50 - Trivia_Paradise of Pretenders

There is only one path out through the forest.

 So the knight heard. But he chose not to heed the words of Erudius, and by tightening his steel-tipped feet in his stirrups he coaxed Macotta out of the cold waters, and onto the bank. It was drier there. Tristan patted Macotta, while not getting his bracers caught in his mane. Macotta bristled, but permitted him to pass his silvered hands through the black tassels.

 After staring at the trees surrounding them, the knight thought he would cut them down. He required a thing in his hands, to take from thought, and give it form. He removed his hands from Macotta’s mane and put them by his side.

 Nothing but worn plate.

 And then Macotta snorted, pushing forward, and a hand, connected to an arm, sleeved in green tassels, reached out from the bush, and patted his head. Macotta snorted in contentment. The hand retracted.

 The hand extended, holding a green apple. Tristan did not recognize its skin. Macotta gulped down the apple, happily; two bites, his white teeth bursting, and the hand retracted.

 The hand extended; it was holding a length of twine, or the sliver of oak, and Tristan took it. The hand retracted.

 The hand extended, holding a long limb of wood. It was supple, easily held; Tristan took it.

 Tristan had the length of wood, whose mother he too did not know, on the saddle in front of him just beneath Macotta’s mane. He held the length of string; neither was a sword, or a dagger, or even a halberd. Before he could piece the two together, tie the string around the wood, the hand extended, followed by another, and the two took the twine and stick, and with deft, calculated movements, tied one small part of the twine to each end, bending and curving the wood, and the string held, connecting the two into one implement, one which the hands handed him, and the knight, watching the hands gesticulate in that way, pulled back the string, with his right hand, taking care not to break it; and with his left hand holding the curve, watched the two together form a decent shape, not untoward, not unwieldy, but somewhat graceful.

 Tristan thanked the hands. But he knew that the thing as it was, while good in his hands, would not suffice to cut down through the forest. There were other ways. He could go back through the brook. Macotta would cuff him later with his newly shod hooves. But after reconvening with the other knights, he could rest and found new paths. Percival would tell him that there was only one path; one beyond the forest, one that led to the thing he truly wanted. Bedivere would caution them both against straying too far into unknown woods, for the trees were silent at night.

 Sun. Tristan let go of the wood and string, and raised his right harm against the light.

 Hands extended.

 Clang.

 He lowered his arm. A silver piece was resting on his right bracer. It was triangular and, without touching it with his left hand, which was bare, Tristan could tell it was sharp. Just sharp enough to pierce through the air, at least the leaves, if somehow he could get it attached to a longer shaft.

 Hands extended.

 Their green tassels brushing the leather, fingers smooth and coarse. Hands that led to arms in large, verdant vambraces. Above them was shadow, still concealed in the upper reaches of the tree, descending down, as if the tree itself were the man or woman. These hands placed a long basket, but one that the knight could hold between his arms, and inside this mouth of leather and sheepskin, with a strap he could fit around his shoulder, which he did, were long wooden branches, but honed and polished and cylindrical. He once again looked into the shadows. And the hands extended, making movements within, retracting vine and bramble, and Tristan saw that the sticks inside the basket now had like silver pieces, and he kept watching.

 The knight saw as the piece before him connected via a steady length of twine, from hair of goat, to one of the cylindrical pieces, in his left hand, and by continuing to observe the shadows he held one end of it with his right hand, coaxing it to the string, pulling it back, matching his thumb as it scraped against the wooden center of the bend, feeling the string tighten as he pulled it back, and instinctively, for there was no way through the trees with such a small piece, the knight brought his arms up, and in a rough spasm, let go.

 The piece soared. It fell somewhere across the topmost branches.

 Without a sound, the hands were there. They handed him the next.

 Tristan repeated the same movements, and let go. But this time the knight had leaned back, using his legs to hold fast to the horse, as he aimed above.

 And the arrow, for arrow it was, shot far and fast and high, flying over and up until he couldn’t see where it had went.

 Macotta snorted. He was becoming impatient; his hooves were dry, and all the apples Tristan gave him weren’t for standing, they were for trotting, or for galloping as fast as he could carry all that armor. At least he didn’t have to clean it.

 Tristan thought of where the arrow might be. He looked back into the forest.

 A green knight stared back at him.

 <hr>

 Tristan stared at Y’sazant. He couldn’t believe it.

 “I’m not a techist,” his friend was saying. “I’m not Don De Mai. That was all pretend.”

 “That’s not what we’re asking, student.” Zen De Mai. “We are asking if you, simply, are a Scion, or Descendant. They are the same thing.”

 Syz shook their head, their bright, vivid jade bangs falling.

 “I’m not,” they said. They looked at Tristan, and back to Zen De Mai. “I’m not. I don’t know what that is.”

 Tristan didn’t know, either. But neither of them were members of the De Mai family. And so they wouldn’t be descendants of the first De Mai techists. But that wouldn’t justify why they were sitting in a library, one that wasn’t vast or ornate, and not in the GAT facilities, at least the one for student techists, which he’d entered to receive his Alter Crest badge.

 He fingered his white shirt. He’d worn it today so that he wouldn’t be recognized as a techist, just an observer, and, of course, that was Y’sazant’s idea. Not his. His ideas came into the V-bow. Y’sazant was still holding it, one hand around it, as it sat on their lap beneath this small white table they were all sitting around.

 But Syz appeared nervous, even though, as he was sure Syz knew what GAT facilities looked like. Anyone who cared about techistry would. If they were in GAT right now his father would come. And take them away.

 And, of course, they hadn’t come in through the outside. After leaving the Exhibit they’d all portaled, in groups of two, directly here, and Tristan couldn’t locate the portal from where he sat. It was just a library, with both real and V-books, and while the other readers here were all dressed in uniform, he didn’t recognize them from Pops’ techist registry.

 “The one you’ll be in,” his father said. GAT’s Tiers.

 Thought-message to Syz. Syz, we’re just in a library. Maybe the university where the De Mais go. Maybe even Sector.

 No Tristan. I recognize some of them. They’re—

 Yeah, they’re the De Mais. The real ones.

 No Tristan! They’re all—

 “I’m not Phil, and that’s truth,” Phil De Mai said, before his entire self changed, and he was now a bald man, bare-chested, a red bird of fire on his chest, wearing deep white cloth-pants. Y’sazant gasped, their mouth actually open wide.

 Y’sazant had very white teeth. “You’re the Philosopher!”

 The Philosopher smiled, showing white teeth of his own.

 “Only in name. Senra, you were true. They know us.”

 “Senra,” but then Tristan remembered, Senra Beaudicious, or Agent Avalon, who too was now changing, into the Agent, in high school like them, with the full flynder, iststarkes beneath the table, and the silver globe on their lapel. Hair of a crystal silver. Their sleeves were rolled back, a long silver line marking each arm. What had been there before, he realized.

 Tristan stared. They were all Agents. As he watched, the rest of them changed; Numbers De Mai becoming an Agent with glasses, mouth closed; Ray De Mai’s round, thick layers of white slimming down and up into the tallest Agent at their table, one who looked at him, curiosity raining down out of his middling brown eyes, sharp and strong red hair, and whose suited back rested against the deep sofa behind him.

 Exclamations of ‘Raegoth!’ and ‘Fourth Agent Senra!’ suddenly percolated the room, as Agents in the aisles around them left their books to come greet. Tristan looked down, and even though he hadn’t caught a full glimpse of them all, the room felt now like it was shining, like he and Y’sazant had been thrown over a wall and into the throngs of the crusaders, come from battle, quenched, the light sprinkling their blood stains and their golden armor no longer heavy but strengthening, all abright with the sanctitude of being alive.

 ‘Raegoth,’ the one who must be the one with red hair, was smiling.

 “Not all of us yet,” he said. “Artok’s yet to come.”

 And as if that were some hidden signal, the Agent with glasses stood and left.

 “We’re much better in the listings, right?” the Philosopher asked. “This many Agents, surrounding these inquisitive students from the Sector’s truest techist school. Or at least by name. You are not descendants. What, Senra—why are they here then? In Agency Headquarters?”

 Of course. They had come because he’d broken another techist’s piece, he didn’t know who, or he’d forgot, there was a name holocard, he thought, no, there wasn’t—Y’sazant had been there, right next to him—still no TMs from Father—

 Wait—how did Y’sazant know they were Agents—

 He looked at Syz, but at that moment the wall just behind that shelf containing volumes of V-movie in the 23rd Century: ‘V-plays’, there were thirty-six of them, morphed, and another Agent strode through, brandishing a terribly long Weapon, it was protruding up and over their head, but not brushing the ceiling, as Tristan saw there were at least two floors above where they sat.

 “I’m not doing that again,” they said, and both the Philosopher and Senra laughed. The new Agent squeezed themselves in between the two, just on Y’sazant’s left; the unwieldy stick, Tristan didn’t dare follow its full design, it was an Agent’s, and he hadn’t done anything that serious.

 The Weapon had a silver sphere hung at its handle, if that was the handle. It was like Senra’s globe, but big enough that from here he could see that it had something swirling inside, a steam of colors. The Weapon had quick, precise orthogonal braces that he could see through the sofa where its holder and the Philosopher sat. The Weapon had at its top, or the top third, long and intricate silver curlicues, and Tristan immediately saw that as uncohesive the whole design looked, there was an integral there, a parabola there, and maybe even Vel’atta’s Resistance, but in miniature, and Tristan realized that the thing he had made, the white and jade thing, it was still beneath the table, Syz don’t take it out, put it back in the V-locker, this thing he had dared to construct, was nothing.

 “Tristan.”

 Syz was staring at him, their face pushed forward, blocking his view. “Do you know what a scion or descendant is?”

 I just want to touch it, he thought. But Tristan turned away, and looked at Raegoth and the others seated. By this time the others in the library had gone back to their reading. Or they were studying him, and learning of his disqualification from the last Exhibit, how even Starboy with his primitive, primordial colors had—

 “I’m the son of Meliodas Mott,” he said. “Tristan Mott. I am a techist.”

 “Hmm,” Senra only said, their expression not one of acceptance, but of a different tone, as if they’d wanted him to say something else. “We are starting, for the first time, an internship program here at the Agency. While we will be scanning schools—”

 —Here the other Agents turned, surprise deepening their faces—

 “—Senra?” Raegoth asked—“I am leading it, along with others you’ll soon meet, others yet to attend university, and I’ll continue it when I enter Sector,” and here Tristan started to pay closer attention, as Sector University was the premiere locale for not just techists who wished to do more than just be techists, but for students everywhere in the Sector. Father hadn’t even mentioned it once. But he’d known for years that he’d never go. Techists first, students second, he’d say.

 The armed Agent nodded in congratulations; but here, they were Agents, and so an Agent going to Sector, and leading a program for the first time, and coming to Exhibits, and finding him, was nothing.

 And as such, the others’ nods—Raegoth’s in affirmation, the Philosopher’s nearly indifferent—showed to him that here was a higher place, and he suddenly remembered the V-movie, Portal 13, where the son had wanted to be an Agent, and the father had said he had a chance. He’d seen it with Syz. Syz was also staring at the Agents, with the kind of profound fascination that they’d reserve for techists not Tristan when they thought he wasn’t looking, or when Cel Rin had first come into the school, drawing up his retinue and parochial followers like kingdom come, the dichromatic saint.

 “For both of us?” Y’sazant asked.

 Senra nodded. “Being a descendant of this or that techist, real or not, does not hinder you. Per our rigorous prior research, both of you, Y’sazant Syzer, and you, Tristan Mott, are welcome to the program.

 “It is a golden opportunity.”

 Tristan could see both the Philosopher and the one with the beautiful piece besides them, skeptical. He was just a high school student. He hadn’t taken any Agency classes. Joined or even seen the model student Agents. Knew who they were on the listings, and he thought, right now I can go through their avatars, and find the ones sitting here… Tristan glanced up, and saw that some of the Agents on the upper balconies were staring down; they returned to their reading and light discussion as if it were natural.

 But he wasn’t, this was the Agency, and, he knew, that many Restor students would ignore their receptors, flashing, dismount from their cubes and projects, turn their eyes from the falling raiders if only they could stand—or sit—if only they could be here, talking to Agents, the pride of the Sector, the path most pristine, an elegiac life, one that Tristan saw ahead of him, suddenly, thrown across his sight precluding him from seeing their faces, but he saw groups of people, their faces hidden, but they weren’t shadows and they were bright… he knew that the Agents lived here, on this grand campus that had everything, not just a library but, as he barely heard voices from his left saying something, he Thought Agency, and then Avatars, and then as the listings in holoscroll surged, he shook his head, Campus, and saw a list of some twenty or so places, seeing Library around the center, but he also saw Training Center below it, Animal Reliquary above and Forgery and Gallery. And others. Any of them he could select, and before he could think for internship

 he felt a tap on his shoulder.

 Syz. “Tristan, it’s your turn.”

 My turn.

 “My turn for—Syz, what, yes, we’re doing it.”

 He breathed. That was all there was. In that moment, in that singular boson, devoid of color, he could think, and stay, and hold onto that thought. Only that thought.

 “Tristan, I just said I can’t. I can’t decide right now. I’m not certain I want to be an Agent. I don’t even know what I want to do. Tristan, we’re only in our first year. I mean—Agents. You have to go through their Examinations, once a year. This year’s already happened. Some of the new Agents, Tristan make us, make Cel Rin, I mean, go to avatars and find Rexy.”

 Without saying a word he Thought back for Avatars and for Rexy, and a dazon with black eyes, carrying—carrying—a unity of pieces he couldn’t comprehend—

 —he whispered to himself, hoping they all wouldn’t hear, “Alter.”

 “Alter, Tristan, and I kind of like going to Restor, so I think I might just go there. I mean back there. My friend, you’re the best techist I know! Techists don’t become Agents. Agents serve and enforce and monitor. I—I mean, Agents, Tristan, what about your dad? He’s on an upper Tier in GAT, isn’t he? What if—”

 What if. That wasn’t enough.

 “I have to do it,” he said, and he wasn’t sure if he was saying it for himself, for the Agents silent, or for his only friend in all the world he knew. All thoughts of Meliodas of the black knight of the dark waters were deep beneath the mist. All he could think were of—that handle with its mathematical crenulations—of how Agent Avalon had thought he was worthy—of how empty and perfect this white, round table was.

 <hr>

 Jaceus threw his arms through his clux. It still reminded him too much of the wing-cloaks, but that wasn’t something he told them, especially not Cerise, who after his failure only spoke of Skylark, how they had to find her, especially now, as Movement Blue’s concertmaster likely had held concert, but Jaceus didn’t feel the same measure of enthusiasm.

 As he did before, he imagined, for its own sake, what it might be to have not gone here, and stay with the Furies, and lead them, as Lucas had suggested, and maybe he’d have become closer to the truth of things, of the ways of these worlds, than he was now.

 “Jaceus, do you have your papers?”

 “Sheets,” he said. “Here, Sterne.” He reached down to the low cloud-stool and, beneath Kadens’ copy of Nine Notes of Cloud, pulled out his newest sheets. They were slightly damp, but, and this continually surprised him, that was preferred among the Majors.

 He handed them to Sterne, who thanked him and proceeded to write some notes.

 “I’m ready, Sterne. Have you seen the others?”

 Mr. T nodded and, after drawing a few more circles, wrapped up the sheets and inserted them into one of the pockets of his tuba. Jaceus was sure that some of the pockets had empty sheets—but he nodded as Sterne sang praises to Agate, who still wasn’t in sync with her bind, even though she had perfect pitch, and it was probably due to her being a Scion—here Jaceus, who had begun to walk towards rehearsal, stopped.

 “Because she’s a Scion?”

 “I mean Descended, Jaceus.”

 “No, do you think that it’s because of her being descended?”

 Mr. T shook his head as he walked besides him. Jaceus prepared himself to answer if the former teacher would ask to wear his clux for a bit. He wouldn’t, because only he, Jaceus, was newly announced C Major, from the performance they had done with Kadens and Amaranth. A G and an F Major, that was enough.

 “Well, and they still haven’t explained clen biology—no one has since Ultramarine—but I suspect, from my studies of Sector I extinct fauna, that if Sector II’s originally came from, the coral polyps in the oceans, right below us, in the wake of AIV as Atlantis—”

 He paused; Jaceus wondered at moments like these, if Sterne still thought about teaching. He knew about coral; there were some Element’r families in the N?tr, living beyond the Range, who dwelled among such formations underwater. But Sterne only knew of coral as it used to be, untouched by magic and the singing dances of the dragons.

 “I’ll save my lesson for later, Jaceus. But I suspect that our binds bond to us, and it’s likely not like the bonds between different animals of the past, something attuned to the water here, and the water inside us—”

 Jaceus thought—to himself—that he was glad he had brought Mr. T.

 “—But Agate’s a Scion, and as her trait prevents her brain from being fatigued, that affects the water inside her brain. That water, of course, affects her ability to sing, recognize the notes, and ultimately, sync with a bind. She passed the test, but she’s still having difficulty.”

 By now they’d reached the snow-pit, and the rest of the Majors, Minors, and page turners had amassed, and Jaceus immediately recognized Kadens among them, his blue-white hair bulbous and tangled. He was conducting already with his bind, soaring around the Minors milling around him, touching their shoulders and the G Major examining their sheets.

 Jaceus turned to Sterne.

 “I don’t know about the human brain. But that’s a really sound theory, Sterne. Your trait involves the stars, who are beyond you, and Cerise’s her hands, and Luke is purified. If he still had his trait—”

 “OK, Jaceus. Thank you.” Mr. T turned and approached the edge of the pit, readying himself for the slide down. He adjusted his wild black hair before settling himself firmly into his tuba and then letting himself descend.

 This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

 Jaceus watched Mr. T’s tuba go down, swinging to the sides as it passed some others, likely page turners desiring the hard climb, as they moved up. Some of them saw Jaceus and attempted to wave, causing them to release a handhold, and slip back down again.

 He would take a different route. It was three days now in Skylark’s absence and the word tuba

 kept making him think of Pur?, and that made him wonder if Pur? was thinking of him, how he was spending his days as taehel ri without him. What Ila ce might be saying to him. What Herceus was telling him to make him laugh, and how Triomphe might be telling them of the alternative paths besides the route of color. And that made him think of Apolluceus and Etr ce, and as he looked down at the Minors around Kadens, sound beginning to percolate, he thought again to what Qumulo had told him, of how someone had been taken to his world, because he was taken here.

 Jaceus was having the easier route, even if he was now in his second world… for he had magic, and could not speculate as to how one, Descended or not, could live in the N?tr Kingdom.

 And there, his eyes gold and glowing, was Pur?.

 Jaceus coughed.

 “Jaceus!”

 came a distant voice, and he looked down the hill, and could barely make out Sterne at the bottom, his black hair contrasting sharply with his yellow tuba, waving and jumping. Jaceus nodded and, taking a few steps forward, tossed himself off the edge.

 “?,” he said, and thinking as hard as he could of his gold, raised his bind above him and let it carry him down.

 A few seconds later, he arrived. And as Sterne clapped his hands, and the Minors moved around him, Kadens was there, his clux reading MOVEMENT BLUE in bold blue, his eyes flaring. Jaceus knew without thinking that, with his magpotis, he could take him in a beat.

 But here he only had his bind, and his memories. So he smiled and lit up into dayform, only slightly, such that only Kadens and other Majors above C here would notice –

 – And that, more than anything about this place, made him miss those who could look at him unaffected.

 Kadens nodded and, his bind with its great wide wings, dropping by each of them and lightly grazing their heads, made Jaceus again think of Sacre del’ Ement. But he was in Sector II on Earth, and she was in one of the eight kingdoms. She was cavorting with the fellow members of Mine Tiara Dirn, and Triomphe was telling her stories to the Nam and Crea, and Ila ce was being her Sunbird.

 “Jaceus, your sheets.” Kadens’ hand was extended.

 Again, his voice. It sounded like it had a wind inside, like he was speaking around a funnel, not quite like the lilts of High English, or the fluidity of Nox, but Jaceus knew if he responded, Kadens would keep speaking, because Kadens liked to speak. He was a G Major, which for Jaceus in this regard meant somewhere around Triomphe’s regard among the people beyond the Taenim Laev.

 Jaceus reached inside a fold of his clux and pulled them out. They were dry. He caught a glance of the notes drawn therein as he handed them to Kadens, the circles his weak attempt at their music, as they were vastly, extraordinarily different from the Madrigal back home. But he believed now that they hadn’t changed from the music on Earth, just less structured, less concerned with how the circles and dots flowed together, more arranged for – and this was purely theory – their facility with the binds. For every higher Major had better sync with their bind, which meant more musical variability. And Kadens was smiling at him, a G Major looking down at a C Major, he was like Tammarin Le, but he wished for his magpotis although – he’d never used it to produce sound, only shapes.

 “That’s beat, Jaceus. Blue beat.”

 Jaceus nodded and watched as the G Major took his sheets from the other Minors arrayed there. He saw Sterne was asking a question to a much younger page turner, and he realized – as he did each time – that all of them were holding binds, or had binds fluttering about them, sheets plucked around the air, by hands, tubas emerging, and Jaceus wondered, was this the usual route for everyone in this Sector, as going to the Taenim was expected, or did the people on the third residual choose to come here, leaving their lives, and as for age – while the Taenim did not accord one’s tassel by age, but by proximity to one’s shape – Kadens looked older, but Jaceus surmised that, like Sector I, age and appearance had very little in correspondence.

 “CONCERT BLUE!” Kadens roared, and Jaceus followed the rest as they huddled, grouping together like swans, onto the stage that was just nearing readiness by the Harmonizers, marked by their wearing of hornets instead of tubas, their wide golden brims nearly sweeping the floor as they brushed away the residue of snowflakes from the previous performance. Jaceus made sure not to step on any of their claves, which emitted low tones as they cleaned, subsuming the flakes and depositing them onto the hornets. Then he found his mark, where he was supposed to be, as a C Major, in between – what was her name? Harmonie, Kadens’ C Major – and C Major Vielle, who gave him a curt nod as they hummed a series of notes for their bind, which hummed them back.

 Jaceus looked ahead. Today there were five C Majors – two others he hadn’t met in his row – and beyond them, just one or two Majors in each line going forward until the center, where stood Kadens. No A or B Majors – as Kadens was the highest Major here. Kadens was brushing back his hair with his bind, or rather his bind was brushing his hair, Kadens using both of his hands to flip through the tall stack of sheets on the pedestal of ice in front of him.

 There are many ways to use a bind, Jaceus thought. So different from one’s magpotis, traditionally seen as more symbolic than functional, other than for shape-matching and demonstrations. He supposed in that respect the Movement Blue and N?tr were less distinct than he had thought.

 An image brushed his mind – a blue bind, shooting out of the distance, and Sterne falling… Jaceus hadn’t seen anything like that since. They didn’t fight here. They just performed.

 Just like home.

 Harmonie was tapping his shoulder.

 “Jaceus, you’re on cue,” she said.

 He nodded and held up his bind, whose wings rose; and, imagining the note C in his head, or rather right in front of him, a sizable crescent, he opened his mouth and hummed C, and his bind followed.

 Soon Harmonie and Vielle followed, raising their binds, and Jaceus closed his mouth. He was still doing it – his bind did all the singing, but ever since Agate – no, he was just singing, and he had to do this until he was G Major, that was they all said for those who were permitted to go up – or able – unless accompanied by Minors.

 He lowered his bind at Kadens’ drop of his arm, and watched as F Major Amaranth, her velvet hair resisting her bind’s attempts to worm itself into her curls, sang the notes herself – and he could tell, he could tell from the first time he heard her, that everyone knew she wasn’t using her bind to sing, but because Kadens never said anything, no one said anything either.[1]</a>

 She should teach Agate, he thought. Kadens’ arm – he raised his bind again, and hummed. Agate was searching for other variations of cleave.

 No, the reason she wasn’t here – she wasn’t C Major. He turned his head, past Vielle’s black locks – and looked at the raised snow-slope, but it was empty today – oh, he forgot again. There were Minors on the stage, identifiable by their not wearing of the clux, and page-turners forming the back row in their mock cluxes that, the more he glanced at them, the more they looked like the Sector I garb they had had.

 He imagined that their calm expressions held anxiety and envy.

 He returned his gaze to the front. Kadens was throwing his arms up and down, around and behind him – concocting brief poses that Pur? couldn’t even do, even after temporarily taking off his scales – writhing and elbowing, his forearms turned around him creating triangular crevasses, and Jaceus had to find a way for his right leg to go in, and then, extricated, they became a tangle, and amongst the high laughter and echoes thudding throughout the dark cave, both their Magpotises

 laid against a wall, next to some pointy rocks, and the raw Magcreat

 liquid shifting ahead in the shadows, as they searched for each other, even though they still couldn’t figure out whose arms were whose, whose legs were whose, whose triangles and trapezoids of shadow were whose.

 Until they touched, and Jaceus felt himself go soft. And all the darkness in the cave became the beats of light and fire.

 Some notes sung. The notes swam around him.

 Jaceus raised his bind. He sang of Pur?. And soon the music stopped.

 His bind squirming, Jaceus let go, and it jerked off into the air, flapping wildly, winding its way upwards and quickly out of sight.

 Silence. And then a clapping of hands. Jaceus opened his eyes, and looked.

 It was F Major Amaranth, her velvet-colored eyes piercing orbs. He had broken their measure. She gave him a stern face, but smiled slightly, as if she’d known exactly what he’d been remembering.

 But she couldn’t. She couldn’t. None of them could. He lowered his hand and he felt embarrassed.

 “C Major. Did you take your cleave this morning?”

 Kadens was frowning. His blue brows furled.

 Jaceus shook his head. He had, but he’d take another.

 Kadens nodded, and his bind flew over to where a page-turner, already holding out a fresh cleave, was standing, it retrieved it and flew over to Jaceus. He held his palm out. It fell on it, he sang his note, and the cleave drifted over and up to his open mouth, where it disintegrated within.

 Jaceus held himself down. Clarity swam behind his vision and, a few seconds after, his bind descended, back onto his waiting palm.

 Why don’t you fly, Pur??

 Pur? only smiled and resumed his breathing exercises. His feet spread apart and his neck tilted back. Jaceus imagined a set of wings extending from behind Pur?, but he’d never seen any, so he couldn’t see any now.

 Just because – I’m Element’r – doesn’t mean I have to. We’re Lye now, Jaceus. I still choose to roar and wear my scales. But I like being on the ground, and running on it.

 As he said this, the soft air whistling through his teeth, Pur?’s chest and back remained still and hard. Jaceus thought to himself that Pur? could still run on the ground with his wings. But he’d known him for three years now and he knew one thing – that without wings, he was like Jaceus, even if he wasn’t Myodor.

 Jaceus sighed through his teeth and, without further signaling, Kadens resumed his conducting and the sounds resumed. Amaranth returned her head to the front and Harmonie and Vielle, who had been looking, turned back to the front.

 More sounds. Jaceus closed his eyes and tried as hard as he could to imagine the strange combination of binds’ notes, being anything, marginally or tangentially close, to the Madrigal, once and forever a diluted path for those in vareau, roaring and cascading their variegated scales and skin-flecks through the runnels of the sky.

 Then the bind succeeded in Amaranth’s hair to nestle itself completely within, and she stopped singing. Jaceus immediately heard the gap it caused, not one in the sheets, and Kadens raised a hand again.

 “Missed a note, Amaranth.”

 Soft, muffled sounds from the curls around her shoulder; Jaceus saw the hair moving, and wondered… “Not on my sheets, G Major.”

 “We’re in concert. Not ad libitum. Give me your sheets.” G Major Kadens was shaking his hand out, and Jaceus felt his heart plunge as the motion looked distinctly

 like the V?ng for pletmayr – hastening, quickening, a need to do something quickly. Jaceus after making Nam watching the lower colors at Magcreat

 making the movement for their soaring understanding of their shapes and Ila ce always responding with the motion for lvvo. A strengthening. With emphasis. Four fingers clasped, waving up and down.

 F Major Amaranth shook her head. Her curls unraveled and her bind hovered out.

 “Solo crescendo.” At this a wave of gasps issued.

 G Major Kadens shook his head, and laughed. Deep from his throat and Jaceus saw the bob in his neck vibrate.

 “Let’s take it back a few measures. Concert –” He raised his arms.

 And Jaceus saw the multiple binds tucked into the pockets of Kadens’ clux – and as they all raised their binds, Amaranth laughed, sharp and elevated, and a number of sounds were different, discordant, but concerted: they seemed in line with each other, Harmonie besides him was standing straighter, and as he watched a number of hands rose, higher than the group of them; Kadens was shuffling through his sheets; and without further conduct a number of binds all hurtled towards him –

 – and they landed. Striking him from all sides, Kadens froze. Handles stuck out of him, their wings protruding like flowers. And the binds on him hummed a deep and disconnected note, somber and rising, and as Kadens’ bind, great wide wings broader than any bind Jaceus had seen, rose slowly from within his clux, but its wings were frail, twitching – Amaranth was there and – stepping lightly on past the head of the F Major to her right – her bind sticking out from the back of hers like a large pin – she took ahold of it. With two quick jerks she snapped

 it in two, and a sharp, hissing scream in G seared through them as they all ducked, but Jaceus shaded his eyes with his hand as he looked and saw that a small tuft of cloud was oozing out of the broken bind, and the F Major was standing on the podium on top of Kadens’ sheets, one foot raised and on the slumped form of the G Major, his other binds nowhere in sight, and she tossed the broken pieces up in the air; they seemed to hover, life seeming to still reside in their halves; and then Amaranth’s bind emerged from her hair fully, broadening its wings – four of them, all white – and clasped the halves with them to itself, to the handle, and as the G scream became silent, a note just below it became redolent, as the bind unclasped its wings. And there were no longer the two halves. Amaranth’s bind hovered there in the air above its owner’s velvet curls – and, as Amaranth began laughing again, her eyes clear – it extended its wings outward, and a third pair of wings grew from its handle.

 Then it screamed the note, and Amaranth’s laughter matched it in pitch.

 <hr>

 Why wasn’t she struggling?

 Skylark nodded her head several times as G Minor Calm explained once more that it was concert here to have at least two Minors, especially if you were going up past the fourth residual. Whether you were a largo C Major or, even a descant B Major who had B Minors – well except B Major Kororo, she didn’t need Minors –

 “Who is Kororo?” Skylark asked.

 Calm shook his head. “Don’t be alto, G Major. Some of us in concert say that she can sing past the Concertmaster.”

 She had a sudden thought of Miss Gravity – giant blue shoes – hair in both blue and white – eyes a searing snowstorm –

 “And who’s past the Concertmaster?”

 She extended one foot out; already light wisps of cloud caressed it, she was so high up. But there were so many residuals left to go.

 Calm sighed; sat himself down with a poof, letting go of his bind; it moved besides Skylark’s foot, balancing itself on her shoe.

 “You’re not from Sector II,” he said. “Are you from below?”

 “I’m alter,” she said. “I’m an alter person.”

 “And you came alone?”

 Falling through the clouds. Turning pink – Cerise’s trait – Claude, moving a finger through the air, Skylark’s binds obeying – Jaceus.

 I have to go higher.

 “I came alone,” she said. “I came to go up.”

 Calm sighed again. “The Concertmaster leads us,” he continued. “But there are above her, the Octaves.”

 She didn’t know what that meant. But in that instant she saw how much higher, how much further, she had to go. And she felt glad.

 “OK, Calm, let’s go.” She raised a hand. And her binds joined Calm’s, mingling in the nearly silver ribbons of mist.

 He was thinking about it. She had seven binds – and, of course, she’d gone easy on him – he had just been an E Major. And she’d only just come here, already doing so much.

 …

 But was she?

 I can teach you to bodiesify.

 “I have to give my final sheet to my former upper chair. Then we’ll go.” He was arranging some sheets of paper, marked by a few quick lines; she remembered, he’d explained, as an E Major he’d reported to some F Major, but now as her G Minor he didn’t. And now she had to report to –

 “A Major Bolero?”

 “Not Bolero. We would – we would, as is concert, hold auditions like you did for your Minors. You didn’t come from a page already – a line of Majors from C to B

 – so, right now, G Major, it’s just you, with one G Minor, Calm Ic Icle.”

 Did she want more?

 She didn’t think so. G Minor Calm nodded and, making a click with his tongue, swept back his arm for his bind to leave her shoe, take his sheets, and whisk them off, upwards – creating a soft cylinder of white plume that disappeared almost as quickly as it appeared.

 Skylark did some thinking and moved her binds, two of them, into the upper pockets of her clux; two more by where her tuba touched her shoes; one each by her hands; and Alter One hovering in front of her.

 They started humming. It was G, high and demanding.

 “Portamento, G Major,” Calm said, but then Skylark thought Go up, and up she went, all her binds carrying her forward and up and off the snow. Calm gave a shout, before coming up alongside; Skylark ignoring the thud thuds in her chest as, of course she’d done this many times, she kept her hands in her pockets and stared up at the sky – the next layer of cloud, clear and white – a row of them – the binds in her clux tight against its folds, like rods – wait –

 Calm was here, heading up – she looked to her left and there he was, no bind in sight, flying. Wind, light and thin, heading across his face.

 She stopped – still the thudding but thinking hard to Hover here, knowing they were, somehow, without flapping their wings – and slowly turned herself so that she was facing him.

 “Where’s your bind, Calm?” she asked. He wasn’t flying.

 “It’s not mine,” he said, but unfurled his clux, and within it she saw, tucked against his chest – she recognized it – the bind that had shattered. Into snow – it was white, and there were lines etched on its wings.

 Its wings moved, as if in recognition.

 “How did you get that?” I thought it died! But – wait – she had seven!

 Which of you isn’t mine?

 None responded. They didn’t talk to her.

 Slowly – she opened her own coat. Clux. Calm was smiling.

 She didn’t like it. Just as she’d turned his bind – he’d taken hers – he’d given her a fake one – it was working for him – she searched his eyes – they were – calm –

 “I’m a Mordant,” he said. “I modify clen biology. Binds without enough water inside them cannot be put da capo. Yours has a high snow content.”

 But – it had shattered into snowflakes – so binds could be brought back – she had to thank him, he was her G Minor – that meant – she had eight binds –

 “And while you were sleeping, in session – I gave you one of mine.” He gestured to her clux – and the one by her left hand swirled around, and she dipped a bit, but returned to her position – it was white with white wings – she was starting to forget which was which binds she’d seen, they only came in white or blue – while she was sleeping – he’d taken her to what he’d said was his case, a human-sized portal-refrigerator, yesterday, and it was next to a bunch of cases where all the Majors on the residual slept. But she’d stayed up last night – her breath clouding on the glass of her case, watching outside for any others who came – and none did. Until she at some point fell asleep, without having her BMPs – wait.

 She wasn’t the only one with more than one bind. The thought dissatisfied her.

 “Sorry – diminuendo, G Major. It’s our sopra. Each of us in concert have our own desires to go up the key.”

 She had a sudden thought to go back to the flag, and shove Calm’s face in it until he admitted he was only G Minor, E level – but she was already in the air here.

 Up, she thought, and her six binds and Calm’s second pushed her – and Calm laughed, but he followed – and as they pushed through the clouds, water cold as ice slicking up all around her, she saw a block of shoes, no, large blue boots, like rainboots – six pairs – kicking left and right – in unison – and she shot up past the layer, and there were, some two meters away, six Majors in stunning blue cluxes, of midnight blue, each with a giant silver letter curled over their shoulders – they were all moving, in sync, moving this way and that – left – right – no, left three steps, right one step – and back. She watched until she could make it out – their silver, sharp letters, gleaming in what she now realized was an immediate onset of darkness, or a great dimming, like moon’s crescents –

 – spelled BOLERO.

 Their binds now swung in from the back, silver pinpoints of light that shot so fast, and gracefully, around the six Majors, highlighting the letters. BOLERO. As the Majors gradually swung their way over the cloud, going past them – their binds trickling bars – Skylark tucked her clux in more tightly. It was colder here.

 BOLERO. The letters seemed to fade as the Majors stepped into the distance, smaller and smaller until those midnight blue coats vanished like dark splotches on the cloudscape.

 “Alter,”

 Skylark said. So that was A Major Bolero – no, her Minors – they weren’t Majors. They were Minors.

 She turned to see that Calm was sitting, legs splayed out – staring after the departing cluxes, her resurrected bind sitting on the snow in front of him. He had been shocked, completely embarrassed earlier when learning she was G Major – to an E – but these were A, and not even the A Major Bolero herself!

 She smiled. Bolero… A was one higher than G.

 She looked again, out over the cloud – it was barren and empty, just a flat distance, white and dark. But it wasn’t night – only the sound of a soft, rushing wind, like someone was breathing, in, and out, slowly.

 “What’s on this residual?” she asked, into that air.

 “Sectionals,” he said. “Led by A Major and above.”

 So that was a sectional. How could she join –

 – She would not. She had her own – she looked down – and she felt them, all six of hers.

 She stepped out of the theater, Lucas and Cade laughing, saying how the movie wasn’t great or original and not a proper reboot of the MCU’s sixth saga’s ‘Blue Star’ cycle. No, it was introduction, said Cade, but Skylark wasn’t listening, she’d stopped by the steel-ringed balcony that looked over the river. She’d missed Lowers – there was something peaceful about it. It was wide and the surface was nearly violet – Luke asking her if she needed a way back home up in Might. She thought about how Miss Gravity had looked at the Skyborne, laughing in their faces and adjusting her boots. Big and blue. “I can go anywhere,” she said. “Because I can fly, you idiots.”

 Skylark closed her eyes. Big blue boots. Big boots – she couldn’t even feel her feet, it was cold – blue.

 She moved her feet – and – a dark, lurching swooping entered her mind – she lost consciousness – I – she felt – I – I – want –

 – Shaking her shoulders.

 “G Major, G Major,” and it was Calm.

 <hr>

 [1]</a> F Major Amaranth – “Self Care” by Mac Miller, on his 2018 album Swimming; “Wishing” by Kana Nishino, on her 2011 album Thank you, Love

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50 - Trivia