~A/N: Hey Dear Readers! To celebrate 200 chapters, I'm releasing a couple extra chapters early! I hope you'll enjoy!
***
Vaergraes looks at the colossal hallway ahead. The Citadel can be spooky at times because of its massive size. Because the residents of the castle are all human size at this point, the vast excess space goes mostly unused. It has come to the point where Hekate authorized construction of further changes to the hallways to make them more useful, though progress is slow because there aren’t enough people to justify making the castle into a massive interior city.
This particular chasm of a corridor contains somewhere she can’t bring herself to go further towards.
It’s the prison block of the Citadel.
Vaergraes puts her right hand on her left shoulder.
“It won’t go back to the way it was,” remarks a voice that causes the Uhl’tall archpriestess to jump a little. She turns to face the former Queen of Dragons, and now the First Dragon Empress; Ryuogriar.
“I… I know…” murmurs the Uhl’tall woman. “I must live the rest of my life doubting my memories. But…” She clutches the sleeve of her dress, which dangles imply at her side. “She’s… still my little sister.”
Ryuogriar nods. “Xyreko told me that you were standing down here. If you’d like to talk to her, I’ll go with you as emotional support.”
“Are you sure you aren’t making sure I’m going to let her escape?”
“Go ahead,” replies the dragon bluntly. “Take her and run far away.”
Vaergraes looks at Ryuogriar, stunned by the reply. The silvery-blonde smirks. “I’m serious. I won’t stop you. In fact, I’ll walk you both out. But, you will be fugitives, and Mukori won’t be around to protect you both.” Ryuogriar steps closer, and she growls, “Thymeria is working with people that endanger my family. If I could incinerate her at this very moment, there wouldn’t even be ash left already. However, Mukori gave you his word that she would live. She will live for every second of every minute of every day that she is a prisoner. And, because she’s your sister, she will not be tortured for information the way lesser enemies would be. That is the pathetic, aggravating, bewildering, and… lovable weakness of Mukori. He would sacrifice his own safety for people who already tried to kill him once.” The red-eyed dragon looks into the Uhl’tall’s eyes, and her pupils are constricted to their true, cross-like pattern, and her horns and tail are glowing more than normal in the semi-dim lighting of the hallway. “So go ahead and take your sister. You might get far enough away that you’ll never see anyone from the Fievegal again. And, I will walk you out and guarantee your safety to the outer wall. I’ll even keep the others from pursuing you for at least a day.”
Vaergraes is silent. In terms of magic, she could defeat Ryuogriar, but it never crosses her mind. She’s down an arm and deep within the Citadel. Plus, Ryuogriar is only speaking her mind. Her own emotions are charged by the situation, especially because Thymeria specifically tried to ambush Daniel, which he was suspicious enough to suspect was coming.
Vaergraes doesn’t want to believe the little sister she sang songs to, braided her hair, taught magic to, and spent much of her life helping raise is an agent of the enemies of the friends and family she has grown close to in the Fievegal.
That said, she can smell the sweet scent of ignityal. Ryuogriar doesn’t have a pilot flame lit, but she is at the borderline.
Seemingly sympathizing with Vaergraes’ hesitation, the blonde dragon takes a breath and exhales, which emphasizes the deceptively innocent smell. Her pupils go back to normal, relaxing her red eyes. “My apologies, Vaergraes. I let my feelings run away with my words, but I meant all of them, including the promise. However, as I said, Thymeria will live by Mukori’s mercy. His values carry more weight to me than even my most passionate anger. And in addition to that, I do still consider you my friend, so I will ensure her safety, as well as no mistreatment ever comes towards you so long as you remain our friend.”
Vaergraes relaxes her own expression into a soft smile. Ryuogriar just said a lot, but she’s sincere, which is nice.
“Thank you, Ryuogriar. I don’t know how much weight my words carry, but… I know Thymeria betrayed us all, myself in no small part. If she can be… redeemed, it will be long after her masters are all exterminated… And I had no idea she had a master for her many years so far.”
Ryuogriar nods in understanding.
“Indeed. And, it cuts no one else deeper than it must for you.” Ryuogriar starts down the prison corridor, and Vaergraes watches for a moment.
“Worry not, Vaergraes. There are many prisoners that we can question. I’m going to offer Margrave Niulglodsa my body, and then burn his hands off when he tries to accept.”
The Uhl’tall finally lets out a laugh, bringing her right hand close to her chin when she can’t resist. She believes Ryuogriar is serious, but the bluntness with which she said it made it almost seem like a joke. The dragon smirks over her shoulder, and the Archpriestess falls into step with her.
“Forgive me for joining you, but I believe we should keep our prisoners intact until Daniel and Hekate make a formal decision on how to handle them.”
The dragon scoffs and laughs. “Very well. It should be the voice of an Archpriestess speaking of temperance.” The two walk, and Vaergraes can tell the dragon is just creating a distraction for her until she can confront Thymeria properly.
And, she’s thankful for it.
“Has there been any word from Arachne?” asks the dragon.
“She reached Daniel safely, though my connection with her is still weaker than it should be. Something is abnormal, but I trust Arachne will be loyal to Daniel regardless of my own behavior.”
“Is that so?” asks the dragon a little suspiciously, though it’s more in jest than true distrust.
Vaergraes nods. “The very fact that she has self-awareness is already unprecedented for a summon like her, even a powerful one. And, as you know, a name is a powerful tool.”
Ryuogriar is quiet. Vaergraes knows that the name she gave Daniel was Zadarralomme, which is a ‘friendly name’, since a dragon’s real name pronounced in True Draconic is impossible for almost all other races to pronounce. This is advantageous to the dragons because of the nature of how a name intertwines with any magic directed at the soul.
Such as contract magic.
Of course, it became moot when Daniel removed the contracts from the dragons he has come to trust, since even the combative Gold has a friendly rivalry with him, rather than malicious intent. It’s something Vaergraes has always admired about dragons; with a handful of exceptions, dragons are notoriously sincere and honorable beings, especially in defeat. They hate being subservient, but they respect strength.
For the Dragon Empresses, the three Einherjars, and Gold, Daniel’s insistent and intentional lack of using the compulsion of the contracts to force the dragons to do anything endeared him to the dragons in question. If he even tried, Gold would likely give in to his advances and become the fourth Dragon Empress, though she’d likely request her duel first.
The significance of Daniel naming Arachne has given him a sort of sway over her. It’s not slavery or compulsion, but rather, Vaergraes has noticed a sort of admiration in Arachne that she doesn’t have for Hekate or Vaergraes, who both produced the magic to create her. It’s only speculation, since unnamed children exist all over the world, and they have magic and self-awareness. However, there seems to be some credibility to the idea that naming such a powerful concentration of magic in one summon is what helped create a soul, and even she recognizes that fact.
Or, during the confusion of being summoned with sentience, hearing a name assigned to her simply helped anchor her to reality as a ‘person’ instead of merely a ‘summoned creature’.
Ryuogriar cups her chin as she remarks quietly, “We should consider having Daniel forge a contract with her under that name, then. It is rather simple, and with the amount of power that went into her creation…”
“I have thought about the same thing. Since it is the only true name she has, she is at risk.”
The dragon nods in agreement. “I’ll suggest that we come up with a friendly name for her, as well. As an Imperial Knight and Mukori’s ‘daughter’, she is well within her rights to have a title and proper name.”
Vaergraes smiles. While it’s murky, since it wasn’t supposed to play out that way, she does have the ‘eldest child’ with Daniel, that also implies that Hekate is ‘half-mother’ to the Death Knight in that case, since her mana was crucial to the loyal anomaly’s creation.
“One last thing while we’re on that particular line of thought…”
“What is it?” asks Ryuogriar sincerely.
“I… assume… Hekate’s…”
“Morthybargaron is dead, and not even I know what name he used.” Ryuogriar looks directly at Vaergraes as they’re arriving at Niulglodsa’s cell. “My goal for researching the modifying of one’s true name does not only apply to Arachne.” She puts her hand on her chest, where she sometimes paints a fake contract mark with Daniel’s name on it for her own fantasizing. “My mother and father chose my true name with great care and love, so I will never get rid of it. However,...” She smiles, saying tenderly, “I wish to add to my true name the name of the family to which I shall belong forever more.”
The Uhl’tall woman smiles gently. “Perhaps we can find magic for it in time for the wedding, then, hmm?”
Ryuogriar grins. “Yes indeed so.”
The two face the cell door, and Vaergraes offers before they enter, “Just… a thought. Th-... Thymeria… has spent a great deal of time researching magic, including in the Citadel. I… don’t know what she did with the transcriptions she made, but…”
“We will offer her certain luxuries as a prisoner if she helps us with magic-related matters. But of course, under strict guard and in the presence of anti-magic materials or Nemaisol.”
“Yes, that sounds good…” murmurs Vaergraes with a quaint smile. She knows Thymeria is a traitor, and one serving some sort of endless war for reasons Vaergraes can’t really grasp. And, she did it so subtly, that the ‘Demon Queen’ who wished to end the war failed time and time again to forge diplomatic ties to the east.
While she likely wasn’t alone, I have no doubt now that Thymeria prevented my requests for diplomacy from reaching the appropriate ears.
Regardless, the Archpriestess can’t come to hate her sister. There are memories that must be lies planted within her, and it’ll take a lot of psyche magic from Aoloan or Senn to undo the artificial memories, if they can be removed. But, she’s certain the child Thymeria that Vaergraes remembers really did exist.
Maybe someday, Vaergraes’s little sister can be returned to her by the betrayer that took her place.
***
Zuzia mills around the timeless void and the collection of junk that has been gathered within. While his physical body is on a sort of ‘magic autopilot’ as she has come to call it, Serrentuk the elven sage stored his own soul within the timeless void to protect his own mind from the atrocities that his body has been used for. He can apparently peek through his own physical eyes at will, so he is Zuzia’s only window to the outside world right now.
And, as for the timeless menagerie, which really does include monsters, animals, people, and seemingly anything in between in addition to the inanimate objects, Zuzia can’t help but admire some of the feats of Serrentuk the ancient sorcerer who once fought alongside a previous summon in order to fend off some kind of strange threat from beyond Zenkon itself.
She admires a large creature that looks like a wingless, four-legged dragon to her, since it is many times larger than a Komodo dragon of Earth, and it has the armored scales and bone-like scutes she could easily see being on a dragon. It’s much larger than the rakehorn Zuzia helped her mercenary friends defeat, and it makes her wonder what they’ve been up to.
“Any word on the mercenaries who were with me?” asks the brunette gently as she touches the draconic beast.
“Not that I have heard, though I do not think the search has ended,” replies the elven man gently.
“I see. That’s good, at least.”
She holds her foot up towards the reptile’s massive foreclaw, and each of its sharp, slightly-curved talons are nearly as long as her shin. Even so, the creature looks just as lively as if it could spring at her at any moment.
Zuzia has spooked herself many times from turning to find a creature without any signs of death, even though it is as still as a mountain.
“So, was I really an anomaly, or were you able to drag this thing in in spite of its size?” asks the Polish woman.
Serrentuk lets out a laugh. “Thankfully, few are capable of resisting Gate the way you did, Zuzia. It does use a great deal of my mana for something this large, especially if it is alive.” He touches the dragon as well, though his body is in an ethereal state while he’s in his own Gate without his actual tangible form. “I probably wouldn’t be able to extract this one again on my own. It would take too much mana, and if the transfer is only partially complete, it could be severed if my stamina runs out.”
Zuzia grimaces. “So… how do I compare to this dragon in terms of how close I came to extinction?” asks the young woman a little playfully, but also… I definitely need to know. If I don’t make sure I’m all the way out when I kill him…
The deceptively unaged man smiles with a bit of an angelic beauty. “There are lots of humans, so I wouldn’t worry about going extinct.”
“Wha-!? I meant me! There’s only one Zuzia!” whines the young woman as she pats her chest.
He looks like he just realized that, and though she did technically use the wrong word, he also can’t deny that he took her too literally.
“Apologies. It’s probably not the best comparison, since this is actually a drake. While it has an impressive amount of mana for a drake, it’s still far below that of a true dragon.”
“Drake, dragon. Semantics.”
The elven sage sighs with exasperation in his tone. “Come with me…” He waves his ghostly staff, and Zuzia wobbles when the surroundings move. It’s not that she feels the motion, but like VR video games, it gives her brief vertigo for her to suddenly ‘be moving’ without actually feeling it. The brunette groans and crouches, waiting for them to arrive wherever he’s taking her.
“We’re here.”
“You’ve got to give me a warning when you do that,” grouses the honey-brunette.
“Apologies.”
Zuzia climbs to her feet and looks at…
The person.
“What the heck is this?” asks the perturbed young woman. At first glance, it’s nothing more than a human male, though he has dark blue hair and sharp, almost neon-green eyes bearing a somewhat surprised expression. Though she’s still not convinced that she’s looking at a dragon, doubt does start to set in thanks to anime and comics.
She would give the mysterious person dragon-kin at best, if she were coming up with terms, since he has almost tusk-like horns that come down behind his ears and angle back up roughly parallel with the end of his chin, and his eyes are frozen in cross-like pupils. From his back extends a reptilian scaled tail that matches his hair color, but it and his horns possess a strange metallic glow to them.
She inspects the man from various angles, and Serrentuk explains, “He had already depleted his mana, and I was able to catch him off guard several hundred years ago. However, I was unable to destroy all of his creations. The face he’s making… He was about to breathe fire.”
“I meant why is he basically just a human with costume parts?” asks the skeptical European. She tugs on the tusk-like horn, though even if it were a fake, the timeless void prevents even her magically-gifted super-strength from affecting anything. She has already kicked and punched some of Serrentuk’s things when he doesn’t mind it, since it helps entertain her.
“Uh…” The elven sage himself is caught off guard by her description, but he does his best to explain sincerely. “He is a dragon, but one with a vast amount of mana stamina, which allows him to transform into a humanoid form like this.”
“Why? Wouldn’t he literally be able to do anything and everything he could want better
if he’s in his natural form?”
“Yes and no,” replies Serrentuk unhelpfully. “Interacting with the far more numerous races in the world is much easier in a similar form, and it’s easier to stay hidden with a physically smaller size, which was this one’s goal.”
Zuzia notices the elven sage clenching his fists, especially the one on his staff. He adds quietly, “Dragons are powerful, but they are capable of good and evil, just like the rest of us. This one used magic to create horrible monsters meant to slaughter its own family.” He looks down, pain filling his eyes. “I… couldn’t defeat the monster… It is one of my greatest failures…”
The Earthling remains quiet for a moment as she gives him solace. She decides at once what she can and will do. “Right, then.” Zuzia has a pretty good sense of her new enhancements, and she can hit things quite hard without hurting herself.
The brunette cocks her hand back as she postures herself to launch forward, and she lunges towards the alleged dragon with the hardest strike she can manage. A thunderous clap resonates from her knuckles where they impact the dragon-kin’s cheek, and it echoes in a distorted way through the strange void.
Naturally, nothing happens to the dragon, but the attack does cause the elf to laugh a little. “Thank you, Zuzia.”
The Polish woman grins, giving him a pair of finger guns as she confidently declares, “I guarantee instant death or your money back.”
“I had no intent to release this being, but I appreciate it.”
Zuzia giggles. With no time elapsing, nothing happens to the things she hits in this space, but she also suspected pretty confidently that Serrentuk wasn’t going to let the dragon out. Not with using magic to harm children. If anything, Zuzia wishes she could kill him, though she doubts she’d feel very good afterwards.
The young woman then brushes her hands off on her shorts, even though they’re not dirty. Her knuckles are stinging her a bit, but even without holding back much, she hasn’t made herself believe she nearly broke anything, even with the tiny bones in her hand. “So, any thoughts on when Plan: ‘Super Awesome Ninja Zuzia Escape Plan’ will be carried out? I don’t mind being bored, but I really, really, REALLY mind being bored.”
Serrentuk rolls his eyes. “As the answer was yesterday, Zuzia, I have no control over my body’s master and his liege lord, the Grand Prince. But, we are on the move, still. Nesparu and his squad managed to evade Mornistae soldiers while the Grand Prince distracted the servants and Queen, as well as the Deputy.”
“You’re talking about those things. The… magic artillery, right?”
The elf nods. Yesterday, three large devices were transferred into Serrentuk’s gate. Zuzia didn’t do anything to them, since Serrentuk mentioned that they were difficult to move in as it was. Each device contained a ton of mana, apparently, though the third device seems more like some sort of abstract art spider statue instead of a useful tool.
That said, Zuzia is doing her best to accept the ‘fantasy’ parts of the world she has been transported to, which contains many things Earthlings would dream of as conveniences, but the world’s overall technology level is far away from that for now.
Zuzia tries to summon her phone, but it seems she’s completely cut off, even from Amalaskae.
Serrentuk continues his explanation, “I believe Nesparu will be calling upon his carriage once they’re on the road. It will likely be a couple of weeks, though, before they’re ready to try to capture and restrain you.”
The young woman nods in agreement. “Of course…” She cracks her knuckles, saying a little bluntly, “I’m kinda not sorry I sprayed all those people in the face with bear spray, now.” She has one can left with her gear, which currently is with Amalaskae. As soon as she can, she’s going to try to summon it and use it on anyone around her. Hopefully, the blond guy, ‘Yaulander’, according to Serrentuk, as well as Nesparu are going to regret ever laying eyes on her. If she’s lucky, they won’t be able to use their eyes anymore.
“Alright, Serrentuk, today's practice swing. Ready?”
The ancient sorcerer nods.
Zuzia takes a breath and focuses on Serrentuk. She's not actually a violent person, so she needs to be ready to act when she emerges from Gate. According to Serrentuk, they’ll be expecting her to still be in a balance-compromised position, and that she’ll be dazed when she is released. Because she’ll be fully conscious, she’ll have several seconds to escape from Gate, take out Serrentuk, extract his body and flee.
The Polish woman balls her fist and readies to strike. It may not do anything right now, but it’ll help train her mind to be ready.
Zuzia steps into a powerful hit straight into Serrentuk’s chest, closing several yards worth of distance with her lunge and swinging with a straight-through punch. The goal is to get the job done, but not to destroy his body too much.
The elven sage nods. “As long as you move with resolve and haste, you should be able to escape.”
The young woman nods as she exhales. Her heart is beating more quickly, since she knows, in her heart, she’s going to be doing something very wrong. But, it’s the only way to free Serrentuk from the slavery magic binding him to Nesparu.
“I won’t let you down, Serrentuk. In turn,...”
“Yes, I will owe you an unending debt. Once I have my own agency again, I shall always be at your service.”
Zuzia smiles. “Oh! While I’m thinking of it, do you have a pen and paper I can use?” Certain items that Serrentuk gives her are usable to her, even within Gate, since it’s the only way she can eat from the stockpile he has. Time isn’t affecting her at its normal rate, so it takes time before she has to sleep, before she gets hungry or thirsty, and thankfully, she hasn’t needed many visits to the non-existent powder room. Conversely, though, since there’s no day or night, her sense of time is going haywire.
Serrentuk nods, and rather than transporting them to the paper and pencil that he provides, he seems to pull them to the two. Of course, he can’t physically interact with objects as he is right now anyways, so he gestures for Zuzia. “Help yourself.”
“Thanks!” Zuzia takes the pencil and paper that he offers, but when she tries to write her note, she realizes the problem. While the paper does flex, the pencil doesn’t write.
“Oh…” murmurs the elven sage. “I can make them interactable with you, but not with each other… Let me try…”
“No, no, Serrentuk. That’s okay. I think I got this.” Zuzia takes a breath, and she bites the skin on the back of her hand. It takes a lot of force, but like anything else, her jaws were granted inhuman strength through whatever process Amalaskae employed. So, she has no more trouble than she normally would going through her own skin just enough to draw a little blood. She dabs the pencil in it and uses her own ‘ink’ to write her note. It’s a bit macabre for her own tastes, but her Grandpa made sure she was always using her brain if ever she got stuck in a rough situation while out on a long backpacking trip, especially a wilderness hike.
Zuzia adds to her note, “[... P.S., please tell Grandpa I say hi and I love him.]”
She folds the note up and sticks it into her pocket. “Since we know this is an issue, can you please work on interactions between two items? I’d like to take some of your things here and put them in the void bag before the time comes. Is that alright?”
“Yes. I… honestly don’t know what the consequences of my death will be, so that may actually be preferable over losing all of my belongings and what’s… precious to me.” Serrentuk looks in a specific direction, and Zuzia is fairly certain he’s looking at the covered body he showed her.
“Anything and everything you want to take. Let’s do it.”
The elven sorcerer nods, and the two set to work experimenting while things outside continue without them.
No one could possibly expect what Zuzia’s actions in the timeless void have inadvertently set in motion.
***
Aoloan groans as her eyes drift open. She’s been floating in and out of consciousness and dreams so fluidly, she’s genuinely not sure that she’s even awake this time. As a succubus, she can use hypnotic magic, which primarily blends variations of light and dark magic with particular rituals, and the results can be mind control to varying degrees, as well as dream influence and even mana theft through one’s sleep.
It can be risky doing any of them too often, as it can dull one’s senses to those states.
The last thing she does definitively remember as reality was sharp pain in her left arm and… Daniel saving her life from a curse.
She quickly sits up and checks her left arm. Her hazy memories, clouded by that pain and being knocked unconscious at some point is that her whole arm from the bicep down was going to need to be gone. However, her left arm is completely intact. Rather, her right hand is what is missing at the moment.
Wh-... What’s going on? thinks the succubus to herself.
When she looks up, she flinches lightly. Hekate is seated backwards on a simple rotating chair, leaning on the back as she uses her tail to slowly turn herself in circles.
And, both of them are in Aoloan’s private quarters in the Citadel.
Another woman’s voice, Treia, clears her throat. The feldrok empress perks up, turning to look at Treia first, who is sitting up from lounging on another chair. And, seated over Aoloan is Kera’tai, who appears to have been using healing magic on her.
“Wh-What’s… Is everything alright?” asks Aoloan.
Hekate starts, “Before worrying about us, how are you?”
Aoloan relaxes a little, but she’s undeniably disappointed in herself. She knows, now, that she was used by Thymeria to betray the others. There were times that she wasn’t under the Uhl’tall’s influence at all, and times when only Aoloan’s memories were distorted. But, ultimately, she wasn’t able to notice or resist until it was far, far too late.
“I… The last thing I solidly remember was the curse activating, and… a rather dark discussion. But… My curse was on my left hand, wasn’t it?”
Hekate looks to the more mature women, and Kera’tai answers gently, where Doephluev and Treia might have been a little too blunt. “Vaergraes was worried that you wouldn’t be able to endure with such an injury, so…”
“She used awesome magic!” replies Hekate brightly. “It was really weird, too, but it switched your injuries! I don’t really get how it worked, because it doesn’t make sense, but she really did it.”
Aoloan can only stare in horror at the excited feldrok. Hekate is genuinely impressed by the complex magic Archpriestess used. It’s a very old spell that requires a lot of mana to use, and it can only be used between caster and the target, meaning that a person hoping to heal someone else MUST trade their own health for it. In this case, Vaergraes swapped injuries because she can endure the worse condition, but even having both wounds would likely have proven too much for her.
Aoloan’s eyes water a bit, and she whimpers, “Why would she… do that? F-For me?”
All four of the other women present soften their expressions. Treia replies with a softness mixed tastefully with her usually blunt way of speaking, “You’re our friend, so while I can’t speak for her, I don’t think it’s that complex. And, thankfully, it works out.”
“W-Works out?” repeats the succubus.
“Daniel has gone missing thanks to the teleporter and some magic distortion,” replies Doephluev. “The tracking magic on his armor is being interfered with, and we only have a general direction thanks to Arachne being able to be summoned to Daniel’s location.”
“But, we will need to search a large area,” replies Treia. “So, we’re hoping to get help.”
“I-If… If no one else among our group can find Daniel, I don’t know what I can do. I’m not that proficient at any sort of tracking magic. In fact…” She looks to Kera’tai. “Wouldn’t that be more in line with the Chi’rinnis? Or what about Baeka?”
The chieftain’s daughter nods, replying honestly, “For short range, it would be easy, but if we need to cross the ocean waters… We’re thinking we need more power.”
“Which is where you do come in,” replies Hekate.
The succubus understandably cocks her head in confusion, and the feldrok Empress continues her explanation. “We’ve got one more walking superweapon in our midst, but she’s still asleep. And… She might try to murder all of us.”
“Yaulwembor…” The name comes out of Aoloan’s mouth automatically, while surprise and horror grip her expression. “Y-You want to release Yaulwembor?”
“Shhh!” hisses Hekate. “Xyreko has agreed to cooperate, since she is afraid Daniel will try to do it himself, and will be at risk of being harmed if she does react unpredictably. Buuuut…”
“We want you to invade her dreams, and take us with you if you can, so we can try to convince her to help.”
“C-C-Convince…!? Isn’t she…? Even if she somewhat understands… I mean, drakes…”
Treia is the one to speak up this time. “I know I was pretty much useless in that fight, but something struck me as odd while I was watching her fight everyone else. She was able to mirror magic spells effortlessly, but she was smart enough to recognize Daniel’s rifle as the thing that defeated her. Even so, she lowered her guard for him when he tried to communicate that he wanted to help her have children. I don’t think she’s truly an animal. Not like a drake.”
“There’s almost no information on Faormyrs anywhere,” adds Doephluev. “Even why they’re almost extinct is unknown. But, like Treia said, Yaulwembor was capable of obliterating the entire area along with all of us, but she tried to restrain herself as much as we were. All of it seemed too calculated for a defensive or territorial animal.”
“If… that’s true, why… attack?”
Kera’tai clears her throat, avoiding eye contact. She replies quietly, “The more I reflect on how Yaulwembor behaved from everyone’s accounts, including Sir Helbeit and Sir Resken, the more I think… It was a very poorly conceived courting ritual…”
Aoloan is confused at first, but then it sinks in. The Chi’rinnis have normal relationships in most situations, but they also do have a cultural expectation that if they are defeated in battle and survive that they give themselves to the man who defeated them, with the intent of including strong bloodlines into their own. This expectation is most heavily placed upon the chieftain’s daughter, and Kera’tai was the first and fastest to try to claim Daniel after Fort Peony.
If Aoloan understands what she’s implying, it’s that Yaulwembor was gauging the males around her for strength, which is why she didn’t kill Magnir, Resken, and Helbeit, since they would have been perfectly edible, or because they invaded her territory. Instead, she attacked Neith, but only let her guard down for the one who truly defeated her…
…and, who specifically spared her.
“Wh-What am I supposed to do? I-I-If contract magic won’t work on her…”
“I believe contract magic is a stop-gap at best,” replies Hekate. “Instead, I want to convince her to help us. If we go in through her dreams, we’ll be able to talk to her, and hopefully, she’ll be able to communicate, even if she can’t speak.”
“I would do it myself,” adds Doephluev. “But, I’m going to need to impersonate Daniel to get her to at least talk to us. To do that will require all of my focus while in the dream to make sure I fool her. And, I’m not confident it’ll work.”
“Wh-What if she wakes up?”
“Xyreko will be ready with heavily armed golems,” replies Hekate. “I would rather have to revive her than leave her sit collecting dust in void magic.”
“Our other hope is that she’ll be able to track Daniel by smell,” adds Treia. “And, she’ll be able to take us to him. She’s also powerful enough that the Strylak should leave us alone, if it really is looming over the ocean where we’re going.”
Aoloan is quiet for a moment. It sounds like a crazy idea, but Hekate is right. She is useless if they don’t convince her to help, since she’s strong enough to resist contract magic even after it’s applied. And, because she probably doesn’t even have a ‘true name’, it’s very possible the contract magic will be very weak.
But, if she does become loyal to the Fievegal, it’ll be one more very powerful ally they can rely on, whether or not she’s an ‘animal’ or a person the way dragons are.
“I-I guess it can’t hurt to at least talk to her…” replies Aoloan. “I-In her dream, of course.”
The others grin. Their clandestine mission is a go.
***