“You really are not thinking of attending a collegium Malgenia? Even though father has promised to sponsor you to any you might choose?”

“I’ve already chosen my course of studies.”

“I’m not certain the Temple Aspirants have a curriculum. I gather they are more devoted to, well, devotion to their gods, are they not?”

“Devotion is not required. So long as you act to direct the outpouring of grace, they will let you do as you wish.”

“If that is true then why do the Aspirants always prattle on so. It’s always ‘divine mission’ this and ‘purity of heart’ that?”

“Words.”

“Yes, exactly, so many tiresome words. Repeated ad nauseum. It’s as though…oh.”

“Exactly. Words have power. With enough repetition they can shape people’s beliefs, beliefs other people have about them…”

“And the beliefs they have about themselves? What a fascinating insight you have stumbled upon dear sister.”

“I did not stumble.”

“No. Of course not. You never do. I do notice that you have not been availing yourself of the power of Words much however?”

“I speak when I need to.”

“You speak to me. You occasionally speak to father. Is there anyone else you speak to?”

“Of course. I speak to my patients.”

“Correct me if I have misapprehended something, but are you not an Aspirant in the Mortuary Services?”

“Technically, yes.”

“I would think your…patients? It would seem as though they lack the ability to hear any words you might have to share with them.”

“Oh I know. My words aren’t for them.”

– Vitor missing a rare opportunity to understand the association his sister possessed with the Gods of Death

Malgenia wasn’t nervous. A visit to  the Deaths was not a particularly notable event for her. It was the high point of the Death’s month, but it tended to be something she did as much by accident as by any particular design.

So I couldn’t be nervous. 

And I couldn’t treat the visit as though it mattered.

Unfortunately the other thing I couldn’t do was put it off any longer.

Vitor’s visit the day before had been an unsubtle nudge to get the Assumption ritual started, and he wasn’t wrong. My hold over Malgenia’s power was growing by not quite as fast as the power itself was.

Diyas was helping me with that, but apparently she’d made it back to me mostly because I’d recalled her, however unwittingly. Having a link to the God of Life when you were suffused with enough death energy to slay a planet turns out to be an unstable state, who could have imagined that?

I won’t leave you, Diyas’ assurance was heartfelt, I could feel that clearly, but I was also keenly aware that neither of us might have a choice in the matter she was drawn away from me for too long.

I wanted to investigate that more, since wrestling with Divine problems seemed ever so much more appealing that the course of action I was undertaking but I’d put off talking to Responsibility for too long as it was. She deserved better than that.

The plan to investigate the ritual was still in play, Reason was searching for where Malgenia had hidden the original codex which contained her notes, but even once we found the book we needed it seemed unlikely we’d have an answer in time (assuming there even was one). Based on the documents we found, Malgenia’s notes tended towards the horrifically opaque and cryptic, more fragmentary reminders for herself than anything which might illustrate the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of the processes she’d practiced.

“My Lady! You bless us once more!” Overseer Ka dropped herself into a deep bow.

“Am I a blessing? Can I give blessings? What sort of Blessing would you desire?” I asked, engaging ‘random Malgenia babble mode’ as the most convincing response I could make to potentially any and every situation I found myself in.

“To see you is to be Blessed. To stand in your presence doubly so!” Ka said.

The overseers were, as a rule, fantastically loyal to Malgenia. In Ka’s case she took the fanaticism quite a bit more seriously than the others. It wasn’t always a cruel sort of mania, not always. Often she was quite loving, spending time with the Deaths, regaling us with tales of Malgenia’s many virtues and compassions. It was only when we stepped out of line, or stepped out of line in a manner Ka disapproved of, when she would injure us.

Thinking about it now, that’s really wrong isn’t it? Beauty said.

It always seemed wrong to me, Inhibition said.

Did it? Beauty asked. You were never on her bad side? Not that I could remember.

I wasn’t, but I watched what she did to you. There was a deep anger underlying her words. Deep enough that I was tempted to act on it.

Don’t smite her, Reason said. Vitor just showed us that he’s watching the Deaths through the Overseers. If we kill Ka, or act against her, he’ll start questioning why.

Would he though? Beauty asked. I mean who ever questioned what Malgenia did? Especially if it involved randomly killing someone?

Reason’s right, I said unhappy about that but accepting it. The last thing we need at this point is any extra attention or questions. Also, I’m guessing that doing a murder wouldn’t exactly strengthen the bond between Diyas and me?

The Blessed of Life does not typically murder people, this is true, Diyas said, her statement notable in the lack of an absolute edict against doing so.

“I shall triply bless you then with a task, so you may think of me even when I am gone,” I said. There were all sorts of things I could set her to do which would assuage Inhibitions anger, but requests like ‘lick all of the rest facilities clean’ would be a trifle too obvious, to Vitor at least, as a malicious punishment, which would raise suspicions.

Malgenia was many things, but well before she reached ‘malice’ her anger would usually be expressed in a more terminal manner.

“What would you have me do, Dearest Lady!” Ka’s eyes were practically alight with holy fervor.

“I should like a comprehensive report on my Deaths,” I told her, wondering if I might do some good under the cloak of the Assumption Ritual. “I do not wish you to interview them. I wish you to fill as many pages as you can with your memories of the events of their lives up until this moment. Tell me what harms have befallen them each, whether those harms be accidental or intentional, misfortune or warranted. To me what you perceive their joys to be and include detailed plans specific to each one on how we may increase those joys while also raising them to conscientious of their fellow Death’s time and happiness.”

Ka was speechless at that and for a long moment I was forced to suppress a wave of panic spawned by the idea that maybe I’d been a little too coherent.

I needn’t have worried though, Ka was having her own melt down of ecclesiastical glee.

“YES MY LADY!” she said, practically vibrating in place, torn between her obvious desire to remain in Malgenia’s presence and the overwhelming urge to get started on the Holy Project assigned to her.

“You may begin as soon as you are ready. I shall look for results in a year? No, too long. A month? Yes, a month perhaps. See that you have a comprehensive draft available in a month!” 

I didn’t bother to watch how she took the news since I already knew that she would be heads down with barely any sleep or food for the next thirty days exactly. That would, I hoped, give her a chance to reflect on the virtues of the women in her care. At the worst it would at least keep her out of their business until the Assumption Ritual was complete and I could circle back (or my successor, depending on how things went) to see whether her outlook had changed at all.

Did I proceed from there directly to Responsibility? As a responsible near-godling that was the course of wisdom and compassion the moment required. Responsibility needed to hear my answer to her, well whatever it was she’d left me with, and I needed as much time as possible to formulate a new plan for dealing with the Assumption. 

I was not going to go through with a full, regular Assumption. I hadn’t ever planned to but the one thing my spiraling thoughts had shown to me was that I simply couldn’t conduct a normal assumption ritual even if there’d been a Death, or anyone else, I could bear to sacrifice.

The gift of my Blessing from Diyas was more fragile than I’d known. I thought as long as I kept faith in her, we would be inseparable. Tearing Malgenia apart had seemed to confirm that, but when Little had needed to call on Diyas’ power, she’d also exposed the fact that my Blessing was only anchored so deep in me. 

Performing a full Assumption ritual would be one of the worst violations against Life’s domain that I could commit and even if Diyas and I were both in agreement on it, fundamentally rejecting the core essence of Life on a level like that would definitely shatter the Blessing I carried.

Which would in turn me I would lose control of Malgenia’s power.

Which would mean the world would end.

Which I was opposed to.

So, no Assumption.

But no Assumption meant the power would grow beyond my control, and the world would end.

All I had to do to avert all of that was speak with Responsibility and then pick another Death to stand in her place (not Clarity). Putting another Death in the right frame of mind would be challenging – Responsibility had taken my story inexplicably well and it had still nearly broken her, if my read on her emotional state was correct.

Which meant speaking with Responsibility and at least bringing her into a vow of silence on the matter was my only path forward (though a part of me held out hope that she would be willing to act as an advisor, and maybe speak with the Death I chose in case I failed to make the right impression).

Responsibility wasn’t hard to find. None of the Deaths were. They were spread out but if anyone was going to stand out to Malgenia’s senses, the women who’d developed themselves as her highest acolytes were the easiest to spot by far.

That, of course, let me avoid Responsibility and seek out Clarity instead.

You say that like it wasn’t obvious that’s where you were going? Beauty voiced an opinion that I’m certain none of the rest shared.

No, Beauty’s right.

It’s where we would have gone too.

Inhibition and Reason choosing to betray me wasn’t a surprise either.

It’s not betrayal if we’re right, no matter how much you don’t want to admit it, Inhibition said.

The sight of Clarity dispelled all thoughts of betrayal, because, well, Clarity is a delight.

Clarity was also in the midst of reading one of Malgenia’s myths to a group of the younger Deaths.

I could have watched that for days. I could have listened to her forever. 

The moment any of them saw me however, it would all end. The children would be over-awed to see me in their midst. Clarity would close up into the formal propriety and deference the Deaths inherently showed to our god.

I could be with Clarity as much as I wanted, but she was never again going to be with me.

Leaving them wasn’t hard. Moving unseen and unheard was among the most trivial of Malgenia’s inherent abilities. Leaving them was, as always, the hardest thing of all.

That was what it took for me to find Responsibility though.

Sitting alone in one of the observation rooms which offered a view into the wasteland.

I closed the door behind me both in a physical and a mystical sense. The Overseers weren’t going to report our conversation back to Vitor. If he was looking, he might notice the veil I’d draped over the room, and was certainly capable of piercing it. I didn’t dare make one of any serious consequence as that would absolutely raise questions I didn’t want to answer, but the small, gentle one I wove in place was sufficient to dissuade mortal inquiries.

I was, it seemed, a little clumsy with it though as Responsibility noticed the veil’s arrival.

“Hi,” I said, my voice sounding shy even to me. It was as non-Malgenia a greeting as I could possibly have given.

“I’m in.” Responsibility said, without preamble or any convincing at all.