Erntoron - Where Our Journeys Meet
Chapter 1 - Heart of the ArcaneDaron was running. Sweat was beaded on his forehead and he kept looking over his shoulder. There was something chasing him. His legs were so small, he was so young, how could he outrun something like that? His parents were with him too, running, mother ahead, and his father behind. They were all that stood between him and the darkness that swirled around him. The slam of a heavy door let him know he was safe, but it was dark. He heard steel clashing, and something else. He didn’t know what it was, he hadn’t ever heard it before, nor since. A high pitched keening sound that was wholly alien and yet perfectly terrestrial. Something was out there, but he was with his parents, he was in a shelter, he was safe. He turned to look at his mother and father. They were gone, outside of the door, shielding him, protecting him. It was here, it was upon them. That sound, squealing and shrieking as metal clashed and scraped across whatever it was. They were doing battle with it, and losing. Another whine and then a scream and then- Daron bolted upright in his bedroll. His hair, normally handsomely styled when it wasn’t encased in his helmet, was shiny and slick with his own sweat. Matted to his forehead in odd ways from the tossing and turning. He felt the woolen blanket soaked as well. The muscles in his arm hurt from gripping the hilt of his sword so firmly and for so long. “Nightmare?” Eloise’s silhouette flickered in the dying light of a campfire that had been reduced to embers. It was best to keep the light low while keeping watch. The crossbow that was usually strapped to her back lay across her lap, even as she bent over it to prod the coals with a stick. The red glow from the embers only seemed to enhance the flowing red hair that was normally bound up in a tight bun, tonight though, she had chosen to let it out. “Yes, sorry if I worried you.” Daron replied, his mind coming back to him and the dense fog of his nightmare clearing out at last. “Same one?” Daron hesitated, comforted by the two other snoring companions, still asleep, undisturbed. At worst he had only disturbed his longest friend, which was acceptable. “The same one.” Daron confirmed. He had once, and only once shared what fragments of the nightmare he could remember with Eloise. She had nodded along and comforted him. His parents had died protecting him. The standoff that had ended them had also saved Castle Aeonir, Daron’s birthright, home, and shield to Emberdale. If those walls were breached, then there would be little to stand in the way into the valley and everyone who lived in it. The Beohold family were heroes and it was commonly understood that great things came from the family. In the years since the siege though, Daron had grown in the care of the staff in the castle; they were his family as much as his parents had been. The castle, though, still bore many of the scars from past wounds. Which was why Daron was not in the castle and instead in the wilderness with a small cadre of companions, earning coin for supplies to restore it to the same glory it once radiated. There was a sizable bag of coin to be earned in adventure. Daron had snorted at that. Adventure, dashing knights and slaying dragons. It had been mud and muck, rain water seeping into his clothes as it slipped through the plates in his armor, and blood. So much blood. Not always his, but after a while it all smelled the same. The metallic scent of it suffused his very senses even when he wasn’t in battle. It did, however, pay well. There was money in it. The small single horse cart that sat next to their camp, safely out of the reach of any wild ember that might burst from the fire, but well within eyesight. Sacks of gems, gold and silver coins locked in a sizable chest, and a number of other craft goods that various villages and small time nobles had given as tribute for their good deeds. When they arrived in Koris tomorrow most of the intangible goods would be sold, or traded, and the sum divided up equally between Daron, Eloise, and his other two companions. Tanila, their healer and Hakenos would get their fair share. Tanila would squeak, bow her head and stutter a thanks and comment that her contributions were meager at best. Daron would practically have to shove the coin purse into her belt for her sometimes. Often with a smirk behind his helmet. He had hoped that after being with their small party for so long that she would grow to be confident in her abilities. He still held out that hope, knowing that one day she might realize her own value. Hakenos on the other hand would be like flicking gold at a brick wall for all the response he would get. The ashen skinned man was a person of few words, but the combination of military training and the magic that had been forced into him were invaluable. Even if those abilities were originated by nefarious means, and were more torture than blessing, Hakenos had made the best of the worst. Daron could see that, along with the struggle writhing inside of him. They were broken people, and despite everything Daron had done, he worried that they were only more broken after years in the world. Eloise shifted in her seat, slipping away from her little perch and settling down in the dust next to Daron. All it took was a simple hand on his shoulder from his long time friend to help his heart rate plummet. He took a deep breath, balled up the terror in his mind and shoved them into that lungful of air and let it seep out of him. Like the early morning fog burning away as the sun rose, so too did Daron’s emotions clear. “The sun will be up soon. Join me and we can watch it together.” Eloise offered. Daron nodded slowly, knowing there was no more sleep to be had for him. He stood and reached for his sword belt and chest plate. “Leave them.” Eloise spoke barely above a whisper. “It’s safe here.” Daron looked at her for a long moment before consenting to leaving his armor there, but the sword would come with him. He was a lot of things, but a fool wasn’t one of them. He knew they weren’t safe here, they weren’t safe anywhere. Eloise was right though. The sunrise was beautiful. The golden disk of the sun smattered the horizon with reds and oranges as it slowly claimed the sky as its own. Daron, through squinted eyes, could see the gates of Koris and the sprawling city beyond. The trail they were on would take them right up to its gates. Once there, they had a reward to claim, money would be divided up and their party would split. As the first bright rays of the sun crested the mountain range in front of him, Daron admitted to himself that he both dreaded and anticipated that time. It would be good to get his hands on raw material and use it to build, or rather re-build his home, Castle Aeonir. To use his muscles to build up instead of cut down. To see the faces of those who lived in the castle, like returning home to family. His eyes drifted to where Eloise sat on the fallen log they occupied. Her crossbow leaning comfortably against her leg. Her elbows resting on her knees and her face resting easily in her hands. Daron could practically see the reflection of the swirl of colours in her eyes. Her, Hakenos, and Tanila were every bit a small family to him. More siblings than the people in his castle that had raised him after his- “Food?” The word was more grunted than spoken. Hakenos had extracted himself from his bedroll and was clattering around the camp some twenty paces back from Eloise and Daron. Shortly after Hakenos, Tanila quietly slipped from her bedroll as well, and like every other morning, quietly settled down into place and began a small ritual of prayer. Daron knew the moment was over, but he was thankful for what he got. A sentiment that he found oddly humorous as it perfectly contextualized his life. The camp was broken nearly an hour later. Bellies were filled with trail rations and the very last of the salted meats that they had carried with them from the last bastions of civilization. How many miles ago that was was not a concern. What mattered, more to some than others, was looking ahead and the kind of food that the evening would bring. As usual Daron was still busy clipping and tightening straps on his heavy set of armor while most of the other members of his party doused the cook fire, rolled up bedding, and packed their own packs. Tanila gleefully nuzzled the pack mule and hitched it up to their cart. To Daron, she always seemed more at home with wildlife and nature. Perhaps that was her elven heritage at play, perhaps it was just personality. Regardless it was her duty to get the cart hitched and ready, once it was, she planted herself on the back of it, happy to let herself be pulled along wherever the cart went. Hakenos, as usual, was on cook duty and spent more than a little time splashing water from a water skin over the cast iron pan and muttering. Never sure if he was pleased or grumbling or perhaps just making noise, Daron left him to his devices. Eloise, took care of most other things. Issuing orders and ensuring nothing was left behind. Daron would spend the whole time strapping metal plates across his body. Many times padded only by a layer of cloth or perhaps leather at the joints. It took time, and he perpetually hated how little he contributed to breaking camp, despite his abounding usefulness in other ways. Still, the routine was done, only a scorched and makeshift fire pit remained as a monument to where they had camped. Daron lowered his heavy steel helmet to his head, latching the chin strap in place. He was finally whole again, he was finally safe. The remainder of the day progressed very much as Daron had expected. The march from their campsite into town was slow and quiet, a far cry from the ringing steel and shouts of battle that had dominated his life for the last years. It had only been months, but there were times when it felt like so much longer. He had lost track of time. Once he was diligent about tracking the passage of time and cycles, but after so long, the ritual had become background noise. Lively and diverse, Koris was not exactly the central city for the region, then again, nothing was. It was a collection of villages, smaller towns, and settlements built on and around the ruins of a much more ancient Inikas civilization. Koris happened to be the most prominent, and therefore the default trade center for the region. Abundant in natural resources with lush woods that provided some of the heartiest timber for miles, and mines that were abundant in every kind of mineral and gem. The claim to fame though, was the technology. Gnomish and Elven craftsmen were easily enticed into the area by the abundance of ancient technology there. There was good business in not only recovering artifacts, tomes and trinkets, but refurbishing, study and even the sale of some of the more well understood items brought a measure of wealth to the city. The smell was the first to hit all four of the companions. Heads tilted upward slightly, allowing their noses to fill with the scents of roasting meats, glazed in something sweet and savory. The warm comfort of fresh baked breads and pastries swirled around them and the succulent scent of fresh fruits. All of it assaulted them as they passed the threshold into town. Hakenos felt the pull and wavered away from the party only to be pulled back in by Daron. “Sell the goods first, get our reward, then you can empty your pockets at the baker later.” Hakenos, finding this denial to be utterly offensive, replied with a simple spoken word instead of a grunt, a rarity for him. “Fine.” The lavish manor they were bound for was set near the far end of the city, sitting comfortably on the waterfront. Polish marble and white pillars adorned the estate's lawn and clashed brutally with the rough and tumble look for Daron and his company. They left the cart with the stable hands and took only a heavy burlap sack with them. “Behold my lord.” Eloise began as they entered the small quasi-throne room. A place they had been only once before, and it had only been brief. “The beast of Koris. As requested, slain, purged from the holy vault, and its head brought as a trophy.” Daron slipped the sack from his shoulder and lowered it towards the plush carpet they stood on, stopping only as the nobility before them quickly held up a hand. “No need for..that..to touch the grounds here.” He snapped and one of his personal guards took the sack from Daron, opening it and almost retching into it. He coughed hard and looked to his master, nodding in confirmation. “Good good. As promised.” A moment or two later a large trunk was brought in, flipping it open Eloise and company could see that it was stuffed full of glimmering coins. “We can have this delivered to your cart if you would prefer.” He offered. “Splendid.” Eloise chirped before looking back at him. “But I don’t think you understand the trouble this whole endeavor caused us.” That earned her a look from the man in front of her. The raised eyebrow was only the first crack in the facade of calm control he exuded from his little throne. “Our deal was-” “Our deal was to go to the Koris Holy Vaults and stop whatever was corrupting the church’s artifacts. Now, had we known that it was a half-demon monstrosity, we would have doubled our fee.” “Well I hardly see how that’s-” Eloise kicked the trunk shut. “And you know what, the priests there in town were talking to our healer friend here.” She gestured to Tanila. “And do you know what he told her?” The bead of sweat that formed on the man’s head told Eloise that he knew exactly what they had been told. “They said that they had told the good folks of Koris exactly what it was that was on the prowl in there, and that they were thankful that someone had finally taken up the job of slaying a demon.” The stammering let Eloise know she was almost there. “Now we have the head. We could restore it, but only, what, about a quarter of its power, right Hakenos?” Grunt “So. Before we call this a done deal. What say you pay us what we are owed…what we are actually owed.” The man swallowed hard, nodded to one of his attendants who scampered off to pull out another box of coins to join the one at Eloise’s feet. “Your generosity knows no bounds.” Eloise said with a smirk. “And I assure you this will be plenty to keep the details of this deal between us.” With that her whole demeanor changed. The dark and knowing tone in her voice changed to sweet and kind. Thanking the lord for his gracefulness in hosting them and telling him that she looked forward to doing business again soon. “Bit over the top don’t you think?” Daron asked once they were back at their cart and a few blocks away from the manor. “He tried to swindle us.” Eloise commented, “I was only getting what we were owed.” Grunt “See, even Hakenos agrees.” Daron pulled in a deep breath and let it back out slowly. “I just feel like there was a better method.” “You couldn’t actually bring it back though, right Hakenos?” Tanila asked, her voice just barely above a whisper and fidgeted with the staff she carried. “I could.” He replied. “But..” Tanila squeaked. “I’m too hungry,” Hakenos said, smiling at no one in particular. An hour later the various carved art pieces, statuettes and raw coins had been exchanged, divided up and the companions were sitting comfortably in a tavern. Weapons were stored, Daron’s helmet had come off, though it sat prominently on the table, easily within reach, though the mug of thick, dark beer he drank from would suffer from a scramble. Daron didn’t feel unsafe here though, Koris was secluded, well guarded, and he had insisted on a tavern well off the beaten path. Admittedly, it also had some of the best brews and food in the city. “Friends.” He said simply, lifting his cold mug of beer to be met with the others at the table. “It has been a pleasure.” Eloise’s amber ale, Tanila’s glass of fine wine, and Hakenos’s thick sludgy porter all rang true, and the companions shared a drink. Food arrived shortly after and the table fell silent. It was tough to chat when your mouth was stuffed with fine stew, fresh breads, and crisp vegetables. More drinks came and were drunk, slowly but surely, as conversation progressed along with the day. Until it was finally time to part ways. Purses laden with coin, the four companions said their goodbyes and parted, assuring one another that they would meet again and Daron, as per his usual humble courtesy, extended an invitation for them all to stay at Castle Aeonir anytime they wanted. The doors were always open to company as fine as they were, though he smirked and tossed a mocking sneer at Hakenos. “Even you Hakenos. That gloomy old tower is still there. It’s all yours if you want it.” There was a roll of laughter in the streets then, and when it quieted they departed from one another. Daron walking off with the cart and mule, bound for a number of less than exciting appointments. He needed stonemasons, timber, a few tools to replace the ones that were spent, and supplies of various kinds. Before he made it to his last stop, the stonemasonry, his cart was already filled. Part of his purchases that day would include a delivery, which he was thankful to pay. Despite his cautious airs though, he never saw the shadow trailing him through the streets, watching from just around the corner of a building, or standing at a fruit stand and looking sidelong at him. Daron left the mason’s shop and gently coaxed the mule, pulling his cart into moving. The stone’s he requested would be delivered in the morning. For now, though, he was, at last, headed to his family home. Whoever was following him slipped into the shop once he was out of eyesight.
He never looked back and slowly faded into the crowd. Once Daron was far enough gone Eloise nudged her head in the direction of the side street they stood by. The three remaining companions followed her into the shade between the two buildings. “I needed the extra coin for something, a gift. It’s not much, but Daron has put things on the line for us too many times to not be rewarded for it.” Eloise said, letting the words flow from her mouth like a fast moving stream. Tanila couldn’t help but beam at the idea of secretly doing something nice for Daron and the grin on her face made that clear. Hakenos’s nod was more than Eloise had hoped for from him. “Good, I think my portion should be enough to get something, but-” Eloise began but found coin purses being produced from Hakenos and Tanila thrust at her. “Are..are you sure?” Tanila let out a small sweet laugh that practically illuminated the alleyway. Grunt “Alright. Follow me, I’ll explain on the way.” Daron would be in the market for a while, they knew. He was nothing if not thorough with his purchases. Wise with money meant pursuing the best deal and balancing quality with quantity, leaving ample time for Elosie. The Gnomish tinkerer’s shop was easy enough to find, if not from the smell of oils and grease, then certainly by the sound of metal tapping against something crystalline. The ringing made Tanila’s elven ears twitch and wince the first time she heard it the same way a sudden sharp scrape of a fork across a plate might prick up your ears. Inside was a wholly different universe. It was one part showroom, one part manic mess. There were a number of contraptions and gadgets littering the various display shelves, none of which were overtly apparent as to their use. Seemingly as soon as the three friends entered the door and let it latch behind them, a small man appeared from behind a curtain. Goggles perched on his head let them know he had been working on something, only because of the soot free circles around his eyes where they had protected him. “Greetings! Welcome to The Spinning Cog. Can I help you, folks?” Eloise stepped forward and as she did so easily put aside her usual sweet personality and slipped into the same demeanor as she used to negotiate for more gold. Her posture was tight and her hands coiled against the small of her back. SHe started with a small, polite and respectful bow. “Yes, hello. I was told you had a selection of automatons. I’m in the market for something special for a friend of mine.” Eloise’s more elegant speech seemed to land squarely on the small gnome who eagerly nodded and tried to match her grace. Impossible a task as that might be, given the smears of some kind of substance on the stained coveralls he wore, but he tried. “Yes yes, of course, ah, one moment.” He darted to the door and stood on the tips of his toes to reach a sign that he flipped around, indicating that the shop was temporarily closed before deadbolting the door. “This process usually takes some time, I prefer to allow my clients a bit of privacy.” He commented and then waddled across the shop floor to the curtain he had appeared from behind. Pulling it aside and sweeping his hand in a gesture for the companions to join him. The rear of the shop, like the front, was a lesson in clashing concepts. Large wooden tables braced with metal dominated one side. Clearly layers upon layers of projects were laid across them. Schematics and glowing crystals held in place by receptacles, tools, and a number of indescribable inventions. None of it was anything like what the companions had ever seen before, none of it made sense to them. Along the opposite walls were the automatons that Eloise had requested. Ethereal in their beauty. Each one seemed to have tumbled out of the annals of time and divinity. Three women, one man, or at least that was what they looked like to mortal eyes. They were, at their core, something altogether not humanoid. Even Tanila’s timeless elven beauty only barely compared to the grace and delicate construction of the automatons. They looked human, or human enough. The simple clothes they all wore did more than enough to sell the image. Each one was strapped into place by a tightly bound cord around their waist and around the chest. It was enough to hold them upright while they were offline, though it did not look comfortable by any stretch of the imagination. “All of these are essentially the same, it’s mostly just the outer casings that are different.” The little gnome mentioned, putting on the best sales pitch voice he could muster. “They’ll all have the same additional runestone slots, they’ll work just great, perfect for laboring, or care taking, or-” “Conversation?” Eloise asked. “Sure sure, yes. Though they’ll all start off fairly simple, but give them enough time and they’ll catch on and grow from there.” “They’ll grow?” Tanila said, looking from the mechanical humanoids to the gnome. “How does that work?” “Wh, w-well we aren’t actually really sure yet.” That drew some strange looks. “These are all recovered and repaired from some of the deeper caverns and what not. We’ve been studying how they work and we have a pretty good understanding about what to do to encourage growth and expansion and everything, but the actual arcane magics themselves, well, those are still a mystery.” “So. Then. How do they grow?” Eloise asked. “Oh yes of course. That’s the whole point of the cores!” The little gnome scampered over to the disheveled workbench and produced a small stone that seemed to shift colors as it moved. Sharp edges jutted out here and there, but etched deeply with runes that pulsed gently. It looked almost like it was breathing in his hands. “These little things. They do different things. Add on a new aspect for your automaton. Insert this into one of the receptacles inside of your automaton and boom starts learning and doing new things. As it learns more and more runes will start to appear on the core. That’s the crystal deep inside of the body. Basically the core is who it is, or what it is really. Teach it how you want, enhance it with these, and-” All of it seemed over their heads, even Hakenos who was easily the most well in tune with the arcane arts than any of the rest of them. Even then he was no mage, just in tune with the magical weave. The little gnome caught on that he was beginning to ramble and even titter on the edge of diving far too deeply into how everything worked..or how they suspected they worked at least. To stop himself he cleared his throat a bit and resumed his little pitch. “So, all that remains is to pick out what your, ah, friend might like.” The trio exchanged looks with one another and then turned to the line up of automatons before them. They scrutinized the automatons for a minute or two. Eloise and Tanila seemed undecided, but Hakenos stood staring at one for almost the entire time. He wasn’t so much considering it, rather looking at it with squinted eyes and concentrating. Tanila and Eloise had learned long ago that Hakenos had a way about him, and they were never quite sure if he truly was sensing something magical or if he was simply staring at something absently. He nudged his chin towards it. “You’re sure Hakenos?” Eloise asked. “This is the right one. He’ll like it.” The two girls looked at one another. That had been the most they had heard Hakenos talk in a single sitting. Probably. Still, if he was speaking that much he must have had a good reason. “Why that one?” Eloise asked. Hakenose grunted once, shrugged, and turned to leave the backroom. “We’ll take her!” Tanila declared.
The stonemasons guild had a storefront that he had visited in times past. Their artisans were like no other and he was welcomed in as a friend and familiar face. The amount of raw stone he would need for the planned repairs would require a sizable amount of the wealth he had just acquired. In that moment he was more than a little thankful for Eloise’s methods and squeezing some more coin out of their contract. It would provide new doors for the chambermaids, a patched hole in some of the living chambers and fortifications. It also went towards paying for the rental of two additional carts to haul the raw materials back to his castle some three days' travel from Koris. With his purse emptier than when he started the day, but his heart more full, he was finally ready to settle in for the last night in Koris. In the morning he would meet up with the masons to take possession of the additional carts and then set off for his home.
Eloise threw back her hood and leaned against the counter while she waited for one of the artisans to come and talk to her. Her request was simple, and she made a small show of tossing a small but weighty bag of gold up and down in her hand. All she wanted to do was add something to the convoy, no questions asked. The unmistakable rattle of coins worked wonders to allow her honey sweet words to land on the right ears.
Soon though, the spires of Castle Aeonir loomed on the horizon. He could still clearly pick out one of the towers that had been blown apart by a wayward explosion set by saboteurs in an attempt to blind the castle guard to an oncoming attack. It had only worked for a short while, leading to a surprise attack that was repelled, but not without its losses. Some were good people, some were parts of the structure itself. Daron himself had overseen the burial of the dead in a place of honor. They would never come back, but the scars left by the attack could be fixed at least. Daron cast a long look back at the crates and barrels, lumber and stone, that he hauled with him. It wouldn’t heal the scars left by those who had served and died, those who sacrificed everything to keep the people of Emberdale valley safe. Finally arriving home had sent a surge of exhaustion through Daron. As if the threshold to his own castle possessed some form of magical cleansing that removed the fears of the outside world, the blood and the screams. All of it faded, though the price was his energy. “Welcome home, my lord.” The last part of the statement seemed like it had been tacked on as a means of obligation. The older woman's mature voice rang from Daron’s left side. Turning to look at her, Daron could only see the years of harsh winters, hot summers, sweat from hours in the training ring and the crows feet at her eyes that belied more smiles than most. In an instant he was in front of her and the two embraced as family, fellow warriors and long time friends. “Auntie.” Daron murmured in reply and released her. “All’s well I see. Supplies, goods and my favorite adopted child.” Helene’s smile cracked her face and spread across her lips, radiating a caring love that few in the castle had. When Daron’s mother and father had perished in the defense of the castle, and therefore the entire Emberdale Valley, Helene had been there to continue raising Daron. Though he was a young lad at the time, he still wasn’t an adult and still required a bit of guidance. Daron wasn’t exactly raised by her, nor was he actually related to her, but the endearing term of ‘Auntie’ seemed to transcend that fact. Likewise, Helen had been taken in by Daron’s family when the fires of war robbed her of her family and orphaned her. Helene had been in and out of the castle as Daron was growing. She, like Daron was now, was a knights errant and had her fair share of adventure and sorrow beyond the walls of the castle. She never failed to make sure Daron saw her, and knew her, when she returned though. She was stubbornly determined to be something of a mother figure that the war had denied her. Daron, like her, was an orphan and she sought to alleviate those pains whenever she could. As the pair strolled along through the castle environes, Daron and his convoy of supplies and Helene, still armored and ready. Daron smiled at every passing child who begged and pleaded for stories of monster slain, of daring adventures and harrowing escapes. Every maiden blushed and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and looked away from the handsome lord of their home. Every able bodied man nodded stoically and knew that with Daron’s return that the castle was that much more strong. The keep was nestled towards the back of the castle, behind stables and living quarters for the residents there. A tall affair, bolstered by the barracks at the base of the stone building. He parked his convoy there and hitched the horses and mules, leaving them in the able care of the stable hands. His eyes were suddenly weary and he felt the immense weight of his armor and the expectations of the castle he stood in now. Not the expectations of the people there, but a promise he had made to himself. His eyes darted around, looking at the damage that still lingered there. Chips in stones, walls that the supplies he brought home would fix, and smaller buildings that had been partially demolished. Buildings that could easily house more people, make them more comfortable, keep the rain off of their heads and warmth on their bones. There was so much left to do, and Daron felt it was all on him. He turned back to his keep, stepping into the heart of his castle and wandered the halls. He put on a smile, greeted the staff there and made his way into his private quarters. His own little tower on the back of the keep. Shedding his armor, he let the subtle coolness of the air left from the setting sun wash over him. Stepping onto the balcony, he rested his arms on the heavy stone railing and looked out. To the right, a decent enough view of the courtyard. It was partially obscured by the battlements along the walls of the keep, but it was good enough. He could see his people milling about and saying their goodnights as they slipped into their humble but comfortable living quarters. Daron swept his eyes over to his view from the other side of his balcony. Lake Ysilde yawned out in front of him, catching the last few rays of the sun and sparking like a field of jewels on its otherwise dark surface. Beyond that was the city of Jarin. Daron could just barely make out the distant beads of light as torches were lit along their own walls. A chilled gust of wind rose from the lake and washed over Daron and on instinct alone sucked in a deep, cleansing breath through his nose. He was home, and it felt good. Morning came far too early for Daron. The sun was mercifully not streaming into his tower, but that wouldn’t stop the gentle murmur of the world around him. The miles of travel, the fatigue of battle, and the weight of his day's tasks were waiting for him in his muscles as well. He argued, fervently with them, explaining that he had been away and deserved a day off. His body agreed, but his mind wouldn’t simply let him lavish in his tower all day, not while there was work to do. A short while later, dressed casually and sporting his trademark longsword on his hip, Daron stepped into the early morning air. Everyone had their tasks, and knew to do them, leaving Daron to mostly make his own schedule. Which started with making sure his supplies were in order. It was at this time that he discovered something he did not expect… The convoy of sturdy wooden carts had been loaded with lumber, stone, and sacks. There was something else though. A long crate, as tall as Daron if it were lifted up, as wide too. As he looked over it he felt as if the whole thing were almost as large as a casket might be. His hand was on the hilt of his sword in an instant as he knew with some measure of certainty that he didn’t request something like this. Slowly approaching the cart, he saw that, on the bottom of the heavy wooden crate, there was a sealed envelope with something scrawled on it. Peering at it, he recognized his name, then three distinct handwriting styles. He recognized those too. Hakenos, Tanila, and, of course, Eloise had all signed the envelope. The note inside was clearly written by Tanila, judging by the swooping and well practiced penmanship. The words were Eloise’s though, there was no doubt about that. “Daron, words cannot express how much all of us appreciate you. Not just for walking alongside us and doing your damnedest to keep us safe, at your own expense I might add, but also for being the kind of friend everyone should have in their life. You’ve never asked for anything other than coin in return, and we know that even that was drained in service of making other lives better. “So it is that we pooled our funds, including the extra we negotiated for from our last job, and got you something nice. It is just for you, and all of us, even Hakenos, sincerely hope you enjoy this gift.” Daron looked up from the note, then around the stables. He expected to see his companions spring out from behind the walls and beams and smirk at him, but nothing happened, and no one was around. Even the residents of his castle seemed preoccupied with their daily lives. He was surrounded but alone with whatever was in the crate. It was nailed shut, but the prybar and mallet on one of the other carts made short work of that and within a matter of minutes the nails were loosened enough that he could gingerly pull the wooden lid off of the large coffin sized crate. He managed to give himself a small splinter in the process, but it was off and that was all that mattered. Inside, packed in fresh yellow straw was one large piece, swaddled tightly in silk cloth that clung to the very obvious curves of a feminine body. With furrowed brow, Daron wondered if his friends had commissioned a statue of someone for him. It wasn’t until he pulled away the fine cloth that he found the inert form of a woman laying in the crate. Daron took a half step back, his head immediately swiveling left and right to see if anyone was looking before stepping back up to the crate. She hadn’t moved and after a moment of observation found that she was also not breathing. Blinking Daron took a moment to take her in. Long hair, not quite snowy, but far lighter than anyone he had ever seen before clashed hard against the redness of her lips. He wasn’t sure if the intent was to make her look as if they were stained in blood, but he had seen enough blood in his life to know that it wasn’t the right color. Nor was it akin to rubies, it was just deeply maroon. By all accounts though she was beautiful in a strange ethereal kind of way, the same way elves carried themselves. Leaning in he pulled back more of the sheet only to reveal that she was completely unclothed, at least her chest was. The sigh of well proportioned but bare breasts sent a flash of heat through his body. His heart was immediately racing and he could physically feel the heat radiating from his face. He quickly tossed the sheet back over her chest and once again looked around to see if he had been caught. Seeing that he had not, he formulated a new plan. The silken sheet was tucked around her body again and the lid returned to the crate. Daron himself nailed in half a dozen of the nails and made sure it was all secure. It took him another few minutes to flag down someone he knew was strong enough to help him haul the thing up to his private quarters. Navigating spiraling stairs and corridors was a chore, but well worth it. Mercifully there were only a few questions which Daron easily deflected with a lordly “It’s personal” comment. Once the box was in his room, the door closed, and bolted, Daron pulled up a stool, tucked his longsword to the side and sucked in a deep breath. Opening the crate again and fully pulling back the silk wrapping revealed the woman’s entire form. She was every bit as beautiful as Daron had originally assumed. Slender and free of blemishes, while still looking as if her body was filled out and proper. Her chest full without being absurd like some of the serving maids he had come across in taverns. Hips slightly wider than he would have guessed given her frame. It wasn’t until his eyes flicked over her crotch that he noticed anything wrong. It was only a brief glance at first, but the observation was clear. There was nothing there. Not that there was an empty voice, there was definitely a continuation of her skin from her pelvis, but that was all it was. After his eyes bounced off of that part of her body he had to blink once and then intentionally look back. A smooth piece of flesh covered the space between her legs where her womanhood would be. It was slightly dented inward, lending it the appearance that there was something there, but only in the most vague senses. Perhaps it was curiosity, morbid or academic, but this was the catalyst for Daron to actually touch her. There was a certain amount of give to her skin, particularly on the spot between her legs. It felt as if there was some deeper opening just behind it, but there was no actual penetration. With furrowed brow he pushed a little harder and found that there was a limit to how far he could press the whole plate before it simply did not budge. He pulled his hand back and looked back to her body, attempting to see if there were other anomalies that he hadn’t initially noticed. He felt his heart leap again as he found her eyes open and looking at him. The red tint to them felt unreal and he leapt back before turning away and stammering. “I’m so sorry miss, I just. You seemed to. I’m so sorry, I’ll-” “Are you my new owner?” The question was spoken in a flat, calm tone. There was no accusation there, just a question. Nothing more, nothing less. Daron looked over his shoulder to her. She was sitting up in the crate, her expression expectant without accusation. She had asked a question and now was simply waiting. “I’m- I think so. I..what are you?” “A multi-purpose mechanical servant. Are you my new owner?” Daron could only blink at that. This was..an automaton? He had heard of, and even encountered some of them in his travels. He knew that they came in a variety of forms, some more rudimentary, almost like the magical and alchemical golems, others were far more human. Some were completely indistinguishable from the biological people who owned them. Daron found himself lost in thought for a moment and with a small shake of his head brought himself back to the present moment. His eyes met hers again, they were still unassuming and waiting. “I- I suppose I am.” She nodded and Daron could swear that there was a small, almost imperceptible flash inside of her eyes as she replied. A small crimson spark inside of her that fluttered and flickered and was gone as suddenly as it had appeared. She held out a hand to him, her palm down as if she were requesting help to get out of her crate. “Please hold your hand against your servant’s to claim it.” Daron’s brow furrowed for a moment. The words sounded so odd coming from someone who looked so perfectly human. Still, he reached out and gently took hold of her hand in his own. “Are there any additional runestones for this servant?” Daron didn’t know what that was but his eyes darted to the crate she was in and found other things in straw as well. Things he hadn’t noticed before as his eyes had drifted too quickly to her…to her figure. There was a small box inside of the straw she had been packed in. A simple small chest with polished brass rivets and a well oiled hinge was stuffed in near where her head had been resting. Near her feet was a roughly rectangular canvas bag. “Runestones?” Daron said, curiously reaching for the box inside of her crate, happy to have something else to focus his eyes on. Even without looking at her, he could still imagine a smile on her face in his mind's eyes. There wasn’t a giggle as she spoke, but Daron could swear he almost heard it. “They are in that chest. You can use them to customize how your servant functions.” His eyes darted to her for only a moment as he opened the chest and found small items inside. Barely thicker than his thumb and several fit handily in the palm of his hand. As he pulled one free of the silky cloth that was packed around them, he held it up to the morning light streaming through the opened double doors that led to his balcony. It felt like stone, of some kind, but certainly nothing like Daron had ever personally held before. Whatever it was made of seemed to shift in color as the light reflected off of its surface. As he stared at it he could see that there was a faint glow being emitted from the surface. Looking closer he could see that they weren’t simply floating on the thing, rather they were etched into the surface and the appearance of floating symbols was a trick of the light and angle of the weird little stone. He could tell that there were runes marring the entire surface of the stone, though he had no clue what they meant. What he did know was that they were arcane, and more than that, ancient arcane. His time with Tanila had introduced him to some of the runic magic in the world. She had valiantly tried to teach him a few things and he had caught onto enough to recognize some of the basic symbols. Moreover, he had learned that there were regional dialects. The gnomes and dwarves used similar runes, elves used entirely their own, and as humans dipped their hands into the magical arts they seemed to combine all manner of runes into a new language. These though. These were old. The edges of the etched marks were deep and smoothed around the edges. Ages of wear had somewhat smoothed off some of the sharper edges of the ragged little stones and the runes on it were very clearly some of the oldest dialects. None of which helped Daron identify them. He looked up from the item to the automaton and held one up. He opened his mouth to ask her what it was but she replied first. “A runestone of life. An excellent choice.” Daron tilted his head and looked from her to the stone and back. “What does it do?” “Inserting that will allow your servant to grow to act more and more human as time passes and more knowledge is gained.” “You won't act human without it?” “No, this servant will only obey your commands and serve at a low level.” Her tone was flat and lifeless, and there was something more. Daron only noticed it as she spoke, but she was constantly referring to herself as some kind of object. “Do you have a name?” he asked as he poured the remaining stones into his hand. “No.” The simple response took him by surprise and he looked in the distance for a moment as he contemplated something. If she was going to serve him, surely she would be moving around the keep, and there would be questions. People would interact with her and she would learn from them. She couldn’t simply be called ‘the servant.’ “If I use this one.” He held up the stone that she had called a life stone. “Will you have a name?” “If you give your servant a name, then yes.” “How do I use this? Can you tell me?” She took a step forward and stood up straight, her chest thrust forward. She was close and Daron felt a fresh surge of heat cross his body as he was suddenly reminded of how undressed she was. “As the owner of this servant, simply place your hand here-” She tapped a finger once against her sternum. “And that will open the runestone receptacle. Simply insert it.” It sounded so simple and yet so far beyond Daron’s comprehension. He was a well read gentleman, but magic and the arcane arts, and how they worked, was so far beyond simply learning a language and how to work it. It was like an ant attempting to understand why the heart of a human pumped blood in a different way than their own. Daron knew that it would work, of that he had no doubt, but he had no idea why or how and he wasn’t sure he would ever get those answers. Still, he followed her instructions. As he pressed his palm into her chest he felt nothing but skin that was too cold. Then it began to glow, seemingly from within, with a soft blue light. Something just below her flesh began spreading warmth over an isolated part of her body. Her eyes slipped closed and as they did Daron felt her skin retracting below his hand. He pulled back and revealed that a portion of her chest had simply peeled back and revealed the source of the light. A gently pulsing blue crystal resided inside of her chest, approximately where a human heart might be. Just below the lip of the revealed opening and slightly obscured by her remaining skin. There were other things inside of her too. Conduits with gently glowing runes on it, more of the rainbow colored stones all arranged in strange angles. Other things that were far beyond Daron’s comprehension but all of them seemed important to the automaton’s continued operation. Directly below the opening was something made of metal, brass, stone, and thin silky threads. Set in the front were a number of small slots that looked to be the perfect size to insert one of the runestones in Daron’s hand. He looked down at the small, haphazard pile of stones in his hand and mentally berated himself for not paying more attention to which one was which. Not that he had any reliable way to distinguish them if he had known. “Which one is the life runestone again?” He asked with a somewhat sheepish tone. She tapped one of the stones in his hand and in response he lifted it and aligned it with one of the slots inside of her exposed chest. Glancing up at her for some form of confirmation and receiving only the same vague smile she had been wearing the whole time. Daron pursed his lips and pushed the stone into place. She shivered slightly as it clicked into place and she let out the very smallest of gasps as whatever arcane life inside of her integrated something new into its weave. All at once she seemed to relax a little. Her shoulders slumped slightly and instead of standing at attention she shifted her weight to one side, letting her hip slide out to one side. “Are you okay?” Daron asked with a measure of concern. “Yes, your servant apologizes. That reaction is normal.” Daron noddedand looked back to his hand. “This one?” “Cooking, cleaning, and domestic work.” Daron figured that could be useful, inserted it and moved on, pointing to another one. “Combat and tactics.” That was enough to raise Daron’s eyebrows. He slipped the runestone into place inside of her, leaving a single slot open inside of her. There were more than one runestone remaining in his hand and he got the feeling that he might not want to over crowd her with new information. Something to make her more human and something to help him in defense of the castle seemed like a reasonable amount of information to start with. More could certainly be added later…he hoped. “That’s it for now.” Daron muttered as he cupped his hand and let the remaining runestones tumble into the silk sack they had come from and cinched it tight. With a nod the automaton in front of him looked down at her chest as the artificial flesh reformed itself. “Just a moment.” She said with a serene and almost distant tone in her voice. Daron stood and observed, seeing her eyes flicker slightly with a deep red light for a moment and her body stiffen from its previous stance. She seemed to shiver and then suddenly shake as if a chill had jolted up her spine, and then she was suddenly relaxed again. A small smile spread over her lips as she took a moment to look down at her nude body and then back to Daron. “Well well.” She muttered, causing Daron to blush again and avert his eyes. “I- you weren’t dressed when I- I can get one of the serving girls to bring you-” He stammered. “No need, there is a dress in the crate.” Daron heard the small sounds of rustling hay and the movement of cloth for a few more moments. Once it stopped he ventured a look over his shoulder to see his automaton dressed in a simple, but still elegant gown. Silken and as smooth as her skin was, it was tied with a simple light blue sash with hard soled slippers. She looked as if she belonged among the other serving girls in the castle. Perhaps that was the intention, though the deeper than average neckline suggested otherwise. Still, it was easily dismissed, and she would blend easily into the residents of the castle. “You mentioned a name?” Even the tone of her voice was different now. Before it had been crisp and clipped. Her answers had been brief and to the point with little room for meandering. Now it was soft and inviting and Daron could feel her voice beckoning him to answer her. “Yes, uhm, we can’t just have everyone calling you ‘servant’.” “Why not?” She interrupted, her tone seemed so accepting of the title. “Because that’s not what you are.” Daron replied. “You’re a resident of my castle and-” He couldn’t bring himself to say it. He knew it wasn’t true. She was, at her core, just a thing. As much a tool as the sword on his hip or the candles burning low around his chambers. Or was she? She had, herself, told him that she would grow and learn and become more as time went on. “-And?” She asked. “And you’ll have a name.” He thought for a moment. “Fiora.” She smiled at that. A small gesture, but coupled with her gently tucking away some of the platinum blond hair behind her ear, she suddenly became so much more human. She dipped her head gracefully. “Fiora. I understand my lord.” “Daron.” He corrected. “Lord Daron.” He wanted to correct her further, but let it slide. For now the appearance of being her lord was a perfect disguise for what she was. “Then how may I serve you, my lord?” Daron had almost forgotten what he was doing. The appearance of an automaton and the shock of seeing her nude and swaddled in a crate had stolen his agenda from his mind so keenly. He stood up straight and dug deep into his own mind. What had he been doing? Eyes darted back to Fiora, and more importantly what would she do? “Tidy up in here for now, eventually some of the other serving girls will come in. Introduce yourself to them and follow along with them, learn what you can.” A small head bow was all she needed to show to confirm that she had heard and understood Daron’s orders. As he stepped through the door and made his way back down to the courtyard he realized how much his words sounded more like orders that he would give soldiers in battle rather than a new serving girl. He planted a foot with the intention of turning back and apologizing, but the small gaggle of young girls swept past him, each one bowing their heads to him as they passed and heading for his room. They looked so young, and Fiora would look like a matron to them all when she walked with them. That was fine, and Daron would have to apologize later. For now, there were walls that needed repair. Daron set about hauling and working with a small but dedicated crew of carpenters and folks who had some experience with stone masonry. Repairing the wall was hard work, more so since most of the damage was done to the external surfaces. There was a significant portion of Daron’s day in the sun where he was helping to haul stones up and over damaged sections of the wall, only to help hold them in place against the outside of the wall while mortar and supports were wedged in place. The hot sun was hung high overhead and Daron, like his compatriots, had opted to shed their shirts and let what small amount of cool air waft over their bare skin. Sweat poured from his body and he was beginning to feel the day of work deep in his muscles. He was so used to sword work and combat stances for the last few months that this work seemed to target every muscle he hadn’t used. A chirping giggle from beyond the wall caught his, and everyone else's attention. Serving girls all holding pails filled with fresh, cool water drawn from the well. The gentle clank of a ladle inside only served to remind each one of them just how deep their thirst had become. Calling for a break in their labor was the right choice and Daron found himself sitting in the relative shade and coolness of a portion of the wall they had just finished rebuilding. Looking at the group of serving girls, he could see more than a few eyes darting to the new woman among them. He could also see that their gaze started low, on her hips and traveled upwards. Sizing her up and taking her in. Not to speak ill of those who resided in his castle, but Fiora was clearly magnitudes more attractive than many of the wives and maids within the walls. There would be conversations tonight between wives and their husbands. The smile on her face was so vibrant and nigh infectious. The other serving girls with her, though clearly a few years younger, already looked at her and laughed along with her. Some conversation had already happened and Fiora had clearly established something of a relationship with them. As the others pulled a deep ladle full of cool water and let the men drink from it, Fiora made a bee line for Daron and squatted down to his level. His eyes were locked with hers, though he could feel the eyes on him from around the courtyard. He cupped the ladle in his own hands and brought it to his lips. He was never really one to be served like that. He could take care of himself. Draining it and feeling the spreading coolness inside of him and raising the ladle to her to take. All he could do was wipe the moisture from his mouth and lick quietly at the droplets that clung to his well trimmed mustache and connected beard. Then it was time to get back to work, and with that Fiora moved quietly back to the group of serving girls. They would be wandering off to the mess hall kitchens to start the evening's supper. Stew of some kind surely, something simple he hoped. Why, though? As he hoisted another stone into place and waited for the masons to apply the mortar, he wondered. Why? Why would it matter if it was something easy or not? Because that meant it would be easy for Fiora to pick up on. Something simple for her to learn. Why would that matter? “My lord?” He snapped back and found that the mortar was in place and he was still straining against the stone unnecessarily. “My mind must still be on the road.” Daron laughed it off and continued on, more aware of what he was doing as he thought, but his mind still turned back to Fiora. He wanted her to be accepted. To integrate. Why? Obviously because then it would raise less questions about where she had come from. There was no need to expose that, not yet at least. Why should that matter? She was property, and he could do with her as he saw fit. So, again, why? Why did he want her to be successful? It would be a question he would ponder on for the remainder of the day. Once the sun dipped below the peaks of distant mountains and ushered in the cool of night, he called for work to stop. The wall was repaired now, and with stones left he was already mentally planning to use some of it to bolster some of the other residences in his care. That would be a project for another day though, a point his angry belly reminded him was less of a priority than being fed. He smirked, patted himself on the stomach once and announced that it must be time to tame a different kind of beast. A rousing cheer and slaps across the back, punctuated by laughter and agreement came with it. And so he made his way, with his countrymen to the dining hall. A grand structure in the lower reaches of the main keep. It would house almost everyone. The serving staff had their own nooks for eating as they served their duty, though it was never with resentment. There had been no shortage of parties and celebrations that had occurred in this hall. When the oak tables had been pushed to the side and the floor opened. Dancing, singing, and deep drinking had led to an uncountable amount of late nights. Daron’s entry into the hall caused a ruckus round of applause and cheers to arise from those in attendance and seated already. The sound arrived after the smell did. Something roasted, rich and deep and succulent. It was not simple or easy or, if the scent of it was any indication, plane. Dinner was, as expected, incredible. There had been plans set in place long before Daron returned. There was singing, dancing, good conversation, and a feeling of genuine mirth as the castle celebrated the return of their lord. Helene sat next to Daron and clapped along with the songs and even managed to sing along to a few verses that she knew. Among the festivities Daron found himself lost in the celebration, so when Helene gripped his arm quietly and leaned in he was taken by surprise. “That new serving girl seems to be a good addition.” She ended the statement with a simple nod and wink, causing Daron to wonder what she meant, but the thoughts were swept away by another round of songs. In fact Daron would find that the rest of the evening's thoughts would bubble up and then be lost so quickly in celebration. A celebration that lasted long into the night. He soon began to wonder how long it would be before the sunrise caused all involved to ponder a new day. And then he slipped into the comfortable sleep of his bed. He would never truly remember how the party ended, but he did remember collecting his sword and dragging himself to bed where he fell into comfort and the world faded. The morning light was a rude awakening. It always was. “Good morning my lord.” The voice was unexpected and Daron was instantly awake. The dirk he kept within reach on his night table was in his hand and the blade flashing in an instant. Brandished in front of him as Fiora smiled down at him in pure serenity. So loud was the hammering of his own heartbeat inside of his ears that he only saw Fiora bow deeply and step back in fright. He never once heard her apologize to him, nor the very human quaking in her voice as if she feared for her safety. It took a moment of wide eyed staring for Daron’s mind to put away the urge to strike and instead see the reason in what he was doing, what he was holding, how he was standing, and who he was threatening. “Fiora. I’m..I’m so sorry- I..I wasn’t expecting-” He stopped, swearing that there must be a trick of light cast from the mid morning sunlight on her face. Surely she wasn’t shedding a tear out of fear, though her hands were clutched to her chest and the expression on her face was absolutely fear. Not fear as if her life was threatened, but more fear that she had wholly offended someone near and dear to her. She bowed deeply again, her long white hair falling around her face to curtain her from his gaze. She stayed that way, quietly waiting, fearful that she might have done something so irredeemable that she would surely be returned to that gnome. She was afraid her future involved little more than standing upright and waiting for someone to have the coin to purchase her. Surely she would- A warmth, the subtle pressure that was both pressing on her and gently beckoning her to rise appeared on her shoulder. The hand must have been her lord, who else could it belong to? She looked up, her eyes focusing in on the room around her and found that, indeed, her owner was there, hand on her back, and to her surprise, smiling at her. She rose, hands clasped against her body and looked at him. She was not expecting the smile. Her eyes darted to his hands. The blade he had held was gone, stashed somewhere else out of sight. His mouth quirked up at one side, making the as yet uncombed mustache and beard look a little ridiculous, though she dare not laugh at it. “I’m so sorry. I’m not used to anyone being in my room when I awaken. It’s not normal for me.” She bowed again “I’ll be sure to wait somewhere else then.” “No no, that won’t be necessary. You’re welcome here, but, perhaps we should set up a comfortable place for you to sit where I can expect you to be. Would that be alright?” “Of course my lord.” The title was his, for certain, but it always felt like a sting when he heard it from someone new. He was just Daron, lord of the keep or not, he was just another person trying to do their best. Nobility was an ill fitting garment that was draped over his shoulders. Those responsibilities belonged to his parents, who by all rights should still be here. Taken too early from the world but lived on in local memory as heroes. Another weight on Daron’s shoulder was their legacy. No one had ever said so, but he knew that they expected equally great things from him. A deep sigh and weakened smile accompanied Fiora’s rise. She stood up but took a small step back, distancing herself from him again and retaining the respectful and unspoken boundary between the two of them. She was, after all, only a servant in his house. She excused herself, bowing again, and swept out of the room before he had an opportunity to stop her. He trusted that she knew where she was going and would make herself known later. It was only when he was left alone that he fully let his shoulders slump and fall back to the edge of his mattress. His head fell to his hands and he breathed out, hard. He was more ashamed of himself than anything else. He knew he was home, and safe, and Fiora had done nothing. She had surprised him, and that was all. He wondered how damaged he was that a petite woman in his room was enough to drive a shard of fear into his heart. The soft knock on his door stole his attention and he called for whoever it was to enter. He half expected Fiora, while the other half was to expect his usual serving girl to enter and present breakfast and morning drink. Helene was an unexpected arrival on his doorstep. “A word, if you have a moment.” She said softly into the room. Her tone was unexpected. Daron had known her as a formidable warrior, the captain of the guard in his castle..the castle that stood as a bastion of protection for the valley beyond. She could be a hard woman, and she often was. This, though, was something different. This was a voice that family used when speaking to one another on equal ground. Daron’s nod brought her from the doorway and into the room where she joined him on the edge of his bed. She put an arm around him and pulled him into a small squeeze for a brief moment. “Fiora.” She said before waiting a moment, letting Daron’s mind catch up. “She isn’t a human, is she?” Daron shook his head, unsure of how Helene had so quickly discovered what Fiora was. As if she could hear his thoughts with her waking ears she replied. “I have seen her kind before. I know of them.” “As have I.” Daron confirmed. “Do you know how to nurture one?” His puzzled look let her know all she needed to. “I don't rightly know much myself. I know they are purely arcane, and require attention in certain ways. Gnomes and Elves and wizards could tell you more, and I suggest you seek their wisdom on how to care for her.” A slow, deliberate nod was all the response she got. She nodded in return, slapped her hands onto her knees and pushed herself up to standing. A moment later she stooped to pick up Daron’s sword belt and drew his sword. “This is a good sword, you know.” She held it up and drew Daron’s attention. “Sturdy, well constructed. It’s served you well. You’ve clearly taken care of it too. Oiled it, sharpened it, used it for good.” She resheathed it. “If you take good care of the things you’ve been given, then they’ll serve you well for years and years. Your sword has a few chips in it, and the handle is wearing out a little, but it’s just right for you. Isn’t it?” A confused look crossed his face. “You’ve been given a tremendous gift, you should take care of it.” Helene said as she stood in the doorway, her back to her adopted nephew. “Fiora isn’t the sword, Daron, you are.” Her last look was at Daron, through Daron, deep into his very core. Who he was, who he thought he was. The door closed and Daron was alone again. He felt like a child again, being told that he might have made a mistake but it wasn’t something that he couldn’t correct. Helene was guiding him rather than handing him an easy answer. He dressed, changing into fresh clothes and strapping his sword belt back around his waist before walking out into the morning light on his balcony. Today would be a day of relaxation. After the work yesterday and the party last night everyone deserved it. He let out a breath and looked over to the courtyard of his own castle, and saw more activity than he expected. Some of his people were simply milling about, trying to live their normal lives in slow motion after the amount of beer they had drained the night before. Others were simply in the courtyard discussing things with friends and other residents. And somewhere in the middle of it all was a small grouping of people, centered around the newest addition to the castle. A white haired beauty, her hair catching and throwing the light all around her like some kind of radiant halo. Her head was tilted to one side, lending her a look of curiosity as she spoke with a small cluster of young girls. They were braiding one another's hair. Fiora was just observing and asking gentle questions and the answers she received seemed to only spark more questions. Daron watched for a moment or two as she asked, observed, asked again, got an answer, asked another question and then simply slipped into getting a full demonstration. He didn’t even realize he was smiling as she settled down onto the ground, a fleet of young girls swarming around her. Two were sitting in front of her, demonstrating the simple process of separating hair into three strands, crossing one over the top of the other and repeating it. All while her own hair slowly formed into a thin, tight braid of its own and tied in place with a ribbon red enough to match her eyes. Daron lost track of how long he stood there, soaking in the warm mid-morning sun, just watching. Fiora eventually had a number of braids, none of them matched, all of them administered by one of the girls, each tied in a new color of ribbon. After a while she seemed to catch on and ventured an attempt at braiding one of the girls' hair. Even Daron could see that it was an admirable attempt, but it was far from perfect. It fell out of the girl's hair almost immediately. Fiora was undeterred though. She tried again, then again, and again. Soon, her hands and fingers moved smoothly. Strands of hair appearing one over the other in tight and easy weaves. Soon she had managed to append a number of braids to each and every one of the girls who had taught her that very skill and ended with all of them laughing and parading around her. As they did so, Fiora ventured a look up at Daron, who was still on his balcony, simply observing the goings on. He was fully unaware of the smile that had appeared on his own face, and when Fiora looked up and smiled brightly and waved, he was equally unaware of the touch of pink that appeared on his cheeks. Still, he smiled royally in return, raised a hand and waved at her. He continued to watch her until the cluster of girls around Fiora took her hands and pulled her to her feet and seemed to dance away with her, taking out of Daron’s field of view. Disappointment, mild but prominent, swept over the young lord and he was once again left asking why. Fiora was only a servant and more than that literally just a tool in his castle. Why then did he feel so compelled to see her again? Sucking in a deep breath his mind swirled with that question and in an attempt to escape it his own mind turned to Helene’s words, which did little to soothe him. The remainder of the day passed in peace. Daron spent a considerable amount of time at his writing desk laying out plans and processes for more repairs. Somewhere in the late afternoon one of the other serving girls brought him a tray of meats, cheeses and bread on a platter along with a pitcher of water fresh from the well, and as she set it down Daron had a moment of clarity on something he had promised Fiora. “Excuse me.” He muttered as she turned to leave. “You know the reading chairs in the library?” “Of course my lord.” “Find two able bodied boys to bring one of them up here to me.” He ordered before adding as a quiet afterthought.. “The most comfortable one you can find.” She dipped her head and retreated from the room, leaving Daron alone again. He had almost forgotten the request when the sound of grunts and shuffling preceded a gentle knock on his door. It was the chair he had requested, stacked on top of it was an ottoman. The wooden frame was clearly old and used, judging by the multitude of scuffs and scrapes on it, but the cushioned fabric was well maintained at least. More than that though, it looked deeply comfortable, the kind of chair that one would sit in and then wait for a moment or two as you sank deep into it. “Perfect, over there, in the corner.” Daron instructed, indicating one of the corners of his room that was clear of most of the clutter and furniture. Tucked away just on the other side of a freestanding wardrobe, and only a matter of a few feet from the doors leading to his balcony. As the two young boys set the chair in place and bowed before asking if there was anything else, Daron noted that the corner was almost perfectly suited as a very comfortable reading nook. He gave his thanks and dismissed the two boys and looked at the new arrival. It was missing something though. Daron sat down on the large wooden crate Fiora had arrived in that he had yet to remove from his large chambers. What did it need? He stared for a moment before rising and pulling a thin blanket from his bed and tossing it over the arm and back of the chair. Better, but not quite. A small round marble topped side table was added from elsewhere in his room. He nodded, it was almost there, though no matter how hard he looked around his room he found that what it needed wasn’t there, until suddenly it dawned on him. He dressed himself, choosing to remain somewhat casual while still remaining regal. A white ruffled shirt, buttoned up and tucked into a pair of breeches and simple leather boots. His sword strapped to his hip and his shoulder length hair pulled back into a simple tail on the back of his head. With that, he swept out of his room and made his way, with purpose, to the library. Once there, he set about browsing the shelves, occasionally pulling a book from the shelves and tucking it under his arm. He took his time, weighing possibilities, until he had a half dozen thick volumes with him, then he returned to the room. Stacking them on the table next to the chair, that same small smile spread over his lips. He didn’t have long to wait. The chill in the air had forced his hand and he had lit a fire in the hearth, which by now was burning low as Fiora rapped lightly on the heavy wooden door to his suite. Daron was at his own desk when the sound shook him away from his maps and back to the present. He called to whomever was at the door to enter and looked over his shoulder. The opening between the door and the jamb was miniscule, and somehow Fiora managed to slip easily between it. So graceful that her simple peasant’s dress didn’t seem to even brush against the wooden frame, and then she was there and the door was silently closed. Only in that moment did Daron realize how dark it was outside, how deep into the evening he had sat there at his desk, worrying and fussing over repairs and tasks, and how cold the room had become. Fiora stepped to the small wood pile and tossed a fresh log onto the fire and hoped that it would catch before turning back to Daron. With the fire beginning to rise behind her, the light did wonders to silhouette her and give her something of an ethereal radiance. The braids in her hair had fallen over the course of the day, but still loosely held their place, almost as if she thought someone would be offended to take them out. With hands folded in front of her, she looked at her owner, and he, in turn, looked back at her. It wasn’t entirely clear to Daron, but he sensed that there was something wrong with the automaton. “My lord.” She began, earning a small reaction from Daron. “I- I need to replace my power source, and, I’m sorry to inconvenience you, but I’ll need assistance in changing it.” She refused to meet his eyes, and for the first time the lord of the castle detected a bit of fluster on her cheeks instead of his. His small, amused smirk should set her at ease, but he understood that there seemed to be some delicacy needed for this. Daron knew that, at least for now, she was still just a mechanical thing that was person shaped. He didn’t see her that way, she was already more than just that and he knew that on some level all magic had a personality. Fiora was fueled purely by magic so there had to be some form of will in there somewhere, which elevated her beyond a mere object in his castle. “Of course. What can I do to help?” The pink on her cheek intensified as her hands began to wring themselves in a nervous kind of fidget. She bit gently into her lip and managed to finally look up at her lord. “It..It will require me to..to disrobe and open up a bit more. You’ll- You’ll need to put your hand on me like you did with the runestone and take out my power crystal and place a new one inside of me.” The words spilled out and Daron, conceptually, understood what she needed, though the specifics of it were still above his level of knowledge. What he did understand was the idea that she would need to undress in order to do whatever was needed. Not that nudity, or even her nudity bothered him, but at least he was prepared for it now. “Where can we get these crystals?” “Were there none sent with me? When..when you purchased me?” Daron blinked at that and glanced over at the wooden crate that still lay open and unmoved. Right where it had been when she was brought into his chambers the day before. He hadn’t bothered to move it out yet, nor had he actually searched it for anything else. He took this opportunity to rise from his desk and shuffle through the packing straw and reveal another small burlap sack, clinking with something clearly crystalline inside of it, and just below it was some kind of rounded device that looked as if it needed some kind assembly to use. Daron was careful to pull all the pieces out as Fiora looked on, patiently waiting, never moving from her position in front of the fireplace. Daron seemed to perk up all at once and moved from the crate to the small reading corner he had set up. Placing the round disk on the table next to the pile of books he turned back and beamed at Fiora. “I forgot, I set this up for you. Just a little place for you to call your own. We don’t have an abundance of spare room in the castle, so I thought you could stay here.” He gestured to the chair and table. The fidgeting hands in front of Fiora rose to clutch at her chest for a moment as she looked over the cozy little corner. It looked out into the room with a perfect view of Darons bed and writing desk, though it would be easily obscured by his wardrobe from someone standing in the doorway. If someone wanted to see her, they would need to fully step into the room before they could see her. “That’s- for me?” her voice wavered. “All for you, no one else. Even me.” “Just..just for me? But..but why?” “You deserve a place to call your own. Until some better arrangements could be made for you.” Daron confirmed. She took a step forward, away from the fire and towards her corner. Her eyes never strayed from the rich red cushions or the fine wood grain on the rounded table. Soon her and Daron were standing shoulder to shoulder next to the chair. Her eyes darting over everything, taking in the colors and textures, the stack of books and the gold leaf words on the spines. It was all for her. “Do you like it? I can move it-” “I love it. Thank you my lord. You’re too kind to me.” That seemed to strike, strangely at Daron’s heart. She sounded so sincere about it, while still remaining oddly distant. Like there was some entity on the other side of a portal screaming into the void and only the barest whisper of intent made it through. Still, he was thankful she was pleased with it. With a sigh of relief he wasn’t aware he was holding, he turned to the device on the table. “Do you know how to construct whatever this is?” Fiora snapped out of the trance-like stance she had been wrapped in. Her arcane field mind had been busily absorbing every last detail about her only possessions. With the refocus on the present question she managed to conjure the information needed. Together her and Daron assembled the device. The silvery platter that made up the base had a sturdy rod that rose up the length of a hand before connecting to another, smaller disk. Etched into the upper disk were a number of runic symbols and arcane marks, none of which appeared to be even remotely familiar to Daron. Fiora had taken the small sack and emptied into her hand two oblong crystals. While in her hand they emitted a small glow, Daron saw no such glow while he held them, though the faintest vibrations of magical potential were easily felt. Once it was assembled, Fiora blushed again and sucked in a deep breath. “Are you ready?” “For what?” Daron asked. “You need to open me up, and swap one of the crystals inside of me with one of those.” She gestured to one of the crystals humming in Daron’s hand. “Oh. Right, yes of course. These power you? Give you the ability to move around, right?” She nodded and without further prompting unfastened the sash around her waist and shrugged out of the dress she wore. The silky fabric fell off of her body as easily as water would, leaving her standing in a crumpled pile of cloth. “Place your hand here” She said flatly. Daron had to take a moment to take her in. He had been so shocked the last time he had seen her in the nude that he could only recall glances and flashes of skin. Now though, she was willingly presenting herself to him and he was prepared for it. She was immaculate. His previous thought about his companions commissioning a statue might have been accurate, as she looked to be purposefully built to be ideally attractive. Fair skin, perfectly firm and rounded breasts that were proportioned specifically for her slender and petite form. Flowing curves at her hips and legs that looked soft but clearly hid some kind of power just below the skin. His eyes snapped to where one of her fragile looking fingers tapped on her abdomen. With a stoic nod he pressed his palm against her belly and once again felt the icy coldness of her skin against his palm. A small glow appeared below her skin as Fiora let her eyes slip closed and a small sigh escaped her lips. In an instant a small swarm of intricate glowing lines appeared across her torso, each one underscored by small arcane symbols. One down either side of her chest and abdomen, another streaking across her collar bone while another cut a flowing line across her lower belly, just above the hips. The last to appear ran from the center of her throat down to her lower belly. With another gasp, Fiora dipped her finger into the arcane seam between her breasts and tugged outward, causing Daron to take a half step backwards. The room, previously lit only by the fire and candles, was now gently illuminated in a swirl of colors, all issuing forth from inside of Fiora. As Daron’s eyes adjusted to the influx of light he could see that her chest had been split in half and were now hovering mere inches away from her body, tethered in place by threads of light that seemed to shift in hue depending on what angle they were viewed from. As his eyes traveled from her opened chest into the components inside of her, he slowly realized just how complicated the automaton was. She was packed full of mechanism of some kind or another, tucked behind a dull gray looking ribcage. Each one criss crossed with arcane symbols and glowing runes. Some small and strung together, others seemed to be a prominently displayed single or double rune. Each one pulsed with light at its own rhythmic pace. Silvery strands of magical energy connected each one and at the center of it all was, what Daron assumed, was some kind of core mechanism. Housed in a metallic casing. Not so much a cage, but more of a mechanism to harness and direct the energy of the crystal at its core. It was much larger than the small ones that powered her, and didn’t pulse like the other moving parts inside of her, rather it gently grew and fell with an internal light. It looked to Daron almost as if it were breathing. The small moving parts and pieces that were arrayed around it served some purpose and Daron felt more than a little mesmerized at the gentle beauty of how everything worked with one another while still remaining their own contained ecology. Fiora worked her arm around one of her floating chest panels, and tapped something inside of her, just to one side, approximately where a human heart would be located. It was hidden below the gray ribcage, but as Fiora pressed in on her sternum, even that split and opened like her outer chest had. Once they were out of the way there was a small lockbox with a small turn latch on it. “You’ll need to open this. Take out the crystal and replace it with one of these.” She gestured at one of the small crystals in Daron’s hand. “And just be forewarned, I’ll be down once you remove it.” Daron found her voice to be sleepy now, starting to sound more like whispers than spoken words. He nodded and with all the confidence he could muster, reached into her open torso and turned the latch. Looking to her for some form of confirmation that what he was doing was right, all he found was Fiora’s half-lidded eyes looking back and accompanying small smile. Opening the small cover found a similar looking crystal inside, held in place by faintly glowing tendrils of magic. So small was the space that he was forced to pinch the crystal with his thumb and forefinger to pull it out. Once he did though there was an immediate reaction. Fiora’s body slumped slowly back into the chair, with her eyes fully closed and her head lolling to one side. Once glowing runes and arcane symbols faded to darkness inside of her. The crystal at the very core was still gently pulsating, though it seemed somewhat weaker now. He set aside the crystal he had extracted and gently pushed a new one into place, not knowing what to expect now. Once the new crystal was inside of the casing, those same magical tendrils wrapped around it and almost pulled it into place. A fresh flush of energy flowed through Fiora and she sucked in a deep breath through her nose and then let it seep back out. As she did everything inside of her seemed to reignite and glowed brightly again. Daron looked up in time to see Fiora smiling, eyes still closed and almost cooing softly. “Thank you, my lord.” She said in a dreamy tone. In the next few moments Fiora pushed her opened ribcage back into place and then the floating outer chest pieces. Once they met again the glowing lines of runic magic bound and twisted her flesh back together and she once again looked whole. She seemed to snuggle down into place in her chair and seemed to be enjoying a cozy warmth that only she felt for the moment. Soon though she stood and pulled her gown back on, though decided to forego the sash for the moment. She picked up the empty crystal and slipped it into the space between the upper and lower disks on her side table. As she put it in place the symbols etched into the top disk began to glow and a nearly invisible thread of translucent magical energy connected the crystal to the disk. Fiora explained to Daron that this would slowly siphon off some of the natural magic from the world around them and pour it into the crystal, quite literally. He watched as a physical droplet of magical energy formed and then slid down the thread into the crystal. Every few minutes another droplet would appear and drip into the slowly swirling crystal, causing it to glow slightly more with each droplet. It was explained that Fiora, depending on how much strenuous work she did, would need to do this same process every other day. If the work took a lot out of her it might need to be a nightly routine, and unfortunately, he would need to be involved every time. She could extract the crystal herself, but once it was out of the harness she would be useless to insert a new one. A fact that Daron was graciously happy to do for her.
In that time though, Daron could easily see the growth in her. When Fiora had mentioned that the Runestones would help her grow and evolve all those months ago, he had envisioned some small changes. Fiora had grown explosively though. The small stack of books he had laid out for her all those weeks ago were quickly consumed. Fiora had read and reread them at least twice before she mentioned to her owner that she was done with them and enjoyed them. The tales of regional heroes and thrilling adventure chronicles were replaced with political theories and stories of political intrigue. Those were then replaced with books on theory and philosophy. Daron found that Fiora didn’t seem to have a preference for what she read, she simply liked to take in all the knowledge provided to her. It was something that Daron had not expected. He considered himself more a man of action than theory, but he couldn’t help but smile at her. She was enraptured by anything she read, to the point where on more and more occasions Daron would join her. He would sit on his bed with his own journal, rereading his old entries and then eventually began reading along with some of the volumes Fiora had finished. She would be in her little corner, gently humming some tune to herself that she picked up from the other serving girls, turning page after page. Sometimes Daron found himself only glancing at the page in front of him, preferring to look at her. The flickering candles casting dancing lights across her ethereal form. The light playing tricks on the lily white skin and shimming over her equally whitened hair. Fiora had begun wearing her hair in a long, thick braid ever since she had learned how to style it herself. Daron noticed that most of the small habits she had picked up from various members of his house were quickly and permanently integrated into her daily routines. It wasn’t uncommon to hear her humming and eventually singing along with the other residents. Nothing so organized as a chorus, but a gentle tune would often be heard wafting on the breeze and as she passed along and bowed to her fellows they would join in where they could. The children seemed to follow in her stead and provide a giddy and often off tune backup. Laundry was done with the other serving staff and all the more cheerful because of Fiora’s presence. As the mid-summer sun hadn’t yet risen, Daron slipped out of bed. Fiora was still sleeping, or whatever approximation an automaton like her would do in the middle of the night. He dressed in field gear and as always belted his sword to his hip. Today though, he had plans for he and Fiora. Usually there was a simple routine she would follow, and today that routine would change. He managed to slip out of the room and down to his barracks and back before she had woken, though her eyes did flutter open as he closed the door behind him. Held in his arms were two wooden training swords. The weight and balance on them wasn’t perfect, but that was alright, they would be fine for a beginner like Fiora. Wrapped around the swords were a pair of breeches he hoped would fit her well enough and a shirt that would offer more mobility, or at least less hindrance, than her gown. “Good morning. Ready for something new?” Daron asked, the smile his voice carried was apparent. “Always” she replied and seemed instantly awake. Tossing the bundle onto the foot of his bed, Daron gestured to it and Fiora looked to him and smiled brighter than the sun that was cresting the horizon. She practically skipped to the bed and investigated what was there. Her smile never faded, but added to it was a look of curiosity. “We put in that combat and defense runestone, and like all the people in my care, I’ll require you to know how to fight should the need arise.” There was no real bite in the statement. It had been years since there was any kind of attack on the kingdom, the last time anything had breached the walls of the castle Daron’s parents had- “I’ll be personally instructing you. We’ll start and end our day with some sparring exercises.” The smile turned quickly to a smirk. “Until I can best you?” She giggled and Daron raised an eyebrow at that. “One thing at a time.” Fiora’s pure smile returned and she dipped her head before reaching down and pulling her gown off with no hint of shame. Daron, true to his nobility, averted his eyes and turned away to allow her some privacy. She was dressed again in a matter of a few moments and was already holding the mock sword in her hands when Daron turned back to her. Within the hour Daron and Fiora were in the center of the small packed dirt pit in the barracks. Daron was gently chanting and moving slowly through a series of forms. As he counted off he demonstrated and Fiora followed along. In no time at all Fiora was smoothly rolling through the forms and Daron approved as small beads of sweat began forming on his forehead. It would be another week of morning and evening practices before Daron offered to spar with her. Even then it was slow and methodical, clacking wooden blades against one another in a controlled sequence. The crowds had gathered as the week progressed. One on one training with Daron, the undisputed master of the craft within the walls of the castle. But it was Fiora, sweet, innocent girl that she was. Her time there had earned her a reputation of being unrelentingly cheery and the thought of a real blade in her hand was almost unimaginable. Still, as the pair squared off she seemed to be a natural at the movements. Her control over exactly where the blade went was unparalleled. Daron knew why, and it made sense. Whatever mechanical and arcane contraptions inside of her arms and shoulders moved that wooden sword, they were precise to a fault. Whoever had made her, gnomes, elves or otherwise had made sure that she always moved with purpose. Not wanting to lose face just yet, Daron began to pick up the pace and Fiora had little trouble matching that pace, at least to a point. Where the automaton had precision and speed in spades, Daron was human and didn’t have to follow the expected flow of combat. So when he feigned a strike and instead spun back on his heel and swept his leg out, Fiora’s feet were swept from under her. The yelp she made as she fell to the ground was almost as cute as the small sound she made when she hit. The swear words were less cute, but more than appropriate, and ended the sparring session. The eruption of cheers from the onlookers stole the scowl from Fiora’s lips and replaced it with a barely contained laughter. She took the hand offered to her and was hoisted back to her feet where she began brushing the dust and dirt from her rump. So it went. Training in the morning, a routine that even Daron had to admit was becoming more and more of a challenge for him, and then back to daily routines. Fiora would do the chores she had been doing all along, and Daron would continue his duties as lord of the castle. There were dignitaries he would entertain, plans for repairs and more improvements to mull over. Evenings, Fiora and Daron would meet back in the barracks, and begin sparring. The young lord had to admit that he was enjoying himself in those times. Fiora’s improvement was exponential. Where Daron had trained others for weeks upon weeks with only marginal improvement, Fiora was already at a level where he would pit her against any of the trainees, and that gave him a moment of thought. He wanted to do something for her, but it would take time. Not that there was a shortage of it, though. As Daron sat at his desk in his quarter, sketching and making notes for himself he heard the door behind him creak open. A small exhale drew a small smile to his lips. “Long day?” He asked as Fiora practically fell into her chair. She had taken to wearing the breeches and shirt more than her gown these days. As she settled into place, she slumped a bit and exhaled again before turning her eyes to Daron. “Yes my lord-” “I told you not to call me that.” he said with a small wave of his hand. He knew she did it intentionally too. They had had a conversation about his title. In front of the other residence it was fine, but in private it was more grating than anything. The small giggle she let out only confirmed that it was intentional. “I’m ready for a fresh crystal.” She muttered. Daron looked over, her eyes were only half open and her voice sounded, for lack of a better word, sleepy. He had seen her like this before, when her power crystal ran low on arcane energy she seemed to regress a bit. Her reactions slowed, her body moved sluggishly and she seemed to mentally shut off those things that were unneeded. “Right, arms up.” Fiora barely complied, taking a lazy moment to let her arms drift up and once they were out of the way, Daron pulled her top off. With practiced deftness he pressed his palm into her body and then pulled back the chest panels. The blue arcane threads that tethered them to her torso were barely visible and clearly weak. He plucked the crystal from inside of her and watched as her head slumped back and her small movements ceased fully. He slipped the crystal into the refilling station where a new thread of magic took hold of it and began pouring energy back into it. Taking a fresh one and then slotting it back into place seemed to fully refresh those arcane threads and waken Fiora again. She let out a breath and gladly took over the process of closing her chest and redressing herself before straightening herself up in the chair. “So, had a fun little conversation today.” That drew his attention away from the parchment in front of him. Fiora rarely talked about what she had talked about unless she was specifically asked about it. Still, Daron raised an eyebrow and let out a small grunt for her to continue. “The girls wanted to know what you were like.” She giggled and winked. “They still think you’re my private maiden i see.” “Not any more.” Daron tilted his head and furrowed a brow at her. “I told them I wasn’t really capable of that type of thing. I just didn’t have what it took. So, of course, they didn’t know what that meant so I explained to them that I’m an automaton and not a real person, and that I didn’t have any of the right pieces for any of that kind of behavior.” Daron wasn’t sure how long he sat there, gobsmacked, by how casually Fiora shattered the illusion he had tried to maintain. Not that he was angry over it, not yet at least. “-And how did they take that?” Daron asked, attempting to keep his fear away from his voice. Fior shrugged. “They were interested for sure, and there were so many questions, gosh they wouldn’t stop. So I spent most of my day talking about myself. You know how much I hate doing that.” She giggled and rolled her eyes before beaming at him. “They weren’t upset or anything. They didn’t react..poorly?” “Not at all, they are good people, clearly. They have worked alongside me for long enough that they know what I’m about. Just one of the girls. No one seems to care that i'm more magic and mechanisms than flesh and blood, so long as the work gets done.” Daron sat back in his chair, letting out the breath he had subconsciously been holding, and with that breath a heft of the fear that had been clutched in his heart. Fiora was different, on so many levels. She wasn’t human, not even biological, but there was something else there. She was so unflappable and always optimistic. Daron, in that moment, began to have a dawning realization about how different the two of them really were. And yet, they so easily complimented one another. Where he knew he was somewhat dour when left to his own devices, he was now rarely alone. His room used to be where he went to sulk when the day was hard. Now it was where Fiora was, and she was always a radiant presence in his life. The weight of his sword weighed down on his belt, but today it felt a little lighter because Fiora was here and she was rapidly becoming a deadly force. Between himself, Helene, and Fiora he felt some measure of pity for anyone who might try and breach those walls again. She made him see all that was good in the world, and see it in abundance. Daron smiled, and for the first time in a long time it felt so genuine. He could almost feel the years of hardship cracking and falling off of him. It was only one less thing to worry about, but it was something good and pure, and he couldn’t help himself. “Good.” He commented at last. Life carried on as it always had from there. Daron and Fiora sparred and trained and in response her combat and tactics runestone filled up. He couldn’t help but notice that at a certain point she was beginning to match him. He still had plenty of tricks to use on her if need be, they were dirty and underhanded, but in the heat of battle they were what was required. He also realized that the weight and balance of the wooden training sword they were using would become a hindrance. She needed something real, to hold actual steel. Four weeks later the mid afternoon knock on his door brought a courier to him. It was a simple letter which spoke of the completion of something he had requested a while back, when Fiora was still learning. She had grown so much since then. As it happened, that evening the pair of them found themselves on the balcony as the sun was setting. The sky painted in a wash of colors that seemed to be not only reflected but amplified in Fiora’s eyes. The pair looked out over the lake and towards the city beyond. The distant sparks of light leapt to life as lamp lighters around the city illuminated streets with oil lamps along the cobbled streets. Houses along the waterfront breathed to life as warm fires were ignited in hearths and the whole of the city began to glow like some distant arcane torrent. Fiora sighed and smiled as she looked out at it. Her chin resting comfortably in her hands as she leaned forward over the rail. The warm evening had demanded her gown and not the stuffy tightness of her training clothes. The gentle breeze played at the hem of her gown and sent it flowing. Daron, standing upright and looking stately, looked out at the lake and only occasionally glanced at Fiora. His eyes always sliding over her curves before darting away. “It’s so beautiful.” Fiora said, her voice dreamy. Daron’s eyes had been on her when he grunted. He knew what she meant and it wasn’t the same thing as him. “Do you want to go there?” Daron asked, nudging his chin towards the city. “It’s a little late for that isn’t it?” “We have a weekly caravan that takes goods and produce to the city. We have a whole stall set up in the market. It leaves in two days if you would like to ride along.” Daron remarked. Then there was another cooling silence. Both looked out at the lake and the distant city beyond. The last rays of the sun casting its last gift across the lake. It sparked like so many twinkling stars across the surface of the still water. The occasional ripple distorted the light just enough to make the shifting sea look alive. “How do you feel about boats?” Daron asked. Fiora turned to him, seeing him staring out at the water, unmoving and holding firm to his question. It wasn’t so odd, but it was certainly unexpected to Fiora’s arcane fueled mind. “I’ve never been on one. At least never while awake.” She replied. Daron turned to her and held out a hand to take hers. She obliged with a curious smile, completely unaware of what he had in mind. “Care to take a small trip out onto the lake then?” Fiora smiled with an equal brightness to the sinking sun and nodded eagerly. So as long shadows crept ever further into the castle walls, Daron and Fiora stole away through the cool evening and down to the small marina at the rear of the castle. There were guards there who simply saluted or nodded at the lord of the castle and let him carry on. Even going as far as to help untie the small rowboat and offer a hand to help the lady into it. Daron had little trouble with the oars. The movements were easy and practiced to him, though not nearly as fluid as his sword play. His powerful muscles strained against the water every time they dipped into it, but the small boat was propelled into the lake with ease. There was little conversation to be had as Daron strained against the oars. Fiora, for her part, was enamored by the simple feeling of the cool breeze that curled up from the water and breathed softly into the night air. The crystalline look of the setting sun was replaced by the enclosing darkness and by the time the pair had made enough progress into the lake, the moon was beginning to materialize in the night sky. Pulling the oars up and out of the water one last time, Daron oriented them along the hull of the small rowboat and settled them into place inside. They drifted onward for a few moments longer until they naturally came to a rest. The natural subtle churn of the water below them would keep them gently rocking and slowly circling, allowing Fiora to slowly take in a full panorama of the still lake. It was quiet, secluded, and peaceful. So hastily had they left the castle on Daron’s whim that it wasn’t until just now that Daron realized he was not only unarmored, but unarmed as well. There were no plates of boiled leather over his chest, no braces on his arms and no blade at his hip. The realization washed over him, but in an instant it was gone. In the next instant he had a new revelation. He didn’t feel a need to have those things. Here, on the lake, alone with Fiora meant there was no need for it. Daron was familiar with the sensation of weight being lifted from his shoulders. Every time he doffed his usual armor there was a release. Unbelting his sword and letting it rest freed his hips from the weight of it. And now, alone in the moonlit boat on a quiet lake with Fiora, his soul felt that same weight being lifted. With nothing to weigh down his heart, he began to see things in a new light. The lake was every bit as beautiful as it had been every other time he had seen it, but now there was room in his heart to appreciate it. The glow of Jarin truly was a mysteriously gorgeous sight. His eyes flicked to Fiora. How had he missed her in all of this? Her eyes were dancing over the still surface of the waters, taking it all in. The sun was gone and replaced with the pale light of the moon now, not that it mattered. Fiora reflected and brightened everything she touched. Her white hair seemed to glow just as much, and Daron wasn’t convinced that it wasn’t some kind of arcane trick that he never noticed before. It was still braided and tied with that same ribbon that the little girl had gifted her months before. She still wore the gown that she had been packaged with. She was, by all rights, the very same woman that had come out of that wooden crate months before, but she very clearly was not the same. She had grown, laughed, and learned to be a person. She was more than just a machine, she was a real person. Daron could only stare, entranced by every small movement she made. The gentle smoothness of her face, the subtle blush on her cheeks and the sing song sigh she would make from time to time. All of it penetrated deep into Daron’s heart and he felt it swell. He watched her, for him it felt like an eternity that stretched onward forever, and he was happy with that, but it was equally short and ended far too soon. As Fiora and Daron locked eyes on one another in that boat on an infinitely empty moon lit lake, something snapped. Something Daron had been holding onto for so very long. A deep seeded need to protect, not just those around him, or the valley beyond, the city in the distance and those he loved, but himself as well. There was always some danger out there waiting to snap him up in the darkness. It was why he kept a sword with him, it was why he was always on his toes and cautious. All of it crumbled before Fiora’s gaze, and with his defenses down her smile, so soft and subtle, planted a seed of something beautiful. Neither one was sure who leaned in first, but in the span of a few hasty breaths their lips had met. Their kiss lingered onward in the dark silence, the heavy blanket of a peaceful evening draped over the two of them. Daron’s hands coming up to her cheek just to feel more of her and in turn Fiora reached out for him. Her hands trailed around his chest and pulled him ever closer until they were pressed against one another. The heat from his body and the gentle electric tingle of her arcane mechanisms met in the diminishing space between them. On and on they went, until Daron was out of breath and had to pull away. He wanted to take in one breath and then return to her, but she was pulling back slightly. Not in a way that would suggest she didn’t like what had just happened, but more than there was something that she wanted to say. “What’s wrong, was- was that too much?” He asked. “No, I just…I want to do more, I just. I don’t know how to. Or if I can.” Daron nodded at that. He had moved far too quickly for her, and he had no one to blame for that but himself. He started stacking bricks onto the wall that had been demolished, it was what he did. He only stopped when her hand came to rest on his and he looked back up. A second later they were kissing once again, it lacked the needy and hungry passion that had been there before, it was replaced by a cooling comfort. Daron put the bricks down, perhaps he didn’t need them. She pressed in, letting the subtle comfort flow from her mouth into his and it was Daron’s turn to reach out to her and pull her into him. The same tingling feeling as before rose between them and then Fiora pulled away. This time she looked disappointed and almost embarrassed. Her pleading eyes met his. “I- I just don’t know what to do now. I love the feeling I just…there’s something missing. I-” She stumbled, “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” They clasped hands and both bumped their foreheads together. “We’ll take care of that. We’re headed to the city soon, I know we can find someone to help.” Fiora nodded and Daron rose to plant a small kiss on her forehead. He hated that she was upset and his mood shifted. He still felt something. Something deep inside of him that he hadn’t felt in a long time, so long that he was surprised he could recall it from the depths. He loved her. Not only did he love her but he wanted only good things for her. To shower her in kisses, love, gifts and quiet moments of delight. He wanted more, so much more. He wanted all of her to the point where he fully forgot that she was only an automaton. Fiora was a machine and he was a human, and for all Daron cared, that didn’t matter one bit. They would be together and that was a settled matter. The voyage back to the docks was just as quiet. Fiora was more still, holding her hands in her lap and her lips remained pressed together as a thin line. Daron smiled at her every time he caught her eye, and she would return a weak smile. They were still some way away from the marina when Daron broke the silence that had presided over their return. “What troubles you?” It took Fiora a while to formulate an answer. The arcane mind that occupied her struggled through everything it had learned. It was like it was trapped inside a vast library of knowledge, but every time she found what she wanted to say there was a hard wall that slammed her back. She opened her mouth to reply only to close it again and return to contemplation. Finally, though, she managed to formulate something. “I feel like you’re disappointed in me. Because I’m not functioning as expected.” She looked down, scared to see her lord's response. All she saw was her hands fidgeting in her lap, and then she heard his voice. “Fiora. You aren’t a disappointment to me. Even if we never figure this particular thing out, you’ll always be a light in my life. You have nothing at all to worry about.” She smiled at that and as they disembarked she seemed to pep up again, returning to her cheerful self, though it was tempered. At least until Daron took her hand in his own and held on as they walked through the courtyard. There were surely eyes watching the pair, but for the first time in ages, Daron wasn’t concerned about that.
The sound of giggling children from outside drew his attention. He knew that he should find Fiora and do their daily sparring, but surely one day wouldn’t hurt. Stepping out onto the balcony and looking out into the courtyard he saw a group of children clumped together, and then suddenly one began counting and the group split. Each child bolted out into the castle and hid. Some better than others. Daron smiled at that and after dressing himself more properly he strolled out into the courtyard and strode up to the small boy who was finishing up his rushed countdown. Once his eyes were opened and he was met with the lord of the castle there was an obvious moment of hesitation. Daron smirked and squatted down, the movement felt off for some reason, but that was no concern at the moment. He was going to play a game and hoped to track down Fiora in the process. “Need a hand finding your friends?” He asked and the child before him shed the look of fear and replaced it with a smile and a nod. “Alright, ready or not, here we come!” Daron shouted into the courtyard and stalked off with his new hunting companion. The pair found most of the other children with little difficulty. Daron intentionally overlooked many obvious signs. The tips of shoes poking out behind a stack of barrels, or the obvious child shaped lump in the tarp covering a wagon. There was one, however, that still eluded both of them, to the point that Daron needed to start actually searching for the child. The pair probed deeper and deeper into the castle, looking in nooks and crannies for the child. Soon it became worrying how deeply Daron had to look, though soon he heard the subtle sound of a child's giggle. He had to think he was terribly clever. Daron smirked at that and pressed himself against one of the walls, pressing his finger to his lips and looking down at his young companion. Sliding along with all stealth, Daron turned the corner, ready to pounce on his quarry, but instead felt swallowed whole. The world around him darkened. He felt as if he were once again as small as the children he had been playing with. The doors to the shelter stood open, like a gaping mouth that led into darkness. Daron was familiar with the place, he had seen it more times in his nightmares than he had with his waking eyes. He swallowed hard, and felt a lump in his throat preventing anything from entering him, even breathing was a struggle. His hand flew to his hip, more on instinct than any real threat. Like his nightmares though, there was no sword there. He had left it in his room and he now stood before fear itself unarmed. In his mind he heard the piercing squeal of metal being rent asunder, buried among the grunts and screams of his parents. The clash of steel against whatever was out there as Daron cowered in the darkness. The same darkness that yawned before him. It was the same shelter, the same darkness and it threatened to swallow him whole. He heard his name being called, it was a voice he knew, but not something from his nightmare. It was light and sweet and like a razor it cut through his panic. Fiora’s hand touched his shoulder gently and Daron realized that he was shivering. The children were gone, the last one found and the pair run off to rejoin their group of friends and repeat the process all over again, leaving Daron alone in that hallway. His head was swimming and he felt moments away from collapsing to his knees. The streaks left on his face by tears felt suddenly cold. Fiora’s warm embrace drove away the chill, the nightmares, and helped support him. She guided him gently to the ground and then sat down next to him, pulling her knees up to her chest. The pair sat there, quietly, for as long as it took for Daron to finally begin breathing again. It was Daron’s turn to be embarrassed with inadequacy. He looked down at his own boots and tried to put thoughts in order, to try and explain, and to simply think and function again. He was acutely aware of how Fiora must have felt the night before. Shattered and useless for his purpose. A cowardly lord who couldn’t face the darkness of a place meant to keep someone safe simply because it had done its job. Daron just couldn’t explain why he regretted that. Fiora sat with him as he tried explaining what had happened. How the assault on the castle had resulted in the death of his parents, likely on the very spot they were sitting. How he avoided this part of the castle because he was so scared of seeing it and facing the heroic sacrifice they had made for him. How he sometimes wished that he had been on the other side of the door, fighting for his people, and dreaming that maybe if he had been there he could have made a difference. He knew none of it was true though. If he had stood with his parents he would have been just as dead as they were. Daron and Fiora sat in that lonely corridor for an hour, perhaps more. No one was keeping track of how long it had been, nor that it mattered. Eventually Daron got to his feet and together he and Fiora made their way back to Daron’s quarters. She held his hand the whole way, squeezing it every so often simply to remind him that she was there and she was with him. By the time they had entered his tower, Daron’s panic had subsided and he had neatly packed it away inside his mind once again. Fiora knew it though, she had seen it and he was aware that his secrets were leaking out into the world. He wanted so badly to build another new wall around it inside of his mind. Brick upon brick, until it couldn’t get out and hurt him again. “You know it’s ok to be afraid of something, right?” Fiora offered as Daron settled down onto the edge of his bed. “Not for me. There are expectations. I have to-” “You don’t have to be anything but yourself.” Fiora interrupted. Daron pursed his lips and sighed. He knew she was right. “Daron.” She said, her voice barely above a whisper. “You’re so worried about taking care of everyone else. About looking out for others and making sure they are safe and well fed and looked after. When was the last time you did that for yourself?” Helene’s words rang in his head like a bell. Comments about maintaining his sword and how it worked well because he had taken care of it. He took a moment to idly wonder what kind of condition he was in. Perhaps more incomplete than the automaton before him. He thought about her and how she made him feel. About how he had grown alongside her and felt things he thought were long dead, both good and bad. He thought about sharpening a sword and how it could only be done with a whet stone. “Too long” was his eventual reply. “I’m not sure I remember how to.” Fiora settled down next to him, draping her arm over his shoulders and resting her head against his. “Maybe it’s time you let someone do that for you then.” “Maybe. But where would I find someone crazy enough to do that?” He chuckled. “They’d have their work cut out for them.” “Certainly. You’d need someone who was, perhaps, purpose built for that kind of thing.” She released his shoulders and balled up her hand into a fist which she playfully punched him in the arm with. He laughed at that. Fiora stood and faced Daron. “What’s your favorite dessert?” “What?” “I’m going to go make you something to eat to feel better.” He blinked at that and struggled to think through everything and somehow in the middle of it all tried to pry open the vault of his memories and preferences. He couldn’t fathom thinking about food at the moment, but since it was Fiora asking he would make it happen. Stammering for a moment he managed to mutter something. “Hakenos and I used to share these fluffy little pastry things. He loved them so much, it was actually one of the only times I heard him actually speak about things. They were called Markezian honey pastries? I used to have them as a child too, brought from travels here." The way he said it made him wonder if it was even the right answer. He liked them, for certain, but were they his favorite? It didn’t matter, Fiora already heard it and leaned forward to plant a kiss on his forehead before practically skipping from the room, leaving Daron alone again. As he fell back onto his bed, exhausted as if he had worked all day long, he felt giddy for some reason. He was still recovering from his panic, but there was something else there. Something cutting through the darkness and leaving him smiling. It was a small smile, nothing that would stretch from ear to ear, but just a little quirk at the side of his mouth. Fiora had left it there with her kiss and her insistence on helping him. He didn’t nap, his heart was still far too active for that, but he did recline and take deep breaths for a long while. Once his mind and body had calmed again he sat up and pushed off of the bed. He glanced at the sword belt where it hung over the back of the chair he sat in when he and Fiora were spending the evening together. He wanted so badly to put it on. He was afraid but would the sword make it better? Of course it would, he argued with himself, why wouldn’t it? Because it never had before. Years of wearing that thing on your hip and you were still every bit as paranoid as always. You know what fixed things? Daron huffed. He knew the answer. Her.
Not long after, as Daron was still enjoying the evening air, did a knock come to his door. He turned to let in his visitor, but a moment later the door creaked open and Fiora slipped in. She was cradling a small basket with her and lightly stepped across the room with it. The flour muttered gown was more amusing to see than anything, today Fiora truly earned her serving girl status, even though Daron knew that title wouldn’t last long. With a stifled giggle Fiora set down the basket and pulled back the towel that had been draped over the contents. “My lord.” she said and dipped into a curtsey. The smell that enveloped Daron was more than enough to persuade him to forget to teasingly scold her about using his title. It flushed every bad memory from his mind and replaced them with warm, fresh, sweet, and delicious reminders of a good life. His mouth was instantly watering and as he breathed deeply of the aroma he felt his eyes flutter closed. He plucked one of the roughly cut, triangular shaped delights from the basket. The whole thing was made of incredibly thin layers of dough, spices, nuts, and drizzled with honey. The bite he took was an amazing mixture of spices, sweetness and warm nuttiness. All of it sent him spiraling back in time to a better time in his childhood. It was one of the few times that his youth had been filled with pleasant memories. Bright summer days spent in the courtyard or the countryside. Laughter filled his ears and the warmth of a past sun heated his skin. He could hear and smell and taste and touch those times. He could feel layers of dour years cracking again and falling from his face as he smiled and took another bite. What he was eating was no comparison to the smell from the courtyard, it was so much more. When his eyes opened again, Fiora was standing only a few paces away, her hands in front of her again, fidgeting nervously and looking at Daron. The expectant look on her face demanded a review of sorts. Without saying a word her eyes begged for him to tell her how it tasted. He knew what she wanted. She wanted, no, needed validation. She needed to know that she had done it, that she had made him happy and provided him with what he wanted. “That was..” Daron searched for the right word. There wasn’t one, so he made do. “..Incredible.” Her face exploded into a smile and she practically threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around him in a tight embrace. He was more than happy to return the gesture and hold her tightly to him. So rapt in the moment were the two that neither one truly registered the flutter of body heat and magic that coursed between them. The same sensations as the night before on the boat, but stronger and more subtle. “You really liked it?” She asked. “Absolutely.” He said, reaching into the basket and pulling out another one. “Pardon, I’m being so rude, did you have one?” Fiora shrugged and smiled through. “I can’t exactly taste them, so no, there was no point really.” “Right, yes, of course. I forgot-” He let his sentence trail off. He had forgotten she was an automaton and not a real woman. She couldn’t actually eat or taste or enjoy what she had made. Daron realized that she had to enjoy them through his reaction. Not that such a thing would be difficult to convey. In a flash every one of her interactions with him came into sharp clarity. She couldn’t experience some things, and needed to only experience them through Daron and his reaction. “Well, we made so many of them that we’re bringing them to town with us tomorrow.” Fiora beamed. “How many did you make?” “Half a dozen.” “That’s not so many.” Daron commented. “Really? Each batch made about thirty of those. Half a dozen batches took quite a while.” The innocence in her voice almost made Daron choke on his next bite. Half a dozen batches of thirty pastries. Those would surely bring some coin at the market. Once word got out about how good they were, they would likely have to make them a recurring commodity, he thought as he crammed another bite into his mouth. Fiora settled into her chair and shed her top, letting Daron swap out the crystal inside of her and the pair settled into comfortable conversation. Fiora danced around the topic of what had happened in the castle hall earlier, but her arcane mind wanted to know. Daron was more reluctant to let out the whole story of what had happened, choosing instead to thank her for comforting him and helping him calm down. The remainder of the evening progressed quietly. Fiora offered to soothingly sing some of the many songs she had learned as Daron lay in bed, still trying to fully come down from his panic attack. Fiora eventually joined Daron in the bed, gently draping her fingers along his skin as his eyes slipped closed and her singing dropped into a low hum. With time his breathing dropped and snores began to issue forth. Fiora smiled and kissed him gently on the forehead before slipping out of the bed and lighting a single candle for her to read by. She would have much preferred to stay by his side in bed, but there was little else she could do there. The gentle morning breeze, colder than Daron would have liked, but accompanied by the chirp of morning birds greeted him in the morning. The door to the balcony was open and Fiora’s silhouette could be seen there. Her gown gently ruffled in the breeze as she looked out at the lake, alight once again, with the rays of the sun. Daron made no effort to conceal himself and simply walked out next to her, the gentle slap of his bare feet announcing his presence long before he joined her field of vision. “Excited?” he muttered Fiora nodded and kept her gaze fixed on the city beyond the lake. It was more challenging to spot now, though Daron figured that the automaton had some form of enhanced vision or magical sight that would allow her to spot it more readily. The rising sun's influence on the colors of the sky was beginning to wane, and they still had a journey in front of them. Daron placed a hand across her back, gently rubbing up and down between her shoulder blades and appreciating the feel of, what he assumed, was her spine and some of the underlying structure. It felt close enough to a human, but there was a distinct alienness to it. Pushing it aside he turned and staggered back into his room and began to strip down. Fiora wandered in shortly after that. She blushed slightly at the sight of Daron, mostly nude, but made sure to turn and settle into her chair before he could notice her. From her post she had a perfect view to watch as he dressed himself in small glimpses. He was wandering back and forth from his armoire, to a screen where he would slip behind it and put on whatever he had pulled out, judging it for a moment and swapping it out for something new. Eventually he was dressed. Simple, but regal. A ruffled shirt tucked into a pair of comfortable trousers and covered by a dark tunic sporting the embroidered crest of Beohold. The owl head on the breast stood out among the otherwise muted colors. Soft boots up to his knees finished the ensemble. Daron’s eyes darted to the sword belt slung over the back of his usual sitting chair. “Ready to go Fiora?” The trip to the city was long, taking the better part of the morning once the carts were loaded and hitched. It wasn’t a long journey, but with some folks on foot and extra care given to make sure not to jostle the cargo. The journey itself was smooth though and provided more than enough time for Fiora and Daron to chat, both among themselves and with those from the castle who were along with them. Crates of goods, crops and produce, and the occasional artisan craft were all loaded and ready and in those moments when Fiora was distracted by another conversation Daron would help himself to a pastry. Each one earned him a scowl when Fiora looked back and caught him with crumbs around his smirking mouth. Once inside the city proper and at the market, Fiora helped set up the pastries, but at Daron’s behest, left it in the care of the other maids. He took her hand and led her deeper into the market, ignoring the giggles and idle chatter of the residents who were left behind. Fiora glanced over her shoulder to wave a quick goodbye and was met with a barrage of nods, winks approving gestures. All of which she took in and giggled to herself. Daron had little time for idle chat once he and Fiora made their way into the market proper. There were so many things for Fiora to look at and ask questions about. They had an agenda for the day, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t take a detour into shops to look at nick nacks and baubles. All of them fascinated Fiora and she wanted to look at and touch and examine everything. From small glass globes with some figurine inside of them, to mechanisms that even Daron was confused by, to what she ended up being unable to leave behind. Placing a small stack of coins on the counter, the withered old man smiled and gladly pushed a little wooden box to Fiora. She graciously bowed and thanked him before taking her prize and turning the small crank on the side of the thing. A small metal barrel connected to the crank turned slowly, metal nubs jutted from it and plucked metal tines and created a small looping tune. As she turned it she soon began humming along to it and eventually tucked it away in a pouch on her belt but continued to hum the simple tune as her and Daron strolled along. Daron eventually steered her with intent into a tailors shop. He instructed her to look around for a moment while he spoke with the shop owner, a request she was more than happy to comply with. She disappeared among the displays of dresses and clothes. While she was twirling through the shop, smiling and humming as she went, the woman behind the counter took a letter he produced from his pocket and read it. Nodding she disappeared into the back of the space and returned a moment later. “Fiora. Would you mind coming here for a moment?” A moment later she was at his side but before that her eyes landed on the garment laid out on the counter. An elegant gown with gilded lace along the high neck collar lay in front of her. There was accompanying jewelry as well. A gold necklace and matching bracelets, each one studded with simple gems and fitted perfectly in place. It looked as if it would flow down her body perfectly and come to a halt just above her ankles, stopping it from ever dragging along the ground. A belt, gilded and soft, was already spun around the waistline, ending in a polished brass buckle. The low cut from the neckline would make it easy for Fiora to open that same small panel in her chest and allow access to her runestones as well, though she doubted that was intentional. “For you.” Daron said. “You deserve something more than a simple serving girl’s gown if you are to be seen by my side.” To his recollection, this might have been the first time that Fiora was well and truly speechless. Her hands were still covering her mouth which Daron could tell was still hanging agape at the gift. “Go on, try it on. Madam, can you show her to the dressing room?” He asked the woman behind the counter who was still beaming at the interaction. Fiora gleefully followed along and emerged from behind a curtain minutes later. The fit on the dress was fairly flawless. There may have been some adjustments that could be made, but they were nothing that the staff back at the castle couldn’t handle, if Fiora wanted them at all. Regardless, she looked immaculate and Daron had no qualms about letting her know. With every small compliment she blushed a little more deeply and eventually had trouble meeting her lord's gaze with her own. Leaving the shop, hand in hand, Daron and Fiora looked like a proper regal couple. No one would have suspected otherwise, and certainly not that Fiora was a machine. She did stumble a little in the new shoes that had been commissioned with the dress. They were taller than what her balance felt comfortable with, and the spike of a heel on them led to a number of wobbly steps. Daron was there to catch her every time and secretly admitted to himself that he enjoyed the more socially acceptable reason to put his hands around her waist. Their second destination was one that put a twisting knot in Daron’s belly. The gnomish tinker shop was easy enough to spot. The curling black sooty smoke from the chimney and the abundance of light hammer taps was a clear sign. The glass window displaying a humanoid in it for sale was another, and one that made Daron feel more than a little upset. He thought about Fiora standing there, blankly staring out at nothing at all, unaware of anything and everything. A blank slate to be bought and conformed to someone’s will. He looked at Fiora now, at her abundant joy, and his heart swelled. If she was a reflection of the person that owned her then he couldn’t be too terrible. The shop was lit oddly. Light bounced and redirected itself oddly around the space. Natural light from the windows reflected off of polished brass surfaces and diffused once it impacted some odd shaped gadget. Standing atop a stool and leaning into the open belly of another automaton, stood a stumpy little gnome. His leg was missing and replaced with some kind of prosthetic, made of brass, gears, pulleys and wrapped in leather. He didn’t look up from what he was doing, but his voice resounded from inside of his work. “Be with you in just a moment.” He called before blindly reaching for something off of his belt and then bringing it inside and twisting it sharply. He extracted himself and looked at Daron and Fiora, one of his eyes oddly magnified by something clipped to pince-nez clinging to the bridge of his nose. “Well well, Lord Daron Beohold. What an unexpected pleasure.” He said as he swung an arm across his belly and bowed deeply. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” Daron sighed at the formality of it all. It was interactions like this that added to his delight for the roads beyond the castle. He was just Daron there, no lord, or sire, no titles or formalities. “This is Fiora, she is- She’s my-” “I’m an automaton.” She corrected. “Ah well, I’m not in the market to buy.” The little gnome cut in before being interrupted by Daron. “No no, nothing like that. We just…there were some questions I had that we had hoped you could answer.” “Ah ha. Yes, of course, I’ll do my best, but as I am sure you know, the automatons are still something of a mystery to us. They are ancient and the technology that makes them work is only vaguely understood.” Daron nodded and shuffled slightly. He had rehearsed what he wanted to say, how to say it, and what he had hoped for in his mind a few times since the boat ride with Fiora. Now, though, confronted with having to say it out loud he found the words caught in his throat and needed to be forced out. “We were, ah- having a moment the other night. It was fairly ro-romantic.” Daron stammered. “And there was just something missing. Fiora how did you put it?” “I just couldn’t think of what to do next. We kissed, he was holding me, but there was just no further information for me to process.” She looked to Daron. The little gnome raised an eyebrow at her then at him. “A moment huh?” He sounded skeptical, but didn’t push further. “And your intimacy Runestone didn’t trigger or anything?” It was Fiora and Daron’s turn to exchange perplexed looks with one another. When they looked back to the tinkerer he was smiling and practically laughing. “Don’t have one huh?” Daron blinked and remembered the small bag of additional runestones back in the castle that he had told himself he would investigate later, and then never did. Fiora was enchanting all on her own and he barely had time to think that there was more she could do. “I..I actually might have one. There were more than came with you when I- When I opened the crate you came in there was a little bag with more stones in it. I just never put more than a few in.” Daron admitted. “And you’d need the- uh- the..you know..” The gnome pointed downward and raised his eyebrows, hoping that he wouldn’t have to get too explicit in his explanations of what else might be missing. “Ah, ahem, yes well, I don’t know that we have that particular. Erm. Appendage.” Daron muttered and blushed just as furiously as Fiora was. She was fidgeting as her lord spoke and felt like she was being not only scrutinized but that she was wholly inadequate for Daron. “Worry not, I have what you need. Your automaton here should have some instructions on how to get it in place. Probably once she has it in her hands it’ll unlock the information you both need. Arcane artifacts are like that. Also, don’t forget to insert that intimacy runestone. That’s fairly critical.” “What do those do?” Fiora asked. “Glad you asked. Think of them like a little magical container. They fill up with new knowledge and information the more you use them. So, for example, the more intimate time you two spend together the more that runestone will fill up and the more..i guess creative she’ll be.” Daron thought for a moment, and then all at once he understood. “That explains things a little.” Fiora and the gnome looked at him as if expecting more information. “The combat and tactics one I put in, we spar every morning and evening. She’s shown incredible growth there in a short time so-” “So it’s filling up quite fast. And I’ll bet she’s beginning to match your skill?” Daron nodded. “This will be much the same thing.” The silence that hung in the air as each of the three occupants contemplated that. “Ok yeah I’ll uh, let’s get that artifact. Please?” There was much more silence to follow. The blush on both Daron and Fiora spoke volumes though.
She was far too precious to him to jeopardize what they had for a night of carnal pleasures. The cool night air permeated the whole of Daron’s room. He and Fiora stood there, face to face, hand in hand. He sucked in a deep breath and prepared himself to say something, likely stumbling over something, when Fiora spoke first. “It’s going to be okay Daron. You know that right?” “Wh- what do you mean?” “I know you’re scared. Don’t worry, I’ll still be me. You’ll still be you, and we will still be us. Okay? I’m not going to change, just be better.” “That’s a change you know.” “Stop making this difficult.” She reached up and pulled apart the fringes of the high neck collar, exposing her upper chest to him. He hesitated for only a moment before pressing his palm against her skin and feeling the familiar cool tingle of magic just below the surface. As he pulled his hand back the flesh along her chest was shrinking back and exposing the internal workings below. Glowing threads of magic coursed around inside of her, and many connected to that central console with the other runestone’s lodged in it. There was a single remaining slot inside of her. “This one? Right?” Daron held up one of the runestones, Fiora nodded and looked down at her exposed chest. Daron swallowed past the lump in his throat, steeled himself, and pushed it into place. Fiora shivered instantly and her skin rolled back into place over her chest. She let out a sound somewhere between a sigh and a pleasured moan. Her eyes had slipped closed and once her chest was completely covered again she opened them and looked to Daron. “Did it work?” He asked with a cautious tone. “One good way to find out.” Fiora replied. In an instant their lips were on one another. Fiora leaned in and planted a long string of hot kisses on his neck and moved upwards from there, eventually meeting his lips in a hungry tide. She had kissed him, perhaps, twice before he found his hands flowing up her hips and along her body to her collar. He could have sworn that the clasp wasn’t that intricate to get undone, but he fumbled his way through it regardless. On some level Daron knew that her whole dress wasn’t held in place by a single clasp, but that didn’t seem to be the case tonight. The silky fabric of her custom dress seemed to flow over the smooth curves of her body in a rapid cascade. Perhaps those adjustments didn’t need to be made after all. Fiora mewled a little as Daron’s lips found hers. With the aid of her arcane influences she focused less on the influx of so much information that she knew she would have missed before, and instead focused in on removing whatever stood between her hands and her lover’s skin. She knew better than to ferociously tear his shirt off of him, but she did the next best thing. Her fingers loosening tie strings and then yanking his shirt up and over his head. Once his chest was exposed to her she let her hands flow down and over his well muscled chest. His body was taut and ready at all times, though it seemed coiled and ready to strike tonight. How had she missed such an excellent form in all her days of sword play with him. This wasn’t the first time she had seen Daron with his bare chest exposed, but this was the first time she could truly appreciate it. And she intended to appreciate so much more of his body tonight. Before she could, Daron leaned forward, nibbling gently on her neck and wrapping his arms around her. He crouched just a bit and scooped her up, supporting her rear end in his clasped hands and hoisting her off of the ground. She weighed more than he would have expected, but the grunt he let out as he lifted her was welcome among the other sounds both were making. As he lifted her she found her bare breasts were directly in front of him, a fact he intentionally utilized. Fiora’s head fell back, her white hair cascading down her back as a lewd sounding moan rolled out of whatever mechanism made her voice a reality. The sound carried around the room, rolling along the walls and bouncing back in a resounding cry. She had never felt anything so pleasurable as Daron taking her nipple into his mouth. He suckled eagerly at it and her hands came to tangle into his hair, clenching slightly as her body practically when ridgid with lust. The pair stumbled to the corner that Fiora usually occupied. Daron was careful to place her into the chair. She squeaked once as she was lowered into place and her eyes once again slipped closed as Daron’s lips found hers. She smirked and her hand drifted to one side, fumbling for something on the rounded table next to her chair. Once she found the relic she had sought, there was something that clicked in her mind. As the tinkerer had said, she knew what to do with it. The thing in her hand seemed to draw some of the arcane life from inside of her, illuminating small paths along her skin, radiating from her chest and pouring into the device in her hand. Glowing runes drank deeply of her energy and etched winding paths along the relic, bringing it to life and synchronizing itself to her core. She knew what to do with it. Daron barely registered that she was moving, he was far too enraptured with the taste of her skin and the textures of her body. His hands found their way to her breasts and gently massaged them. Each movement drew a new soft coo from Fiora as her whole body tingled with an electric life. It was the same faint passing of arcane and biological energies on the boat that night, but now she could fully embrace it. Now it meant something, it welled up inside of her and unlocked new thoughts and new actions. There was still something missing though, and it was in Fiora’s hand. As her lover continued to leave kisses along her body, Fiora took his hand and gently moved it downward, letting it land softly on her upper thigh. He didn’t need much more encouragement than that. She felt his hand, powerful and firm, moving up her inner leg and coming to the hard plate that covered her crotch. He pulled back and looked down at it, and a dawning realization rolled over him. He looked up to her eyes from where he was standing over her. Her sly smile told him everything. His eyes moved down her chest, across her breasts and down her slender arms to her hand. The relic there was clearly constructed to be part of automatons like Fiora. Not that he was an expert on the internal workings of the mechanical beings, but the thing in her hand was about as long as his forearm from wrist to elbow and just about as round. Jutting from one end of it was a strange configuration of the same material as the runestones. Shimmering in its greenish blue hues and sporting sharp edges. On the reverse end of the mechanism was exactly what Daron had expected. Flesh that was all too soft and ready. Slightly pinker than the surrounding skin and already feeling warm and comfortable. Daron didn’t look at it for too long, but he would have sworn that there were beads of liquid already forming on the edges of the feminine folds at its center. Fiora was wearing that same bright smile as always, but it was tempered with lust and impure thoughts. Her smile never left her lips but she tilted her head back and closed her eyes, concentrating on something and a moment later Daron felt her body shiver for a moment. Then the hard plate between her legs loosened and seemed to slide out of her body. He was there to catch it and set it aside. Her head returned and looked at Daron, then she pressed the artifact into his other hand. The coy half lidded eyes spoke to him. She wanted this, she needed this, and he held the key to it in his hands. With a flick of his eyes he went from looking at her all to gorgeous face, the pure clear skin down to the hard dark edges of the relic. He could already see the swirling threads of arcane magic seeking her. They probed the air and grasped for her body, longing to be connected to the body they were part of. Many of them seemed to already be fluttering into the darkness left by removing that plate. Daron’s thumb brushed against some of the skin on the thing in his hand and in return Fiora gasped slightly. It was little more than a hitch in her throat, but it was clear that she had felt it, and that gave the man that loomed over her a head full of ideas. He didn’t align the relic with her waiting body, instead he brought her detached flesh to his mouth where a parade of kisses awaited it. Beginning at the very edges of her artificial skin. She surely felt that and let out a dark and smokey sigh. Fiora was surprised to feel as much as she did, though the sensations were distant, they were very real. The magical draw of the relic was powerful and it only seemed to increase the more Daron touched her. His kisses grew closer and closer to the slit at the center of the artifact in his hands and he was more than happy to indulge in that. He knelt down between his automaton’s spread legs and lapped at her womanhood. Encouraged by her increasingly desperate panting he drove his tongue hard inside of her. He knew, on some level, that he should properly connect this to her, but he was having far too much fun with it detached and in his hands. A fact he would be sure to remember later, if his mind allowed him to see through the haze of lust. Another long lick from the bottom of her folds up to the top drew another pleasured peal from Fiora and marked Daron’s last little trick before he inserted the relic into place. He pulled it away from his mouth and took a moment to look upon her. The wild dance of the candle light around the room danced across the pale skin on her legs and left only the deep opening as a pit, yawning and ready to accept the relic. Daron gently placed it there, sliding it into her. Once it had reached the natural end of its length he pushed in just a little harder with his thumbs at the edge of her flesh. Fiora heaved as the connection was established. A torrent of stored sensations and energy flooded into her. Her legs twitched and tried to clamp together, but with Daron there she only managed to squirm and writhe in her chair as the last few moments of stored feelings filled her. The cries she made spoke of lust and lewd intentions, of a feeling of pure sexual desire and pleasure finally coming to a climax. She did nothing to attempt to curb her voice and let the pleasure she felt fill the space. As she lay back, panting and grumbling softly in her chair, she only barely saw Daron rise in front of her. His hands were working at something on his hips, but she was not yet aware of what, exactly. As his boots were kicked off and his trousers came free of his hips though, she soon caught on. What's more, she seemed immediately reinvigorated. Seeing Daron’s manhood exposed and ready, Fiora seemed to immediately know what to do. She slumped a little in her chair and then like a flowing river moved smoothly to her knees. Her hands fell properly onto her lap in a wholly submissive pose, even her head dipped forward just a little, to the point that when Daron was ready he needed to gently cup her chin and raise it upwards. Once he did, he found that her grin was ever present, her eyes practically begged for him, and in an instant her mouth was open. Never one to miss the opportunity when it presents itself, Daron tangled his fingers into the stark white hair on Fiora’s head and stepped forward. As he did, he pulled her head forward and in a simple, smooth motion he was inside of her mouth. Warm and wet, just as real as any woman he had ever been with before, but from the automaton it was unexpected. Daron had wondered in the moments before she took him into her mouth, if she would feel the same as a real woman would. His pleasure told him now that there had been little to worry about. So he did what came naturally, he left his hands gently clasped on her head, fingers comfortably placed at the back of her skull and palms either side. She did the work of pulling back and letting her soft lips flow over every inch of his shaft. Once there, he would subtly thrust his hips forward while pulling her back into him. Never once did Fiora let her lord's member slip from between her lips. There were occasions where the very tip of it came dangerously close to losing contact with her, but whatever information was stored in the freshly installed runestone moved her in just the right way to keep Daron inside of her. As she plied her craft over him she made the most delectably soft sounds. Her throat hummed and vibrated with magical energy and produced little muffled moans and squeaks. All of them clearly dripping with lustful pleasure. Daron had little worry that Fiora was enjoying herself while she pleasured him. His eyes remained mostly closed, but the sounds she made were more than enough to inform him of her delight. Occasionally he would look down on her, and see that she was not only smiling, somehow, with his sex in her mouth, but that her hands were also moving around her own body. Her hands gently toying with her own breasts or lodged between her legs, gently moving and massaging the relic there. As time spread out through the night, Daron felt a rising climax building inside of him. A boiling hot knot formed in his hips and threatened to burst at any moment. He was panting hard and gulping down deep swallows of the cold night air. Each fresh breath helped calm him only to be canceled out by Fiora’s mouth gliding down the full length of his shaft and taking it all in. He was rising and falling, though it seemed to be a losing battle, he would soon be finished. That wasn’t what he wanted though, so he pulled back, and when Fiora moved to keep him inside of her he pulled back just a little more, freeing himself from her lips. The look on her face seemed perplexed but enticed. She trusted him and knew that this wasn’t some slight against her or moment to scold something she had done wrong, rather it was preparations for something more. There would be no words exchanged, instead both instinctively knew what would happen next. Fiora pressed her hands into her thighs and pushed herself upwards only to find Daron’s hand there. She took it and together they rose. He held her hand softly, fearing that he might crush it with all the excitement he held inside of him now. The cool night air calmed him and took the edge off of his lust, but it would never be enough to sate it. Instead, he moved towards the bed, hand in hand with Fiora, and both seemed to float across the space until they were safely enveloped in the comfort of blankets and sheets. Another fresh round of kisses were exchanged, Daron and Fiora’s hunger for one another was insatiable at this point and their deep passionate kisses quickly turned to hands on one another and soft moans. Soon enough Daron knew he needed to take charge and satisfy himself with her, lest he spend the entire night on the very precipice. So, breaking their kiss he repositioned himself over Fiora and took hold of her legs. Not that he needed to as she was already spreading her legs wide and allowing him into her. As before, Daron gently inserted himself into her waiting honeypot and settled into a smooth and measured rhythm. His hips gliding back and forth while Fioa did her part and rolled her hips every time he filled her fully. She moved her hips with each pass, garnering a pleasurable sensation for herself and clearly stimulating her lover at the same time. The pair of lovers could feel the heat between them, either as a product of the simple art of making love or because of the swirling combination of arcane and physical energies in the room. The sound of panting, moaning, grunts and growls and squeals of pure delight filled the night air. After long minutes of deep love, Daron once again felt that coiling beast inside of him. The pressure made itself known and marched onward toward its release. Daron calmed his mind and body to the best of his ability, and continued his thrusts, gauging his responses and actions based on the beautiful automaton below him. She was close, he could hear it. The pitch of her voice, the frequency of her moaning, the greedy way she thrust against him with every movement. In a single glorious moment, Daron finally felt his climax reach its peak. Either in response or as a natural progression, Fiora did as well. As he thrust deep inside of her, he grabbed hard onto her shoulders and pulled her into him, or perhaps he was using her as leverage to thrust himself just a little deeper into her. It didn’t matter. He exploded inside of her, filling her with all that he had and in response she wrapped her slender legs around his body, pulling tight and pleading for more. Her head falling back against the pillows as her hands clutched at the silk sheets. They remained joined as one for long moments after the final climax of the evening. Daron panting and sweating while Fiora seemed to glow. Quite literally illuminated from inside as her arcane core and the runestone configurations swelled with new knowledge and sensations. The magical center of her being was alight and warmly pulsating for a moment or two. Daron noticed, but felt no need to comment on it. Not now, not when his own heart felt like it was glowing with an equal amount of light from a different kind of magic. In time he extracted himself from her and the pair took some time to properly clean themselves. Dipping a towel into a basin of fresh water poured from a pitcher on Daron’s desk. The cold water shocked Daron’s body and invigorated him to the point where he felt that a return to their bed might result in more lovemaking. Not wanting to rush along into new things and out of a deep consideration for Fiora bid him to reconsider. Instead the pair returned to the comfort of the bed, foregoing clothes and instead draping their bodies together. Sleep came quickly to Daron, but not before spending long minutes gently stroking the artificial skin along Fiora’s cheek and brushing aside the multitude of disheveled strands of hair across her face. His eyes slowly slipped closed. Her brilliantly smiling face was the last thing he saw before slipping into one of the most peaceful nights of sleep he could recall.
Once there, clothes were almost instantly shed, falling wherever they may in the room as the pair made their way to the bed. Daron had to admit that Fiora’s improvisational skills in the barracks were becoming impressive. He was still playing very safe with her, but she was pushing and pushing hard. He was keeping up with her and her with him, and he was rapidly running out of tricks to play on her. He was more cautious as well, the steel swords weren’t sharp enough to shear through a man like he was used to, not like his longsword, but they would definitely rend flesh if needed. Today the sound of steel ringing against steel filled the barracks, as it did most mornings. Daron and Fiora were dancing again. The instruments were their blades the footwork was frantic and haphazard, but still filled with measured grace and elegance. The novelty of watching these two had worn off some time ago, a fact that Daron was thankful for, the less audience he had the more he could feel free to be open and honest with Fiora on her performance. She was pressing him again, aggressively swiping at him and in turn he deflected and parried most of her strikes and dodging others. Another thrust that he slapped his sword against, she clearly expected as much and used the momentum of her blade being parried to the side to swirl quickly around and flourish back at him from the opposite side. It was too quick for him to position his blade to block it effectively and so he stomped a foot into the packed dirt floor and threw himself back, skipping a step or two as he landed. Fiora advanced on him then jabbing her sword forward, the blunted tip of it spearing towards Daron. He had seen her do this before and was more than ready for it. He swooped his sword down and then smoothly back up, catching her blade and throwing her attack up high. She was right in front of him now and he couldn’t help but smile. She was right where he would have wanted an attacker to be. His sword whistled through the air and angled for her throat. He was already pulling back, not wanting to actually inflict any sort of damage onto someone so precious to him. Still, her thrust being tossed up high staggered her and she wobbled to one side, forcing her neck against Daron’s blade. In that moment something flared inside of Fiora and blasted outward through the small incision Daron had left in her skin. A white hot shower of sparks flared up as her combat and tactics runestone stole precious power from her core and sent it coursing into an energy shield across the cut on her neck. In doing so it screamed and shrieked as wild magical power surged to the spot. Daron’s mind heard the sound. It was something he knew all too well, a sound he had heard once with his ears, and countless other times in his nightmares. The squeal of an angry monster killing his parents. The sound of their steel on the creature that was assaulting the castle. It was the sound of death, of monsters, of fear, anguish, and torment. It was the sound that punctuated every one of Daron’s worst nightmares. It was the sound that snapped his mind and pushed everything he knew aside. His rational mind retreated from control and left only a lifetime of training and reactions to dictate his movements. He screamed with fury, anger, fear, and raw survival instincts. Fiora was fine aside from a dizziness, but she had no time to worry about that. Daron was coming at her and she could see in his eyes that he wasn’t present. She was on her guard against something that was wholly reactionary. Daron wasn’t attacking her, he was attacking his nightmares. A foe that only existed in his mind, behind his eyes, clawing at his waking mind. She barely got her blade up in time to deflect the first blow and it sent a heavy shock wave rippling along her arm as the blow rattled the sword down to the hilt. Another one came in and all she could do was dash to one side to avoid it. More rapid fire swings came at her in a blind rage and all she could do was throw up her blade and hope it held against the impacts. It was clear that Daron’s attacks wouldn’t stop, not until he snapped out of his nightmares. The only boon was that in his berserker rage his attacks lacked finesse and flare and were power. She wasn’t sure if that was good or not, but it allowed her to duck to one side as another heavy overhead chop came in. She took a page from Daron’s lessons and swept her foot out and caught him just behind the knee and drove him down. Not that he stopped at that. He fell to his knees and used the momentum to roll forward and come back to his feet, and when he did he threw out a blind backward swipe that caught Fiora completely by surprise. The blade dug into her arm just below the shoulder. The dull blade cutting along her skin and rending it with ease. The blade itself wasn’t doing the work of cutting, it was all furious power directly from Daron. Fiora could only venture a glance down at her arm just in time to see the dull metal internal workings exposed and in turn sheared in half. More and more of her arm and the artificial sinew and mechanisms inside were exposed, shattering and spilling around her. Dabbles of fluids spurt from the tubing that was cut and then her arm was gone, dropping to the ground. Fiora could only scream in a wild mixture of simulated pain and terror as her arcane mind began to try and cope with the loss of part of her body. The piercing cry reached deep into Daron’s mind and stirred something there. Where a nightmare of squealing metal and hate had taken over, her scream of pure distress pierced through the cloud of nightmares and woke Daron. He was panting now, the darkness lifted from him and the world came rushing back in with a bright flash. No longer was he cowering in that dark room listening to the slaughter beyond heavy wooden doors. He was in the barracks, the hard dirt below his feet held him firmly and the trembling in his hands was so great that his practice sword fell from it and thumped into the ground. He spun in time to see Fiora collapse to the same dirt flooring. A cloud of dust was thrown up around her several feet away lay her arm, the fingers still twitching slightly as the sword she once wielded lat across the palm. She was still awake, or at least her eyes were open, but the red light that had been ever present behind her pupils was dying, replaced with only a dark pool that reflected Daron’s expression. He saw the terror and pain on his own face, not because of Fiora but because of himself. Because of the darkness that still clutched his heart in its hands. “Fiora, no no! Fiora!” Daron scrambled to her and lifted her limply to him. “Ready my horse!” Daron called with all the gusto his lungs could produce. He cared little about how filthy he looked, covered in dirt and mud made from sweat and dust. Nobility be damned today. Fiora was laid across the saddle, her damaged arm lashed in place with a hastily toed length of rope and he was off. Jarin was only half an hour away on horseback. That wasn’t nearly fast enough and Daron kicked his horse in a constant rhythm to get there faster. It ran at a full pace for as long as it could, and even when it slowed Daron insisted on at least a brisk trot. Despite the crowded streets Daron called for people to clear from his path as he navigated through the cobblestone streets, searching for what he needed. In the end it was a thin wisp of black smoke from the tinkerers chimney that guided Daron to the doorstep. Once there he simply threw the reins over whatever was closest and gingerly brought Fiora’s limp body down from the saddle before bashing his way into the tinkerers shop. “Oh my that was-” “Help!” was all Daron managed. Seeing the distress and the inert automaton in his arms the little gnome snapped into action and waved his hand towards Daron. Skittering across the floor to a curtain behind the counter, Daron followed along, well aware of his long legs and how fast they carried him in the wake of the much smaller man. He had to slow to prevent himself from overrunning the one person who he had come to seek aid. A finely polished wooden table dominated the center of the backroom and was surrounded by every kind of tool and mechanism that Daron had ever laid eyes on. None of it mattered to him, there was only one thing that he could focus on and she was laying on the table. His explanation of the series of events that led him here spilled from his mouth like a cascading waterfall. Little of it was truly pertinent to Fiora’s condition, but he needed to get it all out. By the end a tear was rolling down his cheek and became lost in his beard, joining more mud and dust there. The gnomish man attempted to calm Daron down and assure him that Fiora would be fine, but she would need work. Daron’s assurance that any amount of gold was acceptable and would gladly pay in advance. Assured that prices and payment could be discussed later, Daron was shooed from the back room. Left alone in the shop filled with inert automatons, ready for sale and blankly staring at nothing, Daron could only feel judgemental stares from them. He couldn’t stand to be there, but he was loathed to leave Fiora alone. He needed to be there but he was unable to stay, and so he shrunk away, slipping quietly out into the market. He wandered aimlessly for some time. Looping around the market and looking in the direction of things, but never truly at them. So dense was the feeling of regret and disappointment in himself that he could only wander around, checking in on the tinkerers shop every time he passed it, but seeing only an empty space. No gnome smiling and telling him everything was ok, no Fiora smiling at him. Would she ever smile at him again? Why would she want to? He staggered away. He was lost in the most familiar places. He was without his sword, without his armor, without the walls around his mind. He was naked and alone, left exposed with the nightmares that had hunted him his entire life. Not only had they found him, they had utterly controlled his life for a short time, but it was long enough for him to do harm to someone he… Someone he loved… The sun was low on the horizon, threatening to light the blue sky with spectacular color. Light clouds became a canvass and drifted with a lazy kind of peace. Daron saw it, and knew that Fiora would love to see it. To see that kind of beauty reflected in her eyes and enhanced by the redness of her pupils, and the dark stain of her maroon lips. He peeked into the shop again, this time seeing the gnome there making himself busy. Daron slipped into the shop, afraid that his mere presence might stir some trouble. His expectant look at the tinkerer asked all the questions he had. “As I said before. She is fine. The cut looked a little rough and it shredded some of the skin on her arm. I’ve applied a paste that will rejoin it, but it will take time to dry.” He chuffed a little laugh. “It’s not quite the same complexion though. She’ll have a bit of a scar there until the magic fully reconnects, then it’ll fade.” He cleared his throat and continued. “Internally, well, that was a bit of a mess, more blunt force than a good cut, but nothing I wasn’t able to fix up. It might be a little stiff for a week or two though, until the arcane threads can re-establish a flow.” Daron struggled to hear the gnome, hearing most of his words as a distant voice, perhaps spoken from the other room..or across the city. Daron’s mind was only dominated by the resounding phrase that she was fine. He felt his chest heave once as a fresh stream of tears began to roll down his cheek and he simply nodded along. He brushed his sleeve across his eyes to clear them and only managed to smear more mud across his face. “Is- Is she- awake?” Daron murmured. “More or less, she’s in a restful state, it’ll help the magic flow through her. She’s been like that for a short while now. I can wake her up if you like.” Daron nodded and the gnome disappeared into the backroom. Moments later Fiora appeared, alone. Her training shirt was cut free at the shoulder. It was a cleaner cut than what Daron had done and clearly something that the tinkerer would have done to allow him more room to work. His eyes refused to meet hers, flicking instead to the cut he had left her. True to form, the arm was reattached and currently hung easily at her side. Just below the shoulder was a very rough looking slice that was covered by whatever paste the gnome had applied. It was a lighter skin tone, something Daron would never have thought possible given how pale Fiora was. Still, it looked like a wicked scar for now. Daron fidgeted with his hands in front of himself, a habit he had clearly picked up from Fiora. He wanted so badly to run to her, to throw his arms around her, and never let her go. He was far too afraid of what she thought about him to do so. She, on the other hand, was tearfully happy to see him and rushed to him, throwing her arms around him and pulling him into a tight embrace. She was sobbing and Daron knew why. He could have killed her, and in that moment he was unable to bring himself to return her embrace knowing that he was likely moments away from being told how awful he was. “I’m so glad you’re here.” She whispered into his chest. A choke came to his throat and tears flowed freely now as he struggled to raise his arms to hold her. It was like there was a lead weight tied to every single fiber of being. Still he fought, he had to, and in the end he won. The pair quietly held one another for a long time. Long enough for the little gnome to slip past them, flip over the sign in his window and lock the door, then disappear back to the confines of his repair room.
A cozy little tavern and inn was no trouble to find, though Daron idly wondered if anyone would recognize him in such a state. Muttered with dirt and mud, looking weary and practically hanging off of Fiora for support. He felt low and useless, even as he tried to arrange a room, Fiora had to step in and clarify that they only needed a room for the night and a single serving of food for the evening. The room was small, but Daron wasn’t so unfamiliar with a room like this. He had been away from the castle and on the road for long enough to feel just as at home in a small space like this. He ate the food brought to him and drained a tankard of water that was drawn from a well and tasted like it. As he lay in bed, miserable and broken from the day, Fiora pulled a stool up and sat next to him. She hummed softly, the little tunes she had learned to occupy herself while she worked and to sing along with her companions in the castle. She idly toyed with some of Daron’s hair and smiled as he slipped into unconsciousness. The darkness was ever-present around Daron. It was cold and smelled of something old and rotten, yet oddly familiar. Fiora was there with him as well. She was dressed in her training garb, and Daron had to admit that she looked every bit as wonderful as always. She was smiling at him too, it was the only light in this dark place. Rising from the darkness was a massive set of sturdy doors. Banded with iron and imposing themself, filling his field of vision and weirdly stretching out in every direction. As it expanded before him all he could do was take a staggered step back, because he knew what was coming next. The door opened, giving way to a deeper darkness that not even Fiora’s light could penetrate. Daron didn’t see it though, he didn’t need to, he knew what lived in that darkness. A beast of pain and misery that had haunted him his whole life. There was nothing to be done for it, all he could do was evade it. All he could do was put on layers of armor and hope it cushioned the blows the thing would deal. All he could do was- Fiora wasn’t running with him. He was cowering alone in the dark and she was, instead, staring down the thing that emerged. It was huge, so much bigger than Daron, and clad in black and brass armor. The greatsword clutched in one hand looked too huge for Daron to wield, but this thing held it like it was a mere dagger. Daron screamed at Fiora to move, to run, to hide, to slip quietly away, but his voice was swallowed by the darkness. It never carried more than an arm’s length in front of him. Whatever it was, it squeaked and squealed, the same sounds Daron was familiar with when his parents died, the same one Fiora made when she had been hurt. It was the living embodiment of every kind of destruction Daron had ever known, and Fiora was there. She was illuminating a small pool of radiance around her and making herself a target. Daron could only see the dozens of ways she would be destroyed. Cut to pieces, like he had done to her earlier but in a thousand different ways. It moved, this dark knight, and his swing would easily cut down Fiora. It would extinguish her light and then she would be gone. Daron would be alone with it again, only now he had no doors to impose a wall between them. He had no mail, no plates of steel. His hand was at his hip. He had no sword. Neither did Fiora though, and she stood tall, facing down the creature with no fear. “Hey!” Daron was somehow in between the knight and Fiora. He didn’t remember moving there, nor did he remember shouting at it, but here he was. He could feel something, a strength he had never had before. There was something new and different and warm in this icy void. Time seemed to freeze then, or perhaps he had simply caught the attacker off guard. Something had changed for certain. The knight was smaller now, still towering over Daron, but it was not the monolith it had been when he was running. “Bold of you to accept death like this. Alone and unarmed. You are hardly a challenge.” Its voice sounded like a thousand terrified screams, each one Daron himself had produced just for this thing to use as its voice. He wasn’t alone though. Fiora was right behind him, she always was, and he could feel it. “No more” Daron said, though his voice felt weak, it still carried. “I’m done letting you torment me.” “You finally accept your doom then?” The question was spoken over a chorus of chuckles, mocking Daron. “I accept that you’re part of me, but only part of me. You don’t define me.” “I AM YOU” the thing bellowed and readied the blade that would end Daron. Daron could only mutter a reply. “Only if I let you be.” “You are weak and defenseless. You have nothing.” Daron looked over his shoulder. The light from Fiora’s smile seemed to grow and the pool of light she stood in now extended to encase him as well. He was on the very edge of it and the knight stood just beyond, in darkness. “I have her.” On some level Daron knew this was a nightmare. Only a figment of his mind addled with fear and regrets. He knew that the pain caused by the massive blade being plunged into his gut wasn’t real. But here, in this place, he felt it. Every screaming nerve hurt with a lifetime of sorrow thrust into it. He recoiled, staggering back, but remained on his feet. The sword was lodged inside of him, and was no longer in the knight's hands. Here, in his gut, it seemed so small, almost manageable. It hurt, direly, and his body screamed in pain, but it was pain he could manage. It was pain he could accept. It was pain he could live with. Once that acceptance swept over him, the sword shattered into a spray of glittering white particles that faded into nothing. He could still feel it though, as if it were still stuck inside of him. Blood flowed from a wound in his belly and he clapped his hands over it. He couldn’t stop the bleeding, and he felt weary, but a smile crossed his lips. If he had to die, it might as well be with no regrets. Fiora’s hands offered a soothing balm to his pain. They didn’t remove it, far from it, but the sting was lessened. The wounds stopped bleeding, though they remained open. He looked up at her smile- With a yelp Daron bolted upright in bed. Fiora was there with a look of concern already on her face but she fully fell off of the stool next to the bed as Daron sat up. He was panting, sweating, and his eyes were wide. “Nightmare?” Daron looked to Fiora as she picked herself and the stool up then quickly resumed her post next to him. “You were tossing and turning a lot. Are..are you okay?” Daron was confronted with a cascade of his own emotions. Good and bad. “Yeah I’m..no, I’m really not.” He sighed and didn’t even have to ask before Fiora squeezed into bed next to him. She held him and didn’t say anything. “I’m so sorry Fiora.” He began. “I’m so ashamed of what I did to you. I’m relieved you’re okay, but- I lost control and that’s not okay.” He sighed. “When I was a child, an enemy faction launched an assault on the castle. Probably just attempting to turn the tides of the war..but they had found some kind of ancient weapon..an automaton warrior.” His eyes darted to Fiora and then back down to his lap. “My parents fought back a lot of that invasion, but a lot of good people lost their lives.” Daron could physically feel the coiling darkness inside of his mind. It was screaming at him, telling him that he shouldn’t be saying this, that it was better to keep it contained. He was the only one who could keep it safely stored away. “My parents died heroes to the valley. You remember that big shelter you found me in, when I was playing hide and seek with the children?” She nodded. “That was where-” His voice hitched in his throat for a moment. “Where they died. They pushed me in and locked the doors and fought back. They stopped the invasion but at the cost of their own life.” “And you felt guilty because you survived and they didn’t?” “I became lord of the castle and the sole protector of the valley that day. Titles really. There were a lot of people who still protected it, but I was definitely the new lord of the castle.” “That’s why you hate to be called that.” “Yes, and I just don’t feel like I really embody it. I much prefer the road. That’s why Helene takes care of the castle. She deserves to be in charge, not me.” He huffed. “She was actually the one who dealt the killing blow to the automaton that attacked the castle. My mother’s dagger was lodged in some weak spot in the armor and Helene managed to use that to fully disable the thing.” Fiora nodded again and squeezed Daron. “I would have thought that would make you afraid of…of me…because I’m” “You’re not like that thing.” There was a moment of silence before Daron continued. “I dreamt of it. The thing that killed my parents. I don’t know how, but I knew it was part of me. Like..Like it was a part of me.” “A collection of all the things you dislike about yourself?” Daron looked down at her and for a moment couldn’t decide if he wanted to cry again or kiss her. “Exactly.” He whispered. “What happened? In the dream I mean.” “You were there. You stood up to it and it was going to kill you. I could see it swing at you and..and I just couldn’t let that happen. So I stood there and told it off and then it stabbed me.” Fiora waited silently, knowing that there was more. “And then…you were there…and you healed me, sort of. You made the pain go away.” She giggled lightly, shifting her position to kiss him on the forehead. “I’ll always be there to make the pain go away.” “I know.” Daron replied. “That’s why I couldn’t let it hurt you.” “Keep your useful things in good condition.” He looked at her. His expression was hurt, confused, but more than anything it looked as if she had just said something remarkably silly. “No. No not at all. No.” He shook his head. “You’re not a thing. You never have been, you’re just as real as any person in the castle. As me or..or anyone.” “Even though I’m-” “Fiora.” It was enough to halt her. She just looked at him, seeing the pain on his face, the welling tears in his eyes. She pressed her lips together into a thin line and nodded. He was right. “And how do you feel now?” She asked. “Raw. Honestly, but..better.” He looked into her eyes. “As long as I have you, I’ll be okay.” They held one another for a long time. The day passed lazily around them and soon the chambermaids arrived to clean the room and the pair rapidly scrambled to remove themselves. Daron had completely forgotten to tidy himself up at all, so mud splattered and dust covered, they made their way back to Daron’s horse, and from there, the castle. Once there, a small crowd had been vigilantly watching after rumors spread about Fiora’s injury. There were a number of false tidbits of information, all of which were corrected as the pair arrived and assured that they were safe. They excused themselves, saying that Daron clearly needed a bath and Fiora likely needed one as well. That was more than enough to satisfy the curious and put new gossip in their mouths.
Soon the seasons began to transition. The once warm sunny days gave way to cooler days. The sky was marred with gray clouds and rain washed the land. It was on one of these darker days that a courier on horseback trot through the gates and delivered a letter to Helene, who in turn smirked and handed it over to Daron. True to her word, Eloise had arranged a new contract for them and let him know that they would be arriving in the castle in two days. “I better get to work then.” Fiora commented as Daron let her know. “With what?” Daron asked. Her smile was the only answer he got, and he wasn’t quite sure what to expect. The three companions were welcomed into the castle with the same fanfare as always, though Daron wasn’t there to usher them into the private dining hall. He left that up to Helene. She stepped in and announced them by name as they filtered in. Hakenos, Eloise, and Tanila were wearing the most casual outfits they could afford to pack in their travel bags. Comfortable, but unfitting of a lord's banquet. Daron and Fiora sat at the head of their table, dressed in a fine crushed shirt and polished boots, and in Fiora’s case an elegant dark gown, trimmed in gold and brass and sporting a high collar. She had insisted on it, it was her favorite wardrobe piece. “Well well.” Eloise began. “Markezian honey pastries?” Hakenos’s voice silenced everyone. He was pointing at something. A pile of treats on the table, nestled among the roasted meats and fine cheeses. “Fiora made them. I might have mentioned that you liked them.” Daron confirmed. Guests were seated and food served. It was like no time at all had passed and the four original companions jeered at one another and exchanged stories, or grunts, of their exploits since they last parted. It was clear that all of them wanted to hurry through their stories and get to Daron. “You know.” Eloise remarked. “We had a little pool going. About you and-” She nudged her chine towards Fiora. “Do tell.” Daron replied. “Hakenos said you would forget to unpack it.” Hakenos grunted and shrugged, clearly disappointed but produced a gold coin and slapped it onto the table. “Tanila?” Daron asked. “W-well I thought you were going to just make her a serving girl and make her rub your feet and stuff. Y-you know like…I don’t know..” She flicked a coin onto the table and blushed. “Eloise?” “Sex.” That garnered a boisterous round of laughter, even from Fiora who had, until now, simply sat and smiled and listened. Though as the laughter died down she spoke. “There’s only two coins on the table.” Fiora noted. Eloise raised an eyebrow and looked from Daron to Fiora and back. Both smirked at her but gave no ground. “Learn to live a little.” Eloise said and tossed a coin onto the table before pouting. “So, what did happen?” Tanila squeaked. “Because you two seem-” “Happy.” Hakenos grunted past a mouthful of pastry. Daron wasn’t sure if the comment was about him, or the pastry. “Well.” Fiora said. “It all started when Daron forgot to unpack me for a day-” Hakenos bolted upright. “He gave me a job as a serving girl..” Tanila let out a single ‘ha!” Fiora looked at Eloise, her face expectant and a smile just barely contained on her lips. “Go ahead.” Daron said, placing his hands into his palms. The room erupted into laughter and more mirth than he had expected. The night lasted a long while and a more thorough recounting played out. Fiora, as it turned out, made an excellent storyteller. Once the tale concluded the five spent the rest of the evening enjoying her very delightful company, listening to her songs and elbowing Daron. They would leave in the morning, setting off on the road again.In his quarters Daron made sure Fiora was ready for that. It was a very different experience than lounging in the castle. A fact that made her purse her lips and playfully punch him in the arm before melting into a kiss with him. They quickly fell into bed and resumed their kiss and let it taper out into its natural end. “Fiora.” Daron muttered, precariously wobbling on the edge of sleep. “Mmm?” “You wanna know something?” “Of course,” She whispered. “I love you.” Daron was gone then. It was the very last thing on his mind as he slipped into sleep, so he didn’t see the bright flare of arcane light inside of Fiora’s chest. It flared up and then cooled, sending ripples of magical tingles across her skin. She was blushing, for certain, and she settled down into bed next to Daron, wrapping her arms around him. The subtle mixture of energy from Daron and the mystical arcane from inside of her permeated the air. Some of it even slipped deep into the crystal powering Fiora. Chapter 2 - Taking Shape“Moira, have you seen my pocket watch?” The voice was shouted from across the house, humble though the house was, it was still a little muffled by the distance and a wall. Avery looked up from her little desk, dinged and pitted from years of use. Not all of those marks were her doing either. They had bought the desk second hand and the wooden surface was marred when they got it. She had definitely contributed though. “It was on the kitchen table honey.” A woman’s voice replied. The pocket watch in question lay on a towel in front of her. Though at the moment it was less pocket watch and more parts of a pocket watch that Avery was trying to put back together. She had successfully taken it apart, that had been a challenge all it’s own, but putting it back together was another. Then of course she had to make sure it worked. The sound of her father’s voice accelerated her work. She had wanted to poke at the small glowing crystal in it, to try and understand how it spun the sprockets and cogs around. Now she just needed to get it back in one piece. Young, delicate fingers danced over the parts that she had attempted to lay out in a way that would make sense for reassembly. She worked fast and seemed to almost fall into a flow state where her brain was working faster than her eyes or hands, and was ready with the information she needed. The handle to her old wooden door turned just as she flipped open the watch, seeing it ticking just right. The rhythm moved the little watch hand forward smoothly. “Sweetie, what are you doing with that?” Her father asked. Avery could see the corner of his mouth, and in turn the mustache that covered it, twitching a little. “Just winding it up. I saw that the time was wrong.” Avery lied. Her father, large and well muscled while still managing to be a gentile giant plucked the small brass thing from her hands and looked from her to the watch with suspicion. The face of the watch was already open and, sure enough, the time was off by at least ten minutes. It hadn’t been that way last night. “Avery.” There was only a mild threat in his voice. “Did you take this apart?” She knew by now that not answering was better than answering falsely. The way she looked away from her fathers face, though, might as well have been a confession. He only sighed. “We talked about this young lady. You can’t just take apart everything you get your hands on.” “But I got it working again.” She replied. “That is besides the point.” He sighed. “Avery. You have a talent for this, but you need to learn to pick your battles. You can’t just do what you want with everything that slides into your view. Understood.” She looked down, “yes, sir.” It was hard to stay mad at her. Particularly when she was legitimately good at reassembling what she took apart, more than that she had a knack for somehow improving the things she put her hands and mind on. “Go get dressed. You academy enrollment ceremony is in two hours.” He held up the pocket watch. “And I don’t want to be late.” Schooling was not cheap, even in a city that boasted a large and well rounded economy. Avery’s family was not the kind of wealthy aristocratic family that could afford to send their daughter to a private institution. They were the kind of family that had one somewhat nice looking outfit that needed to have the dust beaten out of it when they inevitably used it once every other year or so. Or on the off chance there was a special occasion, like their daughters first day of real schooling. Avery was a little older than many of her classmates simply because of the amount of time she and her parents needed to save up the coin for enrollment. In the end her father had taken out a promissory note. A loan with strict conditions, stricter still because of the lack of collateral, for Avery, though, it was worth it. The weight of that debt seemed lighter and lighter as he watched her slide into the crowd as they waited for her name to be called. Once enrolled she would get a proper education. Avery would learn everything from modern sciences, mathematics, reading, writing, and once she graduated from the primary institute, she could specialize. He had hunch about what her specialization might be. He watched her, hand in pocket, fingers idly gliding over his pocket watch. Years passed. Avery learned so much while somehow remaining ignorant to what was happening in her childhood home. Her father’s health was in decline by the time she had finished her preliminary studies, exasperated by the fact that he was consistently working additional hours to help pay for the note that was putting Avery in school. Double shifts for a miner were frowned upon for obvious reasons, but no one would stop someone from putting in the work if they wanted it. Avery’s few visits to her old home would show her a tired father, smiling through the bags under his eyes. Even when she came home bearing a letter from him about her mothers demise. Illness had ripped her apart, and with barely a second copper coin to rub together, there was no hope of buying the services of a healer, or even an apothecary’s recommended herbs. He still smiled at her, because she was on track to rise above the squalor, to be come something more than the daughter of a miner and a home maker. When the dust and debris from a lifetime underground finally clogged his breathing, the debt he had incurred on her behalf became hers fully. His death marked the end of the contract and that meant it was time to pay up. Avery had less money than her father had and in a moment of desperation she took what she could from her home, and fled. Clothes, some food, anything of value that she thought she could sell, and there on the kitchen table, still about ten minutes late, her father’s pocket watch. The debt collectors could auction off what was left and eat the remainder of their debt. Avery hated the feeling of free fall that settled over her life after she left. She didn’t dare return home, there was too much pain and too much opportunity to be spotted and wrangled into indentured servitude. In reality, she had so little to worry about. The property itself was auctioned off and though it only occupied a small corner of a small street in a nothing-of-value corner of the city, there was more than enough to pay the debt. The left over money from the sale mysteriously disappeared into the pockets of those involved in the paperwork. Avery in turn pawned what she had for a small bag of coins, mostly copper, with a scant few silver pieces. Her own personal fortune. What she had left wouldn’t even fill the burlap sack slung over her shoulder that served as her pillow on the cold nights she found herself spending in alleyways and side streets. She was twenty five now, possessed of something of a formal education and little more than the clothes on her back and a grumbling belly. She stretched the coin she had for as long as she could, but she needed income. She needed money. Offering her hands to help repair things at junk shops were met with a sneer and a confession that they only hired certified journeymen. If she could only get her hands on graduation papers and a stamp of apprenticeship. She might as well have willed herself to float off the ground and sprout a second head. She stepped out of another junk shop, the third one today. It might as well have been the hundredth though. All she could see were her feet, the scuffed and ruined edges of her old boots occupied her sight. The dipping sun cast a long and thin shadowy form from her own body. Gaunt, stretched too thin, and ending as it faded into nothingness. Fading where the light could no longer influence it. She looked at it and let out a single hard edged laugh. That was her. A shadow of the bright eyed girl who took apart her fathers watch. Stretched beyond herself until there was nothing left. She shook her head and crossed the hard packed dirt road. Metaphors and flowery words. The tools of scholars. She settled her back against the masonry wall of some kind of establishment. It was rowdy inside, she could hear cheers and clinking glass. The furnace was rumbling in the alley way, well, more like rattling. But it was warm and the night was cooling more than Avery would like. She let her bag fall next to her and she scooted as close as she dared to the magically powered heater. The excess heat leaking through the copper and ceramic casing was going to have to be enough to keep her comfortable. She couldn’t sleep. Not with the cheering from inside, the drunken songs, or the infernal rattle from the heater. In a moment of spiteful contempt she turned to the one thing she actually could do something about. Forcing open the small ignition chamber was easier than expected, then again the heater looked like it had fallen out of the last century and directly into the alley. Avery peered inside and found the problem. The fuel line was normally bolted in place, but whoever had installed this had neglected to actually put the binding straps in place. The bronze tube was hanging free and as the vapors were pumped in, the tube vibrated. Over time it had come to rest against the masonry, where it rattled. Avery had to imagine that as annoying as the sound was in here, that it would be worse inside. If the bloody cheering would quiet down enough to hear it at least. Her eyes scanned the small amount of debris and trash that had been left around. A stone, approximately the right size, would have to do. Now all she needed to do was shove the rock into place, no problem, there was just a burning arcane flame dangerously close to where she would be working. No big deal. She tried nudging the stone into place with a stick, but the force required to wedge it in place simply snapped the old brittle branch. She sighed and wished she could just ignore something like this, but it would stick in her brain until it was fixed. She could go somewhere else, but the warmth on the chilling evening was too enticing. So, with gritted teeth, she grabbed the rock and shoved it into place. The burning arcane flame found a new fuel source for a moment. The last remnants of her cotton sleeve caught the liquidy blue flame that had been boiling the water inside the upper tank of the heater. She wanted so badly to scream and pull her arm out, but she knew that it would be quicker to just get the job done. She shoved, kicked her legs to add leverage, and with a little work, wedged the rock she had found in place. Then she recoiled from the whole assembly. Sweet silence was her only comfort. She tore at her sleeve and it disintegrated in her hand. The arcane flame fizzled into nothingness along with her torn sleeve. Just one more of her belongings that disappeared. She settled back down next to the heater, enjoying the small victory, the warmth, and the relative silence. At least for a few minutes. She was just beginning to drift off when the sound of a heavy wooden door slamming open jolted her awake. The deep bass of a grumbling man reached her and in the half asleep haze she could only pluck out the words “gods damned” and “heater” On instinct she curled her legs up against her chest, finding it far easier to hide when she wasn’t well fed. A man who, to the casual viewer, might be described as portly appeared from the other side of the heater. Avery could see that beyond the clear beer belly there was a real layer of muscle there. Thick banded arms and a barrel chest that looked stronger than the leather apron covering it let on. Avery was too shocked, scared, and sleepy to do anything more than recoil. In response, the man took a step back, held his hands up, and changed his tone to something far softer than the burly frame let on. “Sorry. Meant no harm t’ye. Jus’ inspecting this bloody heater.” He chuckled, deep and warm. “Damned thing’s gone out again.” “No it hasn’t.” Avery had no idea why she said that. She should have just let him look at it and be done with it. Get back to sleep, get back to life. What life she had. Instead she had spoken and drew further attention to herself. The man looked at her, lifted an eyebrow and then glanced back at the heater. He placed a hand on it and a moment later pulled it back and gently shook the lingering heat off of it. “I’ll be. Here I thought I had gone deaf.” “The fuel line wasn’t secured. I shoved a rock under it. It’s good for now.” she chewed her lower lip, realizing what she had done. “I can pull it out if you want.” There was that deep, hearty laugh again. It made her want to smile, if she remembered how that is. He stepped over to her and stuck out his hand, not to shake hers but to help haul her to her feet. She took it and found that even standing up tall this man was nearly a head taller than her. “Good work deserves good rewards. Come ‘round the front, I’ll get you something to eat.” It was the single kindest thing anyone had done for Avery in ages. There was a small pang of guilt to it, like she hadn’t actually earned the kindness, but her stomach disagreed on principle. So she slung her bag over her shoulder and walked around front. The old carved wooden sign dangling from a rusted chain was painted with words that were nearing the same color as the rust. The hand painted lettering marked this as the “Bloodied Nose Inn and Tavern.” The sweet smell of spilled ale mixed so nicely with the scent of cooking meats. The haze of pipe tobacco added a hazy cloud over everything inside and softened the edges of the wooden rafters overhead. The interior was so much larger than she had expected, stretching outward from the door in a large, roughly square shaped space. Tables dotted the perimeter of the space, packed with men and women alike, cheering, calling, and spilling their drinks as they waved them in excitement. The reason why was dominating the center of the tavern. Two steps down on all side, ended in a sunk in pit filled with sand. A chair was placed at opposing corners and Avery could see that at one point in time the light wood had likely been pristine. Now it was soaked and stained with blood, stale beer and sweat. In the middle of the pit were two figures, barely staying on their feet as they swayed towards one another. The instant they were within striking distance they sprang to life. Swinging fists and dancing feet moved around the pit. It was clear who the underdog here was just based on how much of a cheer went up when a swing landed. They were few and far between. Even Avery could predict the outcome of the fight long before it was over, but there was something to be said for the gumption of destined loser. He got up over and over again, he kept fighting and kept learning. That was good, but he also kept getting hit, decidedly less good. Avery was so enraptured with the combatants that she almost crashed into one of the serving girls as she balanced a tray of drinks and weaved through the crowd. The girl managed to expertly dodge around Avery. The motion brought Avery back to the present, and she had only a moment to notice the faint presence of seams where body parts could be connected or disconnected, the same vapid smile plastered on her lips. She wasn’t a real girl, she was one of those automaton serving girls. It wasn’t long before the fight was over. A foot misplaced on the sand left a fragile jaw open for a devastating punch. Avery flinched from the cheers and groans that erupted around her. Then she watched as money purses were produced, coins distributed to the fighters, once they were back on their feet. So much money changed hands that it was enough to distract Avery again. “First time ye’ve seen a real prize fight lass?” The voice belonged to the man who she had met in the alley way, the owner of this pub and a strange specimen of a man. He was tall, with a clear beer belly leading the way. But there was muscle there, lots of it too. Tightly corded arms that looked like they could easily hoist one of the large beer barrels clean off of the floor with barely a second thought. The barrel chest hidden below a leather apron and grease stained shirt showed definition that indicated that he had, at some point, been in very good shape. The thick jowls hiding below his facial hair ended in a thick neck, the scruff did its best to hide scarred flesh, but it didn’t render it invisible. “I- Um, yeah.” Avery confirmed. He was already sliding a mug of beer in front of her and a plate with some form of steamed vegetables and a slab of meat. It could have been fresh from a pigs trough, it was hot and it was food and Avery had no issues with devouring it. The only time she slowed down on her eating was to wash what was in her mouth down with cold beer. “Easy now.” The man said to her, even though he knew his words would go unheeded. Avery tipped back the mug of beer, swallowing as much of it as she could, even then there was more than enough that spilled past the edges of her lips and spilled over the rags she wore. She was panting by the time she set it back down on the bar. She either didn’t see the looks of the patrons around her, or she simply didn’t care. Likely the latter. She swiped her sleeve over her mouth to clear off what remained and looked around her again. Folks looked away. She was pretty enough to draw their gaze, but she was still a waif off the streets and was well on her way to earning the ire of those around her. The man was clearing away her empty plate and mug. “Vulco.” He said as he returned. “And I wanted to thank ye’ for fixing up the boiler. Noise was drivin’ me mad.” He looked at her, and the distant stare she had as the alcoholic brew began to percolate into her brain. “D’ye have a place to stay t’night?” The look she gave him told the entire story. She did have a place to stay, that was why she fixed the heater, that was where she was going to stay. The look he gave her in return also told a story. “I cannae’ give ye a room, not without coin. But-” He glanced over his shoulder at the store room behind him. “-you can sleep next t’ the internal part of the heater. I’ll get one of the serving girls to watch over you.” Avery nodded, it was the kindest thing she had been given in ages, and all for the price of a rock. She would move on tomorrow and sort out something then. For now, her belly was full, the beer was tickling her brain and she had a warm place to be. What more could she want? She realized her manners, what was left of them and thanked Vulco before slipping off of the bar stool and creeping into a corner. She stood or squatted for the remainder of the evening, leaving a place for a paying customer at the bar. All the while she kept her eyes on the pit in the middle of the room. She wanted to deconstruct the rules, how it played out, who got how much when a fight was won, when a fight was lost, and how it all worked. There were mechanics to it and she wanted to learn those mechanics. Once she did she could take them apart, put them back together, or make them work for her. Her eyes caught a posted roster of fights, she suspected that these were arranged long ago by some third party. The handwriting on the roster all seemed the same, and those fights seemed to have someone announce them. There were two more arranged fights for the evening that Avery watched. Before the fights bets were collected by one of the mechanical serving girls. Coins sang as they dropped into a heavy leather bag that was deposited with Vulco. The winner would take some of that purse, divided up into smaller cloth bags. The patrons who had made bets got their cut as well, though Avery noticed that there were certainly some below the table bets as well. Shadowy corners of the admittedly large space housed men and women who were dressed just a little too finely for the bar. Their faces were obscured in a hazy cloud of blue and purple smoke drawn from pipes. Avery could only just make out the exchange of currency once the fight ended. Between scheduled bouts there were other fights as well. There was far less official betting on these. From what Avery could tell they were used to settle anything from disputes over who was paying for drinks that night, to long standing grudges. A fighter would wander into the pit, toss down a bag of coins or something of value onto a chair and call out their opponent. From there it was only a matter of matching the bet and gambling your pride. There were some who walked away, letting their pride and reputation be wounded in the process, others strut into the pit and lifted their fists to answer the call. To the winner went the prize. The night dragged on, and Avery was getting tired. The weight on her eyelids was being helped by the beer she had drank and the energy required to digest real food. She wanted to curl up in the store room, but she was sure that there was no serving girl there to watch over her, not until the end of the night. So she waited, watched, and tried to remember. Her mind never stopped analyzing things and even that was becoming exhausting to her. But the night drew to a close sooner or later. Drunkenly stumbling into the night and leaving silence in their wake. The clouds of smoke parted and the shadows moved out first, lingering only for a few fights and little else. Avery noticed the bag of coins lumped at their feet seemed fatter than the others. Fatter than it should be. Soon though, the bar was empty, save for Vulco and his small fleet of mechanical automaton servers. He spotted her, and she felt like she had never really been hiding from her. His eye was always there when she looked towards him. Still, he nodded towards the back room and Avery followed. A scratchy wool blanket and a pillow stuffed with straw was spread out next to the heater. Across from the makeshift bed was a line of women, standing still around what appeared to be a fountain or maybe a clock. Some kind of device on a table. It dripped once or twice a minute. Some liquid splashed against a crystal and it flared before a mechanism clicked and rotated a spout to the next waiting crystal. Again and again it dripped and moved. The automatons surrounding the little fountain looked at it, their unblinking eyes unnervingly still. There was one, however, that was not at the little crystal charging fountain. One of the female automaton’s stood by the door, clearly blocking it and looking directly at Avery. “Are you going to stare at me all night?” Avery asked once she curled up and faced away from the thing. “Yes.” It was a flat response. She had overheard the tone of voice they had while serving drinks. It was flirty, a little giggly, and almost human. Almost. Then again she had heard the same dozen or so little giggles and phrases repeated throughout the night. There was an uncanny feeling to them. If you weren’t paying attention then they could potentially pass as just some awkward woman in a low cut dress and bustier flirting with patrons for a few extra copper pieces, if you heard it enough, that facade fell away. “I’m not going to steal anything.” Avery complained. Silence. She sighed, shook her head and tried to sleep while under the gaze of the mechanical figure. As she slipped off into a comfortable sleep, she tried to remind herself not to be startled when she saw the thing standing over her in the middle of the night. She didn’t wake up until the sun was well above the horizon. The sound of singing, drunken singing, finally dragged her from sleep. Did Vulco re-open in the middle of the night? The smell of cooking meats did a good job of enticing her out of the back room. She smacked her lips to try and drive the filthy flavor of stale beer and food from her teeth. Her eyes watered in the glowing arcane lamplight. She was happy to see none of the inhuman women were in the room. She stepped over the threshold to the back of the bar. Vulco was there, pulling two beers from two different tapped kegs and setting them on a waiting wooden tray next to a platter of some kind of food. “Hungry?” He asked, never looking away from the next person at the bar, muttering an order and slapping down a pair of coppers. “Yeah.” Avery replied. “Good. Kitchen’s next door over. Stir the eggs on the burner and flip the sausage. Don’t burn either. Get moving.” it sounded more like a command than instructions on how to get some breakfast. Avery was too tired, to bleary eyes, and too hungry to really argue. She hauled herself into the kitchen, navigating mostly by smell and sound. The sizzling of sausage drew her attention to a wide slab of black cast iron. There must have been three dozen sizzling links on it, sweating grease. Three pans of yellowish eggs sat in pans, just beginning to bubble. She swirled the eggs with a wooden spoon and began pinching the sausages and rolling them before they burnt her fingertips. She was almost done when she spotted the tongs resting on the side of the counter top. A bowl of porridge was there too, a small piece of parchment just said “girl” on it. She took that to mean it was hers. She finished the cooking and quickly swallowed several mouthfuls of the soupy porridge. It was already cold, but she didn’t care. Vulco came in shortly after and pulled down four plates before gruffly nodding at the food. “Eggs ‘nd sausage, 2 links each. Bring ‘em ou’.” Then left. Avery took another bite and plated the food. The rest of her morning went on like that. Vulco would grunt orders at her, give her just enough information to get started, check up on her once, then move on. There was no conversation to be had, no opportunity to say “thank you” or “what now”. Just orders and porridge. She learned more in the four hours it took for service to slow down than she ever had at home. She knew how to assemble food, certainly, but cooking it was another thing altogether. Vulco had to scold her only a few times, mostly about under cooking something. Avery learned fast though. That day turned into a week, and then two weeks. Before long Avery was waking up and expecting to get to work in the kitchen. Vulco never prompted her to get up earlier, but she did naturally, mostly because she was working all day long and was exhausted by the time the tavern closed. The work was doing her some good though, the somewhat frail arms she had were becoming accustomed to hauling heavy cast iron pans around quickly. Her hands were developing callouses from burning herself. Small slits along her knuckles healed into scars courtesy of the knives required to chop vegetables. Vulco was pleasant enough and understanding, he allowed her time to sit down in the tavern and eat for a bit just past noon. The lunch rush was over, most of the patrons were delightfully sipping on their second mug of beer and the real rowdy crowd hadn’t yet shown up. She had started referring to the people who showed up around this time and taking up residence in the shadows as the “Smokescreen men.” They weren’t exclusively men, nor did they show up every day. There were regulars though and they were beginning to be recognized by her. She was certain that the same recognition went both ways. Avery had just finished her portion of whatever was left over from breakfast and pushed away from a table when she felt something, or rather someone, stumble into her. Whoever it was, she hadn’t seen him anywhere around her, and he certainly didn’t fall, but the kind of noise he made was unearthly. He screeched in frustration and launched into a string of unkind words, laced with slurs and angry words about her looks, her class, and her gender. Avery was no stranger to sideways comments, but there was something about this man, something that broke her. There was no mystery to it either. “If you were my little rat-slut of a daughter I would dump you on the streets too!” Avery didn’t even feel her hand curl up into a fist. Nor did she feel her arm cock back and certainly didn’t realize that the angle her fist went flying put her fist into his gut. He staggered back at that and coughed as he tried to get a breath back into his lungs. “You’re a feisty little bitch!” Avery didn’t realize until it was too late that he was fighting back. The weaselly man slapped her hard across the face. Avery could feel the sweat and grease from his hand splatter across her cheek as it sent her reeling to the floor. Her attempts to reach out for a table or chair or anything at all to stabilize her failed. All she managed to do was pull a chair over in a loud clatter. “Oy!” Vulco shouted from somewhere. “Take it to the pit if ye’ want to tussle!” The command was such an involuntary response to bar fights at this point that he had shouted without realizing who was involved. Avery rose from the floor like a specter rising from the grave, smooth and deadly. Vulco’s face drained of blood, but that was fine, Avery’s blood was boiling enough for the pair of them. Vulco didn’t even have an opportunity to intervene, the wiry frame of the other man was already scuttling to the pit, gleefully, and pulling from his pocket a small pouch. He tossed it on a chair. “Well, come on you little whore. Pony up or beg forgiveness.” He said and threw his arms wide. Avery knew the rules. She had to meet his bet or be forced to beg forgiveness in front of a bar full of half drunk peasants. She didn’t need to consider that option, the red hot numbness at the back of her skull wouldn’t let her. She dug into her pocket and pulled out the pocket watch. Ten minutes late, but made of fine cogs and encased in gold. She held it up, and set it on the chair. Her opponent scoffed at that, as if it was an insult to him, but he wasn’t there to get rich. Vulco’s eyes darted from Avery to one of the shadows at the corner of the room. His face had been pale, but now it was devoid of life. The man there, cloaked in pipe smoke had waved a hand, clearing the haze and allowing him a better view of the fight. Vulco saw the smile there, full of anticipation. Vulco couldn’t see his eyes, but he knew they were watching Avery. With a heavy sigh Vulco stepped into the pit. There was no official announcement for the fight, and he knew it would be over fast. “Ready?” he asked, looking at the oily man and his cocky smile, he got a nod in return. Vulco turned to Avery. “Ye’ don’ have t-” “Ready.” She growled and raised her fists like she had seen so many do before. In front of her face, good for blocking incoming blows. She would need to keep her eyes protected if she was going to see a way around this idiot. Vulco raised a hand, nodded, let it fall and stepped back. Avery was nowhere near a trained fighter and she was banking that her opponent wasn’t either. So when she produced a shriek that seemed to wail up from the very depths of her belly and sprint forward, she saw the man’s confidence shatter. She was still young, and spry, and now she had been well fed. Her first punch was deflected from a quick swipe. That was fine, she had plenty of fury left for another and another. They were fast, strong, and clumsy. She was lashing out and letting her angry boil into rage, and from there, the only outlet was through her fists. She was relentless, and soon her opponent was backing away, trying to put distance between himself and the fury of Avery’s wild swings. He was sure that with just a little more tact and strategy he could put her down. It would only take one good hit. He would never get his opportunity. Avery had been throwing right handed haymakers, dumping every ounce of strength she had into them, and forcing him back. So when a small part of her logical mind stepped in and suggested that she change up the pattern, she responded. A swift left handed jab made it through his defenses and landed on his solar plexus. Avery heard the air evacuate his lungs through his mouth and he collapsed to the sandy floor. The fight was over. But Avery wasn’t done. She clamored on top of him and pinned his arms down with her knees. She weighed little, but with no air to breath he was an easy target. She clamped her teeth together and reeled back and slammed her fist into his face. Then again. And again. Between both of her fists she landed a dozen blows on him. Each one felt like justification, like payback for cold nights on the street and the pain of an empty belly. Her fists hurt so much, but there was so much to give still, she wasn’t about to stop, and as Vulco pulled her off of her opponent she kicked and screamed and her hatred filled eyes never left him. As she was dragged away she saw what she had done. The mottled and bruised face of the man. His nose was broken and spilling blood into the sand and there was some kind of yellow thing there. It took Avery a moment to realize it was one of his teeth. His eye was already swelling shut, and he wasn’t moving. Vulco placed her at the edge of the pit, but didn’t let go of her. “Stay here.” The tone made it clear that it was not a request. He crossed the pit as Avery stood, panting and watching. He bent down and placed a hand in front of the mans mouth. He was visibly relieved when he realized that he was breathing. He dipped down and slung the man over his shoulder with ease. Avery had never quite seen his raw strength, but the man over his shoulder was nothing to Vulco. Her breathing slowed little by little, but the seething rage attached to the words the man had said to her didn’t leave. They solidified into something. Something dangerous and deadly. All she wanted to do was feel the exhilaration of beating the smugness off of his face again. The fight had lasted only a minute or two, but for that short span of time she didn’t have to think about her next meal, her mothers smile that she would never see again. She didn’t have to think about engineering problems or reading or polite manners and “how do you do”. It was her and it was him. Nothing else. But as oxygen began to reach her brain again she remembered that there was something else. She looked to her left, to the pouch of coins. She remembered her own bet, her fathers pocket watch, all that was left of him. She strode across the pit as Vulco came back in from depositing the man on a bench outside. She reached the chair in the corner and scooped up the bag of coins, felt the heft on it, and tucked it inside her shirt. Vulco was watching her, not disapprovingly, but with something akin to sorrow. He had seen rage today. Avery turned her back to him and returned to her chair, plucked up her pocket watch, and tucked it into the ragged pocket of her trousers. Then she stomped back to the kitchen, there was work to do. The remainder of the day passed with the kind of angry silence that an old married couple might have after a particularly explosive argument. Vulco had said nothing to Avery, but on some level she knew that he was upset with her. She had unleashed something that conjured up some kind of emotion with him. They would talk about it eventually, she was sure, but at the moment her own mind was storming and she was a small boat in that torrent. Thoughts of violence and the emotional relief and...something else...something more visceral...were all tied to that feeling. Avery found that her day slipped past without her knowing. It was like she wasn’t aware of what she was doing, she was just doing it. Going through the motions as her mind mulled over that fight. When she blocked or dodged a clumsily throw punch from that man, she felt like it was throwing a log on a fire. Each one made the fire burn more, brighter, longer, more intense. Until it was big enough. Until she felt it in her stomach, through her legs and arms, up into her head. She remembered the numb lightness at the back of her head that crept forward like digging claws until her whole existence had been consumed. She remembered pouring all of that into her fist. She remembered the raw and unbridled release she felt when her knuckles made contact. Now that the fight was over and the adrenaline fading, she could tell that each successive hit felt like another turn on a release valve. It felt good, so very good, to have something, someone, to take out all her regrets and upset on. The little weasel of a man, his bloodied face swimming in her vision, was her first win. He would not be her last. The tavern quieted. Patron left. There were more fights but Avery didn’t watch them, her mind was somewhere else. On one of her many trips to the front she glanced at the small rack of keys under the bar. There were still unoccupied rooms. Between preparing food and dropping them off for the automatic serving girls to take, she pulled the purse from inside her shirt where it had resided like a hard lump against her heart and spilled its contents. Thirteen silver coins, five copper. More money she had had in her possession, ever. She was only a small girl when her father and mother had been counting coins to pay for things, but even then she knew that even a single silver coin represented a days wage. She held in her hand almost two weeks worth of hard labor in the mines. From a useless nothing of a man. Avery had seen fights that were far more...lucrative. She walked to the front of the house, the dining room empty, the pit now silent and still. But not to Avery, she could hear it. The grains of sand begged her to step in once again, to feel them with sweat and blood and malice. She ignored the whispers and pulled up a stool and faced down Vulco. First she pointed to one of the lower shelves, to a bottle half emptied of the brown liquid inside of it, then stacked three copper coins on top of one another and nudged them forward. “Avery-” Vulco began, his tone low. “I’m a paying customer this time.” Avery cut him off, then pointed at the bottle again. She knew the cost of a drink, and she had just bought herself a few. He closed his eyes and let his held breath seep out through his nose. He plucked the bottle and a glass and poured her what she had paid for. He poured himself a small amount as well. He lifted his glass and Avery took the hint. She lifted her, clicked it to his and drank. She sputtered at only a small mouthful, he did not. “I want a room too.” Avery muttered once the burning feeling migrated from her tongue and cheeks and began to sear its way down her throat. Vulco nodded. “And I want you to arrange another fight for me.” Avery said, swallowing another gulp of the brown burning liquid. “I promise you don’t want this.” “Oh I definitely do. This is the most money I’ve ever had. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the room and board, but I earned this.” She made sure that she hit the word ‘earned’ hard. Vulco’s mouth pressed into a hard line, then he nodded. He let his head fall back and he looked upward at nothing at all and muttered something that Avery could not hear. The room was distorting strangely around her and it was a challenge to focus on things. “If that’s what you want.” Vulco said looking down at Avery. “In a fortnight there’s a tournament startin’. We’re hosting a few matches ou’ here. Lot of big names, but a lot of up and comers too. You uh, you might fit in well with the light weights-” Avery shot him a look filled with daggers and venom. “For now. You need to bulk up a bit.” Avery squinted at Vulco, took another drink and emptied her glass. Then nodded. “Put in my name.” “You’ll need a sponsor, or coin.” “How much?” With a sigh Vulco pointed to the small sack of coins. “Ten o’ those silvery ones.” All her money. Of course. She’d have two silver, two coppers, and a load of shame left if she lost. But… “And the take?” Vulco actually snorted at that. “If, and tha’s a big if, you win. A hundred.” “I could do a lot with a hundred silver.” Avery mused. “No lass. Gold.” That settled a few things for Avery. She could live off that kind of take for a long time. All for the cost of ten simple, silvery coins. She pulled the bag from her shirt and counted out the ten silver needed to enter, plus a copper coin. “A room for the night, entry into the tournament. That’s enough right?” She knew it was. Vulco scooped up the coins and silently nodded to her. She couldn’t see the disappointment in his eyes. Her vision was swimming too much. It felt like her eyes were rattling in their sockets and everything was so hard to focus on. Not to mention the feeling of giddiness. She was about to win so much money. This was what she needed, her life was about to turn around. Why hadn’t she done this earlier? Avery woke up the next morning in a soft bed. The sun that was streaking through the open window physically hurt her. She pulled a blanket up and over her head, leaving her feet exposed and cold. She pinned the blanket between her feet and pulled down. That let the sunshine in. She couldn’t wait to afford a large blanket and a soft bed of her own. Probably in a mansion somewhere just off of market street. Nothing opulent, just nice. One hundred shimmering golden coins. So much. If her math was right it was almost a years worth of wages. And that was just for one tournament. There were surely more. If the sun was up, that meant the tavern was open. Avery leapt from bed and made sure she was dressed, slipped on her boots and sprinted down the hall to the stairs. She already smelled cooking meats and the general clatter of service. She was late, Vulco would surely scold her for that. Maybe he wouldn’t need to, the look he gave her when she appeared at the base of the steps was enough to dry out her mouth and turn her blood to ice. She dipped her head and moved to the back room, pull on an apron, and took over the breakfast spread that was already half done. No lecture came, no dirty looks or huffs of disappointment. Just a single glare and she got back to work. That’s how it would be for the next week or so. She paid up for a room, slept there, and worked in the kitchen. She was far better about being on time. At least until it was time for her first official fight. Vulco muttered to her at the end of her shift that she could take the following day off. Something about helping to calm her nerves for the fight. Avery scoffed at that at first, but as the night approached she did feel a flutter in her belly and found herself pacing more and more in the kitchen. Vulco slipped in and told her to go wrap her knuckles and left a small glass with a portion of brown liquid in it. Avery had no idea how to properly wrap her knuckles but she had seen other fighters doing something similar. A strip of cloth between the fingers, around the wrists, and over the palms. She tried to replicate it as best she could, but had an uncanny feeling that she was doing it wrong. There was no time to worry about that now though, she could feel more than hear the hush from the dining room as Vulco stepped into the center of the pit to announce the tournament for the evening. There were sixteen fighters in the room, easily identified as well. Muscles and scars on display. Most wearing a much more competent hand wrap than Avery sported. All of them looked far more mean as well. Avery’s fight was near the beginning of the bracket, best to get the amateur fighters out of the way early. She wasn’t up first, but shortly after. She watched two eliminations before her name was called and she stepped into the ring. The warmth from the drink Vulco had handed her fading into the back of her mind and the creeping terror of facing down some real competition crept in. A man towered over her, even from across the sandy pit. Easily a head taller than her, arms that were already slick with sweat and a long braided beard dangled down past his throat. The look in his eyes wasn’t malice or hatred or even contempt. It was just nothing. There was nothing there, a blank slate that Avery was sure identified her only as an object to mash into the ground. She had been intentionally doing more strength oriented work, and her arms still felt taut from that, but all of that seemed to be meaningless against the giant of a man. It was hard to believe he was in the amateur league. She didn’t hear her name called or even Vulco shouting to begin. What she had done, instead, was focus on cataloging the body of the man before her. Was he going to lead with a haymaker and try and end her quickly, would he square up and try and wear her down with a series of jabs, was he the kind of man to trip you and make sure you never got back up. One hit to end it, apparently. She saw him coming, and even though he was fast, the sand was a little harder to run on and it slowed what would be a wickedly fast sprint down to something a little more manageable. She was shorter than he was, so his punches would be thrown downward, and Avery knew that much. Ducking them would be less useful since they would be coming down on her anyway. So she threw herself to one side and hoped that it threw him off base. Her luck held and he stumbled a bit, though never tumbled to the ground. Avery replied by lifting her leg up and then snapping it forward. She was aiming the kick at the man’s kneecap, a move that, had it landed, would have ended the fight quickly. There were precious few rules about what bones could and could not be broken here. Kneecaps were on the table. She missed though, not because of a clever dodge, but simply because she miscalculated where he would be. A fact that frustrated her, so she hopped backwards and raised her arms defensively. She needed to be smarter in this fight than her first one. The little weasel of a man she had clobbered before was nothing compared to this. A rumbling growl issued from her attacker and he spun on her. He wasn’t making fists anymore, instead his fingers were splayed out and curled, practically twitching, in anticipation. Avery saw that and wondered, but not for long. She was too close to have enough time to dodge with any kind of accuracy, so when he snapped a hand at her she snapped a raised arm out to block. That was the first mistake she made. She would later curse herself for not trusting her analytical skills more. He wasn’t swinging at her to punch her, he was reaching out to grapple her. And putting her arm up to block him only gave him the perfect opportunity to snatch her up. She found herself spun around, her arm pulled behind her back by the wrist and pulled upward. The pain in her shoulder was unlike anything she had ever dreamed might happen. She had spent weeks mentally preparing to be punched in the face, slammed in the gut or thrown to the ground. This was new though, and something new was something learned to her. She could hear his wheezing breath by her ear and feel the scratch of stray beard hairs on her cheek. He was so close. That was all she needed, just a bit of ignorance and some misplaced cocky confidence. She balled up her free hand into a fist and threw it over her shoulder, splitting his lip in the process. He howled and snapped his head back, but didn’t release her. That was fine, she didn’t need him to, she wanted him close still, just not that close. She made another blind toss over her shoulder and grabbed at anything she could, and found it. The long braided beard was now in her hands and she used it to pull him forward while throwing her head back. There was still a hint of the alcohol collected at the back of her head, numbing her scalp just a little. So the feeling of his shattering nose and impacted teeth was barely felt. What she did feel was the freedom of having her other hand back. She wasted no time and hopped away from him, turning to face her target. He was clutching his face and she could already see the blood streaming from his broken nose and split lips. She hadn’t knocked out a tooth, not yet, but there was still time. Unfortunately, all she had done was make him angry, or at least more angry. His eyes were bulging now and as he took her in he let his face go, allowing the blood to flow freely down and soak into his shirt. A fresh growl crossed his puffy lips and he raise his hands again, fingers at the ready. Avery saw that and knew what he was after. She wasn’t about to be fooled a second time. Any second now he would come at her, try to grab her and wrench her around until she gave in, if she was lucky. If she wasn’t then he would start beating on her from behind. So she acted first, darting forward and coming in low. His height made it difficult for him to reach down and grab her, so when she coiled her legs and sprang upwards, shoving her fist into his gut he was fully unprepared for it. She heard the air blast out of him, and felt some of the hot, sticky blood drip onto her. She had her in, she had arrived, all that mattered now was doing as much damage as possible before he recovered. She swung with wild abandon. Fists collided with his kidneys and ribs, and she swore she could hear one snap instead of flex with the impact. That earned her more than just a pained grunt. He was falling and Avery was beginning to feel that same pressure valve release. Her mind was slipping away and she was reliving the years on the streets. She felt the wealthy spitting on her again, and taking that memory and pouring it into her fists. The guilt of her parents spending real money to give her an education only to have her end up in the gutter. That coiled around her body and took up residence in her thighs, causing them to slam into his unprotected groin. He coughed and tried to roll away from her. She wasn’t about to let him go, not when she had more demons to exercise. He raised his arms to protect his face, which was fine by Avery, that left so much more of his body open for abuse. She dove on him, knees first, slamming into his guts again. He was strong enough to throw her off, but robbed of precious air and clearly fearing for the beating that was coming from the rabid little girl, he chose to just defend himself as best he could. Avery battered him all about the body. She would leave bruises on the well muscled body and likely rob him of a future with children. In the end he cried out that he yielded, and Avery considered for a moment ignoring the polite rules of the pit and pounding more of his flesh, but through gritted teeth and panting lungs, she let her last raised fist linger in the air for a moment before shoving off of him. She stood, looked down at the whimpering man, and sneered. There was still pain roiling in her skull and she still wanted to let it out. That was fine though, there were more matches for her. For now she slunk to the bar, currently being attended not by Vulco, but one of the girl shaped machines. Smiling, pulling beers from kegs, and little else. There was no food service today, how could there be? Avery had other places to be. As she plopped into one of the waiting stools she had to huff at that. This tavern would fall apart without her. Vulco was getting far too comfortable with her cooking and cleaning and serving while he slung beer and liquor at people. Avery turned to the girl and placed her last copper on the bar and leaned in. She had to shout her order over the cheers for the next match. “My usual!” She shouted. In return she got a calm, almost bored response. “I don’t know what that is. Can you be more specific?” Avery rolled her eyes and mentally kicked herself. The serving girls were good at what they were made to do, which was jiggle and smile and bring drinks from one place to another. Advanced technology, what a joke! “The rum, bottom shelf, third from the left. Labeled ‘Marksman.’ Two fingers.” “Of course!” was the bubbly response. Avery sighed and watched her last coin turn into a glass of liquor. She took it, then turned back to the fight. She spent the rest of the first bracket watching the competition one by one. Picking up on their style, their tricks, and their general stamina. She only needed to win three more fights to take home more money than she knew what to do with. The rum helped to sooth her mind and bring down the fury and adrenaline that was coursing through her. She knew it would come back, there was no avoiding that, but for now this would do. Her name was called when the wax in the candles were starting to get low. She figured that was about an hour, clicking open her perpetually late pocket watch confirmed that. Now would be about the time that she would be replacing those candles around the room. She used to hate that, her rear end being pinched by rowdy patrons and catching glimpses of people looking at her chest. Even now she sneered at the idea. Leave those perverts for the fucking machines, she had work to do. Avery’s second fight of the night went well enough, she took a few hits, including a hard strike across her nose which, she found out, broke it. The blood it produced stained the front of her old linen shirt, and would never come out. That was fine, she told herself, because after tonight she would just buy herself a new one. She could buy all the shirts and dresses and luxury she wanted. She just needed to go a little further. Once she put her opponent into the sand and with her trademark mount and finale, she robbed him of his consciousness. Cheers erupted around her and for the first time in a long time, she felt something. It was new, but somehow familiar. She had felt it before but under different circumstances. It was hard to recall those circumstances at the moment, but there was something swelling inside of her as shouts proclaimed her victory, and even the groans of those who just lost a sack of coins on a misplaced bet drove her to feel something. She stood, looked around, and for the first time in a long time, she smiled. Not the kind of smile she pasted on when some jerk cat called her, not something dismissive to get out of a conversation or even the smile she gave to Vulco. This was something different, this was something she did. She earned this. This praise settled into her chest and she managed to analyze what it was. Pride. She had earned the respect of those around her and they were cheering for her instead of just cheering for a good fight. She glanced down at the pulpy mass of the face she had just beaten. It was a small price to pay. She didn’t have to buy her next drink. One of the serving machines set a glass down with brown liquid in it. She sniffed at it and recognized the bite of Marksman. The human shaped thing that served her nodded towards one of the dark corners and smiled at her. “A gift from an interested party.” The words sounded like they were said to the serving machine and told to be delivered in that exact cadence and phrasing. It didn’t sound like something one of the serving girls would say. Avery nodded once, turned to the dark corner that had sent the drink and raised her glass on salute before drinking it down. She never saw the dark look Vulco cast in her direction as she swallowed it down. It was brief, he had another fight to announce. The night progressed much the same way. Avery was beginning to feel the fatigue by the time the final match was called. It was her and another woman. Avery had watched her fight and noted how different it was from her own style. Avery was all strength and fury, fueled by everything she hated and unleashed in a savage flurry. That same rage helped to dampen the inevitable hits she would take. She could just grit her teeth and muscle through those. Her final opponent of the night was more grace and fluid. She had control, poise, and she only threw a punch when she was sure it would land in the most devastating manner. She was masterful at stepping just out of range of an incoming blow and countering it with her own small but effective jab. It would only take one or two hits from Avery’s fists to put down most opponents, but this woman was a living embodiment of ‘death by a thousand paper cuts.’ Avery knew enough to be careful, but she knew that the best laid plans never survived the start of a fight. “Avery, ready?” Vulco shouted and got a nod in return. “Hazel?” another nod. Vulco threw his hand up and retreated from the sand. Avery’s hands were up, defending her face as she slinked across the sand towards Hazel. The woman was smiling at her and once she was close enough Hazel actually spoke to her. “Gonna lead with that left jab and right hook combo?” Avery had normally relied on instinct, but realized that she did usually throw a left then right. Was she that predictable? She would show this woman how furious she could be. The verbal jab was already getting under her skin and she was feeling that same searing anger beginning to rise. Under most other circumstances she would let it take over, start throwing punches fueled by that anger. She was going to be smarter this time. She stepped in, planting her left foot as if she were about to throw a left handed jab, but twisted her body and unleashed a hard hitting right hook instead. It would have been hard hitting at least. Hazel had either seen it coming or was just prepared enough to deal with a left or a right. She dodged to Avery’s right, the punch never landed and it threw her off her balance, and an instant later a quick smack impacted her at the back of her head, just behind her ear. She was made of tougher stuff than that, but it rattled her. She had a hard time focusing for a second or two, which was practically a death sentence in the ring. She embraced her off balance stumble and turned it into a roll that took her out of range of the next punch. “Oh, clever.” Hazel muttered, but moved swiftly up to Avery, who was still clumsily attempting to get back on her feet. Avery found another light punch across her cheek and a flurry of sand as Hazel leapt backwards, out of range of Avery’s wild backhand. That gave Avery time to get on her feet and she was seeing red. Her mind was fully shut out of control and only rage and adrenaline drove Avery now. She darted forward and threw a series of haymakers. She only needed one to connect after all. Hazel did a respectable job of dodging them, and those she couldn’t move away from were met with a raised arm. Avery’s punches drove her back and more than that, wiped the smile from Hazel’s lips. Avery quickly switched up her routine and threw a quick body blow into the mix, connecting with Hazel in the ribs. It wasn’t Avery’s specialty, but it was enough to stagger Hazel to the side. Now it was Avery’s turn to smile. She had won, she knew it. She stepped up to Hazel to finish her off only to find a swift and dexterous knife handed chop land against her throat. She couldn’t breath, and her hands instinctively flew to her throat as she started coughing and stumbling back. Her eyes watered and she couldn’t see anything but sand, tears and blurry shapes. One of those blurry shapes was Hazel, staggering and struggling, but still moving. She took a page from Avery’s book and threw a heavy handed punch at Avery and connected. Avery found herself tumbling through the air and landing in sand. She was still coughing, though now there was nothing to breathe in but sand. She sputtered and felt Hazel’s weight on her back, then an elbow crooked around her throat and a hand gripping her hair. Her head was pulled back and she knew it was over. Vulco was shouting, people were screaming, cheering, wailing. The fight was over, and Avery had lost. She felt all the weight leave her. She was laying in the sand, breathing hard and pushing against the sand, no, the whole world with her fists to just try and get back on her feet, and failing. She at least turned herself to one side so she could breathe, but it was over. Hazel and Vulco were a few feet away while she writhed in the sand. Defeated. Again. Down and out with nothing but bruises and shame. How had this happened again? The thought crystallized in her mind and settled into place like a disease that would dominate her for years to come. There was only one way the world worked. You beat it, or it beat you. She would never be beaten again. That was not the only lesson life had in store for her tonight. Strong hands picked her up and put her on her feet. She didn’t want help and swiped at whoever it was. She was sure her aim was true, but Vulco deftly caught her hand before it could do any damage to him. His hand, meaty and firm, was like a steel band around her wrist and his voice a gentle whisper. “Tha’s enough. Just sit ye’ down, second place still gets a purse. Jus’ be calm lass.” Vulco guided her to a bench seat at a table. The candle burled low, too low, where was the fucking serving girl. She needed something to soothe her, this candle needed to be replaced. She had no money, again, Vulco promised her money. How had she lost? Something with weight settled down onto the bench across from her. Avery shook the daze from her mind and her eyes as best she could. Something similar to the sound of coins jingled onto the table, muffled slightly by the sound of cloth. A sack or bag of some kind, leather from the sounds of it. That was nice, she liked the smell of leather. Her head lolled to one side and took it all in. The bag, tipped to one side, spilling silver and some gold onto the table. The fucking candle was too low, it barely glimmered off of the finger print smudged coins. Oil from changing hands dulled the light. Up from that, a familiar smile, though it was less cocky this time. Between the smile and the coins was a hand, outstretched, connected to an arm, slender but hiding power. Up to the shoulder, stitched to a chest that was hidden behind loose fitting cloth. Bent forward enough to allow Avery to see a tease of breasts. “Sorry about your throat. Are you okay?” Hazel asked. Avery grunted, neither good nor bad, though she gripped Hazel’s hand and shook it. “No hard feelings, eh?” Hazel asked. Avery was quiet for a moment. “Marksman and we’ll call it even.” “I don’t know what that means.” Hazel said and, as if summoned by magic, a serving girl appeared. “Marksman, two fingers, she’s paying.” Avery said and pointed at Hazel. The automaton’s head swiveled with a slight jerk towards Hazel. Avery puffed a small amount of air from her nose, the motion was too stiff to be human and Vulco clearly hadn’t kept up on lubrication on the joint work. It could have been so much more smooth, but who would want some walking piece of cog-work to look too human? What would that lead to? Someone would beg Vulco to let them fuck one of them, drunk as they were, they’d tear the thing to pieces and leaving it grinding and spasming on the floor of their room. Then what? Charge them the hundreds of gold pieces to fix, who was she kidding those things weren’t worth being fixed, they would have to be replaced. “Yep. A small ale for me, please.” Hazel replied. “Certainly!” The same tone, the same voice, the same words. Avery had heard it too many times. “it doesn’t come in small, you know.” Avery said. “Oh. I don’t really drink much, it just felt odd to not get something.” Avery raised an eyebrow. That’d be an easy choice to make when you had a fortune on your belt. She scooped up her own winnings and tied the bag shut before lashing it to her own belt. It was heavy, not a bad take, but not a hundred golden coins. She squinted at Hazel, the woman who had defeated her. “Why are you here anyway?” Avery asked, trying to keep the venom from her lips. “I just wanted to say I was sorry for your throat. It was kind of a dirty move.” Avery snorted at that, it was almost funny, almost. “There are no dirty moves here. Just winning moves.” Avery paused, admitting to herself that, in retrospect, it was a good move. “You’ll have to show me what else you know.” Hazel raised one eyebrow at that, blushed, and bit into her lower lip. It was only then that Avery had gotten a good look at her. Dark wavy hair that had been pulled back and tucked up with a leather thong, high cheekbones and full lips that had, amazingly, remained unsplit. Loose short with ties on it that had been left intentionally undone. She remembered that she was wearing knee high boots and black leather breeches. She looked more of a swashbuckler than a melee fighter, but she was clearly competent enough. Even as Avery took her in, she couldn’t help but notice that Hazel’s eyes were roaming over her own features and, in a moment of clarity, Avery realized what a mess she must look like. Dried blood around her nose and mouth, bruises, dirty clothes, and surely a dozen other bruises. She couldn’t feel them, they were just a constant numbness to her whole body. She looked away, unable to control her own blush at the invasive eyes across from her. Her luck picked up as the serving automaton returned, placing a glass in front of Avery with a little too much liquor in it, and a mug of beer for Hazel. Avery wasted no time. She scooped up her glass, held it up, and proclaimed cheers to Hazel. Her former opponent lifted her mug and lightly tapped it to Avery’s glass. In a single swallow Avery took down her drink and remained oblivious to the small sip Hazel took before setting aside her mug. Avery, despite working in a bar, had only recently recently tasted alcohol, and it warmed her body while dulling her senses. After two more refills on her cup, she was feeling comfortably numb and found it difficult to conjure up any kind of upsetting emotions about her past, or her present, or anything at all. The numbness settled in and left only room for a happy, warm buzz. She couldn’t remember closing her eyes. Or walking up to her room. She remembered waking up though. Her head was still spinning just a little and there was something else in her bed with her. She felt a weight there, and something else, something draped over her abdomen. She tried her best to remain calm, but as her senses returned and she took in more stock on her own body, she realized a few things. The weight next to her was a person, or at least something that snored gently like a person. It was almost too cute to be a man, if Vulco’s snores were any indication, so she determined it must have been another woman. Hazel, that was the last thing she remembered. Laughing, a lot, and scooting close to the woman. She had vague memories of making a comment about how warm she felt. She tried to take her own top off, down in the bar. Hazel had told her not to, she had insisted. There was an empty void in her mind and then...she was in Hazel’s room. She took her top off. Avery checked in with her own body and found that her top was still missing, as were her trousers, and everything else. She was naked. The thing on her abdomen felt warm too, and soft. It was an arm, Hazel’s arm. She tried not to bolt upright at the revelation that she was undressed, in bed with the very woman who had beaten her in a bare knuckles fight. She swallowed hard as she struggled to think about what else happened, but all she found were empty spaces in her memory. Then Hazel stirred next to her, the snoring became a gentle breathing in and out, her hand moved up and fell to the valley between Avery’s breasts. She knew she should panic, fly out of bed, throw up her defenses, but there was a lingering sensation of comfort and affection there. Coiled somewhere around her heart and mind, gently soothing her. She knew she wasn’t in danger, far from it, she felt, for the first time in ages, safe. So she let her morning progress with no complaint. It took time to settle both her complaining stomach and her swirling mind. Eventually though, she relaxed into Hazel’s embrace and simply remained still, breathing, and comforted. It was hard to accept how nice it felt. The safety was something new to her, but it a welcome change. Avery was the most surprised at how oddly consistent the next few years became. She might have worked for a few more weeks with Vulco, but she found herself far more drawn to fighting. It gave her that release she so longed for. An outlet for anger and aggression and soon she asked Vulco to begin managing and arranging fights for her. Not just in the tavern, but as she came to find out, other venue’s hosted fights as well. Many were regulated well enough, though the ones that were not paid far better and Avery found herself drawn to those for a myriad of reasons. The fights were harder, it took more aggression and more raw anger to power through the inevitable punches that landed across her body. The take was larger too, and more money meant more lavish living. It didn’t take long for her dream of a safe and secure home with her own bed and a full pantry to be washed away in a sea of angry fights and stronger liquor. At some point one of Avery’s many opponents snatched the tightly bound pony tail she normally kept her hair in. It was both painful and humiliating to be grabbed, thrown to the ground and then knocked out with a few well placed hits simply because she was a woman with long hair. Later that night, she had to sit down with an eye that was swollen shut and pockets woefully empty from the loss and sulk. Hazel attended most of her fights, partially because she participated, and partially because she wanted to keep an eye on Avery, or rather the amount of alcohol Avery consumed. It may have come out as a drunken slurry of words, but Avery demanded that Hazel help her do something about her hair. She would never let that happen again, even in the depths of a drunken stupor Avery knew how to learn a lesson and adapt. Hazel, to her credit, attempted to tell Avery that there were other solutions and that she actually thought the longer styling was quite attractive. Hazel wasn’t sure that Avery even heard her words, as was so often the case when she got like this. “Just fuckin’ doing it.” Avery said, a stern edge creeping into her voice. Hazel sighed, and drew a boot knife that she wasn’t, strictly speaking, supposed to have in a bar like this. Illegal brawling going on in the background robbed any attention she might have had from taking it out though. Hazel bundled up Avery’s messy pony tail and placed the blade against it. “Are you sure? I mean we could-” “Gods above and below! Just cut it. You never fucking listen when I’m trying to be sensible.” The words were there, barely heard through the commotion and the thick sludge of alcohol that captured Avery’s mind. Hazel, reluctantly, complied and sawed through the thick strand of hair and tossed it into Avery’s lap before pushing away from the table and standing. “The fuck you going?” Avery questioned. “Too tired to sit here and watch.” Then left. Avery huffed, called for another drink and turned back to the fight. She shook her head and told herself that Hazel was being odd. It didn’t take any energy to watch a fight. Avery sat, watched, learned and eventually succumbed to the booze in her brain. Her head slumped to the side and she passed into darkness. In that void her mind reeled, summoning up thoughts and dreams that tormented her. She saw herself, looking down over her drunken body at the table. “What a pathetic wretch.” She said to herself. “Father would disown you if your stupid schooling hadn’t pushed him to death.” Her drunken avatar sat up, head lolling to the side and looked at the more sober version of herself. “Fuck you. He did what he wanted.” “Yes. For you. It’s good to see you’re really using the education he gave his life for.” “The shit am I supposed to do? Engineer my way into a good life?” There was silence there. Avery, drunk and drooling on herself in the darkness of her own mind looked down at her hands. Bruises and calloused flesh met her eyes. These weren’t the hands of a girl who took apart watches or fixed boilers or made something of herself. These were the hands that put violence to other people. She hurt people. She looked around and was alone again. Her sober self was gone. Vulco was gone. Hazel was gone. She had shoved them all away. She wasn’t sure how she knew that in the odd and distorted world of her dreams, but she had. She could see their backs, as each of them walked away from her. She had done that. Who cared? She didn’t need them. She was fine on her own. She woke with a start, someone was settling onto the bench across from her. Avery hoped it was Hazel, she also hoped that her bleary eyed look of disappointment were masked by her drunken face. It was not Hazel, rather someone who seemed far too well dressed to be in a dingy underground bar. Fine silks and well kept fabrics layered over each other. Each one colored and matching well to bring together a finely crafted outfit. A moment after seeing this the smell hit Avery. Rich smoke, freshly pulled from a hookah or perhaps a pipe. It was sweet and still acrid, like burning cloves and tea leaf. It wrinkled her nose. Then it came to her all at once. The obscured corners or the taverns that housed the real money in the fights. Sponsors that owned fighters and wallowed in shadow and smoke. She had seen them before, though never like this, never up close. “Avery, was it?” He said as he gingerly pushed a small tumbler of brown liquid towards Avery. “It’s Marksman, your drink of choice, correct?” She eyed the glass, even while drowsy and recovering from a night of drinking she was weary of strangers in bars giving her free drinks. Still, there was something about him that made her want to trust him, not that she did, but there was a kindness and a gentle demeanor there. It reminded her of Vulco, though she could tell that what this man was wearing wasn’t the truth, it was an act. Still, free Marksman… She swallowed the drink. “Avery, yeah. And you are?” “I’ve been watching your match ups and I have to compliment you on both your savagery and technique. More than that though, I noticed that you never let a good loss go to waste. I’ve seen you learning and rarely do you repeat the same mistake twice.” She saw his eyes flick to the clump of hair she had on her lap. Right where Hazel had left it. “Prevents me from being beaten in the face too often.” She replied. “Indeed.” “You never answered my question.” Avery quipped. In reply he smirked and nodded in concession to her. “That I did not.” He held out a hand to her. “Scias.” Avery hadn’t heard the name, though she shook his hand simply not to be rude, she was about ready to be done with this man. He reeked of something unsavory to her and she hated how he was all too smooth. His face had clear blemishes on them, marks from a harder childhood perhaps, he also clearly made an effort to cover them up. His hands were too hard in places to be born from wealth, though his voice dripped with enticing honey. The kind of man who didn’t work for anything in his life any more. Things were handed to him now. The kind of man who had other people to get dirty on his behalf. “Thanks for the drink. I need to get to bed. I have someone waiting for me.” Avery said as she stood and attempted to keep herself steady. “Oh, do you?” There was something in his voice. Something that told Avery that he already knew something she didn’t. The rum was clearly wearing off since she felt a searing hot pang of anger and a rising feeling like she wanted to be the first person to put a bruise on his face. She was sure that there would be a crossbow bolt or a dagger in her back before she got a chance to do so, but the desire was there. Hot and ready. “Yes.” Avery insisted. “I do.” “That’d be Hazel?” Avery sucked in a deep breath to try and calm herself, it only barely worked. Still, she nodded. “Another stand out fighter.” Scias said. “Though I think too timid to do as well as you. Don’t you think?” “She beat me once upon a time.” Avery admitted through clenched teeth. “I remember. It was a good fight though. You almost had her.” “What do you actually want?” Avery spat. “Nothing. I was just making introductions. The bar is empty so I thought it might be a good chance to shake your hand and introduce myself. Nothing more.” He said holding up his hands, palm out, attempting to illustrate that there was nothing up his sleeves. Avery grunted, nodded once and turned to walk away. By the time she reached the stair case to the upper floor she couldn’t help but look back. Scias hadn’t moved, he was still sitting there, on the bench across from where Avery had been napping. His eyes were on her, and the small smile on his lips hadn’t changed. It still looked like he was holding a hand full of game winning cards, even as he admitted he was losing. There was still a play he wanted to make and Avery hated it. No, she hated him. She had half a mind to wander back down and still try to pummel him. In the end, she turned away from the smug look on his face and walked to her room. Her face hurt, her head hurt, and now her mind was reeling with what to do with this new player. All she wanted was the small scratching of a straw bed and the soft feel of Hazel’s breasts under her hand. Something to set her back on the ground, put her on her feet and keep her upright and facing the right direction. Hazel and a good nights sleep had always done that, and it always would. It was late into the night already, late enough that the only people in the bar were drunks passed out at their tables and the sharks swirling around, waiting for blood. Avery was familiar with this time of night, she had seen plenty of it when working with Vulco all those months ago. It was a kind of calm before the storm, the consequences for a night of drinking. When all the energy seemed to drain from the world. The serving girls, if there were any, would be charging, the room filled with snores and the kitchen with water and soap. It was a time of stillness that was only ever broken by certain sounds. An errant snore or the squeal of wood against the flooring as someone got up and left. So when there was an eerie silence in the hall outside of Avery and Hazel’s room, it set Avery’s senses on edge. Something was wrong, she knew it before she even opened the door to her room, and somewhere, deep in the analytical recesses of her mind, she even knew what was wrong. Layers of denial and rum prevented her from realizing it before she pushed the door open. Their room was clean, which was a change to how they normally left it. Hazel and Avery normally left things in a wild tornado of blankets and pillows. A reminder of what the night before usually resulted in. The pair made love like they fought, fast and aggressive, calculated at times, and always in a torrent of wild energy. It left the room and the bed in a certain state. This wasn’t that state. This was pristine. Hazel had cleaned before she left. She wanted to make sure the letter she wrote to Avery stuck out. It wasn’t some errant piece of paper that had been caught up in their activities, it was intentionally placed on the bedside table. Avery’s side of the bed. Just a small piece of parchment, folded once and left there. Filled with Hazel’s swooping and swishing hand writing. “Avery. We’ve had a lot of fun, but I don’t think you are that girl I fell in love with. I think I always had the idea that I could crack through whatever shell you’ve put around your heart. Maybe I’m just not the right girl to do that. I tried though, and I think I’m just tired of being shoved away in return. I do love you, I hope you know that, but I can’t keep this up. Good luck out there, don’t try and find me, by the time you wake up I’ll already be on a ship at the harbor.” She wasn’t sure which she wanted to do more, crumple up the note and cry, or sprint madly through the city to try and catch Hazel. What then though? Hazel wasn’t one to make decisions on a whim, if she took the time to clean the room and write a note to Avery, then her mind was made up. Avery took a deep breath in through her nose and then let it seep out between her lips. Her hand clenched and crumpled the note. Something inside of her wouldn’t allow her to cry over this, though. There was a pressure in her heart and she wanted, so badly, to scream and cry and wail and weep, but the tears were halted. Something hardened inside of her at the same time as something else broke. She shook her head, threw the useless piece of paper across the room and fell into bed. She didn’t expect sleep, she wasn’t sure she deserved any rest after what she had done. But she knew of something that would help. Ten minutes passed in the empty room and Avery returned, a bottle of Marksman in her hands, already a quarter drained and her coin purse a little lighter. Sleep found her sooner or later, she wasn’t sure which, but the bottle would be empty before noon the next day. It was the only way Avery felt numb enough to drag herself out of bed. Even then she felt like there were lead weights on her ankles and eyelids. She wouldn’t fight again for at least a tenday, and that was only because her supply of rum and coin was running low. She found herself, once again, in poverty, struggling to get what she needed. Alcohol, maybe some food, and something to hit. Scias approached her only one more time in that tenday, offering his sincerest apologies, he had heard a rumor that Avery’s friend had left her all alone on that night. She wasn’t sure if it was the haze of the rum or just anger, but she knew for certain she hadn’t said anything about that woman to any one, so where did the rumor come from? Maybe he had just seen her leaving the tavern in a hurry and put the pieces together. Who the fuck cared? She almost spat on him as she made a rude hand gesture at him from across the table and shooed him away. From there, Avery settled into a new routine. She would take any chance she got to throw punches. Fair fights, unfair fights, tournaments that filled her pockets with gold and silver, and brawls in the street when her coin had been turned to rum. She haunted Vulco’s tavern, and never seemed to notice the sad, concerned look he cast in her direction. He never offered to let her back in the kitchen, though in some of her more sober moments she realized that there was one of the service machines, kitted out in an apron shuffling around in the back. It was slow and far too precise. Avery could taste it in the food she was served from one of them. There needed to be more fat integrated into the eggs and the sausage was cooked evenly, never crisp on a single side. Made to order but made without soul. Vulco still organized fights for her, and watched with a sad kind of fascination. In the ring, dancing across the sands of the pit, drunk or not, that was the only time he ever saw the little girl who had fixed his boiler. That look on her face where he could tell she was figuring things out, where her mind snapped into focus and made a plan of attack. Once those plans were made though, it was all fury from there. Tight muscles would throw heavy punches up and down her opponent. Some connecting, some leaving her open to counter attack. Some of her opponents were smart, or maybe stupid, enough to take those openings. It only served to make her more angry. Vulco could see that Avery never hit so hard as when she had just been socked in the ribs after leaving herself open. She was a viscous fighter, winning far more than she lost, but those losses still came. That was when she drank the most. A customary celebration drink or two wasn’t uncommon after a win, but half a bottle went down her gullet when she lost. It was the only way she could take her mind off of things. She cursed her own mind for being as witty as it was. Her own brain seemed to be her own worst enemy as it tried to tell her the booze was bad for her, that her attitude and rage were what drove people away. That the way she had no control over herself was why she was alone. Why she had left all those months ago. Avery only knew two things that would push her thoughts out, one was in a bottle and one was in the pit. It was where she preferred to spend her time. Not even her dreams were safe. They were filled with swirling images. Anger and disappointment in herself, and shame from her mother, her father, from...her… It was on one of these nights, wallowing and not celebrating, that Avery found herself face down at the bar. Her head cradled sloppily in her arms as she clutched a mostly empty bottle of Marksman. The familiar squeal of a tool being pulled back and the creak of wood as it took on the weight of someone sitting next to her. Even in a drunken stupor she could smell him. “What.” It wasn’t really a question so much as an annoyed statement. A moment later she hear the barman shuffle away, apparently bid to disappear by Scias. “I have something of a proposition for you.” He said, smooth and sweet. “No I wont marry you. Fuck off.” Avery slurred. “I’m glad we are on the same page with that, but no, I had something that might put a few more coins in your pocket.” Avery concentrated her will, focused it into her neck and spine, then with a massive amount of effort and raw will power, she lifted her head up and turned to look at him. Exhausted from the effort, she let her head come to rest on her arms again, though this time her eyes remained open and her head turned in his direction. That was all the confirmation he needed that she had at least a passing interest in his words. “On nights like tonight you walk away defeated, drunk, and penniless. Do you not.” “Fuck you.” Avery quipped. “Why not make something of that loss. Something that can benefit everyone involved.” “The shit are you talking about?” There was a moment of quiet, and Avery could see his eyes scanning around the room. No one was there, save for sleeping drunks and a suspiciously missing Vulco. “Stonepile, a fighter like you, is not doing very well in the west gate district tournament. He is barely clinging to his wins. Anyone with a betting eye expects him to be eliminated in the next round. Conveniently that fight is in two days, and I have it on good authority that his opponent appears to be having cold feet and might drop out of the tournament altogether.” he paused as someone snorted and rolled off of their stool to the floor, swore and then staggered away. “Of course, there are guidelines in a situation like this. A replacement fighter, under the banner of the same sponsor, could take his place.” “I should have packed a lunch for this story.” Avery said. “Do you have a point?” “I’d like to sponsor you to fight Stonepile. I’ll place a generous bet on our losing underdog, and all you need to do is show up drunk, fight poorly, and leave with a heavy pouch of coins on your belt. Courtesy of the Dralburg Hounds. From there, you don’t need to do, or say, anything.” Avery gripped the neck of her bottle of Marksman tight. She wasn’t sure she could swing it in a good enough arc to smash it into his head. She was very sure she could bring it to her lips and tip the bottle back enough to let the last dregs of her evening meal slip into her throat. “You want me to throw the fight, so you get rich and I get a few left over copper from your gang of assholes. Do I have that right?” “In a reductive kind of way, I suppose you do. It’s far more complicated than-” “Fuck off you shitty little parasite.” Avery’s eyes had slipped closed again so she didn’t see Scias’s mouth press into a hard line or the muscles on his jaw flex in anger, though he quickly let it simmer down to a huff out his nose. She was far too busy giving in to the influence of the alcohol that soaked her brain. She was asleep and swimming in nightmares again. By the time she woke up, Scias was long gone. There were only a few drops left in her bottle, soon, they were gone too.
“Where Our Journeys Meet – Chapter Bonus – Coming Apart” takes place here. It’s a fun side story and has no important bearing on the plot going forward. Enjoy! Elsewhere in the world, business carried on as usual. People lived, died, sang, wept and in some places, picked up a contract to find and deal with a parasite. It was night out, with the stars scattered across the sky like. The faint arcane glow of blue magic from sconces set in the wall of the guild hall illuminated the street beyond. A handsome man, still wearing his armor as he usually did, leaned against a building, impatiently tapping his foot. “This is taking forever.” He said under his breath. “Eloise likes to make sure she squeezes every ounce of gold for our services.” The tall elven woman finished her statement by taking another bite of an exceptionally red apple, held tightly in both hands. The crunch itself punctuating her assessment. Once the bite was down she had to sigh wistfully, fresh fruit was a rare commodity on the road of adventure. In a quite voice she added “-and Fiora makes negotiations a little more interesting.” Daron didn’t turn his head to look at her, though she could feel the sideways glance he was surely casting at her. Nothing malicious in it, and Tanila knew it, she giggled and took another bite of her apple. From the shadows around the corner of the building to Daron’s left a new voice ground its way into existence. Deep, rough, and almost pained to be heard. “Look.” Hakenos’s alert brought the three of them to attention and all eyes darted to the door across the street at the guild hall. Two figures were silhouetted by the glow of candles and torchlight from within the hall. Both were somewhat shorter and once the door to the hall closed behind them, the unmistakable look of Eloise and Fiora found them. Strolling casually through the early evening streets towards their companions. The pair remained stoic and calm until the door behind them was fully closed and they were well out of listening ears. “Fiora is coming with me on every negotiation from here on out.” Eloise said, running a hand over her forehead and slicking back a loose few strands of red hair. “She’s far too good with numbers to not include.” Fiora stood by her side, eyes fixed on the ground and smiling, remained ethereal in her beauty as always. It was no secret to the other four members of the adventuring troupe why shes was so good with numbers. She was, quite literally, a machine based entirely on the flow of numbers and calculations. Granted those same calculations were swirled together with an arcane life force that was barely realized, let alone understood. Still, the implications were obvious, despite everything Fiora was an analytical genius without even needing to try. “You got the contract though?” Daron asked, pushing off of the building he was leaning against and handing a budle with a crossbow and a clattering bag of potion bottles over to Eloise. “Right here.” Eloise replied and produced a small sealed scroll tube. “Target is the leader of a somewhat rowdy gang of extortionists and thugs called the ‘Hounds of Dralburg’ who goes by the name of Scias.” “That’s it?” Daron asked, earning him confused looks from Fiora, now at his side, and Eloise. “What do you mean?” Eloise asked gaining a small quaver in her voice like she had done something wrong. “How are we supposed to find this person? Is there a description? I mean, I assume they are in Dralburg, but, anything else?” Daron asked. “Look at you, always wanting to skip to the fun part without any of the preamble.” Fiora said with a gentle nudge of her hip against his. “First we pack our bags and hit the road, we have a bit of travel time don’t we? We can figure out how to identify the scoundrel on the road.” Daron huffed a singular ‘fine’ as if he had been convinced through charm or guile, but he knew she was right. He nudged his head over his shoulder at the small tavern and inn he had been leaning against, he was already starting to smile. “Got us some rooms, let’s eat and get some rest.” Avery had wallowed in her losses for a few more days. Vulco had suggested that she maybe concentrate her efforts on developing new strategies for the ring rather than drowning her sorrows in the bottom of a bottle. Her fury had flared at the mere implication that he might know her plight enough to make a suggestion. Hateful words had even formed in her throat, but she had managed to stop them. Part of her brain knew Vulco was right, another part knew he hadn’t exactly had the kindest of upbringings either. He might not have known her full story, or her his, but there was commonality there. Certainly enough to help him understand. She sighed and nodded and left the bar. She had a room for a few more nights, but then she would be right back where she was when Vulco had found her in the alley behind his tavern. Cold and alone and with no place to go. She needed money, which meant she needed to win a fight, which meant she needed to sleep. She managed to mutter her request for another fight to Vulco and then staggered to the stairs. She managed to fall up them until she reached the hall at the top and then her room where sleep claimed her. After a night of fitful dreams that left her pillow wet with tears she didn’t know she cried, Avery got out of bed. Her head pounding with pain, but that was more than enough to let her know she had passed back into reality. She needed to fight again, she needed to feel flesh and bone cracking under her fists. There was too much in her heart to not let it violently out. Vulco nodded, promising to arrange something for her, and soon. As he did though he planted a stein filled with fresh water in front of her and a plate of not quite greasy enough sausage, a slab of ham, and fire roasted potatoes with a little too much salt. But before she could pull it towards her, Vulco pulled it back, pulling her attention along with it. “Scias.” He said. “Ba’ news tha’ one.” “I’m well aware.” Avery confirmed. “No, ye’ don’.” He sighed. “He’s be a’ffer me t’ get you into his ilk. He don’ take no fer an answer. He’ll just keep changin’ the question ‘til you say yes. Don’ do it.” Avery looked at him, her mind snapped into action. There was a mystery here to unravel and she wouldn’t feel right until she knew what it was. She hated her own mind for that, sometimes she wished it would just leave her alone. “He gets his hooks in ye’ an’ he don’ let ye’ go so easy like. I hadda run this place lean to pay him ‘nuff to let me go.” “You worked for him?” Avery said, finally pulling the plate of food over to her and taking a mouthful of breakfast. “For ‘im? No, no one works for ‘im, not officially. But he asks for favors. Want’s ye’ to do just one little thing. Then another, and another. Ye’re jus’ doing a little favor, tha’s all.” “And because it’s all off the books, none of it is truly his fault.” Avery said past a mouthful of food. “Righ’ ye’ are. Jus’ promise ye’ll stay away from his shadow.” “No problems there. He wanted me to throw a fight next week.” She huffed. “I’m pretty good at getting people to get away from me.” Vulco gave her a look, somewhere between concern and curiosity. He wanted to know, but he didn’t at the same time. The less he knew the less danger he would be in. He also knew that Scias was not one to take no for an answer, there was always something else he could offer. Or worse, take away. Still, he nodded at her, she had good instincts, that was why she was still breathing. Scias could change that though… She finished her breakfast and retreated to her room. There was less temptation to drink away her own voice that way, it also had the added benefit of giving her some real time to sit down and think about what needed to change. Her fighting style was primarily just just and viscous assault, and she knew that. It had worked well for her though, or at least well enough. She had survived this long on luck alone, why stop relying on it. Hazel had taught her that luck was just the word someone used for a well thought out plan. She was very much in the camp of ‘you make your own luck.’ Avery disagreed with the sentiment, then again, she hadn’t made much effort to keep Hazel around, and her luck there had run out. So had she. Avery shook her head, physically trying to dislodge the thought and dwell more on herself. That didn’t help much. If she hated anyone in this life it was herself. The ability to hate herself more than anyone else hated her had kept her sane. No one could hurt her, no one could extort her and no one could say anything to taunt her, because nothing anyone said to her was worse than what she said to herself. She had, however, figured out how to weaponize that hatred. The more she told herself she was worthless, the more her stubborn, angry edge came back. The more she wanted to prove that she was capable. Over the course of the following week she did thoughtfully contemplate her style and mentally tried to figure out how to improve it. As she did before most tournament fights, spent a lot of time physically preparing. She ran through the neighborhoods before anyone was awake, and spent time shadow boxing in her room, fighting with an unseen opponent. During the week leading up to it she barely took noticed of the world around her, choosing instead to throw herself into physically straining herself enough that she didn’t have time to think of anything but her own soreness. The night of the fight, Avery arrived early to the venue. It was her typical routine. Show up early, watch people come and go, have a few too many drinks, but in the process watch the fighters arrive. She found that there was a lot someone could learn about their opponent by how they acted out of the ring rather than just in it. Stonepile, for example, arrived not too long after Avery had comfortably settled into a corner seat at the bar. She saw him before he saw her. He wasn’t paying a lot of attention to his surroundings, and perhaps he should have. His name was far too apt, he was big, muscular, and clumsy. She could see why he was pegged to be eliminated from the next round or two. If he was lucky and got in a solid hit or two, he could decommission anything, but landing that his would be the hard part. Hauling that much muscle mass around would be exhausting, and he didn’t appear to be the kind of man would would pick and choose what he swung at. If you were in range, you were getting a fist thrown at you. Hazel would have had a hay day picking him apart. She was small, cute, spunky. Fun. Avery missed her. Hazel would have darted in and out of his range, right at the edge of it, provoking swing after swing. She wouldn’t have to do much of anything, just let him exhaust himself. Once he was out of breath she could dance around him, scramble up his back, and lock her arms around his throat until he passed out. There would be little he could do to stop her. Judging by his mass, he wasn’t flexible enough to peel her off of him. But Hazel wasn’t here, Avery reminded herself. She was dancing around someone else, somewhere else. Because Avery was such a- “Cheers.” “Gods I hate your voice, Scias.” Avery said without looking up from Stonepile. He grunted in return and pulled up a stool next to her at the bar. He was too close. “You know, I heard that our friend Vulco is having some trouble with his supply of ale.” Scias said as he nodded to the bartender, who apparently knew Scias’s order already. “That’s pretty rough for a tavern to not have their lifeblood like that.” Avery turned her head to him, death in her eyes. “Shame really. You know I happened to have a friend who has a brewery who could keep him well supplied until this problem’s all cleared up.” He took a small sip of the brandy that was placed in front of him. “I just need something taken care of tonight before I can get that all sorted, if you catch my meaning.” She did. Stonepile, the clumsy collection of muscles needed to win. Vulco’s words bubbled up from the depths of her mind. Just a favor, just one more thing, stay away from Scias. Avery had a better idea. “Sure, just a thing. I understand.” Avery said and pushed away from the bar. “I have a fight to prepare for, if you’ll excuse me.” “Of course, of course.” Scias said, lifted his glass to her, and repeated “cheers.” Avery was vaguely aware that Scias had finished his drink and moved back to the shadowy smoke filled corner where he could be obscured by beautiful women and hookah smoke. At some point a small boy, clearly a messenger from somewhere, found her and handed her a registration card. It was her match up for the evening. Her and Stonepile would be matched. There was information on it about tournament winnings, that was all well and good, but tonight she had a better prize that a pouch of gold and silver coins. For the first time in a long time. Perhaps the first time since Avery had left her house as a little girl to attend school. Avery was excited about something. Nothing brought a smile to her face quite like underhanded vengeance. She stepped into the sandy pit and settled into her corner. The old wooden stool there wasn’t comfortable at all, it wasn’t supposed to be though. She busied herself by tying up her knuckles and stretching her arms and legs. She had dancing to do tonight. Stonepile had been every thing she had guessed he would be. He didn’t even sit in his corner, he stood there, arms at his side, but never quite touching his hips. How could they? His shoulders were too broad, his muscles too dense. They prevented him from having any kind of grace, but what he lacked in dexterity he surely made up for in raw, unbridled strength. Hell, from Avery’s vantage point on her own stool one of his hands was like a dinner plate, she could only imagine what it would be like clenched into a fist and slung at her. His face matched his demeanor too. She wasn’t sure if she saw him close his mouth the whole time she was warming up. His lips were dry, likely from the constant stream of breathing in and out his mouth. There was nothing behind the behemoths eyes either. No thoughts, no calculations or strategy beyond apply fist to opponent. He was looking at her too, though she suspected he wasn’t looking at her so much as his head was pointed in her direction. As much as Avery wanted to lock in her assessment, she knew she had to be careful. Stonepile was dangerous, those clenched fists confirmed that. She could toy with him all she wanted, but if he made contact, it would be over for her. Avery heard the hush fall over the space before she saw the man waddling to the center of the pit. Clay mugs placed on tables as spectators turned to look at that fight. Chairs scraped on wood floors, turning to give a better view. Avery was no small girl any more. No longer frail and scared like a mouse, she had developed a thick protective layer of muscle over her bones in equal measure to the layer of rage that covered her heart. She had wrapped her torso with long strips of cloth, holding her breasts in place, then slipped a simple cotton shirt over her body. Leggings that hugged her body and hid very little of the work she had put into working her legs. Running and squatting had toned her. Even with her bulk, she stepped to the center of the pit and looked up at Stonepile. He didn’t look at her, just vaguely looked around the arena, he smiled from time to time. It made him look even more brain dead. There was a bit of preamble from the announcer. Something about giants fighting underdogs, Avery truly wasn’t paying any attention to the words being said. Her mind was focused on seeing how Stonepile shifted his weight, committing his movements to memory and keeping an ear open for the words “fighter’s to your corners” once she heard it, she held out her fists, waiting for Stonepile to bump her knuckles. It was an old and odd custom, but it was widely accepted. Stonepile, for all he lacked in mental capacities, at least had that. His knuckles felt like bricks as they bumped into Avery’s. Avery walked backwards a few steps to her own corner, Stonepile fully turned his back to her and trundled over to his unused stool. Bold move, but she suspected that he had been somewhat prompted on the expectation for the fight. Throw punches, let your little girl of an opponent take the rest. It gave him an unearned amount of confidence in the fight. Perfect. The announcer had retreated by the time Avery’s back heel tapped her stool. That was all it took, once the fighters were in their corner, they were free to engage as they saw fit. Avery saw fit to put on a good show and sprinted across the sandy pit. Her stride took her bounding across the shifting ground and straight up into Stonepile’s bubble. It was a classic move for Avery, fury and rage and fast attacks. She knew it, the audience knew it, Scias knew it, and so did Stonepile. He had just reached his corner and turned to see her charging at him, so he threw a punch in her direction. Just as Avery had expected. She let her legs stop, the sand robbed her of footing and her knees hit the sand. She skidded forward, under the heavy handed punch and put her perfectly in range of Stonepile’s nethers. She did not want to be here, but she slammed her fist into his groin and then made her escape. She rolled to the left as Stonepile’s meaty hands came to clutch his hurt manhood. Avery wasted no time as he crumpled, she sprang to her feet and danced backwards. She could have ended it right then and there, he was on one knee and his jaw was perfectly in range, but she was supposed to be throwing this fight and she wanted to string Scias along a little more. Stonepile recovered relatively quickly, though his steps were less sure as he lumbered forward, fists seeking vengeance. Avery moved into range and predicted his left then right combo and jumped back, letting Stonepile hit nothing but empty air. She moved in again, and this time he reeled back with a huge haymaker, which would have been easy to dodge even if Avery hadn’t been ready. It threw him off balance, between that and his hurting groin, sent him tumbling forward. He worked quick to stay on his feet, but his balance was ruined. Avery took the opportunity to throw and elbow in his solar plexus. It did far less damage than she had hoped for, but it was a strike none-the-less. It also seemed to make him mad, or maybe confused, but angry none-the-less. He swung a wild arm out in a wide arc to try and catch her. Avery was able to lift her arms and block the strike, but it still sent her skittering backwards, and it still hurt. Avery found herself with a free moment to look around, something she would never dream of doing while raging. She saw men and women cheering, raising mugs and clinking them together and screaming at the match. She spotted Scias too, in his corner, the smug smile on his stupid lips visible through the halo of smoke and women. Oh how she wanted to wipe that smile clean off of his lips, and she had a plan to do so. She knew the time to end this was fast approaching, she had given them enough of a show and she felt she had convinced Scias enough that she was playing along. Stonepile was on his feet again and advancing on her, far quicker than she expected. She shouldn’t have taken her eyes off of the mountain of a man. He was looming over her and already had a devastating punch in the works. Avery had only a moment to react and thanks to her mind remaining unclouded by anger, she had a reaction in place. Her hand flattened to a knifes edge, then she leaned in and up, slamming the blade edge of her hand into Stonepile’s throat. The strangled gurgle he made as he clutched at his throat and staggered back was an odd site. Avery wondered, briefly, if she looked the same way when Hazel had done the same to her. It didn’t matter, Avery had wasted enough time. She sprang forward and slugged Stonepile across the jaw, sending him tumbling to the sandy ground. From there it was only a matter of slipping an arm around his neck and locking her hand into her elbow. Once done, just pull until Stonepile stopped moving. An act that Avery was astonished took as long as it did, in the end though, he was finally down, stirring the sand with his depleted breathing, and not moving. “And that’s a win for Avery!” the shout was met, as usual, with a mix of groans and cheers. Some people had just lost some money, others had surely won some. Avery didn’t care a lick about them, all she concerned herself with was that Scias just lost a sizable sack of golden coins. Good. The ass deserved a little retribution. She was very sure he would catch up with her later, but for now she was holding a new oil cloth bag with plenty of jingling things that would buy food and drink. Tonight though, she was sure she would have more than enough to drink on someone elses tab, though she made a note to herself to drink lightly, She needed to be mostly sober when Scias found her. And find her he did. It was later in the evening, once the buzz of excitement and loss had quelled itself. Patrons left, the tavern emptied and she was left relatively alone. She had a glass of Marksman, freshly poured in front of her, one of three or four that she had been nursing on for several hours. The tell tale sound of weight settling into a stool next to her was enough to tell her someone had arrived, even if she couldn’t see him glaring at her. “Not going to offer to buy me some Marksman?” Avery asked. “We had a deal.” He growled. “No, you had a misunderstanding. I never actually agreed to anything at all.” Then there was silence. “I came here to win a fight, and low and behold, I did.” “You just cost me a significant sum of money.” he replied. “Oh no, I’m so sorry. Here.” She slid one of the silver coins she had just won over towards him. “This should help tide you over until you get back on your feet.” It took him a moment of deep, cleansing breaths to exhale the fury boiling inside of him. Avery barely noticed. Scias pushed the coin back at her. “I’m sure there will be plenty of opportunities to work together in the future. I am very sure an opportunity will present itself one of these days.” he said and disappeared from the stool, from the bar, and from Avery’s senses. Just where he belonged. Avery reached down and slugged back her drink, dropped some coins on the counter, and left for her room. “Welcome to Bermaun.” Elois said as the troupe settled down for the night. There was still enough waning daylight to allow them to set up a proper camp without the need for lantern light to set up a tent. “Hurray.” Daron said as he slung the traveling pack off and let it fall to the ground. A little less controlled than he wanted, but he was tired. “How much longer to Dralburg?” Fiora asked. “Only a few more days.” Eloise replied. It hadn’t been quite a forced march, and the horses helped with travel time, but the act of bouncing on a saddle for hours upon hours was its own kind of exhausting. Almost everyone seemed tired, somber, and too tired to talk. Fiora still felt perfectly fine, though she recognized the human behavior easily enough. She had seen Daron after a long day of drills with the castle guard or hefting stones into place for the masons to shore up the walls back home. She fell into the same tired silence as everyone else did as they set up camp. “Hardtack and water that tastes like leather.” Daron said as he took a sip of water from his leather waterskin. “I should have saved more of the oatmeal bars. Perhaps something a little more..seasoned and in a cask for the journey home?” “Of course we should.” Elosie said. Daron eyed her. Of course she wanted that, her and Hakenos had made short work of the oatmeal bars, indulging more than they should have. He sighed, it made them happy though, or at least less irritable. That alone was probably worth the hardtack. “If Fiora’s calculations are correct, which they are, we’ll have plenty of spare coin to make it a better trip home.” Eloise added. Daron was initially thrilled about that, then proud of Fiora and her skills, then the guilt swept over him. Was it worth it to spend extra for some salted meats and wine when the same amount of money could go to help others in need? He would struggle with those very thoughts as he curled up on his bed mat, one arm draped over Fiora’s naked body. The small comfort of privacy in their tent was enough. She whispered small chastising words to him as he touched her, but she never made an effort to stop him. Instead she giggled lightly, attempting to remain quiet. Eloise couldn’t sleep. She had resigned herself to sitting by the dying fire in her casual clothes, though she kept a dagger by her side, just in case. It wasn’t a challenge to hear Daron and Fiora, the actual challenge was the ache in her heart. The kind of love those two had for one another was unmistakable. The kind of deep compassion and longing that made for good ballads, and probably more than a few raunchy tavern songs. Eloise wished for that kind of partnership. She knew it was impossible though, there was too much going on in her life, she was too committed to helping Daron and her little ragtag band of adventurers. She cared for them like they were her own kin, and that was worthy of all her focus. And she was fairly unlovable in the dark and quiet of the night. And she stunk of alchemical reagents. She had dirt under her fingers nails. And she had done a good job of ruining every good romantic partner she had ever attempted to be with. So, she had given up. Which was okay with her, life on the road was never quite as conducive to romance as people thought. Daron and Fiora giggled again. Most of the time at least. She sighed and returned to her own tent and tried to ignore their happiness. Avery continued to fight, she continued to win most of the time. After Stonepile even her losses garnered some measure of free drinks, a fact that she never turned down. Whenever she could she made a point to cheers and raise a glass to the shadowy smoke filled corners of the room. She never knew for certain if Scias was there, but she hoped to rib him whenever she got a chance. Tonight though, she wasn’t fighting. She was either hung over, or perhaps still had some lingering effect from taking a hard punch across the temple the night before. Perhaps both. Tonight though she was loitering in the inn’s downstairs bar, trying her best to look threatening enough to be left alone with her thoughts and her anger. It worked well enough, so far only one person had offered to buy her a drink. She accepted, but refused to engage in any kind of small talk, she knew where that would lead. Any small amount of attention might make the half-drunk man think that he had an in with her, then try to get in her pants. She learned to nip that in the bud long ago. She appreciated the somewhat quieter evening. Just her, a plate of pastries and seared meat, and all the Marksman she could afford. The silence was broken by the most syrupy sweet voice she had ever heard. It was like the taste of honey put into sound and she couldn’t help but notice the melodic quality to it, almost like the words were sung and vibrated through the air rather than simply being spoken. “This one looks nice!” A moment later the heavy wooden door to the inn opened, slowly, as if some frail thing was exerting all it’s energy to open it. Truly a struggle, but once it was open Avery saw the source of the voice. Frail was the wrong word, Avery thought to herself. The slight and slender woman who emerged on the other side of the door was petite, for certain and didn’t sport the kind of defined muscle mass that she herself had, but everything she might have lacked in muscle was made up with in grace. Her hair fell around her mid back and was almost white. It was the kind of light hair that looked like someone who had once had golden colored hair and spent far too long in the sun and allowed the color to be drained from it. It suited her well. A white long sleeved shirt covered by a black leather vest gave way to coat tails that seemed to flutter around her boots. Interestingly enough, she also sported a thin needle of a rapier on her hip. Avery raised an eyebrow at that. She wasn’t one to fight with blades, but she was well aware of the kind of damage they could do. One well placed jab with that rapier and a man would be on the ground gasping for air. She was all smiles as she came into the tavern, and Avery watched as her eyes roamed over everything. Every person, the placement of the tables, the textures of the counter top. All of it was like she was seeing it for the first time, and while that might be true, there was something more. It wasn’t as if she was just taking in the scene in front of her, she was cataloging it, memorizing where everything was and how it all worked together. All with a smile that seemed to shine every bit as brightly as the sun itself. Flanking her a moment later was a man encased in armor. Grey steel with coppery filigree over black clothing that was only barely visible between joints and chain. Avery admitted that he was fairly handsome in his own right. Not her type, and at the moment seeming both tired and dirty from days on the road. The pair moved into the tavern and gravitated to one of the only remaining tables that would be big enough to suit more than one or two patrons. Avery didn’t move her head, but she allowed her eyes to follow them. Once they snapped back to the door, and the remainder of the party, she swallowed hard. A man clad in robes with interlinking metal scales, all woven together into a solid plane. That wasn’t what shocked her, it was the purple eyes, the towering figure, and the strangely dense coils of muscle under pattered skin. Next to him, was an about the tallest elf she had ever seen. Still acting dainty and practically quivering like a lost kitten though. Wearing blue and white robes and clutching a staff as if it were a protective ward against all the worlds dangers. They spotted their companions and moved to the table. The redhead who walked through the door and pulled it closed was what caught Avery’s eyes the most. Everyone else who had blow in off the late night road seemed like the standard fare of occasional adventurers that came through. The woman who finished off was something else. Caramel colored skin, deep copper colored hair that seemed to be constantly trying to escape a headband. Avery could see that the cloak she had wrapped around her hid bulky shapes, the unmistakable appearance of a crossbow and the slight tinkling of glass bottles on her hips. She was walking straight at Avery. The Marksman on the bar met her lips and she swallowed it down fully, attempting to appear normal, despite her heart hammering against her ribs. Why was she feeling so flushed all of a sudden. Her eyes fell to her now empty glass and cursed it for making her feel this way. Coins hit the bar and the woman spoke to the back of the bar keeper who had acknowledged her when she came in, but was otherwise attending to his taps. “Four ales if you please, and a pair of rooms if there are any available.” Another grunt and clay mugs began to fill. The woman tucked her hands back into her cloak and waited like some kind of unmovable statue. Avery didn’t have a clear view of her face, but it was clear that the woman’s eyes were roving over anyone she could see. Taking in who was there, unlike her other companion she wasn’t interested in details and fun new settings. She was looking for someone, or something. Avery wondered if they were bounty hunters and this one was looking for their target. Then she was gone, sweeping up the mugs in her hands and gliding over to the table with her friends. Avery noticed that though there were five members of the party, only four drank. The all too chipper one simply sat and smiled and let everyone else drink. A curious fact that Avery logged away in her mind for later. In the mean time, she tapped her empty cup on the bar and found it soon refilled. She had stopped drinking though, the Marksman in the glass spent a while swirling around, it was the perfect reason to be at the bar and eavesdrop. The usual din of the bar made it a challenge to hear what was happening and she was thankful that there was no pit to fight in here, no cheering crowds and no overly drunk men and women falling over each other in boisterous ruckus. That didn’t mean there was a perfect change to hear everything, far from it, there was still distance and conversations to overcome, leaving only a few words here and there to drift over to Avery. “Glad to be off the road.” one of them was saying. Someone at the table only grunted in confirmation, the tall one. “He...in town...last seen…” Dammit why was everyone talking so loudly tonight? Avery asked herself why she cared as well. Strangers meandered in and out of this town every day, hell every hour. There was something different here though, she could feel it, no, she taste it. It was like the air after a lightning strike, there was something in the air about those five. Then she heard it. “Scias…” Her Marksman stopped swirling, her glass set on the bar top. She turned and looked, fully, at the group. They were huddled together, as if they were trying to hide something, but Avery caught a glimpse of a piece of paper, unrolled on the table. There was a fair amount of text on the top, another piece of parchment next to it with a drawing on it, little more than a charcoal sketch, but it was looking at Avery. He was looking at her. Those eyes, deep set and filled with oil and slime, the mouth was all wrong though. It should have been smirking that was that only Scias could. Like a snake about to strike, but wanting to toy with its prey first. Everyone at the table looked at it, then it was rolled up, tucked away, and everyone took a moment or two before attempting to look around. Subtle, but they would need to be better than that if they wanted to spot Scias before he spotted them. A tough task, for certain. ‘I should go help them’ Avery thought to herself. But why? Why should she care? Why help strangers hunt down Scias? Because Scias was an asshole who only wanted to fuck her over and threatened Vulco. One swallow and the burning Marksman was in her throat on its way to her belly and Avery was on her feet. Why was her heart pounding so hard? She told herself to calm the fuck down, it didn’t work. The table they were at had a bench on either side of it, seating six people comfortably, meaning there was one spot for Avery to smoothly slide into. If the Marksman hadn’t been reaching its brown liquor fingers into her brain, and if her heart would just calm down. It was less of a smooth slide into place and more of an awkward straddling the bench and then swinging her leg over and flopping into place. All the while everyone looked at her, but that was okay with Avery, she was sitting next to that redheaded woman. Avery leaned in conspiratorially close “Did I heard that you’re looking for Scias?” she whispered. “We are.” The knightly looking man said with a deep timbre to his voice. “You should be more quiet. Talk about it in your room.” Avery realized all too late that it sounded less like she was trying to give them helpful advise and insert herself as an agent and accomplice, and more like she was telling them to shut up and go away. She closed her eyes and let the air in her lungs seep out of her nose. What was wrong with her? “What I mean to say is, that he has ears and eyes everywhere.” She paused. “Wait, I’m not one of them, I hate that bastard, I’m just saying, you know, caution.” No one at the table had said anything for a very long time. “What I’m saying is that I can help you. I know Sci- I know him. Not like that, I mean I don’t work for him, but he would like me to, but I always tell him to fuck off, but I know how to get to him. In a manner of speaking. I know where he will usually be. Sometimes. Under the right conditions.” Everyone looked at her with a mixture of expressions. The white haired girl was smiling, it was the same kind of smile that her mother used to give her when she was a little girl and said something incredibly wrong, but didn’t have the heart to tell Avery how silly she was being. The man in armor next to her was looking at Avery in the same way Avery imagined she looked at every other drunk fool in the tavern. The elf was interested, and maybe a little afraid. The big man was smiling, oddly. “We’d appreciate any information you could provide.” The redheaded woman next to her said. “I’m Eloise, and you are?” At that, everyone at the table seemed to relax. If Elosie was talking, then everything was going to shake out in their favor. “Avery.” She thought she should say more, but what was there to say? She had answered the question, the fact that no one responded was beginning to get under her skin. “Nice to meet you, Avery. Yes, we are searching for someone and a group of individuals they seem to be working with.” “The hounds?” Avery snapped. “Yyyes. Them.” Eloise replied. “Fuggem” Avery slurred and then giggled at nothing at all. The Marksman had clearly reached her head, and she knew it. There was a shared glance around the table before turning back to Avery. She shook her head, they were looking at her and she was rambling, why was she always so useless like this? It was so much easier to just punch the problems away. “Anyway, he organizes prize fights, mostly underground, mostly illegal, mostly asks people to try and rig the fights so he gets rich and I get punched in the face by Stonepile.” “What’s a stone pile?” Fiora asked. “It’s a who, and he’s a stupid, mouth breathing nobody. That’s what.” Avery said. “And you’re a fighter too?” Daron asked, suspecting where this was going. Avery nodded. That was about all it took for Eloise to start putting pieces together. “I think if our new friend Avery here can point out our target, I can track him from there.” There was a bit of silence then. Everyone contemplating what that might mean. Avery in particular was wondering if it would be that easy. There was no way that Scias was going to go down without a fight, but as her eyes hopped from person to person at the table, they all seemed competent enough to maybe do it. Vulco would be out from under the thumb of The Hounds. She didn’t dare to dream things would go that well, but what did she have to lose? All she needed to do was give them a signal of where to look and then go on to fight. “I’ll arrange a fight, a big one, one of the local tournaments. He’s always interested in those. Lots of money to be, hmm, earned there. Once I have that all arranged I’ll let you know. You’ll be here?” Eloise nodded. “Good, give me a day or two, take it easy and keep your heads down.” Avery murmured and then left the table, then the bar. Everyone had the quiet understanding that they would wait a bit before speaking. Daron was the first to break the silence. “You think we can trust her? Or is she off to tell Scias right now?” Eloise replied “she seemed fairly keen on setting him up. From what I understand she has very little to lose from simply putting us and him in the same place. We know what he looks like, we know he’s here, we know he’s a wanted criminal. We’re just mercenaries.” She scanned the bar, the standard fare was there, but that meant little. There were drunks, couples having a good time, a lonely man who was wolfing down a plate of meats and vegetables. Eloise’s eyes twitched to Fiora, who in turn shook her head slightly. No one was listening, no one was looking at them, no one appeared to be anything but ordinary. Elosie had come to rely on those powers of observation, particularly because she knew they were bolstered by some kind of magic that she didn’t understand fully. If Fiora felt comfortable, then things were likely safe. “I guess we just wait this one out then?” Daron asked. Eloise took another gulp of the mediocre ale, set it down on the table and got up. “Yep.” She said, and left the tavern. Avery wasn’t exactly challenging to tail. Stealth wasn’t exactly Eloise’s strongest talent, but Daron was too loud in all that mail, Hakenos was, a lot, and Tanila was graceful, but tall and timid. Fiora could probably keep up with her, but Eloise wasn’t yet sure that the automaton was ready for something like this all on her own. It had been a few years since the mechanical woman had awoken and proved that she was sentient, more than that, capable in a number of situations. Still, Eloise barely trusted herself these days. Avery was clearly intoxicated, not quite stumbling drunk, but the occasional sway in her steps or misplaced footfall made it relatively clear that she had more than a few drinks down the gullet. That worked well for Elosie though, alcohol tended to make people do two things. Speak too honestly, and forget to look behind them. Avery led Eloise through the sprawl of Dralburg for almost half an hour before she entered another building. A tavern of all things, though as Eloise made a circuit around the building and the surrounding area, it was far larger than she would have expected. Two stories tall, sporting rooms on the upper floor she guessed, and a lot of space on the bottom. As she pulled her cloak around herself and settled into the alley way across the road, she heard a round of cheers erupt from the building. The noise carried on for several minutes, before another loud outburst caught her. A mixture of groans and excitement. Then it was quiet again for almost half an hour before the same series of noises disturbed the quiet evening again. Avery didn’t emerge from the building for a long while and the night was growing late and cold. Elosie didn’t dare entering the tavern for fear of being spotted, but she at least knew where Avery was for the time being. She idly wondered if Scias might be in there as well. She didn’t linger and find out. As promised, the next day Avery returned to the small inn and found Fiora and Daron posted up at one of the smaller tables. Just the two of them Avery noticed, only one plate as well. Sharing food no doubt. “Two nights from now, at a place run by a fellow named Vulco. I’ll be fighting there, Scias is sure to be there as well. Probably in one of the darker corners.” “We don’t plan to be inside, we’ll be outside, scattered around the area. Eloise plans to follow him once he leaves. Once we know where he’s sleeping, well get in and take him quietly.” Daron replied. “Smart. Just watch out. He’s a snake and will absolutely have something between you and him.” She winked, saluted and left, calling over her shoulder that she would see them in a few nights and that they were welcome to place bets on her if they wanted to get some real coin out of the deal. “Should we tell Eloise that she can make a wager and probably wrangle some extra money out of the fight?” Fiora asked. “Absolutely not.” He leaned over and kissed Fiora on the cheek, causing the mechanical woman to, somehow, blush as she smiled. A few nights later Elosie was posted up in the same alley way, wrapped in the same cloak and sitting on an empty crate. It reeked of the onions it contained a week before. She had a bottle in her hands, it was something special she had purchased a while back, but she had carefully moved the contents to a discarded liquor bottle. As she slumped there she looked like any other drunk on the streets outside a tavern. She kept her thumb on the swing lock style cap. Ready to pop it open and drink it down. There were only three possible avenue’s Scias could take when he left. The street sprawled out in two directions, and an alley way along one side of the tavern. From there, there were an infinite number of possibilities. He could slip down any one of the many other crevasse between buildings or turn on the winding city streets. Hakenos had taken up a post in the alley way. The massive figure wrapped in a cloak and hulking half way down the span was sure to discourage anyone from wandering down that way. For the two hours before the fight even started, he remained there, almost meditative, but imposing. Only a few turned down the alley way and none of them made it past Hakenos. Every other route seemed like a better route to them. Daron and Fiora had selected a smaller cafe a few hundred paces up the road from the tavern. Daron had ordered some food and paid for it. He would spend the next hour or so waiting there to see if he and Fiora could spot Scias on the way in. In order to not give themselves away though, they had left their weapons in the room at the inn. Fiora had only complained once about how much she missed the familiar weight of her blade at her side, and Daron could only laugh it off, reminding her that he was missing a lot more weight and felt a lot more exposed. They laughed, chatted, and for a short while, felt like they were a real couple with little to worry about. Except that Fiora’s eyes continued to scan the road anytime she so much as heard a footstep. She couldn’t really help it. There were parts of her arcane mind that grasped important concepts, especially repeatable processes, and imposed on her day to day life. They were there to look for a criminal, so the magic woven into her made sure that she did so. Quite bursts of glowing magic coursed through her head, carried on silvery bands from one crystalline formation to another, and somehow that triggered her eyes to flick up to the people walking past. Daron was used to it by now. It had worried him at first. Not because she was doing something unexpected, but because she was doing it exactly as expected. He had worried that it would take over her personality. That at some point there might be something that stuck in her head as an order and she would follow it to the letter. Marching to her own doom, or fighting beyond her capabilities. It was why he was so careful about what he said to her, despite her insistence that she was in control of herself at all times. She was fairly sure that was true, she had always known that there was something she could do to stop that trigger. She would only walk into the fire if it was her choice. At least she was fairly sure that was true. She wasn’t keen to test the theory. Lurking in another alley way down to opposite direction from Daron and Fiora was Tanila. She never much liked being on her own. She felt safer in a group, particularly around Hakenos. She might have stood as tall as he did, but she was nothing near as imposing. Given the two of them as targets, everyone would go after Hakenos. She was no threat, and she knew it, and she made sure everyone around her knew it too. No need to look at Tanila, just an elf in robes leaning against a building. Nothing to see here. Her ethereal beauty still caught enough eyes though. Plenty of men and more than a few women tossed a glance in her direction. She never saw them though, she was far too focused on her boots, trying to memorize the layout of the gravel beneath them, and silently praying to the primordial light for good luck and for no one to get hurt. That was the worst part for her. Her magic was there to mend and heal, not blast things out of the way. If this criminal came wandering her way the best she could do was throw up a barrier and shout at him. Maybe if he got close enough she could hit him with her staff. She did have a dagger at her side, Elosie and Daron had tried to encourage her to practice with it, but she struggled to plunge the thing into anything, even the straw stuffed dummies back at the castle. She prayed Scias didn’t wander in her direction. The pieces were set now. Elosie noticed Avery strolling along the road and turned into the tavern almost an hour before her fight was set to begin. The sun was just barely kissing the horizon and within a few minute the night would properly settle in place. The last ray of light closed its eyes in gentle night time slumber when he appeared. Scias strolled along, flanked by one other man, tall, muscular, breathing only through his mouth. Eloise could see the last remnants of an angry purple bruise on his throat even from her dark hiding spot. The mountain of a man opened the door and gestured inward for a much smaller man. Still lean, but attempting to hide his frame below loose silks and a cape. He was strong, for certain, but he wanted to be under estimated. She had seen the sketches of their target, and with the exception of longer hair, this was him. Once he had entered the building, Eloise leaned out of her hiding spot and looked up the street. Daron and Fiora were there, casually walking along the road with the other night time crowds. They spotted her and she nodded in return. Daron nudged Fiora with his hip and the pair casually strolled off towards a bank of vendors selling jewelry and trinkets from their stalls. Looking in the other direction, after a short while, Tanila looked up from her boots and met Eloise’s gaze and received the same nod. Now they just had to wait. And wait they did. Scias remained safely hidden inside of the tavern for hours as cheers, booing, groans and good times were heard in the streets. Every drunk man who just lost a weeks pay betting on the wrong fighter got the same scrutiny from Eloise, each one caused her thumb to twitch to the cap on her bottle. Each one passed by without her following. Scias did, however, eventually emerge. It only took her a moment to recognize him, the clothes gave it away, but the sketch she had seen confirmed it. She uncorked the bottle and drank its contents. Scias didn’t even look in her direction, nor did the pile of muscles that followed behind him. The liquid Eloise had swallowed left an oily film on her tongue and rather than the burn she was expecting, she felt a momentary bone deep chill wash over her, and then everything was normal again. She had been told that this particular concoction wouldn’t render her invisible, but eyes would tend to slide off of her form when glanced at. Anyone really looking at her would see her just fine. Looking down at her hands she saw them perfectly well, but she could feel her eyes gliding to the edges, where they fell off and only saw a vaguely blurred shape. She waited a few breaths for Scias to pass, heading towards Tanila’s position, then she smoothly slipped from the alleyway and gave a slow, distant chase. With a grease pen she scrawled direction and turns along her arm, hidden below her cloak, and took mental notes of everything she saw Scias do. He looked upset, she had to imagine that he had placed some losing bets this evening and was sulking his way back to whatever he called his home base. The air had turned moist by the time he slowed down after an hour of meandering through the city. They were near some sort of water, and the tall, wrought iron gate around the warehouse Scias slipped into confirmed that. The industrial district was full of similar structures, and this one blended in perfectly. Except for the myriad of suspicious figures lurking in the vicinity. Elosie made a note to slide back to the inn at that point. “How many, would you say?” Daron asked to the group of four others who had all crowded into his room at the inn. Eloise had spread a quickly drawn sketch of the building on the floor shortly after transcribing the directions she had written on her arm onto a real parchment. “Outside? half a dozen, that I could see. I have to imagine there are at least that many more that were concealed.” She replied. “Draw them away or take them out?” Daron asked. “Aren’t we trying to be quiet about this?” Tanila chipped in from where she sat on the bed. “Draw them away it is, but that’s going to stir things up inside.” Eloise said. Daron looked over at Hakenos as he leaned against the door, arms crossed. To anyone but the members of this group he might look menacing, at best Eloise saw him as a pout grump at the moment. “Hakenos, think you can stir something up then join us inside?” “Certainly.” Hakenos said. “Someone’s coming.” All eyes shifted to the door Hakenos was leaning against then in a flurry of activity rolled up the map and papers, shoving them under the bed only moments before there was a soft knock at the door. Something seemed to squirm across Hakenos’s skin and everyone else reached for a weapon of some sort. “It’s me.” Avery’s voice was muffled through the heavy wooden door. Coiled muscles and nervous glances gave way to a confused expression and Daron nodded towards Hakenos. As he pushed away from the door and opened it everyone else stashed their weapons. “Cozy.” Avery said as she walked in. She looked no worse for wear after a night of fighting. Surprisingly bruise free. Her hands still wrapped in cloth, her body still wrapped to keep everything tucked out of grabbing range. “What’s the plan then?” “Excuse me?” Daron said, genuinely confused and looked to Eloise. “I figured I would come with you to help beat that little gutter shite’s ass.” “I think we’ll be okay, not that we don’t appreciate the assistance though-” Daron started. “I wasn’t asking.” Avery said as she settled onto the floor, sitting cross legged with her back to the door. “Scias has been a thorn in not just my side for long enough. I owe him a few things.” Avery held up her fists as she spoke. “We couldn’t put you in danger just for-” Eloise began but stopped at the withering look Avery gave her. “I can handle myself. I went toe to toe with Stonepile and now that blob has to guard Scias.” She ended with a chuckle. Eloise blinked once. The behemoth of a man following Scias around was Stonepile. Even she had her doubts about that one. Avery having the gumption to not only stare that..thing..down in hand to hand combat was enough to earn her respect. Beating him though, that spoke to some truly deep strength. “I saw this Stonepile fellow. If she feels confident fighting him, then I’m okay with her coming along.” Eloise couldn’t help but looking over at Avery and shaking her head. Maybe Avery was crazy, maybe she knew her talents. Either way, assets were assets. Maps were pulled out and while Avery didn’t have much to offer as far as specifics, her and Eloise fell into a nice rhythm of analytics. Reasoning out where the best entry point would be, and how to get in to the best of their abilities without shaking up too much of the bee’s nest. There was, however, the quiet understanding that the best laid plans never quite survive enemy contact. Nearly an hour later, the six members of Daron’s little crew were wrapped in shadows next to an adjacent warehouse. Scias’s headquarters looked as uneventful as every other warehouse on the docks, and they truly hoped to keep it that way, despite knowing it wouldn’t happen. Still, Daron turned to Hakenos and nodded. “You’re up.” He whispered. Eloise passed him a small glass globe filled with liquid. The shell was thin and easily broken but it seemed perfectly cradled in his larger hands. He smiled, grunted once, and stepped from the shadows into the road. He casually tossed the globe high into the air so that it would land in front of him. It hit the ground and didn’t shatter so much as pop. The liquid inside the sealed vessel met the air and immediately billowed out into a roiling, ever expanding cloud of smoke. The faint breeze of the evening tugged it just a little. The guards posted around the compound saw the smoke, and rushed to see what it was. Even as they peered into the cloud they couldn’t see anything. The iron gate at the front of the compound rattled open as a pair of guards shoved the rusted bars away and readied their pikes for whatever was happening. They were flanked a moment later by four more armored men. Once they were close enough, Hakenos opened his eyes. Pinpricks of deep red appeared, expanding a little and then tendrils of writhing red substance lashed out of the cloud. One man only managed a small yelp before the semi-incorporable thing wrapped around his neck and tossed him aside. He landed some ten feet to the side and only managed to get to his feet and bolt, gibbering something about a demon. The remaining troops took the opportunity to sprint in the opposite direction. “He’s so dramatic.” Fiora whispered. Everyone moved at once, darting into the cloud and emerging on the other side, Hakenos in tow, and moving steadily to the front of the warehouse. So far, so good. Everyone slowed just past the front gate and let Daron barrel into the front doors. They rattled but didn’t stand a chance. Daron plowed into the warehouse and immediately dropped to his knees, bringing up his shield and making himself as small as he could behind it. As expected a hail of crossbow bolts impacted the shield and lodged themselves there. Daron wasn’t counting them, but it seemed like enough that everyone had fired. Crossbow’s might be easy for the common man to use, but they took time to reload. Eloise and Tanila piled in after Daron, keeping low. Eloise had her own crossbow at the ready and another glass orb in her hand. Tanila skidded to a stop and darted to one side, posting up behind a stack of crates. She looked over her shoulder and spotted a set of stairs that rose to the upper level of the warehouse, and beyond that, though the darkness that her elven eyes pierced, she could see something of a room at the far end. “Stairs here.” She squeaked, “and a room at the back on the top!” “Hakenos, Fiora, Avery, get up there.” Daron called, and heard confirmation from Hakenos and Fiora, Avery was quiet, but he trusted she was moving. Cranking. The crossbows were beginning to be reloaded. They had better take out those guards before a second volley could be fired. Daron was thankful that the warehouse was dim, but not pitch black. He had to assume that was for the benefit of the guards there. You couldn’t hit a target if you couldn’t see it. That worked in Daron’s favor though. Eloise threw the orb to the ground and more smoke began filling the space. Her and Daron darted to the other side of the warehouse and began picking their way forward, Daron in the lead and Eloise behind him. They broke from the alley way of crates and tarp covered barrels into a smaller open space, something akin to a loading and unloading area. There were two men there, swords drawn, and already charging forward. Daron was tired of the shield he had brought with him anyway. He reeled back and decked one of the guards in the face with it as he was raising his sword for an over head chop. With that Daron discarded the bolt riddled thing and readied his own sword. The man he had his was on the ground, writhing in pain and weeping from the shattered nose Daron had just given him. Elosie brought her crossbow up at the same time and unleashed the bolt into the second guards chest. He made a strange gurgling nose and tumbled to the ground. There was little to be done about something sharp in a man’s lungs. He was alive for a little while but Eloise had few qualms about dropping to her knees and sliding a wickedly sharp dagger across this throat. He would be dead only a few moments after Daron put his blade through the other man’s heart. Then they were both moving on, there was still no signs of Scias. Hakenos led the charge up the stairs, Tanila behind him, and eventually Avery as well. By the time they were at the top of the dozen or so wooden steps, there was a small cadre of guards at the ready, swords raised. The bestial sound Hakenos let out surely woke anything that might have been sleeping, but at the same time, probably frightened it away. The same oozing red tendrils emerged from all around his body, seeping from his pores and congealing into a spectral lash that whipped and flailed against the unsuspecting guards. The demonic attack pushed against Hakenos to the point that the giant man needed to plant a foot behind him and work against it just so that he himself wouldn’t be shoved back by the lashing. Then, all at once it was done. Hakenos was panting and swallowing deep gulps of the stale, dust filled air around him. Tanila was there in an instant, somehow worming her way under his arm and keeping him upright. His chest heaved and she helped support him. “Are you okay?” She whispered. “Good. Tired, but good. Need a minute.” Hakenos replied. Avery finally reached the top of the stairs. “By the gods.” She said and clapped a hand over her mouth. “No, other side.” Hakenos quipped and gave a weak smile. “You better keep going.” Tanila said. Avery picked her steps carefully as she proceeded along the walkway. She wanted to make sure she didn’t step in anything that was left. She was glad to have it behind her and moving towards the lofted office building at the back of the warehouse. Scias was here somewhere, and that seemed like the most logical place to hide a small suite. All that stood between her and him was a single door and it was in prime kicking range. She bore down and turned her shoulder as she charged forward and slammed into the door. It rattled on the hinges, but it didn’t give out just yet. “Come on out Scias, you son of a bitch!” She yelled and slammed her shoulder into the door again. It rattled again. Avery was really starting to hate doors. She shoved again, hearing something crack, probably the door. Fuck doors. She sucked in a deep breath and shrieked as she lifted a booted foot and cracked it against the wood. The door exploded inward, tearing the latch and part of the door jamb along with it. As it swung open, Avery was treated to a sight of what real riches could buy. The door might have been ordinary, but that was the last obfuscation. The floor was polish hard wood with a richly colored rug at the center of the room. The walls were not just plaster and wood, but paintings, art, gilded sconces lit with gentle blue arcane flames. It was clean, it smelled of fine perfumes and wine, likely from the decanter on a side table next to a large goose down bed. The blankets on it, thick and warm, had been tossed aside by the only occupant in the room. Scias. Comfortable pants, boots on, a loose cotton shirt clinging to his chest. All of it had just been thrown on for certain. As he took in Avery, the clenched jaw gave way to that same smooth, slimy, smile. The one Avery hated. The one Avery always wanted to punch. “Oh, Avery.” He said, as if her crashing through his door in the dead of night was little more than an inconvenience. “Do come in wont you.” His sarcasm was lost on her, she did come in. “I’ll give you this one chance.” He said and thrust his hands into his pocket, looking comfortable, as if nothing in the world was a bother. “Just turn around and leave. I’ll toss a nice bag of coins your way at Vulco’s” he should not have spoken Vulco’s name. Not that it would have mattered otherwise, Avery had fully let her anger and fury take over her mind. “Go fuck yourself.” She said through gritted teeth. “Suit yourself.” Scias said with a shrug and then his demeanor changed. He planted his feet apart like a trained fighter and when he brought his hands out of his pockets they each had a thick ribbon of brass across the knuckles. He was smiling too, not the smooth conman smile he gave everyone. It was the smile of someone who was about to enjoy their work. Avery had not been expecting him to charge at her, despite that being her opening move, and she paid for it. She couldn’t get her arms up in time and Scias leveled a devastating punch across her face. She might not have blocked it fully, but her forearm got in the way enough to soften the blow to the point that it wasn’t a clean knock out. Avery stumbled backwards out of the doorway and onto the walkway. Tanila had apparently seen Avery’s entrance into Scias’s room and had dragged Hakenos down the stairs, much to his protest. He was fine, he insisted, just out of breath. Avery had her bearings now, despite her head ringing from the punch, but that was beginning to work in her favor. There was a lot to keep track of, footing, environmental dangers, more guards, the sound of fighting somewhere else in the warehouse. The ringing in her head and the pain sent all that into the distance, her vision was now only of Scias, his stance, his moves. The way he kept his guard up while trying to maneuver around her. Like he knew what he was doing. Avery snorted at that, the fool had gotten a lucky shot on her, that alone was enough to ignite the familiar burning rage inside of her. Soon, her blood felt hot and her head throbbed with anger. She was in her element now. Scias was dancing closer to her, but she was ready this time. His right hook was blocked with a little effort from Avery and the quick left jab sailed past her head. In return she threw a fast left hook that landed on his ribs. It clearly knocked some of the air from his lungs but not nearly enough. That was fine with Avery, she liked a good fight and Scias wasn’t about to go down without putting up a good enough fight. He hopped back a little, trying to put some distance between them, but all Avery could do was march forward and throw more punches. Scias wasn’t about to fight by the rules though. While her fights in the ring were more about throwing punches and disabling an opponent, Scias seemed to be far more concerned with fighting dirty. He coiled up his leg and snapped it forward as Avery took a step. If she hadn’t been so used to dodging she might have had her kneecap blown out the back fo her leg, and that would be the end for her. instead she landed her foot in a little wider stance than she was used to, Scias took that opportunity. The foot he had tried to break her leg with landed on the ground and he dropped, lowering his center of gravity while also dodging a flurry of jabs Avery was launching at him. Low enough to avoid falling he swept his foot in a wide ark and hit Avery’s ankle, toppling her to the ground. Since he was low and already settled into a crouch, he had no difficulty springing onto her and straddling her, his grin told Avery that he was sure he had won already. All he needed to do was pummel her with the brass across his knuckles. As he rolled onto and got into position, one hand was on the walkway to stabilize him and the other raised high, ready to deliver a devastating blow. It left him open for Avery to reach up with just one hand, grab the side of his head, and pour all her strength into slamming his head into the wooden railing on the side of the walk way. She wasn’t even content with one, she intended to slam his stupid face into the planking over and over again. She got away with two, but that was far more than Scias was expecting. Particularly because the second one caused the wood to creak as cracks formed along the beam. He recovered quickly enough, but only by rolling off of her and steadying himself against the railing at the opposite side of the walkway, only a few feet away from Avery. Like some sort of resurrected demon, Avery smoothly rose to her feet, the small runnel of blood down the side of Scias’s face was enough to bring a smile to her face. The fact that it was staining and ruining some of his finest bedclothes was an added bonus. She raised her fists again, sucking in a deep gulp of air to replenish what she had lost and made herself ready to fight again. “You could just run away again.” Avery said, “that’s kind of your move isn’t it? Screw someone over and then disappear.” “I sure could. But you’re far too dangerous to leave alive. I should have slit your throat while you were passed out, drunk and alone.” “Too afraid that Vulco would mash your face in?” Avery quipped. “I own Vulco.” Scias shouted, “I should own you too!” “Come and get me then you motherfucker.” Avery was sure the taunt wouldn’t work, her taunts never did. She was always the one who had to do all the work. She had to go out there, engage with her opponents and make all the effort to fight them. Everything in her life was that way, nothing came to her, she always had to go and get it herself. It was exhausting, but tonight, for once, her destiny came to her. Scias, through gritted teeth and reddening face, darted forward, right had already raised to throw a haymaker at her. The brass on his knuckles flashed in the steady glow of arcane torchlight. It was a streaking blue comet that was aimed at her face. Despite her surprise, she managed to catch Scias’s wrist and turn him, letting his momentum carry him into the railing that his face had already damaged. He was out of control now and all Avery had to do was release his wrist and let him go, simple. Scias wasn’t about to let her do that and instead hooked his free arm around her and drug her down with him. The pair slammed into the railing and then sailed through the air, landing on the hard stone floor some ten feet below them. Neither Scias or Avery took the brunt of the impact, though Scias did land awkwardly on his side. Both groaned and took a moment to roll away from one another. Scias was no fool, despite acting brashly. He had survived as long as he had by being cunning and as he looked up he spotted a larger man, clearly recovering from some kind of heavy attack and supported by a woman in dueling boots and coat with her rapier already out, another one in mage like robes. They weren’t in his employ which meant they came with Avery. A moment later another large, armored man appeared with a woman at his side, she was reloading a crossbow. Time to leave. Scias pushed himself to his feet and ran towards the door, which was complicated by the fact that his ankle screamed at him in unimaginable pain. His flight into the night was going to be more of a limp. Still, he had a head start and there was a faint haze from smoke bombs and chaos. Tools of his trade already. He made it to the front door and ventured a look over his shoulder. Avery was getting to her feet already and her eyes were on him. He couldn’t hear what she was saying, but her jaw was moving. He shoved open the doors and made his way across the open yard to the iron gate beyond. It was set on a pair of rollers that rest easily on thick metal tubes. He had made sure that they were well maintained, oiled every week. He wanted ease of use and for them to be as quiet as possible. He grabbed the handle, as he had done hundreds of times before and threw the right amount of body weight against it. The gate rattled, attempted to move, but didn’t. “I’m not so much of an idiot that I would let you have an escape route.” Avery said She had appeared in the doorway, one hand on her ribs. She was clearly in pain, painting, and there was an angry bruise forming over her cheek. One arm hung from the socket, likely the one she had landed on and dislocated it. She was staggering forward, her legs moved easier than his, but her arm was useless. Scias looked at the rollers and spotted the metal wedges that Avery had shoved into them. He could probably yank those free, but not before Avery got to him. He looked up at the gate, it was tall, intentionally so, but he could probably climb it. Again, not before Avery got to him. So, he took his weight off of his hurt ankle, raised his fists, and prepared himself. He and Avery met, fists and blocks and dodges all melting together into a flurry of motion. Neither one had the advantage over the other. Scias found he could reliably land punches on Avery if he aimed for the side where her arm hung limp, then again her footwork allowed her to move more easily out of the way. Both were sweating, screaming, and flailing against one another. There were more punches that landed than missed and it soon became an argument of who could weather the most damage before collapsing. Both were too stubborn to allow it to be them. Avery, though, got lucky. She kicked out and managed to connect with his hurt ankle and drove him to the ground where he crumpled into a little ball with a yelp. He was so small and fragile as he collapsed to the ground, smeared with dirt and blood, he looked like any other street urchin. Leapt to pull him apart and finish her work but as she did so he snapped, uncoiled and plunged the boot knife he had drawn into her side. Her arm hung loose, unable to fend off the jab. “I don’t know why I ever tolerated trash like you.” Avery found it impossible to breath. She could gurgle, but that was all. Her mouth hung open and she could swear there was air moving into her throat, but her lungs just seemed to reject it. She felt like she was drowning, like there was liquid pouring into her lungs and making it impossible to do anything but heave. Then she was falling, and at some point Scias was rising. He stood over her as her vision began to darken. “I’m going to enjoy holding this over Vulco’s hea-” He never got a change to finish. A crossbow bolt appeared from somewhere and materialized in his chest. He staggered back to the gate, rattled against it and slipped to the ground, sitting next to Avery as she faded. He was convulsing now too, but his eyes fell to Avery and the pair locked eyes one last time. Scias wasn’t quite dead yet, though, nor was Avery. Both were far too stubborn for that and they both seemed set on watching the other pass before they slipped away. Then there was a great commotion. Avery hadn’t expected anyone to come for her. Why would they? She was some dirty orphan from the street, uneducated and good for fighting and drinking and little else. Why would anyone kneel next to her as she died, why would anyone cradle her head or start crying? Why would anyone start praying to the primal forces of the universe on her behalf? There was whispering, prayers and invocations. Avery knew that voice, she had heard it, but not like this. The white mage always had a small quiver in her voice like she was second and perhaps third guessing everything she did. Her voice was now soft, clear, and collected. “Just a little bit of light.” the elf said, directing her prayers to a force Avery didn’t know. Avery could see tears streaming down her face as she whispered her prayers. She felt something at her side as well, it was hot and hurt like the hells itself. She barely heard the clatter of metal as the knife was drawn out of her side, not the sucking wheeze of air inadvertently being pulled into her lungs. She was vaguely aware of the light though. The darkness that had been seeping into her field of vision as she lay dying was being pushed back. The light was far too bright and it seemed to be coming from everywhere around her. With every new prayer it grew a bit more. She could see it reflected in Scias’s eyes, they were wobbling in his sockets, he wasn’t quite dead yet either, but Avery knew he would be gone soon enough. She was glad she got to see him die first. Maybe they could resume their fight once she was dead as well. Surely the afterlife would let them continue their feud. She would have to wait a little longer for that grudge match. Her side still hurt, but it was different. She was no stranger to stitches, the amount of torn and scarred skin on her body was evidence enough of that, but as her lungs, muscle, and flesh were magically knit back together there was a whole new sensation. It hurt, but it was numb. Cold and hot, pleasing and infuriating painful all at once. It was like an itch that she was just not allowed to scratch. “Shoulder too?” It was that big scary guys voice, Avery recognized it. “That can heal on it’s own.” That was the other guy, in the armor. What was his name? “I..I think I can set it at least.” The elf again. Were they talking about her? Why were they- Fresh pain popped into her mind, this time it was her shoulder. She screamed at that and shoved whoever had done it away from her. She lay panting, tears streaming down her face and she breathed hard trying to steady her mind and body. It took a few moments to realize that she was actually breathing again. She gingerly sat up and looked around. It took a moment to put everything together, her vision was both too murk, and too clear all at once. Daron, Fiora, and Hakenos were standing in a semi circle around her. Eloise had been on her knees, clearly cradling Avery’s head and perhaps holding her still. A few paces away from her was the white mage, Tanila, her robes were dirty now from where she had tumbled through the dirt after Avery shoved her back. “I’m so sorry. I-” Avery began before Tanila smiled at her. It wasn’t a smile Avery had anticipated though. It looked wrong. She was crying still, tears of joy freely flowed down her face, turning into muddy streaks. But there was a genuine happiness there as well. She smiled, laughed, wept, and hiccuped from all the activity. Avery was catching her breath still, thankful more and more with every lungful. It was like the air was made of the purest, most crystal clear air she had ever breathed, despite the motes of dust and dirt that clouded around her. She looked over at Scias. His eyes were open, fixed where Avery had been laying. They were devoid of al life now, but the part that struck Avery was his expression. She was watching him as she was bleeding out, and he had looked smugly triumphant. As if he was saying that he knew he was dying, but at least she was dying too. The expression was burned into her mind. She thought it was going to be the last thing she saw, that smug bastard. Looking at him now, it was a sneer. Revulsion pasted on his face. He had seen her dying and was pleased about it, as he died though, he must have seen her being healed, surrounded by people and he had no one. He had died alone. A victim of his own poor choices. Avery took a moment to wonder if that would be her as well. One of these days. Slumped against a wall, a bottle of Marksman in her hands, the life fading from her body. She hadn’t exactly treated herself with any measure of kindness, and she didn’t expect the world or anyone else to do so either. But as she tore her eyes away from Scias, and placed them onto the five people who surrounded her now, who had cradled her, healed her, helped her. She had something that she hadn’t had in the longest time. Not since she was little girl at academy. She took hold of Daron’s hand, and allowed him to haul her back to her feet. Tanila was there too, pulling strips of cloth from inside a satchel tucked in her cloak. Avery let her construct a makeshift sling and gently place her freshly set arm in it. Hakenos was saying something to her along the lines of a compliment. Brutal fighting style, or something. Fiora smiled and remained quiet and observant. Eloise was standing again and pulling Avery’s wedges free from the gate and examining them with some measure of curiosity and admiration. And Avery just stood there, small tears rolling from her eyes down her muddy, dirty face. For the first time since she was a child, she had some hope that she wasn’t so alone any more. Avery had taken far more of a beating than she had expected that night. She had plenty of adrenaline to get her back to the inn and to collapse into bed, but that was about it. She woke up the next morning feeling far more sore than expected and there was plenty of mess to clean up. Her shirt was caked with dried blood that had mixed with dirt and turned to mud. She wasn’t entirely sure all of it was hers either. It took longer than usual to wash her face in the basin in her room, and an unusual amount of scrubbing to look clean again. Her clothes were well and truly ruined, splattered with gore and muck. She had another pair of trousers and a cotton shirt, but that was the last of her wardrobe. As she pulled them on she began to wonder why she never spent any of her winnings on better clothes that weren’t so scratchy across the back. She answered herself a moment later as she looked at one of the many empty bottles of Marksman rum. The sound of voices wafted towards her through the window in her room. Familiar voices. She didn’t want to make it obvious she was listening in, so she gently opened the shutter a little and listened in. “-I’ll get supplies. Yes, oatmeal bars too, I think I’ll double those. I saw a stall that was selling honeycomb as well, actual honeycomb, you can try and stop me but I’m getting some.” That was Daron. “No complaints here.” Eloise replied. “Fiora and I are going to haul this corpse over to the local office and turn it in. Meet back here by mid-day?” There was a round of agreement from them all. They were leaving, and so soon. Avery snorted at that, get in get business done. She liked the efficiency of it. She pushed back from the window and looked around the room she had lived out of for too long. She attempted to clean things up in the room, and found that she had a lot more trouble moving than expected. Her side ached, though only when she moved in certain ways. Her shoulder was still in a sling as well and moving it around only resulted in a red hot pang of intense ache. She had only bee attempting to clean up for a minute or two when the door creaked open. “Oh! No no, y- you need to stay in bed!” Tanila’s squeak of a voice was so very different from the night before and for a brief moment Avery wondered if she had imagined the whole thing, though the ache at her side confirmed that it was real. “I’m fine.” Avery said turning to look at the tall elf and wincing. “I’ve had a lot worse.” “You’ve had something worse than being stabbed in the side with a serrated knife?” “Okay, maybe not that, but thanks to you I’m totally fine!” Avery said with an odd bit of cheer. “I..I only healed your side, and your lungs. Your shoulder and, uhm, the, the rest of you. That will need to heal normally. You should be in bed.” Tanila said. ‘M- Mister Vulco said you would try and get up and that I should tell you he said to stay in bed or he would kick you out. I don’t think he was serious about that, but he did say you should stay in bed and that it’s whats best for you. Actually he said it would be good for you, which I guess is a little different and I just think that-” Avery was shaking her head and sighed. “Fine.” She huffed once and made to slide back into bed. That was when she caught sight of what Tanila carried. Food, water, a change of bedding, and bandages. “Oh, uh, mmm. Just a minute, if that’s okay?” Avery stood and waited as Tanila set down the tray of food and set about changing the bedding. Avery hadn’t noticed how disgusting it was, even before the bloody mess she had made of it the night before. Seeing it next to something that was actually clean made all the difference. She stood awkwardly by and let Tanila work. Once done, the elven woman set about checking Avery’s many lacerations and cuts. She applied ointment and bandages, all while Avery stood by, refusing to look the woman in the face. Once in bed Tanila set the tray of food next to her and clutched nervously at her own hands for a moment before gently bowing a little and muttering something about letting her know if anything hurt and then leaving. Avery looked down at the food she had been given, realizing that she hadn’t paid for it. Vulco might have put it on her tab, but she somehow doubted it. Bread, some cooked meats, a tall class of cool water, vegetables. Avery looked around the room and wondered if there was any rum left in her room to wash this all down with. She ate regardless, after the first bite she suddenly realized just how hungry she was. For the next three or four days the routine was the same. Avery would get out of bed to clean up or do anything in her room and someone, usually Tanila, would show up and chastise her back into bed. Vulco made an appearance more than once, insisting that he had been asked to check up on her, but Avery knew a lie when she heard it. He was concerned about her, but more than that he was clearly talking to the others. He knew what had happened to Scias, and was almost giddy to tell her that the supplies that had never arrived mysteriously showed up. In the silence when she was left by herself and when she was done cleaning, she had little to do besides lay in bed and think. She idly rolled her thumb over the smooth edges of her pocket watch, occasionally clicking the little button at the top to flip it open before snapping it shut. She hated being in bed, and needed something to do with her hands. If there was one thing that drove her to madness, it was idleness. For the first time in ages she was both sober and left alone with her thoughts. Sitting in a clean room, on clean sheets, with a clean conscious gave her some clarity on things. Her once analytical mind began to turn lick clockwork inside of her again, springing to life and reading things, putting them in order. Vulco appeared again and instead of him starting a conversation she spoke first. “I don’t think I can do this anymore.” She said. ‘It’s jus’ bed rest. Good fer ya’” Vulco replied. “No, not the bed. Everything else. The fighting the...the drinking...everything I have going up here.” She pointed at her head. “I think I just..I don’t know what I need. But...fuck..I can’t.” there was a poignant moment of silence. Vulco knew what Avery was thinking, which was rare for him. Her mind raced along avenues that he only barely understood, and he knew that from the moment he had found her tinkering with his furnace all those years ago. She was something special, something that needed to be loved and cultivated and he idly wondered if he did something wrong for her to end up like this. Tussling through the streets with gang leaders and ending up bleeding in her room or drowning at the bottom of a bottle. His thoughts turned to the group of adventurers he had spent the last two days getting to know. He admitted to no one that he was selfishly trying to decide if Avery might be better suited with them rather than him. With Scias gone and the hounds blissfully unaware of where to turn now, it might be the ideal time for her to escape. He wanted her to go, to be with people who could shepherd her better than he had. But it was her choice, he knew it, and so did she. They didn’t need to say those things out loud, so he just nodded and sat with her for a little while longer before saying that he needed to go get things ready for evening meal. Similarly, Avery had time to wonder where she had gone wrong. This wasn’t where her parents wanted her to end up. Her hand clenched over the metal of her fathers pocket watch. While cleaning her room she had come to a realization. Her entire world fit into a rucksack, hell, less than a rucksack. Her bag was only half full. A few leather pouches with coins, clothes, that she was now wearing, a few trinkets she had collected over the years, and not much else. Her whole life was portable, its what allowed her to hop from inn to inn with no issues. She had no place to call home. Vulco’s was the closest thing she had, and even that was a mere shell. By the third day Avery had managed to get her room clean and was well on her way to being well enough to move freely about. Not before one final check from Tanila though. All that really remained in pain was her shoulder and even that was a dull ache. With that, she was cleared to not spend all day in bed, but certainly not get into any more fights for a while. “You take care of yourself, okay?” Tanila said sweetly once she was done. “I will. What are you and your crew doing now?” Avery asked. “Eloise is getting the last of our supplies together and then we’ll be heading back to Aeonir Castle at first light tomorrow.” Tanila seemed happy to ramble a little about the trip home, how she was happy to be back on the road to her home where she could once again sleep in her bed. She hoped that the castle staff had kept up on the watering schedule she had laid out for the flowers in her room. Avery asked about the castle, telling Tanila that she hadn’t been much past the city. The way Tanila describer the castle, it was a haven, a utopia, a real home. Avery was given a mostly clean bill of health, and left alone for the rest of the evening. At some point she wandered down to the bar. The energy in the place was subdued, but it was still the tavern she had spent enough time in. She felt it in the polished wooden slab, suffused with wax and alcohol. The stools that had held up everyone in town at some point or another. The Gentle melodies of a dozen hushed conversations, punctuated with the clink of glassware and the tinkle of coins. Clay mugs filled with beer thumped onto old wooden tables. And there was Vulco. Tall, rounded a little, sturdy. He looked the same as always. Avery took a seat at the end of the bar and almost on cue one of the mechanical serving girls sauntered up, hips swishing the same way they always did and bent forward, showing a bit too much cleavage, but never enough to see down their shirts. Not that there was much more to see beyond hard molded material. “Anything I can get you sugar.” The same voice and inflection as always. “Marks- uh. Just some dinner. Whatever’s on the grill already.” “Sure thing sweetie.” then she was gone. Avery looked around at everything here. There were people here who she had fought, some had beaten her, some she had taken down on her own. No one held any ill will towards her, some were downright friendly the night of the match. She had drank on their coin. And yet, here she was, alone at a table, surrounded by people but alone. Avery was up the next day before morning light. She had stayed in the bar well into the night, well after closing, and still, somehow sober. She had said her goodbye’s to Vulco and he had said his. In his own way. “They’ll be good fer you.” He had said, Avery agreed. “Jus’ come say hullo when you can.” She promised she would. Daron was the first up, he usually was. He liked to be active for a bit before he needed to be responsible about things. It gave his mind time to really get moving. He made his way out to the cart and the horses and found Avery sitting on one of the crates in the back of their cart. “Good morning to you.” He said. “And you.” There was a moment of quiet, Daron tossed his bag in the back of the cart and couldn’t help but notice a new, half full rucksack there. His eyes wandered to Avery. She opened her mouth to speak, she had been up half the night and all morning planning on what she would say. Her first word hadn’t slipped out of her mouth yet when Fiora and Eloise emerged behind Daron. “I...you should know that who I am isn’t..isn’t what you saw here. I’m so much...I went to school you see and, and I can be useful and I just...I gotta get away from this.” She gestured at Vulco’s, everyone turned and looked at it then back to Avery. “Not the tavern, I can do that any time. I have in the past...It’s...that’s not what I mean. I just…” “You can come with us to Aeonir if you like.” Fiora said before nudging Daron. “I wanted to let her fumble a little more.” Eloise replied. “Wh-” Avery stammered. “We suspected that since you helped us with no promise of a reward that you were the kind of kind soul that might fit in well with us.” Daron said and kissed Fiora on the top of the head and smiled warmly. “Your friend Vulco didn’t exactly say that he thought you would want to come with us, but it was pretty obvious.” said Eloise, jabbing a thumb over her shoulder. Avery smiled at that, of course Vulco was looking out for her. There wasn’t much more to say then, so she hopped off of the cart and helped load up the remaining bags. She laced her fingers together to help Fiora up into the drivers seat next to Daron. Eloise and Tanila clambered in and settled down among the bags and supplies. There was precious little room inside the cart after that. Hakenos only grumbled, a sound that seemed to come from deep inside of his chest as he looked over the cart. Avery too looked into the cart. It wasn’t packed very well, there was a lot that could be reorganized. “May I?” She asked, pointing to the contents of the cart. Eloise was happy to sweep her hand over it all in agreement. It took another fifteen minutes of moving things around, taking a few things out and moving new things into place. By the time she was done though, it was tight, but it was organized, and everything was accessible, but tucked into place. More over, there was room for Hakenos and Avery to sit. “Cozy.” Hakenos said as he shouldered up to Avery. A day into their travels they found themselves running alongside a caravan of merchants. There were more than enough thuggish looking brutes to keep them safe, but once seeing the Beohold crest on Daron’s armor, and the kind of armor and lack of banditry on their cart, they were welcomed to travel alongside. Afterall, there was never too much muscle to have on a merchant caravan. That evening, instead of spending the night on the ground in a tent, they were allowed to circle up with the wagons and spent an evening in celebration. A warm fire, shared stories and good food passed around. Daron and his team had little to offer besides additional protection, but as expected Eloise made herself useful bargaining for alchemy supplies, trading some of the concoctions she had brewed up after a quick demonstration of her bottled fire grenades. Fiora spent an inordinate amount of time at the fire, singing and spinning tales of their adventures, leaving out anything that might be politically upsetting or make appear as if they were only blood thirsty mercenaries. Avery even caught Hakenos sequestered away with a small group of soldiers. Older men who had seen war. She only caught a few words and phrases, but it was clear that there was a comraderies there. Old soldiers commiserating with one another. Tanila made herself useful by offering up what healing she could to those who had something more impactful than a scrape or a bruise. It required little magic and more knowledge of medicines in general. She applied more bandages than anything. Avery just sat at the fire, watching everyone do their part. Even apart from one another they still felt like a cohesive unit. A unified group of people that could all do their part as a whole. She wondered what she had to offer. So she sat by the fire, watching the flames lick at the firewood and occasionally tossing more fuel in. Somewhere, barely audible above the crackle of fire, she heard the small whining whimper. She looked around, simply because the sound caught her off guard. Somewhere behind her a child was crying. She wasn’t sure why she chose to involve herself but she pushed off of her knees and wandered through the wagons to find a small child, and her mother. Clutched in his little hands was something, though even as she approached Avery could tell that it was broken. The mother was clearly trying to soothe the child, telling them that they would have to look into why Mister Duckson wasn’t working when they got to town in a week. The little boy was having none of that, and his whines turned to a full on fit. “Excuse me. I’m sorry, I don’t want to intrude, but maybe I could take a look?” Avery said, crouching down and looking at the child more than the mother. Through sniffles the boy looked at her in a way that struck her deep in the heart. She wouldn’t try to fix this, she would save it, nothing was more important to her. She held out her hand and the child placed Mister Duckson gently in her hands as if too much motion might destroy the thing. “Give me a little time. I’ll see what I can do.” She returned to the fire then kicked herself. What she wouldn’t give for some tools. The little wooden duck in her hands was crafted well enough. The pudgy body clearly contained some mechanisms that made the neck bob up and down, the wings flapped, and all of it was driven by a wheel with little orange duck feet painted on it. She assumed she knew how the thing worked, but she needed to get it open first. As she was rolling the thing over in her hands, looking to see what had caused the malfunction, and how to fix it, she felt the presence of someone beside her, followed by the gently sound of metal tools. “Every caravan has a carpenter of some kind. Even if it’s just a guy with better tools.” Eloise said as she set a tin bucket on the ground next to her. “Good idea to find them first.” Something in her tone struck a nerve with Avery. Like she was pointing out some kind of failing. How was she supposed to know what traveling with a caravan was like? She looked up at Eloise, fully intending to frown at her and tell her off, but she was met with a warm smile. Avery quirked up her mouth at the corner and nodded, letting the anger she had started to feel boil down to a simmer. There was no one to fight here, there was no need for that, particularly when she was holding a child’s wooden duck. The tools proved to be invaluable. Eloise had settled down across the fire from Avery, and pretended to poke at the fire and warm her hands. Avery knew she was watching her though, it didn’t bother her. She was used to people watching her, waiting for her to slip up so they could dart in an do her harm. She breathed, remembered that no one here was like that, in fact they were the opposite. As she looked over the duck in her hands she had to remind herself that Eloise probably wasn’t over there silently judging her, she was likely silently cheering her on. The duck proved to be somewhat simpler than she would have imagined. There was a little wooden clasp as part of the rounded body that she managed to pry apart without breaking it, and inside she found nicely crafted wooden cogs and parts. She also found the problem. One of the central cogs that moved a few other mechanisms had broken one of the teeth on it. With some work she extracted the part and the broken piece and took a closer look. Rummaging around in the carpenters bucket she found a few smaller pieces of scrap wood, a hand auger, and a knife sharp enough to whittle down the scarp wood. Soon enough she had cut out the old broken tooth, burrowed a new place for the replacement part and wedged in a new tooth. Reassembling the duck took a few tries as parts kept slipping around in her scarred hands, but she managed in the end. Soon after, she was walking along, pulling a bloated wooden duck and watching its neck bob up and down and the little wooden wings flap in the firelight. She smiled at that then caught Eloise’s gaze from across the fire and nodded at her work solemnly. Just testing it to make sure everything worked, of course. All in all it had only been a little over an hour to fix it. Avery navigated back to the child, whose tears left salty trails along his cheeks. As she appeared around the corner of the wagon though, she knelt down and held out the duck again. “Mister Duckson!” he squealed as Avery set the toy back in his hands. He set it on the ground and walked it along to make sure himself that everything was as it should be. Avery could see where the inner workings were slipping a little, but it was serviceable. In an instant she found a child’s arms wrapped around her neck. A second later he released her and he stood a step away, the mother watching over him. “What do you say?” She prompted. “Thank you lady!” the little boy said before scooping up his most prized possession and darting back around the wagon, leaving Avery stunned. “Thank you, really.” His mother said. “We don’t have much to repay you, but-” “It’s fine. Happy to help.” Avery stood back up, wincing a little from her recovering side injury. She nodded once and then wandered back to the fire where she sat alone with her thoughts. Maybe there was something she was good for. More than just punching problems and drinking away her past. Her eyes scanned the evening festivities as they began to wind down. No one put a new log on the fire, and simply let it burn down to embers. Daron and his friends were good at what they did, fighting, brewing and lobbing potions and whatever it was that Hakenos did, but there was more to them than that. Fiora hadn’t stopped singing for most of the night. Hakenos was laughing at something and slapping one of the other men on the back. Avery had fixed Mister Duckson. Perhaps the world wasn’t as awful as she had told herself it was. She clung to that thought as she curled up on her bedroll. It warmed her more than the bed of coals next to her. That was, perhaps, one of the best nights sleep Avery had had in years. Traveling along side a caravan was light work, in fact it mostly boiled down to chopping firewood and looking at the horizon to make sure no wild animals or bandits were coming their way. Everyone, Avery included, continued to make themselves useful or at least friendly around the caravan until a branch in their mutual paths forced them to part. After only a few days of relative merriment, the separation was more melancholy that Avery had expected. Even as she sat in the back of the cart, her chin resting on her fist, propped up on her knee, she could only look into the middle distance and worry about them. Rolling open landscape and farms soon gave way to a more populated array of farms. Where there had been a secluded field growing the last of the harvest crops for the season, now there were rows upon rows of golden wheat and corn. Whole orchards opened up just off the packed dirt road and farmsteads rose up and replaced the humble cottages and clustered hamlets of the open road. Avery couldn’t help but look around at it all. Open road was nothing new to her, she had traveled before, but not nearly this far. She was so much more used to the buildings that surrounded her like the boughs of a forest, or the ever present stale stench of horse droppings and burning wood smoke. The silence too was staggering, she hadn’t realized it until they were away from the caravan, but the gentle clopping of horse hooves and nothing else, haunted her. She felt like she had her head wrapped in cotton for all her life and now it was finally off, only to be overwhelmed by something that she couldn’t put a finger on. It wasn’t until Eloise, who had managed to allow herself to be rocked to sleep in the back of the cart sucked in a deep breath and let it seep out her nostrils that Avery started to catch on. It was peace. This place was peaceful. The serenity of not having to look over her shoulder at a noise, or worry about some drunk knifing her because her pockets rattled with coin. No Scias, no hounds, just grass and sky and cattle. Even the first sizable town that they rumbled through, Kesvel as Elosie informed her, was completely different from Dralburg. First, almost everyone seemed to recognize Daron and crew. More than that they greeted him or waved with some kind of enthusiastic happiness. Approaching the far side of the town allowed Avery a moment to shake off the strange jaunt through town. “Are you some kind of famous war band or something?” She asked. Daron looked over his shoulder, there was a small glob of golden honey clinging to his beard as he chewed slowly on a chunk of honeycomb. “You could say that.” “He’s the lord of Castle Aeonir. One of the last real strongholds in this region. He’s got, what, four hundred people on his retainer?” Eloise said. “I don’t think we are up to that just yet.” Daron said. “You’re a lord?” Avery asked with an edge of incredulity in her voice. “Why didn’t you say something.” Daron shrugged and snapped the reins to kick the horses into a steady canter. “It never came up.” “He’s humble.” Hakenos said. Avery could only blink. She had been riding with a lord this whole time. How could she have missed that, then again how could she have known? She had never seen a lord, or his retainer, or a castle for that matter. Not up close at least. The knowledge that Aeonir, the home of this merry band of travelers, the place she was headed now, was an honest to goodness castle made her heart swell. She hadn’t thought about lords and castles since she was a little girl. So it was with a bit of unorthodox giddiness that she stopped looking out at the road, and started looking ahead. The castle itself was surrounded on the outside by farmland. More fields, more crops, more orchards and pastures. To Avery it was like the scene had tumbled directly out of a storybook. The castle itself was constructed against the cliff side of a mountain, emerging as if it were a natural extension of the rock itself. Rolling along she also began spotting some small structures, little more than towers that seemed to pop up across the countryside, each one bearing a banner with a stylized birds head on it. “What are those?” She asked, her curiosity piqued. “They’re for the owls.” Daron said. “Are there a lot of owls out here?” Avery couldn’t recall ever really seeing an owl up close. The city life tended to discourage that kind of wildlife. Despite the abundance of mice and rats, birds of prey weren’t known to swoop into the slums and neighborhoods. “You could say that.” Daron replied, and even though Avery wasn’t looking at him as he spoke, she could mentally see the smile on his face. As they grew closer there was a field with a fairly large swathe of forest just beyond it, stretching onward onto the horizon. Avery could see that at the edge of the forest, just past the field itself, was a masonry tower, a proper tower. It bloomed outward at the top and it was fairly obvious it was an old guard tower. She had to assume it was no longer in service though. Ivy clung to it and shimmied up the cracks in the stone work towards the top. Great green, leafy clusters held the town in place, even as the rest of it crumbled. An old scar of some past even that had never been reclaimed. She wondered if there was still any use for its ancient footprint. With a sort of suddenness that caught her off guard, Avery soon found herself in the shadow of the front gates of Castle Aeonir. There was something like electricity in the air as the cart rolled through the market that surrounded the keep itself. People waved, cheered for their return or just smiled at them and dodged out of the way. More than a few eyes fell on the newcomer in the cart, not that a new face was unheard of in the castle, but it was always a surprise to see someone riding with the lord of the castle. Another gate, this one closed by a portcullis and guarded by a pair of younger looking men, and one woman who had to be in her fifties. Daron nodded at them as he approached and with a wave the gate was opened. Avery watched as a large flywheel was cranked on the far side of the gate and slowly the barred entry yawned open and allowed them in. From there it was all commotion and excitement. The stables were reached and the cart unhooked and the contents of it unloaded by a crowd that seemed to materialize out of the very stonework itself. Avery stood there, a little awkwardly, as the castle residents, presumably staff, tended to the horses, cart, cargo, and everything else imaginable. Somehow in the middle of the commotion Avery lost sight of everyone she had been traveling with, somehow, even the taller and more omnipresent figures. “How about I show you to your room.” Said a small voice accompanied by a gentle touch at her arm. Avery spun and found Fiora there, smiling, and gently dragging her away from the spectacle. “I have a room?” Avery asked. “We have rooms for everyone, somewhere. We don’t make a habit of casting out people.” “I- but I probably don’t have enough gold to-” “I’m sure we can find something for you to do around here to earn your stay, but that’s not really necessary either. This isn’t Dralburg, you’re welcome here as you are, for who you are, and not for what you can do or pay for.” There must have been something wrong with Avery. Perhaps it was travel sickness, or maybe she was suddenly allergic to something in the region. Whatever the cause, she felt her throat swelling up and her chest clenching and something irritated her eyes to the point that they were starting to water. Her room was on the lower level of the castle. Fiora escorted her through a few halls and past a variety of locales. Each time they passed something of note Fiora would automatically tell Avery all about it and what information she had. By the time they had reached a hallway with a number of doors set into the stone Avery knew where the kitchens were, some of the names of the folks who worked there, how the laundry services worked, a shortcut down to the stables, and more than enough information about the aviary and the owls that made roost there. There were scant few things that Fiora admitted to knowing nothing about, but it was mostly “what’s down there?” followed by a response about using the space for storage. Her room was nothing much. It was a little larger than one of the rooms at the inn, though it sported it’s own lavatory and wash basin that had heated water from an arcane furnace that Daron had contracted to be repaired only last year. Much to the joy of those in the castle. “It made for a lot of nice warm baths.” “You have a bath house here?” Avery’s tone let Fiora know that they might have very different definitions of what a bath house was. “Sure! But, only for bathing.” Avery let out a small “oh” and tried to hide the embarrassment she felt. The bath houses in Dralburg were usually attended by a whole supply of mostly naked women and did the washing for you, though there were other things that came before the actual scrubbing. Avery rarely had the spare coin to spend there, though she was not unfamiliar with them either. She made a note to see what the bathing situation was like in the castle. Fiora let her know that she would make an effort to swing by before dinner to get Avery acquainted with the dining hall. Then she left, letting Avery know that if she needed anything she would be in Daron’s study working with him. Avery raised an eyebrow at her and Fiora winked back. Then she was alone again, but she didn’t feel isolated. She could still hear the occasional commotion outside her room. There was never a moment of true silence, though there was always that presence of peace and comfort. Looking around the room she felt a little embarrassed that all her worldly possessions fit in a single bag. Here she was in a castle that had a spare room for her, with a comfortable bed, a basin, a fairly basic cabinet to store clothes and nick knacks in. She still struggled with the idea that this was her room and not just a room she was in ant the moment. She also struggled with the idea that it was just given to her. She would go stir crazy if she sat in her room, especially after spending three minutes unpacking all of her belongings. Some trinkets, her small bag of coins she tucked away inside her bag and stuffed that inside the cabinet and then sat on the bed. It was soft, well, softer at least. She had slept on better but was used to far worse. Regardless, she bounced on it once or twice and then decided to get out and get some fresh air around the keep. Meandering the halls, everyone seemed to strangely friendly. She couldn’t be sure, but there was clearly a rumor about her flowing through the social circles because she got far too many “oh! I had heard there was a new girl, hullo!” from folks. She always smiled and introduced herself, but by the third or fourth occurrence she was getting a little worn out by it. Maybe she needed to get somewhere a little more secluded. She found herself at an archway that led into the castles central courtyard and found it to still be bustling with some kind of activity. None of the party she had arrived with were in sight, as to be expected, this was their home and they probably wanted to sleep in their own bed for a bit. There was too much going on for Avery though, so she turned back, wandering through the halls of the castle and found herself in one of the back hallways. It must be on one of the sides of the keep since the windows all faced outward to the open landscape. She found herself facing a lake in the distance, or at least part of it. The sun was past its zenith and as it was beginning to fall towards the horizon it lit up the lake, casting a sprinkling of diamonds across its surface. It was gorgeous and she found it tough to look away from it. The clean air, the lake, the relative quiet. She could get used to it here. Soon though she shoved her hands into her pockets and strolled onward, because there was something nagging at the back of her mind. It was impossible to really place a finger on it until she was passing some of the closed doors Fiora and her had passed on their walking tour of the castle. Fiora didn’t know what was down some of these halls and stairs, they were used for storage. In a place that seemed to have most things in order and explored, some even freshly repaired, why wouldn’t they know what a room was used for? Gears turned in her head and she pushed the door open. There was little light down here, and Avery retreated until she found a proper source of light, a torch that she struck to life and brought with her. The only things stored in here were a few crates of wine packed in straw, some old tools and not much else. Though that wasn’t what interested Avery. The room itself was more fascinating to her. The steps down to it were wide and shallow, and only about half a dozen of them, which was probably why this was used for storage. Easy to get things in and out of it. The room itself was long with a trough cut down the center. It too was somewhat shallow as well. In the torchlight she found a series of windows that were boarded up along one wall, the same that opened up to the view beyond. They were tall, almost running floor to ceiling, she could see the colorful display of stained glass beyond the barrier. There were spots, usually low on the window, where wrought iron separated the colorful glass from smooth clear glass. Avery wondered why the lower section was clear and not just stained like the rest of it. Stranger still was the mechanism at the end of the trough. She poked and prodded at it, and even used some of the tools in there to delve deeper into it. In the end, it looked like some sort of water wheel or pump. Avery scratched her head at that and thought it might be something like a bilge pump. This was a fairly low point in the castle, perhaps it was made to help catch flooding from rain water and eject it from the castle. As she idly contemplated this and manually moved the wheel inside, she found that it moved in a way that would bring water in and out. There were slots inside of the thing as well, fine brass and copper inlays with silvery strands that seemed to run from one place to another. They shimmered in the torch light and reminded her of something. It was a rare moment that she got to see inside of one of Vulco’s serving girls, but the silvery lines and copper plating on the rune stones was unmistakable. There was something arcane about this. Vulco would never let her tinker inside of one of the girls for fear of breaking them further. He grumbled that not even the best artisans knew how they worked, not really. What she really needed was power crystals. Something that had been attuned to the weave of magic that seemed to suffuse most of the world, it was stronger near nature and Avery’s eyes flicked to the boards, keeping the presence of trees, air, and the lake out of sight. “Maybe it’s like Mister Duckson. Just, a little more complicated…” Avery sat there until the torch sputtered next to her. A flicker that reminded her that her time here was temporary, but that didn’t stop her from getting her hands deep inside of the mechanisms and seeing if she could sort out any more of it. Her hope was that there was a crystal left in there somewhere that she could figure out how to recharge and use it to experiment. Maybe setting it in the sunlight would help. “Couldn’t sit still eh?” It was Fiora, leaning against the doorway at the far end of the chamber. Her voice echoed down to reach Avery. “Yeah, sorry. Idle hands and I are not the best of friends.” Fiora was next to her a few moments later. Avery could see why Daron liked her, she was smooth and graceful. The kind of girl everyone wanted to be friends with and secretly wanted to bed. “What’d you find?” She said, settling down next to Avery. “Some kind of pump or water system. Well, maybe not water, it could be oil or sludge for all I know.” Fiora nodded. “Do you think you can fix it?” “I- maybe. I’d need some power crystals first.” “We can probably find you some of those.” Fiora said with a smirk. “Really?” Avery tried to to sound too excited. “Everything around here seemed to be pretty classic. Torches, wood and stone construction. I didn’t expect to see much magical nonsense going on.” The torch next to her was simmering down to a dull glow, casting the room into shadows. “There are a few little magical devices around.” Fiora said with a giggle. “I’ve only ever seen them in those serving girls at Vulco’s. You know the mechanical things with nothing behind the eyes.” Avery snorted. “I’m somewhat familiar with the automatons.” “Good for a quick lay and bringing drinks, but not much else if you ask me.” Fiora nodded in the darkening room and stood while there was still light to see by. “I’ll get you some crystals from my personal supply.” Fiora said as she moved to the door. “You have a personal supply of them?” Avery said and picked her way through the room, dodging crates of wine and stray tools. “Sure.” Fiora said, chipper as ever. “I’m an automaton afterall, I kind of need them.” Avery could swear she saw a short flash of blue arcane energy from her eyes before she slipped away, though the door and along the hall. By the time Avery made it to the doorway and up the shallow steps Fiora was gone. Avery kept her eyes on the floor and only occasionally muttered about how much of an idiot she was all the way back to her room. She contemplated packing up her bags and slipping out of the castle, or perhaps just flinging herself out the window. She reminded herself that it was always a good idea to be as insulting as possible to the lords personal...what? Was Fiora a serving girl? She had seemed so real and filled with personality and curiosity. She hadn’t been able to tell until Fiora herself had said something. Was she just a juiced up sex machine for Daron. A sex machine that carried a sword and sarcasm with equal sharpness? There were a lot of questions Avery wanted to ask, mostly to herself, but there was a wall in place now. Red hot embarrassment and something else. What was it? Fear? Anxiety? Over what? ‘Getting kicked out of the castle you moron.’ she told herself. She idly wondered if there was somewhere else nearby that she could go. Even if there was, she would make an ass of herself there too. She shook her head and reminded herself that she really was only good for fighting and perhaps emptying bottles of rum. By the gods she could do with some Marksman at the moment. She had found some wine, that might do. There was a gentle knock on the door and her heart raced. It was probably Daron, here to grab her by the scruff of her neck and toss her out. He had every right to, he had given her a safe place, helped her escape Dralburg, fed her and trusted her. And what had she done with all that? There was another soft knock. Why didn’t he just barge in and escort her out? Avery blinked at that thought, then got up and gingerly pulled the door open just enough to peek out. “Hi!” It was Fiora. “I brought those crystals.” She had a small box in her hands, it looked like it might be large enough to hold three, maybe four of the things. Avery pulled the door open enough to allow Fiora into the room. She quietly set the box down on Avery’s desk and then turned to face her, Avery was already looking at the ground. “You know, it’s okay, what you said. I’m not upset about it.” Avery was still struggling to look at her. “There’s a lot you’ll learn about the people here, and this likely wont be the last time you put your foot in your own mouth. Regardless though, we’re going to care for you all the same.” There was that clenching feeling in her chest again. “But why?” Avery said before her mind could get in the way and stop her. Fiora was close, too close, Avery knew she was about to be slapped or something. Fiora pulled her into a hug. “You’re worth a lot more to us here than just what you say and what you do. We’re going to take care of you regardless.” Fiora squeezed her tightly for a moment and felt the younger woman shudder for a moment and knew that Avery was crying. Her hands were still locked at her sides, not held there by the hug, but because she was simply struggling to move or do anything. She had felt it all the way back in Dralburg. She hadn’t needed to convince anyone there to take her along, no one questioned her loyalty or made her prove herself. They just believed her. The fact that they so readily handed over a room and free reign over the castle was more proof of that. What Fiora said had been true, Avery didn’t need to question that either. “You’ll find a lot of love here, and a lot of healing. I think you need both.” Fiora said in a hushed voice before squeezing Avery again and releasing her. “Do you want me to sit with you for a bit?” Avery nodded, both of them sat on Avery’s bed and she cried. Something in Avery’s head kept trying to stop her, to tell her to buck up and stop being such a cry baby, but those thoughts never really made it through. She hadn’t cried since she was a little girl and she realized that all those years of stuffing it down or drowning it out with booze and fighting hadn’t gotten rid of it. All she had managed to do was put it on a shelf inside of her heart where it would wait for the right time to come bursting out. Fiora only smiled and ran a hand up and down her back as Avery wept. Brushing off the half dozen or so teary eyes apologies. Eventually Avery stemmed the flow of tears and sucked in a deep breath. She knew her face was puffy and red and she probably looked like a mess. But Fiora was there still, she hadn’t slipped away at the first sign of ugly emotions. Maybe this place would be good for her. In time, Fiora left her there with her crystals and her thoughts. She figured that Avery might not be in the best place to join them for dinner, so she brought a tray of dinner to Avery instead. A fact that she was immensely thankful for. She ate quietly, reflecting on just how much her life had changed in the last two weeks. She had gone to being almost penniless and living in a nice, but dangerous city to living in a literal castle and crying about it. She was certain that those feelings would come up again and again. She sighed at that, just what she needed, one more thing to haunt her. But, like every other time this happened, she had a solution. She just needed a distraction. Her eyes fell on the box that Fiora had brought. It was a well carved box of some kind of dark wood with a silver clasp and matching caps on the corners. Opening it up cast an ethereal blue glow across her room. These were charged and ready to go right now. She had expected some measure of work to get them refilled, but these were more than what she had asked for. In the days that followed Avery settled into a new routine. One that took her a some time to settle into. She found it hard to sleep soundly and decided it was just nerves and excitement and a new bed. She also found that just after sunrise there was a fairly regimented collection of the castle guard. Or at least she assumed they were. There was an older woman there, running drills and training the men and women in all manner of combat training and maneuvers before pairing them off to spar. The first day she had observed this she merely ignored it, moving instead to the strange room with the mechanism, crystals in hand. On the second day, though, she spent a bit of time observing the goings on. After warm up exercises and as people were pairing off to spar, that same woman spotted Avery, though she wasn’t actually hiding. She had taken up a position on the steps and was watching, rolling one of the charged crystals between her fingers. “Deciding who you could take?” The woman asked. Avery looked up and chuckled, she knew it wasn’t a real question. She knew a baited question when she heard it, but she also liked to indulge from time to time. She scanned the field and nudged her chin at one of the men. “Third group from the left, the taller one. I bet I could take him out easily enough.” The woman looked over her shoulder for a moment, scanning the group and locking in on the man Avery had indicated. “Why do you say that?” “Doesn’t move his feet. He stands there and lets swings come at him. Real good at deflecting or parrying them, but if I could get inside of that sword arm of his I’d get him on his ass. No real room to swing a sword down there.” Avery held up her fists, “these would work pretty well though.” The callouses on her knuckles told an impressive story. “Gregor!” The woman shouted and the man Avery had pointed out looked over at her. “You’re not a tree, move those feet.” “Yes ma’am!” the man, Gregor, shouted back and shifted his position a little. “Helene, by the way.” She stuck out her hand and Avery briefly gripped it. “Avery.” “I know, Daron spoke highly of you and your skills. You sure you don’t want to go a few rounds?” Avery smiled at her tenacity, but declined again. She held up the crystal. “I need to figure out how to get some stuff working in the basement.” Helene tilted her head and looked confused. “The one with all the wine and tools stored in it.” Avery said. Helene nodded at that and pushed off the steps, smoothing out her graying hair and brushing the dust and dirt off of herself. Everything about her looked like it had survived a millennia of battle and blood only to settle nicely down into a soothing routine. At least until she barked at someone to move positions or offer coaching on a maneuver. “Well there’s always room if you need to work out some aggressions.” Helene said returning to her duties. Even as she returned to the yard and barked at the men and women there, she looked over at Avery. She was well versed in the history of the castle, and while she had a very good idea of what it was Avery was working on, there was no point in giving away the secret. From what her nephew had told her about Avery she was smart, a little too smart, and Helene was well aware of what smart people did when they had nothing to focus on. She had tried recruiting her to the guard, she still might join, but Helene could tell that there were other things to work out first. She would let Avery go and work on her project until she discovered what it was. If she needed nudging, Helene could provide that, but she suspected Avery needed to work out the aggression inside of herself first. Avery had plenty of aggressions to work out, in all her time beating the faces of her opponents in, it had never done her a lick of good. She wasn’t entirely sure that fighting was the very best for her at the moment. She did smack her lips though, she wouldn’t turn down some Marksman though. Still, she rose to her feet and wandered along the halls towards the second part of her new routine. She had taken to leaving the mechanisms open and exposed at the end of the day. No one seemed to come down here often and so she felt no fear of anyone tampering with her work. She had, thus far, gotten every slot that could hold a crystal filled with the arcane gems, but she couldn’t figure out the next part. It looked like it was powered, but there was just something missing. She had been contemplating it all night long and she wondered if there was some other component on the outside of the castle that would need to be worked on as well. She also wondered if she should ask Fiora if she knew anything about the mechanism. She was an automaton and powered by something similar to the crystals. The lingering embarrassment was a barrier to that avenue though. She needed a bit of liquid courage before she would consider that and definitely preferred to figure it out on her own. Her eyes fell on the wine in the crates that she had shoved to one side, and considered uncorking one of them to keep her company as she worked. It wouldn’t be the first time she had thought of it, nor would it have been the first time she had been drinking while engineering. She shook the thought from her head, that wasn’t her wine, and she needed to try and keep in the good graces of the lord of the castle, so the bottles stayed by the door way, corked and taunting her. It would be another two hours before she would just give up in frustration. She left the crystal where it was, connected to a number of the silvery connective tubes inside the mechanism. Everything she understood about it pointed to things working as they were supposed to. She was no practitioner, but the arcane leads were connected by fine silvery clamps at the top an bottom of the crystals. The cradles were soundly in place and connected to more of the mechanisms. She could see that the rune stones inside were clean and unmarred. Everything should be working, but it just wasn’t. She shoved her hands into the pockets of her breeches and stormed out of the room and into Eloise. Avery’s eyes had been glued to the floor and she was muttering to herself to the point that she didn’t hear the sound of boots at the top of the stairs. Eloise had been carrying a tray of food fresh from the kitchens. It was now scattered on the floor among spilled drink and a shattered plate. “I’m so sorry I-” “Watch it!-” Both spoke at the same time and stopped just as quickly. “I- Sorry.” Avery said and dropped to the ground along with Eloise to try and tidy up the mess she had just made. “No, it’s fine. I’m sorry. I was just bringing you something to snack on.” the mess was obviously a little hand prepared array of foods. Easily snacked on. Some cuts of meat, a cluster of grapes and fruit, a small quarter loaf that looked as if it had been specifically cut into smaller portions, a bit of soft cheese. A tin pitcher that looked like it had just emptied half its contents on to Eloise, and another smaller vessel with a brown liquid in it. She knew that smell, sweet and smooth, Eloise had brought her some rum to finish off her tray. “For me? But..this is way too much. It would take me all day to get through this.” Avery commented. “Oh, yeah, maybe I went a little overboard.” “I’m so sorry I was just so frustrated with-” She gestured down the stairs, “whatever this is.” “What, actually is it?” Eloise said as the pair brushed together the ruined platter. “I don’t know, but it’s something.” Avery held up her hands and wiggled her fingers. “And I can’t have idle fingers.” Eloise nodded at that and looked away. “I’ll figure it out. I just gotta sort out how to get it, you know, started.” Avery said as she looked down the steps. “Can I see?” Eloise said. “You have more right to it than I do, so, sure.” The pair walked down the steps, Eloise set down the tray with too much food on it and joined Avery by the mechanism she had been tinkering with. It was sprawled out around the stone and lacquered wood casing, though the main portion of the machine was still inside the wall. Eloise peered at it and Avery let her look all she wanted. Eloise nodded, turner her head, looked at it from a different angle, then another and finally pulled back and looked at Avery. “What is it?” “I don’t know.” Avery said. “It look like a water wheel, but it’s way too damn small for that, it wouldn’t move water fast enough to do anything. I would just churn it up. I don’t get it.” “And you just can’t get it to start?” Eloise asked. “Yeah, I am fairly sure I have everything in here connected like it’s supposed to.” Avery said squeezing in next to Eloise, close enough that they were shoulder to shoulder, and pointed at something deep inside the wall. “It’s just not going.” Avery sat on the ground, her legs dangling into the trough that ran the length of the room and blew out her breath. “Well, if anyone is going to figure it out, it’s you. Daron’s had this place under construction for a long time and it’s finally all done. Well, almost all done.” She gestured towards the machine. “Keep at it I guess.” Eloise walked across the room and picked up the tray, then looked back at Avery who was already lazily looking into the machine again. “Thanks.” She said, looking back at Eloise from across the room. “For, uh, for thinking of me.” Eloise smiled and nodded then looked down at the ruined food she had prepared. “I just figured you could use a little nudge to keep you going. You seem tough to stop once you get started.” Then she left, and Avery was alone again. Minutes passed and Avery busied herself putting everything back into the machine, clipping and fastening it in place. Her frustration was still there though it seemed to harden into resolve now that she knew someone was out there looking out for her. As she reassembled the thing her thoughts turned back to Eloise. Did she really think Avery could have snacked on that much food? There was so much of it, practically enough for- Two people… Avery stopped what she was doing and looked up, then back at the door. Eloise was not there, she had slipped up the steps and disappeared into the castle. She had brought food for two. She had specifically laid out everything for them both and in one anger fueled tantrum she had ruined it. ‘Typical.’ She told herself. She inhaled deeply, closed her eyes, berated herself for once again, and let the breath seep out of her nose. She looked back at the wall, it was fully reassembled but still not working. Then Eloise’s final words seemed to finish their trek across the room and lodge themselves in her mind. Tough to stop once she got started. Avery looked back at the machine. It couldn’t possibly be that simple. What a stupid idea. She reached in, took hold of the water wheel and gently spun it. It moved, smoothly, and tumbled end over end, well past when Avery thought it should stop. It was going, and going, slowly turning. She reached in and spun it harder. It kept spinning at the same clip, rolling along and something else. She heard noises. Groaning, ghostly moans as if something was trying to climb up a pipe but just couldn’t make it. She spun the wheel harder and the gurgling continued, growing louder and louder, sloshing around inside of something. Then she felt a waft of something hot and wet. There was a spigot on the front of the machine, she had thought it was some kind of steam blow off system, but she could see now that it was for water. Hot, fresh, water that flowed into the trough now. Her eyes widened and she sprinted across the room. She hauled the crates out of the depression in the room as water crept forward. From where she stood at the far end, away from the pump, looking over the room, she suddenly knew what this was. It wasn’t a trough, it was a pool. Her eyes darted over to the window and she darted over, tearing off the boards from the lower portion of the window to reveal a view of the mountains and lake beyond. She kicked off her boots and rolled up her cuffs, and dropped into the pool as water moved along. It was hot, not uncomfortably so, but she felt it. She crouched down, low, almost to the level she would be at if she were sitting and a smile crept across her lips. You could sit here, comfortably in a small divot in the pool and see the country side beyond. It was still daytime, but she had to image that at night, with nothing but the stars and the moon out, this place would be magical. She chuckled and looked at the pump at the far end of the room. It wouldn’t move enough water to be a blow off system or any kind of fast moving pump, but it would keep the hot water here moving and fresh. She had taken the whole thing apart at least three times by now and she knew there was no heater in it, so she concluded that this water must be coming from some kind of natural hot spring somewhere deep below the castle. The water just needed to be pumped in. She took some time to pull the rest of the boards off the windows and found that there was a small ventilation grate at the top of each window. The room would fill with steam from the water to a point, but it would never accumulate. The level that would ventilate it out was about the same height as the steps, meaning that none of the steam would roll out into the castle hall either. It was a clever enough design. Avery was all smiles after that, and now she knew what to do with the rest of her day. Her first stop was the bath house. She needed, or rather, wanted to be clean. She scrubbed herself clean with some of the soaps that the castle maids provided her. She almost wanted to take it back to the hot spring, but she didn’t think it would be a smart move to get soap scum in her freshly repaired pump. She would just have to deal with a bucket of cold water to rinse. Her clothes seemed to stink once she was clean and she wondered if she had smelt like that all along. Soap was useful for that too. She managed to emerge smelling of creamy goat soap. Next she needed to find Eloise. It took her far too long to find Eloise, in the end though, she was in a small side room just off of the main courtyard. The whole place stunk of vinegars and caustic substances. Eloise was wearing a heavy leather apron and gloves. She was in the process of stirring something in a heavy black cauldron. The smell hit Avery hard as she entered and couldn’t help but stumble back with tears in her eyes. Eloise looked up and smiled. “Hey there, I didn’t think I would see you again today.” Avery was far too excited to notice the small amount of sadness in Eloise’s voice. “I wanted to thank you for the snacks. Even if we didn’t get to eat them together. I just- I appreciated the gesture. So, thank you.” Eloise nodded her head to one side in concession and acceptance. “I also wanted to show you something, but I’ll need to wait until tonight. Maybe after dinner. Are you busy, tonight, after dinner?” She wasn’t sure why she was starting to fumble her words. A moment later she figured it out. She hadn’t rambled like this since Hazel was around and that thought alone terrified her. Her mind was already spinning up an excuse to get out of what she had just proposed. She couldn’t do this, not again. Before she could do anything about it, though, Eloise smiled brightly. “Not at all busy. What’d you have in mind?” There’s still time Avery, tell her never mind. Tell her you just remembered that what you wanted to do wouldn’t work. Tell her that- “Meet me in the north corridor, the one that looks out at the mountains.” Avery said, cutting her own frantic mind off. “Deal! Oh, shit!” Eloise swore as she glanced down at the cauldron which was now boiling a little too vigorously and threatening to spill over the edge. “Okay, uhm, after dinner then.” Avery said and retreated out of the little alchemy lab. The sun dipped down below the horizon and the smell of roasting meats, vegetables, and spices struck Avery. Suddenly she was back in Vulco’s kitchen, burning her hands on hot cast iron pots, dashing around cooking and slinging food at the serving girls to be taken out to the tavern. Then she was sitting in that same tavern, blood running from her nose after a lost fight, a cold mug of ale pressed into the side of her head to stop the swelling. Vulco himself set a plate down in front of her. Even though it hurt to smile, she did so. Something about his food always made her forget her loses. So did the Marksman. She was snapped back to the present. Her mouth felt dry and she felt a craving for rum. Like it was the only thing she needed in the world. More than food, or water, or air. She was suffocating without it. She almost bit her tongue to banish the sensation of the craving from her mind. She had dealt with this kind of withdraw before, when coin had been short and fights were lost. Vulco was a good soul, but he shied away from giving anyone free booze, Avery in particular. Dinner helped her craving a bit, if for no reason other than her belly was full. There was no room for vices when your belly was full. She was a little surprised that there was a large central dining hall that housed a good majority of the staff in the castle. Obviously not everyone could eat together, as someone needed to be cooking, plating, serving, refilling, standing guard. Some were sleeping, some ate elsewhere. But the lords hall was full. Full of people, full of food, laughter, and joy. Stories were still being told of the exploits in Dralburg and with Avery finally joining them at the table, the stories were all freshly retold, now with her perspective. She smiled as she spat venom on Scias’s name and told of all the slime he left in his wake. She praised Tanila for saving her, a fact that made Tanila blush a little then burst into laughter, causing her slender elven ears to wiggle a little. Avery lifted a glass to Daron for finding her and for dragging her to his castle. There was plenty of laughter at that, considering the story of her awkward request to join them had already been told. Drug to his castle indeed! All the while Avery couldn’t keep her eye from drifting to Eloise. Likewise, every time she looked over at the darker skinned woman, her eyes seemed to just be darting away from Avery, giving her the impression that Eloise had just been staring at her as well. She kicked herself for not picking a spot closer to Eloise. Still, dinner passed and the plates were cleared and Avery watched as Eloise intentionally made eye contact with her and pushed away from the table and excused herself. There was still plenty of activity at the table, which made it easy for Avery to stay a few minutes longer before doing much the same. She slipped through the castle halls, lit in the magical blue glow of arcane torchlight. She turned the corner to see Eloise staring out the windows in the north hall. She clearly heard Avery coming but waited a moment or two after Avery turned the corner to look at her. In the arcane and moon light Eloise took on a strangely ethereal look. Her comfortable daytime clothes had been replaced by something a little more elegant. Gone were the sensible cotton pants and leather vest. Her hair remained braided and dangling over her shoulder, but the light tugged at each loose thread of hair and seemed to give it a life of its own. The edges of her figure seemed to glow like a ghostly apparition. All of it made Avery feel more self conscious of her own garb. She was a mess, inside and out. She was still wearing the one set of clothes she owned. “Good evening.” Eloise said in a voice that was just barely above a whisper. It shattered the silence of the castle. “And you.” Avery said, attempting to sound just as elegant, but sure she was failing. Then it was quiet again. Avery sidled up to Eloise’s side and looked out the same window. Avery’s mind screamed at her to come up with a reason to walk away. Just thank her for lunch and dinner and leave. Tell her she was an inspiration for fixing the machine then just let her discover it on her own. “I fixed it.” Avery said. Good, thank her, leave. Find something to numb Hazel’s name from your mind. “Oh, good. What’d you need to do?” Eloise asked. “Just give it a spin. It took care of everything from there.” Eloise nodded. “Sometimes things just need a little nudge to get going.” “Mmhmm.” “People are like that too.” Eloise said. “Sometimes they just need a small push in the right direction and their natural tendencies take over. They just keep going in the direction they were pointed.” Avery was quiet as she thought about the trajectory of her life. Was that her? Was she just moving in the same direction she had always been going? No, something had come along and crashed into her and pushed her off course. No, pushed her onto a new course. She was quiet and thought about what had happened, and if there was a course where it wouldn’t happen again. Was there a life beyond drinking, fighting, screaming, and shouting at Hazel. She cowered away from that memory. “What’d you want to show me?” Eloise asked. Avery looked over at her. This was it. “Come on.” Avery slipped through the halls, down the corridors and to the door way that led down into the hot spring. Even Eloise could feel the distinct difference in temperatures. The halls were beginning to cool, but here, it was warm and welcoming. It was dragging her down the stairs, and Avery followed. The thick blanket of steam from the spring had had a full day to fill the room. It rose from the waters surface in the pool like ghosts released from the mortal coil that held them. Eloise knew her mouth was hanging open at the sight and the feeling, but she couldn’t stop. “Come on.” Avery said as she kicked off her boots and walked into the water. “But, you’re..we’re dressed still.” Avery smirked at her and pulled her shirt up and off of herself. Muscles rippled as she moved, her breasts clung tightly against her chest as if they would never let go. Her hands moved down to her waistband and soon she was naked. Eloise got a good look at the life Avery had lived. Hard, coiled muscles were marred only by a myriad of scars. Some were more viscous than others, twisting flesh as they healed. She was strong though, a hardened body from a life of less food and more work. As her eyes tumbled off of Avery’s breasts and tumbled over her abdominal muscles, they found their way to the wild tangle of hair above her sex. She raised an eyebrow at that. She took the cue though, and soon her own dress was off and both sank into the water together. For long minutes they simply looked out the windows across from them. The glow of the moon illuminated the stained glass windows, revealing a story board of lords, castles, knights, and battles. Below them all was the land beyond the castle. The lake glittered in the moonlight, the fields and hills glowing. Above it all, stars splashed across the sky like a fistful of diamonds had been thrown there. All while the pump at the far end of the room hummed quietly and kept the water fresh. The majesty of the landscape could only hold their attention for so long though. Avery couldn’t help but relax into the hot water. It soothed her muscles and her mind, and her thoughts melted away. So when Eloise’s lips found their way onto hers, there was no need to think about it. She responded in kind and the two let passion flow. Eloise floated around Avery and straddled her, rising over the light haired fighter and kissing her deeply. Avery let her hands roam over Eloise’s body and they found her way to the breasts. She played there, toying with Eloise’s nipples and earning a small whimpering moan directly into her mouth in return. The water sloshed and splattered against their naked bodies, driven onward by the increasingly frantic motions they made. Hips were ground into one another and soon Avery and Eloise were not only kissing one anothers lips. Mouths moved down to the neck and breasts. Avery took Eloise’s excitedly stiff nipples into her mouth and began to let her tongue play with them. She wasn’t moving with any sort of intentionality, she was just letting things flow. It felt easy. It felt good. It felt like she was with- She broke her mouths hold over Eloise’s body and settled back, panting, partially from the surge of activity, partially just to force the fear from her body. “We, we shouldn’t do this.” Eloise muttered, also out of breath. Avery nodded, and averted her eyes from Eloise. She was a prominent member of the castle, part of Daron’s usual strike team and likely held some sway over the goings on here. She was a talented alchemist and likely brewed any number of concoctions for Daron specifically. “Yeah, uh, you’re right.” Avery said. “Someone might stumble down here on accident.” Eloise said before leaning in to Avery, nibbling at her earlobe and whispering “Maybe we should head up to my chambers.” Avery had never seen two women spring from a pool and dress themselves so quickly in her life. Their clothes clung to their wet bodies, feet slapping against the stone floor. Eloise navigated around the castle with practiced ease and took a route that avoided the sight of anyone’s eyes, staff or otherwise. It took longer, but they arrived in good time. Eloise threw herself into her door and hauled it open, shoving it closed behind her. As quickly as they had gotten dressed while at the hot spring, they stripped out of their clothes again, letting them fall around Eloise’s chambers. Her room was larger than Avery’s, well decorated with lavish carpets and comfortable chairs. A stack of books next to it, instead of on the shelf across the room. Her bed was meant for one person, though they would make it work to comfortably fit the pair of them. Avery was never quite sure what came over her in those first moments, but she found herself squatting down and scooping Eloise up into her arms. The woman squealed in both shock and anticipation. Avery deposited her in the chair and then found herself falling to her knees, hands on the woman’s knees, gently spreading her legs. Avery hadn’t indulged like this in ages. Not since...not since she had been fighting regularly. She had tried this with one of the mechanical girls before and the strange chemical taste it left on her tongue took far too long to dissipate. Eloise was not like that, she was fresh and delicious. Avery found she had taken care to keep her sex shaved smooth and idly wondered if there was some kind of alchemical tonic she used to achieve that. She appreciated it though, and tried not to feel self conscious about her own body. Eloise squirmed and squeaked in the chair, clearly enjoying herself. Her legs shook, Avery felt the continual vibration though her hands as they rest on her knees. Eloise, on occasion, twitched her legs and Avery had to keep her hands in place to prevent Eloise from clamping her thighs around her head and squeezing. Avery continued to lick and lap at Eloise’s slit though, and as long as her lover continued to moan softly above her she kept doing what she was doing. At some point Eloise caught the hint that she should stop trying to squeeze her legs together, a habit she had come to depend on when she was pleasuring herself. Now she had someone to do that work for her, and there was no lack of talent in the work Avery was doing. She had a strange talent for bringing her right to the edge of a climax and then backing off. A string of kisses were planted along her thighs, a process that took just long enough to break the rising orgasm she had been building, only to have Avery dip back in and start all over again. Eloise’s eyes rolled up in her skull as Avery brought a hand up and used her fingers to part her slick lips only to drive her tongue deep inside of Eloise. She had thought there was no possible way for Avery to draw more pleasure out, only to be proven completely wrong. She felt a sudden spike of raw sexual gratification. Her hips pressed forward, craving every last bit of pleasure Avery had to offer, and she wasn’t slowing down. Her climax grew and grew until it finally boiled over. Eloise arched her back, her hands flew to her own breasts and gripped them hard. She clenched them and gritted her teeth as feminine sex clenched and worked. Avery had pulled back and was continuing to gently swirl a thumb over and around Eloise’s swollen clit. Her ragged breath caught as she came back down and sagged into her chair. Her eyes remained open, though half lidded and the room became a pleasant late night haze. The moonlight from beyond her window cast everything in a cool glow, including her lover. Out of the entirety of the hazy room, Avery was the only thing in sharp focus to Eloise. There was no getting around it, the well muscled naked woman between her legs was her whole world at the moment. The sly smile she wore told Eloise that she was pleased with herself for what she had just done. Eloise’s mind snapped into place. She wasn’t about to let Avery get away with bringing her that much pleasure without reciprocating. Eloise smiled and allowed herself to slide down in her chair, forcing Avery to scrambled backwards. Eloise flowed down, landing on her knees and allowed her momentum to carry her forward. She landed on her hands and found herself positioned just over Avery’s hips. Her smirk told Avery everything she needed to know and a moment later she found her own legs being spread apart and her new lover in place. The cold stone floor below her was a delight and helped to wick away the rising heat that Avery felt spreading across her body. One of her hands began to toy with her own breast, the other found its way to Eloise’s head. She felt the bobbing and wiggling she was doing and Avery had to resist clenching her hand into her hair and shoving her deeper into her slit. She struggled to let go of control and let her lover do what she wanted to do. She also struggled to not compare Eloise to pervious partners. It was easy to elevate her above the clunky automaton sex machines she had borrowed in her more lonely moments, but there had been others. She forced her mind back to the present, back to the room, to the evening, to Eloise and the moments they were sharing. She needed to learn to just let things happen. To, as Eloise had said, keep going on the path she was on. Avery’s hips also bucked like Eloise’s had and she knew her own climax had arrived. Eloise had chosen not to string her along as Avery had, and Avery had to appreciate that. She was already far too turned on and her head was muddled enough to not really pay attention to the passing time. Her arched back gave way to a long and breathy moan that bounced around the room before settling back down into the quiet night. Then her and Eloise were panting and holding one another in their arms. They kissed again, tasting the lingering flavors of one another on their tongues. Eloise cooed softly and rest her head on Avery’s chest, and soon felt Avery gently playing with her hair. It was still bundled up in a long braid, but there were loose strands after the evening activities. Avery was only barely aware that she joined Eloise in her bed. It was a little larger than she had first registered, though they definitely spent the evening in one anothers arms. It was, however, one of the best nights sleep that she had experienced in a very long time. In fact, she only woke up because Eloise was attempting to slip out of the bed without too much disturbance. It didn’t work. Avery scooped up her discarded clothes from the night before and made to start dressing herself again. “No no.” Eloise said, as she began filling a basin. “Excuse me?” “Here.” Eloise said and tossed her a fresh pair of trousers and a simple shirt. “We need to get you some more clothes. But you can’t just keep wearing the same thing day after day.” Avery nodded and dressed herself in the clothes Eloise had given her. They fit well enough, but they were a little uncomfortable. She gathered up her discarded clothes and made for the door. “Somewhere to be?” Eloise asked. That took her by surprise. No, she didn’t, but getting up and leaving in the morning was just what she had grown accustomed to. A one night stand was just how things worked in her life. Attachments to other people were sparse, and if Avery had been capable of being honest with herself, a little frightening. The voice in her head telling her to run away was still there, though a bit more distant now. “I just thought-” “You thought we would fuck and I would toss you out?” Eloise said. Her voice betrayed the small wound she felt from thinking that Avery might want to disappear on her as well. Avery only replied with a small smile, a glance at the floor, and turned away from the exit. She found herself back in Eloise’s arms, back in her mouth and her hands moving along her body. Somehow the rest of the day disappeared into this woman’s kisses. Her body was a constant companion and those uncomfortable clothes soon became less of a problem. It was just past lunch time when the pair decided that they should, perhaps, make an appearance in the castle. Eloise was busy tangling her fingers into Avery’s hair, holding her into a kiss before pulling back with a smirk. “This is getting kinda shaggy isn’t it?” Eloise asked, rolling her fingers through Avery’s hair once again. “I guess it is.” Avery confirmed. Indeed, it had been a long while since she had made any effort to keep up on her appearances. She made sure she was clean, when she could, but grooming was left by the wayside. She had had other things to spend her precious money on in days past. Somehow Eloise appeared with a pair of scissors, a razor, some kind of small dish with a bar of some kind of substance in the bottom, a brush made of badger’s hair, a comb, and a chair. “Sit.” It wasn’t really a request. For nearly an hour Eloise pulled at the tangled mess of dark hair on Avery’s head with a brush and a comb, pulling the hair out enough to allow her to snip at it. Eloise hummed to herself as she worked, clipping away the years of uncaring apathy. Tangled ends of hair had begun matting together and were clipped off, revealing a light, but short, cropping of hair below. Hakenos had mentioned that Avery might look good with a traditional Markezian inspired warriors cut. She had to admit, Hakenos was right. Eloise finished that and moved around the front of Avery, knelt down and looked at her. “You look beautiful you know. You should start taking better care of yourself.” With that she stood up, leaned forward and kissed Avery on the forehead. Eloise moved around her again, gathering up more supplies and left Avery to look at the floor, blushing a furious red and feeling that strange tightness in her chest again. When was the last time someone had called her beautiful? When was the last time someone said something nice or complimentary to her? She wanted to cry as the distance between just now and the last time lengthened in her mind. Eloise reappeared, she had a razor in one hand and a bowl filled with a lather that had been whipped up from the badger hair brush. “Okay, now spread your legs.” “What?” Avery snapped. “If you want me to keep going down there, I’m going to need to tame that particular jungle.” Avery looked anywhere but down for the next ten minutes or so as Eloise did her best to shave up Avery’s crotch, turning it from an unmitigated mess into something Eloise would enjoy. Avery was rewarded for sitting so still as well, making the whole ordeal well worth it. Word of the newly repaired hot springs spread quickly. Avery only managed to keep the knowledge between her and Eloise for a day or two at best. Before long though the place was filled, almost every day, with folks just stopping by to relax in the naturally hot and slightly salty water. It rejuvenated soldiers and cadets after Helene had spent the morning hammering them with drills, sometimes Helene herself would join them. She had known about this location and what it was since she was a child, even then the spring didn’t work so she never had the opportunity to enjoy it herself. She made sure to fix that. The castle maidens had found that on certain nights there was an opening and arranged a regular girls night to simply sit and relax. Daron had declared that if the spring was to be used, some kind of dedicated garment should be worn for the decency of all parties, Hakenos ignored the edict and regularly slipped down to the hot spring in the dead of night to sit and soak nude, as the gods had intended it. Avery found herself in a rare moment of alone time in that very spring. The regular staff attended their duties and the spring was clear. She sighed happily in the hot water and let her head fall back and come to rest against the lip of the trough. The sound of bare footsteps on the stairs drew her attention and sone enough Eloise appeared. Form fitting cotton shorts and a top covered her as she settled into the water next to Avery with practiced grace. They were quiet then, just for a few moments, like every other time this happened. Eloise let out a small sigh. So did Avery. “These last few weeks have been a lot of fun.” Eloise’s voice had taken on a small quiver to it as she spoke, like she was nervous about something. “I’m not sure I want anything about it...about us...to change.” “But?” Avery asked after a beat. “But I think I need to be honest.” She sucked in a deep breath, so did Avery. She was prepared for the worst. She had heard this speech before. “I think I might be falling in love with you.” Avery’s mind was a scramble of information. That was definitely not what she had been expecting. She had already built up a whole array of things to say to let Eloise know, in the gentlest way possible, that it was okay. She had made plans on how to handle the break, how much rum she would allow herself to drink to assist in that endevour. The whole thing was laid out in her mind and now she was unprepared for how to respond. She turned and blinked and stammered and just looked at the woman she had made love to over the last few weeks. Or was it months? How long had she even been here? How many nights had she spent in Eloise’s bed? “I- You are? I mean...I’m” Avery struggled again, she felt like such a child. How was Eloise able to punch through that shell she wrapped around herself so easily? “It’s alright. I know it’s sudden, and you don’t have to-” “I love you too.” Avery cut in, it was the only correct response. They rest their heads on one anothers shoulder for the rest of the time they had, brief as it was. Eloise was the first to leave, she had actual duties to attend to. Avery did not, but she also felt so light that she might float away. She needed to do something with her hands so that her brain could process what just happened. She drug herself out of the water, dried off, dressed in some of the clothes that Fiora had insisted on buying for her from the market in Jarin, and retreated to her room. She hadn’t been here in a while. She spent most nights with Eloise, she spent most days around the castle. She settled into the chair at her desk and looked around at the meager few things she had. Eloise had established herself and her room reflected that. Avery supposed her room also reflected her personality. It was empty, there wasn’t much here that she cared about. Save for the glint of a small round device she had placed on a shelf. Her fathers pocket watch, her pocket watch. The last part of her childhood that she had. She almost couldn’t believe that at one point she had gambled it on a stupid fight with a stupid drunk. Then again, she had turned into that same stupid drunk. She had lost plenty of fights because she could barely stay on her feet. It was still broken though. The watch was still ten minutes late. She had never once thought about fixing it, but now, in the stillness of her room, she felt a compulsion. Her hands moved almost without her bidding them to do so. She pried off the back cover, like she had done when she was a little girl, and inside she found the same delicate cogs and gears. All spinning perfectly, just as they were intended to, but the time was wrong. It was like her, she worked, her gears spun, but she was also broken. It was a surprisingly easy task to fix the time. The coil spring inside of the watch needed to be tightened a little and she clearly saw the mistakes she made as a child. She was an amateur then, she didn’t know what she was doing. Did she know now? She reassembled the watch and opened it up, placed it on her desk, and watched. She counted seconds in her head and watched as the hands on the clock face aligned nearly perfectly with her own recollection. It had taken all of about fifteen minutes to make it right. The process had been simple. She could have done this at any time. She sat back, closed the watch and looked out the window. Her thoughts turned to Eloise, who had cared for her. Daron and Fiora who had dragged her out of her old life. Tanila who had healed her. Hakenos who, despite his usual scowl, had been spotted laughing at some of Avery’s stories. The castle, that offered her shelter and peace. Had it really been that easy to fix her all along? Why had she waited? She wasn’t quite sure that she was healed, but there was a lightness in her heart that she hadn’t felt in a long time, maybe ever. But it was there, steady, bright, cool and crisp. An autumn evening filled with joy and sharp wind. The gentle knock on her door gave way to Eloise’s smiling face again. The two fell into one anothers embrace, into a kiss, into love. Chapter 2 - Bonus - Coming ApartDuring her darkest hours, Avery had only a few comforts. The feeling of her fist hitting some moron who stepped into the ring with her, the jingle of coins that bought her a delicious bottle of Marksman, and when she could get it, a good night of sex. Tonight, she might just get all three. --- Vulco had organized this match for her, laid out the exact prize and that it was one of those fights she shouldn’t talk about. She had agreed, and not just because she was too drunk to turn it down. The prize he had laid out for her was different and interesting and that was a rarity for her these days. Rich assholes in the city of Dralburg knew that the easiest way to arrange to see the lower class fight one another was to offer up a purse of coins. And it worked. That wasn’t how you organized an interesting fight though. “Isstill money though?” Avery said, picking her head up and looking at Vulco, the left Vulco, that was usually the real one. “Aye, some, bu’ there’s also-” “I’ll do it.” Avery said and began to snore. Another night of having to drag her up to her room. At least she had paid for the room for a week ahead of time. In actuality Vulco had insisted on it. Avery was getting worse about making sure to reserve some gold to buy room and board, and while he wouldn’t relish the idea of kicking her out, he could only let her slide for so long. He started asking to pay up front. Before he served her any rum. Avery woke up the next day to a pounding head and a stench that she hoped wasn’t her. It was her. She turned up her nose at that and made an effort to splash a bit of water on her face and made a plan to slip into the bathhouse. This time for a real bath. As she passed Vulco on the way out she heard him call after her. “Oi, lass.” Avery spun around and sidled up to the bar, chipper as an angry wolverine she leaned in and spat a “what” his way. “Yer match up. Two days from now. Barnes and Dudley industrial works. Ye’ remember, yes?” There was something in her mind about a fight. Money was involved. She nodded. “Barnes and Dudley. Got it.” Vulco eyed her and shook his head. He worried about her some days. Most days actually. He watched her go and, though she recovered, she still stumbled on the door step out into the cobblestone and dirt street beyond. He shook his head, one of these days she was going to piss in the wrong persons beer and get herself stabbed for her troubles. That wouldn’t be today though, he hoped. He liked Avery and seeing less of her around would be a shame. For her part, Avery actually did remember a few things from the night before. The stupor that a half bottle of Marksman left her in did not completely destroy her mind and memory, though there were certainly times when she wished it did. Her mind just did not work that way, try as she might it took in information and stored it for later, sometimes imperfectly, but all the words were there. “Hey there good looking.” Avery waved off the woman at the bath house. As enticing as her breasts were and her cute little face seemed, Avery had more on her mind today. The only thing in her life that made her focus. She had a fight on her hands and only a few days to prepare for it. She would normally try and scope out who she was fighting, watch them, observe their style, make a plan. She closed her eyes at that thought, someone had taught her how to make plans when it came to fighting, and by taught she meant that she had gotten into a fight and lost because she just went screaming and swinging into combat. Her and Hazel had fucked that night. They had fucked the next night too. Several others as well. Never once did they ‘make love’ and both agreed that the term itself was stupid. There was no love in what they did. Avery sometimes wished there was, and Hazel likely did too, but there wasn’t any. Avery knew that was her fault, she had to protect her heart and Hazel did too. The best they could do was grind against those walls. She was clean, and her clothes were less dirty. She was fairly sure they would always be that way, until the day they fell off of her and withered in the wind. Not today though. She spent her day wandering the streets of Dralburg, fists clenched around the sad remains of her last win. Second place afforded her some silver coins, and those were disappearing from her pockets. That was okay with her though, they were going to a good and charitable cause. Getting her drunk and allowing her a room to pass out in. By noon her head was swimming in brown liquid and her belly had food in it and her back was cushioned on a bed. She snored and snored. Avery would wake up at some point and repeat the process again, what else was there to do? That was how she found herself sitting in the corner of a warehouse. The bench below her was old and scarred by years of bar fights. One of the legs on it had clearly been broken off and likely used to club someone only to have a new hole drilled in the seat and have it reattached. The whole stool wobbled, which made Avery feel better, the world wasn’t swaying because she was drunk, for once. What she was, on the other hand, was angry. The word Vulco had spoken to her found their way to the front of her mind now. She was angry that she had known about this all along and that there was something, somewhere, that had prevented her from actually registering it. She knew she should be staring down her opponent across the makeshift fighting pit. Instead, she was looking at the smug smile on Scias’s face, the only thing that upset her more was what was standing next to him. Unconventional prizes begot unconventional fights. That’s what people paid good money to see. It was easy to have two opponents throw half-hearted punches and kicks at one another when it was just money. Money that, if lost, could be regained within a few days at another fight. Legal or otherwise. On the other hand, for something a little more diverse that offered carnal pleasures, people would swing wildly for that. They would be viscous and fight tooth and nail. Scias himself had been part of sponsoring this fight, as such he had slithered out of the normal cover of hookah smoke and writhing bodies, to stand next to the fight announcer. Scias himself looked well dressed, comfortable, confident, and extremely punchable. Next to him was a large portion of tonights prize. She was beautiful. There was no debate in that. She had been built that way after all and if her creator had failed in that, well, perhaps they needed assistance at the leather working stalls. The automaton stood there, shifting its weight from one foot to another. Simple sandals protected her delicate soles from the harsh flooring and they aced around her ankles and up her calves. They squeezed the artificial skin just enough. She was wearing silks, though wearing might be the wrong term. They were draped over her body and wrapped around her torso just below a pair of voluptuous breasts. The sash pulled her silky tunic back enough to make her chest protrude. There was no doubt that she was a machine though. The polished brass joints at her knees, elbows, hips and shoulders made sure that was apparent. Each joint seemed to flutter and glow, just a little, with a distant and pale blue light from somewhere inside of her. It was like you could see her breathing though the exposed mechanism. Her segmented fingers toyed idly with one of the silky scarves that covered her body. Her face, and presumably her chest, were about the only part of her that looked like they contained any amount of life. Avery assumed that the announcement that she was the prize for tonight meant that there were very likely other parts of her that would fit that life-like quality as well. A cupid bow for lips, eyes that had a color to them that was hard to distinguish, and a button nose gave her a cute, and almost innocent quality. Her hair looked all at once tangled and meticulously placed around her face and shoulders, bone white and almost impossibly set in place. Had she been a flesh and blood person she would be the kind of courtesan that royal bloodlines would keep locked away and use only for themselves. She smiled and waved and occasionally winked at the contestants, the audience, and even Scias if he caught her eye. Avery could see after even a short while that the movements were all the same. Practiced, no, programmed in. The same movements, the same wink, kiss, giggle over and over. She might have looked and even acted like there was something going on inside of her head, but the more Avery watched her the more she knew that there was nothing more than a loop there. There was something else too. Something Avery wasn’t quite able to put her finger on. Something about the automaton just tickled her in the wrong way, but the knowledge of why was locked away somewhere in the vaults of her mind. Too much rum had locked it away, or maybe there needed to be more to lubricate the hinges and open that vault. Avery wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to have the knowledge, but it bothered her that she didn’t have it on hand. Never one to cower away from a fight, even if she turned up her nose at the prize, Avery made herself ready. Reputation and the small amount of coin that came along with a win would be well worth it, even if the talking piece of slag next to Scias wasn’t. Her fight was against something that was greasy, oily, and sporting more muscles that were strictly necessary. He looked disgusting and Avery didn’t want to think about her fists coming in contact with any part of him. The sweat from the hot enclosed warehouse air didn’t help either. He glistened, and not in a good way. Avery decided it would be best to end this particular fight quickly and without him getting to lay a hand on her. Which meant she was going to have to win. Her name was announced, his was too, they rose and it was time to start. Avery raised her fists and began dancing towards him. He was doing his best to match her in that regard, they circled one another for a bit before either one of them made a move. In the end he lost his patience first and darted forward, swinging wildly and missing every punch he threw. Avery took the opportunity to plant her knee against his gut and sock him twice across the cheek, sending sweat, spittle, and grease across the floor. After that, it was really just ceremony rather than a real fight. He continued to get up, screaming slurs at her and swinging as if he had already won the match. Avery didn’t even need to get angry and focus her hate on this idiot, he was easy enough to put down by simply dodging the clumsily thrown attacks and hitting him where it hurt while he was off balance. In the end, she put him out of commission for good with a hard strike across the back of his head. They had to drag him out of the arena. She had a sneaking suspicion that he would spend the rest of his days getting into petty squabbles with other small time fighters. Relegated to be no one of consequence to her. All in all the entire match up was about ten minutes and Avery could have made it much shorter than that if she had wanted to be more aggressive. The simple fact was that in the ring the world faded away, it was like the edges of her vision closed in on her as did her mind. There was something almost relaxing, a zen like flow to being the ring. There was a very obvious goal in mind, hit the other man while not getting hit by them in return. Simple. Life beyond those ropes was far less simple. There was emotion and politics and relation to other people. There was money to manage, dark alley ways filled with danger to avoid and the search for what made you happy. In here, the sting of flesh against her knuckles was what made her happy, simply because it just didn’t make her sad. Once the fight was over, the world returned to her vision. Those dim edges faded away and she was back in a warehouse, Scias was smiling at her and she hated that. The joy of the fight faded away into reality, where she accepted a leather bag of coins, smaller than she wanted, and also a week with an automaton. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. She lied to herself as she slipped out of the ropes to meet Scias. “Good job.” He said, his voice somehow smooth and grating all at once. “I was hoping you would win this particular prize.” Avery could only sneer at him and give a piteous “thanks” before looking at her prize. Then it all fell into place. Her mind had taken the clarity of battle and used it as a key to unlock those vaults deep inside of her mind. The knowledge was released and Avery suddenly needed to figure out the best way to shove it back into those depths. There had been a very good reason why it had been relegated to be locked away. A cup of Marksman would help ease the memories of her back into the deep dark places of her mind. “I had requested her reconfiguration just shortly after you and Hazel parted ways. I knew she would be a good prize for you. I asked for her to look just like your old love. I’m so glad you participated tonight. Now go on, have...fun.” Scias leaned in and whispered the last word before gliding away, Avery swore there was a trail of slime left in his wake. She closed her eyes and tried to calm the rage that was boiling just below the surface. Of course Scias was going to take any opportunity to rib her, to remind her that he knew things and could influence things. He had set this all up in hopes of showing Avery just how much command he and the Hounds had. He had the money and influence to commission a god damned machine to look like Hazel. As much as she disliked the mechanical girls, she felt like the best way to get back at Scias was to do exactly as he had asked. To try and have fun. “Come on.” Avery muttered to the automaton as she snatched her hand and practically dragged her from the warehouse. She followed along, wordlessly. Avery glanced at her as she guided the thing through the late night streets of Dralburg. The way she moved, she was practically floating along the ground. Her feet touched the dirty pavement only long enough to move her weight from one foot and propel herself forward. “So.” Avery said. “Have you worked with Scias for very long?” Her voice sounded like honey tasted. Sweet, delicate, sticky and delicious. “He just had me made two weeks ago. I’ve been sleeping since then.” Avery nodded at that and realizing just how bad she was at conversation. Hell, even if she was amazing, what did you talk to a machine made for sex about? Hey how are you liking the weather? Is it weird being purpose built to be fucked? Wanna go kick Scias in the shins later? Avery steadied herself and tried to remember that she didn’t really need to treat this girl like a human, because she wasn’t. She was there to be used. Vulco lifted an eyebrow as Avery entered, and there were more than a few drunken eyes that followed her and the automaton’s movements through the bar and then up the stairs to her room. She wanted nothing more than to lay out each and every one of them, the scowl she threw at them said as much. Still, she pushed onward to her room and opened the door before stepping aside and letting the automaton in. Like she was some kind of lady who deserved courtesies. With the door closed, Avery and the automaton were alone. Something about that made Avery incredibly nervous, like she was some young woman being locked in a closet with her crush. The expectation was to kiss and make love and touch one another and enjoy the moments they had. Avery swallowed at that and looked into the face of her love from long ago. With a deep breath she decided to try, actually try, and have a good time. “So uh, do you have a name?” Avery asked. “You can call me anything you like sweetheart.” It replied. It moved too, gliding across the space to wrap her silk draped arms around Avery’s neck. They were close now, Avery could feel the pressure of the machine’s breasts pressing into her own torso. A breath too, hot air wafting out of its mouth and splashing across Avery’s neck. The thing smelled like fresh linens, lavender, and honeysuckle, yet somewhere just below those scents there was something else. Chemicals, a concoction of materials that stung the nose a moment before being covered up by sweet and herbal smells. It was the machine just below the things needed to mask it all. Avery had to admit to herself, it smelled nice and it was definitely helping. She closed her eyes, hoping that the darkness would make it even better. Her mind was kind enough to her to take the relatively close image of the automatons face and morph it into another face. Avery opened her eyes again, maybe looking at the thing was better. “So, what’ll it be? Give me a name, or should I just be your mysterious little play thing for a week?” Avery swallowed, a name might help distinguish it from Hazel. “Clara. You can be Clara.” Clara cooed softly into Avery’s ear, the warm scented breath caressing its way all along. “Sure thing, and should I call you Avery, or maybe just mistress?” “Avery is fine.” She said all too quickly. Why was her heart racing so much? She needed to calm down. “Okay then, Avery, what do you want to do with me, or to me.” She giggled and the way she said Avery’s name made her want to melt into the floorboards. When she didn’t answer Clara continued. “Or maybe you want me to do something to you?” Inside of the mechanical woman there were so many silvery threads magically sending signals from one logic gate to another. Strings of confirmed or denied conditions. If her guest for the evening didn’t want to use her, then did they want to be used? If neither, did they want conversation? Something else? She had an almost limitless array of possible outcomes, all of them a swirling mass of information inside a cluster of complicated stone and metal platters, etched with runes and inlaid with silvery currents for the arcane to race along. Those instructions powered and informed other magical conduits. They made her face move, made it smile and wink and giggle. They made her hands gently slide up and down Avery’s arms. Not too firm, just a light touch. They told the mechanical woman to slide forward a little, to place her leg next to Avery and gently press her hips into Avery’s. She had no choice but to obey those commands. In fact, the concept of choice was non-existent to her. She wasn’t some consciousness that struggled against instructions, she was instructions. Just a this or that flow chart wrapped in soft alchemical skin. Skin that Avery was having a hard time resisting. And why should she resist? It felt nice, there was no harm, she told herself she had worked hard and deserved this. She smirked and leaned in, her own lips smashing into Clara’s. Her mouth worked and her tongue invaded the machines mouth all at once. Avery’s hands rose and pulled the machine’s head tight against her own. Clara yelped a little at that, a small surprised sound, then melted into Avery. Something awakened inside of Avery, a heat that felt like her usual barrage of anger and sorrow, but this was a different temperature. It started in her belly and boiled up through her body. Down it went to her sex and up to her brain, enabling one and numbing the other. Sex was a drug that made her feel the same way as a good bottle of booze and she indulged it the same way. Drinking deeply and throwing caution to the wind. She grabbed Clara and spun her around, shoving her hard against the door to her room. The solid wood rattled a little but held tight. Avery gave little worry about hurting the thing in her arms. It wasn’t a person and it felt nothing, she knew that much at least. So she pushed harder into her, moving her hand from the automaton’s head and letting it fall to the silk wraps around her. She pulled on them, freeing the rest of the woman’s body to Avery’s touch. Clara’s breasts felt real enough and anyone lost so deeply in the throes of passion wouldn’t have bothered with analysis. Avery, on the other hand, couldn’t help it. They were firm, a little too firm though and the way the nipples felt was good enough. They were stuck with some kind of adhesive though, permanently puckered and ready. Avery pinched one of them and Clara responded with an aroused squeak. The response was just half a second too late, like something inside of her had to first register where Avery’s hand was, what it was doing and how it should best respond. It wasn’t natural or organic, nothing about Clara was. That wouldn’t stop Avery though, she was here to indulge. That was the perfect revenge against Scias for this thing that looked like someone she cared about. Enjoy it to the fullest, don’t be repulsed by it, use it as intended, have a good time. Avery broke her lips free of Clara’s and placed a hand on top of the automaton’s head. She applied just enough pressure there to indicate that Clara needed to be lower. Clara let a sly smirk cross her face as her internal workings registered what Avery wanted. “Let me have some fun with you darling.” Clara sighed. Avery allowed it and soon found her old dirty shirt being untied, the laces pulled free in an infuriatingly slow display. Clara’s eyes darted between looking at Avery’s face, an expression that made Avery’s heart ache, and back down at her chest. When the machine looked away Avery took a deep breath and used it to calm herself, to force her mind to let go and just have fun. Just let this happen. Don’t think about it too much. She needed a drink. Her shirt fell away and Clara expertly and almost inhumanly lowered herself to the perfect height to take Avery’s toned chest into her own mouth. The slightly rubbery tongue caught and drug it’s way over Avery’s nipples for a moment or two before some form of moisture formed in the mouth. Some substance created in a lab and stored in a glass vile inside of her for certain. Avery pushed the thought away and let herself indulge in the pleasure. She let Clara suckle and lick and nibble at her. Avery let her body shudder and a small pleasured sound escaped her lips. The sound rose in pitch a moment later as she felt segmented but soft fingers glide between her legs. She felt her slit twitch involuntarily as Clara moved her hand up and down, massaging her mound gently but firmly. Pressing harder and harder as she continued to pleasure Avery’s chest. Avery wasn’t sure who made it happen, herself or this automaton, but her trousers seemed to be falling off of her. She was only vaguely aware of it when she felt the cool night air slide over her bare thighs. She kicked her pants away which made it easier for her to spread her legs. Once she did, Clara took the opportunity to press her fingers into Avery’s newly exposed clit and slide inside of her. Clara somehow utilized the small amount of space between the solid door and her lover to slide down to her knees with out so much as breaking Avery from her lustful sighs. Her lover continued to widen her stance and soon the two fingers that had been inside of Avery were extracted, slick with her juices and replaced by a mechanical tongue. Avery cried out at that one and felt her climax rising. It had started in the same place as the heat from earlier had started, but it didn’t move around her body, it only grew and grew. A hand slammed into the doorjamb as Avery leaned forward, bucking her hips against Clara’s mouth. She slurped and resumed her pleasuring. Avery so badly wanted to just let it all go, to sink deep into that heat in her belly and let it consume her whole. She wanted to let Hazel lap at her pussy until she was shivering and moaning. Clara...she meant Clara...fucking hells… Avery only allowed the mechanical woman to eat her out for a minute or two before she felt frustrated and angry at herself. Why couldn’t she get Hazel out of her mind. She decided it was because she was just standing there and letting this piece of technology and magic pleasure her. She needed to gain control of herself, to control Clara. She needed to be involved. If she was doing something then she wouldn’t be thinking. She pulled back from Clara, leaving a long string of artificial saliva and her own juices strung between her lips and Clara’s. She bent down and scooped up the automaton, finding that either her strength had grown, or these machines were far lighter than she would have thought. It didn’t matter, she didn’t have far to travel. Avery spun around and let go of the girl at the right time to launch her towards the bed. Clara let out a delighted little squeal as she was tossed across the room and landed on the bed. Not quite a perfect throw, but Avery knew what she was doing and the little automaton only bounced once one the mattress before coming to a stop. Her fake breasts swayed and jiggled as Clara lay there, ready for more of whatever Avery had in mind. Even Clara was blissfully unaware that when she was built, her construction had been hasty. Scias needed her to be done in time for the fight, and some things hadn’t been tightened nearly as well as they should have been. Avery was on top of her a moment later. First straddling her hips and placing her hands on Clara’s breasts, kneading and massaging them as the lust grew. Her eyes were hazy and her cheeks red as she let herself sink into lust, hoping that it would be enough to banish Hazel from her mind. It was working and as Avery let her mind slip and act on instinct instead, the world began to fade. The edges of her vision darkened and she focused on Clara. On the face. On that face. On Hazel’s face. She needed to not be looking at that. It took little effort for her to shimmy up Clara’s body and plant her knees on either side of the automatic girl’s head. She could have gently lowered herself onto Clara’s waiting mouth, but why wait? She needed this and she needed it now. Avery’s hips ground hard into Clara’s mouth. The mechanical girl had time enough to open her lips and unleash her tongue inside of Avery. From there it was a mechanical sequence. Avery bucked her hips, harder and harder and Clara simply needed to keep some form of stimulation going. Lost in lust, Avery didn’t think about anything else. Just stimulation and pleasure. Clara was also unaware of the consequences of Avery’s movements. Inside of her throat, just below the collar bone, something popped free. She would never be sure of what, no one would. The more Avery ground her hips into Clara’s face, the more her lust rose and the less she thought about what she was doing. At some point one of the carefully etched and polished rune stone array’s burst free from the binding it was housed in. It rattled around inside of her torso, still trailing silvery arcane threads, but not for long. Harder and harder Avery slammed her slit into Clara, more and more the rune stone bounced and rattled. Soon the threads of magic couldn’t even hold it and it came free. Clara’s fingers dug into Avery’s thighs, a movement that seemed to only drive her lover deeper into the depths of her lustful pleasures. She didn’t stop and in fact, rammed her hips harder into Clara. Another piece rattled free from the bindings, drug along by the rune stone that had already dislodged itself. Clara’s eyes rolled up in her artificial skull and she began muttering. All Avery could hear was a muffled vocalization, no different than the sounds of any other automaton processing pleasure. The sounds were lost in a sea of lewd moans and heavy breathing from above. Avery ground harder and harder and soon, more than just rune stones began to break free of their bindings. The actual structures inside of Clara’s neck were loosening from a quick and sloppy assembly. Avery leaned back, arching her back and letting out a fresh cry laced with ecstasy and raw sexual pleasures. Her legs quivered as her climax moved from a burning fire to an exploding burst. In that moment Clara’s head wobbled and spasmed as it fully disconnected, or rather, tore free of the framework meant to hold it in place. The rubbery skin stretched and lightened to a milky white moments before it tore free. A slit appeared and ran a jagged line around her throat and the back of her neck. It wasn’t quite enough to fully tear free, but it was clear that something was destroyed. The wild surges of magical energies coursed through Clara’s body. Some of them caused her hands to clench into Avery’s thighs, a fact that only seemed to encourage Avery further. Some swirled down into her feet, splaying her mechanical toes outward. The rest coiled itself around her sex. The mechanisms inside of it, so delicate and finely tuned, suffered from a wild surge of energy. They twitched and clenched as the arcane repository of sexual pleasure assaulted her there and left her ruined and leaking. As a final reminder that she was nothing but an artificial girl, the rubbery skin around her sex detached itself from the artisanal framework it was connected to and thrust her sex out from between her legs. Part of it remained inside of the opening between her legs, inert and lifeless, the rest of it dribbled onto Avery’s bed sheets. All of it connected to one another by finely woven threads meant to carry magic and lust, none of it meant to be exposed like this. Avery was far too busy letting her head loll backwards, her eyes closed in orgasmic pleasure and to her own delight, it was pops and flashes of color and no sign of Hazel. Maybe this could work out after all. Avery settled down, her heart hammering in her chest, her hands fell to the bed and supported her as she breathed heavily. Clara lay still below her. Once Avery focused enough to take it all in, she swore. Small blue flashes emanated from the tear in her neck and within moments something popped and sizzled inside of her. Clara’s eyes remained open, vacant, and looking at nothing at all. Her tongue was out, still stiffly waiting for Avery to slide her slit along its surface. That would never happen again. Avery had cum, leaving some of her juices smeared across Clara’s mouth. “Fuck..” Avery whispered and rolled off of the automaton. She took her in, all at once. Her feet remained pointed, toes splayed out. Her arms had lost power and simply flopped to her sides, stopping wherever they desired. Her face, the face that Scias had wanted to look like Hazel’s, was left somewhere between surprised, shocked, horrified, and orgasmic. Avery tossed her pillow over that face, she never wanted to see it again. “Fuck!” Avery said again and dressed herself. She paced around her room for a minute or two trying to think of the best way to spin this. What story could she come up with as to why this had happened. After her mind steadied itself she had a thought. Did she need to? Scias had spent plenty of money on this thing and had clearly meant for it to be a thing that hurt her a bit, or maybe reminded her of a lost love. Something to keep her deep in her desperation and deep in her drink. He had invested real coin into it, so breaking it just meant he was out the cash. She smiled at that and looked over at the ruined mechanical body on her bed. She finished dressing. Down in the tavern below she reemerged once she managed to catch her breath and drive the blush from her cheeks. She ordered a double of Marksman and settled down at the bar. She looked around, and sure enough, cloaked in smoke and women, Scias was there. She knew she wouldn’t be able to see it, but she was sure he was smiling. The smug idiot. Between her and him was the sand filled fighting pit, a place she was familiar with and longed to drag Scias into if for nothing else to throw him into the dirt like she had. She downed the drink, then ordered another one and placed her payment on the bar for Vulco. He looked at her, an expectant expression and Avery only shook her head at him. She took the drink with her as she strolled around the tavern, making her way to Scias. “You work fast. Done already?” He asked through the smoke and bodies around him. “I would have had a lot more fun if the thing didn’t break down on me. She’s really busted up. I think I’m just going to dump her with the rest of the trash.” Avery replied. Scias didn’t say anything, she could barely see him in the haze. What she could see, though, was the way his hand clutched onto the wooden arm rest. “You broke her?” He said through unseen, but gritted teeth. “Yeah, hope you weren’t going to try and resell her later.” Avery slugged back the Marksman, it tasted delicious. “Good thing you only got a cheap model. I’d hate to think you lost any significant amount on her.” Scias didn’t reply to that. “Well, good night.” Avery said and strolled off. She would have to figure out how to dismantle the thing. Actually, she might see if she could repair it. She was no expert, but she could always learn. Who knows, the knowledge might come in handy some day. |