Her hair is long, blue-gray and white in turns, and she wears robes to match. Her eyes are pale, a small mark like a silvery diamond at the center of her forehead. Our eyes meet, and recognition bolts through me though I know I've never seen her face before. The almost overwhelming compulsion to run out and throw myself into her arms is even more dreadfully familiar. I fight to hold myself in place, root my feet to the spot.

"Um," I clear my throat, turning to look back to the Petran shopkeeper.

"Is there a back exit I could use by any chance? I...I think I'm being stalked."

"Oh spirits! That's awful," the woman's eyes go wide, and she glances sideways. "Of course you can use the back exit. But which of them is it? Should I call the I.G?"

"I'm—I'm not sure. She's the one with the—" but when I look back to the window, the woman is gone. "Oh, I don't see her any more."

Sympathy and concern written across her pleasant features, the woman shows me out to the back entrance. The narrow street is more alley than anything else, and full of the reassuring presence of restaurant and shop workers on break with their cigarettes and sandwiches. I peer carefully to each side before thanking the woman and making my escape, finding another shop with a back entrance and no "employees only" sign and darting inside.

Once past the threshold I pause, taking a steadying breath as I get my bearings. Framed art covers the high walls, the vast majority of it beautifully stylized glyphs of different animals, plants and spirits. The furniture is tastefully streamlined black leather, and potted plants crowd the display space at the shop's front windows. Two black doors in the wall to the right lead into who-knows where, and behind the high polished wood countertop stands E.J's ex Circle-mate, Song—arms crossed and frowning.

~*~

"I'm sorry," says Song, looking genuinely thoughtful as she contemplates the gray woman's description—eyes distant and lips twisted—before refocusing on my face. "I don't think I've ever seen anyone that looks like that before. Must be someone visiting as another guest lecturer or something like that, or maybe a new employee somewhere in the village. I can ask around."

I nod, looking down into my coffee cup and gnawing my lip.

"And...I'm sorry if I came off a bit, ah—terse, back at the hotel," she adds. "None of this is on you. My anger is at Jonathen, and Jonathen alone." Her expression twists a bit at that, and she covers for it by taking another sip of her own coffee. Her office is as tastefully decorated as the rest of the tattoo parlor, with purple-gray paint on the walls, dark wood finishes and a continued abundance of plants.

"It's alright," I assure her, perhaps a little too quickly. She smiles, glancing over at Mittens as the little rabbit-fox sniffs about the room and Boon as he follows, keeping her out of trouble.

I want to say more. After all, I have some idea of how she must feel. I didn't handle it well either, when E.J.dropped out of my life.

But all of it feels out of line. Too personal, perhaps even patronizing. Instead, I smother the beginnings of a sigh and take another drink of coffee, wishing I were better with this sort of thing.

Then my eye catches on another of her framed designs—this one a hammerhead shark with a halo of flowers.

"Your glyph-work is beautiful," I say. "I love your style."

Another smile, and this time she even leans forward just a bit in her seat, dark eyes sparking. "You're an artist too, aren't you?"

Before I can answer, Boon zips over from across the room, Mittens giving chase.

"Call from E.J," chirps the little servitor. "She's between lectures. Shall I answer?"

I throw a glance over at Song, who's already standing up. "I'll give you a moment," she says. "You'll be safe in here. Just come out when you're done, and try not to take too long, alright?"

Waving off my thanks, she leaves, the door clicking shut behind her. I point a finger at Boon.

"Hey."

"Ashwyn?" E.J's tone is off, either with agitation or worry or both. "What's wrong?"

I recount my experience, trying to be both thorough and to-the-point. After my story comes to an end there's a long, hard-edged silence.

"Call Song into the room, please."

The Petran in question answers my summons with eyebrows raised and arms crossed, lips already settled into a hard line.

"What is it, Jonathen?"

"I'm sorry to ask this of you, but there's only you and Hakka, and I already know he can't. But please, could you stay with Ashwyn until I'm done with my lectures? Don't let her out of your sight. And—again, I'm sorry—but I have to insist we move our talk to another night."

The Petran looks sideways at me, and a hand goes to her forehead.

"I'll stay with her, but E.J, please don't make me wait any longer. We don't have to go out anywhere. We can just...talk in a separate room or something. But I need this. You owe me this."

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Another period of silence, a hissing exhale. "Fine. But we can't take too long. Ash and I have business with Hama Oyabi. And Ashwyn," Boon turns to face me, E.J's tone suddenly stony. "Arm yourself. An animal corpse or skeleton. Something. Find it and bring it to you now before you actually need it."

"A—alright. I can do that," I hedge. Though she makes no objection, the look on Song's face is far from pleased. "But what do you think is happening?"

"I don't know, but until I do we're playing it safe. I'll be done in about three hours. Promise me you'll be alright?"

I draw in a slightly shaky breath. "Promise."

"Thank you, love. I'll see you soon." The connection cuts off.

Song looses a beleaguered sigh. "You're lucky my only appointment today was cancelled. Now I'm going to have to close shop to any potential walk-ins, too. If I get caught with anything dead in here I'll lose my license, so I'll take you to my place upstairs and you can bring it in through...I don't know. The bathroom window or something. Just try to be discreet, for the love of all spirits. I'll be right back."

She leaves me then in the relative safety of her office—technically out of her sight, but I don't quibble. I dim the lights a bit, bundle Mittens into my lap, and settle back in the comfier of the two chairs. The web of unlife flares to shadowy brilliance across the span of my awareness, and I sift through it—searching for my weapon of defense.

I'm drawn almost immediately to a particularly dense and diverse concentration of bodily remains both fresh and old, marveling at it for the briefest of moments before realizing where I am. The pit of death at the heart of the Avdayari caverns.

A shock runs through me as I realize something I should have much sooner—this is my chance to see the rest of that engraving. Sharing the senses of a thrall is an advanced skill, though, and one I haven't learned yet.

But how hard can it be, really? I'm Stormstruck, after all.

A returning Song snaps me back to myself, and she gestures at me to follow her. A door near the back entrance opens into a narrow stairwell.

"Make yourself comfortable," says Song, sounding only a little sardonic as she gestures around at the quaint apartment, the styles and decor of which much resemble the shop downstairs. "And whatever mess your roadkill makes in here, E.J's cleaning it up. So bear that in mind."

While I take a seat on one end of her couch, my host stamps off to the kitchen. Again, I sink back into the dark web of energy—but this time with greater purpose, turning my inner eye straight for the pit. But, though I single out a clean-picked skeleton perfect for the purposes of protection in Song's pristine apartment, I leave it for now to focus instead on fresher corpses.

The one I choose is an eagle, sharp-eyed even in death. Presumably, at least. But though I can make it move, flapping about in the gravewater—and sense it doing so—I'm not joined with it. Though I strain and fight for it, I can't see through its gaze.

I cast about for ideas, for memories that might trigger them...my focus flashing about the web of undead energy as I do so. Feeling along the threads connecting all things no-longer-alive to one another and to myself. Threads I usually tug on. Now it occurs to me I might travel them.

Honing in on the series of threads connecting the eagle and I, I attempt to push my consciousness along it—envisioning a mote of light traveling across a dark network. At first, it's as though it's pushing back, and a painful pressure at the front of my head nearly yanks me out of focus. But I power through it, shoving and shoving until, so suddenly it's shocks me, the resistance gives way like a door swinging abruptly inward.

I topple through the threshold, landing with a jarring resonance in the body of the dead eagle. Stretching its wings and legs, I struggle to contort my borrowed figure into an upright position, but from this inside perspective it's unsettling. Everything in the corpse feels cold, sluggish. Wrong.

Peering around and tilting the cadaver's head just right, I finally settle my sights on the portion of etching-mural I'd missed before.

The Stormstruck, upon consuming all the other Umbran types, has come to a rocky outcropping near the peak of a mountain. Energy pulses around them in multiple even layers. Static Trance, perhaps? In the next image, there's a long knife in their hand, its tip sticking into their ribs. Blood drips at their feet, and from the wound they've opened, energy pours. In the next section, something has begun to materialize on the rock before them, rendered in broken, curving lines. And in the one after, the final one, there it is…in decisive, continuous cuts.

A great monolith with a doorway gouged at its base.

An Umbra Gate.

My mind reels, my view of the legend's last sequence lost as I relinquish control of the body I'm wearing and flop sideways into the water. But instead of slipping back into the confines of my own senses, I just lay there. A spike of panic drives through me as I push at the boundaries of the eagle's decaying body, trying to get out, to return to myself. But it just sets the wings and legs to flailing, and a horrible wet screech escapes its beak.

Blind panic sweeps over me like a tidal wave, dragging me under.

No. Nononononono. But for all my flapping and fighting, the only thing I accomplish is to damage the form I'm trapped in even further—feathers and bits of loosened flesh flying in my desperation to free myself.

But at some point, the terror becomes too much and it all just...shuts down.

I lay still, in a state of calm forced by exhaustion and some survival mechanism I could kiss the spirits for, and after a moment I begin to think.

I can't get myself out right now. But what can I do?

My true body, even more vulnerable without my awareness to animate it, needs a guardian. After all, that's what I was supposed to be doing in the first place. Finding a weapon. May as well make one of the bird I'm wearing. What's more, I need help—the guidance of someone who knows how to get me back to myself. Something I could perhaps find a way to ask for, if only I can get out of here.

I set my sights for the largest gap amongst the tangled graveweed overhead, ready my wings, and launch.

Or at least, I try. And try and try again. It's every bit as difficult as I'd expected to get the dead body airborn, even harder to force it through the graveweed in mostly-one piece. But when I finally do I turn my sights towards the village, an unerring sense drawing me to my true form's location.

Coming to a scrabbling stop on the balcony rail outside Song's living room, I'm relieved for a moment to find the doors leading inside already open. But it only takes me half a heartbeat to realize that something is exceptionally wrong. Inside, there's a chaotic tangle of movement. Song shrieks, and someone else speaks an unfamiliar language, their voice strange and echoing. Umbral Energy pulses from within. My eagle eyes focus, the bird's dead heart freezing to ice as I recognize the gray-clad, diamond-headed woman from before—locked in battle with a bleeding Song.

I lift the eagle's wings to join the fray, but in the next instant the woman shoves Song so hard she flies across the room. Her head cracks against the wall and she slumps to the floor, unconscious. Then my stalker turns to my prone, slack-jawed form, stoops, and pulls me easily up into her arms. She looks toward the open door and her eyes fix on the ones I've borrowed. Her lips twist into a grin, umbral light flares around her body as she charges forward. Then she's hurtling through the door, past my eagle form and over the railing. Enormous wings erupt from her back, carrying her, with my true body in tow, up into the darkening sky.