Scarlet sat with her back to the wall, a stack of books next to her, unread. She wasn’t quite sure how she had ended up on the floor, rather than one of the library’s desks that she usually would sit at. Sweaty mats of hair clung to her face. She’d come right from training.

Everything was out of focus. She drew a long breath into her lungs, which ached from the workout Death had just put her through.

It had been a week since she’d run the last gauntlet. Her days of training since then had been intense, but Death appeared to have gained the slightest respect for her. Maybe.

Scarlet was surprised to hear footsteps; someone else had entered the library.

“Scarlet?” It was Bronwen’s voice that called out for her.

Scarlet rose and wove her way through the stacks of books to where Bronwen stood near the doors of the library.

“Bronwen. It’s good to see you.” She had rarely seen him outside of her healing sessions, which were becoming less regular as she got slightly better at avoiding injury during training. He had finally given up on trying to heal her wound from Riordan any further. It still pained her when doing physical activities, and her mind had been strangely foggy since she’d arrived in the Crossworld, but there seemed to be little more he could do for her.

“It’s good to see you as well,” Bronwen said. “Would you come for a walk with me? There’s something Death wanted me to show you.”

“Of course,” she said, though a little hesitant at the mention of Death. A walk with Bronwen on its own would have sounded wonderful. Chatting with him was the closest thing to regaining some normalcy in her life, though increasingly he seemed distracted when they ran into each other.

“What have you been doing lately?” Scarlet asked as he led her down to the first floor of the castle. “I see you around Deianira less and less.”

“Ah. It’s been time to replenish the storerooms, both of food and other various supplies. As caretaker, that’s part of my duties of course, so I have been away at times.”

“Away?” Scarlet said. “Like, to the World?”

Bronwen cleared his throat. “Yes. I must travel there to trade, of course.”

“How do you get there? Where do you go?” Scarlet asked her questions perhaps a little too intensely. She knew emissaries could open portals between the World and the Crossworld, but had no idea how.

“Scarlet. I’m sure you must know that these are not things I’m permitted to share with you.”

Scarlet’s heart sank, though she really couldn’t have expected anything other than that. I’m an emissary, I’m learning magic, but there’s still so much kept from me.

“But,” Bronwen continued, pulling a key from a pocket, “I do think you’ll find what I’m about to show you rather interesting.”

He unlocked a door at the end of a hall and ushered Scarlet in ahead of him. Bronwen squeezed in behind her. The room was only slightly larger than a closet. Inside, against the back wall, there was some sort of… contraption. Magic flooded a series of crystal tubes that weaved in and out of the stone of the wall.

“What is this?” Scarlet asked.

“This is the light engine of Deianira. It powers the light motes in sconces throughout the castle.”

Scarlet, fascinated, gently touched one of the tubes. Instantly, she could sense the energy running through the vast system.

“An artifact,” she murmured. This light engine had been crafted from magus stone, dug up from underneath the earth. She’d never seen magus stone before. In her library readings, she had learned that artifacts were no longer permitted, as mining magus stone damaged the flow of magic throughout the World. But that ban was a part of the Magus War treaty, which Death had made clear did not apply to her.

“It’s my responsibility to keep it charged,” Bronwen said. “However, my duties have been keeping me away more often than usual. If I’m gone too long, you may have to charge the engine to keep the lights running. I’ll keep this door unlocked from now on.”

Bronwen demonstrated how the recharging process worked. He grasped a crystal orb near the bottom of the light engine. Scarlet, still with a hand to a tube, could feel the energy running through the system increase as Bronwen let it absorb his power. A simple enough task.

Bronwen walked with Scarlet back to the library. She memorized the way to the light engine room on their way back out.

“Death has set up some… traps, I suppose I would call them, for the tests she puts me through. Are those powered by artifacts as well?”

“No,” Bronwen said. “Even Death doesn’t create new artifacts in these times. Since the extraction of magus stone damages the fabric of magic in the World, the other gods take such a thing quite seriously. However, Death has the power to manipulate energy in its purest form. There are some creative things she’s been able to come up with using those abilities.”

As they wound their way through the castle back to the library, Scarlet found herself asking Bronwen one more question, the question that eternally lingered in the back of her thoughts at all times. She often tried to suppress it, but eventually, it always came out.

“You haven’t heard anything about my mother, have you?”

“I haven’t. I’m sorry, Scarlet.”

“It’s been weeks. No, months now, isn’t it? She hasn’t even visited. Are you sure nothing’s wrong?”

“I wish I could put you at ease, but I know as little as you.”

As bitter as it was to part with Bronwen on that note, during a visit where she wasn’t injured no less, it was what it was. Back alone in the library, Scarlet found she could concentrate little on the words she was trying to read. Her mind kept drifting, too anxious to be filled with much else.

Her brain reverted to examining the letterforms, delicately created by a flamescribe. It had been ages since she’d flamescribed, herself. It was a practice she had enjoyed back when it was the only magic she’d been allowed to do. Now, she wondered if it would be satisfactory, in comparison to the fireballs, energy bolts, and other magics she’d been drilled on endlessly.

Restlessness and curiosity drew her to a stack of blank paper on one of the library’s desks. She sat and snached the top sheet, then stared at it in all of its emptiness, pinprick flame ready at her fingertip. What to write, or draw?

After a moment, she began tracing out a map of the Crossworld. There hadn’t been one in any of the books she’d been through yet, a fact that had irritated her. She wanted to know everything she could about the Crossworld, and yet there’d been so little. The books were mostly histories of the various regions of Nymandia, and chronicles of the Magus War, which were interesting enough—more knowledge than she ever could have found in Saridian. Yet her mind was never sated.

She sketched out the center island, where Deianira stood. The circular river that surrounded them, splitting off into five. She had pestered Bronwen to tell her which direction each of the gods’ realms laid, so she added the appropriate topography to them. Forests and fields for Riordan’s, a reflection of the landscape she had grown up in. A desert with the occasional oasis for Kajiem, the god she drew her fiery roots from. Grasslands and a jungle for Io, the god of knowledge and healing, to which Bronwen was attuned. Sturdy mountains stretching across Meyra’s realm, echoing the god’s protective nature. And, finally, scattered islands to make up Cascara’s realm.

Cascara. The god her mother was attuned to. Scarlet found herself with a new piece of paper in hand, her mother’s face appearing as her hand moved across the page. Sharp eyes, angular nose, her hair curly like Scarlet’s, but shorter—

And then it hurt too much. Her heart hammered a heavy beat. Her fire couldn’t be contained to a pinprick any longer. An outburst of flames flashed in her face, and the paper she held disintegrated into ash. In her frustration she stood and threw a second round of fire, more concentrated this time, at the desk. The wood was too resistant to catch aflame, but the top of the desk smoldered, and the rest of the paper stack burnt up before her eyes. The map she’d drawn, left to the side, she managed to grab. Its edge was crisped, but otherwise it was left intact.

A buried thought surfaced. Why did Bronwen have to bring up my father?

It had been weeks since the topic had been prodded at. It was the smallest pinprick in her armor, and Scarlet had been careful to tread around the breach in her mind, but as time went on, and her mother still hadn’t returned, or sent a message, nothing—the comparison was becoming difficult to avoid.

Her father had left without a goodbye, and now, so had her mother.

Her whole life had been spent criss-crossing around Saridian. Friends were scarce, and short-lived if existent at all. It didn’t help that she’d inherited her mother’s Galapian looks—her black hair and sharp features were an oddity in Saridian.

Her old life had felt empty. It was lonely, frustrating, and often boring. In the Crossworld, she was learning magic and had endless books to read. It kept her busy, and satisfied in ways she had craved for years. But the loneliness. It had its claws in her deeper than before.

Not to mention, the fear. Her mother knew what leaving without a goodbye would mean to Scarlet. But she’d done it anyway. And she’d stayed away. There were only so many things that that could mean.

Her mother was captured. Dead. Abandoned Scarlet, or compelled to stay away by Death. None of the options were positive.

And if Death wasn’t going to give her answers, Scarlet had to find a way to get them herself.