Archive of Our Own

“You will die out here,” her Captain had told her, and Dramis believed it.

Their pack had walked the tundra for a time Dramis could no longer remember – the Devil’s Lair was a long way back. Noksis led them, tall and proud and with eyes like the winter. She was tall, even for a Captain – Dramis suspected she had been sneaking extra ether, but there was no way to prove it, and Noksis would probably rip her remaining arms off if she made the accusation.

Dramis was the weakest of her pack. The Vandals gave her self-satisfied smirks and the dregs eyed her like wolves. The weakest before her, a dreg named Arkin, had already succumbed to the Russian winter.

Noksis was powerful, and knew it. She kept the Vandals in line with startling efficiency, and didn’t hesitate to use her shock knife on them as lesser Captains may have. In turn, the Vandals turned upon the dregs.

When they stopped at a decrepit barn in the middle of the tundra, Dramis could have collapsed with relief. The day was mild, a sign of the turning season, and the barn was surrounded by faint clumps of snow mixed in with the brown grasses of the tundra.

“Scavenge what you can,” Noksis ordered gruffly. “We will spend today and tomorrow here, or until we have everything. Then, we go home.”

The Vandals didn’t say anything, but Dramis could see them exchanging glances. Home was far behind them. Dramis could barely remember its face. There was happiness there, too, mixed in with the fear. Dramis knew that some of them had families to go back to, even children. Gentleness in a parent was discouraged, but Dramis wondered if any of those children would be happy to see them, too.

There was work to be done. Noksis let out a small growl, and the pack immediately made for the barn. The Vandals started stripping the spinmetal off of the rafters, and Dramis went with the rest of the dregs inside.

She had been working for only a few minutes when she felt a cold hand grasp like iron around her left arm.

She squawked and almost defended herself, but when she looked up it was into the face of Himsis. She recognized him. When he was a dreg, he had ripped her docking cap off and thrown it into the forest. She had scrambled to find it before Noksis found out.

“Noksis wants you,” he said. He bent down until he was a little less than eye level with her, like a supplicant before a Servitor. “Better hurry,” he said, almost on the verge of laughter, before he turned and vanished beyond the door again.

She glanced at the things she’d gathered. Admittedly, it was not very impressive – a few nuts and bolts, some spinmetal, and rubber from where a track-tor’s wheels had melted and re-hardened. She dumped them on the ground, maybe for another dreg to find, and went to find Noksis.

The Captain was just outside. Her upper arms were crossed, and she was staring at the early morning sky. Dramis took the moment to follow her gaze to where the clouds were pooling atop the morning, set afire by the sun.

“You wanted to see me?” she asked softly.

“Dramis,” Noksis said. She didn’t sound angry, like usual. This time, her voice had softened into a tremor. “I want you to walk with me for a moment.”

Dramis hid her surprise and did so. The two set out away from the barn, towards the eastward mountains. Dramis felt the jealous eyes of the Vandals behind her, but they too turned away, back to their work.

“How old are you?” Noksis asked.

Dramis startled. “Newly twenty,” she said. “By Earth years.”

Noksis nodded. Dramis wondered for a brief moment if she were going to reciprocate. It was impossible to tell how old Noksis was, but something about her bespoke youth. Dramis had met Eliksni who were old like the ground beneath their feet, who spoke like the sound of the mountains moving and the sun rising. Noksis was more like a forest fire, sputtering its way into life, raging at all that was old and established.

“Twenty,” Noksis snorted, eventually, as though now she had the time to think about it, twenty was in fact a pathetic age. “Twenty years old and not a Vandal or dead. How impressively mediocre.”

The dreg nodded her head once, anger flaring.

This is when Noksis said it. “You will die out here, you know,” she said, her eyes fixing on her companion, fiery and indifferent.

Dramis frowned. “I thought you said we were going home.”

“Oh, we are. And if your life is any indication, you’re going to cling to life until then, at least. But we will leave again. You’ve gotten lucky, but you’re still going to die here.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

Noksis laughed the laugh of a madperson. “I don’t know,” she said.

The barn was still visible behind them, but it was small. Noksis could travel quickly, and Dramis noticed she was hurrying to keep up with the Captain’s strides. Suddenly, she started to feel nervous.

“We all will,” Noksis said, her gaze fixed once again on the mountains. “Kell and dreg alike. Earth will be our tomb, every one of us.”

Dramis scuffled her feet, feeling dumbstruck. She had never seen Noksis like this.

“Not necessarily.” She had found her voice at last. “When we find the Great Machine, we’ll leave, and find a new home.” This is what the Archons had told them.

Noksis didn’t respond to this. “We are already dead,” she said.

The wind flowed gently around them. Even in the warming weather, Dramis felt it chill her bones. She drew her child’s cloak around her and shivered. The Earth felt very big, just then.

“Go back to the barn,” Noksis said. “I have nothing more to say to you.”

Dramis did so gladly. As she left Noksis behind she felt the tension leave her body, and allowed herself to look forward to seeing the Lair again soon.

…

The next day a storm was raging. Dramis woke to the sound of slurry slapping against the roof long before the Vandals were supposed to jerk her into consciousness. She sat up. The other dregs were rising, too.

“It’s going to blow the barn down,” one of the whispered.

“Don’t be silly,” another snapped. “It’s stood for this long – why would it fall now?”

Indeed, Dramis could feel the old building be rocked by the wind, but it stood fast. She was glad she wasn’t a Vandal right now –

Himsis barged indoors. The other vandals streamed in behind him. Noksis was nowhere among them. “There’s a skiff,” he snapped, as though it were the dregs’ fault. “King colors. About a kilometer west of here.”

Chatter amongst the dregs started as Himsis climbed the stairs to the attic, presumably to use the glass look-point. Dramis felt fear push itself into her heart. What did the Kings want with their little band?

She had been brought into Noksis’ crew late. It was after they’d lost their Servitor and half of their number in a raid. Nobody deigned to tell her what had happened, but she had gathered, through talk, that it had been the Kings.

Nobody was sure if they were supposed to work or not, so the dregs on the lower floor coalesced into little groups to whisper gossip to each other. She had no lasting relationships with any of them, so she kept to the corner and watched the Vandals that hadn’t followed Himsis. She was sure one of them was about to clock an unfortunate dreg over the head and tell them to stop talking, but they seemed more interested in talking to eachother.

Finally, the looming silhouette of Noksis appeared in the door. The Vandals scrambled to make room as she stalked into the room like the winter itself. She vanished up the ladder as well. This did nothing to quell the dreg chatter.

Himsis descended after Dramis endured another half an hour of whispers, and dread. “It doesn’t look like it wants anything to do with us,” he announced. “The Kings are after something else. Everyone must now remain indoors to avoid detection.”

The wind howled outside. That was fine by Dramis.

Noksis descended next. She was still silent. Dramis wondered if her mood had changed since yesterday, but the grimness of her face suggested otherwise. She paused to survey the rabble, eyes pausing for a moment on Dramis, before she retreated to a corner. She sat down, and appeared to busy herself with other things.

Dramis tore her gaze away to scavenge amongst the corners, as some other dregs turned their attention back to the track-tor, and the last vandals filed in, word passing through the ranks. There wasn’t much left to find. Perhaps she would have an easy day today.

Time passed. The wind abated slightly, but the slurry didn’t stop colliding wetly with the roof. The cold continued to seep in, however. An enterprising dreg discovered an old radiator and excitedly asked the Vandals if she could start it, but they snarled and told her it was to go only to the Devil’s Lair.

After who-knew-how-much time had passed, one of the Vandals told her to go upstairs and check on the Kings, giving her a spyglass and a dirty look at the pitiful amount of spinmetal she had managed to find.

She climbed into the attic. The cold was even worse up here, but she spied a bed piled with blankets. She wondered if the Vandals would notice if she took a minute to sew some of them into her cloak.

When she looked out the window, the Skiff was still there, barely visible behind the storm. It was parked near a solitary pine tree. She thought, if she concentrated, she could see Kings huddled underneath it. A huge purple Servitor bobbed among them.

What kind of Eliksni would be out here like this if they could help it? She wondered. Whatever attack had taken her crew’s Servitor had taken their Skiff, too. She dearly wished they had one now, so they could fly up and away from this nonsense mission.

Still, it didn’t look like they were about to do anything other than huddle. She sheathed the spyglass and turned – only to nearly run into Noksis.

“Oh!” she said, scrambling into a deferential stance. “I’m sorry, Noksis, I didn’t see you.”

“What is it doing?” her Captain asked flatly. It took Dramis a moment to remember what she was talking about.

“Nothing,” she said. “They’re…” she remembered how they sat, squatted beneath their ship, not doing anything she could tell. “…waiting for something, I think, but they’re not going to act now.”

Noksis nodded. “That’s good,” she murmured. “That’s good.”

They waited together another few moments, awkwardly, before Noksis gave her another cool glance and descended once again. Dramis waited a few moments, hearts pounding, before she followed.

…

The next morning was heralded with an explosion. A Vandal’s fingers dung into her shoulder at almost the same time. She shrieked.

“Up, get up!” he roared. Dramis forced her breath to calm before another explosion rocked the barn. Old, rotting wood finally collapsed, revealing a slim portion of the sky. It was night, and the stars were visible. Impressively, the greater part of the roof remained.

Another Vandal was thrusting shock pistols into the hands of bewildered dregs before ushering them outside. The others were outside – she could hear the twangs of their rifles, and the occasional scream.

Dramis emerged, shock pistol in hand, and immediately almost got her head taken off by a King sniper. The smell burned her nostrils almost before she watched the flash of blue light arc above her head.

She threw herself to the ground, behind a gentle incline of a hill. The other dregs joined her.

One of the Vandals broke from the line to stand in front of them. Ether leaked out of a shoulder wound, but it was nothing serious. “Flank them,” she ordered, hissing through pain or rage. “Go around and hit them from the side. We’ll distract them.”

All at once, Dramis saw her life ending.

This was a suicide mission. Surely the Vandals had to know that! They weren’t going to draw fire off of the dregs, the dregs were going to draw fire off of them.

The dregs around her had noticed too. They stood paralyzed as they faced the open plain.

“Go!” the Vandal hissed, and leveled her shock blade. Dramis, the closest, could feel the heat on her face. They moved by force of suggestion.

Every step Dramis took felt like her last. She hunched herself over as if to hide herself, but the mass of Eliksni moving towards the enemy was impossible to disguise.

Sure enough, dregs began to fall around her. The snap of a shock rifle took down the one next to her, a male who had once shared his findings with her so she wouldn’t go back to Noksis empty-handed.

In the front, another fell. He had once spat in Dramis’ face when Noksis told him Dramis had found more than him even though she hadn’t, and Noksis had laughed.

When half of the dregs had fallen, Dramis noticed something.

The King skiff was nowhere to be found.

It had been there the previous night, she knew. Where had it gone? She felt the fear creep over her spine.

Then, it appeared in the horizon. Dramis turned her head slowly to follow the sound of the warp, but she thought she already knew what she would see.

Clinging to its bottom was a Walker, painted in King colors.

The machine dropped onto the battlefield, and extended its legs with a wash of steam. It wasn’t the most put-together specimen Dramis had ever seen – several armor plates were missing, and there was no grenade launcher - but the part of her mind that cared about that was vastly dwarfed by the part that felt cold terror wash over her as the gun aimed directly at the pack of dregs.

“Run!” one of them screamed, and Dramis didn’t need to be told twice. She ran numbly, expecting at any moment to find herself sent to the Dark, but when she looked behind her, the gun had reoriented itself. Now, it was pointed at the hill the Vandals were hiding behind.

“Where is Noksis?” a different dreg cried.

“She abandoned us,” the first responded as quietly as the din of battle would let them hear. “She left us behind.”

Dramis wanted to feel angry, but she didn’t. Who could blame her? That’s what Dramis should have done, had she been stronger.

And besides. The battle was already over. Dramis heard the screams of Vandals behind her as the Walker blew them to bits. All that was left to do was wait to die.

She kept running.

...

She had almost made it to the open plains when a Vandal seized her.

Another few dregs died in the struggle, but the others quickly learned to subdue themselves. She drooped in the other Eliksni’s arms. The vandal grinned down at Dramis, toothy and dangerous. “Good choice,” she said, as she and her cohorts dragged the dregs back to the King camp.

Overnight, the pine tree the Kings had been sheltering under and the area around it had become a rudimentary camp. A fire burned faintly in the center of a ring of stones, and piles of fabric suggested something that may have been beds. They had been planning on staying here a while. Until something changed.

The Vandal deposited her roughly on the cold stones on the west side of the little camp. She drew her legs inward and shivered. She could feel her own breath rattling around inside of her, her blood pounding in her ears.

The Devil’s Lair had never been a pretty sight, but she would regret not seeing its face again.

The Kings chattered to one another. Dramis caught only a few words, but most they kept quiet, lost to the early morning winds.

The sun climbed above the mountains. Dramis felt a little warmth seep into the rock, but it wasn’t enough.

She could run. She hadn’t been restrained – none of the dregs were. There was nothing stopping her from doing so.

More likely than not, one of the Kings would put a shock round through her head. Good, she thought savagely. Whatever game they were playing would end now. And who would miss her, back home? Who waited for her return, clenched their jaw and felt a pit in their stomach at the thought that it might not come?

Perhaps she would have thought to do it, if a familiar figure hadn’t stepped into the camp just then.

Noksis had changed, though Dramis told herself that was impossible. She seemed even taller, taller than the Kings. Some of them turned to look at her mistrustfully, but soon returned to their conversations.

The Captain made her way to the dregs. Dramis stood upon her two feet – she owed herself that much.

Noksis stopped. “I told them to spare you,” she said.

The dregs were silent. Dramis wasn’t sure if she was talking about them, or her specifically. Noksis was looking directly at her.

“The Kings are… recruiting from the Devils now,” she said. “Devils is a dying house. I refused to be here when it was finally ash.”

Recruiting. Dramis wanted to laugh.

“Don’t fight them,” Noksis said. “You’ll lose.” With that, she turned to go.

“Bastard.”

Dramis didn’t know it was her who had spoken until Noksis turned to face her. Her eyes with winter in them once again. “What?” she asked, lowly.

Her mouth felt dry and empty. Every sensible instinct in her was screaming at her not to continue. But the rage in her heart demanded she speak. She forced the words out of her ragged throat.

“You heard me.”

The other dregs were looking at her. Dramis felt her heart in her throat. But she had to keep going.

“You sold us like animals,” she said. Her voice quavered, but she didn’t care. “How can you call yourself our leader? How can you call yourself Eliksni?”

“Watch your mouth, dreg,” Noksis growled. “Or I’ll nail it shut.”

“I’m not afraid of you,” Dramis said, very afraid. The momentum of the moment carried her forward. “I’ll kill you,” she continued, whole body burning. “You’ll die by my hand. This I swear, by the world we came from.”

Noksis laughed at that. “Will you?” she asked. Then she bent down, and Dramis knew in the next few moments she would find a shock dagger in her throat. It was worth it, she thought to herself, hazily, angrily.

“We’re all dead anyway,” Dramis said, mockingly. “What’s one more?”

Noksis laughed again, louder this time, but somehow, Dramis wasn’t afraid of that laugh. It was too high, too false.

“Actually, this is what’s going to happen,” she said, still squatting. “You’re going to the Kings’ Lair, and you’re going to be a dreg. Again. I’ve already told them you’re the weakest. If your luck holds out, you might just survive long enough to see your friends die. The Kings are not kind to… converts. You will be a slave, like all the others. And then, just for that threat, when you’re the last one left, I’m going to kill you myself. I would do it now, but your life will be so much more miserable there, and subterfuge has taught me patience.”

She grinned. Teeth all askew.

The Captain stood up straight. Dramis didn’t see her fist curling up until it was too late. “I’d like to see that,” Noksis said, and Dramis saw nothing more after that.

…

The sun was setting again when Dramis woke up.

One of the Kings was prodding her with his foot, and seemed surprised when she responded. He hauled her roughly to her feet, and pointed at the other dregs, all ahead of her, moving towards the setting sun. Dully, Dramis realized her hands were manacled this time.

She felt herself being tugged forward, and followed mechanically. The Kings walked to either side of them, Noksis among them, near the front. The Captain had shed her Devils colors and now wore yellow.

Dramis looked down at her restraints. The cuffs were bound by chain to the dreg in front of her. She looked up, seeing the sea of dregs all lashed together like cattle.

She looked behind her. There was the barn, still standing. She wondered at what force could have built it, what people had once dwelt here, who now had the favor of the Great Machine. She had never seen a human before. She’d heard they were spectacularly ugly.

When the barn was gone behind the horizon, she looked at her manacles again.

They were plain steel, mostly. The chains that bound them could be easily cut, if only she had her shock knife.

She looked forward. The Kings had spread out. Noksis was talking to one of them, out of earshot. None of them were paying attention to the dregs. Hatred boiled up inside of her.

“We can escape,” she hissed the others, as lowly as she could. “Does anyone have their knife?”

At first, she thought nobody was going to respond. Then, the one in front of her turned back. “Why?” he asked. “We’re trading one master for another. What’s so bad about that?”

She looked into his eyes. Despite what he said, they were filled with despair. “Look,” she whispered, nodding towards Noksis. “The same master as before.”

The dreg snorted. “She’s a fool if she thinks the Kings will let her be in charge.” But he looked thoughtful.

Another dreg, adjacent to the first, turned back. “I have mine,” she said, urgently, as if she had to say it now or else she never would. “I have my knife. It’s only got a little charge left. But the Kings never took it.”

Dramis inhaled. Only a little charge. Only enough, maybe, to free one dreg.

From their looks, the two in front of her knew it too. The others, whom Dramis assumed hadn’t heard or were ignoring them, began to murmur to themselves. She didn’t worry about the Kings hearing – dregs were practiced in the art of speaking so that Vandals could not hear.

Finally, one spoke, a small creature Dramis had never spoken to. “It should be her,” she said. “It should be Dramis.”

Dramis tensed. The last thing they needed was for a scuffle to break out over who got free. And she didn’t want herself to be the center of it.

But the others were nodding.

She’d never seen dregs agree on anything, let alone to sacrifice themselves for the sake of another. The world spun beneath her feet.

The dreg with the knife took it out, cautiously. When no Kings materialized, she handed it awkwardly back to the dreg in front of Dramis, who swiveled to walk backwards.

“Promise me,” he said fiercely. “Promise all of us, you’ll kill Noksis. And you’ll come free us.”

Dramis nodded. “I swear,” she said. “I swear by the world we came from.” The old oath flowed off of her tongue once again.

“No,” he said. “Swear by the Earth.”

Her eyes widened, but the other dregs were nodding. She had been born on the Earth – they all were. Unkind though it had been.

“I swear by the Earth,” she said. “I will kill Noksis, and I will free you.”

The dreg nodded, and then he cut.

The chain shattered, a little louder than Dramis would have liked. Little pieces of steel flew around her, one smacking against her face. The pieces crackled with Arc for a few seconds, lighting tiny fires on the grass. She stamped them out hurriedly.

“Go!” the dreg whispered. “Go now!”

Dramis nodded, and saying no more, fled.

…

It wasn’t far she went, but the whole way she expected to be put down. She remembered that morning she’d ran with the other dregs through the battle like it was ages ago, even though it was closer to her than the others.

No shot came, however. The Kings hadn’t even noticed.

At last, there was the barn. She darted inside, closed the heavy doors, and then she was safe.

She sunk down on the wall. It was strange, being alone. She had grown used to the press of other Eliksni around her. The silence of the barn was almost frightening.

She almost laughed when she noticed the steel was still around her wrists. She hadn’t even noticed.

Waiting, heart pounding, for the Kings. At any moment, they could return. She had not heard much of the House of Kings, but she knew they were cruel to those who betrayed them. So were the Devils.

Oh, gods. She was Houseless.

A helpless, sputtering laugh, as she held her face in her hands. Houseless. If she returned to the Lair now, there was no guarantee they would welcome her back. A lone dreg, back from patrol, having survived the deaths of all her crew? They might well kill her, just to be sure.

Houseless, ether-less, alone in this ancient home of her enemy, the sun setting over the mountains.

She kept laughing.

…

The next morning, wrapped up in the bed in the attic, Dramis saw a bird.

It was a – what was it? – a raven, perhaps. It eyed her beadily. “Shoo,” she told it as she slid out of the human bed, too big for her. “Go away.”

The bird did not, but Dramis descended down the ladder anyway. Today, she was going to see if any of the Devils left anything behind. Hopefully, there was still an ether sup left in the debris.

In truth, there was still a lot of detritus from the hasty beginning of the battle. She found one sup, almost completely depleted. She attached it hurriedly and sucked the remainder down, but she was still hungry.

The bird kept watching her. She shot it a dirty look, but it just ruffled its feathers and clacked its beak.

She had heard whispers among the Eliksni that the black birds remembered those who had helped them. She looked down at the ether sup, of which still a bare amount remained.

Cautiously, she held it out the bird. “Do you eat ether?” she asked uncertainly.

The bird chuffed, as though amused, but did not come closer. That was probably a no. She shrugged, and went back to trying the get the rest out.

When she looked up, the bird was gone.

After the sup was totally empty, she let it fall to the ground. It was even less than she was used to as a dreg, but it would do for now. She looked up at the roof, where the hole showed her the blue sky, and tried to think of a plan.

She could scavenge for ether on her own. She’d heard of Houseless Eliksni who’d done the same. She shuddered. One run-in with either the Devils or the Kings and she would be done for.

Still, what other option did she have?

She glanced longingly around the barn. It was a nice place. It would shelter her from the rain, at least. Mostly. But it was an empty place, too. She wouldn’t find any ether here, or in the plains that surrounded it. She would have to move.

She spent the rest of the day combing the wreckage, but found nothing. Discouraged, she returned to the bed as the sun fell.

Tomorrow I will leave, she promised. The hunger gnawing at her bones agreed as she tried to sleep once more.

…

The bird had returned the next morning, and this time it brought a gift.

The ether sup was full, and the bird balanced it in its beak with ease. It laid it on the floor in front of the bed, and bowed, as if in mocking. Dramis watched, the blankets bunched around her, eyes wide.

“So you do remember,” she murmured.

She grabbed the sup carefully, as though it were about to explode. As she made ready to eat what was inside, she grew swifter, and inhaled the ether in thick, greedy gulps.

The sup was empty quicker than she expected, but the hunger, only worse from last night when she had woken, had eased considerably. In fact, she thought, she thought this might be the first time that she could remember that she had not been hungry. It was certainly the first time she’d had a whole ether sup to herself.

The bird was chuffing again, eerily similar to Eliksni laughter. She narrowed her eyes at it.

“Thanks,” she grunted, and cast the empty container aside. She watched the bird warily for a few moments. She wasn’t sure she trusted this thing, with its empty eyes and wicked intelligence. She wondered if they had had anything like this creature back home.

Still. She was not hungry anymore.

“You’re a long way from home,” she continued, feeling silly. “I hope you’ll find your way back again, when you’re ready.”

“What a lovely thing to hope,” the bird said. “I thank you.”

Dramis stared at it for a few moments, then looked at her hands, testing their reality. Then, back to the creature. It looked like it was about to laugh again.

“I’m sure you have a lot of questions,” the bird said.

“Did I drink the ether too quickly?”

Laughter again, and this time Dramis was sure it was Eliksni. “Possibly,” it (he?) said. “But if you’re asking if I’m a result of such a binge, I’m afraid I’m not.”

Dramis didn’t realize she had sat down on the wood floor until that moment, a slight chill shocking her from her thoughts. “What are you?” she asked.

“I’m a Crow,” the crow said. “Formerly belonging to Prince Uldren of the Reef, now to Variks, of House Judgment.”

The Reef. She’d heard of that place. A cold, rocky kingdom between Jupiter and Mars. The other dregs told each other stories about it, about House Wolves and the Queen.

“Variks,” she said, slowly. “You speak through this creature.”

The bird preened. “I’ve been watching you,” he said. “For quite some time.”

Dramis strained to think if she had seen the bird before, circling above her crew. She thought she could, but she didn’t know if that was just false memory. “Why?” she asked.

Instantly, she knew the Crow wasn’t going to say why. It cocked its head, and when Variks spoke again, it wasn’t to answer her. “You escaped the Kings,” it said. “And you pursue the traitor. Noksis.”

The name felt strange in Variks’ voice. “That is true,” Dramis said. “I made a promise.”

The Crow seemed pleased by this answer. It bobbed its head, as if in thought. “I have come to help you,” it said.

Dramis narrowed her eyes. “Why?” she asked.

“I have my reasons.”

More secrets. She didn’t know that she wanted any more secrets.

“Have you ever heard of House Judgment?” Variks’ voice penetrated her thoughts once again.

“No.”

The Crow shrugged. “Few have. But perhaps it will comfort you to know that I am Judgment’s last scion, and I stand against the wicked in favor of the powerless. That is House Judgment, and that is the reason I am here.”

“Is that the whole reason?” Dramis asked.

The Crow hesitated. “No,” it said.

Dramis nodded, and came to a decision. Variks could have his secrets. He had brought her ether, promised to help her. And at the end, he had not lied to her. “I accept your help,” she said.

The Crow seemed to grin. “Then,” he said. “A signifier of our oath.”

He trotted up the metal cuffs still around her wrists, and placed a claw upon the left one. With a quick series of motions from him, it fell off, wide open upon its hinges. The other followed suit. Dramis flexed her wrists as though they were newly made.

“I will return tomorrow,” Variks said, and took off through the hole in the roof, wheeling into the sky, leaving the barn far behind for places Dramis knew not of.

…

That night, Dramis dreamed she was Noksis.

She was at the Kings’ lair. The building was old, human. Surrounding her were rows of ancient computers, and above her the vaulted ceiling hung, higher than any she’d ever seen before. Draped across the walls were banners, human and Devil; at their feet were treasures, weapons and bones. Noises, unfamiliar and alien – the Servitors, a whole fleet of them, working in low soft sounds on the outskirts of her hearing. The Kings around her were Eliksni, but not Devils. They spoke unfamiliarly to her and didn’t seem to make much distinction between her and the prisoners they had brought in.

And there was a dreg missing.

She was holding one of the little creatures by his head, slammed him against the cold metal of the old human structure. “Where is she?” she asked, lowly.

The dreg shook his head, such as he could. “I don’t know,” he gasped. “I didn’t notice her leaving!”

“Liar!” she screeched, and flung him hard against the ground. Dazed, he couldn’t do anything as she unslung her rifle and cocked it against his temple.

“One more time,” she growled. “Tell me where she went. I have many more of you to make it through if you don’t.”

A hand clasped her shoulder, hard, and threw her back. She stumbled, almost losing her grip on the rifle. A King Vandal bundled up the dreg and whisked him away. Another admonished her, but she couldn’t hear him, as the blood pounded in her ears and fear coursed through her veins.

Later, that night, she stepped into the roaring storm, crashes of thunder echoing and nearly drowning out her voice. “I will find you!” she cried, she screamed into the maw. “There is nowhere on the Earth that you can hide from me! The ground will drink your ether and bury your bones!”

Eventually, not even she could hear what she was saying. She screamed loud enough, it seemed, for the whole world to hear, for the echoes to find every rock and tree and lake and to fill the mountains with its reach. The storm howled above her, perhaps in response.

…

Dramis woke up before the sun had finished spilling into the valley. She drew the blankets around her and shivered in fear or rage. Rain fell hard against the roof.

…

When the Crow returned, later that day, it was holding something large and green in its claws.

It maneuvered the thing through the hole in the roof with seeming ease, and dropped it on the floor of the attic, where Dramis sat on the bed. She crossed her legs and stared at the bird as he fluffed his feathers.

“What is it?” she asked, finally.

“A book,” Variks’ rough voice came through the creature.

Dramis was annoyed. “Yes, I know that,” she said. “I’ve seen books before. What’s in it?”

Variks didn’t respond at first, merely ran his wing along the cover. It was bound in green, with an unfamiliar symbol upon it. She narrowed her eyes, trying to remember. It looked like a House sigil.

“Judgment,” Variks said.

“I’m sorry?”

“The symbol,” he continued. “On the cover. That’s the seal of House Judgment.”

Dramis nodded. Another name she had never heard. Then, hesitantly – “Did you bring more…?”

Variks laughed, and passed a full sup to her in the Crow’s claw. She took it and drank it, slower this time, keeping her eyes on Variks as though he were going to stop her.

“Today I’m going to show you what’s in this book,” the other Eliksni declared.

Dramis finished the sup and unconsciously flexed her arm as she continued to look at Variks. “What’s in the book?” she asked, after some seconds.

“Stories,” Variks. “Of the Eliksni, of our home.”

“I thought you were going to help me kill Noksis,” Dramis said. And as she put the empty sup aside, she knew that she was bigger now. Not Vandal-big, but dreg-big, big enough that she would no longer be the weakest, if she was still part of a crew.

“I am.”

“Will the stories help me?”

“What was your plan, Dramis?” Variks sounded irritated. “Take ether until you are Captain-strong, and outmatch Noksis that way?”

Dramis was silent, glaring stonily at the bird.

“Noksis is older than you, stronger than you, and more bloodthirsty than you,” Variks said. “You, however, are smarter than her, and that is the only way you will be able to win. And if you listen, perhaps you will find that even I may have something useful to tell you, if it will fit in your mind.”

Dramis felt a bit ashamed at that. Variks had been kind to her – who was she, to rebuff him? “Very well,” she said. “I will learn. If you keep bringing ether.”

There was no way for the Crow to be able to grin, but Dramis could swear once again, in that moment, that it did so.

“That I will,” Variks said. “Now. Open the book for me, please, to the first page.”

Dramis grasped the odd green binding, and lifted it. On the first page was a short message in a language she couldn’t read, almost entirely faded.

“My mind is growing old,” Variks murmured. “The page after that, please.”

“What does it say?” Dramis asked. No one had ever taught her read. Expected, perhaps, but she resented it.

“It does not matter,” Variks said. “The next page, please.”

Sulkily, Dramis did as she was told. At the top of the next page, marked in a sloping numeral it didn’t take advanced knowledge to guess was a one, was eloquent, almost artistic writing, different in numerous subtle ways from the message, and from the written language Dramis was used to. An unfamiliar symbol was emblazoned across the top.

Still, Dramis was a bit surprised that she thought she could make some sense of it, foreign though it was. “The something of… House…”

“Rain,” Variks finished. “The Prophecies of House Rain.” He sounded impressed.

“I’ve never heard of it.”

“Rain has been dead for many years,” Variks said. “One of the Houses lost forever in the Whirlwind. A shame. Those of House Rain were skilled prophets, and quite well versed in the Light.”

Dramis knew, intellectually, that there must have been other Houses, other Eliksni before the Whirlwind. But her mind boggled at the confirmation, nonetheless. She wondered what those Eliksni were like – a tall, proud race, never lacking for ether. Perhaps they were all as tall as Kells in those days.

Variks cut her out of her own thoughts. “Can you read the title?” he asked.

Dramis frowned. The words were too strange, now. “No.”

“Kell of Kells.”

Dramis drew in a quick breath. “Oh,” she said.

“What do you know of the story?” Variks asked.

She thought. “Skolas,” she said, lowly. “Cruel. Binding-breaker. I never knew much of him.”

Variks seemed displeased. He fluffed his wings up and shook his head. “There is more to the story than Skolas,” he said. “But we will not speak of that just now.”

Dramis felt odd, as though she had failed a test of some sort. A peculiar mixture of indignant and embarrassed. “Why not?” she asked hotly.

“We have other things to discuss.” Variks’ voice had sharpened, or was it her imagination? She nodded once, and kept her mouth shut.

“Turn to page seventy-two,” he told her. Dramis did as he asked. Numbers, at least, she was good at.

On the page, a picture presented itself. It was worn in places, but Dramis suspected that it had lasted for quite a long time nonetheless. It was of an Eliksni,

There was writing scrawled above it, in an unfamiliar hand. Even to Dramis’ untrained eye, it looked roughly done. She wondered if it was Variks’ handwriting.

“The story of Andaris,” Variks read. “Have you heard of him?”

Dramis shook her head. She had heard many stories, but little of where the Eliksni came from.

“Andaris was a great hero on the old world,” Variks said. “Or perhaps he never existed, as is the way of things.”

In those days, Variks continued, the Eliksni homeworld was illuminated in sunshine during the day but plunged into utter darkness during the night. After the Kell of Fire’s son became lost in the darkness and never returned, she begged Andaris, famed for his prowess and his intelligence, to find a solution.

Andaris thought for four days and four nights. On each day, he traveled to a ‘land’ (here Variks explained the term had several meanings in Old Eliksni; continent or planet or island all worked). Each land he visited, he walked so far and long that his path was worn deeply into the earth, cracking the very ground, until by the fourth night, the gods visited him and demanded he stop.

“Andaris,” they said. “Your strength is great, your heart full, but your mind is missing something.”

Andaris was angered at the insult. “I have sworn an oath. I will bring light to the dark.”

“We the gods alone can dictate to the world,” they said. “You must cease.”

When Andaris refused, they sent a great beast, named Old-Place, to defeat him. Andaris wrestled with the monster for four more days and nights, tearing yet more great gouges into the ground, until at last he slew it. From its luminous flesh, he crafted four great orbs, the four moons of the Eliksni homeworld, and cast them into the night sky. From then on, while the night remained dark, it was never so dark that the Eliksni could not find their way.

When the tale finished, Dramis looked at Variks with wide eyes. “Did Andaris really exist?” she said.

Variks laughed again. “I don’t know why you’re asking me,” he said. “This story was old when I was young. However, ask yourself this – does it matter?”

“Of course it matters,” Dramis said irritably. “If he didn’t exist, then he didn’t exist.”

“It’s not always that simple.”

Dramis couldn’t comprehend it being simpler than that, but she remained quiet. She ran her hand over her head and thought about Andaris, mighty hero of the Eliksni, towering high above them, high enough to fight their enemies. High enough, perhaps, to steal back the Great Machine.

Variks was looking at her appraisingly. “I will return tomorrow. In the meantime…” he glanced down at the book and slowly, almost shyly, slid it towards her.

“You want me to keep it,” she said, voice low with surprise.

“Until I come back.”

She looked at the unfamiliar symbol again, the crest of House Judgment, which held meaning only to Variks now. She wondered again how old this book was. She thought she caught some glimpse of the greatness of the trust being put in her, and felt very small indeed. “I will do my best,” she replied.

“Good,” he said. With that, he took towards the sky, leaving Dramis alone again.

…

The next day, the creature looked more haggard than usual. The Crow’s wings were drooping, and its eyes, characteristically afire with cold machine intelligence, had dimmed.

“What’s wrong?” she asked him.

“Nothing with me,” Variks replied. “I fear the Crows are beginning to degrade. Only Uldren truly knew how to keep them up, and who knows where he is?”

Dramis still wasn’t sure who Uldren was, but she nodded anyway. “Will they be alright?”

“For a while longer, I’m sure.” Still, there was anxiety in the other Eliksni’s voice, quickly erased. “Do you still have it?”

She drew the book carefully out from under the bed. Variks nodded. “Good work.”

“This is important to you,” she said, grasping it close.

“There is nothing more important to me in all the worlds.”

Dramis nodded. She thought she understood. Carefully, she passed the book back to Variks. He placed a claw upon it and seemed to be testing its reality.

Finally, he looked back to her. “You’re getting bigger.”

Dramis started. “I am?”

Even as she spoke, she surveyed herself. Indeed, she seemed to sit a few inches taller than she did before. Her hand, once slender and breakable, now seemed if not large, at least solid. From a distance, she wondered if she could be mistaken for a small Vandal.

“So I am,” she whispered.

With this realization, however, she looked at the docking caps.

The caps were meant for dregs. They were cold metal, and would not grow like an Eliksni. It wouldn’t be long before she outgrew them.

Variks had followed her gaze. “Would you like to remove those?” he asked.

Dramis stiffened. “I-” she began. She glanced at them again. “I don’t know how.”

“I do.”

She glanced up sharply. “How?” she asked.

The Crow just grinned again. “A story for another time, perhaps.”

She looked at the caps again.

She had made a promise to her fellows to free them, and kill the one who’d betrayed them all. And how could she do that with two arms? She had known, all along, that she would need to remove them.

But the thought paralyzed her. “I’m still just a dreg,” she said hollowly.

“You have no House.” Variks sounded mystified. “No one will stop you. You have no masters, not anymore.”

But that wasn’t true, was it? Even if Noksis wasn’t her Captain anymore, she still dwelt in her thoughts, even invaded her dreams, like a parasite. She had always been a dreg; could she be good at anything else? Could she possibly be anything else? Panic flooded her.

“Not yet,” she whispered. “Not yet, please.”

Variks was surprised. She could see it in the way the Crow shifted its foot and drew its head back. “Alright,” he said.

“Thank you.”

Variks bowed. “I wouldn’t make you do anything you don’t want to do.” He looked up at the hole in the roof. “I should go, for now. Hold onto the book for a little longer. I’ll return later.”

Just before the not-bird prepared to fly, Dramis said, “Variks?”

It turned back. Deep black eyes stared back at her, but Dramis thought they didn’t seem so empty anymore.

“Someday.”

Variks nodded. “Someday,” he echoed, and took to the sky.

…

It was many days later before Dramis dreamt of Noksis again.

This time, she felt the weakness in her bones. She felt small, and pathetic. The Kings watched her like hawks. She glared at them as she tread through the lair, back from patrol, a crew of barely-loyal dregs following her. Not hers. Those had been taken from her.

It had been days since she’d had ether. Her cloak, once proud and well-worn, was tattered. She clutched at the fading fur upon her shoulder and shook her head vehemently.

“I request an audience with the Kell,” she spat at one of the Kell’s Guard. He looked at her impassively.

“Why should he give it?” the guard asked.

“I must speak with him.”

“I’m not hearing a reason.”

She sputtered with rage and fear. “I’m his informant!”

“Noksis.” The Guard leaned forward – the Fallen Captain stepped back unconsciously. “Your usefulness in that area ran dry a long time ago. You have nothing else to give us but your service, and you’ve been wasting your patrols looking for some Houseless dreg you think is coming to kill you.”

The Guard leaned back again. “I do not grant your audience. And unless you start properly serving your new House, I expect you will not be tolerated here for much longer.”

Anger pumped through her veins. She fought the urge to strangle the Guard right here and now. “I told you she’s a threat,” she hissed.

“Noksis,” the Guard sighed again. “You have to let it go if you’re going to be a proper part of the House. The dreg escaped. It happens. She’s probably already rotted away on the moor.”

She shook her head. “I know she’s still out there. I can feel her, eating at me, like a parasite. You must let me search!”

The Guard seemed to relax imperceptibly. “Very well,” he said. “Search as you want. I won’t get in your way. But you won’t be speaking to the Kell today.”

She snarled. “You’ll regret this.” She turned back to the lair and walked away, feeling the Guards’ eyes boring into her, feeling each step send pain through her starved bones.

…

Dramis told Variks about her dream the next day.

She felt foolish, spelling out all of the details of what was probably nothing more than a fantasy crafted of her deepest mind, but Variks listened intently.

Finally - “Interesting,” he said.

“Foredreams were not uncommon amongst Eliksni in the old days,” he continued. “The House of Rain were particularly skilled in them.”

“The House of Rain?” Dramis said. But even as she spoke, the name came back to her, written above a title. Kell of Kells.

“A House, one of many, that perished in the Whirlwind,” Variks said. He sounded as if a great sadness had descended upon him in that moment. She remembered, earlier, how she thought Noksis to be young – Variks was old. She could see, in that moment, the same thing she thought Noksis lacked. But the Crow shook its head, eminently bird-like, and the moment was gone. “It’s not impossible the traits were passed down.”

Dramis ran her hand over the book. “Did they write the whole book?” she asked urgently.

Laughter. “That was all Judgment,” Variks said. “Judgment were storytellers, and record keepers. Scribes. Only Rain could foretell. But, they informed some of our stories."

As she considered this, Variks spoke again. “Speaking of the book,” he said, “I have another story for you.”

This time, he read her more than one story. The first was of a clever young Eliksni who tricked a mighty Kell into building the first Ketch. Here it was the namesake of the great Ketches she knew today, a ship meant to ply the ocean instead of the stars. With it, the Eliksni brought vast wealth to her people and her House, although the House’s name was not recorded, for before the invention of the Ketch the various peoples of their home were irreversibly separated.

“The Kell was not very smart,” Dramis observed. “Neither were the gods, if these heroes got what they wanted from them so easily.” Variks regarded her curiously before continuing.

The Ketches, however, were soon put to use in warfare, rending the Houses capable of doing such damage to one another that the future of their race seemed in question. The clever Eliksni, horrified at what her actions had wrought, once again approached the Kell. This time, however, she convinced him she could build him an even better Ketch, one that could withstand any attack. Eager to see this new ship, the Kell granted her access to the ship – only for her to convert all of its weapons into armor. From then on, Ketches were not warfaring vessels.

Dramis frowned. “Couldn’t they still build the ones with weapons?” she asked.

“It’s a legend,” Variks said. “Legends don’t have to make sense. They just have to tell the story.”

Dramis didn’t like that answer. But she decided not to ask again.

…

“Tell me about Noksis,” Variks said, later. The summer had touched the mountains and the sky, and the snow had long since melted away except for the mountain peaks. The sky above them was clear, and the sun shone like a great Servitor.

Dramis blinked. “There isn’t much to tell,” she said. “She was cruel, and petty. Is. She sold my crew into slavery.”

“But what do you remember her as?” the Crow urged. “Before she betrayed you.”

“The memories are tainted,” she spat. “If ever I had any good feelings toward her, I couldn’t tell you. I wouldn’t count me as an accurate informant.”

“Wise,” Variks nodded. “Try, anyway.”

The dreg huffed, but thought. “Efficient,” she said, the word tasting odd on her tongue, like she should not be giving any concessions to Noksis, even as an enemy. “The Devils all thought well of her. She could command a patrol like few others.”

Variks nodded, and motioned for her to continue.

“I don’t think she was always like that,” she said slowly. “She faced the death of her crew, before I joined her. Perhaps it hardened her heart.” Made her cruel.

The Crow sighed mechanically, a burst of static abruptly reminding Dramis of what it was. “Many Eliksni have hardened their hearts in these days,” Variks said. “Perhaps we could do with more who are soft.”

The wind whistled. Dramis thought she could hear it brush the grass, tousle the snow on top of the mountains.

“And your crew,” Variks said. “Tell me about them.” His eyes seemed once again to flicker out of lifelessness, exposing a wildness beneath that Dramis wasn’t sure came from Variks.

“Some were mean,” she said, “and selfish. Others were kind. All did what they had to do to survive.” All of a sudden, she felt their absence like a hole in her chest. Perhaps that was sentiment, clouded by distance – but she missed them nonetheless.

“Were you close to any of them?”

“Not particularly.”

“Then why do you hope to rescue them?” Variks’ voice grew slightly icier. “The fate of many dregs is much worse.”

Dramis closed her eyes. “They are Eliksni,” she said. “And they did not deserve what they got.” She thought of the flash of light as the shock knife broke her chains. She was Eliksni, too.

She opened her eyes again. The Crow was grinning again. This time, it was not so disturbing.

…

The summer passed.

It would never be quite warm, in this part of the Earth, but Dramis spent her nights with fewer blankets than normal. The nights were clear and cold, and little creatures she’d never seen before awoke to hunt and play. She would spend some of those nights on the roof of the barn, watching the night animals make way for the day.

Variks decreased the frequency of his visits, but he still came. Each time with a new story from the Book of Judgment, as it was called. And each time, Dramis thought his familiar to be a little more wearied, a little more broken. Variks didn’t say any more on the matter, however.

Over time, he would ask her for stories, too. At first they were of her, but her life was short and hard and dull like a beetle’s shell, and she rapidly ran out.

So instead, she told him old Devils stories, heroes who had killed Guardians or had stolen from the Hive. She even, over time, came to tell him human stories, short tales passed in secret amongst the Fallen. Old human commanders winning battles, wars so long gone she doubted even the humans remembered them. Brave, clever human children winning something from supernatural creatures, or saving their brothers or sisters or friends.

“Have you ever seen a human?” Variks asked her, one day.

Dramis shivered. “No, thank my luck,” she said, but the words felt hollow. “Have you?”

“I have seen many,” the other Eliksni said. “I have talked to them, too.”

“What were they like?” she asked. She couldn’t imagine a human talking to an Eliksni. She would have thought it must have crushed his head in before it thought to speak.

Variks hesistated. “Odd,” he said. “It depends. Not many trust me, but some do. I talk to them the most.”

She knew he lived at the Reef, but the thought of him dwelling amongst humans seemed to have never crossed her mind. She wondered at the tales of the Queen’s people, former keepers of the Wolves, if any of them were true.

But Variks was hesitant to speak of humans, though she pressed him. “We are Eliksni,” he said. “We must not forget that, in these times.” Eventually, she stopped asking.

Finally, he asked her with great solemnity to turn to page one again.

The words were no more intelligible now than they were before, but she could still recognize what Variks had told her read Kell of Kells. There were no illustrations on this page, but patterned across the top was the same symbol, still unrecognizable.

Variks traced a steady wing over the words reverently. “The youngest story in the book,” he said. “The last prophecy of House Rain, made as the old world fell. A sign of hope for those who escaped the Whirlwind.”

Dramis was silent, watching Variks closely.

To her surprise, he caught a claw beneath the cover of the book and closed it. It smacked shut with more force that Dramis thought one was supposed to handle this book with.

“I will not speak of that,” Variks said.

She felt disappointed. “Why not?” she asked.

“Instead,” Variks continued, as though he had not heard her, “I will tell you of House Wolves, and Skolas.”

She perked up. “I know about Skolas,” she said. “I’ve heard the story.” Skolas had never conquered the Devils. She remembered that with a faint prick of pride, although she knew Devils was not her House anymore.

“Yess,” Variks said, and Dramis could hear the slow way of speaking he had here more than ever. She wondered if Variks wanted to tell this story.

“Skolas was once Kell of Wolves,” Variks continued, despite her interruption. “You know what happened next.”

Dramis nodded.

“But I knew him before,” Variks hissed. “Petty, cruel, tyrannical. He is everything I hate about what we became.” The Crow seemed to cast his eyes downward before he spoke again. “I spoke against him, in the Reef Wars. Everywhere he touched, no matter if it housed the innocent or the sick or the weak, he burned. In the name of… strength. I could not stand it any longer. And so I gave him to the Queen. He cut off all of my arms for the privilege.”

Dramis was horrified. The lower two would grow back, but the upper? Not even the cruelest Captains stooped so low.

“I’m sorry,” she said awkwardly.

“I did not tell that story for sympathy,” the Crow said, grinning once again. “I told it to you that you might understand. An Eliksni like he once claimed he was Kell of Kells, and there were many who believed him. Do you?”

She thought of Skolas, the fabled Kell of Kells foretold by House Rain to give hope, and wanted to laugh. And then she felt fear settle on her shoulders. “No,” she said. There was nothing hopeful about Skolas.

“Good,” Variks said, and they did not speak more of Skolas.

…

As the summer passed away, Dramis realized it was time.

She had been realizing it for some time now, she knew. She grew ever stronger, now large enough to be called a Captain, even. She laughed as the bed in the attic, first vast and encapsulating, now felt almost too short for her.

When Variks returned, not long after the trees were touched by autumn, she told him so.

“Are you certain?” Variks asked her, a touch anxiously, she thought. “Are you ready?”

“Perhaps not,” she said. “But I do not think I will get any more ready than this.”

“To kill Noksis,” he affirmed.

“Yes.”

Another electric sigh. Dramis felt off-balance – did he not say, at the beginning of the season, that he was here to help her? Why did he seem so reluctant now?

“Then,” he said finally, “permit me to tell you one last story.”

She owed him that much. “Of course,” she said.

Variks spread open the book again, like he had done so many times here before. This time, however, he opened it to the very first page, the one he had insisted she not see. Scrawled in writing younger than the rest of the book was a message Dramis still couldn’t be sure she could read, despite the progress she’d made.

“What is it?” she asked, hushed. If letting her keep the book was an honor, this was a greater one still. She could sense, even through the Crow, how much it pained Variks to look at it.

“A message,” he said. “From when this book was given to me, many long years ago. From… my mother.”

Dramis didn’t know what to say. Variks shook his head, and read.

“If given the choice, be kind.
If given the choice, be full of love.
If given the choice, stand in front of evil.
If given the choice, let your heart be hurt.
For I promise you, my heart, all of the alternatives hurt far worse.”

Below this, another line was scrawled, more hastily.

“I give you my love. Wear it. Carry it with you. And make it your armor.”

Dramis’ heart clutched. She could barely remember her own mother – she had not much interest in hatchlings. She had been alone for most of her life.

Variks closed the book. “That is it,” he said, almost succeeding in sounding unaffected. “That is all I have to teach you.”

“Thank you, Variks,” she said, sincerely.

There was silence between them for a few seconds.

“You are still going to kill Noksis,” he said, slowly, resigned.

Dramis nodded, confused. “This is what I’ve been waiting for. I swore upon the Earth!”

Variks bobbed. “You have so much more you can do,” he said. “There is so much you are capable of, now.”

“Like what?” she snapped. “I’m Houseless. After I kill Noksis and free my friends, what left is there for me?”

“Much,” Variks whispered.

“Tell me!” Dramis felt the change in mood like whiplash. She didn’t know what she did wrong, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to make it right – what right did Variks have, to say she should not do this? Had he watched his crew been enslaved? Had he seen the absolute hate in Noksis’ eyes? The same, she thought, he must have seen in Skolas’?

Variks dipped his head towards the book. “I had not come to teach you just for your revenge,” he said, slowly, as if he weren’t sure how to say what he was saying. “I had hoped…”

He trailed away into the still air as what he said sunk into Dramis’ mind. She closed her eyes and felt her fists clenching.

“Of course,” Dramis said lowly. “You wanted something from me.”

Variks shook his head, but didn’t say anything. It helped to see that the Crow, at least, looked suitably ashamed.

“I had thought-” Dramis swallowed hard, catching the words as if in amber. “I should not have thought.”

“I am sorry,” Variks murmured.

She had given him his secrets. What did she have to complain about?

“Tell me why,” she says. Demands.

“Do you not know?” Variks asked softly.

She turned back to the book. It was still open to the note. Dramis turns it, with care, still.

“Skolas,” she said. “Kell of Kells.”

“I have been looking,” Variks said. “Looking for someone who could take his place. Ever since I was made master of the Crows. I think you-”

Dramis did not know if it was shame that stayed his mouth just then, and she didn’t care. Let him feel shame, she thought. “You lied to me.”

“I omitted.”

That answer just made her angrier. “You said you were here to help me kill Noksis.”

“I said I have come to help you. And I said that was not all.”

That was true. It didn’t make Dramis any less angry.

“Dramis,” he began. “You are something special amongst Eliksni. I was watching you, at the barn, when you were attacked by the Kings. Your crew chose you, to leave, to save them. Do you know how impossible it is to get dregs to agree on anything?” he let out a short, hollow laugh. “But you did. Not because you were strong, but because they trusted you.”

“Shut up,” Dramis said. Her head was burning.

“You are everything Skolas was not,” Variks insisted. “You understand kindness. The strength of helping, and being helped. How the weak may become strong if only they are cared for. If you did not, you would not have offered a humble bird what you had when you were starving.”

“You are everything Noksis is.”

Variks took a step back. Dramis wished she hadn’t said what she had said, but now that they were out there, she took a savage satisfaction in hoping Variks felt that insult deep. “I’m going to take my revenge,” she said. “And I’m going to free my crew. And you will not get in my way.”

The Crow was silent for a while. Dramis considered shooing it, but she just sat there, breathing heavily, watching it. She felt as though she had run many miles.

Finally, Variks bowed his head. “Forgive me,” he said. He hobbled over to where the book lay. Dramis thought she could now see all of the marks of age on it, the scuffs and tears and dirt that bespoke of its long journey. Obscurely, she felt guilty – but not enough to regret what she’d done.

After the Crow grasped the book in its claw, it turned to Dramis. “I hope you will realize,” he said. “Revenge is the most worthless of causes.”

Dramis felt like she should say something, here. But she remained silent as the Crow took to the sky once again, and she was alone in the barn.

…

The next morning felt wrong.

She was alone. She half-expected to find Variks there, and when she didn’t, she mulled her future over in her mind like a shiny.

She could raid the Kings. She was strong – surely, she could take on a dreg or two, and steal its sup. But no. Nothing she could scavenge would be as much as she was getting with Variks, and she would only grow weaker.

The Kings’ lair felt very far away. She hadn’t realized it, but her goal had become much more difficult without Variks. This didn’t make her regret anything, however – just more determined.

It was time.

…

As the sun grew closer to its height, she took hold of the docking caps.

She still didn’t know how they worked. But perhaps that didn’t matter now.

She twisted the mechanism until the pain filled her head. She felt them loosen. It helped that she hadn’t had them replaced for a while. Their grip had weakened in rust and stress.

Finally, they wrenched free.

She felt, more than heard them clatter to the ground. The stumps where her lower two arms had been felt raw and exposed and better than they’d felt in seasons.

She hadn’t been ready before. But she was ready now.

…

That night, she went to bed hoping to leave early in the morning. She had asked to dream. She hoped that Variks was right, and that whatever her heritage was, it meant she could see what others could not.

That night, she was Noksis again.

She was standing at the mouth of the King’s Lair, a monstrous fissure in the side of a once-grand, perhaps, human building.

“The new Kell has no patience for outsiders,” a vandal said, pointing the rifle at her head.

She can’t, doesn’t argue. Not anymore. “Where will I go?” she asked in a small voice.

“We don’t care,” another said cruelly, her armor hastily painted over in the new style. She jerked the rifle forward, as if shooing her on.

She knew there was nothing left to say. She swept her tattered cloak behind her with as much dignity as she could muster, and stalked into the Russian night.

It was colder than she’d ever remembered it.

She didn’t stop dreaming there.

Now, she was Andaris, long ago. Her world was barren and filled with tundra, not unlike Old Russia. To the north and south were great fields of ice, where few Eliksni dwelled but the strongest. This is where she was from, to the north, and she was walking the world.

The gods spoke to her, but they were not gods. They were spirits, who inhabited every thing in the land, and there were millions of them. “You are strong,” they whispered to her. “You are the strongest thing in the world.”

Suddenly, she could see the Great Machine. It was undamaged, and very small – smaller than she was. She realized that it wasn’t small, she was large. She reached out to take it.

As soon as she touched it, however, there was a burning on her skin, and a voice in her mind. “This is not for you,” it said. “This is not to be taken, only given.” And then the Great Machine left, flying into the sky where it disappeared.

She felt herself grow smaller. The walls of the cities grew higher until they were higher than she was, and then until they were as high above her as anyone else. But they kept getting higher. At last, when the blades of grass outmatched her, she thought she was finally going to disappear.

When she woke up, she was as large as she ever was. But she didn’t feel like it anymore.

…

When her arms were weak but functional, she stood in front of the barn.

It was odd, seeing it like this. Over the summer, she had grown to think that the barn was her home. She would miss it.

But as she walked away, she felt a new strength enter her. The wind was cold but not biting, and each of the fingers on her new arms tingled in the chill. The sun warmed her skin where the wind flowed over it.

She was Dramis. She was Eliksni. And she had sworn upon the Earth.

As she walked, she reveled in that promise. She asked the Earth for strength, and she felt it fill her limbs. She asked the sky for protection, and felt more confident. She asked the wind for speed, and felt the lightness in her feet.

She looked back at the barn, wondered if she would ever see it again. But she dared not ask for too much.

…

She went like this for a week, by her count.

Occasionally, she would find an enclave of Kings. The Devils had all fled – to where, she didn’t know, and she found she also didn’t care. She only wanted Noksis, and the Kings’ Lair.

She was not strong enough to fight them. Instead, she crept into their camps while they slept, quiet like a dreg, and stole their sups. From two she took shock knives, nearly fully charged. She drank the sups underneath the stars, and slept dreamlessly.

…

Finally, she thought she had found it – or at least, found the way.

She had been mapping the Kings’ movements for a week, and they all returned to a single location. All she had to do was avoid the Kings, which was easier than it seemed – they too, were ravaged by the Guardians.

She may have made it had she not found Noksis on the dawn of the ninth day.

The Captain was drinking from an ice-beset river in a clearing by the start of a forest. She had discarded her cloak, once the most beautiful Devil cloak Dramis had ever seen, and her armor was scuffed.
She was as tall as ever, which didn’t surprise Dramis as much as she thought it should. Imagining Noksis without her stature was an utterly alien thought, and besides, she didn’t expect the universe to make this any easier on her.

Dramis crouched behind a hill and watched. Noksis stopped drinking abruptly, but didn’t stand. She stared at the water for a few moments, running choked down its length. It wouldn’t be long before it was frozen altogether.

Now was the time. Dramis settled her heart.

“Noksis,” she called. And the other Fallen stilled.
When she raised her head, Dramis almost flinched. An eye was missing along her right side, a ragged wound in its place, and her filter was broken. It hung limply off of her helmet, exposing a mouth permanently twisted in a grimace.

“I knew it,” she whispered, but Dramis still heard her. “You. You’ve come back.”

“I’ve come to kill you,” Dramis said.

Noksis stood to her full height, which wasn’t quite as intimidating now. She laughed, and that was as intimidating as ever. “Good,” she snarled. “I was looking forward to it.”

Dramis thought of her dreams, and wondered if Noksis was just as scared as she was.

“So come, dreg,” Noksis said. “Let’s end this.”

Dramis stepped forward.

Noksis moved faster than she had thought possible in her state. The Captain brought her hand low and tried to drive a shock knife into Dramis’ gut.

She barely managed to dodge. She brought out her own knife and made a pass at Noksis’ neck, but she ducked it easily and danced out of range.

For the first time, as Noksis went in for another attack, Dramis wondered if this was a good idea. Variks was right – she was Captain-big, but she didn’t know how to fight like one. Noksis was old and desperate and experienced and driven by rage and hurt, and Dramis felt for the first time that she was out of her depth.

Another cut caught her across the shoulder. The wound leaked ether freely, and she swore as she drew her knives up to block another attack.

Noksis grinned. “Not so tough, are you?” she laughed, and lashed out with her foot. It caught Dramis against the chest, and she barely avoided falling over.

“You dregs think the same,” Noksis said, huge and terrible. “If you were bigger, or stronger, you could stand up to your betters. But we’re your betters for a reason.”

Noksis was standing in a relaxed position, as though she hadn’t been planning on continuing the fight. Dramis heaved a breath and went on the attack again.

Noksis brought up one knife to block hers, and deftly moved out of the way to dodge the second. Dramis realized her opponent only had one knife, but it didn’t make a difference. She was outmatching her anyway.

She was shoved away. Noksis continued. “Not that it matters anymore,” she said. “We’re all dead. The Devils have left. The Kings are under the control of that mongrel human.” She laughed again, and it sounded broken. “Perhaps you understand now,” she said. “We are dead, and even our bones are dust!”

Noksis struck. Another wound was opened on Dramis’ stomach, and she just managed to block a blow intended to cut her throat open.

“Grow your arms all you like,” Noksis hissed. “You’ll always be a dreg.”

With that, she brought her hand up like a missile. Dramis saw the attack just too late.

She managed to avoid the worst it could have been, but the knife sliced hard across her stomach. Ether spilled out in waves, and Dramis felt herself growing weaker. She didn’t realize she had dropped on the ground until Noksis spat on her from above.

She turned to face her enemy. Noksis’ face swam.

“And you will die a dreg,” Noksis said.

She had lost.

Months of planning. A season of anger and hope and longing. And she had lost.

Perhaps Noksis was right. She was a dreg. And that’s all she ever would be.

The world was getting harder to focus on.

She was dying.

She lost.

no.

No!

She would not die without killing Noksis first. She would not return to the Earth without fulfilling at least part of her oath.

She placed an elbow on the ground. Pain washed through her.

She didn’t need to fight like a Captain. She was a dreg. Dregs had given her freedom. It was to dregs she had made her oath in the first place.

She turned her face towards Noksis. The Captain was already far away, or so it seemed.

“Hey,” she croaked. Coughed. Tried again. “Hey!”

Noksis stopped. Turned back. It was hard to tell, but Dramis thought she could see astonishment in her face.

She hoisted herself up to her feet. The ether in her was almost all gone, and wet clumps of blood fell out of her stomach as she did so. She almost fell down again, but steadied herself as she saw Noksis drawing closer.

This would work, or it wouldn’t.

Noksis was almost there.

Here goes.

There was anger on Noksis’ face as she drew her hand back. She was saying something, but Dramis couldn’t hear her over the sound of her own heart.

Dramis felt the knife carve her chest like roast boar. It missed her heart (it must have, or else she would be dead), but she felt it dig deep. The Arc poured into her chest, and she felt her hands going numb.

She grabbed her enemy’s wrist. Noksis’ eyes widened in shock.

With her upper left hand, she held her knife. And she drove it, and herself, forward.

Her knife found its mark. It buried into Noksis’ jaw, slamming upward into her head. Noksis released her knife, still in Dramis’ chest, and stumbled backwards.

Noksis looked at her, bemused more than angry or even afraid. She sat down, staring at Dramis like a hatchling, before she turned to face the mountains, and laid down on the grass and breathed no more.

Dramis could feel every breath rattle her body like it was made of straw. She dared not move – she couldn’t feel her own body anymore. The knife was out of charge. Removing it now would just speed her demise, what remained of her rational mind told her.

She should have felt triumph. Instead, only regret. She realized now that her oath had two parts, and she had only gotten to fulfill the less important one.

Perhaps Variks was right. But she couldn’t think about that now.

She was sitting down. When had she sat down?

Dark.

She hoped her crew was OK. She hoped the new Kell wouldn’t treat them poorly.

Dark.

…

But above her, a light…?

…

The coldness of the ground was the first thing Dramis noticed.

It sent chills into her bones until she was obliged to sit up. Immediately, she noticed that something was off.

The first, of course, being that she wasn’t dead.

The second was that not only was the first true, all of her wounds seemed to have been healed.

The third was that she was encased in new armor, flawless, if basic.

And the last was that a tiny robot seemed to be floating above her head.

“Uh,” the robot said. “Oh, boy.”

Dramis squinted. “Who are you?” she asked.

“Oh no,” he said. “I mean, um. My name is… Idwal. I’m a Ghost.”

Something about the Ghost’s bearing suggested nervousness. She reached her upper hand out, in friendship. “Don’t be afraid,” she said kindly. “My name is Dramis.” She looked around. “Unless this is the beyond-world. Then, I suppose my name was Dramis.”

She stood up on shaky legs and examined her new companion. She’d seen something like him before.

Yes. She remembered now.

With the Guardians.

She took a step back. “I’m a Guardian,” she said, breathlessly.

“Huh,” the Ghost – Idwal – said. “They tell us we usually have to explain that.”

“But Guardians are human,” she said. “And I’m… Fallen.” The word the humans used for her kind. All of a sudden, she understood its meaning.

“Not anymore,” Idwal said.

“No,” Dramis said, feeling her chest, whole again. “I suppose not.”

There was silence for a few moments as Dramis inspected herself. It was true – all of her wounds were healed. She felt better, in fact, than she had felt for perhaps her entire life.

“We need your help,” Idwal said, rushed, almost panicking, as though he’d just remembered something important. “The City – it’s in trouble.”

She eyed him carefully. “And why should I help the humans?” she asked. She couldn’t feel any bitterness, not now, just logic. The humans were more likely to kill her on sight than they were to accept her help.

Idwal looked as though he couldn’t respond to that for a few seconds. Then, he spoke.

“I found you in the wilderness, Guardian, as the brightest light in all the system,” he said. “They say it’s like that, for Ghosts. The Light of your Guardian overpowers you. But there is so much Light in you, Guardian. And–” he looked frustrated, briefly. “That means something. I know you know it does, too.”

She stood awkwardly for a moment. Idwal spoke again.

“Here,” he said, a note of desperation in his voice. “Here, just – just look.” With that , he drifted closer.

Dramis unconsciously shied away. Idwal stopped, surprised. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not going to hurt you.” He floated gently up until he brushed against the skin of her hand.

And her head filled with visions.

The City was burning. Humans ran through the streets, screaming, as lumbering beasts – Cabal, she thought, although she’d never seen them before – cut them down. Children sat numbly in the wreckage, cradling the bodies of their parents.

Above them all was one of the Cabal, larger than the rest. He watched the children die with eyes like winter.

She pulled back with a gasp. Tears filled her eyes, unbidden.

Unexpectedly, she thought of Variks. She thought of him watching alien children scream and die as his Kell laughed. She thought of a long night spent before a decision was made.

And she thought of what it had cost him.

Then, her crew filled her mind. She had oaths to keep.

She opened her mouth to speak, but…

Alien children were dying right now. And she had a decision to make, too.

She remembered the looks in the eyes of her crew, taken prisoner. Desperate. Hopeless. Until she said what she did. And she knew, instinctively, that there would be no prisoners amongst the humans.

“I will help,” she said. “And then, I will fulfill my oath. This I swear upon the Earth once again.”

The ground felt warm beneath her feet. Idwal bobbed in happiness.

And then, she added to herself, she was going to find Variks. She would show him her Ghost and hope that he could forgive her.

But for now, she has an oath to keep.