Matthias was shaken and weary, his robe singed from battle. "You at least have some idea of the problem now. One of the few secrets we've learned is that the runes on that rubble act as a magic-suppressing enchantment. It forms the basis for the hidden artifact we keep somewhere nearby."

Nusina was back to relaying messages through Ruyo, now that they'd left the magic-rich environment of the Pale City. "We've seen something similar in the kidnappers' basement, where they were containing the fire elemental. We didn't get the chance to study it. Maybe you could practice containing and suppressing elementals?"

Ruyo said, "What was that horrible thing we fought? Its guardian?"

Matthias said, "Let's confer." He knocked on the room's door three times. It opened and Brother Ecumas arrived, bowing.

Ecumas held a hatchet but put it back on his belt. "You've met the Unspoken One?"

Ruyo nodded. "Could we get a healer, please?"

They moved to another cabin where they could lay down and rest, tended to by a monk who was in on the "Mysteries". Matthias and Ruyo explained what they'd seen.

Ecumas spoke in a low voice. "You shouldn't have risked yourself down there, Keeper!"

"I didn't expect that much danger, but at least Ruyo got to see. Which brings us back to her question. I believe that that monstrous wheel was a form of light elemental, though that doesn't seem like the right term. A creature made of magic filtered through some specific form and bound to its creator's will."

Ruyo said, "If that's so, then the Unspoken One used it to attack us. Why? Some hope of killing me and taking my power?"

Matthias nodded. "Likely that or testing you. We've never been openly attacked like that before. In fact the Unspoken One has been... eager to talk, as you must've sensed."

Ruyo shivered. "Can it control minds?"

"Emotions, maybe. The exact extent of its power is something we'd love to know but are, frankly, terrified to study in detail."

"After unexpectedly fighting a beast with too many eyeballs, I can't blame you." She turned to Nusina. "Superficially, it seemed reasonable. I'd hate to be trapped and unable even to make my case for why I should be let out. But part of me screams 'kill it, kill it!' whenever I think about it, and I don't know why."

Nusina drifted to in front of Ruyo, and her eyes glittered. "Mistress, I'm damaged and incomplete. I have only fragments of my old memories and I'm frustrated with how many things it feels like I'm missing. Yet I have glimpses of what that thing really is. You, too, carry a piece of the old goddess' power. We both have the same instinct about it."

"Isn't it unfair and irrational to try killing something that's never harmed me, based on someone else's say-so and a bad feeling?"

"If the soul of every creature that knows or remembers this prisoner, screams out to kill it dead, doesn't that seem like an important message from the past? Milady, you've been a woman traveling alone with valuables. Have you ever met someone and thought, Don't be alone or unarmed around this man? And did you heed that?"

"A few times. Yes, I stayed away."

"The people who didn't listen to that voice, didn't live to become your ancestors."

Ruyo thought of lonely nights on the road. Friendly inns, and on a few occasions a seemingly friendly face with some excuse for getting her alone or drunk. Or someone offering to help her in a way that felt just a little out of place, then looking insulted by her refusal and saying something like "You're not a very nice person, are you?" There were honey-tongued merchants -- she liked to think she was one, on a good day -- and then there were smiling predators.

She sighed and turned her attention back toward Matthias and Ecumas. "I'm on board with trying to kill the Unspoken One. If I can call it something less cumbersome."

Nusina suggested, "You might call it... Zovvah. That's not its name, but similar."

Matthias snorted. "That sounds like something insulting in the old tongue."

Ruyo said, "Now, I would have suggested destroying the room that contains it, but now that looks like a horrible idea since the rubble itself is the container. If we deface all the stonework around it, that might accomplish something, but I didn't see an elaborate mural like I've got." She turned to Nusina. "You said something about a temple it had in bright light. Does that mean it's surviving using a shrine elsewhere with stockpiled energy? Maybe way to the north, on the equator?"

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"I'm trying to recall. That building you monks have unearthed... We saw only the one room, and the Pale City. Was there more to the place?"

Ecumas shook his head. "No, and we would expect some sort of elaborate decoration if it were a temple."

Matthias added, "And a crystal and more of what Nusina called 'theotech'. So that confirms our theory that it wasn't a temple. Maybe a deliberate trap built for it."

Ruyo said, "In that case there's little point in wrecking the room."

Nusina bobbed in agreement. "Have your people, modern humans I mean, explored this world enough to reach the equator? You obviously grasp that it's a sphere."

Matthias said, "Yes, accidentally. There was a famous pursuit of some pirates that led both parties to head far north and got tossed in a storm. They were assumed dead, and in fact most of them did perish. But a year later a single ship returned to report finding an island."

Nusina said, "Hmm. I vaguely recall the equator was almost all ocean, so any island you find there has a good chance of being the right one. But that doesn't mean my memory of its high temple being there is reliable."

Ecumas threw up his hands. "Then what do we need to do, spirit? Sail around the world to find a lost temple that might not exist, and then discover there are eleven other backup shrines like yours?"

"I don't want to go on a scavenger hunt for a twelve-step solution," Ruyo said. "So how do we strike at the root? Can we stab the Unspoken One with a magic sword, or cut it off from its power source, or shut down all its shrines from one place?"

"Oh, we've tried ordinary weapons," Ecumas said. "And weapons blessed as hard as we can, and spells. As you saw, even our specialized anti-spirit magic is little more than a nuisance to a monster that powerful."

"You could be onto something," Nusina said. "I'd like to study more temples of Ruyo's predecessor for comparison, to know what to do. We should be doing that anyway."

Matthias said, "If the last of the goddess' power ended up at a small power storage station, doesn't that mean the rest were thoroughly destroyed?"

"Too badly to work as shrines, yes. But something might be intact to study, restore, or salvage. In fact we could use a certain kind of material." She described the dangerous cables or conduits that were broken at the Wellspring. "Have you seen anything like that?"

"We're defenders, not ruin hunters, but we do keep records of what we learn."

Ecumas said, "Wait, Keeper. Are you sure?"

"I can think of no one better to learn this secret. Miss Ruyo, we know of a ruin not too far from here, that might hold some of the equipment and answers you seek. Our scouts weren't able to get far, but you likely can."

Nusina sparkled. "The hospital! Or the power plant! I remember something about structures south of the Wellspring. Which, by the way, was one of at least three, so Ecumas is right about there being possible backups for... Zovvah."

Ruyo said, "We have a plan, then. In the near future I can go to this ruin, hoping to find more information or tools that would make a hunt for Zovvah's high temple worthwhile. The long-term goal will be to learn enough that we can cut the god off from its power reserves. Sound reasonable?"

They agreed.

#

She stayed for one more day in Brotherhood, demonstrating magic and allowing the monks to practice entrapping or disrupting elementals with their spells. With some reluctance, even Nusina joined in to give them a better sense of what an intelligent spirit could do. For some of the monks including the Witch Hunters, it was their first true experience with such things. Fun, if really a form of practice for deadly threats. Ruyo lured them farther away from the village's ward, where she could cast more effectively.

The "spirit containment procedures" were also practice for Ruyo. The monks' best magic analyst watched her with his tools while she demonstrated her powers.

Nusina said, "Milady, try to sense the Wellspring. Can you detect it from here?"

Ruyo had no idea how, but the spirit guided her through spinning around and trying to gauge the direction toward it with her eyes closed. All her shrines were roughly east of here, so that helped. Finding the most powerful one was hard.

It took hours of frustrating effort that left her feeling drained, not up for handing out more free metal or spawning more elementals. Even so, she couldn't start remotely waving hello to anyone yet. But Nusina declared it a good practice session.

The next morning, she set out again. They let her keep a horse "to make your life easier". But as a former horse owner, Ruyo knew taking care of even a good and gentle riding mare like this one took effort.

She traded stories and theories with Nusina as they rode home. Somebody had been asking about details on that space-folding magic that Zovvah used. Nusina didn't know much about it, but recognized it as high-level magic that few or no mortals could ever reach.

"But that doesn't stop you," she added.

Ruyo shivered despite the warm weather. "Do you really think I can be around a hundred years from now, working miracles?"

"If you can avoid getting yourself killed by horrible eyeball monsters, yes."

She rode on, feeling that she was staring into the far future.

The spirit kept reminding Ruyo to try sensing headquarters, and had tried having her feel out the edges of Brotherhood's anti-magic ward. Ruyo did feel she was getting closer to base, but wouldn't trust that intuition as a compass.

It rained one afternoon. "Ah, good!" said Ruyo's guide. "You can try shielding yourself."

Ruyo looked up into the grey sky as the rain began to pick up. She raised one hand, trying to push the incoming water away. It was like trying to repel a thousand arrows, and staring skyward while riding made her dizzy.

"Not like that. You don't need to use your hands, not for something so simple. Focus on repelling water all around you."

Ruyo had taken to directing magic with her hands, but in theory that was just a way to concentrate and direct power. Could she use her water-shaping ability all around her? It took effort not to focus. But she found a way. The rain began to fall around her yet spraying to either side as though she were under a dome. The horse looked up, puzzled, shielded along with her rider.

"Ha, nice!" Ruyo said. "I've seen enchanted items that do this, but never splurged for one."

"Really? I should get a better idea of what enchantments are common."

Ruyo rode beneath some trees, and got hit by a clump of twigs and moss. She sputtered and threw it off her, which made her lose concentration and get soaked. "Ugh!"

"Good practice!"