Episode 53 - The Death Twins, Part 2

Speaker 0 00:00:00 Hey Al Hey Barry, Speaker 1 00:00:03 Why are there not very many vampire philosophers? Speaker 0 00:00:07 Why Speaker 1 00:00:09 They have a lot of issues with self-reflection it's time for compelled dual Speaker 1 00:00:29 Hello everybody. And welcome back to compelled dual I'm Barry Speaker 0 00:00:32 And I am Speaker 1 00:00:33 Al and we are usually a single player, Cody, M to D and D 5g actual play podcast. But we told you last week, things are going to be getting a little freaky around here. 40,000 years later. Speaker 0 00:00:50 Darella you find yourself on the beach again, the sand is soft and gritty under your feet. The water is rushing in and out. Never quite touching your feet, but lapping toward you. Like it's trying to draw you closer in and the lady with the cloak is there again, Barry, please describe your character. Speaker 1 00:01:21 Sure thing. Uh, Darella Val sign is a young Salleian elf girl. She's about 35 years old. So the equivalent of about seven, she has long dark hair and curling black horns, silver eyes that are all IRS. They don't have whites with slit pupils, sharp, pointy canines, kind of silvery gray skin, and in various places on her body, but most noticeably around her eyes and up across her forehead, she has patches of silver scales and she is just standing on this beach, the wind whipping her hair across her face and her nightgown around her legs. Staring up at this figure in the cloak, Speaker 0 00:02:11 This tall figure in the glimmering fine storm cloud cloak leans down and reaches a hand to push some of your hair out of your face and says, Speaker 3 00:02:28 Hello, Darla. It's good to see you again. Speaker 1 00:02:35 Hi Kiva. What is it this time? Are we going to have another earthquake Speaker 0 00:02:40 You see under the shadows of their hood, the strike and flash of one of Kivas lightning bolt smiles. And then she says, Speaker 3 00:02:52 I'm not here for the village type darling. I'm here for you. Speaker 1 00:02:59 That's scary. Darella has been hanging out with Kiva for several years at this point though. So she's not actually that frightened. She just kind of shrugs and sits down on a big piece of driftwood. Okay. Speaker 0 00:03:16 Kiva sits next to her on the same piece of driftwood, kind of mirroring her posture would flux very funny because she is eight and a half feet tall. Speaker 3 00:03:27 What have they told you about your history? About the landing Speaker 1 00:03:36 Darella frowns at her for a second, but then looks up at the sky. Uh, they talk about it in church. Sometimes they say a long, long, long, long, long time ago that lived up there and she points up at the moon and that the world was going to end and really bad stuff was going to happen. So you and Kimra took your priests and brought them down here to a leery because your death gods and you are shielding them from death. Speaker 3 00:04:10 The truth is a little more complicated than that. Speaker 1 00:04:18 Oh, Kay. So what's the truth. Speaker 0 00:04:22 Kiva adjusts. The folds of her cloak. Speaker 3 00:04:28 Well, just before the landing, something very bad happened to Kimberly and I, and we made a little mistake trying to fix it. And because of that mistake, the two of us had to leave Slayer along with our most loyal and most trusted followers. Speaker 1 00:05:00 Oh, so you didn't save everybody. You got kicked out Speaker 0 00:05:07 Kiva winces Speaker 3 00:05:10 You could put it that way. Speaker 1 00:05:15 So why the story with the world ending and you saving everybody? Why not just tell the truth? Speaker 3 00:05:24 Well, frankly sweeter and the truth would have had a PR nightmare. Speaker 1 00:05:29 What's PR Speaker 3 00:05:33 It stands for public relations. It doesn't matter. The point Darella is that we think we figured out a way to fix everything Speaker 0 00:05:45 And she reaches out one hand and just cups the side of journalists, cheat the tips of her talent, like nails just barely scratching into the underside of her chin. And we think that you can help us. And Darella you wake up with seawater, filling your mouth. You are standing chin deep in the ocean, just a little bit down the beach, where it slopes down into the ocean from the island that your family lives on looks to Gotland, Speaker 1 00:06:32 Uh, Lander. It is pitch black, dark where you are. You can't see a thing. You couldn't see your own hand in front of your face if you want it to. So with that sense, not available to you, you start trying to branch out and see what else you can perceive. There's something solid under your hands and knees where you are crouched, but it also feels wet. But then out of the darkness behind you, you see a light that briefly flashes rotates off to the side and disappears a few seconds pass, and it happens again and again, this very familiar circling pattern of light. You turn to look at it and it passes across your face before leaving you in darkness. Again, Al please describe your character. Speaker 0 00:07:33 Uh, Lander Val sign is also what has become known as the Salleian elf. He is also 35 years old. He has this messy shaggy shock of snow white hair. Usually his mother keeps it a little shorter than it is right now. It's fallen into his eyes. He has sort of jagged also snowy white horns, going back from his forehead and a very similar pattern of silvery scales on his forehead and around his eyes to his sister. But his eyes are big and bright blue with the slit pupils. Speaker 1 00:08:16 You are looking around trying to find the source of this flash of light. When directly behind you, you hear this bone dry raspy voice that says, Hey kid, Speaker 0 00:08:33 Uh, Lander for reasons of his twin is blunder that a baseball bat has gotten very good at being very charming to authority figures. So he turns back around, puts both hands behind his back and kinda bounces on the balls of his feet. Looking as much like a little cartoon boy, who's about to put a finger to his dimple and go who me as he possibly can. And he says, hi Lord cameral. What can I do for you? Speaker 1 00:09:07 This rhythmic beam of light that is cycling through the darkness keeps up. And as you turn, you see this massive eight feet and some change, tall skeletal figure, silver tipped, fangs, long spiraling horns coming back from his head twin spots of bright purple light in the empty shadows of his eye sockets. He tilts his head to the side as if he is considering your question and then replies Speaker 3 00:09:40 Quite a lot. Actually it's a long story to make it as short as possible. Uh, you ever mess up just so bad, like really bad. Speaker 0 00:09:55 Um, one time Dora threw a cabbage at brother hall, dear, and she ran, but I thought it was better to hide and he caught me. So yeah. Speaker 3 00:10:09 Uh, yeah, the thing I'm talking about when exactly like that, Speaker 0 00:10:15 That sucks. You're big. How can they make you sweep up the whole church Speaker 3 00:10:21 Sun? When I tell you that I have been sweeping the proverbial church for the last 40,000 years. Anyway, the point is Atlanta that sometimes we mess up really bad. And when we find an opportunity to fix it, we would do almost anything to do so. Right. Speaker 0 00:10:42 I guess, yeah. Speaker 3 00:10:45 I messed up really bad a long time ago and I think I can fix it, but I need your help. Speaker 0 00:10:57 Okay. Um, w what do I have to do Speaker 3 00:11:03 For now? Just accept a gift, use it to get stronger with it. And then one day in the future, I'll ask you to use it, to help me out, but it's important for you to know that you can say, no, you have a choice. You always have a choice. Remember that Speaker 1 00:11:33 You feel a very large skeletal hand, come down on top of your head, the bones, ruffling your hair a little bit and no. Uh, and in time with that touch, you feel this cold creeping feeling, go down your spine out across your shoulders and down your arms, through the tips of your fingers. And before you can ask what that was, that rhythmic light flashes again, and you wake up, Speaker 1 00:12:09 You jolt out of your trance to bitter cold and damp air blowing in your face. You are standing on the very narrow strip of balcony that is around the lantern room at the top of this light house that your family has been responsible for taking care of for untold years. You can kind of tell where that flash and your dream was coming from now, because the light inside is still turning around and around and around illuminating the gray stormy sea off the coast of this island. Trans walking has always been a problem with you. You have heard your mother talk about it pretty much since you can remember. So this isn't a horribly uncommon occurrence, especially with these prophetic dreams that you get. But what is uncommon is that as you're standing leaning against this railing, you see something coming up the beach two small humanoid figures, one cast into sharp shadow. As this light behind you keeps rotating and the other one glowing like a beacon through the night, they are moving their way. Looking like they're struggling a little bit over the wet sand up towards the front door of the lighthouse. Speaker 0 00:13:35 A lender is going to go back inside. And as soon as he thinks he's within earshot of his parents, he's yelling, mom had happened. Speaker 1 00:13:45 Then you're headed down this spiral staircase that passes the door to your parents' room. And your mother comes rocketing out into the hallway. She is a middle-aged Solei and woman. She looks very similar to you. White hair, white horns, blue eyes, and she looks panicked. The wards didn't go off. Is she still in the house? Speaker 0 00:14:10 I don't know. I don't think so. Speaker 1 00:14:13 How I kicked the door before bed? Did she come out the window? What's from further back in your parent's room, you hear your father mumbling. Something is still half in his trance and your mom just totally ignores him, throws on a dressing gown and goes charging down the stairs past you. Speaker 0 00:14:32 Okay? Andrew's going with her. Speaker 1 00:14:35 The two of you head quickly down the rest of the spiral staircase into the grand open foyer. That takes up the entire bottom of this light house. By the time you make it down because you're little, you've got short legs. Your mother is already open the big, heavy double doors and standing outside on the threshold. Are your twin sister or Ella soaked to the bone waterlogged nightgown clinging around her legs, hair plastered down to her face. And your very good mutual friend Loray Lorraine is weird to look at. And you have this paradigm as somebody who is a little weird to look at yourself due to the nature of a lot of recessive genes. There are not a lot of people in the land of Australia that look in anymore in the tens of thousands of years, since the landing, most of the people, you know, have no horns. They still have the slit pupils like you do, but their eyes have whites to them. They have kind of the same pointy canines, not as pointy. Very few people have scales. And as a rule, people tend to have cool bluish undertones to their skin. Speaker 1 00:16:05 There are not a lot of people that look like you, but there are also not a lot of people that look like Luray. She is something that you have heard referred to as a night elf, who are said to be the people that were living in Australia around the time of the landing. She is a very slight slender little girl about your age. She has long, very straight bone white hair eyes that are solid black, no pupils, no whites, just ink black, these big bat, like ears that you notice twitching and moving around of their own accord. As she's listening to her surroundings. And she glows a lot of what would be considered Australian elves, quote unquote. Now have a subtle bioluminescence to them. They glow softly in the dark Luray puts off bright light in a five foot radius. You can see her glowing, even under midday sun, although you don't see her in the daylight very often. She is nocturnal. When you're standing this close to her, you can actually see the beautiful spider web of blue veins under her very pale skin pulsing and lighting her up from the inside. Speaker 0 00:17:31 So true. Although it must be said that this perception for a Lander is a little bit colored by the fact that he's decided he's in love with her. Speaker 1 00:17:41 Good for him. Luray also moves in a way that is very different from the way that you are capable of moving. She has something going on with her joints. You're not sure anatomically what it is cause you're a kid, but she can get her up a tree backwards. You've seen her do it. And that is evident in the motion of her ushering your sister forward over the doorstep. She looks up at your mom and grins, this big smile full of sharp, sharp teeth. Hi lady, Val sign. I found Dora in a rip tide. So good thing. I was taking a walk. She's a little damp, but she'll be okay. I think, uh, I know it's very late for all of you. Do you want me to go home? Speaker 0 00:18:31 Uh, Lander from behind his mom says no. And then pauses and stands very stiffly for a moment and then says that would be rude, right? Mom, we should give her a snack. Speaker 1 00:18:49 Your mother blinks slowly. You can tell she is still not fully awake yet. I of course, Lorraine, you know where the kitchen is, El honey, if you could just go help her with that, I need to go get Dora dried off. Come on, sweetie. And she spirits your sister away up the stairs and you are left standing in this big, open foyer with Luray, Speaker 0 00:19:14 Uh, Lander brushes, both sweaty palms off on his pajamas. Um, Speaker 1 00:19:25 You know, if YouTube are going to grow up and take care of the lighthouse one day, it might be a good thing for both of you to learn, to swim better. I did have to pull Dora out of that Riptide kicking and screaming. Does your mom still make those hand pies that I had last time I was over? Speaker 0 00:19:40 Yeah. Yeah, she does. Uh, actually we made, um, a batch of cherry ones yesterday. Speaker 1 00:19:46 Cool. She walks right by you. She knows the way to the kitchen. Speaker 0 00:19:50 Uh, Lander stairs down at the floor for a long moment in the despair of a young boy who knows. He just made himself look like an idiot in front of the prettiest girl in the world, and then follows her. Speaker 1 00:20:05 You walk into the kitchen and Luray is in the process of skittering up onto a counter and sitting down very primly. You can't actually see much in the kitchen because the Lorraine has not bothered to turn on the lights. You know, that she can see in the dark and her eyes. Cat-like are just reflecting out of the darkness at you. As you hear her Trump down on a hand pie, Rochelle, Durrell, Roy out of it. When I pulled her out of the water, I think, I think it's happening again. Do you think she had one of the dreams, Speaker 0 00:20:43 Uh, Lander, as he's turning on the lights puts one finger to his mouth and goes, you're not supposed to know about that. Remember, you'll get me in trouble. Speaker 1 00:20:54 You go to light one of the lamps sitting on your kitchen table and Lorraine flinches back from it with a and then squints at you. Very hard. Like she's trying to block out a lot of the light. Speaker 0 00:21:08 Sorry. I can't see. Speaker 1 00:21:11 It's fine. You just got to warn a girl anyway. I'm sorry. I brought up the, the thing. Why is your mom so weird about that? Anyway, Speaker 0 00:21:22 She always says nothing good happens to profits. My uncle used to be able to see the future Speaker 1 00:21:30 Luray, shrugs and reaches down to grab another hand pie off this plate fully, literally unhinges her jaw and just pops the whole thing in their hole and choose for a few more seconds. Well, yeah, that makes sense. You remember a couple of years back when Dora insisted that we all go take cover and we didn't really know why, but then that huge hurricane hit. Speaker 0 00:21:54 Yeah, I remember. Speaker 1 00:21:57 And I mean, no one can beat you at cards. Bluffing just doesn't work. Speaker 0 00:22:02 It's not just cards. It's he looks down at his hands and kind of brings them together for a second. I can just kinda tell when people aren't telling me the truth, which is good. I mean, people should tell the truth about stuff, but, um, anyway, uh, my uncle was a priest and my mom says he got sick. Like not, um, and he kind of gestured to themself, not, not body sick, like, and he kind of put the hand on his chest, like in here, sick. And that's why we can't tell anybody about the dreams. Speaker 1 00:22:49 She hops down off the counter and presses her hand over yours where you're holding it to your chest. You know, I'm not going to rat you out. Right. Speaker 0 00:23:01 I know. Mostly. Speaker 1 00:23:06 Am I lying? Speaker 0 00:23:09 No. Speaker 1 00:23:11 Yeah, exactly. Look, I got to get home. If I miss lunch, my mom is going to lose her mind. Go check on Dora. We'll talk about this some other time. Okay. Speaker 0 00:23:24 Okay. Um, and he kind of moves the hand. That's not on his chest to cover hers. Thanks for bringing Dora home and not writing now. Speaker 1 00:23:42 I mean, of course I saved her and of course I'm not going to rat you out. Don't be weird. Speaker 0 00:23:51 Yeah. Right. Um, and he's going to dart forward and give her a little kiss on the cheek Speaker 1 00:23:58 With how close you are to her. You can see the capillaries in her cheeks go bright luminescent blue as the blood rushes to her face. And she blushes. Yeah. All right. I'm going to go by out. Speaker 0 00:24:16 Yeah. Bye. Bye. He's going to rush past her up the stairs. He's going, he's out. Speaker 1 00:24:25 You head up the stairs past your mother who is on her way back into her bedroom, onto the floor above where you and your sister stay. Darella his door is open and you hear kind of heavy, anxious breathing coming from inside. Speaker 0 00:24:48 Uh, Lander is going to stop kind of shifting his weight on his feet. And then he's going to go in Speaker 1 00:24:59 Your sister much drier than the last time you saw her is curled up in one corner of her bed. Fresh night gown on hair, braided down her back with her head in her hands, just hyperventilating. Speaker 0 00:25:15 Uh, Lander's going to scramble up next to her and just try to get one of her hands in his own. Speaker 1 00:25:23 She squeezes your hand back super hard. Did you have a dream to, Speaker 0 00:25:31 Yeah. I woke up in front of the light again. Speaker 1 00:25:37 Yeah. And I've woken up on the beach before, but not in the water like that. I think, I think something's coming. I think they want something. Speaker 0 00:25:49 Yeah. And then he squeezes her hand a little harder Speaker 1 00:25:56 As you do that. Something strange and unprecedented happens. You and your sister have never demonstrated any kind of magical ability before your mother does magic, but it is more along the lines of druidic magic. She works a lot with the energies of nature and the energies of the tides and the sea surrounding the island. But as you squeeze your sister's hand, there is a rumbling under you across the floor and an odd glow that comes out around your joined hands. Mechanically. This is a thermometer G spell. And to mechanically, you are now both clerics, Speaker 0 00:26:51 Uh, Lander, let's go have a sister's hand instantly. What was that? Speaker 1 00:26:58 Your mother had very obviously dried Darella off before you came in here. But after you yank your hand away and you look back up at her, you see that there is water dripping off the ends of her hair and soaking in big droplets through the thin fabric of her nightgown outside, there is a deep roll of thunder that rattles the pains of her window. And she clutches her hands together in her lap and says, I don't know, but I think we're going to find out Speaker 0 00:27:50 Darella cold wind blows off sea off the coast of Maine Manchester area. The slightly younger of your twin daughters, Anya is clinging to your leg and swaying against the wind. The slightly older of the twins. Uh, Laura has been trying to run off through the crowd for the last 20 minutes. And it is about to make your head explode. If kid leashes existed in a Sheria at this era, you would have one Barry, please describe your character. Speaker 1 00:28:33 Darella obviously is quite a bit older than the last time we saw her. She's in the equivalent of about her mid twenties. She's got her hair braided back around her horns and then pulled into a low ponytail and is wearing a set of priests robes that have the symbol of Kiva on the front and sort of turning her spell casting focus, which is this orb of stormy magic back and forth between her hands. She gets a Laura by the back of her robes, as she tries to run off again, yanks her back. Both of the twins look a lot like her. They have the same dark hair and the same curling horns. Their dad was another sullen elf dude that Darella is not with anymore. She sighs deeply and looks around at her surroundings. Speaker 0 00:29:26 The dock for the ferry boat leading to looks to gallon is not ever super crowded, but you recognize a good few of them and assume that they're all people that are headed back for funeral as well. The ones you don't recognize you assume are here for you and you are studiously trying to ignore them. I would assume. Speaker 1 00:29:50 Yeah. Anyone who would try to harass her for a miracle on the day of her mother's funeral is getting ignored at first and then struck by lightning if they don't back off. So she is not engaging with that group of people at all. Speaker 0 00:30:03 The ferry is pulling away from the dock behind you. There are murmurings in the crowd from some people and others are starting to move up the road from the docks toward the village, as the crowd parts in front of you. With one hand, fist it in the back of a Laura's robes and the other resting on top of Anya's head. You see your brother done the dock. A Lander obviously has also gotten a bit older. He has his hair kind of loose around his shoulders. He looks like what rest he has gotten over the last couple of days has been pretty hard. One. He is also in dark formal priestly robes with the jagged knife symbol of camera on a medallion around his neck. And he raises one hand and a little wave. Uh, Laura breaks out of your grip instantly just darts forward yelling uncle Al and Lander. No question drops to his knees to grab her Speaker 1 00:31:10 Darella is also going to walk over and give him a big hug. Hey, sorry. It took so long. We got sidetracked in illness. I had to help out with the drought situation. Speaker 0 00:31:22 He hugs you back super tight and then gives you a strain smile and says, yeah, I figured it was something like that. Uh, things have been bad up north as well. Speaker 1 00:31:35 And apparently they're moving further south. She looks down at both of the girls and kind of winces. She doesn't want to talk about this right now, but we can have that conversation in a little bit. Girls, do you want to go play with your cousin? Speaker 0 00:31:50 The girls both yell. Enthusiastically Allura starts taking off down the street and a Lander reaches out and gets her by the shoulder, easy their alley. You want to piggyback ride and he scoops her up grown femurs and finger joints. You're getting heavy. Speaker 1 00:32:11 Yeah, Darella knows the way she's gonna grab Anya by the hand and start walking up towards the lighthouse. Speaker 0 00:32:19 You make your way up through the village and to the grand lighthouse that dominates the skyline of the island looks to go on in the sitting room area. At the base of the lighthouse, there are more than a few people gathered. Uh, Sherry and funeral practices are a bit rambunctious, a bit rowdy by which I mean, there are about four dozen people in your house. Darella and all, but maybe six of them are drunk. Speaker 1 00:32:58 And there's about to be one more drunk person. She's going to grab the nearest glass of wine. She can, Speaker 0 00:33:04 You grab a glass of wine down it as you lower it back onto a table. You hear out of the crowd on Speaker 1 00:33:15 She's going to turn around, ready for a scoop and hug. Speaker 0 00:33:18 You turn ready to scoop. And your niece Oriana, who's a little bit older than your two daughters, but not much like the human equivalent of about five in a formal outfit for this funeral, with their hair and a little pig tails sprints out of the crowd and just runs up to you. She takes a lot after Lorraine and that she is very pale, almost bluish. She is not quite as luminescent in the light of this funeral. You can't really see any glow coming off of her. And she is inherited a Landers slip, pupils and fangs, but otherwise she looks very much like her mother, who coincidentally is sliding out of the crowd behind her, her long graceful, quadruple knuckled hands wrapped around a coffee cup, squinting in the light, her ears moving rapidly as she makes little chittering sound out of the corner of her mouth because of how photo sensitive Luray and all night elves are. She can't really see what's going on. It's too bright in here. So she is trying to echolocate her way through this party without bumping into any drunk people. Speaker 1 00:34:43 Darella is going to give her niece one last squeeze before putting her down and moving over to Luray, Hey, Lorraine, on your left. And then she's going to give her a big hug as well. Speaker 0 00:34:55 Luray gives you a tight hug and right next to your ear says, oh, thank goodness you're here. That means the Lander's back, which means I don't have to manage this. Speaker 1 00:35:05 You uh, actually might need to hold down the Fort for another minute, if that's okay. I need to go have a talk with my brother about the state of affairs, Speaker 0 00:35:16 Luray slumps in this hug. Oh, joy. Speaker 1 00:35:22 I promise that we'll be back to work the crowd as quickly as we can. Um, girls, you all go play, be good. Don't break anything. And then she squeezes Luray shoulders. One more time. You are a gem. I owe you so big. And then she's going to grab a Lander by the back of his robes and haul him up the big spiral staircase or on the outside of the light house, up to, uh, the lantern room. Cause it will be the most private place to have this conversation. Speaker 0 00:35:52 You catch a Lander actually in the middle of someone asking him for a miracle. Uh, so as you come over and grab for his arm, he gives you a look and then says, sir, I am so sorry. It seems my sister requires my assistance. Uh, we will finish this conversation later. Speaker 1 00:36:12 I was not kidding about not fucking around with people asking us for miracles at this funeral. As they walk away, she summons a rain cloud over this dude's head. Speaker 0 00:36:21 Okay. You walk away. Uh, there is a soft of thunder from this very tiny rain cloud that you have summoned as you leave the room, a Lander snorts under his breath and then leans over to you and says, don't you think that was a little excessive? Speaker 1 00:36:41 No, if anything, I think it was a bit of a muted response. We're supposed to be the ones that are miracle workers, but I think the real miracle is how all of these people manage to find the audacity. Speaker 0 00:36:55 Normally I would argue with you, but it's been a rough week and you to head up to the ladder. No, Speaker 1 00:37:03 As soon as they're up there alone and the door closes behind him, Dora is going to pull him into a big hug and just hold onto him for a really long time. I'm sorry. You had to be here alone at the end. I know it wasn't easy. Speaker 0 00:37:19 Uh, lender, hunter PACS super tight. No, no it wasn't. Thank you for acknowledging that. And then he's gonna kind of slip out of the hug. Speaker 1 00:37:32 Did she, was it peaceful? At least Speaker 0 00:37:37 The lender sexist teeth goes to lean against the railing. Dora, I'd love to lie to you. But I have said that it was for a lot of people this week and honestly, no, it hasn't been possible for anyone. Speaker 1 00:37:59 That's what I was afraid of. I haven't seen much with my own two eyes, but the last thing I heard from any of my colleagues up north things are getting really bad in OMA, Groth, Speaker 0 00:38:11 Dora, there is no more on McGrath. Speaker 1 00:38:15 She had started to pace, but stops and slowly turns to look at him. What do you mean? There's no more, oh, McGrath. It's one of the biggest city states in Australia. There's something like 75,000 people living there. Speaker 0 00:38:30 Well now there are zero people living there. We got out everyone that wasn't exposed and everyone that was, we managed to lock down things spread quickly. And of course, once the infection reached a sector, the only people that had a chance of surviving were the night hours. And of course that was enough to fuel all kind of backward, awful sentiment in a bunch of scared sick people. That was fantastic to have my wife there through I, and he reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose, rubs at his forehead. It's the same as it has been everywhere else, headaches, bruising, bleeding, trouble breathing the, and he makes kind of a gesture with his arms. The heaviness inside. It's the exact same everywhere. I haven't figured out anything. I've tried every spill that I have at my fingertips. I've tried every bit of magic that I can summon up. I have had people that have talents other than my own, try it, nothing works. And I am taking every precaution that I can. I am doing everything. And I am just, I don't know how long even that'll hold out. His eyes cut sideways down toward where the funeral is still going on. And he bites down hard on his lower lip. Speaker 0 00:40:12 I'm nearing the end of my rope here. If you couldn't tell, Speaker 1 00:40:17 And if it's as bad as you say, if it's moved this far south, Darella also looks down towards where the funeral is still being held. I mean, mother was getting on in years, but she was healthy and it took what less than a week, Speaker 0 00:40:37 Five days and seven hours. Speaker 1 00:40:42 Do you think that we should have risked having a get together like this Lux two gallon is isolated. If this gets loose in the village, Speaker 0 00:40:50 Uh, Lander drops his head into his hands. We took every possible precaution while she was sick. And father insisted said her memory deserved the attention. I'm inclined to agree. And I wasn't going to say no to a man that just lost his wife. I, I couldn't. Speaker 1 00:41:16 No, I understand. Listen, hell. You've had a lot on your plate these last few years and father's no spring chicken. He's not going to be able to run this place on his own. Have you thought about maybe just taking Luray and Oriana and staying here for a bit? Speaker 0 00:41:35 Yeah. Yeah. I've thought about it already hates the mainland anyway. And it's not like I'm much good to anybody in all of this. Speaker 1 00:41:48 Darryl is going to reach out and grab his hand. Maybe it's time to let me shoulder the weight a little bit. See what I can do. There's gotta be something that can be done to stop this. I just, I know it. Speaker 0 00:42:01 You squeeze your hand back super hard and says, have you been having the dreams again to Speaker 1 00:42:10 Yeah. Every night for a while now, um, woke up in a river last week. Had to explain that to Anya two in the morning, I'm planning on locking my door from the inside tonight. Speaker 0 00:42:22 Good call. Nothing good ever happens, profits. Speaker 1 00:42:28 She was right. Yeah, she was. And that's one of many reasons she deserves a proper sendoff. We'll finish catching up later. Let's get back downstairs. I want to get absolutely shit faced. Speaker 0 00:42:47 Uh, great and Outlander without saying anything else. Just hose her down the stairs. You are both down among this funeral crowd for a while. Engaging in the typical practices of Assurion funerals, telling stories, making a lot of jokes, dancing, laughing, drinking more than a little, this funeral wine's on through the afternoon, through the evening, into the night. By the time you look up from the bottom of your glass, you see everybody has kind of slowed down for the nights over on a couch. Luray is like taking micro naps as your twins and Ariana are all curled up and like a puppy pile on the couch next to her, dead to the world have absolutely no rousing. These little shits. Speaker 1 00:43:46 I think Darella has been talking and drinking with her father and just gives him a quick squeeze on the shoulder and then goes over to pet the twins hair down while they're asleep. Speaker 0 00:43:58 Neither of them stirs at all. As you've had their hair down, they are trancing peacefully, curled up together with the cousin Speaker 1 00:44:07 She's, um, hammered and kind of a weepy drunk. So she looks over at Luray, tearing up and goes, oh, we made these they're so cute. Speaker 0 00:44:19 Luray gives her kind of a pitying Fonda look and just reaches out and pats her Oso gently on the face. I sure did. Speaker 1 00:44:32 You should get them in bed, but they're so cute. And I don't know if I can get them in bed. Will you help me get them in bed? Speaker 0 00:44:40 Luray raises her eyebrows at you and says, Darella, I'm going to take my trans right on this couch. And you're too drunk to be carrying any children. Speaker 1 00:44:53 Yeah. She's going to stumble off to find a Lander, pull him away from whatever conversation or activity he is engaged in plant one hand on either of his shoulders and very seriously slur. Do you ever think we're screwing up our kids, Speaker 0 00:45:11 Uh, Lander slams a shot or rum puts it down. Looks over at you, shakes his head does another one. Nope. I'm not unpacking this with you right now. As a Lander reaches over to kind of shove you into a seat next to him. The front door slams open and in walks. What seems to be a kind of copper toned Solei and elf big copper eyes, copper skin, little patches of copper scales over the cheekbones, the chin down on the hands, curly copper hair pulled back. They are holding something in a sheath in one hand and a big bundle of fabric. And the other, you watch their eyes lock onto you in a Lander and with a sinuous kind of grace, reminiscent of a wild cat. They ooze through the crowd at you, but one elbow down on the table in front of you and a Lander and then say, well, Hattie, I come bearing gifts Speaker 1 00:46:33 Darella is pretty plastered, but not plastered enough to completely forget her social graces. She sits up and kind of swipes both hands under her eyes really quick. It's really nice of you. I'm sorry. Who are you? Speaker 0 00:46:52 They give you this sharp mischievous Gran dominium sign this sweetheart Emissary to the gods, and then they hold this bundle fabric out to you and slide the thing in the sheath across the table to a Lander. As I said, I come with gifts. Speaker 1 00:47:17 Uh, she's going to take this bundle of fabric and look at it. Speaker 0 00:47:22 You see a long flowing, stormy cloak, the fabric ripples and changes, colors like a thunder storm moving across the sky. It has this scale male sort of chest and shoulder piece that it's laced into. And as you gather it into your hands, it almost crackles with saddle electricity across the table from you a Lander unsafes, whatever his gift is to reveal a long wickedly Jagen organic looking knife. Speaker 1 00:48:10 Darrelle is going to put the Cape on Speaker 0 00:48:13 You, pull on the shoulder piece, clasp it in front of you and feel this fabric drape over you. It feels intensely magical across the table. A Lander checks the balance on his new knife looks up at your visitor and says, Hey, nice to meet you. Speaker 1 00:48:41 Trello's weepy. Drunkenness is setting in again. She pulls the Cape around her like a blanket and just holds it to her chest and bites back a sob. Speaker 5 00:48:52 This is so pretty. It's so nice. Nobody ever gets me presents. And I've been going through a lot. I mean, my mom, Speaker 1 00:48:59 She just died and she waves around at the funeral, the dying party, the skull on an alter at one end of the room. Speaker 5 00:49:09 Obviously Speaker 0 00:49:12 You're a visitor with the copper eyes, nods sighs and says, and they're both plastered whale to not, should be interesting. I love my job. Speaker 1 00:49:34 Uh, Lander, you have a weird next few days, the entire tail end of your mother's funeral is mostly taken up by do menial Saunders who after a couple hours of conversation and several drinks asks you to call them Mia, talking to you and your sister about the divine gifts that you have both just been bequeathed. Apparently things in the realm of the gods are stirring. And that deal you made so long ago is about to come. Do you keep having the dreams? They are a morphous and hard to interpret Kim roles there a few times, but he doesn't say much really only shows up in flashes. You keep waking up in the lantern room, your sister, as she said, she would start locking herself in her room at night. So there are no rescue missions down to the beach to fish her out of the ocean, but she does stay behind on the island for a bit to help you transition into helping your father out with the lighthouse, taking on a bit of the duty that your mother left behind. Speaker 1 00:50:52 When she passed, you don't see or hear from Mia. Again, they kind of just disappear after your mother's funeral, but you spend a while getting acquainted with this knife that you've been given. It has a long blade that appears to be made of some kind of bone wickedly. Sharp could cut paper with the slightest press. You figure out that you can channel magic through it and your magic when it comes out of it does seem to be a bit stronger than it usually is. Our camera zooms. In a few days after this funeral on you, your sister and your wife standing on the black sand beach of Luxal, Gollin watching the three little girls playing in the surf, running back and forth. Drella has her new Cape wrapped tightly around her shoulders and is rubbing at the hems of it between her fingers and Luray with a big parasol propped up over her head, squinting against the sunlight, kind of frowns out at the horizon. So I've been thinking about the schedule now that we're home. Dear you take over the child-rearing and all watch the lighthouse at night. So I don't have to deal with this all the time. Speaker 0 00:52:12 That seems like a reasonable division of labor, and he's gonna lean over and give her a kiss on the cheek. Speaker 1 00:52:21 She makes a weird chittering purring noise and kind of nuzzles into you, but then she takes a step back and looks up towards the lighthouse. All right. Well, we can say that it's starting now. If you two are on baby patrol, I'm gonna go check on your father. He keeps forgetting to eat, Speaker 0 00:52:40 Uh, Lander winces. Yeah. I've noticed that I'll I'll try to get him involved in cooking. Maybe that'll make it stick. I don't know. Speaker 1 00:52:54 Lorraine puts on this big fake smile per cerated teeth. Glinting in the Twilight. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure that'll help. Uh, Lander. You've always known when people are lying to you. She turns around and goes back up the beach towards the lighthouse over the sounds of the waves crashing into the shore. You hear the shrieking laughter of the three children playing in the waves and Darella is looking off into the horizon. Her eyes a bit unfocused. I know we usually do a big thing for Equinox, but it feels wrong without mother here. I think maybe we should just do dinner and bed and the girls and I will catch the ferry out in the morning. Speaker 0 00:53:44 That sounds wonderful. Yeah, just the seven of us. I think that'll do all of us some good. Speaker 1 00:53:54 Yeah. I think it will. We could all use a spot of quiet in our lives right now. The two of you stand there in this comfortable silence for a moment. And then you feel a little hand tugging at the side of your robes from next to you. Speaker 0 00:54:13 Uh, lender looks down at whichever of the girls is trying to get his attention. Speaker 1 00:54:19 It's your daughter is standing there, her skirts plastered to her legs below the knee from where she's been running back and forth through the surf with her cousins. But she looks very pale and her eyes look kind of glassy. She looks up at you and tilts her head. Daddy, Speaker 0 00:54:44 Uh, Lander immediately squads down to get on her. Eye-level yes, sweetheart. What's going on. Speaker 1 00:54:52 As you get down on her level, you can see a thin stream of blue blood starting to run down out of both of her nostrils. She sways on her feet. I don't feel good. And then she goes down onto the beach, like a sack of bricks, Speaker 0 00:55:15 Uh, Lander scrambles to catch her and pulls her really, really close and feel his stomach sink like a stone. Speaker 1 00:55:24 As you pull her in, she feels heavy inside. Like her bones are made of stone. Speaker 0 00:55:33 Outlander takes a deep shaky breath because he knows what this is. And he knows that if it has come for his daughter, then it is coming for him. And it is coming for his wife and it is coming for his sister and her family. Dora, we need to come back to the lighthouse. Speaker 1 00:56:02 Your sister looks over at where you are holding your daughter's half conscious body and goes so pale her eyes, dart outwards back towards the surf. And she cannot bite back the panic in her voice. Girls come here now. And the five of you make your way back up to the lighthouse. You are barely two steps in the door before Luray comes down and gets your daughter out of your arms, takes her upstairs, away from everybody else in the lighthouse. She's the least likely person to get sick from this. And do you know this to be true for a moment? You're left standing in this grand entry hall with your sister and your nieces. And Darella looks haunted up the stairs where your wife and daughter have just disappeared. I, I will find somewhere else for father to stay, but right now I've, I've got to get them to the baths. I've got to get them clean. Girls, come on, come on. They book it outside and you are alone. Speaker 0 00:57:11 Uh, lender's going to go get kitted up with fantasy PPE. Basically the gear that he has been wearing to walk into plague zones, the long flowing over robe, the gloves, the veil. And he's just going to head up to Arianna's room. Speaker 1 00:57:28 When you get in there, you see your daughter laying in her bed, absolutely piled high with blankets. And your wife is on the floor in similar protective equipment to you with this big wooden box full of glass bottles open in front of her. Laura is not a magician by any stretch of the imagination. She's not a healer, but she has helped you enough through these plagues zones that she knows what herbs to use to help with some of the symptoms and her hands are visibly trembling. As she's pouring different herbs and things into a mortar and pestle, I'm trying to keep her warm so she can sweat the fever out, but she's burning up. L I don't know what to do. Speaker 0 00:58:13 Uh, Lander goes and sits on the bed next to his daughter. He's going to cast a greater restoration and feel it not work. So he's going to cast kind of a modified shield Hutch around his own hand, just to cool it down and then just put it on her forehead. Speaker 1 00:58:33 She is unconscious, but you do notice her relax a little bit, but you see the glowing blue bruising leeching out under her skin and can feel how hot she still is. Even through the spell, even through your glove. And you've seen enough of this. She's got days, maybe less. You feel a hand close around your arm and to look down, to see Lorraine, big reflective, solid black eyes staring up at you from her. She's still not on the floor. You need to go get washed up and keep your distance. I'm not losing both of you. Speaker 0 00:59:16 I had preferred to stay with Speaker 1 00:59:18 Her and I'd prefer my husband. You should go. There's nothing you can do here. That justifies the risk. Speaker 0 00:59:32 You're right. And then stilted and awkward. He's got to stand up and he's going to walk out. Speaker 1 00:59:43 As you leave, you pass an open door a little further down this hallway where inside your sister has already tucked both of her daughters into bed. They are soundly trancing, but she is sitting up with a hand pressed to both of their foreheads. Just keeping an eye on their temperature, making sure they're not too warm. There's a moment where she looks up, makes eye contact with you, and then just purses her lips and goes back to taking care of her kids. Speaker 0 01:00:17 Uh, lender's going to go back to his own room and just try and take his trans tomorrow is not going to be easy. Speaker 1 01:00:24 It is hard to put your mind at ease, but eventually fatigue wins out and you fall into a fitful trance, and you have the dream again, You're on your hands and knees on the completely flat mirror, like surface of this calm water, that rotating light flashing behind you and on its next rotation. It flashes across the imposing skeletal silhouette of Kim role. The Lord of bones. Speaker 3 01:01:01 Hey kid, I get that. It's a bad time. Speaker 0 01:01:06 Uh, Lander doesn't get up. He's still on all fours on this glassy ocean service. Yeah, you could say it's a bad time. Speaker 1 01:01:18 Kimbrell tilts his great horn at you in such a way that you feel like he would look sympathetic. If he had a face to express it. Speaker 3 01:01:29 Unfortunately it has to be tonight. It's time to make good on our agreement. The enter we need your out. Speaker 0 01:01:42 He made that bargain a century ago when I was a child and you've waited this long and now my mother is dead and my daughter is dying and you can't give me a week. Speaker 3 01:01:57 There are many things that are in my nature. A lender cruelty is not one of them. I have waited a hundred of your lifetimes for this moment. And if I could put it off a little longer for your sake, I would, it has to be tonight. Speaker 0 01:02:15 The Lander still on his hands and knees crumbles. And on himself, he lays his head down on the glassy surface of this ocean in his dreams that he has never gone under in all the years, he's been visiting it. He curls it on himself and he sobs. And then with all the effort as if he had the world on his shoulders, he nods to himself and he sits up wipes, his eyes and says fine. Tonight. Speaker 1 01:02:58 You wake up to a peal of thunder that rattles your bones and you are no longer in your room. You are standing in this big circular grade hall at the bottom of the light house. And you see your sister, a few yards away from you also apparently shooting back to consciousness, very bleary, but even more noticeable than that is a third figure that is standing between you eight feet and some change tall wrapped in a magnificent stormy cloak of shifting colors with these two crackling electric blue eyes and a grim lightning bolt line where a mouth should be in the shadows of their hood. You've never seen Kiva in person, but she looks enough like the statues in every temple you've ever been in that you can put two and two together. She looks back and forth between the two of you and then with a voice that echoes like the thunder rolling outside says, Speaker 3 01:04:13 All right, I think it's finally time for you to learn the truth a very long time ago. Kimra and I did something that gods should never do. We defied our nature. And in the wake of that decision, this happened, Speaker 1 01:04:34 Kiva turns in a really weird way, and there's a flutter of their cloak and some stuff that your mortal mind cannot process happens. It hurts to look at it. And when you can see clearly again, Kimberly is standing there exactly where Kiva was less than a second ago. He gestures down at himself with his skeletal hands. Speaker 3 01:04:59 We got, well, I wish there was a big intimidating theological term for this squished. Two deities, one shared celestial consciousness and abomination that never should have existed, blah, blah, blah. Speaker 1 01:05:16 There's another ruffle of fabric and that horrible Eldritch beholding that you can't process again. And then Kivas back where Kimra was just standing Speaker 3 01:05:27 Shut up. Kimra anyway, for this, we were exiled down to a leery along with enough of our followers to provide us with adequate belief, to survive, supposedly to learn our lesson and fix what we broke. But by the time we did that, Speaker 1 01:05:48 Cloak ruffle Kim rolls back. Speaker 3 01:05:51 Soliah had pretty much bombed itself back to the stone age, the celestial plane up there, there's almost nonfunctional anymore. Let's just say our mother attempted a business merger that resulted in bankruptcy. Speaker 0 01:06:05 I don't understand any of those words. What does this have to do with us? Speaker 1 01:06:12 Cloak ruffle, keep us back. Speaker 3 01:06:15 We've spent thousands and thousands of years doing our jobs, following our nature, gaining back enough power to as my brother would so eloquently, put it on squish us. And now's the perfect time. It's the autumnal Equinox. The veil is thin and well, Speaker 1 01:06:38 There is another cataclysmic roll of thunder from outside, and you can see the windows of the light house light up as a big flash of lightning comes down into the sea. Speaker 3 01:06:50 We can do it, but for the separation to be possible, we need vessels Speaker 1 01:06:58 Across the room from you. You see Dirella go very pale vessels. Like our bodies. You want to take over our bodies, cloak flutter Kimmerle speck. He puts one bony hand up to his chest, kind of a fronted, Speaker 3 01:07:17 Oh, heavens no mortal bodies. Can't hold on to divine essence for that long, without massive amounts of external power. And besides I wouldn't want to walk around wearing a Lander for the rest of eternity is really not my style. Speaker 0 01:07:30 Uh, Lander makes a face and then says, all right, so what do you mean for us to do Speaker 1 01:07:37 Cloak flutter? Kivas back. Speaker 3 01:07:40 We need both of you to hold on to a fragment of our essences souls, something like that for a few moments, while we built the power to separate ourselves and then let it go. When we tell you to the whole thing will only take a few minutes and neither of you will be harmed. You have our word, Speaker 0 01:08:04 That's it. Just take on more power and then let it go. Speaker 1 01:08:11 Cloak flutter, Kim rolls back. Speaker 1 01:08:15 You would be very surprised what a hard task that is for most people across from you directly purses her lips and runs one hand down along the fabric of the cloak wrapped around her shoulders and nods. All right, I'm in, I, I suppose I am as well. Kiva motions, you both forward and then grabs both of your arms and pulls you so that your hands are clasped together. The storm outside kicks up in intensity. The thunder is roaring. The rain is lashing against the stone of the lighthouse. Outside. The veil is thin from the Equinox. You can hear the whispers of ghosts floating in the air around you, low murmuring voices. Something that for a moment sounds heartbreakingly like your mother's laugh. Kiva hovers. One hand over where your hand is joined with your sisters. This bright electric blue ball of energy appears below her Palm sinks into your joined hands and shoots up Darella his arm. Speaker 1 01:09:30 You can trace it like it's moving through her veins. She doubles over for a minute. Looking like she's had the wind knocked out of her. She doesn't appear to have been harmed, but holding this power seems hard. There's that ruffle of a cloak again, that incomprehensible shift and then roll puts out one bony hand over your joint hands, a ball of Misty purple energy comes out into your joint, hands with your sister and then shoots up your arm. It is like being hit in the chest with a sledge hammer, Atlanta. You are familiar with the process and the feeling of casting magic. You've been able to do it since you were a child, but until now you don't think you've ever understood the feeling of raw power because all of the magic you have ever cast in your life has been done with Kim role's blessing and at his behest. And as you are holding this core of power inside of you, and it is singing out through your veins with every labored pound of your heart, it is all yours. And you feel like you could move mountains with it. Ellender lets go of his sister's hand. There is a rumbling under your feet that almost knocks you prone on the ground. The moment you let go of your sister's hand. This jacket crack goes through the flagstones of the floor between you and the floor of the bottom of this lighthouse splits open like an egg from beneath it. You see this pulsing swirling silver light, glowing as if from underground Darella lurches forward, clutching at her chest and heaving for breath. I can't hold it alone. I can't. Speaker 1 01:11:40 And this bolt of electric energy shoots out of her hand through the crack in the floor and down into this pulsing light, Speaker 0 01:11:49 The lender is holding on this power with both hands. He stumbles grits, his teeth and says I'll be back. And then he runs up the stairs. Speaker 1 01:12:05 Okay. Where are you going? Speaker 0 01:12:08 Arianna's room. Speaker 1 01:12:11 The scene in there is much the same as when you last left it. Orianna is in her bed under all these blankets looking very, very ill. Luray is sitting on the edge of her mattress, petting her hair down, whips around to look at you and her eyes go wide. You should not be in here without something over your face. Are you insane? Speaker 0 01:12:32 I needed to try something. Oh, Lander sits on the bed and he's going to cast greater restoration. Speaker 1 01:12:39 Usually when you cast magic, your holy symbol that you wear around your neck, glows and pulses, but now the magic leaves your body. As if you are channeling it out through the very tips of your finger bones, this pulsing silvery purple light that leaches across Oriana skin and down into her body. There is a breathless pause. A second goes by two, three, and then you watch the bruises under her skin. Start to retract the sickly. Pallor leaves her face, her eyes open, not cloudy at all. Very clear. And she apparently has no heaviness left in her bones because she sits up in bed blinks at you and confusion. Daddy, what time is it? Speaker 0 01:13:36 Uh, Lander reaches up to cover his mouth with his hand, pulled back a sob. It's late, baby. You should go back to sleep. Speaker 1 01:13:47 Lorraine is looking at you like you have grown a second head. What did you just do? Speaker 0 01:13:54 Uh, Lander gives her a sharp look and then looks back at Rhianna and strokes the hair back from her forehead. It's all gonna be okay, sweetheart. Just lay back down and he's gonna wait until she has drifted back into her trans to say anything else to Luray. Once she has, he turns back and he says, I found a solution. Speaker 1 01:14:16 I don't understand the magic's never worked before. Speaker 0 01:14:20 No, it has an, I I'll explain everything later. I have to go back downstairs. Speaker 1 01:14:26 She looks very confused and a little bit frightened, but doesn't say anything else to you just goes and sits back down on the edge of Arianna's bed. Speaker 0 01:14:37 Well, Andrew's gonna lean in kiss her and say, I love you. Please just trust me. And then he runs back downstairs. Speaker 1 01:14:49 The situation downstairs seems to be worsening it. You can hear this storm absolutely raging outside the whales of the dead, through the thin veil of the Equinox, getting a little more insistent. And this light is still pulsing up through the crack in the floor. Darella is crumpled on the floor clutching at her hand, like she's been burned by the force of this magic, leaving it. And Kimmerle is standing there looking extremely perturbed as angry as a skeleton can look, Speaker 0 01:15:24 I'll help. You got Speaker 1 01:15:24 Your errand to accomplish. Let's finish this, let it go. Speaker 0 01:15:29 The lender stays where he is. He looks at his sister, Dora, it worked and he looks down in his own hands. And he says, I haven't been able to cure this thing in years. And I just saved my daughter and he takes a step back. Think about how many people could be saved by this. Speaker 1 01:15:58 And she looks up at you, this silvery light from the hole in the floor beneath you, washing across her face, eyes big and frightened and desperate. I know what you're thinking of doing, and there's no way it won't have consequences. Don't do this. Speaker 0 01:16:18 Dora 70,000 people died in OMA gruff, and he takes another step back. I'm only doing what I have to Speaker 1 01:16:28 From a couple feet away. Kimmel's head snaps over to look at you. And you can just tell that his expressionless skull is snarling. Speaker 0 01:16:39 We had a deal and I had a choice. You said yourself that I had a choice. I'm making it. Speaker 1 01:16:51 He lunges for you. And right before those talent, bony hands sink into your skin. There is a bright flash of light from this crack in the floor. It goes white and then silver. And then you can see a band of electric, blue snap, back from it like a rubber band. It hits the body of what you perceive to be Kimmerle. And in the air, there is a clap of thunder and a scream of Eldridge, existential pain as it collides. And when the light fades, neither Kimbrel nor Kiva are standing in this room with you. So mechanically, what you have done is broken that agreement you made with Kimra that night so long ago, and he has reneged on his end of the deal and taken away your cleric powers. You are not a priest anymore. What you have become is a Leary's very first divine soul sourcer Across the room. Darella gets shakily to her feet and shuffles over to look down through this crack in the floor where that silvery magical light is still pulsing. She looks back up at you, naked fear on her face. What did you do? Speaker 0 01:18:23 Uh, Lander looks down at his own hands again. Pulsing softly with divine magic. I guess we'll find out Speaker 0 01:18:37 Darella it's about 10 years after that night, things have been hectic and a Sheria the casualties from the plague. Although they have slowed since your brother has taken to the road with his new miraculous gift were heavy. And given that the plague doesn't discriminate between people that have very little social influence and those that have a lot, things have kind of been thrown out of whack. You are back on looks to Gallen for summer solstice, and you don't recognize some of the people running around this village. This is the town that you grew up in. This is the place you were born and the place your mother died. And there are faces that are completely new to you. Speaker 1 01:19:34 Hmm? Don't like that. She's got a very firm grip on both of the twins shoulders. They're a little bit older now and it's just piloting them up the road towards the lighthouse, looking around her very skeptically. Speaker 0 01:19:49 There are more children outside the lighthouse than you expected running around, playing some kind of tag game. You see a boy of about maybe the equivalent of 12 fall skin, his knee and start crying. And then as you're walking up, you see a little girl, a little older run over and pass a hand over that scrapes knee and the wound vanishes. You do not recognize either of these children. In fact, you do not recognize most of these children. They don't look like anyone. You know, they are certainly not people that you've been introduced to. They are entirely new to you with the exception of a girl, the equivalent of about seven, who is sitting on a bench and spots you coming up the path and yells auntie Dora Speaker 1 01:20:49 Darella puts on a big fake smile and runs over to hug her knees Oriana, sweetie. Hi, um, have your parents opened up an orphanage that they forgot to write to me about Speaker 0 01:21:04 Your niece is Hale and healthy as anything. There is no sign that she ever caught. The plague that wiped out thousands and thousands of people. She's got a big, bright smile. She's bouncing a little bit on her feet. She looks around at these other kids and goes, um, sorta it's complicated. Speaker 1 01:21:28 Yeah, it looks that way. Probably something I should clear up with your father. Um, girls, you want to go play with your cousin? Speaker 0 01:21:36 Uh, Laura does not need any further prompting. She runs off to join this game of tag Oriana on her heels. Anya grabs your skirt and leans a little closer to you and looks up and goes, is everything okay? Mommy? Speaker 1 01:21:54 Everything is going to be okay, sweetheart. Go play with your new friends. Just be careful. Okay. Speaker 0 01:22:02 Um, okay. And she follows off after her sister Speaker 1 01:22:08 Darella is a bee lining into the lighthouse to find her brother Speaker 0 01:22:13 It's early enough in the morning that Luray is still awake and you see her as soon as you walk in out of the corner of your eyes, she's in the kitchen. Crooning, softly to your little baby nephew who was curled up on her chest with both hands fisted in her hair. You don't see a Lander anywhere. Speaker 1 01:22:32 She's going to go in the kitchen, give her a hug, give the baby a little smooch on the head. Happy solstice. Hi, sweet boy. Um, have you seen my brother anywhere? I need to have a conversation with him and I'd prefer not to spoil a holiday dinner again. Speaker 0 01:22:50 Luray laughs and says, yeah, I think we'd all appreciate avoiding a repeat of winter solstice three years ago. Speaker 1 01:23:00 I want to go on the record saying that I didn't start that, but I damn well finished it. Where is a Lander Speaker 0 01:23:07 Oven? The lantern room again? He said he needed some air and the children make it hard to say secluded otherwise. Speaker 1 01:23:17 Yes, I bet they do. And she turns on her heel and heads up for the lantern room. Speaker 0 01:23:25 As soon as you open the door, you smell smoke. Alandra is smoking a pipe, which to your knowledge, he has never done before. It's super disorienting. He is leaning on the railing, his other hand, propping his head up and looking out over the water. Speaker 1 01:23:44 So here's the thing. Darella his relationship with her brother has been really Rocky ever since the night of the ritual. And she's never been anything else but impulsive. So she just gets him by the back of the shirt and rattles him. Speaker 0 01:24:00 He flails almost drops. The pipe did not know you were there. Speaker 1 01:24:07 I'll give you something to scream about. You stupid bastard. What the hell do you think you're doing? Speaker 0 01:24:12 He gives you a baleful look, looks out at the pipe in his hand and says, I mean, I know it's bad for you, but I'm 137 door. I can make my own decisions. Speaker 1 01:24:22 I don't give a rat's ass about your bad habits. L I'm more concerned with the sea of children on your front lawn. Part of me wants an explanation, but the vast majority of me is terrified to hear it. Speaker 0 01:24:37 He relaxes a little, he goes, oh, I part of my healing work. They didn't have anyone else to look after them. So I just invited them back here. Speaker 1 01:24:49 She gives him a look that positively oozes the sentiment of you are so full of shit and crosses her arms over her chest. Oh yeah. So you've taken up philanthropy on top of everything else. That's really big of you. You know, they're singing your praises down in the village. I think I caught a snippet of conversation about old Mr. who runs the ferry. They said his boy died of the plague last spring while you were out traveling. And as soon as you came back, you just resurrected him quick. As you, like they said, the boy came back a little wrong though. Started moving things with his mind, setting things on fire. You don't have any idea. What would cause something like that to happen to land, or do you, Speaker 0 01:25:34 The lender pulls away from you Smith's down his robes. It seems that one of the side effects of my new powers are that those, I use certain resurrection magics on gain a little bit of arcane talent themselves. And then he gestures down at the front lawn where again, there are maybe two dozen kids just running around playing tag, the younger they are and the stronger the magic I have to use, the more power they get. And I can't just leave them wandering. So I bring them back here. I didn't expect you to object to there being less dead children in this country. Dora. Speaker 1 01:26:20 Oh, don't you try to turn this around on me, just because I'm concerned that you're passing on the consequences of your broken promise to innocent children that never asked for it. We both know what we saw that night. I told you then that your decisions were going to have consequences. And those are your consequences, not theirs. Speaker 0 01:26:41 Oh like, hell you're concerned. Those children would have been dead. If not for me now they're alive. They're breathing, they're playing. They're telling my wife what their favorite candy flavors are. And they have magical power that they never dreamed of. And not a single one of them has had one of the dreams that we had. You can say what you like about my choices, but the results have been a net good for every child here for every other child that I've brought back, that I got to return to their families for every one that I have helped the way I said I was going to and what have you done lately? Speaker 1 01:27:25 She bawls her fists up in the fabric of her stormy cloak that she received so long ago and just trembling, hisses. My fucking best is what I've been doing. I am still out there in the blood and the mud and the shit of it. Ending droughts and feeding the hungry and healing, the sick as best I can. And I know that your ego has gotten a little inflated now that you have your special powers and your little fan club following you all over Australia, but you do not get to stand there and imply that I haven't done anything. Speaker 0 01:28:03 Uh, Lander's face softened a little bit. And he says, you're right. I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry. I don't mean to minimize the work you do. I just wish you wouldn't act like the work that I'm doing is some unforgivable sin. Dora. Speaker 1 01:28:23 She also softens a little bit. Her shoulders go a bit less rigid. You know how, when we were kids, I always knew when a storm was coming. Speaker 0 01:28:35 He smiles a little nostalgic. Yeah. I remember Speaker 1 01:28:41 Ever since that night, that's how I feel when I look at you, whatever it is that you've got going on in this whole operation, there is a dark side to it and it is coming for you and for everybody else that you've let it touch. And this is the last time that I am going to stick, hand out and offer to help you out of it. A Lander. I swear, this is the last time Speaker 0 01:29:07 There's a long moment of silence and then a Lander by two's lip and says, look, if you're worried about the consequences, I'll show you the consequences. Just give me until tonight. All right, please. Speaker 1 01:29:28 Yeah, fine. Tonight. Speaker 0 01:29:33 The two of you move through this day through the holiday celebrations of summer solstice, you get to passing acquaintance with the various children that your brother has taken in. And as things are winding down for the night, a Lander takes your hand, make some excuse to Luray, and he leads you out of the lighthouse down the road, through the village. He raises a hand in waves at various people in down, and he leads you to a little boat house on the water. There are a lot like it looks through. Alan is an island of fishermen. This one looks pretty abandoned. He stops outside the door and says, you wanted to know about the consequences fine. And then he opens the door and walks inside. Speaker 1 01:30:35 She's going to follow him. Speaker 0 01:30:37 There is a little boat on the water. It's big enough for maybe four people to sit in. And the only thing in it as your brother opens the doors and untied it from its Moring is a big leather trunk. Speaker 1 01:30:56 What's in the box. Speaker 0 01:30:58 The lender winces and says, get in the damn boat. Darella Speaker 1 01:31:05 She narrows her eyes at him and gets in the boat. But under the folds of her cloak, her hand is closing around that orb that she uses to cast magic with Speaker 0 01:31:17 Your brother, rose this boat out of the boat house, away from the island of flux, to Gallen into open water. Once you are far enough that you aren't in clear sight of anyone that would be standing on the shore, he stops steep plus fingers and starts to speak. You know, I started to notice it the first time I brought someone back. It's not like with revivify with something stronger. It, it feels more, it feels stranger. There's more of a pull in the opposite direction. It takes power. How are that I have now? But I started to feel it afterwards, something pulling at my magic, sapping it, I assumed it was just growing pains. I assumed it would go away. I kept going, but after it couldn't have been more than the 20th time, maybe I don't know. Speaker 0 01:32:43 I raised someone from the dead and then the next person that I went to cure it stopped working again. And I was right back where I started helpless, afraid. It was like I had been starving and I had finally gotten a morsel of something to eat. And it was ripped away from me. It was starvation of the soul Darella I couldn't. So I tried to find other ways to stop the outbreak that I was in the middle of. I went back to what I had been doing. I tried to find anything I could do. And I found out that the town I was in had been going through somewhat of a shortage of more material remedies, medicinal herbs. And then I found out that it had been caused by a rich man and the next closest town. And I looked around at these people that were dying in front of me. And I knew that everything I had done to save people would be for nothing. And I knew that, well, I just wanted to talk to him. You understand? But I got to thinking on the way over, he had agreed to meet with me. Everyone in the area knew what I was, what I could do. He had agreed. I got to thinking, Karen will said, I'm worried about, he cannot hold onto the kind of power that I have now. Not without an external power source. Speaker 0 01:34:45 God, they're fueled by belief, belief in what they are and what they stand for. And my power comes from the God of intentional death, purposeful death, Dora, you know me, I don't lose my temper often, but I was floundering. I was, I was feeling very purposeful that might, and then he opens the trunk and you see that there's a corpse in it. Speaker 1 01:35:21 Darella claps, both hands over her mouth and wretches. Her eyes are as big as dinner plates as she looks down at what she's being shown And what you killed this man. And your powers came back. Speaker 0 01:35:39 Uh, Lander looks out at the body in the trunk and says, no, not this man, this man. And he Jostle's the trunk a little bit. He looks angry. This man didn't do what that man did. No, no. He just hurt a lot of innocent children, a different sort of stain on the world, but a stain nonetheless, no one will miss him just like no one missed the first one or the ones that have come between. And with the death of this worthless piece of shit, thousands of people will live. It's all about the numbers Stora. And then he tips the trunk sideways off the side of the boat. And the body sinks into the water. Speaker 1 01:36:38 Darella is trying so hard to not just lean over the side of the boat and get sick. She's curled up against this little bench that she sitting on, both hands, so clasped over her mouth, but then eventually she peels them away and clenches them both in her lap wardrobe bodies can't hold divine power without an external source. So you go out and you create more and more people with the divine power in their bodies. Of course, that external source is getting hungrier a Lander. What the hell? Speaker 0 01:37:19 Dora, if you just thought about it logically for a moment, you know how many people I've saved since that night thousands with my own hands, do you know how many I've had to kill to save those thousands of people? Speaker 1 01:37:37 Don't I don't want to know Speaker 0 01:37:40 Eight, eight versus thousands and hate that we're doing immeasurable harm. Speaker 1 01:37:49 And how many more are you going to have to kill, to justify the next thousand people that you or the thousand after that or any of the people that you are dragging back into this world attached to a power that is only going to need more. Speaker 0 01:38:09 You Speaker 1 01:38:09 Put blood on those kids' hands. Hell doesn't matter whose blood it is. You put blood on their hands and I don't know what you thought I would get out of this. If you thought that I would understand or be on your side, but I know I'm not going to stand by and let you continue creasing up an already slippery slope. This has to stop the plates on its way out. We've done. What we set out to do. I have access to a commune spell. I can talk to Kiva. I can figure out how we fix this. We need to make this right. We need to finish what we started. Because if you keep going at the rate that you are, you're going to run out of people whose deaths you can justify. There aren't that many bad people in the world, Speaker 0 01:39:03 Lander size goes up the trunk. You've always been an idealist. There is an abundance of people in this world. I've found who should be honored. That the way their lives end is in service of the greater good. What I am doing is reducing the harm in the world. Whether or not you see it that way Speaker 1 01:39:29 You don't get to call it harm reduction. When you're the one deciding who gets harmed, that's not how any of this works. Speaker 0 01:39:38 He does up the last class on the trunk and says, I understand this is all a lot to come to terms with. I'll let you sit with it for a few hours and then we can come back to this conversation. All right, I, for one would like to go to bed. I suggest that you do the same. He picks up the doors again. Speaker 1 01:40:00 Darella is silent. The entire trip back. She sits there, waits for them to get back to the boat house steps out onto the dock and out the door walks back up to the lighthouse with him and stops right outside the front door. Say, I sit with it a few hours and I don't come around. Say I make it my job to stop you from doing this. What happens then Speaker 0 01:40:29 The lender stops this hand on the door knob. Well, I would prefer if you didn't do that, Speaker 1 01:40:38 Hypothetically, Speaker 0 01:40:41 Then I suppose it would be a question of which of us stops the other first, what net I'm going to bed Dora. And then he opens the door, goes inside and shuts it behind him. Speaker 1 01:41:02 So Darella has a panic attack on the front steps of her childhood home, just like sobbing hysterically for several minutes. But then eventually she gets up wipes at her eyes and goes around to the tool shed that is just outside the lighthouse. And she finds the biggest file that she can like a big steel file. She looks at her reflection in the window. Pane realizes that she is a very recognizable person and that if she is going to do what her conscience tells her, she needs to, she needs to disappear and presses the side of the file to one of her horns. Speaker 0 01:41:49 Several months later, we pick up at a market and a small town outside of illness, a woman with gray skin and patches of silver scales on her face stands at a stall with her two young daughters who both have their hoods pulled down low over their faces. The person Manning the soul finishes, jotting down her order and says, all right. And, uh, the name for that order, Speaker 1 01:42:19 She purses her lips looks over her shoulder at the storm tossed gray sea between illness and the distant blur of Luxal Golen on the horizon. Turns back to this woman smiles and says justice. We pick up a few decades later in the grand halls of the palace in the city state of velum tall, the last bastion of resistance that has just recently fallen to the war of Australia and unification. Al please describe your character. Speaker 0 01:43:07 Archduke, a Lander Val sign who will later be known by his descendants and by all of his people centuries down the line as a unifier of nations, as a healer of the sick and as the first proper Saint of the camera light church is a slim Salleian Elvin man. He has gray skin patches of silver scales. He is in the equivalent of his early to mid thirties. His hair is tied back and on top of his head rests a gleaming enchanted circuits. He leans over a table with war maps on it and looks to the closest of his advisors. One of the people whose faith, he has earned through his work. And he says, I understand the practicality, but we've driven them as far as golf Shona. And I just think a final push Speaker 1 01:44:14 From your other side, you feel someone's head and nuzzle into your shoulder and your wife, Luray, who is very pregnant and looks exhausted, kind of leans over, kisses you on the cheek and goes, I'm so sorry. I need to lay down. I'm not feeling wonderful. Um, update me later. Yes. Speaker 0 01:44:37 A lender turns to her eyebrows furrowed and goes, yes, of course, darling rest. And he's going to give her a kiss back on the cheek. Speaker 1 01:44:47 She leaves and you are left looking out across this table at your council of advisors. After that last confrontation with your sister on Luxe Togala and you kept going the way you were, you brought more people back from the dead you saved in numerable lives. And every time you felt that pull at your magic, but even more. So you started to feel it when your son Loris got old enough to walk and talk and do things like turn lead into gold or multiply a plate of food, a hundred fold, the demands of your power started to grow. And eventually you ran out of bad people that you could kill to fulfill them. So the natural next step was to gain enough power that you could find bigger and better people to sacrifice for your cause. This led to the take down of all of the Australian city states, the justifiable murder of many corrupt Nobles and the place where you are standing now over this war table, looking at how to counter just how hard your sister has been pushing back against your effort for years. Speaker 1 01:46:15 One of your top generals, Connick, Tor mayor, a man whose entire family you saved from the plague, move something around on one of these war maps and points. I mean, I understand what you're saying, your majesty, but we're looking at marching. Hundreds of people over the mountains in the dead of winter, there will be deaths. If we do that, I understand the concern that they'll move. I know that the wizards were able to shut down the portal system, but it seems that your sister has gotten access to a Keystone. If the strike teams that have been coming out of the woods and our people are any indication, Speaker 0 01:47:00 Uh, Lander rakes, a hand back through his hair, not to disrespect your years of experience connect, but there will be deaths either way. We minimize what they're able to do then until we can cut this off at the root, Speaker 1 01:47:16 The member of your council, who is the chief liaison with the church, a very small slight Knight elf woman named Amber to Caren raises one hand softly glowing under the low light of this room. Speaker 0 01:47:33 Yes, sister Emre, please enlighten us. Speaker 1 01:47:37 She folds her hands together in front of her, that extra joint at the end of her fingers, curling oddly around her palms. Not that I would ever dare to disagree with general turmeric's military expertise, but we will have to explain theologically to the people, how taking out the high priestess of Kiva while she's on the run is a morally justifiable thing to do, Speaker 0 01:48:06 Uh, lender pauses. And he says, everyone, I think I've arrived at a way to take out two birds with one stone, my sister, and those that follow her, draw their power from Kiva and Kiva draws her power from the belief of the people. The belief that the people have in a goddess of fate and natural death, 50 years on from a plague that almost wiped out this entire country. I, for one, see no reason why that faith wouldn't be shaky. Speaker 1 01:48:49 Sister Emre, who at this point is the high priestess of Kimmerle narrows her eyes at you and tilts her head to the side. Not that I'm disagreeing with the points you're making here, your majesty, but a religious overhaul of that magnitude would require destruction of all existent temples, evacuations of cities. It's a big move, but if you think you can pull it off, I have your back Speaker 0 01:49:21 With as much time as I've spent out among the people hearing their prayers. I know I can pull that off. Start moving the trips out. I'm going to go attend to my wife and Lander walks out. Speaker 1 01:49:38 You head out through the grand stone hallways of this castle that is now your home off to your chambers. You crawl into bed next to your wife. She smiles turns over kind of nuzzles into you. I hope it went well Speaker 0 01:49:58 As well as it could have. We all make our choices and then he's gonna wrap his free arm around her, pull her really close and drift off into his trance. Speaker 1 01:50:15 You have the dream again For the first time in decades, you find yourself on your hands and knees on the surface of this cold, still mirror like water and the flash of a light house that you have not seen in years. Illuminates the scene around you. You look down at your hands and then when you look up, you see this rotating light flash across and eight plus foot tall skeletal figure with spiraling horns and bright purple pinpricks of light where it's, I should be Speaker 3 01:51:01 Long time to see kit Speaker 0 01:51:05 The Lander. It gets to his feet. Lord Kimra I have nothing to say to you. Speaker 3 01:51:13 Oh, well, isn't that nice? I have several things to say to you, but I'll limit myself to you. Don't want to do this, especially not in my name, Speaker 0 01:51:24 The lender, juts his chin out stubbornly. I am doing exactly what I've done since the first time you came to me. Exactly what has to be done. Speaker 1 01:51:40 Once again, you get the impression that this skeletal face is snarling at you. Speaker 3 01:51:47 This choice will bring about the ruin of everything you have ever sought to accomplish. Maybe not in your lifetime. Maybe not for several more after it, but everything you have built is going to fall. Speaker 0 01:52:03 If you're so sure of that, why don't you stop me? Speaker 3 01:52:06 Yes, I can't. You're carrying around a piece of my soul inside. You remember and passing it on to other people like lighting one candle off of another. And besides we had a deal and you had a choice, the choices have consequences. A Lander. I greatly look forward to watching yours. Speaker 1 01:52:35 And then you wake up Speaker 0 01:52:44 Justice. You have the dream. Again, you wake up on a beach of black sand that you have not seen in decades, far, far above your head. The light of the light house, where you grew up spin slowly and Kiva is sitting on a piece of driftwood hands folded in her lap. Speaker 1 01:53:10 Justice gets to her feet and goes over and sits on the piece of driftwood next to Kiva. Oh, well this can't be good. Speaker 0 01:53:20 There is a pause. And then Kiva sounding tired and sorrowful says, Speaker 3 01:53:30 Well, think of this as a courtesy call from an old friend, something is coming for you. You won't be able to escape it, but you have an opportunity to get your daughters to safety. Speaker 1 01:53:46 I would ask what's coming, but I think I already know the answer. Speaker 0 01:53:52 Kiva inclined their head at you and says, Speaker 3 01:53:56 If I had the strength, the Lendio to let you weather the storm, I would, Speaker 1 01:54:06 I don't live through this. Do I Speaker 0 01:54:10 Kiva shakes her head and says, Speaker 3 01:54:14 The only comfort I can give you is that we are not dead. While our names are remembered and you justice have burned brightly enough to be remembered for a long time. Speaker 1 01:54:28 She closes her eyes and shakes her head softly. I've done the best I could with what I was given, but I I'm scared. I don't want to be alone. Speaker 0 01:54:43 Kiva reaches out and cups your cheek. In one hand, Speaker 3 01:54:50 You won't be. I'm sending someone to buy you the time that you need. Speaker 1 01:54:56 If Kiva is corporeal in this space, justice is going to launch forth and hug her. Speaker 0 01:55:02 She hugs you back super tight and against your hair. She says, Speaker 3 01:55:09 I have courage. It'll be a blaze of glory. Speaker 0 01:55:15 And then you wake up Barry for the final time. Please describe your character. Speaker 1 01:55:27 Justice is a bit older than the last time we saw her. If she's out, moving around, trying to keep a low profile, she often keeps her hair styled up around the file down nubs, where her horns used to be. But right now it is loose around her shoulders. As she shoots bolt upright in bed, she lurches forward hands over her mouth and just sobs for a few seconds and then gets up, puts on several more layers, topped off by her stormy cloak with the silvery scale male over her shoulders, and then is going to leave her room and go find her youngest daughter. Speaker 0 01:56:16 Your youngest daughter truth is about the equivalent of three years old. She looks as much like you, as the twins did at her age, she is deep in her trance. She does not stir. When you walk in Speaker 1 01:56:37 Justice is going to scoop her up and try as hard as possible to not wake her and then go find the twins. Speaker 0 01:56:45 The twins are also trancing in their shared room, just down the hall from the nursery. They're about the equivalent of 14 now, but you wouldn't be able to tell from the weights that sit on their shoulders, Speaker 1 01:57:01 She's going to put truth still trancing down on the nearest soft surface, and then go shake both of them awake with a finger pressed over her lips. Speaker 0 01:57:13 Uh, Laura starts to say something as she sits up and Anya who woke up fully first reaches across the gap between their beds and just puts a hand on her twin shoulder and shakes her head. Speaker 1 01:57:28 Justice looks back and forth between her daughters chokes down another sob and swallows really hard they're coming and then reaches down around her neck and pulls out a chain that is attached to a massive Emerald, the size of a chicken egg, and hands it to Anya. Go out there, get everybody. You can prioritize that. The old, the sick families with children, anyone else that can't fight, tell them to run and tell everyone else to fall back to the temple, wait for your sister, and then go as far south as you can and take the Keystone with you. Speaker 0 01:58:15 Elara who has always been, the more headstrong of your daughters says what? Speaker 1 01:58:20 No, this isn't up for debate. And then she's going to reach into her cloak and pull out her holy symbol, this crystal or befall of stormy magic Anya, who is also a cleric of Kiva already has one, but justice presses this orb into a Laura's hand and squeezes super tight. We both know, but you've been able to do with the trickiness, with the snow, take truth, go out to the walls, do your best to bring down an avalanche in front of the gates and then go meet your sister and get out of here. Speaker 0 01:59:00 But, but mom, Anya squeezes, her shoulder super tight, and Alora goes silent on you. Looks at you, nods and says prioritize those. That can't fight. Go south. I understand. Speaker 1 01:59:21 I have love for you. All of you so much. Speaker 0 01:59:25 Yeah. They lunged forward in both huggy. Super tight. Anya is the first to pull away. She pulls back, stands up, brush yourself off and says, Laura, we have to hurry. Come on, Laura tears running down her face and Sheetz pulls back nod shakily and then grabs her baby sister, who was still fast in her trance. And both of them carrying spell focuses that will later belong respectively to Ferrara of Al sine and defiance. And with the Keystone that will later find its way to Arivale and Mar the girls that will soon after this named themselves mercy and vengeance walk out Speaker 1 02:00:21 After they leave justice gets up and moves her way out of this room across a snow field square and into the temple at gal Shona, where the last of the resistances in camped, Speaker 0 02:00:40 As you are walking across the square, a figure falls into step with you. Long time. No, see sugar, Speaker 1 02:00:48 Justice grits, her teeth, and inclines her head to the side. Mia. Don't suppose you're here to bring me another present. Speaker 0 02:00:57 My presence is your present darlin Speaker 1 02:01:00 A great comfort in my hour of need. I'm sure she charges across the square casting, a thermometer G spell to make her voice louder and amplified, echoing off the stones of the city. All right, everyone who can wield a sword into the temple. Once everyone else's out bar the doors, Speaker 0 02:01:23 Everyone who is not gathering at the portal, stone starts walking with you towards the temple Mia at your side, leans over and says, you know, they ain't gonna to remember that you were scared. Not going to remember what you lost either, but when it comes to stories like this, they remember how your dad and not much else, Speaker 1 02:01:52 They're not going to remember me at all. I get that you were sent here to offer me comfort and that your journey and Kimberly's journey and Kivas journey have been much longer than mine. But I know my brother. I know what he wants. How many people like me have you seen die, nameless and purposeless Mia. The best thing you can do now is be honest with me. Speaker 0 02:02:26 They step in front of you tilt their head to the side eyes flashing strangely. Honestly, you think I didn't have France sisters, a lover to my home was rebel long before Solea fail. I have seen more people fade into obscurity than you have ever known, but, and Mia smiles like a gash in the face of the world. Not a single one of them has been forgotten. I remember all of them. Speaker 1 02:03:16 Will you remember me? Speaker 0 02:03:19 Mia's eyes flash again. And they pull two daggers out of sheets on their hips, sweetheart. There's no forgetting you 17, Speaker 1 02:03:36 17. Speaker 0 02:03:39 That's how many I took out from the whole. I died in 17 before one of them got me. Speaker 1 02:03:49 Um, justice walks over to one of the many weapons stockpiles within this temple, pulls out a sword, looks over at Mia and smiles, sad and bitter and defiant. I think I'm going to shoot for 18 Speaker 0 02:04:12 Mia Thursday high back in laughs. You can try darlin. No, one's beat my record yet. They shift into a fighting stance just inside these doors, knives out justice. You find yourself back to back with me. After the assure enforces outside, beat the door down, and you find yourself at the center of a tide of death. You are reacting more than thinking you cast every spell you have in you. And then after you run out, you are addressed slamming your shield and the people and running as many of them through with your sword as you can. But the forces you had left were not large. And there seems to be no limit to the battalions at your door. This temple starts to fill with bodies, but you think you get at least 18. Eventually even Mia's seemingly inexhaustible energy runs out. They go down to one knee, coughing up acid and ICAR and your brother walks in the door. He is wearing fine decorated armor, holding his knife in one hand and a sword in the other. Speaker 1 02:05:56 And at this point, justice has taken more than a few licks. I think she has fallen back against the plinth that the Kiva statue in this temple sits upon and just sort of leans back against the stone and meets his gaze. I told you it was going to come to this. Speaker 0 02:06:20 Your brother looks around at the bodies, littering the floor of this temple. He sets his jaw firm and proud and stubborn as ever. It doesn't have to end this way. Darella Speaker 1 02:06:39 My name is justice. Yes, it does. Speaker 0 02:06:46 He stepped closer adjusts his grip on camera's blade and says you still have a choice. Speaker 1 02:06:57 She drops her shield to the floor with a clatter and then reaches out to grab his hand. I've made my choice, make yours. Speaker 0 02:07:21 And that is where we're going to end this week. Speaker 1 02:07:26 So when we said generational trauma, Speaker 0 02:07:31 We meant it like Speaker 1 02:07:33 10,000 years generational trauma. And now that we have this context, we will leave that with Leo and fi next time on compelled dual Speaker 1 02:08:02 Hey, everybody, Barry here with the postscript, just clearing up a couple of housekeeping things here at the end of the episode, as always, I'm going to go ahead and plug our social media profiles. You can find us on Twitter, Tumblr, and tick-tock at compel dual. We have lots of other cool stuff going on. However, an official website and official Spotify profile, our official merch store, stuff like that. You can find all that stuff linked on any of our various social media profiles. If you're interested in supporting the show, we ask that you consider heading over to patrion.com/compelled dual, where starting at just $2 a month, you can get access to all kinds of cool patron perks, including early access to episodes, access to exclusive playlist and bonus content, and even handwritten letters from your favorite character every month. If you're interested in supporting the show in ways, other than pledging to our Patrion, we ask that if you're listening to us on apple podcasts or Spotify, that you leave us a rating and a review, since that helps the show get promoted to a wider audience, we host a weekly Q and a show on our YouTube every week. Speaker 1 02:09:11 And we would love to see you show up for that. Ask a couple questions. We always have a really fun time. And as always, if you like what you're hearing on the show we ask that you just tell a couple of friends about it. And if they like it, ask them to tell a couple of friends as well. Word of mouth advertising is the most powerful tool we have at our disposal. Our next episode is going to be going live on Friday, March 25th, 2022. Or if you're a member of our Patrion, you're going to be getting early access to that on Thursday, March 24th. It's been a few weeks. Huh? See you guys next time.