Andrei

The revelation that Vincent Delestade was Sebastian Vonsinfonie, in hindsight, made sense. But at the time, it came as quite the shock. As always, I had questions. We all did. And for once, it seemed our answers were there to stay. There was no entrancing and disappearing as Zacharias was known to do. No storming off and leaving us to hold the bag, as Councilwoman Faust had done. Sebastian Vonsinfonie promised to answer everything, sooner or later, and he would only begin once we arrived someplace special.

And someplace special it was, indeed.

"Where are we?" I asked once we'd debarked.

"We are in an empty field," Adeline replied.

I couldn't help recall a horror novel I'd read which had begun that way. But surely not? If Sebastian Vonsinfonie wanted us dead, he wouldn't have to bring us to a frozen wasteland to see it done.

"Much as I'm curious, I've gotta skip out," Finlay said. "This whole getting kidnapped twice thing has put a right kink in my business. Places to go, people to be. Catch me up later, aye?"

"Disappointing," Sebastian said. "But you are not being held hostage, Agent Finlay."

A few pats on my arm before Feargus stepped to my right and gave Adeline what sounded like a hug, and then to my left to say goodbye to Sebastian. The breeze picked up around us when the Strachan took off, full-speed, to wherever he went when he wasn't with us. More than ever, I wondered where that was.

As I stood in the clearing I imagined was surrounded by snowy trees and a thick fog common to Amalia that time of year, I thought of Sinclair. I'd been so close to reaching her, and now… there was a deep rumble as the ground began to shake, and an ecstatic squeal from Adeline. The snow squeaked beneath her feet, the air fanned around her. She was bouncing. But the trembling and the bouncing continued for no more than ten seconds. Crunch, crunch, crunch through the snow as Sebastian Vonsinfonie approached, linking his arm with mine.

We took several steps forward through a thin layer of snow, and then we descended a long set of stone steps. They were dry.

The underground cavern was dry, too, and it carried the scent of metal and must. The walls around us shook. Another few seconds and I no longer felt the air from outside.

"Welcome home." Sebastian snapped a finger—woosh. The heat from a newly formed flame pulsed nearby. Another snap, another woosh. A total of four times until the whole of the room was illuminated, I suspected.

"How wonderful!" Adeline exclaimed.

I couldn't help feel frustrated. Not the least bit because it had been a rather frustrating few days, but I longed to see what Adeline saw. I wanted to know exactly why Sebastian had been presumptuous enough to call this cavern home.

"Would you prefer to take the grand tour now or after the exposition?" he asked.

"After," I said in tandem with Adeline's, "Tour, please."

After a pause, Sebastian decided. "We flip on it—triangle point up for exposition, triangle point down for tour." A tink as the coin was flicked into the air. A clap before the dramatic pause. The results were in. "Speak now, tour later. And for your sake, Andrei Strauss: consider permitting me a path into your mind. You will see what I see, and wouldn't that make for a much more immersive experience?"

Obviously, but if Sebastian Vonsinfonie wanted an avenue into my thoughts, he wouldn't have to ask. Was he being polite, or was he manipulating me? I couldn't be certain. The man was capable of feeling my every feeling, and he may have just heard my every thought.

"May I instead?" Adeline offered. "I could use the practice sharing visual messages with Andrei, and you could focus on sharing your story, mister Vonsinfonie."

A smile in the composer's tone. "By all means, Adeline Blanchett."

Adeline took my hand and within minutes, the negative space in my mind filled in, detail by detail. Four freshly lit sconces. Luxurious tapestries hung between the paintings along the walls. More specifically, portraits—all Partisans. Rich blue and gold fabrics upholstered the overstuffed couches. Mahogany shelves filled with books of every shape, colour, and size.

It reminded me of the lair, if the lair had been designed by a fashion-forward thespian. Puffy cushions, shaggy rugs. Accent tables and a fully stocked bar, bottles caked in grime. A delicate chandelier, but why were there no candles? Not even stubs. In their place were these odd, bulb-shaped fixtures made of glass. Finally, there was a piano in the corner, and a feeling when I saw it: desire.

Adeline led me to one of the dusty couches where we took our seats. Sebastian sat across from us in a matching chair.

And through Adeline's eyes, I saw Vincent Delestade without his rotating illusions. Sebastian Vonsinfonie without his elaborate masks. He was fair—almost luminescent, though everything I visualized may have been a reflection of Adeline's perception, I realize. His hair was a pure shade of white, and his eyes were a close match.

That day, he wore a cream-coloured suit

"Forgive me, but your new home has been vacant for centuries. I haven't had the opportunity to do any housekeeping."

"Grime is the least of our worries." I gave Adeline's hand a small tap. I'd seen enough to imagine the rest. I wanted her to experience Sebastian's story without the added mental taxation.

She released my hand and gave my shoulder a soft pat in return.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

"Where should I start?" Sebastian asked.

A professional storyteller asking us where he should start. Giving up control. Another illusion? Whatever the case, I wanted answers to the basics first.

"Explain Vincent Delestade," I said. "How did you become him?"

"Vincent Delestade was the love of my long life," Sebastian began. "We met nine years ago while he was stationed in Delphia on a reconnaissance mission. I wasn't one to mingle with the mortals, typically. Not for some misplaced measure of importance, but because I preferred perceiving over participating. But Vincent was…," a pause. "Well, you understand, don't you, Andrei?"

I did, so I nodded.

"Vincent would come and go with every job, as the Assembly willed it. On one such job, he informed me he was to be stationed in Amalia next. I knew the terrors that awaited him there. I am the terror that awaited him there, my friends. I should have done more to stop him—to convince him to defect as he thought I'd done, thinking me another Partisan as you all had. It had been so long since the months felt like years and not minutes, and it would be long, agonizing months before I would see him again. Hollowed and haunted—a ghost of himself."

"Then everything you told me and Sinclair in Delphia was the truth, just not your truth," I said.

"Precisely. Vincent told me about his time in Amalia, about the horrors he'd faced and the hurt he'd experienced while helplessly watching his comrade's rapid descent into madness. It was all the Assembly's fault for not warning them, for not preparing them. He'd had enough, and it was enough to finally decide to defect."

"And so you could finally be together," Adeline said. "How romantic."

"Romance breathes only one breath away from tragedy, my dear. The plans we had to make a life together were tainted by trauma. Nightmares, weeks without sleeping. For all his admirable qualities, resilience wasn't one of them—not like you and your companions."

A soft rustle while Sebastian Vonsinfonie adjusted his position. I imagined him leaning back, or crossing his leg. Perhaps both.

"We were living one place to the next, abandoned homes on the Isle of Littera, another on the Isle of Audio. It was there I made a fatal mistake," he continued. "One night without thinking, long after the sun had set, I lit the sconce in our sitting room with a snap. He saw in that moment who I was—what I was. I tried to explain. At first, I drummed up some drivel about having Celestian blood. But why wouldn't I have told him? He wanted nothing more to do with me. He accused me of taking advantage of his mental state to manipulate him more, said that I was keeping him sick as part of some greater conspiracy. He asked me to leave, and I loved him dearly, so I did. I was convinced he would come around, know that I would never harm him, but when I returned home, it was too late. He'd hanged himself from the rafters with a silken rope."

Silence until the sniffles to my right began.

"I'm sorry for your loss," I said.

"Yes, well—it was then I decided I must do something to avenge him. To avenge all of you. I assumed Vincent's name, his story, sometimes even his face, my friends, and over the years, I formed a resistance group. You might recall your time in Delphia during your pilgrimage. Feargus Finlay and Rhian Sinclair killed the corrupted ones while freeing the remaining."

How could I forget? I'd been responsible for several deaths myself. Further, one of the rescued had recently become one of my closest friends.

"What were you aiming to do, ultimately, with this resistance group?"

"Collapse the Assembly. Brick by brick, and non-aggressively if it could be helped. We had a long game. But those on our inside became impatient, and those on their inside became uncertain. We were betrayed more than once, and forced to relocate more than once as well. But the point I'm trying to make is they, for the most part, turned out to be short-sighted, easily corruptible, and not the correct crew."

"I see," I said. "Is that what this is about? You believe we're the correct crew?"

"I know you are."

"And where does Zacharias factor in?"

"He is my brother," Sebastian said, "my maker, my muse, my partner, my oldest companion, and he is, too, my arch nemesis."

"Your arch nemesis? The stories say—"

"Oh, it wasn't always that way. But centuries is a long time for bad blood to fester between relatives, and let's say, my brother and I don't relate. He seeks to foster and protect the institution of Palisade where I've never believed it should exist to begin with."

"I see," I said. "And your maker?"

"In a sense," Sebastian answered. "I was the first, yet it was he who made me."

"You were the first?" Adeline asked. "The first Anima?"

"Yes, and I'm glad to hear the preferred moniker has persisted through the ages."

"I don't understand," I said. "You were the first, and yet you were made? By a mortal?"

"To answer that question, I would have to begin at the beginning. But I sense you're both tired, and I have a tour to conduct. So, why don't we take our walkabout, select your bedrooms, and continue after we've all had a chance to rest. Besides, we're not all here yet, are we?"

No, we most certainly were not.

"Will you get her?" I asked.

"But of course," Sebastian replied. "This collaboration cannot commence without your co-leader, can it? It's only a matter of time now. You will see her soon."

"One more question, then," I said. "What does the name Jakob Adler mean to you?"

There was a hesitation long enough to convince me that the inquiry had caught Sebastian off-guard. A quick wind when he stood and stepped in my direction.

"Jakob Adler means everything to me." He took my hands in his and crouched before me. "Where is he? What do you know?"

And with that, my friends, the tables had turned.

I was in control, but it wouldn't last long. Because after telling Sebastian about Jakob, he promptly cancelled our tour and abandoned us in a hurry, leaving me and Adeline alone on the couches. In close retrospect, we should have gone with him. I wasn't certain I could open the door should the need arise. My connection with the earth was not as strong as my connection was with water or air, but at least it wasn't as volatile as my connection with fire still was.

"Well," Adeline started, "what a bizarre few days these have been."

"No shortage," I agreed. "Thank you, by the way, for stepping in."

"Of course I stepped in." Adeline dropped back against the couch. A puff of dust clouded around us, and she sneezed. "He may be a legend, but we hardly know this Sebastian Vonsinfonie. I once thought Everleigh Gloom was a friend, and clearly, she is not a friend. I won't trust so easily this time. Even though I'm rather enamoured by this place, and ever so excited by the news that we're the chosen ones."

I, too, fell back against the couch. Another sneeze from Adeline.

"There was something about the way he reacted when I mentioned Jakob," I continued. "He was concerned and it seemed sincere. We'll proceed with caution, but—"

"You think Sebastian can be trusted?" she asked.

"I don't know," I said. "But if he can't be, then we are rather more screwed than we were yesterday."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.