Rivers of the Night

Dean Thistle sat across from his son, Sigil. The two of them saw the reports and were quite stunned themselves. Though Dean Thistle’s expression didn’t change much, Sigil wasn’t as reserved as his father and reacted quite fiercely.

Then he began to laugh.

Who would have thought that the Luminescent Moon Sect would make such an exception? They were making such large moves in the background just for the sake of placing Chosen at key positions.

But this…

Dean Thistle shook his head. "Your vision is still too limited."

"What do you mean, father? Isn’t this a good thing?"

"No. It is not. The weight of the title of Chosen has been thrown into the trash in a single night. If the Patriarch of the Luminescent Moon Sect did this on purpose, it’s a brilliant move and it makes things far more difficult for us."

When the Chosen Selection occurred, there would usually be one winner. In the rarest instances, there might be two or three. But with the plans they had in place, even if there were two, they were confident in ensuring that at least one of them would be theirs—even accounting for that Ironvale and Aeryn’s inferiority.

But now, the Nightingale Clan had found an easy method of placing one of their own up there, and as for Aeryn…

Aeryn’s state was unknown, having fallen into a heavy coma after exiting the tower. It seemed that he had failed because he wasn’t teleported away like the others.

Now, they had both lost a path to Chosen, and one of their best trump cards at the Silver Mancy rank would be out of commission for who knew how long.

The worst part of it all was that Theron was now the only link they had to the Sect, making them even more reliant on him now than ever before.

Dean Thistle thought about sending Sigil to the Sect too, but he had to be wary. Sigil was his strongest heir, there was a reason Clans were so cautious with talents like him and preferred to keep them in-house.

Plus, what if Aeryn’s unconsciousness wasn’t a coincidence? How much control did the Patriarch have over the tower? What could he do if Sigil entered and then ended up dying?

Not only would the Thistles lose a great amount of face, but he would lose the heir to his bloodline. It was unacceptable.

If he was the Patriarch, he would much rather the battle between the Thistles and the Imperial Clan happen on the Bronze Mancy scale. It would be far easier to control like this.

Having Theron and Thessa at one another’s throats was far more manageable than having to deal with geniuses on the cusp of Gold Mancy.

Sigil wasn’t quite there yet, but would it be long?

No, he couldn’t take such a risk. It seemed that… Theron had won another round.

Dean Thistle looked down at the Verdant Bloomstone on his desk. Was he really going to have to hand this back to Theron with both hands?

**

Theron threw a gaze at the tower from a distance, his feet still aimed toward the exit of the Sect.

This time, he could only say that he had gotten lucky, as much as he wanted to take credit for it.

The Verdant Bloomstone he had given Dean Thistle was, indeed, the real one. It was just that he knew that there were very special requirements for entering the realm where it could show its youth, requirements that only one person at the time could have met.

Aeryn.

Theron hadn’t been 100% certain that Aeryn had already met those requirements, but he knew that only a disciple of the Sect could. By extension, he also knew that once he showed his use, given the plans of the Thistles, the Dean would eventually send him to the Sect.

Once he was here, he was confident that he too would meet those requirements.

What he didn’t expect was that the requirement would necessitate the tower--something he hadn’t learned of until completing it--and he also hadn’t planned for Aeryn to push himself too far and fall into such a coma, leaving the only connection to the Sect as Theron himself.

Of course, the Thistles certainly had more than just one pawn in the Sect, Jodie likely being one of them considering how close he and Aeryn seemed to be.

But none were likely to be as dangerous, and more importantly, without clearing the tower, none would be able to affect him.

In the end, things actually fell so perfectly into his lap. While he was the one who put the chess pieces in place, this was almost too perfect.

But he didn’t let his guard down, not just yet.

There was someone that had unexpectedly succeeded… that being Thessa.

In addition, that Ironvale… he had a feeling that lost in all these shuffling pawns were the ones that the Patriarch himself had put into place.

Would Ironvale allow him to do as he pleased in that realm? Theron doubted it.

But Theron himself was eerily calm about it all as he looked away from the tower. It was time for him to use his privileges as a Chosen to leave the Sect for a while and return.

After he put the last puzzle pieces in place, he would be sure to come out on top in this Secret Realm.

Something told him that if he wanted to successfully reach Silver Mancy, he would need a big opportunity. And this would have to be it.

He would have to thank Dean Thistle in advance for that.

…

Theron left the Sect in the dead of night, the moon hanging overhead and radiating a shallow blue mixed with a murky mercury.

But, it was when the Sect was no longer in sight that he came to a stop.

"I didn’t know that the duties of the law enforcement branch extended so far outside of the Sect," he said indifferently.

The sound of rustling leaves and shifting branches filled the air.