Even though Rhode was dressed, he continued to blush. Rikva was already waiting, standing at his door with her claw around the handle. Once he secured his final button, she nodded, twisted, and opened the way into a catacomb of yawning shadows.

“Come on, you’ve really gotta go,” she urged. Then the young woman turned her head away. “And I won’t tell anyone, I promise.”

Rhode hitched up his pants further with a little hop that caused all the shelves and pots in his room to shake. He coughed lightly into his fist. “I’m really not the kind of guy that gets hung up on that kind of thing. I just, you know, glad to be alive again. Everything else is just a blessing.”

The woman eyed him and squinted. “You want me to tell everybody?”

“Like, actively?”

The scholar shook her head vigorously, her fiery hairpin glinting. She clapped her hands. “This is a distraction. Seriously, Rhode. Come on!”

Ever since he’d first woken, there had always been at least one someone attending outside of his door. Whether it was a servant, or a healer, or one of the scholars, they had sat (perhaps at the wobbly little table) and kept vigil. Now? There was no one in the halls. There were no candles lit. There were no voices echoing from beyond. Only the orange and purple of medicinal crystal-light reached outside, and it was spilling there only from inside his room.

Rhode was surprised by how hard it was to convince himself to take the first step. Then it was easier after, but he never quite got over the feeling that every stride he took was carrying him further underground into darkness.

Which was foolish, because Rikva was leading him up.

“I guess I understand – no, I mean, I DO understand why I want to be there for this. Waking up like I did… alone…”

“You weren’t alone, big guy.”

“No, I know, Rikva. Sorry. But I mean, if it were me, I would want one of US to be there. Someone from home. Someone who could be there to tell them that everything’s gonna be okay.”

“Hm,” the scholar hid a wince. She turned a corner and he followed. The only light was coming from a handful of orange she’d taken along with her, and the one shining purple dot that Rhode held daintily in between his thumb and fore-finger.

For a while, the only sound that kept them company was their feet and the shuddering heave of [bellows]. “But why is this such a big deal for you?” Rhode broke the silence between them. “You make this seem like I gotta be there or this is the end of the world or something.”

“It’s just a crossroads, Rhode. Standard Fate stuff, a fork between choices which define who you become or what you do. Us seers are wet for this stuff. You find a good one, a big juicy one, and you can write a book and retire. You’re made for life.”

The goblin stopped at the end of a tunnel. There was a solid wall in front of her.

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“Damn. Okay, back this way. I could’ve sworn…”

“Like a butterfly flapping its wings,” Rhode murmured, beginning to understand.

“A flutter-bug?” Rikva stopped. Her nose pinched up, and her tongue flickered once out of her mouth in disgust. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“You know,” Rhode hesitated. Not for the first time, it occurred to him that neither of them were really speaking English at all. “It’s a tiny insect that flaps its wings. And then the little vortex it makes in the air is carried in the currents, just a minuscule change. Sooner or later, that change compounds and echoes, and then before you know it: boom. A storm.”

The scholar considered it for a moment. “That’s dumb. I think of it more like leaving a rusty nail on your neighbor’s kitchen floor. Smaller than your pinkie, but still if their luck is bad enough, you might make them lose a foot.”

She discovered the corridor she had been searching for, and pleased, led the homunculus on.

“I guess that’s one way to put it,” Rhode admitted. “But something about me being there, today will – today, right?”

“Yea, it’s day.” Rikva replied distractedly. But they encountered no one else: just echoes – just the ghosts of whispers. "Mealtime," she added in a whisper.

“- is important,” he finished.

Rikva huffed, impatiently. She thrust out a plainly made ceramic cup and rattled it. “If you get there on time, it’s big, textbook, good-luck destiny. A time of trials and tribulation, followed by triumph.”

Rhode reached his hand backwards, in the general direction of his room. “But if I didn't trust you? If I chose to sleep in?”

The goblin scholar’s teeth snapped shut. She avoided his eyes. “Well, then. That’s squiggle, scratchy, skull-face. And you know how that goes.”

She tipped the cup forward for Rhode to see inside. His stone revealed strangely shaped dice, carved of yellowed bone, and inlaid with [rune]s of fetid color that made his vision swim, just to look at.

“Don’t feel bad if we miss it,” Rikva sighed. She sounded tired, and sad, and in a moment of weakness: kind. “Bad things happen. You can’t always stop them; no point to punish yourself. The Ring keeps turning anyway.”

Even though he wanted to reach out to her, Rhode held his hands to his side. He recognized a door and pointed it out to his guide, and he ducked as she led him through.

“You could have woken me earlier,” he said. He didn’t mean to sound judgemental, but he did.

“They moved up the schedule,” Rikva shrugged. “Nobody told us. I had to get it from Krevinkya.”

“Really? Why?”

“I don’t know if you know this,” the goblin barked a cruel laugh. “But, your fight with Lady Jern? Rhode, you were kind of impressive. The higher ups are… I mean, they’ve seen what’s possible and they’re hungry for more.”

“But she ruined me,” the man who’d died protested.

“Yea, but she’s supposed to. Hakkat-Yune is a third-entrusted Knight of the Viper. She’s crazy high level for her age. Even if she was making a game of you, the fact you could even stay standing by the end is monstrous.”

“So now they want another one of me.”

“No, Rhode. You’ve forgotten all the steps in between. The mistakes with your arrival. Your health. The sloppiness that we were handling you with, since we weren’t ready. You’ve got them all thinking now.”

Yellow-red light rose in her grip and cast shadows over her face like a skull. The goblin reader-of-fates looked, for a moment, afraid.

“What if we did it all over again, but this time we do everything right from the start?”