“Who gave the order?” Zviad’s grip tightened, the guard’s breath tearing at his throat. The man clawed at Zviad’s forearm, eyes bulging. No words came, only a desperate gurgle.
“Release him, Khasav. Now.”
The voice was Iago Shervashidze’s, smooth as polished obsidian, yet edged with steel. Zviad did not loosen his hold. He glanced over his shoulder. Iago stood at the threshold of the narrow corridor, flanked by two more sentries, their cudgels already drawn. Lamplight from the main hall gleamed on the silver insignia pinned to Iago’s tunic.
“These men attacked me,” Zviad stated, his voice flat. He maintained eye contact with Iago, challenging the settlement leader to deny it.
Iago stepped closer, his expression a practiced blend of concern and mild reprimand. “A regrettable misunderstanding, I assure you. My watchers reported an unauthorized presence near the archives. They acted on protocol. Perhaps they were…overzealous. It is a secure facility.” He offered a small, placating smile, yet his eyes held no warmth. “Let him go, Zviad. We can discuss this with clear heads, away from such…physicality.”
Zviad held the guard for another heartbeat, letting the silence stretch, before shoving the man away with a rough expulsion of air. The guard crumpled to the floor, gasping, hands clutching his throat. The other two guards rose slowly, groaning, their faces bruised in the dim light.
“A misunderstanding that left three of your men incapacitated?” Zviad’s tone was laced with an acrid skepticism. “They came armed, Iago, and they came to kill.”
“Nonsense. Your Khevsur training makes you see ghosts in every corner, Zviad. They were merely performing their duty, perhaps a little too enthusiastically.” Iago knelt beside the nearest fallen guard, checking his pulse with a theatrical flourish. “See? Still breathing. Proof of your strength, Khasav, though hardly of your diplomacy.” He straightened, a sigh escaping his lips. “I have already heard reports of your…aggressive tendencies. Doubtless the stress of the journey has unsettled you.”
Iago turned to his men, his voice shifting to a tone of calm authority. “Take these men to the medicarium. Remind them of the proper protocols for engaging guests. And Zviad,” he fixed his gaze on him again, “I expect you to exercise more restraint. We are not in the rust-plains anymore. This is a sanctuary. We operate under different rules.”
The message was stark, delivered with the subtlety of a viper’s strike: Zviad was being publicly chastised, his valid claims dismissed as paranoia, his strength rebranded as a defect. He saw the thinly veiled contempt in Iago’s eyes, the satisfied curl of his lips. This wasn’t a misunderstanding. This was a calculated power play, designed to isolate and humiliate him. Iago had orchestrated the attack, knowing Zviad would retaliate, and then used that retaliation to portray him as a dangerous, unstable element within the redoubt. It was a cold, efficient manipulation.
Zviad’s initial goal, the Dadiani clan, felt distant now, a ghost of a target. The Khevsur internal affairs unit, the bomb… it all coalesced around Iago, the charismatic leader who saved them from Rust-Eaters, the man who held the ledger, the man who now sought to discredit him. His partner’s murder wasn't a Dadiani act, not truly. It was a means to an end, a piece in Iago’s grand design. The true threat was not outside these canyon walls, but within them, wearing a smile.
He had to protect Ketevan. Exposing Iago was no longer a path to revenge, but a necessity for survival.
Hours later, under the pretense of retrieving a discarded water skin, Zviad slipped into Ketevan’s assigned dwelling. The room was sparsely furnished but surprisingly warm, with a small hearth burning low. Ketevan sat by a crudely carved table, a half-finished embroidery piece in her hands, her brow furrowed in concentration.
She looked up, startled, at his intrusion. “Khasav? What are you doing here?” Her voice was hushed, but her eyes held a spark of irritation.
Zviad didn’t waste time on pleasantries. He pulled a rolled piece of parchment from inside his tunic, the ledger he’d found in the archives, carefully folded. He laid it flat on the table, pushing it towards her. “Look at this.”
Ketevan hesitated, then set her embroidery aside. Her gaze scanned the dense columns of script. She had a sharp mind, honed by years of navigating her family’s intricate politics. She leaned close, tracing a nail down the page past names of merchants, quantities of raw materials, and dates.
“‘Chromium ingots… Pylon wire… Detonation dust…’” she read aloud, her voice barely a breath. “These aren’t typical supplies for a sanctuary.” Her thumb tapped a specific merchant’s name. “This is Borjomi’s Syndicate. They run the northern routes, through the Shida Karti passes. They’re notorious for their Dadiani ties. My uncle, Giorgi, funneled most of our family’s illicit trade through them.”
Zviad watched her, a grim satisfaction forming in his gut. “And the dates. Do they mean anything to you?”
Ketevan squinted, her hand moving faster. “Many of these are old, but some are recent… This one, three weeks ago, for a shipment of ‘stabilized blasting gel’… It passed through the Shida Karti just before my escape from Gori.” Her eyes snapped up to meet Zviad’s, a cold dread replacing her usual sarcasm. “The Dadiani are funneling weapons to Iago. He’s not sheltering loyalists. He’s *working* with them. He’s a double agent.”
The realization hung heavy in the air, a poisonous bloom. Ketevan’s face was pale, the truth starkly etched there.
“There’s more,” Zviad said, his voice low. He recounted the incident with Iago’s guards, the calculated humiliation, and the shifting focus of his revenge. “He wants you, Ketevan. Not as a symbol, but for something else.”
They spent the next few hours poring over old texts Zviad had managed to pilfer from a less-guarded section of the archives. Most were historical records, genealogical charts, and flowery poems about the Dadiani ‘Unity.’ But tucked away, behind a loose stone in a crumbling wall, Zviad had found a brittle, diagram-filled codex titled ‘The Great Engine of Chronos.’
Ketevan’s palms brushed the ancient script, her ‘Unity’ power reacting. The faded ink seemed to brighten under her touch, revealing hidden annotations. “The sanctuary isn’t just built *in* these canyons,” she murmured, tracing a schematic of interlocking tunnels and chambers. “It’s built *around* something. A machine.” She pointed to a vast diagram at the codex’s center: an apparatus of crystalline conduits and humming coils, buried deep beneath the rock.
“The ‘Unity’ ritual…” Zviad read from a translated passage. His voice tightened. “It’s not about mastery. It’s about power *amplification*. The heir’s energy isn’t extracted; it’s *fed* into the Chronos mechanism. A sacrifice.”
Ketevan gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. “To power this…thing? But what for?”
“It states here,” Zviad continued, marking a specific line, “that once activated, the device will resonate across the Shattered Kavkasi, amplifying the Dadiani’s latent Unity, projecting it over the entire land. Whoever commands the device governs the continent.” He slammed his hand on the codex. “The ‘elegy’ isn’t a mournful song, Ketevan. It’s the sound of the Chronos core activating, a sustained hum that will reverberate through every rock and river. It’s a tool for absolute dominion.”
Ketevan stared at the diagram, a horrified understanding dawning. “Iago doesn’t want me for the Dadiani. He wants me to activate this. He wants to be the one who commands it.” Her voice was thin, almost lost.
Just then, a klaxon blared through the canyon, a piercing, metallic shriek that echoed off the rock walls. It was the general alarm. A chilling voice, amplified by the cavern’s arcane acoustics, boomed through every dwelling.
“Attention all loyalists! Zviad Khasav and Ketevan Dadiani have been exposed as traitors, infiltrators working for the corrupt Dadiani regime! They seek to steal our ancestral power and betray us all! They are to be captured on sight, dead or alive!”
The voice was Iago Shervashidze’s.