(I’m taking the month of January off to rest. I hope you all have a wonderful end to the New Year and here’s wishing a good 2026. —pirateaba)

Garry – Opening

Here was a lesson for you that he had never forgotten: one person changed everything. Not ‘one person could change everything’…a person always did.

Sometimes it was small, a family or household, but by their presence, each and every person had an impact. But sometimes, all it took was a single young woman to take an Antinium’s hand and breathe life into a lonely, despairing Hive.

Now, approaching two years later, look at the city she had changed. Unintentionally and not always for the better, you had to admit. But she had never been the only person. She had just precipitated an avalanche of lives, and he?

He was a single snowball rolling down the hill after her, and he knew he would not be the last. But Garry the Baker didn’t stop. When he awoke the day after his grand delivery that had set the world to talking, the Antinium Worker sat up, full of aches, pains, healing, grey gel smeared on his body, in a city where everyone knew his name and stared at him, with that same expression they had once given a certain [Innkeeper].

He continued, which surprised them all. But he had never said this was the end of his plans. He just needed new ones. Bigger ones.

He was formulating them the moment he started rolling bread just before dawn. With safety gloves; his fingers still had cracks in them.

——

They told Garry that there had been a door, a palace that led into the future. He’d missed that too, but he was sort of glad; he didn’t know what his future looked like.

Besides—this was the future to him. The Antinium [Baker] remembered the time before Erin Solstice, and there were Antinium and Liscorian citizens who didn’t. He recalled when Antinium Workers walked only in the shadows, never straying into the light of a city where they had no names.

These days? A Worker strode into the [Bakery] with a little object on his head. It was a crocheted puppy designed to hang off the antennae and rest on their forehead. A very cute design.

“Trendshell, what is that?”

A Gnoll working the morning shift grinned when he saw it, and the other Antinium went still. One of them, a Soldier with scars on her body, glanced at Trendshell.

“It is a Head Puppy. Stitchfingers made it, and I have obtained the first batch.”

Trendshell informed the others, and instantly, several Workers spoke.

“I must have one. Where does Stitchfingers sell it?”

“I must petition a [Knitter] for one.”

“I like cats.”

Garry just smiled as Trendshell did a spin, showing off their newest Antinium-fad, and he was rolling dough so quietly that the other [Bakers] jumped when they finished donning their clothing and hats and found him already working.

“Head Baker, you’re here? But I thought—after yesterday—aren’t you healing?”

One of the Gnolls, Herill, was dismayed as he saw Garry’s still-mending wounds, but the [Baker] replied calmly.

“I am just making up for lost time. Do not mind me.”

He was kneading some regular bread and Scaethen Dough, and the [Bakers] got to work, but were distracted by him. After a moment, one had to ask.

“Did you really fall down a cliff, Head Baker?”

“Yes.”

They waited, and Garry added.

“It was quite unpleasant.”

“But you climbed out? Or did that [Knight] rescue you?”

“Ser Solton? No, I had to climb.”

“You climbed out of that chasm with your bare hands?”

His fingers were cracked a bit, and Garry massaged the dough as everyone gazed at him. He smiled, the ordinary [Baker] they had known yesterday. Only…perhaps he wouldn’t be again, even if he tried to look normal. He had always been the same Garry, but now the one they knew was different.

“It was far less pleasant than kneading dough. Let us begin work, everyone. We must not be late.”

They jumped and, reminded of their work, rushed about, but one would ask another question, and Garry would have to reply that yes, he’d run back. Or no, he hadn’t asked the Flying Antinium to help him, and yes, they could fly…

In the end, he stopped work after an hour because he was distracting them. But more than one [Baker] came up to him as he tried to go. One of them was his day-manager, Lief.

“Listen, Garry…I just wanted to say that the entire kitchen was barely working the entire time you were being attacked. Which I know would have made you upset, but think of how we’d feel, huh? All those cities attacking you and none of them believing you were just delivering bread, our bread…well, I wrote a letter to my aunt and uncle down south because they sent me a [Message] asking if you were selling poison. I don’t know if it changed their minds, but…”

Lief was a Drake, and he gazed down at the ground as Garry saw a huge queue out of the bakery. People standing on their tiptoes to see him. Lief glanced up.

“It’s not all of us that’re crazy. And I was proud to be working here. Sorry, I just wanted to say that on behalf of everyone.”

The other [Bakers] nodded, and Garry smiled. He placed a hand on Lief’s shoulder.

“I do not doubt that, Lief. I think the bakery will be very busy today. And I will be back to check on it, but please, do not think I assume all Drakes are cowards who destroy good bread and kill innocent horses. Just like not all Antinium are as good as Liscorian-Antinium.”

He flicked one antennae in a wink, and Lief grinned. Then there was clapping as the [Bakers] applauded him. Garry found that a bit embarrassing and silly, but he waved to them.

“Should we put some bread aside, Head Baker? For next time?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean, Herill. All bread is meant for Liscorians only. Stealing from the bakery would be theft.”

And probably a bit harder next time. They just grinned at him, and Garry exited his bakery and was surprised when more people clapped or cheered for him.

The clapping was highly unnecessary. Garry actually got so uncomfortable that he removed his hat and pulled his apron and clothing off, becoming a regular Worker.

Only…today, the average Liscorian citizen picked him out of the crowd with surprising ease, even for people who knew Antinium. Garry had no idea why at first, then realized he did have injuries.

There was another reason too, but he didn’t figure that out for a bit. But mostly, what Garry decided to do was…take it easy. Just for a bit. He had worked hard, and while he was formulating new plans, he had things to work on himself.

——

Garry the Baker. Bird the Hunter. Pawn the Priest—though he wasn’t as ‘famous’ publicly as the other two, ironically. Add Belgrade the Strategist and…well, you had Antinium who were changing perception of them. Shaping their Hive. Enemy combatants approaching Gold, or even Named-rank, threats.

That was how Grimalkin should have thought of it. Last year, he’d have been submitting dossiers filled with contingency-plans on how to take out Garry if they entered a state of war with the Antinium. And he would have been part of High Command’s strategy meetings as an expert on Liscor. But these days, he spent as much time in Liscor as Pallass.

So, he supposed that some other bright and loyal son of Pallass might be drawing up contingency plans for him, and he thought that was…well, pointless. Just like he’d viewed the entire attack on Garry’s wagon as a fruitless endeavor.

Well, the bread was probably wheat-based, but the point stood. Garry mattered, but he did not fit in the military ‘us or them’ framing. If Grimalkin could just convince someone of that…well, it was why he had spent this morning seeking out a particular individual and why he was working out with a unique guest to his gymnasium.

General Shirka wasn’t actually that much of a ‘gym rat’, a term that came from Earthers. She was strong enough and could figure out proper form after being shown once, but their conversation was the main focus for her, not the exercise.

Too bad, but the plus side was that she took every officer and [Soldier] stationed with her in 2nd Army for training and rebuilding as well. Over two hundred hit Grimalkin’s gymnasium and actually crowded him out; he let his students teach the soldiers how to exercise and nodded at Lady Pryde. She lifted a too-heavy weight-bar off one of the [Soldiers], shouting.

“No one lifts without a spotter, fools! You want to see what happens when someone’s ribs get compressed by three hundred pounds in a second? Grimalkin, you, me, lunch. Bring the [General] along then if you’re still talking.”

He liked her approach to scheduling. Grimalkin had been all too willing to take the time to discuss every facet of his life with Lady Pryde Ulta, but it turned out that she disliked niceties and asking where she wanted to eat. Be there, 12 o’clock sharp. He respected that. Though he had, privately, noted that the when was very important. Missing a meal by an hour meant Pryde got…testy.

Grimalkin nodded, casting a spell to add it to his schedule, then halted at the doors and coughed.

“Uh, Pryde? We have an engagement already. Lunch is already accounted for, but meet at 10 o’clock?”

The hemp bag on Lady Pryde’s head turned, and she paused.

“We do? Ah, yes, of course. Ten, then. You there, stop lifting like that!”

He left her to it. Grimalkin gestured as General Shirka walked next to him.

“There’s another place we can exercise, General. And talk more privately.”

She grunted.

“I’ll hear you out on the Antinium, and I’m receptive to not thinking every Humans is a foe, Sinew Magus, but you’re not exactly making inroads with the right person if you want political clout. You’d be better-served finding a [Senator] or another [General].”

“I have a running spreadsheet of powerful players in Pallass, General Shirka. However, I would like to state that the most expedient choice is not the best when it comes to determining the City of Invention’s future.”

She smiled thinly as they strode along.

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

——

Grimalkin had a private gymnasium he ran, of course, and Pallass had built a second one with a third on the way, but for privacy, there was really only one place to go.

Liscor, or rather, The Wandering Inn. Another public gymnasium was up in the city proper, but the private one in the inn was relatively unused. You’d get the Thronebearers, a few of the Goblins, and Relc or Bezale in there, but most of the guests weren’t [Lifters].

Plus, the inn was virtually impossible to find unless you were a friend. Even Grimalkin had to concentrate in the portal room for a second.

“Right. This way.”

He covertly motioned Shirka to the door and led her into the ‘invisible’ inn. They were talking as he pushed the door into the weights room open and halted.

“I just don’t see the potential for any alliance, Sinew Magus. No matter what, they’re just independents, never allies. Pallass will never accept an Antinium, even as auxiliaries. And the odds of them helping us? I—huh.”

Shirka stopped in the open doorway. Grimalkin observed, in the calm portion of his mind, that this was a record.

He had never, actually, seen an Antinium in his gymnasiums. They didn’t…work out. A few might have lifted weights for the novelty of it, but they didn’t seem to need it to build muscle. But—well—he saw the Antinium in question stop deadlifting a bar.

The weights on the bar told him the bar was currently at four hundred and forty pounds. Which was…Grimalkin coughed as Shirka’s eyes swung to him.

“Is this an eponymous Solstice Moment, Sinew Magus?”

“Possibly just coincidence. Er, good morning, Baker. You have excellent form.”

Garry turned his head.

“Do I? I am glad, Sinew Magus. I was uncertain about it, but I have read through your instruction manuals and reviewed all the poses. Though for Antinium, they are somewhat complex.”

Yes, they didn’t have the same body structure! What a blunder! Only—an Antinium lifting weights? Grimalkin kept staring as Garry executed another squat and realized Garry was right.

Due to his back-shell, his ability to flex his posterior was almost nonexistent. Actually, the deadlift worried Grimalkin.

“I’m not certain how effective that is, Baker. You’re bearing the weight amazingly well, though.”

“Oh? If you can suggest a better form—”

Shirka stood back, watching as Grimalkin paced around. Instantly, the Sinew Magus made a few suggestions and began taking notes in a journal. He composed his first Antinium-form guide within minutes of walking Garry through safe lifting techniques, but stayed there for nearly half an hour.

Merely to…well, note down the weights that the [Baker] was lifting. He’d compare them against his own datasets later, but General Shirka herself went to try the bench press after Garry was done and grunted.

She glanced sideways at Grimalkin.

“Not a threat, you said? That’s the largest damn Worker I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“I believe the term is ‘swolest’, though I object to the term myself. Earther-slang.”

“Another headache I don’t really want to be part of.”

She grimaced, and Grimalkin eyed her as they watched Garry wipe down the equipment he’d been using. He didn’t actually sweat, but he’d done a thorough workout. Then the [Baker] turned.

“Sinew Magus, as it is still objectionably wet in the city, I would prefer to run elsewhere, but other locations are apparently an issue. What would you consider appropriate distances for running?”

“Er, for an amateur? I would start at a mere mile or less; anything is better than nothing. For you? Four laps of the city, depending on your available time.”

Garry nodded.

“My legs find this idea objectionable, but I suppose this is considered ‘healthy’. It appears most healthy things are unpleasant.”

“Do you—like lifting those weights, Baker?”

Shirka addressed Garry for the first time, awkwardly stiff, but polite enough. Garry glanced at her.

“I do not, General. But it appears to me that it would be good to be more in shape.”

“In case you have to climb another cliff?”

“Yes, that did occur to me. Thank you, Sinew Magus, and good day to you, General Shirka.”

He walked past the two. The two Drakes stared after him, and then Grimalkin blinked.

“General Shirka, he knew who you were.”

“Yes. And your point about him not being a threat was…”

She turned to him, and Grimalkin scratched at his chin, then shrugged.

“I believe, General, that my point is actually further demonstrated by the preceding encounter. Would you want him as an actual foe?”

“Hm. Fair point.”

——

The Wandering Inn was an excellent place to get a lot of what Garry needed. Of course, even here, everyone wanted to talk about his delivery.

Lyonette, in particular, was incensed, but unable to scold him fully, which Garry was relieved by. In fact, they just pointed him at the gymnasium, and when he emerged after an encounter with Grimalkin, he was barely able to procure a breakfast.

“Here, Garry. Very sorry, but is a busy day, eh?”

Calescent shoved some egg salad onto a tray with a fried fish. Garry didn’t mind the food, and he noted the [Chef] was scarfing down a red bowl of peppered pasta with someone else.

Elia Arcsinger was wiping sweat out of her eyes but refused to stop gulping down food. As they ate, a Goblin was shoving neatly-wrapped boxes into a hamper bin.

“Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen…how many is we got, Boss Peggy?”

Asgra complained, and Peggy counted.

“Eh, Grimalkin and Pryde coming too. So add two more.”

“Damn. Oh, hey, it Garry! You didn’t hear that! I’m very good. Very good Goblin. Am I on the good list?”

Asgra brightened up and clapped a claw over her mouth. Garry tilted his head as he saw more of the staff rushing about. They seemed to be preparing for something. Mrsha and Nanette were importantly marching to-and-fro.

“Okay, Calming Tonics, check! Octavia’s going to have the rest brewed, and we’re waiting on some of our initial strikeforce. Late, as usual.”

Nanette had on military boots and a quasi-military uniform, and even Mrsha wore a sash and kilt. Lyonette was in the midst of it all. Garry addressed Asgra.

“What list would this be, Asgra?”

“The nice list! Does I get presents now? Or only in the winter?”

“Oh. Only in the winter.”

“Bread?”

“Are you starving, Asgra?”

She thought about it and patted her stomach.

“Eh…no. Damn. I mean shit. You forget you heard that. I a very good girl…for a Goblin. Okay, we going soon. Garry Christmas!”

“Er…thank you?”

She waved at him with a huge smile, and Garry backed up a step as Ser Dalimont and Lyonette found him.

“Garry! I’m so sorry we can’t give you more of a welcome—sit, please! Anything you want, on the house. We have Xinthe minding the shop while we’re gone, but Calescent will be out, and so will I. Er, Garry Christmas!”

“Is that a saying now, Miss Lyonette?”

She hesitated.

“I heard all the children shouting it. Is it not something you’d say? You are Santa now.”

“I suppose I am. You realize that was an artful ruse, though?”

She chuckled as she adjusted a very impressive dress. Ser Dalimont’s armor was polished, and the door opened to admit more friends of the inn. Colfa swept in, followed by—

“Hey, there the Baker is! Chieftain, Chieftain. Can I get autograph or bread?”

A Hobgoblin, a Redfang warrior, that Garry didn’t know shouted right before someone booted him in the butt. Chieftain Rags marched forwards.

“Out of the way, idiots. Don’t bother him too much. Lyonette, we’re here.”

She and Lyonette met as the [Princess] thanked her for coming; Garry had no idea what was going on and saw Ser Dalimont greeting the Goblins.

“Redscar, thank you for coming. How many Wyverns…?”

The [Blademaster] grinned.

“Two. Don’t mind Chieftain; she just grumpy because certain cute [Student] gone. Also, she argue for two hours with Naumel about him coming. You glad he not coming; he’d actually fight.”

“Very perceptive as always.”

“Yah. Hey, you Garry, right? You got any bread?”

Garry did not, in fact, have any bread. The disappointed Goblins contented themselves with greeting the other members of staff, fist-bumping Nanette and Mrsha, and grinning. Garry had to ask.

“Excuse me, what is going on today?”

Mrsha turned and held up a card, surprised.

Don’t worry, Garry, it’s going to be low-key. Off the scrying orbs, if we can help it. Valeterisa will see to that. We’re just going to beat up a loudmouth and a [Healer].

Garry thought about that for a second.

“Oh, of course. The Healer of Tenbault. I find it hard to keep up with happenings. Is it dangerous?”

“Yah, for her.”

One of the Goblins grinned, and Garry estimated the relative levels of Rags, Lyonette, her various guardians—he could see Elia, Elosaith, Vaulont, all preparing—not to mention Redscar.

He concurred.

“I hope you have an uneventful time.”

The inn’s family nodded at him as Bird came buzzing down the stairs with Apista.

“I slept in! Are we rescuing Tessa yet? I will have unborn birds for breakfast! Oh, Garry. I am going to hit you because you made me worried.”

“Ow, ow, ow. Bird, that hurts.”

Mrsha and Nanette dragged Bird away from Garry as they prepared for an important mission of mercy of their own. And Garry? He sat and ate his breakfast and swatted Bird away when she tried to eat his egg salad.

It wasn’t his battle. Also, frankly—he felt like they didn’t need him. After Relc and Valeterisa came downstairs, Garry wondered if Lyonette wasn’t engaging in overkill a bit. Ah, well.

It’d distract from him being all over the news. And that wasn’t a bad thing.

——

Garry hated running. Especially on Liscor’s slippery, wet streets, but if it helped, then he’d do it. He was slowed by foot traffic and the new lights on streets as well as people recognizing him.

Mostly children, who shouted ‘Garry Christmas’ and assured him they were being good. Many wanted to try his bread, and he directed them to the bakery. But, thankfully, the Liscorians seemed to be focused on the two Wyverns they’d seen flying across the Floodplains, and his disguise of not wearing any clothing but his loincloth kept him relatively anonymous.

He was finishing his third lap and grumbling about how this was going to cut into his time for anything else but running when Garry came across Visma and Ekirra. Well, a gang of children, really.

Kenva, Rittane, Rinni, Mrsha’s former school bully, Visma, and Ekirra, were playing with forty-some kids from across Liscor.

Humans, Gnolls, Drakes, all of whom were listening to Visma shouting. Garry slowed as he jogged by the park where they were occupying one of the enchanted playgrounds and the sand.

“The Wandering Inn is under attack! It’s five Adult Crelers and—Ancestors, an Elder Creler is coming out of the ground! Fight! Fight! Goblins, hold it back! Where’s our reinforcements?”

“The Silverfangs are coming! We’re coming!”

Ekirra led a howling group of Gnolls against the ‘Crelers’, which were wet, soaking contraptions of wood that the children attacked with swords. The fierce battle of shouting was like any other group of children playing, but again—it was a reminder.

A reminder that Erin and Garry weren’t the only people who shaped Liscor. Even Mrsha had made things change. So, as the Antinium [Baker] and several onlookers watched, they saw the children fighting the advancing ‘Crelers’ and then do something strange.

Normally, in such fights, you’d expect children to be the Gold or Named-rank heroes saving the day, perhaps a few [Princesses]. Beating up the unlucky side who got to be the bad-guys. Certainly, there were a lot of beatings involved for the hypothetical Crelers. But by the time the Elder Creler was being killed by ‘Archmage Amerys’, played by Visma, two Named-rank heroes, including an almost-naked Human boy in his underpants as Saliss of Lights, and over two-thirds of the children were lying on the ground in the rain.

Dead. Visma turned as the Elder Creler toppled over, and looked around. Then Rittane, who had on a [Witch]’s hat, lowered a frying pan and cried out.

“Oh no. They’re all dead. They’re all…the Silverfangs. My friends. Dead.”

She gazed around with such a stricken face that several of the adults glanced at each other. Then Rittane buried her face in her hands and began to sob. All the children began crying, and several of the ‘dead’ children began sobbing too.

“Dead gods.”

A horrified mother wanted to take her children away from the captivating scene. Garry just watched until the sobbing stopped and Ekirra sat up.

“Okay! That was good! Let’s do the Meeting of Tribes next!”

“Hm. I am sure this is not entirely healthy. But what is?”

The children raced off to play more ‘Wandering Inn’ as more converts followed. Garry continued jogging, thinking.

——

There was something…crass about it. Speaking as a Worker who had been there, fighting Skinner, Garry did not like the way they played at death, but then again—they’d seen the inn attacked.

Children, he understood, emulated what they saw. He certainly had in Erin’s chess club when it had been all he’d known. So he could not hold it against them entirely.

Moreover…they’d lost people they loved, surely. Children were drawn to true things. There was little truer than that grief; they just displayed it in ways that were mildly offensive. So let them play?

“It’s not my problem.”

That was the [Baker]’s swift conclusion. There was a lot in the world Garry would do, if he lived. Amending children’s playtime? Not on that list.

It was eight o’clock by the time Garry finished his new routine he’d been working on. Morning bakery, of course, exercise—he could optimize it down to an hour, probably—then he got to work. Garry checked the news and was pleased to see the villages he had listed were being fed. It was, in fact, the morning news, and no one was paying attention to him.

There were Drakes on Sir Relz’s show loudly speaking.

“—could have blown up that bridge himself, you know.”

“Really? Himself?”

Sir Relz was entertaining the caller, but had one brow raised as the Drake blustered.

“Well, why not? You didn’t see who cast the spells, didja? Could be the Antinium did it to make us look bad! Or Humans!”

“It’s true we didn’t see who cast the spells, but—oh, I think another delivery has just reached Imec. And we’re getting more callers who want to talk about their situations. Caller, hold one second, let’s go to a camera and see—”

Garry sat and thought about it for a second. Food being delivered? Excellent. There was no such thing as ‘too much food’ in the cases of the villages and settlements he’d listed.

“But certainly, I have missed some. This will work. For a day, a week. They will get bored.”

It did not diminish the success, of course, merely indicated a window in which further deliveries of bread were suboptimal. Plus—Garry was investigating his pantries while he worked—

“…I’m out of bread.”

Months of stockpiled bread delivered in the span of a week. Time to build it up again. Sadly, Garry hadn’t received any Skills that multiplied the quantity of bread made. But he had a number of unique loafs he could now bake.

[Bread Mastery] might mean the quality of his personal baking was higher. He’d investigate. If the [Loaf of Luck], for instance, had some commercial viability, maybe he could sell it for gold?

Research. Exercise. And oh, yes. Garry heard a ping as a [Message] scroll the Mage’s Guild had given him this morning lit up.

“Ah, time for my meeting.”

The point of the delivery was to deliver bread, as he’d told Erin. But as she’d recognized, it was never just one thing. It was the television, it was the attention. If he lived—it was what came after.

He’d learned from the master, after all.

——

Perhaps the man in the scrying orb was a monster. Perhaps he was simply powerful, and the two were one and the same. Garry hadn’t worked that out yet in his head; philosophy was hard, the books on it esoteric.

But the Mage’s Guild certainly jumped when this man spoke. Garry sat in a private room for this meeting, and the fact that the suspicious, great Archmage of Memories had time for him was because Garry had been on the news.

He would have ignored Garry completely otherwise. And yes, Garry knew that he was an enemy of someone. Perhaps Ryoka, perhaps Erin, perhaps more…but that did not preclude Garry from talking to Eldavin. He needed the half-Elf’s help, so Garry smiled at the half-Elf. Eldavin did not smile back, but merely puffed on a pipe.

“I note the smile. Let me summarize for the sake of expediency. You want me to enable further crimes—”

“That is a hostile way of reframing your actions, Archmage. I only want a small donation, please.”

“The Drakes won’t see it that way. Let’s say I make this vehicle. Of which you have numerous demands—”

Eldavin glanced at a sketch Garry had made and snorted.

“—But which is within my abilities, naturally. I would incur the wrath of the Walled Cities and Drake antipathy why?”

Garry smiled even brighter.

“I wonder what the rest of the world will see, Archmage? I have seen your splendid magical carriages, though the ones around Liscor cannot run on water, which would also be wonderful advertising.”

Eldavin frowned and flicked one finger.

“They don’t? Damn, that’s purely obvious. Valeterisa should have…too busy ‘rediscovering’ autocasting. What other cities…? Sandstorm proofing, light spells for use in dark areas like Noelictus—Teura? I need a list of cities with unique geography—”

He called to a half-Elf, who wrote industriously, then turned back.

“Perspecarious of you.”

“Thank you, though I am sure you would have thought of it if you had the moment, Archmage.”

The half-Elf paused, seemingly surprised that Garry knew the word and, perhaps, by the flattery. He went on after a beat.

“All of this may advertise Wistram’s carriages, you have a point. But I should give you, you specifically, one because?”

“Because it is for a good cause—feeding the hungry—Archmage. When such news spreads, your name will be the one people speak of. And Wistram’s. I am sure you will do this.”

The half-Elf’s cerulean eye gleamed in the smoke.

“Aha. The threat being that if we did not, you would go to another magical institution or make it known we refused?”

He sat like a coiled cat waiting for the trap. And Garry? Garry tilted his head.

“Threat? I would not threaten you, Archmage. I am merely confident because you are a good person. The Archmage of Memory has already led Wistram in solving the crisis of farming in the New Lands. You have given magic to the magicless. You would not let the hungry starve.”

The Archmage of Memories glanced past Garry and grimaced. He shuffled the papers on his desk, cleared his throat a few times, and coughed.

“Ahem. Well—expedience is a virtue unto itself with great institutions and nations. If Wistram does perform charity, it is because magic is often free. Just add mana. It costs us nothing to—I’ll consider your request. Thank you. Have a nice day. Teura? Make a—”

He vanished from the scrying orb, and Garry kept smiling as he stood up, on the vague hunch that Eldavin could see through the scrying orbs even after they seemed to turn off. He walked from the room after thanking the [Mage] who hurried in after him.

Plans indeed. Garry was not above daggering an Archmage in the morality-kidneys if it helped a single person. He was a good deal below it, in fact. He was an Antinium.

——

Liscor’s Council wanted a word with him at 1 PM, probably about his actions. Garry calculated that this Council would be sympathetic to him, especially Lism. If another one was elected, well…he’d figure that out.

But like The Wandering Inn, it was not his concern. In a very deliberate sense; tying his actions to the inn would have meant probably being shot by the Bloodfeast Raiders or something on his delivery.

He had to be separate. Garry was scratching his head as he tried to make his first Loaf of Luck; unlike Erin, he believed in using all of his Skills.

“Four-leaf clovers? Alas, I must have them grown, I suppose.”

He scribbled a note to the Antinium [Farmers]. Easy enough to grow more…he hoped. In the meantime, he had his first piece of Kraken Biscuit sitting next to a Shadowloaf he’d always wanted to make.

The Shadowloaf was wonderfully dark and dimmed the light in the room. The Kraken Biscuit? After a few attempts with a knife, Garry knocked it against the side of his kitchen counter and took a divot out of the hardwood.

“Hm. I suspect I may have overbaked this. Or perhaps I need to figure out how it’s eaten.”

Seborn would have probably known. He’d have to inquire with Drowned Folk. Maybe it could make for good armor? If only he had access to Pallass’ libraries, Garry could look up some of this bread.

Oh well; he placed it on a tray filled with treats and rolled it into the Free Queen’s chambers.

“My Queen? I apologize for my absence and unannounced trips. I have some treats for you as a result of my levelups.”

His attempted bribe for the Free Queen did not go as he hoped. Instead of snatching the food and calling Deferred Sustenance, her pet Rock Crab, the Free Queen just regarded him on her comfy Throne of Fluff, which she’d had made when she realized it was softer on her nether regions.

“Garry. You have caused a disturbance in Drake cities as well as the Antinium Hives. Your actions have alarmed them and thrust my leadership into question.”

He hesitated, then bowed his head.

“I am sorry, my Queen. I did this in furtherance of my levels.

She paused, and Xevccha bent forwards. Her tone was serious, but not dark.

“You lie well, my [Baker]. If you are mine. It occurs to me, belatedly, that the strength of our Autonomous Antinium project was always built upon the fact that they rebelled from us. Klbkchhezeim and myself. Pawn. You. Belgrade. Bird most of all—none of you are truly mine, are you? Anand might have been, but I think he was Klbkchhezeim’s.”

Garry peeked up at her as Deferred Sustenance scuttled forwards, took the Kraken Biscuit, and tried to break it with its little claws. Well, little relative to the Free Queen. He wondered if he should lie or use the lack of a statue he’d seen in the garden to deflect the conversation. He opted for truth.

“I…respect you as the Free Queen, my Queen. Without you, the Hive will not function.”

“But your deliveries were a surprise to me. You have your own plan. As do the other Antinium. I am the Queen of the Free Antinium. However, the irony of this name did not occur to me until now.”

The Queen sat back in her throne of pillows, and Garry waited. She spoke softly.

“We are changing, Garry. Klbkchhezeim is perhaps the last of us to change. I have seen shifts in him, but not fully. He is upon his grand journey, and we shall see what he chooses. But you and I? We truly are new Antinium of Izril. I merely clung to my old shell because I had no way forwards.”

Garry bowed lower, sincere.

“If I have endangered the Free Hive, I do regret it, Free Queen. What does the Grand Queen will?”

He knew from his overheard conversations and the Free Queen’s complaining that Xevccha did not care for the leader of all Izril’s Antinium. The Free Queen waved a feeler.

“She damned you to the Drakes. Despite your levels. In the wake of your survival, she has humiliated herself. A common occurrence. She can do little to my Hive that has not been done already. Withhold resources? We produce enough that that is no longer a salient threat. No, two elements concern me. She has insisted I will soon receive a supply of some new…auxillary units to the Free Hive. [Slaves].”

Garry’s head rose.

“[Slaves], Free Queen?”

“From Roshal. I do not like the idea of them. They are a foreign power’s tools. I have studied these Slavers of Roshal, and I do not trust them—but the Grand Queen wills it. It may be against Liscor’s laws as well. Even if we do not need to respect them in the Hive, I…wish to honor them as well as we are able. I shall see what becomes of these [Slaves], but before that—she is greatly displeased by your actions, Garry.”

“I…see.”

He did not know [Slaves] well, either, and wished he knew more. A library would do. Or was this something Erin knew much of? Kevin had gone with Lyonette, and so had Joseph…Imani. Garry could bring her his new loafs and share the recipes. After the Council meeting. Had Erin not been upon Roshal’s ships?

The Free Queen’s next comment brought Garry’s working mind to stillness, though. She spoke as she bent forwards again.

“The Grand Queen demands your presence, Garry. You will go to the Hivelands via our tunnel. Tonight. I will send Free Antinium in case of monsters and to represent the Hive…I cannot find Pawn at this moment. Take supplies. Ensure she is impressed with your cooking.”

Garry stared up at the Free Queen, and she flicked an antennae at him.

“She is rather partial to foods herself. Do not worry, the other Queens will merely wish to meet you as well. You will have to do a lot of cooking. Try to avoid the Twisted Queen.”

Like that—Garry suddenly had a huge problem on his hands. Not the Grand Queen. Nor what the Free Queen thought would be his concern, for she did not truly understand him. But they respected each other.

No…Garry’s crisis was suddenly straightforwards and hit him like a Tier 8 spell when it manifested in his head.

The Antinium. I never even considered my people.

They, too, were hungry. But he didn’t think his bread could feed them, even if he had enough. Not the deep hunger in their souls.

He was suddenly in desperate need of advice. A certain [Innkeeper] to send the door for him again. But she did not. Erin Solstice was a bit distracted with her fight with Ulvama.

——

Erin and Ulvama – Intro

Lemoste-Under-Cliffs had finished its first layer of walls, magicore mortar and enchanted bricks worked into natural vines and plants, a living barrier, after the passage of another week. And the second, inner layer of wall was already mostly done, because it was a wall of water. The real trick was pumping all of it from a stream; it was only a few feet thick, but embedded cryomancy spells would freeze anything coming through it—if they made it this far.

The third wall would just be mithril, but sourcing a vein and mining and forging the plates would take time. The first two walls going up had restored some semblance of safety to the Fraerlings, and the city life had returned, even if there were still mandatory volunteer hours.

It was a lovely, brave Fraerling city. Not the strongest. Not the most advanced, but Lemoste’s crafting and artisanal districts were among the top five on Bowom’s lists, and its proximity and good connections to Fraerling villages like Dretonamis meant it had a lot more ‘natural’ resources unlike a more traditionalist city that was all metal and magic. Lemoste, rebuilding, mourning, thriving, beautiful, and spirited and for so many, home.

Bowom hated it here. He couldn’t wait to leave. The problem was—they’d been here long past when Eurise had wanted to go, and it seemed like they’d be here longer.

Certainly, the Fraerling [Explorer] wasn’t happy; he didn’t like big cities much either, and without any more ants to kill and Lemoste restabilizing their food supplies, he was bored. So he was hounded by all kinds of Fraerlings, from Tallguard to civilians, who wanted to either trade stories with Eurise the Explorer or test his mettle. His scowl grew day by day, but over breakfast, he just asked one question.

“How’s it looking, Bowom? Ready to go?”

“Uh—I could use a day or two in the city. You know, visiting my patient? Reflatibulating the adreconsoid valves? Can’t do that without a hebribrolator, and where am I going to get that?”

The [Explorer] nodded shortly, then pushed himself up.

“I’m going hunting. Roja, you coming?”

“Er…sure.”

“We’re going too!”

The rather silent breakfast table saw Zemmy and Mera shoot to their feet. Instantly, Eurise and Roja glared.

“You’re staying here. Help rebuild or something.”

Roja pointed, and the two [Brawlers] glanced at each other, then sat back down, visibly reluctant. Bowom peeked at a Hobgoblin picking at her food and an [Innkeeper] looking anywhere but at Ulvama. Then at the annoyed hamster who was punching Erin.

“Ow. Ow. Stop it.”

Matha tried to separate the two, and Eurise eyed Bowom. It was a sign of the times that no one even asked Bowom what a ‘hebribrolator’ was. He had no idea; he’d just thrown it out there.

“Take your time, Bowom.”

His time. The [Mad Doctor] smiled and flicked his eyes towards Erin and Ulvama. Eurise shrugged. Roja waved her fingers at Mera and Zemmy and then, when Zemmy protested, mimed slamming his and Mera’s heads together.

Cowards. Well, there was a rule in Fraerling villages that two high-level people shouldn’t quarrel, but Bowom sighed gustily. He glanced at Erin, who eventually got up to eat breakfast outside. Ulvama began chatting noisily the moment Erin got up.

“The magical wall is very pretty. Why don’t we see it later, Matha?”

“I dunno, Ulvama—”

“C’mon, we go. And Bowom, you coming?”

“Maybe.”

Bowom experimentally cut a slice out of the air and put some on his toast. He chewed for a bit. He was getting into this bread stuff. It really went well with all the tension. He put his feet up on the table and glanced right as Ulvama left the table as well.

“What?”

The Battle Hamster had stopped glaring at Erin, and Zemmy and Mera were peering at Bowom. Mera hesitated and pointed at his toast.

“Bowom, what the heck did you just cut and put on your toast?”

“An idiom.”

“Huh?”

Zemmy slapped Mera’s shoulder.

“He’s calling you an idiot, idiot!”

“No, just the both of you. I’ll take Ulvama—you go out with Erin and try to be useful?”

The two [Brawlers] glared at him as Bowom stretched and brightly smiled around at the world. One week and the two were still fighting. He wondered if slitting his throat at the table and bleeding over breakfast would work—probably not. But he was rapidly looking into it as an option.

Ah, well. The tension could not last forever. Bowom had his own moment to wait for. He hummed to himself before swinging himself out of his seat.

“Putting it off too long really is true madness. Important conversations to have. Important moments, really. You can’t argue with that.”

Zemmy and Mera gazed at him as if he were crazy because he didn’t bother with context and they didn’t ever search for any. Plus…well, it was his class. What, did they think [Mad Doctor] was a joke? Now, a [Sane Doctor], that was scary.

Bowom sharpened his scalpel as he sighed and got to work.

——

As Bowom understood things, somewhere in the world was an Antinium who, contrary to the name, looked more like a beetle-person with four arms. His name was Garry. He made food, and his technical class was [Chef], but he was famous for being a [Baker]. He had delivered bread to starving people, and this was objectionable, horrible, and wrong—to some sensibilities.

Because he had delivered bread, many things had happened. People had not starved. He had made enemies, galvanized people to be charitable because, again, funnily, they had needed a reason to feed hungry people—

And it was why Erin and Ulvama were fighting.

There was more context to it than that, but it was an amusing way to write his report back to Dretonamis. The Hobgoblin and [Innkeeper] had quarrelled over Garry’s actions and amplified an existing fight over armpits. Another thing that really required explanations.

Vrilla had sent Bowom three letters demanding explanations on behalf of everyone, and he’d happily failed to give any satisfactory ones. That was all well and funny, but the truth was that the fighting was past amusing, if it had ever been that, and into annoying.

So long as the duo were at odds, the expedition wasn’t going anywhere. Hence Eurise acceding to Bowom’s stupid requests. Only Erin and Ulvama seemed to buy it wasn’t about them. Though that was probably willful ignorance. Neither one was an idiot.

Correction: they were all stupid, and this was their particular hangup. Bowom was caught in the middle of the fighting, and because Eurise was hands-off, Roja had appointed him as the peacemaker.

Him. Pure madness, but she’d framed it as it being a medical problem, and in fairness…Bowom did know what was going on the best.

He just didn’t have answers because resolving social matters was not his expertise, but who else did they have?

Mera and Zemmy punched and kicked their feelings out. Eurise was a Level 50+ [Explorer]. Roja? Same problems, lower levels. She was trying with Erin, but…

Of the Fraerlings who really knew Erin and Ulvama, that left only Matha, who probably was doing the best out of the lot, and also the Hamster and Beetle. So yes, it was Bowom’s job, and if he had his druthers, he’d have taken the Corumdon Beetle everywhere with him as backup, but the darned insect couldn’t fit into buildings.

Here was his prognosis: the two were fighting not about armpits or Garry, but about deeper issues that were coming to a head here. Not just because it had been bubbling over for a while, but because it was Lemoste. Safe.

You couldn’t have these kinds of fights on the road. Bowom had heard of groups of Fraerlings working together as Tallguard or [Explorers] serving together for years in the rough, then getting back and breaking bones on the first night they were in a village. He’d done some of the patching up too. Not socially, again, but physically. Lots of splints or, sometimes, sewing a limb on. Sometimes a genital, and that was always fiddly.

So all this to say that no one was taking this lightly, except maybe Zemmy and Mera, and only because those two were idiots. They were grousing as they cleaned up the table.

“I don’t get why we’ve gotta do all the talking, Mera. Plus, we’ve gotta do dishes. How do you clean them?”

“Scrub, idiot.”

“With what? Damn, broke another one.”

[Brawlers]. They lived with friends at their age, and Bowom watched as Zemmy tossed a dish across the kitchen and into the washbasin, which had splendid plumbing. He shattered the dish and winced. The fact that it was both Fraerling-made and enchanted was offset by how hard Zemmy had hucked the dish.

“You idiot! Do it like this!”

Mera lifted the table, and all the utensils and plates slid onto the floor. She then scooped it all up with the tablecloth and dumped it in the washbasin.

“Nice.”

What ensued was the two of them picking at the dishes, pouring water and too much soap over them, and grousing. Bowom didn’t help. He just listened, practicing some fine stitching on the skin of his right arm. Exact, evenly-spaced stitching, the kind you could suture a Fraerling heart’s vein with. And he listened.

“I don’t get why Eurise isn’t helping. He should take Erin aside and, I dunno, tell her to make up or punch Ulvama a good one. Always works with us.”

“Yeah! And why’s Matha so important? We’re the ones who made friends with Erin and Ulvama first. But now it’s Matha this, Matha that—she was leading the Cottontail Raiders! What about us? They’re always pulling her aside.”

The two [Brawlers] placed the still-sudsey dishes on racks, and Bowom counted how many had food particles attached. Then counted how many didn’t, then gave up.

You had to admit, they were entertaining in the same way that a carpentry incident was. Bowom didn’t mind that sort of thing; you could put almost anything back on with enough thread, and if not? Replacements made for a wonderful change of limb.

Zemmy glared out the window.

“Let’s do this thing or Roja’ll shout at us. Who should we talk to first?”

“Erin? We said we’d spar with her.”

“Sure.”

They exited the guest house, and Bowom strode over to the window. He didn’t clean the dishes as they dried, just watched from the kitchen window as Erin sat on a little bench, staring at the ground.

Fun facts about the fight. Erin Solstice was banned from exploring the city by Vision Tiregal. She was confined to this sector—because her aura and Skills were bumming everyone out. Well, she wasn’t always gloomy, but she alternated between that and…

“Hey, Erin! Wanna spar?”

Zemmy and Mera were actually too late to challenge Erin; a certain Battle Hamster was vying for a brawl. He was glaring, literally hopping mad, and clearly on Team Ulvama.

Now, you might ask why the Battle Hamster had chosen sides. Was it because Ulvama fed him? His own prescient understanding of events and moral deliberations on Erin? His dislike of the [Innkeeper]?

Possibly, possibly. But Bowom rather suspected that the reason the Battle Hamster was so mad was because he hadn’t been combed or pampered for the last several days. A certain Ulvama hadn’t done it, mad as she was, and the Battle Hamster, now used to being taken care of, was upset. And the [Shaman] had indicated where his anger should lie.

Wasn’t that interesting? Bowom had liked Erin and Ulvama from the start. They were new, fascinating, arguably insane, and that had captivated Dretonamis. But inevitably, he’d gotten to know them, and you know what happened when you got to know someone?

Well, to use a completely unrelated example, it was like dating. First, it was all honeymoon love (or just surface-level attraction, couldn’t rule that out) and positive vibes. Completely glandular on some levels. We like each other, we appreciate a new person, etcetera, etcetera. But then, inevitably, you saw the cracks.

They got on your nerves. You realized a certain [Druid] didn’t mind having filth in her home and excused it as ‘all-natural’ instead of just forgetting to pick things up. She claimed you couldn’t have a serious, heartfelt conversation. Then you fought or it worked out, but you saw a person’s faults and foibles.

Lots of people couldn’t handle that moment. They drifted from relationship to relationship, seeking the honeymoon period before the cracks showed, never quite understanding that what they were chasing was an illusion. ‘Everyone must be crazy, petty, gross, and stupid. It’s not me aiming for a perfect mannequin who doesn’t exist.’ Then they got so mad when you offered to make them said mannequin, even if it was 100% recycled parts.

…The point was this: Bowom rather liked seeing the cracks show. He enjoyed the moment when someone let him down, showed him the flaw behind the smile. Not because he liked being disappointed, but because it was real. It appealed to him in the same way truth did. Be it so unpleasant, he preferred it to the lie.

Ulvama’s flaws were that she was, at her very core, a [Shaman]. A social being, but differently social to Erin, if that made sense. Because they were fighting, the Battle Hamster was challenging Erin to a fight. Because they were fighting, half the Fraerlings in the city knew Erin was an armpit-shaming madwoman, and sometimes, people came to the concerts where she played to heckle and boo her.

Fascinating tactics. Erin, by contrast, wasn’t gossiping or cheery. She was what she was: visibly annoyed, depressed, and she shoved the Battle Hamster back when it went to jab her in the side.

“I said go away, Hamster. Zemmy, Mera, I don’t know if fighting is a good idea.”

“C’mon, we haven’t done it all week! Let’s, uh, just throw a few punches.”

Zemmy raised his scarred fists, and Mera nodded. [Brawlers] without a single social Skill. Bowom watched as they cajoled Erin into a fight. The second lovely thing about Zemmy and Mera, aside from their lack of domestic talents, was this: they were good fighters.

“[Wild Uppercut]!”

The first punch from Zemmy hit Erin completely off-guard after her slow swing. Bowom watched Erin go up…and then come down as the Battle Hamster glared from the side. Erin rolled over to the Corumdon Beetle. He kicked her in the back. She got up.

“Ow. Zemmy, I really don’t—”

“Coming at ya, Erin! Get ready or get hit!”

Flying knee from Mera. The [Innkeeper]’s head ground into the beetle’s side, and she twisted as Mera threw her sideways, and then Zemmy axe-kicked her on the shoulder. They began fighting for a second, and Erin stared at the sky.

“Ow.”

She sat up slowly, and the two [Brawlers] grinned. Mera made a beckoning gesture.

“We’ve been fighting magic ants with Eurise while you sat around and sang. Plus, we both levelled! Give us your best shot!”

“I like singing and dancing. You sure?”

They seemed to have forgotten what happened the last time Erin got mad, or perhaps they thought that was as mad as she got. Bowom chewed on more tension-toast as he checked his stitching. He’d done eighteen rows on his arm; not bad, but he could be faster. He undid the threads and pulled them out as Erin smiled.

“Okay. Didn’t I hear you two got toughness Skills?”

Zemmy flexed one arm with new scars.

“For the stupid ant-bites, yeah. You want to use weapons?”

Erin had pulled out a pair of kitchen knives. When he saw that, the Battle Hamster stopped edging around her for a sneak-attack. Zemmy and Mera didn’t flinch; they just grinned.

“Unless it’s enchanted, it’s not going to scratch us! Zemmy’s got [Rhino Beetle Skin], and I’ve got [Resistance: Piercing]. Let’s go.”

They beckoned, and the [Innkeeper] smiled again. Then she reached down to her belt and touched something.

“Almost ready. Hey, did you know there’s a bunch of new merch from the bands? Cool stuff. Your people can make anything. Even song crystals.”

Music began playing as the two [Brawlers] rolled their eyes and scoffed. Mera sneered.

“C’mon, Erin. That’s fun, but not action. Weird song, though. Aren’t most of yours more upbeat?”

As a matter of fact, for no particular reason, Erin had been teaching the bands more hard rock, and even what metalcore songs she knew—though it was mostly still close to pop-rock. Not that she knew much about music, but her [Perfect Recall] had let her dredge up songs she’d only heard once. Accordingly, there was a bit more black on some of the band’s makeup and in their hair.

This was still a fast enough beat, if slightly—ominous? The [Innkeeper] held the kitchen knives out as Zemmy and Mera circled her. Then she stared down at the ground and began hopping. Feet together, head slightly tilted.

What the heck? Zemmy nearly went in for a kick until he realized Erin was watching him out of the corner of her eyes. The music kept playing as her head rolled right, and Mera hesitated.

“C’mon, Erin. Take this seriously—”

The music was getting louder. Bowom saw the [Innkeeper]’s hopping continue with the beat, and her head was twisting around. She resembled a weirdly menacing scarecrow, actually. Bowom kept watching, then turned a light on inside. It was morning, but…

He watched as the hair on the Battle Hamster stood up until the rodent resembled a puffball, and it lowered its fists and began scampering away. The hopping [Innkeeper] was advancing on Zemmy. Smiling.

“Must be a magical dance.”

Bowom had never seen one of them used in combat before. Vrilla knew a few, mostly ritual-dances for [Druids]. He watched the [Innkeeper]’s limbs jerking as the song intensified. Then Zemmy croaked.

“H-hey, Erin. Uh—”

The [Brawler] had top-tier instincts for fighting. Erin shouldn’t have been able to get the drop on him even when she knew he was coming, but he only knew how to punch. He didn’t understand fear. It seemed to Bowom that Erin’s neck was twisting slightly further than her skeleton should have moved, but he could put that on a trick of light, along with her jumbled arms and the knives.

The low-light conditions she was generating meant that when she leapt at him, Zemmy was caught off-guard. He screamed, and Mera jumped in.

“Hey! I’ve got your back—gyaaaaaaaaaah!”

Erin’s head twisted around, and she changed targets. It wasn’t even a 180-degree twist. It probably just looked like that.

Bowom applauded inside the kitchen and watched for a few more seconds, but she wasn’t trying to gouge the [Brawler]’s eyes, and they did have defensive Skills. So he went to find Ulvama.

——

Erin was hard to talk to, which Eurise probably sensed.

Ulvama was easy to talk to. Having a conversation was just as hard. She hadn’t gone that far from Erin, actually. They were within eyeline of each other if either glanced over; Ulvama was sitting where a new park was being constructed—again, replacing this destroyed district. She was on a bench, and Matha was squirming.

“C’mon, Ulvama. Please…”

“Hush, you. Big performance tonight, right?”

“The Fourth Battle of the Bands, yeah, but—I’m not playing for any one band, I’m just MC-ing. They don’t need me and Erin anymore, and we’re letting her have the night off.”

“Even more important, then! The one who presents others must look best of all. The first thing they see should set expectations. You wanted me to show you my talents, didn’t you?”

“But—”

Matha was squirming, but Ulvama had a grip on her head, and she was painting bright colors onto the young [Raider]’s face, where her eyes met at the corners. And the corners of her cheeks…a little decorative tear was already running down Matha’s cheek, shimmering blue highlighted by a traced black outline.

It was certainly eye-catching. Ulvama would study different colors, then wipe it away and add some shading, adjust the color palette. Add that to the eyeshadow and other makeup she’d applied and Matha’s face sprang out at you.

Not garishly; Bowom was no expert, but it was quite impressive. He also noted the magic on the paint. Ulvama had restored much of her craft in Lemoste from Fraerling dyes, and the magical skin-paint was shimmering. When Matha spoke—

“Ulvama, I don’t need—whoa.”

Her voice took on a feeling of authority. Presence—a subtle reverb to her tone. Bowom wondered if it was approximate to a Level 15 [Aura of Command] or something similar. He had the distinct desire to boot Matha in the rear-end, but that was just his class running against the effect.

“Mm. Not bad. But maybe charm better? Or beauty. Hold on.”

The [Shaman] ignored the fighting and Zemmy and Mera shouting at Erin to ‘hold on’ and ‘stop biting’, then produced a little tin filled with carmine. Which came from lovely red beetles, but that didn’t stop anyone. She dabbed some on a finger and went to apply it to Matha’s lips.

This time, the Fraerling did get up.

“Ulvama, why don’t you help Erin with her makeup or something?”

“Erin? She’s fine.”

Ulvama glanced over and then tossed her head. She smiled as Matha fidgeted.

“Come on. I put this on and no Fraerling girls or boys will resist you.”

“I don’t need boys coming after me, and I’m great with flirting!”

“Oh, really?”

“Sure! These lips have kissed a lot of things. Tons of stuff they probably shouldn’t.”

Bowom snorted, and the two glanced at him. There it was, just for a second. Zinni’s granddaughter was no idiot, and she squirmed away, but Ulvama leaned over.

“Maybe you show me sometime? I’m good at kissing.”

The [Raider]-[Punk] went stiff as she gazed at Ulvama’s own lips. The Hobgoblin was smiling with all the mysterious allure she had, and as the only Goblin to ever visit Lemoste, at least Fraerling-sized…

Bowom waited with one of those happy smiles on his face that were like placeholders. Matha leaned forwards—then jerked back.

“I, uh—we have to get merch ready!”

She leapt off the bench, ran past Bowom, and glanced back over her shoulder. Three times—then she nearly fell over the guardrail and into the sewers again and was running off. Ulvama stared at Matha’s back, perplexed.

“Huh. I didn’t expect that.”

“Really?”

She jumped, saw Bowom watching her, then gave him a round-eyed expression of confusion. He gave her another smile that weirded her out, and then there was a scream.

A shriek. It sounded like a swamp-thing from nightmares, and the crescendoing music and the shouts of Zemmy and Mera coincided with Erin’s own scream. Ulvama flinched, and Bowom admired the cadences. For a second, Ulvama twisted around and stared back with a wretched expression at the angry, painful tone—then her features set. She leapt up as Zemmy and Mera surrendered, and Erin came to a halt, panting. The [Innkeeper]’s head turned their way.

“Bowom! Let’s go into the city! You promised we’d do something interesting! More studying? What this about your workshop?”

Ulvama glomped onto Bowom’s arm, and he beamed at her. He was most definitely a breasts man. And a butts-man. Whatever you could get in the most shapely form, really. He’d always thought two sets were fetching, but everyone he spoke to said the back pain wasn’t worth it.

“Splendid idea, Ulvama. We’ll be off in the city, then! Zemmy, Mera, see you this evening?”

He waved, and the two [Brawlers] hesitated.

“Wait, Bowom, we’ll go with—”

“No, no. I wouldn’t want to take you from your time here. I insist. Also, we’re going around my old place I used to keep, a library, and people who speak in words longer than four syllables. Absolutely unsuited for you two.”

“Hey.”

He and Ulvama strode off as Erin stared at the Hobgoblin, and Ulvama waved and managed to include everyone but Erin. After a moment, Erin turned away, and Ulvama’s arm tightened on Bowom’s shoulder—then she tickled him.

He didn’t laugh.

“Sorry, replacement skin. Didn’t connect it to the nerve endings.”

Ulvama stared at Bowom for a moment, but he was smiling. There was something hilarious about all this. You just had to see it.

——

Zemmy and Mera saw Erin turn back to them, and Mera lifted her hands. She had faint cut-lines on her skin, but Erin hadn’t done more than that. She was just…unnerving.

“Uh—good fight, Erin! But why don’t we just talk?”

“Yeah. And, uh, clean up? I bet the dishes are dry.”

Erin gazed at them, then twisted to look after Ulvama and Bowom. Then she sheathed her blades and exhaled.

“Fine.”

One glance at the two’s dishes and Erin instantly put them back in the sink. She began to clean, and Zemmy awkwardly dried. After the third time he tossed a dish onto the rack, trying to flip it, Erin stared at him, and he desisted.

Mera was reading from a little notecard as Zemmy shot her imploring looks in the long silence. They were trying to figure out a way into this conversation, much like someone trying to throw a punch past an impenetrable guard and not finding one.

It was Matha, damn Matha—whose fault this all was, obviously!—who came running into the house.

“Hey, Erin, there you are. Uh—like the makeup? Ulvama did it for me.”

You idiot! Mera swatted at Matha, who evaded nimbly, and glared back at her. Erin twisted her head.

“I saw. Magic?”

“Yes. Um…so. Big concert tonight.”

Fourth Battle of the Bands in a week meant it wasn’t that special, but Lemoste was in its honeymoon phase with the music, especially since the ant queens had been hunted down or were driven out of the area. Erin nodded.

“Did you want help? With the practice.”

“No, no, I’ve got this! You take time off. But, um…want to come by? We’ve got merch, and everyone wants to see you. No pressure.”

Matha scuffed a foot on the floor, and Erin paused, staring at a plate.

“Sure. I don’t have anything else to do.”

It seemed to Mera and Zemmy that the invitation was stupid and Matha shouldn’t have made it, but Matha just smiled and gave Erin two thumbs up.

“Great.”

Well, she was no help. Mera rolled her eyes and showed Zemmy the notecard. He edged over and shot Matha a ‘go away, dumbass’ glare. Then he addressed Erin.

“So, Erin. Nice fight. Uh, great moves with the knives. Where did that come from?”

“Dancing.”

They waited. Erin washed a dish, put it on the towel.

“Dead people. You can make a battle dance out of anything. It just takes refinement. Mastery.”

“Nice, so that’s like a combat attack?”

“No. If it were a magical dance, you’d know. Just scary.”

“Super scary. Mera nearly crapped herself.”

“You idiot, you’re the one with stains on your trousers—”

The two began to punch each other until they remembered the note. Zemmy glanced down, cleared his throat again.

“So, uh, Erin. ‘Would you like to talk about what’s going on between you and Ulvama?’ Like…how you two are fighting?”

Matha slapped her face with a hand. Mera hid the note behind her back as Erin’s head turned. Her voice was flat.

“We’ll talk it out, Zemmy. When she wants to. She doesn’t want to, yet. Garry’s alive, and that’s what was important, then. He levelled, he saved lives. No matter what she thinks—”

Clack. She put the plates together, then began to dry them. Mera hesitated, glanced at Zemmy.

“So, um…but if you two made up, that’d be great. Or you could beat each other up.”

“She’s not a [Brawler], Mera.”

“Hey, I heard she choked Matha out! She could probably throw a good punch with her magic.”

“No.”

Mera swallowed and glanced down at her note.

“Well…it’s sort of awkward with you two. So, um, if you two could talk, that’d be awesome. If we can help, let us know.”

“She doesn’t want to talk.”

Erin began putting the dried dishes away. Mera coughed.

“Well, yeah, but…maybe we can smooth it over? ‘Do you want to talk about anything you did wrong’?”

This time, Erin caught Mera reading the notecard. She walked sideways, one step, and then the side-kick caught Mera in the chest. The [Brawler] was dodging reflexively, but it still tossed her across the room.

Somehow, the door opened, and Mera went tumbling out and down the steps, cursing. Zemmy hesitated. Erin flipped a butter knife up, twirling it, and caught it by the knife’s dull blade. Which was less cool, but the look she gave Zemmy made him back up.

“Okay, maybe not. I’ll, uh—”

He hurried out of the room. Matha hesitated until Erin glanced at her.

“What’re you doing?”

“Oh—just taking the makeup off. I mean, it’s great. But…”

“Don’t do that. Ulvama worked hard on it.”

The [Innkeeper] caught Matha’s arm before she could scrub with the handtowel, and the Fraerling hesitated. She licked her unpainted lips, and Erin stared at them, then let go.

“I’ll see you at the band headquarters later.”

“Got it. Sorry.”

“For what?”

——

Matha exited the guest house as Mera and Zemmy squatted together. Mera was shaking her head.

“She’s so unreasonable. Did you see that?”

“Nice kick, though. She’s learning.”

“Yeah, I didn’t see it coming—”

They glanced up as Matha exited the building, and Mera shook a fist.

“Nice going, Matha. We’re trying to help, and you’re just fanning the flames.”

“Me? You? Help?”

Matha pointed at her chest, and Mera and Zemmy glared at her. The [Raider] threw up her hands.

“Great. I’d rather have the hamster on my side than you two!”

“Hey! We’re just trying to get Erin and Ulvama back to being best friends! You want to go, Matha? We’ll kick your butt without Zinni’s aphids!”

The two [Brawlers] got up, and Matha stared at them. Then back at Erin.

“Friends. They’re not—have you two ever fought like that?”

“What? Where we don’t talk to each other? I mean, we were feuding for a few months because Zemmy broke my front tooth one time, and we’ve had big fights, but they’re just being silly. But we always patched it up after we trashed each other. That’s the simplest way. Throw them in a ring and see who wins; both of ‘em will be right as rain afterwards.”

Mera wrinkled up her nose, and Matha eyed her.

“I…don’t think Erin and Ulvama brawling is going to fix things, Mera. If this gets bad, they might not be friends again. Maybe—and maybe that’s okay.”

They stared at her, genuinely aghast. Matha had done a lot of things, but this was like finding out she killed baby aphids. Zemmy blustered.

“You really are a bad person. Your class making you stupid, Matha?”

“No. I just think that whatever they’ve got won’t last forever.”

Now, both [Brawlers] were outraged.

“They’re the best! Like us! They fought through a war at sea together and made it here from the beach!”

Matha stared down at her feet and scrubbed at Ulvama’s paint again.

“Yeah. Like I said, I think it was doomed to fall apart. I just feel bad for doing my part. But I don’t think you get to put it back together. They tried that. I don’t know if even Bowom can stitch together this thing if it goes bad. But you guys keep doing whatever you were doing.”

For some reason…Mera and Zemmy felt uncomfortable at this. They shifted, eyed each other, and were uneasy. Mera glared.

“They’re going to get back to normal, you’ll see. It’s going to be just fine. That kind of relationship lasts forever.”

Zemmy nodded. Then he and Mera glanced at each other and away. They folded their arms in sync. The two famous [Brawlers] from their villages, Eurise’s disciples…and childhood friends who’d grown up next to each other.

For them, this was personal. They’d fallen in thick as thieves with Erin and Ulvama, but they weren’t [Thieves]. They didn’t get why the two were fighting and it bothered them, because…

Sometimes, Matha felt older than Zemmy and Mera, which was incredible to think because she was young and never wanted to be old. But they were just idiot kids. She grunted.

“This relationship lasts the exact opposite of forever.”

There it was again. She gave the two [Brawlers] the same look that older Fraerlings sometimes did, of amused curiosity. As if asking—how long will you keep lying to yourselves?

They weren’t used to that from their old arch-rival. So they chose violence. Mera made a grab for Matha’s shirt, growling.

“You’re talking awfully tall for someone who’s only here because she’s a nuisance to the villages, Matha. What do you know about any of this? It’s all your fault!”

Matha backed up a step, shaking her head.

“I messed up, yeah, but this wasn’t me. What do I know? I led the Cottontails for years. I’ve seen this before.”

I’ve…seen this before. She had to go after Erin. But now the two idiots were blocking her off. Zemmy sneered.

“The Cottontails? That’s just a bunch of idiot misfits living together and raiding real, hardworking Fraerlings.”

“Yep. Just a bunch of kids living together and growing up. Having to live together and fight together or the first big predator eats us without any Eurise to bail our group out. No knowledge whatsoever. Don’t mind me. I’ve gotta get ready for tonight, you guys.”

Matha walked off. Zemmy was searching around for a pebble to throw at Matha. He hucked it—not too hard, just enough to give her a bruise, but Eurise plucked it out of the air moments after it had left his hand. Mera jerked; Roja was standing right behind her.

“Hey, I thought you two were going hunting—”

Roja smacked the back of their heads.

“You idiots. Our turn, Eurise.”

She sighed as the [Explorer] folded his arms and stared up at the skies. Zemmy and Mera watched as they played rock-shield-wand to see who went in first. Suddenly and unaccountably nervous for Erin and Ulvama.

——

Ulvama kept flirting with Bowom as they walked through the city. And other Fraerlings too, but carefully. Not blatantly blowing kisses everywhere; she made sure they were single. It was subtler: a touch on the arm, a smile in the right place.

Someone who knew how it was done. Adults flirting rather than teens doing it for the first time. Sometimes, it was as obvious as it needed to be, but it stopped when they got to their destination.

Mostly because magic left little time for anything but concentration.

“Hup…hmm…aha! [Water Snake]!”

Ulvama managed to cast the shamanic magic after only eighteen minutes of working on it, which impressed Bowom. For a [Mage], that would have been the act of pure genius, to copy a spell she didn’t know.

But the little group of [Druids], [Mages], [Wild Mages], and yes, a single [Shaman] of their own informed him this was impressive, but not insane. They were willing to mince words with him despite his reputation because most weren’t actually locals, but had come from villages to assist with rebuilding and defending Lemoste. Plus, they liked Ulvama.

“[Shaman] magic isn’t all memorization and formulas like [Mage] magic, Mad Doctor.”

“I prefer ‘Madman’, Shaman Yiric. I didn’t know we had any [Shamans] around.”

The Fraerling [Shaman] shrugged; he had on a cloak of legs. Grasshopper legs, artfully stitched together. Some might call it creepy, but the legs seemed to give him the bounding power of a grasshopper; they flexed whenever he lowered his body.

“I just took it up when reading about it—you know how it goes. Only, I stuck with it. I had, what, fourteen friends who got the class? When I left to found Euc’s Rising, it was useful. Community-based Skills and magic. I’m not at her level, though.”

He indicated Ulvama, who was using the snake to attack a series of fire-based creatures from one of the [Summoners]. Said Fraerling woman was encouraging Ulvama.

“Now give it more power, Ulvama!”

“Trying…”

The Hobgoblin was sweating, and the simple snake made of flowing water rose higher as she called more liquid from a pool nearby. It developed green, banded stripes on its body, like a real snake’s, only made out of water, and the Fraerlings murmured in approval.

They were teaching Ulvama magic. Given they were staying here, it was one of the things Lemoste could offer of great use, even if their books on shamanic magic were few and far between. Hence the conclave of magic-users willing to share tricks with Ulvama.

Bowom was here purely to spectate, but that didn’t mean he was bored. It was the commentary he liked, and after nearly a week of practice, one of the [Alchimagi] commented softly.

“My, but she is quite talented, though. I heard Tallfolk weren’t much good with spellcasting, but Miss Ulvama has done tremendously despite the lack of spellbooks.”

Bowom knew Ulvama’s spellcasting abilities and raised his brows.

“Not to be the cat in the room here, but how is she talented, Alchimagus? I was neighbors with a [Wizard] who could cast spells two tiers higher than her, and he’s good, but not extraordinary among us.”

“Who? Gollesume? Is he still fighting with the [Armorer]?”

“Hasn’t stopped.”

They liked to gossip about Fraerlings they knew. After a few moments of chatting, the Alchimagus clarified his statement.

“What I mean is, she’s casting magic.”

“Right.”

“As a [Shaman].”

“Following your words and your meaning not at all, Alchimagus.”

“Doctor, she’s casting magic as a [Shaman] without a tribe. That’s the source of her powers!”

“Ahh.”

Now, it made sense to Bowom. The [Summoner] trooped back into the room as Ulvama rested, her enhanced Tier 4 snake circling her as she stared at it, eyes aglow with delight.

“Okay, next!”

A [Druid] traded off; their main advantage was that some of their spells overlapped with Ulvama’s. Finding out what spells Ulvama was allowed to cast as a [Shaman] so they could teach them to her was their goal. Bowom glanced at the others.

“How’s she casting if she’s got no tribe?”

Shaman Yiric scratched at one of the limbs in his leg-cloak.

“Well, she claims she’s got residual magic, but as far as we can tell? She’s using her mana reserves. A lot of her spellcasting is due to her magical training as a [Mage] and [Witch]. It’s very impressive. Someone gave her a thorough grounding in spellcraft.”

That was interesting, especially if it held up to Fraerling expectations. When Ulvama paused after trying to learn a new [Druid] spell, they brought it up to her, and she explained. A touch shyly, but she was safe here.

“Oh, that? I was part of the…Molten Stone tribe. You don’t know them. They’re very secret and in Izril.”

“Good magic-users?”

She nodded vigorously, face lighting up and then falling.

“The best. A Great Witch, Anazurhe, teaches them. She…she taught me, though I wasn’t finished with my training when I left. But I remembered and practiced. This is good practice. With all the tools, I can cast big magic again. Thank you.”

She patted her belt, and the Fraerlings nodded at her, but the [Summoner] waggled a wand at Ulvama.

“It’s the least we can do for a guest, young lady. But we don’t want to leave you merely ‘competent’. Competent gets you killed the first time a big animal decides it’s hungry enough. I’d rather keep you here until you can cast a Tier 6 spell within three seconds, but—ah, well. Is there anything we can do to prep you more?”

“Aside from more magic?”

“Tools? Catalysts? Spellcasting aids? I know you don’t need any, and you’d have to construct your own staff for maximum effect since we don’t have any artifacts made for [Shamans], here. What other magic did you learn in your tribe? I’d expect multiple disciplines, unless you only got to magical paint?”

Ulvama fidgeted, turning red, then realizing no one was judging her. So, shyly, she shook her head.

“I brew a bit. And I know medicines, some alchemy…um…oh! I used to train with pipes.”

Bowom’s first thought was music, but the [Mages] just eyed each other, and one of the [Grand Mages] fished around in a bag of holding, then handed Ulvama a pipe.

A smoking pipe. Bowom stared as Ulvama hunted around, and he offered her some tobacco leaves. She packed them in there, added a magical coal, and then blew out a stream of smoke.

“Er…I trained with pipes too, if anyone wants to give me one. I’ll take something fun.”

Bowom raised a hand and realized they were serious when one of the Fraerlings smirked at him. He blinked, and Ulvama muttered.

“Should be a longer pipe. But you do this, and then—aha!”

She blew a stream of smoke downwards, then twirled the pipe in her fingers. Instantly, the smoke began to revolve around the pipe, which cleared a space in the air. She halted the pipe, flicked the pointed end in her fingers, and the smoke whirled towards one of the [Mages]. The [Summoner] put up a barrier spell and coughed.

“Hak—argh! Smoke in my eyes!”

“Sorry.”

Ulvama lowered the pipe and nearly fumbled it, and the [Summoner] laughed.

“Not bad! Should we get you a long pipe, then? And a few magical things?”

“How long a pipe are we talking here? Yay big? Or down to one’s knees?”

The [Grand Mage] was measuring out an inch with his hands, and Ulvama grinned.

“Only a foot, maybe? Sorry, I mean inch? I once saw someone training with a super-long one, but it seemed stupid.”

“Stupid, but dead gods, imagine the looks if someone sees you lighting one up! Conversation-starter, that. I may just have one made as long as I am. Add in a little counterweight and featherweight spell and I’ve got my costume for the midsummer gala!”

Bowom kept waving his hand as the Fraerlings talked happily, and Ulvama turned to him, smiling genuinely for the first time this morning, he thought.

“Seriously? Pipe magic?”

She shrugged.

“Shamans learn all kinds. It’s [Mages] who have boring, straightforward magic. I used to train in this—a little bit. Everyone wanted to be Witch Anazurhe. But with a bit of smoke, you can make illusions…!”

Then her face fell. She stopped puffing excitedly on the pipe and lowered it.

“Eh, no. It won’t work.”

“Why not? Magic’s magic, and it seems like you know a few moves.”

The [Druid] kept coughing as she waved a hand in front of her face, but even she was supportive in the name of self-defense. Ulvama just handed the pipe back to the [Grand Mage] and stared at her shoes, excitement gone.

“Erin hates smoking.”

“That’s the young woman who’s been so objectionable? Phooey on what she thinks!”

But Ulvama’s interest was gone. Bowom decided their time was up for the day, so he thanked everyone—they were going off to get smoking pipes commissioned anyways. He jerked a thumb at the door, and they walked off.

——

“Where to now?”

“My old workshop. It’s condemned, and they used to promise to lock me away if I ever got near, but I bet they’ve stopped following me around. Everything’s preserved unless someone dispelled it all.”

Ulvama brightened up a bit when Bowom told her that. She followed him as they strolled down the streets.

“I didn’t know you lived here long.”

“Oh, I’ve got places in a lot of cities. Most are probably gone, but Lemoste used to like me. Emphasis on ‘used to’.”

“Until your patient, Mieve.”

“Yes. So, how are you doing with Erin? Going to stay in Lemoste forever? They’d let you, you know. It’s probably the safest place in the world for a Goblin.”

She froze up, and he strolled on until she ran after him and began poking him.

“Don’t joke.”

“Who says I am? If you want to—”

Ulvama raised her voice.

“I’m not staying! Even if—even if it’d be nice. Erin won’t stay in Lemoste. So, I have to leave, too. We’ll make up. Sometime. She’s—she’s focused on Garry. Stupid Garry. Brave, courageous, charitable Antinium. Just like always. And armpits.”

The Hobgoblin stomped on, and Bowom supposed he was her best friend, because she was venting to him. He felt so bad for her about that he held his tongue as she glared; she was in a very respectable camisole that maintained the dreaded proximity to bared armpits, but who cared?

Ulvama’s ears twitched.

“She doesn’t even understand how mean she was. She never thinks.”

“Mhm.”

“And she hurts herself. Maybe not herself, this time, but through Garry, she still puts her heart in front of a wagon.”

“Nasty, that. Crushing injuries are so much worse than cutting ones.”

“She made all the children yell at me. She has power. She can speak and, if she wanted, an entire city would take her side. Just like they love music. She’s the scary one, and she doesn’t think. If Erin ever…she could find me anywhere in the world. She says she can see her connection to people, even. Like pieces of string. If she wasn’t…Erin…she’d be terrifying. She could find you no matter where you hid and make everyone around you take her side.”

It was not cold, but the Hobgoblin shivered as if a wind were passing over her, and Bowom considered the idea.

“Anyone over Level 50 is so dangerous, though.”

“Yes. I know it, but she pretends she’s just Level 30 or Level 20. Until she gets mad. Like at Zemmy and Mera. It’s always Erin’s way or she’ll run you over and beat you down. Even when it’s nothing you’ve done wrong.”

Like armpits. If Bowom were a caring friend, he’d follow the through-line and add that. The unspoken words lingered until Ulvama sniffed.

“She spent an entire day in the [Pavilion of Secrets]. With him. If he died, she’d watch him die. That’s her madness. That’s why it’s hard, Bowom.”

They were walking through storage districts where Fraerlings were less abundant, and Bowom stared at the familiar streets untouched by the ant attacks given how far into the city they were. He nodded.

“That’s terrible you two are fighting over all of this and she doesn’t see it. Is any of it your fault?”

Ulvama halted, and her glare didn’t affect Bowom. He kept walking. She raised a finger to poke, and he raised a scalpel. The [Doctor]’s smile was that same one he’d worn this morning.

“Oh, wait. Am I supposed to be supportive? Let me try.”

He rubbed at where his spleen used to be, then pinched his skin and shrugged.

“No, wait. I’m out of supportive juice. Removed that organ.”

She stomped after him, clearly weighing the odds of kicking him in the rear, but she calculated correctly and, after a moment, rejoined him. Bowom pointed.

“Just to the left there. See that storehouse with the stairs going up?”

“Huh. Made of metal?”

“Well, I wasn’t going to get one made of wood. It rots. And stains. Hold on while I get the key. It’s under the mat.”

He lifted up the front doormat, and a key was stuck in the fibers of the rug. Ulvama snorted incredulously as Bowom stepped to one side and clicked it in the lock.

Instantly, a part of the metal door shot outwards directly at groin-height. Ulvama nearly leapt down the stairs. Bowom grinned.

“Now, the trick is…”

There was a little groove on the piece of punishing metal which he removed; it was virtually impossible to see. Bowom inserted the second key into a piece of the door and exposed a second keyhole, then replaced the little piece of metal. Instead of turning it, though, he pulled the first key out and clicked it into place there.

Ulvama’s eyes narrowed as she heard several clicks. Then she pointed.

“What happens if you take the second key and turn it by mistake?”

Bowom gave her an innocent look.

“Nothing. Well, except if you walk through the door. Looks like no one’s tried, if they even knew where the lab was, though.”

“How can you tell?”

He swung the door open, and they coughed as dust assailed them, but Bowom pointed at the floor.

“No soot marks. Home sweet home!”

He strode in, doing a twirl, and Ulvama’s red eyes glowed in the darkness as Bowom laughed. She halted in the doorway, because the [Mad Doctor] halted abruptly—and the racks of still objects swayed slightly in the sudden gust of air. He smiled at her.

“I am a [Mad Doctor], Ulvama. Sometimes, I go quite, quite mad. You saw what I did to my patient. I had every right. She gave me her consent. We were being hunted down and eaten, and the Tallguard were dead. Because she cut a hole through every part of the carnivorous locust swarm, sixty-three Fraerlings lived. But the Architects who ruled on my case in this city said that right did not morality make. I agreed. But I never apologized. I don’t think I ever will.”

——

A storage warehouse in the least-populated district in Lemoste. A hidden, magically trapped laboratory where no one knew where they’d gone.

Perhaps it had just occurred to Ulvama that if you wanted to take someone somewhere where no one would find you, or hear you crying out for help, it would be here.

She did not step through the door at first as Bowom smiled. The racks swung, and what they held was very clear. He knew the Hobgoblin could see it.

Bodies. Cadavars, if you wanted to get technical. Each one was carefully preserved with both spell and science, and they were, well…justifiable.

If Geneva Scala had seen Bowom’s laboratory, it would not have given her great pause, which in and of itself, might be concerning. But it was just…research.

After all, how could you know a body without seeing it? That was why the cadavers hung, flesh and organs dyed so you could see how tendons and veins were supposed to flow. Same with the brains. They had to be cross-sectioned, and Bowom had forgotten to stack them up properly.

The other organs were just spares, floating in liquids that kept them stable and from drying out. He had eyes of multiple species. Not just Fraerlings in here.

Sliding glass displays of a torso. Skeletons—you had to have a skeleton hanging up, didn’t you? Erin would have said that. Only, what would she say to an actual skeleton? Geneva might have said that this resembled a classroom from her world, where they did the same thing for medical students.

But Bowom had come up with this on his own. When he smiled and the light coming in from the one-way windows caught him just so, standing there with his roach leg amidst the bodies of his own people…well.

He wasn’t laughing. And he was slightly disappointed when Ulvama closed the door and walked inside. The [Mad Doctor] scuffed a foot on the ground.

“Damn. Have I lost it?”

“No. You’re very scary. Eh…these bodies all from dead patients? Or did you steal them? I don’t think Fraerlings would give you bodies.”

“Ah, you’d be surprised! You get to talking to some folks and they’re quite happy to leave you their bodies. But yes, a few gravediggings—not many patients. I do try to keep them alive, you know. I haven’t been here since Mieve. Hah. Look at that. I wasn’t even finished with this leg upgrade for the one I’ve got. Still preserved. That’s quality work right there. I should endorse the [Enchanter] who did it for me.”

Ulvama glanced down at the insect leg that looked more grasshopper-ish than roach. Bowom had sliced it open, and a strand of too-bright muscle was being sutured in. She raised her brows.

“Galas muscle?”

Bowom sat down and absently ran his fingers over the leg. Picked up a needle, began stitching, then stopped. He smiled up at her, face alight with passion. And guilt.

“Hard as heck to get, even in the cities. Mind you, I kept a travel-bag of parts with me, so Mieve…I put everything I had into her. Fantastic work. Beautiful. She killed the locusts faster than I could dream. I just—didn’t think she’d make it. I can’t give her body back.”

Ulvama sat down at the table, and she realized something.

Oh. Bowom. She’d been fighting with Erin so long she’d neglected him. His encounter with Mieve…she stared down at her fingers, embarrassed.

“Why not, Bowom? It, eh, it’s not as easy as putting a head on another body, I know—”

“What? No, it is that easy. First thing I ever did. [Necromancers] do it all the time, those hacks. Not that they need to do more than get it mostly right and let the death magic work.”

She opened her mouth, and Bowom gestured.

“The fiddly bits are the spine and nerves. Get one thing wrong without a corrective Skill or treatment and there’s glitches. But I didn’t do that for Mieve. Putting a head on another body is just a [Sawbones]’s job, or a [Stitch Doctor]. Dead gods, Stitch-folk can do it. It’s risky, hard, but that’s the realm of Level 30, Level 20 if you’re actually good at what you do. But what is that in the end?”

“…New body? Sounds nice.”

Ulvama was trying to keep up, focusing on Bowom because Erin hurt her heart. The [Mad Doctor] prattled on for a bit.

“Yes, but it’s just a body. And okay, let’s say you do the groundwork. Get a body, pump it full of Galas-muscle, make sure each part is connected. Then you’ve got, what? A Draugr-equivalent when some absolute toad-licking [Necromancer] finds a pile of corpses and gets one in three days with minimal effort.”

“Hmm. But your patient is living.”

“Not living their best life!”

Bowom slammed a fist on the metal table, and the leg twitched. He grinned up at her as his glasses slipped askew.

“Besides, that’s so mundane. So banal! Fraerlings, Humans—we don’t have the best bodies. But what if you gave them the best qualities of other species? The speed of a cockroach. Wings! Bones that won’t break, or the spine of—the problem is that the mind can’t use it.”

He tapped his head.

“The brain is our weak spot. It can’t…process a lot of the new limbs. Oh, it can adapt. Wonderful things, brains. But to make it sync up, much less to a rush job, I had to…”

“No.”

Ulvama’s heart sank. Bowom was giggling, but he stopped. Went silent.

“I was careful. I figured out where everything went. Motor skills do link up in one section of the brain, mostly. I couldn’t have made what I called the ‘impeller-brain’ without Skills. Just pieces spliced together from each creature. But that’s the thing about brains. They adapt. They grow, even if you give them the wrong pieces. Give her a regular body and it won’t work again. Worse…I was too good at my job.”

He peered around aimlessly.

“Are there any—? No, I didn’t come back here. There are some wonderful, amazing images of her mind that they showed me. Her brain’s overgrown the new segment. If I cut it out, I’m pretty sure I take something else with it. Amazing she lived, really. She shouldn’t have. I gave her three hours tops. She counterlevelled. I never account for that. Madness. I shouldn’t have given her part of a Creler’s brain.”

“You what?”

“I washed it! Entire thing’s poisonous. But I cleared it, and it was the only way. They’ve got strong psychic…it’s the only brain that can adjust to malleable limbs like that. Turns out it did its job too well. No way back for Mieve.”

Bowom finished his explanations and sat back. Limbs hanging on the walls, experimental digits, eyes—and Ulvama thought it was scary.

Scary, and yet, if he had been in any Goblin tribe, how many wounded warriors would have lined up for a limb he could give them? She stood here, and despite him trying to scare her, she didn’t think she was in danger.

A monster didn’t stop or ask if he was wrong.

He was no Tremborag.

“So that’s why you left?”

Bowom gestured around vaguely as he finished stitching the leg up and began closing the skin. The smell of preservatives and dead flesh hung around him as his fingers moved as beautifully as Honored Deskie at her work.

“No mirrors in here. I packed it up, went somewhere I could think, and I was so miserable I was going mad. I figured I’d find another way or go back to it and not feel guilty again. Instead, I came back before my metamorphosis was completed. But enough about me! Tell me how awful Erin is!”

He swivelled around, resting his arms on the chair’s back and giving her his most twinkle-eyed look of attention. Ulvama found a chair and sat down. When she spoke, it was to her hands. She’d painted her fingernails, and she inspected them before meeting his eyes.

“I’m sorry, Bowom. Erin is…complex. She’s the only person from home. I have to help her, but she hurts herself. Again and again. What am I supposed to do?”

He closed his eyes as he sat back in his chair.

“Eurise was much the same in his day. He was asleep when she got here, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But now? What to do with Erin? If I were you, my class says: put her back together. Again and again. Better and better. Until death itself stands at my mercy. What does yours say?”

No one had ever asked her that. She shivered, then closed her eyes. Ulvama listened, then shook her head, despairing.

“A [Shaman] needs a tribe. She needs a [Chieftain]—but Erin doesn’t want to be one. Rags doesn’t need or want me. I am strong in some ways, but she passes me. She has lived for almost two years in this world. And she is past my levels. She will continue. When she is Level 60? I will only be useful as the voice in her ear, and that’s if I even know what to say.”

She paused, then gazed at her feet. Her toes wiggled in their sandals, and she gave Bowom the saddest smile he’d ever seen a Goblin wear.

“But that’s okay. Because she’s a kind person. The trick is, you find a kind person. So even when they realize you’re useless, they don’t get rid of you. She’ll forgive me. And I’ll have a place at her inn, if she lives.”

The [Mad Doctor] was hunting around for something on his workbenches.

“Hold on, I’ve got…no, there’s no paper fans here. Someone taught me how to make them. Here, this’ll do.”

He brought down the metal tray on Ulvama’s head with a rather loud bang, and she screeched and swung at him. Bowom dodged and sat back in his chair.

“That’s not what I asked, Ulvama. This is all larger than your fight.”

She sat up and puffed out her cheeks.

“No, it’s not! It’s the Garry problem! It’s what she does—”

“I distinctly recall armpits being part of that.”

Ulvama hesitated, then turned her head, blushing.

“That’s just her being stubborn and prudish.”

“Uh huh.”

“She’s thoughtless.”

“More than not, when it comes to you. Strange for such a perceptive young woman. Did you know she once told me that she can read everyone except Eurise and Zinni like books? But you’re closed to her?”

The Hobgoblin’s head rose, and her eyes widened.

“She can’t? But I thought—sometimes she can.”

“Not anything but the big things, she claims.”

“Oh. Then maybe she didn’t know. And she got the children because—”

Bowom sneezed into a handkerchief.

“Damn dust. It’s still an incredibly crass move to have children shaming someone like that.”

“Yes, but she doesn’t know her aura.”

“Is that an excuse? If I go around swinging a Skill and hurt someone, that’s still a crime.”

“True…”

Wait, why was she defending Erin? The Hobgoblin got angry again, but Bowom was staring up at the ceiling.

“I’m going to get some tools here, and I need to put together some old files. But after this, Ulvama…”

“I’ll talk to Erin.”

He shook his head absently.

“No. I don’t really fancy doing this on the road or the next city we come to. I’m not hearing you confront the real thing at the heart of this. I’m honestly not sure if Eurise or Roja will bring it up; it’s not really their forte. He can barely hold down a relationship with his hair these days. Too high-level. Seen too much. Roja thought she could keep up with Eurise, but they broke it off after four months. Nearly killed her.”

Ulvama had gone still. She breathed in, coughed on the dust.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, absolutely. And I suppose I’m busy here for another week.”

The Hobgoblin’s cheeks were heating up.

“I—what am I supposed to do? She doesn’t know anything! She’s an idiot!”

“Well, if you don’t know what you want from her, then you’re both blind. I could replace your eyeballs, but I don’t know if I can improve on your looks. Crimson eyes and that wonderful hazel stare…that’s a hard admission for me, you know. I’m great with eyeballs.”

The [Mad Doctor] waited as Ulvama sat there, flushed to the tips of her ears in his dark laboratory. There was a reason he’d chosen Ulvama. He wasn’t actually that empathetic a fellow. With her, all he had to do was point it out and hope.

Did she have an answer? After a while, Ulvama looked at something she’d been given before leaving her training session.

The smoking pipe. She played with it in her hands.

“Erin had a pipe like this. I forgot…she played with it all the time.”

“Didn’t you say she hated smoking? Or was it that pretentious thing you do where you never light it? Because I will start disliking her if that’s the case. Say it isn’t so.”

Ulvama ducked her head, grinning toothily.

“No. She blew bubbles.”

“Hah!”

Bowom laughed in genuine surprise, and Ulvama raised the pipe to her lips. She blew a single bubble of magic into the air and watched it fall.

“Oh…maybe it is me. I think I know what I have to do, Bowom. I have to ask…me…what I want. I didn’t want to, but maybe—”

The [Shaman]’s eyes lifted, and her gaze shone with magic as she recalled the last of her powers that she had to her, even isolated from her tribe in Izril. Bowom smiled encouragingly.

“Good. But can you give me thirty, no, forty minutes? And I really could use some hands finding all the stuff I need.”

She glared at him, and he raised his hands.

“What? You didn’t think this was all heartfelt self-revelations? Please. No one else would come with me, and I’m fairly sure Mera and Zemmy can barely read.”

She got up, and suddenly, they were in a hurry. Bowom began listing things they needed, and Ulvama protested.

“I need things too! We need to go back to my friends. I need more supplies.”

“Like what? There’s that big Battle of the Bands tonight. Good time?”

“So soon? Eh—maybe! But first, I need, um, Dreamleaf!”

He twisted around, and Ulvama protested.

“No, seriously! It’s useful! I promise! This isn’t a joke! I’m not Palt!”

He just rolled his eyes as he went back to hunting for supplies.

“[Shamans].”

Such a silly class.

——

As Ulvama prepared for legitimate shamanic magic, Erin Solstice sat, staring into blue flames in the guest house. She didn’t look up even when the snowflakes started to fall.

Bowom was doing his best. What, exactly, that meant was only something he knew. But other people were making an attempt as well.

Not Mera and Zemmy, though they were watching through a window uneasily. Instead, a Fraerling caught a snowflake on his hand, and it melted as Eurise sat down.

“Even now, sometimes you envy other classes. All I can do is put a hole in things. Not mend them. Not make fire.”

She jerked and peered up at him. The blue fire went out, and Erin glanced around.

“I’m hurting the house. Sorry. It’ll get mildewy.”

“Eh. Mind if I sit?”

She nodded, and Eurise sat down. Awkwardly. He glanced over his shoulder, and he was a direct man. Someone she trusted. But—he crossed one leg, cleared his throat, then came out with it. A [Scarred Wyldbeast] going for the kill. He had a past longer than even Bowom’s, and it was reflected in his cautious expression.

But she had lived a life as stressful as his, and they respected that about each other because they saw it. So Eurise spoke.

“Listen. I don’t know much about relationships or love, but if you wanted to talk it out…”

She glanced up at him, genuine surprise written on her features.

“Love? I thought you were talking about Ulvama. Or—is this about Matha? I’m sorry I kicked her, I am. And she’s not bothering me anymore.”

The white-haired Fraerling [Explorer] stared directly into Erin’s eyes. She blinked quizzically, and he slapped his knees and stood up.

“Right, I’m out. Your turn.”

He walked towards the door, yanked Roja out of hiding, and shut it as she cursed at him. The other [Explorer] threw up her hands.

“Eurise—!”

She saw Erin frowning at her and stomped over.

“Okay, let’s go for a walk.”

Erin got up willingly enough, and Roja clomped down the street as she glared at Mera and Zemmy; Eurise had just leapt onto the roof of the house where he was watching them from afar. Roja chewed over what to say.

“Listen, you and Ulvama need to make up. I don’t really get the entire situation, Erin, and I don’t need to. You two are great friends, and you’ve been through a lot. This? This is silly.”

Mera and Zemmy nodded along with Erin as the two [Brawlers] shadowed the two.

“Absolutely. A lot of it’s my fault.”

“Great. Good you understand it! This entire thing with, uh, armpits?”

“That was Matha. I didn’t like it, and I shamed Ulvama. Which was wrong.”

“Matha. I knew she had something to do with—and it’s complicated by your friend. You can hash it out with her. Go on a walk or something, and just air your feelings. Then we can get on the road. Maybe it takes a few hours of serious talking, but you two are grown women. Tonight, after the concert? That work out?”

Roja was hopeful, and Erin stared ahead.

“…I don’t know, Roja. She and I disagreed about Garry. On something bigger than just—the armpits thing was bad. But it made me realize that what Ulvama wants, what she thinks I am, isn’t what I do. She thinks I’m like a Chieftain. Like my inn is a tribe. I think…I think I can’t just ask for forgiveness and move on. She’s wrong. I think she’s wrong, at least, and until one of us says the right thing, we’re stuck. I just—don’t know. I don’t think I’m wrong.”

And that was terrible, because she knew she was. Just not which part. But not Garry’s decision. Never that. Roja scowled. She put a hand on Erin’s shoulder.

“Listen, Erin. Like I said, I don’t know about this Garry, uh, Antinium, but I heard enough. Just say she had a point. Give a bit, and—”

“No. She was wrong on that, Roja. What she told me was wrong.”

“Then what you accused her of. Something about a Trem—Tremborat…?”

“Tremborag. It was cruel of me, but we needed to talk about it. We need to talk about it. That’s not it. It’s something else.”

She kept reaching for it, but it kept…and there were always distractions. Like Ulvama flirting with Matha. Which Erin knew was to annoy her, but she couldn’t think.

Something—this time, Roja was the one who swung Erin around.

“Now you’re being unreasonable. Listen, we’ve been cooling our heels here for a week. Just compromise, Erin. This isn’t about you—”

“Roja, I appreciate the pep talk, but I’m serious. Neither of those things is wrong. I’ll explain it as best I can, but I’m not budging on those. Not Garry. Not Tremborag.”

Roja might have been the wrong person after all. Zemmy and Mera had been getting encouraged, but now they saw Roja do what Roja did when she got lip from a younger [Explorer]. She put one arm around Erin’s shoulder and began to drag her back to the guest house.

“Okay, I am going to have you sit for a second. You’ve been taking your temper out on Zemmy and Mera. But you’re as stubborn as one of Zinni’s aphid bulls.”

Erin’s face went blank.

“Hey, Roja? I am stubborn. But you’re not helping, buddy. I think I can figure this out if someone leaves me alone for two seconds. Or I talk to Garry, maybe.”

Roja’s grip tightened as Erin tried to break free, and the [Innkeeper] was weaker, despite the level differences.

“I think leaving you alone is what everyone’s been doing when you need someone to be honest with you. You had everyone worried, and Ulvama was in a panic that day you vanished. That’s not considerate.”

The [Innkeeper] flinched, a true expression of shame and regret—and cold necessity. That was what took the two [Brawlers]’ breaths away. What Eurise saw. Roja was just staring at the house and didn’t see Erin glance up.

“I know. But, pal? I don’t think you get who Garry is to me. If Ulvama and I cannot resolve this, and he is part of it—perhaps she should stay here.”

Roja halted, and Erin went on.

“I’ve heard you talking about it. She likes this place.”

“You don’t mean that. Stop speaking like a child.”

The older Fraerling woman buffeted Erin’s arm, hard, then grabbed her. Erin was standing her ground now, feet dragging on the street. Tearing up cobblestones.

“I do. It hurts to think about, but if she treats me like a Chieftain—sometimes, things break, Roja. She’s a friend. My best friend, but something is wrong, and sometimes…I would rather her stay here and not see her again then have her be like Numbtongue. Numbtongue. Why did I think of him?”

Zemmy and Mera halted in horror. No, Mera wore that look of horror, of abstract dread. Zemmy’s eyes were on his friend, and—their hearts were beating faster. Something terrifying was following Erin, and it was not her aura. They saw it, and Erin caught a glimpse of the idea circling her head too.

There it was just for a second. It flickered, and then Roja put Erin in a headlock.

“That’s it. Get inside and sit your ass down.”

“Hey, guy. Gal. I really think you should let go.”

At last, the Fraerling woman halted and frowned down at the [Innkeeper] whose head was locked under one armpit.

“What’s with the naming trick? Listen, Erin, you are going to sit and—”

Erin was struggling to get free of Roja’s headlock, but the [Explorer] had both height and more experience and strength. So Erin’s reddening face didn’t actually get free until Roja shouted and let go.

“Eagh! What the—”

She rubbed at her armpit, and Erin spat and wiped her tongue on her arm.

“Bleh. Gross. Matha’s insane.”

“Stop kidding around and—”

Erin threw a punch.

“[Minotaur Punch]!”

“[Deflect Blow]. Don’t do this, Erin. Because I will—”

Roja shoved the Skill aside, reaching for Erin, and the [Innkeeper]’s feet shifted. She stepped, gracefully, in a pattern to the right and spoke.

“[Rhythm Combo]. [Minotaur Punch].”

One, two, three, four, five, six—Roja dodged the fast swings, swearing, eyes wide. Mera’s jaw dropped. Erin could throw six—?

The last hit Roja’s crossed arms, and the woman skidded across the ground. Stumbling. Erin saw her tense to leap. She reached up, and her witch’s hat flared.

“[Playful Radiant Fishies].”

Roja’s leap took her off her feet, but the [Explorer] was distracted from Erin, slashing at the attacking, glowing fishes. She cursed.

“[Explorer’s Art: Barrier of Cuts]!”

The attacking swarm of spells vanished as she created a whirling dome of blades that cut the attack magic down. Then she swirled and hesitated. She stabbed Erin’s arm, but she didn’t even cut the [Innkeeper]’s [Reinforced Structure]. Erin rushed Roja towards the guardrail as the [Explorer] kicked at her, but Erin didn’t let go until the drop. Then, as Roja tensed, Erin spoke.

“[Apista’s Jetflame].”

“[Aerial Backf—] huh?”

Mera and Zemmy saw a green flash. Then they heard Roja screaming. Eurise tilted his head back as a Fraerling woman flew past his head. Roja spun through the air, and Fraerlings looked up as the woman soared across the city of Lemoste.

Erin dusted her hands after shading her eyes to watch Roja hit the far wall of Lemoste then furiously begin swimming out of the water barrier. She’d thought Fraerlings were probably pretty easy to toss like that. She spat and rubbed her tongue on her arm again, then glanced up at Eurise.

“I just need a few hours to think. And maybe to talk to Garry, okay?”

He nodded. Erin went back to thinking. Mera and Zemmy eyed each other. They peered at the door to the guest house as Erin opened it and went inside. Then, after some whispering, they ran off to find Roja.

And Erin wondered what Garry was doing as she tried to focus.

Garry – Book

That evening, Garry begged the Free Queen for a favor. Which was to not send him to the Hivelands right away.

“One day, Free Queen. One day for me to work on offerings for each Queen.”

She peered at him from her Throne of Fluff as she wrote notes on a huge pad of paper. The smells of toxic alchemy clung to her, and he knew she was creating new life.

Perhaps killing it if she could not create what she deemed important. Mostly, ways to improve her Antinium without needing to kill them or make new batches.

She had given Soldiers voices, and so she was changing. Gone were the days when he was the scared little [Cook] making her food and she was the unknowable giant.

But perhaps he had made a mistake. For she granted his request with the wave of one of her feelers.

“You have a day. The Grand Queen shall not object if the tunnel to the Hivelands needs reclearing after a monster breach.”

She paused, then added.

“…Or she should not, if she were reasonable. You have your day, regardless.”

He bowed.

“Thank you, my Queen.”

He had much to do. The other Antinium…he had nothing to give them. Not even bread; he was out. Garry was striding away when the Free Queen added slyly.

“You did not ask me what the other Queens enjoy, Garry. Strange. You must have mastered the Unitasis Network.”

The [Baker] stopped and turned.

“Ah—I—”

“Go. It seems to me that your levels are a result of your freedom, Garry the Baker. You shall ask me when you need something from me. The highest-levelled Antinium in the Free Hive is one to learn from, not curtail.”

He bowed, startled, and the Free Queen sat alone after that, except for maybe a happy buzzing sound. That came from Pisca and Runel, her dedicated [Cooks]. The Free Queen added to herself.

“This, perhaps, is rulership. But the Grand Queen is a fool if she thinks she learns it from other species. The Queens of Rhir deferred to Centenium and their Prognugators. Pisca! I require food!”

She clapped her feelers together and waited. Like an indulgent [King] waiting for a worthy subject to entertain him. Sometimes, all one had to do was wait to see splendor and know when to applaud. Plus, Xevccha added in her head—she had her own wellbeing to think of.

If she and Garry came to odds, Pisca and Runel would stop making her delicious things to eat.

——

Mind you, it was all very well for the Free Queen to send Garry off to work more of his giving wonders. She didn’t have to come up with said wonders.

Garry strode back to his kitchens and stared at his pantries. He had…fourteen cartons full of eggnog from his magical pantry Skill today.

“What.”

He normally did not question his powerful Skills that let him give out free, magical presents or delivered him with ingredients, but eggnog? Garry tasted some.

“…Pumpkin?”

It was the most useless ingredient he’d ever been given. Oh, sure, it was tasty, and it’d be a hit with everyone. He’d give it out to all his regular clients, trade Imani a carton for some of her Earth-only ingredients, or he could swap it with Calescent, again, for more food.

But it was not going to feed a million Antinium in the Hivelands. Garry shoved the eggnog onto the counter and rang a bell.

“Runel. Give the Free Queen her cut, then swap this for something useful.”

The Flying Antinium took the eggnog happily as he sorted through his pantry. Sometimes, it had themed foods! Or something nice. He just needed inspiration. What could you feed that many Antinium with?

Nothing but water. Not even flour. Not even if I did mini-pancakes and gave one each. Flavored water? Behind a bag of Ashwheat Flour, he found…

Fifty-six candy canes. Garry stared at the candy canes.

This time, Runel had to do a flying leap to save them from being hucked at a wall. She spoke.

“What iz wrong, Garry?”

“I don’t have anything to give the Antinium. My people. Our people, Runel.”

Garry sat with his head in his hands.

“What a fool I’ve been. For all I spoke of how other species literally starved and how we had been fed—there are so many who are like we were. Alone. Lightless. Now, I am going there with nothing.”

She shuffled closer, patting him on the back with one of her claws.

“Not nothingz, Garry. You can bring stories. Give cooking to them.”

“I can never feed a Hive. Not even my own.”

Bitterly, Garry thought of the Workers and Soldiers who were not [Crusaders], Painted Antinium, or anything else. No wonder they would volunteer to fight and die in Liscor’s wars.

That, at least, was preferable to living in the Hive. A system which encouraged people to become soldiers because it was more pleasant than living…

Ah, there is my philosophy. But I cannot fix it yet. But I must. Garry felt a soft object resting on his shoulders; Runel’s wing. He turned to her.

“What can I give them, Runel?”

“You gave uz homes. Not being dizzected. Food. Love iz enough.”

Garry laughed and patted her on the head.

“If only I could share that like bread, Runel. If only…”

His head was roaming the kitchen and home he had built, searching for inspiration, when his own words seemed to echo back to him. Garry’s eyes alit on something few Antinium, even here, possessed.

“Wait. That’s it. There’s something I can make that is cheaper than water and Antinium may need. Something I can create.”

He leapt up as the idea hit him. Runel stared around the kitchen.

“Of courze. Air. Flavored air.”

Garry spun and pointed at her.

“Y—wait, no. Er, no.”

“Oh. What iz?”

He was striding around, grabbing objects off the shelves, stacking them up. And Garry remembered an [Innkeeper] whose song had saved a hurt Antinium.

“Ideas, Runel. Music. I need you to buy song crystals for me, all you can find. But not just that. This.”

He shook it at her and spoke. Again, becoming the first Antinium of his kind.

“Books. Stories.”

Runel’s mandibles opened as she realized what he meant.

“Right. There iz hundredz of pages in each book. Plenty to eat.”

The [Baker] stared at her and thought he might have more of a problem than he thought.

——

Antinium couldn’t read.

Or to be more precise, Workers could read Drake script in Liscor just well enough to get around. And that was more pattern recognition of certain streets than anything else.

But reading, as in solid sit-down-and-read reading? Now that Garry thought about it, he wasn’t sure how many Antinium could read in the entire Hive. Antinium got basic words imprinted on their minds at creation and could thus talk if they were Workers or newer Soldiers and read basic things, but not read and understand advanced concepts. They had to teach themselves that.

Pawn could read, because he was writing his Book of the Sky or whatever he called it. Belgrade and Anand had needed to in order to take over the Hive’s duties and act as [Strategists]. But as Garry conducted a quick census—

“Excuse me, have you ever read a book?”

An Antinium with flowers on her shell turned to the person who’d asked. She stared up at Garry.

“No. You’re tall.”

Garry walked over to a [Templar] trying to play billiards with some off-duty [Crusaders]. Another tap on the shoulder.

“You, do you read books?”

“I would like free bread. Also, no.”

“I see. Excuse me, sir. Do you read?”

A city-Ant with a tophat and coat was jingling a bag of copper coins at a table where he was gambling. He whirled and glared at Garry.

“Who’s asking? Do you read? What business of it is yours, buddy? Whoa, don’t come at me just because you’re big!”

—Most Antinium didn’t read, even if they could. And those were Painted Antinium he’d asked. So, Garry’s problem encountered a hitch, but only a minor one. He knew the Painted Antinium had picture books, and a few admitted that, yes, they’d taught themselves or just read the books for the pictures.

“A picture book, then. Something that can be printed and spread around the Hive. And…an Antinium who can read could read it to others.”

It was all about scalability. Nothing was so transmissible as an idea, and books could contain a story and be reasonably copied and spread. That was how Garry knew he had to write a book.

You see, he didn’t come at the idea from the desire to write a fascinating tale, but from the need to give the Antinium, who had nothing, something. It was certainly a good motivation to gather the supplies he needed in a rush of energy.

Quill? Check. Inkpot? Check. Parchment and paper? The kind people at the Scribe’s Guild had given it to him for free. Check! Also, send them some nice bread…

That evening, Garry was sitting at a desk he normally reserved for accounting or writing ingredient lists. He had a scrying orb on, just to check the news, and he wetted the quill, ready to bring a book to life.

The scrying orb had switched from more broadcasts of food being delivered to some evening news. At the moment, it was of Archmage Valeterisa wearing her most commercial smile.

“Hello. I would like to announce a new service being rolled out by select [Mages]. For a long time, the [Restoration] spell has been considered lost magic. However, I am pleased—so pleased, smile here—to announce that I have rediscovered and taught others the spell. Apprentice, please stab yourself with a knife.”

“You can’t do this! You—you—”

The Healer of Tenbault was screaming in the background. Garry watched, craning his neck to see any Goblins, but they appeared to be out-of-frame as Drassi excitedly commentated.

“How wonderful. Ah. Tessa does not appear to be looking well.”

He wondered if the Scaethen Bread would help with her drug addiction. Probably not; he still wasn’t clear what the rules were. After a few minutes of watching Archmage Valeterisa try to get a volunteer to be stabbed with a knife, Garry jerked.

“Right. Writing.”

He turned back to the page. Lifted his quill. Then he turned his head.

“Oh, so that’s Crowdcaller Merdon. Didn’t I hear he could fly or something?”

Compared to Elia Arcsinger, he seemed quite…nervous. Then again, anyone faced up against Lyonette might be. Garry kept watching and then shook himself.

“I have to write this.”

He had only one day. Plenty of time to write a book containing all the love and things Antinium needed. Garry turned the scrying orb off and scratched his chin while the other one arranged the paper and the quill-holding hand poised to write. He was really hoping his fourth hand returned soon; kneading one-handed was tough.

He was able to read. Surely, writing was possible. He wrote lists all the time. How hard could this be?

Garry stared at the parchment. After a moment, he began drawing straight lines, so he could write his words very neatly whenever they came to him. Then he reached for a book.

“Inspiration is often imitation. How could I make pasta before I ate Erin’s pasta, which she sometimes forgot to even butter? Let’s see how this one starts…ah, ‘the default nature of monarchy is headlessness. The states whereby they exist unto this moment are transitory, an inevitable procession unto their final form. Monarchy is not a system that succeeds or fails on its own merits, but a delayed conclusion before the axe falls’.”

He paused, then turned the book over.

“Ah, this one is written by Queen Merindue. Perhaps a lighter book.”

——

Fifty minutes later, Garry was staring at a bunch of books the Painted Antinium had in their barracks and a few more he’d had Runel and Pisca run out to purchase. He tried to write.

‘There once was a cute, fluffy, and extremely lovable dog.’

It was easy to write that. He made the ‘T’ at the start curly like they did in the book and tried to project the warmth and emotion that he could feel in some stories into the text. The excitement, the passion.

He could feel Merindue’s contempt, her seething rage at the world in her words. He could remember Erin Solstice’s embrace, recall the first moment he had seen the sky. He stared at the sentence he’d written.

After a moment, Garry wrote on.

‘There once was a cute, fluffy, and extremely lovable dog. It ran around and barked. Yip-yip, went the little dog! It would roll around, and it had a huge spot on its nose it would lick sometimes, because it thought the spot was edible. When the dog ate, it would wag its tail, and it was the most happy animal in the world.

One day, the little dog found a friend. A cat. She had huge orange stripes and long whiskers, and she rubbed her head against the little dog’s head, and they were best friends. Then they went to play in the park, and I wish to curl up into a ball, what is going on?’

It took him ages to come up with the two paragraphs he’d labored over, and when he did—they were bad. He could feel the badness oozing off the page, but he’d added all the things Antinium liked.

Dogs. Cats. Love. The ingredients were there, but when Garry took his story around to other Antinium, the results confirmed his suspicions.

——

There were plenty of Antinium who were willing to read his story. None of them liked it.

“I do not like this dog.”

“Why not? You love dogs.”

“I cannot hold him. Also, what is his name, please?”

Garry had to read out the story to some Workers, but even this receptive crowd—who were holding and petting a dog at this moment—were critics. Another Worker raised his hand.

“Spot on its nose? Excuse me, but how would a dog know if it had a spot on its nose?”

“…Because it has one?”

“How could it see the spot on its nose? Does it have a mirror? This story makes no sense. Also, yipping is not a good sound for dogs to make. It sounds like it’s in pain.”

The other Antinium concurred, nodding wisely. Garry wasn’t a dog-expert, and he’d written doggrel that any animal-lover could tear apart. But perhaps the most cutting critique came from a Soldier, who Mrsha-signed at him simply:

“[Book says cute thing. I feel nothing. Book lies.]”

That—actually hurt a bit. Garry wandered away from the others, burned his writings, and then came back with some bread to thank them for their time. He sat, staring down at a piece of paper in the Painted Antinium’s barracks, trying to search for inspiration, when someone walked over.

“Hello, Baker Garry. Is there any free bread?”

“No, go ask Pawn, please.”

“Pawn has left. There is less free bread, though some [Priests] can make it. It is not as good as your bread.”

The Worker cheerfully sat down, and he was a Painted Antinium. One of the originals, or close to it; his paint was a bit frayed, and he had a full personality. Garry pointedly indicated his quill.

“I’m writing.”

“Okay. Why are you here, then?”

“I’m searching for inspiration.”

“Do you need help?”

“Unless you know how to write, no thank you.”

Garry snapped. He felt bad about being so rude, but the Worker didn’t seem to mind. He scratched at his antennae.

“I wrote a book once, you know. The others said you were writing horrible things about puppies, so they called me since everyone else is gone.”

“Excuse me? You wrote a book?”

Garry stared at the Painted Antinium, incredulous. The Worker nodded.

“The Book of Carnal Intercourse, a How-To and Explainative Manual. Volume 1. Remember that? Anand? Belgrade? Yellow Splatters? You were there too, but you didn’t contribute to the actual writing of it.”

The [Baker] stared at the Worker. He did remember—after a moment, Garry put his head in his hands.

“Ah, this would be what is known as ‘crippling embarrassment’. Yes, I recall.”

The Worker, who it transpired was known as Lewdquill, nodded wisely. He sat next to Garry, folding his arms.

“I’m a [Scribe]. I write things down for the Hive. Got the class while copying the book 86 times.”

“Dead gods. Eighty-six copies?”

“Most are still around. We had four different volumes, you know. With corrections, addendums. And illustrations. I had to do those by hand. You know, it’s not really that accurate.”

“I’m…aware, yes. It was an amusing mistake made by all the original Individuals when we were young.”

Lewdquill stared at the blank piece of parchment, then spoke.

“I don’t know about that. It was certainly lots of wrong things, but some Antinium tried it out.”

“They what?”

“Why wouldn’t they? It taught them things, and they made mistakes. Hilarious mistakes. It’s an inaccurate book, and the illustrations look really funny because I had to re-copy them, and I didn’t know what the source material looked like for a long time. It’s considered a collector’s item by non-Antinium, you know.”

“…What?”

This time, Garry’s head rose with actual interest, and Lewdquill nodded.

“They love it. Because it’s wrong, it’s funny to them. And Antinium love it because it explains what other species do, even if they’re wrong. It’s a good book. I helped write it. You want to know how to write?”

Now, Garry was looking at the Worker who helpfully sat there and grew embarrassed, because he’d dismissed the Worker out of hand. And he’d never thought there was an expert in the Antinium Hive; he’d thought he was the first. Well, he’d just not counted the book of intercourse or Pawn’s book of the sky. He’d sort of thought neither one was real writing, and that made him more embarrassed. Elitism? He wasn’t an elitist [Chef], but here he was doing it to stories.

“I…yes. Thank you. I’m sorry I was rude, Lewdquill.”

“No problem! I like my job. I’m not a [Writer]; I just copy down the book and make adjustments, but it has lots of perks. Like lots of ladies showing me what things actually look like. Males don’t want to that much.”

Garry’s mandibles opened, and he decided he’d better stop asking questions here. He’d heard about Pawn and Lyonette. He indicated the paper.

“Tell me, what do you think makes a good story, Lewdquill?”

The Worker thought about it for a second, then answered seriously.

“I think it’s writing something you know about. And passion. I read books sometimes, for fun. Copy them for the Hive. All the good ones are written with passion. Like Krsysl Wordsmith.”

“The Free Queen thinks his writing is highly inaccurate.”

“Ah, but it’s passionately inaccurate. And it’s what he knows about.”

“But he’s wrong about so many things.”

“Yep! But he knows it well. Does that make sense? We did tons of research for our book when we wrote it. That’s why there are all kinds of details, even if it was wrong. If you’re going to write, write something you know well.”

“…I don’t want to write a cookbook. I want to write something that makes Antinium happy.”

The Worker was nodding along to the [Baker]’s statements as Garry glared at the page. Then he inspected Garry sidelong and spoke.

“You know what made me happy? Proud to be an Antinium?”

“What?”

“It was when you delivered that bread. Despite all the Drakes trying to kill you. I thought, ‘that’s an Antinium like me!’ Only, you’re not. But I could believe it for a moment. And visiting the inn. The first time I went there, as a little Painted Worker, and had my first bowl of soup? That’s real. Put that into your story. Then have me make copies!”

He smiled, and Garry saw him stand. Then regard him again.

“At least, I thought you were a Worker like me. Anyone tell you that you’re big?”

“What are you talking about? I’m—”

Garry stood up, then stopped. His mandibles opened, and the two Workers eyed each other. They were Workers, made from the same exact blueprint in the Free Hive. Indistinguishable. And yet…Garry realized that Lewdquill’s mandibles were lower than his own. The eyes of the other Antinium weren’t exactly facing his. He hadn’t noticed it because he’d been so busy, but he was bigger.

Maybe…an inch bigger? Not that noticeable, and not on the level of a Soldier, but to the identical Antinium, Garry stood out instantly. And he swore his arms were a bit bigger too.

“No wonder they couldn’t kill you! You’re huge! A giant! Well, I don’t want to keep you from writing. Just hire me when you need work! Here’s my card.”

Lewdquill handed Garry a card. It said:

Lewdquill, Level 22 [Scandalous Scribe], Scribe’s Guild. 

I print anything.

The Worker walked off, and after a moment of staring at his back, Garry muttered.

“Antinium are getting weirder and weirder these days.”

The pot looked around at all the kettles and then strode off to think.

——

A story that he knew. Garry the Baker sat there and realized…he had treated writing poorly. Because he had made the assumption he could just sit down and write a book.

A good book, no less. But if he extended writing the same grace as cooking, then this was a ludicrous, nay, offensively arrogant take.

Assume that writing was analogous to cooking. Then how many hours had he put into his craft?

Had he mastered it? Would he dare to walk into a kitchen without having done more than cook a handful of meals and say he could run it during a lunch hour rush?

Yet…he had to try. Because despite realizing the scope of what he wanted, and his humbling, part of Garry believed in his conclusion.

“I have nothing to give so many of my people. Food runs out. I cannot feed them. But it was that [Innkeeper] who gave me chess. Chess did not save my life. I’m ambivalent on chess, but it led to everything else. A story is the only thing I can bring into these dark Hives.”

He touched his chest. All he had to do was bring that conviction that had carried him out of his own abyss. Put that onto the page.

The burning fury at the state of the world. The righteous helplessness. But how to convey it? Garry began to write, and the first candle he lit burned down, and another, but he had all night to do this if he must.

The light of a little piece of Scaethen Bread he nibbled on, the scritching of his pen nib, and occasionally, the clank of metal on metal or chopping as he went to cook to sort out his thoughts. And the smells…

Okay, the smells kept every single member of the Flying Antinium awake down the hall, and eventually the Free Queen shouted.

“Garry! You must cease cooking or share some with us! What are you making?”

“Offerings to the other Queens, my Queen.”

Garry got up and gave them a huge roasting spit’s worth of lamb meat that he had been carving as an offering. The stacked meat he’d been rotating over a flame dripped with fat and seasonings and got all over a page. Garry crumpled up the first page and offered it to Runel, who chomped it down. Then he got a new piece of parchment out and went back to work.

This is what he wrote, his second attempt.

The world is unfair. People starve, and this should not be so. But this concept, this simple concept that every single person who has ever starved knows, is somehow objectionable, wrong.

We exist in this world for brief moments. I have seen death coming in chance moments, without rightness or sense, and I am tired of wasting it. What value have coins when I am dead?

Then he stopped. Not because the words were wrong; he agreed with them implicitly. And nor from a sense that they were ill-formed. He knew they could be better, but the attempt would be worth it if…

“Something is wrong. This isn’t a story. It is philosophy. And this would not move me.”

Not the Garry who had no name, the lonely Worker who had clung to chess and marvelled at the sky. Then, Garry understood.

“I am writing to myself. But the myself I am writing to is the one who exists now. And I have forgotten, perhaps, the being I was. To that Antinium, I must write. The assumption I make now is that I am the better Antinium. The bigger Worker. That I care more. He cared just as much, perhaps more, but all he wanted was…to live.”

His hand trembled, and he eyed it. Then Garry stared up at the ceiling, and his antennae waved for a moment. When he began the third time, he wrote the only thing he really did know. His quill meandered on the page, hunting for something.

There is a…bug.

There is a bug. He has no His name is Calby.

Garry stopped and sat for a long while until [Kitchen Timer] went off and he checked on his boiling pots. Then he came back to the desk. Calby the Bug. Like him, but not. What did he know? What did the Unnamed Worker who would become Garry know? What spoke to him?

The quill’s tip moved in the silence. Truth.

Calby was a beetle with a big round shell, four arms, and he lived in his Hive the ground. 

“I am alone,” cried Calby the Beetle, and it was true. Loneliness was a deep and dark hole. He could see in the dark, but not through despair, and it enshrouded him. There was no future. No hope. 

He could stand in a crowd of a million, and he would still be alone.

Ding! [Sense Temperature] told him that the pasta needed straining now. Garry got up, then came back to his words. Stared at them.

“…This may not be what I intended.”

But his quill seemed possessed by that truth that had written Calby into being. It went on as the [Baker] who believed in goodness watched, horrified, a captive to his own words.

Somedays, the lonely bug wished the world would swallow him, for then he could rest. You may think that this is too harsh and there were good things in Calby’s life.

You would be wrong. He had nothing to hope for. If there was pleasantness in Calby’s life, it was an absence of cruel things. 

He was alone, and the voice that came from Calby was a shout though he dared not scream out loud. Every day, and every moment, he was crying for something, anything, and he had no idea what. 

But nothing came for him, and the voice grew louder and louder from Calby’s mouth until he thought that cry would consume him. He continued, day by day. Crying out without the words to know what he needed.

“Help me, please. Oh, please help. I’m stuck down here in this hell hole.”

Now was the moment when the story went uplifting, Garry felt. It had to be, but this was the despair of Antinium given words. He waited, and the quill dripped ink onto the page.

Then he realized—he was supposed to be giving them hope and froze.

Yet no one heard him. No one ever did.

“Won’t someone help me,” Calby continued, pleading. 

“Anyone.”

Yet there was no one down in the hole.

No one but Erin. And could he write her in? The Antinium hesitated. But there was no Erin. Now, his quill was possessed by an evil power. It moved, and he stared at his hand.

There was no answer. Not for Calby. Perhaps other bugs found hope, a hand reaching down to lift them up.

But not Calby.

“Help! Help! I shall die of this loneliness inside, then out. Help!”

And there was no one there.

“Liar! I can see you writing up there! Help me!”

Who, me?

“Yes, you! Help me! You can see me!”

Garry lifted the piece of paper. Peered at his own words. Turned it over.

“What the fudge?”

He placed it down and then—

The narrator wasn’t sure what to say. Calby’s situation was objectively impossible. A beetle trapped at the bottom of a hole had no friends. No one knew him. 

“But you can see me!”

This was true, but what did Calby expect they would do?

“Well, I don’t know, but you’re there. This is a terribly cruel pit I’ve been placed in. I am dying of loneliness. Surely you can do something?”

At this point, the narrator had to go off and have a long think while he added butter to pasta. Upon sitting back down, he analyzed the situation.

Calby the Beetle was stuck. There was no handy rope present.

“Just get me out of here!”

The narrator was working on that, but what did Calby expect when he left?

“I hope…to not be alone. But I don’t know what that’s like. And I do not wish for miracles, because I have never had some,” Calby’s voice trembled. Then he continued, rasping. “But despite that, I hope for it, because this current state of affairs is intolerable.”

Now, the narrator was also a relatively helpless figure in the grand scheme of things. But after some deliberate thought, they had an idea. If Calby was down there.

Maybe…

they could write

in a clever way

such that

Calby could get up?

“You did it!”

Calby cheered as he ran up the text like a staircase. He stopped at the top of the hole, then turned.

“Thank you. Surely, things will be better. All I needed was for someone to help me. Just once.”

This is all very well and good, Calby. But what do you expect to find outside of your hole? 

For answer, Calby looked up, and there it was:

The sky.

Perhaps, dear audience, you are like Calby. Stuck at the bottom of your hole. Perhaps we all are, and there are beautiful things in the darkness. But no matter what direction it is, no matter what form it takes, there is always the sky.

It is like nothing you’ve ever dreamed of. To those of us who live in holes, it is impossible to conceive, because the dirt has limits.

The sky has none. Calby stared into the great beyond that some called the sky, and he could see into forever. Colors where there had been none. The whispering grass, the smells of flowers blooming, but the sky—

There is wind up there. Not merely air, but a rushing like your heart being filled. That is the sky. When you see it, it will not be painless.

I daresay it is painful. For infinity, where there was a roof to your world, is terrifying. Frightening. It may break a piece of you, and nothing will be the same.

The terrifying thing about the sky is that it changes you. And perhaps, then, you should never look up lest your soul fall higher. And you are allowed to do these things. But if, like Calby, you are lonely, then you should climb.

“It’s beautiful,” Calby said. He sat at the edge of the hole that had been his world, and he knew that he could not go back. Not as the same Calby. He stretched his arms out wide and wondered—

What came next?

——

Once upon a time, in a meadow by a huge, dark, desolate pit, there lived a Beetle named Calby. He lived under a huge willow tree, and he was not lonely.

Because he had a friend.

An [Innkeeper]. No, not her.

There were a bunch of friends around his meadow. On a hill blooming with flowers lived another bug named Bird.

“Wait, why Bird?”

Bird sang many songs that drifted down to Calby, and he liked them all. They were always silly songs, for Bird was a silly bug. Even if she was Bird the Hunter.

“La, la, I am me! I am Bird, and I am free as can be!”

Calby envied Bird’s ability to sing. But she did not often come down from her hill of flowers, and he had many other friends.

Such as…

“Um…”

It was late. He didn’t know what to write, so his quill went on automatic, grabbing the only things he had in his head.

Such as Jexishe, the (one and only) Friendly Creler! She lived in a thicket of thorns and often warned Calby not to come close.

“I’m often toxic, and I’m always poisonous! I’m vicious and mean!”

She’d scurry out and bite everyone in sight, or spit venom, but then she’d go back into her den and add—

“But I’m working on being better.”

Since that was something Calby could get behind, they were best friends. They would often go out picking berries, which were Calby’s favorite snack. Only, he didn’t know which ones were which!

Red berries, green berries, purple berries, Calby would eat them all and sometimes get dreadfully sick.

“Calby! You should think more carefully about what you eat!”

Jexishe scolded him, and Calby would groan.

“But I thought they all looked good until I ate them.”

Garry checked a timepiece on the wall.

“What time is it? I should be asleep.”

Another of Calby’s friends lived next to the meadow in a big, big fort made of snow. Her name was Recia the Snow Squirrel. She loved playing pranks, but she loved pranks a bit too much, and she’d make other people unhappy.

There was also Mrrga, the chattiest Gnoll in the world, who sometimes did not know when to be quiet, and Nalete, the hairiest Human in the world, who lived under a huge redwood tree. Last of all of Calby’s friends living in this strange meadow was Gar the Goblin, who was always unhappy and suspicious.

“Everyone hates Goblins like me.”

Since Calby knew Gar was a Goblin, he did not disagree. But one day, he and Jexishe decided to pick Gar a huge basket of flowers. 

“One, two, three! Gar will be happy as can be when he sees these flowers,” Jexishe sang! 

(Calby wondered if he’d really be happy as all that.)

They were filling a basket when Bird the Hunter buzzed down and demanded to know why they were stealing her flowers.

“Oh, excuse me, Miss Bird,” Calby said. “I did not realize they were your flowers.”

“Of course they’re mine, silly! I demand a bird for all these lovely flowers! Or something bird-like. Anything will do. I am a silly Bird, so…toodle-loo! Don’t come back without a bird!”

Jexishe offered to kill a bird, but Calby did not want to kill an innocent bird, so they wandered away, hoping to find something bird-like to satisfy Bird. Upon the way, they ran into Recia the Snow Squirrel, who grew excited when she learned of Calby and Jexishe’s job.

“A bird? Why don’t we give Bird a snowball and trick her into thinking it’s a snow bird’s egg?”

Lying did not seem to be very nice to Calby, but since it was to give Gar flowers, he thought maybe it was worth a try? So they gathered up some snow and…

At this point, Garry nearly fell asleep onto his page of paper. Unsteadily, he got up and retreated to his sleeping corner, where he sat down and muttered.

“This is crazy.”

But then he got up twice to finish the story of Calby and Jexishe, who learned that lying was not a good way to do something good and that even if Gar the Goblin didn’t care for flowers, he thought they were quite good since they were edible.

Then Bird made a snow-bird hatch from the snowball, and they all had snow bird for dinner together—

He thought that the story might not have saved the Worker who had become Garry. But maybe it would make him dream of the sky.

Certainly, someone else agreed that Garry was onto something.

[Writer Class Obtained!]

[Writer Level 3!]

[Skill – Basic Penmans—]

Garry sat up blearily.

“I don’t think I’m a [Writer], though.”

[Level Ups Cancelled!]

——

The next day, a rather sleep-deprived Garry set out with some Painted Antinium towards the Hivelands. He gave all of them free bread, of course, but he barely spoke.

Instead, he rode on a little wagon they carried, and as payment, he cooked them breakfast, lunch, and dinner and read out his ongoing story of Calby the Bug to them.

They liked it. Oh, they had notes, like Garry needing to explain more about everyone, and they all wanted Calby to eat nicer things, so Garry found himself adding descriptions of wonderful soups and food that Calby got to eat.

Rather to his surprise, though, he ended up cranking out fourteen more pages filled with cramped handwriting and even a few images of ‘Calby’, though he was very rudimentary. He didn’t even realize the day was passing until it was time to camp, and when he curled up again—

[Scribe Class Obtained!]

[Scribe Level 6!]

[Sk—]

Garry sat up again.

“Nope.”

It would get in the way of his [Baker] class, and that was over Level 40. A few writing Skills? No.

[…Level Ups Cancelled!]

He settled back down and then heard—

[Storyteller Class Obtained!]

[Storyteller Level 7!]

[Skill – Captivating—]

Garry put a pillow over his head.

[Level Ups Cancelled.]

Somewhere, perhaps unseen, an invisible presence was getting slightly annoyed. C’mon, work with me here, buddy. After a few calculations, it went with—

[Philanthropist Class Obtained!]

[Philanthropist Level 2!]

[Skill – A Touch of Morality Obtained!]

[Skill – Designate Charitable Work Obtained!]

[Skill – Charity: Satisfied Pride Obtained!]

A bleary [Baker] sat up.

“…Huh.”

He didn’t object to the class and instead just fell asleep sitting, much to the other Painted Antinium’s relief; they’d been trying to get some shuteye, and no one was levelling them up.

——

The next day, Garry awoke and did some reading in the wagon for a bit before jogging with the Painted Antinium. He had a book he intended to trial in the Hives, plenty of food to appease the Grand Queen and other Queens, and a new class.

…Wait.

Garry paused after a bathroom break to address the sky. He clasped his hands together while the other two wiped, in the vague sense that it was fitting. In front of him sat one of the books he’d brought. Not the one he was writing, but good reading material for bathrooms: a dictionary.

“Excuse me. I believe there has been a mistake. While it is true that I accepted the [Philanthropist] class last night, I have done some research today and it appears I misapprehended the meaning of the word.”

He opened the book to the right page and pointed.

“According to this, a philanthropist is someone who seeks to improve the wellbeing of others, but primarily through the ‘donation of money’ to others. This goes against my beliefs, as I do not believe that the wellbeing of others through a fiscal system of coins is a necessary step. Also, I take issue with [Philanthropist] as a class because of the wording. ‘Seeks to’ implies there is a choice, as if this is some charitable decision, not a cause.”

He paused, and there was no response. Garry concluded his prayer and his bathroom break simply.

“I would appreciate rectification of this issue as I believe my main class encapsulates my desires, and any sub-class goes against my additional goals of leveling as swiftly as possible. I may even view my [Strategist of Sympathy] class in the same vein as strategy is purely rendered in service of baking. Everything is in furtherance of feeding others. Including writing.”

Again, there was no response, so Garry got up and continued walking. Well, riding. One of the Antinium in his company had [Unit: Match Speed], which was why they were keeping up with his wagon and the two mules who were moving so fast they were leaving a slipstream in the tunnel. The mules seemed to enjoy it, though.

Garry missed the horses. One had been named Freud. He’d let them down.

——

The Grand Queen welcomed Garry into her Hive that evening when he arrived after the long journey into the Hivelands. He stared up at the unnecessary marble pillars and paved stone, at hanging golden lamps fueled by, well, fuel, and at the hall where Workers and Soldiers ate below her.

She assured him she had [Cooks] of her own before a procession of people of various species wearing collars served him and his company food.

Garry smiled at the Grand Queen before offering her the largest shawarma ever created in this world’s history. She took one huge bite and chewed for fourteen seconds before ordering him to cook the rest of the night’s dinner and expressing her patent relief that he survived his deliveries of bread for ‘charity’, whatever that was.

Thus, the [Baker] found himself in the Grand Hive as a welcomed guest and noted they even had kitchens of their own. And [Slaves]. He lay down, thinking mightily, and before he drifted off, he heard a voice speak in his head with distinct annoyance.

[Philanthropist Class Removed.]

[Skills Removed.]

Garry smiled to himself. Then he wondered how Erin was doing. It had been a while since she’d called him. She hadn’t actually told him much about what was going on in her life.

He had a feeling there was something going on with her too.

Erin and Ulvama – Costumes

Erin wanted to talk to Garry. But she knew that would be running away. If she wanted a resolution to this situation, she had to find it for herself.

Garry was like an ace in the hole. But you still had to have a good hand of cards before you pulled him.

She was walking through Lemoste, thinking. For two reasons, really. The first was that she had an appointment she couldn’t miss for the Battle of the Bands. She’d let people down if she didn’t at least show her face, and she was tired of that.

The second reason was that Roja had come storming back after half-an-hour, and Erin had sensed her coming and was avoiding her.

It was easy. Roja was hunting for Erin, but the [Innkeeper] knew where she was thanks to her inn-senses. She just walked in the opposite direction Roja was storming. That didn’t take up her mind, so she really had no excuse. But her head just felt blank.

Ulvama’s angry at me for stupid stuff I did. I hurt her, and we fought. I brought up Tremborag’s mountain and what they did to non-Goblin women. And men, I think. She doesn’t want me to self-destruct. All these things are fair, important things, but this isn’t why we’re fighting.

I know that. I wish I could read her mind. I wish I could see exactly what she’s feeling.

“But what a boring life that would be. Too close to divine, and I have to believe they’re miserable people.”

But I want it. Just for her.

Ah, there was something there, but when Erin tried to focus on it, it slipped away. Like how it was sometimes hard to think of the deadlands and the ghosts and their quests or her parents and home.

Something too big, too painful or scary for her to want to live with. Erin tried to find it, but by the time her feet led her to the large warehouse that had a huge garage door open and was letting out the clatter of objects and the thunder of drums, the screech of a guitar solo, and so many voices—she didn’t have anything else.

Then someone spotted her.

“Miss Erin! We’re gonna take Battle of the Bands this time! No matter what my parents do!”

The Fraerling girl, Elohi, a [Rock Bassist], was all dressed up in raggedy clothing like some kind of post-apocalyptic survivor. She even had temporary tattoos and what Erin hoped were fake piercings. Her entire band were kitted out the same.

“Hey, Elohi, you look great. How’re you feeling? The Deranged Cats going to kill it?”

“Yeah! We’ve been practicing three songs, and they’re really good. Way better than the Fallin’ Gnomes or Acoustic Devils!”

The Fallin’ Gnomes were her parents’ band. They were dressed up in clothing that Erin felt like her parents would have called similar to Kiss from Earth: white facepaint, black hair, and a mix between bodysuits and just not wearing shirts at all.

They were waving, but the glaring younger Fraerlings were flipping them off and booing—it looked like Battle of the Bands 4 was going to be the olds versus the youngs.

Erin wasn’t sure which side she was on, or should take, so she settled for encouragement.

“Hey, knock ‘em dead. Sorry Matha’s still under the weather and I’m, uh, busy.”

“You’re going to be there, right?”

“Absolutely. But I’m not taking sides!”

Erin lied, and Elohi leapt up and punched the air before landing as she struck a chord on her guitar. The ground trembled a bit.

“Great! Then we’re going to knock the new walls down! Just wait ‘till you see our Combined Skill!”

“Your what now? You got one of…”

Erin was left with questions as Elohi raced off to shout at some fans who were lining up for the concert. The [Innkeeper] didn’t have any Combined Skills! She was about to go over to the other bands when someone exited a washroom, adjusting her outfit.

“I think I’m okay, guys. It only sprays one in four t—oh, hey Erin.”

…And there was Matha. Erin sighed, but she didn’t have the same animosity towards Matha right now with the Ulvama fighting. Plus, she felt a bit bad that Matha still had, uh, toiletry problems after all this time.

Plus—Matha was being very cautious. She raised her hands, and Erin noted that Ulvama’s makeup was still on her face, and Matha had on a costume that would have done a rock n’roller from the height of sequins and sparkles proud.

A long one-piece suit in off-gold with a v-neck and decorated with multi-colored streamers cut in wavy lines. Like flames. Erin was going to say Matha looked ridiculous, but closed her mouth on the insult.

“Hey, that’s not bad. It’s either corny or cool.”

Truth. Matha’s hair had glitter in it, and she brushed at it, glancing at Erin.

“Thanks. Costumes are amazing. Some [Artisans] are sponsoring the Battle of the Bands, and they have tons of amazing stuff. Song crystals, oh, and you have to see these!”

She had leather jackets. Erin’s lips twitched as she saw there were a load of blank ones, ready to be stitched with your favorite bands’ logos.

“This is very cool.”

If this were in her world, in her city, and someone was giving out free jackets for your favorite band or putting this much effort into something that was free…? She wished she could enjoy it.

Matha was glancing at Erin.

“So, um, thanks for coming, Erin. It means a lot to all the bands. They know about, um—Ulvama.”

Oh, the fighting. That explained why Elohi’s parents weren’t racing over to get her to do an intro song. Erin shrugged.

“At least no one’s coming to tell me off about how stupid I am.”

“Eh, half of ‘em are on your side. Fraerlings, I mean. Everyone here knows you’re great. I keep telling them it’ll turn out alright. So—if I’m bothering you, just say the word. You can probably leave after, like, twenty more minutes.”

She really was trying. Erin squinted at Matha, then glanced about.

“I’ll hang around for a second. I’m not doing much good. Frankly, I thought I’d be needed to stop actual fights or sabotage. Remember the last Battle of the Bands?”

Someone had put a baby earwig in the drumsets, and someone else had rigged a stage light to fall. Which wasn’t fatal given the relative toughness of Fraerlings and the weight of the lights, but—the two age groups were sniping at each other.

Maybe it was a metaphor. On one side, you had the kids, who loved and embraced the music and resented the older Fraerlings who said things needed structure, who obeyed (mostly) rules about when you could make sound and made things less cool.

On the other hand, though—kids were jerks. Erin had heard Elohi tell her parents they didn’t ‘get’ the new music and they were too old to play anything or have good taste. Which was a hell of a thing to say to two forty-year-old Fraerlings.

Never make an enemy of a Fraerling grandpa in his eighties. He was flashing hand gestures at a pair of teens that were avoiding him. His name was Alack, and he’d told Erin that it had genuinely made him want to stay away when the kids had told him that. She’d encouraged him to get someone to make a saxophone and blow them away.

Neither side was right, and neither side was entirely wrong, especially since they wanted to just enjoy this thing, and the other side could be controlling or judgey or annoying.

“Someone should break both sides’ legs and toss them down a well.”

“Uh…no, no need for that Erin! They’re being good, really!”

Erin glanced at Matha and hesitated.

“No, that wasn’t—I was just joking.”

Matha gave her a nervous smile, and Erin scratched at her head.

“But I thought there’d be some fighting. Some of these guys are wild.”

“Oh, that’s me. I used a few Skills. The only ones I’ve got. [No Infighting]!”

Matha puffed out her chest, and Erin blinked at her. The [Raider Leader]…oh, of course. She had to have a few Skills to keep her Cottontails in line.

“Huh. Well…good work. But that won’t work on anyone higher-level than you or if they get really mad.”

“Right.”

“So the key isn’t watching the kids. It’s the high-level Fraerlings. Like…hey!”

Erin dragged Matha to an older Fraerling about to enchant a bunch of guitar strings to snap. She was after a particularly annoying band, but Erin caught the woman’s arm.

“Save it for the performances. Beat them with music, okay? Don’t go tarnishing the Battle of the B—oh dead gods, I’m a B-grade movie character.”

Erin glanced around, and all they needed now was for the main character and the love interest to appear and start making out under the stands. She rubbed at her head as Matha glared.

“Yeah, back in your spot, and if I catch you, I’m disqualifying your entire band! What was that other bit, Erin?”

“I literally have no way to explain it.”

Ulvama would have gotten it or found it amusing. She’d probably be here applying makeup and making her own jacket if they weren’t fighting.

Erin was tired, all of a sudden, and went to raid the refreshments. Matha came over after a while and found Erin gulping some dewdrop water. She gestured hesitantly.

“Want to sit somewhere backstage, Erin? There’s a clothing storage room.”

“Yeah. That might be a good place to think.”

——

Somewhere in the city, Ulvama was with Bowom, preparing for her encounter with Erin—mostly by packing incense burners full of Dreamleaf. And Bowom was up to something too.

Erin could feel it. Perhaps it wasn’t even a Skill, but a sixth sense after doing this so long. Today would be a conclusion to their fighting. Whether it was a confrontation or resolution…

Still, she had no clue what to do as she sat on a costume box. She had no Bowom, only a Roja and a Eurise.

Matha fidgeted, hopping from foot to foot and glancing around, but no one else was here. And she knew Bowom was going to talk to Ulvama, so she took a huge breath.

The worst thing that can happen is she dunks me in the toilet or kills me. Wait, that’s bad.

Nevertheless, she had to do it.

“S-so, Erin. I was thinking, for the big concert, um, Ulvama’s going to be there. She loves free food and stuff.”

“She’ll be there, yes.”

Erin was staring at her hands, and she didn’t look at Matha. Not for the first time, the [Raider] had the vague impression that Erin would have been happier if she could push Matha’s head through a wall and leave her there. Which Matha deserved, but—!

“I was thinking. It’s a fun night. She’ll love the food we’re putting out since the city’s stopped rationing. The Architects said it was as good as a public holiday now that there are two walls up—um, it’d be a great time to talk to her.”

“If I had anything worth saying, I’d actually agree, Matha.”

“Right. Right. But what if—you, uh, got ready for it?”

“What a thought. It’s almost like I’ve been trying that all day.”

She was like when Zinni was mad. Lots of flat tones and sarcasm. Matha squirmed, but she was in this deep and she wasn’t dead.

“What I mean is you could dress up a bit, Erin. Impress Ulvama.”

Erin’s head snapped up, and she gave Matha a flat gaze.

“Why would that matter?”

Matha’s heart stopped, and she spluttered out the truth.

“She likes it when people do that kind of thing.”

“That’s stupid. No she d…”

The [Innkeeper]’s glower cut off, and she hesitated, then crossed her arms. Erin scowled, then glanced down at her clothing.

“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”

Erin was wearing a blue t-shirt and pants made out of a semi-rough cloth of some kind that had a bit of white mixed in. It was definitely a style…she’d worn the same type of clothing all week now that Ulvama had stopped bothering her about what she wore.

Matha hesitated, but not even her fear of offending the [Innkeeper] could keep her from making a few remarks.

“Nothing. It’s just that it’s the same thing you always wear. And Ulvama likes fashion and stuff. She never eats the same meal twice if she can help it.”

This was also true and another source of strife even prior to the big fight. Erin was happy to make something and eat it as leftovers for breakfast, but Ulvama insisted on something being different, even about leftovers. The [Innkeeper] glowered as she tried to find a flaw in Matha’s arguments on the grounds they came from Matha, but then she jerked her head.

“Feh. Fine. I guess this is the room for it. I’ll put something else on, I guess.”

She hopped off the box of costumes, and Matha ran around to find things that Erin could try on. When she rushed back with a huge sample of clothing, Erin had found something she liked.

“Hey, this could work.”

She had found…black pants. With worn holes around the knees. Erin held them up as Matha’s face fell.

“These are like those pre-worn pants that were trendy, uh, sometime. And how’s this?”

She’d found another t-shirt. Matha stared at the clothing.

“Oh, come on. It’s so boring.”

She snapped at Erin as if she were a fellow Cottontail, and Erin’s eyes flashed. Matha flinched.

“Sorry! It’s great, it’s just—”

“What’s wrong with jeans?”

“Is that what they’re called? Nothing’s wrong, Erin. It’s just—you wear them all the time. Unless Ulvama makes you wear something else, it’s the exact same kind of outfit every single day. Same with the shirts.”

“No I haven…hmm. Well, so what? I like jeans.”

“What about this?”

Matha gingerly held up a long, flowing dress she sort of wanted to see Erin in. It was definitely not Erin’s style, and she took one look at it and shook her head.

“No. I’m not a dress-person. I haven’t worn those since I entered middle school.”

Matha had no idea what a middle school was. What, was there a left school and a right school too? A top school? Bottom school?

She would have loved to ask, but Erin was a closed book and she was getting annoyed, so Matha tossed the dresses.

“What about, uh—”

If you took out dresses and anything even vaguely skirt-related, you could see how Erin got to where she was. Erin started shooting down clothing Matha held up. After twenty straight ‘no’s without a moment of hesitation, Matha drooped.

Erin—noticed.

——

Matha was genuinely a bit upset, but she was trying to project upbeat energy. The fact that she was hiding it and not filled with…lust, attraction, or silly excitement made Erin feel a tad bit guilty.

She’s trying to help me. Strange. I thought she’d be flirting with Ulvama. But she actually wants the Battle of the Bands to go well. I’m being stubborn.

Erin reluctantly glanced at a onepiece, trying to give it another chance, and decided that one was genuinely way too skintight, regardless of any goodwill. She spread her hands as she turned to Matha, who was hunting for something that would pass the muster.

“Listen, Matha. I appreciate you trying, but I’m not going to wear anything well. I don’t have any style. Plenty of people have tried to get me to look good in clothing, and it just doesn’t work.”

She was a plain person, without the kind of style that Ulvama or even Numbtongue or Lyonette had. Dead gods, even Mrsha could wear a Scottish kilt and make it her own.

Erin’s simple style was objectionable here, though. And Matha poked her head out of a rack of coats.

“C’mon, Erin. We want to just impress Ulvama a bit, right?”

Neither one questioned that it was Ulvama they were trying to win over, and Erin stuck her hands in her pockets.

“Yeah, but I’m not dressing up like a clown. No dresses.”

“Can I at least ask why? Some dresses are really cool.”

Oh, well, that was easy. Erin elaborated, realizing that she had never given her treatise on jeans to, well, anyone in this world. But it was very simple.

“Dresses don’t have pockets. I have to have pockets in whatever I wear. I know it’s not trendy or fashionable, but jeans are comfy, and I don’t have to worry about what I’m going to wear like everyone else. I found what I liked in, like, middle school, and I never changed it.”

“When is middle school?”

“Nearly a decade ago.”

“…And you never wore anything else? No dresses? Not once?”

The [Innkeeper] shrugged again, uncomfortable without being able to say why.

“They’re just too conventionally girly. I never liked ‘em. And again, pockets! It’s one of the things that guys always get with their clothing and girls don’t. It’s a huge pain.”

She didn’t know how you could live if you had to carry around a handbag or clutch or use coat pockets or something. Matha peered at Erin above a rack of clothing. She pulled up a dress at random, then spoke.

“Um. Erin? All these dresses have pockets.”

“…Huh?”

It turned out that every single Fraerling article of clothing had pockets, even the form-fitting ones which had interior pouches. Erin blinked, then reddened slightly and blustered.

“Well—back home they don’t! At least, they didn’t when I was in middle school. Because of the patriarchy or something.”

“What’s that?”

“Too hard to explain. I’m not down on dresses because I think they don’t fit, anyways. I—here, let me search around. All I’ve got to do is shake up my regular style, right?”

Matha let Erin take over poking around the rather varied costumes that Fraerlings had made to indulge this other world’s musical stylings. She sat on a box, cross-legged, as Erin muttered to herself.

“Look, some people have style, some people don’t. You’ve got style, a bit, Matha. You can get into wearing this kind of stuff. I can’t. Your costume’s okay. I’d have called it tacky a while ago, but I see how you can wear it.”

“Thanks. Like the flames on the sides?”

“Yeah. It works.”

“Ulvama came up with the idea. Like how she wanted to wear that dress because it had your magic on it.”

Erin fumbled a set of underwear and turned. Matha flinched as the hazel eyes flashed, but then Erin just peered at the ground. Bent to pick up the clothing and dust it off.

“Great. Another thing I didn’t notice and did wrong. I’m surprised you stick around. I know you can tell I’ve been mean to you.”

“Oh, like when you’re really mad and I feel like a [Dangersense] is going off? Yeah, that’s not fun, but I stick around because—well, I feel bad. I didn’t know what I was doing, and a lot of the Cottontails got hurt.”

“Because I destroyed your base and started cutting throats.”

Erin’s head bent further, and Matha bit her lip.

“Everyone survived, and Bowom put on the, uh—fingers—”

Dead silence. Matha changed subjects desperately.

“Anyways, don’t think I’m doing this just because I’m guilty. If I didn’t follow you and Eurise, I’d have run off or started the Cottontails again after, like, a month. I’d never stay in Wyewesshi.”

That brought Erin back to being annoyed with Matha again. She turned, but Matha saw the twist of her lips, even when Erin thought she was hiding it. The [Innkeeper]’s voice had a touch of scorn.

“Too boring to settle down in and work a regular job?”

That hurt Matha’s feelings, but she put on a determined smile.

“Kinda. It’s mostly Great Grandma.”

“Zinni?”

“Yeah. In Wyewesshi, everything she says goes. Everything ends up how Grandma Zinni wants. Even if you say no, you end up doing more or less what she wants.”

Erin stopped running her hand over a fuzzy coat and turned back to Matha.

“Huh. That sounds annoying. Sounds like someone should stand up to her.”

“People have tried. They just move out. She likes me; she says I remind her of her at that age. But I bet she’s picked out a job for me for once I’ve ‘settled down’.”

“Ergh. I hate controlling people.”

Erin made a face, then stared at a full-length mirror that someone had put up, as if struck by a truly unpleasant thought. Matha chattered into the void, venting a bit.

“Yeah, well, I tried.”

Erin turned to her.

“How?”

“The Cottontail Raiders? Raiding Grandma’s herds? Doing all kinds of stuff that annoyed her? I thought we’d maybe make a village someday and prove we didn’t need her. But…we still needed help now and then, and I guess we weren’t that good if one person could take us all out.”

Matha kicked her legs, glancing away from Erin. Her treasured base with her friends…that still hurt. Erin averted her gaze.

“I was wrong about you all. I’m glad Ulvama stopped me. Zinni…Zinni cares about you.”

“Yeah. I know. I just wish she cared enough to let me be me instead of a younger her, or whoever she thinks I am.”

Matha gazed at her boots and remembered Zinni gifting them to her special. She loved her grandma, but Zinni made it hard. Erin was lost in silence again until she unhooked a uniform like the Fallin’ Gnomes were wearing. The black, skintight suit embroidered with crow-feathers like fur was a look, and Matha’s heart beat faster at the idea of Erin trying it on. But the [Innkeeper] just laughed.

“You know what, Matha? I could almost see myself trying this on. This is crazy. I’d call myself stupid for just thinking about it a few months ago. But a few months ago, I was dead.”

“What? Like dead-dead or…?”

Erin nodded, and Matha had so many questions and realized Erin hadn’t told many people about her past, except for maybe Bowom and Eurise. But the [Innkeeper] kept murmuring.

“I thought I knew what I liked. I thought I knew who I was, but look at me now. Rocking out on stage is fun. I didn’t think I could perform for a crowd. I mean, I did it once but not like a real concert, something I wanted to put on. I didn’t think I could dance, either. But I learned I liked dancing, and—everything new, I like. Or most things, at least. I hate eating sugar. I’m down with salads. Who am I? I didn’t think I was supposed to change.”

She gazed at her hands.

“I was proud of knowing who I was. Now, the world’s topsy-turvey. I used to be an [Innkeeper]. Then I died, almost by accident. When I woke up again, I was a girl with a quest. A mission to save the world. I didn’t realize how much that sucked until I had to do it.”

Save the…? Matha’s mouth opened, but then she just waited, because Erin was talking on, walking through the lines of clothing, touching articles, pulling them out as if even the most outlandish thing might fit her.

“I survived that battle at sea and the depths of The Naga’s Den, but I am not the same. I will never be again, and I’m afraid of who might have emerged if things hadn’t gone the way they had. But for Ulvama…and here we are fighting over such small things. Small things that matter.”

Matha nodded. Just like what she’d said to Zemmy and Mera—it felt like this was bigger. She fidgeted, trying to think of something to ask.

“D-did, um, you want to change before this?”

Erin turned, surprised, and met Matha’s eyes.

“No. Never. I was always the [Innkeeper] trying to save that little Goblin. I was in the Floodplains of Liscor, waving that flag…and I would never do it otherwise. How could I betray their memories like that?”

More things Matha didn’t get, but now Erin was shaking her head.

“But no—that’s not true either, is it? There was once. A few times, when I saw something and I wished I was stronger. Cooler. Maybe I wanted to change, but I was afraid that if I did, I’d let go of everything I…huh. Fashion. Do I have to wear only one costume?”

“No, go ahead! Anything that looks good, be my guest! You could go out in your underwear and I wouldn’t complain.”

“Yeah, I bet.”

Erin shot Matha a sardonic glance, but then she was wandering around. Searching for something.

“I need a pole. Oh, here’s a mop. Now, I need a white…there.”

She found a white shirt, tore it up, and began to sew with a kit left in a corner for just that purpose. Matha didn’t understand what Erin was doing, but when the [Innkeeper] attached the white fabric to the pole she’d taken from the mop…it meant something.

She planted it, the white flag, on the ground and stared at it, and Matha watched, not knowing why her heart beat faster. Only that for a second, Erin captured that thing she claimed she didn’t have.

Style. Memory. She murmured as she hefted the flag up.

“There was just one moment when I could have been someone different. I didn’t want to, but it tempted me. It brought it up again when I hit Level 50. I could have been a [Bannerlady]. I don’t want death or fighting, but I think…hmm. What else should I wear?”

She put the banner down, and Matha cast around.

“I, uh, dunno. What do you think looks cool? Anything you’ve ever wanted to wear?”

“No. I n…hmm.”

Once more, Erin seemed to catch the lie and went pacing through the room. This time, she was hunting for something. She spoke to herself and her audience of one.

“There was just one time. I have had so many guests in my inn. From Dragons to undead monsters. Heroes and villains. Each one has fascinated me, but I was sure I would see them again, even when they left on their adventures. There was only one that I knew I would never understand. They only came into my inn a moment for a war I was too late to join. Their name was Theillige. A member of the Wild Hunt, from another world.”

“What did they wear?”

Erin was staring at a figure hoisting a tankard in her inn before they drew that terrible blade to duel a goddess. Her lips whispered as her eyes stung.

“They walked into my inn with a thousand thousand lives. A [Knight] of the winter. A grim reaper of frost. A…wait. Where are those jackets for the band merch?”

She went outside and came back with the leather jacket. Stared at it, then glanced around.

“They had a helmet on in each life. In one, they dressed like someone from my world. As if the Wild Hunt were a biker gang. A motorcycle helmet. Hah. There’s no way—”

“We’ve got all kinds of people who’re helping the bands! We could make it or make it look like what you want, no sweat!”

Matha leapt up, and bemused, Erin tried to describe what she was thinking of. It was ridiculous, of course. Way too cool for Erin, but when one of the [Costumers] heard about the shape of the bicycle helmet…

“[Customer’s Image]. Oh, that’s so much better than your sketch! So shiny! I can do that! Just get some wood, polish it up after some paint with the right reflectiveness…I’ll have it within an hour. Matha, you’ll need leggings like this.”

The excited, very passionate Fraerling woman sketched out the outfit, and Matha snatched it and sighed.

“Oh, you’ve got to wear this.”

“Er—”

That was how Erin found herself assembling a biker’s outfit despite not actually biking, let alone motorbiking. But in fairness? Leather jacket and pants were pretty close to her standard outfit.

But the vibe was very different. Erin held up the jacket as Matha raced to give it suitable accoutrements. She was holding up metal studs.

“Hey, Erin, what if we gave them armguards on one shoulder like the sketch? Can I? Please? Please try it on?”

A number of Fraerlings wanted Erin to try the new look, actually. The [Innkeeper] was about to object, to say this was a bad idea, when she hesitated.

“One second.”

Matha’s face fell, but Erin vanished into the costume room and came back with the flag a second later. She held it over one shoulder as she tried on the jacket. The shiny black leather…she sat, lacing up some boots, and Matha glanced at some other helpers.

More color, more little details, but—then Erin twisted around.

“My back’s too bare.”

“We can put a logo on it. Or a band—”

“Can you put something else? A chess piece? A queen?”

Erin had to show them what she wanted, just a standard queen piece, and she was vaguely surprised when they ran to get one cut out. By the time a prototype helmet had come back to put on, she was finding some gloves and this?

It was silly. It wasn’t her, but maybe it was something she liked. Did you dress to…become someone you wanted to be? To channel who you were?

“That’s silly. It can’t be that.”

“Can’t be what?”

Erin glanced over at Matha.

“I was just thinking that you don’t dress up to try to be something different, even if you’re not. Because if that were why you wore fancy clothing, it’d mean I wasted twenty years of my life because I didn’t get it.”

Solemnly, Alack the [Saxophone Player] clapped Erin on the shoulder.

“No time like the present to change it up. You want to do something with that hair?”

He indicated Erin’s hair, which was regrowing, even the side that had been mostly burnt away. This time, Erin didn’t even say ‘no’. She just tilted her head.

“Normally, I have the same hairstyle. It’s way too uneven on this side to do much with, though. Sorta scraggly.”

She brushed at the short hair that hadn’t had enough weeks to do anything with it. Matha cast around.

“There’s a [Barber] who cut my hair a few days ago. You could buzzcut it short. Real short.”

“Then I’ll be unsymmetrical! What, do I comb over the rest?”

“Yeah.”

“Well…it can’t be worse than now. And I bet they can regrow my hair if it’s really bad. Plus, it’s all discolored. Okay.”

The Fraerlings were running off again, and Erin smiled despite herself. Then she realized she hadn’t come to any conclusions about the big conversation this was all for. But she thought…this was helping.

A quiet realization was dawning over her that she didn’t need some grand theology to comprehend. She just needed to be in the right mood. To be the right person.

——

When Matha ran back, the [Barber] had Erin sitting in a chair in moments, and the [Innkeeper] was grimacing, possibly with nerves, as she watched her hair falling down.

Matha was not uncertain; this was going to be amazing, and she was getting tingly as the costume came together. She wanted to know what Ulvama would think.

Ulvama.

Matha hesitated as Erin sat there, and the rift between the two was weighing on Erin’s mind. But she just smiled at Matha.

“Thanks for helping, Matha. I know I’ve been mean to you, and perhaps you deserved some of it.”

“Maybe a bit, even the sewer thing.”

Matha flushed, and Erin shrugged. Then she went on as the [Barber] scolded her.

“But I appreciate you doing this. I know you’ve been trying to help, and I just…didn’t like you. For a lot of reasons. However, pushing me to dress up a bit, push my limits? That’s good. Not many people do that. Well, Lyonette, Magnolia, Ryoka, Selys, plenty of people have tried. I’m a bit stubborn.”

No kidding? Matha held her tongue on that one, and Erin rubbed at her chin again.

“I haven’t dressed up like this since…the last time I went on a date, I guess.”

“When was that?”

Erin’s face grew shadowed.

“Oh, at least…four years? Hard to count given how long it’s been. It wasn’t great. I used to date, back home. I gave it up. I had exactly one boyfriend and one online person who turned out to be a girl—but the boyfriend just didn’t work out. Actually, he wanted me to wear a dress.”

“Boys, yuck. Who needs ‘em?”

Matha’s opinion was unnuanced, but it made Erin smile and go on after a pause. She stared ahead, as the [Costumer], [Barber], and everyone else listened with a long ear.

“Yeah. He wasn’t great, but I probably wasn’t either. It just wasn’t anything special. It was tedious, nervewracking, uncomfortable—nothing like it was supposed to be. But I wanted to try because…I was lonely, I guess. All I wanted was someone who saw what I saw. Does that make sense?”

“Um…see what?”

Erin lifted a hand, and flames of every color danced across her hand.

“Everyone sees the world differently. Sometimes, I think I’m speaking a different language than other people, even when I say the exact same words, Matha. Take Goblins for example. Plenty of people say, ‘who cares about Goblins? They’re monsters. There’s no point defending them’. And I look at them and wonder if they’re blind. Can they not see a Goblin cry? Does it mean nothing?”

Her face was bitter then, but she went on.

“—Not just Goblins. Everything. I wanted, all I wanted, was to find someone who saw my world. And chess? Chess was not the way to find those people. All they were was good at chess and usually so different from me that it wasn’t even something I thought about. But for a while, I hoped…nah.”

She shook her head sadly.

“I’ve found plenty of people I respect, who I love. Lyonette is so utterly unlike me in so many ways. Same with Ryoka, Pisces, or…but I guess it’s still lonely. I don’t feel lonely when my inn is full, of course, but I never found that person. Some people see sides of me. Like Niers.”

“…As in Niers Astoragon, the Titan? Do you kn—”

Someone kicked the [Costumer] to shut her up, and Matha interrupted.

“What about Ulvama?”

“What? Ulvama? She doesn’t see the world the way I do.”

“Oh.”

Erin paused and inspected her reflection in the hand mirror the [Barber] was working off of. She brushed at her lopsided haircut, then her hazel eyes shone clearly at Matha.

“She can’t see my thoughts. But she understands me. And I realized that’s what I really want. I don’t need someone who thinks the way I do, just someone I can talk to who gets me. But I suppose that’s also the problem.”

Erin touched her chest as Matha’s heart hurt. Because this, too, was painful, but she stomped down on the emotions. This was too captivating. The [Innkeeper] blew on her fingers as the [Barber] stepped back, and a flaming hat appeared on her head, her half-cut hair swept over the buzzed side. Her features were hesitant as she stood and inspected the long pants, the biker’s jacket emblazoned with the chess piece that the [Costumer] held up, and leaned on the white flag.

“This looks good. It really does. I’m just worried, I guess, that if I ever met someone special that…it’s all surface-deep. I’m afraid there’s nothing but a monster or emptiness if you really looked into my soul. Nothing worth anything deep down.”

She turned, leaning the flag across one shoulder like a woman marching to war, and she didn’t understand. That silly [Innkeeper] saw half her audience burst into tears and blinked at them. But—then—

She was almost ready. She took Matha’s shoulder.

“I have to talk to someone. A dear friend. But I promise I’ll be there for the concert. Thanks, Matha.”

The [Raider] wanted to say something. She gazed up at Erin and blurted out.

“If—um—no matter what happens, I think it’ll be okay. And if it doesn’t, I’ll listen to anything you want to say.”

Erin touched Matha’s shoulder and squeezed once with a grin. Then she stepped back as a door opened in her chest.

“Thanks. But I don’t know how you put up with me.”

Then—she was gone.

Matha thought she had done everything, everything she could. If this failed, it would not be because the [Innkeeper] wasn’t ready. And the Goblin?

It turned out that the Goblin had the same idea.

——

She was in the company of Bowom the Slicer, one of Lemoste’s most infamous figures. But the people who flocked to the Hobgoblin were on her side. Not necessarily against Erin, either, but just for Ulvama.

The [Shopkeeper], Thist. Miss Eitine, the [Enchanter] that Ulvama had met. Even the healer, [Restorer] Ginthe, was watching with arms folded because this was technically a risky procedure.

“That’s a lot of Dreamleaf. These other substances will produce a hallucinogenic effect.”

One of the [High Magi] was nodding.

“I think someone should be in the room with Miss Ulvama, to test the effects. I volunteer.”

“No, I think we need multiple volunteers—”

Bowom ignored the happy spellcasters. Ulvama had a charm about her unlike Erin. She was much like a woman who’d been hurt, abused, and who had learned not to trust the world slowly opening up and finding people who would do anything to help her or see her smile.

Exactly like that. He was bad with analogies. If that wasn’t enough to make you want to spend time on the Hobgoblin, well, she was also a Goblin. She had a magic not even Fraerlings understood.

Speaking of which…the [Summoner] tapped Ulvama on the shoulder.

“Gift for ya, Ulvama. In case you have to kick that [Innkeeper] around a bit.”

“I can’t beat Erin in anything. Maybe magic, but she’s too…oh.”

Ulvama stared at the long-stemmed pipe and held it in her hands. It was newly-carved and varnished; Fraerlings worked incredibly fast when they wanted to. But they weren’t prepared for tears to leak from her eyes.

Instantly, everyone rounded on Bowom. Not because it was his fault, but because he was the bastard who could stride over.

“Hmm, well, I’m not tearing up myself, but that’s smokeless tobacco for you. Insidious. It’s not even enchanted. I’d shed half a tear and move on with a firm handshake and ‘thank you’.”

The [Summoner] kicked at him, but Ulvama stopped sniffing and turned.

“Thank you. It—I’m not sad because—it just reminds me of being small. Being home. I lost everything from my first tribe.”

Which, of course, begged the question—what had she lost?

The [Summoner] cleared her throat tactfully. There was a Battle of the Bands tonight, after all. Plenty of time to dress up.

“And you’re leaving the city. With respect to fashion, that clothing isn’t going to stand up to any hits. Don’t you have any armor?”

Bowom had seen the rather revealing clothing that exposed almost all the skin Ulvama had. Practical if you dealt in magical paint. He was going to mention that when Ulvama blinked and looked down at the pipe in her hands.

“Normally, I just uncover since magical paint is better. But…but…when I was in the Molten Stone tribe, I had a mask. It broke the month I left the tribe. And armor. I remember they had armor you could put paint on. Made of natural materials.”

“Ah, you’re speaking my language. No metal, yes?”

The [Druid] knew what she was talking about, and Ulvama glanced around hesitantly.

“Yes. Maybe I could make some if I’m here? I can pay…”

She was surrounded by high-level spellcasters who assured her this was not a thing they cared about. So Ulvama laid out a concept with flicks of her fingers that conjured illusions, and Bowom blinked.

“Oh my.”

“Fascinating. I know this [Costumer] who does wonderful work—she’s sewing for the musicians. I could nip down and bug her. Hey, you know, I think there’s some spiders that would do really well with this armor.”

Ulvama didn’t even blink at the suggestion of spider-based armor. As for the mask, two [Wizards] were already arguing with an [Enchanter] over where to find the right wood or bark to make it happen.

“Don’t forget to make a few for us! I want to decorate one myself!”

Like that, the Hobgoblin found a costume of her own being put together, but she walked back to the center of the little ritual space she’d set up. It was just a few incense burners and a simple pentagram without any magic involved.

It confuzzled the magicians as Ulvama sat cross-legged.

“Some kind of ritual magic, Miss Ulvama? If you need boosting or linking to enhance the effects…”

She smiled at the polite [Alchimagus] and shook her head.

“This is only for Goblins, [Alchimagus]. It…it’s not even magic, really. Just the power of [Shamans].”

So saying, she lit the burners and inhaled the Dreamleaf and other substances she’d mixed together. It wasn’t a powerful high, and nor were the hallucinogenics strong, much to the disappointment of the [High Mage].

The power of Dreamleaf was to soothe and, of course, to enhance dreams. Both waking and slumbering. Ulvama had known of this power since she was a girl along with so many things Anazurhe and her teachers had taught her. But…she had never done this once in her life.

She’d been too afraid to. Yet now, as she met Bowom’s eyes, she knew that she had to do it.

Unlike Erin, she had no [Pavilion of Secrets]. No one to talk to who understood Ulvama. Even if she had gotten Erin to lend her the Skill—who could she talk to? Another Goblin? Rags, Calescent, the living Goblins had so few connections to her.

There were only two Goblins who had known her previous lives well.

Tremborag of the Mountain City tribe, and Pyrite, who had always been a tribe of his own.

They were dead. She was no [Soul Summoning Shaman], and that would be a painful conversation. So, Ulvama closed her eyes as the Dreamleaf swept around her and used the power innate to all Goblins, but gifted to [Shamans]:

Memory. The ability to peer back in time. For information, techniques, bravery. But she used it in a way that Rags had never dreamed of.

The mortal world vanished, and Ulvama closed her eyes. When she opened them…

——

…a little Goblin wearing a mask with huge spider fangs in purple was tilting her head at Ulvama. The [Shaman] nearly jumped back, but the Goblin just crabbed forwards, nimble, sure of herself, and spoke.

“You is fat. What happen? Fat is slow. Why I get big fat Hob? Tall not worth it.”

She spoke in a chattering, fast dialect native to the tribes around the Molten Stone’s volcano without any of the deliberate diction or nuanced vocabulary Anazurhe kept trying to teach her. Ulvama stared, and her heart…oh, it hurt terribly.

“Hello, me.”

A ten year-old Ulvama scuttled around her older self as Ulvama’s eyes stung. She wiped at them, then yelped as a little clawed finger poked her hard, then retreated.

“Now you cry. Is waste of good water. You bad.”

“A lot’s happened. I…I wanted to speak to you. For wisdom. Because I’m having trouble.”

“Oh? With what? Big monster? You leading huge tribe?”

The younger Ulvama sat up, excited, and the older one stared at her. Yes, life had been so simple back then. She shook her head.

“No. A…a friend. A Human one. We were fighting.”

The young Ulvama stopped bouncing up and down. She lifted her mask slightly, exposing a smaller face, sharp teeth, and a ‘huh’ expression written all over her face. She was ten, which was old for a Goblin by many tribes’ standards. But not if they were allowed to have childhoods.

“…You ask me for advice with Ritual of Memory’s Self because you have fight with Human friend?”

“Yes, her name’s Erin and—bweh!”

Ulvama ate a rolling axe-kick from young-Ulvama. Straight to the nose. It hurt. She’d had no idea that your memory-selves could inflict damage! But she was talking to a [Shaman]!

“You stupid! You weak! You fat! Is this get old? I waking up and not being a [Shaman]! I being a [Witch] or [Warrior]! This the wrong future! Glad I found out!”

Young Ulvama hammered on the older Ulvama, punching and biting as the older one tried to get her off. It hurt! She started getting angry and hoped this damage wasn’t actually being inflicted on her body. Then the little monster bit her on the arm!

——

Bowom had been disappointed when they didn’t see anything happening and none of the [Mages] could find out what Ulvama was seeing.

He’d been about to start annoying the healer or the others when Ulvama began shouting and flailing in the middle of the ritual circle. Bowom beamed.

“They never let me down. Popcorn, anyone? Let’s see that armor, by the way. And I could use a mask! Something culturally insensitive.”

“What’s culturally insensitive to a Goblin?”

“Um…a Human’s face?”

“Ooh, I like that.”

——

Ulvama finally grabbed her little self by the leg. She still kept getting hit; the young [Shaman]-in-training was a whirlwind of martial arts blows and techniques she was being taught. All talent. All potential. Thinking she was the greatest thing in the world and that her tribe was the best in Izril.

The Hobgoblin wished she could go back so badly it hurt. But she snarled at Young-Ulvama.

“Listen, you brat. I’ll beat you like a bloated rat if you keep hitting me. Make me really mad and I’ll hit you so hard I develop a scar.”

The little demon stopped fighting her and hung there until Ulvama let her drop, then she sat, slightly respectful.

“That a good threat. Why you talk with non-Goblin words?”

“I’m…not around Goblins that much. I lost my tribe. My only friend is…Erin. Well, I have lots, but she’s the only one from Izril.”

“Oh, you left Izril! It fun?”

“Not…really? Some of it. The Fraerlings—”

“Eeeeeeeeeeee! You met Fraerlings!”

Then the little Goblin was agog with questions, asking all kinds of things, and Ulvama had to tell her a story. Exasperated after forty minutes, she realized she was getting nowhere.

What had she come here for? Just the pain of seeing the Young Ulvama smiling? Ulvama snapped.

“—And now we’re fighting. I came here and performed the ritual because…because there’s no one else to talk to who knows me. I came to you for wisdom.”

Clearly a mistake. The younger Goblin was rolling around Ulvama while cross-legged, too impatient to sit still. She rolled onto her back and stared at Ulvama, upside-down, seriously.

“You wise because I wise, old-me. I am young [Shaman], but I give wisdom! I think you should make up with weird scary awesome Human. There. Now tell me about cute hamster again.”

Ulvama slapped her face with a claw.

“I’m being serious, idiot!”

“Is am me too! You make up, all better.”

“It’s not that…easy. She said hurtful things. And I hurt her too. I’m afraid she’s going to kill herself.”

The little Goblin smiled at Ulvama.

“But she is best friend, yes?”

“Yes. I don’t know if that’s enough, though.”

“So? Who cares? You have Human friend! That amazing! Why you so sad? Why…what make you so sad?”

The young [Shaman] grew confused, then, genuinely. And Ulvama closed her eyes, and the Dreamleaf hanging around them like fog rippled.

“Thank you for your wisdom, myself. And…what changed? I suppose she would know.”

She called the second of her lives to her. This one she feared even more than the little Goblin whose beautiful innocence was a scar on her memory.

Only, the second Ulvama, Ulvama of the Mountain City tribe, did not appear before the older [Shaman] at once. Instead, a different memory played itself.

——

A Hobgoblin with an aura like war itself walked into the Mountain City tribe a week after the Goblin King died. He bore only a single blade on his back—a greatsword—and despite their numbers, despite their bravado and youth—not a single Goblin could meet his eyes.

Greydath of Blades made the [Shaman] hiding behind Tremborag shiver as the Great Chieftain rose. Tremborag feared Greydath, but there was also, the older Ulvama realized, a true and genuine distrust there. A contempt for what he thought the Goblin Lord was.

“So. You live, Goblin Lord of Blades.”

“Yes. I do not come here for succor, Tremborag. Merely to rest a day.”

The two spoke in Goblin, but Greydath’s voice contained eloquence far beyond even Anazurhe’s tribe. Tremborag glared as he sat himself, heavyset, unable to maintain his Fomirelin form.

“You live while the Goblin King and every single Goblin Lord with him dies. Why?”

“They would not run. They were drawn in by his madness or loyalty to Velan. Someone must wait for the next King.”

“Again and again. You’ve killed enough for other species to hunt us for a century. Leave quickly, Greydath of Blades.”

The two clashed with words, but Tremborag was no match for Greydath; even with his aura suppressed, Goblins were fainting. It sounded like he had brought the war with him. As if the beating of drums were his heart. His footfalls the march of legions.

He rested a day and left and only went to one [Shaman]’s abode to seek her magic. It was flattering, but mostly terrifying to Ulvama, the newly-inducted [Shaman].

Ulvama, watching Greydath now, saw how tired he looked. How much of his aura was a façade to scare the other Goblins. She remembered this. What he said next—

“Do you have a tonic to grow hair?”

“H-hair? Yes, I have…you, eh, you need it?”

Ulvama of the Mountain City Tribe had stared at Greydath’s hairline and had wondered if the mightiest Goblin Lord in the way of the sword was going bald. Not all Goblins had hair on their heads, though they had pubic and other hair just like Humans or other humanoid species. She’d thought she’d acquired some secret about him. When in reality…

“Ah. So that’s why you did it.”

The older Ulvama saw Greydath pocket the hair tonic and leave. Then the memory fast-forwarded to show her an old, senile Goblin with a grey beard laughing and dicing among the Goblins.

He looked half Greydath’s height and scrawny, and he was so jovially pathetic that Tremborag never glanced at him. Nor did the [Shaman].

So that was when Greydath had lain in wait in the likeliest tribe to bring word of a new, rising Goblin. Ulvama would have called it embarrassing, but the transformation was too good. No one would have thought Greydath an actor of that level.

She was about to break out of the memory when the [Shaman] strutting along with a bevy of her followers turned and walked out of her own memory.

Mountain City Ulvama was not the innocent, cheerful Goblin. She had power. Control. Experience—but she was like an open wound, guarded, suspicious. Even here.

“I have something else to show you.”

So saying, she took Ulvama’s hand and—

——

He was always the same Goblin too. But he’d not always been so round. In fact, the first time they’d met, the young Hob had been rather fit.

Ulvama, a fourteen year-old Goblin acting as a [Shaman] for the Dirtdagger tribe, had no real standing. Neither did he. Goblin tribes had been meeting to share resources and threats, and he had squatted down to watch her mixing paint as Anazurhe had once taught her.

After thirty minutes of watching, she’d snapped at him to either go away or bring her something useful. Whereupon he’d left for an hour and come back with some chalk.

That was how she met Pyrite. Even then, he was curious. And she was arrogant.

“I am [Shaman] of the Molten Stone tribe! You show me respect! You a no-name Goblin, yes?”

He nodded agreeably even though the truth was that she’d wandered too far from her home, run afoul of some Humans, and fallen in with a local Goblin tribe to survive. She still had the idea of going back to Anazurhe’s tribe to impress the Great Witch with a promising new tribe and get more training and equipment—but the Molten Stone tribe was far away, and she was needed here. Most Goblins had no idea of, well, anything. They lived and died like mayflies.

Pyrite was just one more of them, but he scratched at his stomach and grunted.

“No name Goblin. But I practice. Not very good, but I practice.”

“Practice. What you do that important?”

“Kill Gold-rank adventurer. Chieftain say I second-in-command.”

She paused, open-mouthed. 

“You practice and do that? How?”

He shrugged.

“Saw old Goblin swing a sword. Copy. Not very good, but it work sort of. Not very. Not very smart.”

He tapped his head, then asked her how magic was done and seemed disappointed to know how much magic was required instead of knowhow. That was the first time he saw her.

In the two years after that, Ulvama saw Pyrite several times and, once, in the company of an old Goblin, some wanderer who’d been showing him how to swing that sword. Encouraging him to start his own tribe.

“Even then, he had his eyes on Pyrite. But Pyrite didn’t think he was important.”

The [Shaman] in the memories nodded. Her face scrunched up with pain as they both knew what was coming next.

“Watch.”

——

The Humans were drunk again. Coming back from the fields, and she knew what that meant. The Goblin had been hiding in a corner of the basement, trying to saw at the iron chains on her legs. She kept staring at the tiny, tiny hole in the ceiling.

Too small for her to wiggle out of, even if she weren’t a Hobgoblin. She waited as the voices grew louder, and the little bit of magic she had left went to a single word that she wrote in the air and sent out of the basement they were keeping her in.

‘Help.’

Help hadn’t come. But if she believed it might, she could survive another day. Until they got tired of her or thought she was bearing a child. That’s when they’d kill a Goblin. She wasn’t sure if she was waiting for that.

The older Ulvama couldn’t look, but the younger one, re-living her memories, just raised her head.

“It wasn’t him.”

When the laughter and creak of floorboards turned to shouts of alarm, then cries of fear—hatred—and then pain, the Goblin woman sat up. If it was a monster—

Then she felt it. A wrathful flame blooming overhead, and she screamed for help. Screamed until the very foundations gave way and the massive Goblin, covered in the blood of her captors, crashed downwards.

His eyes were crimson, and steam was rising from his body as he grinned. For a moment, she thought it was the Goblin King himself. 

That was how she met Tremborag of the mountains. He tore the chains loose, and his tribe ransacked the farming village as she watched, numb. Not sure if she was alive.

“Join my tribe. Hurt them back. See?”

He pointed a finger and showed her how it should be done, and she heard Humans screaming as Goblins captured them. There was still a part of Ulvama who shuddered, who wanted to…

She followed the Goblin Chieftain to his mountain.

Ulvama was shaking. She looked away, but that was not what the memory was trying to show her. The naked [Shaman] turned.

“Look.”

——

When the new [Shaman] ran into one of Tremborag’s officers who’d survived a bloody brawl and come to her for treatment, she screamed and then hugged him. Which only made Pyrite’s bleeding worse. He grunted as she fished for a healing potion and poultice.

“What happened, stupid? How you get hurt?”

“Fight.”

He was heavier, with both muscle and fat, and poked in dismay at his belly wound.

“Need more fat. All muscle gets too hungry. Not enough armor.”

“Or get actual armor, dummy. What you doing here?”

He shrugged.

“Goblins get hunted after Goblin King dies. Have to hide.”

“Oh. My tribe died, and I—they capture me. But I get free.”

She looked away from him, then stood straighter, trying to smile. More than one of the Mountain City Goblins had been rescued like that. She was important, the 2nd-best [Shaman], and she was making allies. Tremborag liked her more than the old, male Goblin who was the chief [Shaman]. Soon—

Pyrite didn’t make a sound as she stitched up the wound she’d daubed the healing mixture onto.

“I know. Your tribe—we looked for you. Couldn’t find you. Sorry.”

“Oh.”

How much had he searched, she wondered? He had more scars. A lot more. But he hadn’t found her. Tremborag had. But for that…

The two sat in silence until Pyrite smiled.

“I meet funny Goblin here. Old man. Greybeard.”

“Eh. Same old Goblin teaching you sword? When he get beard? You not need him. Talk to Goblins I know. Very important. Must know right Goblins.”

“I do know right Goblin. He old.”

Pyrite protested in that contrary way of his as she scolded him and began to tell him how things worked. And perhaps, even then, he had known who Greydath was. But refused to answer the Goblin Lord’s demands. Perhaps he hadn’t thought he was worthy or ready.

Or maybe—the [Shaman] in the memories stumbled, and they shared a thought.

Perhaps it was what came next.

——

The last time Ulvama ever cleaned Pyrite’s wounds, it was after whispering in the ear of the two big Hobs clad in plate armor. She slipped into the jail cell, and he lowered the manacles on his wrists.

“Idiot!”

She rushed over; Pyrite’s nose was broken and a number of bones. He was a mess. She began to set what she could as he muttered.

“Not good. He’ll notice.”

“I’m his best [Shaman]. I’m fine. You’re the fool. You should never have challenged him.”

She spoke like a Human in the Mountain City tribe that aspired to humanity in all of its worst ways. Especially the worst. Pyrite grunted as she snapped a bone into place.

“Had to.”

Tremborag had never lost a challenge for his seat as Great Chieftain. Pyrite…he just lay there as she tended to him.

“I’m leaving, Ulvama.”

“Yah, you are. Those two idiots will fall asleep soon. You get out. No one sees you. And if they see you, they don’t see you or they get cursed.”

He glanced at her, surprised.

“Can you put the guards to sleep in the cells?”

“Are you mad?”

He exhaled and shook his head.

“Too much attention. I shouldn’t have mentioned them.”

He wanted to free the prisoners. Ulvama slapped his arm and glared at him, but Pyrite was just staring ahead.

“I’m leaving, Ulvama. I cannot be here. Cannot stop it. So—leaving. Starting my own tribe.”

“And doing what?”

“Don’t know. Mining, maybe. I like shiny rocks.”

“You idiot. You were important here.”

“Hurts heart too much. You come with me?”

He turned to her, and she hesitated, drew back, affronted.

“Me? Go with you to stupid new tribe? This is the biggest tribe in the north! Why…why would I leave?”

“Because you want to.”

Ulvama whispered as she watched her younger self hesitate, and a grimace of regret stole over her memory’s face. But Pyrite didn’t push. He never did.

She wished he had. If he had said ‘I need you’, just once…but he didn’t think like that. She was more important than he was, a nobody Goblin.

So he left. The next time they saw each other, they were at odds. And he had a new, young Goblin genius he was following, and she was angry and jealous and…

They never had that final conversation. Just two weary Goblins marching to escape Lord Tyrion’s army, trading glances, hoping their tribes survived.

That was how the second Ulvama walked forwards and stood in front of her. Ulvama of the Mountain City Tribe pointed at the silent Goblin rising from his cell.

“He was the only one who knew both my lives. I have made many mistakes. A Human? I used to want to meet them. Am I a fool?”

To that, Ulvama could only say:

“I don’t know.”

——

This time, she showed her past self the ship. The moment when she had chosen to go after Erin. And the Mountain City Ulvama was silent.

“She’s Human. You can’t trust her.”

“I didn’t trust Mountain City Goblins either. I didn’t trust anyone—but I couldn’t trust them. Tremborag took his revenge, and he made us just like our captors.”

The younger Ulvama turned her head away. The current Ulvama called out.

“I am guilty. It weighs on me more than anything else.”

“…Doesn’t matter.”

“It does! It does, or why did you never take part? Why did Pyrite care if it didn’t matter?”

Mountain City Ulvama hunched over and then sat, re-painting her arms. Tying her hair back, flaunting the beauty and every trick she had. Not like the young [Shaman] who ran around happily unserious. She eyed her older self critically.

“Soft.”

“That’s what younger-me said. I’m higher-level than you. I know more tricks.”

Mountain City Ulvama pointed, accusatory.

“No. I mean soft in being safe. You trust her too much. That woman is another Tremborag. When she gets tired of you, bring her back. Entice her. Be careful or she’ll take everything.”

“That’s not Erin.”

“That’s everyone.”

“Not Pyrite.”

Mountain City Ulvama turned her head away, crossing her arms.

“…He’s different.”

“How?”

“He’s…he was…stupid. Didn’t care about enough, including himself. That’s why he died. You want to die?”

The Ulvama of now bowed her head. She sat there, trembling, and then looked up.

“No. But I’m tired of having no one I trust at all. You know everything that has happened to me. What would you do?”

The Hobgoblin in the prime of her life eyed her older self, then gazed down at her hands. And she spoke with a sudden flash of honesty.

“I am unhappy. Bitterly unhappy. I will never trust again, I say. I will never love again, I say. I will never be happy again. I will never know true innocence or joy again. I will never feel safe again. Has…any of that changed?”

She peered at her current self longingly, and Ulvama stared back through her own memories.

“Today…I feel safe. I am not always. I am in danger again, sometimes. I cannot trust everyone. Nor am I always happy. But I saw lanterns flying in a festival, and I have friends. I—I am afraid of the future.”

“So don’t go.”

Another simple answer, but now, the Ulvama of the present was crying again. She wiped at her crimson eyes as the Mountain City [Shaman] watched her.

“I am afraid that if I don’t try, if I sit here forever, then I will never be happy. I could stay, but then I will be right here again.”

Sitting in the Mountain City tribe. The younger [Shaman] nodded slowly. She inspected her older self, then closed her eyes. When she stood, she was in the memory again, and Pyrite grunted as she helped him up.

“I’ll go with you. I cannot stay here either. I would rather leave than spend forever here.”

That was what the younger Hobgoblin said. She glanced back once and raised a hand. And her other self, surrounded by the fog of memory, wept.

Wept for a door that would never open. A time that never was.

When she opened her eyes—she was calm.

——

“Ulvama? Did you find what you needed?”

“Maybe.”

She smiled at Bowom, and that was the last time he ever saw her.

…For the evening, that was. Because she put the carved mask on her face, adjusted it, then had a [Woodworker] help her adjust and contour the mask. Changed the look of some of the paint, then exclaimed over the armor.

They had found a bunch of raw materials for Ulvama, but rather to everyone’s surprise, she didn’t ask for a more…revealing set of armor like some expected and, perhaps, hoped for.

Instead, the spider chitin set was, while lightweight, completely covering her skin, spiderweb clinging to the armpits and joints for padding. When Ulvama added on her magical paints to the armor, as if it were her skin, she resembled some wild creature herself, a spider with fantastical markings.

In fact—she even demonstrated a very creepy spider-scuttle while crouched over. She poked her head around a corner, peeking at the bemused Bowom. Then did a zig-zag dash after the [Summoner] who, it turned out, was arachnophobic.

“Gaaaah! What, did you unlock your previous life as a spider?”

“No. Just Molten Stone moves. Argh! My back!”

Ulvama held her lower back, which, it turned out, could not keep up with a Goblin a third of her age in terms of flexibility or energy. She needed to get back to her daily dancing and stretching. Bowom grinned as he came over.

“So that’s the battle armor you want to wear for tonight?”

The woman peered at herself in the mirror and saw a completely-covered Hobgoblin, who showed not an inch of flesh, wearing a mask from which only two crimson eyes shone. Hiding her.

She smiled at herself.

“Yah. This is what I want to wear.”

“What a tragedy for everyday life, then. You must have been entirely uncomfortable until now.”

His casual remark made all the Fraerlings turn to Bowom, then Ulvama. She lifted her mask up slightly so he could see her bared teeth.

“Maybe I was. But I trust you all, so I don’t need to look so good. Is…do you think Erin will be at the concert? Or is she still mad?”

Bowom glanced at the [Costumer], who was vibrating with the desire to speak, but three Fraerlings had a hand over her mouth. He casually flipped a scalpel in one hand.

“I think we’ll find a moment for you two.”

“Thanks, Bowom.”

She hugged him, and the [Mad Doctor] swept an arm out.

“Well, on with the show! Everyone used the bathroom? I don’t want any interruptions!”

“Oh! Good idea!”

Ulvama scrambled towards an unroofed bathroom, then pressed her gloves to the wall and climbed over it like, well, a spider. There was a scream from inside, and Bowom beamed as he palmed a delayed-action sleeping tonic into a bowl of punch. He began pouring everyone glasses.

“This should be good. To disaster or triumph tonight. Cheers!”

Author’s Note:

Fear not. This chapter is but the first of two. Due to the length of this chapter, I have split it into two parts and am releasing both for Public and Patreon users as the New Year’s/Christmas gift.

There is much to say, but I have left a longer Author’s Note in the next chapter. For now, I will just express this:

Profound gratitude towards beta-readers, my audience, my agent, producer, the webcomic team, artists of fanart, family, and everyone else for this year. It’s been hectic, frantic, and stressful at times, but the story always keeps coming out, and I appreciate it.

Also, I ate a linguini pesto tonight at some fancy restaurant and had a drink or two, so I’m convivial as I post this. Your word for today, incidentally, is ‘mirmilin’. In Goblin, it means ‘Shaman’, but the root words are, I believe, ‘mir’ as in ‘memory’, and ‘milin’ as in the verb ‘keep’ or holding onto. Because a shaman is literally ‘one who holds memory’.

Goblin, like other languages, well High Goblin technically, is a complex language. I don’t speak it or have a language-teaching app, but I should…all I know is ‘es’ for ‘her’ and stuff like ‘ehivu’ means heart. Anyways, that’s all from me, I’m rambling, and this is unimportant.

The second part awaits, and it’s filled with all the things that I hope you enjoy.

Previous Chapter Next Chapter