She wasn't quite sure how to receive the praise Giggle offered - she wasn't often praised and so didn't quite know the proper way to respond. She felt faintly hot under her fur and passed it off with a shrug, but a definite warmth to her. "Thanks, I guess I just...I've seen too much to think otherwise." It wasn't really intended as a riff against Giggle, but as soon as it passed through their minds, she realized it could be taken as that and her intention was a little more clear now - the things she had seen had been things that had opened her eyes to the cruelty done to the gembound of the caves, in history and in the present.

She didn't show her the sky, not yet at least. She had found the view of the sky to be a bit like Hume's magic - intoxicating, maddening, one taste was simply not enough. One look would ruin anything the caves could offer.

She paused and thought for a moment. She hadn't really...tested limits. She had received the power some time ago, but she'd been scared to do anything too crazy with it. Nor had she particularly wanted to play with it. Giggle might capture this hesitancy - the moment shared between her and Hume had been something deeply important to Wilder and the wish magic was something close to her heart, that she took very very seriously. "There is most likely a limit - I am not the owl-meteor herself, its just a bit of her power. But maybe it is not me doing it, but Her. I'm not sure. Either way, I can't do it all the time. I have to wait between wishes." She felt the magic and connection drain during that time, and rebuild itself. She knew why - she could always feel the madness tickling her at the feeling of the wish. If she could do it all the time...it would probably destroy her.

"I probably could wish it on others, but call me selfish - I don't want to. I was the one to wish for this first and I feel responsible for it. I asked for it to be here and, unless someone wishes with Her directly as I did, I intend to keep it to me. There are enough conflicting powers in these caves, I think. Besides, if someone bad were to get their hands on it, they could do some pretty horrible things. It doesn't distinguish between good and evil, only what is and what is not." She could feel the magic slipping away and tried to thread through it with something more permanent so they didn't have to continue this charade of throwing spells back and forth, back and forth, but the stronger power faltered. Before she lost her own connection, she slipped in a last, "I will wish for myself when I need. I have simply not had the need." Not for a while, at least. She did consider the exodus of lessers from Eridanus to be "her wish". So she did not doubt it would work on her.

She turned towards the rings of mushrooms around the edge of the bonepit, eyeing the expanse of Order beyond. "I will. Perhaps we could clean up a little, too." She glaced back at Giggle and pawed a little halfheartedly at the white mushrooms. It would be a good cover, if Mother was watching. Working on keeping Giggle's space clear while speaking through their minds. They wouldn't have to cover for the awkward silences.

@Giggle

'I probably could wish it on others, but call me selfish - I don't want to.'

The disappointment flared, not overly powerful but clear. And puzzlement, too. As she paused to formulate her thoughts, she felt the link flicker and fail. She offered Wilder a glance and brief shake of her head, as if asking for a moment; in the meantime she pushed up, halfheartedly scraping at the mold. "It's a mess," she confided. She likely meant the fungus; but maybe she meant the caves on the whole. "It has been, for awhile. I try to clean it up, but it's a lot for one Gembound."

She concentrated on reforming her magic, and after a beat it snapped back into place, and she took a breath reflexively. Her words, though, weren't audible anymore. "That's a shame. That's exactly what I'd have asked for. I'd imagine the more of us who are good, trustworthy, who can help others that way-... the better-off we'd be." That faint puzzlement returned, her next glance toward Wilder displaying a faintly furrowed brow. "I think the idea I'd be 'the wrong hands' is a terrible thing to say. But to say it's selfish is fair enough, I guess." It was honest, at least. Though she couldn't help but wonder if there was something else beneath the surface.

She sighed through her nose, as if deflating, and shook her head. "It's a shame. I'd have liked to be able to help others; I do as much as I can, but reading bones only goes so far." But it wasn't accusatory. It was an idle thought, a musing, though truly laced with disappointment, and she covered it a moment later with more speech. "I'll take this side, I guess. Don't inhale it-... I guess you know that already."

Wilder would likely feel the emotions and thoughts of a few minutes prior repeating themselves: the memory of the dead, and the missing, streaming through Giggle's mind. Vinea, still completely missing, with no sign of their fate, was first among them. Then those who had sufferered, as Giggle wondered if it were possible to undo such a thing. There were the faintest touches of anguish, of indecision. Her mind roamed the caves, wondering where such a magic could be best put to use; and it was clear that her intentions weren't quite to serve herself. She was thinking over the Chaos Forge and its absolute disaster of a malajusted horde of child-monsters. Was it possible to 'fix' them somehow-? To neuter their threat, while granting those monsters a simple happiness?

And what of the darkness?

Claws ripped at mold, a little more fiercely. Memories flashed past, time spent sequestered alone in the dark: no scent, no sound, no vision, only black and floating nothing for an indeterminate amount of time, until her mind had fractured. She knew its bearer, now--Senka--but not its source. And she still didn't know its nature, nor why Omen (who felt closer, now, watching and listening with some concern as her memories revisited that time) could travel to and from that place at will.

If only Giggle could understand that-...

If only she could understand all of this. The history of her world, beyond what she knew. The origins of all these magics, and what it meant to them.

The thoughts slowly coalesced, snapping logically into place; it wasn't broadcasted deliberately to Wilder, though the cat might pick some scraps up here and there. Throughout, Giggle's emotional state was... slow, considering; even sad. And it was selfless, too. The Masters and these gods had always held knowledge that had placed them at an advantage above the Gembounds. She was pretty sure that a few of them would just give her the answers if she asked, but knowing which questions were important was difficult. And half the answers, she knew, would be half-answers or riddles. But if she had that information? She could use it to better aid, and to better predict the future. If she could grasp the very nature of the universe?

She considered that potential Wish and held it aside for a moment, and scoured her mind to see if she were overlooking anything else. The idea of asking for some sort of blanket protection for the Bonebound occurred to her and it was alluring. A fierce sense of almost viciousness came with that in a thread, a mother's love for her children and hatred for their enemies. But no... that was likely too vague, and too selfish--to only protect one's own family.

A moment's thought, and she'd circled back to her first idea, firmer now as she could see nothing of more interest to her.

"You know," she said aloud, pausing in her scraping and scratching. "If I could wish for anything, it would be to understand everything. Where did all these magics came from? Where do they come from--Order, Chaos, and her. Their nature, you know? Their goals." She looked back at Wilder, wondering if she understood. "The darkness that comes here--where does it come from? What does it want? How can I travel in and out of it, the way Omen does? What's its nature, too? These caves--what's beyond them? Are there other caves outside them? Why is there magic in our stones, and why are we hatched with one innate magic? Do we have some fixed fate ahead of us? Will we be safe here? What happens when we die?" She had her own, assumed answers to all these questions, but to truly know-... She shook her head, her expression intently focused and thoughtful. "I Wished for him to come back, because I'd just seen him in visions. I missed him. But he could die again tomorrow. And none of us would be any safer than before." There were other thoughts, ones she clamped down on before they could broadcast. The knowledge that Azazel hasn't remembered offering any form of guidance at her Pit, despite her reading into it-... That bothered her, and had done for some time. Had he simply forgotten, once he'd reawakened? Or was it something else..?

Had she misunderstood the nature of magic, of death, all this time?

More importantly: how could they protect themselves from their world, if even now--after all these years--they didn't fully understand it?

The darkness, though-... if Wilder couldn't somehow grant her knowledge of history, of magic and of their world, then she'd focus on that, she decided. On understanding that eye-filled shadow; on where that'd come from-... But she'd wait to see what the cat had to say to this wish, first.

She hoped Wilder--the owl beyond, perhaps--could provide. If Giggle could understand the deepest motivations behind the Forge and its corruption; if she could grasp why Order wished to spread as it did, and its final goals; if she could know, finally and truly, what the darkness was and how to traverse it-... If she could know the nature and creation of their home and what was beyond, and what it meant for them?

Maybe she could better plan ahead.

@Wilder

Wilder expected the disappointment, and her ears flattered back in her apology. She really did feel a little bad that that was the one wish she wouldn't grant, but to be honest, it scared her. She doubted that she would simply be able to give someone else the same power as her, just like that, and she feared what consequences would come with it. Even now, seeing the disappointment in Giggle and the faint hurt made her want to claw her gem right out of her face from the madness that threatened to pull her under.

Her consequence. Her burden.

She didn't try to show Giggle this - she didn't want her to see. It was her burden, but the hyena would probably still pick up on it, how Wilder's madness briefly reared its head as she rejected the wish. She shook through it quickly and turned her attention back, listening through their shared mental bond. Her eyes widened and a small gasp escaped her mouth. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that! I don't think you would be the wrong hands at all. I think you would be responsible with it. It's just...a hypothetical. What if something happened to you that twisted your worldview? What if someone threatened you or made to control you or something else bad happened that would give them access to this power? I don't want to risk it. One wisher running around is...enough, I think." Again, selfish. Again, the tickle of madness, but she brushed it off. She was firm in this stance and she would continue to fight against her own mind to keep it that way.

She continued to listen quietly and the loss and suffering Giggle had seen saddened her - she knew that the Bonebound had been through so much, but the darkness she had never seen. It had her stomach drop, her heart cracked at the thought that someone had been trapped in there for who knows how long.

She sliced at some of the fungus herself, halfheartedly as she listened and watched through the bond for as long as it lasted. She wanted to cry for her, cry at her, It doesn't have to be selfless! but who was she to tell her about choosing for herself, being selfish just this once, when Wilder had given up a part of herself for others in such a dramatic way? When the madness was still threatening the edges of her mind, a willing burden she had taken that said "help help help" at the cost of herself, those closest to her, everything she had, was, and is?

So she was quiet and let Giggle think, quietly ruminating herself over the good ideas that the hyena came up with. Knowledge. Understanding. Had she not wished desperately for something like that too? Chaos and Order, Natural Order and Autonomy, whatever other powers drifted around poking their noses in and out. The shadow beast that Mossie had summoned. The lonely whispers that had once driven her almost mad. It was a good idea, and a good wish, and as Giggle verbalized it, she nodded.

And she would have done it then, but then she paused. But he could die again tomorrow. And none of us would be any safer than before. It sounded like her own sentiments, that which she had whispered to the feathershard, something that Hume had repeated as she had drifted away.

We live over and over again, forgotten a thousand times only to live again and suffer more. It's not fair.

I have been forgotten before, too, but am eternally reborn.

Why must this cycle never end? Is it cruelty? A gift? A blessing? A curse? She looked at Giggle and a pensive expression took over her features. This was a big wish. She would do it, it was a good one, and a selfish part of her hoped she would share her understanding, if it worked, but that receding voice of Hume reminded her - those that bore her power were those that bore her burden.

She let the link slip away this time, and, just as Giggle had spoken aloud, she, too, made to speak. "I think I would wish for that too. It's a good wish. It's a very big wish, too. I'm sure whatever that power is could grant it, but it would most definitely come with consequences. Not grave or cruel ones, but just...consequences." She glanced at her knowingly and made to make the connection again, to show her, give her an idea of the potential burden she would carry should the wish take effect.

But then the madness roared its head, this second rejection, this hesitation, being a step too far, and the magic slipped away and snapped back in her face. And it was bad, it was really bad. Wilder gasped audibly, legs trembling beneath her as her consciousness briefly left her.

She was failing to help, she was failing to do what was right, she was being selfish, she had to give her power away, she had to she had to because Giggle wanted it, needed it, wanted it, had to have it more then her! Her head spun briefly and a flash of cosmic gold drifted over her senses. She swallowed heavily and squeezed her eyes shut as she tried to push through the sudden onslaught of madness. It hadn't quite been this bad before - she hadn't had any reason to reject a wish, so this first time fighting against madness was a battle she hadn't been ready for. And the magic that had rebounded through her head. She staggered forward, catching herself before she fell directly into the white fungus before her, and planted her feet on the ground, turning her head away so she could breathe heavily without risking the infection.

After a moment of collecting herself, still on the edge of madness consuming her, she let out a soft, "It could be a burden."

@Giggle

Giggle went back to pawing at the mold, back arched in a hunch as she scratched with rapid movements, like a digging dog. She slowed a little as Wilder spoke, to listen.

The conversation wound on.

Giggle hadn't replied further to the explanation, the assurance that Giggle wasn't currently the "wrong hands" but might become so; to her, it was just as damning. But Wilder's gift wasn't hers to demand, so she wasn't exactly put out by it; still disappointed, absolutely, and a little of that was disappointment in Wilder for thinking so little of her. Or maybe disappointment that Wilder did feel that way--because, really, they didn't know one another and it was a fair thought. She still didn't like it. Didn't like it, but it wasn't unfair, so she didn't say anything further, because there was nothing more to say just then.

As to the rest-?

Giggle turned, eyes on Wilder, and almost asked, 'what consequences?' Then she second-guessed herself and asked nothing, because it didn't really matter. She was sure that she could handle it. And it'd be worth it, to have that sort of knowledge. A vague part of her almost hungered after it, the sort of part that could become exactly what Wilder might have feared: a draconic part, a part that would hoard knowledge and guard it like a fire-breathing dragon, possessive and tyrannical. But Giggle wasn't like that, and that part was only very tiny and very fleeting.

More important was the idea that this could be a trap. Whether Wilder knew it or not, it could be. It reminded Giggle of The Collector's schemes and deals. She'd heard rumors: great rewards, with horrible consequences. Things that made one regret.

Would she regret this-?

She was considering it, when Wilder began to-... What is she doing? She looked like she might pass out. Then she was moving, staggering, nearly falling.

Giggle's brow furrowed and she stepped forward, wondering what this was. What it meant. She tried to extend her mind back out, to slide that link back into place, mostly out of concern.

Whatever it was-... it kept her out. At least, that's what she assumed. The backlash was immense and immediate, a blinding lightning flash of pain that shocked her through. One moment she was approaching Wilder, and the next she was blinking back to awareness, half-sprawled on the rock before the cat. What the fuck? she thought, and then sneezed at the dust that she'd kicked up. The crash of pain came like thunder to that lightning a moment later, the slow dull ache roaring in, and suddenly it was hard to think. Cascades of thoughts--nonsensical, only memories--tumbled through her mind and crowded there, echoing and muffling one another in a discordant cacophony.

The hyena gritted her jaws hard and shook her head, wincing. "Fucking magic," she half-hissed, half-spat, and knew Wilder would likely understand.

It took her a moment to gather herself. She wasn't meant, it seemed, to know whatever-that-had-been and so she just asked directly, after taking a steadying breath. "What sort of consequences?"

There; question asked. If this was a cursed Collector sort of deal, a pit filled with regret, she wanted to know before she jumped.

@Wilder

The sound of something hitting the ground startled Wilder and she turned, shocked to see Giggle sprawled out in front of her. She was confused - had she just done something to cause that? Guilt immediately overtook her and she reacted without thinking. If she went another second without helping someone, she was sure the madness would take over.

The black metal chain buried in her fur warmed as she sent magic out to try to take on whatever pain Giggle was experiencing. The small metal serpent, usually hidden under the fluff of her neck and chest, suddenly moved. A stinging bite on her neck made her flinch, but it was nothing compared to the strange duel-sensation of agony, as she felt the mental toll of failed magic rush into her, and the relief as the madness was satiated, at last. Even for something small, she at last gave into it a little bit.

She stood there, looking oddly miserable and relieved at the same time, and hoping that it at least did something to help alleviate what feedback Giggle had accidentally imposed on herself. She let out a breathless chuckle. "Fucking magic," she agreed.

She was quiet for a moment, giving them both a moment or two to collect themselves after their momentary shared failures, the fungus forgotten for now. Wilder's ears were still ringing from the feedback she'd taken on from Giggle, but at least now the feeling of losing her mind had receded back to a tickle in the corners of her head. She took a breath. "Madness. You felt it, when the comet passed, just a bit of it. They are not always...bad. I must help - if I do not, I will lose my mind. It is not bad, but it is a burden. I don't know if it will manifest so dramatically for you but benefits come at a cost, and costs afford benefits." Hume's words echoed in her own as she spoke softly. "I think it is a good wish. As long as you don't fear what it may cost."

@Giggle

Giggle took a moment, rolling her shoulders and grimacing, her fungus-mottled hide rippling with unpleasant twitches. Then she looked at Wilder, more serious after the head-blasting, and gave her a nod of gratitude.

On, then, to more immediate considerations.

"Madness." She'd known madness. It hadn't been good-... Not knowing what was real, and what wasn't, it had been devastating at times. It had been an ouroboros of misery, a snake of uncertainty that fed itself; for if she couldn't trust her own senses again and again, how could she trust anything..? It still hit her, sometimes, but so mildly these days, and so rarely. Omen was a big part of that.

Giggle looked over her shoulder, peering back at where the black Hallowed Caller now perched, staring back with rapt attention.

If I do something stupid, you can steady me, right?

It was rhetorical, really. These were concepts too complex for even the corvid-like bird's mind, and the tilted head indicated her confusion. Giggle offered a brief surge of soothing emotion, as if to say 'never mind,' and looked back to Wilder.

It wasn't really a question. If she could learn things like this, she didn't have a right to refuse, either--not for everyone in the caves. The "mad witch" had always been her role, hadn't it? The void-touched shaman, the seer who'd seen too much. Maybe that'd been fate's plan for her all along: these tastes of madness a mere preparation for whatever might come, all her years of bone-reading a training for her task ahead.

Or maybe I'm being a stupidly poetic old lady, she told herself, wryly.

"That's fine," she said, at last, with a nod to Wilder. And then--whether in regards to the Wish, or her magic help, or both--she said, "Thanks."

@Wilder

Wilder looked up as Giggle looked at the bird behind her. She knew Omen, only really by name and what it served for Giggle. A friend, a steadying force, even if it was a small mind not made to comprehend exactly what it was that they'd seen, she realized how similar in purpose Omen was to Vaati. Perhaps through the familiar, Giggle would find solace from the burden that was knowledge and Hume's madness.

She nodded. "I can't say what it would do to you, if it will work at all, but we shall see." Perhaps she would see, remembering that she had the ability to glance forward. Her head spun a bit as she did so, seeing wisps of cosmic pink and gold, the tickling of madness at the back of her mind, but the images were fragmented, confusing, and Wilder could pick out nothing useful from them that she could put together.

She was not bothered, however - if Giggle was prepared for the consequences, then Wilder saw no further reason to delay or deter her.

Her eyes slid shut as she reached for that madness now, the source, and she remembered wisteria trees, soft brown feathers, glowing golden eyes that were so sad, and gazed at her with such love. And she Wished - I wish for Giggle to have all the understanding and knowledge she desires. About Order and Chaos and all the other forces at work, about our world and us and our place in it and our fate - as much knowledge as she can handle. She took a deep breath as she released the wish, and slid her eyes open, immediately looking to Giggle, in case something went wrong.

Our FATE... As much knowledge as she can handle... In this moment, Giggle's form would look to have seized—all of her muscles tensed at once and her eyes glazed with the violet-gold of Magnolet's influence, her head turned skyward. Small cosmic wisps of violet strands lifted from her fur, blinking with the glow of golden stars; but they moved strangely, slowly, as if time around Giggle had come to a crawl. From her forehead sparked snapping bolts of yellow lightning, cracking the Fire Agate each time it struck:

Our... One strike. A tumultuous blur of birth, war, death. The shattering of a rainbow sky.

FATE... Another strike. Another tumble through the same visions, with slight differences. The shattering of a rainbow sky.

As... Strike three. Again, she whirled through the lives of billions of souls. Birth. War. Death. The shattering of a rainbow sky.

Much... Fourth strike. Birth. War. Death. The shattering of a rainbow sky.

KNOWLEDGE. Strike five was significant. It arched for what felt like an eternity, reaching through her gemstone with its many electric arms to touch each and every aspect of it. BIRTH. She saw human babies born, alien babies born, animal babies born, more alien—but no Gembound. In none of her visions thus far had she seen them. WAR. Valkhounds ripped through her vision, decimating entire civilizations in a splash of BLOOD AND OIL. But through the purple-tinted sky she saw the flash of an owl. WISDOM. It circled where she looked up to it from her PERSPECTIVE, circling through rolling clouds of shadow. NOCTUA. The image of a cathedral shifted within the clouds and was gone. DEATH. A gaping green maw billowed from the clouds and swallowed the owl whole.

The clouds crumbled to reveal the shattering of a rainbow sky...

As... The sixth strike of lightning was a quick pop and without rest, she was again thrust back into the whipping visions of birth, war, death. The shattering of a rainbow sky.

She... Strike seven was another quick pop. Birth, war, death... Another world upturned by VALKHOUNDS. These visions were absent of the Gembound, but also of the Drones, she'd realize. Did it matter—? The shattering of a rainbow sky.

Can... Eight. In her visions she feels like she is CLOSE to the END—BIRTH. WAR. DEATH. The shattering of a rainbow sky.

Handle...! THE NINTH COIL. THE NINTH STRIKE. Here, time completely stopped. For Wilder, she would see all of the elements gripping Giggle freeze. For Giggle, who unfortunately could "handle" a lot, she saw, finally...

BIRTH. Her vision opened with a loud peal of thunder, the Spire—as she knew it, the aqua-rainbow Skystone—flashing into view as if illuminated by a strike of lightning. All manner of chrysalises were populated around it: Obsidian, Lightning Ridge Fire Opal... Fire Agate, Onyx, Emerald... Any gemstone she could think of lay glittering around the Spire. But as the light faded, so did her vision. Another strike of lightning brought a new scene: the Gembound, in groups through time, completing events, making discoveries, and growing together. Fade. Rumble of thunder. Darkness...

BLINDING. The lightning reveals CLEARSTONE, embedded in creatures like a web of crystal. Her vision pans out to reveal a single animal, then a MASS of different creatures, aliens, bugs—and they all turn to look at her at once. THE DRONES ARE BORN. They are swallowed in a veil of black.

Flash! This scene was Tamulus, and though she had never met him, she had seen his portrait scribbled in the chambers of Canis; and she knew this was Tamulus, his blue eyes locked on to her as if he could see her. Long, blonde hair fell freely across his shoulders and his wings were drawn against his back. His head tilted as if regarding her. Broken chains lay around him, they were metallic, HOLOgraphic; he had been CONTROLLED but now his shackles lay in pieces. After the shock of seeing Giggle subsided, he said, "You know." A small smile followed.

"You know." The second was sighed with relief and his eyes closed. From the RIB of his abdomen emerged a shard of OBSIDIAN, and from this shard grew LET. SHE stood beside him and smiled, looking toward Giggle. "You know," she said softly, and closed her eyes, too. Then it happened quickly: From TAMULUS and LET emerged the WITCHES and HUMANS. From the WITCHES emerged a BOY. HE grew to adolescence, a streak of white hair piercing the shaggy brown like a strike of lightning. A strap was fastened to his chest, holding a sword that hung behind him. He looked at Giggle with a goofy grin. "You know, huh?" he laughed, and gave her a thumbs up. "See you soon!"

Fade out... Fade in:

Jupiter, her body furred in soft creams and whites, looked to Giggle with a start. Oh, they had known each other briefly, yes; and Giggle knew her son whose hoard of hounds lived within the vents of Canis. But at Jupiter's feet also lay the shattered remains of HOLO. Behind her trailed a long tail that began to wave idly. From JUPITER grew the creatures and the animals of THE MOON, LET. Then the vision expanded to include TAMULUS and JUPITER breaking free of CONTROL, and LET extended her arms to the sky and rejoiced, for THE MOUNTAINS WERE HER BONES, AND THE RIVERS HER VEINS.

Fade out...

WAR. Giggle was thrust from BIRTH into WAR with the crack of thunder, and THE BLACK WOLF OF VERIN reached for her PERSPECTIVE with HATRED. (While the moment was frozen in time for Wilder, she would feel a chill bristle her fur, then the hot-white pain of GREED, NEED, HATE in the scar beneath her gem. It passes in a second.) His reach fell short and the vision shifted to the mass slaughter of the WITCHES and HUMANS. They are at WAR. To protect them, LET puts herself between the two forces and sacrifices herself. LET DIES IN THE FIRST WAR. Realizing he is no better than RREVALK and his VALKHOUNDS, TAMULUS retreats to the VAA in a moment of shame where he will suffocate from the LOSS OF LET. All by his CREATION. HE DID THIS. Everything is CHAOS. All life is EVIL.

WAR. The Verinen set their sights on the remaining WITCHES. They go to WAR with the other four nations to round up any and all witches that they can find: but the witches HIDE. They retreat to the VAA, the VALLEY OF THE WITCHES, the WILDS. Here they prosper, for some time... without their MAGIC to sustain them, the beings of THE MOON, LET start to suffer. THE MOON, LET IS DYING. Verin strikes an alliance with TESARILL and they set out to find the WITCHES to restore their lands.

BIRTH. A boy is born. Brown hair with a streak of white... He is happy. The WITCHES are happy. But a STORM erupts on the SURFACE OF LET. It tears their VALLEY asunder. At the same time—

BIRTH. The Spire crashes through her vision, eliminating the OILSTONE that once stood as the pillar of Polaris. Then she revisits the scene of the gembound in their chrysalises around the SPIRE... A centaur stands beside it: it is a gentle creature with silver skin and silver hair trailing being its two pairs of deer-like rounded ears. Its silver... no, colorless eyes settle on her. It shifts the staff it holds between one hand to the next across its body. An extra set of arms is clasped together by the hands at its lower abdomen. As it looks to her, it frowns. "I'm sorry," it says, its voice ethereal and soft, engulfing her like a freshly washed blanket. Then it starts toward her with one step, the hands clasped unfolding to reveal an owlet in its palms. It stops advancing after a few gliding steps and its silver tail shifts defiantly. "Almost." Its voice carries around Giggle like a breeze. The centaur is looking at the owlet, whose form begins to shimmer with HOLO. "Yes," says the creature, and it looks to Giggle for a final time. "You have done so well. Thank you." Its form bubbles and shimmers away in a cloud of rainbow-blue particles.

DEATH. On the SURFACE OF LET, many of the WITCHES have died in the storm. In the rockfall of a destroyed mountain, FRAY unearths the beaten and battered body of a BOY. He has brown hair with a white streak through it, his freckled face dirtied and bruised. He opens his blue eyes—and Fray knows: this boy is a WITCH. Deep within his abdomen is a RIB of OBSIDIAN. And though he is clad in the armor of VERIN, FRAY BETRAYS THE BLACK WOLF. He takes the boy and FLEES.

BIRTH. Vargas shifts on his monstrous legs, looking into the blind eyes of his CREATION. But DHRACIA steps from behind him and smiles, her holographic eyes sliding up to lock on Giggle. "This is the one," her voice draws out like the uncomfortable slither of a snake on one's neck, a hot breath too close, too soft. "This time, I will not fail." But is she talking to Giggle? She takes the child and the vision shifts to the snowy forests of EARTH! Here, she plants the child for someone to find. From somewhere in the treetops an owl takes flight. Some creatures of EARTH are afflicted with a DIRE radiation from the child. In the background of this vision shifts a shadow, he is a WOLF. His body drips BLOOD AND OIL. He looks directly at Giggle and, from the shadow, she can see his grin split nearly to his ears. "LET..." he snarls—his voice is like a scream that bursts her inner ear: "LET ME IN."

DEATH. She is pulled away from THE WOLF. The shattering of a... Her vision pauses with the rainbow sky frozen in time, lifting away in glass-like panels, creaking with the held sound of near-broken glass. Through the broken pieces she can see a METEOR hurtling through space. It is a violet-gold of INDESCRIBABLE COLOUR. It sparks with cosmic flairs. Her vision pans to view a planet: EARTH. Her vision pans again to the horizon, just below the frozen, shattering sky. She sees a WOLF, but he comes off as friendly; he is grey and white with bright red-orange eyes looking upon her sadly. In her KNOWLEDGE, she KNOWS he is APOSTLE. In his pawsteps, the sand shimmers with the rainbow-aqua of the Spire that she knows, the same color that is held captive in the sky. When he reaches her, he smiles and opens his mouth to say something—his name? Na...? She does not hear it through the sound of the glass sky above her shattering in an explosion of sharp sounds as the METEOR crashes into EARTH.

****

About CHAOS...? Her KNOWLEDGE shifted, and she saw the Centaur as a constellation, something her WISDOM could fathom: from the main star—NATURAL ORDER—were connected three other stars, and she KNEW one was DISORDER, one was ORDER, and one was AUTONOMY. The stars orbited the main star; without it, they would not exist, but too, the large star would not exist without its other parts. The DISORDER star fought against its orbit. This star billowed with black and green and yawned into a black hole that consumed everything, even some smaller stars scattered around the main group—the sound of shattering glass closes this vision shut.

****

Ten. A final strike of lightning releases Giggle's muscles and she relaxes as if she is relieved, but she is still trapped within the visions. She sees EARTH again, but its buildings are in ruin and overgrown with vegetation. In the window of a mostly-standing house, she sees the upright figure of a dog, of a boy: around his neck is wrapped a comfortable red scarf. Her vision moves through the window and she sees that he is drawing a map—a good one!—and he signs it T— her vision blurs, ... SUNSHARD. As he looks up proudly, he gazes out of the window and her vision sweeps outside. She is lifted into the air on the wings of an owl and they soar over the pines, and wheat, and mountains—and she knows. This is BIRTH.

****

Through all of her visions, Giggle KNOWS that this is not the first time the stars have looked down upon their ROCK, not always as THE MOON, LET. It will not be the LAST. It will not be the END. The vision snaps to DHRACIA, then to TAMULUS, working on an oilstone chrysalis. There is someone who KNOWS DHRACIA'S version of events: his monstrous, purple figure turns to look at her from its place in DRACO—The MASTER, Vargas. But too, she KNOWS, he would sooner KILL HER than share his KNOWLEDGE. His collection of eyes shimmers briefly with HOLO before the vision fades entirely.

As she is released from the WISDOM, she KNOWS something else, something that Vargas does NOT KNOW: NOCTUA. "But you cannot find me yet," rings a voice, soft and tinkling like the wind through a crystal forest. And then, gently and lifted, as if its speaker were smiling, "Wilder will find me soon." The voice fades with the feeling of hope. DISORDER can drag its oily claws through them all it wants; but they are the GEMBOUND, and HOUNDS no longer.

The black cat slowly comes into focus before Giggle. Her Wish was granted.

In the gilded cracks of the hyena's fire agate, the KNOWING drove a sharp stake into her brain: Wilder's Wish was granted, but now Giggle had the PERCEPTION OF WISDOM. What she thought she KNEW... What she is certain she KNOWS... Right now it was a lot, but if she had to simplify it: their FATE, their PLACE IN THE WORLD... is to LIVE.

Giggle suffers the madness of wisdom beyond the caves, of BIRTH. WAR. DEATH. CYCLE AND RECYCLE. COIL AND RECOIL. COIL AND RECYCLE. She will randomly feel like she is tumbling through time, as if she does not feel a part of this timeline... But, in the same moment, that this is exactly the time she should exist in. She will feel torn apart but whole with no certain KNOWING of what is the right version of her, WHERE is the right version of her, WHEN is the right version of her...

As the cycles go on, she will come to understand more of the things she saw in her visions and new KNOWLEDGE will dawn on her. However, as the cycles go on, she will struggle to KNOW if she has lived this life before...? Has she walked the sands of END with the wolf, Na—, in the past or in the future? Has she been there more than once? Had she ever been there at all?

The Fire Agate in her forehead is permanently scarred with streaks of Magnolet: the cost of ENLIGHTENMENT, the curse of knowledge.

She was--gone.

Somewhere else.

She'd been standing in Canis, wreathed by mold and the stench of stagnancy: bones and old water. Then, suddenly, she was hurtling through...

everything.

She was unaware of her black muzzle tipped upward, of the strangely familiar magic that threaded in little lightning streaks from her gemstone. She saw-... yes. Everything.

It was a shame that Giggle had never seen a grandfather clock: the sort with with ancient wood and ominous, bass tolls that would reverberate through the chest. If she had, she'd have likened it to this, to a clock's swinging pendulum. Back and forth, changing yet unchanging, like the creep of time to some unseen end.

What she would be left with was a jumble, but in the moment there were certain things that her mind latched onto. The rainbow sky--what was that? How could it be? It wasn't the first time she'd seen the sky, though hers had been starlit darkness. This was... different. Impossible. Beautiful. It showed itself again and again, so that while other memories slid away into the chaos of her vision, this one crystallized into something she'd remember.

And the rest-... So many births, lives, deaths. So much war. So much destruction. A cycle--no, many cycles, repeated.

Five. She spoke the number in her mind, her thoughts somehow breathless, her eyes empty and wide. This one was... if the others had been tastes, this was a meal, rich in its details. Humans--and animals she'd never seen, and Valkhounds, blood and Oil. It was familiar enough, in its way, but the owl? Noctua. She didn't know what this meant. Was it a name? A cathedral showed itself, a glimpse through clouds, and--DEATH. The words echoed in her mind, her own thoughts repeating them, as she struggled to remember. Was Noctua Death? Was the cathedral Death? Were they all the same? The maw-... the sky...

She began to blink.

The gesture was unfinished by the time the next cycle repeated. The births. The lives. The deaths. It would be overwhelming; it was overwhelming, but passing by so fast that she had not yet even registered the weight of all this knowledge.

Seven. The blink was one third completed. Valkhounds, blood and chaos. It was another flash, yet another cycle of existence, of eternity. Another toll of that great unseen clock, but she remembered it nonetheless for the differences it carried.

Eight. The end? Would it end? A chill gripped her, but it felt there was more to this. Not only more story, more cycles, but-

Nine...? It all seemed to grind to a halt. Her blink was finishing. Her eyes were closed. But still she could See. She Saw the Spire; she saw all of them, all the lives within this cave (was that what they were?), glittering with waiting life. More flashes of visions, interspersed with dark and growling nothing, filled her mind's eye; she Saw Gembounds, all of them, and she Saw clearstone and Order's creatures, before they vanished into the dark. She Saw Tamulus-

Him-! She knew him. She KNEW him. A flicker of excitement, of recognition, beneath the drowning visions. She'd seen his image. She knew-... Chains.

He was speaking. Was it to her-? She thought it was. Let. A rib. A stone. A person. A... civilization, a society. A species. And the boy--as a mother, Giggle warmed to him at once. Her heart latched to his silly grin, his laugh, and she wished him well, and he was gone. Had he been speaking to her-? Had Let? See you soon? she thought back to him, tentative, almost hopeful but then this was whisked away and forgotten, for now, replaced by a soft-furred creature. Giggle thought she recognized her, but she didn't, or she did? -more chains-...

The woman was a planet. A planet? A moon? Giggle's mind began to creak, to stretch, this final clock bell's toll beginning to shudder the edges of her reality.

War-... The black wolf. No--it was a name, a title but before she could amend the thought he was reaching, and hatred and murder and death-... Yes, war. War. Let's death. A mother's sacrifice, and Giggle understands it, more than she's understood anything else so far, her heart wrenching. Tamulus--bitterness born of loss and she understood that entirely, pitying, a mother wanting again to embrace someone in pain, but this was gone, now, too.

The boy. Again. The boy. Worry surges in her; the boy is now an infant, and this world is in turmoil, and the Black Wolf, and the war and the storms-

The shuddering became an earthquake, the reality of her mind beginning to falter, to crack along its edges beneath the strain of the visions. And then the centaur, so gentle, so pure, apologizing--and Giggle starts to think back, It's all right, but why are they apologizing? Are they even addressing her? She has only a flicker of time to wonder if these faces, these voices, are speaking to someone else and she is only Seeing.

The owlet-

Her eyes fall to it, to the rainbow blue. Don't break, she thought, fervently, at the color itself.

Her mind shuddered again.

Giggle saw the boy, fallen. NO- Again she is the mother, but his eyes open, and for a moment she is frozen even within her instant of stasis. Horror, hope--and relief, as the good traitor takes him to safety. At least, she hopes he does, but there's no time to think, or even to remember what she's seeing, because now there's Vargas.

She knows him.

And she sees Dhracia, and a chill runs through her. She has time, if barely, for her instincts to register a predator, danger, and then--it's shifted again, to a place called Earth. Forests. The owl. Dire. Was that what their magic was-? The wolf-... Was this the Black Wolf? Now in a new place? Another wolf, and-

Her thoughts were crumbling. She couldn't hold one cycle from the next, one person from the last. They were merging and falling together, still quaking.

Let-

No, not again; not the sky. It can't break this time. Can it-? And--oh, it's her. A meteor. An owl. Like Wilder said. Na- her mind repeats, and then it shatters.

No-... No, the vision shatters. It isn't over. Her mind must persevere, must maintain against the weight layered on, the volume filling it. Because a new vision has replaced the last, and she's beginning to fear, now. To fear that it'll crack and break her, that there's simply too much to see.

Chaos.

The words circled like the stars in her mind: Chaos, Knowledge, Wisdom, Natural Order, Disorder, Autonomy, Order... And had the sky again shattered-? No, she thinks, a desperate denial, but-

-it still isn't over-

Her eyes began to open from their blink. Her body was released and it began a swift collapse, but in her mind she was plunged into new visions.

Earth, but lush and decrepit all in one. Overgrown. New creatures. New... Birth. A handkerchief in red.

And back again, whipping through the stars to see their--planet, their moon, their... Rock? Giggle saw Dhracia, and Tamulus, working. And Vargas--and perhaps only because she knew him, recognized him, had spoken and hell, had created children with him, did she See the color of the chains reflecting in his eyes. Was he... a captor? Not chaos, but jailor, imprisoner-? Was that what Dhracia was? Why would Tamulus--if he'd broken free--but-

Noctua. Noctua.

Was she--was it a she? An it? A name, or a thing?--Giggle could not tell. She heard this voice. Hope, though-... Hope. And--freedom.

The dichotomous knowledge of shattered chains and the trio who worked with the chains' light in their eyes, and of hope, spiralled through all that she had seen. It was the last she saw, and the thing that stuck with her, though she didn't understand it at all.

How could captivity be freedom? How could chains be hope?

Were all those chains broken-?

LIVE. It came like gentle knowledge, and it came like a sacred command, driving everything else away.

All at once time returned, accelerating. She felt herself hit the floor, and there was a confusing moment where the quaking of her mind intensified and the scent of dust rose in her nose, and a cloud of spores drifted from her impact on the stone. She could see Wilder. She could see Birth. She could see Canis behind Wilder. She could see War. She could see stalagmites. She could See Death.

She could See-...

The quaking shuddered, her thoughts all threatening to collapse upon themselves, to leave her with only madness, to shatter her mind again into a thousand pieces-...

...but after a moment... it subsided. Slowly. Giggle inhaled a great, ragged breath, and made no attempt to move or speak. She let the dust settle around her. She let her thoughts fade into the confused jumble that would not break her mind.

The clock had gone silent.

She let herself breathe, for just a moment.

She let herself Live.

what even are tenses

@Wilder

Wilder stood by the hyena as the wish gripped her and, while it was alarming to see her go so quiet and rigid, she told herself to calm - her wish was being granted. Everything would be okay.

She watched Giggle's eyes glaze with magnolet, the sparks dancing off her gemstone, and she felt a sadness within her for what scars it would leave on her mind and body. It was a big wish and there was no way she would walk away from it unscathed. She forced herself to stay calm. She staved off her own madness for the time by convincing herself over and over again - there was nothing she could do right now to help. The burden was Giggle's to adjust to and carry.

Even when Wilder felt that caress across her cheek that tasted of greed and war and death, when it brought images of a man clad in black, a wolf's head upon his own, she didn't try to interfere. She held herself and her own curiosity back.

Only when Giggle collapsed did Wilder move, barely a moment after she seized. The wisps of pink and gold were gone, her body was no longer tense, but she could immediately see the physical repercussions. The stone on her head, streaked with magnolet, infected by the wisdom and knowledge she had now. Wilder could only hope that he mind survived what had just happened.

She was quiet for a moment, standing by the hyena's side, shuffling her feet as she gave her a bit to recover, before gently whispering, "Giggle, are you okay? Still here?"

@Giggle