“So I know, Vaingloth, that, of course, we cannot speak of the defenses we have arranged.”

“There is security in obscurity, but it is a fragile sort of safety. That said, I do agree Kurst, we will benefit from keeping some degree of mystery to exactly what sort of defenses we have arranged for our holdings.”

“Yes and see that is the thing Vaingloth. What we have setup should be kept as secret as possible, but the fact that we have them must, conversely, be made as apparent as possible.”

“I believe that is what our security summits have been directed towards have they not?”

“They have but they have been woefully lacking in one crucial area.”

“Oh? Have they?”

“Yes. As you are well aware.”

“Enlighten me if you would.”

“There is a threat which shall persist into the new world we will create which I have yet to hear any suggestions or stratagems raised to address.”

“And this threat would be?”

“Must I name it? Even that entails a degree of peril. As you well know!”

“I must confess, I do not. Or rather there are so many perils before us, I would be certain I know of what you speak, before offering what might be misplaced guidance.”

“I’ve not come to you for guidance Vaingloth. This something all of us must consider and if any of us cannot make a credible case for possessing a defense, we risk imbalancing the very delicate balance of power we are striving to achieve.”

“Oh, there I must disagree Kurst. The balance of power we are striving to achieve must be anything but delicate. If we are to reign eternally, then no winds of fate, fair or foul must be capable of disrupting the balance which we create.”

“Then you agree with me! That something must be done about her!”

“About whom my dear Kurst?”

“Malgenia! Malgenia! You know I speak of Malgenia! Who among us can claim to have safeguards against her, should she decide to make include us in one of her damnable art pieces?”

“Why we all will, consider that she has been a part of creating our new world at every step. She will be as invested in it’s continuance as any of the rest of us, perhaps even more as our world will offer her something which this world never could.”

“And if the capricious devil changes her mind?”

“Vitor has already pledged to manage her has he not? Let it be his problem.”

– High Accessor Kurst making an early but critical mistake which eventually compounded into his position as the second Neoteric Lord to fall.

Tallgrim played his part. A little too well if I was being honest. I mean, I’d spent a couple of years pretending to be someone I was not and while I wasn’t the best performer in the world, I was pretty sure I could spot a bad one.

I’d always wondered what the others had planned to do if Malgenia turned on them, and my ‘reappearance’ was absolutely the moment they would set those plans in motion.

Or, hmm. I suppose they’d already set their plans in motion, at least one of them, given the attempt they’d made with the Beast Fragment. 

To their credit, that would have worked. I mean, if Malgenia had actually been stupid enough to hang out in the wasteland and stay in contact with them for weeks and weeks. Honestly, could I even fault them for trying? I’d given them the best opportunity they were ever likely to see to eliminate her. Not taking a stab at it would really have been criminal.

And they’d even been smart enough not to try to stab me in person! When you love and hate someone like Malgenia like I do, it’s kinda hard to decide exactly how to feel about people trying and failing to kill her.

Left to my own devices there, I chose ‘murder’. I was feeling ‘murder’, or maybe ‘murdery’? Murderous? Nah. Just Murder. That seemed fun. And appropriate. And like what Malgenia would have wanted, and what I wanted, so really, how could it be wrong?

Trying to stay in character? Diyas asked.

I feel like I should lie here, I said. Except of course lying to one’s deity is generally about the worst idea you can have. Lies create distance, or revel it, and the last thing a Blessed need – or the last thing I need – was distance from my deity.

I am the God of Life, among other things, Diyas said. Trust me I am familiar with people wearing out their welcome to my domain. A suggestion though; perhaps don’t get so lost in planning their demise that you invite your own? There are other ideas you can hold onto after all.

Yeah, and they want you back in one piece, Beauty said.

We all do, Inhibition said.

Let’s not undersell the danger she’s in, Reason said. We know how potent Malgenia’s power is, but we’ve never seen it tested against the might of the other Neoterics.

I’m counting on that, I said and held fast to my hope that I’d sweetened the pot enough to draw in even the most paranoid of the Neoterics number.

‘Recruiting’ Wepan, Grosh, and Hanshel had been more-or-less as straightforward as my conversation with Tallgrim had been. They’d been dealt weak hands to play and they knew it. That I was inviting them to the table at all meant I intended to take what remained of their power, but at the table, all together, was their best chance of changing that fate. They had to bank on my arrogance and the stratagems they’d set aside for a confrontation with Malgenia or they had to bank on my mercy.

And they’d met Malgenia, so there was really only one right play there.

I hadn’t invited either Insikir or Vitor to our little gathering, ostensibly because they hadn’t lost any of their divine fragments and this was just a ‘friendly little swap meet’ where we were going to ‘put things back into balance’.

I wondered if they would think I was afraid of the two remaining full powered Neoterics? Or if they’d think I was sparing Vitor because he was my twin and Insikir got a free pass as a result?

I never got a chance to find that out, but I like to imagine that on some level the four Neoterics I brought back to my house in the wastelands thought themselves lucky since it meant they could divine my power and domains into four shares, rather than six.

Could they have thought they’d be able to harvest the domains of death from me? It had to be a tempting thought. Not to mention if they could have learned the secret of how I survived a Beast Fragment. 

That was the lure. The promise that all they’d ever wanted was still within their grasp. All they needed to do was deal in bad faith with me. So simple. So familiar.

If they’d had an ounce of sense, any one of them could have run though. Give up their power – the rest or to me – and found some means to pay for their crimes. Turning into the mindless god of worms for example. That had worked for Sasarai, and something similar could have worked for them to. 

Heck even becoming a true guardian and servant of the populations they’d saved would have been enough to hold off my wrath and Malgenia would have been confused as hell and probably let them live just for that.

But none of them cared about their people.

And none of them were interested in atoning for what they’d done.

All four of them just wanted to go back to what they had.

They’d stolen it fair and square, didn’t they deserve that?

“So we should work out what each of you need, and once we have that sorted, what each of you deserve. Vaingloth always said that keeping things fair would keep us safe and secure!” I wasn’t doing a good Malgenia impression anymore, but I was still making a bare attempt at it. They were so consumed with hunger for the divine fragments I’d scattered across the table in front of them though that none of them were evaluating my performance, and if they had been they probably would have chalked up any discrepancies to ‘she was just eaten by a Beast Fragment, must have lost a few bits in there’ or something like that.

“Do you have a proposal for how we will divide these up? Perhaps a draft selection?” Wepan asked.

“First we need to work out what you each require,” I said. “Did any of you manage to retain any of your divine fragments or did they manage to clean you out entirely?”

Was I asking them to choose between admitting that they needed less than one of the others vs. admitting that they had been so foolish and weak that they were completely swindled? Yes. Yes I was.

“I have a few still,” Hanshel said. “Ones I had set aside for more frequent use.”

“I have a similar stash as well,” Grosh said, nodding to the other three as though they’d had their answers pre-selected.

“I was between research projects and all were committed to my vault,” Wepan said, which drew a frown from Hanshel.

“I am in a similar state,” Tallgrim said. “When we lost…or thought we lost, you to the Beast Fragment, I began securing my city and belongings. The vault was supposed to be the safest place for such things.”

They were all studiously not speaking about how I’d walked through the wards and carried them out. It wasn’t a fun topic for any of them to contemplate, especially since I hadn’t used magic to do so.

Or at least not the magic of grace they knew.

“Let’s have Hanshel and Grosh tell us what they have left then,” I said. “I’ve always wondered what you managed to pluck from the dying heavens?”

“I would need to review the stash,” Grosh said. “Perhaps we could adjourn to my sanctum? This feels very exposed.”

“Exposed? I don’t follow?” I said, gazing through the missing wall of my house at the dark and empty wastelands beyond.

I hadn’t repaired the house at all because I wanted it to capture whatever part of their attention wasn’t riveted on the divine fragments.

And I wanted it to remind them what had been done to me already and what I’d survived.

“I suppose you would have a different perspective, but we cannot be so sanguine about an encounter with one of the fragments of the End,” Hanshel said.

“If you could perhaps share the techniques you used? That would place us all on a much better footing, better even I would say than we’ve had since the Sunfall.” Grosh was so ernest I was forced to wonder if he really would have traded all the divine fragments on offer for a chance to learn how to deal with the Beast Fragments.

That having the influence over them that I enjoyed would allow him to destroy the rest of them and claim their fragments was surely not something he’d considered though.

“Techniques? Oh I’m sorry, you seem to be mistaken,” I said. “I used no techniques in my encounter. Or at least none you will be able to replicate.”

Which was the absolute, unvarnished truth, but the funny thing about the truth is how infrequently people are willing to believe it when it conflicts with what they want.

“I told you she wouldn’t be forthcoming,” Vitor said.

I turned to look at him since he’s teleported in behind me, only to discover that I was frozen in place.

“You’re certain she can’t escape this time?” Tallgrim asked. “She all but ignored my High Wards.”

“We won’t have any problem containing her,” Vitor said. “Or dividing her from her domains like we did with the gods.”

“But she survived the Beast Fragment!” Grosh said.

“She had assistance with that,” Vitor said. “And now that we’ve reviewed our collection of divine fragments I know exactly who that was.”

What? No!

And that was the last I heard of Diyas’ voice.