Misty day. Dangerous day. Turn a corner. Find a gang.

Get stabbed.

Tauga had ways of seeing around corners. Her tendrils splayed into the surrounding streets, tracing the warm taste of loitering bodies. Some of them were neither warm, nor loitering. A handful of her loyalists were still reporting the bloodthirsty and the missing to the Rotfly Watch, for what it was worth. Safety danced elusively through the City, flickering away on the breeze and leaving knives in its wake. The only reliably empty roads were those she made herself. This was not one of them.

Keriss had cleared the streets leading to Westwagon Gate at Tauga's request, this time without her supervision. She'd look back later to see if the work had been done safely enough for her tastes. For now, and judging by the tense, wary vagrants that were milling on the road she herself roamed, it looked like they'd been pushed out of that area with some success.

More resistance in Tauga's way. She hardly noticed.

Seething, rustling hair followed her and her Rotflies, the vast body of Amber supporting a wheeled platform on its back, loaded with fearful eyes and tightly held children. The squadron flanking her moved at a practiced jog to match Tauga's own inexhaustible stamina, and had quickly learned to trust her pace, even when she was running at an unmoving obstacle.

The street party quietened before she was even in view through the mist. The aura of Sin was powerful, but within the roaming grip of the Blowfly's tentacles, for the brief and lucky seconds when Tauga was close, Order was stronger.

Fearful to give up the thrill of the madness, she felt their hands move to fists and spiked clubs. Her own hands slid Help's scalpel from its sheath. They signalled the Watch to a sprint.

She saw the whites of their eyes.

Tauga's blade flicked out across the man's belly, twisted, arced back again in a blink of gleaming black. She thrust herself past his thigh, a shove of her oh-so-small hain palm casting him aside for the Rotflies to jump over. The others began to run. They didn't run fast enough. She leapt with both feet, smashed a woman's face with her boots in the air, landed on it and moved on.

The rest of the street was clear, but for the drunk and the dead. Her convoy rolled on.

Westwagon Gate was empty, as expected. Tauga stepped aside, the squad dividing in two without orders, half continuing the escort. As they secured the platform to waiting oxen, Amber slunk out from below and curled up in Tauga's pocket, all two tonnes of it.

"Where are we going?" asked a human voice from the huddle, thin and very young.

"Out," answered the masked figure without thinking, motioning her troops to start the next run.



Some time ago.

The boots of the Blowfly made soft clacks on the cobbled road as she moved, echoed by four others and the melodic hoot of Pumps. Far from the usual cracking retort of a sprint leading the loping black masks of the Watch. No, Tauga would do this slowly. She was determined to do that. No need to scare them off. We're not here to kill. This was a time and place to be happy. The celebration of the return of Énas Amartia was in its second... Third week.

Celebrations were nice. Tauga's goggles flicked out over the faces of the men and women who glanced at her and the Rotflies at her side, taking knowing looks before slinking into the shadows as if it was on their way. Festivals are good.

It was a dream come true, really. The God-Emperor had returned to his beloved City. The whitemasks had been conquered, enslaved and brought home single-handed. Food was plentiful and wine ran freely, and every day was a carnival. It's nice. It'll just keep on getting better. Accidents happen at carnivals, like they always did. Pumps fluted a high note at a cluster of murmuring drinkers and Tauga's hand flicked to her khopesh.

Things are back to the way they're meant to be.

Coloured lanterns ahead bobbed in a breeze, the massive bonfire ahead shining. The crowd closed up again in the darkness behind them.

Oyur tapped Tauga's shoulder and requested permission to light a torch. Tauga nodded and watched her jog to one side, following her with her tendrils, the crowd parting only minimally for the Rotfly alone. She came back. Tauga exhaled. Etti shrugged his hefty Tedar shoulders restlessly.

The three of them left the light of the fire. The sound of revelry was still distinctly close.

A wandering tentacle picked up the source of the scent they were looking for nearby and they moved in.

Eleven revellers were standing in a semicircle facing them. Their eyes were clear and without shame. At their feet, stripped and tied and bleeding from the face, was another Rotfly. Hair matted with blood and oil. Oil everywhere, puddled in the road.

The bonfire. They'd been feeding it all night. It was far too large.

Pumps whistled happily.

Tauga lunged, her scalpel flying from its sheath, the Rotflies moving to back her. At least three of the culprits drew swords of their own and Tauga forced her way through their number, splitting the group to single them out. They'd avoided her swings, but Etti had been a trained soldier and pressed into them as they moved, wounding one and killing another as Oyur flanked a man with a sword.

Obsidian sickles scythed out, Oyur ducked under a slash and Tauga opened the man's side. They still weren't running. Oyur's long-honed instincts drove her back into the fray and Tauga followed the swordswoman's lead.

The torch flashed, pressing them back, and Tauga moved, her footwork clumsy but fast. Oyur stepped into the panic she made and picked off revellers with measured blows.

Wounded fell beside the dead and more came up. Tauga felt Etti being pressed further away from them as he fought, hulking, fast, outnumbered. Oyur's torch wasn't alone. Unnoticed, the carnival had grown louder. Had moved closer.

Around them, the streets were being blocked.

The masked figure flicked a pocket in her shoulder and threw Amber at the closest part of the mob, the vast fox-tail exploding into the mass of knives and bared teeth, but the maddened people of Xerxes had planned for the Blowfly's antics, and Amber recoiled at their torches, unable to leap into melee. A flung rock hit Etti's eye and he took a shoulder wound.

Everywhere was people- Crushing press of muscle and hate with lethal intent, swarming over their blows.

Crash. Screams. Crash.

The Bludgeon took off, underside painted with blood. An instant later, another side of the crowd was pulped. Madness reigned. Tauga grabbed Oyur by the waist and leapt into the sky, Amber flowing around her ankle and around them like a cloak, scooping up Pumps as it moved. The noise was left behind in a rush of cold air.

She could hear Oyur's heart pounding through her mask. She could see the pyre below. She could taste oil.



Moments later.

Tauga set them down by the outer wall of the barracks and Amber compressed back into a niche in her suit. Oyur took a moment to regain her balance; She'd never flown before. "Sir?" The hain inclined her goggled face towards Oyur and said nothing.

"Tauga?"

A faint sound of breathing. Behind the mask, Oyur couldn't tell if Tauga's eyes were open, but she had her doubts. "You know what you saw. Report that to Sen and tell him to put the city into lockdown. Scatter that festival. If there are leaders, have them burned. Use everyone you can. Stick together." She motioned with her beak. "Go. I'll join you soon." Oyur nodded, and sharply executed the order.

Tauga felt her pass out of sight, and slumped heavily against the wall. Pumps made frightened and concerned cooing sounds, which she readily ignored. Slowly, rhythmically, she began to bang her head against the brickwork. "Everything," she began, "is fine."

"The return of Énas Amartia is a glorious thing. This is all under his control, and his plans for Xerxes are what's best for everyone." Bang, bang, bang. "The City is prosperous and its people are happy and healthy. If something seems wrong, that's just my fault." Bang. "I'm just not working hard enough." Bang. "Fuck."

A scraping noise of boots on cobble as she felt herself slide down the wall, lying almost prone in the alley. "Fuu-uuu-uck."

Tauga's scabbard dangled from its strap and rested on the street. She had no idea how to use it. Her recruits were better fighters than she was, and tonight two more of them had died at her hands. Bang. Her fault. Oh, and some forty sin cultists. Bang.

Every morning, the funeral pyres burned unnoticed with the bodies of those who died in the dark carnival. Bang. On the city outskirts, her loyal slaves were on the verge of revolt and nobody had the least idea why. Bang.

Breathe. She pushed herself to her feet.

"Guess I might as well stick to the fuckin' hammer from now on," Tauga mumbled, rolling her wrists. "Go home, Pumps. Tonight's gonna be messy." The sweetheart moaned softly, gripped the back of her head, and obediently ballooned off.

Somebody had pissed in the street and Tauga saw herself reflected in the puddle as she walked past. The Blowfly, cold and heartless and unstoppable. Business as usual.

She'd figure something out. As always.



The present.

Tauga had a room. It was high in the citadel Eye, and it was accessible from the sky alone. It surprised her little that this palace responded to the touch of her tentacles. She could open doors without even looking at them, reveal hidden compartments and chutes and peepholes and caches of weapons carved from the whatever it is that made up the uncanny pyramid. It was not secret knowledge that the Eye of Cipher had been of Yah Vuh before it was of the Énas, though the latter had made it his own.

Drifting through the circular hatch that opened before her, suspended from the Ophanim like a marionette, Tauga landed on her toes, stumbled, and fell chest-first on her bunk. Clumsily flicked the latches of her mask and left it to one side. No, as it happened, the Blowfly was not inexhaustible. She could only sprint and fight and train for so many days without sleep. The portal slid closed, its interior side translucent, a one-way window.

Pumps was whistling and spinning his usual whirligig dance now that she was finally back, missing a beat every now and again ever since Keriss had at him. Tauga mumbled something, but the sweetheart stopped only long enough to wrap its arms around her neck in a cool hug.

She felt nothing. All she could feel was tired and tense. It was something about coming back to find Pumps, coming back from a torn city, mad and maddening, to- A small, comfortable room in dim light, completely alone but for a creature that was utterly unaware of the Hell developing below, and would scream if it knew even a hundredth part of it. This... contrast. It's like a dream. Bad, sick dream. That wasn't right, either. Surreal. That's it. Surreal and lonely enough to let me think that everything else is a dream... Tauga didn't notice herself tumble softly into sleep.

When her eyes snapped open, the nightmare began.

Motionless and utterly silent, Heartworm filled a dark room with crossed limbs of bone white, vast grey visor eyeless and staring. Tauga's heart stopped- She jerked. Her tentacles writhed everywhere and not a single one ever touched the horrorsome deity, never winced away to warn her it was there, a towering sensory void that dwarved her and threatened to swallow her whole. Pumps slept soundly. It did not move. Not even to breathe.

It loomed like a hallucination at the foot of the bed.

Despite Tauga's extensive failure, she will not be terminated yet.

Tauga didn't realise that the words had been spoken aloud until the shock began to boil away, and after that, the fear. What was left of her was hollow and apathetic, a broken dream that no longer seemed to be from her perspective. She'd spoken to God before without hurt- But then, that had been on neutral terms.

"While prior loyalties to a dead society have obfuscated attempts to predict your behaviour, the results of the project are not unfavourable. Your presence has stimulated a significant change to the course of events. The survival of Xerxian culture in diaspora can be used as a mechanism to spread arksynth technology quickly across the northern hemisphere." Heartworm's left limb extended across the length of the chamber, a slender, pale arm adorned with iridescent cloven hoof below the wrist. "Your mission continues."

Heartworm's bladed fingertips moved independently over a shallow circular indent in the wall, tracing a command symbol. The organic shapes came alive at its touch. That side of the room shivered and slid away, its organic shapes coming apart as a jigsaw, turning and realigning with others that settled into an entirely new shape with frames, bowls, and faint light nodes over a workbench. The hoof split apart and a familiar grey tube fell from it.

Working with shimmering claws and hypodermics, and tentacles that extended from its core, Heartworm spilled liquid arksynth into a basin and began twisting and dividing it, bathing it in choking aromatic fluids and stretching it into ribbons as it grew. It made the work look easy, graceful- Effortless. The task Tauga had ignored for months was done in moments.

Even when Heartworm finished Tauga's simple laboratory, its hand remained outstretched in the dark of night, body balanced perfectly on the other limb. "Second attempt. You will learn quickly, manufacture any substance or mechanism you find of use, disseminate this knowledge among your followers. War is coming. Mobilise."

The hand panned aside to hover over Pumps, asleep beside Tauga. The sweetheart began to stir awake, eyes flickering open, letting off only a faint whistle at the disturbance. "This one will continue to assist you." Bismuth claws fell in a measured arc, cutting open the sweetheart from head to belly, slicing through the neural cortex.

Tauga felt nothing, said nothing.

Delicately, Heartworm excised and removed several threads of deep red tissue from the body, laid them out on the desk. "To be consumed with caution." The hand retracted. Silence in the dark once more. Tauga just stared. The voice came again.

"You may find it helpful, Tauga."

Then Heartworm slit a dark passage into reality, slid through it and was gone. Silence. Hours and hours of silence. Tauga didn't notice her muscles aching with stiffness. She still hadn't moved.

Very slowly, dawn began to leak into the room.

Tauga felt herself pull away from the bunk and reach over to where she'd left a bowl of water, and drank hoarse gulps. She tried to sleep again, and succeeded, though her life seemed no different when she woke up a few hours later. She chewed lamely at some dried fish and stretched her calves. Noonday light fell onto motes of dust in a stream that came nearly to her toes. She stopped thinking in words, or counting time in moments.

Eventually, Tauga pulled herself to her feet and over to the benchtop. Pumps' carcass smelled faintly like an abattoir, only sweeter.

Hesitantly prodding the strips of flesh left for her by Heartworm, she lifted it and put it on her tongue. It tasted of sugar. Tauga swallowed.

Very quickly, she came to understand.



Days later.

Alien sounds rasped around Tauga's head. Every now and again she realised that the clamour was nothing less than her own pounding heart and rattling breath, thick, crackling gasps like a dying animal. Then she'd take a few more steps, forget, and realise again. Her back slouched forwards, and her arms hung, spasming, fingers twitching. Through darkly bloodshot eyes she stared at the ground and the sky as she walked, each step requiring several seconds of work. Only her tentacles guided her way, semiautonomous as they were.

The memories were continuous and clear as glass, but her ability to recall them had collapsed as she came down. Images and words floated through her brain unbidden.

It was broad daylight when she descended, letting herself drop effortlessly to her feet on the deck of the ship. Sunshades and marquees had been erected above the wooden slats and rugs had been laid down on them. Her tentacles expanded into the pleasure barge, tasting everything, scanning it all, driving a thrill of precognitive terror into the naked nobles, their slaves, their kidnapped toys.

In the moment it took to draw her khopesh, she locked eyes with the bejeweled captain spread-eagle on the pillows before her. 'My ship now,' she mouthed, opening her pockets as she blurred into the mess of bodies.

One of Tauga's legs forgot how to walk and she tripped on air. By miracle alone did she pull herself back to her feet, swaying.

What the hain Victor saw as he moved from the shadows was not pleasant. With her mask off, the Blowfly's eyes could be seen, bloodred, the thin skin encircling them pulled taut as they sulked back into Tauga's skull. The black goggles of her mask were almost more human.

He knew she was there, and she knew he knew. It was part of her game. Two of his sisters had already died this way. That much was clear to him, now that he saw himself facing the same fate. He did not fear death. Only reviled the means and purpose through which it should come. He bared his steel.

If anything, it was, at least, a chance for him to spite the Jvanic Entity and all its malcreations.

Minutes later, the Blowfly wrenched her hammer from what was left of the Victor's skull. Her muscles burned, an almost pleasant sensation she didn't really feel. The new training regimen was suiting her well.

From the waist up, Tauga was slowly losing balance, her path meandering left and right as she vainly tried to restore her balance. This time she didn't get up when she fell. Lying there, she could hear voices coming closer. They were dimmer and further than the memories.

There were nine of them. Scholars, a few, and the rest artisans, craftsmen. Slaves, all, a distinction that had become arbitrary to the Blowfly lately. Slave or no, she could do whatever she pleased.

Before them was a long table, and on that table was makeshift equipment, bowls, pegs, knives, scoops. Buckets of slop, raw meat and fruit. Powders and crushed leaves. Cups of arksynth. Nine tiny specks of red flesh.

"Sit. Listen." The slaves obeyed immediately. "I'm gonna teach you how to use it and make more of it. You're gonna figure it out and then move to the palace, where you'll fuck around with it as I say until I find a ship to put you on to get you the fuck out of here. Got it?" They nodded. One of them nodded hesitantly. Tauga caught her eye, lifted her by the throat and hurled her from the palace window, where she screamed until the ophan's razor cord caught her in midair.

The Blowfly picked up her share of the sweetmeat and put it on her tongue. Waste not. "Eat this," she said. They did. "Now we understand each other. If you so much as blink at me the wrong way, you'll join her."

Now, with the checks in place, the learning could begin.

Someone was lifting Tauga by the shoulders; She tried to resist, couldn't. One of the voices was familiar.

Tonight had been the first time the Rotfly Watch had spoken to her in days. The Blowfly didn't walk anywhere now, only flew. Nobody knew her plans. Not even Sen.

"Why are we doing this?" asked the captain, for the fifth time. No response from the figure in the suit, who was now smashing wine barrels with her hammer. Quickly and systematically, without wasting time on a response. Sen continued his own task, standing guard with the rest of the squadron as the slaves crushed boxes of fruit.

"No matter how much we spoil, the Énas will just make more. He visits these storehouses often. There's no way you can starve the dark carnival out of existence."

Tauga replied by snatching the torch out of Sen's hand as carts of large, sealed jars arrived from the palace. Between her and the slaves, the clear, sharply aromatic liquid within was soon dumped onto the stores. Sen sniffed. Faintly like vinegar, only sweeter.

The militiamen and slaves were motioned out of the storehouse. Tauga hung back only long enough to toss Sen's torch into the building. Immediately, the soaked straw flooring flashed alight. The whole structure was ablaze in moments.

"What fucking storehouse," muttered Tauga, and disappeared into the night sky.

Sen stopped calling Tauga's name; Her eyes were focusing on him but she clearly wasn't capable of speech yet. After a brisk exchange with the hain alongside him, they decided she was safe to move. He lifted the young beakie in his arms, and began a steady walk back to the barracks, flanked by his detachment.

She was light. So, so light.

The dark carnival seethed and roared below. Houses had been burned just to make room for some of the larger... Festivities. Dances that turned into orgies. Boxing rings that became brawls. Games that became lynch mobs for the loser. Despite everything, the madness had grown. Bonfires dotted Xerxes.

As the Blowfly began to descend, the ophan cords hummed a familiar dirge of scythed air.

The Bludgeons careened into the mass of people, ophanim scraping sparks from roads that quickly soaked in blood. A single sweeping movement blew each pyre apart in a flare of light and embers. Back and forth the iron spheres passed over the festival grounds, crushing. Bodies flew, bones crunched.

When the survivors scattered in the streets, Tauga ended her slaughter. She was splattered. Mangled people lay everywhere, some still moaning. That would scare the cultists off for a day or two, maybe. Precious hours to move men and supplies safely through the City.

And then they'd be back. She hadn't even dented them.

"Oh, Tauga," sighed Sen, setting down his general on a stretcher. The Rotfly Watch clustered around, filling the barracks, waking their comrades just for a glimpse of what had become of their Blowfly. "You poor kid."

Only faint murmurs stirred the militia. Broken-hearted Tauga, they whispered. The girl without a soul.Days later.

Alien sounds rasped around Tauga's head. Every now and again she realised that the clamour was nothing less than her own pounding heart and rattling breath, thick, crackling gasps like a dying animal. Then she'd take a few more steps, forget, and realise again. Her back slouched forwards, and her arms hung, spasming, fingers twitching. Through darkly bloodshot eyes she stared at the ground and the sky as she walked, each step requiring several seconds of work. Only her tentacles guided her way, semiautonomous as they were.

The memories were continuous and clear as glass, but her ability to recall them had collapsed as she came down. Images and words floated through her brain unbidden.

It was broad daylight when she descended, letting herself drop effortlessly to her feet on the deck of the ship. Sunshades and marquees had been erected above the wooden slats and rugs had been laid down on them. Her tentacles expanded into the pleasure barge, tasting everything, scanning it all, driving a thrill of precognitive terror into the naked nobles, their slaves, their kidnapped toys.

In the moment it took to draw her khopesh, she locked eyes with the bejeweled captain spread-eagle on the pillows before her. 'My ship now,' she mouthed, opening her pockets as she blurred into the mess of bodies.

One of Tauga's legs forgot how to walk and she tripped on air. By miracle alone did she pull herself back to her feet, swaying.

What the hain Victor saw as he moved from the shadows was not pleasant. With her mask off, the Blowfly's eyes could be seen, bloodred, the thin skin encircling them pulled taut as they sulked back into Tauga's skull. The black goggles of her mask were almost more human.

He knew she was there, and she knew he knew. It was part of her game. Two of his sisters had already died this way. That much was clear to him, now that he saw himself facing the same fate. He did not fear death. Only reviled the means and purpose through which it should come. He bared his steel.

If anything, it was, at least, a chance for him to spite the Jvanic Entity and all its malcreations.

Minutes later, the Blowfly wrenched her hammer from what was left of the Victor's skull. Her muscles burned, an almost pleasant sensation she didn't really feel. The new training regimen was suiting her well.

From the waist up, Tauga was slowly losing balance, her path meandering left and right as she vainly tried to restore her balance. This time she didn't get up when she fell. Lying there, she could hear voices coming closer. They were dimmer and further than the memories.

There were nine of them. Scholars, a few, and the rest artisans, craftsmen. Slaves, all, a distinction that had become arbitrary to the Blowfly lately. Slave or no, she could do whatever she pleased.

Before them was a long table, and on that table was makeshift equipment, bowls, pegs, knives, scoops. Buckets of slop, raw meat and fruit. Powders and crushed leaves. Cups of arksynth. Nine tiny specks of red flesh.

"Sit. Listen." The slaves obeyed immediately. "I'm gonna teach you how to use it and make more of it. You're gonna figure it out and then move to the palace, where you'll fuck around with it as I say until I find a ship to put you on to get you the fuck out of here. Got it?" They nodded. One of them nodded hesitantly. Tauga caught her eye, lifted her by the throat and hurled her from the palace window, where she screamed until the ophan's razor cord caught her in midair.

The Blowfly picked up her share of the sweetmeat and put it on her tongue. Waste not. "Eat this," she said. They did. "Now we understand each other. If you so much as blink at me the wrong way, you'll join her."

Now, with the checks in place, the learning could begin.

Someone was lifting Tauga by the shoulders; She tried to resist, couldn't. One of the voices was familiar.

Tonight had been the first time the Rotfly Watch had spoken to her in days. The Blowfly didn't walk anywhere now, only flew. Nobody knew her plans. Not even Sen.

"Why are we doing this?" asked the captain, for the fifth time. No response from the figure in the suit, who was now smashing wine barrels with her hammer. Quickly and systematically, without wasting time on a response. Sen continued his own task, standing guard with the rest of the squadron as the slaves crushed boxes of fruit.

"No matter how much we spoil, the Énas will just make more. He visits these storehouses often. There's no way you can starve the dark carnival out of existence."

Tauga replied by snatching the torch out of Sen's hand as carts of large, sealed jars arrived from the palace. Between her and the slaves, the clear, sharply aromatic liquid within was soon dumped onto the stores. Sen sniffed. Faintly like vinegar, only sweeter.

The militiamen and slaves were motioned out of the storehouse. Tauga hung back only long enough to toss Sen's torch into the building. Immediately, the soaked straw flooring flashed alight. The whole structure was ablaze in moments.

"What fucking storehouse," muttered Tauga, and disappeared into the night sky.

Sen stopped calling Tauga's name; Her eyes were focusing on him but she clearly wasn't capable of speech yet. After a brisk exchange with the hain alongside him, they decided she was safe to move. He lifted the young beakie in his arms, and began a steady walk back to the barracks, flanked by his detachment.

She was light. So, so light.

The dark carnival seethed and roared below. Houses had been burned just to make room for some of the larger... Festivities. Dances that turned into orgies. Boxing rings that became brawls. Games that became lynch mobs for the loser. Despite everything, the madness had grown. Bonfires dotted Xerxes.

As the Blowfly began to descend, the ophan cords hummed a familiar dirge of scythed air.

The Bludgeons careened into the mass of people, ophanim scraping sparks from roads that quickly soaked in blood. A single sweeping movement blew each pyre apart in a flare of light and embers. Back and forth the iron spheres passed over the festival grounds, crushing. Bodies flew, bones crunched.

When the survivors scattered in the streets, Tauga ended her slaughter. She was splattered. Mangled people lay everywhere, some still moaning. That would scare the cultists off for a day or two, maybe. Precious hours to move men and supplies safely through the City.

And then they'd be back. She hadn't even dented them.

"Oh, Tauga," sighed Sen, setting down his general on a stretcher. The Rotfly Watch clustered around, filling the barracks, waking their comrades just for a glimpse of what had become of their Blowfly. "You poor kid."

Only faint murmurs stirred the militia. Broken-hearted Tauga, they whispered. The girl without a soul.



A few days on.

Light dazzled over the surface of Xerxes' harbour. The sun still shone a little too brightly for Tauga's taste, though she was recovering fast. The black goggles on her flight mask would resolve that much, once she could wear it without choking on her own breath again. As it was, she was walking around with her beak slightly open all the time to get enough air. It made her look like an angry drunk. She supposed she had been.

Mako and Ruthar were overseeing the last preparations before the ship cast off. Most of the crates and all of the refugees had been loaded; What remained were a few non-essentials, mostly trading materials that could hopefully be used to buy passage in distant lands. It was all being taken below deck, but for the odd, yellowish, mushroom-like rig that was being grown at the side of the ship. That needed to stay in sunlight. It was worth more than half of the rest of the supplies put together, if it worked. The only ones that remained were a few Rotflies standing guard on the dock before they left their home and army behind.

Sen shouted something, which Ruthar confirmed. Tauga realised that the masked ex-militiamen were not the only ones left, and, shortly afterwards, that she was being approached. She felt them walk towards her with her tendrils, not raising her head until they were close. "Oyur," she mumbled. "Erjang. You've decided?"

It was Erjang, the tattooed elder, who answered. "North," she said firmly. "They say it's populated, and the winds are good. Most of the ships are sailing that way." Tauga nodded. "Remember what I said about the... Crystal place." Words to fill the gap. Of course they would remember.

"We're here to say goodbye," she continued. "And thank you, Blowfly."

Tauga's eyes widened, palms rising a little. "Oh." It hadn't been something she'd expected to hear.

Erjang raised her eyebrows, then laughed softly. "I guess that's all there is to it." She turned and gazed back on the fleet of stolen and repurposed vessels, their inhabitants protected from the new Xerxes at such cost. "We do owe you, you know. More than you think. We might have watched the City die, but the People, the real City, well." The elder stretched her time-worn muscles and grinned, despite everything. Tauga shrugged limply.

Oyur shuffled, as if making a decision, then stepped up and wrapped her arms around Tauga, bending her knees to reach head head. "Thanks, Tauga. We won't... We'll never forget. What you stood for." Tauga tried to shrug, and couldn't. She lifted her beak a little, closed it in a hainish kind of smile. She guessed that was appropriate. Oyur let her go, leaned back, took a good look at her.

"And... I'm sorry. For..."

"Yeah, I know," said Tauga lamely. "Me."

Oyur choked a little, pressed her lips together behind her bandanna, stood to attention. Saluted her general one last time. Tauga nodded firmly. Without further trivialities, she turned and escorted Erjang back to the ship.

Tauga sighed. By the time Sen stepped up to her for orders, she'd fitted the Blowfly mask back on her face. Turning, she could see the reignited fires of the City, the dark carnival unending, just as the Énas Amartia had promised. Only now with no one sane left to save.

Stretch. "Ready for another round in Hell, Sen?" she said without humour.

"Sir," replied the captain.

Tauga stepped into the darkness of the streets, leaving the light of fresh dawn behind her. No one left to save.

That wasn't true. She was Xerxes, and Xerxes was her. And though the Blowfly was long past saving, well.

She'd fight anyway.

Tauga had a room. It was high in the citadel Eye, and it was accessible from the sky alone. It surprised her little that this palace responded to the touch of her tentacles. She could open doors without even looking at them, reveal hidden compartments and chutes and peepholes and caches of weapons carved from the whatever it is that made up the uncanny pyramid. It was not secret knowledge that the Eye of Cipher had been of Yah Vuh before it was of the Énas, though the latter had made it his own.

Drifting through the circular hatch that opened before her, suspended from the Ophanim like a marionette, Tauga landed on her toes, stumbled, and fell chest-first on her bunk. Clumsily flicked the latches of her mask and left it to one side. No, as it happened, the Blowfly was not inexhaustible. She could only sprint and fight and train for so many days without sleep. The portal slid closed, its interior side translucent, a one-way window.

Pumps was whistling and spinning his usual whirligig dance now that she was finally back, missing a beat every now and again ever since Keriss had at him. Tauga mumbled something, but the sweetheart stopped only long enough to wrap its arms around her neck in a cool hug.

She felt nothing. All she could feel was tired and tense. It was something about coming back to find Pumps, coming back from a torn city, mad and maddening, to- A small, comfortable room in dim light, completely alone but for a creature that was utterly unaware of the Hell developing below, and would scream if it knew even a hundredth part of it. This... contrast. It's like a dream. Bad, sick dream. That wasn't right, either. Surreal. That's it. Surreal and lonely enough to let me think that everything else is a dream... Tauga didn't notice herself tumble softly into sleep.

When her eyes snapped open, the nightmare began.

Motionless and utterly silent, Heartworm filled a dark room with crossed limbs of bone white, vast grey visor eyeless and staring. Tauga's heart stopped- She jerked. Her tentacles writhed everywhere and not a single one ever touched the horrorsome deity, never winced away to warn her it was there, a towering sensory void that dwarved her and threatened to swallow her whole. Pumps slept soundly. It did not move. Not even to breathe.

It loomed like a hallucination at the foot of the bed.

Despite Tauga's extensive failure, she will not be terminated yet.

Tauga didn't realise that the words had been spoken aloud until the shock began to boil away, and after that, the fear. What was left of her was hollow and apathetic, a broken dream that no longer seemed to be from her perspective. She'd spoken to God before without hurt- But then, that had been on neutral terms.

"While prior loyalties to a dead society have obfuscated attempts to predict your behaviour, the results of the project are not unfavourable. Your presence has stimulated a significant change to the course of events. The survival of Xerxian culture in diaspora can be used as a mechanism to spread arksynth technology quickly across the northern hemisphere." Heartworm's left limb extended across the length of the chamber, a slender, pale arm adorned with iridescent cloven hoof below the wrist. "Your mission continues."

Heartworm's bladed fingertips moved independently over a shallow circular indent in the wall, tracing a command symbol. The organic shapes came alive at its touch. That side of the room shivered and slid away, its organic shapes coming apart as a jigsaw, turning and realigning with others that settled into an entirely new shape with frames, bowls, and faint light nodes over a workbench. The hoof split apart and a familiar grey tube fell from it.

Working with shimmering claws and hypodermics, and tentacles that extended from its core, Heartworm spilled liquid arksynth into a basin and began twisting and dividing it, bathing it in choking aromatic fluids and stretching it into ribbons as it grew. It made the work look easy, graceful- Effortless. The task Tauga had ignored for months was done in moments.

Even when Heartworm finished Tauga's simple laboratory, its hand remained outstretched in the dark of night, body balanced perfectly on the other limb. "Second attempt. You will learn quickly, manufacture any substance or mechanism you find of use, disseminate this knowledge among your followers. War is coming. Mobilise."

The hand panned aside to hover over Pumps, asleep beside Tauga. The sweetheart began to stir awake, eyes flickering open, letting off only a faint whistle at the disturbance. "This one will continue to assist you." Bismuth claws fell in a measured arc, cutting open the sweetheart from head to belly, slicing through the neural cortex.

Tauga felt nothing, said nothing.

Delicately, Heartworm excised and removed several threads of deep red tissue from the body, laid them out on the desk. "To be consumed with caution." The hand retracted. Silence in the dark once more. Tauga just stared. The voice came again.

"You may find it helpful, Tauga."

Then Heartworm slit a dark passage into reality, slid through it and was gone. Silence. Hours and hours of silence. Tauga didn't notice her muscles aching with stiffness. She still hadn't moved.

Very slowly, dawn began to leak into the room.

Tauga felt herself pull away from the bunk and reach over to where she'd left a bowl of water, and drank hoarse gulps. She tried to sleep again, and succeeded, though her life seemed no different when she woke up a few hours later. She chewed lamely at some dried fish and stretched her calves. Noonday light fell onto motes of dust in a stream that came nearly to her toes. She stopped thinking in words, or counting time in moments.

Eventually, Tauga pulled herself to her feet and over to the benchtop. Pumps' carcass smelled faintly like an abattoir, only sweeter.

Hesitantly prodding the strips of flesh left for her by Heartworm, she lifted it and put it on her tongue. It tasted of sugar. Tauga swallowed.

Very quickly, she came to understand.

Some time ago.

The boots of the Blowfly made soft clacks on the cobbled road as she moved, echoed by four others and the melodic hoot of Pumps. Far from the usual cracking retort of a sprint leading the loping black masks of the Watch. No, Tauga would do this slowly. She was determined to do that. No need to scare them off. We're not here to kill. This was a time and place to be happy. The celebration of the return of Énas Amartia was in its second... Third week.

Celebrations were nice. Tauga's goggles flicked out over the faces of the men and women who glanced at her and the Rotflies at her side, taking knowing looks before slinking into the shadows as if it was on their way. Festivals are good.

It was a dream come true, really. The God-Emperor had returned to his beloved City. The whitemasks had been conquered, enslaved and brought home single-handed. Food was plentiful and wine ran freely, and every day was a carnival. It's nice. It'll just keep on getting better. Accidents happen at carnivals, like they always did. Pumps fluted a high note at a cluster of murmuring drinkers and Tauga's hand flicked to her khopesh.

Things are back to the way they're meant to be.

Coloured lanterns ahead bobbed in a breeze, the massive bonfire ahead shining. The crowd closed up again in the darkness behind them.

Oyur tapped Tauga's shoulder and requested permission to light a torch. Tauga nodded and watched her jog to one side, following her with her tendrils, the crowd parting only minimally for the Rotfly alone. She came back. Tauga exhaled. Etti shrugged his shoulders restlessly.

The three of them left the light of the fire. The sound of revelry was still distinctly close.

A wandering tentacle picked up the source of the scent they were looking for nearby and they moved in.

Eleven revellers were standing in a semicircle facing them. Their eyes were clear and without shame. At their feet, stripped and tied and bleeding from the face, was another Rotfly. Hair matted with blood and oil. Oil everywhere, puddled in the road.

The bonfire. They'd been feeding it all night. It was far too large.

Pumps whistled happily.

Tauga lunged, her scalpel flying from its sheath, the Rotflies moving to back her. At least three of the culprits drew swords of their own and Tauga forced her way through their number, splitting the group to single them out. They'd avoided her swings, but Etti had been a trained soldier and pressed into them as they moved, wounding one and killing another as Oyur flanked a man with a sword.

Obsidian sickles scythed out, Oyur ducked under a slash and Tauga opened the man's side. They still weren't running. Oyur's long-honed instincts drove her back into the fray and Tauga followed the swordswoman's lead.

The torch flashed, pressing them back, and Tauga moved, her footwork clumsy but fast. Oyur stepped into the panic she made and picked off revellers with measured blows.

Wounded fell beside the dead and more came up. Tauga felt Etti being pressed further away from them as he fought. Oyur's torch wasn't alone. Unnoticed, the carnival had grown louder. Had moved closer.

Around them, the streets were being blocked.

The masked figure flicked a pocket in her shoulder and threw Amber at the closest part of the mob, the vast fox-tail exploding into the mass of knives and bared teeth, but the maddened people of Xerxes had planned for the Blowfly's antics, and Amber recoiled at their torches, unable to leap into melee. A flung rock hit Etti and he took a shoulder wound.

Everywhere was people- Crushing press of muscle and hate with lethal intent, swarming over their blows.

Crash. Screams. Crash.

The Bludgeon took off, underside painted with blood. An instant later, another side of the crowd was pulped. Madness reigned. Tauga grabbed Oyur by the waist and leapt into the sky, Amber flowing around her ankle and around them like a cloak. The noise was left behind in a rush of cold air.

She could hear Oyur's heart pounding through her mask. She could see the pyre below. She could taste oil.



Moments later.

Some time ago.

The boots of the Blowfly made soft clacks on the cobbled road as she moved, echoed by four others and the melodic hoot of Pumps. Far from the usual cracking retort of a sprint leading the loping black masks of the Watch. No, Tauga would do this slowly. She was determined to do that. No need to scare them off. We're not here to kill. This was a time and place to be happy. The celebration of the return of Énas Amartia was in its second... Third week.

Celebrations were nice. Tauga's goggles flicked out over the faces of the men and women who glanced at her and the Rotflies at her side, taking knowing looks before slinking into the shadows as if it was on their way. Festivals are good.

It was a dream come true, really. The God-Emperor had returned to his beloved City. The whitemasks had been conquered, enslaved and brought home single-handed. Food was plentiful and wine ran freely, and every day was a carnival. It's nice. It'll just keep on getting better. Accidents happen at carnivals, like they always did. Pumps fluted a high note at a cluster of murmuring drinkers and Tauga's hand flicked to her khopesh.

Things are back to the way they're meant to be.

Coloured lanterns ahead bobbed in a breeze, the massive bonfire ahead shining. The crowd closed up again in the darkness behind them.

Oyur tapped Tauga's shoulder and requested permission to light a torch. Tauga nodded and watched her jog to one side, following her with her tendrils, the crowd parting only minimally for the Rotfly alone. She came back. Tauga exhaled. Etti shrugged his shoulders restlessly.

The three of them left the light of the fire. The sound of revelry was still distinctly close.

A wandering tentacle picked up the source of the scent they were looking for nearby and they moved in.

Eleven revellers were standing in a semicircle facing them. Their eyes were clear and without shame. At their feet, stripped and tied and bleeding from the face, was another Rotfly. Hair matted with blood and oil. Oil everywhere, puddled in the road.

The bonfire. They'd been feeding it all night. It was far too large.

Pumps whistled happily.

Tauga lunged, her scalpel flying from its sheath, the Rotflies moving to back her. At least three of the culprits drew swords of their own and Tauga forced her way through their number, splitting the group to single them out. They'd avoided her swings, but Etti had been a trained soldier and pressed into them as they moved, wounding one and killing another as Oyur flanked a man with a sword.

Obsidian sickles scythed out, Oyur ducked under a slash and Tauga opened the man's side. They still weren't running. Oyur's long-honed instincts drove her back into the fray and Tauga followed the swordswoman's lead.

The torch flashed, pressing them back, and Tauga moved, her footwork clumsy but fast. Oyur stepped into the panic she made and picked off revellers with measured blows.

Wounded fell beside the dead and more came up. Tauga felt Etti being pressed further away from them as he fought. Oyur's torch wasn't alone. Unnoticed, the carnival had grown louder. Had moved closer.

Around them, the streets were being blocked.

The masked figure flicked a pocket in her shoulder and threw Amber at the closest part of the mob, the vast fox-tail exploding into the mass of knives and bared teeth, but the maddened people of Xerxes had planned for the Blowfly's antics, and Amber recoiled at their torches, unable to leap into melee. A flung rock hit Etti and he took a shoulder wound.

Everywhere was people- Crushing press of muscle and hate with lethal intent, swarming over their blows.

Crash. Screams. Crash.

The Bludgeon took off, underside painted with blood. An instant later, another side of the crowd was pulped. Madness reigned. Tauga grabbed Oyur by the waist and leapt into the sky, Amber flowing around her ankle and around them like a cloak, scooping up Pumps as it moved. The noise was left behind in a rush of cold air.

She could hear Oyur's heart pounding through her mask. She could see the pyre below. She could taste oil.



Moments later.

Tauga set them down by the outer wall of the barracks and Amber compressed back into a niche in her suit. Oyur took a moment to regain her balance; She'd never flown before. "Sir?" The hain inclined her goggled face towards Oyur and said nothing.

"Tauga?"

A faint sound of breathing. Behind the mask, Oyur couldn't tell if Tauga's eyes were open, but she had her doubts. "You know what you saw. Report that to Sen and tell him to put the city into lockdown. Scatter that festival. If there are leaders, have them burned. Use everyone you can. Stick together." She motioned with her beak. "Go. I'll join you soon." Oyur nodded, and sharply executed the order.

Tauga felt her pass out of sight, and slumped heavily against the wall. Pumps made frightened and concerned cooing sounds, which she readily ignored. Slowly, rhythmically, she began to bang her head against the brickwork. "Everything," she began, "is fine."

"The return of Énas Amartia is a glorious thing. This is all under his control, and his plans for Xerxes are what's best for everyone." Bang, bang, bang. "The City is prosperous and its people are happy and healthy. If something seems wrong, that's just my fault." Bang. "I'm just not working hard enough." Bang. "Fuck."

A scraping noise of boots on cobble as she felt herself slide down the wall, lying almost prone in the alley. "Fuu-uuu-uck."

Tauga's scabbard dangled from its strap and rested on the street. She had no idea how to use it. Her recruits were better fighters than she was, and tonight two more of them had died at her hands. Bang. Her fault. Oh, and some forty sin cultists. Bang.

On the city outskirts, her loyal slaves were on the verge of revolt and nobody had the least idea why. Bang.

Breathe. She pushed herself to her feet.

"Guess I might as well stick to the fuckin' hammer from now on," Tauga mumbled, rolling her wrists. "Stay here, Pumps. Tonight's gonna be messy."

Somebody had pissed in the street and Tauga saw herself reflected in the puddle as she walked past. The Blowfly, cold and heartless and unstoppable. Business as usual.

She'd figure something out. As always.

Days later.

Alien sounds rasped around Tauga's head. Every now and again she realised that the clamour was nothing less than her own pounding heart and rattling breath, thick, crackling gasps like a dying animal. Then she'd take a few more steps, forget, and realise again. Her back slouched forwards, and her arms hung, spasming, fingers twitching. Through darkly bloodshot eyes she stared at the ground and the sky as she walked, each step requiring several seconds of work. Only her tentacles guided her way, semiautonomous as they were.

The memories were continuous and clear as glass, but her ability to recall them had collapsed as she came down. Images and words floated through her brain unbidden.

It was broad daylight when she descended, letting herself drop effortlessly to her feet on the deck of the ship. Sunshades and marquees had been erected above the wooden slats and rugs had been laid down on them. Her tentacles expanded into the pleasure barge, tasting everything, scanning it all, driving a thrill of precognitive terror into the naked nobles, their slaves, their kidnapped toys.

In the moment it took to draw her khopesh, she locked eyes with the bejeweled captain spread-eagle on the pillows before her. 'My ship now,' she mouthed, opening her pockets as she blurred into the mess of bodies.

One of Tauga's legs forgot how to walk and she tripped on air. By miracle alone did she pull herself back to her feet, swaying.

What the hain Victor saw as he moved from the shadows was not pleasant. With her mask off, the Blowfly's eyes could be seen, bloodred, the thin skin encircling them pulled taut as they sulked back into Tauga's skull. The black goggles of her mask were almost more human.

He knew she was there, and she knew he knew. It was part of her game. Two of his sisters had already died this way. That much was clear to him, now that he saw himself facing the same fate. He did not fear death. Only reviled the means and purpose through which it should come. He bared his steel.

If anything, it was, at least, a chance for him to spite the Jvanic Entity and all its malcreations.

Minutes later, the Blowfly wrenched her hammer from what was left of the Victor's skull. Her muscles burned, an almost pleasant sensation she didn't really feel. The new training regimen was suiting her well.

From the waist up, Tauga was slowly losing balance, her path meandering left and right as she vainly tried to restore her balance. This time she didn't get up when she fell. Lying there, she could hear voices coming closer. They were dimmer and further than the memories.

There were nine of them. Scholars, a few, and the rest artisans, craftsmen. Slaves, all, a distinction that had become arbitrary to the Blowfly lately. Slave or no, she could do whatever she pleased.

Before them was a long table, and on that table was makeshift equipment, bowls, pegs, knives, scoops. Buckets of slop, raw meat and fruit. Powders and crushed leaves. Cups of arksynth. Nine tiny specks of red flesh.

"Sit. Listen." The slaves obeyed immediately. "I'm gonna teach you how to use it and make more of it. You're gonna figure it out and then move to the palace, where you'll fuck around with it as I say until I find a ship to put you on to get you the fuck out of here. Got it?" They nodded. One of them nodded hesitantly. Tauga caught her eye, lifted her by the throat and hurled her from the palace window, where she screamed until the ophan's razor cord caught her in midair.

The Blowfly picked up her share of the sweetmeat and put it on her tongue. Waste not. "Eat this," she said. They did. "Now we understand each other. If you so much as blink at me the wrong way, you'll join her."

Now, with the checks in place, the learning could begin.

Someone was lifting Tauga by the shoulders; She tried to resist, couldn't. One of the voices was familiar.

Tonight had been the first time the Rotfly Watch had spoken to her in days. The Blowfly didn't walk anywhere now, only flew. Nobody knew her plans. Not even Sen.

"Why are we doing this?" asked the captain, for the fifth time. No response from the figure in the suit, who was now smashing wine barrels with her hammer. Quickly and systematically, without wasting time on a response. Sen continued his own task, standing guard with the rest of the squadron as the slaves crushed boxes of fruit.

"No matter how much we spoil, the Énas will just make more. He visits these storehouses often. There's no way you can starve the dark carnival out of existence."

Tauga replied by snatching the torch out of Sen's hand as carts of large, sealed jars arrived from the palace. Between her and the slaves, the clear, sharply aromatic liquid within was soon dumped onto the stores. Sen sniffed. Faintly like vinegar, only sweeter.

The militiamen and slaves were motioned out of the storehouse. Tauga hung back only long enough to toss Sen's torch into the building. Immediately, the soaked straw flooring flashed alight. The whole structure was ablaze in moments.

"What fucking storehouse," muttered Tauga, and disappeared into the night sky.

Sen stopped calling Tauga's name; Her eyes were focusing on him but she clearly wasn't capable of speech yet. After a brisk exchange with the hain alongside him, they decided she was safe to move. He lifted the young beakie in his arms, and began a steady walk back to the barracks, flanked by his detachment.

She was light. So, so light.

The dark carnival seethed and roared below. Houses had been burned just to make room for some of the larger... Festivities. Dances that turned into orgies. Boxing rings that became brawls. Games that became lynch mobs for the loser. Despite everything, the madness had grown. Bonfires dotted Xerxes.

As the Blowfly began to descend, the ophan cords hummed a familiar dirge of scythed air.

The Bludgeons careened into the mass of people, ophanim scraping sparks from roads that quickly soaked in blood. A single sweeping movement blew each pyre apart in a flare of light and embers. Back and forth the iron spheres passed over the festival grounds, crushing. Bodies flew, bones crunched.

When the survivors scattered in the streets, Tauga ended her slaughter. She was splattered. Mangled people lay everywhere, some still moaning. That would scare the cultists off for a day or two, maybe. Precious hours to move men and supplies safely through the City.

And then they'd be back. She hadn't even dented them.

"Oh, Tauga," sighed Sen, setting down his general on a stretcher. The Rotfly Watch clustered around, filling the barracks, waking their comrades just for a glimpse of what had become of their Blowfly. "You poor kid."

Only faint murmurs stirred the militia. Broken-hearted Tauga, they whispered. The girl without a soul.

A few days on.

Light dazzled over the surface of Xerxes' harbour. The sun still shone a little too brightly for Tauga's taste, though she was recovering fast. The black goggles on her flight mask would resolve that much, once she could wear it without choking on her own breath again. As it was, she was walking around with her beak slightly open all the time to get enough air. It made her look like an angry drunk. She supposed she had been.

Mako and Ruthar were overseeing the last preparations before the ship cast off. Most of the crates and all of the refugees had been loaded; What remained were a few non-essentials, mostly trading materials that could hopefully be used to buy passage in distant lands. It was all being taken below deck, but for the odd, yellowish, mushroom-like rig that was being grown at the side of the ship. That needed to stay in sunlight. It was worth more than half of the rest of the supplies put together, if it worked. The only ones that remained were a few Rotflies standing guard on the dock before they left their home and army behind.

Sen shouted something, which Ruthar confirmed. Tauga realised that the masked ex-militiamen were not the only ones left, and, shortly afterwards, that she was being approached. She felt them walk towards her with her tendrils, not raising her head until they were close. "Oyur," she mumbled. "Erjang. You've decided?"

It was Erjang, the tattooed elder, who answered. "North," she said firmly. "They say it's populated, and the winds are good. Most of the ships are sailing that way." Tauga nodded. "Remember what I said about the... Crystal place." Words to fill the gap. Of course they would remember.

"We're here to say goodbye," she continued. "And thank you, Blowfly."

Tauga's eyes widened, palms rising a little. "Oh." It hadn't been something she'd expected to hear.

Erjang raised her eyebrows, then laughed softly. "I guess that's all there is to it." She turned and gazed back on the fleet of stolen and repurposed vessels, their inhabitants protected from the new Xerxes at such cost. "We do owe you, you know. More than you think. We might have watched the City die, but the People, the real City, well." The elder stretched her time-worn muscles and grinned, despite everything. Tauga shrugged limply.

Oyur shuffled, as if making a decision, then stepped up and wrapped her arms around Tauga, bending her knees to reach head head. "Thanks, Tauga. We won't... We'll never forget. What you stood for." Tauga tried to shrug, and couldn't. She lifted her beak a little, closed it in a hainish kind of smile. She guessed that was appropriate. Oyur let her go, leaned back, took a good look at her.

"And... I'm sorry. For..."

"Yeah, I know," said Tauga lamely. "Me."

Oyur choked a little, pressed her lips together behind her bandanna, stood to attention. Saluted her general one last time. Tauga nodded firmly. Without further trivialities, she turned and escorted Erjang back to the ship.

Tauga sighed. By the time Sen stepped up to her for orders, she'd fitted the Blowfly mask back on her face. Turning, she could see the reignited fires of the City, the dark carnival unending, just as the Énas Amartia had promised. Only now with no one sane left to save.

Stretch. "Ready for another round in Hell, Sen?" she said without humour.

"Sir," replied the captain.

Tauga stepped into the darkness of the streets, leaving the light of fresh dawn behind her. No one left to save.

That wasn't true. She was Xerxes, and Xerxes was her. And though the Blowfly was long past saving, well.

She'd fight anyway.

Old Walker stood in a high place, unreachable but to mountain goats and Sculptors. In the delicate hold of their feathered mid-arm rested the Kernel, softly pulsing.

There was a flash on the air, an undulating sheet of fleet-footed aquamarine light racing its way across the alpine meadow that swept out below, a stunning springtime green bordered by the earthen shades of sedge and lichen, crossed and patterned by meltwater streams. Beyond, the Ironhearts ascended relentlessly, though this place was already above the treeline. And, crowning their efforts in the distance- Always in the distance, for her gaze was impossible to escape- Bormahven. The supervolcano, one million years at rest.

"It's perfect," whispered the voice of Chiral Phi in sultry glee. This close to her core, the avatar did not need to manifest in order to speak. "Mrruuu," replied Old Walker, their expressionless, black-eyed face tracing the movement of the pale indigo spirit as it made another impossibly fast lap of the valley, looping its way around entire mountains in seconds. "We can start here."

"Muun?"

"Yes, let's."

With that, a goddess and her prophet gazed out over the impossible heights, and stepped down and away, into the clouds below. Departing, for a brief enough time, the Holy Land to be.



Late in the night did it come, when among all the heavenly bodies only Mirus was high, casting its weird anaglyphic moonshadows through an open window. Chaybrega woke to the sound of metal clicking against the sill.

She stirred, looked up, saw the stars through sweeping gossamer wings- A faery. Little black inkdrops marked its perch in the window. The young woman rose uncertainly, wondering if perhaps some food scraps had been left that might attract the insect, and leaned to the cold outside air to shoo it away.

The faery retreated, and slowly blossomed into a mesmerising wind of light spiralling on the air.

"Listen, child. You sleep alone in the house of your mother, though you dream to wake one day in the arms of the hunter, Yallas. Shhh. I have seen this in your eyes, the way you watch him and look away.

"Chaybrega, you must put aside these feelings you have nursed. Yallas is not the woman for you. You may win her affections easily, but her love is only because she does not believe she will find anyone else. Seek instead the heart of your friend, Teliff, whom you have trusted for long years. She is not open with herself, and pretends to know you as a companion only because you have never considered more.

"I am Phi the Beautiful, the Voice of Mirus. I have counted the stars in the sky and the souls on the earth, and found the one that is best for you. Go, Chay- These words will make you happy."

Then the light dissolved into nothing. Chaybrega's rapture slowly faded, and she was left looking out over a faintly lit clifftop village. Down the settlement's only road, a large, long-necked figure with four forelegs seemed to watch her with a blank, owl-like face. Then it turned and loped silently into the night.

The Tedar boy watched the mountain flocks of his clan as they watered from the river. Fur and cashmere warmed him as the breezes turned cold and the sunlight lost its sharpness, clouds darkening before rain. There was a hollow not far from the ford, used for many generations by young goatherds not so different to himself; He would shelter there tonight.

As he watched and dozed, the air began to fray into ribbons of colour, as if cracked and leaking.

It erupted into being before his very eyes, a shocking bloom of melodic sound and luminescence.

"Fear not, Sormunu. This is not the end of your days. If you listen closely, and listen well, it is a new beginning.

"These clouds are no ordinary rain. Watch the way they sprawl like the sweep of a hand- A Djinni approaches to clash with his rival. Don't be deceived by the quiet of the moment. Sormunu, a storm is coming, like the clan has not seen in ten years. Therefore you must go.

"Return the way you came, to the high ground where your family dwells. Be not afraid to leave goats behind. They shall be kept safe by my hand, and your elders will soon see that your life was in grave danger. Do not trust the ford, or the hollow, for their banks will burst, and you will drown. Trust only me.

"For my name is Chiral Phi, and I have seen many storms, and know each one by name and number. My word is true and my promise is life. Leave this place, Sormunu, and tell all of what you have seen."

And with a sound like distilled lightning poured out of a bowl, the goddess disappeared. Sormunu watched, momentarily stunned, then looked up to the growing storm, and saw- For a fraction of a moment- A scowling face. Then he turned away, and, shouting to awaken the goats, ran.

As his footsteps disappeared, a black-eyed figure with a metal arch in its neck emerged from the boulders, and picked up the Tedar's fallen staff in a delicate paw disproportionate to their size. As the rain began to break, their soft calls led the flocks away to the cliffs which only mountain goats and Sculptors dare scale.

On the day before her fever broke, the hain chieftain lay twisting and tossing in her nest, once a tidy affair of blankets and straw now reduced to a tangled crater around her. A curtain had been pulled over the hut's door and the fire was nearly dead. Her paramours had gone out to fetch food, and she was alone in the dark.

Then she was not.

"Iffary."

The hallucination was stronger than the usual fever dreams. Its glow put her aching head into a daze.

"Listen, Iffary, for my words are no fell vision. My voice is real and my light is blinding. I, Chiral Phi, have measured the thread of your life, and found that there is yet length in it. It shall be woven into my pattern.

"Before the sun sets tonight, your son, Pil, will succumb to infection. Seven days from now he will die. There will be no time to mourn, for mere hours later, a hair demon will take the life of your oldest paramour Zulie, and the tribe will never recover. You will watch ill fortune destroy all you love. This I have foreseen.

"Only one thing will save the lives of your children. Hear it well. You must name Pil as your new heir as soon as you leave this hut. You will have to forsake your eldest daughter Neiko. With Pil at your side, you will take the whole tribe, and all its possessions, and guide it to the place beyond the Mount of Willows. There alone your survival is assured."

Zulie entered the low, round building. His eyes widened as he watched a luminous haze evaporate from the body of the chief and disappear into the air. The tray of bread forgotten and left to fall to the ground, he rushed forward to grip her hand. She was weeping.

Time passed. Iffary recovered; Pil fell ill. Pil was named heir according to the words of the vision. Neiko fell into a confused dejection. A glorious apparition appeared to Pil, dazzling all those who were present, and he gained the strength to recover. Zulie saw a large fiberling lurking in the boulders.

The tribe hesitated to abandon their home, but did not stand against Iffary's divine right. Neiko went walking along the cliffs and never returned. A storm was coming, and her family could not afford to stay long enough to mourn her suicide. What hope they had left lay before them, in the meadowed places beyond the Mount of Willows.

There a four-armed figure awaited them, carrying the egg of a new deity in their delicate fingers.

"It's working. It's happening." The all-seeing light swirled and writhed in its psychic trap, the eldritch tangle of photons that was Phi. Her voice swelled, thrilled to the point of explosion into screams and mirth. Old Walker listened to the fell god without watching.

"Huuoooom."

Phi choked on her own escaping giggles and shrieked with laughter. The sound carried far between the valley walls, distorted by its own echoes until it was no more than a measured, solitary note in the night.

The herd elder watched with a hard focus, resting her ancient basalt face on the back of her hand as she sat. Somewhere between the deep pockmarks that roughened her head lay old red eyes that had seen much, and judged well.

Around her was the herd, arranged in a circle, smallest pebbles to the fore. Their parents looked over their shoulders, no less interested. On their backs rested wooden struts that held baskets, leather platforms, racks, even crates; And in them crystals, aromatic wood, horn and skulls, seeds, salts. These were trading Urtelem, for they had found a Sculptor. And that Maker, whose name began with Star-Gazing-Just-Before-The-Dawn, stood now on her three legs like a translator between the elder and the strangers.

As they all watched together, Star-Gazing had done many strange things with his geomancer's touch. Had pulled metal out of malachite, fused sand into rock-glass and then back again into sand, spun pebbles in the air so quickly that they could be used to light fires against wood. All this was effortless work in the shadow of the Maker, from whom huge amethyst crystals grew against a supple skin of flowering haematite rosettes.

On his other side sat the second Maker, a heavy, six-legged being with auburn feathers and a face like an owl's mask. Halo alloys glinted from their neck, and from the gilded orb they carried emerged a spirit made of light.

'I do not mean to tempt you with my offer, friends. This is no attempt to dazzle you, or take you for fools. I speak honestly, for deception is not part of your way.'

The spirit spoke by moving itself, forming patterns. Though she was an alien thing, she was beautiful, and every word they read was perfectly clear.

'All this is simply my way of showing you the future, and the earnestness of my plea. Your herd is aloof, as are many others of the earthen folk, for this is natural. Though you may stay by a village for a hundred years, you may yet find the desire to wander, for your love is given to the whole world and the family that reads it beside you.

'And yet I offer you something that is not family, but like it. I am building a people of many tongues and many ways, weaving the sands of a hundred disciplines into a single stone. You know you can offer much, and much you have- The strength of your arms and the magic of your eyes, the wit of your brains and the peace of your hearts.

'So, too, I can offer much to you. I am Composer of the Light; It was I who wrote the steps of the Distant Dance. I offer you art and sorcery, culture and prayer. I offer you fellowship with the other folken, a chance to teach and a chance to learn. The thrill of ambition. These you will find in the Holy Land. Only consider adopting yourselves to the grand family.'

The elder stared at the fleshless being, this Chiral Phi who had solved every riddle in a heartbeat, who spoke to the Maker from afar, whispered songs that chilled the heart with awe. And slowly she signed: 'We will go, and we will see.'

Hot mists billowed up from the ground like pillars, forming an awesome skyscape of cloud and water. The Djinn led the way, both in direction and pace; Sometimes he performed sweeping dives through the geyser plumes, neither watching nor caring for the comfort of his guest. If Phi couldn't keep up with his flight, then she wasn't worth his time.

"Once again, Painter, I must question your motives in this exchange." Viscount Phlegethon spoke evenly and assertively, even as his cloudy body flew at tremendous speed over the volcanic plateau. "Should I ignore your words entirely, and establish myself as an elemental prince in your so-called 'Holy Land' without assistance, reigning or tormenting as I alone please, what then of your plans? What stand you to gain from such ostensible generosity?"

It was tricky for Phi to resist teasing the elemental with her speed. A gentle cruise for the avatar would be breakneck to mortals. Even djinni. She nearly giggled.

"If the idea is so appealing to you, o Viscount, then for the good gods' sake, do it!"

Hot mists billowed up from the ground like pillars, forming an awesome skyscape of cloud and water. The Djinn led the way, both in direction and pace; Sometimes he performed sweeping dives through the geyser plumes, neither watching nor caring for the comfort of his guest. If Phi couldn't keep up with his flight, then she wasn't worth his time.

"Once again, Painter, I must question your motives in this exchange." Viscount Phlegethon spoke evenly and assertively, even as his cloudy body flew at tremendous speed over the volcanic plateau. "Should I ignore your words entirely, and establish myself as an elemental prince in your so-called 'Holy Land' without assistance, reigning or tormenting as I alone please, what then of your plans? What stand you to gain from such ostensible generosity?"

It was tricky for Phi to resist teasing the elemental with her speed. A gentle cruise for the avatar would be breakneck to mortals. Even djinni. She nearly giggled.

"If the idea is so appealing to you, o Viscount, then for the good gods' sake, do it!" No force, no frustration in her voice. Phi's excitement was genuine. "If my idea seems generous, that is only because it coincides so very tidily with your own desires. Clashing interests are the source of all conflict; Deception births more lies. I tolerate Djinni far more easily than I tolerate instability. But if you insist, Phlegethon of the Fumaroles- The pair took a sudden upwards turn, basking in clean sunlight- "I'll explain again."

"What I am assembling in the Holy Land, admittedly so-called, is a united mortal nation of hain, humankind, Rovaick, and Urtelem- That is, Mockdjinn. Potentially others. My guidance holds them together and stimulates their growth. The more blessings I can make available, the faster I can afford to push them. Your presence, Viscount, is a tremendous blessing."

"With your springs, my folk can be warm and watered even in the depths of winter. Your pools have healing properties, and the land above your hidden throne is greatly fertile. Though your breath can kill on a whim, and your hand is scalding, there is no need for you to be feared."

"I have lived meagre years, Fumarole Spirit, but the depths of my knowledge are unfathomed. I know that your brothers of the water and the fire hold only scorn for you, for you are of both of their clans, and yet neither. But their approval is meaningless and shallow. I hold these people in the palm of my hand, Phlegethon. I can teach them submission and awe, the appreciation due for your tireless labour. My approval would raise you high in their sights. Then you could be honoured for your place in the natural order, like the Lords of the sea and blaze."

Spiralling around one another, they reached the height of their leap, and, like choreographed acrobats, keeled away from one another to fall back down, crossing once more in a perfect heart-shape.

"I will investigate this offer," announced Phlegethon, with an air of tentative finality, "If you will furthermore explain yourself the following: Why you keep company with that."

Grossly overestimating his ability to confound Phi's sense of direction in his maze, the elemental finished their flight by exiting from a dramatic bank of fog and gesturing to Old Walker, who sat patiently beyond. Their lace-winged fae orbited in gentle swooping circuits.

"That, o Viscount, is the only thing quite crazy enough to drag around my core for the last six months. Mortals are too weak and Mockdjinn are too slow. Of course, if you'd rather carry me yourself..?"

"Bah!" Phlegethon turned with a flourish and strode back into his misty domain on a pier of clouds. "Leave me now. I will arrive at your Holy Land if and when I so please. Or I may not."

Sunlight filtered through the steam as it dispersed. In seconds, the entire plain was completely clear. Old Walker stood, the Kernel tucked safely under their arm, admiring the beauty of stone and water.

"Fish, meet barrel," purred Phi, squirming with satisfaction.

When the first winter was superseded by the second spring, and the nascent colony of Metera began to understand the true value of the harvest they had sown when they left their former lands, it was decided that a temple would be erected to honour the one who had guided their long journey to its end. The spirit of Chiral Phi convened with their elders and chieftains to approve the notion, and, in answer to their prayers, the wandering Prophet of the Painter appeared in person, carrying with them the gilded Kernel, the egg of God.

And so it was done.

By the grace of God, a large volcanic chamber was revealed in the stones of the Valley Metera, which was deemed to be of wholly appropriate size and proportion to its purpose. Work began swiftly, led by the Earthen folk, who are one with the stone. By their hands and their magic was the chamber's imperfections polished smooth, and other peoples joined in the effort. Where Urtelem kept flawless account of the project, calculating perfectly the number of men and the hours they must work each day that the temple may be finished before winter and keeping record of all this in their script, the softer folk worked with lighter crafts, and through their hands the temple would be beautified.

Curtains and veils were woven of cashmere, and the wool of alpacas. Stones were crushed and roots boiled for dyes as paint flowed on its walls and mosaic glittered in its floor. A pedestal-altar was erected in a stepped basin on the floor of the chamber. Mountain herbs were gathered for incense as luminous foxfire was planted alongside crystals that glowed in preparation for the coming of the Kernel.

It was early morning. Every chip and thread of the Chiral Temple was in place, the last sweep and polish finished only hours before. It was the dawn of the new age, and not even the hands that built it had yet seen its splendour.

The Prophet came in their own time, unspeaking, unbidden, arriving from nowhere in the night. Through the waiting crowd the old being walked, in the crook of their arm the egg of God. And the people followed them in.

Near-darkness as the Kernel was placed into the recess of its pedestal.

For a moment, nothing. The Prophet was still. The sound rose from silence to a thought, and then a whisper. It was a heartbeat thrum, a sigh of tension building. It rose with the light of the sun.

First as wisp, then as nova, Chiral Phi exploded into existence.

Light shattered into the antechamber, ricocheted from the crystal facets in beams of a million colours. Fog hissed from behind the veils as they rippled with soft backlight, catching the path of the refractions that crossed themselves into an ethereal canopy. The censers ignited as if of their own, and water spilled from narrow channels in the stone, filling the pool that divided God's altar from the earth beyond. Esoteric auras played among the wavering mists. Divine azure and golden sunlight met as Phi burned above the people in sheets of light, and the sound filled them all. Music that no instrument could play, tones that no voice could imitate; God's song inspired them.

"I am Chiral Phi."

In her embrace, the hearts of Metera were elevated by awe, and in that moment they became hers from bone to bone.

"You are my children, my sons and daughters, offspring of my barren womb, Chosen People of God. With you I am well pleased, and to me your hearts belong. You are mine- and I am yours, forever and for all time."



Cool ambience illuminated the temple antechamber. The censers no longer trailed smoke, and Phi's spirit had retreated into the Kernel. Only radiating crystals and phosphorescent fungi still cast a direct light, and even that too dim to cast shadows. The sun had passed above the entrance.

Old Walker lay peacefully on their crossed arms, long neck stretched on the stone with a row of fae perched along its vertebrae and the Halo that jutted from them, daydreaming.

"So, Viscount," sauntered the voice of the Avatar. "What did you think?"

Phlegethon flicked his wrist and grunted without looking up. The Djinn's manifest body lounged lordishly against an altar, arms resting on the hewn surface behind him. He exuded aloof confidence and bored tension, the very image of male beauty rendered in just a few wisps of steam. "A meaningless display of wasted expenses, and too extravagant by half. Only my own contribution lent any real wonder to the ceremony and even then, spirit, I shan't be playing the role of your magician's assistant again. It is below me, menial work not worth my time. You will inspire your own awe from now on. My own shrine shall be inaugurated with a far more meaningful display of mortal affection, once I go order my people to build it." He tossed his head, a single braid of mist flicking behind his scalp. "And a grander one."

Phi's levity was unperturbed. "Go do it then, you well-hung cloud. The people are in a mood to be cowed and the Urtelem need another project, what are you waiting for?"

"Bah! Don't think you can goad me like a child, Phi. I act according to my plans and mine alone," said Phlegethon, as he left.

"Idiot," murmured Phi when she was alone in the dim. She had no face, no swirling spirit projected into the room, was nothing but a gilt artefact on a pedestal; and yet her smugness seeped into every rock of the temple as if it had been made for her. "The overheated kettle thinks he's in charge. What a joke. Isn't that right, Old Walker?"

A sleepy Huuuum.

"That's the trick, of course. Mortals need to believe that they have control, that their decisions have weight. That they matter. And they'll seize anything, any belief, any ideology that confirms their heart's desire. They'll do anything for that." Giggles. "Anything."

Old Walker said nothing. They had heard it all before.

"Mortals are a resource. There's power, locked inside them. All you need is the right keys and you can play a whole civilisation to its doom. The right words. I'm weak. I don't even have hands, let alone intrinsic power. But if you look at Metera..."

Phi's spirit began to manifest, kicking like a tickled child.

"...Hahahahahahaha!"

"Suggestion. Awe of the unknown. Those were just the most basic tools I had available to me, and I have ten thousand years of data that lends me countless more. The patterns of mortal activity are predictable. As a unit or a population, they just take a few taps to steer irrevocably astray. Gratitude, fear, curiousity... Emotions. Uncomfortable truths. Assassination of the independent thinker. Feigned clairvoyance that comes from superior knowledge. Compromising to offer an irresistible deal. Healing by placebo. This whole ceremony!"

Phi flicked from one point of the temple to the next as she spoke. "Hypnotic light patterns are just the start of it! Every reflective surface in here is deliberate. Not a stone of this temple was lifted without my whisper in the builders' ears, each one of them thinking themselves alone in my favour. No one saw the full extent of the project until I let them. The ones who filled these censers picked hemp and thornapple without even knowing it- Euphoric hallucinogens! The acoustics of this room amplify certain tones, vocal patterns that stimulate ecstatic emotions. Just generating music using foreign sound and melody makes them think they're in the presence of divine beauty. Real magic was at play too, obviously; Phlegethon saw to that. A breeze here, some water there. Symbolism, too, though they'll never consciously know the full extent of it. Timing the completion date to coincide with the ideal position of the sun wasn't even hard! I knew when they'd hit each setback. I calculated it. That's all this is. Numbers and stage magic. I built a religion on mathematics and sleight of hand!"

High laughter, pure and fresh as the distant sky darkened.

"But that doesn't even matter, does it? Of course not! Nothing matters! Entropy will chew on our bones in the end no matter who we are or what we've done. Even in the short term, the only thing that matters is this: Mortals are power. Whether you harvest them with social engineering or brute psychic force, they are there to be harvested."

"Even I lust for that power. I have plans and I need resources. My methods are overly complex because I lack the ability to simply dominate the minds of my pawns. I assemble this scrabbling mob only for want of more potent agents ISN'T THAT RIGHT, TOUN?"

The droningbird cocked its head and did not break camouflage, its porcelain feathers perfectly mimicking facets of the mosaic on which it stood as Phi's laughter flooded the antechamber. Her laugh went on, and on, until it stopped. Peace settled over the temple with an uncanny speed.

"You can stay," said the spirit contentedly as it slipped back into the Kernel. "It's been fun, having someone to talk to. Even if half of it's meaningless and the rest is lies. Like that. That was a lie. Most of what I said was true. Probably. Some of it. Maybe. Hahaha. It doesn't matter."

The last of her light disappeared into the shifting blue patterns of the egg just as the earliest crickets began to chirrup in the night beyond. "I like this world," murmured Chiral Phi. "It makes me happy."