Opening [System: Time] I was able to verify his claim. It had been a little over thirteen months since I had entered the Dungeon. Either time ran differently in the Dungeon, or Summerlands had screwed us over. That was the most likely event. Everyone knew that Summerlands might return you anywhen in time, that it opened only a bit more than a year in the future could be considered luck.

The passage of time was real. A linear progression that effected cooldowns, and made my yearly Respawn available again. That was interesting to note, something to keep in mind as a possible workaround if things got desperate, I could portal back and forth from Summerlands until a time jump I was hoping for was triggered. I didn’t have to live or experience that year; System would do a comparison based on the date used and the current date to restore functionality.

It seemed something that should have been used, the Sidhe were tricksters at heart and would enjoy employing this type of gimmick. Perhaps this was the case, but I’d never heard anyone mention it if that were the case. My memories. My knowledge. A past that I could remember experiencing.

Truthfully, the time skip would not be beneficial for most people. Other than resetting System cooldowns it was more onerous than beneficial, the break-in continuity, missing the events that occurred with friends and family made the option less attractive. Additionally, not everyone had access to the Summerlands, that ability was System awarded once a person reached Rank: Commoner. Although the vast majority of Sidhe had attained that rank or higher, there was still a significant percentage of the population that was Rank: Peon.

Those numbers did not include children who had yet to ascend.

I doubted I would play with what I considered a System bug, not for anything other than dire circumstances. The Summerlands was too unpredictable to rely on. This time I had moved forward a year, it was entirely possible next time I would move even further in time.

In some rare instances, people had been known to travel backward in time. How Summerlands solved the paradox of a person being in the same place at the same time was beyond my understanding. Suffice it to say, it was magic. The same kind of magic that allowed the Summerland realm to connect to all times, all places, and all multi-verses.

I did pause briefly to consider how the System would handle and adjust skill cool-downs if you were transported to the past. It would be just my luck that [Respawn] would have a negative net number that would have to be satisfied before becoming useful again. That scenario made my decision not to risk the quirks of Summerlands even more rational.

Still, [System: Time] had corroborated their claim. And if it had been more than a year, what did that mean for Cedric, Uron, and Lohne?

“Where are my people?” I demanded as I responded to their provocation and remembered the challenge to my identity. “My Vassals should be able to vouch for my identity. That is if you have no way of testing for illusion or glamour.”

“Your people? We have been the only ones here for over a year. The only other people we see are those sent from Duke A’Daoine to monitor and collect Silinium and gems,” the Abhac spokesman claimed.

“You know nothing about the people that closed the dungeon that used to exist here?” I asked in disbelief.

Understanding blossomed across the Abhac’s face followed by uncertainty. It was obvious he knew at least something about the CERN closure, even if he wasn’t familiar with Cedric, Uron, and Lohne’s disposition and current whereabouts.

“There have been a few rumors. Tales and gossip mostly,” he admitted. “You'd best try contacting your people to find out what is true.”

“Leroy!” One of the other Abhac exclaimed supplying a name for the Abhac in charge. “You can’t mean to just let him go without checking his identity!”

“Not our place,” Leroy argued. “We get paid to farm the Silinium and maintain the mine. That’s all. If he is who he says he is, then it would be best for us to forget we ever came across him. The instability we monitored has been solved. The rest is for someone else to deal with.”

“I’m going to gather the rest of the people I brought with me from the Summerlands, and then we are going to go outside. The Silinium and ley-lines interfere with the communication arrays on my M-AI,” I said letting him know what was going to happen, whether they liked it or not.

They gave their tacit agreement, perhaps finally realizing the danger they were in as flashes of fire and ice were released, nothing dangerous, just bits of hyper-energy being released as I restrained the urge to punt an Abhac or ten.

Returning to the small opening hidden and protected by the Geode, I gathered Duchess Wynne, her people, and the Cernunnos. “It appears the Summerland has played tricks and we have returned a year from when I entered the dungeon. Much has transpired in that year, most having to do with Lord Kel and Lord Haygan. The Abhaic running the mine doubt that I am who I claim to be. Even the sharing of True-Name has not persuaded them otherwise.”

“I’m not sure if they are completely inept, corrupt, or simply poorly outfitted, but they are cautious, they don’t want to become embroiled in Seelie machinations. Let’s get out of here, see who we are able to contact, and formulate a plan based on whatever intelligence we can gather so we can be on our way.”

“I have gotten System quests to save my people, those I tasked with destroying the dungeon entrance. I want to find out what is going on with them, and if they are safe,” I seethed furiously.

They were a much-subdued group as they followed me, joining up with the Abhaic who were also heading out of the tunnel system. I felt a twinge of sympathy for the Knockers. Their return. Their freedom. All of it marred by my anger, and what I was sure was going to be Politics. They had been so relieved to finally be free of CERN, only to find that that freedom may yet come at a cost.

I had barely stepped past the waterfall that obscured the mine before I activated my wrist device and attempted to contact Cedric, Uron, and Lohne in that order. All attempts at contact resulted in the same message. Their devices were not in service. I wasn’t sure if that meant they had been switched off temporarily, lost, or confiscated and destroyed as they were hacked and examined.

I was afraid it was the last one, and that they had been captured and were being held as hostages. If that were the case, I would need to rescue them. But freeing them would mean I needed information. I wondered who was holding them and for how long, those questions much worrisome than why they were being held and where. Sidhe did not build jails, what they built to hold those that had been captured were torture chambers. Holding cells that allowed Sidhe innate regeneration ability to restore a person to health so the torture could be repeated.

Seelie and Unseelie had elevated torture into an art form. The Sidhes ability to regenerate, their long lives, and the healing nature of magic, meant that much could be done, atrocities to flesh and form that only those with Sidhe constitution could survive.

Torturers that were so skilled they could bring their captives to the brink of death, over and over again. Each time the victim begging for real death and release from torment. The Sidhe’s flesh would heal, but their mind? Their mind could be so broken it would never heal.

Those poor souls became whimpering and drooling automatons, broken and forgotten examples that were used to scare and reinforce Seelie and Unseelie's authority. Or they became sexual deviants, people that delighted in pain only capable of sexual satisfaction when there was pain involved, becoming cruel and destructive practicing bed-sports that was violent and bloody. Sex became a dance of survival for them and their partner, each encounter a knife’s edge from death. They had learned the lessons of the torturer at the hands of masters, and although they preferred to receive pain, they became adept at giving.

They became the apprentices for those Masters of pain and insanity. Never as talented. Still their sexual perversions became whispered warnings. These were not the playful bit of spank or tickle that some engaged in. These were bloody scenes of carnage. Sex used as a weapon.

And if I had been gone for over a year, how long had my Vassals been subjected to something like this? Because no matter what you thought of the Seelie, you could be certain of one thing. If you found yourself in their power, if you frustrated or denied them, the reckoning would be the stuff of nightmares.

As a Ranked Prince, my Vassals should have been protected. Even the Seelie and Unseelie Monarchs should have considered the political and magical ramifications of poking the hornets’ nest, of incurring the enmity of a being that was blessed with both Beleros’ and Cyronax’s bloodlines. Awakened bloodlines that fueled by magic and fury could be so destructive as to level cities.

Giving up on trying to contact my Vassals, I next attempted to contact Brianne. As my assistant, she had enough authority to keep those I had hired fed and sheltered. I’d set up accounts that should have ample gold to keep them afloat for ten years let alone one.

Finally, my device connected, and Brianne’s concerned countenance was projected into a life-size hologram, her guilt and fear palpable even through the magical device.

“Your Highness,” she began her voice filled with anguish and despair. Tears began flowing as recriminations and uncertainty revealed her emotions. It was obvious I had lost her trust.

I would find out why.