The Scholar's Tale(Original Fantasy)

[Strigoi Grey]

Book IV, Chapter 10

* * *

Mharra had always told himself that, the moment he started sitting in rooms' corners, thinking deep thoughts and seeing colours everywhere, he'd need to do himself a kindness and go swimming with a millstone about his neck.

Thing was, this room had no corners, and the colours weren't in his imagination. Even if his reflection looked way too sinister for what should've been an inanimate image. Was his smile really that menacing?

Oh...would you look at that now. The thing in the mirror was trying to claw its way free, the smile plastered on its face having as much to do with joy as its empty eyes.

Mharra would be the first man to say he had no deep knowledge of wonderworking and things beyond the world, but he was no idiot, either. Not in this regard. He had an eye for symbols, for themes and tendencies, for...props.

The tools one made and used to fulfill their goals.

The mirror was symbol, story and barrier at once. For, Mharra knew, if he let it, the creature that had his face and knowledge and little else would replace him, and live his life as it wished. Briefly.

If it was lucky, it would run into Ryzhan first.

As for him...he was not sure whether that would be one of those cases where his living corpse was used as a suit of flesh, consumed or dragged into the mirror's world in a swapping of places.

Or maybe he was, in fact, going crazy and imagining things. But it didn't feel like the insanity whose edge he had walked too many times. Besides, you were only crazy if whatever uncanny things you thought, said and did resulted in failure and harm rather than something beneficial. In which case, you were a genius, maybe an eccentric one.

Mharra was not sure he was arrogant enough to call himself brilliant. But he'd been clever enough to survive this far, and wasn't that a tale and a half?

He'd have to get someone to write it down.

But first...

'You are likely wondering how I got here,' Mharra said to no one in particular. Not that anyone was around.

He risked a glance at the mirrored freak. It was looking less and less human at every look, with a jaw as unhinged as its mind and teeth that'd have fit in no human's mouth.

No. No thinking beings, at least.

Mharra had a feeling a wandering eye and voice to balance a focused mind was the best approach here (that felt like the right word, approach; more suited to his goal than "method"). He looked forward as if addressing an audience, but he imagined he was speaking with Three at his side...yes, maybe at the steamer's prow...

He'd been hesitant about talking to himself as if the ghost were still there. Some people got sick or sicker if they thought they were, so who was to say insanity couldn't be invited the same way? Granted, back on the ship, no one could really talk to themselves, between the ship itself and Ib. But they tried to ignore and not reply to such things, so the effect was much of the same.

Mharra usually preferred noise, bustle. It helped distract him from what ran around in his head. Theatre work had seemed like good work for that sort of man, and the flamboyance had naturally followed. On any other occasion, he'd have been annoyed at best at being left alone with his thoughts. Tides knew what happened last time...

He wasn't sure, on the other hand. Had that been a hallucination, or a vision? A genuine one, not one brought about by some unseen miasma or freak weather. It had seemed too...targeted, for it to be anything but an effort of will. Not to mention he wouldn't have told himself what the Three apparition had implied. The Mharra of that moment had been thinking about doing everything but finding another way to be happy.

He wasn't sure he'd ever get over it, unless he succeeded here.

'But hey, look at the bright side,' he smiled lazily, shrugging, as he continued to talk at the air. 'Maybe I'll finally pull off one of those tortured artist roles without needing gruesome props or to get hammered beforehand.'

In all honesty, it wasn't like Mharra needed much more material for that sort of thing. Just...more honesty. But roles that struck too close to home had always made him uncomfortable. Wasn't the whole point of acting to get away from reality, for a while?

Sure, playing roles that resembled the lives of others could've been called hypocritical, but he didn't really know the people he pretended to be enough to really care about their triumphs or tragedies.

'Good play name, that,' he mused. 'Triumph or tragedy. It could be about...practically every attempt at sailing.'

Mharra's chuckle was as dry as autumn leaves, and sounded like them hitting the ground. Sea and sky, but his throat felt parched. Was he thirsty? No, he'd made sure he wouldn't be distracted by anything like that during this. Hunger, sleep, the need to relieve himself or move about so as not to get cramps, nothing like that would interfere.

Hmmm...Mharra stroked his beard. Could he make it so? His power was difficult to understand at the best of times - the closest thing to a rule it had was that it seemed to work better with props, though practically any object could be one, granting him a great deal of options - but drama and symbolism seemed to be able to make it work towards his goals sometimes.

This was dramatic enough, no? At least by his standards. And perhaps that was another metaphysical law of his Gift. Was his situation here dramatic, objectively speaking? What would that even look like?

'No, I'm sure there are people aloof enough they wouldn't be moved by this,' he said, making a sweeping gesture as he took a few steps. Such gestures could actually sweep rooms clean, provided there was enough dust to make the people he was demonstrating to sneeze. He'd done it a few times. 'Either because they don't know enough or because they simply wouldn't care. So, it's all about me.'

Damn, but that sounded stupidly arrogant when he said it like that. And it had felt plenty dumb in his head.

Was he wrong, though? His Gift was his Gift, not some receptacle for existence's sense of style. Otherwise, he'd be meditating on some snowcapped mountain's top, legs crossed and beard as white as his surroundings, rumbling answers to profound questions and ah, who was he kidding? Any useful sort of cosmic knowledge was more likely to get him pressganged by a Great Power than anything.

'And if I wanted that sort of thing, I'd have never left my fleet,' he said. Why, it might have even been better. Most cultures' clutches were far easier to escape than those of the Powers, and that was discounting the ways they could rewrite minds.

Ah, but he was ignoring the real issue, wasn't he? Talking his way around it. And how cowardly did you have to be to do that when there wasn't even another person around.

'Maybe it'd have been better if that little armoured creature stayed with me.'

Where had it gone, anyway? He could scarcely recall anything between being led away by it and the Queen taking over as guide. They'd swapped places at some point, obviously (though the Queen felt like she'd always been there, somehow). Had he really been so deep in his own thoughts that he'd missed it clanking as it left?

'Now, that would be another good play. Some idiotic snob whose head is so far up his behind he doesn't notice anything around him.' Probably a comedy, though you could make that sort of story sad or terrifying with ease. Much like his was - he was sure some people would have found it hilarious.

'They'd be like,' Mharra spread his arms, smiled, 'imagine spending so much time travelling and hoping, only to get nothing! Isn't it ironic?!'

The laugh he faked became distressingly genuine a few seconds in, and stretched for much longer than he'd wished. By the end, he was coughing between nervous chuckles.

There was a sort of animal that did something like that, looked halfway between a larger wildcat and a wolf. When one was sick or injured enough it'd only drag the pack down by staying around, it mimicked health and happiness enough the others wouldn't get suspicious, then slunk away to die. Some scholars deemed it one of the most altruistic and thoughtful behaviours observed among beasts.

'Think it'd work?' Mharra wondered, snapping his fingers in lieu of a coin to flip. He'd never really had much love for that habit, and less for people who practised it - mostly smarmy game riggers who'd suffered from a lack of punches to the teeth before they'd met him -, but it galled him to have nothing to do but talk and move. Which, in this context rather that on a stage, made him feel more like a caged rat rather than an artist.

Insert sneering statement about human nature.

'Think it'd be a good look on me? Getting out of everybody's hair out of my heart's kindness.' Out of pure vanity, Mharra was convinced practically anything was a good look on him, but the question was still rhetorical. Not Mharra's kind of talk (the fact it wasn't directed as anyone else would've been odd for anyone, but especially him), or it wouldn't have been, not so long ago.

The captain was one dark thought away from resting his chin on his fist while sighing deeply.

'And I'm not even built for that sort of pose.'

Not to mention the beard would get in the way.

Mharra tapped fingers against his cheek as he looked around the chamber. Honestly, by now, he'd have expected a Three-like apparition to arrive and talk (or gesture, like last time) him into doing something worthwhile. Or Ib bursting in with a solution or revelation, or the steamer doing so after getting fed up.

He hadn't even started hallucinating from frustration or anything else, which he'd figured he'd do faster than any of his friends in a situation like this. Did that mean he was the sanest person on his crew? Now that was bloody horrifying to think about.

'At least they're getting some things done,' he said, mildly happy. Ryzhan was probably being ravaged by a pent up shapeshifting monster woman, while Ib and the ship's avatar were...what did they even have in common besides not liking each other? Maybe they were trading tips on what machine oil made joints the most flexible, or whatever they could meet each other halfway about.

Ngh. Now he was distracting himself again. Thinking about the crew wouldn't get anything done, he'd done nothing but that on the way here. Besides, it felt wrong, for reasons he couldn't quite describe. Maybe it was his ego rearing up again (when it had slipped free from under his self-deprecation, anyway?), but he felt that not thinking about himself would just move him away from the solution.

Not that his Gift's instincts were generous enough to even hint at the nature of said solution. Waves, it was like one of those ill-defined "danger senses" in some cheap adventuring novel, which made sure the hero (bland enough for anyone to use them them as a vehicle for wish fulfillment) knew when something was wrong and thus dangerous, but not what, why, in what manner or how much.

Honestly, his power being some some cosmic hack's attempt at making his journey more suspenseful by pushing him into hackneyed dilemmas seemed so eerily likely he almost expected to find an Observer out of Ghyrria grinning at him when he glanced over his shoulder.

'Smugly, of course. I bet they even take their tea that way.' With the babies they ate, knowing them.

'You know, there's something unsettling but unsurprising in the theory that maybe all of our lives are parts of a story spun out by a being or force beyond our comprehension.' People were jackasses most of the time they could get away with it. When you were so powerful nobody else even felt real, why not nudge some of the insects into moving in circles for your amusement?

...Also a distraction, he'd say. But at least having nothing to do but think let him determine what was less.

'Now, Ryzhan would say something sarcastic, maybe about how I should brood more often.'

But that was one of the few looks that were bad on him. Scrunched together, his eyebrows almost seemed to fuse. He'd once seen a yellow-furred, potbellied ape with that sort of monobrow, and now he felt vaguely insulted whenever he scowled in the mirror.

'What am I doing wrong?' Mharra tried to keep his voice mostly flat, with just a tinge of curiosity and bafflement. It wasn't like he'd received meaningful advice before this whole endeavour, which could be seen in the fact he wasn't even seeing his goal on the horizon.

Thinking about the crew or the wider world wasn't helping, which killed his theory about drawing strength from his experiences. Well, most of them. He didn't really remember things in relation to himself alone, it was almost always how he'd impacted others.

'But that feels too simple,' he admitted out loud. And it did. Drawing power from his memories of how he'd changed others for the better felt ridiculous now that he tried to put it into practice. It was too simple a way to get Three back, so how could it happen?

Had he been a more altruistic sort, maybe there would've been the shape of a story there: a man who aided everyone he could but was unable to help himself. But the closest thing to that he knew was Ib, and the grey giant was as far from helpless as you could get.

Something else, then. This place, the hosts? No, he'd offered enough courtesy, in his opinion. And his Gift thought that the Weaver Queen and Clockwork King trapping him here for a slight they didn't mention was so unlikely as to be almost impossible.

'It's not the present.' Mharra rubbed his chin with a knuckle, then his eyes, blinking heavily as he strode from one end of the room to another, his other arm behind his back. Admitting his problem should've been the first step to solving it, but he'd done that long ago and couldn't see how it had helped, if it had.

No, no. He'd got over the distractions, yes? He was no longer derailing his internal monologue. He was focusing on the dilemma, not on anyone or anything else, not in what might be. What he needed to keep in mind was how'd he'd got here and where...he was going...

* * *

The crystal making up the room (an artificial substance, far as Mharra could tell, for it resembled no gem or ordinary rock he'd ever seen) could be made into props, as it turned out. It just took a lake of sweet and a bucket of blood, like most things worth doing, as some utter idiots would say.

Broken by his Gift-enhanced strength and improvised tools, each crystal shard filled the stale air with a great deal of multicoloured dust, which might've been pretty to look at, but was choking to breathe in, scraping his lungs like a handful of needles.

He'd heard some jewellers ended up with all sort of diseases from the materials they worked with, and he could believe it. Each breath burned and his line of sight had narrowed, as if his vision were a tunnel. It was not because of the dust, which, though thick, was easy to see through.

'I let Three step into that experiment,' Mharra breathed hoarsely, 'and didn't lift a finger to help in any way.' The Free Fleet would've stopped the interference, more likely than not, but it didn't matter. It was a matter of (tides, he'd really started talking like this) principle.

'It was for Ib's sake,' he went on. 'Couldn't leave a friend with a warped mind.' But that didn't excuse anything. Ib was happy at becoming more capable, but the giant saw only ends and means. Three's disappearance had set off the chain of events that had led to the steamer developing the ability to truly think, but the ship was gruff at best when that was brought up. It missed its old engineer, though it didn't need him anymore.

'But that was a coincidence, not an aim. We didn't even know it would happen.'

It had also led to him and Ryzhan travelling and growing on their own, which certainly delighted Ib, for it would help the being's plans. But that was also a coincidence.

In the end, he hadn't helped when he could have. Maybe he could've talked the Free Fleet into altering the experiment a little, who knew.

He hadn't given that much thought, since. Not helping when help wasn't asked for - wasn't that natural? The people who had the time and means to help others without crippling themselves didn't have the inclination. It was just a fact of Midworld...

...but who was to say that life had to say that way? Ib had always talked openly about wanting to change all of existence, and Mharra had never really doubted the grey being, for it was as powerful as it was ambitious. The sea and its turnings might have been eternal, but who was to say the people who plied it had to remain unchanging?

Hadn't the Great Powers themselves built their might with the bones of the first truly great Midworlder civilisation? The wealth they'd plundered from the peaceful scholars they'd slaughtered, well-meaning fools too gentle to raise a hand in self-defence?

Even such an event could be a boon, seen from a certain angle. Atrocity, serving as the foundation of the polities that now, turned like gears in Ib's plans. Necessity. But beyond all that, it had been a change, the dawn of modern Midworld.

Perhaps a harsher, crueller world than what had been before, but who was to say that couldn't be reversed?

'That's why I'm doing this,' Mharra said, revelation and confession in one. The table he had assembled, crystals melting and melding under his Gift's attention, had taken on the hue of seawater, and stretched and rose like a living map of those stretches of ocean Mharra had travelled. With a simple touch and a thought, or even a look and an effort of will, one could learn about those areas, know what to avoid and what to sail towards.

A new, better version of the invention he'd crafted on a whim. Did the crystals' nature have to do with how this table was easier to use? Perhaps. His Gift did not provide answers when prodded, but the reason didn't matter, in the end.

'I am making the world better, because I can,' he continued. That was as close to an universal law as Midworld's civilisations agreed upon. Not making the world better, of course, but doing things because they wanted to and could. A whim, backed by enough power, became ironclad.

'Might does not make right. It does not justify actions. It only enables them.' Needing more power to be better was the only proper reason for pursuing it.

And in his mind, Mharra felt a gear turn. There was something scratching at a surface, some truth he hadn't grasped yet, but he was getting closer.

It was not a lie to say he was trying to improve Midworld because he wanted to. But it felt like a part of something, not its whole.

Mharra was not sure what that would look like, once he stumbled across it, but wondering and worrying would not help.

So he kept crafting.

Paths of light stretched from one seamark to another, like bent sunrays. Notes, comments and jokes floated above it all, Mharra's remarks upon an uncaring world.

Mharra was sweating, his breath sounding like bellows, yet he felt a coldness spreading around his shoulders, and beneath. Through the skin, under the flesh. It was not an unnatural sort of chill, no, but an imagined one.

Dread that he'd fail? As likely as anything. But that, too, only felt like a puzzle piece.

His mouth began to twitch into a smile, despite the effort. Every muscle felt like it had been filled with lead. But he was getting closer, he could feel it.

* * *

One of the reasons Mharra preferred to stay outside when he could was that, in buildings like this one, you couldn't tell the passage of time by anything, and that, like sensory deprivation, could drive a person mad in short order.

Of course, some people said linear time was an illusion springing from limited perceptions, but it wasn't like like he could turn his mind acausal just like that.

...Could he?

Mharra asked himself this, and many other things, none he would remember later, as he sat against a wall, resting, sweat stinging his wounds as it dried on him. He'd cut himself working those crystals like he'd run through a razorblade bush, then done it again to make sure it had really been that. He fancied he could see the bones of his knuckles, where the cuts had reached the deepest.

'It's funny,' he admitted, 'because I've never wanted to punch someone more.' He was the most likely target. Had anyone broken their hand punching themselves? Maybe he'd set a record.

The captain couldn't help it. The laugh strained his lungs, which felt stretched and flattened like bloatfish awaiting gutting, but it was like a weight was slipping from his shoulders.

Because another laugh answered him.

It wasn't anything so dramatic as Three appearing beside him, hale and beaming. In fact, the shapeless presence was heard only within his mind, and from what his arcane sense could spot of it, it didn't feel wholly like the ghost he'd known.

But it was enough. He felt closer to Three than he'd had in...how long had it even been?

The presence settle about his shoulders like a cloak, and it was enough for him to ignore the pain of his wounds until his body felt numb.

When it spoke, the being felt distant, but no less familiar, though it used his own voice to speak. Mharra got the feeling it was like someone used to a foreign tongue using his, for the captain's sake.

It sounded better than him talking to himself. Squalls, he really hoped that wasn't happening...

'You never really thought this would end like a fairytale.' The voice sounded kindly, chastising as it was. 'You never truly admitted it, not even to yourself - but you wouldn't have despaired so on a journey you believed would end the way you wounded.'

Mharra nodded, though each movement hurt, like he was lifting a millstone with his neck. Storms, he felt like death...

'You only managed to reach out at the end of your wits, and thought yourself half-mad for doing so.' The voice had changed, becoming higher even as it gained two more layers, and he could hear the trio of smiles behind it. His sight was a field of blackness interrupted by painfully flashing coloured spots, but he did not give a rat's tail about any of that. 'Are you surprised another reunion is only taking place after you have nothing else left?'

Was this how the future would be, then? He'd work himself to exhaustion, wondering if this time, the gap would be bridged again?

'You can't tell me you'd rather live a lonely life.' The voice was regretful, but confident. And not wrong.

But Mharra would've rather had Three back on his...crew, and he said as much.

'Unless Ib,' the presence replied,' and its fellow conspirators have their way, no one will always get what they want.'

He supposed he was being greedy, aye. This was already more than he'd hoped for. He could be honest, now.

Not that he'd have sat idly, even knowing it would end like this, or with nothing at all. He'd have made the journey, hoping against hope...Mharra had always loathed the term "man of action", because people who called themselves that weren't worth spitting on, but being passive, in this regard, had never been in the cards.

'I had a good time,' he managed after a series of coughs that stained his beard red. 'Wouldn't do it again, but only because I want to see...more.'

'A captain after your own ship,' Three chuckled. 'Burst has grown, I saw.' His threefold voice was tinged with sadness as it added, 'Doesn't need me anymore.'

'You were getting sick of the engine room, anyway,' Mharra reminded him, wiping his scarlet mouth.

'That I was.' The mirth lingered, though, to Mharra, it felt like it had faded as quickly as it had come. 'You're not walking out of here, captain.'

Well, of bloody course not. He'd always said he'd only be making it out of a room like this in a box. Had Three forgotten?

'You're not wrong about that,' the once-ghost agreed, after being reminded. Though Mharra felt nothing, he felt a gesture towards his table. 'A sailor's guide to Midworld...given away freely.' A shaking of three heads, long gone in truth, but remembered and perceived through a sense beyond nature. 'In a place with fewer wonders, I might have laughed at it.'

'Don't feel much like it, though?'

'Never felt right laughing without you.' A hand on Mharra's shoulder. 'And it'll be a while before we're back to that.'

Mharra bobbed his head. He was having one of those strange headaches, he thought; the sort that felt like your ears bursting while the rest of your head was cold and numb, as if stuffed with cotton and filled with ice.

He was, thankfully, awake enough that he could tell it wasn't his mind reeling from the idea of a mostly lonely life briefly interrupted by meetings like this, or some other flowery deal. It had more to do with how he felt like he'd been trampled by elephants. Fat ones, that took their time.

'Don't tell me.' Mharra forced a smirk, even as he felt something settle over his lips like slowly falling warm dust. How close to the brink was he for his own lifeblood to feel that...dry? 'I'm dying of a broken heart.'

That sort of thing only happened in bad romance stories, and even then it usually took one of the parties being an unskilled mage to accidentally mutilate themselves out of stress, or some other excuse.

The laugh that answered Mharra was gruff. 'No, there's nothing wrong with your body...that is, your flesh isn't the cause.' Something cool touched his brow, lingered between heartbeats. Were they slowing down? It felt like an eternity before the sensation retreated. 'You overclocked your Gift for this, captain.' There was that chiding again. 'You strained yourself.'

'Wor-' more dry warmth, filling his mouth as he coughed. 'Worth it.' And it was. Maybe he'd even stop slowing the crew down with his moping. It wasn't like they actually needed him, now; the most he might do was distract Ryzhan from whatever Ib needed him to do.

He must've been thinking out loud, because the ghost said, 'Quit that talk.' He felt something grabbing him by the arms, lifting him up. 'You're not dying, Mharra. Didn't you listen?'

Nay...nay, he wasn't. Had this been orchestrated by the Manmade Gods, the tragedy would've been too short-lived, too...clean to be entertaining. A few decades more of this, with him agonising whether he should've made that bloody journey at all, though?

'You know, when we met,' Mharra rasped, 'I didn't just give you that ultimatum because I was offended by you enabling reckless fools. I'm not...wasn't that sort of man.' He gulped, feeling like he'd swallowed a handful of blades. 'You were...squandering your potential. Said to myself, couldn't miss that sort of talent, hm?'

Three didn't say anything while he chuckled, then replied, 'Aye, I figured. About a year in, I'd say. Can't recall exactly. But I always knew you don't just do things, with nothing to gain.'

That pleased Mharra, though he couldn't say why. Guessing at his own motives had him feeling addled. 'Good, that...that's good.' Maybe he was just trying to be honest. Clear out misunderstandings.

It didn't matter. Getting to talk again made the crew feel whole again - bigger in truth, since the steamer was more of a person now than it had ever been. That said, the ghost's voice filled the air strangely, as if from some distance rather than from next to Mharra's ear. Was he really that out of sorts. 'I say, you can let go of me now, yes?' He lifted a hand in what he hoped was the direction of the exit...but was there still an exit? Had it closed itself after he'd arrived here? He couldn't remember. 'I'll walk out...myself, hm?'

There was a pause before Three responded. '...No one's touching you, captain. You've been staggering for a while, though not towards anything I can spot.' The ghost forced some cheer into his tripartite voice. 'Damned straight line for the drunkest-looking sober man I've seen in a while, though.'

Glaring dimly, Mharra began to turn his head, but a jolt in his neck made him stop and wince, gritting his teeth. 'Don't...joke with me, now.'

'Mharra, you're doing what you've been doing since you set foot here.' Three sounded mildly exasperated. 'Forcing your body to go along with your mind when it really shouldn't. Your power is facilitating it.' He sighed. 'Just...just take a look, won't you? Look down.'

Mharra did, slowly. It wasn't that he expected some nasty surprise from Three of all people - but he felt like any sudden movement now would daze him, like that man from the joke about falling off the floor.

There was, indeed, no one holding him up. Now, he couldn't exactly spot Three either, but his gut told him that had more to do with the ghost having achieved a subtler state of being rather than hiding. He couldn't sense any of the chill he'd come to associate with Three's touch, but...mistaking his own power for someone else's? Maybe he shouldn't have been up and walking. Who knew what stupid thing he'd do next...

Mharra rested his hands on his hips in lieu of anything to brace against, head lowered. Now, it felt like someone had trapped a clutch of crabs in his skull and they were cutting their way free, making sure to go through the brain first.

A hesitant presence on the edge of his perception helped distract him. 'Don't look, but a door's beginning to open.' Taking it as a joke, he began lifting his gaze, but found himself held in the same pose. 'I said don't look, didn't I?' Three clicked his tongue, though Mharra doubted he had one now. Shame. Losing a humanlike shape often drove former humans to madness. 'You'll faceplant. Just...stand here until we're on the next leg, will you? Sailing will be smoother from there.'

'Next leg...?'

'Of the journey.' Another pause. When Three spoke again, the cheer didn't sound forced; he was genuinely amused, far as Mharra could tell. 'Don't tell me you expected to retire after you left this place.'

He hadn't, of course. He couldn't imagine a sedentary life, even if he somehow found a place beyond the reach of Midworld's tides and storms. Maybe if he'd been old and weak, too tired to travel, he'd have asked Ib to make an island for him, where curious sailors could visit the old actor. But if that future had never seemed likely for him, now it felt all but guaranteed not to happen.

As he rubbed his back, despite having just finished thinking he was no old man full of aches, Mharra recalled the last few exchanges of the conversation and almost groaned. 'Smooth sailing...? I'd cry at the pun if I wasn't blanching at your jinxing.'

'You're too dusky for people to tell when you're blanching. Cut me some slack.'

They stood - or at least Mharra did, though he could not quite grasp the state of being the ghost was in - apart, but close. Mharra took comfort in that, for proximity was less than he'd wished for but more than he'd hoped for, more than he'd truly expected.

His ship, feeling both within arm's reach and a myriad leagues away to his arcane sense, stirred, like a numbed limb twitching to life. It would find him, he knew, ripping through everything in its way with its characteristic cantankerousness. The thought made Mharra smile, under all the blood.

But since he could not sway in place like a raggedy puppet until the steamer made its way here, he sought to satisfy his curiosity.

'And what have you been doing all this time?' he asked Three. 'Been anywhere interesting.'

'Here and there,' the ghost replied, deceptively casual. 'Plenty places.'

'Anywhere I've heard of?'

Mharra fancied he could count his heartbeats in the silence. '...What do you believe that experiment made me, captain?'

'Scarce.'

Three huffed a laugh. 'Free Fleet ships bend nature's laws to travel. Do you remember that?'

'You could already do that.' Mharra could not help but sound bitter. 'You can't tell me you couldn't find your way out of whatever path they use to travel.'

'But captain - they wanted to stop limiting themselves to paths.' Suddenly, a pale, transparent outline hovered before him, arms spread. It had no features to speak of, but Mharra recognised the ghost's regret. 'When no one can truly pin you down - when people whose thoughts become facts of life can't determine your location - you become almost as difficult to find as you are to stop.'

Mharra shook his head. 'Don't believe it. Ib could've-'

'Ib's power was never in question,' Three cut in. 'But power isn't the deciding factor here, Mharra. Not everyone can assume every role simply because they've acted before. I shouldn't have to explain that to you.' The silhouette vanished. 'Listen. This power was meant for thinking machines much larger than me, in every sense. Reckoning devices whose power anchors them into being. I...am still frayed at the edges.' Three's laugh mocked himself. 'You're not the only one growing altruistic in his old age, captain.'

'Mm? I do not believe I'm insufferable enough it counts as an act of charity to talk to me. You're mistaking me for the boat.'

'That'd never happen.' The presence flickered, and when it returned, the ghost's voice was hurried, on the edge of panic. 'Most of the time, the best I can do is nudge some unlucky ship away from an airquake or a Seaworm's maw. Things of that sort.'

'How do you know those people are worth helping?'

'Trust me, I've nothing but time to think about what I'll do, when I'm...awake.' Flicker. Flicker. 'Familiar things help. My ship and its passengers are far easier to focus on than most things. Say, remember that pirate fleet that harassed the steamer before you and the pleasure fleet met?'

'Never saw any.'

'You're welcome.' Flicker. 'Mharra...I'm not sure I'll ever get over this, if I'm supposed to.' The ghost's breath would've been ragged by now, had he been alive. 'Not much time left of this outing either, I'll wager. So let me say this, before I drift to sleep once more: I could've never focused enough to make any of this happen if I didn't have the power of your journey to guide myself by. The determination...I'd have liked to give you some more hope, speak to any of you, but...' The energy wavered once more. 'You helped me pull myself together, Mharra. For a while.'

Mharra tried to sound gruff, self-assured. 'Nothing new there.'

An arm wrapped around his shoulders. 'Nay. Take care, so it's not the last time either, will you?'

There was nothing to say to that. Mharra tried to keep his balance, using the cold around his shoulders as an anchor, before he remebered something else. 'That time on the ship. Did I hallucinate, or did you really...?'

He almost fell when he saw he was alone, once more. The room, cavernous and towering, held a monster in every facet, and he could not ignore them so easily anymore.

More than a score of them faded, screaming in silence, as a towering, dark brown form with flames blazing under its protean skin, burst inside. The ship's avatar said nothing, its head swivelling to take in the captain, then the table.

'Tell the Queen,' Mharra said, 'I'm going through with it. Everyone who'll benefit can feel free to line up and kiss my...' a yawn cracked his jaws. '...hand.' He waved in what he hoped was the right direction. 'Which I'm not using to make the copies. Tell her to cobble together some contraption to imitate real talent, for once.'

'Captain,' the steamer gravelled, 'she's the one with the ugly living art pieces. Her mate's the one making attempts at machinery after seeing craftsmanship from a distance one time.'

'Mgh,' Mharra replied, articulately. Then toppled.

Burst caught him easily, a clawed hand wrapping around the captain's torso. It took a knee, shifting metal grinding against crystal brimming with half life. What skulked therein slunk away from the shadows of its flames.

Burst lifted Mharra up to its chest, which was already splitting, reforming. 'Maybe I'll show her what preserving life looks like, too.'

* * *

Gods unheeding, but it was glad to be out of that glorified quicksilver vial's presence. The fact cosmic awareness and optimism could exist within the same mind said some damning things about the extent of idiocy, but Libertas would be out of the way soon.

Blazing a trail into the endless tomorrow would be, unlike most of its endeavours, worth a damn. The steamer might even begin thinking about changing course before running over it, if they met again...no. Not going out of its way to flatten The Idea of Freedom was generous enough. It wouldn't take part of Mharra's insanity.

The captain was, at least, still interesting. And who knew, his mapmaking attempts, once they found a decent way to imitate his living maps, might result in more crewmembers worth the ship's while joining. It almost cracked a smile at the chance, but caught itself.

It had a reputation to maintain.

Mharra was safely nestled within its core, its metal replacing the flesh that was now worthless (well, worth even less than before, damaged as it was), while its will poured into his riven mind and spirit. No part of the process would change the captain's thinking, for better or worse, but it would keep him together enough to plot their next course.

At one point, the steamer and its charge passed a grey, faceless being, leaning against a corner of one corridor, as innocuous as its ilk could be.

'It's beginning?' Burst could no keep its voice as aloof as it wanted. When would this mess be over with, so it could just travel?

Ib did not uncross its arms, nor morph a face. To a being that knew fear, it might've been unsettling. 'Everything is in place. Do not worry: if we fail, we won't linger enough to lament our incompetence.'

Burst snorted. How'd people even get motivated to do anything before this polished bastard came along? 'Just stay out of my way,' it warned, then its tone softened, despite itself. 'I might need to get to the spellslinger, at one point.'

If he was to save its stern, and everyone else's, it might need to get through to him, too, if he wavered.

Burst did not waver at the thought, for its words would be vindicated, even if the worst came to worst.

It would stop existing before it even began thinking about letting its crew fend for themselves. It had never been a fatalist, nor a masochist, nor any other sort of person who craved pain or oblivion - but if there was no way out, it could think of little else better than dying alongside those it had deemed worthy to be conveyed.

Burst gave the grey giant one more look. 'Do not disappoint me. If you ever cease to be, it will be by my hand.'

And if Ib succeeded...Burst was never going to thank it for anything, no matter how necessary its machinations were to greater existence. But over an eternity of its travels with Mharra, maybe it could find it within itself to stop despising its childishness.

'Don't go to sleep just yet, captain. No curtain call until you say so,' Burst reminded Mharra.

And kept moving.

[Strigoi Grey]

Ryzhan



I was not made for this.



All of Ib's preparations aside - and any grudge against the giant seemed so petty, now -, I had not been truly prepared to attempt so much as saying hello on the scale of all existence, much less preventing its collapse.



This was the sort of disaster than, in adventure novels, would be averted by some rediscovered scion of an astoundingly powerful bloodline, who had been reared by mentors as skillful as they were mighty.



I was barely starting to get there as far as power went, thanks to Aina's shaping of my body, but I wasn't the right man for this, damn it all.



We have all seen children trying to put wooden cubes through round holes while playing, then crying in frustration or dismay after breaking the edges or the toy.



I could not help but think I was going to make Ib cry, out of disappointment, because I did not feel like I was the right shape for this.



At some point, with eyes that were flesh once more, I blinked, or began to.



I felt like I was trying to force mountain ranges off my eyelids, and my world was nothing but a field of greyness dotted with shapeless things, as I supposed the nearly blind might have seen.



'...hear me, Ryzhan? Can you hear me?' Aina's voice could've come from anywhere: that is, I could barely tell where my own body was, much less who or what was around me, and where.



I sighed, throat feeling as dry as if I'd sustained myself on naught but dust and sunlight for days, like those sages who wasted away trying to look enlightened rather than suicidal. 'And I am glad to,' I said. 'I'd say I'm at Vhaarn's side, if it didn't feel like Fhaalqi was smearing my insides across the Pit, with them still inside me.'



The snap of Aina's fingers next to my ears was like a thunderclap. I didn't jump out of my skin, but then, it had always been clingy.



'Ach!' I turned a bleary glare on her (I thought). 'I'm not hallucinating, woman. What was that for?'



Appendages grabbed my shoulders and turned me around, thoroughly dashing my hopes of being able to spot people without sight. While the motion lasted, I felt like I was being manhandled by something far taller and broader than me (or Ib's usual form, or even the steamer as it usually appeared), which was moving me with only the tips of its feelers, like some island-spanning thinking plants might touch dust motes.



But Aina was back in her normal shape by the time my sight returned, though I managed to catch, on the edge of my vision, her shadow thinning and contracting. That must've been how those monsters people only wished were imaginary hid under children's beds. I'd tried to hunt some once or twice, but most of their ilk couldn't be targeted if you were focusing your full senses on them; you, essentially, had to be thinking about something else while flailing about and hope you'd hit them. Unless you were dealing with one of those impervious to power bereft of intent, but those were usually much more of a handful than the skulkers, being built to slaughter rather than frighten.



'Focus, Ryzhan,' she replied. Her eyes were sunken in a pale face that seemed to be melting like wax, and I raised a hand as her brow began to deform and shiver, blackness deeper than any darkness showing in the gaps between the flesh. When her eyes disappeared under the warped skin, she reached behind her and pulled up a hood that had not been there, the shadows hiding almost everything above her nose.



Almost.



The writhing blackness stood out in the mundane gloom like ink on snow, and Aina absently held a hand to her forehead as if to wipe away sweat. I heard her claws snap into being as she gathered herself.



'Your mortal senses are only beginning to recover from being scrambled. They will go from overloaded to numb and back again, but you mustn't lose yourself,' she continued as if she hadn't just mutated under under my eyes. 'Above all else, you mustn't forget yourself, nor your duty.'



Despite everything, I went for a rakish smirk. 'Forgetting? When have I ever trucked with that?'



She returned it, and though her own smile was as thin as it was brief, any joy was lovely to see upon her features, especially knowing I was the reason for it.



Hah. Maybe Ib should've taken another shape when trying to build up my confidence...on the other hand, no. That would've been passing strange, and I doubted I could've looked at this woman without feeling more awkward than I already did.



'You are saying that now, but you don't know what you've been through,' Aina said in response to my half-joke.



I gave her an unamused look as I began turning about. 'I couldn't if you took my brain apart and put it back together.'



'If?' Her smile was back, then gone in a blink. 'You are not going to thank me for what I did, but if you still get a chance to curse me afterwards, I will be happy.'



'I always knew you women just want to be put in your place,' I sneered, earning a poke in the nape.



'Don't joke now.' Then, in a thinner voice, 'Please.'



Despite my recent experiences with her, I tensed. This was not a woman's voice cracking out of nervousness: if I was right, she was holding back her monster from bursting to the surface, mayhap literally, and ruining her ability to think straight.



'Will you do me a favour, Ryzhan?' she asked more levelly, after a few moments.



Carefully, I nodded.



'We must test if it worked. Recall your boyhood for me, would you?'



"It" obviously meant whatever she'd done with my insides and the other parts of my being, but I wasn't sure why she wanted to test my memory. I didn't feel like I'd forgot anything (but then, how many did? Life would've been easier if we could have always seen gaps for what they were), wasn't feeling distracted or anything of the sort.



But since it was, quite literally, as easy as thinking about it, and I couldn't see any harm in the request, I indulged Aina.



And nearly keeled over. It was like being beaten again, each strike as painful as it had been to my younger self, for all that my flesh was far tougher and my endurance much greater than those of the child I'd been. Though no bruises appeared on me, no bones broke, no blood spurted, that hindered more than it helped: my body was convinced I was suffering, and the lack of proof only confused it, leaving me dazed,



Remembered endurance let me remain upright, straighten my knees after they buckled. Harsh breaths whistled through gritted teeth, and I was glad I'd not bitten my tongue in half. Choking on my own blood would've been awful for my melodious voice, not to mention red did not agree with my complexion.



I reached out with my hand and will, and my cane was soon in my grasp. I spent no time worrying about whether leaning on it made me appear weak and thus appealing to Aina's other mind - I needed some support, so I could not do anything if this triggered its instincts, or whatever directed that creature.



As I tried to bring my breathing under control, I reeled - not at the sensation in of itself, for I'd melt greater pain for longer - but at how uncannily vivid it had felt. I was a memory mage, aye, and so familiar to how sensations might be recreated; but that was because I wished to draw upon the past in order to persevere in the present, thus blazing path to the future.



But that only happened when I wanted to relive something. And now, I'd only wished to remember in a mundane sense, not to recreate my pain. Why would I have? And it could not have been a mistake, for even as a clumsy witchling, I'd had enough of a head on my shoulders not to tap into things like that, lest I cripple myself.



Which left only one option.



Lifting my cane from the floor, so that I was holding it about the middle with both hands, ready to pull it apart, I whirled to look at Aina. I wasn't stupid enough to glare at her, much less draw a weapon - but only because I did not yet trust myself enough to face whatever skulked inside her flesh. Who knew if I could strengthen myself properly, with my Gift warped like this?



'Did you scramble my magic?' I asked quietly, twitching muscles finally settling. 'Did you?!' I could feel the sword and staff that made up my walking stick trembling with residual mana, eager to be used: what passed for their minds recognised that their maker had been harmed, and they wanted retribution. Aina stood still before me, not saying a word, lidded eyes unmoving. Her face seemed frozen in a pensive expression. 'Silence is an answer too,' I spat, not needing to fake my sneer this time.



Deciding that, if I could remember endurance, I could remember strength too, I tried, drawing upon an inkling of power and speed. I felt it settle around the core of my being, like a layer of living armour. So. Not that helpless. 'Are you insane, woman?' I spat. 'Are you addled?' Right now, when Ib had insisted everything might fall apart but for my power used in the right manner... 'What folly are you-'



'It is working.' Her voice was easily heard over mine, for all that the latter was both deeper and raised. She glided closer, wrapping a hand around one of my wrists. 'You truly think I couldn't have harmed you by now, if I wished?'



I was breathing fast, not with exertion but with anger, so it took a few moments to take her words in. She was not wrong. Had she wished to end me, she could've done it earlier, when I'd been more or less helpless under her claws.



But that didn't mean I should let my guard now. What if her Lunacy was sadistic rather than simply destructive? What if the thing wanted a living person rather than a corpse to shred? Being paranoid had always done little good to my mood, but it had yet to kill me (likely bidding its time, since it would only get one chance to make it stick). A little wariness would not hurt.



'What is?' I asked gruffly. 'Your attempt to make sure I never forget my past? I'd say I hardly need the help.'



That upwards twitch of her mouth's corner, again... 'I think you'll find out it will have have the opposite effect, soon.'



'Soon?'



A nod. 'If there is still time to discover anything.' Her sleepy-looking, fully blue eyes turned sharp. 'I am neither stupid nor senile, Ryzhan. I know what we're facing.'



'So why-' I broke off with a growl. 'You failed, Aina. You didn't increase my power, you just made it automatic. I can't think about anything without reliving it, no matter my intent.'



'Good.' I could've throttled her at the moment, but I knew I'd have died shortly after. At best. 'You can't have expected a sudden burst of power.' She arched a slim eyebrow. 'Your magic has always been about building strength up.'



I snorted. 'I couldn't build a mud hut after what you've done to me. I'd keep tripping over my own thoughts.' Imagining my future with magic like this, I turned aside, clutching my cane to keep my hands from shaking. I'd never be able to think about anything I'd ever experienced without feeling it again - not the sort of thing a man with a life like mine would've ever asked for.



Look at the bright side, the contrarian part of me whispered. You'll never lose sleep over memories again.



Aye, my sarcasm agreed. He'll just try once and be too busy gasping in agony to repeat it..



Neither was wrong, but I tuned both out, for my sake. I felt I was at that point where pretending to argue with myself might very well result in actual voices in my head.



'Well?' I finally said, in response to Aina's silence. 'What now? Not going to tell me I should be grateful about having nothing to look at but the future?'



'Don't whine, mage.' There was weariness in her voice and aye, something old, too - for she was of an age with me, and wouldn't have spoken thus had she fully been herself. I bristled at the tone, but turned slowly, lest I set off her other half. In more measured words, she added, 'You are past the age of complaining so.' Satisfied I wasn't going to do something reckless, she nodded to herself, continued.



'Were I able to give you all the power needed right away and painlessly, do you think I wouldn't have?' Not waiting for an answer (which was helped by the fact I truly wasn't sure she would have, and thus hesitated; I had a feeling part of her found was amused when I got hurt, and it was hopefully the monstrous part), she went on. 'In order to remember properly, you needed to-'



'I was doing just that back on the Wrought Island,' I protested, lifting an arm. I doubted I was actually pointing in Illuminaria's direction, but that wasn't the point.



'I'd like you to stop interrupting me,' Aina replied curtly. 'Back there, you were going over memories as if looking at paintings.'



'Yes! Like everyone does!'



'And if anyone could do what you need to, you wouldn't have been waited for.' Funny, how unpleasant privilege could be. Or maybe uniqueness was the right term. 'Regardless, this step of helping your magic bloom is over. But it has to be...tuned.'



'What?' I scoffed. 'Like an instrument?'



She did not disagree with the comparison. 'Or some of the automatons here. Actually, that's likely a better comparison. Some of them have false minds,' she tapped her temple with a gnarled grey finger, ending in a claw like transparent steel, 'that need to be spurred, in order to accomplish certain tasks. But once they are...'



'My Gift is not some windup toy of the Clockwork King.'



Aina almost rolled her eyes at the retort, I could tell. 'Oh, cut the mysticism. I spent years watching you trip over your feet befoe you learned to run properly. You're decades too late to try something like that with me.'



I did not flush, because she was lying shamelessly and thus there was nothing to be embarrassed about. 'How is oversensitive magic supposed to make me more powerful?' Being overwhelmed by your arcane perception was a beginner's curse, no pun intended. 'I won't be able to do anything properly if I almost collapse whenever I try to think.'



'And how is that any different from the usual state of a man?'



'Wipe that smirk off your face,' I groused. 'You already poked me right after that jibe.'



For a ridiculous moment, I almost believed I had been lied to, all the while, and this had been a setup, to deter me from reminiscing and thus from using my power; perhaps to make things easier for my pursuers (what if they were real, and I had been tricked, somehow, in that regard as well?). Ib could've put me through the wringer for any reason, even amusement - how could I have spotted a lie?



But I was past that kind of paranoia. Even if I hadn't been, my magic, which, coupled with my mundane instincts, warned me about airquakes, Body-coring Slimefish migrations and other disasters, was all but trying to pull me away by the hand. If its usual warning were like sparks off a candleflame, this made all the flames in Midworld combined look like nothing.



But there was nowhere to hide, anymore. In another life, I might've thought this was a punishment for doing nothing but that since I'd fled home, but I wasn't so bloated with pride as to believe existence revolved around me, not in this regard. Nor did I believe Vhaarn would risk harming so many to get at me.



I didn't have proof about the last part, of course. I'd never so much as heard my god, much less seen him, and while Vhaarnism didn't have scriptures or true dogma like some fleet-bound religions, many agreed that trying to depict him was both pointless and insulting. The closest thing to meeting him had been when, in a dark alley, a cutpurse had tried to recruit me, hoping to harness my Gift, and had begun talking about how morality and deities were both lies. Vhaarn, being a kind god, had aimed the thunderbolt so that it had only singed his hair.



The recruitment effort petered out somewhat, afterwards.



All that being said, I was almost happy that my faith wasn't so widespread as to be hijacked by the powermongers that inevitably arose within any institution; there was no one to tell me I was wrong for thinking like I did, much less trying to punish me for it (the latter being something the instincts interested in saving my hide were quite happy about).



'I have a question I'd like answered,' I said, having been struck by a thought. 'I understand I am to be a sort of...crucible...for the memories of others, in what is to follow. Will theirs feel as lifelike as mine?'



The description of my purpose I'd been given was actually closer to that of a container than a crucible, in that I was expected to keep experiences intact; whether said process resulted in some of them being "refined" (Ib had not elaborated, though it had seemed pleased at the possibility, in a meanspirited sort of way that had discouraged me from prodding) would be coincidental.



'Of course not, Ryzhan,' Aina answered. Then, to crush my hopes, as was the wont of most things I came across, 'Most will be far, far worse.' With what might have been a sympathetic look, she elaborated, 'Your senses are not so sharp nor your mind so broad as to experience some lives without recoiling. What else do you think I am preparing you for?'



I grunted. 'And how many such memories shall I have the pleasure to brush against?'



Aina patted my shoulder. 'I would contemplate infinity, in your place.'



Tch.



Well, I supposed she did not need to contemplate it, did she?



* * *



As I sat on the ground, cane across my legs, I reflected on how I was never going to be able to relive the past in a metaphorical sense, like so many did.



You'd have thought life as a mage would've prepared me for this sort of strange change, but my mind had always been my sanctuary. it was not something other people were supposed to be able to change, and I wasn't even talking about my stubbornness.



The part of me that was still a brash boy only approaching adulthood tried to see this as a boon: obviously, Aina wanted me, had made sure I'd only ever think about my present and future with her, brood less, and thus be happier. But I couldn't be convinced by that sort of argument, not even from myself. Perhaps especially from myself, since I was no stranger to tricking myself into thinking in ways that seemed to confirm my doubts.



Not to mention, even if we weathered this crisis, who was to say something like this wouldn't happen again? How long until Aina changed me for my own good, and only told me about the details afterwards?



I wasn't sure I hated her. But, if I ever found myself growing cold to her, interested in, at most, a meeting of bodies (and even then, half of me would just be interested in half of her, and not the human part), I would not be surprised.



I was once again pondering how unlike a heroic story this was, but now, I couldn't help but wonder if the shape of that wasn't going to ruin this most carefully laid plan.



I did not have the makings of a saviour; one could easily argue the opposite. I didn't even have the makings of an impostor, for I wasn't so much as trying to get to the source of this problem and talking it out of destroying us, or slaying it an in a needlessly flamboyant battle that'd make everyone with taste cringe, once the attempt at talk inevitably failed for drama's sake.



Are you doing this again? I berated myself. Do you think Ib is stupid? It's been pulling your string this whole time - could you have even noticed that if it didn't say it your face? Obviously, it accounted for your flaws.



I knuckled heavy eyes. There was no one to talk to in hopes of finding another way: everyone knowledgeable had already insisted this was the only option. Not for creation as a whole, but for the parts of it I - we - could affect.



There was no way I could find Ib or my captain without this place's inside warping to stop me, or worse; even if I did make my way to them, a part of me believed the grey giant would leave at best, forget about being convinced to look for another solution (and I did not want to to attempt a worse version of Aina's surgery due to seeing my as shirking my duty).



As for Mharra, though my arcane sense had only been able to perceive him dimly before the beginning of my ordeal, he now flickered at the edge of my second sight. Not because he was moving in and out of my sensing range, I did not think (nor would that have made sense). No, it was more like his life was hanging by a thread.



But, however much I wanted to rush to his side and heal him with remembered vigour - I was certain I could do that and more, now, and if I couldn't why the bloody Pit was anyone relying on me? - I, again, knew I couldn't make it. Not to mention that I could sense the steamer surrounding him like living armour, radiating contempt and rage and hatred. Nothing knew, there, and those was most likely directed at whatever looked likely to oppose it, but I had the feeling that the ship's avatar would not be happy to see me.



Not that it ever was.



But if we crossed paths now, I was sure I would run into the kind of aggrieved belligerence one expected from mother bears with wounded cubs. Though it would be scrap long before it admitted it, the steamer almost certainly blamed itself for whatever had harmed Mharra so, and would take my presence as a taunt: what, was I so bloody skilled and powerful I could heal him whilst it couldn't, then turn around and save the rest of existence, too?



While I debated how likely Burst's temper was to get the better of it and thus prevent me from restoring the captain, should I meet him through a miracle, I felt the flickering spark of his life settling, then...no, not returning to its former state. It was growing, yes, but the shape of it was different. This was not healing, but addition. I could feel it flowing inward from the construct, layering itself around Mharra, and repressed a grimace.



This was the arcane equivalent to having my face pressed against a coffin as it was being built, for all that no harmful or lethal intent radiated from Burst. Instead, it felt like it was freezing Mharra in amber, as far as the world was concerned.



I ground my teeth. Had it truly been unable to wait? Could it not have done bet-no. The steamer had never believed in cutting corners, and though its pride would've burned, I knew it'd have sought Ib had it believed that the grey being could help.



Though, who knew? If the Dream that was this world and all others was fading into wakefulness, perhaps the minds of those therein were being frayed. Mine certainly was, though no power beyond existence was responsible for that. And no wonder; since when had people needed cosmic help to make trouble for each other?



Do not despair so. You are not even the leading actor of this play, I tried to console myself, remembering the "dead man" Ib had obliquely reference, who had gone through at least as many travails as I had, and who was supposed to - continuing the analogy I had begun - prevent the threatre that was creation from being closed down.



Earlier in my life, in my stupider moments, I might have felt slighter about so many depending on me, but saddling me with this secondhand duty nonetheless. Was I important, or not? But now...now, it felt more comforting than anything. I was supposed to be the mortar in the wall this corpse-man would raise, not the wall itself, and even so, I only had to intervene if one forgot their lives, memories being as important as will.



I was not sure what the shape of this whole endeavour was - what, was everyone in existence supposed to huddle together until we found a solution? Maybe try for an united front while asking to be spared oblivion? Gods, and I couldn't remember if Ib had detailed this during our talks. Was everything becoming too unstable already?



Cease that folly, my magic would've cautioned, had it been able to talk, but I understood its intent even so. With your Gift sharpened so, do you think there are any memories - yours or anyone else's - you could not retrieve?



I did not. And, with that bleak calm the inevitable sometimes engendered, I was able to unfold my power further. It was not unlike those patterns that repeated themselves infinitely the deeper one looked, but the sound and feel of it and all the other aspects that could be sensed by the spirit but not named in any mortal language were likewise repeated.



Yet even so...



Even so, I did not think I'd felt more lonely even in my days on the run.



Aina - the closest think to a companion I had now - stood a ways away, though I knew no distance would stop her from closing in on me in an instant. In my mind's eye, a shapeless thing, now grey, now white, but always looking ready to pounce and rend, crouched and hovered and coiled around her and hung from her shoulders like a mantle, a barbed, hooked beak opening and closing beneath cavernous orifices that gleamed without catching light, amidst a betentacled hide.



Then that visage was gone, and her Lunacy was - had always been - a roiling, shifting mass, its gaze all the more baleful for having nothing to project it.



Even with them here (and Vhaarn knew I'd never needed much help to focus on monsters far less dangerous), even with my mage's cane in my grasp and the tendrils that extended from its budding consciousness to brush the edges of my thoughts, I felt as isolated as any hermit with a thousand times a thousand thousand leagues of ocean between their raft and the nearest ship.



Was it because of the change of perspective? I'd always focused on me before all else, ever since I'd set sail on my own, for doing aught else would have been folly. Before Mharra, no Midworlder I'd come across had inspired trust, much less loyalty, and even on his crew, I'd often thought about the world in relation to me, until so short a while ago.



It could've been called selfishness. Driven by paranoia, inarguably, but still self-obsession, or as near as to make no difference. I wouldn't have called myself egomaniacal - I knew my flaws all too well to be proud of myself -but myself and my survival had, almost always, been the driving force behind my choices.



It had, as such, made sense to worry about disasters as if I always faced them alone, for when you disregard everyone else, no crowd is grand enough to make you less of a loner. Taking only my prowess into account, I had weighed consequences, set paths. Being on the crew had broadened my horizon, but I'd never stopped thinking like this, not truly. For I knew that my choices could affect everyone around me, and aye, myself as well.



I'd appreciated the safety brought by my crewmates' abilities, but, looking back...had I taken them for granted?



Vhaarn, how self-centred could one man be? Had it truly taken the likelihood of my survival being decided by another to make me stop thinking about myself?



But it fits, I thought. I was always so, so focused on ripping one more day out of the world's jaws. Of course that being taken out of my hands would make me rethink...everything.



With that realisation came calm, and this let my thoughts build up on themselves, broadening my view and my magic alike.



I was alone. Almost no one I knew could help help, and those who could wouldn't, not any more than any other made being.



And that was all right.



I was not a man to be held up by others. Instead, I would lift others up. Perhaps Mharra had gone through a similar revelation, and that had prompted his mapmaking. A twist in the fabric of my magic formed at that thought, and my mind flew like an arrow, not of any numbered day, but in the manner of the missiles that might have been launched before eternity was carved apart and the pieces were called time.



Between the ticks of the clock, this extension of my consciousness, prompted in only the gentlest manner, found the fruit of Mharra's labour. It was living stone, living in a way few machines were, however they moved, and it changed between moments to illustrate the span of sea it represented.



I cracked a smile, despite everything. Mharra's power could not just warp reality outright, or rather, it felt it needed an excuse. A prop in a play. So was Midworld the stage? Or had he prepared this for a greater one?



From an entrance that appeared as a wall rippled, things spun together in the Weaver Queen's flesh-looms darted in, quick as any bird though froglike in aspect. One, bigger and bulkier than the rest the way Seaworms dwarf most of their land-dwelling counterparts (it was only thanks to my arcane sight that I could see the tricks enabling the giant to fit in this room so much smaller than itself) hauled something like a cart full of the crystal that made up the walls. Soon enough, its smaller fellows got to work, taking the raw matter therein and beginning to shape it into more tables.



At Mharra's request, I'd have wagered, given the instructions projected from a corner of the original.



It was...good. Seeing a good work repeated, even if not out of one's own initiative, brought a certain kind of contentment.



(My only slightly younger self would've been baffled to by me voicing sentiments like this, but there you go.)



My attention drifted back to its source after that timeless moment.



My attention hadn't faded, in the meantime: a fraction of it had just decided to - or it had almost felt like it - think for itself. But it hadn't felt like attempting multiple tasks at once, with my attention being divided, thus straining my mind.



Nay, instead, the effort, the need to succeed, had become the seed of accomplishment. My mind, I now knew as I knew my limbs' purpose and shape, would grow like a nourished tree the more it had to struggle, to accommodate the necessary thoughts.



Struggle is growth. It niggled, as if the words should've presented a deeper truth than the simple revelation I'd received, and at that sensation, part of my mind burned and shifted, like someone had lit a fire in the core of my being.



I wanted, needed to know, out of more than mere curiosity. I needed to learn, to catalogue, to...hold this knowledge, for all who might come after me.



It was in this scholarly mood that I smoothly rose to my feet, lightly tossing my cane up as I remembered life. My memory took that instrument of my will, crafted by my hands, and changed it, moulded it, as surely as a creator god with a yet-lifeless clay figure, that still waited for that first breath.



The newborn being warped in midair to land, coiling, around my arm. It turned and turned, tighter, until it seemed I was wearing an obsidian serpent with a golden head - features still vague, for it was new to this existence of us who moved and reckoned of our own accord.



[Not until you broke the chains of your past could you achieve aught], the cane spoke into my mind, and there was no chance of telling its silent words apart from my own musings, nor any sense in trying to. [You could change naught until your focus shifted from yourself to the world; now you change the crudest matter into life.]



Now, this might have seemed like I'd wrought life so I could have someone praising me - the sort of hilariously egocentric working one might've found in the more lighthearted warlock stories -, but, in truth, with how my mind was going now, I couldn't have thought about self-reflection without the nearest magically-attuned object responding to that impulse.



Vhaarn had just arranged it so my own weapons had been the closest.



I briefly saw the blade of my sword extending from the snake's tail, only enough for me to glimpse myself in it: it had been polished to a mirror sheen by nothing but my desire to ponder myself, and thus its nature had changed. Then the bladed tail tip retreated into the greater body, which hadn't looked like it'd lost weight or aught else in the change.



[Growth is struggle], the living cane continued. [What did you make of yourself, before you were challenged?]



I began to protest, but-



[Were you?] it retorted, sounding more curious than chiding. [You did not live an easy live, nay; but the burden on your shoulders was placed there by yourself and no one else. Had you stayed, you would have noticed Aina was able to control her monster, at least enough to avoid hurting you. Fool! Did she not let you embrace her, right before you ran?]



The snake's head rose, resembling its hooded living cousins when they rearer up to spit venom. Appropriate, given its words. [Had you not feared so for your safety, as you have since, you might not have sealed your people's doom. Fear, Ryzhan!] Its tail rose to jab my brow, and it stung, though it hadn't extended the blade.



[Terror has been gnawing at you for as long as you've been able to fear, and it's been killing you slowly...nay.] Its eyes, gold on gold, narrowed. [I say it did kill you, and you were no more than a moving corpse until you found more to live for than the chance of thwarting your imagined captors.]



If I relived this memory, would I hear myself chastised in my own voice? The words were certainly mine.



When I smiled, the serpent returned it with a baring of fangs.



[A pity], it whispered. [Perhaps you would have been able to make things right, had they lived. Had you not succumbed to the disease that plagues almost every Midworlder's mind.]



The self before crew, the crew before the fleet, the fleet before aught else. I hadn't even had a crew, for so long. Not truly. Until Mharra, I'd never felt like I belonged.



A dry chuckle escaped me. 'I understand', I promised. 'The scales have fallen from my eyes.'



As if on a cue we'd long agreed upon, the snake darted down the length of my arm, into my hand, until I was grasping its old cane form, though now thrumming with power and more flexible by far, as though I'd swapped a blunted wooden sword for one of living steel.



I was relieved, in a way. At least the world didn't end before I made something of myself. Just...during it.



* * *



Utter collapse was decidedly less dramatic than I'd imagined, or at least less violent.



There had been no thunderous sound, no rending of the sea and sky and islands, with unspeakable things crawling through the rips. It was fairly fast but utterly silent, like a dying man's breath leaving him, and wherever I went, wheber I cast my mind, it followed.



Or it had already been there, had always been. Like darkness waiting for light.



Where reality and the bonds of substance unravelled, they left an eerie absence behind, as if existence was both contract and being covered by a void without changing size. I could not explain it, only witness and in doing so, gather the lore that may turn the tide.



There was neither shadow nor the blinding paleness of fog in the wake of this dissolution, but rather the colourless, formless expanse some of the blind claimed to perceive, after they were confronted by those beings whose visage left observers mad.



My cane melted like a candle around my hand, drawing a scream that had me nearly biting my tongue in two while quashing it; my clothes began falling apart around me like ancient rags, and suddenly loose skin sloughed from rotten flesh hanging off thin, yellowed bones.



Even as my mouth lost shape, powdered teeth melting into the disintegrating flesh, I managed a snarl. I understood the shape of this destruction, for my mind still clung on to sanity by broken nails.



I was collapsing on myself like an ancient thing, and all I had wrought with me. Was Burst being pulled apart like strained cloth, a traveller who could not be everywhere it wished?



Was the Dreamer Ib had warned us of possessed of both the power and the inclination to create this monstrous kind of irony, or was this simply the result of our world falling apart and, in its last moments, marking us as we had marked ourselves?



But I was not the sum of my skills and accoutrements: I was their source, their fount. By my will they had carved grooves into the world, and by my will, I would do without them.



Even as my knobby knees hit the floor - where was Aina? When had both of her halves faded from my perception? -, I rose out of my failing form, spinning from my memories the sort of corpus I'd always dreamed of.



Not crude matter, this, but what might be wrought from mortal flesh like gold from lead, mind and soul and more in one, for they had never been apart, any more than the rest of creation's contents had been.



My weapons had fallen out of sight and substance but not out of mind, and what more did a mage like me need? A thiught later they were in my grasp, blade glinting, staff thrumming with power.



Not the enchanted wood and metal I had crafted, these, but the Forms that had cast those shadows into the physical.



My faceless visage twisted, changed, so I could smile. How many beings of thought and glory had needed such a thorough realignment of their minds to grasp what should've always been theirs? How long, how badly had I stunded my own growth?



[You should never have fled,] the serpent observed rather than scolded, the Idea of it coiling about those of my shoulders even as I wielded its halves. [The Mage of Memories, running from his past? Its vileness and its beauty alike? Inconceivable.]



So, of course, my magic of the mind had reeled, breaking apart, leaving me with a shadow of a grain fallen from one of its shards. I had only begun piecing it back together, and I supposed I should thank my parents, before all.



Without their careless wickedness, I'd have never awakened to my Gift. Preserving the creation they had known would have to be enough payment.



There was a period of silence after that, as the timeless unspeaking recounted things. The fabric of existence, shredded and frayed, was becoming as unto the protoplasm from which life might arise, that step between inert matter and the simplest, smallest living things.



Yet there was more.



On what I might've perceived as the horizon, had I been bound by space, I could see three beings, and countless infinities more around them, so close as to touch yet infinitely distant.



The being in the centre radiated a greyness that had naught to do with the collapse around him, the sort of wholesome solidity an old armour might emanate. I could only see fractions of them, coming and going and never the same, but I understood enough.



In this moment, Vhaarn help me, I understood enough.



Here was my opposite number, the one who would make of himself a pillar in the house of the Dreamer, so it might enter and partake of its demesne when it gazed into itself. The road that had led him here had been as bleak and twisted as many, yet on his back would rest the bedrock of existence. On it would rise the foundation of creation mended.



In his arms he bore a witch child, a girl of ten winters who had been driven mad by her Gift when it had made a curse of itself, preying on her desire for peace and cooperation to make of her an eater of minds, the vessel through which it would extend its clying reach. Yet that was of the past, for the dead man had taken steps to turn her magic to a better cause.



A ways away from them stood a stranger, grey of skin and black of eye, form manlike yet not. For this was a sailor of the stars, one sent into the timeless wilds by its people, so they might chart the ocean of mana between cosmoses. Its journey had led it to the living corpse's world, and now it bent its mind - not that mighty in of itself, not on this scale, yet backed by a story and an alignment of events that lent it great weight - to the task I would aid in, also.



* * *



How to describe it? Many often likened otherwordly pain to being crushed, ripped apart, scorched and frozen and struck by lightning at once.



I felt a grand regard, pushing me down and away. Not out of malice, for the eye casting that gaze was closed in sleep, yet even that was enough to pierce what now passed for my heart.



But I was not is focus. No one was, yet everyone was. For it held everything that pertained to us in its slumbering mind's eye.



In that moment of unity, which lasted an eternity and a heartbeat yet no time at all (for had we not left that lie behind and beneath?), I knew what I had to do, and set to it with vigour the likes of which I had never dreamed I could possess.



I was the mortar between the bricks, there to catch and set upright those who faltered. I learned, then, how many had lent their wills to this endeavour, so we might stave off oblivion through the promise of what we could achieve together, and my heart felt a little lighter.



Some began forgetting, strained, not careless. Yet I held in my thoughts, now, all that existence had held, held and might hold, all its possibilities and impossibilities, and as easily as I could grant myself any power I fancied by dwelling on it, I pushed their minds back together, speeding off to aid another before I could be given thanks I deserved not.



Yet even in this myriad-faced alloy we had forged, there were flaws, darkling and seething.



I saw them, like rot amidst heartwood: one a god black in heart and aspect, the other the chaos that crawled, which had hoped to engineer the end of what it saw as the foulest lie.



The Black God had dreamed of an eternal kingdom with him at the helm, but if it could not be founded, he would sate himself with the destruction of all he loathed - and there was naught he didn't.



Or almost naught.



I caught the dead man's thought like a whispered word, learned and thus had always known, of the brother the god had devourer to save him from death.



'Are you going to end him yourself, now?' I asked so he could see the folly of his hatred. 'Your love was false in the end, then?'



The snarl that answered me was wordless, but I understood. In that boiling cauldron of hatred at the centre of his being, there was a kernel of-



I gasped, despite myself, as the Chaos rearer up, a snake spitting venom now that its ambush had been thwarted. Yet its opposite, its counterweight who I now recognised as Mendax, that Meddler of a thousand thousand names and more, moved to match it.



At the same time, the Black God ripped away from the gathering of beings, but it was too late to disrupt this working.



The Dreamer had seen. And in awakening to this, it had remembered those who had sprung from its dreams, and would, forever more.



As the living corpse called out for the mantle of power that had been waiting for him, as he carved out the cancer at the heart of creation and cast it away, I fell.



Duty fulfilled, the burden of my deeds now rested on my shoulders alone, and they were not so broad as to bear it, not yet. It had been in hands burning with power I had not yet mastered that I had grasped aught I could, for everyone's sake. Now I held cinders, and the ashes scoured my throat.



I could remember nothing without reliving it, whatever its nature, and now I held more memories than any man had ever been meant to possess, much less comprehend. My mind and spirit shrieked like steel under great strain, and my body followed.



* * *



The beach I awoke on was as cold and quiet as a crypt, and held about as much colour.



It was not sand piled on the edge of a shore as much as a hill of it, the grains grey, rising from the middle of a roiling blackness under a dome of the same shade, so that you could not tell where the sea ended and the sky began.



The monsters in the dark roamed both with natural ease.



Familiar by now with places where purpose and will dictated distance, I quickly decided that it was impossible to progress in any way except over the slope in the middle of this island, for I was led in circles otherwise and would not swim this sea if asked with a blade at my throat.



It was over the hill that I met a corpse who spoke.



He was sitting on the island's edge, sitting on a smooth flat stone with his legs crossed, a worn brown book in his lap. The corners and parts of the spine had once been gilded, I thought.



Chin in his hand, he turned his head slightly to face me, and eyes darker than the chaos around us gleamed above a fanged smile. 'Long way from that window to here, eh sailor?'



I arched an eyebrow like that, remembered a chair so I could sit at my ease. 'Do we know each other?'



He nodded, sympathetic. 'For your sake, maybe it's better than you don't. Practically no one remembers the moment of unity except vaguely, and you react worse to things like that than most of them.'



That stirred something, but it slipped through my fingers, still. I said nothing.



'Anyway,' he continued, 'I think I ought to thank you, now.' Deadpan, he added, 'If you knew how much I hate things like that, you'd be terrified by it as a conversation opener.'



'And whom am I being thanked by?' I shifted to micic his initial position when he went to shake my hand, making him retract it.



'I'm going to feed you your arms fir that shit, soon enough.' His smile returning, now edged, he answered me. That was enough to cleanse my mind of cobwebs.



'The dead man who lives?' I asked. 'Would I be right to think you've met the Meddler before?'



His grunt, almost a groan, was all the answer I needed, and more.



'Might you be able to tell me where I am?' I tried, wracking my brain in hopes of retracing my steps.



'Between nowhere and anywhere,' he replied. 'Somewhere to the left of the middle, I'd say.'



I nodded, frowned, and, belatedly, said, 'I am Xary.'



'No.' He tapped the book. 'I'm past that part.'



I sighed. I supposed he was, at that.



'You aware of your condition, Yldii?'



A shadow passed over my face at that, I think. 'Least I'll never become a nostalgic dotard.'



He snorted. 'Your life's too shit to be nostalgic about. Take it from someone who knows what it's like.'



We stared out over the inky tides, for a time.



'The betentacled visage is a mask over the face of madness,' the corpse said, with the air of a quote, as ripping tendrils darted down to drag a swimming abomination into the sky. Turning to me, he added, 'From the youngest Arkham's Musings on the Squamous: krakens, Grand Ancients and other mind-blasting perils.'



Sounded pleasant. 'I've not yet had the chance to peruse that tome.'



'It's a podca-' he stopped. 'Never mind. You wouldn't get it.' Tapping the faded back cover with clased fingers, he turned the book so I could see the front. On a gentle sea at lit orange, a ship of gears and steam sailed towards the setting sun. I recognised the figures gathered at the prow.



'I'm not going to lie that you're going to get healed and reunite with your crew and everything will be right again,' the dead man said, tracing the ship. 'It would be a miracle if it happened, like you getting back together with...' he stopped, briefly. 'But this doesn't have to be the end. You can find comfort in each other, of course, and I don't mean just you and her.'



He had a work offer for me to, a group of once-mindless creatures to captain now that, to worship him through deeds, they wished to defend creation.



'Guarding what came before is part of my job,' he explained. 'And those geniuses are kind of a package deal if I want to get something done indirectly.' He ran a hand down the book's spine. 'There are some vaults, too, with horrors past to harness. If you can.'



I could. I needed the challenge, to restore myself to the heights I had soared to. And in the meantime, who knew? An image of Mharra, the steamer's shifting metal fused with his clothes and flesh, eyes twin flames, flashed through my mind. A faint presence, like the suggestion of a phantom, floated next to him, and a grey giant watched from a distance. And above, like a shadow passing the moon...



'You are going to write this, one day,' he explained, hefting the book. 'But that version of you has always struggled with names, among other things. Maybe you can change your future for the better. God knows I managed.'



I knew what he was getting at. Remembering a quill that dripped molten gold, I took the tome from him, and completed it.



So far. This Scholar's Tale, I understood now, was unlikely to ever truly end.



* * *



AN: Well...here it is. The end of my first original story, finally. Or at least its main plotline.



Check out Strigoi Soul's epilogue from another perspective of the moment of unity. I tried not to have too much overlap, so both could be read alone.



Now, I'll likely write something short for post-Epilogue ST, before I resume my other projects. Alongside the sequel to both it and SS, there are several stories in the same setting I could and want to write about. Some might be referenced soon. I'll likely expand my SS multi-cross collection and rename it Strigoiverse stories, and I'm still wondering whether to write things unrelated to the sequel's main plotline as apocrypha in it or separately.



I don't know when I'll return to ST, or in what way, or how often I'll update it with post-EOS stories. But it's always about the journey, with this sort of thing.



To be continued in



Sing, Silver Stars

[Strigoi Grey]

Sidestory: New on the Nexus

* * *

'It's real?'

David sighed at my question. 'No, Ryzhan. I'm fucking nuts and dragging you along on a journey that will end with me missing an obvious danger until it destroys us both. Do keep up, Jesus.'

I frowned but kept walking beside him. His hands were in the pockets of a harment I understood usually lacked those, except decoratively.

'Whoever makes suit pockets makes the pockets for chicks' pants too,' he'd grumbled earlier. 'It's all a plot by Big Bag to sell more purses. But I I'll never buy one.'

'Who's Big Bag?' I'd asked, not liking the sound of this merchant, whom I imagined as a slimy, fat sort looking to trick people out of their valuables.

David had just given me a flat look, not answering. It didn't matter. This "Bag" wouldn't get me.

'Anyway, yeah, the Nexus is real,' David said. 'Not exactly the kinfmd of place where I'd usually hang, but then, it's not a tree.'

Between his expression and the dark bruises circling his throat, I had enough reasons not to ask.

Nexus Core was the kind of settlement that shifted to match its inhabitants' mood ("Like the secret part of that London, not mine, the one with too much neon and detectives with bullshit powers") so most maps were useless, but David either knew his way around or was browbeating the place into something walkable.

'Core can get you anywhere,' David said gruffly, 'because if it's somewhere, it's connected to it. Anyway, it's a good place to spend time in for those like you. Enough fuckery that you won't have time to reminisce and have a seizure.'

It sounded too much like a madhouse for my liking, but I'd bear it until my Gift was in working order once more.

'You stay here.' He pointed at the inn that rose before us as suddenly as if it had been waiting - though not in a friendly manner. I didn't think I'd ever seen a more hostile building that hadn't been alive and possessed. "Enter at your peril" had been carved into the stone above the door.

'Is that a joke?'

'That's the neat part, you get to find out everytime you pass by.' David rubbed his hands. 'The Flintlock Warlock and its namesake will always have what you need, provided you can dodge the mood swings.'

'The owner's?' I guessed.

'Huh? Yeah, those too,' David said distractedly, then pushed the barred door open.

Though I could not judge the room's dimensions, it looked much like any alehouse, if with more metallic furniture. Behind the bar, a tall, dark-skinned man with a scowl wide enough enough for a whale hlared at us from under a mop of hair as black as his eyes. At his belt, almost hidden by his colourless long coat, hung two guns.

'Flint,' David greeted, leaning his elbows on the bartop.

'You never buy,' the innkeep said, voice as cheerful as his face. 'You never donate. If I could throw you out, you'd-'

'Do flips, probably, yeah,' David cut in blindly, jerked his head at me. 'Got a new one for you.'

'Customer?' "Flint's" nostrils flared. 'Or tenant?'

'Exactly.' The strigoi's voice was still airy. 'I'm glad you agree.'

'What-' Flint began, groaned as the door opened. 'Edith, I know you didn't drag your kharzplated ass here to drink. If you want a place to brood your way through, go back home.'

'Locke.' The armoured figure that entered looked and sounded neither nor female, covered in something like thick, living smoky glass, constantly catching light as the surface warped. There were no openings to see or breathe through. 'As cheery as ever, I see.' Her (I thought) cape, made of the same material and held up by nothing, swayed as she moved to stand beside David. 'Silva. Still hideous, huh? How's your girl?'

'Hotter than you,' he replied, not glancing at her. 'Yours.'

'Hotter than you, but you try to hype that up.'

'Me? I could never.'

'Too bad you didn't say that after you imagined wearing suits.' Her mask melted enough to let me see a smirk on a pale face as she kissed his cheek. 'Good to see my favourite undead monkey boy still kicking.'

'I am here-' Flint tried and was utterly ignored.

'So you haven't been fighting with Mia, right? You're getting along?'

'I tried to argue once but she put my stuff on the top shelf and I cried.'

'Tragic. Not that you could ever get things done with a top anything.' Edit coughed to mask the muttering at the end, unconvincingly.

'You wouldn't believe what I had to do until she agreed to get it back down.'

The armoured woman mimicked wiping away tears, then addressed me. 'Don't worry, new guy. These two here are going to set you up right fast. If not well.'

'Hey!' That was David.

'That's not-' Flint began but got cut off.

'Nah, you shut the fuck up. I have flair, you wouldn't know it if you tripped over it,' the strigoi interrupted him. Patting the innkeep on a shoulder, he turned to face me. 'Don't mind him, Ryz. He acts like this because he's too dumb, I mean, manly, to express feelings other than anger. Don't you agree?'

Flint's eyes drilled into mine, and I suddenly gained great interest in the wall behind him. 'I would like to spend some time here, for...health reasons, if I wouldn't impose.'

The innkeep sniffed. Coming from a bastard who looked like he glared bears to death then cussed their hides off, that felt like a death threat from most men. 'Is there anyone else passing through today?' Locke asked the other two. David shrugged, Edith chuckled, and his scowl deepened.

'Y'all are dumber than a bag of rocks...fine. Get your ass behind me, cane boy.' He said, turning and pulling a bottle from one of the racks along the wall. The stone between it and the next slid away to reveal stairs lit by torches, leading up.

Edith did not squeal (because she's a woman too dangerous to be described as doing that, like I learned later, and I did not want her to correct me), balled her hands into fist. 'I knew rhere's a secret entrance!'

'Don't wear it out like it's one of yours,' Flint groused, beginning to walk. 'Inn tells me you're a writer Yldii. For your first day's stay, you can kludge together today's Nexus News. I'll edit.'

David was carving shapes into the bartop. 'Take it easy. Not all of us got to the epilogue as fast as you, Flint.'

A snort from the next floor up. 'End of the backstory, at best. That's the shit deal of having a past leading up to episodes with no common thread. You can never tell what's next, or when it will end...you still alive, Yldii? Your captain will find you by the time we finish the paper, at this pace. And people dob't come here cuz I'm so damn irresistible.'

I followed.

[Strigoi Grey]

Sidestory: Burst of Brass

* * *

AN: The first of a few post-EOS stories tying up loose ends. Aside from what happened to the crew and Aina shortly after the series, there are a few more already introduced or mentioned characters I could focus on before writing Midworld stuff unrelated to the main plot or the metaplot continuing in Sing, Silver Stars (S3). I'm still deciding whether to depict what happened between ST ending and BOS S3 here or in S3.

* * *

Mharra

The captain with no ship and no crew was usually a character found in riddles, not an actual person. Mharra wasn't sure how he felt about being the answer to a mind-bending question; he guessed that in his case, it would be themed around life not going the way people expected.

He was closer to his vessel than he'd ever been, literally and, aye, mayhap spiritually too. Less in the sense of getting to feel Burst's grouching as it happened, and more in terms of...

To be honest, he'd never been sure the steamer would go so far to save him. Oh, it'd helped him during that addled episode, and yes, maybe keeping a human alive was a trifle for it, but he'd expected it to abandon him at some point due to his moping getting on its nerves.

The ideal passenger, for Burst, was self-sufficient, tough, resourceful and, perhaps most importantly, smart enough not to bother it. It was, in a way, the ideal conveyance for the rugged explorer-adventurer.

Mharra supposed he ought to have been flattered he almost fit that preference (almost; his optimism, especially his tendency not to assume his worst of everyone, apparently grated on it, which was funny to hear, since Mharra had never considered himself too much of an optimist). Somehow, he couldn't quite bring himself to do it.

Knowing he was one with the steamer was one thing - his mind felt deeper, broader and quicker, his senses sharper, but he didn't really think differently - but feeling it every waking moment (an expression he'd need to stop using, as he hadn't slept, lately) was another matter.

Wires, tubes and machinery he couldn't name wound through his damaged flesh like veins and intestines, so that he felt every shift, every burst of heat or harnessed lightning and all the other energies the Burst tapped into. He knew machinery made his organs work and supported his limbs even without his input, and he was glad, but Mharra had never trusted help from things he didn't understand. Maybe he could get Burst to talk. Brag about the greatness of its inner workings, for example.

'Burst,' Mharra began. 'I was thinking-'

'I agree completely,' the steamer cut him off. 'My name does not make sense at all, but fret not, it shall be changed momentarily.'

He blinked. Once. Twice. 'Wha-'

'Obviously,' the ship continued, 'I can no longer be the "Rainbow" anything, for my hull does not bear anything to do with that, anymore.'

It was true. The garish paintjob had actually been gone for a while, but Mharra had stuck to the old name even as his ship had become able to shift shape.

'Therefore,' the ship rumbled, 'I shall henceforth be known as the Brass Burst.' It paused. 'You are welcome.'

What even for-oh, tides. 'Burst, if you're finding your identity, that's wonderful and no lie, but it's also not what I meant to speak to you about.'

A black cloud of smog hissed as it left his back. 'Typical,' Burst spat, 'you're only thinking about yourself, even as I haul you about like a menial. You're a slave driver, fleshbag. A slave driver.'

'...I do believe you are being dramatic.'

'Perhaps,' it replied haughtily, 'but prove me wrong. What did you want to talk about?'

'...Myse-'

'Hah!' it crowed. 'HAH! The selfishness is unbelievable! You'd be in poeces without me, but oh, what does that have to do with aught?'

'Burst!' Mharra snapped, frowning. 'That's what I bloody meant! I don't want to spend my whole life being hauled about by you! It's degrading and you're-' Insufferably abrasive, but was that safe to say? Especially when the ship could literally become so. '-obviously occupied, with your own thoughts.'

Burst was silent for a few moments. Then, it became suspicious. 'Why? What do you have to hide?'

Mharra managed not to roll his eyes. Somehow. 'Why don't you tell me? Since you're all up in my everything.'

'Hm? You think I'm reading your mind? Absurd.'

The silence that followed was no less awkward than any they'd shared the previous days, and more so than most. Eventually, Mharra sighed. 'Burst, I'm sick of walking on water towards nowhere. Can't we just float for a while?'

He felt it sneer at him. 'Aw, are we bored? Walking on water is not fantastic enough for us? Most humans would give anything to become capable of this!'

Mharra scoffed.

After a few moments, the steamer said, 'Besides, you'd get bored out of your thin flimsy skull staring at the same sea and sky until some monster attacked you. This way, at least we're staying active.'

'...Aye,' Mharra agreed, grudgingly. 'And the shape of this journey - a man on the brink of death still moving, showing the world his life is not over, might help us achieve its purpose.'

'You are absolutely right,' Burst responded, then fell quiet once more.

Mharra could've heard a pin drop in the ensuing silence. 'Burst,' he said flatly, not liking how quickly it had agreed, 'did you just make up a reason for our aimless movement?'

'You will never know, will you?' the ship said airily. 'You don't let our minds touch, remember?'

Mharra sighed. Again.

* * *

'There are worlds to walk yet, captain!' Burst exclaimed that night, raising their hand to point at the stars and, yes, even at the moon. Mharra had felt quite queasy looking at it, out of habit rather than actual danger (the steamer's fiery mind seemed able to counter Lunacy, though seeing the scarred sphere still felt like pressing his eye against a white-hot knife's edge), but he'd got used to this change. Ironically, it was something familiar to him that made him feel despondent, nowadays.

'Why do you still call me that?' Mharra asked voicelessly, knowing his thoughts were being carried to Burst by his intent.

Just as he knew that label was inappropriate at best by now, most likely mocking. What had he done that could be considered worthy of a captain? He'd managed to recover a lost crewman, if you were generous enough to call it that...but he'd lost Ryzhan, and after the mage had aided in the preservation of everything.

He didn't have the vaguest idea of where the spellslinger might have disappeared through, or even if he still lived. Meanwhile, he'd spent that time tangled up in his quest, then recovering with Burst's help.

A sideshow, when he was supposed to lead the troupe. More proof if it was still needed that it was absurd to pretend he could be the first in the company of Ryzhan and Ib.

The giant was gone, too. To pursue its grudge against the Free Fleet? Possibly. Likely. It was what Mharra would've done, and he'd weep no tears if the grey being ended up wiping the Fleet out. They'd brought it upon themselves.

Or maybe Ib didn't take things so personally anymore? Now that its schemes had succeeded, mayhap it would focus on bringing freedom to all.

Mharra felt himself smirk at that, not that one could've told by his visage. How easy would it be to rip the Free Fleet to shreds with that as a justification? They were, after all, quite oppressive. And if Ib took that route, Illuminaria was all but guaranteed to follow.

Then there would be the lesser tyrants and despots of Midworld, but they were quite far apart, were they not? Ib would need to bridge the cultural gaps between the ocean's travellers to help them shed their chains, whatever forms those took, and bridging the literal gaps whilst toppling whoever abused their authority could only help with that.

Mharra wished the giant luck it was unlikely to need. Few people with the power to do what Ib intended had the inclination for it, so truly, there was none better for the task.

'You are wrong,' Burst replied. 'Not about that overly shiny idiot's plans, but about how "losing" it and the mage makes you less of a captain. That they have gone their own way has naught to do with any neglect on your part. And even if you'd tried to abuse your authority and keep them with you...do you think that'd have worked?'

Mharra shook his head with a dry laugh. 'Be that as it may, I cannot be a captain without anyone to command, and what we have is a partnership.'

'More will follow,' Burst said calmly, and though Mharra couldn't place the source of its confidence, he found he couldn't deny the words, either. Somehow, he knew the ship was speaking truth.

He looked up and saw beyond light, vision unimpeded by the limit it imposed on the speed of the mundane. He glimpsed worlds spinning about their stars, most airless, nearly all lifeless - and of those inhabited, few could've glimpsed what passed for life there without having their minds blasted off their hinges. Mharra himself did not fancy travelling to those lands, for he had always preferred to go around places he'd have had to fight through, uncaring of the delay.

A wry smile would've curved Mharra's lips, had he any. But the ruin of his skull exposed raw muscle, and the bone of his lower jaw, thus his amusement only reached Burst through their bond; even the ship could've found nothing in Mharra's expression to indicate his mood. Perhaps someone better at reading faces might've caught a glimmer in a bloodshot eye, but the steamer had never cared much about such details unless pushed.

'Are we going to fly up there like some wingless bird? On jets of flame and lightning?' the - aye, why not? If the ship insisted - captain asked, and despite appearances, he was neither teasing nor doubting the chance of that happening. If Burst wanted to blaze its way into the stars, Mharra fully believed it would, even if that took it a million lifetimes.

In response to the question, the substance of the ship shifted about Mharra's head and shoulders; an approving nod, perhaps. 'We could walk the void itself, had we the need.' With maybe a hint of reproach, it added, 'I do not just float on water like some sorry raft, captain. I travel. Whatever the means, no matter the destination, I blaze trails.'

'For travel's sake,' Mharra suggested.

'A conceit,' Burst replied, 'of a very human sort. No. You fleshlings flit around out of boredom. I travel because that is what I am. Whether discovery or wonder awaits, I shall face it, as I would horror.'

'Oh? I did not know anything could scare you.'

'No more than a stone could be. But I bring plenty to frighten, and I am, also, prepared to face whatever terror of me might drive one to doing.'

Aye. That sounded more like it.

'Burst,' Mharra began later, when the dark was thinning, 'these planets' suns and moons are unlike those of greater Midworld, as I suspected, I gather.'

'Indeed. They cannot radiate strength and life and madness as they do light.' Mharra felt a pressure on one shoulder, like a reassuring squeeze. 'Far less dangerous to fly there than to fly to the Sun and Moon - not that I'd refuse the challenge.'

'No,' he chuckled, 'I thought you would not.'

Mharra thought he might like to walk the void. To see what lay above the tides, and maybe below. The world had gained its name for being between the celestial bodies in their eternal dance above and whatever lurked in gloom that had never seen light. Midworlders, burdened enough by the ocean, had rarely wished for more struggles.

Mharra had moved beyond that, in spirit. Perhaps it was time to do so in truth.

[Strigoi Grey]

Sidestory: Choice Of Freedom

* * *

Ib had not travelled alone much, in this incarnation.



In what it nowadays looked back on as a cursed infancy, it had spent time on and around the fleet of its birth, like most Midworlders. Afterwards, cast out and mindless, it had drifted about aimlessly, until Mharra had happened upon it. The machinations of its greater self, to set up the empowerment of its avatar in this realm. Ib could not begrudge itself without feeling insane, but void, could it really not have tried something less awful?



'You know, it kind of says everything that you're mad about playing yourself and not doing the same to so many other people.'



Ashe was one of those people you felt as if they were clinging to you regardless of distance. The fact she could speak silently, into minds, regardless of the distance or time separating her from her intended interlocutor only amplified the feeling.



'That might be because I'm so focused on myself I don't see others as people,' Ib spat acidly.



'Aye, exactly,' the dragoness replied, obviously choosing to miss the sarcasm. 'It might actually be worse that you're aware and doing nothing about it than if you were ignorant. Acknowledging a problem isn't a solution.'



'I'm sure the cult leader could tell me all about that.'



To an arcane eye, the grey giant's broad shoulders would have appeared shrouded in smoke, of a darker hue than its own silver-steel skin. Had one possessed a sharp mind's eye, they might have glimpsed the vague reptilian maw and eyes like embers at one end of the cloud, but the island Ib now strode across was not populated by people of such talents.



It was, in many ways, a typical Midworld settlement: a spit of land not much more than a league across, upon which a hardscrabble fleet had happened. Having felt down on their luck on the seas, the sailors had decided they might as well spend a few years, maybe a decade or more, in the relative safety of the island. Midworld's ever-fertile nature meant trees and other resources appeared upon newly-formed islands overnight more often than not, sometimes as one watched, when they didn't form right alongside them.



This land had plentiful lumber and stone: there was no home without shingle or stout beams, nor any that stood lower than two storeys; most had three floors, and the largest matched some hills in height and breadth. For anything more they'd need steel, or some way to flout the world's laws, and human mages were rare in Midworld, rarer than in most of its counterparts. It was a lucky fleet that had one, and more, ones with power, were ofttimes considered a blessing.



To be considered a curse, they had to go against the mundanes' will. That was laughably easy, in a practical sense, which given Midworlders' dispositions, meant there were enough fleets cursed with spellslingers.



Ib made its way to this town's main inn - the most well-appointed one, that is -, as inconspicuous as a dust mote in the wind, for all its bulk.



There was something to be said about being able to free oneself from the burden of others' attention.



Ashe tagged along, in a manner more similar to shifting her eyes than to keeping pace with the giant. She also kept the commentary going. 'Oh, I know. You're going to flatten that building and rip everyone inside limb from limb because their awful culture doesn't involve everyone voting on everything.'



'How'd there be any limbs left to rip off after that?' Ib grumbled. 'And no, I'm not.' Why would it? By that "logic", every lackwit and madman would get to weigh in on important decisions. Might as well enhance animals, plants and fungi to think like people too, wouldn't want to leave any opinions unheard, no? Why, do the same for rocks and sand grains and-



'I can tell you're ranting at me in your head, you lump.'



'Lies.'



'Which?' she smirked, a red slice in the middle of her manifestation's face. 'You're not ranting? Or I can't tell you are?'



'Yes.'



That resulted in her tapping her talons on the side of its neck for a time. 'It is unfair that I get to deal with all the bickering of marriage with none of the good parts.'



'You talk about it like you're the only person involved.'



'Thank you for proving my point.'



Ib scoffed. 'We're not even married in the loosest, most metaphorical sense. We are not allied in any way-'



'Ha! You speak as if freedom and order are strangers to each other!'



'-much less in love. So I would appreciate it if you refrained from implying that, or joking about it, or anything of that sort.'



'How about making it a reality?' Ib had the feeling she'd have wiggled her eyebrows at it at that point, had she any. Similarly, had it true insides, they would have roiled.



'No.'



Dragon mouths were not shaped for pouting. Thankfully. 'Even in the supremely unlikely circumstances of it failing, would you refuse to partake of my charm for tides know how long?'



'People have killed themselves out of less.'



The talons returned.



* * *



Contrary to Ashe's increasingly-bleak guesses ("predictions" would have been too generous, and she deserved nothing of the sort) about its aims, Ib was not planning to hurt anyone, but to observe. This island, it knew, was close to its end, and would soon collapse, almost certainly dooming anyone too slow to get on a ship to a watery grave. Not all islands ended so, some were destroyed by volcanic explosions too intense to be called eruptions, or other catastrophes, but many ceased in a fairly quiet, unspectacular way.



In other universes, islands were usually attached to the seafloor, like peaks of great underwater mountains. Few had ever heard of a "seafloor" in Midworld, for in most areas of it the concept made no sense, and fewer still had imagines islands with anything that could be called permanence. Had it been otherwise, the Great Powers might not have been so great, so difficult to challenge by most who cared to.



Ib strode as lighthly as if it were wrought from air, no, light; no bending of perception this, but control over its own form. Stealth served its purposes yet.



And as Ib beheld this world of matter with hidden eyes, so did its truest self from a perch endlessly higher, yet immeasurably deeper. As a square might appear to have been slice from a cube, so was Ib's corpus cut from a source with incomprehensibly many facets.



That is to say, what might have been found out in time had already been known and weighed in that realm of no place or moment which was at once creation's bedrock and the sun that cast the shadows of its contents.



'What do you hope to achieve here?'



'There is nothing to be accomplished,' Ib answered Ashe, 'yet much to be observed.'



Observed, less like an insect under a magnifying device of the Clockwork King, and more like a rite by its practitioners. That was, indeed, not a wrong way to put it: Ib scarcely needed faith when it was a god, or something so much like one as to make no difference, in of itself, yet such habits had the same purpose as those of mortals with far more fears and far less confidence: to put its mind at ease.



Not by dispersing doubt, however. By settling its temper.



When the dragoness raised the matter of Ib skulking about to eavesdrop, the grey giant reminded her that, 'Distance is as meaningless to me as duration; whether it occurs in the gap between the smallest of things or within the Void beyond all others, an event is clear as day to me, and always happening.' Thus, it would make no difference if it listened from an infinity of leagues away before making its appearance, or wether it stood behind a house then revealed itself, for both would be instantaneous.



'There is a choice between "freedoms" to observe,' the giant elaborated, 'though many of those making it will not see it thus. Nay, they will see it as a choice between freedom and insanity.'



'Then there are not multiple freedoms being judged here?' Ashe inquired.



'Not at all. Mostly, people spitting on common sense and embracing its opposite with both arms.' A fist like a cannonball clenched. 'But perhaps I will be proven wrong.'



The truth was, Ib did not fear disappointment, even in an abstract sense. It knew what Midworlders were like, void help it. But having no standards to meet, in this regard, did not mean it did not wish people were better.



Ashe remarked upon that, wryly. 'I cannot help but notice you hope for more from humans and their peers than they dare themselves.'



Ib might have sighed. 'Is that so wrong?'



'Morally? By no means, yet how can you?'



Easily, not that it said this. It was the easiest thing in this world and all others to hope for the self-improvement of thinking beings. Had their unity not startled their addled Creator into Awakening?



What was a rebirth of ethics compared to that? Nothing. Less than nothing. Just another step on the winding path leading to the birthright they had almost lost, the reclaiming of which would undo the chains upon their beings they did not even feel.



'I will remain hidden, for a span,' Ib said instead, changing the subject. 'My aspect would cause a commotion, and fright is too often the mother of dishonesty.' Somehow, the self-styled goddess managed not to spout an exasperating remark. She must have been eating, or some such. 'Not that I do not expect my ideas alone to not scare such people; even from a child's mouth, they would.'



So it was that Ib went and sat besides the inn, still more than tall enough to meet most species' eyes, even look down on many.



And it listened.



It listened, and it was not pleased.



* * *



Gender stereotypes were a peculiar but pervasive form of idiocy. They bothered Ib more than most alternatives, it believed, because their supporters hurt others and limited their freedoms for no discernible gain.



The grey being thought it had some objectivity in this, since, not having bought into the matter, it could look at all of it from outside.



The admiral it had listened to earlier (her actual title more closely translated to "Exalted above the captains amongst whom this one was chosen", but the function was the same. She led her fleet) faced it from across a table broader than most people were tall. Ib debated whether this was a sign of her disgust towards it or whether Kxhera was trying to make herself safer. Both ideas amused it.



"Xera" (she was one of those people who seemed to believe insisting on informality made them more likable) was a heavyset woman, taller and broader than more men, with the middle of her greying purplish hair pulled into a tail and the rest dreadlocked. She'd managed to avoid shooting the giant one of her characteristic suspicious glares, so far, but her watery blue eyes seemed ever on the verge of narrowing.



The admiral's grey leather coat hung over the back of her chair. Ib had made a point of refusing her offer to have two brought, first because it'd never needed furniture, second because it helped things into perspective when it could easily meet her eyes while cross-legged on the floor.



'Like I said,' Ib rumbled, following another veiled threat that accompanied the implication it had been spying on her fleet for this or that enemy, 'I happened upon this island on a journey of my own and decided to join you after overhearing your...monologue. So why act as if I am trespassing on your property?'



There it was, her eyes almost slitted again. 'We of Lark's Roost,' their original islan'ds name, according to their folktales, 'were the first on these lands following their formation. Therefore-'



'Oh, don't start. Midworld law has ever flowed from the edge of a blade or the barrel of a gun - do you mean to tell me you wouldn't have pushed another fleet back into the sea, had they been on soil you desired?' Ib shook its head.



'You have been acting as if on the brink of ordering your men to remove me, perhaps not just from the premises. Unless you're eager to find out what people look like staked on their severed limbs, I'd leave that for another time. Besides, how could they do that when your guards were too incompetent to spot me until I was right in their face? Void! No one ever greeted me on my way through town.'



The grey giant's voice cracked towards the end, as if with great emotion. Ashe scoffed incredulously. 'Maybe I should be the one feeling insulted.'



Xera did not believe a word, not that it'd expected her to. But honestly wasn't always nevessary to rattle a slave-driver.



Deliberately casual, Ib turned to face one of Kxhera's crew of mutes, a treatment she hadn't applied to her whole fleet because captains needed to bellow orders. The man was tall and tanned and muscled, with dark hair and darker eyes. All in all, little would've made him stand out in a human crowd, unless someone tried to get a word out of him.



Ib felt a twinge like vague pain inside. A healthy body and mind marred by another insanity, when the brilliant thoughts of so many were hibbled by crippled flesh or some other affliction they couldn't find a way out of. Where was the fairness?



'You said you wanted to debate my choices,' Xera said flatly, because who wasn't impressed by people with no personality. 'Do so. There is no purpose in both of us wasting time by waiting.'



The giant's snigger could've been a man's thunderous laugh. What she meant was that she'd sensed Ib was too powerful to coerce, much less kill, as well as too bold to browbeat. A human, having "overheard" her policies, would've been thrown into the sea with a slit throat by now, or pressganged into the fleet with a severed tongue. 'I am glad you're so happy to speak to me, Xera.' Its honeyed voice seemed to eat at her more than an insult or beating would have, given the minute twitch at the edge of one eye.



'Now, you can call me naive,' Ib began, 'but it seems strange to me, in a sad sort of way, that a woman would begin mistreating her fellows as soon as she got authority over them. Have you not spent most of your life being looked down on by men?'



It was not that women were considered inherently immoral in most Midworld cultures, or less virtuous, or otherwise inferior. But in the view of men so fiercely "pragmatic" they scarcely treated those less capable than them with aught but contempt, being generally smaller and weaker, not to mention pregnancy and all it entailed, women were all too often almost-people. Not animals, but not anyone you'd treat as an equal either.



This changed depending on circumstances. Fleets with more women than men, or women more capable than men, mostly managed to avoid misoginy, at least outwardly. Kxhera was proof of this, for she wouldn't have been where she was had the previous admiral been better at navigation, persuasion, strategy or swimming while hogtied to a boulder.



One would have expected a competent woman to have some sympathy for the plight of others, including men (for there was nothing stopping men from abusing each other) and those who were neither that nor women, in body or in spirit...



Ah, there was the glare, finely. Coupled with a frown that could've frozen sunflame. 'You must think me some hypocritical woman-child, lashing out after excaping from under the boot.'



'I mean, I'd ask your crew for opinions, but...' Ib spread its arms.



Those of her captains who were present knew better than to chime in, and they hadn't needed to be instructed into staying silence. Meaning this sort of behaviour was not recent, though the mutes couldn't have been so for too long: even if they hadn't known any sign language during mutilation, they'd have cobbled together one given enough time.



'This is about efficiency,' Xera said in a voice as warm as her expression. 'Unspeaking crew don't waste time and strength chattering like monkeys, thus voyages go more smoothly-'



'And how do you expect them to report a problem, should one arise?' the giant deadpanned. 'No, I know! They all know how to write and keep pen and paper on their person all the time! Nothing like writing a description of the monster under the ship before it swims up.'



'A crew bereft of distractions can indeed do so much faster than one whose attention is divided by nonsensical matters.'



Ib stroked its chin. 'I suppose this is so much more efficient than drilling them until they know how to shut up, hm?'



'Coddling people leads to them dying idiotically,' Kxhera answered without missing a beat. Her face hadn't shifted. 'If I began by telling them what to do and not do, they would've taken liberties interpreting my orders, leading to our downfall. You are criticising an act of supreme altruism.'



Ib could've laughed. This woman was like a caricature, the sort of villainness you'd find in stories spun by half-grown children trying to appear dangerous and jaded. None of her choices really made sense; she just seemed to hate comfort and so went for anything that did not involve it, because it made her feel world-wise.



'No,' Ib replied, 'I am remarking on insanity. These people will live to resent you for treating them as less than livestock, for at least farmers do not mangle their animals pointlessly. But very well, say this works. They learn to communicate voicelessly and never revolt. What are you hoping to achieve? Bleak joyless survival for as long as you can afford? Why?'



Instead of giving her time to answer, Ib abruptly stood up, head almost brushing the ceiling. 'For survival's sake alone? Like a frightened animal would react to constant struggles? Or maybe you want to prove man can endure in the face of an uncaring world, but then, you do not seem to have much love for either mankind or philosophy, do you?'



Some of the substance of its face slipped away, and a steel-blue flash swept the room as the giant took it in. 'I see a tyrannised people. Let this go on long enough, and you will have no people to torment. Shells, maybe, at best.'



She had stood up as well, it saw. 'You are blind, fittingly enough.'



'Oh, cling on to eyelessness, will you? Such a toddler's retort...prove me wrong, then.'



She went on about her planned policies as she had while hectoring earlier, as if Ib were some bent-backed lackey used to nodding at everything she said.



Most men being de facto reduced to expendable labourers and fighters was not much of an extension of typical Midworld culture, but while the matriarch of an aggressively misandrist society might've done so out of spite, Kxhera seemed to be building one that was just misanthropic. Too much hatred for just one group, Ib guessed.



Women being handed jobs of secondary importance when they weren't being used as breeding sows was, again, noy unusual, though it felt surreal to hear a woman argue for it. Not that she intended to break her back doing what the men would be already too busy for (unless one wanted to use the admiralship as an example of one such occupation; men would certainly be too busy for that, and so would everyone else, for that matter), but she genuinely was not planning to avoid pregnancy.



For all the wrong reasons, though.



'Strong blood spawns strong people,' Xera said when she reached the point of bloodline - not that worthlessly sentimental arrangement, family - planning. 'The barren have naught to give after death, and the ill in flesh or thinking or spirit only flaws to pass on.' Her scowl was firm. 'We will breed these faults out of the ship. The next generations will be perfection itself.



Good luck surviving long enough with such a lack of diversity for humans to even begin resembling "perfection." 'Ill in spirit?' Ib repeated sardonically. "Such as those resenting your policies? Or would those be the ill in thinking?'



'You mock pointlessly, which is unsurprising. Humour is another useless trait that shall be purged when the bloodlines are cleansed.' She clasped hands behind her back. 'There are many breeds of spiritual illness. Those who feel too strongly, or lack enthusiasm for the solutions common sense dictates; but also those who think they love their own kind, men bedding men and women mounting women. Some are too insane too accept how they were born and think they have men's or women's souls whilst they are the opposite, as if anything but the body dictates that.'



At this point, Ib's stare became heavy enough Kxhera felt it, eyeless as the giant was. 'What do you believe I am?' it asked slowly, softly.



She blinked, then her features became pinched with outrage. 'You are a freak powerful enough to do as you please with my fleet and laugh off reprisal, otherwise you would not be standing there. You-'



'Still that tongue, you moronic waste of flesh.' Ib's voice was thunder. 'Are you as daft as you seem? Surely that is impossible.' It laid a heavy hand on the table, which snapped like rotten straw. 'I asked, what do you believe I am? Male? Female? Otherwise?'



Puzzlement broke through her anger, and Ib caught her crew looking at each other in bemusement. '...Male, obviously. Tall, strong, angled, not curved. A thunderous-'



Ib did laugh now. 'What? I am humanlike enough that I must be male, because of these superficial similarities with the males of your species?' Ib bent down. 'I am no more male than a storm cloud, nor more female than a boulder. I do not believe I am both, or between them, permanently or changing from one gender to another. Because I've none.'



The table broke apart as it walked forward. 'Why would I adopt these construct so many societies have kludged together? People do everyday, and good for those fond of it, but I've no need to make up words for what I am because my body is closest to those labeled so and so.' Shards of wood became dust under its tread. 'I could call myself a woman without looking like you at all. I could call myself a bloody hermaphroditic shrimp if I looked like a houseplant.'



It was now past Xera, who was still as if rooted to the floor. 'The corpus is the vessel of the spirit. Believing it has any bearing on the latter's nature is insanity, not the opposite.'



There would be, Ib decided, no harm in walking through the wall of a building raised by this contemptible mob. But, though part of it wished to slaughter them for being wicked or spineless enough to agree with Kxhera's madness, it knew that thinking like that would make a mass grave of existence.



Ib laid a palm against the brickwork, as transparent to it as a bubble of soap. 'In a story about freedom, I'd throttle Kxhera with her own guts now, then you'd grovel before this grand foreign hero and harmoniously build a paradise.' Because they were obviously hapless victims swept along in her wake, the poor souls... 'I will not.' It turned.



'Instead, I will give you a choice between freedoms. You can leave this island with the means to live luxuriously, for as long as you wish; I will make each of you but your admiral a demigod. Or you can choose to go along with her, dreaming about the freedom to abuse and mangle.'



Its will pulsed through the room, heavy as a mountain range made a whip. 'But I will not let you put it into practice. Should you freely choose to enable this upjumped despot, you will reveal your worth. Then I will find you. I will break your ships to flinders, and rip each of you to shreds. Will you put up a fight, when you let yourselves be silenced forever so as not to dusplease your leader? Not that courage would help. Then, I will take your children, take them to fleets and islands that will have them and help them grow up sane and healthy.'



The wall broke against Ib. 'Choose. Or 'ware the time we meet next.'



* * *



Most, predictably, choose lyxury. Greed was an useful tool in such dealings, and Xera's face turned red, then purple, as she watched all but a handful of her captains depart.



Ib loomed over them, ready to fulfill its promise early - what was the point in waiting? - then Ashe, breaking her uncharacteristic silence, whispered to it.



'Will you stain your heart striking these coeards down? You don't want that. You're just angry at what they represent.'



A wordless grunt and a swipe of its arm had them running towards the shore, where, without hesitating, they hopped into the self-directed boars it had conjured. In no time they were over the horizon.



Xera was on it, clawing at its chromed hide, moments later. Ib, sighing, stepped aside, leaving an identical body like a solid afterimage. An instant later, it was walking on water. 'I see what cloth you're cut from. When you stop assaulting that ersatz-me, you will be able to leave this island behind.' Then it was gone.



Years passed. Decades. Lifetimes. The Ib-fraction kept the island stable and isolated, Kxhera unburdened by age or hunger or mortal needs or the passage of time.



She hardly noticed, apoplectic after Ib had, in her view, taken her fleet from her. On a few occasions, she tried to fashion weapons from trees or ruined buildings, but they broke on the giant.



'I gave them every Midworlder's dream and restored their speech. You can be free of worries too, if you but see your faults and admit them. No one has been wronged here. Understand, and you will receive far more than a fleet if cringing acolytes could have provided. But that's not what you want, is it?'



A shove had her with her back against a rocky outcrop, the grey giant crouching steps away. 'You are not angry I wronged or hurt them in any way. I just injured your pride, thwarted your control. You're so obsessed with being unchallenged you've been trying to injure me for centuries in the name of ego, and you think that will change, or that it's worth it? You think you'll kill me and they'll return to be subjugated once more? Think, Kxhera!' Ib tapped its temples.



She did not, however, think about these things. For many, many ages.



* * *



Later that night, Ib laid on its back, a hand behind its head, as it beheld the night sky. Ashe still surrounded its neck like a smoky scarf. 'I'm proud of you, Libertas.'



The giant gave her a mildly reproachful glance. 'Don't call me that. And there's no point in praise. Anyone decent would've done the same, and besides, you helped.'



She nodded, smiled. A claw slid along a shoulder blade. 'We work well together, no?'



'Don't go expecting me to make love to you under the stars, now.'



She pushed away with something of a sneer. 'No, I see expectations are the best I'll get. Goodnight, then.'



As she turned so her back faced Ib, she took the humanlike woman shape she'd first borne in her temple. There was not a stitch on her this time either.



Ib pointendly rolled to face the other way.



All in all, not a bad day. Not all oppressive cultures could be bribed into dissolving, but collapsing some helped pave the way for later reformation. It would just take a while to carefully sort the materialists from those who genuinely believed in freedom, but just getting rid of those who cultivated the mentality of oppressors or slaves would be better.



This was just the beginning.