Chapter 29: Chapter 30: A gate guardian, a heroine of heartbreak, and handmaiden

"Nope," says the three-horned guardian in the ash-swept aperture. Fluted silver armor and a glimmering blue surcoat patterned on Kairliina's dreams of her heritage, of the the future Graesh Saelvur. A Harrower of the Cobalt Immortals. Psionic elite. Death, fire, and zeal. The seed, perhaps, of a Carag soldier. "Not happening. I sense the rage rolling off you and I am not dealing with this today."

The heroine--self-appointed, of course--grinds her teeth and raises her shotgun higher. "Oh, I'm SORRY!" The guardian's whirling spear smashes away the first spread of buckshot. A wave of pure force disperses the next. She keeps firing, and spits hatred all the while. "I apologize for the inconvenience! Sorry the destruction of a stupid shithole MORTAL town doesn't matter to you--"

"I fully understand that you want your loved ones back," the guard says. Their words cut across the righteous tirade as though wreathed in a great wake of stillness. "That doesn't give you a single scrap of right to invade our home and try to hurt Kairliina. I doubt you could, but she's worried that she already depends too much on violence to express herself. I want to help her keep growing. Machrae Diir looks after its own." The armored figure settles back, reclining against the doorframe, and examines their claws.

"The Lady didn't destroy your town. Volcanic eruptions just happen. If I was indifferent to your suffering, you'd be dead. But like I said, got my own community to think of."

They blow out a breath that reverberates loudly inside their silvery helm. "I hope you find someone who can help. Truly. But if I let you in there, either Machrae Diir's going to eat you long before you reach her, or you'll try to pull some codependent crap and… Well, and then if it works you'll encourage her to pity you, mentor you, sacrifice for you even while you hurt her." The spear's butt thumps down. "More likely, she'll recognize that you're trying to seize control of her life for your own ends and kill you where you stand. Her prerogative, but again, she wants to focus more on lust than violence. So, you stay out."

"S-she's powerful enough to raise the dead," the heroine says.

"Lots of us are powerful enough to raise the dead," the Immortal observes. "Machrae Diir's full of witches, seers, occultists, mystics of all kinds. Some of them are even human! There's no call to bother the Lady in particular if you want to resurrect someone. Are you strong enough to accept what that's gonna mean? Dying changes people. So does resurrection. Those experiences don't just leave our souls after we have 'em."

They shrug. "Either way, the life you knew is over. The people you built it with don't exist. As for new bonds? You're either gonna alienate the folks with healthy boundaries, or really mess up the others, by trying to pull them into the patterns of your past."

"I-I'll use this gun on myself--" says the quavering voice of a child without a home.

Seized by unseen force, the glinting gun-barrel wrenches into corkscrew shapes and compacts until it's shut. Then, just to drive the point home, the trigger fuses to the guard.

"Fuck. Off." The Harrower growls. "Fuck you for trying to guilt people into letting you trample their boundaries. If you want our help, ask. You're lucid enough, you can speak. And you know what, if you're so eager to die, just ask that instead, I'll be happy to--"

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A diminutive blue-clad form steps up beside the guardian. "This one is bidden to inform the drifter that she may take a home on the Rift of Recompense," the handmaiden says. "Work will be made if she needs the distraction. No meeting with the Lady is forthcoming." She turns her attention fully on the would-be invader. "Kairliina seldom monitors these entrances herself, these days. We have scryers, a communications network, you know... a community? You're far too late to guilt your way into our Lady's graces."

"Yeah, and just a little heads-up," the Immortal says, "Machrae Diir proper exists beyond morality. Nobody's gonna tolerate your toxic horseshit from a sense of well-meaning pity. You can mourn as much as you like, that's your right, but don't expect to moralize it into control over others."

"This would not have worked in any case," the handmaiden says. "This one is bidden to tell the drifter that she reeks of dissonance. Any demon of the deep ways can smell the aura-stench with their other-sight from ten miles away."

"You... you're..." the girl with the gun that doesn't fire drops her arms. "How can you be this cruel?"

"If we can be this cruel, why do you want in?" the guardian shoots back. "'cuz you're afraid of loneliness? You think that's healthy? Hanging out with folks who make you sad?"

"This one is bidden to tell you nourishment will be provided if you wish to walk the lonely road," the handmaiden says. "You will not starve, nor be permitted to die once the Lady takes heed of your steps. But, and this one quotes, 'I am too old to build friendships on a lie.'" She shrugs, then adds, "she said that about thirty Earth years ago, I believe." A slow smile. "She's finally standing firm in it."

The ash-encrusted figure of a girl who lost everything stares, stiffens, and then marches away.

She screamed at the sky often in the weeks to come, especially when food and water appeared next to her bedroll. But of course, the Lady never answered her.

The handmaiden had said only that nourishment would be provided. She never said the Lady would be listening to a word the spiteful little idiot said. As for whether anyone in Machrae Diir will resurrect the dead of her town, well... that's between our necromancers and their ghosts.

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