The funeral at Elediah’s Trail was a quiet, solemn affair. They held it early in the morning to try to beat the afternoon heat, but by the time they were burying the last of the bodies, the summer sun had already become almost unbearable.

Rain took her time to make the rounds and visit every individual still standing. She sat with the wounded. She offered words of condolences to those who were grieving. She knew every name and face of every settler at Elediah’s Trail, and yet, the people most familiar to her were conspicuously absent. She had known Lunette, Arvel, and Fidget would not be here, but to see Frederik had missed the event came as a shock.

By the time she was walking back to the farm house in the mid afternoon, she was completely alone. For a small mercy, the sky had grown overcast, and a few droplets of rain began to fall while thunder rolled in the distance. Though Rain took it as Fidget’s influence, she only grew more bitter thinking about it.

‘Arvel is alive. Fidget wants him to stay that way. You go to your funeral and your people... and Fidget makes sure Arvel comes home.’

“You had better,” Rain whispered under her breath, picking up her pace as the rain began to fall more heavily. Her argument with Fidget from that morning kept playing over and over in her mind. She quickly unlatched the gate and ran up the steps of the front porch. Once she was inside, she slammed the half-repaired door shut behind her, and leaned back against it to keep it shut as a gust of wind whistled by.

The farmhouse gently creaked beneath a steady fall of rain. The quiet din of raindrops was almost deafening. Rain slowly slid down the door, beginning to sob as she settled on the floor, and she hugged her knees tightly to her chest.

“I hate this,” she murmured, “I hate this! I hate being... so useless...”

A rumble of thunder rolled across the sky and rattled the house. The cups in the cupboard clattered against one another, and the tools hanging by the door lightly swayed and bumped back against the wall. Rain lifted her head, and looked up at the antique sword that swayed on its mount, the tip of its sheath lightly tapping the wall.

Meanwhile, though Lunette barely had the strength to lift her head, allowing it to lull forward only made her body ache more. She groaned as she forced herself to straighten up, and pressed her head back against the rock and crystal behind her. Her eyes had adjusted to the darkness of the room, which seemed almost featureless; it was a cave of dark, almost black stone, and softly glowing purple crystals grew on many of the surfaces. As best she could tell, she had become embedded in one of the largest crystal growths. She could still feel her fingers and her toes, encased as they were, but her torso was left to dangle freely and her shoulders ached from sagging.

“The Pale Emperor,” she whispered, “I know of him only in whispers.”

“Mn?” Melodia asked, resting against a nearby wall, lounging back on her black feathered wings.

“My entire life, I’ve feared demon attacks,” said Lunette, “Goblins were the more prevalent danger, but demons seemed all the more terrifying. They came rarely, but they never took anything except people.”

“Your jewelry and baubles and such mean nothing to us,” Melodia said, “We don’t even want your crops or livestock. Demons derive no energy from consuming food. The only way for a demon to grow stronger is to consume other living beings. Animals offer us almost nothing, but humans are wellsprings of vitality.”

“So it’s survival?” Lunette asked, “Are we to you, as cattle are to humans?”

“It goes beyond survival,” Melodia said, “The reason you know so little of the Pale Emperor is because he was sealed into the underworld millennia ago by human warriors. But, he sends his children out through the cracks into the human world, so that we might pave a path for his return.”

“Pave a path?” Lunette asked, eyes narrow, “How?”

Melodia smiled faintly and said, “The distillation of power. Demons growing their territory, growing stronger, then killing one another and taking what was theirs, until only the strongest demon remains. One who would become the perfect vessel for the Pale Emperor to claim as his own.”

Lunette’s eyes slowly widened.

“That’s what you meant by ‘filial piety’?” Lunette asked, “You’re vying for the chance to give up your existence to your emperor?”

“My existence already belongs to him,” Melodia replied, “It was what I was created for. What all of my sisters were created for. And what I’ve killed dozens of my sisters for. I am the last demon princess in Nathulan, and eventually, I’ll be the last one in your kingdom, and then the world.”

“Why would you want that?” Lunette asked, “Make me understand. Why in the world would you pursue something like that, so doggedly? Why would you pursue your own erasure?”

“I don’t think I can make you understand,” said Melodia, letting out an exasperated sigh, “Humans are born selfish. You attach yourself to your parents like parasites until you’re strong enough to seek independence. Even if you try to ‘repay’ your parents, in the end, their needs carry less weight than those of the children you’ve decided to spawn. You’re born a fraction of a person who struggles their whole life to become whole, collecting ‘things’ and attaching yourself to friends and lovers to fill the void in you. Failing that, humans put their best effort into making sure their progeny are better than they were. It’s like some way to prove your existence wasn’t a waste. But a demon born of the Pale Emperor is born whole, complete, and with purpose. To give up that purpose... it’s unthinkable.”

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“What a miserable purpose,” Lunette muttered.

“Perhaps humans and demons will never be able to understand one another,” Melodia said as she stood and stretched, arching her back and extending her feathered wings behind her, spanning the length of the room.

“Yet you remain obsessed with a human,” whispered Lunette.

Melodia paused, and slowly folded her wings against her back, before saying, “The most pathetic thing a demon could do is live forever. I’ll never grow old, and never die unless someone kills me, or I’ve fulfilled my purpose. But I do have that one goal, pushing me ever forward. But in the meantime, I want to live this life as brilliantly as I can. If there is one thing that we can agree on, it’s that no one wants to live their life in solitude.”

“Solitude,” Lunette said, “surrounded by other demons?”

“Another place we cannot see eye-to-eye,” Melodia said with a smile, “You humans still view your lessers as ‘people’.”

“If only we all did,” murmured Lunette, her eyes drifting down to the cave floor.

The gentle clack of Melodia’s heels echoed on the cave walls before her feet came into Lunette’s view. Melodia extended a hand, gently curling a finger under Lunette’s chin, and tilting her head back.

“I’ve long theorized that the greatest vessel that could ever be offered to the Pale Emperor would be one that was not completely demonic,” Melodia said, “An elegant blend of human and demon, that did not struggle to exist in your world by its very nature.”

“What?” Lunette asked, her eyes narrow, before they widened at the realization: “Is that what you want of Arvel? To create a half-human child?”

Melodia laughed and said, “Oh dear, no. I despise the way you humans hang all of your hopes on your children, because you failed to live up to your dreams.”

Melodia stroked her knuckles softly along Lunette’s jaw, and her cheek, before lifting her hand to grab Lunette by the top of her head, her fingers threaded through the lady knight’s golden tresses. Lunette clenched her teeth, wincing as her hair was pulled, before a soft purple glow began to pour from the palm of Melodia’s hand. A rich purple magic condensed within her grip, and rivulets of it began to trickle down Lunette’s brow. Lunette held back her voice as long as she could, before letting out a quivering scream.

Arvel could feel cool mud beneath him, and the constant splatter of rain pouring down on him, soaking him to the bone. Beneath the quiet, consistent clamor of the rain, he could hear the familiar choked sobs of one of his most precious people.

Slowly, Arvel opened his eyes, and saw Fidget crying over him. Frederik was kneeling beside her in the mud, with an arm around her shoulders, trying to offer her some comfort. Arvel lifted his hand up, and gently petted the side of Fidget’s head.

“Hey,” Arvel said, “You’re gonna cause a mudslide like that.”

Fidget gasped when she heard Arvel’s voice, and immediately threw herself over his chest, clinging tightly to him.

“You’re alive!” she shouted.

“Yeah, I do that,” he replied with a chuckle, though his mind began to drift to the question of how. He remembered the threats that Tork had made. Arvel pushed himself to sit up with a groan, shifting Fidget off his chest and onto his lap, before looking around to appraise his surroundings. There were a few abandoned weapons and even chunks of armor, but no signs of any goblins, living or dead.

“When we came upon you, they were trying to saw your head off,” Frederik said, “Bless their poor weapon technology, because their blades are thankfully in terrible disrepair.”

“What are you doin’ up here?” Arvel asked, wrapping both his arms around Fidget, who hadn’t yet stopped crying.

“Looking for you, of course!” said Frederik, “Fidget was quite insistent that I accompany her to watch her back. That, and I’m better at wrangling her goat than she is.”

“Goat?” Arvel asked.

As if on cue, he felt the back of his hair being tugged, and a quiet chewing sound.

“Tim!” Arvel exclaimed, reaching back over his shoulder to both pet Tim’s face and also shove the goat off of his hair, “I never expected the three of you to get along.”

“To say we ‘get along’ might be an overestimation,” Frederik said with a smirk.

The rain was beginning to subside, but Fidget still sniffled against Arvel’s chest.

“Hey,” Arvel whispered, “I’m still here. I’m gonna guess I have you to thank for that... You ran ‘em off, didn’t you?”

Fidget nodded a little.

“Oh, they were terrified when she appeared,” Frederik explained, “Her hair stood on end and the air began to crackle with static. I thought lightning might strike one of them right then and there, had they not fled with such alacrity.”

“A-Afraid they already went too far,” Fidget murmured.

“Hey, they didn’t,” said Arvel, “Look, I’m good as new.”

“I see that,” said Frederik, “Even your wounds from yesterday have healed.”

Arvel looked down at his right shoulder, and rotated his arm, before he began to pull the disheveled bandages off.

“Those born beneath the Warrior Star generally waken weak and weary,” Frederik said, “and still suffering from their wounds, only barely closed enough to restore them to life. Some may even continuously succumb to infection after they rise again. But you return completely restored and full of vim and vigor.”

“Just like my pa,” Arvel said quietly as he looked down at his fully healed shoulder. After a moment, Arvel looked at Fidget and said, “I’m gonna guess you won’t go back home if I tell ya to.”

Fidget shook her head.

Arvel looked up at Frederik, who likewise shook his head and said, “Nor I! The young lady asked me to accompany her and I would not be so unchivalrous as to abandon her here.”

“I’m goin’ straight toward Melodia’s den,” Arvel said, “and she knows I’m coming. I can’t protect you.”

“It’s okay!” said Fidget, “Fidget will protect skinny writer man, and we both watch your back.”

Arvel chuckled and pushed himself up to his feet, setting Fidget down beside him.

“Well,” said Arvel, “Then we better get a move on if we want to make it before sundown.”