I offered up that since the demon had tried to persuade Stark to leave herself out of this whole business, maybe if one of us, in the guise of wanting to survive, should pretend to sell the rest of us out by offering Hakthla the tome. Fletcher believed we could warp the spell within or trap the book itself. Greyson considered that but was not sure who'd be believable.
I looked out on the balcony, where a lone, lanky figure curled near the edge of the rail. "I do," I said softly, opening the glass doors to the outside.
*****
Shen looked to be trying to sleep, but his eyes opened as I came out to him. As I began to explain to him what role he might play in our ruse, I watched his face. Of all of us, I wished that he would come to no harm. Shen seemed such a simple being, with no darkness to stain his soul. The rest of us, I could not say. Now here I was, suggesting that he put himself in the position of gravest danger.
He had reservations, but agreed to discuss things with the rest of the group, and I could help but to drop my hand on his broad shoulder as we came back inside.
Shen's strongest argument was that we should not even let Hakthla know there was a way to restore the occulus; Cecily did not think there was any other lure that could draw him out. Greyson believed we should destroy the original, and that was something on which we could all agree. The arguments went on long into the night, but eventually we all fell to sleep with little resolved, tabling the discussion until we returned to Cecily's shadow.
*****
I got into the smaller "car" with Fletcher and Cecily as the others trailed in the wagon, lost in my own thoughts on the way back for a good part of the trip. The jostle of the first hard winds brought me out of my meditation -- little did we know it was purely the honey on the stickybun. Cecily tried vainly to keep us upright, but the maelstrom around us quickly became so powerful as to lift the car up off of the road. Colors and objects tore around us, and the car suddenly began a stomach-dropping freefall. I saw grain through the windows, and then we stopped harshly, fog and vapor in each direction.
Leaving the car, we found ourselves in a marsh. The car was in hip-deep and more than likely could not be salvaged. Fletcher decided to draw any chance of assistance required firing the cannons at his hip. Crazily enough, this seemed to work.
The men rowed us back to their town, only stopping to roll their eyes at our problems and lack of understanding of how things worked there. I had an interesting conversation about the source of the great winds that did this damage -- apparently there exists a great giant whose breath that was. My questions were designed to poke holes in the complication excuses -- or should I say explanation? Fletcher did not care for it after long and we kept on in silence.
*****
Mere hours later began an episode in which Fletcher near killed a double dozen men, and only a frantic song of healing was able to save the son of the local mayor. He would have certainly had our skins adorning the walls of his home if not for the healing and some quick talking, though I thought mostly that he was sweet on Cecily. This story was neither here nor there, though. The mayor confirmed that there indeed was a great titan who was responsible for the great winds that occurred here. Captain Jack (as he requested being called) was one of few who survived the encounter and he was even so good to give us a map to where the giant lived, as well as a canoe to get there. Nothing was binding us to this pirates' cove, so we grabbed our things and made for the edge of dry land.
The trip there was horrendous. Bugs assailed us all the way there, though Fletcher seemed not to mind. We went for many hours before hitting enough land again to give up on the boat. The wind was regular now, but warm and gentle, though holding a smell just less horrible than the swamp. It was at that time that all hell broke lose.
Fletcher and Cecily looked at me, shocked, as my chest burned and actually began to glow. I threw on my cloak to conceal the episode as the pain drove me to my knees. Finally, the star (which I'd nearly forgotten) burst from me into the air, arcing directly towards the giant, who began to wake with food on its mind. The star entered its mouth, and the giant stood, convulsing, until the contents of its stomach rained down on the others like some twisted rainstorm. Luckily, it seemed to take no notice of us, stumbling away from our position.
My colleagues could not decide what to do first -- clean themselves off or ask me what in the hell that was all about. Something ending up taking precedence over all of that, anyway. We'd found something.
*****
Having rooted through the junk and cleaned ourselves, we stood there with three objects. Cecily marveled at a shining sword. Fletcher shuffled through more of the Tarot cards, looking only at us with such a covetous glare that I knew not if I should ask what he had. I'd managed to pull a great jewel from the filth, which glinted red in the little light remaining.
I looked at it, and the others, and knew I wanted what they had. Sure, I kept telling myself it was because the objects were my father's (and in fact a good part of that is true) but it seemed as we were all caught up in the spirit of greed and envy. Cecily wanted the sword to use against Hakthla. Fletcher's eyes narrowed, and he would not show me the cards. I put some mummer's work to my advantage and was able to get the sword from Cecily before our friends showed up in the wagon, and we were on our way again, not saying much.
*****
All that way, I thought of how I'd acted. I didn't like what that had done to me. When we'd returned to Blythe I decided that we needed to lay it all out. I gave the gem to Cecily and set the sword on the table, as well as the Trumps that I'd gotten from the desk of Lucas Reynard. "It's time to talk about what binds us all together," I'd started, but my good intentions were cut off by Cecily, as she showed one of the cards that Fletcher had held. Other than the dress, the face was that of Greyson's -- and he could not tell us why he appeared there.
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