A Dream of Mortals

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

The Lords of the Seven stood close together in a circle in the dim stone chamber, lit only by the sole shaft of light pouring down through the oculus in the ceiling, and faced each other silently, donning their all-black robes and black hoods. Immortals, beings who had led the Empire through century after century, who had been there all the way back at the Great Forming, these seven men stood in the shadows, on the periphery of the sunlight, silently staring into it, as they had for millennia.

For millennia, they had stood there and stared into the light, seeing visions, watching the past, forming the future as it swirled through the dust in the light, deciding on a course for the Empire. These beings represented the four horns and two spikes of the Empire, and the seventh was the deciding vote. They were the One Who Ruled All, the ones whom even the Supreme Commanders had to defer to. They were the ones whose will was absolute, and whom had never been defied. Ever.

Now, for the first time, as they stared into the shaft of sunlight, the circular black granite table beneath it was not empty—but instead, held the severed head of their messenger. They had sent him to Volusia, and she had returned him lifeless.

They all stared at it solemnly, silently concurring on a plan of action.

It was the seventh Lord who stepped forward, as he often did, to speak on their behalf. He reached out, grabbed the hair matted with blood, picked it up, and looked into its eyes. They were still open, and stared back at him with a look of agony in death.

“This Volusia,” he began, his voice dark, gravelly, “this young girl who thinks she’s a Goddess—she thinks she can defy us. She has come to believe she can win.”

“We shall dispatch our forces from all corners of the Empire,” interjected another, “and crush the capital. Within a fortnight, she shall be deposed.”

The seventh Lord raised the head higher and stared into its eyes, as though searching for an answer. The silence hung heavy in the air.

“No,” he finally replied.

All the others turned to him.

“Don’t you see?” he said. “That is exactly what she wants. She has weaved a trap. She has some power at her disposal, a dark power, one I cannot discern. One I don’t quite trust. We shall not fall into it.”

“Then shall we just let her run free, run the capital with disdain?” asked another, outraged.

The seventh waited a long time, then finally stepped into the sunlight, revealing a too-pale face, startling blue eyes, a visage marked by centuries of evil and deception. He looked out at the others and grinned an evil grin.

“We shall give her what she does not expect,” he added. “We shall make her suffer where it hurts her most.”

He breathed deep.

“Volusia,” he said.

The others all stared back, and he could feel them thinking.

“We shall send our armies not to the capital, but to her home city. It is defenseless now, left unguarded. She shall never expect it. We shall destroy everything she’s ever known and loved. All of her people. Every last one. It shall lure her out, irrationally, to war. And then we shall meet her, then we shall make her know the power of the Seven.”

There came a long silence, and finally the other six Lords stepped into the circle, each raising their fists.

They touched fists to the table, the sacred symbol, and it was decreed.

Soon, Volusia would be a memory.