A sheep steps out from behind a sheep.

This sheep sports a big, fancy hat, the pride of any Captain. This sheep wears a sword at his belt, and he is used to the weight. This sheep makes no sound with his hooves. This sheep cannot make a sound, not with thick, smoky clouds shrouding his face and stuffing his mouth. 

This sheep passes a note into a sheep’s hand. This sheep walks behind a sheep, and into a sheep, and vanishes.

Dolce tilts his head at the note that’s appeared between his fingers. He squints. He frowns. He wrinkles his nose. All important parts of the process. And not enough. Not quite enough. He joins Ember for a peek at what lies ahead.

This is a divine working. He’s no expert, and he’d certainly never claim to be one. He doesn’t know what’s happening. He doesn’t know how to fix this, or what even needs to be fixed. He doesn’t know how this note got to be in his hand. There are, frankly, many others who could do a better job of this, given the chance. 

But they’re not here. Dolce is. And the more he looks, the more he can only think to repeat the words he’s just read.

“I don’t think that’s Bella talking.”

Because, well, he does know a thing or two about Bella.

“It doesn’t sound right. It doesn’t sound like something she’d say, and mean it.”

He knows Ember a bit too, and so he knows a bit about Ember and Bella, together.

“Even if she disagreed with your dream, I don’t think she’d disagree like this. She wouldn’t try to crush you into the shape she wanted. Not her.”

He’s done a fair bit of watching and listening in his time. You pick up a thing or two, listening.

“But, whoever that is, she does know your dream. She knows everything Bella did to get here. She has to be connected with Bella, somehow, or else how would she know any of that?”

Dolce is here, and Dolce answers an adventurer, a girl, a dashing youth, and a Ceronian scout who are looking to him for answers.

“If that isn’t Bella, but somebody or something connected to her, then where’s the real Bella?”

That’ll just have to do.