Something was off, Coyua could feel it in his very bones. The air felt wrong. Thick, like the Sol wasn’t being properly filtered through the Vell. But if that were to be true, The Rule would have evacuated the city long before any signs of the Vell failing were observed by the common folk.

No, this was something else. A someone else. Coyua needed to get home as soon as he could. He did not feel safe roaming the city. His day was ruined anyhow when someone ran into him, spilling his Sol soil he meticulously weaved the week prior. He didn’t get a glimpse of who they were as they flitted out of there long before he even got up off the ground and looked, but their hurried apology felt genuine to him, so he couldn’t bring himself to be too mad about the encounter. This week, he and his sister would need to ration their food supply. One week wouldn’t hurt, they’ve done it before without issue.

He could find more work at the Forge, too, if they became desperate. He’d be depleted for a couple of weeks after, but he’d make do. For his sister, he’d make do.

However, when he made his way back to The Station to go home, he found his bones weren’t the only ones singing with distrust as The Station's usual empty space now bustled with Daemons with misgivings whispered from their tongues. When he first walked into this space, he overheard murmurs of a human making a ruckus in the streets earlier in the day. The voices that permeated the space did not restrain from being overheard. Gossip speared heavily in the air. However, Coyua could not care, he only wanted to go home. But he couldn’t help but wonder if the human was the source of their harmonized foreboding that expressed within all their bones, but he didn’t think a mere human was capable of such a mystery. Not in the way it stung. 

A line of Daemons stood long for the Lower Missurdeold District, wrapping around the pillars of the open roomed building the station was housed in, a library in the human world he was told once long ago, located directly in the center of the trading district. Because of Coyua standing in The Forge, he could bypass the line and move to the front. And because of his standing, no one questioned it, letting him pass with a nod.

Normally, Coyua wouldn’t bypass the line. He would wait with everyone else. But the circumstances had him taking advantage of his standing, and he skipped the line of Daemons so he could make it back to his sister as quickly as possible and put the sting in his bones at ease.

The Gatekeeper stood tall, towering over the heads of all daemons, including Coyua’s tall stature. When Coyua approached, the stone minotaur’s head swiveled toward him, awaiting his command.

“Lower Missurdeold District, section two,” Coyua told the stone minotaur. He briefly wondered if he Forged this minotaur, and he held back the urge to check the neck for his signature stamp when it turned and walked toward the oDendae crystal, its large axe clinking against its bare dark-blue skin-like stone on its back as it walked away from him toward one of three holes in the wall in the back of The Station. The three entrances to the oDendae crystals stood unparalleled to the barren room that didn’t even have accommodating seating for the daemons in wait.

Two more minotaurs stood guard at the entrance of the oDendae. The purple crystal poised tall, reaching about twelve feet in its enclosed bricked room, resting in a divot in the floor made of specialized weaved stone that didn’t look any different from the bricked stone that covered every facet of the crystals housing. The room that was located at the back of the station was barren, much like the waiting area, concealing only the crystal. 

Coyua followed behind the minotaur, keeping his distance from the stone Sol weaved into creation, but close enough so the minotaur didn’t think he abandoned his request and moved on to the next daemon in line.

Coyua walked through the entrance to the oDendae, the two minotaur guards stood as still as stone with no sign of acknowledgment from Coyua's presence. Coyua knew better, however. They were more than observant of his every move.

When Coyua passed the two guards, he instantly felt the crystal’s presence. It’s Sol was intense, but what pushed against his pure white skin was neutral in nature. Neither malevolent nor benevolent. An unbiased source of unmixed astral Sol.

The minotaur stopped in front of the oDendae, right in front of the divot on the floor. The single, multi-faceted crystal glowed a dark blue at its core when the minotaur came close to it, resonating when the minotaur reached forward, reacting to the obDsendae that was carved into the center of the minotaur, made specifically to control the oDendae, and for that single minotaur to use.

When the hand of the minotaur touched the center of the crystal, the resonating dark blue pulsated wildly, and when the minotaur stepped back, from the center of the crystal an equilateral square materialized, taking on the form of reality, then it flipped, breaking existence where it touched. Then it multiplied. A multitude of squared realities formed, flipping and breaking existence, and shaped a new image.

The minotaur stepped back, letting the distortion grow, but when it reached the edge of the divot, it halted, and the new yet familiar image appeared. Within the divot showed a room similar to the one Coyua stood in now. But instead of gray stone that surrounded this oDendae, the one of two located in the Lower Missurdeold District, section two, was enclosed by dark blue stone. 

If someone were to walk into this room at that instance, they would think they painted the far wall blue at the center. The outside edges of the portal remained invisible to the naked eye. When Coyua walked up, he knew accurately where the portal was. He’d done it so many times before that he no longer thinks about the risks associated when using an oDendae. 

And when he stepped through the portal, the Sol washed over his skin like a familiar friend, before leaving him when both of his feet connected with the blue stone. Coyua continued to stride forward, past the minotaur that guarded the oDendae in its district, and out the front doors of the station.

When he stepped outside after strolling through the empty station of this district, the air felt even thicker than it did before. Burning his skin and lungs when he breathed in and seeping the sensation to his bones. Coyua knew something wasn’t right, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was a part of this sickness in the air, or was going to be part of it.

Coyua didn’t hesitate any longer as he took off in a sprint, his steel toe work-boots that he bargained good weaved sol stone for beating heavily against the payment as he moved. He needed to know if his sister was okay. She was home alone, and her Sol weaving skills were no better or worse than any other daemon in this district. If something happened to her . . . if she got hurt . . . Coyua could never forgive himself.

The usually bustling streets of his district were quiet, crippled with darkness that felt foreign. When he ran past Feos’ house that was only a block away from his, it only confirmed his worst fear. Feos never closed up shop. Out of everyone Coyua knew, Feos worked with every ounce of his strength to make a living, and at this time of night for the last twenty years Coyua had lived there, he’d never once seen Feos close up shop. But his home was dark. Decrepit looking. His garage shut tight with all his trinkets and charms he found in the human world he would sell with reasonable trade.

His heart raced when he rounded the street nearest his home. He could see it off in the distance. The one story gray-blue bungalow glowed in the otherwise silent and dark world he lived in, nestled tight between similar housings.

His sister would be up waiting for him. It wasn’t unusual to see the lights burning when he came home. She’d always had dinner waiting for him, prepared and ready to eat at their small dinner table. And her smile, ever present and persistent, nuzzled on a youthful face that looked similar to his own, pearl-like skin glowing in his otherwise dark world he lived in. Despite their similar futures, Coyua knew his sister’s glow was not because their skin was white like snow, but because his sister was a kind and gentle soul, and it radiated in a way Coyua could never mimic. 

When he ran up the pathway that would show as red in the human realm, he fully expected to see his sister preparing dinner when he opened the front door that led to the kitchen. She was probably cooking potato and cabbage soup, and if they were lucky, cheese would be mixed in, too. She’d turn toward him, wiping her hands on her old yellow apron that he was meaning to replace, teeth shining bright and sharp, two all-encompassing gray irises shining bright in greeting, flat nostrils flaring with her smile. It was a sight he saw every night, a view that would never grow dull.

And when Coyua opened that door, his sight was not greeted with the vision of his sister making dinner, but rather he fell face first onto the wooden floor below, his flat nose stinging profusely, with a weight pressing into the center of his back.

“What is the meaning of this!?” Coyua yelled from the floor as he tried to lift his head up to get a look at whoever had intruded into his house, speckles of what appeared to be white dirt falling onto his head and on the floor near his face.

“Where’s my sister?” Something pressed to the back of Coyua’s head, pushing his head back down into the wooden floor below, grinding his goggles on top of his head he always forgets to remove after a full day at the Forge.

“You’re sister is unharmed, master forger. You needn’t worry,” a woman spoke somewhere in front of Coyua. He suspected it was near the kitchen table near to the door. He knew there were two assailants in his home, one holding him to the floor, and the woman in front of him. The assailant that was holding him down was too strong for Coyua. Even when he used all his strength to get back up, he didn’t budge. Coyua knew he was large in daemon standards, and was quite strong physically without the help of Sol weaving, but his Sol wasn’t used to enhance his physical abilities, so he was useless against a weaver who could enhance physical talents.

Coyua could feel a thrum coming from his assailant’s hands. He knew he was keeping him down using Sol. There was nothing he could do. 

Coyua relaxed, to not make a show that he was going to be difficult. They had his sister, and he didn’t want to provoke them into hurting her.

“What do you want from me? I’ve paid my dues.”

“So cooperative,” the low-pitched female voice said, sounding pleased. “There’s no need to fret. I’m not here on The Rule’s order. I’m simply here to collect, and we’ll be on our way.”

“What do you need to collect? We have little. I’m a simple forger and my sister has no definitive weave. We are poor.” Coyua tried to look up with his eyes alone, but he couldn’t get past the kitchen cabinets to see who he was speaking to. 

“I’m not here to collect your material items. I’m here to collect a far grander prize.” Coyua heard a scrapping of a chair, and then footsteps coming nearer. In his vision, he saw a pair of brown laced high-heel shoes step close to his face. 

“Coyua The Forger. The awe-inspiring rookie recruit with the potential of becoming a Grand Forger. Flattering, isn’t it?”

Coyua didn’t respond to her question. 

“If I haven’t made it clear enough, I want you. Your body. You, Coyua The Forger, have been chosen.”

“Chosen for what?” Coyua tried lifting his head again, but to no avail. Whoever was holding him down, they never relented. 

“We have chosen you for my master. The details are irrelevant, really. It won’t matter to you soon.”

Coyua felt cold. He had a sense something terrible was going to happen, and it was going to be completely out of his control. He knew whoever this woman was would not give any details freely, and he didn’t want to try her patience. “What will happen to my sister?”

“Like I said before, we won’t hurt your sister. In fact, she’ll be well taken care of.”

“How so? How can I trust you?”

“Because this wouldn’t work if we didn’t.”

“What wouldn’t work?”

“This.” The woman stepped back to the far side of the kitchen. Then the pressure that was holding him to the floor released. Coyua turned his head to look first at the one who held him down and what greeted him made his bones shudder with utter defeat and dismay.

A skeletal face released from a decaying face, the skin of its host breaking with every movement it took, raining to the floor and on Coyua like dirt falling from an uprooted tree. With the way plant-like material sprouted from the decaying body, his analogy wasn’t too far off.

He stared death in the face, and death mirrored his truth.