1 00:00:00,920 --> 00:00:04,660 Speaker 1: Before we started this week's episode, I just wanted to give a special thanks to 2 00:00:04,740 --> 00:00:09,540 Speaker 1: Katie at Summation Fifty-Two for her poems and inspiration, which I integrated into 3 00:00:09,600 --> 00:00:15,300 Speaker 1: this episode. You can see more of her poems at summationfiftytwo.com. Thanks, Katie 4 00:00:15,500 --> 00:01:05,720 Speaker 1: [haunting music] 5 00:01:05,720 --> 00:01:06,960 Speaker 1: . Soul Binder. 6 00:01:10,800 --> 00:01:16,340 Speaker 1: Strength from within. Learning trust from where you've been. 7 00:01:17,460 --> 00:01:23,440 Speaker 1: A truth that is withstanding. A reminder that inner peace becomes built 8 00:01:23,560 --> 00:01:26,880 Speaker 1: in. Trust in where you are going. 9 00:01:28,440 --> 00:01:29,160 Speaker 1: Belief. 10 00:01:30,840 --> 00:01:32,600 Speaker 1: Belief in wha-- 11 00:01:34,920 --> 00:01:39,300 Speaker 1: I can't, I can't do this anymore, Marcus. 12 00:01:41,300 --> 00:01:46,280 Speaker 1: I'm not strong enough. It should be you finishing these poems 13 00:01:46,300 --> 00:01:51,780 Speaker 1: [paper rustles] . One. 14 00:01:52,820 --> 00:01:54,000 Speaker 1: Die tomorrow 15 00:01:54,000 --> 00:02:01,400 Speaker 1: [wind blows] 16 00:02:01,400 --> 00:02:02,000 Speaker 1: . Stand. 17 00:02:03,640 --> 00:02:09,320 Speaker 1: Estus Darkwater watched the snow blow into the lean-to. Her breath 18 00:02:09,400 --> 00:02:15,360 Speaker 1: billowed in great white clouds of steam, a cold so deep that she couldn't feel her 19 00:02:15,440 --> 00:02:21,420 Speaker 1: face, her hands. A numbing cold. A gentle death awaited 20 00:02:21,480 --> 00:02:27,180 Speaker 1: her, and soon, if she did not rise now. Stand 21 00:02:28,180 --> 00:02:28,480 Speaker 1: up. 22 00:02:30,380 --> 00:02:35,980 Speaker 1: Her limbs rattled, then fell limp again. She couldn't. 23 00:02:36,560 --> 00:02:42,340 Speaker 1: She couldn't rise. An unbearable weight had pressed her to the ground, a 24 00:02:42,400 --> 00:02:47,700 Speaker 1: weight that dominated every waking moment. It would be so easy to lay down. 25 00:02:48,540 --> 00:02:53,620 Speaker 1: It would be so easy to just stop. Just stop doing anything. 26 00:02:54,640 --> 00:03:00,380 Speaker 1: But the voice in her head demanded more, always demanding more. 27 00:03:01,760 --> 00:03:06,600 Speaker 1: Get up. Die tomorrow. Die 28 00:03:07,620 --> 00:03:13,260 Speaker 1: tomorrow. Why couldn't she die today? It would be 29 00:03:13,440 --> 00:03:15,580 Speaker 1: so nice to die today. 30 00:03:17,160 --> 00:03:17,500 Speaker 1: No. 31 00:03:19,340 --> 00:03:24,720 Speaker 1: The inner voice offered no explanation, no comfort, only an 32 00:03:24,780 --> 00:03:30,460 Speaker 1: implacable will. That will was all that drove her now. She was not 33 00:03:30,540 --> 00:03:36,100 Speaker 1: human. A human had depth, richness. Estus had only 34 00:03:36,160 --> 00:03:41,720 Speaker 1: rage left. And when she blinked open her eyes, she found that rage was 35 00:03:41,780 --> 00:03:46,320 Speaker 1: enough. Perhaps she could die tomorrow instead. 36 00:03:48,040 --> 00:03:52,540 Speaker 1: And with the weight of a mountain on her shoulders, she began to rise from the 37 00:03:52,620 --> 00:03:58,580 Speaker 1: floor. She raged against that weight, gritted her teeth against the pain. 38 00:03:59,500 --> 00:04:05,500 Speaker 1: No. No tears. Not again. She'd cried so often that 39 00:04:05,540 --> 00:04:11,100 Speaker 1: it wasn't even meaningful anymore. It wasn't cathartic. It was just something that 40 00:04:11,180 --> 00:04:17,079 Speaker 1: happened when you bore a mountain on your back. Estus got a hand under her. 41 00:04:17,540 --> 00:04:22,800 Speaker 1: She stared at the rotting floor of the lean-to. The canvas flapped noisily in the 42 00:04:22,860 --> 00:04:28,780 Speaker 1: wind next to her, taunting her. Her arm shook from the effort, even though the 43 00:04:28,840 --> 00:04:34,160 Speaker 1: weight wasn't physical. There was nothing wrong with her body. She stared at the 44 00:04:34,220 --> 00:04:39,900 Speaker 1: floor six inches from her face, smelled the musty boards, the clean, icy 45 00:04:39,980 --> 00:04:45,120 Speaker 1: scent of fresh snow outside. Her face was a mask of rage. 46 00:04:45,880 --> 00:04:51,720 Speaker 1: She fed that rage, the only animating force she had. You 47 00:04:52,120 --> 00:04:57,820 Speaker 1: don't have to do the whole day now. You don't have to do anything 48 00:04:57,920 --> 00:05:03,240 Speaker 1: except stand. You just have to stand, damn it. 49 00:05:04,340 --> 00:05:10,200 Speaker 1: And with a heroic effort, she stood. A shadow of a shadow 50 00:05:10,280 --> 00:05:16,220 Speaker 1: of a woman, but still, she stood. That first burden of 51 00:05:16,260 --> 00:05:21,780 Speaker 1: the day was always the heaviest. From there, she would have the willpower to start a 52 00:05:21,840 --> 00:05:26,840 Speaker 1: campfire and cook herself a simple breakfast. There was no denying that a hot meal 53 00:05:26,880 --> 00:05:32,760 Speaker 1: had a magic of its own. Maybe just enough magic to get her through this day. After 54 00:05:32,820 --> 00:05:38,420 Speaker 1: this day would be another, though, and then another. The days would keep 55 00:05:38,500 --> 00:05:43,740 Speaker 1: coming. How could she bear that? She couldn't. No. 56 00:05:44,760 --> 00:05:50,000 Speaker 1: Stop thinking. Thinking is death. You can't die. 57 00:05:51,180 --> 00:05:57,040 Speaker 1: Not yet. Estus let out another billowing cloud of breath and parted the 58 00:05:57,120 --> 00:06:02,700 Speaker 1: tattered canvas to look out of her shelter at the towering pine forest [wind blows] 59 00:06:02,700 --> 00:06:02,701 Speaker 1: . 60 00:06:08,192 --> 00:06:12,932 Speaker 1: Thin, dark pillars that spread into a tangle of bony branches set against the 61 00:06:12,992 --> 00:06:18,952 Speaker 1: lightning morning sky. Snow had piled in around the little shelter. It 62 00:06:18,992 --> 00:06:24,192 Speaker 1: would take any other person an hour to clear enough space on the ground for a proper 63 00:06:24,251 --> 00:06:30,092 Speaker 1: fire. Estis, however, was blessed with power. Power enough 64 00:06:30,152 --> 00:06:35,412 Speaker 1: not to be bothered with many of life's little unpleasantries. But, she remarked, not 65 00:06:35,452 --> 00:06:41,212 Speaker 1: enough power to actually change the events that truly mattered. Dark thoughts 66 00:06:41,292 --> 00:06:45,672 Speaker 1: simmered under the surface. She shoved them back into the depths, lest she get 67 00:06:45,732 --> 00:06:50,212 Speaker 1: dragged down with them again. There was work to be done. 68 00:06:51,652 --> 00:06:55,872 Speaker 1: Estis felt around in the cloth pouch at her right hip. There were little pockets 69 00:06:55,952 --> 00:07:00,072 Speaker 1: sewn into the pouch to organize the glyphs she carried. Most of the pockets were 70 00:07:00,112 --> 00:07:05,712 Speaker 1: empty. Some part of her mind screamed at her for that. She shoved that down too. 71 00:07:06,352 --> 00:07:11,532 Speaker 1: She ran her hands across the glyph in the far left pocket. It had the right shape, 72 00:07:11,832 --> 00:07:17,292 Speaker 1: but was there really only one left? She pulled out the heat glyph, a 73 00:07:17,432 --> 00:07:23,232 Speaker 1: small, red, glass-like object about the size of a marble. It was cut like a 74 00:07:23,332 --> 00:07:29,092 Speaker 1: gemstone, but warped and twisted, with the tip like a flame frozen in time. 75 00:07:29,972 --> 00:07:34,272 Speaker 1: Estis tore the canvas drape off the wall with her left hand and held the heat glyph 76 00:07:34,352 --> 00:07:38,572 Speaker 1: out in front of her with the right hand. She thrust her right hand into the hill of 77 00:07:38,692 --> 00:07:43,872 Speaker 1: snow and connected her mind to it. She imagined the boundaries of the snow hill, 78 00:07:44,472 --> 00:07:50,412 Speaker 1: imagined it as a single object. Then she bound the heat glyph to it. The glyph 79 00:07:50,492 --> 00:07:55,032 Speaker 1: flashed out of existence with a little red pulse, and at the same time, the snow 80 00:07:55,092 --> 00:08:00,912 Speaker 1: hill simply washed away in a wave of steam. She had to shield her eyes from the 81 00:08:00,972 --> 00:08:06,392 Speaker 1: thick, hot cloud. When the steam dissipated, there was a wide circle of moist, dead 82 00:08:06,472 --> 00:08:11,332 Speaker 1: grass where the snow hill had been. She stumbled out of her makeshift shelter onto 83 00:08:11,372 --> 00:08:17,072 Speaker 1: the still warm ground, though the chill was already creeping back in. Perhaps 84 00:08:17,792 --> 00:08:23,312 Speaker 1: she should have bound the heat to her clothes instead. Or, she realized, saved the 85 00:08:23,352 --> 00:08:27,932 Speaker 1: last heat glyph to actually start a fire. Stupid. 86 00:08:28,392 --> 00:08:34,172 Speaker 1: Impulsive. When had she grown so short-sighted? I 87 00:08:34,232 --> 00:08:38,152 Speaker 1: suppose I'll have to do it the old-fashioned way after all. 88 00:08:39,932 --> 00:08:45,512 Speaker 1: So she spent the next hour gathering fallen limbs in the early dawn for a fire. The 89 00:08:45,572 --> 00:08:51,552 Speaker 1: pine forest was deathly still, making her own movements seem loud and intrusive 90 00:08:51,592 --> 00:08:57,592 Speaker 1: by comparison. Hopefully, the sound would not attract danger. She 91 00:08:57,692 --> 00:09:03,252 Speaker 1: kicked herself again for her low stock of glyphs. At 92 00:09:03,312 --> 00:09:08,832 Speaker 1: last, she assembled a small clutch of sticks into a nest for the fire. Estis rifled 93 00:09:08,872 --> 00:09:13,512 Speaker 1: with clumsy, frozen hands through her pack of dwindling supplies for the flint and 94 00:09:13,612 --> 00:09:19,512 Speaker 1: steel to start the fire. It wasn't in there. She ignored the little spark 95 00:09:19,532 --> 00:09:25,512 Speaker 1: of panic in her chest, so she checked the side pockets. Empty. Except for 96 00:09:25,572 --> 00:09:30,912 Speaker 1: a single glyph. A composite glyph of some kind. A reflective gray 97 00:09:30,972 --> 00:09:36,452 Speaker 1: rectangle with little streaks of orange running through it like veins of fire. She 98 00:09:36,512 --> 00:09:41,512 Speaker 1: rubbed it between her numbed forefinger and thumb and closed her eyes, trying to 99 00:09:41,652 --> 00:09:47,132 Speaker 1: discern what it had been. Steel. Steel and something else. 100 00:09:47,832 --> 00:09:52,272 Speaker 1: She couldn't be sure, though. It looked familiar somehow, even though she couldn't 101 00:09:52,312 --> 00:09:57,632 Speaker 1: remember making it. She put it in her coat pocket to investigate later. Assuming 102 00:09:57,692 --> 00:10:03,412 Speaker 1: there would be a later. Estis was shaking from the cold. This was such a 103 00:10:03,712 --> 00:10:08,992 Speaker 1: stupid way to die. That implacable voice in the back of her mind told her that this 104 00:10:09,052 --> 00:10:15,032 Speaker 1: was exactly how most people died. From mundane causes. An illness. 105 00:10:15,312 --> 00:10:21,152 Speaker 1: An infection. A bad heart. Exposure. So 106 00:10:21,212 --> 00:10:26,212 Speaker 1: she stumbled back out of the lean-to and into the pine forest. She leaned against a 107 00:10:26,291 --> 00:10:32,112 Speaker 1: tree. Her shivering was actually beginning to slow. The cold 108 00:10:32,172 --> 00:10:37,932 Speaker 1: was almost beginning to feel warm now. She was sure that this was not a good sign. 109 00:10:39,372 --> 00:10:45,372 Speaker 1: Give me your heat. And now she was talking to a tree. 110 00:10:46,292 --> 00:10:52,232 Speaker 1: Not a good sign either. Estis placed one hand on the massive pine tree and looked 111 00:10:52,352 --> 00:10:58,132 Speaker 1: up. How did anything survive this far north? This thing was 112 00:10:58,212 --> 00:11:02,452 Speaker 1: alive. Somehow. It must have some heat. 113 00:11:04,152 --> 00:11:08,872 Speaker 1: She traced the branches with her eyes, looked at where it intermingled with its 114 00:11:08,932 --> 00:11:14,512 Speaker 1: neighbors to form a skeletal canopy. She imagined the tree's roots where they must 115 00:11:14,572 --> 00:11:20,472 Speaker 1: penetrate the frozen ground beneath her. The tree was cold, just like everything 116 00:11:20,552 --> 00:11:26,512 Speaker 1: else, but not quite as cold as everything else. When she was sure she held 117 00:11:26,552 --> 00:11:32,452 Speaker 1: the entire tree in her mind, she focused on what little warmth it had, and she took 118 00:11:32,512 --> 00:11:38,512 Speaker 1: it, drawing all of it to a single point in her right hand. There was a tiny flash 119 00:11:38,572 --> 00:11:43,312 Speaker 1: of red light, and the tree creaked and groaned as the heat was removed. 120 00:11:44,512 --> 00:11:50,132 Speaker 1: Estis looked down at her right hand. A tiny red heat glyph lay on her palm. 121 00:11:50,792 --> 00:11:56,652 Speaker 1: It was barely larger than a grain of sand. So small it might blow away. She 122 00:11:56,712 --> 00:12:00,932 Speaker 1: closed her numbed hand tightly around it and trudged to the next tree and repeated 123 00:12:00,972 --> 00:12:06,592 Speaker 1: the same process. Finding the edges of the tree, holding the object in her mind, 124 00:12:07,152 --> 00:12:12,788 Speaker 1: then consciously drawing only the heat from it. Ten minutes later, her mind 125 00:12:12,928 --> 00:12:18,448 Speaker 1: swam with the effort. Her thoughts were getting stupid, sluggish, her 126 00:12:18,528 --> 00:12:23,688 Speaker 1: movements dreamlike. When she looked down at her hand, she had a dozen or so red 127 00:12:23,828 --> 00:12:29,708 Speaker 1: specks of heat glyphs. She moved step by frigid step back to the circle of 128 00:12:29,768 --> 00:12:34,688 Speaker 1: grass and the pile of sticks there. Estis held the tiny heat glyphs to her chest, 129 00:12:35,308 --> 00:12:40,048 Speaker 1: knowing that she would be unable to bind more if she dropped them. There was a 130 00:12:40,128 --> 00:12:45,508 Speaker 1: popping sound in the forest directly behind her, not unlike the sound of the trees 131 00:12:45,568 --> 00:12:51,528 Speaker 1: giving their life's heat to her. But it was far off. She kept walking, then 132 00:12:51,588 --> 00:12:57,468 Speaker 1: knelt before the sticks to start her fire. Then she heard the sound again, 133 00:12:58,048 --> 00:13:03,628 Speaker 1: much closer. And was that the sound of snow crunching? 134 00:13:04,648 --> 00:13:09,888 Speaker 1: Estis turned to peer into the gloomy dawn forest. The evergreen canopy blocked out 135 00:13:09,948 --> 00:13:14,948 Speaker 1: most of the fledgling sunlight. There was barely any color to the world. Something 136 00:13:15,127 --> 00:13:20,868 Speaker 1: long and dark moved through the brush. Some of her training kicked back in, and she 137 00:13:20,948 --> 00:13:26,548 Speaker 1: turned back to the sticks. Fire. She needed fire. She bound the dozen or so heat 138 00:13:26,608 --> 00:13:31,848 Speaker 1: glyphs up into a single large one. There was that same flash of weak red light as 139 00:13:31,928 --> 00:13:37,468 Speaker 1: some of the energy was lost in the transfer. She isolated a single fat stick at the 140 00:13:37,508 --> 00:13:42,968 Speaker 1: bottom of the pile and held it in her mind, calming herself, forcing herself to 141 00:13:43,028 --> 00:13:48,808 Speaker 1: ignore the sounds of an approaching creature behind her. Then she applied 142 00:13:48,948 --> 00:13:54,768 Speaker 1: all of the heat glyph to her stick. The stick burst into flame immediately. Within a 143 00:13:54,828 --> 00:13:59,288 Speaker 1: few seconds, the rest of the clutch had caught. The radiating heat of the small fire 144 00:13:59,348 --> 00:14:05,308 Speaker 1: turned some switch in her brain back on. There was something right behind 145 00:14:05,348 --> 00:14:10,768 Speaker 1: her. She rose and turned to face it, but saw nothing in the gloom. She tried to slow 146 00:14:10,828 --> 00:14:16,008 Speaker 1: her speeding heart with deliberate breaths. Estis reached towards the pouch on her 147 00:14:16,068 --> 00:14:21,168 Speaker 1: right hip without taking her eyes off the spot where she'd last seen movement, some 148 00:14:21,227 --> 00:14:27,188 Speaker 1: thirty feet away. She felt that composite rectangular glyph again. It was 149 00:14:27,288 --> 00:14:31,968 Speaker 1: complicated, expertly made. Steel and intellect. 150 00:14:32,868 --> 00:14:38,588 Speaker 1: Yes, that was an intellect glyph woven in there. Interesting. Had she 151 00:14:38,668 --> 00:14:44,608 Speaker 1: created that? If so, it had been a more thoughtful, more prepared version 152 00:14:44,668 --> 00:14:49,308 Speaker 1: of her. Perhaps she had made it before. Before 153 00:14:50,648 --> 00:14:55,928 Speaker 1: There was a creaking, popping sound like the sound of rapidly spreading ice. A 154 00:14:55,988 --> 00:15:01,688 Speaker 1: nearby tree she'd tapped for heat began to go inert. A chalk-white circle formed on 155 00:15:01,728 --> 00:15:06,388 Speaker 1: the trunk where she'd touched it. It rapidly expanded to wrap around the trunk and 156 00:15:06,788 --> 00:15:11,888 Speaker 1: sped up and down the bark like a growing cancer. The transition to a chalk-white 157 00:15:11,928 --> 00:15:16,728 Speaker 1: material happened quickly once it began. A moment later, the earthy gray-brown of 158 00:15:16,768 --> 00:15:22,708 Speaker 1: the bark and the soft green of the pine needles had all turned a sterile matte 159 00:15:22,768 --> 00:15:28,528 Speaker 1: white. The needles no longer moved in the weak breeze. The great white statue of a 160 00:15:28,608 --> 00:15:34,108 Speaker 1: tree smashed to the ground and shattered into countless tiny pieces, spraying shards 161 00:15:34,148 --> 00:15:39,268 Speaker 1: of inert material in every direction. Estis shielded her eyes from the shrapnel. As 162 00:15:39,328 --> 00:15:44,708 Speaker 1: soon as she lowered her arms, the next tree went inert, and then the next, and then 163 00:15:44,788 --> 00:15:50,308 Speaker 1: the next. Estis dove into the tiny wooden lean-to, realizing only once she'd looked 164 00:15:50,388 --> 00:15:55,628 Speaker 1: up from the ground that it would do her absolutely no good if a tree fell on it. 165 00:15:56,528 --> 00:16:02,448 Speaker 1: The forest around her groaned, snapped, and shattered with rage. She closed her eyes 166 00:16:02,508 --> 00:16:06,648 Speaker 1: and clutched her life with a pure, primal longing for survival. 167 00:16:08,188 --> 00:16:13,088 Speaker 1: The storm of noise around her finally stopped and she looked up from the dirt where 168 00:16:13,148 --> 00:16:18,748 Speaker 1: she lay. Estis got up and looked around the camp's surroundings. The mounds of 169 00:16:18,888 --> 00:16:24,448 Speaker 1: snow concealed the destruction on the forest floor. Only the ugly white bases of the 170 00:16:24,508 --> 00:16:30,087 Speaker 1: inert trees remained, sticking up out of the snow like ragged snapped-off bones. 171 00:16:31,668 --> 00:16:37,608 Speaker 1: Obviously, the trees had gone unstable after she'd removed the heat from them. They 172 00:16:37,648 --> 00:16:43,088 Speaker 1: hadn't just lost their heat. They'd lost their ability to hold heat as well. 173 00:16:43,668 --> 00:16:49,668 Speaker 1: It had punched a tiny hole in their identity, their place in reality. That hole had 174 00:16:49,728 --> 00:16:55,508 Speaker 1: caused them to go unstable. And when things became unstable, they eventually 175 00:16:55,588 --> 00:17:01,568 Speaker 1: went inert. Binding was such a terrific art. You could mix 176 00:17:01,628 --> 00:17:07,628 Speaker 1: and combine the very rules of the universe under the watchful eye of the Judge. With 177 00:17:07,688 --> 00:17:13,428 Speaker 1: binding, you could cheat reality for a while. How long depended on 178 00:17:13,508 --> 00:17:19,288 Speaker 1: what you were doing, on what scale, and, obviously, how skilled the cheater was. 179 00:17:20,168 --> 00:17:25,228 Speaker 1: Big overt cheats in the form of dangerously impossible bindings called paradoxes 180 00:17:25,288 --> 00:17:31,008 Speaker 1: were caught immediately. More mundane bindings might last years. Eventually, 181 00:17:31,088 --> 00:17:36,888 Speaker 1: though, the Judge caught every cheat, no matter how small. When that happened, it 182 00:17:36,948 --> 00:17:42,228 Speaker 1: behaved like the Judge of a sporting game. It threw out everyone and everything 183 00:17:42,288 --> 00:17:47,128 Speaker 1: involved, not by removing them from reality, but by turning them into the most 184 00:17:47,208 --> 00:17:53,068 Speaker 1: mundane and useless of materials, by turning them inert. There 185 00:17:53,108 --> 00:17:58,988 Speaker 1: was the sound of something moving again, far in the distance. The creature that had 186 00:17:59,068 --> 00:18:02,568 Speaker 1: stalked her had been scared off. For now. 187 00:18:04,248 --> 00:18:08,488 Speaker 1: Which was good. Though, if she could still hear it at this distance, it must have 188 00:18:08,528 --> 00:18:14,204 Speaker 1: been big. Very big. Which was not good. It might 189 00:18:14,264 --> 00:18:19,284 Speaker 1: simply come back when she was sleeping. Yes, that's what she needed, another 190 00:18:19,364 --> 00:18:25,364 Speaker 1: pursuer. It seemed unfair that she could be so relentlessly pursued while failing 191 00:18:25,444 --> 00:18:31,044 Speaker 1: so miserably in her own quest. She looked to the south, close to the direction where 192 00:18:31,084 --> 00:18:36,204 Speaker 1: the beast had fled, and was increasingly certain that she was being followed. 193 00:18:37,064 --> 00:18:42,644 Speaker 1: And they were getting closer. Perhaps these two would run into each other. That 194 00:18:42,684 --> 00:18:48,684 Speaker 1: would solve a number of problems. Speaking of which The piles 195 00:18:48,744 --> 00:18:53,724 Speaker 1: of burning sticks had been scattered across the campsite by the falling trees, their 196 00:18:53,784 --> 00:18:58,324 Speaker 1: life-giving fire now little more than smoke and dying embers. 197 00:18:59,424 --> 00:19:05,384 Speaker 1: Estis sighed and put her face in her hands. Problems come in threes, she 198 00:19:05,444 --> 00:19:10,524 Speaker 1: remembered her mother saying. It seemed that her problems came by the dozen. 199 00:19:11,364 --> 00:19:16,743 Speaker 1: She lowered her shivering arms and found that the brush with death had given her a 200 00:19:16,844 --> 00:19:22,804 Speaker 1: weak but growing will to live. She did have a little more left 201 00:19:22,864 --> 00:19:28,704 Speaker 1: in her, enough to bind the heat from a dozen more trees, far away 202 00:19:28,764 --> 00:19:34,264 Speaker 1: from camp this time. Enough to live another day. Enough, 203 00:19:34,924 --> 00:19:37,344 Speaker 1: perhaps, to die tomorrow. 204 00:19:39,924 --> 00:19:44,044 Speaker 1: It took her the better part of an hour to gather enough heat to light another fire. 205 00:19:44,464 --> 00:19:48,984 Speaker 1: Between the warmth of movement and the rising sun, Estis was merely miserable 206 00:19:49,044 --> 00:19:54,664 Speaker 1: instead of endangered now. Hopefully she wouldn't lose any toes to frostbite. She 207 00:19:54,724 --> 00:19:59,864 Speaker 1: dropped another piece of firewood onto the growing bonfire. It would need to be big, 208 00:20:00,424 --> 00:20:06,104 Speaker 1: very big. Once her brain had warmed enough to reason, she'd found a fallen rotten 209 00:20:06,184 --> 00:20:11,164 Speaker 1: tree and bound the moisture out of it. The result was an easy-to-move, highly 210 00:20:11,264 --> 00:20:16,864 Speaker 1: flammable wood. It would burn away long before it had time to go inert. While the 211 00:20:16,944 --> 00:20:22,483 Speaker 1: fire grew, she pulled the map out of her pack. Seventeen red X's marked every 212 00:20:22,564 --> 00:20:28,524 Speaker 1: failure so far, every dead end. Each one had turned up no useful 213 00:20:28,584 --> 00:20:33,984 Speaker 1: information, or worse, false trails that had wasted weeks of her time. 214 00:20:34,784 --> 00:20:40,124 Speaker 1: Whoever it was she was following, if she was following them, they had 215 00:20:40,304 --> 00:20:46,244 Speaker 1: known how not to leave a trail. Instead of evidence, now she only followed a vague 216 00:20:46,304 --> 00:20:51,104 Speaker 1: intuition. They were going north. She was sure of that. 217 00:20:52,104 --> 00:20:58,004 Speaker 1: Estis examined the map for the ten thousandth time. Trouble was, she was running out 218 00:20:58,044 --> 00:21:04,044 Speaker 1: of north. In all the Empire, only one town had the misfortune of being farther north 219 00:21:04,104 --> 00:21:10,044 Speaker 1: than she was now. A town called Dire. She rolled up the map 220 00:21:10,084 --> 00:21:15,544 Speaker 1: and put it away. Such a fitting name. If there were no clues in Dire, 221 00:21:16,164 --> 00:21:21,784 Speaker 1: what would she do? Estis stared into the raging fire, now a 222 00:21:21,904 --> 00:21:27,364 Speaker 1: towering inferno with flames reaching as high as her shoulders. It was not even a 223 00:21:27,444 --> 00:21:33,424 Speaker 1: candle next to her own rage. She knew what she would do if the murderer's 224 00:21:33,504 --> 00:21:38,864 Speaker 1: trail finally went cold. Estis reached a hand into the bonfire, 225 00:21:39,384 --> 00:21:45,264 Speaker 1: just before it could truly burn her. She bound the heat, then the smoke, then 226 00:21:45,324 --> 00:21:50,884 Speaker 1: the light. Without the light, the forest fell back into gloom. She 227 00:21:50,944 --> 00:21:56,264 Speaker 1: dropped the light and smoke glyphs back into her pouch, but kept the large heat 228 00:21:56,324 --> 00:22:02,304 Speaker 1: glyph in her hand. She stared at the unnatural fire. A fire with no light, 229 00:22:02,864 --> 00:22:08,404 Speaker 1: no heat, no smoke. A strange flickering image in the dark. 230 00:22:09,544 --> 00:22:15,524 Speaker 1: As she watched, it turned chalk white, then collapsed into a plume of dust at her 231 00:22:15,624 --> 00:22:21,544 Speaker 1: feet, leaving her standing alone in the dark forest. Estis Darkwater 232 00:22:21,664 --> 00:22:27,664 Speaker 1: stared at the heat glyph still in her open hand. If the trail didn't go cold, 233 00:22:28,343 --> 00:22:34,224 Speaker 1: if she found the person or people she pursued, she knew what she would 234 00:22:34,284 --> 00:22:39,764 Speaker 1: do then, too. Her hands shook, but not from the cold. 235 00:22:40,804 --> 00:22:46,784 Speaker 1: She would give them this fire. That, and much, much 236 00:22:46,864 --> 00:23:30,004 Speaker 1: more.