Chapter 186 - Those Lost to Time (Patreon)

As they disembarked at Vadraich City, Mirian reviewed the plan. “Alright. Jei, I’ll meet up with your team here on the 3rd of Duala. Nicolus, you have the address to send me zephyr falcons on your progress. Lecne, you’ll join Jei here on the 3rd as well. Everyone knows their role?”

There were murmurs of agreement. Jei, Torres, and Runer all waited with a spellcart for the leyline detection devices to be unloaded from the cargo of the ship they’d crossed in. Lecne and his cult, all dressed in Akanan clothes, would be attempting to keep an ear low to the ground about any Prophets. They would be moving up to Arborholm first, while Jei’s group deployed devices north of Arborholm and Ferrabridge where Aurum’s industrial arms hadn’t reached in previous cycles. Nicolus and Sire Nurea would be meeting a Syndicate smuggler in Mercanton who was willing to sell information.

“Excellent. Ominian watch over you.” Mirian turned to Professor Viridian and Selesia. “Alright. It’s a short walk to the train station for the coastal line.”

“This is so weird, watching you order professors about,” Selesia said.

“It’s quite the novel experience,” Viridian said cheerfully. “I think more people should see what it's like to experience an inverted hierarchical social relation. You know, in pre-unification Baracuel, several kingdoms and one of the free cities had a holiday where they had all the nobility serve the servants and slaves for a day.”

“I think Sylvester Aurum would die if he had to do that,” Mirian said.

They continued chatting on their way to the train. Viridian began an impromptu lecture on the early political history of western Baracuel. Mirian only half-listened to it, but Selesia seemed to enjoy it. Mirian was still far more interested in practicing druid techniques, and had continued to work with Viridian as she prepared for their trip to Akana. She had attempted to apply her lessons to her dreams, though as usual, when she spoke to the Ominian, They were silent. Only rarely did They ever seem to respond.

Once on the train, the conversation died down. They set up in the private car Mirian had bought, then ordered dinner.

Once the waiter had gone, Viridian spoke. “Well. How much instruction on myrvite plants have I given you?”

“The outlines of basically everything in north Baracuel,” Mirian said. She thought of bloodleaf, and her mind went back to Westerun. She had to stop herself from clenching her teeth. But the memories are still there. I remembered the cat. I remembered the house. Not every path to the memory is blocked. There are ways around it. She blurted out, “What do you know about ebonblooms?”

Viridian tapped his chin. “Ebonblooms specifically? Not the jewel lotuses in general?”

“I suppose we could start with the more common varieties.”

“I can tell you I’ve been trying to get my hands on them for many, many years. There’s a garden in Mahatan that supposedly has a few, but I was told the garden was secret and by law, the prince who rules that city owns the flowers. It would be a death sentence if anyone were caught ‘stealing’ one, so I gave up. There isn’t a flower in the world that’s worth getting someone killed over.”

“Are they really that rare?” She had a flash of memory. There had been another garden in the courtyard, with a pool full of lotuses. Were they jeweled lotuses, or just mundane?

“Now? Yes. I don’t think they used to be. I found a historical text about how the citrine, sapphire, silk, ruby, and sunrise varieties all grew in the wetlands near Alatishad. Then, alchemists discovered just how many magical substances could be found in a single plant, and they were hunted nearly to extinction. I believe the law in Mahatan was an attempt to preserve the flowers, though I suspect the prince now leverages it to sell the flowers at an exorbitant price.”

Mirian sighed. “That does seem to be how people think. They couldn’t possibly repopulate the wetlands with it because then the price might go down.”

“And they would just be harvested again. So it goes,” Viridian said. “Unfortunately, it was the logic of economics that guided my work on the greenhouse, under Medius’s direction. Growing myrvite plants without knowledge of the soul is a difficult task. I strongly suspect the most successful herbalists kept focuses hidden away from the Luminates. Tlaxhuaco is apparently quite good at growing myrvite cultivars, but the trade restrictions means there’s little enough of their goods or ideas coming from the island. I have no idea if they grow any jeweled lotuses there.”

Mirian only knew a bit about the isolationist policies of the island nation. Some sort of conflict between Tlaxhuaco and Akana Praediar had happened about two generations ago, and now, Uxalax was the only port opened to foreign trade, but that trade was heavily taxed and regulated. There was a book full of goods banned from entering or leaving the island, and most merchants didn’t bother since making a profit was too much of a hassle.

Apparently, Xipuatl’s family had some sort of special exemption from several taxes, so they were able to use that to their advantage. That will be useful if I ever need to go there, but it might not be necessary. The leyline breakdown is far to the north of them, and they don’t use many spell engines.

“So what about the ebonblooms?”

“An absolutely strange plant. They grow in conditions most lotuses couldn’t survive in. In fact, one text thought they could only grow in conditions most plants would find toxic. It’s unclear whether or not it’s a variety of jeweled lotus, or a different species altogether. One particularly pious Luminate bishop wrote that it should be renamed ‘necrobloom’ and the flowers burned on sight. He was writing some three hundred years ago when there were still more necromancers around, and his writings may have contributed to the rarity. Another scholar compiled all the legends about the flower and tried to map them to locations in Persama. They concluded it only grows in places where the groundwater leeches through fossilized myrvite first. I don’t know that the scholar understood that mana is not a soluble substance like salt, but that would explain why no one can find them anymore. The environments that allowed them to grow have been taken over by mining. If it is true, that would also make it a fascinating organism. It may be one of the few organisms that can grow using D-class mana. Only a few fungi we know of can do that, and they tend to live in alkaline caves.”

Potentially useful, Mirian noted. “Nightmare Leaf produces toxic mana as a defense, doesn’t it?”

“That it does, and I’ve seen it classified as D mana, but I don’t think it is. I think the entire classification system is oversimplified and we should be using Rodrick’s Taxonomy of Mana.” Viridian cleared his throat. “That probably isn’t a high priority for a Prophet.”

Mirian chuckled. “No, probably not. Still, it will be important to know the precise nature of the mana we need to deal with.” She grew thoughtful as the countryside continued to pass by. “In fact, are the leylines composed of the mana they absorb, or do they change the composition somehow? Either way, that might inform how we design and use the mana regulators. If that ends up being what we do.” She looked at Selesia. “Sorry, this is probably a bit much,” she told her.

“Oh, it’s fine. I think I understood half of that.”

Mirian started looking out the window again, thinking. How long is all this research going to take? And how much time do we have? She was still avoiding Ibrahim. How much longer could she justify doing that?

“Oh, Viridian, there is this other spell I’ve been working on. So it turns out stone moles can ‘leap’ through the fourth dimension…”

***

They made their way to the original First City again. This time, Mirian flew them in bursts so that they could better understand the region.

“These plants are all so content compared to the ones in the greenhouse,” she said after soul-bonding with another cypress. “Well, this one is annoyed by something trying to grow into its bark. But you know what I mean.”

“When you plant something in a greenhouse, you have to attend to its every need,” Viridian said. “Out here in the wild, things grow where they are best suited. The cypress trees are going to be happy, because all the seeds that landed in terrible places never grew.” Viridian looked around the swamp while Mirian used a very tiny chain lightning on some of the mosquitoes flying about. “You know, I’m sure a good poet could use that as a metaphor about the human condition,” he said cheerfully. Maybe old age had made his skin too wrinkly for the insects, but he didn’t seem bothered by the biting bugs at all. Whatever it was, it wasn’t fair. Mirian was strongly considering just erecting a force shield to repel the bugs. Cycling soul energy through the bites did nothing to alleviate the itching.

Viridian put his hand on the trunk of the cypress. Briefly, he closed his eyes, then nodded. “Let’s keep moving,” he said. “Unless… I don’t think I’ve seen a mushroom like that before…”

“Some other time,” Mirian said, but she couldn’t help but smile.

After four more stops, they finally made their way to the overgrown ruins and the great mound that had once been a pyramid.

As they approached the slab of quartzite, Viridian stopped. He closed his eyes and was silent. After a moment, Mirian saw he was trembling. A tear streaked down his cheek. When he opened his eyes, he looked shaken. “There is… such a history here.” He turned to Selesia. “You said Shiamagoth touched the world here?”

She nodded.

Viridian’s voice was a whisper. “I believe it,” he said. They stood there together. The wind was soft as it rustled through the trees. At last, Viridian said, “It cannot be explained in words. You must feel what it says to your soul. I know you intended me to help you but—I have taught you what I know. There is nothing I can say. It must be felt. I know you will feel it.” He stepped away and sat on a ledge on the hillside looking out over the forest.

Mirian nodded at Selesia, and she joined him.

The wind whispered by again, and Mirian sat cross-legged atop the stone slab. She held her soulbound spellbook in her lap, one hand on the binding where it was closest to the titan catalyst. She breathed in. In her mind, it was Grandpa Irabi’s voice telling her to slow her breathing. No, as she let her mind drift, there was another voice echoing his, one she’d heard so long ago. The feel of cool stone beneath her while warm air prickled at her skin was familiar.

She let the memories circle her, but didn’t focus on them. She had another purpose here.

She focused in on the tiny sparks flitting around. They danced like ghostly dandelion seeds in the wind. There was a pattern to it, but Mirian couldn’t describe it. This time, instead of trying to seek that pattern, she simply listened.

A spark touched her, and there was a fleeting sensation. Joy. Wonder. Then it was gone.

Mirian waited, clearing her mind of thoughts, simply waiting for what she felt. Another spark skimmed by her soul, and she felt sorrow. Help, came the thought.

She waited again.

Another spark, another feeling. Anticipation. Another spark. She saw a flash of vision: a stone house, wrapped in roots. Another spark screamed danger! while yet another gave the feeling of exhaustion and peace. These were little pieces of souls, Mirian realized. Something here must have kept them from dissipating entirely. Shiamagoth’s touch? she wondered. That would be a magic beyond anything she could understand. So she didn’t try to understand; she continued to feel.

She felt a child running through the forest, laughing. She felt someone admiring the way a grove of trees had leaves that never touched each other, yet covered the sky like a dome. She felt the terror of a squirrel as it dove for cover. The patience of a sapling, waiting for the canopy to brighten and get its chance to grow. There was the anticipation of a crocodile as it floated near prey. The joy of song from a bird. The sorrow of death as a family stood around a bed.

The longer she meditated, the easier it became to understand what she was feeling. Emotions, not her own, swirled around her. Each one came with a fragment of memory. At first, the memories seemed jumbled. But the longer she sat, the more she began to place them.

The First City was old. As old as the Cataclysm. She saw glimpses of the great pyramid that had dominated the city, covered in beautiful terraced gardens. Beyond its slopes was a city made of both stone and wood, but the timbers had not been cut down; the trees that supported houses still grew. The city was alive.

Over a hundred generations had lived and died here in this place that was both city and forest. The gardens bloomed with myrvites. In one memory, the pyramid was still a shallow hill with a temple atop it. In another, workers toiled to build up the dirt mound while others worked on the stone cladding. Gardeners sang with their souls to the trees growing. A procession sang dirges for Xylatarvia. In another, a man watched his wife disembark from a catamaran, happy she had safely journeyed to and from Uxalax. In her hand, she clutched the sacred jade.

There was a man, holding the hand of his sick son, weeping. There was a woman, hands spread in joy atop the pyramid, thanking Shiamagoth for His blessing. An old woman grew feeble and bitter. A young man dreamed of traveling to distant shores. Children fought. Children played. A man wept over a lost lover. A lost lover reminisced of a better time.

Above them all, Mirian became aware of a presence, a spell, that had once touched this place. A burning scepter, so bright it was indistinguishable from the sun. A great shield held aloft to the heavens, so great it might have encompassed the dome of the sky. This presence echoed across time, and she couldn’t bear to focus on it. Shiamagoth, she knew, and when she felt even the barest hint of that Elder soul, she felt her thoughts spiraling into dark voids and places where ten thousand eyes blinked at her, where claws and teeth bit into the world, where the cosmic void was no barrier and time became less like a line and more like a great ocean, complete with storms and depths and terrible beasts that swam beneath it.

The Elder Gods were beyond comprehension. She focused her attention back on the fleeting memories, on this place Shiamagoth had so lovingly gazed down upon.

She needed to comprehend this thing. This city. The lives that had passed here. It was more than just the people. Over the centuries, trees grew and died, and in the First City, funerals were held for them as well. When a great ceiba died, it was like the passing of a beloved elder, and the city mourned. Mirian saw a glimpse of ten thousand funerals—and ten thousand births. Each life here had been full, each person, the hero of their own story. They had all had dreams and sorrows, rages and joys, pains and loves.

No one living remembered any of them. As soon as the soul fragments flit away, the memories went with them, and only the faintest echo persisted in Mirian’s mind.

All these lost souls had once lived. All these souls were now forgotten.

But they had been.

Here, where Shiamagoth had stepped, there was a tribute to her memory. But this place is not unique. A thousand more cities have seen the same. She now lived only because of these forgotten generations, because of these full lives lived so long ago not a single record of them existed. Eventually, she too would be forgotten.

Except, she would leave a mark on the world. And like a ripple in the ocean of time, the future would be changed forever.

She found herself weeping for all those that had been lost, not just here, where these smallest fragments of souls lingered, but across all of human history. Each one deserved to be mourned, each one deserved to be remembered. Each one had left their mark on history, no matter how small.

I will carry you with me, she promised, and she realized that the souls had already heard her; the fragments had gathered and now swam about her, swirling like motes of light. They offered to change her.

Of course, she had to accept. Each one of these souls had been like her; influenced by a past that stretched beyond record, built out of the world that had come before. And if she succeeded, there would be generations to come, each touched by what she did now.

The souls swarmed around her, and she felt her own soul changing again. They had removed nothing; they could only add to the multitudes that made her up.

She gasped as she opened her eyes. She had been so lost in herself that her body felt strange to move, and it took her a moment to figure out how to move again. She was covered in sweat. But she felt alive.

Selesia let out her own breath. “Thank the Ominian, you’re okay. I was worried.”

Viridian nodded. “She was very worried.” But I wasn’t, she knew Viridian was thinking. He had some understanding of what had happened.

Night had fallen, Mirian realized, and the forest hummed with the calls of cicadas. She looked inward.

In the depths of the Endelice, surrounded by that glacier, she had begun to understand the nonliving world. Now, she had peered back into time, glimpsing the forgotten generations that had come before her. The Endelice had changed the way her soul flowed, but this had strengthened those flows. And there was something else…

Mirian could feel that fragmented soul energy in a way she hadn’t before. Experimentally, she called to it—and dissolved bits of soul came to her. Fascinating, she thought.

Selesia turned to Viridian. “Are her eyes glowing? I think her eyes are definitely glowing. Like, they kinda were before, but they still kinda looked right, but now, especially in the dark…”

“I think they are,” said Viridian smiling, patting Selesia on the shoulder. “So it is. That is a little thing, though. What is important is that the Ominian chose well. You saw far beyond what I did, I think.”

Mirian stood, and when she did, there was a heaviness to her step. She felt the weight of what she was carrying more. But there is a path forward. She was beginning to see what she needed to do. Piece by piece, it would come together.