Wish upon the Stars chapter 973

The rest of the ceremony was mostly just smiling and nodding, unfortunately. I shook the hands of an endless parade of relatives, and they definitely took me up on my open door policy. My head was aching from the sheer number of subtle overtures and attempts at backroom dealing. The politicking started early, and after announcing that I wanted to be hands on, I couldn’t very well pass the buck like I might have otherwise.

By the time we got back into the shuttle, I was leaning back, mask off, rubbing my temples in the hopes of making the constant ache go away. “I feel so much sympathy for Aiden now,” I groaned. “He was right. They DO suck.”

“Probably best to keep that observation to yourself,” my mom said wryly. “But you did amazing out there, sweetie. I am SO proud of you.” She turned to smile at Callie. “Both of you. Don’t think I didn’t see you propping him up and feeding him lines during that mess. That would have been a million times harder without you.”

“Impossible,” I corrected. “It would have been impossible. I’d have punched someone in the throat after fifteen minutes. I swear, I almost stabbed Peter.”

Dad snickered. “That’s a common reaction to Peter’s presence. No one would have blamed you. Honestly you might have made a few friends. It’s staggering to me that someone can be so thoroughly unpleasant and still so politically connected.”

“How is he related to us, anyway?” I asked with a grimace. “He seemed to be insinuating he was a close family member.”

Dad rolled his eyes. “He’s your grandfather’s second cousin. He likes to play up the family angles with anyone he feels is useful. Oddly, it seems to WORK for him more often than not. I’m surprised he tried it on you though, he and my father have a contentious relationship, and he usually avoids members of our direct line.”

I snorted. “If only. But I think all this was worth it.” I glanced over at Callie. “What do you think? Was that enough?”

She grinned at me wolfishly. “Can’t be sure until we try, but I’m pretty positive we hit the mark.”

“We figured you might be skimming off the ceremony to bump her up to C-rank,” my mom said wryly. “Honestly, everyone noticed, but being godspawn has a certain cachet, so no one was too bothered. Of course, I may have let slip that she was my mother’s personal apprentice. And THAT has plenty of cachet of its own.”

Laughing, I leaned over to hug her. “Thanks ma, I appreciate it.” I turned to look at my closest friends, who had been fairly silent since the ceremony. “What did you guys think?”

Jessie grinned. “I thought you nailed it. Just the right mix of reassuring and stern.”

“And threatening,” Bethy chirped. “You were super ominous there for a minute. People LOVE ominous leaders. Daddy says being ominous is like half of his management style. The other half is eating troublemakers.”

I chuckled at that. “Noted. I think I’ll skip the second part though.”

“Probably a good call,” she said conspiratorially. “None of them looked like they would taste very good.”

Turning to my sister, I raised an eyebrow. “How about you? I saw a lot of people approaching you to talk. I’m glad to see the family welcoming you. I was worried that not having the Wish power might ostracise you, but everyone seemed really excited to get to know you.”

She beamed at me. “It was pretty cool. I was expecting them to hit me up for favors, and a few did that, but I mostly just told them that I had to ask you about anything I did, and they all gave me letters to pass you and then moved on to conversation. Speaking of which, I’m going to need a place to put those. The pile is EXTENSIVE.”

“Ah, throw me under the bus, lovely. How about you Benny?” I asked my best friend. He’d been oddly quiet since the ceremony. Even moreso than the others.

He blew out a long breath. “I don’t know. It was…a lot. Weird seeing you like that. You looked almost competent. I had no idea you were that good an actor.” He winked at me, but it wasn’t up to his usual standards. He looked…tired. And sad.

Seeing my concern, he waved me off. “I’m good. Just been thinking. I have a lot of training to do during your honeymoon.” His eyes hardened. “You better watch out when you see me next. I’ve got big plans.” I could tell something he’d seen at the ceremony had rattled him, but I could also tell that he didn’t want to talk about it, so I just nodded and moved on.

Abel hadn’t really cared one way or the other, Mel had been impressed, Fade had just nodded his approval. In general it seemed like I’d gotten favorable responses from everyone. Which was nice to know at least, because I didn’t think it was universal, and most of my family hadn’t seemed impressed. The few that had though, they had approached me during the meet and greet and passed me contact information, which would be a good opportunity to build connections…later.

“So, with all that over with…” I looked to my dad. “I want to arrange Perit’s resurrection first thing. But once that’s done and we have everyone processed for departure, I plan to skip out for a few months. I’m taking that honeymoon.”

He shrugged. “You’re technically just the heir right now, rather than the Wishmaster. The old man is going to want to meet you, but as you can imagine, he isn’t one to rush. Six months or so should be doable. Though you realize that you won’t start getting the really heavy point boosts until the coronation? If you remember from your childhood, members of the Unlucky Thirteen are very famous, but their successors don’t come up much.”

I just shrugged. “I’ll get the renown eventually. And with six months of almost a thousand points of income a day from wishes, I think I’ll be alright. Nine scrolls at a hundred apiece is plenty.”

“Fair enough,” he nodded. “I’ll make the arrangements. Natalie, I assume you’d like to be present. Would you like my sister to attend? It shouldn’t be too hard to arrange, given her presence here.”

Nat seemed enthused by the idea, and when we arrived they headed off to organize more of the details, and Callie and I headed for the cottage. Once we arrived, we settled in to prepare for her rank up. She let out a long, shaky breath. “Ok…wow. Haven’t done one of these in a while. D-rank was a doozie.”

“Yeah, it’s been such a long time since then,” I agreed. Then I paused. “How many people do you think would try to stab me if they heard me say that?”

She giggled at that, falling backwards onto the bed. “More than we could count in a lifetime. But I get it. It’s been…a lot. Now we’re here. Really here. It feels like it should be a bigger deal. But C-rank is almost inconsequential now. I mean, I know you said we can Bind pages in advance, or at least you can, but still. It feels like we’re just killing time until B-rank.”

“We might be getting a little jaded,” I observed. “But if it helps, you’ll FEEL the difference when you get to C-rank. Especially you. Your Heretic Archangel trait is pretty complicated, I’m guessing the effect of it ranking up will be…considerable. You ready?”

She nodded, letting out a long breath, then laid back on the bed. Her three pairs of blue black wings spread out behind her as did her hair, which had that same blue black quality in a way I hadn’t really noticed before. It was subtle, but beautiful. I felt through the bond as she opened herself to the renown, and let it all pour into her, running through her body as it pushed her closer and closer to C-rank. And then, she was past, and everything…shifted.

It had been so long since I saw another person rank up that I’d forgotten how…impactful it could be. Her body stiffened, eyes going wide, and I felt her soul start to change through the bond. The power crashed into it, overflowing, and the Impact rolled through her body, carrying changes unlike anything I had ever been able to witness personally, as her powerful trait upgraded alongside her soul and took her body with it.

When the changes stopped, she rolled over, hacking and gasping, and I snagged her a cup of water. She drank it slowly, looking a bit unsteady, but as she calmed down her body seemed to adjust. Apparently the physical changes from a racial trait were very different than the normal rank up process.

“So, how did you do?” I asked eagerly. I could feel some of it, but I wanted to know the details too.

Grinning, she pulled a pen and paper from her ring and slowly wrote out the changes, passing the paper to me with relish when she was done. I took it eagerly, reading over everything, and I couldn’t help but let out a low whistle.

Calliope Wyndham. C-rank. 

Ability-: Grandmaster Trait: Heretic Archangel. An instrument of the will of a faded god. A child of the flame that burns back the heart of the Void.

Weapon:Gossamer (huge black sword housed in Callie's new soul space, a massive cathedral created when she formed her Chronicle)

Chronicle:Book of the Final Flame

Might-257,550

Impact-155

Vitality-159,742

Fantasy-246,520

Focus-157,908

Perception- 176,375

Creation-156,485

Progress to next rank: 1,154,735/10,000,000

Soul Strength: Tanzanite Soul Body.

Skills: Minor Tracking, Beginner Dual Dagger Mastery, Intermediate Stealth, Intermediate Trap Mastery, Beginner Disguise, Lesser Balam Mastery, Mastery of Shadow Manipulation

Path of the Heretic Scion- Solid. Technique: Dance of the Abyssal Fairy

“That’s…a lot. But also not very much?” I said slowly. “It’s wild to me how condensed your stat page is. Your Path changed, apparently, which is cool, and the archangel trait is front and center. Your Skills seem to have fallen behind, I guess the reforging severed the connection your shadow manipulation had with your ability. But it also seems like the bump from the ceremony was more comprehensive than expected.”

She shrugged. “A lot of my stats were lagging behind. Hyperfocusing and all. And we know that a rising tide raises all ships, stat wise. I guess people were perceiving me as a bigger all around threat than I actually was, and that evened me out a bit. My Might and Fantasy are still far in the lead.”

I gently set down the glass before pulling her into my arms and flopping onto the bed. “And look, you’ve almost caught up to my numbers. That’s pretty impressive.”

She gave me a flat look. “Your rank up happened days ago, before the ceremony, before the mess with the Void Ladder even, I think. I have NOT caught up with you, you just haven’t updated your status in too long.”

“Maybe,” I shrugged. “But still. We’re both C-rank now. And as a Heretic Archangel, your base form is WAY stronger than mine anyway. So it all evens out.”

She rolled her eyes, giving me a long, slow kiss before laying her head on my chest. “I love you, you dope. I don’t care which of us is stronger. Because we’re BOTH stronger together. And that will never change.”

I squeezed her tight, smiling softly down at her. She was right. I’d always be better when I was with her. We closed our eyes and drifted off to sleep there, in each other's arms. And my last thought before I was swallowed up by my dreams was that being there, alone together, was a bigger prize than any faction I could ever be put in charge of. Not that I would ever say that out loud. Some things were too sappy even for me. But from the warm pulse of adoration I felt through the bond…she already knew anyway.