I’ve seen some serious nightmare fuel at work, the appalling things that can happen to a body in a split second in an accident or an attack or more slowly by illness. Dealing with the horror of it is why a lot of first responders are very into some very bck humour, because what else can you do? People need you to keep it together and keep going. You can have your own hysterics once it’s over—or, more likely, just bottle it up and try to keep functioning while the ever-increasing collection slowly eats your mental health.

  Intense personal grief wasn’t the same kind of emotion, but experience paid off. I was already tired, and emotional storms are exhausting. As the tears wound down, I shoved the pain away and forced my mind to focus instead on what had to be done. The people who were around me, hurting because I was hurting, needed to be safe from the consequences of my actions. Direct conflict wasn’t really my thing, but protection from infection was, and there was a massive one here that needed to be contained and, if possible, eliminated entirely.

  Right now, that mattered.

  I gently disentangled myself and sat on the edge of the pond, hoping the fish wouldn’t mind if I borrowed a bit of water to spsh my face and try to banish at least the worst signs of crying. It wasn’t so much that I honestly thought anyone in this world would have a negative view of showing emotion, more that I really didn’t want anyone asking what was wrong and in all innocence forcing me to find an answer.

  “I’m not going to be able to talk about it yet,” I said, back on my chair. “For the moment, that needs to just stay behind walls where it won’t get in the way. I need to be able to keep functioning a bit longer, until it’s safe and I can start looking for ways to deal with something that big. I mean, people do, and there’s only one we know of who is completely broken and we have no reason to think that’s why. Logan is... well, probably okay, and I met three newcomers yesterday who made it very clear that they really prefer life here and wouldn’t go back for anything. Ary, as near as I can recall, they’d all been to one or two Quincunx sites and then decided to stop. They stay in contact with each other and try to help each other out.”

  “Thoughtful,” Zanshe said. “That would, I imagine, be a small and complex community, but a safe pce to ask about things that it might be difficult to ask others.”

  “I think that’s the idea. Do not include these details, that would viote personal privacy, but just for a general idea. One was in an aquian form, has been here a year or so and is looking forward to a performing arts school’s next semester after a frustrating attempt at a theatre career at... before. One was saurid, has been here for ten years or so, farms vegetables after having nowhere to grow anything except a balcony and the future looked tough at home. One has been here for over thirty years, seems happy with his human form which isn’t the same as his original one, and he has a tavern and a partner and two children, instead of a failing restaurant, basically a tavern, and always feeling like an outsider. And wow he makes wonderful food.”

  “Logan mentioned the name Reese,” Serru said. “There’s a tavern in Starry Hill, the closest settlement to the Quincunx. I sell to him frequently, and to his alchemist daughter more recently. Reese makes rounded breadrolls and cuts them in half and puts a rge slice of still-hot sunburst mushroom fried in seasoned oil into it with sauce and sliced vegetables and sometimes melted cheese... I’ve seen a few people try to copy it but they don’t get it quite right, somehow. It sounds like a sandwich but it isn’t and it’s delicious.”

  “Sounds it. I promised I’d come visit and thank him properly if I could. I... he was there waiting, I came out of the Quincunx with no memory at all of who I was or where I was, and he and his friends helped a lot. I left them rather rudely and abruptly when I got enough memory back to be sure you were in danger and I needed to get back to you.”

  “I have contact information for all my regur customers, they send me special requests sometimes. I’ll send him a message, if you like, and tell him thank you and I’ll make sure you can find him. Or you can do it yourself. It sounds like you have a bank account and a post office account, you just haven’t tried to access them because you didn’t know they existed. Learning those won’t be difficult.”

  That felt... permanent.

  “I think that’s going to have to wait. Almost all I’ve had since Reese’s stew yesterday is travel bars, with a bit of bread and fruit st night, and I was flying on the st stretch, and I am absolutely ravenous. And I didn’t get much sleep st night before a very bad nightmare. I seriously need food and sleep before anything else. And apparently first thing tomorrow, I need to make a quick trip to high ground so I can get in the air, and leave you for a couple of cycles. Although I really don’t like that.”

  “There is nowhere,” Aryennos said, “that she can’t go if she’s willing and able to ignore the rules, other than directly inside homes. We got here this morning. Now that we’ve made sure Peace and Cheer are safe until we come back for them, and had lunch, we were considering restocking here, doing some heavy shopping, and hiking on foot out into the Grassnds to set up the portable house. She can’t get inside that, and at least it would mean that we aren’t making another settlement into a target. If we have enough food and we’re on a water source that she can’t interfere with, we’d be safe until you get back. Logan said he’d arranged for someone to tell you that we were okay and you should go directly to the Axis, so we expected that you’d find us afterwards.”

  “I think we should still do that,” Serru said. “We don’t know how long you’ll be, and I don’t think any of us want her invading Drumsong Cascade. There are far more people here to suffer for it, even if there are also a lot more wardens and everyone knows what she did in Whisperwillow so everyone is frightened and on alert.”

  “But they’re not terribly surprised,” Terenei added. “I think a lot of people expected retaliation for Purification. Probably from both. If it’s only one with the other supporting it, we’re still ahead.”

  “There have been rough times before when she was extremely active,” Aryennos said. “I wonder, if I dig into that, whether I might be able to find evidence that she was hunting a newcomer she objected to. Those times have been bad but they end, and this one will be worth it.”

  “And also the st one,” Heket said.

  “That too.”

  “But best if we can stay out her hands and not attract her attention to any settlement. We were able to live in the house through the snowstorm. We can stay in or very close to it out on the Grassnds for a short time.”

  I sighed. “I really don’t want to admit that it’s probably the best pn, but it’s probably the best pn.”

  “We’ll be fine,” Zanshe said. “I’m unsure whether Logan pns to come with us, but he does have his own house, so space won’t be a problem. He’s very clever with his hands, and very fast. Somehow, he made a new wagon for the ornithians. He admits that it isn’t as refined or as comfortable as the one we had, but it got us away from Whisperwillow much farther and faster than we could have on foot, and with any luck it will take time for the Queen to track us. It would likely be an advantage to have him with us, and that is not a thing I ever thought I would say about... him.”

  “That,” Aryennos said. “Many times over, that, considering how much history I’ve read, especially tely. But also true.”

  “He’ll probably stay with you,” I said. “He’s smart enough to know that I’m coming back to you before anything else. If he wants to find me, that’s where I’ll be. And if he lets anything bad happen to you that he can prevent, he’ll risk his chances that he can trust me to work with him. Pretty sure he knows that too.”

  “I would say he does,” Zanshe said, “but I don’t think that is his motivation. I think he is genuinely disturbed by what has happened to his felid friends and does not want it to happen to others. Us, for example.”

  “Everyone should be disturbed by that,” Terenei said. “So, are we keeping the same pn, but taking a chance on staying here overnight instead of going today? I don’t think you’ll get much farther than a bed, Nathan, and I for one am not leaving you alone. If we go to bed early, and get up and moving early, that will only dey us by a few hours.”

  “I think that’s the most reasonable option,” Serru said. “The longer we’re here the greater the chance of her finding us and coming after us. I can’t think of any alternatives. We could get Peace and Cheer and leave in time to find a campsite before sunset, but Nathan will need a high pce in the morning and those are scarce on the Grassnds, and it will still be necessary to find a way to keep the ornithians safe and healthy—bring them back, which is risky travel, or keep them with us, which is not good for them. I doubt very much that it will keep the town any safer if the rest of us leave and Nathan sleeps here alone. I don’t know what else we can realistically do. But that would suggest that we need to go to sleep as early as possible, and that means getting everything else done by then.”

  Which transted into my friends each taking part of the list and a communicator, and scattering to different stores. Heket and Myu stayed to keep me company; Terenei cut through the tavern with the intention of thanking them for the ck of interruption and asking them to feed me. I ordered a jotun-sized meal and some extras besides, and the two felines nibbled a bit of my cheese and shared a cup of milk.

  Heket no more made me feel like I needed to talk than Myu did, just being quietly there.

  I was still eating when Logan returned. He looked cautious, bck ears flicking back and forward and tail twitching.

  “I’ll survive,” I told him. “I’ll deal with grieving ter. The others are shopping, we’re all crashing early and leaving as early as possible in the morning. Everyone’s going out on the Grassnds with my portable house except me. Obviously I’m going to the Axis instead, and whenever I come out of there, I’ll search for my friends. It’s on a mountain, right? As long as I have enough food, I should be able to get into the air both ways. I guess I have motivation to learn how to do that off ft ground.”

  “Yeah, lots of time to figure it out. Just as soon as we save the damned world. Up with the birds it is and we’ll get out of here.”