Bloodcrete: Epilogue

Thanks to everyone who has stuck around this far! In addition to this epilogue, I have some very fun things in store for you, from art to polls to soulhome blueprints to future information about the series. But let's just get into the content first:

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Epilogue

Nanjuma walked through his soulhome very slowly, observing it more with his skin than his eyes. He had never noticed when rushing upward as a young man, but there were subtle currents within the flow of his cantae beyond those he controlled. Each sublime material produced its own eddies. As he walked, he could feel every inch of his soulhome beyond the simple materials.

It had been a long time since he had done any soulcrafting beyond repair and polishing. Ages ago, he had accepted that the intensity of the ascension to Authority was beyond him. Rather than becoming a broken Ruler, he could accept his place. Being a leader and protector in a community like Myufuru was more than enough for him.

At least until Nauda had returned, and spoke of her new community traveling other worlds.

Nanjuma wasn't so arrogant that he believed a little more willpower would let him ascend. Yet he did find himself thinking about how much he had learned since he had become a Ruler. Some elements of his soulcrafting had entrenched themselves, deepening over the years, while others had shifted in subtle ways that he hadn't realized. Perhaps...

"Excuse me." The voice came along with a blossoming of new cantae. Nanjuma left his soulhome to see his old friend hovering in the air above the former school. Bimanu looked as healthy as always, the same hale man he'd been three decades past. "I know you have work here, Nanjuma, but I need that favor."

"Of course." Nanjuma had known this was coming, ever since he had called Bimanu to help Nauda return to her conflict in other worlds. "What do you need?"

"Your strength. I believe there may be a potential community violation to the north, but I think I shouldn't go alone, and the Landguard is stretched thin these days. How much time will you require to prepare yourself?"

Looking over the city, Nanjuma couldn't help but smile to himself. "They respect me here, but they don't need me so much. With the days of demon attacks behind us, higher soulcrafting is not so relevant to their lives."

"It will be relevant here. Come."

Bimanu lifted back into the air, grasping Nanjuma with his cantae as well, which was a surprise. "We aren't traveling by weirkey?" Nanjuma asked. "I recall you had one before."

"The Landguard pools all of its weirkeys, and our Tatian stock is urgently needed elsewhere." Bimanu flew him to a golden leaf that floated above the clouds, woven with supporting sublime materials into a flying vessel.

They flew north, far faster than Nanjuma could have traveled on his acorn. Along the way, they spoke about the old days when they had been Farmguards together. About old friends, still living and long passed. Bimanu always spoke around his work, but he continually implied that what should have been the heart of Tatian was becoming unstable.

When at last they arrived at the city of Nlukoko, both fell silent as they observed. Nanjuma was deeply saddened by the anger and paranoia of the broken community. Perhaps some cities organized themselves around such suspicion - his conversations with the Arbaians had been intriguing - but the Tatians suffered greatly as trust in their society declined.

"This place is ruled by a fallen Noveni Authority named Ariano," Bimanu said. "He was a known entity, accepted by the Landguard because the border with the other side is always troublesome. But it has grown much worse, and no one has believed me."

"And you want my help to investigate?" Nanjuma asked.

"I would like you to assist me in removing him. Ariano may be a failure, too weak after his ascension to join his world's equivalent of the Landguard. But I believe he must have a Ruler or two in his community, stringing them along with promises of ascension."

"I see."

"We do not begin with violence, but I think that it is almost certain to end there."

Without any further discussion, Bimanu arced the golden leaf down toward one of the grandest palaces of the city. It floated in the center of the lake, a grand proliferation of giant flowers both living and wooden. In a healthy community, it would have been a home for many different families, yet now it was dominated by a single man and his cohorts.

Would they truly end his reign with a battle? And if they did, would it restore the community of Nlukoko? The older he became, the more Nanjuma wondered if the true heart of kinship lay in something deeper than all his world's customs. For now, all he could do was ready his cantae for combat.

They arched inward, sweeping past lesser guards: armed with weapons of violence, but not strong enough to oppose them. Bimanu leapt off their leaf when they reached the central chamber, a grand hall that spiked in all directions like a bromeliad. Every petal was partially made of glass, each a different color, leaving the center a rainbow.

Ariano of the Golden Wings sat on a golden throne in the center of the room. Nanjuma knew nothing of his species or his culture, but he did not think the man's wings should look so bent. The man's robes were rumpled and he stared up at them blearily, not quite as drunk as he appeared. Only three other people in the room: two servants and a Ruler.

"Your perversion of this community must come to an end!" Bimanu declared. "Ariano of the Golden Wings, if you do not accept the society of our world, then you may not remain in it."

"Now? After all this time?" Ariano sat back in his chair and folded his hands over a softening gut. "I didn't think the Landguard had time to waste worrying about someone like me."

"We welcome visitors, but not those who destroy the peace of our communities!"

As Bimanu continued to lecture him, Nanjuma extended his senses through the chamber and the rest of the building. The Ruler sitting beside Ariano had a soulhome of three shoddy floors with no shielding wall: likely a sycophant desperate to ascend. But there were two points of concentrated power within the palace, and those worried Nanjuma more. A strong concentration of cantae to the east, and a perfect shielding wall giving nothing away to the northwest...

"You have no right to speak to him that way!" The Ruler finally got his nerve together and rose to his feet. "Ariano has done more for this city than the Landguard ever has!"

"Do you have any idea what the Landguard protects you from?" Bimanu demanded, stepping forward.

Nanjuma made eye contact with the servants and gestured for them to depart. They did hastily, their polite smiles covering their terror. Elsewhere in the palace he could hear footsteps on the wood, most running away, but not all...

At last the violence began: Bimanu stepped forward to grab Ariano, and the Ruler grabbed his arm. Bimanu contemptuously pushed him away... and created an opening on his left. He had always paid too little attention on his left, and it seemed that hadn't changed after ascension.

Ariano sat up, his wings burning with raw cantae that slashed forward in strange arcs. Nanjuma had been prepared to deflect his attack, but realized there was nothing he could do against such a technique. Instead he applied pressure to Bimanu, pushing him out of the way. The golden cantae flitted across the chamber and tore through the roof.

The glass became a deceptively beautiful rain. Nanjuma stepped aside, the local Ruler flinched back, and both Authorities ignored it entirely.

"Now you will face the Landguard's justice!" Bimanu grabbed Ariano by one of his wings and wrenched him around, pushing his face against the throne.

Another man ran into the chamber, apparently a Ruler. Bimanu glanced at him briefly and dismissed him, but Nanjuma looked again. Not only was he the perfectly polished soulhome from the northwest, there was something strange about his hair... Nanjuma would never have recognized it before he'd met Nauda, but this man was clearly a Tatian from below using dye to blend in.

"Bimanu, I think you sh-" Nanjuma's warning was interrupted as a group of three strode into the chamber.

Three Deuxans. An old man walked at the front, clearly a Ruler who had been soulcrafting for decades. To his right floated a woman at Authority, and to his left a handsome young Ruler. They made no attempt whatsoever to hide their identity, even down to being swathed in Deuxan silk. All three had the same silver hair and similar jaws, with a strong family resemblance. Nanjuma knew there was a gateway to Deuxan near Nlukoko, but to his knowledge they had never sent so much as a delegation.

None of them even tried to negotiate: they immediately attacked with lethal techniques.

This time Bimanu was prepared: he lifted Ariano and hurled him directly into the female Authority's cantae bolt. Meanwhile the other two were moving to flank him, but Nanjuma had already moved into position.

He began with a cantae bolt toward the old Ruler, which the other elder contemptuously knocked aside. A moment later, Nanjuma's raised hand flew forward and struck him in the chest. Quite often, elders fought with cantae alone and ignored physical strikes. Clearly Deuxan elders had the same blind spot, because this one looked shocked as he crashed through the palace wall.

Nanjuma had braced himself, expecting a lethal attack afterward. But the Authorities were fighting in the air, the sycophant was cowering, and the lower Tatian stood with his hands behind his back, watching with only mild interest. That left the young Deuxan man, who drew a thin sword as he turned toward Nanjuma.

As he defended himself, Nanjuma was surprised at the young man's skill. He clearly had a strong foundation, yet there was something amiss: his shielding wall displayed repairs as if catastrophic damage had been done to his soulhome. Yet the young man had picked himself up and rebuilt, and his new Ruler floor gleamed complete above his wall. Nanjuma thought that he might eventually win, given time to leverage his experience, but it would be impossible in such a complex battle.

Without warning Bimanu tackled him through one of the walls. Nanjuma had been braced to react to Authorities, but hadn't anticipated his friend would move in such a way. In a flash they broke out of the palace and skimmed over the waters of Nlukoko. It bought them a little time... not much, as Ariano and his Deuxan allies were already emerging.

"This is beyond expectations." Bimanu set Nanjuma down on a strange slide-like structure and fumbled in his soulhome for a flower. "The Landguard needs to exterminate this invasion before it can grow worse. If something goes wrong, you can use this as well. So long as they understand..."

Cantae flowed through the sublime flower, and Nanjuma felt a link to someplace far away. The petals contorted into something like a face, and a woman's voice emerged. "What is it, Bimanu?"

"Bring the entire Landguard to Nlukoko! There are two Authorities and three Rulers openly dominating our community, trying t-"

"You should have spoken to us about this first," the woman said sternly. "We are aware of the current situation in Nlukoko. The Deuxans offered us assistance in dealing with a problem from their world, a community-destroying abomination called fleshmaskers. They may not match our idea of community, but we need their assistance to retain order."

Bimanu stared at the flower in shock, and Nanjuma breathed a heavy sigh. While the woman spoke, the others had caught up. Ariano floated at the front of the group, and his wings no longer looked so bent. Nanjuma knew that he couldn't fight even this one Authority, much less the entire group.

"You see?" Ariano's face twisted in something almost like a smile. "Everything is perfectly accepted by your leaders. The Armeau family has become an ally to Tatian. I'll forgive you for attacking me... in the spirit of healthy community."

It seemed that Bimanu was too angry to answer, so Nanjuma spoke. "Why now? The gate was silent for years, then suddenly this?"

"Deuxan is changing," the Authority said, "but there is no point explaining it to you. Have you even heard of the Demon Court?"

"You can't do this!" Bimanu glared down at the flower, ignoring everything else. "It doesn't matter what you call them, don't you see that we're allowing conquerors through our borders?"

"We must protect our communities," the Landguard answered. "That is all that matters."

The flower unfolded, its petals losing all shape. Bimanu let out a cry before grabbing Nanjuma and fleeing. Nanjuma watched the city shrink beneath them, but the smiles he saw on the faces of the conquerors only seemed to grow.

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As I said last week, I've been waiting to get to this epilogue! One thing I've said a few times is how I hope this series will seem meaningfully interwoven by the end. From some reviews I've paced things out too far for some, but you'll increasingly see that every detail is relevant, every act has consequences, and every character exists even when the narrative leaves them behind. 

There are certainly smaller pieces to flesh out the Nine Worlds (not every detail can be of great importance), but I hope to surprise readers with how many pieces turn out to be more important than they appeared at first. There's so much more ahead. ^-^