Serenity checked the farside portal while Rissa did whatever she was doing. He knew it had to do with her Time and Mind specialties; she’d tell him the results when she was done.

The portal was fine; it seemed nearly unchanged from its previous condition. There was a little less energy stored, but that made sense; the portal was only going to last so long. He didn’t find anything amiss until he decided to recheck the information on Earth’s portals.

The data does not match. Either many portals have moved or there is something I do not understand about the coordinate system.

Serenity examined the data Aide provided. He was correct, but Serenity didn’t think the portals had moved; it had to be something about how they were interpreting the data.

If you use the new coordinates, what does it do to your map?

Processing …

Using the coordinate map retrieved closest in time to each portal coordinate set, including both instances of the nearby portal, reduces the estimated error distance radius per coordinate by approximately 20 miles. Error radius reduction is primarily due to the inclusion of an extra coordinate set; the small amount of improvement is due to the two coordinates having only small variations.

Query: is a universal reference frame in use?

Serenity blinked. That was an odd question. Or was it? “I didn’t do interstellar travel. Uh. Most mages used relative locations, I think? But that wouldn’t work for interplanetary travel, now would it. Hmm.”

He knew it was all relative locations for planetary travel; the spell he’d imitated out of Messenger’s Magic was definitely relative. “Wait a minute, I think there was something about that in the book. Uhm. I couldn’t use it yet, but what were the details … hm. It said something about longer-range travel requiring a point of reference. I thought it meant a beacon near where you were trying to link to, but perhaps it meant something else? I’d have to check the book. I can do that on the trip home.”

I will search for possible astronomical objects to use as reference points and compare them to the data.

Thanks. We should also take a look at the calculations again. If we missed this, what else did we miss? Is there an astrophysicist we should be consulting?

Dr. Mattingly has likely forwarded the data to one. I will be certain to forward the data to her along with all assumptions and calculations for further refinement.

Serenity nodded. With that taken care of, he was done with what he’d planned for the trip. He was happy he’d come; he hadn’t originally planned to return, but it was good to see Echo and Doyle. Learning they’d gotten something wrong about how to locate portals was vital information, as well.

Serenity found Rissa lying on her back in the sunshine. “You good?”

She opened her eyes, then climbed to her feet. “Yeah. I’ve hated not being able to go outside. I’m done here; you already know the sun’s fine. Other than that, not too much to say. There’s a rockfin that seems to be keeping an eye on the camp from inside the cliff, but it doesn’t seem to be worried; it feels like it’s safe in the cliff. It doesn’t want to come out as long as it can see creatures moving around here; it thinks anything willing to be on the outside is too tough to mess with.”

Serenity brushed some dirt off of Rissa’s back. “What about the Time check you wanted to do?”

“As far as I can tell, there’s some dilation during the transit, it feels like it should take longer than it does, but the connection to the Timestream here seems normal. I suspect that when we get back, we’ll find that we lost a minute or so in transit each way, even though it should have taken longer than that and seemed like it took only seconds.” Rissa shrugged. “That would match the results you mentioned.”

Serenity nodded. Those results were why he’d asked Rissa to check in the first place; while it seemed unlikely that Time ran at significantly different speeds on different worlds, Serenity knew it was possible. There weren’t any worlds that he knew of that were off by more than about a percent across a single portal, usually far less, but the differences could add up. Fortunately, lower-Tier worlds tended to be faster; Serenity didn’t want to think about what it would mean if higher-Tier worlds also had a Time advantage.

“Let’s get going, then. I want to stop by the Settlement before we head to the airport.” At Rissa’s puzzled look, Serenity explained. “It should be easier to talk to Gaia there, and I need to ask her about the Sun thing.”

Serenity touched the Settlement Crystal. Could it help him contact Gaia? If it couldn’t, he’d try finding the Lord’s Door; there was a good chance that would work. There was probably a way he could manage it through his Rift, but that seemed rather excessively dangerous without knowledge.

Serenity paged through the options. Nothing. Of course, he also wasn’t talking to an intelligence, at least not directly. Maybe that was what was needed?

Serenity let his hand drop from the crystal. For a moment, he thought about visiting the Settlement Gardens Dungeon, but it didn’t seem like that should be necessary. Not when he knew the Serenity Settlement Crystal was connected to one of Earth’s ley lines, which Gaia managed.

There was one thing he hadn’t tried, the same way he’d managed to talk to dungeon cores. The Settlement Crystal was more like a pillar than the smaller core-on-a-pedestal that dungeon cores usually started out as, but Serenity doubted that mattered. Serenity knelt in front of the crystal and leaned forward, carefully tapping the top of his head, just above the forehead, against the crystal. He felt a spark run down his spine as one of his horns made contact, then he was floating in the same darkness as when he’d talked to dungeon cores.

Only this darkness was different. It was filled with sparks - no, threads! - of color. It reminded Serenity of seeing a distant, weak aurora except that it surrounded him.

Serenity? Is that you?

Serenity focused on speaking instead of watching all the pretty colors. “Yes, it’s me. Gaia? Can you explain something?”

I will try. What do you need?

Where to begin? With Rissa’s current condition? With the curse? With Rissa’s psychometry being interrupted? It was probably best to give as much background as he could. He didn’t know which pieces were important. He’d start with the problem. “Rissa, she’s my fiancee, is having issues in sunlight. It prickles and starts to burn. It started a couple days ago, but we’ve already found out that it’s not a problem in Aki’s dungeon or Serenity Settlement. It’s not a problem on the other side of a portal to another planet, either. We think it might be related to a curse, but we’re pretty sure the curse on her is broken…”

Serenity told the entire story, including what he knew of Rissa’s family history, everything that had happened with Jacob, and what they’d found out about the Child of Time legend, before returning to the moment when Phoebe interrupted Rissa. He even went over the visions she’d seen. “...and when we got to Aki’s zone of influence and Rissa stepped in, she realized it wasn’t just a reaction to the broken psychometry; it was something else. It took us a while to figure out exactly what was setting her off.”

That is concerning. There are very few things that could cause that, and fewer which would mean that she only reacts to the natural sunlight of one world. I do not believe that there is anything in my sunlight that would not be present on another world, and even if there were, an open-air Settlement or dungeon filters out very few things, usually only things that are toxic to its own inhabitants. While that does include Rissa in Aki’s dungeon, she is not an inhabitant of Serenity Settlement. No one else is having this problem?

“No.” Serenity started to shake his head before realizing that in this space, he didn’t have a head to shake.

Then I can think of only one possibility that is powerful enough and yet also limited enough. Rissa has angered a local deity. Probably a deity of the Sun. As Serenity Settlement has no formal deific ties, passive influence would not be permitted. Aki’s dungeon does appear to have a deific tie, but it is in its infancy; I cannot tell who or what it connects to, but it certainly does not feel like a tie to the Sun. Any god strong enough to affect sunlight continually would be incapable of making a tie that weak.

“A local deity? What does that mean?” Serenity hadn’t heard that particular term before, but he’d always tended to avoid worrying about the politics of gods. They had nothing to do with him . At least, they’d had nothing to do with him before they started hunting him in his past life, and at that point he hadn’t cared how they were ranked. Even then, he’d rarely needed to deal with them directly; gods seemed to prefer to work through their followers.

It might be more important this time.

A local deity is usually an ascended mortal, generally one who is called a deity because of their power. They may be a god for a region or a planet, even a few planets. If they are known and supported beyond that, they are no longer considered local.

Most are not even Incarnates, and those that are were usually deities first; becoming a deity is one of the faster ways to gather the power and inclination to qualify as an incarnate. At least, it used to be. Of course, they still have to meet the other requirements and that is insanely difficult for anything other than the Beast-Gods.

They create a following because prayers are another way to gain power. Prayers carried on mana bring mana to the one they are meant for. They can also have secondary effects, but that is not why the proto-deity creates a cult.

Once upon a time, I did not mind them. Today … there are still local deities on Earth today, though they are vastly weakened from what they once were. The war was less damaging to the survivors than it was to me.

“War? You mean, the second time you were damaged, when the island sank?” Serenity remembered the vision all too clearly. He was confident it had inspired the legend of Atlantis, though setting when it happened wasn’t possible.

Yes. They were uncaring of me and of any but themselves. I can easily believe that one would set a generations-long curse and then be angered when it is broken. I suspect that the moment he knew was when the problem started.

Or perhaps that was simply when he was able to mark her as his enemy? Yes, that seems more likely. A single moment, a single touch would not be enough to both determine the loss and set a Mark for one as diminished as may exist on this world.

“What can I do to protect Rissa?”

Take her away or keep her hidden. Taking her off the planet would be safer; hiding her away in Aki’s dungeon may lead to an angry god descending on it.

Or plan for that. The young gods have never fought; perhaps they would agree to help you against one of the Old. If you can, find out who he is and what he holds; prepare to counter it. Most of the old gods have fallen and few worship them; his power is limited. Prepare quickly; as any of the old gods are now, they cannot destroy me, but if you wait he may grow.

When you are ready, anger him and make him come to you. Aki’s influence will weaken him and strengthen you; be prepared to strike hard when he comes.

It really wasn’t much of a plan, but Serenity already knew which of the options Rissa would want. She wasn’t one to run away if she could fight.

Neither was he.