“I am the Queen of Salt! Let go of me!”

“General, the oracles have spoken, to kill the witch of the desert is folly…”

“But are your enchantments not perfect, mage Trayx?”

“I…”

“The witch of the desert needs to be judged for her crimes, do you not agree?”

The woman bound by the enchanted chains was raging as much as she could against them, her expression was crazed and filled with anger.

“But…why? I have almost finished my enchantments to create paradise, to punish her now will not bring us anything if not the wrath of nature.”

“I am the Queen of Salt! Trayx, TRAYX!”

The general lowered his gaze to her, only hatred filled his eyes.

“You are the witch of the desert, nothing more, and you shall pay! Trayx! Put her in the cage!”

“I…I…”

Past, well before the War.

The young woman with cloudy eyes was cleaning Bubble and Lake when Trinne entered her room. She had felt her friend’s Rreico before she entered the space in the Chambers of the Imperatrix, but despite it, she wasn’t quite expecting the expression on the duchess’ face.

Nay was quite torn between happy seeing her here, as Hyn had been right, Trinne had most obviously been allowed to leave the Cathedral, and anxiousness.

“Hani?” She said as she put her blades on her bed.

Trinne met her gaze, and weakly smiled. She didn’t answer though, going to sit on one of the two chairs that surrounded the small table they used to play comptoy. She swore silently as she sat down, as if the simple action was extenuating. Nay went towards her, and knelt next to her, putting a hand on her thigh in a reassuring manner, while smiling softly.

“I am happy that you are here.” She said.

“Me too.” Her Rreico wasn’t lying about it, but Trinne did pinch the bridge of her nose as she responded, as if to contradict her own words.

A few minutes passed without any of the two woman moving, before finally, the redhead decided to break the status quo.

“You want to play a game?” She asked as she pointed towards the comptoy board with her index finger. The game looked very different than the one with flat stones and little wood pieces that you often found in inns or the ones handcrafted by travelers with whatever they could find around. The board itself was a large, checkered marble square, the soldiers were perfect discs covered in either filament of gold or silver, and the Touched were cubes in dark granite, also either covered in lines of gold or silver.

Nay didn’t think Trinne wanted to play right now.

“No. No, I would like you to tell me what happened in the Cathedral. What is going on, Hani?” Nay asked in a gentle manner.

Trinne avoided her eyes. “Problems for later. Big problems for later. You first, how are Ra’fa and Liz?”

“They are great. Liz was disappointed that we could not train together before next week, and Ra’fa asked me about you, she wanted to see you as well, and was quite worried when she heard about your powers.”

Trinne groaned in a very not noble fashion. “Biach.”

“Tell me.”

“…Defin ordered me to go with you.”

“What?” Nay felt like an idiot all of a sudden, because Trinne’s sentence was making no sense to her.

“He used his authority as an Archbishop to send me with you, because where else would a God-Touched go than with his God? I had to say way more than I wanted, or he would have gone and commanded Liz as well.”

“I…what?” Nay squeezed her friend’s thigh tighter, making her grimace. The Legio immediately removed her hand. “Sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it, I get it. I wasn’t expecting it either, but I should have…listen, in our theology, where do miracles come from?” Trinne was keeping her head low.

“Well, Gods?” Nay was used to the sudden changes in subjects that her friend often used to explain something.

“Are there exceptions?”

Nay had a bitter laugh. “Not for the clergy of the Empire, no. If you even pretend there is something else…”

“There you go. Lisana, then me, you technically gave us power.”

“Erm?”

“By consequence, you are a God, a Goddess, I don’t know.”

“Oh.” The Legio was a bit taken aback. She thought about it for a short moment. “Yeah, well, it’s our dear Archbishop, his head always was a bit skewed, and when you consider how he always looks at me…it isn’t that surprising, what is…”

“Nay. He’s holding his mouth for now, but what will happen if you’re suddenly elevated to godhood by the church? What if all the Touched and priests begin listening to you? Would they listen to you or the Emperor first? Do you think Hyn will let something like that pass? And what do you think it’ll mean for your dream, what will happen to our freedom? You think we’ll get any, ever?... We need to kill Defin.” Trinne had a dark look all of a sudden.

“Whoa, whoa. Calm down. It is just the Archbishop that believes this, not the entire church. And anyway, I’m pretty sure he believed I was some kink of divinity since the beginning. It doesn’t change a thing for us, he may have an important position, but he’s not the only Archbishop in our clergy. He can’t add new gods to the pantheon just because he believes it. Actually, in this case…isn’t it good news? As long as he believes this, he will never oppose us! And right now, we can go visit the Boiling sea together! You always wanted to see it, right?”

The duchess had a smile perking up her lips.

“Sure. Without the murderous mage turning people into his slaves between me and the sea, but sure.”

“Can I assume you’re feeling a bit better, if your sarcasm is back?”

“I…yeah. Thank you. Defin…he honestly scared me. The way he looked at me when he checked if I was really Touched or not…Brrr.”

Nay caressed her back a bit, before sitting down in front of her.

After a few games of comptoy, the duchess seemed calmer.

“I can exchange my turn to get a double soldier Nay. If you do what you’re thinking of doing, you’ll lose in three turns.”

“Wha…Oh, oops.” The Legio scratched her head, she didn’t have a Touched to kill a double soldier anymore. “I’ve lost, haven’t I?”

“Since your first move, yes. But you can still force a draw if I make a mistake.”

Nay rolled her eyes to the sky.

“I hope you have a better strategy to face the Devourer.” Trinne added.

The Legio scrunched up her face. “Well…”

“What is the meaning of that expression? I don’t like it.” The duchess scrunched up her eyebrows.

The trip to Mov had been much more fun than Nay had initially imagined. After all, she wasn’t doing it on her own. She and Trinne had fought and insulted each other a bit after the fourth day stuck in the same carriage together, but the duchess had ultimately apologized, and Nay had prepared her friend’s favourite meal while borrowing the oven in the inn they had stayed for the night. Their convoy was composed of their carriage and two chariots. One of those was used to carry their supplies and some packages meant for Nephrite, and the other was used by the five guards accompanying them for the trip. The province south of Leïn was called the Boiling Ground, but people generally just used the Mov province to describe it. You would have thought that with such a name, the region was hot and arid, but truthfully the temperature was fairly equal to the one in Leïn. It was also the region providing most of the Empire in wood. After two days of travel through wheat fields, the two women had only seen trees around the cobblestone highway. The vegetation was so rich that it had even taken over some of the Imperial road, despite the heavy funds that were used to maintain it. It wasn’t just one type of tree either, because even though there wasn’t any of the coniferous variety, you almost never saw a tree and its neighbouring one being the same species. Some were twenty meters tall, without branches until the very top, straight as Vanni’s donjon in Makaka.

Nay knew of Mov’s architecture through her studies, but she was surprised by the city nonetheless. First, it had no walls, just a tall wooden palisade, and coming into it, you could have mistaken it for a normal village, as its real size was hidden by the vegetation and its weird shape. It hadn’t been built like the other cities, if you looked at it on a map, it was like an ink stain on dry parchment, some of the parts of the city centre didn’t even have buildings, only seemingly untouched woods. It was because the city had many sawmills, and honestly, it was more like many villages stuck together than one cohesive city. Logically, everything was built in wood. Yellow-brown were the most common colours of Mov’s architecture, but the most striking was the green. Even in the busiest parts, there were trees everywhere. The air was humid, but not overly hot like in the Hymere.

“We are lucky, it is not raining.” Trinne was acting as if she wasn’t as interested in the novelty of Mov as her friend currently was.

Despite some clouds, the weather was nice. And it was rare, because the main reason why the city hadn’t suffered from horrible fires despite it being constructed entirely of wood, was because the rain here was quasi constant.

Mov’s inhabitants didn’t look very different from those in Leïn, if not a bit poorer. Nay grimaced when she saw a beggar in one of the side-roads they passed. Mov was much better than Makaka, but after having lived in Leïn for a year, seeing such obvious signs of poverty was almost shocking.

Trinne had seen the same thing she had. “It is their fault, provinces have the right to follow or reject the Imperatrix’ social improvements. If they had followed her recommendations..”

“Whose fault? The beggar’s?” Nay retorted.

Trinne thought for a while. “The community and their elected. The Duke Framtyn too, or his father. I don’t believe it is pertinent to look at a social thing with an individualistic point of view.”

The beggar had already disappeared from sight, but the two women continued to discuss for a dozen minutes, before finally reaching the church of Ja in Mov.

They didn’t stop there though. Nay did look at the magnificent structure, completely different from the stone churches of Leïn or Gite, for the time they could see it, before the coach finally brought them into an adjacent street, in front of a building three stories high, between two of it exactly the same.

Nay felt unease in her friend’s Rreico, so she turned to face her.

“Trinne?”

“Don’t you think…doesn’t it look like the Assini headquarters?”

Nay looked at the building again. The colour, sure, but the windows weren’t barricaded, and it had two neighbouring houses. “Not really?”

Trinne sighed, her face becoming perfectly neutral as the coach opened the door to let them out.

“Thank you Henry.” Trinne took the extended hand of the coach to descend on the street.

Nay didn’t wait for it, she was on the road as fast as she could, a hand on her sword’s pommel. She scrutinized her surroundings, but did not find anything out of the ordinary. She relaxed a bit.

Some sort of butler got out of the house to meet them.

“Miss Nephrite is waiting for you. If you may follow me.” These were his only words. Despite his servant clothing, his clumsy reverence and his lack of decorum in his words were betraying his true job. Nay remembered a Rreico just like his as well. He was probably one of Nephrite’s men that she had sensed in Broutilles, the village in Striavie.

Trinne gave a quick look at their guards, but they didn’t follow them in. Their mission was over, after all.

The two women entered the building with their travel bags. Nay’s buttocks were hurting from sitting so long, the cobblestone road was nothing like the new railroad.

The inside of the home was much more like a warehouse than a house. The Legio blinked wildly as their guide made them cross a simple corridor to get into an immense room filled with soldiers, much bigger than the house they had entered.

"The three forefronts were fake, it is just one big building.” Trinne explained, seemingly having sensed her friend’s surprise.

“Oh.” That made sense.

The soldiers, dressed in dark clothing and for the most part having quite mean-looking faces, were playing card games or Comptoy, some were training or taking care of their weapons as well. Half a dozen, with Nephrite in their midst, were standing around a round table in the middle of the secret warehouse. Nay saw the guards that had accompanied them on their trip enter from a different door, carrying the objects that had been requested by Nephrite. From what she knew about them, the boxes were mostly filled with documents; copies of transactions of Mov’s noblemen and noblewomen. One of the boxes contained enchanted swords though. Nephrite wasn’t only keeping an eye on the Devourer, she and her men were also tasked with defending Mov’s coasts from Trechuite pirates.

“Perfect, right on time.” Nephrite raised her eyes toward the two women. Her face was as unsettling as in Nay’s memories, the burn mark deforming even her expressions.

The pleasantries were very short-lived, Nephrite and her men had to leave as soon as possible, a Trechuite ship having been spotted in the morning. The Jewel quickly explained the situation to Trinne and Nay.

“Blueanchor village is fifteen miles east from Mov. There were five hundred inhabitants, but we count something like a hundred living here now. All under his control. There are twenty soldiers, ten Touched, and the rest are just slaves, sex or for other reasons, taking care of the devourer and all his disgustingness. Merchants bring him food and trifle things every week, so that he won’t leave the village. It is the best solution we found in the short term. If you want to get into Blueanchor unnoticed, disguising as merchants is probably the easiest way, but there are many other points of entry. It is just a simple village, after all. Those that are enthralled by his power aren’t exactly fully there. “She pointed at her head. “It is quite easy to distract them or to avoid them entirely. But most of the Touched stay around the Devourer to protect him. I have a map leading you to the village, the road has been secured by us… Do you know what he is capable of? I don’t want to send our two new Jewels to their deaths, especially some as cute as you two. Your end would not be a nice one.”

Nephrite was talking fast, and Nay was having a hard time following everything. Trinne responded simply.

“We are aware, and Hyn has her methods, don’t worry.”

“You found a way to cancel his powers?”

“Make it ineffective on us, at least.”

The disfigured Jewel nodded. “Good. Very good. Make him suffer, if you can. What is your approach?”

This time, Nay answered. It was her plan, after all. “We’ll just go in and ask to talk with him.”

The Jewel blinked once. “Sorry? Even without his power, he has more than twenty guards, and God-Touched. You won’t make it out…”

“The guards are only village guards, right? No experienced soldiers or Imperial guard?” Nay verified.

“I…that is correct.”

“Then there won’t be any issues.” The Legio felt a bit relieved. She had imagined much better defenses.

Nephrite smiled. “I forgot, you are Marke’s child, after all…” Her expression relaxed a bit, and Nay could guess she was smiling behind the scars. “How is Ra’fa?”

“She is in good health. She thanks you for your help in Broutilles, by the way.”

“Very normal. And you were innocent, I would have been quite in a pickle if I had murdered the Imperatrix’ goddaughter.” She and her men began to laugh.

Trinne’s expression didn’t budge, but her Rreico was very much not neutral. Nay grimaced.

“Very well. If you need something for the road, take it. But if you exit our headquarters, you won’t be able to get back in without one of us, the door closes automatically and I didn’t have the time to make a double of the keys.” She pointed to the keychain around her belt. Then she clapped her hand once and shouted. “We leave in five minutes!”

Immediately, noise burst out in the warehouse: Soldiers moving and blades being sheathed. Five minutes later, Nay and Trinne were left alone in the warehouse.

The sandy coast of the village of Blueanchor was a great testament to how weird the Boiling sea was. The water was crystal clear, and the waves were flat and soft, not making the same sound like the ones in Gite at all. But it wasn’t a giant horizon of blue that you could see, as it was stopped abruptly by a cloud of infinite mist, blocking the view as effectively as a mountain. This almost apocalyptic wall in appearance was quite far in the distance, some parts completely white, others black and cut with green and red thunder. You could hear the growling of the lightning from where they stood. It was as if magical creatures were fighting there. The sky just above the Legio and her friend was blue and sunny though.

“I heard that the water on this coast is perfect to swim.”

“Mh.” Nay was tense. Her plan had seemed the best before, even Trinne approved, but now that they had reached the periphery of the village, she was starting to have doubts.

Her emotion was verified when she heard a voice behind them.

“Welcome travelers, what have you come to do in the village of Blueanchor?”

Trinne and Nay immediately turned around.

A woman, quite cute if not for the many bruises on her face, was standing behind the fence that served as the frontier of the village. There hadn’t been any inflection of voice in her question, no emotions. But it wasn’t her tone nor her too thin physique that shocked the Legio.

She had been surprised.

Because this woman had no Rreico.

Or maybe she had another, but it wasn’t her own, it was something that should never have been there.

She felt sick in her stomach. This woman was already dead.

Trinne was also having a hard time. “I…we came to speak to your mayor.”

The woman did not answer, she just left without a word. The way she walked made it feel like she was a puppet.

She disappeared a few yards further away, behind a bush.

“Well, he knows we’re here…I didn’t hear her come.” Trinne said, a bit frazzled. “I’ve never felt so weird talking to anyone…Nay, you okay?” The duchess finally noticed that Nay had one hand on Lake and the other on Bubble.

“No.” The Legio was starting to understand what Trayx had meant. After what she had seen in Broutilles, she thought she knew what to expect here.

That was not the case. It was way worse.

Just before, when facing this living carcass, her first reflex had been to unsheathe her sword and bring an end to the ignominy that forced a dead woman to still walk and suffer. Because all the senses she had gained when becoming a master Legio were screaming at her. What was happening here was an indescribable horror.

Nay clenched her teeth. If this man was imprisoning other people’s Rreicos…if he was doing what the Firantes had done during the War…

She was going to kill him.