Camilla, leader of the Elven Grove, former Green Empress and ruler of the four continents, sat down on the simple wooden stool. There was nothing particularly impressive about the piece of furniture, oak-wood carved with rudimentary tools. The Elf Queen felt a twinge of nostalgia at the rudimentary simplicity of it; it brought back memories from before she’d become a ruler, from before thrones and silks were the norm.
Memories that were fuzzy and gnawed out, like a tree that’d been weathered out by the elements. The maiden could scarcely remember the faces of those that had served her then, during those times when she was nothing but anger and ambition.
Truly, the feral curse was a great equalizer, only second to death.
“Why are you here?”
She glanced at the Nightingale slave, the maiden’s eyes full of fire and none of the temperance. The girl twitched as she crossed her arms, bony wings shifting slightly.
Camilla stepped out of her memories to glance at the humble home. An abode as humble as the stool she sat on, devoid of decorations, gold, or silver. There were no jewels within Richard’s abode, the Prince of Sinco, a most amusing paradox.
“To offer assistance, of course.” She answered after a moment to further inspect her surroundings. Many things could be learnt from where a mortal lived. According to the reports, Richard had every opportunity to move somewhere more fortified, certainly more luxurious. Yet he’d remained here, in a house no different to the rest.
A man whose ambitions were not of power but something else.
“I’m not going to let you run the city.” Dia declared.
As if she could run the city.
Camila’s only answer to the claim was a lenient smile. Right now the city was “officially” in the hands of no one.
“If that were my goal, I would’ve approached miss Kiara.”
The person with highest “officially” recognized ranking was the leader of the militia, a thickly-mustachioed human whose authority was entirely dependent on whether the Succubus would seek to remove him or not. Camilla could only fathom that the reason Kiara had yet to do so was out of convenience. Succubi were quite prone to preferring expendable figure-heads and scape-goats than stepping into the limelight. It was one particular feature that had made it somewhat of a headache to deal with them in the games of politics.
“So?” Dia asked after the long silence, impatient to be rid of her.
Perhaps Camilla had been too lost in thought. “I have spent a considerable amount of time commanding armies. The rescue operation you seek to take is… an entirely different scope to the attack on my Grove.” Keeping her tone neutral, she made a point to glance out of the window. “An operation I can assist with.”
“Yeah?” The black haired maiden flashed a smile devoid of any humor. “How?” The question was rhetorical. “Are you going to propose some option-”
“I am going to head there myself.” The Elf Queen cut-off simply, almost airily. Her green gaze lingered on the disbelieving healer before moving onward to the kitchenette near the back. The place was immaculate, clean even when the only ones living here currently were clearly distraught.
“You’re shitting me.” Dia accused after a second. “You have no reason to leave the Grove and put yourself in-”
“The situation has changed.”
Grinding her teeth, the healer crossed her arms. “How?”
“You.” Neither moved, both of them holding the other’s gaze, Camilla savored the silence, reading the impatient young maiden and waiting for another few seconds before she elaborated. “Your ascension into a Nightingale means my life would be far less at risk during this operation.”
The feline huntress had apparently ascended into a Sabertooth shortly after bonding with him. Evangeline’s ascension into a Vampire had also occurred within mere months of bonding with him. There were also all those Mousegirls and Doggirls that had ascended by mere contact of the bond with him. And if Camilla’s estimations weren’t wrong, then the Succubus herself would see ascension within the next decade or two.
She’d long since learned that coincidences like these were not ones to be ignored. Richard’s value to the grove only kept rising, and the Elf Queen was not in a position she could ignore such a potential asset. That… and she might find it amusing to watch the human growing out of the confines of such a tiny little walled village.
Maybe a little endearing as well.
“What makes you think I’d heal you?”
A fair question, but one not worth answering. They both knew the slave was a slave, and as such Dia would not kill a potential source of aid without good reason. There was also not a shadow of a doubt that the Nightingale would cut Camilla’s throat if she ever suspected a potential betrayal, but that, too, didn’t need to be said out loud.
“One of my scouts has been following the Tigress-clan’s tracks.” The statement was true, but she’d sent eight of her ghosts to do this task, to prepare the way ahead. That, however, was information the healer had no need to know, and information that she could not keep hidden from a skilled telepath.
Richard had mentioned an unknown “player” in the political events that had unfolded these past few months. Though Camilla lacked any context or proof to validate the claim, she’d seen the human’s instincts being far sharper than they had any right to be.
“According to her reports, they are currently struggling to cross through what the locals call ‘Watchers.’ Monica’s perverse little… stunt, has proven a crippling blow to their capacity to sneak about the place.”
The “Watchers” were, as far as Camilla knew, a string of tiny fortresses and walls surrounding the swamplands on the south-western edge of the kingdom. Each of them was a pantomime of an actual fortress, barely more than a hut for four that’d been over-designed and over-reinforced. The walls were equally metaphorical, detection spells with little to no actual infrastructure to back it up.
Apparently, the ferals made building actual fortifications too costly to maintain for little-to-no effectiveness in blocking passage.
Theirs was the job to warn the kingdom of an approaching invasion, a warning the kingdom would, supposedly, take seriously. But by all accounts, it appeared that both the Vampires and Tigress clans had found ways around their surveillance, or at least, ways to do so as long as their numbers were small enough.
“I’m listening.” Dia folded her hands on her lap, staring at the Elf Queen with severity. “What do you propose?”
It did not go unnoticed how the healer had reframed the proposal. “Preparing the city so that it may survive without the Orc tribe is… commendable, but it wastes days that you cannot afford.”
“We’d be outnumbered.” Dia shot back without missing a beat. “We have no one familiar with the marshlands, and only Monica could hope to hide from them. They’d spot us days before we even got the chance to do anything. They could just run off, lead us into some trap.”
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The Elf Queen nodded in acknowledgement. “A wise choice in your current circumstances.” Indeed, taking as many Orcs as possible would be the best option from the slave’s perspective. “But the circumstances have changed.”
“How’s that?”
“I am here.”
The healer’s lips drew thin. “You want me to heal you.”
Camilla chuckled lightly, amused. “I wouldn’t expect you to tolerate my presence in the operation without me being at my best.” The deep sleep still lingered in her joints, in her heart, throughout her whole body. It was a minor annoyance she wouldn’t have minded, only having to put up with it for the next months, but if the healer was offering, she wouldn’t turn it down.
“You seem to be placing a lot of trust that I won’t leave some trap in your body.” Dia countered.
“I trust you understand the importance of retrieving Richard before they have the opportunity to reach the heartland of their clan. At that point, I would presume the task to become a war not just against this specific clan but all of them.” Camilla kept her air of regality as she folded her hands over her knees. “You have the means available to capitalize on this very narrow window of opportunity before it closes. The Centaurs from the Darktons might not be trust-worthy, but all you’d need them for is to travel to the edge of the plains. The Darkton nobles are also equally not trustworthy, but any one of their nobles should make it possible for us to pass the Watchers unperturbed. Me and mine? You do not trust me, but my presence would be necessary to make traversal through the marshland undetected possible.”
It was also exactly the sort of thing the healer wanted. It was not hard to see how desperate everyone was to regain their lost Lord. An understandable feeling, and a sound choice all the same.
“And to do that, you want me to heal you.” Dia’s brows furrowed, crossing her arms. “If that’s the case, you can tell me about Nightingales.”
The Queen laughed. That’s right. She’d turned down the slave back during their first encounter, hadn’t she? With amusement, she rocked a little back and forth on the stool. “Very well, I will speak of the great deeds of Nightingales long deceased. Whether or not you glean anything from this, and whether you ever become capable of replicating such feats… is up to you.”
This would certainly be amusing to watch.
Why, Camilla had met her fair share of healers who would’ve been supremely annoyed at the thought of a willing slave somehow managing to surpass them given the opportunity.
And yet, none of them had ascended to their final form as early as Dia had.
The pang brought about from a sense of long-lost friendships, of people whose only persisting proof of existence was a single name within her mind. It was a familiar feeling, one that made it all too easy to become lost in thought.
But Camilla pushed it aside, focusing on what was to come.
Her subjects still slumbered, and if she was to guarantee a future for them, then angering a few ghosts of the past would be a small price indeed.
“Deal.” The smile on the healer’s lips was all teeth and no warmth. “Fair warning, this will hurt.”
“I’d expect nothing less of a fleshcrafter doing a thorough job quickly.”
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She stepped out of the tiny little home that was Richard’s abode after their little mutual session had come to its conclusion. Even though her whole body felt as if it were a knotted elm about to splinter under a storm, she held herself high. The Elf Queen kept any and all signs of pain or discomfort hidden.
Slowly but surely she marched onwards towards the gates. Her ghosts moved alongside her, discreetly traversing through the nearby streets. Others were perched further away but no less within easy reach. Each and every one of them was no more than a thought away from dealing with any target.
The healer was already at work.
Already, orders were traveling quickly through the walled village. The militia and the tribe began to move, making the preparations that were sure to be completed before nightfall. A bit too rushed for her tastes, but the Elf Queen had no complaints to give. Though the healing had left her weakened, she expected to have fully recovered by the time they reached the so-called “Deadlands.”
Camilla would’ve preferred not exposing herself to the mortal crowds in such a way, but in the end, it was necessary. It was important that Richard’s subjects saw the alliance to her in a positive light. A hard sell, she suspected, but one that she had all the time to nurture.
As she reached the city gates, she began making her way towards the maiden who’d be left in charge of Sinco once everyone else had left.
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“Oh God, it’s you.” The Succubus openly glared from the front porch of the little rustic house secreted away from anyone accidentally seeing it. “Forgive me, I don’t have any tea available.”
Camilla jostled a little. “That is rather rude of you.”
“I can put-up with giving mortals some fake kindness; they’ll be dead in fifty years tops. You? We might end up needing to tolerate one another for a lot longer than that. I don't plan to keep my opinions to myself that long.” Kiara crossed her arms. “What do you want?”
The Elf Queen raised an amused eyebrow. “I see that Richard has rubbed off on you since last we spoke.”
“You killed me.” The maiden’s voice wavered ever so minutely.
“Only a little. You know how it is in these games.” She eyed the maiden for a moment, gauging the power currently floating and shifting around the Succubus. It was as if watching a tapestry that flowed in and out of reach, liquid in all forms, devoid of any hesitation or stiffness.
It was begrudgingly that Camilla admitted to herself that, of the two of them, the Succubus had better control over her elemental energy. The level of mastery was, in a way, fascinating… yet not the reason why she’d come.
“Before we head out, I need to know more about Evangeline, the Vampire.”
Suspicion flashed across Kiara’s features. “Why?”
For a brief moment, Camilla considered the prospect of withholding details from her answer, but this time it was not something worth risking. A mortal blaming her for lack of honesty was a problem that could be solved by merely waiting. But Kiara was ageless, and she could very well end up being the one carrying forward Richard’s legacy. Why give up on a carefully cultivated base of power otherwise?
That is, if the Vampire was not part of the picture.
“She knows how bond-collars are made. The knowledge itself is of no interest to me, as they are useless to awaken my sisters and subjects.” Her face hardened. “However, it’s to my understanding there are powerful factions who would burn everything for the sake of keeping those designs from spreading far and wide. At least, I wish to verify this, seeing how you hold far more knowledge of the broader world.”
The Succubus’ gaze narrowed. “You want to know whether her death would be the better outcome.”
“I would not discard the possibility.” She neither confirmed nor denied.
With a heavy sigh, Kiara looked away. “I will blame you if she dies.”
Had Camilla been walking, she might have stumbled over such a claim. “What?” she said, unable to hold back the surprise.
“If that little blood-sucking runt dies, I am going to blame you. No matter how she dies, I will do everything in my power to blame you.” The Succubus replied coldly. “And I will make sure Rick knows it was you.”
The Elf Queen stared blankly at the maiden, unable to believe Kiara was being serious.
“I’ve traveled plenty, Empress of Green, and I’ve gathered many stories of your exploits.” The Succubus’ jaw set. “If you’re even half as powerful as the myths claim, snatching her out of the Vampire’s grip should be easy. And I will make this clear to Rick too.”
“Let us assume you speak the truth.” Camilla’s voice lowered to a whisper, the very ground began to shake underneath. The grass and the trees rattled, shifting against invisible chaotic winds. The very hut behind Kiara groaned and creaked, the wood bulging out and bending under her anger. “Would that not make your threats a poor choice of words?”
For a moment, the Succubus paled, all too aware that for all her skills, she was too weakened to be able to fight back. And yet she did not buckle, merely raising her chin to look at Camilla with even more determination. “Only if you choose to make it the worst mistake of your new life.” Leaning back, she made a dismissive gesture. “Be on your way, Greenie. Wouldn’t want to miss your ride.”
Mouth agape, words failed her entirely. The ghosts, ever professional, sent a discreet request of confirmation whether to engage or not. And yet Camilla noticed the slightest most minute note of humor within their message.
Worst, the amusement in Kiara’s face was all she needed to know the Succubus had caught that flicker of emotion within the Elf Queen.
“We… will continue this upon my return.”
“Make sure to fetch prince charming soon.” She waved at the retreating ancient maiden. “I taught him well, the longer you take, the likelier it is he’ll have fucked the clans into joining us or something, and I’m not fond of hairballs.”
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Rick sneezed. His gaze turned eastward, sensing… something stirring out there.
Shivering a little, he curled up, munching on the bit of meat that had been left for him by Throag. The Sabertooth lay on her side, asleep, her tail wrapped around his ankle like an iron shackle.
Though aware he could not kill her even if he caught her by surprise while asleep, his gaze kept returning to her collared throat.
For now… all he could do was wait and think… and look for an opportunity.