Over the next couple days, the group settled down into their routines. Shiara and Adageyudi spent their time discussing their favorite authors. Arakash remained silent, contemplating numerous creative torture techniques which could revolutionize the industry. Around them, the smugglers pretended they didn't exist. So it remained until a smuggler tapped on their door.

With a simple "We're here, get out before we toss you overboard," they were informed that it was time to leave and gathered what little supplies they had brought with them.

"You'll love it. They have such lovely architecture, and I'm told the music is-" Ada hesitated when they came out from below deck. "This isn't Port Vera." She looked over at Arakash. "You said we were going to Vera."

"There was a slight change of plans," Arakash said. "We're close to Vera, but have to make the rest of the trip on foot through the mountain pass."

Ada glanced around at the others, aware she had an audience. She didn't appreciate the looks they were giving her, either, so she walked faster, in an effort to get away from these men before some other disaster happened. That in spite of them being criminals, they were better behaved than what were supposedly her law-abiding and law-enforcing subjects galled her more than she would admit.

Arakash lagged behind, just a little, as they stepped off the deck onto the safety of solid ground. With one hand on the rail, he reached into the ethereal and drank deep of the power running the complex mechanisms of the ship. A little more energy for him, a little more trouble for people who annoyed him. While not the target he truly wanted to suffer, he was willing to settle for now. He then hurried after the girls.

Once they were away from people, Ada turned and faced Arakash. "Why didn't you tell me about this last night?"

Arakash smirked. "I seem to recall that I was ordered by my slave-master not to speak. A command which I followed faithfully. Would you be so unjust as to lay at my feet her regrets for her own actions?"

Ada sighed. "This is going to be a common occurrence, isn't it?"

"That is not for me to say." He might not have the power to defy her, but Arakash was dead set on attacking her on every angle he could conceive. "I am a mere servant, with no control over what whims my unreliable mistress may hap upon."

"Ugh, I was told you were a demon." Shiara, not being held back by the weird sense of guilt and responsibility Ada was, stepped between them. Her eyes glowed as she confronted Arakash. "Not some whiny, petulent, child. It's pathetic. But if you like, I'm sure I can spare you the onerous burden of not being executed like you deserve."

"Thank you for the assistance, but this is my burden." Ada put her hand on Shiara's shoulder. "Arakash, consider it a standing order not to attempt to annoy me or Shiara. Or anyone else that isn't actively trying to kill us."

Arakash glowered, but was still forced to obey. The pressure was as strong today as it had been the day he was enslaved, no doubt due to his recent injuries weakening his resistance. "As you command, Princess. The pass is this direction." Arakash began walking ahead of the girls, getting far enough ahead of them in to obscure himself with the trees, if only to be alone under the lush semitropical canopy. He could trust Shiara to do her best to slow the princess down with meaningless prattle, anyway.

"Why do you put up with him?" Shiara muttered once Arakash was out of sight. "We should get rid of it. Make him hold still and I'll do it, then you won't have to worry anymore, and I'll protect you from anything else."

Ada hesitated; she liked Shiara, but the talk of casual murder worried her. "I... can't do that." She wished she could, but she couldn't. "Leaving aside that regardless of motive, he saved my life twice? Killing him when he's not a threat and can't protect himself is too much for me. I'll understand if you disagree; it wasn't me he tried to kill."

Sensing the turn of Ada's mood, Shiara caved. "I don't think I'd be able to do it, either. Not in cold blood. Besides, if he saved your life, then I suppose he's earned a chance." Shiara fought down her twinge of jealousy. She wanted to save the princess, too. Then maybe she'd... but, no, that was out of her reach for now. "But if he goes out of control again, I will end him."

Ada forced herself to smile. "Thank you."

As Arakash walked ahead, he considered his priorities. It was obvious he had little of gaining freedom any time soon. If he did somehow find a way, he'd then need to kill both of them to prevent the information they knew from becoming public, which was far easier said than done. Not that he felt a particular loyalty to his own kind, but because it would sooner or later lead to his death as well. While killing the princess would be easy enough, he had no reliable weapon against the elemental.

After several minutes, they arrived at a the pass, or as it happened, the cave. Shiara looked around at the glimmering white of the walls, reflecting the sunlight in a trillion sparkling lights. "Ice?" She gazed up.

"Salt," Ada said. "Scholars say this part of Karana was once sea floor, until it was forced up by some cataclysmic event. The water evaporated, leaving these salt caves. The path looks stable and well-used, they even built stairs in spots." Eyes wide staring into the darkness, she considered their options. "Shiara, could you use your fire like a torch to make light for us?"

"Just give me a moment." With a bit of focus, Shiara's hair burst into flame. "But, as much as I'd love sightseeing." And in such a romantic spot. "Can we hurry through? I don't like caves much better than boats."

Ada hesitated; she didn't want to put the victim of her failings through any more stress. "Are you certain this is the way through?"

Arakash almost laughed at how pathetic the exchange was. "It's the one way through that's reliable this time of year. I had a very thorough discussion on the subject before we left the ship."

Ada cringed as she considered his implications. "What did you do?"

"Does it really matter?" Arakash asked. "They'd have done far worse to you if they had the chance."

"I hate to agree with him, but he's right." Shiara stepped forward into the passage, darkness driven back by flame in a scene that looked for all intents like a portal to the deepest bowels of the earth. "They were pirates, they'd have sold us all into slavery, or worse."

"I suppose you're right," Ada conceded, then recognized she was losing control of the situation again. "But to be clear, I command you to stop making decisions behind my back."

"It gives me no small pleasure to announce that I refuse your order. It appears the binding contract has a loophole, or the closing of a loophole. I can, and must, disobey your orders in order to protect you." It was an amusing loophole, regardless. What annoyed him was the spell forcing him to inform her of the how and why of that refusal.

"Interesting." Ada walked faster, hoping that the red glow of the flames would hide the glow of her own humiliation. She knew about the contract, and had been tasked to memorize its contents; the command to defend her life and freedom was given priority over all other things, even the obedience law. She was even given specific instructions about the threat of him using the spell against itself in such a way.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

They made their way through the caves, and aside from having to use her gravity magic in some places where the spring rains had knocked the easy trail out, they found it to be a comfortable, if cramped, trips. After one particular cliff face, they found themselves staring out at a wide expanse of shimmering pools of water sitting in sunken pits of crystal salt. It was like looking out at an alien ocean. "It's beautiful," Ada murmured.

"Incredible," Shiara agreed. She swallowed, then moved a step closer to Ada, and slowly began moving her hand to touch the princess.

A crack and pop later, Arakash shifted to his demonic form and jumped over the two of them. "We have a monster!"

"What is it?" Ada glanced around, and grabbed for her focus crystal.

Shiara wanted to cook the demon for ruining the moment, no matter how important the reason. Then she laughed at herself; who was she fooling, she'd never have been able to work up the courage to follow through, anyway.

"I'm uncertain. It's big, and it's fast." Arakash glanced around. "But I only barely sense any life force from it."

One of the pools exploded, and from it emerged a long, slender, serpentine creature coated in the same reflective white rock as the cavern proper. Finger-like protrusions opened, to reveal its gaping maw coated in countless crystalline teeth. While it showed no sign of eyes, it seemed to have no trouble tracking them as it propelled itself forward with hundreds of tiny tendril-legs.

"Pless! Erat nar!" Arakash cursed. "It's a wyrm!" Arakash jumped forward; the opposite of the direction he wanted, but someone had to block the monster from eating the princess, and his binding forced the responsibility on him. His Vilos began to rework its weapon, resulting in a long spear that he braced against the ground.

Streaks of flame and ice rushed over his head and struck the charging beast. While it didn't seem more than superficially harmed, it twisted around and dived into the nearest pool of water.

"Did that scare it off?" Having the worst eyesight for this situation, Ada glanced around uncertain.

"Scare off a wyrm?" Arakash laughed. "You can't scare off wyrms. Walk into its territory, and your choices are run, kill, or die. And we're too deep for the first option to work." It seemed this was what the Captain meant by the trail being dangerous during this time.

He felt the motion before he saw the attack, as several shards of rock flew forth from the inky darkness of the caves. He braced himself for pain as gashes formed across his flesh. He hissed at his injuries, while Ada screamed in surprise.

Shiara, however, screamed in pain and rage. The same emotions that had driven her to transform when Arakash attempted to violate her mind blossomed forth at this new thing that had tried to hurt her princess. Her veins coursed with power, flesh subsumed into the conflagration. With a gesture, the wyrm's sheltered position erupted in a fireball.

Arakash closed his eyes; they were useless in the blinding glare, anyway. "It's still moving," he said. He pointed with his left hand, the one not holding the Vilos spear. "It's heading that way, I think it's going to come up... now!"

As much as she hated the demon, she hated the thing trying to kill Ada more. Another surge of power wrapped around and through her, and with it compressed ball of flame streaked toward the location in question.

The wyrm screeched in surprise more than pain, then back in the hole it went.

"It's not dead yet," Arakash shouted over the howling winds caused by the heating of the narrow tunnels. "It's made of the same salt of the cavern, it won't burn easily. Ada, you try. Now!"

A bolt of ice energy struck near the wyrm, but missed. Another volley of dagger-like salt crystals shot forward. Arakash did what he could to evade the attack, but was rewarded with another wound due to Ada being too slow to react.

Sensing a moment of vulnerability, the wyrm rushed them again. Several bursts of fire washed over its crystalline hide, causing pain but not injury. It's what it didn't feel that surprised it, when it went over what seemed like just some more rock formation and something pierced through its exoskeleton and into soft flesh.

It twisted and rolled away from the offender, then retreated yet again, leaving Arakash wounded and laying on the ground.

Not for the first time, Arakash was glad his lack of a heartbeat confused creatures that hunted mainly by sound. If the binding wasn't forcing him to sacrifice himself to protect a far less resilient princess, he'd be at the exit already.

"Are you okay?" Ada ran to him. A swirl of purple light enveloped him, fusing him with some small amount of mana to help his own body recover. Ada's method of healing by accelerating normal recovery was less than impressive, but it did serve to heal Noctrel, which was something most healers could not do, even if they wanted to.

"No I'm not!" He forced himself back to a crouching position. The bleeding had stopped, but it cost him power in the process. "I took a wyrm's charge for you! They hunt by tracking heartbeats, which means you. So you need to distract it."

"Hey! That's not the deal!" Flew over their heads; from her position touching the ceiling, she looked for approaches from the monster.

"No, he's right," Ada said. "Whatever it takes to get us to safety."

"The plan is you start running that way." He pointed toward where the wyrm had originally attacked from. Shiara... now that it's bleeding, it'll think twice about your fire. Go!"

"Without telling us what you're- hey!" As Shiara tried to argue, Ada had made up her mind and begun running. "Why are you listening to him!?"

Ada considered her answers, and had only one that made sense to her. "Because he's better at killing than we are!"

Arakash stumbled behind, tracking with his senses the wyrm as it navigated its own submerged paths. There. He stopped over one path, and allowed his blood to drip into the pool. It glowed as his magic joined the mix, coating the surface of the water with a viscous slime toxic to any living thing.

The wyrm emerged, unknowingly coating itself in the deadly fluid. Arakash struggled to follow, but was relieved to see the bursts of fire pushed it back again. It retreated into a clean pool of water, but that wouldn't matter. With luck, it would swallow some of the water, and with it the poison.

He didn't trust it. "Turn around, run back this way!"

Ada's magic-enhanced movement twisted around a stalagmite in a flagrant violation of the laws of momentum, with Shiara nearly running into a wall before she corrected her own movements.

Arakash stumbled to another nearby pool, laying his trap yet again. But he didn't stop there, moving to a third pool and a fourth as the wyrm kept moving. Sooner or later, the toxic sludge would kill it and everything else in this cavern.

It emerged, slower than it had been. It opened its massive jaws and ejected the contents of its stomach. It had learned the lesson about the now deadly waters, but continued its pursuit on land.

Arakash stopped for a moment to smear his own blood over the Vilos bone, then came after the creature from behind. He kept his distance, however, because Ada and Shiara were hammering it with their magic.

One lucky shot from Shiara saw a burst of flame enter its throat, causing it to begin writhing as it experienced its insides burning in addition to blood loss and toxins soaking into it through its skin.

Arakash got the kill, however. Invisible to the beast, he approached with the most cautious of steps, until he had the opportunity to plunge his blade into the section of the body that contained both the heart and brain of the wyrm. With it dead, he began the process of twisting the blade and pulling open a hole in the thing's hide.

"What are you doing?" Ada approached, with Shiara back to normal following right behind her.

Arakash grunted in effort. "It's called survival, Princess. Wyrms might be the weakest of all dragonites, but they are still dragonites." He plunged his fist into the hole he carved and ripped out the precious jewel within. "Sarite, fresh from the still-warm corpse. A fine reward, I'd say."

Ada fought down the urge to be sick. "Sarite?

Arakash snorted. "Don't tell me they skipped that part of your education, Princess."

She found herself getting angry. "I know what sarite is. I just thought it was... refined, or something."

"It's usually better to refine it," Shiara said. "The natural stuff can have all sorts of ugly surprises and side effects."

"This one doesn't. The question is who uses it." Arakash stood, then walked over the wyrm using his claws for balance. There was no reason to do so, other than to literally step on one more troublesome pest. "It's got an earth bolt spell and a boost to toughness. I'm not compatible, but either of you will be fine."

"Give it to Ada," Shiara said after a moment. "I had a few shards, but except for my one fire shard, they were destroyed when I transformed. Along with most of my gear. Best that I don't hold anything valuable."

"If neither of you can use it." Ada reached out and accepted the gem. She took a moment reaching out to its energy with her own; she had little experience with attunement, and even experienced sarite users required some effort.

Arakash stepped down on the other side of the slain wyrm.

"What about reagents?" Shiara asked. "It is a dragonite, like you said."

"Most of it's useless." Arakash turned to examine the corpse. "Any organs the poison hasn't melted are going to break down before we reach a buyer. But I suppose some of the scales will be salvageable. Let's get to work."