"Please tell me you didn't promise these kids they would learn magic."

We were sitting around a campfire, somewhere Southeast of the Necropolis. Cyne looked like I had given him a migraine.

"That's the plan, right?" We were back to eating the jerky, because with the extra kids and the emergency lift out of the pit Connie was out of cash. The rest of the journey shouldn't really cost anything since we had our supplies though - assuming we didn't run into any other problems that delayed us much.

"Calliope, I know you come from an area with little exposure to Dumineres, but surely you at least know the basics of how they work." He sat down near me, rubbing his temples. "I've gathered that you expect to gain access to a Duminere as a result of this journey - presumably in return for recovering some valuable cultural artifact - but even if that happens and even if you can get the children access as well the vast majority of people that enter a Dumine come away with a blank. A dud. Whatever term you want to use. It is most likely that none of these children will learn any kind of magic."

I nodded, thinking. I'd thought of that, of course, but not only had it occurred to me after I'd already made the promise - probably because I felt so sure I was going to get one with Connie as evidence - I also just... really wanted to give them something to look forward to. It was bad logic, and I knew it, but while I was happy to call out bad logic in others it was harder with my own shitty choices.

"You're right. I fucked up. But they will, absolutely, have access to a Duminere. So how about this. You and Sige and Connie talk to them about how the Duminere works and what the options are and everything, and as part of that I'll break the news to them."

"As I believe we've discussed, I am talented at knowing when I hear a falsehood. I must say, your confidence in securing this reward is reassuring. I will see if Mister Laleah is willing to educate the rescued children with me, but I have a request to make. If you cannot locate their parents, when this is over I'd like to take them with me to the Sithlan House in Twelve Towers. I was raised there, after my parents passed away, and can vouch for them."

"Let's say Yasna there gets frustrated and stabs one of the adults with a fork. What happens?"

"They would give her blunted forks, and talk to her to determine the root of her anger."

"And if Tig sneaks out to hunt squirrels and eat them?"

"It would be frowned upon, but the monks at the Sithlan House do not believe in forcing beliefs - or in corporal punishment. He would be subjected to some disapproving looks, but little more."

"I guess that sounds as good as anything. Yeah, no problem." And of course it was going to be a problem - I could already feel it. I was going to have to hand these kids over to what was, essentially, an orphanage and that was going to trigger all sorts of feelings and I was probably going to freak out. But that was a while away, and there was a chance on that day I would be an emotionless husk which would help me get through it.

Katrin and Errod and I joined the kids, and it was only a little awkward. Being lectured at by Cyne in particular with Sige and Connie chiming in or disagreeing from time to time made it feel like we were... I don't know, on some sort of field trip. I certainly didn't feel like I was an adult on an important and exciting quest across an alien land. Cyne's descriptions of the different gifts were a bit dry and technical, but Sige was of course the exact opposite. So Cyne would say something like "Fabrication converts mana to physical matter, as guided by either a template or a mental image maintained by the user. By default this form is unstable and will lose coherence once the flow of mana has ceased, but with modifications to the ability through the development of the Dumine one can extend this time or even make the effect permanent. As some other planes contain matter that degrades quickly when returned to the true world, fabrication is useful for importing foreign materials by granting them a more permanent form. It can also be used alongside gifts that borrow matter from elsewhere, such as growth, to enhance them and extend their normal limits," and then Sige would say "Fucking good money in making metal, no fucking joke. I knew a guy that used it to make this slippery shit too, not a fucking person alive that could stand on that stuff - just fucking falling all over each other, absolutely fucking hilarious. Good for combat and for parties, am I right?"

Sige was way more positive about the ones like affinity that weren't particularly useful on their own. "Naw, affinity and enchantment and shit are fucking amazing. Yeah, sure, they'd be garbage by themselves - but you put just a little of your training into them and you can get so fucking much more out of your main ability. It's a fucking... a force multiplier, you know? It's not three plus three, it's three times three. But just, like, in some limited way. And you can build it up however you want - I don't know how it works exactly but it seems like you can pick practically anything when it comes to the affinity. Materials, creatures, emotions - there was this fucking guy, had affinity with spiders and the leader gift which is another one people shit on. Long fucking story, but nobody messed with that guy more than once."

"Yes. Well." Cyne looked like he wasn't sure how to follow that one. "Let's remember that as Calliope has mentioned it's only every one in six people that get a Dumine at all, and most of them receive only one gift. So you most likely will not need to worry about finding interesting combinations. Having one gift is only slightly less powerful than having two; there is a limited amount a Dumine can be built up regardless of how many gifts it grants - so for example, while my own abilities are more diverse because I have chosen to learn both healing and planar travel, I will never be as powerful at either of those as someone that has focused on a single specialty - even if they only have the one gift."

The discussion devolved into very lazy theorycrafting. Roran wanted to summon spirits, and wanted to know if he could bind them to tools to make them do all his chores for him. Tig was trying to find out if there was some valuable combo involving heat and light - honestly he seemed like he was probably just a bit of a pyromaniac. Some had questions about thought magic which was complicated, but the mood took a turn when I realized what they were really asking was "can I erase my memories of being with the Sahrger". Katrin made it clear her top priority was spellcasting which I knew, but she was still torn when it came to potential secondary options - scholar had good synergy, as did runic, but she also wasn't sure she wanted to go for the obvious choices. Errod was still certain he was destined to be the greatest fighter ever known although he had been better about keeping it to himself - especially around anyone that had seen him attempt to fight, or knew how he had lost his toe - and so obviously his priority was the fighter gift, with a secondary choice of density.

I had this sudden terrible mental image of all of them getting duds - statistically that was fairly likely. And there was still some concern about the possibility that I might not be able to get one at all, since whatever guiding force was behind magic clearly counted us as the same person for some purposes. But I set those thoughts aside - it seemed like a night for being hopeful. Eventually everyone curled up in the wagons and went to sleep, other than Sige who was on watch.

"Connie," I murmured at her as I began to drift off, "how close are we?"

"There's a town we'll reach tomorrow, if it's not warded I think we can go into Nusos from there. Most small towns aren't warded against planar travel I think, so odds are good. But Cyne says we have to wait until we get there and look around."

"Have you been to Nusos?"

"Nah. Besetie for training reasons, and Brynnklar for... you know, world saving reasons. And Biltagiretzae which is just like, a storage unit."

I took a moment to make sure I was speaking in English - the bracelet would translate automatically if I let it, and being half asleep already I didn't want to slip. "I still think it's strange we have so little to offer this world. Earth has all this advanced technology and... I don't know, these guys mostly have it figured out. Earlier Tig said electricity seemed useless unless you were fighting someone and I wanted to say no, electricity is so useful, but... is it? I mean, the only thing I personally know how to make is a lightbulb and as far as I can tell making a magic light isn't a big deal."

"It would still be useful in a big city where things are already competing for the low ambient mana, but... yeah, probably not worth it if that was all you were using it for. I think that's the problem - there's a ton of great shit they could benefit from if we found a way to bring it over from Earth, but all the first step stuff, the things that would drive you to really develop those technologies, are easier to do with magic instead."

"I'm going to think of something cool. I just don't know what yet."

I didn't have any dreams I remembered for once, but I woke up with that impending doom feeling I'd had back before we left the Necropolis. Even knowing it was probably just paranoia combined with the horror of watching Aestrid die I was on edge, but as the day went on and nothing happened I relaxed. Finally I got a much needed distraction later in the day when I saw a massive structure reaching across the landscape. It was enormous, arches upon arches that stretched as far as I could see.

"What the fuck is that?"

Sige laughed. "It's an aqueduct. Fucking huge, right? Goes from some big fucking lake all the way to Rentat. Must have been a fucking bitch to build, though it's way lower to the ground for most of the way."

I'd seen some pictures of old Roman aqueducts and this was remarkably similar which made sense - arches are used for a reason, and it's not like you're going to get crazy and experimental with something as straightforward as an aqueduct - but it was still surreal as we approached and then traveled under it. I'd been in Phoenix since I was twelve, and the oldest buildings I saw there were well under a hundred years old and totally unimpressive.

Our little refugees were equally interested, having seen no construction that didn't involve a treehouse for the past however many years. They were dealing with their ordeal pretty well as far as I could tell, though they were still having nightmares and Lilan insisted there was a Sahrger watching her "over there" - she was consistent about the direction, though she got confused if we asked her for any details and there was for sure nobody following us. We reached the town of Zistarne in the late afternoon, and rented a room that was - rather than something like a hotel room - just a big open room with some blankets piled on the floor. Still, it meant we didn't have to worry about bugs or anything.

Cyne was unhappy - he said it was possible to get to Nusos from almost anywhere, but there were things that made it easier. It should be indoors. There should be room to walk from one room to another, preferably in a continuous path rather than one that forced you to turn and go back out the way you came. The building should be one that wasn't too unique, and the windows should be covered. The town of Zistarne was mostly small houses with only a few rooms, so Cyne wasn't hopeful. He said it would need a lot of mana and a lot of time, and Nusos wouldn't be aligned for five more days - we weren't waiting that long.

There was another city not much further along, but we paid for the room anyway rather than sleeping in the wagons - everyone wanted to spread out a little. Right before bed we got some arguably good news, which is that Zistarne was built on the ruins of a larger, older city and therefore had a stretch of road underground, with connections to some disused sewers and some old basements and storage areas. Cyne said we could take a look in the morning but he didn't want to get his hopes up.

There was no night life, no interesting shops, nothing in particular to do - and we were out of money anyway. So I went to bed early, wishing I had something to read.

"Now that I know at least some of it was real I want to read the Jake Ross books again."

"No shit," Callie replied, without bothering to open her eyes. "I tried to get some of the details from this world out of Errod but he's... pretty spotty. Could hit a proper library at some point, once all the urgent stuff is over. But you can go see Brynnklar yourself, especially once the war is officially over. One of us has to, to get the soldiers in so they can clean up Hallenvar's last holdout guys and make sure the doomsday thingy is properly destroyed. But then after that? I mean, so far as I know at that point we'll be the only ones able to get in and out. We can treat it as our own personal clubhouse."

I drifted off with that exciting thought in my head, and my dreams were actually pleasant for most of the night. But then... there was a familiar feeling. I could see the room we were in, but I wasn't there - someone else had taken my place, and was wearing a mask of my face. The others didn't know it wasn't really me. I hurried away, out of the town, and up into the hills. There, hidden away, I found four cloaked figures trekking along avoiding the road. They looked up as I approached and I could see who it was - Telen in his ever-present plate armor, the Behemoth now shrunken back down almost to a normal human size, and two other Halenvar soldiers.

"You've found them?" Telen asked me. "Good. We can strike while they still sleep."

I sat bolt upright. "Fuck. Fuck. Fuck." I shook Connie awake, then threw one of my boots at Errod. "We have to get up. We have to go. They're coming."

Sige sat up, still blinking. "Who's fucking coming?"

"General Telen, the Behemoth, two others. They're in the hills, maybe fifteen minutes out. Less if he teleports them."

Sige was up instantly, as the others were still looking around unsure of why they had been awakened. "Okay cool. Behemoth, huh? Always wanted to fight that guy. Sure he can be the size of a fucking house and heals faster than you can hurt him and is super fucking strong and everything but... I don't know, I'm pretty sure I can take him."

Connie had a hand on my shoulder. "How do you know this?"

"I... don't know. I had a dream, but I'm just... I'm certain it was real. Is real."

"We can't see the future. I think it was probably just a dream."

Cyne stamped his boots on, shaking his head. "Regardless, I think we should not settle for 'probably' in this case. I see no harm in being cautious."

Connie sighed, but then nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, okay. Better safe than sorry. Everyone up. If they're actually that close we can't take the wagons out of town so... into Nusos?"

"I suppose. Hopefully this storage area in the ruins beneath the town will suffice."

The kids looked nervous, and had their whittling knives out in shaky hands. We hadn't truly unpacked so it didn't take long to get moving. Cyne, Errod, Katrin, and the kids all headed to the wagons to grab some supplies while Connie, Mila, and I went to break into the ruins. Mila made short work of the door by popping the hinges out of the surrounding stone, and we hurried down the stairs. There was, as promised, a long hall with some side passages and little wooden doors. From Cyne's description of how we would enter Nusos this looked fairly promising. We left Mila down there to look for the best place to walk back and forth, and headed up to find the others - and saw General Telen already striding through the town gates.