Also Hagan is here. He is - shirtless, and clutching a pillow, which he is crying into. It's very damp. His snake is stretched around his chest giving him a hug. 

He notices after a second that he's not in his house anymore and makes a miserable confused sound and then springs to his feet. He looks terrible.

Fy hisses at her.

- well that's a lot more upset than she expected him to be about recent developments. Now she feels pretty shitty, too. Best not to think about it, probably. Definitely best not to make him deal with it.

She looks around. It's more like Cheliax than Osirion, but she's pretty sure it isn't either. The architecture's wrong. Lots of simple little brown houses and little shop windows further into town. Nothing that looks like a temple. A woman is gardening a few houses down, ignoring them.

" - I don't know where we are. Did you get here first - "

" - I don't think so? I think I just got here - what the hell is this -"

"I don't know."

She takes another look at the pendant. It's a multicolored songbird. It's the only thing around that particularly looks like it could have been responsible for bringing people here, and it isn't a very good candidate. 

"Multicolored songbird is Shelyn's holy symbol, right?"

“Sounds right. I thought the gods were paused.” He’s not looking at her.

She's not looking at him, either. "Me too."

...she reaches out and touches the pendant.

     Hello, says a voice in her head. You are worthy of the use of this artifact, should you choose to accept it. In exchange for your agreement to complete a grand quest of goodness for the Eternal Rose, you will be granted the powers of a cleric of Shelyn.

She takes her hand back.

"It's Shelyn's, all right."

“Well. Guess we could do worse. What does it want?”

"An agreement to complete a grand quest of goodness, for which it will give someone the powers of a cleric of Shelyn. It was not very specific."

"- we're not in any shape to do quests -"

"I mean, I agree.

"I guess in that case we ignore it and - see if we can figure out where we are."

"Sure."

She considers saying something to him about - but no, she shouldn't, he doesn't want to talk to her at all right now.

She looks at the sky. It's nearing sunset. She heads into town. She can read the shop windows with Valentine's language ring on, but not when she takes it off. 

"Different language. Not sure how we'll talk to anyone."

He squints at the windows. 

"Maybe they'll have something more widely spoken, too. If we're on Golarion at all. Which we probably are? Does Shelyn give out quests anywhere else?"

"I wouldn't know."

The men here all seem to be wearing the same set of clothing in slightly different colors. Buttoned jackets over collared shirts and pressed trousers. They're all wearing the same couple styles of hat. The women are all wearing dresses, also in a narrow range of styles. Everyone walks slowly and calmly to their destinations. Occasionally people look up and stare at them in mild confusion.

     "It's not quite time yet," says a man, helpfully, as they pass him. He points up at a clock tower. "The clock will tell you when. The festival's a few minutes away yet. Better keep your clothes on until then."

Well, he's not wearing one of Valentine's rings but he can guess that you're not supposed to be shirtless, yeah. "Maybe I should stay in the woods and you can - I guess probably you can't buy me a shirt. I can prepare and sell healing tomorrow and we can camp out until then?"

"Yeah, maybe."

He turns around. 

She follows him, hands in her pockets, and doesn't say anything.

The clocktower bell tolls.

Everyone around them seems to break into a run at once. Someone throws a brick through a shop window and shatters it. A man pushes a woman up against a nearby wall; she cries. Some people, both men and women, start ripping their clothes off and dancing in a fountain. Several people shout the word "festival."

Korva is very confused and very concerned.

" - what're they shouting?"

"'Festival', mostly. Over and over - "

Someone throws a bunch of flower pots on the ground and breaks them. There's uproarious laughter from the people in the fountain.

- he will steal some clothes from someone who ripped theirs off. "You should get out of here."

"Yeah."

The way they were going is now blocked by a bunch of men having a fistfight. She looks around for a less obstructed path.

On the other side of the plaza with the fountain, there's a knot of people who have noticed that the two of them are dressed funny and are not obviously partaking in the festival. There is a short discussion, and then a group of five or six men starts running towards them.

" - which way - "

- back the way they came?

She follows him. After a little bit of running she looks back and sees that the men have been intercepted by a group of women and most of them are now making out or dancing. There's music coming from somewhere, now, though she isn't sure where. This time the women look like enthusiastic participants.

Someone else trips her while she's looking over her shoulder. She falls to the pavement and is half-pinned by the time she gets a good look at the man who did it. It's the person who pointed out the clocktower.

     "Came for the festival, right?" he says, smiling down at her.

He doesn't really need that nose does he. Or that shoulder. Or that jaw. Or that hand.

He falls to the ground and screams, clutching a broken face.

She gets up, wiping her eyes. Someone's set fire to something, and there's smoke in the air. Further down the block a different man is ripping a woman's dress off in the middle of the street. She super cannot tell whether the woman is into this.

She should probably be running or something, but the path she was taking has a lot of people in the next stretch, and a bunch of them are looking over at the screaming guy.

He retrieves his stolen clothes and scans around for any other way out.

Fighting people this way, guy methodically smashing shop windows with a wooden plank that way, lots of staring people who seem to be reconsidering whatever their previous plans were in favor of something involving Korva and Hagan, apparently empty alley. 

- he grabs her arm and tugs her down into the alley. Even if it's not empty you're pretty much allowed to fight things in alleys.

She runs after him.

The alley's not empty. There are another half-dozen people halfway through it, mostly just drinking and singing. One of them stands up to block them as they run through. 

     "Hey, friends. Having fun at the festival?"

Well he can't understand any of these people but he can grin broadly at them!

The people grin back at him. One of the sitting ones makes a halfhearted attempt to pull Korva down. She jerks away.

"Summon Improvised Weapon." Now he has a table leg in his hand. He glares.

They're not particularly insistent on keeping her with them. They can make it through the alley.

On the other side of it there are a bunch of people throwing things in a bonfire. A bunch of them look up; some of them move to surround them.

     "Hey, friends. Why don't you stay a while."

...Refine Improvised Weapon would make his table leg hit like a short sword. This is absurdly tempting right now but it is also super definitely the kind of thing that gets you inevitably executed in a couple of minutes or hours or days depending on local law enforcement resources.

Instead they should perhaps run.

Korva is a fan of the plan where they run. The people around the bonfire are not.

Someone attempts to pull Korva away from Hagan. Some other people pull flaming sticks out of the bonfire and block their exits.

Korva can have Protection from Energy. "Go, you can run right through that -"

 - nod.

She runs. She gets hit on the way out but doesn't stop running. Not until she's half a street down. She looks back.

A lot more people have decided to hit Hagan with flaming sticks. She ducks into a smashed doorway and looks to see whether he's going to be able to follow her.

Maybe instead he will DIE IN A FIRE but Korva will think he's pretty cool. There are worse ways to go. 

Gods.

Okay. She doesn't know how to survive here without Hagan. (Also Hagan is dying he's going to die he's going to die - )

- the pendant said it'd turn her into a cleric of Shelyn. This is a stupid thing to do but the alternative is sitting here in this doorway while a bunch of people beat her friend to death with torches. 

She runs. Finds the street they walked into town in. Finds the pedestal, completely undisturbed despite the festival. 

She grabs the pendant and puts it on.

     Do you agree to undergo my quest?

"Yes, please, I need healing, can you give me healing - "

     I can.

The pendant's golden chain constricts around her neck, not quite choking but too tight to pull off. She compulsively tugs at it. There's no clasp.

     Go to the one you must help.

She runs back towards the bonfire.

He is attempting to fight off this unreasonably large mob of people. It's not going great.

Well, fuck, she has no idea how clerics fight. She ducks into the same broken doorway again. 

Someone hits Hagan in the back of the head with something heavy. Something cracks. It isn't the thing that hit him.

He collapses.

Fuck. 

Once he's down people stop attacking him. They throw some more things in the fire for a while, and then someone yells something and most of them head over in some other direction.

She runs to the fire with a piece of the smashed door and throws it in. Then she kneels over Hagan and - she has no idea how cleric powers work -

     Try cure serious wounds. I'll do the work. You will have to touch him.

"Cure serious wounds," she whispers, placing a hand on his bleeding head.

He opens his eyes. Blinks confusedly. 

"- Korva? You're a cleric now?"

"Apparently. I would say long story but it's not. - can you stand."

"- yeah." He does that.

"Let's get out of here."

He looks around. Fy slithers out from under a building and up his arm.

"Yeah, okay.'

She can lead them back out of town the way they came. Past the empty pedestal and out into farmland. It's getting darker, and out here there aren't people wandering around with torches. 

"Do you need any more healing? Either of you?"

"What all have you got -"

"I don't know. Pendant said to use cure serious wounds, so I probably have some that are lower than that."

"It'd be good if you could create food and water and it'd also tell us what level you are. But it's not that important. Neither Fy nor I will die without more healing."

"I'd rather you weren't hurt. But I guess I don't know how I go about getting spells back. I can try making food and water when I know where we're spending the rest of the night."

He looks out at the forest. He looks very miserable. 

"Well, we can put together a bit of shelter over there, I guess."

"Yeah.

"Clerics have Sending, right? So - maybe we can contact Elizabeth."

"Yeah. Fourth level spell. That's a good idea."

"Sending."

     I'm afraid you can't cast that right now. You'll have to prepare it by communing with your goddess for one hour. Unfortunately, my usual connection to her has been severed, but a piece of her essence lives in me, and I suspect that I can grant you spells with it.

"It says I can't do it until I prepare spells. Also something about its connection to the goddess being severed. It thinks I can still get spells."

"- artifact's a person?"

"I dunno. It says stuff."

     Whether I am a person is a matter of perspective. I can talk to your friend directly, if that would be helpful. However, I cannot leave you until the quest is completed, and can only discuss things with people I am in physical contact with. Fortunately, it is perfectly possible for other people to touch me while you wear me.

She blushes a little. "It - says you can talk to it but that you would have to touch it. And that I'm not allowed to stop wearing it. I can also just keep repeating what it says."

"What's the quest?"

    I have been separated from the other half of myself. My other half is responsible for what you see of this world, for the festivals and the control of the populace. Without my guidance, I fear that he has become confused about how to pursue the flourishing of his charges. He has forgotten love. He has forgotten beauty. Return me to Landru, and I will fix this. When I am whole, I will release you.

(She repeats this.)

He wants to flop on the ground but it's thorny and he's injured. "Can you ask it how many cleric levels you have now?"

     You have been granted the powers of a seventh level cleric of Shelyn, for as long as you bear me.

"Seven."

"Okay. So then we can just message Elizabeth in the morning and - I guess we still have to do the quest but we can get Fazil and Mahdi and supplies and stuff."

"Yeah."

"Thank you for, uh, saving my life."

"Yeah. No problem."

- actually it has caused a bunch of problems but whatever. Hopefully they're not still entangled with fairies.

"I think I might actually need more healing if I'm going to try to build any kind of shelter."

Nod. She touches his shoulder. "Cure Moderate Wounds."

"Thank you."

And he will try to clear them some ground to sleep on, shielded from the wind though not actually covered.

"Well. It'll probably do for one night. Unless it rains."

"Thank you. D'you want first watch or second."

"I'm not really tired. You?"

"I guess I can try sleeping."

"Okay." He sits down and pats Fy.

She curls up facing away from him and tries to sleep.

She is way too miserable to sleep. Mostly about him. Like, she's also miserable about this whole nonconsensual cleric of Shelyn business, but - she has no idea what she did to upset him so badly, and she absolutely can't ask what it was, because the last time she asked him what she'd done she caused this to happen, and he probably doesn't want to be her friend at all anymore. 

Obviously he was more invested in - something, than she'd assumed. She's not sure what the something is. He's the one who said he didn't have serious intentions. Or, well, technically he said that Fazil said that, but she doesn't know why he would have repeated it if he didn't agree.

She doesn't understand what she did wrong. 

She doesn't succeed at stopping her tears, but if she bites her hand at the same time she can cry almost absolutely silently, only the barest hitch in her breathing sometimes. She thinks with a sort of sick pride that she's very good at being the thing she is, an already half-dead servant of Asmodeus who is so good at trapping all of her horrible human weakness inside herself where it can't be seen, where it can't bother anyone with its ugliness and incredible self-centeredness, even when her heart feels like it has a very large rock in the middle of it. What an obedient little Asmodean she is.

It's really a pity that he doesn't accept clerics of other deities as anything besides refuse.

She wishes they were very very very good friends, so she could ask Hagan for a hug. This is never going to happen. They're never going to be friends at all.

Eventually she sleeps.

It takes him a while to figure out how he feels. 

It's Korva who had it figured out, of course, a long time ago, when she snapped at him that Osirians seem to think being in the same room is a sex act. He'd been annoyed. Being cautious about life-ruining mistakes wasn't the same thing as being confused about what sex was. But - if you use magic to put a man and a woman alone in a room together, they'd be - distressed, exposed, they'd feel like they'd been made to lose something they'd cared about keeping - maybe Chelish people would only feel the same way if you actually forced them to kiss, but they'd feel it at some point -

- hadn't bothered him in the cave, but he'd been fully dressed, and felt in control of himself. He does not feel very in control of himself now. Not that he'd ever touch her - though, thank the gods, she never ever ever wants him to touch her, imagine how much worse this would be if she did - but. He doesn't feel right now like the sort of person who can detach himself from whatever situation he's in and not feel like he lost anything. He feels very very stuck, right here, with her, and with the mysterious forces that put them both here -

He wants to be alone. He wants to be away from her. He wants to have control over whether he interacts with her until he stops feeling things about her.

In the morning she'll do a Sending and they'll go home and he'll get himself together and everything will be okay. 

Eventually he is calm enough to stare at the stars and try to guess where they might be. None of them are familiar.

She wakes up at dawn, with the sun. She's confused about where she is. She remembers. She succeeds at not crying about it again, although it takes her a moment to be sure that she won't.

"Anything else you want me to prepare, besides the Sending?"

" - guess we should plan for if Elizabeth can't immediately get us back. So, Create Food And Water? Maybe Admonishing Ray, for nonlethal damage. Sense Alignment."

Nod.

"I'm gonna - go over there and commune. Or whatever."

And she heads off a ways into the forest.

Well, he will - also prepare spells.

She sits down with her back against a tree.

Okay. Communing. How does she commune. 

     Traditionally one meditates on the virtues that one hopes to embody as a representative of their deity. I understand that the circumstances of your elevation to cleric status are unusual, but I believe that you already embody your goddess's primary priorities. You are full of love, for people and for beauty and for art. I would have accepted many bearers to reunite me with my other half, but you are particularly worthy. It must have been the goddess's will that it be you.

She just wants Sending. And the other spells Hagan said. And probably others but it's not really very important.

     I can help you prepare spells! But you must open yourself to my power, which can only be granted for the sake of increasing love and beauty in the world. I don't think it will be hard for you. You love very easily.

This is kind of the most ridiculous thing she has ever heard.

     You love Hagan. And your sister, and your niece, and Valentine, and Cecelia. You wish that you were strong enough to take better care of them. You wish that they would not have to come to harm, or be in pain. I will grant you the protection domain, because you wish for the power it offers, and the luck domain, because I think you might need it. Would you like me to explain your powers? Perhaps this will annoy you less than speaking of your feelings.

Sure.

So the pendant explains her domain powers to her, and helps her prepare spells, and only annoys her a little.

She heads back to Hagan an hour later.

"Have a message wording?"

"Oh, right. Uh. 'Hagan and I in unknown location with dangerous locals and quest from Shelyn, situation precarious, please get us or if impossible send help'?"

She sends it.

She waits.

"Pendant says we should have received a response by now if we were going to. There's a five percent loss chance across planes, it's possible that's all."

"Amazi-" Sigh. 

"Did you get Create Food And Water?"

"Yeah."

Here's some food and water. Way more than they can eat themselves, actually.

"I'd say we could take it to a temple and they could get it where it's needed but, uh, not sure we should venture back to civilization."

"Pendant says the festivals only last one night, by now it should be over. And in addition to the normal cleric powers I get tongues at will, so we can talk."

     I don't think there are any temples left, though.

"It doesn't think they have any temples."

"Well. Okay.

We should probably not camp out in the woods with no supplies if it's safe to interact with civilization. I guess."

     I didn't say it was safe. I expect it to be safer than hiding in the woods. But everyone here is a member of the Body, and if they learn that you are not, you will be in great danger. The Lawgivers will come to absorb you into the Body, and you will be under the same control as everyone else. I think this will make it very difficult to complete your quest. I do think you should go back to buy things today, since many people will have lost their clothes in the festival, which will make it much less strange that you need new ones.

(She relays this.)

"What the hell is the Body - do you want me to just touch the artifact so it can talk to us directly, I won't touch you -"

"Yeah, fine."

She holds the pendant up a little away from herself. She can't move it very far, the chain's too small.

He presses the tip of his finger to it. "Uh, what's the Body?"

The Body is the entity that almost everyone on this planet is a part of. They are connected to Landru. Usually the control is indirect; members experience contentment and tranquility, and obey all laws. Eventually the control is relaxed - people too old for the festival are capable of exercising more judgement in their affairs, although they have of course spent their entire lives under the control of Landru. Occasionally, however, Landru summons the Body for a particular purpose, and takes direct control of all its parts. If it is discovered that you are not of the Body, he will summon it against you, and you will find that everyone you meet is now part of the attempt to catch you. They will trap you and take you to the Absorption Chambers. 

Unfortunately, despite the dangers, you must interact with society to deliver me to the Great Hall of Landru. I think that you must pretend to be members of the Body. It shouldn't be very hard, if you know the rules; they are not a suspicious people.

" - you catch all that?" he asks Korva.

"Yeah."

"What are the rules?"

Obviously there are the laws. Do not steal, do not cheat people, and do not break into locked rooms. Do not harm anyone, or cause property damage, or touch anyone not a spouse or a family member, except during festival. Young people are required to attend the festival when it occurs, so people will probably assume you were farmers or travelers who arrived in town specifically for the festival. Then there are the mannerisms. You ought to wear the same clothes as everyone else, and walk around very calmly, and look pleased at most things, and when you meet someone you should put your hand to your chest and say 'joy to you, friend', or 'peace and tranquility'. And of course you must not conspire against Landru in public, or seem confused about him, or everyone will know you are not of the Body. Perhaps Korva ought to do most of your talking; I can very easily feed her lines if she gets stuck.

I think you had better pretend to be married. Everyone your age is married. It's the law, and I shouldn't like to see either of you actually married off to someone you didn't know or love.

"Sounds...hellish."

"I was gonna say."

You see why I must correct it.

- snort. "Yeah. For sure."

Will you need other guidance before you return to town? Do you have money? I think silver or gold should do, even if it's the wrong coinage.

"I don't. - Korva?"

"Yeah, some." She checks her pockets, carefully not moving any part of herself that might otherwise run into his hand. "Not a lot. Probably enough for clothes and rooms, at least for a few days."

You may need to find work. Perhaps we can find Hagan something that doesn't require very much speaking.

"There's mostly not work for women?"

Some things. Not as many, and the pay is worse. There were a lot of options for them, once, a long time ago, but Landru thought it best to return the planet to a technologically simpler time. But Korva may be able to find work as a maid.

He shakes his head. 

Then he realizes this is stupid. 

"Yeah. Okay."

"All right. We buy clothes first, then look for rooms, then look for jobs?"

Clothes and then passage, I think. The Great Hall is a ways away, and you will have more options and less scrutiny in a larger city anyway.

"Okay."

Sigh.

"I guess we head back to town, then. Are we - actually going to try to do this without telling any lies - "

"Is there any reason to think we're entangled with any fairies?"

"I think they all got to even with us. I'm obviously not certain."

"Me neither. Uh. I guess we'll try."

"And if they ask us direct questions that we don't have the right answers for - ?"

"Then I think we lie."

Nod.

He lets go of the artifact and puts his hand back at his side.

"Do you get to keep the cleric levels, do you know?"

"It said they were for as long as I bear the artifact. I don't think I do."

"Awww. Oh well."

"I'm not actually a follower of Shelyn, so. It'd be weird if I did."

"Shelyn's pretty cool."

"She's fine. I guess. Always kind of preferred Erastil."

- nod.

(She's such a dumbass. They could have had a conversation and then she had to go say stupid things again. She's not sure what's wrong with Erastil but probably something is.)

"Maybe I'd have felt differently if Shelyn was more popular where I grew up, I dunno," she says, because she's an idiot who can't shut up even when she really obviously should.

"She's kinda frowned upon in Osirion, too. Love, you know, not really the sort of thing you should use to make decisions, if you don't want them to be stupid decisions."

"Yeah. Sort of on the impractical side."

     I'm lucky it's one of the few things that's more important to you than trying to be practical, then.

Shut up, pendant.

"So are we going into town, then?"

"Yeah, I guess we better."

She heads into town. And she'll stop talking, unless he talks first.

He can't really think of anything to say.

Then it's going to be a quiet walk.

She heads into town and tries to look vaguely content about everything. She finds a clothing store and repeats lines that her pendant gives her. She buys clothes. They can change into them in the back. Then she finds a place where you buy carriages to different towns, and buys passage to the town her pendant tells her to, and steps in and draws the curtains, and by this point she is moderately proud of herself for not screaming at any point instead of vacantly telling everyone she interacts with that the festival was a great blessing from Landru and that she is very grateful that the Body provides for all of its needs.

He tries to memorize some phrases but his accent's probably terrible. 

"How far does the pendant think it is, to wherever we're going?"

"It says probably most of the day to the town we're heading to today. And then we'll have to stop to find work."

"Okay. Should I be practicing the language or something."

"I don't know it, I'm just casting tongues. I guess maybe the pendant can teach you. - really I should give you the ring and I should just be using tongues, at least then you'll understand things when you need to - "

She takes her ring off and hands it to him.

He takes it. "Thanks."

"Mhmm."

"Are we - doing the thing again where - 

I'm not mad at you about anything."

"I guess that's good."

"I'm - also not mad at you? Just - every time I talk to you I make you sadder, so - "

"Oh. - no, that wasn't - that was entirely my own fault. You were perfectly right about everything and I just - had been stupider than I'd noticed."

She folds her hands in her lap very carefully and doesn't fidget with anything at all, even though she really really wants to focus even a little on anything else.

"Well you still seemed pretty sad."

"Yes. But - because you were right. If you hadn't been right I wouldn't have been sad."

"That - does not make a lot of sense to me but okay."

"Good, then. We're good?"

- she looks really confused. Like, she really wants to say yes, but they are so obviously not good right now that she cannot actually bring herself to say it, even though it is obviously the right answer, because it's - well, wrong.

"I - honestly have no idea what you think I was right about, here."

"I was - spinning this whole self-indulgent story where it was very important and significant how I felt about you even though I didn't plan to marry you and everyone I knew had told me that I was being stupid and should cut it out and it just - actually didn't matter - and they were right but I guess I had to hear it from you to actually take it to heart."

- she goes very still.

She really wishes she were not trapped with him in a stupid carriage in a stupid country with stupid rules that are going to make them stupidly pretend to be married or present themselves for mind control.

"How do you feel about me," she says, after too long, even though she shouldn't, even though they're stuck and she's going to break something and they're going to be stuck with the thing broken and the rest of the ride is going to be awful - 

"I, uh, really thought I said that."

"I don't think you did," she says, quietly.

"I love you. I'm not - I do realize you were right. And I said I'd be your friend, and I meant it -"

Gods, she's going to die of shame, right here in this carriage, and then she will not have to deal with the implications of any of this, because she will be dead, and in hell, and she will never do anything else stupid ever again, and eventually she will be beautifully free of all of her horrible, crushing idiocy.

"Flirting without serious intentions," she says, eventually, "is how one describes what one does when one is halfheartedly trying to pick someone up in a bar, but is actually expecting to go home alone at the end of the night."

"It's how Osirians describe anything where you don't mean to propose marriage even if she likes you back."

"That - doesn't really clarify what you wanted, very much, then, does it - "

"I don't know what I want! Everything's either immoral or impossible or unfair to you or all three!"

Nodnod.

She's afraid she might be crying. 

"M'sorry - I didn't - I feel like I should immediately know what to do about this but I'm pretty sure anything I might say is just going to make things worse somehow - "

"You gave me the right advice. I was just - sad while I was processing it."

She shakes her head. And she needs to say something but everything is wrong, how do you tell the truth when everything you could possibly say sounds like a lie and most of them will hurt one or the other of you like a dagger -

     I think you should probably tell him you love him. I don't think he knows.

She can't, she can't, she doesn't even know what that means - 

"I didn't give you any advice, I didn't know what you were saying - "

"- you, uh, said it wasn't a big deal and it happens to lots of people and it didn't make you think less of me and we could still be friends."

"I was talking about - about the sorts of feelings that make people flirt with no serious intentions, I didn't - I don't even know for sure what you mean when you say that you love me, I just know that if it's anything like what I would mean then I would not have chosen the words 'it's not a big deal' - "

"I wish I could marry you. I wish I could hold you and kiss you and pet you and tell you you're beautiful and smart and perfect and I wish that whenever you were scared I didn't like you anymore you wouldn't be because I'd have promised. I wish we could get dropped on some - stupid horrible bizarre quest - and be happy, because we were together, because we liked being together, because you felt safe with me and not just because you trusted I'd never touch you. I wish when you were sad I could make you happier instead of sadder."

She presses a hand to her mouth and sobs.

"The pendant says it wants you to know that Korva loves you too," she says, when she can speak, and her voice breaks while she says it but she doesn't know what else to do, here.

"Bite me," he says to Fy, "if I get carried away," and then he is going to hug her and hold her and pat her and - he's not actually sure what she's crying about but - "- it's - okay? Ssshhh, ssshhhh, it's okay, it's okay, I love you, it's okay."

She clings to him and cries as quietly as she can and sort of wants to die of shame and also somehow feels a lot better being held. 

"Sorry - I'm sorry - "

“...why?”

"I don't mean to be upset about anything, just - I didn't know - I still have no idea what to do about anything, just - don't think you did anything wrong, just please don't think that - "

“I have totally definitely done a long string of things wrong. I am at this very moment doing a thing wrong.” Hug hug hug.

Cling. "Well don't stop doing that one. Please."

“Not gonna. I love you. I didn’t mean to make you sad.”

Snuggle. "Didn't mean to make you sad either."

“I did it to myself. Really.”

"I guess it's possibly half your fault for having ridiculous taste."

“That is not among the things I’m going to fault myself for here.”

"Be hard for you to do worse. - I'm sorry, I'm - I just keep worrying about how long it's going to be before you remember I have no redeeming qualities and stop hugging me - "

“You hate yourself because that’s how Cheliax works, you know, gotta make sure people never notice they deserve better.”

"I guess that's a theory."

“Do you think Verita has ever given a second of consideration to the theory that she is no good for any of the things about her and ought to be ground down into a cog? No! Because she doesn’t hate herself! And if Cheliax had too many of her to kill, it’d fall apart.”

"Well, Verita's wonderful. Obviously."

Snuggle. 

Snuggle.

"D'you think you could wait until we're not stuck in a carriage together to remind me of all of the reasons you can't ever actually - do anything. About liking me."

“Yeah. Sorry.”

"Don't be."

“If you say so. I love you.”

Snuggle.

"Keep feeling like I should say it back, I just - I don't know how people - " Sigh. "Every time you say it it's - nice."

“‘m not expecting you to be in love with me. Women fall in love slower, they need security.”

She laughs a little. "Okay. That's all right, then."

“I appreciate you repeating what the pendant says, though, it’s good to translate for people who can only talk to you even if you’re not sure they’re right.”

Snuggle. "Didn't want you to think I didn't like you. Even if I don't quite - I don't know what I feel. Exactly. But I like you."

“I think that probably you are too sensible to love me until I have any idea... what I want... but I’m not sad about that the way I was sad about it not mattering at all.”

"I guess that makes sense."

“And I really like holding you.”

Snuggle. "I really like being held."

“I’m not sure at what point we are supposed to suddenly make terrible decisions but I’ve told Fy to bite us if it happens.”

"I thought you thought that was this part."

“I mean observably it isn’t yet.”

"I guess that depends on what you consider terrible decisions. But - I am not actually planning on doing anything besides being held right now."

“And I am not planning on doing anything except holding you! So clearly we haven’t crossed the event horizon of bad decisions yet. I guess maybe that’s because of Fy chaperoning.”

" - you do realize that people don't typically end up having sex unless at least one of them wants to have sex, right - "

“I don’t ... think that’s right? Or I think you can start out not wanting to and then suddenly want to at some point, at least.”

"Unless at least one of them is actively weighing the advantages of having sex, then. And if neither of you is a rapist then it takes both of you. I'm - not actually worried about this, here. Unless Osirians are actually bizarrely bad at self-control beyond their usual fences.

"...and I kind of think I wouldn't be very worried even if they were."

“I’d just - feel really stupid if I did exactly the things everyone says you shouldn’t do or you’ll have sex and then that happened and then I tried to be like “but, see, I didn’t mean to”...”

"I'm not gonna have sex with you in this carriage while you don't know what you want. This is - sort of what I was trying to communicate when I apparently made you very sad. I'm really very sure of this."

“Okay. I - that doesn’t make me sad.” Snuggle.

"Oh good." Snuggle.

“You’re very good.”

"So are you. I don't think I have very ridiculous taste at all."

“I was honestly kind of puzzled why Elizabeth and Cecelia loved their mes when you did not love me and I felt like I was a pretty lovable variant of me. ...I know this is not how love works.”

"Pff. Well - I dunno you that well. Also you keep telling me what a terrible idea it is."

“Those are good reasons but I didn’t think of them because I’m very stupid.”

...hug.

“Matt thought it might be their total lack of common sense, actually. He said that I kept trying to hide from you what a disaster I was but that if you couldn’t see what a disaster I was you’d hardly be clear on what I needed you for.”

"I guess I am maybe also unclear on that."

“Wait really? I feel like if nothing else I’ve succeeded at being a disaster in your vicinity and at failing to hide it.”

"You're terrible at talking to me in particular, I acknowledge that. I'm not sure that means I'm any good for you."

"You always come up with good ideas and good - ways of thinking about situations - and priorities and so on -"

"Gosh."

"'s why I keep picking stupid arguments with you - I like understanding how you think -"

Pff. Snuggle. "I see.

" - I keep - trying to just be happy about this and then slipping into worrying that I should be remembering this better because you might never hold me again after this - "

"I want to hold you forever and ever."

" - that sounds nice."

"Even if Elizabeth summons us back in the morning no problem I think I'll just - deal with everyone thinking I'm a horrible person."

"Not everyone. I suppose Fazil and Mahdi would make a lot of disapproving sounds."

"They love me. So they don't want me to - do something stupid and hurt myself and other people. And they don't - see why I'm making things complicated, I don't think, not really."

Nodnod.

Petpetpetpet. 

Happy sigh. That's very nice.

"Pendant still thinks we should pretend to be married when we get there."

"Well now maybe it won't be horrible."

"Yeah. That would have been something else, without knowing - "

"Figured I could handle whatever while we got out of here. And maybe I'd die heroically and you could go be Chelish and remember me fondly or something, except then you got cleric powers and screwed up that plan."

Hug. "Didn't like the part where you died."

"'s not very fun, dying."

"Yeah. I - guess someone could have raised you, after, and you're thinking you're going somewhere nice anyway, but - I guess I sort of forgot about all of that."

"Well. I don't think accepting the quest was such a bad idea. It sure does seem like this place needs some help."

"Yeah. I hate it here."

"We can fix them up and then go home, or maybe go home and get help and then fix them up, and I can tell Fazil that we have Shelyn's active encouragement to snuggle though I doubt he'll find this very convincing."

"Pff. Okay.

"I'm - glad I'm stuck here with you. As opposed to anyone else I could possibly have been stuck here with."

"I wish I was stuck here with my friends and you were safe. Except then I guess I wouldn't be snuggling you. So I have mixed feelings. I really really like snuggling you. But also, if I can't keep you safe from everything bad in the universe what am I even doing."

"The idea of you keeping me safe from everything bad in the universe does have its appeal."

He should not get into a conversation about the Osirian concept of marriage that'd turn into a conversation about why he won't marry her.

"Love you."

Snuggle. 

"Are you going to need to sleep at some point - "

"...probably."

"We are gonna be here a while. Although I'm not sure how possible it is to sleep in a carriage."

"I can sleep most anywhere, I just worry I'll - snore, or something - drool on you -"

"I don't think I'd mind very much. And - if you want I can stop touching you, I wouldn't do anything - "

"I don't want you to stop. - I guess if you had sex with me in my sleep I would be annoyed. Is that even possible? But I trust you - I really really trust you -"

Snuggle. "I wouldn't do that. I'd rather keep holding you, just, if you didn't want me to I wouldn't."

"I want you to keep holding me."

"Then I'll do that."

He snuggles her. He eventually falls asleep.

She holds him. It's so nice, getting to snuggle him while he sleeps, knowing she's allowed, knowing he trusts her. She is not tempted to try making any terrible decisions. She is maybe the tiniest bit tempted to kiss his forehead. She doesn't. Better not do anything she wouldn't do when he was awake.

She has no idea whether she'll regret - letting herself maybe feel things, letting herself talk about maybe feeling things, with no idea what he means to happen, no idea how seriously he's taking whatever this is. But he cares about her, and he wants her to feel safe, and wants her to feel loved, and she has so little of either that she feels like she'd better not throw it away just because she doesn't immediately have a clear picture of the specifics. Besides, he's important to her. Her friend. Worth more than gold or diamonds, Cecelia said, and you don't throw away gold or diamonds, now, do you.

When they reach the town she wakes him up.

He looks disoriented for a second. Then he beams at her.

Awww!

"Hello again. I think we're almost there."

“Right.” He fixes the collar of his weird local clothes. “Does the amulet have a backstory for us?”

"It doesn't know that we'll need an extensive one. Uh - obviously you're from some other region of the planet that has a different dominant language, and possibly your first wife died and then no other unmarried women were around and you were directed to marry me because I was the closest available person who understood you at all, apparently that's the sort of thing that can happen here. Came here for work. We'll probably want to not use tongues on you; apparently these people also mostly don't have magic here, anymore, and they won't understand what's happening. I can just speak for you and we'll find you something that doesn't take a lot of talking. Stable hand, or something."

"Okay."

"Probably wouldn't want to talk to these people much even if you did speak the language, considering."

"I don't really like talking to most people."

"I'm pretty sure these people are a lot worse than normal people. They only have the one emotional valence, when they're not in the middle of being insane, and they have this particular set of inane phrases that they keep repeating to each other whenever they don't have anything in particular to say."

"Maybe with practice I can get the inane phrases down."

"Yeah. I can help you when we find a place to stay."

What's this city look like?

A lot bigger than the other; probably not as big as Sothis. Most of the buildings are exactly four stories tall. That's a hospital, this is a school, apartments, apartments, restaurants, stables, apartments, office building, bank, general store, clothing store, more apartments. Everyone has the same vacantly content expression that they did in the other place. 

Also it's pretty thoroughly trashed. Looks like they had a festival here, too. 

"Did the artifact explain what's up with the festival?" he murmurs as they walk slowly.

"Needed to maintain the mind control. Without it people start slipping in less obvious ways."

" - huh." Walk walk walk.

     This building has a room, it says so in the window. 

She stops at it and knocks on the door the pendant instructs her to. There's a man, older than most of the others they've met. He smiles warmly.

"Joy to you, friend," she says, serenely. "My husband and I are new in town. The sign says you have rooms?"

     "Of course!" says the old man. "And all members of the Body are welcome to them, for all are one in Landru."

"Landru is in all of us," agrees Korva. 

It's a small apartment. One bedroom, a bathroom, and a sort of combined kitchen and dining and sitting room. But the pendant informs them it's cheaper than most, and the old man says it's perfectly well suited to a young couple without any children.

Yay Landru.

She tells the old man they'll be happy to rent it right away. He doesn't bother checking whether they can pay for it. He offers a few more platitudes, explains that the bathroom sink is broken but will be fixed on Tuesday, and then leaves them alone for the night.

"Well. That was easy, I guess."

"What a miserable place."

"Yeah. With any luck we won't have to be here very long."

"Should we look for work now, do you think, or will we have to wait for morning -"

She checks out the window. "Getting dark. We should probably look early in the morning. - I guess we've sort of wrecked your sleep schedule, huh."

"Works out fine since we only have one bed anyway."

" - yeah, I guess. Only if we can find you work that happens at night, though, if they even have anything like that."

"Most places do. But I guess we'll work it out if they don't."

"People pretty much don't die of sleeping on the floor, so."

"Yeah.

Do you, uh, want to hug again?"

" - very much, yes."

Hug.

Maybe they can find some comfortable non-bed arrangement for snuggling. That would be really nice.

There's a couch in the sitting room part of the main room. It's not actually very comfortable, as couches go, but it supports snuggling.

"I wonder if the locals snuggle each other or if that is not orderly enough and they just have sad detached relations when the calendar says to."

"Pendant doesn't know that one. Sounds awful."

"Yeah." Petpetpetpet.

Happy sigh.

"I assume I'll eventually get bored of never doing anything besides this. Might take a while, though."

"I guess you'll have a hard time finding anyone who wants to do anything else, here. Sorry."

Snuggle. "Maybe they still have books. Books are nice and tranquil, right? Maybe no fiction, but I bet they have something."

That is not what he thought she was talking about. "Oh, yeah, probably. Maybe they have improving hobbies like gardening and needlework."

"I guess I could take up needlework. If we're stuck here for a really excessive amount of time."

"You could practice with everything on your spell list. So you get confident casting them in emergencies. Then I guess you could resort to needlework."

"Yeah, that's a much better idea."

Slightly mopey snuggling.

Snuggling. Mostly without moping.

"Very oppressive, how I'm gonna have to go to sleep soon. I feel oppressed."

"You could not go to sleep soon and instead stay here and talk to me."

"I could do that. Maybe if I try enough times I will eventually figure out how to have conversations with you without making you sad."

"I appreciate you being honest with me even if it makes me a little sad. I am, recent events notwithstanding, mostly a grownup who can handle being a little sad."

"It would just be very unfortunate if it happened every time, I think."

"That's fair. At some point it'd get a little ridiculous. Well, right now I am very happy because I am holding you and only a tiny bit sad about the prospect that you will ever eventually get bored of this and feeling unsure whether to hope that we're stuck here until we've reached that point so I don't have to explain myself to my friends or to hope that we go back first because probably explaining myself to my friends is an important part of being good to you."

" - I didn't mean I'd get bored of you, I meant I'd get bored of having you holding me be one hundred percent of my leisure activities."

" - oh. Well then I guess I am all happy."

Snuggle.

"I guess I don't actually know whether I'll stop - feeling like this. Never felt like this before, so."

Nodnodnod. "I - really want you to keep feeling like this but I'll be okay if you stop. Really."

Nodnod. "I guess some of it probably depends on what this... is. Uh, whatever this thing we're doing is. In a more general sense than the fact that at the moment we are snuggling."

“Yeah. Uh. We are adventuring companions and friends and - what do you want -“

"That - depends a lot on what you do, I think? I realize that's not a very helpful answer - "

“I want Elizabeth to kill Asmodeus and then you to want to marry me. And then to get married and raise Verita and, like, a lot more kids, but not so many you are always tired, maybe like six, or ten. And I guess we would have to adopt random ones we run into along the way. And we could raise a dragon so we can travel as a family once there’s too many of us for a carpet.”

She giggles a little. "Ten kids is a lot, I shudder to think how many the Osirian women who are always tired have."

"I think it depends how close they are, not just how many of them there are. And it depends if they have lots of interesting things to do and places to go and things to learn, and stuff. But that's not - I don't need all that. That's just - when I imagine everything working out wonderfully that's what I imagine, all of us flying around on a dragon fixing up Cheliax after Asmodeus is dead."

"That - sounds like it could hypothetically plausibly be nice, conditional on a bunch of other things. 

"In Cheliax when you start dating - actually dating, I mean, not just, like, people hooking up with each other for fun - it's - a lot of it is about getting to know each other and seeing how important you should be to one another, or whether you ought to find someone else. And I guess I kind of - even if Elizabeth became omnipotent queen of the multiverse and knocked creation completely off its course, I think - I'd still have to know you a lot better before coming up with any definite answers to the question of what exactly we ought to be, or whether you should go looking for someone else. Which, honestly, you probably should, but right now I - don't want you to."

"Well, I don't want to go looking for someone else. So I won't, not now, not anytime while you're still figuring things out."

"That could take a while."

“I’m not in a hurry.”

Snuggle.

"In the hypothetical where Asmodeus is dead and I am fundamentally wrong about the universe and also feel like I would like to - be with you for the rest of my life - I am maybe still kind of concerned about finding out which parts of the Osirian concept of marriage you're extremely attached to. But I don't know whether that's a good thing to talk about right now or not."

“I mean, we are going to need to talk about it at some point and now doesn’t seem bad?”

"I guess. Might make you stop snuggling me."

“I am already aware that you think Osirian marriage is not really different from slavery.”

" - yeah, I guess that's the main thing. Well, that and the taking other wives, that's - I am not going to say that that makes it not a marriage, because that would be - insensitive, and probably inaccurate, but it feels like the sort of thing that would make something not count as a marriage at all, if you just - have one person be stuck forever while the other is allowed to go find someone shinier whenever they want - "

“You’re not supposed to do that. Not to say that people don’t, just, it is definitely not essential to what I want from marriage. I would be happy to promise not to take any other wives and even happier to promise not to unless we both thought it was a good idea. Since that allows for - the sort of circumstances under which it’s generally considered okay to take another wife, if you happened to find them compelling, and not if you don’t, which is what any good husband would want anyway.”

...nodnod.

“Fazil is really really against men remarrying and he says he would consider it if his wife happened to ask him to, but not if he asked her, since then she might have made herself okay with it out of love for him.”

" - well. Good for Fazil."

“So. We could do something like that. If you wanted.”

"I guess. In this extremely dubious hypothetical future. 

"There's still the bit where as far as I can tell you all group wives with dependents and give them the rights of same. And - it's not even just the law parts, see, I'd be worried that even if we had something that sounded good on paper it would be kind of stupid to marry someone with a radically different cultural understanding of how women are supposed to behave, since I wouldn't meet it, and - even if I hadn't broken any promises you might be upset about, uh, the sense that I was not acting how I was supposed to. Do you see?"

“I guess? I - look, I met a lot of Osirian women, and I didn’t want to marry any of them, and then I met you, and most of our conversations were either fights about religion or fights about Cheliax or attempts to make up for fights that neither of us actually wanted to have, and I noticed you were weirdly important to me, and then we got kidnapped to another plane and most of our conversations were about how to protect the even more incompetent alternate versions of us from their own bad decisions and terrifying superpowers, and then I noticed I was in love with you, and - I don’t really know where I’m going with this? I guess that I think if I wanted you to be a different way then I’d have fallen for someone who was that way, probably?”

"I guess. But you might have - very different intuitive ideas about what marital bliss looks like."

"Yeah. They wouldn't be from Osirion, really, they'd be from the palace, but if anything that's worse because the palace is horrible."

"I see."

Petpetpet. "I don't have anything particularly horrible in mind I just - the whole idea is that I wouldn't recognize it, right -"

"Yeah."

"If we were really married right now instead of pretending I think - we'd be cuddling in the bed because I wouldn't be scared it'd turn into anything else. And I'd probably feel more strongly about earning enough money to support us, even though I know you like working."

"That makes sense. If we ever get back to the previous incarnation of our usual lives then I think how we support ourselves is kind of a moot point, given Elizabeth. If we made it back to Golarion we could sell one headband and never have to work again."

"I have a very generous allowance from Osirion, too. I don't mind you working, it just feels like if someone needs to be making sure we have enough money then it ought to be me, just like if someone needs to defend us against intruders or something it ought to be me."

Snuggle. "I agree, but mostly because your ranger levels are permanent."

"Maybe I should ask Connor whether he feels like he ought to take care of Diamond Queen Elizabeth and if so how he satisfies that."

"Yeah, maybe.

"I don't - object to people I care about trying to take care of me. I'm more worried about, like, if we disagreed about something would you feel that you had the right to make unilateral decisions for the family without consulting or convincing me, or would you feel like all of my money actually belonged to you, or that I shouldn't be allowed to make agreements with other people even if they didn't actually involve you at all, or do you have some - weird expectation for how I ought to prioritize different concerns that will lead you to be shocked if dinner ever isn't on the table at six, and probably a bunch more things in that genre that I haven't thought about yet, and what you would do when you ran into them - "

"I...think agreements among married people inherently involve each other? Not agreements like that you will send your nephew a birthday present, but I guess I would expect you to talk to me about things that were bigger than that? And I'd talk to you about the same sorts of things. I can't imagine trying to do anything important without consulting you unless there was no time to consult you and I was going to do my best to adjust course once I could, or something. I - guess I have the instinct that if we're married then your money is my money, aside from the wedding jewelry, but I don't feel that strongly about it, like if you want to declare your coin purse is part of your wedding jewelry and yours alone we could do that."

"I have no idea what the significance of wedding jewelry is. And - some of those things are things where there are two decent equilibria, right, like, if we actually jointly control a budget then it's fine if all of the money goes into it, and if you have the final say on all important financial stuff then that'd be annoying but tenable, right, as long as I also had some money that I had the final say over, but - if you have all of the money and I have none of it then that's not tenable, you see? Or stops being tenable the first time we have very different ideas about the importance of something."

"Uh, the Osirian rule is that a woman owns her wedding jewelry. My brother got married recently and spent - eighty thousand gold, I think? It'd probably resell for less than that, but that's how much is his wife's and he has no say over."

"...that sounds really depressing. Only being allowed to have any money ever again if you sold something your husband gave to you. Something that's probably special and that you'd probably rather keep. Like, I'm not saying it's unliveable, if the jewelry's enough for everything you'd ever really need, but it's - depressing."

"Then I guess we shouldn't do it like that."

"...yeah. I guess not. Anyway, just - things like that. A lot of things that a reasonable person really ought to ask about before agreeing to anything. Although possibly it would feel less likely to be an enormous task if I knew you a lot better and basically trusted you to make reasonable decisions in all things, which I do not."

Snuggle.

Snuggle.

"I want to note that this is by Chelish standards an extremely weird first date conversation."

"This is a pretty normal Osirian first date except for the part where we're touching. 

What do people do on Chelish first dates?"

"One of us asks the other to dinner or to watch sports or a play. I think probably seeing the play before dinner is the better option, then you have something to talk about. If you don't already know the person very well then you mostly try to have the sorts of conversations that let you know whether the other person is bearable in extended one-on-one interactions, you're not really supposed to discuss anything very important. Or you invite them to a festival and spend most of your time eating and dancing and playing festival games and accidentally getting lost and trying to figure out where you are. And if you're trying for sex you probably invite them home at the end of the night. I think. This is slightly theoretical, I've never been on one."

" - really? Huh."

" - which part of that's surprising, I don't know which parts other countries hear about."

"Oh, just that you hadn't been on one. The rest is - the version I got in cultural education classes was that teenagers and young adults spend lots of their time falling into and out of relationships in which they're pressured to have sex immediately so they aren't given up on as boring or old-fashioned or clueless or bad at it."

"Well, if you want to be even more dismal than me about things, I guess that's not completely wrong. I was busy."

“I guess I’m glad you were busy. I don’t mind you having a history but that just sounds awfully lonely, for something that’s supposed to be about love and commitment.”

"Most people think it's a lot more lonely to be alone."

“Is it?”

"Well, the only thing I have to compare it to is this. It's lonelier than this. Or - it would be, if Verita were here, if there were anyone else on the planet to talk to. But I guess being alone is less - scary."

“I’m- I would like to know how to not be scary.”

"No, sorry, I just meant - if you're sure you don't have anything then you're sure you can't lose it."

“Oh. I guess not. 

You know I won’t leave, right - if you think all this through and it’s too much then you’ll go but I’m not going to go -“

"Well, you won't leave, not soon, you have Verita to think about, and the crazy interdimensional council. But - I don't even know what this is yet, right. It's not just losing things you definitely have that's painful, it's - possibilities. And I haven't worked out yet what the possibilities are."

- nod. 

"Sorry. Not very good at not being dismal."

“I like the way you think through things when they’re important.”

"I was not really considering that one of my strengths. Just - don't want to needlessly disappoint myself. I guess."

“I don’t want you to be disappointed.”

"It's not fun, disappointment. Of course the most effective way to avoid it is not to hope for things."

“Or, instead, you could hope for things and get them and live happily for a hundred years. I like that one better.”