Another week had gone by, and I''d gotten frustrated with the templating ability.


    I did feel like I''d made some progress, but I kept getting sidetracked and it was all the fault of that stupid keychain. Every time I tried to mess with it I zoned out and ended up feeling... well, pretty fucking good honestly. Not contented exactly, but... satisfied. Purposeful. It was possible I''d subconsciously found a way to dump all my anxiety about being trapped somewhere into it, but if so I wasn''t sure how. I''d finally attempted to unpack it even though I was worried it would dump all that anxiety back on me at once, and instead I just blanked out for fifteen or twenty minutes.


    That had led me to suspect that there might be some special category of template that worked differently, something about it being a vibe rather than specific information or memories? Or maybe it was a function of my mind palace, like it had partly created this thing automatically. To test that, I tried unpacking some objects that were already around the first time I''d entered my mind palace since they had to be in some way a construct of my subconscious. I tried the television first, and while it didn''t unpack the way a template would it did give me a brief flash of watching that television in the real-world version of the room.


    The television had been Bill''s, I was sure of it. It was old, but it had been one of the first things he''d bought with his own money after getting a job so he''d kept it around.


    The little gold brooch not only didn''t unpack or give me any memories, but it felt super impossible to do anything with - like I was trying to do origami with a steel plate. It was too... dense, or something. Finally, I tried it on the creepy statue in the closet and almost felt like there was something there - but it was somehow too large and deep and confusing for me to unfold correctly, and after a moment I stumbled away from it with a pounding headache - no small feat considering I wasn''t even using a physical body. I also found that I was holding a framed photograph.


    It was me, and Connie, and Errod, and Katrin... and my old bully from high school, Zoey, and the Behemoth. We were all wearing Earth clothes, with the Behemoth smiling - not in his crazy way, but more like a normal human - in a "I ? NEW YORK" shirt, and Katrin just barely looking up from a cell phone. Zoey was handing Errod a hot dog, while Connie or I - I was having trouble deciding which was which - held up our drivers license and gave a thumbs-up. It was honestly a very cute photo despite the presence of two of my worst enemies, but it left a hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach.


    I hadn''t thought about them. Katrin and Errod were not only the best friends I''d ever had, but they were family now... and I''d barely thought about them at all in four weeks. It was partly an out of sight out of mind thing, and partly me being self-centered and shitty, and partly that I just didn''t want to. After all, what if Ulren had killed them? Or what if they were enjoying their time without me so much they wouldn''t want to see me again? Or what if they wanted to, and I wanted to, and Hammersmith wouldn''t allow it?


    It was easier to just focus on what was in front of me. After all, I couldn''t contact them anyway. The only person I could reach out to would be... hmm. I sent out a ping, hesitantly. She responded almost immediately. "You are not here, when I check."


    "Yeah. I guess lately I haven''t been here a lot, especially in terms of time on the prime plane. I''ve been fucking with time here, I don''t know if it''ll work with you as well - I''ve been using my mind here to do most of my thinking these days, unless I''ve misunderstood how it works."


    She nodded. "Your body is still very important, not everything transfers to your mind or soul. But yes, it is an ability many cultivate. Have you made progress in eliminating the link between us?"


    Right down to business. "I have enough potential built up to start messing with it, I think, but it... feels wrong. I''m trying to make sure I do it in the right way. But also... I don''t know, I wanted to see if you knew anything about how Katrin and Errod are doing. Or Harmid, I guess, since he looked like shit when I left him. It would suck if it turned out he died anyway."


    Human Calliope looked bored. "He is very annoying, but healthy. He is too excitable, and I am not used to traveling with others, but we have exchanged some spells which was nice."


    "Wait, you''re traveling with him?"


    "I was going to leave you a note, but." She shrugged, and it was clear she wasn''t going to elaborate on why that hadn''t happened. "Harmid and his bodyguard and I snuck out of the city and have traveled to the ruins of Poicelria''s fortress."


    "Oh! With the guru person! That''s where I wanted to go before shit went wrong. I know Harmid has been there before, I didn''t really get the impression he was all that impressed but it seemed like it was worth a shot."


    She sneered. "The woman is a fountain of meaningless platitudes, I suspect she knows nothing of any value. We are supposed to be meeting with her again shortly, but I feel increasingly certain this process is only being dragged out in order to cajole more ''donations'' out of us. I was hoping you finally reaching out today meant you had a plan. Your request for help on the fifteenth of the eighth seemed significant, but nothing has come of it. If we must wait for the fifteenth of the second I will be... disappointed."


    "I don''t know why those dates are important. Are some special planes aligned or something?"


    She had started pacing as she ranted about the guru, but at that question she stopped dead and slowly turned to face me with an incredulous look on her face. "You... do not know?"


    "No. I''m still pretty new to all this shit, remember?"


    "The fifteenth of the second is our birthday. The ritual that bound us required that we were born at the same instant, I thought maybe breaking it without ending either of our lives might be linked to that same day. That makes the fifteenth of the eighth its counterpoint at the far side of the year, and so I thought that you asking me to help you might have had some... meaning. It was a stupid idea, a pointless superstition."


    "That can''t be right. My birthday was on... oh. No, okay, I was thinking about Earth years. I celebrated a birthday on the first of the fifth, so I was thinking of that. So it''s on the fifteenth of the second? You''re sure?"


    She nodded. "The sixth of the ninth. And to answer your other question, no, there are no important planes aligned. It is a terrible day for magic from that perspective." She sighed. "Are you asking me for advice? With your feeling that your options are wrong? I know very little about how Dumines offer up branches in magic, and even if I did it would not cover anything touching on Fate."


    I perched on the desk, and tried to gather my thoughts. "The thing that''s kind of... being pushed forward... when I think about it is a way to create connections with Fate. And at first I thought that would be cool, and that I could do stuff like fate myself to win every fight I was ever in. It wouldn''t be a guarantee, sure, but it would presumably add a little extra push of probability to things. But then I was remembering what I read in Harmid''s book, and I don''t think that''s right. Fate... it has to be leading to something specific. It can''t be that open-ended, or I don''t think it''s meant to be.


    "And I guess that''s why I''m also worried that learning to make new fates wouldn''t help me break existing ones; the end is part of the fate, they''re not supposed to be cut prematurely. Killing someone to end a fate is... it''s a workaround, I think, not an intended ending. So either there''s another condition built in to our thing already, or what we''re dealing with isn''t quite the same as what I''m thinking of as Fate magic. If it''s the former, then I should be focused on trying to read the threads, understand all the rules of them. That could be good to do regardless, I know Harmid was using a map to try and chart out where some were leading from me but it would be even easier to just touch one and know what it''s trying to do.


    "But if it''s the latter... I see the threads in all different colors, and only some of them seem to be truly about some sort of destiny. The one that connects us, it''s got shades of Comprehension and Spirit and Perception - all the shit you''d expect if it''s joining our thoughts. I don''t see anything that makes us look the same, but maybe I just can''t see that because it''s not one of my gifts or maybe it was a one time thing unlike the rest. The point is, it''s not... I don''t think it''s a fate thing, really. I think it''s other magic, but on the same layer of reality as fate. Hiding there so that it can last basically forever and not be seen by anyone else.


    "So maybe... maybe what I need is the ability to do that. To mess with magic that''s on that layer, somehow. I think if I focus too much on just fate itself I''m not going to be able to help you. I don''t know that I can do the other thing, though. I think it would count as wild magic, which you''re not supposed to be able to do with a Dumine. If I can, though, maybe I can make new ones with all sorts of different abilities. It would be really great, if it''s possible - and I think that might be the best way to help you.


    "My concern is that even if I''m currently growing in potential faster than a normal person that''s not going to be the case forever and I don''t know when I''ll hit a wall. So if I make the wrong choice, it could be that it''s going to be really hard to back up and do the right one - and I don''t want you getting impatient and going back to trying to murder me. To be clear, I''ve been genuine about wanting to help you and I''ve even made some choices that are inconvenient for me and my friends to do that, but if you do change your mind and try to kill me again I''ll fucking end you. No offense."


    She shrugged, looking totally unconcerned. "I assumed as much. I could have killed you the last time we saw each other in person, it would have been very easy. I have committed to giving you some time - so long as I think you are working towards it I will not end that time prematurely." She looked around the room and sighed. "I will return to my body. It is almost time for us to see the charlatan again, and I will ask if she knows anything about using fate-like magic to do other things."


    "Wait! Can I... can I see? I think I can probably make this place match your location, the same way we can spy through each other''s eyes. I just want to watch as you meet with her."


    "No!" The word was said a little too enthusiastically, and she seemed to have caught herself off-guard with it. "I... do not wish to feel you in my head."


    "It might be different, if I do it this way. You might even be able to keep an eye on me, sort of." There was a pause as she seemed to be considering it, but from the sneer on her face I didn''t have high hopes. I decided to change the subject and see if she warmed up to the idea when I wasn''t pressuring her. "I almost forgot, do you know where Katrin and Errod are?"


    "They remained in the city for a few days, and then left abruptly. I saw them both leave, but did not investigate where they were going or why."


    Hmm. Well, at least Ulren hadn''t killed them. Human Calliope departed without saying goodbye, and I decided to finish the last thing I''d been meaning to do with the templating ability so I could give it a rest - boxing up my fake memories. So far as I could tell, the Granch wouldn''t be a problem as long as I didn''t dig below the surface. Some false memories might quality, but if so it would be ones that were carefully crafted, not the long stretches of blurry "Generic Group Home Memories, Do Not Look Closely" that I was targeting.


    It was surprisingly easy once I got started, since they all had a similar feel. It was like waving a stick around to collect all the cobwebs; no matter how many there were or how dense it looked, a few swipes clumped everything up into a fairly tiny ball. When I was done I opened my eyes to find I was holding a snowglobe, with the inside so foggy I couldn''t make out what the scene was supposed to be. It was appropriate, at least. I dropped it in a desk drawer, not that I thought I''d ever want to do anything with it.


    My head felt... clearer. I didn''t think it would let me immediately recover any of the real memories, but at least the fake shit wasn''t getting in the way anymore. Not the generic stuff, anyway. I''d been planning on doing that for a while, but I had thought it might take longer and Hugh had been using up more and more of my time over the last week since he''d been making me let him in to my mind palace. I''d insisted on taking a break today to reset and go over my goals, and it was nice to have a break from him.


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    Not that he wasn''t helping - hell, the ideas he''d been coming up with on how to train inside my mind were amazing. I''d been breaking into buildings, mostly, but he''d found ways to add little challenges like they were escape rooms. Hugh couldn''t change anything in my mind palace directly, but through careful direction of my divination he would gather resources and set up obstacles. Most recently, I''d been forced to sneak down a street in Erathik to where Hugh was sipping a cup of juice. Without him seeing me, or hearing me, while I was covered in bells. In no more than five minutes.


    He had very deliberately left things that would help with the bells scattered around in plain sight starting a third of the way down the street, and what he probably wanted me to do was only deal with the bells I could easily reach and remove quickly before sneaking over and getting the better tools that would allow me to speed up. In particular, the big fluffy furs would have almost certainly muffled everything if I put them on right, allowing me to move way more quickly for the remainder of the road. There were also some scissors, which would have been nice since he''d forbidden me from ripping my shirt and that made just yanking the bells off risky - but I didn''t want to use scissors. Some other things scattered around I was less sure about - why a box of candles? He''d put them there very deliberately.


    Anyway, I ignored all that stuff and carefully removed as many bells as I could get to without pulling something or falling down, and then snuck into the restaurant I''d spotted a couple doors down. I''d eaten there in real life, and they had a huge vat of batter they''d ladle out onto a griddle. It was really good, but in this case I wasn''t there to eat. I flopped - carefully - into the batter vat, and once the viscous glop had thoroughly coated all the bells I just speed-shuffled towards Hugh.


    In theory he was supposed to blast me back down the street if he saw me - his powers sort of kind of worked in my mind palace if I let them - but in practice by the time he heard me coming and turned around he staring at a humanoid slime monster and was so caught off guard I was able to lunge and slap him with a batter-filled palm. It splattered everywhere, and he begrudgingly admitted defeat. So it hadn''t been all bad, and that disgusting move had earned me a reprieve.


    As I was updating the whiteboard to reflect my disposal of the generic false memories, the real Calliope popped in again. She was avoiding eye contact, and fidgeting.


    "Harmid has asked me to allow you to view our surroundings through the binding," she said, "so you can see our talk with the charlatan. For what good it will do. I will allow this. Once."


    And she vanished again.


    I reached out to that connection, and tried to figure out the best way to use it. Looking directly through her eyes was kinda creepy, and also I didn''t like that I had no control over where she looked. Ideally I''d get a divination-perfect view, but immediately I could tell that wouldn''t be an option. I would have to settle for a middle ground, and make it like my memories where I could stand off to the side. Anything she wasn''t actually looking at might not be completely accurate, but it would feel more natural.


    I got it online after only a minute or two, and sure enough there was Professor Yanipliss. His fake Dumine was still on his forehead, but if it weren''t for that I might not have recognized him right away. He was wearing travel-worn clothes, and had some very messy facial hair. He''d also lost a lot of weight, going from "kinda skinny" to "skeletal".


    "He looks like shit, is he dying?"


    I couldn''t see the wild mage''s expression since in the real world she was wearing that wooden mask, but she seemed confused. She stepped back, looking around, and then - very slowly - turned to face where I was standing even though from her point of view there wouldn''t be anyone there. "No. His recovery from being poisoned was interrupted, but he is healed enough. His only risk of death is from me stabbing him in his sleep for snoring. He is distressingly loud, even when I try to keep distance from him."


    Harmid looked surprised, and tried to turn to face me but got his aim a bit off. "Ah! Cal..." he paused, and looked nervously at the wild mage. "Miss... um. This is awkward."


    "Yes," the wild mage said, "because she has continued to use my name even after knowing she has no right."


    "Shit, I knew this was going to happen. Listen. Everyone is calling me Calliope. They have my whole life. And my double switched to Connie, but that was an inside thing that was kind of about muddled memories of you and also now she''s dead and I don''t want to call myself by her name. And I could pick a new one, I''ve lied about my name plenty of times, but I... don''t want to. I have a new last name, one that''s actually legitimately mine, so you can either call me Calliope Runelighter or pick a name to call me that''s not going to piss you off. But either way, you''re still going to run into people that call me by your name and I''m not always going to stop and explain it to them. Okay?"


    She rolled her eyes and sneered. I decided to take that as "no problem, I completely understand!"


    Harmid made another attempt. "I wanted to thank you for saving my life, and to let you know that I... well, that I don''t have any concerns about your... heritage. The children''s home towns were all identified, by the way, and I have notes on the other readings we took. I also had some books for you, but I unfortunately left them behind."


    "Ooh! Ask if they were in his office when we saved him from that prick Ulren."


    She passed it along, reluctantly.


    "Yes, actually, all but one. They were stacked on the corner of my desk closest to the door."


    Hell yeah. I could use divination to pick those up later. As I was about to ask some follow-up questions, another person entered the room. They were in mismatched armor that still somehow looked super cool rather than silly for being all different types, like some post-apocalyptic warlord. A helmet covered their face, and the inside of the helmet was just black rather than showing any part of their eyes. In case that wasn''t badass enough, they had four different kinds of swords strapped to them which - even moreso than the armor - really should have looked ridiculous or like they were some sort of tryhard edgelord. But again, they just looked badass.


    "Whoa, is this the bodyguard you mentioned?"


    "Yes," the wild mage said, "I was skeptical, but he killed five men who attempted to rob us on the road here in a manner that was... impressive to me. His attempt to persuade them to surrender made me think he was afraid to fight, but once they moved on him things ended very quickly. Sadly, he will not remove the armor for any reason."


    A sigh came from the helmet, followed by a deep voice. "Calliope, I mean no disrespect."


    "And yet you turn down a generous offer. Bah. At any rate, other than being celibate he is an acceptable traveling companion. He does not snore, like this one."


    "I don''t mean to interrupt your conversation with... your invisible friend? But the guru''s attendants say she''ll see you now."


    We walked outside, and I got my first view of the area. They''d been in a sort of log cabin, but once we stepped out I could see a mountain range stretching off in the distance beneath us - we were on a flattened peak that had clearly been made with magic, as if a giant had chopped off the top of the mountain and smoothed it off. There were ancient-looking frozen trees, all clearly dead and covered in ice; we were clearly above the tree line, so I had to assume that in the past some magic had kept the plants alive. A path led to a large temple-like structure made of the same stone as the mountain, but there were clear signs that it had seen better days.


    A mound of rubble circled the whole thing, with only a few small sections standing to reveal it had been a thick wall. The temple itself was all domes and towers, but half of the towers had collapsed - often into a dome - meaning it didn''t look like there were many untouched sections. The center appeared to be largely intact at a glance, but even there I could see signs of decay where the edges were all crumbled and chipped. As we approached I noticed a section where there was a bit of strange-looking greenish metal as trim, and I realized what had happened - someone had stripped most of the metal off and sold it or something, like they were ripping the copper out of an abandoned house.


    Inside, there were hundreds of banners strung up everywhere in eye-popping colors and layers of carpets lining the path we followed - and it was a good thing, because otherwise the place would have been a maze. The actual architecture wasn''t that confusing, but ceilings or floors had collapsed everywhere and so we had to take a circuitous route to get anywhere. As we traveled, we passed through an inner courtyard where I caught a glimpse of the most gorgeous airship I could have ever imagined.


    "Oh my god. Yes. No, no, don''t keep walking! Go to the airship. It''s an airship, right? We''re on top of a mountain, it has to be. Look at it! No! My baby! I''ll come back for you!"


    And then it was out of sight. I felt like not letting me see it up close should make us even for the whole changeling thing. We continued to wind around, and when we finally reached what was clearly the main chamber - I could see the high ceilings and extra-large banners - it was blocked off by a fallen pillar. Instead we made a sharp turn through a hole in the wall into a nine-sided room where seven of the sides had ornate carved patterns. Probably the side we''d come through used to, before someone violently remodeled.


    The attendants were about what I pictured, very fit young men and women that looked like the kind of teenagers that join cults. The guru, though... that one caught me off guard. She was also young, maybe in her late twenties, and was barely wearing anything. Some strips of silk were artistically arranged over her, but they didn''t leave anything to the imagination. And it wasn''t like in Erathik, where I''d seen women just walking around topless - that was almost always done in a way that was super casual, whereas something about the presentation here was overtly sexual. She was on a throne which was in turn on a raised dais, so despite being seated and fairly petite she loomed over the room.


    "Welcome back, seekers of Poicelria''s knowledge. I sense... another presence."


    She closed her eyes, and a third eye opened in her forehead. It was... well, an eye. It wasn''t a glowing symbol or a ghostly manifestation, it was just a totally normal eyeball. It maybe didn''t match the other two, but I hadn''t gotten a good look.


    "Holy shit. That''s a hell of a thing. Can she see me?"


    "I doubt she can," the wild mage said in English, "I still believe she is a charlatan."


    The guru tilted her head as if she was straining to listen. "Too few planes are aligned for me to speak with you directly, traveler. If your party would like to stay until the twenty-fifth of this month I should have the strength to commune with you."


    "This is what she does. While we are here, we must pay her people for all supplies and for lodging. So she comes up with excuses, and we must stay a little longer, a little longer, a little longer."


    "Got it. Still, if you''re already here... you might as well ask, right?"


    She sighed, but switched back to Imperial and tried to explain the idea of magic being done on the same layer of reality as fate. The guru nodded along, and then closed her third eye and opened the others again. "I know of what you speak. While many of Poicelria''s records were destroyed, we do have information on this topic. I will have my attendants gather what they can, and we can reconvene in one week''s time to discuss..."


    Harmid rolled his eyes. He didn''t look surprised at this answer. "We''re leaving in the morning, either way. You can tell us anything you know, or be honest about knowing nothing, and we''ll drop another donation on our way out. Or you can keep up this game, and we''ll just leave. You did this same thing to me last time I was here."


    The guru looked offended, but not half so much as the attendants. They were clearly ready to throw down, although I noted that none of them were actually coming any closer. After a moment, the guru sent them all into some other room behind the throne, and her posture shifted as she slouched. "Fine. I do actually know something about this one, so it''ll be... three hundred and twenty-four pins."


    The bodyguard spoke up. "Three reds is unacceptable when we have no reason to trust you. One red, or I tell my companions here a story about the twelve families."


    The guru''s third eye shot open as she stared at the bodyguard in shock. "Who the fuck... two red, and you tell me where you heard that story."


    "One, and I''ll tell you afterwards. Or we can just leave, and I can tell whoever I pass on the road."


    The guru glared with all three eyes - the middle one seemed to have some sort of nearly invisible pseudo-eyebrow that let it get in on the expression - but there was no way to win a staring contest against a helmet. "Ugh, fine! Money first."


    They clearly didn''t actually have a red on them, so they picked out four of the yellows and one orange. Once the guru had the little triangular coins, she sighed. "I don''t actually know all that much anyway. Back before the last Grand Alignment, the Clockmaker stormed this place. He took almost everything that wasn''t glued down, just left some old decorations, the busted flyer, and some shit in a secret basement he missed even with those fancy glasses. Probably was going to come back to go through brick by brick at some point, if his shit hadn''t collapsed like a year later. He had done what you''re asking about, but he couldn''t... manipulate things, once they were in place. He seemed pleased when he left, I guess he found what he wanted here. Whatever it was, he took it."


    "You were here?" Harmid asked.


    "Yeah. I looked different back then, but... yeah. Anyway, he either found a way to fix his problem or something just as good. But he for sure said he was doing magic with fate shit. I can show you guys some murals and stuff that he made copies of, the ones he didn''t just rip out of the walls I mean, but you might want to pass on it - that secret basement I mentioned? It had shit warning about people being doomed if they fucked with some of Poicelria''s old experiments. And the Empire collapsed so soon after he left here, you know?"


    I felt something pulling at me. I shifted my awareness, and could hear Hugh telling me that Klinec was going to do an inspection. That asshole. He was someone important at the base, probably he was in charge whenever Hammersmith wasn''t there, and he really didn''t like that I had any kind of privacy. He wasn''t a complete dick, but he liked to do random inspections and ask questions I refused to answer - I wasn''t sure at what point it started to count as interrogating rather than making conversation, but he was determined to balance right on the line.


    "Fuck. Okay, I have to go. Can you see if they''ll let you look at those murals and the basement and stuff? I''ll work on things on my end."


    I sat up in the real world, and looked at Hugh. "That couldn''t have come at a worse time. Can I just kill Klinec and be done with it?"


    "No."


    "You ruin everything. Also, you know that guru I wanted to visit?" I think I''m really glad I skipped it. They suck."