The Effaced: Chapter Twenty

“My dad brought a proposal before the senate to set up a program with Elucidate Labs to produce and freely distribute self charging magical items that would work as a draining array, since we couldn’t tip our hand yet,” Rhys said.

“That would still make magic far more accessible,” Kelly said. “Least from what you were sayin’ earlier, most places only sell one use or a few use ones. Not self charging.”

“Why are we even discussing who the hitter could have been?!” I asked, the frustration leaking through my voice. “Whoever it was obviously was opposed to the spreading of aura to everyone.” 

“That’s exactly the problem, Axel,” Rhys said with a sad little laugh that died halfway out of his throat. “Half the political parties in the city would be opposed to something like that. But they probably would have used hitters from the undercity, which is the point of the discussion. Most of the people in the sky don’t like to get their hands bloody.”

“Why would they oppose it?” Kelly asked. “Wouldn’t it just be a good thing? I mean if anyone could work as an enchanter or somethin, that just means more people could have options. Even if they don’t wind up using it, it could let them… I don’t know. Use some light runes or something?” 

“That’s exactly the problem,” I said wearily. “The people who are in power that don’t want equality are going to argue that it will destabilize the job market. We’re stable at a quarter of the population having the choice to enter it.”

“That’s stupid!” Kelly protested. “Is there anything we can do?”

I looked up hopefully.

“And what does this have to do with the tattoos? It sounds like that would be thirty years off, not worth revealing it for this conversation.”

Hadiya and Rhys shared a look, and Rhys spoke.

“Hadiya, we should be open, tell them everything.”

“Maybe,” Hadia said. “We’ll say this – we are both members of the ligature.” 

I did my best to recall the details, though it was hardly surprising. Zone had mentioned that was the party that Senator Ermonte had worked for. 

The Ligature political party was one of the smaller ones, backed heavily by the faerie courts, but focused heavily on the freedom of information. They’d seen explosive growth since their interference in the north, but they were still only the fifth largest party in the city. 

But they also were backed by the faerie courts, who wanted information to spread for… reasons I didn’t know. I’d never learned much about faeries, and between my recharge ensuring that I always had iron touching my skin, and the fact I was a metal mage, they’d long since avoided me.

This only added to the feeling that there was an invisible assassin behind my back, and I weighed how to continue.

Kelly, on the other hand, was completely willing to open his mouth, even when he would have been better served not to, or to at least think through his words first. 

“I thought you were some history person, not a politician,” Kelly said. 

“I am a historical researcher,” Rhys said. “But I’m quite an active member of politics. It comes with the family, and we’ve worked as major members of the Ligature for some time.” 

“I knew that history wasn’t a real job,” Kelly muttered, and when Rhys opened his mouth to respond, Hadiya cut him off with a raised hand, thankfully sensing the derailment. She reached into her desk and took out a heavily rune-covered coin, as well as a crystal covered in more runes, and an hourglass full of bright pink sands, which she flipped over. She tossed the coin into the air and it vanished in a flash, then the crystal began to glow with a pulse of red light. 

Not for the first time, I wished I was an archmage, so I could trace the flows of magic with my vision. Not that all archmages had that power – some chose a different pinnacle arch-star – but it was a choice unique to archmages and some exceedingly powerful demons, as far as I knew. 

“Are you two willing to swear a compact to Rhys in order to keep it secret?” Hadiya asked, glancing at the sand, which was falling rapidly, then back up to Kelly, then to me. 

“I’m willing to swear to keep my silence within reasonable limits,” I said. That was vague enough to let me wiggle out of whatever I said. 

“What limits?” Hadiya asked. 

“I am not going to provide you with a list of exact terms to faerie bargain your way out,” I said. “But examples of limits that would force me to break my silence include, but are not limited to, learning that the two of you are involved with human sacrifice, that Elucidate wants to use their artifact drain arrays or something else to track and seize control of the city, that they can be remotely detonated to kill anyone Elucidate views as an enemy, or other drastic things.” 

“Same,” Kelly agreed, seemingly contentedly. I struggled not to stare at him for being so nonchalant about everything. 

Hadiya looked contemplative, but Rhys lit his aura and looked at Hadiya.

“Hadiya, it’s hardly unreasonable to not want to swear absolute silence, especially given the lives these two must have led…”

Hadiya glanced at the hourglass, which was a quarter of the way to empty. 

“Fine,” she snapped. 

Rhys, Kelly, and I all quickly swore, and Hadiya began explaining. 

“I, alongside Rhys, and Rhys’ father, are all members of the Ligature as we said earlier,” she said. “What we didn’t say is that we are both members of the political party and the Ligature’s covert operations network. Our core tenants are the decentralization of magic, to stop corporations from achieving their goals.”

I couldn’t say I was shocked that a political party that had been interfering in foreign affairs would have covert operatives inside the city as well, but I was getting more confused by the second. Kelly opened his mouth, but Hadiya just bowled right over him and kept explaining.

“In some places, this means governments built entirely on magical control need to be torn down. Here it means investing heavily in the memory banks and public libraries. But in this case, it also means that the higher ups at Elucidate Labs are aware of the second generation tattoos, as well as two-a and two-b, but not the third generation. As far as the lab is aware, the design is expensive. What I didn’t tell you, or the lab, is that I’ve designed a third generation tattoo. No additional benefits or improvements, but substantially cheaper.”

“How expensive is it to create?” I asked intently. 

That would be the key factor in everything. If it was too expensive, then it just opened up a new branch of research based on making it cheaper, and there wouldn’t be anything too serious that changed. It would still pave the way for future research, of course. It was interesting, but no different than the tattoo she’d shown earlier.

But the fact that she’d talked about the tattoos at all? 

That they were willing to jump through all these hoops to keep this so secret? 

That it involved death and members of the covert operations?

It had to be cheap enough that it would change everything.

“The material cost to develop one was five thick-panes, eleven medium-panes, and seven thin-panes,” Hadiya said.

I rounded up the extra five thin-panes to make it six-thick panes, in order to make the math simpler in my head. That was seventy-two medium-panes, or eight hundred and sixty-four thin-panes.

That was…

Well, eight and a half hundred thin-panes wasn’t cheap to a normal person, but it was distinctly within the affordable range to many. To purchase an aura for someone who didn’t have one? There weren’t many life changing investments that only cost that little.

Even if you grew up in the undercity and socked away ten thin-panes a week in savings, it would be affordable in just under two years.

Assuming that my estimates of how much an illegally acquired one cost were even remotely accurate, these tattoos would cost twenty times less.

Sure, getting one through the legal channels was free, but that required you to be improving the city in a way that the council of aura spark distribution thought was worth the investment, as well as a reliance on supplies that were always far lower than the demand.

Eight and a half hundred thin-panes… By the thrones of the void and archangels of abundance, that would change everything in the city. Maybe everything in the entire world, if it could be performed anywhere.

“Are you having to do anything horrendous to get the price down?” I asked quickly. 

“The only thing some may find morally objectionable is that it does require the sacrifice of thirteen chickens,” Rhys said. “It’s part of the lifeline empowerment necessary to get the spell to work. But the average citizen of the street city or above eats far more than thirteen chickens in a year, and the ritual doesn’t render the meat inedible.” 

Hadiya glared at him, but nodded. 

I considered that for a moment before shrugging. I wasn’t a vegetarian, and chickens were hardly the worst thing to sacrifice. If it was a human, elf, aster, or beastkin, I’d have issues with it. 

But chickens? Who cared? I was sure there were some people who would take umbrage with it, but they seemed like bleeding-heart types, to an almost unhealthy degree. 

“That’s not bad,” Kelly said. “I mean, I like eating chicken.” 

I was almost tempted to laugh at the ridiculous statement amongst all the secrecy and worry. 

“It’s got some minor issues, but it’s not horrible,” Rhys said, and Hadiya picked up talking. 

“I worked with Rhys and Bloody Eyes to get the ritual sorted out, then brought it before Rhys’ father. He brought a proposal before the senate to set up a program with Elucidate Labs to produce and freely distribute self charging magical items that would work as a draining array, since we couldn’t tip our hand yet.” 

“We then had a foreign enchanter who is also a member of the ligature approach the senate with the design for this tattoo,” Rhys said. “He’d offer to share it with the Ligature party and perhaps even Elderglass as recompense for what we’d done before. He’s not exceptionally well known now, but he’s done some fascinating work.” 

“It’s easier to accept a man and a mage with an aura is able to create something like this than an auraless woman,” Hadiya said with an unamused laugh. 

“If the proposal had passed, then the reveal of the tattoos from an allied, but foreign, national would serve to show that other nations might be distributing them. That would have smoothed things over with the bulwark party.” 

“And the fact that the proposal to shift from artifacts to tattoos would free up the budget would have appeased some of the other parties,” Hadiya said. “It was a perfect plan.” 

If their little secret organization was truly dedicated to improving people’s lives, decentralizing knowledge, and spreading magic to everyone, then I tended to agree. 

But they still needed to convince me that was really their goal.

I could believe that Hadiya, a young genius spell designer who had discovered a method to create something like this, would want it to be shared freely. I could see the subtle signs in her posture, from the moment we’d first met. She’d lived a hard life. 

I could understand why someone who lived that sort of life was willing to take risks to make things free, and would never want someone else to suffer the way they had suffered, to be passed over at every opportunity. 

But in my experience, organizations were rarely so benevolent. 

Rhys leaned forward and looked at me seriously, his meltingly soft eyes surprisingly resolved. 

“You two have been let down by groups in the past,” he said. “I swear, by my oath and my power, that what we have said is true. I want to help everyone get a shot at receiving an aura and improving their lives. I want to bring you in to help. You’re being targeted because of our plan, and we want to help.”

I stared into Rhys’ face.

I was used to keeping my heart behind lock and key. I had learned to harden my heart as a child if I didn’t want to die. 

During my years in the army, I’d let it soften. The drill instructors and higher ups were crude and abusive, but they weren’t the Arenamaster. 

It had softened more during college, and in the few years I’d had with Darren, but after our breakup, I’d been almost entirely alone, and I’d allowed my emotions to compress. I spoke to Zone on occasion, but never for long. I worked, went home, got up, and worked again. 

I had allowed myself to retreat inward again and not feel anything.

So why did I believe Rhys when he said he wanted to help me?