Book of The Dead

“Master Almsfield,” Elsbeth greeted him, much more warm than she had appeared before. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. My name is Elsbeth Renner, I believe you were expecting to see me?”

He was? He was!

That cursed shrivelled prick had told him they’d send a liaison to speak with him. If he’d thought about it for a second, he would have known this was coming.

“The pleasure is mine,” he fumbled, dipping into a slight bow to cover his confusion.

More than anything, the way she’d almost instantly seen through his disguise was like a knife in his heart. Was he that transparent? How had she done it?!

An awkward silence descended as he stood, brain churning until he suddenly became fiercely conscious of his two gossiping employees burning a hole in the back of his skull with their eyes.

“Uh. Please. If it pleases you, could you join me in my–join me upstairs for some refreshment? We can discuss more privately there.”

Elsbeth smiled again, a twinkle in her eye as she acquiesced and he turned to guide her, shooting a glare at Cerry and Flynn as he went.

Both studiously avoided his gaze.

Only when they’d entered his living quarters and he’d activated the magickal protections around the door did he turn and demand “How did you know it was me?”

His childhood friend stared at him, open mouthed, a hint of reproach on her face.

“That’s the first thing you say to me?” she said. “Really?! No, ‘Hi Elsbeth, turns out I’m not dead’, or ‘Hey there, Elsbeth, it’s great to see after four years, how have you been?’”

Tyron slapped a hand to his face, and, after a moment, dismissed the glamour that hid his features.

“Yes, you’re right, I’m sorry. It’s just… unnerving to have my disguise seen through so easily. I depend on this glamour to keep me alive.”

She simply stood, tapping her foot on the floor as she levelled a steady gaze at him.

He sighed.

“Hello, Elsbeth. It’s wonderful to see you after four long years. I would have reached out to you, to let you know I was alive, but it felt too dangerous. I’m sorry.”

The priestess nodded slowly before she thrust her arms out to her sides.

“Now a hug,” she demanded.

He rolled his eyes and stepped forward, enfolding her with his arms. To his surprise, she squeezed him tightly, to the point he almost felt his ribs creak. How’d she gotten so strong?

When they separated, she brushed a tear from the corner of her eye and Tyron invited her to sit at his table as he rummaged for some tea and biscuits.

When he sat down and sipped his drink, he found himself at a loss for words. Elsbeth looked… different. She was still radiant, but that innocent glow that she had always carried with her was subdued. After four years of serving such gods, she must have gone through a great deal.

“How have you been?” he asked softly.

“It’s a struggle, out there,” she said, waving a hand vaguely toward the west. “I’ve seen just how hard life can be for people, how much they have to struggle just to survive. I learned a lot.”

Tyron snorted.

“If I know you, then you’re still doing everything you can to help them.”

The Priestess of the Old Gods stuck her tongue out at him.

“So what if I am?” she said as she laughed and shook her head. “I’ve always wanted to help people, that’s why I wanted to be a priestess in the first place.”

The Necromancer held up his hands.

“That’s not a criticism. Quite the opposite. I’ve never met anyone who had as kind a soul as you ‘Beth. I’m pleased to see that hasn’t changed.”

He hesitated.

“Are you still able to help, though? Considering your… patrons?”

Elsbeth lifted a brow.

“You think Crone, Raven and Rot don’t help people?” she took a long sip of her tea and nibbled on an almond biscuit as she thought. “In a sense, I suppose they don’t, but they can be more supportive than you give them credit for. My teacher told me many times how surprised she was to see how many blessings I’ve been able to wrangle out of them. Raven especially is getting sick of me.”

“Isn’t that dangerous?” Tyron was alarmed but Elsbeth waved away his concerns.

“I don’t think so. Raven bestowed a blessing on me at my Advancement, so I don’t think they’re really that mad.”

A blessing from the Raven?

“Is that how you were able to see through my glamour? A gift of sight?”

His guest looked at him, a slight frown on her face.

“What? No. You’re making it far more complicated than it is. That glamour may hide your features, and disguise your voice to a certain extent, but your mannerisms, the way you stand, the way you hold yourself? All of that stays the same. I’ve known you since we were kids, it was easy to recognise you.”

He stared at her.

“Seriously? You spotted me by my mannerisms? So quickly? You thought I was dead!”

“I never believed you were dead, even before Ortan tried to convince me you’d survived,” Elsbeth snorted. “And yes. If Worthy had walked into this place, he’d have recognised you just as quickly.”

The thought of his uncle wandering into the store caused Tyron a painful pang in his chest.

“Well, that’s a problem,” he muttered.

“Is it? There’s less than a handful of people who know you well enough to do what I did. Don’t be too paranoid.”

“How… how is he? Worthy? And Aunt Meg?”

Elsbeth looked at him, sadness brimming in her eyes.

“Not great,” she said. “The loss of his family hit him hard. He and Meg are still operating the Inn, but it’s… not like it was.”

He could see she wanted to say more, but she feared it would be too painful for him to learn anything else.

“So… now that you’re here, we’ll have plenty of time to catch up. I’d love to hear more about your journey over the last four years, but first, I’d be grateful if we could discuss more serious issues for a moment.”

His old friend hesitated before she sighed and nodded.

“Fine. Do you have any questions?”

“I assume you’re the intermediary the Venerable said would be sent my way?”

“That’s right. Since you won’t talk to them yourself, I’ll be around to pass along their words.”

“They don’t exactly make themselves easy to trust,” he grunted.

“They don’t care if you trust them,” Elsbeth rolled her eyes. “They’re gods. Don’t think of them like people, they were never mortal. You’ve taken on certain obligations and you have to fulfil them, that’s all there is to it.”

It hadn’t been an easy decision to Advance his Anathema sub-class the way he had, but he’d known he couldn’t afford to throw any possible source of power away, given what he was up against. That didn’t mean he was willing to forget what the gods had almost done to him, and to Elsbeth, but he could look past it if they dealt with him more fairly in future.

“Well, you’re here. Tell me, what is it that the Three want from me? Build them an altar? Kill some priests? Defile some temples?”

“What? No!” Elsbeth wrinkled her nose in disgust. “Why would they want you to go around murdering priests? Generally speaking, they don’t care to interfere with the church of the five, and us followers don’t want to draw attention to ourselves and get burned at the stake, so we avoid them as much as we can.”

“So… what then? What do they want me to do?”

“Nothing much. They want you to kill the Five Divines.”

Elbeth took another sip of her tea, watching him over the rim of the cup. He stared back at her open-mouthed. After a few long seconds, he closed it.

“As in… today?” he said finally.

“Obviously not,” she retorted. “But ultimately, that’s what they want you to do. It’s only taken five thousand years, but the Three seem to have finally decided enough is enough. They want to reclaim the spark of divinity they gave away.”

This was good news, since that’s what Tyron wanted as well. With the help of the Old Gods, he might even have a chance of succeeding. Although there had to be a catch, or five.

“Is there a particular reason they want me to do this? Can’t they just do it themselves?”

Elsbeth shrugged.

“Can’t, or won’t, I don’t know. I’m not even certain if they want you to kill the Divines directly yourself, or just help create the circumstances that lead to the outcome they desire. The only way to learn more would be to ask them yourself, though they probably wouldn’t elaborate.”

“Probably not,” Tyron agreed sourly.

He thought for a moment.

“What do they want me to do in the short term? If all they had in mind for me was to help with some grand design far into the future, there’s no reason to send you here now.”

“Of course there’s more,” Elsbeth agreed. She hesitated before she continued. “Have you gone out much, since your parents… died? To the keeps, or anywhere else in the province?”

He shook his head.

“I basically locked myself to an Arcanist’s bench for three years straight,” he confessed. “Since I completed my apprenticeship, I haven’t travelled that far from the city.”

“People are… pissed.”

It was weird to hear her swear.

“Pissed?” he asked.

“Really pissed. When Magnin and Beory died, most of the slayers didn’t believe the explanation they were given. Instead, they blamed the Magisters.”

Dove had told him that might happen before his family had perished. Slayers hated the Magisters on principle, it didn’t take much for them to assign blame to the hated mages.

“I think they kind of expected it, the Magisters, I mean. They were out and about the first year, making themselves known, making an example of any infractions they uncovered.”

She shivered.

“They were brutal. The things they can do with those marks… Anyway, I believe they expected things to die down after that, but it didn’t. Things only got worse.”

Tyron was confused.

“What are you telling me, Elsbeth? What’s going on out there?”

“There’s a rebellion brewing,” she told him. “In all of the keeps, but especially the most remote ones. Slayers are renouncing their vows, many are turning from the worship of the Five, and they’re banding together. The Old Gods are trying to harness this momentum. They’ve been gathering followers, trying to create a locus of power, far from the Magisters’ reach.”

Was there any place in the Empire that they couldn’t reach?

“Where?”

“Cragwhistle.”