Nildeyr remained in his struck pose. After what seemed like an eternity, Dindale extracted a couple of coppers from his waist pocket and dropped them into Nildeyr’s open palm.
Nildeyr bowed, nudged Dorri until she dropped a hurried curtsey, and strolled away still smiling at her as if she hadn’t nearly brought all of Mizan’s justice right down on their heads.
“Keep up appearances.” Nildeyr’s whisper was far quieter but no less warm than when he’d spoken to her moments before.
Dorri felt blank inside, hot and sick and ready to collapse in a trembling heap onto the cool stone walkway beneath her feet. But Nildeyr was right. She still wanted to get out of this without getting caught, and he was her best chance of doing that.
So no matter how badly Dorri wanted to hurry, she went through the motions as Nildeyr led them along the path, stopping to perform for other patrons as they went. It became soothing, almost, falling into the pattern and responding to Nildeyr’s cues, like stepping into someone else’s skin, someone who wasn’t dying inside with wanting to be out of this garden and out of this city and anywhere whatsoever where there were no people.
They were approaching the outside edge of the spiraling path, breathing roses and autumn sunshine and hopeful calm, when Dorri noticed a woman watching them and realized that it wasn’t the first time she had noticed that same woman. She was lovely, that woman, with long black hair and flowing green robes. Serpentine gold bracelets wound in several places up and down her bare arms.
“I think she’s watching us.” Dorri tried to direct Nildeyr’s attention to the woman without giving away that she’d noticed.
I know she’s watching us. I was supposed to notice she was watching us.
The dice hadn’t rolled an Awareness check, but Dorri remained convinced it was true.
Nildeyr didn’t immediately look. He started up the steps leading out of the gardens and back into the shelter of the covered walkway surrounding it. About halfway, he turned his head, smiling as if to cast one fond look back at the scenery.
“She’s one of Mizan’s priestesses.” Nildeyr faced forward and slowed his steps, allowing Dorri the chance to catch hold of her skirt and pull it away from her feet rather than tripping over it. “She was just enjoying the show. We have to hurry, now. But don’t look like you’re hurrying.”
Dorri’s objection to Nildeyr’s dismissal of the priestess died under the onslaught of his conflicting instructions and her confusion about why, exactly, they must now hurry without hurrying.
Because we’re not done yet.
Exactly as Dorri had feared earlier. She’d failed to swap out the message in the pen the simple way. Now they’d need to accomplish their goal some other way.
Some other way that’s even more likely to get us caught.
They hadn’t gone far before Nildeyr abruptly hauled Dorri into one of the alcoves she’d longed to duck into previously. Instinctively, she dropped onto the bench and slid as far back as she could go.
Nildeyr didn’t object. He also sat on the bench and slid back far enough that he couldn’t be seen from the hall outside. He lifted into place the strip of green ribbon which indicated the space was occupied and busied himself with peering through the enclosing foliage back in the direction they’d just come.
“You don’t seem to be having much fun.” Nildeyr said it so conversationally and without looking that it took a moment for Dorri to realize he was speaking to her.
“I’m not,” she bit out.
Now Nildeyr did glance back, confusion written all over his freckled, boyish face. “Then why are you here?”
That question had layers and layers of possible interpretation. They all flowed together into an overwhelming and confused rush.
I’m here in Redemption Wars because the world was dying, and my mother died, and it seemed like the thing to do. I’m here in this mess of a quest because… I don’t know. Because the game’s System wasn’t designed to deal with loners like me? Because it was probably created by people who, like so many others, assume that no one actually prefers to do things alone?
But of course, she couldn’t say any of that out loud, because no OOC chatter to NPCs was allowed. While Dorri was trying to process an adequate but vaguely IC answer, Nildeyr ducked his head to peek out from their hiding spot once more.
“Hsst! Here he comes.” Nildeyr lifted a hand to silence anything Dorri might have said.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
Both of them sat still and quiet. Dorri could see nothing from where she sat, pressed so tight against the back of the alcove that roses drooped over her shoulder and nudged her ear. Their sweetness tickled her nose and the back of her throat.
Nildeyr kept his hand up. Then, just as suddenly, he flipped it around and beckoned to Dorri. When she didn’t immediately move, he turned and looked at her with wide green eyes and beckoned harder.
Get it over with.
Dorri took a deep breath and slid along the bench. Nildeyr eased from the alcove, and Dorri followed him.
They trailed Dindale away from the garden, out of the cloister, and into the maze of halls winding into the temple’s guest quarters. Dorri had already gotten herself lost here, in this enclosed place with only walls and ceiling and no sky or wild terrain with which to mark her location. Even the map hadn’t helped. When Nildeyr ducked into an alcove, Dorri went with him. When he emerged and scurried several more yards along a hallway to peer around a corner, she scurried behind him.
Eventually, Nildeyr leaned around a corner and then back again. “He’s gone into a room. He’ll be out soon enough, to go for his noon meal.”
Nildeyr lifted a finger and fell silent. Dorri stood against the wall and waited alongside him. She heard, eventually, a faint click and shuffle and click again from somewhere around the corner, followed by more shuffling and rustling which grew ever fainter.
“With a little luck, he’s left his pen inside. Come on.”
As usual, Nildeyr didn’t wait for Dorri’s opinion or agreement. He wheeled around the corner, apparently trusting that she was well-trained enough by now to just follow.
She thought about turning around and going the other direction. It would be easy enough. Wouldn’t it? Surely Nildeyr had more than enough talent to handle all of this alone? Maybe letting him do the quest would be enough to update it in her journal.
Nildeyr leaned back around the corner. Candlelight from the sconces along the walls deepened the red in his carrot-colored hair. “Please?” he whispered.
Dorri sighed inwardly.
Just a little longer, then. This one last thing, and then she could be done. She needed Nildeyr to get her out of the temple and out of the city anyhow, probably.
The halls were largely deserted. They’d barely seen anyone the entire time they’d followed Dindale, and silence and stillness remained as they approached the door Nildeyr indicated.
“You stand watch, and I’ll pick the lock.”
That seemed simple enough. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe she could handle this and then it would be over.
[You rolled a 13 for Awareness.]
Not good—if she was rolling to see if she noticed something, that meant there was something to notice.
Even as Dorri turned, intending to look back the way they’d just come, something metallic and musical clinked and tinkled from that direction.
The priestess Dorri had noticed earlier stood in the center of the hallway, mere steps away from them. Close enough, Dorri immediately recognized, to have heard everything Nildeyr had just said.
The priestess smiled as she pushed one of her bracelets from her wrist up her forearm, where it no longer dangled so loosely. The smile, Dorri thought, didn’t look threatening. In fact, the priestess seemed quite pleased. Lines creased around her eyes, which were a lovely pale color that wasn’t quite gold and wasn’t quite gray but was instead soft and somewhere in between.
“I am reasonably sure that is not your room.” The priestess spoke with a gentle kindness, as if she were correcting children—not, Dorri thought, too far off the mark.
And yet, somehow, Dorri couldn’t quite shake the sense that the priestess was as much delighted as disappointed.
Many minutes later, in the chambers of Mizan’s high priestess, Nildeyr wove a careful tale of half-truths while Dorri allowed him to continue doing all the talking.
Maybe the NPC can get us out of it. I sure as hell can’t, not the way I’ve been rolling.
Mizan’s high priestess, who wore a long white braid but also the same lush green robes as the other priestess, made a sharp gesture and interrupted Nildeyr in mid-lie.
“The Order of Riddles left Diairm days ago. Why are the two of you still here?”
Nildeyr smiled sheepishly and cast a sudden, adoring look at Dorri. She stared flatly back at him.
No, game. You are not forcing me to play flirty girl with the charming NPC.
Maybe she was wrong. Maybe that wasn’t the direction this was going.
“We wanted to take in a few more sights, so we snuck off while they were packing up.” Nildeyr all but batted his eyelashes at Dorri. “They probably didn’t miss us until they were well away from the city.”
Dorri managed not to roll her eyes and thus inflict disadvantage or something on any rolls the System might be making for Nildeyr’s attempt to get them out of this. She should probably do or say something to reinforce his claim. Smile adoringly back at him, maybe. Make some noise of agreement. Nod, at the very least.
Dorri couldn’t quite bring herself to do it.
The high priestess sighed, and Dorri realized that there was nothing either one of them could say that this woman was going to believe, anyhow. In a way, it was a relief, because this—whatever it had been—was at least over.
At the same time, Dorri felt so exhausted that she could fall straight into and through the marble floors.
I just want to be anywhere but here.
“And you were breaking into Lord Dindale’s room because…?”
“We thought Lord Dindale might have something valuable.” Nildeyr’s shoulders slumped. The regret in his voice sounded almost genuine.
But he was still lying, and after a second Dorri understood. The priestess who’d accosted them hadn’t searched them. Neither had anyone else. No one knew about the parchment scrap. No one knew that Nildeyr and Dorri had really only intended to swap out whatever was written on that with whatever was written on a similar scrap inside Dindale’s pen. They were spies, not thieves.
And Nildeyr apparently preferred to be taken for the latter instead of found out for the first.
With a lurch of her stomach, Dorri realized that she hadn’t gotten rid of the parchment. She’d merely shoved it into the pocket tied inside her skirt, along with her flute. It was still there. She’d learned and then forgotten a lot of things recently about the Riddles and the rules involved in belonging to them. One of them came back to her now.
If you get caught, you point the blame away from the Order.
She should have gotten rid of the paper. The very last place it should be was in her pocket.