Parsec

According to Venera, they were following the tunnel westwards. The depth had not changed much, though parts of the twin metal lines set into the floor fractured in places. They passed a great many broken stones and piles of earth. It was quite unlike the few glimpses she’d gotten of Glister’s layered depths; disappointing, really.

“You have quite the friendships among humans?” Linden asked.

“Not especially,” Parsec answered. He was likely trying to establish conversation rather than catch her in a lie, but Venera’s murmurings left her all-too-aware of her disguise. “The guide there was one of the friendlier sorts. There are different encounters to worry of, I have found.”

“Don’t we know it,” Linden said moodily. “Well, we are always glad to help our newcomers recuperate. Should be reaching the main portion soon—can you scent it alright?”

Parsec concentrated. “I believe so.”

A faint mixture of scents drifted about them, subtle change from stillness and stone. Sour apricots, Venera categorised. True fruits. Brindled bark and bird’s eye maple.

“How many occupants do you have, in this, as you say, un-Hive down here?” Parsec continued. It seemed the question to ask, to convey polite interest. It was also useful information.

“Such things are in forever-flux,” Linden said, tilting his head. The ornaments dangling from his horns chimed together as he did so. “But sixty or so permanent residents. Some leave and return. Many are independent schismatist groups, stopping by in a nomadic manner.”

Sixty was enough to be considered a proper swarm.

“I see.” She hesitated. “Are you their leader?”

“A swarmlord, you mean?” Amusement winked in his tone. “I wouldn’t say so myself. Not like the Hival tales. But what about you? What are your intentions?”

They rounded a corner. Scent bloomed, proximity-fresh. The side of the human-made tunnel had been cleaved open, and another offshoot excavated. This new tunnel was reinforced with wooden planks and slabs of biosynthesised composite; not fine work, she judged, but sturdy enough. In truth, it did not look like the entrance to a place she would want to live, the problem of Eltanin notwithstanding.

Intentions? Venera said. Hunger ones; perhaps best know not.

Parsec hesitated. Was trickery an option here? “I would like to regain some of my strength away from Hive’s influence,” she answered, which seemed ambiguous enough.

Linden gave a knowing twitch of spine before stepping into the offshoot. “It is quite alright, Pavao. Many come here to seek syrup only. And who are we to blame them? The Hival embrace is a crushing one.”

Parsec blinked at his answer, and at the ghost sighs brushing her spines. It was unsettling, that there existed people who believed such things beyond all else. She turned her attention back to the offshoot. It was at least as large as the human-made tunnel and it widened further some metres in. Linden ventured ahead, pushing aside a curtain of leaves to reveal a vast cavern at the very end.

“Watch your steps coming out,” he warned, edging off to the side. “There is a ledge, but it isn’t very large.”

Parsec blinked at the warning and peered over the precipice. The tunnel’s mouth overlooked a sprawling cavern blanketed in blue-grey moss, illuminated by huge, bulging lamps webbed to the walls. They cast a calm, yellow glow that reminded her of the artificial suns installed in larger Hival hollows. The light refracted and diffused through an abundance of mineral cylinders spearing down from the ceiling. Flowering vines waterfalled down flowstone walls, filling the air with the scent of foliage and springtime, pollen and karst. Figures moved around a large cluster of what looked like repurposed human-crafted structures, placed squarely in the center of it all.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Linden said, practically beaming. “It’s taken some time to cultivate, but it was worth it in the end.”

She cast about for a suitable compliment. “It smells good. Light and fresh.”

“Yes, I’ve been told as much.” He chuckled softly. “But feast your eyes, if you would. People forget to, until they’re reminded.”

Parsec edged gingerly out onto the ledge. The view was just as good as the smell, she thought begrudgingly, though a shade overwhelming for her taste. It reminded her a little of Segin’s decorative follies.

Did the predecessor have follies? Venera mused. Predecessor remembers little, but sensation of stone changing beneath the hand is clear enough. Her tone seemed oddly musing, perhaps even wistful. Recalls the scent. Berries and pine. Sensed the echo. Lord Linden did much with what a scentless could. Do not begrudge his joy.

Parsec dragged her gaze from the cavern back to him. “Ah. You’re an anosmic?”

He dipped his spines, but not in a self-conscious manner. “Many of us are. Some Hives are better about this sort of thing nowadays. I don’t know about your old one, but the one up there thinks us little better than fodder bodies. Not three generations ago, they classed it as an inoperable defect. Drowned in the recycling vats alongside the unformed…I’ll admit a selfishness: I made the view for myself. A word of advice?” He leaned in fractionally. “I’m alright with questions, but there’s no need to ask others unless they bring it up themselves. Some of us—the older ones, especially—have bad memories about this sort of thing.”

“I see.” She hadn’t expected a reply like that. Come to think of it, had she met many anosmics in her time at the Hive?

Predecessor usually set them to solitary synthesis routines, Venera spoke. Minimal collective crafting for psychological enrichment, depending on extent of anosmia. Predecessor remembers it failed to create a subroutine once. Two-point-five per one thousand individuals. Zero point zero-zero-two-five percent. Three quarters voluntarily severed from Hive, half within two cycles after fledging. Complaints collected and testimonies gathered but small dataset, low priority. Detailed information not parsed beyond Lieutenant-level. Could not optimise for aggregate assembly line duties nor integration with pre-existing hunting collectives nor gathering routine tree nor patrols due to city interaction…

The list went on and on. Parsec wondered what it’d be like working in synthesis for her whole life. Alone. Void of scent. In the dark. She swallowed her thoughts as Linden stepped into the air and beckoned for descent.

The structures, it turned out, were old shuttle-shells, half engulfed in blueish moss. A selection of schismatists looked up at their approach, and a few tilted their spines in greeting. Parsec almost forgot to return the gesture, before Venera whispered an impression of reciprocity.

Most looked ordinary enough. Scout’s wings. Processor’s jaws. Here and there, a hooked tail and a few eyes like jewels—special vanities. Unimportant. Everything was arranged like a human village, the gaps in between the shuttles forming surprisingly even, if meandering, corridors. Linden led her through a clearing like a town square, featuring a bubbling spring. Schismatists glanced up at her passing, some murmuring softly amongst themselves. To her irritation, she could not make out the words—perhaps they knew this.

Solace, this-one-Parallax. Taste the air.

Parsec bit her teeth together to keep from speaking.

“I’m guessing you’ll be wanting to see our dear Brewer, then?” Linden continued, and beckoned her to follow without waiting for an answer.

Brewer? She thought. Not Archivist? Ah, but of course—these poor fools couldn’t have an Archive.

Threading through the cluster of half-buried shuttle-shells, they approached a mossy hump of earth—so large it probably counted as a hillside. Did these schismatists hope to become un-Hival by copying the architecture of the Hive? Parsec suppressed a curl of her tail. There was another tunnel entrance set into this hill, small enough that one would have to crouch. It looked dark, too. Parsec’s fingers twitched at the thought. Linden might have seen it, because he summoned a fresh handful of spell-light and entered first.

The passage was unremarkable, save for a few boulders studded here and there. It smelled dry and crumbly, shored up with planks and roots and magic. The air pulsed, then stilled. The motion was so brief that she might have suspected her own imagination—but no, she knew the ways of the inner Hive. She had felt the steel-filament-gauze of the Archives for herself enough to know: this unassuming tunnel was warded, and warded well.

A strong net, Venera said, with what might have been a hint of cheer. Shed antlers. Spoiled plums. Far from Archival. No fear; the air paths branch out and away.

Parsec did not reply, focusing instead on the bobbing light ahead, the soft clink of dangling stone against swaying shell. The fanciful ideals of the schismatists meant nothing to her, she reminded herself. It was only her weakness, her dulled senses combined their frivolous proximity, that set a grating itch at the base of her spines.

Ahead, the air thickened with herbal scents: boiled bark and sourwood. She could make out a sound now, too—liquids, simmering. Fresh light poured into the widening tunnel, the milky green of carefully cultivated glow-mosses.

“Sylvan,” Linden spoke, no longer addressing her. “I bring a guest.”

Shining mosses furred the hollow. Pale stalactites gleamed like polished teeth. Benches had been assembled from spare shuttle parts, bearing glasswork and cauldrons, a tangle of human-like instruments that made her tail flick with unease.

It shivers for want of recognition, Venera murmured. Far from Archival. Far from predecessor, and home, and…you scent it, this-one-Parallax?

No, she almost replied. No, she did not. This place did not resemble a queen’s collection chamber by either measure of scent or sight. It was disgusting. Unnatural. And loath as it was, she did not need help any less for having known it: this tainted source, this poisoned spring.

In the middle of it all stood a schismatist, broad-winged and sleepy-eyed. The cauldron before him bubbled violently as he stirred, heated by the flames of a human contraption. His tail whisked restlessly across the ground, combing over the moss as he muttered something about berries and orpiment beneath his breath.

“Sylvan,” Linden said again, a trace of impatience to his tone.

“Yes, yes,” the brewer said distractedly. He flicked his tail and effused a vague cloud of thistle-tinted irritation. “Just one moment.”

The mannerism was telling. She reassessed her estimation of his age. He seemed to know what he was doing with the cauldron, yes, and he was sturdily-built, but he was most certainly younger than she had first assumed. Further unease stirred within her at that, but what choice did she have? An inexperienced brewer had to be better than none at all.

The brewer—Sylvan—gave the cauldron another stir, before upending a vial into its contents. The liquid frothed bright blue. Fat bubbles formed atop the foam, sparking with spellfire before they burst. It all smelled highly unusual, smoky and bittersweet. Was this even a precursor for honey…?

Venera made a vaguely appreciative impression over her shoulder. Catalytic solution, she said. Curling ligands. Enzyme hundred-four.

“She’s just here for the syrup, then?” Sylvan said, setting his stirring stick aside. The flames dimmed as he fiddled with a set of levers at the base of the heating contraption. He headed for the back of the hollow without waiting for an answer.

“She is here for our help,” Linden said. His voice carried calmly across the space. “Aren’t you, Pavao?”

“For your brewer’s help, largely.” She held out the vial. “I come to barter.”

Sylvan’s spines rippled as he drew closer. “Is that what I think it is?”

“Hival honey,” she confirmed, and watched as his eyes took on a covetous gleam. “You need base material to refine your craft, correct?”

He gave her a sharp look. “Close to one who knew brewing, were you? That’s not ripe, though. Where did you get that?”

“Not important. Can I exchange this for some of your syrup, or not?”

Sylvan exchanged a look with Linden, still at her side. “Show me the scent,” he said. “It has to be genuine.”

She uncorked the vial. A scent of green-gold flooded the space, pure and sweet.

Sylvan took a deep breath. He held it for several long moments, as if luxuriating in a taste of long-lost pleasure. These schismatists could say all they liked, but she doubted they could avoid missing their Hives. Sylvan exhaled quietly before meeting her eyes again. He nodded and strode for the back of the hollow.

Upon some squinting, she realised there were hundreds of vials nestled into the moss there, only discernible by glints of reflected light. He selected three vials out of their moss-choked hollows. “Take these, then.”

“Only three?” she challenged.

“Any more, and it’ll spoil.” She couldn’t be sure he was being truthful, and Venera had nothing to add on the matter.

The liquid within shimmered gold as he held them out to her. It did look like proper honey, as far as she could tell.

“It’s not as potent as the Hive stuff,” he continued. “You need to dose over time. See the mechanism there, in the cork? Squeeze the tab for a drop. One or two drops a day, understand? An extra drop if you’re tired. Don’t drink the whole thing at once, unless you want to have a bad time.”

Venera murmured something about half-lives over her shoulder.

“Thank you,” she said warily. She handed the honey over and for the syrup, cradling the vials in her hands. “And you require no additional payment? No…special work to do on your behalf?”

Linden shook his head next to her. “No, no. Well, I won’t lie: a helping hand would be nice. But nothing is demanded of you, Pavao. I don’t know what you’ve heard about us, but we simply want our fellow lone-flyers to survive away from Hival influence above all else.”

“We’re not the weird sort of schismatist,” Sylvan grumbled, with a flick of spines.

Linden nodded sagely. “We do not wish violence upon Hives. We do not call for death of Titanias. Some individuals give us a bad name—exiles, especially. Be careful out there.”

Exiles, Venera echoed with what might have been bitter amusement.

“Must be desperate if you came here worried about that,” Sylvan scowled. “Go on, have a drop.”

She hesitated. If the syrup had an ill effect and it struck her here, in their home territory…

“If we wanted to steal your barter, we could’ve done it already,” Sylvan added. “But if you would like to have a surprise reaction in the safety of your own home, feel free to. It’ll be quite the trip for an antidote.”

She ground her teeth together at the bluntedness of her senses, the weakness so obvious throughout.

That-one-Sylvan not so fast, Venera broke in. Nor leader-Lord Linden. Weakened Parallax…if biting, could help. Predecessor is here. If poison…will give all that predecessor can. Leap. A picture of a trajectory blazed in her mind, coils of motion ghosting through air. Reclaim honey. Drink-flee.

Venera’s proposal was better than nothing. It would be a most unpleasant course of action, it was true, but Parsec doubted it would be easy for her to die here. Wounded, yes, but not killed. It was an acceptable risk, given the alternatives. She raised a vial and squeezed a drop onto her tongue.

Sweetness stung at the back of her teeth. The power followed momentarily, and the world clicked like a turning gear as magic soaked into her veins. Edges aligned. Scents sharpened. The shadows receded, revealing caches and contours tucked into the moss. Every colour seemed to twitch in unison before settling into a fractionally more vivid version of itself.

Dawn now, Venera said approvingly. Memories of scents floated through her mind in a wave, several of them unfamiliar. Dehiscence. Decorticating.

“Good, right?” Sylvan asked. He sounded as smug as Orion sometimes did after a clear success.

“Thank you,” Parsec said begrudgingly.

Linden flicked his wings with approval. “Ah, no problems at all. You’re looking rejuvenated already.”

“Have a proper loading dose,” Sylvan said, turning back to his cauldron. “Another three drops should do it. Come back with more payment when you run out—no, actually, a little before. I don’t suppose you’ve got more of that honey, but other service will do just fine.”

She had no intention of aiding their cause. Still, she nodded jerkily and partook of another few drops. There came the same sensation as before: shivers of distilled power.

“I trust you can find your own way out from here?” Linden asked.

“Yes,” she answered. Already, the shadows were peeling away like old bark.

He tilted his head serenely. “Good. Do return whenever you’d like, Pavao. Lone-flyers are always welcome here.”

She twitched her spines courteously, and sensed Venera doing the same via some sort of tactile afterimage. Three vials of syrup in the hand: that had been suspiciously easy. She evaluated the functionality of her senses, scenting for any sign of a pursuer the whole way back.

There was none. She exited the tunnel unharmed, made her way back to the main streets and listened to scraps of human chatter as Kraedians passed her by. The words fragmented in reverse with each passing moment, making more and more sense: children chattering excitedly, street hawkers selling soup. Glyphs wavered into letters like fungi pushing through soil, like buds bursting in springtime. The crowds thickened with the fast-rising sun. Humans milled on all sides, but the path she wove was her own.

Hers—and Venera’s.

===

The ramshackle inn was quiet when she returned. A sullen barmaid polished glasses behind the counter and a few other humans shared a pot of something in the corner—an over-salted stew with poor-quality grains, by the smell of it. None of them paid her any mind. She ascended the stairs and down to the end of the lodgings corridor to find the door locked.

Stir in the wind, Venera said anxiously. Moss crawling over ledges. Split sputum. Mucus. Halcurin. Hunger-tide.

The scent of blood hit her. Her syrup-sensitised senses latched onto it and drew information out with almost startling efficiency, like incisors winnowing flesh from bone. Her scenting told her the blood was human blood, red and sharp and a few hours fresh at most. An unusual quantity, but not more than a mouthful or two. No metal, no smoke, no char of wood nor straw.

“Jackal?” she called. He was in there—she could scent his presence, partial exhales indicating recency. “Jackal, it is I. Parsec. I have returned.”

There came no verbal response. Only faint sounds of shifting fabric—and something else. A light clicking, spaced in irregular intervals. Worry and suspicion curdled in her core.

Terror-dreaming? Venera suggested.

Parsec peered through the keyhole. She could see the wall opposite, a sliver of curtained window, and his rucksack—but the cots were flush against the wall and not visible through such a small aperture.

She lashed her tail and twisted at the handle, meeting resistance once more. The door creaked more than she assumed it would. It was not an overly strong door. She could destroy it if she tried. Had her strength felt like this before? How quickly she had forgotten. How easily she must have adapted to a state of lesser self. It almost disgusted her.

Loading dose, Venera said in what might have been a warning tone. A selection of numerical concepts unfurled in her head, but she brushed them aside: getting the door open was the more urgent matter. She shifted her stance, angling her shoulder before readying wings and tail.

Far too reverberant of a solution, Venera broke in. Humans down below. This-one-Parallax is standing upon their heads.

She hissed with frustration. “What must I—the window, then?”

How is one to slip through the glass?

Parsec lashed her tail again, then calmed herself. “If he has the key…” She glared down at the vials in her hands, hoping for an answer to present itself.

Her hands…

“Are you able to induce the malleable ways, Venera?”

The words had barely left her mouth before a familiar spike of pain came. Her fingers shuddered all over. Carefully shifting the vials to her non-malleable hand, she pressed the other to the keyhole and fed melting chitin inside. The usual tactile sensation was dulled like this, but she could order it where she wanted with some concentration: in moments, she had the keyhole filled.

Reversion, Venera said approvingly.

The chitin hardened into place. She twisted, and the lock clicked open. The magic allowed her hand to melt again, freeing her finger. She shoved the door open.

“Jackal,” she said sharply, whirling to face the source of the blood-scent.

Harbinger, Venera said, hushed.

Her first impression of Jackal was that he was alive and awake and very, very unwell.

He sat on the cot with his back wedged into the corner, eyes wide and glazed and elsewhere. He was also bundled in his oilskin, still hands clutching an empty bowl. Bone fragments littered the mattress. There was a shallow wound on his arm, and his mouth bled bright red. There came that delicate clicking sound again: his teeth chattering together in an uneven rhythm.

Parsec shut the door behind her, for lack of any other useful thing to do.

“Jackal,” she said again, more quietly this time. “Are you here? Can you hear me?”

No response.

“How did this happen?” she asked, though she had the sinking suspicions of an idea.

Is…must be…Archival-like.

Parsec edged closer, waving her free hand warily in front of his eyes. There came no further response. “Undoubtedly. But why?”

Hunger.

“If he is hungry, I can bring him meat. Perhaps the humans have some sort of market…” She trailed off, looking more closely at the emptiness in his eyes. “But surely that cannot be all.”

Hypothesis: filaments. Disturbance. This-one travelled two-hundred miles and ruptured something within. Slow onset, peak concentration. Now it soothes, stills, replicates.

She stiffened with alarm, looking his head over for any sign of blood. “But the Archival magic—he was unharmed, Venera. He would have shown signs earlier if I truly…I have seen head injuries in the shattered lands. Surely the humans are not so different.”

Archival magic being the problem. Influx. Feed. The creature and its aponeurosis. It being the muscle, he the bone. The placement. The lever. When fed with influx…

“We truly caused this?”

Venera hesitated. Perhaps. Was already worsening. Only a catalysis.

A strange shiver passed over her wings and shoulders—then a sense of Venera’s presence peeling away, floating momentarily closer to the unresponsive Jackal. Several moments passed as thrumming, wordless impressions clouded her thoughts. Eventually, a ghost-hand rested upon her shoulder and Venera spoke once more.

Sensate. Incubate. Parallax, the predecessor worries.

Parsec gave a restless flick of the tail. “That we cannot fix him?” She fell silent as a thought occurred to her.

She could simply leave, now that she had a source of honey-substitute. An Archive-troubled dungeon-scout was unlikely to be of significant help in delivering justice to Eltanin. She considered it for a moment, before dismissing the idea. There were many reasons to help. Venera was watching, for one.

…Parallax aught not worry not for now, Venera said hesitantly. All begs more thought. Unflesh ways of thought and seeking. Parallax may hunt, yes? Syrup sufficient? Predecessor must think-hunt. Half-urgently. Many…hours? Yes. Hours of unspeaking.

“Why?”

It is…Parallax passed through Jackal-mind. Jackal-mind being Realm-touched—could be…vector?

Parsec frowned. “The syrup worked. I don’t feel strange in the slightest. If it were to affect me, surely I would know by now?”

Halseny, Venera said, sounding unconvinced. Predecessor thinks it best to check.

“I gather this means you will be away for…how many hours?”

More than one handful. Streams and rivulets. Shores eroding faster. Could call predecessor to aid if must…use blood and brain, but—far optimal. Interruption. Delay. Predecessor extrapolates attempt would injure Parallax. Much blood. Splintered armature. Squama. Matchwood. Pellicle. Not predecessor’s pain. No other flesh to…balance cost. The fulcrum must turn. One-way distributions. Understand?

“Then it is not a problem. Besides, the syrup will suffice. I am hardly defenseless without you, Venera.”

Predecessor extrapolates aftermath would hurt Parallax. Much.

“It is alright,” Parsec said. She wondered how one might try to sound reassuring to a dead Titania. “So long as it would not harm you.”

By no means. Only unflesh cannot further die.

“It would be a last resort,” she promised. “Not to mention severely unlikely. When is it that you will you be…thinking? Retreating?”

Soon. First the human.

She cast another glance at Jackal, sitting still but for slight twitches of eyes and jaw. “I suppose that wound needs bandaging. I have no poultice…”

Burdock and heartwood?

She trailed off and knelt by the pack at the foot of the cot. Rummaging through, she retrieved a roll of bandages and a selection of vaguely medicinal-scented bottles. One of them had a handwritten label declaring itself a salve, used for cuts and burns. She laid her vials of syrup onto the nearby table to take the salve in hand.

“Jackal,” she spoke as she approached. “Easy, now.”

His eyes did not focus. There was no reaction as she pried the bowl from his hands and set it aside. There was no flinch when she poured the salve onto his wound nor when she looped strips of bandage around his arm.

Far gone, Venera murmured, the whisper as cold as frost. Must think. Perhaps follow, see…if he had sustained on the dungeon flesh…ambient osmosis…

She gathered some of the meaning there. “As magical as that meat may be, I do not think we have time to fly to the dungeon and dig it through.”

Quantity, then.

Quantity, she could do. She even had the beginnings of an idea in mind. But with larger quantities came more weight, and she did not have a team of helpers and scouts as she was accustomed to. How many days had Jackal paid for this room? She couldn’t recall.

“Perhaps it will be better to carry him with me,” Parsec muttered. “Suppose he resists?”

Strength suffice it. Rope in the pack? Though…

A ghostly finger touched her forehead. Icy ripples spread from the point of contact.

Archive left you a gift, necromancer.

“No.” Parsec frowned. “It brought you to me, but it gave no indication of…”

It is there. May not help human’s brain, but…transport…

“He is not dead,” Parsec said quickly.

Not alive, neither.

“Are you offering to…” She wracked her head for the correct word. “…Unlock it? This supposed necromancy?”

Is already here. A tinge of austere amusement. Have not discerned? Speaking to predecessor, Parallax.

Her spines flattened instinctively with discomfort. “Hearing you speak is not the same as necromancy.”

Nourish. Polyps. Not the usual kind. River murmurs secrets. Endeavour it.

“How?”

Fly with own wings, Venera said.

Parsec scowled. She understood the necessity of not relying on a ghost for this sort of thing, but she saw no connection here. Jackal was simply a scared-looking human huddled into a corner. There was no Archival interface, no intuitive strings to manipulate. Flying and scouting was far easier than delving into the vein of the strange images Venera voiced, and the shattered lands had not built her towards fine control.

Rainfire, Venera mumbled. Reach into…?

She set down the bandages and ointment and gripped Jackal by the shoulder, alert for any change in posture, any hint of recognition. He stared right through her.

Forcing her magic to the surface of her fingertips was not difficult; doing anything useful with it was. She knew the waiting potential like she knew the joints of her own hand: spell light, spellfire, shielding. None of that would be worth much right now.

She concentrated, searching for the slightest twitch, perhaps some slow-writhing anomaly, a dark seed of power…

Blindness not darkness. Simply nothing at all.

She hesitated, still searching, and struggled to sweep her magic like a hunting formation. One pass. Two. Jackal breathed into the silence. Venera did not breathe at all.

Her magic struck the absence of something, a notch of void. It snuffed out the waiting potential like sand poured over dying coals. Her first instinct was to pull away, rid her arm of the icy sensation creeping up its length like a hundred-toothed worm.

But Venera said, hold.

The iciness abated, lapsed neutral. Her fingers twitched, and her awareness expanded. It felt as if she had grown a hundred gossamer tails from her very core, every one fully prehensile. Several anchored themselves into Jackal’s shoulder where her hand touched.

Anemone, Venera observed. Colours filled her head, as did a myriad of hazy sensations—the strongest of which was soft, blunt-tipped tubules tickling her fingertips.

It was not easy magic. She felt just as off-balance as she had upon sprouting capacity for faster flight. Still, movement was easier than molecular interpretation. And she knew something of what was expected, understood how to command. Not that she’d ever had opportunity to command fodder bodies, but they’d discussed the theory plenty, behind closed walls. This wasn’t that different.

“Rise,” she rasped, and he did.

She jerked her hand back, startled by the very movement she’d initiated. A dull pressure touched her mind; intuition, maybe. Water might erode its receptacle given enough time, and dead things had no need of time.

Walk. She tried thinking it this time. She threaded the command with facets, pressure and directionality.

The action was shaky and staggered, far more shambling than the constructs she’d seen back in the shattered lands. There was a resistance there, a pervasive sluggishness stronger than her thickest shield. That was encouraging: it meant he was not actually dead.

Venera posed her a wordless question. Are you ready? it seemed to imply.

“Yes,” Parsec said, moving Jackal to stand by the door. “And you? Is there anything else I must know?”

Good hunting, Venera said, and left for a place Parsec could not follow.