Chapter 5: The Beginning
The crack of displaced air echoed across the plateau, and Alaric Peverell stood once more before Aetherion Spire.
Fifteen years. He'd been gone fifteen years, and the castle hadn't changed at all. Same glowing crystals. Same singing waterfall. Same empty halls waiting for a life they'd never known.
Aurelia launched from his shoulder the moment they arrived, spiraling up toward the highest tower with a cry of pure joy. They were finally home.
Alaric walked through the gates, silent, and empty, yet welcoming, and made his way to the throne room. The obsidian and aether-crystal throne sat exactly as he'd left it, glowing softly in the light from the dome above. He ran his hand along its surface, feeling the magic hum in response.
"Alright," he said quietly. "Time to get started."
☆☆★☆☆
The first year was planning.
He didn't rush. Rushing led to mistakes, and mistakes in kingdom-building could last centuries. Instead, he walked every inch of his island. Measured and mapped it and considered the layout of his kingdom.
The island itself was six times the size of Bear Island, which meant room for a proper city. Room for farms, forests, ports. Room for thousands of people, maybe hundreds of thousands, if he designed it right.
He created books on architecture, urban planning, civil engineering. Devoured them with his accelerated learning, then created more. Roman aqueducts. Medieval fortifications. Renaissance city designs. Modern sanitation theories. He took what worked, discarded what didn't, and slowly formed a vision.
The city would flow toward the castle like water downhill. Layered terraces, each with its own purpose. Highest terraces near the spire for nobility and administration. Middle terraces for merchants, artisans, scholars. Lower terraces for common folk, spreading toward the coast where ports would eventually rise.
Canals from the castle's endless waterfall would feed every level, providing water and beauty both. Wide avenues for trade and travel. Plazas for markets and gatherings. Parks and gardens everywhere, he'd spent too long in Sothoryos's brutal jungle to deny his people green space.
Defenses came next. The island's cliffs were a natural start, but he wanted more. Walls around the city's perimeter, keyed to his magic, rising from the stone itself when completed. Towers at strategic points, each one a bastion of layered enchantments. And beyond the walls, enchanted forests that would confuse and repel any army foolish enough to approach by land.
He sketched. He planned. He revised. Aurelia watched, occasionally landing on his plans to leave claw prints that he learned to interpret as approval or disapproval.
By the end of the year, he had it. Every street, every canal, every wall and tower and plaza, mapped in perfect detail across a dozen created scrolls.
"Ready?" he asked Aurelia.
She trilled.
☆☆★☆☆
The creation took three months.
He started at the highest point, just below the castle's plateau, and worked downward. Stone rose from the earth at his command, marble, pale granite and silver-veined crystal, just as he'd planned. Streets formed themselves, perfectly straight, perfectly graded. Canals carved their own paths, water from the castle's endless waterfall flowing into them the moment they were complete.
The first terrace took shape: grand estates with columned porches, private gardens, views across the entire island. An academy district with lecture halls and libraries. Administrative buildings with vaulted ceilings and enchanted lighting that would never need tending.
Second terrace: wider streets, taller buildings. Markets with covered stalls. Guild halls for every trade. An amphitheater that could hold thousands, its acoustics magically perfected.
Third terrace: homes. Thousands of them, each one unique but harmonious, built to the same standards of beauty and comfort. Workshops for craftsmen. Taverns and inns. Public baths fed by the canals.
Fourth terrace: farms. Terraced fields stepped down the gentle slopes, ready for planting. Orchards of fruit trees he'd created from nothing. Pastures for animals he didn't yet have.
Fifth terrace: the port. Docks and warehouses and shipyards, all waiting for ships that hadn't arrived. A lighthouse at the harbor's mouth, its beam visible for miles.
And everywhere, beauty. Trees lined every avenue. Flowers bloomed in every plaza. Fountains sang in every square. The city glowed with its own gentle light, not harsh like torches, but soft like moonlight captured in crystal.
When the last stone settled into place, Alaric stood on the highest balcony of Aetherion Spire and looked down at the city below.
It was empty, silent and waiting for it's residents.
But it was his.
"Aetherion," he murmured. "My eternal home."
☆☆★☆☆
The wards took another six months.
He started with the island itself. Layered protections that would alert him to any approach, any intrusion, any hostile magic within a hundred miles. Detection wards so sensitive they could count the heartbeat of a single rat climbing the cliffs.
Then the city. Wards against fire, against collapse, against natural disaster. The buildings would stand forever, or at least as long as he did. Wards against disease, keeping the air clean and the water pure. The canals would never stagnate, never breed sickness.
Then the people-oriented wards. Intention wards, like the ones at Aretuza, that would sense hostility and respond accordingly. Anyone approaching the city with murder in their heart would find themselves suddenly... elsewhere. Turned around, confused, walking back the way they came. Anyone who pushed through that would face the next layer.
Combat wards. Shields that could stop arrows, bolts, even catapult stones. Wards that would slow invaders, confuse their senses, turn their own weapons against them. Wards that would alert every defender in the city the moment a threat appeared.
War wards. If an army somehow breached the outer layers, the city itself would fight. Streets would shift, walls would rise, buildings would become fortresses. Invaders would find themselves lost in a maze of stone and magic, picked apart by forces they couldn't see.
He layered them carefully, each one keyed to his blood, his magic, his will. No one could enter Aetherion without his permission. No one could harm what was his.
Finally, the castle itself. The spire became a fortress within fortresses, its wards so dense that Alaric himself had to create a key to let himself through. The throne room was the most protected space on the island, maybe in the world. Anyone who reached it without his blessing would find themselves facing the full weight of his power, amplified by every ward in the city.
When he finished, he stood on the highest tower and felt the magic hum around him. It was beautiful. Perfect. Impenetrable.
"Now," he said to Aurelia, "the army."
☆☆★☆☆
The alchemical sentinels took a year to perfect.
He'd learned the basics from his created books, refined them with knowledge from Sothoryos, and adapted them with his own creation magic. The result was something new. Something only his.
Each sentinel stood seven feet tall, humanoid but clearly not human. Their bodies were forged from enchanted stone and metal, their joints fluid despite their apparent weight. Their faces were smooth, expressionless, with eyes that glowed soft blue when active.
They were loyal. Not programmed, not enchanted into obedience, truly, deeply loyal. He'd woven that into their creation, a fundamental part of their being. They would serve him, protect his city, follow his commands, without question and without fail. But they weren't mindless. They could think, adapt, make decisions. In battle, they would be as dangerous as any living soldier.
He made a thousand of them.
It took months of continuous work, each sentinel requiring hours of careful crafting. He didn't sleep, didn't need to, really, though he still enjoyed it. He simply worked, Aurelia keeping him company, until one day he looked up and saw a thousand glowing eyes watching him from the courtyard below.
They stood in perfect rows, motionless, waiting. Their loyalty was absolute. Their purpose was clear.
"From today," Alaric said, his voice carrying across the silent courtyard, "you protect this city. You guard its walls, its streets, its people. You are the first line of defense, and if needed, the last." He paused. "You are the Aetherion Guard."
A thousand heads bowed as one.
He'd need more, eventually. A full army, with living soldiers to complement the sentinels. But this was a start. This was something.
The gargoyles came next.
Smaller than the sentinels, more agile. Designed to perch on towers, roofs, walls, any high point. Their eyes missed nothing. Their claws could rend steel. And when they launched from their perches, they were almost invisible against the sky.
He made five hundred. Enough to watch every corner of the city, every approach, every shadow. They would be his eyes when he wasn't there, his claws when trouble came.
He set them to their perches, and the city came alive with silent watchers.
☆☆★☆☆
When the work was done, Alaric stood on the highest balcony and looked at what he'd built.
The city spread below him, beautiful and perfect, but empty. The sentinels stood at their posts, motionless but aware. The gargoyles watched from every tower. The wards hummed with power, a constant song of protection.
Thirty-nine years. That's how long he'd been in this world. A decade alone on the island, practicing. Ten years exploring Essos, building connections. Fifteen years in Sothoryos, learning from sorceresses and witchers alike and 4 years planningand building his kingdom.
And now this. A city without people. A kingdom without subjects. A throne without a court.
"It's time," he said quietly.
Aurelia tilted her head.
"The connections I made. Eskel. The merchants in Pentos. The smiths in Qohor. Tissaia and Yennefer. The witchers." He smiled. "I need people who want to be here. People who believe in what I'm building."
He thought about what his kingdom needed. Farmers to work the terraced fields. Craftsmen to fill the workshops. Merchants to trade through the port. Scholars to teach in the academies. Soldiers to fight alongside the sentinels. Administrators to manage the daily work of running a city.
And beyond that, industries. Fishing fleets to feed the population. Mines, if the island had resources he hadn't found. Shipyards to build vessels for trade and defense. Glassblowers, smiths, weavers, bakers, brewers—every trade that made a city live.
He couldn't create them. He wouldn't. They had to come willingly, or not at all.
"I'll start with the people I know," he said. "Eskel first. See if he's tired of wandering. Then the merchants in Pentos—they'll know who might want a fresh start. Then back to Sothoryos. Tissaia might have students who want something new. Yennefer might know people."
Aurelia trilled agreement.
He looked out at his empty city one more time. Silent and waiting for them.
"Soon," he promised. "Very soon."
The crack of displaced air echoed across the balcony.
And Alaric Peverell, lord of a city without people, vanished into the world once more.
The king had built his kingdom, but now came the harder part: finding someone to build for.