Daneera smiled.

They were sprawled on the starlit grass outside Kerik's cabin, taking a breather from the afternoon's... activities before they hunted some food. Kerik huffed softly, his head on her lap, truly tranquil for the first full moon - the most restless nights for him - since she had arrived. Not a disruption anymore, benign as it was, now Daneera's scent calmed him, allowed him to access the more peaceful parts of his wild instincts. Daneera's hand sank in his fur, scratching him behind the ear - dog, fox, wolf or werewolf, she still had to meet a canine that didn't appreciate that.

Kerik's head sprung up, eyes wide and ears perked up.

Daneera followed his gaze, but she only saw forest in that direction - she was no match for his senses, not without magic. "Was that dinner, Kerik?"

Kerik sprang up into his fours, heckles raised and teeth bared. This time Daneera had felt it too, a disturbance she could only sense her bones but still unmistakably there. She rolled into a crouch. "I'll come with you, Kerik, just let me- Kerik!"

He shot into the woods. Daneera ran into the cabin, picked up her knife and jumped through the open window to follow Kerik, infusing her limbs with primal speed to keep up with a frenzied werewolf. He hadn't even reacted at her calling his name, which wasn't a good sign.

As she sped through the forest, easily tracking Kerik's mad dash, Daneera started to smell deer blood - but that wasn't enough to whip up Kerik in this kind of a-

A small explosion shook the forest.

Kerik flew past her and into a tree, falling to the ground with a whimper. Daneera ran to his side, eyes widening at the sizzling circle in the middle of his chest. Judging by his wheezing breaths, whatever hit him had cracked a few ribs as well. She turned at the approaching threat.

"What's with me and weird-wolves lately?" A large and thoroughly pissed off viashino stomped through the underbrush, shaking numbness off the arm holding an inscribed bone dagger - the other was nothing more than short stump. "Full moon? Again? Frozen hells and uncaring spirits, I was just done with that ****!" Only then they seemed to notice Daneera. They shook their head. "When you're relieved to see a human... is that angry furball yours, by any chance?"

Daneera bristled. "He is his own person, and you are trespassing." She had never heard of viashino in Morvata, and being surprised at the lunar cycle... there weren't many explanation for that. Planeswalker.

"Sorry, must have missed the picket fence," Sharaka replied dryly. "His own person, you say? Good, so he can make his own decisions." Sharaka met Kerik's furious gaze and gestured at him with the dagger. "Listen here, mate: try me again, and I won't leave enough for you to heal from. If he doesn't understand my language as you do, ma'am, please translate. The name's Sharaka, by the way, forgive me if I don't curtsy."

Kerik was well enough to lift himself into a crouch, and looked - and sounded - like he wanted nothing more than going for the viashino's throat. Without taking her eyes off Sharaka, Daneera crouched and held her hand to his snout, filling his nose with her scent, and pulled his head close to her chest. "Kerik, look at me," she whispered in his ear. "She'll leave our land, Kerik. We'll dine on deer tonight, she'll surrender her prey and submit. Just stay here with me, Kerik." Kerik's snarl slowly went back to a low warning growl.

"Well **** me, you really get results," Sharaka chuckled, wary but appreciative. "I wish you had been around for the last pack." She made a face, and Daneera had no doubts about the ending of that particular tale. The mention of an entire pack of werewolves also put any doubt about Sharaka's Spark to rest.

"Werewolves aren't mindless monsters," Daneera warned.

"I know," Sharaka grimaced, showing some trace of regret. "Doesn't count for much when they're trying to have you for dinner, unfortunately - not all of us can be wolf-whisperers or whatever the ****."

"Neither can we all respect apex predators, it seems," Daneera hissed despite herself. The thought of an entire pack - and entire family - of people just like Kerik slaughtered with only a cursory second thought, even in self-defense... it didn't sit right with her.

"Respect is earned," Sharaka replied with a flat look. "And if you're too stupid to either recognize a fellow dangerous creature or take an accurate stock of your chances, you won't have mine."

Daneera crossed her arms; she wished to see how well that philosophy held on against a rampaging baloth. "So as long as you win, you were right all along?"

Sharaka looked at her, tilting her head. "What has being right to do with anything? Not tickling a boar's balls isn't a matter of respect or being right, it's a matter of not being a **** idiot." She shrugs with her stump-arm. "But if you want to call it respect..."

Daneera shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose. This was going nowhere. "What brought you here anyway?"

"The amazing company," she replied with a sarcastic grin and an unimpressed glance at Kerik.

Karik's heckles raised again at that. Daneera sank her hand into the scruff of his neck, gently pulling him behind. "Back to the cabin, Kerik. I'll come back with the deer when she leaves." The werewolf huffed warily, but after a tense moment he slowly backed up until he was out of sight.

Sharaka didn't provoke the werewolf further, but wiggled her fingers in goodbye - as far as her dagger permitted - as soon as he turned his back.

Daneera, not having to worry about Kerik's reaction anymore, now openly glared at the viashino. "The real answer, Sharaka."

Sharaka half-shrugged. "My feet, obviously. Or chance, if you want to look at it that way."

"Chance?" Daneera raised an eyebrow. "You can't just stumble into the middle of the Bladǎri forest."

"Really?" Sharaka tilted her head, lips split into a big sardonic grin full of sharp teeth. "I can. I might even not be the only one here."

Daneera crossed her arms and leaned back. Was she implying...? "What are you on about?"

"Please," Sharaka rolled her eyes, "I know all too well how rare viashino are, and you're not scared or weirded out by me at all. You're a 'walker, and not a newbie at it."

There was something she wasn't saying - going from "comfortable around viashino" to "planeswalker" was bit of a leap, if admittedly not a very big one in Morvata.

Daneera wasn't enough of an actor to point-blank deny that, though. "And so are you," she just replied.

Sharaka shrugged with a bitter smile. "The perk of being a viashino 'walker is you easily spot other 'walkers - they're the ones that don't immediately take you for a monster."

Daneera blinked. That was... a way to see it, certainly. No point in hiding all the cards, then. "Why Morvata, then? That's the name of this plane, if you didn't know."

Sharaka shrugged again. "I was looking for a nice place to catch a breather, after the adventures I had lately, but I can see this Morvata's not it."

Daneera nodded, not without sympathy; she knew all too well Morvata had plenty of adventures to offer, even if one didn't exactly go looking for them. "So why not just 'walk away, then?"

"Now? Because I just caught dinner and I'm starving." Sharaka points behind her with the dagger. "After that, though, I'll gladly leave you alone and look for a plane where viashino are welcome in inns - didn't think I'd ever say that, but I've got my share of forests for the week." She looked honestly surprised at herself.

Daneera frowned. Sharaka had caught her own prey, and fought off the predator who had claimed the hunting ground, but still... "Did you intend to bring the rest of the deer with you?"

Sharaka took a good, long look at Daneera. "Is there some sort of werewolf tax?"

Daneera took a deep breath. Goodness, did she like to prod the baloth... "Let's put it like this: if you take some meat off the deer, 'walk away and leave most of it with us, next time you might not need me to intercede with Kerik." Not that Daneera wanted there to be a next time, but still. She had a strong feeling nobody would enjoy the ending of that particular fight.

"Kerik." Sharaka considered Daneera for another long moment, then shrugged. "How can I turn down such a generous offer... Can I have your name, before I go?"

Daneera deliberately didn't nod, wary of her wording. The chances Sharaka was a fae ally were slim to none, but still. "You can call me Daneera."

Sharaka nodded. "Until next time, Daneera," she sighed, and turned her back on the huntress. A risky move on her part, but maybe her confidence was warranted... and maybe all of Daneera's hostility hadn't been. If Sharaka was really willing to leave without a fight, surrendering most of her catch to strangers she has just locked jaws with as a gesture of goodwill... she might deserve the benefit of the doubt.

"Until next time, Sharaka."

Sharaka's big grin lost a few teeth. "Come again?"

"To learn the Eightfold Lotus," Jinsen explained, as calm as ever, "you must first learn battle is a means, not an end."

"So I heard you right the first time." Sharaka made a face. "Nice assumption you have there. Care to add I should stop eating babies to improve my reputation?"

"I did not mean to offend, Sharaka," Jinsen pointed out, "but only to warn you about a common pitfall in one's path toward mastery."

"Sure, let's say I let that go," Sharaka shrugged, but she still eyed the kor warily. "Did you miss the little detail that if you 'walk in a random plane, the most likely reaction you get is "is that weird pale human sick?" Just so you know, what I get half the time is "how many humans have you eaten alive today, monster?" I'd spend all my days mating, eating, drinking and sun-basking if I could." Kimberley colored slightly at Sharaka's order of priorities. The viashino shook her head. "Fighting off idiots is a necessity, not a fun pastime."

"You move in the world like a battle is behind every corner," Jinsen replied levelly, "by always expecting a fight, some will mistake it for a desire for violence, and oblige you one way or the other."

Sharaka blinked, unimpressed. "Jinsen, I'm outnumbered and out-armed wherever I go. If I didn't keep on my toes I'd be dead." She gestured vaguely at Jinsen's whole figure. "And unlike you, I can't just wander about in the confidence I'm able to slaughter anybody I meet before they can unsheathe their blades."

"My balance doesn't come out of superiority," Jinsen observed, "but out of grounding and centering myself. The sword only exists to convey the strength of the spirit."

"Line yourself behind every strike, body and soul." Sharaka declared solemnly, then gave another unimpressed look at Jinsen. "See? I can drone maxims too. What I mean is, you can keep your relaxed center or whatever you call your stance because the people able to pose a threat to you are next to none, and I bet that vague magic hanging around you enhances your awareness as well. I, on the other hand," she waved her stump with a bitter smirk, "have to care about numbers, terrain, magic, everything, everywhere I go - because if I don't, I'm a moment's distraction away from death."

"Everybody is always a moment away from death," Jinsen just replied. "We both know that."

Sharaka scoffed. "In theory? Yeah. In practice? A crippled goblin in a dragon's cave is way closer than the dragon licking his lips in anticipation." She tilted her head and raised an eyebrow. "Let me ask a question: did you ever campaign? Like, took part in a real war."

Jinsen held Sharaka's gaze for so long Kimberley thought that would be the end of their conversation. "Yes," he just said instead.

"Did you now," Sharaka replied, sizing Jinsen up again. Her stance loosened ever so slightly. "See? I made an assumption, but I checked before saying you obviously don't know how it feels to lose comrades because you're not good enough. Second question: how much training did you get before going to war?"

Jinsen's eyes grew melancholic, but not in a way anyone but Kimberley and maybe Lord Eijo would have noticed. "I was not prepared for war, Sharaka - I suspect you know nobody can be truly prepared for it."

Sharaka's eyes narrowed for a moment, shoulders tensing up, then she shook her head with a huff. "Yeah, well, answer the actual question."

"When the call to arms came, I was already Weapon Master of the Eightfold Lotus; it took twenty years to achieve it." Kimberley's mind stumbled at that, boggling at the thought of a training that had began before she was even born.

"Twenty- how old are you again? Never mind," Sharaka shook her head. "If I had had twenty years of training..." She glanced at her left arm. "Well, some things would have gone differently, that's for **** sure. From what I see you have all your bits on you, for starters."

"Knowing one's weakness is the first step toward strength," Jinsen observed. "Some have to pay more than others for that lesson."

Sharaka rolled her eyes. "Again with the maxims - I have fought with warriors that knew all the battle wisdom you can imagine by heart. They died like everybody else," she drawled bitterly. "My point being: meditation, self-centering, awareness, they help a lot to keep your mind straight - but they don't put your weapon through your enemy's heart, nor deflect a strike meant for your throat. That's what technique does, honed and practiced down to your very bones, performed with strength and will - did you like the sound of that? I can come up with this **** too." She hunched her shoulders in a way that suggested she would have crossed her arms if she could. "So believe me when I say I've got enough lore to last me three lifetimes - what I need are techniques."

Jinsen considered Sharaka thoughtfully for a long moment. "Then allow me to ask you an honest question in return: does your lore teach you to revel in bloodlust? I have seen what you left of those bandits."

Sharaka bristled. "If you want me to reply with a maxim, "a weapon is a weapon, and everything is a weapon." If you want the long version, the Burnspine teaches us that "mastering" Fire - feelings - by chaining them down opens only an additional front for you to wage war on; you harness feelings - both yours and your opponent's - and make them your edge."

As fascinating as Kimberley thought that idea was - turning her own unwanted feelings into something useful sounded great - she knew Jinsen disagreed deeply on that, but he didn't let it show on his face. "And in so doing, don't you preclude yourself from retaining clarity?"

"Oh please," Sharaka rolled her eyes. "If you care enough about something that you're fighting over it, feelings are already there. Rather than bottling them up and have no idea what to do with them when they overflow - when, not if - we use them to our own advantage. That's especially useful when you're fighting numbers and you lack, you know, a way to casually blast down enemies by the dozen." Sharaka leaned in, tail jerking back and forward. "So, again, I'm more interested in the actual techniques than all the cute trimmings - I'll find a way to adapt them to my own style and magic in my own time."

Jinsen took a deep breath. "The strength of the Eightfold Lotus lays in its teachings, not in its swordsmanship or footwork," he said, still perfectly calm. "Every stance and technique stems from its founding principles, which breathe life into the whole style. It is not a piece of machinery that can be easily scrapped for parts, because those parts are nothing without their foundations. Do not misunderstand me, I am willing to teach you," Jinsen added, and Kimberley didn't know why she felt some surprise at that - he had been teaching her, after all, and Sharaka looked like a fearsome warrior already. Jinsen continued, unaware or uncaring about Kimberley's thoughts. "But if you are to learn the Eightfold Lotus, you shall do so as everybody else - roots to petals."

Sharaka shook her head, deflated. "I thought you may say that. Forget about that sexy shockwave of yours, then," she said as she picked up her backpack, "I'll find myself a less patronizing teacher. Double good luck, girl - pretty sure your friend doesn't need his share." She waved a goodbye to Kimberley with a knowing smirk, and turned her back to them.

Jinsen and Kimberley stood there in thoughtful silence as Sharaka walked away, without hesitation and without looking back. Eventually Kimberley spoke up. "Can I go speak to her before we carry on, Jinsen?"

Jinsen looked at her for a moment, then nodded. "Please do. You may have a better chance at getting through her." He looked through her for a moment, carefully considering his next words. "It would be a great shame for her heart to fall to darkness."

"Of course," Kimberley nodded, and ran after Sharaka. Jinsen was, of course, right - despite their obviously different upbringings, Kimberley could relate to Sharaka's outlook better than her teacher. And like Jinsen, Kimberley would have hated to see Sharaka lose herself in the bitterness she spat with every other word of hers.

But Kimberley, to her shame, also felt like Sharaka had made some good points.

You should have looked for me.

"You arrived in the end, gramps," Rhysannon replied, casually tossing a lock of hair off her face.

The flaming runes floating in front of Tulemnak reignited, stronger and brighter.

YOU SHOULD HAVE LOOKED FOR ME.

Rhysannon held her smile in place. "You arrived in the end."

The ancient ouphe glanced meaningfully at the scarred forest, the broken and torn Iandoki machinery littering the sacred soil, then glared at Rhysannon and grew his runes bigger.

Rhysannon held Tulemnak's fiery stare for a long while, but she had never managed to stare him down. "A girl needed me," Rhysannon eventually admitted, looking away. His reply was quick and fiery, three lines of runes towering over her.

THE LUGARA NEEDED US.

YOU PUT THE NEED OF AN INDIVIDUAL BEFORE THE NEED OF AN ENTIRE FOREST.

I TAUGHT YOU BETTER THAN THAT.

Rhysannon matched Tulemnak scowl for scowl this time. "The Storyteller," she just said.

"Hold your tongue, girl." Tulemnak shook his head in contempt, their forest thrumming with his every syllable. "This is nothing like-"

Rhysannon shifted her throat into a lion's to imitate the ouphe's gravelly voice. "War and politics are a fool's errands."

"Hold. Your. Tongue." Tulemnak's lips curled bitterly. "You never faced the Cabal. You can't understand that time."

"No," Rhysannon conceded, "but I can understand you."

Rhysannon knew she had won the argument, but his disdainful scoff made her feel like a guilty child all over again - no matter her age, no matter how many younglings she had raised. The Lugara echoed him like always, joining him in judgment, and Rhysannon hung her head, a truant girl scolded by her elder.

She would never introduce Daneera to him. Her girl needed peace, she needed understanding, not more power and responsibility. Rhysannon did what she could for her own.

Tulemnak's next words came into a whisper, carried by the breeze slithering through rustling leaves. "I thought you had died."

Rhysannon's eyes snapped up. He... he had returned to a burning forest, and no living Rhysannon to respond to his call. She had left to look for him just the day before... as soon as Daneera had left. "I'm sorry," she whispered back.

Tulemnak huffed and shook his head in dejection, anger gone as quick as summer rain. His next words were carried by flame, not by sound. Is the girl alright?

Rhysannon sighed in relief. "If she's not right now,"she said, "she will be soon."

He nodded, soft eyes deep in thought. There's no need to hide her from me. You know that.

Rhysannon hesitated. Sometimes she forgot he understood her as thoroughly as she understood him. "Maybe," she shrugged. "But a girl has to get her fun somewhere, right?"

Tulemnak shook his head again, but there was a slight smile on his ancient face. I shall take your word for that. Grow strong, Rhys-Of-Many-Skins. I leave the Lugara's healing to you.

Rhysannon nodded, grateful for his trust. "Grow strong, Tulemnak."

She watched him 'walk with a fond smile - even after all this time, it was always wonderful how gently he parted the boundaries of a plane. She sighed again and looked at the azure moon above her. She's still not introducing him to Daneera.

Not yet, anyway.

Kyewdz smiled as he set down the steaming cup. "Very good tea," she nodded. "Thank you."

"I'm glad you like it!" Aloise smiled back, glad to have elicited five whole words and a smile from the guarded goblin girl. "Beryl told me you're an expert artificer, Kyewdz?"

Kyewdz wiggled her head with a not really expression on her angular features, making her unkept mohawk dance. "Not expert," she shrugged. "Interested, yes."

Beryl leaned to the side to glance at the goblin's pack near her knee, dozens of wires and tools poking out of its countless pockets. "You can go from base materials to functioning construct in under a minute," she tentatively replied. "That's more than a passing interest, is it not?"

Kyewdz tilted her head with a timid smile. "Yes. Passion, maybe? No apprenticeship, no dedicated study. No research. Most skills acquired through improvisation. No expert," she insisted, shaking her head minutely before taking another sip of tea - Beryl noticed she had no trouble holding the scalding cup against her palm even as she carefully took small sips to avoid burning her tongue. Her eyes went to her tattoos once more, careful not to stare.

"It does sound like meaningful experience to me," Aloise pointed out with an encouraging smile, happy to have found a conversation topic the goblin was willing to engage. "Anyway, making a construct in less than a minute? Can I see?"

Kyewdz' eyes dropped to the table, tapping her index and little fingers together as her intense gaze flickered purposefully, as if tracing an invisible blueprint with her eyes. "Yes," she declared after a moment, then disappeared under the table as she bent over her pack for a few seconds of intense rummaging. The goblin girl reemerged with a double handful of small metallic blocks, sticks and spheres mottled with dust and oil, all sticking together in a tight cluster. "Magnets and ball bearings - weak joints, best modularity," she explained as she absently dropped the dirty materials on the spotless white tablecloth. Beryl glanced nervously at Aloise, but the girl didn't say anything so Beryl held her tongue as well - Kyewdz had seemed a bit self-conscious at how long it had taken to get her hands clean just to have a nice lunch together, after all.

Kyewdz's four-fingered hands were almost a blur now, fingers picking bits and pieces from the magnetic cluster to put together some kind of physical stick figure about four inch tall; the ball bearings made up the joints and the magnets just about anything else. The assembly lasted far less than a minute, then Kyewdz tapped the index and small fingers of one hand on the figure and it literally sprung to life with a small electrical crackle, twisting in midair before setting out in a plucky march, trailing flecks of dust and oil all the while.

"Amazing!" Aloise blurted, giddy with excitement, and leaned in to observe the tiny construct as it marched along the long side of the table, made a clean about-turn and marched back toward Kyewdz. "The movements are so fluid! I'm guessing being held together by magnetism makes the animating magic easier to convey via electrical mana discharge?"

"Mana affinity, effective shortcut for basic artifice," Kyewdz nodded with an absent smile, drumming an upbeat rhythm that matched the figure's march on the table. Then she put a finger down on the construct's path and watched as the figure stumbled over it, fell face-first on the table - and bounced back upright to return to his determined march as if nothing had happened. "No obstacle awareness, no memory, no triggered instructions - proper animation takes more time," she explained with a dismissive wave of her index and middle finger.

Aloise cautiously reached and tugged the construct away from its course, her eyebrows rising as it immediately jumped back to its original path and resumed its march. "Smooth movements, keeps to a well-defined area and adapts quickly to interruptions," She commented, smiling fondly as she watched the tiny figure go. "Why do you call it basic?"

"Observed masterwork artifice," Kyewdz simply replied, tapping the same two fingers on the construct once more to make it fall into a lifeless bunch of metal; she casually dropped it back into the cluster of magnetic materials, and as she busied herself putting the materials back into her pack Beryl couldn't help but feeling a bit sad about it - she knew it had been a mindless bunch of materials, but the construct's movements had shown some kind of... personality, almost. Kyewdz added: "Basic animation quicker, simpler. Less room for error."

Aloise hummed thoughtfully. "That reminds me - we stumbled on an interesting piece of artifice some time ago and we can't agree on what the enchantment is supposed to do. Remember Ish's shop, Beryl?" She said, meeting Beryl's confused gaze. "Dormant power or merchant trick?"

"Oh, you mean the sapphire locket?" Beryl perked up, remembering at last.

"Exactly," Aloise nodded. "Can I ask you to be our tiebreaker, Kyewdz?"

The goblin girl tilted her head, clearly interested. "Which tests were done?"

Aloise rattled off a list of divination and appraisal spells, then concluded: "Magic tells us the locket's enchantment is powerful and almost nothing else, but Beryl has a talent for analyzing wards, runes, seals and other enchantments, and she's confident the enchantment is a fraud," she explained with a bit of a pout, "magic made to seem powerful while doing nothing. She is probably right, to be honest," she admitted, "but the only way to be sure would possibly disrupt the enchantment and I kinda want to be a better story to it than 'Ish fooled me'." Aloise ended her explanation with a casual shrug.

Kyewdz blinked, fidgeting excitedly as she took some time to process the information. "Will take a look," she eventually said with an emphatic nod.

"Thank you!" Aloise beamed. "Be right back."

The girl left the kitchen with light steps, leaving Beryl and Kyewdz alone. After a moment, Kyewdz turned to fully face Beryl and gave a her a big smile, earnest but somewhat... deliberate. "Very nice."

"She is," Beryl replied, trying and kinda failing to keep a dopey smile off her face.

"You both," Kyewdz insisted, trying to beam harder at Beryl. "Kind. Welcoming. Patient. Thank you."

"Oh." Beryl tilted her head slightly forward, hair shifting to cover some of her blushing cheeks.

"Uncomfortable?" Kyewdz asked, smile faltering. "Sorry. Was trying to fill the silence."

"N-no, don't be sorry," Beryl hurried to reassure her. "I'm just not used to compliments. Thank you."

"Oh." Kyewdz' eyes went to the door Aloise had left through, then back at Beryl with a curious tilt of her head. She pursed her lips, carefully considering her reply. "Can relate," she eventually admitted.

They waited for Aloise nursing their tea in a slightly awkward, but not exactly uncomfortable, silence.

"Here it is!" Aloise announced as she returned in the room. She excitedly put the sapphire-inset locket in front of Kyewdz before sitting back to her place.

The goblin girl stared at the item with needle-sharp focus, only stopping to put on the tinted goggles she kept around her neck; she started fiddling with the dials around the lenses with sharp and practiced movements, tilting her head one way and the other to catch different angles of the locket while giving it a wide berth. "Taken through Eternities?" She suddenly asked.

Aloise met Beryl's confused gaze and shrugged. "Yes, I bought it off-plane about... last month?"

Kyewdz made an acknowledging noise and she swiped the locked off the table to hold it less than an inch from her nose, shifting it from hand to hand as she adjusted her goggles' dials. Her face was a mask of absolute focus, gone the fidgeting and the tension in her bare shoulders.

Aloise yielded to her curiosity first. "Does it hold a... trace of the Blind Eternities?"

Beryl frowned; she liked to think she would have definitely picked up on that, but maybe the goggles were picking up something separate from the enchantment?

Kyewdz shook her head minutely. "Volatility," Kyewdz simply replied. "Non-planar exposure can give small shock to enchantments."

It was Beryl's turn to blurt a question: "What kind of enchantments are disrupted by planeswalking?"

"Poorly cast ones." She carefully adjusted another dial. "Also, equipment for aether-sealed or null-fielded places."

Beryl met Aloise's gaze, each checking whether the other was familiar with those terms. Beryl could make an educated guess about a place of study completely sealed from outside disruption to analyze or weave particularly delicate magic, but... while Kyewdz had told she hadn't underwent any apprenticeship or structured teaching, her confident use of official-sounding jargon implied otherwise.

"Enchantment surface looks inert," Kyewdz concluded, gently putting the locket down. She seemed to suddenly remember about her tea; the muscles around her eyes twitched as she took a more liberal sip, her mind probably still processing the result of her examination. "Surrounding aura is not illusion. Probably."

"Probably?" Beryl asked. "There's no hint of illusion in the enchantment."

Kyewdz's lips twisted in a worried pout. "Exactly. Illusion making onlookers believe the item carries powerful aura, hiding own true nature. Unlikely, but possible."

Beryl blinked, the possibility slowly filling her with unease - she didn't like for other people messing with her mind, let alone inanimate objects. Aloise cleared her throat. "That seems like a lot of trouble to go through just to trick a customer."

Kyewdz scratched her head. "Unless illusion also hides second, more important enchantment," she pointed out. "Very unlikely, still possible."

Aloise tilted her head. "All to trick a random customer?"

Beryl didn't want to point out that Aloise might have not been a random anything to the person enchanting the locket, if all had been planned from the start - but despite her growing sense of paranoia, something didn't sit right with her in that scenario. "I sensed the intent of deception in the enchantment," she pointed out. "If the enchantment worked by removing any trace of itself from our minds, or something along those lines, that... shouldn't have been possible."

Kyewdz considered the matter for a long moment, drumming a fast rhythm on the the table as she focused, then gave a sharp nod and relaxed. "Good." Issue apparently solved, Kyewdz's hands darted down... only to slowly coming to a halt halfway under the table. "Um," she said, suddenly awkward. "Can you. Um. Close your eyes. For a moment?"

When Aloise and Beryl did, there was an urgent noise of metal and leather, as if Kyewdz was... fiddling with her belt? After a few seconds of frantic activity the noise suddenly stopped.

"Done."

Kyewdz's cheeks were tinted with deep green now, and she was hunching in her shoulders as she showed them a small leather cilinder. "Inner pocket. Sorry."

"Oh." Beryl lowered her gaze. Whatever it was, it was clearly even more precious to Kyewdz than the backpack she never let out of her arm's reach - even now she could hear from time to time the rustling of Kyewdz's boot against the pack as she absently checked it was still there. Beryl suddenly realized that everything Kyewdz owned was probably in that very room.

Unaware of Beryl's thoughts, Kyewdz set her expression in a determined frown and tried to power through her embarrassment. The goblin girl opened the curved surface of the leather and upended its contents on her cupped hand with painstaking care, surreptitiously sliding some of them back in before Beryl could see. She then set the cilinder aside and laid seven items on the table in front of her.

They might have looked like seven metal coins at a superficial glance, made in the same size but with different metals, but the incisions were too intricate and each had a tiny inset of a gem or gem-like material. Beryl would have bet anything the discs had been custom-made for a specific function. Kyewdz started laying the first five in a tidy pentagon; the pairings of those discs' materials were easy to identify and understand - gold and pearl, silver and sapphire, lead and jet, iron and ruby and lastly copper and emerald - but the last two... "White diamonds are related to unaligned mana," she said aloud, pointing at the sixth disc, then at the seventh, "and platinum is sometimes used for powerful wards. What about opal and...?"

"Chrome can attune to any mana, so it pairs with diamond for neutral reference," Kyewdz explained absently. "Opal has emergent mana properties, platinum the strongest magical potential out of nonmagic metals. Combined with others, simulates magical effects or checks for resonance - harnessed by design or not."

Aloise met Beryl's gaze to check if she had any idea what Kyewdz was talking about. She had not. "Resonance?"

Kyewdz froze, as if suddenly remembering she wasn't just speaking to herself. "Please forget it," she said, sounding strained.

Not for the first time that day and probably not the fifth either, Aloise and Beryl exchanged a confused gaze. "Okay?"

"Can. Um." Kyewdz cleared her throat nervously; she held her elbows close to her sides and her hands closed into fists, her knuckles rhythmically tapping against each other in front of her chest as she stared down at her lap, hunched in her shoulders, as if bracing for punishment. This was significantly worse than the embarrassment from a moment ago. "Can you. Please. Promise. Not to mention artifice resonance. To anyone? Please?" They couldn't see her eyes through her goggles, but her face was screwed in anxiety and regret - it was miserable to see. "It's. Um. Important. Please."

"Of course," the two girls replied in near-perfect unison. They had no idea what Kyewdz had been talking about and the gravity of it all was setting Beryl on edge, but the promise was a small price to pay to make her stop worrying. "We swear not to let anyone know anything about your methods or your explanation," Aloise declared, "not without without your explicit permission."

"We swear," Beryl echoed her immediately.

Kyewdz hung her head and stilled, her shoulders slowly relaxing as she let out breath after shaky breath. "Thank you," she whispered.

Aloise reached for Kyewdz, but seemed to think better of it. "I understand if you can't tell us the specifics, but... Are you in trouble, Kyewdz?"

"...No," the goblin girl replied, head still held low. "You promised. Thank you."

Aloise tried again. "Would the secret not spilling out put someone else in trouble, Kyewdz?"

The goblin's head lifted to met Aloise's gaze through her tinted goggles, brow furrowed in confusion.

"Is the secret like a... like a trade secret?" Aloise asked delicately. "Some rare knowledge about artifice that you are not supposed to tell anybody about? Or... is that a secret about something that is going to put people in danger if nobody knows about it?"

Beryl's blood ran cold. After... everything that had happened with Fisco, she was surprised she hadn't thought about it herself.

"Trade secret," Kyewdz replied, sounding bewildered that was ever in question, and Beryl sighed in relief. "Can't tell anything more. You promised. Thank you."

"And we won't ask for more details," Aloise replied earnestly, hand over her heart, "I just wanted to be sure that the three of us keeping the secret wouldn't endanger anybody."

Kyewdz nodded gratefully, slowly straightened her back and avidly drained the remainder of her tea to soothe herself. After a deep breath, the goblin girl loudly cracked her knuckles and returned to work with a full-body shiver, shaking off the nerves like a dog.

The goblin girl adjusted her goggles' dials and stared intently at the empty pentagon of mana-related coins; after a few moments she started swapping their positions two at a time, taking a moment to observe the new configuration after each swap. She was satisfied after what seemed like half a dozen random swaps, ending with a pentagon in which the lead-jet disc was slightly closer to the center and the gold-pearl one was slightly more distant. From the confidence of Kyewdz's movemens, Beryl would bet the irregularity was deliberate.

"Were you checking for outside interference?" Aloise asked.

Kyewdz nodded. "Ambient mana." She took the locket and laid it on the center of the five discs, then leaned forward on her arms so she could look at the figure from above. A long moment of silence passed, the goblin girl almost perfectly still, before she dropped back on the chair and started moving the five discs again, bringing them closer and back again, swapping them before setting them back in their place, each time tilting her head at a different angle. Beryl couldn't distinguish a clear pattern, but from the goblin's practiced movements punctuated by split-second pauses she had the impression Kyewdz was fiddling instinctively within a structured method. After a while the chrome-diamond disc was added to the tests, sometimes being put on top of the locket or of another disc.

Beryl only dared to interrupt Kyewdz's concentration when the goblin girl huffed softly through her nose and put the first five discs back into their container. "No mana affinity, right?"

Kyewdz' nodded. "No intake, no outbound channel - neither single-mana nor combined." She lifted her head to glance at them through her goggles. "Knew that already, yes?"

Aloise nodded. "Spells couldn't find any mana affinity either. What are you going to check next?" She asked excitedly, leaning in.

Kyewdz cleared her throat nervously. "...Opal and platinum checks."

"Oh." Aloise leaned back a little out of courtesy.

Kyewdz handled the new disc with painstaking care. Without ever touching the locket, she took one disc in each hand and started moving them around it; the chrome-diamond one moved first in circles, then in apparently random patterns, then in sharp movements, then in circles again and so on, while the other one slowly moved closer to the locket and back. From the term resonance and the type of movements she was making, Beryl was reminded of the tuning of a fine instrument, almost.

"Inert," Kyewdz sighed in relief, putting the platinum-opal disc back into the leather cilinder. "No reaction. Only effect of enchantment is making aura." She started drumming on the table again, eyes darting back and forth from the locked and the cilinder. "Unless."

Beryl had a bad feeling about this, but she couldn't resist. "Unless...?"

Kyewdz hummed thoughtfully and gingerly pulled an eight disc, one perfectly translucent except for a small shard in its center. "Plane-magic and mana fields. Very rare."

Beryl's eyes went wide. "What material...?" What kind of materal could react to that?

Kyewdz puffed her cheeks, hesitating. "Broken and disrupted, yes?" She said, staring intently at them both. "Was part of a very big one, now only inert shard with faint mana field, understand?" When the other girls nodded, she took a deep breath and said a single word: "Powerstone."

Beryl's eyes went wide as saucers.

Kyewdz carefully brought the powerstone coin closer to the locket and all three inhaled sharply, a sudden flicker of magical pressure sweeping through their bodies. They all stood still for a long moment.

Then Kyewdz took a deep breath and picked up the chrome-diamond disc.

This round of tests were even more slow and tentative than the last, but this time even Aloise and Beryl could appreciate the effects of the discs, the subtle variations of magic brushing against them and giving them slight goosebumps. Kyewdz moved the locked multiple times, propping it up against her (long since empty) upended teacup or even face-down on the table. She looked like she was figuring out an invisible shape by the impalpable variations in magic, but judging by the careful tweak of her goggle's dials and her rapt expression she was getting far more precise information than them. She seemed particularly interested in the space parallel to the sapphire inset, her brow furrowing whenever she came close to aligning the discs there.

Beryl couldn't tell how much time passed as Kyewdz conducted her tests, but the afternoon had begun to make way for the evening when Kyewdz set down the two discs far, far away from the locket.

"That was fascinating," Aloise breathed, entranced. "That was just the fragment of an inert powerstone?"

"Inscribed diamondglass casing. Physical protection, field amplification," Kyewdz muttered under her breath, hands almost blurring in frantic activity. Someone might have called it fidgeting, especially with how she was rocking herself back and forth, but there was a deliberation in her tight gestures that gave the impression than more than soothing herself, the goblin girl was physically sorting and piecing together thoughts. From time to time she picked up the discs again and double-checked a certain configuration or movement pattern, then returned to her... physical thinking.

Beryl glanced at Aloise, who was looking at Kyewdz with concern; concern for the goblin girl, or for the information she was about to share, she wasn't able to tell. Beryl opened her mouth, not sure what she should say, but before she could utter a word Aloise's hand landed gently on hers. Beryl entiwned her fingers with Aloise's, and maybe it was wishful thinking but Aloise's worried smile also relaxed a bit.

"Asked for tiebreaker, yes?" Kyewdz said at last with a lopsided smile, hand nervously combing her wild hair.

"Yes," Aloise replied. "I thought it was a powerful dormant enchantment, while Beryl says it's useless magic that just feels powerful." Beryl felt that discussion was a bit... irrelevant with how unnerved Kyewdz looked, but maybe Aloise was just going along with her trail of thought to avoid adding to her nerves.

Kyewdz hummed thoughtfully, still rocking back and forth. "Familiar with magnets, yes?"

Aloise made a see-saw gesture with her free hand. "A bit."

Kyewdz nodded sharply, rolled her shoulders. "Will try to explain." She raised her hands, closing them into fists against each other. "Mirrored planar enchantments. Powerful. Pull space in different. Um. Directions? Like clock-turn and opposite-turn, yes? Like magnets pulling in different directions, but in a circle." She pressed her fists tighter together and slightly twisted them in opposite directions. "Twin halves push against each other, but sealed together. Tight. So close, they only affect space between each other, which is nothing." She winced and put a hair's width between her fists. "Almost nothing. Powerful aura is from planar fields... Um." She mimed the slight twisting again, pretending some force was keeping her hands in place. "Interacting. Um. Like. Grinding together? But halves are well-sealed. No containment seam." She shrugged and opened her hands. "Non-responsive."

"No dormant enchantment of legends, then," Aloise sighed with an amused smile, then turned to Beryl with a phylosophical shrug. "Looks like you were right - the locket does nothing. Can't blame me for-"

"Um."

Something in Kyewdz' hesitant voice grabbed their attention better than any shout.

The goblin girl picked her next words with painstaking care. "Locket does nothing now."

"What do you mean?" Aloise asked, thoughtful.

"Could the containment of the enchantment... fail?" Beryl asked, immediately thinking of the worse. "Is it set up to... explode?"

Kyewdz hesitated for a chilling moment, then shook her head. "Seals good. Stable. Might take centuries to wear down." She shrugged. "Maybe twin halves break down first, maybe small disturbance as halves collapse together."

Beryl dry-swallowed. "But the seal could be disrupted."

Kyewdz nodded. "By accident? Only with big mana flare. By design?" She grimaced. "Just takes good wardbreaker and power."

Beryl held her breath. "What would happen then?"

She tilted her head and huffed, struggling to find the words. "Um. How to say. Planar... quake? Planequake? Like earthquake but space." She made a wide, forceful gesture. "Force wave. Explosion. Big boom."

"...Oh," Aloise said, alarmed gaze slowly dropping to the locket.

Beryl's eye, on the other hand, didn't leave Kyewdz' worried twist of her mouth. "There's worse," she ventured, sharp dread climbing her spine.

Kyewdz winced, confirming her fears. "Planequake if outward seal is breached. Seal between halves. Um. Tight. Snug. Hard to reach. Would probably break one half first."

A cold shiver ran down Beryl's spine. "But if you could disrupt it..."

Kyewdz leaned back from the locket, dry-swallowing. "Couldn't," she blurted, hunching in her shoulders. "Wouldn't. Couldn't. Won't."

Aloise got there first. "Not if you specifically did it, Kyewdz." She tried again: "What would happen if someone disrupted the inner seal?"

"Um." Her brow furrowed in thought, expression slowly turning into an anxious grimace as she stared at the locket. "Don't know. Bad things. Bad. Very, very, veryveryvery bad. Big planequake, at very best. At worst..." A full-body shiver shook her. She met each of their gaze in turn, thick eyebrows raising meaningfully. "Understand? Promise not to try, yes?"

"O-of course," Beryl replied. "Who would even want to try?" She asked, even if she had a dark suspicion someone would. Gladly, even.

Kyewdz just shrugged helplessly, brow slowly furrowing once more. "Um..." She straightened, as if struck by a sudden idea. "Travel much, yes?"

"...Yes?" Aloise nodded. "We like to explore. Visit new places," she glanced to Beryl with a warm smile, earning a faint blush. "Meet new people."

"Good." Kyewdz nodded. "There is. Um. Man. Um..." She drummed excitedly as she searched for the right words. "Hard man. Jagged. But good man." She let out a small, wistful sigh. "Master artificer. Skilled warrior. Hard man. Scary-strong. But good."

"He was the one to design the discs," Beryl blurted, kinda... forgetting to make it a question. "You were his... apprentice?"

"No apprentice," she replied instantly, emphatically shaking her head. "But he taught things, yes. Taught a lot. Artifice-roots. Aura-testing. Self-defence. Fight-thinking. So you can keep yourself alive out there," she quoted, voice raspy in the effort to reach a low timbre.

Beryl dreaded the question that bubbled to her own lips. "...What happened to him?"

"Don't know," Kyewdz whined, hugging herself. She tugged down her goggles to rub her misty eyes. "Don't know. Artificer went out many times. Was left back. Once, bad people get in. Had to run." She hung her head. "Never met again."

"You want us to... tell something to him?" Aloise offered. "If we meet him in our travels?"

Kyewdz nodded frantically. "Tell. Um. Tell Kyewdz is sorry. No!" She shook her head, holding herself tighter. "Had to run. Had to live. First lesson. Don't die. Tell..." she took a deep breath, not quite meeting their gaze. "Tell Kyewdz found dangerous artifact for him to check. Show artificer locket. Be patient with warrior. He rough - scary - but good," she pleaded. "Good artificer. Good man."

"We will bring him your message, Kyewdz, don't worry," Aloise said softly, soothing. "What is the artificer's name?"

"Artificer's name..." She rubbed the tears out of her eyes and straightened her back with a sharp huff, her eyes puffy but determined - as if remembering him made her stronger, tougher.

"Name is Jack."