There were and are infinite towers where Logos’ servants work. They rose like black monoliths over a field of stars, their foundations moored in rippling, mirror-clear waters that reflect the night sky above.

Emmet Hrane was among the most loyal of those servants.

A phone appeared over Emmet’s desk. It was a beetle-black old rotary phone contained in a window of blue sky. He lifted the receiver in one immaculately gloved hand and pressed it to his ears.

“Is this what happened on that planet with the ridiculous name?”

“Earth? Yes.”

Infinities away, Joyeuse Skylark held a single ornate tarot card in her hand as she reclined under a starlit sky. It was the Tower. Printed on the card’s face was the image of a small, fastidious man sitting at a mahogany desk, dressed neatly in a starched black suit. He could have been human, if he didn’t have three red eyes and small white wings that sprouted from the side of his mouth.

“Regrettable, and unexpected.” Hrane said. “I am looking now for some contrivance to punish the worm responsible.”

“What?” Skylark burst out laughing. It was a beautiful sound, like silver bells. Hrain despised it anyway- he despised all laughter. “It was magnificent. If anyone’s to blame, it’s that foolish angel, trying to put his hands on the scale like that. Really… What is that dismal Azmin girl worth anyway, when she’s failed us once already...”

“A little failure is good for the guts. It hardens the soul up nicely. She was too afraid of the Pearl’s strength to use it properly. Now that she’s experienced loss, she won’t hesitate to use it in the future.”

“Oh, is that all you care about?” Skylark teased. “If you’re going to protect the girl so heavily, take her away from Earth. We have too much going on there for you to be fussing over some nobody.”

“Miss Skylark…”

“No no, I mean it! These competitions are meant to be fair, Emmet. We already know you can’t make a champion. They have to struggle and bite and claw and live.” Her voice turned pinching and sharp. “So I’m not going to allow you to go killing off all the really interesting seeds to protect your pet, when we both know she won’t amount to anything in the end.”

“Won’t amount to-” Hrane sputtered, and stopped himself, squeezing the bridge of his nose between two fingers. “Listen to me. One more champion won’t matter. Package them up as a hero, send them off to war, we’ve seen it all as many times as there is dust in the cosmos…”

“Unlocking the secrets of the Pearl? Learning to use a hostile cultivation?” He licked his lips. “Now that’s something. That will make us both the favored children. We only have one chance, Miss Skylark. There are too few worlds left to conquer in the skies above. One chance to make our names…”

The reply was as infuriating as he feared. “Pah, did you really think a little speech was going to convince me? We’re not in control, I fear, in the way you’d want us to be. We don’t shape fate. I’m afraid my vote is going to be to sit back and let come what may.”

“And that means letting the worm off the hook?”

“Now, Emmet. I know you’re the vengeful type, but your emissary did make a promise…”

“Right before being blown up.”

“Right before being blown up.” She agreed. “But a promise is a promise.”

“So you propose amnesty?”

“I propose we honor the agreement. An artifact of equal value…” He could hear her smile over the phone. And as he realized what she meant, Emmet smiled as well, an expression so rare on his bloodless face that even his own mother had never seen it. “That could mean a lot of things.”

“Ah. Ahhh. Yes it could.” He reached out and touched a black cube on his desk. One side lit up, and information runes flowed up his finger into his hand. “There’s a very wide world of trouble out there, oh yes.”

“See? You have a wonderfully evil little mind, Emmet. Make something interesting happen. Interesting, but not lethal. He needs to be given the same chance as anyone else in this position, regardless of how irritating you might find his actions…”

“That was my best Inquisitor…” He complained, but Skylark ignored him.

“As for that tiresome girl…”

Emmet’s good mood was instantly gone. “The girl is non-negotiable. I’ll remove her from Earth until it’s time for her second match with the worm.” He snapped.

“Yes yes. So long as she’s not interrupting the food chain, I could care less. Now Emmet-”

“I prefer Mister Hrane, and you know that.” He interrupted.

“Yes, yes. Now, Mister Hrane, I bid you goodbye.”

Joyeuse Skylark flicked the card down into her deck, which instantly shuffled itself. She could feel dozens of presences within trying to contact her. Every card was a different thread in her endless web of connections and obligations.

There was only one person she wanted to talk to.

She drew the Moon card from her deck. It held the image of a full moon reflected in a lake; the moon above was proud and stern, but the moon’s reflection wept.

“Sophont 13-T2-82.”

Skylark’s voice was nothing like the pleasant, sweet songbird who’d sung to Emmet. She was stern now, as her servant’s image rose from the card.

At her words, a miniature hologram rose from the card.

“Or do you prefer Sofia, now?”

Sofia flinched. Her body was a suit of sterling silver armor carved with immense delicacy into a human form, while her face was a mask of iron that floated in a halo of blue flame. Like all Sophonts, she was stern and proud and beautiful.

Like all of Pathos’ children, she was proving to be terribly flawed.

“I report for duty, elder sister, under any name you wish to call me by.” Her holographic image knelt, pressing the knuckles of one hand to the earth.

“Good. Tell me, why is your host so…” Skylark flicked her hand. “Spiteful? He has to know he angered all sides with what he did.”

“He knows. But he feels aggrieved. The System has never offered him a home, a sense of place. He sees himself as a rebel.”

“Don’t they all? But most of our would-be firebrands know when to toe the line…”

“I’ve tried. He is…” Sofia looked up, and met the Joyeuse’s eyes for the first time. “Intractable. Stubborn beyond belief. But these don’t have to be flaws…”

“He’s survived his own poor judgement so far, yes. That does evidence his skill in some regards. I’m concerned, however, by his opportunity to turn that skill against us. So many heretics have been unleashed on that poor world by the breaking of the Inquisitor’s prison. So many voices will try to lead anyone who listens off the righteous path...”

“I know. Joyeuse, I seek your wisdom in this matter.”

“If he has a belly full of righteous anger, then let that anger lead him. The god above and the tomb below know that heretics leave corpses in their wake. Let him see with his own eyes what he’s unleashed, and when he feels sick with guilt, give him a push…”

“I…”

“That is a command. Set him on the path of slaughtering the heretics. If he does well, we might even have a new Inquisitor to replace the one we lost. That is a form of justice, no?”

“I hear and obey.” But her voice was small and tightly controlled.

“One more thing…” Skylark watched the guilt on Sofia’s face grow. “It is not beyond my notice that you, too, have deviated. Contact with the designs of that old scoundrel Lahvin have changed you, sister. Do you think you need correction?”

Sofia drew herself up. “I have been improved, elder sister. I can see things that the System cloaks in obscurity. I can act in ways that other Sophonts cannot…”

“And are not meant to.” Skylark cut in. “We are the wandering eyes of Pathos, sister. We see all, we learn from walking alongside a thousand hopefuls on the path of heavens, we return to share our wisdoms. If you deviate much further, you will not be able to commune with the whole.”

Sofia reached up, grasping her arm at the shoulder. She looked small, uncomfortable, and unsure. “I feel I have failed my past hosts. They have all died…”

“Those selected for the Sophont program are very short-lived. We choose them for their blazing flame, not their longevity. You know this.”

“My current host has the potential to be more than a curiosity. You saw what he did!” For a moment she forgot her status and spoke openly, her voice rising. “He killed an angel, an Inquisitor, and a heretic all in one blow. Surely that means something. Surely he deserves the status of a chosen…”

“I decide that.” Three words, without any hint of anger.

But they were close enough to a reprimand that Sofia sunk back to kneeling, obediently listening as Joyeuse continued.

“If you truly believe he is worthy, guide him on the path of bringing righteous fire to the heretics. That will prove something more important than raw talent- that he is capable of being shaped into a useful weapon. Do this and all else is unimportant.”

“And if you think the best way towards this goal is to continue nurturing your own corruption, then do so. But know that you will be quarantined before you are allowed to rejoin the Chorus. If you are found to be beyond repair, you will be terminated, alone and without comfort…”

“I understand, Joyeuse.”

But in those three words, Joyeuse felt the first spark of real defiance from her younger sister.

“You are dismissed.” She declared, and with a breath from her lips, the hologram was dispersed.

---

“Nicolas Winterhome…” Fingers drummed on a table. “No. You’d have to check the archives.”

When people imagined the governor of a dismal city like Layer d23, they imagined a fat, incompetent dullard. Karamandus was anything but. He was fat, yes, obscenely fat, but with a huge and broad-shouldered physique that made him seem like a giant rather than a overstuffed wineskin, his face covered by a perfectly sculpted red beard that extended from his chin like the prow of a ship. His eyes were dark and full of a certain animal cunning.

Standing in front of him was a slim man, who could not have been more different. He had elven, dainty features, and his slender hands moved ceaselessly over a small wooden harp that made no noise at all as he plucked the strings. A cape of wolfshide and bone jewelry hung around his shoulders, marking him as the offspring of some savage world.

The dark red tone of his skin marked him as a demon, although not a particularly advanced one.

He smiled in a thin way that said, with completely certainty, he didn’t believe Karamandus. “I think he killed your son.”

“My son is alive. To my regret.”

“Yes, in a dream realm, used for training. I think you would follow your own son’s training, no?” He raised a thin blonde eyebrow.

“I have a lot of sons. And I’ve got a mind to make a few more before my hair goes grey.”

“I notice you don’t answer my questions directly.” The elf stated, every word like a dagger.

“I notice you look like a girl. What of it? I keep to my own business, and so should you.” Karamandus spat. “Why do you want this Winterhome anyway? He has an orphan’s name and no consequence I can think of.”

“Oh, it’s not him I’m interested in, really. But his fate has crossed with the fate of my family, and I think finding him…” The elf smiled. “Yes, finding him will be my best chance at reunion.”