Adamant Blood 432

Mark loosened his collar as he stepped off of the tram into the pale gold of a sunrise sky, under the pyramid over Domal’Takela. The glass above was a barely-visible spiderweb of triangular prisms, and everything was beautiful.

Eliot bumped into him, wrapping an arm around Mark’s shoulder and slurring, “What’s the seeing, buddy buddy?!”

Mark laughed and asked, “You want to Purify you yet?”

“Ain’t no fucking way!” Eliot proclaid, standing tall and swaying a little. “I am good and drunk and I got so many numbers.”

Maybe Mark would have said sothing about that, about caution and whatever, and about how Eliot really, really needed to not get so drunk at these things—

But then Sally was there, tall as she used to be at 3 ters, saying, ‘Huuuup!’ as she picked Eliot up into her arms, Eliot cradled onto her happily mumbling about boobs, and then Sally walked with him down the path, toward the Green House. Mark grinned at that.

Lola softly told Mark in passing, “That was a well done evening, Mark.”

Freyala wasn’t looking through Lola right now, but her hand was still on Lola’s shoulder.

Mark grinned, saying, “I think so, too! And I think I want to invite Xander to the settlent, and maybe the witches. Did you get to talk to the witches?”

“I did,” Lola said, as they walked down the path toward the house. “Uva truly desires you.”

Mark winced—

“Fucking hell, yeah she does,” Isoko said, striding beside Mark, shoes in her hands as she walked barefoot on the stone.

Andria was there, too, also with her shoes in her hands, saying, “She wants to rob the bank and never go back, though, which is a pretty standard arrangent for Daihoon nobility. Don’t think you need to fall in love with her. It’s just kids.”

“Eugenics is freaky,” Mark said.

“Oh it’s not… well maybe it is?” Andria said, “There was a World War on Earth about it, wasn’t there?”

“ ‘Or sothing’,” Isoko sarcastically said.

“I didn’t study Earth history,” Andria said, scoffing. “Did you? People from Earth always find noble arrangents to be weird.”

Mark said, “Eugenics is freaky anywhere, and that’s the kindest way I can put it.”

Andria said, “Then you shouldn’t do it, but if you invite those witches into the settlent then they’re going to make it happen eventually. That’s what they do; make things happen.” Andria said to the sky, either in disgust or in simple proclamation, “That’s what witches do!”

Mark seriously asked Andria, Isoko, and Lola, “Could I ask them not, and would they abide by that?”

Andria ehhhhh’d.

Isoko scrunched her face.

Lola asked, “Why invite them, anyway? What do you hope to gain?”

“A bunch of witches making rituals on behalf of the settlent and the people therein,” Mark said, “This Witches' Welco is pretty amazing. You all noticed it at the party, right?”

Isoko said, “A little.”

Andria said, “Slightly?”

Lola solidly said, “Yes. I noticed.” Lola looked at the sky as she walked, saying, “It was like the world was turned toward cooperation. Subtle yet strong.” Lola looked ahead. “I am not sure I appreciate being on the receiving end of it, but… It was strong. It worked most strongly around Jessie Stills, as well. Every ti he got mad, his anger bled away. It was… not unlike a Union of Peace and War.”

“How much do you think I’m being affected in order to call it ‘aweso’ instead of ‘a gross violation of my ntal sanctity’?” Mark asked, grinning a little.

“Invite them over and ask them,” Lola advised. “Perhaps at the Understanding Party for Water People in a few hours?”

Mark kept a strong lookout around himself, around the dreamspace in his area, looking for the shifting undercurrent of the Witches’ Welco.

There was no undercurrent.

Mark said, “Quark. Please send out that invite.”

Still, the world was quiet around him.

Lola shrugged. “I did not see anything.”

“ either,” Isoko said, frowning a little, looking around.

Andria asked a good question, “If the social manipulation is for the good of us all, then is it a bad thing?”

“Yes and no,” Mark said, leaving it at that.

The butlers had breakfast ready if anyone was hungry. Only Mark and Isoko ended up partaking. Everyone else crashed for a few hours except for Mark, who ended up sitting by a window and reading a holographic book on Water People.

At around 10 AM, Tulo Khava went out to speak to his people.

As he left, Tulo told Mark, “I do not know their Wavespeaker, but I do know that my Uncle Ropapo and Auntie Mabi are with them.” Tulo gestured at the holographic space that Mark was reading from, adding, “Reading will not help much. It is a language you have to live to understand. They will say that ‘your glass is too full’ if you co at them with preconceived notions. Don’t let them know you studied first.”

“Thanks for telling .”

Tulo nodded, and then left— He paused, saying, “There will be discussions of goblins. I believe they want your direct help, though I cannot say. If I could say, I would tell you.”

“Thank you, Tulo.”

Tulo nodded again… and then he left.

Addavein showed up at 11 AM, looking discontent.

Mark asked, “How did it go with Doomo?”

“It went poorly, and I am strictly forbidden from doing any kaiju defense except if Aurora dies, and with that said, I’m not sure if they’re setting it up to kill her, or if they’re more interested in preventing from standing on a stage. Probably both. I already told Aurora. Are you ready for the Water People Understanding Party?”

Mark stared for a mont— He said, “Sorry you can’t kill kaiju with us. And yes, I am ready for it, though Tulo said that being too learned would be an affront, or sothing like that.”

Addavein scrunched his face like he couldn’t believe that anyone would want to go into anything without full learning beforehand— And then he went, “Ahh… Hardliners. Probably going to have a lot of water-based sayings, too, like ‘your cup is too full’.”

“Ha! Tulo said that exact sa thing.”

Addavein moved along, asking, “Do you need sleep yet?”

“Not at all.”

“Then I’m taking an hour. Let know when you need an hour or eight later.”

Addavein was already in the hallway, moving fast to the bedrooms, before what he said caught up to Mark. Mark felt warm, and not just because the sun was pouring in right now.

Mark called out, “Thanks! I will!”

Addavein waved behind himself.

Mark continued reading.

Soon, it was ti.

- - - -

The venue was a wide island upon an even larger lake. The lake had been around forever, according to Addavein, but the island in the center had been constructed for the sole purpose of this Understanding Party.

Under the afternoon sun, the hovercraft landed on the shores of the island. Mark stepped out alongside his team of Sally, Eliot, and Isoko. Lola and Addavein ca out next, and that was it. The party had been split due to last-minute changes. Tartu and his people, Andria, and Derek, were left behind, along with Rylan Drakemore, and, theoretically, the ambassador. Mark hadn’t seen Ambassador Iliandra since they got to Domal’Takela, and that was… whatever.

Mark and the ambassador had never really gotten along, and that was fine.

The island in the lake looked like it had been taken directly from the South Pacific, or rather, from Northern D’Australia. Tall palms, bushy green trees, lots of white sand and so black volcanic rock here and there deeper in the forest, and a complete lack of anything ‘Winter Ball’. It slled vaguely of salt and sea, and also greenery, and Mark felt, for a mont, like he was back ho in Orange City in the Floridas.

Sally breathed deep, feeling so similar kinda way, grinning a little, and then she walked on across the white sand, toward the tiki torches that lined a forest path. She had opted for a one-piece swimsuit and a breezy set of gauze-like pants.

It was an exclusive event, but it was also casual. No one in Mark’s party wore anything fancy at all. Mark had on a loose shirt, board shorts, and flip flops, as per instructions.

Lola held her sun hat on her head, protecting it from the breeze. Her dress fluttered in the wind as she looked toward the island pathway, asking, “Can you feel them in there?”

Mark could. He walked that way, saying, “It’s Walaria, Tulo, 2 people I don’t know that I assu to be Tulo’s aunt and uncle, and the witches from last night, Pearl, Amy, and Uva. It makes worried that we’re only a handful of people, and many of them witches.”

Eliot said, “Terrible turnout for an ‘Understanding Party’.”

Lola humd, fingers flexing out for a bare mont, then she closed her fingers. Trepidation and plotting blood in her vector, like she was seeing a monster, as she solidly said, “That’s 13. That’s an official coven-size.”

Mark worried now, too. “Covens co in defined sizes?”

“Covens co in many sizes,” Addavein said, unbothered, “3, 4, and 10 are the most common sizes. Sotis even a single person is a coven. There are hardly any permanent 13 person covens, but there are a few out there, most notably the 13 No’Witches and the 13 Green Witches of Okuana. Aluatha has a rotating cast of 13 Grand Witches, and it appears we might beco part of that 13 today.”

Sally stared a little, unsure and asking, “Uhh?”

“13 is bad, right?” Isoko asked.

Addavein walked into the forest, saying, “It’s bad for soone else. Usually not the practitioners.”

Lola seed to agree with that, her worry smoothing out.

“That’s why the event was size-limited?” Sally asked.

Addavein said, “Exactly.”

Mark had a few things happen all at once for him, as he saw the shape of what was coming —they were obviously going to be doing a ritual— and he wondered how it could be used forthem or Aluatha or againstthem on behalf of Aluatha.

His first instinct was against Aluatha, but it wasn’t nearly as strong as it used to be.

Mark looked for influences upon himself, or his people, so he looked to the dream all around them, checking for witchery influences. None appeared. The dream looked normal enough; a mishmash of dark not-color hiding just beyond normal reality. If there were influences upon that then those influences were too large to really notice, so Mark continued to look at the dream, to see if his idea in his head was his own, or if it was influenced into position.

Because Mark’s main feeling in that mont was that he had already accepted the idea that there were grand workings shoving him around without his knowledge, and that was alright. And yet, there was an ‘ick’ factor to it that he couldn’t quite shake. Mark likened his dislike of witchery to be sothing like Eliot’s dislike of Mind Control; perfectly normal dislike.

And yet, Mark was deeply interested in witchery, and in all magic, because learning how things worked and how those things could be used to make the world a better place was really interesting.

It was like being shown a sword.

Mark couldn’t help but imagine swinging that weapon through so monster and protecting soone else.

… Huh.

Mark didn’t realize that about himself until that mont.

He knew he was kinda bloodthirsty, he supposed, but he didn’t realize it went that deep.

Mark had the sa feelings about Forbidden Magic. Witchery, soul magics to turn people into powerhouses, shiny swords; all of them had one thing in common. Mark liked them because they were expressions of power, and power was important.

And maybe the witches were massaging his ntality to make him not hate them. Perhaps they were doing so to Eliot, too, because he hadn’t complained about ntal effects at all on this trip, or in months, really. He was rather protected against ntal effects these days, though, due to his Mind Power Level being in the mid 70s.

… Anyway. Back to current events.

Mark asked, “Maybe we’re going to cast sothing against Okuana… no wait. The goblins? Yeah. That seems more appropriate.”

Isoko looked at the air around them, trying to see what Mark was seeing, her vector flickering through the sky like a platinum sheen. “I don’t see what you’re seeing?”

“More like realizing,” Mark said. “The dreamscape seems normal enough.”

Addavein was already inside the forest line as he called back, “You coming?”

Mark got to walking alongside Isoko, bringing up the rear, and soon they were walking beside the lit torches lining the forest path. Trees reached overhead, blocking out the light, and Mark got the distinct impression that the island forest was a density upon the world, sort of like a cave system. Light fell in shafts from between thick boughs and deep green leaves, casting dots of light in the dark. But mostly, it was black.

Mark’s Unionsense got lost in the dark, unable to penetrate those depths, but he did send a tendril of adamantium up, into the canopy, and he made it through the green just fine. Isoko didn’t seem claustrophobic at all, because her power was certainly flowing in the sky right now. So… this was fine? His people walked forward, unaware of the tiny pang of claustrophobia Mark was feeling, though Lola did glance backward at him. Mark smiled and shook his head, and Lola continued on.

And then they were out of the forest, on a different sort of white-sand beach that was more of a depression in the ground than any real beach. That depression held perfectly clear water, though, about 20 centiters deep, maybe.

Tulo Khava stood to the side, near two people with the sa island-dark skin as himself, while the witches were all pale won wearing black bikinis.

Walaria wore a giant black sunhat and a black beach dress, her red hair in braids down her back. She almost looked like a normal girl, but the power in her presence was enough to make even the world notice. The sun seed both brighter and darker around her; She stood out without trying.

Everyone was in beach wear, and one of Tulo’s people, the older man whom Quark labeled as ‘Wavespeaker Uncle Ropapo’, was drinking from a bottle of water he had taken from a cooler. The older woman got an ‘Auntie Mabi’ label from Quark, and she was sipping a soda. Everyone had a drink in their hands, taken from coolers. There was no grill.

Mark almost expected a grill and soone flipping at, but all they had were a pair of coolers sitting in the sand; one red, the other blue—

“Hello, everyone!” Walaria called out, seeming like a completely different person than the one Mark had t at the Traveler’s District yesterday. Less posed. More relaxed. “I’m sure you have questions, Mark.”

Addavein huffed and walked over to the coolers. He popped open the blue one and took a cold soda as he let his wings down to soak up the sun.

Lola joined him. Soon, they were talking with Tulo and with the other two people.

Mark, anwhile, ended up in front of Walaria, saying, “This isn’t the Understanding Party, is it. It’s a ritual of so sort?”

“Yes, and a deeper ritual than you’re used to, because I want these girls to work for you,” Walaria simply said, regaining that air of power that she usually had. “But before we can do that, we have to align them with your purposes, and your purposes have to align with Aluatha. It’s a Contract between nations, Mark. Non-aggression, mostly, backed up by a geas.

“In return, we release you from your previous settlent contract, declare you a diplomat and with all the assorted powers thereof, and we bring you into the Grand Working of Aluatha, which ans the weight of the Empire is magically supporting you.

“In factual terms, that ans Pearl, Amy, and Uva are working for you, directly, casting rituals as you demand, like the one that made humans invisible to goblins around the settlent. You still have to supply them with power in the form of adamantium, but that is a much lesser requirent for you than it is for most other people.”

For a mont, Mark was thrilled.

Then that word, ‘geas’, tickled sothing. Mark had never heard the term before and suspicion roared in the back of Mark’s mind.

Mark asked, “What’s a geas?”

“An enforcent of thought twisted into a person, making the recipient unable to purposefully do or even think of certain things. In this case, it would make you unable to harm the Royal Family of Aluatha.”

Mark instantly, strongly, said, “No.”

“Okay,” Walaria simply answered, as if Mark hadn’t practically spat in her face. She moved on, “Then we’ll be doing a ritual of fate to deduce if we can do more to help The People with their goblin problem, and in doing so you will learn how to speak Water People both in reality and in the dream. It is graduate-level witch work. It’s also a thousand kilos of adamantium, provided freely and clearly by you, the killer of Goblinho. 1000 kilos is the minimum. More is better. You will be shaping it into the proper forms as dictated by the ritual. Upon completion, it will alter fate wherever Aluatha touches in order to bring about the downfall of the goblins as a species.

“By rely completing the ritual and letting it stand for a few hours, we will see how much of an empire-wide problem the goblins are, because the ritual will be used up at a rate comnsurate with the current goblin problem.

“If it is used up quickly, then we will know there is an issue that requires physical correction sowhere in Aluathan space. If it remains solid and generally unmoving, with minor flakes of adamantium evaporating into the Empire, then that would indicate barely any real problem at all.

“Basically, we think Goblinho has moved, but if they haven’t there are still normal goblin problems to fix.” Walaria asked, “Questions?”

Mark was absolutely on board with killing goblins on a grand scale… except for maybe Goofy Goblin, who was sowhere. Mark had no idea where he was. Mark’s lesser concerns centered around the truth that goblins were elves, so Mark wondered if such a ritual would harm him, since the System categorized him as an elf… and thinking about that brought a question to the surface.

Mark said, “The elves in Endless Daihoon seed truly sad that the goblins were what they were. A few of them spoke as though they would try to redeem the goblins, or to fix them. I thought that was ridiculous and I told them as much, but I don’t think they really understood. Even though I haven’t seen any elves, I’m pretty sure so have co to Daihoon.” Mark asked, “So would it be better to kill the goblins, or to split their kingdom in half and let the ones who can be redeed go back to the elves, away from Wongod?”

Walaria paused for all of half a mont, then said, “There have been many people over the years who have spoken to about goblin leniency, but I never expected you to be one of them.”

“Iwas expecting an Understanding Party and minor instructions on fate magic and moving furniture around. Not antagonizing the goblins and potentially the elves. And now we’re here. So like, yes, kill them all, but we should at least see about splitting a difference to make the job easier.”

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“And if we split the difference enough to allow for goblin allies? Would you accept those sorts into your protection, knowing that all the world would still want them dead?”

“I’d have to see what such a situation would look like before I made that decision.”

Walaria moved on, “We’re still attacking the goblins currently here around the Empire, and we’re still doing an Understanding Party in order to do that, but we’re moving around the ‘furniture’ of Empire in order to sweep the goblins out of the ‘house’ of Daihoon. The specific blend of Water People and witchery is based on the overarching discipline of House Magic, which has gained a much different connotation ever since your display of the elven ‘house’, but which should still function properly as long as all of our purposes are aligned and we generally know what we’re doing.” Walaria added, “It will be more difficult to ‘split the colony of roaches in the walls and make them fight each other’ than it would be to fumigate the walls with goblin-killer and drive the goblins out. That is the difficulty you have given at this mont.”

Mark sort of understood the shape of the ritual Walaria was proposing. He had seen enough witches in popular culture and done enough reading about rituals and otherwise to understand what Walaria was getting at. But it was so far outside of what Mark was used to that he was now rather unsure about the whole thing.

Mark asked, “Should we even be… doing this at all?”

“Yes.”

“I guess I an: Will this work?”

“Likely not,” Walaria said, “I expect all of the adamantium you put into the working to suddenly vanish, even if we’re not secretly under attack by the goblins of Goblinho. But it will still do sothing. Later tonight, when I’m going over the reports for all of the goblin activity in and around the Empire, I expect to see a certain type of story in all of the reports I request to read. For example: A man boasting of how an old sword suddenly swung sharper than ever before, cleaving through goblins, allowing him to survive overwhelming odds. A woman using an apple knife to save herself and her child from a goblin ambush. That sort of thing. Maybe so will even report a black flash on their blade as they killed this or that goblin. Mostly, our contribution will go unnoticed, as they almost always do.”

Mark’s eyes went a little wide. “Can we… can we do sothing like this any ti we want? Can we do a lot of this?”

“No,” Walaria said. “This sort of ritual is simply not done, for many reasons. There are astral stresses to Empires that must be accounted for, which is a topic too large to get into, but mostly there is the cost/benefit issue.

“The major reason we’re doing this now is that Okuana acquired thousands of tons of adamantium from your escape, and they could use that adamantium for similar rituals. We don’t know if we can fight back against those rituals, so this is an experint to see if this works at all. If it does work, then we’ll talk about further actions. If you wish to take my apprentices to the settlent to work for you, then you will be able to supply them with enough adamantium to enact more rituals for you, and for Empire. If you can do that, then expect calls and plans and people coming to the settlent at all hours to enact other such rituals of similar nature.”

Mark felt as though he were standing on the gears of a clock; everything was turning around him, everything was synced in ways he could only barely understand. Mark found himself quietly saying, “Ah… lots of cause-and-effect huh.”

Walaria seed to allow herself a small grin. “Quite so.”

Mark walked with Walaria back to the group, which had gathered by the coolers and by Tulo Khava’s family.

The eting was quick, and rather curt, for obvious reasons.

Uncle Ropapo was an older man with grey hair and a grizzled, older-surfer’s body, with a voice made harsh by big scars that traced down his neck and onto his chest, cutting up a great deal of the wave and wind tattoos on his body. He rumbled, “I and my cousin Mabi ca here to share our understandings of our language with a party of new practitioners.” He looked to Walaria and the three witches, adding, “But our Wavespeaker was waylaid, our party minimized to just us two, all for this witchery.”

Ropapo was probably understandably angry.

“It is more than what we asked for,” Auntie Mabi said, voice rough yet motherly. Diplomatic. She wore flowing blue and white beach robes. Wave tattoos decorated her skin while her grey hair looked like a mist clinging to her back and shoulders. She looked at Walaria, saying, “And perhaps, afterward, we can speak of actual support against the goblin threat on our shores, considering it was your soldier and your diplomat that shoved those green naces to our doorstep.”

She ant Mark and Doomo, and Mark did not like being lumped in with that asshole.

Walaria said, “We’ll support you with 10,000 soldiers at an average of tier 5, with at least 4 core teams at tier 8, as agreed upon this morning.” She added, “We do have a few archmages that wish to return to the goblin war, if you want to take them, too.”

Ropapo scoffed. “We’re not taking those bastards.”

Mark imagined they were talking about Buckler and Lancer, the two archmages who had almost killed Sam and Lee back at the settlent during one of their Gate Days.

“We want Mark,” Mabi said, pinning down her actual desires.

“Mark is not in the bargain,” Walaria easily replied.

Mark spoke up, “I’ll go.”

Walaria didn’t look at Mark as she said to Mabi, “We have our own wars to fight, Wavespeaker Mabi. If our overtures to Okuana fail, we expect Okuana to strike at the settlent directly in 20 days, so Mark and his team will be occupied.”

“Oh fuck,” Mark muttered, suddenly very worried, like he hadn’t prepared enough for anything.

It was a sentint shared by mostly everyone except—

“We want Mark,” Wavespeaker Mabi repeated, “Andwe want your Resurrection man. In exchange, we will open up our oldest archives to Mark.” She looked at Mark as she said, “Our oldest archives contain information about elven houses and about elves, and about trovakara, the Dragon King’s ho city, on D’Austrailia. We are rather certain that Wongod has found it, considering he ripped up the Lightning Spires last week. Great amounts of stone and rock have been moved out of the central country, near where we think trovakara is thought to have been.” She told Walaria, “The simple fact is that the Empires of Daihoon cannot sit back and simply send soldiers. If you will not help us now, and deeply, then we will have to go to Okuana.”

Walaria easily said, “You will adhere to the bargains made or else you will be going to Okuana as a beggar, and you will see how they treat beggars.”

“We have another house book,” Mabi said, dropping a conversational bomb. “Like the one that gave Mark his own house. We are prepared to use it as a bargaining chip in these discussions.”

Walaria’s red eyes seem to flash.

Mark’s eyes were wide.

Eliot’s vector flexed with an abyss of need.

Addavein stared, greed plain on his face.

Mabi said, “We’re prepared to exchange the house book for the eradication of the goblin threat, once and for all, and to the highest bidder. Will that bidder be Aluatha? Or Okuana?”

“I want that book,” Mark found himself saying, “I want all of that information, too. Eliot will have the book, and you will have our swords against the goblin threat. But for now, we’re going to oust the goblins from Aluatha, and prepare for more rituals like this in the future, should this ritual prove functional. If this works, we can do this for you at your places, too.”

Mabi locked eyes with Mark, saying, “The ritual will work provided the Language is spoken correctly. We will have to give you a true Understanding Party when you visit us in our hos.”

Mark almost agreed… But this wasn’t his show right now.

Walaria looked to Mark, as if waiting for him to overstep, but when Mark pulled back Walaria assud the center stage, saying to Mabi, “You never ntioned these things to Doomo.”

Mabi said, “We could not trust Doomo for he is the one who shoved the green nace in our direction. We can trust Mark for he has proven himself against your machinations and in his ability to speak truthfully to the world. The calculation made to tell him and you here and now was simple enough considering how minimally Doomo bargained with us this morning.”

Walaria did so rapid calculations of her own, then said, “In light of this new information, and in Mark’s desire to split the goblins apart and possibly have them fight a civil war against Wongod, we will be shrinking the ritual today into a weeding ceremony, plucking out all of the goblins that have thorns in Aluatha’s territory. The downside to such a distinction is that so of the peasantry will see non-violent goblins and think the species is redeemable. It will cause the deaths of humans.

“The upside is that we might be able to create a wedge of compliant goblins to use against Goblinho, which would make the ultimate goal of control on the goblin population a lot easier. There is no version of reality where we kill them all permanently, so control would be the goal there.

“Mark.

“If that is acceptable, then we’re going to go with that. What say you?”

Mark felt pulled in many directions. Too many. He agreed with the fact that there was no killing the goblins completely, but… he didn’t want to weaken the ritual, and have people die who could have otherwise been saved.

Mark decided, “Fumigation is fine. Let’s do that.”

“Then we’re back to the original ritual, and Pearl, Amy, and Uva will work on the designs for a weeding later. It is the safer option.” Walaria said, “Let us begin.”

Pearl, Amy, and Uva all breathed a small sigh of relief.

Auntie Mabi nodded professionally, and then she said, “Then we will begin.” She walked out toward the clear waters of the lake in the center of the island, saying, “Attend to , everyone, and listen closely to the sweeping of dust, the swatting of carpets, and of the eradication of pests. It begins with a collection of tools…”

Mabi stepped to the edge of the water, talking of brooms, and requesting Mark to make them. That was when Walaria told Mark to begin with the Union of Understanding. He did both. Auntie Mabi, Uncle Ropapo, and Tulo Khava were all apparently smiths of various kinds, and the lessons of the day were talk of form and function and brooms made out of cutting, carving purpose.

Mark created sweeping brooms, and at first the bristles were adamantine-solid, because they were made of adamantium, but soon the Understanding that Mabi was trying to give him, buoyed by the power of the witches, allowed him to make flexible adamantium. By the tenth broom, Mark was recycling the older ones and creating flexible brooms with bending shafts like whorled wood that were easy to grip and easier to use, with long straw bristles that bent as Mabi brushed the broom through the clear waters of the central shallow lake.

She swept the water up to the shore, and if anything was happening then Mark didn’t see it.

But she declared it good, and then Mark produced 12 more brooms, one for each of them, and then the group had circled the clear lake, each of them standing equidistant from each other. It was not a large lake. Every person was only 4 ters apart.

Sally experintally swept the sand, and the bristles were tough again. She almost cut the sand as she brushed it. She almost spoke up, saying hers was defective, but for so reason, between one brush and the next, it went soft again.

Mark had no idea what had happened there.

The ritual was already active, and he was still Understanding, but not understanding at all. Not really. It was like he was half-asleep and he could wake up at any mont and the fignts and the unreality would fade, forgotten.

Tulo Khava and his uncle, Ropapo, along with Mabi, ford a triangle-like fra around the lake.

Addavein arched an eyebrow as he looked at the whorls of ‘wood’ on his broom, hmm’ing once.

Lola tapped her broom into the sand, almost proud at how the bristles bent.

Eliot looked to Mabi, and he wanted that house book.

Isoko looked at Uva, not sure what to make of the athletic woman, while Uva looked at Mark and desired him in a way that Mark didn’t want to Understand. But he did. He knew what she wanted. Pearl and Amy stood in lockstep with Uva, forming a secondary triangle in the grouping around the lake.

With how the ritual was set up, 12 people stood around the edges of the clear, shallow lake. 3 ford a triangle. 3 others ford a different triangle. Mark and his people took the 6 positions between those two triangles, with Addavein at the northern position and Mark at the southern position.

Walaria stood alone, beside Mark, her broom the largest of all but easily held, almost gracefully.

And then Walaria took over, Mark’s Understanding fading into dream, and it was like he was waking up in a completely different direction as the waters of the lake suddenly flexed into darkness, and then…

A map.

Aluatha stretched out on Toth, dominating what they would have called Central Arica on Earth. Aluatha dipped down into Sototh in the south, including all of the many islands to the east of Toth, and then up, beyond Toth, to the north, to Krototh.

The settlent was a shining beacon on the Shine, in the middle of Krototh, far north of the main Empire.

Walaria stepped past Mark, onto the waters between continents, her feet landing on waves smaller than the hairs standing on Mark’s arms. Wind curled over mountain ranges flatter than roads, and storms gathered into white fluffy stretches of sky close to the surface of the map, which was not a map, not really. But the lands were still labeled like nations, and Crytalis was a beacon of power in the very center of the map, on the Crying Peninsula.

They called the Crying Peninsula the Yucatan Peninsula on Earth, but they did not call it the Yucatan here. Daihoon had been willing to adopt Earth naming conventions in many things, but not when it ca to the nas of the lands that they cared about.

Pearl, Amy, and Uva began to hum.

And then Walaria began,

“We weep for the lost souls, taken too early by the goblin horde,” Walaria said, holding her broom in her hands, at a diagonal angle, the bristles not touching the map as her feet crossed an ocean. “We call upon those lost souls, asking them if they wish for vengeance.”

The clouds over Aluatha shifted, turning darker.

The sky overhead seed darker, too.

Sothing whistled in the wind, vibrating and hurt.

Walaria walked around the map, edging into Aluathan territory, trailing her staff across the clouds, gathering the clouds like cotton candy.

“We hear you. We see you. We know you, and we take your vengeance upon ourselves. Co to , the dead and the dying. The damned and the dangerous.”

Lightning sparked in the bristles of her staff, as clouds swirled in her wake.

“Those who have been hurt, I allow you to hurt in turn.

“Those who have seen the evil green, I allow you evil in turn.

“Those who want revenge, I give you revenge.”

Walaria gathered a hurricane into her staff as she moved into the Crying Peninsula, and then she was there. Standing tall above Crytalis, staff raised high, storms promising death.

Mark saw faces in the clouds in Walaria’s staff.

He looked up.

Mark saw faces in the clouds overhead—

Sothing flexed through the power of the glade. Eliot had stepped away, fear flexing hard through his vector—

“The dead and the living,” Pearl, Amy, and Uva intoned, holding their staffs high. “We give you revenge against the Green nace, against the enemy of humanity, put here by an ancient foe through a terrible cri.”

Eliot ca back to the ritual, to stand firm.

The ritual stabilized.

Astral bodies rged, one person’s power flowing into another.

Addavein stood beside Mark, and also on the other side of the lake/map/world.

Isoko held Mark’s hand. Isoko was in the sky.

Eliot built a wall and guns fired upon goblins.

Lola guided people to shelters and executed a student who was working with the goblins.

Sally killed thousands of goblins with a sword the size of a mountain, and then Mark broke the mountain in turn.

But none of that happened. All of that was a dream.

The map was gone.

The lake had transford into that Green nace.

Goblins, like drops of water, were piled 20 centiters high and thick as sli.

Walaria, Mark, Sally, Isoko, Eliot, everyone, spoke at the sa ti, words pulled out from them, into the ritual,

“Guide our hands, our harm, and help us protect our ho.”

As one person, as a thousand people, everyone took their broom and they began brushing away the sli. One brush; a million dead goblins. Every brush turned green to red. Every bit of red flowed away into dust, revealing more green underfoot. Everyone stepped onto the green, and then they danced.

It was a thodical dance, 13 pairs of feet guiding 13 black brooms, brushing away the green, evaporating the lake with each deep sweep.

Mark wasn’t sure how long it lasted.

All he knew was that it happened, and then it ended.

Mark stood on bloody sands, hands empty, just like everyone else.

The sun hung low in the western sky, and the basin of water in the middle of the island was gone. Dry as a bone. The 13 brooms were stacked upon each other in the center of the dry space, practically locked to each other, all with flecks of red on the brooms themselves, and bloody handprints on the whorled shafts where they had been held by the 13 participants.

All of them had blood on their hands. All of them had blood on their feet, like they had been dancing in the blood for hours. The sand soaked up so of that blood, but the white remained marred by red. Lola stared at her hands. Addavein wiped his bloody tail off on the sands. Sally looked disturbed, but in a way she approved; she simply wasn’t ready to like what had happened just yet. Eliot looked vindicated. Isoko was unsure. Lost, almost.

The witches were happy.

Satisfied in the silence.

No one spoke at all.

Walaria left the depression in the ground where the lake had been. Everyone followed.

Mark walked alongside Isoko, Sally, and Eliot, out of the interior of the island.

The trees that had been so oppressive felt open, now. Like sothing had been taken and used. Like ground had been broken by apocalyptic storms and reduced to sand. But it was just a forest.

Mark stepped out of the forest, onto the beach where they had co in. Everyone else soon filed out of the forest path. Sohow, the red and blue coolers were out here already. Guards were out here, too. They had robes for everyone. Mark did not take a robe, but Isoko and Lola did.

Walaria finally broke the silence, saying to them all, “That was a working well done. If the implents are here in the morning then I will call it a success.” She told Auntie Mabi, “You will co with . We will discuss several things, including an exhibition match of Swords of Empire happening tomorrow. Mark still has a great deal of training left to do, and sword-making is one of those things.”

Mabi said, “Thank you for the opportunity to air my concerns, Second Princess.”

Mabi, Ropapo, and Tulo, all took a knee in the sand.

So they were back to formality, huh?

Mark thought that was kinda weird, considering they had just done… sothing big.

Walaria didn’t seem to expect anything from Mark and his people, though, for she walked away, getting on to a hovercraft that the guards had provided. Pearl, Amy, and Uva went with her, along with the representatives of the People. Tulo went with his aunt and uncle, as well.

And then Derek was there with the fancy winged hovercraft, and Mark was sitting on the deck, drinking so water from a cup, watching the sunset.

Addavein was beside him.

Mark asked Addavein, “Did that actually do anything?”

“Yes,” Addavein said. “We’ll know more tomorrow, but when you put that much power into a working, into the power already present in Aluatha, then stuff happens.”

Sally was there, too, asking, “But we didn’t just kill every stray goblin in the Empire… right?”

“Oh no, no no no,” Addavein said, “Thatwould be asking for too much with witch magic… but I imagine a great many people will find themselves having an easy ti against their own goblin threats tonight and for however long the ritual lasts.”

Eliot was there, too, saying, “It takes a lot of mana to kill even smallmonsters inside of a city. That might be adamantiumbut… it’ll get used up fast? Even if it’s just empowering others? The Empire is big.”

“Canyou kill monsters directly with Castellan?” Mark asked. “I thought you could only tell us where they were, and if they were big enough.”

“With fire I can, yes,” Eliot said. “But it’s always cheaper to tell your people where the monsters are and have them kill the monsters instead.”

Mark nodded a little.

Addavein said, “But she called upon the dead to help, so… That was a ritual of delegation, so its power has been multiplied considerably.”

Isoko was there, saying, “Tiny, very strong cogs, moving larger and larger cogs.”

For a clear, nice mont, Mark wondered if Isoko had shared in his own mont of feeling like a cog in the machine of Empire—

“I hope you’re hungry!” Derek said, as he landed them at the Green House, “Because we got lotsof great food.”

Mark stuffed himself and slept on a fantastically huge and soft bed because Tartu and his father were sorcerers with a grill, and Addavein sat in the front rooms all night long, under the stars and reading books, on guard.