The date hadn’t occurred to employee #3654, otherwise known as Eagle, real name REDACTED, in the moment. Things like that happened when you were in the middle of a long stretch. She’d done overnights at a fast food joint, back when that was a thing, in the time between high school and joining the military. She would have missed New Year’s of 2009 if not for a coworker wondering how they could get the broadcast when there were only a few minutes to go. You could just get so focused that the dates slipped.

  It had been Christmas. Funny what a week at sea does to your sense of timing. The only clock running in her head had been the mission’s. Not that anyone had missed gifts from her, her life was practically her job. She loved her job, for all it had its risks and moral gray areas. It bore reminding that if someone had been holding the Rigel’s crew prisoner and they had a chance to free them while on mission, they would have taken it. At least, in the end, she’d found out what had happened to them.

  Marmot. Such a stupid name, even for the Menagerie. A good right hand, hadn’t flinched when she’d decided to hold the bridge. The dragonfire shells had worked, somewhat, and if not for something she could have in no way predicted Scorpion would have hit his shot. Of course, he’d already been dead by that point. She wished she knew just how many had survived, if only for her ego. Would less or more be better? She’d tried to go down fighting, and Eagle wasn’t sure waking up the next day was the best outcome.

  Talking with those in the other cells didn’t help, much. She was being held alone, though the general structure resembled a warehouse that had cells built into it. The guards patrolling didn’t mind the talk, much, and she wasn’t sure if they could understand the language. Escape had been her first concern, but the former crew of the Rigel testified that the guard had practically supernatural senses and could spot an attempt even when another group was making a major distraction.

  At the least, it seemed they weren’t treated harshly. Fed, as much as could be expected, and not… abused. The natives of the island hardly interacted with them at all, though a few weeks back some of the Rigel’s crew had reported hearing voices in their heads. Must have been the stress from being kept here so long without any sign of what the future would hold.

  It was now three days after the defeat of her company and Eagle was conflicted. No one would believe what had happened, should she escape. Completing the mission was a forgone conclusion. If she were to take that yacht, ‘wash up’ on a remote shore, and spin the best lies of her life, her employers might believe the Menagerie was ambushed by warships defending a secret naval base the Rigel had wandered into. It was just a shame living after such a failure was a luxury.

  Other companies might be sent in their wake, but she doubted the transponder on the Rigel would cut through whatever shrouded this island if their satellite connection was blocked. Going by their last transmitted location would just leave her employers with the same information they’d had while trying to find the Rigel.

  Those were the deliberations the logical side of her mind dealt with. What she couldn’t help but be distracted by was everything else. At most times, every day, there were humanoid non-humans in sight. Eagle supposed the possibility of some tribe of bird people living undiscovered in the Pacific was a possibility, but the city was too well built, the people too well mannered and mixed with humans, for that to be the case. The shield that man had carried struck her as futuristic, but the direction that led her didn’t match either.

  She’d spent the days near-catatonic, dead from the perspective of the outside world, but deep in thought inside her mind. Working the angles, generating and discarding theories. This kind of focus wasn’t new to her, but something about it now felt strange in a way she chalked up to the current, dire circumstances. Eagle hadn’t exactly been a prisoner of abhumans before.

  For all of her pondering, it turned out she’d just needed to wait for the answers to come to her. Or the madness, depending on how optimistic she was feeling. Congratulations are in order. You killed a man that dragons would have broken before.

  Her back stiffened as the infamous, ghostly voice infiltrated her mind. Eagle almost called out but held her tongue. The remainder of the Menagerie was still an asset, but if they lost faith in her completely her already narrow options would shrink significantly. As it was Eagle waited it out, wondering if she had snapped.

  Being difficult, I see. You can reply to me in kind.

  Dragons? That word hadn’t escaped Eagle’s notice. Wondering if that had worked and, more importantly, not wanting to come off as weak, she tried to project, If you can hear me, you should know both our days are numbered. We were the easy option. They’ll send bombers to flatten this place next.

  I’m sure. There was a snide edge to the mental voice, Eagle surprised at the depth there was to it. True, she’d had a richer imagination than most, but the detail in the voice itself was beginning to convince her it wasn’t a figment. We figured out what you were doing. Gold, is that it? What all this death was over?

  The dismissiveness in the voice got on her nerves. Sure, it wasn’t the grandest of motivations, but it added up to a number that was currently giving her a winning lottery ticket to a visit from the firing squad. An operation like yours should know the value of it, she replied, matching the man’s tone while also thinking to herself, Is it worthless to them? Highly advanced society, or cultural disinterest maybe. Doubt it’s the first-

  Hey! I’ll have you know I consider my society as one advanced beyond yours in all but one area of expertise, thank you. Now the possible schizophrenic manifestation of her failure was taking sarcastic affront with her. Great.

  Can you hear all my thoughts?

  The man in her head, conclusions on his existence pending, somehow managed to sigh. Just separate what you want me to hear. You sound quick enough to manage it without me needing to go into detail.

  Surprised, Eagle found there was something to this communication method that allowed her to screen her thoughts. It was like the difference between shouting at someone from across the room to talking to herself, not that she entirely trusted this feeling. She decided to get to the point. You’re here to negotiate. I’m willing to discuss terms of your surrender, she added, sensing this was the kind of interrogator that liked banter and feeding into that for now.

  You’re half-right. I’m afraid to say I’m not in the best of negotiating positions right now, as it were. It has a little something to do with you cutting the last leader of this city in half, and the one everyone wants to take charge is, uhm, predisposed. There was a sad note at the end there that Eagle ignored.

  Fucking amateur, Eagle thought as the voice laid out his own weak points.

  I know you’re letting that slip through on purpose, but I’m willing to look past your abrasiveness. For now. This isn’t a conversation that ends in, what is it, ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ if I don’t like your answers. Not for you or any of the other prisoners.

  That made Eagle raise an eyebrow. The voice was going hardcore good cop, which meant they wanted something. They already had the gold, and there was a far simpler way to assure their island’s secret remained safe than getting a promise out of her. Access to the Menagerie? Like hell I’m giving you my ship.

  Let’s just slow down and take a breath. First things first, none of us are here willingly. The first ship, this Rigel, crashed on the island accidentally. Honestly, we’re lucky it’s been the only one so far.

  Never heard of a lighthouse? She scoffed, making a few of the nearby prisoners and one of the guards look her way. She glared at the latter. There was nothing in the voice that made her want to disbelieve him, except for the fact that it was a disembodied voice in her head. I’m sure this is all a misunderstanding, but that doesn’t change the fact that at least half of my men are dead and that your side attacked first.

  I have two traumatized young women who disagree. Eagle grimaced. That was a fair point, a mistake on her part to try and take the moral high ground. As well as a fair number dead and injured from that battle on mine. You may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but that hasn’t changed what you’ve done. Neither do I think I could convince you to forget all of this if we let you go.

  So what is the point of this?

  To at least allow you to understand your situation. I had a devil of a time trying to figure out your language earlier and we’ve been keeping these poor people here, the Rigel’s crew, not yours, without any sense of what or who we are. If you would be receptive to information, then I’m sure you also wouldn’t mind putting it in a way your compatriots would better understand.

  A common maxim held that more information was always better, which you could tell was bullshit if you knew how DDOS attacks worked. Eagle operated by honing in on critical information and making the most out of that while screening out the junk. Having a smarmy ghost pump disinformation into her wasn’t the clear positive he was trying to make her believe. Still, I guess I’m in the mood for a good story.

  Very well, the voice replied, taking the win. First of all, we aren’t monsters. We should know, because we live with them. Perhaps I should start with your earlier question and tell you about the little bothersome lizards we call dragons.

  …

  “I’m sorry,” Daniel said again, seeing the state his mother was in. The last few days had been harder on her than anyone else, and that was saying something considering his sisters had been temporarily kidnapped. That was part of the problem. There was also the suspicion every native of Eido now had toward them, though it was directed at Kara the least.

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  Anyone looking at her could tell she’d been running ragged. Long hours weren’t anything new to a physician of Earth, yet she was working without many modern conveniences or a support staff trained in the methods she was familiar with.

  Even so, she paused and looked at Daniel and Alex, wiping her hands on a makeshift gown made for her to wear while the others were washed. She’d had more of those brought too, but not enough. Her look was weary and conflicted, for all she tried to hide it. “No, I’m sorry. Alex, I should be spending more time with you and Ami. I just.”

  “It’s ok, Mom,” Alex assured, but without the force of her usual assured confidence. Six armed thugs had stormed the yacht and drugged her at gunpoint, and it was only thanks to Chris and Lograve that she was alive. All things considered, including Ami, she was taking it well. “Daniel wanted to try talking with that Knight and Lograve’s busy with something else. Is he?”

  Kara grimaced, and for a moment Daniel was sure she was going to tell them not to visit, but it passed. “I’d take him out of there if I could. Not that he’s dangerous, but I don’t have the people to move him or the walls to keep him out. Neither does he see how he’s hurting himself.”

  “I think he does, he can just tolerate a lot of pain,” Daniel said sadly. Octyrrum-Daniel had never known the secret Gadriel had kept locked down, which was unsurprising and surprising at the same time. Evalyn had eventually folded and admitted her fears and hope for her family, but Gadriel had never once mentioned what he’d lost to the Upswell. “How is she? I mean, is there any chance?”

  His mother’s hands clutched each other down by one side in an unconscious movement, and she shook her head. “No. She should be dead already, and I think the only reason she can be alive at all is that her brain stem was undamaged. Though that’s supposing the biology is close to ours. I’m still not sure, and I can’t possibly speculate on how this endurance of hers affects her. If the damage was less severe, if she had a chance, we would still be talking about skull grafts, rehabilitation, months to years with no reasonable expectation for a full recovery. Regaining consciousness at all would be a… a miracle.”

  Daniel knew there were people out there who were so religious they spurned modern medicine, secure in the knowledge that faith alone would heal. While Kara had met people who could make that work, she was and always had been someone who was both devout in her faith and trusting in science. While one was failing, she didn’t seem to anticipate another kind of intervention.

  Rather than raise points of magic or what could happen if they got Masika back to the Octyrrum, Daniel just nodded in acknowledgment. “I won’t get his hopes up. That’s not why I’m going anyway. Thanks. Do you think you’ll be able to get dinner with us tonight?”

  Kara’s eyes panned the long hallway filled with the results of the battle three days ago, some with guards at the door, some without, before she nodded. “I’ll make it work.”

  …

  He didn’t turn as they entered the room. Gadriel remained as Daniel had seen him last, sitting aside Masika’s with both hands clasped at his forehead, head bent, like he was asleep or in prayer. Someone had managed to get the armor off of him, but those two glowing armbands remained. Before him was the wounded Cleric, unmoving on the bed. The burns had been treated at this point, as well as other incidental damage she’d taken, but her head was another matter. At least it was bandaged, but you could tell the shape wasn’t right despite accounting for the difference in species.

  Daniel nodded to his sister and she said something a bit haltingly in the language of the Octyrrum. Part of what she’d been doing while Chris and Ami had been gone was learning it, mostly for something to do and to make up for the fact that there were only two people on the island who could talk to her without Lograve’s help. She hadn’t matched the Arcanist’s speed by any means, but there was something to be said for the power of immersion in a foreign language.

  Gadriel’s head lifted a few centimeters and he responded in kind. The voice was respectful as always, but broken. It was as if he had pulled Excalibur out of a lake and found it covered in rust. The pain must be finally getting to him with everything else that’s happened. He’d been bearing it all the while, relieved only by the effect of Evalyn’s bond. His mother’s suggestion had been rejected out of hand after she’d warned him about the possibility of addiction.

  “He says he thanks us for visiting, but he’s afraid he isn’t in a state to be a good host,” Alex translated after a moment. It wasn’t easy for her to do it simultaneously as Lograve could, and she wasn’t perfect either. The few other times she’d tried this with him she’d had to ask for clarification and could have an entire side conversation before it was relayed to Daniel. He had been trying himself but was finding it far more difficult.

  “Sounds like Gadriel, at least.” He wasn’t sure exactly how to respond. Daniel hadn’t come here with some fix or speech figured out beforehand. I should just- “Tell him I’m sorry she’s hurt, we’re thinking of him, and that he should let us know if he needs anything.” It sounded banal. The point wasn’t the words but that he was here saying them. Or, that Alex was for him.

  His sister puzzled that out into Gadriel’s language while he looked awkwardly around the room. There were signs of his mother’s attention, from the IV running fluids she’d somehow managed to place to the stitching on Gadriel’s leg. There were feathers on the floor, not from inattention to the room’s cleanliness but that some were falling off of Masika on occasion. She had a blue plumage primarily, a bit dark and bordering on green.

  Another fell as Gadriel just grunted in thanks, the sound weak enough that it told Daniel he was true in his word about his willingness to talk. He was going to leave it at that, but Gadriel looked down and then turned in his chair, saying something with a hint of reflection.

  “Has anyone told you of us?’” Alex translated, her face scrunched. “I think he’s trying to get something off of his chest.”

  “No,” Daniel replied directly to Gadriel, leveraging one of the few words he was confident in. He added to Alex, “But he doesn’t have to tell us if he-“

  Gadriel started talking at the same time, and they locked eyes. Daniel saw guilt and regret and let him continue. It took longer for him to understand than it did for Gadriel to say, Alex having to clarify a few times and even rely on Gadriel to try expressing what he could in English. It was a complicated issue, touching on concepts Earth didn’t have, but if Gadriel could have spoken directly to Daniel, he would have said this.

  “I came to the Thormundz after my exile from Threst. On that, it is too much to say, but I will speak of Thest. My home. I know of its issues, the attitudes of its people, but consider that it is a bastion of their species. Perhaps here, where it seems humans predominate, you do not understand. Humans are still the Octyrrum’s favored children. We are the most numerous, develop most often into Blessed. Well, save for draconoids, but they have their own issues. No, I do not cast blame on the avianoids for being forthright in their own space.”

  Gadriel’s tone had grown distant at this part of the story, and he remained unbothered by Alex’s imperfect translations. “If anything, it was a joy to watch them soar. Flight is a keystone of the species, and when I had become Blessed I had hoped… but my wish was granted capriciously, it seems.”

  His gravity powers, Daniel thought, but didn’t interrupt to confirm his suspicion.

  “When I came to the Thormundz it was as an outcast. It is claimed those who serve dutifully have their pasts erased. Perhaps that could have been the case, but for Heldren.” The solemness around Gadriel briefly parted whenever he mentioned the fallen Tyrant, anger rising that Daniel hadn’t seen before on the Hero, not even when he’d dueled the man or confronted his other self that first time they’d met. It would’ve made Daniel afraid if it were directed at him.

  “He could be said to be like me, were it not for circumstance. In attributes I believe we were matched, though he was hasty to reach level 3, and even quicker to debase himself for personal gain. Instead of an exile, he came to the Thormundz as a volunteer having heard of my story. Any of the flights or those above certain station could not have avoided the news, thanks to- No, I digress.”

  A break in the conversation, his mother coming in to check on them and forcing Gadriel to drink some water. He couldn’t resist her when she insisted and appeared surprised by his thirst after the first sip, quickly draining the glass he’d been given. “Suffice it to say I was made an unpopular figure by his hand. He tarnished my honor and name in the service of those who had wronged me in Threst, hoping to gain their favor. My word and deed were meaningless. All they had garnered me were four allies who saw past the lies. Borjin, Sarah, Reshi, and Masika. She is all that remains.”

  Daniel thought that was why he was so torn up, but something on Alex’s face told him the worst was yet to come. “During our years hunting, I admit, I grew… enamored. It is not impossible for humans and avianoids to pair, they are one of the more common species to, in fact, though some form of aid is still required to reproduce. This is the heart of the problem.” Gadriel picked up one of the feathers from the floor and looked at it for the rest of his explanations. “Her full name is Masika Windwing. Perhaps you are not aware, for it is not a well-known fact to most humans, but the last name of a Grafted species is significant. There are ‘true names’ which signify one’s line has never crossed outside of their species.”

  There were a few questions had here to clarify how any had remained pure-blooded, a term Daniel decided to immediately kill using the first time after he said it, and Gadriel just turned the feather in his hand as he said, “It is not an easy thing to allow for two of differing species to sire, though two Blessed could manage. But you are correct. The true names have persisted because they are valued, and because there are ways to assure purity of one’s line. It is a point of pride, and Masika,” his head turned to regard the avianoid briefly, the one time his head moved.

  “She rejected me. Not harshly, not unkindly, but because she felt too pressured to maintain her name. There was interest, she admitted as much, but… It was not meant to be. That was to be the end of it, or so I had hoped, but my heart, this treacherous heart could not let her go. I had become poisoned by the hope that one day she might reconsider. My honor prevented me from pursuing her further, it would be unseemly. She had her reasons, but love does not care for reason. In the end, in the days before the Upswell, I had started to become, if not satisfied, accepting of how matters stood, and satisfied only to be a close friend that could at least witness her happiness when she found someone she would not reject.”

  The feather dropped from Gadriel’s hands. “Then the Upswell came, and I lost her. I had begun to move on, only for fate to reunite us. My hope, kindled and smothered again. Now, at least, I can be here until the end and let it finally die.”

  Daniel felt physically sick after Gadriel had stopped talking. Not from disgust, but from just how much the Hero had been carrying. “Why did he tell us this?” he asked Alex, who was hiding her tears.

  “Your mother has asked for me to remove myself on several occasions. I understand the reasons, of course, and I am grateful for what she has done,” Gadriel replied. “Perhaps now, she can understand why I cannot agree to this. I do thank you, Daniel and Alex, for visiting me, but now that I have spoken my piece I wish for some time to reflect.”

  …

  “You ok?” Daniel asked as the two stepped out of the room.

  Alex wiped at her face again and shook her head. “No. I think I need to talk with Ami.”

  “I’m not good enough?” Daniel asked in an attempt at humor.

  She half-smiled. “You know how it is.” Twins. If it was at all possible here, they’d probably form a bond if it hadn’t happened already. There was no way to tell, only the odd interaction with how Lograve’s power affected them. “Sorry, I know Lograve’s going to be busy, though if you learned the language yourself you wouldn’t have this problem.”

  “Working on it,” Daniel shrugged. “It’s ok. I won’t need it for who I’m going to next.”

  “Chris?” Daniel shook his head and Alex understood after that. “Alright, but be back at the house before dusk. I’m serious about us all having dinner together. We need it.”

  “I’ll be there,” Daniel assured and saw his sister off before making his way to another visit. In the aftermath of the mercenary invasion there had been one more development. It was a good one, but it came with another surprise.