What were you thinking?

Tamara sighed gently as she closed her eyes. She had been expecting Arathan to broach this subject but had idly hoped that her soul shape could read the mood and left it alone for now. She was sitting down on a comfortable couch, Ruth’s head laying in her lap. She had no romantic inclinations toward him, she had merely delighted at the expected discomfiture he would have when he woke up.

It also allowed her to put her hand on his forehead and repair his mana system. When she had dumped mana into him he hadn’t really had a chance to convert it and make it his own. It was equally disastrous to his body that he had immediately used it all at once. It had been quite a shock to his system. Normally, his body would repair itself over time. A case of this sort of mana burn might take a month or two to fully heal. Since it was mostly her fault, she had decided to just fix it herself.

In reality, there weren’t many people in the universe that knew Ruth’s body better than her, after all.

“I was thinking I would be selfish, which I usually am?” Tamara retorted. She paused in her work to slightly move his head. Working around the horns was problematic, and despite the look of ‘intimacy’ that observers might think they saw, his head with the horns was actually quite uncomfortable to have on her lap -- his head was too wide for her lap.

There is another soul chain on our space now. It was quite literally a binding oath! You have to swear fealty to him! If he asks your life, you must give it! Why would you do this?

“First of all, the hair I meant wasn’t eyelashes so there’s some leeway there. I’m already pushing back against that chain. Secondly, I said I would swear fealty and make him a mighty king, something that I would be doing anyway. Lastly, he brought up the life thing -- I mentioned no such thing.”

Yes. Keep playing with words and soul chains. That’s worked out so well for us!

“Yes, forgive me.”

Why?

“Why did I do it?”

Truly. He is unconscious and so is Rush. We are alone.

“I wanted to give him something over me. When this is over and I’ve done everything I’ve set out to do, he will be my judge.”

Why?

“...because even I know shame.”

↢↦

When Ruth opened his eyes there was an unfamiliar sensation of comfort. His body, in addition to the creature eating clothing, had a blanket draped over it. It was warm and reminded him of his lair after he heated the stones right before a nap. The scene was somewhat spoiled because Tamara’s hair was hanging down over him as she smiled down at him from way, way too close.

“Going to ask if you’re dead?” Tamara grinned.

“I am alive,” he whispered hoarsely. “You are unkillable. If you are here and I am here, I must be alive.”

“You could make a joke about being in the underworld or a layer of one of the hells?” Tamara tilted her head.

“Where are those?” Ruth thought for a moment. From the way she spoke, it seemed that those places were bad places. Places that Tamara might frequent. Bad places indeed.

“Nevermind, dragon.”

“Fuck you, goddess.”

“It’s cute that you’re trying to circulate your mana to attack me,” Tamara removed her hand from his forehead. Seemingly ill at ease with what to do with it, she started to stroke his cheek. She smiled widely when she saw him cringe.

“Why can’t I?” Ruth gave up and asked. He had been surreptitiously trying to shock her since he woke up.

“I decided not to allow it. We need to talk about things. Surely, you’ve questions?” Tamara looked up and jerked her chin toward the room. “We’re in Under Arch. We’re in the master study for the Archivist building. Our ‘retainer’ Sikes allowed us to use it and has barred entry. For the most part the city is leaving us alone. There are no demi-gods here, let alone gods… so no one could really do anything to us anyway.”

Ruth didn’t look around the extravagant room. There were candles everywhere and books and that was all well and good but none of that was as interesting as the woman who was currently restraining his powers and forcing him to sit still.

“I don’t care.”

“No, I suspect you do not,” Tamara sighed. “What am I going to do with you? I can’t simply…” She pinched his cheek and gave it a teasing tug, “...leave you to your own devices.”

“Where is Rush?” Ruth did his best to ignore the feeling of having his cheek pulled. He would have immediately lopped off one of his feet if it meant he could smack her hand away.

“A fine first question. Do you know why you care?”

Ruth kept his face blank even as he thought about her question. It was funny, how she could ask him a question and it would immediately send his brain into overdrive. Maybe it was because she always asked interesting questions? Why did he care about Rush? He and the little guy had been through a lot together but had only really known each other for a few days? It seemed that they’d an alliance of convenience. If for no other reason, Rush had seemed to be the only one he’d ever met that he trusted implicitly.

Ruth’s face began to slowly screw itself up in confusion.

“Ah, that leads to the next question doesn’t it? Since the answer to the first was surprisingly simple! You trust Rush. So, onward to the next question we go?” She pushed her hair back behind her shoulders and out of his face with her free hand.

If she hadn’t been a giant bag of sand Ruth might have been grateful.

“Yes. But...why?”

“Because he is your soul shape,” Tamara booped him slightly on the nose, apparently tired of tugging on his cheeks. She did it a second time with a little ‘boop’ noise.

Soul Shape.

Ruth closed his eyes.

The simple words conjured up a vision from ages distant. A mighty dragon far larger than Ruth had ever hoped to be coiled itself around a tree that rose to the very heavens. It opened one serpentine eye and seemed to stare right at him. It didn’t matter that Ruth was not really there -- he still felt fear. It closed the eye after a moment of consideration and let out a long exhalation as if sighing slightly. Around the dragon a mighty sphere of mana formed, extending for miles in all directions.

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Within the sphere was…

An illusory figure of another smaller dragon. A Soul Shape.

The Soul Shape of the mighty dragon.

Friend? Compatriot? Partner? Comrade? Another being that the dragon loved as much as himself.

Ruth opened his eyes, and once open they widened with disbelief.

“...but… what is a Soul Shape?” Ruth finally stuttered.

The vision had been incomplete. He hadn’t understood any of the concepts. It was one thing to believe that a Soul Shape was an ally of convenience. To be used when another formidable enemy was about. The information he was receiving felt like there was more to it than that. It was possible, Ruth finally decided, that the concepts were alien to him because there were no words for them in draconic!

Tamara began running her fingers through his short hair as she smiled. “Now, you have asked the right question.”

After she was quiet for some time and didn’t appear to be about to continue, Ruth finally snorted. “Well?”

“I’m trying to think of a way to explain it to you,” Tamara replied apologetically. “The philosophers of old, the gods that exist, and even the ancient powers that yet remain in the universe could speak for weeks on end about what a soul shape is, or why it is, or even where it is. I suspect you would rather have a short version?”

Ruth stared up at her pointedly, refusing to take the bait. She was making a joke about his intelligence, he was sure.

“The fact you can understand I’m making fun of you means you’ve come a long, long way.” Tamara rested her hand on his forehead and ceased her teasing of his hair, cheeks, and nose.

“If he dies, do I die?” A sudden fear went through him.

“Mm?” Tamara looked up toward Arathan who was perched near a window. They seemed to be sharing a moment. “In many cases with powerful soul shapes, the death of a soul shape can result in the death of the person. In your case, immature as it is, you might survive. I am not going to imagine how crippled or horribly maimed and mentally disfigured you would be. There are instances of soul shapes being destroyed and their person living on without any problem, but they are few.”

If you die though, Rush will certainly perish.

The strange raspy voice infiltrated Ruth’s brain. He shifted his eyes slightly to look at the crow in the window. It looked so small… The moment the thought crossed his mind Arathan seemed to look straight at him. The crow grew to fill his vision. It was the same feeling he had when he was a dragon looking into the true face of Tamara -- right before she cut his head clean off -- death!

“Why?”

If you die, your soul space collapses. The soul space is the only place where a soul shape can --

The crow hesitated and looked confused for the first time. It tilted its head and stared at Tamara. The longer it stared the more baffled it seemed to become, as if wrestling with a sudden disquieting thought.

Tamara. If Rush can eat aura--

“What Arathan is telling you is that a soul shape subsists off the mana provided from soul space. You gain mana from creatures around you that die, things you eat, even the atmosphere of a world. You have a circulatory system that a soul shape does not. If you die, the space where the soul shape lives collapses and it will eventually starve to death,” Tamara smoothly interrupted Arathan.

The crow turned away from them as if in deep thought.

“What is soul space?” Ruth asked, growing more confused by the second.

“You are soul space,” Tamara grinned. “What separates thinking creatures who can use mana from every other thing in the universe is a soul. Now, if you were to cut up all those creatures and place them side by side, do you know what you would discover?”

“Someone has done such a thing?” Ruth was horrified.

“What?” Tamara blinked and then looked the slightest bit irritated at being interrupted.

“No. But if you did, you’d find that creatures aren’t that dissimilar to one another. Organs for breathing or moving blood. Of course, there are exceptions. Plant and rock creatures don’t have those organs but they do have similar functioning systems. I’m not going to even get into the biology lesson you’d need to describe all the different ways creatures can be similar to one another on a species level. It’s unimportant. However, you look for something in particular and you’ll be scratching your head every time. Do you know what is missing? Anything to do with soul space.”

Ruth was beginning to think that Tamara was right. He was too stupid to understand.

“You can’t find anything, no organ, no grey matter, no rock, no gland, no cell, no plant, animal, mineral -- nothing to do with soul space. If you are just looking at corpses, there is no way to tell which one has a soul space and which one does not.”

“Can you look while they are alive?” Ruth asked, trying to follow along.

“...don’t hurt yourself thinking,” Tamara finally said. “If they were living you could just ask them.”

“No, I mean, could you see if they had some organ or whatever you’re talking about while they are alive? Maybe it disappears when they die!” Ruth was feeling quite smart.

“Goodness I feel dumber with every word you speak,” Tamara grimaced.

Ruth tried to electrocute her again and found that his power was still sealed.

“No,” Tamara said slowly with deliberate pacing. “If you looked at them while they were alive you wouldn’t find anything either. Therefore, soul space, or the soul, in this case, exists… say it with me now…”

“...in…” Ruth tried to draw it out and guess what she would say but ended up frustrated because she just waited for him. Finally, he was forced to ask, “...okay, where?”

“Somewhere else!” Tamara laughed. “It exists somewhere independent of the body.”

“My soul is elsewhere?” Ruth blinked rapidly.

“Funny thing. We call it the Elsewhere most of the time,” Tamara looked back up at Arathan and smiled. “It is a place your soul shape is born. They are born of your soul and are inextricably tied to it. They are the protectors of your soul space. Elsewhere is vast Ruth, far larger than you can possibly imagine. That doesn’t mean your enemies couldn’t find it with sufficient motivation. For instance, I can find your soul space at will because of the chain you put on it.”

“Chain?” Ruth had just been getting used to the fact that his soul was housed in a place he didn’t know how to get to when the idea that enemies could find his soul if they wanted to find it. That didn’t seem good. Chains were getting off-topic to that point, and he was about to steer the conversation back toward the idea that someone could fucking destroy his soul when Tamara continued.

“Yes, at some point you asked me to just decide things for you. When you have a soul space there are certain responsibilities you take on. For instance, if you swear to someone else who has a soul space, or say something with sufficient emotion or conviction, the universe, for lack of a better word, takes that very seriously. It puts a chain on your soul. I can find you with that chain because we are bound.”

“Oh.” Ruth was starting to feel like maybe his life was even worse than he had thought.

He used to be a dragon, and now he was not. He had finally got some semblance of power and started to bully the creatures around him until Tamara came and showed him he wasn’t such hot shit. He found out he had a soul space and a soul shape, rare and powerful occurrences, and now he found out that Tamara knew where his soul lived -- so to speak.

“If someone were to be looking at you, they could also send their soul shape to try and investigate where your soul space would be. If their soul shape were more powerful than yours, they might succeed. It’d take more for them to assault your soul space. Rush would have a lot of advantages on his home turf. In many cases, your enemies will simply try to establish your soul space location so they can keep track of you and spy on you,” Tamara paused slightly, her eyes narrowing. “I wouldn’t worry a whole lot about people trying to invade your soul space. Rush is special, and anyone that wasn’t a demi-god or higher would really be cursing themselves for kicking that metal plate.”

“I don’t understand why anyone would want to ‘kick that plate’,” Ruth muttered.

“Because you’re my chosen,” Tamara said simply.

“What does that mean?” Ruth demanded.

“You are the rock.”

“Could you be any more vague?”

“Okay! How about, you will experience a great change in your time…”

“... I was a fucking dragon and now I’m not!”

“At least you got it out of the way early?”

IDT

Planar Tiefling: Ruth (Level 13) (Baby Ruth/Lord Rush) (Lightning Specialized)

5 of 5 spell slots

Mana: 20/20

★Lightning Ward: 50%

★Lightning Chain: 50%

★Lightning Wings: 0%