This Ascent to Divinity is Lewder Than Expected

7.40 – Chitchat

Zoey started with the easy stuff. There were deeper questions she wanted to ask, but lots of casual topics she was interested in too. As they walked around the market, peering at the varied wares displayed in stalls and occasionally grabbing sweet treats that caught their interest, she learned more about her newest girlfriend—and sheesh, the thrill of getting to call Maddy that wasn't going to fade for a while.

Favorite food, hobbies outside of wayfaring, pets, favorite places she'd visited during her travels, and so on. Whimsical questions too, like, if she could learn a single skill instantly, what would it be? She felt like she had a good grasp on Maddy, but these small, maybe even unimportant questions provided delightful insight, and especially if they were going to be calling each other girlfriends, Maddy was right—they should know more about each other.

After a while, though, she moved into more meaningful questions.

"So," Zoey said. "What are your parents like?"

As expected, Maddy pursed her lips and thought her response over, taking longer than the previous. "You remember who my mom is, right?" she asked tentatively.

Zoey wracked her brain.

"I said her name, like, once," Maddy said. "So I wouldn't be surprised—"

"She's in the Sovereign, obviously. The … something weaver? The Moonlight Weaver? That's her title. You mentioned her actual name too, but …" It came to her a second later. "Right. Maggy? Margaret? Margaret Quick?"

"Margaretta," Maddy snickered, "but I'm impressed you got close. Stop saying you don't have a good memory, there's no way I would've remembered that."

"Only when it comes to my girlfriends, then," Zoey amended.

Though, to be fair, when so many other parts of her life had been wiped away, space had been cleared up to better remember what had happened this past month and change. Maybe that was why.

Maddy rolled her eyes at the quip, and she also blushed slightly. "Anyway, yeah, my mom is a minor member of the Sovereign. Normally that'd be a big deal, but considering who your first girlfriend is, I guess I'm only a few steps removed from a commoner in comparison."

"You're speaking to an actual commoner," Zoey reminded her dryly.

"Er, I didn't mean—"

"Just playing, obviously."

Zoey had only said it to be funny, but Maddy seemed slightly abashed, which hadn't been her intention.

"To answer the question, Mom has a … distinctive personality. Like basically all high advancement wayfarers do."

Distinctive. Zoey knew what that was code for, if not what exact flavor of crazy she meant.

"She's sixth, to be specific," Maddy said. "Which, I know you hit fourth in a month, but sixth is crazy high. Even in Mantle, a capital city, you won't be finding more than, what? A few dozen of those? And probably only a third of that at any given time, most wayfarers are out and about most of the year clearing shards. I would be surprised if there's more than ten here. I'm getting sidetracked. What's she like?" Maddy hummed for a few moments as she decided on the phrasing. "She's crazy as heck," she finally said. "She's my mom, I love her, but she's crazy. I guess … she's really enthusiastic. Forceful. She speaks her mind. And she's obsessive. She loves magic, we all do, but—she hit sixth advancement for a reason. I think you'd have to meet her, she's hard to describe."

Zoey raised an eyebrow. "You would want me to?"

Maddy blinked. "Yes and no?" she hedged with a laugh. "Again, she's a bit much, but of course I wouldn't mind you meeting my family. That's not happening for a while though, it'd be at least a week to reach Sovereign territory, and—well, we have other stuff going on. Not to mention, it might cause issues to bring someone who isn't one of us there. Especially a d'Celestin, or anyone affiliated with one. It's kind of an issue I'm even in a party with her." She winced and hurried to say, "Not that I'm saying anything about Rosalie, of course, it's just—"

"Politically delicate situation," Zoey said, squeezing Maddy's hand. "Don't worry, I get it."

"Politically delicate," she agreed, relaxing.

"Your dad?"

"He's the calm and composed to Mom's crazy. But he's also … too … accepting?"

"A pushover?" Zoey didn't even mean to say it aloud, because she didn't want to sound like she was insulting one of Maddy's parents, but she knew Maddy well enough that it had been obvious what she was implying.

"W-Well, no, just, he's very … accommodating."

"Right."

"But Mom wears the pants in the family," she conceded.

"Right," Zoey said, more amused.

Maddy opened her mouth, but then her teeth clicked as she shut it. Zoey was confused, briefly, but then had a suspicion. Maddy had been about to ask, 'what about you? What are your parents like?' Unfortunately, she had vague impressions to go off of, at most.

They moved past the awkwardness with Zoey following up with, "And growing up as a member of the Sovereign? What was that like?"

"It wasn't like anything, really," Maddy said. "Besides that I didn't live in a place with a lot of people, and I didn't meet new friends often. Which … I guess isn't really common. But it's not like we were recluses, there's plenty of us there, if spread out. Everything tended to stay in the clan, so to say."

Like growing up in a tiny rural town, Zoey thought, making the comparison that fit into her own world view.

Or more accurately, a tiny rural town where everyone was an elite or related to an elite. The Sovereign were much, much smaller than the two other Highguilds, but every one of their members was powerful. They didn't have obscenely strong eighth advancement wayfarers at their head like the Striders and the Deepshunters each did, but they had tons of sixth- and seventh-advancements. Probably more than either of the highguilds. Which was why they were left alone.

"Growing up, Mom was always going on about secrecy and independence, staying out of other people's affairs, stuff like that. Like all of her opinions, she feels strongly about …" Maddy snorted. "Sovereignty. We have a reputation for a reason. But growing up didn't feel weird, I think we just had our own quirks, like everyone does."

"Makes sense."

They walked along, Maddy swinging their entwined hands back and forth as she hummed, obviously considering something.

"It's still crazy how many people you said were in your cities," she said. "Millions?"

Unsurprisingly, they'd veered back to the Earth topic. Zoey continued humoring her. "It depends. But yeah, up to tens of millions. Density wise, though, we were less packed in than Mantle." She gestured around; said 'density' was quite obvious in the market during the middle of the day. "We were sprawled out." Except downtown, in high-rises, obviously. But the industrial revolution and cars had done a number on society, and how cities were shaped.

Maddy briefly lost herself in thought, which was fair, since the idea of multi-million-population cities was probably pretty insane from her perspective. Zoey elbowed her way in with another question, wanting her girlfriend's attention back.

"Before being thrown into our party," she said, "what was your goal?"

Maddy's eyes refocused, and she blinked up at Zoey.

"Huh. Good question," she said. "What if I said I was enjoying being a layabout?"

"You? A layabout?"

"I really was kind of just enjoying the good life," Maddy said, amused. "It was my first time away from home. But, I guess that's not totally honest. I definitely had goals, I was advancing pretty quickly, I wasn't sitting around. But that's also my upbringing. Had high standards drilled into me. All my sisters were doing just as good, and I wasn't going to fall behind."

She pouted.

"But really, I would've been fine exploring, seeing new places, meeting new people, and clearing shards at a decent but not awful pace. I don't have the same drive that Rosalie does, or even Delta. Those girls are something else."

"You're just as amazing," Zoey said, nudging Maddy. "But yeah, Rosalie definitely has … work ethic."

Maddy smiled at her. After a moment, she said, "But if you're asking why I'm a wayfarer, it's for the same reasons as most people. Getting stronger. I love magic, same as the rest of my family, and I won't be able to cast really cool spells unless I'm higher advancement. Plus, family expectations, I won't discount that. What about you?"

"Me?"

"What's your motivation? For wayfaring. Er, guess I should rephrase that. If you didn't have to save the world and weren't picked by a goddess, forced into all of this, then what would your motivation have been?"

"Good question." Zoey thought about it. "Honestly, I might not have at all."

Maddy blinked. "Really? Not the adventurous sort, growing up?"

"Sort of? I didn't sit around all day, I got into my fair amount of trouble. More than average, probably. But if you're asking if I was the kind of girl being chased by cops every weekend, or an adrenaline junkie or something like that, definitely not."

"Cops?"

"Uh. Our peace keeping forces. So, like, city guards?" She responded to the question automatically, at this point.

"Adrenaline?"

Zoey blinked. "It's a chemical your glands excrete, it's what makes your heart pound in a fight." She hoped she'd gotten that right. It wasn't until she started really thinking about some things that she questioned whether her assumptions were completely correct. "Lots of people like how it feels."

Maddy mulled this over. "You really don't think you'd have been a wayfarer, minus the … you know, bigger stuff going on?"

"I would've, just because of Rosalie," Zoey said. "And by that, I mean all of you. I'd never give up getting to explore with you. But if I hadn't met such amazing people? If my first shard was me, alone, fighting for my life, nearly dying, bleeding everywhere, losing an arm?" She grimaced. Phrasing it like that confirmed it in her head. "Maybe there's a chance, because a sense of adventure does appeal to me, and I want to get stronger, but I don't think I'm cut from quite the same cloth as all of you. So I couldn't say."

"That's fair," Maddy said. "Most people don't get into wayfaring, and they shouldn't. The average wayfarer dies young. You have to be a little crazy in the head."

There was a brief bit of silence. They hadn't even stopped to look through a stall's wares in a bit, too lost in the conversation. It started back up a moment later.

"So," Zoey said. "Thoughts on Rosie and Delta?"

"Oh?" Maddy glanced at her curiously. "You'll need to be more specific."

"Just, if we're girlfriends now, they're also my girlfriends. So…?"

"So how do I feel about them?" Maddy's cheeks colored slightly, and she took the question seriously. "Probably should talk about it," she acknowledged. "I'm not sure what to say though. I don't think I would call them my girlfriends yet, not like you … but I don't know if I wouldn't dislike it, either? Eventually." She squirmed at Zoey's side. "I should probably find ways to spend time with them alone, too. It's just so busy."

Zoey smiled. Maddy didn't have to be as far along in her relationship with Delta and Rosalie as her, she had just wanted to make sure there weren't any problems. She hadn't thought there were, but best to confirm.

"When you do," Zoey said teasingly, "our exclusivity agreement is just 'stays in the group'. So have fun, if you want." That, too, felt important to bring up, even if it came a bit out of nowhere. She should also check in: "You're fine with that?"

Maddy paused, then nodded slowly, face finally turning that bright crimson Zoey loved to see. Which was fair: she had just told her, and even encouraged, that if she did find time to go on a date with Rosalie and Delta, they should have some fun together.

She laughed and dropped the topic. She had more questions to ask.