As we enter through the saloon-door front of the inn, the sight is mostly identical to earlier this morning. There are many more people seated about the insides of the tavern area however. Teuila flips back the hood of her fur poncho, and shakes out some of the rain droplets. Hm, the fur lining in her poncho really does help her blend in with humans. Eventually that’ll probably come in handy. Realizing I’d be trailing water everywhere if I don’t follow suit, I do the same with my hooded cloak as we approach Keeley at the bar.

Keeley’s immediate response upon seeing us is to ask Teuila, “Where’s your little braddah from earlier? Who’s this now? They staying in the same room? You’ve got the price on you instead of them?”

Wait, what’s Keeley on about? Oh, oh! She doesn’t recognize me! That’s fortuitous, I have a chance for a new start. I can make a fresh first impression!

Teuila grins slyly as she taps her nose, as if confiding a great secret, “This is that little braddah from earlier. Not braddah, not wahine, just mine, my great, changeable, shiftable, rearrangeable dork.”

I slump, defeated. I almost want to laugh. I ruined my first impression on Keeley earlier, and now I’m stuck with that one. My first impression on Sugar and Spice was stolen by my inner circle a long time ago too. I scarred several other beavers for life. Luna almost killed me and Lil when we first met, and well, when we second met as well. I ruined my first impression on Linti all on my own. I brutalized my first impression on Priscilla out of necessity. I have terrible, terrible luck with first impressions.

Keeley glares suspiciously between Teuila, and my slumped-shouldered form. She tilts her head to one side. Maybe if I’m lucky, she won’t believe Teuila, but then Teuila might be on her bad side instead. I don’t want that either. Ugh. I’d better just admit it, before she starts to dislike Teuila.

Nodding, I state, “Yes, sorry, it’s me. I’m not trying to trick you. I’m stuck like this for a little bit. If you need proof, I will bleed a lot, so we’d better do it outside.”

Keeley responds, “You’ll what? No, never mind. If you’ve still the payment, I don’t even want to know. The clients keep getting weirder every year, ever since that wild woman who wanted passage to the isles for that archery tourney.”

Wait, wait, wait wait wait. Wild woman? Archery tournament? Did, did Lil say something? Ugh, I can’t remember. There was a thing, a thought. Why are the memories that I want to dig up, so much harder to focus on than the random things that pop into my head? Maybe I’m just making stuff up at this point. I’m not even certain anymore.

I lean sideways to nuzzle Teuila for comfort, forgetting where I am for a moment. Keeley glowers at me dubiously, and I facepalm for forgetting that we’re in the middle of a transaction. I fish out some of the gems, since Keeley already knows about our wealth. We’re not going to be able to haul this massive backpack around with us when we explore the Colossi peninsula, so I try to hint that we’d like the room for a couple of weeks bare minimum. Hopefully we can use it as a safe place to store things.

Keeley inspects the gems again, trying to determine their legitimacy I suppose. I have no reason to swindle anyone, but I’m happy to patiently wait for others to determine the worth and value of any wealth that I possess. Mostly since, on my world, wealth was just something we sort of accumulated magically from doing what we were going to have to do anyway. For a long time, we didn’t even know how to spend it, until Spice and I accidentally invented magic shops. Regardless, the wealth is essentially worthless to me, so I want people to evaluate its worth to them. Maybe if they said it was all as worthless to them as it is to me, I might be a bit put out, or lost. We’re going to need money to operate on Rayileklia. Thankfully it’s going alright for us so far.

Keeley nods as she pockets the gems discretely, handing us a key. As Keeley turns her back to walk away, my danger wraps’ tactile senses indicate a large person is moving closer to Teuila, reaching for her. Ugh, not this again. I turn just in time to see a long-faced man with a shaggy mop of sweat-matted hair, in an open trench coat, clad in a scruffy well-worn sweater, and a pair of breeches that aren’t sure if they want to stay rolled at the cuff, or fall to his shoddy boots.

As his hand connects with Teuila’s shoulder, he slovenly, drunkenly asks, “Hic, hey cutie, what’s your, hic, sign?”

Teuila’s face adopts a sneer that spells danger for this man as she replies, “Trespassers beware. Executed on sight.”

I gulp down a laugh and cough a snort through my nose for my troubles. That’s even more creative than stop sign. I suppose a stop sign wouldn’t be relevant on Can’Z’aas or Rayileklia though. The long faced man draws his hand back, not out of fear, but to scratch his chin in puzzlement and confusion. Teuila rolls her eyes and drags me up the stairs to the room number engraved on the key.

Oh boy. We’re literally the first room at the top of the stairs. Keeley really will be able to keep an eye on us. There’s even a vent that looks down into the kitchen, probably to keep the room warm in whatever passes for winter months on Rayileklia. Teuila scowls for a bit, stomping around the room after she locks the door behind us. She peers around conspiratorially before bursting into laughter. I guess she was trying to keep up the angered act for the patrons downstairs, but found the situation too funny to hold in. That man has no idea how lucky he is that Teuila is in such a good mood after meeting Tiago, and getting to go clothes-shopping. She starts stripping and throwing clothing atop the giant backpack, setting it landing in place with unerring accuracy.

Teuila, standing next to me in her bare glory suddenly looks surprised as she exclaims, “Oh! Oh I get to shop for jammies or nighties tomorrow! Humans wouldn’t understand this.” She motions to herself imitating an exaggerated hourglass, though she’s not that curvy, and continues, “Plus, on this planet, this is only for you.” She pantomimes the hourglass around herself again. She then mumbles, “And maybe dragbutt.”

I smile towards her, momentarily glad that she’s not able to ride my thought waves, because I’m fighting laughter. Not exactly at her, more that she was so animated and exaggerative with her motions. I don’t want her to be self-conscious about her less curvy curves than Luni. Lords Teuila is so gorgeous, her muscle is so supple, her form is so lithe, I could probably spend all day just admiring each of her features. I actually have, several hundred days over the course of our lifetimes actually. In idyll thinkspace anyway. Yeah, phew, gods Teuila is so lovely, I can’t tear my eyes from her as she saunters and sashays about the room, checking out each of its features. And now that she’s drawn my attention to her taut yet supple curves, oy vey. I turn away to quickly fan myself momentarily before Teuila catches on.

I suppose I should also purchase some undergarments when we’re next out. I’m mostly happy with the Valkyrie under-armor padding, but I’d likely enjoy something more intended for bed rather than combat. I’m also plenty happy to spend a short while shopping with Teuila. It seems to make her happy, and it’s sort of fun in and of itself.

I join Teuila in stripping down. Just as I’m finished neatly piling away my clothing, there’s a knock at the door. I roll my eyes and sigh. What are the odds? Teuila giggles at my eyeroll. I slip the padded legging under-armor back on, and answer the door as Teuila snuggles under the quilted comforter or duvet or whatever it’s called. I open the door to find Keeley placing two bowls of stew, adorned with large hunks of bread, on the floor outside the door.

As Keeley stands, her eyes take me in and she averts her gaze suddenly as they pass up my torso. Oh, crap, right. I look slightly femme in this form, and we don’t even have, ugh. How did I forget nipples exist? I mean, I guess I’ve never seen one in this life, well, definitely not this life, possibly even my Can’Z’aasian life. Or maybe some male human dockworkers and some of the crew of the Undine may have gone shirtless. Hm, was it Undyne or Undine? I’d heard the crew refer to it both ways. Regardless, my exposure to them is far lower than any human, since I don’t have them. None of us critterkin have them. I hold my right arm across my pectoral region temporarily out of embarrassment.

While facing away, Keeley growls, “I’ll expect you to remain decent if you leave your room or open the door again. I’ve enough trouble with the rowdy ones. Don’t need any of them thinking you’re inviting them. Go on, git, close up. Marshal will come to take the overnight shift, but don’t think I won’t ‘ave him keep an eye on you two as well. Make sure you put the lid on your chamberpot when you take it out. And don’t leave it stinking up the room for an entire day.”

I snag the two bowls of piping hot stew and skitter back inside, closing and locking the door behind me, my heart hammering in apprehension. That woman is going to utterly hate me by the time we leave this town. Ugh. I wonder if I should have told her we don’t use chamberpots, or any sort of restroom activity. Teuila is snickering from beneath the covers after hearing what Keeley growled at me. I can hear Keeley mutter something about oddities as she tromps back down to her bar. Te pops her head out from the covers, sniffing the air in a vaguely feral fashion. It’s rather adorable.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Teuila reaches towards me without moving, and makes a grabby hands motion, ordering, “Gimme gimme! That smells great! I thought I smelled something baking from the vents. Didn’t catch the stew though, weird. Mm that bread looks fresh.”

I approach Teuila agonizingly slowly to tease her for being so bossy. She pouts up at me and I nearly crack at her beautiful eyes going all wide and shiny. Her pouting distraction also causes me to nearly trip over her boots that are placed next to the backpack. Teuila’s at my front in an instant, lightning fast, keeping me propped up. We stand chest to chest for only a moment, with her grinning maniacally at me. She slugs me playfully in the shoulder as she grabs for one of the bowls of stew. She then grins wide with glee as she sits on the floor against the bed to begin tearing into the bread and gulping down the stew.

Hm, we don’t have utensils. I wonder if it’s worth investing in like, a spork or something. I suppose we could whittle one. For now, I’ll do like Teuila, and use the bread to shovel the stew from the bowl into my mouth. Neither of us are used to mastication or consumption, so we don’t really have any table manners to speak of. Most of our lives were spent just placing food in front of our faces, and it disappearing while satisfying our stomachs.

Okay, I mean, most of our lives sounds weird. The meal times of significant portions of our life were essentially never more than a few seconds, each, due to their digital nature, where food just disappeared and we felt full again. We didn’t sit around shoving digital food down our gullets for incredible quantities of time. Ugh, why am I dissecting my own mental semantics. Ugh, me, you’re such a bonehead sometimes. Or maybe just crazy, I don’t know. Who knows? The sh— wait. Yawn. Oops. My eyes had already been growing heavy from being awake for a day and a half, but now that we’re consuming our first real meal since Daffodil’s place, I’m all that much sleepier.

Teuila finishes first, and looks around for something. Ah, there’s a pitcher of water and a small washing bowl on a table. This really is a high quality room. She gulps down some of the water from the pitcher, and contemplates pouring some of it into the washing bowl. Instead she rubs her fingers across her hips, cleaning them and probably making her fur slightly gunky in the process. I really took having that soap stone for granted. One might think staves that conjure thunder and lightning, or daggers that never dull are incredibly powerful magic, but a simple stone that degrimed and cleaned everything on a person or object at a single touch, now that is a phenomenal enchantment. We’ve never even really practiced actual hygiene, just magic or digital hygiene. Teuila rubs her athletically toned abdomen to comfort her tummy and lets loose a soft burp before nodding approvingly. She then climbs back into the bed and yawns, stretching out to take up as much of the bed as possible. I grin at the obvious invitation to cuddle.

As I finish, I mirror basically everything Teuila had just done. Once I’m ready, I join her under the covers, laying on top of one of her arms and legs, since she was hogging the whole bed. Teuila giggles and hoists me closer suddenly. She snuggles up close as we lay chest to chest, legs now intertwined. We nuzzle our noses into each other’s necks, and I can tell I’ll be asleep rather shortly. I try to push off of Teuila playfully so that we can sleep in comfortable positions, but even as I’m raising away from her, I keel over back into her waiting arms, falling asleep in the span of a scant few inches.

Taylynn needles me again, “So, come on, out with it. We’ve been meeting for years, and you’re still pessimistic. I know you haven’t found a way in to his stronghold yet, but that can’t be all you think about. You don’t seem so keen on this life, especially the jobs you’re taking on lately, it’s almost like you have a death wish. What about the next one?”

She knows it has all been one long job, slaughtering my way through the emperor’s lieutenants until I can piece together a way into his sanctum, or heck, to even just discern its true location. I feel like I’m no closer to its entrance than when I started though. Apparently I’d been acting on a false rumor of a lead back at the beginning. It set me back nearly a year following that information.

I play dumb, “The next what?”

Taylynn, undaunted, continues, “The next life, if there is one. What would you want out of it?”

I struggle to find an answer internally for some time. When it comes to me, it’s fairly simple, "Next go-around, I'd like a childhood, and a famliy. Though, I guess I don't want a normal childhood, I want to have about as much knowledge as I do now. I don't need the memories, just the knowledge. Hell, I’d prefer without the memories. Maybe then, I could have some semblance of innocence. I want that childhood somewhere far from people and their politics, and I want some sort of power preventing the Celestial Emperor from reaching into the next life to snuff me out. I wouldn’t mind meeting you again, or Selunie. Earlier in my lifetime, or if I’m really lucky, our lifetimes, perhaps."

Taylynn edges closer, her nose touches mine. Her breath warm against my lips, she asks, “Oh, have you grown sweet on us now?”

I smirk in response, causing my lips to brush hers fleetingly, she can’t possibly think otherwise, “I’ve returned to this inn after several harrowing segments of this job, and at least one of the two of you have welcomed me at every turn in the journey. As cold and lonely as I thought my life was, yes, I suppose I have. What do you even get up to between-times? I’ve asked about you each time, and never gotten a straight answer.”

Taylynn plays coy, “Oh a little of this, a little of that.” Her smirk is undeniably delicious, frustrating as she may be. I can’t help drinking in her features momentarily.

Now it’s my turn to have none of it, undaunted, I request, “Come off it, spill.”

She giggles as she exclaims, “That’s what she said! Hehe.”

I give her a droll look accompanied by a partial eye-roll in response to her statement. Taylynn dances nimbly away, twirling and tossing equipment into their proper places with unerring accuracy before continuing, “Okay okay, enough with the dirty looks old friend, fine.” She enunciates old extra clearly, teasing me for going on a century in age. She manages to swap from blouse to nightgown in the blink of an eye. Her speed and grace are unmatched by any I’d ever seen.

Taylynn looks me up and down, her gaze is licentious in nature, and I nearly react in modesty, but I’m still clothed. She walks back her tease, “Maybe not so old, at least in all the ways that count. But yes, fine. I took up archery this last time, rather, I trained day and night for a month a few segments back. This last time, I won first place in a small tourney in a kingdom on one of the isles out of the reach of the Celestial Emperor. The time before that, I took up jousting. I wasn’t first in any of the tourneys though. If I could wield a lance and move that fast without the horse’s aid, I’m sure I’d have done better.”

I snort at the idea of her running along the ground wielding a lance, as fast as a ridden-horse, “If you could move as fast as a horse, you wouldn’t need your family’s money or horses for your travels.”

Taylynn intertwines her fingers, and splays them as she stretches her arms, palms forward. Her neck angles towards her right shoulder, it’s one of her braggart stances, “Selunie joked much the same. Joke’s on the both of you. I win enough that I don’t rely on my family to finance my travels.”

I smirk, and begin to tease, “Handy, that. Sel and I having the same sense of humor always catches me off guard though.”

Taylynn interrupts my thought before I can continue on to the idea of teasing her about her winnings as she chides, “She hates when you call her that. She says it sounds like —“

I interrupt, chiming in in time with Taylynn, “A transaction, I know. When she asks me to call her ‘Lunie though my tongue always wants to fumble and say Luna or Lunar instead.”

Tay smirks cruelly before giggling, her reply goes over the top, “Never really found your tongue to be one that fumbles.”

Flustered at her latest tease, I return to the previous topic of her winnings, turning the tease back on her, “Anyway, congrats on your wins. You’re quite the lady. A skilled, self-sufficient princessora who maintains her marvelous appearance and rides willy nilly across the land seeking adventure, contest, and sport? You’ll make someone incredibly happy some day.”

She tries to catch me off guard in response, “Who’s to say I haven’t already?”

I play dumb once again, “Oh? Do I know the mister or misses?”

Bitingly, Taylynn teases in reply, “You’re such a clod. Are you not incredibly happy during our times together?”

I bite back, teasing more sharply than I intend to, “I meant marriage you harpy.”

Hints of anger work their way into the tone of her voice as she defensively calls me out, “Easy there, Killer.” She only uses that nickname in that tone of voice when she’s annoyed. It stings, since my entire life is killing. When she’s sure I won’t interrupt her, she continues “Why marry? To pay credence to some religion? To establish some sort of internal laws a pair,” under her breath she mutters, “or more,” thinking I won’t hear it, then continues, “of individuals couldn’t just work out amongst themselves?”

I gnaw on my tongue and the inside of my lower lip as I contemplate, “I suppose I’d never thought of it. You nearly never open up, in all the years I’ve known you. You almost never talk about yourself or your feelings, let alone on subjects like that, emotional ones. I feel like I barely know anything about you besides your, well, body frankly. Wonderful though it is. I’m not saying we should marry either. Not that I’ve ever sought marriage, I just assumed I was alone in not desiring it.”

Taylynn, still worked up, her ire drawn across her face making it all sharp angles and scowl lines, prods me further, “And what, you thought I did desire it because I’m a woman?”

Now I’m worked up, she knows that gender is a touchy subject, “Shove off, not because you’re a woman, I just said I thought I was alone in not desiring it, I assumed everyone else on our forsaken little planet did.”

Realizing she hit a low blow, her expression softens as she apologizes, “Alright, alright, sorry.” She pauses, her expression turns to one of love, “That wasn’t fair of me. I know that you’re unsure of, well, you know. Also, you’ve never treated the fairer sex with any less dignity than the other.”

She’s quite capable at everything, including backpedaling and recovery, I give in and laugh as I respond, “Snrk, and which is which, oh ravishing one?”

She expertly leaps to the mattress, twisting midair to land on her rear. Once she’s landed, she pats the bed next to her, “How about we retire for the night, and you tell me your guess in the morning?”