Ghost and the Writer

Albus side, part 3

Albus figured out why she was pulled along soon enough - Tiamat asked her various things about Ahea. About her family and how Fumus was doing, what sort of things some famous Aheals were doing, also - about some elder dragons. Even when Albus said she only knew rumors, Tiamat said those were plenty. In exchange, Albus learned how Tiamat had made friends with Aheals for all these years.

Aheals lost their immortality if they came to Urea even once and Tiamat herself was bound to Urea, so Albus had wondered how had they met. Turned out Big Purple had set up an odd thing called 'Boundary cafe' where it could invite the consciousness of beings from various dimensions. Accessing it turned out to be so easy Albus was dumbfounded how she had not heard of it. Although judging from Tiamat's questions it did not seem like Tiamat had met any unicorns there.

Big purple was one of the top odd items peddlers in both Ahea and Urea, you could always either find or summon a wisp (its familiar) to buy various goods or services. Even Albus had at times bought water and food in places with bad access or a teleportation service from them. Turned out you could buy 'a night at the cafe' for small magic crystal worth of aether either taken directly from your body or in the shape of the said crystal - not a cheap price, but not expensive enough to avoid trying.

The dubious part was that a wisp overtook your body while you were 'out' for protection purposes. Tiamat said that the only way purple uses the bodies of its clients, though, is to sleep, thus avoiding the need to sleep with its main body. In case of danger, the body teleports around unless the client has set up a different defense protocol in advance.

Tiamat was a regular there, saying she didn't have much to do in Urea now that all the dragons had left the nest. She did appear to be genuinely happy about having two eggs to take care of, saying it would get busy (in a cheerful sense) in a decade or less.

By the time more than an hour had passed, even Albus herself noticed that she no longer felt intimidated by Tiamat or her presence. At first, she guessed it was due to being a dryad's familiar, as nothing of the sort had happened with high standing Aheals regardless of how long of a time she had spent around them.

Admiral was an exception to that rule, but, truth be told, it was hard to be intimidated by someone who sobbed about fictional characters when drunk and confused her with some character on top of it. Or perhaps the same applied to Tiamat. Albus hadn't expected Tiamat to laugh about the rumors regarding some friends or show a goofy face about her expected grandchildren.

When they got back to the hut, Marcus no longer seemed to be deep in thought, rather, he was waiting for them to come back with an expression of silent determination. August and Leum were still sleeping in the same position as before.

Veri silently got up on the terrace and tiptoed towards the two, but before she could kiss August awake, her lips were met by his hand.

"Stingy," Veri mumbled, disappointed.

August half-opened his eyes, yawning. "Good try," he replied and poked Leum's cheek to wake him up, before straightening himself out.

"What did I miss?" August asked.

"Not much," Veri replied. "Marcus didn't know how to become the Emperor of Hades and when Tiamat told him he became unresponsive from shock, so we left for a walk and Albus told us rumors about Tiamat's friends."

"Ok. How do you become emperor of Hades?" August asked.

"Eat your brother and father," Veri replied.

"Yes, that would shock someone," August replied as he yawned again. He didn't seem shocked one bit, though.

Leum yawned and looked towards Tiamat. "So, location and time for a gate to Hades?"