“Here?”

Ral grasped at his sister’s frail elbow, making sure she doesn’t trip over the uneven and treacherous path to the edge of the island. Aris described in great detail the exact place she wanted to be: at a particular tree right at the edge of a cliff into the ocean just south of the lighthouse. “You know this will be a lot safer and faster if you just let me drift,” she grumbled, almost tripping over a rock.

“Camaz was saying you spend too much time as a shadow already,” Ral said. The professor spoke to him briefly about what side effects it would have on Aris, including making her forget to eat as normal body sensations like hunger are nearly non-existent when she’s in that state. His stomach clenched in worry feeling her bony arm through the thick robe she wore. “Here’s the tree. I think.”

He led her to the base of the closest willow and let her hand settle on the trunk. “I suppose sitting on the base will have to do,” she said.

“Yeah I’m not about to carry you up a tree.”

“You’ve always refused to do it anyway,” she said, a half smile on her lips. “I wish I could show you I can climb this tree. In the past I did it all the time so I can look at the Heart.”

Ral glanced to the direction of the city. The spot they were at, especially if one were to scale the tree, would give an excellent view of the Empire’s capital and most of the Aortic strait. “It’s nice down here too,” he said, guiding Aris down to sit with her back against the trunk then settling down next to her.

“It’s also noisy with the water so people won’t overhear us,” she said. “And none of the runes and enchantments are here to distract me. I can tell if someone is approaching.”

“What is this super secret thing you have to tell me then?” Ral asked, amused.

Aris pursed her lips slightly. “It’s not a secret,” she said tartly. She paused, then gave a huff. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry. For trying to kill you.”

“I forgive you.”

She tilted her head up as if trying to look at him from under her low hood, but of course she couldn’t because of bandages stretched across the upper part of her face to hide the green gemstone that replaced her eyes. “That easily?”

“Aris, you weren’t in your right mind. Camaz and Verne told me what you’ve been through. It would drive anyone mad.”

“What happened to me was the result of my own actions,” she said. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I believed it.”

The long trailing branches of the willow gently swayed, long leaves whispering against each other in the breeze. The Blood Ocean was a cheerful blue under the sunny blue skies and he could nearly taste the salty spray crashing up from the base of the cliff.

“I really thought dying was better than living by the Parts’ rules,” she said. “For both of us.”

“Dying isn’t the only way to defy them.”

“No, the next best thing is hubris,” Aris said bitterly. “And I think I’ve demonstrated that you only get punished for that.”

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His sister looked smaller, more frail than ever, as if the sea breeze alone could blow her away if not for the heavy robes grounding her. If indeed they were needed to fulfill some prophecy, Ral wondered if she would even survive it. “You said so yourself: you don’t think the Parts are gods,” he said. “It’s not hubris.”

“I suppose Doran said himself that he isn’t a god,” Aris said. “The being in smoke, the Part - he has a name.”

“Doran.”

“Yes. Strangely Kuvan sounding, isn’t it?” she said. “He said that he watched our lives and Nilda’s life come to pass. And that he encouraged those events to happen. If he isn’t a god, he did a lot of god-like things.”

“Then you killed him and took his eyes,” Ral said. “I do think you’re brilliant, but I don’t think you’re good enough to kill a god.”

“Not sure if I should be insulted or comforted,” Aris said dryly. “You have such a way with words, brother.”

Ral snorted, then sobered. “If the Parts aren’t gods, then what are they?”

“Well, there are animals, there are people, and then there are Yscians according to the Kuvan chantry,” Aris said. “That’s the common belief. Of course people are divided up between nobles, commoners.”

It was the Kuvan theory of Living Distinction, a result of their religious beliefs. Ral never quite understood the need to define living things into categories that way, but he has heard of it. It was commonly accepted that it was probably a way for Kuvans to firmly write off Ysicans as a completely different ‘thing’ from everything else.

“We know this theory has been disproved with the existence of Shades,” Aris said. “They don’t fit into any of these categories. It’s why Kuvans had long dismissed any research into Shades from Camaz since they all still cling to their Living Distinction nonsense. Is it so hard to believe that there are more categories of living things? Maybe the Parts fit into one of those.

“But does it ultimately matter what they are? In the end… I believe what Doran said about him shifting the Solvent and manipulating fate. He gave Nilda rock manipulating powers and guided her to our parents’ lives. In the end Nilda knew her purpose was to die so we could live. He said our kingdom had to fall so that we could live.”

“He wanted to ensure our existence,” Ral said quietly. “Because we would be able to close Gates.”

“Well I can’t,” Aris said, annoyed. “So maybe all his work only partially worked. Or was that the point? Only you’re supposed to do it?”

“You can see a version of our world nobody has been able to before,” Ral said. He paused, struck with a thought. “Maybe that’s what he intended all along.”

Aris grew very still. “You don’t mean he meant for me to kill him,” she said. She then shook her head. “No. When we talked in that Yscian village, he said he performed a scrying spell and that it only brought him up to that point. He couldn’t have known.”

“But that would make the puzzle fit,” Ral said. “You can see solutes but you can’t interact with them, correct?”

“Yes,” she said. “Camaz nearly interrogated me on whether or not I can touch solutes. I’m sorry I can’t be a Gate killer like you. Truthfully what I can see isn’t always reliable either.”

“If you can see the solute and I can actually destroy it; this makes the process much easier,” he said. “It takes me a very long time to concentrate long enough to pinpoint exactly what to ‘grasp’. Maybe I wasn’t meant to do it alone.”

“Inner Eye and Manus,” Aris murmured. “Working together.”

“Two parts of a whole again,” Ral agreed. He paused again, then cleared his throat. “I should apologize too for trying to kill you. Since we’re doing that today.”

“Self-defense,” Aris said dismissively.

“Now who’s forgiving too easily?”

She smiled slightly. “It must be a family trait.”

They sat in amiable silence, listening to the ocean together.

“Will you help me then, sister?” Ral asked. “Until we figure out what Mind wants from us? Maybe after that…”

“Maybe after that we can go home.”