“Alright, I think I should be good to go.” After listening closely to the other halfbreed’s heartbeat and confirming that her breathing had slowed, the fox stepped outside, activated an administrative function, and restored the hollow to a previously cached state. The broken trees regrew, the water-filled homes were drained, and the furniture was placed back where it belonged. Not even the corpses remained. Every trace of the ravens’ presence and wrongdoing had been outright erased.

“Well done, Sylvia.” A husky feminine voice called to her. “You could hardly tell it was your first time.” Its source, a tiny green-eyed woman no taller than a phallus, floated through the air. The soft glow that emanated from her body made it easy to spot her even through the shrouded darkwood. Her hair was tied into a neat bun, her body was adorned with a leafy dress, and her shapely rear was hidden beneath a bouquet of tails. All three orange dusters hung behind her, lifeless and unmoving, even as the tiny, wingless fairy floated through the air.

“Thanks, Mom.” Sylvia changed forms as she spoke. Her fur quickly vanished, replaced by hair and skin as she matched her mother’s size. Unlike the older fox, whose locks were a fiery red, hers were not dyed in a single colour. There were oranges, blacks, and whites interspersed to form a set of distinct layers. Her eyes were also different, shining in a tint akin to a honeycomb’s prize. “Where are all the others?” The words were spoken in a soothing, smooth voice—completely unlike the one she had presented to the torch. It was calmer, lacking the innocent excitement that had accompanied her haphazard facade.

“We’re here.” A voice came from the forest, and with it, a gruff elder covered in silver hair. He was accompanied by a herd of fairies and a skulk of canids, all appearing out of thin air at a moment’s notice. “We were just giving you two a moment, cub.” He approached on all fours, his gait both lazy as a sloth’s and graceful as a swan’s. “It isn’t every day that a mother gets to see her daughter grow up. Not that Dixie’s matured much herself.”

“I can’t believe you tried to meow,” said another older fox. “You’ve been reading too much of Alfred’s work.”

Sylvia smiled awkwardly. “She dragged me completely off script. I wasn’t sure what else to do.”

“Right. She was more bitter than we expected, given her age,” said the elder. “At least you didn’t have to rely too much on your spells. I would’ve used at least three times as many.”

“A proctor that has to rely on magic is hardly a good proctor at all,” said Dixie.

“Says the idiot that slept with her torch.” Grant, the elder, fired back.

The retort earned him a glare from Sylvia’s mother, who promptly cleared her throat and changed the topic. “Why don’t we get on with the celebrations? It’d be nice if we could finish before the torch awakens.”

“Right.” Grant lowered his head and chanted a few words under his breath. The spell soon manifested, taking the form of a silencing barrier that spread throughout the hollow. It didn’t target any entities in particular, but it would keep any fox-made sounds from reaching those beneath the ground.

Dinner was served as soon as the enclosure was completed. A group of particularly muscular fairies emerged from the canopy with large barrels of wine and even larger plates of fish.

Sylvia ate her fair share and participated in all the festivities, but her mood never caught up with her people’s energy. She kept to herself throughout the party, only speaking to those that explicitly called her out.

The vixen escaped the scene as soon as she was confident that the others were too drunk to notice. She wandered around aimlessly at first, settling on a destination only as one eventually came to mind.

The scenery warped, turning from the familiar sky-eclipsing trees to a sunny clearing featuring a massive, sparkling lake. She sat down by its shore, and after a brief moment of silence, extended her voice into the void.

“Hey, Al?”

“Yes, child?” There was a ripple in the air as he appeared beside her. Though it almost looked the part, save for how it would occasionally flicker, it was not his body, only a magical projection toned in shades of grey.

“Is it okay if I speak my mind?”

“Be my guest.” The human adjusted his hat as he walked his projection onto the water’s surface and turned around. “While you lack overt feline features, you are still one of my creations,” he said slowly. “I will never condemn you for revealing your thoughts.”

“Okay.” The fairy pressed a hand to her chest and took a deep breath. “I don’t think I can do this.”

“I figured it would be something like that.” Alfred sighed as he adjusted his hat with his wand. “Must run in the family.”

“Maybe it does.” The fairy smiled uncomfortably before turning back into a fox and flopping on the ground, ears drooping and tail deflated. “It just feels wrong.”

“By some measures, it would be, but there is nothing that I would not do to achieve my goals. Whether you work towards them is up to you. And while I would prefer your cooperation, I will not chastise or punish you, no matter your choice. I am your progenitor, Sylvia, not your master.”

“Thanks, Al.” The oversized squirrel looked over her shoulder with a smile, but having said his piece, the ancient human was already gone.

* * *

When Claire came to, she found her mind trapped in front of a painfully familiar canvas. The sun’s rays shone through the open windows, but bright as they were, they failed to fully illuminate the atrium by their lonesome. The lack of natural light was compensated by several rows of large candles. The expensive, scented luxuries were strewn throughout the room, placed in static intervals to ensure that its inhabitants would not find their eyes impaired.

Four familiar faces were seated within the chamber, all eerily frozen in time. The manor’s head chef, Amereth, stood by the entrance, pushing a cart topped with lunches and pastries. Claire had never quite understood how the shark lady walked on her fins, and observing her only deepened her interest.

Allegra—her tutor—was by the windowsill, one hand on a textbook and the other fiddling with a pair of wide-rimmed glasses. A large pointed hat sat on her head. It was a ridiculous aesthetic. The decoration was more than half her height. If not for the slits that her ears were slotted through, it would have fallen right off her head following even the slightest of movements.

The meter-tall rabbit was lecturing a young halfbreed with no interest in the lesson. Her younger self was wearing light clothing, a plain sleeveless dress that exposed the occasional patch of scale decorating her arms. She was a lot paler back then. Her light blue colouration didn’t grow in until she turned fourteen.

A smile crept onto Claire’s face. Though she had only been twelve at the time, she had already been much more attractive than her mentor in magic. The ears were the deciding factor. Aellgra’s were oddly rounded, while Claire’s were nice and bevelled.

The last person in the room was Durham. He was seated in a corner, eyes closed, legs folded, and palms together in a moment of spiritual enlightenment. Though no threats were imminent, he was dressed in full gear. Thick metal plates covered every last part of his body, from his legs to his tail to the hairs on his head. Even his face was hidden from view, masked beneath a layer of metal that perfectly silenced his features.

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The man was her guard and combat instructor, but in the end, he had proven himself capable of neither.

Claire gritted her teeth. Recalling their shared history only irked her, so she turned away from the scene and phased through the wall. She made for the castle’s front gate, stopping only as she reached the floating rock’s furthest edge.

The artifact that kept the manor in the sky was one of Canterbell’s three perfect, lossless, and eternal masterpieces. The other two were also present, floating off in the distance, visible just above the clouds. Together, the three ducal manors formed a triangle that perfectly enclosed the Cadrian capital below. They were keystones, artifacts meant to strengthen the barrier protecting the king and his castle. Not that it was her business any longer.

With a shake of the head, Claire returned to the manor and resumed wandering its halls. She knew her destination. Every step carried her closer and closer to her father’s office. Her brow was creased and her teeth were clenched, biting against her lips with enough force to draw blood. Her hands were balled into fists—trembling, fragile fists with their nails digging through her skin. The sun rapidly set as she got closer and closer to his study, the sky turning as red as it had been when he had informed her that she would be sacrificed. She wanted to question him, interrogate him, even though she knew exactly what his answer would be. To the decorated war hero, the lives of his men far outweighed that of his daughter. She understood the claim from a purely rational perspective. But she couldn’t agree. And she had to confront him. Even if—especially because—it was a dream.

It was the only way to set herself free.

But despite her best efforts, she was unable to reach him. Her steps only took her further away. Every time she placed a foot forward, the corridor would extend, leaving the door further than it was before her attempt. Over and over again the cycle repeated until the hall was a thousand meters long. His doorway was so distant it may as well have been a star.

Her fiery emotions dulled as the futility hit. There was no choice but to give up. She suddenly felt much smaller, weaker, too weak and unwilling to confront him. Her heart started to pound harder and harder as she was filled with the urge to run. Somewhere. Anywhere. But she couldn’t. Her legs trembled. Her feet refused to move. Even as fury pressed her to strangle him, to grab him by the neck and squeeze as hard as she could.

And then, there was nothing.

Her anger and fear both vanished, replaced by a sense of listlessness.

She didn’t care. She couldn’t care.

None of it mattered, not now, not then, not ever.

She fell to her knees, hugging them to her chest as she shook and trembled. With every empty tear that dripped down her cheeks came a distortion in the scenery. Gone was the reddish hue that accompanied the setting sun, and with it, the familiar scent of home. Even the cold that accompanied the howling winds had vanished without a trace.

Churning together, the elements warped, transforming into a sea of white, fluffy blobs, the same scene often visible from the manor on days with the skies overcast. But somehow, it was different. Her curiosity slowly pulled her from her shell. She raised her face from her knees and looked around the heavenly delusion in wonder. Something about it was equal parts foreign and familiar, gripping her heart until she blinked—until a clowder of catgirls suddenly and inexplicably filled the space. One hundred and one feline humanoids frolicked about, plaguing her with the urge to end it all.

The halfbreed immediately turned her eyes on the sky. She looked beyond the heavenly garden and at the ball of fire suspended above, begging it to bestow her with the gift of blindness. But her retinas remained sinfully intact. She couldn’t get the pollutants to vanish no matter how long she stared or how little she blinked. Looking away served no purpose. They remained in her peripherals, slowly eating away at her sanity. Not even closing her eyes provided much of a solution. She could still hear their giggles, their meows, and their growls in vivid, vivid detail.

“How awfully obscene. Is this meant to be your idea of the divine realm, Claire?” A voice broke her from her frustrated trance. It was soft but critical, equal parts tired and disapproving. And even though her ears were preoccupied tracking the hundred and one beastfolk, it had rung clear. Just like the mirewood’s bell, it echoed straight into her mind.

Unsealing her sense of sight, she looked around for the woman that was its source, eventually spotting her upon a grand throne far off in the distance.

The divine seat shifted as soon as it caught her eyes. It was suddenly right in front of her, situated on an elevated platform less than five meters away. The pure white stone glowed brightly at first, but soon faded to reveal in detail the being atop it, a young woman on the cusp of adulthood. She wore only two pieces of clothing. One was a dark dress made of a ghostly fabric thin enough that it looked like it would fall apart in the wind, while the other was a crowning laurel wreath, dyed in a rich, raven black. To label it as a mere accessory would certainly have been irreparably inaccurate. The crown never touched her head. It floated directly above her curly locks as if to profess her purity.

Her hair was of a peculiar colour. It was a set of dark blues and purples featuring only the occasional speck of white. Almost like a cloudless night sky. Her eyes were the same. They were dark and brilliant as a pair of distant nebulae, shimmering with all the light of a thousand suns.

“I have summoned you to address an insult,” said the entity.

Claire stared blankly, speaking only after a few moments of silence. “What are you talking about?”

“One of your statements has left me with a sense of discontent. Why is it that you are so irreverent, mortal?”

“I still don’t know what you’re talking about.” Claire blinked several times as she racked her brain, but she couldn’t come up with anything meaningful.

Seeing the blank expression led the crowned woman to slowly shake her head. “Do you not recognize me?” Pure, unmasked disappointment.

“Nope.”

Sighing, the raven-haired being stood up from her throne and opened her arms wide.

“Behold, mortal. You are in the presence of the goddess of the eternal flow, the guardian deity that has watched over your soul for all of its iterations.”

Claire crossed her arms and tapped an irritated foot against the cloudy platform beneath her feet. “So you’re the box?”

“You are correct. For once.” The deity narrowed her gaze. “Now I believe that I am owed an apology.”

“Because I likened you to a toad?”

“Correct again. It is rather unusual for you to make two astute observations in a row.”

“Why are you worried about insults? You’re insulting me all the time,” muttered the halfbreed. “And I call you stupid about just as often.”

“I had every intention of encouraging you to recall each of those instances and apologizing for them as well, preferably with your regret expressed in terms of offerings.”

“Well, that’s too bad,” said Claire. “I’m not apologizing.”

“And why not?”

“Because I don’t care what you think. You’ve never done anything for me. I should be resenting you for not providing me with any oracles or forewarnings, not worshipping you.”

“That is because you swore yourself to Builledracht during your childhood. Are you not aware of the idiocy that such a choice entails? You would have left the realm of my control had he not owed me a favour.”

“I don’t see how that matters.”

“Your lack of intellect is once again preventing us from holding a productive discussion.” The goddess smiled. Gently. Lovingly. “I suppose I will have to try a different method instead.”

She walked forward and descended the steps that separated them. With the distance closed, she slowly extended a hand and placed it atop Claire’s shoulder. The halfbreed had tried to recoil away, but her body failed to respond. Her flesh and blood were bound in place.

Log Entry 791

You have received a minor blessing from the goddess of the eternal flow. Your log has been upgraded.

“I will excuse you for swearing to Builledracht, but a second similar mistake will not be forgiven. Swear only to me, Claire. And remember, remember that you are not destined to walk the simple, straightforward path taken by the chosen. You will face hardship. You will face despair. And you will struggle. But even so, you are mine of your own volition.”

The next time Claire blinked, she found herself returned to the burrow, with the world upside-down and her bed laid on top of her like a blanket. Her mind was wide awake, and the goddess’s warm touch lingered, but the rogue was focused neither on the out-of-place sensation nor on the abnormal degree of her alertness. She was too preoccupied with a certain important question to consider anything beyond its realm.

“Which goddess was supposed to be in charge of the eternal flow again?”