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What convinced Lucian wasn't, ultimately, that Lianelle couldn't remember her past. Sure, it was suspicious how all of her connections to anyone besides May had been cut or weakened, but that was only enough to push Lianelle so far. What convinced him that May was mind controlling his friend was Lianelle's lack of interest in being anywhere but by May's side. Lianelle didn't do that for anyone. She loved Katia with an intensity Lucian had hardly seen in any marriage, but she'd only visit Quiteria for a week at a time - never staying unless it was urgently required. When armies had been raised to fight the Magyar Lianelle had been there, but even then she'd ride off alone often, returning with news about how one village or another was now free. Seeing her relegated to a bodyguard and lover of someone she'd just met, with no apparent intention to ever leave, was... wrong. It wasn't Lianelle.
And so, this is how Lucian finds himself digging a hole in an unremarkable forest in west Austria. Well, digging several holes - the landscape's changed enough in the last 1200 years that it's difficult to locate the exact spot where he and his men, victorious but weary, buried the Magyar's artifacts that they could not understand the purpose of.
"Oh, I think you're compatible with me, enough to notice at a distance, did you not feel it when I was going for the fistbump with him?"
"Kay, if other not-quite-me is still planning on being there in like, six hours, I will come and give her a hug."
"These people kind of showed up uninvited in my silo and I don't super want them to still be here in six hours, that's past my bedtime."
"I don't want to linger here, it's costing me magic. How about we have some nice civil meeting where nobody's response to being resurrected from the dead is to go plot my downfall, some time in the future, at my and Lianelle's place in her world."
"I confess there was too much uncertainty for me to have a schedule of my own, but I don't actually have future plans anyway."
"Okay. Did you settle up with your landlord before you went to Europe or do I need to do that for you?"
"I wasn't sure whether I would return - can you? I'm uh. Sorry for the misunderstanding."
"Yeah, I can do that. Also if you wanted to pay me back for your ridiculous roaming in Europe phone bill sometime that would be cool, I was not really expecting that when I got you a phone and it's mildly annoying to move my money from home to your world. - which now that there are this many worlds I'm going to go ahead and name Artesian."
