Fluff from sheep is a common component for illusion spells because it’s literally pulling wool over someone’s eyes! How did I not see this before?

- Findings of founding archmage Vexington Larezuz, recorded the day he died.

Weldon was finally getting the hang of rezan, and I had no idea what had taken him so long. Now, when I punched him for losing focus on the battlefield, he was able to get away after only taking one punch. I had actually gotten better at throwing punches, so that was impressive. Of course, my punches hadn’t become stronger. I was just better at throwing them, and got less tired for doing so. Not much would change how weak I was.

However much I improved at punching, disarming Weldon was something I had improved to a much greater degree. Five intense days of training could do that. When Weldon finally crossed the threshold of maintaining the magic in his sword without losing concentration, thus achieving rezan, I saw it his eyes. He tried to stop me, but I still slid my sword down his blade to near the hilt, and twisted with more force than I should’ve been able to. Arcus went flying, and Weldon quickly raced after it.

I nicked him in the heel and felt a bit of satisfaction from seeing my student all grown up. Then I sheathed my blade. “We’re done here. Congratulations.”

“Ow! My foot!” Weldon complained. “Why have you properly wounded me so!?”

“Wanted to see how it felt.” I smirked. “And to see if I could do it.” Which, going by the single drop of blood that had bled from the wound, I could.

Weldon was about to protest, but then he suddenly processed what I originally said. “We’re… done?”

“You held on to your magic as I was disarming you, that was the threshold I had to pass before Brynn said I had done Rezan. All that’s left for you is to learn how to actually swing the sword.” I looked up at the darkening sky. “Just in time, too. It’s a blank moon tonight.”

“You’re talking all strange and I don’t know how to feel about that.” Weldon said. Then he pumped both fists and shouted. “I did it! I’m a warrior now! For Justice!”

“Don’t stay too long, you might be forced into living here.” I told him with faint amusement. Him actually achieving rezan was good, since it meant he no longer had a reason to seek me out. Tonight was the night I was leaving Veliki, after all. I’d expected to be stuck here for at least another hour, and had prepared accordingly. As a result of that, I suddenly had an hour free that I didn’t know what to do with.

But it was better than another hour with Weldon and Lavina.

“I must offer thanks for your teachings.” The tiny angel flickered into existence between me and Weldon while the boy celebrated, as if responding to my thoughts. She carried a hint of distaste in her voice. “Even if I disagree with your methods.”

“Didn’t you teach Brynn how to fight?” I asked as I gathered my things.

“I did.”

I shrugged. “Well, he passed it on. I did the same.”

“It has been perverted.” Lavina said, “Though its effectiveness is admirable. You have my thanks, Amber Jewel.”

I glared at the tiny angel. “Don’t do that with my name.”

The fluttering form recoiled in surprise. “That’s simply how my kind delivers gratitude to you mortals. None have ever taken issue with it before.”

“Does it do something to my soul?” I demanded.

“Of course. It marks the conclusion of our agreement.” Lavina cocked her head in a very humanlike gesture. “How else would you be able to genuinely claim that you were of assistance to the Heavens?”

I paused as I was fixing my belt. Then I continued and started to leave. Making a big deal over it wouldn’t remove what had already been done. I allowed myself to give Lavina some parting words. “I hate the Heavens. Nikolai’s going to be walking the streets in a few hours. Make sure you’re inside before then.” Then I was out of the woods and walking the short gap between the forest and Veliki.

My mood didn’t seem to want to make up its mind. I was feeling good because this was a day I had been looking forward to, and finishing up with Weldon’s training was another point towards that. On the other hand, I was leaving home.

I didn’t know what that entailed, and the prospect of the unknown was making my heart beat faster even though all I was doing was walk. Something else made my heart flutter before I reached my temporary home, and I saw it too late to do anything about it.

“Amber!” A young male voice called my name. Internally I was groaning, but externally I was grinning and hastening my walk to get closer.

“Avien!” I said, sickly sweet.

The boy was waiting on the border of Taranath’s estate. I could see the slight barrier of mist on the boundary, and I wanted to be on the other side. Unfortunately, ‘I’ had no such intentions. Instead, I was taking in Avien in all his short sleeved glory. The defined muscles that showed through his shirt, the way his hair was pushed back, and how he was looking at me in the exact same way.

Oh. Fucking. My.

“You upgraded your wardrobe.” Was the first thing out of his mouth. “It’s really good.”

I agreed. My current ensemble had been dug out from the bottom of a bag that Maiathah had acquired with my time. It was made up from loosely fitted blue pants, a blue shirt with no sleeves, and had a matching choker that I couldn’t think of not wearing with the blue. The blues were ocean, sky, and dark respectively. Taranath probably had a hand in this one.

“Thank you.” I said, linking my hands behind my back and shifting my shoulders. I didn’t know what I was doing until my hips shifted and my weapons were on the side closer to him. “See anything else?”

Avien’s eyes widened. “You have a sword! And a dagger. What’s that about?”

I drew the sword, did a fucking pirouette, and relaxed into a fighting stance. “Surprise.” I said, trembling into a flat cadence.

The pirouette had taken me onto Taranath’s estate. I was in control again.

Avien’s smile was uncertain. “This was the surprise?”

I considered outright saying no, but I felt the tug of my strings. Whatever protection had been afforded to me by Taranath, it was fading. I still had to play along.

This would be the last time.

“Part of it.” I said, spinning my sword a few times and returning it to its sheath with a flourish. “There’s something I’m waiting for first.”

“Right.” Avien’s expression became serious. “I talked to Wrenn. He made me spend two days tending to patients as a nurse before saying anything, but he told me about the two aftereffects from death. He directed me to Lilith, you know that shut in on the south of town?”

I nodded. While I hadn’t spoken to her, I had heard of her exploits. An entire town destroyed by the handy placing of a weapon of mass destruction, and she had taken part in a quest that was now written in the tome of heroic deeds.

“I learned that she has died multiple times, and she had a lot of things to say on the subject.” Avien continued. “I took my findings and cross referenced with the surviving notes from Garl’s teachings, and have reason to believe you were incredibly traumatised by the events surrounding… the geas.”

“By dreams, a new and destructive relationship with the person or circumstances of my demise, and…” I prompted.

“Spontaneous bouts of melancholia.” Avien finished. “But I also learned that the severity of these symptoms is directly related to the amount of time spent in the afterlife, so with the length of time you-”

“Avien.” I cut in. “You almost made me forgive you for your involvement. But you just did something wrong.”

His eyes widened, and he took a step back. I’d never talked back like this. It felt good. “What- What did I do?”

I stepped up to the barrier. “I’ll tell you again, Avien. I died. You just tried to make my death mean something less, which is like, the worst thing you could have tried to include in an apology.”

“I’m sorry!” Avien quickly said.

“Apologising for ruining an apology doesn’t make things better.” I shot back. “The fact that I died still hasn’t changed. And I’ll tell you why whatever you were trying to say doesn’t matter anyway. The symptoms increase in severity over time. Whatever was lost to the afterlife left a stain on my soul, and that has persistent consequences.”

“I’m really, really sorry.” Avien repeated. “Is there anything I can do to make it up?”

I almost said no, but the tugging on the strings stopped me. There was something else that occurred to me that stayed my tongue as well.

“Stay here.” I turned around and walked to Taranath’s estate, taking the time to discard my weapons randomly along the way. The mist collected my weapons as it always did, and I was shortly in my room. There was a travel pack resting on the floor where it couldn’t be seen from the entrance that I rummaged around in and retrieved something from.

That something was pushed halfway through the barrier preventing Avien from entering the estate. It was letters. Two of them.

“You’re going to read both of these letters tomorrow.” I told him. “They are the same length. I promise you, both are important for you to read.” I was put off kilter by the power that suddenly flowed through my voice, but I kept going. “Other than that, I’ll accept your apology here. Goodbye, Avien.”

Avien took the letters and looked at them, before slowly glancing back up at me like a wounded pixie. “See you… Amber.”

I just nodded and turned away, happy that he hadn’t said ‘see you soon’ at the very least. What was troubling me was the way I had made the promise. Yes, it was something I genuinely believed, that both letters were important, but the gravitas of the promise had been involuntary.

Whatever ended up happening tonight, that was hopefully my final interaction with Avien Shepard. It was good enough, by my standards. Really, I wanted to stab him for all the things he put me through, even if he didn’t realise he was doing it, but I also didn’t want All to have reason to make us meet again.

This would have to do.

\V/

Before the sky truly darkened, I left a letter in my room and saw my parents for the last time. We had dinner, which had been cooked by my mother. Whatever the Waterlilys had sought to do with her had ended, and she was the same mother I’d always known her to be. She made a lasagna for us to eat, and it was the best meal of her’s I’d ever eaten.

If my parents found my suddenly huggy mood strange, they didn’t say anything about it. After that, I gathered my pack and left through the window one last time. It wasn’t the blank moon just yet, but there was one last stop before I departed. If my luck held out, I’d be gone with the wind before Nikolai came up from the Abyss and started wrecking havoc.

My last stop was a building erected not too far from the town hall that was made completely from bamboo. It was a three story construction which had living walls, and was well known throughout the younger population of Veliki. This was the School of Paper.

It was a place where kids learned to read, write, calculate, and think until the age of thirteen. Anyone could go back and learn more, and the teachers of the school of paper always had more to teach. It was just that the teachers weren’t conventional.

Instead of people, the teachers were folded paper that always had the right things written down on them. Classes always had an even number of students and the teachers taught in pairs, with one reading the paper aloud and the other taking notes. I had, in the past, been perpetually paired off with Avien for that. This was the first time I’d been back since turning thirteen.

It was closed, unsurprisingly. It was late and today was a blank moon. I opened the door anyway, only for a swarm of folded paper in the shapes of various flying creatures to slam it shut. One landed on the door and indignantly pointed one of its wings at the sign saying ‘closed’.

“I want to see Voxis.” I told it.

It pointed at the closed sign again.

“I want to learn about the mascevan path.” I said.

It froze halfway through pointing again. Then it unfolded and started leading me away from the school of paper to the town hall. After fifteen minutes of me following and getting more and more tense, it slid under a door that had a sign helpfully saying Voxis Verygood on it.

The door opened before I could knock, so I walked into an arcane study much like the one Voxis had made the majestic manor in. This one was much grander, however. I couldn’t see the wall on the other side, and the part of the room I was in was reasonably lit by all accounts.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” Voxis asked from somewhere in here. I couldn’t find her, probably thanks to her lack of height.

“You mentioned something a while back that I’m interested in hearing more about.” I said, projecting into the vast space. “The mascevan path.”

Miscellaneous sounds from things being picked up and put down echoed throughout the room. “Have you decided to be honest yet?”

I frowned. “I want to hear about anyone that successfully reached the end of it. Preferably without dying or something similar.”

“Ah, so you haven’t.” Something slid from one end of the room to the other. “And you aren’t stealing from me. This bodes to be significant.”

“I’m not following.” I said, “I really just want to hear any stories you have. If you don’t have anything I’ll be on my way.”

“I have a story. But first, have some sugar.” On cue, the folded bird that had led me here flew up to me carrying a jar of liquorice. I realised as I accepted it that I hadn’t sought it out like I normally did. Was that what Voxis had noticed? “Brynn Willow was once Chosen of the Heavens, you know.”

I rolled my eyes as I bit into the candy. “I know Brynn’s story.”

“Knowing the story and respecting the significance of the story are two different things, Amber Jewel.” Something clicked, and a fire ignited in a brazier in the darkness across from me. It sputtered, then formed to shape a much younger Brynn, but it was difficult to make out since it was still fire. “For example, you know that Brynn and Lavina had a long relationship spanning decades. What you don’t do is respect the profound sense of loss stemming from their parting once Brynn decided to settle in Veliki.”

“I think I have an idea.” I said snappily. I was about to leave my life behind, and that felt comparable. It was also incredibly difficult to miss how the two of them still pined for each other.

“An intellectual understanding, yes.” Something else clicked from a different direction, and another brazier ignited before settling into the form of me dead on the floor. “But did you understand the weight of being once dead until you had returned from the afterlife?”

“Fair.” I admitted, and the second fire ceased to burn.

“When Weylon and myself were planning to desert our Chosen duties, we went through a phase not different from what you are presently going through. Brynn’s commitment to the Heavens, and thus All, was greater than any of the rest of ours, and that takes into account my numerous demonic pacts.”

I rolled my eyes at the humble brag.

“I researched in the Accursed Atheneum for years between the seconds, looking for references to others that have walked the path.” A brazier ignited, but took its time forming the image Voxis wanted to show. “I found tale of a man who had been Chosen to feed the ducks in a specific pond. Mind, this was before ducks were widespread.” The fire took the form of a man feeding a few ducks at his feet.

“This was an eternal posting.” Voxis continued, the fire shifting as she spoke. “The Heavens did not want to make his role an inherited one, as that would require effort on their part. Eventually the man became tired of seeing his loved ones dying before him, and he fled the pond.” The ducks vanished and were replaced by sand. “He fled across the world to Eiar, where there were no ducks, or even water for them to live in.”

The fire showed a veritable flock of ducks swarming the man. “The ducks tracked him down regardless, and pecked him to death. That, dear Amber, is why ducks are a sacred animal in Eiar, and why they are found all across Sontoria.”

“So distance doesn’t matter.” I observed.

“It is unreliable, and has a limit in its usefulness.” Voxis corrected me. “The man lived for a decade and found love before his ultimate death. His wife joined him in the Hells, and last I heard he has quite the fiendish following.” A third brazier lit up.

“I have already told you of the young lich, who achieved immortality before his third decade.” The fire took the form of a larger than life skeleton adorned with extravagant robe and grasping a magnificent staff.

“Drublehm Vitor.” I recalled.

“What I did not include in my tale were the dozens of soul experiments he performed on himself to remove the marker that the Heavens used to identify him. It was ultimately his downfall, as the time he spent on the subject amounted to the majority of his time in hiding. Had he planned to topple the Heavens instead, he may have had more success.” With that, the fire shifted to show the moon instead.

I rolled my eyes. “And the third tale?”

“Maxim the Miner.” Voxis spoke, and a fourth brazier ignited. I was wondering where all these dramatically appropriate braziers were coming from. “He hated physical activity.”

I raised an eyebrow. “So what did he do?”

“At first he attempted to do as little mining as possible.” The fire shifted to show a man with a pickaxe over his shoulder and the worst slouch I’d ever seen. “All that got him was an angel to supervise him, however.” The fire split in two and a figure not all that dissimilar to Lavina was defined, though this one had smaller breasts. Then I realised it was a guy.

“When that didn’t succeed, he started looking for any and all possible ways out. His supervisor was more than enough to get him back to work, however. This arrangement actually continued for a decade until an artefact was unearthed and a message needed to be sent to the ruler of the region.” The fire shifted to show a nondescript orb, which fire Maxim picked up. “Maxim quite enjoys walks, so there wasn’t really a decision to be made.”

“Thus, he accepted the quest and altered the nature of All.” Voxis continued, the fire animating to show the two figures walking in tandem. “He still has his supervisor, but Maxim the Miner became Maxima the Messenger. The Heavens allowed this because his duties shifted to one that still benefited them. Had Maxim simply left on a walk, he would’ve been hauled back to the mine or executed in a jealous fit. But because he did so through a quest, the Heavens couldn’t do anything but grudgingly accept his resignation.”

“So that’s the Mascevan path then?” I demanded. “It’s not really abandoning your duties so much as it is finding new ones.”

“A valid observation.” Voxis admitted. “And that is exactly why the Heavens aren’t jealously attempting to destroy Veliki simply because we harbour Brynn.” Fire Brynn waved at me. “They are doing that for other reasons.”

“Is championing the forgotten really that important?”

“You should see the damage a forgotten angel can wrought before making a snap judgement such as that.” Voxis reprimanded. “My braziers aren’t large enough to show you such a scene. Regardless, that is the answer you sought, is it not?” The fires all winked out, but the last trace of the images they showed briefly remained, burned into my eyes.

Maybe. But it wasn’t an answer that I liked. “Thank’s Voxis.” I said shortly. “You were helpful.”

“You state the obvious, Duskchild. Allow me to do the same.” Voxis walked into the room from behind me. She hadn’t even been in here the whole time she was putting on that show. “The blank moon has begun. You should hurry, Nikolai is feeling especially strong tonight.”

I paled. I had wanted to be out of Veliki before the blank moon started. “What makes you say that?”

Voxis sneered. “Someone in Veliki is placing a lot of importance on this night for some reason. Nikolai is especially sensitive to that kind of thing. Doubly so when it’s associated with the Heavens, the inverse of that which binds him. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that would you?”

She was testing me. Why and for what were beyond me, but I really couldn’t afford to spend any more time here. When I couldn’t immediately think up a decent response to her question, I just walked past her intending to go outside.

I paused at the door and looked back. I needed to give everyone I spoke to a parting word, so that’s exactly what I did. “Goodbye.”

“Farewell.” Voxis responded. I nodded and left, but those burning black orbs watched me even after I broke line of sight. Even after I had left the building and walked out into the cold night under a blank sky did they still watch me.

\V/