Stretching his legs, Reed reached above his head with a groan. His new body looked twenty and felt fresh out of the box, but that didn't stop him from getting sore from sitting on a motorcycle all day.

He was well away from Meg'ante and decided he could afford to stop for a few minutes to stretch and take a leak.

Bella perched on his motorcycle handlebar, legs crossed, chin in her hand.

They hadn't spoken for a few hours, which was fine with Reed. He'd gotten used to silence after being invisible for ten years. Squinting out at the rolling pastures and farmland, Reed took a deep breath of the fresh air. Deciding he wanted some lunch, he returned to his bike to open his bag.

He stopped as he found that the first thing on top when he opened it was A'shia's Miku toy. Carefully pulling it out, he sighed softly.

"Oh!" Bella gasped, flying down to look. "What a beautiful Sacrifice!"

"Sacrifice?" Reed looked up at her.

"She gave it to you," Bella said, moving closer to put a hand on the bunny toy's head. "I can feel the Intention. She gave this to you because she thought it would help you."

"I can't take it, though," Reed objected.

Bella snorted. "Why?"

"Because, it's hers."

"Are you going to turn around and take it back to her then?" Bella challenged, folding her arms.

"No... I'll keep it until I can return it," Reed said.

Bella sighed and suddenly darted in to smack her hands on either side of his face, looking him in the eyes. "Listen here. You're being silly. She gave it to you for a single purpose."

"And what's that?" Reed asked.

"For you to consume it."

He blinked at her.

"What did you think you were going to do with the Odinsphere?" Bella asked, letting him go and floating back.

"Use it?"

"You dope," Bella said, though she sounded fond. "No. The Odinsphere will become part of you. That's what a Sacrifice is. If you return this to her, she'll be insulted."

Reed sighed, looking down at the stuffed animal, petting its ears back. "It just seems wrong to take a child's toy."

"It would please her more to know that you accepted the Sacrifice. She's young and doesn't understand that this isn't the type of thing that's given to the Astralitar. She's undoubtedly going to be scolded by her mother for it."

"If that's the case..."

"She would know when her Sacrifice was accepted," Bella said.

Reed took a deep breath and let it out in a slow sigh. If that was the case—

The stuffed toy dissolved into sparks, absorbing into his hands. The constant tingling he'd felt in his palms now spread through the rest of him. It made him feel... a bit more whole... and a bit comforted. He'd not realized how utterly alone he'd felt for so long. This felt like a warm, sustained hug, unconditional love given to something that could never return it, joy of shared moments and secrets with no judgment. Innocence and trust had been wrapped in this gift. A'shia had given him her best friend.

Falling back on the ground, Reed stared up at the sky and just... sat with that feeling for a while. Bella settled down to sit on his chest, just below the mark over his heart.

Blinking the blurriness from his vision, he asked, "And she'll know?"

"Yes," Bella assured, petting the mark on his heart through the linen shirt.

"Breakfast felt a bit like this."

"The priest Blessed it," Bella explained. "But everyone cooked with Intention. They wanted to thank you for saving them. They would've given you anything. But you asked for food."

"I liked it," he wiped his eyes.

"Your life before must have been hard," Bella said, rubbing his chest with her tiny hand. "If just this has brought you to tears."

"It... ain't been great," Reed agreed, getting hold of himself with a deep breath.

"What do you want for this world?"

"That's a weird question."

Bella floated up, hanging in the air over his face, blocking the sunlight. "Not really. You are here for the purpose of changing this world. Usually we know how our Astralitar wants to change things well before we bring them here. But you... We don't know you. So how do you want to change things?"

"I don't know how things are here," Reed admitted. "Going around just changing things before understanding them is going to have unintended consequences."

Bella laughed softly, putting her hand to her cheek. "Wow. It's really nice dealing with an adult Astralitar for once. Dylan had an immediate answer. The one before him took a few minutes before answering with conviction. Even the ones who claimed they didn't know were just playing coy."

"I'll give it some thought," Reed said.

Bella shook her head. "Your heart already knows the answer. There have only been three Lotus before. They all wanted peace in some fashion. Given how you instinctively try to make people like you..." She reached down to poke his nose.

Reed glared. "Why'd you bother asking if you already knew?"

"Because I don't know. I just know that you want to belong somewhere, but I don't know what you think that should look like. So be honest with yourself. How do you want to change this world?"

Clenching his teeth briefly, Reed stared past Bella, focusing on the scattered clouds overhead. "I'll stick with my first answer. I don't know if maybe some of the things I want are already in place." He took a breath and looked at Bella. "And if it isn't... I'm allowed to change it?"

"You're the Astralitar. You were chosen by the gods to be their avatar in this world. Your will is Their will."

"Y'all got damn lucky you didn't get someone seriously fucked up, Bella," he shook his head. "Most homeless guys like me had serious mental health issues and drug problems. I ain't sayin I'm in good shape either, but at least I'm not convinced the birds are government spies."

A bird landed in the grass nearby.

They both turned their heads to look at it. Bella was the first to laugh. Reed joined her.

**

Reed's lunch was also a Sacrifice, he discovered. The tingly feeling he got when touching certain things let him know what had Intention behind it. He was starting to become accustomed to the vocabulary related to his abilities.

Bella had turned herself into an earcuff again. He supposed it was easier for her, or something.

Topping a rise, Reed got view of his next possible obstacle.

"This is Atalazia," Bella informed him.

Reed stopped his bike at the top of the hill to admire it. The city sprawled below a castle on a cliff, and Reed wouldn't have recognized it if he hadn't looked back after landing his hang glider. "Wow. I just did a big circle."

"Though the distance you traveled would've taken a whole week by horse," Bella agreed.

Beneath the palace was a sprawling metropolis. This wasn't a city like he was used to. The architecture was neither modern nor typical fairy tale fantasy. Reed didn't know enough about buildings to say what style they were, but they weren't the ones with white walls and wooden beams visible. Given the number of buildings and the fact that it had grown on either side of a major river, he could tell there was a large population of not just residents but also itinerants. Boats were coming in from the north and south sides of the city and making port at a marina in the middle. He could see the northern road he'd followed to get to that unnamed hollow in the glade. The road he was currently on came in the city's west side.

There were no walls or gates, but traffic was backing up on the road. A giant spider flew through the air to land on the hill just beyond the palace gate. Reed could see why the landing had been so smooth now. The Tar'chulla had landed in a web that caught it and broke. As soon as the Tar'chulla was clear, a smaller giant spider got to work restringing the web.

"As you can see, that's the palace you escaped from," Bella said. "Thankfully, no one will recognize you here. They didn't have a whole parade this time."

Nodding, Reed continued riding until he got a short distance from the back of the line. The group ahead of him were cat-people with a large cart full of goods they'd covered with a tarp. They stared at him and his bike with eagerly flicking tails. Stopping, Reed looked ahead again and considered his options. He could get around the line and get into the city without following the road, but not knowing why they had a blockade could get him in trouble. Bella flew off his ear with a brief sparkle as she turned into a pixie again. "I'll go check out what's going on." She zipped away, flying over the crowd. No one looked up. Possibly assuming she was a bird.

Ahead, the cat family was gathered into a huddle, whispering with lashing tails and flicking ears.

"I'm doing it," announced one man. He stepped back from the group, revealing himself as a burly cat-man with a thick beard. Taking a breath, to steel himself, he strode over with a confidence he clearly wasn't feeling. Reed scratched the side of his cheek in confusion.

"Sir Knight," the cat-man said with a wide grin. "Might I ask what is that form you have your core in?"

Reed looked the cat-man over thoughtfully. His silence made the man's tail twitch nervously. "Motorcycle," Reed answered finally, sensing that his continued silence was intimidating. "You wanna look at it?"

The cat-man's ears flicked up and forward. "Yes!"

Reed put the kickstand down and dismounted.

Hurrying closer, the cat-man crouched to look at it from every angle. "This is no animal," he remarked.

"No..." Reed frowned slightly as he considered how to explain it. "It's a machine."

A speeding object zipped past Reed, then pulled back around to hover in his face. "They've put a bounty on you," she announced, then realized that Reed wasn't alone.

"There any way I can use my core to disguise myself?" Reed asked.

"No. It doesn't work like that," Bella said, giving up secrecy, since they had an audience. The cat-man straightened, looking at Reed with wide eyes.

Reed nodded. "And I'm assuming there's nothing you can do either?"

"No. You may have to go around."

"Nah." He grinned at the cat-man. "I got a plan."

The cat-man focused his gaze on Bella, then Reed again. He seemed frozen in shock.

Bella floated up and landed on Reed's head. "You're going to stir up a lot of trouble, you know that?"

"Trouble's my middle name," Reed assured.

"No. Your middle name is Reed," Bella said, but she did laugh a bit.

"I'm pretty sure you look up Trouble in the dictionary, my picture's there," Reed assured. "How much about my shit can I tell random people, Bella?"

"Oh. Go ahead with whatever you want. That's part of the Astralitar's job, to bring new ideas to the world," Bella said. "Though you should probably get a contract with him before you do."

"Contract?"

"He's going to reproduce it." Bella leaned forward to look at his eyes. "You already showed it to him, didn't you? I leave you alone for one minute. Fine. Your middle name is Trouble."

"I didn't tell him how it works," Reed said.

"You're the Astralitar?" the cat-man asked, ears folding back, tail going still. He twisted to look back at the city entrance. The line had barely moved. The guards were searching in and under the wagons a bit more violently than necessary. He looked back at Reed, eyes wide. "They're looking for a violent criminal—that's what they said!"

"Huh. Is Meg that mad about me punching her?" Reed mused, then shrugged. He really couldn't care less.

A group of five guards were coming down the road toward them, riding metallic horses at full speed. Seemed someone had noticed Reed and told them.

"Well, what's your plan, Reed?" Bella asked.