Skyclad (Fate's Anvil Book 1) Read online

  You have survived a [Mana Cascade]! For achieving this feat under the Aspect [Naked Survival], the Aspect has increased in rank to become [Naked Affinity]!

  This time Morgan slept until dawn.

  Chapter 4: End of an Age

  Rella silently padded onto the balcony with the [Oracle]’s dessert on a plain wooden tray. She placed the fresh pastries on a low table next to the older woman’s partially eaten supper, then stood quietly to the side of the wicker chair in which her mistress rested. There had once been a time when Rella would have wondered why a blind woman liked to spend her evenings on a balcony overlooking the inland sea, but nowadays she took it in stride. The [Oracle] had other ways of seeing than her eyes, after all. Keeping alert for any requests from the priestess, she let her gaze wander over the moonlit waters. The Sea of Possibility, it was called, and the City of Possibility, as well. Both were so named after the Temple of Possibility.

  Life was never easy for a child alone in any city, and for girls it was even worse, but she was silently grateful to have lived in Possibility instead of anywhere else fate might have put her. At least here there are so many people with divine-touched classes that they keep most of the worst kinds of people away, she thought to herself. After all, people were rarely willing to give in to their debased nature when there was always a [Clairvoyant] or a [Truthspeaker] around. They and other, similar classes could simply see through the walls or compel confessions, so such people with disturbing vices limited themselves to the licensed brothels, or simply stayed away from the city.

  Rella’s early childhood had been begging for scraps or stealing food on rare occasions, and showing up at the temple for the daily bread handouts. As she grew older and prettier, avoiding unwanted attention became even more difficult, even in a city such as Possibility. She was not inclined to join one of the brothels or take her chances on her own without some sort of patron, so when a scribe at the temple had offered her a place as an attendant, she’d jumped at the opportunity for free meals and a safe place to sleep. She’d thought her next few years would be scrubbing floors and emptying chamber pots, but to her quite happy surprise, she’d been tasked with attending the [Oracle] herself. Gifts as powerful as those granted to the [Oracle] came at a heavy price, and the woman had finally lost her physical sight as those gifts simply showed her too many things for a mortal mind to process.

  She had no [Class] as of yet, even at fifteen winters of age. Rella had reached level ten, but the skills she’d developed while living on the street had led to her only being given unpleasant options, such as thief or swindler, or things even less savory. She’d hoped working in the temple would provide her with more options, so she’d refused to choose right away. Surprisingly, the [Oracle] had insisted she attend classes with the other students and acolytes of the temple, so Rella had learned to read and write. After two years of spending time writing out letters dictated by her mistress and running them all over the temple grounds or into the city, the [Messenger] class had finally presented itself. Still, she refused to commit to it. She’d hoped to unlock even better options by studying various schools of divination offered by the temple, but hadn’t yet had any luck. Predicting the future through ritual and rite was something only a few could learn, and truly prophetic gifts were handed out by the various deities, and that extremely sparingly. Rella’s internal musings were soon interrupted by the woman sitting next to her.

  “Go ahead and finish off those pastries, girl. I always request extra just so I can share with you, but you always wait until you take the leftovers back to the kitchens to indulge yourself,” the woman grumbled at her. The girl did not take offense at her tone; they’d fallen into a very comfortable kind of companionship over the previous three years. At least in private, anyway. After all, it was pointless to stay formal at all times around the person who helped you bathe and dress, and the [Oracle] was not one to bother with such wasteful awkwardness.

  The older woman seemed to give a contented sigh as Rella devoured the remaining desserts, but the girl knew her mistress and her moods better than anyone else. She could tell the old woman was anxious about something, but she knew the [Oracle] would either tell her or not, and didn’t try to pry. It seemed her mistress was in a talkative mood this night, as she continued once Rella had washed the last of the pastries down with a glass of tea.

  “Do you know why the priestesses and their ilk fawn so hideously for my favor, Rella?” the [Oracle] asked her, then continued as though she’d already heard Rella’s reply. “I am old, and they each wish for me to name them as my successor.”

  “They don’t see the price you pay, mistress,” Rella responded, unable to keep her disdain for the temple sycophants out of her voice. To the nightmares and visions that plagued the [Oracle] more nights than not, Rella was the woman’s only witness and confidant. “They don’t know what terrible things you dream, or how you weep from them.”

  The blind woman turned her head in the girl’s direction, as if able to see right through the silk band that covered her eyes. For all she knew, the woman actually could see her. “They sense something coming, and fear because I keep silent. Every talent and god touched from Eastharbor all the way north to Arctern has probably felt it. The possible futures are too chaotic to interpret, and this terrifies them.”

  “I don’t understand, mistress,” Rella replied in confusion. “Why are they so afraid of vague premonitions and confusing visions? Aren’t they used to that?”

  The [Oracle] replied with nothing more than a cryptic smile, which only heightened Rella’s confusion. “It is good that you ate something while you had the chance, girl. I wasn’t certain you would. You won’t have much of an appetite after, and it will help you recover your strength.”

  “You’ve never spoken a word about my future since you took me in. Why now?” Rella asked with growing concern.

  “Because the city is under attack while all foresight is disrupted, and the temple will be next,” the [Oracle] replied flatly.

  Rella barely managed to contain her shock. “Who would dare? The City of Prophets stays neutral, and the Bargain of Kings means—”

  “Absolutely nothing to the slavers from Deskren. They rarely get the chance to capture anyone with divination talents, and everyone’s been blinded for weeks. It presents an opportunity they’ll not be willing to miss.”

  Rising panic threatened to choke Rella. The [Oracle] had spoken without a hint of fear, but with a touch of sadness. “Can we do anything at all?” the girl asked, as the older woman stood up from her chair and stepped forward to the balcony as if she could see it perfectly.

  “We can do nothing,” said the [Oracle], “but you have a choice to make, and then you must flee, no matter which you decide. A True Vision comes, and it will be my last. I am simply too old to run.”

  Rella had no words with which to respond. An [Oracle]’s True Visions were powerful, uncontrollable, and undeniable messages. They were sendings directly from the Goddess of Prophecy, and could herald anything, from the fall of kingdoms to the birth of Heroes, or the beginnings and endings of an Age. The woman standing before her had not spoken a True Vision in Rella’s entire lifetime. Rella stood with mouth agape, frozen in a sort of panic, but unsure of what to do.

  “Close your mouth before you catch flies, girl,” the [Oracle] snapped at Rella. “We have some time yet. Not much, but enough for you to decide.”

  “Decide what? Which way to run? If Deskren is attacking, you are the target they want most. As interesting as what I’ve read about True Visions is, I’m more interested in not wearing a slave collar.”

  “To decide if you will accept the [Mantle of Prophecy] and become the next [Oracle], of course.”

  Rella’s legs promptly gave out, and she fell right on her rump on the stone balcony while the old woman cackled and bent over, clutching her sides. The sudden bruising on her backside didn’t even register as her face twitched back and forth between shock and surprise, before sud
den horror dawned as Rella realized the woman was utterly serious. “I don’t see what’s funny about it, mistress. The mantle is only passed on when an [Oracle] dies.”

  “That definitely was funny, even knowing you had a better than even chance of doing it! Better to laugh before one’s end than cry about it.” The [Oracle] straightened herself up and spoke again with a more serious tone. “Besides, it’s not all bad. My Sight gets clearer as the moment approaches. Deskren’s little raid won’t be as successful as they hoped. Tragic, yes, but no Age ends without bloodshed. But I am too old to run with you, and too recognizable. I will not survive the night no matter your choice, but I hope you will take the Mantle and flee. What was it you always said about growing up with the other children in the city? Survive now, cry later.”

  “Yes,” Rella said in a half-whisper, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her temple attendant uniform. “But it’s been a long time since I actually had any practice at it.” Her stomach was turning flips under her heart, but she managed to keep from tossing up the recently eaten pastries, if only just barely. “How will I run away in any case? Won’t I be blind to anything up close?”

  “I can’t tell you everything, but I can say that you won’t lose your worldly sight for years, if at all. The Mantle itself will show you more, but it binds me from granting too much knowledge, as it will you. It affects every [Oracle] in different ways.”

  Rella slowly got her feet under herself and stood back up, stepping to the balustrade next to her friend. “And if I refuse the Mantle?” she asked, with a hesitant waver in her voice.

  “Then you still flee, and I jump from this balcony before they can put one of their abominable collars round my neck, and the Mantle passes by the will of the Goddess alone. There’s still a chance it would fall on you in that case, anyway. A small one, but a chance, nonetheless.”

  “And if I accept? Will I be on the run forever, or bound to some ruler, collared in debt if not fact?”

  The old woman snorted with derision. “No [Oracle] has ever been so bound, unless they chose it to bring about a better possible future they saw. It takes a God’s intervention to blind the stronger seers, and more than Gods to blind the Mantle’s gifts. What’s coming isn’t their doing, or I would have already Seen.”

  “I thought you were unable to talk to me about these things…” Rella’s mind was reeling at these new revelations. The [Oracle] never spoke about how the Mantle worked. “And how can anything do what the Gods cannot?”

  “Some things simply cannot be foreseen. Elder Dragons are beyond any Sight or prediction, as are certain places like the Wildlands. Another thing none of us can predict are travellers arriving from other worlds. Worldwalkers simply cause so much change, they leave the fates unstable when they step through to Anfealt. The [Oracle] announces these strangers only when they arrive. We are blind to them until they actually set foot here. And there are also exceptions from time to time, things Seen that we normally cannot, and things we simply do not See.”

  “If you can tell me all this, then that means at least part of me has decided,” Rella stated. “How will I know where to go or what to do?”

  “The Mantle does not control the [Oracle], Rella. It simply gives knowledge. What you do with it is up to you.” The woman turned back to face out from the balcony, as if looking at the mountains across the inland sea. “There are gaps in the stone you can use to climb down from here. That was how I often got away from the temple without being seen when I was closer to your age. The city will not fall, not completely. You will at least be able to escape, for now. Whether or not you return to the gibbering sycophants and their games will be up to you. Not every [Oracle] stays in the temple.”

  Rella was about to respond, but as she opened her mouth to speak, words fled. The mountains across the sea suddenly stood out in stark relief, outlined in the night by flickering purple lights. The air around where she and the [Oracle] stood seemed to thicken, and Rella could no longer move, or even draw breath. The older woman’s hand snapped out and latched onto Rella’s wrist with more strength than she’d ever shown in the years Rella had been the [Oracle]’s attendant. The moment the woman’s hand closed around her wrist, Rella received a notification.

  The [Oracle] has invoked the Right of Succession and offers you the [Mantle of Prophecy]!

  Will you accept this Gift and the Burdens it entails?

  The air around Rella seemed to hold her in place as it waited, and the light over the mountains winked out, only to come back a heartbeat later with even more intensity. She could barely hear the older woman rasp, “Choose, child, we are out of time!” And as the ominous purple lights flashed beyond the mountains once again, Rella made her Choice .

  For a brief moment Rella’s mind shattered into a kaleidoscopic whirlwind of images, and then she felt a presence pushing the storm of confusion back. It is much easier this way, she heard the older woman’s voice in her mind. The burden of the transition is shared when the Mantle is passed in this manner. Those who aren’t so lucky often go insane if the others aren’t able to get through to them in time.

  Rella’s awareness had expanded. She could sense the temple grounds behind them and the city below. What she had just been told finally pierced her moment of wonder, however. What do you mean the others? she thought.

  The Mantle carries our predecessors, of course. It is one of the secrets we are incapable of speaking. There will be only me for now, but in time, you will learn to call upon the others who once carried the Mantle. Rella could feel the humor in the other woman’s mental voice. Her presence had a definite calming effect on the girl, otherwise Rella would have been swept away by the sheer amount of information she was taking in.

  She could see the city with an odd, flickering detail. The outlines of people stood out as they moved around, seeming to dart in three or four directions at the same time before settling on a single direction. She could also see fighting, and the captured. The collars stood out to her vision like sickly glowing greasy ropes around necks, and gave her a feeling of utter revulsion. Deskren compulsion collars were illegal in every nation north of the Elemental Desert for a reason, and Rella could see that reason displayed in how the captives complacently marched themselves toward the docks and into the waiting ships. The sickened feeling in her belly reached new heights as she realized the smaller shapes had to be children. There has to be a way to save them, mistress! Rella thought at the other woman.

  Not without letting them capture the [Oracle], and that would end with half the continent in chains. Do you think I did not try? That is the heaviest burden of the Mantle, to witness evil and do nothing, in order to avert even greater evil.

  Rella could see violence playing out on the lower floors of the temple below them, but few of the guards had fallen. Close range precognitive abilities seemed to be affected by the disruption to a far lesser degree than divination had been, and nearly everyone employed by the temple had such skills in at least some measure. Her observations were brushed aside, however, as the pressure around her and the [Oracle] increased. The whirlwind of visions swirling around them seemed to condense, like shattered glass reforming itself into tiny windows with spiderwebbed cracks. The jagged windows drew more of the smaller pieces into their edges, and clumped together to form larger and yet larger panes that gave glimpses of scenes that Rella’s mind simply could not place into context.

  In one window she saw a giant cylinder painted white and blue, flying across the sky on wings that did not move. In another, hundreds of structures rose from the ground, taller than anything she thought could be built, covered in glass, flashing lights, and moving images of people in strange clothing. Metal and glass boxes moved more swiftly than any horse along grey paths with yellow lines, travelling past each other at terrifying speeds, yet never touching. In other windows men and women in strange cloth-covered armor pointed even stranger weapons at each other that spat death, while behind them smaller flying things flew past so quickly t
he air itself was shattered in their wake, followed by stone and steel buildings simply vanishing in incomprehensible bursts of destruction.

  The windows slowed as they clumped together into even larger panels; like crystals shattering in reverse, Rella could see the cracks melt and fade. Millions became thousands became hundreds became tens, and then there were thirteen flickering doorways encircling the pair of women. Each door a window shifting between different visions with flashes of pale, melting blurs. Rella found she couldn’t turn her head or shift her attention away, and as one window slid out of her line of sight, the next came into view. The blurring shifts on its surface slowed, and then solidified in perfect clarity. Violet and silver lightning flashed stark shadows off the snowcapped mountains onto the besieged city below. Standing hand in hand with Rella, the [Oracle] began to Speak.

  “The Windows of Fate open yet again; Strangers tread these lands.” The [Oracle] did not raise her voice, yet the air carried her words. Rella could sense the entire city falling still, bound at attention by the power of a True Vision that compelled them to stop and hear the words.

  “The Harlot tames the vicious night; strike her daughters at your peril!” and the scene in the window in front of Rella shifts to show a young woman in a flimsy dress running barefoot, chased by three rough looking men who are laughing. Her swollen eye and bruised neck tell a story that needs no divination to guess. As one of the men closes on the girl and takes a drunken swing, she hits back with a rock she’s picked up. The man pushes her away with a snarl, and the girl falls through a hole in the ground and appears in another city. The gate disappears, and the vision shifts from the confused men to the even more confused woman before the window slides away from view and another approaches.