Page 16 of Bright Blinding Ruin

“What…” Frederick is at a loss for words as he studies the door. It almost looks like a hieroglyph, a symbol of a door and nothing more, but being as how this place is full of magic, I doubt it’s just a life-sized symbol. Somehow, someway, that’s got to be a working door. Above the carving of the door lies an archway inscribed with words I can’t read.

“Before my lady sent us away, she told me a great many things that she then locked away in my memory,” Fred says. “It’s all coming back to me now. Son, you won’t be able to open that door.” With his free hand, he points to me. “Only she can.”

I give the man a sheepish smile. “Uh, don’t take this the wrong way, buddy, but that doesn’t look like a door I can open. There’s no handle—” The look Fred gives me stops me dead in my tracks.

“It’s not that kind of door, child,” Fred says. “You are the key to opening it, but opening it now, without the essences of my lady’s sisters, would make it pointless. You said Empress Morimento told you to visit the undercrofts, yes?”

“Yeah.” The word comes out of me slowly. I’m a little nervous at what he’s going to say. Going on a cross-kingdom journey on my own two feet doesn’t sound fun. Revisiting Pylos and what’s left of Acadia… not to mention a castle I’ve never been to in Magnysia, all while crossing my fingers that Invictis doesn’t finish what he started years ago.

Fred goes to sit at a nearby table where abandoned books lay, open to whatever page their readers were on before we kicked them out. I am sluggish in going with him, taking the chair across from him. Once he’s done inspecting the stone door, Frederick sits beside me.

“My lady sent me on a mission,” Fred began, “but it was not the one I told everyone. I was instructed to keep it to myself, lest the secret get out and it finds a way to seal off the aether for good.”

“Aether?” I question. I’ve heard the word before, but I can’t remember where.

Beside me, Frederick answers, “It’s said the aether is what connects the empresses to their magic, and to the empresses who held the power before them. It is a… concept that has not been proven, but used to explain much of Laconia’s history.”

Fred gives his son a strange look. “Nonsense. It is not a concept. It is true.” He takes the vial that contains some liquid between two fingers and holds it up. “A piece of the aether, from the undercroft of Magnysia. My lady retrieved it for me before she… before she changed.”

“That’s aether?” Frederick tries to take it from Fred, but his father jerks his hand away.

“No, son, you cannot unbottle it yet. We must have all three first, and we must open that door.” Fred points to the stone door we uncovered. “My lady told me there is a great chasm beneath Laconia. Only there can we combine the aethers together.” He looks at me, his eyes lucid. “And only then can you truly defeat Invictis.”

Frederick still has hope in me, as does his dad, apparently, but that doesn’t change the fact that I don’t believe it. How can I fight that golden bastard when I don’t have nearly as much magical power needed to match him? It’s obvious Fred wants meto go to Pylos and Acadia to fill those other two vials with the aether from their undercrofts.

But how? How the hell am I supposed to do any of that?

“Don’t worry,” Fred says. He must sense my trepidation. “We have time before Invictis regains its full strength. I think it will be a while before it dares show itself again, and if my intuition is correct…” He quiets as he stares right at me, causing Frederick to glance between us.

“If your intuition is correct, what?” Frederick asks.

Fred doesn’t hold back his thoughts. “I don’t think it will try to attack Laconia. I think it will put all of its effort into defeatingyou.”

Me. That tracks. Just my luck, really, get some ancient evil who was hellbent on destroying an entire kingdom obsessed with killing me when I have no way to defend myself.

“It would take me forever to go to Pylos and Acadia,” I say. “And what if the only reason I was immune to the shadowstorms was because I was carrying a piece of him around with me?”

“It,” Fred corrects me. “Invictis is a weapon. It is not a man. That much knowledge my lady imbued into me. It is a being of unimaginable strength, something that goes against the fabric of what we, as Laconians, were taught of our own history. We thought our empresses were the only ones that could control the aether and will it into form—into the magic we see with our own eyes—but its existence proves otherwise. There are other forces out there beyond our comprehension.” He must realize he got a bit too intense, because he coughs and adds, “And I don’t think your bond with Invictis was the reason you’re immune to the scourge.”

Hmm. As much as I believe him about the whole weapon thing, I still can’t bring myself to call Invictis an it. Maybe I got a little too close with him during our journeys together; maybe webonded too much, but I swear he has feelings. Mostly anger and jealousy and haughtiness, but those are still feelings.

And a true weapon doesn’t have any.

“You did not stumble upon Invictis in your world by accident, Rey,” Fred goes on. “You were always meant to come here. My lady foresaw it, and she hoped she could make your journey easier by sending me with my own question. I was to go to Acadia and ask Empress Morimento if she could fill this with Acadia’s aether.”

His fingers toy with the vial on the necklace he dug out of the dirt before he reaches to his neck and pulls off a similar chain, one containing two more vials, though both are empty. He places the second necklace on the table beside the first.

“And then I was meant to travel to Pylos to ask Empress Gladus to do the same. What my lady did not anticipate, however, was the fact that her sisters fell first. My lady lasted the longest against the madness. When I told Empress Morimento of my quest, she took my research and threw me in Acadia’s dungeon.”

Frederick rubs his cheek. “I had no idea.”

“Of course not,” Fred quips. “I didn’t tell you or your mother the truth. I couldn’t. My lady forbade it. During my travels, I hoped I’d discover a way to counteract the scourge, reverse the blight and protect crops from the plague… but the closer I got to Acadia, the more it tried to get inside. It grew stronger and stronger the closer I traveled to the castle. Invictis was waiting for me.”

Shaking my head, I mutter, “I still don’t understand how you survived in that dungeon for so long.”

“My lady’s will is eternal,” Fred says simply. “And you—” He pulls the full vial off and slips it onto the chain with the two empty ones, and then he pushes it toward me. “—must gatherthe aethers so we can combine them. I would go with you if I could, but… only an empress can enter the undercrofts.”

“I’m not an empress,” I say, for about the millionth time. These people… fuck. You’d think they’d realize I’m nothing special. “I don’t have magic. It was all Invictis. I’m not the hero you want me to be.”

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