He stopped a moment to enjoy the sight of his father gaping in amazement, but to his surprise and disappointment, Banage only nodded, his eyes dropping to his empty fingers where the small fire still burned. “Miranda told me something very similar.”
“Miranda?” Eli couldn’t quite wrap his mind around it. “What does Miranda know of the Shepherdess?” Unbidden, a memory of his childhood welled up inside him: the Shepherdess standing cold and terrible before the Spiritualist whose name he’d never learned. Miranda would ask the same questions, he was certain, and for a moment he saw her hanging on the Lady’s hand, staring down in disbelief at her own death. Eli shook his head and forced the thought away.
Banage didn’t notice. “After the events with Izo the Bandit King, Miranda went with Slorn to the Shaper Mountain,” he said, his voice full of worry. “There she learned of the stars and the Shepherdess. Afterward, Slorn stayed behind so she could escape. The knowledge she brought allowed us to answer the West Wind’s request to come to Osera and help in the fight against the Empress.” He raised his eyes to Eli. “Later, when everything was done, she also told me that you gave yourself to save us.”
Eli gritted his teeth. Of course Miranda would see it that way. She would never understand what it meant to lose like that, to give up. And since Banage thought he was dead, she must, too, which gave more credence to the whole martyr story. The idea of Miranda spreading fabricated stories of his selflessness annoyed Eli so strongly that he completely missed what Banage said next.
“What?”
“I said I’m proud of you,” Banage repeated. “I’d thought you were lost to even the concept of responsibility, but it seems I was wrong.”
For several seconds, Eli just stood there, blinking. “What?”
Banage’s face darkened. “If my gratitude means so little to you, Eliton, you don’t have to accept it.”
“No, it’s not—” Eli stopped, dragging his fingers through his hair. “I just never thought I’d hear you say that.”
“I never thought I’d get the chance to say it,” Banage answered, his eyebrow arching into a skeptical glare.
Eli decided to leave it at that. Any more pushing and this bizarre world where both his parents said they were proud of him in a single day would surely shatter.
“So,” Banage said, clearing his throat. “The Shepherdess just dropped you here, did she?” He folded his arms over his chest with a glare. “What did you do, Eliton? It must have been terrible to make her so angry she’d hand you over to the Council.”
“I’m sure she thought it was,” Eli said, his voice snippy. “But I didn’t do anything except speak my mind.”
Banage made a disbelieving sound, and Eli decided it was time to change the subject. He wasn’t quite ready to throw away this strange new respect his father had for him by falling right back into their old ways.
“What are you doing down here, anyway?” he said, leaning back against the cold stone. “I’m used to jails, but they’re not the sort of place you expect to find the Rector Spiritualis. Did Sara decide it was time to get the family back together and have you kidnapped?”
Banage’s face fell, and what warmth there was in the room fell with it. “I am no longer Rector,” he said. “I refused to allow the Council to use the Spirit Court as a weapon, and for that I have been charged with high treason.”
Eli’s eyes widened. “But you were at Osera before the Council could send a fishing boat.”
“Because the Lord of the West asked for our assistance,” Banage said. “The Court fights for the good of the spirits, not because Whitefall is worried about his borders.”
Eli dropped his head and began to rub his suddenly aching temples. “No offense, but that sounds like a pretty small distinction to lose your office and go to jail over.”
“It is the small distinctions that matter, Eliton,” Banage said solemnly. “If we do not stand on our morals in all matters, small or great, then we are no longer moral men, and no longer worthy of the spirits’ trust.”
Eli sighed deeply. This was more like the Banage he remembered. “So what now? Will there be a trial, or did Sara just lock you down here and throw away the key?”
Banage gave him a flat look. “Guess.”
“Good old mom,” Eli said. “At least she’s consistent.”
“Actually, I’m pleased with the way things worked out,” Banage said. “Though I was named traitor and stripped of my position as Rector, there were issues I lacked the freedom to pursue as part of the Court. Now that I’m in disgrace, I mean to set things right.”
“Like what?” Eli said, genuinely curious.
Banage’s eyes drifted up to the darkness above them. “Do you know how the Ollor Relay works, Eliton?”
Eli arched an eyebrow at the sudden change of subject. “You speak into one ball, sound comes out the other.”
“I meant how it really works,” Banage said with an exasperated sigh. “How it moves sound like that?”
“No,” Eli said. “But that’s kind of the point of a state secret. Why, do you?”
“No,” Banage said softly, lowering his eyes until he met Eli’s again. “Not for sure. But before Sara and I were married, she showed me, just once, how she made a point.”
“She always was a show-off,” Eli said with a shrug.
Banage laughed. “At least you come by it honestly.”
When Eli refused to dignify that with a response, Banage continued. “You saw the tanks above us?”
Eli nodded. How could he have missed them? The cylindrical tanks filled the cave beneath the citadel like the eggs of some enormous insect.
“Each of those tanks is one Relay point,” Banage said. “Every Relay point is really three parts: two orbs, one that’s kept by the Council, usually by Sara, and another that’s out in the field, and the tank is the third part. It lies in the middle, connecting the other two. Words spoken in one orb echo through the tank to the other, allowing communication across any distance.”
“Come on,” Eli scoffed. “I’m no Shaper, but even I know that can’t be how the Relay works. For words spoken in one end to be heard through the other, the orbs and the tank would all have to be part of the same spirit, and that’s impossible. I mean, maybe if you were working with a very large, very strong water spirit and you were a Shaper with a deep understanding of Spirit Unity, you could possibly divide the water into three separate vessels and still keep it as one spirit for a few minutes, but it would never work long term. A spirit separated becomes two spirits. That’s a fact of reality. If you pour a water spirit into two blue marbles and a tank, you’re going to end up with three spirits. It’s just how the world works. Claiming otherwise is like saying rocks fall up when you drop them.”
Banage shrugged. “Then you tell me. How does she do it?”
“I don’t know,” Eli said. “It’s probably some kind of stupid trick. Or maybe she’s got a Great Spirit on the line.” She was egotistical enough to try it.
“She can’t,” Banage said, shaking his head. “No Great Spirit would let itself be used like that willingly, and the only Enslaver who ever kept one longer than a few hours was Gregorn. But whatever she’s doing, she’s hidden it very well. I’ve been looking into the Relay discreetly for years. Every time I came down here, I tried to question the tanks, but I never heard a thing back. It’s like the entire cavern is asleep.”
Eli remembered the strange, thick silence and shuddered. “Still, that’s good,” he said. “If they’re asleep, then you know she’s not Enslaving anything.”
“I almost wish she was,” Banage said darkly. “Enslavement is straightforward. Enslavement I could end right now. But I don’t understand what Sara’s doing, or how, and that makes me afraid.”
“If you’re so worried about it, why didn’t you stop her before?” Eli said. “I thought protecting spirits from abusive humans was what Spiritualists did.”
He stopped there, bracing for the explosion that always came whenever he criticized the Court, but Banage just ran his hand over his tired eyes.
“I’ve asked myself that many times,” he said quietly. “At first I did nothing because she was my wife and I was sure she’d tell me eventually. Later, I did nothing because I was furious and wanted to keep you away from her. And then, when I became Rector, I still did nothing because the Spirit Court needed the Council of Thrones. I
