When Lefty regained consciousness he was lying in the familiar feather bed that Pluuthrchk had been providing for him. The light from his window told him that it was morning, but he’d only learn later that he had slept through an entire day. Though he still felt sore and very weak, his rage from the previous night was… mostly gone. He was clean and warm now, the stench of sewage a distant memory. The sharp ache in his feet had faded significantly, and so had the overwhelming melancholy which had been inflicted by the saddest song. The only discomfort which remained was his hunger… and someone had already thought of that.

  Sitting on the table next to his bed was a plate of magical sweet cakes. They were a treat of the highest caliber, one of the most delicious and refreshing things that money could buy… clearly a gift from Pluuthrchk.

  I’m not sure if the thulhan realized just how intense Lefty’s anger had been… because I’m not certain if the young man’s insult even registered in Pluuthrchk’s mind. It lept into action as soon as the lad fainted, mobilizing its whole estate despite the late hour. Messengers were sent out into the night, rousing both a doctor and a chef from bed to ensure the young man’s health. At the same time Pluutrchk's many servants worked to clean the sludge which coated him from head to toe, before dressing him in fresh clothing. By the time Lefty was safely resting in bed… the sun was beginning to rise… and though Pluuthrchk had stayed up all night to care for the young man, the only emotions it expressed were happiness and relief.

  Of course Lefty didn’t know that. All he knew was that he had been betrayed… and now there were sweet cakes. And though his stomach growled loudly… he hesitated to eat them.

  For a long while he simply stared at the honey glazed confections, as he thought long and hard about the thulhan who had purchased them…

  In the end though… his hunger outweighed his anger. When Pluuthrchk checked in on Lefty an hour later, the sweet cakes were gone; reduced to nothing but crumbs. The old aristocrat never brought up the previous night or the insult its pupil had uttered, and neither did Lefty or Ol Blu.

  This is not to say that things returned to normal for the group. They almost did, but despite everyone's willingness to forgive and forget… or at the very least ignore what had happened, Lefty never quite got over it.

  In the following weeks, as he recovered from one tabernacle and began preparing for the next, the two of them tried to fall back into their old routine… but there was a rift between them now; one which couldn’t be mended or crossed. Lefty no longer felt like he was being taught by a flawless master. Pluuthrchk may have been more intelligent than he was, but Lefty realized that he surpassed Pluuthrchk when it came to nobler traits… like bravery, determination, and loyalty… and that made him see the thulhan less like a superior to be obeyed, and more like a business partner. In his eyes, they were on almost equal footing now, which caused him to question Pluuthrchk more often, and sometimes, even argue openly with it… especially when the topic of Scaevolus came up.

  It hadn’t taken long for Lefty and Ol Blu to relay the story of their sewer adventure to Pluuthrchk… and they told it everything. They described the ruins of Perfectum, the pitiful sludge creatures who were trapped there… and how both of those tragedies were caused by Scaevolous’s betrayal. And while the historian was quick to believe their account… it was far less trusting of Marcus.

  “It's a very compelling legend… that’s for sure” Plutharch would say, trying to dance around Lefty's feelings. “But how can you be certain that it's true? All you have is the word of one source… an anecdote that runs contrary to all the other sources we have. It's entirely possible that this… sludge creature… this Marcus… fabricated the entire thing. Or, at the very least, that it told a biased and exaggerated account. When it comes to history, you can't trust a single perspective Lefty, you need to use multiple sources whenever possible.”

  To be fair to Pluuthrchk… it did have a point. It was certainly possible that Marcus simply… made up the entire story… But to Lefty, who had experienced the legend in all its musically poetic glory…that was inconceivable. The tale had been too detailed, too vivid, too personal to be a lie. He had felt it; the totality of Marcus’s soul bared before him. He had glimpsed across the infinite gulf of time to witness the life of an ageless sage… and then watched… as the former immortal withered and died before his eyes. In his mind, there was no way something like that could possibly be faked.

  If every other source disagreed with Marcus… then every other source was wrong… and he could not be persuaded to think otherwise.

  Of course this reasoning did little to convince Pluuthrchk. It wanted evidence… and Lefty’s emotions didn’t count. Ol Blu’s emotions didn’t count either, but then, that was nothing new.

  What was new though, was Lefty’s awareness of this. With his trust in Pluuthrchk waning, he finally began to realize just how bigoted his teacher was towards kickens. I mean, he had always been somewhat aware of it, but the excitement of his education had distracted him from its severity. Now it was on full display. The young man saw just how rudely Pluuthrchk treated his friend… and it didn't sit well with him. That rudeness, combined with a renewed connection to Ol Blu- forged by their shared adventure in the sewers -drove the student even farther away from his teacher.

  Fortunately for all of them, Lefty and Pluuthrchk wouldn’t have to spend as much time together as they had previously, because their next goal was to overcome the Sleep Tabernacle. This would require Lefty to learn a great deal about sleep magic, which was a topic the decidedly non-magical Pluuthrchk had no experience with. Instead, the thulhan managed to get Lefty access to Sgllg'Throk's Dreamery. This was the premier gathering place for sleep mages in The Capital, and the closest thing that dreamers-in-training had to an academy. Once enrolled, young hopefuls could practice their craft under the watchful eye of more experienced mages, essentially apprenticing en masse.

  Of course, Lefty wasn't actually enrolled at Sgllg'Throk's. Not only did the dreamery have a strict enrollment period, which was still several months away, but potential applicants were required to dream up a few simple objects to prove their skill… and so far Lefty had only created useless piles of sand. It showed potential, certainly, but dreameries were a place for established mages to hone their skills, not a place for amateurs to learn them. Apprentices were expected to finance their education by producing goods which could be sold by the dreamery… and Lefty was nowhere near that level of skill.

  Now, as is often the case, the right kind of money could get someone apprenticed early… but even Pluuthrchk didn’t have cash like that. Dreaming is a very lucrative enterprise, second only to owning land. Paying sleep meisters to spend their precious time guiding a complete beginner is insanely expensive… and while Pluuthrchk probably could have afforded it… that would have stretched its finances to the limit. So rather than go with a straightforward but very costly approach, the crafty thulhan decided to try something risky but far cheaper. Instead of enrolling Lefty into the dreamery proper, it would sneak Lefty into the library.

  Sgllg'Throk's library was a separate building which lay across the street from the main workshop. Dreamers of all skill levels gathered there around the clock to do research and discuss the latest techniques. It wasn’t supposed to be open to the public… but everyone knew that ambitious outsiders often slipped in. It wasn’t hard for someone to go unnoticed. All they had to do was dress well enough to avoid suspicion, refrain from checking out any of the books, and of course, pay the guards to look the other way.

  Simple bribery was a bit distasteful, but it was an expense Pluuthrck could afford, and it resolved to do exactly that, allowing Lefty to creep into the library three times a week. Once there, he could access books on sleep magic which were unavailable to the general public, and rub elbows with apprentice mages who might be able to teach him a few things. Hopefully with those two sources of knowledge at his disposal, he would be able to learn all he needed to tackle the tabernacle.

  As you might expect, this plan thrilled Lefty to no end. After all, learning more about sleep magic and meeting with professional dreamers was… well it was a dream come true… But as is often the case, those dreams didn’t hold up to reality, and Sgllg’Throck’s Library quickly proved itself to be far less exciting than he imagined. While there were plenty of books there, nearly as many as in the God Dam library, most of them were far too advanced for him to grasp. Keep in mind, less than a year ago Lefty was nearly illiterate, and though he had made astounding progress since then… he was in no way prepared for the scholarly technical tomes that the library held.

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  He might have been able to get through them with Ol Blu’s assistance… but he wasn't allowed to take books out of the library, nor was he allowed to bring Ol Blu into it. Not that Sgllg’Throk’s had any policy against kickens, but given how rare they were, it would have brought undue attention to Lefty, who remember, was not actually supposed to be there. Without Ol Blu to define new words for him and patiently explain certain concepts, the books might as well have been in thulhan... which... some of them were.

  On top of that, the place was surprisingly loud for a library. The greater dreamery complex didn’t have a mess hall or a large courtyard, and so the library served as the primary gathering place for young apprentices. Some of them used the space for its intended purpose... but many more simply used it to… hang out… talk with friends. The building was constantly echoing with catty gossip and loud laughter, stemming from crude jokes that only sleep mages would understand. For Lefty, the constant chatter made the already difficult task of reading even more difficult.

  After just a few days of trying, he deduced that it would be better to skip the books and simply ask his fellow mages for help… but that didn’t go very well either.

  He started by approaching the talkative groups, since they seemed the most friendly… but after some brief introductions, their attitude always turned to mockery… Because the experienced dreamers could tell, almost instantly, that Lefty was not actually enrolled at the Dreamery. Like many niche communities, outsiders were not well liked, especially those trying to cheat the system… and while none of the mages reported Lefty to the librarians… many of them joked that they would… just to see the panicked look on his face. It only took a couple of these encounters for Lefty to realize that he should avoid groups and keep his profile as low as possible.

  To that end he tried speaking to some of the quiet, solitary mages instead; reaching out to a few individuals who were studying on their own. They were a lot more polite…. They still declined to help him, but they did so in a very polite way. Because anyone actually reading in the library was far too busy with their own research to offer Lefty much assistance. They might help him to find a book or answer a simple question, but they would not go through an entire text with him or take the time to explain complex concepts.

  That’s why, after visiting the library for just a couple weeks, he found himself at a complete impasse; unable to make any more progress.

  “Yeah… I think I’m done.” Lefty told Pluuthrchk one morning over breakfast. “Like, I’ve learned just about everything I can learn. No reason to keep going, really.”

  Pluuthrchk... laughed openly and mockingly at this insinuation… before turning rather serious.

  “I don’t care what you think, Lefty. I’ve gone through a lot of trouble to get you into Sgllg'Throk's, and you’re not done going until I say you’re done.

  When pressed for a more exact time frame, Pluuthrchk said it would be at least three months. For that’s how long the thulhan’s next round of lessons would last. History had only been the first. If Lefty wanted to be king, he’d also need to know about economics and politics… and many other things of course, but those two topics were very important to Pluuthrchk and so they were next.

  Lefty would receive these lessons on the days he didn’t visit the dreamery, and the schedule was set in stone. He would only progress to the tabernacle after those lessons were completed… and until then he would continue to visit Sgllg’Throck’s.

  Lefty tried to argue against this, pushing as always to rush towards adventure rather than spend time on scholarship… but the historian put its foot down. So long as Lefty lived in Pluuthrckh’s home, he would follow the course Pluuthrchk laid out. If he didn’t like it… he could find somewhere else to live.

  And so, with the threat of homelessness hanging over his head, Lefty did as he was told. He continued to travel down to Sgllg'Throk's library week after week, making vain attempts to learn in the noisy, uncomfortable environment. Eventually, his trips would pay off.. though not in a way that anyone expected. We’ll get to that shortly.

  For now, there’s one more thing I want to mention; something strange that Lefty did just a few days after he had recovered. This was before he began going to the dreamery, and before his lessons with Pluuthrchk had started up again. Things seemed to be getting back to normal. The young man awoke, ate a simple breakfast, practiced in the garden with his feathers for a while…and then disappeared for several hours, leaving Pluuthrchk’s estate without a word to anyone. Stranger still, when he finally returned around dinner time, he refused to say where he had been; simply stating that he had “gone for a walk around the city.” Ol Blu and Pluutcharck were both concerned at this sudden mysteriousness… but when things returned to normal the following day, they simply took him at his word. It wasn't until much later that Ol Blu learned the truth… that Lefty had gone that day... to visit Scaevolus.

  The former king was not that difficult to find. His unconscious body was displayed publicly, in a little stone building that was not-unlike a mausoleum. It stood a short distance from his castle-turned-museum, and had originally been built as a shrine to the man after his poisoning; a place where citizens could pay respect to their sleeping king in the hope that he might one day wake up.

  When Lefty found it, it had long been in a state of disrepair.

  The ornate sandstone walls were marred with graffiti which no one had bothered to remove. A single elderly guard kept watch over the entrance, sitting on a small wooden stool with his staff leaning against the wall. The weapon was a mere formality for the scarcely visited monument; no one cared enough about Scaevolus to threaten him these days. The white haired human guard barely looked up as Lefty approached, only giving him a small nod of acknowledgement as the young man made his way through the entrance.

  The building was not very large, and most of the space was taken up by a grand regal bed, leaving only enough room for maybe four or five visitors to stand comfortably. It was clear almost immediately that the building had not been designed with the bed in mind. It sat partially upon a raised platform which previously held a throne… but at some point the bed had replaced it. Two of its legs extended beyond the platform, and some cheap pieces of scrap wood had been stuffed underneath them to keep it level. The vague shape of a man lay motionless on the bed, covered entirely by opaque red blankets. The sleeping figure was barely visible, its form literally overshadowed by a large realistic painting which hung on the wall behind it.

  That painting showed the king as he was when the monument was first constructed. A grizzled, muscular man with a square jaw and piercing green eyes, who sat stoically on a simple throne of shining iron. He looked powerful, fierce… and surprisingly handsome, despite the many scars marking his pale flesh. He was dressed not in elaborate kingly robes, but in the sleek, forest-green infantry uniform he had worn during the war. Atop his head he wore a long drooping conical cap made of the same green fabric as his shirt. The stump where his right hand used to be was fitted into the socket of his iconic scissor sword, its twin blades open, forming the “Y” shape that had come to be a symbol of peace and royal authority around the kingdom. His left hand sat across his lap, holding the impossibly dark mind pick which had proven so pivotal in defeating Ekkss.

  Originally, this was how Scaevolus had been posed, minus the open eyes of course. His sleeping body had been propped up in a throne so that the people might see their king in all his glory. As time went on though, this image became impossible to preserve, as Lefty soon discovered.

  After staring at the portrait for several moments, he slowly approached the bed. The green eyes of the painted king seemed to follow him as he walked closer, looking down with scorn as the young man lifted the blanket and dared to see Scaevolus as he actually was.

  The human laying in the bed was barely recognizable. It looked more like a half melted wax sculpture than a living person. He was more than eighty years old at this point, but somehow managed to look much much much older; like the very embodiment of elderly feebleness given form. If it wasn't for the very subtle rise and fall of the king’s chest, Lefty would have thought himself looking at a partially mummified corpse. Decades of immobility had withered the once strong man to a pathetic vestige of his former self.

  It was clear why they no longer displayed him on a throne. None of the king's old clothes would have fit the shriveled form in this bed, and his stump of a right hand would not have been able to support his legendary weapon. No matter how you dressed it up, no one would be able to look upon this pitiful thing… and feel any amount of awe or reverence. Any attempt to prop him up or make him look as he once had… would only be making a mockery of the former king.

  That’s why the powers-that-be had stuffed the old man under some regal blankets, and commissioned a painting of his younger self; it was all they could do to preserve his dignity. That’s also why no one thought to actively protect the monarch. Who would hurt him now? After so long. When he was so helpless.

  ...

  Lefty would later admit… that he had gone to the mausoleum intending to kill Scaevolus. Marcus's story had instilled in him a desire for revenge that rivaled the fervor of Domitainus. Even days after the fact, the idea that Scaevolus still drew breath gnawed at his mind, driving him inexorably towards cold blooded violence.

  But as he stood there, looking at the shriveled remains of the old king, all his blood lust faded. He realized there was no need. To damage this decaying husk… would be as petty and as useless as knocking over a tombstone. The man who had been Scaevolus… was gone. He had closed his eyes a long time ago… and he would never open them again.

  A few moments later, Lefty exited the shrine, nodding to the guard as he went for a long walk through the city to gather his thoughts. He had no intention of ever returning.