Salme @ Badri

Hey, so I figured I might as well set this up while I’m still around to explain things in person, but the library entries you’ll probably want to take a look at are:

• Speaking With Constellations: This is where I interacted with the Duelist’s Mask constellation
• Bahamut, The First Sword-Saint of Almachadta: I was able to dive deep enough in the Mask to find … an … echo? Of the first Sword-Saint of Almachadta. It isn’t a memory; it can learn and grow.
• A History of the Liminal Library: And here’s the making of the library. It has some mention of … the Mask’s inner workings and how the library is based off it?
• The Dream-Whales of Samudra: This is less necessary, but … there are some mentions of the possible connections with the Mask here?

Uh. If you encounter someone named Jorule, that’s … okay, so it’s really complicated, but there’s another guy who is part of Aurelius but different and he’s from another world? We’re … friends most of the time, I think. But. That’s who that is.

I sound insane, don’t I?

Oh, Light. This is… both incredible work on your part, and incredible… memories? Discoveries? I’m not sure what to call this. I’m reading through things very slowly to make sure I don’t miss anything. To think that so much was in the Mask the whole time I held it, and I had no idea.

I don’t think you sound insane at all. I think the world’s a bigger tree than we thought we were sitting under, which is an overwhelming feeling. I felt that way the first time I wore the Mask, and I couldn’t really talk about it with anyone at all. I’m so very glad you have good people to share this with.

Oh, please take your time. I just wanted to write this before I forgot.

There’s … even more beyond that. You’re welcome to look at whatever you like, and I can try to explain anything else. It’s been. You know, some time partway through Samudra I started believing it was more likely that we’d succeed than we’d fail. That’s. Well. You know I’ve always been, despite my role, a bit of a pessimist. That’s something.

Thank you again for welcoming us with all the attendant chaos. It was … really good, to share a meal with everyone. Next time I’ll have to drag Wolf along. Drag everyone along, really.

Oh, Salme. Reading all of this, I can– I can see the moment when I believed that there was a possibility that things could change. You say ‘despite my role’, but we shared that role, and the role made it very difficult to hold hope in anything other than– that something would survive, and remember us. And I told myself that everyone who lives faces that knowledge, that all they have to them is the legacy they leave, the memories that come to the living when they speak a name, that Almachadta’s truth and the Mask’s purpose was not that much different from the fate we all face.

And yet, we both know that’s not really the case, and never was, and that, until now, it was very very hard to hold out hope. Put on a brave face? Aye, that I could do. But no, Salme– you gave me hope back.

And now I hope that you and yours are doing well. Have you made it to Aurelius’ world, yet? I hope that the return is joyful for him; he seemed to be in good spirits when the three of you visited.

Did you hope that something would remember you? I did not. Or. I thought often about that tally mark. At least I would get to make one. How many Sword-Saints do not get that privilege? Most of us, I think. I thought about that tally mark so often, how deep I’d gouge it, how I’d leave a little diagonal slash at the end, like I do on my Es. Something, anything, to show I was a person, that I lived and that I died.

I used to think that the role hadn’t—that I had borne it with more grace than most. I had been unhappy before the Mask, and after I was. Well, not happy, but contextualized. I had a purpose, I had a role, and my very presence was a balm. It didn’t matter, I told myself, that I would likely see the end. At least I’d get my tally.

But I sliced out so much of myself to do it and I crafted other, different parts of myself to be better and better at the role, because who I was could in no way be adequate. And I am realizing now, just now, that I—I don’t know. I am happy, brilliantly so, happier than I’ve ever been. I think that just makes the fucked-up parts of me stand out more.

And the worst thing is that sometimes I’m upset with you about it. And I know that you could not have stopped me from winning the Rite against you; the Mask was mine once I decided I wanted it. And you were the best mentor I think anyone could have hoped for; your let me make the most informed decision I possibly could. I know all these things intellectually.

But sometimes I wonder why I couldn’t just have been your daughter?

And I know that is unfair to say. I know that will hurt you. I never said it because I felt you didn’t deserve to hear it, because it doesn’t change anything, and Light knows you’ve been hurt enough.

But fuck, Badri. I don’t know how to get past this. So this is me, messily and imperfectly, asking you to help me again.

(And Aury is doing well. Our arrival on his home plane, The Beast, was … complicated, but he is doing better.)

(I am also sorry AG called you a chode. I was … telling them my story and. They got very upset with you because they are … very impulsive.)

Oh, Salme.

It’s not unfair to say.

If it hurts, it’s a hurt I can handle. I’d rather hear you say it than you keep it bottled up inside. Don’t worry about -me-.

Can I admit something to you, in turn?

I used to have thoughts in the dead of night about- how badly I wished I could slough the Mask off on someone who wasn’t you. Not because I didn’t think you could handle it. I knew you’d be a brilliant Sword-Saint. But I had a feeling, knowing what it cost me, that it would cost you dearly, and I didn’t want. I wanted, so badly, to just find a nice corner of the Courtyard and be, not the Sword-Saint, but the father you never had.

I kept hoping someone would seriously challenge me for the Mask before you could beat me. I knew in my heart that that wouldn’t happen, but I hoped for it. I hoped for it.

When you beat me, after you wore the Mask for the first time, and the celebration in your honor was over, and I was alone again for a while? I wept. I wept tears I’d kept in since Ciet threw me the Mask, I think. I was relieved to not be carrying it any more, and that’s the part I can’t forgive myself for. And I was– so worried. About what it would do to the impetuous girl who stood in front of me, about to put the Mask on, saying “I haven’t a fucking clue”.

The Mask isn’t kind, Salme. It’s kind to Almachadta, perhaps, but cruel to those who bear it. And I can’t say I -would- have stopped you from taking it, if I could have; you wanted it for yourself, badly enough that the Mask itself could tell.

I hope I never gave you the impression that you would have to slice out parts of yourself to be the Sword-Saint. I… worried that you would feel like you had to emulate me; when it seemed like you had found your own way of being the Sword-Saint I- well. No, I still worried, because of who I am as a person, and it sounds like I was correct to do so. But I was also so proud of you, and I still am, and…

I’m sorry. I should have talked about all of this with you as soon as you became the Sword-Saint. I didn’t want to unduly influence you, any more than I thought I already had, and that was foolish of me, and I hope that, for that at least, you’ll forgive me.

I love you, no matter what.

Well. The thing I think I needed to hear … that if it could’ve been, you would’ve been happy to have me as your daughter. I. Didn’t know that. I needed to hear that, I think. To know that just being Salme-and-Badri would have been enough for you too.

Or. Not enough. The Mask was always my future, I think. If you hadn’t been the Sword-Saint then, if Ciet had somehow still been the Sword-Saint, I think I probably would have dueled them for it. I can’t imagine myself ever being content on Almachadta being anything less than the Sword-Saint. But. I would have liked to have been older, I think. To have maybe had more joy, and the father my heart chose. I’m sure you would have liked to been older too. If we ever get Ciet out of that fucking door I’ll have some words for them, I’m sure.

As for the rest.

You’re ridiculous. Of course you were relieved. I’d be angry if you weren’t relieved. I took the Mask for myself in part so you would get to be relieved (but just in part, Badri, don’t let yourself feel guilty about this too). Seeing the way you shone after—truly proving that Sunbeam-and-Dog sigil. And you never once made me feel like I had to slice out parts of myself or emulate you. I put that all on myself.

But I did put it on myself.

I. The secret was heavy, but the thing that got me was seeing the previous Sword-Saints and feeling … inadequate, I think. I know you know some of this but. I never really felt like I fit in Almachadta, in anywhere I went. You, after Iikka died, were the first person who ever seemed to see me and like what they saw. I was overwhelmed. Couldn’t see how I could ever be something like that. Perform? Sure. Carry sorrow and memories and stories? Absolutely. But all the small ways the Sword-Saint makes peoples’ lives better? I …

I should have talked to you about this because I’m sure you’d have a lot to tell me about being silly, but I hated myself so much. So the parts of me that were. Impulsive. Angry. Hurt. And also anxious. That needed and wanted? I smothered them. I thought I’d killed them, honestly, but they’ve been … coming back with a vengeance.

And you didn’t seem to. Notice a difference? You seemed happy and proud? So I thought that was the right thing.

And again it wasn’t all misery, even mostly misery. It wasn’t—I loved it. I still do love it. When I get the chance to perform, to tell our story, or any kind of story, I take it. I—well. You can see the library. I’m still. I’m still the Sword-Saint.

I’m just also trying to be Salme again, and that’s. Been harder. Than I thought it would be?

And I love you too. And I don’t think you need forgiveness for anything you did. I don’t, actually, think I need forgiveness either, not really. I just need. Guidance. A lamp. Help finding my way out.

And any guidance I can possibly give, I’d be glad to. I’m glad you’re trying to be Salme again. I’ve always loved Salme. And– I should have said something, this isn’t me berating myself, or begging for forgiveness. But a part of me did notice the way you were acting, and compared it to. Well. The way I acted, in my own way, after I became the Sword-Saint, and I had the impulse to say something, and I didn’t, and I regret that.

I, also, compared myself to- well, Ciet, directly, and then the memories in the Mask once I started getting my fingers dirty digging. But the thing is, in the fullness of time, the Mask only remembers… things that were ‘important’. Things that were memorable. So you’re comparing yourself to Light knows how many peoples’ best and brightest moments in their entire life, or– sometimes their darkest but most pivotal, or– you get what I mean, I think. I hope.

The Mask doesn’t remember… stubbing your toe on that one damn paving-stone in the Courtyard for the 600th time, or– being petty or mean or cruel by accident, or the day to day mundane lives of its bearers. The Mask doesn’t remember oatmeal for breakfast and lunch and maybe even dinner on a wagon between towns. The Mask doesn’t remember a lot of shit that’s really important if you’re trying to hold it and what it contains up as an exemplar of what your life and conduct ought to be.

It took me a while to learn that, and then a while after that to find a balance that wasn’t just… trying to rebel against the idea of a perfect Sword-Saint. To figure out who Badri was now that he was the Sword-Saint. To figure out who I wanted to be. Certainly took me longer than it’s been since you first wore the Mask, if you really want to compare yourself to an exemplar.

And, again, I should have… told you about this. But you seemed so happy, Salme. And I think you were, but– thinking you’ve found your purpose can be so dangerous. I’m glad you’re finding your self again, now. I’m so very glad.

Yeah I take your point about the comparison and what the Mask remembers but. I mean. I never thought I was worth much even before, you know? Though that’s also … sometimes I’m angry, in a way. We had access to the shrine. We could have written histories. We could have. Carried messages to ourselves. That’s part of … the library I built with Aury is for collaboration and discussion, but it’s also. I want to be remembered. I want all of us to be remembered. It’s my version of the Mask, in some ways. Hopefully a kinder, more joyous one. Hopefully.

And yeah I … never tried to figure out who Salme was as the Sword-Saint. I figured out … what the Sword-Saint needed to be and I was that. And I completely gave up on being myself. On wanting or. Loving, really. Not that I didn’t care—I did—but it was the kind of care at a distance, right?

Again I wasn’t unhappy. I think if things had gone how I thought they were going to go I wouldn’t have been unhappy. But. I’m so happy now. Even with the messiness, and the fucked-uped-ness, I’m so happy. And it’s hard to remember how I was, how I wasn’t unhappy but how I was also very much. I mean, I was waiting to die, Badri.

It seems. Really fucking unfair. And I know I did it to myself, I know it’s the choice I made, I know you had no way of knowing that I’d get that premonition, or I’d measure out the Mask lifecyles, or that I’d even be right, but. Light.

I’m still scared, you know. I have a lot of hope, but the fear that we might fail … I find myself trying to guard against every possibility. I go a little insane about it like. Every few days. I don’t know how to stop. People have failed so many times. I know it’s different, I know—but people have failed so many times.

It brings me more joy than I know how to express, to know that you’re happy, right now. I’ve never not been proud of you, Salme, but I always– hoped to see that.

I don’t think it’s fair to say that you did that to yourself. Could you have done things differently? Certainly, and so could I have. But the Mask and our world laid their burdens on us, Salme, and any sorrow that they caused can’t possibly be our own fault, even if we didn’t handle them with the grace hindsight gives us the capacity to regret.

I also… I certainly can’t say I know you’ll succeed, but it does seem like– the Mask hadn’t had any record of anyone trying to do anything like what you’re doing, right now. So either every trace of anyone walking the worlds was removed from the Mask somehow, or never recorded… or you’re trying something genuinely and completely new, and so you can’t say that others have tried and failed, right?

I don’t know what, if any, comfort that can be, but it’s what I’ve been telling myself ever since you told me what you’d learned and experienced, after you came home.

I mean, as fucked up as I am about the Mask, I’d rather have borne it than anyone else, right? I. It’s strange, to know how something changed you, possibly for the worst, but still being grateful you did it. Who else could I have asked to bear it? I suspect you feel much the same.

And I agree. The fact this hasn’t been tried is. Some kind of hope, I think, for me. Hard to hold on to all the time, but it is a hope.

Though there have been people who’ve walked the planes. There’s a woman from Samudra I’m hoping we get to meet on the Beast. I suspect she’ll have some answers if we can track her down. But the Mask holds no record, and … I cannot be certain, but the Architect was able to burn away the evidence of his actions in the Mask. Luĉja and I were able to repair it, but he had left an a sign of his actions.

Still, trying something new doesn’t necessarily mean it will succeed. It is a damn sight better than knowing how to fix the problem and being unable to.

Onto … happier matters, perhaps, I’ve been. Trying. To craft stories for each of my companions. Poems. Something to tell whenever I get the chance, and I’ve been struggling. I was wondering if maybe you could help me workshop some of it? I have a fiend I use to record my thoughts, but I feel like I’m mostly smacking my forehead against a copy of my forehead.

I’d be happy and honored to help with that, Salme. Sometimes you need to bounce your ideas off of someone else’s forehead, after all.

I keep trying to think of … how I want to talk about them, about us. I started drafting something for each of them—Wolf in simple slant-rhymes, but music, always; Aurelius in that sliding alliterative meter instead of with rhyme, that sort of thing, but.

Well it’s hard to write a story when you don’t know the end, yet, isn’t it?

And then there’s knowing where to stop. There’s the six of us—Aurelius and Awoken, Wolf, Archie and Luĉja, myself, but there’s also so many more people. You, and Archie’s partner Caion on Samudra, and Jae and Saranzaya here on the Beast. Jae is AG, by the way. I finally met her, and she’s.

Well. Were you there when we mentioned the Scorpion Queen who rules the Beast? That’s her.

But there’s also.

Aurelius is Aurelius, but before he was Aurelius he was someone named Annarr. And at some point, something in Annarr got … broken. We don’t know what, but it made room for someone else to come and breathe life into him. His name is Jorule, and we hadn’t met until we were leaving Almachadta, and.

It’s weird, isn’t it? Loving someone who is also another person, and having a completely different relationship with that other person. Aurelius is my partner, and Jorule is my … somewhere between “friend” and “brother,” but not in the same way Wolf is my heart-brother. I kind of hate that you never got to meet him, but Jorule can’t be present without Aurelius disappearing and … it’s complicated, Badri.

Or Awa. He. He’s so much, we’ve done so much together, I love him beyond all reason, but he doesn’t know his past. Not in the way I forgot (though my forgetting was very partial) but there’s nothing. How do I tell a story about someone when I don’t know where they’re coming from? When I sit down to do it, I just sound like a besotted fool.

So I turn to Wolf, World-Singer, Heart-Brother, yeresh and friend and confidant, but even then I don’t know him well enough, not yet. You know I struggled to ask him to be … I used the word “clan,” that’s the word they use on Samudra and the Beast, but I only did so because “family” leaves such a bitter taste in my mouth. But I asked Wolf to stand beside me, and I struggled at first because he seemed so … the the ideal yeresh, the best version of a yeresh there ever could be? But he is … just as fallible as I am, as any of us are, and enshrining him above the rest … that seems counterproductive. That seems like the opposite of what I’ve built.

And there are Archie and Luĉja who I love, but if there are corridors and secrets to my partners and my heart-brother that make me feel inadequate to telling their stories, I do not think I could speak of Arcs-Through-The-Depths-Towards-Truth’s-Light or Luĉja the Clockwork Knight.

Though, I guess, do you ever know anyone well enough to tell a story about them?

And then, of course, there is me, but I am not sure I know myself well enough to tell a story about myself—not a real one, not one that many people would hear—and I don’t think I’d want to be the focus anyway. Not all the time, anyway. I want it to be ours not mine.

I don’t Badri. It’s frustrating.

“do you ever know anyone well enough to tell a story about them?” is such a good question, Salme. It’s one I’ve struggled with. I wanted… for a long time, to tell Ciet’s story in a way that they would have wanted. They never got to finish their story– as the Sword-Saint, as a person. Certainly they’re not the only one with an unfinished story, but being able to tell theirs mattered to me.

I never managed it. With all the stories I’ve told, even before and after I bore the Mask… I think some part of me felt like if I were ever able to tell their story it’d mean that their story was over? And I couldn’t bring myself to do that? I never really thought about it, properly, until recently, and then when I did, I felt very silly about it. Of course their story is over, even if it doesn’t seem fair, and I should… sit down, and find a way to tell it.

All of which is a very circuitous way of saying that I understand your struggles, Salme. When it’s telling stories about the past, tales the Mask holds, fanciful fables about the lands on the other side of Almachadta that your audience COULD visit but, you know, likely won’t– it’s easy. When it comes to people you live with and love, it’s a lot harder.

The good news is, you can always write a first draft, and then revise it later as you reflect, and learn and experience more. Write something, even if it’s wrong at first, press it like a flower when you close your book, and come back to it later to see how time’s changed it.

Well, Ciet’s story as the Sword-Saint is over. Ciet’s story as Ciet is … I don’t know if it’s in the library, but they’re very much. Alive. They’re stuck in the door between worlds, but they are alive. And if we manage to get them out, then maybe they’ll get another story. Or a continuation, but I generally don’t like skipping that much time between parts of a narrative.

This is good advice, Sunbeam-and-Dog. I’ll take it.

Though.

Can you tell me … what did you think of them, when you met them? All of my companions. I think an outside perspective might be helpful here.

This is a selfish request, but… if you ever do figure out any way to bring them back out of– the situation they’re in. Please try? I know you will, I know you would without my asking, that’s not why I’m asking. It’s just– I’ve spent most of my life wishing I could talk to them one more time.

I’ll do my best to recall my thoughts.

Wolf I’ve respected for a long time. When I heard that he was going to be traveling with you, before– everything, I was happy, and relieved. Not that I didn’t think you could manage the situation on your own, obviously, but I’d have rather you had one of Almachadta’s best yeresh by your side. That’s still true today; he’s a good man, and I’m glad he’s standing with you. He… listens, he hears, I’ve watched him intuit in the precise cadence of someone’s voice what it would have taken me hours of conversation to dig out of someone.

Archie is– adorable? He seemed like he was hiding so many secrets in his pockets, the entire time I saw him, except for– when the swifts were present, and he lost himself cavorting with them. It sounds like returning home was good for him, on balance? He asked me a delightfully impertinent question about ear scritches. I hope that he gives himself time to breathe. I’d like to see him in the Rite, I think it’d be informative.

Luĉja (am I getting their name correct?) I have probably the least of a read, on. When I say they try very hard to be Dependable and the rock that you can lean against, I don’t mean to imply in any way that they don’t succeed - but I recognise when a role is being played (although in their case I think it’s being played with great joy and enthusiasm). They remind me of Ciet, in a strange way.

Awoken… has a boundless energy and joy that he takes in life, in every step and in every motion. I could understand immediately what drew you to him. He’s not afraid to be strange, not afraid to rely on the strange being accepted. If I needed to pick one out of the five of them to do an emergency trust fall with - yes, this is contrived, I know - I do think it’d be him. I noticed that he always seems to reflect what’s presented to him, return the energy that you bring to the conversation, more so than anyone I’ve ever known.

As for Aurelius… he was a bit of a mystery to me, until he brought those cookies along. He’s obviously capable - including of doing things to the Quarry that still have Tsem in fits, I keep trying to get them to get on here and talk to you all and they’re being stubborn about it for no reason - and he obviously makes you happy, but– the way he lowered his voice and spoke so quietly to Josef. You know Josef struggles with feeling comfortable around strangers, he was being very brave that day, and Aurelius, without knowing him or saying a word to anyone, had him smiling. I love him already for that.

I hope some of that is helpful. I can always be relied on to ramble, after all, I just wish I knew more of them a bit better.

I … want to respond to the lovely things you wrote about my companions, but I have to … first. Tell you something. About Ciet and what I almost did.

I think you might overestimate how good I am, because I. Ciet is still there, and I do think the plan is to try to bring them home, but. The way we got around it the first time was—it’s a really long story, and I was not at my best during any of it, but the people who went out of their way to save them were Jorule and Aurelius.

We weren’t able to open the door between worlds without killing them, and Aurelius found another way by leverage Jorule’s powers. They both worked a miracle—one that lets us come back to Almachadta at will; one for which I’m very grateful. But. I wouldn’t have done that, Badri. I would have ripped open the door and killed him.

I think. I know you love me. But I think it’s important for you to know this.

Indeed, for a while … the way Aurelius and Jorule found a way around harming Ciet—it let Jorule manifest in our world briefly, and I thought it meant that Aurelius was dead as a result. And I was so upset about it, Badri, that I wished we’d sacrificed Ciet’s life instead.

We weren’t even together then. I liked him, sure. Had a crush. Loved him as a companion, yes, but I wasn’t even thinking about your history with Ciet. And that. I know a stray thought isn’t an action, and I also … now I think we can get Ciet free somehow, and you’ll get that conversation which you deserve. But.

You almost didn’t, and that’s on me.

Oh, Salme.

For… whatever it’s worth. If that had been the only option… I can’t speak for them, really, but in another sense I’m one of the only ones who really can, and I think if that had been the only option, they would have wanted you to take it.

And if saving them had required sacrificing someone else, they - and I, as much as I wish to see them again, as much as my heart leapt at the thought that it might some day be possible - would not want you to do so. So how could I be upset with you for being upset when you thought that that had happened?

I’m so very glad for what Jorule did. But being willing to do what you had to do in order to make Ciet’s dream finally happen, even if they weren’t the one to experience it? That’s a strength I know they would have admired, if it helps you at all to know that.

I think what I’m trying to communicate is that I was callous and selfish about Ciet. I didn’t think carefully about what it would mean to sacrifice their life—not for you, and not for them, really.

It isn’t what happened, of course, and I cannot hold myself too accountable. But you always assume I am kind and careful, and I try to be. I do. But I am not always.

There are ugly parts of me. Tell me you see them clearly. Please.

I’m not trying to ignore them, I promise. We all do things we would have done differently, or aren’t proud of. Light shines on the times I’ve told you about -my- regrets here alone.

But I can’t be upset with you over something that didn’t happen. That was true in your heart, and not in your hand, even if you say Jorule was the only reason things didn’t turn out that way. And if they’d died… it would have been because you were doing the right thing, either way, not because of whatever was going on in your head when you made the call.

But I appreciate you being willing to tell me about that, Salme. Doesn’t change my love for you one bit, is all.

I think sometimes I push and push and push because I think I’ll hit a limit where someone steps back and says, “this is too much, stop, no more.” I don’t know why I expect you to do that. You’ve never once showed any such inclination. Still, perhaps because I fear it I try to trigger it before it can surprise me and hurt me. So thank you, Badri. For proving me wrong again and again.

Honestly, I’ve been proven wrong delightfully often. A bit more on that later, but. Things are good. Hard, sometimes. A little frightening, but really, really good.

I’ll return to your observations about my companions in a separate post.

Wolf is … had I ever met him before our mission to the Tangle? I feel like I would remember him. The others I obviously could not have met, but with Wolf it has felt like … here is someone who I think, eventually, I could have been my full self with and he was an Almachadta all along. Obviously I have found him now, but tragic and strange it took the end of a cycle for me to find him.

As for Wolf himself … he is a careful listener. He hears everything in terms of music. He’s grounded, but always climbing toward the sky as well—a strong vine with deep roots, I think, growing as high as he possibly can. He is the easiest for me to understand, in some ways. Perhaps it is because we are from the same plane, perhaps because the yeresh and the Sword-Saint do not play entirely dissimilar roles. He is filled with wonder and he is careful and he is sometimes ridiculously, absurdly stubborn. He can be quite silly, you know. I love that about him. It makes him human.

Archie takes to secrets like a fish to water. It is his mode and his method. In the Rite he is all movement and clever feints. He’s brilliant in a way that I am not, and I both respect and admire that but also feel intimidated by sometimes. When he lets down his guard you’re correct, though, he’s sweet. He also feels wonder at the world, and he’s brave. You’d think an academic would be very cautious, but Archie knows when to charge ahead and when to hold his counsel.

There are currents and complexities to him and I don’t know. I will be honest; Archie and Luĉja are both difficult for me in different ways. It is not that I do not love them; I do. It is just I haven’t learned their contours quite so well. Archie has a sharp sense of humor and he loves he a challenge. He’s the kind of person who’ll learn a new skill from the ground up, skipping no steps in the process. I hope to do his story justice.

Luĉja (yes, you got the name right) is the most difficult for me. Of all our companions, they are the one who seems … to have played a role much like the one I have, and yet their take on their role seems inverted to mine, in some ways. And part of that is coming from different worlds, and part of that is age—they are 120 years old, which. I have memories of Spoken Wood who are much older than I am (or of plain old metahuman Sword-Saints, such as yourself) but I myself am still very young. I think I have much I can learn from Luĉja, and I hope I can also give them something in return.

They are. Complex. Determined, in a way I think even the rest of us are not quite determined. Patient and reliable, yes, but also strangely goofy. They laugh easily. You wouldn’t think that looking at them, but they laugh. They show off a bit too. They embrace their strangeness and make it … something that can bring joy to those around them. I have asked, that if worst come to worst and I cannot continue to bear the Mask for whatever reason that Luĉja be the one to take over for me. I thought about it a very long time. I have no intention for that to be necessary, but I would rather have a clear plan than any uncertainty.

They were built for a purpose, though. I hope that purpose brings them joy, and if it does not, I hope they are able to grow beyond it.

The more you treat him as a stranger, the stranger he’ll be, yes. He cares so deeply, and he presents himself in simply ways worded complexly. Something I noticed early, early—even before you and I had reunited—was that the things he says, said strangely, do often make sense. Sometimes I felt he was the only one making sense and once I was able to get past the noise in my head about that being a trap, once I was able to show him I was listening, I think we got on much, much better.

He. We just. I just had my first date, Badri, in Queenstown, the capital of the Beast, and he … made it magical. There is a giant wheel, taller than the tallest tree you could imagine, with gondolas on which you can sit, and as the wheel turns you move higher and higher into the air, until you can see all of Queenstown smouldering below you. And at the top of the ride, the wheel paused, and glittering flowers of fire and gnosis were launched into the air, and it was so beautiful, and he held me and used one of his techne that allows him to move around the world and pulled me into the center of one of the … fireworks, is what they’re called and … I’m not doing it justice. I need more distance. But he’s that.

He will meet you as you are and make no demands that you change (but you will want to change for him, to discard doubt and fear and walk beside him. Or at least I did).

The thing about Aurelius, and this is the thing I have to keep reminding myself, is to watch what he does. And sometimes he is very quiet and is not doing much at all. And sometimes he is very loud and the loudness distracts from his actions, but. There is no one steadier. He will listen. He will see. And he will be beside you, holding your hand, before you even realized you needed someone holding your hand.

I found him attractive before I even really knew him, which … if you knew how deeply I’d buried the part of me that found people attractive, that in and of itself is remarkable. But even the glimpses of him I got early on were enough to make me interested. Curious. Sometimes I worry I rushed things, or forced him, but he’s also pretty stubborn so most of the time I think he’s exactly where he wants to be.

But with Josef—that’s exactly it. That’s him. And he can get in his head or get frustrated with dumb things or decide to show off a bit and that’s him too. He’ll do what anyone in the group asks of him and he won’t even grouse about it most of the time. And he. Well. Again. I’m still learning him. It might sound strange, to say I have to work harder at understanding him than I do Awa, but for all of Awa’s strangeness he wears his wants on his sleeve. Aury is … I don’t know. I think he could do anything. I think he will continue to perform miracles.

I’m not sure if this is actually helpful to myself, or even informative for you, and I can’t even begin to try to explain Jorule at the moment. But. I want everyone to know them, Badri. I want them to shine, and for their names to echo throughout history. I just need to figure out how.

… also I should probably let you know I lost Sanna’s sword. Sort of on purpose. It’s part of the Scorpion Queen’s throne now? Which. Means it will endure for a very long time, but. That is very much a thing that happened.

I’d love to hear that story, Salme, if it’s one you’d be willing to share. I don’t think it’s accurate to say that you lost it, under those circumstances. Thank you for letting me know where it is, though. I think - from everything I know about her and about the Queen, I think that would make Sanna smile, honestly.

What are you using for a weapon in its absence?

Thank you for your thoughts on your companions, I’m glad to know my own reads were… more or less correct. And for whatever it’s worth, everything you said about Aurelius made absolute perfect sense, to me.

I’d be willing to share it, yeah. Would you like me to write it up here? I think it deserves a bit of literary polish, all told. I’m working on Annarr’s story right now too, though that will take … more work.

Right now I have a lovely gun Aury commissioned for me, and he’s working on a replacement blade as we speak. He’s … of course he has skill at weapon-forging. Why wouldn’t he? I should probably buy a secondary sword in case I end up fighting Jae again though. Sanna’s sword was a sacrifice I was willing to make, but. It would gall me to ask for a weapon from Aury and then fucking lose it in a duel almost immediately after.

I’d love to hear it in your own words, yes! That said, I’m in no particular rush. Focus on Annarr’s story first, if you’d like to. But, when you’re ready, I’d love to hear it.

Does she demand a weapon every time she wins a fight? Is this some kind of elaborate ruse to keep her forges in good business? Light, one wonders.

I.

Dull-rooted girl, snare-stuck sparrow, she watched
their dance; not waltz, not reel, but Rite—the Scorpion Queen
stinger-to-throat against her heart-brother, steel shifting
swift and vicious then transcendent, the queen’s laugh a song, spiraling
endlessly up into the star-strewn sky.

She had learned the scorpion’s heart from words
woven, half-twinned to her own, over space and
through a surfeit of time, but her face was a stranger’s, then,
ice-chip eyes and smile like a war-wound, seed sprouting
into familiarity, sighting burnished hope in her bared blades,
hands grasping greedily—for blood or bonds—and sadness, too.
The lightning jolt of recognition jarred the sparrow
feathered-flustered, snared her well, eye-caught, watching
her scorpion find a match in him, world-singer, wolf-priest, and
the sparrow knew:

The blade of want had not gone dull or dust-gathered,
sitting, ignored and idle in her breast-coffer.
Her whetstone heart could only sharpen, only yearn, and
unused, any weapon craves a hand to wield it, and work—
purpose itself is no vulgar thing, no higher calling either;
it simply is—and want, a weapon always, fine-honed now,
cut itself clean-free, clamoring for a dance,
a duel, the scorpion’s witness and more—a place
care-carved for her sole self.

II.

As so she climbed the stair, sparrow-small, Rite-ready,
toward Stings-and-Kills, true hero, queen, loss close-kenned,
foreknown, and certain but settled still, walking
into the scorpion’s hall, stars and sparks spinning in her wake,
the skein of fate spun fast and found in every echoing step
upon the polished floor.

Steadfast she stood under watchful eye, the scorpion
herself seeming snare-struck, the sparrow yet unquaking,
bowing low to say, “Do you know why I have come?”

Upon her throne, sword-built, metal-melted-upon-metal,
a mountain of legacy and of lives long past, the scorpion smiled,
said, “tell me, word-weaver, though I might guess.”

Trifling as a brown-bird in the dim, the dull-rooted girl looked
up and up and up at her, whip-cord strong, lithe and built
for war and winning, and said, “a duel and dance, from you.

“The stakes?” spoke the sparrow, offering up her sword,
storied bronze borne long by the saga-sworn before her,
not sword-kin but sword-kind, weight and will to serve
a world-story, the sparrow’s chosen path. “Your win sets
my sword in your throne, made immortal, ever-wrested
moment, sheathed, stalwart, by your unending hand. A gift
of my ghost, of when you saw me and me alone
for this Rite-stretch.”

“And I will not win so let us not waste wit and time
setting stakes for such a thing,” the sparrow said, discarding
such impossibility without care.

The scorpion’s smile burned, battle-born, beautiful as
sun flame, as sea-foam smashing rocks to rubble,
inexorable. “I accept your stakes, word-weaver,” said she,
unfurling to step down from dais to dueling-circle,
reaching one hand into the palm of its other half,
the third hand into the fourth, mirrored motions, then pulling
palms apart to show dual blood red, fire-flecked blades.

The sparrow did not step but flitted, falling
into a tumble then rising, flying, feet but fleetingly
on the ground, freeing sword from sheath as she
rose to meet her scorpion’s mettle.

Rite-caught, both scorpion and sparrow girded
gracefully for the first flurry.

III.

The duel was danced in flame encircling,
scorch-threat to the fallow-hearted, though that
was not the scorpion, could never be, nor even
the sparrow, not then; only: Rite-tones rilling, steel-song
sent pulsing through the blood, drumbeat-strong.

The first strike fell to the scorpion, as it must,
the hero herself, but found forfeit there; the sparrow
had sang out the scorpion’s story, a fable fallen
through many worlds and ways—a frog, stung and sinking,
after ferrying some scorpion; the frog’s refrain of “why”
met without pity: “thus is my clay so crafted.”

That story so stymied Stings-and-Kills that the sparrow
spun in close, took her unarmed hand and spoke,
soft and unsweet, an invocation which the scorpion
could not deny. “Tell me the truth,” she asked, as if
she was not demanding a reply.

The blood-proud and battle-born, hope-hoarder,
wound-winner, queen-with-no-equal—she flinched.
The wind wound around the sparrow, whispered
in that still-sparking circle a scorpion’s truth, and thus
the sparrow, vicious, built bitter victory, not
in the clash but a cruelty more cunning.

“Shall I give your taken-truth back?” the sparrow offered.

Still held hand-fast, the scorpion spelled forgiveness
in their grasp but declined, driving blades down deep
into the sparrow’s sides, and as the swords bit, the sparrow
knew better than to ask why.

IV.

The sparrow laughed, letting fall their finger-grip, whirling
away, joyous and pain-proud, despite the blood that sluiced
slick onto the ground. She had come here to lose, to learn—
and now to hurt. A sword-strike for the steel-strong
queen, a bite repaid in kind. Flame sparked blue-hot along her blade,
spread to her skin, rendering her wild, wounded but will unweakened.
The sparrow flitted forward, leaping high to strike thrice—
a line drawn on her neck, a blade deep between her ribs,
another at the knee, a butcher’s parting of bone and tendon.

A scorpion bleeds as well as a sparrow. She chose to;
stood eye-locked as the sparrow ate near half her life.
“By my reckoning, at least, the win is mine,” the sparrow sang,
though she had all the time in which to lose, and would.

“Well played,” said the scorpion, breath-broken,
“But we both know you can’t pull that trick twice.”

The sparrow grinned, pulled air to lung, unbound
herself from gravity’s grasp, drove a kick into the scorpion’s chest
to which the scorpion replied with a sword-hilt
driven into her shoulder, hitting hard enough to stutter
the sparrow’s next step.

Breathless, still burning, tone-twinned, the sparrow dove down—
no scorpion can match a sparrow’s fearless fall—
took her flesh-toll then turned to find her footing because,
as the scorpion said, “I can keep fighting but we both know
you can’t.”

“Then make this count,” the sparrow said, sure in her strength
to bear this last blow.

The scorpion, blue-eyed as sword-flame, laughed, drew close,
kissed her throat with cold steel, and said, “I win.” Then spun—
stinger-seeking, wind-swift—and struck.

The sparrow’s breath betrayed her, overburdened by the prick
of pain, but not her eyes—she kept the scorpion well in her sight.
Knee-weak she buckled, Rite-broken but spirit strong,
and from her, dull roots stirring, singing: I am alive, I am alive.

V.

The sparrow offered up her sword, both hands, unshaking,
eyes still locked to eyes. Even after the flames had fallen,
fire was a filament between them, banked-ember gazes
seeing each other wholly.

The Scorpion Queen, reverent, took—
what was offered,
what was hers,
what she wanted—the sword,
won by Rite and longing for its place. She traced
one finger down its length, touched guard then hilt
in careful study, returned her gaze to the sparrow then leapt
backward—soaring, sky-strong, impossible—rather than
turn away, rather than break the thread between them.
She grazed her fingertips along the blade again. It caught, white-hot.
She did not flinch, did not seem to notice.

Sitting, then, upon her throne, she drove the sword
into the armrest, hilt asking always to be a home
for her hand, for the fall of her fingers—hers, now
and forever, more than any Sword-Saint’s tally mark
could ever hope to be.

“That sword,” spoke the sparrow, “has been handed down
Sword-Saint to Sword-Saint. It was Sanna’s, once, who melted
it and made it new to fit her hand. And now it is remade again,
to fit mine.”

Sparrow-saint, saga-sworn, the girl sloughed off titles
and epithets, and smiled, just Salme, and said,
“Thank you, Jae.”

This is, of course, not quite how it happened—I can accession the actual memory if you’d like to see, but I was fairly pleased with this result. I was thinking of giving it to her as a gift if you think it’s any good? I eschewed any formal meter here. I’m not sure how I feel about that, but I kept finding myself otherwise stuck.

I’m pretty sure. Hm. There’s a serious answer and a funny one. I think Jae’d want me to choose the funny one so: probably not the intent, but a good bonus.

Salme, this is… this is staggeringly good work. And– what it’s describing– I can’t imagine anything possibly could give me a clearer view of what happened, even if accessioned memories would be, strictly, more accurate.

I think that this sort of sprung verse ought to count as a formal meter every bit as much as the old forms! But then again I would say that, and - I actually dug through the Mask to check this one, once, as a foolish youth - people have been having that argument longer than could possibly be imagined… regardless, I agree with all of your creative choices here, and I think she’d absolutely LOVE this as a gift. I can’t imagine that someone wouldn’t. This is, and you are, magnificent, o sparrow-saint.

Thank you for trusting me with a first look at it.

Oh, well. Thank you. I do think there’s some weaknesses—upon hearing it, I rewrote a stanza or two, and I do think there needs to be more of a caesura before the final line, though I’m still (rotating) how I might do so. As for the versification … I’m happy with it. It sounds right, and I’ve always been willing to slant a rhyme or allow an extra metrical foot if the words feel right in my mouth.

I did … have a question for you, though, now that you bring it up. “Sparrow-saint.” I realize, even though I identify rather heavily with my sigil that I can’t remember … who chose it. I suspect it might have been you?

I was actually wondering if you’d be willing to maybe. Tell me some stories about what I was like as the Sword-Saint? I … that might be self-indulgent, but I realized I don’t really remember and. I’d like to know?

I wouldn’t say that I chose it, but I definitely… suggested or inspired it, I would say. I’ve always loved the small brown songbirds of our world, wrens and sparrows and dunnocks and thrashers that all get mistaken for each other if you’re not paying close enough attention.

One day, when we were telling stories back and forth and just listening to the sound of each others’ voices around a campfire on the way to some town in the middle of nowhere, I said that you… reminded me of? That I thought of sparrows, when I thought of you? And I didn’t think anything of it, just another thing we’d said to each other, metaphors piling on top of metaphors for the joy of it, but the next day you told me that you were still thinking about it, and that it had made you smile. And that, I think, is when the story of the Sparrow-Saint started, truly.

As for stories about what you were like as the Sword-Saint? You were magnificent, Salme. I want to think about this a little, think of a specific story to tell, but- two years after you became the Saint I traveled with you, a while, and I could see the way everyone brightened up whenever you came to town. Which– I was the Sword-Saint too, people came to the gates to see me, too, but. I watched you, and I watched you always make time to just listen to everyone’s stories - anyone who wanted to commemorate someone who’d been buried that year, anyone who’d done something that that person felt ought to be remembered, even if it was something completely inconsequential like “baked a pie that won the contest”. You’d always listen, and I always admired that so much.

Did I tell you why it had made me smile? I think … the man who gave birth to me used to call me his skylark, until he realized I didn’t have much of a voice. I’ve noticed I’ve been drawn to birds pretty consistently. I. Hm. Thought it was a comment on how common I was? Which I guess it’s not not that. It’s frustrating to not remember so many things.

As for the rest—I still want a story, if you think of one, but. I did remember, recently, that feeling. Of people waiting for me, happy to see me. And I remember how happy I was to listen, and how little it mattered to me what it was I was being told. Triumphs and sorrows, no matter how small or large. I’m finding that part of myself again too. I missed her.

Oh. Badri. Badri. Did you know I recently found out that Wolf and I had met? Back when I was a little hellion of a child, and he was a surly teenager? I bit him! All the while I was telling the story I didn’t realize it was him until he above expired from embarrassment. Did I ever tell you about when that yeresh came to Oaretsch? I almost certainly did.

I also had another question. Are there any stories about irrica, the stone, specifically? I mean to dive in the Mask, and I remembered the story of Irric’s Rest about as soon as I stepped foot in Kesset, but about irrica itself?

I will, as long as I live, not understand how anyone could listen to you, and conclude that you don’t have much of a voice. I’m not much of a singer either, Salme! And yet I know we’ve both held entire towns captivated around the campfire. And I’m sure Aurelius and Awoken would have some correct and true opinions here, as well.

I’m glad that you remembered that, it was always… it did not, ever, make me feel like I had been inadequate, as Sword-Saint, don’t worry about that, but- seeing you succeed in ways I never could have done made me smile.

….oh, Light. I remember the story, yes, and I remember your choice words for the yeresh’s apprentice. That was Wolf!? I can’t possibly imagine. Strange to think of how far we all come from the people we once were, I suppose.

Irrica… that’s a good question. I’ll ask the King and some Lightdrinkers if they know any stories? They found it first at Irric’s Rest, this cycle, at any rate. I know it’s been found before, it’s had different names. In most places, you have to dig fairly deep for it, except for cave systems where it more readily appears. Stories, though… hm. I dove into the Mask looking for irrica, once, on a… romantic whim, and the thing that struck me particularly was that each cycle’s story about its origin always seemed to echo Irric’s Rest’s story, in peculiar ways, the way some of our stories told over and over again tend to do. Some great beast, bequeathing its treasure to the people it loved.

I mean my parents wanted something very specific out of a child, and truly, in retrospect, perhaps they should have crafted a fiend instead. I may be more sparrow than skylark, but I do know I can captivate an audience. Maybe that’s what caught me so much about the sparrow imagery—it felt like you actually seeing me, rather than what you wished I was.

That was Wolf! It. You know, that moment, with me, and his subsequent scolding … it sort of put him on the path that made him who he is today and I. I’m feeling some kind of way, some big, unspeakable way, that even as a little menace of a child I … mattered, to him. And that we found each other again and I get to have him as my companion. There’s maybe some poetry in me about it, though I don’t know what shape I want it to take.

On irrica, I … think there might be. Hm. So. Last night I was spinning. I’ve been doing a lot of experiments with fiberwork and gnosis—the others are much better at using pure gnosis to accomplish what they want, but my hands often need to be holding something physical as well. At any rate, spinning gnosis into silk is very natural, and I was able to spin threads of all five and then use liminal to … collapse them into something entirely different? I’m still not sure exactly what happened. The artifact I made ended up looking like two snakes—one, very clearly, the union of tenebrous and radiant, the other a union of burning, flourishing, and pellucid, and it looked like irrica.

I don’t know if you saw in the library, but Awa and I were able to see Almachadta from the outside, and it is wreathed in rings that look like irrica too. I don’t know … I might do some diving myself. I’ve been meaning to, anyway, but I’m just so busy. But “Some great beast, bequeathing its treasure to the people it loved”—Badri your way with words is so striking, even in this form. That makes me think of, well, many things, much of them ill-formed. But I am thinking. Please ask the King and the Lightdrinkers if you get the chance.

Oh. I do suppose I should tell you—we made contact with Tasna and the others whom Ciet was communicating with. I. They seem to know much less than I had hoped, but they are very interesting people, and kind too. Tasna cared about Ciet very much—I showed her … the memory of their attempted crossing (though did not show her the door shutting) and she was … struck by it, I think. If there’s anything you’d like me to ask for your sake, please let me know.