The Icon Unbound

Chapter Eleven, Part A - Rigel

I have been WAITING to share this chapter, my lovelies! You just don't know. Here is where I get to fracture my tight-knit families and plant seeds of doubt inside my alliances. MUAHAHAHAHAAHA comment below if you saw any of this coming. :)

So, that's still true. This is the best part of writing: taking what you have built, and then pressing it to the limits. It sort of makes me feel maniacal. Just minor fixes here. Thank you to everyone who is reading this, please comment and vote if you think it's good! --Elizabeth, UPDATED 05/24/2017

Serreh Hallstead's face was swollen and red. Rigel kept one hand on her trembling arm while she muttered uselessly to herself the same things over and over. "I knew better then to send her off for the day. I wanted her to stay and get her last fitting for the... for the dress... but she heard the r-roads were clear and she begged."

Michael said nothing, just kept one arm around his wife.

Master Runedorf brought a tray with steaming cups of tea. "These herbs will help you all regain your strength and sleep. Drink, and no arguments, Serreh. You too, Rigel. Grief does tricky things to people, and you'll all need strength for what's ahead."

Strength. That admonition reached Rigel through the gray haze.

Rigel took the cup and allowed the warm, bitter liquid to sting his throat. The brew knocked both Michael and Serreh into sleep within a few moments of each other. Rigel put a blanket on their shoulders. They looked aged and stooped, just like the Icon. They looked this way because he had left them childless, without even a body to burn and send to the heavens.

Blood spilled, a heart torn out, a head cut off: the means didn't matter. As long as something paid for all this senseless pain.

Early morning made the shadows lengthen on the Bathhouse floor.

Despite the haze of the drugs, his mind continued to churn and deny him sleep. Even in the best of times, his mind whirled away, wandering up and down different paths, people, and problems.

What did anyone actually know of the shield?

Icons maintained it, obviously. They'd created it.

The shield was specific. It kept people out. Legend said it was meant to filter out even the dark water, but that was obviously an exaggeration.

The Twisted came right for him. Depending on how they entered Waterwall, their target could have been his home, or him, or Era. The last two seemed illogical, but he couldn't rule them out as possibilities until he had more facts.

What had they been after?

If he could only discover their goal, it would lead him back to the instigator.

Only, the instigator was not his only problem.

Glancing over his right shoulder, he saw the Icon curled up on her narrow pallet and asleep with her drakys. How she didn't suffocate underneath all her wrappings, he didn't know.

Era was dead because of her incompetence.

An Icon who loved, was an Icon who was flawed. Obviously she had never been properly bound, which meant that no one had been safe for as long as she'd held the office. She may not have had anything to do with the dark water coming to waterwall, but she had failed her one duty.