“I think, first, you should tell me exactly what it is you’re proposing.” Florette stared the oozing creature down, trying to discern what exactly it wanted her for. Trying to stop and think for once, before getting tangled up in a gigantic mess again.

“In a way, nothing more than acting in my nature, young one.” Corro’s words were slick in the air, steaming unnaturally out of the enormous mouth that filled his entire head.

“As a poison spirit?” Did you seek me out because I wreck everything I touch? That was distressingly plausible.

“Poison accounts for one part of my being, but it is not the sum of it. No more than fencing is yours.” Condensing tighter, his body rose in height until Florette could almost stare down his mouth at eye-level. “I am of the Wastes, desolation and perdition and, above all, decay. Both catalyst and witness to it, for every instant of my existence since the first splinters of my being coalesced in the throats of the doomed and held onto what remained as they were pulled to Terramonde.”

“And so when you heard about me, you thought I’d be a kindred spirit,” she said resignedly. “I can’t say I’m not flattered, but…” Fernan has his plan here, getting a sun back that’s more empathetic. I don’t want to mess things up for him. Even if he could be so condescending it was hard not to want to, sometimes.

“When I heard of you, you seemed unremarkable. A human killer amongst countless others, momentarily relevant in that you were an impediment to Glaciel, and perhaps destined for a premature death within my purview, but otherwise unremarkable.”

“Did you talk to the Fallen? Because you seem to have taken some notes from them?”

“I have met none by that name. My perspective changed when I talked to my friend, a wiser spirit than I, and with greater vision and insight than any alive.”

“Who?” It’s not like I’ve met any other spirits.

“I just told you.” Was that a smile on his massive mouth? “Her sight reaches far, and she said that Glaciel was not the first powerful figure you angered heedlessly. In fact, it seemed to be something of a habit for you.”

Florette buried her head in her hands. Is he drawing on his spiritual power to destroy me?

“That vizier you killed on the metal monster, why did you do it?”

“What, Perimont? He was actively preparing to wage war here, to attack people I care about, people he mentioned by name. I had to stop him.”

“Reactivity?” A drop of purple fell from his teeth, sinking deep into the ground with a faint sizzle. “You saw a threat to your established situation, and acted to stop it from changing things? I have seen such from many who called themselves heroes, and it is wholly unremarkable.”

“Maybe don’t ascribe a motive to me just to criticize it then.” Not unexpected, to see a spirit who talked about overturning the natural order taking a dim view of protecting the status quo. “Fuck no I wasn’t acting to keep things as they are. I just saw that he was about to make them worse, it was an imminent threat to—”

“Allow me to help you, then. This Perimont figure, you say that he posed an imminent threat. What if he had not? Suppose you found him alone in the woods, defenseless before you. Would you have killed him then?”

“I… I don’t know. I feel like I’m supposed to say no, but if he were the same person, having done all the things he’s done…”

“Do not tell me what you believe I want to hear.” Corro sagged back to his shorter form, dipping further onto the ground as he did. “Concern yourself less with what is expected of you.”

“That might be the first time anyone’s ever said that to me. But honestly, it’s a stupid hypothetical anyway. A man like that is never without his guards, never really defenseless like what you’re talking about. And the world is better off without him, no matter how he died.”

Corro sat silently for a moment, his mouth turning slightly to follow her hand as she drummed it against her leg. “You have just skipped past the construction of my analogy. I cannot help but admire the ruins into which you have just rendered the intended course of this conversation.”

“What?”

“Already, you grasp that some are never truly vulnerable by their very nature, a fact far more true for my kind than yours.”

Florette frowned, waiting for him to get to the point. Right now he seemed to be trying even harder to act suspicious and creepy than the last shadowed figure she’d met in the dark of night, and that had only been a few minutes ago.

A shame, too. He’d had such a promising start.

“I was incompatible with the Undying by our very natures, and yet I served her just the same. I think she must have enjoyed thinking she had mastered her opposite force and turned it to her own ends, an ultimate expression of her strength. Like so much of what I find myself amidst, she was impressive while her power lasted. Lunette is different. She is weakened, for want of offerings. She lacks coordinated followers or active sages, and now lacks her father to act as her benefactor as well, contentious as that relationship was. Too weak to turn down my help, even knowing what happened to the last spirit I served.”

Florette blinked. “I thought spirits only followed strength?” Which is why you’re all so fucked up.

“Most do,” he said resignedly. “Most do.”

Setting her hand back on the handle of her sword, she took in the disgusting form of this spirit anew, processing the obvious intent behind his words. “Look, I’m not going to kill anyone for you until I’m extremely clear on the details and what exactly they did to deserve it, confirmed by others. This is sounding more and more louche by the minute. You know, dubious.”

The sound that emanated from his shaking mouth was unmistakable laughter, even as wet and distorted as it was. “I explained to you that I am a spirit of death and decay, of premature demise and ruination, and you thought that I would go to a human if I wanted someone dead?”

“Well, it certainly seemed to be what you were building up to.”

“I can admire your audacity, at least, and I suppose I cannot blame you for thinking so little of me, given what you know.”

“Well, likewise, I guess. But you still sought me out, and I asked for a straight answer about what you want like an hour ago by now. Could you please just… explain?”

“It has been thirteen minutes.”

“Oh.” Florette clicked her tongue. “Well, that’s still a long time to wait for an answer while you talk about the distant past. I was pretty excited there, for a moment.”

“You killed a powerful arbiter of your society, a despot. As pitifully weak as he might have been, I am given to understand that, by your standards, his power was nonetheless quite notable. The act saw you injured and cast out.”

“Well… yeah.”

“Would you do it again, knowing what you know now?”

Florette didn’t hesitate. “Yes. He had to go.”

“What I propose is much the same. Terramonde’s surface is divided in one sense, ruled by disparate arbiters of massive domains encompassing the essentials of existence, and yet they stand together when their power is threatened. One need look no further than Khali for that. And we must serve them without question, should we desire to avoid the same fate. The patronage of the better of them might spare some individuals from the wrath of others, but not many. Such is a privilege I have been fortunate to benefit from, but a rare one, and swiftly revoked for the slightest disobedience. Everyone else lacks even a voice within the arbiter’s domain, let alone formal power. All is left to strength or direct utility to the strong.”

“Oh…” Florette whispered, her eyes widening with realization. Still, I can’t get ahead of myself. Need to actually verify this first.

Corro nodded. “It was not my intent, yet it was in my presence that even the Undying ceased to exist as she had, her power never again to be used by her own hands. Instead, it was wielded to kill another arbiter, perhaps the most powerful of all. Only to plunge the world into darkness. Their power is too consolidated to allow them to fall, and so it falls to us to raise them up. Arbiters depend on us, our offerings, our efforts, our followers, and yet they do not consider us. Their right to their domain comes from strength alone, leaving the rest of us too shattered and weak to challenge it.”

“So entrenched it seems almost impossible to even contemplate anything else…” Florette muttered, her thoughts turning to Malin. “But it’s not impossible.”

“Precisely. Not for nothing did I see the Queen of the Exiles in you, young one, for she too saw that her peoples’ condition could not stand. I would have complemented her well, had I stepped in. Arbiters must, to an extent, stand on ceremony, by their very nature. By my nature, I corrupt and degrade the pristine, twisting health into sickness, glory into failure. I bring things to their premature, unnatural end, leaving only twisted waste behind. But for some, such an end is better than allowing them to continue.”

“So you—”