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Flux stood among the acacias of his home, holding a stylus and with it scribing subtle curves upon the earth. Clay was not a medium often used for the magic of ciphers, but alas, he could not work stone.

Yulosi rode up beside him on her black wether-goat, her lich's eyes glowing from behind her hood. Her staff lay across its back in front of her, trailing lizard skulls.

[color=c4df9b]"Done with tha'?"[/color]

[color=00a99d]"A moment."[/color] Flux added the final glyph and gestured forwards. Yulosi took a stem of inkcap mushroom and ignited it between her fingertips, whispering a prayer to the demons and touching her staff to the pattern. It glowed briefly.

Flux lifted the clay slab and fitted it to its place in the pattern. The gulch was a dead end, its stream long since blocked by landslides. Unguided travellers found it often, and were turned back by its steep slopes. Flux intended for the next arrival to come here by choice.

[color=c4df9b]"I get the impression you'll be spending the night here."[/color]

[color=00a99d]"I will,"[/color] he said. And he felt the wave of a presence pass again in the back of his mind.

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Mirus shone its aberrant light directly into the pit of stone, destined tonight to be full. Flux glowed in its center. The urtelem who had chosen to accompany him had once again curled up for the night. It was a brief hour's rest they were taking. Work would resume before dawn.

For now- just this moment- all was silent. Flux was the only one awake.

Yet he was not alone.

A presence turned its gaze upon him and at that same moment Flux vacated the space, ferrying his incandescence with him and leaving it dark. His hands trailed behind him like scarves of ferrous liquid. He touched the pattern of spiral algebra on the wall he'd been facing.

The presence passed on. Like a patch of light between dappling branches, it wandered thoughtlessly back to him. And he was gone.

His quarter-circle wings curled effortlessly behind him and he settled among the copse of holy trees above. He increased his golden light. The stranger looked at him, but he was touching the bark of a tree nearby, and when it looked again he was elsewhere.

Thus he moved, and led the dance of that night, with sweeping, flowing steps; a silent dance, of look and look-not, touch and not-touch. His arms flowed smooth in his wake like twin dancer's sashes, and the presence was lured to his rhythm. Be it what it may, yet in this, small thing, it was an excellent partner.

Flux landed on a single point in the gulch and dimmed his light, bowing as a cloud passed over the moon of Mirus.

[color=00a99d]"I think not, Yivvin,"[/color] he said into the dark. [color=00a99d]"My story's not yet over. I'm growing still."[/color]

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