Malwine had barely gotten to the part of her recollection where the golden text on the panel replied to her when Veit simply leaned forward, eyes closed, his elbows on his knees as he rubbed his temples. He’d sat down on a hanging chair next to his bed, which Malwine was fairly confident had not been there the first time she’d been here.

  She paused her tale. “What are you doing?”

  “Mentally preparing myself for the rest of this,” Veit said with a sigh. Her teacher still looked a mere wrong turn away from another meltdown, but at least he had been listening to her so far.

  Yet that undercurrent of discomfort remained, his earlier admission hanging heavily in the air. For all she’d technically been using him for his ability to teach her, knowing he wouldn’t have taken her on if he’d known about her abilities stung.

  He’s still wrong about me being a Forger, though. But first the guard, and now Veit. What were you up to, OBeryl?

  “It wasn’t that bad,” Malwine insisted. “It seemed confused as to how I was communicating with it, I think.”

  Veit straightened with a barely suppressed groan. “How so?”

  “It seemed convinced it somehow ran afoul of whatever a Lorekeeper is, because I’d run that trial for Anselm. I mean, at least I think my trial for Anselm was the reason.”

  She detailed the exchange—well, as best as she could recall it. Veit listened intently, seemingly deep in thought and not interrupting her once.

  “No lie, I’m incredibly curious as to what… as to what’s up with my uncle, I guess,” Malwine admitted. With her initial confusion now in the past, she recognized that trial for what it had been—one altered by a secondary force, and unlike with Katrina’s, she might still have had a chance to understand the oddities of this one. “But I reiterate, it mistaking me for a ‘Lorekeeper’ worries me. I don’t like it when people keep referencing things I don’t understand.”

  “That.” Veit scowled, shaking his head. Whether he refused to take the bait or simply missed it was beyond her. The forester was clearly still on edge, but he grew calmer a moment later—physically, at least. “Actually, that might be good, as far as misunderstandings go.”

  Malwine somehow doubted that. “I’m not going to get in trouble for it thinking I’m a Lorekeeper?”

  “Did you claim to be one?”

  “No.”

  “Then it will be fine,” Veit seemed confident enough of that, waving her concerns off. “Whichever being was communicating with you was not actually aware of anything on your end, and wanted to seek your favor, out of the misguided belief that you were a Lorekeeper. The offer of aid, the attempt at a bargain—all hallmarks of one who would wish to get on a Lorekeeper’s good side.”

  “And a Lorekeeper is…?”

  “They’re a Kind that seeks to collect history, in the same sense the fell cling to specific Affinities.”

  “…Something tells me I wouldn’t like them.”

  Veit shrugged. “They are of the universe—as far as I know, none have visited this world in centuries, and the last one simply came to record a war on the surface. It was during my father’s time.”

  Malwine nodded, though she had no idea what that meant as far as the timeline went. She only managed to hold her tongue for a moment longer. “Which millennium are we talking about?”

  “Oh, I haven’t the faintest clue,” Veit admitted. “But I believe the deity you shouted at is the important matter here—you must under no circumstances cross paths with it again. It will likely be more baffled than anything else, now, but it would undoubtedly demand answers if it got the chance to contact you again.”

  She’d have been lying if she said she didn’t feel her heartrate pick up, despite her current status as a double. “I’m sorry, did you just say deity?”

  “There are no gods under the waves, not anymore. You should be fine so long as you do not seek it out,” Veit sounded less confident this time, and avoided her gaze. “In terms of what concerns me, I suspect your uncle is compromised. As to what that means, in detail… I know not.”

  I could have told you that. Malwine squashed that ungrateful part of herself. She’d guessed there was something seriously wrong with her uncle even before Veit had dropped that bombshell on her, but his observations had been sound so far.

  Then again, the casual mention of a god didn’t stun her as much as she thought it should have. Maybe it was because the man in front of her had a Proclivity drawn from a Devil, and Devils apparently cast the gods out. Maybe it was because the widow came from a world where few even believed in higher powers—the idea didn’t feel as unsurmountable as it should have.

  I can now officially say I yelled at a god, actually. “How can you tell it was a deity?”

  “Because of your description. The way beings past a certain level of power interact with the world is something our minds cannot fully process,” Veit explained. “It means that when their words manifest, regardless of medium, certain characteristics are to be expected. For one, most people interpret some of those undertones they cannot parse as color.”

  “Oh,” Malwine felt her eyes widen. “So if I see text color, it’s a god speaking?”

  “Over a panel, yes. The description I’ve heard of involves fluttering colors at the edge of one’s vision, when deities speak. Again, I was born long after the Devil’s Empire had come and gone,” the forester said. “You’d be hard-pressed to find many who’ve encountered deities in recent memory, at least under the waves.”

  Malwine couldn’t help herself, grinning. “So I’ve managed something few have?”

  “That is not something to take pride in, let alone given the circumstances,” Veit gave her a look. “Besides, people on the surface interact with deities on the regular.”

  She pouted like the toddler she was.

  Veit breathed deeply. “I must confess I expected worse.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence, I guess.”

  He ignored her. “Worry not about your uncle—I will look into the matter,” Veit met her gaze. “Now. The crux of the matter is that you are a Forger. That fact stands above all.”

  “I’d heard of Forgers, while grabbing Skills from books,” Malwine volunteered that much. “But none of my Skills reference such a thing, and I don’t even know what it means.”

  “Show me your Skills,” Veit asked—no, it did not come off as a question, or a request.

  Malwine frowned, eyeing her Skill panel.

  Even if she could have simply shared the whole thing with him—which she could not—she did not feel particularly inclined to.

  “Why?”

  “Because if I am to aid you—a Forger—no longer will I agree to work blindly,” Veit said. “I need to know what I am dealing with.”

  It sounded fair, and he’d yet to lead her astray. But that didn’t put her at ease, not when his comment reignited her doubts. “I don’t believe I’ve asked you—why help me still? By your own admission, you wouldn’t have helped me if you’d known about this Forger thing, specifically.”

  She hadn’t forgotten his earlier outburst, and found she was uncomfortable still. It was the first true crack she’d seen in his persona—anything that had gotten him to lose his composure in such a way couldn’t possibly be shrugged off so quickly.

  Veit eyed her, as if trying to measure where she was coming from with that alone. “I stand by actions, when you first used your projection ability on me. I will not apologize for doing what seemed correct at the time,” he started, and Malwine couldn’t help but be slightly disappointed—it was little more than a rephrasing of his usual justification, than an answer that would be relevant now. “But while I had my reasons, I still suspected wrong. I’ll say I meant to teach you earnestly, then. Aiding you was half an apology, and half necessity to limit the damage you might cause if left to your own devices.”

  “Hey!”

  “Neither fact would have mattered had I known you were a Forger, no. I’m not one to go back on my word, but I will not lie to you, either. If that is not justification enough to you, as to why I help you still, consider that by your own admission, you have lived beyond your years. You are not naive enough, to not know people do things for self-serving reasons—if nothing else, I would very much like to be in good terms with a Forger for once.”

  Malwine balked at that, jolting in place.

  “I believe in honesty—to an extent—at least when it comes to things like these. I do not dislike you as a person, and making an attempt at teaching you has been enjoyable, even if at times I cannot help but think you focus on literally anything other than what I’d prefer be your next step,” Veit gave her a pointed look. “But I am not fond of Forgers in the slightest, for while they are not numerous, every single dealing I’ve had with them has been for naught.”

  “That’s anecdotal, though,” Malwine joked. She regretted showing him a panel more and more by the second, but she couldn’t have accounted for his personal history, let alone for it leading to such a reaction. “And you’re aware I still don’t even know what Forgers even are. Maybe I can do something Forgers do, but I am not that. No offense, but you don’t just get to throw a tantrum at someone for being a Forger when they’re only a Forger in your head.”

  Veit’s gaze snapped up. “…That much is true from your perspective. I apologize,” he said—the words came off as too forced for her to think he truly meant them, but each movement of his looked so strained that it struck Malwine he probably wasn’t even thinking straight at the moment, not really. His words seemed way too clouded by some deep-rooted hate for that. “I lay claim to my own resentment here—it is my responsibility, not yours. That goes without saying. Forged Traits are one of the few ways in Existence to extend a mortal’s lifespan. And… Allow me to explain. Trades tend to be passed from masters to apprentices—with techniques and biases alike. Forgers are no different than that, and somewhere, long ago, the baseline with which they work decreed they would never offer aid to any being who was not human.”

  Malwine suppressed the urge to scowl. Her satisfaction at actually getting him to open up this much clashed with her utter confusion as to just what the fuck he was going on about.

  “Pola was kin to trolls,” Veit spoke softly, as if it pained him to even say that. “My wife.”

  Despite the fact that the widow’s life gave her a general idea as to what he might mean, Malwine just eyed him with confusion—she didn’t even have to fake it for the most part. “Veit, I’m sure this is a heavy subject for you—and, again, sorry about your wife—but I have no idea what that means. What do you mean, that she was kin to trolls? While we’re at it, what in any Devil’s name are trolls?”

  The forester stilled. He met her gaze again, and for the first time since his initial outburst, Malwine felt as though he wasn’t looking at her as if she had become an enemy.

  Then he started laughing.

  Okay… Though her initial reaction at unbalancing her teacher had been amusement, she’d switched from that to confusion, to distrust, and now to sheer concern, all so abruptly that she wouldn’t have been ashamed to admit just how badly at a loss she was. Something told her that even if she’d manifested this double with [The Way of the Clave] applied, that wouldn’t have been enough for her to make sense of anything.

  “I am a Devilsdamned idiot,” Veit laughed again, once he’d regained some semblance of stability. “I practically yelled at you, and you don’t even know a thing. Not about the world, let alone about them. I’m sorry, truly.”

  “I don’t disagree,” Malwine was still keeping her distance from her teacher. At least this apology sounded more genuine than the last. The gears in her head were finally turning, however slowly. “But grief makes people behave like idiots, or so I’ve read. I want to think this was just that, and that we won’t have any trouble going forward.”

  “Oh, going forward, if I leave, you are not going to interrupt my time away,” Veit snapped back, though he no longer appeared truly on edge. “We might both have been spared this unseemly display if you’d simply let me be, until I returned to you.”

  “No, no, no, mister,” Malwine pouted. “You don’t get to lay the blame of this one on me. I’m willing to move past it, but I’m not the one who yelled at a four-year-old because Forgers refused their wife service once upon a time.”

  For a moment, she wondered if she was being too harsh there, but she felt the need to stand her ground. While his admission that he would very much like to be in a Forger’s good graces had shaken her trust in him, it hadn’t truly eroded it.

  Maybe it was the widow’s transactional view of the world shining through, but if nothing else, it left her more at ease about seeking his tutelage going forward.

  After all, Malwine wouldn’t have to secondguess his motives a third time if she already had a good idea as to what he was getting out of helping her.

  “Do not speak to me like that,” Veit warned firmly, then tipped his head. “But I will accept I was at fault. Now,” he inhaled slowly and deliberately. “Will you tell me what your Skills are, or shall we dally further?”