Chapter 333: On the Wind

Thank you to my beta reader and editor, GlassThreads!

Toren Daen

"Stay away from the captive," Sarvash ordered, his dark hair glimmering as he cinched the chains tighter. What had once been Ulysseiah bit and snapped and howled. "She is a danger to everyone."

Ulysseiah—who had appeared to me at first as a vulnerable, scared young woman—now looked like something hauled up from the depths of the Marianas Trench. Her face had elongated, scales flickering there like gleaming pearls. Her teeth were sharp as a shark's, gnashing and biting at the chains that kept her effortlessly secure. The ridges on her forehead had become fin-like fans, stretching along her face and back toward her neck.

But no matter how much she thrashed, the transformation into her true, aquatic form was halted by the dark iron links wrapping around and around her. Sarvash's intent boiled about him, his mana churning with a compressed gale, forcing the leviathan down through the sheer weight of his power. It made me think of a hydraulic press slowly, methodically squeezing a bar of iron into shape.

She was no threat to him.

"What's happening to her?" I demanded, recalling when the young woman had struggled to suppress something in her mind. "And what happened here?"

Sarvash hardly spared us a glance. "She is taken by the Seeker's Madness, just like her father was," he sneered. "This is the fate of all Navigators who dive too deep and refuse to listen to the decrees of Lord Indrath. This leviathan has only brought this on herself."

The Matali dragon held out his hand, a blade of silver-pure mana forming there, poised to strike at the frenzied woman's throat.

And finally, I remembered where I'd sensed this flavor of utter fury before. Before the dragon could act, driving his blade into the innocent woman's throat, I gripped his wrist, a shrouded spirit amplifying my strength.

"Step away, Yaksha. This does not concern you," Sarvash growled dangerously, his mana flaring powerfully. "Do you want my blade turned on you as well?"

"Call back your mana," I hissed, resisting the urge to stare at the chained leviathan. "Can't you sense it? It's the very potency of your power that is aggravating these symptoms. This madness is worsened by your mana signature!"

When I stepped into the crucible of sorrow and fury on my apotheosis, I thought quickly, my skin tingling from the implications, this was the rage I sensed. This utter, insensate anger. The rage of the dead for their unjust end, the cry of slaughtered children and mothers and fathers howling into the void.

Except what I felt radiating from Ulysseiah was only the rage. Sorrow was a low, simmering emotion—it dragged you down, pulled you to the ocean floor like a stone lashed to the ankle, but anger? Anger was volcanic oxygen, heat in the limbs that yanked you toward the sun. And within Ulysseiah, I could sense that the despair had all burned away, leaving singular fury.

But why? What in the hell was happening to her?

Sarvash glared at the place where I gripped his wrist, and I sensed his growing irritation. "You have irritated me already, Lord Yaksha. Unhand me, and I will allow you to keep your ha—"

Before he could lash out, however, I stepped in close, staring into his eyes.

This dragon was related to Vajrakor—the very same Vajrakor whose core I had torn out and feasted on like a fruit. The same Vajrakor whose body had broken beneath my dominion, as retribution for his disrespect of my mother's sleeping form.

And he feared like Vajrakor, too. That same suppressed terror of the unknown, the same uncertainty about what could not be understood. So when I unfurled just the hint of my wings, influenced the intent I'd laced through the gigantes' rumbling footsteps like camouflage, it was not the utter dominion of King's Force that he felt.

He caught a lingering taste of what I kept leashed. A flickering spark of the utter enormity of my soul, just barely out of his sight. Not enough to demand violence. But enough.

"Your mana is what is perpetuating her current condition," I whispered, low enough only the dragon could hear. "Rein it in, and maybe you don't need to get blood on your hands."

Sarvash's intent flickered, but he showed none of his emotions on his face. Too many millennia of politics and battles had trained him not to. "So quick to try and defend this one, Lord Yaksha," he drawled. "Why? What is she to you?"

A link to something I thought was done, I thought. "It is because I am a warrior that I know what it is like to be weak and defenseless, Sarvash Matali," I hissed. "Are you so quick to end a life?"

The dragon's intent slowly, hesitantly lessened, his mana signature seeping back beneath his skin. He ripped his wrist out of my grip, never breaking eye contact. Behind me, Chul—who had been subtly prepared for another bout of combat and was keeping his attention focused on the approaching twin dragons—shouted in sudden surprise as he looked down at Ulysseiah.

The change had been practically immediate. With the dragon's mana signature retreating, the rage and fury lost its fuel. It wasn't truly lessening, not really…. But something sideways of that, something I didn't have the time to try and understand.

Ulysseiah's leviathan form seeped back under her skin, like a fish forgetting its scales. Her thrashing weakened, growls turning to whimpers. She trembled within the chains, which I belatedly realized were shimmering with icy cold.

She blinked a few times, radiating confusion, before she finally appeared to take in her surroundings, coral-pink eyes blown wide with fear.

"Oh, no," she moaned weakly, shivering within the chains. "No, who did I hurt? What did I do?!"

I looked down at the trembling woman, a stab of pity streaking through me. I opened my mouth to say something, but Sarvash was faster.

"You attacked your hosts, Ulysseiah Cephallon," he announced, leaning over the bound leviathan. "Clanlord Lo Phrain has been injured because of you. Your host, who took you in despite your cursed lineage."

The young woman trembled, curling in on herself. "No, I couldn't have. Couldn't, could not," she whispered to herself. Her eyes snapped back up, begging deep from her soul. "My lyre! Where is my music? I need my music!"

I snapped a glare at Sarvash, before kneeling by the chained woman. I lowered my voice, remembering how one was supposed to interact with victims of battle shock. The young woman was displaying so many of the same symptoms, and I'd felt personally what it was like to have such rage course through me. "You're okay now. I remembered what you said about your mana: you were able to calm down. You're safe now, okay? Deep breaths."

"My lyre. It would've stopped this. Would have," the woman whispered, her eyes glistening with tears, though she at least managed to avoid hyperventilating. "Aquinas' bones, I didn't want to do this. Did not."

As if on cue, someone stumbled in from the sky. Nerium Mapellia was breathing heavily as he moved closer, something clasped in his hands. I recognized it immediately as the bone-crafted lyre that Ulysseiah had been playing when I'd first seen her. He looked around, his brow furrowing in consternation.

"Ah, it's resolved then!" the hamadryad said cheerily, striding forward. "That is good. I worried that things would get out of hand before I managed to get back with this."

"Please," Ulysseiah begged, staring up at Sarvash, "please, I didn't mean to hurt anyone. Did not. The chains, they hurt, and…"

The dragon captain, for all his faults, was not emotionless. Staring down at the lashed woman, bound and on the verge of tears, pity streaked through his intent. He snorted, turning away in disgust as the combat chains retracted, shimmering away into the air. "You can no longer stay with the gigantes. You are a threat to everyone's safety, and by the power vested in me by the Indrath Clan, if you endanger innocents again, I will be forced to kill you."

Okay. Maybe he was an emotionless prick.

Chul glared at the dragon captain, his sense of justice irked by such callousness. "Are you so cruel, scaled one?" he demanded, stepping around Ulysseiah. The disguised phoenix crossed his beefy arms, puffing himself up like a balloon. "Have you no compassion for one so clearly troubled?"

"It isn't a matter of compassion, Arjuna Promethes," he asserted. His two companions—the twin, silver Matali dragons—slowly returned to his side, presenting a more united front. "It's a matter of security. As a crafter and a forger, you have no idea what the war with Agrona Vritra entails. There are events in play that you cannot fathom. With recent events, we cannot afford such clear threats to the common folk anywhere."

All around us, heads started to peek out of the gigantes' scaled crust. Sylphs watched the interplay with wide eyes, some fearful, some curious.

The eruption of the acclorite prisons, I thought sourly, pinpointing a dot of blazing red grief in the dragon's emotions. I'd already pinned him as some sort of relative of Vajrakor, and the fuel of his emotions amplified every one of his actions. The death of so many soldiers in the heartland of Kezess Indrath's empire can't go unnoticed for long. And the culprits—if there were any, of course—would presumably still be at large.

"And such recent events would demand that you assault your guests, too," I commented idly. I slowly stood, straightening from Ulysseiah's side like a bow being unstrung. "Test them, just to make sure they are not threats. That they are who they claim to be."

The dragons didn't look away from my challenging stare, unreserved. They were right to try and fight us, of course. Chul and I were threats to everything their regime relied upon. But the hypocrisy of it irritated me.

At my feet, Ulysseiah shook, pulling herself woozily to her feet.

Nerium shook his head irritably, sensing the conflict building in the air. "At least let her pack her things, Sarvash," he said, much more familiar with the dragon. He handed the woman her lyre gingerly. "It won't take long."

Sarvash—who had been considering me with an arrogant stare, wondering at his next words—spared the hamadryad a glance. I knew that the Mapellia clan had close political ties to the Indraths among the Great Eight, and at least from a cursory observation, Sarvash seemed to treat Nerium as though he did have such authority.

So why did Naesia Avignis believe that Nerium wasn't a Mapellia?

"Fine," the dragon said, sending a skeptical look back to Ulysseiah. He turned, gesturing to his companions, before lifting into the sky. "But she will be gone by sundown."

Nerium watched them go with a wrinkled, mossy brow, before turning back to the young leviathan, who was still lingering near me. My suspicions lingered in the back of my head as he regarded the young woman.

"It's not worth much, but I'm sorry about him," he said, moving closer. "I've known him since we were young, and Sarvash can be difficult."

Ulysseiah shook her head. "Just… it doesn't matter. Does not. Just let me get to my stuff. Please."

Nerium gave me an unreadable stare, his lips quirked into a sympathetic smile. "Yeah, of course. I'll go find Clanlord Lo for you, get the full story for you on what happened before your, uh… incident."

The leviathan nodded wearily, abruptly grasping my arm for support. "Thank you. But you shouldn't. Should not. I… I'm dangerous. I have the Seeker's Madness. At any moment, I—"

The hamadryad waved her off. "Trust me, I understand. The members of my clan aren't exactly…." He shook his head, as if willing away a bad memory. "Another time. I'll be back soon."

The man drifted away, weaving around orange tents as he searched for Clanlord Lo. The back of my neck prickled, an intuition there.

"Please, may I walk with you?" Ulysseiah said beside me, meekly. "It's quiet around you. It is. Easier to avoid."

I shifted, looking down at the exhausted, mentally strained woman. "What's quiet, Lady Ulysseiah?" I asked, the implications of what she'd been projecting swirling about my head like a boiling pot. Had I failed in some way to fully purify that heartfire? But that didn't make sense…

"The mana," she mumbled, her too-pink eyes looking up at me like pastels. "It doesn't rage like normal. Does not. I do not risk…. Relapse."

I nodded slowly, walking forward, my questions swirling in my wake. "Okay. I'll follow you."

—

It didn't take long for us to reach the place where Ulysseiah's belongings were stored. Chul, who had dropped the gigantic, folded tent when he'd been forced to defend me, went ahead to pick it up again, laughing at the victory of it. As the young leviathan began to pack her things, the half-phoenix in disguise set about re-anchoring the stakes of the tent, hammering each one in with powerful blows.

At least it served as good training for his new aetheric strength. Wren was with him, hidden once again in the chiton, and I'd gotten the sense from the titan that was where he'd prefer to remain hidden henceforth.

Which made it difficult to ask him what Seeker's Madness was, and what a Navigator could do. I had a gut feeling I'd need to know.

"You can ask, you know," the woman said, picking up a few items and putting them in her pack. The wind whipped around us, curious sylphs peeking their heads from the cracks in the stone. "I don't mind. Do not. I am most accustomed to it."

I resisted the urge to wince, kneeling and picking up a few spare bags. I felt like asking her any of those questions—like "What is Seeker's Madness," and "Why did it feel like you were channeling the rage of a thousand slaughtered men"—was a really bad idea, especially when she was feeling so vulnerable. There were better times for things like that.

Instead, I tried another angle, one I'd sensed open up when Sarvash had ordered the leviathan gone. "Where are you traveling to, Lady Ulysseiah?" I asked. "You were certainly on this caravan for a reason, probably heading somewhere, yes?"

She shuffled, adjusting a simple sling bag and a couple of other packs. That was something that struck me as strange about the asura: the way they had to pack everything into bags and carry them everywhere. In Alacrya, most middle-class people could afford a decent dimension ring to carry their regular items, and they were a crux of cargo movement.

It was a small thing, really. But it served to highlight how much my frame of reference had changed since Earth. When I'd first came to this world, I'd used a sling bag to carry my meager possessions all throughout the Clarwood Forest. Now, I saw it as odd?

Ulysseiah patted the lyre strapped to her hip, and for the first time I noticed that I couldn't sense what spellwork was woven into the bone-crafted article. She stared distantly at Chul as he went around the perimeter, taking great joy in every stake he successfully hammered down. "I was playing my music for money," she said quietly. "The tips helped, and Clanlord Lo was happy to feed me for the music. He was so kind, and… Aquinas' bones, I hope he is well. I didn't want to hurt anyone. Did not."

She shuddered, closing her eyes tight for a bit. "I wanted to get to Ecclesiah. That's where. That is. They can help me. They wouldn't want me. Would not. But they must have knowledge. Generations of Navigators have lived along those shores. They must have something more."

I considered this for a moment, remembering the talk I'd had with Wren, as well as the willingness of the dragons to attack their guests to probe for weaknesses. "If you leave now, you won't have any way to protect yourself," I said slowly. "The Aborshan Wastes are unkind to those who don't know their way around a blade. You'd have to make it to the River Suda at least before you'd be safe."

"I must take my chances," she said stubbornly. "I have hurt others again. It is only fair that I be without protection."

I was about to say something when a few familiar mana signatures approached. High in the sky, the dragon twins escorted Clanlord Lo, who had a single hand wrapped in bandages. His face was one of pity as he drifted low, looking at the distraught young girl.

Not far behind them, Nerium drifted down to stand with Chul, who had just finished hammering in one of the last stakes. The bulky hamadryad's face was a mask of remorse as he stared at Lo.

"Ah, Ulysseiah," the once-jovial sylph said, his mouth a solid line. "You are well now?"

Ulysseiah flinched. "Well? Well. I suppose I am well?" she stammered, yanking one of the bags from my hands and hastily stuffing everything together. "I am most sorry for hurting you, Lord Phrain. You were… nothing but kind, nothing but welcoming to me."

Her eyes rested painfully on the man's bandaged arm. And this is how I repay you, was left unsaid.

Clanlord Lo's brows furrowed like a thundercloud. "I welcomed you, yes. Because you said you could control yourself when I let you into our tents," he said, just shy of anger. "You claimed the Madness had not taken hold."

The leviathan wilted like a plant deprived of the sun. "I did have it under control," she insisted weakly. "But the pulse of mana in the tent right before, it—"

"I do not wish for excuses," the sylph said lowly. "It is the utmost rule of the Nomads that we forego fighting of any kind. You cannot stay here."

I felt something well up from my gut, companionable sorrow matching that of the wilting leviathan by my side. I didn't know her struggle, didn't know what it was like to fight against whatever she battled. But I did know what it felt like to be ostracized, to linger on the outskirts of society.

Even though I'd started talking to her for personal, selfish reasons—because I'd sensed a way to trail the Avignis clanmembers—the reason I spoke up next was not for one reason alone.

"You forbade combat and battle, Clanlord Lo," I said, finally drawing attention to myself. I was like a statue in the wind, utterly unmoved by the shifting of the world around me. "But do you know what transpired shortly after Lady Ulysseiah's… slip?"

I looked the Matali twins in the eyes, and for the first time, I caught a flash of their guilt as the middle-aged sylph followed my attention. "My companion and I fought with your guards. A short scuffle, but a battle all the same."

The woman on the right opened her mouth to speak, no doubt to try and defend her actions, but I cut her off. I turned my back on them, looking at the kneeling leviathan. What hurt the most, seeing her like this, was not that she felt despair. No, from the projection of her emotions, I could tell that this was something she was accustomed to. The exile. The banishment.

"If the Lady Ulysseiah will have us, we would escort her to Ecclesiah unharmed," I said sincerely. "Justice must be blind, after all. It is only fair that we are expelled in turn."

There was silence in the air at my proclamation. I could sense Clanlord Lo's confusion and, as he glanced at the utterly silent guards, tasting their guilt, his rising anger. He was experienced enough in politics to read between the lines. The dragons, who were supposed to be protectors, had instead assaulted us, and there wasn't much he could do about it.

Ulysseiah gaped up at me as if I had spoken in an alien language. Her coral-pink eyes shifted rapidly across my face, seemingly searching for some sign of deception.

There were none. I could not uphold the fullness of that promise, could not see her past the River Suda, but I could see her safely through these Wastes. I wouldn't let a young woman waltz into danger unprotected. She swallowed visibly, hands tightening on the straps of her bags.

"I would be grateful," she finally whispered, taking the metaphorical hand I'd offered. "But I am… dangerous. Though you are Yaksha, an asura of the blade… Pardon me. I must gather the rest of my belongings. I can leave shortly."

The young woman scampered off, flying off toward another gigantes. I got the sense that she didn't like being in the presence of the Matali twins, especially as Lo Phrain looked about ready to blow up on them.

Before he could, however, I stepped forward, laying a hand on his shoulder. "Do not worry about this, Clanlord Lo. I hold no blame for you for this. It was out of your control."

The sylph's eyes flickered with controlled lightning, and when he spoke, his voice was low. "They wear our traditions away inch by inch, like our gigantes tearing apart the walls in their way. Since the formation of the Great Eight, the clan leaders have treated our ways with utter disdain," he whispered, so low I could hardly hear him. "This was not the first boundary they have crossed. It will not be the last."

The old man glared at the dragon twins, who finally looked something close to chastised. "Hold close to your traditions, Venerable Yaksha. They are all you have."

Then he lifted into the air, turning back toward a few of his other clanmembers. For a moment, I couldn't decide what to feel. After all, I was no Yaksha, merely wearing a mask. Pretending to be something I was not, using his hospitality to further my own goals, even if they were just.

A ways back, Chul bellowed a laugh at something Nerium had said, the two of them engrossed in conversation. But for now, I was left to face the two dragon twins.

"Did you learn what you wished, dragons?" I asked of the silver-plated women, scrutinizing them carefully. My attention drifted pointedly toward the twin whose helmet I'd dented with a punch. "Has your captain gleaned all he needed to know?"

I could read between the lines of politics now, too: these two dragons had been ordered to attack Chul and I. Not for a full battle, but as a test of our abilities. And for all that I didn't wish to fight these dragons—at least not yet—our short scuffle had allowed me to more firmly ascertain my own strength. They were both far more powerful than Taci ever was, each accomplished asuran warriors. And though I was holding back a significant portion of my abilities in our exchange to maintain the illusion of being a pantheon warrior, I hadn't lost, either.

"Our names are Avhilasha and Anakasha of Clan Matali," said the first woman, turning her chin up as if it could squash the guilt she felt from Lo's anger. "And you do not hold the right to question our authority in matters of security, pantheon."

I slowly strode between them, unbothered by the subtle intent they released. Like a spring breeze rustling my hair, it seeped over me without finding purchase. "Hence why I leave," I countered easily. "If I will not be treated fairly, I will not remain." I turned on my heel, toward where Chul and Nerium spoke.

I sensed the one I'd clocked in the skull—Anakasha—suppress a wince. "Captain Sarvash only seeks to keep the peace across Epheotus," she spoke up. She seemed to believe her own excuse, too. "He has lost those close to him in this war recently. It is his fuel."

My mind drifted to Vajrakor, and I had a bitter intuition that I knew who Sarvash had lost. "One of the things I have learned in warfare, Anakasha Matali," I said evenly, "is that wrongdoing only begets itself."

I slew Vajrakor and more than a dozen other asura within that cesspit of a prison, before ripping my way out like an enraged butterfly tearing free of the cocoon. But the echoing explosion of that mountain affected others, perpetuating the misery that I'd thought I'd erased.

I was no more detached from that cycle than anyone else. For all I spoke of higher principles, I was enslaved to the wheel, forced to roll with it lest I be crushed by it, too. I'd slain Skarn Earthborn during the Battle for Burim, and I'd slaughtered many more of their brothers since. That festering hatred would not simply go away.

"I wish your Captain luck," I said with finality, amused by my hypocrisy. The Matali twins exchanged looks, and I wondered if I'd given them anything worth considering.

When Chul saw me approaching, he smiled genuinely. The sight of it eased the swirl of thoughts in my mind, anchoring me down to the earth again. "Lord Yaksha!" he said, gesturing broadly at the statue of muscular ebony at his side. "Nerium has offered to join us in our quest eastward! He has seen many a flaw in my routine, and wishes to help."

And immediately, my heartbeat picked up again as suspicion took root. "He has, has he?" I echoed, tilting my head as I smiled thinly at the hamadryad.

"I travel for new experiences," he responded with an honest shrug, before clapping Chul companionably on the back. "Why else would I be out in the middle of absolute nowhere? And I think there is something I can learn from Arjuna here, especially after he beat me so soundly in our contest."

Nerium's expression shifted slightly as he looked at me. "Of course, you do have the final say over him, don't you?"

The way he said the last sentence, twisting the implications ever-so-slightly, unsettled me. But more than that, taking him along? "We would need to organize travel arrangements for that to happen," I said, keeping my tone neutral. "But we might also have a change of plans already."

Nerium looked toward where Ulysseiah had fled, his expression falling slightly. "Ah, old Laertes' daughter," he said mournfully. "You'll be helping her, I suppose."

I shifted, moving a bit closer to Chul as I looked at the bulky hamadryad. "You know of her?" I asked, remembering how he'd retrieved the girl's lyre for her.

"I knew her father," he corrected, and his intent misted with genuine grief. "Before the madness took him too deep. And it seems that she's following the same path he is, just another Navigator cast out from society."

The man huffed, running a hand through his mossy hair and pushing it away from his face. He forced a smile onto his face. "But that's not really what matters now, is it, Lord Yaksha? I can promise I'm not a bad traveling companion at all, and if I can help old man Laertes' daughter not go off the deep end? Might be more worth it than I first thought."

I gave the asura a respectful nod, still struggling to read him a bit. His intent seemed genuine, but his race didn't really have a heartbeat in the way I was used to. My normal methods of detecting truth and lies—that I'd relied on so much in Alacrya and Dicathen—didn't fully work on this man, and it left me more paranoid and distrustful than I would have otherwise been.

I pulled Chul a bit to the side, walking for a bit along the tumultuous, shifting gigantes. Its back reminded me of the continental plates, always in flux as crust subsumed crust and produced more beneath the heat of ultrapressure. The disguised phoenix walked with me, his intent focused.

Finally, when I'd guessed we were far enough away, I swaddled us in a sound barrier. I wasn't the first to speak, however.

"I witnessed your confrontation with the terrible dragons," Chul growled lowly, crossing his beefy arms. "They are most unjust! I wish I had leeway to strip them of such undue arrogance. It irks me so to withhold my fire."

I snorted without mirth. "I know," I muttered, agreeing inside. "But I'm not sure how much they can help it. In the same way we're passionate and the basilisks are focused, I suspect there's something in a dragon's blood that demands pride."

"That does not make their upturned noses any less worthy of my fist," Chul grumbled, his shoulders slumping.

It was my turn to laugh a little, amused. He said aloud so many of the things that I was always thinking, but kept reserved. It was refreshing. "I suppose that's true. But maybe it would make it easier to restrain that fist." I shook my head, my long gray ponytail waving in the wind. Then, with a tone far more serious, I added, "Regardless, what's this about Nerium joining us?"

Chul wilted slightly, his intent radiating quiet gloom. The way his eyebrows arched and his eyes pleaded abruptly reminded me of a puppy that had been pushed a bit too much. "Was it unwise of me?" he asked, looking back furtively toward where Nerium waited. "I have made an error."

I didn't let myself sigh. "Not necessarily," I said carefully. "We need to exercise caution, is all, and… Well, I can't bring myself to trust so easily. Especially someone who wishes to join us. I just wanted to know what you were thinking."

Chul straightened his shoulders, finding his confidence again. "He unnerves me, brother. This hamadryad speaks great truths of the body, and partakes in great tests of might and valor! He has the makings of a great friend. But behind his eyes, I see schemes aplenty."

I furrowed my brows, feeling a bit more worried. My distrust of the hamadryad came more from my inability to fully read him rather than anything concrete, but this only made Chul's decision to let the asura join us more confusing.

"You know, I'm wondering why you'd say yes to this, too," Wren added, poking his little mink head out of Chul's chiton. "He was pretty obviously trying to get in good graces with you, from what I heard. And then when he asked if you were traveling alone, and to the east? Well, you fell for the bait, oaf. Hook, line, and sinker. I think that's a human saying that's apt here."

Wren looked at me, tilting his head so his beady eyes looked strangely inquisitive. "Spellsong, that was a correct usage of the idiom, wasn't it? The context you humans keep for all your metaphors is so strange sometimes."

I rolled my eyes. "Yes, Wren, it sounds like you used it correctly to me," I allowed. "But that just makes this more perilous. If the hamadryad were trying to join us for some sort of plan of his, that is very likely not good for us, or at least introduces more complications into our own."

I considered what I knew of the hamadryad a bit more, and though I knew very, very little, I was starting to come up with a bit of an idea. We'd first met him when he'd been engaging in some sort of political maneuver with the Avignis heiress, but Chul had ruined the gambit, whatever it had been.

So he sees a chance to follow after the Avignises, just like us, and make up for wherever he failed, I thought. Is that it? Naesia Avignis' flight could easily be a flight from a perceived foe, too. Running from, not running toward, as I'd first assumed.

I didn't have enough information to really form a solid theory, but it seemed possible. So the question was, did we let this play out?

"You said you saw schemes behind his eyes," I continued, "but you made a deliberate choice to let him come along. I just want to know why."

Chul looked at me. Really looked at me, in a way that made me feel self-conscious. The way Aurora used to look at me when she thought she understood something at a deeper level than before.

"When I first came upon the great cavern of Burim, I trusted the raging fire in my heart alone," he said after a moment. "I listened only to what I wished to see."

I felt suddenly like a limp doll, understanding seeping through me like a wave. My limbs didn't entirely feel my own, attached by some distant puppeteer. "Oh," I muttered, memories of that time clawing at the edges of my mind.

Chul wasn't done. "I saw schemes behind the eyes of your nest-mate, the one for whom you yearn. I hurt her greatly, brother. Because I refused to heed the words of the schemer, I condemned many to a terrible fate."

Chul's words settled within me like a stone that settled at the bottom of my soul. "So now, you're going to engage, even though you feel… uncomfortable?"

"I know nothing of this land, brother," the young phoenix said quietly, staring out into the distance. "Every sight is as wondrous as the last, and I am left very small. I find that I do not understand what I wish to."

So he seeks understanding, I thought, remembering what I had sought so long ago in Alacrya as I played my violin for the masses. Even if it's painful. He'll see who this man truly is.

"You know how it would impact our plan," I said quietly. "It can't be permanent. And… it would be unwise to get attached."

Wren looked at me as if I were absurd, which was surprisingly well-communicated given he currently had the face of a rodent. "Don't tell me you're actually considering this!" he admonished. "It's foolish! You'll have one more point of failure. It's basic engineering: don't engineer a plan and then specifically add in weaknesses after! It'll make everything more complicated! All for what?"

The titan went silent at my stare, then looked up at Chul. He scoffed, irritated, before hiding back inside Chul's chiton. "Fine, Spellsong. Do what you want. It's not like I'm here, a voice of reason and intelligence that you fools should listen to."

Chul looked at me askance, his eyes darting across my face in a strange mirror of Ulysseiah's a few minutes ago. Searching for disapproval and afraid to find it.

I let out a weary sigh. If being a leader were this taxing, I couldn't imagine what it was like for Arthur. "Let's go talk to Nerium," I said, hoping my voice was as even as I wanted it to be. Hoping I was making the right choice. "Don't worry about our plan. I'll make sure it still works, even with these two."

It was going to be more difficult to pull off with two extra eyes on us. But I found that, even if it did make everything far more difficult, I would do it anyway. For Chul, so he could grow.

The realization settled somewhere in the corner of my heart, nestling there like a little pulsing sprout. Something was growing there, nurtured by every moment I saw him struggling to grow. Something so very unfamiliar, yet so terrifyingly familiar all at once.

Chul flew off toward another gigantes, citing a need to go about a "most important task" before we set out. And as I spoke again with Nerium, and eventually Ulysseiah, we worked out a general plan to travel toward Ecclesiah together.

Am I doing a good job, Aurora? I wondered at the sky as I spoke with alien deities about something so simple. When I bring you back, can I tell you I've done well? That I've shown him what it means to be better?

The smile on my face did not match the worry in my heart. That I could balance what was needed with what was wanted. So many worries swirled about, threatening to overwhelm.

But I would keep the course as best I could.