The cloud palace was not only the largest magic construction in Greenstone but also the most sophisticated. This was demonstrable in ways large and small, from its ability to take multiple forms to the amenities incorporated throughout the structure.

In Belinda and Sophie’s guest suite, there were several cooler cabinets, each with a front of translucent mist. Belinda went to the one specifically for non-alcoholic beverages and reached directly through the veil, her hand feeling the chill. She retrieved a frosty pitcher of fruit punch and took it back to the terrace table where she and Sophie had been spending their idle days.

“This is so strange,” she said, sitting down in a meltingly soft patio chair made of blue and white mist. “Did you ever expect to experience something like this?”

“No,” Sophie said, taking the pitcher and pouring out drinks into crystal tumblers. “It scares me.”

“You’re wondering that if it’s this good now, how wrong will it go later?”

“I am. I don’t know what game Asano is playing or how he intends to use us.”

“It can’t be worse than handing us over to Silva or that Magic Society guy,” Belinda said. “Look around. The director of the Adventure Society doesn’t dare come get us. If this is the company Asano is keeping, what does he care about Silva or even the local Magic Society? What would he possibly need us for?”

“Lots of things. None of which are good for us.”

“Jory thinks Asano is doing this to help us,” Belinda said.

“You don’t seriously believe that?”

“I believe that he believes it. So does Clive.”

After Asano and Bahadir departed, Clive had periodically appeared to visit Belinda, the two spending hours going over the various tools and tricks she employed in her career as a professional thief. They also toured the cloud palace and its myriad wonders. The palace was enormous, with multiple wings in all directions, connected to a central building by cloud pathways. The palace was unaffected by floating on the exposed water, with neither wind nor wave causing so much as a shudder.

There were dining rooms, ballrooms, bedrooms, bathrooms, ritual rooms, parlours, terraces, kitchens, studies, training halls, libraries, art galleries, it just went on and on. In the lowest levels, below the waterline, there were lounges with walls of translucent mist, allowing occupants to see out into the water. Very few places seemed out of bounds, with the major exception being Bahadir’s personal suite. It occupied the top four floors of the central building but almost all other areas were open to them. The other restricted areas were secure rooms containing various valuables. The two thieves naturally thought of robbing the place but were not foolish enough to try.

Experimentally, they went to the cloud path that led to the shore. None of the people  Emir left behind attempted to stop the two women as they stood just inside the palace, looking out. The bridge to the shore was anchored directly in front of the Adventure Society reception building, beyond which were gardened paths leading deeper into the campus.

“I really don’t think they’ll try to stop us leaving,” Belinda said.

“They don’t need to,” Sophie said. “Do you really think we’d get out of the Adventure Society grounds without being snatched up?”

Rufus held out his glass.

“To Farrah.”

Gary and Jason touched their glasses to his and they drank. The trio was in an open-air bar in one of the wealthier parts of the city of Boko. It had been a day and a half since they arrived and they had been exploring the city. It wasn’t a port city like Greenstone, or as large. As such, the population wasn’t as diverse, being made up almost entirely of humans. They were very dark-skinned, like the Ustei, but the cultures were clearly very different. The hairstyles in Boko weren’t wild and crazy, and the clothes weren’t a patchwork mess. The local fashion was loose and breathable, like that of Greenstone, but in more subdued colours. Earthy browns, yellows and reds dominated, compared to the kaleidoscope colours the Greenstone populace preferred.

Gary and Rufus shared more stories about Farrah, while Jason brought them up to speed on his activities in their absence.

“You want to make this thief girl an adventurer?” Rufus asked. “What was her name again?”

“Sophie Wexler. She’s a celestine, no family ties in Greenstone, from what little I was able to get out of her.”

“It’s a creative solution,” Rufus said. “At the very least it would prevent her from being quietly handed off to Lamprey in some backroom political deal. The Society would never allow that for a member.”

“Lamprey’s fixation on her is the key,” Jason said. “It’s the lever Arella is tugging on. If we can definitively remove Wexler from Lamprey’s reach, that lever goes away. Her political value vanishes and she goes back to being just some woman from Old City.”

“The problem is her fugitive status,” Rufus said. “Until that gets resolved, you won’t be able to get her Adventure Society membership.”

“What if we did it here?” Gary asked. “She’s not a fugitive here in Boko, and they have an Adventure Society branch.”

“I thought about that,” Jason said. “There’s too much chance of Arella finding out and interfering. One communication to the branch director here and everything comes unravelled.”

“Then what’s the plan?” Rufus asked.

“The key is the service agreement between the Adventure Society and Greenstone,” Jason said. “The right to her indenture is clearly mine. So long as the Adventure Society legal advocate doesn’t roll over, there won’t be an issue. Which means we either need leverage on the advocate, or leverage on Arella.”

“The thing with her father being a crime lord isn’t enough?” Gary asked.

“I very much doubt it,” Jason said. “Rising above her criminal past to become an anti-corruption crusader is a narrative she can use to her advantage. It does make it harder for her to make any blatantly corrupt moves, though.”

“You may not have to do anything,” Rufus said. “The leverage may provide itself.”

“Oh?” Jason prompted.

“The Adventure Society recognises that politicking is a required part of administering a branch, but Society interests have to be protected above all else. We just lost a whole slew of adventurer, which means the Continental Council will be raining down in full force. There will be an inquiry that holds the Greenstone Adventure Society upside down and shakes it until all the goodies come out.”

“And Arella is the one responsible for the makeup of the expedition,” Jason said, realisation dawning. “Everyone wanted in, so she let in every political rival who wanted to go along, instead of building an effective team. Still, the blame could fall in a lot of places. I’m guessing it depends on who does the blaming.”

“It will depend on who the Continental Council sends,” Rufus said.

“The expedition was a mess,” Gary said. “Surely it has to fall on Arella. We lost so many because there weren’t enough strong people to shield the weak.”

The glass in Rufus’s hand shattered, his face full of quiet but hot-burning fury.

“Farrah died covering those people,” he said. “I’m done putting up with Greenstone’s worthless adventurers. I think I’ll pay Elspeth Arella a visit myself.”

“I would hold off unless you have a goal beyond yelling at her,” Jason said. “Don’t muddy the waters unless muddy water is useful to you.”

Danielle and Emir finally declared the expedition at an end. They withdrew all their people back through the aperture, along with everything they collected. Although the cost in blood was heavy, they succeeded in their goal of finding and stopping what disrupting the astral space.

A network of astral magic nodes had affected the whole astral space. They hadn’t figured out what it was for yet, but they didn’t need to; they just needed to take it down. They did exactly that, packing away large portions in dimensional bags for study and destroying the rest.

As people and supplies were loaded onto skimmers and sand barges, Emir and Danielle were looking at an object, waiting to be packed away. It was a five-sided column, the height of a person and covered in engravings, one of many waiting to be stowed away.

“So this is what was causing all the trouble,” Emir said. “How many are we taking?”

"Our people examined them," Danielle said. "There are fifteen different types, so we're taking three of each and destroying the rest. It’s the Magic Society’s problem now.”

“It is what they do,” Emir said. “I think it’s past time I added an astral magic specialist to my team.”

The columns had been the physical medium of the astral magic. No one in the expedition could even tell if destabilisation was the goal or a side-effect. They would also be taking the remains of several construct creatures, plus one construct they had captured intact. Their purpose and origins would eventually be teased out by the Magic Society.

“What about Rufus and Asano?” Emir asked. “Any word?”

“There was some kind of altercation,” Danielle said. “Shortly after, Gary and Jason took Rufus out into the desert and didn’t come back. According to Vincent Trenslow, they were heading for the city, so you should find them there.”

The return to Greenstone was going to take two paths. The vast majority of the people and supplies would take the skimmers and barges they brought with them back overland, with Danielle in command. Emir and his people would return the extra skimmers requisitioned from the city of Boko.

“Do me a favour when you head to the Adventure Society in Boko,” Danielle asked Emir. “See if the Ustei have been causing trouble since we turned them back out where they came from.”

When he arrived in Boko, his first goal was to arrange the local Adventure Society branch to send periodic, silver-rank patrols into the astral space. Left alone, the astral space should eventually return to normal functioning, replenishing the drying oases. After that, he would return to Greenstone via portal ability. Many of the more prestigious members of the expedition petitioned to join him but were refused outright.

When the last of the gear was packed up, both groups left the aperture behind. Emir and his people had the shorter journey, arriving at Boko within the day. He organised his people to return the requisitioned skimmers and see if they could find Rufus, Jason and Gary. Emir was on his way to the Adventure Society headquarters when something strange appeared in front of him.

You have received a voice chat request from [Jason Asano]. Accept Y/N?

“What?”

Hester was the member of Emir’s staff who had opened the portal to Boko and back. She was widely travelled, which was an advantage to anyone with such a power. Portal-type abilities had several limitations, starting with destination. They could only be opened to locations that the one with the power had been before. There were also limits to who could use it, based on rank. The only reason she was able to create a portal the gold-ranked Emir could travel through was that her portal ability had reached gold rank, even though she hadn’t.

The portal she opened back to Greenstone deposited them at the Adventure Society campus, right next to the cloud palace. It was late in the afternoon and Emir led them inside where a large meal was quickly arranged. Emir’s people went about their business after that, except for Constance. She joined Emir, Jason, Gary and Rufus on a terrace. They took after-dinner drinks as they watched the sun set over the ocean.

Jason let out a loud sigh.

“I’m just now remembering the crisis I was dealing with before the other crisis,” he said. “I missed the essence and awakening stone auction. Is that mysterious thing of yours still coming up, Emir?”

“I’m going to push it back,” Emir said. “I was intending to rely on the Greenstone’s iron-rankers, but that clearly isn’t viable. The entire adventurer community here will be reeling from the results of this expedition. Even if that weren’t the case, the standards here are lower than I feared. A few stand-outs aside, the general level ability is woeful. I’m going to put out an open contract and ship more capable people in.”

“You’ll have some competition, Jason,” Gary said.

“Competition for what?” Jason asked.

“Something that will, for the moment, remain unrevealed,” Emir said. “Suffice to say, there is a place that only iron-rankers can go, in which there is a thing iron-rankers cannot use. Whoever brings that thing to me shall receive glorious prizes.”

“And this place will have essences and awakening stones?” Jason asked.

“If the conditions are what we believe, then yes.”

“Still,” Jason said, “if you’re moving it back, I’m going to need another source of essences.”

“You still want to make this thief girl an adventurer?” Emir asked.

“That, or send her so far from here it’s not worth anyone looking. Given how hard it would be to get her into the Adventure Society, that’s the direction I was leaning. That may change, depending on how much trouble Elspeth Arella is in.”

“A lot,” Emir said. “The Society doesn’t like to interfere with its branch directors but losing all those adventurers will be more than they’re willing to tolerate. Danielle Geller told me that she lodged a protest about the makeup of the expedition before it even left. That will make things all the worse for Arella. I will be astounded if she keeps her position.”

“Then I should act quickly,” Jason said. “If she has to walk the line, suddenly the rules people have been stomping over have some teeth. If I can lock in the indenture, that resolves her being a fugitive, and if I can then make her an adventurer, she’ll have the Society’s protection.”

“I’ve never heard of anyone getting their indentured servant into the Adventure Society,” Constance said. “The Society’s protection of its members would eliminate almost all control over them.”

“Jason has been making crazy choices to rescue people since literally the day we met,” Gary said. “You get used to him.”

“No you don’t,” Rufus said. “Jason, you need to work on making enemies of your own rank. You have the directors of the Adventure Society and the Magic Society after you, now.”

“Yeah,” Jason said. “But how amazing will it be when I win?”