He needed to figure out what to do. Protecting the family was his responsibility. Even if Melchor was physically the strongest, Ismael was the one who had to lead the Blackburns away from the ruin that was knocking on their door.
It was such a mess. The whole reason he’d had Melchor bring the Elroy children here was to divide the other Rainlords’ attention and make it easier for Parson to end the siege at Rheinhal quickly. After which, Parson would come to Luzo and help House Blackburn rout the enemy before anyone became the wiser. But now, Ismael doubted Marshrock would hold out that long.
If it had only been Houses Sebolt and Delaguna, then it might have been manageable, but that one extra Sandlord had proven to be the dreaded wrench in this machine. He was the reason they had completed their soul net so quickly. With all the attempts at interference that the Blackburns had been running, it should have taken at least twice as long. But no.
Certainly, it hadn’t been the best plan with Ibai here, but Parson hadn’t given Ismael much choice. If Ibai’s presence were discovered, it would be the end of everything. It would not matter that Ibai had never actually killed anyone before, nor would it matter that Ibai was Ismael’s only child--the only child that he and his wife had ever managed to create in the past thirty-eight years of trying. The other Rainlords would never allow an aberration to live. There were no exceptions. Especially now, after having kept Ibai a secret for so long, after what his family had done in order to keep Ibai a secret.
No, it was much too late to reconcile. The Elroys would want his house to drown in lakefire before the end.
‘Have you decided yet?’ came Rholtam’s voice with the echo of privacy.
Ismael looked up to see him floating above the center table. To his eyes, the reaper was a pterosaur, glowing faintly gray all over but also with only about a third of its flesh still intact, the rest decaying gorily or just missing altogether. He’d always wondered why his subconscious had chosen to see reapers as undead, extinct flying reptiles. Even taking into account his youth studying paleontology, pterosaurs still seemed like a strange choice. He had more important things on his mind at the moment, however.
“No,” he said aloud, as there was no one else in the Hall to hear. “Tell me what I should do, Rholtam. Tell me how this can end well for us.”
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every night at midnight PST by ~400 words.
"Elroys would want see" should there be a "to" Here?
ReplyDeleteShoulda been, yeah. Decided to just reword it a little. Thanks for the catch, Ben.
ReplyDelete"a thirds" -> "a third"
ReplyDeleteHuh, that's interesting. I always thought servants saw reapers as whatever made the most sense to them. That he doesn't know why he sees them the way he does means there may be something else at play.
ReplyDeletewell guess melchor was lying when he said he came to take the kids somewhere for protection
ReplyDeleteWhat's "lakefire?"
ReplyDeleteA Rainlord expression. Not a thing that actually exists on Eleg.
ReplyDeleteAww, I was imagining some sort of ceremonial lake in the mountains with a high concentration of organic chemicals, extremophile bacteria that convert it into methane, and the whole thing on fire all the time, that they used to throw high-profile criminals into during the Dark Ages.
ReplyDeleteFire would burn the methane up too quickly for it to be sustained for very long, let alone indefinitely. And if the bacteria were just THAT fast at converting the water/chemicals into methane, then the lake/chemicals would simply dry up too fast.
ReplyDeleteAlso, it would totally smell like farts. Kinda puts a damper on the whole badass ritual element.
Stick a hot springs in there, and it's not farts. It's BRIMSTONE.
ReplyDeleteWouldn't the whole "control over both elements of H2O" give the rain lords the capability for limited fusion? But I guess as far as a term for the collective wrath of a clan of water utilizing servants "lake fire" is pretty damn good.
ReplyDeleteNot really, Zeff can only produce things with a chemical makeup of H2O - not hydrogen individually, nor oxygen. Think of it as classical elemental water, and that's how he has to interact with it in circumstances without much control.
ReplyDeleteNot really. Most of the stinky stuff is derived from sulphur. I'm pretty sure methane is odorless, for example.
ReplyDeleteMy personal guess had been some kind of incendiary weapon, like napalm except more servant-y and generally awesome.
Oh, Frost! does Zeff get compounds of hydrogen and oxygen, or specifically dihydrogen monoxide? Admittedly, the only other thing I can think of is peroxide, but that has to come in handy somewhere.
ReplyDeleteHuh. Didn't know that.
ReplyDelete:)
ReplyDeleteHydronium ion. I'm not sure that's stable without an acidic chemical being present, but even if it isn't, free hydrogen.
ReplyDeleteI asked whether Asad would get silicon monoxide as well, and that's what he said - regardless, I'm beginning to lean towards "no".
ReplyDeleteHowever, the fact the compound materialization users exist makes me wonder if transfiguration users might have similar capabilities, which would be much more powerful.
Yeah, almost all of nature's foul smells come from sulfur. Rotten eggs (hydrogen sulfide), fart odor (methyl and ethyl mercaptan), skunk smell (various complex mercaptans), and even garlic breath all come from sulfur compounds.
ReplyDeleteH2O2 releases an oxygen. It never produces hydrogen ions.
ReplyDeleteHydronium (released by acids) is H3O+. H2O2 is hydrogen peroxide. Hydroxyl (released by alkalis) is OH-.
ReplyDeleteNo fair. There's someone present who actually knows the answer and has no real reason to be cagey about it. Also, mysticism aside the rain and sand powers have gotta be well-documented what with being very high-profile things that have existed since that one war from a very long time ago.
ReplyDeleteI just realized: we know now that it isn't thing from what Frost said, but I think an integration servant could make it regenerate as fast as it burns, same as Hector's Haxxshield.
ReplyDelete