§104 Disgruntled (Patreon)

Taylor — The Void

"You aren't yourself today," said Strife. "It's been a while since we've seen you."

Taylor was taking a lot of pieces off their chessboard, throwing pawns at the god's lines to watch his defenses react, then prying open the gaps. He was playing more to hurt Strife than to win the game.

"I'm a mortal. I don't have infinite time."

"You do when you're with us. You're sulking because you're mad about the children."

"Of course I'm mad about the children. They all died from hate or neglect." One of Taylor's future pieces came due and entered the battle in Strife's rear lines. The piece wouldn't last long, but it would do some damage.

"Not all of them. A few died of perfectly natural causes."

"Aggravated by neglect, like Bilius was. He might have survived if they had taken better care of him." Taylor took over Bilius's body when he arrived in Aarden. Even in a house with servants, that child had been deeply alone. "And I don't approve of cruelty."

"Ah, but we don't need your approval, do we? We are the gods of this world."

Which was entirely correct, of course. They allowed him into their realm, gave him gifts, and let him do as he pleased. They might even like him, in their own way. But they were gods, and his soul was a tiny thing to them. If he failed to meet their purposes, then they would make the best of the situation and get someone else. They had to. And when he died, they wouldn't mourn him.

Strife cheated. If Taylor had been watching the board, as he always did during these games, he would have missed it. But today, because he was angry, he was watching Strife instead of focusing entirely on the board, and he saw the god place the extra piece out of turn. Taylor said nothing, but continued to watch the god as he savaged the ranks without regard to his own losses.

Then, Strife did it again. He placed a new piece, a minor one, to plug a critical hole. Taylor stood back from the board and summoned the greatsword he used for fighting monsters. He had taken to keeping it in his personal inventory instead of his satchel, for quicker access.

The god's eyes turned hard. "What do you think you're going to do with that?"

"Oh, I think you know." He edged the sword with force magic and brought it down two-handed onto the playing field. Strife didn't even try to stop him, but took a step back, amused. Past, present, and future layers of the game shattered under the blow, roaring like a fallen tower, the hundreds of pieces scattering into voidstuff. 

"If there are no rules, then it's not a game!" he shouted. The destruction loosed something inside of him, an anger he had kept at bay. What was the point of it when faced with gods? He was half-amazed Strife didn't strike him down on the spot.

Instead of being angry or laughing at his tantrum, Strife looked satisfied. "It's never just a game." He turned toward the void and moved away, fading out of sight as he went. "Go bother someone else for a while."

Taylor looked around. He was still in the gods' void realm. They had never left him alone there before. "Right. Because I'm the bother," he muttered to no one. Putting away his sword, Taylor began to walk. The void didn't look like anything, or smell like anything, or even sound like anything. The only sensation was the floor under his feet, and even that was conceptual.

Walking aimlessly would get him nowhere in the most literal sense of the word. So instead, he decided to visit with Nokomis, the goddess of magic. He didn't change direction or change his pace. He simply decided he was going to her, and that the distance was brief. In a dozen steps, he was in her library.

Nokomis was three times his size today, in a flowy dress the color of night, wearing a circlet of moons on her head. It was the same moon, actually, in all its phases, like she had plucked the images from the sky to mount them on her jewelry. She reclined in mid-air, her shelves of books all around her. The library didn't have walls, nor was it endless. It just faded into the void. He stood in one part of her sanctum, whatever part she occupied and decided to share with him.

"What's happened?" She wasn't loud, but her voice was large. She could topple cities at a word if she willed it.

"Nothing serious. I just chopped Strife's chessboard in half."

"Why would you do such a thing?"

"He was cheating. Got anything good to read?"

She looked up from her book, and he realized it was his book, The Alchemical Codex. "That was almost funny. I was very nearly amused."

"I'll try harder next time." He looked through the shelves and discovered he couldn't read most of the spines. Then he realized many of the objects weren't books at all. Clay tablets, strips of wood, tablets of stone, anything people could write on was here. Most were written in forgotten languages. He opened them, one after the other, and was overwhelmed with the futility of it all. All this knowledge had passed through mortal hands and was forgotten by them. Those works might exist only in the Nokomis' library, and only the gods could read them.

"Why have you published Permutations, but not Alchemy?"

"Permutations is useful today. Alchemy requires significant study to understand."

"All the more reason to begin now."

"I can't do everything at once. And besides, if I end up in a fight against the Dorian Empire, I'm going to need my advantages."

Taylor had been sitting on a question ever since his meeting with Gisela, the midwife-oracle. There would be no better time to ask. "Why did the gods need a soul from somewhere else? Why not raise someone here?"

"What makes you think we haven't tried? We are trying still, but it is more difficult than you assume. Suitable teachers are even rarer than prospective heroes. And, assuming the candidate doesn't die or become too enamored of their own strength, by the time they have gained the requisite strength, they become invested in the way the world is. Few would risk toppling the world that made them great, even to fix its foundations."

Taylor thought of Reginar the Reckless, the ancient beastkin magician who was renowned for his heroism. If anyone could fight the empire's human-centric policies about classes, he could. And yet he was a supporter of the status quo.

The goddess read his mind. "Reginar was one of our most promising. He serves us well, in his own way. His prayers are earnest, and his courage earns him Strife's favor. But he fears to break the current cycle. He likes his life the way it is. He passes his limitations onto his followers, thus doubling my disappointment in him. He will gladly kidnap a promising child to enlarge his circle, but he would never teach that child to subvert Knexenk worship."

"Who else do you have that looks promising?"

Nokomis returned to her copy of Alchemy, but glanced at him from the corner of her eyes. "A fruitless question, as you well know. You would be better served by training your own helpers instead of poaching ours."

The library fell into a watchful silence as Nokomis returned to her reading. She turned the pages without so much as a whisper, as his heart beat loud against his chest. Taylor looked at a few more book spines and found nothing but dead languages. He took the hint and walked himself out to the void. He blinked, and he was back in his own body, in the hotel, with his travel-sized statues of the gods lined up on the writing desk.

Taylor — Avimore Palace

"No." Taylor wrote in a loopy, irregular hand. It was the best he could manage with Miss Wibbles's slime appendage. "I will not teach her."

"I admit she made a poor first impression, but Princess Rebecca is very talented. Moreso than I am. She could benefit a great deal from joining our lessons." Since her conversation with Saria, Mariella spoke to Miss Wibbles exclusively in Arcaic.

Taylor gave up on the pen, fine instrument though it was, and creased letters directly into the paper with magic. "More power will not make her a better person. It will do the opposite. Nor should you apologize for her. Her actions are her own."

"You sound like Ras. Very well, Miss Wibbles, I am in your metaphorical hands. What are we learning today?"

"Non-systematized magic." 

They were in her suite, in the room she used as a study, with Eterine nearby. He worked with her for half their time together on performing a simple levitation without using a spell, and she was close to pulling it off. But she lacked the confidence necessary to finish it. He pushed until she was on the verge of frustration, and then called a short break.

"You are closer than you know," he wrote, "but let's try something else." When they were finished with Eterine's excellent tea, Taylor showed her how to take a spell to the edge of completion and then, instead of releasing the formed mana, activate it several times in a row.

Mariella learned the technique after several minutes of practice. And why shouldn't she, when the necessary skills were already hers? He made her light several silver dori in a row, levitate five rocks in quick succession, and set fire to each of the pages he had written on. The battlemages called it O.I.R.A: One Incantation, Repeat Activations. It was an advanced skill, but Taylor thought of it as intermediate at best. It was handy whenever he needed to use the same magic several times in a row.

The effort left Mariella sweating in her silks, enough that Eterine started to fan her with an oversized paper fan so beautifully painted that it should have been hanging in a museum instead of cooling overheated princesses.

Taylor popped a small mana crystal from his inventory. He had put it there before he was summoned, just in case she needed a boost. It was considerably smaller than he remembered, several carats instead of several ounces. He also spat out a small permutation circle designed for her specifically, to help her recharge: it turned mixed crystal energy into life mana. 

"Use it," he wrote. "One more exercise."

"Where did you get that?" At first, Taylor thought she meant the circle, but she was eyeing the crystal.

"It's not stolen."

"Mana crystals belong to the emperor, no matter where they are found."

"Does your father claim the spirit realm now? If so, I shall inform the Greats. They will find it most amusing." Not only did his letters crease: they seared the paper. He didn't get the crystal from Twilight, but from areas of the empire that the emperor didn't truly hold, so he was technically deceiving her. But the principle was the same: he didn't think Mariella's dad should be laying claim to places he didn't have the power to reach, much less hold.

His contempt must have found its way across their link because she gasped and set fire to the paper immediately, before even Eterine had a chance to read it. In spite of her complaints, Mariella used the circle to restore her mana until the crystal was spent. 

"Perform the spell-less levitation now. Release the formed magic exactly the same as in OIRA."

To Mariella's surprise, but not to Taylor's, she levitated her teacup without using a spell. At first, she stared at the cup, hovering in the air, slowly tipping over and threatening to spill its dregs on the rug. Then she shot to her feet, raised her fists, and cheered! "Yes!" she shouted at the room. "Who needs spells?! Not this princess!" She wooted repeatedly, while Taylor wobbled in time and shot tiny, colorful fireworks into the air.

When Mariella was done celebrating, she collapsed into her chair and retrieved her upside-down teacup from its airy perch, never minding the mess it made on the tablecloth. Eterine refilled it and started fanning her again. She was even more sweaty than before.

"I didn't believe it when the envoy said it was possible."

Etiene poured more tea for both of them and went back to fanning. Taylor had to admit the breeze felt nice, but he would have used a magic device instead of a person to do the job. He extended one pseudopod into the cup and drank it dry, dregs and all.

Enough, he sent across their bond. Home.

"You must be tired, too. Thank you, Miss Wibbles. You're an amazing teacher."

He wrote one last message before disbanding himself.

"Today was your first step toward mastery. Practice."

Princess Mariella — Avimore Palace

"Eterine, does Miss Wibbles seem different to you?"

"I doubt that she has changed in such a short time."

Mariella could make Eterine sit at the table with her, but only when they were alone. Even then, when she was acting "informal", Eterine never relaxed.

"True. We gave her a voice and invited her to use it, and now she seems a different person. She's less adorable, now that she can make demands and disparage the emperor. I nearly regret giving her a pen. And she does not think highly of my sister."

"Whatever Princess Rebecca's virtues may be, she earned the assessment she received. Miss Wibbles will only change her mind if Her Fiery Highness demonstrates better behavior in her presence."

"You don't believe Wibbles can be convinced to take my word for her good character?"

"You are Princess Rebecca's sister, and therefore biased in her favor. Miss Wibbles knows this. She is, as we have learned, intelligent."

"I miss thinking of her as something cute and marvelous. Now, she's more like one of my tutors. No," she corrected herself, "she's like one of the elderly ones."

"Would you rather have the adorable slime, or the magic tutor who can teach the impossible?"

Mariella sighed. "Can't I have both?"