III-15 Persuasion

Sometimes, you don’t need to actually kill or hurt someone to get what you want. Sometimes, a few threats, a bit of charm, and some bribery

Sometimes, you don’t need to actually kill or hurt someone to get what you want. Sometimes, a few threats, a bit of charm, and some bribery can go a long way…

-Memoirs of a Master-Tier War Mage

III-15

Persuasion

Exalted Mother Null Mont stared at the Court Leviathan hovering just over the Abyssal Gateway. A crackle of Aeromantic lightning danced along the metallic strips jutting free from her body. It did that when she was focused. It did that when she was excited. And right now, she was extremely excited. A Court Leviathan captured for Weave and offered to the Composer! This would be the offering of a decade, and more importantly, it'd allow Elaboration a deeper insight into their greatest adversary.

Pair that with the turncoat vampire—unconfirmed turncoat vampire—that remained aboard the Court Leviathan, and Null Mont had a bit more than just a significant offering. She might have a way to strike deep into the First Blood itself, if he could be properly adjusted…

Of course, it wasn't just good news. As Cherished Sister Uva Mettabon reported, there were traitor Weaveresses here as well. Traitors Weaveresses who defected from Elaboration of all places. The Cherished Sister said they were part of an illegal weaver breeding operation and would have delivered them into custody, but the traitor Weaveresses unfortunately perished when the eldritch entity revealed itself.

And that led into the lamentable part of things.

Despite all the good work she had done, Sister Uva tragically allowed herself to be compromised in the process. The Sister recounted what happened in the gate, how things became so dire. As Null Mont listened, her disappointment grew. She expected more than a Sister of the Arachnae Order to turn away from the Composer's song and seek power from a most unholy and unnatural source. 

The Outsiders: creatures beyond the system's purview or perhaps barely in it, were unworthy divines. And now one such unholy being had struck an accord with Sister Uva. More than an accord, it had infested the Sister's very eyes and imbued in her an Eldritch Skill. And Sister Uva betrayed herself by choosing to accept.

Now, instead of rewarding the Sister, she would likely need to undergo a lengthy interrogation and observation process at Elaboration. It seemed unjust, but alas, it was absolutely necessary. One couldn't let down their guard against the Outside, after all. Or any unknown adversary for that matter. Weave only endured due to constant vigilance and the actions of Weaveresses like Exalted Mother Null Mont.

As she leaped across another chasm and landed atop a sloping half-collapsed wall that used to be the outside of a building, she stared at the great Court Leviathan and let out a light laugh. She stood at the very edge and gazed into the distance, as if an explorer standing atop a mountain. A mountain of ruin. 

"Quite the windfall, isn't it?" she spoke now to Brother Urad, one of the few male umbrals who had joined the Arachne Order. He gave the Exalted Mother a bow, yet there was something in his eyes that seemed uneasy, and his uneasiness was conveyed in the body language of a trapdoor weaveress, one Still Water.

"Exalted Mother," Still Water said, "I'm going to strongly suggest this again, but I think you should talk to Gate Lord Adam or Exalted Guest Shiv.

"What is there to speak of?" Exalted Mother Null Mont declared. "They are but guests. They have offered great deeds in service to Weave, but guests is all they are. This is a matter of the Composer's honor. This is for the defense of her, Lady Arachnae, for the defense of our city. In fact, they should be honored. Honored that I will mention their name in this service. If you are so concerned that they will be offended, then be off, Operative Still Water. Seek out the Gate Lord. Seek out Hero Shiv, and inform them of my decision. I had this conversation with Cherished Sister Uva already. I don't think I need to have it again with you."

Still Water held back a twitch of her palp, the closest thing a Weaveress could offer in place of a sigh. But then she adjusted her bandana and slowly turned to walk away instead of saying anything. Midstep, she paused as she noticed something. Still Water looked up into the air and let out a loud hiss of surprise as she tripped. 

Exalted Mother Null Mont shook her head in disapproval. How a Heroic-Tier Trapdoor Weaveress could be so careless was beyond her. In fact, Null Mont was going to mention Still Water's lacking attention during the overall debriefing—

And then a shadow passed over Null Mont. A shadow passed over everyone. There came a heavy rush of wind, and Null Mont's Aeromancy sensed what felt like a heavy gale washing over her. Suddenly she turned, and she saw what looked to be a small mountain tumbling in her direction. Her Umbrals escorts froze. She froze. Still Water threw her invisible cloak around her body and vanished from sight.

The colossal shape descended, and Null Mont quickly updated her description of the object. It didn't look like a small mountain. No, it was a tower. A tower the shape of a wickedly curved blade. It was thin and absurdly long at the top, and its edges radiated with a rainbow hue, while the flat sides of the blade pulsated with the darkness and distortion of Dimensionality. 

As it fell, something clicked in Null Mont's head. She summoned a burst of Aeromancy and flung herself out of the way.

Just herself. 

She left the Umbrals behind.

Good Pathbearers saved their own lives.

Null Mont landed on something fragile, something that shattered beneath her. It felt like porcelain. But to her surprise, she realized dodging was not necessary. The blade continued tumbling along, sailing far through the air until it crashed hard into the ground in the distance, just beneath the abyssal gateway. There, a column of dust and debris rose into the sky from where the massive, tower-sized blade hilted itself. 

And even still, it grew, swelling larger and grander until it was at least three hundred meters before it finally stopped.

Through a haze of dust and a rain of descending shrapnel, Exalted Mother Null Mont, stared at the colossal weapon, and it radiated with prismatic brightness. Suddenly, atop the hilt, came a pulse. A pocket of space opened, and a figure emerged. A figure clad in skeletal armor. Null Mont recognized the figure immediately. It was Exalted Guest Shiv, the Deathless Surfacer; the one that Cherished Sister Uva, had also unwisely chosen to start an intimate relation with.

Exalted Mother Null Mont's mind whirled. Had he just thrown that tower at her? A… knife tower? A knife that he was now standing on, that he was… And there came an ungodly noise. A terrible noise as Shiv hovered across the sky, dragging the knife behind him with his left hand. 

The ground parted. Things broke and split asunder. More dust, more debris, more shrapnel filled the air. But what shook Null Mont the most was how easily he dragged that long blade behind him, as if it weighed nothing at all. As if he wasn't cleaving an entire section of the landscape apart as he got closer and closer to her.

Null Mont was also technically a Heroic-Tier Pathbearer—except her Heroic-Tier Skill was in Physics. Her Toughness and Aeromancy were a fused Master-Tier, but throwing an entire tower like that was…

What kind of skill allows one to casually drag a building behind them? Could he truly have a Gravitic Wrestler Skill. I saw his profile but… it must have been exaggerated. It must have…

Then, faintly, over the clatter of falling detritus, she heard something. She heard him whistling. His head was swinging from side to side, and the actions he performed were dramatic, exaggerated. Then, finally, he paused and then he looked down at Null Mont. He looked down at her Umbrals. He brought a dramatic hand up to his face and let out a very loud and obviously acted gasp. "Oh, no," Shiv cried. He planted a hand on his head. "Exalted Mother. Sisters. Uhh… Brother? Sorry. Can’t tell with some of you. I did not see you there. I am so terribly sorry. I was just testing out this newly reforged knife I got. It is a very good knife. I was trying to see how far I could throw it once it reached its full size. Unfortunately, I was both stronger than I remember being, and this thing was larger than I expected. Whoops.”

Null Mont's palps reared back in fury. Part of her mind screamed at her to be outraged, to rise into the air and to demand why the surfacer had done this. But another part of her warned her that this might not be the wisest course of action with someone dragging a 300-meter-long building-sized dagger along the ground. That, and the other detail about how he could quite stay dead…

That… that skill couldn’t possibly be true… could it?

Beside Null Mont, Still Water suddenly unveiled herself. "Well," Still Water said, a hint of mirth in the other Weaveress's voice, "looks like I don't need to go looking for them after all. They came looking for us. How convenient. Well, I'll leave you to it, Exalted Mother. I believe this is your duty now as ranking Weaveress in charge." 

The Trapdoor Weaveress threw her cloak over herself and vanished once more, abandoning Null Mont to her fate.

“Wait, Still Water? Still Water!” Null Mont cried out.

And again, a shadow rose over Null Mont. Slowly, she froze and turned to face the massive, looming blade…

***

"Shiv, Shiv, Shiv," Uva repeated again and again through her telepathic link. "Do not hurt her. Do not kill her. Do you understand me? Do not—absolutely do not—kill her."

"I'm not going to kill her," Shiv replied, his mind perfectly calm. "I'm just going to talk to her. I'm just going to cook some food for her. I just want to talk to her, you know? I like talking to people. I find people interesting. I find everyone interesting. I especially find it interesting when they try to steal my Court Leviathan from me, take a guest I invited into this gate prisoner, and demand that my girlfriend submit herself to some kind of questionable interrogation process after she nearly broke herself for me and the other survivors. So interesting.”

Uva was about to issue her complaints again, but then she paused. "Shiv. Why am I last on your list?"

"Because between you, Angelo, and Courtney, only one of you could fry the mind of this poor, mentally challenged Weaveress."

"I cannot fry the mind of an Exalted Mother!" Uva's voice filled with absolute revulsion.

Right, the Umbrals had that complex about the Weaveresses. Well, here was the worst outcome.

"Yes, but that's more of a personal decision rather than you not being able to do it. Angelo's too traumatized to put up much of a fight against anyone. Courtney's about as smart as a snail. So comparatively, you're the one I'm least worried about."

The temperature of Uva’s mind fell by a few degrees.

"It's a compliment," Shiv replied. 

Her mind got even colder.

Shit, I’m going to have to cook her something nice after this.

"Listen, I'm not going to kill her, okay? I just want to talk to her," he said. "Adam," he spoke across their link. "Do not let Shiv hurt Exalted Mother Null Mont."

"What are you calling me for?" Adam replied. "I want to talk to her too." An incredulous snort escaped the umbral. And she sailed through the air, flying atop her shield as she blasted towards Shiv's current position. She could directly jump into his mind, but Shiv had a feeling that part of her wanted to see this. Part of her wanted to watch what might transpire when he had his little conversation with the Exalted Mother. And Shiv would oblige her.

In fact, he wasn't lying at all. He wasn't going to kill the Weaveress. Frankly, he wasn't going to hurt her at all. From what he could tell, and from what Uva described, Exalted Mother Null Mont was mostly a narcissistic glory hound. An asshole, in other words.

That didn’t mean she had to die. But that was a good thing. Because he needed to train his Dread Aura some more.

But then again, if Shiv had to kill all the assholes in the world just for being assholes, there might not be that many Pathbearers left. Hell, there wouldn’t be that many people left for that matter. "And I'll absolutely not do that, because it'll end with me stabbing Georges too,” Shiv grumbled to himself. "No, I'll just be convincing." Real persuasive. Use reason and argumentation and all that." 

There came a series of loud shouts from the Exalted Mother. She sounded kinda pissed, but the winds and the noise Shiv made as he continued pulling his new Skysplitter through the ground really made it hard to hear.

"How's the knife?" Adam asked telepathically, more curious about the weapon for now.

"Pretty good," Shiv replied. "Gets up to 300 long, but that's about it. Anymore and it starts shaking uncontrollably. I think I’ll end up breaking after that.”

"And the mass?"

"Mass is stable," Shiv replied. "Right now, it feels… I don't know, maybe a fourth as heavy as the Jealousy. I think it can still draw in more weight, but it’ll make moving it around harder.”

"A fourth as heavy as a massive greater demon. Sounds pretty impressive to me," Adam replied. “It will come in useful if you need to weigh someone down or potentially smash a large group of people to death.”

"Or just one very annoying spider.” As Shiv thought those words, he narrowed his eyes at the Exalted Mother. Again he wasn't going to kill her. He absolutely wasn't. But it was very, very unkind of her to just try taking what was his.

"Hero Shiv!" Null Mont cried. This time, he was close enough to hear her. She was flying through the air, lightning crackling across the many metal extensions jetting out from her body. Shiv wondered again what kind of Skill Evolution that was. Aeromancy and Physicality? Toughness? 

"I guess I can ask her in a minute," Shiv muttered to himself.

"Have you gone completely mad?" Null Mont roared. “What is the meaning of this?”

Shiv pulled off his helmet and gave the approaching Weaveress a wide grin. "What? What's mad?"

"You!" she cried again. She stuck one of her long limbs in his face. And just then Shiv realized she was a pointer. She liked to point. She pointed the same way at Uva's eyes. He eyed the small humanoid finger sticking out from her forelimb, he ignored the intrusive thought to bite it. “What has possessed you, surfacer? Was this deliberate? Do you have any idea what you have just done?”

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry," Shiv apologized again, putting his hand on his chest. "I didn't realize you were there. You see, I was testing my knife."

"Your knife!" Null Mont cried. "Your… your knife! This?”

"Yeah, it's my knife." He ripped the enormous Skysplitter out of the ground, casually lifting it over his head. He bit back a slight grunt of exertion. Yeah, this wasn’t that practical for most combat scenarios. He needed speed more than mass. Frankly, what might be more useful was injecting doses of mass into an enemy or stealing mass from them, if that was possible. It was something he was going to have to discover in the field.

The Weaveress's palps flared back. A few strings of lightning went off course, whipping into the wind rather than traveling along the many metal extensions sticking out from her arms. "Wait… you—" the Weaveress choked. Shiv lifted the blade high, rearing it back. He felt her courage crack down to its foundations. “No! Do not—the Composer will—”

Then, with a casual swing, Shiv slashed out with his knife. A blast of wind washed over both of them, and before Null Mont could be sent flying, he reached out and caught her with his left hand. "Shit, sorry. Didn’t think I cut that hard" The tip of his blade severed a small piece from Courtney, the Court Leviathan. A piece of the tentacle fell. The leviathan didn't even notice, for the wound filled a half second later.

Shiv shifted his new blade and caught the piece of leviathan flesh along its flat side.

"Shiv. Do not hurt her." Uva hissed across their link. “Do not hurt her in creative ways, either! No Bowel-Breakers or—”

"Relax." Shiv grinned at Null Month. "This is just going to be a conversation about personal property, what constitutes a prisoner, and also respecting a certain Cherished Sister of Weave. I know some of what she wants isn't entirely unreasonable, but she can't just take my stuff. And more importantly, she can't just take you. Not now and not on a whim. These things need to be discussed. And if she’s not going to respect us, I’m going to have to cook for her.”

The Skysplitter began to shrink. The blade retracted, and in seconds the massive tower-sized blade drew closer to Shiv’s body, bringing the piece of leviathan flesh with it. But when the blade reached forty meters, Shiv stopped shrinking it. Instead, he descended, and found two nice pieces of rubble to place his Skysplitter upon.

We’ll be able to start up a nice fire below…

“What are you doing,” Null Mont cried. She pried at her arm, but Shiv released her before this could truly turn into a struggle.

“Are you hungry?”

“What?” She called out. “What are you—”

"Let me cook a piece of a Court Leviathan for you. Did you have any earlier?"

“I… No! No! I refuse! I refuse to eat this… It is a plague-beast of the enemy. How you managed to convince the others to indulge in such a foul act, I will never understand. But—”

"Come on, I insist," Shiv said. "I really do." He gave her his most earnest stare as he started channeling a stream of his own Pyromancy across the blade. Despite his fire magic being relatively underdeveloped, the edge of the blade ignited like a burning rainbow, amplifying the power of the magic substantially. Soon, the first sounds of cooking flesh sizzled upon the blade. "You won't regret it. And, I'll tell you what. If you don't like what I cook for you, I'll give you the Court Leviathan.

"Let… let me?" Her voice was somewhere between confusion and absolute fury. “You… I am the Exalted Mother in charge of this expedition, and I will not be talked down to like some kind of weaverling! You—”

But just then, Adam appeared beside her, coming to an uncanny halt as his Vectors of the Eternal Ascent stopped their acceleration. "Shiv," the Gate Lord cried out, his voice nasally and high with exaggeration. "I told you to watch where you are throwing that thing!"

"I'm so terribly sorry." Adam gripped Null Mont by another one of her arms and began pulling her down even faster alongside Shiv. "Please, let Shiv apologize to you by cooking you a meal."

"What?" she said, her anger losing the fight to naked confusion. Across their mental links, Shiv and Adam could feel each other struggling not to crack up.

“Do not make me laugh, you shit,” Shiv said, his right eye twitching.

“Focus on yourself, you bastard. And stop making that expression at me.” Adam shuddered, clenching his teeth as hard as he could.

"Cooking food," Adam said, "it's something surfacers do as an apology to each other all the time. We must persevere. If you reject us, Shiv will be obliged to commit an honor suicide to redeem his shame.”

“A what?” Null Mont gasped.

Shiv shook his head. "It is a thing of honor."

“Honor is extremely important to us,” Adam said, staring at the Weaveress.

“Honor and respect,” Shiv added, spiking his Dread Aura ever so slightly. “So please. Take a bite. Just a bit. Let’s talk about what just happened between us. You know. Start off on a new foot. Turn the page.”

The Weaveress's head swung between them. “I…”

But by now they were grounded, standing upon a field of rubble. A field of rubble further displaced by Shiv dragging a massive blade across the ground. 

Null Mont was placed before the Skysplitter as Shiv pulled out his chef's knife and cut the leviathan cut into several smaller pieces. Briefly, he dosed it with a puff of moisture using his Hydromancy and shaped a Biomancy spell as he started kneading them into five dense spheres of meat. Then, he pressed the meatballs back against the blade, and they sizzled before Null Mont very eyes.

Her courage started trembling. But a burst of lightning flashed out from her body. “This… I do not know what trick this is. But you cannot make me eat the flesh rich with viruses and plagues.”

“I think I can,” Shiv said. “I’ll take a bite first if you’re worried.”

“I’ll eat one right after to show that it’s safe,” Adam continued.

“I do not care if you both eat all of them!” Null Mont snarled. “There is no way you can make me devour a piece of that… that creature. No one but Her Lady Arachnae, the Composer herself, can compel me to… to…”

And now Null Mont noticed a certain Legendary Pathbearer hovering beside her. “Young one,” Valor began. “You should cherish every bit of food you get. Every flavor. For you never know when you might lose the opportunity to indulge in the finer things in life.”

“G-Great Valor,” Null Mont squeaked. “I—I thought… You were… You are still damaged. I think you should—” She then finally noticed how her Umbrals were getting called away by Can Hu, leaving her here entirely alone.

“Eat,” Valor said. “Taste it. Taste it on my behalf. I insist. I want you to describe how it tastes to me. Every detail. It will be an honor to hear such a thing from you. More importantly, I will offer a good word to the Composer about your bravery and willingness to experiment when I next greet her in person.”

“I…” Null Mont flinched as Shiv held out a small piece of leviathan meatball impaled on the end of his chef’s knife.

“Come on,” Shiv whispered. “It’s just a bit. I gotta make you feel better. I gotta apologize. I have to. I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if, say, this was your last meal. If you somehow got ambushed and then torn apart by a First Blood while trying to get back to Weave with my Court Leviathan, I would consider it a great regret of my life.”

“He would be honor-bound to raise your shadow and make your Necromantic remnant eat the food instead,” Adam whispered. He added a shudder at the end.

“I don’t want to,” Shiv said. “But traditions demand it. Honor and respect.”

“Honor and respect,” Adam repeated.

“Take the bite,” Valor said, leaning in. “Do it. Do it now.”

Dread Aura 90 > 91

Null Mont’s courage shuddered and cracked as she looked between all three Pathbearer’s pressuring her to take a bite. “I—I… Oh, Composer preserve—”

***

“Oh, Composer…” Null Mont looked between them, and slowly she stared down at the prismatic edge of the Skysplitter. Her body language betrayed just how forlorn she was that there was no more food. But more than that, how confused she felt. “How?”

Shiv snorted as he shook his head. His arms were folded, and he had watched her squirm throughout. Squirm, until she took her first bite.

Then, the ugly part was all over. Everyone else regarded her with a similar level of amusement.

Now that the Weaveress was appropriately sedated, Shiv intended to deal with the issue properly.

Shiv walked off to the side and pulled a piece of rubble over. He sat on it and stared at Null Mont for a moment. "Look, Exalted Mother, can I be very honest with you for a second?" She looked away from her food and stared at him. There wasn't so much anger, terror, or annoyance in her anymore. It was mostly just faint astonishment, and incredulity. 

You could control a lot about how someone acted if you had something they wanted. If they were happy, if they were influenced, if they wanted something from you. That's what Shiv realized. That was what he learned from watching Georges deal with people over the years. 

And this was the main reason why he told Uva that he wasn't going to hurt Null Mont, why he knew it was going to be the absolute truth. Because day after day, month after month, year after year, Georges would get into a fight with Path-bearers, literal fights with soldiers who frequented the Swan-Eating Toad. 

And after the fight, after intense exchanges of curses, and sometimes the involvement of guards, the same Pathbearers would come back to the Swan-Eating Toad and eat there like nothing had ever happened. Because they wanted the food there. Because the fight was a momentary lapse in self-control, usually on their part. Georges just got very mad. But there was nowhere like the Swan-Eating Toad. And feelings were things that changed with proper incentivization. 

Null Mont was a glory-seeking narcissist that was about to negatively affect the group’s cohesion. But she ultimately wasn’t a lethal threat, just a social one. And social threats were just another thing Shiv needed more practice in dealing with.

"What do you mean by honest," Null Mont replied, sounding uncertain and dubious.

"Yeah," Shiv said. "I like being honest. Look, you trying to take the Court Leviathan from me was kind of a shitbag thing to do." He looked at Courtney. "I spent quite some time clearing it out. In fact, I died a good few times taking that. Now, if you wanted to buy it from me, or potentially if you wanted to negotiate how useful it would be for Weave, I would have dealt with you honestly. The answer would have been no, but I would have been straight. And I wouldn't need to do this whole threaten you with a knife thing then cook food on it shit to get you to speak with me like an actual adult.”

Null Mont’s palps reared back in near-outrage. “I—”

“And Angelo, the vampire you want to take prisoner, you understand that he was going to get his heart cut out by the others, right? He was just trying to set up a village. You don’t even seem to care about why I brought him back. You know how many vampires I’ve killed in the past two days alone? A hell of a lot. Think about that. And think about why I left him alive.”

“It… he is of the First Blood. He has a Lineage Core.”

Shiv frowned. “Yeah. I guess he can be useful. Have you tried talking to him? Asking if he can help you? Did you even speak with him once at all? No. He’s still on the leviathan, last I checked. 

“He hasn’t even touched his food yet,” Adam confirmed. “He’s just staring into the bowl.”

“Shit,” Shiv muttered. “I probably should go talk with him myself. But back to you, Null Mont. The fuck’s your problem? What are you trying to do? What? You think bringing back a Court Leviathan is going to get you accolades and glory? Null. How the hells did you get sent here? Because you didn’t think this through. You didn’t think a lot of things through. Why do you think I would have just let that go? Why do you think the Composer would have just rewarded you for bringing back… what? A Court Leviathan? Yeah. Nice. Useful. But you think it’s more valuable than the Jealousy.”

“Slightly less,” Null Mont breathed.

“What?”

“It’s useful because it regenerates,” she let out a sigh. “It’s a partial solution to the population problem. Weaveress eggs… You know how our life cycles work?”

Adam and Shiv shared a look as both of the understood. 

“You're using them as breeding material?” Shiv said.

“Yes. And good incubators at that. Good stock. But we still need more.”

“And so you just tried to take it from me?” Shiv asked.

“I just…” Null Mont paused. “I assumed you wouldn’t fight me over it.”

“Because you’re a Weaveress?” Shiv asked. “And I’m not?”

A long pause followed. In the end, Null Mont didn’t say anything.

Shiv considered several options then. He decided to exercise a bit of charisma for once. To see if he could make use of her instead of just terrifying her into submission. She wanted glory? She wanted to indulge in pride? Fine. He’d give her those opportunities. But she would need to play along and learn about respect.

“Exalted Weaveress, I am not an Umbral. I am not from your culture. Your social advantages don’t mean anything to me. So. You’re going to have to deal with me like I’m a person. You’re worried about Uva being compromised by the Outsiders. Fine. Valid fear. But sending her back to Weave on a whim immediately is stupid. Do you think we can hold the gate without her? What other Heroic-Tier Psychomancers do you have?”

“There is a risk she might be compromised,” Null Mont justified.

“Yeah. But did she tell you everything? About the Dreamtaker? Her new skills.”

Null Mont looked away. “Yes.”

“And you think an Outsider would let her do that? Just give all that away? The suspicion I get. The rest of the shit you decided is half-assed. This is not the time to take her out of the field. We can’t afford it. You can’t afford it. And the Abyss can’t afford it.”

“The… Abyss?” Null Mont replied.

“Yeah. We’re here to stop another war between the surface and the Abyss from happening. And you were about to get in the way of that.”

Once more, her courage fissured. “I… I—”

“She might be more of an arrogant, unthinking idiot than a narcissist,” Adam muttered.

“Yeah. How the hells did she find herself in charge of this expedition anyway?” Shiv asked.

“Well. Weaveresses are overly favored… And with the right connections…”

“You think that’s how it is?” Shiv asked.

“That’s how it is everywhere,” Adam replied.

“Listen, I see that you’re still thinking about Weave, so. I’m going to help you. And you’re going to help me. How does that sound?”

“How?” Null Mont asked.

“Instead of you just walking around and making a bunch of executive decisions, why don’t you come along with us, and we can figure some things out together. Think about it. Would it be more glorious for you to take part in an operation that stops Vicar Sullain from getting a whole lot more people killed than whatever you were planning?”

Silver Tongue 21 > 22

Null Mont considered it. And then she regarded him once more. “Perhaps… Maybe… We can discuss a few more things over a meal? O-one you make? To further the honor and respect between us.”

Shiv laughed. “Yeah. Honor and respect. Sounds like we reached an understanding.”

“Shiv,” Adam said. “I think I might just take you up on some cooking lessons.”