After that, it became much easier for me to access many of the real movers and shakers. Suddenly, my Captains and I were finding that we were the new object of fascination among the wealthy Ball attendees.

  Especially with Isolde in tow.

  I took advantage of this, of course. I was well acquainted by now with the reverence that your average Herztalian had for their royalty. This held true even within the upper reaches of society. After all, these people lived by a very strict code of social strata, and seemed perfectly willing to nearly kowtow before her. However, Isolde didn’t use this chance to speak over me, like I’m sure some of them were expecting. It was important for us to establish right now that although she was one of the founding members of our Order, and my second as well, I was still the one calling the shots. This seemed to baffle many of the people we were suddenly being granted access to, but my Commander did an excellent job of merely smiling and staying quiet whenever someone tried to speak over me.

  They all eventually seemed to get the idea, if not reluctantly.

  While the Ball kicked off in truth, with most of the attendees descending onto the marble floors to dance under the direction of the orchestra, we were doing something different.

  Courting the High Lords of the Assembly. Luckily, all of them were in attendance tonight.

  Not so luckily, we were still being denied access to some.

  As I understood it, there were seven permanent seats on the High Assembly, overseeing seven different aspects of Herztalian governance. None of these were elected, of course, being appointed by a High King to act in his stead. The current batch were leftovers from the reign of the previous High King. These were the High Lords, and they appointed seven different underlings of their own to manage individual aspects of their domain. Altogether, the High Assembly itself sat a total of forty-nine different members. The actual authorities had been split up into the realms of War, Justice, Trade, Labor, Public Affairs, Foreign Affairs, and Sea.

  Of those, I was granted audience with everyone but the High Lords of Justice and Labor. I was very pointedly refused entrance into their private balconies.

  Which was immensely frustrating because they were the ones I had been looking to make deals with the most. I was likely going to be stepping on their toes the hardest with our plans to resettle all of the slaves that Bleddyn freed. The legal status of a freed slave in Herztal could be tricky if it was publicly known, which was the entire reason Bleddyn had asked me to be so circumspect in the first place. There were all kinds of treaties that Herztal was nominally meant to honor with Velancia, the result of a very fractious history with the Dwarven nation. Herztal wasn’t obliged to return Dwarven ‘property’ if it escaped onto human lands, whether the slaves were human or not. But they were meant to inform the Velancians that the slave was on Herztalian land, and not to bar Slave Catchers if they ventured south to find them.

  Officially, of course. But pointedly, the Martial Orders were an invention that had occurred after the last Human/Dwarven war, and were not officially under the governance of the Crown. Thus, the Martial Orders were not bound by those treaties, and according to historical precedent, had always been very enthusiastic in greeting those Slave Catchers.

  And often sending them back to Velancia in pine boxes.

  Multiple of them.

  But Velancia had never had such a widespread slave revolt in its history up to this point. They had happened before, of course, but with the advent of the Bond Breaker, it was really starting to pick up steam. Now, there was an actual method to re-empower those slaves whose Status had been stolen from them, and they could fight back.

  Robert, Bleddyn’s agent down here, had quietly told me that they weren’t sure just how the Principality would react to hundreds and hundreds of former slaves suddenly showing up in Herztalian lands. Which was why I had wanted the backing of the High Lords of Justice and Labor so badly. It would have simplified matters immensely if I had their assistance in resettling and finding employment for them with a stroke of a very highly placed pen. Not to mention all the other ills that Herztal was facing. But no, I was very pointedly turned away before I could speak to them.

  Still, it wasn’t all bad. I had particularly interesting conversations with the High Lord of Public Affairs, who oversaw the infrastructure and bureaucracy of Herztal, and the High Lord of the Sea. War, Foreign Affairs, and Trade were all mostly neutral to mildly interested in my proposals. I got the feeling they were adopting a ‘wait and see’ approach.

  All of these meetings took quite a length of time, to the extent that the Ball had been in full swing for well over two hours by now. With my goals for the night mostly completed, I had retreated to a private balcony of my own on the second floor of the hall. Most of my Captains had fulfilled their own objectives and split up by now. Azarus had begged off and chosen to head home for the night, while Renauld had elected to join a group of other Gnolls down at one of the dining tables. Maria and Alex, to my surprise, were choosing to spend their time as one of the few couples enjoying themselves on the dance floor.

  I…didn’t know what was going on there, and frankly, it wasn’t any of my business. It would only become so if it became a problem. And considering the professionalism and training they’d gotten in the Nocturne Division, I didn’t foresee that happening. Meanwhile, Isolde had joined the other royals up on the stage and seemed to be slumping almost exhaustedly in her throne.

  Not far from her, I could see the patient form of Aurelius sitting in his own modest throne, speaking with one of his petitioners. From what I’d been able to see, the Primector had been entertaining a near-endless stream of them all night. To his credit, though, he seemed to be treating each with respect. I’d…thought about joining the line to meet the man, considering what I now knew to be true. But, the things we had to speak about were best discussed in a more private setting.

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  Even if I had announced being a Precursor to the world, I got the feeling he had never done the same.

  Most of the dancing seemed to have died down by now, even if I could still see a few oblivious couples down there waltzing the night away. I felt a brief pang at the sight of them, considering what my plans in that direction had been. But my own partner had yet to show herself, even though I knew she had to be here by now. There was no one else who would have had the wherewithal to cast that flag from earlier. Maybe she had been staying away while we conducted our business, but...I would have still liked to see her.

  However…maybe that was about to change.

  I didn’t turn when I heard the door to my balcony open, allowing someone to briefly slip into the room before closing it behind them. I kept leaning up against the railing as I heard soft, slippered feet approach my position and join me silently at my vigil. Despite myself, I felt a smile cross my lips because I could tell who it had to be, just from their presence alone.

  After all, her people didn’t have a heartbeat for me to sense.

  I broke the silence first, turning to face them as I did so. “You sure took your…sweet…time…” I said, trailing off as I did so.

  Because the person I was expecting looked decidedly different.

  Framed by the light of both Elys streaming through the far window and the chandeliers above, was Sylvia. She was wearing a downright elegant-looking gown woven from white silk, sweeping down her form in sleek waves all the way to her feet, while similar gloves covered her arms up to the elbow. But I almost couldn’t tell that it was her, because for a moment, I thought I was looking at a human woman.

  Sylvia had changed.

  Any seams or delineating lines that had still remained on her body had vanished as if they never existed. In their place were smooth, unbroken expanses of what looked like regular skin. At first, I thought it might even have assumed a normal skin tone, but no. Instead, it still retained a silvery, shining metallic sheen to it, reminiscent of the Mithril she had been first forged from. Her hair had changed in appearance as well, looking more and more like the actual strands that someone like me would have. If not for the golden sheen, I would have had trouble realizing that it wasn’t real hair. And her eyes…they no longer looked to be convincing facsimiles of a true pair, reminiscent of prosthetics.

  Now, even in their sheen, they were indistinguishable from those of a born human woman.

  Still, they retained the clarity of the sapphires they had once resembled.

  Some quiet suspicions I'd had about what was keeping Sylvia away for the day were realized. She had undergone her second Ascension Ritual as a Cultivator…and it had changed her.

  Sylvia met my stunned stare with a small, coy smile. She didn’t protest as I reached out and grasped the white silk of the glove, hiding her hand from view. Maybe it was a bit forward of me…but neither did she stop me from removing that glove, and holding her hand in my own. To my astonishment, not only did her new skin feel realistic to me, but…

  There was a faint warmth to it. Not enough to indicate the warmth pulsing of blood from a true heart, but more than enough to indicate life.

  I threaded my fingers through her own, and she didn’t stop me as I shook my head in disbelief. “Crazy,” I whispered in the quiet air of the balcony. “It’s almost hard to tell you aren’t human.”

  Sylvia hummed in the back of her throat in agreement, nodding. “It can be, yes,” She finally spoke, startling me again. Most Sculpted, her included, typically had a small…presence in their voice, which indicated something about their material. Stone Sculpted had a note of two rocks grinding against each other, while wooden Sculpted had a hint of the creaking of branches within, for instance. Sylvia had always had slight ringing in her own, as if there were distant silver bells resonant within.

  That was gone, now. Her voice was more…natural sounding in the aftermath of her Ascension. Pure, somehow.

  “It’s something we’ve discovered, about the nature of Cultivation for the Sculpted,” She continued, gazing down at my knuckles and tracing a faintly warm thumb over them. “As we progress through our Ascension rituals, we become less…inorganic. Our bodies change more and more to resemble yours, gaining new details and even organs. It’s…difficult to predict the extent of the changes, considering how young we are as a people. There are, perhaps, only four others of my people who are either at or above my level, and only one of them is a Cultivator.”

  “Woodrick,” I nodded slowly.

  “Yes,” Sylvia flashed me a smile, displaying startlingly white teeth. That was new as well. They weren’t like mine, still being clearly metallic, but they looked real. “The others are all Magi, and their changes are…different from ours.”

  I tilted my head toward the small table in this room, only large enough to fit two chairs. “How so?” I asked her as we sat down together.

  I was quietly thrilled that we didn’t stop holding hands as we moved, merely resting them on the flat of the table.

  “Instead of becoming more organic…” Sylvia said slowly, sounding almost contemplative. “They become less so. Imperfections are smoothed away for inhumanly precise craftsmanship. Softer contours and curves are instead replaced with hard angles and straight lines. Extraneous organic features such as ears, or even something as simple as a mouth are lost, and yet they do not lose senses or the ability to speak. Emotions are dulled, instead of…enhanced in my case,” She said, with a leading stare.

  My smile widened.

  Sylvia chuckled softly. “For the Sculpted, it seems we are destined to be a people of extremes. Our Magi shall embrace a life of physical and mental purity, while our Cultivators shall slowly embrace the chaos of your kind.”

  “Any…other changes?”

  At that, Sylvia bowed her head to stare at our joined hands. “I…remember.”

  My heart leapt into my chest. “Do you mean…?”

  She nodded almost shyly. “Yes, the Ascension seems to have…repaired whatever damage to my soul remained. But, Nathan?” Sylvia looked up, meeting my gaze almost pleadingly. “Those memories…they feel like they’re from the perspective of another woman. I…can remember everything that Sylvia felt, over those months. The serene companionship, as you and she traveled the breadth of Herztal from the seat of a trundling wagon. The thrill of battle at your side, as you fought together in Caer Drarrow. The quiet joy of your confession to each other, before the Breaks. And…even your days diving deep into each other's thoughts and fears, in the shadow of Elderwyck.”

  “But that’s not you,” I said, strangely calm.

  Because she was still holding my hand.

  “Yes,” Sylvia said, flashing me a smile and tightening her grip. “And I want what she had. I’m…not perfect, Nathan. Just like others, I can see what another woman had and be jealous of her. After all…we arrived at very similar conclusions over a similar length of time, that Sylvia and I.”

  “That’s good…” I said, slowly leaning across the table, Sylvia copying my movements. “Because what I want has never changed.”

  Our lips met over the surface of that table, and I couldn’t help but idly note…

  That even her lips were warm now.

  We separated after a quiet moment, pulling back just enough to rest our foreheads against each other. I met her eyes, and I could tell she was smiling as widely as I was. I chuckled, feeling a weight that had never quite left me after Elderwyck vanish from my shoulders. “Join me on the ballroom floor?”

  “I’d be happy to,” Sylvia breathed.

  We rose from our chairs, left the room, and joined the rest of the late dancers, including Maria and Alex. But Sylvia and I paid no attention to the knowing stares of our friends, or the interested ones of the gossips.

  We only had eyes for each other, the rest of the night.