Chapter 7: Stuck
When the Outsider came to, he shivered at the chill. The bathroom was empty, the door closed. He sat up in the chilly water, and looking to his left he saw his clothes neatly folded atop a table, and boots neatly arrange beneath them. No longer did he feel the feverish burn; no longer did he feel the Void.
Wait, there it was. So distant that it might as well not be there at all. Its whispers were so faint he had to strain to hear them. It was reassuring to hear them.
Something had changed. He shivered again, and tried to put a pin on what was different.
"Perhaps you can think better if you get out of the freezing water," a part of him suggested mockingly.
Ah, that is what is different. He had a body again, a physical form. The Outsider stepped out of the tub and dried himself off, noting the sensation of being wet and cold, and how nice it felt to be dry again.
Was his spirit elsewhere? He reached out and found it resting within, nestled in the quiet void each creature had within themselves. This too reassured him.
As the Outsider got dressed, he noticed his underclothes were different, not his own. He put them on, finding that they were clean and comfortable. Once fully dressed he felt more like himself again, and the last few hours seemed more like a nightmare than reality.
He was sharply reminded that was not the case when he reached to the distant Void and tried to pull himself back to its comforting embrace, only to hit a wall of heat and pain.
Alright. Much more had changed, beyond him getting a physical form and Void becoming distant. He scraped his mind, trying to remember what happened. There was the rune; Delilah's pocket dimension compressing, then exploding; Heat and pain, Emily, water, Emily, that rude being of light, the shackles, Emily, pain, water, then nothing.
He shuddered, and was unable to keep a frown from his face. This was the first time in four thousand years that he did not know the answer to something, and he hated it. What irked him even further was that a mortal knew more about the situation than he did.
There was nothing left to do but find Emily and get answers. It wouldn't do to get spotted and cause panic. Dealing with the ensuing chaos would be yet another annoyance he most certainly did not need.
Much to his relief, his power of sight seemed to work. Nobody was in the chambers beyond, or wandering the nearby hallway. Emily seemed to be in the kitchen with two other people, one was Corvo; the other was that Oracular Sister that helped remove those shackles; Greta, he recalled. He focused on the empty space near them, and willed himself there.
Corvo jumped as he appeared, a wary expression on his face, his lips parted as he was going to ask why the Outsider was here.
"Good to see you awake," Emily greeted, effectively cutting her father off.
"And dressed," added the red-haired Zealot behind her teacup, punctuating that remark with a sip and raised eyebrows.
Emily shot a warning look at the woman, while Corvo simply gaped. The Outsider resisted rolling his eyes. Emily turned back to him and offered an apologetic look.
"We have some fruit and a couple tins of jellied eels if you are hungry," she said, gesturing to the crate of pears.
"Perhaps later," he replied, folding his hands behind his back. He was about to ask Emily of the matter at hand when the Sister began to speak.
"Now is probably a good time to brief the Royal Protector and the Outsider of the situation, Empress," she suggested, fiddling with a teaspoon.
"Yes indeed, Emily," agreed Corvo. "What on earth is the Outsider doing here, and why doesn't he seem to know himself?"
Emily inhaled deeply before she spoke. "The Outsider is stuck here."
"Stuck?" he heard himself say at the same time as Corvo.
"The rune we used to trap Delilah was tainted by magic from the stars, or at least it felt like it," explained Greta as she made a new cup of tea. Her stirring was maddening. "It basically turned Delilah's pocket dimension into a type of explosion that destroyed the void the Outsider was attached to, and displaced the Void proper."
The Outsider found himself rubbing his temples, and Corvo looked painfully lost. Emily just looked at Greta expectantly. The Sister turned flustered.
"Alright, so to destroy a void you have to make it not a void, so fill it up with something," she tried.
"The Void is filled with things," the Outsider snapped.
"Do those things feel strange or foreign?" probed Greta. "Do they hurt you?"
"Of course not; they are a part of me," he retorted, annoyed.
"To amend my point, to destroy a void you have to fill it up with something foreign to it," the Sister stated with new confidence. "From what I can tell, something took advantage of Emily and I making the rune and Delilah's painting to introduce foreign matter into the Outsider's void and destroy it."
Corvo looked like he understood more of what was going on. He folded his hands and leaned on the counter.
"You keep saying 'the Outsider's void'," he said carefully. "But the Outsider is the Void. Either it was destroyed or it wasn't"
The Outsider nodded in agreement, folding his arms across his chest. He idly wondered if he could still float, and found that he could. Emily looked over at him and seemed amused to see him reclining in the air.
"Do you need to destroy every part of a human to kill them?" Greta raised an eyebrow and quirked a smile before sipping her tea.
The Outsider recalled with a jolt that Delilah's little pocket dimension was close to the Ritual Hold. Dangerously close.
His frustration at his own carelessness must have shown on his face as Emily was giving him concerned looks. He tried to smooth his expression.
"You are saying I should be dead?" he asked, his frustration bleeding into his voice.
Greta made a somewhat comical face and nodded her head side to side. "Yeeeeaaaaaah," she finished by gulping down her tea. "But we saved you, so please don't go about creating more witches."
Wonderful; he was indebted to humans. "I do not create witches. They search for power and make it themselves," he said coldly.
"But you Marked Delilah," Corvo added stiffly, his eyes narrowed accusingly.
Perhaps he should not have done that, but she was an interesting person. The closest he'd come to admitting to possibly regretting Marking Delilah was in conversation with Emily. Rather than saying anything, he snatched a pear and bit into it with a little more violence than was required.
The Outsider was clearly in a sour mood, and Emily could relate. Was it not recently that she was a fugitive in her own realm? Greta also seemed to take pleasure in needling him, which Emily regarded as phenomenally dangerous. The Outsider clearly remained just as powerful now as he was before, demonstrated by him appearing in the kitchen, tendrils of the void licking his frame. He further proved it by floating, and pulling a pear to him with a twitch of his fingers.
He was also a surprisingly messy eater. Juice trickled down his chin and covered his fingers; he wiped it away using the back of his hand and licked his fingers clean. His face remained sullen as he ate the pear down to its core, and then ate that too.
Emily looked to Corvo, silently asking what to do. Her father offered a slight shrug, he clearly was uncertain what path to take. She turned to the Outsider, who was cleaning one of his rings with the corner of his jacket.
"You are welcome to stay at the Tower, if you wish," she offered. He looked up, clearly surprised. Emily guessed that the thought had not yet crossed his mind.
"You cannot exactly return to the Void just yet," she explained. "And you will need a place to stay."
The Outsider's face was carefully blank. He slipped his ring back on his finger, and seemed to consider her offer. He straightened up, lifted his chin and folded his hands behind his back.
"And if I accept?"
Emily mimicked his stance, and made her tone as regal as possible.
"The safe room will be yours. I am the only one with the key, and you do not need it. You may do what you like with it, as long as it does not threaten the safety of those inside and outside the Tower."
He raised an eyebrow. "Am I to be confined in that space?"
Emily hesitated for a moment. "I do not think it wise for people to know you are here. I would allow you free rein if I could trust that you would not be spotted."
A smirk appeared on the Outsider's face. "I can choose who I appear to, Empress. No one should see me unless I wish it."
Greta coughed by the stove, prompting Emily to look at her, and raise an eyebrow.
"Not that I doubt your abilities," Greta said, taking up Emily's invitation to speak. "But I would prefer if we could test it out first. You can use me."
"Agreed." He looked rather smug saying that. Tendrils of darkness flickered across his being.
Greta put down her teacup, a focused look on her face. She slowly walked to him. The Outsider watched her move, amusement dancing in his dark eyes. With astonishing speed she seized his shoulders, and gave him a little shake. The swift change of expression on his pale face nearly made Emily giggle.
"Well, he's good on the visual front," Greta said, removing her hands from his shoulders and walking back to her teacup. "The problem is he is very much tangible, so if he is not careful people can bump into him. Also when you disappeared, I could detect the very faint smell of aged ambergris, and it's pretty concentrated where you stand. If someone knows what they are looking for, that could also be an issue. Oh!" she lifted her teaspoon, then pointed it at the Outsider. "Say something."
"Ambergris?" he sounds both peeved and interested.
"Whale vomit," Greta replied primly. "Used to make perfumes stick to the skin longer."
Corvo made a noise of interest, and Emily herself was somewhat surprised. "Really?"
"Yep," Greta took a sip. "My great-auntie made perfumes. You know Courier Number Seven?"
"That was one of hers?" Emily asked, delighted. "My mother loved that perfume!"
The Sister gave her a wide grin. "I'll write to her and ask her to send you some that she made herself. She keeps a bunch just for the occasion. Anyway, ambergris is a vital part of the perfume."
Corvo had a sad smile on his face, but he seemed just as pleased as Emily that such a fond and unexpected connection was made.
The Outsider lifted the spell, and this time Emily tried to find the smell Greta was talking about. She found herself leaning closer to him, noting a light, earthy scent.
"Did you find what you are looking for?" he remarked dryly, looking at her with an imperceptible smile. Emily immediately stood up straight, willing her face not to flush.
"Oh, Empress!" Greta's tone indicated she was about to make a request. Emily gave her a nod, and she continued. "Would you mind briefly using your Mark? I just had a thought."
Corvo looked startled that Greta knew, and leaned over to whisper in her ear.
"Is it safe for a member of the Abbey to know you are Marked?"
"Probably not, but I trust her," Emily replied with a murmur.
Corvo sighed, and looked resigned. Such was the life of the Royal Protector and Father. Emily felt a little badly for adding yet another anxiety to her father's long list, but so far Greta did not indicate that she was going to betray her.
Emily collapsed into her Shadow Walk, and Greta yelped, looking started and frightened. After another moment she pulled herself out of the form. The Sister looked pale, but after a moment started sniffing the air, then walking over to Emily and sniffing around Emily.
"Are you trying to find if both uses of power smell the same?" Corvo asked, mildly amused.
"Pretty much," Greta answered, taking a step back. "As far as I can tell, the ambergris smell is not so much a 'Void thing' as it is an 'Outsider thing'." She held up her hands and gestured the quotes.
"Why take note of this?" the Outsider asked, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.
"When I am eighty years old I will publish a scandalous tell all detailing my time here as an advisor and assistant to Empress Emily and our torrid love affair," Greta said saucily, giving an overacted wink at Emily. Emily couldn't keep herself from giggling, and theatrically got on one knee before Greta.
"Oh Greta! I had no idea you felt the same! Let us never be parted!"
Corvo affectionately rolled his eyes, while the Outsider looked like he had just eaten a live plague rat. Greta cackled with laughter, placing her teacup aside as she shook with laughter.
"By the Strictures, I am delighted that our Empress is you," Greta said with deep warmth. Emily stood up, a wide smile on her face. The Outsider still had that unpleasant look on his.
"Well," Emily tried to straighten her face and erase her smile. "I trust that you will not allow yourself to get noticed, so you certainly may wander around the Tower and its grounds."
"I suppose if I behave myself you will let me wander around Dunwall, oh Empress?" his mocking was rather playful, though his face remained grim.
Emily sighed. "Will you be staying?"
A small smile now appeared on his face. "Yes."