Cat looked down at the girl cradled in his arms. Small. She was so small. How had he not realized. All he had seen to this point was her potential. His eyes of destiny could see many things, but even someone like Cat could not have seen this coming.

He had been walking back to the Paws and Claws Inn and Tavern but decided that was too slow. He needed to get her to the tavern, and they needed to call a White Mage. He knew that they were expensive, but at times like this it was important not to waste time. Money. They could always get more money. They could not get Ami her future back if he didn't act quick enough.

Cat did not know what she had been poisoned with but saw that she was fighting it. Even as she was sleeping, she was still fighting.

How could he have let this happen! He didn't even know the "he" that he was mad at. Was he mad at himself? At the god that was supposed to be looking after her? No. He couldn't let this blame fall on anyone aside from the one who deserved it. Whoever had decided to blow that poison dart. He would not rest until he found out who it was and soon as he did they would never rest again.

Cat had to remind himself that he was not allowed to rip someone limb from limb. Could he? Probably. Should he? Probably not. Who else would seek justice. Who else would find a form of justice that could be enacted within the adventurer's code.

He passed the Mage's field on his way back to the Paws and Claws. He gritted his teeth. He needed to get Amaya seen to, but he could not ignore Kay. While his thread of fate was not as brilliant, it still glowed. He was still a unique presence, and he would have a lot to offer. He failed to protect one of them. He would not fail to protect the other.

"Kay. Time to go." he said.

"Cat, our training time isn't completely up. I was also going to take him to the bathhouse and get... Some..." Crestin's words dried up in his mouth. He looks in Cat's arms. He tried to swallow but it seemed that he was unable to produce enough saliva to do so. "Cat. why are you..."

"Not here. Follow me."

Kay hadn't seemed to be paying attention and was still blasting off spell after spell at the spell absorbing mage boulders. Or whatever they were called. Cat wasn't a mage so he didn't know the correct terminology. How was he going to get Amaya back without Kay noticing what was going on.

"Kay, Crestin. I will race you both back to the Inn. Loser buys the winner crepes!"

Ah, that statement Kay heard.

"Ready, set, go!"

“What, but who are you? And how many crepes are we allowed to get? You know it doesn’t matter free crepes are free crepes!” Kay says before he takes off running.

Cat pretended to start running but he let Kay and Crestin get ahead of him. He stayed close behind them keeping an eye out for any trouble. Kay would get the momentary satisfaction of a win and Cat would be able to avoid making a scene in public. Kay seemed like a rather sensitive boy.

"Mmf. Mmmr." Amaya was whimpering and making little noises as she was jostled. He tried to carry her as gently as possible, but gentle really wasn't possible right now.

"Why the hell did you try to leave me behind!" Alice shouted at him, sounding irritated, but he knew that she was more worried about her pupil then she was actually mad at Cat.

"Did you find what she was hit with?" Cat asked. He knew that most of the poison would have been absorbed into her skin and clothing but he also hoped that some of the residue would be on the dart.

"Who do you take me for?” She said, annoyed.

Okay, now she really was annoyed with him. He supposed that he might deserve it. But only a little. A very little. Miniscule. But still deserved.

"How is she doing?" Alice says, moving right up next to Cat and looking down at the girl that he was cradling.

"She is making enough noise that I can tell she is alive. So that's good, but she is clearly in a lot of pain and lost consciousness so... Do you have any idea what poison this could be?" Cat asked.

"I do happen to have an idea. I took a class on potions and poisons when I was training to be an adventurer. A few things seem to have stuck. Not as many things as I would have liked, but a few things none the less."

"You are beating around the bush Alice." Cat said. He knew that he was being rude, but he was a cat so he assumed that he would be able to get away with it. Just this once. Just today.

"I'll tell you when we get to the Paws and Claws I want to examine her more first." Alice said. There was silence between the two of them for a few heartbeats.

"Do you really care about her so much Cat? You have known her for only a week." Alice said, but she knew that time meant very little between adventurers. They were a bunch that grew close quickly, knowing that they most likely were going to end up living short lives.

"Yes. I do." he said, a bit annoyed at himself for it. It really had only been a week. But he feels as though he had grown close to her in that time.

"Please tell me this isn't because of your damn eyes. It isn't, is it Cat?"

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"Maybe at first, but not anymore, she reminds me of Daniel."

Short. Simple. Honest.

"You cannot act like you did when our guild leader died. It wasn't your fault. And this isn't either."

"The hell it isn't!" Cat said, barely able to keep his voice down. Not his fault. Not his fault? She was fine until he turned his back on her. They had been led into a false sense of security. He knew better. He KNEW better.

Alice seemed to know to leave him alone for the time. He needed to be alone with his thoughts. Cat did not like being alone with his thoughts today. Any other day? As long as he didn't think about the guild leader, Cat was pretty okay with himself. He knew he wasn't the best person, but he was a damn good one compared to many other adventurers.

"We won! I don't know how we beat you Cat, but we did. Crestin had to tell me while we were running that it was you, because I don’t know if you know this but you don’t look like Cat at all. You know with being really tall and all those muscles. I guess my agility really did improve. When I saw my numbers go up I thought, wow that's really cool. The numbers went up! But I didn't really know what that meant or what that was going to feel like. But I was fast! I went zoom! I mean, I guess I do have the spell boosting my speed. But still! I managed to beat you and you are a full adventurer. Admit it, Cat. Admit that I am awesome. I am awesome right?

“Well awesome or not I get a crepe. I wonder what kind I will have. I want to make sure that it is one that Ami will like since I will want to share with her. I mean I won so that means I get a crepe. Ami didn't so I guess she didn't win a crepe and..." Ah. It seems like he just realized. "Hey, where is Ami?"

"Mmm. Mmmrgghh. Sniffle."

"Inside Kay. Now." Cat said, snapping Kay out of whatever he was going to say.

"Yes Cat." Kay says, quick to obey. Not only did he go in, but he held the door open.

"Well hello there. Did you work extra suuuuper hard today? Oh my! Do we get to feed Alice and Crestin because of their... Hard... Cat! Why are you a humanoid? I mean, you are sexy like that but still. It's been really cute watching you let Ami play with your toes beans."

One. Two. Three. Cat counts in his mind. Please at least let the door close before you freak out Vita.

"Oh holy carp! Is that Ami! What happened. What happened to her Cat. Ami. Ami!"

"What's wrong with Ami?" Kay says, spinning around, the gears finally clicking into place in his mind.

"Kay, bring me to Amaya's room. I need to you to hold the door open. Vita, you need to stay calm and greet people the way you always do. Don't let anyone think that anything is out of the ordinary. Alice, go and bring those two darts to Polly, and tell her to step on it. Crestin, go fetch a white mage." Cat says, efficiently dividing up the work and giving people tasks that they would be best suited to. Like a leader. Like the guild leader that he was supposed to be.

Kay, silent for one, leads Cat up to Amaya's room.

"It's locked." Kay says.

"Pat her down. Help me find her key it should be in one of the pockets."

"Move out of the way!" Hillie said, wings flapping in irritation. Hillie knew Amaya the least out of everyone, despite working with her, so was able to keep the most levelheaded. "We keep a spare key to all of the rooms in case an adventurer goes and dies. We have to be able to get into the rooms after all."

Oh. Right. Cat should have known that. He probably did know it.

"Kay, move everything off of her bed." Cat says. It would be easier to examine her if there weren't blankets in the way.

Kay moved to do as Cat says. "Sorry blankets." he says, as he bundles them all up and shoves them into the little closet.

Cat lays Amaya flat on the bed. That bothered him. She looked a little too uncomfortable. He pulled a pillow out of the blanket pile in the little closet and slipped it underneath her head. Okay, now she looked a little more comfortable.

"Auughh." She makes a sound, somewhere between a scream and moan. She looked so fragile like that. And Cat hated it.

"Kay? Get strong fast. You need to become guild leader if I end up killing someone."

"Umm, okay. But maybe don't do that? Obviously I am still inexperienced. And skinny. I can't defend anyone. I can go pew pew, burn, freeze, ZAP longer than a lot of other people, but that doesn't mean a lot. And Cat. WHAT HAPPENED TO AMI!" Kay shouts, finally losing it.

"Stop yelling or I am going to kick you out, she needs quiet right now." Cat said. He was serious too. She had to sleep. She had to fight. She had to do whatever she could to fight this off. She was tiny and polite, but she was also fierce and strong.

"Fight this Amaya. Where is that damn god of yours right now." Cat said, furious. That was it. He had done all he could here. He began pacing back and forth. And the waiting began. Waiting for her to wake up. Waiting for them to tell him definitively what poison it was. Waiting for the white mage to come in and heal her.

"Cat." Alice said, coming into the room. Her face was white.

"Polly really is fast isn't she. Well, what is it?"

"Cat. I'm sorry. She was poisoned with Rookie's Bane."

Rookie's Bane. Every adventurer that got deep enough into the dungeon knew what that was.

"Did she just say Rookie's Bane?" Kay asked. Oh. It seemed that Kay knew what that was. "That can't possibly be right. That is illegal. No one should be able to bring that out of the dungeon. No, nope, nuh uh. You must be mistaken. Maybe Ami just has a really bad stomachache. Right Ami? Right? Haha I knew that crepe yesterday tasted weird."

Cat put a hand on Kay's shoulder. Rookie's Bane would keep Amaya from ever becoming an adventurer. There was no cure. You couldn't mix up a potion, there was no antidote. There was only this. The poison would wreck her immune system. Anyone with a high and strong constitution could fight it. And while her stats were impressive, they weren't enough.

"I'm going out." Cat said.

"Out. Out? Where are you going out to Cat? What is she needs to squish your toe beans when she wakes up?"

"Then she will have to wait. Or ask Alice or Vita to go into their beast forms and let her play with theirs."

"Can I come with you? Can I help? Tell me how I can help." Kay said. He was clearly starting to fray at the edges. And Cat couldn't blame him. Kay the library mouse. He had heard of him. His parents had been incredible. Had made it almost to the lowest level of the dungeon that had been explored at that time. Only to mysteriously die.

Kay had never really had friends before. He was a half-elf, and many thought him unclean. The morons. He would eat them, but they would likely give him indigestion. Amaya was most likely the first friend that he had ever had.

"Kay. Do you know where she is from? Someone needs to alert her family. She may end up going home." Cat said and became even more angry. He did not think that it was possible to become even more angry, but he had hidden depths that even he hadn't known about.

"I really don't know. I don't know that much about her. She is closed off, even to us. And we even know about her secrets, well some of them…” Kay said. He was having a very hard time with this.

"My blood is one fire. Please help me. My blood is on fire." she whimpered, before falling back into fitful sleep.

"I'm going to track down who did this."

"Cat, you know who did this!" Kay wailed. He was right. They did know. But he had to get evidence. He had to put that little shit in the ground. He had to bury him so deep that not even his daddy's money could bail him out.

"I know Kay. I know. And I will try to find a way to prove it."

And with that Cat left the room. He thought that for a moment he heard Ami whimpering his name. He had to tell himself that he misheard her. Clearly, he wasn't hearing things right?

He took the stairs two at a time on his way out of the Inn.

"Cat. Where are you going?" Emmi asked, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. She always was the most gentle out of all of them. Most people would not recognize that about her at first. Too many people thought that they knew what serpent-kin were like, without actually knowing what they were like.

"Emmi. I am going to the black market. I am going hunting, where should I start?" he asked, and in a moment of weakness let his head drop onto her shoulder. She just had that way about her he guessed.

"You should start by going to the Black Rooster auction house. Ask them to show you the silver nest. It is the code for this week. That will get them to let you purchase the underground items. If anywhere is selling poisons, that is where."