The ink of Olyana’s script had soaked dry into the rough paper: “For Karsan.” Zhaniya squeezed the parchment into her fist. Without those extracted strands, the Solstice veil would fail, leaving her borrowed body to tear apart under the strain of an incomplete soul-bind.
Footsteps echoed in the corridor. Zhaniya shoved the crumpled parchment into her pocket as Karsan appeared, his face etched with worry. He took in the empty plinth, the frantic energy radiating from her.
“The memories,” she stated, her voice flat, “they’re gone. Olyana took them. She left a note.”
Karsan stared at the empty stone. “The Solstice,” he said, his voice flat and gravelled.
“Impossible without them,” Zhaniya said, forcing her tone into brisk cadence. “She will have carried them straight to her spire, convinced we cannot touch her above the cloudline.”
Later, in a secluded alcove near the main kilns, Mavola joined them. His arm was bound tightly with fresh bandages, a stark white against his usually immaculate robes. He moved stiffly, but his gaze was sharp, unwavering. “So, the serpent has struck again,” he observed, his tone devoid of surprise. “Her private perch, the Sunstone Spire. Secure, self-important, and utterly tasteless, I’d wager.”
Zhaniya explained her plan. “She’ll expect us to mourn, to search the lower levels. Not to march straight into her den.”
“A frontal assault?” Mavola raised a skeptical brow. “Even I am not that reckless, Zhaniya. My arm, for one, prefers to remain attached.”
“Not an assault,” Karsan clarified, leaning against a cooling vent. “A performance. A distraction.” He looked at Mavola, a glint in his eye. “You, Mavola, are the most insufferable critic I know.”
Mavola straightened, a flicker of pride in his expression despite himself. “I take that as a compliment, Arbiter. My aesthetic sensibilities are, after all, unparalleled.”
“Exactly,” Zhaniya said, her grin flashing razor-sharp through the apprentice's mask. “You’ll go to her reception salon. You’ll demand an audience, claiming to need her ‘expert’ opinion on a new technique. And then, you’ll tear her decor to pieces. Verbally.”
Mavola considered this, a slow, predatory smile spreading across his face. “Her collection of ‘Kavalan’ tear-globes? Her ghastly crimson light-catchers? The entire gaudy display? It would be my distinct pleasure.”
Their ascent to the Sunstone Spire was swift, carried by a concealed lift usually reserved for material deliveries. The higher they climbed, the more the air thinned, the light grew blinding. Below, the city of Yz-Kava was a sprawling map of shadowed troughs and fog-shrouded trenches. Above, Olyana’s spire, a gleaming shard of polished jasper, pierced the cloudless azure.
They disembarked on a service platform several levels below Olyana’s private salon. Karsan gave Zhaniya a small, obsidian bead. “If anything goes wrong. Crush it. I’ll come.” He nodded once, sharp and precise.
Mavola adjusted his bandages, a theatrical sigh escaping him. “Wish me luck, for I am about to inflict upon myself an act of profound self-sacrifice in the name of aesthetic purity.” He strode confidently towards the main entrance.
Zhaniya and Karsan watched through a concealed viewport as Mavola entered the opulent reception salon. The room was, as predicted, a monument to Olyana’s self-regard: walls of polished sunstone, shelves crammed with glittering, mismatched glass baubles, and enormous, blood-red light-catchers that pulsed with an unsettling, saccharine glow.
Olyana emerged, her silk robes shimmering, her smile practiced and fragile. “Mavola! To what do I owe this... unexpected visit?” She fluttered her eyelashes, a damsel in distress even in her own domain.
Mavola bowed, a gesture of mock deference. “Lady Olyana. I come to you with a matter of artistic urgency. A new method of shaping the Kavel-stone. I found myself in need of a… discerning eye.” He paused, his gaze sweeping the room with an almost visible sneer. “Though, perhaps, ‘discerning’ is not the correct word for the current… climate.”
Olyana’s smile faltered. “I don’t understand.”
“Oh, but you will,” Mavola said, his voice dripping with condescension. He pointed to a collection of delicate, teardrop-shaped glass sculptures. “These ‘sorrow-drops,’ as you call them. You claim they represent the tears of lost love. Yet, the refraction of light through this particular shade of azure? It’s not melancholic, my dear. It’s simply muddy. A child’s attempt at pathos.”
Olyana gasped, her hand flying to her chest. “How can you say such a thing? They represent my suffering, my sacrifice for Karsan’s happiness!”
Mavola ignored her. His eyes landed on a massive, crimson-tinged glass mural dominating one wall. “And this ‘Passion of the Sun-King’? The reds are too raw, too garish. It screams desperation, not passion. It’s the visual equivalent of a shriek, rather than a lament. Utterly devoid of nuance.” He took a dramatic step closer, examining the glass with an exaggerated air of distaste. “The leading lines are crude, the emotional texture… nonexistent. It’s an offense to the very concept of glass art.”
Olyana’s face, usually so carefully composed, began to flush. Her voice rose, losing its feigned softness. “You wouldn’t understand! You, with your cold, precise work, could never comprehend true emotion!”
Mavola merely scoffed. “Emotion, Lady Olyana, is not an excuse for poor craftsmanship. It’s a challenge to be mastered, not an excuse for sloppiness. This entire room… it’s a monument to sentimental excess. Every piece cries out for attention, yet says nothing of substance. It’s a tragic waste of good silica.”
As Olyana launched into a furious, self-pitying defense, Mavola expertly kept her attention, drawing her further into the center of the room, away from the corridor leading to her private chambers. Zhaniya, taking her cue, slipped through a service hatch.
The boudoir was a symphony of soft silks and scented oils, predictably overdone. A massive, four-poster bed draped in shimmering fabrics dominated the center. Zhaniya moved with practiced stealth, her gaze sweeping the room for any sign of hidden compartments. She checked the vanity, its polished surface reflecting the sunlight from the vast windows. Her hand brushed against a loose panel at the back.
The catch yielded beneath her fingernails. Inside, nestled among silk sachets, were several small, dark glass vials. Each pulsed with a faint, internal light – the distilled essence of memories, the very threads she needed. She slipped the cold glass cylinders into the velvet pouch at her belt.
She turned to leave, aiming for a window that opened onto a discreet ledge. As she swung one leg over the sill, her elbow caught the edge of a small, decorative chime hanging from the window frame. It was a shard of Obsidian, etched with faint, almost imperceptible runes. An Obsidian truth-chime, designed to alert its owner to any falsehood or transgression within its vicinity.
A high-pitched, piercing alarm shrieked through the spire.
Footsteps thundered outside the door. The sound of multiple boots, heavy and urgent.
The latch splintered inward, framing two spire sentries with notched heavy crossbows drawn level with her chest.