"It was entirely unintentional, there's this unprecedented snake monster that tries to eat people and sends them to other worlds instead that appeared on one of my roads and ate my avatar; I have it trapped in a hole now. I do think I'll stick around at least long enough to have a look around, though."

"We did rather have our infrastructure comprehensively destroyed around here quite recently; it'd be nice to get some of the great bridges back, or at least open some of the collapsed passes."

Arbiter Gallius is already not having a good day, and it doesn't look like it's improving any time soon. He descends the stairs while Adolphus gabbles about the god that probably isn't a god because there aren't gods and Sextus seems to be being quite civil to it, which has fallen in his lake and therefore is somehow his problem.

"I can also make claims to clear passes and build bridges and then abandon them - that's very expensive, I would want a formal agreement for something like that, but it's not conceptually impossible. Is there anything I should know about Arbiter Gallius?"

"I should think he'd be overjoyed to hear anything that can help him with his supply problems, but it's not like he'll show it."

Here he is now. "Greetings, Kiraavi - have I got that right? I do apologise for the welcome - we do have towels and warm showers, if you would like to dry off and be clean instead of sitting out here being interrogated by our Questor."

He is attempting to sound Diplomatic but it certainly has an undertone of Why Am I Having To Waste My Precious Time On This.

"It's fine, towels won't help when I'm this sodden, but thank you. Kiraavi is correct, of roads and travel. I hear you're having an infrastructure problem with your roads?"

"Well, yes, the Druj rather happened to them. Autumn, I take it?"

"I haven't gotten much of an explanation of your magic here yet. I'm something like an Eternal, from another world where things work very differently. I am familiar with humans, at least."

Well, yes, the Realms do work rather differently, the Arbiter does not say because he has at least a little practice at this kind of thing.

"If you did want an explanation of magic, you have certainly come to the right place.

How would you like to proceed? I can't speak for the entire territory, much less the entire Empire, but everything hereabouts is under my jurisdiction.

Adolphus here claimed you had identified yourself as a 'god', but I would be delighted to hear that was simply a misunderstanding."

"I don't think learning about your magic is urgent, it can wait. Whether I'm a god is maybe a bit complicated - I don't think it's wrong to describe me as one, exactly, but from what I've heard of the local - sort, or the local ideas about them, I'm not entirely sure of the details - I certainly don't have the kind of attitude toward mortals that you'll expect given the term, and it seems best to avoid it for clarity's sake.

If you have the authority to let me clear passes and build bridges, we should probably start with that, it does sound a bit urgent for you."

As an Arbiter, Gallius has had a lot of practice at not looking affronted when someone suggests that the study of magic might not be the most important thing right now.

"I have the authority to commission bridges in the immediate area; for larger projects we'll need to involve the Senator.

What would we owe you in return?"

He worries a little that the question may be too blunt, but despite his circumlocutions this does appear to be an Autumnal kind of creature and they are rarely too offended by getting down to business, at least if they're going to be useful at all.

"Well, it depends on how you want it done. The type of being I am, we're made of terrain, first and foremost; I'm roads, conveniently enough, which does include bridges. And we can take on more terrain and make it into our sort of terrain, more or less wherever we want as long as we're not trying to overlap each other. So the most straightforward way to do it would be for me to become your roads and bridges, or the places you'd like roads and bridges to be, and continue being them and maintaining them, and do my usual thing of helping the people who travel there in exchange for the kind of consideration that lets me keep doing that - my kind of being subsists on attention, so I don't need to be worshiped but I do need people to be aware that I'm around and have me in mind as someone whose presence matters. It's also possible for me to claim terrain temporarily, in which case it'll keep being roads and bridges when I leave it, but I lose almost all of the energy it takes to make the claim and change the land when I give it up, so that's quite expensive for me. I'm not sure what exactly I'd want to do it that way, and it sounds like it'd be hard for me to make suggestions without alarming you, but attention is the coin of the realm, so to speak."

"What kind of form does this - attention - need to take?

I apologise for the complication, but the last time we let an architect build infrastructure with deity-related frescos, there was something of a mob with sledgehammers that occurred to it.

Nevertheless, since then we have built multiple statues of Summer eternals, so a nice acknowledgement plaque and a likeness of yourself - or whatever you normally prefer - in strategic locations may well be admissible, so long as it's very clear what you are after is gratitude for services rendered, rather than worship per se."

"It's fine, from what I hear frescoes aren't that effective anyway without the active presence of the individual they're dedicated to. An acknowledgement and likeness - or a few, in different places - might be sufficient if there's a way to get people to interact with it, that's generally the important part. At home it's traditional to give offerings, and the important part of that is that the person giving the offering has to think of how it's relevant to me and how to explain that; it doesn't matter if the offering is something humans find valuable at all. I do prefer to actually receive the offering, which I can't do if I'm not there, but the sentiment counts even without that."

"...can this, in fact, be a toll booth?

The idea that the bridge was constructed by an entity who wants to collect a toll on it, and the toll is somewhat conceptual because of the entity being magical in nature, is not particularly foreign here - we could certainly accept you setting up a toll booth on any large construction project.

If you are capable of staffing the toll booth rather than requiring us to provide staff, even better."

"Sure; that's not entirely accurate to how I normally do things, but it's mostly that how I normally do things is a bit friendlier - I don't require that people give offerings to travel on my roads at home, and hopefully it'll be fine not to require it here, either, once people have the idea."

"I can definitely staff the infrastructure if I keep the claims on the roads, and that has some other advantages for you as well; if I don't keep the claim it's harder, but I'll be able to help with some things if you don't mind me having a presence at the infrastructure in particular, or I might be able to hire some people to manage them entirely - what kinds of things are economically valuable here? Gems, spices, dyes?"

"Certainly it would be quite usual for a toll to be mandatory for an initial period, then become more customary - we do, here in Urizen, understand the power of gifts, and could easily couch it in those terms if that is preferable.

I'm not entirely clear on what this 'claim' entails - what effects would it have on those using the roads? We already have magically empowered routes in much of the Empire, the Spring-powered Trods, so your equivalent would probably not be entirely unfamiliar?

All of those things have some value here, although of course mana crystals and the magical materials - most of our best dyes are iridescent gloaming based - are more reliable, and generally command a higher return for a smaller volume."

"I'd be interested in seeing examples of those, to see if they're something I can make."

"Traveling on a road I've claimed doesn't have any magical effects, at least unless and until learning your magic allows me to do that. The claim just means that I'm there, and can see and hear what's happening and react to it - for example if someone gets lost, they might ask me for directions, or if they run out of supplies they might ask me for some that I can give them from the offerings I've received, or if there's some kind of danger on a particular road that I can't fix myself - bandits, or wild animals, or a problem at their destination that I've heard of from other travelers, or things like that - I can warn people away before they get to it, or before they set out in that direction at all. In general I want to be appreciated, so I want to do things for people that they'll appreciate, as much as I'm able."

Oh, right, it's a spying thing, like the friendly metallic spiders. That makes sense, Autumn Eternals do like information.

"I suspect the Senator might ask for some guarantees about not selling details of army movements to our enemies - or civilian movements to some of them, for that matter - but that aside, as long as it's clear you're watching, we are generally in favour of being Witnessed.

Adolphus, go bother the Architect for some material samples, will you?"

Adolphus is very glad to head off on a simple, comprehensible task. There's a fairly extensive workshop in one of the towers which is his destination.

"I'm not very good at keeping track of human politics - usually I have people I'd ask for advice about it, but I'm not sure that'll be wise here - but if you can explain clearly what you'd like me not to do I don't think I'll mind trying; I'm not generally in the habit of telling people each others' information in any case. For army movement in particular I'd want to use that information to prepare to help any refugees that come my way as a result of it; hopefully that won't be an issue?"

"What kind of preparations are we talking about, here?

In general we are very keen that refugees get to where they would like to go; Urizen doesn't have an official Proffered Hand establishment, but with the recent invasions we've all got used to housing our fellows from time to time. Sometimes there is some concern that refugees coming into the Empire from certain foreign nations - particularly the Grendel - might in fact be spies rather than genuine refugees, but those fleeing persecution and slavery are always welcome."

"If they have a place in mind to go, I'd certainly facilitate that, though it's usually a good idea to make sure their chosen destination doesn't get more refugees than it can handle, and in my experience it's a good idea to have a few places lined up to suggest to people who aren't sure of the best place for them. I also try to get supplies to them - I'm not sure how that will work here; at home I generally collaborate with others of my kind to get the supplies, but I'm not sure if the attention that gets them will count properly between worlds - and depending on the situation I sometimes arrange for temporary quarters for the refugees near their origin, so that they can find their loved ones before traveling on or things like that. And I can confirm at their destination that they're coming from a place where there's been a war or disaster, if that's helpful."

"Those all sound like useful services.

What are the extent of your bridge-building powers? For instance, there used to be a span between here and the Hall of the Risen Sun. That now lies in ruins, but one of the problems preventing its reconstruction is there's no good route in any longer. What would you need to repair that?"