> “Even a cursory examination of the so-called “Craft” should reveal that it is little more than perversion. Though its proponents claim it is equal to the Art of Magic, the Art is a noble, dignified and sober affair, whereas witchcraft is infamously prurient, consisting as it does entirely of drunkenness, naked debauchery, orgies and lesbianism.”

> —Denrick Roth, Witches

DUCAL PALACE, AULDENHEIGH

Enerlend province, Garanhir earthmote 09.05.15.11.11

Ellaenie was proud of her workshop. In the months since she’d first resumed her magical studies, she’d done much to cut out some of the frippery and distractions. The library had been trimmed down, removing the drier and more pompous tomes in favor only of those her expert advisors agreed were truly necessary to learning the Art.

The Art. She’d seen in one of her books that magic was traditionally divided between Art—the magic of enchantment, infusion, evocation and imbuement as practiced by mages, navigators and other academics—and the Craft, which the author of that book had rather snootily dismissed as “hedge magic” and “witchcraft.” She hadn’t really seen why such a division would exist, before.

One conversation with Thaighn Saoirse and the Herald Rheannach had been thoroughly educational in that regard. There was an extra layer of conversation and understanding passing between them that Ellaenie could sense, in a muffled, distant, conversation-in-the-next-room sort of way. But Saoirse had pulled her into it as well, somehow. Had…read her.

Ellaenie was teetering in that odd state of mind somewhere between excited and scared. What would her people think of having a witch-duchess? What would become of Enerlend as she studied?

But on the other hand…what could she be for Enerlend, if she took this path?

“Well…here it is.” She stepped aside and swept an arm around the room, feeling awfully like a little girl showing a visiting cousin around her playroom. “It’s, um…”

“Very well-appointed indeed,” Rheannach commented, smiling as she took in the room’s accoutrements. “You have a lovely magestone collection.”

“I…honestly, I’m worried it’s a little gaudy,” Ellaenie confessed, despite the glow that lit inside her at being complimented by a Herald.

“’Tis ducal,” Saoirse commented. “The Garanese expect pomp an’ finery from their duchess. An’ to practice the Craft is to be yersen’, fully an’ whole. Ye’ve no need tae apologise for this side of yerself, my girl.”

My girl, Ellaenie noted. It seemed the unspoken contract she’d entered into with these two women was going to involve a degree of familiarity she wasn’t used to. Was that a Craenen thing? A witch thing? Or was it just how these sorts of things went, outside the strictures of ducal etiquette? The truth was, she’d not really had the opportunity to experience a different kind of life.

“Surely there’s more to it than just being myself?”

Rheannach giggled softly as she trailed a finger along the bookshelf, inspecting the titles. “You say just as though being yourself is a simple and small thing.”

Ellaenie frowned at her, confused, then at Saoirse when the thaighn gave a soft cackle.

“This is always the tricky part wi’ young women,” she said indulgently, taking a seat of her own and pulling her tartan around her shoulders for warmth. “Who are ye?”

“I’m…Ellaenie?”

“Good start. But who is Ellaenie?”

“She’s…the duchess of Enerlend?”

“Is she, now? Well, well. And is that all she is?”

“Well, I…no. I mean. I like magic, and dancing, and chess—”

“Oh, so Ellaenie is the things Ellaenie likes, then?” Saoirse leaned forward, her blue eyes turning penetrating. “And Ellaenie is her duty to her people, and Ellaenie is her fine dresses and jewels, and she’s this grand palace and its lovely genteel gardens. Ellaenie is a noble who’s never worked a hard day’s turn in her life and wouldn’t know what tae do with a pitchfork if the stable boy burst in right now and handed it over. But she’s also the girl who hunted down her parents’ murderers and was there to watch their heads drop intae the basket.”

She tilted her head in an oddly avian way, quite crow-like. “What did ye feel when ye saw them die, girl?”

There was a long silence broken only by the crackle of the fire. Finally, Ellaenie exhaled and broke it. “…Nothing.”

“Nothing at all? Truly? Those were people, who did what they deemed right and died at your word. And ye felt nothing?”

“I thought we were talking about who I am?”

“We are, girl.”

“I’d rather you didn’t call me ‘girl,’” Ellaenie said, feeling suddenly like she should assert herself.

“Then I shan’t.” Saoirse sat back in her chair and rested her hands lightly on her cane. “Now, do ye see what ye just did?”

“I…no.” Ellaenie shook her head, feeling quite lost by now.

“Ye changed the world, a tiny bit. Ye changed me. Ye demanded the respect due to ye, and bade me remember my manners. Ye changed the world before, when ye had the murderers executed. So who are ye?”

“…I’m…the thing that changes the world?”

“And is changed by it in turn,” Rheannach added. “Or at least, that’s part of it.”

“I’m…that which thinks and feels.”

“Carry on.”

Ellaenie thought for a moment longer, then shrugged and shook her head. “I…need a hint.”

“You’ve already been given one. Saoirse wasn’t mocking you earlier, she spoke the truth.”

“Huh?” Ellaenie frowned at the thaighn, who gave her a sly, grandmotherly wink.

“Go on, dear. You’re gettin’ this right quick.”

“…You mean…I am the duchess, and my friends, and the things I like, and all the rest of it? I thought you were—”

“Aye, a little bait-and-switch on my part. But that’s just it. Ye are those things, and ye are what binds them together. Ye are will, and feeling, and thought, and memory. To try and unweave a person from what she does and the life she’s led and the experience she’s had and the people she cares for is nonsense. Ye are all of it at once.”

“So. Just being yourself, was it?” Rheannach had a handsome, indulgent smirk that creased her eyes.

“I think I get the point,” Ellaenie replied, carefully. There was, for a moment, silence broken only by the crackle of disintegrating firewood, and the ticking of the wall clock.

“…Ye really felt nothing?” Saoirse asked gently. Ellaenie paused, then flopped down in the last remaining armchair.

“I remember thinking…it all seemed pointless,” she said. “Like all I wanted was my parents back, and exacting justice against the killers wasn’t going to achieve that, so why did I even bother? I didn’t feel guilty, or vengeful, or satisfied, or anything. I just felt...empty.”

Rheannach leaned forward, her expression sympathetic. “What do you feel now? What would you do, now?”

“Oh, they’d…they’d still go to the block. They had to, you don’t kill people that way. You don’t arrange to have them Taken. That’s a line nobody gets to cross. But that’s what had to happen. It wasn’t what I wanted. What I wanted could never happen.”

“No,” Rheannach agreed, sadly.

Ellaenie sighed heavily, then thought about who she was talking to. Rheannach didn’t have parents. She’d been woven into being alongside the worlds themselves, created by King Eärrach to be his companion and bride. What a different perspective she must have…what a source of pain she’d never felt.

Rheannach met her gaze, and half-smiled, as though she could almost read Ellaenie’s mind.

I almost can.

Ellaenie jolted to her feet out of sheer surprise. “What-?!”

“That was cruel,” Saoirse chided her friend, with a laugh in her voice.

“I-I…” Ellaenie cleared her throat. She knew of telepathy spells, of course. The Navigators used them to receive updates to their charts and tables, or as a kind of messaging service for ship captains and guilds. But she’d never been on the receiving end of one, before. And she’d certainly never heard of mind-reading.

“It’s not mind reading,” Rheannach told her. “It’s Witch-Sight. Looking past the superficial to infer the unspoken, the subtext, the ommitted and the privately held. You’re actually rather good at it already.”

“Father taught me a lot about politics,” Ellaenie admitted.

“Aye, that’d be good preparation, ‘tis true,” Saoirse agreed. “So. We’ll ease ye in to your learnin’ o’ the Craft by pullin’ on that thread, I’d say. An’ given the nature o’ yer worries about this church o’ Oneists, mayhap the Sight will be the tool ye’ll need most in the days to come.”

“Agreed,” Rheannach nodded. She picked up pen and paper, and started to scrawl something. “Fortunately, the Art’s notation is of some use here. It won’t be as you progress deeper into the Craft, but…”

The pen scratched a few seconds more, and then she handed it over. Ellaenie touched her finger to the beginning. It was quite basic, really: Upper clavis, second mundane form, waxing arcanum. The first stanza indicated to draw moderately upon her own inner energy rather than from a magestone, strike the correct form, and then hold it in readiness. Like playing middle C on the piano at mezzo-forte, and then…doing nothing with it. Just sitting there. An utterly trivial bit of magic, not even a spell. More like the preparation to cast.

“I don’t understand.”

“Try it.”

Ellaenie shrugged, and did so. It was barely an effort.

“Good. Now the tricky part to all of this is to hold onto the magic and feel how it responds to the world around you. You’re not casting it on anyone or anything, you’re simply…holding it. Letting it resonate with what you see. But pay attention to it.”

“How do ye feel?” Saoirse asked, watching Ellaenie with interest.

“Uncertain,” Ellaenie confessed.

“What’s the magic doing?” The thaighn asked.

“It’s….sitting there.”

“Going still? Becoming calm?”

“Uh, yes. Kind of smooth and flat. Like…a mirror, or a calm pond.”

“Aye, exactly. Ripples an’ reflections, that’s what ye’re looking for. Not from what I say and do, but from what ye feel about what I say and do. Allow it to magnify the impressions ye get.”

Ellaenie considered that for a second, then gave the old woman a studious look over. Saoirse was sitting forward in her chair, one hand resting lightly atop the other on her cane and her face carefully neutral. At first blush, there was nothing for Ellaenie to see…

But the magical charge she was holding seemed to…want something. It nudged her, somehow, like a friend at a ball touching her elbow and then slyly glancing across the room. Some detail of Saoirse’s hands, something small and easily overlooked…

Trying to focus on holding the charge and inspecting Saoirse was too much. The magic flickered, slipped from her control, and escaped in a small randomized jolt that briefly had her feeling like the whole world had turned crystalline and sharp. The impression faded, leaving behind only a sense of full-body stinging, and Saoirse’ sympathetic nod.

“’Tis not easy. Ye would have stunned me had ye managed it first time.”

“I definitely felt something…” Ellaenie said, glancing at Rheannach.

“You did wonderfully. Just remember, focus on the magic. Keep it steady and still, and let it do the work. Care to try again?”

Ellaenie nodded fervently. She was hungry to learn, hungry to discover, hungry to be more. Not just for herself, but for the sake of her people. So she summoned the energy again, held it like a cup and saucer at tea, and let it carry her.

And this time, it opened her eyes.

----------------------------------------

> “The elvish language, Feydh, is notoriously both easy to grasp the basics of, and indecently difficult to master. The Feydh vocabulary is tiny in comparison to any human language, with each word denoting a vast territory of related concepts which are then differentiated through subtle and at-times contradictory rules of context, tone, body language and inflection that a human could only hope to master quite late in a lifetime of study.

> To give one example, the Elvish word ‘Idh’ refers, broadly, to communication, and indeed can literally mean ‘communication’ if one uses it as a noun, applies the upward tone and hardens the “dh” sound. Use the downward tone with uptick and soften the “dh,” however, and you will have said ‘conspiracy’ or ‘secret,’ depending on context.”

> —Denrick Roth, Elves

DOCKSIDE, LONG DROP CITY

Ajhazra, Alakbir Earthmote, Sayf 09.06.03.06.05

Jerl’s whole body was crawling like he had an ant nest in his pocket. Surely, any second now, Civorage would figure out how to undo what Mouse had done, break the veil of protection that Mind had granted them…

But no. They were being left alone.

It was more than just the usual anonymity of being one ship’s crew in a city that saw a dozen ships come and go on any given day. This was eerie, forced. People made room for them, got out of their way, but didn’t look at them. Street vendors would pause in their hawking and look around while Jerl’s group passed, as though the street was empty.

Even though they were carrying a wounded man on a litter, with his shirt soaked in blood.

Mouse touched Jerl’s arm as a group of watchmen in Clear Skies guild livery patrolled past them and didn’t so much as glance in their direction.

“Did…I do this?”

“Yup.” Jerl watched a cat blink at him lazily as they passed it. When it noticed his attention, it turned and poured itself off the wall it had been sitting on, flowed up the side of a building, and vanished. Not everything was affected, then. “Are you okay?”

“Not really….” Mouse fidgeted. “It’s…loud. I’m trying to block it out, but the longer I hold on to this thing, the more I feel like I could…I could reach out and count every mind in the worlds.”

“Alright, we’ll deal with it. We just need to get away first. Can you hold on?”

Mouse nodded, mutely.

Jerl squeezed his shoulder. “You’re doing great. C’mon. The Queen is this way.”

Mouse nodded. “Bay twelve. Last time, they left a hook in the bag. Got to check that this time. Got to get some fuel aboard too. They’ll probably leave us alone. Just hope the crew aren’t affected…” he groaned, staggered, and leaned against the wall. “Too much. It’s too much!”

Jerl gestured sharply for the others to carry on ahead, and stopped. They slipped past him and bore Whisker onward toward the ship, while around them the rest of humanity simply acted as though they didn’t exist. “Look at me, Mouse. Focus on me. Only me.”

Mouse’s icy blue eyes met his own, and—

For a moment, the barriers between minds fell away completely. But of the two of them, Mouse was by far the more powerful: his mind was blinding, overwhelming, like straying too close to the blast from a furnace. He tore into Jerl’s thoughts and memories without even really wanting or meaning to, it was just that to the Word of Creation, a mind as tiny and limited as Jerl’s was hardly any more complex than a moth’s…And moths strayed close to candle flames at their peril.

But there was something in Jerl’s memories that nobody else had, and which Mouse desperately needed: how to let go.

Jerl didn’t fight it. He laid himself bare, allowed Mouse to read him, in his entirety. Some instinct, some prescience that had nothing to do with Time, told him this was the only way they all got out of this alive and sane. He opened himself up and trusted.

Confused images flashed through his brain, secrets he’d forgotten, memories he’d left neglected until they faded, intrusive thoughts he’d never have voiced openly, like just how fucking gorgeous the young man in front of him was—

Then there was a feeling of something snapping, or releasing, or being yanked back. The all-too-familiar sense of unlimited power rushed back out of Mouse’s soul and back into the box he’d been clutching in white knuckles this entire time.

What remained was Mouse. Staring at him with a face full of trauma and shame.

“I-I’m sorry!” he babbled. “I didn’t…I couldn’t not—!”

“It’s okay. I know.” Jerl nodded fervently, and squeezed Mouse’s shoulder again. “You okay now?”

“…Better. I think I’ve got it. I’ve kept…enough. I think.”

Jerl looked around. They were still being left alone it seemed, so Mouse had at least kept that much. Which he was not going to argue with, right now. “Alright. Come on. Sooner we’re out of here, sooner we can talk.”

“I…” Mouse hesitated, then nodded. “Sure.”

Sure enough, the Cavalier Queen was sitting pretty and unmolested, right where he’d left her. He trotted up the gangplank and gave the gunwale a fond pat-pat as he came aboard. “They been treatin’ you right, girl?”

The ship, which was after all still sitting there under lift tension with her keel deadbolted to the docking gantry, tipped and creaked slightly under a subtle change of weight or shift of the wind. Jerl chose to interpret it as a noncommittal shrug.

No hook in the bag this time, he noted with satisfaction. It seemed bribing Bellarn had actually worked. Now, the only thing to worry about was whether the crew would get back and the ship could get underway before Civorage returned from wherever in the worlds the Street Rats’ ship had led him to.

They’d planned to have more than enough time for that. But Jerl knew from more grim experience than just these last few subjective days that when things went wrong, they did so fast.

Well…nothing to do except prep for a rapid and unexpected departure. He took a swift round, tried to figure out what they’d need. Fuel, obviously, and while there were several barrels stacked on the quay, they wouldn’t suffice.

The food supplies? Equally pathetic. Restocking to leave was usually a weeks-long process of calculating, ordering, marshalling and loading, and though Sin was the quartermaster Jerl still knew the numbers by heart: for a sixty day voyage they’d need…let’s see…half a ton of salt beef, another of salt pork, two tons of ship’s biscuit, a thousand gallons of beer, two thousand of water, and…well, a lot of butter, cheese, oatmeal, peas, flour, suet, vinegar, dried stockfish, raisins, rum…

Feeding his crew was easily the biggest part of Jerl’s overheads on any given run. What little remained in the hold now had been adequate for the couple of days it had taken to run down to the Thundering Hall, but all the way to Ilẹyede? Not a chance.

Premonition was driving him forward, though. Don’t linger, it seemed to say. Run, now, and don’t look back. Civorage is coming, and his wrath will be unbelievable. Your only hope is to go where he won’t guess you’ve gone.

But where would that be?

Well…all he could do was trust himself. For want of anything better to do, he grabbed Derghan and the two of them started rolling fuel barrels aboard, while around them the dockers all carried on as if nothing was happening.

Sin and Amir worked fast, though. Within minutes, the first of the crew turned up in the form of Gebby, Marren and the twins.

“Mornin’, Skipper. Mister Amir said we’re going early, and it’s urgent….?” Marren shot the oblivious dockhands a curious look.

“Ignore them,” Jerl told him. “Just get these onboard. If any of ‘em give you trouble, there’s a guy on board, name of Mouse, tell him to sort it out.”

“…Right, uh…Okay.”

“Where we goin’ boss?” Gebby asked.

“Ilẹyede.” Jerl heaved another fuel barrel out of the stack and up onto his shoulder. “And yes, I know we don’t have the supplies to make it that far. We’re gonna deal with that. But we can’t stay here.”

Gebby watched him for a second with a frown. “…You were actin’ weird earlier, you’re actin’ weird now. Are in some kinda trouble, Mister Holten?”

“Huge. And, I’m sorry to say, big enough to wrap up everyone involved with me, for which I’m sorry, Geb. I’ll explain once we’re afloat.”

Gebrahim twisted the point of his beard around his finger, then shrugged, nodded, and headed on up the ramp.

That was more or less the tune of it as the rest of the crew came filtering back over the course of the next three hours. Jerl, conscientiously, left out exact payment for all the provisions they scavenged from the docks and the harbour fee…nobody even glanced at the unnatended money.

Well. His own conscience was clean, at least.

He found Amir and Sin waiting for him in the cabin, poring over Amir’s charts.

“You two got somewhere for us to resupply?”

Sin grimaced and shook her head. “Easier said than done. Civorage has the money and influence to find us at every major port we can reach.”

“Even on iron rations and if the Crowns themselves put the right winds at our back, there’s nowhere we can reach he won’t find us before the Church of the One finds us,” Amir agreed. “I don’t think I appreciated just how far their reach has grown since they first formed.”

Jerl nodded grimly, and cast a wistful look at the map. If they really tightened their belts, they could make it to Garanhir’s leading edge, and his family…

But Civorage had Mind and the power to control and influence from far away, and the Church of the One was well-established on Garanhir. No, the safest thing for his mother, sisters and cousins was to stay well away from them and give the Church no reason to bother them.

Well…fine. The time had come to try using the Word again, rather than just rely on the premonitions he’d left himself in its fullest flourish. Jerl shut his eyes, took a deep breath, and imagined the future as a series of paths through the woods. Some of those paths led into a bear’s den, or over a cliff. But some few…

The power coiled in his mind, but stubbornly refused to yield its secrets. Not yet. The time wasn’t right.

Well…fine. Go with his gut. “Where’s the nearest place can we grab supplies fast?” he asked.

“Nearest place?” Amir tapped a spot on the map, rapping his painted fingernail on it. “There’s an Outer Worlds guild outpost further around the Alakbir edge cliffs, about three days from here.”

“Good. We won’t completely stock up, just grab and run. Let’s go with that.”

“Doable…” Sin conceded with a wobble of her head. “But if we’re not careful which ports we grab from, we’ll draw a line pointing straight toward Ilẹyede.”

“I should be able to jink and dodge a bit to throw them off our scent,” Amir predicted. “And you never know, this protection young Mouse gave us might last.”

“Maybe…” Jerl conceded. “I have a feeling things aren’t going to shake out the way we think, though.”

“Premonition?”

Jerl shook his head no. “Paranoia.”

“I trust that even more,” Sin declared. “…And unless I miss my guess, that’s Andony come to tell us we’re ready to get gone, nay?”

She tilted her head toward the cabin door, moments before Marren knocked on it.

“All aboard and ready to depart, skipper,” he reported, poking his head through.

“Thanks, chief. Amir, you brief Gebby. Sin, go tell Derghan to spin ‘er up.”

A small flicker of a smile shot across her face as she nodded. Jerl followed his navigator and rigging chief out onto the deck: the riggers had already finished repressurizing the bag to flight load, and the ropes were ready to cast off. Even as he stepped to the helm there was a jolt through his feet as the huge steel bolt holding the Queen in place was levered back and out. There was a lurch, a sway, a creak of rope and wood.

The last of the men scrambled up the ramp and rejoined them just as the engines wheezed, coughed, then roared.

Out of paranoia, Jerl looked up at the bag one last time, just in case. Still no hook.

“Astern one-quarter, Mister At-Manza,” he told Gebby. “Take her out, quick as you can if you please.”

“Quarter astern, aye aye…”

Jerl put his hand on the wheelhouse and watched as they backed out into open sky, and the full wide, flat brown shelf of Long Drop City unfurled in front of him.

There were steps on the deck next to him: Ju-Wi, and Mouse. Both of them stood and watched as the Cavalier Queen turned and climbed, moving to the rail to keep the city in sight for as long as possible.

For once, Ju-Wi seemed sombre and grim.

“Been my home for twelve years. Only home I ever really felt like I fit,” she commented, when Jerl joined them.

“I’m sorry,” Jerl said, sympathetically.

“Yeah, it’s shit. But…better to leave as a free woman than stay as a slave,” Ju-Wi shrugged, and tapped the Yunei exile brand on her forehead.

“Are things really that bad in the Empire?”

“The worst cages are those where the bars are disguised as blessings.” Ju-Wi watched a coil of cloud obscure the city, then stretched up on tip-toe to hawk and spit over the side. “Or so I thought. This Civorage yusha-lao wa mah o-tse de guishu might just have my countrymen beat.”

“Dare I ask what that means?”

“Born even though his mother conceived the wrong way.” Ju-Wi shot him her signature gap-toothed lecherous grin. “Loses something in translation, right? Means she took it up the arse and shit him out anyway.”

“…Cankuu’s cock, that’s not half bad.”

“Hey, the Yunei devote themselves to perfection in everything we do. Including insults.” She chuckled again, then clapped Jerl companionably on the arm. “Don’t worry about me. Just find me a job to do, yeah? I’m a decent cook, when I’m not nipping a bung…”

“Can you make our supplies stretch?” Jerl asked.

“Shit, I’d’ve been dead years ago if I couldn’t make do with only a little. I’ll have a look, see what I can manage.”

That just left Jerl alone with Mouse again, who hadn’t spoken a word. He was still looking back toward the city, even though the ship’s rise and turn had long since taken it out of sight.

“How’s your dad?” Jerl asked him, after a minute.

“Comfortable. Alive…” Mouse looked down at the deck for a moment. “…I saw what happened to yours. I’m sorry.”

“Yeah.” Jerl leaned on the gunwale and looked out at the clouds. “Guess you saw a lot, huh?”

“Yeah.” Mouse took a deep, shuddering breath and let it out, then gave Jerl a complex look. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to—”

“It’s okay,” Jerl promised him. “I’ve got nothing to hide. There’s no skeletons in my closet, no dark secrets…and besides. I let you in, remember?”

Mouse was silent a second, staring vacantly at nothing. Just as Jerl was wondering if he should break the silence or leave the younger man alone, he cleared his throat and looked Jerl in the eye.

“Nobody’s ever opened up to me like that before. Everyone I know has a secret, loves secrets. Dad does. Ju-Wi and Imdura do. But you…you just opened the door for me, when I needed it, even though it’d cost you every secret you have.”

“Did you find any?”

“No. That’s the bit I can’t wrap my head around. You…really don’t have anything to hide, do you?”

“Oh, I bite my tongue to be polite just like the next fella,” Jerl shrugged. “But…no. I’ve got my ship, I’ve got my crew, I’ve got people I care about and who care about me. There’s not a lot I want for, really.”

“There’s got to be something, though?”

Jerl shrugged. “A quick end to all this Words of Creation nonsense so I can get back to just enjoying life would be nice. That and maybe a warm body in my bunk…”

To his immense satisfaction, Mouse laughed, turned a little red in the face, and looked down. “That…does sound nice.”

“Mhm.” There was nothing more to say. Mouse had already had a good look inside Jerl’s head and seen everything there was to see. Which honestly sounded like a bad time, to Jerl. He certainly couldn’t think of anyone he’d want to know in such a way, not even the people closest to him.

“Haven’t you got a ship to run?” Mouse asked after a moment.

“True.”

“You should probably.”

“I should probably,” Jerl agreed. “But later, I want to talk about what you’ve kept of the Word, and about what we’re going to do with that box you’re still carrying. We’re going to need to know what you can do. Besides getting an entire city to ignore us, I mean.”

“I hope it’s just one city. But fine, yes. We’ll talk later…” Mouse swayed away from the gunwale and nodded, then frowned at something in the distance. “What’s that?”

Jerl turned to look. After a second, he fished in the case on his belt and produced his telescope.

What he saw through it took his worries away in a rush of utter relief. Up ahead, drifting through a cloud bank, was an earthmote. A rogue earthmote, so vanishingly tiny that if Mouse hadn’t happened to glance in the right direction, they would very likely have flown past it and never known it existed.

That all by itself was nothing to get excited about. The sky was full of such drifting pebbles, and they were easily missed, in all senses. Nobody would even think to take note of its passing.

But this one had something that most didn’t. In the middle of its flat back surrounded by farms, a windmill, and a mooring mast, sat an inn. Which meant this was a wandering isle, one of the tiny earthmotes that pinballed around the worlds, sticking for a few days to the major landmasses it encountered. This one had probably just parted ways with Alakbir and was now going somewhere else.

In ages past, before the invention of the airship, wandering isles were the only way to travel from mote to mote, and had been home to a whole civilization of people whose lives consisted of providing hospitality and supplies to travelers who wished to ride on their isle, to wherever it took them.

Few people bothered with them, nowadays. Why would you, when an airship could make the voyage more directly, predictably and dependably? But the Islekeepers endured, living as they always had: in comfort, wherever the wind took them. And there would always be enough people using their services to keep the coin flowing.

Including, now, the crew of the Cavalier Queen. Jerl retracted his telescope and put it away.

“That,” he said, “is exactly the miracle we needed.”

Even as he said it though, he knew it was no miracle. It was his own doing, the premonitions he’d left for himself pointing him in just the right direction for this stroke of apparent luck to happen. But who was he to look a gift from himself in the mouth? Jerl grinned, darted away from the rail, and went to grab Gebby and point him toward the mote.

Though part of him did wish he could be there to see the anger on Civorage’s face when he realized they’d slipped away again…

----------------------------------------

> “Those who practice the ‘Craft,’ if they can ever be distracted from their fornication long enough to voice an opinion, will generally assert that they are attempting to ‘commune with the worlds’ and ‘embrace nature.’ They are, in short, wholeheartedly rejecting civilization and all its virtues.”

> —Denrick Roth,Witches

THE AULD FOREST

Enerlend Province, Garanhir Earthmote 09.05.15.12.02

When Saoirse and Rheannach had asked her to wear something rugged that she could sleep in for several days, Ellaenie had struggled at first. Ducal life meant she hadn’t worn the same outfit two days in a row since…well, ever!

Rugged she could do, though. In fact, her nice hard-wearing riding ensemble in tweed was easily the easiest, simplest clothing she had. She didn’t even need a lady-in-waiting to help her dress!

It seemed to pass muster, anyway. Saoirse simply looked her up and down, shrugged, nodded, and mounted her horse.

Well. Not her horse. He was one of Ellaenie’s, a handsome Betlend Cob gelding by the name of Sidan. But he was her horse for the duration of her stay, and Saoirse had won his instant and undying loyalty the moment they met by sneaking him a mint humbug.

Ellaenie for her part was riding Rosewild, a rather more feisty creature than Sidan who’d been her favorite since she was twelve.

Rheannach needed no horse. Among her many powers was the gift of shape-changing, and Ellaenie had grown up on nursery stories of Rheannach taking raven form: to actually see it for herself was…

What a thing it was to be able to call a Herald her friend and mentor.

This trip out into the Auld Forest was no mere pleasant ride in the country, there was purpose to it. They were performing a ritual, apparently. Exactly what ritual, neither Saoirse nor Rheannach had shared, but they promised it was important.

They had also insisted it must happen privately. Ordinarily, Ellaenie couldn’t go anywhere in private, given that she was the duchess and her entourage wherever she went was necessarily enormous, but they’d managed to work out a compromise. The entourage would be nearby, rather than directly with them.

Lord Drevin had been instrumental in securing that. He, of course, was the one person besides Ellaenie who knew the secret of who “Calyah” really was. His say-so as Ellaenie’s spymaster and as a colonel of the Enerlend armies had done much to make things easier.

All of which was how, after riding for two days without a proper rest, bath or change of clothing, Ellaenie came to slip down from Rosewild’s back feeling saddle-sore and tired, but also eager.

One day had been enough to reach the edge of the Auld Forest, where the waters of the river Heigh stopped the trees from coming any further. They’d made camp on the banks, with Ellaenie rather enjoying the novel experience of having to set up her own tent, light the campfire and cook her own dinner.

Progress into the forest was a different matter. The woods were well-used of course: they were part of the public commons, maintained by foresters to supply wood for the city, picked over by herbalists and foragers and haunted by hunters. This was a living, civilized forest, one that was just as much a part of Enerlend’s economy as any mine, quarry or stockyard. So, for much of its interior, there were trails to follow.

But not all of the Auld Forest was like that, according to Rheannach.

“People have good instincts,” she explained. She was back in human form for now, walking alongside Rosewild while Ellaenie rode side-saddle and listened. “There are places in the forest set aside for other purposes. Not by any decree or treaty, but because they’re sacred.”

“We’re going to one such?”

“That’s right.”

“What…exactly is it that makes a place sacred?” Ellaenie asked.

“You’ve never felt it yourself?”

Ellaenie shrugged.

“She grew up in a palace, remember,” Saoirse commented. “This here’s the first time our duchess maiden will e’er set foot in the wilds.”

Rheannach nodded thoughtfully, then looked around them. “You wouldn’t catch my husband dead in this neck of the woods,” she said.

“Why not?”

“Too tame. This is the next best thing to a cobbled street, though it may not look it. Look, you see the fruit bushes along the trail?”

“Yes?”

“That’s the work of generations of foragers. The trail itself tells of hundreds of feet a month passing this way. The grove we’re going to…only witches would even know what to do with it.”

“And what’s that?” Ellaenie asked.

“Ach, haven’t ye read it in your books?” Saoirse asked, in the light tone that told Ellaenie she was about to be teased mercilessly. “Why, we sup of strange mushroom tea and dance naked in the night!”

“Both of which are a lot of fun,” Rheannach added.

“Wait…you’re serious? You don’t actually—?” Ellaenie asked, a little shocked.

“Of course I do. Why not? I mean, it’s not why we’re here, but you definitely should.”

“Why?”

Rheannach stopped walking, and Rosewild halted with her. She looked up at Ellaenie with a curiously intense expression. “You’ve been raised in a world of gems and silks and finery and people waiting on you hand and foot. I won’t call you spoiled, but you are…out of touch. Not just with the natural world, but with an important part of yourself.”

“What part is that?”

“That you are a wild animal yourself, my dear.”

Ellaenie frowned at her, then down at her own riding outfit. “I thought one of the important things about thinking beings is that we’re not wild animals.”

“Then ye haven’t paid close attention,” Saoirse commented. “The wild’s always just under the skin, darling. When a man loses himself in the killin’ o’ battle, when the newlyweds lose themselves in the makin’ o’ new life, when the children are threatened an’ a harmless mother becomes a bear…or in your case, when the young lose yourselves in the joy o’ learning. ‘Tis all nature.”

“Human beings do themselves a great disservice to lose touch with their wildness,” Rheannach agreed.

“What about the elves? Have you ever seen the Empires of the Dead? I’m sure the elves of Vathelan would have said it was nature for them to enjoy skinning their slaves alive.”

“Those were dark days,” Rheannach agreed. “They took the cruelty that lurks naturally in every heart and embraced it in ways they never should have. But that was a case of going too far, and an excess of restraint and self-denial is just as dangerous. Tell me, when in your life have you ever truly made yourself vulnerable?”

Ellaenie frowned. “…Why would I?”

“Ach. Spoken like a follower o’ the Art,” Saoirse lamented. “Power, power, power, that’s all the Art sees. Ye’re a witch now, lass. And if ye’re to be a good one, ye need to know just how vulnerability can reshape the world.”

“There is deep, unattainable power in it,” Rheannach elaborated. “The give and take of life, to dominate and submit, to protect and to receive…you must master both. If you can’t throw off your cloak and stand gloriously bare in front of existence itself, you can’t ever truly be humble when it comes time to wield power. After all,” she added, stroking Rosewild’s nose. “How can a ruler be wise if she does not know what it is like to be ruled?”

“Besides. Some kinds o’ vulnerability are a lot o’ fun…as yer husband will one day teach ye if he’s worth marryin’,” Saoirse added, throwing in a lecherous smile that left Ellaenie’s face burning pink.

Rheannach giggled at her discomfort, then indicated off the trail. “Come on. Here is where we part ways with the horses.”

“They’ll be safe?” Ellaenie fretted.

“Perfectly, I promise you.”

They plunged into the trailless brush. Far from catching and snagging on her skirt or on the other two’s tartans however, the brambles and branches always seemed to bend just the right way. It wasn’t anything so dramatic as a path opening for them, but still the forest seemed to let them in.

“…Is this witch-magic, or herald-magic?”

“Witchcraft. Not my doing, either,” Rheannach replied. “This is all Saoirse.”

Ellaenie glanced at their coven’s beldame, who gave her a smug look and tapped the ground with her walking stick. It was quite a handsome one, in the odd fashion favored by the Craenen: polished smooth from both dilligent craftsmanship and long use, with a forked flare at the top for its bearer to rest their thumb, and a leather wrap about a third of the way down which Saoirse had decorated with bird bones and feathers.

Fetishes, she called them. They served much the same function as a magestone, with the critical difference that they had once been part of something living. Ellaenie had struggled with them, so far. A magestone’s energy was very…clean, like a properly glazed stoneware cup that could hold water without flavoring it. Fetishes, though, altered the energy they held. Flavored it, added their own distinctiveness. An Artisan would call the magic they stored polluted: Saoirse called it aspected.

Just one of the many ways in which pivoting from studying the Art to studying the Craft had proven difficult. Ellaenie was having to un-learn much of what she learned, even while she used it to make sense of what she was learning.

The Craft was living, though. Changing, flowing, emotional, muddy, dirty, organic and intuitive. One didn’t control the Craft so much as persuade it. And Saoirse, she’d quickly learned, was a lifelong master of persuasion.

So, the plants obligingly offered no resistance, the roots politely failed to trip them, and what Ellaenie had feared would be an hours-long slog through the underbrush instead was almost a stroll.

The forest was very different, here. Rheannach was right, even a few hundred yards off the path the texture of it changed dramatically. These woods were older, untouched, unbothered by human hand. As often as not, their path was dictated by the lie of long-fallen deadwood as by the still-standing living trunks. The air carried smells that Ellaenie couldn’t identify, mossy and musky and grassy and animal.

More than that, though, it carried a feeling of age. As though this place had been much like this from the First Day, and all the worlds had spun on around it without ever touching here.

Well…not quite. Their destination, which they entered quite abruptly, was a cleft in the ground where the soil was too shallow and stony for anything significant to take root. There was grass, and a scattering of wildflowers, but little more.

The stones had been carved by human hand. To Ellaenie’s eyes, the carvings looked scratchy and crude, as though whoever made them had been gripped with the fervent need to communicate but had no artistic or literate education to draw upon. Primitive stick figures formed a circle of supplication around two other, larger figures: one was tall and broad, the body described by a thick triangle and the head adorned with…a crown? Antlers?

The other, smaller, more feminine figure had wings, and held aloft a trio of circles, one of them broken. A chain.

Rheannach sighed and cleaned a little moss off the stones. “A place is sacred because people make it so,” she said. “Their spirit echoes down through time, long after they’re gone.”

“Is that…you?”

“It’s Raksuul. The version of me they worshipped. The chainbreaker goddess, the defiant voice. The weeping witch, who shed tears for them when no-one else would.” Rheannach looked briefly as though the memory might make her cry again. She sighed heavily again and stepped away from the carving. “The elves were so cruel in those days…”

“And…your husband?”

“Yes. His wrath, once finally provoked…was unstoppable.”

“Why did he let it happen at all?”

Rheannach didn’t answer for a moment. her pause was thoughtful, as though she was staring into the past and remembering the faces who’d carved this sketch in the stone. “He has…immense respect for free will. I will not put words into his mouth, but it is genuine, and more than anything it is that respect which restrains his hand. For which we should be grateful. The Crowns have their domains, and power is his.”

“I thought they were equal in power?”

“It is a matter of perspective. Where it concerns us and this world they have made for us, each is equally responsible for it, in their own ways. But when it comes to the power of creation itself….”

“Equal does’nae mean the same, after all,” Saoirse pointed out.

“Yes. That is the essence of the Craft. The King is might incarnate, but what he does with it all is tempered by those he loves most. He is vastly more powerful than the other Crowns, but at the same time deeply dependent on their love and counsel. He is mightier than all of them, and nothing without them.”

“Just like with any throne,” Ellaenie realized.

“Exactly. There’s more to creation than force and desire. The Crowns balance at the apex of power, and so they know better than anyone how carefully it must be used, and where it truly comes from.”

“But you intervened long before he did.”

Rheannach shook her head no. “All I did was give a haven to those who escaped, and treated them like they mattered. It was nothing, less than the least I could do. But at the same time it was the first crumb of true kindness they’d ever known from somebody with power over them. So they worshipped me as though I’d personally set them free.”

She sighed heavily, lost in the memory. “When the time came, when the human slaves finally managed to organize and grow and overthrow the Ordfey, that’s when we all, Crowns and Heralds alike, made our displeasure known in full. But we only did it after the humans had already won their freedom, because if they did not reclaim mastery of their own fate, they would just be trading slavery under one power for slavery under another. And slavery, however gentle and benevolent the master, is barren soil in which the spirit can never properly flourish.”

Ellaenie nodded. “I think I understand.”

“Good. This isn’t what we brought you here for, but I think it was important for you to see it.”

“So…what are we here for?” Ellaenie asked.

Rheannach shot her an unreadable glance, her face suddenly and curiously inexpressive. Then she turned, and walked between the carved stones and down into the cleft. “Follow, and find out.”

Ellaenie glanced at Saoirse, who gave her a twinkling but enigmatic smile and followed Rheannach, the shoe of her walking stick tapping on the rocks as she went.

Well…alright, then.

The cleft swiftly turned into a ravine. As Ellaenie followed her mentors the stone on either side of her grew ever higher and higher, until all the worlds were gone and all she could see was this narrow squeezing gap between two towering mossy walls. Within minutes, even the sky was gone, hidden by the looming overhangs and the tree canopy.

For minutes, the only sounds were the tapping of Saoirse’s cane, and Ellaenie’s own footsteps as she picked her way down a path of smooth, loose pebbles any one of which would have made for a perfect magestone.

Then there was a tight spot, a corner…

And open space, so unexpected as to leave Ellaenie blinking in astonishment.

They were in a glade of sorts, or perhaps the more accurate word was crater. The formation was so perfectly circular, it was almost like a titanic chef had pressed a pastry cutter down into the earthmote’s surface and removed a scone-shaped puck, which was marred only by the crack through which they’d entered, a patch where the crater’s edge was a shallow forested slope, and an immense rocky spike which jut up from the very center.

“Woah…”

“Aye. Ye stand in one o’ the most sacred places in all the worlds now, dear.”

Ellaenie nodded, breathless. She could feel it, the spiritual presence of this location seemed to rush up through her boots to squeeze at her heart.

As they approached the central spike, she realized it was an altar of sorts. At some point, an alcove had been carved in the front, and within she could see…offerings. Thousands of years of offerings, from hundreds of different people, still remarkably well-preserved by the alcove that kept them out of the sun and rain.

Some, she guessed, had been modest: there was a scattering of beads in glass, wood, bone, clay and metal, though many of them were no longer strung onto anything. There were small piles of coins in dozens of different denominations, an elven vamdraech, an ocarina…

“Who are these for? What are they for? I never heard of the Crowns accepting tribute…”

“Of course no’. The Crowns dinnae claim godhood…” Saoirse unfastened one of the trinkets from her walking stick and laid it down before bowing and taking a step back. “’Tis no’ about them. ‘Tis an offering tae the sacred itself.”

Rheannach slid a silver ring from the middle finger of her right hand, placed it down gently, bowed, and took a step back in turn, and Ellaenie realized…this was expected of her too. And she hadn’t known. She hadn’t had time to prepare, or bring anything special…

She paused. Then, with a touch of sadness and a whispered apology to Adrey Mossjoy, she reached up and untied the ribbon choker that held the wonderful opal magestone to her throat.

“Are ye sure, lass?” Saoirse asked. “‘Tis a right valuable offering, that.”

“I didn’t bring anything else. And…” Ellaenie considered the stone. It really was beautiful but it was also, she’d come to understand, a tool of the Art. The Craft was so different as to make it basically just a shiny bauble a friend had given her. Expensive, to be sure…

But what it represented was leaving behind the study of the Art. And that felt…very right, somehow. She took a deep breath, kissed the magestone, and laid it down carefully in the alcove before bowing and taking a step back. She could feel both her mentors’ approval as a kind of warmth in the back of her mind, which only got warmer when Rheannach gave her a little one-armed squeeze and whispered “Well done.”

Ellaenie nodded and exhaled, feeling like she’d let go of something that would have weighed her down.

“So…what comes next?”

“Oh, we wont’ have to wait long…” Rheannach predicted. She turned to face the edge of the glade where the forest came spilling over the edge and down a bank rather than a cliff. “He’ll be here any minute.”

“He—?”

Ellaenie’s question died in her throat as she turned her attention outwards again and felt it. There was a…a presence approaching. She couldn’t hear or see it, but she could feel it as it moved, thrumming the space around them. Both magically…

And physically. There was rhythmic shuddering, a feeling through the ground as if something truly immense was walking about. She expected to see, what? Few creatures were weighty enough to be felt in their steps, and none she’d ever met had such earth-shakingly heavy footfalls! No draft horse, no matter how big. No prize bull, no matter how powerful…

Not even a rampaging elephant could do such a thing!

No. Instead, into the clearing paraded the most impressive stag she’d ever witnessed or even imagined. It was a giant, primal king of the wild, not overly tall but thickly layered over from neck to rump with healthy, rippling brawn. It was crowned with great towering antlers covered in soft velvet, fur perfect and unscarred, eyes fierce and challenging, with its body taut and ready for anything. It carried its might effortlessly as it pranced about, thumping the earth with its massive hooves, tossing its head proudly and exulting in its being, as if it understood its magnificence. The pale nighttime light reflected from the far earthmotes gleamed on its every deep-carved, perfect line.

The magnificent buck turned its full attention to them. What she’d seen in profile was so much more seen from head-on—no. It was as if the creature was somehow increasing before her very eyes, yet it wasn’t changing at all! It was an otherworldly sight. No painting or hunter’s tale came close to the vision standing before them.

Entranced though Ellaenie was, Rheannach snorted as if meeting an old, familiar friend. “Oh, very subtle. I suppose an understated entrance was too much to ask?”

The stag…chuckled?

Then it changed.

Ellaenie’s mind refused to quite follow the strange shapes it went through as the glossy coat receded, the shape of the shoulders and trunk changed, as it stood up, and up…

And the stag-vision in all its perfection became human, then expanded into something so very, very much more. He was a flawlessly, brutally handsome vision of a man, with long, luxuriant inky-black hair and shining flawless skin, well-tanned and supple like the most beautiful of youths. He had a dusting of black body hair everywhere too, which, strangely to Ellaenie, somehow served to amplify both his youthful beauty and his extreme masculinity.

For he was a giant hulking brute of a man. He stood naked before them, huge and perfectly sculpted like an ancient warrior-god, his vast granite-like musculature fighting with itself for space on his inhumanly powerful frame.

If she had to guess, he must have stood something over…over eight feet tall, with the beam of his boulder-like shoulders more than half of that across. Every inch of him was packed deep and full to bursting with strength, from his broad, sinewy bullneck above a massive slab of a chest, down through a thick cobbled belly and a giant, rippling pair of legs. Great heavy arms packed with bulging muscle hung from those vast shoulders, each bigger than his head. Veins showed prominently everywhere under his skin, especially on his arms and legs, his enormous blunt-fingered hands, his huge sturdy feet…

There were simply no words.

Strangely, and just as she’d seen with his stag-form, the more she gawped at his unreal presence, the more of everything he seemed to become, yet…he wasn’t actually changing. It was as if…as if she could not comprehend what she was seeing, and it was her growing understanding that slowly revealed the fullness of him. The more she studied, the more she saw…

The man before her radiated power, so strongly it was blinding her sense of the magical to all but him. Awesome power in every sense of the word. Powerful feelings she couldn’t identify stirred within her. Awe, certainly. And many others. She couldn’t look away. He was magnificent. Terribly, terribly so.

But his deep, chest-shaking voice was somehow…gentle. Friendly. Playful. And his smile for them was genuine.

…It was him. She was in the presence of the King. Not some lowly royal in some human province. This was the King of the Crowns. Caernnenas, Strength-Of-Trees, the Stagfather.

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Eärrach.

“I have rarely been accused of subtlety, my love.” He shot his wife a teasing grin and spread his arms wide. “Is this better?” His grin grew wicked, then he growled, curled his arms inward and…

Ellaenie felt a flush run through her and she had to avert her eyes. He was showing off for Rheannach and paying no heed to the other two, as if he hadn’t a care in the world. It was just too much on top of everything else!

“Yes,” he proclaimed confidently. “Much better. Why should I be subtle at all?”

Rheannach’s reaction was…interesting, to Ellaenie. She folded her arms and tried to radiate cool disapproval, but she was fooling nobody. Under the facade she was amused, glad to see him…and powerfully in love.

And he played right back. He reached out and ran the back of his hand down her cheek, in a gesture of nigh-infinite tenderness and gentleness. “I’ve missed you.”

“I’m still mad at you,” she chided, even though she leaned her face into his caress slightly. “And spare Ellaenie some blushes, you lout! You could at least pretend to some modesty.”

“It’s been eighty years, beloved. Far too long to stay truly mad at me. And why should I?” He gave Ellaenie a truly mischievous look. “I think she likes what she sees!”

Ellaenie felt like her face was on fire, but Eärrach acquiesced and a minimal cloth of plain, smooth weave materialized to cover his…his very much maleness.

It didn’t hide anything. Not that anything could hide something that…that…

“Better, I suppose. Still an oaf when you want to cause trouble, I see. And Sayf still waxes on about that entire affair!”

Eärrach laughed, deep and friendly and entirely playfully. “Of course he does! Boy needs to be humbled, now and then…”

“As do you.”

“And none are so skilled at humbling a man as you! Come, now. I have a warm cabin and a good fire. And for our guest, I have a hot bath with good soap and clean, comfortable clothes. Sometimes, it’s the simple luxuries in life, eh?”

Ellaenie would have never understood that before today. But after days riding and tromping about…

“But first…” he added, and took Ellaenie’s hand. He was so colossally tall, he had to sink to his knees to properly reach, and his hand was so vast that her fingers could barely reach around one of his own; but he, absurdly, bowed and kissed her hand like the most refined gentleman at court. “There is a necessity we must attend to, if you are to advance in the Craft or long endure in my presence.”

“Wh…what necessity, your majesty?” Ellaenie asked.

“An inward preparation. You could spend some hard weeks laboring furiously, meditating, fasting, studying, and making attempt after attempt to attain the inward Eye, or…I can save you the trouble.”

“A…shortcut?” Ellaenie asked, confused.

“Assistance. Without downside, I assure you. Though it won’t be entirely pleasant…”

She looked to Saoirse, who nodded encouragingly.

“Well…I didn’t expect any of this to be easy, so…whatever you think is necessary, your majesty.”

He nodded, skewered Ellaenie with his dark gaze, and before she could even brace herself she felt overwhelming power pass through her, around her, into her and out, an ocean of it, so much she felt herself flayed apart and floating away—

----------------------------------------

—and then it was over, as if it hadn’t happened at all. All that remained was the memory of it. She knew, somehow, it had been agony and bliss and terror and intimate and…so many things, all at once. But whatever had happened in just that glance, he’d been kind enough to put right. She knew all these things had happened, but she had no recollection of them.

He’d torn her apart and put her back together, and was nice enough to let her know he’d done it.

Weirdest of all, was the sense that she’d known what it would entail, somehow.

Because I did. The thought was like an ice bath.

“Apologies,” he offered. “I have found over the years that the kindest way to help a novice open their inner self involves brute force of mind. I hope it was not too much.”

Ellaenie blinked, a little confused as to his meaning, but… “I…no. It’s just—no. I’m fine. I sense you’ve done me a kindness, somehow.”

“And spared you the pain of it,” Saoirse added.

Eärrach nodded, and let go of Ellaenie’s hand. “But not the memory. The memory is important. You will come to understand very soon. But in the meantime, where are our manners?! You have not introduced us, my wife!”

“You were too enraptured by young Ellaenie, the Duchess of Enerlend, my love.”

He gave an acknowledging shrug, and nodded agreement. “You know me too well. It is a pleasure to meet you at last, your grace.”

Unthinkingly, Ellaenie dropped a curtsey in reply though part of her noted the ‘at last.’ “The pleasure is mine, your majesty.”

He flashed her a smile and a puckish wink, then straightened to look at Saoirse, who was leaning on her walking stick and watching him with quite an amused expression. “Good to see you too, you old hag.”

“Ach, last we met I wasn’t so haggish as this, now was I?”

“You’ve only grown in the beauty that counts,” he offered. Genuinely, too.

“I could do wi’out the bloody arthritis, though,” she countered with a smile.

“Just say the word. You’ve long ago earned it from me.”

“Ne’er. I’ll take ye up on that warm cabin an’ good fire, though.”

He nodded approvingly. “Good! I’m happy to provide. There’s fresh kill roasting on the fire, too.”

“Never turn down a good meal,” Saoirse intoned sagely. “You never know when you’ll get better.”

“I like to think my table is up to standard,” King Eärrach grinned. “Rustic though it is. Now come! I would hear your story, young duchess.”

With that, the great hulk of a man turned and walked into the woods, and it was here that any remaining doubts—if one could possibly have them—were dispelled. The Crowns famously changed the very world with their steps. It was different for each of course, but with Eärrach, the Stagfather, the King of All, the master of life and the wild things of the world…

Eärrach strengthened the world behind him. Trees thickened and sprouted. Grass grew lusher, the air thicker and heavy. Greenery spread in pulsing waves with his every step, the din of animal sounds grew that bit more complex, more fundamental and fierce.

And the earth moved beneath him. The sensation was hard to describe; it wasn’t the same as if something immensely heavy had fallen nearby. This was so much more. It was as if something mighty enough to contest with the earthmote itself was walking about. She could feel magics far too immense to comprehend radiating away beneath his feet, connecting him to every part of the entire mote they were standing on…and of his incomprehensible weight pushing it about.

As she followed, she began to accept that such a thing was, beyond all belief, exactly the truth. Eärrach was beyond any limits. The power to create worlds, the weight to push them about. The sheer strength, she no longer doubted, to jump from Sayf down to the Unbroken Mote and leap back up again, as the silliest children’s tales of his exploits would have one believe. But now? Seeing him in person and feeling his immense presence as it dominated the world beneath him…

And he left monstrously huge, inhumanly wide footprints of hot, new stone behind him, just as the stories claimed. Air shimmered above them and she could feel the heat radiating off each, as if the very land had been fused together by the might of his passing. On the rare occasions he’d visited palace halls, his always-bare feet famously left impressions in the rich marble floors as if they were wet mud.

Next to such a being, what could she do but follow along as he bade?

Of course, there was another, rather uncomfortable matter: he pressed on the senses like no other man she had ever met. His scent, his shape, his voice and his movements. The sheer brutal handsomeness of his face and physique. All of it far, far beyond mortal dreaming. She tried (and failed) not to gawp at him too much, for Rheannach’s sake, but…well, it was a small trial in itself. Every hulking part of him was in rolling, hypnotic motion, sinuously predatory yet confident like the most arrogant bull, from the craggy boulders in his calves, through the alternately swelling mountains of his distressingly huge rear, up along the rolling hillocks of his back to the high peaks astride his colossal pillar of a neck.

It was at once so much it was outright revolting…yet it’s perfection meant she couldn’t look away, and she couldn’t deny the tight feeling in her chest.

Fortunately Rheannach didn’t seem to mind. She seemed quite amused by it, in fact.

If the forest had seemed to make way for them before, now it was like the land itself conspired to speed their journey. What should have been a long hike through forest and hill and vale took a strange turn down between some rocks, followed a babbling stream downhill between mossy walls of stone, and then out onto the shores of a small lake, where a fishing jetty and a log cabin were waiting for them.

Strange. To judge from the chimney, the fire was lit inside, but Ellaenie hadn’t smelled any smoke until they got close.

In any case, the cabin was…not what she expected. It was hand-hewn and sturdy. Mighty trees indeed were felled to build it, yet it was still somehow a modest home. Tall and sizable enough to handle its owner of course, but still unassuming. Perhaps it was rather more complete, as log cabins went: there were a few obvious rooms, and a stone chimney sat against the biggest. But compared to a proper countryside chateau? Let alone the Ducal palace?

“Like it?” He turned his great head backward and grinned down at her. “Nice and cozy against the evening drizzle! And I’ve already drawn you a bath. You’re not used to days on end in the same clothes, so I imagine you feel quite ready, hmm?”

“…How did you—?”

He chuckled, low and amused. “I am a creature who strides across space and time as you might across a dance floor. How do you think I did such a thing?”

“You knew we’d be coming?”

“I hoped.” Eärrach shot his wife a warm look, then opened the door. “Maicoh! Maingan! We have guests!”

There was a crackling fire in the hearth, which was hung with sturdy wrought iron tools. There was also an ocean of fur asleep in front of it. Midnight black and milk white, with no clear boundary between the two—

Until two great wolves detangled themselves. They were…well. Great. What a man like Eärrach would keep as companions. Appropriately powerful canines to put dire wolves to shame.

And Heralds. Maicoh and Maingan were legends in their own right: the horned god’s hunting hounds, who’d crashed into the ranks of the Ordfey armies in the great battles that ended the elvish empire and wreaked as much carnage as entire cavalry formations. The elves had named them Boweth and Adhfö, Howling Death and Silent Nemesis. The very spirits of revenge.

Right now, they seemed far more inclined to embody the spirit of puddle.

Nonetheless, they dutifully pointed their noses at her and gave the air a sniff before Maicoh rose, approached and nuzzled against her hand, demanding scritches which Ellaenie was only too happy to give.

On the other hand, Maingan the white female yawned, tucked her nose under her tail, and went back to sleep.

Eärrach’s demeanor changed notably with that.

“Really, now? It’s been ages since you’ve approved of anyone I invite over.”

Maicoh yawned, and damn near crushed Ellaenie’s legs by laying his chin on her lap.

“Careful, boy. You forget your strength sometimes.”

A tail as thick and heavy as a fire log thumped the ground twice, making the tools in the hearth rattle on their hooks.

“Oh yes, he understands perfectly,” Eärrach answered before Ellaenie even thought to ask the question. “He is properly a person and not a beast. He can read and think as well as any other. Speak too, if he pleases. Even take human form. Usually he does not. I think the last time he deigned to do either was, what? Eighty years ago?”

He glanced at Rheannach for confirmation. Rheannach, who was standing oddly aloof in the doorway, with her arms folded. Maicoh looked up at her, then sat and whined plaintively.

Rheannach softened. “Don’t you worry, blackfur. I am glad to see you.”

Another whine, if such a word was entirely right for a rumbling noise that Ellaenie felt more in her belly than heard with her ears.

Rheannach sighed. “And I’m glad to see him, yes.” She shot Eärrach a look that Ellaenie couldn’t interpret at all, then squatted down to rub her fellow Herald under his chin.

Eärrach for his part seemed…resigned. Heavy touch of melancholy. Not that he was difficult to read, his feelings radiated out of him like the weight of an imminent storm.

“Rhee…if you’d rather not be here…”

“I’m here. Our maiden needs this.”

“That’s not what I asked, my love.”

There was no rebuke in his voice, no anger. Only that feeling of an old, old argument playing itself out again, its every movement predictable and known in advance.

She gave Maicoh another scratch, then stood up. “Then…give me a little more time.”

“Of course, Rheannach. It is not mine to give.”

“You, who created us all?”

“Not even I am the master of all things. You have always been free to do as you will.”

“Have I?”

Ellaenie blinked at the wave of terrible sadness that rolled off him. Rheannach had wounded him, in a way Ellaenie wouldn’t have guessed anyone could. “Yes. From the moment I made you. I mean it with all my heart.”

Ellaenie couldn’t imagine how those words and the sincerity that went along with them didn’t thaw Rheannach instantly and completely. And they did have some effect, in that she paused, then turned away from the door long enough to kiss him lightly on the lips, touch her forehead to his…

And then she was gone. The storm of muddled passions that had entirely filled the cabin went with her.

A pause could hardly be more awkward.

Eärrach sighed, looking at the door, then gave Ellaenie a wan look. “From this you should learn that no man, no matter how mighty, is immune from the power of an unhappy love.”

Ellaenie felt a small nudge in the small of her back from Saoirse. Of course, this was…some kind of a test, or a moment of learning. She should say…something. Prove something about herself.

Well…

“I note you didn’t actually apologize to her for anything…” she ventured.

“Or she to me. Our quarrel isn’t so easy as that. Besides…that would require I apologize for creating her in the first place. You can see how that might be a bit awkward.”

“…Admittedly, not a species of problem I’m experienced with…”

“Heh!” His laugh was deep and explosive. “I can see why my heralds like you.”

Another touch in the arm from Saoirse: well done, lass.

Ellaenie nodded her understanding, and looked around the room a little more closely.

She’d heard stories of the Oasis where Prince Sayf reclined on silken cushions by glittering fountains among the finest marble and tilework, sipping wine while petitioners across the world came to him with performance and poetry and music to delight. She’d seen artists’ likenesses of Queen Talvi’s Glacier Keep, whose towering blue walls were the most colorful, glittering feature in an endless field of snow and black rocks, and the pure ice refracted the light so that the interior was lit with rainbows.

Lady Haust, of course, kept no home that anyone knew of. And it had always been known that King Eärrach lived in the woods with his lady wife and his hunting hounds…but if she’d ever thought to try and imagine it, she would have pictured something a little more…

Well…something a little more. A grand house in the midst of the most awe-inspiring scenery, built across gorges and watered by falls, maybe. Something equal in stature to the First of Four.

This was just a hunting lodge. There were herbs tied to the rafters, a boar spear over the door, and the rug had once been a brown bear large enough to be the king of all bears. The walls were decorated mostly with simple tools and handiwork, but here and there was a trophy fish fit to make a champion angler bite his rod in half, or the antlers of a beast that could have battered down a castle’s gates. A couple of exquisite paintings had pride of place, both depicting things she didn’t understand: one showed some kind of mythical warriors of a stature worthy of Eärrach himself, the other…was mostly black, and depicted a swirling mass of colored, point-like lights…

Both were masterworks worthy of the King, but they stood out precisely because of that. The rest? Elevated, perhaps. But ordinary. The air smelled of hearthfire, dry herbs, wood oil, beeswax, fur, leather, firewood and salted meat, and the furniture was…

Well, actually. The furniture was hand-made by one who’d mastered woodworking over time immemorial, and who favored simplicity. The table had once been the knotted and knurled roots of a tree, painstakingly polished and sanded smooth to create something that was both a sturdy eating surface, and an elegant sweeping work of natural art.

It was, above all else, cozy. Ellaenie had often had to wrap up warm in the Ducal palace’s studies and chambers, even with the fires roaring. This cabin, though, felt like the worst blizzard in the worlds might break against it, and the occupants would scarcely notice. In fact, she was already starting to feel quite warm.

“May I take your coats?” Eärrach offered.

“Uh…thank you!”

He gathered her riding coat and Saoirse’s shawl, and hung them on a pair of wrought iron hooks by the door, alongside a vast leather cape. Helpful, considerate, polite…while he himself remained bare of anything at all save the smooth bit of cloth barely containing his loins.

The primal heart of man, right there: infinite capacity to be both civilized and savage. And that was the true difference. The being before her was achingly perfect to behold, outsized and heroic beyond words. He couldn’t properly claim modesty, as shamelessly unclothed as he was…

But the life he chose to live said more about who and what he valued more than anything else.

“We will talk of many things,” he said as he did so. “Of happy and sad memory, of my love’s quarrel with me…But first! That bath awaits you. I would tend to my roast and to Saoirse’s fresh haul of news while you indulge.”

With that, she was shooed into the adjacent room by his great chest-sized mitt patting her gently on her back, the door closed tight behind her…

He’d been right. It was the small luxuries that truly mattered. The bath was simple, but built for Eärrach’s immense frame: Ellaenie found herself almost swimming in water that was right on the edge of being too hot.

She took her time to wash properly, to gently oil her hair and comb it out properly. Her curls would be a mess of course, but there was no helping that anyway without her ladies-in-waiting. She toweled off—and honestly, she’d never experienced a towel so wonderful. Nor the soap, nor the clothing laid out before her. Those were…strange. Unlike any she’d ever seen. But it was, more importantly, clean and didn’t have two days of riding and being worn lingering about it.

Sinfully comfortable, too.

There was a mirror. One of the expensive ones made of silvered glass, which made it one of the only expensive things she’d seen in this cabin. When she examined herself in it, she had to blink at the strangeness of her own reflection. The clothes were cut so oddly, so…simply. They weren’t unflattering, but nor were they flattering. They were just…bits of fabric to cover her body. There was no discernible fashion to them, that she was familiar with.

Still. They seemed serviceable, and far better than the unwashed blouse and petticoats she’d been wearing for more than a day. And who was she to refuse a Crown’s gift?

She came out of the bathroom, still toweling her hair, and simply had to ask.

“They are things from a world long, long gone. Things the people of this new world have not yet learned to make. In time, I suspect. But not now. The soap, though, that is a secret of Sayf’s. I am not so crafty with perfumes and…well, alchemy I suppose.”

“Oh!” Saoirse nodded knowingly. “That towel.”

“A different one! You never did take your own home with you…”

“We’re not here for gifts, your majesty,” Saoirse pointed out.

“No, but a little is not so much to ask, yes?” With that, he presented Saoirse with her own. “I did wash it since then.”

“It’s been forty-some years, I would bloody hope ye did!”

He shrugged. “I am not known for my civilized ways. In any case…please. Sit.” He gestured to his table, and when they’d taken their places he began to carve the deer. A platter of rustic roasted vegetables sat in the middle, fragrant and glistening with butter. “But, before we eat…”

He did something then that shocked Ellaenie entirely, something she would have never imagined he’d do.

He offered a prayer. Not in a language she understood. Nor that anyone understood, if she missed her guess. But the subject could not be more obvious.

It was a prayer of thanksgiving.

“…Amen.”

The meaning of that last bit was impossible to miss.

“Well? Tuck in!”

Questions burned in her head, but it was her stomach that got the best of her. She carved a piece—quite rare, not her preference—but she ate anyway.

It was impossibly delicious.

For some time they ate in silence, too hungry for proper conversation, until at least he punctured the quiet. “I can feel the question about to incinerate you from the inside out, duchess. Please, ask. You need fear nothing at my table.”

He scooped another massive helping of roast venison into his mouth while she composed herself.

“You pray?”

“Of course. As I’ve always told the worlds, young duchess: I am not god.”

She noticed his specific phrasing. “God. Singular.”

“Correct. I realize I can’t truly argue against lesser accusations of godhood…we never wanted worship, you must understand. As strange as it must be to imagine, I was once just as plainly human as you, or any other in this world. What I am now does not change that reality.”

“Perhaps not, but forgive me, you are still godlike. Next to you now, we are all…”

“Points of being so feeble and small,” Saoirse added, “it is only by his great care we exist at all.”

The thought clearly made him uncomfortable. “Reluctantly…yes. But there are limits.”

“You don’t claim supreme power.”

“No. As I said, I am not god.”

She realized. “So you believe in the singular god, as the Oneists proclaim.”

His mood soured so dramatically, it practically made the walls creak. “They,” he said, darkly, “are victims of the worst crime ever to touch these Worlds. It is only the careful, difficult work of undoing such an evil that stays my hand, even now.”

“…Forgive me, your majesty.”

There was a strange effect his stupendous size had on any space he occupied: his moods were magnified by it. When he was happy and jolly, his presence was warm, comforting. Protective. Angered? It was raw threat, radiant of menace and power. But terrible moods did not suit him well. He brightened immediately.

“No, no. Nothing to forgive. A young witch needs a sharp mind!” He turned to Saoirse, “and often a sharp tongue…”

“Aye, though hers is still a wee touch too soft,” Saoirse grinned at Ellaenie.

“The worst crime?” Ellaenie said, carefully ignoring the dig.

“A perversion. The most dangerous lies grow in the soil of truth, and what Nils Civorage uses to shackle and enslave is the twisted echo of a truth that should set the soul free. It…his actions are going to set us back centuries, I fear. In some ways, the peoples of my worlds are woefully behind the curve.”

“The…curve.” Ellaenie frowned, not following the strange turn of phrase at all.

“Ah. Sorry. So, the first important truth you will learn about me and the rest of the Crowns: I am old. If you wish, I can help you understand how old. But it will be a bit of a shock…”

“Why?”

“Because along with it, you will learn a great many other things to frame the scope of it.”

“I….maybe someday? I’m already feeling a little overwhelmed as it is.”

He nodded graciously. “Entirely reasonable. So the short version: it is a turn of phrase from an advanced form of mathematics very few here understand. In fact right now it would be only the Navigators, and the Heralds and Crowns, and…well. That’s for another day. In any case,” and here he took a big bite out of a whole roasted potato, “for you it means there are things the Garanese would have discovered by now, if the worlds were constructed differently. Things which you perhaps cannot reasonably be expected to discover because, firstly: we constructed them this way, and secondly because we are here.”

“Such as?”

“Well…why do your feet stick so firmly to the inward-facing surface of an earthmote? Why don’t humans drift just as the motes themselves do?”

“Well, the navigators suggest it’s because the sun pushes us away. But it doesn’t push the earthmotes away because you fixed them in place with a standing magical field powered by the sun itself.”

“And they’re exactly correct. The problem is, that force would normally work in the opposite direction. The sun is…something special, you see. It exists to serve as a fountain from which light and matter pours forth, back into a dark and empty universe. It is the very beginning of a work that will last…well, from your perspective, effectively forever. These eleven thousand seven hundred and fifteen years since the First Day are nothing, hardly anything at all, next to the scale of the grand work.”

He smiled when Ellaenie frowned, trying to picture that. “Imagine stretching out your arms to either side of you. Imagine that all the distance between one fingertip and the opposite is the length of time that must pass in order for our project here to fairly be said to have completed its infancy. Now imagine that your lady-in-waiting made one stroke of a fine-grained file against your fingernail. In that single stroke, she would file away everything that has elapsed since the First Day.”

Ellaenie tried. It was impossible to hold in her head, but she tried. Eärrach nodded grimly and sat back to swirl a tankard of mead larger than Ellaenie’s head.

“You chose wisely when you declined my offer,” he said. “A proper grasp of the scale involved is, I’m sorry to say, physically impossible for you.”

“But you said…there are things we don’t know that we should?” Ellaenie asked, shaking off the impression.

He nodded, and indicated the strange painting on the wall, the colorful swirl. “You see that?”

“Yes…what is it?”

“It is a galacksee. A thing that does not exist, has not existed, for a stretch of time that would destroy you if you could properly glimpse it. But it was, once, my home. Our home. Where our people came to be, so very long ago.”

“I don’t even know what I’m looking at…” Ellaenie said, shaking her head.

“No. And therein is the problem. This world is not the right shape. It is warped by our wills, by our very existence. It does not rigidly obey its own rules, but our rules. This is necessary, you see, for there to be any intelligent life at all right now, besides we Crowns…and I think we might have filled with despair if we did not have a world to share with someone. You and everything here were created as an act of love. For ourselves, and for you. So, lacking enough mas-ennergie to rebuild the universe proper…We started small. And that has consequence.”

“One o’ which bein’, because it’s no’ consistent tae itself, but is a product o’ their will,” Saoirse interjected, “there are things we cannae know. Truths that are closed tae us that the great minds shouldae found by now. The very thing that lets us live is also a prison.”

“Yes. Please…indulge me one more swipe at the scale, because it is important you have some understanding. Imagine that galacksee there: it was not one object, but rather a cloud of many hundreds of billions of stahs. You do not know what a stah is, of course. They looked much like the sun does here—brilliant points of light overhead. But all the Nested Worlds would fit inside even the very smallest of them a thousand times over. Our own stah? It was vastly bigger…and very much in the average. That painting represents a thing so incredibly vast, light itself would take nearly a hundred thousand years to cross it.”

Saoirse sighed as though she was nostalgic for something she could never have seen. “And there were more galacksees in the sky then stahs in each one.”

In the midst of all that, Ellaenie caught on to a question she could ask. “…Light has speed?”

“Yes!” Eärrach clapped his hands together so excitedly that it was like a small thunderclap. “Exactly! You see the problem! the Worlds are too small for humanity to ever notice this! But it’s one of the most foundational things one must understand if one is to begin to access the deep knowledge. Because the why of the speed of light is tied to time, to the shape of space, to the reason behind aging and decay, to why anything at all has form or color or texture…to everything!”

All of this was, honestly, too much. But she understood the intent. He was coloring something in, with big, broad strokes for her later benefit. First, though…

“I feel compelled to ask: how fast, exactly?”

“One hundred eighty thousand Garanese miles per second, or thereabouts. Nothing moves faster, for most reasonable definitions of ‘move’ or ‘fast…’”

Ellaenie blinked, and tried to chew on that. That was…fast enough to rattle back and forth from one side of the Unbroken Earthmote to the other dozens of times in one second.

And she had no idea what further wonders he was hinting at. He continued anyway, obviously eager to share.

“—And even weirder? It’s also a speed limit! That speed is always true for everyone, no matter how they’re moving! And it’s not just the speed of light, it’s the speed at which causality itself propagates across the—”

Saoirse leaned forward and playfully whapped him on the knuckles with a spoon. “Too much, yer majesty. Dinnae drop th’ whole deep lore on the poor girl all in one go.”

“Ow!” He withdrew his hands and chuckled, playing at some grievous injury. “You’re right, of course…but to be fair, I do not expect this to stick. It is simply important to convey the depth of the problem. It is…you cannot help but have a deep love of study, to be what we are. Even I!” He grinned, “I know I do not look much like a studious acolyte…“

He was teasing her. Well, why not? “No, your majesty. You look as if you have studied boulders and boxing far more than books.”

“Ha!” His booming mirth shook the cabin. “It’s true, I have an entire earthmote hidden away just for exercise and play. Perhaps one day I’ll show you…” That telling grin of his, and Ellaenie again felt flustered as he lifted an arm and tensed it in a show of his godly brawn, admiring himself for a bit. He then extended one of his hulking legs from his seated position and flexed it every which way he could, admiring it as well. With a skewering, smug expression: “I’d say it’s paid off, yeah?”

…Well, no point in evasion, and there no hiding how it made her feel. “Y—yes, your majesty.”

He got the message and somehow folded himself back onto his little stool, which creaked heavily under his weight.

“Please, forgive me my fun. It is not often I can indulge with one so enjoyably receptive. Anyway. Let’s pause. Why, my young duchess, do you think I would share all this tonight?”

“I…” Ellaenie shook her head slightly, more to try and rattle loose the slightly dazed feeling than to convey not knowing. “It’s…it’s important to you that somebody knows this. It’s important to you that at least some humans understand as well….” she paused as she realized the full significance of Saoirse’s playful smack on his hand.

“You’re as human as the rest of us, and you want somebody to understand that,” she ventured.

“A good answer! Though I am of course rather more than human, and have been for a long time…but human I was born, from the union of man and woman just as you were. And human I remained even as the whole universe faded and died around me. And human I still wish to be, as much as I can. Not quite the right answer, alas, but a good one, and entirely true. Try again?”

Ellaenie thought some more. To buy time, she sipped some of his mead, and found it incredible. She wasn’t usually one for mead—too sweet—but this was more like a rich, mellow wine.

The thoughts simmering in her brain finally rolled up another idea.

“…You’re saying our world is unintelligible because of you. But you didn’t really have the…resources?”

He nodded encouragingly.

“—To make it intelligible. So you need somebody to…to pierce the veil, so to speak?”

“You’re getting close. Pierce the veil how, would you guess?”

Ellaenie didn’t feel ready for this at all. Her head was starting to feel fuzzy and pressured, and she was still reeling from the bit about the nail file and how long it would be before the Nested Worlds could fairly be said to have begun their true purpose…

Oh.

“I suppose…we’re not ready for it yet, are we? I know I’m not.”

King Eärrach sat back, crossed his huge arms across his vast, thick chest, and smiled. “You picked a good’un,” he commented to Saoirse.

“Knew it frae the moment I clapped eyes on her.”

Ellaenie blushed, and drank more mead to cover it.

“That, my lovely young duchess, is the beginning of it. We need to guide the people toward readiness. The end of that road is the Words themselves, and perhaps a few might become like us Crowns. The beginning is simple logic and math, community and belief. And the bumps along the way?”

“But it must be us who guide ourselves, by choice. We’re no’ slaves to the Crowns’ will, and shall’nae be,” Saoirse declared. “We cannae be, no' if what they truly wish for is tae be realized. So, their role is tae lurk in the woods an’ the palaces an’ in people’s imaginations—”

“Maybe sire a big strapping boy or girl now and then, here and there…” Eärrach waggled his eyebrows at Ellaenie, and she felt her face flush even redder.

Saoirse ignored him. “—an’ pick frae among the peoples o’ these worlds, those who can handle the delicate craft o’ guidance.”

“Witches,” Ellaenie seized on that, grateful for the escape from his teasing.

“And the occasional mage,” Eärrach conceded, “If they can pull their head out of their ass. And sometimes one who has no talent for either Art or Craft, but has other useful skills and the right kind of mind.”

“But mostly witches.”

“Indeed. And I think you’ll understand why in the fullness of time. But Saoirse’s right, I’ve dumped a lot on you, and right after a full dinner. I do have a small little after-dinner treat…”

He rose and vanished into his pantry, returning with a cloth-wrapped bundle which turned out to be fruit cake.

“Here. A gift from Lady Haust.”

“How is she doin’ anyway?” Saoirse asked, while Ellaenie reeled from the idea of the most secretive of the Crowns not only baking a gift, but baking her a gift.

“Oh, she’s always well. Right now she looks about as old as you do. She was quite pleased when she heard you and Rheannach had chosen a new maiden...” he flashed a grin at Ellaenie. “No doubt you’ll be visited by her fairly soon. Not that you’ll know it’s her.”

The cake turned out to be simple but expertly made, and with the addition of a little butter it was the perfect thing to chase down an already filling meal and pack out those last few corners.

After it was reduced to crumbs (and a slice set aside for Rheannach) King Eärrach stood, sighed, stretched, and relaxed in a way that reminded Ellaenie she was supping with a god; some immense power he’d been restraining returned to him, flowing through his feet and into the cabin’s floor, pressing in on her senses like he’d done outside.

“Forgive me, my little tableside stool isn’t quite up to the task anymore. Please, make yourself comfortable, I’ll just sit down here.”

He picked a spot on the floor, and somehow folded his tremendous legs into a cross-legged position before the fire, comfortably next to his hounds. Maingan made a grumbling you-dare-disturb-my-slumber noise, and transferred her chin onto his knee, where she demanded ear-scritches with a lick from a tongue as large as a saddle flap.

Eärrach was only too happy to provide.

“Right. So! We’ve spoken long about Crowns and plots and such. What about you? How does a duchess come to an interest in the real?”

Ellaenie blinked, then sat in the easy chair alongside him.

“Well…magic always fascinated me, since I was a girl. And I started studying it as soon as I could. And I think I’d have been quite happy to learn the Art and be a mage, but…”

“You would have been a good mage,” he offered, then grinned, “but that wouldn’t be nearly so fun as all this, eh?”

“Uh…no. No, definitely not!” She had to allow a nervous laugh. “Thank you. But…my parents’ murder changed things.”

He sobered immediately. “They were Taken, weren’t they?”

Maingan opened one eye and flicked a listening ear as Ellaenie sighed. “Yes. My father…when he was about my age, he put down the so-called Oderan King. I’m sure you heard about that.”

“I’d like to hear it in your words.”

Ellaenie sighed again. “Comte Gavier Navarro de los Oderos emerged as the first claimant to the Garanese throne in two hundred years, and claimed he had the family records to prove it. He managed to get a small army on his side, until my grandfather convinced the other dukes to let him put down the so-called king, and my father commanded the Ducal armies. He outmaneuvered Comte Gavier at the battle of Rio Serpiente and, well, that was the end of the Oderan King. The Navarro family’s titles were struck, and Father never thought a bit about it for the rest of his life…until a servant sabotaged the light stones in the ducal bedchambers, and my parents were Taken as they slept.”

A pulse of sorrow and anger rolled off Eärrach that no doubt presaged some words of sympathy, but astonishingly, Maingan levered herself to her feet, padded across and rested her massive chin between Ellaenie’s knees.

Ellaenie had thought she’d shed every tear she was ever going to about that night. But that gesture was enough to bring them prickling back up. She scratched the wolfen herald’s ears gratefully as she continued with the story. “She was just one of several conspirators, but she was one of the Navarro family. Born in poverty, and she blamed my family for her situation. I was supposed to die as well, but I’d decided to stay a week longer with my aunt and uncle in Lendwick. After I returned to the city and took up the duchy…my first business was tracking down the conspirators and seeing justice done.”

“And you did.”

“No. I saw them dead. What they deserved was a justice I couldn’t stomach handing out. It wasn’t only my parents who were taken that night. Some crimes…I don’t know. I had the moment of deciding their fate, and I realized that if the punishment fit the crime, I’d just dirty myself. So instead they got the guillotine, and I washed my hands of them.”

There was silence, except for the rustle of her fingers through wolf fur, and the crackle of logs in the hearth. it lasted until Ellaenie shook aside the moment of melancholy and carried on.

“Since then, I’ve been trying to do right by my people. But most of the time, that means listening to the advice I receive. And some of my advisors are doing…well, they’re doing the smart thing and improving their own position while they have an impressionable and inexperienced young duchess to pressure. Because they’re right, I am inexperienced. And if I wasn’t impressionable I don’t think I’d be here at all, would I?”

Eärrach chuckled at that, as did Saoirse. “True. But being young and impressionable is no fault, you know.”

“Maybe not. But I want to receive the right impressions. I want to be a good duchess. I want to understand the world, so I can serve properly. And that means I need to learn fast. I sense…I can trust Saoirse, and Rheannach. And you. And Lord Gilber. But there are others I’m less sure of.”

“Ah.” King Eärrach shifted, and another wave of power pulsed off him and through the room. “Are you sure you should trust me, though? As you say, you are young and impressionable. And beautiful, in so many ways. I do have a reputation…”

“An’ powerful men can be predatory,” Saoirse added. She’d sat back and lit her pipe, and now her eyes glinted coldly through the smoke.

“I get what I want,” Eärrach added, simply. He crossed his godly arms, tilted his head confidently…

Despite knowing perfectly well that he was trying to fluster her, Ellaenie couldn’t quite resist being flustered. She cleared her throat and ventured, through a blush that was about to set her ears on fire, “Maybe you do. But I don’t think you want to betray trust…”

“You should be careful just who you confide in, young duchess. The powerful and the predatory are drawn to such things. None more than I.”

“You have nothing to gain from me, your majesty. Only a fleeting pleasure.”

“Fleeting pleasure is incentive enough, you know. Men are motivated differently.”

“Often, maybe. Are you telling me all men would take a fleeting pleasure and damn the consequences?”

“Do not forget the men who think, all-too-often rightly, that they can take their fleeting pleasure and suffer no consequences at all. Can you tell which is which?” he countered. “Feel me out. I will not hinder you. What do I feel right now?”

Ellaenie frowned, then exercised the witch-sight. She’d found it was better for her to visualize the held magic as a violin string that resonated to somebody’s voice, rather than a mirror or still pool, and listen to the notes it played when she considered…

Um…

It was overpowering. King Eärrach had not been teasing her, he really did desire her, truly and without any pretense. With the force of his godlike being behind it. Worse, he knew exactly the effect he was having on her, too. Better than she knew herself, probably.

It was absurd. He wasn’t even really the sort of man she normally found attractive, he was much too large and rough! And yet…the mental image the Sight took from him was of one of those crushingly powerful hands around her head and throat, and her own face utterly lost in sensation under his rhythmic, impossibly powerful attentions. It was equal parts shocking, terrifying…and secretly, scarily enticing. She was, she realized, being tempted. She was tempted! Even as her lips and mouth went dry, some deep part of her was whimpering at the impressed fantasy he was giving her of how it would feel to submit and let him have her, for hours, days, weeks on end…and the implication it would all be more, far more than any mortal could possibly bear on their own.

But it was only a thought, and the moment passed.

Eärrach chuckled darkly and sat back as the impression faded. “I am held as a god of fertility and virility, and it is not an unfair accusation,” he said. “If you let me, I would be very glad to do a great many terrible and wonderful things to you, my beautiful young duchess. I would change you into something fearsome and new, so that you might survive to savor the smallest taste of my power. You certainly wouldn’t be the first, but with you I would be artful. And, so: do you still trust me?”

Ellaenie shook the mental image out of her head and refocused. Assessed him, and what he was trying to tell her.

“…Yes. I still trust you.”

“Why?”

“You asked permission. You’re saying all these things and shared that…vision with me to prove a point. And…and you let Rheannach walk out of here without argument, even though you plainly want her far more than this…passing fancy you have for me.”

He smiled, and the powerful tension between them drained away entirely.

“Very good. And you are correct, you need fear nothing from me,” he re-assured. “But how would you know that of a man by the Sight alone?”

“I…suppose the Sight is just one way of looking at things.”

“Exactly. Men often do not read like women, and vice versa. You saw what was lurking in my mind, and I assure you that was only the mildest passing part of my fantasy. Men are often savage animals in our own heads; It is our discipline and self-control that matters. So…how then, should you judge a man? His feelings might be helpful…”

“Character. I need evidence of their character.”

“Yes…but let me suggest something, being what I am. What drives a man is often primal and savage. I sit before you as the avatar of a man’s innermost nature, and I have been polite and restrained about what thoughts have passed through my mind. But I do not simply take like an animal, because what disciplines a man is what he cares about. For an undisciplined man cannot achieve anything worthwhile. So for a woman in your position, you absolutely must know what concerns the men in your orbit. What is it they have disciplined themselves against? What do they wish to attain?”

He smiled, and rested his hands on his great legs. “You’ve learned the witch-sight well. And now, I think, you understand its flaw and limitation. Knowing a man’s feelings can be misleading, because they are often raging and snarling against the bars of his self-control. Therefore: know how and why a man governs himself, and you will know the most important thing about him.”

Ellaenie exhaled, feeling like he’d just stuffed another lesson inside her mind alongside the one about the World Before, and that any more might just make her burst. But she remembered her manners, and bowed her head gratefully. “Thank you for your lessons, your majesty,” she said. It was equal parts formality and a request: please, enough.

“You’re very welcome.” He smiled and rose to his feet. “In any case, I’ve been restraining myself for your benefit so long it’s starting to get quite uncomfortable, and my larder needs restocking. So, I hope you don’t think me rude, but…”

Maicoh and Maingan both immediately perked up at his words: Maingan turned her head away from Ellaenie’s lap and whined plaintively, her tail thumping the floor.

“Yes, girl. I am feeling a need to run tonight…”

The two wolf heralds were both immediately at the door, behaving so exactly like the animals they pretended to be it was hard for Ellaenie not to giggle at them, and giggle even harder when Maingan flicked a slightly offended ear and Maicoh panted at her in a way which looked exactly like a conspiratorial grin.

Eärrach laughed, and paused to take Ellaenie’s hand and kiss it again. “You’re welcome to entertain yourselves as you please, and retire when you wish.” he said. “Please, enjoy your evening.”

He turned his back toward her just as the fabric around his loins shimmered away. He turned at the waist, grinned…

One last brief godly show of the King’s inhuman physique. One last tease. And a promise. One day, when you’re ready and willing…Another vision, this one as tender as the other was primal…

And then he was gone in a rattle of door, a thump of bare feet on floorboards, and a scrabble of eager paws. Ellaenie took a deep breath to shake off the weight of his presence as the latch rattled still, then turned to Saoirse.

“…Is he always like that?”

“Nae, usually he’s far more intense. The true weight o’ him is enough tae push motes of almost any size onto new courses, and his true power is enough tae remake all o’ creation. ‘Tis part o’ why he avoids civilization: he does’nae want to accidentally flatten every little hut he walks past, ye know.”

What an incredible thought that was! It prompted an immediate question.

“Why build a cabin, then? If it can’t withstand him?”

“Oh, it can. Just no’ with everyday mortals about. We would be crushed into a thin smear against the floor by the press o’ his presence if we’d not been prepared, and he let himself fully relax. ‘Tis why he prefers the outdoors or very large spaces—he can root it all in the ground easier, and be safe around regular folk without havin’ tae concentrate. But do not forget his power! I’ve seen him reduce a small castle to liquid-hot rock beneath his feet, because its owner had done true evil and attracted his ire.”

“I…I thought that was just a legend…”

“Take heed, then: he can do more than simply destroy. He can un-make if he feels the need. nobody remembers it as but a legend, because that is how he wills it to be.”

“Are the Crowns all like that?”

“Mm….the same but different. Ye’ll meet them all, in time. The other three are gentler tae be around, sure enough. But no less impressive, each in their unique way.”

“I’ll meet them all?”

“That I promise ye.” Saoirse offered a small smile, then gestured to the cozy chair by the fire. “Now. If ye don’t mind, I fear age brings wi’ it the need tae sleep off such a healthy meal. An’ I’m sure ye’ve much tae think on wi’out an old beldame natterin’ at ye.”

Ellaenie nodded gratefully, and sat back down at the table. The plates and cutlery were gone, she realized. She hadn’t even noticed it happen.

Convenient, though. She rested her elbows on the tabletop, stared into the fire as Saoirse settled herself in the easy chair, and let her thoughts wander wherever seemed best.

They wandered for a long while.

----------------------------------------

Time passed. Saoirse, after adding a few more logs to the fire, settled in the easy chair and promptly fell into the sleep of an old woman who’d had a long and quietly exhausting day. Without her tending it, the logs burned down, and down, until there was little left but glowing coals while outside the moment of nightfall arrived and the world became dark in an instant.

Ellaenie’s thought just couldn’t seem to settle on any one thing. They flitted from fact to revelation to feeling like an insect gathering nectar, and left her feeling…overfull. Stuffed. Not on food (though definitely quite a bit of that) but gorged on knowledge and experience with no idea what to do about it.

Absent a better way of handling it, she decided to follow Eärrach’s example and go for a walk. Somehow, she knew she was perfectly safe to wander, here in his domain.

She rose, added some new logs to the fire for Saoirse’s benefit, stifled a giggle as her elderly mentor emitted a snore like a farrier’s file scraping the shoe, and slipped out into the dark.

The worlds-light reflected from distant, daylit earthmotes danced on the lake’s still surface, along with the thin but unmistakable orange light of a campfire under a large tree, some distance away around the shore.

She followed it, feeling quite certain she knew to whom it belonged.

Sure enough, she found Rheannach sitting and brewing something in a stone cup as she sang softly to herself under the wide branches.

♫“My heart keeps going missing in the night, in the night And I can’t find her, however hard I seek… She sings to me, and listen though I might, though I might, Her words are in a tongue I cannot speak…”♪

It was an unguarded moment. Up until now, Ellaenie guessed her Herald mentor had been restraining herself much like Eärrach did. She’d been impressive, to be sure—powerful, knowledgeable, breathtakingly beautiful, and she’d taught Ellaenie more of magic in a couple of tendays than her previous tutors had managed in five years.

But now she was letting herself be herself, and though her power was, Ellaenie knew, only a fraction of her husband’s…the melancholy and self-doubt and heartache rolling out from her was so achingly beautiful as to bring tears to the eyes. In the firelight, she seemed more than just a beautiful woman, she seemed eldritch in a way that resisted description. It wasn’t anything to do with her appearance, but the sense of complex and subtle power weaving around her.

Then the impression faded, just as Ellaenie had begun to recognize it. Rheannach stopped singing, looked over her shoulder, smiled, and beckoned Ellaenie to join her.

“Are you alright?” Ellaenie asked.

“As well as I ever am.” Rheannach mashed the cup with the handle of her knife. “How do you like my husband?”

“He’s…overwhelming.”

“Mm. That he is. And he’s got your mind feeling full of broken rocks, I’d guess.”

“That’s…accurate.”

“And flirted with you too, I’m sure.”

“Flirted is…a tame word.”

Rheannach barked a short laugh, “Hah!” and nodded. “Oh, yes. I know very well how tame he isn’t.”

Ellaenie watched her for a moment, frowning. “You…don’t mind? He’s your husband. Doesn’t that mean—?”

“It means fidelity, love. Fidelity and faithfulness. For you, in whatever marriage you find, that may mean exclusivity. Not in ours. He and I have both had many dalliances over the long years, and I would be delighted if you were ever one of his. In due time, anyway: you're definitely not ready for him yet.”

Ellaenie watched her for a long second, then decided, well…in for a steel, in for a silver. “…I don’t understand.”

“What?”

“It’s like you love him unconditionally, but at the same time he hurt you terribly and you resent him for it, and the largest part of you wants to forgive him but at the same time you think he needs to really feel how he hurt you and not take your love for granted...”

Rheannach inhaled through the nose, sharply at first, but slowed.

“Sorry,” Ellaenie apologized. “I shouldn’t pry.”

“No, no. Pry away. It’s just that being seen so clearly by one so young stings a bit.” Rheannach set her cup down and looked back across the lake toward the cabin. “It’s true. Completely true. You have me exactly right.”

“What happened between you two?”

“Little sister…I hope you get to enjoy love. I hope you find it and flourish in it. It’s a wonderful thing. But when you do, rejoice most of all in the fact that you will get to choose love. I never did. I was created loving him. I was created to love him. And I do love him, more than I could ever put into words. But I never got to choose to love him. That is a terrible thing to do to somebody, and the worst part is, it's the one truly thoughtless thing I've ever known him do.”

“…Oh.” Ellaenie didn’t know what else to say.

They sat in silence awhile, until Rheannach picked up her cup and sniffed it. Apparently she found it good. “Enough about my husband. You’ve a head full to bursting, and you need something to empty and settle it. That’s what I’ve been preparing for you.” She waggled the cup.

“What is it?” Ellaenie asked.

“It’s exactly what we talked about. I plan to drink a tea made of strange mushrooms, and dance naked in the night.” Rheannach smiled, then tilted her head and offered the cup. “Would you like to join me? After everything you just learned, it will be a moment of simplicity.”

“I—” Ellaenie blinked, feeling all sorts of things and thoughts rushing through her head. Heat in her cheeks and ears, tension in her chest. Embarrassment, propriety, the fear of what scandal it would cause if the people of Enerlend found out what their duchess was doing. But the astonishing thing, when she took an honest look at her feelings, was that the true answer was…yes. Right now, she wanted to do exactly that.

She took the cup and sipped from it. At Rheannach’s encouragement, she drank a little more, about half, then handed it back. She watched her immortal mentor drink the rest in a single swig, then set the cup carefully down by the fire again.

“It takes a minute to work,” Rheannach said. She flopped onto her back and gazed up at the distant earthmotes far away on the other side of the worlds. A wave of her hand invited Ellaenie to do the same.

Ellaenie did, feeling foolish and nervous and like she’d just taken a big step off into the open sky and wondering if it was too late to take this decision back, even though deep down she didn’t really want to…

The feeling faded as she looked up at the Worlds. She recognized those earthmotes. That long skinny one was…how was it pronounced again? Pāpūpauʻoleo. A land of endless plains and steppes where she’d heard the women even gave birth in the saddle. And that, casting Papu’s trailing edge into Eclipse, was Yonguitang, where the people were all dwarves and believed in doing things the Right Way…

Crowns it was beautiful. All of it. She could see lakes and the dark stains of forests, and the distant frosty expanse of the Endless Earthmote, whose other side must be far behind and below her.

She felt a sense of warmth alongside her, and turned to look at Rheannach. Raksuul. Beloved-Soul. And oh! She deserved that name so much. Here was young little Ellaenie, just a human among all the millions, billions who’d ever lived, and Rheannach was here, mentoring her, lying next to her, teaching her…

The surge of affection and gratitude she felt almost bowled her over.

“You’re feeling it already, aren’t you?” Rheannach asked.

“I just feel…Oh! Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet, dear one. This has barely started…” Rheannach smiled, then looked back up at the distant sky. “It’s all so close, isn’t it? All those earthmotes are so far away, but you could sail to any of them…”

“I feel like I could reach out and touch them,” Ellaenie agreed, looking at them again. “They’re just…they’re all right there…And it feels like they’re…like I’m…”

“Like you’re part of it?”

“Yes.” So much so. It was like she’d been wearing a heavy leather hood like a falcon her whole life and suddenly it had slipped and let her feel the breeze through her hair. Like the moment of opening the window in a stuffy library and the relief of fresh air.

“You are, you know. You’re part of it all. There’s no difference between us and this and any of it. It’s all one thing, really…”

Ellaenie nodded dreamily. That made perfect sense.

“We’re all made for the same reason,” Rheannach continued, softly. Her expression had relaxed, as though the troubles and foul feelings she’d been holding onto had entirely evaporated.

“To be loved…” Ellaenie recalled Eärrach’s earlier words.

“Exactly. The same reason I was made. To be loved, and to love. If you truly understand that one thing…well then you know the most important thing there is to know in all the worlds.”

That sounded…really nice. It sounded beautiful, so much so that Ellaenie almost wept as the thought dropped into her brain like ink dripping into water, where it curled and coiled and clouded, and—

Rheannach stood, suddenly. She shot a grin down at Ellaenie, then unfastened the cords that held her dress closed, and shed it onto the grass with a shimmy and a flourish. She reached up to unpin and untie her hair, and the tight braids she’d worn around the crown of her head spilled down, down, down and out in a glossy midnight curtain, all the way to her ankles. She spread her arms, took a deep breath, sighed in distinct pleasure, and her skin almost seemed to glow in the firelight.

Ellaenie gawped at her: in this moment, Rheannach looked divine.

Then, with a cry of “come on, little sister! Dance with me!” she swept up her hand drum and whirled wildly about the fire with no modesty, no courtly grace, no formal steps, and no thought beyond the sheer joy of moving and being.

Ellaenie wanted to know what that felt like. She wanted it more than she’d ever wanted anything.

Even so, when she stood and tried to join in, nerves stopped her fingers at the buttons of her blouse and fear kept them trembling there for a second. But Rheannach smiled at her, and Ellaenie knew deep in her soul she had nothing to be ashamed or afraid of. Not here. Here was special. Here was sacred.

Here, she was loved.

She surrendered to it. In moments there was not even a thread left to shield her, and she stood gloriously bare, spreading her arms to show the entire world here I am. This is me.

The breeze rolled unhindered across her skin, and for the first time in her life, Ellaenie truly felt its touch. The last walls came crashing down, and she no longer remembered where she stopped and creation began. All she knew was that she wanted to throw herself into this and never look back.

So she did.

With a giddy laugh she flung herself into motion around the fire, took Rheannach’s hand, and danced naked through the night with a goddess.

----------------------------------------

> “Sexual congress between humans and elves is dismayingly common and can even yield a pregnancy, the infant’s species being determined by that of its mother. Bear in mind of course that elves are conceived only when one of their kind is dead and awaiting a body to reincarnate into. It is for this reason that elf-maids are notoriously promiscuous: they rarely risk pregnancy, and will always be glad of the child if it should happen. Meanwhile, a human male provides a vigorous and strong plaything for them to use for their own pleasure.”

>

> —Denrick Roth, Elves

THE WANDERING ISLE

Somewhere in the endless sky 09.06.03.06.05

From what Jerl had gathered of Isleman culture, it was considered very bad luck indeed to “curse” their wandering isle with a name. The traditional view was that a named isle would eventually “find its place” in the great dance of the Worlds and stick, becoming a minor earthmote.

The inn, though…Even from the air, Jerl could see the words “Poři ai piřo” painted large on the roof.

As the Cavalier Queen drew near, dozens of people rushed out of the building to line up along a stone quay chiselled into the isle’s edge, and started waving swatches of bright fabric at them. Jerl saw one of them swarm up a semaphore mast like a veteran rigger. In moments, the flags at the top were fluttering in and out:

WELCOME.

CLEAR TO DOCK.

“Well, that’s encouraging,” Amir commented. “I was beginning to worry Mouse might have doomed us to a lifetime of being ignored.”

“I’ve never visited an Isle before,” Jerl commented.

“From what I gather, Isleman culture emphasizes hospitality. We’ll likely be pampered generously. But for the love of Raksuul, respond in kind. The Islemen speak to each other, you don’t want a reputation for taking advantage of them.”

“Amir, c’mon. I’ve never cheated a man out of an honestly won coin in my life.”

“Good. Oh, and put on your best. We want to look rich.”

“We do?”

“Trust me.”

Well, fair enough. Jerl ducked into the cabin and picked out his nicest clothes, spritzed on a little perfume to chase away the scent of mothballs, and broke into his rarely-worn collection of rings. A merchant needed rings if he wanted to be taken seriously by other merchants, after all.

He checked himself out in the mirror. Hair still a bit too long, stubble in that awkward middle ground where if he left it he’d have a beard, but right now it just looked scruffy...no time to shave, alas.

Good enough.

Sure enough, once the business of bringing the Queen in and lashing her to the bollards was done, the crew were fairly showered with welcome by some of the most extravagant people Jerl had ever met.

Showing off wealth, it seemed, was a big part of Isleman life. Everyone was dripping in it, from brightly patterned silks to the way the women wore coins and ribbons braided into their hair or sewn into their headscarves. Jerl alighted from the Queen into an instant party: somebody was playing a lively bouzouki, with accompaniment from a hand drum and flute. A lass swooped in from his left to press a mug of light ale into one hand and a small sweetbread into the other, graced him with a kiss on the cheek and was gone before he could even think to say hello.

“Crowns stone me,” Derghan commented, as he received a similar welcome. “We should hitch on an isle more often!”

“Yes you should, friend!” boomed a new voice. It came from a large, avuncular man who spread his arms wide then clasped Jerl’s hands and damn near crushed them. “Welcome, welcome! Forgive my family, we do not speak Garanese so good, yes?”

“And I speak none of your tongue, so you have me beaten already, sir!” Jerl replied, slipping easily into his talking-to-strangers merchant charm. “But what a welcome! I feel spoiled rotten!”

“Hah! This? Is just a taste!” the man clapped Jerl on the arm and led him inn-wards. “I am Cerkos! This is my family, my inn, my isle!”

“Captain Jerl Holten, and this is the Cavalier Queen,” Jerl replied, warming to the man’s enthusiasm. “This here is Derghan of Clan Vargur, my engineer, My navigator Amir at-Bezwi, and my quartermaster Sinikka Nerissith.”

Cerkos’ hospitable smile betrayed the tiniest flicker when he looked at Sin, whom Jerl noticed had not received a drink and a snack. The moment was gone in an eyeblink, the overpowering hospitality back in full force.

“You are merchant brig, yes? Crew of, what? Fifty?”

“Fifty-five.”

“Room for all, then! You hitch with us far, I hope?”

“We’re ultimately headed for Mehoom, on Ilẹyede. But, right this moment, we’re more looking to go wherever the wind takes us.”

“Hah! Said well!”

“We’re low on supplies, so we’ll probably part ways with you the first time we’re near a suitable port…”

Cerkos tilted his head curiously as a woman darted in to whisper something in his ear, then was gone again in a swirl of skirts. He frowned at the ship, then back at Jerl.

“Not to talk away a guest, but Long Drop is very close. I would be bad host if I did not tell you, you can go there. Or maybe you are leaving, but with not enough supplies…?”

Well, shit. Of course the man was shrewd enough to see the implications of a ship leaving a port like Long Drop with inadequate provisions. And he had a large family to think of.

Oh well. There was a fine art to honesty.

“Sir, I promise you, your family will not regret having us for guests.”

“Mm. And the man who has been shot? He needs better healer than we have here.”

Jerl met his gaze levelly. “We have two good healers looking after him. And I of course will not fail to match the generosity you show us…”

For just a few heartbeats, Cerkos’ eyes were calculating rather than friendly. His smile, on the other hand, had lingered through the entire exchange like it was painted on over his real expression. Quite abruptly, he relaxed back into it and the moment of interrogation was gone.

“Ach, forgive me. I mean no prying. Is language barrier, yes? Now, I must ask how you are paying for your stay? Fifty-five is many mouths to feed!”

“I have a hold full of goods from the Winter Bazaar. I daresay we can barter a fair exchange, don’t you?”

Cerkos’ smile became its full warm and genuine self again. “Of course! But that is for later! Now, you are new guests! Eat, drink, find your beds! We talk business tomorrow!”

“I look forward to it,” Jerl replied. He shook the innkeeper’s hand, and then Cerkos was gone with a jingle of jewelry and a booming greeting for some more of the crew.

Amir watched him go with a pensive expression. “He is most definitely going to gouge us.”

“Yup,” Jerl agreed. “Can’t blame him, though. He has a family to think of, and we’re clearly in trouble.”

Sin nodded. “True. But don’t get carried away in your empathy, Jerl. This is a long road ahead of us, and we’re going to need as much wealth in our pockets as we can, nay?”

“Needs must, right now. I’m sure this is the only safe way for us to slip the Clear Skies’ net. But I hear you.”

She nodded, then frowned slightly as a young man who was definitely one of Cerkos’ sons slipped past her with a bottle of wine and shot her the first truly unfriendly look Jerl had seen anyone on this island wear. It was gone in a blink, but the message was clear: elves were tolerated here, rather than welcome.

“…I think I’ll stay on the ship,” she declared. “Somebody needs to.”

“Are you okay?” Derghan asked, frowning at their hosts.

“I’m fine. It’s okay.” She favored him with a small smile, then looked to Jerl. “We need to go over inventory, if you’re going to talk business with Cerkos in the morning.”

Jerl nodded, seeing the sense of it. “I’ll be up in a few minutes, then.”

She nodded sharply, and departed. Sure enough, the islemen gave her a wide and mistrustful berth.

Jerl caught Mouse’s eye as he came in, carrying one end of Whisker’s litter. There was still that whole conversation to have, about Mind and what Mouse could do now, but from what Jerl had already seen, secrecy was in short supply here on this isle. Cerkos’ family made a big show of hospitality and welcome, but they were still vulnerable, alone and unsupported on their tiny fragment of stone with nobody to depend on but themselves. They’d be fools not to keep a very close watch on their guests, especially the ones who carried a hint of trouble with them.

And Jerl and the Queen must be carrying a great deal more than just a hint.

Best save that conversation for when he could be certain of privacy, then. Besides, it looked like Whisker still needed some care if he was going to pull through this.

He ate the sweetbread at last—very sweet, made with honey and figs and nuts—drank the ale, which turned out to be excellent and light, licked his fingers clean, and headed out to catch up with Sin.

He found her up on the poop deck, looking up into the rigging.

“Hey.”

“Hey.” She looked back down at him. “Shame they don’t have a proper docking cradle. We’ll need to get the rigging crew to keep an eye on the bag as if we’re still afloat.”

“Andony knows what he’s doing. He’ll stay on top of it, I’m sure.”

She nodded, and leaned against the rail, facing out away from the isle. “You’ve started calling him by his first name, I notice.”

“He’s a damn good man. Saved my life during that first loop, actually. At the cost of his own.”

“Too bad he doesn’t know it happened.”

“Yeah.” Jerl took the spot next to her. “Just one in a long string of conversations I need to have.”

“Got one for me?” She asked, cocking her head with a small smile.

“Eh…maybe? Do you know a Bekhil at all?”

Her expression locked down instantly. “…Bekhil.”

“I…take it you do.”

“Every elf knows that name. Where’d you hear it?”

“From Talvi herself.”

“Figures.” Sin looked out into the sky toward one of the crown-points of the Unbroken Earthmote, off in the distance. “What was she like, for you?”

“She was…a moment of peace when I needed it most,” Jerl ventured. He’d actually spared some thought the last few days of how he could put the encounter poetically. “She swept in when I was dying in the snow, and healed me, and spoke to me, and made me feel…better. About everything.”

“Hmm. Sounds like she was restraining herself a bit. Which is considerate. I mean, you’d had a rough few days.”

“Restraining herself?” Jerl almost laughed, disbelieving at that thought. He’d been so dazed, exhausted and purpose-driven that he’d barely noticed at the time, but if he had to give a one-word summary of his encounter with the Crown, ‘restrained’ was not on the list. Nowhere near the list. Not even on the same damn earthmote as the list.

“Oh, trust me, Jerl. The full force of her is a terrible thing.”

“I can believe it…but when did you meet her?”

“A few times, over the millennia. The gods walk the worlds, nay? If you stick around long enough, you’ll cross paths with ‘em, once or twice. Though, she uh…I think she has a bigger soft spot for humans than for fey. We rather badly disappointed the Crowns, I’m afraid.”

“The Ordfey, right?” Jerl turned his head up to the sky and searched it until his eyes found the vast crescent of Garanhir, far away. “I never really studied history.”

“Oh, I know. You’d be a lot slower to trust elves if you had. By rights, we should all be getting the kind of reception the Islemen just gave me.”

Jerl looked at her. Sin’s expression was blank and distant, giving away nothing. But her tone had carried a freight of disgust and self-loathing.

“Was it really that bad?” he asked.

“It was…” she paused, framing her words. “In the first years, we didn’t really know there was any difference between fey and men. Pointy ears versus round, the Law of Form, but that was basically it. We intermingled freely, and knew nothing of each other except that we were kin. My first wife was human, actually.”

“Wife?”

“I was male in my first life. It doesn’t matter. The point is…well. It took a while for the truth to show. Human women had babies all the time, but Fey women? It wasn’t until the twentieth year that the first elf-child was born to my tribe, and another fourteen before he fell into the Covka-unelir, the remembering-trance. Up until that moment, we’d thought death worked much the same for us as for humans: one life, and gone. We’d actually begun to despair that our abysmal birth-rate would be the end of us and wonder what cruel joke the Crowns were playing on us, until we realized that the number of elven souls in the worlds is fixed, and we can be conceived only when there are feysuul waiting to be born in limbo, the threshold between lives.”

“Alright…?” Jerl nodded along, listening.

“Then time passed. Lives passed. Generations passed. And it became all too clear that elves are eternal and humans are…not. That to love a human is to love something that will be gone forever while your own soul lingers to remember and miss them. Passing from one chal to the next eases the sting of it a bit, but…”

“But we must still seem like mayflies to you.”

“And there’s the problem right there. After a while, we stopped caring about humans at all. And a while after that, we stopped thinking of you as people. Humans were just…part of the landscape. As permanent as a ripple on a river. They’d always be around, but even at our most attentive and mindful, we barely noticed each wave as it lapped on the riverbank. But you were useful, still. So…”

“So you enslaved us.”

“Mm.” Sin nodded darkly and turned so she was leaning her butt against the wall, rather than her elbows. “And that was the line we shouldn’t have crossed. Because then, humans just became property. Pretty property, perhaps, but just things we kept around the house. How much gentleness and respect do you show to your furniture?”

“Well, I don’t smash it just for the joy of seeing it break…” Jerl pointed out.

“No. No, that was a madness that set in after the first uprising. The slaves tried to win their freedom by force of arms and, well…an unled militia with no armor or real weapons versus a disciplined and well-equipped army who’d honed the art of war over hundreds of years. You can imagine how it turned out.”

Jerl nodded grimly.

“Afterwards, the ringleaders were publicly executed. Made an example of, to really drive home to the humans that we were their rightful rulers and masters. And oh, people came out to see it. I still remember the way the crowd cheered when the heads rolled across the sand…”

She shivered.

“And the madness set in,” Jerl concluded for her.

“Over generations, yes. It started with executing lawbreakers and ‘upstarts’ who wanted nothing more than their Crowns-given freedom, and taking a little too much joy in the spectacle of it. But as the human population grew, it became apparent that we’d never keep them under control if they outnumbered us too much. So one of the advisors to the emperor, a Fey by the name of Othris, proposed that we should keep the human population ‘manageable.’”

“Meaning slaughter.”

“Mhm.” Sin’s jaw clenched. “They painted it as necessary for the sake of the empire’s stability. So Othris orchestrated regular culls, to keep the human population in check. The slaves were told they were being relocated, sold to a distant city, but we their gracious masters allowed their families to stay together.” Her knuckles, already parchment white, were tense and angry as she gripped the wood. “Instead, they were marched to hidden camps in the mountains of Valai province, and now their skulls line the walls of the catacombs the Valanese call ‘Empires of the Dead.’”

“Red Lady…” Jerl grunted, appalled.

“Mhm. At some point, the Ordfey just stopped giving life any value at all. Humans were a useful pest that needed culling to keep in order, and an individual elvish chal didn’t mean much either. We became an empire of death-worshippers, obsessed with maintaining order through pain and fear. There was no logic behind it, Jerl. We just…went mad. All of us.”

“Even you?”

Sin sighed and turned around to look back out at the sky. “Chal-an-chal,” she said, simply.

“A life for a life…you’re on a penance.”

“Mhm.”

“It’s hard to imagine you being that cruel, Sin.”

“Kind of you.” She sniffed thoughtfully and scratched at the scar tissue where one of her ears had been cut shorter some years ago. “But naive. Everyone has that evil in them, waiting for the circumstances to be right. Believe me, some of the shit the humans did to us in their revenge was…understandable, but they crossed some lines even the Ordfey never did.”

“Like what?”

“Staked captured elves out in eclipse for the shades to take. The only way to permanently destroy an elf.”

Jerl shivered.

“Mhm. That’s what happened to Othris. Though, if anyone in all the Worlds’ history deserved it, it was them.”

“Glad they didn’t catch you.”

“Oh, no. After the humans started doing that, that’s when we all started wearing the vamdraech. No, I died fighting, on the steps of the imperial palace. Afterwards, there were so few elves left that my rebirth took…a long time. I was in limbo for centuries. By the time I was born again, the human empires that sprang up in the ruins of the Ordfey had largely forgotten our crimes. It was all ancient history to them.”

“And Bekhil?”

“Bekhil was the Imperial consort. And they were the very worst of us.”

Jerl blinked at her, trying to imagine that in light of what he’d just heard. “Worse than Othris?”

“Othris proposed the culls out of what they felt was necessity, and their vivisection of slaves was motivated by a desire to master medicine. The Emperor, Ekve, they ordered the culls believing it was the only way to keep order. Bekhil, though…the slaves named them ‘The Laughing Death.’ They were truly insane.”

“I heard once that an Ordfey orgy wasn’t considered complete unless a slave was tortured to death,” Jerl said. “I always took it for exaggeration.”

“I wish. No, that was Bekhil’s doing. They were the driver behind the insanity, the one who danced gleefully into the abyss and led us all along behind them like a piper leading a march. Where the Imperial Consort went, the masses followed. They were a monster on par with Civorage. Worse, maybe: at least we can say of him that the Word of Creation drove him mad. Bekhil just used to get off on killing.”

“What happened to them?”

“What do you think? They died laughing, while slaughtering men by the hundred as they stormed the imperial palace.”

“So you fought alongside them?”

Sin turned and looked Jerl dead in the eye. Her expression was hollow and resigned.

It took him a second.

“…No.”

“Let me guess. Talvi’s message: it’s ‘you’re loved, no matter what.’”

“Sin—”

“Yeah. Sin. It’s the best name I’ve ever worn.” She looked out over the rail again. “That’s what she said to me the last time we met. ‘You’re loved no matter what.’”

“How can you be—?”

“Because a goddess took it on herself to break me, Jerl. Talvi sought me out in my first chal after the empire’s fall, when I was still brooding and planning how we might reclaim what was ours…she found me, and she took me, and she tore me apart and put me back together again. She made me see myself for what I was. And then, when she’d reduced me to a sobbing, self-hating ruin, once I was finally and truly sorry for what I’d done…she told me she loved me.”

“No matter what.”

“Mm.” Sin’s eyes were dry, but her expression said it was because there was no point in weeping: no ocean of tears could ever be vast enough. “It’s not a kind sentiment. To be shown, completely, just how awful you truly are, to know on every level that you couldn’t be less worthy of love…and then to receive it anyway? That’s what destroyed me, more than anything else she did. When she held me to her breast and kissed the top of my head and said those words…”

She finally hung her head and turned her head away to hide her face.

“…What did you do afterwards?” Jerl asked. It felt like the right question at the right time.

Sin sighed, and wiped off her cheek. “I founded the Nerissith tribe in that life, and the Rüwyrdan in my next, then the Wethcradh, and finally the Kacovaraan. The Penitent Four. I invented the doctrine of chal-an-chal and I’ve been living it ever since. I’ll probably live it forever. The code calls for giving my life in service to one human for every life I took unjustly in that time, but the honest truth is…I don’t know how many that is. Dozens of people a week, for a thousand years…”

Jerl didn’t know what to say. He settled, lamely, on “…Shit.”

“Mm. Hence why I don’t mind these Islemen giving me the frosty treatment. It’s no less than I really deserve, nay?”

“If…you say so…”

“I do. Humans have short memories, Jerl. To you, everything I just said is a story, ancient history. Reading about the Ordfey in books, or hearing it from a friend…it just doesn’t carry the proper weight for your people.” She cast a look back over her shoulder at the inn. “Honestly, it’s nice to meet some humans with long memories. Reminds me that I’m not forgiven, just…forgotten.”

“And loved,” Jerl repeated.

She paused, her face screwed up in an incredible effort of self-control: it wasn’t quite enough. She sniffed loudly and shook her head as if she could rattle her emotions out if she just shook it violently enough.

“Four damn you, don’t you start as well…”

“Tough.” Jerl touched her arm lightly. “I’ve only ever known you as you are now. And who you are now is a good person.”

“No I’m not,” she said, rejecting that idea with a sharp cut of her hand. “I’m still the Laughing Death under it all. There is nothing, and I mean nothing in all the worlds that gets me worked up in quite the same way as killing. So whatever ideas you may have about me being a good person, you forget them, mellwan. You’ve barely known me twenty years, and my soul-name is just one of the many things I’ve never told you. I’m a twisted monster, I always have been, I always will be, and whatever goodness you see in me is just a reflection of you, because I’m your weapon and you’re my conscience.”

Jerl’s heart sank. He hated to hear a friend say such awful things about herself. But…on the other hand, he’d rarely heard her speak with such conviction, either.

“So that’s what chal-an-chal is really about,” he guessed.

“Partly. If I can’t be trusted to do the right thing, perhaps I can trust somebody else to point the way for me.” She looked out over the sea of clouds again, then turned and smiled at him. “You’re doing pretty good so far. I feel like we’re doing good. I feel like all this might just wash away a drop of blood.”

“If we succeed.”

“I’m with you to the end, no matter what it may be.”

Jerl nodded, accepting it. “I think I understand why, now.”

“Yeah…you know, you’re the first human I’ve ever told the truth to. I’d, uh, appreciate if you kept it to yourself.”

“Of course.”

She nodded her gratitude, and finally turned away from the rail. “C’mon. We’ve inventory to do, nay?”

True enough. Jerl gestured you first, and headed down into the hold while she grabbed the cargo manifest. He was quite sure that Amir was right and a large chunk of the valuable goods they’d carried up here from Sky’s End would go on paying for their room and board on the Isle.

Best to know exactly what they had, so he could haggle. Besides, he needed some quiet work so he could chew over everything he’d just learned and decide what it meant. Talvi had given him that message for a reason, she’d wanted him to know this. She’d wanted his relationship with Sinikka to grow and change, somehow. She wanted him to understand her better.

Why? Just because that was generally a good thing, or was there deeper purpose to it?

Both?

He’d find out, he supposed. And with that, he set his thoughts aside and cracked on with the work.

About Sinikka, he had no worries at all.