192 (III)

Whores

He collapsed to his knees, and blood dribbled out between his fingers as his breathing quickened. Cripple reached down to pick him back up, but Veronica held up a hand. Slowly, the Deathless lifted his gaze, and he met his grandmother in a fierce glare. He spat what remained of the bloody mess choking his lungs and painting his teeth at her feet. Things inside him were broken. Things inside his mind felt raw, like someone had used an abrasive stone to scrape his brain until it was a festering wound.

But despite all this, he fought back against it all. He forced himself to stand, even though he wanted to stay kneeling there, broken and wailing on the inside. He couldn't afford that. His past might be a nightmare, but there was still the future he had to fight for. If not for him, then for Adam, Uva, Valor, Georges, and everyone else. He wasn't alone. He had more responsibilities than his own feelings.

And frankly… Fuck… fuck whatever happened to make me. I am my own man. I am my own man. I am my own—

"That's right, my boy," Veronica breathed. "Be the pillar. I see you now. You're like me. So very much like me."

As he got to his feet once more, Veronica wore an expression of surprise and naked pride. "Oh well, how was that?"

Shiv grunted, and then he slammed his forehead into her face. A loud crunch filled the air. Veronica flashed red-gold and silver, but a trickle of blood running down her nose became a rapid flood thereafter. Despite this, she took no step back. She betrayed no hint of pain. Her gaze stayed fixed on his. And in that moment, he felt more kinship with her than at any second prior.

"Veronica," Shiv growled.

"Yes, grandson?"

"Fuck you, and fuck Udraal," Shiv snarled. "I told you to keep your words away from my mind."

Veronica teleported a handkerchief into her hand and began to clean her face up. "Well, at least you got all that anger out. So, now that you know the whole sordid affair with your family and the pitiful emotions that drove them, I'm going to have you make a choice."

"No, fuck that," Shiv shot back. He pulled hard on his manacles. The overflow tides he'd been cultivating slammed into the Orichalcum, and it started screaming. The magical spells holding his mana at bay rattled and flared, but came apart as if a rope being pulled by two titans. A rattling sound filled the chamber, and after less than ten seconds, the manacles broke apart in a burst of red-gold shrapnel. It splashed into Veronica's dimensional armor, disappearing instead of striking her. She waited for him to strike her, but he stood there with both fists balled, trying to control himself.

"Fuck that. I'm not playing with either of you. I don't care what he did right now. I'm getting out of this prison. I'm not going to be led around by some dog of the Republic. I'm not going to let you break my mind, let you make up whatever excuse you want, and go along with your fucked up plans. I'm going to offer you a deal instead."

Veronica's eyebrows rose. "Now, this is a surprising turn of events." She briefly eyed Cripple. "Quite the scheme you two have concocted."

"I had no part in this," Cripple said, though it wasn't particularly good at lying.

Veronica waved it off again, not caring about the Ascendant's attempt at deception. "That's fine. We all lie. We all have our own interests. Tell me what you want. Try to sell me on it."

"I'm giving you a way in," Shiv said. "A way to stay connected to me. You can try stopping me right now, but there is nothing stopping me from leaving this room."

"Well, aside from me," Veronica said, sounding slightly offended.

"You're powerful, Councilwoman. But no. I'll leave whenever I want. Hear that truth in my voice now, and listen closely. I want Cripple to leave one of its Avatars with me. That Avatar will follow me. That Avatar will make sure I don't damage your precious Republic any more than I have to keep myself safe."

Veronica frowned. "So far, it sounds mostly beneficial to you. You gain a bodyguard."

"Not a bodyguard. A preventative measure."

Veronica nodded slowly. "Against Udraal."

"Yeah, because I know how powerful he is. And you do too, probably more than I. So, if he tries to make a move on me, or if he tries to force me to do something, Cripple's Avatar will activate, and it will give you our position, so that we can bring the full might of the Republic against him."

"Of course, of course," Veronica said, her voice trailing off. "And you're using Udraal against us the same way. Very, very clever. A balance of power, with you in the middle. I should call you Fulcrum, instead of Deathless. Are you sure you've never been trained in politics or espionage?"

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"No," Shiv said. "Technically, I'm still mostly just a chef."

Veronica laughed. "Well, I have an additional condition." She walked back over to her stone table and picked up a booklet that lay there. As she returned, she handed it out to Shiv.

"What's this?" he said.

"This is a sync-letter. I'm sure you've encountered one, considering your dealings with the Inquisition."

Shiv nodded. The sync-letter taken from Master-Advisor Oldsmith was how Adam had fooled the Inquisition into attacking Gate Theborn. It was also how they'd known the Inquisition was coming in the first place. "So what? You want to be my pen pal right now?" Shiv asked.

"No. I wish to train you," Veronica said.

Shiv paused. "Okay. First off, fuck no."

Then something clapped him across the side of his face. The Deathless flinched, and his right ear was ringing. He shook his head and glared at his grandmother. The anger inside him coiled back like a serpent and threatened to snap. But then she spoke once more, and the fire inside his gut was blunted.

"Did you even see me hit you?"

Shiv paused. He didn't answer, but that was answer enough.

"Exactly. You're a Legend, I suppose. But you're a Legend who got there because the System is forcing you. The System is confused about you. You've been fed far more power than experience, and you need a proper hand to guide you."

Shiv scoffed. "I already have some."

"You speak of Valor Thann? Or the broken fragments that remain of him?"

"Better a shadow of a Legend than one that wishes to keep me under her heel."

Veronica snorted. "Fine. Resist now. But hold on to the sync-letter. In time, you'll come to seek me. Trust me, boy, you need more power. You need more everything. And Udraal, he's going to give you certain things. He's going to open certain doors for you, but he doesn't care about your advancement in that way. He just wants you to be useful in your role as his experiment. He wants to use you. I want to use you, but the way I will use you is to make you the best instrument of the Republic as possible."

"And I'm not going to be an instrument," Shiv shot back. "For anyone."

"You don't want to be an instrument," Veronica corrected. "But whether you are, remains to be seen. We're going to start with rhetoric with you. And also philosophy, theory, everything Roland neglected to train you in, actually."

The whiplash Shiv felt was immeasurable. "You batter me with your words? You nearly make me throw up by revealing that Udraal is my mom? And now you want to train me? Felling really?"

"Of course. And as for your little plot, I'm assuming you're going for the mana core right after this. I need you to avoid killing my wardens if you can. You were gentle before. I'm going to ask you to stay gentle now. If you do manage to break out, I will focus on containing the other prisoners. You will have an opening to escape from the Republic. But I advise you against returning to where Blackedge used to be. We have a detachment placed there. They will see you coming. Your teleportation will be intercepted, and you will likely be recaptured in short order."

"Udraal is going there too," Shiv said.

"Ah, well, that changes things. The detachment will be killed to the last man, the Ascendants will spawn in, and the chaos will continue. You have somewhere else to hide?"

Shiv didn't say.

"Oh, Gate Theborn. Very well. The gate is populated by dignitaries from the Abyss?"

Shiv didn't reply to that either.

"Well, good. That can be used to your advantage. The Ascendants are many things, but willing to start a fight with the Five Faiths is not one of them. Especially not now when the North and the South are closing in."

"What do you mean by that?" Shiv asked.

"Please, boy, we're not the only surface nation. And the Tarrasque going on a bit of a rampage through our territory made us look vulnerable and weak. We diverted it to the Southland, where the Feathered One and the other Gods of Sacrifice currently have to deal with our issue. But the Jotun of the north are still coming, and the Southerners will come seeking war once they push the Tarrasque out of their own territory. We're about to have a chaotic period again."

Shiv just stared at the legendary Councilwoman. "Is everyone a godsdamn mess in this world?"

"By 'everyone,' do you mean nations? If so, then yes. Because there is no such thing as 'everyone'. There is an infinite amount of 'I', as in countless individual Pathbearers who are vaguely aligned or share similar communities and interests. The art of politics is arranging them, herding them, treating them like sheep while you are a shepherd. But then again, you are a sheep pretending to be a shepherd, because you number among the 'I'. You understand?"

Shiv blinked. "I don't think I fully do."

"Good. You're perfectly naive and ripe to be cynical and refined. I look forward to breaking your heart, perhaps quite literally. Now, get out of my office, get on with this little rebellion you've planned, and keep me informed about how it all falls apart. This might work out for me better than I expected…"

"So what, no counteroffer? You're just gonna take my demands?"

Veronica let out a breath and adopted a pitying look. "You're desperate, and I want my own way in on the great game. Especially without my grandmother mucking things up even more. I am going to use you to the best of my ability. And right now, that's not keeping you in a lab of some kind. It's letting Udraal deal with keeping you safe from the world, while I focus on undermining him at every angle."

Shiv was utterly speechless. "Wait, so you're going to use him to do what you couldn't for me?"

"It's not a triangle we have here," Veronica replied. "It's more like a set of lines that break dimensional boundaries. There are things he's going to use us for. There are things we're going to use him for. There are things you're going to use both of us against each other for. And the other way applies as well. Oh, and Shiv," Veronica said, "do be wary. You're going to be running into Enoch's new Avatar soon." She drew a long breath. "Consider the following my condition for going along with this silly little scheme: I want you to kill the one called Rebis."

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