The wizard let Seawater swish between his teeth, and it rushed along the length of his tongue. Theodore was struck by just how much it tasted, just like seawater should.
Only it had no salt—Theodore had tested three times to be sure. It was as if the salt in it was but a memory.
Salt, which provided an environmental foundation for the oceanic ecosystem, was gone. The fish he studied from the dwarven market told him the fish in place relied on false matter.
That drew to mind the question of what might happen if this 'Memory' Salt were to vanish suddenly. Could all those who had taken false salt into their bodies lose it just as quickly? Would those people disappear like a memory? Would their brains suddenly stop functioning? How many coastal villages relied on saltwater fish, and how many supplemented their diet with something else?
Theodore felt a dead hand reaching for his heart.
The water, which he knew tasted no different than before, soured in his mouth, and he spat it out to splash against black rocks.
The water soon joined with cousin molecules as the ocean spat its seawater onto black rocks to mingle. The powerful stream of water hit Theodore's face in the process, causing it to sting, but the wizard did not flinch; instead walked closer to the water's edge, where the water met solidity.
It had been a day since Theodore had abandoned his plans to search the deep roads, and now he considered it time to answer another question—the question of salt.
The storm, having lost no steam since he'd arrived, had long become background noise to the beating of Theodore's own heart.
Vroengarg had drawn him here, and it was a lonely place. Burned sand slipped between black rocks, and yet what did live here was plentiful and well-adapted, if not diverse.
Within seconds of his arrival, Theodore had been assaulted by a pack of titanic snails. Only to stumble into a thick forest intertwined like nets of wood set to ensnare him. Despite himself, the wizard enjoyed pushing through the bramble, noting new species of snakes and insects he'd never seen before. Still, he had not cataloged them all as he usually would, not with that magic pulling toward the sea.
Not with that mysterious drum beat sounding. Tap tap... and its echo, quieter and somehow hollow, tap tap. It would beat faster or slower and even pause at times, but would always start again.
Theodore flicked his wand, and the water eagerly receded to leave a floor less cluttered with fly rock. It became mainly silt instead. 'How inviting,' Theodore thought.
Down, the wizard jumped into the muddy sand, splattering his couture boots without care. By force of will, the water parted further for him. Waves were cut apart by his elliptical shield in the same way it would be by the bow of a cruiser.
The wizard let his being fill the water, sensing a dozen or more dragon-sized creatures heading his way. Despite not knowing what they were, the wizard thought, 'These are creatures that belonged far below,' and yet they were here bearing down on him, hiding perhaps from whatever made those noises beneath. The wizard's magic hummed dangerously as they came closer; those creatures, cowards as all intelligent survivors were, swam off, looking for easy prey.
Theodore paused for several minutes, and when he was sure they had abandoned him, he continued his walk into the depths, only to be joined by something else. He could tell from the amount of water they displaced, though making out shapes was harder. Based on its size and swimming pattern, he could only guess that this was a variety of fish.
Rainbow-scaled barbs came to nibble at his shield, and he was proven right. Ironically, it seemed those easy prey the predators were looking for knew they were safe with him, and like moths to a flame, they darted around him. Snouts nuzzled his magical bubble the same way a dog might lick its affection. It was companionable—comfortable in the way something familiar in an alien landscape should be—but soon, the percussion beat grew louder, and Theodore quickly found this was a sound that scared off fish, too.
Theodore stalked deeper depths. The murky darkness gave way to true night. The wizard now walked the place where Leviathans once slept in his world. The ground seemed to sweat beneath him. Several times, Theodore slipped, but eventually, caution overcame his stubborn nature. The wizard transfigured, gripping spikes on his soles for himself, thin, durable, and small so they wouldn't interrupt his stride.
He went faster now, and with each step, his magic bore more of the ocean's weight. In response to the strain, he altered his magical protection from a broad and elliptical shape to a hemisphere of protection. Compacting magic so that each lumen of effort would support the weave.
Theodore paused briefly for the change. He watched as the water shifted around him.
A half-sphere was narrower than what he had before. The space without water was closer to his delicate human hide. An idle finger poked the water, and now an arm reached away. He let a patch of skin past his hemisphere and felt the skin pulled taut, accompanied by acute pain that came with tissue being crushed. The wizard took his finger back and let it heal, acknowledging he would not have liked his chances of surviving down here even with body-strengthening magics.
He walked deeper. He reached depths that even muggles had struggled to build technology to survive. The strain increased almost exponentially with each step until he reached a place again different from what came before. The ever-downward slope began to even out.
Something told him he should not breathe the air as the wizard ventured deeper, so Theodore gave himself a modified bubble-headed charm. Still, the smell of ozone pressed upon the wizard the same way the water at these depths did.
Theodore knew this smell. It was the smell of a fulcrum's complete turn—the smell of world-binding magic, clashing nature, reality broken. This was the smell at the edge of matter—the taste of everything.
A ravine leaped, sharp stony cliffs avoided, and soon, Theodore reached the bottom with an oaken knock. The wizard could feel the floor beneath him stretch and rebound like the skin of a drum.
'A door straining in its frame,' Theodore thought as he pressed magical light into the water, letting it mix with the watery night until there were no shadows. The light revealed a plane of smooth black devoid of much else.
The wizard knelt, the stone prickling his goosebumps as he touched it, but he still laid his ear on the black stone. Tap, tap… tap, tap. The sound echoed. He did it again, his knuckle hitting the drum stone more demanding this time. He heard it echo again, louder and clearer than before.
Theodore stood, his ears straining for the drum beat that drew him here. It should have been loudest here of all, and yet it was quiet instead.
Without even a second thought, strands of power collected at Theodore's wand tip, but he didn't let it loose. He was not quite willing to break the stone.
He let the magic dissipate instead.
Common sense reasserted itself in the wizard as he allowed those strands of intelligent thought and deduction to consume him: The ground itself was artificial, its surface smooth and far too flat not to be made by magic, and the hollowness beneath spoke of stone, too thin and flexible not to be of the alchemical form.
Where Theodore stood now, deep beneath the water, was too inhospitable for humans or even elves to have constructed it.
In fact, now that he looked closer, the floor was black marble, the same kind that surrounded the godling's fountain in the Dwarven capital.
Making this perhaps some godling's larder.
Perhaps this was where they hid the salt, but it also occurred to him that something more powerful might lurk beneath the stone. It wasn't uncommon for world-rending beasts to exist. In fact, wizards had bred some of their own. No world did not fear a Pydragon's flame.
Either way, Theodore thought a small conversation with the little gods was in order. They, as likely as any, had something to do with the absence of salt from the water. They, as likely as not, were the ones maintaining the actual memory of what saltwater was. The wizard was sure that some magic was being sustained within the water.
Looking around, Theodore knew this was an ominous place to cut a hole to the gods', but logic dictated it might also be the only place. If the gods had created their plane of black here beneath the sea, then it was also likely to be close to where they 'lived.'
Theodore, using the subtle knife, cut his way through to the strand of reality he'd long looked for since his fight with the statued godling, one he'd tried and failed to cut through to on the surface long before. This time, the blade did not scratch black stone; instead, with a satisfying slash, he unleashed pulsing white. Light that made daggers through the dark as he let light spill between his fingers. It was cool to the touch, not unlike metal, but Theodore could see the magic that bound it. What he touched was light, molded solid, and told to remain in such a form.
He gave it a few good knocks like one might a door, but this time, there was no echo.
A few minutes without a response, and Theodore sheathed his dagger and let his wand return to its holster as he knocked again, sure of this path.
"Well, come on, wizard. Come to your death," came a sly voice. The veil swallowed the wizard, pulling him through sheets of sundered white fractiles and whipping him away into another world.
He found himself floating in the void among a sea of stars with no anchor, which was comfortable for him.
He was less unsettled than others who might find themselves suddenly floating in space. Weightlessness was one of the dangers of the Chaotic Sea, an obstacle he had to overcome in his travels. In fact, Theodore felt more comfortable here amongst the stars than he did under the sea, with its oppressive depths.
Directions were subjective here, so Theodore decided he was lying on his back, surrounded by the stuffing of galaxies, stars, and nebulae, content with silence.
Whatever brought him here wouldn't let him rest for long. The stars, none of which even looked the barest bit familiar, shifted to lines, and with impossible speed, Theodore was dragged forward through space.
With direction came orientation; he was upright, and some force seemed to reach past his chest and pull him forward, his arms flapping behind him. The light show became more dazzling as he began to be pulled faster. They twisted in spirals and danced in patterns that were indecipherable. It was as if the stars themselves were making themselves merry for the wizards' amusement.
Hours passed as he traveled. Though perhaps it was a lifetime, and maybe it was a second, Theodore couldn't be sure. So entranced was he that he barely realized he had reached the end—a place with no world, no stars, no galaxies, no nebulas.
In a place without sound, Theodore found it curious to hear the light screeching of leaves dragged by wind. Turning using the smallest jets of pure magic, he saw a silver platform unfold before him—a crumpled silver ball unfolding to become flat and smooth.
Even without light, the platform had a magical sheen. Its gravity drew him in, and he stood on gleaming metal.
Then, as if on cue, a planet and ocean of cerulean blue speckled with islands of green appeared like a blip in reality. Illuminated gently by the platform's magical sheen,
The stars, one by one, flared to keep it company.
The sun sizzled to life, glaring and blinding him for seconds at a time. When he figured out how to keep the sun at his back and only his back, he turned to the bespeckled darkness to find the stars familiar again. They made constellations he'd recorded in his time in Alagaësia.
"What do you have to say for yourself, summer prince?" asked the sly voice.
It was the godling from the statue before. Theodore wasn't entirely sure how he knew, but he did. It had the same strange lilting accent; its face made a creepy, almost too-wide smile—a smile that wasn't nearly as bad with flesh and all its teeth fully formed. He held a smaller form, and yet, here, he seemed more real and solid than Theodore had ever seen him.
Even this godling's words betrayed power, searing Its permanent amusement in one's very soul as he spoke.
Though he wasn't talking to Theodore, it was as if he was talking past him to some part of his biology, like a person talking to your still beating heart instead of looking into your eyes. Or a scientist watching your DNA underneath a microscope as you held a conversation.
It wasn't alone.
Theodore turned to meet a thousand faces. All of them were striking, with black eyes and expressionless stares. He turned again to meet the sly godling's eyes. The wizard noticed he stood in front, his arms crossed as if he were guarding his companions.
'This thing is trying to provoke me.' Theodore thought as he took in its words. The wizard didn't take the bait. He smiled instead. Using the same face he wore when greeting a foreign dignitary, one he molded this face to suit when he'd first arrived in Alagaësia when molding his thick chestnut lips, but in this case, it was the god spawn he greeted. The wizard wondered if this smile would be enough.
Godlings had an analytical way of knowing things. They did not learn as humans did and would never stumble twice. One might feel anger and suppress it or even hide behind a mask, but there were always thoughtless millisecond inflections and microexpressions that couldn't be hidden.
It wasn't out of the realm of probability that a godling might remember every human expression a face could make. It wasn't out of the question that this was something that this godling, in particular, had done. In fact, Theodore suspected this practice was quite common among these creatures.
He had it on good authority that godlings felt no strong emotions, and yet most that interacted with mortals for any length of time were social experts.
They were well beyond introductions now, and there were no polite ways to offer names as greetings when names, in particular, held such power in this world. Instead, the wizard decided to wait silently, cataloging the godlings that surrounded him.
There was nothing uniform about these creatures besides those eyes, black as midnight, and perhaps their pale grey skin, but even that came with different shades and deformities.
Fins and horns were prominent.
Horns were especially prominent, as most godlings had so many that they resembled briar bushes.
Theodore also noticed oversized limbs, missing fingers, or claws instead of hands. Many were twice Theodore's size and even more alien; others were smaller than any human child.
Besides the prominent physical features, there were more exotic ones, too.
Cosmic flames sprang as hair from heads. Starlight stretched across bodies like the cloth in cloaks or gowns. Seafoam, see-through and revealing, seemed to bubble from their skin to cover their shame, but not all or even most hid their bodies.
Many were naked, their large members or slits or even more strange erogenous things as inhuman as the rest of their bodies were on full display for most.
Absently, Theodore spotted one that had shoes with little wings sprouting on either side, waggling with exuberance and somehow bearing a human-sized godling barely aloft. Somehow, the wizard managed to find some humor in that.
Gathering himself, Theodore decided direct was best. It made him off-putting, which was always good when dealing with godlings.
"Salt?"
The trickster was lost at that, just as Theodore intended.
"That is your last word, wizard? Truly?"
The male godling who spoke looked more human than the rest. He had the same black eyes as the others; he was tall, a figure that towered over Theodore's current form, though Theodore didn't mind looking at him.
His face was average and pale, almost blushing with black blood, and that, along with the bald head, worked together nicely to make him homely.
Theodore had no doubt the godling's body was a soup of muscle, but they mainly lay hidden behind his odd, loosely fitted monk's robes, a strange white thing tied together with a thousand knots as if to make sure they remained closed.
It was an appearance, a fashion, that Theodore had never seen before across the entire stretch of Alagaësia. Perhaps the style belonged to another continent. Sadly, that was something Theodore couldn't know
"You said I could only be attacked once, godling? Are we in the habit of breaking promises?"
"A promise meant for Prime Zera. We've left the planet behind, wizard. It's there beneath you," the godling said, his voice harsh as he pointed at the planet's canvas bare beneath the silver platform. That voice brushed so roughly against Theodore's soul that it might have wounded Theodore had he been a more delicate being, but even though he was made of harder stuff, it still made the wizard uncomfortable.
Theodore made a show of looking. "Truly?" Theodore asked, and he turned his back to study the planet beneath.
He allowed himself to seem more ponderous than he actually was to let magic surge beneath his skin, readying it to ignite in an instant should he need it. He only needed to buy himself a little time.
A reflective silence fell between them, and Theodore drank in the planet beneath.
This world was nothing like his earth. It was grape-like—an egg made of purple stuff instead of blue.
The wizard could spot blots of green, and they were like cereal flakes in purple soop. Each a land just the same size as Alagaësia or even perhaps a bit larger, and yet they amounted to nothing in the vast purple sea. Theodore looked for the familiar land mass. He found it quickly next to its iconic weeping star.
The five drooping points that were indicative of the island of Vroengarg were receding slowly into the planet's horizon and falling further into night.
"The salt?" Theodore asked with some intensity. The creature's eyes, which too had been peering far away into the cosmos instead of the planet was far too patient as it asked his question, "Salt?"
"You have something to do with missing salt. Don't deny it."
"I deny nothing." The creature grew indignant and came closer, perhaps intending to invade Theodore's personal space to kick off their fight truly. This tactic would have worked had Theodore been a timid person, but instead, the wizard waited until the creature was its own arm's length away before telling it to stop, and then, to his ecstatic relief, the godling did follow his request, and stopped mid-step as if afraid of what another step might mean before standing tall to loom above him. It was then that Theodore knew he'd guessed rightly.
Coming here wasn't as foolish as it seemed.
Theodore had never figured out whether it was some trick of consciousness or some rule of magic, but something held human safety in trust. Something ensured godlings couldn't kill with impunity.
"Your quest for salt has led to your death."
"I think not. Now stop with death threats. That is no way to speak to your guest."
After all, making a guest comfortable was one of the mandates for all people in this medieval reality, and a guest's comfort held some importance when practicing guest rights
Once, it was said. They were bound.
Theodore knew he couldn't be unreasonable with his requests, but the wizard also thought he might taste the godling's hospitality.
"Guest?" The godling seemed to forget its human appearance in its confusion or perhaps its anger. Tricking it appeared to drive the creature against its very nature as the god's face became not just blank but twisted, pained even.
"I knocked, and I was invited in. Making me your guest." Theodore didn't mention the godling's attempt to make him no longer his guest. To make Theodore strike first and abandon his guest rights. It would bring nothing to their conversation.
The creature with an inhuman screech and in throws of drama, shifted from its plain white robes to a deathly black.
"You tricked me!" the godling ground through his teeth, and it seemed to shout it over and over again. Its shouts did not break the threshold for pain but came close.
'Well, this godling seems quite foolish,' Theodore thought, and it was true. Throwing a tantrum helped no one now that the ruse had been revealed. Though the wizard didn't blame it for its apparent youth, it still seemed odd.
Though perhaps the wizard was expecting too much.
More friendly godlings had spoiled Theodore.
Theodore could acknowledge his perspective was skewed as he'd met millennia-old godlings who literally drank at the tits of refinement and splendor.
An entire pantheon of gods who would never done something so barbaric as screaming nonsense to their guests.
The trickster godling's face turned black and even more ugly than it was before. His muscles tensed as if he were some great predator ready to pounce, but he seemed to catch himself in time and gave a shallow bow acknowledgment instead.
Theodore reiterated in his mind that this particular godling wasn't very bright, but again, he said nothing. He would not provoke a godling more than he had to.
Theodore waited for the godling to start even more screaming, but it was interrupted.
One of the pygmy godlings behind him started giggling, and Theodore managed to hide his anxious annoyance at the sudden addition.
Up until this point, the godlings were unconcerned with him, and Theodore liked it that way. The wizard preferred godlings direct their odd attention away from what he considered his precious person. In fact, Theodore, at times, wished there were no godlings at all, but that was mainly beside the point.
The thousands of godlings looked at him curiously when he first arrived and ultimately forgot him seconds later. Their attention was taken up by more important things, like counting stars or curiously studying their feet or hands or one another. Theodore saw a few lewd acts he'd have to magically sponged from his mind later.
Some were obviously not used to a human form. He would not begrudge them for enjoying it.
This laughter was new, and with godlings, new was dangerous.
"He... He... Haha, He made a fool out of you, big brother." The pigmy human began to roll on the floor, seesawing between two horns as he slapped the silver that lay beneath to the sound of an anvil screech.
The little figure bathing in silver sunlight barely took a breath as he continued violently laughing.
"Is he going to be okay?" Theodore asked mildly, though his hand had fallen to rest upon his still-sheathed knife. He made the move seem casual, as if he was only shifting his weight.
'I am the trickster's guest, not this little runt's.' Theodore was unsure how far guest rights might extend. He'd never met with so many godlings at once. There was no way to know
He could only hope the small one did not direct ultimate cosmic power in his direction. Theodore preferred life to undeath.
'Brother?' The wizard wondered if all these godlings were family. Even more, he wondered about the number of godlings. Much more than he'd ever seen confined to one planet.
"Dragons-bond, he's a new god. Young and unworshiped, and so he has fits of emotion. Like your mortal seizures. Though perhaps not as dangerous." There was more laughter, and it continued for several minutes as the wizard and trickster godling stood watch until, eventually, the laughter died, and the odd not-quite-child stood and went off without another word.
"I'd like some food if you have it." Theodore felt famished, but more than food, he craved the reassurance it offered.
The godling sighed and looked up to the stars once more, as if to be sure they were still there, before turning to a stubby gray godling bare-chested with a beard and just as bald as he was, his expression just as alien as his own. "Well, since we are dining with a summer prince, the meal must fit a theme. Miek, bring some summer wine and summer boar."
The godling Miek, who had been sitting cross-legged until now, his muscles wholly relaxed, his face completely calm, stood instantly with a speed Theodore's eyes could barely see and an immediacy that came with an order.
"Summer boar? On Prime Zera? My lord, I've never heard of such a thing." The broad-shouldered gray god said dumbly. His muscular chest seemed to burn with force as it came alive, vibrating.
The man seemed stolid, neither surprised at the request nor strongly affected by his confusion.
The trickster god rolled his eyes, "It was but a jape, Mieky. The boars of summer are fatter. I would hardly ask you for a winter boar, now would I? "
The gray god paused and considered before giving a nod. He accepted this truth in a thought span and disappeared instantly, only to return just as quickly. The thick, juicy boar was squirming and held in only one hand.
The thing let out tortured squeals; it was still alive. Holding up the beast with one hand he brutally sheared through the pig's neck.
Its slit throat gushed blood like the sky gave rain, and all that fell, tinkling like bells as it fell on the silver metal.
—-------------------------------
It turned out summer boar tasted very good. Theodore swallowed the last of the fat meat and was uncaring as it smeared his lips, but the wizard didn't much mind the mess as he half chewed and half swallowed each bit of minced pork.
Theodore, who had barely eaten all day, gave a satisfied burble. The meal had made Theodore feel oddly comfortable, even surrounded by monsters. Leaning into his chair, the wizard unburdened his exaggeratedly large stomach.
He took another sip of summer wine. That was good, too—one might even say godlike if one wanted to be gauche, and if one wanted to be gauche, one might also say it had this sweet taste that mellowed into sour complexity. it was like the entirety of summer, and its ending summed up in each sip. It brought up memories from before the war.
Looking around, the wizard could see the godlings having polite conversations over their meals, which allowed him to enjoy his meal instead of worrying about watchers.
When the trickster god had set his silver table, and all thousand gods sat to feast, there hadn't been enough boar to go around, and so some of those strange beings were content with pulling meals of meat and other odd-looking things that Theodore could only assume were food from seemingly thin air.
A feat Theodore wished he could mimic. The wizard found he still had a little space for dessert; magic was a hungry business.
Sadly, Wizardkind never escaped the confounds of Gamp's law, and unfortunately, he'd already eaten all his meat, and there was no more to duplicate.
The scene was festive, with the silver torch lights that magically grew from the ground. The little gods were competent conversationalists, at least with each other, and what music played was powerful and rhythmic or quite contrary, gentle, like the wind seeming. The musicians who played, who were also godlings, seemed to shift between the two in eternal duality.
Theodore turned to the godling sitting beside him. The godling, correctly interpreting the expression, asked his question, though it wasn't phrased like a question. His tone was blank, eternally amused and cutting like before, "You said something about salt when you first came to me."
Theodore met the trickster's eyes.
The thrones they both sat were next to each other, but there was quite a bit of space between the godling and the wizard, so the trickster had leaned over, and the wizard did his best not to lean away and hid his disgust at the scent of the foul odor on the godlings breath.
"I was wondering where all of it went."
"What is salt?"
'Well, that was certainly curious. There had been salt used in the boar. Theodore was almost sure of it because he certainly had tasted it.' The wizard knew the gods might have had a different name for it, but indeed, whatever magic they used to communicate with him or even understand what he was saying would work to translate. Even the dwarves, as confused as they got when salt was mentioned, at least knew what it was.
Theodore looked down at his plate, which was silver, like everything else—silver like the platform beneath them. He picked out a single kernel of salt from what remained of the boar and held it for the godlings to view.
The Trickster godling's eyes screwed up in a look of half-remembered confusion.
"What is that?"
"Salt," Theodore said, hiding his confusion.
The godling held out his enormous hand, and Theodore put the kernel in the godling's palm, and as he held the speck of white to his black eyes, Theodore saw confusion flicker across the godling's face—at least, that was what he thought it might be.
In reality, the creature showed the same pained expression it had shown before, and Theodore could only imply confusion.
The Trickster tasted the salt, and his face burned with recognition.
"I know this. What you ask for is forbidden, wizard." The godling said, seeming more amused than angry as he spoke. That smile it gave was a conspiratorial one. It let Theodore know there was a deal to be made.
"What do you want?" Theodore asked, feeling no need to be subtle. The wizard needed salt fresh from the sea, and for his ritual, nothing else would do.
"We could play a game for it. I'd say the salt for your life would be more than fair."
Theodore hesitated. Guest rights extended only to accepted societal norms, and here amongst godlings' lives were playthings. Their understanding of such things was inhuman. Such a deal would likely bypass guest rights, putting him at the godling's mercy.
"What game?" Theodore asked, his tone cautious now as he tried to think of all the things the godling might try. Godlings were not all-powerful, and not all of them were equal. The ability to manipulate time was pretty rare, and it wasn't something he could match with mortal chronomancy.
The only question was what they would play. A game of chance would give the godling better odds of winning; if it was a game of strategy, things might be more even.
Theodore felt a familiar arrogance as he had that thought. One he knew to temper, as it had caused him trouble time and again. He was sure of his chances in a game of logic. A sureness that his mind was more deft than a magical construct could ever be. That was arrogant, and the fact that the wizard could acknowledge that truth didn't make it any less compelling.
"How about Chess?"
Theodore felt his thoughts churning. He checked his mind to make sure the godling hadn't touched it. The wizard felt no mind but his own, but perhaps it wasn't the mind that the godling had read; maybe it was something in his expression.
"Alright, I'm in."
It turned out chess against the godling was all about the long game. There was no quick, easy winning.
Theodore set each piece in its place in the opening, but The godling played defensively. Theodore pushed, and the godling would pull away.
There was a testing quality to the game.
The godling moved its dark metal pawn forward into the E5 square, bypassing Theodore's gleaming white pawn. Theodore set a pawn at D3 to take it, but the godling did nothing to stop it and instead plodded along without a care. It didn't mean he'd lost the game, but it did mean the godling was a pawn less for nothing in return. It gave the wizard a queer feeling.
Theodore studied the silver board and its layout, appreciating its shining aesthetic, even if it was distracting. Each white piece seemed to hold all the light available; the sun shining to the side of where they played made each piece gleam like a divine armory.
The black pieces, dull silver, were a little better, but that difference hardly made up for the white pieces, which were blinding him.
Theodore glanced over to the godling, who in turn watched him instead of the board.
The godling gave him a smile. A smile that the wizard didn't like.
There were no timers. This was a chess game with no set time limit, so Theodore patiently waited for the spots to leave his eyes before he spoke for the first time in a while.
"Why didn't you know what salt was?" Theodore asked, and it was a blunt question, one he didn't expect the godling to answer or one he expected such an obtuse answer as to irrlevent.
Contrary to his expectation, the godling did answer, and it was a simple response.
"I was made to forget."
Theodore chuckled at that.
The godling showed far more social intelligence than it had before. Theodore even suspected it knew what his chuckle meant, but it said no more.
Theodore met the Godling's black eyes, and he was content to stare right back at him.
"You're kidding, right? Nothing could make a godling do something. Why would you forget something so benign as salt."
"Salt is not as 'benign' as you think it is. You've studied the magic of our world. Can you tell me what makes it special? What makes it different from your magic?"
The creature moved a bishop without looking down, putting Theodore in check. As he had his bishop defended, Theodore was beginning to wonder if the godling was taking this game seriously.
"The magic of this is more flexible. More changeable. More easily stored…" Theodore paused consideringly as he said the last one, "Ah, I see. So salt counts as crystals, and they store magic, don't they? I think that it wouldn't work well in a dissolved state."
"It doesn't."
The godling moved his bishop back into a little squad of pawns, and Theodore, being his aggressive self, took the bait with his own bishop.
"It doesn't work well, but at one point, there was so much of it that someone somewhere found some way to use it, and you didn't like that, did you?"
The godling's face twisted again, but it was a more easily read expression than it s confusion before. The godling was angry, black blood flushing its face at the memory of salt as if something unsavory came with the memory.
Theodore guessed this godling hadn't interacted with many mortals when they first met. It had been evident to him from how this entire encounter had been handled. Theodore was almost sure this was true now, but perhaps at one point, it had played a more active role in its world.
Theodore doubted the trickster godling was ever a virtuoso of speech and social interaction, but something had changed in the godling; there seemed to be more of him now that he remembered salt.
"I'm right, aren't I?"
The godling's eyes never strayed from the wizard as he nodded.
A pawn took a bishop, and a queen took a pawn, and now it was the godling's king who was in check. It moved its king, and Theodore moved his queen, and now the king, having nowhere to go, sacrificed its queen to an exchange.
Theodore looked at the board, casting a spell so as not to be blinded, and saw the game nearing its end now.
This particular game was one he'd played before a thousand times. It was one he'd maneuvered the godling into playing with him because one didn't have to calculate a thousand moves when you've already played thousands of variations of the same game.
It really put a nice bow on the whole thing. It made it so he would have nothing much to worry about the rest of this game at the very least.
Theodore, comfortable now in his victory, wondered why the godling wanted to play chess, of all things. It wasn't very good.
Clearly, this creature had seen him play with Arya before. How else would it know the game? However, even though it had learned the rules, it hadn't quite acquired the skill to play well.
The Godling, without looking down, tipped over its king.
That made Theodore raise a brow. There were a few more moves to play, perhaps a dozen or more, before Theodore's victory was self-evident for the layman, and from everything he'd learned, this godling was not very good at the game. It couldn't possibly know what would happen. Not like he did.
Theodore met the godling's eyes, which hadn't looked down at the board even once, and the creature seemed prepared for something. Eager even. Theodore understood it must have somehow read victory on his face, and yet there was no anger at its loss.
It was as if the godling had expected this outcome as if it was not playing to win the game but idly playing to pass the time.
Theodore suddenly had dark premonitions about why a godling might idly pass time. Pushing his chair back Theodore half walked, half ran to the edge of the platform.
"Send me the salt at your earliest convenience," Theodore yelled over his shoulder just as he bent his knees to leap over the edge, but he never made the jump as a gigantic hand snatched him midair.
"So this is our little wizard, " a voice thundered. Theodore's body strained between gigantic black fingers.
Hardening his body Theodore reached for the subtle knife, but it was pressed hard against his side.
Magic sprang from his fingertips. Lightning struck like dynamo mini nukes against the black skin, but it bounced like a static shock off of this gigantic being's monolithic finger, barely causing even flakes of flesh to fall off.
Lightning made parabolic arcs as Theodore laid even more magic in the spell. In response, even more flakes exploded off the flesh, but the black flesh that held him firm, and the spell did not even spill blood.
His fingers' tips strained against the power forced through them, and the pressure of the black hand only increased. Black flesh crushing against his reinforced body as if trying to squeeze blood off his bones.
Stars appeared at the edge of Theodore's vision.
Bones creaked under pressure, and Theodore could feel them begin to bend.
The wizard knew then more pressure would be the end of him. More pressure would pop Theodore's body like a particularly juicy tick. It was an apt comparison for while most of his body has been reinforced unbreakable by his own magic. It was his own blood pushing against his skin under the strain equivalent to a hydraulic press that would kill him as it searched for escape from his moldering form.
Theodore let his magic go, and the thunder dissipated.
The hand loosened. Theodore Looked up to see the furnaces this being had for eyes.
Looking into the violent flames incinerating even nothingness, his body tingled, like stomach butterflies after a kiss. That delicate feeling increased its intensity until his soul was burning, and his body was being charred into a carbon husk.
He was dead. In fact, he wasn't just dead. He was a thousand years dead. He was ashes. He could not think anymore, and yet, somehow, he was still aware of the ashes that sloughed off his dead carbon print.
Theodore watched as each particle that was him became no longer his own—each bit of carbon fertilizer for some tree or fuel for the chemical cycles in the ocean. He even watched the creature that would take part of his form and even the creature that skittered far beneath that, and soon, they would become part of a thousand other earth processes.
It wasn't over. It wasn't even close. It started again. He was reborn suddenly and lived an entire life, whole again, only to burn for the cycle to start again.
It wasn't quite pain he felt, but nirvana. The cycle was never-ending, and Theodore was starting to feel numb to sensation.
He knew he should stop looking into those furnaces, and yet he couldn't bear to tear himself away. There was too much there. Even now, some distant part of him could acknowledge that had he been a normal muggle man, this is where he would have unraveled, where the ranting and raving might have started.
It wasn't difficult for the wizard to imagine screaming about fire and blood or the endless cycle of life and death. It was good that Theodore wasn't normal.
This wizard was born to tear his very soul from the cycle of samsara. That thought, that determination, is what allowed Theodore to finally, after what felt like hours but in truth was seconds, rip his eyes away from those cosmic furnaces.
The wizard had lived lifetimes in a thousand instances. He'd seen his beginning and his end. He'd followed his every speck of matter through the cycle of life and death and life again.
He'd been purified.
His sanity, which was already hung by a thread, was now bound tight by a single string of unshakable arrogance and domineering masochism.
Theodore liked the pain and drank it with the hate. He had to; otherwise, it would break him. Like a dark lager beer, he nursed its bitter taste while thinking of asking for more.
Theodore, at that moment, loved this being that held him.
He felt alive again. He felt the most divine fear there was. Mortal fear.
He was truly heart-stoppingly terrified of what came next, and as he looked at the stretch of black skin in front of him, he knew this was why he traveled from world to world.
He wasn't some savior of wizard kind, though he liked pretending he was. Gods, how it made him feel good to pretend to be a saint. No, he was a thrill seeker, a conspirator, and his most fantastic plan of all was to land himself in this trap.
Theodore remembered the spell he laid upon himself when he first entered this world, a memory he'd hidden even from himself as it was laid.
He remembered the horrible luck he had with arrows, the assassin who seemed to come from nowhere to hunt him, the cup of allegiance, and the secrecy field he laid on hallowed land—all of those unlucky coincidences.
Those had been more than a coincidence, it had been fate. Theodore had spun one of the only spells he knew that could manipulate fate all so that he could fall into the hands of this abomination.
he'd used magic to finally find what he was looking for.
"Please," Theodore said, begging now, and the emotions sank deep into his bones, corrupting even his magic as it reached for his mutilated soul.
Even the Dust responded to his desperate plea allowing his words to reach across the void to this black being's ears, and it listened.
It knew what he asked for, and a bargain was struck.
Then stars faded and the wizard was squeezed again through hard light to fall on his knees upon his plane of black beneath the sea.
The wizard bubble was warbling now for his protection as his magic began to break.
Theodore, tired, teleported to the surface and, careless in his landing, fell amongst the angry waves. The wizard barely found the strength to harden his flesh as he let wave after wave tumble him about, throwing his body against black rocks, jagged edges marking white lines across his flesh.
When it finally ended, he washed up on shore battered and bloody despite his magic and lay there panting like Murtagh would after an especially rough duel.
The not-salty water has settled on him now, sticky, and so deeply ingrained that he felt it would not leave him even if he cleans it off.