Shadows of the Setting Sun (Main)

[WlfSamurai]

Makuro, you have been watching Embrace like a hawk. Or... a Lunar... well, really closely and with incredible detail. You do find kernels of honesty. She isn't lying about wanting to stay and her feelings for Toun and Sigrdrifa. She isn't lying about the danger in staying, either. She truly believes she will put all of you in danger, somehow.

But you also see the twitches. The sporadic eye movements. The muscle-tenses in her jaw and arms that are almost imperceptible—unless you're looking for them. Because you are looking for them, you see it plain as day. The violence that bubbles underneath. The seething hatred. And you see the monumental (masterful?) restraint holding it all back.

You know what the other thing is she wants. The reason her mind is a storm of chaos: murder, death. She craves it.

She isn't lying. But, she's also not telling the whole truth. She mentioned the storm, but not how deep it goes or its nature.

 

[jaydude]

Now that she has fulfilled her Sacred Hunt, Tyree is feeling much calmer, and is ready to return to the other Exalts to face the darkness that has taken over the one person that was once a friend to some of her companions. Shaking her head, she tries to put that thought out of her mind to keep from getting angry once more and ruining the peace she has found after her hunt.

Running across the countryside in her new form, Tyree shifts back to human before advancing upon the camp. No need to startle everyone with the sudden appearance of a sabertooth.

She walks up and finds a place to sit, then asks of the group, "So, what has been decided about Embrace? Is she a prisoner, ally, sent away, or has she been killed?"

Makuro, you have been watching Embrace like a hawk. Or... a Lunar... well, really closely and with incredible detail. You do find kernels of honesty. She isn't lying about wanting to stay and her feelings for Toun and Sigrdrifa. She isn't lying about the danger in staying, either. She truly believes she will put all of you in danger, somehow.

But you also see the twitches. The sporadic eye movements. The muscle-tenses in her jaw and arms that are almost imperceptible—unless you're looking for them. Because you are looking for them, you see it plain as day. The violence that bubbles underneath. The seething hatred. And you see the monumental (masterful?) restraint holding it all back.

You know what the other thing is she wants. The reason her mind is a storm of chaos: murder, death. She craves it.

She isn't lying. But, she's also not telling the whole truth. She mentioned the storm, but not how deep it goes or its nature.

Makuro looked towards Tyree. "To an extent, she's our prisoner. Toun here seeks to free her from the control of her master, whom she claims she can't tell us about because it would invoke what I'm assuming is some death-related being of great power."

He then looked back at the male Full Moon and his mate. "For the sake of clarity, I still don't entirely trust her." he warned them. "Her feelings for the two of you seem genuine and strong, particularly in regard to you, Sigrdrífa. And she also appears willing to try and keep her more base instincts in check. But whether or not it is the result of her Exaltation, her nature is that of someone who relishes in violence and dealing death. I admit that that doesn't sound entirely different from certain members of our own group, but it's still not something I can ignore."

 

[Esbilon]

Zoya regards the captured Deathknight with pity and disgust. While she appears as much a victim as a perpetrator, there is no denying that she is both and that leaving her free to pursue her own goals as well as those of her Patron could easily doom far more people than herself. With the Sun's radiance upon her, Zoya sees through empty words and platitudes towards the truth of things, even into the withered heart of an Abyssal.

She then looks to Sigrdrifa and Tuon, "this is a decision for the two of you to make regarding your old friend. I do not trust her to be free, I do not trust her to be a calm prisoner, and I do not want to kill one who asks for my help. In the absence of a clear answer, I think your bond with her is more important than our feelings and I will support whatever your decide."

OOC: Rolling per+soc with a stunt and 2 peripheral motes. 5 sux.

 

[WlfSamurai]

Zoya, as you look at Embrace, you're able to see into her heart through her eyes. Like a conduit through Embraces mind using the Sun's light and brilliance, piercing the depths of her soul. And there, you see what Makuro saw. Her conflicted feelings. Her ties to Toun and Sigrdrífa. The love, the lust, the bond. And you see the roiling sea of molten violence.

It's all laid bare to you. Just as Makuro saw it.

But, you are able to see just one-layer down, into the final depths beyond even that. And it's only for a fleeting instant. You see into emptiness and darkness. You see the Void. As soon as your piercing sight touches it, there is a flash of something so grotesque and black, it is beyond description. And it is wrapped in Embrace's infatuation.

[OOC: Embrace's Defining tie: The Blackened One (infatuation).]

 

[Random Word]

Sigrdrífa tenses as Makuro speaks, one hand wrapped around Embrace's cold pallid throat, the other wrenching her arm behind her back. His words are like a knife slicing open a wound freshly cauterized by fury. She didn't need to know that. She doesn't want to feel like this. Hates the conflicting emotions raging inside her. There should be no uncertainty. The enemy deserves nothing but death. She can feel the tears threatening to form again, and fights to hold them back. It's shameful. You cry when you kill your friends, never your enemies. She isn't a little girl anymore. She stokes her anger over being made to feel this way, because it's easier than the pain. And so easy to transfer to Embrace. It is her fault. If she hadn't been so fucking stupid. If she hadn't gotten herself killed. If she hadn't said it. If she'd just walked away.

"You won't have to," replies Sigrdrífa coldly as Zoya falls silent. Her grip tightens around Embrace's neck as she speaks, her lips almost against Embrace's ear, her voice laden with emotion and barely restrained violence, "Don't look to Zoya. She can't save you. You wanted to be my enemy? Now you are. The moment Toun no longer needs you, I will give you the death you are so in love with. Out of respect for who you once were, I will make it swift. Then I'm going to go find whatever did this to you and kill it. I swear to you, that death I will make as long and painful as possible."

 

[D. Rex]

The every word of Embrace of the Blackened Soul crashed against the ciffs of Afureru's mind. An ocean of familiarity churned by the chaotic storm of indecipherable thoughts clinging and pulling against the face of earth to try and swallow it.

All of that Afureru could relate to. All of that she knew and had felt before. But it wasn't until Embrace looked into her in the eye and asked for help that Afureru began to crack. For but a moment her vision turned to blackness of memory of one she didn't recognize -- eviscerated, in pieces, clinging on to life, mortal wounds that a man surrounded by the glow of the setting sun worked dutifully to --

It stopped as suddenly as it began,, flashing to a different but sickeningly familiar scene. One she actually did remember-- hole after hole barely sewn together, body destroyed and vision failing, a man sitting beside her dabbing her feverish head --

"No." Afureru said quietly. This wasn't right at all. Looking at Embrace. Who she wanted to kill, but now this feeling reversed completely. Now this felt wrong. To kill her now would be wrong. "We can't..." her words were a feeble protest at best.

Her crystallized further, and again flashed the unfamiliar memory of before -- healed, but her dagger plunged into the golden man, she didn't want to, she had no choice. His eyes shown with determination and salvation, and she saw in them a life she forgot she had forgotten, and her lips uttered "Help me, please" and the warmth of life would fill her to such ecstatic fullness that burned her away --

She shook off that memory, but what came next she could not -- the coldness of life fleeing her, replaced only by regret. But she clung on to life to roll out of the bed. The man who helped her was outside. In danger. And she could do nothing about it as she tumbled to the floor. Too weak to even breath. Never before did she ever want to protect somebody. Never before did she say a prayer. She didn't know what compelled, but it felt like the night was about to break, and when she cried out "help me, please", the sun did rise. --

"No." Afureru would say more firmly. "Zoya, how can I see mercy here when you do not? If anyone's heart among us should be merciful, I would trust it to be yours. " She said harshly to the priestess.

She looked back towards her army. To her beast. Well more than half had faced her blade as an enemy. Villains once, the lot of them. All of whose life would have been forfeit if not given a second chance.

"No. She is asking for help." Her voice now carrying the same determination it held when she declared Embrace should die. "No Sigfrida, this has gone far enough. I was an enemy once. I was given a second chance when I was among the least deserving. I was saved when none had reason to save me. I lived exclusively in Night, I too was a slave to it before the Sun rose on me. In my darkest moments I had summoned the strength to ask for help to change and it was given. And now there is one here doing the same."

"You stopped me when I was going to kill her. Now I am asking you to do the same. If her life is that forfeit to you, then give her to me. If none else of you will break the shackles of those who plead for it, if none else of you will even make an attempt. Then I will pull her out of the shadows by myself." Her anima burned again, and now this close to Embrace would no doubt feel the warmth of the sun.

Afureru looked down at Embrace, her own gaze, as intense as the essence that burned around her like an inferno boring into Embrace's own eyes. "I will help you. Whether you like it or not. Hurt me. Do you your worst if you must. But I have made up my mind that you WILL see the Sun. Even if must pry your soul from what death God has claimed you and put you in the hands of the Unconquered Sun myself."


She gripped the haft of her halberd with purpose. Leaning in with teeth bared, and her essence rumbling a thunderous growl "I have conquered death once, and by my soul I shall do it again. "



Mentions
Esbilon Random Word WlfSamurai

 

[Esbilon]

"She is an agent of Death," Zoya answers Afurefu. "Creation belongs to the living and her nature makes it a struggle for her to do good at the best of time. If her contrition is genuine, I will give her a chance, but I do not trust her and will believe Sigrdrifa's judgment of her character."

 

[Rykon]

A low humming punctuated the silence and a hand reached for Embrace's face. A gentle touch, for such hardened features conditioned to overcome the brutality of the wild. Light filled the space, radiating from the features of the fox god, crowned by a brilliant mark upon his brow. A moonlight specter of his truest self, his war form, settled upon him as a waking mirage as he slowly leaned forward and tapped his forehead to Aleifr's in the solemnity that this could be the last friendly moment they could ever share.

Toun leaned back, eyes wide with warmth still lurking in the depths of darkness. When he locked his gaze with hers, he reflected image after image from the well of his spirit as a content smile now marked his face. Contests, hunts, feasts, and even famines celebrated or suffered by both of their tribes. Then the reflections changed from the distant past to more recent. Great beasts felled with tooth, claw, and tenacity. Gods slain and consumed in their corrupted rampages. Behemoths and leviathans devoured and subsumed into a monstrous avatar of raw power. Then, the flash of dreams like memories ended as quickly as it began. In the assumed mantle of divinity, of Whitefang, his message reverberated with two voices as one.

"Does your honor and kin, your attachment to Sigi, mean so little to you? Is your master's power at its pinnacle so much against the infancy of ours? I think not, little leopard. I am the fox god. I am the slayer of the dead and divine. I am the plague eater and breaker of corruption... and I am not alone. His days are numbered. Are yours?"

[I reckon this is an instill to shift intimacies. An attempt to erode attachment to the Blackened One, and build attachments to Toun and Sigrdrifa. Full Excellency and a will. Boosting Appearance to 11 through the excellency to cheese the die pool. 11-4 for 7 dice from Appearance differential. 12 6 total successes including the will.

Edit: ignore the last 7 dice of the first roll, second instill is to erode the tie to the Blackened One. Only 5 successes on the second roll including willpower.]

 

[Sherwood]

Tyree watches with a sleepy expression and a half-smile on her face that belies her willingness to explode into action if this woman so much as twitches an eyebrow out of turn. She has tasted blood once today; it would not put her out at all to do so once more.

 

[WlfSamurai]

Hearing Toun's words, Embrace shifts her gaze to the ground and becomes lost in thought. In Sigrdrifa's arms, she slackens and leans more on the Night Caste to hold her up. The thoughts and feelings swirling inside her shift and change and shift again.

"I see what you're saying," the Abyssal says after some time. She lifts her head again and tears slip down her cheeks. "I love you both so much. I don't want to lose that. It's just...the truths that They have opened my eyes to... And the will They have over me... I can't just let that go... I wish to shed this suffering and step back into the day. And yet, the cold embrace is such sweet comfort." She stops to think again. "I will think on what you have said. I don't know that I can do anything about it—not yet at least. But, I will listen. And think."

She looks to Sigrdrífa, still holding her. "So, what now? I'm too confused to ask you to let me go. Or to...finish it. What now?"

Esbilon Rykon Sherwood D. Rex Random Word Teh Frixz jaydude

 

[Random Word]

Sigrdrífa's teeth grind like boulders as the immeasurable force of her white knuckle grip around Emrace's neck meets the immovable object that is her will. Something in her just will not let her fingers effortlessly snuff out this traitorous unlife, to her immense frustration. "Oh, fuck you, you impossible dead bitch," she hisses as she drops Embrace unceremoniously on the ground, glaring at Toun and Afureru accusatorially, barely holding back tears by force of will, "You and sunshine want her so bad? Fine. She's your fucking problem now. When she tries to slit your throat in the middle of the night and says, 'the shadows made me-' " her breath catches and her heart freezes at the all too plausible thought. "Fuck."

She doesn't want to be here right now. She doesn't want to deal with this. She doesn't want to think about this, or anything. She certainly doesn't want to talk to anyone. So she ceases to exist. Dissolves into shadow. It feels like smashing through black ice into a frigid lake as she passes into the realm of the Spirits, so bitterly cold she can barely think and - that's it. That's what she needs. Here in this world the light of the sun is a cold and distant thing that struggles to pierce the gloom, but the light of Toun's and Afureru's incandescent souls cut through it, the remnants of the Fox totem plain to see. Sigrdrífa storms out of their brilliant light and into the darkness to find and plunge into a lake cold enough to numb everything, a place where she can scream in frustration and anger and pain until her lungs are empty.

 

[WlfSamurai]

END CHAPTER 1

Please hold replies.

Esbilon Rykon Sherwood D. Rex Random Word Teh Frixz jaydude

 

[WlfSamurai]

Chapter 2

The Circle of mismatched Solars, Lunars, mortals, and one Abyssal stand at the edge of Butcher Ridge overlooking the blasted land below. After plunging into Marama’s Fell days before, they had made their way through the grim landscape of the shadowland, picking past ancient mass grave sites, crumbled fighting pits, and rotted gallows.

Initially, Whitewaller shrines and paper prayer chains gave the traveling group a false feeling of hope or security. Those feelings were quickly shattered as the Circle pressed further into the Fell only to find remnants of the atrocities that once took place here.

The only encounter on the way was a cruelly misshapen and disfigured dog-sized animal. The creature steered clear of the group as soon as it caught sight of them. An hour after seeing the dog-beast, the Circle found a mutilated icewalker corpse slumped against a dead tree. He was unrecognizable. His innards and most of his face were missing.

The air in this wretched place is heavy and harder to breathe. The ground, devoid of living plant life, crumbles and sinks with each step. The sky is dark and seems almost sickly despite the feeble setting sun. Though no bodies are here now, the stench of fresh murder still clings to this site.

This Butcher’s Ridge was so named as it once was a place to execute creatures or men and dispose of their bodies by tossing them down to the rocks below. Now, the Circle stands overlooking a host of ghosts making ready for war in the plains that stretch to the horizon. The activity below looks like chaos. Specters flash in and around siege weapons under construction, a score of ancient abominations hammer arms and armor on anvils, cooling them in massive forges burning with sickly green flames.

An obsidian tower has been shaped and molded from the cursed ground below. Its erect silhouette dominates the center of the ghost’s war camp. The movement of something more solid than the spectral shapes around it catches the keen eyes of the Exalts. A large group of men and women dressed in blood-soaked furs and leathers—icewalkers—are being lead to the obsidian tower where who knows what horrors await them.

The number of ghosts and creatures in the host below are uncountable with all the action taking place. It would be easy, despite this, to estimate it into a hundred thousand or more.

"No..." is all Haze can utter as she falls to her knees.

Esbilon Rykon Sherwood D. Rex Random Word Teh Frixz jaydude

 

[jaydude]

"This doesn't look like something we can deal with on our own." Makuro said to the others, stating the obvious as he clung with one hand and both feet to the edge of a short cliff overlooking Butcher Ridge. He'd chosen the higher vantage point to better observe the scene below him, and because he knew he could hang there with the same ease that everyone else stood on the ground. And because, he had to admit, it seemed fitting for a Lunar with a spider totem.

Having gotten a good look, he then let go of the cliff, twisting his body as he fell so that he was facing the other Exalts when he landed. He stood up, and then approached them. "At the very least, we need to warn Whitewall about this army's existence." he said, before turning to Aaki and Haze, the weaker members of the group as he saw them. "You two, do you think you can make it back to the city?"

He hadn't made any reference to the captive icewalkers being led towards the tower. Why should he? There looked to be no chance of saving them without drawing the undead host's attention, and quite frankly, their deaths would mean nothing in the grand scheme of things. He might have wanted to protect the people of Creation - those not ruled by the Realm anyway - but he wasn't going to take pointless and suicidal risks for them.

Spoiler: Makuro Stats

Essence: 1
Personal Essence: 16/16
Peripheral Essence: 33/38

Committed Essence: 5 (Hundred Rings)

Willpower: 6
Join Battle: 7
Health Levels:
-0: [_]
-1: [_], [_]
-2: [_], [_], [_], [_], [_], [_]
-4: [_], [_], [_]
Resolve 4, Guile 4

Attacks
Hundred Rings (13 Withering, 10 Decisive, 14 Damage, Overwhelming 4)
Unarmed (14 Withering, 10 Decisive, 9 Damage, Overwhelming 1)

Actions
Rush: 7 dice
Disengage: 10 dice

Evasion 5, Parry 6
Soak/Hardness: 6/0 (Buff Jacket, +3 Soak)

 

[WlfSamurai]

Haze stands up. She and Aaki exchange a look.

"I can for sure," says Haze without hesitation. Her eyes are determined and her hands are balled in fists. She looks as though a behemoth couldn't stop her.

"Sure," says Aaki with a shrug. "I'll manage." Haze punches him in the arm.

"I'm the damn mortal here, idiot," she barks at Aaki.

"Oh trust me, I remember," he replies rubbing his arm. "You remind me every day."

Ignoring him, Haze addresses the Circle as a whole. "Any other messages or anything? Otherwise, we'll leave right now."

"Right now—" Aaki begins to complain, but stops when Haze shoots him a look.

Esbilon Rykon Sherwood D. Rex Random Word Teh Frixz jaydude

 

[Sherwood]

Tyree crouches down as she looks at the massive numbers of ghosts and other dead in front of them, eyes widening in alarm. "That will be no easy feat to take care of, even for a large city like Whitewall, and that is assuming that Whitewall is the target of this army. If it is, it might take all of us falling back to bolster the ranks of men on the walls to keep the city from falling."

 

[jaydude]

"If there's anything else that needs to be said, we'll tell it ourselves when we return." Makuro replied to Aaki and Haze, before he turned to look at Tyree.

"Oh, I was most certainly considering helping the people of Whitewall against this threat. Warfare is won by being able to efficiently crush your enemies, and our presence would most definitely aid in that." he then said to Tyree in a dry voice. "Still, you're right in that we don't yet know the target of this host..."

He scratched his chin and looked back towards the undead host. "War camps generally have a central command area, a tent or group of tents where the commanders make or discuss their plans. If these ghosts have something like that, I could possibly find some clues about their intentions." he said. "Then again, this isn't exactly a Realm host, or even that of a living army. I don't have the means to pose as a ghost, and if I go down there as a bird or a spider, I can't help but think I'll stick out."

"Perhaps we should talk to Embrace. See if she's willing to share any more information with us now..."

Spoiler: Makuro Stats

Essence: 1
Personal Essence: 16/16
Peripheral Essence: 33/38

Committed Essence: 5 (Hundred Rings)

Willpower: 6
Join Battle: 7
Health Levels:
-0: [_]
-1: [_], [_]
-2: [_], [_], [_], [_], [_], [_]
-4: [_], [_], [_]
Resolve 4, Guile 4

Attacks
Hundred Rings (13 Withering, 10 Decisive, 14 Damage, Overwhelming 4)
Unarmed (14 Withering, 10 Decisive, 9 Damage, Overwhelming 1)

Actions
Rush: 7 dice
Disengage: 10 dice

Evasion 5, Parry 6
Soak/Hardness: 6/0 (Buff Jacket, +3 Soak)

 

[Random Word]

Sigrdrífa peers over the ridge in awe. It was hard to tell, but there might be more ghosts down there than there were people in Whitewall, and that was more people than she had ever seen by a margin she could scarcely comprehend. There was, perhaps, just maybe, something to Embrace's warning, and she would never admit that. Slaying an endless horde of ghosts was certainly a good story, but she was here to hunt something with a name. That settled-looking tower looked important, and wrong, and like something that shouldn't be. Destroying an evil fortress defended by an endless army of ghosts wasn't title worthy, but it was a decent first verse for a legend. A warmup.

She looks over at Toun and grins, "I bet you I can knock that tower over from here."

 

[jaydude]

"I'll wager ten dinars that you can't." Makuro called out to Sigrdrífa, interrupting the discussion between her and Toun before it could get started. "Even assuming that you can somehow hit that ungodly edifice with a boulder large enough to bring it down from here, we'll all have to deal with a massive army of very angry ghosts afterwards, along with gods only know what horrors might be accompanying them. And while I'd probably find such a thing absurdly hilarious if I witnessed it in a play, it'll be a lot less funny when it's happening for real, and I'm the one getting chased because of someone else's foolishness. Thus, I will most certainly consider fighting you if it means I can prevent such a thing."

There was a wry smile on his face as he said that, the only sign of a bluff that he was willing to show regarding his words about fighting her. It also served to nonverbally tell Sigrdrífa that he was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt, and assume that she was not in fact serious about attempting something so ludicrous.

"I have to admit though that if you do somehow manage to topple that tower from here, the sight is likely to leave me impressed. At least until I return to my senses and remember the ramifications of what you've done." he then added.

Spoiler: Makuro Stats

Essence: 1
Personal Essence: 16/16
Peripheral Essence: 33/38

Committed Essence: 5 (Hundred Rings)

Willpower: 6
Join Battle: 7
Health Levels:
-0: [_]
-1: [_], [_]
-2: [_], [_], [_], [_], [_], [_]
-4: [_], [_], [_]
Resolve 4, Guile 4

Attacks
Hundred Rings (13 Withering, 10 Decisive, 14 Damage, Overwhelming 4)
Unarmed (14 Withering, 10 Decisive, 9 Damage, Overwhelming 1)

Actions
Rush: 7 dice
Disengage: 10 dice

Evasion 5, Parry 6
Soak/Hardness: 6/0 (Buff Jacket, +3 Soak)

 

[Esbilon]

The sheer number of ghosts did no more but make Zoya's eyes widen. It was the threat they posed to Whitewall and indeed all the living of the North that chilled her to her core.

"This does not look like a force that can be defeated with traditional means," she says somewhat nervously. "Nor does it seem to me like the kind that has gathered on its own accord. Someone must be behind it, and that someone is who we should be focusing on."

 

[Sherwood]

Tyree chuckles. "The problem is, the force behind this army is either in the middle of all that, or somewhere behind it, pulling strings from afar to guide generals that are the field commanders of this, and any effort to find a leader would be suicide for any of us."

 

[Random Word]

Sigrdrífa rolls her eyes, "I wasn't going to do it while you were standing beside me. I'm not crazy. Maybe go over there or something," she gestures vaguely off to some distant vantage point overlooking the camp. "Besides, you've got nothing to worry about. There are more ghosts down there than ice in the Pole, and I'm of no mind to fight them all. That would take until the end of time, and it would get boring fast. They'll never find me - I'm more ghost than they, and all of you Moon-Chosen can just turn into birds and fly away," she interlaces her thumbs and mimes flying off with flapping hands, looking only a little bit jealous. She pauses for a moment, considering, "And what's a dinar?"

 

[jaydude]

Makuro gave a little shrug. "It's the main unit of currency in the Threshold. That is, every part of Creation besides the Blessed Isle." he answered.

Spoiler: Makuro Stats

Essence: 1
Personal Essence: 16/16
Peripheral Essence: 33/38

Committed Essence: 5 (Hundred Rings)

Willpower: 6
Join Battle: 7
Health Levels:
-0: [_]
-1: [_], [_]
-2: [_], [_], [_], [_], [_], [_]
-4: [_], [_], [_]
Resolve 4, Guile 4

Attacks
Hundred Rings (13 Withering, 10 Decisive, 14 Damage, Overwhelming 4)
Unarmed (14 Withering, 10 Decisive, 9 Damage, Overwhelming 1)

Actions
Rush: 7 dice
Disengage: 10 dice

Evasion 5, Parry 6
Soak/Hardness: 6/0 (Buff Jacket, +3 Soak)

 

[Random Word]

"Currency? You mean settled 'coins'?" she laughs. "You can't bet those. You have to bet something real. Drinks, favours, a weapon of legend, something useful."

 

[WlfSamurai]

Realizing the’ve been mostly forgotten by the Cirlce deep in discussion on hosts of ghosts and currency, Haze motions to Aaki. They both saddle up on Haze’s horse and she clicks her tongue followed by a, “Yah!” The horse takes off at a gallop. In a few moments, they’re a cloud of smoke on the dead plain. Then, gone.

As the group continues their discussion, Zoya’s keen eye for the occult notices a detail the others had missed. Several siege and war machines are being built with large groups of slaves, abominations—large mismatched shapes of flesh and sinew not shaped like a human—and ghosts. The Circle can discern the various piled materials being used, even at the their current distance; stone, wood planks, tree trunks, metal bands, rope, and netting. Each different design or function uses these materials.

Yet, Zoya spots something else. Two structures are different. They’re easy to miss as they’re only the size of two mammoths stacked. Likewise, It isn’t their rough tripod shape that makes them stand out, either. What Zoya sees is the distinct faint shapes coiling through the black material.

Soulsteel.

Upon seeing this, Zoya also notices that only ghosts work on these two structures.

Esbilon