>>6262672

“So, for the time that you have in store, be it days or decades, you will come back to this moment, Argia Candente. The moment when you could have learned how to change things. I stood against the web of fate — I paid the price for it! — but I did stand. And now…” she picks up the Cameo and sets it between you two, resting upright on the steel band that Ansàrra herself wrapped around it. “Now it is your turn.”

She flips the Cameo. It starts turning on itself, like a swirling top.
It does not slow.

It spins and spins and spins.

“I might have a suggestion, if you may want to hear it,” she adds, sitting on crossed legs before you — your eyes would be almost level with her, if not for the fact you are taller than a good head; she is so small… “There may be a way yet to save your friends. And all you care for.”
“By damning my soul,” you croak.

The Stilladìa scoffs.

“You think too highly of yourself, Argia. A soul is just a soul. What is attached to it, now…” her eyes darken once again. “That is much more worthwhile. Yours is a puny thing, and yet it sits right at the crossroad of doom.” She tilts her head, that way she did before. “Is Ansàrra here, telling you what to do? Is here, now, any other… voice inside your head? Different suggestions battling over each other to pull your strings? Are you a puppet?”

“I like… I like puppet shows.”

The Stilladìa nods, her smile turning fond.

“I like things that grow. I like it when puppets come alive and bloom into what they would not be expected to, Argia. I like the unexpected. I like liberty.”

“Would you— pry off the most beautiful flower… then?”

The Stilladìa smirks.

“She showed you that one time. No. I would leave the pot to do its bidding. Let it carve a story for itself.”

Between you, the Cameo keeps spinning.

[cont.]