> "And whom, mine Lord, would embrace wisdom abandoned?
>
> Mongrels raised hand fed by lessers, deafened by the jangle of silver and cut quarts.
>
> Would thy words ever reach such ears?"
>
>
>
> Once more did the Lord in Iron laugh, jovial.
>
>
>
> "Oh, Aenexias, foolish Aenexias.
>
> Thy is a won fight! What is the crown, the staff, the bracelet?
>
> Mimicries! Combs, pelts, fanning tails for those who bear none.
>
> Like to the beasts they so covet, true power lies at the tip of talons and incisors.
>
> Bare yours, allow the forsaken to feel their pierce, their flesh worn history.
>
> No ear shall ever be deaf to thee."
>
> -- Citrine Tale
Beyond the cramped roads of the Floodlands, a city sprawled in all directions.
Treil, who once bore the name Threehills, on account of having been built in a small valley between three hills and the Ivian Cordon, the River Hooale, long ago one of the most disputed borders between the Empire of Galehold and the yet to organize Tyrian tribes, was a remarkable place at fist glance. Second most populous settlement in Bellfort, commercial hub between the Saintdom of Awin, the Kingdom of Bellfort, and the relatively recently open Galehold.
Its history too, was remarkable. Streets of cobblestone and houses of brick and mortar had been laid over the open tombs of ancient battlefields, burned thrice over by bloody conflict as it exchanged hands between powers both native and foreign, until the Bellfort Revolution, when its council of Elders and Nobles decided that enough was enough, and smoothly fell in with the rebels against the Bear.
Marquise had a several minute long rant ready at all times, waiting for whenever the topic of Awin's budding vassal state was broached. Fordu himself held no such unfavorable opinions, finding some odd comfort in it. All sorts, reputable or otherwise, inhabited the place, and traffic was constant both ways, making it a quick and easy place to infiltrate and leave as needed.
Bringing Aleh along, then, had been easy. The pretentious witch was sat by the knot of a great ficcus, cursing under his breath ever so often as his carving knife slipped and nicked his fingertips, though for all the complaining his work seemed to be coming along fine.
Fordu was alerted when his hands stopped, head snapping South and West as he focused on a sliver between the canopy of several trees. The illusion broke silently, the copper glint of One-Two sweeping down towards Aleh's extended arm. It slowed with a few beats of its wings, dropping on his forearm like a stone and almost pulling him to the ground.
"You were supposed to land, you fucking asshole!" Aleh murmured, glaring at the bird-shaped object. "I give up. Fuck this!"
"Aleh," Fordu said.
"Patience Agare, I'm getting to it!" Aleh touched his finger to One-Two's front-side. Once his biometric signal was recognized, he moved it in a particular pattern, hitting several keyspots and unlocking its back compartment. Snuggled among hides laid a letter, rolled into a small tube. Fordu reached in, plucking it out and wasting no time in reading it top to bottom.
After a few seconds of silence, a cough.
"So? Not going to read it to me, Agare?" Aleh said. "Going to let me guess what exhilarating things Marquise has rooted out to make our week worse?"
For the nth time in too short a period of time, Fordu wished he could sigh. Still, the witch had a point, and so, making a discreet check if there was nobody eavesdropping, he crouched and began to read out loud.
"To all my men.
"I would like to first offer my condolences for your loss, Almalilly most of all. Blades had always been an incredibly reliable asset to our operation, and the kind of ally you could go an entire lifetime without ever meeting. It will be a difficult bond to move past, and I wish I could offer something more meaningful than platitudes, but circumstances tie my hands.
"Things have changed. I do recall the Di Aila family, and for all their political insignificance and overall hostility to Beli Di Magwalran's faction, they were fairly well connected and poor with secrets. I agree with your previous assessment, Fordu, Holly's existence reaching her ears has become a matter of time.
"I will not condemn you for your mistake. As unfortunate as allowing one of the Children escape is, if there is one thing I learned in all my time sabotaging the Azure is that if one of their Heirs really wants to get away, it will get away. Besides, I don't see too much of a likelihood Lady Di Magwalran will have immediate enough interest to make an open move, so long as you remain far from Skawlan borders.
"Rather, it is the other story that worries me. That the Sect would send forces through the Tunnels was expected, but had things gone according to plan, their fated enemy would have been either the Royal Corps of Bellfort, or one of the Len. The Second, the Third, and even the Fifth Len would have caused ripples I would have felt from here, yet there is no movement in your region. It leaves us with one alternative, the way I see it, a rather unpleasant one that I'm sure you already guessed. Out of season, but our dear comrades might have poked that particular lion awake.
"That being said, the plan stays on track. Show Holly the best of the Dashi world, keep being her big happy family, and keep me up on any changes to her behavior, specially anything related to those "questionable interests" you say you might have picked on. I will try to move a few things strings from here, but keep your eyes on the road and your ears sharp. Only change routes if strictly necessary.
"You are not alone. Send One-Two back as soon as possible, so we may keep in touch.
"--With love, Marquise."
"You didn't have to read that last part out loud," Aleh said.
"Then you shouldn't have asked me to read one of Marquise's letters out loud," Fordu said.
Aleh might have had a good answer to that, but he restrained himself. Making a show out of taking a deep breath, he glared in Agare's direction. "Alright, nevermind that then. When she said we were left with one alternative..."
" ...She meant the Citrine Tale, certainly."
"Wondrous." Aleh rolled his eyes, knocking the back of his head again the ficcu's trunk. "And she says we have to stay on course! Does she want this to fail?!"
"Believe in Marquise. She is not the kind of person to invest blindly in a plan."
"Not anymore, anyhow," he scoffed.
There was much Fordu wished to context with that statement, yet he knew it was a lost battle. Instead, he pursued the topic. "Are you having doubts, Aleh?"
"Curious you ask, I am not so sure myself!" he chuckled with as much mirth as his scowl indicated. "We are past the point of no return, and well past the point doubts could be acted upon, yet despite being one of those to have met her the earliest, I still fail to see what Marquise does to entrust so much to Holly's presence!"
"There is a purpose to it. So long as it is fulfilled, you will get your due."
Aleh clicked his tongue. "Don't play on being dense, you Faceless pisshole, if my concerns where with how much of my trust Marquise was worth, I would not even be here! No, my concerns lie with how we can, or rather, cannot deliver on her expectations."
"Then you are not listening to me. This team was picked for a specific reason-"
"This team was picked because out of our merry band of callous and rancorous assholes, three of us would better fit the makeshift family of an overgrown child, and the fourth would come regardless. You and perhaps that other creature were the sole ones to be chosen on bellic merit, and the crack in that particular wall has been left wide open after what might be the first of many engagements!"
"Which we dealt with."
"At what cost?" Aleh struggled to rise, leaning back against his tree. Fordu made to help, but a warning swing kept him away. "Indulge me: We came this close to a total loss against a third or a forth of what a Lesser House of Skawla could bring to bear. Now, we are heading into potential battle with the reason this side of the Yine Wall, despite an abundance of skirmishes, pillaging, and miscellaneous issues never suffered from organized brigandry in the last century. How?"
"By not doing that." Fordu said, feeling some irritation. "Avoid the fight altogether, and flee if they make an attempt."
"And that is the thing! How?! We aren't the instigators, so if it comes to stour how can you guarantee running will even be an option?! It wasn't last time. We were hooked from the start, separated and almost culled by an opponent that shouldn't have known our weak points in the first place!"
"Much of their plan succeeded on coincidence, they probably didn't know half as much as you think."
Aleh looked away. "They knew Holly was there."
Fordu almost clenched his fists.
"They knew where we would be. They knew-"
"Aleh, you are losing morale," Fordu said.
"Ha! Good eyes for a Faceless! Now, use them to look my way and figure how am I suppose not to!"
They stared at each other in an impasse. Worse, Fordu couldn't entirely deny his points, the situation with the Di Aila had been come uncomfortably close to a loss.
"Listen to me Agare," Aleh said, "You know my loyalties, you know how much I can and will do for this mission, and killing myself is where I draw the line. I did not come this far to fucking die, and I will not join your mistress' protracted suicide!"
That gave him pause. Watching the young witch, Fordu bristled. "What did you just say?"
"My dreams are hers, her dreams are mine," his smile was dripping with triumph, and not for the first time did Fordu eagered to fix that. "Did you think I, of all members of the Sect, couldn't connect a few dots to find out what our esteemed Lady's end goal is?"
"That will not happen."
"I don't care either way." Aleh snarled. With each passing second, that hostility left his eyes, until all that was left was the haggard young creature they had tracked down so long ago. "I don't care. All I want is to leave, and if you can't reassure me we will make it at least to the last step, I would be much grateful if you cut this loose end right here and now."
"Don't be dramatic." Fordu said, though with little feeling behind it. "We were taken by a better prepared foe, yet we survived. We were ready, we still are, this is group created with more purpose than you can see, and if that isn't enough evidence, we might have gained one other triumph."
"What you saw that night," Aleh said, not sounding too convinced
"Indeed."
"...One Child of the Lake with odd peculiarities is far from what we would need to repel the Haruspect, Agare."
"It will help. Besides, we do have more resources to rely on now."
Aleh sighed. "I suppose I must grant as much."
"And as you said, I will not pretend to be dense, there is nothing I could say that would reassure you, Aleh, not me. I offer what I have available: honesty, plans, and resources. This is will be the closest you will come to escaping the Sect."
In his early twenties, Aleh had never lost that quality to him that made his anger look no more severe than a teen's pout. It was difficult to remember, sometimes, that this was a man Marquise had approved of, who had done as well as humanly possible against forces far above what he had been expected to fight directly.
"Fine," he backed away first, turning and nearly slipping on a root. "Fuck! Fine! Enough of jungles! I'm going back, see how Almalilly is doing. Are you coming?"
"Later. Please inform her we will have much to discuss soon."
"Yes, yes," Aleh said, stumbling his way back to Treil. This close, he wouldn't need any escorts, unless something had been trailing them from out of sight.
Again.
Fordu waited until he was out of sight, before climbing the closest tree and watching him from a safe distance, all the way to the gates.
----------------------------------------
They had settled around one of the less reputed parts of the Southmost hill, a place far from Treil's main roads that still saw enough crowds all sorts came and went, maintaining an unspoken rule that made questions unwelcome.
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Their inn was an ideal place to hide, and an ideal place to stay up to date on issues usually not publicly spoken, with cheap services and cheaper goods. Or, in other words, a polite den of debauchery, with a bar that ran full from evening to dawn and rooms that hardly ever quietened.
Needless to say, Fordu did not enter it lightly. He could, if he so wished, he was certain that so long as he stuck to his own person nobody would be interest enough to start something, but that was a double edged blade: just as it was a good place to observe, it was a good place to be observed, and better not test whichever flimsy cover they had found.
Instead, he waited until night had fallen, climbing in silence to a shorter building parallel to the inn, searching for one of the two rooms they had rented. Once he was sure there were no witness to a potential mistake, he crossed the distance with a jump, and swiftly entered through the window.
It was dark inside, its sole illumination, an incandescent cracked lamp filled with a meager serving of Fireflystones, having been covered by folded sheets so as to allow only a sliver of light to touch the ground around the window. The floor was a killing field of creaking boards, an alarm system as effective as any, and would have been troublesome to cross had Aleh not repaired the enchantment of his boots.
Silence would not trick the rooms sole inhabitant, however. A bolt flew true, certain to hit his neck had he not caught it midair.
"Sir." Rosen's voice echoed from the shadows. "My most sincere apologies."
"It's a good reflex to have." Agare flipped the bolt on his hand and returned it to the dark, careful not to turn it into a deadly projectile once more. "Wouldn't have hurt me anyway. Rather, it's your verbal slips that have become frequent enough I don't believe they are slips anymore."
"What slips, si- Oh." Rosen gasped. "I-I am so sorry, s- Agare, I did not mean to-"
"Stop. I was... joking. I don't like it, but if it's so important to you I suppose I can bear with it."
"Much gratitude, sir." Rosen shuffled around, the click of strings being pulled back into place coming soon after. "It does mean a lot to me."
Fordu returned his attention to the center of the room. A large container had been settled in the middle of a large magical array, drawn in chalk with sixteen interconnected points, each bearing a jar filled with different types of dead vermin. The numerology had been meaningless, as far as Fordu understood, but he had seen no issue with relenting on that particular issue.
He halted close to the array's boundary, unwilling to disturb its rather complex workings. "Has she come back?"
"No, sir," Rosen said. "Not while I remain awake. If you permit me a comment?"
"Marquise has not birthed, raised, or slept with Furfu the Third, no," Fordu said.
"N-no sir, I guarantee you, t-that was not what I wished to imply!" Rosen was quick to answer. For all his imponent appearance, Fordu had always found him one of the easiest to deal with agents to the Marquise.
"I know." Fordu took a step back, returning towards the window. "You are curious why the Marquise sent her on the mission, and I know the kinds of theories Aleh would have proposed."
"He did," Rosen sighed. "Forgive the young sir, he is merely lashing out. I fear he is not accustomed to losses on the field... But if you permit me, I do have some curiosity on the topic, her behavior during the previous confrontations was..."
"I permit you to be honest, Rosen. It was shameful, far from what is expected of someone once rumored to have been considered to Unit Paleworm."
"... I must confess, I had taken them for false. So she was that promising indeed?" Rosen stirred, grunted. Down beneath, in the alley, a shadow went past the windowsill without ever looking up.
"She was. She will be, if it's the last thing I do. I'm going now, Rosen, keep your eyes sharp, and remember to take your medicine. Tomorrow, we will gather to discuss our next steps, and your presence will be required."
"... Of course, sir, how could I forget?" Rosen grumbled, bitter. Fordu didn't blame him, his circumstances were just as unfortunate as the others.
He slipped outside in silence. Careful not to draw attention, he crept down the windows, four rooms to the right counted, finding his destination already filled with life. A brief glance inside, and he entered.
Neither the glaring Aleh nor the swaying Almalilly jumped at his presence, both already aware of his coming. In fact, Almalilly even smiled and waved in his direction, a sign as worrying as any as far as he was concerned. Her face and hair were completely drenched with water, as was the far corner of the couple's bed she was sitting on. Still, he could spot the vomit stains at the corner of her lips and the collar of her simple green dress.
"Took your time," Aleh said, sitting down on the opposite bed. "Found her nearly passed out at the counter."
"Uuuugh, still stuck on that?" Almalilly said, massaging the bridge of her nose in clear discomfort. "I told I was just going to rest my eyes for a while! And could you speak a little quieter please, your voice is too shrill."
"W-wh- I would have you know my voice is not-!"
"Aleh," Fordu said. "Quiet."
His glare intensified, but considering he got started on his breathing routine, he had heard loud and clear.
"Almalilly, report."
"Sooorry, I-" she hiccuped, "I was listening for anything at the bar like you told me, and the innkeeper was looking at me weird, so I thought to myself, since we now have all this coin to waste, why not blend in a little better?"
"We have not a coin to waste," Fordu felt the start of a headache, but pushed on.
"Well, all those things you bought with that big blue flower tell a different story, little man!" Almalilly laughed, and even drunk it came as completely farcical.
"You know as well as any of us that I only bought what we needed."
"And sold what you don't, right?" She gave a sharp smile, the accusation echoing across the room. He allowed it to linger, until the mood left her. As it died, she fell back into her bed, eyes firmly fixed at the ceiling. "Sorry. That one was petty even to me."
"O-oi, Almalilly!" Aleh said. "If you are going to rest, do so on your side, as I do not care for rescuing you from suffocating on your own blie!"
"Yeah, chill out, I'm getting there." She turned, laying her head over her own folded arm. "So annoying, can't even rest my eyes in peace anymore."
"... Almalilly, report in earnest now," Fordu interjected before the bickering grew unbearable.
She sighed. "Grapevine caught nothing on the Citrine, Boss. Rather, the gossip of the moment is on the mysterious raids happening at the Mountainous Region."
"Raids?" Aleh frowned.
"Villages in Awin going dark one after another, refugees from the mountains starting fights, the underground trails getting hit hard by someone who doesn't ask questions, a huge mess. Lots of people worried, lots of gossip circulating, and some of the Len might be moving West, or are already there, something like that."
And not here? So Marquise's information had been right, as expected. Aleh seemed nonplussed, casting a questioning glance Fordu's way. His lack of answer proved enough of one, as Aleh resumed his routine with renewed intensity.
"And nothing on the Citrine."
"Nothing solid, nothing around these parts, but you know better than me there won't be any of that until they start acting in the open," Almalilly said, eyes closing. "And then it's the same old hubbub, cat chases uluun chases mice, until they decide to hide again and everyone can rest for a couple of years. Every time I heard them brought up this week was entirely out of paronia, rather than any genuine evidence."
"That's something," Fordu said.
"And I feel like shit. Uuuuuugh, Awinian fruit ale tastes so good but goes down so bad..." She grumbled, curling into herself.
He hesitated. Watching a once reliable subordinate brought this low made him uncomfortable in a way he hadn't felt in years. A distant part of him reached for years of old teachings, wishing to shake and slap her sober, eager to scream on her face how pathetic it was for even a Face to make themselves so comfortable during a mission, anything to make this scene disappear.
Another part wanted to do worse. A cracked tool was better broken, least it becomes a disadvantage at an innoportune time, least it comes to be wielded against its owner. Elden teaching, quickly cut before they festered.
He was helpless to deal with this. Faceless and Face alike were raised so such situations never arose, and what inevitably fell through the cracks seamlessly dealt with.
"...Almalilly," he forced himself to say, receiving not a glance in response, "has Aleh informed you Marquise's letter arrived today?"
"Hmm-hmm," she hummed. "Want me to rewrite one for Holly again?"
"It would be appreciated, but I will leave the decision to you, those we have are enough. Rather, I want you to keep listening, and avoid doing yourself this level of disfavor, it may jeopardize us as well. I want you sober until tomorrow, I plan to hold a meeting on our future steps tomorrow and we need your inputs.
"Because they have been so helpful..."
"They have," he said, but she didn't seem to be paying attention. With a deep exhale, her body relaxed, and he had not to guess what happened. "Disgraceful. Aleh?"
"You want me to nurse her." Aleh trembled to his feet. "Fuck's sake. You have more planned for tonight?"
Fordu gave a slight nod."Something I'm better suited for."
Chasing down a rampaging monster.
Without another word, he slipped out the window and disappeared into the night.
----------------------------------------
Ivias was said to be, in common parlance, a giant forest surrounded by water.
Not entirely accurate, but Fordu had never cared to argue its finer points. He had sneaked through much of it in his time, and in part agreed with the sentiment, it's just that he had little interest for the nuances of his environment that had no practical use. What local fauna could present a danger to him, if any? How could the flora be used to place himself?
Both Light regions bore the most clear space, having the least amount of cover overall and the most chance to be pursued by common cavalry. The Floodlands subregion was as dense as a maze, with extreme poor footing and uneven terrain, so much even the Ivian natives had once avoided making settlements within its reaches. The Hollows was a no man's land forced to bear Dashi life, and did not hesitate to show its displeasure by stimulating dangerous Phantasms into proliferating. The Skawlan Wastelands were a hellhole to most, yet one of the safest places for his kind.
The Sacred Forest Region was an odd meeting ground between all those. Were him to be plucked and dropped off in a random corner within its vast reaches, he might believe himself lost in any of the previous at first. The position of Mt. Shulgan, the ruins of old Ivian settlements, and other such details would eventually clear the misunderstanding.
One in particular, however, stood famous.
The Yimolaga tree. Capable of reaching over sixty meters of height, wood the slight yellow tinged white of luun milk, it had earned the moniker of "Dead Giant's Hand" for the way its trunk divided itself ever upwards, as if reaching out of the ground for salvation. It required a very specific quality to its soil to grow, a quality found the most frequently within the Sacred Forest, though not exclusively.
Rather, the regional indentifier here was its treatment. To the Yine, to the Skawlans, to Territory Gobans, the Yimolaga was nothing more than an incredibly valuable commodity, its wood reaching ludicrous prices on foreign markets while its nuts were a very valuable ingredient in both alchemy and enchantment. To the Tyrian cult, however? The Yimolaga was sacred, an omen of prosperity to be cared for and protected.
Only within the Tale's borders did cutting down an Yimolaga bear sentences worse than murder. Only within the Tale's borders would Fordu find one of these grown to such gargantuan sizes, draped in veils, shawls, prayers beads, and so much ritualistic paraphernalia their accumulated mass grew tumorous on its trunk.
All this to say, Fordu wondered if the bloodied creature before him understood the irony of her desecration, if she was conscious of what she had done at all.
The body of the Ivian Cave Hound had been torn in too many pieces for easy identification. Blood splatters reached several meters away from the carnage, a great dragging mark marring the once pristine folds of an old ceremonial robe, ending in a clumped mass of gray, rough hide and red muscles. Avoiding the smaller chunks and fragments of bone that peppered his path became a challenge the closer he approached, avoiding sudden moves as to not alert the still raging Faceless.
She stopped, a fist raised to strike a head that now bore almost no skull.
"H-have you come to e-execute me?" Furfu said.
"... Look at me." Fordu said.
"I-I deserve it. I-I know I deserve it, so p-please be quick, I don't w-want to bear this anymore, I d-don't want to live knowing t-that I can only fail h-her-!"
"Furfu III!"
She shrunk down against the splayed cadaver, covering her head. She was whimpering so softly he could barely hear it. His fists clenched for an instant, but he managed to calm himself.
"Look my way. I will not repeat myself."
If she had thrown a glance over her shoulder, he would have been justified in in pursuying that nagging feeling at the back of his mind, but he knew better. She took her time shifting against the gore, turning completely towards him.
"Pull back your hood, and remove your helmet."
Shivering hands reached up, their moves slow and careful as if trying not to scare a wild animal. He couldn't help give a pointed look at the larger carnivore left all around her. He watched as her bent steel helmet, made for the particular necessities of a Faceless, was put aside, revealing her inheritance in full.
The Mark of Eligor was not only a Faceless gift, not only the sign of their duty, but also a powerful indicator of their state. A part of him hoped Furfu's Mark would be undisturbed, that this violence was only part of her natural self; a part of him feared Furfu's Mark would have overflown, in which case her prediction would have been right.
Neither was correct. Its movements had grown rapid, shapes surging to the surface at irregular intervals, yet never quite breaching outside for all their obvious presence, a small relief. Things could still be fixed.
"You've been careless," Fordu said, risking approach. "The mysterious deaths of several large animals, including Phantasmal predators, was picked up on fast and now there are talks of expeditions to hunt down this potential threat. If they discover the responsible party is one of the Faceless, what do you think would happen?"
"M-My apologies," she whispered.
"Don't be cheeky with me. I know your ways better than you think."
She looked up, meeting Mark to Mark before relenting with a full body tremble. "S-sorry."
"Have you at least been taking nutrition from the things you kill?" He came close enough they could reach one another at a sliver of a blink. He wished things wouldn't come to that.
"Y-yes, and I still have some M-Mush too."
"Good. This stops tonight," he said, leaving no space for discussion. "You will head back and keep watch over Holly."
"...H-heheheh."
The sound took him by surprise. Beyond a mockery of laugh. For all he didn't retreat, he couldn't avoid tensing. "Furfu."
"I-I'm useless, right? C-completely useless!" With every sentence, her first met the ground, cracking the earth. "I failed her! I-I failed you, I failed H-Holly, but most of all I failed her! I tried to fight, I did, y-you have to believe me, just because I d-didn't want her to be disappointed in me, but m-my head went blank and I, and I-I-!"
"You did not fail her, your growth was expected to be slow, she would-"
"No! It's not enough, y-you know it's not enough! I-I'm still too weak, stupid, fucking p-pathetic!" The earth trembled. Her screams resounded through the night. "I thought I-I could do it if it was for her s-sake! D-did you know she didn't f-force me here? She asked me if I would be okay with it! She asked me if I thought I could do it, and I lied!"
...Marquise had known Furfu would accept the proposal with practically no motivation so long as it came from her. Had she stayed, she wouldn't be of any more help than a meat shield when the final steps of her side of the plan came around. That she didn't know, had been both Marquise's and his' decision.
"Having you fight is already a great improvement from the state we found you," he said.
"A g-great improvement? W-where?! H-he was right about me, that stupid f-fucking witch, I didn't help, I d-disappointed her! H-he's going to tell her h-how useless I am!" She snapped to her feet, as if tugged by invisible strings, already too close before he could react. "I-I need to get stronger. It's why I'm here. C-can you see?"
"I've seen it. Furfu, this is-"
"Enemies. The largest I-I could find! Low P-Phantasms, M-medium P-Phantasms, apex predators, anything. I-I can better this way, l-little by little-"
It was disturbing.
It was unlike Almalilly's state, however. He knew better. He was supposed to know better. Yet, he couldn't knock the sense of revulsion at seeing one of his kind, one that should be at his level, so completely broken. He should be empathetic, knowing what had to be done to turn a human being into Furfu III, what she was allowed to do to herself and others, and he loathed that he couldn't.
He needed this to end, and soon.
"...I understand," he said.
She froze on the spot, watching him in silence.
"If it weren't for her, you would be a cadaver rotting in the woods."
"Y-yes! She's the reason I'm alive, the reason I live!" she staggered his way, bloody fingers grasping him by the shoulder.
"She is your light."
"Yes!" her grip tightened, and he felt his armor dig into his skin.
Fordu had never known how to comfort, but tools he understood.
"Then this? This is not the way."
He could feel her gloves pressing with such strength his leathers would not hold if she decided to cause damage. "T-then how am I suppose to become what I was a-always meant to be, just like s-she wants?"
The frankness, the accuracy, even the specific wording of it, all brought his thoughts to a crashing halt. He nodded, needing a second to recover his words. "Not like this. You want to be useful, so help her just like she help you, but here all you can do is sabotage her work, putting her agents and her life goals in peril. What you see in these animals, you will not against your true enemy."
Some of the strength left her hand. "N-not against the Tales?"
He nodded. "And not against the Sect."
At the mere utterance of the name a full body shiver crossed her, reaching all the way to his muscles. Saying it out loud, it made things feel too real, when he had always preferred to pretend they had been a dream. He was the one to feel useless then, but he cooled his thoughts fast, least they interfered.
"W-what am I suppose to do then, A-Agare?"
"Follow us. Remember her words to you. We are with you, and so long we are you have nothing to fear," he said.
"A-and you really believe that?" She squeezed harder, searching his Mark as if any sign of deception would be there.
"I know it to be true, because I have been with her the longest."
He had been there at her lowest. He had been there at her strongest. He had fought besides the monsters and thought besides the woman, had seen the separation and blur, and so he knew Furfu was, in a stranger way, not too unlike her. She had been one day, after all, her second coming, with all the promises and none of the mistakes.
What a delusion.
"E-everything you just told me, i-it's what you tell yourself isn't it?" Furfu said, interrupting his thoughts.
He didn't flinch, not physically. "I'm telling you what I know, you can make of that what you want."
"Y-you were always a little like us, a-and like Holly too." She finally let go, staggering back without ever tripping over the creature's corpse. "M-my apologies if this sounds too rude, s-sir, but I think that's why I tolerate you so m-much."
"...You tolerate me?" he said, incredulous.
"If I didn't, you would know."
And that, he knew to be her truth. The threat passed him by, as she turned and walked away, him following her steps closely.
That night, she would still bath herself and cleanse her equipment, and he would ponder her carefully. Furfu III was a danger every part as much as she was a potential asset, and even now he was uncertain of all the nuances to Marquise interest.
What Marquise wanted, however, he would follow, so long as his words still worked.