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The Saint of Hope and the Saint of Loyalty might have looked better if they'd swapped eyes. The Saint of Loyalty had the absurdly pale skin of a naturally fair woman who had not seen the light of Dominicus, or any other star, in close proximity for myriads. Her hair was the vivid red-orange of fire. Wrapped in the rainbow-sheened white of Lyctorhood, she looked like she'd been carved out of ivory or wax, a candle crowned by flame, and her eyes, such a deep and richly-pigmented brown as to be nearly black, were like dark pits in her white face. The Saint of Hope was similarly pale, but his hair was dark, his face thin and austerely mournful, which only made his warm hazel eyes the more disconcerting.

In this particular moment, regarded by both pairs of eyes, Nemei thought they might look better in one another's faces. It was a useless thought, but the only coherent one left to Nemei in their exhaustion.

The corridor of the Mithraeum was carpeted with gore, blood and globules of flesh and fragments of bone. Some of it was Nemei's, and some of it belonged to Raetha the First; if Nemei was half-collapsed against a wall, new and untried Lyctor that they were, they had at least made the Saint of Loyalty expend some effort. Raetha had a fine sheen of sweat upon her brow, and her strange black eyes regarded Nemei with grudging respect.

Not so the deceptively friendly hazel of Everard the First; he looked between them with equal tired disappointment. Nemei couldn't entirely resent this, just as they couldn't entirely resent that they were still upright in part because Everard had come into the corridor, taken in the Lyctoral duel -- or, yes, the desperate fight for their life that Nemei was slowly but steadily losing -- and immediately erected a wall of bone between them a meter thick. When it melted into a gory slurry among the other biological detritus on the floor, Everard had one hand gripping Raetha's arm, and a momentary truce had fallen.

Nemei blinked the blood out of their eyes and attempted to stand unassisted.

"For fuck's sake," the Saint of Hope said in an undertone to the Saint of Loyalty. "And don't tell me it's mercy."

She shook him off and said, stiffly, "It's my job."

"Oh, fuck off with that, too," Everard replied. He let go of Raetha's arm and stepped, lightly and delicately, through the gore towards Nemei. Every place his feet fell, an outline of pure crimson bloomed in his wake, and when it faded, all the surrounding gore vanished, seemingly reabsorbed by Everard. Nemei couldn't see the theorem, didn't know it -- something Lyctoral, then, that they should know intuitively, if the process had gone as it ought.

"Come on, kid, let's get you cleaned up," Everard said, not unkindly.

Nemei was nineteen, and a Lyctor, even if they had proved a poor and broken one so far. They had poise sufficient to not snarl at being called a child. They forced themself fully upright, established that their legs would hold them, and gave Everard a dignified nod. They did not look to Raetha at all, and as they walked with Everard up the corridor and away, the Saint of Loyalty let them pass with no further violence.

*

The rooms given to Nemei had belonged to the previous Lyctor of the Eighth -- to the founder of the Eighth, one of God's original disciples. There were traces of that Lyctor's personality scattered around the suite: a beautifully-carved pipe of real wood, which Nemei had immediately taken for themself; richly upholstered furniture in lavish colors, more real wood for the frames. Beautiful, pure white curtains on the plex that looked out onto the asteroid field surrounding the Mithraeum. This last Nemei had disliked for its domestic whimsey and removed, but the rest stayed.

The rooms belonging to the Saint of Hope were very different.

If Nemei hadn't known his House of origin, one look at the suite could have told them. The whites and yellows and ivories of bone fragments flashed their brightness from their embedded places along the walls, the ceiling, the floor, even the inlays of the furniture. Unlike the luxurious wood of Nemei's suite, Everard's furniture was of metal or stone, all the surrounding fabrics dark. One lamp lit a large desk on which sat a stone chess set, and a low fire burned in the grate. The effect wasn't tomblike, but neither was it the sterile solemnity Nemei was used to on the Eighth. It was a tired old chapel of a room. Nemei had never visited the Ninth -- no one ever visited the Ninth -- but if one worked backwards from the dreary little monks and nuns who endlessly paid homage to their heresy, one might find at its origin point a man like Everard the First.

He flung himself into one of the chairs near the fire, gestured to Nemei to sit, and poured himself a glassful of amber liquid. When he looked up to find Nemei still standing, one eyebrow rose delicately. "I suppose you don't drink, either."

"No, thank you," Nemei said.

He made a careless gesture, and all the remaining blood flaked off Nemei's body and drifted to the floor like rusty snow. Another gesture, and a number of bone fragments detached themselves from the detailing around the fireplace, swiftly reassembling into a small construct -- not a full human skeleton, as Nemei had sometimes observed in bone adepts, but a strange bipedal creature with a sharp skull, the whole construct less than in a foot in either height or length. It bobbed its strange head and scuttled off in a soft patter of bony talons, vanishing into the shadows. Nemei stared after it.

"They were called crows," Everard said. "Sit. Before you fall over, preferably."

Seeing the wisdom in this, Nemei grudgingly sat. For a moment there was silence but for the crackle of the fire. Everard sipped his drink.

"Does the Saint of Loyalty hate me?" Nemei asked.

A foolish question, perhaps. Over the past fortnight, ever since Nemei's arrival at the Mithraeum, Raetha the First had attempted to kill them no less than eight times, the first occurring when Nemei was still bedridden and sweating blood, their body fighting the Lyctoral transformation. On that first occasion, Nemei had so much raw power, fueled by the grief -- no, rather, the crushing soul-deep disappointment -- of having discovered themself unfit for the power they'd seized, that they'd simply grasped at the threads of Raetha's soul and yanked.

Raetha's scream, more of surprise than of agony, had nevertheless been very satisfying, and their successful counterattack had repelled the Saint of Loyalty for three days. But her second attack was better calculated, and Nemei's attempt to seize at her soul came to nothing, the theorem skidding off Raetha like hands from slick plex. That time, to their shame, Nemei had run.

They were better prepared the next time, having reviewed and thus armed themself with theorems that might surprise Raetha, or do some kind of physical rather than spiritual damage. The necromancy of flesh and bone, the purely biological, had never been Nemei's forte, but they had once been the Wielder of the Purifying Flame, heir to the Eighth, the most skilled and celebrated necromancer of a proud and ancient House, and they were not to be outdone. They dissolved Raetha's theorems as they came, broke apart lumbering constructs, threw the whole slurry back at the Saint of Loyalty, tried to spear her with a bone spar -- no success -- and was speared in turn -- bled -- lost control of the immense power that lay just beyond their reach, if only they could hold it, but it laughed and fled and nearly reminded Nemei of something--

That was the point at which their eardrums had burst, and to their eternal shame Raetha might have killed them then if Zakki hadn't interfered. And Nemei learned their lesson. Every time Raetha came for them since, they defended themself and fled.

Shameful, embarrassing, in no way befitting the scion of the Eighth. Perhaps Raetha was attempting to put some broken, mangled thing out of its misery. She might even be right.

"No," Everard said now. "She doesn't hate you." He took another sip of his drink and added, "Far be it from me to psychoanalyze Raetha -- I expect we'd all find it terribly dull -- but at a guess, I'd say she hates uncertainty. The extra uncertainty you bring, that is."

"I would categorize Zakki as the more unpredictable of the two of us," Nemei said, less a defense than a clarification. They couldn't see the Saint of Hope's face. Everard sat half in shadow, impossibly ancient, the founder of a tradition Nemei neither trusted nor understood. This was the most any of the three elder Lyctors had conversed with them; would, in a few minutes, add up to the most time Nemei had spent among God's original disciples.

"I might agree with you, if I knew nothing about the Seventh," Everard said. "But the Seventh are perfectly primed for this. Every day they're told that their suffering is beautiful, that if only they think creatively enough they might squeeze just one more drop of thanergy out of that lovely suffering, that perhaps it isn't suffering at all-- Now imagine that a young person of that House, aware of the thanergy eating away at their blood but not yet feeling the awful effects of it, is presented the ultimate creative loophole: it will never get worse. Not only that, but once their cavalier has been integrated, his own suffering will never become worse, either. The briefest of dilemmas, followed by his consent. Nothing about Zakki is unpredictable."

Nemei felt a trickle of blood, and dabbed at their nose.

"God," Everard said softly, which confused Nemei for a moment, as they were alone in the room and Everard was looking right at them. They didn't know that Lyctors were in the habit of swearing by someone they know personally. That Nemei knew personally now, too.

A light tap came at the door to Everard's rooms. "Come," Everard called.

The Saint of Resilience entered. Of the three remaining original Lyctors, Nemei knew her least. They were briefly together on the journey to the Mithraeum, but between the trials of the River and the confusion of their own botched recovery, Nemei recalled her very little.

On Raetha, the shimmering white of the Lyctoral robes served as a kind of armor, wrapped tight around her torso and shoulders to keep it out of the way, practical shirt and trousers underneath. Everard wore his in a thrown-on, careless sort of way, darker clothing clearly visible beneath. But on Alieldrenne the First they became a shining robe of office, a stylish wraparound dress of a garment that glinted beautifully on her curves in the firelight. Her hair was a cascade of impeccably-maintained otherworldly pink, precisely matching her sharp-tipped nails. Alieldrenne was absurdly beautiful in the way of flesh magicians. Her perfectly sculpted cheekbones could only be found on a necromancer.

"Raetha again?" the Saint of Resilience asked, taking in the scene.

"Mm, yeah. How many attempts are we up to?"

This question, Nemei realized after a beat, was directed at them. "Eight."

"That must be embarrassing for her." Alieldrenne wound her way into the room, stepping around the furniture with the thoughtlessness of long practice, and sat down next to Everard, nestled snug at his side in a chair not really made for two. The Saint of Hope immediately set an arm across her shoulders, and with his free hand poured another tumbler of the amber liquid. Alieldrenne made a face but accepted it, tapping her glass gently to Everard's, and took a sip. Her attention back on Nemei, she looked them critically up and down. "God, how old are you?"

No one in the Temple of White Glass ever looked at Nemei as though regarding a small child, not even when they had literally been one. On the Eighth, everyone knew their roles from birth, carefully matched for compatibility of soul-syphoning; so Nemei has been looked on as the Wielder of the Purifying Flame, not as a child, and similarly DUZUT had never really been a child.

They dabbed at their bleeding nose again. "Nineteen."

"Nineteen," Alieldrenne repeated, turning to Everard in appeal.

But the Saint of Hope said, with a trace of irony in his tone, "Same as it ever was."

She gave a funny, hiccupping sort of laugh at that. Nemei considered, not for the first time, that human minds were not meant to live myriads. Such a thought would have been outright heretical on the Eighth, where as a matter of basic dogma it was understood that God was infallible, and thus the Lyctors, his Hands and Gestures, must be guided by that infallible will. Even after the truth of Lyctorhood, even after meeting murderous Hands and Gestures whose eyes disconcerted them horribly, some of that dogmatic belief remained, because Nemei found themself asking, "Does God want me dead?"

The two Lyctors exchanged glances. They both looked surprised.

Nemei did not wish to believe that God wanted them dead. They did not wish to believe that the Emperor Undying, Lord of the Nine Houses, the Great Resurrector, wished violence upon Nemei Octavellian, heir and scion to the great House of the Eighth turned Emperor's Hand, any more than they wished to believe that God, who looked like an ordinary man and whose ordinary human smile could light up rooms, wished violence upon his new disciple. But God was supposed to be infallible, all-powerful; surely nothing aboard the Mithraeum happened without his knowledge and his permission.

"Nooooo," Alieldrenne said finally, drawing the word out. She sounded puzzled, but she didn't sound unsure.

"He's seeing what you're made of," Everard said. The Saint of Resilience gave another of those weird little giggles, and this time the Saint of Hope joined her; they laughed together like a two-headed construct programmed to find the most basic of necromantic double-entendres hilarious. But after a moment Everard sobered and said, with an odd twist of bitterness, "He likes tests."

"I'm good at tests," Nemei said.

"We all are." Alieldrenne stretched out her long legs, draping them across Everard's lap, and gave Nemei an unimpressed once-over. "We all have clever minds, a great passion for necromancy, and a willingness to do the unspeakable because we believe we understand the consequences." Her regard became, if possible, less impressed. "Most of us don't throw fits about it, though."

"Be kind, Ali," Everard murmured.

"It's your turn," she replied, sounding supremely tired of everything.

"Fine." He looked up again at Nemei. His warm hazel eyes were amused now, though Nemei suspected it wasn't directed at them; they were seeing Everard the First with someone he actually liked. Disturbing concept. "Your continuing Lyctoral education," he said. "My rooms, tomorrow, the second hour after breakfast. If you come any sooner, bring coffee and I won't have to pull your spine out of your body as a reminder not to wake me early. Now go away, and try not to get killed before tomorrow."

"Thank you," Nemei said, at a loss for another response sufficiently gracious for Everard to not rescind the offer.

This struck both Lyctors as deeply amusing. Nemei left as swiftly as they could, shutting the laughter away behind them. The sound lingered in their head afterwards; not the laughter of madness, but something worse, like despair.

*

"Alieldrenne's been training me for weeks," was Zakki's response to the intelligence that Nemei was to begin lessons with Everard the First. They scrunched their nose in consideration and added, "I wouldn't want to be trained by Everard. He's such a downer!"

"I don't care about his attitude, as long as he imparts the lessons efficaciously," Nemei replied.

"Efficaciously!" Zakki repeated in apparent delight. "Great word. Adding it to my vocabulary ASAP."

As usual, Nemei had absolutely no idea whether Zakki was making fun of them. Their eyes, no longer particolored but instead a lovely, luminous green, sparkled with friendly cheer. Nemei had not known Zakki well, prior to the trials of Lyctorhood; the Seventh and the Eighth had little to do with one another. The Seventh were obsessed with thanergy of the blood; the Eighth were spirit adepts. Nemei had, in earlier years, kept up correspondence with a spirit magician called Ayveus at Koniortos Court on the Fifth, but what use could they have for the Seventh?

Though apparently they had made a use--

"Stop thinking about things, you're bleeding again," Zakki informed them, using a corner of their shimmering Lyctoral robe to wipe the blood from under Nemei's nostrils. It flaked and fell off the robe at once. Zakki bounced up from their place beside Nemei's chair and returned to what they'd been doing when Nemei interrupted: cooking an unnecessarily complex dinner.

Presumably Nemei's suite also had some kind of cooking area. They hadn't bothered looking. But Zakki -- after arranging bouquets of roses everywhere, awfully Seventh of them, followed by draping every available surface in multicolored fabric, which Nemei couldn't comment upon except to feel like it was all a bit much -- had somehow uncovered mountains of shiny, unused-looking cookware, and attacked cooking with the singlemindedness of a very simple bone construct.

"Maybe I could invite everyone to dinner!" Zakki said over their shoulder. "That might smooth things over!"

Presumably Raetha wouldn't be stupid enough to attempt murdering them in company. "I do not believe there's anything to smooth over," Nemei said. "I believe Raetha the First intends to kill me because I am a Lyctoral failure."

"You're not a failure!" Zakki said at once. "You just got … creative about it."

If only they think creatively enough, Everard had said of the Seventh, they might squeeze just one more drop of thanergy out of that lovely suffering. But Nemei knew that their current predicament wasn't Zakki's fault; indeed, that Zakki may have in some way ameliorated it. So said the letter Zakki had given them when they'd reached coherence, after those feverish days attempting to integrate. To be opened on my recovery, the letter's flimsy envelope read in Nemei's own hand. The letter inside was in their personal cypher, of course. That any of this was another's fault would be far too easy.

The contents, naturally, were less than illuminating. The Lytoral process had not gone as it ought; obviously. Nemei and Zakki had taken it upon themselves, guided by Zakki's new and uncorrupted Lyctoral power, to set up a complex interlacement of blood wards and spirit sigils designed to -- but here the letter elided the problem so thoroughly that the only possible conclusion was that even knowing the purpose of the wards might destabilize them, which Nemei felt was very poor planning. That had the Seventh written all over it. Whatever had happened to Nemei, it had happened fast enough that they'd needed Zakki's help in whatever form it took; the form it took was one of spontaneous string-and-chewing-gum necromancy of the sort that would never be tolerated in the Temple of White Glass.

"Surely in that case you can simply tell me the purpose of our warding," Nemei had said, lowering the flimsy and staring over it at Zakki.

"I can't!" Zakki had replied, cheerfully enough. "You have me under a geas. A kind of vicious one, too, you do not screw around on the Eighth. Geas is a funny word, isn't it? Change the first letter and you get peas. Or teas!"

So Zakki was going to be no fucking help beyond whatever they'd already done, Nemei concluded.

Nevertheless, when the subject arose they had to try again. As they watched Zakki dance around the kitchen, Nemei said, "Yes, in what way did we get creative about it?"

"Never mind that," Zakki said. "Let's get creative in the kitchen! Which beans go best with tofu?"

*

Nemei had tea with God.

"Having tea" was what God called it, in any case: full skeleton constructs arrived in God's warm study, laden with delicate dishware, piping hot tea and the sorts of little sandwiches and sweet biscuits that inevitably appeared at any function where the scions of the great Houses gathered. Nemei sat in one armchair, God in another, and neither of them much touched the tea service. Instead, as usual, Nemei drank in the presence of the Necrolord Prime, the Emperor Undying, the man who became God sitting a bare foot from them in a firelit room.

Their first sight of God had been something of a shock. That was inevitable: the moment at which God ceased being a concept, and became one singular and specific person, would be a shock no matter who the singular person of God turned out to be.

What God turned out to be was a solidly-built man, about six feet in height, with warm bronze skin and a frequent smile that lit up his face. He wore his shining white robes with the childish excitement of someone attending a costume party in the perfect outfit; his head was bare save for a circlet of very small phalanges. His only other affectation was a pair of glasses he wore on occasion, which were tinted pink and did absolutely nothing to hide the starless black pits of his eyes. He moved through the world with the kind of light cheerfulness only possible to those absolutely assured of their own safety and power.

"I hear Everard's stepping in to further your Lyctoral training," God said, holding a teacup like he was intending to drink from it.

"He is," Nemei said.

God gave them a gentle smile; that was his way of prompting them to elaborate.

Nemei could think of very little additionally to say about the subject. God knew about Nemei's Lyctoral defects, but had made no commentary about them, instead choosing to ask Nemei how they were adjusting to life aboard the Mithraeum. God knew that Raetha the First's favorite leisure activity, or hobby, or calling, was repeatedly attempting to kill Nemei, but made no commentary about this, instead choosing to ask Nemei about Everard the First furthering their Lyctoral training. Perhaps, like Zakki, he disliked coming at an unpleasant topic directly. Or perhaps the man who'd known him for myriads had the right of it, and as Everard said, God was testing them and enjoying it.

"Lord," Nemei said, setting their teacup aside, "Raetha the First is trying to kill me."

"Is she?" God said mildly.

He knew about Raetha the First's favorite leisure activity. He was not stopping it. He was looking at Nemei with kind interest, with the air of a man who knew that the topic was of great import to his conversational companion and was therefore entertaining them despite his own polite disinterest in the subject. Perhaps it was a test, and he'd set Raetha upon it. Perhaps he believed Nemei more than equal to it. Perhaps--

"Yes, Lord," Nemei said. "She is. Why?"

"I suspect she'd know the answer better than I do." God leaned forward, regarding Nemei with paternal concern. "She knows better than to interrupt your training with Everard, so you don't need to worry about that. As to the rest… You need something to focus on, while you get your strength up. Do you have any hobbies?"

Nemei stared at him. The silliness of the question was like a brick wall, dropped abruptly in front of all conversational avenues. Whether or not God had actually removed himself from the business regarding one of his original Hands repeatedly attempting to kill his new one, he was certainly pretending it had nothing to do with him. Hobbies.

The children of the Eighth had practiced soul-syphoning, on one another and on their assigned cavaliers. Perhaps Nemei's childhood hobby had been breaking Ariphi's arm to break her concentration before she sent Saborys into a coma or hollowed him out entirely.

"Zakki cooks," Nemei said, a bit blankly. "I could. Learn cooking?"

"That would be delightful," God said fervently. "I don't mind telling you, Alieldrenne is wonderful with drinks, but she's no cook. And Ev and Raetha will eat just about anything. We haven't had anyone with a real passion for cooking on board since--" He stopped abruptly and gave Nemei a rather melancholy smile. "I'm sure Zakki would be very happy with the company. Cooking!"

"Yes, Lord," Nemei said again, only half paying attention to the words coming out of their own mouth. Their mind ran ahead. God would not tell Raetha to stop; there were only so many times that Nemei could rely on the timely intervention of one of their fellow Lyctors. They could not know why their own Lyctorhood had failed so utterly, but they had once been the Wielder of the Purifying Flame, heir to the Eighth House, the most skilled and celebrated necromancer of a proud and ancient line, and they were not to be outdone.

The necromancy of flesh and bone, the purely biological, had never been Nemei's forte, but a new application for these disciplines came upon them in a flash. Cooking, too, was purely biological. With clever theorems of flesh -- with the correct application of bone--

"Yes, Lord," Nemei said. "Perhaps I'll start with something easy, and learn to make soup."