"Arius," the golden man cried, "I need your help with something!" He darted into Arius's house to let his eyes fall upon the scene inside.

Arius remained silent and unmoving, his eyes fixated on his untouched food. Evalaite sat at the table beside him so that her hips twisted right next to his plate. It looked like she was trying to feed him now, but she set down the fork at the newcomer.

"Ludo," Evalaite said, exasperated, "you came at a good time!"

While Val had not recognized him, she knew the name. The golden god was Ludovico, god of life and medicine. Gaping at Evalaite, he snapped, "Who in the Nether are you?"

"I'm… friends with Arius." Her long pause and pinched eyes clearly indicated that they were more than friends, never mind her revealing dress or the way that she had been sitting on his table right in front of him.

"That's nice," he spit. "I'm here to talk to Arius." Moving to his side, his words rambled out in a frenzy.

"I know that you have just finished your campaign against the Sea Itself, but this is urgent! Someone has broken into my lab and stolen every last one of my life elixirs. I have not run any scans for hair or skin cells yet, but once I do, I will have a perpetrator for you. Please, can you help me?" Ludovico looked on with expecting eyes.

When Arius did not reply, he bent down to examine him closer. "Arius?"

There, he could see his darkened, red eyes.

Evalaite swung around to stand up. Joining at Ludovico's side, she tapped at his shoulder. With a grim frown, she shook her head and motioned him to follow her outside. She trod carefully over the glass shards, but she did not have to lead Ludovico all the way back.

"Rakurruankathor!" Ludovico shouted and took up a sprint at once. He came to a halt and stood at the dead dragon's nose. Slowly, he stated, "He tested all of my life elixirs… at once… on a dragon." His fingers pinched to his brow and rubbed at the tension there. "Sometimes I really hate this boy."

Evalaite had crossed the hazardous ground and arrived to stand beside him by now. "He has been… distraught like this ever since he discovered that Urru has passed away."

A pause fell between them until Ludovico asked, "Has he spoken a word at all, since this has happened?"

"No," Evalaite said slowly, "not to me anyway." Worry crossed her own face, probably because this threw some sort of wrench in her plans.

A tight grimace crossed Ludovico's lips. "How close are you with Arius, if you do not mind me asking?"

"He loves me very dearly," she said in a whisper, "but he is scared of anyone knowing about me. Even so, I know how important you are to him, Ludo. It is entirely safe to tell you about our relationship, but I just think that Arius has been worried about the wrong people finding out.."

"That sounds typical of him," Ludovico said with a mutter. "I suppose this is what I get for not checking in on him recently."

It was scary how Evalaite could spin lies to someone who supposedly knew Arius well when she had not even known him for a day. Definitely, she was not a woman to be underestimated.

"Has Arius told you much about his past?" Ludovico asked.

"No," Evalaite hummed, "not particularly. I know that he had a difficult time growing up, and his father troubles him. Aside from that, I am afraid that I do not know any of the details. I never wanted to press him on the issue."

Ludovico glanced around as if conflicted by what he should say. "Well, he had a very troubled childhood as you have gathered. I will not divulge his life story, but when he came to me, he was…. How should I say it?" After a pause, Ludovico had decided upon a word. "Mute."

Continuing, he said, "He would only speak to Urru in the Fire Tongue for a long time. Sometimes we could get him to say a few words in Marivanch if we really needed him too, but really, Urru was the only one that he would talk to willingly. It was Urru's presence in his life that had pulled him out of that. Alas, not much has sizably changed in his life since then, so I am afraid that he might rebound back to that state, or worse."

The corner of Evalaite's lips twitched, most likely resisting the smile that wanted to crawl up her face.

Before, Val had been thinking that this might mess with her plans, but on second thought, Val imagined that this would be even better for Evalaite. She had dug her nails into Arius's mind at the perfect timing for him to have a crisis in his life. While he was already destabilized mentally, his brain would be putty for Evalaite to mold.

On the contrary, Arius had pulled himself together enough to walk outside. Staggering out of his house, he looked like a zombie. No emotions crossed his face as his boots crunched over glass. Not only had he gotten up by himself, but he could also speak. "You don't have to worry about me, Ludo. I'm not a kid anymore. I'm going to search for Urru's sprite."

Ludovico bowed his head low. "It will be a hard task, but I am glad that you have the motivation to do something."

Looking around, Arius just seemed to remember that he had a very underdressed demigoddess here. "Oh, and this is Evalaite. She needs help getting situated on the Summit, if you would help her in my absence." Arius did not ask Ludovico for a favor, he simply stated what he wanted from him.

Personally, Val could not imagine how he could introduce her without an ounce of shame. Maybe he made a frequent habit of keeping sexualized women in his company. It was true that Arius could probably do just about anything that he wanted with almost any woman in the world, between his looks and his status.

While Arius turned away, Ludovico barked at him before he could leave them there. "Arius, you need to take us back to the capital, if you want me to help her!"

"Oh, that's right." Definitely out of sorts, Arius had been ready to abandon them both on the mountainside. Though Ludovico could turn into a bird and fly off, that would have left Evalaite here.

Arius grabbed onto both an arm from Evalaite and Ludovico, and then he took off with them into the sky. The red ray widened to include all of them, so his guests appeared to fly comfortably alongside him aside from the vice-like grip that he had locked around their elbows.

"I suppose this is what I get for coming to you for help," Ludovico groaned at Arius. "I don't believe that I caught your name, miss."

"My name is Evalaite," she said with a golden smile.

Arius let them make small talk across him while he stayed silent the entire time. Then, the walls of the vast city came into sight once more, and Arius landed outside of the building that he had broken into previously.

To Ludovico, he asked, "Could you also let Suvier know that I will be gone, too?"

A hand slapped across Ludovico's face and drew downwards. "You really are throwing all of your problems onto me, you realize that Arius?"

"Thanks, Ludo."

Val would laugh at that, seeing just how brazen Arius could behave towards others. Something told her that if he were not both Suvier's son and insanely powerful at the same time, he would not get away with treating any other gods like this.

Again, he turned to go.

"Don't you think that you should have a plan if you are going to track down a dragon sprite, first?" Ludovico asked, rushing to stop Arius.

He glared back at him with those reddened eyes. "My plan is to scour every inch of the land until I find him. I will find Urru's sprite." Arius threw Ludovico off of him and looked up to the sky once more. Yet again, he was interrupted before he could shoot himself into the air.

"Arius, wait," Evalaite sang. Now, it was her turn to run up to him, except she threw herself into his arms. "Will I see you again once you are back?"

He let her kiss him, slow and gentle. Arius still seemed too out of sorts to return any of her affections, but he said, "Yeah. I will see you later."

With that, Arius jumped back into the sky, becoming nothing but a hazy red blur against the clouds. Since she had received conclusion to that section of the past, Val terminated her vision with a note of finality.

She lay there completely still, trying to let everything that she had just seen absorb into her mind. In a way, her head spun around at just how messy their lives had been back then, and still were now. The aftermath of that battle between Tavras and Arius left her with an empty, numb feeling.

A physical warmth brought her back to full awareness. Foofy was there, curled in her arms so that he sent a nice heat along the front of her body.

"You are such a good boy." Val clutched her Dobie closer to her chest, and buried her cheeks against his short fur. As hard as it had been to watch a god lose his dragon companion, she knew that she had nothing to worry about. Val would never lose Foofy in the same way that Arius had lost Urru.

Exhausted from the long vision, Val gave into sleep.