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Balls.

A string of curses ran through Rylan's head as he realized with a jolt that it was gray and raining.

Even now, having found himself on the wrong side of Ashdown several times and having developed a better command of the powers he'd been given, he still found himself accidentally wandering across the divide without quite meaning to. Every time it happened, he cursed whichever one of that sinister pair was responsible for making the world the way it was. Damn them.

"Sorry, buddy," he said to the black bird sitting atop his head, which had let out a rather disgruntled chirp.

He was about to wander off in search of an exit when a voice sounded behind him, and he turned to see Tibbie looking rather pitiful in the rain. The poor girl. Rylan would have offered her his jacket if it wasn't getting rapidly drenched itself, and as it was he could only offer this barely-hopeful response: "Uh. Short answer, no I don't. Long answer, we're bound to find a way out if we keep looking."

It probably wasn't what she wanted to hear. The firefighter in him kicked into gear, and he continued, "But hey, don't worry, if you're looking for an exit, we'll get you out of here."

Rylan nodded and gave her his best comforting smile, a bright sunny thing that lit his face as if there wasn't a worry in the world to concern either of them. "Yea, we'll figure this out," he said confidently, even though finding a way out was always more a game of chance than anything else. The only claim to fame he had in that regard was that he'd gotten better, lately, at guessing which areas might lead to real Ashdown. "I've never been stuck here for more than a couple hours."

He began to walk, leading the way down Ashdown's at once familiar and unfamiliar streets. It was a good thing she was here. Rylan never liked to dwell on how sad the town looked on this side, how empty, as if all the warmth had been sucked out of it. In a place that rained all the time, it was hard to feel at home.

"I'm Rylan," he said. "Pleasure's all mine, Tibbie. Can't tell you how nice it is to have someone to talk to for a change over here. Makes you feel a whole lot braver, doesn't it? Having some company." By which he meant, she made him feel better. Whether or not that was true - and in this case, it certainly was - it seemed like the right thing to say, maybe, to keep her from continuing to shrink into her dress under the rain.

"Oh! Thank you. This is my buddy Imp," he said, plucking the shrike off his head with one hand and holding the bird next to his face so she could see their matching eyes. "He's my familiar, I guess you could call him. A warg. We're... well, I hate to say we're regulars, but it looks like it's becoming that way." Much to his dismay.

"That would be incredibly cool," he agreed, opening his hand to let Imp hop contentedly back to his shoulder with a quiet churr. "He's not a shapeshifter, sadly. But he's... A bit like a conduit for my vision, I guess. I can see through his eyes."

The initial, rather spontaneous development of that ability had scared him half to death but the more he used it, the more comfortable it felt. The headaches still plagued him after extensive use, but even those were becoming par for the course. Pain had never been enough to deter him from anything.

"It's pretty crazy to see through a bird's eyes," he admitted. "Colors you could never imagine without seeing them. It makes the world through our eyes seem incredibly dull."

"Apparently we can," Rylan answered with a lopsided smile. Tibbie's enthusiasm was so pure and real that it was refreshing. There wasn't a lot of genuine excitement left in the world - at least not in theirs, not when there was so much at stake. "I can feel what he's feeling, but I can't control him. Maybe one day, when we know each other a little better."

And then... his smile grew wide, and even a little wistful. "Flying is... incredible," he said without hesitation. "I don't think you can ever understand what it feels like to be free until you've flown like a bird. If I were him, I'd never come back to earth."

If he could have his way, he'd spend all of his time with Imp, soaring above Ashdown without a care in the world. If the migraines weren't so damned painful, he might have.

"Oh, sure," he said, looking down at the cat nestled in Tibbie's bag. Imp blinked owlishly at Nibbs, tilting his head one way and then the next as he studied the cat. "One of the guys who discovered he could warg around the same time as me, his familiar was a cat. A huge fluffy cat. I think you could do it too."

As to how she might even start to learn how to warg... Rylan wasn't too sure. His certainly hadn't been voluntary, but maybe if she tried hard enough, long enough, it could work. Maybe some people were meant for it while others were not.

"If you need any help figuring it out, let me know," he said. Ashdown needed someone as enthusiastic about it all as Tibbie. "And yea, that's a good way of putting it. The magic that makes people dream, not the kind that pulls all the laughter out of the world."

He gestured at the rain and the dreary landscape around them with an uninspired shrug. Case in point.

"I wouldn't say I know a ton," he added. "But I know some. Enough to get by, at least, although there's a lot I've yet to figure out."

Sometimes, it frustrated him to know that they came ever closer to letting the Enemy out of his cage, making it at once easier and harder to defeat him, without truly knowing how to win. How would they take their world back when they didn't even have the right tools for it?

"This place, right? This is the Enemy's place. He trapped the world in a never-ending cycle, kind of like a home-made board game that only he can win. He wants to destroy our world, and he's... well. He's getting close." That was about the only way to put it.

"It is bad," he agreed. "But from what I've learned, it seems there's something... different this time around. The timeline's changed. I don't know if you heard about Michael Mitchell a few months ago, but his death wasn't supposed to happen until a later cycle, which I think means that there's an opportunity somewhere for us to win."

He glanced over at Tibbie, saw the look on her face, wondered what justice there was in someone so young and unfettered being forced to witness the tithe. An uneasy expression crossed his face, and there was a brief silence before he began to answer.

"It... depends on how you look at it, I guess," he said finally. "Adoelle was one of three teenagers that made up the cage that was both keeping the Enemy trapped and protecting him. We've been told that the only hope we have of getting rid of him is to break the cage, which both lets him out and gives us a chance to defeat him."

And this was where things got tricky.

"So... when it comes to deciding whether or not we messed up, or did the right thing... I guess it comes down to whether you think the greater good is worthy of the sacrifice of a few individuals." He glanced over at Tibbie again. "But either way, given how it all went down, I'm not convinced we could have saved her."

"I know, she..." Rylan paused and saw how very miserable she looked then. How he wished he knew what to say, because all the comforting phrases he usually tossed out to people he helped were either patently untrue right now or would hardly help.

It's going to be okay and It's not your fault seemed rather out of place right now.

"Here, let's sit down," he said, guiding her toward a sheltered bus stop across the street that would offer a little respite from the rain. "I can't tell you that you had nothing to do with it, or that it's not your fault. That's something you'll have to figure out for yourself. But I'll tell you what a wise man told me."

Rylan sat down on the bench and let Imp hop down onto his knee. The bird shook the water out of his feathers, sending droplets spraying everywhere.

"You have to find a way to make your peace with it. No matter who was right or wrong, it happened. There's no changing that. And it's not easy, but... you can't carry it with you forever."