Princeps Buccina had not ceased glaring at him all evening, and the Rex was growing weary of it.
"Is there something you wish to say, Basilicus?" he asked, trying not to move his lips very much before the watchful eyes of the masses.
He and Princeps Buccina processed with Princeps Oliva, Princeps Fidentia, and the rest of their royal retinues down the Via Pomosus. Pyrrhaei throngs flanked them to either side, and the grand avenue's fruit trees had been stripped by a crowd more interested in food than funeral rites.
"This is a disgrace, Augustus." Buccina flicked a glare over her shoulder.
Behind them, ten Electi groaned under the weight of the massive black pillar they carried. Augmented starholder strength only extended so far.
"Trellis Descent destroyed most eidolons," the Princeps Mindholder went on. "They're not going to step through that pillar to join the procession, and you know it. And the dust? The cypress branches? The evening funeral?" She gave a tiny shake of her head, her regal bearing as stoic as his own despite her heated words. "Now you treat him like a child? After executing him like an adult? Surely the people must see through this pageantry."
Decus sighed. "The people need honored traditions in times like this." Therefore, yes, he'd arranged a funeral fit for a child Princeps. He'd scheduled the rites for early evening, as appropriate for a young person who died too early. And he'd ordered the servants to refrain from mounting cypress branches atop the Onyx Palace's doors or sprinkling the corpse with dust. The boy had been beardless still at the time of death and thus pure, making such cleansing rituals unnecessary.
"You're cherry-picking what traditions to honor, Augustus."
Decus narrowed his eyes at the woman as the procession led by Princeps Laetus stopped outside Arx Luminosa's western odeon. "I am always happy to hear your thoughts and counsel, Basilicus, but you will mind your tongue."
Her jaw clenched, but thank the Eternal Radiance, she stepped a few feet away to focus on Laetus as he watched servants transfer his brother's body to the bier. Her promenia hummed, a faint drone that swept toward the inexperienced Princeps.
At last, peace. Decus tried not to sag beneath the weight of his heavy paenula and even heavier burdens as he listened to the child Princeps, voice cracking, call upon the torchbearers to ignite his brother's funeral bier.
The Regum Chorici broke into song, and with every rising note of the familiar epicedion, Decus's heart sank. He had attended a great many state funerals over the years and heard the haunting twelve-part harmony many times. But he'd never heard it at the funeral of a child he'd executed. And he'd never heard it under an unrelenting blood-red sky as a growing chill, eerie blankets of glowing night-side moss, volcanic eruptions, and bestia attacks swept a Trellis-less planet.
The notes of the ten-string cinyra lyre accompanying the choir sent a shiver down his spine. He half-turned, expecting to see the formless shadow of Daedalus's shade lurking behind him to take revenge.
Instead, Decus's eyes found something far worse.
"Eidolon," one of the Electi hissed.
The Rex stared, wide-eyed and stricken with terror, at the radiant woman approaching him. The whispering crowd parted to either side of her like water, leaving her approach unobstructed. Eyes of molten gold burned into his soul.
"Eternal Radiance preserve us," Princeps Oliva whispered. "Is that..."
"Princeps Verita," Decus managed. "You... You are..."
She stopped on the other side of the double line of Electi, raising a brow as they squeezed tightly together to block her passage and gripped their cludens. The prometus-disrupting weapons would do nothing against her promenia form.
"Are honored ancestors no longer welcome to pay our respects?" the eidolon asked in a lyrical voice, tilting her head of flaming golden curls.
Decus hesitated as the guards turned to look at him, the tension in every line of their bodies. After a moment, he gave a curt nod.
His body quailed as the pure promenia figure approached him on soundless feet. "I... I..." Sweet Eternal Radiance, was he going to die today? Perhaps he should interrupt the funeral and command Princeps Laetus to come to dissolve his dead mother. But no, the boy stood oblivious before his brother's bier, staring, pale and forlorn, at the riotous flames consuming his twin's body. Besides, one could not simply attack an eidolon in front of thousands of witnesses, especially not an Eidolon Principis, one of the most honored of ancestral guests. "I..."
"You killed my son."
The Rex felt the blood drain from his face, and Oliva and Fidentia both edged away. "I deeply regret--"
"You do not yet know the meaning of regret," the deceased Princeps interrupted, musical tone casual as she came to stand beside him.
Whispers spread like a wave through the crowd; eidolons who chose to attend funerals traditionally remained behind the black pillar, unable to venture far from it, but this one, unchained, ignored the artifact.
Her eyes stared straight ahead at her son as Laetus began reciting the epitaphius honoring his brother, his voice and body guided by Buccina's power. "Choose one," Verita said lowly enough that his ears almost failed to make out the words.
"What?" Decus frowned. "What do you mean?"
Still, she did not look at him. "You know what I mean."
Only then, as she said the words, did her intentions clarify in his mind. He shrank from her in horror, eyes darting over his shoulder and past the eidolon pillar to his six royal heirs. "I-I cannot," he hissed. "They're my children."
"If you are willing to slaughter other parents' children," she said coolly, "you must be willing to slaughter your own."
He shook his head, searching the crowd for a worldholder who could dissolve the eidolon. But few would be able to match a former Princeps Worldholder in skill. "It was painless. He is with the Eternal Radiance now." He knew he was babbling but could not stop the cascade of excuses pouring from his mouth. He had not encountered anyone more powerful than himself in over fifty years and his own terror shocked him. "I didn't want to kill him, but it was necessary for the common good."
"And now, giving me one of your children is necessary for the common good. Choose one." She turned to him, blazing eyes narrowing. "Or I will tear what remains of this world apart until only eidolons remain to walk the ruins. So choose."
Could she truly do what she threatened? He had no idea what kind of power an unbound eidolon possessed. Most of the entities commanded promenia with great felicity when visiting the pillars, but were unable to use their magic for ill.
She watched him, cool and confident. A bluff? If he misstepped and failed to take her seriously...
I will tear what remains of this world apart until only eidolons remain to walk the ruins...
He shuddered, heart-clenching in grief as he cast his eyes to his ruby-studded velvet slippers. "F-Felicitas." The youngest of his children and the least trained to serve the world. Eternal Radiance help his child, and him; he could not allow this creature to finish what her sons had started. "I choose Felicitas."
For several agonizing heartbeats, she watched the thick smoke from her older son's bier billow across the glowering sun.
Then she dipped her chin. "I will spare her," she said, and Decus's knees shook with relief. It took all he possessed to remain standing instead of sinking to the snow-dusted ground. "I do so only because I truly believe that you are willing to do anything you must to save the world."
"I am," he said, his voice weak. Breathless. "I do not know yet if it can be saved, but I will do anything and everything I must."
"Good," she said and turned to face him, molten eyes burning into him. "Ten thousand eidolons and daemons survived Trellis Descent. We are yours to command."
Decus blinked and then frowned. "And the others of your kind agree to this?" He doubted ten thousand unchained eidolons and daemons would care about commitments one of the youngest among them made on their behalf. Though the Eternal Radiance only knew what their kind sought or how they organized themselves.
Verita turned and narrowed her eyes at the black promenia pillar the Electi had placed on the ground. The Rex yelped as it dissolved in a brilliant shower of sparks. The mourners gasped, and even Princeps Laetus lifted his head to look, squinting past the sparks and flames of his brother's funeral pyre but unable to see what no longer existed.
Princeps Verita turned to look at the Rex. "They will agree," she said, "or I will hunt them down one by one and destroy them."
Decus shivered, grateful he no longer seemed to be the target of her wrath. How could such a being be stopped? No one on the planet possessed the ability to destroy an eidolon pillar, one of the only artifacts in the world impervious to a worldholder's power of dissolution. The art had been lost to time. What had Verita learned on the other side of death? What had all the eidolons learned?
"Why do you want to help?" he asked meekly, feeling like he questioned the Eternal Radiance itself.
She watched the pyre burn, grief heavy in her promenia visage. "One of my sons survived your cruelty," she said, voice soft. "He must have a world in which to live."