us are meant for it. Every one of the Eight has failed in some way - some minor, others catastrophic. I think we’ve always failed. I can tell when she speaks of her soul that Leire has killed people by mistake. Jeorg created Spark and the Institute. I admired Jeorg more than anyone I’ve ever met, but I have to admit that his failures were equally great.”

He sighed and shook his head. “Nobody lives perfectly. We’re about to go to war with Saf, and Antolin wants me with him. I’m-” Michael’s voice caught, and he frowned. There was an odd tightness in his throat.

“I’m terrified,” he admitted, his voice a quiet rasp. “I don’t want to fight Saf. I don’t want to be a part of so many men killing and dying - but if we don’t, if we stand by and do nothing, then that doesn’t stop the killing. It just changes who dies, and how. Daressans rather than Safid, common people rather than soldiers.”

His jaw tightened, and he worked it slowly until he felt able to speak. “But that’s not why I’m going to fight. I knew what the occupation was doing to Daressa within a week of arriving. I had most of the power I do now. I could have stood with Sera then, if I wanted.”

Luc forced a smile. “Good thing for me you didn’t, yes? I’d still be in that work camp, or buried under it.” The expression faded, though, and he licked his lips nervously. “Why, then? How do you master that fear?”

“I can’t,” Michael said. “It’s still there, and maybe it always will be. But I fear what will happen if I do nothing far more. Letting my father do as he pleases, leaving Sera and the others to fight the world alone - delivering Leire’s soul to Saleh. I may stumble in this war, and cause suffering. But I can’t-”

He made an exasperated gesture, his words growing jumbled on his tongue. Luc said nothing, and after a moment Michael looked up.

“I can’t leave them,” he said. “There isn’t a path left where I could take Jeorg’s way out, and hide from the world until it finds me. Nor could you, I’m sorry to say - Spark saw to that.”

Luc raised his hand, splaying his fingers in their glove - then drew off the thin leather. Michael looked again upon his own fingers, feeling an odd ache in his own mismatched hand.

“I’m afraid of the day when someone dies under my hands again,” Luc said quietly. “I was afraid of my soul when Gerard died, but I thought I could help him still - just seal the bleeding away, save his life. I tried, but he was too far gone; he died moments after I touched him. I thought I had done it. I felt this - this ache from my hand, and I saw a glimpse of something vast and horrible.”

He shook his head. “But then it was gone. I thought I had killed him, killed him right in front of everyone. It didn’t matter that he was going to die anyway. And sometimes I still see flashes of that blackness, that-”

“Void,” Michael murmured. “The oblivion at the end of everything.” He met Luc’s startled eyes. “I see it too. Jeorg said he’d seen it, and I’m fairly certain Leire has as well. The endless dark and the river of souls.”

“I thought I was going mad,” Luc said.

Michael chuckled. “No worse than the rest of us,” he said. “We have souls, Luc - pieces of something vast and inhuman thrust into the core of us. Our lives are going to be a bit strange as a result.” He extended his mismatched hand to Luc. “It gets easier when we walk together.”

Luc looked at the hand for a moment, then extended his own to take it. Michael felt the callused palm of his own hand as he clasped it and shook, flashing a grin at Luc.

“Come on,” he said, pushing Luc gently towards the headquarters. “We’ll miss dinner.”

“Damn them!” Sobriquet seethed, storming from her room into the common area of the barracks they had been allocated. Vernon turned to look at her; Charles stayed very still.

“What’s wrong?” Michael asked.

Sobriquet wheeled on him, her eyes reddened and furious. “Everything’s gone to shit, that’s what,” she snapped. “We were only gone a few weeks! Now that I’m close enough to check on nearby cells, they’ve gone completely rogue.”

“Rogue?” Michael said, sitting up straight. “What have they done?”

“Everything!” she said. “The fighting in Imes has destabilized everything. They’ve used weapons caches we were stockpiling, tipped off Ardans and Safid alike to our networks-” She balled her hand into a fist, slamming it against the back of Michael’s chair. “Clair always used to deal with this shit, I have no idea where to start.”

Michael’s reply was stolen from his throat by the wave of anguish that pulsed off of Sobriquet; her eyes narrowed at the expression on his face.

“Don’t you dare,” she warned him. “That’s not what I need. I need to get this resistance in fucking hand, or we’re not going to be in any position to capitalize on the Mendiko offensive.”

Michael looked for a moment, then nodded. “Okay,” he said, rising and turning towards the door. “Follow me.”

Her eyes narrowed further. “Follow you where?”

“Headquarters,” he said, beckoning her forward. “Come on.”

Sobriquet made a discontent noise, but followed him out into the cooling night. “Were you going to share more of this plan of yours?” she asked.

“I had a talk with Luc earlier,” Michael replied.

Sobriquet blinked at the non-sequitur. “And?” she asked. “How is he going to help us organize a countrywide resistance effort against two occupying armies?”

“He’s not,” Michael answered. “But it helped me get some things straight in my head, talking to him. We’re not in this fight for our enemies, we’re in it for our allies.”

“Pithy,” she replied. “Again, a countrywide resistance effort-”

“The Mendiko are our allies,” Michael said. “They’ve been leaving the resistance to you because it’s ‘yours,’ so to speak, but that doesn’t mean they can’t help. At the very least, Antolin should have some ideas on how best to coordinate resistance efforts with our movements.”

Sobriquet’s eyes flashed. “What do you mean, ‘so to speak?’ That’s-” She paused, blinking. “That’s a very decent idea.”

“I have them occasionally,” Michael sighed. “Try to be kind to Antolin. He’s singlehandedly organizing the Mendiko buildup somehow, on top of worrying about Leire-”

“She can take care of herself,” Sobriquet snorted.

Michael shrugged. “He still worries. He loves her more than a little.”

“What, has the Grand Marshal of Mendian been going over his romantic woes with you?” she asked incredulously. “I didn’t know you two had grown that close.”

“He said they were dear friends,” Michael retorted. “And there may have been some educated guesswork on my part.”

“Something your tutors went over?” Sobriquet asked, leering.

Michael rolled his eyes, walking up the headquarters entrance; the two Mendiko MPs to either side saluted as he approached. “No,” he said. “Just that I worry about you too.”

The door swung wide; Michael walked in.

“Hey!” Sobriquet sputtered. “You-” She paused, looking up at Antolin and his command staff, currently clustered around a table strewn with charts and maps.

“Good evening,” Antolin said mildly. “May I assume you have a reason for your visit?”

Michael glanced at Sobriquet, the corners of his lips turning up as he noted the flush on her cheeks. “We were hoping to coordinate Daressan partisan movements with the Mendiko offensive,” he said. “I don’t suppose you’ve ever coordinated a resistance before?”

Antolin straightened up, smoothing his jacket, then looked back at his command staff. One of them said something quiet in Mendiko that provoked a chorus of low laughter from the group.

“I have not,” Antolin said, smiling. “But I agree with my commanders that it should prove to be a very interesting exercise indeed. What sort of information do you have on their current strength, both in men and materiel?”

Sobriquet shook herself, glaring at Michael briefly before stepping forward to address Antolin. “I can give you some notes,” she said, “but it might be simpler if I just-” She raised her hand, crooking her fingers, and a relief map of Daressa sprang up across the central table. Markings appeared on it in red, blue and green, roads spidering out to connect cities and traverse countryside.

One of Antolin’s commanders recovered from his surprise faster than the others, leaning over her impromptu projection. “How current is this?” he asked.

“Within the current week for everything east of Imes,” she replied. “A bit longer, as you go west. I can only reach a few of my contacts in Daressa from here.”

Antolin blinked. “You can observe them from here?” he repeated incredulously. “We’re nowhere close to Daressa.”

“And I am Sobriquet,” she retorted. “You of all people should know not to underestimate one of the Eight.”

Another of the commanders began to laugh, high and gleeful; Antolin silenced him with a glare - though the effect was somewhat diminished by the broad smile he wore.

“I must revise my estimate,” he said. “This will not be an interesting exercise at all. This is going to be fun.”

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