“Finally finished!” Hu sagged back against a pillow. “Thank heavens!”

“Shouldn’t you be upset?” said Dorian as he trussed up some canvas. The elixirs had been put away, the shelves stored in trunks which were then stored in Interspatial Rings. The rest, which couldn’t fit in Ring-space, needed to be bundled up and hauled back by Rust tribesmen. “Today’s the last day we can sell. Our profits are over.”

Hu leaned against a sack of posters. “I, for one, have had my share of work!” He downed an iced yellow drink, then wiped away the flecks which dribbled into his beard. “The Dweller’s Day can’t come soon enough!”

The solstice, in more common terms. It was the final day of the Festival—a day for relaxation and all-out party. Dorian would probably spend most of it in cultivation, recuperation, and preparation-work. It wouldn’t kill him, he supposed, to indulge in a few drinks too.

This year’s solstice was rumored to be special. It’d gotten lost in all the Trials’ madness, but Dorian remembered the warnings Tuketu had issued. Something about how this solstice coincided with the moons’ crossing; there was, he’d said, potential for untold cosmic phenomena.

Dorian didn’t take any of it very seriously. The less sophisticated the society, the more superstition overshadowed fact. Likely it’d just be a day of drinking when qi-densities were the thickest of the year. If there was a quota for cosmic phenomena this Festival Week, Pearl’s entrance and shenanigans had already filled it.

***

Dorian and Hu were laughing their way back to camp when they were confronted by two predictable visitors. It was Rust and Tuketu once more. Rust’s face was pallid, his lips pressed so tight they barely showed. Even Tuketu looked more terse than usual.

“Chief Rust. Master Tuketu,” grinned Dorian. He did not bow. There were no customary greetings either. “What is it you’re here for?” Not ‘how may I assist you’. Not ‘how may I help you.’ As Dorian addressed them he carried himself with a straight, proud posture. His tone was that of an equal, not a subordinate.

It was high time. Almost a month under these cretins and he was done playing the grunt. To think—mere weeks ago Chief Rust had him kneel as he anointed Dorian a Chosen! Now he was wound so tight facing Dorian, veins standing purple against his arms, jaw clenched, that he looked nearly nervous. The passage of time was merciless.

Tuketu inclined his head. “Greetings, tribesman Io. The Chief and I have come for the Tribe’s share of today’s earnings,” he said.

Dorian had decided on his approach long before Tuketu came. They’d made such a killing today that any serious embezzlement simply wasn’t believable; it’d be too obvious. So instead he simply hit on what all of them knew, but none of them dared address until now.

“Not this time,” said Dorian cheerfully. “Our contributions these past few days are plenty. I’ve just won the Trials for the Tribe! Why not let me enjoy the fruits of my labor, eh, Chief?”

“That’s…” Tuketu’s expression twisted. “Unfortunately, tribesman Io, that isn’t how we conduct—“

“It’s alright, Tuketu.” To Dorians surprise, it was Rust who spoke up. All the tension had seemingly left his body. It was like he’d come to a decision. He looked Dorian dead in the eye. “Is that your final decision?”

“Yes.” Dorian held his gaze without flinching.

Then Rust did something Dorian had never seen him do; he chuckled. It was hoarse and grating and unnatural. Dorian wouldn’t have been surprised if it was the first time he’d ever made the sound.

“Then Tuketu and I respect your decision.” He shared a meaningful look with Tuketu, then turned. “Farewell.”

Leaving Hu and Dorian to look to one another in confusion. “…What was that all about?”

***

Very late that night, after Dorian had digested most of the Roc’s energies and had blazed his way more than half-way through skin purification, he succumbed to sleep.

The stars twinkled innocently above. The moons, red and white, grazed one another, touching but not overlapping: in there intersection a brilliant crescent of pink was birthed. It was a time when the distance between realms grew thinnest. When creatures from above could descend upon the world, after a fashion. On this night and day, life and afterlife blurred together. Sometimes ghosts arose; sometimes one could speak to a passed loved one. In these hours prayers became truths.

None of these applied to Dorian. He had no use for anyone else. He had no-one to seek out from above. He slept thinking nothing of the solstice.

What he didn’t account for was that someone might seek him.

A sliver of intent from high, high above. A soul so vast that to enter this plane fully might collapse this reality in a stroke; a soul that had to resort to simulacra of itself to slip in unnoticed.

It might’ve been the last soul in the Multiverse Dorian expected. Someone he hadn’t thought about since the very start of this run.

He awoke in the center of a lake. Its waters were a soothing clear blue and almost totally still; the only movement below the surface were the easy movements of silver-scaled koi. All he heard was the soft, pleasing hymn of the currents—all else was silence. Tufts of mist drifted lazily above, shrouding the horizons and the distance.

He sat cross-legged atop a large raft of bamboo. To his side, perched in the center of the raft, was a small wood table. On it were two white-china cups of tea filled to the brim, wisps of steam and qi drifting up from its grass-green veneer.

Dorian recognized this place. It was one of the lake-worlds of Uria, a place ruled by a Godking who’d outlawed violence. The Godking took care of this world like a gardener, rooting out all wickedness and tirelessly preserving its natural equanimity and beauty. One of Dorian’s favorite vacation spots.

Bemused, Dorian reached over the side of the raft and felt the water. Comfortably warm. The ripples from his finger was the only disturbance on the glassy lake surface.

“This is a dream,” he said aloud. He frowned, peering at the point where his finger touched the lake. There was an ethereal quality to all this—mist didn’t only obscure the distance; a faint, blurring mist shrouded his perceptions too. “And not my own.”

The illusion of calm shattered in an instant. A pit opened in Dorian’s stomach.

“Astute.”

Dorian whirled around and faced the last person he wished to see. A regal nose, high cheekbones, a scarless face and milky white eyes. A man wrapped in gray, flowing silks. The most striking thing about him was his hair; his beard and hair seemed to shift and shimmer constantly, blacks and whites shifting into each other. A yin-yang in constant motion.

He groaned. “Really? How’d you even find me?”

“Luck,” said Old Man Fate, and smiled enigmatically. “That, or fate.”

Fate nodded to their surroundings. “How do you like it? World sixteen, the Everpool. Your favorite, isn’t it?” He gestured to the tea simmering on the table. “I’ve even made some delicious Dragonheart Tea. Drink with me?”

He picked up his cup smoothly. “Well?”

Dorian didn’t move, to which Fate shrugged. “Your loss.”

He started to drink. A second later Dorian scooped up a handful of water and in one fast whip-motion threw it at him. It splashed all over Fate, matting his hair and drenching his face. He blinked slowly, finished the tea, and set it down.

“I was about to ask if you’re as pleased to see me as I am you, old friend,” chuckled Fate, wiping wet hairs from his eyes. “But that suffices as an answer, I think.”

“We aren’t friends, Fate,” growled Dorian, eyes narrowing. Puzzle-pieces linked together in his head. The one-in-a-million chance encounters, the presence of a god, the perversions of fate…”Why do you always insist on meddling in my affairs?”

“Your affairs are the world’s affairs!” laughed Fate. “The world’s affairs are yours. We are all connected in fate. Deny it all you like. It won’t cease to be true.”

Dorian opened his mouth to speak, but Fate pre-empted him. “I know, I know. I know that you know. I won’t bore you with my platitudes. You’ll forgive an old man his occasional rambles, won’t you? It’s irrelevant, besides—you’ve pegged me wrong.” Fate spread his hands helplessly. “I’m not the one interfering with the flow of fate in this plane.”

“Oh?” Dorian raised an eyebrow. “Am I supposed to take your word for it?”

“I’m many things, old friend,” said Fate. He shrugged. “I’m not a liar.”

A headache was starting in earnest, and not from Dorian’s fast-healing soul wound. “Stop calling me that. And…say I believe you. If not you, then who?” He frowned. “Hold on—why are you here? Why am I here?”

“I’ll get to that,” said Fate, his tone soft as a swan’s feather. “In the meantime, won’t you have some tea?” He jerked his head to Dorian’s still-full cup.

Humphing, Dorian squinted at it. This might’ve been a dream-space, but real qi was emanating from the drink. This space blurred the lines between construct and reality. An easy feat for a Godking such as Old Man Fate. “Which species?”

“Silverfang.”

“Fresh? Time-stopped cellar? No prior freezing?”

“Of course.”

“The leaves?”

“From the highest boughs of the Tree of Eternity. Top-grade, certified by Elysia.” Grandfatherly, kind wrinkles crinkled Fate’s eyes. “It’ll resolve your soul wound. It also tastes splendid, if I do say so myself.”

Still squinting, Dorian reached for the cup and brought it to eye level. He inspected it for a few seconds, then gave it a sniff.

“What?” chuckled Fate. “Do you think I’d poison it? Truly? Have I ever given you reason to distrust me?”

“No. But you are a tremendous annoyance. You stick your nose where it doesn’t belong in service of some grand, imaginary greater good in which I have no interest.” His mouth was starting to water. He hesitated before raising the cup to his lips. “I want you to know that this is not acquiescence. You haven’t gotten me to buy into your plan. I’m not in your debt. All I’m doing is drinking tea, no strings attached.”

“No strings,” agreed Fate, rolling his eyes. “If you’re going to be such a pain about it, I may as well—“

Dorian downed it in two gulps. Wiping his lips with the cuff of his silk gown, he met Fate’s nonplussed gaze. “Well then. You have ten minutes of my time.”

“Yes, yes, this engagement is on your terms, and so forth,” said Fate with a whimsical snort and a wave of his hand.

“Nine minutes, fifty seconds.”

“Believe it or not, this isn’t about you.” Fate took another sip. “I came to this world to investigate an unusual snag in the flow of Fate. A diety has interfered on this realm, as you’ve found out. But their influence extends beyond your friend—Pearl, he calls himself?”

“Hm.”

“There are signs of godly involvement all over. Not merely in the North Desert; not merely in the desert, even. It all seems to be the work of one god, or one collection of gods, sowing seeds of discord. It is the force which powers a conquering threat in each region.”

Humming, Fate tapped his chin with a finger. “If I’m to guess, their aim is to conquer the plane.”

Dorian took it in with a plain expression. “…And?”

“It doesn’t concern you—you’d rather finish your work and ascend, leaving the plane to its fate. I know,” sighed Fate.

“Precisely.”

“Here’s the issue: it’s not just this plane that has seen interference. Of the hundred and ninety-two lesser planes, forty show signs of tampering. Three have already been conquered fully—under the rule of one Empire.” Fate’s rheumy eyes didn’t blink as he stared. His voice took on a preacher’s quality, prophetic. “I sense a shift coming,” he murmured. “A rise of a great and vast evil. A shadow falls over the Multiverse; it stretches up from the lower realms, invading the planes of the Gods, and above!”

A lengthy pause. Then—

“Uh-huh. Refill my cup?” Dorian tapped the white-china handle.

Fate shot him a dry look. There was a gushing sound and Dorian’s cup was full to the brim once more. “I sense you aren’t taking this very seriously.”

“Remind me,” said Dorian, grinning wryly, “What was the occasion of your last visit to me? Or the time before?”

“…to warn of an impending multiverse-ending doom…” A faint blush filled Fate’s cheeks. “So I got the timing wrong once or twice.”

“Six times. Seven, if you count this one.”

Fate raised an imperious finger. “This time I’m certain!”

“Last time you also said you were certain.” Dorian took a sip of tea. “You got all worked-up over the mole-peoples taking over the Mountain Realm—said it was a stepping-stone to conquering the multiverse! How did all your peaceful protesting go, by the way? Did those two centuries of sign-making and hunger-striking convince the mole-king to abdicate?”

Fate stared out silently across the surface of the lake. “I see you won’t be persuaded,” he said, a note of sadness in his voice. “May I appeal to your self-interest, at least? These ruffians have their eyes set on this realm—they’ll show no mercy to anyone, natives or you!”

“I’m on a speedrun,” said Dorian. He finished the last of the tea. “With any luck, I’ll be gone long before then. My thanks for the tea. You’re right—it is delightful.”

Even when he was defeated, Fate didn’t look sad. At best his expression read peaceful resignation. That was Fate; his emotions oscillated in small spurts around the same set-point of gentle equanimity. Dorian could’ve hurled abuses at him for the next decade and his face would read the same. “Very well. At any rate, it was pleasant chatting with you, old friend, after all this time.”

“All I ask,” said Dorian, setting down his cup, “Is to be left to my own devices. In return, I don’t meddle in the affairs of others! Is that too grand a request?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” smiled Fate. “Anywho, we need not retread old ground…” His eyes drooped shut. “My time here is ending. Before I go, I’ve one last warning. If you listen to nothing else, hear this.”

When his eyes flickered open once more, they were unfocused. Staring out at the flows of Fate, mapping the ebbs of the future. “The strings of Fate tangle at the solstice. It spells disaster—cosmic disaster. Bloodshed stains the geyser red! Bodies litter the sands… the moons cross paths…beware the all-seeing eye.”

“Wait.” Dorian frowned. “What do you mean, cosmic—“

Before he could finish, the scene dissolved like an old memory.