20th November 2019
(Day 3)
The Missing Shield is epic high fantasy but it still has a little bit of everything, so today I thought I’d treat you to a bit of drama.
What do you you do when all your options are gone? Why play your final card of course…
Snippet from episode #6 (The Final Card).
It was risky; it was an act of betrayal in itself just to be contemplating the idea but if she could make it work… if the State of Veranto did not fail her… if…
Well, if she could do nothing more for Iambre, then this would have to do!
Iambre, I’m sorry…
“No!” she said aloud to no one in particular, her voice void of the New Wood accent she’d tenaciously clung onto till now.
It felt peculiar to embrace the finality of her decision; of her situation. Her tone reflected deadened emotion and voided the aching sadness that now began to vibrate within her core in alignment with every breath she pulled. Regrets were for those who would live, though. Duty came first! Always! And if she could find that level of Veranto she’d enjoyed earlier, then perhaps… then perhaps she might try this one final thing… she might…
At the thought, a deep fear ate at her innards as though they’d been dipped in the acidulous venom of a red viper but it wasn’t a fear that could compete with what she felt if she did not make the attempt because her friend’s life was on the edge! Chief Eso – Klaas – had to be warned and she must try this. No, not try! Do! And so, by the Back of the Beyond: let Inkar’Chi spit her in the eye – see if she cared, for she must do this! Must!
She’d never done anything like this before, though; had never pushed her skills that far before, and she knew that she might have to stumble her way through with disastrous effects, and still…
And still she had to try her utmost to succeed because there was no more time. The Meer’ron was coming…
Solancei shut her mind away.
“No.” she repeated in the same tone as before – as if to get the persuasion straight in her own mind – then drew a deep breath that would have been impossible, she knew, without the State of Veranto to cancel out her injured ribcage. If only I can remember…
“No, you will ruin everything,” she told him, “And so I fear that I cannot tell you what you wish. I cannot and I will not and your plans will be ashes.”
Solancei let herself float to become as light as a speck of dust drifting in the golden midday sunbeams emitted through the wooden slats of her Etruian palace apartments. Unlike the dust, she had a purpose though; a destination – and as she relaxed, she allowed her consciousness to sink deeper into herself till there seemed little left of her but her own name and her connection to the Link.
It was a comfortable state of mind, however, and to do this she needed the distance: needed the objective insight that would allow her to think back to an event long past. Now what exactly had that scroll said? She recalled the formal prose; the nine – or was that ten? – ‘Signifiers’… but now as for the exact context…?
Somewhere outside her limit of care, Simarovien exhaled sharply through his nose, a hiss of air that translated his disbelief as surely as any words of anger. Next to the fire-pit, she heard the sentiment echoed by the one remaining cajoler in the shape of an unintelligible, half-formed gasp of words, but already she was pulling away from reality through the Link with Veranto.
‘Out of all the scenarios: not the final, you envisaged’, a snarky, laconic part of her commented, but she paid it no heed. For one crystal clear moment, she saw Simarovien’s glacier eyes narrow with concern, but then she dismissed him too, zoning in now instead on the uniform groves of the ceiling where the evidence of workmanship appeared oddly out of scale. You know what Zulavi is about to do. What he will be forced to do now! Perhaps you’ve even known all along. But it cannot matter! He still thinks his, the winning hand of course, because in a way it is, and that is fine too – if only you can go deep enough. Now the scroll had been clear on the process she must follow… if only she could recall…
Feeling afloat, she sensed Simarovien’s emerging ire but she didn’t care. It was like a gnat throwing itself against a wall. This man was nothing – Iambre was everything! Her core was a sparkling brightness but she’d not wanted to look that way: it hadn’t felt true, and now, thankfully, she needn’t go that far…
Solancei smiled. So, he thinks he knows about the State of Veranto, does he? Well, the bastard hasn’t seen a fraction yet! Not a fraction! Her final card was about to hit the table… double ace if this worked; jesters if not…
****
You can find out whether Solancei succeeds or not – as well as check out the full series via the link https://www.amazon.com/L.-L.-f/e/B07B8K4J6S
