...it does absolutely nothing to her.

The trees that ring the valley are some extremely local species of pine, tall and silent and foreboding. There are no birds or small animals in sight, no rustling in the underbrush, no distant calls, except behind her in the world outside the valley. A few steps under the trees, and the morning light is almost completely obscured by heavy boughs laden with long green-black needles. All together it looks very cursed.

But looking cursed is all it does; the trees aren't shifting into her way or reaching for her with their branches, the ground isn't twisting beneath her feet, she's not finding herself inexplicably turned around or tripping on thin air. It's just a really ominous forest.

.... Huh.

Does she need to go in further to bounce off? Is that what's happening here?

She decides to test turning around and exiting before she goes in further, in case there's some kind of - something going on.

Turning around and exiting works just fine! The forest continues to be really ominous but not actively hostile in any detectable way.

Ooooookay.

Back to trying to bounce off, then?

The ominous forest persists in its ominosity, but also persists in not doing anything much.

She can walk for quite a while without any strange phenomena trying to happen to her whatsoever.

This is weird. Things are not working as advertised, and she verified this with a number of trustworthy sources before trying this.

She exits the forest again, and then she straightens out her web of starlight again, and throws out a line to her brother. She hasn't figured out a way to let him answer, yet, but just letting someone know that something weird has happened is enough for her purposes.

"Hey, uh. I'm not bouncing off the valley. It's just - letting me enter. I checked, it's much further in than anyone mentioned getting. It's very weird. I'm going to leave this up and keep you updated on my progress, but I am very apprehensive of this now."

And back into the ominous forest, this time with commentary.

It's ominous. It's a forest. The ominous conifers are tall and good at blocking out the sun. There is no perceptible wildlife -

- no, that was a birdcall from somewhere up ahead. A perfectly ordinary non-ominous birdcall.

She can't have gone all the way through, can she? The valley is bigger than that. But it's been known to warp space in weirder ways. Maybe it's finally spitting her out. If so, it's doing it without affecting her directly in any way.

"Oh, wow. Just heard a bird. Weird... It might just be peacefully sending me through to the other side instead of making me bounce off it. Maybe something to do with intentions? I didn't intend to actually try to get inside, so it's warping me to the other side rather than turning me around? I don't know. I'm just making guesses. As far as I can tell it's not twisting anything at all, and I could just leave earlier."

She keeps walking.

The ominous conifers gradually give way to a wider variety of more cheerful species of tree. There are more birds audible up ahead. But she's still headed downslope; this isn't out, this is further in.

"Nnnnope I'm going downslope. I'm going to try exiting again to check to make sure it's not trying to catch me instead of turn me away. Exciting adventures in walking. You find this riveting, I know."

And then she attempts to do precisely what she said.

After a few minutes of retracing her steps, she finds that the ground is leveling off, so that she can't tell her direction by the gradient of the slope.

"..... Fuck, I think it is trying to catch me."

How about if she navigates via the sun?

The sun that the ominous conifers are so very good at blocking? That sun?

Here's a gleam of light that suggests it's this way. Here's a gleam of light that suggests it's that way. Gosh, those conifers sure are ominous.

"Okay, yes, it's probably trying to catch me. Shit. Okay. Okay. I can probably think my way out of this, just. Be my soundboard as I talk my way through this, sorry if I just got caught horrifically by an evil valley in front of you. Can't navigate by the sun, because it'll fuck with the trees so I can't see it. Can't trust the direction I go, because it'll warp space around me and turn me right back around to where it wants me to go. I can't trust my environment, I have to be able to navigate independently in the right direction without it."

She stands for a minute, thinking, and then she tugs her threads inward to see if she can weave something that'll work like a compass into herself. Not pointing North or something - she doesn't know how she'd manage that, actually - but pointing towards the thread she left out to her brother. She explains as she works, so her brother won't worry.

It takes her about half an hour, and it's not like she can safely test it or anything, but her intuition for how her magic works is pretty accurate when it comes to this kind of self-modification. And it seems to work right.

Okay. Time to try this again. Walking towards her brother, fuck you evil valley.

The direction her brother is in rotates slowly around her in a steady circle, at a rate of about one revolution per minute. If she stood still, she could count the time by it.

"... Okay it's rotating my you-compass. Or. My you-compass is rotating on its own. I - can't tell if that's me messing up, or if the valley's fucking with me, but if the valley's fucking with me it's being very rude. If it isn't, I guess I just made a clock by accident."

She checks over her compass to make sure there was no reason for the rotation, finds that it should work as she expects, or at least not fail in such a bizarre way. From this, she decides to attempt to navigate by her rotating brother-compass anyway. She's more inclined to trust it than the forest, even if it's rotating once a minute.

If she walks at a reasonably constant rate, it will soon become very obvious to her that she is going in circles, as you might expect from someone using their clock as a compass.

Well, she had to give it a shot.

She disentangles the compass/clock, and sits down, and tries to think about how she could get out of this fucking place when it controls her environment so completely.

"You know what, let's try asking nicely. Why not." She stands and clears her throat. "...... Could you please let me go?" she asks of the forest.

There's no response for a few seconds.

Then the trees ahead of her shift aside; the forest opens like the pages of a book, and in front of her she sees...

...the middle of the Cursed Valley.

It's beautiful.

There are streams and rivers and sparkling waterfalls, fields of grass and flowers; there's a lovely tidy hedge maze encircling the whole thing, with an entrance a little ways downslope from her current position, far enough that she can easily see over the top of the hedge from here; there's a city in the middle, or maybe just a palace the size of a city, with domes and towers and huge stained glass windows and more waterfalls interwoven with the architecture.

She lets herself have a minute of stunned staring.

And then she composes herself.

".... Okay, you have some really impressive aesthetic tastes and that is absolutely gorgeous. But if I go see it am I going to be able to go home again? Because I'm willing to go visit for a day trip, even come back multiple times and try to help do - whatever it is you seem to want, probably even daily, but I would like to also go home and sleep in my own bed at night."

No answer. Well, a few distant birdcalls, but they don't seem especially communicative.

Sigh.

"Fine, but I would like to put forth that I am definitely willing to work with you without the coercion. You don't have to trap me here to get whatever it is you seem to want. I am much nicer when not coerced."

And then she walks to where it clearly wants her to go. Can she spot some kind of path through the hedge maze from here? Because she just has this feeling that she's going to have to navigate it.

Well, it's a cursed hedge maze and is probably not going to be kind enough to maintain a consistent layout, but -

- actually when she walks up to the flower-bedecked archway the hedges shuffle around until they make a straight corridor directly through to the other side.

Or not?

Ugh. It'll probably be another layer of the thing that'll be keeping her here. Maybe she should just stop going in further and see if she can think her way past the barrier? ... No, she didn't bring enough supplies for that, she was expecting to bounce off.

She keeps walking, eyeing the corridor warily.

On close inspection, the hedge possesses teeny tiny flowers. They range in colour from pale blue to white, and they're very cute and small.

The corridor stays stable the whole way through, and then it closes behind her when she's a few steps past the inner gate.

Yeah, that was predictable, but she's trying to see if she can get along with this stupid magic thing.

"Really not making me feel warm and fuzzy here, valley. At least bake me some cookies or something."

She continues forward.

She's headed through a field of ankle-high wild grass toward the edge of the city/palace, now.

There's a - bird? - flapping toward her from somewhere up ahead. A large, oddly shaped bird. No, that's a picnic basket with wings.

She stops walking and stares. At the picnic basket with wings.

Navethae should probably say something clarifying to her brother here, but also, what.

The wings are made of woven straw just like the rest of the basket, but the effect is remarkably feathery, especially from a distance.

It glides in for a landing, sets down right in front of her with incongruous grace, and flips up its lid to reveal... cookies. Freshly baked cookies. Several varieties, and probably more under that neatly folded cloth.

"I. Okay. That. Thank you for the cookies, the. Flying picnic basket was definitely a sight to see."

She's pretty sure she's just at the mercy of this place. So she can let herself find out if the cookies are any good. Are they?

They are delicious.

Of course they are.

... She takes a few to nibble on as she wanders.

"Thank you, these are delicious," she says, and then she is just going to. Keep walking, yep.

The field is lovely. There's a delicate little stream winding through it, narrow enough to step over, which provides a soft pleasant background noise to go with the distant birdcalls. Once in a while there's a patch of clover or some wildflowers.

As she approaches the edge of the city/palace, she can see the outlying buildings more clearly. They are all lovely. The part she's headed for has an aqueduct made of some pale stone, lent a soft golden glow by the sunlight. Behind its slender arches, a road paved with what looks like white marble leads between a pair of beautiful ornamental gardens.

Well, this is gorgeous, but also kind of surreal. A place like this feels like it should have people in it. Except there's just - no one.

"Still very pretty, but can I get a note as to like. Why you want to trap me here?"

The marble road in front of her shifts and ripples, and a block of marble the size of a small room or large closet rises out of it. The side facing her has a door in it.

... Okay.

She opens the door?

On this side of the door, it's set into a large block of marble in the middle of the street.

On the other side of the door, it's set into the outer wall of a tower, opening onto a stone balcony with a stunning view of the valley.

She makes a face, then after a moment of hesitation, steps out onto the balcony.

It really is a very lovely view.

"... Are you fishing for compliments, valley? Is that why I'm here?"

The valley doesn't answer.

Except -

This balcony overlooks an orchard, and there's something big moving amid the trees.

If the valley brought her here so she could be food for a giant terrifying monster she is going to be pissed.

Is she at a good vantage point to see the something big?

Well, she would be, if the enormous apple trees weren't blocking her view.

It seems to be moving toward the tower.

The door behind her is still open, if she'd like to flee.

It's tempting, but honestly, she's in a spot where if it does want to eat her, she's far enough away that it'd have trouble. Even better, she has an exit behind her that'll get her far away, and if she's very lucky the door will stop its reality-warping shit after she closes it.

".... Hello?" she calls, wedging the door behind her with a foot so it doesn't close without her permission.

The branches that were rustling a moment ago stop doing that.

There is silence and stillness for a few seconds, and then something - someone? - emerges from the trees to stand in the open space at the base of the tower. It - he? - is approximately twelve feet tall, humanoid in silhouette, with two arms and two legs and one head and one tapering lizardlike tail. The limbs are long and powerful, the torso broad and bulky, the face more man than beast but only just. It's hard to see fine detail on him, because his skin (or are those scales?) is iridescent, like a beetle's shell or a raven's wings; the colours gleaming from that dark surface ripple like water at the slightest movement, blue turning to purple turning to green turning to orange turning to red. His eyes, almost the only constant, blaze green-gold. He looks like the answer to the question, 'What is the most beautiful yet terrifying way to combine a dragon with a gorilla?'

He gazes up at her, his expression indecipherable at this distance. Iridescent black hair falls down his back in a long loose braid; he is wearing short trousers in some dark fabric, and nothing else.

Even at his height there's no way he could possibly jump high enough to reach the balcony. She's got to be at least thirty feet off the ground. That's safe, right?

He stares in silence for a few long seconds, tail sweeping back and forth behind him in a graceful arc. Then he speaks.

"Who... are you?"

His voice is deep and loud, his accent unfamiliar, his pronunciation distorted by the strange shape of his mouth and the fangs set in that heavy jaw.

"Navethae." The word comes out more like a squeak, she clears her throat and continues in more of a volume he'll actually be able to hear. "I'm Navethae. I, came to investigate the valley for why it's expanding slowly every year and why it bounces people off of it, and. Then it did not act as expected. Um. And yourself?"

"Tarakova. I've been trapped in here for two thousand years," he says matter-of-factly.

"Oh." Her filter isn't up and running yet, it's a miracle she's even able to talk, so she doesn't think to try to stop: "You look good for your age?"

He laughs.

Apart from the pitch and volume, he has a very human laugh.

Oh, good, he didn't get offended at that, great. She smiles, hesitantly.

"Are - are you the only person here, or? I mean, besides, besides me."

"...Yeah," he says, looking up at her again. "I'm... there were other people trapped here when Liador fell, but I'm the only one who was made immortal."

She recognizes the name. The capital of the Artelindaion Empire, swallowed up by the Cursed Valley, decadent court and all.

"Oh. I'm - I'm sorry."

"I deserved it," he snorts.

... She hadn't thought very much of the information when she'd acquired it, since it hadn't been very relevant to her project, but the way he said that causes her to connect this Tarakova to the Emperor Tarakova - something or other. Reigning emperor of the Artelindaion Empire, to everyone's dismay.

"I'm honestly not sure what could possibly deserve two thousand years of complete isolation."

Nobody deserves that. No matter what their crimes.

"Pretty sure they actually meant to kill me," he says, "which would've been entirely justified, but they fucked the spell somehow and here I am."

He tilts his head to one side, then adds, "Mind if I come up? I'm going to get a sore neck looking straight up like this."

"I," she begins, and then the thought of being that close to him on a small balcony with a thirty foot drop sort of makes the courage in her evaporate into gas and drift away in the wind. ".... Why don't I, figure out a way to get down."

She looks at the door behind her, and closes it with a foot. "Well, go on, valley, continue your bullshit."

The door ripples slightly, and shifts into a different, taller door.

She opens it.

And there is the former Emperor, scales gleaming in the sun.

He blinks down at her, then sits in the grass, which puts him at a reasonable conversational elevation. Unfortunately he can't also fold himself in half side-to-side to present a less intimidating silhouette.

She has a moment of hesitation because wow he is very large and scary.

Then she forces it away because no, her fear is not allowed to control her.

And she hesitantly steps through the door and lets it close behind her.

"So. Am. I the first person it's actively caught?"

"Not counting the fall of the city, yeah," he says. "I've seen it turn people away plenty of times - there's a way for me to watch the outside world, that's how I learned your language, or I'd still be speaking Telindai."

She nods, pensive.

"I - suppose it's not clear why it wanted me, then, is it."

"I... could guess," he says, glancing away uncomfortably.

"Oh?"

He sighs.

"It's... sort of a long story and I'm not sure I have it right and..." he trails off and shrugs his mountainous shoulders.

"Okay. You don't have to tell me if you don't want to." But she kind of needs to know so she would really appreciate it, but he has been in isolation for a long damn time so she can let him not have to confront awkward or uncomfortable topics if he doesn't want to.

"Am I - likely to be as caught as you, or as caught as the people in the beginning that it didn't make immortal, or - only temporarily caught, and likely to have an exit option eventually? Not that I'd take it immediately, I - think I wouldn't forgive myself if I just left you here alone because it was easy, just."

"I'm not sure," he says. "If my guess is right... there's a way for both of us to get free, but you might not be able to leave without it, and it's... not exactly under our control. If my guess is wrong then I have no idea."

"Okay." But what is your guess, she doesn't ask. Because if he doesn't want to talk about it, he doesn't want to talk about it.

"I'm sorry," he adds. "I'd tell you if I was sure it was true. I just - " He shakes his head. "If you're still trapped here tomorrow I'll make myself explain."

"All right. Fair enough. I'm sorry, I don't like being trapped very much, especially without understanding why? But I get the impression that whatever you think it might be, it's awkward, and. I understand why you might not like to talk about it."

"I'm a little," he waves one huge clawed hand, "overwhelmed, is that the word? By having someone to talk to besides myself and the valley."

"Overwhelmed is a good word for it, yeah. Good overwhelmed, I hope? I can definitely give you space if you need to process, if it's not."

"I don't think space would help much. But thank you."

"You're welcome. Let me know if there's - anything I can do?"

He... smiles. That's a smile. Minimal amount of fang, which is still some.

"Thanks. I appreciate it."

She smiles back.

... Then frowns.

".... Shit, uh - hold on," she says, "I have a thing with my brother open, where he could hear anything I said. He is probably very confused. Hi, Rylen, sorry, I was kind of busy and completely spaced on continuing my charming narration, um. You probably caught most of what was going on from what I said. Um. I'm pretty sure I'm okay, and I seem to be a unique case for being pulled in here, everything else is pending. There's - someone else here, you probably noticed that too. Sorry if I worried you. Love you."

He blinks.

"...but you can't hear him?"

"No, I can't. It's - my magic is intuitive when it comes to myself. It was actually a bit of trouble figuring out just how to send what I said, but I managed it with a bit of trial and error. Figuring out how to rig up something that would let him talk back is - trickier, less instinctive. And I hesitate to experiment too much."

"Do you want - I can - " Words fail him; he shakes his head and stands up. "Come with me, I want to show you something."

"Okay," she agrees, trailing after him. Trying not to be too intimidated by how enormous and scary he is.

He taps on the wall, and a door shimmers into existence, tall enough and broad enough for him to step through easily. He does that.

On the other side is a big round room with a round stone - table, you could call it a table - in the middle. The top of the table is shaped like a very large, very shallow bowl, and the bowl is full of water, nearly invisible against the dark stone except where it reflects the light.

"Show me Navethae's brother," he says to it. The reflections on the water spread to cover the whole surface, and then an image forms.

Here is a man that looks like he could probably be Navethae's brother, sitting outside with his back to a tree.

He looks vaguely unhappy.

Is that the Cursed Valley in the background? Those ominious conifers look familiar.

"..... Oh, hey. And if you learned the language it does sound, too, so - Rylen, guess who just got a way to actually hear you."

He blinks. He perks up immediately.

"Is it you?"

"It is!" she giggles. She turns to Tarakova. "Thank you, that's - amazing, I was sort of resigning myself to not having a way to communicate to the outside world."

"Yeah, thanks from me, too. Person whom I assume is responsible for this."

He grins delightedly.

It's... something.

"You're welcome!"

The smile is kind of terrifying, but honestly she's too pleased to really care right now.

"Okay, so I bet there are some holes in your understanding that I can patch now, wh - ..... Rylen did you try to break into the woods after me."

"Yes."

Navethae's palm, meet her face.

"Of course you did."

"Honestly, why are you even surprised? Of course I'd try to break into the Cursed Valley after you once I realized it decided it wanted to keep you. I would have been shouting at you about backing off once you got further in than anyone else if you could have heard me. Next time, for reference, wait for someone to tie a rope to you or something. At absolute minimum."

".... Well, okay. Yes. Sorry."

"Apology accepted. It seems like it's not the worst thing ever for you to be there, anyway - I'm going to act upon the assumption that your companion can hear me, hi, I'm Rylen, pleasure to counter-factually meet you."

"Nice to meet you too," he says to the pool, amused. "I'd invite you in, but I'm afraid the border guard is not under my command."

(Navethae relays this sentence to Rylen.)

"Yeah, they seem like they could use new management." He looks, grumpily, at the border guard.

He glances at Navethae and adds, "You can tell him who I am, I don't think you have."

"I haven't told him who you are, no, though he might have figured out some of it from context clues. Rylen, the person I'm with is Tarakova, former Emperor of the Artelindaion Empire. He's pretty sure the spell that did this was trying to kill him and instead got a bit fucked somewhere and made him immortal and trapped here instead."

He eyes the ominous conifers some more, sort of like he is considering a round two versus the border guard, but doesn't otherwise flinch.

"That sounds like a really shitty situation, regardless of anything else. I'm sorry you're in it. I think I'll agree with my sister's earlier assertion, about the two thousand years of isolation and how nobody deserves it. Honestly, I'm kind of really impressed you're something resembling sane."

He shrugs. "It's lonely, but honestly I was much crazier before the curse."

(Navethae relays this, with a slightly concerned expression on her face.)

"Well, all right, fair enough. And you have one and a half people to talk to, now."

(He looks thoughtful.)

He snorts with amusement. "Yes."

After a relay:

"I'd offer to hug you, but there are some ominous trees in my way."

"... I can," offers Navethae, a little shyly. "If you, um. Want a hug."

"...I'd feel a little ridiculous," he says, looking down at her. "And I'm - a little afraid I might hurt you by accident - I've gotten good at being careful but for two thousand years there hasn't been anything here that the valley couldn't just make again if I wrecked it..."

"Fair enough, and it would be kind of ridiculous - it might be doable safely if you stay still and I hug you? But that might make it even more ridiculous and might tempt fate a bit."

He laughs. "Maybe later. But - thanks. I appreciate the offer."

"Yeah, no problem."

"... Question, uh. What part makes a hug ridiculous?"

"Oh, he's twelve feet tall and, um. A little bit beastly. No offense."

"None taken," he says, smiling.

"..... Huh," pronounces Rylen. "Okay. Thank you for being responsible about not breaking my sister, I only have the one."

"I like your sister," he says to the table.

"He says he likes me," relays Navethae, sounding sort of pleased with this. "Thank you for that."

"And I don't think it's just because you're the first person who's spoken to me in two thousand years."

"I have won you over with my natural charm and wit?"

He giggles.

She giggles, too.

Rylen looks thoughtful again.

"He keeps getting that look," Tarakova observes.

"He does, doesn't he," she agrees. "Rylen, are you having a thought?"

"Eh. About a quarter of one. Nothing substantial or really even repeatable. Don't worry about it."

Tarakova shrugs agreeably.

"That's a shrug from him, and an agreeable nod from me."

"Thanks."

He stands.

"You guys can hear me even if I walk off, right? Because if I can't get past the border patrol I'll head home."

"Yes, I told it to show him and it'll keep showing him until I tell it to show something else," says Tarakova. "Unless he's somewhere private. The seeing pool won't peek in people's bedrooms for me."

"We can, but it won't let us see and hear you when you're somewhere private, so we couldn't talk to you while you were in your bedroom. ... Also, honestly, I feel much better about the seeing pool not peeking in people's bedrooms than the alternative. Like, even if you weren't ever going to use it for that, just as a - a way this thing is laid out."

"I did try it, but mostly just to see if I could."

"... Fair enough." He has had a while to eventually get bored and try it. And he's admitting it, instead of not.

Shrug.

"Rylen, any holes you have that I can patch while I'm thinking about it?"

He considers.

"I'm sort of wondering how the other side of your earlier conversation about whether my sister was trapped forever or temporarily caught went, but I will understand if you'd rather not talk about it."

"I don't mind if you repeat my end," he says to Navethae.

"Well, now the problem's with remembering it," she says, wryly. "Tarakova has a guess about why the place is keeping me, but it seems like an awkward guess and he's not completely certain of it, so he thought he'd hold off on it for now, because having an actual person to interact with is a little overwhelming as is. He promised to tell me later, when he was less overwhelmed."

"Fair enough," agrees Rylen. "Thanks."

Awkward shrug.

"Awkward shrugs from us both," pronounces Navethae.

Rylen snorts.

Tarakova laughs too.

Navethae smiles, pleased.

"I'm glad you find my sarcastic exploits amusing."

It occurs to him to say, "If you want to talk to your brother alone for a while, I can go away."

"Oh, um. Tarakova's offering us time alone if we want it, I think I'm okay but you might not be?"

"Nothing for now, I'm getting the impression this isn't a one time thing?"

"Yeah, I think I can just find this spot and get to see you whenever I like. Right?"

"I don't know if the pool will do what you tell it to, but I'll leave it showing him if I use it for anything else."

"We could always test it right now," she points out.

He shrugs. "Ask it for something, then."

"Right, uh - I'll let you know when I'm looking at you again, Rylen - show me Karaille."

A tiny sparkling city surrounded by huge, perfectly clear glaciers. Many of the buildings are constructed entirely from snow and ice, partly for the aesthetic, partly because they're the only building materials reliably available in the vicinity. If it weren't for the magic of a long-dead benefactor who really liked those glaciers, it wouldn't be possible to live there at all.

Navethae gazes upon it, enamored.

".... Okay, yes it works, and also I need a minute because the Frozen City is very pretty."

Tarakova laughs. "Isn't it?"

"It is. Just. It's also so impractical! I can kind of see why they'd live there anyway for the vista, but - okay, show me my brother, so he can actually converse."

Tarakova giggles.

The pool shows Rylen again.

Rylen is also giggling.

"I can speak and be heard now?" he confirms.

"You can, yes."

"Of course you'd complain that it was impractical! It's not really impractical to live there, they've got a good magic setup going, it's just the getting there and getting anywhere else from there that's a pain. Food will just sort of appear in places where food is meant to be stored, and there's a magical arctic berry that grows voraciously in the snow and offers excellent nutrition -"

Navethae makes a face.

"- you're making that face, aren't you, you have no poetry in your soul."

"I have some soul poetry! Just not the kind of poetry that involves being in a frozen wasteland, cut off from the rest of society and living off of - what was it, the berries and seal?"

"Their diet is not entirely composed of berries and seal, Navethae."

"Good for them! I'm still not living there!"

"The berries are very pretty," Tarakova contributes. "They don't grow as well away from the city, but I got the valley to make a garden of them."

"Oh, really? That's lovely -" she relays Tarakova's words to Rylen, and then adds, "Which of course means that I win, I can have the berries without trekking across a tundra, ha."

"Yes, get caught by a valley, that's much more sensible."

"Well. Well. You - shut up."

And now he is giggling again.

Navethae giggles, too.

"Honestly, I liked the trek. Wouldn't do it again, I think, but there was some nice scenery and I got to feel very adventurous and competent."

"It's nice to feel competent!"

(Navethae kindly relays this.)

"Yep! I can successfully wander around in the frozen wilderness and not die, very competent. Though, to be fair, I had a guide and was with a group, so it wasn't just me wrestling polar bears and killing them with my teeth for dinner."

He snickers, displaying teeth that would probably have very little trouble killing a polar bear.

"Rylen, I think of the three of us, only one of us could wrestle a polar bear and kill it with their teeth. I don't think it's you."

"I bet I could if I really wanted to," sniffs Rylen. "It's just impractical."

"I'm not sure your teeth could get through the fur," says Tarakova, with an amused swish of his tail.

"Tarakova's not sure your teeth could get through the fur. I think I agree. Plus, how could you get a good angle for biting without the polar bear mauling you?"

"I mostly kill it with something else, then I finish it off with my teeth. Possibly first cutting away its fur so I actually can."

"That sounds," declares Navethae, "stupid, risky, impractical, and like it's sort of missing the whole point of the exercise."

"I agree. If you really want to kill a polar bear with your teeth, get better teeth. Ideally not the way I did."

Navethae is too busy laughing to relay this message.

Tarakova giggles.

She manages to get her giggling under control enough to relay the message to an amused Rylen.

"Well. Okay. Fair enough. Guess I'll stick with my boring weaponry."

"Much more sensible."

Navethae relays this too, along with her agreement.

Rylen, for his part, is now within sight of town.

"... So how much do you want me to explain, here? I was going to go with 'My sister is trying to fix the Valley, I'm getting updates on her progress, she's making progress but it might take a while, don't worry about it,' but I'm not necessarily attached to that?"

Tarakova shrugs. He doesn't have an opinion here.

"That - sounds okay. Maybe don't mention the part where I'm sort of - stuck. In here. Until we know I'm properly stuck for sure."

"Sure. I also might want to uh, avoid talking to myself in front of people, you remember the weird looks you've gotten for it. I can linger out here if you want me to?"

Navethae considers. "... No, I'm all right, I think. Tarakova? Willing to say goodbye to my brother's charming company?"

He shrugs again. "Sure."

"All right. Then be free, Rylen, to walk in front of other people without talking to yourself like a crazy person. Love you. Any preference for when I next contact you?"

"Not in the middle of the night, please, I need my beauty sleep."

Which of course actually means 'whenever you like is fine.'

"Love you, too. Nice talking to you both."

Tarakova smiles.

Navethae gently disentangles the spell sending her words to her brother, then:

"Okay, he no longer hears everything I say. How does it - return to the quiet form that isn't spying awkwardly on my brother?"

"Show nothing," he says to the pool, and the image fades away.

"Oh. Okay. Convenient."

"Most things about this valley are convenient. There's just the big one that isn't."

"Ah. Yes." Disappointed sigh. This valley needs to be better.

Shrug. "Sorry."

"You didn't make the spell," she points out. "Though I guess I could say, 'how dare you almost be murdered by it,' if you like."

He snickers.

"How dare I drive Artelindaion almost to ruin and provoke someone into finishing the job just to get rid of me," he suggests.

"I guess. But honestly I think you might have suffered enough for that. Blaming you now for the weird stuff the spell's doing just seems excessive."

"I'm hardly about to argue," he says, smiling wryly.

"I am really dismayed at the spell, though. Come on, spell. Do better."

Snort. "Do better at what?"

"At not being terrible to people."

"It did its job, which was to make me stop being Emperor of Artelindaion. And kill my best friend. It started going wrong at the point where it didn't kill me too."

Wince.

"I - can agree that it did its job, but. I don't think you deserve two thousand years of imprisonment and isolation."

"Well. Maybe not," he says with a mountainous shrug. "I just don't know if it makes sense to tell the spell to do better at that, any more than it makes sense to tell water to do better at burning."

Snort.

"I suppose. But I'm still annoyed with it." She stops herself from asking why he thinks the spell brought her here, again, because he said he'd tell her tomorrow.

"... So is there any other neat stuff here, like the viewing pool?"

"The viewing pool is the only thing like the viewing pool. There's a lot of architecture. Gardens, if you like gardens."

"I like gardens," she says, softly.

"The valley is very good at gardens."

"Lucky me," says Navethae, a little wryly.

"Not very," he says.

"I'm attempting to be positive! It works for my brother, it might work for me."

"Good luck with that," he says dryly.

"Thank you, eternal ray of sunshine."

He laughs.

She smiles, pleased.

Giggly twelve-foot-tall fanged monstrosity!

Yep, that sure is a thing that is happening in front of her!

"Not expecting me to call you that?"

Giggling, he shakes his head.

"Well, happy to have pleasantly surprised you."

"I haven't laughed like that in years," he says. "Thank you."

"You're quite welcome!"

He smiles. As far as it's possible to tell, on that face, it seems sort of sad.

She smiles back. She - notes the hint of sorrow, but thinks he might not appreciate it if he pried. So she doesn't.

"Does the place change as it likes whenever it wants, or is it - I want to say twisting a painted canvas?"

"It keeps most things steady unless there's a need, but it can change whatever it wants to change."

"Huh. So I shouldn't get overly attached to the layout of anything."

He nods.

"... I'm probably going to be frustrated by the layout changing subtly anyway," she predicts, wryly.

"I'm used to it by now," he says, just as wryly. "Though it does respond to what I want, and perhaps it will do the same for you."

"You hear that, valley? Stability. I would like stability."

"Wouldn't you get tired of everything being exactly the same forever? I know I would."

"Well, yes, but there's things changing to keep it from getting too dull, and then there's 'the floorplan is never the same from day to day,' and one is vaguely helpful for my mental health and the other really, really isn't."

"Ah. It already does not do the second thing."

"Good."

"It does try to make things comfortable here."

"Well, that's better than the alternative. It could just - catch me and lock me in a doorless room with scheduled meals until the end of time. I'm glad it doesn't do that."

"No, instead it locks you in an enormous beautiful palace," he agrees. "Where food and drink appear in charmingly whimsical ways for the asking."

Snort.

"The flying picnic basket isn't the only whimsical food delivery method?"

"It has plenty more!"

"I think I'll tentatively look forward to witnessing them all."

He laughs.

She smiles.

It's nice to make someone happy. She doesn't precisely make people unhappy, but she's never been such an unambiguous positive for someone else's mood before. It's - pleasant. This is probably how her brother feels around people.

Happy tail-swish.

"...I want to go for a run now," he says. "I think the valley can be trusted to give you most things you might ask for, except for an exit."

"Okay. Have fun. I presume it'll be easy to find each other again if we want to?"

"Yes."

"Then I'll see you later. I'm going to explore."

He grins, and opens a door that appears in the wall, and bounds away with his tail streaming behind him.

Well that's adorable. In a terrifying sort of way, but it counts.

She goes exploring.

The city/palace is beautiful. She already had evidence of that, of course, but there just keep being more beautiful things everywhere she goes. She likes gardens? There are gardens. Is she fond of waterfalls? There are a lot of those.

Waterfalls are lovely, the gardens are gorgeous, and the idea of getting to stay here is sort of - growing on her. A little. She'd like to leave, but as long as she's here, it's so nice.

Eventually, though, she thinks she wants to find a room of her own to put down what little stuff she brought with her and sit down.

If she expresses this wish, the valley will offer her a door to a lovely cozy room with a nice view of the western fields!

Hmmmmm but what if there are better ones?

She looks over some others, too.

Rooms are available in a variety of sizes, styles, locations, colour schemes, and degrees of opulence!

It takes her a while, but eventually she finds a cozy room with a lovely view of gardens, a verdant green color scheme, and a little bit of opulence, but not so much that it makes her feel weird. She deposits her stuff and lies down.

"... Do you have some kind of book delivery system? I would like a pretty good adventure novel, please."

Her door opens just far enough to admit a finely engraved silver tray, which tiptoes into the room on finely engraved silver legs, four of them, long and thin and graceful. The tray is just large enough to contain one book, which it carries over to the bed.

It's difficult to resist such a display of adorable whimsy. She giggles, despite herself.

"Thank you very much," she says gravely, bowing her head and taking the book.

The tray bobs once, like an acknowledging nod, and then leaves the same way it came in. The door closes behind it.

Well, that's just endearing.

She toes off her shoes, curls up in bed, and gets to seeing if the book is any good.

The book is all right. Not scintillating, but not bad.

Eh, she'll take it. She kind of wants to just have something nonthreatening and vaguely familiar, and this book is the former and books in general are the latter, so this will do.

Halfway through reading it she has a break for food. What adorable instrument of whimsy will deliver it?

A much larger wooden tray, walking on wrought iron legs!

Not as adorable as the picnic basket, but still pretty adorable.

She eats, resumes reading, and eventually finishes the book.

By this time, it's gotten dark. Does the wardrobe in this room conveniently spit out whatever clothes she likes? Because she thinks she'd like to go to bed.

It can guess that she probably wants nightclothes given the time of day!

Awesome. She closes it, tells it the sort of nightclothes she'd like, and then opens it again to retrieve them.

She's getting the hang of this place.

Then she changes and goes to bed.

Bed is very cozy.

Excellent. Good bed.

The next morning, she requests breakfast in bed. Just for the novelty.

Another wooden tray, but this time it has wooden limbs, and it climbs deftly in the window.

That is very endearing.

"Excellent climbing skills," she compliments, and then: nom. Breakfast in bed is pretty great. She'll probably do this again, because it's easy and pleasant and why not?

Then she gets up, gets dressed, and decides to go exploring again.

She sort of doesn't have anything to do. She can keep herself busy for a while, but she doesn't particularly like being so idle and aimless. Maybe she'll get some kind of direction when she learns - whatever it is her fellow jail mate is keeping from her. He said he would tell her, today. She'll give him time to find her on his own.

Well, she could always go find Tarakova and ask him to explain his cryptic comments from yesterday.

Or she could investigate that beautiful tower surrounded by gorgeous waterfalls in what might be the exact center of the valley. She could do that too.

She'll go with investigating that beautiful tower. Tarakova has kind of been through a lot. She doesn't have to add 'interrogate him first thing in the morning' to that list. It can wait until after lunch.

What's the tower like?

It's very tall, and hard to see into from the outside even though it seems to be mostly made of glass. The sparkling streams of water twining around it do a good job of obscuring whatever's inside.

Well, the only way to solve this mystery is clearly to find her way inside. Is there an obvious door somewhere, or does she need to ask the valley for one?

There is a door, made of glass and framed by falling water.

Pretty.

She opens it to explore inside.

Inside, the waterfalls spilling down the walls look like shining curtains of light. It's dazzling.

But the walls are almost forgettable compared to the thing they enclose. It's a rosebush, but it's a rosebush the way this palace is a palace. Thorny branches form intricate patterns, arching over one another, laden with scarlet roses. The ground is carpeted in petals. In the very middle of it all, a single stem rises like the trunk of a tree, up and up and up to end in a flower the size of a house. Lesser rosevines twine around the great stem, densely at the bottom where they mingle with the outlying branches, thinning out gradually as they approach the top.

Well no one said that anything in this garden had to follow the typical rules of reality.

She has the bizarre and slightly hilarious urge to climb up to the large rose and bury her face in it. The petals are probably absurdly soft. There are a number of reasons why she can't. She's not really great at climbing, those branches definitely have thorns and she wouldn't be able to avoid getting punctured, and a fall from that height into thorns might actually kill her. That's without even getting into the more esoteric ways the idea might be unsafe. She doesn't actually know what this rose is for - it might be for some kind of magical thing, maybe disturbing it in any way would cause the entire spell to implode. It might be decorative. Still, she wants to.

But since she can't, she's just going to stare at it for a little while.

It's very beautiful.

It's also - kind of hard to tell with the sun shining in through the walls and bathing everything in light, but - glowing, it's glowing. Very very faintly. Mostly the petals. If she picks one up off the ground and closes her hands around it and holds it to her face, there it is, definitely glowing with a faint silvery light.

Well that's - probably something towards the entirely baseless 'it might be for some kind of magical thing' hypothesis.

She peers at it for a while longer, then reaches out with her threads of starlight to see if magic can give her some kind of - idea of what this is. Her magic's kind of - well, it's absolutely terrible at telling her literally anything about anything besides herself, but she feels she needs to make an effort.

That there sure is a gigantic magic rose!

Yeah, that was about what she was expecting. Maybe she should instead use her words, and ask Tarakova.

Sigh.

Is there anything else noteworthy to stare at, here?

No, the gigantic magic rose is pretty much the highlight of the room.

She collects some rose petals, then debates whether or not to go bother Tarakova now, or wait a little while longer to bother him.

Eh. She doesn't need to know right now.

More exploring!

Gorgeous palace full of gorgeous gardens and gorgeous magical water features!

It is all very pretty.

Navethae eventually finds a nice place to picnic, and then requests that an appropriate picnic be brought to her.

The picnic shows up in the form of three flying picnic baskets, one big one and two littler ones. There is lots of tasty food.

Gosh, that's adorable.

She's honestly not sure that she can eat all of this.

"Were you expecting me to have help, valley?" she wonders. "Because you can invite Tarakova if you like, I don't mind."

No answer from the valley, for a few minutes.

Then she can see an enormous silhouette bounding through the fields toward her, now and then gleaming brilliantly in the sun. He slows as he approaches.

"Hi," she says, smiling a little. "Hungry?"

"The valley seemed to think I would be welcome at your picnic."

He sits.

"It brought me too much food, I pointed this out, and mentioned I wouldn't mind sharing it."

He looks away and sighs.

"... What? Would you rather not?"

"I..."

He shakes his head.

"Have you tried leaving again?"

"Not yet, no. If it'd worked I wouldn't want to have left without saying goodbye."

Nod.

"... I can try right now, if you'd like?"

She's sort of confused as to what's troubling him. Does he want her to go away? Maybe some form of company after several thousand years of not having any is intimidating and scary?

"I said I'd explain things if you were still trapped here today, and we don't yet know whether you're still trapped here."

"No, we don't," she agrees.

She has another bite of food.

He doesn't seem to know what to say to that.

Navethae doesn't really know what to say, either. She's just going to quietly keep eating food.

Awkward silence it is, then!

Aaaaugh.

"Do you want me to leave you alone?" she offers, awkwardly.

"...what?"

"I can't tell if you want to be near me or not," she admits. "You seemed less than thrilled about running into me and immediately asked if I've tried to leave, yet. That - doesn't read as 'Hi Navethae it's nice to see you.'"

"...I don't want you to be trapped here," he says. "But I do want you to - be here."

He looks away again.

Softly: "I'm... frighteningly lonely."

She considers, then picks up her food and moves to sit next to him.

"I don't want to be trapped here either, but neither am I super desperate to try to get away right this instant and abandon you."

"Thank you," he murmurs.

"You're welcome."

Tentative, only-mildly-terrifying smile.

She smiles back.

"So um - do you need me to make sure I am definitely trapped before explaining your hypothesis about why the valley wanted to draw me in?"

"I'd - rather be sure, yeah. If you're not trapped then it... matters much less."

"All right. Then we can finish lunch and then I'll - I'll see if I can get out? At the very least, even if it spits me out, I should be able to rig something up so I could talk to you without being able to hear you. And eventually I can figure out a way you can reply. I - think."

He nods.

"... My offer to hug you's still open. And I can delay if you'd rather."

"...No. I... I don't..." He trails off and shakes his head.

"Okay," she agrees. "That's all right."

He sits quietly.

He hasn't actually touched any of the food.

Well, that's his prerogative.

"Do you mind if I try to set up the long distance talking thing now? I might be able to manage it if the valley kicks me out, but it's easier to reach you if I already have before, and for the first time it's easiest to do it when you're right in front of me."

"All right."

So she carefully repeats the exact methodology she took when she first successfully managed this with her brother. The strands weave together solidly enough, and it feels the same as with Rylen, just pointed at a different person.

She covers her mouth with a hand, and whispers, "Testing."

It comes through as if she were whispering the word into his ear, instead of her palm.

...he tilts his head and smiles slightly. "I heard that."

"Oh, good," she says, echoing strangely. He hears her next to his ear, and from where she sits in front of him. "Then I'll just disentangle this so you can stop experiencing the weird double-speak -"

She does that.

"There. Now I'll be able to talk to you directly!"

Smile.

She smiles back, warmly.

Then it falls.

"I'm tempted to try and figure out how to be able to hear a reply before I try to leave, but that's - it's harder. For esoteric magic reasons. And experimenting to get one way was - not always super pleasant, for my brother, and I hated asking it of him and I'd hate asking it of you, too."

"Unpleasant how?"

"Well, first it failed by letting him hear everything but me, then it failed by having him hear me so well he could awkwardly hear my heartbeat and breathing, then when I tried to fix that I - sort of temporarily deafened him. I fixed it. And then there was some trouble with getting the volume right so I wasn't, uh, basically screaming in his ear. Nothing too awful, but it wasn't super pleasant at the time."

Snort. "Ah. My magic wasn't so inclined to act up."

"Mine doesn't act up with me, I rigged myself a perfect memory just fine, it's - wait. Wasn't?"

"I haven't been able to use it in a long time."

That - follows, really. His magic was torture powered. He hasn't had anyone to torture for a while. Maybe himself, but from what she's read (and what she can recall, she had been seriously skimming at the time and her memory picks up what she pays attention to, not everything she sees) the required pain for power was - well, it had a high bar. People did not really get tortured by this man and then walk away. Self harm can only go so far.

"Ah," she says. "Unavailability of subjects, or does the magic shut you down? Do you know?"

"I tried to escape with it, in the very beginning, when there were still other people around. It didn't work."

"Ah," she repeats, softly.

He looks away again.

She does, too.

"... Anyway. Mine doesn't act up with me, I can heal myself and wire in changes just fine, it's. Whenever I do something external that it starts getting strange."

Pensive nod.

She can stave off having to say anything with the power of food. Food, meet face. She is saved from having to converse, now. Excellent.

Tarakova still isn't eating.

"You can um - eat, if you're hungry," offers Navethae.

"I..."

He tries to find words for a few seconds, and then gives up with a sigh.

She considers him.

"If it helps any," she says dryly, "I don't bite."

He snorts softly.

"I mean maybe if someone asked nicely but that's - nevermind, I stand by my statement, I don't bite. It's okay to just - say things to me? Even if it'll come out awkward? If you haven't noticed I'm plenty awkward."

"It's not that I - it's -" Frustrated gesture. "I don't - I can't always just say things. Sometimes it works and sometimes it's like... like I've forgotten how."

"... Yeah, fair enough. I'll um - help how I can?"

"Thank you."

"Sorry if I'm not - if I don't know how to say the right things to help, or. Something. I haven't exactly dealt with this kind of thing before."

He shrugs. "It's all right. No one's ever tried to help me before, either."

"Well, let me know if I'm doing anything you don't appreciate, and I'll just try my best. Sound good?"

He smiles and nods.

She smiles back.

Unless he has a topic of conversation, they can have companionable silence while she finishes her food. That works for her.

Yeah that seems to be fine by him too.

And soon enough she's - well, she's not out of food, there is enough food for two people, but she is sated.

"Do you want me to put off testing to see if the valley will let me out, or just - get it over with now? I'm fine with either."

"I think - just try it now."

"All right." She stands. "Even if it does let me out, I'll keep talking to you and trying to help you out, okay? I'll get two way talking eventually, and I bet this will be very motivating. You're not going to be stuck in here alone anymore."

His tail flicks back and forth a couple of times, restlessly. He nods.

"Thank you. I - thank you."

"Anytime." She smiles at him, warmly. "See you later, either way."

And then she picks up her bag and goes to see if the valley will let her out.

Hedges shuffle to block the archway whenever she approaches an entrance to the maze.

"What, you're not even going to let me try to wander through the maze, you're just going to block off the entrance to the maze itself? What if I want to run around in a maze for a while?"

The hedges shuffle out of her way.

Smirk.

Maybe she can talk her way out of here with logic like that. She doubts it, but hey, it could happen. Theoretically.

Into the maze she walks.

It's a hedge maze. The hedges stay put this time.

She reaches an outer exit in fairly short order; it is not blocked by a hedge, but the archway is filled in with beautiful iron latticework. Theoretically climbable, but at least meant to signify a definite lack of exit.

She knocks politely on the framework of the archway, like she's asking to be let into something.

"What if I want to see the forest outside of this place?" she asks, innocently.

The walls of the maze shuffle rapidly away until she is left alone next to an archway set into a lonely outer ring of hedge, with the inner ring visible behind her. The outer ring retreats into the distance. Trees spring up between her and it.

Now she is in a forest.

"Well, that's not precisely what I meant but thank you for the intention, I think. I can't see the forest outside even if you don't let me wander out of the valley?"

No response.

Sigh.

"Can I go wander through the maze some more, then?"

Un-tree. Re-hedge.

Is she in front of the exit archway again?

Yep. Still with the lack of exitude.

Okay so it's theoretically climbable, but does it look like something she could actually climb?

Mmmmaybe not.

She considers.

Then she tosses her bag over the archway.

"Complete accident," she lies solemnly and outrageously. "Can you just open the door and let me go get it?"

The patch of ground she is standing on retreats rapidly through the hedge maze until she is standing on the inside of the inner gate. Then her bag comes zooming along to follow her. There's barely any sense of motion; it's like she's standing still while the world flows around her.

Well, it was worth a shot.

"So. Not going to let me out, is the impression I'm getting."

A hedge shuffles across the inner gateway.

Sigh.

She could try to fight it some more, but she thinks she gets the message. No need to risk injuring herself on something utterly pointless. It's kind of hard to escape a thing that has that kind of environmental control, especially when her heart's not really in it.

"Okay, fine, then take me to Tarakova, please?"

A block of polished granite with a door in it rises out of the ground.

She opens it.

It takes her to a courtyard where Tarakova is climbing a huge oak tree.

"Hey," she calls. "I'm pretty sure it's not going to let me out, I could maybe try to push it but I think that would just be inadvisable?"