Tallah

Four men had been found unconscious at their posts. None harmed in any other obvious way aside from being knocked senseless. They all had no recollection of events. Quistis handed them over to the Sisters’ ministrations just in case.

Now Barlo made his report on what they had to say upon being cleared by lady Aliana of Tohman.

“Did they remember anything?” she asked. Not likely. But one never knew.

“All normal in the watch. No movement. No visits. Regular night. All report the same. One moment everything fine, the next waking in the Sisters’ care, confused but otherwise unharmed.” Barlo set his full report on her desk and crossed his arms.

“No victims. No blood. No clues. Nicely done.”

Quistis yawned while skimming the document. It was all neatly written in Barlo’s impeccable hand but mostly there for bureaucracy’s sake. Nothing to suggest who the attacker might have been. The why of it was rather simpler and needed neither of them voicing it.

“Aye. Straight into the Commander’s bedchamber. Colour me impressed.” Barlo looked anything but happy, a dark frown creasing his already craggy face. “I’ll form up a squad and see about kicking some doors down.”

“You’ll do nothing of the sort.” Quistis filed away the scroll and finished writing her own report, rising from the desk to don her cloak. “You’re with me for the day and the foreseeable future. I want Rumi on this.”

That got her a raised eyebrow and a confused tilt of the head from the large vanadal but no comment.

“And get Vial to offer her support,” she went on, absentmindedly checking her schedule. Her plaques should be done by now and they would be heavy to carry.

“Ye’re taking Rumi’s claws away?”

Barlo now stood to attention, large hands behind his back, small on his daggers. Ever the obedient soldier, she liked how easily he rallied to changes in structure. For now, she needed someone that could keep up with her mood.

Two empty mugs littered her desk, dried up dregs on their bottom. When had she had the second cup? Beginning of the night? Earlier? No matter. Her heart rate was elevated enough even without drinking more of the poison. A bit of air was just the thing.

The vanadal’s surly, reliable presence steadied her mood.

“I need Aidan for something else and can’t waste him on a goose chase. Come.”

She swept past him into the hallway and down the narrow flight of stairs, out into morning’s soft light. The new day looked wretched to her with nary a cloud in the sky and barely any wind, a far cry from the storms of early-Winter. One of those would’ve fit nicely in her schedule just then.

Had she slept at all since the attack? She supposed she must’ve dozed off at some point but for the life of her she couldn’t remember when or if.

“Ye don’t seem terribly concerned about this breach of security we’ve just had.” He was at her back, talking as casually as if they were discussing the weather.

Well, she supposed, they pretty much were. Anti-empire sentiment was as common as snow in Winter in a free city like Valen. In Drack it could cost your head to comment on the empress, and a brazen attack like this would’ve led to exactly what Barlo had suggested. People would have swung for old crimes just to make the point.

“I’m not concerned at all,” she admitted. “Why would I be?”

Morning smelled of so many things in the crisp chill of late Winter, but mostly of fresh bread. It made her stomach grumble, aware that she’d barely eaten in the day since the attack, but she wanted things in order before she sat down for breakfast. Dinner? Both?

Crossing the courtyard, she caught a glimpse of the changes she insisted on in the Citadel’s watch. Two soldiers at each ingress point, two more watching from above and watching each other. Redundancy introduced, schedules shifted, people completely swapped out and around their duties. Rumi would be doing random check-ins. Not something a dedicated invasion force wouldn’t be able to handle, given time and opportunity, but enough to deter another mishap.

Barlo fell in next to her, silently eyeing the same preparations.

“Sneaking into the Lord Commander’s own bedchamber without a drop of spilled blood issa rather hard message to ignore,” he rumbled. A slight hint of disapproval was all the protest he offered. “I imagine that’s not something we should be shrugging off. The Commander’s been chasing that Crepuscular for a full day straight now.”

“Of course. He should be back by now I imagine. Could you do what that Crepuscular did?”

“Of course.”

“Could Vial or Aidan?”

“Not bloodless, no. I reckon Aidan would choose not to leave a single warm body and call that the message.”

“There you go.”

More silence followed as they crossed the still frozen grounds. Some minders spread salt and sand across the main thoroughfares in anticipation of the daily bustle. Their Storm Guards were already out and exercising in the chill, thick clouds rising from laboured breaths as they trained in full armour.

“Get the right information, the right tools for the job, the opportunity, and you can topple an empire that spans a world,” Quistis mused. “Use them to scribble nonsense on a ceiling and all you’ve achieved is arming your enemy with forewarning. So again, why would I be concerned?”

“Ye concern me sometimes, Quis.”

He bellowed some instructions at a pack of fresh recruits. Vial was out with them, overseeing their sparring. Quistis waved him over.

“Why is that?” she asked as they waited. Something could worry Barlo. She found it amusing that it was she of all people.

“Blood’s colder than mine. Rare in a human. Bloody terrifying if I may be candid.”

She didn’t argue, only signalled for Vial to be at ease.

“Have you seen the Commander?” she asked. “I expected him back by now.”

“Haven’t yet, but we did see lightning striking at the Agora when out on the morning run. Sporadic clashes all of yesterday but no call for support. I think he’s given up the chase and is returning on foot.”

“Good. Relay that I want him to get breakfast first, coffee second, and then I want a word with all of us in the afternoon.” She handed over his orders. “I’m assigning you to Rumi. She will be investigating this breach until we either have a head on a spike or a good, strong lead. See that she doesn’t bloody anyone needlessly. Falor will sign the order when you show it to him.”

“Aye, ma’am. Where will you be? The Commander’s bound to ask after you if you don’t run into each other.”

She sighed and her breath misted white in the clear air.

“Barlo and I will be following up on the Cinder investigation. I don’t aim to let that slip my grasp due to another surprise. I’m sick up to here of distractions. We’re getting the plaques today. Barlo’s my minder.”

“I’ll get a squad leader for the lads then go and find Rumi. Will that be all, ma’am?”

“Yes. See to it, please.”

The mood in Valen was jovial even with celebrations mercifully winding down. Early-morning songs echoed from bars. A crispness in the air itself. The intoxicating scents on the wind, of baking apples and cinnamon rolls. Stalls mushroomed on corners now that the worst of the blizzards had ebbed and some of the passes had reopened.

They passed an elend selling watered-down coffee. The sniff of it made her mouth water.

Valen’s biggest terror, the one most hated woman in the city’s long history, had come back and got herself beaten down before she could inflict another grievous wound. Falor’s name would be in songs for centuries to come and Quistis would be surprised if that statue of him wasn’t already being erected somewhere.

“Yer lady chose a good time to come,” Barlo said. “Never seen the place so spirited.”

They joined the queue waiting for the lift to finish its return trip from the Lower City, their crest assuring them a front spot.

Quistis forced her mood into trying to enjoy the moment and not think of the issues at hand. She failed. An invasion into Falor’s quarters would, inevitably, leak and there would be talk. This fragile peace would strain then, the hero thwarted and caught with his knickers down—

“Imagine how they’ll all sing once they learn the Commander’s beaten off another attacker. Naked, no less.”

She looked up at Barlo, drawn out of her brooding. “What? But he didn’t…”

“Don’t matter if he did or didn’t. Someone attacked ‘im in bed and got kicked in the teeth. Commander’s alive and well, not even nicked. I tell ye. He’s set to becoming a true Valen hero. Makes ye wonder if the empress planned it when she sent us here.”

“Kiss-ass,” she muttered. “What got you so cheerful?”

Barlo only tapped the hilts of his curved swords, his atagans. Even the dull knobs on the ends gleamed like a polished mirror.

“Got favoured. Hard to be sour. Curious why ye’re in a mood. Lady Panacea don’t come down that often, and certainly not on a night when the Heir to the Empire banishes the Bane of the Empire back into the shadows.”

Quistis winced and scowled up at him.

“Please don’t use those titles. People will overhear and parrot. And you know the Commander hates the melodrama.” She looked around and, sure enough, there were some gawking merchants and their haulers just a few steps away, waiting for the same ride down. She gave them a glare, daring them to repeat the two monikers. All avoided her gaze. “And anyway, the last time the Lady came down, she started a war. Garet burned all Summer until Wither rains and the empress’s peacekeepers got to it. I’m amazed not more people are wary of what her coming may mean. People read into omens.”

The lift ground to a halt, stopping with a hiss of steam. They packed in together with a host of merchants and adventurers almost too drunk to stay on their feet. She scrunched up her nose at them, displeased at how they spent their Summer-time earnings while cooped up for Winter. Work for them would pick up soon and Valen would breathe again more easily.

“And then Garet banned healers from its walls. The edict still stands, did you know?” She went on even if Barlo hadn’t said anything else on the subject

“Aye. Dullards cut off their noses to spite their face. Still, chin up. Thaw’s on the horizon. We may finally move on.”

Quistis’s wet boots and sodden socks disagreed with his optimistic sentiment, and she along with them. It was still a long time to Thaw and she wasn’t certain she liked this cheerful Barlo much. She preferred someone sharing her surly mood but it seemed Cassandra’s coming had lit a fire in the vanadal warrior. The city’s joyful mood infected him too, and annoyed her.

The blue sky above Valen vanished as they fell between the tallest of the Lower City’s red-roofed buildings, the lift’s carriage gently slowing to a halt with the same, predictable hiss of escaping steam.

As the cage opened she found herself locking eyes with a painted-face man. She took in the two colours on his features, gold and red, and immediately groaned. The man grinned upon noticing her.