The Divisions
Rivers Between Us threw a half chewed bone at his mentor. "What on earth? I paid a fortune for this garbage? Root of the East, I told you to watch out for him."
The earth elemental slowly lowered the cart to the ground and stepped out of the traces, mutely walking up the stairs into the great hall. Rivers had begun to suspect of late that his servitors were capable of understanding when questions were being directed at them even if he didn't give an explicit command. He wasn't certain if he was more irritated by their impertinence or pleased with their independent thinking. He shook his head and returned to the matter at hand.
"How much did I pay for that moldy bone? You took five talents of jade into town and I'm not seeing any change. Don't tell me they actually had that armor of the unseen assassin they've been promising me for months now..."
"It's a very powerful reagent!" The piping godlet scurried down the dusty road and picked up the oversized femur, easily thrice as tall as himself. "The bones of a dragon-king carry with them authority over the elements, which can be used to make superior summoning traps. They also carry trace metals and minerals which can be decanted with the correct formulae, and they make decent soup stock as well!"
The young lawgiver turned back to the cart and pulled out a chicken coop with one hand and rusty shield with the other. "Chickens and scrap metal?"
"Not just any chickens! Dire Hens of the Apocalypse! I'd heard rumors in the writings of Gebsius, but never hoped to actually find an egg-laying set. During the calibration they lay eggs of brass and thunder that, when hurled at your foes, explode in coruscating rays of light, leaving a crater of destruction ninety miles across!"
"Who in Malfeas can throw an egg a hundred miles in the first..."
"...and that shield, do you not recognize the rarefied essence? Carefully hidden under a glamour, it may be, but that is the first thundershield wielded by the Unconquered Sun in battle against his son..."
Rivers dropped the chickens and the rusty shield and bit his fist. "I'm never letting you talk to a guild merchant again. You gullible little lackwit." He jumped into the cart and fished through a pile of molding silk quilts, lacquered hand mirrors and shiny beads, pulling out a book and flipping through it. "I can't believe it... I thought you'd at least check to see if this, undoubtedly alleged as some book of fabulous lore, actually had something written in it, eh? It's completely blank!" He hurled the book up in the air.
Seven Thousand Wonders Unfolding leapt deftly into the air to snatch the book up in a net of copper wires. "Be careful master. Delicate enchantments are weaved into the spine, crafted by a renegade sidereal so as to be sheltered from the its own fate while guiding the destinies of others. Burn, it cannot, and what is writ within can never be effaced!"
"What need have you of a diary? It isn't enough that you tell me lies all day about your glorious past but that now you have to write them down for posterity?"
If possible, the tiny clockwork god looked genuinely wounded. In a hurt tone, he stated, "It's not for me, of course. This is to be... THE BOOK OF DIVISIONS BEREFT OF DISTINGUISHING GRADATION!"
The youth leaned against the cart and looked askance at his mentor. It strutted before him, marching back and forth. "Surely by now you've realized that it has become necessary that we prepare for our coming glory. In a few days we will be traveling to the Infinite City, and if you can become its master once more, then you will have at your command the most powerful array of first age weaponry and tools extant in this fallen age. Then it will be time for us to begin the millenia of just rulership. Hence, THE BOOK OF DIVISIONS BEREFT OF DISTINGUISHING GRADATIONS!"
"I don't follow."
"Those spirits who have aided our cause deserve suitable rewards, of course. Hence they will be placed on the Most Resplendent White Lists of the Lawgiver's Glorious Vanguard. That way when it comes time to select suitable beauracrats and officials we will know who is deserving of such spoils. On the other hand, there is also the black list, for misbehaving spirits. You know, like that annoying zephyr you summoned that one time. What was his name again..."
"Wait, just black list? Not the Abysmally Degenerate Detailing of Blackened Souls Destined for Oblivion?"
"Be serious master. I'll not waste my poetic skill on reprobrates."
"Hmm... you really have the most ridiculous ideas, you know." Rivers laughed pulled an opaque green jar out of the rubbish and sniffed the discolored stopper. "Say did you see any more of those Ashigaru in town?"
"I don't believe so, but I was probably far too busy being duped to notice anything past the nose on my face," it responded with rancor.
Rivers frowned and began walking up the stairs into the great hall, tossing the jar between his hands.
Seven Thousand Wonders stood with the book cradled before him, shaking his head sadly and staring after his master. "It seems I'm not the least gullible in our court... ah well." On crab-like legs of finely drawn silver he began scrambling after the sorcerer.
