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"The sounds of the Rift are mostly all echos. There the falls in the distance, near the castle. It isn't water, I don't think. Obsidian always told me never to drink it. That it was poison. Footsteps echo a little. Not as far. The cavern room is high. Out of sight of the crystal light in some places. I did not sing aloud there. I tried to limit what noise I made. "

"Noise is strange, if it isn't some Youma's noise, and they have all been there for ...since the castle fell maybe. There are some new, like Bazzite, but every day is the same there. Differences catch attention. It was better to be quiet, uninteresting, and seem like more trouble than my starseed was worth. In the Rift, officers are guests, at best. "

"I didn't rest much on the way, because of that. Lighting a lantern was a strange light, and would make them curious. I don't have my own youma to have called on to protect me in sleep. Maybe Bazzite would have, but maybe he wouldn't. I didn't risk it. I didn't want him telling Beni that I was down there. Or anyone wondering why, other than in a vague way in the population of Youma. They've seen me, at least, often enough training with Obsidian. "

"The most sound I made was breaking through crystal, once I summoned my hammer. "

"It was because I was looking for a building belonging to the court. Nobles put their arms on things- English, French, Scandinavian, German, Italian, Russian. Even Asian nobility had their helmet things and flags. I was looking for proof of the fjord, so it would have to be in a plac elike that. If there was a knighthood, they would have sworn to their monarch. The marks of them would be somewhere. It was HHHH to...I didn't mark it. It was wide, that last road. The symbol of Earth was worked into the pattern of the stone, paler rocks set into the dark bricks...or ...rocks ...or whatever they were using. The pale stone was like marble. I don't know much about stones.. That was where I first saw what I was looking for in a government building. It was so long it went into shadow at either end out of my sight. It had windows. Actual windows of glass where the crystal hadn't drowned it. The buildings there in the Rift, in the Capital, don't look very much like the Lofotr Vikingmuseum. Or the Foteviken Viking Village Museum. I think glass was very rare in old times. Expensive. At least history classes made it like that. Maybe it wasn't, but this building had colored glass, like churches, and that must have been expensive if the people were still used to knights. I thought it could be wrong, maybe a bank, or a grave place. But there were a few other large buildings there, too. Like Washington D.C. or London, big buildings all together. "

"I'd gone to the front of it, or what seemed like the front and faced towards the castle far away. There was a lot of crystal there, deep purple and barely lit. It took me six hours, I checked my watch. It was just using my hammer to hit sections of the crystal to break off the big pieces and then clear them away. Like mining. Just clearing the one door of the crystal. The door was sunken in under a half circle and carved art like churches in France. There were three doors. I didn't clear the other two. They're still buried behind feet of crystal."

"The crystal had stayed to the outside of the building though. It hadn't grown inside. It was the rooms inside, and the bigger room....too big. The room with the chairs and chairs. It didn't make sense, but it was bigger than the outside of the look of the already big building. " Maybe that was too many bigs in a sentence, but he wasn't paying as much attention to elegant or even correct structure to words. Titan closed his eyes, rolling his shoulders with some discomfort at the ghosts of sensations- the fatigue and aching stabs of dehydration in joints and muscles. Hver's voice still registered as her own, as her, but it was creepy in the light, mood and memory of the Rift even ghosted to some unfinished seacreature exhibit.

Is there something that could be found out from my memories of the place? Other than just an idea of it as a place? I don't know. Maybe it can be compared against something Kairatos remembers? Or any other knight's memories? Or their ancestors, like Mena....Babylon's. If they're not all gone like the older lord of the lamplight streets.

" The cushions on the seats were still shining with gold thread. There were shining stones in the knotwork. The floor stones were made in pictures of roots. They got more and more to the raised floor at the back. There were seats on that, so far down the room that the lamp hadn't reached them from the doors. There was a greater seat in the center and two on either side behind it. Flanked in support. Those seats didn't have the plates. They had large symbols of Earth on their backs. All eyes would see those seats if they spoke, or would look on someone who spoke from the floor. Maybe standing or maybe walking. "

"The plates...I thought they must be the houses that served the monarch. The air was so still there. I could feel it tight in my chest, tighter than when I have been to other places with history. Somehow- somehow that whole place and every person who had touched it, every house that served it, every person high and low from noble to woodworker and stonelayer has been wiped out of every book. There are no marks of any of it anywhere. Not in stone, wood, paper...no class or teacher talks about it. Down there is every monument left on Earth about the Earth's capital city, the government, the people, the Knights and their system of magic and wonders. That time. I have never seen a Knight of Earth's wonder. Maybe those places hold small pieces. But the rest....it is all there and all lost. " Even speaking of it hurt.

'I have not served as I should. I will make it right.' But how. I don't know how one knight could raise the city from its crystal grave or from the occupation by its own enemy. I don't even know where the Rift is on this planet. Knights must have stood against the siege- the map and its pieces and plans. So many could do nothing to prevent it. So how could one redeem it? Pain turned his visage to a grimace, teeth bared against the despair of the place and any hopes to it's return. He did not check the tears that came. Hatr er hjarta dauði.

"I tried all the plates on the floor, and those in the upper seats. The upper ones were different. They were marked with other planets. I thought of vacations to castles, and found there were halls and rooms behind the great seats on the raised floor. That was where I found the map and all the pieces still on it. I brought the little pieces, too. They're wrapped in cotton with the plates. Some of the streets and buildings I made out after a long time. And I followed each of the waterways on it looking for a place with other buildings clustered to a larger ones that looked important. When I found one, I looked around the rest of that room. The other scrolls were all decaying to dust. There were cups and furniture. I don't think anyone came there again after the plans on the map. There was no marks of battle or theft. There were no bones. Not in what I explored. Battle or siege change what is worth. "

Touch of hand and voice were welcome. Titanlåvenite closed his eyes against the glow, external or internal worlds of memory and presence. It was better with just Hvergelmir and himself. He lifted his hand to cover over hers on his arm. The grimace took some time to smooth away, but it did with her there. She was as balm as the shimmering mantle she wore.

Can it live where it lies, eaten through with maggots? It feels impossible. The dreams gave no hope in the founding of so many great and princely knights to follow Camelot. The foundation was always ruined beneath the feet of new royalty. But Lady Hvergelmir is wiser than I am. She serves Sailor Cosmos. There must be roots to warm the Earth that aren't a part of the capital or the throne. The wonders exist. Camelot exists. Lyonesse must exist out there, somewhere. The fjord with its mountains and waters.
"Is any of the information useful to you?" Then he remembered all the bags left behind at the bench. "The other things we left at the park...there was a box there of things the Knight may need, a letter to him. You can look through or use any of it if you want as well. If you would be willing to keep them for him. It's hard to find clothes..."

"I will find a Youma to witness the fall as my second. The last step is arranging a day with the Bull and one of the Royalty. Are you still willing? At your quiet land with the sky of stars?"

His gaze drew down to her cheek, framed by whorls of opalescent silk, lay stark and warming on his arm. She'd kissed his hand. She stood near. It felt as long as she was near, the stars might hear his petition for forgiveness and cleansing. Asking the Earth itself, alone on his bunk in the Dark Kingdom, in the blacks of his mind did nothing. As long as the Lady Hvergelmir was near, there was a chance of hope- her faith would surely reach her Lady Cosmos.

"I am a member of the Special Operations. One of our duties is to find would-be traitors, or track down those who already have turned against our Kvaen, Metallia. I tracked Realgar's life- his name, his job, his finances, his digital footprint, his family and friends. With little Alkahest's help, I looked for any connection that could be found for his defection. Connections lead to the identities of enemies, to Realgar's identity as Kairatos. There was not much. "

"I wanted to leave as little to follow me, and even less reason to look. My plan was to claim my Youma servant from the Rift as a witness. Kairatos and I will have a battle- He will win. I take a wound enough to look true. I leave the magic of my uniform. Kairatos ashes my Youma- it will return to the Rift. It will regenerate there. It's memory and all proof will point that Titanlåvenite is dead. And I hope they will think the Fjord chose some other to bear it's name." The hesitation of her question dogged his thoughts. "It is alright? Did I missed some thing?"

Had failure occurred to him, and he'd ignored it? Or had it, in some youthful bravado, not considered it at all? They would not be able to practice the blows at all. Even movie doubles took serious harm, sometimes, faking fights they practiced for hours. I think I knew it was dangerous. I have so much family. I will die either way to them. I just don't want the Negaverse to have reason to find them specifically. Death accomplished that, too.

But Lady Hvergelmir is afraid. Can I follow how she thinks? She is not counting the lives in Norway and Sweden against mine. She has never weighed how many I have killed or wounded in this war. She does not want to lose either of her friends and ....potential lovers. She is afraid. Saying we will be careful will not help. There is no assurance words can give. Accidents happen, as she says. A stray inch. Titanlåvenite turned slowly, careful not to spill her as he extricated his arm. It was only brief removal of contact - he brought it back and his other around in order to wrap her secure and close. He wasn't sure if the contact would reassure where words wouldn't.

"The ribbon will be close- it is in the box we've left behind. Officers ...we are expected, but not required, to carry starseeds on us for emergency. I don't prefer using souls to heal my body, but it is a protection against actual death. It will be hard to see. Even as a play, it is hard to see our hearts fallen to the ground. It is alright to be afraid, Lady. I am as well. " He waited to see if the embrace helped. He wanted to kiss her, like Kairatos. The action so often burned away other thoughts and fears with the certainty of the heartbeat and breath on their lips. His own heart beat hard, like was trying to break out of it's prison of bones.

I am important?
How an enemy, a captain, a fool, could be important to so high a lady, Titanlåvenite. But she said it against him, her face at his chest, with no indications prior or following it that directed the statement towards Herger, Nærøyfjord Knight of the Earth. She said it, aloud, and he had never been given a concrete proof of her lying or intrigue. She was as she was: a high lady with high ideals, peppered with human insecurities and failings, young, wise, but never spurious. "Your heart made the sky a road, Lady of the Roaring Cauldron. Hvergelmir, Knight of the Cosmos. Woman behind all these titles- whose name I don't know. You hold faith for those without any, so they finally find their own. The road is clear, and worth the risk."

Får inte. Det går inte . Vill inte.
Any wish, I try to find a way to achieve it. But all the stars live around your home and they are better for wishing than broken weapons. Not long. Your faith and Lady Cosmos, Kairatos' help and valor, and my will ....to set it right... we can make it and a knight will be reforged from pieces that Metallia and I ruined. He bent, tracing his fingertips hopefully at her jaw to lift her face from his chest and shirt. It wouldn't do to part ways with all her heart dwelling in terror. He was certain she could weather much, but capability was not always need. The thoughts didn't seem solid enough to say. 'Try' was not certainty of success, no more than her nerves already troubled her about the ruse. Action seemed more solid, lasting and definite. With Kairatos, kisses burned away ruminations for a while. Could it work the same for Hvergelmir? Every person was different.

It was worth the try, for her comfort and for the feel of fire against all the pressing dark of his own memories. Leaning down, Titan pressed his lips to hers to drink. He liked how the smaller crest of her chin fitted and pushed against his labret.