Resting Xamiliere’s head on her lap, Anastacia sat near an edge of a cliff facing towards a vast but warm sea she had never seen before. Waves as tall as a person crashed against the rocky wall below her and caused quite a bit of salty mist to reach her on occasion, but it didn’t really bother her after the oppressive moisture and heat of the grove. Behind her was an untamed field of hay and thistle, which apparently was under Sorbus’ charge as one of their less-liked responsibilities because of its proximity to the sea and salty air. Continuing along the cliff, towards what Anastacia presumed was south, took one to a decently sized fishing village full of life on an early afternoon such as this. In the north, the cliff she was sitting on turned into a mountain that was slowly crumbling into the water as time took its toll on the rock.

Sorbus only remembered so many locations in the outside world and none of them were conveniently close to Valor, so Anastacia had allowed the fox to arbitrarily pick one as their destination, which didn’t end all too badly all things considered. Sorbus had remained with them for a while, but seeing how desperately the fox was wishing to return to their more important duties, Anastacia urged them to go. She figured that Xamiliere would be able to get them to Valor anyway, and even if she wasn’t, they could simply work their way to the city from the nearby village with a bit of effort and time – after they figured out where they even were first. Before Sorbus departed, Anastacia told them about Valor and its rough location in the world, just in case the spriggan needed help or just wanted to visit later on. She felt that the fox had more than earned what help she could offer by sticking by Xamiliere’s side even against other nature spirits – and she was admittedly curious about how things would turn out for them in the future.

And so, with the grove and its curious inhabitants finally behind her, the necromancer stopped to think on everything that had happened, including the reason they had left it so suddenly. Had the incoming intruder been of the sect, they would have no doubt allowed her there to fight, so she figured it must have been about some ancient business beyond mortal comprehension and better left to the spirits to deal with as they had wished. As she pondered, she kept instinctively caressing the wooden surface of Xamiliere’s fresh body. Not much had changed in its structure, definitely not enough for just anyone to notice, but Anastacia did. Most of it was simply the removal of small imperfections that had stayed behind after old injuries had healed, but her appearance was also slightly more youthful. Had she been a regular mortal, it would have seemed like ten of fifteen years had been lifted off her body. Her bark was smoother and thinner, her entire body slightly slenderer and her face even more lifelike than before. Anastacia absentmindedly pressed her finger against the spriggan’s lips, thinking they would be soft like her own, but wood was still wood in the end, and they didn’t budge.

Understanding her own feelings a bit better now than before their excursion, she knew why her gaze lingered on Xamiliere’s lips for a good while longer than she wanted it to. “Is this one of those stories where there needs to be a kiss for you to wake up? We might be here for a good while if that’s the case. It’s not that I don’t want to, or wouldn’t in a heartbeat if that really was the case… It’s just… I need a friend more than anything for a while longer. There’s too much going on, both in me and out here, and I’m just frankly very lost in all of it. Not only am I supposed to be dead, which is more than a few sleepless nights on its own, but I’m also supposed to be a fairly big actor in some pretty big stuff – which I just don’t want to be. I’m happy to slap the violet out of these sect assholes, but only because they’re being shits to me and my friends, not because of some color-coded soul nonsense. I just want to be me and do stuff Anastacia wants to do, including this whole kissing business eventually, none of this white necromancer garbage I get peddled constantly, none of this dumb sect stuff, none of whatever the fuck is going on in Mournvalley… Maybe it’ll all be over once I stomp the sect out of existence, and probably once we find the other white one. I get if this is just profoundly selfish from your perspective, but please trust me when I say that this is the best I can do right now.” She rambled to herself, almost hoping Xamiliere wasn’t hearing any of it. “That is, assuming you’re still there.”

Neither the speech nor prodding her face gave any more life to the spriggan, but the green wisps of energy kept brightly flowing within her, suggesting that she only needed more time.

“Can you imagine how mad Rosie will be once we get back?” The necromancer chuckled and placed her hand on top of Xamiliere’s, slipping her fingers between the spriggan’s. “Even if we hadn’t left a bunch of soil and two entire trees in my room… I might get off with a stern talk, but she’s probably going to assume you kidnapped me, isn’t she? I’ll do what I can to calm her, but I’d be prepared to sleep elsewhere if I were you, until I smooth this one out with her…”

Having spent most of her life alone in a cell, it was hardly a struggle for Anastacia to carry a conversation on her own, usually with something that wasn’t even sentient to begin with, so while time passed, she simply kept talking.

“It kind of pained me to leave Iris behind if I’m being honest. She just seems like the kind that’s always only a moment away from doing something extremely stupid for perfectly good reasons, and I don’t think she’s anywhere near as okay with everything that has happened as she pretends to be – some of which may be my fault, but that’s beside the point. I know Emilia will look after her, but at the same time I don’t really think she should be leaning too much on gods for help, even Sylvia… Maybe especially Sylvia. Something about that one doesn’t add up whenever I try to think about it. Apparently shoving me back to this side of life and death was a big deal, and she did request me and Gilbert to look into the sect without telling Emilia about it for some reason – and now this whole thing about Emilia becoming untouchable by necromancy. Something fishy about that whole thing but I’m too dumb to put the pieces together.” She pondered out loud as she watched some kind of a fishing ship approach the village by the shore. “Or maybe I’ve just been listening to spriggans too much as of late.

“I hope Iris’ wings are ready though. She’s supposed to be in the upper end of what Mournvalley has to offer, but she may as well not have been a necromancer when we left. The power was there, but it felt like it was stuck in her, barely trickling out here and there. Though I guess that makes sense considering the designs she wanted in the wings. They’re not actually that useful for fighting, nothing like Coquelicot’s arms at least, but more like conduits to more easily divide her attention between multiple things… But that in on its own is hardly inquisitor worthy. Amaranth, the old hag I needed to go to Mournvalley to beat, could basically take over the entire collection of skeletons they had in her heyday, and send them out of Mournvalley without having to go herself. Makes me think there’s more to Iris’ talents than controlling a handful of thralls and that weird biting habit. Well, it’s not really my business what they do, after all, I think the main goal is to not have to get rid of this inquisition as well – and she’s kind of fun, you know? If she didn’t have just a puzzling level of reverence for the pile of burning ass that is Mournvalley, it could be nice if she stayed in Valor.”

The ship in the distance had managed to successfully dock itself to the pier and Anastacia could only barely see barrels, presumably full of fish, being moved around on the deck. She spared a moment to think how fun it would be to sail around for a while, and see even more of the world than the trips from Valor allowed her to. She then glanced at the sea that seemed to continue infinitely into the horizon as a bottomless black mass of water, and decided that maybe a smaller boat and a lake would do before trying out the real deal. Rosie rarely spoke of her days of piracy, but she did seem to miss the sea at times, so there must have been something to the whole thing, even if it seemed like a terrifying prospect at first.

“You sure are taking your time, huh?” The necromancer sighed. Every minute that passed made her a bit more worried that something big had changed within her friend, and she wouldn’t be herself anymore. Back when Xamiliere was trying to make up her mind, Anastacia had made sure to remain as confident as possible to hopefully inspire a bit of hope in the spriggan, but as time slowly passed on the cliff, the act had started to crumble. It wasn’t exactly outlandish to consider that the grove could have decided to take back one of its children, even if her form had remained the same. It also wasn’t that hard to believe that the grove wouldn’t be all too bothered by the threats of a single necromancer if it had some other goals in mind. It was still entirely possible that Xamiliere would wake up as entirely indifferent to her previous life, or worse yet, as someone entirely different. Still, even as doubts began to pile up, Anastacia held on to the belief that Xamiliere had been exactly who she was supposed to be, and there was nothing for the grove to change.

“It’s going to be terribly cold when we get back home, and I forgot my coat and shoes back there… I’m actually kind of worried that Rosie has gotten rid of the trees in my room and we have to walk back from the forest outside of the city. If that’s the case, you’ll need to carry me since I want to keep all my toes.” She said, now with a hint of doubt in her tone.

“But I think it’s supposed to start getting warmer any day now, right? When the spring comes, we can go hang out outside again, just the two of us. I think that was the best part of this whole thing as well. I did learn a lot and met some interesting spirits, but we did get some nice alone time. The inn is great, but it’s a bit hard to just spend time together there. A lot of watchful eyes, people that don’t need to overhear everything and all that.” The necromancer traced the burns on her arm with her finger as she tried to keep talking to avoid having to consider the possibility that all was not as she hoped. “I’d like to hear more about your past as well. Ulmus did say some things they probably shouldn’t have, and if you don’t want me to know about all that, I won’t mention it again – but you know, I want to know you better, the you I’ve seen here as well as the one I’ve known before… So please wake up already…”

The wooden body of the spriggan was starting to weigh on Anastacia’s legs, and though she wanted to stay as they were just in case Xamiliere were to wake up, she eventually had to give up when her legs started to become unbearably numb. Working out the pins and needles, she took a few steps without straying too far from her friend. Eventually, after quite a bit of pacing, she ended up a bit closer to the edge of the cliff, close enough to peer over the edge at the waves crashing against the jagged rocks below. Even though it probably wasn’t too deep, the water appeared entirely black against the light grey stones, making the sea seem bottomless even so close to the shore. She could feel a few schools of fish in the distance as well as a couple of larger creatures slowly drifting along the shore towards the town – likely having learned that a fishing ship arriving meant that there was a chance for some of the catch to end up back in the water, or even just the offal. After the vibrant colors of the grove and her brief glimpse at the primordial night, the world around her felt like it lacked all meaningful color all of a sudden. The black sea without reflections, grass and thistle around them was barely green, the daunting grey overcast sky above, even the buildings of the town seemed like their once bright colors had worn down to a slight tint. Having seen the perfect lushness of the primordial times, the lingering greenery of the grove and now the faded world that was left in such a quick succession really made the trajectory of things obvious for the first time. To someone who had lived in a dark cell for so long, even the current state of the world had always appeared miraculously beautiful, but it was suddenly very difficult to see it as much more than a worn-out husk of what had once been.

“Is this how you, King and other ancient things see the world as well? Just as kind of… disappointing now?” She asked and watched the clouds slowly roll across the sky. “Though I guess I should be happy with what I have, since some day in the future, someone will feel exactly like this about what’s left right now – or maybe this will pass when I start to forget or when my mood gets a bit better…”

Obviously, she knew the colors she had marveled at in the past still existed completely unchanged, but even in her memories they now seemed faded. The bright crimson of the red inquisition’s robes, the royal purple of the guild’s uniforms, the soft light brown of coffee with a bit of cream in it, even the accursed violet of the sect may as well have been ashen grey. Only four colors remained as bright as ever: the green energy swirling within spriggans, the pale blue glow of the ancient simulacra and the reddish crystalline horns of guild officials, as well as their orange counterpart on unit twelve.

Having done nothing but further ruined her mood by thinking about something else, Anastacia returned to her friend, this time simply sitting beside her while holding the spriggan’s hand. As time passed, the doubt and desperation in her rapidly gained more of a foothold. Evening began to approach and the temperature fell well below what she had gotten used to, but neither that nor her hunger really bothered the necromancer. Finding food or warmth wouldn’t be an issue, so she simply ignored both of them and focused on what mattered to her.

Then came the night. Nothing had been said for oven an hour as the necromancer stubbornly clutched onto her friend’s hand and emotionlessly watched the occasional lantern flicker in the town as someone there had business outside. The clouds covered the night sky to a point that even the moon struggled to show itself through them. Once the birds had perched themselves into the trees for the night, only the rhythmic crashing of waves below kept the silence away and provided some sense of time passing. Every now and then, some beast of the forest was lured closer by the faint green glow of the spriggan, but very quickly convinced to leave by their own body warning them of the necromancer. Cold, hungry and exhausted, Anastacia knew she should have headed to the town for shelter ages ago, but couldn’t move Xamiliere on her own and refused to leave her alone even for a second. She could have still easily made it there had she tried to, but that didn’t even seem like an option to consider to her weary mind, which was only being kept going by the nature spirit’s flowery scent and far from being able to make rational decisions. Finally, surrounded by nothing but darkness, resting against the spriggan’s wooden chest, Anastacia fell asleep against her will.

The bastardly yells of seagulls caused Anastacia to flinch awake, already adding to a headache no doubt caused by dehydration. Far too disoriented to remember what had happened and hesitant to even open her eyes because it would only hurt her head more, she pulled on her blanket to cover her face with the intention to nap for a while longer. It took over a minute for her to realize that anything was awry, but as her memories from the previous night returned, she slowly lowered the blanket to survey her surroundings. She had woken up in an unfamiliar room of a visibly old but well-kept home. Though worn, the furniture, including the bed she was in, were clean and gave of a fairly cozy atmosphere. A few stuffed toys lined up on a shelf by the bed, and a few wooden toys neatly tucked into a corner of the room suggested that it likely belonged to a child a fair bit younger than her. As Anastacia slowly got up from the bed, she noticed a pair of shoes by her feet but they were too small for her so she figured they were simply there for the real occupant. On one side of the room was a window that cast light onto a small table with a vase full of neatly arranged wild flowers – seemingly picked no more than a few hours ago. Though not an unpleasant place to wake up in, what struck her as a bit odd was the light cowering of dust on everything besides the bed she had been put in and the table. Not thinking much of this, she stood up and looked out of the window to see a view of the same ship she had seen on the evening before, and deduced from there that she had been brought to the village for some reason. Even without necromancy, she could hear there were plenty of people outside, going about their not even slightly suspicious business, as well as two of them almost directly on the other side of the door leading out of the room, based on a muffled conversation coming through the door.

“Xamiliere!” She exclaimed in a whisper as she remembered the spriggan and quickly looked through the room again to no avail.

With no signs of her friend, Anastacia had little else to do than to exit the room, both to look for Xamiliere and at least thank whoever had put her into a warm bed. She knocked on the door to announce herself and opened it. Immediately flooded with the scent of freshly baked bread and homemade food, she suddenly realized how much she had missed it for a past few days. In the room that included most of the living space of the building, a kitchen and the way outside, were two people: an older man and a young woman, but again no signs of Xamiliere. The man appeared to be in the middle of fixing a broom when interrupted by their guest, his dark skin had several ocean themed tattoos, making it fairly easy to assume he was a retired sailor. Seeing the necromancer, the woman put down a wooden spoon she had been using to stir a pot hanging over the fireplace in the kitchen. With a striking resemblance with each other, dark complexion and interestingly grey hair regardless of their ages, the two appeared related at the first glance. Both of them cheerfully smiled at their confused guest as she stumbled out of the bedroom.

“I… hello?” Anastacia uttered, incredibly distracted by the food. “Were you the ones who moved me here?”

The pair quickly glanced at each other, as if to decide who should speak up, before the woman decided to take the lead. “You have woken!” She happily greeted the necromancer. Her strange choice of words as well as a peculiar accent made Anastacia think this was likely not her native language. “Moment, I will prepare a meal. Please.”

“Thanks, I’ll gladly eat something even if I’m already in your debt.” The necromancer nodded graciously. “Sorry, but was there anyone with me before?”

The man immediately knew he had an answer to the question but couldn’t quite come up with the words. Instead, he simply pointed out of the window by him and gestured for Anastacia to come have a look. Outside, fully awake and staring out to the sea, was Xamiliere.

“The Umoya carried you here. Strange thing.” The woman explained, but by that point Anastacia was already outside and dashing towards the spriggan.

With no intention of slowing down, the necromancer crashed into her friend and grasped on tightly. Allowing a few tears to roll out, she pressed herself against the spriggan as hard as she could for a while before finally looking up. The moment their eyes met, Anastacia could feel her heart sink, as there was no joy or look of recognition in the spriggan’s eyes, only confusion. Xamiliere placed her hand on Anastacia’s head, not because of familiarity, but because some crying girl had just run up to her and it seemed like the thing to do.

“Ket ditat, hosi rararaa dor? Dotja.” Xamiliere said in her usual voice, but in a language that meant absolutely nothing to Anastacia, and looked around for a reason why someone was clinging on to her.

“Xamiliere, if this a joke, it’s a shit and cruel one.” The necromancer uttered and slammed her fist on the spriggan’s shoulder. She could still tell that it was the same Xamiliere she knew, with the same kindness in her touch and tone, which brought some comfort. However, the idea that she meant nothing to the spriggan turned out to be wholly unacceptable after all.

Hearing her name clearly roused some level of reaction in the nature spirit and caused her to blankly stare forwards for a moment. “Xamiliere… but that’s… me?” She slowly realized as pieces began fitting into their places once more. Suddenly the green energy within her flared out unlike ever before, engulfing both her and the necromancer. Every bit of soil within hundred meters filled with countless blooming flowers of every type native to the area, trees stretched a much as they would have grown in a year and completed an entire harvest cycle in seconds, and decades old logs and planks used for building sprouted new branches as they were briefly forced back to life by the sheer magnitude of the energy released. “And you are Anastacia.”

Whatever the necromancer tried to say became incomprehensible wailing as she realized her friend had survived the grafting process despite everything. Xamiliere fell on her back into the thick patch of flowers that had bloomed all around them and dragged Anastacia down with her. All of this caused quite a commotion in the center of a village, but both of them were completely oblivious to their surroundings, instead simply laying there until the swell of emotions calmed even slightly.

“I’m sorry.” Xamiliere eventually said. “My feelings were there, but I was an outsider to my memories. Unable to sort old from new, important from unimportant. But there is no better point of reference than my name spoken by you. It’ll still take time for it all to settle, but trust me when I say that it’s all there, every bit of it.”

Anastacia nodded. “Then… did anything change?” She asked and wiped her eyes.

“Everything changed. I’m no longer a false being, forced to carry someone else’s name and a purpose I’ve failed no matter what I claimed to be. Now I am what I have always known I was… Xamiliere.” The spriggan explained with a wide, satisfied smile.

“Does that mean you have no purpose then? I mean like the other spirits have.” The necromancer kept inquiring.

“Quite the opposite, I finally have one that feels like my own. One that I know to be important and one that I know I have always been good for.” Xamiliere rejoiced. “No more guilt or doubt, just… me.”

Such excitement over a purpose got the necromancer curious. “Are you going to tell me what it is?”

“Not for as long as it’s possible for me to fail it. That would be far too embarrassing to live with.” The spriggan laughed. “But how about we head back home? I rather like this fresh body of mine and each moment we spend out here makes Rosie more likely to turn it into kindling for her stove.”