Of Kings and Killers (Elder Empire Sea #3) - WIll Wight Page 0,53
the stranger wore armor of unrelieved black that would have blended into the void if not for the nimbus of blue light that surrounded his entire body.
The armor he wore was smooth as polished obsidian, almost liquid, and Calder could see no seams at the joints or even around the neck. It was as though the plates had fused to the man’s skin.
That skin was pale, paler even than Calder’s own. He had a handsome face, if a bit long, with eyes of such an intense blue that they didn’t seem human. His hair was long and flowing white, though age had not marked him at all. He seemed timeless, perfect, like an impossibly detailed sculpture or the ideal form of a human brought to life.
The man watched Calder for a moment, though only Calder’s awareness had traveled through the Optasia. Somehow, he met Calder’s eyes.
Then he beckoned with one hand.
Calder instantly found himself in a room. Each of the four walls, floor, and ceiling were made up of stained glass depicting the same figure—a featureless man with black armor and white hair—in various scenes.
In one, he stood atop a rock in a sea of wheat, hauling back a huge scythe for a great swing. On the ceiling, the same figure held a ruby planet in his right hand and an emerald planet in his left while behind him a great sapphire river flowed like a ribbon.
Whoever this was, he was very taken with his own deeds.
That man lounged on a luxurious couch, basking in the multicolored light. “I am he of the name Ozriel, which is my identity and my purpose and that which you can call me.” His accent was all wrong, like nothing Calder had ever heard.
Calder tried to sort through that sentence and realized the man was introducing himself, but he obviously didn’t have much of a grasp on the language, so Calder spoke slowly and clearly. “My name is Calder. Where am I? Do you understand me? Where?”
Ozriel quickly rolled his eyes. “Sorry and apologies, the fault is not held in your hands. Speak more, if your will aligns with mine.”
“All right…ah, I am Calder Marten, Steward of the Aurelian Empire. I have come here as a representative of my people in order to discover the cause of the…crack…that the Great Elders left in the sky. I am communicating with you now through a device that amplifies Reading.”
It was strange, talking this way, because he couldn’t feel the words in his throat or his lips move. He supposed he was communicating entirely through Intent, which might have explained the translation difficulties.
“Can you understand me?”
Ozriel waited for a moment with the concentrated expression of a man doing calculations in his head. After a moment, he said, “Ah, there we are. Is that better?”
His accent was now almost entirely gone. He might have grown up in the Capital.
Legend had it that the first generation of Readers, including the Emperor and Estyr Six, could speak with those of other languages by Reading the Intent behind the other person’s words. They had used those skills to unite the language of the Empire.
Had this man drifting beyond the sky done the same thing?
“Did you learn the language by Reading my Intent?”
“Something like that. We had the language of your world stored away, but such things change over time. Hearing you speak helped me connect with you and your knowledge, since your world is usually cut off from me.”
That opened a library’s worth of questions for Calder, but he couldn’t ask them. “I might have only moments, but I must know. Who are you?”
“I am Ozriel, the Destroyer.” He sounded a little too lighthearted for a man calling himself ‘the Destroyer.’ “Eighth Judge of the Court of Seven, and the end of all that was, all that is, and all that shall be. Please don’t call me Oz.”
Calder couldn’t go on pulling answers out of this man one question at a time, so he focused on the one that mattered: “The Great Elders cracked open the sky. Do you know how to fix it?”
Ozriel sat up on the couch, his face becoming serious. “Yes your consciousness has a tenuous connection to this place. I will restrict myself only to the most important details.”
He held one hand out to the left, where a massive apparatus appeared out of nowhere. It was a complex network of glass flasks, tubes, whistling steam vents, and whirring parts that Calder could scarcely comprehend.