Chapter 1413 - Secret Meetings IV

“Strange being back here after so long…” Justin whispered as he hurriedly led them through the ornate passageways, passing doorways and rounding corners with the confidence of a man who knew exactly where he was and how to get where he wanted to go.

“Stay alert,” Leon warned.

“I don’t sense anything, but there may still be traps and other wards down here.”

“Doubtful,” Justin scoffed.

“The tunnels this close to the heart of the palace are for Kamran to get around quickly and privately.

Only his most trusted subordinates know about them, and even fewer have direct access to them.”

“If that’s true,” Cassandra asked skeptically, “remind me how you learned about them?”

“Ariana.

She’s one of those few with access.

Since we needed somewhere private to meet, she showed me how to get down here.

It allowed us to meet far more often than we would have been able to, otherwise.”

Justin slowed for a moment as they passed an alcove with a suit of armor seemingly standing guard.

A quick scan of it told Leon that there was enough magic running through the armor to denote it as more than what it appeared, but he wasn’t able to immediately say what.

He assumed it would animate and attack intruders, though he wasn’t keen on putting that theory to the test.

“We once thought to use some of these armor sets to… have fun…”

Justin trailed off as Valeria clapped her hands around her ears.

She hurried to respond, “We don’t need the details, Father.

Let us cease wasting time and get to Mother.”

Justin nodded, an embarrassed flush coming to his cheeks.

“You’re right.

Let’s go.”

Without another word, he tore off down the halls.

Leon and the rest of the party followed, their senses extended, always on the lookout for anything that might trip them up or alert the massive palace above them that there was something wrong in the palace’s secret basement.

Fortunately, the labyrinthine halls were devoid of both such security mechanisms and other people, leaving this final leg of their journey almost insultingly straightforward.

“Here…” Justin whispered with tremendous uncertainty as he stopped outside of a fairly standard door, at least for these tunnels.

It was dark enchanted oak with inlaid Adamant.

The glowing blood-metal depicted a man standing atop the corpse of some defeated beast, sword raised high, lightning crackling along the blade.

Notably, the door had no physical locks, and the enchantments in the walls and the door itself were fairly weak.

Justin, if he could be taken at his word, had come here multiple times and had never encountered such obstructions before.

That, however, Leon knew didn’t mean that such obstructions would never be implemented.

Leon examined the door closely while Nestor unraveled the few enchantments that flowed through it, and neither of them detected anything concerning.

Less than a minute later, Justin was pushing it open and leading them into the room beneath the ninety-second tower.

It was a comfortable room, though somewhat on the small side for how large their group was.

The room was hexagonal in shape, with sofas lining the edge of the room, separated at the corners by triangular tables.

The middle of the room was open, leaving the room feeling somewhat empty.

To Leon’s eyes, it felt like a room that had been turned into a sitting room because there was no other reason for it to exist; Kamran’s palace was already so damned large that filling it seemed impossible, even with it serving as the capital of his interplanar administration.

He quietly wondered how many similar rooms existed in Westmount, as even though he’d consciously kept his palace smaller than it could have been, there was undoubtedly still some unused space that, for lack of any other purpose, was just filled with a couple seats and tables.

This room, however, was more notable for what it lacked instead of what it had, as Ariana was nowhere to be seen.

Justin didn’t look particularly put out by this, though, as he slowly walked into the room, looking around in wonder as if every stitch in every sofa cushion held a cherished memory.

“Is it…?” he whispered as he walked over to one of the sofas and pulled it back from the wall, revealing something that made him laugh.

Looking over his shoulder, Leon saw a surprisingly realistic painting that had been hidden by the seat of Justin embracing Ariana.

“We met here more than anywhere else,” he said as he stared at the painting.

“No one would ever disturb us here.

We didn’t have to hide ourselves and could just… be.”

Valeria went over to stand with her father, laying a hand on his arm.

“Not long, now,” she said, and Justin took a deep breath, visibly summoning the strength he needed to finish this operation.

He pushed the seat back into place.

“Yes.

I need—we need to focus.

I’ll wait for her… here…”

He took a position in the center of the room, standing facing the door with his hands clasped behind his back and a welcoming smile on his disguised face.

“All of you… maybe have a seat?

Look non-threatening?”

All eyes turned to Leon as they waited for him to weigh in on Justin’s suggestion.

“Maybe…” Leon whispered, “if you’re looking for us to be non-threatening, we should be invisible?”

“That might startle her when you’re revealed,” Justin said, though his tone told Leon that he was considering the option.

“We’ll be invisible,” Leon said more definitively.

“We don’t know who might come through that door next.

You trust your wife; I don’t trust Kamran.

We’ll play it safe, let you speak your piece, and then we’ll reveal ourselves once we’re sure that there won’t be any surprises.”

Justin frowned as Leon took charge, but he didn’t argue.

Instead, he just started to pace as the rest of the party took up positions and obscured themselves with several runes that Nestor inscribed into the air.

In seconds, it appeared as if Justin was waiting alone, nervously pacing as he waited for the door to open and reveal his wife.

To Justin’s right stood Alcander and Nestor; to his left waited Zhang and Daryun; and directly behind him, opposite the door, were Leon, Valeria, and Cassandra.

Leon could feel both of his wives wound tightly, but it was Valeria who was more obviously stressed as she attached herself to Leon’s arm with an iron grip.

“Almost there,” Leon whispered to the silver-haired woman.

“We’ll be out of here by the end of the day…”

“Woe to anyone who tries to stop us,” she replied.

After a long enough time for tension to continue ratcheting up, but not long enough for anyone to manage to relax, Leon sensed someone approaching from outside of this room.

“Here we go,” he announced to the room, and everyone focused on the door.

Justin stopped pacing and turned to face it with as neutral and non-threatening a pose as he could throw together as the door clicked and swung inward.

The opened door revealed Ariana, as radiant as she was visibly terrified.

Her lips were set into a hard line even as her eyes darted to every corner of the room before settling on Justin.

She had changed from her extravagant debut dress into something much easier to move around in: a short dark blue tunic that left her arms bare, and black leggings that clung to her body more tightly than Valeria clung to Leon’s arm.

A pair of simple black boots completed the ensemble, while her shimmering black hair was tied back in a simple bun so that it wouldn’t get in the way of her trying to move quickly.

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At the same time, she tentatively allowed her aura to spill into the room as if afraid of what it might find.

Leon’s heart skipped a beat as he thought Ariana’s magic might disrupt Nestor’s runes, but after a moment passed and they remained invisible, he exhaled in relief.

Ariana entered the room with uncertain steps.

Her eyes remained locked on Justin, and it was only a few seconds after entering that she turned and used her power to shut the door behind her, allowing the wards in the door to reactivate and keep this meeting private.

“…

Nathaniel?” she asked, her voice quivering with anxiety.

“Or… Justin…?”

Justin smiled, then slowly removed his disguise bracelet.

His fake face dissolved away, leaving the man himself, somewhat aged compared to how he looked even back in the Bull Kingdom but still recognizable.

“My love,” he whispered as he pulled the bracelet back into his soul realm.

“My star, my guiding light…”

He took a step towards Ariana, and she took a step back.

It was clearly not the reaction he was expecting as he halted in place, a questioning look crossing his face.

“It’s… been a while,” she said.

“Why have you…”

She trailed off, a shallow frown flitting across her face before she settled on a different question.

“You said that you came here with others.

Where are they?”

“Close,” Justin said reassuringly.

“Close enough to help us.”

“To help with what?” she asked, a harder edge coming to her tone.

“To…” Justin whispered, but his voice died as he seemed to look, truly look, at Ariana for the first time since before his exile.

His smile faded, and he said with less love and a great deal more seriousness, “I have thought about you every day since I was sent away.

My heart hasn’t changed; you are the reason it beats in my chest.

My resolve to live has faltered, but it was always thoughts of you that brought me back… and thoughts of our daughter…”

Ariana put on a stoic front, but Leon saw her eyes twitch when Justin said that he’d been ‘sent away’, and she nearly burst into tears at his mention of Valeria.

He could feel the silver-haired woman in question nearly snapping his forearm from the tightness of her grip.

“You should see her,” Justin said, his voice softening.

“She’s beautiful.

Stronger than I am.

She took a bit of her looks from me, but I’m happy to say that she takes after you far more.

She’s imagined the three of us together her entire life, and now… now we can be!

Ariana, I returned to Torn Sky to find you, to take you away!

So that we can be together, as we always spoke about in this very room!”

Ariana stared at Justin, pain etched into every line of her face.

She was a post-Apotheosis mage and so didn’t look a day past her prime, but in the soft light of this sitting room, lines were cast across her face that aged her several decades.

“It’s been… centuries…” she whispered, hurt ringing in her tone.

“Why did you leave?”

Leon wasn’t sure if it was a trick of the light, but she twisted her arm slightly as if recoiling from someone’s touch.

He tuned his senses and began preparing himself, readying Iron Pride in his soul realm.

Justin responded, confused at first but growing more angry with every word, “I…

Ariana, you are my sun, my moon, my stars…

I would have never left you if I had any choice at all!

I would have stayed and done whatever it took for us to be together!

But Kamran…

He was furious.

He tortured me.

He told me that he would never allow me to have you.

He waited until Valeria was born, gave her to me, and threw us away.

He gave me an impossible task to complete, hoping that we would die and never bother him—or you—again.”

As he spoke, Leon evaluated the room.

As far as his physical senses could tell, Ariana had come alone.

She was an eleventh-tier mage, and so her aura was immense, but there was something else coming from her side of the room, a hint of power not coming from her.

“That is not what I was told,” Ariana said softly.

“Lord Kamran told me that you ran away.

That you stole our child and abandoned me.”

“I would never—” Justin said, his fury growing, though he still remained in control.

“Ariana, you know me.

I shared everything with you.

You should know that I would never abandon you, as I would never abandon my own heart!”

“Where is my daughter, Justin?” Ariana inquired, her tone growing cold and hard.

Somehow, Valeria’s grip on Leon’s arm became even stronger, strong enough to crush a mortal man’s arm to dust.

“Where did you take her?”

“She…” Justin whispered, but he halted and took a step back.

“She is safe.

She is… she wanted to come with me.

To be here when our family was made whole…”

“Where is she?” Ariana pressed.

Justin didn’t immediately respond.

Instead, he stared back at her, his expression falling just as hers was growing angrier.

“Do you remember what we spoke about when we were last here?” he quietly asked.

A crack broke Ariana’s angry fa?ade.

“A small villa in the mountains?” Justin said.

“On the shores of a lake?

Air filled with the scent of dusk orchids and birdsong?

A pavilion with water access, so we could have rainbow carp?

A few children, laughing and playing in the gardens?

Please, my light…

That is all I have ever wanted for us.

That is all I have ever wanted, full stop.

To live a life of peace with you and our children…”

By this point, Ariana had closed her eyes, and her expression had fallen.

Several tears had already fallen down her cheeks, and she hoarsely whispered, “Then… why did you leave?”

“I… my light, I did not leave!

Kamran forced us away!”

“You lie!” she suddenly shouted, her eyes opening to reveal them blazing with anger and pain.

Tears flowed freely, though, even as she seemed to be trying to set Justin aflame with her gaze alone.

“He would never lie to me!”

“He lies to everyone!” Justin insisted.

“Not to me!” she cried.

“He is my father!”

Valeria gasped quietly enough that only Leon could have heard it, and her grip finally became so tight that it started being painful.

Leon, however, only heard Ariana, and he only felt the cold dread spreading through his bones.

‘…

Father…?’ he thought.

“That’s…” Justin whispered, his disbelief only exceeded by Leon’s.

“That cannot be…”

“He raised me as his daughter,” Ariana said, her tone inviting any challenge to what she had to say, “because I am his daughter.

He loves me.

Why would he lie to me?”

Justin’s face twitched as if it didn’t know how to express what he was feeling.

“Many reasons…” he murmured.

“Anger.

Humiliation.

He wanted you to stay with him, not to try and follow me.

He made me disappear.

He made our girl disappear.

All to keep you with him.

To ensure that you remained his.”

“You don’t know anything,” Ariana said coldly.

She then stepped back, pressing her back against the door.

“You shouldn’t have come here, Justin.

You should have forgotten about me.”

The air shimmered to her right and left, and four figures materialized as if from nowhere.

All were eleventh-tier, and three of them Leon had never seen before.

The last, however, was at least passingly familiar.

Dionysias, Kamran’s regent in Torn Sky.

“You really should have, Justin,” Dionysias said with a wide smile of anticipation.

“Coming back here was a mistake.”

In one smooth motion, he drew a long, straight sword from his soul realm and took a step toward Justin.

In response, Justin stood his ground, drawing a sword of his own, though his eyes remained locked on Ariana.

He looked like he was trying to speak, but anger and betrayal had locked his throat.

Dionysias charged.

Justin braced.

Valeria moved.

Leon flashed.

In a single swing, Valeria took Dionysias’ arm.

She’d moved so quickly that she was still regaining visibility as her glaive’s head pierced his skin.

Leon slipped around Justin’s other side, lightning surging through his body as he drove Iron Pride into Dionysias’ chest.

The man, in his arrogance, decided not to wear armor.

He’d ‘only’ been facing a tenth-tier mage, after all.

The rest of Leon’s party surged.

Alcander buried an ax in the neck of one of the other eleventh-tier mages, while Cassandra put her sword through another’s neck.

The last was just as swiftly dispatched by Zhang and Daryun simultaneously piercing his throat and heart with their spears.

Ariana screamed as she tried to back up against the door.

Dionysias stared in shock at Leon as lightning tore his heart to shreds.

The light left his eyes, and Leon tore his blade free.

Ariana slid against the door until she’d collapsed on the floor as the last of her protectors fell.

She raised her hand to try and conjure some magic to protect herself, but it was clear that Kamran had apparently never trained her in such ways, as she was barely able to conjure a few balls of searing light despite her incredible power.

But even those small balls of light faded as Valeria approached, her glaive disappearing back into her soul realm.

Valeria knelt beside Ariana, just barely out of the older woman’s reach.

“I’m right here, Mother,” she said.

No smile graced her lips, and her crestfallen face could have been carved out of marble for all that it shifted.

Ariana stared for a long moment, then went limp, her eyes falling shut.

She’d fainted.

Leon stared at the mess they’d created, and he felt a faint tremor in the walls.

Though this room wasn’t nearly as well enchanted as some of the palace’s more defensive features, it was still reacting to this brief but intense burst of magic.

He imagined alarms blaring throughout the upper sections of the palace.

He imagined a furious Kamran charging toward them right that very second.

“Grab her,” he ordered his party at large.

“We need to leave.

Now.”