Easthaven; Tanahr
Two weeks after the events of Aether and Honor.
Brennan Hawke stooped low, shoving his armored body through the cramped passageway. Metal scraped across the crumbling wall, sending a shower of pebbles to the dirt beneath his boots.
“You might wish to give me some space,” he muttered to the woman behind him.
“Take your sword off your belt so you don’t smack me,” Leneah Thorne shot back. “I’m giving you all the space I can while still lighting the passage.”
Brennan chuckled to himself as he stepped over the rubble from a partially collapsed door frame. He might sound testy, and she might seem impatient, but that is how it went with them, and he lived for it. Crawling through a shambling, musty old underground mausoleum with the love of his life at his back, he knew he’d never wanted it any other way.
“It’s been far too long,” he said softly, angling a smile in her direction. “We don’t do this nearly often enough.”
“No, we don’t. My months have been far too Brennan-scarce and crypt-free for my liking.” She lifted her arms higher so that the hovering magelight suspended by her magic stretched further down the passage than before.
“It will be the door on the left…the one with no markings,” he said, waxing businesslike again.
“Of all the ways that I thought I would meet my half-brother, this was not on the list,” Leneah said dryly. “My brother, I should say. That I have any kind of brother at all is an absolute dream come true,” she added.
Warmth at the joy in her voice suffused Brennan from head to toe. Leneah had been without family for most of her life, thinking them all to be dead. That her mother had, for even such a small time, been happy and at peace in the Dominion was not something Leneah had dared to hope. Now, this brother she had never met was hiding in a crypt below a dilapidated temple in the Scatter, a wild mishmash of historic buildings peppered amongst newer townhomes, pubs and eateries, along with some of Easthaven’s more eccentric vendors and boutiques.
“Once I give the sign, you’ll finally meet him face-to-face,” Brennan said.
“Meeting, feigning an arrest…it’s all the same,” she said wryly.
Brennan grinned at her words, then concentrated on the unassuming crypt entrance before him. This was definitely the one, judging by the five deep gouges carved under the heavy iron knob. Three quick, shallow knocks, two big thuds, and four more quick taps. He tugged off his right gauntlet and knocked on the ancient wooden door under its stone lintel with a leather-gloved hand before replacing the armor. Brennan was certain the secret knock and location Corvus had provided were solid information, but there was always a chance that something had changed, or might go wrong. He braced himself for the worst.
There was a long pause, then shuffling from within, then an answering set of four irregularly spaced knocks from inside. The door creaked open, and Corvus Sevens, formerly one of the Dominion’s deadliest assassins, stepped out into the cramped hall. Tall, silent, and expectant, he waited, barely seeming to breathe.
“Alistair Blackstone?” Brennan called out imperiously in his best Valiants captain voice, using the false name that Corvus had gone by while undercover these past weeks. At the same moment, Leneah, who had already pulled the hood of her borrowed Mageguild Sage’s robe over her coppery hair, stood menacingly behind him, hands alight with shimmering air leymagic.
Other faces peered from behind Corvus, a flicker of magelight igniting somewhere in the dim chamber behind Corvus.
“Who the hells are you?” Corvus spat the words with convincing disgust, his Dominion accent barely there.
“Get them,” another voice hissed at the moment a ball of fire leymagic flew toward Brennan. Leneah was prepared. With a whispered command, a wall of shimmering yellow-green shot up around her and Brennan, the fireball dissolving harmlessly in a puff of acrid smoke.
“They have a Suppressor,” another voice muttered from behind Corvus, a hint of fear in the woman’s words.
Brennan pushed back a smile of pride at the mention of one of Leneah’s many gifts and leymagical powers. Leymages who could successfully cancel out others’ spells were incredibly rare, and Leneah was one of the best Suppressors in all the Ivory Order.
“Oh, we have far more than that, and you’ll feel just how much more if you do not drop your weapons and douse your magefires,” Leneah said, the words loaded with deadly promise.
Brennan fished the Sending Stone he’d prepped for the occasion from the small satchel at his side. “We have them. Mages and Valiants, to me.” He spoke clearly toward the stone, tapped a pattern on its surface, and watched the air leymagic shimmer over it to show his message was sent.
Leneah reached out a hand, fast as an adder-strike, clamping a magic suppression cuff to one of Corvus’s wrists. She tugged him toward her, grabbing his other wrist to secure his arms and limit his range of movement. He glanced down at her, impressively cold, and muttered a rude curse.
Footsteps echoed from the tunnels behind Brennan and Leneah. Reinforcements, hidden just out of sight, were here.
“Mages, ready your attacks. Valiants, with me,” Brennan ordered and stormed into the chamber where the other cultists were hiding. There were only three others, and they did not fight. One look at the four Valiants flanking them, with three leymages (including a powerful Suppressor) waiting outside the door showed them how outnumbered they were. The three other soldiers made quick work of cuffing and restraining the cultists, while two Mageguild Sages who had been waiting in the wings until it was safe entered the room, both carrying kits for examining any magical evidence, weapons, or writings left behind in the dismal crypt that had served as covert meeting grounds for the suspected Harbingers now in their custody.
Brennan supervised the Valiants as they dragged the cultists out into the passageway, suddenly bathed in the glow of portable magelamps. Two of them wore masks and hoods, and he tugged away the black cloth that hid their faces. The third wore no mask and was someone he’d have recognized anywhere. Sir Horace Nightshade, a noble from an old and powerful Easthaven family, gazed at him with raw malice.
Damn. This is not good news, he thought to himself. If Nightshade was mixed up in all of this, who knows how many people he might have recruited to the cultists’ cause? Brennan suppressed a sudden flash of anger at the thought—he would have to deal with that whole mess later.
“Gag them,” he said, offering the man his best blank stare before turning his back to join Leneah. Muffled protests echoed in the chamber then the three cultists were silent, lengths of leymagic-treated cloth tied around their mouths. “Let’s get this sorry lot to the Keep.”
“Yes, sir,” the Valiant called Kesten replied briskly with a bob of his head.
Within an hour’s time, the prisoners were shut away into individual cells treated against leymagical tampering, including Corvus, who had gone to the cell furthest down the hall. None of the prisoner’s doors had bars or see-through windows, so they did not notice when Leneah guided one of their supposed own away from the grim Keep and out into the Garrison proper.
They arrived at Brennan’s office, any attending Valiants dismissed for privacy.
“Finally, I can introduce you properly. Leneah, this is—” Brennan started, but before he could say anything else, Leneah launched herself toward Corvus, wrapping one arm around his neck with a sudden, delighted laugh.
Corvus stiffened, just for a moment, then lowered his chin onto Leneah’s head, patting her back awkwardly.
“I know who this is. This is my brother. My little brother,” she managed through choked sobs.
“My big sister,” Corvus said, wry, towering a full head over Leneah. “I did not think I could meet you so soon. It’s the best sort of unexpected,” he added, his Dominion accent thickening as he worked through the emotions he was feeling.
“You are good at what you do, brother,” Leneah said proudly. “Better than many who have been at the game for years,” she added.
“You had me convinced I was to be blasted into bits,” Corvus replied, the corners of his lips lifting in a barely there smile.
“I was impressed with you both, but then I always am,” Brennan finally cut in, nodding at them in appreciation. “Corvus, you performed admirably.”
“I assume there is to be a full briefing? You saw who we are dealing with, no doubt,” the younger man replied meaningfully.
“I did, and there will absolutely be a briefing this afternoon. Emrhys brought you a change of clothes earlier, so that you can be ready for your report, and for something far more enjoyable this evening. Emrhys reserved the big room at the Duskcat for a celebratory dinner. You’ll be able to meet her too, Leneah,” Brennan said, eyes bright.
“The one you’ll be marrying…how delightful!” Leneah exclaimed. Brennan had told her everything he knew about Corvus and his past, including his devoted relationship to the talented aethermage.
Corvus lowered his head, looking just for a moment like the bashful young man he was beneath all of his soldierly trappings. Brennan sometimes forgot just how young he and Emrhys were, and how much they had been through to get here.
“She is a remarkable person,” Corvus finally replied, voice little more than a whisper.
“I know she is, if such a remarkable person as you found her,” Leneah said, and dove in for another quick hug before giving Corvus some space. This time, he hugged her back, and there was no hesitation in the gesture.
Brennan could not help the broad smile that sprung to his face watching the scene before him. Soon, Leneah would meet not just Corvus and Emrhys, but Niamh and Jeron, the wild little Sionnach girl, Rexi, and all the others who he counted as a found family over the last weeks. Then he would do what he had wanted to do for years…ask Leneah to marry him properly, not just the hasty little handfasting they’d done so many years ago. It would be something simple and private, but most important of all, a ceremony to drive home the fact that despite what she’d thought when she was younger, Leneah was not alone.
She was loved, cherished, and needed. She had family waiting for her, ready to welcome her into their world.
“What in the world are you thinking about?” Leneah watched him, a curious glint in her eyes.
“Oh, just sundry good things,” Brennan replied with exaggerated evasiveness. “Many of which we will discuss over Easthaven’s best pie and ale after this little mess with the cultists is settled.”
“I look forward to your thoughts on good things,” Corvus said unexpectedly, humor in the words.
“As do I, dearest Captain Hawke,” Leneah echoed with a joking salute. “As do I.”
Lizzie Sinclaire 