Fang Lai battled hatred on his face; the rain’s pour turned his bleeding into rivers running south. But in a sudden moment, he exhaled. Eyes closed off to the world. It was a brief stretch of silence and the Elder’s fingers hadn’t lowered in the slightest. Then they snapped open. Fang Lai was calm. A measured calm. Despite his shortcomings, Fang Lai could master his emotions when a situation demanded; if he weren’t born to cultivate or was destined to be the Patriarch’s right hand, the child would be carried by fate to be a prince for an aging kingdom, or a minister’s valued advisor.

At the heart of intrigue is Fang Lai. His obedient daggers flew back into his sleeves like ducklings. A convenient weapon with no special handling required. He brushed some dirt off his robe, and, with some hands folding behind his back the Fang Lai of two hours ago returned; albeit with some tension in his shoulders. No matter his outer calm the boy was a panther in the undergrowth.

He nodded slightly, “I understand, Pillmaker.” Try as he might to pretend he wasn’t boiling inside and won’t stare at Grisla again, the latter knew everything around this boy was smoke, mirrors, and delicate subterfuge. “He will stand accused by tomorrow, please take him to the guardhouse.”

“You need not tell me,” Olimuth groaned. After his word his fingers separated, and so too did the barrier protecting Grisla, splitting apart and fading much like a balloon and mist. The man had no exaggerated motion or visible strain to pull up a defense against a Chosen’s attack, although any Elder, especially one whose directly responsible for the Chosen’s ability to progress as per his title, could match the Chosen’s strength and more, still it couldn’t’ve been that easy to do, could it?

Unless, the Elders sat on a level even above the Chosen. ‘Course, that needn’t to be said. But to see it for himself…

Grisla’s longing teased him. Olimuth’s back had shown him a level of power that could match or trump the gifted children of heaven with ease. Without relying on forbidden techniques or an accursed deal for power. This was, to him, true strength.

“Home is what awaits me, I’ll be going,” Fang Lai said as he turned his back. “One more thing, Grisla. To Xinrei, you’re a forgotten memory. And some memories… are better left forgotten. Well, you don’t need me telling you. Bye.” He vanished with a puff of smoke.

Grisla’s spine-chilling feeling said that, although on the outset it had come as a loss, Fang Lai would surely take away a lesson from this and implement that teaching in a future plot or even temper his heart. Two dangerous possibilities that made him, behind the Chosen’s terrifying strength for the younger generation, a dangerous entity. And he sharpened his edge. This could backfire someday in the future.

Like a breath he’d been holding, Olimuth let it free. Muttering left unheard by Grisla due to the drumbeat of the rain. He could, focus his ears and maybe steal a word or sentence, but just the thought of trying to use Juva here weakened him. Fury stood him up; pride allowed the anchoring of his legs. However, all things must come at an end, and with Grisla, sooner than later. Cut the strings and he was toppling over to kiss the water-sodden mud, but a pair of hands caught him. Taking up the duty of his failing legs.

Olimuth glanced at Grisla, then said to himself: “That child’s getting more presumptuous by the day. Acting as though Xinrei’s ascendancy is only but a year away.”

“On the other hand, that is but a candle to the idiocy you just pulled. What say you to this, hmm? Orlith?” The boy was a heavy sleeper, for every bump and ditch in the journey back to the shop was as though he were in a rocking cradle. Olimuth on the other hand had more on his mind than the weight of a beaten boy on his back.

“I guess he didn’t notice,” Olimuth whispered, care taken in caution as the wrong word, though he was sleeping, could set him off. A short but piteous glance to Grisla, and a foreboding one at the spectator of everything since he arrived.

The structure sat behind a tree line yet to be cleared, despite this if one took their attention to see they would catch it. But Grisla Orlith was a leaf in the wind; the shock was only but one of many, and, likely, he would’ve died here before Olimuth’s arrival, had he seen it. Going ballistic would be guaranteed. Columns supporting arches supporting Everlight beacons freshly placed as of last week. Raising so high as to blot out the sun, the structure was now the second tallest building in Leimuth and would be higher if it didn’t look silly allowing it to dwarf the capital tower.

The Colosseum. Built over Orlith land and is now, possibly, the most exorbitant expense the clan has ever done since its inception, will soon be complete in a month on what the architects say and the Elders regurgitate. In a month, it’ll be ready to host a tournament in two year’s time where the greatest of the younger generation will compete for the Queen’s favor and beg for a chance at an invitation to Rosewater University, at the heart of the One-City Kingdom: Eboncrown. Where the Queen herself is the de facto Dean. Olimuth had so many questions. But, depressingly, he was sure that none of it would ever be answered unless his name had a “Grittus” behind it.

Patriarch Meng’s secretiveness was accepted, without a doubt as typical for his status as the reigning head of their people, but there’s a limit. Olimuth’s involvement in the clan and its political strings meant he’d always be out of their talks, and news would trickle down to him by way of rumor, with anything specific meaning that it pertained to him and spoken by the man himself. Sometimes, if rarely, Meng let his tongue flap about his intrigues, some of which would get him lashed by his spymaster and a threat-but-not from her agents in his store, if she would ever to find out.

He was a reserved man before, but as of now even Olimuth couldn’t puzzle out what was going on in the man’s head, much less his absent father—their Ancestor. Olimuth’s own detachment from their affairs had him confused if he should care, or at the very least question why he bothered to. In the end he knew he was but one string of many, pulled when necessary, and could be severed if desired. All to the ends of a man’s ambition to which the clan was ignorant of.

And the boy was an inescapable victim, once again.

Olimuth carried him away under the moon.

Grisla awoke abruptly and felt irritated because of it; eyes peeling back and drinking the weak candlelight in the room. Taps of ceramic echoed here. Whether it was his bruises or unpleasant dreams, overall he was a sad circus. He himself felt like a medical student’s pet project, every stitch felt like it was done… somewhat correctly. Rough and inexperienced; but the job was done regardless. Even his robes were taken from him during his sleep, and he laid nearly bare beneath a sheet. Burning some of the unhealed scrapes with every bout of friction in his wakefulness.

The aging Pillmaker coughed. A desk cluttered with bio waste didn’t hamper his work at a pestle, muttering to himself on habit, the man robbed a hanging leaf off a stem—Bloomvine, if memory serves—dropping it in to mercilessly grind it. Someone of Pillmaker’s talent understood he was awake, and even still it wasn’t his place to open his mouth until prompted. Not like he desired to.

“This,” the Pillmaker began, “is not the first time you’ve stared at my back, teetering between this world and the next.” His pestle tapped the edge of the mortar to get off the remainders. Each hit like a drummer in the first minute of his warmup. “Do you remember?”

Not the first time? Oh, he was right, Grisla thought. Memories knocked loose off the shelf floated down like petals, and he could only curse and thank Fang Lai for it. He remembered. Barely. It’ll come to him with better vividness later. The herbal air intoxicated him, and if this was an interrogator’s trick, he wasn’t offering up much resistance in the moment…

…On a dark night, three years before, a bent tree was in his room. He’d taken up most of his room with his trinkets, vials, and vials yet to be filled, and the tastes of every concoction the evil bastard thought up only served to make the issue worse, from what he thought. Out of the corner of his eye shadows breezed by the crack of light at the door, one he certainly knew was his father’s. Delirium kept him from focusing or caring too much about the outside; without it, the first order of it would be to stand up and force his own drink down the man’s throat and tell him what’s what.

He started but—raised his hand as a shackle held it. One look at the Pillmaker’s back and Grisla fell back to his pillow. Weightless. Defeated.

“Water,” Grisla croaked. The ceiling needed a new coat of paint. Olimuth’s head half-turned, and he noticed it. Adding a “Please,” to finish.

Olimuth appeared next to him, shadows dressing him as an overgrown raven. The chain’s shortness, and with both being aware of it had the cup silently be put to his lips; caretaker watching. Something wasn’t right. He coughed and had a scare that the man had poisoned him—water didn’t taste like a dog’s ass, no matter how degraded the quality. Grisla’s accusatory eyes went unseen by the man, who stole back his cup as though offended.

“Dramatic. Overcautious. Impulsive. You’re the same child from back then, just a bit bigger.”

This annoyed him.

“Far from one.”

“Really, then? Prove it.”

“How?”

“How indeed.”

Olimuth strolled to a free candlestick and brought it back, laying it down on the nightstand before taking a seat at the foot of the bed.

“I went over your body while you were asleep. Scars, bruises and—”

“Time for healing?”

“I wasn’t talking about the… new stuff,” Olimuth breathed. “You’re an active boy. But I wouldn’t have figured you’d be up to combat while absent. A thing I wouldn’t believe you to try.”

Grisla wanted to squirm under his inquisitive study. “Did what I had to. We had an agreement, after all.”

Olimuth nodded noncommittally.

“I respect your resolve. However, the line between stupidity and courage thins or thickens depending on the man. You, as an Orlith, throughout my years in service to the clan I am well aware that your kind is predisposed to—”

“I didn’t ask for your lecture,” Grisla interrupted, throwing the chain at a tautness that pained his wrist, “your help, or your… whatever it is you’re trying to do. Actually, what are you trying for? A ploy of sorts? A buildup to a greater scheme? I want to know. If you think you’ve done something—”

The whip-cracking slap threatened to break open his stitches.

“…What I’ve done, you stubborn lackwit, was spare your life. Today and later. When the trial comes I’ll be burning all my pull and face in the clan in order to keep you from the gallows and the torturer’s hold; Brother Dong has a taste for sadism, however much he may reject it. Should it so happen that I am not the Pillmaker but any Elder I would be dismissed before a second word.”

Olimuth furrowed his brows. “Because why, you ask? Does everything in good faith to you have to be part of a plot? Have you become so detached and distrustful of men that you honestly believe that…?” He let the words die before they ran.

Honestly yes. And they both knew why.

“My home is gone. My father’s away, and I have no one to rely on. I am… alone, Elder. I’m sorry. I’ve nothing to thank you for your help, as you are aware, I have no lands and… well…” Grisla had wanted to shatter into pieces. He’d sworn off on tears since his encounter in the haze of his memories, however it seems that would be a nigh impossible to maintain forever.

“Friendship doesn’t require gifts, though they do help. Had you been a rich child my hands would’ve long since shaken you down for tribute.” Olimuth laughed wearily. “Besides, the child of my friend goes without saying.”

“Your friend?”

“Head and Patriarch of the Orlith family, Tenth placed in the 47th Exchange, and husband to Mira Yunhei: Gihren Orlith. Well, I doubt he’ll admit it just as I won’t in public but, yeah.”

“I see. So, thanking you isn’t necessary.”

“Correct, and I hate the idea of wasting words on the obvious. Keep them to yourself.”

Grisla nodded, and as he opened his mouth Olimuth’s hand halted him.

“There’s questions you have. Answers you’ll receive, but only when you rest.” The boy made a sound as to protest but Olimuth did a sharp silencing of that. “Rest for another hour. I’ll be at your side then. Answering… anything.” Standing, Olimuth was a fast walker when he needed to be, as he was at the door and had his body almost through. But he let himself pause and look back.

“Before I leave, I will give you this to help: your father’s alive. Perhaps not in a jovial mood, but alive.”

He left the candle to burn. Grisla watched as the stems, leaves and roots around made for nightmarish shapes in the light. Stewing in thought, but none of it felt productive. Or even give him a semblance of peace. A brief smirk did pass him.

“Thank you, Pillmaker.”

He’ll take his hour of sleep, but not here. Not in the clan which disgusted him now. Under brilliant stars he slept, a new blanket covering him whilst a girl of alien features and beauty oversaw. Only there did she hear his weeping. At a place where no human besides himself could ever reach.