Flying directly from Hiakoreska to Sorjek was too far. Zie set zir first day of travel less ambitiously: welcoming Shibanyet, at the northern tip of Kanjamund's northernmost isle. This involved a good southwest cut across the Rainy Strait.

It wasn’t too far, but it was a very wet flight. Shibanyet was ever-rainy. Hiakoreska was hardly dry. Between the two of them stretched the aptly-named Rainy Strait. Aleicree flew through the rain that bridged the gap between them. Without zir amicus breeze it would have been a miserable flight. With it, it was still somewhat difficult. It was good exercise at the least. Aleicree would have preferred to get to Shibanyet by ship, though it would've taken hours longer, but flying there zirself was fast and free.

Although Aleicree was not an exceptional geomancer, zie felt when zie flew into the airspace of Shibanyet. The invisible flux of Fate agreements was different here. Accustomed as zie was to wild sea ports and imperceptible sea theomes, the geomantic boundary of Shibanyet was an almost tangible thing. This was a "model city", as geomancers termed it. Fate was woven strongly here by the local land god (who was named Vesset). Everyone in the city existed within the influences of Fate. The reward: the city spread before Aleicree in an artful order of perfectly connected structures. Kanjamund had a reputation for being undeveloped, but this city defied it.

The clouds were breaking as Aleicree approached the bay, bringing a sunset colored by the evening light across the mostly cloudy skies, but Aleicree was looking for an inn. Zie flew over the famous Bay of Shibanyet and its harbour jammed with ships, the great tower of the royal palace, the temple of Vesset, the marketplace, and many more places of interest. The smell of cooking fires and roasting fish was strong over the city. There seemed to be nowhere to land. Zir unfamiliarity with the area was a disaster, and a frustrated Aleicree wondered if zie would have to spend the night in the clouds.

Then, miraculously, a building Aleicree thought might be an inn came into view. It was built of red bricks and had a large garden around it. The garden had an open grassy area for a landing space.

The soft grass was welcoming underfoot as Aleicree touched down. Such a lush carpeting in a busy landing area meant that the grass here was surely enchanted to survive being trod upon countless times. The building next to zir mounted up four stories with countless white-framed arched windows. Light spilled welcomingly from the nearby open doors of what was very definitely an inn. Aleicree could smell the hot food and drink already.

The main square of the city, where the Temple of Vesset stood, was not far away. This was probably a major visiting point for journeys to and from Shibanyet, and therefore crowded. Aleicree wondered if zie were Fated to visit this inn. Surely Vesset would have accounted for every visitor to make her model city perfect.

Zie walked over to the inn's entrance and peered in. A large number of dragons were flowing through the doors, but the room was not yet full. An apron-wearing vashael standing just inside the door said, "Welcome! The dining room is this way, sir!" Aleicree entered the inn as bidden and was surprised to feel that the muggy air outside immediately dissipated. Magic was thick in this place, so much so that the air itself had been tweaked to be more comfortable for the patrons.

Turning to the vashael by the door, Aleicree asked, "What is the name of this establishment?"

"The Royal Lion of the Sun," the vashael replied.

"What's a royal?" Aleicree asked.

"A great leader, first among many,” the staff dragon said, and then, “We often call our inn The Royal.”

It seemed a pretentious name to Aleicree. Zie wondered as zie went towards the dining room of the inn whether that was a trait of Shibanyet. Zie'd never visited here before today. What kind of society had Vesset curated over the centuries in this place?

The dining room of the Royal Lion of the Sun was a large place, and public houses were generally not small. The room was filled with smoke from pipes and the burning of incense. There was a roaring din of conversation among the many dragons in the room. Hardly a soul seemed to notice Aleicree's entrance, focused on their own conversations as they were. Zie sat down at a table and surveyed the room.

From a nearby table zie witnessed an animated conversation. "What use is all your magic if you're afraid to use it when we need it?" asked an exasperated brownish red vrash of a cringing white-scaled fellow. They were both wearing armour of the typical vrash style, which didn't necessarily mean anything. Most vrash wore it.

"Every time I use my magic," said the white dragon, his head down, "One of two things happens. Either the world gets more chaotic and nears its inevitable demise, or I get more chaotic and near my own. Everything has a price!"

"You're doubting the promise of the land gods," said the brownish red vrash. "They keep everything stable."

"They have limits!" said the white dragon. "Do you remember Sorjek? They use magic too much, and mutagenic black wisps fall like rain or snow there. Dragons don't live forever in Sorjek."

The conversation fascinated Aleicree, who had never thought of zir wind magic as making the world or zirself chaotic. Zie spent zir time in meditation. What was chaotic about that? They'd mentioned Sorjek, too.

A waiter came to the table where Aleicree had sat, and said, "Would you like to order anything?"

Aleicree waved off the waiter saying, "I will soon," and stood to step over to the table with the brownish red vrash and the white one. "I overheard your conversation," zie said to them, and looked to the white-scaled vrash. "Do you really think magic speeds the end of the world?"

"Magic is logically incoherent," said the white vrash gravely. "And when we invite logical incoherence into our world, we invite its return to the primordial state."

The brownish red vrash grimaced and said, "The primordial state of the world is soaked in magic. Everyone has magic, Azosta!"

"I've read the Deathwall far to the north is soaked in magic, too," said Azosta, shaking his head slowly.

"What's the Deathwall?" asked Aleicree.

The brownish red vrash said, "That's the northern edge of Theoma. There are a few pockets of life in it, but it's mostly a vast wasteland of necrotic energies. It tears everything apart."

Azosta said, "Necromancers can make some headway into it, if they're willing to take the risk."

"This isn't relevant," said the red vrash. "Look, magic has its own logic. It doesn't all go to necromancy."

"If we use it lightly, it has its own logic," said Azosta.

"We don't even use necromancy!"

The two of them looked to be paying attention mostly to each other again, and Aleicree felt like zie was intruding, but zie tried again anyways. "I use magic every day, and it doesn't seem to be pulling me towards chaos."

Azosta sighed. "It takes exceptional sensitivity to discover the chaos created by magic. You have to turn away from glory and revel in the quotidian."

"Revel in the what?" asked Aleicree.

"Yeah," muttered the red vrash.

"The quotidian," said Azosta. "The day-to-day. The magic of order is the magic of a city of dragons living their lives. Libraries are filling with the stories of lives lived well or poorly. Powerful magics... break that. They fix or ruin everything at a go, and the drama is out of the story."

Aleicree asked sceptically, "Are you saying that drama and struggle are the basis of reality?"

"In a very subtle way..." said Azosta.

The brownish-red vrash actually growled at that, and Azosta flinched back into a low posture. With bared teeth the red vrash said, "You're making a very strange excuse for failing a job, Azosta."

There was an uncomfortable silence around the table. "Soooo..." started Aleicree, "What happened?"

The brownish-red vrash looked past Aleicree, and zie glanced that way as well. A group of three dragons had descended on the previously vacant table nearby, leaving Aleicree's prior seat taken. He looked at zir and said, "You may as well sit down and tell us your name."

"I'm Aleicree the Windlost," said Aleicree.

"Windlost, eh?" said the brownish-red vrash. "You'll have to tell the story sometime."

"Sure," said Aleicree, sitting down.

When Aleicree had sat next to the table, he said, "I'm Limist the Pipeseller. This is Azosta the Endseer. We're plumbergons, but maybe we're ex-plumbergons now. We just got back from flooding someone's house with a failed installation. Azosta has geomantic contracts for water manipulation, and I know he does," here Limist paused to glare at the other vrash for a moment before continuing, "but he won't use them for plumbing work."

"This work doesn't need magic," stressed Azosta.

"It does when you mess it up!" said Limist, nearly yelling.

Another silence descended, until Limist growled, shook his head, and... shrank in on himself. He said, "I've been messing up, too. This kind of thing isn't supposed to happen in Shibanyet, but we've both been having accidents lately. Fate is against us for some reason." He stink-eyed Azosta again. "If only we had someone who could renegotiate Fate."

Azosta snorted at that and stood straighter. "No, no, and no! That is not how geomancy works. I do not renegotiate Fate. I work with Fate. If Fate turned against us, using my contracts to fight it would turn out badly." He looked at Aleicree. "See? Fighting Fate is necromancy. Limist doesn't get it."

Aleicree glanced between them. "If Fate is against you, maybe you should try visiting Nidrio," zie said, wondering if Taisach could make use of visiting plumbergons. Maybe for irrigation systems. He would likely appreciate visitors in any case.

"Where's that?" asked Limist.

"The mountainous forests due north of Zyrine are Nidrio, where my mother Praoziu is the land god," said Aleicree.

"Why is she your mother?" asked Azosta with furrowed brow.

"Because she loves my father very much," said Aleicree.

"Land gods don't..." said Limist, then he looked at Azosta and asked, "Do they?"

Azosta touched his chin with a hand. "I guess they do if they want to. Talk about biasing Fate, though."

Aleicree said, "My parents are trying to recruit dragons to live in Nidrio. You can speak to Praoziu herself about it, though you may find my father more approachable. His name is Taisach."

The waiter came by to check on them again. Limist and Azosta had eaten, but they accepted another glass of wine each, and Aleicree said, "A roast fish, if you would. I smelled a great deal of fish roasting as I passed over the city."

"Very good. It will be out in less than a minute," said the waiter, hurrying off.

"Less than a minute?" asked Aleicree. "How do they provide fresh food that quickly?"

Azosta said, "Geomantic predictions. They already know most of the orders they'll get in a night. You probably didn't feel it, but Vesset even leaned on you when you were ordering so that you'd be more likely to fulfil the prediction."

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"Do you think that turns reality towards chaos?" asked Limist.

"It's up to Vesset to handle the consequences from this one. Or, no, it's on us as well, but I think here this is part of the day-to-day," said Azosta. He seemed uncertain.

The fish arrived soon. It was large and had been cut into several pieces and was already sizzling in the hot pan. Slices of green vegetables had been placed next to it. Seeing the entire pan brought out to the table was a pleasant exoticism.

"Eat and enjoy," the waiter said, and then he hurried off.

The smell was appetising. The heat from the pan, a bit intimidating. Aleicree hovered a hand over the pan to test the temperature, then with zir cutlery carved a tiny cautious bite from the fish. The skin was crisp, the white flesh was tender. The taste was mild and just a bit sweet.

As Aleicree ate, Limist said, "I think we will visit Nidrio. We have debtors here, but the work is hopeless right now; it's only been getting worse. Nobody will go bankrupt if we flee."

"You're talking about running out on our debts?" asked Azosta.

"We're immortal and so is everyone we owe a debt to. It'll all be paid in time," said Limist. "This is just... a bit of renegotiation. We can't pay right now."

"If you sell your armour, can you pay off any of your debtors?" asked Aleicree, pointing at them with a fork.

Limist grimaced, and Azosta ducked his head. "Yeah, maybe," said Limist. "Metal IS pretty expensive. Showing up naked's a statement of its own, though." He put on a voice and said, "Hey, lookit us, we're poor!"

"Better poor than in debt," Aleicree said.

"We can't pay them all off that way, but it is the honourable thing to do," said Azosta. "The land gods reward honourable conduct."

Aleicree finished off zir fish and vegetables swiftly as it cooled. The pan didn't sit empty for long before the waiter returned to their table again. Before taking up the pan, he bowed to them and said, "The meals and drinks you have ordered so far are on the house, sirs. As will be your lodgings if you will stay with the Royal Lion of the Sun for a night."

"Why?" asked Limist.

"We are humble servants of Vesset's will," said the waiter.

Azosta said, "You mean to say, it pays to do what the land god wants."

The waiter smiled. "We are prosperous servants of Vesset's will as well. We received more in prediction than just your orders. The three of you were destined to meet here, and staying the night will be auspicious."

Limist looked at Azosta and said, "Well, we weren't planning to, but if it's free? Why not? The room here is nicer than the one I'd be sleeping in otherwise."

Azosta was frowning. He looked uncomfortable. "See, there's something wrong with this," he said. "This is magic being misused."

"Will you stay the night?" the waiter asked.

"Oh, I will," said Azosta. "This is a very nice inn. Only a little marred by all the smoke. I'll stay. I'm just... Nevermind." He slumped against the table. "Nevermind! And take my drink. I've had enough." He pushed it away across the table without looking at it.

The waiter bowed again, departing with Azosta's wine glass and Aleicree's empty pan.

Aleicree looked across the table at Azosta. "So what was that about magic being misused?"

Azosta rested heavily against the table, scrubbing his face with both hands for a moment. When he looked up, he said, "I think I'm living in the wrong city. Here in Shibanyet, everyone is destined to meet exactly who they need to meet. Model city. Heavy Fate pressure. And being told I was destined to meet you makes me feel all of a sudden like I was being managed out by minor catastrophes that would make me want to leave-" and here Limist went open-mawed and droop-eared, but Azosta continued, "-right before I met someone who would tell me to travel across to another theome. I just got bounced out of normal social reality by powerful magic."

Limist asked, "Do you think Vesset wanted us to move away? Is a string of petty accidents the kind of thing that just happens to dragons who Vesset thinks don't fit into their perfect model city?"

"That's horrible," said Aleicree, reaching across the table to try to grasp one of Azosta's hands. "But does it change the importance of leaving?"

"No, it doesn't," said Azosta.

"Sounds like it's time to move on," said Limist.

They stayed in separate rooms that night, occupying two rooms on the upper floor of the pretentiously named inn. There was a blessed absence of the scent of smoke in Aleicree's room. Even though the inn's rooms were surely frequented by dragons who smoked in their rooms as they smoked in the hazy dining room below, the whole room was crisp and clean, likely soaked in petty magics designed to make it comfortable. Shibanyet was a paradisic theome.

Laying on zir side in a plush bed, Aleicree wondered why it wasn't paradise for Azosta and Limist. Was Vesset really rejecting them? From their story, it seemed like she was doing just that. Had they done something wrong? Would Praoziu reject them, too?

There was one oddity in the idea that Vesset was rejecting them. If they were getting the boot, why would Vesset instruct the inn to pay their way for the night?

Zie expected to meet them the next morning again. Zie would tell them zie was bound for Sorjek, to meet a geomancer there. If they might do irrigation in Nidrio, they might have even more business in Sorjek, assuming Azosta could overcome his reluctance to deal in such a magic-soaked place. Zie would suggest it at the least. The two sounded like they could use new opportunities. If zie was honest with zirself, Aleicree was fascinated by the idea of a geomancer reluctant to use magic. Limist hadn't made much of an impression, but zie wanted to talk more to Azosta. Zie fell asleep looking forward to the next morning.

The three of them planned to meet the next morning in the garden of the Royal Lion of the Sun. Since the inn wasn't covering a round of free breakfasts, the three of them were planning to skip it. Aleicree could afford it, but zie was skipping it in sympathy to the poverty of Limist and Azosta.

Aleicree got there first. All around zir, flowers bloomed between bushes alongside grassy paths. A wooden sign with a cheerful little sun painted on it bade guests, "Please step on the grass." It was a lush carpet underfoot.

Experimentally, Aleicree crouched low and bent a single blade of grass as hard as zie could without breaking it. When zie let go, the crease in the grass vanished.

Alas, zie thought with a smirk. The world was going to lose the beauty and drama of bare dirt developing where dragons walked in this garden. Truly chaos primordial lurked waiting to consume them.

The garden of the Royal was not large. It was a simple loop of pathing that led to a flower-ringed clearing behind the bushes. A small fountain burbled in the centre of the clearing. Aleicree lay resting by the fountain and wondered if it was fed by magic or plumbing. Zie decided it was likely plumbing. There was a completeness to pipework that was missing from an instant solution like summoned water.

Was that completeness what Azosta had complained about being missing if magic was overused? Zir mind flickered back as well to zir discomfort with accepting a palace in Nidrio. The absence of magic here created room for the labour of the plumbergon.

Azosta and Limist came around the bend of the path into the clearing. They were wearing bundles of metal on their backs, and their scales were bare of armour. It was ready to be sold at the market. Both of them looked much more naked without it. Vrash weren't usually bare-scaled.

Aleicree got to zir feet again to greet them. "Hallo," zie called to them.

They dipped their heads and walked over to sit next to Aleicree. "Hello," said Limist, and then he asked, "Are you returning from here to Nidrio?"

"I am going on to meet a friend in Sorjek," said Aleicree. "I wanted to invite you to join me."

Azosta got a Look on his face at the mention of Sorjek, and he Looked slightly up and away from Aleicree as he said, "What business would we have there?"

Aleicree giggled at Azosta's reaction, and said, "Hey, I think it would be a great place to get back on your feet as plumbergons."

"Do you want us in Nidrio, or on our feet?" asked Limist.

"Oh, both!" said Aleicree, smiling at them. "If you pay off your debts before you come, we won't have angry dragons coming to Nidrio to complain about you."

Azosta looked at Aleicree with a more focused expression. "Who is your friend in Sorjek?"

Aleicree said, "A windmage named Vrekant. My best friend in correspondence, he works with the farmergons to provide for perfect weather."

Limist frowned. "They won't have much use for irrigation if they've got windmages controlling the weather."

"I think you can still sell it," Aleicree said hopefully.

"How?" Limist asked.

Aleicree tipped zir head to Azosta. "Tell the farmergons there's a stability in using non-magical solutions. The occasional really catastrophic weather outcome might make them want stability instead."

Azosta said, "I hadn't thought of my perspective as a marketing asset in Sorjek."

"I think your perspective is fascinating, but I have a confession," said Aleicree, taking a step towards Azosta. "It makes me want to show off and glory in magic. I want to weave a flight-wind about us so powerful we go from Shibanyet to Sorjek in a day, skipping over Mount Ardaziel, which would otherwise be on our way."

Azosta grimaced and pulled his head back, but it was Limist who spoke first. "Can you do that?" Limist asked.

"It's a long way. It'd be reckless!" said Aleicree.

"You really shouldn't do anything reckless." Azosta looked sternly at Aleicree. "A bit of flight-wind is fine, but we should still go to Mount Ardaziel on the way. And glorying in magic is a bad idea."

"So you've said, but I don't know it." Aleicree smiled at Azosta. His white scales were beautiful in the spring light, and zie wanted uncharacteristically to tease at him and his strange philosophy. "Mount Ardaziel is an easy-ish flight in any case, only a few hours over the coast. You two should head to the market to deal with what needs to be dealt with."

Azosta and Limist looked at each other a moment, and then Limist asked, "Yes, of course." The two turned to leave, and soon were gone from the garden.

Mount Ardaziel was half a day's flight away. Aleicree could spend the morning elsewhere, as Azosta and Limist were spending the morning elsewhere. Yet the prospect was a bit intimidating to the usually-shy dragon, and Aleicree opted instead to go up into zir room at the Royal. There zie fetched out zir lev-i-quill and started writing a letter to zir father.

“Dear Dad, I was harsh to you when we last talked, and I’m sorry. I’m still thinking about your effort to recruit people to Nidrio. I do want you to succeed. I’ve met two people who I think Fate is drawing to Nidrio, and I hope I’ll be able to accompany them to visit you soon. They’re a pair of plumbergons. You’ll have irrigation for your garden!”

“One of them is named Limist and of late he’s frustrated because Fate turned against him. The other is named Azosta. Azosta is the one that drew my attention. He doesn't talk like a plumbergon at all, but is blatantly a geomancer. Yet he's a very unusual one who is convinced that magic pulls reality towards primordial degradation, and he used Sorjek (where the weather flinches between perfect and necrotic) as an example of a theome where far too much magic is used. He cited drama and struggle as important to reality, which was even stranger. Who could think reality was made of such things, and not of the will of the land gods themselves? When I talked to him about this idea, I was afterwards left thinking about 'completeness' and the idea that he was a plumbergon made me think that Nidrio needs a lot of labour to thrive. Praoziu doesn't know how to create a building without summoning it from the ether, and I think your immigrants should live in houses that were built mundanely. Maybe someday, I'll live there, too!"

That last line was perhaps an excess exuberance, but Aleicree was in a great mood and zie knew that Taisach would love Aleicree to move back to zir homeland. Zie wanted him to feel happy reading this letter.

Writing the letter to Taisach went by in a rush of inspiration, and not a great deal of time was taken by it, so afterwards Aleicree set about writing more letters. To Denziu, who had a house already in Nidrio though zie was a travelling merchant, Aleicree proposed that zie renovate zir house with indoor plumbing. To Praoziu zie wrote a more difficult letter that described Azosta's ideas without criticising Praoziu the way zie had to Taisach, intending thereby to spare zir mother's feelings though zie knew that land god omniscience would likely see Praoziu reading Taisach's letter as well. To Ekis and several others zie wrote brief summations of Azosta's ideas cribbed from the letter zie wrote Praoziu. These letters were nearly copied from each other, and zie wouldn't have bothered save that the lev-i-quill made them fun and easy to write. Zie was glad to have it, and with such a tool flicking over zir papers the idea of someone seriously proposing drama as a basis of reality was too precious to not share with dragons zie knew might find it interesting. Most of these went to dragons zie had met in windmage academy, and zie wondered if any of them would reply, for they were connections long gone dark. One of them went to Kajir. That one at least would surely yield a response, and zie knew just where in the route of the Serene Chordalite zie should send the letter to ensure it would get to Kajir soonest.

Finally, Aleicree wrote a very brief letter to Vrekant that told him zie had met two companions who zie was bringing with zir to his home. Zie wasn’t sure that this would reach Vrekant before zie did, but the flight from Shibanyet to Sorjek could be done in one day. He’d get a day of warning. Aleicree was a little self-conscious of impinging on his generosity by bringing in more dragons. Hopefully Fate was on zir side.

When zie had filled all these sheets of paper, zie stacked them up and put them in a carrying pouch, then flew to the post office to pay yet another round of their fees for shipping paper about. Worth it, zie thought as zie flew back to the Royal. How invaluable it was to be connected at long distance with other dragons!

At the Royal Lion of the Sun, Aleicree searched the garden and the smoky tavern rooms again without finding any trace of Azosta and Limist, so zie settled into the part of The Royal that was a public house. Zie waited, breathing in the fragrant spice of the exotic smokes in the room, and didn't have too long to wait before the two vrash came back again. Now they were even more naked, without even the bundles of metal at their backs, and they seemed smaller and shyer dragons walking nude like this. Limist wore nothing but a pouch. Azosta wore several pouches.

When Aleicree saw them, zie stood at once and walked to them, saying, "Hello again! We should fly at once for Mount Ardaziel, the better to arrive before the sun is down and the inns are full up."

"I suppose we are fasting today," said Limist grimly.

"You did not eat while out at the market?" asked Aleicree.

"Nothing was very cheap," said Azosta. "It will not kill us to fly on an empty stomach today. We can eat somewhere in Mount Ardaziel itself."

“If you’re sure, but I’ll pay for you to eat on the other side.” Aleicree frowned with worried eyes. “Once we are in the air, I will broaden my amicus breeze until it gives us excellent flight winds."

The three dragons leaped into the air, and flapped hard for altitude. When Aleicree felt stable in the air, zie reached out into the world with zir wind-sense, doing just as zie had promised with the amicus breeze, until zie felt the air-silhouettes of Azosta and Limist. Zie grasped at them with the wind, pushing at them, buoying them upwards and laughing again as they spread their wings wide to cup the perfect breeze zie gave them.

The three flew on to Mount Ardaziel.