Advocate Demetos put away the artefacts arranged on the floor. He slipped the fire lighter back into his pocket. An item like that would cost most Republicans their income for the year. He wrapped the charming little bow-drill in cloth and laid it with care in a padded box. The vulgar combinations of iron, wood and flint from across the god-bothering world he threw into a sack in the corner.

  He waited for his next visitor and mused on his meeting with the forest boy. A child of the Sevener Clans, yet as bright and fresh as a new recruit to the Institute. He could prove more useful than Demetos had hoped, if he did not push him too fast. Certainly, he had more potential than those slippery Sullin. Demetos was sure they had over-sold their value to him and he had a creeping suspicion they were playing games. If so, he would show them what it meant to play with fire.

  “General.”

  Demetos looked up and saw Tristor in mid bow. The Captain moved more quietly since his return from the forest, as though afraid that even on its border, loud noises might awaken the things that dwelled there.

  “Captain. Sit down.”

  Tristor eschewed the cushions and knelt on the ground.

  “I’ve just spoken to the boy,” said Demetos.

  “Will he tell us where to find it?”

  “I think he will, and perhaps more besides. But I did not ask him yet.”

  Tristor’s upper lip twitched.

  “May I ask why, General?”

  Demetos considered snubbing this impertinent question. His Captain’s appointment had been the return of a favour to an important family – little to do with merit. He did not like this closed minded and hot headed soldier. He had proved loyal though, despite all he had suffered.

  “Hesio has established a rapport with the boy. I think they like each other, and I think he is more curious about us than he dares to admit. He has potential.”

  “As much as I celebrate a new convert, General,” Tristor replied, “I wonder if there are greater matters at stake.”

  “He will tell us in time. And information given by an ally is more reliable. The careful way is the quicker way.”

  “Perhaps at the Institute, General, but this is war.”

  “Is it?” Demetos sharpened his tone.

  “It will be, sooner or later.” The captain sounded confident. Something had happened.

  “Elaborate,” he commanded.

  “We’ve received a message from the Sullin leader. He’s tracked down the last of the rebels from his clan. But he can't yet bring us emissaries from the others. He can't speak for them all, as he promised. He says some clans intend to flee, but others will fight.”

  “Flee?That must be stopped.”

  “Is it not ideal?” Tristor looked thoroughly confused. “That way they divide their forces and leave the land for us. Each clan that flees makes the others easier to defeat.”

  Demetos rolled his eyes. “A torrent of refugees flowing into the West, talking of our conquest. It could be enough to rouse even King Brunulf from his torpor. No. If any clan intends to leave, their exit must be blocked.”

  “Let the king be roused! If we have the forest, we have the powder! We need only to persuade our young friend to tell-” The Captain became animated, forgetting the gulf between their ranks and Demetos cut him off.

  “That,” scolded Demetos, “is folly. Only when the powder is shovelled into barrels, weighed and measured and on its way to my workshops will I seek a war. Even with our new weapon, a war against Giftahl is no trivial thing. Before then, I will not risk the Republic on a hypothetical advantage.”

  Tristor blinked and bowed his head. Demetos allowed the silence to grow between them before adding:

  “Besides, we need to secure not only the powder, but the means to use it.”

  “On that matter, ‘the means’ has been in touch with you.”

  Tristor reached into his tunic and pulled out a sealed scroll. Demetos whipped it from his hand before he could pass it. He tore away the seal and buried his face in the parchment. He must have let slip his irritation, because after a moment the captain asked:

  “She’s refused, hasn’t she?’’

  “She wants to visit," Demetos replied flatly. He folded the parchment, firmly pressing on each pleat and doubling it until he could reduce it no further. “She wants to visit the camp. Why this endless dither and delay? Why won’t she name her price?”

  Tristor shrugged.

  “In the Murrows they call her The Mad Tyrant. She must have something about her if she can rule that district, but she’s not right. Perhaps we’re better off without her involved. You have the Institute, General. Can’t you replicate her invention?”

  “Even if I can, without her forges we can’t make enough. We’ll play her game a little longer, while I work on the Grand Listener to force her hand. Ready a tent to receive her. Have the Sullin visible, though not too close. I want it clear we have a forest clan as an ally. Don't let her meet the boy though, or anyone else who knows what we are looking for here. She still believes the only fire powder comes from her own scarce mines.”

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  Tristor nodded and Demetos made to dismiss the captain, when a thought occurred to him. Irritating as this visit was, it could yet prove useful.

  “Actually, Tristor, if the boy sees her, that wouldn’t be so bad.”

  Tristor frowned. “She’s no sight for sore eyes, General. If you want him to help us willingly, are you sure you want to show him Ilargia in the flesh, if you can even call it that?”

  “Trust me, Captain,”

  Demetos smiled, then narrowed his eyes and added in a sharp tone:

  “And she’s Advocate Ilargia to you, Tristor. Mad or not, her title demands respect.”

  “Yes, General.”

  Tristor’s face reddened. Demetos wondered if he had taken the captain too far into his confidence. This was the second overstep today. He noted it, before turning his thoughts to the next task.

  “Dismissed,” he announced, as he stood and pulled on his outer robe.

  Demetos glanced around as he strode through the camp. Nobody stopped what they were doing but he knew they saw him pass. They worked a little faster, a little harder, a little better. Small improvements, one day after the next – that was how he had built his power. While he walked a steady, careful path, Ilargia rose to greatness in jagged lines that zigzagged this way and that. How many times had his advisors assured him her career was over? He’d lost count. How many times had he suddenly felt her breath on his back?

  At the doctor’s tent he paused. An acidic, burned smell assailed him. Doctor Darius, a wiry man of fifty years, emerged.

  “I’m using the new poppy seed inhalation. It’s terribly dangerous in the long run but it’s the only thing that settles him.”

  “I sent a message that I wanted him lucid, Doctor.”

  "He’s had a lower dose. We’re weaning him off it slowly.”

  “He’ll recover then?” Demetos allowed himself a little hope. He’d be sorry to lose Gavan – a star student who was never meant for the military but had joined up to follow him out here.

  “He’ll live,” the doctor replied. “But recover is another matter. What assails him is beyond an ailment of the body. Perhaps if he returned to the city he’d do better.” Darius stepped aside and gestured to the entrance. “Would you like to talk to him, General?”

  Demetos entered. Gavan lay in a special section of his own with holes cut for the smoke. He approached the still, silent patient. Even Gavan’s brown hair seemed paler. He opened his eyes behind two dark rings and gave Demetos a weak smile.

  “Don’t try to get up.” He sat on the ground beside the soldier and felt his forehead. It was cold.

  “I’ve heard from Hesio some of the things you said. He thinks the creature's venom affected your head.”

  “The doctor thinks so, too. He says I’m imagining things and being close to the forest makes it worse. He doesn't like to hear what I'm imagining, though.”

  “What are you imagining, Gavan?”

  “Bliss, at first. Such happiness. I was going to join her under the ground. It was so simple.”

  “What did she want with you there?” Demetos pulled gently on the thread. Is it madness or a mystery worth revealing? Carefully, I’ll tease it out.

  “With me? I was food. I would have grinned as she ripped me limb from limb and consumed my thoughts as well as my flesh. That's why they like the taste of humans best. They want the mind as well as the body."

  Demetos shuddered and looked over his shoulder. The doctor was out of sight.

  "How do you know, Gavan? How do you know what 'she' wants?"

  "You don't believe I'm imagining it?"

  "Let's just say I'm imagining it's true. Humour me. How do you know?"

  Gavan frowned and rubbed his temples.

  "It's like I got a look inside their minds at the same time. I don't think it mattered to them, since I was going to die. They didn't try to hide anything. But their world is so different. I saw it like a whole landscape revealed in a flash of lightning. I can't remember everything."

  "What can you remember? What do they want?"

  "Revenge. That's all she wants, and all her children want it too. She wants back what was stolen from her," Gavan growled. Is he angry on their behalf?

  “Stolen by whom? Humans? The Seveners? Was the forest hers before they arrived?”

  Gavan nodded vigorously and began to rise on his elbows, bringing his face closer.

  “Humans and the imposter who favours them. The one who dared to call herself a queen. The real queen gets closer every year. She gets stronger and her enemy weakens. When she devours her...”

  Gavan suddenly groaned and shook. Demetos tried to steady him, but his limbs seemed out of control and the doctor hurried in and pushed a pipe between his lips. He released Gavan’s arms as he quietened. The doctor stayed. Demetos leaned close and whispered in Gavan’s ear:

  “Where is she and where is her enemy?”

  “A chasm of water, a wound that goes to the bedrock of the earth.” Gavan sat bolt upright and his tired face animated. He spoke in a high, rasping hiss like an old woman, bitter and vengeful. The voice filled the room and Demetos was not sure if Gavan spoke, or someone else through him. “Death itself bleeds out of the void! She’s lost control. Oh, the gifts she bestowed on them! They should have been mine. They will be mine!”

  Demetos’ throat closed and he pushed Gavan hard onto the bed. The doctor thrust the pipe back into his mouth and Gavan sucked the smoke down like a drowning man sucks air when he comes to the surface. The horrible sense of a presence of someone else filled the room and then faded. Gavan coughed in fits before breathing normally and drifting into something resembling sleep.

  “You see why I tell people he’s hallucinating,” the doctor said quietly.

  “I appreciate that,” Demetos replied in a dry whisper. He waited for his heartbeat to subside and the shaking in his hands to pass before he trusted himself to stand. “Start him back on whatever dose he needs. Wean him off slowly. I won’t come again until he asks for me.”

  As he made for the exit, the doctor thrust some paper into his hands.

  “You may want to look at this... Or destroy it. He asked for paper. I thought it would distract him.”

  Demetos shut himself in the privacy of his tent. He took a long draught of water and sat with his back against the pole. When he felt ready, he opened the rolled up paper. He recognised immediately Gavan’s script and drawing. He smiled. A map. His mind is still in there. The map showed an outline of the forest and a rough design of the camp and the city beyond it. He’d hastily scrawled the mountains, too. Thick lines curved a path to meet in the centre and snaked up beyond that to the lake in the South. The rivers. Demetos turned the map around then rotated it again. He’s put the South on the top. He’s put the lake where North should be. What drew Demetos’ attention, though, were the lines. All around the forest were scrawled thin, curved lines that connected in nodes and separated again. They were fine and delicate and it looked as though Gavan had covered a spider’s web in ink and lowered it onto the page. He thought of Hesio’s stories of their difficulty traveling there, and his mention of paths that Ingo talked about. What secret world have you glimpsed, Gavan?

  Demetos always found it easier to think with a quill in his hand. He scrawled on the bottom of the map:

  Who is “She?”

  Who is her enemy?

  Which of them seeks the other at the lake?

  He put the paper and quill aside and looked up at the ceiling. He closed his eyes. He had been right to come to Saltleaf Forest. How long had the world overlooked this place? Put off by tales of its fearsome creatures or discouraged by the reputation of its so-called primitives. What discoveries and power might reside here, for one willing to grasp the nettle and bear its sting? Advocate Demetos had come tracing the source of an extraordinary fire powder superior to the scant deposits of saltpetre that Ilargia had a monopoly on. The trail had led him to so much more. He scrawled one more question underneath the others.

  How much does Ingo know?