Wonder and fascination had gripped me as I walked among the lights of the unified souls. I had felt the anger of the flock of souls from Ravenrock, but in the end, the souls had not enough agency or even feelings to reject my wishes. As much as they had influenced me this past year, I was influencing them, as we were connected with my Gift [A Flock of Souls]. Now, both groups, doomed knights of the Ravenguard and those perished in the Abyss, were still two distinct groups, with a different color of light each, but the anger was gone, as the souls accepted my forgiveness as their own.

The spectacle lasted a while, but near the end, I saw the dejected figure of the Betrayer where his prison used to be. Alone. And I walked over to him once more, catching his gaze.

“What of you, Regicide?“

He stood up, to his proud and towering height, to face me.

“My word is worth more than your forgiveness, Ravenspawn. I promised you something in return, for taking in the remnants of my men. And the system has accepted.“

Now it was my turn to frown. “What do you mean?“

“You fight the darkness as I did my whole life, and you wield the sword I earned by awing the Emperor in the arena. And yet you fight like a cornered beast at best and like a boy with a stick at worst. You bring dishonor to a family that was famed for its swordsmanship. That will not stand.“

“You will train me?

“Someone has to if only to avoid bringing more shame to this family.“

“Here? How does that work?“

“Find a way, you have imprisoned me no longer, so I will wane until you call on me.“ He began fading away, drawn to a statue at the base of the cliff, that prior had no facial features, but now was carved like the proud, arrogant man that he had been in his life. He was now properly part of my Skill [Unchained Ancestors]. Maybe that meant that I could now summon others to my aid, with him no longer be present at the forefront of my mind, literally imprisoned there. I had assumed I could reach no other, with him being right there. Now that might have changed.

I watched him go, my smile slowly draining away from my lips. I had not been able to lose that dreadful man. He was haunting me, almost since the beginning, and now it looked like I was stuck with him for longer, still.

All the humility and guilt he had displayed as he recalled his memories for me was gone, in an instant. I assumed it to be the last time he would allow himself that weakness, now that his story has been told.

“Lily?“ I asked the wisp. “Do you know how we could train sword fighting inside my Demesne?“

“Yes, it is part of being a Twice-Born to train your mind as you improve your body. Usually, there are problems with the fact that a lot of training is reinforcing and improving your muscle memory through constant repetition. And as you are in your Demesne, you would not train your muscles or your reflexes. There is a structure you can build inside your Demesne, which would allow you to simulate every situation you feel necessary."

“How does that help with the problem of muscle memory?“

“Well for one, you can simulate your exact body under realistic conditions. You will train the muscle memory of the mind, and that will be much easier to adapt to the real world and the real body. You will have to work in reality to teach your real body what you learned here. It is the difference between being told what to do and having felt and actually done the thing you are attempting. Truly entering your Demesne - with your body and soul that is - is a feat that no Twice-Born can attempt.“

“I have a feeling I can use my Skill [Unchained Ancestors] to circumvent some of the problems.“ I mused. "What if the ancestor takes over my body in reality, showing me the motions. I would have a far easier time adapting then, I assume."

"Quite possibly. But as for the training yard: Even if you have to do the practice and repetition in reality, the training of the mind and the knowledge of how things are meant to be done should not be underestimated."

I nodded. "We should do it as soon as possible, then. Why not now?"

I frowned at the ugly speck of nothing, where the misty prison of the Betrayer had been. My Unity had risen after its disappearance, but there still was the dissonance of the angry souls that had been there. I decided to rework that side of the cliff, forming a slow decline from the top with the Wind-Oak tree into a valley, surrounded by smaller hills, with sparse greenery and even sparser trees, somewhat resembling the other side of the Ravenport Bay.

Training under a roof or inside a structure was not something I wanted, so this small valley would be perfect. To define a purpose for the valley, I created swords of all sizes and forms, anything I could imagine. All the swords I had known, seen, read about, and more. Sticking in the stone, the earth, the hillsides, and giant swords on the top of the hills, carved out of the pale stone. The Valley of Swords. A place to hone my craft, a place to honor enemies and allies by including their chosen weapons. For that to be true, I sprinkled in the axes, maces, and spears I had seen the Wyldlings use.

At last, I moved the statue of the Betrayer from the base of the cliff to the center of the Valley of Swords, and changed his statue so that a copy of Whisper, or Kingsbane, was in his hands, already drawn.

Lily showed me how to form the space into a proper training yard. That cost me 453 Essence, but after that my Unity rose even more from 59% to 65%. The dissonance was completely gone and now my sanctuary had a place that expressed a part of my personality I had not formerly allowed in here. The part of me that held a sword and did what was necessary to survive. The part of me that embraced violence as a necessity of life.

I was proud of what I had created and left my Demesne to catch the sunset. I was eager to try out my Skill again, maybe even try to reach a different ancestor, but my Mana was spent and an evening beholding the beauty of Ravenport was never wasted.

And as I watched the sun go down behind the floating Isles of the Broken Lands, I sighed. I needed even more Mana, didn‘t I?

“Beautiful. Truly astounding. A view worth a million steps.“ A musing voice, ageless and as vibrant as it always had been interrupted my musings. The Wanderer sat beside me at the railing, feet dangling off, smoking his pipe.

“Wanderer!“ I shouted in surprise. “I thought you had said we would speak again if I find a way to do so.“

He pointed with the butt of his pipe at me, smirking. “And you have. Your little friend has found my Demesne and I followed it back. I just wanted to speak with you under your stars. I know my own.“

“I have so many questions, Wanderer. I struggled so hard to get here, and now...“

“For every question that came up, you solved a riddle on your own. That is what it means to be alive. Finding a way no one has trodden out. I trust you to find a solution for the other open questions as well.“ He grinned. "My time is limited, as always. Choose your questions with care, young Raven."

I closed my mouth, turning back to the sunset, considering my words with greater care. I did not need the Wanderer for every problem I faced. “I see. I would like to talk about freedom, then.“

“My favorite topic in the world.“ He chuckled.

“You chose me, a lifetime ago, because you admired the spirit of freedom I displayed in the face of my execution.“

“Quite so.“

“And yet, I chose to adopt the Dogma of freedom on my own. And I find it hard to...follow it.“

“Ahh, you speak about the traitors you freed just now? How can you follow the Dogma of freedom if pragmatism or fate forces your hand?“

“It worked out, in the end, and I freed them. But now I am responsible for many more people, not just the fate of the dead and their souls. Freedom is a hard concept to bring into reality when life gets in the way.“

“I know.“ He sighed. “Better than you might think. In the end, I came to one realization, as earth-shattering as it is simple. There is no freedom. Not ever.“

“But...“

“I know, trust me. It is an ideal, one to strive towards. I took the ultimate path, cut myself from every responsibility I could, nothing but the road below and the stars above....and yet...am I free?“

“Yes, I would wager a guess. If you are not, who is?“

“At the very least you know of one responsibility I have.“

I thought for a second. “Me?“

He nodded smiling. “You. My mind is not free of worry. For you and the ones you freed. The gamble I took making you Twice-Born. Freedom, absolute freedom, is not possible as long as you have a mind to think and others to care about. Even feelings will bind you. More often then not we cut our own freedom away, for something we deem more important.“

“I met others. Others who seemed to be...free in spirit and life. As free as it gets.“

“Are you talking about the Pirate and the Jester? They are not my Twice-Born, but I know of them and their patrons, and we share common goals but disagree in others. They are free, yes, I would agree. But they are different from you and I, as well. The pirate has his crew and his aspirations he chained himself with. And the freedom he thinks is absolute is nothing but anarchy, the thriving of the strongest in his given circumstance. His crew is not free and his...customers are not, either. He is free, on the cost of all those around him. And the Jester? He is as close to me as any I have seen. Because he is care-free.“

“Carefree? He doesn’t care for others?“

“Well he was a mortal once but even then the opinion of others was of no concern to him. It was his calling to challenge the actions and thoughts of the mighty and dangerous. He is fearless, careless...but he is a slave of his desires. He cannot help himself but challenge the impossible.“

He turned to me, eying me seriously, the colors of his eyes ever-changing. „The lesson here is, that no being is a singular entity. Not even I am the god of freedom, for that would be a truly useless existence, floating among the stars bound by nothing, caring for nothing. Freedom is something we aspire, not something we mold our very being after. Freedom is not clear cut and every being on this world would say something different, if asked for a definition.“

“How can I be king, or lord protector, and free at the same time? How can I bring freedom to those under my protection? Even taxes seem like tyranny...so does forcing them to fight, work, or listening to their superiors.“

He grinned. “You are doing well, Raven. Why? Not because you are saying the things I want to hear. But because you are questioning your actions. The moment you stop doing that is the moment you have to be wary of. Until then, everything one can do is strive to do better and be better. There is a limit you can achieve, but it is a worthy goal to move that line further out, ever so slightly.“

“Thank you, Wanderer. I do question myself a lot, maybe too much.“

“There is no such thing. No one will judge you like you do. If you don‘t do it, no one will. And how would you know to strive for bettering yourself, if you can‘t even question yourself? You are not a mortal anymore.“

I thought about that. There was something to be said about being healthy with your self-judgment, but I was not bound by mortal restraints anymore, was I? I could just change what I hated about me, and had an eternity to do so.

“I would ask your council for myself, then, if you allow it.“ He nodded his head and I continued: „Ever since I came here, the place I desired to reach and to build for the chained and fleeing, I feel restless. A part of me longs to travel and leave, while the other half wants to stay and protect. It...does not exactly tear me apart, but it makes me uncomfortable.“

“Ah yes, that would be my Essence coursing through your veins. I would not have acted differently, had I known you to head towards a position of leadership, but I would have prepared you better. I am your patron, I created you so to speak, and there is a part of me inside of you, a part that is hard to ignore. But it is not your true self. It is...borrowed.“

“What does that mean?“

“Lifting a mortal from its coils to the existence of a Twice-Born is very expensive, even for those you would call a god. That is why it is not done without cause. But there is recompense as well. You will lose your connection to my Essence, the more of your own Essence you accumulate. A part of which will end up in my endless gardens, as a reward for my...expenses. But sometime in the future, the Essence of me will be just a speck of dust in the sea of your own Essence. Until then, you will be of two hearts in most matters. Mine and yours. And of course, both sides will influence what you will become. You are neither a spirit of freedom nor a young noble from the mountains. You are both, and both will form what man...what god will emerge from your struggles.“

“One last question, Wanderer. I have been prayed to and it feels wrong. I want to build a shrine to you, to give the people something to hang on to, to pray to, and not turn towards me. I am asking for your permission to do so. I do not know anything about your religion.“

“It is well within your rights. And I would certainly appreciate a shrine, I am not above such things.“ He mused smiling. “Now that you have looked behind the curtain, and know how gods are made...and know that they are neither infallible nor omnipotent. Does that make it worse for you, being prayed to?“

“It feels like a scam. The mortals wish and hope for something the gods cannot give them.“

“Or can they? Pray to the goddess of fertility in a foreign country and she very well may bless you with a child, come next chance. Your gods have failed you and yours. But only because they lacked the strength to face the dangers that came their way. Maybe it helps if you manage your expectations and those of your people that would...come to you for aid? Maybe it helps if you don‘t think of yourself as a god, which you are not, by the way. Think of yourself as the admired hero of a town. Exchange prayers for pleas and reverence for admiration. Do not promise something you cannot hold, but reap your just reward.“

We talked a bit longer, but soon the sun was set and the time was up. And the Wanderer went on his merry way, having spotted another sunset around the world somewhere.

I stayed back, lighting the lanterns and torches on the Raven‘s Nest. Wondering what the future would hold for me. Thinking of how to implement me being a Twice-Born without claiming to be something I was not.