The Vampire & Her Witch
Chapter 405: Ancestral Wisdom (Part One)

Chapter 405: Ancestral Wisdom (Part One)

On the snow covered slopes of the High Pass, the night sky rippled with lights. Ribbons of pale, icy blue and soft, shining lavender bent and twisted like curtains in the breeze, bending and swaying at the direction of a young man standing atop an exposed ridge.

Further down the mountain, at one side of the ancient roadway that had guided travelers across the mountains for centuries, several Frost Walker sorcerers stood in awe as they watched Young Lord Hauke transforming the icy tower they’d constructed into something that felt infinitely colder and more dangerous than the simple structure they’d built during the day.

"You’re doing well, young hero," a soft, feminine voice whispered to Hauke as he extended the reach of his sorcery as high into the sky as he dared. "Can you feel it? How much colder the air is at the top of your ribbons than it is at the bottom?"

"I c-can f-feel it," Hauke said, his teeth chattering as his sorcery brought him directly in contact with air that was several times colder than the worst winds to buffet the High Pass in the depths of winter. "H-have I, gone h-high enough?"

"It will do," the voice said. "Now, as I’ve taught you, allow that cold to flow through your ribbons and into the core of the tower. The colder the core becomes, the longer your Eternal Ice will last."

"I u-under s-stand," Hauke said, touching the shining, iridescent horn on his chest as he adjusted the flow of energy through his Sky Ribbons, forcing the temperature of the icy tower to plummet even more than it already had.

The horn’s glow intensified under his touch, its light pulsing slightly as the remnant of the powerful ancestor dwelling within the horn helped Hauke to adjust and finetune the flow of his sorcery. Even after months of working with the honored ancestors who possessed iridescent horns like his own, that feeling of silent guidance and support still filled him with a mix of pride and unease. Pride in being trusted with such power, and unease at remembering how close he’d come to losing this opportunity entirely.

The glowing horn was the second in a row of five iridescent horns that the young Frost Walker lord wore on a bandolier across his chest. The first time he had appeared in public wearing the horns it nearly caused an uprising when Cator, one of the candidates to replace Elder Paulus on the council of elders, saw his actions as an opportunity to advance his own position and immediately decried Hauke’s actions as heretical.

The aging Frost Walker demanded that he be captured immediately and that the ancestral horns be stripped from from his body so they could be returned to an appropriate Ancestral Cave. Commander Jannik had actually agreed with the shouted demand, ordering his warriors to surround the young lord. Only his father’s swift intervention had prevented things from coming to blows, but he was still forced to stand before his father and the council of elders to explain the heretical arrangement.

"I’m not defiling our ancestors," Hauke had insisted when he was brought before the full council. Thankfully, Cator had yet to earn the right to occupy Elder Paulus’s vacant seat, but there were still plenty of people who felt strongly that Hauke’s actions were almost as vile as those of the Elder who betrayed them to Tuscan hunters.

"If we return their horns to an ancestral cave," Hauke said, "they will shatter and our ancestors’ wisdom will melt away like snow on a summer day. I know it defies all traditions, but those traditions are incomplete because we’ve forgotten how our greatest ancestors with iridescent horns once served as our greatest guardians. Please believe that I’m doing this to preserve our ancestors!"

"Young Lord Hauke," Svenja said from her elevated icy chair. The glassy-eyed woman was one of the oldest living Frost Walkers who spent much of her time tending to the ancestral caves. In matters related to the ancestors, her voice often carried more weight than his father, Lord Ritchel’s did.

"We understand that you have done a great deed by retrieving our ancestors’ iridescent horns from the sealed cave that held them," she said patiently. "But that does not give you the right to determine their fate. You say this is an ancient tradition, but Lady Nyrielle claimed it to be the work of an ancient vampire, the Fangs of Death."

"We cannot blindly accept such sorcery as a tradition that must be preserved," the aging Frost Walker said, lowering her dimly glowing horn and shaking her head at the young lord who dared to carry ancestral horns on his body where they were vulnerable to the entire world. "What you’re doing is still different from even that method. At least the Fangs of Death kept our ancestors enshrined "

"We have already begun to open a new cave for these most honored ancestors," Commander Jannik said, his dark fur twitching in agitation as he fought to restrain his desire to snatch the horns back from the arrogant young lord who felt like he could defy centuries of tradition. "Surrender them now so we can give them the honored rest they deserve."

"Fool, do you wish to erase us from this world when we’ve only just returned to it?"

The deep, resonant voice that resounded from Hauke’s mouth sounded nothing like the gentle, unassuming Frost Walker that he’d been known as for most of his life. Instead, it spoke with heavy, unquestionable authority and a sharp sneer of contempt.

The moment the voice spoke, resounding through the icy great hall with a power and majesty that rivaled or perhaps exceeded the strength of Lord Ritchel’s voice in the chamber, the assembled council froze in panic.

Never in hundreds of years had the voice of an ancestor been heard in a meeting of the living council. It was one thing if one or two members of the council visited the painfully cold chambers of the Ancestral Caves to consult with the ancestors and receive guidance, but no one would dream of allowing the remnant spirits of the ancestors themselves to speak before the council.

After all, if the ancestors could continue to speak in the ruler’s hall, what would stop them from attempting to continue to rule, even after their death? The very idea was so blasphemous that as soon as it occurred to the gathered elders, several of them turned to Commander Jannik, expecting him to command his men to remove Hauke and the ancestral horns he carried so they could resolve this matter without interference.

The dark-furred commander, however, shared a knowing look with Lord Ritchel before gesturing for his men to hold their places. If the ancestor wanted to speak, then as dutiful descendants, the least they could do was listen.