What the hell are you doing here, scribe from the Beuzaheim marriages? Malwine frowned, the memory of the name still fresh enough for her to recognize. This isn’t even the right context for you to be in!

Her ability to joke about it, even within the confines of her own mind, faltered soon after. The fire of her ever-growing resentment for Adelheid’s alleged great-grandmother—and apparent namesake—grew stronger by the second.

As did her concern—[Unpacifiable] hummed in the back of her mind. Not loudly, not overtly, but enough for her to understand that, much to her horror, this was a threat. The matter of Adelheid’s great-grandmother had become a threat to her. Not just to Adelheid, or perhaps because it was also a threat to Adelheid.

The widow had been protective of no one save Yoyo, not really. Protective of things? Certainly. But neither Rupert nor her children had held such a place in her heart. They were family, but they were not hers to defend.

Even her new family as a whole didn’t elicit that type of feeling from her. She cared for them, still, but the instinct just wasn’t there.

In a small part, Malwine felt guilty. She stood by her reasons, but she was the one who convinced Adelheid to get [Identify], even if it had been the girl’s idea to examine her great-grandmother. Not only that, but Malwine had been eager to learn of the results. Like the fool she was.

Now, she had to approach this rationally. Though she found she struggled to, she crushed the nascent dread coming from the warnings [Unpacifiable] sent and all but commanded her mind to grow calm. [Cool Head on Your Shoulders] might have started to pull its own weight now, after years of being little more than her default state.

There was a mysterious woman somewhere, the color of her level was golden, and she was a threat to her and Adelheid. She could work with this. A plan began to form in her head.

“Adelheid, I’m sorry to pester you so soon,” Malwine spoke slowly, softly. “But can you do me a favor?”

The girl sniffled, but she pulled away, wiping her nose with an unfortunate sleeve. “Yes, sure. What?”

“Do you have anyone you trust?” Malwine asked. “Any of my aunts and uncles, your siblings?”

“I don’t know,” Adelheid whispered, her next words making her voice waver. “I trusted great-grandma.”

“Okay,” Malwine winced. That had been her initial idea, but there it went. Recalculating, she focused on [Earthless Glory]. It was almost stunning, how smoothly her thoughts were flowing. She tapped at [Multitasking], hoping the Skill could keep [Cool Head on Your Shoulders] running, even if she couldn’t make a double with access to it.

She granted the double [Close to my Chest] and created it to the image of Rupert, his decrepit old frame a bad memory she almost regretted bringing back.

The double spawned by the door to Thekla’s room, and she wasted no time knocking. Her aunt opened the door, looking groggy, her eyes widening before she said whatever she’d meant to. Her open mouth flopped for a second before she sputtered, “Who in any Devil’s name are you?”

“Is Abelard here?” Malwine, as her double, ignored the understandable confusion. “I need to know something.”

“No, he was in the gardens, last I saw of him,” Thekla blinked. “Is it an emergency, Baldur, the cit—”

Malwine was gone before her aunt could continue, fully intent on ignoring the question. She wasn’t on a time limit as far as she knew, but when facing the unknown, every second counted.

Fake-Rupert landed in the gardens next, given shape in a blink. Indeed, Abelard had been sitting on a bench, a notepad in his hands. He jumped, staring at the unknown man that appeared before him. “Who are you? How did you get in here?”

“Do you know what a sibyl is?” Malwine asked him. “What is it?”

“A legend,” Abelard answered, soon thinking better of it. “Why are you asking me that? Seriously, how did you get in here? Rīsan!”

“None of that. I just need a straight answer. What do you mean, a legend?”

“Supposedly, prophets of the sea. It’s a myth, and if they exist, no one confirms sighting them for a reason,” Abelard spoke slowly. He kept looking to the sides, and whispered as if she couldn’t hear him. “Seriously, Rīsan! Where are you?”

Malwine grit her teeth, dismissing the double before Kristian actually showed up. Having confirmation that Abelard was at the silvery stage, learning he was expecting the presumably lower-leveled Kristian to defend him would have been hilarious, under different circumstances.

This is going to suck. Malwine sighed as her real self, once again readjusting her plan.

“What are you doing?” Adelheid asked her quietly. “The copy thing?”

“I’m sending a double around to ask about that title she identified as for you,” Malwine explained. “And I’m about to do it again.”

This time, the double spawned at the end of the path, where she recalled she met Veit properly. Aside from Abelard, this was likely to be the highest level in the entire estate. She hadn’t been surprised in the slightest when Adelheid told her—if nothing else, she’d been surprised to learn Abelard was anywhere near this level.

“Veit, or whatever in any Devil’s name you’re actually called!” Malwine-as-Rupert shouted. “Come here!”

As expected, she didn’t have to wait long. Keeping him from chasing her double when she first made her way to Beuzaheim had been difficult enough, so his senses were bound to be sharp.

“Who are you?” Veit appeared before her. The air shook, and she suspected this wasn’t straight teleportation, at least not in the same sense as what Adelheid did was. “Why are you here and what do you want?”

Malwine would admit Rupert was ugly as fuck, but she still allowed herself the slight amusement she got out of everyone immediately assuming he wasn’t supposed to be here. The fact that the estate was warded and they didn’t know him surely played a part, but it was still funny.

Not that she could stop and enjoy that.

“I need to know what a sibyl is. Now.”

“Wha—” Veit blinked. His eyes narrowed. “You are not real.”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

“I am not,” Malwine confirmed. “I am a fake man, who is not real, but nonetheless needs to know what a sibyl is, and needs to know it now.”

His expression remained one of wariness. Malwine didn’t even see him move as his hand shot out, sparks of something crystalline dancing in her vision.

[Toll] 54 → 62

Whatever he had just done passed right through her intangible double, but sustaining it had cost her. She tried not to let it show. “Are you done? I need an answer.”

“Sibyls are the forgotten dead the sea keeps the husks of to use as it sees fit. They are naught but flesh,” Veit said, something between pensiveness and apprehension crossing his features. “You’ll find them in seafarer temples and the world’s worst corners, and nothing good comes of crossing their path. They exist for nothing but to carry out the sea’s will. Now. Why do you care?”

“I might have run afoul of one of them,” Malwine admitted. “My young friend and I both.”

Veit suddenly proved his eyes could narrow even further. “And under which circumstances have you found yourself here, coming to me, for information?”

“That’s a secret. We—”

“You are within the estate,” Veit spoke in a rush. “The false self is tethered—”

Malwine dismissed the double. For fuck’s sake.

But she’d gotten the answer she needed. Even if Veit knowing the double’s source was somewhere inside the house was quite likely to bite her in the ass.

“Great, it’s a zombie,” Malwine mumbled. “We pissed off a zombie. I wonder if setting it on fire would work?”

Adelheid looked horrified. “You want to set great-grandma on fire?” She paused. “What’s a zombie?”

“Something I read about once. It’s the risen dead. Resurrected, but with no mind or soul, just instinct.”

“That’s something that can happen?!”

“Apparently!” Malwine exhaled. “Sorry, that tone was unwarranted. If your great-grandma’s a sibyl, she’s actually a servant of the sea or whatever. And considering how much everyone talks about the sea being bad, this might be a problem.”

“Oh, so that’s why she moves the puddles.”

“…That’s why she what?”

“Sometimes, she’d move the puddles. I always just pushed them away with the helpful shadows.”

Malwine just stared helplessly. All this time, this great-grandma of Adelheid’s had just casually been a potential sea monster, and the girl hadn’t thought to mention this water thing once. Granted, neither of them had known about—

“She did talk about sibyls one time, but I didn’t get what she meant,” Adelheid put a finger against her chin as if she were about to rub it. “The sibyl in the mangal and the oracle above us.”

“The sibyl in the what? Like, a different one?”

“Yes, it was her friend. I tried to look for her once, but I couldn’t find her.”

Malwine hid her face behind her hands and momentarily regretted her existence.

She sent the double off without another word, once again seeking the area where Veit stood. She found him atop a tree this time, pressing what looked suspiciously like binoculars over his eyes.

“You again!”

She spoke quickly, intent on disappearing soon. She hoped this was like when they traced phonecalls on the TV, in the widow’s Earth, and if she went fast enough, he wouldn’t have time to track her. “What in any Devil’s name is an oracle?”

“A what?”

“Okay, bye.”

“Shame, shame,” Malwine told Adelheid. “He doesn’t know.”

“Wait, who did you ask?”

“Forester.”

“You talked to him and you didn’t ask him for his age?!”

Malwine sputtered. Okay, I deserved that.

“I sent a double to him. Disguised, so he wouldn’t know it was me.”

“Okay.”

“He might have noticed anyway.”

“Noticed what?”

“That it was someone from inside the house.”

“Oh,” Adelheid nodded. “You spooked me for a moment. I thought you meant he noticed it was you.”

“I don’t think he did, but I think he’s trying to figure out who it was.”

“So? It could have been anyone!”

“Eh…” Malwine winced. “I guess. I’ll just… refrain from sending the double off for now.”

“Refrain?”

“I won’t send it off.”

“Oh.”

Malwine sat on her bed, once again cupping her own head. “I don’t want to scare you, but I think we might be in trouble.”

“Because of the forest man?”

“That, too. But mostly your great-grandma. The other Adelheid. She has Bernie’s old name.”

Adelheid tipped her head in confusion. “Huh?”

“Your mother’s birth name was Bernadette fon Hūdijanin. That and some others, actually. I know because of my Skills.”

“That sounds… nice,” Adelheid’s eyes lit up as if that were somehow more important than the mess they had gotten themselves into. “Do you think I could be a better Adelheid fon Hūdijanin?”

“…I don’t think stealing this sibyl’s name would help us right now.”

“Not stealing. It’s mine.”

“…Alright,” Malwine let her have her victory—her own thoughts were already slipping back to the problem. She’d successfully annoyed Veit into explaining sibyls to her, but in the process, she’d given herself a new problem. Using the double outside the estate shouldn’t bring trouble to her, but her home was likely to be off-limits for the foreseeable future.

Not to mention, chances were, Abelard had gotten Kristian riled up by now. So her grandfather was probably running around the entire place, looking for Rupert.

She might have laughed despite herself.

“Think, Malwine, think,” she chastised herself.

Adelheid, bless her heart, cheered her on. “I believe in you!”

Goodness, it’s impossible to ever get angry at you.

Malwine sighed. “Okay. I don’t know what to do. But I’ll think of something.”

“Maybe we could tell Dad?” Adelheid offered.

“I thought you wanted your parents not to know anything.”

“I wouldn’t tell them that,” Adelheid huffed. “Just about where great-grandma is.”

“Wherever that is, do you honestly think Kristian could take her?”

“Take her?”

“Beat her. If it came to a fight.”

“I don’t know, but… Great-grandma can’t move. Only the puddles do. She’s missing one leg and she never moves, never talks.”

“But she’s angry at you.”

“She is,” Adelheid confirmed with a little sniffle.

“Don’t tell Kristian,” Malwine warned—immobile or not, she didn’t actually believe something connected to the sea could be beaten by tossing a violent middle-aged man at it. “We’ll have to figure it out for ourselves. Unfortunately.”

“Alright,” Malwine raised her head before continuing. “I’m going to look for a library in Beuzaheim as my double. Maybe there’s some information out there, about how to deal with the sibyl.”

“Sibyls, plural,” Adelheid corrected.

“Yes, that does wonders for my confidence.”

She was being a bit rough, she knew that, but even with her Skill running, she was still dangerously close to a freakout. She had to crank it up a notch, until a semblance of that enforced calm returned to her.

Though her initial actions hadn’t been perfect, they’d achieved their intended purpose. Even if she had disturbed the obvious high level in the mangal, the man’s job wasn’t to track down the source of mysterious doubles. It would likely get passed on to someone else—Kristian, no doubt—and nothing would come out of it, beyond perhaps the concern over some random old man showing up to ask for Abelard and a presumably random employee.

Sure, they’d both know the ‘man’ had asked about sibyls, but how would anyone tie that back to the toddlers?

Okay, I’ve got this. Malwine took deep, steadying breaths. Once she sent the double off to Beuzaheim, she’d ask for directions in the archive, to the nearest open-access library. There had to be one. And once she got to said library, she’d request information on the sea and sibyls. If the sea was as much of an enemy to human life as she’d been assuming it was, surely, there must have been literature out there on how to protect oneself from it and its weird zombies.

I wonder where the seablooded fit in here, Malwine couldn’t help but get sidetracked ever so slightly, as always. They must also have a connection to the sea.

She shook her head. They had fucked up, there was no other way around it. Both in using [Identify] on this sibyl—even if that had technically been Adelheid’s doing—and in how Malwine chose to handle the search for information.

She could, admittedly, have started with a library search, but this had felt like a good idea at the time. She hadn’t actually known a sibyl would be related to the sea until then.

Adelheid said she’s missing a leg. Is that why it’s a ‘shattered’ sibyl?

All of a sudden, the room shook. A kite-shaped construct of crystal, framed by what appeared to be honest-to-the-whatevers bone appeared before the door—and it was larger than it. It shimmered, iridescent in color, and floated a few inches above the ground.

The bizarre shape cracked, sending pieces in every direction. They faded to wisps in the air, as if they’d never existed. A figure rushed out, so entangled with the fading wisps that they might as well have been formed by them before fully appearing.

“I caught—”

Veit blinked with undisguised shock, seemingly unwilling to meet the gazes of the two toddlers staring up at him, each with a look of practiced innocence. “What the everloving… fox?”