Ars Hyrannor: Book of the Bloodcallers

CHAPTER 1: ELITHREL ULITH

Today.

Tu-Alomi.

The view over the city of Tu-Alomi was magnificent. It was called the Jewel city by many, and for good reason. The shining center of the Oheli Empire, there was little that happened in its expansive borders that didn’t pass through Alomi at some point. Core of administration, trade, and where all the nobility worth their salt lived. And many craftsmen and farmers too. Broad in size as it was in impact, it was structured like a massive crescent. Towering walls of massive stones bordered a city that was built as much deep and tall as was wide and long, a colony of towers and spires, a web of roads and bridges, all painted in the golden shades of local stone, ribbons of colour from precious stones and majestic materials woven into the very architecture of every marble pillar or stone wall. And, writhing in the gaps between the expert masonry, was a cacophony of sounds and people, amongst them being-

“Elithrel Ulith.”

Ulith looked up from her pondering of the view in the window. She was greeted by the stern and disapproving face of her tutor.

“How many times are we going to have to play this game, Lord Elithrel?” The aging woman ranted, “You are 18. You are to be the head of your house before the end of the year. You can’t possibly be a good one if you don’t listen to me, for once in your life, listen to a thing I have to say, instead of thinking of some fantasy or other.”

The lecture bit into Ulith. It would have. Were she not used to it. Used to lectures like this from every direction, from everyone she knew. Her father, her priests, her past tutors. She’d been begged to change, to somehow get better, to fix this issue about her she couldn’t name. But, she was used to it. She was used to the fact that she could just not pay attention. Not when she tried, not when she wanted, not when she needed. And the worst part? She had no clue why.

The tutor calmed, and looked frankly to Ulith, “You are not a foolish boy. You could make for a fine houselord. But for no reason, you refuse your potential. We tire of this, Lord Elithrel.”

That was the second issue, which she could happily name, not that anyone would listen; young ‘Lord’ Elithrel would really rather prefer to be a Lady, thank-you-very-much. By this point, she felt like there was a good possibility her tutor was driving the point home, though she couldn’t remember if she’d told this one or not. Disorganization aside, noone really listened to her. Best she hoped for when someone knew was polite ignorance, worst was. Not what she wanted to think about right now.

But, regardless of what her tutor or father or priest or the world said, she knew she was a girl. She’d had this fight inside herself for long enough, she wasn’t going to let them deny that.

Now. Back to facing the world. Her tutor was looking at her expectantly.

“I’m sorry… I will try harder…” she hazarded. It seemed to be the answer the woman was looking for, as she resumed.

“As I was saying, steel is the greatest resource the empire has, with high houses and the council themselves being the only ones right to control its flow, and servants of the council only allowed to wield it. Steel is, ofcourse, a gift from Above-“

Ulith was already phasing out of attention.

Damn it.

—

A good length had passed, and Ulith was dismissed. She stood, rising from a chair made of firm wood, southern import most likely, and picked up her things. The tutor was employed directly by her House, and the room was only her study, but it still felt like a separate bubble of reality, a world-within-a-world. A damn torturous one.

She gathered a sack that clipped to her belt, carrying styluses and measures, and her courtsword. The long, slender blade was made of bronze, with gaps in the leather scabbard to show its polish, and its handle was a dark wood, interwoven with wires and beads. It would probably break as soon as it hit something harder than wood.

The fact was that she didn’t even dislike her tutorship. It blew how focused it was on her duties as a head of a noble house, and even on things she’d never need to know -why did she need to know every single thing she shipped? Her job was to pay people to know that instead of her- but she did like learning. When they had brought in a scholar to tell her about beasts had been a highlight -apparently househawks were a form of dragon!?- and some of the history was nice. But it was the constant abuse that broke it for her.

She proceeded through labyrinthine halls of the tower, identically corridors built in sandy stone and furnished in tangerine carpets and banners, snaking her way up floors after floors, rooms made only to take up space and rooms made to take up the function of 20. Impatiently, she kneaded the handle of her courtsword as her footsteps rang through, ascending higher and higher, to heights noone had any reason to build a building too.

Infact, what she was supposed to learn today was probably interesting! Steel? Who doesn’t think that’s the coolest thing ever. Everyone had a story of wanting to become a council guard as a young child, if only to use those long steel spears. Where bronze shone like a sunset, and could be gotten from any smith, steel was almost mystical in how it was woven of moonlight, and so rare it might as well have been mythical. It was supposed to be super strong, but she wasn’t sure how much she was going to bench her knowledge of real materials on martial-arts plays. Didn’t want to end up like someone who learnt Blood Arts just because they thought Nyshyr the Huntress was cool.

“Lord Elithrel?” A small voice pinged the back of her head, she almost thought she made it up. She turned, to see a meager messenger scrambling up to her. Green and gold, his dress was in the colours of House Anahat. Ofcourse.
“The matter?” She asked.
“Young Lady Anahat has requested your audience, urgently!” The messenger stammered. ‘Lady Anahat’ really scared him this time, huh.
Entertaining it, Ulith feigned panic, “Oh! Forge above, it must be terrible!”

The poor messenger paled, before Ulith took off into a run.

Fleet-footed over the cobbled bricks of bridges and roads, Ulith took a high-route, worming through the pathways between the highest levels of the city’s towers, avoiding the deer-drawn carts common below, and the hectic markets upon the broader of paths. Soon, she finally neared a building bannered in green and gold silks, as a single figure stood outside.

Anahat Chyla.

“Ulith!” She called, arms crossed.

“I was told it was urgent, my lady,” Ulith dipped into a low bow, before looking up, to see her friend with a grin like the crescent moons on her face.

“Get inside, you!” Chyla strangled Ulith with a broad hug, leading the taller woman inside, this floor holding her personal rooms.

Ulith was familiar with the scene, the tight rooms she stepped into being almost a second home, for better or for worse. House Anahat and House Elithrel were long standing allies, so when two heirs were born within months of eachother, they’d been practically joined at the hip in young years. This, ofcourse, meant that Chyla had been one of the first to hear of Ulith’s desire to become a woman. They were 9 years old, if she remembered correctly. She’d come to her crying, Ulith didn’t want to remember why, and confessed, only for Chyla to respond with her trademark grin and weaving Ulith’s hair into a feminine bun.

It was, really, the first thing that made Ulith feel like a girl, start her off in breaking out of ‘I want to become a woman’ in favour of ‘I am a woman.’ She’d been there for her since, through thick and thin. Since they were both weeks away from becoming House Lords, their parents couldn’t be happier. Though, Ulith doubted they would be if they knew what they got up to.

“You’re stuck in your own head again,” Chyla noted, as Ulith starred off into nowhere in particular, “do you wanna put your stuff down or what?”

Ulith dropped herself onto a pile of cushions, propped up in a recess in the wall, one of many around the room. “Just thinking.”

“You’re always ‘Just thinking,’” Chyla chimed back.

“You’re always saying something. So it works out.”

“Truer words have never been spoken.”

Ulith turned to look at her properly, “So, I don’t suppose you were serious about scaring the sparks out of that poor messenger? Or is there a mammoth in the room I’m missing.”

Chyla was fiddling with a chest of possessions, off to the side in the cluttered sitting room, “No mammoths, but something you will be happy about.”

“Particularly exciting land exchange for when we ascend?”

“Not at all close.”

“Long metal against regulations?”

“Close, shockingly.”

“Something my father will be upset about.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she finally pulled herself out of the chest, with a small wooden case, “But that’s far too vague for me to let you have that.”

“Half a point?”

“I’m not one for sport,” she motioned for Ulith to follow her into a sideroom, she recognised as her dressing room. Brushing the last flecks of dust she’d left on the silken pillows, she stood and followed, trying to keep In the Moment.

“Don’t say that in public, they’ll have you hung.”

“And they’d still make it about ‘fitness’ or ‘competition,’” she led Ulith to a bamboo screen, before pulling it aside to reveal

“I think you could win the ‘Getting Executed’ competition. I could help out, they say I tie a real good noose,” Ulith bantered. Admittedly, she was beginning to suspect that she had no clue what Chyla was going to show her. “Admittedly, I have no clue what you’re going to show me.”

Chyla gestured towards a chair -woolen seats, had to be expensive, a damn good chair- and Ulith sat down to be confronted with a broad dresser, topped with a mirror.

“Ah, torture?”

Chyla’s grin damn near shut her eyes, “Welllll, I made a generous donation, and lent my dressing servants to House Iqui, so we have everything here to ourselves.”

Ulith’s eyes widened, “You’re not gonna-“

“Oh, I’m gonna. Prepare to finally see yourself, Elithrel Ulith.”

Confronted with the dark volcanic glass of the mirror, Ulith avoiding looking at herself. She’d been called too feminine, told to dress and look more like a man, but she could never see it. To her, the mirror was the domain of a strange, scary man. Having to face forwards, not to disturb her friend’s work, she looked at her instead.

“I’ve been meaning to do this for a while, call this what I owe you for 18 years of friendship, cribmate,” Chyla jested, “your skin is dark, your hair is light, you’ve basically got it set out for you. Even if we will have to work around that curl…”

Chyla was short, and not just because Ulith was taller than most girls. With a stocky build, her wardrobe orbited around dresses focused on clinging to her bust, her favouring bell sleeves, even as trends moved towards lantern sleeves.

She used a bronze razor to clear the straggling stubble clinging to her chin and cheeks, making a point to indicate how Ulith had guessed a blade would be involved.

“Look forwards for me… There. The blue eyeshadow will fit your golden eyes much better… Why do you let them put bronze on you? Your eyes are hard to work with anyway, heavy lids…”

Her hands moved delicately around Ulith’s face, her own supply of cosmetics, and the dresser’s drawers. Skin tan, lighter than Ulith’s, it was garnished with patches of a lighter tone, that had gradually appeared and grown since she was young. Similarly, her pink-tinged hair was occasionally speckled with locks of pure white, matching her eyes of the same duality.

“I don’t trust myself to cut your hair, or what your father would do if I did. I’ll just braid it up like usual.”

Her hair was cut short, flaring out around her eyes, and not going much further. Like a summer tree. It was nothing revolutionary, Forge Above knows Ulith had been jealous of the short hairstyles women were allowed to wear for long enough, but it suited her well.

“We’re done on your head, then.”

She still didn’t look, “Do I look good?”

“Not until I put you in a girl’s dress you don’t.”

—

Ulith’s heart raced as her friend brought a bamboo screen infront of her, covering everything below her chin, isolating her in her own personal dressing room in the corner.

“I’m beginning to think you’re getting a kick out of this.” Ulith said frankly, beginning to realise how absurd her expressions must have been.

“Hey, this is just about the greatest thing I could do for you, right?” She affected offense, before lowering her voice “but I won’t ever complain about making you blush like that.”

Sparks and Steel, maybe she should have paid attention to the mirror.

“Catch.” Came from Chyla, as a pile of cloth flew towards Ulith. She dodged instead, and picked up the pile to inspect them.

A short dress, silken blue with a high collar, puffy sleeves that would puff over her upper-arm, and had a tight sleeve over her forearm. Cut with the shoulders beginning closer to her collar it would make hers appear narrow. The sleeves, skirts, and neck, were embroidered in bronze.

A wrap to go over the top, sheer with a marbled silvery fabric.

A matching scabbard for her courtsword.

Bronze hose, slightly sheer. She was thankful for it; didn’t want Chyla coming to shave her legs.

And a final garment, she couldn’t quite pars-

A bra. Stuffed with a woollen stuffing, like a less-dense pillow. She didn’t even mean to speak, but a soft “Sparks and Steel…” escaped her lips anyway.

“Only the best for you! Don’t disappoint me, Elithrel!” It sounded like she was only paying half attention.

It was like she was being offered a soldier’s drugs, or an oily cake. Tantalising, forbidden. She wasn’t allowed to even touch all of this. She should be wearing long hair, a long dress, and soon a long beard. Eyeshadow below her eyes, archery instead of polearms, design instead of building. Masculine things, what a man should do. This? It was breaking all the rules.

And she’d die if she never did it.

It wasn’t an illegal temptation, it was like a starving man given bread.

Forge Above, it was more like she was being brought back to life completely.

She tried not to look down as she un-and-re-dressed herself, but she could feel her heart running, and she was practically shaking when she pulled aside the bamboo screen, and called for Chyla. The shorter woman practically galloped back into the room, and exploded in excitement seeing her friend.

She exploded in a sequence of noises only resembling words, before practically shoving Ulith to a mirror.

Forge Above. Sparks and Steel. Holy fucking shit.

It was her.

Chyla had done a number to her, or unlocked something Ulith had never allowed herself to notice. She looked like a girl. A pretty trendy girl, too. Intricate braids hid the curl and length of her hair, the padding looked frighteningly real, and the skirt’s petticoats were enough to give her some hips to work with. Infact, with her hair up and her oufit feminine, things she’d hated had become advantages; ‘too tall,’ ‘too lanky,’ had became ‘elegant,’ ‘slender.’ She almost fell to the floor.

“No!” Chyla hurried to her side, “If you cry, I’ll cry, and it’ll ruin both our makeup.”

Ulith couldn’t respond.

“Right, your voice. I’ll tell people you can’t speak or something.”

Ulith tilted her head. Tell people?

Chyla’s eyes lit up, “You didn’t think I was going to get you dressed up, not to take you out on the town, did you?”

Ulith was, somehow, both ecstatic, and mortified.

But, mostly, she was overjoyed she could feel anything now.