Orenda awoke with a splitting headache staring at a ceiling that she did not recognize. The bed she found herself in was huge, and she had apparently not changed into her night clothes. Anilla and Falsie were both curled up in different places on the same bed- Anilla looked as if she had just jumped face-first into it on top of the covers and had not moved since, and for the briefest moment Orenda was worried that she was dead. She stared at her, even reached out a hand to touch her and check for a pulse, but she saw the magic still flowing from her heart, weakly, sickly, but there, and pulled back. It was likely that Anilla was ill and would not want to be awakened.

Orenda’s heart pounded in her ears as she swung her feet from the bed and rose on unsteady legs. The bedroom was small but immaculate and the sparse furnishings were beautiful and well cared for. She made her way to the dressing mirror and looked into it.

She looked awful. Her eyes were bloodshot and much too wide in her face, as if they were trying to escape. Her hair had obviously not been treated in any way before she went to bed and it showed as it stuck up at all angles with no uniformity. Her body slumped and she could not force it upright.

She had never been hungover before, but she recognized it instantly.

Her staff- the magical, sacred, irreplaceable, priceless staff- had been thrown to the side as if someone had slung it there when they opened the door, so she walked over, hating the sound of her footfalls- by god had she slept in her boots- and picked it up. It was still useless in the sense that no magic flowed through it, but it was useful in keeping her on her feet despite her weariness as she leaned heavily on it.

She opened the door, hoping she could somehow get her bearings, and was greeted by an amazing smell that made her stomach grumble. She was starving in a way that made no sense, given that the last thing she remembered was a feast, so she wondered if the drinking she didn’t remember doing had caused her to throw up everything she had eaten.

She followed the smell down a long hall until it opened into the same small sitting room she had come in with Krothy to prepare for the celebration yesterday, and she was startled to see Bella sitting at the table, shoveling parathas into her mouth. They had been laid out on a large tray, and there were plates, sauces and butter, but Bella had elected to ignore fancy things like flatware. Gareth was slumped forward over the table with his mask off and his head in one hand, staring at the plate he had made without actually eating it. His eyes flicked up to Orenda when she entered the room.

“You look like shit,” he said.

“Thank you,” Orenda said, sat at the table, and began to make a plate. “That means a lot, coming from you.”

“Would you like to borrow my mask?” He asked, full of snark, “I mean I know I look bad, but honestly.” He giggled despite himself, then seemed to remember that he was brooding and fell back into it.

“How was the party?” Bella asked, in a considerably better mood than Gareth.

“I can’t recall,” Orenda said.

“That means it was a good party,” Bella laughed.

“Terrible news, Orenda,” Gareth said. “I won’t beat around the bush. There was no corpse.”

“What?” Orenda asked, “In the temple?”

“Yes,” Gareth said. “Because we pushed it into the lava, didn’t we?”

“I…” Orenda said, racking her brain. That would have been the sensible thing to do, but she honestly didn’t remember either of them doing it.

“You see, darling,” Gareth said to Bella, “That’s what I told you.”

“Orenda,” Bella said, “Did you push it into the lava or not?”

“I… I don’t… I don’t remember doing that,” Orenda admitted, “We were in such a panic. It all happened so fast. I can’t remember.”

“I don’t know why we wouldn’t,” Gareth argued. “He’s dead, darling, I’m sorry.”

“Of course he isn’t,” Bella said.

“I saw it,” Gareth said.

“No one could convict on it,” Bella said, “No body, no murder. That’s how that works.”

“My head is pounding,” Orenda said, “And I’m starving.”

“I’ll get you a hair of the dog,” Gareth said as he stood.

“Aunty Bella,” Orenda asked, “There really was no body?”

“No,” Bella said, “There was a trace, ash and scorch marks where it would have fallen, all smudged around, but no corpse. The marks did not look as if they went toward the edge of the platform, but as if something was dragging whatever had been burned back toward the portal. We both studied that doorway for a long time, but neither of us could figure out how it worked. It’s obvious that it does something. I’d like to know where Magnus came from, and where he returned to.”

“I… am not as thrilled by this prospect as you are,” Orenda told her, “He tried to kill me.”

“Morgani Magnus is the guardian of the shifters, Rendy,” Bella said as Gareth came back with a glass, and Orenda watched his eyes dart between them.

“You said that before,” Orenda said, “I was hoping I could get you to tell me about it. You say that the sacred texts have been tainted by the Urillians.”

“Yes,” Bella began, but Gareth cut her off.

“Darling,” he said, “I implore you, again, to consider how much you may have been influenced by that awful cult.”

“Cult?” Orenda asked.

“Yes,” Gareth explained, “She was in a cult, for years. Indoctrinated. Those people found her as a vulnerable child and groomed her. I don’t like to question you, darling, but you did ask me to, if you ever began to sound like them.”

“I know,” Bella admitted as Orenda sipped from the glass Gareth had brought her and felt the heat slide down her throat. It really did help with the headache. “But Xac met Morgan, he can attest to that- to his love of shifters. We protected him so now he protects us.”

“Ah, yes, the drunken junkie,” Gareth said, unconvinced, “What a good source of information.”

“He did much better,” Bella argued, “After what he went through I don’t think anyone could begrudge him his vices. We all like to escape every now and then. Glass houses and all that. Besides, if anyone had a reason to prove the Kabaal wrong about anything it would be Xaxac.”

Orenda felt as if she was missing too much information to be of any use in this conversation, and began to eat.

“The thing is, Orenda,” Bella said, “Thesis has… well those Urillians, and others as well, I suspect, have been… doing public relations for him, for a long time. That doesn’t mean he was right.”

“What do you mean?” Orenda asked.

“I mean,” Bella explained, “That this entire planet was caught up in a family feud- a fight between a prideful father and his son. Morgani was not the one who tried to destroy Xren, even in the sacred texts that survive- Thesis is the one who caused the ice age, who hit the planet with the moon.”

“To protect us,” Orenda said, “He had to wipe out all the evil Morgani had caused so we could start over.”

“You do realize,” Gareth asked, “That you two are fighting over whose imaginary friend is better?”

“Gareth, you saw Morgani!” Bella insisted.

“I saw someone who claimed to be Morgani,” Gareth argued, “People can say whatever they like- it doesn’t make it true. I can call myself Gary-six-pack and it won’t give me muscles.”

“It was Morgani Magnus!” Orenda insisted.

“Whatever you say,” Gareth snarked, “You would know. You’re the Chosen One. I can’t wait to be back on my boat away from all this nonsense.”

“Gareth!” Bella warned.

“What?” Gareth asked, “I’m old. I’m allowed to be tired.”

Bella made a sound of exasperation and turned her attention back to Orenda.

“Morgani had every right to leave the Crystal City,” Bella told her, “No one would want to be a prisoner.”

“Do you think he’s insulted by that?” Gareth asked playfully, “I always wondered that, when we were learning about the high elves and Morgani, if he would be insulted to be called ‘he’. He isn’t a man. High elves don’t have genders, the language doesn’t even allow for it. They were perfect and immortal, with no need to reproduce.”

“I don’t know,” Bella said as if she didn’t take it for a joke, as if that line of thought was worth considering.

“There’s nothing in any of the sacred texts about him having a dick, is all I’m saying,” Gareth went on.

“Would that be worth noting?” Orenda asked, amazed at how little crude language shocked her anymore.

“I would think,” Gareth said, “Because he would be the first elf to have one. Can you imagine, after the ‘curse’, being the first elf born with a dick? Actually… how would one even be born? Without a pussy? Did the survivors just grow genitals? Did it happen all at once? Did everyone look down like, ‘What the hell is that!?’ And what did they have before? You’d have to have something, right? They apparently ate and drank in that magical garden, so one could intuit that they’d have to piss eventually.” He paused, in thought, and continued, “If I had been in my right mind I would have asked him. I wish I hadn’t panicked. The whole story falls apart the closer you look at it.”

“Rendy?” Anilla staggered into the room, looking worse than Orenda had ever seen her. Her normally chipper voice was pathetic as she continued, “I think… I think I’ve fallen ill. I need a healer… I… my face feels so hot… everything feels so… help… help me…”

She braced herself on the wall and heaved. The three people sitting at the table watched as an amount of vomit poured out of her small frame that was, frankly, impressive in it’s sheer volume.

“Anilla!” Orenda sprang forward and caught her before she fell into the puddle she had created. There were tears streaming down her small face as she clung to Orenda as if her life depended on it.

“You poor thing,” Orenda said in her most soothing voice, “Here, come rinse your mouth out. You need to eat something.”

“I can’t,” Anilla begged, “I’m… I’m so sick. I drank too much. I haven’t done this in so long. Even at festivals and stuff I can usually control myself. I don’t know what happened last night… I got carried away.”

“Here, darling,” Gareth stood and pulled out a chair, “here, sit. You’re too small to drink like that. Let me get you some water to rinse out your mouth. And a glass of rum to take the edge off. Drink it slowly.”

He darted back to the cabinets and Orenda rubbed Anilla’s back.

Master, the staff said from where Orenda had left it sitting against her chair, Master, slay the halfling. Slay the halfling now while she is weak.

Orenda’s eyes widened. She ignored the command, and elected not to relay it to the rest of the group.