Chapter 13: Chapter 12

Taaffeite sat in her office, her desk still laying in two pieces though she did have her husband move the obsidian slab that used to occupy the space. Hecatolite had apologized profusely when she learned that the world screens did not in fact float when they were removed from the world system, becoming very unruly large obsidian slabs that radiated mana. Babylon had stated one could in fact incorporate them into the skill if they were able to unravel the enchantment rings in them; however, this endeavor would take even a seasoned enchanter weeks to properly map the intricate web of enchantments on the terminal. She had considered asking her daughters to look at the two screens that were now sitting in a storage room of the house, however with Hecatolite busy attempting to find a way to suppress her… aether, to wake her sister, and Alexa had been on edge since Hecatolite had arrived. She figured it best to wait, she could look into it herself but given the amount of work in running the territory, not to mention drafting new laws to ban the Valor church inside of their borders, she simply could not find the time to tinker with the project herself. Though the Babylon skill has proven to be immensely useful, being able to take notes with a simple thought and set up timetables with no more than a glance, she had even been able to convert most all her documents with a glance. All it took was one look and someone could save whatever document they were looking at.

“This is truly a terrifying skill.” She sighed as a screen appeared before her flashing a light burgundy indicating she had a message. “With just this one could become a very frightening information broker for any kingdom.” She mused motioning for the skill to open the message.

“Mother, I have spoken with my captain about your proposal to remove the Valor religion from your territory, and they will bring your proposal before the Queen's advisors in their next meeting. They seem suspicious of the Babylon skill, and I have been barred from summoning my terminal while within eyesight of the royal castle, and banned from entering the royal archives, however the queen and the royal princess have taken great interest in it much to the displeasure of my commanding officers I feel as if I may find myself between my duties to the royal family and my commanding officers soon if this persist. On one side the princess all but demands I allow her to see Babylon whenever I am on duty, on the other my commander seems to want to burn me at the stake every time he sees it. The Queen herself sends her regards and wants to extend an invitation to our family to come to the capital for “tea”, despite her advisors telling her to send a proper invitation befitting a queen she simply scoffed and replied, “more proper than the voice of the world” and asked in jest if they have any cherubs free to deliver the message. I wish you all the best and hope to hear from you soon, sincerely Jasper Lapidary.”

Taaffeite couldn’t help but laugh at the long message, Jasper has yet to get used to the instantaneous messaging of the Babylon skill and always replies as if he were writing a formal letter. And it did seem he was having his own issues with the introduction of the skill, of course the soldiers would not like such a powerful skill near sensitive documents or the secret archives of the nation, however knowing Queen Irithyl would care little for such concerns, Taaffeite was hardly concerned for her son. She had met the queen years prior after they fell the dragon, and her and Taaffeite became rather close over the years, even going as far as asking Taaffeite to become a royal advisor which she refused much to the amazement and disgust of the other nobility. But Taaffeite had no interest in royal court or being pulled into the internal politics of ruling the Empire, she was already much closer than she was comfortable with being a Marchioness and preferred to keep to herself when matters of the empire as a whole were involved.

All of that aside it had been nearly 8 years since she had seen her old friend, maybe after this all settled, she could take some time and go visit, she was sure the queen wished to speak to her about a particular matter involving Jasper himself. She knew the queen would not try to strong arm her son into something he did not agree with, however she also could not overlook the new bloodline skill that much Taaffeite was sure of. Queen Irithyl was an intelligent woman and even if she did not trouble herself with her soldiers normally, she would certainly see the usefulness of the skill. And even Taaffeite could see the simplest solution to the unrest about the skill though it would be a few years yet until it became an option best to start discussions early.

“It would be a lot easier if I could just talk to the queen directly like I can with Jasper. He’s a good boy but he’s a soldier through and through now, I thought I raised him to be more flexible but now it's always by the book with that one.” She sighed letting the screen drift in orbit around her. “He should have just brought the proposal to the royal princess himself, or even the queen. Clearly she’s in contact with him.”

“Solution found, use the unused terminals as a guest terminal to Babylon.” The screen flashed.

“Is that possible? But wouldn’t that give the access to the entire skill?” Taaffeite had grown very used to the terminal, it had personality and would often answer what most people felt to be passing thoughts. Despite what Hecatolite claimed, Taaffeite could feel clear intelligence from the terminals, it was not a soulless skill like Hecatolite seemed to claim but a budding consciousness that is quickly growing along with its use. Taaffeite could already see it too, the terminal had already begun learning and adapting to every family member now taking notes for Taaffeite before she even thought to invoke the skill or setting reminders for meetings the moment the meeting is created, or something as simple as watching it dim itself as Alexa fell asleep reading it. Or even the fact the terminal seemed to only come into existence arm’s length from Hecatolite. It was quite comical really, even if someone else summoned the terminal it seemed to instinctively know to appear either out of reach of the young woman or with some form of obstacle between them, not that it seemed to help.

“It is possible, and no. if one were to change enchantment rings in the terminals they could then be set in a location and used as a remote access point allowing a non-skill holder to contact one of the members of the Lapidary family from it. If one were to do this and send said terminal to the capital, it would be possible for anyone with access to the terminal to send a message but with the terminal set in such a manner it is recommended that you remove the enchantments that would allow access to the Babylon system as a whole.”

Taaffeite pondered this for a moment then asked, “would it be possible to encode it so only a certain person could use the screen?”

“A specialized enchantment is possible, searching for possible enchantments.” The screen flashed as text scrolled by at a nauseating pace. “Hecatolite has already created an enchantment that could be used in such a manner. It called it “soul binding.” It is an enchantment from the Soul magic school used to recognize a specific mana signature to activate the enchantments.”

“She has? When?” Taaffeite inquired standing from her seat and looking out her window, she could see Alexa and Hecatolite sitting in the back of the house deep in their vocal lessons. “Why would she need an enchantment like that?”

“Hecatolite created the enchantment the day before last, during a break from its attempt to make an aether storage ring. It has taken to adding enchantments to the long sword it acquired from the deceased guard Dora, however this action seems to bother Hecatolite as it states repeatedly that it dislikes making weapons, and they are a waste of resources. However, it has also stated a desire to give the sword to Amethyst upon her awakening in hopes that she will be able to defend herself should the need arise.”

“So, she is making amethyst a sword.” Taaffeite smiled as she watched Hecatolite throwing a Babylon terminal into the trees making rude gestures as she stomped her feet. “And she does not like making weapons, which is interesting. I wonder why? Do not answer that Index, please note the enchantment, and add it to the list of things to do with the extra terminals we have. It would be useful to have a direct line to the queen. Please send a message to Jasper, “dear son, you don’t have to send the whole message at once as if it were a letter. We can simply talk to one another. However, thank you for the update and I hope my proposal does not get tied into too much political “rigmarole” as the queen would call it. Also please inform the queen that I would be delighted to join her for tea however given the current state of our territory I fear it might be a few months yet before I have time. I will send word once I can.”

She did not bother with the formal ending her son did, instead sending the message as she looked over the remnants of her desk, she had put off removing it but it is now becoming inconvenient stepping over it every day. She sighed as she stored the two large parts in her storage ring and simply called a maid to clean the rest of the mess leaving the office for the day. “Maybe I’ll go train with Alastair for a bit.” She stated as she left, the memory of her fight with the bishop fresh in her mind.

---

“Careful… souls… scarry.” Hecatolite said calmly as Alexa stood, eyes fixed on the new skill she acquired. 

“Just… just like that? You can just give skills away,” her voice shaky as she called her own soul page up. 

Name: Alexandrite Lapidary

Age: 20

Race: Human

Titles: Archmage, Scholar, Ice mage, Medic.

Traits: Ice affinity, healing affinity, Dual affinity, inquisitive, strong will, Bilingual, ancient knowledge, short tempered, Mana bathed, well educated, Baptized in the name of Siofra.

Skills; Frost magic, Healing magic, spell circle creation greater, inspection, spell chant negation, mana mastery, first aid, etiquette, housework lesser, Alchemy, enchanting greater, teaching, Soul sight

Lapidary Bloodline skill personal: Babylon “Bable”

Hidden traits: Blessed by X47, Aether touched, seedling.

She was at a loss for words, with one-word Hecatolite had just given her 3 traits and a skill as if it was nothing. Something that would take months of training at least, or hours of praying at a temple or church and here this insane little girl did it between bites of a sandwich. With one word a spell circle encased Alexa and flooded her with a raw power that she never knew possible and ingrained a trait into her very soul, what neither woman knew at the time is that the Elven goddess of knowledge and nature Siofra was currently sitting in her own realm wondering why someone would grant a blessing to a different gods follower, She couldn’t tell who had done it but she was sure it had to do with the uppity human god Valor given it was one of her increasingly rare human followers. 

“You… well?” Hecatolite asked, “lot of aether, fix size difference maybe.” She poked Alexa in the side causing the older woman to jump.

“don’t just poke…” Alexa started looking down at her only to bite her own tongue. What looked back at her was not the face of her younger sister but a small dark creature, its featureless jet-black face looking up at her, bright white orbs where its eyes would be. Its arms seemed slightly long ending in cream white claws, strange jagged colorful lines covered its dark body pulsing as if in time with a heartbeat. One of the most off-setting things about it was a bright golden circle in the center of its chest, black lines webbing the slightly pulsing golden spot, seeping into it changing its color as if it was… converting it. Whenever Alexa focused on that spot, she could feel that it was different from the rest of the creature.

“Is… is that the soul you ate?” she muttered as she looked at it, bile rising in her throat.

“See it?” Hecatolite asked, tilting its head, “is ugly. No look long time.”

Hecatolite watched as Alexa inspected it, her normally beautiful eyes flashing inky black as they made eye contact, it could feel a slight draw on its aether, but it was a proverbial drop in the ocean that was its power reserves. The blessing itself however that took a lot of its power, about a quarter if it had to guess, it wondered why it took so much aether to perform the blessing if it would only need to supply enough for the skill when it was used. Soul sight was probably its least taxing skill it knew, even a basic enchantment or reinforcement would cost more aether to cast, it kind of just left soul sight on all the time forgetting to turn off the automatic functionality of the skill instead it just avoided direct eye contact becoming quite good at looking at peoples noses or foreheads. It watched as small black lines branched from the corners of Alexa’s inky eyes as she held the skill first inspecting it then looking at her own hands.

Alexa could feel tears start to form in the corners of her eyes as they began to dry, she marveled at the stark difference between her own soul form compared to Hecatolite, where Hecatolite was a void covered in jagged lines hers was a solid icy blue with green swirls swimming in it. She kept herself from blinking as long as she could before she was forced to cancel the skill, letting out a long-held breath she did not know she was holding.

“How… you cannot tell a single person about this.” She stated curtly, “there would be riots in the streets if people found out”

“And what world ending event is transpiring in the halls of my home today.” Taaffeite called, causing Alexa to spin to see her mother uncharacteristically covered in sweat, a towel wrapped around her neck. 

Alexa locked eyes with her mom and immediately regretted it, her legs nearly giving out as the sudden manifestation of her mother’s soul overwhelmed her. She felt small unsteady hands stabilize her.

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“Souls scary.” Hecatolites voice rang out as she used her entire body to support the taller woman. “No eyes, noses.” She said causing taaffeite to raise an eyebrow. 

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Taaffeite noticed immediately that her daughters were up to something when she saw the two girls whispering in the hall leading in from the back yard. When she called out to them, she saw Alexa’s eyes flash the same inky black color as her younger sisters, lines not too unlike Hecatolite seemed to branch from her eyes. Hecatolite moved to support Alexa comically causing both to fall as Taaffeite approached. It was not lost on her that Hecatolite was speaking, her voice quiet and broken, but still words were being formed.

“Explain?” she said hoisting both girls up easily, the soreness from training with her husband flaring as she did.

Alexa sheepishly looked away, the black lines on her face fading as she began explaining. Hecatolite abandoned the conversation entirely to go find more food, later to be found sleeping on a counter in the kitchen by the chef who was preparing dinner, she gave the counter a solid 4 in places to sleep, stating it was too hard, but smelled nice.

“So, let me get this straight,” Taaffeite sighed heavily, having her world views shattered yet again by the young woman. “You were teaching Hecatolite how to speak, she went and got a snack, and just gave you a skill.”

“If you want to simplify it, yes.” Alexa said, calling her soul page up on Babylon to show her mother. “It seems to be a skill she got for… eating that bishop.”

Taaffeite was silent as she read the soul page, then with a flick of her wrist she pulled up Hecatolite’s and read the Blessing skill. “And you decided it was a clever idea to just test this skill on yourself? We have talked about this before Alexa, we could have used something or someone else, if need be, what if the skill went awry, Hecatolite isn’t exactly gentle with her magic, or did you forget we use to have a shed.” 

Alexa flinched at her mother’s gaze, unable to reply remembering the incident a few days ago when the young girl overcharged a storage enchantment and stored the entire shed full of firewood, and a large portion of the back yard… and the storage ring itself causing a impressive implosion that rained wood and dirt across half the town. Luckily, she was smart enough to throw the ring out of her room window before it went off. Neither of them knew this was when Hecatolite developed the soul binding enchantment after creating a bomb it decided that whatever it made would not be able to be tampered with.

After a long silence Taaffeite sighed, returning her attention to the Babylon terminal she held. “Also, I doubt it has anything to do with the poor soul she…” she trailed off trying to find a better way to phrase, “my daughter ate a soul.” “Consumed… that’s not better, is it? Regardless, I think it has more to do with what Hecatolite is. It says in the skill itself that only one with an “Aether based” soul can acquire it. The question is what is aether compared to mana. I don’t think it’s just tainted mana like the churches want people to believe.”

“I also have the same feeling, even more so now that I have felt it.” Alexa said looking her mom in the eyes causing her new skill to activate. “It does not feel corrupting. If anything, it seems… stronger.”

Taaffeite looked into her daughter’s eyes, watching the inky black aether seep out and branch across her face. She recognized it immediately, even though it was a different color it was nearly identical.

“It’s the bishops’ eyes. That is what it looks like, exactly like that in fact.” She said inspecting them, “just not gold, I wonder if that’s because of a difference in blessings? And your eyes go completely back to normal when you deactivate it?” She watched as her daughter’s eyes seemed to lose focus and return to their normal blue with green accents. “If anything, it’s a better blessing than Valor’s if that’s what gave that man those golden eyes. His eyes did not seem to deactivate like yours, turns out he was a rather famous bishop, known for his “sight” used for finding heretics. Blessed Alexander, the eyes of Valor.” 

Alexa shivered at the mention of the man’s name, somehow saying the name instead of just calling it a soul made her feel worse when she remembered the golden mass in Hecatolite soul. “Apparently Dora will be reborn with that blessing of sight, so says Babylon.” Alexa started filling her mother in on some of the finer details of the day.

---

“Well that certainly is interesting. And you picked soul sight? I would have gone for that reinforcement she has.” Alastair bellowed, “anything that can strengthen her small body enough to cause it to dent a brick wall and survive is a hell of a skill.”

“Now Alastair you don’t need anything to make you any more dense. And don’t go asking Hecatolite for her skills until we know exactly what it entails.” Taaffeite chastised her husband as they sat at the dinner table.

They quipped at one another as Alexa sat, mouth agape as she caught sight of her father’s soul, the wildfire filling the entire room blanketing them all in red glow as it reflected off her mother’s soul.  Hecatolite started tapping her on the arm.

“Switch… off.” Hecatolite finally said, bopping the woman in the nose with a Babylon tablet causing her head to snap back as she finally blinked the skill away.

“Ow you little,” Alexa cursed, grabbing her nose causing Alastair to laugh louder.

 “But in all seriousness, how do you keep it from just turning on like that?” Alexa finally asked, rubbing her sore nose. “It's a bit inconvenient.” 

Hecatolite did not answer as she just shrugged, causing Alexa to slightly regret her decision, she had allowed Hecatolite to basically mark her soul with a skill that she herself did not understand. 

“It's most likely the same as all sight-based skills,” her father said, rubbing his bearded chin, “practice, can’t tell you how many marksmen and bow men have a hell of a time their first month or so after gaining far sight. Got to find a way to keep mana from rushing to your eyes when you look at stuff. How do you keep your inspection skill from firing every time you look at someone?”

“That was a lot easier, I already had the preconception of speaking the skill name to activate it.” Alexa said as she pondered what he said, “I guess I could try making the connection between it and another word.”

A Babylon screen appeared in Hecatolite hands. “I just don’t look people in the eyes. Noses, people think you’re looking them in the eyes if you look at their nose.” She casually discarded the screen by tossing it over her shoulder, it disappearing on its way to the floor.

“That's not a solution Hecatolite, that’s avoiding the issue.” Taaffeite said as she looked at the young woman, her stern gaze causing the girl to squirm. “You need to properly train your magic unless you want another enchanting incident.” She could tell Hecatolite could not understand her as the girl quickly summoned another terminal and held it up, but she did not repeat herself, learning to speak and controlling her magic went hand and hand. Besides, given how the young girl squirmed she could tell the point of her words had been received. “More to the main point, we need to keep Hecatolite and all of her abilities a secret for the time being. At least until we can figure out how to introduce her and wake up Amethyst.”

“That's going to be hard dear,” Alastair stated. “The bunny boy has started coming with gift baskets from his family. They haven’t told anyone what happened, but Hecatolite made one hell of a commotion on her way into the city.”

“That and any mage in between here and the northern wall can feel her if they try. She’s not exactly subtle with her magical presence.” Alexa said, they have been able to avoid any question by keeping her in the house, but if she were to leave, anyone she came across would start to feel the oppressive force of her magical ability. “I mean we are all fine, but unless she learns to reign it back a little, she’s likely to cause a heart attack.” 

Taaffeite rubbed her temples, “I am aware, and news of our new bloodline ability traveled fast given Jasper’s position in the capital.” She sighed, “every noble family with a son even remotely close to her in age is sending letters asking to meet.”

Alexa scoffed at this causing her mother to glare at her, “you’re not off the hook either, my lovely daughter who happens to also be of prime marriage age.” She spoke, producing a letter and tossing it to Alexa, “your suiters seem to have grown. The Queen's nephew has formally asked for a conference with you at your earliest convenience.”

Alexa paled, slowly pushing the letter off the table as if she had not seen it. “What did you say mother, another messenger was ravaged by bandits, a true travesty.”

“knight” 

“Of course, that pompous prick sent a knight!” Alexa yelled, stomping on the letter. “Were the griffin riders too busy or something!”

“Griffin.” Hecatolite spoke softly. “Tasty.”

This caused everyone to pause, before laughter erupted, none wanting to ask how the young girl knew what the deadly and sacred creatures tasted like.

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