Indigo reflected back at Omid from behind glass, and as he stared it down indigo stared back at him from just at the edge of his vision.

‘Beautiful, isn’t it?” Sareen asked with bright eyes focused on Omid with a bright smile to match.

Omid’s teeth grit together by the tiniest amount as he remembered literally everything about the indigo flower that seemed as though it had laid at the heart of everything.

“I wouldn’t be here without it.” Omid said with the smallest of smiles that had him wincing and wondering what exactly this had to do with their grand plan.

“You might be!” There came the teeth in the smile that made it look just slightly adjacent to only happiness. “You have proven yourself quite adept at surprising me!”

Omid looked over at her with a raised brow. “That was not a reassurance that all would still be well had it not been for one particular event.”

“And do you really want that assurance of mundanity?” That oh so dangerous smile remained, and Omid returned it with a much weaker smile. Which wasn’t saying much considering the power of Sareen’s smiles in all their forms.

The young man looked back at the flower after peeling his eyes away from Sareen. “We stopped here first. I know for a fact that that was not due to simple pragmatism of proximity. So I shall assume that this is...foundational to our plans?”

The Kirzallan answered with a growing grin and sparkling indigo mirrors that Omid caught his reflection in, seeing his own small smile and dark eyes staring back at him. She finally answered after a held gaze. “As a demonstration of power, I will require this individual’s presence at the war party. I need you to fetch them from Kir.”

A momentary flash of shock immediately fell into a questionable idea as Omid answered. “Where on Kir?”

“So bold!” Sareen put a hand to Omid’s face, tracing a finger along Omid’s jawline through a beard Omid really wanted to see about grooming into something more presentable. “You would know the mountains as those that we journeyed to. Much further in, but for one such as yourself it should be no problem at all.”

“When do I set out?” Omid asked as he kept formulating this plan that was liable to fall apart any moment now.

“Several days from now. I don’t expect you will need but a few days down there yourself while I and every other servant up here work tirelessly to prepare for our guests!” The flash of a fang told Omid the answer to his next question about taking Taljir, though he continued onward with his plan with only a slight wince.

He nodded until the wince was once again no more than a slight smile, reaching out a hand towards the bell jar and ran a finger along the surface as he watched Sareen’s reaction out of the corner of his eye. “How exactly do I...use this?” he asked, noting his continual lack of destruction as proof enough that Sareen truly did trust him enough to lay hands on this object of power.

The Kirzallan pushed a small stone tablet into Omid’s free hand. He looked first to Sareen with a raised brow, then down to his hand to read the impeccably well carved script upon the stone. Sareen answered his obvious question before he could wonder for too long. “When you arrive at the place described upon that tablet, read out that final line as you hoist that precious gift above your head.”

Omid answered with a curt nod, and stowed the tablet in a belt pouch. “Shall we attend to the rest of the planning now that the simple things are out of the way?”

“You are being witty again.” Sareen said with a small head tilt and a grin before turning and walking towards the exit and casting a glance over her shoulder. “So tell me how you believe any of that to be simple?”

The young man followed as his eyes took in the room and it’s myriad artifacts of unknown origin or power. “You wrote such clear instructions for me, which is a welcome change. So really all I need to do is venture forth into a hostile land and survive an encounter with an entity of unimaginable power. I would like to believe I have proven myself quite adept at such situations. Party planning is a far more complicated beast in comparison.”

Sareen turned and kept her pace as she walked in reverse, facing Omid with a smile. “Your compliments in regards to my teaching abilities are appreciated. Just don’t forget that you are mine.”

Omid caught the casual threat and continued walking forward until his nose was pressed to hers. “How could I forget when you are mine as well?”

She stared into his eyes, both of them unblinking and unfocused on anything around them in a room filled with unimaginable power and ancient secrets.

“You are a strange one, Omid.”

“Thank you, Sareen.”

They mutually backed away from one another, and as Sareen returned to her speedy walk towards the exit from her private quarters Omid swore he saw a pleased yet confused look across her face. The human counted this as another vaguely decisive victory, as he was still alive and also not in an endless waking nightmare.

Omid missed a step as he followed behind the woman, wondering when exactly he had downgraded this whole experience from endless waking nightmare to perpetual living surreal experience. He shook his head vigorously, just barely maintaining his balance while following as his eyes came to rest straight ahead of him and he got the answer that was going to have to do even if Omid hadn’t fully accepted it yet.

“Don’t start slowing down now.” Sareen said with a sweet smile tinged with just a bit of venom. “So much to do, still. And don’t think you’re exempt from training now. I can’t be going too easy on you now that I know what you’re capable of.”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

That cursed smile growing as wide as her eyes had Omid averting his eyes from her as he felt some heat rising to his face. “Well...you are quite adept at making things hard.”

Sareen, who had been in the process of opening the impossible door to that storage room that somehow opened to the rest of the palace, stopped as still as a statue. She turned her head too slow and too smooth with a lock of silken black hair falling over her shoulder just before she leaned an arm against the door frame to block the way out of her ever so neat private quarters and into the cluttered storage room.. Her head tilted at an angle just beyond that of a human as she stared down the foolish yet bold human.

Said human dared not blink nor look away or even shrink back. There was no taking that comment back, even if it had slipped out and showing any amount of hesitancy now might get him killed. At least if they met in the underworld, Taljir would find a way to die a second time of laughter once he found out that this was how Omid died. Right here, right now, where if you listened closely you might swear you could hear Omid’s fool comment echoing off the high stone walls lit with that pale light of death casting it’s ethereal glow on the man doomed to die or become some manner of living yet immobile curiosity displayed amongst the dozens of other objects of power here.

The Kirzallan broke Omid out of his reverie with a small dark hand grabbing a fistfull of his green collar and yanking him into the storeroom with her at lightning speeds right before her lips were at his neck.

----------------------------------------

“A little higher...a bit left…” Omid instructed with accompanying hand gestures. “Wait...there. Perfection!”

The two servants up on ladders gave a smile and a nod before descending so that all could appreciate the decorative banner hung carefully to hide a small passageway for other servants to use to flee in the inevitable event of a fight in the dining hall. It looked exactly like so many other banners now being hung around the palace. Otherwise unremarkable except for a small yet simple green chevron sewn into the center to differentiate them from every other tapestry that either lacked such an addition or had other colors sewn in with the same design. It was just enough for all servants to know to follow the green to safety while all other colors would be to throw off any “guests” who may get curious in discerning a pattern.

Sareen’s raised brow lowered as she gave an approving nod after she uncrossed her arms. “A simple solution to ensure minimal loss of the help.”

Said help cast uneasy glances towards Omid who winced back to them in sympathy as he cleared his throat. “Esteemed servants and specialists who ensure the successful day to day operations of this fine palace, yes I agree.”

The Kirzallan’s neutral expression remained for a moment longer before turning to a grin. “The neck of one who’s always sticking it out for others is a tempting target indeed.”

She turned on her heels and marched off to the next preparation project to oversee, with Omid offering an apologetic smile and shrug to the two servants before pulling up his green scarf over the latest mark of passion that Sareen had left on him. The gentler light of morning peeking in through those immaculately clear windows that the pair passed had Omid questioning just where any and all time had gone, and how he was possibly still standing after...everything.

Perhaps this was a side effect of when she had cured his wounds earlier?

No matter, there was still much to do and the feeling of pushing oneself onward in a never ending effort of survival was becoming too familiar to Omid. The rest of the day was filled with overseeing one project or another, from mundanely organizing the finest meals that could be managed. As they were looking over the strange devices that provided food to the palace, Sareen had informed Omid that food of this nature was for servants and other human companions that her distinguished guests would be bringing along.

For the other Zallans, she announced she had something more personalized in mind.

Sareen led the human down into a previously unknown depth of the palace. A place with little light, and bereft of servants. Only guards. The pair came to a stop before a large expanse of pale stone that was in no way notable aside from being distant from any of the already scant light sources down here. Sareen hummed a low, sweet sounding tune and a large square of the wall sunk into the floor to reveal a short passageway carved into dark gray stone with a light blue glow emanating from deeper within. She turned to Omid and said “No one else is to know of this place. Understood?”

“Of course.” Omid said without hesitation. Which was all the easier when he had absolutely no idea what he was walking into. And when he thought that thought back to himself in his head, and followed after the dangerous woman he realized that this sounded like a worse and worse idea.

If each was a grain of sand, and he were to gather them all, perhaps in another year or so at this rate his expanse of bad ideas may rival that of The Great Desert.

A short walk later and Omid saw the source of the blue glow.

Crystals.

A cavern no larger than the “guest house” Omid had spent his nights in with Sareen back in The Great desert. The crystals sat on “shelves” carved from the stone walls with a tiny stream of water running along each stone shelf similar to some advanced watering systems that Omid had seen illustrations of in books of grand palaces both contemporary and ancient. Each crystal was a dark and stormy solid blue, growing in blocky protrusions of rectangles and squares all hanging off of one another. All emitting that light blue glow that hid their identity for a moment longer before Omid realized what they were with a jolt.

“You eat these?” He asked.

Sareen eyed them with a seldom seen genuine delight as her smile grew ever larger. “A delicious and sweet treat, far too valuable to share with normal company but while establishing power there are few greater statements to be made in the choice of delicacies presentable to my kind.”

Omid’s eyes had narrowed as his mouth formed an involuntary O from realizing he was standing in what might be the most valuable and magical stash of candy in all the cosmos. He shook his head and commented “And I thought I would be your only sweet delicacy.”

“You are not sweet.” She commented so offhand that Omid thought he might just die then and there, worrying about how hard he had fallen for her later in the underworld. “Your flavor is that of a spice rather than a sweet.”

The young man’s voice caught in his throat as he tried to fire back in kind, holding up a hand in some small defiance as though it would reverse that subtle attack. Omid crossed his arms behind his back, cleared his throat and simply said “Thank you.”

That pleased yet confused look from earlier had returned as Sareen leaned down to retrieve a simple yet finely crafted medium sized wooden box to shove into Omid’s arms. “Hold this while I harvest.”

Sareen reached out to the geometric stalks humming a new melodious tune and tapping with deft fingers at the blocks of crystal that fell into her waiting hand before delicately placing them in the box Omid was holding out. Though it did not seem laborious, the deceptively young appearing woman took her time and bore a smile as she did so. It was a calm lacking in any threat that he was only just starting to discover was even a possibility for her. And though he had a million and one questions at the moment, like most other moments, he had already learned to keep quiet and treasure these moments while he could.