Waking up never felt easier than today. The air was cool, the bed warm and snuggly and home filled with distant voices that underlined rather than reinforced the pervasive silence. Mum probably assigned her a buttload of chores, but today was a day like no other. She felt like she could lift the world.
Rye stretched until her back cracked with satisfying pops. Too many pops. That was fine. She hadn’t slept this long in, well…
“I don’t even remember. Wow.”
And that was before that wonderful dream. Absolutely nothing made sense besides the occasional flashing image of cats being cats. They were weirdly fuzzy and scaleless, but a cat was a cat, recognizable even beneath a coat of alien weirdness.
Most of Elias dreams were weird, but that just made them so much more fascinating to her. Flashing signs hung low, sounds she never could have imagined assaulted her every sense and glowing text everywhere like magic was going out of fashion. Her windows were glass and so large she must have lived in a mansion.
Was Elia a princess? She certainly didn’t talk like one. She never talked much about her home at all. While politeness demanded she respect her wish for silence, brimming curiosity was making keeping quiet a losing battle.
After she stood up and scanned her sparse quarters, it took three seconds for her mind to catch up to the present and all her mental fortitude not to scream. Pictures of arrows whizzing by, toothy jaws snarling, bone cracking and the legionnaires screaming and dying mixed with a never-ending string of way too close calls and the laughing face of Rhuna, the Rhuna, Rhuna the terrible.
And then there were the deaths. Quick deaths, long deaths, painful deaths, muted deaths–
Focus. Focus. Find the good, the nice, the pleasant.
The legion soldiers were nice. Sextus especially.
Elia was warming up to her. She even apologized, once!
They kil– beat the giant dog.
The distant voices grew quiet as the sentence dug circles in her head.
They killed the dog.
That horrible thing, Vita the Fane-Eater, was dead. The path to the keep was clear. They did it.
She fell back into the happy thoughts from before. A monster dead by her hands alone. Mostly Elia’s, actually. Not even her father could boast of that much, not that he ever was one for boasting. It was a heroic feat, a tribulation worthy of a soul shard if anything, maybe even two if the gods were feeling generous. Stories abounded of young shepherd boys or weaver girls who, armed with nothing but a sling or needle, defeated ‘thalian mountain lions or biclopses and had their efforts acknowledged by the gods.
She knelt down in prayer, sending one to every deity who she could reasonably have caught the eye of and thanked them for their assistance. After all, a sling or a needle couldn’t fell a wolf, much less a beast of the forest without some divine intervention. And she was only a single farmer’s daughter. One of them had to have mingled with her fate.
“…For watching over and seeing me through the darkest times, I give thanks to thee, Ruthe, Worga, Wroti, Aurana, Valti.”
Predictably, there was no answer. She sent another round of belated prayers, this time asking for protection. The whole… encounter with the false knight Rhuna yesterday still rung like a knife across metal. Once again, she felt too small for her shoes. At least Elia was confident and that was a good sign, right?
Right?
In lieu of distracting herself from giving an answer , she took a bath. The spring water in the cellar was refreshing and cool and though Elia had tried better than last time, she still wasn’t nearly as thorough as Rye would have liked.
“One, two, scrub, two three scrub.” It filled her stomach with butterflies as she marveled at her transformation. The ugliness still stuck to her skin, undeathly pale and purple, and her hair was by no measure enough to do any styling, but at least she didn’t look emaciated.
She closed her eyes and listened to peaceful pitter-patter of the flowing water for a while. Only after the coolness had crept into her bone did she wrap it up, turning to her clothes. The brown tunic wasn’t half as pretty as the red one. If anybody said it looked like a giant dog had used it as a chew toy, they would have been correct.
She definitely couldn’t give it back to Sextus like this.
Ascending some stairs, she wished the attendant a good morning and turned a corner towards the Morifurt merchant’s upholstered stall. The pillows and pieces were still in the same place as she remembered. The man himself was snoring away, fast asleep.
“Hello? Sir?” He stirred, waking after she loudly cleared her voice. She tried to put on her best appearance, though it was an exercise in futility with only her shredded tunic and armor to wear, but it was better than a bed sheet.
Another pleasant occurrence. And there would be more. All she had to do was look. The merchant saw her and she recognized immediately that this was not going to be easy.
“Back again so soon to insult my wares? Or perhaps myself? My city of birth?”
“Um, n-no, I’m just here for some dealings this time.”
She bit her lip, cursing herself for the slip up. She was stone, channeling the clipped curt demeaner of her Da’. She was Da’–Rye. And Da’–Rye didn’t stutter gods–darnit!
“And not a single apology,” he claimed, turning away. “Fie! Fie I say! Ill weather on you and your progeny, may they choke on a deluge of frogs and–“
“SORRY! Sorry sir, I truly am. I… don’t know what came over me last we spoke. It was like I was… possessed by an ill spirit.”
Though technically not a lie, dragging Elia through the mud didn’t make her feel better, even if this was all her fault. Not everyone brushed away her… brutish and crude language away like it was nothing. In fact, many would call her out as a witless split-tongue, and rightfully so. It was dangerous being a witless split-tongue.
Thoughts better kept to herself. She owed Elia for… well, a lot just yesterday, a whole heap more if they were to actually get through Loften and back home. Only defeating one fish ogre didn’t make up for that. Life was give and take, and it was her turn to give lots.
The merchant formerly known as Harris gave her a side-eye. “Well, if you’re that sincere, I suppose I may give you the privilege to peruse my wares.”
“Thank you kindly, sir.”
The moment she found a different vendor, she was ditching this man. Every word from his mouth felt slimy, oily. This was all part of the dance of power in a negotiation and his flicking, leering gaze was almost certainly a part of it, to make her feel small, feel insecure. But she faced the Fane-eater (from the backseat) and lived.
Initiative. She had to take back the initiative.
“Merchant, these boots. They were once exactly my size, yet I have recently gone through a spurt of growth.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest, both blocking sight while standing tall and imperious.
“They will be adjusted, of course, free of charge.” He smiled and Rye cursed. Generosity need be met with generosity, as was polite.
“Very well. I intend to splurge, merchant. Tell me,” she pointed at three round objects sat atop a most expensive pillow embroidered in reds and golds, “are those… real pearls?”
He smiled. “Ah, of course an esteemed undead would find their interest taken by these treasures. Pearls they are, yet locked within is essence of purest form, thought and emotion. Some say they were plucked from hidden corners in the world, others from our very minds. Curios, curious. Are you interested? Only ten thousand per pearl.”
Not turning and leaving on the spot was Rye's win for the day. She could gawk at jewelry and pretty clothing well out of her reach later. For now, necessities were on the list. Basically groceries, except instead of spades and rakes, she was buying swords and mailed plates.
Her budget?
Soul count: x8180
It was little more than last time, but she knew it to be that much more. She had her staff, morningstar, and a dagger. All she required was armor, preferably an entire set and as protective as could be. Five sets sat in the back, ranging from mostly mail to thick gambeson and some incorporating plates of dirtied armor.
Being stabbed by spears and daggers through mail was not a nice experience. Her choice sunk from five to the two that protected her chest bits more rigidly. On the one hand, she spied a thick scale set that covered nearly her entire body. On the other, there was a scavenged set of metal chestplate, chain hauberk, helmet and pauldrons still depicting a dog with the yellow colors washed and chipped away.
She smelled a deal. And more importantly, a chance for style.
“I will take the blue tunic and two uncolored brown tunics, a set of needle and colored thread, boots and the set of plate and mail in the back. And a cape. The azure one.”
Harris followed her as she pointed at each item in turn. “I see. I would never be so presumptuous as to assume, but you were here not a day ago, young lady. Do you truly have the means…?”
“I do.”
“Then that makes… thirteen and a half thousand souls.”
Rats. Having someone who could figure out the quality with a single finger touch would be really helpful right now, but that half of her was still asleep. And she didn’t need Elia for everything.
“Seven thousand, at most. I don’t need the helmet on that set and the armor still reeks of dead man.”
“Everything reeks of dead men and women. Twelve thousand five hundred.”
“I don’t.” The merchant scrunched his nose. A point for her. “Eight and a half.”
“Eleven.”
She gave him her best baleful stare of disapproval and he held up his hands placatingly. “I won’t argue further with one who can collate as many souls in such little time. Nine thousand five hundred, my last offer.”
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Going down by that much was basically an admission that he had been trying to fleece her, but even now it was slightly above her budget. What to do, what to do? Would she have to sell one of her weapons, the dagger maybe?
Her hands wandered through her pocket and touched upon a thing of warmth. It glowed, even through the leather. It was a large drizzled soul and a small one, collections of many smaller souls, except missing the identity of the greater ones. They could not be used for her own soul. Their only use was as a currency that persisted between deaths.
Oh gods, now she was sounding like Elia. Maybe they really were becoming more similar as one soul rubbed off against the other. Elia was definitely getting the better end of the deal here. Rye didn’t imagine she’d want any of her features.
She crushed them both and belatedly panicked, hoping that she didn’t actually destroy the souls, only separate them. May the gods forgive her if it was the former.
You have gained: Soul x1200
You have gained: Soul x300
Soul count: x9680
It was barely enough. She wanted so much more.
“Alright,” she sighed and ever so slowly pulled out her dagger, as if it was the most precious thing in the world. It wasn’t. It would probably take Elia five minutes until she ‘found’ one on another corpse. Maybe they could earn some money through scavenging?
“Nine thousand six hundred and the dagger, for all the above.” As he touched the hilt, she held it tight and looked into his eye. “And one bag of sugared apricots.”
They each held their gaze for a solid while.
“You rob me clean, me, a poor cripple! No heart, no compassion.”
Good. The words meant nothing coming from a merchant. No mercy. The moans and lamentations were a compliment.
Soul count: x80
She stared long and hard as the stream of glowing soul fog changed owners. Somehow, she managed to spend nearly everything at once. Again.
“Do you have a boon for haggling?” She asked.
“Perhaps.” The merchant drawled, all signs of lamentation gone with a snap. He totally had one. He was still ripping her off, she was absolutely sure.
For the equivalent amount in silver coins, she could have bought an estate and a lot of land. As the merchant handed her the armor and boots, she watched with rapt attention as they shook, twisted, and shrunk down until they fit as if tailor made.
It was great. Besides showing how much larger the average person was to her, that part was mildly insulting. Did everyone have giant ancestry here and only eat red meats? What did undead even eat? Soul soup?
Her confidence dwindled as she put on her purchases one by one and made way for worry as her mind drifted back home. Hopefully her family was doing ok. Hopefully she wasn’t making them wait too long.
An ethereal yawn shook her while she was in the middle of sewing an ear of wheat onto her newly acquired cape.
“Elia! Welcome back, sleepyhead. Can you touch my breastplate please?”
Ugh.
Twinpeak chestplate
A metal chestplate hardened in glacial dew and finished with unadorned steel grooves over a well-padded gambeson. Commonly worn by the captains of Glenrock, denoting their rank, and shielding them from the elements.
“Captain Rye.” She giggled, twirling around, watching her cape swish this way and that. “Commander Rye.”
Truly, her fate was blessed. She nearly messed up her next row of stitches when she returned to it but caught the mistake before it would take any real work to undo.
“While you were out taking a long nap, I got so much done today. I took a bath; I got us new armor and a cape. We look like civilized people now and look, look here!” She kicked her feet. “Boots!”
Oh. Boots. Yaaay~.
Satisfied with the state of the tunic, she folded it and turned to walk out the front to practice her magic. This part was never going to get boring, even if hitting was still an unlikely proposition. Practice made proficient.
“Is something bothering you?” Elia sounded more than just a bit groggy. “You can tell me if you’d like, or not, whichever you prefer.”
Elia took the choice of silence as Rye went set after set of five Heavy Hailstone Bolts each. Only once did Elia intervene, only to throw ten knives at the gnarled tree Rye was using for target practice.
All of them hit dead center. Two even hit the hilts of the previous ones. Meanwhile, her own bolt veered drunkenly off to the right. She winced as it obliterated a washed-out nub of a tombstone.
“Show off.” She muttered, repeating her sets of five without lessening her enthusiasm. “I sure do hope I’m getting better by just practicing daily. I’d prefer having a teacher, or any instructions at all, but I figure I can gain some proficiency like this. One in five at fifteen feet is pretty good, right?”
Mhm.
“Of course, I still need a long time to focus. I assume it would be a lot easier if my soul were stronger. I wonder what metric they use. Do you know?”
Nuh.
She stopped her bolt mid cast and sent a worried glance to her left. No one was there, but it helped to imagine a small person whispering into her ear when talking to Elia. It helped curb the sharp, often bitter bite of her words. They reminded her too much of her father.
Do you ever feel like your life has no meaning?
Nevermind all that, she was the exact opposite of her father. “I… certainly didn’t expect that out of you today. It’s not time to be sad but to celebrate! You didn’t even comment on my cape, or the rest of my outfit. Look, blue and yellow, a dog and a symbol that’s an… ear of rye. Get it?”
You know what? Forget I said anything.
Ok, something was clearly not alright with her. “No! Nono, please, tell me what’s weighing on your soul.”
There was a pause, then a sigh.
I’m a ginger, Rye, by popular consensus I don’t have a soul.
“Uh-huh.”
Silence spread again.
Some days, I get up. I attempt to do a single thing, just one. I fail. I go to bed and feel like shit ‘cause I couldn’t achieve even that much. You ever feel that way?
Rye sighed a wistful sigh. “There has never been a day where I haven’t. I don’t know about you but work on a farm never ends. Always some chore, a fence or pen that needs fixing, catching an escaped grug that takes everything but a few hours at the end of the day and those are spent studying. It’s the rare occasion when I can do something I want, just for me. But that’s normal. Everyone who’s anyone does at least that much, right?”
Uh-huh. Big workaholic energy right there.
She took aim, squinting hard in the hopes it would make her more accurate. The bolt carved off a branch. Rye winced as it shattered against another distant gravestone, muttering an apology.
“I’m not a workaholic. I’m perfectly normal, for a prima.”
Lots of expectations for a firstborn?
She paused, took a few breaths in between aiming. “Yeah. It’s… not easy.”
Another two bolts. Both misses.
When the Fane-eater died, I didn’t feel like I deserved the victory. Then that Rhuna bi– knight woman, whatever, I thought she was like me. I was wrong, she was just another messenger of my bad luck sent to build up hopes and crush them. What did the centi-doggo matter when someone like her could just show up and ruin my day? It’s like god is taking my victories too now. It wasn’t all me, not all skill that we got out of that with our souls and shards intact, just luck.
If this went on any longer, Rye would need some cheering up herself. “Elia, I’m going to tell you something you told me: You did well. It was mostly you, and isn’t mostly enough?”
That earned her an ethereal snort and the equivalent of a cold shoulder.
“Cheer up, we only need to overcome one final hurdle, the keep itself. Where’s your adventurous side, the Elia that always talks nonsense and makes… jokes, I think?”
There was a laugh, some mirth hidden in between a sadder tone.
What, you can’t even tell? I’m not that unfunny, am I?
“Your constant humor sure doesn’t make realizing when you’re serious easy.”
… Fuck it, my twenty-minute mope break is over. I’ll feel a lot better after killing some shit with our new and improved kickass body. I wonder, can I do a standing backflip now? What’s our lethal fall height? Can I bench a cow?
“… I’d rather you just focus on getting us to Loften.” Rye returned inside the temple, taking a few gulps of healing water against the magic fatigue. “Who knows, maybe the people inside the keep are not all mindless undead. Maybe they’re nice.”
A grasping pair of hands clutched the hem of her cape.
“Pearl.” A scholarly undead moaned.
“Ack!”
“PEARL!”
“ACKACK! Elia! He, he’s got me by the cape. Do something!”
Relax. Look at this dude, Rye. You think he can keep you back? Just kick him across the room.
Her foot tingled and wound up for the mother of all clobberings. She tried to fight it but found that Elia’s hold over a single part was as strong as hers over the rest of her body.
“Elia, stop.” To her credit, she did.
The undead was still clasping the tip of her new accessory in its hands. A quick tug and it slipped from his grasp with surprising ease.
“Pearl...” the undead moaned dejectedly, before sinking down, prostrate before her.
It was enough to make her feel like she kicked a puppy. He wanted a pearl? The only round things in her possession were Quibbles the toad and the essence of loyalty. She pulled the essence from her pockets, kneeling down to see how he would react.
“Here, you want this?”
The undead peered up. He had the looks of a dreg, sunken eyes and bony cheeks, shriveled skin, and twiggy limbs. But there, at the back of his eyes, shone a spark of intelligence.
“Pearl.” He extended a finger to touch the marble-sized pearl. It slid off, to no effect. When she next looked into his eyes, they were as dim as all the others.
Rye, don’t just go around and present our hard earned spoils to the nearest dreg. They might have rabies.
“I feel bad for him.” She stood up, staring at the pearl. “What even are these?”
They can make certain boons stronger. Never seen one in your past life?
“No. No, because boons were rare. Even common ones were… well, common in some circles, but I never… this was not part of my education and… maybe I’d known if I grew up in a bigger city.”
Don’t worry, it’s probably just a thing used to widen the power gap between rich and poor, like air–friers or fiscal responsibility.
What a silly idea. “Can I just eat this now? Will my [Heavy Hailstone Bolt] work with this?”
Does it have an empty socket?
She gave it a quick check. “Yes? Oh, can I use it, please?”
Knock yourself out.
She popped the essence in her mouth. It tasted… pleasant. Like warm citrus with a sharp tingle at the back of her gums. The tingle turned into a fiery blaze and moments later she dunked her head under water as her entire head turned red hot.
She emerged, sputtering and coughing, feeling like her body had expunged an entire week’s worth of sweat. Still, she managed to conjure up the breath while walking down to take another bath.
[Spirit] Heavy Hailstone Bolt [Uncommon] [Essence of Loyalty]
Gather your Spirit to launch a Heavy bolt of Hailstone which will seek out your designated target.
A cumbersome pattern of conjuration, this projectile submits to the laws of gravity in exchange for greater potential. Disliked by conjurers for its crude design, though its efficacy is undeniable.
There it was, a tiny difference in the first line of text.
“Will seek your target? This is great! I don’t need to aim anymore!” And it would eliminate her chance to hit anything else on accident.
Leave some luck for us poor, wouldn’t you?
“Oh shush, you were plenty lucky with the dog.”
That got something in her mind to physically bristle.
“Sorry. Wrong wording. You’re a good warrior, Elia. Be proud of yourself.”
Yeah. Proud I can dunk some braindead undead after doing nothing but for decades. Real skill, real achievement right there. Like outboxing a toddler.
“They don’t play fair! The undead, not the toddlers. They come at you with two, three, six at a time. You’re – we’re – a small girl, Elia, you can’t expect us to lift the world.”
Lifting myself out of soul-poverty would be enough. Or undeath.
Talking to Elia was harder than usual today. No matter what Rye said, it seemed like she was insistent on having the conversations she wanted with the conclusions she wanted. Was she sulking? Well, if she could bring a stubborn grug to water she could make Elia drink it too.
“I think you’re looking too far ahead. What about the things you achieved so far? Look at the little victories, and once you’ve learned to hop between them the larger ones will come on their own.”
Rye, I know I’m not doing great, but anything you suggest I’ve tried a thousand times. I’m not playing a game I can win. I’m just not trying to lose too hard.
After much too long a silence, Rye finally mustered up the courage to ask a question that had long been on her mind. “Have you tried to look for a companion?”
…what?
“Sorry, that was poorly worded. I… often I fall on hard times. When the chores, the studying, the responsibility becomes too much, and nothing seems to work out. I’ve found it nice to have someone I can rely on, for comfort, for trust, for fun.” She smiled, sorting her clothes and armor into neat piles. “You wouldn’t believe it, but some things I just can’t talk about with mum or my siblings, not even Cali.”
And you want me to cope by, what, finding a relationship?
“I’m not telling you to woo anyone, gosh, don’t ever try that all willy–nilly and always use protection.” If people like Elia were allowed to breed, the world would end with a bang. “But put in some thought. Maybe you can find someone who has what you lack. Or lacking that, a stable personality, a friend you can rely on.”
Who, you? Sorry brain bud, but besides the fact that we literally share the same shriveled grapefruit body, our friendship is entirely platonic. You want me out of your head, and I am here to facilitate that process.
Rye’s next sentence became stuck in her throat.
“Y–you don’t mean that. You’re just having a bad day. Now I’m upset too. And you know what I do when I feel upset?” She peered at her reflection, let one of her more intact locks fall in front of her face and lay down in a (hopefully) alluring pose. “Oh no~, I am such a clumsy undead, I can’t reach my back. Won’t anybody give it the service it deserves?”
It took all of thirty seconds before the attendant appeared at the bathrooms entrance, towel in hand. Rye smiled as their eyes met and before she could say anything she threw her hair back (ignoring the strands that fell out and stuck to her hands) and took a deep breath.
“I require a massage.”