Pultine gets to know Alia while they wait to be transported to the existence known as Paradise. They are in the Smiting Chamber and Pultine smiles as Alia interacts with her friends, Ivan and Clay. Their familiarity reminds Pultine of her time with her sisters, even if their dynamics are very different. Tracia is the oldest and wisest, but she never lords over her sisters, she doesn’t have to because they trust her implicitly, and an outside observer would think that she is the most reserved judging by her reluctance to directly disagree with her sisters. Ahdis is the youngest of them and she is quick to laugh or tell a joke, always the comic relief until some situation called for something else. Pultine is the middle, and she is known as the no nonsense truth teller, though some may describe her as the mean one and the trouble maker.
Alia is seemingly the oldest of her trio, the one in charge, but both Ivan and Clay treat her like she is their charge, their precious person to protect, which is funny considering that she has the exact same feelings of protecting her precious friends that they had for her. Ivan and Clay are a couple, and despite the tension they’d experienced since traveling with Alia to the Fonlands, they are in good spirits with Alia. Clay is probably the most like Pultine, he frowns the most and seems to struggle to control his temper at times when someone mentions something he doesn’t like. Ivan is as gentle as Ahdis and, just like the white aboatia, the things Ivan said made the others laugh.
“When we left to find Owuo with Alia,” Clay explains, “I didn’t imagine that we would travel to another universe and for so long. How long we been here?” he asks looking to Alia who shrugs.
“Good thing we did come,” Ivan says.
“I should say so,” Pultine says, smiling at the three Earthers. “Are you two like the Hyperion?” Pultine asks, looking from Ivan to Clay. “Do you have the same power? I’m sure you’ve answered this question before, but I was just wondering if you’d be with Alia when the fighting commences.”
“These two don’t have the Hyperion power that I received from aether,” Alia explains, “The power they have is fueled by their love for each other. Even if they hate each other,” Alia says jokingly and elbows Clay. He looks away from them all.
“You two were at odds before we went to Talj,” Pultine says with concern.
“It’s nothing…” Ivan starts but Pultine interrupts.
“Sublimated, neglected feelings do no good,” she says. “What was the cause of your disagreement?”
“Nothing, really,” Clay says, but Ivan speaks as well.
“He was with that Vodun all the time,” Ivan says.
“I told you I wasn’t comfortable in this chamber!” Clay begins to get angry.
“Ivan,” Pultine says in a measured voice that is mostly a reprimand, “you know better than to believe Clay would just drop you and he doesn’t like Gu nearly as much as Gu likes him. They are like Alia and Xêvioso, where Alia is a being perfectly aligned with pattern magic, just like myself with life magic. I assume Clay has mastered his rage…”
“Ha!” Ivan yells sarcastically and it echoes around the chamber.
“Petty bitch,” Clay says, not looking at Ivan but definitely referring to him.
Pultine chuckles. “I wonder if you two are even really mad or just playing out the argument, refusing to be the one to apologize first. I recognize it because my sisters can be very petty bitches, but it doesn’t change the bedrock of our cooperation. I recognize this and I’ll leave it alone. Ivan, you are learning Death Magic?”
He nods. “I don’t understand what makes it death magic, though, besides the fact that Owuo does it and it’s purple.”
“It sounds like it’s just rousing the dead,” Pultine explains, “but death magic is the opposite of pattern magic. Pattern magic establishes the rules, death magic breaks them. Maybe you would be more comfortable with life magic.”
“Isn’t that the opposite of death magic?” Clay asks, obviously confused.
“Life magic is an extension of pattern magic and a constituent part of death magic. The pattern dictates life and the absence of it precipitates death. None could exist without the others. Life and death aren’t opposites, they are two sides of the same thing.”
The three earthers nod solemnly at the aboatia who smiles at them. “It’s only complicated when you try to explain it.” Pultine continues. “Users of Arcana who come by it naturally don’t need words of explanation. Alia didn’t need it when we met Un…”
“Maybe don’t say that name,” Alia interrupts. “Xêvioso was pissed before.”
“Right,” Pultine laughs. “It hardly seems like it matters anymore. When we meet that mushroom again, it will be the end of her, that I know for sure. Not that there isn’t reason to be concerned, I understand that and will refrain from uttering that name again, if I can help myself. Did seeing it, seeing her, change the nature of your fear about the battle to come?”
Alia nods. “I’m not less afraid, exactly, but I think I know what you mean. Before, it was just whispers across universes and explanations from Vodun, but when we talked to her, I was able to understand it better. I will say that I left that planet or whatever it was full of pity for that mushroom. She was so wounded and reacting out of fear that something was coming to end her and that fear consumed her, filled a whole universe. Can you imagine the past she endured that created her?”
“You do well not to fill in blanks and make the monster more sympathetic,” Pultine says. “I have seen it before, it reminds me of the Death Witches who are our allies in this fight now, but we must be wary of their intentions and their actions at all times. Recently, just before we went into to Talj actually, the Death Witch Detritus strongarmed Tracia into returning the Death Witches from a place of banishment, and all the while Detritus was appealing to Tracia’s womanhood, her coven are her sisters like the mmoatia are for Tracia. I’m not saying that Tracia made the wrong call in freeing them from their banishment, I honestly don’t think it was our call to make considering that we did not banish them in the first place, but Tracia considered everything, the coming threat, and it remains to be seen if the Death Witches can be real allies or if they will be opportunistic and defect or just wait around until the threat is gone to seize power. Maybe it is true that the mushroom woman was the victim of terrible treatment that drove her mad and what she is now is just the sad realization of that past, but it is just as likely that her fears of bad treatment, of deprivation or death, are completely conjured in her mind and in the long time she has obsessed over it, it has consumed her. But there is no doubt that she is mad and there is no going back. The only way for other realms of the multiversal structure to avoid the fate of Talj and all of the lives who dwelt there oblivious to our struggle and beyond our ability to help, is for the mushroom to be burnt out at the root. Mycelium grows deep and fungi are resilient, so we must be intentional and lethal. There is no room for sympathy.”
Alia nods at Pultine, the two holding one another’s eyes and not blinking. Ivan and Clay can feel the intensity between them, it feels like a ritual and there is palpable, tangible magic churning between them and it glows golden and green.
PRL Serials 