“Why do we provide hospitality, and honor the blessing of the hearth for strangers? Is it in payment so that we ourselves might in turn receive safe lodging and free support when we are not secure in our homes? Is there a calculus to the giving of food and shelter such that we may have the expectation that what we give will be accounted for and returned to us coin for coin?”

“To the miserly that would seem the only fair and proper balance. To give a single coin beyond what will be received in kind is in their eyes contemptible. They do not see that in providing hospitality we invest not in our future but in the world as it is in the moment we provide for others.”

“What those consumed by greed fail to understand is that to live in a better world requires that the world be better for all. That in striving to batter down others that they might rise, all they ensure is that there will be misery for all, and solace for none.”

“And so we open our doors and make free with our table, that by giving of ourselves today, a blessed tomorrow may shine on us all.”

– from the Catechism of Tylna, Goddess of Travelers, being being struck from the official records by the First Council of High Accessors.

If there was anything that proved that Helgon was dead it was that he seemed sincere in admitting what he was.

“The plan to summon the Plunderer was one we debated vigorously of course.” Helgon’s gaze went distant and somber. “Perhaps if even one of us had brought up the right point, or conceived a convincing enough argument the rest would have altered course? Perhaps we could have avoided all that came after? I know that was beyond me – which excuses nothing I assure you, I speak only of my own failing. Dyrena though? No. I think she saw even early on what might become of things, but I think she saw too what would have befallen her had she stood in the other’s path.”

“Dyrena’s one of the other fallen Neoterics? Like you?” I asked. She had to be from the wistfulness in Helgon’s voice, but it was good to be sure. If she was still alive, then she was still a problem, and I wasn’t a fan of the problems I already had.

“Like me? No, not at all. I mean, yes, she was one of the Twelve. And you are correct, she was cast down. The first to be in fact.”

“But she’s not a ghost like you?” 

“She could be. I rather wish she was in fact. Her visits were always a delight. For me at least. She may not have gotten as much out of them. Which is perhaps why she chose as she did.”

“Chose what?” Zeph asked.

“It’s difficult to describe without equations, but I think a functional metaphor might be that she left the building.” Helgon’s left hand twitched like he was looking for one of the chalk sticks to write on a nearby board that was covered in chalk lines, numbers and symbols I’d never seen before.

“The building in this context is the world?” I asked, trying my best to follow along.

“The world, the numinous sphere around it, the conceptual volume we occupy. What you might call ‘everything’, though ‘everything’ for us is not ‘everything’ there is.”

“Because the beast, or the Plunderer I guess, isn’t part of our everything. It comes from a different everything,” I said, grasping what he was saying though I was sure I didn’t understand all the implications of what any of it meant.

“Precisely so. All Dyrena left behind was her laughter. At us. I think she must have known it would come to that. Even early on. She never stood against the plan, but her involvement was always at a remove. Most of what she did provide was commentary on disasters which we would have blundered into quite unknowingly.”

“So she could have stopped the Sunfall by letting you all just screw up?” I asked. Was that as bad as the crimes the others committed? I don’t think that kind of question mattered given the scale of the what they’d done.

“Not at all. Had Dyrena not amended our plans, we would not be sitting here as there would be no ‘here’ at all. When I say we debated our scheme vigorously, it wasn’t out of conscience or a struggle with the moral implications. Those who would have provided moral opposition were removed from power long before any open debate on the matter was broached. No, our discussions, once they became openly acknowledged as such were around the practicalities and logistics of our endeavor. No one had had ever dared what we would dare and so there was no roadmap to follow and no guarantee that our approach would yield the results we longed for.”

“And did it? Is this,” I gestured to the everything around us, “is this what you wanted?”

“I wish I could lie and say either yes or no. Were I a proper Lord like the rest I would say ‘no’, because there was still power I had yet to claim. Were I what I had thought myself to be, I would offer a resounding ‘yes’. Time without end? The chance to study and understand, to build a new world drawing upon all the lessons of the old? A path to the perfected forms and eternal states of being for all? Even cast down as I am, even with the world sunken to the state it is, even with all the dead piled upon me, I should be able to say ‘yes, yes it was all worth it’.”

“Why can’t you?” Zeph asked.

“Probably because of us.” An unexpected voice, feminine but deeper than mine or Zeph’s coming from behind my chair should have sent me jumping to the ceiling. 

I drew in a quick breath, maybe to try the aforementioned jump, but my body completely vetoed that idea. To jump one must have muscles and mine were firmly in recovery mode. My bones were in agreement too. From their point of view, they’d been reduced the elemental dust and were still unsure of the benefits of resuming a solid form.

I didn’t fight either of them for one simple reason though. I knew who was behind me.

Or maybe more ‘what’ was behind me.

“Hello God of Battle,” I said, without turning to look at them.

“Hello to you, God of the Sun,” the woman said, walking past my chair to pick up a cup of tea and sit down on Zeph’s other side. I hadn’t seen many Automatas before, so saying that this woman was a unique blend of organic and mechanical parts didn’t mean much coming from me, but it was hard to imagine many creators who would be capable of making metal flex and flow like flesh and flesh appear as solid and unyielding as steel. If the fact that she bore a fragment of the God of Battle inside her wasn’t breathtaking enough, the artistry of her creation would have blown me away too. 

But she wasn’t alone. Along with her, two other people followed.

“The God of…Farms?” I asked, fairly certain but not entirely so.

“The Harvest,” the Orc who answered was big even by orc standards, but his voice was surprisingly soft. He took a cup of tea too, but pushed a chair back to sit on the floor in our circle instead. That still left him at roughly eye level with the rest of us, but it made him a bit less intimidating than his size would have warranted.

“Don’t worry about guessing,” the last person said. They were a Crowkin, and small enough that even I would have towered over them. They hopped onto the orc’s shoulder and settled comfortably there as though it was their right and proper perch. Since the orc held the tea cup up for them to peck a bit of refreshment from, I had to guess that was, in fact, the Crowkin’s proper place.

“Wasn’t sure you would be here,” Zeph said.

“Wasn’t expecting you would be either,” the Automata woman said. “And we wefinitely weren’t expecting her,” she nodded towards me, “though it is nice to see you both.”

“Little, this is Xalaria,” Zeph indicated the Automata, “Blessed of Battle. And Fulgrox,” she indicated the Orc, “Blessed of the Harvest. And…” she paused, turning to the Crowkin. “Do I have your permission?”

“For her?” the Crowkin gestured towards me with a wing. “Yes.”

“Little this is a Kalkit, Blessed of Secrets,” Zeph said.

“I see why guessing wouldn’t have helped,” I said. “It’s nice to meet you all, though I should apologize for not being terribly presentable at the moment.”

“You are, or is it were, a Ratkin?” Xalaria asked.

“Are. Mostly,” I said.

“You seem to have gotten a bit of…of something, um, all over you,” Kalkit said.

“And inside you,” Fulgrox said. “All inside you.”

“Is it growing?” Xalaria asked.

“I don’t think it would fall within the domain of a harvest if it was,” Fulgrox said.

“I doubt it would either,” I said. “You all seem at home here, I’m guessing you’re familiar with the beast fragment that was outside?”

“Yes. We were a bit worried to find it had wandered off,” Kalkit said.

“Worry no more,” I said. “You found us.”

“Us? Fulgrox asked to which MB opened it’s eyes, raised its head and gave a tiny wuff of acknowledgement.

The three Blessed shook in surprise.

“That’s alive!” Xalaria asked.

“And sleepy,” I said. “We had a rough day.”

“It’s not the beast though,” Kalkit said, hopping off Fulgrox’s should to get a closer look at both MB and I.

“That’s mostly true,” I said. “If you’re looking for the beast fragment though, that’s us!”

“I will get us some more tea,” Helgon said. “You may want to explain in a bit more detail Little, but I shall save you some time and…no, wait, my explanations just make everything more confusing. Damn that woman. Dyrena, I can hear that in your voice! You are quite the cruelest person I know.”

He wandered off without explaining what was up with me, or what he was talking about but I think, even with the brief exposure I’d had so far, I understood what Dyrena had said about him.

“Do you want the long version or the short version?” I asked. Did I trust them? Not really. Was I comfortable with being around this many people who could pull down miracles like melting the eyes of a Neoteric Lord when I, notably, did not have access to that sort of shenanigans? Not so much. Was I far too tired to care at this point and maybe hoping that someone would melt me down? I refuse to address such scandalous accusations.

“She’s okay,” Zeph said. “The beast fragment is gone. She and MB are something else.”

“Something else which holds one of god fragments,” Xalaria said.

“Something which you are not actually worried about, or we’d be having this discussion outside already,” Zeph said. 

I don’t pick up on a lot of relationship queues. I’ve been told that people were interested in me when I never caught the faintest hint of what people assured me was ‘flirting’. My new senses had no expanded even slightly in that direction either, and yet I could still tell that there was some kind of history between Zeph and Xalaria. 

Idly I tossed a thought towards Sola that could have been called a prayer. I didn’t expect an answer or Sola to do anything, I just wanted to share my hope with her that the two nice ladies not decide to stop being nice.

“For what it’s worth, she’s telling the truth,” Kalkit said, indicating that they were referring to me. “Which might complicate the question we came here to ask her.”

That they knew of me at all was a bit worrisome. That Fulgrox and Xalaria groaned and sagged in their seats confirmed that my day was going to continue along just like it had been going.

MB turned and wuffed, offering to carry me far, far away which was a seriously compelling idea.