The workers went back to work, which meant that I needed to clear out of the way again. With everything else going on, I just sat Ryan down on the cliff and switched back to my godly body--who, I guess, needed his own name, didn't he? Should I just call him Xethram, or was that too on the nose?

He had been sitting quietly inside, often watching Miana come in, use the meditation pad for a while, pace back and forth, or otherwise find ways to occupy herself physically while doing godly matters, and leave. With him not really being... useful, neither Miana nor I was paying that body much attention.

That left me with some extra questions. Alanna and Xenma had shown up in person to fight the necromancer, but the book of Ciel'ostra suggested that all of her bodies were people, canonically, with their own identities. Was I wrong, and the fight before had involved some kind of powerful spiritual illusion? Or was it something else? Was there really any need for me to show up in person as a god? It was helpful to have a second identity, but did I need that identity to be the god itself?

I paced and stretched as I thought that through. Alanna had insisted that I not indicate gods were real people; Erika had suggested there was a creep-cult following Alanna that would try to forcibly marry her if they knew she had a physical body. Xenma had no church and had shown up in storms to have sex, but also represented elemental violence and hatred and might have kept a large body around just to--

Wait, if he did have another body, what happened to it when I received his key? Both keys were in this body, but when I focused inside, there were no easy answers waiting, no second body hiding in a cave somewhere ready to pop out and say "It was me all along!" But after all the power that had gone into the creation of a godly body, I couldn't believe that it had just disappeared.

What... what about the version of him that had been in the Council chambers? He'd been "in" that body, but I'd received his soul, his Ashen Flame. Or had all that ash been other people? I wasn't eager to confront that thought, especially with war beating a path to my door, but the Book of Ciel'ostra had also said that eating an ashen ghost would pass their knowledge on to you.

I grabbed my head with both hands and squeezed. This body's mind was restless, I realized. This me had been stuck indoors doing nothing, while the other, the "real" me got to do what I wanted. Was that why I had created this body, to stand around and do nothing safely while "I" could be out in the real world having fun? This me--who was a real "me"--had spent weeks in a slimy cave, then again in a dry cave, and now even with Miana here and the builders and all else, he was still nobody, still stuck in a world that didn't need him, except to be a warm body filling a role.

It was a familiar feeling. I grit my teeth.

No. There was an almost manic edge to the thought, in this body. We can do this. The story makes more sense this way. Ryan found 'a god' in the wilderness--he found a priest in an abandoned temple. This is the real High Priest of Xethram; Ryan is just supposed to be a Vicar, if a fake one. But what message does he have? What message that is different enough from Ryan's that nobody will mistake the two of us as being the same?

Somehow, the answer came naturally, and a nasty, pained smile crossed my face. Why was there a hidden sanctuary in the middle of the wilderness? Because someone foresaw a need. If that was the play--if that was the pretend nature of this place--then the High Priest of Xethram... had to be a mad priest. Someone who thought he could see the future.

For me, though, even with divine magic and wish fulfillment, I didn't believe that the future could be seen. But perhaps I could take that logical part of myself and seal it into Ryan? Or at least bury it to let me keep up an act? I nodded to myself, a bit more energetically than I meant to. My role is to show people the coming future. And the future... the future is always death. How could it be otherwise?

But as I felt an odd rush going through my blood, a rush that spoke of getting to say things that felt good, getting to feel people react to me, getting to tell people things, I felt the Ryan part of me objecting. There were people coming that were fleeing from death; I needed a positive and welcoming message. I could rant about death to the Necromancer and the enemy army, when they showed up, but good people didn't deserve that kind of mistreatment. And... they would also be the ones staying, wouldn't they? A mad priest was not the right person to be leading these people into the future.

It would work if the mad priest was an old man, destined to be replaced by Ryan or Raine or Muir. But more than that, a mad priest would need to be ugly, twisted, a caricature. I could use the green flame to do that... but...

I frowned. This body had memories of being very kind and gentle to Miana, more than once, when I wasn't aware of it. It had also been touching on other godly matters, and although it was pained and hurting, it was also good and kind. It had to be; it was me, both as a living entity and also as a god. Was I really going to destroy all that good in order to create a mad priest? No. I took a deep breath. There was pain here, and I could use that pain, but that's not all he was. That wasn't all I was.

Pal'lud had been kind, too, while also being kind of a jerk. People in general, I guess, were contradictions. It's only in trying to create a fake person out of whole cloth that it's obvious just how nuanced a real person is. I smiled at the thought, but the smile didn't last. Could I be good to Miana and to my people, while still being a mad priest who had been alone in the wilderness awaiting some kind of prophesied day?

More to the point, if the day was prophesied by a god, why were we still doing such a lousy job of handling it?

I took a deep breath--one of many since I switched bodies--and let it out as a deep sigh. "Erika, my Lady," I muttered quietly, in Xethram's warm voice, "I doubt you're listening, but if you are, I admit I could use some advice."

I let a few heartbeats pass, expecting nothing, but suddenly, I caught a whiff of a familiar scent--ozone--and turned to find her there. She was sitting on my bed--again--stroking her tail with one hand, while the other had a tall glass of some kind of juice, one which fortunately did not smell alcoholic.

She raised her glass as though toasting me, and waited patiently.

In a way, her appearing was just another pain point. Did I need to be careful what I wished for, even when just whispering into the dark? But I shook that thought off quickly. "I find myself at a loss. For someone else it might be simple, but I... I don't know how to make this deception work." I pressed my lips into a line, unsure of whether any of this was supposed to make sense. "Each path forward in its own way seems like a terrible mistake waiting to happen, and I simply don't know how to proceed."

She nodded, taking slightly more than a sip, but said nothing.

I knew I was hoping against hope that she had some kind of really good advice, and just ended up rambling. "The worst of it is that it all hinges on a lie," I said. "Or many lies. I have never been good with lies, Lady, and I don't truly wish to be good with them. But between enemies and allies, there are many people to convince, as I am not sure I dare even try to fight them. And the enemy... the enemy will be here... soon, won't they?"

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

"Not really," she said after another sip. "I mean yes, the army is coming and there will be a pair of necromancers with them, but not the one that killed Lu'nella, the you're so rightly afraid of. She is still at the Temple of Blades, growing stronger while you fret and plan. You might have known that if you bothered to look."

I blinked. I had been... was still terrified to go sending my power out into the world. There was a kind of arrogance that was implied with that, a kind of nothing-can-go-wrong that was definitively proven wrong by the death of a powerful goddess. "Growing stronger?"

"You'll kick yourself if you reread Ciel'ostra's book." Erika made a slightly pouty face. "There is a facility in the temple that converts other kinds of soulflame into a more pure form. For Ciel'ostra, and indeed for most gods, that facility means very little."

"...because all the kinds of soulflame are useful except blackflame." The chill that ran through me went straight to my core.

"Oh, blackflame is useful, and so is bloodflame. But those are highly tainted with madness and are poisonous in the long term. I only got to see Lu'nella use the place once, because there was an enchantment that she wanted to make that was very sensitive. It's an impressive facility, a big room in the depths of the mountain with a lot of circles and crystals and exotic metals, and quite a light show when it is active. Luckily there are no records there of how to use the room, so the Necromancer can't just churn out clear flame even once she's found it--and she hasn't found it yet. But the existence of the facility serves another purpose, and that is to filter out bad flame that gets into the temple. She feels the death aura leaving her, and she is chasing the room down. I imagine she'll end up tearing up floors to find it. The pure flame produced just by cleaning the blackflame from the temple will be enough to spark her interest, though, I'm pretty sure."

"And you haven't told us this, why? Can't Miana stop it?"

"Sure. Once she gets back there." Erika offered me a sympathetic smile. "It's warded against teleportation magic, godly and otherwise. It's warded against a lot of things, really. There are also other things down there that she'll find. Really, it's a terrible loss."

I felt, honestly, more than a bit betrayed to be finding all this out now. "But it's Miana's--Ciel'ostra's magic. Can't she just... stop it?"

"I'm not an expert on divine magic, but I'm pretty sure she'd need to know what she's stopping. Magic, even divine magic, has rules, and 'domain' is a big one. You can't stop something unless you can reach it, and even with divine magic, things are out of reach unless you know about them."

It was hard not to feel like the whole world was falling apart around me. I had thought that maybe--just maybe--this would all be over with the next engagement, for better or for worse. Either we'd screw this up royally and be dead, and that'd be the end of it... or we'd land a solid blow against The Enemy and she would be dead and we could move on. But if she's not even here...

But there are still dangers. Somehow, the Ryan part of me, without my being consciously part of it, had gone off to find Miana and talk to her, which--to be fair--is exactly what I would have done, and should have done, under the circumstances. His part of me continued, even if it wasn't... me, exactly. If we're still alive tomorrow, or the day after, or whenever the armies have come and gone, we can worry about getting back there and making things right.

How are you, me? I asked the Ryan part of me, incredulously.

I'm not. But Ryan isn't you, either. I felt Ryan's eyes on me, a duller pair of eyes than they might have been if I were behind them, but somehow still very familiar. You are more than just your past. You are more than one perspective. Look... I know it bothers you. Go back to the mental image of the chair, of the monitors. The one you created to let you be more than one thing at once. What do you see?

It was weird to receive that kind of advice, and I used a little bit of soulflame to try to--

A ghost. There was a ghost in my mind.

Yeah, ashen flame is weird like that. The face that was sitting next to me, facing a monitor, grimaced at me. Ashen flame is a living soul. I dedicated my soul to you, and it is yours, but it is also not you. Hang on, I have to talk to--

I reached in and yanked the spirit--Xenma, I recognized as soon I laid hands on it--out of that position. You do not have my permission to do that.

Having the soul of a god inside of you is more useful than you'd think, but... it's your life. Xenma's spirit gave a smug shrug and settled down.

Instead of talking to Miana, I told her to come inside where Erika and I were, and then had Ryan sit down on the ground and do nothing while I switched back to the other version of myself, my voice suddenly uncharacteristic of Xethram. "What the hell even... goddamnit..."

"Something wrong?"

"Discovering some bullshit about godhood that I didn't know," I said with a grimace. "Xenma's spirit was taking over part of my role as a god, but I didn't know... don't know... and I don't trust him... argh."

"I seem to recall the Book told you what you can do about that, too," pointed out Erika, amicably.

"I'm not eating Alanna's father." I gave her a snarl, realizing finally that my persona had slipped. "Not... not unless... forgive me, Lady, but I don't even want to think about it."

"Well, you can let him go, if you prefer." Erika stretched out her legs, idly, and I have to admit I was momentarily distracted by her, but... not enough to let me let go of the situation.

"We can come back to that in a moment, but Miana is--" and then she was there, rushing into the room like there was a fire that needed to be put out. When she caught sight of Erika, her face seemed to settle on an expression of frustrated worry.

"Yes, hi again." Erika tilted her head to the side and smiled. "Xethram thinks you ought to know that some of the things in the temple are going to make your enemy stronger. I should have said, but there's not much you can do about it."

"Stronger how? What things?"

"Do you remember a passage in the book, Laxy, about a facility to purify soulflame?" I asked, since I didn't, not really.

Miana rattled off the line immediately, since my own enchantment had helped her memorize parts of the book, if not really understand them immediately. "There is only one form of this flame deemed truly pure, and that is clearflame, but that flame is not worth the cost to produce it, although a facility exists in the temple to do this."

"Yes, that." Erika nodded. "She hasn't yet found it or figured it out, but she will someday, and if she does it will be quite a nuisance. I'm not completely sure, but I don't think you can shut it off from here, not without knowing which enchantment it is. And if you spend too much time trying, right now, you won't be prepared for the enemy that will be coming."

Miana squinted at Erika, and I thought that once again, she was frustrated at not being told things and not allowed to choose for herself, but...

My face blanked for a moment. How often did I tell people things and let them choose? I did sometimes; I let the Blades decide the successor, let Tammy decide her vicar, let Alanna choose rather than being forced into marriage... but... I was not very good at talking to people in general.

Ryan isn't, came a thought, and I knew this time it was Xenma. What about you?

I felt my heart beating harder in my chest. All this time, although I was becoming a god, first and foremost I was Ryan Thomas Valentine, formerly of Earth. That meant all of his strengths, but all of his weaknesses. If I... if I could change my whole identity, become someone new, that meant new strengths and new weaknesses, but... letting go completely of old parts of myself... was that even possible? Was that real?

Or would that just let something else sneak in the back and decide who I was, against my will? Again, I clamped down on Xenma, uncomfortable with the idea of being manipulated, even for the best of reasons.

I serve you, am a part of you, argued Xenma.

Not now.

"You're growing up," commented Erika, and for a moment I thought she was reading my thoughts, and had the sudden and violent urge to yell at her, but I stopped, realizing that she was talking to Miana.

"Don't toy with me. I know you are playing a long game, and I do not like being used, but neither do I know enough." Miana raised her chin at Erika. "If you using me will make the world a better place, then do, but tell me my role in it. There are many hard lessons to learn, but I must, or I will not be ready."

Erika gave a grin, and stood up. "I like you, Miana," she said, then cocked her head to the side, thinking. "The thing I suggested before, what do you think about it?"

Miana glanced at me, for some reason, and back at Erika. "It is early to tell," she said stiffly, "but I don't consider it... likely."

"What if I told you it would make you stronger?"

"There is more to winning than strength," Miana replied with a frustrated hiss. After a moment, she added, as an afterthought, "and more to life than winning."

"Indeed." Erika turned to me, suddenly. "Let's go down into the caves. Have Ryan send the Order to meet us. We might as well do this as long as I'm here."

I felt baffled, but scrambled to do as she suggested.