Both of them grimaced as they set foot between the trees. No forest, this - an artificial grove, instead, too ill-planned to be called an orchard, but kept bare of undergrowth just the same.

Knap glared at Lichen, frantic with worry. "You said she needs nature! Why isn't she better?"

The nameless orphans named themselves, Timid and Vicious, Nervous, Soft, Blunt. The only name the trainers interfered with was Mercy - "What chance has he had to show mercy?" they demanded, never knowing that their continuing lives were the reason he was given that name.

Goziem (no compound name, not for them) pulled impossibly tighter, and focused.

One set of hands to stoke the fire, one to weave cool air into a buffer against the storm, one to flow water away.

"You can't defeat a STORM!"

"We just have to outlast it."

Suspicious eyes followed him every time he left the Tower on some errand, along with dark whispers.

"Too ill-shaped to be human."

"Too poorly made."

Hovathe's grace and beauty won it admirers as it pretended sympathy.

As if it had made him.

"A sin is a crime against God."

The creature blinked luminous grey eyes at him. "Which God?"

"There is only one!" he declared, hating the quaver in his voice.

The creature blinked again, eyes filled with alien knowledge. "Are you certain?"

"This ritual will craft a bloodbond between the two of us."

"You can't falsify blood relationships, you know."

"Falsify? You wound me!"

"No, the athane's doing that. What's it made of?"

"Godsmetal."

"...That can't be shaped."

"Not by mortals. What sort of power did you think crafts bloodbonds?"