{Alexandra} The Orion's Equal - Moments in Time

Alex sat with her eldest childe, running her fingers over the ring on the fourth finger of her left hand, over and over, as if trying to understand it, trying to derive some truth from it that it hadn't already shared with her.

"Will you be upset if I marry, Ellis?" She asked, eyes distant, voice trembling with sorrow and- fear? Nervousness?

The man next to her considered for a long time, and eventually shook his head.

"No," he said, "I won't. Those of the Monachal Creed will be, but it isn't them that matters- it's what is right in your belief."

Alex nodded, and considered the ring again.

"I don't know if I can love him like he does me."

"Has he asked you to love him like that?" Ellis countered, without scorn, without judgement, only the question on his lips.

"Well... no. He hasn't." She paused for a moment. "And I don't think he will."

"How do you see him? What is he to you?"

Alex closed her eyes and considered her lover, his eyes, his words, his hands, his heart before her. There would be no other like him, and that thought struck her speechless for a moment, as Atalanta before Meleager.

She opened her eyes, and smiled shakily at her childe.

"He is... my equal."

Ellis smiled in return, and put his hand on hers, and she wondered at the touch as he spoke.

"That is a good start. In fact, that is an ideal start. You must reflect, though, and contemplate. Pray if you will. This is not an easy thing, and you still have your year and a day."

Alex leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.

"Thank you, Ellis. You always have the best advice for your sire."

{Skirruk} They have taught her how to hate

Skirruk's front brain, the curious child, kept trying to tell her that the nothing abover her was sky, and that it's colour was grey. Here, her back brain, the Wilder, the one who understood how the world worked, disagreed, and worked to keep her attention away from the colour of the nothing, and even worse, the thing behind the nothing, which would stare back if any of them paid too much attention to it.

This was not right. This should not be. This came from the dark places, the places beyond the worlds, where the gods of the Illithids lived, and it was trying to climb through into this place. Then they would not need Madoc Idrys, who wanted to destroy everything that was not him and his, no- then they could unmake everything, bring the Outer Astral into the places that lived and breathed and hummed with life and unmake them into nothing. Like the sky in this place.

The dreams of the people went about trying to construct the temple to the thing that was not, their bodies running into the doors that the Illumians had barred in the real world. Only Qelkah the Telepath was able to speak to them, his shiny thing kept him safe at least a little, but his body had betrayed him, and already yielded to the thing beyond the nothing in sleep.

"We all have these-" he said, and ran his fingers through his short blonde hair, revealing a grey, glowing dome at the base of his skull, that looked almost as if it were made of stone or glass.

Skirruk shuddered, repulsed by the very sight of it.

"That's the anchor," she said, "That's what's keeping them here. We need to break them!"

And before they could stop her she was gone, in a child's flurry of movement. She jumped onto one of the men, and thrust her brain into the grey thing, with all her power and-

*pop*

She was on the ground, there was no sign of the man, and the entire world recoiled. For a brief, horrifying moment, the thing behind the nothing blinked, and it saw the Illumians, and it shrieked in outrage.

"COME ON!" Roared Skirruk, bounding to the next one as the ground started to tremble. "I can't do them all on my own!"

Gauchel, Ruthtaloth, Zurashakgau and Sekurr all leapt into action, grabbing the men and women and smashing the anchors out. One by one, they winked back into the waking world, and the dream world trembled, becoming more and less all at once as the shrieking grew louder.

At last, there was only them and Qelkah.

"Go," muttered the telepath as they went to him, "While there's still time."

He was shaking, and his brow was dotted with sweat. Skirruk's eyes widened.

"It's in your head, innit?" She asked, horrified. "You're the only one left. Let me help!"

"No, get out!" Qelkah moaned. "Go! There's no more time!"

And as a child of the cabal, she had to obey.

Skirruk awoke in the real world, as Qelkah started screaming. She ran to him, and bared her teeth at her friends as they came too close.

"Don' touch him! Not yet, it's not safe!" she snapped, hands hovering a moment away from his skin, eyes flickering with concentration.

Qelkah's screams peaked, and his eyes seeped out of his head, as if boiled out from within. In her trance, Skirruk saw his Shiny Thing, the well of his psionic power, fold in on itself and vanish, like a candle going out.

She shrieked in disbelief and alarm, scooping the now-silent telepath into her lap.

"It took his Shiny Thing. GAUCHEL, IT TOOK HIS SHINY THING AWAY!!"

She screamed with all her heart, like a human girl who had seen her mother slain, or a man weeping for the loss of his love, and though she tried, she couldn't understand why, or how to make this better.

Gauchel stood guard over the pair as Skirruk nursed her maimed brother, unsure how to help his little friend, Ruthtaloth drew sigils of warding and sanctification, and Zurashakgau and Sekurr brought the other villagers to the hall, starting with the priest.

He smiled at them, and then at Skirruk.

"I know who you are."

"And who are you, and what did you think you were doing?" Skirruk asked, struggling to keep her voice calm.

"I am but a servant, and I was making the way clear for my lords beyond." He replied with a laugh.

Skirruk's eyes narrowed as she gathered her power, and in the moment it took her to do so, Zurashakgau clubbed her soundly in the head, realising her intent. After doing the same to the cultist, she looked from Skirruk's unconscious body to Gauchel.

"She's... going to kill me, isn't she?"

Gauchel nodded slowly.

"I think she might give it a try."

"Tell her I'm sorry, but we can't afford for this one to die, he knows too much."

~*~*~*~

Back at the monestery, several days later, Davquelyi slipped in to Nahlehntra's office.

"She won't leave Qelkah's side." He said, all pretense at niceties set aside. "She blames herself for what happened to him, and insists she needs to protect him. Nahlehntra, they're in big trouble, and we are too."

"What makes you say that, Woodwing Davquelyi?"

"Because my star pupil, our eight year old girl, who could kill any one of us- or any one of them- with a thought, has learned how to hate."

Nahlehntra sighed, and pinched the bridge of her nose.

"That is... less than ideal, but is it really so unexpected?"

"Not really. But Nahlehntra... she doesn't have the same understanding of right and wrong as we do, or even her friends... how is she going to know when to stop? I understand Wilders are ruled by their emotions, so how is she going to be able to stop, and, more importantly, how can she tell the difference between what she hates and the things that look like they do? How are we going to stop her from becoming what we have feared? They have taught her how to hate- can we teach her how to not give into that?"

Nahlehntra nodded, indicating she understood him, and gestured to the files on her table, one for each of the Illumians that had gone into the dream world with the little Wilder.

"We can't. But I think they can, and they will."