The mounts brought by the Keepers of the Pale Lotus were not beasts of flesh and blood.
They were Qilin of the First Era—towering, quadrupeds carved from living obsidian, their cloven hooves shod in runic brass that muffled their tread to absolute silence. Along their curved, serpentine spines ran crests of pale jade scales that breathed a faint, cooling mist, neutralizing the stinging scent of raw aether that seeped from the northern mountains.
Lady Vespera stood by the iron-banded gates of the northern gatehouse, her arms crossed over her pristine naval tunic, her jaw set into stubborn lines of displeasure.
"Two days, Your Grace," Vespera insisted, her sea-green eyes darting between Aurelia and the towering shadow of Mount Kar-Vash on the horizon. "If you do not return by the setting of the second moon, I am marching the Vanguard's heavy cohorts straight through these jade streets and blowing a hole in that mountain with our dwarven mortars."
"You will hold the harbor, Admiral," Aurelia replied, tightening the buckles on her riding harness.
She had exchanged her ceremonial mantle for a travel coat of dark wolf-fur, lined with oiled seal-hide to turn the acidic mountain drafts. At her hip rested her ancestral blade; in her saddle-pack lay three flasks of pure glacier runoff and the black iron compass Theron had calibrated to the resonance of the Void.
"If the mountain claims us, an army will only die in the mist," Aurelia continued, her silver-violet gaze meeting Vespera’s with quiet finality. "Keep the dreadnoughts' dragon-mortars trained on the Patriarch's spire. If the city stirs against our people, turn their white towers into gravel."
"Understood," Vespera gave a crisp, reluctant salute.
Beside them, Malakor vaulted onto the broader of the two obsidian beasts with effortless, brutal grace. The stone steed let out a low, grinding growl, its brass-shod hooves pawing the quartz flagstones, but Malakor hauled back on the braided copper reins with one heavy, scarred hand, forcing the ancient automaton into absolute submission with pure, terrifying dominance.
"Quit barking orders like an old fishwife, Vespera," Malakor growled down at the admiral, his amber eyes alight with the fever of the hunt. "We're going to kill some overgrown lizards, take a ring, and be back before your tea gets cold. Keep the rum locked up until I get back."
Vespera’s lips twitched, but she stepped back as the iron gates groaned open.
They rode through the northern portal at a dead gallop.
The obsidian steeds did not run like horses; they glided across the broken basalt wasteland like skipping stones over water, their brass hooves barely kissing the cracked earth. Within an hour, the lush, verdant gardens and white spires of Shen-Zhul were swallowed by the choking violet haze of the northern rift.
The landscape grew jagged and hostile.
Towering spires of blackened volcanic glass rose from the fissures like rotting fangs. The ground beneath them was no longer white jade, but porous, smoking pumice that hissed violently whenever droplets of acidic mist drifted from the low, purple clouds.
As they reached the foothills of Mount Kar-Vash, the heat inside Aurelia’s chest flared into an agonizing, thrumming crescendo.
The Seven Shards thrashed against her sternum, pulling violently toward the yawning caldera above. A sudden, blinding spike of pain shot through her left shoulder, forcing a ragged, breathless gasp from her lips as she nearly lost her grip on the copper reins.
Instantly, a heavy, leather-clad arm snaked around her waist.
Malakor had spurred his mount alongside hers, matching her stride pace for pace. He didn't ask if she was hurt; he leaned over from his saddle, hauling her half onto his lap, his hand pressing firmly against her collarbone where the seven glyphs burned white-hot through her wool tunic.
His dark shadow-magic surged down their soul-tether, cool and viscous as river ice, wrapping around her boiling core and quelling the violent resonance.
"Breathe, Aurelia," he rasped into the howling mountain gale, his jaw pressed against her temple. "I told you. You don't burn alone."
Aurelia leaned against his chest, drawing in a long, shuddering breath of filtered air. She looked up at the sheer, black walls of the crater looming five hundred paces ahead.
From the dark, gaping fissures of the summit, three pairs of colossal, sulfur-yellow eyes slowly blinked open.