A couple of weeks had passed since settling in at the Chorea’s, and because she didn't need to worry quite so much about securing a place to stay, Sheeva found she could pour focus into her search for Llyud as well as save up money for when she would need to eventually leave. She didn't want to take advantage of their hospitality, despite their insistence that they didn't mind and that the help she had given towards fixing the porch, assisting Mildred on walks or with chores, and even running the occasional errand certainly made up for more than what they'd expected.

In between tasks, Sheeva concentrated on her search as much as she was able. During the day, if not searching in person, she would craft a false bird fashioned from the brown moss and twigs on the rooftop. After verifying that she could see and hear through it, she would fly towards people's windows or tables and pretend to peck at the ground for scraps while she listened in as they chatted. Every once in a while, if the people she was eavesdropping on noticed her bird, they would throw her treats and be none the wiser. She'd learned how oddly comfortable it could be to nestle in a windowsill garden under the shade of a growing tomato plant. During the night, if not patrolling the streets she had yet to memorize or asking for information at the many taverns likely to be packed until past midnight, she would retrieve a handful of coals from the fireplace, jump up to the roof, and form a Black Knight Owl, a black owl with silver head feathers appearing as a regal helmet, to blend in as both nocturnal and having a natural camouflage.

Occasionally, she would use her false friends to check up on Tyler and Tazaro while they were away, whether at work tinkering on a project, taking up another guard's night shift, or, sometimes, in Tazaro's case, too tired to head home and sleeping on a cot in the workshop.

Only once had she been caught sitting on the roof, and as Tazaro looked up at her with a bag of produce under his arm for the weekly dinner, he simply chuckled about something and asked: “Doghouse or window?” Sheeva briefly didn’t understand, considering she had crawled onto the roof through the window of the bedroom, but as she looked at the now obvious path from her current spot to Jax’s doghouse, she realized it was a straight shot.

“Ah. Window,” She admitted, wondering how many times Tazaro might have used it to sneak out at night, if at all.

At the rumor of a string of women going "suddenly missing," something that she had overheard while eavesdropping on a group of people as they crowded around a newspaper, she had decided to head up into The Northside District for a temporary detour from her usual methods.

As Sheeva stared at the corkboard with little to offer and ignored the mass chatter of imbibing patrons behind her, she scanned the board for anything eye-catching. She had already taken down the current day’s newspaper and scoured it for anything particularly alarming: strange or inexplicable murders, sudden, “magical” happenings, or, worst-case-scenario, another unfortunate victim to the string of serial killings, though she wasn't sure what the women had looked like. Still, it was enough for her to worry since it seemed that Llyud was somewhat preferential to his victims–most had black hair, and most were mothers or expecting mothers.

She tore down a flyer of a missing person that bordered on familiar, though she didn’t match Llyud’s preference. Instead of black-haired and fair-skinned, this young lady was a brunette. Even more alarming, the name tugged at something in memory, and when she read Last seen in Raynak, Desait District Docks, Sheeva’s brow furrowed in even more concern. Thankful for her meticulous note-taking, she fished in her pocket for her tattered journal, then flipped backward through its pages from her most recent journal entry.

She stopped at an entry with a newspaper clipping glued into it, finding the date to be roughly a year after she had started traveling. Surprise at how long it seemed to have been, she gave a soft "huh!" And let her gaze wander beyond the page as she reflected on what…who she was at the time.

In all honesty with herself, she was greatly inexperienced and incredibly naive to the ways of the outside world, full of the idea that people might be receptive to her inquiries, and that her journey "wouldn't take long." She somewhat wished she still was so naive, finding herself unnecessarily critical as she wrestled with her "self-loathing"--as Mildred had pointed out–and her cruel inner thoughts. The more she looked inward, the more disappointed she became.

Unnerved, she returned her attention to the newspaper article.

Dockside Butcher strikes again!

By Daryl B. Payne

Late last night, a third victim of the recently-coined “Dockside Butcher” was found, eviscerated and hung from Desait District’s drawbridge. Susan M. Garrett, Age 25, was a primary school teacher in Raynak’s Wallingford Division, and leaves behind her husband, Aerich Garrett, and their two-year-old son, William Garrett. Guards urge anyone walking about after curfew to exercise extreme caution, and if any suspicious activity is noticed, we ask you to come forward and report it immediately!

Unfortunately for the named woman in the article, she was not the same as the one whose picture she had plucked from the board, and after skipping past victims 8, 9, and 10, she finally stopped as the faces matched.

Victim number 11, a “Jane Doe,” stared out into the world. Sheeva sighed in mild disappointment at the poor soul who’d suffered the serial killer’s perfected M.O, and she only wished she had rid the world of Jaxton Durzig long before he’d even claimed his third victim, the first she’d heard of upon arriving in the capital city.

Perhaps the flyer was incredibly old, and, curious to know the publishing date, Sheeva peered at the bottom-right corner of the page. The publishing date was a mere month ago. Whomever it was searching for information, they had apparently still been looking for at least four years, give or take. She tsked in pity and pocketed the paper with the promise to leave a simple note explaining what had happened to their loved one.

Hopefully, it could give them some closure. She couldn’t imagine not knowing what had happened to Rose, fearing that her imagination could carry her to dark, twisted scenarios if she didn’t already live with the memory, which was bad enough.

When the door opened and sent a few more flyers flapping in the wind, Sheeva caught sight of an even more familiar face and reached for the pristine copy of Llyud’s portrait.

True to his word, Micah had copied the painting she had given him, though something seemed off. She fished the painting she carried, and compared the two side-by-side, then snickered to herself.

The already large and crooked nose now seemed even more comically large and crooked, and she wondered if the Captain had done so on purpose to satisfy some mischievous urge.

I do hope your ugly mug did not break their machine, you bastard. T’would be a shame for Tazaro to have to fix it, though I think he might find the circumstance funny after seeing this, She thought, pocketing the awful caricature as well. While she somewhat wished they hadn’t made quite so much of a mockery, perhaps the copy would serve a better purpose of getting a good laugh someday.

Spotting a flyer of a “lost tabby cat” that reminded her much of Squirt, she reached up to pull it down.

Goosed into a sudden shriek of surprise as a hand firmly grasped her butt, Sheeva whipped around to see a drunken patron with a gleeful smile, eyes glossy with alcohol as he laughed with himself and his two buddies, who laughed with him.

“Aha! Gotcha, girlie!” He cackled.

Sheeva didn’t waste time with words and reared back a fist. With as much force as she could, she decked him in the jaw, sending him stumbling to the side. The violent flinch his body gave caused his arm to jerk, effectively flinging his drink all over his face before he tripped on his feet and fell over.

It was a glorious two-hit combo; Sheeva hit him, and he hit the floor.

Of course, this drew the attention of other patrons, some turning to witness Sheeva’s yell and others turning at the sound of a body thudding to the floor.

“How dare you!” Sheeva hissed, face burning with embarrassment and chest heated with instant fury.

“You stupid bitch! Do you know who I am?” The man on the ground asked. Sheeva gave him a brief second look. The man dressed sharp and snappy wasn’t familiar.

“No–Am I supposed to?” She blurted, somewhat surprised with herself at her sassiness.

Still, she stopped the two buddies scrambling to pick their friend up as he tried to get to his hands and knees.

“Don’t even think about it! Let this bastard crawl like the turd he is!” Sheeva barked, boldly getting in the taller one’s face–at least, as well as she could, considering she was only as tall as the patch of hair peeking out from beneath the man’s shirt, unbuttoned a little more than necessary. His orange eyes widened in pure shock, then narrowed into slits before he tried to push her away.

Sheeva snatched his hand from its shove of her shoulder, side-stepped to the left and then behind him, jerked the arm straight, and pressed into the man’s extended elbow with her free hand, causing a shriek of pain to erupt from within the man’s bushy, scraggly beard as his arm muscles overstretched with the hyperextension of his elbow.

“Try that again, and I’ll break your arm!” Sheeva threatened, maneuvering the man slightly away from the one on the floor–who was still trying to get to his feet–so that Mr. Big and Burly didn’t trip and she accidentally broke his arm. The third man stared in befuddlement at his two partners, then at Sheeva, and slightly shook his head “no” to signal he didn’t want trouble.

“You crazy bitch, I’m Don the Rooster, you can’t just–

“Did I ask, you crawling turd?” Sheeva asked, barking out a laugh to brush off the insult.

“Ey! No fightin’ in mah bar! Take it outside, willya?” The bartender called over the commotion as the patrons sitting on stools and leaning on the counters all laughed in astonishment.

“Yeah, we’ll leave! We’ll leave!” Goon Number Three promised.

“And you won’t cause any more trouble?” She asked the man in the grapple, who squealed his answer as she roughly shook him.

“And you won’t go harassing people, Crawling Turd?”

The man slurred his compliance, still struggling to get up.

Sheeva turned the man towards the door and shoved him towards it, satisfied with their answers and slightly relishing in the pained face Mr. Big and Burly had as he held his overstretched arm in a hand.

She stepped aside and leered at Crawling Turd, then at Goon Number Three.

“Pick him up and take him with you. He stinks,” Sheeva ordered, head held high as she watched Goon Number Three reach with clammy hands for his friend’s shirt, pull the man to his feet, and trip over their steps as they hurried through the door.

Pleased with herself, it showed as Sheeva gave a cocky sneer, thinking that, had Hasch been around, he might have been impressed; usually, it was him causing all the barfights they took place in on the occasional outing to the nearby town of Urul. She was grateful that this minor altercation hadn’t escalated to chairs broken across backs and tankards smashed to bits on faces.

Aware of the silence, Sheeva looked around at herself, finding that those who had stopped to watch the scene found the items on their tables suddenly interesting as they pretended not to have noticed. One man was even pouring salt in his beer in an effort to seem nonchalant.

“My apologies, Gregg,” She announced, turning to the barkeep, who was in a mild pout and grumbling to himself about “friggin’ bar fights, swear m’gonna fuckin’ quit someday” as he focused on pouring another round of drinks for the bar wench ringing up an order. When he didn’t acknowledge her apology, Sheeva tsked and ignored the matter. Had she been running the place, she probably wouldn’t have appreciated an outburst, either.

She checked her fist, finding the knuckles had split open and were bleeding. With the trace of a healing sigil on the inside of her pocket, she stuck the back of her hand to her mouth and licked her knuckles to deliver the subtle healing spell, then checked her work. It wasn’t as effective as a free-hand cast, but it would do.

She looked back at the board and realized that it wouldn’t have changed much in the last five minutes. Even though she had already asked around for information, Sheeva made another round to kill time as well as to see if anything new turned up–most folks grunted in dismissal or gave her what she came to call “the look,” a mix of shock, skepticism, amusement, or mockery. The extra round was as unyielding as the first one, though people that had seen her feat seemed to take her a little more seriously and actively thought about their answers. Not wanting to bother people any more than she already had and call her momentary loss, Sheeva stepped out of the tavern and sighed away the disappointment.

The springtime rains were back with an unspoken promise as the sheet of rain fell so heavily that a stream ran in the gutter, carrying with it leaves, small stems, and other debris. Her eyes followed the rivulet down the way before it fell into the grate of Roussell’s sewer system. She looked up as a light caught her eye, watching the flicker of the gas-lamp spark to life, then remain steady. Apparently, the network of gas-lit street lamps was a recent addition to this part of Roussell, and while other street lamps were covered with plain glass, the lamp outside The Green Lantern was aptly fitted with a gentle green-stained glass.

Hovering beneath the awning to stay momentarily dry, Sheeva closed her eyes in focus of a full-body shield, relieved as the warmth of the spell spread from head to toe. As the phantom of a helmet covered her head, she knew the spell had fully taken form and stepped out into the rain.

While the rain still dampened her clothes, it did not sap her body heat as the droplets seemed to roll off her “armor”, and she pulled her hood over her head to “keep her hair dry,” though the spell would take easy care of that. Heading off to the left and towards the next tavern on her list called “The Blue,” she wondered if perhaps their street lamp would also be a different color than the others as an unspoken theme of the city’s watering holes. She eyed a man smoking a cigarette that emitted blue, Tarrakkian Tobacco smoke beneath his large-brimmed hat, then stepped across the street towards the opposite side.

Amid the sound of pouring rain buffeted by the thick hood of her cloak, she thought she heard the clicks of shoes on the cobblestone. As the skin of her neck crawled, she turned her head in attempt to look, but with the veil of her hood, her peripheral vision was blocked. Uneasy, she paused in the entryway of a cobbler’s shop, attempting to use the angled window to peek behind herself. Unable to discern whether it was a trick of the light, a warped spot of the window, or if she was just being overly cautious, she peered at the looming shadows in the reflection, then turned sharply on her heel to face whoever lingered mere footsteps behind.

No one was there, but she felt sure she’d heard something.

Hand on the handle of her blade, she stepped forward, looking around on the street and thinking that, perhaps, the man smoking his cigarette might have followed her, but as she peered in the direction, the face lit by an orange-glow as he ignited another cigarette was wrought in despair at whatever thoughts he was entertaining.

Irritated at her flightiness, Sheeva decided that her brush with the three men in The Green had her on edge, and that she ought to retire for the evening lest she unleash hell on some soul that didn’t deserve it. With a sharp inhale, hold, and slow sigh, she felt her shoulders release their tension, and as she shrugged off the remains of her anxiousness, she turned around to continue on her way.

The sound of a clatter in the alleyway beside her sent shivers up her spine, and as she sucked in a nervous breath, Sheeva’s eyes widened in hasty search up and down the dark alley. Echoes of a cackle tickled behind her ears, and as the hairs on her neck stood up again, she grabbed Abraxas and wrest him free of his scabbard.

“Llyud? Show yourself!” She barked into the darkness, still searching.

Something waved at her in the dim light, and, taking it for the cloak of someone trying to hide, Sheeva stepped forth, ready to strike. Nearing the spot she thought she’d seen the person duck away into, she raised her blade, ready to spear it through, and–

Stopped, as she saw a pile of trash beneath an old umbrella leaned against the wall, fabric swaying and flapping gently in the breeze.

She laughed at circumstance then at herself for her nerves, then shuffled Abraxas back into his scabbard.

“Fuck’s sake! I should just go to bed! Huh! Spooked by trash! Get a grip!” She grunted, relieved that it had only been herself bearing witness to her folly, and that no one had to know she was being hyper-vigilant unless she told them…or Mildred read her as she tended to do.

As she turned back to leave the alley, a fleshy, hard fist socked her across the jaw, and, while it didn’t hurt thanks to her passive shield, the pressure and surprise sent her stumbling backward. She caught herself on a dumpster and tried to get her feet underway, but a pair of chubby paws gripped her shoulders and pulled her to her feet, then wrapped around her shoulders, pinning her arms to her sides.

“That’s for earlier, Bitch,” a voice said, and as Sheeva’s sight adjusted to the dimness, she saw the scowling face of Crawling Turd, with Goon Number Three at his side. Both of them blocked her exit, and as she struggled to get out of the grapple, she could only assume Mr. Big and Burly was the one holding her back.

As he reached out and tore her hood back to bare her face, Sheeva sent him a fierce glare, though the hard expression didn’t do much to mask the fear in her chest.

“Don’t touch me!” Sheeva barked, struggling again to break free of her hold.

“Oh-ho! She’s so feisty!” Crawling Turd mocked, reaching out to grasp her face, rudely slapping her cheek before clasping his hand around her mouth. Her cheeks ached as he pressed on her jawline in an effort to pry her jaw open. The web of his thumb and forefinger wrapped around her chin as his thumb and index finger squeezed on her jaw. Sheeva realized her shield had fallen as the pressure exerted triggered a stinging pain along with an involuntary reflex that forced her mouth open. As pudgy fingers prodded at her teeth in inspection, Sheeva attempted to bite, but with the painful pinch of her temporal-mandibular joint, she couldn’t. “The worst kind of slave, but the best kind of fighter. You’ll do well in the ring! And, with all those pretty teeth to knock out? You might net us a nice little fortune!”

As soon as the man released her jaw, Sheeva spat the foul, tinny taste of his prodding fingers onto his face. Naturally, the man slapped her hard across the cheek in return.

“Let me go!” She ordered, thrashing against her grapple once again, terrified of ending up in the ill-fated, underground dogfights. Desperate as she have might have been for money before, betting on those rumbling in the cage or even partaking in a fight, herself, was something she had promised she would never do.

“Hah! I don’t think so!” He laughed, stepping forth once again as he looked her over. His hands dug into her pockets, retrieving the random objects there: her wallet; her pocketbook; her coin purse, which promptly disappeared into his pocket...

As she felt the heaviness of her pocket-watch shift, her stomach churned with worry. He lifted the precious trinket from her pocket, and, thrilled to find a seemingly expensive item, he jerked it harshly. The chain snapped at its clip-on to her pants pocket, and he held it up in inspection.

“Give that back!” Sheeva pleaded, unwilling to part with the second, best gift she had ever gotten from Rose upon a rare trip to Maizen after Sheeva had begged to see the outside world.

He ignored her demand and clicked it open, peering at the clock inside.

“Tut! I was thinking of keeping this for myself, but this watch doesn’t even work,” He appraised, tilting it around in his hand. "It's nothing more than a paperweight!"

Spotting the clip inside, he pulled out a piece of parchment tucked inside, then ‘tsked’ in disinterest at the loving note kept in the keepsake.

“Aw, did mommy dearest get this for you?” He snickered, delighting in Sheeva’s desperation. She didn’t answer, more fearful of what he might do with it if he knew how sentimental it was.

The piece of paper was tossed aside carelessly, and it floated to the ground and disappeared in a pile. Sheeva’s face wrenched in agony, betraying her wishes to keep the pocketwatch and note’s importance hidden. Noticing the look, and with a sick smile, the man held up the watch by its chain again, right in front of her face.

“You don’t really want this broken thing, do you?” He taunted before he pitched the watch, full-force, like a baseball at the wall. Sheeva’s eyes followed it in despair, and her heart broke as it shattered.

“You bastard! What gives you the right to break my things?” Sheeva cried, squirming to break free of Mr. Big and Burly’s grasp. He only held on tighter, enough that the air became squeezed out of her. He stood to his full height and she squeaked as she felt herself lifted off the ground by about a foot.

He only laughed at her loss.

“You won’t need that where you’re going, girlie. Maybe you net us a fortune, and I buy you for myself,” He threatened, stepping close enough to put his hands on her body, giving another firm grasp of her butt.

The threat made Sheeva sick, and with brute force, she promptly raised her leg and kicked him in the groin. He cried out and doubled over, and Sheeva reveled in the pained expression on his face as he cradled his testicles. Fearing what he might do in a counter-strike, she struggled to recast her passive shield, concentrating the brunt of the shield densely around her head in lieu of an even-layered, full-body shield. Considering the buffer it presented from the ambush-strike from Jaxton Durzig, the offset would be worth the safety if the man she’d just kicked in the balls were to try to pummel her face to a pulp.

His red eyes seethed with fury, bug-eyed, and as he reared back a fist to strike, Sheeva made a last-ditch effort to avoid it. With a kick of her heel into Mr. Big and Burly’s knee that caused it to break and make him lean forward as he screamed with pain, Sheeva grasped the man’s forearms as well as she could and put all of her weight into a drop to her knee, effectively lining his face up with Crawling Turd’s fist, which didn’t have time to stop. As the gruesome ‘pop’ of the man’s nose sounded in her ear and his hold broke, Sheeva sprung from the trap in a barreling charge.

The top of her head bashed into Crawling Turd’s chin with such force, Sheeva heard the hard clack of his teeth in her head as they smashed together. His head flung backward, then ricocheted forward like a released spring, and he screamed in pain as blood oozed from his mouth. In the dim light, Sheeva saw the pink flesh of a half-severed tongue dangling from the side of his mouth.

Attempting to grab for her again, Mr. Big and Burly took hold of her shoulder, but as she wheeled around, grabbed his arm, twisted it behind his head, and dropped to a knee, he wailed out bloody murder as the harsh ‘pop’ of a dislocated shoulder sounded out. She grabbed the broken arm and used it as a lash to swing him into the wall, and as his face collided with it, he flopped mercilessly on a stack of wooden pallets covered by tarp.

As Goon Number Three entered the fray, Sheeva collected a pool of energy to her hand and thrust her palm into his sternum, pulling a card from Llyud’s deck as the pulse of electricity disrupted the man’s diaphragm, rendering the thing useless. He gasped for air, wind knocked out of him, mind numb from pain as his stomach spasmed. Furious, she did it again, aiming for his abdomen, and with the same technique that caused his muscles to twitch and seize, he fell to his knees as his bowels evacuated themselves, then lay in the mud as he desperately sucked in for breath in a raspy croak, gaping like a fish out of water.

When Sheeva stepped toward him in a menacing loom, Goon Number Three managed to sit up a little, shaking his head and raising an arm to shield his face as he scooted away. Sheeva stopped and ordered him to leave. He grabbed a nearby gutter pipe and pulled himself up, awkwardly shuffling his feet as he fled. Sheeva felt no remorse that Goon Number Three now had a sloppy, brown mess on the seat of his pants.

She turned to Crawling Turd, who was still reeling with pain on the ground, reached for his collar, and threw him on his backside. She dug in his pockets for her belongings, also nabbing his coin purse, then grabbed the slim skinning knife she kept tucked in her boot. Pulling him up by the collar of his dark maroon blazer and light blue dress shirt now stained with blood, she pressed the sharp end of her blade against his throat as she glared at him.

“Rest assured, you fucking skulka: when I’m done with my search, the next thing I’ll do is come after you, and I will take. You. Down. You and all your damn cronies. You got that?” She threatened.

He could only whimper, eyes wide in fear.

“You got that?!” She asked again, shaking him.

“Yeth! Yeth, I godth dthadt!” He wailed, tears spilling from his eyes as he begged to be let go, words slurred and messy from the damage done to his tongue.

“Good,” She finished, tossing him facefirst to his hands and knees in the mud.

He scrambled out of the alleyway like a bat out of hell.

Convinced that he wouldn’t be back, Sheeva searched the area for her watch, finding it in a broken heap among a pile of wet, soggy newspapers. She picked it up tenderly, mourning its state as its face stuck out amid a network of now twisted springs and offset gears. Frantic, she looked around on the ground for the note she’d previously kept tucked inside, spotting it stuck to the mud and getting soaked by rainwater.

“No,” she blurted breathlessly as she stooped in reach. She pulled it from the dirt and opened it, pleading that the ink inside was still good.

It was no longer good, as the teal-colored ink now bled onto the page, watered-down and destroyed by the rainwater.

“No!” She squeaked, attempting to pat it dry on her clothes. It didn’t help, and instead only smudged the ink on her white, flax-linen shirt, and she whimpered with despair. Pills from the pulp of the paper were now rolled up and barely clinging to the parchment.

Angered, she instinctively clenched her fist, then regretted the action as the paper crumpled in her hand. She attempted to smooth it out, then stopped as she only made it worse. Forcing herself to quit trying to fix it for fear of completely destroying the precious piece, she folded it as gingerly as possible, then attempted to clip it back into the lid of the watch.

The clip only served to shred it even more, and she sobbed.

Hearing a noise behind her, she gasped and looked for the source. Mr. Big and Burly, whom she had forgotten about, lay awkwardly on the pile of pallets, neck unnaturally bent with a piece of broken wood stuck into his neck. She readied herself to defend again as he struggled to move, but slowly realized that he wouldn’t be struggling for much longer as a gurgling death rattle sounded out and he lay still, eyes stuck open as the stake in his neck trickled blood. Sheeva stared in horror before instinctively reaching to help the man, then stopped as her frazzled brain reminded her that he was dead and that there was nothing she could do.

Killing the man had not been her intent, and as she slowly realized what she’d done as adrenaline faltered and reality settled in, Sheeva staggered back until her back met the wall, then slumped against the brick in exhaustion, breathing heavily and trembling as she stared at the dead man in the shadow of the streetlamp. She stared blankly at her hands and how they shook; the harbingers of death. She tried to rub Crawling Turd’s blood off onto her pantleg, which wasn’t much use; her hands were already stained. She fell to an awkward sit, then curled up into a ball as she tucked her head between her legs. Her face burned as she wept and balled her fists in her hair in terror.

Even though she’d exercised restraint, she had killed again.

No, I had to do it, she tried to justify.

How close had she been to capture and enslavement?

I had to do it, she reasoned.

How close had she been to being forced upon?

I had to, she bargained.

How close had she been to being killed?

The tiniest of sobs had just begun to surface before a child’s voice asked her if she was alright, causing Sheeva to squeak in shock, gasp, and look up from her sniveling ball. The band of children that she’d met on her first day in Roussell, of all people, were staring back at her, though the dark-skinned boy was staring at the dead man less than five feet away.

Sheeva blinked in astonishment that they were even here, then wiped the tears from her eyes and the snot threatening to drip from her nose, sniffling.

“What are you–what are you doing here? You, you shouldn’t…” She began, then looked at the dead man, then back at them. “Did you see–She shook her head as she hoped they hadn’t, but as the boy still stared at the dead man, perhaps, they had seen everything. Still sniffling, she got to her feet and ushered the children away from the sight. “No. No, you shouldn’t be here. Come on, go. Get out of here,” She tried to shoo.

“Wait miss, our stuff is here,” The oldest protested.

Sheeva stopped, blank as she struggled to collect herself.

“What? Your stuff?” She asked, dumbfounded.

“Yeah, ‘our stuff!’ Our food. Yelena’s stuffed bearog. Nook’s action figures,” The oldest listed, heading to shuffle past Sheeva and towards the pile of broken pallets. “That guy broke my house,” he explained.

Sheeva stopped him from looking on and used her cloak to shield their view of the dead man.

“Wait, wait, please.” She tried again, shaking her head to will it to clarity. “You’re–you’re telling me you are living here?” She whispered in disbelief.

“Yes’m,” He answered.

Sheeva stared at them, then slowly realized that they hadn’t approached her from the street as most of them seemed grouped towards the back end of the alley. Any escape they might have had earlier would have been blocked by the three men and herself. Disturbed, she looked out beyond the alleyway to see if anyone was walking by, then tucked the children beneath her cloak. Looking in the direction of the broken pallets and the dead man glistening with rain, mud, and blood, she directed her light to illuminate the spot. Tiny huddles were lined against the back wall, where she saw a pile of clothes in each, bedding, toys, and what looked like a sack of food.

“You can’t–um,” She swallowed, then forced a breath, dispelling her light before letting them out of the confines of her cloak. “We need to find you someplace else,” She decided, not ready to face the fact that they might have seen or heard the entire, violent ordeal.

Nyet…unfortunately, there is no “might have,” Sheeva reasoned.

“Is that man dead?” The dark-skinned boy asked, and Sheeva jerked her head back to look at him. He didn’t seem much phased, and she felt pity as she wondered if he was unfortunately accustomed to the harsh reality of death. Still, she couldn’t bring herself to lie, personally irritated with the sugarcoating she’d heard other parents telling their children.

The man wasn’t simply “asleep,” as other adults might tell a child, considering his neck was unnaturally bent, he was covered in blood, and his eyes were stuck wide open.

“Yes,” She answered truthfully, feeling the weight of shame in her stomach, though it paled in comparison to the knowledge that the kids had indeed witnessed the ordeal. “Yes, he is,” She repeated softly and to her own horror.

Sucking in a breath as her skin began to crawl, Sheeva shook her head and tried again.

“Look, it’s–it’s really not safe. We have to find you somewhere else–somewhere-somewhere warm, and dry, and…” She blabbered, looking around. “And warm,” She finished, still reeling.

“But, what about my stuffed bearog?” The youngest girl asked.

“I–I’ll buy you a new one,” Sheeva offered. She would rather purchase, sew, or steal a new one–anything, to get them away from here.

“No! He’s my friend! I can’t leave him!” The girl cried.

Sheeva looked down at the pouting and worried face, then back at the wreckage of their makeshift lodgings, hesitating. Perhaps it would be easier to gain their trust and get them to adhere to her wishes if she did ruffle through the debris in search of their things, which seemed in easy reach, save for the bags of food in the shack broken by the dead man.

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With a sigh at herself for even considering touching the man she killed, Sheeva beckoned them on the opposite side of the dustbin, where they couldn’t see what she was going to do.

“Stay here, and don’t look. Promise?” She asked. All of them covered their eyes, save for the boy likely accustomed to death and the eldest boy, who assisted in shuffling the others against the wall in agreement. They both frowned and crossed their arms.

Sheeva stepped over to the corpse, and, uttering an apology, struggled to move him out of the way–moving a deadweight body was not easy, and the fact that he was still faintly warm made her stomach churn even more as she whispered another tearful apology.

She grabbed as much as she could of the items they requested, as well as the half-full bags of potatoes and carrots, noticing that it was the only food they seemed to have available. The stuffed teddy bear was in miserable shape, only having one button-eyeball and missing stuffing from its leg, which had been tied into a knot to keep more fluff from falling out. She tucked it under her arm, slung the bundle of clothes she’d wrapped in a blanket and tied to a nearby pallet plank over her shoulder, then hurried back to the huddle.

“Here,” she insisted, dispersing the free items among them, unsure what all belonged to whom while handing off the bundle to the oldest boy. Stealing one last look to make sure no one would come after them, she deliberately patted the children on the back to guide them away from the alleyway and into the street.

They wandered the streets aimlessly, Sheeva unfamiliar with the twists and turns of the Northside District. When the rains began to pour even harder, she tucked them beneath someone’s porch, not caring about whose porch it was. As long as they were quiet, the owner might be none the wiser, and they could wait out the heaviest of the rain.

Hungry as her stomach growled at her–the cost and demand of casting spells–she winced from a hunger pang, eyes closed as she tried to breathe past it. Had she brought something to snack on, or even her stash of energy tablets, the drain wouldn’t be much of an issue.

Her eyes snapped open as one of them shoved a cold vegetable in her hands, and she looked at the orange, withered and wilted carrot.

“Eat it. You’re hungry, aren’t you? It tastes better than potatoes, at least,” One of them insisted. Sheeva refused, trying to give the carrot back to the oldest girl.

“This is all you have; I can’t do that. You need it more than–

–Aw, just shut up and eat it, wouldya?” The oldest boy barked, stunning Sheeva into silence. She huffed, impressed with his adamance, and took a bite of the carrot. Though withered, it was still sweet, and she found herself gobbling it down in less than a minute.

“So, how did you get these? Do you have enough money to buy more for yourselves?” Sheeva questioned, curious to know how they’d been faring over the last three weeks. The oldest admitted that he had taken up Sheeva’s advice, and while he was still only sweeping doorsteps, he’d slowly been learning to do other things, such as weeding gardens and folding laundry. He even had a mind to have the others join in to help so that they could pool resources in hopes of renting a room somewhere.

“Well,” she sighed, feeling relieved. “That’s a good thing.”

“Yeah. Not a fan of potatoes, though. They’re icky,” He stated, pausing to shuffle the bag of potatoes he carried into a better hold. “Cluckatrice, too. They’re slimy, and rubbery.”

“You think so?” She mumbled in half interest, slightly aware that her focus was fragmented and shoddy. She fought to entertain the current subject, and as the phrase “slimy and rubbery” registered, it served as a tether, although unpleasant, since Sheeva knew cluckatrice wasn’t supposed to taste or feel that way.

“I find they’re tasty,” She countered in disagreement. “Potatoes, too. How have you been cooking them?” She asked, now craving a baked potato with butter, pepper flakes, and chives, with two roasted cluckatrice breasts, which she would likely devour like a savage beast and make Jax seem like he had better manners.

“Cooking them?” He asked.

With the innocence of his question, Sheeva stopped, thinking to herself before looking at his face. It was obvious that he was pondering what he might be doing wrong, and she bit her cheek to hold back her ‘tsk’ of pity as it slowly dawned on her that they hadn’t been cooking their food.

“You haven’t been…” She mumbled, then cleared her throat, not willing to embarrass them if it would come to that.

She thought about her options, wondering what to do since she couldn’t, in good conscience, leave them to fend for themselves, considering they were eating raw meat and hard, dirty potatoes. It reminded her of her time as a stowaway, hiding among food barrels and munching on raw potatoes.

“Mm. No…raw potatoes don’t taste very good, that’s for sure,” She agreed, taking a swig of water from her canteen to alleviate the reminder of starchy, dirty potato juice.

In her still frazzled state, She tried to recall what Rose had done for her when Sheeva first arrived at the temple. Other than declaring her birthday as the day of her arrival for lack of knowledge when it actually was, Sheeva remembered being bathed in calm, warm waters, fed as much as she could stomach, clothed in better, cleaner clothes than the rags she clung to, and cradled to sleep with the lullaby she came to memorize later on.

Come to think of it, it had been raining just like this when Sheeva arrived at the temple steps, or rather, had been carried like a sack of vegetables through a pit of darkness and swirling stars and placed at the front door like a delivery. If she thought hard enough, she could recall the softness of fur at her fingertips but slowly realized that the teddy bear Yelena put in her hands had something to do with it. She blinked and looked at the item in hand, wondering when it had been put there.

“You seem sad. Ted wants to cheer you up. He’s good at that,” Yelena said with a smile.

The sweetness was too much for Sheeva to handle, and she chuckled.

“Ah, well…thank you, uh, Ted.” She managed, meanwhile still thinking to herself about what to do.

Finding them a shelter to stay in that was sturdy, warm, and dry would be the first order of business; and damn it, in spite of herself, she had killed again; and apparently, Ted’s full name was “Theodore the bell-hop, because he used to have a jingly bell and hops around on one leg.” Sheeva managed a wry chuckle at this beyond the film of shock.

Slowly, she decided that after securing a place for them to sleep, given the circumstance, she would teach them to strike a fire and show them how to cook their food. She racked her tire-addled brain, trying to recall if she had seen such an abandoned place to put them up. As she remembered how they’d crossed paths on the day they’d met, she wondered if the house she had helped the family move out of was still standing or unoccupied.

“So, this might be a long-shot, but there’s a family I went to help when I first met you all. The house they moved out of may be abandoned. I could take you there. It would be dry, at least. Would you be willing to give that a try? If it is not available, we will figure something else out,” she offered, though she didn’t know what else she could possibly do.

They looked at one another, then collectively nodded, seeming hopeful. As the rains died to a sprinkle, they stood from their perch and walked on at a more brisk pace than Sheeva had been plodding with before.

“You know, we haven’t said anything about you, miss, since the day you met us.” The oldest commented, poking at the mud with a stick he’d found along the way. “And, we won’t say nothing about what happened tonight, either.”

Sheeva stopped, upset with the reminder.

“I’m…I am sorry you had to see that,” She mumbled.

“He was gonna hurt you; we heard him say it. You’re not the only lady they’ve snatched up or hurt. Nook and I saw them do it before.”

Sheeva fought a disappointed face at the mention of their names, and felt even more disgusted with the fact that they’d been subjected to such violence.

“What were you doing out there, anyway?”

Sheeva wrestled with herself. She didn’t want to bring them into her circle of contact any more than they already might be. It was hard enough with one family possibly being a target. Although…if they knew some of the facts, she might be able to get them to follow her wishes, and could keep them out of trouble.

“Alright, I’ll explain, but only after we get there. I don’t want people overhearing us,” Sheeva half-promised.

They stopped a couple of times more before finally making it to the house, which was more run-down than it had been before, but thankfully, unoccupied. After an initial sweep to ensure there wasn’t anyone else inside, Sheeva ushered them in through the door, making sure they didn’t trip on the hole just inside the entry hallway.

To the right, a living room with a stone furnace rested, which Sheeva immediately set to building a fire with scraps of paper thrown about and the leftover bundle of wood. Wanting to amaze them, just a little bit, she traced the sigil of a flickering flame and blew a steady breath through her mouth, igniting the pile in the pit with ease, and of course, the children were amazed, staring in awe while she sat in a hazy, drained stupor for a few seconds.

She bid them to wait there while heading up the steps in search of the mattress the family had left behind, claiming that they would buy a new one when they reached Raynak. Instead of lunking around the hefty thing, she formed another sigil, and with a brilliant, blue light, shrunk the mattress to a size that she could pick it up without much trouble. As she thought about it, perhaps she could have used the spell to shrink the dead man’s body, but after practicing with dummies while trying to perfect the spell, she’d learned the hard way that trying to cast a spell while upset or distracted ended up in an accidental explosion and stuffing thrown everywhere.

She carried the mattress to the living room and expanded it, wide enough that all the children could fit on it comfortably, and, while she didn’t have a heavy, warm quilt, she still had her woolen, emergency blanket. Expanding that to accommodate for all of them, she draped it over the mattress, offering an apology that she couldn’t offer more.

Wondering if the place had running water, Sheeva checked the upstairs bath. Sure, there was running water, at least, but the water was not hot. She could at least utilize the wooden stove built into the framework, and after carrying pot after pot of hot water up the steps as it came to a soft boil, she had enough for them to at least wash quickly. She cooled it down with a bit of cold water from the tap.

While she didn’t have shampoo or conditioner, she at least had a bar of soap. The girls bathed together while the boys waited, and once the girls were finished and dried with a spell that Sheeva cast on them, the boys took their turn. When Sheeva went to drain the water, her eyebrows raised at the state of it, and she wondered if she herself had shed as much dirt with the first bath she took in the temple.

After they were bathed, Sheeva took the pot of boiling potatoes, carrots, and seasonings from the old pouch she’d found in the bottom of her bag, her only set of silverware, and offered them for them to use to eat. Unlike herself, they knew how to use the spoon and fork and shared among themselves, trading after every other bite. Their compliments brought a smile to her face, even though she hadn’t put much effort into making it taste “so good!”

Who would have possibly thought that potatoes tasted much better when cooked?

Before she could protest again, they each introduced themselves against her will.

The oldest of the bunch was Josef, apparently a runaway from a drunken home, and while he was supposedly fifteen, it wasn’t apparent, being as shrimpy as the boy was. His favored blue cap and plaid shirt were far too large, and if she wouldn’t be able to hem the fabric to a size better fitting, she made a note to bring along a seamstress’s tape-measurer to properly fit him for the otherwise dashing look.

The twins, Arc and Sophia, were thirteen, and had been indentured to servitude by their stepmother when they were eight years old for coin. After their owner had “clutched at his chest and then lay still,” they fled to the streets rather than return home. Once they began to squabble over the blanket, it became strikingly clear that they were siblings. Arc had blue eyes and a thick, denim jacket that appeared a size too small, and Sophia had blue eyes and an old, grey dress with tattered fabric at the hem.

The second youngest boy, Nook, was apparently twelve, and a survivor of a bandit attack that claimed the lives of his mother, father, and older sisters, which led Sheeva to understand his unfortunate acquaintance with death. He was brought to Roussell by a traveling Pacemian caravan who’d found him wandering along the road in post-trauma shock. Seeming to cling to their kindness, he wore puffy black pants with a navy-blue shirt and an old pair of sandals that his toes poked out of, unwilling to part with the sentimental things. He seemed particularly interested in her sword, and Sheeva allowed him to examine it so long as he didn’t cut himself on it or stab anybody.

The youngest girl, Yelena, was “five,” found by Josef when she was “maybe two,” sleeping by her mother’s corpse in the alley next to a brothel that Sheeva had decided to avoid searching until absolutely necessary. What a toddler was doing in such a place, Sheeva didn’t want to know, but as she thought on it, she felt a chill sweep over her, fully disturbed as she realized that her mother likely worked the sinner’s corridor. Perhaps, it had been a deal for sex or iphsium, the corrosive, addictive opiate made from the complex roots of Iphsodelus Caryophyllaceae.

Yelena was roughly Sheeva’s age when she first came to live with Rose, but Sheeva tried not to think too much about that, and rather, a way that she could ensure their safety from afar, so that–if something should happen and Llyud came looking for them to use against her–she could be prepared and not walk into an ambush or a trap.

“Hey, listen. I…I need you all to do something for me. It will be for your safety, as well as mine. Can you all agree to what I am about to ask you?” Sheeva asked clearly, apologetic that they stopped eating with mildly frightened looks on their now clean faces.

“What is it?” Sophia asked, seeming worried at what the request was.

“If someone comes to that door looking for me or for any of you, do not open the door.” She stressed, looking at each one of them and waiting for their answer. As each of them nodded their agreement, she continued.

“Also, I’d like to set up a passphrase for us to use, alright?” She asked, feeling the idea might have gone over Yelena’s head as she frowned in question and bit the wooden spoon in her nerves.

“Uh–a passphrase, like a…” Sheeva trailed off, unable to think of the word. “A password, that only we know and we speak at the door. I’ll be using it, too, so you will know it is me without having to open the door.”

“A password? You mean, like this is gonna be our secret base?” She asked, excited as her face lit up and she gave a missing-toothed grin. Grateful for the example, Sheeva nodded.

“Yes. Yes, exactly.” She agreed. “But, this base is gonna have to be kept a big secret, alright?”

Josef and Nook remained skeptical, and Sheeva knew she wouldn’t really be able to pull the wool over their eyes quite so easily.

“Which is why…” She said slowly as she thought of a quick compromise. “While I am gone, Josef will be in charge, as the oldest, and if he is gone, Nook will be in charge, and I will go over the details about that with you two later.” She insisted, nodding her head. To her surprise, they agreed, and she relaxed.

She thought back to what she might have used as a passphrase when she was a kid if anything, but found nothing, not in the habit of creating secret bases. Snowforts, yes, but bases? Still, whatever they decided, she wanted it to be something that wouldn’t make much sense out of context but also contained parts of Roussell so that they would be more likely to remember it.

The only thing she seemed to focus on was the fact that Roussell had a clock tower, a nice, golden one, with a high belfry that she might like to fly up to someday for a steady bird’s eye view.

She snorted at herself.

Bird’s eye view, indeed! Considering it would only be in the dead of night, I’d have to be some type of owl to be able to see anything!

She paused and huffed at herself, feeling clever.

“Where do the Tinker Owls roost?” She asked them as a beginning example. They looked to one another, confused.

“I don’t even know what a Tinker Owl is, Miss, and I don’t think the rest of us do, either.” Josef voiced. Sheeva gave a small “ah,” and then pursed her lips.

“Well, it’s a type of bird that lives in the forest, but, to confuse others, we could say they roost in the clocktower, instead. And, if they do know what a Tinker Owl is, they might say ‘forest,’ and you’ll know not to let them in.” She explained.

“So. The next time I come by and you ask me: ‘Where do the Tinker Owls roost,’ if I don’t say ‘in the belfry of the clocktower,’ you cannot let me in. Do you all understand?” She pressed, looking intently to Josef and Nook, having designated them as the group's leaders in her absence. “And that answer goes for anyone. If something should happen to me, I will try to send word, but if they do not speak the correct phrase, you must trust that I did not send them, and flee.”

“What will we do if you are gone, Miss? What if they barge in through the door, anyway?” Josef asked.

Sheeva hummed in thought. A veil, much like the one that guarded them at the temple, would be a perfect addition to their safety, but she sighed as she realized she hadn’t the slightest of how the spell had been cast in the first place, having being fabricated long before her time. She supposed the closest she could get was the warding spell she would cast in hotel rooms to alarm her if someone else entered the room while she slept.

As she contemplated how she might adapt the spell to allow the children to leave if need be, she thought back to what the basics of spellcasting happened to be, in her case. Anytime she cast a spell, the cost was a bit of her own energy, equally relevant to the magnitude of the spell she had cast. The harmless ball of light cost far much less energy than a breath of fire or even a healing spell, depending on the severity of the wound she was attempting to mend.

Perhaps, there was a medium that she could use as a segue between her power and their physical presence, and as she glanced at her fileting knife, she shook her head at herself.

While blood would be the easiest medium to use, she couldn’t bring herself to do harm to them, despite how necessary it would be. Maybe, something harmless, like a strand of hair or gob of spit might suffice. Curious to test it, she called Josef and Nook into the kitchens at the left of the entryway.

“I need your help with something. Do you trust me to try a spell?” She asked first, and when they nodded, Sheeva felt relieved at their initiative. Unwilling to deal with wads of spit, she settled for something less disgusting. “It won’t hurt; I’ll just need a piece of hair from your head.” She explained. Josef looked at Nook, who looked back, and without any further question, Nook took a single strand of his hair and handed it to her.

“Thank you,” She said, heading for the backdoor. She paused, then asked Nook and Josef to stand outside. Waiting while they did so with bated breath, Sheeva wiped off a clean spot on the wall from all the dust and cobwebs, trailed her warding sigil, and pressed her palm to the wall with Nook’s hair in between.

A red, circular sigil flashed, then faded.

“Good, good so far. How do you feel, Nook?” Sheeva asked, half expecting a shrug or so, since every time she had cast the spell for herself, there was nothing different about herself unless someone tried to pass through.

“Okay. I don’t hurt or anything,” He answered, in a much deeper voice than Sheeva expected, leading her to believe he may have actually been older than the twins. Maybe he and Josef were the same age and just didn’t know it.

“Good! Good, that’s normal. Now…walk back through the door,” She guided, bracing herself for the slightly annoying buzz that tended to happen when others intruded on her space.

When nothing happened, she looked in surprise at him, then at the sigil on the wall.

“Nothing happened,” She stated.

Confused, Josef went to walk through the door, and as he passed beneath the threshold, the annoying buzz in Sheeva’s brain flared, and she grunted, disturbed by the sound of bees in her ears.

“Ach, vilg!” She swore, waving her hand to dismiss the spell.

The buzzing stopped, and she rubbed at her temples in irritation.

“Well, it works, that’s for sure!” She grunted, taking a step back. She stared at the frame of the doorway, wondering how to get the hairs to stick to whatever ward she placed, not to mention, finding some way to make a long-lasting spell so that she didn’t have to recast it all the time.

A chilling thought that made Sheeva appreciate the sacrifice that who ever had cast the veil had potentially offered their life surfaced, and she shivered. Hopefully, that would not the case here, and perhaps, she could make do with something less life-threatening. She looked at her fileting knife again, and then at her thumb.

“Alright. Nook, Josef, go grab a hair from everyone. And Nook, I’ll need another from you. I accidentally lost it.” She directed, offering them a distraction as she traced the sigil for a breath of fire, sanitizing the knife before she pricked her thumb with the tip of the blade.

The blood that flowed was enough, and she painted the outline of the warding sigil, modified into the shape of a Zinnia Flower, mostly so that they wouldn’t be frightened by an unfamiliar sigil drawn in blood, but also wishing to grant a subtle nod to their perseverance through their hardships. As they walked back around the corner and handed her the hairs she had requested, she added her own, wedged the tip of the knife into the woodwork, then attempted to shove the hairs into the knick, using the knife to assist until each strand disappeared into the pulp.

With a deep breath and a slow exhale, Sheeva pressed her hand to the wall, and focused. She heard the ripple of a wave of energy and snapped her eyes open to look. A light-blue halo expanded from the edge of the sigil and crept up the walls and along the ceilings, and as she heard the stairs creak to her right, she realized her spell would affect the whole house, and became slightly worried for herself, forgetting to take such a thing into account.

Before she could back out, the inside of the house was completely shielded, complete with an odd schlorp that tickled her eardrums. From the point where the last of the halo converged on itself towards the front door, a beam of light shot from the doorway and into her chest, taking her breath away.

In her surprise and left gaspless, she felt the ripple effect take place as it coursed through her body before slowly ebbing away, then hissed as a searing pain spread across her forearm. A wound matching the modified sigil in the wall appeared on her skin, puffy and inflamed from irritation. The sap of energy quickly followed, and the pull of heat from her toes and her head left her chilled to the bone. She brought her hand to her chest as it ached, then fell to a knee, shivering and cold.

“Are you ok?” Josef’s voice sounded, warbled and slurry. Sheeva looked up at the two of them in her crouched position, finding they spun around the room as though she’d had too much to drink.

“C-cold,” She stuttered as her teeth clattered. Two pairs of hands helped her to her feet, urging her to the living room and helping her to sit in front of the hot coals, where she lay on the hard, warm floor as the heat spilled over her. Crowded by the faces of children, she tried to insist that she was fine, but could only slur. Her limbs became heavy as her brain melted into the wood, entire body dripping like ooze between the cracks, and her vision darkened, overtaken by shadow.

She woke sometime later with a startled “bah!” and a sharp intake of breath, struggling to sit up as her arms felt weak and her head ached. Her mouth soured, and as the room still spun, she likened it to a nasty hangover. As something fell down her chest, she looked, and saw the fabric of her emergency blanket now bunched over her waist.

“Good, you’re awake! You sure scared us, Miss!” Josef greeted, quickly heading to her side to help her sit up better.

Looking around the room, she spotted Nook sitting by the bay window across the way as he stared out the window, one of her knives in hand, while the twins huddled together on the mattress for warmth, Yelena curled between them and “Ted” snuggled in her arms.

Sheeva looked at the blanket draped over herself, then pulled it off, trying to get to her feet and cover the three children with it. As the room spun, she only managed to kick it off and shove it close.

“Here, give them–urk–this,” She insisted.

“You sure you don’t need it anymore?” He asked.

Sheeva shook her head, then regretted the action. Her body felt like it was on fire, and her clothes seemed to stick to her like a second layer of skin. Josef obliged the request, stood, and threw the blanket over the others. Sheeva looked for her bag in the meantime, her brain screaming for a painkiller, her mouth begging for a drink of water, and her body crying for an energy tablet. She grimaced as she remembered she didn’t have any, then continued to look for her bag. She at least had her canteen still tucked in it.

“Where is my–She stopped as she found it lying a little ways away, contents spilled onto the floor, having been rummaged through. Angered at the lack of consideration, she looked at Josef.

“Why–

–we were lookin’ for medicine to help you, Miss. Thought maybe you had some,” He explained. “You didn’t, but we found some bandages. Sophia wrapped them around your arm.”

Sheeva hadn’t noticed anything sticking to her arm, but as she looked, she felt a spot of gratitude at the young lady’s attempt, even though she had apparently used an entire roll of bandages and wrapped them far tighter than they needed to be for what had seemed a small wound. As she unwraveled the constricting bind from her arm and looked at the wound by the emberglow, she likened the wound to a carving of some kind, and winced at herself. With a trace of a sigil in the shape of a leaf and the guide of a green cloud to her arm, Sheeva sighed in relief at the sting as the wound healed itself, though not as well as she would normally be able to manage, still in need of good rest and probably a gut-splitting meal. Carefully, she wrapped the bandages back around, less tightly than they had been applied, and made a note to herself to thank and teach Sophia how to properly care for someone with basic first-aid.

Sheeva stared into space as she thought back to the contents of her bag. Other than the necessary medi-kit, there was nothing of significant importance, most of her belongings already folded and shuffled into the dresser at the Chorea’s home. In any case, she supposed it didn’t matter, since the sentimental things she kept with her were directly on her person and had not been carelessly littered around the empty bag, and anything not of sentimental value was easily replaceable with a little hard work, time, and money.

Eager to collect herself, she rubbed her eyes, then stretched, groaning softly from how good it felt on her tense muscles, stiff from sleeping on the floor. As a pop chucked an ember out of the fireplace, she snuffed it out with her foot, then looked at the pit. The fire was still warm, still burning, and still crackling, though it would be on its way out within an hour or so.

“We should get some wood for the fire–

–We already found more, in the shed in the backyard. You really should sleep, you seem like you need it,” Josef assured. Sheeva shook her head, rubbing at her eyes again.

“N-no, I am alright, now. You and Nook should get some rest. I’ll take over the watch.” She suggested, standing from her warm spot by the fire to sit by the bay window and peer out from it, albeit tired as hell and fighting the strong urge to go back to sleep.

“Not yet. You owe us an explanation,” Nook insisted, not moving from his seat by the window. The moonlights glimmered off the blade, and she hummed to herself in thought. Perhaps, she would allow him to keep the weapon, so long as she took some time to train him how to use it.

“Yes, I suppose I do, don’t I,” She mumbled, peeking at the other three. Not wanting them to overhear if they happened to wake up, Sheeva waved her hand to beckon them to the kitchen, and as they huddled around the big, iron stove, she wondered where to begin.

“I have been looking for someone. A murderer. He is a dangerous man, a manipulative man, who has turned others against me and even kidnapped others to torture, force my hand, or hurt me, and I don’t want the same to happen to anyone else. Not anymore. He can do some magic–enough that he can shock others and put up traps, but other than that, I don’t know what else to expect, which is why I refuse to give you my name and I insist that you use the passphrase I’ve set up for you,” She explained fiercely, then softened. “If you don’t know my name, perhaps he can’t use you. I just want you to be safe. I don’t want to see anyone else be hurt. I don’t…” She trailed off, unwilling to admit that she might not be able to handle seeing anyone else shrieking for mercy as his hands beat them to literal death or witnessing the massacre of good, kind people.

I don’t know that I can handle another failure.

“Alright,” Nook said with a clearing of his throat as he shifted his feet and crossed his arms. “So, then, what should Josef and I do?”

Sheeva looked at him, then at the sigil she had carved in her arm.

“I think, with an escape plan and with this, you won’t need to take up arms, but if you like, I can show you how to use that.” She said, pointing at the blade in his hand. It didn’t seem to be the fileting knife she hid in her boot, which was a relief.

“In any event, for the moment, it’s probably best if you remain in hiding, and only leave if you must,” She proposed.

“But what about food?”

“I…” She paused, trying to decide where to cut the slack. With a long sigh, she supposed that she could sacrifice time spent towards assisting the Chorea family with things in order to pivot and teach the band of children to care for themselves. “I can swing by to deliver supplies if you need them, but I’d prefer if you stay inside at least until I’ve either found Llyud or am sure that he is not in this town.”

“Unfortunately, after what happened earlier, I don’t know that I will be able to move about freely,” She doubted, then shook her head. She would simply have to disguise herself better. “No, never mind. I’ll–I will see what I can do,” She promised.

At a second moment of doubt, she reached into her pocket, felt Crawling Turd’s coin purse, and retrieved it. It was a weighty thing, and as she peered into it, what had to be twenty or so hundred-Inue coins, shiny and golden, clinked inside. Not wanting Josef to spend it all in one place, she carried it to the counter and poured its contents out, set aside three, then checked her own purse for change. She had enough for one-hundred Inue in smaller coins, so with the even trade, she put the small change in the bag and dropped it into his hand. The rest went into the old sack she used for setting aside foraged items and into the depths of her bag, to be hidden inside the house at a later time when all the others were asleep.

“In case I’m unable to, take this. There’s a hundred Inue in small change, here. Get yourself some blankets. I’ll come back with a measuring tape and help find you some clothes that fit better and that are in better shape, starting with shoes for you, Nook, and a better jacket for Arc. Oh, and I recommend you buy yourselves some jerky. Jerky is cured, so it’s safer to eat than raw meat, and until I can teach you to cook, it will tide you over.”

“Oh,” Josef said, taking the soft, maroon pouch from her hands. “What about potatoes?” He asked. Sheeva gave a soft huff.

“Wash them, then boil them in water for a little while until they are soft. That will at least make them taste better, though they are safe to eat uncooked,” She explained, then left the old pouch of seasonings on the counter by the pot she had used. “You can sprinkle some of those seasonings on it. All you need is a little bit–any more, and the taste will be too overpowering. If you would like, buying apples or lemar fruit would be a good choice, too. The yellow ones are cheap this time of year,” Sheeva suggested, feeling that the citrus fruit with a hint of tomato would be a good, somewhat shelf-stable item for them to eat if she would not be able to return for a few days in between visits.

She took a deep breath, feeling better about their situation, at least. They had shelter. They had warmth. They had access to water, and access to food, and better yet, stable food. They had a blanket, and money for more blankets and, if enough to spare, money for clothing, though she hoped Josef or Nook waited until she could return and take measurements as promised.

“Do you feel comfortable, now? Perhaps you should take some time to sleep,” She offered. “I…” She began, then swallowed a brick of guilt as she realized she had not necessarily told Tyler nor Mildred about where she was heading, only that she was “heading out.” She wondered if they were worried for her, and hoped they weren’t, though it seemed that Tyler would wait up for her to return, sometimes well into the wee hours of the morning. “I must be going; it will be dawn soon. There are some who are likely waiting for me,” she admitted.

Nook offered to take the first watch and sat by the bay window while Josef crawled beneath the blanket with the others, seeming asleep in minutes as he finally had the chance to sleep someplace warm, safe, and comfortable.

“Alright. I’ll return later this evening if I can. If not, I will return at night,” She promised to Nook, who nodded his acknowledgment.

Sheeva paused inside the doorway to cast a disguising spell on herself, though unsure of how well it took, given the extended amount of time and the significant drain on her energy as the change of her irises burned and her scalp itched with the shift of black hair to blonde, unwilling to even consider brunette as she usually would. After what had happened in the alleyway, she was reluctant to utilize her old disguise.

A blue-eyed, blonde Sheeva stepped out of the house, keeping her head down as she walked briskly through the streets towards the Chorea’s house, though paused to take a breather as her legs became wobbly with weakness.

Reflecting on all that she had told the children in an effort to help them begin taking care of themselves, Sheeva hadn’t expected herself to attempt to take care of any children at all, and hoped that–should her journey take her elsewhere–they wouldn’t beg and cry for her to take them with her. It would be a difficult thing to say “no” to, she felt, even though she wanted to give them tools for a more positive outlook and turnout on life.

Barring Llyud’s capture or death, she found that the risk she was about to take for their sake might be worth it if they could have the chance of a happier, healthier adolescence.

She laughed somewhat derisively at herself as she found the situation ironic, wondering if Rose had felt this sense of…awkward obligation when Sheeva first arrived at the temple’s doorstep. Of all the people that could have taken her up, she briefly wondered why it had been Rose, then huffed–perhaps Rose saw something of herself in Sheeva, as Sheeva had begun to see in the children.

Is this how it was for you, Rose? Did you feel as responsible, or did you really see something of yourself in me, too?

Recalling the brokenness of her watch and the destruction of the precious paper inside, she retrieved it from the depths of her pocket and mourned its state before pulling the still-damp paper from its clip. With a trace of a sigil and the touch of a fingertip, she dried it, though it would do no good, and as she unfolded the parchment, she saw the faintest of scribbles blotted on the page. The words previously cherished didn’t exist anymore except for in memory, and beyond the veil of blurry tears, Sheeva murmured the phrase that once was:

“Wherever you go, dearie, my love is always with you.”

******

As she shut the gate as quietly as possible, Sheeva felt she’d successfully slinked back into the Chorea family’s yard without alarming them. Celeste, the larger moon, and Kursu, the smaller moon, still lingered in the sky, and sun had not peeked over the horizon, but was well on its way to as the night sky brightened into a watercolor mix of blues, oranges, and reds. All she had to do now would be to sneak around to the back, jump up onto Jax’s doghouse, up onto the roof, and in through the window of Tazaro’s old bedroom.

However, when Jax barked in cheer and bounded to her, Sheeva tried to shush the excited thing, then paused as Tyler walked onto the porch to stand there, cross-armed and upset with a tight-lipped-line across his cheeks, though relieved to see her return as amber eyes looked on with softness. She settled at the gate, and awkwardly scratched behind Jax’s ear to alleviate her nerves. This must have been how Tazaro felt upon getting caught sneaking back home after the apparent and occasional “night out with friends.”

“Yeh look like death,” Tyler commented, and whether or not he was trying to be witty, Sheeva couldn’t tell, and could only blink at him in tiredness, then squinted her eyes as she realized the out-of-place thing.

Tazaro was more the comedic one, not his stepfather.

Sheeva felt a mix of appreciation and guilt and dropped her head in shame as her face heated from embarrassment. Too tired to fight about anything and feeling that she ought to square up and do the right thing, she approached and stood, sulking in remorse at his feet.

“I…I’m sorry,” She stated, though she wasn’t quite sure what for.

“Hm. Somebody gave yeh quite the shiner,” He pointed out, looking her over from head to toe. “And…yeh got blood on yer clothes.”

Sheeva grimaced at the reminder and looked at her hand. Though it was clean, it still appeared stained.

“It’s not mine,” She admitted. “Sir.” she added, wanting to be as respectful as possible in gratitude for his hospitality, if this were somehow the reason she were to be kicked out. “Something…happened, and I…I couldn’t come back. I couldn’t risk it. I needed to make sure everyone was going to be safe,” she somewhat explained, managing a harsh whisper as her throat constricted with even more guilt. “I truly am sorry.”

“Don’t call me ‘sir,” He grunted, annoyed at the fact. “Haven’t been ‘sir’ since…” Tyler stopped himself, took a deep breath in through his nostrils, then sighed as he uncrossed his arms and rubbed the tired and likely angry look from his face. Considering she had not returned all evening in order to keep “everyone” safe, he couldn’t fault her for worrying the hell out of him and Mildred.

“Ok. Yeh needed to keep everyone safe,” He repeated, wanting to ensure she–and he–focused on that, feeling it was the more important factor. “Can yeh tell me what happened?”

Sheeva found herself unable to look him in the eye, unwilling to witness even the briefest shadow of disappointment.

“I don’t know that I can, Tyler,” She answered. “Not without self-implication,” She admitted. “And, given the circumstances and promises I have made to keep, I cannot go to jail. My help is still needed for…the sake of others,” she answered as ambiguously as possible.

Tyler took in another slow breath, then chuckled at himself.

“Well, wouldn’t yeh know it, maybe I’ve never heard of a Sheeva Jules before.”

Surprised, Sheeva blinked, and caught his eye to search for truth. No malice lay there, no thrill of challenge, not even a glimmer of anger–just pure, honest, assurance. When he sighed again and sat down on the porch, he beckoned her to sit beside him. Jax waltzed up and immediately set his head in Sheeva’s lap with a snort and huff, then a smile and cheerful panting as Sheeva absentmindedly played with his ears, placated.

“There’ve been times when I’ve defied unethical orders, and I’ll always hold myself to that, even if I’m not proud of what I’ve done, I can be proud that I tried my best to make sure I did the right thing,” Tyler admitted. “Yup. Always proud of that. Do the right thing, even if it’s the wrong thing to do. I told Tazaro that as he grew up, and I’m tellin’ you now: Do the right thing, even if it’s the wrong thing to do,” He repeated.

Do the right thing, even if it’s the wrong thing to do. Sheeva repeated silently, feeling a sense of empowerment that she hadn’t felt before. She took a breath, held it, sighed, then began to tell her tale.

“I was in Northside, searching for Llyud. I was looking at the request board in a tavern; The Green Lantern. I heard about a string of killings, and I wanted to check it out and make sure it wasn’t connected. It didn’t seem to be; rather, to a man and two of his henchmen.” She paused, trying to recall whatever ridiculous name the man had spat at her, amusedly stuck on the nickname of Crawling Turd. “Ron the Rooster? Dan? Whatever; it doesn’t matter. The bastard grabbed my butt, so I socked him in the jaw. Stopped his buddy, threatened to break his arm,” She explained. Tyler chuckled and muttered a “good job, hope that showed him!”

“They cornered me later in an alleyway, must’ve lied in wait until I left. Supposedly, they run a trafficking ring and have been snatching women off the streets. They shattered my pocketwatch and threatened to put me in a dogfighting ring, or…or buy me–as if I’m some kind of prostitute,” Sheeva seethed in disgust and shuddered at the prospect. Though she’d had some skeevy encounters, none had ever seemed as possible as they had in that moment, and she figured it due to the tight grapple she had been in. “I fought, and broke free. Kicked him in the groin, smashed his teeth, nearly severed his tongue. Broke his friend’s arm, threw him into the wall. Punched the other guy so hard, he shit himself.”

“Good! Yeh defended yerself!” Tyler commended.

Sheeva frowned.

“The man whose arm I broke; when I threw him into the wall, his neck snapped and he landed on a pike of wood. He’s, he’s dead. I-I didn’t mean to kill him. I swear, I didn’t mean to. I don’t want to kill people,” She whispered, voice small. “I don’t want to be a killer like Llyud,” She murmured, trying to will away a darkening fear.

“Yeh defended yerself, Sheeva.”

Sheeva sighed, feeling defeated.

“I haven’t known yeh long enough, so this might be an odd thing to say, but hear me out. Am I proud of the fact that someone died, and from what sounds to me by accident? No, of course not. But, am I proud of the fact that yeh defended yerself?” He asked, giving pause to ensure Sheeva was really listening.

“...Yes?” She chanced, unsure.

He grinned, and clapped her on the back with a paw, causing her to grunt a small hiccup.

“Well! Yer damn right, kid!” He stated, groaning as he stood from his seat. Sheeva heard the pop of his knees and winced on his behalf.

“Y’know, we’re used to Tazaro fallin’ asleep in the workshop and not comin’ home, but at least we know he’s safe. Considerin’ yer out there doin’ what yer doin’, it worries us. At first, we thought yeh’d had enough, and yeh left without sayin’ goodbye and all that, but when we found yer stuff still tucked away in the room…” He frowned, took a deep breath, and sighed. “Look, just promise me yeh’ll leave a note next time of where yer goin’, huh? And, if yeh do decide yeh gotta leave, at least say goodbye, especially to Mildred–she cares about yeh, yeh know. And Jax, too–hell, I think yeh might’ve stolen my dog from me!”

Sheeva looked at the battle-dog, and smiled, then reached out to scratch behind its ears, happy to give it that happy-drunk look as its leg jerked and its tails wagged and thumped on the porch deck.

“I’mma go back to bed–and yeh should get some sleep, yerself. And, feel free to take a bath first and grab a bite to eat. Not the ideal breakfast, but we saved yeh some meatloaf,” He offered, pausing in the doorway.

“Oh, and we never had this conversation,” He insisted before disappearing into the house.

Sheeva sighed and beckoned Jax inside, thankful that dogs couldn’t talk since he’d surely yip about her winged state if he could. Once she’d bathed herself and scrubbed her skin nearly raw to rid it of the ghost of licentious hands, Sheeva grabbed the plate wrapped in cloth from the icebox and snarfed half of it down on the way to the room, shut the door, finished the meal while sparing a bite for the bedside Ragora, then crawled into the bed, asleep in minutes after Jax hopped up and curled up at her feet.