From the mind and hand of Yetic-Ein

Keyed to the sign of our people's shared soul

Rao,

Dredgen Sere has killed an engineer and elevated me in her place. My thoughts are waveforms flattened by the weight of his throne. I barely have the strength to imprint this on quartz. I hope it's readable. I hope you're still reading it.

I can barely make my hands work at my assigned tasks. I am almost ready to stop trying.

Sere swells with greater power daily, even as he loses his form. He's fraying like an old rope, growing stronger, mouthing along to the whispers. I would wish for Sere to tear himself apart, but I fear something worse would take his place.

Something will make use of a dry seed on dead ground. Something that is not the bird's heart will fit itself back into the bird's ribcage.

His project is more than I thought it was. It's more than a hiding place for one small death.

It's a door, and there's something on the other side. A thought, too big to fit in my head. If I tried to think it, my every cell would burst.

I don't know how Bael is still alive.