This also acted as context for superiority. If, now, they were to become something akin to an organization, a ranking was required. She must... she had to be the one next after I Am. Anything else was an insult to her status as highRegent.
Ivory affirmed herself, placing her palms over her stomach, one atop the other. She said, "So, what exactly are we?"
Wednesday turned a glance to I Am before returning those round eyes to Ivory. "Aren't you quick to establish a position, Miss Friday?"
"Order is the way of things," Ivory responded. "Without a concept to abide by, we might just as well be nothing but barbarians roaming the world."
"Is that so?"
"Yes." Ivory spared a gaze at I Am and continued. "You are a Formless. You require belief and people to spread and complete you. You need these things; thus, if you are to create an organization, it requires a logic to follow. A pattern. That's the fundamental nature of symbols."
"You seem very sure that he is a Formless." Wednesday smiled. "He could be anything, you know."
Is she trying to confuse me? Ivory disregarded the words and added, "If the Days of the Dreaming are to be more than nothing—something that can truly help me—we need a pattern."
"That is true, Princess of Valor," I Am muttered. "Dreams are the answer. Everyone in this world has dreams, desires, some want that fuels their hearts. We are to fulfill that."
Ivory did not understand. "We grant dreams? How?"
"You are a princess, are you not?"
"Materialistic?"
"You are also a caster. A dreamShaper. What more of a perfect fit is there?" he asked, his right arm pointing at her. "You all—we should become this: the granting of dreams."
"In exchange?" Wednesday asked. "What do you gain from that?"
"Secrets," I Am said. "Secrets and favors."
"So they owe you for that dream," Wednesday mused. "They owe you, and you learn more from them. I suppose this includes some access through their memories."
"There is more than one way to gain information outside the ways of the silverAssurer," Ivory countered. "And outside that, the stronger of minds, regardless of casterhood, can resist those influences. I have seen it be done."
"You mean that Fermen you have in your castle," Wednesday countered. "The one you had attempted to learn information from and failed. Of course, you did manage something unique to counter it. A change in colors, was it?"
Ivory froze.
How? How did she know that? There was terror in that idea. Was there a leak in her clan? She suspected, yes. The redNight was one such show of it. And then there was No'el. Undoubtedly, there was a false man in Valor—one who could not keep their mouth shut.
"How did you know that, Miss Wednesday?"
The child grinned. "You should get a handle on your clan, Miss Friday. You have rather a mouthy people. It seems the danger to Valor remains Valor itself. I suppose it is true that only the steel can bend itself."
"There is also fire," Ivory said. "They could have been forced."
"Not this person," Wednesday replied. "I doubt anything can cause more pain than what they exist naturally with. No, no." She chuckled. "She is very strong-willed. She has a desire she wants fulfilled."
Ivory was stunned. She? A woman! Someone in Valor who was a woman and had a desire? Was it them? Was it the accomplice of No'el, the one who perhaps had caused the redNight, and even the one who revealed the secrets of Valor to wanting ears?
Impossible. Ivory felt as though she stood in a room with countless eyes—all watching, all staring and waiting to pounce and feed and destroy what it was she was to become. Who were they? Who would dare?
"Tell me!" she said. "Tell me who they are."
"That is your dream," Wednesday shrugged. "Except it's one that I can't grant."
"Can't or won't?"
"Won't." The child smiled. "I think—I believe it would be far more interesting to see you find out for yourself. To watch you go mad with questions, to suspect and drown in paranoia. I want to see that. So, in that sense, seeing that event is my dream."
Ivory tensed in rage, but maintained her sure calmness. "Why... why are you doing this?"
"Oh?" The child, that small thing, cocked her head with a smile. "I thought you knew. I am pretty mad, you see. Casters, in a sense, would refer to it as discord."
Ivory took a step back.
"No need to fear," the girl said. "It's nothing severe like me losing a complete sense of self or true madness. Simply a tiny conflict with what is right and what is interesting. And as you can see, the latter is winning. Possibly soon, I will be all about finding my interests. And nothing else."
"So, you have no compassion?"
"Not that you do either." The girl grinned. "But it is what it is. So, now that is done, what do we do now, I Am?" She smacked her lips. "That's kind of a mouthful. I Am. Off-sounding. You sure you're not going to change it?"
"A Formless cannot just change themselves."
"Huh?" The child glanced at her. "You're still on that?"
Ivory groaned. "Outside that mistsense, is there anything else this meeting was called for?"
"No, there is not," I Am declared. "But for future meetings, you will feel a sense of sleep ten minutes before you are forced to dream. That, princess, is my cure to your problem."
"Good," she said, her eyes still somewhat drifting down whenever she attempted looking directly at him for too long. That told her something. Symbols had a certain uniqueness all upon themselves. Thus, regardless of what Miss Wednesday said, I Am was undoubtedly a symbol.
Nonetheless, she propped herself up. "Now I must really return to deal with the consequences of a highRegent falling asleep during a burial."
"That must be terrible," Miss Wednesday smiled. "You should hold on to your clan before yet another great house is destroyed, like how the Emirate of Old was."
Ivory said nothing, turned to I Am, and said, "Send me back."
The world went dark before shattering into nothing.
She awoke and found herself in a room, smaller than most spaces in Valor. Dark walls with a spotty texture. A floating eiya hovering nine feet up in the air. She, however, was seated on the sole chair in the room.
Oddly, it gave the impression of an interrogation. And as if to drive home that idea, figures stood menacingly before her.
One was a bald Aspirant dressed in a white, filmy dress. Another was the bored-faced Veil of Valor. Then there was a Sister of the Gresendant Sonitras, her face covered in a pitch-black veil. There was Mother, too. Mist it.
And finally, the most unusual addition to the group: a child carrying a blackened, square box.
It seemed her latest act had attracted some attention. She poised herself. "You would bring me here without my consent?"
"You could have just as easily been left in the tomb," her mother replied. "Perhaps you would be the first highHeir of Valor left alive in one."
Ivory took in the words. "So, what then, Mother? What is this?"
"It is my attempt to quell the rage of the church."
"Please." She glanced at the two aspects of the theocracy—the Aspirant and the Sister. "We both cannot play the role of the manipulator."
"You think she tricks us?" the bald Aspirant questioned.
"The caster has an inherent nature. It is stupid to expect otherwise."
"Is that why, child of Valor," the Sister interjected, "is that why you choose to become a heretic? To blaspheme against the Almighty and the prophecy of the Promised Sun?"
"AQuestion then," Ivory looked to the Sister. "Is the Promised Sun male?"
"What?"
"Didn't you know?" Ivory narrowed her gaze. "Don't you know quite a number of people consider the prophecy as the Promised Son? So, what if the Almighty decided to send a girl? What if I am the Promised Sun? What do you do then?"
"That... that... what?" The Sister was stunned. Rightfully so.
Ivory smiled. Let them see how well she played them.
The small child in the center chuckled for a moment. "Isn't she very intelligent, Samara?"
Ivory twitched internally. Samara? He called Mother so casually. Even Aspirants wouldn't do something of the sort. So who was he? And more importantly, why was a child in the midst of these people? He seemed hardly qualified.
"Who are you?"
"Be quiet, child."
Ivory paused. "You dare talk to me like that?"
"Must I repeat myself?" the boy sighed. "Speak again, and without fail, Valor will be destroyed this very moment."
Mother flinched.
What? Ivory analyzed the room again. This time, she attempted to see the child in a different light. More questions. Who was he? How could he make such a claim? What gave him that right? What was this?
The child smiled. "Good. Now, I am an Emissary for the Comes, Actus of the Northern Diocese. And you will have him."
"Is that worth this parade?"
The child flashed a glare. She froze.
He continued, "He will come soon. And he will ask questions of you and your people. You will answer him. You will not question it."
Ivory took a silent breath and asked a different question. "What's in the box?"
The child smiled. "The head of Saedon Valor!"
Ivory trembled.
"Your mother gave me this box after the gift that was placed in it. I think you have that gift," the boy said. "And I had a hard time wondering what to put in it. Then, fortunately, your cousin dared to treat me as a servant. 'Get me some drinks,' he said. Even ruffling up my hair. What an insult. Ah, regardless, I finally found the thing that would suit perfectly for this box."
No... that's impossible. Her heart pounded.
The boy grinned, leaned forward, and opened the box. In there, she saw it: a head, blood-marred, with wide eyes of utter, dead confusion. He had actually done it. The church had gone mad!
They had declared war by killing a brightCrown of the highest rank!
This was the first step to chaos.