Eleanon walked forward, his feet crunching over the coarse sand and grit of the northern Isembaardian plains. To his left rose Hairekeep; to his right the desolate plains undulated westward toward the River Lhyl. Before him stood Bingaleal, with the twenty-five thousand Lealfast fighters he’d brought with him into Isembaard ranged behind him in ordered ranks.
They were all different. Their eyes as they watched him approach were sharper, their posture more still, their demeanor more confident than Eleanon had seen previously in any Lealfast.
They were stronger.
They were assured.
They were whole. No longer half-breeds of any manner, but whole.
Bingaleal took a few steps forward to meet Eleanon. They stopped a pace or two apart, Eleanon somewhat awkward, Bingaleal poised and confident.
“What do you here, Eleanon?” Bingaleal said.
“Come to see what has become of my brother,” Eleanon replied. He hesitated, hating himself for it in the face of Bingaleal’s self-possession. “I come on behalf of the Lealfast Nation, Bingaleal. Come to see what path it is you have chosen.”
Bingaleal nodded, then swept a hand out behind and to one side of him. “Sit down, brother, and we shall talk.”
As they sat cross-legged, the ranks of the Lealfast behind Bingaleal faded from view. They were still there, Eleanon could sense them, but to those only of ordinary vision it would have appeared that the two birdmen sat alone in the deserted plain outside Hairekeep.
“I have become Elcho Falling’s enemy,” Bingaleal said.
That shocked Eleanon. Not so much what Bingaleal had expressed, but the stark manner in which he had done so.
“Tell me,” Eleanon said. “What has become of you, Bingaleal, and all our comrades?”
Bingaleal did not immediately reply. He drew in a deep breath, raising his eyes and focusing them in the far distance.
“I have entered into the One,” he said eventually, softly. His eyes suddenly refocused, very sharply, on Eleanon.
“And where did that lead you?” Eleanon said, equally as soft.
“It led me into a promise,” Bingaleal said. “It showed me a path toward a world of power and fulfilment. It showed me a clear path, Eleanon, step by step, toward what we have always lusted after. Our own future. Beholden to no one. Despised by no one.”
“And the price?” Eleanon said.
“There is no price.”
“There is always a price, brother.” Eleanon sighed. “Bingaleal, I come before you today because I, as all our brothers and sisters, felt the change in you and those who came into Isembaard with you.” He put his hand on his chest. “We feel it here. We felt it, and we yearn for it, and it was all I could do to stop the entire Nation following me down here…but there is still a little bit of me, Bingaleal, which remains cautious. What has the One offered you, what has he shown you, and what is the price he demands?”
“He has shown us a future free of our Skraeling blood, a future in which the Icarii kneel before us in humility, a future in which we no longer inhabit frozen wastes. The price? Only one price. The destruction of Elcho Falling and of its master.”
“But Elcho Falling and its master is what we have dreamed of for millennia, Bingaleal.”
Bingaleal smiled in genuine compassion. “Yet look to what the Lord of Elcho Falling has become, Eleanon. He cannot give us what we need. Not anymore. Now, brother, tell me. What do you here? Does Axis know where you are?”
Eleanon told Bingaleal what had happened—the slaughter at the hands of Armat, Axis’ subsequent contemptuous dismissal of Eleanon, and the StarMan’s belief that Eleanon and the remaining Lealfast fighters were sulking within the Sky Peaks, licking their wounds.
“Bingaleal, you have no idea what it cost me, to watch Lealfast fall from the sky, but—”
“But it has won for you Axis’ disregard. I understand that and, while I grieve also for those Lealfast lost, I applaud your decision.” A small smile curved about Bingaleal’s face. “And so will the One, once he knows. You shall be our key into Elcho Falling, Eleanon. The One has constructed a curse with which to distract Isaiah, and shortly Maximilian and Ishbel, but it is largely meaningless. You shall be the One’s key into Elcho Falling. You, Eleanon. You shall walk the One into Elcho Falling unseen while Maximilian and Isaiah and Axis fidget with worry about the curse.”
Bingaleal chuckled. “You have no idea how easy this is going to be, brother.”