Seasons of Heroes: A D&D-inspired Adventure!

[The Laurent]

3:1

Lotte had wanted peace and quiet. Her previous two adventures, and the past few weeks, had been traumatic, exhausting, and though she didn't wish to be greedy, rather unprofitable. She hadn't ventured forth to gain a fortune and retire in a year, but the stories had always had their adventurers turn out better than when they'd started. Usually, at least.

Lotte was heartsick and exhausted, and she didn't want to kill again, not yet. Not while she still dreamed of it.

At least she got peace.

Lotte took on a few simple merchant escort jobs, and not once during them was there any attack. She wasn't even going long distance, instead escorting town by town, job by job. It wasn't glorious work, but it gave her coin, and she kept that coin close to her, despite all of the attempts of the world at large.

She thought that there were heretics who didn't believe in anything at all who would still be ashamed to act the way some of the people she met did towards adventurers. If she sat down at a bar, the tavern keeper doubled the price of the drinks because she was an adventurer, and surely that meant she had a dragon's treasure-hoard hidden away and a deep desire to burn through it. So you learned to notice two things, first what taverns generally charged, and then what you heard them charge others. Lotte would then stride forward, put the proper amount of coin down, and if the tavern keeper tried to lie about the prices, she'd just stare at him until she either got bored and left, taking her coin with her, or he learned some manners.

It was a frustrating process, and of course there were a thousand snares for an adventurer. She resisted the temptation to buy new clothes. Some of that temptation was rather weak, such as when a merchant had pointed out that for formal presentations in the future, if she ever guarded nobility, a dress might be useful. It hadn't been hard to convince herself not to waste that money. It was harder to keep from spending a little extra for the nicer meals at the taverns. It was harder not to be taken in by promises of arrows made with a wood somehow superior to those she already had. Surely the adventurer--the blacksmith had said--would like some armor, or a better knife than the cheap whittling one she'd had to purchase?

She did, but she also knew she was too poor to afford any of that. So instead she saved her coin, carefully building up her emergency funds. If they grew large enough, she could take them to a city, and go into a bank. She knew of banks, in a vague way, that they took the coin adventurers had and then sent word to other banks so that they could withdraw their earnings later. They figured in some of the newer stories, in which peasant heroes won fortunes by their bravery and stored them in banks for their family after their tragic and heroic deaths. Certainly, it was better than carrying all of their wealth with them.

She was thinking a lot about money, especially since she was around so much of it. None of the merchants were all that rich, or they'd have hired more than just a few ex town-guards and Lotte, but by the standards of the village Lotte had come from, each was exceptional. She did nothing more than scouting ahead at times, sitting in a cart with her bow at her knees at other points. It wasn't hard, but she was good at it, had a keen eye for danger, and the closest she'd gotten to a conflict had been when she'd spotted a rained out path up ahead and had advised going around the hill, even if it was the long way around.

What all of that travel time had given her was a chance to train her aim. She hadn't ever consistently practiced her shots the way she did in the weeks after the Ingeld-Guilliam affair, as she thought of it. She needed not only to hit her target, but hit her target well every single time. Obviously, in a fight the target would be moving and she'd have no time to aim, but it began with a steady arm and a calm heart.

She also had a chance to see more varieties of birds than she'd known had existed. It was relaxing, to train, to scout nearby forests, to fall into the rhythm of a life lived not by farmyard chores, but by her duties. She'd continued south until she'd reached the Vaspel Mountains, and then gone west from there, looping around, eventually, to perhaps return home in a few months, or a year, to give her family some of what she'd earned.

She did want to one day visit one of the Sepult mountains, to see their cities, and she wanted to see crowded, bustling cities in general. She wanted to gaze upon the ocean, and imagine what lay beyond. She wanted so badly to see the world, but she also knew that she had years to see it, and that even more than that, she wasn't ready for it. There were not strong Kingdoms and weak ones, but there were also familiar and unfamiliar ones. If she was injured, if she died, she could probably trust someone to bring the word back to her family around this region.

Beyond that?

She'd have to hope.

So she walked through the woods, enjoyed the breeze, and the sights and sounds, kept away from the gambling and the hard drinking and the prostitution, and found herself remarkably happy. Every so often she'd go have a beer or two with some of the workers and guards of the relatively small merchant caravans, but she'd never feel more than a little light-headed, and despite their flirty behavior, she'd just wave them off.

She felt at one with her body, and yet a little detached, and not even the onrushing coming of her monthlies could dampen her good mood. She didn't strain her body any more than usual, but everything felt a little better. Other than the unfortunate merchant who suggested the dress, quite politely, few people paid attention to her sex as opposed to her status as a hunter, archer, and guide willing to work for cheap enough and do well enough.

She slept well, though she had strange dreams she could almost remember, and she ate better than she had in some time, since she also hunted for the merchant parties, to help fill out their diets. The caravans were small, a few carts at most, and so it wasn't hard to feed everyone well.

Of course, she knows that many of the nobles are jealous of their hunting grounds, but it hadn't been a problem for her. She'd just acted as the merchants had said she could, and left the laws for people fancier than she was.

She learned plenty, of course. One of the merchants was a thin, straw-haired woman who seemed to divide up her goods the way a good butcher divided up a deer. Lotte, who had seen many of them work before, liked to take on the task herself, despite her lack of expertise in some of the particulars. But one started with the loins, the choicest parts, and made sure to use everything, saving the brains for just the right moment, since they, along with other parts, could make for delicate eating. You also wanted to get everything, because even the gristle could be ground up and given to dogs, and so could the bones of the deer. You wasted nothing, but you did not throw tenderloin before swines. It was just common sense.

Similarly, Merri had all the right goods for all the right places. She didn't sell wool in the high hill villages where sheep roamed, and she didn't sell metal goods down in the valleys where the blacksmiths had no trouble providing for everyone. Instead she set aside the choicest delicacies, like the brains of a deer, for those most inclined to appreciate them. Lotte watched her dicker with a noble for nearly an hour about an old Sepult magical artifact, which did very little but was a symbol of power and wealth. Meanwhile she passed off to the poor families cloth to make their clothes, and to everyone little treats, bits and bobs of candy, honey, and other things not easily gotten.

And to most everyone? What they needed, always what they needed, until at last there was nothing left to her caravans but quite a few coins, and goods to trade further down the line. By the time Lotte parted with her, she had made a fortune that it would take Lotte years to match unless she became famous.

It impressed Lotte, for all that she could never have done anything like it. Even the bones would be sold off eventually, and Merri had asked if she wanted to keep on going south, down to the cities there. She was going to sell off the carts, and everything else, and find a blushing husband to marry her that she might--she hoped, eyes shining with something between avarice and lust--start a sort of mercantile dynasty, over time.

Lotte had left anyways, and continued her slow, careful circuit. Perhaps in some other life what had happened didn't. Perhaps she continued around and around until she stumbled into danger and faced it or died.

There were a lot of things that might have happened. But they didn't. Instead, she had weeks of relative peace, comparative prosperity, and occasional bad dreams.

Now, things didn't go wrong. Actually, what changed the trend was her time in a small town called Mares' Hollow, where her good luck had finally gotten stuck in the mud. The merchant was frustrated, the wagon had tipped over trying to dig it out, and now they were in no position to continue hiring an adventurer as a guard.

This left Lotte to drink in the small not-quite-tavern. The ale-wif lived in the back of it, and it was really just a place to drink. There was nothing much to recommend it, but the ale (not beer) was cheap, and Lotte had drunk two glasses of it. The woman didn't seem to have a head for cheating Lotte, and so she stood and downed the second ale, slowly at first, and then quicker as she felt the liquid courage pool in her stomach. She looked around at the rowdy group of men and women, and for the first time in weeks allowed her eyes to roam.

She wasn't going to do anything about it, but she felt as light as if she were about to start dancing, and she wanted to sing but didn't know what to sing… maybe she should get a third drink?

But her eyes roamed over bared calves and strong chins, short-haired women and long-haired men, bodies in motion, bodies sweating, bodies pressed together. She spent so long looking that she instantly noticed when new people entered the already overcrowded room.

The room itself had a dirt floor, and boots trod over straw. Three sets of boots, one soft-soled shoe. The person in the lead was a woman who looked like she was a noble. Everyone stopped to look at her, to look at the dashing cut of her cloak and the silken nature of her hose, all of the cuts remarkably masculine, her dark hair just long enough to look glossy, her face thin and sharp.

Shoving past her was a short, muscular looking blond man dressed like an adventurer from a story, in leathers and with a ragged cloak. Behind them came two people who were unmistakably adventurers, a thin elf just behind the noble-looking woman, and a short woman still in mail, helm under her arm.

"Can we find Lotte the… Lanky, was it, here?" the elf asked, peering around as if someone was just going to jump up. "We wish to talk with this bold adventurer."

"No, we wish to talk with the bold adventurer, Lotte, first," the blond man said. "We entered this alehouse first."

"This… fine establishment doesn't matter," the noble looking woman argued. "What matters was that I got to town first, and thus it is my honor to speak with her first."

If they had come in and demanded Lotte's head for some unpunished poaching violation Lotte hadn't known she'd made, Lotte would have been less surprised. The...honor? What honor was that? She certainly felt like perhaps she should have had her bow along, or not have drank down a little too much ale. Lotte stepped forward, "I'm Lotte."

"Are you?" the elf asked, leaning closer. "Prove it."

"How?" Lotte asked, a little baffled.

"She does seem to have a noble countenance. In fact, she looks quite handsome," the noble woman said, looking her up and down.

"I don't know, but she does seem like the song described," the man, clearly her rival in some respect, said. "But I suppose if she truly wants to demonstrate her prowess for us… it'd be good for her business, eh?"

"You wish to hire me?" Lotte asked.

"Exactly," the noble woman said, stepping forward. "I am Naja von Siebert, gentlewoman scholar and explorer of ancient ruins."

"I am Karle, actual scholar and explorer," he said, with a tight smile, his voice as rough as stone. "This is an adventurer I hired, the honorable warrior Pippa."

By now they had a very large audience. Everyone was watching and listening, and Lotte, nervously suggested, "We should talk outside."

******

"What is this about?" Lotte asked, staring at the group of them. It wasn't night yet, and they weren't that far from the small house she was staying at, where her bow was kept.

"We heard your song! Well, not yours, but you were in it. You are Lotte, aren't you?" Naja asked. "'Lotte the lanky, kind and humble/ skilled hunter of the forest?' friends with 'Clemencia the Sepult, ancestor-famed/ clever and wise advisor and warrior' and comrades with 'Oscar, the virtuous Knight/ Who fought with holy skill?' and 'Guilliam the cunning, sly-tongued troubadour/ Who became one with Ingeld'?"

Lotte stared, and then stared some more. "...Yes? What is…"

"You have a song," Karle repeated. "About an event a few weeks ago. It's spreading quite far and wide, in light of all that has happened."

Lotte didn't know what that was, in fact she'd almost gone out of her way not to hear gossip, and to keep ahead of rumors. "What happened?"

"The family has been slain, except for one of their daughters, seventeen winters of age, who has fled. She is being hunted, the last of them. Or so I've heard," Naja said. "My brother--"

"Is a fool and has always been a fool," Karle said.

Oh. So this hatred between them was personal, if they knew each other that well and felt as they did.

"But they've found proof, or so the word was, that the family was as Ingeld claimed!" Naja said. "Back to business, I discovered--"

"I did, Naja, I did," Karle insisted.

"I was the one to open the book first," Naja said.

"I read the page first," Karle said. "She's a dilettante, who simply wants to mimic my profession."

"And he's a crude thinker," Naja said, with a disappointed shake of her head. "It's often been so."

"Sir, ma'am, I am…" Lotte hesitated. "I am not here to… to be a judge in your disagreements. I am sorry to be so rude as to say so, L-lady Siebert, goodman Karle. But--"

"Right, yes," Karle said. "Whichever one of us named Karle that was the first to find it, both of us know about a Sepult ruin that is in a forest--"

"Your forest!"

"No, it is nearby, but it is not the same one," Karle said. "The ruin must be opened by a sacrifice of hunted animals, and you know the region, at least in a general sense."

"If I'm being honest, as Karle isn't," Naja von Siebert conceded, "Your fame is also a factor, since we wish for this discovery to be known far and wide. Well, I wish it, and so does he, being who he is. But you can only select one of us!"

"Oh. You cannot work together?" Lotte asked, eyes wide.

"Never!" Karle said. "You should pick me."

"I'll give you this," Naja insisted, taking out a…

Lotte stared. It was not a huge coin, but it didn't have to be, because it was gold, and had what looked like a regal looking woman and scribbles on one side, and a dove on the other. "It is a coronation coin from Louisa VI, Queen of Galincia and it is worth plenty to you, or anyone at all."

"I'll match its value in white Pfins," Karle said, though he looked pained. "I'll also give you ten percent of any treasure we fine."

"I'll give you this one coin, and then another gold coin, though not of the same provenance!" Naja insisted. "I'm a noble, I can always win bidding wars, and you should choose to work with me. I cannot go without two guides, and--"

"Let the woman make her choice," Karle said.

"But, I'd be so helpless out there without her," Naja said, and her eyes were wide in a way that made Lotte blush.

"Oh, by the Gods," Karle muttered, looking at Naja incredulously. "You're really going to do this?"

"Do what?"

"Listen, Lotte. I think that my expedition will have the most chance of success. And I understand where you're coming from, you were born a peasant like I was, I know what kinds of expectations and hopes you might be having, and--"

"And by the Gods, what is this?" Naja asked. "You know that my father loved your father, and raised you as if you were his son."

"As if, she says," Karle said, with a sneer. "Another word for 'like'. If she gave you a coin that was 'like' gold, would it be so?"

"Uh, no," Lotte said, playing along.

Rather more gently he said, "No, and even the greatest alchemist couldn't make it into gold. I was never her father's son, Naja. Claiming I was is nonsense."

"Uhm," Lotte began.

"You're scaring the hunter who is, I remind you, a bizarrely young eighteen year old human, if she is truly who she says she is," the elf said. "She should have time to consider this, rather than be scared away by your arguments."

"I need to pray on the matter," Lotte said. "But I shall have an answer soon."

"Oh, of course," Karle said, quietly. "Take what time you need."

As sweet as honey, Naja echoed his sentiments.

Lotte left to walk, and think, and pray.

Who does Lotte go with/work for?

[ ] Karle.
[ ] Naja von Siebert
[ ] Both They refuse.
[ ] Neither Lotte would do a lot more for a single golden coin than this.

******

A/N: And so begins the third adventure!

 

[The Laurent]

3:2

Lotte thought about it. She prayed about it. She also considered both of them. Karle seemed brusque, and arrogant, but then so did Naja. Lotte knew better than to assume as to which of them was more competent, and Karle had seemed sturdy enough, in his way. Lotte didn't know whether to trust her gut or think through it properly, and so her prayers were cut short, and she decided that Naja was perhaps the right choice.

At the very least, she offered more… though the fact that she didn't offer any of the actual goods of the Sepult ruins could mean that Lotte was going to be cheated out of a fortune.

Karle seemed more honest in some ways, but eventually she emerged, bow in hand, and walked over to where the others are waiting.

"I… believe I shall be going with Naja von Siebert. I am sorry, Karle," Lotte said. "It isn't a personal judgement."

It truly wasn't, since Naja honestly terrified Lotte more, since she was a noble and quite likely to expect far more of Lotte than she could reasonably give.

Karle tensed, and for a moment it seemed as if he would yell. There were lines in his face, like cracks in a building. But then he sighed, long and slow, his breath a draft through those very cracks. "Very well, then, Naja, do you need my books on the matter?"

"I--yes, but why would you, of all people--" Naja began.

"I hate you. You're selfish, you stole my discovery involving the Ephert Ruins, and put your name on it--"

"They never would have accepted it, without my--"

"I do not care," Karle said. "You are vain, and you make yourself like my sister when it's convenient for you, and separate yourself out from me when it's not. But if you fail, it will be because you have died. You're too stubborn to turn back. I do not like you. At all." His voice was soft. "But I do not want you to die, nor do I want this hero, Lotte, or your mercenary. I will simply explore some ruins in the area, see if I can't figure out more than what others have before. I wish, if you found yourself over your head, you'd run like a sensible person."

"I am quite sensible," Naja said, firmly. "You've just never believed in me."

"No, I really haven't," Karle admitted, which seemed to surprise Naja for some reason. "But maybe I'm wrong. Even if I'm not, I hope you stumble your way to glory. It's better than the alternative."

Naja stomped her feet. "You… you're so infuriating."

"It was nice to meet you, Lotte. Good luck dealing with Naja, perhaps I'll get to hire you next time."

"As if! I'm not going to lose to you, Karle, not now and not ever," Naja declared, standing with her hands on her hips.

"Well, are you going to come?" Karle asked. "To pick up the books?"

"Oh, right! Uh, Aisling, could you talk to Lotte, make sure she understands what's going on?"

"If you insisted, then yes," Aisling said curtly.

"Then, uh, I insist," Naja said, sounding as if she were trying to draw up her courage and conviction like water from a well, one turn at a time. It was odd, considering how bizarrely confident Naja had seemed.

"Very well," Aisling said.

Naja hurried off, leaving Lotte with the elf woman, tall and lean, but with a puckered scar on her neck, and a few pox-marks on an otherwise smooth cheek. Aisling had eyes the brown of autumn leaves, and red hair. She quirked an eyebrow, her pointed ears twitching, and said, "So, this is the great hero."

"I didn't make the song," Lotte protested.

"No, you didn't. And you were not the only hero of it. It was a very fair song, if everyone did about the same amount of work," Aisling said. Her voice was rich and honeyed, but with an accent that Lotte couldn't place to save her life, except to assume it must be the Elvish accent. "I have been on parties. This is never so."

"Guilliam did the most," Lotte said.

"Ah, yes," Aisling said.

"But, we all fought in the final battle." Lotte didn't know what she was trying to say, but from the way Aisling was looking at her, neither did the elf. "Nothing I did was unique. I was just… part of a group who happened to be there when something important came."

"Well, you are humble. Don't tell Naja that. She probably won't believe you, but if she does then you'll be talking yourself out of quite a payday."

"I understand," Lotte said. She knew that there was something to selling yourself, though she had no idea how anyone did it. She'd just stated her qualifications and taken any offer that seemed reasonable enough. But she probably didn't fully understand. But Lotte knew she wasn't all that smart, and knew that sometimes all speaking up did was reveal that. She was going to be working for a learned scholar. Karle had insulted her intelligence, but Lotte suspected that this was by the standards of a scholar, and that Naja was rather more literate than Lotte was.

"Your job is to scout ahead, to guard Naja's life to whatever extent you can, and to be the hunter to provide the necessary sacrifices for opening the… site," Aisling said. "Am I being clear?"

Lotte didn't think she was, because why would any of that need to be… "Yes, you are."

"Nothing else is required of you, though it may be that it is asked. You can choose to do so, or not. It's pleasant if you wish to, but I do not wish to make assumptions."

"Make assumptions?" Lotte asked.

"I do not know how you humans do it, at least humans who aren't close by. You have the look of, how shall we say, a "man-eater" in my culture, and--"

"Um," Lotte said, her face almost as red as Aisling's hair, now.

"And I have embarrassed you. Humans are a wee bit silly about these things. But an Elf with such muscles would be assumed to love that which is like a man, and… I see you are not only not following, but that you haven't even picked up the trail."

"I--" Lotte began.

"I am sorry that now I am yet another person scaring you off," Aisling said, and she sounded almost gentle. "I do not know why Naja chose you, when I could hunt perfectly well, but it is not your fault that she is such a glorious fool."

"Glorious?"

"Glorious and quite beautiful," Aisling said. "Foolishness like that, it is said, is beloved by the Fae, and has its own shine to it."

"I, er. Is it good to be foolish when one is a scholar?" Lotte questioned.

"She is not dumb, that is not always the same thing as being a fool, or foolish," Aisling said. "I've known many unlettered peasants wiser than the sorts of scions I have served."

"Oh," Lotte said, shifting a little uncertainly. "What else do I need to know?"

There were people watching, in truth. It was late in the day, and men and women streamed around them on their way to this or that drinking hole, or just to socialize with their nearest neighbors. But Lotte didn't notice them, not compared to the tension of watching Aisling.

Two gold coins. She wouldn't have seen that kind of wealth, not all at once, at any point in her life. Her parents did well, but all that they had left over, by and large, bought the niceties they desired and the animals and labor they needed. Adventurers, it was said, wore their wealth on their backs; farmers spread their wealth on their crops.

"You need to know your choices, and your chances. We'll be traveling for days, and so if we don't get along it's going to be miserable for all of us, Naja especially," Aisling explained. "You also need to show off your skills. You should follow me, down to the tree line."

Lotte nodded, and kept close behind her as they moved. This village didn't have a forest, barely had a woods, just a clump of trees, really, though there were still the sounds of birds around.

"Do I begin?"

"No. Naja will want to watch as well, though perhaps for different reasons than I," Aisling said.

Lotte began to stretch and limber herself out, wanting to be strong and sure. She was still a little tipsy, and a part of her would have appreciated another drink, at least for the warmth. It was not a cool night, but she still felt chilled by the thought that if she did badly enough she'd lose a chance to make her fortune.

"Or perhaps the reasons are not so different," Aisling admitted, her voice as dry as dust.

Lotte looked up from her stretching, and for a long, blissful moment didn't understand what Aisling meant.

Then she realized. Oh. Oh no. Lotte thought about the eyes that had been on her when she'd dragged back the animals, the way girls (and some boys) would stare at her, and for a moment she was at once a little excited and sick to her stomach.

But she couldn't let that stop her. She was… it should be fine, eyes on her like that.

Lotte continued stretching and preparing anyways, and then paced, glad that she was moving in a straight line. She wasn't that drunk, but she'd seen drunks wobbling about like an overfilled cart.

Finally, in the distance, there was Naja, carrying what looked to be a book in a leather bag, no doubt for protection. The book itself was large enough that it perhaps could double as a makeshift weapon, being both thick and tall.

"Hey, I didn't miss the test, did I?" Naja asked.

"Yes, you did," Aisling said, in a voice as sober as the town drunk the day after the bender.

"I… I did?" Naja asked, looking at Lotte with wide, hopeless eyes.

"Well… perhaps not all of it," Aisling said.

"Wait a second," Naja began, snapping her fingers and straightening up. "You're mocking me."

"I might be, ma'am," Aisling said. "I wonder, it is as if I sometimes don't even know my own mind." Her ears were twitching rather more than Lotte had ever seen ears twitch.

"Don't know your own--"

"Why, I am but a simple guard, and how was I to know you would wish to see me test Lotte's skill with a bow? You never did seem interested in archery, when I was telling you about my mothers."

Naja was looking as if she was about to collapse, "Please, not in front of Lotte."

This was flirtation, and Lotte almost didn't want to stand for it, because she wasn't sure whether that much blushing would… unbalance her humours or something. Surely it couldn't be healthy. So it was in the interest of her health that she blurted out, "Archery?"

Then Lotte realized how inane a single word was and said, "I was, er, supposed to show off my archery."

"Hmm, very well then, first, taking as much time as you'd like, hit the top third of that tree," Aisling said. "If you don't mind." She was pointing to a tree close enough that Lotte could just throw the arrow and probably hit it.

Lotte drew and aimed as fast as she could, in the span of a few heartbeats, and loosed the arrow. It hit dead center in that top portion.

"One to the left, bottom third."

Another hit, and Lotte began to limber up, shifting and moving as she hit the middle of a tree, one of its branches, and then a tree all the way almost out of sight, all in a reasonably short period.

Lotte wasn't challenged, not particularly, even as the targets were marched, shot by shot, further away from her sight, until she was squinting at trees in the distance.

She only started missing shots when Aisling started demanding she hit branches she couldn't even see, at least not with her human eyes, and even then she still hit the tree, if not exactly.

Halfway through the test, as Aisling's voice began to grow quieter, Lotte began to sweat, and Aisling changed her demands.

"Run to that tree you just hit,and then hit the tree right next to where you are!"

Lotte, who was running low on arrows, complied, sprinting as fast as she could to the tree and then turning, aiming, and firing. It still took a little longer than she'd like, but she was starting to enjoy it in an odd way.

Lotte liked being given tasks, especially if she could manage most of them.

Finally, it was getting late, even in the long days that middle-spring brought with it, and Lotte said, "We should stop. I need to retrieve more arrows." She'd had to grab a few as it was, on the way to some of the destinations she'd been made to loose from.

Aisling nodded, looking as satisfied as a cat, but Naja was staring at her in a way that was familiar.

She'd seen it before, among village boys and girls, but it felt different this time. It wasn't quite as unwelcome as it usually was. Lotte had kissed someone in the meantime, for the first time, and surely that meant something. But it was more than that. Besides the desire, the hunger, there was also a sort of admiration.

Lotte realized that Naja would be happy to be able to do what Lotte could, and yet it didn't extend to envy, and it certainly didn't stop at admiration, the way peasants who trained for the local levies looked at her and wished they could shoot even better than her.

Lotte still didn't like the warm feeling in her stomach, the coiled desire like a snake rearing up, hissing at her and warning her off, but she wasn't able to back up when Naja stepped closer to her, her bright-blue eyes almost shining as she reached out a delicate, noble hand and drew up Lotte's arm.

She'd worn short sleeves, and she was sweating rather more than she thought smelled anything like nice, but Naja just stared at her for a moment…

Lotte realized she was being given a chance to back away from whatever was coming, but she shrugged, and Naja lowered her head to, briefly, kiss Lotte's arm right on the tired muscles. Her lips felt so soft, as if they were almost not there. It was a brief kiss, lasting a single heartbeat (too long and too short, her heart like a runaway horse). Then Naja drew herself back and said, "Exquisite. I will be safe in those arms of yours." Naja winked, "Your archery, I mean, of course."

Only then did Lotte take a step back, "Er." It felt right and wrong at once. She thought of love, she thought of how what she wanted most was to one day marry someone she loved and live in conj… con...marital bliss with them, being chaste and proper within--

But that's not what this felt like, not at all. Lotte was at once attracted and repelled, like those lodestones Lotte had heard of, but whose workings she didn't know the why or the how of.

"Do not worry, she would never go further than another girl would agree upon," Aisling said.

This, somehow, soured everything a little. Lotte didn't know why, perhaps it was the idea of getting something because she was a girl?

"Oh, come now," Naja said. "I'd appreciate a man with such… skills equally well."

This, bizarrely, made Lotte feel better. Lotte said, "Are we staying in the village?"

"Ah, yes, I have been graciously offered a place at the house of the local worthy, a peasant of high status who also serves as a go-between for merchants," Naja said. "You shall have to share a room with me, but I hope it is something we can both enjoy."

******

Lotte had never been in a house as luxurious as this one. It had a wooden floor, and two stories, and with it two rooms, one for the Master and Mistress of the house, and another for their five children, who shared two beds in a room that Naja complained was small, but Lotte found instead comfy. It smelled constantly of wood smoke, and incense used to sweeten the air against foul illnesses. Lotte had to step over a cloth doll and an adorable hobby-horse with a white painted head and a purple mane, out of some fantasia.

Lotte sat on one of the beds, not sure how the three of them would divide up the space.

"You should know what we're dealing with, shouldn't you?" Naja asked, having changed into a night shirt and a pair of old looking, but no doubt comfortable, breeches. "What do you know of Sepult ruins?" She pulled out the book, and laid it down right next to Lotte, as Aisling hummed a tune to herself, seemingly paying the discussion little mind.

"They're… magic. They appear and disappear, like… like fairies do?" Lotte guessed.

"Fairies, disappear?" Aisling asked. "Well, I suppose so."

"Ah, well, there's a definition of Sepult ruins in here. Can you read?" Naja asked, opening the book and flipping through it.

"Not… well enough," Lotte admitted.

Naja nodded, looking thoughtful. "My father was a great explorer, and that is why I shall be great as well. It is in the blood. He once made a comparison that I think might help. A Sepult ruin is like a serf."

Lotte listened, and as she listened she considered whether she'd made the right choice. She was more confused than offended, but there was offense, too.

"When you come calling for the labor they owe, they are nowhere to be seen, but when you generously lay out a feast, there they appear."

Aisling was looking at Naja as if she were considering hitting her.

Lotte, meanwhile, did the best she could do and merely frowned. "I don't quite understand."

"Right, so, you have to do the right rituals to get a Sepult ruin to appear, just like you have… to…" Naja trailed off, looking Lotte up and down as if only just now realizing that Lotte was a peasant.

Aisling was making a low groan, he face in her hands. Naja just ploughed on, stubbornly. "Either way, Sepult ruins are, er, hidden everywhere. The Sepult were brilliant about being able to make material, stone and iron and weapons, that defied all reason. They could fold space until you might have to stand at a particular place at midnight to enter a palace a mile long. And others in the past have gained use of their skills."

"So most of them are lost?" Lotte asked, trying to grip onto something that made sense.

"Actually, most are found, and most found are already occupied, either by Sepult or others who stumbled upon a tomb, or a palace, and made their lives there," Naja said. "But some are not, and each one offers the chance at impossible wealth. We shall be exploring the Palace Of Stone Bars, as the ancient language described it. It is some days travel away, and when we reach the spot, there is a ritual you must help me with. Before that, you will be responsible for… all sorts of things."

"Hunting, and keeping watch," Lotte said.

Naja pouted, "Well, yes, but if you wanted… you know the nights are cold, and more than two would fit in my bed."

Lotte considered it. Desire tightened its grip around her, but something about it felt wrong, and she didn't know what she would have to do, or how it'd go. She pictured Naja laughing at her clumsiness, and when she tried to picture, having only vague knowledge, Naja touching her down there--

It made her feel a little sick.

"N-no thank you. Thank you for your kind offer, my Lady, but--"

"Please, don't speak like that. It makes me feel like a monster," Naja said, pouting rather extravagantly. "I will not pressure you, and I am grateful for what you're going to be doing."

Gently, she reached a hand out to touch Lotte's cheek.

Lotte let her.

"We should sleep, for tomorrow will be a long day of hard riding."

Lotte, who could not ride, knew that this would be a problem. But it would be a problem for later, not now.

So she slipped into the bed, and eventually, after much tossing and turning, into sleep.

Towards Naja and Aisling, Lotte:

[] Is distant and Professional. This is just a job, and she has roles to do and tasks to take part in, and that's that.
[] Tries to be distant and professional but fails miserably. It's hard to be unfriendly, especially in the face of Aisling's wit and Naja's strange, attracted tenderness.
[] Is friendly and personable. They are strange people, but not, she feels, bad people, and she can get along with them.
[] Tries, very awkwardly, to flirt. She's not all that good at it, but she's at least trying, for all that she was like a dog chasing a cart.

Along the way, several interesting events happen, including (Choose 2)

[] There's an embarrassing moment with a bear that could have been a lot less embarrassing and more painful if Lotte wasn't there.
[] Aisling tries to teach Lotte Elvish, and Naja tries to teach Lotte Sepult. Neither really succeeds in doing much more than confusing the hunter.
[] They find a wild fruit-bearing tree, and relax with a little eating. Naja wears an apple for a hat.
[] Lotte's second sleep is interrupted by sounds she'd prefer not to hear from Naja and Aisling, but she has the last laugh… sort of.
[] They very briefly run across an adventuring party on another mission, and both sides awkwardly try to hide their task from the other.

******

A/N: This was pretty fun to write, honestly.

 

[The Laurent]

3:3

Lotte was quite aware that Naja was not perhaps the model of pious humility. In fact, there were things about her that Lotte would go so far as to call distinctly immoral, and others that anyone could see were annoying. Aisling, meanwhile, seemed more amused than anything both by Naja's behavior and by Lotte herself.

But as they ate up the ground, and she struggled to ride on a horse that was no doubt worth more than she was, she couldn't help but like them. Aisling was graceful, and kind in this odd, dry way, like a shelter before a storm. Naja was the storm herself, yet there was something very attractive about someone attracted to you, and something… fancy about Naja. Her style of dressing, like a man's and yet certainly not, fascinated Lotte. She herself already dressed in very practical sorts of ways, but Naja von Siebert dressed how she did for that most impractical of reasons: she liked it that way.

Lotte liked that. So, as Naja teased her about how sore she was at riding a horse, she felt something like fondness for her. The oddest thing is that it didn't feel like something that could become love. There was attraction, a desire to run her fingers through Naja's short hair, and kiss those thin, aristocratic lips, but it wasn't tied to anything stronger than fond regard. Lotte had never… she'd never been the type of person who'd kiss someone unless she truly meant it.

The only problem, truly, with their journey along the roads was the horse. It didn't seem to like her, and Lotte did her best to like him in turn, but in truth she failed. He was an ornery creature, made more for knights in battle than to carry rangers on patrol. She left it behind every time she wished to scout ahead, and luckily enough, Naja was willing to slow down for those moments, and Aisling willing to hold her steed.

Stories spoke of the man on horseback, but they never spoke of saddle sores, or having to stop each night to bathe in a river if there was one, trying to be gentle and kind to her body, which for all its usual strength seemed unable to stand up to days in the saddle. It was humiliating, and Naja's concern, the way she pressed ointments and soaps upon Lotte, didn't help. Lotte didn't know what she wanted to do with Naja, but it made her sick, to think of Naja, knowing that she was that weak. It made her feel fleshy, in the worst way possible, and she was drawing so close to her monthlies. A day, or maybe two, more. Her stomach churned and at moments threatened to empty itself where she sat upon the swaying, strange beast.

Her nights were haunted, or at least she had dreams she didn't remember, but which left her in a cold sweat.

And, yet.

Naja didn't seem to begrudge her her weaknesses, and Aisling respected her efforts. Luckily, there were no bandits waiting on the roads as they wound their way northwards. Lotte would have had to do something about them.

As it was, Lotte enjoyed the weather, which seemed to drag on in perfect balance. The few times clouds gathered for it to rain, it was behind them, or ahead of them, and they could either press on faster or not and still remain unsoaked.

Amidst all of that, of course, more happened than a simple journey.

******

"Your village, what was it like?" Naja asked on the first day, humming to herself, in a fine mood.

"Small, isolated. Valweld was at the last link of the chain," Lotte explained, deciding to tell the truth. It wasn't as if even the most polite lies would make Naja think it was anything other than a doghole. "But the forest was beautiful, and my family… I know that we are not nobles, but my family was not poor, by the standards of peasants."

"Ah, middling farmers?" Aisling asked, knowingly.

"Yes. They occasionally hired out in busy moments, but they mostly dealt with their own labor, and sent around animals as studs," Lotte said.

"Ah," Naja said, sounding as if she were stepping into a pool of water only to realize it was deeper than expected. "Well, were you popular?"

"My mother was a pious adventurer with skill in priestly arms, though she was not a priest, and my father the son of a very diligent peasant close to the village headman," Lotte said. "I did what I could to help the village, hunting and lending a hand."

"And… did you have any sweethearts?" Naja asked, as casually as a cat sidling up to a mouse. Which was to say, far less subtly than she thought she was being.

"You really don't have to answer," Aisling said, from a little bit up ahead on the road.

Lotte waited for a long moment, glancing down at her stallion, who at least was paying none of this any mind. "The daughter of the village headman, Hildegard often looked at me the way a starving man would a stray cattle, and it made me feel uncomfortably like… like so."

"Oh," Naja said, and then by some miracle realized, "Oh. I'm, I'm very sorry, I didn't mean to, I… you're a brave adventurer, and there wasn't meant to be pressure--"

"It is okay," Lotte said, though this was only partially true. "There was also Arndt. He went out to be an adventurer, and returned with a wound in his stomach. He blamed me, perhaps with cause, for not having been there to fight alongside him."

Sometimes she wished she'd kissed him when he was sixteen, and they were both far brighter people, less burdened by duties and pain. Instead he'd become someone different.

"Ah," Naja said. "First loves… they do so struggle. I loved a maid, and a noble boy of a nearby family, and both of those came to ruin and wreck." She smirked, "So I content myself not with love but with pleasure and affection. It has stood me in good stead."

"I still wish for more," Lotte said.

"It is admirable that you do, I suppose," Naja said, though she sounded disappointed. "What do you imagine?"

"Marriage, and perhaps kids one day."

"To a man, then?" Aisling asked, proving she had been listening the whole time.

"Not necessarily. I could adopt, as my parents adopted me."

"Adopted?" Naja asked. "Do you know from who?"

"No, I was left on a doorstep," Lotte admitted. "But as a suckling babe, and so none questioned that we were family."

"The milk of the mother is stronger than blood," Naja muttered, repeating the saying quite common in the Central Lands. Of course, Lote was surprised to hear a noble say it, since so many of them quite unnaturally had nursemaids, but the meaning was still clear.

Lineage was far more than simply from whose body birthed you.

"Yes," Lotte said, nodding. "So I suppose I was nursed on adventure."

"Ahh," Naja said, shaking her head, looking very thoughtful. "The offer stands, Lotte."

"The offer?" Lotte asked.

"I know that as a highly educated and beautiful noble, I intimidate you, but--"

Aisling snorted.

"Quiet, you," Naja said, pouting in a rather silly way, eyes bulging a little bit with her glare. "I meant, that's not how I, you know."

Lotte didn't, not really, but she had the vaguest idea of what Naja might meant. It was enough to make her blush. But it also made her a little sick to her stomach, to imagine, whether like a noble or not, Naja looking over her hideous body, soon to enter into her monthlies and, what?

Recoiling, perhaps, in horror.

Or worse, not recoiling, because she thinks it looks fine, which besides meaning Naja had no taste, meant that there might be something wrong with Lotte.

Best for everyone if it didn't get that far, or--

(Lotte pressed down visions of kissing Naja, doing anything to keep herself and her body out of it.)

"You don't, do you? Well, if you ever do know, the offer's there."

Lotte smiled, "I really am… grateful for your offer." It was a lie, it wasn't a lie. The trees nearby were beautiful, there was birdsong fluttering its way through the air, and if she could truly believe them she'd be grateful for the implication of her words.

But she couldn't.

******

"So, do you want to learn Sepult?" Naja asked. "You really should. I'm a skilled teacher, if I do say so myself, and it would benefit you."

They were at a table at an inn, on the first night of their journey. Lotte would have been fine camping out, but Naja had loudly refused that idea.

"Alright."

"Well, then, let's start with something simple. There's a few basic words, and then I should talk to you about how to conjugate verbs, and the past, present, and future tenses and how to--"

Lotte didn't know what conjugation was, but she had a feeling it hurt.

"So, Hello is Avita, and when you're saying hello to a good friend it's Avitahara! To, as in, 'going to the ruins' is Eta, but went to is Veta, and--"

Lotte opened her mouth to ask questions, but Naja kept on going, spewing knowledge as if she were sick with it and needed to get it out or die.

The words flowed on.

******

She woke on the second day to the start of her monthlies, and had to squirm out of her bed. She hadn't used rags out of…

She didn't know. (She did know - denial. As if she could just pretend it wouldn't happen and that'd solve anything.)

Either way, she had to pull off the sheets, and affix the rags, and do it all while tearing up a little. It wasn't that her mood swung much, because to swing implies to move back and forth. No, Lotte's mood plummeted, and only recovered when it was all past. She moved carefully, the pains in her stomach and lower back constant, and adding to the pain of the saddle sores. She felt swollen, and her chest was so tender that, when she dressed some time later, she had to be careful not to brush against her… chest. Because her chest was tender.

If the other two noticed her odd behavior, they didn't ask, and Lotte was glad of that. She hated it, and she hated that it shouldn't be so bad. Monthlies, after all, were proof that she was becoming a woman, growing up. Her mother had gone to another town, and come back with apples to bake into a pie, to celebrate the day.

How could she tell her mother she didn't like it? She hated the feeling of not being in control, she'd trained her body to do many things, but she couldn't train it not to bleed. But how selfish a viewpoint was that, and how arrogant? Neither body nor soul was in the control of a person, that was to fate, chance, and the Gods. Her monthlies were inconsistent, with her exercise and her life, sometimes skipping months. Many women had it far worse than her.

She talked to herself a lot, when she was having her monthlies, explaining to herself how silly she was, how impious her arrogant desire for command of her body was, and it never seemed to solve anything.

She just had to endure it, as she endured so many things. She didn't complain, then, she saddled up and if she was smiling a little less, if she nodded a little vaguely at the jokes being told, they didn't seem to react.

(Lotte's arrogance, she knew, began with how rarely she got sick. She could only remember one time, when she was fourteen, just two months after her first monthly. She'd never gotten sick before, and then all at once it had hit.

She'd groaned and writhed, sweating until every sheet was soaked, lost in some strange daydream. She didn't remember the details, and when she tried they'd shift, like muddy ground, beneath her feet. She was fighting someone, she was talking to… something? A flash of scarlet, a little bit of blood on the ground, a hand reaching out, making a fist, to come crashing down, a flutter of wings, but also a rabbit the color of the sky. None of it made sense, and the images didn't just appear. No, they came with smells, of vomit and flowers, of dead, rotting bodies and the perfume of nobles, of sweat and the feeling of coarse hair beneath her fingers.

The taste of ashes.

The sound of a breaking dream.

Her parents had crowded around her, had panicked, had been afraid, and she babbled nonsense, until at last five days later all at once the fever broke, long after the priests had come, frowning, to declare that there was nothing they could do, that she was in the hands' of the Gods now.

If she was, then they let her go, let her drop to the earth, and groan, and stir. They let her drop down and rise up, changed. Once she knew she could die, once she'd been faced with it, the world seemed less terrifying, as if she had faced enough. She grew stronger and bolder, working harder to make up for the wrack and waste of her body, and she pushed herself further and faster, until at sixteen she felt ready.

But she wasn't, she was still in the grips of the fever, in her parents' fears for her life, of their memories of those lonely, hopeless nights.

She'd always liked the idea that she could control her body, discipline it, but afterwards it'd seemed even more important.

She wondered, sometimes, whether she should have been more scared of her fever than she was.)

No, they continued onwards, and it was only at midday that Aisling slowed down her mount, this big brown mare, and asked, "Do you need any of my medicine?"

"Medicine?"

"For… womanly cramps," Aisling said.

Lotte had not known such herbal medication existed, or at least she'd never quite brought herself to ask about it.

She nodded, and while the green powder wasn't the end of her monthlies, or even her pain, it did help just a little.

******

"So, do you wanna learn Elvish?" Aisling asked, looking around at another clear blue sky. They were stopped in a clearing. "It will take her a while."

Naja was off dealing with personal business, which was to say finding a bush. "It will?"

"Oh, be sure of it. We have quite a few minutes, if you'd like to know how to get by when you meet someone who doesn't speak her tongue."

Lotte hesitated, thinking of the hundreds of rules Naja just expected her to know already, after a few sessions, and the… perhaps twenty words she'd actually been introduced to, none of which she could currently remember. "I… suppose."

"Well, alright, so. Help is Cabru, while Greetings is Beanacti, please is Le Do Thi, and food is Bi, so Greetings Food Please would be Beanacti Le-Do Thi-Bi," she said, very slowly, sounding out each of the words.

"What about tenses?" Lotte asked.

"Why'd I teach you tenses? This is about communicating. If you're in the situation, then being able to say anything at all matters more than saying nothing correctly," Aisling said, with an annoyed twist of her ears. "So, as I was saying, Water is uisco, and piss is the same. So if you had to go pee, it'd be Pas Uisco, while wanting water would be Uisco Le Do Thi."

Lotte blinked a little, but nodded, trying to commit the words to her memory. Aisling's ears were twitching now in something that felt like it might be excitement, as if she'd longed to teach someone words from her people. This seemed more practical than Naja's efforts, but Lotte could barely remember half the words even a minute later, and the phrases confused her as Aisling had her repeat them back… they both stopped the moment Naja came into view, as if they were both doing something shameful.

*****

On the fourth day, they reached the forest south of her 'home forest.' It looked so similar, truly, since it eventually met up with it after a short gap, but an even more isolated village, right in the middle, through a thin route. The trees were gratifyingly green, and there was nothing of the tension that the trip through the Red Forest had brought. No, she could enjoy the breeze against her skin, and try to relax despite her body's discomforts. As they stepped deeper into the forest, they'd had to dismount and lead the animals.

Lotte guided all of them ahead, stopping every so often to scout ahead, her movements light and careful. She hadn't strung her bow before she entered the forest, but now that she was here, she was going to be ready for anything.

On her way there, she came across a tree so large and ancient she stopped the whole party to step closer and ran her hands along its length. It stretched up to the very edge of the canopy, drinking in all the sunlight it could get. She stared for a long moment, wondering what its story was. It was unlike any of the other trees, its body seeming to spiral together, its form vast compared to the thinner trees around it.

Someone had planted this. "What is it? Is this a secret tree? This isn't where we're supposed to do the ritual, but what if it's--"

"It's a tree," Lotte said, quietly, looking up at it.

"And what's so special about that?"

"Everything," Aisling said. "This is a tree to memorialize something. I can tell it," Aisling.

"But what?" Naja demanded, pouting, and looking around at the two of them.

"I don't know, but I know the species. We call them the Memento Trees, which can survive everywhere. Anything, almost. There's no magic to them… except where there is, but in a forest like this, it was not a Fae that planted it." Aisling hesitated for a moment and said, "Probably."

"But it was an elf, then?" Naja asked.

"Possibly. I suppose we cannot know," Aisling admitted. "But what we can know, or what Lotte can know, is what comes next."

"I need you to kill five squirrels, four blackbirds, three deer, two fox, a wolf, and we also need a Mocker's feather. And magic cannot be used to acquire any of them," Naja said.

"A Mocker?" Lotte asked.

"It's this strange bird, made from magic itself. Black, like a raven, but with dozens of eyes, and when someone attacks it, bad luck follows them," Aisling said. "Some pulp up their eyes for brews that will give the drinker bad luck and make misfortune follow them."

"Really?" Lotte asked, looking from Aisling to Naja.

"Yes. It is a strange monster, though not as dangerous as it seems. The misfortune is only sometimes fatal, and it is said that these beings have a sense of humor, far preferring a stumble, or… someone like Naja being humiliated to actual death," Aisling explained.

"Someone like me?"

"Proud, arrogant, vain, beautiful. Watch out for dung heaps to be flung face-first into," Aisling said.

"I'll be fine. In fact, I should at least work to locate where a nest of theirs is," Naja said. "So that Lotte can get a feather. It doesn't have to involve killing them, and really we shouldn't. That's incredibly bad luck, and when they're dying they often…"

"They're cornered animals," Lotte said. "They bite and fight without any regards for what comes next." Which, Lotte thought, would be terrifying if it involved fate itself turning against someone.

"Well, yes," Naja said. "In the meantime, while I'm looking, you should use that horse to transport any bodies you find to, say, here? They need to be prepared before we move to the ritual site."

"If I had a sledge, I could drag the deer myself," Lotte said.

Naja swayed for a moment, and Lotte stepped forward. Was Naja ill? "Are you okay?!"

Naja looked at her with wide eyes.

"She was swooning," Aisling said. "Rather dramatically."

"She just admitted she can carry a deer. A deer!"

"On a sledge," Lotte added, though she could also carry it the normal way for shorter periods. Nobody seemed to be listening.

"I admit, it is very impressive, especially to Naja, who doesn't have the strength to lift more than a book," Aisling said, her ears flicking in obvious amusement.

"Hey," Naja said, a frown twisting on her lips. "That's rude."

"It's true, as well," Aisling said.

"Is not!"

"Well, then why don't you prove it, by--"

"Please, stop your flirting, you two," Lotte said. Then she realized what she said and her eyes widened, her face going as red as a robin's breast.

"Oh, wow, she recognized it," Aisling said, while Naja looked at her with stunned awe. "She's learning and growing even now."

"I suppose I am," Lotte said, her voice small and choked, "You flirt with each other all the time."

"And you have, quiet piously, ignored it until now," Aisling said, tilting her head thoughtfully. "Now you aren't. Would you be adverse to kisses? Really, I just ask, because you don't have to marry everyone you kiss."

Lotte looked away. "I'll think about it." She meant it, because she was attracted to both of them, and yet at the same time it felt cheap to go further, when she didn't intend to go all the way and wanted, eventually, matrimony of some type. She also didn't want to have to mention the monthlies, and how miserable and undesirable they made her feel. "So, the animals…"

"Well, gather them here, mighty hunter, and we'll move them to the ritual site by noon tomorrow, when the ritual has to be completed," Naja said, with a smile.

"I understand," Lotte said.

******

The hunting wasn't all that difficult, for all that it was dreadfully specific. The squirrel hunting was the worst, because she didn't have the right sort of bow. Squirrels were small, and she'd rarely bothered to hunt them, and so she'd brought the kind of bow you used to take down deer and larger animals.

Still, she persisted, putting the smaller animals in a bag she'd brought, and using her horse, ornery though it was, to drag the deer. It was hard, bloody work. By late afternoon, she had to stop to wash in a nearby stream, or else she feared her scent would knock Naja out. Naja, for her part, kept on checking on Lotte, curious as to her progress, but not speaking of her own search.

The sun was just starting to sink when Lotte returned to the tree, with the final fox. The wolf had seemed as if it would be a hard task, and in other circumstances it might have been, except she found a wounded wolf an hour into his search. Lotte didn't know what to think of that, and neither did she know how to feel after having killed so many animals without even eating them. It felt wasteful.

"I've found the Mocker," Naja said. "Well, a cluster of them, near this grove."

It was quite a walk, and by then it was starting to get late. They'd have to find everything soon, or else they'd be desperately searching come morning, or even waiting an extra day for the ritual. Considering the animals themselves, this would be a disaster, since they'd be rotting by then.

The grave was huge, and more open than it should be, as if a fire had cleared it out. The trees hung down over it, blocking out at least a little of the sky, and they seemed to droop and bend towards the center of the grove. In all that space, it took more than a few moments to see the Mocker. Then, alighting on a branch, was… quite the animal. It really did look like a raven, but all of its yellow eyes swiveled at once to look at Lotte. She felt as if she were under the glare of the summer sun. It stood there, looking at Lotte, and Lotte stood oddly transfixed, strangely afraid, as if it was peering deep into her soul.

"C'mon, go get it!" Naja demanded, with a stamp of her foot, her hands clenched into fists, passion in her eyes.

"How?" Lotte finally managed to ask. If she chased after that, what good would it--

"Fine, I'll do it," Naja said, walking over to the tree and starting to climb, slowly but surely. She was terrible at climbing, and kept on almost slipping. The Mocker just sat on the branch, apparently entirely unworried.

"Naja, are you sure--" Lotte began. This seemed like a terrible idea, and yet Naja was the employer, wasn't she? Lotte didn't want to be yelled at, or disliked. Not by Naja.

"Of course I am!"

There was buzzing, and then down came a beehive.

Naja shouted and tried to twist out of the way, but it smacked her in the head and broke, at least enough to leave a smear of honey across her now-mussed hair.

The bees buzzed angrily as she tumbled down a few feet and hit the ground, before rolling with a groan and beginning to stand up.

Lotte had already begun moving to help her when she saw the bear. It was a big, black bear, a female at Lotte's guess, and it sniffed the air as it headed over towards the hive.

"Ahhh! Oh no, I, don't--" Naja screamed, loud enough to set anyone on edge.

"Quiet," Lotte said. Her voice wasn't loud, but it was firmer than she was used to being, and Naja just stopped. "Do not move."

"Y-yes ma'am," Naja said, which were words that didn't quite feel right, but she didn't have time to think about it.

"The bear isn't after you." The bees might be, but it was best not to say that. "Now, stay still. Yes, the bees are…"

The bees were buzzing, but not attacking, because the hive had fallen some ways away, blown by the wind. The bear ambled past her, nuzzling at her hair, and then giving it a thoughtful lick before moving past Naja entirely.

"Now, walk over to me," Lotte said.

"I can't…" Naja whined, sounding almost like a child.

"I believe you can," Lotte said. "Do it for me."

Naja moved, slowly but surely, until she was standing, unsteadily, next to Lotte, clinging to her.

"You… you saved me," Naja said.

"You weren't in danger," Lotte said.

"Do you know how… how…" Naja stuttered over her words, blushing so hard that Lotte… realized what Naja meant.

"Really?" Lotte asked, startled. She didn't really think of herself as someone who could be that forceful, let alone apparently… attractively so. Nor did she know what to do with that information. It pooled in her belly, warm and strange, but…

She shook her head, and Naja must have picked up on her feelings.

"I'm sorry," Naja whined, and then gaped at the Mocker, which flew overhead. "Oh no…" Her shoulders sagged in resigned defeat, as the Mocker winged back around and… landed on Lotte's shoulder.

One of its feathers looked like it was almost falling out, and Lotte reached out, hesitantly, and plucked it. The Mocker cawed, relieved itself on her shoulder, and flew off.

"...what?" Naja asked, looking at her with something like bafflement.

"I suppose…" Lotte began, but in truth, she couldn't make sense of it. She could easily make sense of the bear ignoring Naja, because what would be the point, particularly? But… just how intelligent was the Mocker? "I suppose… we have our feather."

After Lotte got Naja back to the camp, Aisling laughed herself silly at the whole story. Naja pouted for the whole night. Lotte didn't tell her it was cute, even though it was.

That night, Lotte dreamed of the Mocker, but remembered nothing more than those many eyes, at the end of it.

******

The sun beat down upon them as Naja chanted, circling around and around the ritual site.

The wolf was in the center of the clearing, her throat slashed, her head staring up at the son, while a diamond of four blackbirds surrounded it, one above, one to the left, one just below, one to the right, with the foxes laid out, nose to nose, like a great bit comma just above the upper blackbird. Then, down at the bottom of the ritual site, a line of squirrels, stretching across the middle, their tails, bizarrely, cut off. Then finally a triangle of the deer, anchoring to the left and right of the squirrel line, and--

It all felt so clinical, when eventually she tried to describe it. But it wasn't. It was visceral and it felt wrong, and worst of all it stank. The carcacsses were starting to rot, and Naja stood there, feather in her cap, dancing around and around the bodies, chanting in some tongue that seemed vaguely like the Sepult she'd learned, but no more than that. Lotte watched, not sure how it was that any such ritual could do anything worthwhile.

Finally, the chanting slowed down, and when the last word of Naja's strange babble stopped, the world was transformed.

The trees seemed to groan and shift out of the way, and in the space of a single heartbeat, there it was. It was a vast castle of dark, molten looking stone, stretching almost to the edges of Lotte's sight, despite the fact that it was hundreds of feet from where she stood to the great, blood-red wooden gate, which was open just a crack. Above the parapets, there was a tower in the far distance, and before it a rising of stone that Lotte guessed might be the center of the castle itself. The castle stretched from east to west, and seemed to crackle with a strange power. Even the sky above seemed changed, darker as if it was nearing nightfall.

"Well," Aisling said. "You did it."

"I… I did," Naja said, her voice breathy, as an arrogant grin slowly stole over her face. "I really did it!"

Lotte was still gaping, still taking in the details of this strange building. How was this even possible? How could magic do so much? Suddenly what little she understood of history seemed transformed in the light of… this. Where else were such pockets, such places? What had she missed? It could take days to explore all of it, and Lotte knew that Naja wouldn't stop until she'd done so.

It was with entirely understandable foreboding that Lotte followed the two of them towards the great gate, and then into the strange forgotten (or was it?) Palace.

When exploring, where does Lotte position herself?

[] Nearby Naja, to both protect her and talk about what they're seeing.
[] Up ahead, in order to be about to scout and hear trouble coming, though it will make things awkward in a fight.
[] Behind. She is, after all, the archer, though this will leave her the last to see things, and a bit excluded in general.
[] Write-in.

Where do they go first?

[] The castle soon opens into a choice between a long east, and a long west wing. Each seems empty and barren, at least at first glance, but this makes up a large chunk of the whole palace. Choice: East.
[] The castle soon opens into a choice between a long east, and a long west wing. Each seems empty and barren, at least at first glance, but this makes up a large chunk of the whole palace. Choice: West.
[] There seems to be a way down towards the dungeon, and as unnerving as that seems, Naja suspects that there might be objects of value hidden down there, in the depths of the palace.
[] It takes time and effort, but there's clearly something waiting in the tower, and at the very least it'd give them a good view of the rest of the palace.
[] The center of the keep is, in these modern times at least, the heart of the castle. What is in there, and what might it tell them about the purpose of this palace?

*****

A/N: This was a long one, by the standards of Seasons. I hope it all works out.

 

[The Laurent]

3:4

"What do those mean, on the walls?" Lotte asked, having finally worked up the courage to ask after some time of walking. They had torches, and held them out, for the hall itself was remarkably dark, and without the spots for torches or candles that she might have expected, even if all of them had long since guttered. All the stories said that the ancient dungeons were untouched. On the walls were strange symbols, carved into the black stone, visible only when the light of the torches passed over them, and even then as a hollow more than anything else. The symbols were interesting, in a way, but made no sense to her. She wasn't smart, but even the smartest person in her village might have struggled.

"I have almost entirely no clue," Naja said. "And it gives me a headache to look at them."

"Why?"

"You can't feel it? When I look at them, it's as if there was a bear right there. The only thing I can make out is a rune or two, here and there, in something like old Sepult. 'Vigilance' or perhaps 'Vigilant' or perhaps 'Hero.'"

Lotte blinked at that last one, "What do you mean, hero?"

"Well, Sepult heroes weren't exactly approved of by those in power, once upon a time," Aisling said. "Also, the runes, they… shine."

"No, they don't," Naja said.

"Please, think. It glows like the blood of the Fae," Aisling said, though her voice was different, somewhere between reverent and terrified. "It calls to me, not because it is like the Fae, but because it is unlike them. It gutters, like a candle lacking strength. It is hollow, like the elves before the Fae, it… it also disgusts me, and I fear what I would do if it didn't."

As she'd talked, they'd been walking, taking the main passages. The words, though, seemed to echo in the halls. Lotte glanced at the runes, and saw nothing odd at all. "They seem normal to me."

"Could she be less sensitive to them?" Aisling asked. "Or… if we're thinking about it, less likely to grasp how wrong it is?"

"Oh, like she's not worldly enough for that?" Naja asked.

"Well, if I knew nothing about the Fae, I'd just say it gave me the creeps," Aisling said.

Lotte thought that could be it, and it was true that the palace itself unnerved her. There was nothing, truly, to see at that point.

In fact, that was some of why she worried so much.

"Maybe you're right," Lotte began. "Do we know where we're going?"

"The keep," Naja said. "The center. It's where anything important is going to be. I will have to find a way to draw those blasted sigils at some point, if we're doing research, but the first step is to find things that aren't tied down."

Aisling nodded at that. Of course, Lotte wasn't going to get a share of any treasure she found, but she understood the fact that such dungeon expeditions were as much about getting stuff as learning stuff. Naja wouldn't be satisfied if all she found were a few old gold pieces and a mystery, but a few gold pieces probably didn't hurt even her.

Lotte stuck close to Naja, occasionally even bumping into the other girl. Naja seemed to hover closer to Aisling, then Lotte, as if she couldn't quite stand to be alone. Lotte wondered at Naja's fear, but also how she sought comfort, and tried not to imagine holding her. Certainly, it was better than telling her off, because Naja also babbled. She talked about the weather ("I wonder if it will rain tonight? Do you think? Do you think it's even tonight in here, or whether there's weather in this pocket?"), sleep ("Are there any beds in this place? We will have to stay overnight, I suppose,") and even Lotte's past ("So, tell me more about village life. How was it? Was it homey and close and as if the whole village was a family like they say in the… I don't see how it's offensive, Aisling. Are you offended, Lotte?")

Unfortunately the emptiness of the palace was broken with blood. Lotte smelled it, faintly, and then the torch picked it out. On one of the walls, there was a bloody handprint, and beyond it blood smeared all over, seemingly at random.

"Fool," Aisling said.

"W-what?" Naja asked, turning to her.

"Look at where the blood is. Someone… someone tried to activate the runes, if that's what they are, with their own blood. But I could have told them, anyone could have, that it takes Sepult blood, or Fae blood, or the blood of the divine to… to…" Aisling shook her head, and suddenly looked ill. "I'm… remembering something I shouldn't?"

"What do you mean?" Lotte asked.

"I've been having these dreams, the whole way here. It's not worth talking about, I'm not a prophet, and I'm not a whiner. It's just the Fae playing tricks, or perhaps trying to help, in their way," Aisling said.

Unsurprisingly, this didn't sooth Naja much, who looked at Aisling with concern as they continued along. What good would it do to look at the blood, or speculate on where its owner's body was? Of course these ruins were dangerous. That's why Lotte was there, and so she steeled herself, waiting for an attack that never quite came, at least by the time they reached a large main room, which had long halls to the right or left. Lotte recognized it vaguely, from outside, as the wings. Then there were doors forward that would probably lead to kitchens, or servants quarters. Then there was a set of stairwells up to a balcony, the door flung open, but heavy enough to withstand quite a bit. The stairwell itself was rather plain, but the doorway had a rather striking arch, each of the stones above it a different color.

It stood out against the darkness of the rest of the stone.

"There," Naja said, and up the stairs they went. By the end of it, Naja was looking tired. "Hey, don't look at me like that. It's been a long, long walk."

It really hadn't, but Lotte wasn't going to say anything about it. There was more to watch for, as they stepped through the door. Beyond that, at last something was different from the endless dark stone and nothing. This stone at least was closer to grey, and there were occasional scraps that might have once been rugs on the ground. They found a few spilled coins outside of a room with a large iron padlock, which seemed to not have even begun rusting. They couldn't make it through that, at least at the moment, and so Naja had them move on, circling around and around. Some of the rooms might have been barracks, and they all seemed to circle around a central area, most of which was equally cleared out. They spent almost an hour, and found nothing more than a few white pfin laying around, which brought the question of where their owners were?

Lotte didn't know if she actually wanted answers, considering what those answers would probably be. Finally, though, they found a room that was only mostly ruined. Chairs were overturned, and the wooden, four-legged table lacked one of its legs, but hadn't quite collapsed. But most notably, there was a desk in the corner, though the drawers were torn out and scattered, and there was no paper or parchment on it. But near the fireplace, there was a torn apart book.

"Huh. This feels like an office," Naja said, walking over to the book and picking it up, before opening it.

"I hate that there's no windows in a Sepult castle except on the outside," Aisling said. "What does it say?"

"Two pages. One says, check the fireplace. The other says 'To whomever may read, or to myself, there are three gems. I do not know what my next move will be, because I fear it is a ask that I, no matter how powerful, would find impossible. But perhaps you could manage it.'" Naja stopped to frown, "I… hope so. It goes on…"

"'All but these few pages will go into the fire, that and a map I made, which should be nearby. If it is not, then… I am fearful too. If I leave, I would have to try again to return. I do not wish to quit. But if I stay, I will starve." Naja read it slowly, her eyes growing wider. "I… where could he be? It's almost to the end of the note."

"'I believe that the key is balance. The East and the West are two halves of what the Sepult viewed as a single harmonious whole. I can go down neither pathway, nor can any single being go down both, at least I believe so. They were narrow-minded fools, but the Sepult believed in balance. Each half of the three (or is it four) has a parallel. Imbalance leads to ruin, ash, and fire. Imbalance will kill--No more from lack of space. If I find something else to write on, I will conclude.'"

Naja turned the paper over, to show that the paper was dense with writing, but not in any language Lotte understood. It also seemed to be repeating, like some strange mantra. "Oh, come on," Naja said, pouting. "But, we learned something, didn't we? That wasn't so bad."

Lotte stared. "That was…"

"Annoying," Aisling said. "But, there might be something in the fireplace. Lotte, you wanna take a look?"

Lotte shrugged, and got down onto her knees and peered into the fireplace. Then she blinked in surprise. Near the back, beyond the ash piles that had once been the rest of the book, were three slots. She could just about put her pinkie into them, and in the center was what looked like a keyhole. "Oh," Lotte said. "It's some sort of test."

"Test?" Aisling asked.

"Like… in the stories, where you have to prove your wisdom or bravery before getting the treasure?"

"That's just in stories. Let me look, Lotte!" She shoved past Lotte, even though that meant they were in close quarters, their bodies warm against each other. "What? These are gem sockets, I've seen those before, in other ruins. And then a key, but… it doesn't look like it's a real keyhole. So, hidden gems? Or are we supposed to have brought our own?"

"I don't know, but I do know both of you shouldn't be down in the soot like that," Aisling said. "Get up both of you, and we can start looking."

"Looking?"

"Well, it's a big castle, and maybe we can find something."

"But we don't even know what this will do," Lotte said.

"Something fascinating. Something worth the trip," Naja said, quite firmly. "We're doing this."

It seemed that they were doing this.

Where to next? (Three Gems remaining, 1(?) Key(?) remaining)

[] West wing!
[] East Wing!
[] The Tower!
[] The Dungeon?!

******

A/N: Hey, it's short, but this is going to be an arc of short-ish updates. Depending on a number of factors, though. There are choices that can speed this up or slow it down.

 

[The Laurent]

3:5

The group made its way towards the tower. "After all, it's the highest place in the building, so it's probably the most important," Naja had reasoned.

Aisling had looked at her as if, perhaps, she was very simple indeed, but hadn't said anything. Lotte thought it made as much sense as anything else, and also thought that the point about two parts of a whole might apply to more than just East and West. It'd make sense, right? That's a thing that intelligent people did, make entire dungeons or castles that referenced some strange philosophical point.

Lotte, of course, would have just put the gems behind a big door with magic on it, if she really wanted people not to get to it. But maybe they did want people to find it, and it was just a test? If it was, then it was apparently a very good test. Lotte had never had a test she hadn't failed, of course, the priest frowning over her answers and dismissing her with a wave of his arm and a muttering about lack of promise.

The odd thing was the lack of spiders, and in fact anyone at all. They made their way around the center keep, and then towards where the stairwell to the tower should be, and saw no signs of life or even its memories. There were no skeletons lying around, at least not yet. There were no bloody handprints on the wall. There was nothing, just long stretches of winding, curving hallways.

Lotte almost wished there was something she could hear, or something she could do. It was like walking through a forest and hearing nothing: the absence was large, and honestly scary, it had its own presence, like that prickle on the back of your neck when you were being stalked by some foul monster. She'd never seen monsters, but she knew they existed, often far more dangerous than a Mocker.

Lotte was surprised the place wasn't crawling with monsters. Perhaps the ritual to get in was too specific? It wasn't something some random beast could manage on accident, even one as cunning as monsters always seemed to be in stories.

Finally, they reached a set of stairs, and began to walk up them. Lotte had to take point by then, because there wasn't room for all three of them to walk around. Naja followed up closely behind her, and Aisling took the rear.

"I admit, this is a little… more unnerving than I thought it'd be," Naja said.

"Of course it was. You've been in a ruin before, you said." Aisling sounded carefully blank.

"Well, I was telling the truth, but it was one of those picked over ruins, with nothing left in it," Naja confessed, quietly.

"Naja! Why, I wouldn't believe that you'd lied to me and exaggerated your skill just to convince me to work with you rather than your more experienced brother," Aisling said, voice dripping sarcasm so thickl that Lotte had to wince.

"He's not… yes, he has a little more experience, but he lacks my esprit! So buck up. We're almost…"

"There," Lotte said, as the stairs leveled out, into a room that had four pillars centered around what looked like a table with a book fixed to it. The room itself was circular, and Lotte stepped towards the book, glancing at the writing.

It was in Sepult, and so Lotte couldn't understand it. Or, at least she figured that the big, blocky letters were Sepult. There was also the fact that the desk itself was rather short, so that Naja had to bend down to read.

"All time flows each way, in a world without sense, where blood is green and the night is purple, and the Enemy watches our every step. First it was noon, then it was sunrise, then the last hours of Ghosts, and then back to the hour of the Beloved, before going forward three days hence. Finally, we consider the hour in which the coward takes his last breath, and the moment where the royal midnight is crowned," Naja read, slowly but surely. "Huh."

"What does literally any of that mean?" Aisling asked.

"I… think I have an idea, but let me look around." Lotte held a torch as Naja examined each of the pillars. "There's a green stripe on this one, a purple on this one, a black on that, and a white on that." She pointed from the 'top left' pillar, to the top right, then bottom left to right as she named the colors. "And look at the circle it's all in. It looks a little like an ancient Sepult invention."

"What invention?" Lotte asked.

"They had these clocks that began at midnight and ran for twelve hours, then twelve more hours, powered by… I'm not sure; there's magical and technical ideas behind it, but what mattered was--"

"Midnight? Why would the day begin at midnight?" Aisling demanded.

"I have no idea," Naja said. "But if this is a clock, and it looks a little like one, then they're giving us times to turn to, somehow." She looked around, and then walked over to the desk and looked under it. "Aha!"

She pressed something, and with a rumbling noise part of the wall opened up to reveal what looked like a wheel.

"Should I turn it?" Lotte asked, frowning. She'd already forgotten half of what Naja had read aloud, though she assumed that each was a different time.

"Not yet, I'd like to figure out what it does, and what the clues are. Blood is green, the night is purple, and the time isn't necessarily… linear. So it doesn't just go one way," Naja said, tapping her chin. First noon, then sunrise, then the 'last hour of ghosts', the 'hour of the beloved' and then… the same time but three days later? And then something about royalty and cowards? It could have to do with the purple, since it's a royal color? I'm not sure," Naja admitted, as she began to pace. "Noon is twelve, but when is sunrise? What hour?"

"What are hours?" Lotte asked. "How long are they?"

"I don't know either, Lotte," Aisling said.

"Well, if noon is twelve, then halfway between noon and midnight is sunrise, right?"

"Often less than halfway," Lotte pointed out. "It'd depend on whether it was summer, or winter, or somewhere in between."

"Well, I'm pretty sure that this test is probably just using an approximation," Naja said, with an annoyed sigh. "So noon. Then back to six, or maybe five. But what's the last hour of ghosts?"

"Well, what are ghosts?" Aisling asked.

"You've never heard of ghosts?" Naja asked.

"Of course I have. But people tell different stories."

"These are Sepult, so could it mean ancestors?"

"Not this early, that was… very recent. This whole palace seems like it was abandoned around the time of the Empire's collapse, or earlier," Naja said. "Still, you're right. Ancestors exist first and foremost in the minds of others because… oh. I get it."

"What?" Lotte asked, still not really following along.

"They're in brains because the skull is dark. Light drives them away. So the last hour of the ghost would be whatever hour comes before sunrise," Naja said, snapping her fingers and looking very pleased with herself. "But, hour of the beloved?"

"Marriage, perhaps?"

Lotte frowned and did nothing at all, just waited for them to figure it out. She had no idea whether there was some traditional time to marry that'd be the same as with the Sepult.

It is actually ten minutes of standing around before Naja finally concludes that it's sunset, whenever that is, because they marry then, and then spend the whole night together, as per old traditions she'd vaguely remembered in a book. But this didn't give them a time, not really.

"I think we should start," Aisling said. "If we get this wrong, there's probably a penalty, but we can't spend too long standing around. We should be able to figure out the first part."

"Alright, so, Lotte, you watch out for any attacks. Aisling, you turn the wheel, while I'll stand in the middle and tell you when to stop," Naja said, sounding authoritative.

Aisling walked over and pulled on the wheel, and then frowned. "Oh, this is actually… what if I keep watch for dangers, and Lotte turns the wheel."

"Is it that hard to turn?" Naja asked. "Sepult need to have been able to do it."

"Or maybe there was magic that made it easier and it wore off?" Aisling guessed, frowning. "Lotte, can you turn this?"

Lotte walked over, and tugged at it. It was heavy, and moved very slowly, but she could. Her muscles strained as she did so, then turned back. It seemed as if the central circle had moved, rather than the pillars, shifting around a fraction. "Yes."

"Alright, first, we start out… ah, there's the line. I need you to push it upwards until I say stop."

Lotte got down to it, and noticed something. Despite being a wheel, the spokes weren't actually attached. What was that about--

There was a click, as if something was settling into place.

"Stop! Now, down until I say stop."

"Stop!"

Lotte's arms were aching a little, but she did so as soon as she was told to. "Wait," Lotte said. "I need to try something."

"What? Okay, sure," Naja said. "As long as it doesn't mess everything up."

She turned at the spokes of the wheel, and heard a grinding sound as she pushed.

"Oh shit," Aisling said, and when Lotte looked back, the four pillars were now forming a sort of diamond, northwest, northeast, southwest, and southeast. "So, we've figured out what to do with the colors."

"I think we have," Naja said. "Now, next we need you to…"

Lotte kept on following the orders, even as her arms started to ache. She really could use a meal, since she'd broken her night's fast some hours ago. They were all walking, but now she was the one straining desperately as they went through it.

"Okay, when does a coward die?" Naja asked, a dozen or so minutes later. After each step, there was a click, and Naja waited a little while, trying to think it through no doubt.

Finally, Aisling said, "What about… if they only go in corners, and it's twelve degrees, then the only options are twelve, um, three? Six? Nine? And then times right in between them. Why would a coward die at nine? Or twelve? Or six?"

"But why three, if that's the option?" Naja asked.

"Three in the afternoon? I don't… know," Aisling admitted. "What if it's something about how a coward dies before the day is out? If marriage is at sunset, and ghosts disappear at sunrise, then maybe it's something about disrespect?" She shrugged her shoulders.

Neither of them were sweating, as Lotte was. Lotte leaned against the wall, glad that neither of them had noticed how tired she was, and how much her muscles ached. Yes, pity might have been nice, but she was useless except for providing her muscles. So, she was glad that they just kept on giving her orders.

The puzzle involving the colors involved moving both the pillars and the clock at the same time, so that they all added up. Cowards, apparently, were white with fear, so white and purple were needed, while green and black (the other two pillars) were just distractions. After the last movement, Lotte slumped as the wall opened up near her. It rumbled as it did, but she saw no mechanism for it. It was magic, of course. But she wished she understood more.

"Wow, that was hungry mind-work," Naja said, wiping her brow as if she'd been sweating. "Well, no time to be laying around, Aisling. You just watched."

Aisling shrugged and said, "So, onto the next floor?"

The 'good' news was that there was even less she could do on the next floor. It was this baffling test in which there were five rows of five pots, with colored or marked out lids, and a long set of instructions that said things like, 'When you've found the third red, its neighbor is poison, unless it is drank with the essence of water." Apparently the key was that you had to open certain pots in order, and if you didn't…

Halfway through, Naja made a mistake, and a greenish gas poured from the vase. Naja left back, but she did so while coughing, and Aisling dragged her over to a corner and made her throw up, rather violently, rather than letting anything stay in her after the gas had been there. It could have done something, but as it was, the gas eventually stopped pouring from the pot, and they were able to get a lid on it.

Lotte, meanwhile, wondered whether she should have volunteered to be the one who opened the pots. But Aisling took over for that, while Lotte stood near Naja. "Are you okay?"

"Yes. Yes, I'm fine. A leader must sacrifice for her expedition," Naja said.

"I could have opened it," Lotte protested.

"And then what? If it hurt someone, which of us is easier to carry, all things considered?" Naja asked with a raised eyebrow, as if Lotte had missed something obvious.

Eventually, they passed the test. Lotte took the lead again, as they climbed upwards until it felt as if the tower would never end. Finally, they found themselves in a room with moonlight. There was what looked to be a sort of shaft in the ceiling up above, about the size of a window, but angled slightly oddly. Where the moonlight hit, there was a wooden chair, upon which was a piece of paper. Just slightly off to the side of the moonlight was… something on a stand. It looked almost like the horn of some great beast, but it was made out of metal, and rested on a set of three legs that balanced the strange metal thing carefully.

Lotte stepped forward, towards the strange device, reaching for her bow as she did.

"Wait, let me read this note, first…" Naja said, picking it up. "It's in Central Lands script, actually. It says 'This challenge was difficult, but I ultimately prevailed. I decided to make it easy for those who come after by placing this invention, my Monocular, in this area. It is based on the principles of glass, and the virtues of bifocal lenses. With it, this challenge will involve about half as much bleeding from the eyes.' Bleeding from the eyes?! Are they joking? It goes on to say, 'Look through the monocular and look around at the sky.'"

"I am sure that it is no problem at all," Aisling said, with a shrug. "Isn't it usual to risk your life in such places? That said, you first, Naja."

"No, I believe that your elvish eyes would--"

"I'll do it," Lotte said. "I have sharp eyes too." She stepped forward, and the others backed up.

"Fine," Naja said. "But if you feel your eyes start to bleed, then please step away."

"I will," Lotte said, and she walked over and knelt so that she could line up one of her eyes with the 'horn' of the device, which seemed to end in a flat glass surface, like a window. She looked up from there, and saw the stars. They were strange, a little different than expected, and the night sky had a slight pinkish cast, as if someone had been bleeding a little bit in a large pool of water. She couldn't recognize the stars, but they did not seem to have any noticeable new pattern, nor was there anything else odd as she, after a bit of trial and error, figured out that she could move and swivel the "monocular" to look all around the sky.

She found very little, and finally admitted, "I'm not seeing anything, sorry. Maybe Aisling should try?" Lotte stepped away, reaching a hand out to feel at her eye.

She wasn't bleeding, at least.

"What are you seeing?" Naja asked.

"A purple-pink night sky, and stars that aren't the same as the ones I'm used to," Lotte said. "But nothing else."

"I will try it, then," Aisling said, stepping over and poking at the device. "Ah, there's a wheel here. I bet it adjusts the view, somehow. But first…"

She knelt down, put her right eye up to the glass, and gasped. "What," she muttered, and began fiddling with the device, panning it one way and the other. Her other eye was closed, but she seemed to stiffen, her ears pointed straight up and twitching as she shuddered. "What?" Then she began to mutter in Elvish, or some language Lotte didn't understand. Her whispers grew almost into shouts, and then she broke down sobbing.

Aisling pulled away, and crawled over towards the corner. She wasn't weeping blood, but she kept on muttering.

Naja and Lotte had each watched, shocked, unable quite to act. Naja ran over to her the moment she pulled away from the Monocular. "Aisling! What happened?"

Aisling responded in Elvish.

"What?" Naja asked. "Something tried to…"

Aisling responded, sounding rather angry, and then continued in Central Lands. "Thousands of eyes, with something blinking behind it. And the sky, it went from pink to red and began to bleed. But I saw something. A gem. A red gem. Or I thought I saw it. That's what we're after. I just… I was too afraid. I wasn't expecting it at all, after what Lotte told us."

"I didn't see any of that," Lotte protested.

"Right…" Aisling said, eyes narrowed. Then she turned and threw up on the ground, gasping and choking.

Naja stood up, some minutes of whispering later, and strode right over to the Monocular. She knelt, and began looking, using the wheel and turning it carefully. Even as her hands began to shake, she didn't make a sound, just kept on looking. Lotte watched her, her heart thudding, wondering whether Naja would be okay.

Finally, after what seemed an eternity, Naja held out her hand and plucked, seemingly from the air, a red gem about as long as a finger-nail, and roughly that size. She pulled back, blinking, turning over towards Aisling, who had finally sat up.

She was crying blood, and shaking, but she stalked forward. "Something is hunting us," Naja declared in a hollowed out voice, and then she fell to the ground and dry-heaved.

"What?" Lotte asked.

"I'm not sure. But I think that if we can open whatever is in that fireplace, it'll be the discovery of the decade," Naja said, rallying quickly, as if all that she'd apparently suffered, and even the still-dripping bloody tears--impossible and yet that's what they looked like--were just signs that things were going to go right.

"Right, yes," Aisling said. "You're bleeding from your eyes."

"It happens," Naja said breezily, though it felt like a thin cover over a lot of worry. "So, the Tower is… Mind, or Spirit. Does that mean the dungeon is body?"

"Could be," Aisling said. "Can you stand?"

"I… can. But Lotte, could you keep close to me, to make sure I don't fall?"

She didn't even sound like she was flirting. Lotte walked over to her and grabbed her by her shoulder, and the three of them headed down the stairs.

Behind them, the shadows flickered, as if something large had passed overhead in the moonlit room.

Where to next?

[] East Wing. It must be the opposite, and yet in some sort of paired dynamic, with the West Wing. But what?
[] West Wing. It must be the opposite, and yet in some sort of paired dynamic, with the East Wing. But what?
[] Dungeon. Perhaps this means body, perhaps this means flesh? If it's the opposite of the Tower… of course, none of them are necessarily in the best position if the challenges are physical.

******

A/N: And there we go!

 

[The Laurent]

3:6

They at least ate before they went down. Naja wiped her face with a cloth, and looked almost normal again. But neither of them seemed as if they'd escaped from whatever it was without marks being left. Not on their body, but on… their brains? Or something? Lotte wasn't an expert in anatomy, and didn't know whether souls could even be marked like that by something scary. Well, scary wasn't the word.

It was apparently worse than scary, though Lotte couldn't be sure what that felt like. She'd been afraid before, but she'd never been so terrified she was out of her senses, the way Aisling had been. There was a part of her, like a hunter prowling through the dark recesses of her head--which she imagined must be rather empty and dark anyways--that never panicked. She worried, she got carried away by rage, but she didn't gibber.

But she knew it was nothing to do with her, not really. Aisling could speak two languages, and was wry and clearly very intelligent, and so she doubted she had much of an advantage over the other woman.

So Lotte sat and watched the others, nibbling on the bread and dried meat they'd brought. It wasn't much, but she didn't want to eat too much if she was going to be running around as part of some sort of physical test.

Naja spoke again only after they'd eaten. "This is a lot, but I feel as if we are getting close to some real sort of discovery, something that will make our reputations. If we turn back now, we've gained nothing, and if the note is to be believed, we don't even get to keep the gem to try again with next time."

Aisling frowned. "But, we almost... "

She trailed off, not having the right words, and then finally after an awkward minute said, "Went mad."

"But we didn't," Naja said. "I'm sorry that I didn't go first."

"Why?" Aisling asked.

"Because I hate seeing you in pain more than--" Naja said. Then she blinked, looking like a cow that'd been felled by a blow, stunned and confused by her own words. "Too much. Besides, if you died, what sort of expedition leader would I be?"

"Then we should go back," Aisling said. "What do we gain? What is even being hidden that is worth that much. If you truly want to continue, why not leave and return with a dozen people?"

"What will that get any of us? A dozen ways, even a fortune would not be worth much, and any discovery--"

"What discovery? Do you really think there's anything here that the Sepult wanted getting out?"

Lotte cleared her throat. "I… feel as if after all we've risked, we might as well continue. But I know I'm not the one who was doing most of the work."

"Fine," Aisling said. "But if the next challenge almost kills us, then I told you so," Aisling said.

*******

They went for the dungeons, or at least tried to. It was a lot of walking to descend the towers and then they had to go down hall after hall looking for how to get down into the dungeons. Finally, after almost an hour, they looped around enough that they could see stairs downward.

Down at the bottom, the walls were a little wetter, and there were cells, to the left and right, each of them empty, with nothing in there worth seeing other than chains. Lotte felt a creeping sort of fear ebb and flow through her in a way she couldn't understand. It was as if she felt something close, and then far off. But the other two didn't seem troubled by it, and Lotte knew she had no room to complain.

They moved from cell to cell, looking around for the trial, and finding nothing… until they found what looked to be a hatch in the ground.

"Aha!" Naja said, tugging at it. Then she seemed to realize that the odds of her being able to actually lift it were low, though in her defense it did move upwards a little before she gave up. "Oh, um, Lotte?"

Lotte walked over and pulled it up with a heave, though by this point she suspected her arms would ache all night when or if they finally bedded down. There was a ladder down, and against all the centuries it must have been there… it seemed to be in perfectly good shape.

"I will go first," Aisling said. "Cover the hole, Lotte."

Lotte nodded, pulling her bow off her back, though not drawing the string back to prepare to loose, as Aisling went down into the darkness. It was two-dozen seconds later when they heard Aisling curse.

"By the blood of the fucking Fae! There's dead bodies down here. Or… are they dead? Someone bring a torch, I can't see that much, even with my eyes," Aisling said. Her voice seemed far less cool and in control than it had been earlier, and Lotte was the next down, while Naja held a torch out, to illuminate below.

When Lotte reached the bottom she saw that they were in a large room, longer than it was wide, and that there were indeed bodies laying, motionless, on the ground. But Lotte could not see any obvious wounds, and each of the people were mostly naked. Men and women were mixed indiscriminately, and a few were Elves or Sepult, there was one Orime, and, bizarrely, a dead Lamia.

Everyone, regardless of their sex or race, was equally intact and equally unmoving. Nearby there were weapons, and in one corner Lotte saw a vast pile of what looked like discarded clothing.

Naja was climbing down one-handed, gasping every so often as she looked on all that…

"I increasingly suspect that the Sepult never actually lived here, at least not in the way an ordinary castle's staff would," Aisling began, "Can you imagine anyone surviving when they have to solve a riddle to go to the toilet?"

Naja laughed at that, though it was a high-pitched, hysterical sort of laugh. "It does seem rather impractical."

"Yes," Lotte said. "Are they… dead?"

"They're not breathing, so yes. But their skin almost looks like it was carefully nurtured," Aisling said. "Like they were all Princelings, rather than, from the looks of some of them, rough mercenaries."

The Orime, especially, was a rather impressive sort of man, tall, broad-shouldered, and well-muscled. It was odd to see such a body sprawled out like some broken straw doll.

All three of the explorers huddled together, clearly not wanting to step forward. Lotte, finally, moved closer to one of the bodies and lightly kicked it in the leg. it didn't move at all.

"Lotte, be careful," Naja said.

Lotte said. "They're not moving. But whatever did that might get back. If it killed them without harming their body, was it some sort of miasma?"

"It could be," Naja said. "The effluence of these bodies, and the clothes in the corner, might be creating just the circumstances to spread disease."

"The… what?" Lotte asked.

"The smell. The miasma, like you said. Rotten ground breeds rotten illness," Aisling said. "Though, the bodies, they don't smell."

Lotte wasn't that stupid, she was not going to get close to smell them, not when they might have died of some poison or something that could effect her if they did.

"Huh," Naja said. "They look as if they'd be perfectly alive, if they only were breathing."

This was not a comforting thought, and Lotte grabbed an arrow, ready to aim and loose her shot at any moment.

They began to move forward, staying as far away from any of the bodies as they could. There were a dozen, just within the first part they could see, and beyond them the hall widened. Its walls were as square and polished as anywhere else, but the ground itself was bumpy at places. At the back of the room was a statue.

It looked like a woman with four arms, one wielding a knife, another outstretched to hold a flower, and one of the remaining hands over her mouth, while another rested in her lap, for the statue was cross-legged.

"Pillagers," a voice whispered, seeming to come from around them. "Pillagers without the nonclav. Sinners, in need of eternity."

"Who are you, and what do you want?" Naja von Siebert asked, her tone haughty and arrogant, nose almost up in the air. It almost hid the tremble of her body as she said it. "I am a noble explorer, no pillager at all."

"I am a bit of a piece of a goddess, and you shall soon be saved."

Lotte stared at one of the men, a thin, hairy man. He was slowly but surely standing up, though his eyes barely seemed to be looking at any of them as he stepped forward.

One by one, almost a dozen of the bodies got up, moving as if they were shaking off sleep. But other than that, there was nothing different. Except that they didn't speak, and except for one of them who reached down to grab a sword off the ground, they didn't dress or arm themselves.

Lotte's arrow struck him--it--in his chest, the arrow's wound half-hidden by the forest of hair. He pulled the arrow out, and began to bleed even more before collapsing.

Well. This wasn't going to be as hard as she thought. Aisling was keeping close to Naja, lashing out with her spear, which was enough to just barely keep the unarmed hordes away. Not all of the bodies had 'awoken' but even the ones that were there were enough to distract everyone.

So it wasn't Lotte's fault that she almost missed the man she shot standing up less than a minute later--after she'd gone through another four arrows, downing four more of the attackers--with not a wound on him. There was blood where he'd been hit, but the wound was entirely closed and he charged right at her.

Lotte shoved him back. For all that he was big, and a man, she had muscles too, tired and sore though they were, and he stumbled. Lotte wished she'd trained herself in fighting with her hands, as she glanced around at the arrows. One of them had been broken off, while the others could be reused, but eventually she'd run out of arrows long before she ran out of enemies if they wouldn't just go down.

"Why. Won't. They. Die?" Aisling asked, a cry from the heart.

"I shall heal them," the strange woman's voice said. "Again and again. I will protect this place from those who would defile it. Those who would--"

"Shut up," Naja said, as she recoiled from the Lamia hissing as she went towards them. The Orime and the Lamia seemed like the largest threats there, since Lotte had the feeling that that long tail wasn't for show. "We need to get to that statue!"

Lotte could easily see that this wasn't possible. The Lamia woman was silent as she blocked the way, and combined with all of the others, even a run for it would probably end badly. None of the bodies were slow, for all that only one of them wielded a weapon, rather than trying to pummel the three of them with their fists.

The Lamia leapt, and Lotte couldn't quite dodge out of the way in time as she toppled over, the tail wrapping around her, dark red in the dim light. It squeezed at her as the Lamia leaned in.

Lotte punched it (for it wasn't a person anymore, that much was clear) in the nose, and it recoiled, its broken nose already forcing itself back into shape as it did. Lotte drew a knife and stabbed at its bellow, right above where… where the rest of it was, below the belt. She wasn't exactly looking, it not being relevant since the beings were clearly unthinking and, in any meaningful sense, dead.

Of course, Lotte's thoughts were more: oh no, come on, come on, as she stabbed and slashed at the lamia until at last its grasp loosened and she could step away, grabbing her bow from the ground. She notched another arrow and hit the Lamia in chest. It was still healing, every wound going away, so she had to keep it up. She ran over and pulled the arrow out and drew another and fired it, the arrow plunging into the--

The truth was, the whole fight was gruesome work. Blood was everywhere, and Aisling was being pressed back. Naja was waving around her little sword as if she had no idea how to use it, and they were going to run out of room soon enough unless Lotte did something. But what could she do?

It was somewhere between frustrating and terrifying, having to keep putting down foes that would not die.

Lotte might have kept on doing it until she ran out of arrows, except Aisling shouted. "Look!"

One of the figures was down, a spear through through her, grotesquely torn apart… and she was healing slowly. Lotte could watch the strange process of the flesh starting to knit, but creepingly, inch by inch. Lotte tackled another one of the bodies and tried to force her way through. What if the statue was running out of power? But more of them were crowding around her, five or six just trying to drag her down. She hauled off, wincing at the feeling in her fist as she punched yet another one of them.

"Naja! You need to get to the statue," Aisling said. "We're too busy trying to fight these things."

Lotte was already tired, and had no idea how she was supposed to keep on fighting forever.

When she fell, and died, would she soon become just another body here? Just another tool for whatever strange being was--

"Not if I can help it," that woman's voice whispered, and as Naja began to run towards the statue, the other figures moved to get in her way. Lotte was running low on arrows, but she nocked another one and the arrow went into the stomach of a man right in Naja's way. As dark as the room was, the press of bodies made it hard to miss, even if it was hard to really aim.

Naja almost slipped on the blood, and the torch went skittering, falling into the blood which…

Which briefly lit on fire, as if there was a little bit of oil in the blood. It didn't last, but it burned, and the being thrashed as it tried to heal and escape. For a moment the way was clear, and Naja didn't slip again as she reached the statue and grabbed at its arms as if it were going to fall apart at the touch.

But something did happen. There was a brief flash, and suddenly all but four of the figures collapsed, healing of their wounds but not moving. The four were the human woman with the sword, the female Lamia, the male Orime and the male Sepult, beard down to his knees, who had been biting and clawing at anyone in reach.

"This is not over. I simply need to focus on a few pieces…" the statue said, its voice echoing, even as Naja held on for dear life and tried to budge or shift the statue. But it wasn't working. Aisling stabbed at the woman with the sword, while Lotte shifted out of reach of the Orime's arms, trying to draw and loose an arrow in a matter of moments. The shot didn't quite go wide, but it hit the Orime in the shoulder, and he didn't even bother taking it out as he pressed in closer.

It was luck that nobody had been badly injured yet, but it was luck that was unlikely to hold. "What kind of challenge is this?" Lotte asked, panting, as she was backed up against the walls.

"One meant for more than three people," Aisling snapped. Oddly none of the four fighters were headed towards Naja, as if they knew there was little she could do.

Lotte was down to her second to last arrow as one went into the Orime's chest. But he didn't go down this time, for all that his healing was still a little slower than it had been before.

"Stop this!" Lotte said, furious and confused. "Why do you abuse the dead like this?"

"It is their bodies, not their souls, there is nothing left, just my healing light to fill them and make them move," the statue hissed, as it began to tip slightly. Naja was straining as hard as she could to move it.

Lotte glanced at the creatures, the monsters, and ran towards Naja. There was no point in fighting them. She reached the statue and grabbed.

"What, what are you doing? That's not how you pass the test."

The statue began to glow, and the woman sounded increasingly desperate as Lotte tugged.

"You shouldn't, there's not, you're supposed to defeat them, not this, don't, please don't, I can't, if you, I--"

The statue was almost toppled over when it spoke, "You… you win."

The bodies fell to the ground, healing slowly and not getting up.

"I can't do it. How many times must I fail to protect this place, and this world, from things like you," the voice said, quiet and soft. But what startled Lotte was that the head of the statue had twisted to look right at her. "I've succeeded, and I've failed. All those times. If you all swear upon your lives to take the key and never return, this fight is over."

"What?" Naja asked.

"You will all die, or you will not, and there will be others. But if you destroy me, then I can save no other lives. I am an avatar, a piece of something greater."

Lotte was staring.

The hand over the statue's mouth moved, until a stony hand was presenting an old looking iron key. Lotte reached out.

"No, not you. This girl that is with you," the statue said.

Hand trembling, Naja grabbed the key.

"Please. Leave. Before I change my mind."

Lotte, arms aching even worse, grabbed a few arrows on her way out. But no more than that.

******

Lotte was sure that they'd turn back, after all of that. All of them were so tired they almost didn't feel sleepy. At least, Lotte was, and the others looked just the same.

Naja led them back to the central area, looking at the fireplace accusingly.

They stood there for a while, blank and tired, until at last Naja whispered, in a hoarse voice, "We can leave if you want, Aisling."

Aisling had been very quiet, frowning the whole way. "No. I feel as if there is something we've missed, and that if we don't do something we'll regret it for a long time. I'm… not convinced whether we should still go on, but I would like to sleep on it? And pray on it."

"Pray on it?" Lotte asked, liking the sound of that.

"Yes," Aisling said.

"We can do that. And sleep in shifts, to keep watch for an attack," Naja said.

Lotte slept poorly, and woke up sore, but better off for having had at least some rest. She'd prayed at night, but everything had felt a little far away, and she'd hesitated to call out to the Nachtmater, now that she'd met the Goddess in person. It felt as if it would be a mistake, though of course she didn't know why. But she trusted her instincts, and felt rotten for it. There was no sun that rose, so it was dark even by the time it'd been hours and hours.

The next 'morning', they all woke slowly, rubbing their eyes and moving as if they were still dreaming. Lotte ate mechanically, wishing she had a fire, or more to eat. Naja kept on muttering to herself, and took out a pack to continue to write. Aisling, meanwhile, was silent the entire time until at last she spoke. "Let's continue."

"Are you sure?" Naja asked, rubbing her eyes.

"No, not at all. But I'm not going to be any more sure than I am now."

And that was that, it seemed.

******

A/N: So, no vote this time. Might not update as fast this time.

 

[The Laurent]

3:7

They went to the east wing next. They were a dispirited bunch, still exhausted, with their supplies good for another week but their hearts and minds good for no more than another day or two of exploration at most.

Lotte knew that she should be panicking more than she was. But at the moment she was trying to focus on the task ahead of her. The light didn't change in this dark place, so it might not have even technically been morning. There were always stories about time moving as oddly as space when it came to Sepult ruins, though you could usually tell when it was. Or at least, there were fewer stories of people stepping into a ruin and stepping out decades later than Lotte might have feared. Usually it was a matter of hours flying a little too fast, or a day or two at most. Even the scariest stories were careful not to promise too much dread. Lotte had, of course, listened to every story of adventure she could.

She followed them through the arch to the east, and then felt something odd. It was a sort of pressure on her chest, as if a hand was trying to push her back. But she kept on walking, keeping close to the other two.

Nobody talked much, not in the shape they were in. They had their own thoughts, though Lotte's were more niggling worries. She wished she'd prayed more, but she had very little to sacrifice, and very little to ask that wouldn't be arrogant.

They reached another archway, and Aisling walked through first, and then Lotte stepped forward to go next.

But she saw blue shimmers in front of her as she tried to do so, like something out of a story, and when she tried to step through it was as if she'd run into a wall, the shimmering blue light holding her back.

"What?" Naja asked, incredulously.

"Can you break through?" Aisling asked.

Lotte pulled her arm back, and then thought better of it… and backed up to have a running start first.

"Whoa whoa whoa, dear Gods no!" Naja yelped, right as Lotte ran fist-first into the barrier, which didn't even budge.

Ow.

Ow ow ow.

"What did you think would happen?" Naja asked.

"Well, it was worth a shot," Aisling said, smirking.

"Aisling, did you think that'd happen?" Naja asked.

Aisling shrugged. "Well, it was magic."

"Maybe I should try it again?" Lotte suggested. Yes, her hand hurt quite a bit, but perhaps if she tried to shoulder past it?

"You… want to try running into a wall again?" Naja asked, staring at Lotte as if she were some rare but particularly ugly flower.

"Just once more, to see whether I can't make it through," Lotte said. "I am pretty strong."

"I refuse. I really, really refuse," Naja said, waving her hands, and then saying. "Let's see if I can make it through. Maybe it's one person only? Aisling, can you get back through?"

Aisling shrugged and walked through the archway without even a hint of the blue sparkling light. Then she walked back, equally untouched. Naja frowned and stepped through, and then looked back at Lotte.

"Oh, well. Maybe only two people can come? But then, wouldn't you have been able to go in? Maybe it has something to do with age? Or perhaps… do you think you'd be okay here?" Naja looked extremely dubious. "On your own? You know that there's something here, something after us, right?"

"I will be fine. I hope you two will be as well," Lotte said, not wanting to be a burden again.

"Please, stay safe," Naja said, her eyes wide.

"I'll try."

******

Despite that, Lotte was more worried about them. There was a feeling like she was being watched, but she saw nothing, not even any odd shadows. It was simply a long, boring wait. She couldn't allow herself to relax, or miss anything. As far as she knew, she didn't, and eventually, Aisling and Naja came through the archway again.

Naja was limping. "Hurt my foot in a trap," she muttered, when Lotte stepped forward. Aisling looked a little tired, and she smelled faintly of sweat as if there'd been running or fighting involved. But neither of them looked nearly as bad as Lotte had feared.

"What happened?"

"There was a maze, and there were traps in it," Aisling said. "Along the way there seemed to be plaques, and drawings, telling the stories of ancient heroes. Half of them were destroyed, but we saw one for the Sepult heroine Claudina, and another for Vespasia, and a few others whose names were defaced. Naja stopped to translate them."

"It was… important information," Naja said, continuing to limp forward. "And we got the blue jewel." She held out her hand, and in it was yet another small gem. They had three of them now, and Lotte hadn't been attacked. "Did anything happen?"

"No, it was quiet," Lotte said.

"You were bored?" Aisling asked.

Lotte said. "No, of course not."

"We'll try to bring a few more monsters for you to fight next time." Aisling waved her hand. "So that's one down. Who's willing to make a bet whether the west wing has a force-field too?"

"I'll bet you a white Pfin they don't," Naja said. "Yes, they're creating pairs, but how are they even supposed to divide us up. Could it be by age? Or species?"

Aisling pursed her lips, looking at Lotte as if trying to see into the depth of her soul. "I'm not sure."

*******

"Guess what you owe me?" Aisling asked, standing in front of a red barrier. "A blood barrier?" She reached out and touched it. Just like the other one, the sparkling light seemed to congregate where she was touching it.

"A White Pfin," Naja muttered to herself.

"What was that? I didn't hear you."

"I owe you a White Pfin," Naja said, with a sigh.

Lotte frowned. So, were none of them able to get through?

"Alright, now you try, Naja."

Naja stepped forward, and the process repeated.

Then Lotte stepped forward and… nothing. She walked straight through the archway. On the other side was a hallway ending in a door.

"Oh, well. Go on ahead, Lotte?" Naja looked nervous. "It just doesn't make sense. What's Lotte have that we don't? What do we have that Lotte doesn't?" Naja's hands rubbed together, as if she were trying to light a fire.

"I have no clue," Aisling said, though her ears were stiff, and twitchy.

"I'll try to get back here as fast as I can," Lotte said. "Please, be safe."

"We should be the ones telling you that. There's two of us, but only one of you," Aisling said. "Just get in and out as fast as you can, but take no unnecessary risks. If you're hurt, there's not going to be anyone to pull you back out of there."

On that uncertain note, Lotte left.

*******

Through the door, things immediately stopped making sense. There were two ways to go, one to the left and one to the right, and Lotte suspected that this was the start of the maze. Except that the wall in front of her had been knocked down. No, torn down, brick by brick, the runes on the wall around the area broken. Lotte, frowning, ducked through it, and found herself in a straight path. She walked forward, and when she turned a corner stopped again.

The wall to the left was covered in arrows, so thick that there was no free space left. Lotte, looking at the pattern of the arrows, decided she'd have to run for it. She sprinted across the area with the arrows only to hear--

Clicks. Clicks, like a crossbow without a bolt.

"What is going on?" Lotte muttered to herself.

A pitfall trap was filled in with dirt, another trap marked with lines where the stone would give way to trap her ankle. Where there were the plaques, or what looked like the start of drawings, someone had spent a good deal of time carving it up until it was unrecognizable, not that Lotte could have read it anyways. The path to wherever she was going was entirely clear, without any maze to navigate at all, since anywhere there was a choice, there was a door knocked through a wall.

At last, she reached what looks like where the gem should be. There was a stone table, and on it an odd looking red pillow. But Lotte's eyes were drawn to the wall to the right, where it looks as if someone had knocked it down and then begun to dig out, going downwards.

Lotte, watching the opening, walked over to the table and noticed… there was nothing on the pillow.

"Hehehe," a ragged voice said. It wasn't Lotte's.

Lotte whipped around, ready to draw and loose an arrow, her heart racing.

"Someone finally arrived. All these years waiting, and finally a man arrives," the voice said.It sounded like a man's voice.

"Who is this?" Lotte asked. "My name is Lotte, and I am a huntswoman."

The voice giggled, hoarse and unhinged, and said, "Sure you are, sonny. And I'm a godling. One second, let me see you with my eyes." There was shuffling, and then a figure stepped out of the darkness of the wall.

He was dressed in rags, with golden hair so dirty and matted it was blond only in places, with a beard that swallowed his face. His bushy hair almost hid how thin he was, but his hands showed it. The man wasn't skeletal, but he did look as if he had been eating just enough to keep going for years and years. Lotte had seen farmers who looked like that, or beggers passing through. The rags themselves stank. Lotte had gotten used to the smell of poop (you had to be on a farm), but the man smelled like rot and death itself. His bright, mad blue eyes took Lotte in. "What a drink of water you are. Tall, blond, and heroic looking. Here to slay the… no, no, I bet that's not it at all."

"Who are you?"

"You can call me Waiz."

"Orphan?" Lotte asked, frowning.

"Well, I am one, sonny. Lotte. I'm also the boy with the gem you need."

He didn't look like a boy. If Lotte was to guess, she'd guess that he was somewhere in his thirties, or perhaps even forties. "What do you want for it?"

"Want? I want to talk with you, brave fool. I've been here this whole time, and if you kill me for it… then you'll have to get back the hard way. My Daddy figured it out, if you die or leave the dungeon, then everything you did is undone, at least unless you do some crazy magic shit. And maybe even then? I'm not sure. It depends. But kill me and things get harder for you."

"I wouldn't kill you!" Lotte said.

"Well, then, so you're here to break down the doors of the prison, are you? As my Father and I were, all those… what year is it?"

"I don't know," Lotte admitted. She knew there were schemes to number all the years, but she didn't see the point. Wasn't it more important to know how many years a Duke had reigned than to combine them all into a number that didn't matter?

"I was ten winters old when I came in here," the man said.

Lotte stared. Decades. He'd been here for decades. "I'm sorry."

"Sorry? There are worse places to live. There's water, and I can grow mushrooms and other delicacies in the soil. By the only God that matters, I am quite blessed. And I get to meet you, you strange… what are you, again, sonny?"

Lotte considered protesting again that she was in fact a girl, but it wasn't as if his insistence would hurt anything. She'd just let him think whatever he liked. That's why she didn't say anything, of course.

"A person," Lotte said, a little baffled. "I don't know what you're talking about?"

"You don't?" Waiz asked, looking at her as if it shocked him. Then he began to creep forward, a grin on his face. "Well then, that's the first step. I need to see just who I have before me." The man moved as if he wasn't used to moving around other people, straight forward and yet slightly cringing. He stared, and reached a filthy hand out to hold Lotte's.

She didn't know what to do. If she attacked him, what would happen? But she didn't want to attack someone who hadn't--

He pulled out a knife, and she shifted away as he slashed her palm. She winced at the bite of the rusty knife, and punched him in a single, smooth motion. He went down, holding the knife above his head, as if he were trying to keep it as far away as possible.

"Fuck, that's an arm," Waiz muttered. Then, louder, he said, "I wasn't going to hurt you, sonny!"

"You slashed me!" Lotte protested, staring at this strange, loathsome and lonely man.

The man frowned. "Yes, but it didn't hurt that much, did it? Big tough guy like you, whining about a lil' ol' cut."

Lotte flushed, unable quite to find anything to say to that.

"This is a test. You'll see in a little bit, what happens…"

Waiz stood up and stumbled over towards the walls, which he had not defaced. At least, he hadn't defaced what was left when the walls had been knocked down at one place. Then carefully, he smeared the dripping knife over the wall.

The runes began to glow, and the glow began to spread, rune by rune, shimmering and seeming to leap like fire from one rune to the next. Lotte stared as the dark room, lit only by a guttering torch in one corner, began to grow brighter than day as it spread.

"Wow," Waiz muttered, staring at him with tears in his eyes. "You did it."

"I… what?" Lotte asked, baffled.

"I can't deny you the gem, not after that." Waiz tossed the knife aside and began digging in his rags. "I had more tests, I had more questions, but what's the point of it?" He giggled a little. "Best get out of your way before I'm run over like a boy jousting with a cart."

Lotte stared at him. "What?"

"You really are confused." He pulled out the red gem, which was almost pink, and walked over to Lotte, holding out his hand. Lotte took it, gripping it tight.

"Yes, I am."

"It is the will of the Gods, if you are confused. I am simply a messenger."

"You should come back with us," Lotte said. "What is there for you, here?"

"Duty. Peace and quiet. I haven't seen another human in fifteen years, and only the one, hehe, little son," Waiz gave a grin that showed off his broken, rotting teeth. "You should run along before nightfall."

Lotte took a step back. "Nightfall?"

"Isn't that what sons--"

Suns?

"Are afraid of?"

"I don't know," Lotte said, her heart beating rapidly. Something about the man's tone unnerved her, and so did the runes in a way they hadn't before they started glowing. The light seemed like it was dancing, and Lotte could no more understand them now than she could before.

"You are afraid."

Lotte admitted, "Yes. I'm just not sure what."

"Good. Be afraid of everyone. And everything," Waiz said. "It'd make sense."

"I'm going to leave now," Lotte said, her voice trembling. She needed to get out of here.

His mad, giggling laughter followed her as she ran back.

******

The glowing ended some dozen feet from the archway, so there was no way that either of the other two saw it. Lotte had no idea what any of this meant, and she preferred not to think of it as she stepped through.

"Oh! You're hurt!" Naja said, rushing over, eyes glued to her hand.

"That was fast. Did you get it, or did something stop you?" Aisling asked.

Lotte opened her uninjured hand as Naja began tutting over the wound.

The gem gleamed.

"A h-aon, a dha, a tri, a ceithir," Aisling counted out, aloud, with a satisfied smile. "We have gotten it. Was it difficult?"

"I…"

What could Lotte say? That she had somehow made the walls glow? That there was some madman who'd helped him through the maze?

"Not that difficult," Lotte muttered.

Aisling looked at her with worried suspicion, but Naja was too busy fussing, as they made their way up to the fireplace.

It took a few minutes to bandage Lotte's hand up as well as Naja wanted, and then they stood in front of the fireplace.

"The only question now is… what order do we put in what we've found?"

Lotte felt as if that was far from the only question.

But What Do They Do?

[] Aisling believes that it might be a journey. Thus, they should put it in order in which they gained it. It was clear that the dungeon itself was in some way watching… or it feels like it. But at the same time, how is that balanced?
[] Naja has two ideas, the first of which is to place the top and bottom at the same time, then the left and right at the same time. After all, each is a balanced, co-equal pair, so they should all connect.
[] Ooor, Naja thinks, it could have to do with all four in balance, in which case she and someone else should put all of them at once.
[] Write-in.

******

A/N: There is a right and wrong and very wrong answer.

 

[The Laurent]

3:8

"It's in balance. The note even says so. So obviously, this means putting in all four at once. That way, everything is balanced," Naja said.

"But, what does Mind and Body have to do with… whatever the other two were. Do the Sepult have some sort of weird… everything is four things schema?"

"Not really, but it just makes logical sense. It has to do with balance, and we balance all four at once. After all, the top and bottom both involved facing an entity, while the west and east both involved navigating a maze, right?" Naja von Siebert asked, with a dramatic sweep of her hands.

Lotte almost opened her mouth to reveal that she never actually navigated the maze… but did she? She had gone through the whole thing, in a way, even if there had been no threat or wandering.

"Sure, but--" Aisling began.

"In order? What does that have to do with balance."

"We did it top, then bottom. East, then west. We did it in balance. I was pretty sure that was your idea, wasn't it?" Aisling asked.

"Well, yes, of course. I intended to do it in that order because I knew, haha, yeah, I definitely knew that was the right option," Naja insisted.

"You did it at random, didn't you?" Aisling asked.

"...well, I just thought that the lowest place would come after the highest. But you're right, that the order we did it matters… but not for putting in the gems and the key." Naja frowned, "Though to be fair, the key doesn't really seem to fit with all the others. It isn't a key made of gemstones, after all."

"It's probably a pun. Or a metaphor," Aisling said, glancing over at the fireplace.

"Well, Lotte, are you willing to help me with the gems? You seem like you had a better time with the maze than I did." Naja smiled, and Lotte felt even worse. But what would they think if they heard what Waiz said? He said insane things, and called her son, and what if they heard it and thought she was weird and terrible, or secretly working against them, or…

No. It was better to lie. But, she hated lying. Lying was wrong, and the kinds of people who lied to another person were the kinds of people she'd never wanted to be.

"Lotte, are you okay?" Naja asked.

"No. I mean, yes," Lotte said. "I'm fine."

"Well then, let's get in there."

They both crawled into the fireplace, and Naja handed Lotte the east and west gem, small as they were, and then said. "I can crawl under you, if that's okay, so that I'm between your arms, so that we can put it all in at once."

"Naja, focus on the task at hand. You can talk about putting it in later," Aisling yelled out.

"T-that's, that's not what I meant," Naja stammered, as she crawled underneath Lotte, her back pushed up against Lotte's stomach as she got into position.

Lotte had to admit, there was something to be said with how close they were, the way Lotte's shirt was rubbing against Naja's back, the warmth of the fireplace. It felt as if it had just been lit earlier, but from the ashes it had been some time. Lotte moved her hands, until she was leaning against the wall to one side, and she was holding the two gems right before where they should slot in. They were just the right size.

"On three," Naja said.

"Wait. When you say one, or will you say go afterwards?" Lotte asked.

"When I say one, of course. Why would I say go?" Naja asked, frowning.

"I dunno. I've never timed anything like that," Lotte admitted, with a blush.

"You're adorable, and also a little hapless. It's part of your charm," Naja said, pushing the key against the lock. "And three, two, one!"

Lotte and Naja managed to do it at the same time, as Naja turned the key as well. There was a glow, and it spread from the fireplace to somewhere behind them.

But the glow was odd, a little dark, and there was a smell, and a sick feeling in Lotte's stomach moments before the entire fireplace went up in a raging inferno. The flames roared around her. They hurt, but the pain was secondary, as Lotte grabbed a flaming Naja and threw herself backwards, out of the fire, rolling around desperately on the ground, and patting at Naja.

Every year, at one festival or another, someone wound up setting their fool self on fire, and so she knew what you were supposed to do. You rolled around, smothering the fire, and got some water. Then with the burns, you--

She didn't know. She'd never paid attention, and now she hated that she hadn't.

"Naja! Lotte!" Aisling yelled, and as Lotte rolled she felt water being dumped all over her. In fact, it felt like almost all of their water was being thrown away. But she needed it.

Finally, after a few desperate moments, the fire was gone. Lotte felt the burns here and there, but looking over both herself and Naja, it was…

It wasn't okay at all, but they weren't badly hurt, for all that their clothing was now blackened with soot, and Lotte's neck felt as if she'd been way too long in the sun.

"What happened?" Naja muttered, as she picked herself off, looking wide-eyed. "It should have worked. Did we do something wrong? Were we supposed to tip over the goddess? Or… Lotte, can you tell us about your maze? Maybe it was different in some way we--"

"Guys!" Aisling said, pointing at the wall. There was a trail of runes, not the whole wall, which was still lit up. It was like a path.

"I, I--" Lotte began.

"What?" Naja asked, glancing from the runes on the wall to Lotte.

"Did you leave something out of what you told us?" Aisling asked.

"It would not be hard," Naja said, and then gave a few hoarse coughs. "Agh, the smoke in my lungs. You didn't tell us anything, just that you'd gotten the gem."

Only moments before, Lotte's actual life had been in danger. But she hadn't had time to panic, and so she hadn't. She'd just acted, and even the pain felt distant now. But those words made it feel as if the world was closing in. Lotte wasn't afraid of tight areas, but she was used to having a wide-open world before her. Now, it felt as if she were in the smallest room possible. "I think I messed up."

"How?" Aisling demanded, narrowing her eyes, and looking from Lotte to Naja. No doubt blaming Lotte for it.

"Someone had disarmed all the traps in the maze, and knocked out the walls. I didn't… I didn't walk a maze, I just went through the path I was told, and there was a man at the end."

"A… man?" Naja asked.

"He and his father went into the place, I think. But his father must have died," Lotte began. "He called himself Waiz, and he called me son, and talked about the sun… and then he cut my hand and rubbed it against the runes."

"What an idiot. How old was he? How insane? He sounds it," Aisling said, voice snapping.

"He was odd. I do not think he was entirely there. But the runes lit up. I don't know why," Lotte insisted, desperately. The idea that she was working with this dungeon somehow was silly, but what if they thought…

"Perhaps it has to do with your parents? Or perhaps only the blood of a hunter can activate the runes?" Naja asked. "Still, that's more evidence. If the two weren't--"

"If Lotte had told you about it, you might have guessed!" Aisling said, striding forward.

"She's saved our lives repeatedly," Naja insisted.

"And lied to us!"

"I…" Lotte began, feeling the prickling of tears against her eyes.

"See, and now you've made her cry."

Aisling snorted. "Her? Is it her I've made cry? I'm starting to wonder--" Aisling began, and then she turned away. "Whatever. We should follow it. If we're not going to turn back."

"I'm fine, so why would we?" Naja asked.

"We're out of water now."

"Lotte has some in her pack. She'd be willing to share."

Lotte nodded, uncertain that they were doing the right thing. There was more that she hadn't explained, and more that didn't make sense. For one, why had her blood done that? Did it really just come down to being a hunter. How was being a hunter in her blood?

*****

The trio looked nothing like the heroic legends. No, by this point they stumbled exhausted through the dungeon, still damp, ash-soaked, burned in places, limping, low on arrows and low on water, though not food.

But the path of the runes was pretty clear, taking them down and around, to a part of the castle that they'd walked by on the way to the dungeon.

At least, that's what it looked like.

They were also very quiet. No songs of adventure for any of them, especially with Aisling glaring at Lotte the whole time. No, it wasn't just glaring. There was a part of the look that felt as if she were weighing Lotte on a scale, and wasn't sure whether she'd turn out not to be a clipped coin.

But as they walked, Lotte began to hear sounds behind them. Yet whenever she looked back, she didn't see anyone. Nor did she see anything, since she thought the odds that anything here would be a person rather than a monster was unlikely. Even the people were warped and twisted.

The sounds got louder, but there was still no sign of anyone, as they hurried until at last they came to an archway that hadn't been there before. It was about half-again Lotte's height, and far more elaborate than anything else in the palace. Along the arch for the door, in white against the black rock, were what looked like the pattern of snakes, twining and crawling their way upwards, their eyes made of pretty looking gems whose value Lotte couldn't guess. At about stomach level on each side, there were strange vessels. On the left, there was a tiny, thumb-sized cup held in the mouth of one of the serpents, which had icy blue gem eyes. On the other side, what seemed like a hand coming out of the spiralling pillar of the arch, holding a tankard.

Then up top, there was what looked to be writing… for the door was not a door, but instead a white wall of stone where the entryway should be.

"Oh," Naja said. "One moment, let me translate this."

There was a hissing sound from behind them.

Lotte turned, and saw nothing. She stared out into the darkness, and finally she saw it, a glint far off, and bright eyes, as if someone was watching them.

"It's some sort of creature," Aisling said, her elvish eyes no doubt seeing better. "I can't make out details, but we need to hurry!"

"It says: one drop, or one cup."

"That's all?" Aisling asked. She looked briefly panicked, and then she turned to look at Lotte. "You should try your blood on the smaller of the vessels."

"What? No, we can't just…" Naja began.

"We've fought and we've bled already than this. You burned because Lotte was too scared to just admit what happened, and what it meant," Aisling said, fingers gripping tightly on her spear. "Lotte, you will do it." It felt like a threat.

"I was going to do it," Lotte said, looking at Aisling. "You do not have to threaten me."

"Do I? I feel like you know far more than you let on. Is this all a trick?" Aisling asked.

Lotte stared at Aisling, not sure how she was supposed to prove it wasn't. Wait, she had an idea...

"You forget yourself!" Naja said. "I am the employer, and not you!" Naja looked like a rope that was about to finish fraying and snap. "We approached Lotte, not the other way around! If anyone was deceiving anyone, it was me! And I wasn't!"

Lotte took out her knife and pricked her thumb, before stepping forward and pressing her hand to the tiniest cup. She pulled away, and that's when the very top of the entryway began to glow. It was a very thin patch, at the top where the two archways met, but it seemed to be moving.

"Oh," Aisling said, staring up at that. "It's doing… something."

It was then that the monster in the distance began to move their way. It flowed across the ground, with a billowing robe that covered its lower body, and a strange bone-white mask barely visible underneath its hood. Gloved hands gripped a sword that seemed to wave and move, and a strange hissing sound came from the monster as it threw itself at Aisling.

Aisling managed, just barely, to duck aside, spear-point coming up to slash at the robes of the creature.

"Aisling!" Naja yelled, pulling out her own sword.

"Stay back," Aisling retorted, barely keeping up with the movements of the monster, which were just a little faster on the ground than a human's should be, let alone while still wielding a weapon. Naja wouldn't stand a chance.

Lotte, meanwhile, drew one of her last seven arrows, notched it, and when Aisling had taken another step back, loosed the arrow into the thing's chest. It let out a high-pitched scream but didn't slow down, pressing Aisling still further back, until she had to either stand or let the monster aside.

Aisling changed instead, spear stabbing at the thing's shoulder as she ducked a fast, powerful blow from one side, and shifted away from an overhead blow… leaving the monster open as Lotte buried another arrow in its torso. Lotte didn't have the time to really aim, and so she focused on getting solid shots in the same general area, rather than trying to hit the glowing eye-slits on the mask, or anything fancy.

With each arrow and spear stab, the body of the monster seemed to grow more solid, to the point where Lotte could hear a strange sort of scraping sound, like a boot dragging very quickly across the stones. But not quite that, worse than that.

Lotte's third arrow caught it in the already wounded shoulder, thanks to a desperate shift to avoid another Aisling offensive.

Lotte was down to four arrows, but the creature seemed more solid now, and it looked like what was trailing back behind the robes was a… tail? Like a snake, perhaps. It was hard to tell, and Naja distracted Lotte for a moment by saying, "Look!"

She was pointing at the door, and when Lotte glanced she saw that the light had grown. It was as if the door was opening, or rather turning into pure light, from the bottom to the top. It was still above their heads, but if it kept on dragging itself down, soon enough it would be a door they could use.

Aisling let out a cry as the masked being shifted forward and… bit her. That's all that it could be described as, its jaw unhinging as it took a chunk out of her shoulder. She went down in a shower of blood, stabbing limply upwards..

It shouldn't have hit, but the monster was careless, and the spear went straight through its stomach. It screamed, and its sword sliced the spear in two as it backed up. It didn't take a step back, no. It slithered backwards.

"A lamia?" Naja asked, eyes wide, as Lotte's fourth arrow caught it just below its neck. It twisted and turned, one way and another, as Naja stopped heeding Aisling's advice and began desperately and clumsily attacking it.

"Naja, out of the way!" Lotte yelled, and her fifth arrow caught it in the stomach, just below the spear.

"Grab the damn spear from its guts," Aisling cursed, covering her bleeding shoulder with a clumsy hand.

Naja, realizing what she meant, grabbed it and pulled as hard as it could. But it was stuck in there tight, and the monster continued to slash at her. She ducked, a slash cutting across her forehead as she did, and Lotte realized that the moment for standing back had passed.

She charged forward, roaring in anger and frustration, one hand with a bow in it, but the other open to pull out the spear.

The creature stared at her for a long moment, then finally slashed, but by then she'd half-slid under it, and then grabbed the spear. From where Lotte was, she could see how there was a point where human flesh became that of a snake, below the belly. In a single pull it came out, and with it the bile and guts of some strange and ancient… ghost?

Lotte retreated, filthy and exhausted, and drew another arrow as the monster keened and writhed.

"Lotte," Naja said, her voice faint. "Lotte."

Lotte wasn't in front of her, though.

No, Lotte stared at the creature as it died. It whined and wailed, it was hissing in a tongue Lotte did not understand.

Lotte was in front of a wolf, all those years ago.

It was dying, there was nothing she could do, and perhaps no mercy it deserved.

If she approached seeking to slit its throat, it'd probably tear her hand to pieces. She could only act at a distance, and while the world had seemed to retreat for the fight, now she could smell the bile on her body. She stank as bad as she had early on in her hunting career, when she'd been less careful about blood and guts, and fascinated as a child was by all of it. The monster, the lamia (another species, like others she'd seen) was hissing and groaning in misery.

It would never thank her. Nobody would.

But it was the right thing to do, and Lotte grabbed her second to last arrow and shifted into a proper archery stance, nocking the arrow and pulling it back. Then she held it for a moment, shifting where she held it, and how she held it.

The lamia's eyes weren't glowing anymore. In fact, the mask had half-fallen off, revealing a face like any other. In fact, the rest of his body above the waist was entirely like any human's, at least if you didn't consider his eye color, or the tongue in his mouth, lolling now as he writhed and died.

Then she loosed the arrow. It seemed almost to whistle as it went through the air and slammed right into the lamia's heart. She'd taken the time to aim, and it gasped and collapsed. In a matter of moments, it died. Then, after it died, a male voice said, loudly. "Praise… and… thank… you."

Lotte blinked, not wiping at her eyes because her hands were filthy. But she was crying a little.

"I… I should be fine," Aisling said. "If I can get up."

"We'll rest here, and then continue. Unless there's another monster, in which case we'll go in or run away." Naja tried to stand up, and stumbled, the cut in her head no doubt keeping her from thinking.

"No. We go back," Lotte insisted. "I'm the only one strong enough to do anything. I'll carry you out of here if I have to." She would have been willing to go on, if there was one less burden, if she hadn't almost gotten them burned alive, if she hadn't just killed another… person?

"You're going to try to carry me?" Aisling asked. "What happens if I fight back."

"I… I don't want you to die," Lotte said. "You can keep your coin, if it means you live." Lotte thought about Naja's brother, who wouldn't have wanted Naja to keep on going into death. "We're going, and that's final."

"Lotte," Naja said, eyes wide.

"What? I'm sorry I'm yelling," Lotte admitted, since her voice was very loud. "But I don't want--"

"Lotte, behind you!"

Lotte turned, just in time to see what seemed like a tendril, or a tentacle, or something inky black… wrap around her leg. It was smooth to the touch, though she had very little time to appreciate this as she was tugged backwards towards the almost entirely open gateway.

Fumbling, she grabbed onto the edge of the archway with one hand as the powerful tendril tried to drag her in. She shifted, trying to get her other hand to grip the side, the spiralled grooves of the pillar helping her to hold on, as her burnt, bloody fingers were very slippery. She was screaming, wordless fury and fear, heart feeling like it was about to explode.

Lotte managed to get her second hand around the archway, which was when she felt a second tendril grab her other leg and pull. Her fingers slipped, and she scrabbled, screaming, at the archway. She was hanging on by her fingertips, every heartbeat an impossible struggle.

Thump. Eyes blinded by tears, sure she was going to die.

Thump-thump. Just a few fingers.

Thump-thump. She let go, and was dragged into to the light as the stone closed up behind her.

She thought it'd last forever, dragged until she died, dragged until at the end of the tendrils was a mouth.

But, just as suddenly, the tendrils were gone, and she was… somewhere else.

******

A/N: To be concluded.

 

[The Laurent]

3:9

Lotte's eyes had been tightly shut in those last moments, half-blinded by the light, and so it took her a few moments to get her bearings. When she opened her eyes, she found that she was in a large field, covered in thick, overgrown grass, under a vast, open sky. There were none of the other plants that should be growing in the field, as if The field ended, at least to her left, in a blank black wall that stretched hundreds of feet up, and yet barely began to touch the sky, which was the red of a sunset.

She could just barely see the stars, just waiting for the sun to go down further to come out. More imposingly, in front of her was a pathway made of large cobblestones, improbably smooth, as if they'd been in a river, even though there was no water around. Lotte turned around, half-stumbling, and walked the other way. She thought there was no good in anything around here. She paused after a few steps to kneel down and run her hand through the short grass. It felt entirely normal, and when she dug with her fingers, there was good loamy soil, smelling remarkably like that on her parents' farm. It was the kind of soil anything would grow in. So, this impossible place was somehow like the place she knew.

Lotte kept on walking, and then blinked in shock. She found herself at the start of a cobblestone path again. When she turned around she saw, behind her, the area where she'd dug up dirt, still faintly disturbed. So she turned herself right and kept on walking… before finding herself, after a minute, back in front of the cobblestone path. When she looked behind her, she saw… the hole she'd dug up out of curiosity.

This was bizarre, and there was a sinking feeling in her stomach. She'd have to walk on the path, unless she just sat there. But a part of her was afraid that the tentacle would come back, and so she began to walk.

She was still soaked in gore, still with barely bandaged wounds, still smelling slightly charred if you could smell that beneath the sweat and blood and guts. Lotte was just about at the end of her strength, and so she limped along, her legs aching more and more with every step. Finally, she spied a shape in the distance which, as she grew closer, she could see was a building made of a very familiar looking type of black stone. It looked a lot like slabs of smooth stone stacked on top of each other like steps.

When she got closer, she could see that it was vaguely triangular, and that on each level except the ground floor, there were dozens and dozens of life-sized statues of Lamia, humans, a few Sepult, and snakes of all shapes and sizes. They were beautifully carved, and almost looked real, and were--unlike anything else here--colorful, clearly painted to look just like real life. They were slightly off, the yellows too bright, the blues of a cloak looking too much like the sky.. At the very top of the structure was a shining, white-gold capstone that seemed gemlike. It glittered like the stars had when she'd looked at them. Plain and normal, but… if that's what she saw, what would others see?

At the base of the structure, where the cobblestones led, there was a wide open door. As she got closer, she realized that each of the steps was about twice her height, so the door itself was very big. It gaped, leading into some sort of hall. But just before she stepped in, she heard a voice, coming from up above.

"Prince, you have returned," it whispered. "No, not Prince."

"Who are you?" Lotte called out, loud enough that she winced, afraid that she'd be attacked again. But no one responded, and after a tense, terrified moment she continued on into the building.

Lotte saw no other choice but to walk in, looking around. There were what looked like stone tables, here and there, in a large circle. There were several doors, and the room smelled faintly of perfume. It was almost relaxing. The first door seemed to lead to more halls, and the second, when Lotte finally managed to make it over there, opened up to… well. The room's floors were of the same black stone as everywhere else in this place, but they were slightly slick on the stairs down, and then there was what looked like a huge bathtub, the size of a pond, stretching outwards. It was empty.

Then she reached out and touched it with her hand. The black stone of the tub began to turn white, spreading from where she'd touched it, until the whole tub was made of this strange, beautiful white stone, which seemed almost to have patterns swirling in it. Then the water began to fill it, slowly, coming from seemingly nowhere. Cautiously, Lotte touched the water. It was warm, but nothing more than that, at least not at a glance.

Lotte had a feeling that whoever had dragged her here wanted her to bathe, and so she turned around and walked out.

She was too tired to be polite. And why should she be? This wasn't some noble, who she had to be polite to because of their status and power.

She was stopped short when she opened the door in the front area of the building. She came upon smooth stone steps down to what seemed to be some sort of stone altar, white unlike everything else in this building. After a moment, Lotte realized something.

...a Temple. This was a Temple. At the heart of this 'Palace' was a Temple, and one incredibly hard to reach.

Lotte walked down the steps, setting down her bag at the second to last of the black stone steps, and then touching the strange stone table that looked like it should be laden down with holy works like a beast of burden was with supplies.

"Why am I here?" Lotte asked, her voice echoing.

Then she saw symbols on the table that felt vaguely familiar. When she reached out to touch the table, the altar… sacrificial, perhaps? It began to turn into white stone, and Lotte knew instinctively what it said.

One drop or one cup.

Lotte bit her lip, but felt an odd sort of pull. It was as if she was going to throw up, and she reached out her bandaged hand and rubbed it against the white stone until a little blood came out.

Nothing happened, at first, and for that Lotte was glad, because her body had moved almost without her.

Screaming, crying, hoping and dreaming, nightmares that wouldn't end and then a feeling of being watched. Blood, so much blood.

The world drowned in it, sometimes. But she cried for her own blood, blood not even shed so much as released by her body.

She felt sick and strange, as if her head was about to burst. She staggered back, and blinked as darkness gathered all around the center area where the altar was. Then the darkness began to take the shape of eyes, and serpents, thousands of them.

There were snakes in a riot of colors, a voice seeming to come through all the snakes, on the ground and yet seeming to stretch out to be connected to… nothing. The voice coming through them was somehow able to make the ground shake.

'Little One. At last I can see you with mine own eyes, rather than the pale reflections. It has been too long.'

The voice was strange. One moment it was deep, the next high-pitched, and then after that raspy, as if it was everything at once.

"W-what?"

'I looked upon you once, upon a dream. You remember it. I knew you then, I dreamed with you, and knew that you would come back to me, sooner rather than later.'

Lotte gaped as the snakes swirled around him. They didn't seem to have a center, some place where they came from. They were everywhere, never stopping their motions. Then they began hissing all at once, as one. Lotte knew they were tasting the air, but it didn't keep her from backing up a step. But of course she was surrounded.

'Eighteen years. Eighteen years I've waited. And I could not see into your mind because of my deal with Her. Eighteen years, and only a single glimpse dearly bought. And now you are here, at last, my child.'

Lotte spun around, drawing her bow and preparing to loose her final arrow at… where? Where was she supposed to target?

'Do not. Do not attack me. It will do you no good, and we are linked, the two of us. It was bold of you to come like this, to wear a false face and call yourself a woman, as you are not. It shows a dedication to me.'

"Who is…?" Lotte asked, heart hammering in her throat.

'I have many, many names. Speak three and at last we can begin. Speak three and you can at least see. You've spent all those years, and now your body and soul are ready. Or you can stay here, trapped. I can give my word by my divine essence that it shall do nothing more than reveal who you are.'

Lotte blinked, "What words?"

'Did they not teach you, boy?! Well then, repeat after me. I have ten trillion names, and to declare this is a name.'

Lotte hesitated, but she realized she was surrounded by a… a mad God of some sort. Or Goddess, or… both? It was hard to tell, hard to be sure. "I have ten trillion names, and to declare this is a name." The words sounded strange, and seemed to echo, as he spoke them.

'I have been Forgotten, but not by my friends: to declare this is a name.'

Forgotten? Lotte, her legs hurting more and more with each moment. She had to fight through all of that, and heartsickness, and the headache, even as she recognized the name. She had heard it before. "I h-have been Forgotten, but not by my friends: to declare this is a name."

'Imnatash ai Hurwasa.'

Lotte hesitated.

'We are here, at the beginning of all things, at your rebirth. I cannot read your mind, but I know your fears. How could I not, after so many times? Seven and seven. Speak it.'

From a choked, broken voice, Lotte spoke the final name, unable to help herself, as if the words were being dragged out of her. "I-I-Imnatashi ai Hurwasa." The weight of the name seemed to drain her energy, and for a moment she stood there, barely standing.

Then she felt agonizing pain in her legs, and then her body, and she began to scream. She'd never hurt like this, she'd never felt closer to dying, she'd never felt as if it would be better to die than to feel this for even a moment longer.

She was still screaming in pain and terror when she passed out into the darkness, to the voice of the… God.

'Sleep, and awaken to a new world, my child.'

*******

A/N: And there we end the Book of Lotte. To be continued in the Book of Rebirth.

 

[The Laurent]

The Book of Rebirth

"You are what your deep, driving desire is. As your desire is, so is your will. As your will is, so is your deed. As your deed is, so is your destiny."--Brihadaranyaka Upanishad


"'What is it you want?' asked he, without fear. 'For you have done much to harm me, and you have transformed me, and I do not understand what I am now, and why you have done it.'

'Peace, my chosen child, for all shall be explained' the serpent said, with bright, flashing eyes.

Yet he did not balk, and demanded again, 'Peace I shall have, but answers as well, for as the dog sniffs its prey out, so too do I stubbornly seek the truth with my every breath.'

'Do not think to question me, child, for what is your station and what is mine?'

'My station is to ask. Is yours to answer? I ask thrice, what is it that you want?'

'I answer again, though you heard not: a rebirth.'
--The Book of Rebirth, 1:8-15