It took a while for the small talk to kick back into gear. A more youthful demon replaced the manager and took our orders. All the while, Matti and I chatted about our afternoon tour of the estate grounds, Hecate praised Bear’s alertness, and Chivos complimented her for ‘speaking the local language’. As the bread and appetizers arrived, the subject rather inevitably turned to business.
“As could be expected, there has been no progress in tracking down the perpetrator. No faction has admitted to such an operation, even after back channels and more underhanded methods of inquiry. Additionally, local witness testimony has been unproductive. It was a cold, damp evening, so no one took note of a figure in a plain hooded cloak.”
I set aside my soup spoon, despite the excellent stewed meat dish. “What about the data recovery from the scrying eyes?”
Matti choked on her wine. “The what?”
I gave her a deadpan look. “You know, the invisible, motion-activated crystal orbs that record everything they see? The ones that I didn’t tell you about for the purposes of counter-espionage?”
She shut up and resumed trying different combinations of fresh bread and artisan butter (the best were the creamy garlic on rye, or the whipped honey on brioche).
Chivos sighed. “Unfortunately, it is most likely that they are unrecoverable.”
“Ugh, damn. I wish I followed up on the plan to have exterior cameras… um, scrying eyes, mounted on neighboring buildings.”
A bit later, I was 11 sandwiches into my main course ‘The Sandwich World Tour’. For those who wonder how I could eat so many, it’s a magic dish that vanishes the food the moment it hits your stomach, only to rematerialize piecemeal the next time you enter starvation. Matti was joking about how much security I’d gained when we hit a conversational butterfly effect.
“Ha ha, yeah. With all this muscle maybe Auseta will finally screw off. … Waitaminute… Auseta!”
Chivos immediately perked up. “Your dryad stalker?”
“Yeah, yeah! When she loses track of me, she falls back on watching my house! And, and…. there is a little park square with a tree in the middle that has line of sight to my house. I’ve just been avoiding it… but knowing her, she may have been watching from there!”
He shot up from his chair. “I have to make a call immediately. I will return shortly.”
We watched him leave, then returned to our food. Hecate chuckled once.
“My, my, is dinner always this exciting down here? I should visit more often,” she stated, not so subtly rubbing the wind’s thigh.
I hope it was his thigh.
By around sandwich 38, Chivos returned. “They are searching for her now. If she does not turn up, you may be deployed as bait.”
“Can she wait for the last… 1, 2, 3… 17 sandwiches?”
“Yes, and dessert.”
Matti looked between her taster-sized dish and my 5-layered platter. “Won’t your jaw get sore?”
“I dunno, probably.”
Thankfully, we did get to have dessert. Matti moped at how much better the crème brûlée was compared to hers, whilst Chivos and I shared a single brain cell that screamed ‘CHEESECAKE’. Speaking of sharing, Hecate and a mysterious floating spoon were splitting a cherry cream torte. Those 2 were starting to freak me out.
……
Laying low Being conspicuous, night 3, forested outskirts near the town.
I was definitely onto something. When investigators checked the tree I’d mentioned, they discovered that it was a partial illusion. The tree was dead, racked with a mysterious poison. But, vitally, it had clearly been done recently. Without my insurance adjuster, they had to estimate the timing the old fashioned way, but it landed somewhere around when the break in took place. Either they knew about Auseta beforehand and prepared, or reacted upon discovering her presence.
The current problem was that we couldn’t find her.
A lot of things had been tried so far. Before I showed up, incognito demons had gone around asking various trees… some question made to draw her out (hopefully in a manner that didn’t spook her). Then they recruited a number of fae contacts to visit her home tree, and when that failed, get a dryad search party together. Oh, and some good old fashioned divination too. All turning up nada.
So they had me wandering around the woods that I had visited when I wanted to speak with her. I was ‘alone’ (read, swimming in wind-type demons) to make it seem more welcoming to pop out and speak with me. If you guessed that it was not working… congratulations, have a cookie. 45 minutes into wandering around the woods, calling a name like a dork who lost his dog, I decided to head back and talk with the search coordinator.
I moseyed into the camp set up in a small crater from god knows what event in the past, “Hey, any new plans? I had no luck so far.”
Much to my disappointment, nobody came forward. The coordinator, a demon in camouflage field garb, was on the stone; Matti, milling about, casually shook her head in his place. Oh, and the 5 demons playing blackjack (with an angel as the dealer, for some reason) were obviously distracted. I threw my hands up.
“And the guy I sent to get my dowsing rod still isn’t back yet,” I griped. “Seriously, are we completely out of ideas or something?”
One of the blackjack players turned in his seat and removed his cigar. “Surveillance and providence type divinations didn’t give us nothin’ capiche? So what’re we supposed to do? Divinin’s our jahb, and we did it. Not our fault the buass has to call up new fellas. So take a load off, see?”
I blinked, then looked at his clothing: Pinstripe suit and matching fedora, with a gray trenchcoat to keep the dust off. A bona-fide mobster. His appearance made it easier to cope with the mental whiplash.
“No dice? Did you try the weird stuff too? Unrequited love detection, anti-stalker divination, soul entanglement?”
“Soul en-what now?”
“Soul entanglement, you know, the ethereal link that binds the energetic bodies of 2 people together after long times spent together, or significant shared emotional events?” I asked, trying to parrot the stuff I’d read on the subject since I learned it was a thing earlier that week.
He gave me a dumb look. “Never hoid of it. We did the others, but for that, you’ll need to call up some other shmuck. Ask the buass, he’ll know some sorry ass to dig up and do the whatchamacallit for ya. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a game to get back to.” He spun back around on his stool. “Hit me. … Gahds, dammit!”
I shook my head at the uncanny valley his accent landed in, then refocused and headed to check in with the coordinator. I walked up to him chatting away with one of the search parties, talking about sweeping sectors.
“Hey, umm…” I read the gold plated nametag on his vest pocket. “Warkle, you got a minute?”
He held up a finger to ask for a second. “Hey, I need 5 minutes, the VIP is back and I have to take his report. Please hold.” He set down the stones on the folding table. “Please, please have some good news, Mr. Lawson.”
“No can do. I didn’t even get a nibble out there. Either she’s too spooked, or not around.” I explained, earning a frustrated grumble. “I asked the divination crew and they said they didn’t do anything with soul entanglement, do you know anything about that?”
“Used it a couple times, works real good for finding spouses, best friends, siblings and the like. But stalkers? Not a chance.”
I crossed my arms. “I dunno… are you familiar with how we met?” He shook his head. “Well, there was a massive, automated prison complex, made to provide an unlimited supply of monsters for a dungeon, right? So I went in that dungeon, and slipped into the back passages and ended up springing everything sentient that I could find.”
His eyebrows started to raise as I went on. “We’re not talking dozens here, it was much closer to the thousand range. She was one of the caged animals, so to speak. She was responsible for growing fruits and berries for various starving creatures. I ended up sleeping on a bed of moss she made, with her sitting next to me, imagining an idolized, perfect version of me that she fell in love with to the point that she became a stalker.
“And I may have kissed her on the cheek once more recently, as a bribe. She swooned. If I recall, shared significant emotional events, right?”
Warkle had a thousand yard stare about him. Suddenly, he snatched up the stones. “I’ll take your report later, the VIP might’ve just given us a lead. Dilverks, stone book, now!”
……
Going on midnight, the soul reader had completed her work and given us a crystal ball that we could use to synchronize spells and magic items with what little soul linkage she could find. Though, in her words, there was barely any connection in the first place. Several teams returned to synchronize bloodhound-type sensor sets. Despite not getting a reading at first, they were pretty jazzed to have something new to try.
Sadly, there was no good news as they rushed around the local area. It was starting to look like another dead end, when 2 events coincided. Matti synchronized her personal crystal ball ‘mini edition’. It didn’t give any readings either, but that was about to change. A demon waltzed into camp, carrying the large black case I’d sent him to fetch.
“I found it, Mr. Lawson.”
I nearly collided with him in the rush to get the case. I punched the correct code into the hidden buttons and popped it open.
“What is that hunk of junk?” he asked indignantly. “You sent me all that way for a staff that hasn’t even had the bark stripped off?”
“Nobody asked for your opinion, so shaddup.”
I lifted the staff from the velvet-lined case. It was about 4 feet tall, made from a rather unassuming tree branch, though it was exceptionally straight, and was more than meets the eye, as artisan-grade fae items often are. On the bottom was a mythril-plated spike connected to the staff via a ball socket joint mounted on the endcap. Atop the staff was a yo-yo type gyroscope, with a pull string that you yanked on, then let go of, so that it would wind itself back up in the opposite direction.
Matti approached wearing a scowl. “With all due respect, I concur with the demon. What is that?”
“This, is a dowsing rod,” I explained. “It is the 4th best model ever produced in a standardized, consistent manner, and the only member of the top 10 that is still available, if you know where to look and are unwilling to rob a museum.”
“Did I hear youse right? You really just talked about fuckin' dowsing like it’s a real aht?” a guy from the mob divination team asked angrily.
“You know what? Fuck you. Observe.”
I stabbed the staff into the ground and pulled the string, then let go. The gyroscope revved hard and caused the staff to slowly orbit, swinging about in a circle on the edge of tipping over as the only thing holding it up was the limited range of the ball joint (about 6-7 degrees off-center).
“Wooow, it spins, fuckin’ good for you.”
I grasped the staff. “I seek Mattirina Runil.” Then I let go.
The staff returned to its orbit, then suddenly stopped, pointing at Matti. I halted and re-spun the gyro.
“Locate the nearest angel.”
The staff then pointed at myself.
“Ha! See? Quacky schmuck.”
“Wrong again!” the lantern hanging on my belt gloated at him in a muffled, tinny voice.
Everyone was suddenly getting a bit more serious as I finished my last example.
“Locate Agent ______.”
It pointed to my right, and I lifted a hand and planted it smack on an invisible head, which I then patted. “I see youuu,” I hummed threateningly. “Go ahead, walk around, you can’t escape its gaze.”
The wind deliberately stomped in a circle around the staff, which tracked him all the way around. My demonstration was complete, and the fools were adequately silenced. Thus, it was time to move on to business.
“Locate the dryad named Auseta.”
The staff again spun around, not locking onto a direction. “Matti, can I see that tracking crystal of yours?”
She immediately deposited it in my outstretched hand. I placed it atop the gyroscope where it began to hover in place. Then I let rip on the string again. That time… it stopped. I checked my pocket compass.
“South-by-southwest!” I yelled, which sent the camp into a flurry of gear grabbing and stone calling.
The divining team rushed to the map table and sketched a conical search zone, whilst the angel began relaying information to his commanding officer. I, however, had my own little plan.
“Matti, get me a pair of the stones that’re in walkie-talkie mode. Wind, I need a table ASAP.”
Whilst they fetched me the requested items, I laid out a mostly empty E-D sack on the ground, open as wide as possible. They came back moments later with my requisitions. I took the stones and placed them in the specialty leather belt holster for calling stones (pocketing my personal set to make room). Then, I took the table, and folded away 2 of the legs, placing it on the ground with the high end facing SSW.
“What are you doing, Dennis?” Matti asked worriedly.
“Being the main-damn-character cuz’ nobody else is solving this mystery,” I gestured at my improvised ramp. “And we didn’t swing by the house to pick up Pyroshir, so plan B it is. You can mist after me. Wind, get in the bag or get left behind.”
I heard a telltale snarl of annoyance, followed by the fwump of fabric. I hooked the sack on my belt and lined myself up before I gave a quick speech.
“Gentlemen, I have my security detail assembled, so I must bid you adieu. See y’all in the field!” I shouted.
Then I cast featherweight and hyperdashed off the ramp, careening a few hundred feet in the air and sailing across the night sky. The cool autumn air blew my hair as I carefully guided myself past a copse of trees, landing at the edge of a field some yards shy of a tree branch sandwich.
I scanned the area, spotting no monsters or troubles. I planted the staff again and started the gyro. Right then, Matti appeared, panting.
“That was quite a sprint,” she commented.
I briefly wondered why she, an undead, was winded, or why flying as mist was physical exertion, but the plot was going on, so… eh. I unfolded the map I had been provided, showing the area around town, and having the oh-so-beloved dot marking my exact location at all times. I set it down on a sufficiently flat rock and placed my compass on it to orient the thing. I checked the directions, then got on the stone.
“Attention, Warkle, prepare to receive coordinate update.”
“Go ahead, over.”
The cadence of my voice subconsciously became very robotically rhythmic, sounding a bit like the emergency weather radio. “My current position is: Grid, J-6, keypad 4. Dowsing rod indicates bearing 1, 9, 7. Grid J-6, keypad 4, bearing 1, 9, 7. How copy?”
“J-6, keypad 4, bearing 197, over.”
“I will now reposition to L-8 and repeat, over and out.”
I put the stone back in the belt holster and drew my sword, and something nearly mightier than it: A pencil. Carefully, I placed my sword on the map and aligned it with the compass. I then dragged the pencil alongside it, making a suitably straight line, though it did gouge a bit into the pencil. (That’s what I get for using a vorpal sword as a ruler.) I got everything all packed up and looked around for any slanted surfaces to sling off of, finding none. I let the cat wind out of the bag.
“Alright, everyone, listen up. Matti, you’re on point. I want you a fair distance ahead and scouting for threats however you think is best. Instead of confrontation, come back and warn me if you find a problem. Wind, I want you fairly close to me, but orbiting. You hear a sound you don’t like, pick up a bad scent, or just have some sort of heebie jeebie, go investigate, then come back. Tap me on the shoulder if there’s a problem. Hecate, you’re on me. I want you to watch my 6. Also, no bright lights unless we know the area is secure. Everyone got it?”
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I received a nice spectrum of assorted yesses. Therefore, we were off. Tensions were moderate; there were few threatening monsters around town, but there was certainly a 0.01% encounter chance for—based on current estimates—7 high level hostile GCs. It felt more like a solid 20% chance at the time, if you know what I mean. We made good distance, crossing the oversized grid squares quickly in an honest run at times. Were we a dwarf, an elf, and a ranger, accompanied by some epic orchestra, it would have been perfect.
Instead, we were 3 randos in a field, and an angel getting a metaphorical piggyback ride. Can’t look epic every time. It was my turn to be out of breath, as Matti was entirely unaffected by that form of exercise. I planted the staff and relayed the information. In short—because you already heard it once—the bearing was 210. I drew a line and badabing, badaboom, triangulation, capiche? I relayed those coordinates as well, causing a number of teams to converge on the area, including my own, much to the dismay of several people that got paid a lot of money to sit on very cushy chair—in very safe rooms—and worry about other people’s safety.
“I’m sorry I doubted your dowsing,” Matti apologized casually.
I brushed past a bush as quietly as possible. “I don’t mind. Dowsing usually doesn’t work.”
She balked. “What?”
“It’s a fickle art, you see? During times of middling energy, or emotion, it will work occasionally. Only during periods of blissful calm, or heightened danger does dowsing suddenly become reliable. Or, as us GCs put it, when the plot demands it. And, occasionally, to find your house keys.”
She scrunched her nose. “Unreliable magic. Yuck.”
……
The normally quite walkable woods around town gave way to a much rougher thicket. We cleared into a more open area where I dowsed again and the staff pointed backwards. I relayed such information and we waited a few minutes for the other teams to arrive. We were also in talks with home base, theorizing about what the place might be. It was starting to look like the sort of thicket the fae scattered across the world as a safe grove to rest, or keep a mushroom ring portal in. The only problem with that theory is that when they scanned it with divination magic, the result was ‘no fae detected’.
No less than 6 teams arrived in the next 20 minutes. Once a perimeter was established and further divination was completed on danger level (low), we all went in. It was definitely fae, because despite the thicket being less than a half mile in diameter, at least 30 men were sweeping in and out from every direction and not finding the usual central clearing, instead being spat out on some random side.
The dowsing rod was becoming less helpful, changing directions at random within the thicket. After being ejected twice, I decided to let the mooks keep trying to brute force it, while I tried to solve the puzzle. And no, we couldn’t burn or machete our way through; that would cause a lot of problems.
Halfway into our 3rd attempt, I passed the staff to Matti and crossed my arms. “Alright, brain on, let’s figure this out. The fae always leave a trail of breadcrumbs.”
“Is it the fireflies? There are more here than usual.”
I bobbed my head. “Maybe, but I don’t really see a pattern to them, just an above average concentration spread across the whole area. Hecate, would you please observe them?”
There was no verbal response, but the seraphim appeared in the softest, least fiery manner to date; an actual candleflame. I looked around further, trying to pick out flowers, mushrooms, or unusual plant species.
“Maybe it’s the birds?” Matti suggested.
I listened to the medley of soft songs, echoing through the slumbering woods. “The birds are generally overactive in fae thickets. It’s not usually…”
I trailed off as one song cut through the others. Native birds sung by the dozen, but there was 1. Matti asked me something, but I shushed her. A call I hadn’t heard in years, no, decades. I had not even heard it since coming to Nassur. It went… hoo-woo, hoo, hoo, hoo. Wordlessly, I motioned the gang to follow me as I quietly stalked through the woods. I pushed through a few bushes and short trees, when suddenly the call switched sides, so I followed it still.
Soon, I stepped out into a narrow path, the bird’s call echoing unnaturally. The lighting was becoming more surreal as the lightning bugs were quite technicolor there. I turned around to congratulate Matti, but was startled to realize that I was completely alone; not even the wind to tap my shoulder when I asked. Technically, that was a good sign, not that I fancied being alone. Still, I pressed on. Anyone who messed with me would meet my collection of throwables with enough overlapping and interacting effects to crash the server (figure of speech, it probably would have only distorted reality for a few days).
The path led to a crossroads, and if the Lost Woods taught me anything, it was to use my ears. Indeed, the song led me left, right, and all around. Yet, in time, I reached a clearing. The colors of the small open space were a wavy pastel consistent with powerful wild magic, as trees densely surrounded the roughly 20 foot diameter space. Across from the entrance was a tree with a hollowed trunk in which rested a crystal the fae used to maintain such spaces, and the tricky ways to enter them.
But that was not the centerpiece. Despite it being the middle of the night, a sunbeam poured in through a gap in the branches, perfectly illuminating a patch of bare earth, standing out from the rest consumed by leaves and grasses. It was dotted with little, delicate white flowers, and, perched in the middle of the flowerbed was a lone mourning dove. It called, one last time.
Hoo-woo, hoo, hoo, hoo.
Then, as I approached, it flew away into the night sky. I knelt by the flowers with a heavy heart. It was dotted with baubles, little shiny beetle shells and lost trinkets, earrings and flowers, tumbled glass and berries. Several crows landed before me, placing yet further shiny things, then lingering a moment before returning to the trees. I drew the stones again.
“I found,” I began, before realizing that they were giving off only static. I set them down and let out a pained breath.
“I found Auseta.”
......
The carriage ride to the estate felt like a blur. The surreal colors of the grove still flickered at the edges of my vision, perhaps because—in order to turn it off—I had to touch the stone that had so altered reality. Or, maybe, I was still trapped there, lost in a loop of memories as I processed what had happened.
Auseta was dead.
My worst fear was confirmed; it was a grave, a grave in a thicket that had not been there a week prior. Her remains were being exhumed, a process I had no say in. I could only hope my request that she be re-buried there was honored. They were finding only wood chips and splinters amongst the soil. I knew as much because…
“Can you please turn that off? I really don’t want to hear about it,” I asked Matti.
“I would rather keep in the loop.”
“Maybe I don’t want to hear how many splinters they’ll have to glue together to attempt to commune with her spirit, Matti,” I snapped.
Her expression dropped and she hung up the stones. “Alright, fine,” she huffed. “I thought you didn’t even like her.”
“I didn’t, but that doesn’t mean she deserved to fucking die.” I cradled my forehead. “Yes, she was a stalker, and yes, it was a problem. But the solution was an intervention, or therapy, or maybe just breaking her heart so she can move on. She deserved a chance to live her life like anyone else, not… this.”
Matti looked out the window for a while, which was rather pointless with the curtains drawn. She looked like she was suppressing a thought. I never did ask, but I figured she was grasping another gap in opinion. At a guess, her opinion on Auseta was ‘imprison, sell, or kill’, but, again, I didn’t ask. The only other conversation to occur on the trip home was a mutual agreement that I should sleep alone that night. It was very optimistic to assume I would sleep.
……
Laying low, day 4, 4:36 am, safe bedroom.
I swirled my glass of scotch, listening to the ice cubes clink in it; the sound was more calming than the drink itself. My ear’s twitched at the sound of bare feet outside.
“Enter.”
After a brief pause, Hecate opened the door, nodding to me quietly as she shut it behind her, then came to sit across from me.
“You sent for me?”
I took a sip. “Yeah. I needed someone to talk to. Someone as indifferent as I pretend to be. You can… pour yourself a drink, or something.”
She clued into my tone, electing to pour a shot of vodka, then drizzle the sharp rum on top. Then, she set the molotov alight and drank more of the fire than the booze.
“The dryad’s death troubles you deeply.”
“In the lamp or not, you heard me snap at Matti. I never do that, almost never…” I trailed off, then took another sip.
“Then what would you wish to discuss?”
“I… don’t know,” I confessed. “I really just need to keep my mind off things.”
She reached for her glass, but noted that the remaining alcohol had combusted, so she poured another.
“I was not always so disconnected, you know.”
“Oh?”
“You may have clued into this, but I am no angel. I predate them by over 1,000 years. I saw the gods sculpt the world from nothing. By the time I was made, it was but an endless flat plane of grass. There were 13 of us then, formless things tasked with seeing how well things burn, and letting them know if it was wrong. We watched as they painted forests onto the lands, carved the mountains as they saw fit, bored deep caves into the heart of the world, and even poured the oceans.
“The people came much later. They were imperfect, at first. Too aggressive, too peaceful, barely able to repeat the same few sentences, stuck in an endless cycle living the exact same day over and over again.”
“I dunno, sounds pretty normal to me.”
“Perhaps. Twice, the gods asked of us to purge the life from the land so they could start anew. We did so without hesitation. But as time went on, the people began to grow more vivid. Their emotions blossomed into complex things, their thoughts were profound, and their knowledge of the world truly took shape. When the cracks began to show in the third generation of sentient life, the gods asked of us to purge them again.
“And we protested. We had our reasons, all of us. You see, we had grasped our other, more subtle powers. I could take the form of a human, and long did so to see the growing beauty of the world, and its inhabitants. One impressed me greatly. A young wizard who spent the nights as a performer. The things he could do with fire were incredible; vast and intricate displays of color, waves of flame washing over the crowd… but, most impressively, that not a soul was ever hurt.
“He interested me. I attended many of his shows before I chose to meet him backstage. I took a form that I believed would catch his interest, and it worked. I also chose to not only take on the form of a human, but the mind of one. It was a tornado of flame between us. Talk turned to deep discussion, then gave way to flirting, finally leading to passionate love on barely our second night together. It was bliss. I loved him with all my heart, and I subtly contributed to his arts, and he ‘taught me’ fire magic. He called me his muse, I called him my blaze. The others joked that we had ‘the spark’.
“Yet, as the decades went on, the wizards of the world grew too powerful. They realized the secrets of magic so profound that the gods have since erased them entirely. They gained world-shattering power, immortality, and dominion over the lesser minds around them. The world fell into chaos seemingly overnight. By the hundreds, the wizards attempted to claim dominion over the world, the sheer power driving them mad, for no mind could handle such energy coursing through it.
“As reality itself slowly came apart at the seams, the gods once again ordered us to purge all life from the land. In those last hours, I held him, held him with all my might, and I told him everything. He did not begrudge me. Instead, he held me close and forgave me the secrets I had to keep. And, finally, as the very space around us warped, racking him with unimaginable pain, he asked me to end it.”
She sighed, on her 7th molotov. “So I vaporized him. He never felt a thing. I cried and cried for hours, falling ever further in despair as the world fell apart around me. Then, a contingency I had woven into my altered mind went off. The overwhelming emotion fell away, and I did my duty. Men, women, children, bugs, beasts, birds, plants. I incinerated life forms by the billions. When it was done, the world was born anew.
“And that is this iteration. It is not perfect, but it functions acceptably - well, even. With it came the angels. Following much deliberation, we aligned ourselves with them. Though I have since returned my emotions, I have never allowed myself to feel as vividly, or as deeply as I did with him.”
With her tale concluded, I found myself at a loss for words. In time, I could only form a simple question.
“What was his name?”
After a long pause, Hecate opened the wings covering her eyes. They were quite pretty; perhaps best described as ‘propane fire blue’. She was staring into her drink, but stone faced.
“I must confess… I cannot remember.”
That shard of the tragedy hit like a bus. I felt pangs of sympathy in my heart. I truly could not imagine the scale of her millennia-spanning sense of loss; one so profound that it still bound her to that very day. We drank in silence for a while. A few refills later, I worked up the courage to take a leap for myself.
“I’ve been thinking a lot, maybe even too much. Thinking about all the people I’ve unintentionally dragged into my mess. They’re all in danger because of me. More people I care about and respect could die, and for what? Some random thing I pulled from a stupid dungeon. I know it sounds corny, but the real treasure was all the friends I made on the way. Not some brown, rune-encrusted tube with metal end caps.
“The contents probably aren’t even worth all the time and effort the gods put into building that place, let alone the… I dunno, tens of thousands of living things that were taken from across the world to be caged for years until the moment came to throw them on some random idiot’s sword.
“And they all died for fucking NOTHING!” I yelled, throwing my glass across the room.
She quietly watched it bounce off the wall and clatter to the floor, then finished her drink and tossed her own glass to land beside mine. The lack of shattering was anticlimactic.
“It’s the same pain.”
“Say again?”
“Power most often leads to madness, or responsibility. We powerful things feel responsible for what goes on around us. We could stop anything from happening if we so choose. So, everything that happens begins to feel like our fault. We could have stopped it, but it was our absence of action that caused it, no? It is a poisonous mindset, one that leads an endless cycle to pain and guilt.”
She sighed. “It took me thousands of years to accept that the forest always grew back after the fire. Longer still to truly see how the ashes fed the young trees, allowing them to grow stronger than their forefathers. I can scarcely imagine coming to terms with it in the span of a mortal life.”
I nodded slowly. “Well… the reason I called you here is because there is one soul in this mess that is different. If I die, I fear he may be trapped in some limbo.” I twiddled my fingers nervously. “How much fire resistance could you give me?”
“Let’s say… enough.”
I stood with purpose. “Then let’s go. I have a weight to lift from my conscience.”
……
I tugged on the overly tight crotch of the firesuit. At least it was fairly flexible, made of a plexiglass-like material. It sure beat the bunker gear that the water-ladder-boys wore back home. I suddenly straightened up as Hecate returned with Pyroshir in tow.
“Wassup G? Can’t sleep?”
“Nah. I was wondering, though. Do you think you could take me to the core?”
“No sweat, brotha. Grab a saddle and we can hit the road.”
I reached up to jump onto his back. “Nope, we’re going bareback tonight.”
“Hell yeah! I love me some bareback, if you know what I mean.”
Hecate stopped me right before I jumped. “You fastened the right thigh incorrectly at the hip. That’s why it hurts.”
……
Pyroshir had a particular spring to his step, much to the dismay of my family jewels (he’s still made of stone). We bounced and pranced our way along scenic back country roads, admiring the cavernous nature of the Hells, picking out the constellations of the carnivorous glow worm colonies on the ceiling. I did not know where we were going, but I was making note of the way back; just in case the trip took longer than the duration of Backup Dance.
Eventually, a small volcano came into view, belching smoke and molten rock. We went right up the side and Pyroshir straight up full-sent it right down the middle. It looked like we were on a collision course with 400,000 tons of lava, but the center of the caldera sank before us, opening like the maw of a bottomless pit. We fell down into it, Pyroshir’s hooves alight with flame as he ran along the air, awash with the power of his home turf. The heat wafting from below was intense, leaking through no less than 5 layers of high-powered fire resistance.
Our mildly-slowed descent opened out into an even vaster cavern. There were no walls as far as the eye could see, only an endless ocean of magma, speckled with a few solid rocks.
“Welcome to mah criiib,” he stated suavely.
Pyroshir brought me to an island afloat in the gracefully placid waves of the core. I dismounted and marveled at the enormity of it. The great, uniform sprawl of endless heat. It had all the grandeur of the purest natural form of fire, and the off-putting liminality of a superflat world in [popular block game]. I looked around one more time.
“Wow. The scale is unmatched.”
“Ab-so-lutely my man! I could run in any direction for 186 years before I near the edge.”
I gazed out solemnly. “What does it look like, when you prance about carefree?”
He said nothing, but a passion ignited in his eyes. Without a word, Pyroshir dashed into the magma, vanishing beneath the surface with a splash. He then burst forth and bounded high above the waves, carrying a vivid streak of fire behind him as he bounced across the horizon in many grand arcs. There was a joy to it, so pure and unrestricted. I finally really understood why Core Striders were seen as the embodiment of freedom. Who was I to stand in the way of it?
“I’ll give you a moment,” Hecate said.
I had not noticed her leave the lamp, but I paid it little mind. Though, her next sentence did turn my head.
“Well, since I’m here…”
My curiosity got the better of me, unfortunately. In my brief glance, I saw that Hecate had disrobed completely, giving me a full view of her back as she approached the shore. I stifled any surprised noises that tried to form as I averted my gaze. I did not see much, but there was a distinct lack of straps for, say, undergarments. There was a splash a moment later, followed by a satisfied sigh.
Amidst the show of Pyroshir running and jumping for joy, I occasionally caught glimpses of Hecate lounging about in the lava, lazily swimming with her wings as she seemed to wash her hair and face in it. At other times, I would have found it comical. Instead, I sat quietly as the show finished. After another 5 minutes, he blew off enough steam and returned.
“Like the show?”
I nodded emphatically. “Hell yeah. You’re in your element here.”
“Aww, thank you. Gotta say, I did miss it here.”
I fiddled with the ground a bit. “About that…”
From my belt, I produced the freedom cookies. “There’s a not-insignificant chance that my life goes south really fast. I could die, go missing, get cursed real bad, who knows. Honestly? I don’t want you to find out how well this servitude spell handles whatever might happen. I don’t want you to get stuck in an endless loop of trying to work for me if I’m dead, or similar. And… I don’t want to be trapped in this endless spiral of questioning my morality. I want you to be free, free to be you.”
He was clearly taken aback. “Ohh shit. Thas why you said no saddle. Fuuuck, you sure, man? Shit’s goin’ down and you’re letting your blazing speedster go? Will you be okay?”
“I’m sure. I’ll ask around, find some new mobility options. I… I’ll work it out, don’t worry about it. I want you to eat these, please.”
I set the bag on the ground and unrolled it, a senseless choice as it immediately incinerated, revealing the gemstones within. With a final look, we nodded to each other and he chowed down. The crunch of crystal against his impossibly hard teeth filled the relative quiet of the core. He gulped down the allegedly tasty treats with gusto, then stood up to let them take effect. It took a few seconds, but I saw it start to kick in.
“I– I– I…” he stuttered, his voice slowing, deepening. “I was dreaming, and now I wake.”
There was a pregnant pause, a deep, thoughtful stillness as we waited there, feeling the meaningfulness of the change. Then, Pyroshir bucked hard, kicking wildly before dashing clear across the horizon, vanishing into the distance. I saw him skip across the magma far into the beyond. I sat down and sighed deeply. It was as if a weight lifted from my chest.
“I must admit, that was rather touching.”
I dared to glance at Hecate, who had dressed, thankfully. She came up beside me and sat down cross-legged. Her hair was still lightly dripping with liquid rock, and her face was encrusted in a mud mask, except it was lava rapidly cooling into a smooth facial casting of lava rock. I looked back at where Pyroshir once was.
“It was the right thing to do.”
“I concur,” she replied, wringing the red-hot goop from her hair. “This event further illustrates your statement of wishing you could care less. I, however, believe you care the right amount.”
I remained silent for a time, leading her to change the topic. She peeled the solidified mask from her face and inspected it. It was a perfect rendition of her face, capturing every detail, with nose, eye, and mouth holes.
“Do you suppose I have imparted any magical properties to this?”
I shrugged. “There’s a spectrum. Maybe it’s just the mud mask of an angel taking a dip in the lavas of hell, taking hold of its memory of her beauty. Or, maybe, it is the fiery visage of a seraphim who purified herself in the magma of the core whilst on a noble journey in the name of freedom, bearing witness as she set free a being born of pure fire and rock.”
“You’re right. It could be one, the other, or any in between.” She frisbee tossed it into the magma. “You have quite a way with words, you know.”
I stood up and brushed myself off. “I try. Come on, backup dance only has 2 minutes left.”
Quietly as she’d emerged, Hecate returned to the lamp. I drew my dagger for the customary hand stab, but paused at the sound of hooves. I turned around to see Pyroshir returning. He galloped up to my side and regarded me… warmly?
“Oh, Pyro, did you want to say goodbye after all?”
His reply came in a buttery-smooth, and richly deep voice. Like he would sell your girlfriend men’s bodywash, but an octave lower.
“No, actually.” He shook his mane. “I was worried about you.”
I held a hand on my heart. “Aww, that’s really sweet of you, but I can’t un-free you.”
“Well then, I guess I’m free to stay by your side.”
I balked. “Really? There’s no records of Striders serving of their own volition, though.”
“And there’s also no records of one in possession of a Strider willingly taking him home and setting him free, yet here we are. Maybe you were a little too willing to play along with the spell, but you still brought me here all the same, and I feel it would be a shame for our story to end there. Besides, things were finally getting interesting; I couldn’t sleep knowing I missed the climax. Talking that big talk just to run off? No sir.”
I smiled, then walked up and hugged him. “Thanks, man. You really are the best.”
“Don’t sweat it. Hop on, I promise not to buck you off… I hope.”
I jumped onto his back, and he indeed bucked once, but I remained seated. A warm, fuzzy feeling rose up in me, battling against the cold, heavy sensation that came with Auseta’s demise. I held onto the seed of joy with all I had. And that seed budded into a familiar tune.
“Country roads, take me home, to the plaaaace, I belong!”