“Hmm. Well, first off, let me tell you that even if you did kill that girl, you didn’t put yourself in that place. Someone else royally screwed up, and that led to their girl dyin’ instead of killin’. But you might want to keep this under wraps from people who haven’t seen the rougher side of life. They don’t understand what it’s like to be breaths away from bitin’ it, and they’ll always say there was a better way to do this.” Prisoner moved his arm away from Sechen’s back and snapped his fingers, a small card appearing between them. “You did what you had to do, Sechen. When it’s kill or be killed, I ain’t gonna berate you for pickin’ option number one. And I got one more question; what kinda wisp were you?”

“I don’t really remember, honestly. I never really used my own powers, but when my light didn’t come out as brilliant as hers, Revel acted like I’d done it on purpose. Saying she couldn’t teach me if my light was tainted.” Sechen sneered at that thought. “Well, she couldn’t teach me when I forced myself to use only ‘untainted’ light, so why in the hells am I trying to stick to it?”

“Your Issi was that murky dark that your light seemed trapped in? Those tendrils you showed me a few minutes ago? That stuff?” Prisoner asked.

Something about that work spoke to Sechen, stirring something long dormant in her container. “Murk. I think that’s exactly it. I was a murk wisp.”

“Well, ain’t that convenient.” Prisoner laughed, the card disappearing from between his fingers. “Don’t need this any more, then. Stop tryin’ to be what Revel wanted you to be, and start bein’ what you actually are. You still got that necklace I gave you?”

Sechen pulled the crystal necklace out of her pocket and raised it. “Got it right here.”

“Good. Keep it on your person from now on, and I’ll contact you if I find anything. For now, focus on evictin’ that unwanted stowaway in your headspace. Remember that you’re the only master of your body, and that it’s just memories combined with insecurities yellin’ at you. And nobody knows how to hurt you better than you.”

“Ain’t that the truth.” Sechen muttered. “So just stop doing everything I’ve been doing for the past few years? Simple as that?”

“How does your body feel now? Cause you didn’t have that a few years ago.” Prisoner pointed out, and Sechen looked down at herself. “Just cause it’s what you’ve been doin’, don’t mean it’s what's best for you. Tomorrow, try not to limit yourself. Let Sechen out, not Ensche, or whatever the little clone Revelation was tryin’ to raise. You can handle it.”

Prisoner stood and started walking away, then seemed to remember something as he pivoted on his heel and started walking backwards. “Even if your Issi ain’t pure light, you could still learn somethin’ from Morriss’ statues. Keep ‘em safe, please. It’s all I have left of him.”

“I will.” Sechen said with a nod. Prisoner smiled and waved as he backed out of the room, leaving Sechen alone once more. She flicked open the marble case Prisoner had given her, seeing that there were indents that perfectly fit each and every statue. As she matched statue to indent, Sechen found her thoughts less intrusive than usual. Prisoner hadn’t seen her as a monster. Nothing like when she’d told Revel.

Using Issi no longer felt like an ordeal. Sechen sat at the edge of the roof, a curtain of murky light cascading down around her with a power she’d never felt before. A confidence she’d only felt once before. She spread her fingers before her eyes, the previously gold accents on the back of her hand now pure luminescence swirled with inky darkness. No more gold, just light and murk.

Sechen drew a circle in the air with her hand, black Issi trailing after it to create a halo in the air. Light tried to shine through the murk moments later, luminescent power that mingled with the murk instead of being diminished by it. She pressed down on her knuckle and felt a halo spark to life around her shoulder, and the light wasn’t blinding like it had been. It was a three dimensional halo almost exactly like the one she’d just drawn, the power rolling off of it feeling more natural and usable than anything her old rings could have put out.

This was how her Issi was meant to be. A combination of Revel’s light and her own murk. Not whatever path Revel was pushing her down.

“Sechen?” Paui asked, something in her voice that Sechen couldn’t explain. “Did you dye your hair last night?”

“No, nothing like that. Kinda the opposite, really.” Sechen said with a grin, lying down with her legs still dangling over the edge. She looked up at Paui, who had both eyebrows raised and was staring at Sechen’s eyes. “Did my eyes change too?”

“Oh, yeah. I’ve never seen someone with black irises and… I don’t know what to call the colour your pupils are. They’re sort of super light yellow, but then they’re also almost completely white?” Paui frowned. “Is all that stuff your Issi? What happened to it?”

“I think they’re like liquid light, if that’s what you’re thinking.” Sechen said as she tapped right next to her right eye. “And yeah, all this stuff is my Issi now. Revel tried pushing me one way, and completely forbid me from using this other part of my Issi. I’d almost forgotten it existed, but I had a talk with Prisoner last night and he helped me work through some things.”

“Wow. That’s good? I think?” Paui sat next to Sechen, letting her legs dangle over the edge alongside Sechen’s. “And you won’t have to relearn anything, since you didn’t really know anything about your Issi in the first place.”

“Ouch. True, but ouch.” Sechen laughed. “Has Prisoner talked to you yet about what’s going on?”

Paui paused, then nodded. “He thinks we can do this on our own.”

“He does.” Sechen agreed.

“Then he has to know something I don’t. Because I don’t feel like I can do this.” Paui kicked her feet over the edge, and Sechen put a hand on her shoulder to keep her from tumbling over. “See what I mean? I can’t even sit still safely, nevermind clearing an entire floor on my own.”

“You won’t be alone. You’ll have Gilt and me. We’ll find a way to get through this.” Sechen squeezed Paui’s shoulder just a little bit harder, trying to assure her. “Metea/Irric needs Prisoner’s help way more than we do right now, so we’re gonna have to make do without him.”

“That’s going to be easier said than done. I still haven’t made heads or tails about this ‘tainted bonds’ thing Prisoner’s got me looking into, and I’m almost done reading through all of the notes he gave me.” Paui patted the bag slung over her shoulder for emphasis. “Since I couldn’t get anything to work on my own, would you mind giving me a helping hand? Maybe I just need some new eyes on this.”

“Tainted bonds, huh.” Sechen wondered if her bond with Revel would have been considered tainted up until last night. Probably, yes. “Sure, why not. I forgot to ask Prisoner if I should switch up my routine once I’ve fixed all my muscles, so I’ve got time. How can I help?”

Paui cleared her throat and gestured for Sechen to stand in front of her.

“Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, and let your arms hang loose at your sides. Grasp your container with tendrils of your mind, and lock onto the feelings that come off of it. Do this for five minutes, then take a five minute rest as you record anything you felt. Repeat this five times daily after random events that could put you in an emotional or physical state.”

Paui read off of Prisoner’s instructions for one of the steps for diagnosing a tainted bond, following them herself then looking up to make sure Sechen was joining in. Sechen nodded for Paui to continue, and she buried her nose in the hand-written notes once more.

“If you feel any Issi trying to leave your container while you’re doing this, let it. Note how much Issi you had at the start and how much you lost over the five minutes, since that can tell you how much agency you have over your own Issi. If you feel your headspace trying to invade on your session, try pushing it back. Your headspace and container being too connected can be dangerous if you don’t have a good handle on your Issi, so I’d make sure they don’t collide, fumbly.” Paui blushed as she read that, quickly flipping through what Sechen assumed were notes that only applied to Paui. “Um, once you’re done with your introspection, use a technique you’re confident in. If you have any trouble with making it work, or it comes out differently, look in the index near the back of this book to see what that could mean. Good luck, and don’t hurt yourself.”

“He never told me not to hurt myself.” Sechen sighed, shaking out her hands. “Any idea what he meant by tendrils of your mind?”

“I actually had to ask him that yesterday. Apparently that’s how he sees the space inside you where you can touch your container. So, just do that and watch what your container does. It would be better if something interesting had happened so we weren’t going about like normal, but we can’t go back to earlier today or last night.”

“I don’t think I’ve recovered from last night, so I’ve got something to brood on.” Sechen grinned. Paui frowned and looked down for some reason. “What’s eating at you?”

“Nothing. Nothing.” Paui said quickly, shaking her head and closing her eyes. “Yell if something goes wrong, and I’ll do what I can. And if I start yelling, do the same for me, please.”

Paui’s eyes were squeezed shut before Sechen could get a word in. She wondered what brought on Paui’s frown, but she’d ask about that after this was done. A long breath preceded the venture into the place her container resided, and Sechen found herself staring at something she didn’t recognize. It tugged at memories she knew she should have had, but she couldn’t draw anything out of those decrepit shelves.

It didn’t look anything like any container Sechen had ever seen. It certainly didn’t look like hers. Hers had been a simple sphere made of blackened gold, nothing getting out of the metallic shell. But this was something else. Three haloes of shifting murk and light ringed a column of some sort of material that mimicked the look of her light and murk, marbled together in frozen harmony. She reached out and touched one of the haloes, feeling her Issi trapped inside of it like a smaller container within her container. She raised an eyebrow and felt the other two, coming away with the exact same feeling as the first. With a hum of curiosity she snaked her arm through the gap between the haloes, pressing her fingertips to the column in the middle.

Memories flashed by her at breakneck speed, Issi-coated projectiles that bounced off Sechen’s mind like pebbles in a windstorm. She recognized a few images in the deluge; the first time Revel took her to the glacier, Revel giving her the circlet that had been holding her back for years, and the metal hatch she’d pulled herself out of on the night she’d escaped from the place that gave her a chance at life. They breezed past with only a mild inconvenience, leaving three large floating squares of indecipherable murk hovering before her eyes. She somehow knew exactly what had to be done, reaching out with a hand that should have been planted on the column and pushing the luminescent part of her Issi through the murk.

Revel’s face appeared, full of concern as snow danced around her. She spoke without words, reaching out a hand for Sechen to take. Back then, she’d looked like the most beautiful thing Sechen had ever seen. The memory paused, and Sechen recoiled in surprise. She pushed herself out of the snow, looking down at a body that she definitely didn’t have back then, and looked across at Revel. Under the halo that obscured her eyes, Sechen saw the concern that the rest of her face showed. But there was something else there. Hope. Greed. And just the smallest touch of desperation. She’d been Revel’s only apprentice while she travelled with her, and unless Revel was hiding something, her only apprentice period.

“She needed me just as much as I needed her.” Sechen whispered, her words coming out raspy and ethereal, the way she’d expect a breeze to speak. “I gave her everything I could, and she gave me the same. So why did she force me to be exactly like her?”