Wakespire: Chapters 36-37 (Patreon)

Some straight relationship content this week, like we haven't seen since Chasmfall. As I've always said, this story will not focus on romance, but given that it will cover many years of the characters' lives, I felt like it would be unrealistic not to include any. And to respond to comment I've seen in various place: yes, Theo will get some romance eventually, he's just a grumpy old man.

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Chapter 36

Nauda gripped her staff, lifted the blunt end, and gently hit Fiyu in the head.

"Ow." Fiyu rubbed her head through her hair. "I was not successful."

"I don't know, I thought your 'getting hit in the head' technique was very majestic." Once Nauda had worried about using sarcasm with Fiyu, but the other woman only smiled.

"I hope to improve it to a 'not getting hit' technique. Again, please."

For her next swing, Nauda aimed at Fiyu's side. She didn't want to hurt her friend at all, but apparently her attack needed to have some real force behind it or the training was useless. In theory, Fiyu was supposed to disappear or turn translucent or otherwise evade the attack. It had yet to happen.

"Are you sure we're going to get this?" Nauda switched her grip and instead struck lightly at Fiyu's calf.

"I do not believe it is possible at Ruler, but I need to refine my skill and the associated chamber before reaching Authority."

That made sense: like every other part of her soulhome, Fiyu needed to polish her skills to the utmost before she could move on. She had been using the same small set of refined techniques ever since they met, so it seemed to take her some effort to adjust to developing new ones.

"I believe that is enough for now." Fiyu raised a hand before the staff could descend again. "Now please use your staff to bind me."

"At least this one won't hurt you." Nauda took a step back and pointed her staff at Fiyu's chest. "What's the next technique supposed to be?"

At first Fiyu couldn't answer at all. With no chance of actually harming the other woman, Nauda had used her technique at full power, freezing Fiyu in place. Her cantae flared up instinctively, trying to push through, then Fiyu retracted it and instead focused on something else. For a long time, nothing seemed to happen, then suddenly Fiyu slipped to the side.

Taken off guard, it took Nauda a moment to aim at her again and bind her a second time. She wasn't sure what had happened. Fiyu hadn't broken free of her binding, it had somehow just... slid off her. The second time Fiyu wasn't able to repeat the trick as easily, but she wasn't as firmly bound, no matter how much cantae Nauda pushed down her staff.

"This one..." Fiyu managed to slip free again and got several steps before Nauda caught her. "It is designed to resist techniques that affect my body. Particularly disrupting the organs, or creating poison, or binding. But yours... seems to be difficult to escape."

"I'd hope so, otherwise all the soulcrafting I've done would seem pretty useless." Nauda grimaced as she gripped her staff tighter and tried to keep Fiyu in place. She preferred this test, since there was no chance of injury.

"It is similar to, though more refined than, the techniques you have seen to resist enemy attacks. You have observed them many times when others attempt to resist Theo's fields."

Nauda had to resist frowning and worried that Fiyu would still pick it up in her body language. She didn't want to talk about Theo right now. In fact, she hadn't intended to train with Fiyu at all, but the other woman had asked so plaintively that there had been no real choice.

Regardless of the reasons she'd come, Nauda was enjoying herself. They'd practiced Fiyu's darkness first, then her new defense, and now this immunity technique. Her third floor contained three technique chambers and three enhancement chambers, from what Nauda understood. It was a strong design, given how each room was much larger than Nauda's average chamber, and so they all had an impact. Fiyu's new speed chamber made her nearly as fast as some Authorities, and she'd formally enhanced her Nine Worlds Feast, which gave her surprising stamina.

Eventually, however, it had to end. Once they were both tired, they sat down at the side of the room. There was a bowl of manna there, but Nauda no longer felt hungry despite all the training. They couldn't put it off much longer. It was time for the conversation they had promised during the Wakespire.

"How much do you have left to do before ascending?" Nauda asked. She immediately cursed herself for her cowardice.

"All of my chambers are filled, but they require polish." It was impossible to tell from Fiyu's expression whether she felt the same tension or anything at all. "Up to this point, I have focused solely on my third floor. So I must also complete my pyramid in order to make the ascension possible. If I do not want to cut corners, it is likely to be very close."

"Then... perhaps we shouldn't talk after all. I'd feel bad distracting you during such an important time."

"No, please do." Fiyu turned to her and began twisting her braid in her fingers. "I will be... less distracted after we have spoken. We are still friends, right Nauda?"

"Of course we are." Nauda sighed and dropped her head back against the wall. No more denying it. "Back in the Chasm, I... I know I hurt you. I didn't understand how things looked to you and I was selfish and I should have-"

"Please! You do not need to insult yourself. I have thought long on this and I believe I understand how I offended you. I am very sorry, Nauda."

She "believed" that she understood. Sometimes Nauda wondered if the idea of a relationship was foolish and it would be easier to just remain friends, but she couldn't deny the way her thoughts constantly flowed back to Fiyu. No, she definitely needed to address things now. If she didn't, most likely she would end up hurting feelings by Tatian standards, much less Ichili.

"What I mean to say," Nauda said very slowly, turning over each word in her mind, "is that I wasn't able to think about what you asked. So my answer... wasn't a good one. I was wondering if..."

At that point she finally ran out of words, especially when she heard Fiyu's sharp intake of breath. "You... are not still offended?" Fiyu always spoke softly, but now she barely reached a whisper. "I wanted to ask you one of the most important questions in life... I understand how I made it seem wrong. I thought you would never forgive me for that."

"Fiyu, I can't get you out of my head. I can't count how many times I've thought about that conversation and cursed myself for rejecting you. I just..."

Nauda reached out and clasped Fiyu's hand, even though she knew it wasn't appropriate. To her surprise, Fiyu didn't pull away at all. It appeared that she was blushing, underneath her mask, and she was definitely squirming, but she didn't pull away.

"Does that mean..." Fiyu took a slow breath. "Does that mean you want to be lifemates?"

"I want to be with you, Fiyu, but I don't want to hurt you even more." Their hands felt too hot and Nauda started to pull away, only for Fiyu to maintain the clasp. "If you were a Tatian woman, we'd begin a courtship. But I want you, and I... I'm not sure I know what that means."

Fiyu nodded somberly. "It seems there may be many questions. I care for you very much, but I do not think Ichili emotions work like yours. When you rejected me, I thought that we should never be more than friends. I have been suppressing those thoughts so I could be a good companion."

"Then you don't..."

"I have... not been very successful."

How could that dark smile be so bright? Nauda gripped Fiyu's hands tighter and breathed a sigh of relief. Her heart was pounding and she had the feeling everything was about to get a lot more confusing, but at least they were past the horrible silences and assumptions. It took Nauda a while to even think about what she was going to say, and Fiyu beat her to it.

"We will still travel together no matter what, right Nauda?"

"Yes, of course."

"Then I will stop suppressing that facet of myself." Fiyu finally pulled her hands away and placed them in her lap, but she seemed pleased. "I will search those feelings, and you can also consider me as a potential lifemate. We can discuss any issues before we make our decisions. This is the Ichili way of doing things."

That seemed very formal and cautious, but had Nauda expected anything else? She couldn't get the smile off her face as she responded. "That'll be better than being afraid I'd ruined it forever. But for how long? Do we just... travel together for years? How long does it go on?"

"Do not fear, Nauda. We have already known one another four years, so it will not take so many more years to discover our feelings." She gave a sheepish smile. "That is... slow for Tatian, is it not?"

"A little bit."

"Then what about this: let us first both ascend to Authority. My relatives have always told me that it is wise to reach that point before making other life decisions. After that, we will know if our emotions will endure for all time."

"Well then, let's get back to training!" Nauda pretended to grab her staff and was relieved when Fiyu giggled.

They didn't, of course. They didn't so much as kiss, even though Nauda desperately wanted to try. But she felt as though this conversation had been even more stressful for Fiyu than it had been for her and she didn't want to harm the Ichili woman again.

Truthfully, Nauda was still riding the high of those emotions as she left the room. She didn't know if she had a relationship now, and it didn't sound like a real courtship, but it was something. It was absolutely nothing like Tatian... and neither was Fiyu.

~ ~ ~

Friend Nauda wanted to be lifemates! Fiyu had known that there was emotional tension between them, but she had assumed that it was a strange Tatian instability. The fact that Friend Nauda had also been haunted by their argument and reconsidering her emotions felt like an impossible dream.

The thing that touched her most was that Friend Nauda had taken such pains to try to speak in her manner, to explain her emotions carefully. They were not Ichili emotions, but Fiyu could understand them and even love them. It was dizzying to think that Friend Nauda had only known her for a few years and somehow fallen so deeply in love with her.

Outside the room, where Fiyu walked to drink a glass of water, some doubts began to creep in. She was worried about what Friend Nauda might have assumed about their conversation. It seemed possible that there could be great confusion and sadness between them.

But no. Friend Nauda would speak to her and they could resolve anything. Just the fact that Fiyu had permission to begin considering Friend Nauda as a potential lifemate left her giddy. She walked out to the balcony to order her thoughts.

"You should be careful."

Relative Guchiro had been wrapped in his own stealth technique until that moment. He hadn't dropped it, merely expanded his sphere to include her. Fiyu immediately realized that he had overheard the entire conversation, which left her with strange feelings. Of course it was completely appropriate for an elder relative to be concerned about potential future lifemates. But if she did find a lifemate, then it would mean a new relationship with boundaries even for other relatives...

"Did I seem reckless?" Fiyu asked. Her relative stepped forward and gently smoothed back some of her hair. Underneath his mask, his mouth pressed together tightly.

"You are an adult and you can make your own decisions. But I fear you will be hurt deeply."

"Surely you don't think Nauda could do such a thing! She... she..."

"I saw her sacrifice her body to defend your life on multiple occasions. I do not doubt her passion." Relative Guchiro stared down at her, his eyes terribly sad. "But passion is like a serpent that can easily turn on you. I worry that, even if she has the best of intentions, she will make painful mistakes."

Fiyu drew a careful breath and closed her hands at her sides before responding. "Some things are worth being hurt."

Instead of answering, her relative stepped away to the edge of the balcony. He didn't answer for a long time, staring out over the city without using any of his deeper senses. When he did speak, he sounded different than she had ever heard him.

"I don't hate her, Fiyu. You've found good companions. But they've shielded you from the worst of what other worlds offer." Relative Guchiro didn't move, but his shoulders flexed and his senses reached back to brush against her in concern. "You haven't seen how insane some can be. They believe that stable relationships are boring, and they celebrate breaking lifemate bonds for the sake of temporary passions. They consider these things to be their highest arts and deepest natures."

"That can't be true!" Fiyu knew that she was acting like a child now, bluntly contradicting what her relative told her. But she didn't want to believe what he was saying.

"She did respect the time you need. That counts for something. If she hasn't changed her mind by the time you truly ask the question, then maybe it could work."

"Nauda will not change. You will see."

"Perhaps so." Relative Guchiro finally turned back to face her with a smile underneath his mask. "I meant what I said about you being an adult, Fiyu. Everything I have said is only advice given as a relative."

"And I thank you for it." Maybe there was a bit of childishness left, but Fiyu continued speaking. "I want you to help Nauda."

"What do you mean?"

"She is going to negotiate with the Noveni lineages so that I have more time for soulcrafting, but she will be limited without an Authority. She also lacks elder relatives to assist her in soulcrafting. While I finish polishing my soulhome, I want for you to help her. That is my request... as your relative."

His smile broadened and he touched her shoulder as he passed. "And how could I refuse such a request?"

As he walked away, his stealth technique passed over her body and Fiyu stood alone on the balcony. There was no one visible, but she suddenly felt exposed. She retreated to her room, trying not to think about everything that had been said. Even if she was certain that he would be wrong, the warmth within her had cooled.

-

Chapter 37

Across numerous fights, Theo's gravitational fields had faced all kinds of opposition. Many opponents had no resistance and could only struggle against the effects. Authorities and other powerful soulcrafters could burn their own energy to keep themselves in place. Demons could resist the core technique itself, and a rare few opponents could render themselves immune to the gravity shift.

For all of that, he'd never actually tried to use a field as a brute force tool. Theo grimaced and kept his hand up even though sweat was rolling down his forehead and back. 

On the other side of the room, Isorales hovered in the air. He was burning through his own cantae to keep himself upright despite the gravity bearing down on him. Theo kept pouring cantae into the field, which should have rendered Isorales absurdly heavy, but because he only manipulated gravity via cantae and didn't actually control the fundamental force, it could be resisted with enough power.

Normally, such a simple method would be completely useless in a battle, since Theo would just use the other techniques he'd developed. Here, as training, it was surprisingly useful. Theo remembered having liquid cantae from years and years ago, but there were some tricks he was adjusting to using again. Exerting all of those spiritual muscles was helping him sharpen his edge at the Authority tier.

"It's amazing... you can output so much at Authority..." Isorales sagged and pulled in his wings so they wouldn't crumple. "Okay... that's enough..."

Theo didn't move. He couldn't make the gravitational field any more intense, but his opponent would be feeling the attrition.

"Hey... come on... let up..."

"What if I don't?" Theo asked. He reversed the field abruptly, which slammed Isorales into the ceiling, then flipped it back around. Isorales barely managed to catch himself on the floor and struggled to rise past his knees. His rings clattered to the ground, no longer supported by his cantae.

"You wouldn't..." He was staring at Theo in utter terror, though. Theo couldn't see his own expression, but it must have been believable. After letting Isorales sweat for a little longer, he answered.

"I won't, but what if you fight someone else who will? Not in a contest, not someone who cares about your lineage. Someone who wants to kill you."

"Then... I'll probably die..." Isorales managed a self-deprecating smile, but Theo didn't let up and drove him further to the ground.

Finally understanding, Isorales grimaced and tried to fight back. His body was exhausted and the most he could do was make his bronze rings slide closer to his hands... which Theo realized a second later was actually enough. They rolled together into position in front of Isorales, then shifted upright. A moment later a beam of power slammed into Theo's chest and knocked him into the wall.

Even with his coat protecting him from the blast, it felt like getting punched in the chest. Theo dropped from the dented wall, prepared in case Isorales was angry and planning to attack. But the other man sat forlornly on the floor, checking his rings for damage.

"If it had been a real battle, you would have killed me with something else." Isorales cast him a rueful glance. "I don't know your cantae flow, but you're unnaturally good at switching between techniques."

"I'm impressed you managed to pull together that technique," Theo said as he sat down beside the other man. "But I knew you had it in you."

"Many people have said that sort of thing. They don't have a good track record of being right."

When they'd started training, Theo's only goal had been to get the Noveni man to feel some anger and really exert himself. Maybe, in a small way, he was expecting Isorales to be like Eratius. But of course they were nothing alike. Eratius had been born with nothing and filled himself with pride and anger. Isorales seemed to have been given everything and been left empty.

He wasn't incompetent, though. As far as Theo could tell from their training, he actually had mastery of his soulhome and a strong mind for soulcrafting. His intellect was less brilliant than a subtle current that slipped underneath you and swept your feet when you weren't looking. With a different disposition, he could have been a very dangerous man.

"I've been thinking that someone needed to push you harder," Theo said abruptly, "but now I'm guessing I was wrong. You've been pushed too much, haven't you?"

Isorales chuckled darkly. "I guess you could say that."

"You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. In fact, I'd like nothing more than to leave and go back to soulcrafting."

"Yeah, I get that impression." Isorales finally finished inspecting his rings for damage and instead lifted one of his wings over his shoulder to massage a bent point. "It's not that complicated. My parents wanted me to be the one to restore our lineage. I was supposed to be the heir worthy of my grandfather's patronage. From the time I could crawl, they told me I was going to be the best."

"And it backfired?"

"It worked brilliantly, right up until it didn't. I was the earliest to soulcraft, the first in my generation to Ruler, and then..." Isorales dug his fingers into his wing briefly, then went entirely slack. "There's one type of resilience that lets you keep going in the face of difficulty. The resilience that it takes to get over a failure turns out to be something very different. When I hit something I couldn't master, I failed and never really recovered."

Now that it was explained directly, Theo could put the entire story together. He probably should have before, he just hadn't been paying enough attention to Isorales. The golden son of the lineage, apparently strong but actually just one blow from crumpling. Not so different from the way Theo had been in his first life, not that he was about to share his own feelings.

"You're afraid I'll let you down." Isorales stared at him. His voice had sounded hurt at first, but Theo realized that it was actually cool analysis.

"You did well enough in the Wakespire," Theo said. After searching through his thoughts a while longer, he decided that he might as well. "Actually, it wasn't that at all. It seemed to me that you're the type who has lots of people telling you that you need to believe in yourself when you actually need someone to slap you in the face."

That got another rueful chuckle. "Maybe. I wanted to say, it's been a relief to work with the three of you. None of you care about the Jadadictus lineage at all."

"We don't. So if you want to stay allied in the final round, you'd better work hard."

"Now you sound like my parents." Isorales shook his head. "They're much happier with me these days, but in a way that makes things harder. I'd rather not talk about it. Have you decided on your strategy for your fourth floor?"

"I've built one corner room and part of another." Theo glanced into his soulhome out of habit. "I have the materials for them, but I'm not going to fully add them until before the end so my new enhancement chambers surprise people."

"Clever. The way my walls work, I need to build the entire circumference of my soulhome at the same time or it will collapse..."

They discussed soulcrafting for a while longer, until Senka arrived. Truthfully, Theo hadn't been intending to leave at any moment. The plan had always been to spend a while on recovery until it was time to travel with Senka again. Talking to Isorales had been an unexpected bonus.

She entered and hurled a rock at him. "Come feed Senka yummies!"

"Alright, gotta take care of her." Theo groaned as he got to his feet. "We'll talk later, Isorales."

"Wait, already?" He blinked between them. "I wanted to talk to you about the Artisans' Gallery. Are you planning to attend?"

"What's this now?"

"The event where Ugustial's best soulcrafter artisans try to compete for patronage. Technically it has nothing to do with the Wakespire, but of course this year we'll get the majority of the attention..." Isorales trailed off and then shook his head. "But you need the backing of a major lineage to buy any of their wares. Sorry, I should have thought about that."

"Can we get Jadadictus backing?" Theo asked. He was actually thinking more about the timing and wondering if this was what Ractifus had suggested.

"I can't give you that permission and I don't think anyone higher up in the lineage would be willing, sorry... maybe I shouldn't have even brought it up."

"No, it's fine. Maybe you'll see us there anyway."

As Theo left the palace with Senka, he thought more about this alleged gallery than what Isorales had told him. Given his limited social experience on Noven, he hadn't even been aware of it. If entry required major backing, that suggested prestige, which in cities like this generally correlated to soulcrafting. He'd have to think about it further.

"No running around to empty caches today," Senka told him once they were out. "I've been hunting for other sublime materials based on my memories."

"Out of caches?"

"Hardly! But if I want you three to carry me around the Nine Worlds, I need to make sure you don't get yourselves killed in the next battle."

Once they were outside the city defenses, Senka guided him once more. They skated around the edge of Noven and came back down in a region that looked typical enough. But before he could even examine the mountain spires around them, Senka led him through the cloud layer. Theo switched to his gravitational senses, though it wasn't as natural as he'd hoped. His intellectual awareness of points of mass was always overlapping with strange tingling sensations over his skin.

"You actually know what we're looking for," Senka whispered in his ear, "you just don't know it."

"Did you revert to your cursed form?"

"Fumpet. Just feel out the area and search for sublime beasts."

Unlike most areas beneath the clouds, which were gentle valleys between mountains, here the cliffs descended on and on. Disoriented by the weirkey travel, Theo wasn't sure if they bored directly into the heart of Noven or if this region just had an absurdly high cloud layer. When his senses fell away into the depths he shifted uncomfortably, imagining some beast crawling from the heart of Noven...

But what he was searching for was nowhere near that deep. He noticed it almost coincidentally: annoying little flecks of mass that distracted him from examining the caves within the cliffs. It was only after trying to filter them out of his senses that he realized they were exactly what Senka had told him to look for.

"Wheel beasts can live below the clouds?" he asked Senka. She shrugged from his shoulder.

"I've been trying to remember their locations ever since you started rambling on about lighteggs. As far as I know, they're not related at all. Some people tried to interbreed them in my era and failed. But they have the same bodies and they process sublime materials in exactly the same way."

"Must be convergent evolution."

"Alright, now you're the one babbling nonsense."

Theo was curious how "convergent evolution" had been soul translated, but he was more interested in the potential rewards. He began flying closer to the caves where he felt the majority of them flying. "So we're here because they create... not lighteggs, I suppose?"

"The word is 'darkeggs' and I'm sure it sounds pretty blunt via soul translation." Senka sighed from his shoulder. "Every word gets rendered so ugly on the other side. Noveni languages are really beautiful, in my opinion, but in other worlds it's all 'gold this' and 'light that'."

They didn't banter any further, as they instead tried to hunt for mature sublime beasts within the caverns. Once he got closer, Theo could feel the wheel beasts in better detail: just like the ones he knew, they were glistening wheels surrounding a floating core. Their behavior was a little different, including swarming at him until he warded them off with a point of anti-mass.

Senka offered her suggestions for hunting them, but she wouldn't have needed to. Just months ago, Theo had needed to rely on Guchiro. Now he had a plethora of options: many of his gravitational skills could capture the wheel beasts and even his raw speed was enough to catch them. Soon enough he managed to get his hands on a freshly completed darkegg.

"This one isn't bad." Theo hefted it in his hands and wished that he could examine it with his eyes, but she'd already warned him that could damage the shell. "I don't need this anymore, but you're thinking of it for Fiyu?"

"At minimum." Senka hovered away and grabbed one of the flying beasts he'd already driven to exhaustion. It struggled wildly as she plucked at its wings. "Your use for them actually wasn't known in my time, or at least I hadn't heard of it. They have much less dramatic uses at higher tiers. But since I've actually found a region where they haven't all been taken, I figured we should harvest more."

"Yeah, we might as well." Theo wrapped sublime cloth around the darkegg and then began hunting for perfect eggs. "Why is this region abandoned, by the way?"

"Other than the lack of ground? It's hard to build a civilization between cliffs."

"Surely some soulcrafters from nearby regions must hunt here for materials."

"Well, that might have more to do with the much nastier sublime beasts that feed on the darkeggs normally. You probably don't want to stay here too long, by the way."

Despite Senka's warning, they had time to find two more high quality darkeggs before Theo thought they had fully searched the region. That left him with three powerful but potentially useless artifacts. He wouldn't get any benefit from further saturating his soulhome, Fiyu using multiple would be overkill, and it wasn't clear if Nauda could use them at all. Still, it was a benefit he hadn't expected.

Theo used weirkey-skipping to return himself to a space above the clouds, since it felt better than hovering over the bottomless depths. He realized that Senka hadn't seemed even slightly troubled by the darkness and wondered if that was related to her curse or in spite of it.

"I'm not even done!" Senka grinned triumphantly. "I've been searching and found not one, but two sublime materials that still exist from my memories and aren't tightly controlled. You still have stone from Fithe, but you'll need bricks for higher tiers, right?"

"Unless I start building walls from dreams and pixie dust." Theo answered automatically and then wondered if "pixie dust" would make any sense. Judging from how Senka rolled her eyes, it communicated clearly enough. Normally he avoided Earth phrases he thought wouldn't translate, but they tended to slip out with Senka.

"At certain points on Noven, there are living mountains that grow powerful sublime materials. I managed to find some that aren't being mined. After that I don't have anything for you, but I think you'll be pleased."

They teleported across the world yet again and emerged in another cloudless region. As far as Theo could see, there weren't any mountains. The rises around them could barely be considered hills.

"Behold," Senka said with her arms thrown wide, "the mightiest mountains in all Noven!"

"Uh... maybe they look big to someone as small as you, but-"

"Shut it, fumpet! I insist that you start breaking apart rocks for me to eat. Like there, that one."

Ignoring her mocking, Theo cast a torsion bolt at one of the gentle hills. It proved much tougher than he expected, despite the fact that he didn't sense any strong sublime materials. He flew lower and began drilling into the top more carefully while using a gravitational field to lift away the material.

"I actually wasn't sporping with you," Senka explained as he worked. "These humble hills are actually some of the most ancient mountains on all Noven. They only appear this way because time and tide have-"

"Time and erosion ground them down, right?" Theo had already put it together. "We have those on my world too. The highest mountains are actually the newest and some of the hills were ancient mountains."

"Your world takes all the fun out of obscure secrets." Despite her scowl, Senka seemed to be enjoying herself. "It looks like you understand, then. These mountains have been building sublime materials in their cores for eons, but they're contained within layers of weaker materials and dead stone. Apparently that secret has been lost in the modern world."

Theo finally broke through to a more potent sublime material and floated lower to examine it. Instead of just one type of stone, there appeared to be powerful fragments of different types. They proved more durable than the outer layers of rock, however, and he struggled to extract many. It took bombarding the surface with rocks accelerated by gravity to get deeper.

Eventually he had about as many sublime stones as he could easily keep in his vestibule, but there hadn't been anything truly exceptional. He thought about teasing Senka over it and realized just how easily they'd fallen into that pattern. Not sure how he felt about that, he decided to stay practical.

"These are good construction materials, but nothing that could serve as a central material."

"Of course the most valuable ones are at the core, idiot." Senka rolled her eyes. "Can you really not dig deeper than this?"

"I could lift the rocks higher, but they're starting to break apart against the materials." Theo peered down at the small mountain they had cracked open to examine the surface underneath the rubble. "Whatever that dark stone is, it would make a good material for buildings in the physical world, because I don't think I can get through it easily."

"Sometimes I forget you're just an Authority. Here, let me..."

He thought Senka was mocking him at first, but when he glanced toward her, she actually had a strangely wistful expression on her face. Theo wasn't sure what she meant, so he just waited while Senka floated down to the damaged area.

She took a deep breath and began gathering cantae. A sphere began to grow beneath her... and kept growing. Theo's eyes widened as he realized that it wasn't a technique, just raw power being filtered through her curse.

At the last second, the cantae went through some kind of phase shift and became far more intense. It shot down in the same instant and impacted on the mountain, sending shockwaves in all directions. Theo barely saw it, because releasing the blast sent Senka flying uncontrollably into the air.

Slowing her with a gravitational field would have made the most sense, but Theo instinctively flew after her. Senka appeared to be unconscious after releasing the blast and hung limply in his arms. After the Archive of Misery, she had said that she would be able to perform one attack. He had been expecting a cantae bolt, not the devastation underneath him.

Because Senka was still unconscious, Theo drifted into the crater. The tough layer that he'd been struggling to break had certainly been shattered and currently lay all across the gentle hills. Theo decided to leave the rubble and focus on the center. Deeper than the rest, somewhat buried by rocks that had fallen into the crater, he could sense something far more powerful.

Lifting the rubble away was easy enough, then Theo descended to their prize. It looked like a lumpy gray rock about the size of his head, but it pulsed with cantae. He'd encountered many sublime stones that formed perfect spheres or glowed with power. This one outclassed all of them.

"Tah-dah..." Senka said weakly. "A mountainheart. Hope it was worth it."

"This is powerful. Maybe too powerful... I'm not sure I can use this in my soulhome."

"Well it's all I've got, nlermit. Be grateful."

"I'm more worried about the blast." Theo felt awkward carrying her around but she didn't seem capable of hovering, so he set her in the air and pinned her in place with gravity. "You've been capable of that ever since the Archive?"

"Apparently so. It got away from me." Senka looked weary and he saw that her eyes and nose were leaking blood like they hadn't in some time. "I can't do that again for a while... and maybe in the future I should tone it down..."

Left unsaid was the fact that the blast only represented a crippled fraction of her former power. He didn't often think about how Senka had once been a soulcrafter beyond Dominion, but as he stood in the remains of a mountain, it couldn't be denied.

It also made things awkward between them, so he switched tactics. "Don't fall asleep yet. I wanted to ask you about something called the Artisans' Gallery."

"Never saw anything like that in my time, but I heard about it while stealing blook." Senka wiped at the blood, but more continued pouring out. "It's the best way to get soulcrafters to make things for you, but you need permission. If you can't use the mountainheart... that's probably your next best bet."

Since it looked like she really was fading, Theo let her down. She promptly spat a rock into his face and skipped off, but he wasn't even angry. Not with the mountainheart pulsing in his hands.

It took some effort to get it into his soulhome, leaving both his physical and spiritual hands bloody. Within, the cantae it put off scraped against his barrier walls and would definitely destroy any room he tried to place it inside. Theo settled for packing it within the lesser sublime stones from the mountain and then put the whole thing inside one of his containment chests. That would be very useful... eventually.

In the meantime, he had decisions to make. Most likely, it was time to talk to Ractifus Terefilia.