"Rithus is a little harder to pin because he's changed so much. He's a little like an uncle and a little like a brother. I have a love and deep respect for him. How could I not? Back when he was nothing more than an old man, he stood between me and the people trying to kill me with only a suitcase as a s.h.i.+eld.

"Venito is my brother, plain and simple. We worked hard to make it that way. Both of us wanted and needed that. Just like real brothers we have a little rivalry, a little beef with each other's views. It's a warts and all brotherhood.

"Lyra and Vivian are both special to me in different ways. Thinking about them hurts in different ways. I can't say that I truly love either of them but I could if they'd let me. As a 'climber' it's a good thing that they both rejected me but as a man who wants to fill the lonely s.p.a.ces inside, it f***ing sucks."

Orison's words stirred up unfamiliar and confusing feeling in Duran. Gan briefly gave a look of sympathetic understanding before his poker face slid back into place.

Before Orison could go into the final stretch of his confession, Duran said, "Is it...normal? The lonely s.p.a.ces... How many does it take. Wick helps but..."

From where he was sitting under the growing shade of a turret, Orison patted the floor on both sides of him. "It's not that there are so many s.p.a.ces. We make them when we realize a want or need that isn't satisfied and they grow deeper with time, then they hurt. There's not that many of that kind and as long as a person is willing to reach out and invite someone to fill it, most of the time they can.

"The ones that are hard to fill are the s.p.a.ces that people leave behind. Sometimes it's better to try and close them than fill them because anyone that you find to put in them later have to compete with the ghost of the person who once was there. Easier said than done but... Anyway, come over here and sit beside me. I still got a couple of names left and I'd rather feel like I'm spilling my guts to friends than confessing to a jury."

Duran came and sat beside Orison looking stiff and a little uncomfortable when the young mage hung an arm around his shoulder, b.u.mping the side of his head against Duran's like Venito did to him.

Smiling, Orison said, "Filling a s.p.a.ce can be that easy. The thing is, the longer a person is there, the more you feel the emptiness when they leave... I got another one right here, Gan. Are you gonna hear the rest of what I got to say as a person filling an empty s.p.a.ce or a person leaving one?"

With a half defeated sigh, Gan sat next to Orison and hung his arm on the young mage. "I thought this was supposed to be a bullsh*t free confession."

Orison said, "Since when is it bullsh*t to prove a point with a demonstration? Okay, it might be cheating but it's not bullsh*t if it's sincere. If you hadn't came over here, I might not have been able to finish this. It's not that easy to just throw out your feelings in front of someone when you're afraid they might step on them.

"But enough of that. I gotta get through this before the buzz wears off. After breaking out the good stuff, I'm scared that green beer is gonna come out next."

Gan dug his fingers into Orison's shoulder, causing the young mage to squint as he said, "Alright, alright. No disrespecting a Northlander's choice of booze."

The young mage took another deep breath and finished his confession. "Ivan's new. I don't really know him that well but he seems okay. I've been in too many awkward situations with him to feel that comfortable around him. Some of it's his fault and some of it's mine but I feel responsible for bringing him into this so he's kinda like my apprentice I guess. Something like that at any rate."

Squeezing Duran's shoulder a little, Orison said, ���In the beginning, I kinda picked you on a whim. I saw a little of myself and Venito in your situation and that made me feel like giving you a chance... Don't take this personally but for a little bit there, I resented you because in the process of saving you, I lost a lot of stuff. We also ended up having to leave earlier than we night have but that's just an if. If the will of Amoril hadn't been trying to erase you, I might have eventually ran into a situation where it would have came after me anyway.

"You've grown on me though. I'm starting to see you like a little brother. I also admire your grit... I know you're working through a lot and I'm not going to act like I understand but I want you to know I'm here for you if you need me. If you don't feel like talking we can always just go fis.h.i.+ng or look at the stars, whatever helps you untangle the knots."

Duran relaxed and snaked an arm around Orison's back into a one armed side hug. Suddenly, a little flash surrounded Duran and he looked a little 'more real'. The young mage realized overcoming adversity could take many forms. It made Orison curious as to what the adversity the kid had overcome but it was a bad time to get sidetracked.

Orison turned his head to look at the scout. "Gan, you're my best friend, my right hand man. We've been through so much c.r.a.p together that I'd have no reason to stop you from walking away but it would hurt like h.e.l.l if you did... G.o.d, just thinking what I'm about to say makes me feel like crawling under a rock but here goes... I love you, man. Outside of my theoretical future lover, what's mine is yours.

"There isn't a word in my dictionary of what to call family that seems right so it's hard to answer your question. Let me say this instead. If you killed someone in front of me, my first question wouldn't be 'why did you do it?' it would be 'where are we going to dump the body?'. Please tell me you understand what I'm trying to say."

Gan's grim look faded back to normal and he said, "I feel like an a.s.s for making you say all that but it just hit me hard how different the boy I made you out to be in my mind was to the man you are. That isn't your fault but I needed to hear that. Just let me rough up your hair one last time, Little Boss, and then I'll work through the rest of my dumb sh*t."

With the patient tolerance of a martyr, Orison endured Gan turning his head into a bird's nest. That patience was tested greatly when the scout invited Duran to join in but it was a one time deal and he didn't want to break the mood.

As Orison contemplated the pros and cons of baldness, he said, "Alright, I had to lay the heavy. Either of you need to unburden some hard to say stuff be fore I pack up the 'safe place' vibe and get down to grown-up business?... Gan, one embarra.s.sing statement from you is mandatory, all else is on a voluntary basis only."

With a mischievous glint in his eye, Gan said, "I love you too, Little Boss. I'd like a hug."

Orison snorted. "Drink some more and hug a chamber pot. You already f***ed my hair up. I think that's enough touchy feely stuff for one day."

While Orison dodged Gan's halfhearted attempts to grapple him, a contemplative Duran said, "I like girls."

Seeing that Gan was about to say something that would be far from a supportive statement, Orison quickly beat the scout to the punch. "That's important stuff to know. I'm glad you figured out more about your-"

Duran raised his hand, his head pulling off a fairly convincing act of disguising itself as a tomato as he said, "I only feel the itch... thinking about girls but..."

Orison suddenly realized he was about to hear something he probably didn't want to. Similar to watching a train wreck happen in slow motion, he found himself unable to turn away even though the end result wasn't something he wanted to witness. It didn't help that Gan had a 'where's popcorn when you need it?' face.

Through a process that made Orison wonder if having his ears melted off by a wasp grudge was less painful, Duran finally managed to express that thoughts of girls might be what got the party started but it was hard to pop the cork without some extra mechanical considerations. As much as Orison would have liked to pretend he'd never heard the confession or the questions that followed it, Duran had already been through enough without having someone make him feel ashamed. The young mage had no doubt that it had taken all the courage the boy had and all the trust he'd built with Orison to say it.

Ignoring Gan's look of schadenfreude and his own inner cringing, Orison gave a dry and clinical biology lesson as quickly as he could. He then offered what little dependable knowledge he had on the subject before putting Gan on the spotlight to answer any technical questions. After shooting a warning look at the scout to take it seriously, Orison excused himself. Finding a nice spot where he didn't have to hear gory details but could flash Gan daggers, he indulged in a little carefully hidden joy in Gan's misery.

When Gan started giving Orison pitiful visual entreaties to be let off the hook, the young mage swooped back in. "Let's pack the rest of that up for now, Duran. We've got other things to talk about and we've burned a good deal of the day already... Gan, focus on your crystal and tell me if it's giving you any feelings of directing you somewhere."

Gan closed his eyes and was silent for awhile before he said. "It's hard to sense but yeah. Is that bad?"

Orison shook his head. "That's our next destination. Depending on what we find there will determine what we do next."

As Orison began constructing the model for beacon teleport, he suddenly stopped. "Gan, how did you still have a bottle of mead with miasma in it? That doesn't make any sense. This isn't Amoril. The moment the Heart of Osomo caught a whiff of that stuff, it would be gone. Look around, man. The bottle's already been taken!"

Looking a little cloudy eyed, Gan said, "All I had in my inventory was the beer you don't like. I... don't really know.��

Orison turned to Duran. "While you were talking with Gan, you managed to get pretty chatty there for a bit. Do you think you still can?"

Similar cloudy look on his face, Duran replied, "No."

The young mage said, "I think we might owe Mylar an apology. He doesn't have to know that though... High alert, you two."

Orison closed his eyes and focused on a strong desire to connect with the Danann Key. Nothing happened. As soon as he gave up, believing that he'd overthought it, he felt a connection. Caught off guard, Orison fumbled to send a command too late to be any good as the connection closed again. Fortunately, he was just the decoy.

A sensuous woman's voice dripping with mockery was getting ready to say some scathing remark when the t.i.the that Orison's sub-mind had called from Rozcherek came in. It was a pitiful amount but what Orison wanted was a reliable connection anyway. While the young mage worked on making a best case scenario happen, his sub-mind overclocked trying to make more practical and realistic things happen.

Many things happened at once but the thing that Orison was trying to accomplish himself was ruined by a beautiful but scary looking woman with literal fire for hair who dived through him in a hazy smoke-like state. She had managed to capture the diminis.h.i.+ng connection with Rozchereck's realm but not before Orison's s.p.a.ce had peeled a layer off of her in the process. As a spiritual being, she must have been in immense pain but she whispered a 'thank you' anyway as she slipped right through the clutches of Osomo.

The Danann Key, that Orison had physically held in his hand for less than a tenth of a second, had already zipped through Droya's t.i.the connection and into her hand right as the connection closed back off. The faint afterimage of her surprised face as a box fell into her lap while her mind was a.s.saulted by a mental message on what to do with it marked the end of Orison's trick play. The young mage had barely registered the fading Caribbean blue flash of spiritual light around himself and his two companions before the tower started shaking.

Constructing a beacon model, Orison yelled for his companions to run towards the glowing transport sigil. Right as he finished, while the tower began falling, Orison released his model. The last thing Orison wanted was to go through an official transporter channel while the Danann Key's effects on them were only taking hold. For all he knew, the transporter would clean and adjust the hard won benefit he just earned them right off.

Appearing in a border village at the edge of Sek controlled territory, Orison failed to initiate another model as the three of them pa.s.sed out for a few seconds. Coming to with a start, the three men were being carried back to a healer's hut. Trying not to spook the guy carrying him, Orison calmly asked the man to put him down. After an apology and a few gold, Orison lead his companions back to the transporter as he constructed another model, sending them beyond the desert in the direction that Gan's purified crystal was pointing them.

Flas.h.i.+ng into a spa.r.s.ely vegetated area and seeing that Orison was building another model, about to ask the scout which direction again, Gan held up his hands. "Wait, wait! I'm dizzy as the Abyss. Give me a few breaths to get myself put together again... Maybe you can tell us what just happened in the meantime?"

The young mage consulted his sub-mind so that HE knew exactly what happened. "Okay but just so we're clear, I had no idea things would get that intense. I was making a wild toss to see if I could get lucky... I'm pretty sure the tower was being ran by a djinn or genie. It really did grant wishes in a manner of speaking. Thing is, in most tales they either don't like doing it or like to twist the wishes. In this gal's case, I think the Heart of Osomo set some pretty harsh guidelines on how her power works so she outright sabotages them with some other ability.

"My conduit is still on Amoril. I just 'wished' that I could reach it. By default, she tried to screw with me but I've got a way around that. Due to that work around, I opened a different connection to my conduit. Using that, I did a little tweak on us with my conduit and then sent a care package home. I didn't think the crazy lady would try to use the channel I opened to Roz's plane as an escape hatch. Without a genie, I guess the tower's done for."

Gesturing around, Gan asked, "Could you have got us... out?"

Orison said, "To Roz's plane maybe. I doubt we'll suddenly be welcomed back on Amoril. The will of that place was trying to kill us when we left. I think we shouldn't try going back there until we're strong enough to keep from being erased first. And I don't know about you but being stuck on Roz's plane sounds pretty bad too. Remember how Lily got turned into a living mummy lady? She was a fourth step, Gan."

Frustrated, Gan said, "Wasn't there maybe some way you could have... I don't know, wished us out of this world directly?"

Orison sighed then said in falsetto, "Oh, you wish to leave this world? That's simple, just die. Would you rather I sent you to the Abyss in front of a being much more powerful than you? How about to a vast expanse of nothingness or one of another thousand scenarios you can't survive?... Gosh, you're picky."

Adopting a serious expression and normal tone of voice Orison said, "If you ever find yourself being offered easy gains or special favors by unknown supernatural forces, better to aim too low than too high. Even the good ones don't like greedy people and I think there's probably far more of the 'screw you over' variety to begin with."

Patience reaching a low point, Duran cut in. "What did you do to us?"

Scanning with spirit sight first, Orison said, "You'd be better off asking Wick. They took over... Gan, you look a little more like yourself in the best possible way. We even managed to get your knee scar back. I can't tell you a d.a.m.n thing about the internal stuff. Your soul's finally strong enough to pa.s.sively block my sight but until it gets a chance to settle, I don't want to go poking around.

"Alright, enough d*cking around. Let's put at least one more jump between us and Sek. If we don't appear in some garbage dump of a place, then we'll rent a room and get a fresh start early tomorrow... No drinking tonight, Gan. Healer's orders."

A few moments later, the party of three disappeared in a curtain of light, cutting off Gan's complaints.