The next time Scylla met with Lady Peace, the child was fully-dressed and ready to learn. Scylla quizzed the girl on the contents of the previous lesson and the girl answered every question perfectly. She was even able to come up with a list of questions that she wanted answered by the next lesson, prime among these being the question of Kai's betrayal and exile. It was a topic that was still difficult for Scylla to discuss, even after seven thousand years.

  "The Council of Magic occurred not long after the Queen of Darkness finished her eugenics programs to breed animals capable of free will. It was then that the Gate of Souls and the Gray Circus were opened. The Gray Circus, by the way, is just an amusement park for souls, designed to entice them to come to our universe. If a soul chooses not to stay, they can go back to the Ideal World through the same gate they entered. If they choose to say, then they can only leave through the Gate of True Death."

  "Does Gray Baby the cat live in the Gray Circus?" Lady Peace asked.

  "How do you know about the Gray Baby?" Scylla asked.

  "Auntie Klara took me to the Domain of Heaven once. She showed me Gray Baby the planet, and she said it was named after an Elemental shaped like a cat."

  Scylla sighed. "We will discuss the Gray Baby when it comes up later. Now, please remain silent and let me finish the lesson."

  "Okay."

  "Me and my brother Kai had helped the six goddesses create the universe up to that point. The only goddess left was the last one, the Goddess of Wishes, who would bring magic into the world. Traditionally, it was only after the immigrant souls were allowed into the universe that the first of the High Daughters would be shaped by the Elemental Queens. The Elemental Queens, as we discussed in our last lesson, are archons, not souls. The High Daughters would be neither archons nor souls. They would be beings of and within this universe, constructed entirely from aspected essence."

  "What's that?"

  "Essence is what is used to construct bodies. Bodies are made of essence."

  This seemed to puzzle the child.

  "Sorry, that was a tautology. You know, you are pretty smart for a five-year-old."

  "What's a tow-tool-oojie?"

  "Never mind that. Your body, as a human, is made from life essence. All living creatures, from humans to cats to fish, are made of life essence. It is borrowed from the Domain of Life until the time of death, upon which the essence is returned. Humans are somewhat special in that the blood is borrowed from the Domain of Darkness, and it is not constructed of life essence. However, animal blood is just regular life essence."

  "Why is the blood borrowed from darkness?"

  "That's the way it is in every universe. Blood is required for the dark chains which bind a soul to the body. Chains are a thing of darkness, freedom in reverse, and this concept requires an anchor in the body to hold on to. That anchor is the blood. Thus, for humans, the body is constructed mostly of life essence but with a hint of dark essence."

  "Okay."

  "I'm afraid I have digressed. High Daughters, Greater Daughters, and regular Elementals are all constructed from elemental essence. However, as you recall from our last lesson, the Divine Power is bisected. Which means that it has two aspects. Thus, there are two aspects to divine essence. Thus we use the term aspected essence instead, because it begs the question as to which element is available to construct the body. In the case of a Fire Elemental, the body is constructed of fire-aspected chaos essence."

  "If you say so."

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  "Where were we?"

  "What's an im-im-igrant?"

  "Ah, yes. That's right. Some of the souls that come to this world will be set aside to serve the Elemental Queens for all eternity. They basically agree to never leave this universe unless it unravels. In exchange for this loyalty, they are granted access to immortality and overwhelming power. They are called Immortal Worshippers and they directly serve the Elemental Queens. By long tradition, the Flame Keeper is the first Immortal Worshipper, and she always serves the Queen of Fire."

  "Like Auntie Klara."

  "Yes. The Council of Magic was the very first gathering of all the Immortal Worshippers at the time. The purpose was to allocate High Daughters to the various worshippers. Some of the worshippers would be able to bond High Daughters from multiple elements. Once this was accomplished, we were to discuss how magic would work in the new world. The worshippers would then use their High Daughters to construct the preliminary infrastructure required to facilitate magic."

  "What is pre-limm-innn..."

  "Stuff."

  "What is fass-ill..."

  "Help."

  "The stuff to help magic."

  "That's right."

  "Why?"

  "These are words you need to learn."

  "Okay."

  If this girl has memories of another life, Scylla thought, I am going to wring Kai's neck out. I'm really going to do it this time.

  "At the council of magic, I argued that we should wait until the seventh goddess had joined the universe before we made any major decisions. Kai's argument was that it doesn't really matter. He said that the other worshippers could experiment with different magic systems before the seventh goddess joined. The other worshippers, including Klara, agreed with Kai's argument."

  "But you said he was an idiot."

  "He is. Now, there were two competing camps in the council. Klara argued that magic should be available to anyone at all, based entirely on merit. Reyndell, a soul that had reached the rank of Imperator in the armies that destroyed the original Flame, argued against Klara, because he hates her."

  "Because she carries the Flame."

  "Because she carries the Flame, that's right. Reyndell argued that magic should only be available to specific bloodlines. Me and Klara both agreed that this was a terrible idea."

  "People could be born with magic."

  "Yes. We did not come to a decision. After some debate, the Elemental Queens decided to start making High Daughters. Unsurprisingly, perhaps to disrupt the discussion, or perhaps to grant Reyndell an advantage in the implementation of his arguments, the Queen of Darkness simply created the very first High Daughter ever. The Firstborn, or the First of Darkness. She offered this new Elemental to Reyndell, promising that it would allow him to fulfill his dream of bloodline-based magic, no matter what Klara did."

  "Did he accept?"

  "Yes. However, the Queen of Light warned Reyndell, after he accepted the bond, that the bond carried a terrible curse of bad luck. She offered him the bond with the First of Light, which would carry a blessing of unimaginably good luck, to balance out the bad luck from the First of Darkness. He accepted this second Elemental as well."

  "And he gave them names."

  "Klara must have told you part of this story. Yes, he gave them names. The only Elementals with names were granted those names by Reyndell. The First of Darkness he named Erika, and the First of Light he named Titania."

  "And also Felicia."

  "That was much later. Once Reyndell named his Elementals, the Queen of Fire offered her customary First of Fire to the Flame Keeper Klara, who, unsurprisingly, accepted. The Queen of Water then offered the First of Water to her worshipper Reese, who also accepted. The Queen of Stone offered the First of Stone to her worshipper Anders, or Captain Anders, who later founded a transportation service that promises to transport anything to anywhere, fast, for the right price."

  "That sounds like it could make a lot of money."

  "No, he is paid in alcohol. He's a drunk."

  "Like daddy."

  "Who told you that?"

  "Mommy."

  Scylla groaned. "Next the Queen of Wind offered me a High Daughter. This, of course, I immediately refused, and the bond was passed to one of her worshippers. Next came Metal and Lightning, and all the names of these three original bond holders have been lost to history. The Queen of Heaven offered the First of Heaven to Klara, who eagerly accepted. This meant that among the worshippers, only Klara and Reyndell had more than a single bond. Finally, the Queen of Life offered the First of Life to my brother, Kai."

  "And he accepted."

  "No. Kai said that he would only accept the First of Life under the condition that he also be granted the First of Souls and the First of True Death. Three High Daughters in total. I was shocked. No elf has ever, in the history of any universe, made such an offer. The three Elemental Queens immediately accepted this offer and he was granted the three bonds. I chastised him, cursed his name, and finally stripped him of his titles and rights and exiled him from the tribe for all eternity. He smiled at me and apologized that the seventh goddess wouldn't be joining any time soon. Then he left."

  "So it's all his fault?"

  "What's his fault?"

  "The bad stuff that happened in our universe?"

  "That's a bit of a stretch."

  "Okay."