Harlan sat there with her in that false city.

“Can’t you speed up my sense of time? I’m not getting anything done here. If the Cast attack I won’t be there for-”

“I can’t let you out before the five days have passed, we’ve only been here for one.

“Doing so would stress your mind and soul, you don’t understand how fragile you are right now.”

“What do I do then?”

“We talk, keep your mind off of the time. Come, ask of me what you want to know.”

“How do I learn void gate.”

“Please, don’t attempt to take advantage of this.”

“Alright, the first race of Fae slayers, who is it?”

“The Dague.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, one of my myriad failures. The Fae found out about them and interfered, taking away their empathy, but also making it… difficult, to destroy the race entirely. So we moved them out here and let them live or die on their own.

I learned that I needed someone else's help to make them, someone who had magic not from here.

Xol has been a great help, even if the other gods, Aarde included, are distrusting of him.”

“I’ll need to ask him about that. But to stay on the topic of the races, why don’t we have Plest inside of the veil?”

“Though they might claim to be otherwise, the beastkin are still people, and they are not immune to being human.”

“They killed them all, didn’t they?”

“Plest are not quite as hearty as some species. They were given good land, and when others wanted that land, they took it. Unable to survive without the garden they had been given, they broke apart into small tribes and then eventually faded away before Marigold reached the tribes and gave them proper magic.

All of this was also far before Ragne found them and they banded together to form the Confederacy.

In some regards much good has come from the fear humans have for beastkin, their clashes over appearance made it easier for both sides to have a clear enemy and band together against them. Sure, a few million died here and there, but it worked out well enough by the end.”

Harlan narrowed his eyes at her.

“I’m I like that? A thing to be hated so others can put aside their differences?”

“Are you? Or are you a sign of someone who is different and can teach others the strength of oddity, so they might not fear them.”

“I don’t think I’m all that.”

“Think on this, as I said before, there is no other being who can be Harlan, what that means to or about you is your choice to decide.”

Outside, Carmilla left to deal with Sholl, and a day had passed.

She had no desire to return to that place, and could only hope everything turned out well.

Jakel and his father along with the advisors of the Sandsea gathered for a meeting.

“With the Godtouched Saber, I could kill Harlan.”

“And risk that god destroying us? Even Carmilla backed away in fear of that thing.”

“How certain are we that it is powerful? All it did was make threats and shapeshift.”

“Why are you so set on killing that boy?”

Jakel slammed his hand on the table.

“SILENCE. Each of you may speak, but calmly.”

“How do you intend for us to remain calm? If he wakes up, he’s likely to ignore our orders and do what he pleases anyway.”

“Yes, if he wakes up. We need to come to a conclusion, is it safer for Harlan to stay alive, or to die.

Right now Carmilla has seen him, she knows how bad he looks, and distrusts that god.

Could we blame the death on it?”

Tatton stroked his chin.

“It is possible that it could work, but I am uncertain that killing Harlan is wise.”

“We all saw the look in his eyes, he took what we did a bit worse than we had expected.

We made a mistake there by telling him no directly, we should’ve just said we would think about it and then ignored every attempt for him to do what he wanted to do. I believe it would be unwise to wait and see what he is going to do, and we’ve already finished our teaching with him. Redhaven would likely take over Fomoria, maybe it would even remain a nation with his mother taking the throne, but look at how he has expanded, and once more I must say, he spent a month in the territories and stole the nation out from under Colton. Now he comes here and talks about granting more power to the citizens, and that power move when he got here? In his words he likes being the fox, not the hare, he’s already so much as said he sees us as prey.”

They talked for only another hour before they decided.

Inside of the dream, Harlan continued to spend time.

“The Faun? Did the Cast do something? Because from what I’ve heard they are a young race from way after the Fae were already gone.”

“The god of the Cast, not to be confused for their emperor, simply wanted their human subjects to be stronger, and without a desire to give them magic that would bridge this gap, as was the purpose of prime races being rather average in every other way but their ability to use all of the elements, she simply mixed them with a species of deer to make them a little larger.”

The Darkness sipped on the cup of tea that never ran empty.

“It has been quite an experience, having even a fragment of myself spend time leisurely.”

“I’ve tried to make a relaxing Harlan, and it's never really worked. Whatever little peace they can give me is simply crushed under the weight of everything else. I can’t stand the idea of wasting my brain power on something like that unless I get very clear positive results.”

“It is quite interesting to me that you’ve become an Egregore like this.”

“I’m not really a thought entity, am I? If every body of mine dies, or if someone targeted my soul, I’d still die.”

“Yes, I suppose that is fair, but you aren’t quite a lich either. They tend to have one point of failure, the phylactery which is in the stories you’ve heard about them. Anything you’ve ever made, that bears your signature could be a possible vessel, from your ring, to your armor, to your golems.”

“Are there more liches besides Xol out there? I would assume Marigold since Xol would’ve taught her how to do it.”

“Yes, you would assume that. It is not my story to tell for why she doesn’t split herself like you do.

But, yes, there are other liches. Each is rare and unique, only one of them is truly like Xol, from Earth I mean. The process of binding a soul to an object and then using that to prevent it from fading away after the death of a body isn’t new, and Xol does not really hold claim over it. Though it used to be one would need to sacrifice thousands of lives to get such an effect. And now Xol has a large collection of these phylacteries so their owners can’t regenerate without his approval.”

There was a small silence between them, her letting Harlan come to his own conclusions about why Marigold might not want more than one mind running around.

Then once she thought he had exactly enough time to come to a conclusion, she changed the subject again.

“Ritual magic is interesting, to me far more so then the current system.”

“Really? I’ve heard of it, old magic, supposed to be finicky and highly specific.

Though, I guess what happened with that evolved Skinwalker was a ritual spell, and that was effective.”

“Yes, it was both of those things, but the moving of hands and speaking of words lacks flair compared to dancing around ancient trees or throwing people into volcanos and hoping they’d catch the eye of one of us and we would do something. Then those Fae bastards had to make it easy, but almost impossible for those granted magic to understand it, and Marigold then gave the tools needed for magic to be easy, but require a level of understanding.”

“I’ve got enough blood on me already, I don’t think I’d like the old magic.”

“When it was practiced, brutality was simply the way of the world, yet not all of the principles require that.

Coronach… he knew brutality like few others, and wished to soften it.”

“What is he really? Is that whole story about him being an ancient hero who gave up on humanity really the truth?”

“Coronach is many things, but a liar is not one. And he has never given up on humanity, they betrayed him, and whatever he might say, I believe he has stayed alive as long as he has to find someone to prove him wrong about them. A good man he is not, time has passed him by, but in his age, he was one of the better ones.”

“Is that his real name? Because I have tried to look for anything that contains the word, and all I found was an old practice of the same name where one would sing at funerals.”

“That practice is named after him, he would sing to his troops after the battle to guide the souls to the afterlife, and then it became normal for him to hum as he slaughters.”

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

“And he was a good man in his age?”

“When putting the heads of children on pikes to lower enemy morale wasn’t looked down on as an unacceptable brutality, but as just another tactic, a man who would defend the weak was akin to a saint, and not one of them from Reino, I mean the general meaning of the world.

He didn’t change the world how he liked, he didn’t get his era of light, but the stories of him, now lost to time, did make some look at their own actions and better themselves.”

They had decided.

Harlan must parish before he destabilized the nation, his own nation was built on knowing nothing at all and deciding to take over a town on a whim, giving him time to plan out a way to destroy them seemed like a when and not an if.

Tatton was the one who would strike him down, if someone would be a scapegoat, he would take that blame, his life was already nearing its end.

Tatton saw Harlan laying in the shadow of one of the pillars, and thought nothing of his having been moved.

As he brought the saber down, he felt a wrongness in his body and staggered back.

A loud laughter resounded from the darkness, and the others who had been waiting outside so they wouldn’t be direct witnesses came near to see what had happened.

The shadow stood above his father, and though he was uncertain, Jakel did not recognize this thing as the god from before.

Her air was one of divinity, this was one of nothingness.

“I can’t believe you really activated it, oh, I’ve been waiting to see this.”

Jakel struck at the shadow, who simply used his open palm to push him away.

“I’ve been told not to kill all of you if possible, it would look quite bad for the boy if you all died.”

He stood 12 feet tall, his body waved like a flag in slow motion, and he had 7 eyes in a half circle.

“But your father… he has already doomed himself.”

Others tried to use what Harlan had taught them, spiraling radiant beams at the… entity.

Yet with just a finger, he could make his own beam of void and split it, each thread having the equivalent power of their own beams.

As the light and dark clashed, they harmlessly canceled one another.

Tatton was becoming skinny, his fur was graying.

“You see, Harlan is so foolish that he would truly do this for free as a gesture of good will, but he is not so foolish that he wouldn’t include something else. To raise a blade against him with honest intention, that is enough to take back that gift which he has given freely.”

“FATHER.”.

“Fall”

Coronach’s words became a relatively weak gravity spell which forced them to the ground.

“Shouting won’t help, nothing can now. Well, that isn’t true, if Harlan were to wake up and heal him, granting the youth once more, he would be fine. But Harlan isn’t to wake for some time, and I very much doubt he’d care for you all when he does. But… am I using the word too much? It’s starting to sound odd to me, but but but but… hmm, no matter. He will die as he should’ve. And I do hope he has realized how foolish it was to spit in the face of the gift horse.”

Coronach said something afterwards in a dead language, but they couldn’t make any sense of the word.

The gravity returned to normal, Jakel rushed to his father, taking him away from the living void and grabbing the saber.

Coronach was very excited, but Jakel simply backed away.

“Coward.”

Harlan meanwhile was eating a variety of things, many he had never even heard of.

“For someone who doesn’t eat, you certainly know a lot of foods.”

“I am a collector of stories, many cultures long dead had their own customs about these things.”

“This?”

“Kortensplorc. It was said to have been made by as an offering to a god. Though it was made of simple ingredients, the deity was touched that the starving man would give it to him rather than feed himself, and was granted a bowl of the stew which would never run empty or rot.”

“Is there any truth to that?”

“That’s beside the point, it is an interesting story.”

Harlan ate some along with some biscuits.

“It’s kinda bland.”

“The reality is that it is just a very simple stew that was easy to make, and the religious aspect was to make one not look down on it or complain. There is another story that if children refused to finish their stew then a demon would come into their rooms while they were asleep and put a rock under their tongue while they slept.”

Harlan stopped eating and just looked very confused.

“When everyone thought every old looking tree or body of water had a spirit related to it they would blame everything on them, making wild tales and traditions that made little sense unless one was already a part of the culture. They weren’t all wrong however, the rogue Fae, the leftovers who still roam the world today, they are the cause of much local folklore.”

“Why didn’t you all just reveal yourselves? Show them that there are only a few true gods.”

“We reacted too late. Well, my siblings did, I’ve had worshippers since what you would consider ancient times, before the Fae empire.”

“Do you have a lot today?”

“People who worship the god of lies and murder aren’t likely to say they worship me.”

“And are you really a god of murder and lies?”

“Lying isn’t an inherent immorality to me, and murder has a very flexible definition.”

“Huh. Could any of those followers bring me seeds for rice. It’s a good food crop, stable to store, goes well with most things, really the only issue is the poor nutrition of it.”

“I will make sure you get it, along with something else that has been making its way to you.”

Coronach hated this job,, nobody tried to kill Harlan.

But Carmilla did show up.

“So this is the great vampire queen I’ve heard about? I can smell your diluted blood from here.”

“I’m going to rise above your taunts. I wish to see Harlan.”

“Before I am allowed to converse with you further. I am required to state that I am expressly forbidden from harming you.”

His tone was a grumble, obviously thinking it was unfair.

“Why?”

“The boy likes you, and apparently that means without express permission or an inability for both of you to live, I can’t harm a hair on your pretty little head.”

Carmilla was confused, and stepped back out after more or less just checking his vitals.

“Why me? I wouldn’t say we are great friends, and he barely knows me.”

“Don’t question me, I’m just following orders. But the boy does have a type, an older woman, and a vampire? You are in two of his most liked categories of people. You’ve got a pretty daughter, right?”

She pulled her estoc and bore her fangs at him with a sneer.

“How boring, but it’s what I expect from one of your kind.”

“You’ve insulted me for what I am twice already, what do you have against me?”

“You’ve failed to find something to offset that weakness using the benefits of being a diluted vampire, one not a direct descendant of the first born.”

Fury crept onto his face.

“But no, that is not what I hate about you.”

“What is then?”

Coronach stood still, not replying to any further questions from her.

----------------------------------------

Sholl made his way to the communication room, from there a letter would be written and passed along to his hand.

Uncertain of what to do, he simply lived in the room until the reply arrived.

The letter was short.

‘Sholl, please avoid Queen Carmilla during your investigation. If she is involved directly, apply for additional support, but make no moves against her. Your’s truly, Ur.’

He found the response odd, but in his time under him, Ur was not one to rely on tricks, and he could expect an explanation at a later date.

Sholl made his way to another city, one on the next stripe over and under imperial control.

When a Finger made their way to any place, the reaction was always an immediate event of their arrival.

The best food and drink would be gathered the city over, sometimes it would even be paid for.

Thus Sholl entered with a hood and gloves on, telling the guards at the gate that he would rather his visit remain quiet.

Once he reached the mayor’s mansion, he revealed himself to only the guards who needed to know who he was so they could bring him directly to the mayor.

“Greetings, I am Sholl, Left Pinkie of the Emperor.”

The golden Cast in charge of the clearly not expecting him, and thought himself in trouble.

“Cast aside your fear, I am only seeking information about the surrounding nations not yet conquered.”

“I am happy to help. My name is Auria, Mayor of Kalden.”

“I checked the records before I came this way, I thought a man named Aurel should be mayor of the city and Ambassador of the region?”

“Ah… he had an unfortunate accident, and I was sent to replace him.”

“Under what circumstances did he die?”

“We had set a trap, and somehow despite the planning, we failed to capture the subject, and Aurel was killed in the process.”

Sholl looked the man in the eyes, it wasn’t a strong compulsion, but for most people it was enough to make them honest without him needing to use sigils.

“And what was your target?”

“A monster which took over a city south of here, not far from the eastern coast, Kor.”

“What does the monster look like?”

“He was first a pale man, almost human, but he called himself Fomorian, a name none of us know.

He looked young, certainly not over 20 years of age, his eyes were strange, fire, darkness, and light, and they slit like a reptile when he got angry. Now, he is taller, and he has horns like a Dague. But from the survivors who’ve seen him, he can take the form of any beast, real or what he seemed to have invented on his own.”

“And how many troops have you lost to him so far.”

The compulsion broke, the question was one he very much did not want to answer.

“Not many, it’s been very low priority, and we expect him to get bored and move on soon enough, but won’t make it far without a city to hide behind or a surprise attack.”

Sholl thought about how much he wanted to push it, he could just directly accuse him of lying, his word as a Finger was proof enough to get him executed.

But to him that felt like something one of the Fingers of the Right Hand would do.

“Thank you for your time, I intend to stay around the area for a time, but not in the city itself, so don’t worry about food or accommodations.”

He shook the mayor’s hand and left, or at least the illusion did.

The real Sholl followed the man around and listened to his conversations.

In the night, Auria directly visited with members of the orders and other mayor’s from the surrounding areas.

Considering the distance between towns and cities along with him never sending a message, this meeting was one already planned before Sholl arrived and he simply got lucky.

“A Finger has arrived.”

“Why?”

“He is looking for information, I think I was under a compulsion, but I described Fomoria and he seemed far too interested once I said he could shapeshift.”

“Dammit. We are getting closer, do we finally just request more troops from the other stripes?”

“I doubt we will have time, can you convince your Grand Wizards to join in an attack? If Kor is wiped from the map then Fomoria will be in the wind, but it’s better than us never getting the chance to get at those magics first.”

“Or we could kill the Finger, which one is it?”

“Sholl.”

“Hmm… that is bad, he’s not a brute from the Right Hand, but also it could be good, we do know he is rather weak for a Finger. If I convinced a few Grand Wizards to attack, we might have a chance to kill him, buy a little more time for a proper extraction. Taking his son would be a good bargaining chip.”

“What about his mother?”

“If the reports from the west are right, she was involved in an attack on a city, and if she is really the mother to that monster then there is no telling what could happen. The boy has few guards, and spends much of his time with just a single Dague girl, even sometimes going outside of the walls to hunt game or monsters.”

“Then we take the boy, use him to get us the man.”

Sholl had heard enough.