Bylaws of Babel - Chapter 3 (Patreon)

This one went on way too long, but somehow I made it.

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Chapter 3 – Perspective Presages Apostasy

“-. 1048 IC, Late Summer .-“

I had declared myself. I’d done it so far away from home that most busybodies would think I’d insinuated myself in Tilea or Araby instead of all the way up here. I had confirmation that my Guiding Lanterns worked. And I had Khorne believing his one and only consort of thousands of years had actually been Slannesh all along.

As a direct result of his screaming fit – and Slaanesh’s moans everlusting – all the Chaos plots that the Four had been brooding since I spat in their eyes had exploded prematurely. And plenty older ones. Just from my incidental astral wanderings, I had confirmation of several that had descended into in-fighting, or violent collision with a completely different chaos cult or plot. Alternatively, their patsies got exposed along with their secret backers. Many of whom were enemies themselves. ‘You cannot serve two masters’ was in full effect and then some.

It was all one giant mess of confused allegiances that nonetheless promised a better outcome for the forces of sanity, than letting the lowlifes keep on cooking.

I hadn’t even known about any of the individual plots or cults before now, they were just a given.

Also, goblins. And beastmen herds. Lots and lots of beastmen herds. Whose calfs outnumbered the adults by outsized amounts, because they were supposed to still have another few years to breed and rear the latest generation of pillagers. The orks seemed to have a particular dander for them at the moment, though sadly the herds still seemed to do most of their damage to human settlements. Still, enthusiasm exceeded their competence, and they were disorganized because Khorne’s call to war didn’t come with mass telepathic logistics or strategic coordination across hundreds of forests.

Regardless of how well or poorly the humans, dwarves or what-have-you reacted in comparison, the monsters would kill far fewer people in the long run than otherwise.

The irony was particularly salutary for my baby brother’s Empire. Just another three years and they would’ve had to deal with this mess under Boris Goldgather.

More distantly, Malekith the Betrayer was leading the Dark Elves into an all-new invasion of Ulthuan. That was the opposite of good, but also inevitable since the Asur would never be this weak again. I was only surprised it took so long, I’d have expected it to happen a decade ago.

One had to wonder what the galaxy at large was going through.

Closer to home, I’d told mother that father had killed everyone who ever did us wrong, and fucked over the whole tribe on the way out. She laughed herself to tears and just said “Good.”

I was also being more or less blindsided by the actions of my shaman. In fact, ever since the ‘Great Boast’ as most of the world had decided to call it, things had come so far that I couldn’t lump him in with the rest of the lowlifes underserving of names anymore.

Matters had already been strange with him because of the rite I’d kludged together. Not only had he been dreaming bits and flashes of my lives, but his potential and strength in all matters mystical had been growing at the same rate mine was. He assumed it was because of the new way of practicing spellwork, and freedom from the crow parasite, and that was all true. But not the end of the story. If his maximum threshold of ability had been of a fair journeyman by this world’s standards, now he was well into the magister bracket and rising.

I knew there would be side effects from my Name being carved into his heart, as making him count as ‘me’ for the purposes of the ritual had been the whole point. I didn’t expect them to go so far or so deep, though. Of course, I’d never done this before either.

It said something about the dire straights humanity was in now, never mind the whole galaxy, that I was willing to debase myself as low as this. As proud as I was about many aspects of my first life, even if I’d ultimately failed, the institutional slavery I inherited from my forebears was not of them. And not just for moral reasons.

If nothing else, it was important information for the future, if I ever decided I want my own force of superhumans.

Or blessed devotees.

Still, beyond the shaman becoming more capable and thus useful to me, he’d also become more proactive. Where before he’d only been fulfilling my orders as begrudgingly as possible, now he was taking the initiative in a variety of ways. He actively diverted people from wondering why he had them gather or buy sulfur and saltpeter by the cartload. He stopped resenting the loss of his familiar. He was asking me for insights in magic instead of grudgingly accepting instruction with gritted teeth.

He was even letting people live after they offended him, even healing the ones he had to make an example of. He was generally more involved in the community than ever before too. By being kind and helpful. For the first time since my rebirth in this world, he was acting less like a daemonic sorcerer and more like a true vitki.

Conversely, with me the man had become borderline belligerent, challenging me on my actions, plans and world views at almost every turn. But he’d also been biting his lip instead of going mad when I turned it around on him and the tribe every time. I didn’t figure it out immediately, but he wasn’t deliberately testing the boundaries of my patience. He was trying to negotiate terms. Or trying to meander his way into negotiating terms. For the tribe’s survival. Or at least the clan’s. He actually thought I was going to eradicate them, which, fair enough, would be an objectively good thing. Especially with the Bjornlings next door to cultivate into a proper civilization instead. Which I still planned to do.

Then, just today, he’d gone and admitted to one of the younger and less irrevocably ruined children that he no longer had his familiar because it turned out to be an evil daemon. Like all the spirits were now. He did this in the middle of the day. A market day. Which meant that the central square was packed with over half of everyone in the enclave, along with the greatest number of people from other clans that we were likely to see visit before the raid came back.

I strongly wanted to think the man was trying to create a powerbase to use in an attempt to overthrow me…

Except the whole clan was buzzing with grim suspicion within hours. And the visiting traders took no more than a day, after getting back home, to spread the news far and wide about ‘that crackpot of a Mammoth Rider’ that would surely be the first of this year’s sacrifices after the raid came back.

The shaman had only set himself up to fail, and he was neither surprised nor particularly daunted when I told him so.

Also, I’d given him thorough and explicit orders not to knowingly work against me. It wasn’t impossible that he’d found a way to resist commands, or at least circumvent them, but only insofar as nothing was impossible. Also, I was fairly sure he’d count as distinct enough from me at that point that his power would stop increasing alongside mine, at the very least. In other words, it was actually much less likely than him genuinely trying to turn over a new leaf.

Or, because that was far too much to expect from people up here, switching from treating me with bitter enmity to equally bitter appeasement. And only because he had very low standards.

For better or worse, the standards of godhood on Mallus were fairly low compared to the rest of the galaxy, never mind humanity during the Federation.

For better or worse, the vitki of the Mammoth Rider clan was trying to do right by his people, finally.

For this incredible achievement which I hadn’t seen coming in the least, I was going to acknowledge his name. He hadn’t earned more than that, it was all I was willing to give him, but it was lightyears more than what I thought he’d earn from me.

I ignored Hrami’s expectant glances for another week, and his increasingly pointed and frustrated glares, until the day just before he and his handpicked helpers were to start their trip to the Monolith of Katam. The bulk of the clan would go there later, but the vitki that didn’t go on the raid itself always went ahead to prepare the grounds. Knowing when to do so was just another one of the ways they proved their soothsaying powers, and their worthiness to succeed the existing shaman in the case of apprentices.

Claims of prophecy were almost always lies, usually it was just clairvoyance or astral projection at the end of the day, seeing present events far off. But being able to predict the news weeks before it arrived via normal means went a long way in all cultures, and in this regard I couldn’t hold it against them. Even the Federation was no exception to this.

This time, Hrami was going there even earlier and with other designs, specifically mine.

Or, at least, that’s how it would’ve been, if not for the Forms I’d managed to grasp since that day on Sartosa. It might still be, but the odds were going to drop very dramatically today.

Before, with father, the lantern pendant and pretending to be possessed was the greatest risk I was willing to take for the sake of free will.

Now that I was as strong as a giant and healed better than the most freakish troll, I was willing to go a fair bit further.

Especially if it let me stop being a slaver years earlier than I’d originally resigned myself to.

I had Hrami lead me to the grotto where it all began, told him to take a seat at the stone table right outside the cave entrance, and put my hand on his chest. “The problem with slavery is that if we treat our own species like animals, we can’t hold it against other races for treating the whole lot of us the same way.”

With a yank of my spiritual hand, I pulled my Name out of his chest.

Hrami gasped, lurched backwards so harshly he fell on the ground, and crawled away from me on his back with eyes bulging, lungs heaving, his limbs almost unable to bear his weight due to how hard they trembled with every pull and drag.

“There are considerable moral and economic issues that take precedence,” I continued when I judged that his panic had subsided enough that he could actually understand me again. “But I doubt you’re willing to hear them. Either way, even an animal can be noble, more so even than men sometimes. Maybe you can remind enough others of that. And how. And maybe you won’t. It’s your choice to make now. As are all the rest.”

“You-“ Hrami gasped. “What – you – but –“

“Perhaps if I had a less broad perspective, I might have been willing to indulge this ever so implausible saga of poignant redemption. Unfortunately for both of us, there’s no time for that.”

The man finally stopped crawling backwards when his back hit the rock face. He brought up a hand to clutch at his heart, breath still heaving as if he couldn’t get enough air. “You – would just – you’re out – you’re not – I can feel it – it can’t be real – you-“ He looked up at me with shocked, wild, angry, betrayed eyes. “It can’t be. I – I can’t believe it – you can’t – this is a trick, no g- no one can be this k- this mer- this – this foolhardy!”

“You, who can’t even teach mere men the right things, would presume to dictate how gods behave?”

Hrami shut his eyes in bitter frustration. His face was that of someone reliving similar words from the past, only with more pain.

The upbringing of a shaman-sorcerer was not easy, I knew. It started in thralldom in all but name, and only got worse from there. Children with aptitude were given to the sorcerer to raise as soon as they could feed themselves, and they lived hellish lives where they competed for everything their master dangled before them. Knowledge, power, attention, being spared the cane, even their food every single day.

Slaaneshi allowed for multiple survivors if the relationship was uneven enough, and you made it under a Nurgle cultist as long as you had the willpower not to kill yourself to escape the agony of the plagues you were ‘gifted’. Khorne would have had the greatest rate of survivability once the children established a pecking order, but he didn’t have shamans because magic was for the weak. Ours, though, had been Tzeentchian for generations, even if they thought they still had a real tutelary spirit guiding them. Which meant the one who inherited the position wasn’t the one with the greatest aptitude, it was the last one left alive.

The best manipulator. The best murderer.

Hrami had long since spent any sympathy I might have had for his abusive childhood.

“The skalds would have me set you up for various tests, put you through at least three great trials before I decide if you’ve earned forgiveness, never mind trust and blessings. But that’s well beyond the length of time I’m willing to invest in you lot, even without everything else. So. I’m going to put you through all of them at once. Competence, bravery, loyalty. Trust is too much for now. So is respect. Faith. But maybe you’ll make me believe they won’t be so forever.” I took a moment to suppress my physical tells at my spirit finally being mine again. “Probably not though.”

The man’s breath didn’t seem capable of slowing, his chest heaved frantically in tune with the trembles of his spirit. His animus lurched and shook as it adjusted to no longer being tied to mine. The same as mine. Indistinguishable from mine, almost. But his eyes never left my face, blinking hard while staring at me with wide, unblinking incomprehension.

“You know what I want you to do. Go forth and make me believe in you. Or not.” I smiled grimly. “Alternatively, you can try to kill me right here and now.”

Hrami was shocked.

But the same bitter frustration soon came back, he had no reason to believe me.

“You’re more powerful than ever now, and you don’t owe me anything for it because you’ve been my slave this whole time. That nullifies any debt between us. But I never dictated your mind, and now I no longer control your actions either. This is your one and only opportunity to prove to me that even the Graelings can be more than animals. Exhibit true humanity, or never cross my sight again.”

The man stared at me, saying nothing. His mouth hung open. His entire face was slack in disbelief.

“Make no mistake, I’m not your teacher, may he writhe in Tzeentch’s gall for a thousand years. And I’m not like those four monsters either. I don’t set people up to fail. You shouldn’t have done that to yourself either. But I understand that it came from an honest place. It must have been hard for you, but you did it. As acknowledgment for the monumental effort of trying to go against everything you’ve been taught, and in repentance for what I did to you, I’ll give you one free shot at my back.”

I turned around and walked away.

Nuclear bioenergy. Marvelous Management of Mitochondria Bio-Fission. Extremis. Among the forms I’d managed to Name since that day on Sartosa, this one stood out by rendering me practically unbeatable to anything short of what Neoth’s imperium would, in another time, consider a top-grade anti-tank missile. And even that was not a guarantee to cripple me, never mind worse. All this, too, was before you factored in the nigh instantaneous regeneration. I was able to heal from wounds in seconds, even regrow limbs in mere minutes at most. Before this, I’d have had to wait until I was in my twenties for my magical power to push my healing to this point. And I wouldn’t have gained the rest of the advantages without spells, and even then only temporarily.

It was biological enhancement comparable to some of the best that the Federation had deployed – and subsequently lost – during the Iron Men Rebellion. The brainchild of brilliant women and men from a different kalpa. For them, it had been an attempt at creating super-soldiers, and they did it by inducing a change in how cells produced power. They literally turned mitochondria into fission reactors. They didn’t know that this was a capability that has always existed in human genetics and it just… wasn’t used. The Federation had much to speculate about why, but the benefits were much more salient. Chiefly, that the quality and capability of human biology scaled with available power.

My strength, endurance, toughness and reflexes were now literally superhuman. If the Grail Knights of this world represented the extreme peak of human physical performance – perhaps capable of challenging Astartes if they had been the same size and mass – I was well beyond that. And I could go further by pushing myself and lighting up like a bonfire.

I was extremely fortunate that the Form came with total comprehension, because I wouldn’t have been able to apply this knowledge for many decades at least, if I had to go through the same steps as the inventors. Nanotechnology was only the delivery method for this bioenhancement process, and it would’ve had to be developed right alongside virology. The nanobots’ only role would have been to deliver the virus to the cells without it breaking down or being immunized out of existence along the way. Even still, without Eununcia, I wouldn’t have been able to transmute an alternate delivery system, never mind do it out of the raw resources Hrami could get for me.

I could only hope that digging a deep hole, warding it with the most thorough scripts I could think of, and only murmuring the words was enough to prevent the information from leaking into the Warp.

Chaos could not get even an inkling of Extremis. This thing worked on almost anything alive. It had been literally trialed in pot plants.

Perhaps the most ridiculous thing about it was that there was no magic involved. With how it worked, I’d have expected it to tap into Aqshi, the Red Wind of Fire, if not the Warp itself. It wasn’t just enhanced attributes, I could melt almost any material with a touch too, even breathe fire every bit as hot.

But no, it was completely rooted in physics, functioning most akin to C’tan like N'phoran or Nyadra'zatha, if anything. This did not, however, include the matter conjuration required of regrowing limbs without consuming biomass. That was another function of human DNA that was normally inactive, and which had played a major role in the Federation’s now lost bioscience. The human cell knew how to fuse new elements as well, thus the body could conjure new biomass for itself as long as it had energy to convert. Which I now did.

Nevertheless, Hrami was more powerful than ever too, now. Depending on what and how he cast, he actually did have a chance to kill me even with the extreme physique I now possessed. Especially if I didn’t defend myself. Which I would indeed follow through, the first time.

Regeneration was a cure for many ills, but there were spells to interfere with it, and it wouldn’t protect from attacks to the spirit. Extremis didn’t confer any spell or magic resistance either, and certainly not against corruption, save for burning physical mutation away. It was enough for me to narrowly give the Grail Knight blessing the edge, relative to the dangers of the current galaxy. Weapons and empowerment spells could make the difference in combat ability, but the same could not be said of resistance to Chaos.

The Jade Wind, too, may not have many offensive spells, but the few that did exist were quite formidable, and Hrami had something of an affinity for them.

But Hrami didn’t attack, didn’t move, didn’t speak. He just slumped where he was, staring at me in total bewilderment and didn’t rise from where he huddled with his back at the wall.

Symbolism could be a heady thing, but it didn’t always reflect reality.

When I got back to the enclave, I dropped by the smithy and told my teacher Lund to come with me, as Hrami had told him to always obey my orders, no questions asked. Then I went straight to Hrami’s steading, picked up the travel pack I’d prepared ahead of time for what everyone thought would be me accompanying Hrami to the Monolith as his servant, and went to the kitchen.

“Get dressed, mother. We’re leaving.”

“-.  .-“

I carted mother and Lund all the way to Finnsvik, where a sloop had just been completed at Hrami’s expense. There was some skepticism on the part of the shipwright, seeing as I was a small Norscan child accompanied by two full grown slaves out of chains. But it abated after I gave him the potions Hrami had promised as part of the last payment. Thankfully, with the most troublesome men out on the raid, we managed to board and set out to sea without further annoyance. By the time anyone realized we were setting off towards the west instead of east, if they even cared, it was too late to stop us.

We were at sea for days. Lund asked me what was happening but subsided when I refused to answer. Mother was even more quiet on the voyage, as reluctant to talk to me as ever, fearful that dispelling her own ignorance about who and what I was might only invite more misfortune.

For my part, I spent the journey practicing magic in every way I could think of without capsizing us. I drew fresh water out of the sea when we were thirsty, pulled fish out to cook over magical flame when we were hungry, indulged in the supplies I’d packed when that got dull, and practiced all other manner of low-power, high-precision tricks. I also made sure there was a healthy wind in our sails as well.

I strongly wanted to experiment with my Forms too, but I had to refrain. Distorted Reflections of the Aquamirror mainly had to do with conjuring and banishing a specific kind of water entity, but ultimately revolved around a magical item they used. The fundamentals of item enchantment were included in the form by necessity, and were the greatest benefit there by far. But a tiny boat at sea wasn’t the place or time to apply it, even if I did have the requisite materials.

The other form… Well.

Deft Animus Adaptation of the Dragon School was as potentially revolutionary on a personal level as it was suspicious. Assimilating that Form made me feel like I’d dodged some manner of degeneracy by the thinnest hair. It was bizarre, considering how useful the form was.

Technically, it taught the making of a holy, spirit-implanted item. One which enabled someone to categorize their Animus into reservoirs for each different ‘metric’ of ability, if it could be fathomed deeply enough. These ‘reservoirs’ could then be used to shift the metrics, thereby giving someone complete control over their aptitudes, whether enhancing one at the expense of others, or vice versa. In any number of combinations. Theoretically, this could even be extended to affecting others, allowing me to steal energy and magic from enemies, and even the environment. Even permanent improvement to abilities and skills were not out of the question, in the long run.

I didn’t have any way to make the item, it required the blood sacrifice and spiritual imprisonment of a powerful supernatural entity that didn’t exist in this kalpa, and creation magic of divine tier.

But the Form, as all the others, was complete, and fully assimilated into my own anima at this point. I needed only make the last step, one flex of my spirit with all my power, and I would inculcate the functionality into my spirit alone. I had, however incidentally, acquired the capability to manifest a Warp Archetype.

Shape and change it in whatever manner I wished as well.

There were many things I could do with this, but the most paradigm-shifting implications, as always, were those that came at me sideways. In this case, from the direction of my very meticulous observations of animus-magic interactions relative to Hrami’s arcane marks.

It was the sort of thing that would have driven the me of distant pasts to throw caution to the wind. Cut to my destination by the shortest and most direct way, just to finish faster. I had a compass and knew how to navigate deep waters, I’d captained my own sailing ship in two distinct past lives too, and both diesel and nuclear ships in others, even a submarine.

But a sloop was none of those things, and there were whales, megalodons, seawyrms, krakens, and any other maritime dangers on this planet.

For those same reasons, I didn’t dare brave the Sea of Claws with just the three of us in this tiny vessel. I was resolved to moor us at Heimseter, the Bjonrlings’ southmost coastal settlement, where I would discharge my last filial duty.

Long story short, I stuck to the shallows everywhere I could.

It was, therefore, supremely aggravating when all my caution ended up making absolutely no difference.

The storm came out of nowhere just as we passed into the gulf of Taaketskog. It was a wrathful thing that was as sudden as it was unnatural. The waves frothed and swirled even before the wind started in earnest, and the sky darkening was the last thing that happened instead of how things normally went. Even with me successfully keeping wind in our sails with magic, the waves, the currents, the sea itself pulled our ship out of the shallows into the midwater, and eventually beyond. There was lightning, rain, thunder, billowing waves, and a large, wild, powerful, swift shadow in the deeps, shaped like a man with a fish tail.

Triton? Here? Why?

As the sloop listed and tilted, to the point where my petty spells were the only thing barely keeping myself and my terrified passengers aboard, I spotted the far-off shapes of ships. Our ships. The ships from the raid which had still been at least a week away, when I’d checked on them earlier that day.

They’re on a collision course with cliffs! And the reef we just left behind...

Our ship was small and light, I’d been able to go through the former and over the latter instead of having to sail around them, but the same couldn’t be said of the longships, never mind the king’s cog.

Unbelievable, we’re just overzealous collateral.

This was ridiculous. Why was Triton even here? I knew he hated every sailor that ever existed, but why was he having a fit here instead of the dark elves sailing the seas on the other side of the ocean? Those were the people he hated the most, weren’t they? And wasn’t his normal haunt the Southern Sea?

This is what we get for not honoring Stromfels, isn’t it?

I held fast against a massive wave that smashed me straight on. I looked at my mother, who was only still on the ship because Lund had an arm firmly around her where he hugged our tiny fore mast. She was drenched and hyperventilating, scared out of her mind.

I blew sodden hair out of my eyes.

Fuck the king, seriously.

But despite my mood, I couldn’t help a fatalistic grin. This, too, was so very nostalgic.

“There’s nothing new, no matter the sun.”

I stuck my hand in the water and gave magic that bardish twist that I’d done so very many times, when I was on an ocean planet in the past. Zorba the Greek’s final dance was just about to sound through the deeps, when sight beyond eyes glimpsed what accompanied the great shadow of wrath below. Full of hate at the futility of their plight, the ghosts of unnumbered dead.

I paused as the ship listed on its edge.

Closing my eyes, I drew up an older, softer memory, and projected through the sea itself Galadriel's Lament.

The storm didn’t stop.

But the sea changed. The waves stalled as if in confusion, then the surges and surfs began to resemble lesser swells and ripples more and more. The wrath in the deeps gave way to startlement at what strange sounds were coming from the tiny gnat atop the surface.

I very carefully kept the song going even as the great presence turned in our direction, swimming to where we floated with all of our torn sailcloth and creaking masts amidst the roaring rainstorm. Soon, the eye of the storm itself came to us.

Sharp prongs broke the surface first, rising up into the air to reveal a spiked crown. The trident came next, bursting from the water right ahead of our uncontrolled path. Both were made of a material that looked like gold, but was probably the same not-gold material the Old Ones used in their constructions and swords. I had suspicions about that, as I did many things, but I wasn’t fool enough to try and verify them here and now.

Under the crown was dark hair tinted green, and deep sea-colored eyes that stared at me in complete incredulity. Either at my small size, or more likely at the fact that I wasn’t the hauntingly perfect maiden he expected to find. The maiden whose angelic voice he clearly didn’t want to miss a word of, so much so he didn’t rise any higher until the last echo of the song fell gracefully silent in his submerged ears.

Only then, finally, did he rise truly above the surface all the way to the waist.

Works every time, I thought wryly.

Triton. Stromfels, if my guess was right.

He looked… almost exactly as he was depicted in that art from long ago, on Terra. Colossal, muscular, long dark hair, long beard of the same, and fish fins and flippers where clothes would be on a land-legged man. All of him green, if in different shades. The one exception, besides his crown and weapon, were the bands around his wrist made of the same golden material.

Most important to my passengers’ survival prospects, though, sirens only went after sailors because the mermen back home had higher standards than old shrieking whores.

The demigod of the seas had proven as susceptible to the sincere and innocent charm of a maiden’s song as all other sentient sea life I’d ever had the opportunity to meet.

Triton was nowhere as talkative, though, and there was no room for levity to reach and touch his soul. My sight beyond eyes could see the reason why.

Ghosts haunted him in the hundreds of thousands, some the size of a man, some the size of a child, some the size of rain drops, some mere sparks in the wake of the rest. They floated and swam around him, through his very aura like a school of fish. Old spirits worn by even older souls, ancient and unrestful, driven by undying hatred at unforgiveable crimes long since forgotten to everyone, except the sole survivor of their race that stood before me now.

There was a bizarre standoff as my tiny self stared up at the primordial being gigantic enough to pick up galleons in one hand.

Then I turned away, picked up the lantern-on-a-stick that I’d made as a sort of walking staff for myself, and held it out to him, already aglow with its warm light that would never go out.

The giant fish-man blinked incredulously. Well, more incredulously.

But he leaned closer instead of flipping our boat to drown and kill us.

When his face was almost upon us though, a change came over him as the lantern worked its spell upon the angry ghosts,

He pulled back in surprise, and the new waves did almost flip us this time. But while his wrath returned, it didn’t get worse.

More carefully than before, he reached forward with his hand now, and only paused briefly when the shift came upon his mood the second time.

He stopped with his palm upturned just short of out boat, so I tossed the lantern staff into his hand and… waited to see what would happen.

Guiding Lantern Dreaming Golden Skies for the Dead. They could hold spirits, but also sooth them. The restless spirit needed only draw near.

The clouds still rumbled and the mighty winds twisted all around us, increasingly harsher and louder for miles at his back. But Triton was calmer as he pulled his hand away from us. Every single ghost that swam towards the lantern for a better look, more and more as the next took their turn in a stream, were reminded of what peace felt like again.

He gave us one last look, then a much longer stare to the lantern staff that looked like a tiny pin between his fingers.

Finally, he sunk back below the waves and quickly traveled beyond my senses, normal and mystical alike.

The storm seemed to leave with him. The sea and clouds calmed unnaturally quickly, sparing us more grief. And sparing our raiders further losses to Stromfels’ torment.

The Unlamented Prophecies speculated that Triton’s rage might have been unnatural, perhaps even a sickness left behind by his fight against Chaos. Or a curse.

Whatever word fit his plight best, the calming effect of my Lanterns seemed to help, if just a little.

I wonder what Manann thinks about this.

Hopefully something good. The sea was awfully accommodating to our little vessel all of a sudden, practically carrying us where I wanted to go. The rest of the storm faded too, soon after.

It seems I inadvertently saved the fleet as well, more’s the pity.

On a hunch, I swiftly steered out board back, not quite the way we’d come but westward, so that we’d have to double back and go through the cliffs and reefs again like before.

When we were back in shallow waters, I chanced a minute of unconsciousness to fly over in spirit form to see – yes, I’d been right. Whether because of shaman soothsaying or the eyes of their spotters were just that good, or maybe because of a ship of their own that I’d also inadvertently spared destruction, the Bjornlings didn’t fail to discover our limping fleet. Or they knew well enough not to ignore how unnaturally the storm came and went. Perhaps they were even expecting the raid to come this way again, after so long at sea. Their own ships were going out in force to blockade their own gulf and deny ours further approach.

It took almost the rest of the day for the standoff to resolve with our side choosing the better part of valor, for once. The raid fleet, after affecting what makeshift repairs they could, unfurled their sails, stuck out their oars, and resumed their journey west, and eventually north around the greater Norscan Peninsula towards Bjarkoy, our own port of call.

Amidst all that, I was easily able to pass our tiny sloop off as visitors from Trollbo, the Bjornling’s smaller port town to the north. I had dreamwalked their dialect enough to pass off as a native, and as an obvious thrallwife mother had no expectations levied at her to begin with. Lund drew a few more slanted stares, but the confusion at seeing me leading the two around discouraged and confrontations.

Fortune was with us for once. The vessel I’d picked out in my astral wanderings ahead of time – because its captain was the best sort of the options available – was still moored. All ships were warships at a moment’s notice in Norsca, but this particular merchant’s vessel seemed to have had the dubious fortune of being too heavy with load to pull out at low tide fast enough to keep pace. It belonged to a man who had family both here and in Nordland, down across the Middle Sea to the South.

Mother, who was finally beginning to understand – to believe her own hopes of why I’d brought her all this way, was practically shaking by the time I got ahold of the captain.

“Current going rate for a one-way trip for two, plus associated expenses, food, water, the works.” I pushed the bag of hacksilver into the bemused captain’s hands. Around us, every last sailor and longshoreman and what-have-you were shamelessly staring at the strange, bold, tiny sight that I made. “This is normally where a man would bring out the threats, but I’m a boy, not a man. You are, though, and a good one too, isn’t that right Captain? My mother’s the delicate sort, you won’t allow any funny business around her, will you?”

The man stared at me with bafflement worthy of song. He caught himself fast, though, gave my mother a thorough look, and Lund a longer one with barely hidden suspicion, before looking back down at me. “Just the two? Lad, where are your-?”

“To be delivered safely and unspoiled to Emskrank. It should be on your way.” I spat in my palm and held out my hand, my harshest stare boring into his with a flare like hot flame.

Whatever he thought of my display, it killed the rest of what was about to come out of his mouth. He narrowed his eyes instead, spat in his own palm, and gave me a firm handshake.

I squeezed harder.

When we separated, he knew I could have had him on his knees screaming in pain.

“Nimrod…” Mother breathed faintly behind me.

I took off my backpack, turned around and held it out to her.

She accepted it mechanically, put it on and smoothed down the hood of her new fur cloak, which she now wore over the equally nicer, new clothes I ‘coincidentally’ had available for her to change into. Her own lantern charm too. I wished I could have made her a bracelet or talisman woven with Ulgu, to make her harder to catch the attention of strangers if she didn’t call it to herself first. Unfortunately, I still had neither the reagents nor the time to practice magic well enough for it, never mind what it would take to make the objects themselves.

“Nimrod, I…”

I waited, but she found no more words than the first time. It was all she could do not to collapse and cry, right then and there for all these Norscans she so hated to see.

“Lund, can I trust you to look after her until she’s home?”

The blacksmith seemed fit to cry himself, but he gave a tight nod. “Aye, little master. I swear.”

It rankled, but that was the best way he could have addressed me in this situation. “Can they board immediately?” I asked the Captain.

“If this is all the baggage they have, sure. We’ll be in port for another day though. They can stay on the ship if they don’t bother the men, but they’ll have to feed themselves until we leave.”

“That’s fine.” They had food to last, I’d spelled it to keep, and I would also stick around until then.

“Well, no skin off my nose,” the captain shrugged, before hollering for his cabin boy. “Oy brat! Take these two to the guest cabin, and no funny business with the lady! Tell the rest of the louts too while you’re at it!”

“Aye cap’n!”

“Nimrod, I – I don’t…” Mother covered her mouth with her hand, struggling to stem her tears.

I smiled sadly. “Go home, Heta of Emskrank. May the rest of your life be kinder.”

Her shoulders shaking, mother quickly walked onto the ship with whatever scraps of dignity she could keep. Lund, though he managed to keep from showing as much weakness, sunk to one knee to hug me before following her onto the ship.

I stayed in sight of the ship for the next day and night, watching from the roof of the harbormaster’s building up until it finally departed with the high tide. Lund spent the time making good with the sailors and offering his own skills for the trip. Back on the shore, though, I saw a group of toughs sending him very intent stares on and off all day, and then a second group that came to take their place. They didn’t seem part of any organized group, but they knew each other and they worked in shifts. Hankering for a free thrall, were they?

There was no ‘looking the part of a slaver’ in Norsca, everyone was a slaver up here, even this mix of dockworkers and other random men. They occasionally glanced my way, so I glared pointedly back at them. I wasn’t sure they understood the message, but they didn’t do more than talk to the Captain once before backing off. I tried to use magic to eavesdrop, but perhaps I was too far, or the wind just that strong.

Or magic was involved, though I felt no weaves in my range. If so, it would’ve been a charm or item of some kind. Hopefully not. I didn’t need those complications.

Mother never came up from below deck, staying practically locked insider her cabin the whole time the ship was still docked. But when they were out at sea at last, she finally came up on deck to wave goodbye.

I made sure not to be the one who stopped first.

“-.  .-“

Norscans didn’t do taverns. They had alehouses, which was just a word for when someone left their gate and door open for people to come in and pay for a pint of whatever extra they had on hand. These folk had wisely rejected the idea of hops, as they turned ale from a stimulant into a most despicable soporific. But that also meant ale didn’t keep as long without spoiling. Because of this, women always had a new batch brewing, and surplus to sell and supplement their income. This also meant a virtually endless variety of flavors, as each family recipe used different herbs and what else.

Norscans also didn’t do inns. It was all ancient hospitality up here, the rite of salt and bread in a sacred covenant between host and guest. This was one of the few redeeming features of Norsca that even the Graelings religiously held to.

I didn’t need the latter, but I was able to avail myself of the former to my heart’s content. Ale had a very low alcohol content that even children could partake without worry for their health. Where water wasn’t the cleanest, it was even recommended as substitute.

I was also able to buy a few things. It wasn’t a market day, but stalls still hawked wares because port towns always had business. I was able to get a few items that would serve in spellcasting while I rebuilt the right spiritual mechanisms to overcome the need for material components. Fortunately, I was old hat at this. I’d had to do it in more than a few prior lives, the Materium-Immaterium byplay marches ever on. Deft Animus Adaptation of the Dragon School should serve me there in good stead too.

By sheer serendipity, I was able to haggle for a tiny set of stone carving tools too, made of good steel. Shipped over all the way from Marienburg, the vendor proudly boasted after he saw me dislocate the shoulder of an older lad who tried to steal my purse of silver. I hadn’t had the leisure to make tools to make tools to make more tools to make yet more tools that could finally make tools as small and fiddly as these. These would serve me very well indeed. At least until I became skilled enough in altering spells on the fly again, to just transmute things into the tiny shapes and patterns I wanted.

All told, it was a very unpleasant surprise to see my path back to my boat suddenly blocked at both ends of the street.

I’d have understood if it was some ruffian or snatcher, but four people at each end of the alley was too many for a single boy. Well-equipped too, boiled leather, axe or sword to a man, a club each too, and a couple of them were even equipped with breastplates over gambeson. Steel, not iron.

The Captain had tattled. Of course he had, I displayed monstrous strength and made my eyes flash like flame to stop him asking too many questions. But that was well within the means of any random sorcerer or shaman apprentice, not… whatever this was.

“I said don’t crowd him.”

The two breastplate-wearing men at both ends of the street stepped aside. From the direction I’d just come through appeared… not the one that spoke but someone else. A grizzled man covered in charms of stone and bone and wearing a wolfskin skull and cloak.

What’s a vitki doing here?

Finally, there appeared a big, broad, muscular warrior with a thick yellow beard, dressed in the highest-quality summer clothes I’d ever seen this side of the South Sea. He had manticore skin boots on his feet, and an enormous snowbear cloak about his shoulders. He wore a hood too, but I spied the glint of gems on brass within the shadows on his brow. A circlet crown.

The Bjornling’s own King?

What was he doing so far from Skjold? Was it in case he had to contest the Graelings at sea? Or did he worry we might still try to raid them on the way back home? Perhaps higher up the coast?

I hadn’t seen hint of him during my astral scouting, and I’d looked up and down the roads too. He could only have arrived here by ship in the past day or two.

“He the one?” He asked one of the men, one of the dockworkers from before.

“Yep.”

“Seer?”

“Bjorn sees… I don’t have the words to explain it,” the vitki said discomfited. “But the boy burns like a bonfire alright.”

Extremis had its disadvantages too, unfortunately.

Behind the vitki’s eyes, the face of a great, lumbering spirit bear stared at me. It didn’t look or feel like a daemon.

… When exactly did my life turn into one long chain of unexpected complications again?

… But if it wasn’t a daemon in disguise, that meant the Four didn’t have direct ears and eyes here right now.

That rather expanded my options, didn’t it?

The big man stepped forward, paused to give away his axe and knife to one of the bondsmen, then he slowly approached with his palms out as if I were a skittish cat. “We have the ship impounded.” What. “There’s always clever plots going on at the docks, we have a second, separate supply dock an hour’s ride south precisely to send those ships suspected of stuff like this.” What. “They’re not going anywhere until I say so.” What. “I need just say the word and they’ll be rounded up.” That- “If they used any threats or ill means to make you work for them, they can’t follow through on them anymore. You’re safe now.”

I blinked.

All tension left me all at once like snow off my back.

I rubbed my eyes and just had to laugh a few good seconds, at this complete reversal of how my fellow man had treated me this whole life.

I dropped my hand and looked up at the Chief of Jarls who’d stopped well outside arm’s reach. His, not just mine. “What’s your name, good man?”

The others made no mystery of their disbelief, but I ignored them.

The big man himself took it in stride. “The name’s Bran Lostkin,” he said without the boastful manner common of men claiming to be related to Erik the Lost. “I happen to rule these parts.”

“Well met.” For once, it was the truth. “I would that you just let them go. My mother has suffered enough, my teacher has nothing left to teach, and slavery is among the most contemptible things man can ever inflict on himself.”

With just that sentence, all conversation ceased.

Of course it did. For all the good points the Bjornligns had compared to the rest of the tribes, they were still Norscans. They still kept thralls.

I waited. I counted the seconds in my head. There were quite a few of them.

But to my complete amazement, Bran finally looked at one of the two men in breastplate and said: “The inspection didn’t find anything out of order and they’re free to go on their way. The captain has a standing invitation to attend any feast in the Longhall for the next season.”

The man nodded and left to fulfil his commands.

“Thank you,” I said, because it was no small thing to take a mere stranger at their word. Especially when you were king. Doubly so from a child. “What now?” I asked when the standoff began to turn awkward. “Am I to be detained instead?”

“I mean to make sure there’s no funny business happening in my lands, and to offer you my hospitality while you’re here.”

“Why?”

“Bad omen not to give room and table to visiting shamans, especially ones with flaming eyes.” The big man smiled crookedly. “Even babies like you.”

“I don’t hold with the Crow.” Tzeetchian sorcerers were the ones closest associated with warpfire eyes. “Or the other three.”

The look in his eyes changed. “’Round here we call him the Raven.”

“Ravens are wise, noble animals with intelligence almost akin to man, and anyone who ever claimed the Most High-Strung owns that bird is a liar.” The most charitable word for the reactions of everyone hearing me speak such foul heresy was ‘aghast.’ “Crows, though, are all liars.”

The King exchanged a baffled look with his seer, before turning back to me. “I’m only more worried about you now, boy. What will it take to make you trust me?”

I hesitated. He was… really earnest, I kind of wanted to agree just to make sure he was safe now. But… “You are not obliged at all. I’m apprentice to no one and hold to no clan. I bind no tutelary and speak on no other’s behalf, my words are only and wholly my own.”

“Mighty clever words they are too,” the man muttered. “Who taught you, then?” Bran pressed. “How do you know what you know, do what you do?”

“That being what? I’ve hardly done anything noteworthy.”

“Steal men’s words with a glance, crush a grown man’s hand in your lightest grip, bandy with kings as if we’re peers.” He glanced towards the shore, then back. “Sail a ship into port through a fell storm sent by the Sea God himself.”

“Well.” He had me there. “Technically all of that is true. Technically. If you squint.”

“If you don’t worry for yourself, then for my sake. Nightfall’s not far off. I would rest easier knowing a child like you isn’t out on his own.”

“… You really do mean that, don’t you?” I couldn’t help but marvel. Now that I thought about it, I hadn’t seen many street urchins. The realization didn’t come with any sinister feelings either. “You really are just worried some ill-to-do ruffian or hag will snatch me up and have their wicked way with me.”

“Ugh,” the man pulled on his beard. “Do me a favor and don’t use those words that way again. At least until you’re grown. Please.”

I shook my head, still smiling wonderingly. “Miracles walk among the Norsii even now, it seems.”

The king grunted to distract from the flush in his cheeks. His sun-kissed beard did him no favors there, unlike his hood. “That mean yes, boy?”

I smiled wryly. “Because you’ve been honest with me, I’ll do the same – I don’t think you want to do this.”

“Why’s that?”

“I’m a Graeling.” Dead silence. “I’m not some spy or sapper, I wasn’t with the fleet, I came here in secret just to deliver those two to their ship. My only aim now is to leave without causing further disturbance.”

I waited for the… perhaps not inevitable failure of diplomacy? The Bjornlings and Graelings hated each other, and it was an old, deep, personal thing. Not just the enmity of resource competitors and mutual raiders.

“… No way you’re one of those savages,” said one of the metal-clad bondsmen, finally breaking the spell that had fallen on us.

Bran watched me quietly, then turned his head only slightly while never taking his eyes off me. “Ofnir?”

“The boy appears completely ordinary, even to the spirits,” the vitki said distractedly, face turned not to any of us but to the south-west. “But his boat bears traces of a blessing worked by no mortal weaving. Whatever else happened out there, that vessel was conveyed here by the will of the sea itself.”

Now I had to groan. “Oh for goodness’ sake.”

“The Storm King’s, you mean?” Bran said dryly.

“Actually no.” Triton wasn’t the king of the sea, just its most mighty son.

“Well, whoever or whatever it was, they’re not someone I want to offend.”

“Yes, yes, you’ve figured me out, congratulations,” I huffed. “I’m not just a baby magician, I’m a talented baby magician. Bring out the skalds.”

“A talented baby magician with blessings unfathomable even to the spirits themselves.”

I deflated. “You people have distressingly low standards.”

“Look kid, do you accept my hospitality or not?”

I scowled, but when I returned my look at the man I couldn’t help but soften again. He was just trying to do the right thing. Wasn’t that why I came all this way? “… I suppose I can endure a night. Just one.”

“Finally,” Bran harrumphed, motioning for the rest to get things moving. “I swear, I’ve dealt with dark elves that weren’t as difficult as you.”

Since the shaman wasn’t going to, I fell in step next to the king. “Did they speak our tongue, or use a translator?”

“The latter, why?”

“Elvish languages have a lot of nuance. Depending how you pronounce a word, it can mean a dozen different things, more the longer the sentence. They were almost certainly insulting you the whole time.”

“Nothing I didn’t expect then.” Bran’s scowl belied his true feelings though. “You weren’t lying when you said you’re not a vitki?”

“No.”

“Then how does a little boy like you know all these things?”

“Ask me again when I’m royalty,” I replied with total seriousness. “At least.”

“Should I be worried for my seat?”

“No.”

“Well, that’s good.” The man’s huge hand was gentle when he laid his arm across my shoulders. “Now let me tell you what all of this not to tell the local Jarl. He’s a rather more cantankerous sort, and he’s been blessed with so many children that he doesn’t have patience for anyone younger than sixteen summers anymore.”

I spent the night with the Bjornling king. And his two foremost bondsmen who turned out to both be his sons. And his seer, who spoke with the voice of Ursun without knowing that was who it was. And all the jarls and chieftains and warriors mustered too, in case the Graelings tried their luck at the eleventh hour. All under the hospitality of Jarl Aran Foambeard, in his great hall at the summit of Heimsetter Hold.

The man liked his mead almost as much as he liked to boast. About himself, and his son, and his son, and his other son, and those twins that were off being wastrels instead of attending the feast with the rest of their family, and those daft girls that were going to drive him spare before he was even fifty years old, couldn’t some ever so brave and strapping warriors take all five of them off his hands already?

There were all sorts of trophies on the walls. Skulls, crows, feathers, helmets, weapons, teeth and bones of great beasts. But instead of the dragon teeth and manticore heads, the Jarl boasted about the stag antlers, and the little charms hanging from its prongs where it loomed from the top of his throne. A wolf charm done in chalk by a child’s hand, a bear made of amber. A small axe chiseled out of dark rock, a small warhammer made out of gold, a disc of the same to symbolize the sun. Mighty proof of his children’s deft hands from as young as just seven years old, wasn’t it just?

The Nature King’s Antlers, the Sun Disk, Blitzbeil, Ghal Maraz.

Next to me, where I did my part to distract people with my ‘heroic grip’ and ‘winsome wit,’ King Bran nodded at the Jarl’s words every time such a topic came up, all the while carefully studying the reactions of the crowd.

I went to sleep that night with a fervent, bittersweet feeling, just one among hundreds of bodies sprawled haphazardly on their cloaks all over the longhall’s floor

I didn’t plan to do more than that, but the eyes of spirits were one me. I emerged from my body and wandered the sated, sleepy hall. For once, the daemons masquerading as tutelary spirits were a weak presence, overshone by the true tutelaries of the other shamans who’d come with the muster, many of them bears, and the Great Bear himself, their patriarch.

Ofnir, the king’s own vitki, was smoking wattle leaves on the hall’s threshold, tuned as deeply unto the spirit world as anyone could be without falling completely unconscious.

The spirit that walked with him did not share with the man the slightest figment of my arrival. The Brown One, Bjorn, Arth. His deep chestnut coat would surely seem genuine to others’ eyes.

Not mine. “Ursun.”

Even before I named him in truth, he was sizing me up to rip and tear. “If you tell anyone, I’ll eat you.”

“Peace. I understand.” The Chaos Gods and their daemons surely knew that the other tutelary spirits of the Bjornlings served the Bear God instead of them. But as long as the shamans themselves still held the Four as ultimate masters, as long as the Bjornlings at large played their part in their plots – genuinely, because they didn’t know – it should be more trouble than it was worth to wrangle the other tribes to genocide this last holdout of the Old Faith.

The Unlamented Prophecies said the Cult of Ursun was gutted and scattered during the Great War against Chaos, did this state of affairs endure until then, or will it end sooner?

That conflict was over a thousand years in the future, and would only unfold if I managed to conclude this life in even deeper irrelevance than the ones before…

But the Black Death was only some sixty years away, if nothing changed.

“I cannot see past your veneer, boy, if that’s truly what you are.” The Bear God growled with his fangs bared. “I’ve half a mind to take no chances.”

“I’ve a need to fly far afield for a span. Can I entrust my body to your care?”

The bear god’s snarl slackened from surprise. “… You got me there, boy, a better sign of trust I couldn’t ask.” He studied me less angrily now, though still suspicious. “Is it a bluff, I wonder? What if I call it? What if I don’t?”

I waited for him to make up his mind.

“My offspring will keep watch,” the bear god finally decided. “You’ll be running with me, if you can keep up.”

“My apologies but I’ll be using flight.”

I flew up and away at the speed of imagination. Since my perspective was literally cosmic, and the scope of the notions I fathomed could modestly be described as ‘universal,’ that was a very swift speed indeed.

By the time Ursun’s fastest sprint managed to catch up with me, I’d already finished updating myself on the developments back home, and was waiting for him at the edge of the Bjornlings’ territory.

“That – was – ridiculous,” the Bear God panted with his tongue lolling out. Affectation, or inherited weakness from his mortal years? Was he a mortal at any point? A human? A bear?  “Bloody vunderkinds, never miss a moment to kick dirt in our eyes.”

There were many things I could say, but I didn’t. I was too worried about what I’d found. And for once, it was from the complete opposite direction of the worst-case scenarios I’d had in mind. “I’m sorry, Bear Father, but I’ll likely be even poorer company on the return.”

“Are you even tired?” The bear god grunted in disbelief.

“No,” I shook my head. “Only troubled.”

Ursun watched me, then looked to the distance in the wake of my many-looped flight, before turning his eye upon me again.  “… Come, then. You can ride on my back.”

“-.  .-“

I woke up well ahead of the dawn, in the shadow cast on the wall by the large form of King Bran, who’d laid down on his cloak between everyone else and me. I was confounded. I was anxious. I wished I didn’t have to leave these people so soon.

Delving the World of Forms had only made my mood worse. I’d spent a bit of time there after returning to my body, and it was most unpleasant compared to prior times. Perhaps as a taunt from fate, or from luck, the most valuable Form I touched was also the first revelation I ever refused outright. The most thorough and effective way to raise, indoctrinate, and brainwash a child to happily become your meatsuit in case of your death would surely be of interest to evil gods and dark wizards. They could all go to hell. And they will.

The second most valuable Form was Periapt Craft Manifesting Sympathy of the Shaper. This one supplemented my basic magic item creation skills with insight into the making of talismans. Ordinarily I’d consider one-use charms to be a waste of resources, but these could be made from literally anything, and in practically no time at all. There was even a way to dictate and enhance their function based purely on their shape, which was already giving me ideas when considered alongside the form of Arcane Illusion. Being able to direct the sympathetic principle via mere superficial appearance will surely bring many and varied benefits.

It wasn’t enough to wash the bad taste left by the other Form, so much so that I gave up further delving for now. The World of Forms was not static, but I myself imposed a certain constancy upon it – or at least my small place in it – as part of being able to delve it to begin with, never mind tap it for useful concepts. I did seem to possess the ability to reshuffle this in my vicinity, but I had to sacrifice anima to do so. The very substance my soul was made of, not the mere animus of my spirit.

This was something of an emergency, but I ultimately decided that it would be better to have more to work with when the self-actualisation happened naturally, than to rashly make sacrifices that were still unnecessary.

I would settle for the third and last Form as consolation until then, which was actually the first one I Named. Talisman of the Uncommon Raven Mirage.

Technically, it was merely instructions for creating a talisman which, when activated, caused anybody nearby of weak will or low intelligence to believe that they were being harried and pecked at by a huge flock of ravens. Except those ‘instructions’ included a thorough crash course in the Grey Wind of Magic, practically teaching me Ulgu spellcasting all the way to magister tier.

I sat up and watched the sleeping form of King Bran. He was on his side with his back to me, a statement of consideration and protection in one. I studied his aura for any signs of injury or sickness. Spells too. Nothing stood out, so I turned my eyes to the rest of the hall. Up to now, I’d avoided drawing on any of the Winds unless strictly necessary, but this time I made an exception. Like a matrix woven throughout my eyes, I scanned every direction for illusions and any other tricks possible through the Grey.

No one was feigning sleep. No one carried invisible knives or poison vials, or other things concealed. Most critical and relieving of all, there were no invisible lurkers anywhere near, and no skaven.

Relieved, I wrapped myself in Ulgu so that I made no sound and registered to no eyes as I left.

I didn’t run into anyone else awake until I reached the front door.

“The King has fulfilled all his responsibilities as your host, and more.” Ofnir spoke as I stopped at the open doorway. He was sat on the threshold with his back to me, but his second sight was traveling backwards, through walls and men and the dying hearth light between, to pull Bran Lostkin out of his dream. “Will you insult him by leaving without discharging yours? Never mind like a thief in the night.”

“I was going to leave a note.” Which was the truth. “But I can see you won’t settle for that. Ruin his rest then, perhaps I can come up with something worthwhile yet.”

I hoisted myself up on the railing – the path to the longhall bordered a ravine on one side – and busied myself with one of a handful lantern pendants I always had with me, which only needed the last, tiny scripture etched into them. Ofnir watched me the whole time, eyes intent on the way my spirit imbued the small item with every scratch and clip.

“Can’t sleep on the floor?” The King’s sleepy voice preceded the rest of the man, slurred mid-way through by a yawn. “Didn’t have you pegged for a princess, but what do I know – holy shit, kid! Get down from there right now, it’s dangerous!”

“I am grateful for your hospitality, but certain matters have appeared that require my hasty departure. I hope that…“ I trailed off at noticing the thing hanging off a chain from the man’s belt.

“Yeah no,” Bran ‘interrupted’ me, because in his half-conscious state he didn’t notice I’d already stopped. “You promised one night and it’s barely been half. You’re staying here until you’ve eaten breakfast and shared at least one story. Then if you truly must be off, I’ll have one of my boys escort you wherever, at least until our borders.” It was a testament to my eons of experience that I understood all that, because the last sentence was more yawn than words. “Why the hurry anyway?”

“Problems back home, something – someone I’m responsible for.”

“Responsi- Gods, kid, you’re what, ten?”

“Thirteen.”

The big man boggled in disbelief. “But – you’re tiny!”

“I’ll have you know my growth spurt began four days ago.”

The man grunted, rubbing his face. “Because of course you can just tell.”

“That thing at your waist, is it a book or a journal?”

Bran seemed to realize, for a whole second time, that I was sitting on a railing above a ravine. He visibly wrestled with the impulse to come over and pull me back on solid ground. Somehow, he refrained and instead lifted the item I’d asked about from its clasp. The chain was new too. “Haven’t decided yet, got it from Foamebeard’s son, can’t remember which one, as the welcome gift when we got here. Why?”

Because it was a lot of paper, bound very tight and well in leather and bone. “It looks like it came a long way.”

“All the way up from Tilea, lad boasted about it a lot, he’s like a salesman even when he’s not selling anything. Don’t get any ideas, though. I don’t know how things are with your lot, but around here you gotta wait at least a full turn of the season before making gift from another gift.”

“What about adding to a gift?”

“How do you mean?”

I hesitated. The warning of the Bear God was still fresh in my ears, and I hadn’t practiced any of the Winds enough for transmutations, never mind something as complicated as I was now considering. But…

I hopped down from the railing – the man’s shoulders visibly lost tension – walked over to him, and held out a hand. “May I? Just for a few moments.”

Some healthy suspicion finally entered Bran’s eyes, but he held out the blank tome nevertheless.

I took it, drew a slow breath…

Psyker powers and Dhar are one and the same.

I twisted my animus from my soul outward until it spiraled forth as the Golden Ratio in its most perfect form. It had taken me decades during my life as a Federation psionicist – and not even the first one – to be able to manifest truly perfect sacred geometry, even though I’d been able to visualize it for millennia prior. Neither was as easy as it sounds, but completely worth it for more reasons that just leaving anathemic fire behind you, while running from warp gods in death.

Side effects don’t matter if you only leave room for the good ones.

Wild magic formed around me in a shell, through which no emanation could pass to and from either realm. And no sound. As a result, the reality-warping side effects of drawing directly on Warp matter was all concentrated inside as well. On me.

And the object I held.

I brought it close to my lips, breathed my very own anima into it, and Eununciated my most favorite Form into physical shape.

“Be Thou the Primer of the Golden Skies for the Dead.”

I felt the loss. A chunk of my anima every bit as large as the Form itself.

The blank tome morphed its covers into a lantern bas-relief, floated open above my hands, and rapidly turned its own pages as it filled with words. Written in runes. The real ones, not the perversions propitiated in this land by men unlike this one.

Very quickly, the book was full and no longer self-animated.

I let all magic fade. For better or worse, Bran had drawn back when I began to cast, and only Bjorn had stopped Ofnir from reacting rashly.

I held out the book, now full, back towards its owner.

Bran was scowling at me now, but he slowly met me half-way and took the book back as if he expected it to burn his hand.

“Instruction manual. For making more of these.” I dropped the new lantern medallion on top of the book’s cover.

“And what is this?”

“The sage will be able to tell you, and if not, the Brown One surely can.” I smiled sadly. I really wished I could stay longer. “Please convey my apologies to Jarl Aran. I know I haven’t done my full part as his guest either, but I hope he can consider my small sloop a worthy gift.”

“Boy, wait-!”

I jumped on top of the great longhall in a single bound, then leapt clear of the cliff itself to plummet to the town far below.

“What the – holy shit NO! Ofnir, catch him, do something-!”

He didn’t catch me, though he made me work for the counter-spell.

By the time I reached the ground, I had calculated that neither weightless flight, nor my fastest landbound sprint would make good enough time. On their own, that is.

Combined, then.

I sent up a stream of large, bright, shooting sparks. I listened until I heard the sounds of nigh-hysteric sigh relief reach me from up above.

Then I free-ran across walls and rooftops until I cleared the town’s walls, and proceeded straight North at the fastest jump chain my body could achieve without outright exploding from Extremis overburn, clearing entire thickets in a single bound.

Leaving by boat would be too easy to intercept, and I’d run into the raid if I did make it out of nearby waters successfully. Neither was acceptable when I needed haste.

To my complete and utter disbelief, Hrami hadn’t turned on me the moment he was free. Instead, he’d picked up where we’d left off. He had since led his coterie the Monolith of Katam as if nothing had changed, along with our many carts of lanterns and gunpowder.

He was a clever one too, my unwanted convert. Mixed together, charcoal, sulfur and saltpeter had healing properties. Leaning on that, he’d managed to persuade everyone that burying the bags of black powder all over the grounds was for a similar purpose, healing those walking the grounds or some such, nay, the very land of Norsca itself. In fact, he’d managed to do this before any other shamans and their coteries even arrived. He’d then sent everyone back home before they had company, so they wouldn’t blab and give away the plan. He hadn’t killed them, even though he was well used to doing so to preserve secrecy.

Unfortunately, his mercy was already being worked against him. While he was planting the last of the gunpowder charges around the base of the monolith – actively ignoring the entreaties of the Skull of Katam himself that lay inside – the last couple of groups he’d sent home had been waylaid by sorcerers from other clans. Their patrons had whispered no end of plots and secrets in their ears since well before then, including that Hrami of the Mammoth Rider Clan had strayed from the true ways.

They were less than a day from the Monolith now, waiting for the arrival of a few more mages of like mind before heading to confront the heretic as a group.

I probably wouldn’t get there in time to do anything.

But as sweet or bitter as the truth was to face, I had no reason besides sentiment to stay down here either, even though it was what I really, really wanted.

The Bjornlings were the best of the Norse, but they were also the only ones who didn’t need anyone to save them.

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Forms Grasped

Talisman of the Uncommon Raven Mirage 

100

AMULET OF THE RAVEN

Warhammer Fantasy: Kislev

Illusion

An ancient talisman with a powerful enchantment that, when activated, causes anybody nearby of weak will or low intelligence to believe that they are being harried and pecked at by a huge flock of ravens.

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400 cp

(refused)

Spare​

Demon:​ ​The​ ​Fallen

Control

This child was raised from to be a repository of a God by some local cult. They have found themselves in your care. They are quiet, polite, and show you nothing but complete and utter adulation and an undying loyalty. They would want nothing more than to be your host should your current one perish. It is perhaps this reason that Jump-chan allows you to take their body when you die. You can only have one Spare per jump. At the start of each jump, they start at the equivalent age of 16 and is of a non-magical race that will default to human. If your Spare is imported as a companion, you lose the ability to take over their body should you die and a new Spare will appear in your next world. If you wish, Spares that exist in other worlds can have faint memories of their previous lives in other worlds. This cycle of reincarnation and remembrance is broken if a Spare is used and a new one continues.

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Periapt Craft Manifesting Sympathy of the Shaper

300CP

Talisman Adept

Inukami

Domain: Crafting: Magical Items

 You are very skilled at using talismans. What that means is you can make them have different properties (like light or sound) and with enough time and training you can make truly devastating effects. You are much better at using talismans and can give them properties of what shape they are in. Shaped like a frog? These talismans can bounce towards their intended target.

Points Left

800 – 100 (Bran’s Book) = 700 CP