Vinyal embraces his cousin Lesyal. „Thank you for getting me on a real mission. How did you manage?“ Lesyal asks. „I pointed out that I am better at long term planning than they.“ he answers. She responds „You mean that you lied by omission.“. He shrugs „Did you tell anybody about the rings?“. Her ears flutter. „Get the rings out.“ he says. „Now? Why not wait for them to leave?“ she responds in a surprised voice. „Two reasons. First that is what everybody is expecting and second they are hiding something. Sending a pregnant peasant and an infant to watch us makes no sense.“ he answers. „She is a decoy. And I doubt that they have managed to pull off capturing a power source.“ she agrees.

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Hildegard is looking at me with questions in her eyes. „No, I did not arrange for us to be alone.“ I state. „But sending Branislava makes no sense“ she challenges me. „Precisely therefore I sent her.“ I respond. „You want to trick them. That won’t work for long.“ she answers. I respond „It does not need to. They’ll leave in a few minutes.“

Vinyal breaks out in a grin. He knew it. Yet he hasn’t learned their deeper reason. Will they do him the favor? Probably not. The woman does not care and their leader is feeling no need to rehash plans. Patience is called for.

I raise my hands and say „But I understand that we need to talk. Yet please understand that I have no idea about your background.“ She gets up and paces „Unwed mothers are not exactly welcomed in my circles.“. She lifts her hands in a gesture to quell any response and goes on „I realize that Ragnarök makes the question almost moot. And I don’t doubt that you are ready and capable of providing for our children. But I am not our children. I need a future!“

I am grateful to her for giving me time to think this through, although I can see her hands moving impatiently. I slowly speak „You’ll have to tell me what future you want. If I understood correctly, you were to become a duchess by marriage. First let me tell you, that you are not just a mother to me. I would lie if I were to say that I did not enjoy what we did.“. She blushes and lowers her head. This woman is brave, but seriously prone to blushing. I should not reduce her to that. So I continue „I am not an aristocrat. What did the man intended to be your husband mean to you?“

She draws a deep breath „He was attractive. A literal knight in shining armor. I loved … the idea of him. And I liked the idea of leaving home a lot.“. She lifts her head and stares at me.

I don’t know what she wants to hear, so I need to get at the truth. „Well, you have left home. And I guess he does not matter. I am relieved.“. She interrupts me „Yes. Could you say something that is not obvious?“

I lift my hands in defense and say „We need to come back to the core question. What do you want?“

Lesyal needs to control herself to not snort in derision. This female monkey wants to be given a future. Given! As if she were to be paid to breed. But why does he ask? Her aura is clear. She has no well of mana to speak of. From her attitude she is aware that he could order her around. Is it just convinience? Or does he just want a temporary fix?

His aura is – to her considerable surprise – unshrouded. That well is impressive. He does have some basic wards. He must be feeling very secure. Well, he is in a room with an Atlantean power supply. That speaks for itself.

„I don’t want to spend the next twenty years raising children until I am old and gray! That experience of facing death has changed me. I used to think running a household would be enough. Now it seems empty. Small.“ she says in a voice straining to not become loud and then turning quiet. „Very well, then you shall not become old and gray. I will make you ageless. It will take a few months to put a set of spells for that into an enchantment. You at least know what you don’t want. For now that is good enough.“

I hear a little squeak. Then she asks „What?“. I approach her and say „Hildegard, you are nineteen. You don’t need to know what to do with your life. That is why old people have a system for telling young people what they are to do. Somenody has taken that and your old future away from you. I cannot give it back to you. I don’t want anybody to pay for my new life with their future.“

She stares at me. I continue „Frankly, most people don’t know what they want. They are just extremely sure of what they do not want. It isn’t bad. Neither do I know what I want. Not really. Swimming in a tropical lagoon’s warm waters under palm trees is nice for a decade or so, but eventually it would get boring. Maybe it is watching children grow up. I know what I cannot do. I cannot pick between my children or their mothers.“

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Lesyal undergoes a tiny lapse in control. This is outrageous. Immortality! On second thought, he may be bullshitting this woman. But then again, why bother? He could have promised her to conquer a few castles. That would even be easier to believe.

But then, he knows of the tropics and palm trees. They are using a northern language to talk to one another. He is not local.

Her voice is growing dangerously still as she says „You presume to know what I want?“. I sense danger „No. Defintely not. I dare say that I don’t know what either of us wants. I am looking for a way to avoid needing to know.“.

Somebody knocks and opens the door. Just in time I am being saved. Melo announces „They are ready to leave. You better get ready to come out and face the … remaing elves.“. She barely avoided saying hostages. She looks puzzled and inhales deeply. Then she says „Have you been doing sports?“

I freeze and then yell „Get out! Close the door behind you and hold it shut!“. Hildegard reacts quickly and grabs her crossbow and starts ratcheting. I make a spear, draw my sword, ramp up my wards and go to full mage sight, disregarding the distraction the power source causes. Nothing. The power source is hard to look at. I induce a swirling motion in the air of the room. Nothing inexplicable. I induce a separation of charges between floor and ceiling. Careful. I don’t want to have indoor lightning. But still nothing. Hildegard is moving to take cover behind the power source. I have to stop that „No! Don’t touch it! It is perfectly safe to be in the same room with it, but I haven’t fully understood the fluff in the outer layer beside the radiation absorption stuff. I have no idea what happens if you touch or damage it.“. She retreats and shelters behind my cot.

Organics in the air? Nothing. Am I jumping to conclusions? I experimentally throw a small lightning bolt grounding out in a pipe through the room. I hesitate. This is useless. I cannot risk damaging the power source and I have just told them so. They know where to shelter.

Vinyal is crouching next to his cousin. It looks like they are safe next to the power source. Unless he gets the idea to send his … concubine to look for them, whom he seeks to shelter, they could just stay here until he convinces himself that he was mistaken.

Am I imagining things? If they are in here they are using some kind of hiding magic. It is removing all their emissions and is masking their presence. What can I use? My mind is racing. How did Melo find an oddity? Carbon dioxide? No, that is normal. Oxygen then. There I have them. Two pockets of lowered oxygen concentration. Their magic is removing what they exhale, but it does not replenish the oxygen they consume. Now what?

Lesyal is close to wetting her underwear. This is wierdly exciting. Dark Elves have no body hair except in strategic places. Otherwise hers would have stood up. Other body parts are sharpened to hard points. Their leader is a weather sorcerer. He does not use enchanted equipment. She looks at her cousin. His presence is comforting. He is signalling patience. She does agree.

The foreign wizard does understand a part of the power source. Does he understand what he has told them? Do they need to strike? Vinyal seems to understand her silent question. He signals a negative answer.

This needs to end. I cannot let this lead to a carnage. We have enough problems. I’ll not add a war with a clan of Dark Elves to it. If I have to shower them in aluminium to shut them up, I will. I sheathe my sword. Then I carefully rotate my spear with the butt end to the front and point to the intruders. „I can detect you. I presume that you are driven by curiosity. I also have questions. Nobody has been hurt. There is no need for violence. My highest priority now is the safety of my crew. We have survived a confrontation with an Atlantean. I am not going to risk that in a confrontation with your clan. We have won. I am not going to put that in peril. Show yourselves.“

Lesyal is impressed. That guy is clever. He has understood that he told a potential intruder where to hide. He is trying to spook them. Her cousin is signalling agreement.

I walk to my cot, hand Hildegard the spear and pick up a cushion. My throw is not forceful or elegant, but it stops in the middle of the air. An elf holding my cushion shimmers into visibility. „Usually people do not throw pieces of their bedding at me.“ he says. „Do you often sneak into bedrooms while invisible?“ I respond. He says „Nope. I sneak into them reasonably often. But I restrict that to ladies and I am visible, though possibky camouflaged.“.

This guy is trained in negotiations. Yet I cannot help myself. I need to laugh.