Tread Lightly

I jolt awake and sit up abruptly, waking the small Dakota on my chest. The first thing I hear is not his crying but instead the now-familiar whispers of the Bloody Palm. Dakota's cries are distorted and changed to sound painful instead of hungry. I put my hand to my eyes and wipe the tiredness from them as I look around.

All my surroundings are distorted and appear as though they are through a lens. Things that were definitely in the distance now seem very close, while very close objects now seem somewhat distant. Even Dakota appears much smaller and further from me as my whole body elongates in my vision.

The trippiness and weirdness of the sights in my eyes make me expunge a portion of my large breakfast. The murmurs and delusions are getting to me at this point, and the vision makes me sick. I rapidly restart the flow of Ether into the center of my pupils. The focus of my Daydream is on removing the whispers. And it works to remove the noises, but not wholly on my eyes. That's when I feel as though something is really wrong.

The noises disappear entirely, but the edges of my vision in my peripherals are blurred and distorted. Flowing shadows nip at the corners of my eyes where I can't see thoroughly, making me look around constantly to ensure there isn't something nearby. Looking down at Dakota, I see the little fox has grown more during my nap. Not much, but it's simple to sense when you have the precision of being a Philosopher at a point in time.

He appears normal before my sight, just like a crying baby fox before my ears. I rub his little ears with a smile as I try to ignore the signs of madness that dawn upon me. Something to ground me. That's all I need. The more anchors, the longer I can hold on from this damn artifact. Maybe even long enough to evolve my Sigil sufficiently to match the palm and keep it in line.

I wake up around sundown, so I feed Dakota and myself some more before leaving and getting a move on with a body fully expelled of Ether. We travel through the chilly autumn night. A first since I did so with Edmund out of the Andreis forest. But this time, I go backward, as a guardian of my own, in a weird way.

Now that I am beginning to see the signs of being "Artificed," as they put it, I'm starting to understand why I was treated more like a wild beast on a spiked pole than a person. If all it takes is a single few hours of sleep without protection for me to begin seeing things, what would happen if I didn't have Daydream? Surely, Johnny would be right if I didn't have a way to protect my mind. I'd be more monster than human within a few days, maybe less.

And I've always thought I had a powerful will. Ma used to say that quite a lot to me growing up. Now that I think about it, it is odd to tell a child. Maybe not once or twice, but I remember her saying it commonly, even during mundane tasks. Another sign that perhaps she wasn't who I remember her as.

I can't even imagine how quickly anyone else would have fallen to the dark whispers of the Bloody Palm. I mean, it's even got into my dreams at night. That desire for survival I felt in that dream? That must be what keeps the Bloody Palm going. All artifacts are formed from leftover desires or emotions, right? I guess I at least know the Bloody Palm's desire. It's simply a need to survive. One so deep and powerful that it transformed the previous owner's Sigil into a distorted aspect of survival.

An object capable of keeping its holder alive with even severe injuries just by holding onto it. I can't imagine how much it will affect me now that it is a part of me. Both physically and mentally. There is only one true positive to this whole situation of being Artificed, for artifacts that are Artificed onto someone grow exponentially in power with a host to directly draw sustenance from. I laugh as I say it into the nightly air to just myself and Dakota.

"Hah ha, I'm gonna be one hell of a bitch to kill now, aren't I? That bounty poster said I was 'Seemingly impossible to put in the dirt.' Imagine it now, Dakota. Do you think I could have taken those three Hunters now without one running? I feel like I could."

They would be in for a world of hurt if they tried me now. A combination of the Bloody Palm and Strugglers Gasp previously rendered a break in my fucking spinal cord pointless. I could still move my legs with shrapnel shredding my whole body from a bullet in my back. What will put me down now? A shot to the head is the only thing I can think of. I gotta get myself a helmet or something.

But all things do come with a cost. I've been trying to read a bit more lately, and the manuals speak of laws regarding how Sigils work, the first being the Law Of Equivalence.

"No effect is made without something being consumed; whether the resource is Ether, vitality, souls, or something more abstract, a toll is always taken. To gain something of high value, a high cost is required."

And just like the law states for a high-value effect, the Bloody Palm's fee is steep and nonnegotiable unless I take from others.

A few other laws state similarly essential things, but they have no hold on this. There is another law called the Law Of Balance, but it has to do with the power of individual Sigil, not artifacts which are distorted things brought forth from an artifact.

As I walk through the moonlit ever-shifting dunes with Dakota, the growing kit on my shoulder, my thoughts wander this way. The little guy sleeps an awful lot, seemingly to either keep up with his rapid growth or fuel it. I don't know which is the answer. But hours we walk, deep into the night, before I even begin growing tired. I do grow hungry, however.

As I set Dakota down so that I could open and eat a midnight meal from my new pack, I see the little guy wake up and stand to immediate attention. At first glance, I assume he is just excited about food as every time we have stopped recently has been to eat, but no, that's not it. He growls lowly, as low as a baby fox can, into the dark.

I rapidly spin and look where he is facing. The Comanche Sigil focuses on reactions and the senses, so I take his instincts as fact there is something despite him being a kit. At first, I don't see anything in the dark. Nothing but the edges of my conscious gaze frayed with twisting darkness. But eventually, I spot a bit of movement west, toward where we were heading initially, before I stopped to eat.

My first reaction is to flood Ether into my body in preparation for a serious fight, but as I look closer at the movement, I realize it's not that big of a deal. Not a threat that requires me to waste my now increasingly precious Ether capacity. It's a considerably-sized rattlesnake. While it is dangerous, it's not a threat I cannot handle without Ether.

Before I do anything to the snake, though, I bend down and comfort Dakota, petting his still small and fragile head. I also make sure to commend him. I heard that's what you do when you want to reinforce an animal's behavior. If it works with cats and dogs, it also works with foxes.

"Good boy. I'll take care of this one. You can have the next when you're larger."

I draw the revolver from my hip, one of my many weapons, and aim it at the slithering snake as it nears us. It'll be good target practice for me. Never tried to shoot a snake before. Trying to ignore the static in the edges of my eyes, I focus forward using the six-shooter's iron sights. Then, I pull back the hammer to prepare the chamber for firing.

Once the snake is on the other side of the steel sight, I hold my breath for a single short second and squeeze the trigger. A loud bang echoes through the dunes as my first bullet enters the sand beside the snake. Dakota, used to gunfire, I guess, doesn't react much to the gunfire, but the snake does. It begins slithering faster toward me.

"Damnit!"

I quickly pull back the hammer with my thumb and aim once more. Once again, another round echoes through the dark sands. This time, though, the bullet strikes true. It enters the side of the rattlesnake and stops its rattle. I walk over to it and pull out the serpentine dagger that reminds me of it. Then just to be safe, I stab it in the head into the sand with the dagger seemingly made after it or its brethren.

Dakota rushes over once I kill it. Quite sharp for a beast, but I suppose that's what the Comanche Sigil will do. Make an expert tracker, killer, and provider. He's just not quite at those levels yet. When he gets to the snake, he tries to bite into it. But his teeth and jaws are too undeveloped to yield much flesh from the newly deceased snake.

I watch him gnaw on it for a few moments in amusement before I get on a knee and start cutting off pieces of snake meat for the little guy to swallow. I am careful not to make them too big, though. Don't want to make him choke.

While I feed him, I wonder why the snake came at us. We, or at least I, are dozens of times larger than the snake. Surely its instincts would make it stay away from us? Unless it was starving. I know firsthand that starving creatures will do almost anything to feed themselves. Even resorting to things that would be certain death if they failed.

But if that were the case, why would it be starving? At most, I'm only a few dozen miles away from Rustbank, so why is it hungering? There shouldn't be any massive monsters with Sigils nearby. Rustbank and its inhabitants would handle that. Maybe it's the break? Affecting the food of the small predators?

If the break is the reason for this snake's abnormal actions, then that's dreadful news. That means it's getting close enough to affect food chains. I don't know exactly how close that would be, but I imagine it's not crazy far.

This means my little trip back out into the dunes might be short. Very short. But it also means that I need to be fast. Because if the monsters are that close and I don't warn someone, many people will die. My friends will die. I don't want that to happen, even if they don't want to be near me.

From what I've heard, a break is typically thousands of monsters led by a few demons and semi-to-full-intelligent monsters with many Outlaws that follow on the fringes to loot. But this one is said to be unique. An enormous wave of powerful monsters meant to take back land established and guarded by my father.

The Undying's words apparently held enormous weight. Enough to just stave this whole thing off for decades. I can't even begin to see how strong he'd be. Certainly tens of times more potent than someone like Johnny, who has to send me out to scout for him.

I cut these burgeoning thoughts about my father short before they spread over to my Ma. Neither of whom I want to dwell on very much with my sanity under assault. Doing so, I stand and pick up the satiated Dakota, who has snake blood on his muzzle. I wipe a bit of it off and let him know what will happen, even if he can't quite understand me yet.

"Looks like I'm gonna have to skip eating. We gotta get moving, buddy. The break might be closer than we thought. If I don't warn Johnny and it's close enough to attack, our friends will die. You in?"

I end the explanation with a question, and I swear I see the small fox nod at me. I nod back.

"Good! Let's go."

The little guy goes into my predominantly empty pack, merely full of notes and other odd things. His eyes, nose, and ears stick out, though, so he doesn't suffocate and so that he can sense the surroundings for me. The first time might have only been a rattlesnake, but who knows what the next one might be like.

Then, I take a bit of advice from Earl. Adrenaline Surge apparently leaves one with a lasting sense of exhaustion after it wears off. And I certainly felt it last night when I went to bed, but it was completely gone when I woke up. That might not always be the case, though, if my injuries are too significant for the palm to heal overnight.

So, instead of using Adrenaline Surge, the risky general skill that Edmund taught me while pretending it wasn't one, I use Physical Enhancement on my legs. I don't know why Edmund lied about what it was, but I'm sure he had a reason. Maybe to keep my ego down from learning an advanced technique so quickly? Who knows. Only the dead do.

And everyone knows, Deadmen tell no tales. Well, that's unless you go to the Underworld and ask them. But I know very few people have ever made it back alive. All of them are legends and mythical people that might never have existed, now that I think about it. Most of what Ma told me about legends was false, just night-time stories about demons, ogres, and other monsters. She told me very, very little about humans and their tales. And whenever she did talk about people, it usually ended in gruesome deaths.

I force these thoughts about my mother out of my head and focus on running with my legs enhanced by Ether. And I already feel the difference after a few seconds compared to Adrenaline Surge. The lifesaving skill always gives me a massive shot of energy and adrenaline that can keep me going even during dark times, which makes perfect sense why I was taught it, but not why I was lied to about its name. Physical Strengthening just gives me some extra push for what I need.

This extra push means a great deal of increase in speed, especially now that I don't have a few hundred pounds to lug behind me through the dunes like a wagon full of packhorses. I zoom amongst the moonlit sands at a rapid pace. I look back here or there to check on Dakota, and the whole time, he has his head out the side of the pack sniffing the air. He yips and yaps here or there in a low tone as he watches me speed westward.

After a few hours of this brisk pace, I see a bit white of light in the distant west. It's hard to tell whether it's a fire or a lantern, so I slow down and crouch. Then, I slowly approach the light source with Dakota in my pack and the dunes as cover low to the ground. The little guy goes completely quiet as if he knows something is up ahead.

Slowly and carefully, I approach the light source. I try mimicking Edmund's movements and using the only other Sigil skill he taught me. Sneak. Something I have not even thought of in a long, long time as it never came up. But now, I move with icy muteness over the dunes toward the light, little swirls of Ether clouds in the bottoms of my feet quieting each step. I attempt to take this skill one step further as the swirling sands with the breezing wind make noise upon my body.

Instead of just having to swirl cloud-like Ether on my feet, I take a moment to focus and try to replicate the ability on every surface of my body. The task is arduous. To make sections of swirling Ether fit on more extensive parts of my body, like my torso or arms, is a great challenge and causes me to stop moving to focus.

I fail several times and waste multiple minutes, but the light is far away, and I can afford to spend time to get this right. The increased control of Ether from my Sigil's evolution is intensely felt. The streams and collections of Ether twist and turn much more rapidly and smoothly than ever. After my eighth try, I ultimately succeed. Long swirling clouds of Ether now exist within the skin of each of my limbs, my torso, and my head.

Now, I'm utterly noiseless. Wind-powered sand hits my body without a single trace of noise, the sand being cushioned by my Ether. My feet touch the ground without even making a single vibration to be felt, the clouds of Ether preventing them. I even kneel down on all fours in case I must move like Edmund, and even then, I'm reticent. Like a wraith, inaudible and nonexistent, I move without any indications of my presence except for the sand I disturb.

Even Dakota is much quieter. I think the clouds of Ether around my body help him be silent, but it might just be the fox's instinct that does most of the work.

With the upgraded Sneak, something I surely can only do now because of the increase in Ether from evolving into a Daydreamer, I stalk closer toward the light. After nearly ten minutes of slow and deliberate movement so as not to be seen, I get close enough to spot what the light is.

It's a man walking in a fully tailored suit with another man's decapitated head in his hand that he's carrying by head's long hair. The part that really throws me for a loop is that the light comes from the decapitated head's mouth like a lantern.