Lich for Hire

The war between the Unholy Kingdom and Lyon, already extraordinary, had ended in a manner more extraordinary still.

No one had imagined the final outcome would be the disappearance of an entire kingdom.

Lyon retreated to Lavarun. With more than twenty thousand dead and wounded, this was, by any measure, the worst defeat in Lyon's history. And it wasn't simply a military defeat. The young emperor's cowardice had produced something Lyon had never experienced before: a complete collapse of morale.

Lyon's armies had always been led from the front. Commanders who charged first and fought to the last soldier against whatever came at them—that was the tradition.

Instead, the emperor had turned and run, triggering the collapse of the entire support corps. Only the paladin cavalry had held the line and pulled what remained of the army back from total annihilation.

The githarks had sent a hundred and thirty thousand fighters through, with over sixty red dragons. If the spatial disruption caused by the Unholy Kingdom's ascent hadn't destroyed the astral passage in the process, over a million githarks might have emerged in all.

Even so, a hundred and thirty thousand githarks was more than enough to end a nation, had they chosen to press the attack.

Instead, once Lyon withdrew into Lavarun, the githarks made camp and began felling trees. Then, in organized groups escorted by red dragons, they took to sea.

"Latest reports indicate all the githarks have relocated offshore," Harvey said carefully, watching Ambrose as he delivered the news. "Lyon has made no move to pursue them. They simply let them leave."

He was nervous. Ambrose had sealed himself in the laboratory for over two months since returning. Harvey had assumed it was grief from the loss of Mr. Misfortune and had been tiptoeing around him ever since.

Even this briefing required careful handling so as not to agitate his master.

Ambrose looked at him oddly. "What's with the careful tone? Have we been losing money?"

Harvey relaxed slightly. "No, our sales are stable. The Unholy Kingdom was never really a primary market, so its disappearance didn't affect our sales much. The Fountain of Youth is actually selling out faster than ever. Everyone's on edge—even minor lords who normally wouldn't spend are buying a bottle as insurance."

The Fountain of Youth could restore a seasoned fighter's youth for a short time. In a crisis, it was a trump card worth having. It had essentially become a war supply.

"Good. Keep the accounts in order. Now, you said the githarks went to sea?" Ambrose frowned. "That doesn't sit right. Most githarks can't swim, from what I know. Going to sea means they're heading somewhere specific. What if they're looking for other dragons?"

Harvey blinked. "Looking for dragons? They want to work with the dragon clans?"

"It's not impossible. They came with dozens of red dragons, after all. Dragon clans were never naturally unified. The Dragon Tyrant forced them together by sheer dominance, and even then, each dragon essentially operated alone, one city per dragon. Arthur Lyon and his companions killed most of them, and the survivors fled and clustered together for protection. That's when dragons started living in groups and the old hostility between different types began to ease.

"Now you have a large group of red dragons from the astral realm arriving to visit the overseas clans. Those dragons might well be willing to claim them as distant kin." He stopped. "Wait. Something's wrong."

Ambrose stood up, took his Necromantic Codex, and sent a message to Alabastra.

The reply came quickly: "I cannot say."

Ambrose went still. The question he had posed was, "Is Tiamat planning to help the dragon clans dissolve the contract they signed with Arthur Lyon?"

Alabastra hadn't said yes. She didn't need to.

Ambrose shut the Codex and turned to Harvey. "Tiamat played me. That's why she behaved so strangely at the end. The Dragon Queen won't break the established rules of devils. It was a distraction. She wanted me focused on the idea that she'd lost. In reality, the moment those red dragons arrived, her plan was already halfway complete.

"She was never trying to use the githarks and dragons to claim any territory. She was using the red dragons to help the dragon clans break the covenant that bars them from the continent."

Harvey stared. "If the dragons come back, that would throw everything into chaos."

"Master, how does Tiamat intend to accomplish such a thing? Can we stop her?"

Ambrose clacked his teeth. "How should I know? To even begin working out how to stop her, you'd need to know the specific terms of the original covenant. No one living would know it.

"The red dragons from the astral plane are probably the key. After all, they were never bound by the covenant in the first place. Tiamat would only need to transfer that property to the other dragons somehow. Bloodlines, breeding, some more complex method—for the Dragon Queen, none of that would be difficult. And she's clearly had this prepared for a long time. Unless we can kill every red dragon from the astral plane right now, there's nothing to be done."

Harvey's voice grew strained. "But if the dragons come back, everyone will suffer."

"Don't panic. Lyon isn't panicking, and they took the hit directly. You and I are one part of a very large world, so stop casting yourself as the main character. When something this large happens, the people with real power will deal with it first. That's what they're there for."

Two diviners could hardly prevent the destruction of the world by themselves. Surely the monarchs of the various kingdoms would gather heroes across the world to resist the dragons.

Harvey found, against his expectations, that Ambrose's lack of concern was genuinely reassuring. His teacher was right. When the sky fell, the Atlases of the world would hold it up. And his teacher was one such Atlas. He would worry once Ambrose started worrying.

Ambrose, unaware of the mildly impertinent reasoning behind Harvey's newfound calm, continued, "Anything else significant?"

"The Lyon emperor returned to the capital. There are apparently calls for him to be held accountable for the defeat. Lyon is in an uproar over it."

"Someone's bold enough to move against the emperor? Who?"

"William Garrison, commander of the paladin cavalry during the campaign. He's a legendary paladin, a hundred and three years old. He was one of the most devoted royalists in Lyon's history. The emperor pulled him out of semi-retirement for the campaign. No one expected someone with his record to be the one calling the emperor out for incompetence."

"William Garrison." The name was unfamiliar to Ambrose, though he recalled the paladin's performance on the battlefield. He was the man who had produced the barrier of holy light that had held against the bulk of the githark assault, a one-man wall absorbing punishment that should have broken any formation. He was a genuinely formidable fighter who apparently preferred to stay out of the spotlight.

"Even the royalists are turning on him. Lyon really did take a catastrophic loss."

"There's more," Harvey said. "Word is that Allen Watson's speech on the battlefield was recorded and is circulating quietly inside Lyon. Adventurers have already carried the story all the way out here. Lyon sounds like it's close to fracturing from within."

Ambrose shook his head. "I wouldn't trust that. It's probably something those adventurers embellished."

"Why do you say that, Master?"

"I spent several hundred years as an adventurer. I know how they operate. A noble gets married, and by the time the story spreads, it's a succession war with the family in ruins. Nine times out of ten, adventurers take whatever information they have and build an entire drama out of it.

"Allen's speech was completely unplanned. Who would have had a memory crystal ready to record it? The only realistic possibility is that someone intended to record the emperor's speech, and Allen's words ended up captured by accident. But that crystal would have been confiscated or destroyed, or sealed away quietly by the imperial household. Anyone who handled it would be identified. There's no way it was quietly circulated.

"What probably happened was that Allen's speech couldn't be kept secret, because everyone knew it happened. The first adventurer to tell the story made up the claim that someone had it on memory crystal. The next adventurer made up the claim that copies were being circulated. The third adventurer made up the claim that every household in Lyon had received one."

Harvey looked at him with renewed respect. There was still a considerable gap between them, in every way that mattered.

Nothing else in Harvey's report rose to the level of significant news. The most notable item was that the dwarven kingdom, upon hearing of Lyon's defeat, had held a grand celebration. The dwarven king even announced the year's taxes would be halved, to widespread gratitude.

When the briefing ended, Ambrose reached under his desk and produced a thick notebook. He held it out with unusual deliberateness. "Take this, read it, and study it seriously."

Harvey opened it. Inside were detailed records of how Mr. Misfortune had applied the power of fate throughout the events surrounding the Unholy Kingdom's ascent, documented with such precision that Harvey felt as though he had learned something just by rapidly skimming the first few pages.

"Master, this is incredible!"

"It's what Vladimir wanted. In his final days, the only thing he couldn't let go of was his lifelong research. I did my best to record what I had seen and spent the past two months putting it in order. Vladimir walked further down the path of divination than I ever have. We walked different paths. I have no talent for his threadwork, so this notebook is going to you."

Harvey couldn't help but feel the weight of the notebook grow more and more burdensome. "Master, I'm afraid I'm not skilled enough for this."

Ambrose moved to his side and put a hand on his shoulder. "Don't sell yourself short. Harvey, your talent exceeds mine by a considerable margin. Honestly, Vladimir and I together couldn't match your natural gifts. I spent a lifetime mastering my dice of fate. Vladimir spent centuries mastering his threads.

"You simply read a few pages' worth of notes and became a diviner. Vladimir showed you the threads once, and you were already able to touch them. You have a talent that both of us envy, so make sure you nurture it. Don't make me watch your prodigious talent go to waste. Even if you never accomplish anything else in your life, you have to carry Vladimir's knowledge forward. Make sure it isn't lost. Do you understand?"

"I understand, Master. I'll give it everything I have." Harvey exhaled. "So you weren't grieving these past two months, but just organizing notes. I was genuinely worried."

Ambrose made a dismissive sound. "Don't be ridiculous. I'm a lich. I don't do sentiment."

Harvey looked at the softly glowing jar sitting on Ambrose's desk and said nothing. Within it was Mr. Misfortune's soul fragment, carefully preserved.