There was a storm of words in Flint’s head, a war of his own conflicting ideologies, his own loyalties. He had some vague memory of his own recent ascent to power but this was different, and more than any magic he’d ever witnessed or heard of. Luned was altering reality on a whim, or one man’s place in it, and the results were disquieting. She was going to kill him, and as he looked at her sidelong he knew she didn’t care.

He didn’t blame her. Aurelianus would be defiant to the point of suicide, Flint knew – it was the only thing he admired about the tiefling. Luned was declaring herself now, pushing back against the universe, and how could a nascent goddess brook defiance? There was a line here, and Flint saw it being crossed.

Bleddyn’s words came unbidden, a plea to preserve the girl they knew, and the notion harmonized with Flint’s heart: she wanted this now, in the heat of this moment, but if she killed the man would she regret it? Would the power and the rage frighten her, once they faded? Would her heart harden, and her soul darken?

But there was the cold side of him, the side he’d been forging since he was a boy, the side that saw a world full of monsters like Aurelianus, and the only way to overcome them is to be like them. No child wants to grow up, and the first step is always the hardest, but innocence is made to be lost and if one is to be evil then let that evil be necessary.

So Flint watched as Luned put Aurelianus through a wall, and he did nothing. He turned his eye to her and waited, knowing the moment was coming: she was going to kill him. He was going to let her. They’d be the same then, put on the hard path he’d already chosen for himself decades ago. She’d understand him fully, and he’d understand her.

And then the bumbling, criminally negligent fairy appeared. Flint sneered, dismissing her, but Luned didn’t. He turned back to the pile of rubble that housed the tiefling, and then spun around again, shocked, when Agnie shrieked, tumbling through the air and colliding with a far wall. Ornaments and paintings fell with her, and Flint’s brow furrowed. “What are you…?”

“Your guest is a psychopath,” Luned said, ignoring Flint, jaw tense. “Your guest tried to…he...your guest!”

She spat the words, clenching her fists at her sides. Flint looked from Luned to Agnie, and the fairy raised her eyes, and there was something new there. It wasn’t fear, but maybe concern. The floor lurched, and Flint felt his blood run cold. Dust crumbled from the ceiling, and the air itself grew heavier. Luned's anger was a physical thing now, a force filling the room and pulling it in on itself, and it was directed at everyone and everything.

And then he knew that he was losing her.

Luned’s fury was coalescing, and Agnie began scooting back across the floor cautiously, suddenly unsure of what, exactly, she was looking at. She didn’t have a concept of her own end, but that wasn’t going to stop Luned from trying to teach it to her. She might have, if Flint didn’t step in behind the scribe and press the Mark gently to the back of her neck, curling the paper on her skin. The spell caught, blazed, and the paper fell away blank.

The tension in the room faded by a degree, and all at once Luned turn on Flint and slapped his armored forearm away. “You traitor,” she hissed. “You…”

But there was confusion in her eyes now, and maybe pain. She felt the power slipping away from her, coiling up inside her, and in its absence she regained her senses.

“What did I…?”

“Get out,” Agnie said, murderously quiet. “Get. Out.”

“Agnie I…”

But then the fey charged Luned, pushing and shoving at her. Luned raised her hands to defend herself, struggling to escape, begging her to wait. Agnie whipped a door open, and with a powerful shove put Luned through it just as Flint appeared to drive them apart. Only when Luned was gone did he realize what Agnie had done, and with a harsh growl he plunged himself after her. Agnie didn’t care. She swung the door closed.

The door slammed, and the fairy panted furiously for a long moment, fuming. And then slowly, gradually, realization dawned on her. She opened the door again, but she already knew they wouldn’t be on the other side. They hadn't been returned to the ship, or to any other doorway she had in her network.

Somehow, she’d lost them.

They were gone.