It was a warm, spring day. The calm weather made Bel want to perch on a sunny rock as she lazily waited for the sun to work its way across the sky. The air was filled with the sounds of birdsong and the gentle rustling of leaves as they waved in the gentle breeze. Bel breathed in a deep and satisfying breath.

“C’mon kid, you’re wasting daylight.”

Bel sighed, but she tightened her grip on her training dagger. She rushed forward and jabbed the wooden weapon into a straw dummy, her own rhythmic stomp stomp thunk adding an upbeat percussion to the smooth sounds of the prairie and forest.

A sharp-worded shout broke the natural melody. “No! Why do you keep sliding to a stop before you stab? You’re wasting your momentum!”

Bel winced as Beth whacked her across her arm for the tenth time. She nearly dropped her wooden weapon, but caught it after a few fumbles. She knew from experience that her instructor would be even more incensed if she dropped it.

Beth – Bel’s older, adoptive sister – poked her in the forehead. “What are you even thinking about? Where’s your head right now?” she chided.

Bel rubbed at her forehead. “I’m just thinking that life’s unfair.”

She looked enviously at her sister. The muscular, dark-skinned woman acted tough, looked tough, and even dressed tough. She had daggers all over her dark leather shirt and tucked into her belt, and Bel knew she had at least a couple more concealed in her boots.

The assassin’s arms were cluttered with bracelets of different designs and materials. They jangled as Beth huffed and crossed her arms with impatience at Bel’s emotional outburst. According to Beth, she’d added each one after a meaningful personal victory – a euphemism, Bel was sure, for finding someone that she didn’t like and stabbing them.

Beth was a lean, hunting predator. Bel couldn’t be more different.

She glanced down at her own scarred, unadorned arms. Her clothes – a sweat-soaked shirt, a ripped pair of dark pants, and a dirty pair of woven grass sandals – were a mess. Her body was frail, her skin sallow and sickly.

“This is hard, sis. And I’m so much weaker than you,” Bel complained. “It’s already been four years. Whatever happened to me in Technis’ dungeon isn’t going to heal with a little exercise.”

Beth scoffed. “This is just technique, Bel. Strength doesn't matter.” Beth tapped the dummy. “This guy doesn’t even dodge. Real people move, you know.”

“Technis’ hairy balls, Beth, of course I know people are harder. You make me drill with you every other day.”

“Every third or fourth day,” Beth corrected. “Don’t exaggerate. It’s not like I’m pushing you that hard. I know you’re still recovering.”

“Then why take it so seriously Beth,” James interrupted. “In fact, what’s the point of all this practice if we all know Bel can’t get anywhere near as strong as you? Why do you go out and level up, or whatever you call it.”

In solidarity with Bel, her adopted brother had joined her stabbing practice. They were both dripping sweat and covered in bits of straw from their victims. Unlike Bel though, James was comfortable enough with his body to remove his shirt before it became soaked in sweat.

Beth grunted in irritation at her brother’s objections. “We don’t level up, we surpass thresholds in our cores. And you know why we’re doing this.”

James gestured at Bel and himself. “Neither of us have a core. We aren’t warriors. We can’t help in your personal crusade against all of Satrap and Technis.”

Beth’s tanned face flushed with frustration and Bel could already hear echoes of every other argument they’d had over the past four years. She rushed to put up her hands between them, like a desperate fisherman trying to hold back a wave with their body.

“How about we stay calm?” she suggested.

Beth gathered up her frustration and let it out in a large sigh. “Your pacifism won’t help us here, James.” Beth poked Bel in the arm. “She’s a weapon from the gods. She’s supposed to help topple Technis, not sit around and listen to your nonsense all day.”

“Because what? Your god whispered his own nonsense into your head?” James challenged.

“Yes!” Beth shouted. “Because in this world it matters what the gods say! And don’t bring up the Old World, we aren’t there!”

“Guys, please,” Bel begged.

“And when did you last hear from your god? Four years ago, before you rescued us from the temple? Sounds like he hasn’t got a clue what Bel is supposed to do either.”

“Last night,” Beth declared smugly. “I received Durak’s divine providence last night.”

Bel spun to her sister with surprise. “Really? Did he say anything about me?”

Bel leaned forward with excitement as Beth casually tossed her dark braids over her shoulder, a grin of superiority spreading across her face.

“Yes. As a matter of fact, he did.”

“Tell me what he said,” Bel demanded breathlessly.

Beth’s expression froze. Bel recognized the look; her sister hadn’t meant to mention hearing from her god at all. She was a hothead though, and couldn’t stand losing an argument.

James came forward and put a hand on Bel’s shoulder. “Yeah, Beth. What did Durak have to say about our sister?”

Beth frowned as her eyes flicked between the two of them. Bel could see the guilt warring with exasperation across her face. Her lips pressed tightly as she made a decision. “Nothing you need to know,” she finally responded.

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“Something about her needing to improve her knife skills, I’m sure,” James replied sarcastically.

Beth snorted. “Look, I just want her to be able to protect herself.”

Beth fiddled with some of the bracelets that wound around her wrist and looked away awkwardly. “And we – I do have a plan to fix her core.”

Bel put her hands together with excitement, but then her eyes narrowed. “This isn’t like when you had me eating fermented shark paste and drinking powdered kraken beak, is it? I couldn’t eat for days.”

“No, no,” Beth denied, waving the idea away with a flick of her hand, “nothing like that. This is legitimate. A ritual that I lifted from an enforcer. I just need to…”

She trailed off and turned her head, listening.

Bel had heard it to, a sharp tweet from a bird that didn’t exist in the local woods.

Beth put her fingers to her mouth and whistled back. “You two wait here for a moment,” she instructed. The dark-skinned assassin put her hands on her daggers and walked towards the tree line.

Bel stared in her direction and squinted against the sun. “You see anything?” she asked her brother.

James glanced at the trees. “Some shady guy hiding in the shadows. The usual.”

James looked back at Bel, his green eyes serious. “Don’t let her dodge that conversation, sis. You know that’s what she’ll do.”

James had been Bel’s whipping boy for years when they’d been imprisoned under Technis’ temple, but he’d stuck with her after they’d been freed. She didn’t always agree with his ideas, but he’d had her back for as long as she’d known him.

Bel sat down on an extra hay bale. “I don’t really want to get into another fight with her.”

James rolled his eyes and joined her on the bale. He ran his hands through his wild, red hair a couple of times as he struggled to put his feelings into words. Bel could guess what he was going to say, so she spoke first.

“I really don’t think this is like your world’s fantasy stories. I’m not going to suddenly discover powers the day I start believing in myself.”

Bel gestured to herself. “Look at me. Something is obviously wrong. A healthy swagger isn’t going to fix my skin, or make my headaches go away, or, you know, do something about these dead snakes on my head.”

Bel pulled out the tie that held her dead snake-hair together, letting them spill over her shoulder. She grabbed one of them and shook it at her brother.

“See? There’s no way this is right, and I don’t know anyone else who’s going to help besides our sister.”

James leaned away from the dead-eyed serpent. “Put that thing away, Bel. Anyway, of course we don’t know anyone who wants to help, Beth never lets us go anywhere or meet anyone.”

“Then you’ll be excited to hear that I’m sending you two into town,” Beth said suddenly.

Bel and James jerked, startled by Beth’s sudden and silent appearance. Beth said that she liked to keep them on their toes, but Bel suspected that she just got a kick out of their reactions when she startled them. She’d used to do it while they were eating too, but Bel had almost choked to death one time when Beth startled her. That close call had put an end to that little slice of hell, for which Bel was eternally grateful.

Bel was readying a complaint about her sister’s bad habits when she finally processed her words. “W-we’re doing what?” Bel stammered, wide-eyed.

“You’re going to Baytown!” Beth gushed. “I need an ingredient for that awesome ritual to fix you, and I need it quickly.”

James raised his hand. “Wait, are you not coming with us?”

Beth tugged on her hair, clearly irritated. Her smile fell into a frown. “Okay, I’ll be honest, I don’t really want to send you both into town.”

She jerked her thumb towards the woods. “That lizard licker just dumped all of our plans into the open ocean. Apparently there’s some nonsense going on in the western mountains, and – well, it doesn’t really matter, but now I need to rush and do some other thing a week early.”

“But Beth,” Bel objected, “we both stick out, and I’m not good at dealing with people. Baytown is way bigger than the little towns we’ve been to before.”

Bel poitned to her head. “I mean, I can tie these back and throw on a hood, but it’s spring. Won’t I look suspicious?”

She looked at her brother and frowned. He was better, but not by much. His hair was too red and his skin was horribly pale when compared to Beth’s rich, chestnut complexion. He also insisted on removing all of his facial hair, and his teeth were unnaturally clean and straight because of all his obsessive grooming.

And, if someone looked past all of that, James talked funny. Bel hadn’t realized it when they’d been in the dungeon together, but now that she’d had four years to observe other humans it was clear that coming from another world made James just as strange as she was.

“You’ll be fine,” Beth assured them. “It’s cool enough still that no one will mind your cloak, and James can just say that he’s from Hammerstrike. It’ll work if he keeps his mouth shut.”

James raised a finger to object, but Beth cut off his words with a glance.

“The blacksmiths there spend all of their time in their smithies, so their skin is pale as an apple’s flesh and they’re notoriously bad with people. Rumors say that their hair is as red as the fires of their forges, too.” she explained.

Beth waved her hand dismissively. “It’s not true of course, but we’re halfway across Satrap and the people in Baytown are idiots. You’ll be fine.”

James rubbed the back of his head and glanced at Bel. She stayed quiet, hoping that she could leave all the objecting to him. “Yeah, I dunno Beth, this doesn’t sound like a great plan. What do you need us to pick up, anyway?”

Beth nodded as if they’d already agreed. “I–no, Bel needs some essence stones. Two or three of them should do. About this large.” Beth held her fingers apart indicating the size of a small pebble.

“Wait,” James started, “what the heck is an essence stone?”

Beth huffed impatiently. “They’re the cores of essence corrupted creatures and monsters. I guess you could pull them from a human too if you’re evil enough. They’re difficult to extract without breaking though, so they’re expensive.”

“Hold on, so you can just buy cores? Couldn’t I use one of them to get my own magic?”

“Sorry James,” Beth replied, “that’s a terrible idea. There’s a famous story of an old, injured hero taking the core from some beast and sticking it into his body so that he’d have the strength to hold off an invading army on its way to his village. He chained himself to a rock before consuming the core so that he would stand guard on a mountain pass.”

James looked at Beth expectantly. “And? What happened?”

“Well, he turned into a giant who was able to hold a mountain pass against invaders for a week.”

“That doesn’t sound so bad.”

“After the battle his family went to see him, but the moment he saw them he tried to eat them. After praying to the gods for salvation for a year they finally gave up hope. They triggered a rock slide above him, sending him into a dark abyss.”

Beth lowered her fist towards the ground and made a splatting motion. “They do puppet shows of it every cold season. It’s how Technis’ priests teach children that the world before the Barrier was bad and that the rest of the gods don’t care about humans. The story isn’t bad though.”

James frowned. “Well… maybe if we clean the core? Or reprogram it? Or something?”

Beth shrugged helplessly. “Sure, maybe if you knew someone with the abilities to do that kind of thing. I wouldn’t know where to start though.” She turned an angry gaze on him. “And don’t even think of saying that we should ask one of Technis’ priests.”

“How about asking Durak about it?”

“How about doing the important stuff instead of daydreaming?”

She handed James a small leather purse. “You’ll find essence orbs in the central market if you ask around. This should cover the cost, but there may not be much extra so don’t give any to Bel for tattoos or candies or whatever.”

“Hey,” Bel objected. Beth flicked her on the head again.

“I have to go prepare some other stuff, so you’ll be on your own. Just make sure that you’re out of the city by noon.”

Bel looked up at the sun’s position. They’d gotten up early to train, but they would still have to rush.

“What happens at noon?” James asked suspiciously.

“Just stuff.” Beth laughed. Then her eyes turned serious. “Just make sure you’re out by then.”

Beth suffered no more objections, ushering them out of the prairie and towards Baytown in under a minute.