Book Three - Chapter Thirteen (Patreon)

She was humming again.

The 238th’s pet Ordinate had no sense of tune. Her little hmm, hmm-hmm-hmm, hmm-hmm, hmm’s were endlessly off-key as she worked, playing out a fragmented loop of a song that Alarion had never heard and suspected he did not want to hear.

He had thought it a charming quirk when they’d first met, something that distinguished her from the rest of her nameless, faceless order. These days he found it grating, but the rest of the 238th didn’t seem to agree. They’d started calling her Hummingbird as a term of endearment half a year ago, and the name had stuck despite senior staff’s best efforts.

Alarion had his suspicions that it had actually started as a pet name during some illicit fraternization, but he had neither the time nor inclination to run down that particular line of inquiry. He certainly didn’t see what anyone would find attractive about the bald, pale Vitrian functionary, but to each their own.

“Mm,” the young woman murmured, tapping her pen a few times against the edge of her desk before nodding toward her work. “That should do it.”

She set down her pen, folded her hands over his finished dossier, and said, “We need to kill her.”

Alarion had heard worse people say worse things, but never quite so coldly. The Ordinate might as well have been discussing the weather or the evening’s meal.

“Which her?” Alarion asked. Neither was acceptable, but clarity was important when talking about murder.

“Both, actually. Now that you have mentioned it,” Hummingbird said, before laughing at her own ‘joke’. “Even if we kill the old bag tonight, it will only buy us time before a replacement is sent. But I am sensing you have some qualms about my suggestion?”

“Qualms?”

“Complaints. Concerns. Issues?”

Alarion rolled his eyes. “I know what the word means.”

“Then why did you ask?” The Ordinate leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms like a spurned lover. Her fingers found a loose thread in her grey robe, and she began to pick at it as she said, “We told you when we started this that scrutiny is risk. If the hag conducts an Evaluation of her own, you are caught. If you or anyone else we have doctored forgets what Attributes they supposedly have, you are caught. If she conducts a deep audit—”

“I am caught. Yes, I gathered that. But everyone is up to date. We won’t make mistakes.”

“Letting her live is the mistake,” the Ordinate protested. “All it will take is someone hesitating to read a number that is supposedly right in front of them. Ordinates are trained to notice this sort of behavior. And if she looks at our records… Orphan, we are not perfect. We may have made mistakes.”

“I am not killing—”

“She is ancient! We are not telling you to rip her limb from limb. Give her some spicy food, or walk her out in a stiff breeze. Mothers above, have you seen the woman? A convincing sketch of a flight of stairs might be enough to do her in.”

Alarion laughed. He wasn’t proud of it, but the very fact that those were Hummingbird’s suggestions put paid to the idea that she was seriously contemplating murder. The woman was frightened, and she wanted reassurance. He could hardly blame her, given what her culture thought of liars and frauds.

“If it comes to it, I will take action,” Alarion reassured her. He knew it was what she wanted to hear, just as he knew he shouldn’t elaborate beyond what he’d said. Their little group of conspirators had plans in place for if they were ever discovered, but the plans were far from ideal. Dwelling on them would only send the Ordinate spiraling. “For now we wait and see. Blue Ex is going to eat up most of the next five months, and when those are over, we are both gone. And you with quite a bit of money.”

Hummingbird didn’t answer right away. Her fingers plucked and pulled at her sleeve instead. The damage worsened the longer she worried it, annoyance quickening her breath.

She looked ready to tear the whole damn sleeve away by the time Alarion intervened.

“May I?” he asked, wiggling one of his throwing knives between two fingers.

“We do not know what we were thinking,” Hummingbird complained as she let him work. “Faking your appraisal was risky enough, but then you talked us into the others.”

“I didn’t talk you into anything. It was your idea,” Alarion reminded her.

“That does not sound like us.”

Alarion snorted, mimicking her voice as he cut away the loose thread. “Your Martyrs are getting too strong, Orphan. The statisticians may start to notice a pattern, Orphan. Let us adjust their—”

“That most certainly does not sound like us,” she said, recrossing her arms and picking at the stub of the newly cut string as if pattern recognition were a foreign concept. “We need to be prepared for if that crone—”

A sudden tap at the door froze the Ordinate mid-word and had them both at guilty attention in their seats.

It was a polite knock. Three soft taps, spaced just far enough apart that the last couldn’t be mistaken for anything else.

They had a visitor.

Alarion was on his feet by the middle of her second set of taps. He crossed the room with brisk but steady steps—a man with nothing to hide wouldn’t keep her waiting, but he wouldn’t run either—and set his hand on the latch.

“Compose yourself,” he murmured, not looking back. He knew Hummingbird had the look of a woman who’d just gotten caught raiding the cookie jar, but there was nothing for it.

He opened the door and was met by a wall of muscle.

“Master Sergeant,” Cyiar said politely, his voice that of a rolling thunderstorm.

Anastacia’s Systemborn bodyguard was so large that he filled the whole of the doorway, his neck crooked down at an uncomfortable angle to meet Alarion’s gaze. He seemed well at ease despite Alarion’s recent outburst at his ward, and blissfully unaware of the conversation he had interrupted.

“Can I help you?” Alarion asked.

“Not him,” came CeeCee’s raspy, familiar voice. “Us. Cyiar, can you finish, please?”

“Sorry, madam,” the giant rumbled. “Excuse me.”

Cyiar stooped through the door before Alarion could even think to protest—the giant’s red, inhuman eyes sweeping from one corner of the room to the other. There was power behind that look, strings of mana that tickled [Unraveller’s Sense] whenever Cyiar’s eyes passed over Alarion. A passive observation skill, most likely. The brute didn’t seem like much of a mage.

“Just the wards. Good ones, though,” Cyiar reported. Then he looked to Alarion and asked, “There will be no problem, yes?”

“Why would there be?”

The Systemborn held Alarion’s gaze during an uncomfortable silence, one large mitt rising to stroke the grey bone protrusions on his chin as though they were a beard. When Alarion refused to break his gaze, Cyiar took one step closer, looming over him, then smiled. It was not at all a pleasant expression.

“Madam Ana told me to keep her aunt safe. I will keep her safe. Do you understand, Two-Thirty-Eight?”

“We are not the girl’s aunt.” CeeCee slapped the side of her cane against Cyiar’s shin with as much force as she could muster—which wasn’t much—and declared, “Enough with you and your oafish posturing. We are perfectly safe. Out. Out!”

“We are pleased to make your acquaintance, Ordinate,” Hummingbird said, her voice soft and monotone. Alarion hadn’t seen her rise, but she had made her way around the desk and was stooped in a formal bow, her hands clasped together under voluminous sleeves.

“And we yours,” CeeCee answered, adopting the same tone and posture without a moment’s hesitation.

It wasn’t the first time Alarion had seen two Ordinates in one place, but the experience was always unsettling. The Empire had done everything in its power to rob the two women of what made them individuals. They’d given them the same name, the same appearance, the same clothing and rituals.

And they were Vitrians. Flawed Vitrians by the standards of the Empire, yes, but the mere fact that the Empire could do such a thing to its own children was terrifying.

“To what do we owe your presence?” the younger woman asked.

“We were told you were conducting the Orphan’s appraisal. We wished to see you at work.”

Alarion exchanged half a glance with his co-conspirator, then forced a smile to his lips. “Of course. We were just about to go through my progress report. I will grab you a chai—”

“We will stand, thank you.” The old woman circled the desk and took up a position just behind and to the left of Hummingbird’s chair. That too was a ritual, he was sure of it.

Again they exchanged a glance, and this time Alarion felt as though he could all but read Hummingbird’s thoughts.

We. Need. To. Kill. Her.

She took a seat at her desk and flipped open the dossier she’d been working on as she said, “Well, Orphan, your growth has been significant since—”

“This hardly appears significant.”

“Our… apologies?” Hummingbird frowned in confusion. She glanced back briefly at the older woman, only to blush at her own faux pas. “We do not understand your meaning.”

“Given the Master Sergeant’s Aptitude, this growth would be steady, at best.”

“He has gained several hundred—”

“Over a period of months,” CeeCee interrupted again. “We will grant that it is much improved from his growth before the founding of the 238th, but only because that period was abysmal.”

“With respect—” Alarion started.

“Your mistake is that you are looking at absolute values. You need to be grading on a curve,” CeeCee continued as if she hadn’t heard him speak. Her words were harsh, but her tone was merely firm. Instructive. “Let us see that.”

Hummingbird’s eyes were practically screaming at Alarion, but she kept her expression neutral as she lifted the dossier and passed it over her shoulder.

The old woman flipped through the folder with a grace born of experience, sparing no more than a moment on each page. Even at that speed, it took nearly half a minute before she found what she was looking for amid Alarion’s complicated appraisal history and began a quick series of gestures with her free hand.

After a few seconds of quiet arcane chanting, she touched two pages and said, “Ordinate’s Document Review.”

The pages went bright, but not all at once. The light moved through them like fire licking its way along the parchment—faster in some places, resisted in others. Where it passed, the ink appeared to come loose, letters lifting off the page like glowing embers. They formed a slow, golden drift that gathered above the desk, the letters sorting themselves as they went. Name, Age, Attributes—it was all there, two sets of the same data that began to merge into one after a few more gestures from the Ordinate.

Her illusion was interesting in the way all [Ordinate] spells were. The strings of mana behind it were rigid and brittle, but utterly drowning in Sympathy. Generations of Ordinates had cast the spell—and others like it—so often that the magic had become banal. It was so common that the magic was barely magic at all, just something an Ordinate could do. Birds flew, fish swam, and Ordinates cast rote spells passed down to them along with their class.

Rote classes, skills, and magic allowed the supposed dregs of Vitrian society access to abilities above what their Aptitude might otherwise provide, but they were also a double-edged sword. The magic didn’t care that CeeCee was so ancient that Alarion had, more than once, entertained the thought that she predated the order she served. Yet at the same time, those decades of experience meant almost nothing. The spell was so regimented that its caster could never be good or bad, excellent or terrible.

Only adequate.

“This is…?” Hummingbird asked, blue eyes rapidly scanning the Status in front of her as she sought an answer to her own question. “Appraisal ten to current, is it not?”

“Correct,” CeeCee said. “Exceptional events like that Ikeda affair skew the data, but this should be all you need to give us an honest assessment.”

The younger woman pursed her lips and continued examining the data in front of her. Cognizant of her earlier concerns, Alarion took the time to memorize what his attributes should be, while mentally appending his actual status.

“He… had plateaued. Slightly,” she said at last.

“You must not shirk honesty,” her elder scolded. “It is impressive growth for any normal soldier, but if you compare his progression to historical examples like Ruin, it…” CeeCee frowned deeply as she caught sight of something unexpected, and Alarion felt his heart leap into his throat as she made a few irritable, commanding gestures toward the illusion. “What are all these nonsense classes? Ashadi Farmhand? Apprentice Tradesman?” Her eyes widened in incredulity. “Beloved of the Fickle Mothers? A gambling class?”

Hummingbird laughed.

It came out of her too fast and too loud for Alarion’s liking, like a tension-filled bubble abruptly punctured. Fortunately, her senior appeared too perplexed and incensed by Alarion’s status to notice the oddity.

“Our apologies. You have pulled the unabridged Status. May I?” She reached back expectantly, claiming the folder from her peer and folding down the corner of two pages before handing it back. “The Master Sergeant’s full Status is a disaster, his Dedication skill—”

CeeCee scowled in annoyance and pulled the skill in question to the forefront. “I see it.”

Dedication [Rare]

Description: You know there are other things in life. You just don’t care much.

Requirements: Single-Minded

Type: Passive/Training/Flaw

Effects: When choosing a skill or class to focus on for their flaw, [Single-Minded] user may select up to five skills or classes to be penalized. These skills/classes will gain no XP while chosen. For each class chosen, the user gains a minor bonus to XP to their [Single-Minded] focus. For each skill chosen, gain a slight bonus to XP to their [Single-Minded] focus. When a class skill is focused and that skill is at MAX, increase the chance of an Epiphany by an amount equal to the total XP bonus. When a non-class skill is chosen, increase the chance of an Epiphany by an amount equal to half the total XP bonus. The chosen skills or classes reset as usual after 24 hours.

Growths: STR +2. AGI +2. VIT +2. PER +2. WIL +2.

“The Master Sergeant adopted several minor Rank I classes as fodder for the skill. The three you listed, as well as Auxilia Archer and—”

“Novice Herbalist, We see it.” CeeCee was trying—and failing—to keep the annoyance from her voice as she spoke, though it didn’t feel like it was directed at either of them. “These marked pages are a simplified addendum, then?”

“As is proper,” Hummingbird confirmed.

“Hmm,” CeeCee grunted. She wasn’t blushing—Alarion wasn’t sure her heart could pump hard enough to even manage that without killing her—but it was clear to him that she was embarrassed all the same. It felt like a win, but Alarion wasn’t foolish enough to think that was true.

Ordinate or no, the woman was a Vitrian. It was never wise to wound their pride.

The old woman cast the spell again—this time from the proper documents—then gestured at the illusion hovering between them. “Let us go through the last year. In detail.”

ORD – Classified Assessment Dossier #AS-119-3912-238-A

Advisory Warning – This is an abridged Assessment Dossier prepared under Standard Rules 57(b), 58(b) and 61(c). The following changes have been applied for practical brevity:

MAX Skills and Classes that have undergone a Grade Up or Merge.

Excess Classes/Skills defined as not relevant to duty under 61(c).

Omitted skills from omitted classes reorganized into ‘Legacy’ category.

For the complete assessment results, please refer to Classified Assessment Dossier #AS-119-3912-238.

Alarion did his best to appear interested in the floating numbers and pulled his actual Status up alongside them. He knew the fake numbers by heart, and he was confident he wouldn’t slip up.

He might as well review his own.

General Information

Name – AlarionSpecies – HumanSex – MaleAge – Eighteen YearsHP – 8860/8860 [+0.3001/sec]MP – 6846/6846 [+0.9508/sec]Stamina – 11872/11872 [+19.79/sec]Aptitude – 238%UCL – 437

Attributes

STR – 1020 -> 2279AGI – 987 -> 1974VIT – 1209 -> 2178INT – 841 -> 1640PER – 909 -> 1787WIL – 844 -> 1779LUK – 4165 -> 6579

Classes KnownOrphan – Level 50 – Progress – MAXFated Warrior – Level 32 – Progress 82%

General Skills Known

Stealth – Level 10 – Progress – MAXObservation – Level 8 – Progress – 12%Pathforger’s Mastery – Level 7 – Progress – 48%Lock-picking – Level 10 – Progress – MAXInstrument Mastery (Cello) – Level 4 – Progress – 2%Leadership – Level 4 – Progress – 57%Alarion’s Unbound Warding – Level 2 – Progress – 86%

Orphan Skills Known

Orphan’s Fortitude – Level 7 – Progress – 84%Orphan’s Vow – Level 5 – Progress – 9%Lucky Strike – Level 10 – Progress – MAXMine, Mine, Mine – Level 7 – Progress – 39%Shared Burden – Level 10 – Progress – MAXBound by Purpose – Level 3 – Progress – 77%Everything They Left Behind – Level 2 – Progress – 12%

Fated Warrior Class SkillsGuardian Oath – Level 8 – Progress 81%Shatter Magic – Level 3 – Progress 19%Like Calls to Like – Level 4 – Progress – 63%Fated to Defy – Level 5 – Progress – 92%

Legacy SkillsUnraveller’s Sense – Level 8 – Progress – 98%Unbound Student of Isha – Level 8 – Progress – 77%Lifegiving Meditation – Level 7 – Progress – 92%Near and Far – Level 6 – Progress – 22%Summon Familiar – Level 10 – Progress – MAXForesight – Level 10 – Progress – MAXSympathetic Manipulation – Level 4 – Progress – 26%Fatebound Curse – Level 4 – Progress – 71%Act of Will – Level 3 – Progress – 4%Indomitable Resilience – Level 5 – Progress – 51%The Best Offense is Persistence – Level 4 – Progress – 93%Reject the Pain – Level 5 – Progress – 66%Dimensional Evasion – Level 9 – Progress – 11%Dedication – Level 6 – Progress – 17%Last Stand – Level 7 – Progress – 91%Earned SkillsOrphan’s Fated Strike – Level 2 – Progress – 6%

Traits and Feats of Strength

Avian Bane – Rank ISoulless Bane – Rank IIFiend Bane – Rank IIIJuvenile Enchanter – Rank IFavor of Lal Viren – ModerateAttribute Mastery (LUK) – Rank II

Flaws

Splintered Mana Circuits – MajorFated to Fight, Fated to Live, Fated to Lose – ModerateSingle-Minded – MinorOld Wounds – Minor