The Passing Fancy continued her slow passage across the Wake’s version of the inland sea. I became quite familiar with the ship’s galley, and even started to be able to pick out individual crewskeletons who came to watch my cooking. I continued to offer them dishes, but they shook their heads regretfully. They stopped fleeing though, which I took as a positive step.

Captain Ramon had finally stopped shouting at me for offering them food by the end of the second day, though he curtly refused when I offered to let him watch me cook.

“Nay, lass, there’s no need of that! I’ve a ship to run, and no desire to run aground on the back of a kraken!” he snarled, and stalked off to shout more orders at his crew.

“Do you think he’s serious about the kraken?” I asked Soriya.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t think the Wake has anything that’s never existed, it’s only supposed to take up memories and experiences that have happened. But… I don’t know how long they last. There might have been a kraken at one point in this world’s history?”

“Hm. I guess it’s best if we don’t find out then.”

Soriya nodded. “Yes.”

We paused and then looked at each other in alarm.

“You don’t suppose…?” We both said at the same time.

I groaned and Soriya started to grin wickedly. “Oh now…” she clapped her hands and rubbed them together. “This could be fun. I’ve got some new spells I really have been hoping to try out!”

I sighed. “I don’t suppose I could convince you to run?”

Soriya looked at me, her expression skeptical. “How do you intend to outrun something that’s bigger than the ship?”

I waved my arms in exasperation. “It’s huge! It should be slow!”

“It’s obviously an ambush predator, and possibly a ghost at that!” She retorted. “By the time it’s engaged in combat with us, it’ll be too late to run.”

“Well now hang on, this isn’t fair! We have to fight the Kraken and we need to fight the undead skeleton crew?!” I protested.

“Well sure, why not?”

“Because it’s repetitive gameplay!”

Soriya raised an eyebrow. “I don’t know if you noticed, but this isn’t precisely a game. They’re just… grooves. Like I said, lines cut into reality.”

I huffed. “I really hate being right. Just once, it would be so refreshing to be wrong.”

Soriya shook her head. “That would be worse. Sure we wouldn’t know what was coming, but it would throw all our previous efforts into doubt. How do we know we’re headed the right way, if we don’t know what the proper plotline is?”

I huffed. “Easy. We just need to find those shadowselves and stop them.”

“Yes, but if things go off the rails, then how would we know where to find them? It’s a pretty big world, you know!”

I was silent, stirring the meal a bit. “I suppose you’re right, but I don’t like it. We’re supposed to be able to steer things, that was the whole point of skipping Breezewood past the destruction.”

Soriya tapped her lips thoughtfully. “You know… you have a point.” She turned and headed towards the door.

“Where are you going?”

“I have an idea, I’m going to talk to Captain Ramon about it.”

A few moments later Soriya returned with Captain Ramon in tow.

The captain glared… though honestly, it was hard to tell if that was just his normal expression, or if I was actually feeling the emotion.

“Well then. The lassie here tells me you two have cooked up quite the plan. You’re going to scare off the kraken, are you?”

I looked at Soriya and raised an eyebrow. She mouthed ‘poizone’ to me. My eyes widened in sudden understanding, and I turned back to the captain. “We do have an idea, yes. It’s more Soriya’s than mine, but yes. If a concern, then we can work a kind of warding spell to keep the kraken from your ship. … Assuming they’re real?” I raised my eyebrows at him.

He laughed bitterly. “I don’t doubt that your modern world tells you they’re all just myth and fable, but here in the Wake, they’re real enough to eat us all.”

I nodded, and started pouring food onto our plates. “Then we can fix that. Is there some specific action we can take to draw them in, so that we can test the warding?”

Captain Ramon’s eyes widened in shock. “Ye want to draw the kraken to us?! Are ye daft?!”

I shrugged. “We can’t prove the warding works if they don’t come near us. Is there a point of specific danger on our journey?”

The captain stroked his chin. “Aye… there is. Just north of the whirlpool, they like to fish for wrecks there. About half a day’s sail from this point.”

Soriya nodded enthusiastically. “Then it’s settled! We’ll ward your ship for you!”

The captain squinted at her. “And how do ye plan to do that?” He asked suspiciously.

“The same way we solve all our problems, with magic!” She replied with a grin.

“I know that, I’m not a simpleton!” The captain snapped.

Soriya raised a single eyebrow. “Do you want me to describe the precise ritual, or…?”

The captain’s scowl grew even more fierce. “Don’t play me for the fool! Of course I’m not church scholar to know every last spell! I just want to know your plan of attack!”

I stepped in before things went further south, feeling otherme’s gentle guidance. A soft {Persuade} wafted around me as I explained.

“Soriya and I are going to cast a ritual to make the hull of the ship leak poison into the sea. That will obviously taste bad, and the smell will waft through the water, keeping predators and dangerous wildlife at bay.”

The captain stroked his chin again, and muttered to himself, pacing back and forth on the deck, before finally turning to face us, and nodding grudgingly.

“And this magic... it won’t harm me ship?!”

Soriya shook her head. “Not a bit!”

The captain muttered sourly then nodded. “Alright. I suppose I can understand that much. But if you do harm me ship, Goddess’s curse or no, you’ll be going in the drink!”

I smiled gently, feeling the {Persuade} dissipate as it did its work, and gave the captain a graceful curtsey.

“Thank you for your trust in us. We will do our best to be worthy of it.” I replied.

The captain turned and stalked off without a word.

Soriya let out a breath. “Wow. That skill of yours is… really something! Have you been leveling it up?”

I nodded. “Yes, it’s maxed out.”

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Soriya shivered. “I could feel it! Like… like…” she suddenly laughed. “Actually, it was a lot like eating your lemon blueberry bars. Warm and cozy and comfortable and the feeling that everything was going to be just fine.”

I blinked, frowning. “I’m not sure I like the idea of my cooking being so good it’s mind control.” I shook my head. “Speaking of which. Would you call Eshaan. The food’s ready. He’s probably still asleep in our cabin.”

Soriya headed off to fetch Eshaan, and over breakfast we discussed our plan with him.

“So you’re going to…”

“Yes, another ritual like we did in the cave.”

Eshaan chewed quietly for a moment then said “And this won’t create another evil shadow clone of you that wants to destroy the world?”

Soriya snorted. “Goddess bless, I hope not! Besides, I think our evil side is already purged from that!”

Eshaan nodded. “Good enough for me!”

I giggled. “I dunno, I think Soriya has plenty of evil left in her.”

Soriya leveled her spoon at me. “Not funny! I will curse you with the spotty undying flux of bad cooking!”

I mimed a shocked gasp. “You see?! She’s clearly evil! She’s even willing to forego good cooking to do her evil!”

Eshaan shook his head. “No, evil cooking is being forced to eat at the imperial trooper’s mess.” He looked at Soriya gravely. “You’re not that evil, are you?”

Soriya grimaces. “You’re right, there are depths to which even witches dare not stoop.” She said gravely, then giggled. “Come on, lets hurry up and do the ritual! I haven’t done anything properly witchy in a while! I’ll lose my license!”

Eshaan looked up at that. “Witches have a license?”

Soriya giggled. “Yes, it’s our broom license, didn’t you know?”

I glared at her. “Soriya, stop teasing him!”

She stuck her tongue out at me. “You’re no fun.”

“Right.” Eshaan said, shoveling the last of the meal into his mouth. “Let’s get going before you two witches turn us all inside out or something.”

We hurriedly cleaned up the meal, then headed to the center of the deck, and started drawing out the sigil and circle we would need. The magicalculations weren’t anything like as hard as our first ritual, ‘anti fouling a ship with one spell’ was hardly a stretch, and the circle was soon laid out on the bone and wood deck of the ship. Crewskeletons and Captain Ramon stood nearby, watching us finish our work.

“And this is the grand spell to foil the kraken?” Captain Ramon asked skeptically.

Soriya sat back on her heels and looked up at the captain. “Yes.” She stared into his eyes, and the captain was the first to turn away.

“Hurry up then.” He snapped.

“It’s ready now.” She turned to me. “Are you ready Lily?”

I nodded. “Yes.”

“Then let’s begin.”

We knelt on either side of the magic circle, just the same as when we performed the ritual in the cavern. Once again, we poured our mana into the ritual, and though the spell was much simpler and smaller the same ambient glow of power swelled upwards out of the diagram, this time a rich virulent green.

“Oh spirits of darkness, spirits of the earth and water, heed my call.” Soriya closed her eyes, and chanted. The glow from the circle intensified, and small sprites of virulent green started to float upwards from the circle, before diving down back into the circle. A faint aura of green spread outwards from the circle, and I felt a faint sickness in my stomach as it floated past and down, seeping into the ship’s hull.

Oop, almost time for my part.

“Ward us, protect us, shield us from harm.” I took up the chant, Soriya’s voice falling silent.

“Make your presence a guard against those who would do us misery.” I started weaving in the {Spiritist} skills to make our fusion spell. I could feel the spell take, the faint illness vanishing from my stomach, and the taste of wicked green fading away under me. The circle flashed, pulsed once and then faded into the deck and out of sight. I swayed a bit, but the mana drain was nothing compared to the ritual in the Cavern of Trials… Or, perhaps more accurately, my adventure was allowing me to gain strength, to see this spell as a trivial mana cost.

Strength which was abruptly increased, as I heard the familiar voice of the World Soul announce. <{Spiritist} Advanced to level 6. {Reinforce}, unlocked. For warding the ghost ship from the kraken and preventing the attack, you have advanced to {Spiritist:6}>

I sat back, blinking in surprise.

Soriya’s eyes opened wide, and she laughed. “Well! That’s a very clear result!” She said.

Captain Ramon looked around, then back at us, scowling. “What result? I see nothing, just a pretty light show!”

I looked up at him, and smiled, feeling oddly calm and peaceful on this ship of dead men. “We just leveled. The World Soul tells us that our magic warded off the kraken attacks.”

He blinked, the twin bright points of red in his skull flickering. He looked out the ocean, then back at us. The crewskeletons rustled and clacked amongst themselves, a soft swell of not quite speech, slowly rising in what seemed to be wonder.

Finally, the captain stammered out “Truly? Well… I suppose… ye’ve done as ye said then.” He turned to his crewskeletons. “What are ye standing about lollygagging for! Get to work, ye!”

The crew scattered across the deck, leaping to their tasks. The ship felt… lighter. As though a weight had somehow been lifted from the boat. I felt… good. Really good.

Eshaan came over and squeezed my shoulder. “Good work, Lilyanna.” He said softly. I looked up at him, smiling, and nodded. “Thank you.”

He laughed. “I should be thanking you! I leveled too, and I don’t feel I did anything to deserve it but tag along!”

I stood up, Eshaan offering me his hand to steady my wobble on the deck.

“No, that’s not true. We all worked together to do this. We are stronger together than we are apart. I couldn’t stand on my own without you to help me.” I said.

Eshaan grinned at me, and rubbed the back of his head. “Ah heh. Well. Thanks.”

The crew dispersed, and Captain Ramon went to direct them. I drifted forward to the bow to watch our progress. Far ahead, I caught sight of the grand whirlpool that Captain Ramon had warned us about. Under us, the bow wave of the ship was now tinted a faint green, and I noticed that our wake left ripples of green behind us.

I bit my lip, suddenly worried. That was… an awful lot of poison. But then… this is the realm of ghosts and memories, isn’t it? Can you even poison a memory? Well, if you could eat a memory… or kill a memory… I shook my head at the thoughts. This world didn’t really make a lot of sense.

I turned back to the view, watching the whirlpool slowly approach. On the far side, enormous tentacles slowly lifted out of the water and into the air, clutching shattered hull fragments in their coils.

Huh. There’s the kraken alright. And sunken ships… I wonder how many ships…? Well all of them, I suppose. I wonder if that means that all of Captain Ramon’s crew are the memories of those ships? I shook my head again. “We’ll deal with that when we arrive.” I said to myself. “It’s not like I can call the goddess or the crystal dragon…”

Hey, me? What’s the difference between the goddess and the Crystal Dragon anyway?

Otherme shared a memory, faint information about two competing religions, one much older than the other, with only vague whisps of memory. We worship the goddess, in as much as we can be said to worship anyone. She’s just… a vague idea, really. We never studied at the church or cared very much about it. The Crystal Dragon is the religion in the capital, the empire’s religion, but they don’t discourage the goddess, they just say she’s another face of the Crystal Dragon.

So… the goddess is vague for you then? I guess that means you didn’t get any guidance from her about me.

We don’t think so. We’ve always known that you would awaken, it was just obvious to us. And then we would teach each other, and become one.

What does that mean?

Otherme stumbled for a bit, fumbling with images and concepts that lacked words.

It means that eventually you will know everything we know, and we will know everything you know, and we’ll stop asking ourselves questions, because we’ll already know what we need to know. We’ll be whole.

I bit my lip, and worried. Otherme laughed gently. Me, you are too confused. We are already the same person; you just keep pushing us away to pretend we are not.

How can that be true?! I demanded. I don’t remember anything about you! Or this world! I still find it strange that pink hair is a thing!

Otherme pondered for a moment, then said Captain Ramon mentioned the Well of Eternity. Maybe he would be willing to share with us?

I thought about that for a while, then nodded. It was as good a lead as any, and it wasn’t like I had anything else to do.

As I turned towards the rear of the ship, I caught sight of a tentacle rising up out of the water in our wake, taller and taller, shining a faint glowing green and writhing in a distinctly ill manner before it swiftly vanished under the inky black surface of the water. I smiled grimly. “We are not food. And this way… well, we don’t have to make calamari out of you either.”

I set off towards the stern of the ship where Captain Ramon’s outrageous hat was clearly visible.

To my surprise, as I got nearer, I saw that Soriya was already in conversation with him. But as I got close enough to hear what they were talking about, I had to laugh. It seemed Soriya was already ahead of me.

“…So you’re saying that the Well of Eternity is an actual place?”

“Nay lass, ye’ve misunderstood me again. It’s a place that’s left over because none of the other places are it. It’s what other places aren’t.”

“Hello Captain Ramon, hello Soriya.” I greeted them as I approached.

“Ah, Lily! Captain Ramon was just telling me about the Well of Eternity!”

The captain grimaced. “Trying to tell ye, more like. Ye be denser than an ironwood palm.”

“That’s interesting. I wanted to ask about that too.”

The captain rolled his eyes. “O course ye did. My suffering be not complete yet.”

Soriya glared at him, her hands on her hips. “Captain, honestly. We have been nothing but nice! Why are you so angry about us!”

He glared back. “Ye want to ask me that?!”

I sighed. “Captain. Please. We don’t know anything. We’re just asking for help.”

“Now that be an understatement.” He growled.

“Captain, please.” I clasped my hands in front of me.

Soriya laughed. “No, he’s already been a little helpful, even if he doesn’t mean to. We’re… flotsam, I guess. The Well of Eternity is the space between worlds, at least if I’m right that’s what it is. It’s where soul stuff swirls and mixes and slosh about.”

The captain turned to look at Soriya in surprise. She grinned in triumph. “So I’m right then!”

“If I’m right, the good captain and his crew could return if they wanted too, but for all the various reasons someone might choose not to pass on have decided to stay. And now they’re stuck.”

“Aye, you’ve the right of that at least.” The captain snarled.

“Oh!” I blinked in surprise. “So that’s why you’re so mad at us! We got fished out of the well by whatever the goddess did!”

The captain nodded grudgingly. “That also be the right of it. Ye get a free pass to and fro on the planes, and yet we be stuck here in half life.”

I stood there, blinking in surprise, an idea starting to form in my head.