Analia stayed in Nym’s sanctuary for a week. When he’d finished his work and allowed her to wake up, she was as physically healthy as she’d ever been, more so than when he’d started even. Analia had run her body into the ground repeatedly for years and done very little to protect it. Nym’s magic had repaired a lot of damage.

Her mind was another story. She spent a lot of her time staring at a wall, so much so that Nym created little scrying portals that opened up over breathtaking landscapes all over the world for her to see. He didn’t know if it helped, but she seemed to appreciate it.

She also spent a lot of time silently crying. Tears ran down her face, unheeded, to drip off her chin. For that, the only thing he could do was sit next to her in silence and hold her hand. He gave her that time, as much as he could, and did his best to be a comforting presence.

That wasn’t to say Nym did nothing while he sat there. With Analia’s copy leading the way to victory over the cartel they’d been fighting, her vigilante mages did some celebrating of their own, and Nym took that time to start distancing her from the friends she’d made. Maybe she would want to return to that life when she was better, and if so, Nym wanted to leave her a way back to it.

But he hoped she would choose something besides endless violence and being exposed to some of the worst behaviors humanity had to offer. That kind of life took its toll on people who weren’t cursed with magic driving their behaviors and impulses. He didn’t think it was a good place for her to recover for however many months or years it took.

On the second day, Analia started eating again. Nym took that as a good sign, but he didn’t push. One part of him stayed with her while other copies of him went out and handled other matters. He found and confirmed the Earth Shapers were alive and well, checked up on Ciana and left her another purse of gold with plans to stop in and actually speak to her later, and finally, after many, many days of searching, found the snow wolf pack he’d met in his travels. Nym promptly added a visit to Cold Paw to his agenda.

It wasn’t until the third day that she finally spoke. It was just a simple question. “Where is this?” she asked, her voice a cracked and dry whisper.

The scry panned across a lush tropical island with a brilliant lagoon in it. It was only a mile or so across, somewhere deep in the ocean thousands of miles west of Shu-Ain. Nym had discovered it randomly while searching for places to build his first sanctum, but dismissed it due to the amount of wildlife living there.

“Somewhere in the West Ocean,” he said. “I doubt any human has ever set foot on it.”

“It’s beautiful,” she said.

“Do you want to visit?”

Her lips curled up slightly, but she shook her head. “It’s enough just to see it.”

“Okay. If you change your mind, we can go.”

Her hand tightened on his. “Thank you.”

The old Nym might have chafed at sitting still and doing nothing for so long, but he’d learned a great deal of patience in the years he’d been gone. Perhaps it was the merging of his fourth layer echo that had really solidified it as part of who he was, but regardless of how it happened, he was happy to wait with her for as long as it took.

By the end of the week, she was walking around and talking to him. They discussed some of the places he’d shown her, and he caught her up on what the vigilantes had been doing, and how he’d extracted her from their group by saying she had to take care of some personal business.

“You can go back to them if you want,” he said.

“But you think I shouldn’t.”

“No. Not right away at least. You’re recovering from an almost fatal curse. I don’t think there are more than five or six mortals in the world who could have kept you from dying. You need to take it easy, to take some time for yourself.”

“Nym, don’t take this the wrong way. You are crazy talented in so many ways, but you are terrible at what you’re trying to do right now. Thank you for helping me. I will never be able to express how grateful I am for that. But I’m ready to take control of my life again. I need to take control.”

“And you’re going to do that by going back to fighting for it?”

Analia shook her head. “No. It’s good work, and it should be done. But… I think I need to step back and let someone else do it. If I do keep helping them, I’ll have to do some other kind of work, something that’s not fighting. Maybe some information gathering. But I need to do something else first.”

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“Do you know what?” Nym asked.

“Not yet.”

“And… your father?”

Raw, naked hatred flashed across her face. “I’ll take care of him myself.”

“Alright.” Nym paused and thought about it. “How can I help? I’ll take you anywhere you want to go and give you enough money to live for a year. If you want some wards or rune sequences to keep anyone from finding you, I can do that too. Do… do you want me to show you how to forge a conduit to the third layer?”

“Can you do that?” Analia asked, surprised.

“Yes, if you want me to. If you would rather do it on your own, that’s fine too.” Nym still remembered Ferro taking control of his conduit and threading it through the Astral Sea. It hadn’t been so much an unpleasant experience as somewhat violating, and it had stolen what should have been a moment of triumph, the reward for all his hard work snatched away at the last second. He wouldn’t force that on her.

“I’ll think about that. I’m not against the idea, but I have to figure out what I want to do first.”

“Should I give you some privacy?”

“Please.”

For the rest of that day, Nym left her to her own devices while he finished extracting the copy he’d shaped like Analia from the camp. There were a few goodbyes and well wishes, and once she was free of them, the copy simply returned to him. It had been a lot of extra work to keep this one going, since it was only semi-autonomous. Being connected to Analia had required a degree of direct control he was glad his normal copies didn’t need.

While she took some time to herself, Nym made a new copy and sent it out to visit some old friends.

* * *

Not only were all four Earth Shapers alive and prospering, but it looked like they’d added a fifth member to their crew. Nym didn’t recognize the woman, but it was easy to tell she was working with them on a permanent basis. They’d finally gotten back to that job of building the border keep they were talking about when he’d first met them, and they’d done well enough for themselves down south that they’d acquired three wagons. The woman’s name was Kazie, and it seemed like she and Nomick were together, just based on the brief time he’d spent studying them when he’d found them with his scrying.

Conjured food was fine in a pinch, but it didn’t satisfy quite the same way real food did, so Nym made a quick detour before he showed up at dinner time. The five earth mages were sitting at an outdoor table near a mess hall that had been set up for the construction crews, eating and discussing work. Nym appeared at the end of the table, sitting on a chair that hadn’t been there before, with a small basket of desserts on the table in front of him.

“Ack!” Monick, who was closest to him, cried out. The earth mage threw himself backwards and toppled out of his chair.

“Hi,” Nym said. “How’s it going, guys?”

“Nym! You’re… you’re alive,” Bildar said. He eyed up the basket. “Damn, it’s good to see you again. And it looks like nothing’s changed.”

“Some things have, but some things were worth keeping the same.” Nym patted the basket and scooted it closer to the center of the table.

“Amen to that!” Nomick said, scooping it up. “Oooh, only one custard. Well, good thing I got to it fir- hey! Give that back!”

Bildar swiped the basket, located the custard, and claimed it. “Welcome back, Nym,” he said with a grin as he took a bite.

“Oh, honestly boys,” Ophelia said. “Is no one even going to ask how Nym’s doing?”

“He’s doing fine,” Bildar said around a mouthful of custard. “Look at him. If he wasn’t fine, he’d say. You’re fine, right?”

“Mostly,” Nym said. “Still a lot going on, a lot to do, but I had something pressing to take care of. It was kind of time sensitive.”

“Um, I don’t mean to cut in here, but should I leave?” Kazie asked. “Give you some time to catch up with your friend.”

“No, no. That’s not necessary,” Nym told her. “I’m Nym, nice to meet you. You’re Kazie, you’ve been with the Earth Shapers for about four months now, mostly because of Nomick.”

“I… yes. How do you know that?”

“Magic!”

“Nym, it’s not that we’re not happy to see you, but what are you doing here?”

Nym’s smile slipped off his face and he sighed. “I should have come earlier, but I had to figure out how to make sure no one would find out I’d slipped away. You would not believe the ways those people had of keeping tabs on you. I didn’t want to lead anyone your way. But then I couldn’t delay any longer, not without letting Analia die.”

The mood dropped around the table, with everyone sobering up, though Kazie looked confused. “What happened to her?” Bildar asked.

“I figured out what was wrong with her. That father of hers put a geas on her. Three of them, actually. For years, she’s been fighting them.”

“Oh God, that’s… what kind of person…”

Nym glanced over at Ophelia. “Yeah, it was a mess. But that’s why… all of the everything, you know? The arguments. The fighting she was doing. He wanted her spying on me at all times and reporting back to him, and no one was supposed to ever know about the geases. I broke them, but that’s a lot of damage to recover from. She’s barely spoken for the last week.”

“You should bring her here,” Bildar said immediately. “She can stay with us. It’ll do her good to be around friends who love her. We’ll take care of her.”

“I will offer her that option, but it will be her decision. I just wanted to talk to you first. You guys are like family to me, and hey, I even got a new sister-in-law, but the level of care she’s going to need isn’t something you just dump on someone without any warning. And I can’t stick around forever. There’s still… everything… It’s not dealt with, and the longer I stay here, the more likely it is someone figures it out just by accident.”

“Bring her here,” Ophelia said, her voice firm. “Even if it’s just for an afternoon visit. She doesn’t have to stay, but we’d like to see her too.”

Back in Nym’s sanctuary, the copy he’d left there knocked on the door of the bedroom he’d given Analia. “I’m talking to the Earth Shapers right now,” he said. “They’d like to see you. Do you feel up to visiting them?”

“I’ll come. One moment.”

Analia opened the door, and Nym offered his hand. The instant she took it, she appeared next to his body sitting at the table. The sudden change in light caused her to squint, and when she looked around and saw her friends, she started crying.

“Hi guys,” she said. That was all she got out before she was buried in hugs.