Side A – Nia
Nia couldn’t imagine what sort of trick Margrada thought they could pull off that Osdora wouldn’t have a counter for, but in that moment she wanted nothing more in the world than to find out.
“I think we can all agree that catching up to Osdora and Gossma when they’re trying to make their best time away from us is a losing battle,” Margrada said. “I’m sure there’s all kinds of extremely dangerous gambles we could take that might offer a small chance at outpacing them but I’m also sure that those would be a mistake.”
“So far everything you’re saying sounds reasonable,” Pelegar said. “Get to the part where you stop being reasonable.”
Nia wanted to leap to Margrada’s defense, but she had to admit that Margrada’s idea had to be sufficiently out there to qualify as deeply unreasonable if it was going to have any chance of success.
“We can’t catch Osdora, but we don’t have to,” Margrada said.
“You’re thinking we have Yasgrid meet her at the edge of the Darkwood?” Nia guessed. That wouldn’t eliminate all the perils Osdora and Gossma would encounter on their journey but it would reduce those perils as much as possible.”
“No, but that’s probably our best backup plan if everything else fails,” Margrada said. “The point I’m trying to make is that this was never about grabbing Osdora and wrestling her back to the Shatter Band. We don’t need to catch her, we just need to talk to her.”
“I’m not sure that dragging her back wasn’t on the agenda, but you have a point,” Pelegar said. “The only problem is that she’s just a bit too far away to hear our voices.”
“Is she?” Margrada asked. “Because we talked to Nia’s family and Yasgrid in the Darkwood just a little while ago.”
“By the time she gets to the Darkwood again though…” Nia began but then stopped, hearing what Margrada was actually suggesting. “You’re not thinking of contracting Yasgrid again, are you?”
“I’m not,” Margrada said. “She’s not in the right place to help with this.”
“But we don’t have an anchor to work with,” Nia said. “There’s no connecting point to where Osdora is?” As she said the words though she was left wondering if they were true.
They felt wrong.
Did they have a connection to Osdora that they could use? Maybe Pelegar, who’d played with Osdora for years? Or maybe some of the stuff Gossma’s left behind?
“What do you two think you’re talking about?” Pelegar asked.
“We can use the same technique that Nia developed with Yasgrid to let us communicate with Osdora,” Margrada said.
“That’s not possible,” Pelegar said. “Transporting us to where Osdora is would require that we have a conduit to Osdora like Nia has to Yasgrid.”
“Not if we don’t physically transport ourselves,” Margrada said. “All we need to do is project our voices, and maybe an image. That’ll give us the chance to talk sense into her, or hear her side of the story.”
“But we’d still need an anchor,” Nia said. “Something connected to Osdora. Something really important to her.”
“We’ve got that,” Margrada said and when Nia spread her hands in confusion added, “You.”
Side B – Yasgrid
The question of what dark secret Endings might be hiding didn’t strike Yasgrid as particularly critical after the discussions she’d had. What surprised her was that Marianne agreed with her.
“It will be worth discovering what Elshira believes the revelation to be,” Marianne said. “At the very least it will provide an insight into her motivations and limitations.”
“You don’t think it will be so shocking that it would sway our opinion of her cause?” Yasgrid asked.
“Anything’s possible, but from your descriptions of interacting with Endings, I’m marking it as unlikely,” Marianne said. “We have a long history of Bearers we can refer back to and while many have died or met similarly tragic fates, the details aren’t obscured. We know, for most of the Bearers, why their tenure ended. It’s possible that the Bearers whose deaths are mysterious might represent some deep conspiracy but conspiracies don’t tend to last for centuries. Elshira on the other hand, espoused several things which diverged from objective reality well before she became the Bearer. That’s not conclusive proof that she’s wrong but it does suggest that she is not to be trusted at face value.”
“Could she be partially right?” Yasgrid asked. “Could there be a secret that she has simply misinterpreted or viewed from such a distorted perspective that it appear to be an supreme existential crisis?”
“That’s entirely likely,” Marianne said. “The only other likely alternative is that she knows of a trap of ideas – one where if you can reason yourself into it, it becomes extremely difficult to reason yourself back out.”
“What would she hope to gain from that though?” Yasgrid asked.
“What does she stand to gain from any of this?” Marianne countered. “An ally perhaps?”
“She faced me alone, so maybe she doesn’t have any real support to draw on?” Yasgrid said, feeling that wasn’t the right answer.
“An ally she could recruit by just explaining her needs to you,” Marianne said. “I think you’re right. There’s something deeper to her actions. Something more personal.”
Yasgrid flashed back to Elshira catching Endings.
“One moment,” she said and turned her attention wholly onto Endings, asking it, “You let Elshira catch you. Why?”
Ending’s mind space swallowed her up. She’d been expecting that. That Endings appeared within the vast cathedral, standing in the guise of a radiant bolt of lightning, frozen in place, Yasgrid hadn’t been expecting.
“Only the Bearer may grasp me,” Endings said.
“But you let someone other than Kayelle or me stop you from destroying a Trouble,” Yasgrid said. “Do you not remember that.”
“I remember everything that has transpired,” Endings said. “Even the moment that you speak of.”
“Then why did you let someone other than Kayelle or I hold you back?” Yasgrid asked.
“Only the Bearer may grasp me,” Endings said.
A horrible understanding spread through Yasgrid. She didn’t need Endings to say anymore. She knew what Elshira wanted.