The next day, two young men fumbled around my stronghold with the stability of newborn foals. I dressed them with rugs and ropes. The one with green eyes couldn't take them off Celindria, who cut my sheet into a dress with little regard for her appearance or anything really but our research. She stood over the progenitor, watching the next female sleep. One even smaller than herself.

"Have you given any thoughts to names?" I nudged her with a cup of tea.

Celindria took it with a thankful smile, a sign her soul was present. Gently, she mocked, "We are not pets. We choose our own names."

I conceded the point to her and nodded to her two unstable siblings. "Have you learned their names yet?"

With a sip of tea, Celindria shook her head. "They will reveal them in time. Until then, I asked them to read the Verses."

Glancing over, I noticed one held a book upside-down, and the other licked the pages. It made me smile. "Can they read like you?"

"No one is like me."

The way Celindria said it...

I'd finally met someone more alone than myself.

Another thirty minutes passed where I tried to communicate with my sons. Their intellects were less developed than Celindria's, but they learned faster than any non-royal Icarus. Before T.a.o. awakened, Devis read an entire page of a Verse, and Andrius formed his first words, "Elden's grace."

Beautiful.

Ensouled.

Celindria was correct in her hypothesis, and regret threatened to poison me. For as I rejoiced in the Progeny's making, I couldn't imagine the isolation in her. I'd reduced my daughter to a half-life. When T.a.o. emerged from the progenitor with a bright and giving smile, I knew I owed Celindria a debt. These were whole people, and whole, Celindria was not.

I ran out of sheets and rugs quickly. Once Merit's progeneration was underway, same as the rest, I decided to go out and pester Lucas for supplies. Progeny awakened with hearty appetites. In the doorway, I asked Celindria, "Are you sure? This is a recipe for disaster, leaving you alone with your siblings—Leaving you alone at all."

Celindria faked a wry smile at my hilarious joke. "We will manage, father. By the time you return, I will have them speaking."

I kissed her forehead and left for the settlement. The Prince's purse was hefty, and I owed a gilded-eyed Icarus a debt. I alighted at Lucas' shop.

"Most people come through the door," he mused with his back to me, where I'd climbed through the window.

In my study, Kyle called out, "Bat. Man," much to Silence's amusement.

Ignoring him, I continued on.

"Apologies, Lucas, but I find myself in need of your wares. Without detection."

Lucas chuckled before taking a pin from his teeth and fixing it into a gown. He offered, "Is your majesty closer to saving our race?"

I wrung my hands, eager to return. Something about leaving Celindria alone with the others gnawed at me. Still, I said, "Yes. Thanks to you."

With a wave, Lucas went about his work, saying, "Take what you need and leave payment under the counter. I must finish this dress for Colita by tomorrow or her exclusive eye will wander to the human merchants."

Without even knowing how things were in the fortress, I assured him, "She already has."

He laughed as I went browsing. Five Progeny and me. Eleven garments should do. I paused at the only white dress in the store and thought of Celindria in the sheet. The absence of color suited her missing soul. It was more expensive than anything else in the shop, but I could afford it. Without bothering Lucas at his trade, I wrapped the clothes myself and left a considerable purse under his counter.

His laughter was rich as I stomped back through his studio and left the way I'd came in, simply for his amusement.

Elden, it made me miss Korac and my brother. Mischief and laughter. I would return home without preamble, I decided. I'd march right up to the fortress with my Progeny and walk in—

Something was wrong.

In my study, I asked, "Andrius?"

My third Progeny lifted his gaze to mine, asking, "Yes, father?"

Devis glanced between us as I refreshed everyone's memories. "You once told Nox what Celindria did to you while I was gone. Some of it, anyway."

T.a.o. shivered beside her brother, who said, "Yes. I did. Would you like me to tell it again?"

"Please," I said before I kissed Tameka. Leaving my lover's side, I crossed the room to squeeze T.a.o. into a side hug.

The ancient Seamswalker buried her face in my arm.

Before Andrius began sharing the details of that night, I whispered to my frailest Progeny, "You don't have to stay if you don't want to."

T.a.o. met my eyes and said, "Unfinished."

Taking the cue from his sister, Andrius told the story. "Before Merit awakened, Celindria asked me to help her fetch eggs. I followed her under the stars—my first stars—and gazed at them while she tended the fowl Xelan kept corralled nearby. Something slipped over my head and a substantial force cinched around my neck. I understood nothing. Not rope, nor breath—My lungs' burning need to breathe, but this is how I learned.

"I fell to my knees, frightened by the pain and uncertainty. The 'why,' and the dire need to know it.

"Repeatedly I thought, 'Stop. Stop it. Stop!' Two breaths from death, the rope slackened, and I could breathe. Coughing, begging the air to return, I faced my attacker to find my older sister looking very pleased with a rope in her hands.

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"'Why?' I could barely get the word out. I coughed and tried again. 'Why?'

"Celindria said, 'Force me to answer.'

"I was still new, and there was so little I understood. She was the eldest with the most knowledge and speech, so I tried to get to my feet and—

"'No. Not that way. With your will. Compel me to answer you.'

"Celindria's demands frightened me, but what frightened me more is that I knew what she meant. I'd felt it. Tell me. Tell me, 'why.' 'Tell me!'

"Fluidly, Celindria said, 'I am testing your abilities. You and the others have gifts, and I want you to use them. Unfortunately, I must hurt and scare each of you.' She popped the noose she created for emphasis. 'Will you let me test the rest?'

"The thought of exposing my newly made brother and sisters to this torment sickened me, but I knew so little. Celindria looked after us, and father left her to do so... For confirmation, I looked at the twinkling lights in the sky. One shot by in a blaze of light, and I knew. With a nod, I promised not to interfere.

"Celindria went back inside and tested the rest, and the sounds of them choking haunt me to this day."

I flinched so much through his story. How could I not have seen it?

Devis said, "It was similar with me. She came back into the stronghold and... I went with her into a room." He didn't need to say how Celindria had lured him there. The Shadow knew of Devis' feelings for her. "She choked me until I touched her hand and mined through the memories of her creation. That's how I learned she was different from us. Afterward, she convinced me this was the only way and asked me to stay in the room while she tested little sister."

Eyes in the room fell on T.a.o. She was still in my arms and kept her face hidden. I kissed her hair and whispered against it, "You don't need to speak. I can tell if you want?"

She nodded against me.

Shortly before I returned—and I mean minutes—Celindria had tested T.a.o., but her ability, as we all know, gave her a means of escape. When I came back to the stronghold, I found the door open and Celindria calling for her nameless sister. All while Merit slept in the progenitor.

"Celindria, what happened?"

She met me when I landed and cried with no feeling, "Oh father! Little sister disappeared!"

I blinked at her. "Disappeared?"

Celindria nodded, still searching the grounds to find the missing Progeny. "Yes, father. I was performing a test, and she vanished—I must tell you about their wondrous abilities!"

Abilities.

Missing.

I put my hands on Celindria's shoulders to get a literal grip. "Tell me about the missing Progeny first."

For thirty minutes, we searched, but if I understood Celindria correctly, the other woman truly disappeared. By now, the brothers came to help. She told me the teal-eyed one could control volition and the green-eyed one could manipulate nacre memory banks—All easily quantifiable, but these revelations made me glance at Celindria now and then.

Was she concealing any abilities? And why would she not reveal the nature of this 'test,' which stressed my Progeny into disappearing?

In my study, I reached my arms out to Devis and Andrius. The latter moved into hug me and T.a.o. The former hesitated until I said, "Did you hear me? My Progeny. You're my family, Devis. I should never have left you alone with her."

Andrius pulled Devis in, and I hugged my kids.

Across the room, Tameka said, "You should never have to doubt one kid with the safety of the others. Not one with so much obvious intelligence. How could you know Celindria would hurt them?"

"Tameka is right."

I want to believe it.

"I want you to believe it, too."

A quiet moment passed where I let the First Wave Progeny move apart, except T.a.o., who clung to me still. She knew her part of the story wasn't over.

Korac watched us with careful eyes, measuring me—my sincerity, my growth, or my reflection. I don't know which, but it was there. He asked, "How did T.a.o. return?" He glanced at our frail fae before wetting his lips to add, "And how did she come by the name?"

T.a.o. tightened her grip on me, but she found the strength to say, "Weeks. Fires burned my hair. Hands on me. An asylum for lost things adopted me. I heard... the lonely pulse of one I later found. The Seam."

Korac and I maintained eye contact over T.a.o.'s head while she shared her story to the best of her ability. When she sniffled, I kissed her hair again, taking over the telling.

Weeks went by, and I chewed my nails down to the quick—beyond it, until they bled. My anxiety over an entirely lost person never abated, and I worried about Celindria's education of Devis, Merit, and Andrius. In the time since the smallest of them had disappeared, my Progeny named themselves and practiced their abilities.

One night, I went out for supplies when a sight on the horizon stopped me. A storm rolled in on the desert and electricity danced across the sky, illuminating a great dune far off. On this mountain was a silhouette, small and female. Without closer inspection, I knew it was the missing Progeny. I opened my wings, determined to go to her and bring her home, but...

The silhouette flitted to the peak of a closer, smaller dune.

Celindria had told the truth. My fourth Progeny harnessed some form of teleportation. She traveled one dune closer and no further. With a knot twisting in my stomach, I flew to her, fearing her rejection and hoping for her to come home—

Her eyes were Atramentous. This only happens during times of extreme emotion or combat. Nothing about her dainty frame implied aggression or even fear. When she spoke, her voice was soft but firm. "Father?"

"If you would have me?" I wanted to make it clear, I would enforce nothing on her. "Do you wish to return with me—"

"Beware of the flames. The black glow which will consume us all, even the daughter of Elden's making. She will set us ablaze."

Never did I assume what she said was nonsense. There was poetry to her madness, but isn't this what broke my heart? I reached out to her. "I will look after you."

Her Atramentous eyes settled on my hand. With alarming certainty, she assured, "No one will forge a defense high enough to protect me. That is not my story."

Her eyes never shifted back to normal. They stayed in Atramentous as I asked, "Can I be in your story? I should like to be your friend." All the while, I was aware she could vanish at any moment, and I'd never see her again.

Please Elden, anything but that.

"Father, I am The Afflicted One. They call me this wherever I go."

No.

No.

I'd wronged another one. Despite the wave of disappointment threatening to drag me under, I offered, "You could be T.a.o. here, if you like?" After I attempted a small smile, I added, "It is easier to say."

With an avian tilt, she tried the name on for size. "T.a.o." Her smile, when she gave it, took my breath away. "Thank you, father."

When T.a.o. took my hand, I'd felt such relief one other time. After Nox had saved me from plummeting to my death when I was a child. The revivification of the memory, and T.a.o.'s safe-ish return, urged me to visit the fortress. Soon.

T.a.o. warned, "Be calm," before Seamswalking me to the stronghold. That's how I discovered she could form conduits to travel, and I looked forward to exploring this ability with her.

In my study, Kyle asked, "How did you react to Celindria, T.a.o.?"

After she shook her head against me, I answered, "Not at all. She didn't seem to recognize anything. The trauma of Celindria attacking her had sent T.a.o. into a fugue state, and Elden knows the places she Seamswalked to before finding shelter in the Seam."

"Razor's bones," T.a.o. corrected.

Tameka clapped her hands together, drawing the attention of the room. She offered, "Who's up for a break?"

Andrew raised his hand, and Tameka glared at him, but called on him all the same. "Yes?"

"What about Merit?"

I glanced at Andrius and Devis. The former said, "Celindria left her unharmed, as if she already knew Merit possessed no abilities. She was never attacked or ever the target of Celindria's torture."

Devis gave Andrius a look, saying, "Not all of it was torture."

Still defending Celindria. Devis and I have much in common.

I shifted T.a.o. apart from me with a gentle touch and announced to the room, "Tameka's right. Let's take a minute."