Letter's from a novice to an old man

May 15, mid-day

Esteemed Chung Quel (and bureaucrat who reads these things and gives him summary reports),

It remains mid-day on the 15th. The destruction of our world remains imminent. If you get these messages somehow—please do help if you can. We are kind of lost.

So we were about to walk down that hallway where the illusion that speaks even after it has been disbelieved was. Then some voice in Greek shouted “stop!” This was pretty great, because I actually know Greek and love it well. The Septuagint is just so much nicer than the Vulgate. So I told everyone—HEY THOSE GUYS TOLD US TO STOP, because not everyone here knows Greek—but I told them that in Greek because I was so excited about the Greek—so, well, everyone had stopped anyway because there was someone shouting.

There were two people there—a demon lady who everyone seemed to know as evelake’s pal and some druid from Herald’s crew of misfits who could hardly walk.

The devil lady told us that she was here to make a bargain of the sort that Arben would be most interested in. Then they have this whole argument over what language they should bargain in—and they land on Persian. Marduk is cool and all, but I don’t understand any of this. Arben reported back to us that she wants to kill Harold because he’s her father. I’m not sure what to do with this—I mean, I don’t like my dad, but I don’t want to kill him because he’s my dad. Maybe this has something specific to do with being this person’s parent. It’s a good thing I’m not going to be a parent—what if my child was the sort of thing that wanted to kill me because of our family relationship? Herald is in some sort of prismatic something, and I don’t know. We let her borrow Arben’s wind dagger or lyre of blasting or some other magical item in exchange for some very light healing from this druid.

Then they leave (Gwyn tries to follow them but they vanish – well the girl turns into a mouse and scampers away). Before they go, though, they strongly caution us not to go beyond—because chaos and evil are straight ahead.

Treating warnings and calls for caution with our usual disdain, we enter a place that Shaur hates so much that he refuses to leave his sheath-pocket thing, insisting that “now’s the time to sleep or die, now is not the time to try.” We’re then slowed and attacked by hasted skull snakes.

The snake fight was going very very badly, when a snake god asked me to follow these snakes to dig his skull up. I was asking him questions and thinking of going along with him, until he said “put your faith in me.” Now—look, as I told you last week, I am starting to think that not every deity-type-person is just Jesus in disguise. I also know that I put my faith in Jesus. So, I got pretty mistrustful when he said that. Turns out I was right—It was Rahu—which we found out after Marcella saved the day. I was giving some beans to some hindu people and they were talking to me about Rahu eating the sun, and a monkey and him getting in a tussel. I told them that I had met a lot of monkeys, but none that could jump that high, and they told me that this monkey could. Then I told them about the jewel eyed monkey we found in the dessert, and they called me a liar so I left. Anyway—this skull is that guy! Why is he buried in a shrine to Ratri?

We wouldn’t have found this out, of course, if I hadn’t come up with the super smart idea to talk to ask Vettle through the crown if he knew what was up.

In a moment of uncharacteristic switching of horses mid stream based on new information—we decide to leave this place and ask Jesus a few questions that he will only answer with yes or no questions. I wish we could just ask you—you know so much and, even if the connection is a little static-y, you speak eloquently in complete and very fine sentences. Anyway, I hope all is well—and bureaucrat—I know that your work is an act of service and a boon to both you and all who you work with, but I hope you’re not being worked too hard to the point where you neglect the rest of your existence. You’ve been a good friend.

Oh by the way, I remember this Roman senator who ended every speech with a plea to burn Carthage to the ground regardless of whether it had anything to do with what he was talking about, basically because he thought it was so important. I was thinking, maybe I should end these letters in a similar way about something I feel important about. I mean, I know it isn’t a speech in a republic, but who cares? So—“let’s save the earth, guys, it’s a terrible place to be but maybe we can make it better!”