At least this room was brighter than the Zav-level cell at the bottom of Hellfrost Keep, Aven thought. Governor Iraias’ fourth-circles had him moved to a separate, otherwise unused guesthouse. A cage with a feather bed and gilded frames. But at least a window with a pleasant view of the boulevard.

  Hadn’t seen Aelia yet, though apparently she’d be permitted a quick visit after today’s meetings. Until then, Aven was set the terrible task of doing absolutely nothing at all. While trapped in the same building as three vis saddled with the onerous task of keeping him company.

  “Don’t suppose either of you are much for stories?” Aven called out to the hall.

  The mindspeaker guard pulsed annoyance. The other, the very same scar-nosed Auxilar Jaris Moler whom Aven had punched in the jaw a mere few days ago for training, chuckled, “We’re not here to be your personal minstrels, voidtouched.”

  “Pity,” Aven grunted. “My personal minstrel has been quiet so far.” All that he’d worried about Sunshine or Janaya causing a ruckus, and he’d been the one to cause a major diplomatic incident. He recalled a parable about a man who sought to clean specks of sawdust out of others’ eyes while missing the plank jutting out of his own face.

  This much attention was almost flattering. A pair of third circle guards at the door and one of the fourth-circles also present in the guesthouse. Though at the moment, Nadyar Velian was either uncharacteristically quiet or had stepped out for a moment. Probably to pilfer a hogshead. He and Vestra had rotated shifts watching Aven.

  With no prospects of external entertainment to while away the hours, Aven settled on the dreaded task of thinking. First, the meeting with Helena. Right up to “Mother’s” entrance, he was certain the meeting was real. Esharah’s disappearance from his mind coincided right with the arrival of the apparently illusory Mother and Viola. After that, anything and everything could have been one of Hanion’s woven dreams. Even the man’s own presence could have been. Probably was. For all that Hanion was, he was not stupid enough to show up in person before a man who’d tried to kill him twice.

  There still had to be some clue buried in the illusory Mother’s words. Hanion’s dreams were rarely complete fabrications. He relied on distortions, drawing up visions within one’s own mind. Playing someone’s own thoughts, and fears, and memories against them. So while the meeting was false, it was constructed from what Hanion knew of Aven’s family.

  Viola’s “cure” and voidtouched affliction...could that really be a lie? It was such a specific detail, and it went beyond even Aven’s own expectations of how far Mother was willing to go with her research. Experimentation on Aven was one thing, but little Viola...

  Aven tore his mind away from those thoughts. Mother wasn’t the issue right now. He knew what Mother wanted. To understand the void and to use that knowledge to gain power. Hopefully, to use that power to defeat the void. He had no idea what Hanion wanted.

  Spiraling in his own thoughts wasn’t helping, and the guards outside would make for poor collaborators, judging by their silence.

  Time to try a new use of the Battle Mind. Splitting the mind domain was easy for him now. And he’d had extensive practice with simulations. He’d fought Sergrud fel-Maies hundreds of times, and Logash nearly as many in those simulations.

  What if he could get those simulations to talk back to him?

  “We’ll help how we can, but you know we’re still your own thoughts, Aven,” an imagined Esharah’s voice came into his head. Not-Esharah was as honest as the real Esharah about her own limitations. And also brought a familiar touch of comfort, almost as nice as the real thing.

  “Yet even viewing the same problem with the same eyes from a different perspective can reveal details that one hasn’t noticed yet,” an imagined Aelia joined.

  Aven smiled. Even just as pure mental constructs formed of his own memories and imagination, company was good. Even not-Aelia was better than no Aelia at all. Now, who else to invite to the conference?

  Split pieces of his own mind took form and answered the invitation.

  “Don’t know why you invited me,” not-Tanya spoke up from beside not-Logash. “Can’t see what a poor old minari widow with absolutely nothing special about her whatsoever could offer.”

  “Why, the endless delights of your presence!” Not-Sunshine intruded upon the gathering without Aven intending to invite him.

  “Right,” Aven agreed. “Now, let’s keep the focus. What do we do about Hanion?”

  “We should kill him,” not-Janaya said.

  “Tried that,” Aven reminded. “Hence the mess we’re in.”

  “We should kill him again,” non-Janaya pressed. “And let his soul burn in the fires of burning hellflames.”

  Aven judged that particular mental construct wouldn’t be useful and dismissed it. While not an expert on the subject, Aven assumed that listening to the voices in his head urging him to kill was a bad idea. Even if the voices were technically himself. He kicked not-Sunshine out too while he was at it. Both images dissolved, one laughing and the other heaping curses upon the world.

  “Let’s take a step back,” not-Esharah suggested. “What do we know about Hanion’s plans?”

  Not-Aelia ruffled through the pages of her notebook, giving them one of her most adorable squints. “The following are the known actions Hanion vis Dreamweaver has taken. One, he intentionally and personally appeared at this conference. Two, he chose to bring Helena with him. Three, he has attempted to frame Aven for an attempt on the Governor’s life.”

  Aven paced around the room, imagining the companions surrounding him. “Could this all be revenge on me?”

  Not-Esharah sighed, “Not everything is about you, Aven.”

  A chorus of agreement sounded from the others.

  He paused, “I don’t think everything is about me.”

  “Right,” not-Esharah said. “You just think that multi-province gathering to coordinate responses to an empire-threatening force is the appropriate stage to work out your family trauma.”

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  “Well, where else am I going to do it?” Aven demanded.

  To that, his mental constructs had no answer.

  Not-Aelia interjected again, scribbling in her notebook, “We shall take ‘revenge upon Aven’ as one possibility for Hanion vis Dreamweaver’s goals.”

  “But if that were the case,” not-Logash’s voice rumbled, “is this not a foolish way of doing so?”

  “Agreed,” not-Aelia said. “The deception collapsed at the slightest investigation.”

  “An improvised flourish!” Not-Sunshine returned unbidden. “Not one rehearsed.”

  Which placed Aven as an obstacle to Hanion’s goals. Not the goal itself.

  “Right,” Aven said. “So, let’s assume this isn’t about me.”

  Cheers rang out from the surrounding constructs.

  “So, what is it about?”

  Silence fell. Because Aven didn’t have the answer, so none of his constructed imaginings held the answer either. Still reached no conclusion by the time an intrusive mental touch broke into the illusion.

  “What on hells are you doing?” the mindspeaker guard sounded aghast. Horrified even.

  “Trying to have a conversation with myselves,” Aven replied aloud. “Since you haven’t been so accommodating.”

  “Well, quit,” the mindspeaker growled, taking the conversation out of Aven’s mind and into the real world. “It’s giving me a hell of a headache to monitor you like this.”

  “You could always mind your own business,” Aven suggested. “Or find someone else who can handle the duties of watching me.”

  Not that the man could just hand off the duties to someone else. Even in Northstar, where two brilliant mind vis in Madame Truthteller and Lady Ashnya gathered pupils, mind domain vis were rare. Rarest of the three foundational domains, in fact. If they wanted to have a skilled mind vis watching Aven at all times, that meant a notable loss elsewhere.

  “A loss, perhaps, that another mind vis could exploit,” not-Logash noted.

  Another mind vis like Hanion vis Dreamweaver. The thoughts set off a spark. One that Aven eagerly tended.

  That was a possibility worth exploring. Framing Aven hadn’t succeeded. But it did mean that attention was focused on Aven and not elsewhere. An exact strategy that Hanion had employed on their missions in the past: cause a commotion in one place, draw minds away from the real target.

  So, what was the real target?

  A tap at the window cut that train of thought short. Aven turned and saw a familiar black-furred felin staring back at him from the other side.

  “Teja?” Aven asked in a whisper.

  The window was barred. She slipped through the bars like a shadow, squeezing through as if boneless. The former Vulgares assassin perched on the windowsill and grinned at him.

  “My name’s Deva.” She winked, voice soft enough for the guards to have no hope of hearing.

  “Deva, then,” Aven grunted. “Why in the seven hells are you here?” He paused. “If you’re here at all. You could easily be another of Hanion’s illusions.”

  “Oh, he doesn’t know about me.” Deva grinned, tail swishing behind her. “I’ve been careful, unlike you.”

  Aven had no way of verifying that, but if she was an illusion, at least she was more company than the voices in his own head. “Yet I saw you just before Hanion’s illusions of Mother and Viola appeared.”

  “’Course you did,” Deva replied. “I’ve been stalking you. Good job noticing.”

  “And what have I done to deserve such an honor?”

  “You were born the son of Elesmara Genthus,” she said.

  Aven kept the conversation light. The guards at the door clearly weren’t interested in listening in. Probably on account of hearing Aven talk to himself for the past few hours. And Teja (or whatever she called herself now) had always had a way of slipping unnoticed by eyes or Mindspeakers.

  “And why,” Aven asked, “would someone whose sole joy in life is to watch the empire bleed be working with my mother?”

  “Your mother gave me power.” Deva raised her hand. And black claws extended from her fingers. Voidclaws. “I’m repaying the favor.”

  “Hells,” Aven whispered, horror rising up at the sight. Another voidtouched. Less grotesque that it had looked on the false Viola. Still unsettling.

  “Sunshine gave me a gift.” Deva turned her hand over, examining the claws with a look of pride. And hunger. “I’m one of the few to survive such a present. Apparently, it takes a particular mindset for it.”

  Aven remembered Sunshine’s warnings about the risks. The risk of losing one’s mind. For a mind like Teja’s, whose only focus was slow, creeping vengeance, there was likely not much to lose.

  “That splitting you do.” Deva’s golden eyes turned from her hand back to Aven. “How do you do it? I’ve wanted to try, but I’ve no idea where to begin.”

  “I...use the Battle Mind,” Aven said, a bit thrown off by the sudden line of questioning. “Split my mind with that, then create a body with the void. Two bodies and two minds.”

  “Damn,” Deva sighed, slumping back against the bars of the window. “Different mind domain than mine. I’m not cracked enough to fracture my mind into pieces like you. Pity. It’s a good trick.” She shook her head. “Making an entire body out of void, though...just making claws like this is as much as I can do.” The six-inch claws retracted from her fingers. “Looks like I’ve a ways to go to be as good a monster as you.” Her tone was more admiration than mockery.

  “So, you just came to show off, did you?” Aven asked.

  Deva gave another half-smile. Always toeing the line between mocking and sincere. “No, your Mother asked me to check on you. She’s deeply concerned for her darling boy’s welfare.”

  Aven scoffed, “I’m sure she is.” He paused, “Is it true that Viola took voidblood? Or was that something Hanion invented?”

  Deva’s eyes widened in surprise. “Oh no, it’s certainly true. From what your Mother said, she was the third ‘success’ among the void experiments. And I’m lucky number four.”

  Which meant there was another “success” unaccounted for, Aven thought. Assuming Mother actually counted him as a success. A fresh wave of revulsion rose up. Damn him for hoping it was a lie. For thinking that Mother might have spared her daughter the fate she afflicted on her son.

  “Hanion knew, somehow,” Aven mused aloud. “How?”

  “It’s no secret that Viola Avarnius-Genthus has been cured of her ailment,” Deva replied. “Elesmara flaunts it as a brilliant success of her research. Knowing that Viola is voidtouched, though...that’s far less known. Interesting.”

  “Is...Viola actually here?” Damn him again for more hope.

  “Of course not,” Deva chuckled. “Your little sister is well enough to walk, not well enough to travel to the edge of the empire. She’s back in Thallakar, keeping Elesmara’s research going while your mother is away.”

  No chance of actually speaking with her, then. That foolish hope died away, leaving bitterness in its absence.

  “I only met her twice,” Deva continued. “Once when I first arrived in Thallakar with Sunshine’s letter of introduction to Elesmara, and once before we left. Quiet girl, that one. Helps Elesmara with the experiments, though.” A spark lit up in Deva’s eyes. “Oh, I just recalled. Before leaving, Elesmara asked your sister if she had a message for you. Anything she wanted to say.”

  Aven waited. And Deva let him wait. She was enjoying this far too much.

  Finally, his patience faltered. “And?”

  “No message.” Deva’s smile widened. “What she said was ‘Aven is a liar. I have nothing to say to him.’ What do you say to that, eh?” Deva leaned forward, golden eyes gleaming.

  Aven said nothing. That was it, then. That was how Viola saw him. A liar. It was true, really. Aven had promised that she’d get well with time, and she hadn’t. Only with a curse that might well be worse than the ailment. He’d promised to protect her, but when Mother left, he’d stayed behind as she left too. Abandoned her, no doubt, in Viola’s view.

  “Thank you for telling me,” Aven replied. Half not to give her the satisfaction of squirming. Half because truth was a gift, even if it hurt.

  Deva watched him for a while longer. Perhaps disappointed he hadn’t given the reaction she’d wanted. She shrugged and prepared to depart.

  “Just one more question,” Aven said.

  She paused.

  “Does Mother know what Hanion is doing here?” he asked.

  “No,” Deva replied. “I offered to kill him. She told me to wait. How did she put it?” She put on a mocking posh, imperious voice. “’It’s impolite to overturn the board when the game’s only just begun.’ Something like that.”

  So the truth slipped out. This was all just a game to Mother. And Aven, Deva and all the others were just pieces on the board.

  Deva slipped through the bars and was gone as silently as she had come, leaving Aven once more in silence. He returned to pacing the room, but now his imaginary companions were gone. There was only him, left alone with the sour knowledge that he was no closer to understanding the board on which he was a piece.

  Alone with his thoughts, Aven still struggled to fight against minds higher than his own, with purposes he still failed to understand.

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