It took maybe an hour, maybe longer, for Gemma to return. Wiping tears of frustration away, she crept into her mother's room, watching as the woman stared at the candle by the ticking clock. This was their life right now. Terrified silence, waiting for this to pass. Gemma sniffled to get her mother's attention, but she didn't move.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked in a whisper. "How could you keep this from me?" Then, with a small rush of anger in her veins, she held up her blue hands, hoping to get any sort of reaction. "I'm a devil-thing--I'm a tiefling because of the evil you and Papa have done!"

"We haven't done any evil," said her mother in a low murmur. "When people are scared, they do desperate things." Gemma scoffed.

"Papa didn't kill anyone?" What a question to have to ask. And to ask it with such an attitude, feeling like she knew the answer was that her father was a killer.

"At least not while we were…." The woman sighed, and finally looked away from the clock, to the floor. "I don't actually know. But, my girl," she continued. Her mother glanced up to her, pleading, "I know he loved you with his whole heart, just like he loved me. He left to protect us. And maybe if there's an answer to what's going on, he might be able to protect us until we figure out what to do."

Gemma stared at her mother, mouth agape, blood hot.

"You mean, seek shelter from this with the Cult of Mask." It wasn't a question. But her mother shrugged all the same. "What if they have something to do with this? You said they could be underground for weeks without the sun. What if this is their doing?" Another shrug from her mother made her anger dwindle just slightly. She had no answers, just more questions.

"What if this has nothing to do with them at all?" her mother asked. The candle flickered at her question, and the women looked at it as if it would speak. But it didn't. Gemma crossed her arms tightly over her chest, then spun around in the doorway.

"Where are you going?" her mother asked before she made her way to the stairs.

"To pray." She considered remaining silent after that, to maybe give her mother a taste of her own medicine, to hide something from her without answering. But she caved to her guilt and added, "Maybe the Gods have answers."

Gemma was not a regular at the temple. She only crept to the southern edge of town to pray every once in a while, usually when she felt uncreative, hopeless, or to offer some of her jewelry to the Gods. Her work wasn't yet good enough to sell to patrons, but with nothing better to do with the many necklaces and rings she attempted to make, offering the Gods a piece of her time seemed to be the best option. Now, she sourly wondered if this insulted them and this was her punishment. But it was a fleeting, arrogant thought she quieted as fast as it came.

Though the temple, one-storey and octagonal, was normally quite deserted, it was not so now. The broken cobblestone pathway had a line of people--well, humanoids at least--waiting to gain entrance by the priestess at the door. Smoke pouring from the seven chimneys showed that offerings were at an all-time high. And some people, Gemma discovered, didn't even wait until entering to start to pray. She could hear them openly admitting to any wrongdoings, begging for forgiveness.

"Yandalla, my cabbage is wilting! Please! I'll do anything!"

"If there is no sun, give us rain, at least, Bazim-Gorag! I won't go near her again!"

People with tusks, feathers, and tails, some much shorter than before, others taller, all stood in a line of dozens of people, looking to the sky, praying to one another.

"Get these people out of here, please, Bane! Where did they all come from?"

Although there were plenty of people with horns of varying types, either nubs or long and protruding like Gemma's, she still pulled her cloak over her head, struggling to fit everything inside the hood. Between her bushy hair and the long, curled antlers, her cowl hardly fit anymore. But now that she saw people with beaks, others with fur and paws, all in varying forms of distress, she hated to admit that this comforted her. She, at least, mostly looked human. Red eyes and blue skin hardly lit a candle to the one…thing…she saw walking around made of metal and wood. Could that being feel like she did? Did they feel the uncanny chill in the air, the biting, gentle breeze? Could they feel their heart beat? Did they have one?

Her musings kept her company in the chaotic line of people. Everyone had something to pray for, for the safety of their family, for the zephyrs and minecarts to run again. But one person's prayer stuck out to her. The voice was familiar, soft, strained. "Please forgive me for all I've done," said the voice. Gemma turned around to see, to her surprise, Dwight Tennison. He looked exactly like he did just a few days ago, only his eyes, usually a stark white, were black, pupilless. Her stomach lurched, bringing forth the rusty aftertaste of bile in her mouth. Something about him seemed far more terrifying than looking in a mirror.

"Dr. Tennison?" Gemma asked quietly to the man. He looked up to her, startled at the attention.

"Oh!"

"It's--"

"Miss McCoy," he recognized. And although she couldn't tell, it almost looked as if he was trying to make eye contact. "You aren't too different." Well, at least the blind man could recognize her by her voice. Gemma frowned at his words.

"Neither are you," she decided to say.

"I know." Right. The line moved up by a person, and without prompting, Dwight moved along right in sync with Gemma. Although he moved fluidly, as a man who lived in the same place for nearly twenty years might, there was something about his step that wasn't as precise as normal. Gemma squinted at him, hesitating.

"Question?" Dwight asked. Yes, she thought. Many questions. But he probably couldn't answer them any more than her mother. So instead, she settled on one that would help her most immediately.

"Do you pray to all the Gods in the temple?" she asked. Dwight's sad smile took a moment to form as he nodded.

"Yes, my dear. I do. I always have." Although she anticipated this, it was a weird answer. Most people tended to find a favorite and gravitated towards appeasing that one, particular God, rather than all of them.

"Do you think it helps?" This question wiped away any sense of smile from Dwight's face. The sadness that brought on his helpless smile overtook him completely, and for a fraction of a second, Gemma maybe suspected an air of shame about him as he stared at the floor.

"We have no choice, now." His words struck her to her core, cold and sharp. Gemma crossed her arms, as if to protect herself. The line moved again. The hairy, catlike woman in front of her dropped a wooden figurine, and picked it up just as quickly.

"Oh, no," the woman sounded, panicked. She was klutzy in her attempt to try and clean it, and nearly dropped it again. Gemma tried not to stare, but the woman's hands were--well, not hands, but massive paws. With her claws, she delicately held the figurine of a human man in her hand. She was a lioness, a humanoid lioness. "Please, please be enough…. Please let this be enough to bring my boy home…." Gemma's throat tightened. She didn't have an offering like this lioness, not even her mediocre jewelry.

"Why can I see you?" The question from Dwight stole her attention. His voice was so clear, so strong. Not like it was before, not as raspy and insecure. Gemma's gaze snapped back to him, and she gasped. The man stared at her, brows furrowed, eyes a stark white, just like before all of this happened. He stared at her, hard, pensive.

"Wh-what?" she stammered. But the next moment, he blinked, and his eyes returned to the terrifying black voids from before. This didn't ease her nerves. Dwight seemed unbothered by whatever happened, just simply rubbed his hands together for warmth.

Gemma turned back around to avoid staring. Did she imagine that? No one else noticed. Everyone was wrapped in their own worries, praying, repenting. Some praying directly to a bag of coins or a figurine of some sort. She should have brought an offering…

She glanced over her shoulder again, just to check on the strange man. He seemed lost in thought, staring slightly to the darkened twilight sky. This sort of change must have been far more disorienting for him, without the ability to see. Maybe his faith helped him navigate something so confusing. Maybe his appearance didn't change, but his mind….

"Did you bring an offering, Dr. Tennison? Maybe those stone things you were making the other day?" she thought to ask. Maybe he would give her one so she could offer it to the Gods, to not show up empty-handed. He straightened up at her question, shaking his head.

"The slabs?" He cleared his throat. "No, no. Those…. Those are not good offerings." Dwight's gaze fell to the floor. She could hear, barely, that he kept muttering to himself. The person behind him, a man with quite angular features and long hair, looked at Gemma, and silently mouthed, "Is he okay?" Gemma pursed her lips.

"Dr. Tennison," she started carefully, "are you alright?" He nodded, but didn't look up to her. "Do you maybe want to come back later, when the line isn't so long?"

"No!" With how fast and loud he barked, it made Gemma and the man behind them jump. "No, no, no, my dear. Now is…. I must pray now." She glanced up to the other man, sharing his expression of worry. Maybe Dwight needed his wife right now.

"Right, Dr. Tennison. Um, would you save my spot for me? I would like to go get an offering…." And after Dwight nodded to her, Gemma stepped out of the line to make her way to the northern edge of town. She tried not to get distracted, to ignore the vastly different people that now populated Wildfort. There were a handful more buildings, but most things seemed to be built upward rather than between others. It sounded like, from some arguments she passed by, that land and building ownership and whatnot seemed to be a hot topic. She didn't even consider who they would pay taxes to. With the appearance of all these new people, did the government change? Were there less resources, now? And with there being no crops, did that mean resources were even tighter than before?

It wasn't until she passed someone complaining that the street lamps were still out that she noticed this. With all the roaring from the dragons she heard the first day, she couldn't imagine the chaos they handled now….

The worries swirled in her head until she found herself at the Tennison Manor once again. She paused at its pathway, hesitant. It was so beautiful just a few days ago. And now the place looked as if nature, itself, had several years to overtake the architecture. Dusty, dejected, leaning to one side. Whereas other places looked overgrown and stressed, certainly, this manor bore the brunt of whatever happened to Wildfort. The perpetual twilight seemed darker here, on the edge of the forest, as if darkness clinged to the support beams and cracked bricks.

Gemma pursed her lips, but took the necessary steps to the front door, and ignored the shouting in the back of her head that told her to run away. She knocked gently at first, as if telling herself that if Edith didn't answer, that it was fine and she could turn around and leave. But after a full minute of silence, Gemma sighed to herself. If Dwight was sick and needed help, Edith needed to be there for him. So she tried again, this time knocking with a purpose, and listened for any sense of life inside the home.

This time, she heard a loud, curt swear, and the sound of something shattering. Then, finally, Edith shouted, "Coming!" somewhere deep in the house. It was another minute until the door opened with quite a force.

Gemma didn't mean to gasp, but it looked like Edith didn't mind her reaction. What was a relatively plain woman in her forties was now a tall, bulky thing with green skin and yellowed teeth.

"Yes? More accusations?" the woman asked. Her voice at least sounded the same, if a little huskier.

"I--I'm sorry," Gemma stammered as she took a step back. Edith's hair was, as it always was, still tied back, but held chunks of rubble. Dust littered her shoulders, and caught in the folds of her apron were clusters of stone, and even some chunks of glass. "Are--are you alright?" Despite her shock, Gemma found herself reaching toward the apron to pull off slivers of wood, and one sizable piece of glass that she held, rather than throwing on the ground.

"Yes…. I apologize. It's been a long…." Edith shook her head, and joined Gemma in wiping away some debris from herself. "Our home suffered a sort of quake, and I've been trying to put it back together." And from how taut her voice sounded, maybe even something worse than turning into some orc-hybrid and spackling a few cracks in the wall. "I'm sorry, who are you?"

"Oh!" Gemma snapped her hands back to herself, and let out a nervous laugh, even though nothing was funny. "Gemma, the jewel--"

"Right, the girl from The Silver Chain," she recognized, nodding. Edith glanced behind herself a moment, then squared herself up in the doorway, one hand on either side, and returned with an annoyance to Gemma. "Look, I'll tell you the same I've told the Enforcers and everyone else. I've nothing to do with this, I don't know what's going on, how to fix it, or where anyone is!" Her annoyance grew to full anger, even when Gemma shrunk down at her shouting. "Leave us alone!"

"But--but wait!" Gemma cried right before the door slammed in her face. "Your husband--he's at the temple--" Edith opened the door enough to show her face. "And, well, I think something might be--he doesn't seem well…." This didn't do anything to calm her down. The folds of anger grew to anguish, and Edith only responded by yelling:

"And I can't fix him, either! Okay? Let him say his useless prayers and leave me alone!" And with the slamming of the door, Gemma was alone again.

Edith's outburst rang in her ears on her slow walk on the cobblestone street. She turned the broken piece of glass in her hand. Its edges were sharp, and the entire thing was only the size of her thumbnail. She meant to throw it in the trash, but now it helped keep her fingers busy as her mind wandered from guilt to anger to anguish, much like Edith's outburst. Gemma glanced at herself in the reflection of the polished shard, her red, devilish eyes staring back. Her mind jumped back to guilt. Did the sins of everyone here have something to do with this? Were they in one of the levels of hell? Is that why it was so cold, why the warmth of the sun and heavens couldn't touch them?

Gemma hesitated in front of the "closed" sign in front of The Silver Chain. Maybe this was her own, personal circle of the hells. Even if it wasn't, she couldn't repent to the Gods without an offering. She stared at the glass in her hand, turned it over to see its polished silver back. It was a piece of a mirror. How fitting, she thought. She was reflecting on whatever caused this to happen, and she held a piece of a mirror and thought of what to give to the Gods.

With her mind set, Gemma returned home, into her mother's workshop, and got to work.

It took a little bit of her mother's help, but after a couple of days, Gemma managed to create a simple necklace, with every piece made by her hands. She made sure that she twisted the thin metal chain herself, soldered and welded the pendant and the looking glass without the hands of her mother, just her words of guidance. She even painstakingly filed away her mistakes again and again, though there were many. This had to be completely her. This was her prayer.

Working on a project like that brought her mother out of her room. The two managed to walk to the market in Stoneport a couple miles away, to gather groceries for the week to feed themselves so they could continue working on the necklace. They spoke to neighbors, new and old, about the lack of weather, about how despite all this change, time kept ticking on the clocks.

The day Gemma took her necklace to the temple, the street lights flickered on. The line to the temple was maybe half as long as it was a couple days ago, and people were in higher (though not that high) spirits. Just as the clocks dictated, time continued. It didn't look like it did, with no day or night cycle, but everything had to continue. People grew hungry, babies grew older. And while there were no crops to think of yet, perhaps they would find a way around that, too.

It was Gemma's turn to enter the temple, now. The unassuming building wasn't affected nearly as much as the Tennison Manor. Sure, it seemed to show its age, but it at least stood straight.

"Please, Miss," called the priestess. "I don't mean to rush you, but there are people waiting." Gemma blinked at the woman. Her skin was a pale yellow that seemed to glow, and she looked nearly human. She'd heard people refer to her as an Aasimar, which was supposed to be some sort of angelic race. She was certainly beautiful like an angel was supposed to be. But the weight of the past week's events weighed on her crow's feet.

"Sorry," said Gemma as she stepped inside the temple. It looked almost exactly like the last time she stepped in. In the middle, a simple golden brazier in the middle of an extremely plain room. The brazier was overflowing with offerings for all of the Gods: silver coins, jewelry, flowers, food. And evenly spread across this octagonal building were marked doorways to small rooms that held a fireplace for light and sacrifices, and a smaller version of this central brazier.

"Miss!"

"Sorry." Gemma turned to the door immediately to her right, and stepped up to the brazier. This was the room dedicated to Mask. She told herself, quickly, as she walked up to the brazier that it was because she was rushed, not because this was the first prayer she wanted to make. She didn't fully intend to start with, or honor him first. His room looked like all the others, with the only difference being the offerings in the brazier and the symbol above the fireplace.

The God of Trickery, the Lord of Shadows. Mask was the patron to thieves, to people who worked in the dark. It was said he saw all that happened in darkness, so that the people that worshiped him would find comfort in it.

"Mask," she started nervously. She wrapped the chain of her necklace in and over her fingers again and again. "M-may this darkness bring…" But as she said the words, they only echoed back to her, empty. Gemma took a breath and tried again: "God of Shadows, please hear me." She glanced down to the necklace in her hand, letting it dangle over the bowl, to the very few copper coins that remained in it. She knew, just by the nature of the way the Gods worked, that Mask would have the least amount of offerings in his brazier. It was the saying, of course, in the church that followed Mask, that wealth belonged to those that took it. That if you lost something, you didn't deserve it.

Gemma watched the light from the fire refract against the necklace, spinning in the golden bowl, reflecting against the coins as it went. The God of Darkness would not help her find any light. But, as she stared at the bowl and watched her red eyes appear and disappear in the spinning glass pendant, the oddest feeling of certainty washed over her.

Instead of dropping the necklace, she draped it over her head, careful of the tips of her horns, and brushed her hair over the chain so the pendant rested on her chest. Gemma glanced up to the symbol for Mask, nodding to it as if in agreement.

"Never mind," she decided, and left the temple.