by Pirateaba
“I’m not around you all the time, Durene. In fact, I met him in Invrisil. While I was there.”
“Really? But—”
“I’ll tell you all about it. Later. Hold on, someone’s coming.”
I stand up, suddenly worried. Someone is coming. Someone on horseback. Odveig? Sacra?
It’s not her. Instead, a man on horseback rides into the village, staring at the Goblin bodies and asking for me. He’s escorted to me by the villagers, some of whom are holding weapons.
I’m not worried. The man showed Prost his Runner’s Seal. Some use horses. And he has something for me. The man clears his throat a few times and I hear him speak quite nervously as he half-bows in my direction.
“I have a letter addressed to an…[Emperor]? Emperor Laken of Riverfarm?”
“That’s me.”
I have no Runner’s Seal, nor any way to prove who I am. Nevertheless, the City Runner doesn’t hesitate for a moment to hand the letter over. It smells faintly of…orchids? Perhaps. Something close to that, a delicate perfume. Durene’s murmuring tells me the parchment is rich. There’s no name on the letter, just a wax seal.
A letter to an [Emperor]. I break the wax seal and open the letter. It’s short. I have to have Wiskeria read it out loud to me.
“To the esteemed [Emperor] Laken Godart of Riverfarm, I am humbly…”
Looks like it’s a greeting from a [Lady] Rie who lives in Invrisil. She greets me, invites me to her estate which is only a few miles away, offers me her congratulations…I listen to Wiskeria read through the letter, barely able to process it at this time.
“Well. She gave this letter to you, did she?”
The City Runner coughs nervously.
“Her manservant did, mil—your majesty. However, this—isn’t the only letter.”
“What?”
“That is the first letter, ah, your majesty. I have three more.”
He has three more letters, two from [Merchants] and one from a [Lord]. I hold them in my hands and sense the Runner fidget.
“Would you like to send a return message? That service has been paid for by each sender.”
“I’ll consider it. Please, stay for a while and allow me time to decide. Unless you’re busy?”
“No your majesty! My time has been paid for. I will wait wherever you please.”
“My [Steward] will find you a spot. And something hot. I will deliberate by myself.”
I wander away from the City Runner and hear him asking what happened. I wonder what Prost will tell him. Myself, I step away from the village and sit on a rock, brushing the snow off of it.
So much has happened. And this is just the latest development. It’s mind boggling. Insane.
“Strange. I can’t believe it.”
I whisper the words out loud. I stare at the letters, sniff the perfume. Each one addressed to me. All coming at once. From [Lords] and [Ladies], no less.
“It’s all happening like he said. Exactly like he said.”
I don’t know what to think. My head is whirling, my heart still bleeds. I look back towards my village and raise my head to the sky. Here it is. My empire. My people have bought it in blood and I am bound to it now.
My lands. My people. My love. All things start here. I open the next letter with my thumb.
“Well then. Let’s begin.”
After a second, I look around. I wander back into the village and raise my hand. Everyone looks at me.
“Hey, can someone read this to me?”
4.24
It was going to be an important day. Ivolethe felt it, just like she felt the rays of the sun warm her frozen body slightly. She could sense…there were no words for what she sensed. The English language had no words for it, because Humans had only five senses, and perhaps a few others that were more instinctual and sometimes slightly magical.
A proper comparative would be that Ivolethe tasted the sense of foreboding and premonition on the air and felt déjà vu creeping over her while she simultaneously smelled, heard, and thought of all these sensations as well. It was the feeling of destiny, of fate.
Contrary to what Ryoka Griffin feared, Frost Faeries could not in fact tell the future. They could, however, predict the future, but that was a skill most beings had. Humans could do it. Less well than the fae, but they could do it.
It was easy. Show a Human an apple and most would agree that it would fall when dropped. Some might suspect the apple would explode, defy gravity, or commit to some other miraculous feat, but insanity lurks within all species. By and large, Humans could predict the future in simple ways like this.
They could see the apple and know it would fall. However, Ivolethe and her kind were different. The fae could see the apple and know what would happen if it was caught, what would happen if it landed, and what would happen if an arrow shot it out of the air during an archery competition.
They could predict what would happen after the apple fell, but they couldn’t see the whole of the apple’s fate. Just more of it than most. Where mortals saw only the road in front of them, faeries could see the crossroads.
It didn’t mean they knew everything. But Ivolethe could see strands of destiny weaving and changing each other. She could sense…peculiarities and moments in time that mattered.
And today, a lot of these threads were coming together. So many, and the ones that were already moving were pulling the rest. Because of course, destiny was connected. How could it not be?
So today would be momentous for many people in this small part of the world. It would be special. Ivolethe didn’t question the coincidence that pulled together so many events at once; she sometimes thought that reality liked such things. Special things should be special.
It could have been the work of a god as well, of course. Immortal beings were all about important days and destiny. But in this world, such an occurrence would be impossible. Ivolethe knew this. The gods were dead. And they had better stay that way.
The Frost Faerie sighed as the sun rose a bit. She could hear a Gnoll child flopping around her room, waking up to the smell of food as she ran over a young woman’s face. Ryoka Griffin groaned and Ivolethe smiled and flew away from Ryoka’s windowsill.
Today was going to be important. She flew into the Wandering Inn’s kitchen and stole a huge sausage link and some garlic. Even faeries liked something to eat while watching.
—-
Ryoka knew it was going to be a bad day when she woke up. She opened her eyes and knew something was wrong.
There was nothing supernatural about this premonition. Ryoka had lived through too many days like this not to remember.
It was the feeling of things going wrong. It was the sensation in her mind of the sun going out. On days like this, Ryoka couldn’t help but feel angry and unhappy.
It had been a while since she felt like this. Back home, on earth, Ryoka could go for months without days like this. Other times it was a never-ending week of bad days. And oddly, it always felt like the world seemed to agree with Ryoka’s mood.
There was a large, brown beetle with a speckled exoskeleton crawling on her toothbrush. Ryoka stared at it for a long time as it crawled over the fine bristles and investigated the insides of her runner’s backpack. It was a fitting start to her morning.
She flicked the beetle off her brush and then tossed it out of the window. Then the Asian girl determinedly spread the foul toothpaste—a blend of sage, salt, pepper and other herbs Octavia mixed up and sold in small jars—and brushed her teeth with her toothbrush.
She took extra-long to brush her teeth just to show the damn beetle what was what. Then Ryoka remembered she hadn’t had breakfast.
“Fuck.”
She made her way downstairs, trying not to scowl that openly. But her mood had followed her. It lived in her mind. It was a blackness creeping in her thoughts.
“Good morning, Ryoka! Would you like some pancakes? They’re hot and we have honey!”
A smiling Lyon
ette greeted Ryoka. The tall girl grunted at her. The little devil sitting on her shoulder made her shake her head. Just to be contrary.
“No pancakes. I’ll have the cinnamon muffins Erin made a few days ago.”
“Oh? Sure! I’ll heat them up. It’ll be a moment. And you want—”
“Milk. Thanks.”
That was the thing about Erin’s inn. Ryoka could order a steak Erin had seared to perfection five days ago and have it fresh and hot in moments. The hot, warm muffins with a side of honey and milk made the clouds around Ryoka lift for a bit. Then Lyonette came back and showed her Apista.
Ryoka recoiled in her chair as she came face to face with two black, fragmented eyes and a massive, furry insect’s head. She backed up and realized it was only massive for a bee. Apista the bee was a bee twice the size of Ryoka’s hand, clinging quietly to Lyonette’s arm and fanning its wings.
“Isn’t she amazing? I have a lesser bond with her, and she listens to everything I say!”
Lyonette beamed as if a bug crawling on her shirt was something to be proud of. Ryoka took one look at the bee and decided to ask Octavia about what kind of poisons she sold. Preferably powders. A nice can of Raid would be acceptable too.
“Okay. Good. Please get it away from me.”
Lyonette did, looking somewhat hurt. However, the sight of the giant bee crawling over her arm was frightening enough at a distance, let alone up close. Ryoka eyed the bee’s stinger.
“It looks like a queen bee. Are you trying to start a hive or something?”
“No—it’s just a pet. I really didn’t want to keep it at first but…it grew on me, you know?”
“I see. Can you take it somewhere else while I eat? I don’t usually share my meals with insects.”
After Apista was gone, Ryoka looked around and found Mrsha was busy harassing Zel Shivertail before he left the inn. He was always in the city doing something. The Gnoll was trying to pin down his tail and having no luck. Zel could lift Mrsha’s entire body up with his muscular tail. For some reason, seeing Mrsha enjoying herself with someone else annoyed Ryoka.
“She’d just annoy you if she was here. Think, idiot.”
Ryoka smacked herself in the head. That was the thing. She could tell when her mood was bad and she did try to account for it. Well, she tried in this world.
But while Ryoka could tell what was coming, she could never realize when the snap was coming, when the bile rose up and came out of her mouth. When Lyonette gave her a muffin sans bee, Ryoka glanced around to look where it had gone. Apista was calmly eating from a bowl on a table, watched warily by some of the regular customers and hungrily by Bird.
That was another thing. Bird was now a permanent fixture in Erin’s inn. He didn’t say much and sat on the roof where the third floor and new wing were slowly being constructed. But there were also several Drakes and Gnolls who had decided Erin’s inn was a good place to have breakfast.
Right now Ryoka didn’t want any company. She unsubtly glared at a Drake who was sitting across from her table, eying the Ashfire Bee queen warily. And meanwhile, Erin had just edged out of the kitchen carrying a pot that was shaking of its own volition. Ryoka stared at it. Lyonette coughed.
“Um, Ryoka? Are you okay?”
“Awesome. Great. What the hell’s in the pot?”
There was something disturbing about Erin. It was that when you got to know her, the innkeeper of the Wandering Inn never did normal things. In any other person, Ryoka might have assumed the small pot with the shaking lid was…something explainable. With Erin, Ryoka immediately suspected the worse.
“It’s a, uh, slime.”
“A what.”
“A slime. Remember when Erin was talking about healing slimes?”
“No.”
As it turned out, Ryoka was one of the few people Erin hadn’t told about her idea to make a slime out of a healing potion. Lyonette told Ryoka how she’d cajoled Typhenous and Octavia into helping her create one.
“And they did it? They went along with that insane idiot’s—just like that?”
“It’s not hard, apparently. It’s just a mana stone and a bit of existing slime. Apparently they can create themselves. Erin made one out of water to see if it would work first.”
“That stupid—Erin!”
Erin came over, beaming and holding the small pot. She opened her mouth.
“Hey Ryoka, guess what—”
“A slime. Why the hell did you do it, Erin?”
The other girl looked put out. She stared at Lyonette, who mimed an apology and scooted away to help Drassi wait the tables. Erin put the pot down on the table and took off the lid. Ryoka had a glimpse of a mostly transparent blob slowly rising from the pot, questing around with part of itself. She slammed the lid down.
“Aw! Ryoka!”
“Are you insane? Why do you think creating a monster is a good idea?”
“It’ll be cool! Lyonette has a pet, so I thought I could get one. Besides, did you hear about my idea to make healing slimes? We could feed it water and mana and get infinite healing potions!”
Ryoka ground her teeth together.
“Erin, no. This is exactly like the Rags situation. And Toren! Haven’t you learned anything from the past?”
At that, Erin’s smile vanished.
“What do you mean? This isn’t—Rags was cool.”
“She started her own tribe and started ambushing travelers on the road, Erin. She nearly killed me the first time I met her.”
“Yeah, but—she’s innocent, Ryoka. And she’s smart. She’s not like Toren at all.”
Ryoka let that go for the moment. She scowled at Erin. This conversation had been a long time coming. Why did it have to be today it happened?
“Toren? We should have talked about him a while ago, Erin. He was a monster and he didn’t listen to Pisces’ spells or your orders. That much is true, but you were also the problem. You never realized he could think, that he had free will, did you? I warned you. Didn’t I tell you about Frankenstein?”
Erin’s smile was long gone at this point. She sat down.
“Yeah. But I didn’t think he could think. He’s undead! He was undead.”
“And that’s a slime. A living thing. How long before it gets upset you’re keeping it in a pot—”
“I was going to build a larger place to keep it!”
“—Keeping it prisoner and trying to harvest it, and decides to kill someone? And what was that about healing potions? You want to do what, lick its body now and then? Scoop out its insides whenever you have a cut? Doesn’t that sound a bit like cruelty?”
Ryoka stared at Erin. The other girl wasn’t prepared for this, but she was now on the defensive. And getting angry.
“Typhenous said that slimes don’t feel pain! Or think, really. Why are you so grumpy today?”
“I’m grumpy because this seems like another mistake that’s going to cause trouble for everyone, that’s why! Typhenous is a [Mage] and an adventurer, Erin. He’d blast a hole in a Goblin’s head as soon as look at one.”
“Yeah, but—he’s still right when he’s right, right?”
The Runner girl didn’t dignify that with a response. Erin scowled at her. She suddenly seized the pot.
“Look, it’s just a slime. It’s not dangerous, it’s small! See?”
She brought it up right to Ryoka’s face so Ryoka could see inside and tilted it to her. Ryoka saw what looked like plain old tap water swirling around in the pot for a moment. Then the fluid inside grew decidedly non-Newtonian and leapt onto her face.
Ryoka screamed. It was like being splashed by water, but without the splash. Suddenly, she was choking as water clung to her face and shoulders, trying to cover her head.
“Mmfh! Getr off!”
“Oh no! Ryoka!”
Erin tried to grab the water, but her hands passed right through the slime. Ryoka felt herself choking—drowning. She staggered back and shook her head. The slime lost whatever g
rip it had and splattered onto the floor. It formed into a blob and was immediately scooped up into Erin’s pot.
“Are you okay, Ryoka?”
Everyone was staring at her. Ryoka swayed. She put one hand up to her mouth as Mrsha ran over, looking distressed.
“I think I swallowed some of it.”
Ryoka felt something squiggling down her throat. She was immediately sick.
—-
Six minutes later Ryoka sat at the same table. The vomit was gone, the slime was in the kitchen with a very heavy rock weighing down the lid, and Erin was sitting across from her. Both girls were angry at this point. Ryoka because she’d nearly been drowned and Erin because of what Ryoka had said to her afterwards.
“You’ve got to get rid of it.”
“You mean, kill it.”
“That’s the general implication, yes.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
Erin hesitated. She looked around—Zel had left, the Gold-rank adventurers were gone, the Horns of Hammerad were in Celum looking to see if there was any work to be had there, and only the objectionable Drake Ryoka had seen this morning was still around. Finding no inspiration, Erin could only shrug.
“I don’t kill things if I can. Duh. Killing’s bad, m’kay?”
She paused and grinned expectantly. Ryoka’s face remained stony. Erin waited, and then grinned again.
“Hey Ryoka, did you get the reference? See, that was a reference to South Park—”
“I got it. If killing’s so bad, why are you feeding and housing a bunch of Gold-rank adventurers? They kill things all the time.”
“Well, those are monsters—”
“Like the fucking slime.”
“That’s different. They kill really bad monsters that are threatening people. Not slimes that accidentally got on someone’s face.”
“Oh? Bad monsters? You mean like Goblins. Like the Goblin Lord’s army, and Rags’ tribe, come to think of it. I suppose they’ll kill all those Goblins and things will be great, won’t they?”
The other girl stared at Ryoka.
“No. No one’s killing Goblins. I put a sign up.”