Varus hadn’t even finished opening the door of his cottage when he was greeted with a cry of challenge. “Fiend! I am Lady Lithia Sygdria of Kerlan Hall! In the name of the children you have stolen, and the children you will steal, I am here to vanquish you! Give those stolen ones back, and I may give you a swift end!”

Varus stared at the place where the noise was coming from. There was no one there. ‘Invisibility? Alright, that’s a fifth level spell. And she destroyed my summon, she can’t be that weak.’ He thought and shut the door behind him before bringing his skeletal hand up and placing a finger over his teeth, “Shhhh. They’re asleep, and I’d rather you not wake them until you and I have time to talk. Keep your voice down.”

The depression in the grass told him she took a step back, and she was briefly, stupidly quiet as she tried to grasp the unnatural calm in the way he said it, so Varus continued.

“And you know, if you intend to challenge someone, it’s rude to remain invisible while you do it. Or have manners and dueling etiquette died out since I last spoke with anyone else?”

He didn’t have to see her to know she flushed red with embarrassment at his mild rebuke. Her voice gave it away. “A-As if I would let you see me to strike first, monster!”

“Then,” Varus retorted with a shrug of his shoulders and a spreading of his arms, “why bother with the challenge, it would have been better to try to strike without a word. Make up your mind, either be smart, or be polite, but when you try to mix both like this, you just look silly.” He chuckled, and the invisible valkyrie snapped back at him immediately.

“Y-You shut up! I’m serious! I came out here to rescue the helpless, not talk etiquette with an Elder Lich!”

“I’m sure.” Varus said, struggling to contain his laughter, and slowly failing at it, “But I don’t need to see your face to know I’ve already beaten you in a battle of wits, besides, I knew you were there, so you not only look silly despite being invisible, but you wasted your mana before knowing whether it would do you any good.”

“N-No you didn’t! My spell was perfect! There’s no way you could have known!” Lithia’s voice went up another octave as disbelief came out with her words. He felt her tense, and a chuckle came from his open mouth.

“Shall I just prove it, without actually hurting you?” He asked.

“Ha! Go ahead, I destroyed your summon anyway, if that’s the best you’ve got, what’s one minute to make you look like a fool!” She quipped.

“As you like.” Varus replied and lifted a hand skyward. [Companions] It was a fairly simple spell, accomplishing nothing but calling upon those animals which always followed the armies of men and demons and all other living things alike. Though in his case, it summoned specifically one creature, the companion bird to the strongest of undead. The raven.

But it did not summon one.

The seconds passed, and the tension grew with it, he knew she was looking at him and the sky with ever growing confidence…

Until the flurry of black feathers appeared en masse as if conjured out of thin air. The ravens came in vast numbers from the forest, and like a cloud of night, they moved according to Varus’s will, his hand lowering directly toward the feet of the adventurer.

“Wh-a wait! No!” Lithia shouted as she was suddenly caught in a whirlwind of birds landing on her feet, her arms, her head, and the more she tried to shake them off, the more they clung to her cloak, her hair, to everything. They cawed and flapped their wings as she tried to dislodge the creatures without actually harming them. “No! Stop! Stop it I say! Get off me!” She shouted as she wiggled and danced on the grass, and Varus gave up suppressing his laugh, openly guffawing at her as he reminded her…

“I told you so, didn’t I?”

The invisible woman was now an outline of a person wrapped in feathers and birds. “Alright! Alright! You win! You knew I was there! I believe you! Now get rid of those things already!” Lithia barked as she rolled back and forth on the grass, and Varus snapped his fingers to dispel the call.

The birds flapped madly for a moment, the feathers they lost in their struggle with the would be hero began to drift down to the ground around the outraged woman, and a moment later she canceled her spell.

“That was cheating.” Lithia gasped from where she lay on her back in the grass. She huffed as she rolled over to her belly and rose to all fours to stand up again.

“Says the woman who showed up invisible to try to make a sneak attack.” Varus pointed out, and she flushed red in her pale face.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“I announced myself!” She retorted.

“I said you were cheating. Not that you were good at it.” Varus quipped, and she stamped her right foot on the ground in outrage.

“That’s it! You’re going to get it! I’ll defeat you and rescue the children you’ve stolen you…you infuriating undead monster!” Lithia snapped and with a dramatic flourish she drew her sword to level it at the Elder Lich.

“We can fight if we really have to, but that won’t be necessary. You’ve definitely misunderstood me. I didn’t kidnap any children, I rescued them.”

“Liar!” Lithia declared as she braced herself.

“Then whose children did I take? You stopped through that village, didn’t you? Theirs are all present, I assume.” Varus answered, and that brought the valkyrie up short.

“Yes…” She said and her eyes went briefly to the ground where black feathers lay scattered about. “But you got them from somewhere!” She insisted.

“I did, I got them from there.” Varus leveled his hand toward the forest at her back, and she reflexively looked behind her. ‘Amateur.’ He thought, and as her head turned to look, he cast his next spell. [Control Shadow].

He then ripped it away from her, guiding her shadow toward the wall of his cottage. ‘She may be an amateur, but she’s fast enough to get here much earlier than I expected, and strong enough to smash a lightly reinforced summon, not to mention good enough at tracking at least to follow my summon back to me. There’s no reason to take chances with her.’

“H-Hey! Why? Can’t? I? Move?” Lithia said and her body trembled with futile effort. She couldn’t even turn her head to look at her opponent again.

“Because I didn’t think you would be willing to talk unless you had no other choice.” Varus said and began to walk over to her.

“This. Is. Definitely. Cheating!” She declared and grunted as she tried to move her legs and found that she could not.

“You’re right.” He said as he strolled languidly toward her. “I didn’t think you’d listen to me if you didn’t have to. So this seemed like the best way to take control of the situation.”

“Curse you! You cheater!” She gasped and struggled to turn her head at least.

“Fair fights just get in the way. Besides, you seemed competent, and nobody wants a competent opponent after them. Especially a strong one. So I just took advantage of your amateurishness so we could have a few words.” Varus promised while his footsteps carried him around so that he was standing directly in front of her.

“Finish it…monster.” Lithia said with a glare. “I’m not afraid. When I don’t come back, the guild will send more, and more, and more, until somebody brings you down! I swear it on the Dark Mother’s shadow! I shall be avenged ten thousand fold before I am reduced to my bones!” She cried out with outrage as he loomed over her.

‘A line from one of my books? Well that was unexpected.’ Varus thought, but said aloud, “Very well, hero. I end it here for thee, and I will add flesh to flesh in piles to be devoured by time and the earth that is thy shroud, until no heroes come, and I know the peace of final victory.”

Her blue eyes went wide as he quoted the villain’s retort to the hero whose line she stole, and he stretched out his hand…and flicked her little nose on its end with the tip of his finger. The force of the blow sent her tumbling end over end, bouncing along the grass until she slammed into the wall where her shadow was waiting for her, and when she struck it, the shadow was joined with her again.

Not that she could move much, her head wobbled back and forth, her eyes were unfocused, and a steady, “ahwoo owww…ohh…” was all she said for a full minute until she snapped out of it and could see the Elder Lich standing over her once again, now holding her sword in his hand, and leaving her searching for nonexistent options.

“I…give up. I’ll listen, I surrender…I guess if you wanted to take my life, you could have done so a dozen times over by now…but just one thing.” Lithia said and rubbed her still sore little nose.

“Yes?” Varus asked with genuine curiosity before he reversed the sword and handed it to her hilt first.

“How did you know that line? The one you said to me, it’s from the novel ‘Prevailing Evil: Volume Two’.” Lithia’s anxiety had dispersed in the face of reassurance that her life was not at risk, and curiosity was now at the forefront of her mind.

“Easy. I wrote that series. It’s nice to know people are still reading the early volumes even what…fifty years later, or however long it’s been. Time doesn’t mean much out here. Though personally I like volume twelve the most, it really capped off the series nicely.” Varus said, and then took a step back in surprise when her expression went from confused, to worshipful, as if stars replaced her bright blue eyes.

“You’re kidding?! You?! An Elder Lich wrote it and…wait… there’s a volume twelve?! How is that even possible?! I thought no more were written after volume ten!” Her voice went up an octave yet again, but with thrilling excitement mixed with something akin to hero worship.

“Well her tune changed drastically.” Varus muttered low under his breath, which she seemed not to notice. “Yes,” he went ahead and answered, “I suppose the copies I set out for taking just haven’t been picked up yet, or not made it to you, that is. Would you like to read them while I explain…well, everything?”

Lithia put her sword away, got to her feet, and brought her hands together like a child eager to be handed a treat. “Would I?! That series is why I even became an adventurer!”

It was at that moment the door of the cottage opened and both Tuesday and Hannah poked their heads out, both rubbing the sleep from their eyes, Tuesday said, “There was a noise… is everything OK?”

“Children?” Lithia said dumbly and looked back and forth from them to Varus.

‘She forgot?!’ Varus groaned in his head, but kept his dismay concealed there, he coughed into his hand and cleared his throat before addressing the adventurer.

“Ah, yes. This will be a bit of a story. Tuesday, Hannah, go back inside, I’ll be in shortly, everything is fine, we just have a…guest. Go inside, and you’ll get extra honeyed egg yolk with your breakfast.” He promised, and with a shooing gesture of his skeletal hand, they backed inside and closed the door behind them.

“This will take a while to explain, so please, pay attention.” Varus said and headed toward the hollowed out tree where his little library waited for them both.

While she followed, Lithia huffed, “What kind of idiot do you take me for?”

Varus, for his part, considered it best not to answer that one at all.