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“Arkon,” Tiamaris replied.
“Very well. You have heard the world theory, yes?”
Sanabalis raised a brow. “I think it completely irrelevant to the Hawks and the Imperial Law. It is unlikely that she has been forced to study something considered that esoteric.”
“Very well. There is, in theory, more than one world.”
“More than one?”
The Arkon nodded.
“How many?”
Sanabalis winced. Clearly, this was not the right question.
“More than one. Right.”
“Each world has a magical potential.” She nodded.
“And each world has a magical field, if you will, a level of power that permeates the whole. If our own studies are anything to go by, that level of power can fluctuate from place to place. Do you understand the concept of power lines or power grids?”
She wanted to nod, but she didn’t. She could guess how amused the Arkon would be by a simple fib. She could also see that her silence had caused his eyes to shade into a dark bronze. Sometimes ignorance had its appeal.
“Sanabalis, I am entirely unamused.”
“Arkon.”
“Very well, Private Neya. Magical potential seems to form along lines; we are not certain why. Those lines can cross, and in some areas, they will form a grid, in some a knot. Those knots are areas in which magic, when it can be used at all, will be at its most potent. It will often also be at its most wild.”
“Wild?”
“Sanabalis can explain that later. My time is valuable.”
Hers, on the other hand, wasn’t, at least if you went by pay scale. But she absorbed the words, made as much sense as she could of them, and then braved a question. “The buildings in the fiefs—like the Castle—are they on those knots?”
He raised a brow. “Very good. This may be less painful than I anticipated. Yes. They are, as you put it, on potential knots. The magic that defines the boundaries of a fief seem to follow lines that extend from the central knot, and out. But there is some blurring of boundary, as has been discussed elsewhere.
“In the heart of the fiefs, in what was once called Ravellon by the Barrani, we believe potential exists such as exists nowhere else in our world.”
“What does this have to do with other worlds?”
Clearly, this was a bad question. “Nothing. But you bring me to my previous point. Our world has a very high magical potential. It is why we believe the Aerians are capable of flight. It is why they exist at all.”
“But—”
He raised a brow. She closed her mouth.
“In a different magical environment, the Aerians would, in theory, be incapable of sustaining their own weight in flight. They might have wings, but the wings would serve no function, except perhaps in a cultural way. There are sages who have made this study their life’s work. Perhaps you can find one of them to question.”
Kaylin bit her lip. She did not dislike the Arkon in the way she disliked the pretentious and snobby nobles who occasionally crossed her path—but even so, she didn’t like being all but called a moron. Instead of concentrating on her injured dignity, she concentrated on his words. Her eyes widened.
“You think that Ravellon is—”
He raised a brow.
“You think it exists in more than one world.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You didn’t think the first explanation was true, although it would make sense, you believe the second explanation. And the theoretical existence of other worlds ties into that explanation. You think that, near the heart of the fiefs, there is some other world that’s touching ours that wouldn’t support Aerian life.”
He raised both brows. “Sanabalis,” he told her tutor, “she shows serious potential as a student. Why has this not been explored?”
“For a human, she is much like Lord Tiamaris was in his youth.”
This clearly meant more to the Arkon than it did to Kaylin; the Arkon actually grimaced. “Very well. They are both rather young.” He spoke as if youth was a failing. “Yes, Private Neya. That is what I believe.”
“It is also,” Sanabalis finally said, “not relevant at the moment.”
“Do you think the shadows come from somewhere else? I mean, some world that isn’t ours?”
“No. The shadows, as you call them, are at the heart of our world. They are the scions of the Old Ones.”
“But the Old Ones are gone—” She stopped. Glanced at her arms, the marks covered as they always were by layers of cloth.
“It is possible that the magic that once sustained the Old Ones exists only in a very few places now. We do not understand what happened to them, and why they retreated—but no life as we know it would exist had they not.”
“But they created—”
“Yes?”
“The Barrani. The Dragons. Even the Leontines.” Although admittedly that was less widely known. “They created everything.”
“Not everything. But even if they did, it does not refute my argument. What the world is now, and what it would have been, is not the same. Do not look for a return of the Old Ones, for if they returned, it would not only be the forefathers of our races, but also the forefathers of the ferals, and the darker creatures which have no name.”
She was silent for a full minute before she trusted herself to speak again. “Ravellon,” she began.
He raised a brow, but nodded.
“It was supposed to be the heart of a city. There was supposed to be a library there that was bigger on the inside than—” her eyes widened slightly “—the outside. You think—”
“Yes?”
“That the library did exist. And that it existed in a space between worlds somehow.”
He said nothing.
“It was supposed to contain all of the knowledge about anything that had ever, or would ever, exist.”
“Yes. That was the legend.” He glanced out the window. “And for the sake of that legend, many have died.”
She nodded. “Knowledge is power,” she said softly, quoting someone, although she couldn’t remember who. Probably an Arcanist.
“Yes. But power is not entirely unaligned,” he replied. He rose. “And what once lay at the heart of Ravellon—and Ravellon is not a traditional fief name—may or may not now exist. What exists around it, however, in layers we cannot pierce magically or by mundane means, is shadow. We do not know if the shadows came searching for what we sought. We know only that they are now rooted there, and we cannot unseat them by any means we currently have in our possession.
“You’ve seen ferals, no doubt.”
She nodded.
“You’ve seen, by all accounts, worse.”
She nodded again, glancing at Sanabalis.
“It is for that reason, Private Neya, that we are prepared to allow you to investigate. You have experience with what you might find along those borders—or within Barren as it now stands—and you have, better yet, survived. You do not seem, to my admittedly inexperienced eye, to be insane. Nor, if your last involvement with the Courts was an