In An-uxhwi's youth, his mother, Je-thuro, had taught him the stories of their people. And at the furthest edge of those stories were the Gray Highlands, far to the south of their homeland, the highest mountains in the world. Beyond them was a region of legend: the Wet Lands, the home of the Soakers.

It was said that the sun never shone in the Wet Lands. That rain poured down endlessly from the sky, and turned all the earth into a morass of mud and marsh. That the air was too thick and hot to breathe.

The rational mind might have concluded, even without direct evidence, that much of this was unlikely. However different the Soakers' environmental preferences from those of the xtauh, surely their native land had to be at least marginally habitable. An-uxhwi had a chance to reflect upon this as he looked down from a high promontory over the lands about which so much had been said. To the stories' credit, it was raining; but it was not the deluge one might have expected. Nor was it at all hot, but very chilly, for the party was still quite high above sea level.

Hills and valleys spread out below. Shrouded in mist though they were, there was a noticeable difference between them and their counterparts on the other side of the mountains; while there, at the higher elevations, there was greenery and trees, they were… sparser, more limited. Down below them now, at least where the surface of the rock did not defeat them, the plants grew thick and dense. And even the rock had its layer of greenery; soft, thick moss grew everywhere.

The entire party had emerged from the book for a look. The other three xtauh looked down on the sight with astonishment, their gaze moving between the trees below and the far distance, where, if one looked long enough, one could be persuaded that they saw a blue-green expanse in the distance, extending to infinity. Shyriath's expression was unreadable; though An-uxhwi had been around him and Evrith long enough to catch the meaning of their most common expressions, this one was one he hadn't seen before. It perhaps was a mixture of reverence, longing, and bitterness - the reaction to a place where millions of takmar lived normal lives, but where he could not walk unmolested.

Evrith appeared to stare at it without seeing it. When An-uxhwi and Shyriath had returned with news of Ynudh's new counterpart, she had retreated into a bleak silence. But, clearly against her own desires, she had come out of the book; as she had said, whether it would draw the dark takmar to her or not, she would be needed to find their way from here.

There was a long silence, until Tikke finally stirred. “It very soggy place,” he commented. “And cold.”

“It's much warmer far down there,” Shyriath replied absently, “or so I'm told. But still very soggy.”

An-uxhwi nodded along to the conversation quietly. Xtauh were also no strangers to the insight that it got progressively colder up the mountains, even if they certainly had no experience with ones that ended up dressed with snow. “As when we were wandering through the ice, at least with the book in our possession, we can retreat into a more comfortable place if it becomes difficult to stand the weather,” he mused aloud, although by tone it sounded as though he wasn't expecting to need the option, and was merely mentioning it out of a formality. He wasn't expecting the journey to be cosy, though - the dampness was certainly going to affect his scales if he exposed himself to it long enough. Would that result in any health issues? He had no prior experience to draw on to guess.

On that note, “We just need to take special care of the book,” he pointed out. The book was certainly more likely to take damage before he did if they were at all careless about it.

But all of this was more absent-minded musing, and he was much more interested in Evrith's glassy-eyed view of the landscape and what the future was telling her, and so his attention anchored on her body language with some worry and concern - rather more for her than their collective future.

“It could be a problem if we have to go down into wetlands,” Shyriath acknowledged. “It doesn't rain all the time, and up here it's rarely a very fierce downpour, so as long as we keep it in the pack we can probably manage. But in a marsh it's hard to keep anything dry. I remember my mother-” He stopped, his face creasing with pain, and then continued, a bit more subdued, “-I can just about remember being carried above her head while she and my father slogged through one. I suppose it was on our way to the Citadel.” <c>

“Yes,” Evrith murmured. Shyriath blinked, before it became clear to him that she had probably seen it. She added, still staring at the landscape, “We shouldn't have to go that way; what we seek will probably be up here - that way.” She jerked her head off to the right, toward a path parallel to the mountains. “The terrain will make it harder and slower than it would be further down, but it will make us less likely to be - to be found, and pursued.” This last came out as a sort of croak. It was clear that Evrith would rather not be thinking of being found, or pursued.

“Noted,” An-uxhwi acknowledged, hesitant to touch Evrith while she was in the state she was in, but full of an urge to console her and give her the comfort of physical connection, however light and superficial. “Can you tell us more about the destination?”

The question seemed to rouse Evrith slightly; she blinked slowly and turned in the direction she'd indicated. “Not much,” she replied, “not yet. It's not a particular spot that we seek, really. The figure in white will head for the Citadel; we want to cross the path they will take to get there - or at least the most likely path. Possibly should visit multiple sites, to cover the possibilities. But there are only so many routes through the foothills from the south, and they converge as they go. A search of their upper ends should not be unmanageable.”

“We won't have to go up to the Citadel itself, will we?” Shyriath asked, sounding tense.

“I hope not,” Evrith muttered.

It seemed, on reflection, as though perhaps they should be going to the Citadel, if that was where the figure in white would go, despite all the problems Evrith and Shyriath considered it to make. Not only was it one place the figure in white would certainly converge on, but the inhabitants of the takmar witches' Citadel were probably best-equipped to deal with the creatures that were pursuing them.

But he reasoned that if it were at all an option, Evrith would have said something, and so he kept those thoughts to himself. “Then I imagine the only thing left to do for now is for you to return to the book,” An-uxhwi reasoned. “And for us to be on our way, rest and food notwithstanding.”

Evrith stared off into the distance, her mouth clamped tightly shut. At last, she said, “It will be a more comfortable place to rest, but the further we go, the less it will accomplish to remain there just to avoid being detected. I will be needed to find the way.” She sighed. “We will start approaching a choice between avoiding the creatures or accomplishing the purpose of this journey.”

An-uxhwi grimaced. He was here to do whatever was necessary, of course, having pledged his life and meant it, but it didn't make the prospect any rosier. “Let's minimise your involvement, at least, and delay that moment as long as possible,” he recommended the obvious, meaning it conversationally more than as an instruction. A moment's hesitation, then: “Is there anything more I should know that will increase our chances?”

A sound escaped Evrith's nose; the number of times An-uxhwi had ever heard her even approximate laughter could probably be counted on one hand with room to spare, but this sounded like a snort of bitter amusement. For a moment she teetered on the edge of making a caustic comment about their chance, but forced herself to consider the matter seriously.

At last, she said, “If I remain hidden - and if you could devise a way of keeping the book reliably dry while flapping through rainy air, while also staying warm this far up - you might do best to fly parallel to the mountains from here. You will avoid having to cross the rough terrain on foot, and leave less sign on the ground to be tracked. You might attract attention from any takmar living up here - there are some that do, and because of the temperatures they do not often fly - but they will have difficulty following you and, provided you show no interest in them, they may ignore you.”

He nodded in acknowledgement. “I think both those things can be solved with rawhide and fabric - or just rawhide, in a pinch. It's not ideal for the moist weather unless we manage to oil it well, which I doubt, but it should help protect the book even if only partially treated, regardless. Do we have time for that, and a good spot in the book to do it in?” He fully expected the answer to be 'no', but plotted out the hunt and process of drying the skin of their spoils in his head anyway.

Evrith considered this, then glanced at the other xtauh. Unitti volunteered, “Hyd'natt has been learning the book-plants that are good for making things.” He glanced over at Hyd'natt, who had perked up at the conversation; An-uxhwi had not interacted much with the xtauh woman, but he gathered that Unitti, and even Evrith, had been trying to teach her Imperial, and although she still spoke little of it, she had begun to follow conversations. She spoke something that sounded like a question, to which Unitti responded, translating the question for her. Then she looked at Evrith and spoke at length, with Unitti translating for the others' benefit: <“I have made rawhide before while building my shelter-”> She had constructed a small home, further down the rock from where most of the party slept in the book. <“-I might make more, depending on how much is needed. For fabric… there are suitable plants, but I have no loom, so it would take much time. Possibly I could tan furs.”>

Evrith considered this gravely. “If I am to try to remain in the book for as much as possible for a time longer,” she said, “I can help with the rawhide. Possibly Unitti can work on it as well - I believe he knows how-” Unitti nodded. “-and possibly I can find some solution to the fabric as well. And in the meantime, the rest of you can keep moving on the ground until we can get safely airborne.”

She glanced over the western edge of the rock spur. From here, at least, the way down looked horribly unsafe, but- “Some backtracking northward might be needed to start in the right direction; I think there is a gentler slope that way, following a ravine that cuts down through the hillside.”

Shyriath looked glumly in the direction Evrith had indicated. “So you'll be going back into the book?”

Evrith glanced at the pack currently holding the book with some trepidation. “I… suppose I should.” She hesitated, then, as the book was brought out, looked at An-uxhwi. “Would you come with me for a little while? I would like to speak with you.”

“Of course,” was out of his mouth before he even really considered the question, pulling his attention away from the direction of the slope she had gestured to, although something about her hesitation startled him, as though it were a bad omen. For two more heartbeats, he wondered if he should be leaving his other companions - but it was Evrith who asked, and it was Evrith who was, as always, his priority.

Evrith led An-uxhwi into the book, but, unexpectedly, did not stop there. Under the overhang in the cliff, where they kept the books - it did not rain very often here, but often enough that it was best to keep them sheltered from it - she reached for one that was tucked into a wind-etched pocket in the rock, and went into that as well. When An-uxhwi looked at it, he saw that it was one he hadn't gone into before.

On the other side… the place where the equivalent book here was stored was in a crack in the side of a steep-sided ravine, down the center of which trickled a fast-moving stream. Little was visible but a narrow slice of sky, the faded blue of a day approaching evening, but it was quite warm; and there was a scent in the air, strange to An-uxhwi's nostrils: moist, but clean and tinted with salt.

Evrith was standing with her eyes closed, worryingly perhaps, but after a few moments it was clear that some kind of tension was draining out of her. Opening them again and looking at him, she motioned for him to follow her down the narrow ledge of rock between the stream and the ravine's wall. After a few moments, she murmured, “I've had some time to look into the other books. When I came across this one…” She fumbled for the words. “…well, I like this one. Its future is… undemanding, for one thing.”

An-uxhwi walked behind her, tasting the air and taking note of the stark landscape. “Not many inhabitants to confuse things?” he wondered. There were other things that could make a future undemanding - peaceful cultures, cultures that were far apart and technologically stagnant, futures where a culture decided to leave their world behind, and possibly a whole host of others his imagination struggled to even conceive - but the easiest way for things not to be particularly complicated on a world was for there to be no people, or so few of them that any future complexity was still a long way's off.

“No one at all,” she replied. “Not on or near this island, not for many thousands of years - no one but any of us. I think I will ask the others to keep out of of it, so that there is only me and you. Even on the world we're camping in, the future is becoming busier - Hyd'natt and Unitti intend to stay in the long term, and I beginning to think there will come a point where other xtauh join them as well - but I would like to keep this place quiet.” She paused, and then indicated the direction ahead. “Metaphorically speaking.”

She said this because, from further down the ravine, there was a strange noise, faint but growing louder as they proceeded. It seemed too constant to be the wind, which blew in fits across the top of the ravine like someone playing a flute. It sounded like a great crowd of beasts or monsters, all roaring and hissing at once, though one could only guess that Evrith would not be so relaxed were that actually the case.

An-uxhwi let his antennae flex with curiosity and mild puzzlement. The sound was rather imposing, but if Evrith wasn't tense, he wasn't likely to be, either - whatever it was, it could not actually be threatening. “What is it?” he asked, even though he rather presumed he would see the cause shortly.

She merely gave him a faint little smile.

At its bottom, the ravine opened up onto a flat, sandy expanse, albeit one embedded with occasional rocks and boulders. There were forests off in the distance to one side, but just here there was nothing to impede the view ahead, which showed the stream winding ahead across the sand to-

For someone from a desert, who had seen and heard of grasslands, the eye was tempted to think it an unusually wide and flat one. But wind in the grass did not sound like that; and, moreover, the moistness in the air could now be felt as a spray, blown in on the wind, and as they approached, the waves could be seen to be not those of grass, but of liquid and froth.

An-uxhwi had never seen the sea, and very few xtauh had claimed to. It had seemed an unreal prospect, even when Evrith had said that she'd grown up by a shore. But here it was, now: more water than An-uxhwi had seen in one place. More water than he'd ever seen over the course of his life, perhaps. Near to them, it washed up and down the shore and crashed against rocks; and, in the distance, it extended to infinity, broken only by the distant shapes of other islands.

And, nearest at hand, it thrust gently inland for a way. The stream they followed flowed into a sort of small inlet full of clear, shallow water - no more than two or three meters deep - and protected from the waves by a low ridge of rock protruding out into the deeper water.

“What do you think of it?” she asked.

That is definitely too much water. An-uxhwi's split-second awe rapidly twisted to a dull background dread. Visions of xtauh being swept away uncomfortably seared through his chest and he looked at the froth with a soft, mourning horror. Aware that it was not the expected reaction, he tried to bridle the emotion - it had been so long ago, after all, and the desert was a known eater of lives even when the rain came, this had simply caught him off guard - but also, out of respect, did not try to hide it.

He stood silent for a few moments, gathering himself, and when he spoke did so diplomatically: “It's an impressive vista.” Then, after a bit more pause: “Forgive my shameful unease. There are some things you may not realise about the desert lands - they are not without rain, but when the rain comes, it strikes hard ground, and it does not easily absorb, and so a torrent of rain inevitably becomes a sudden, roaring river.” Here he faltered for a moment, his attention still fixed on the froth. “And if you do not shelter yourself in time, the waters will take you, break your bones, and drown you.”

He did not say how much of his family had met the fate, though he was sure that if Evrith wanted to know she could either simply look at it, or even just ask - but he needed the shock of what he was seeing subside a bit before he was willing to bring it up on his own. Instead, he appended: “The waters here,” and he gestured to the froth. “Look as though they could break your Valcen bones, too.”

Evrith was silent for a while, staring out into the distance. At last, she said, “When I was young,” she said, “I lived in a place very much like this, around a stream running into a lagoon by the sea. And to make a living, the villagers learned to live with the sea. To reach the big fish, to harvest the great ocean plants, one had to go out further than one could reach from shore, so they went out on boats - our extended family had a boat. My fathers and brothers went out on it, when their turns came, to catch fish.

“The sea is powerful. It can't be trifled with. But it has rhythms, it has habits; if you know how to listen, it tells you when and where to stay back. It is like your desert, in some respects - it is never entirely safe, but it offers life for those who learn how to live with it.” She glanced around. “And this is a kindly sea, by comparison. At home, around dawn and dusk, there were violent storm-seasons, but not here. Storms happen, of ourse, but they're not powerful enough to push the waves far up the shore. I've been out in them before.” She pointed off to the left, where dark clouds could be seen lurking on the horizon. “One is coming, but it won't be here for some rests yet - we can be gone long before it gets here, if you prefer.”

It was a rare moment where he did not appreciate Evrith's side of the tale. Perhaps it was, at the end of the day, still more raw for him than he realised. He wanted to say 'I'll stay here as long as you want, and we can watch the storm together,' but it stuck in his throat. “With no offence intended,” he said, his tone deeply pained for the imposition he knew it was to assert as much. “I would indeed prefer.”

Evrith had not, at this point, really expected him to agree to stay for the storm at this particular juncture, but felt it was worth the effort. Possibly she could bring him over to the idea in time, if there was a chance. She felt that watching a storm from a place of safety was an incredibly cozy experience that would only be improved by his company.

“If you like,” she said aloud. “I just… had to come here, for a little while. Out there, it's… it's getting harder to feel assured of anything.”

It was hard for him to really feel assured here, either, but this was at least a surmountable problem that he knew could be tackled over time, if it was important to Evrith. Intellectually, he knew better than to be disquieted by the ocean. Eventually, his emotions could probably be made to fit.

With some tension he could not yet quite shake, he kept himself still beside her. “If this place brings you solace,” he said. “And there is no one here that would lay claim to this place, then I consider it yours, and can only encourage you to spend the time you need here. And later, if we succeed…” - he did not say 'when', but 'if', because he trusted Evrith that it was too difficult to be certain about it - “…as much time as you want.”

Evrith stared out at the sea, and shivered a little despite the warmth. It was said that in the deepest depths, where the weight of water crushed the body and, away from the warmth of the sun, it was cold as ice, Uvvun swam in silence. This sea was too shallow to reach His realm, but…

“No,” she murmured, “Not as much time as I want. But it would be nice for a bit, at least.”

A white bird, coasting along with the wind, came to a landing in front of them on the sand. It turned its head, glancing at them with one beady eye and then the other; when they showed no sign of dropping any food, it squawked harshly at them and flapped away again. Evrith recalled that her village had had superstitions about encounters like this, with the little sea-dragons that infested the coast, but she couldn't recall them right at the moment and she wasn't sure they applied to alien feathery things.

She shook her head. “Well, perhaps we should go back.”

With a bit of embarrassment in his voice, An-uxhwi said “Please,” although his attention followed the bird that had briefly caught Evrith's attention. It was certainly a bit odd that a wild, alien animal would approach them this way - from its perspective, it could just as easily have been putting itself into danger of being eaten. He wasn't sure what to make of that it had considered them safe to land near, but felt glad for both his sake and the creature's sake that it had clearly been correct. Maybe it was poisonous.

As they walked, Evrith seemed… uncomfortable, far less comfortable than she had when they'd come down. Whatever anxieties she'd been able to leave behind when they came here had come back. She said, hesitantly, “I should tell you…” She paused, then tried again. “I should tell you some of what may happen…”

She paused again. “As you may have gathered, I wish first to try to… intercept the path of the figure in white. And to find something to set in motion that will interrupt or alter their journey. What exactly that will be, I cannot say - once we are closer, I may have a better picture of who they are and why they are a danger. I hope that, perhaps, their danger is unintentional - or not yet developed - and they might be turned aside with some kind of message left for them. But one way or another, it may not work, and the change made must come somewhere else along their path.”

“Do you have other ideas? Of what to do, if the message isn't enough?” he asked, his tone a little subdued - remaining hopeful, as always, because the alternative was madness and depression, and that helped no one, but also not ignorant of the risks, and certainly not wanting to be ignorant of the risks.

Evrith paused again, and then continued heavily. “There may be other ways besides a message, but there may not. And in the latter case, we must make a choice. The white figure's path will extend in two directions: one backward, to wherever they came from, and one forward, to the Citadel: to change events such that the figure never becomes a threat, or else that the figure does not find the Citadel to be a viable catalyst for what danger they pose. But… there are disadvantages, in both cases.” She stared at the ground. “For the beginning of the path, it is very likely that it will be found in a populated area. Somewhere it will be very difficult to hide from ordinary takmar.”

“And the difficulties with the Citadel?” An-uxhwi asked. It had been brought up before, of course, but he still only had a vague impression of the thing, and he didn't fully understand the threat it presented. Certainly, he himself was probably not welcome there, and Shyriath had some past dealings with it of some sort that seemed bad, but he would be lying if he said he understood much of those dynamics.

A look of pain crossed Evrith's face. “The Citadel is… a refuge. Its people are descended from, and refreshed by, Chosen who are drawn or led there because of what is done to them in the world outside. And because of this, they are… insular. Something like Hyd'natt's people, though perhaps not so obvious. They welcome other Chosen, but they have trouble seeing the outside world and those others that live in it as anything other than a threat. At their best, they want nothing to do with it, to forget it exists. At their worst, they dream of rendering it… no longer a threat.”

She paused to rub the tip of her muzzle. “I think that the arrival of the figure in white will make the latter tendency much more likely, and that that will contribute to what is to come. So my task, in going there, would be to weaken it before she gets there. Oracles are… revered there, to an extent. There would be those that listen to me. But changing a whole society of thousands, in any direction, is not a simple task even in the best of circumstances. And the way I must change them might not be for the better - if I find I cannot persuade them to be more open, it may be that I have to find a way to weaken them. Break their society. It will be a long and painful process, regardless of which way it goes.

“And you and I will be required to bid each other farewell, because you - and the others - will not be going with me,” she concluded, her voice cracking. “Not even for an Oracle's sake will they break their oldest laws: that no one who is not Chosen may enter the Citadel, and that no one who their Council does not declare safe may leave. Those caught between those laws are executed; Shyriath knows it all too well.”

“Understood,” he said. It was a great understatement, of course. They had bonded well beyond friendship, after all, and the idea of parting ways was painful, and it ached in his chest, but the whole basis of their cooperation was, at the end of the day, still his life-debt to her. If they did part ways because it was her destiny to try this alone, that same debt dictated that he would accept the parting. He might yet weep about it, but he certainly wasn't going to do it prematurely, when it wasn't clear if it would even need to happen.

But he wanted to make it clear that it was only an understanding, not a personal statement of cold discontent, and so he smiled warmly and nuzzled at her neck affectionately. A part of him wanted to make the time they did have count for something, count for more, somehow spend more time with her away from the prophecies of doom, but there was no place that was truly away from them, and time was not their friend.

Loving gestures would have to do.