“All done. Now, I’m going to start the transfusion, okay?” Chloe said as she snipped the thread.

Chloe’s face seemed troubled. Pale as a ghost, and her eyes looked past Rosaendra. Her entire world had been shaken. Gods? Goddesses? Magic? She lived by the rules of science. She was a GP, after all. She had seen some things that would make her believe in miracles, but even those could be dismissed with coincidence and statistics. Some people were bound to get better, she had always told herself. She was doubting that now.

“Transfusion? Why?”

“You’ve lost a lot of blood.”

“I’ll be fine.” Rosaendra pulled her arm away and covered it with her blanket.

“Rosie’s your name?” Chloe said, “Now I can’t force you to do it, but I think it’ll help speed along your recovery.”

“Rosaendra’s my name. Not Rosie.” Rosaendra corrected. “And I’ll be fine. Not the first time this has happened.”

She tried to push herself to stand but nearly fell over. Ashley caught her shoulder. Chloe sighed, as Ashley led Rosaendra back down.

“Alright.” Rosaendra rolled her sleeves and looked away as Chloe got things ready. It didn’t take long until she felt the needle’s prick against her arm.

A coolness flowed through her veins. She hated this feeling, like icy slush pushing through her body.

“So... Rosie. Is everything you said true?” Ashley asked as she picked at the bandage on her own arm.

The older woman, Ashley, however, had a sparkle behind her eyes. A light that hadn’t been there for years. Her wrinkled face drew back in an excited grin. She had always believed in ghosts and demons and the like, and even had a passive relationship with the church, and saged her house once a week. Rosaendra’s story just cemented those feelings.

“Yes.”

“So...you’re going to continue to fight?”

“Well, won’t I have to? If I don’t, who will? That’s the way I...look at it.”

She didn’t know why, but whenever she had to under a blood transfusion, she couldn’t talk without feeling nauseous.

Ashley put her head down on the table in front of her.

“...can I help in any way?”

“What? Why would you? Don’t you see what happened to me?” Rosaendra put up a front of trying to keep them away. If she accepted right away

“I do, and that’s why I want to help. Don’t you, Chloe?”

“You can earn money from this?”

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

“Yes. I got a little over 200 dollars tonight.”

“That’s more than I make at the hospital...” Chloe muttered before shaking her head. “No, I can’t.”

“Well...now that I know that there’s a whole war going on to save the world, I can’t be sitting around in the library, can I?”

“Mom! You can’t really be considering this.”

“Why not?”

“You can die!”

“Well, so what? Since your father passed last summer that’s all I’ve been waiting to do anyhow.”

“Mom!”

“It’s true!” Ashley turned to Rosaendra who was busy picking at the needle in her arm.

“Don’t do that, you’ll pull it out.” Chloe chided her.

Rosaendra stopped.

“I wouldn’t mind the help.” Rosaendra said, “Even if it’s just logistical.”

“Like driving you to places and getting you things?”

“Yes, so that I can spend as much time as possible fighting.” She said, “And of course, I’ll pay for the help.”

Ashley shook her head.

“No, I want to fight with you.”

“Mom!”

“I don’t know if you could,” Rosaendra said.

“Well, you spoke to a goddess, right? Like an actual goddess?”

“Yes, I told you. Hecate.”

“Well can you ask her for me?”

Rosaendra wanted to tell her no, she was far too old to be putting her neck out like this, but she couldn’t deny the look in her eyes. Still...

“I don’t know.”

Chloe sighed and ran her hand through her thick blonde hair.

“If you’re doing this Mom, I’ll do it too.”

“Chloe, you don’t have to.”

“You’re the only family I have left, Mom.”

Rosaendra didn’t want them coming into Efra with her, she just wanted some help in case she got injured, and to help hide it from the anti-cult division.

“I... I’ll ask.” She sighed. Ashley was the closest thing she had to a friend. Hopefully, Hecate would just say no. “In the pocket of my jacket there’s a mirror. Hand it here.”

Ashley pushed herself off the chair and walked over to the jacket laid out on the desk, and dug around in the pockets until she found it.

“Is this what you’re looking for? Looks like a makeup mirror. Beautiful.”

“Yes, hand it here.”

Ashley took the few steps across the room and handed it to Rosaendra’s outstretched hand. She clicked it open.

“Hello, are you there Servitor?”

Yes, did you need something?

“I have, uh, two people who would be interested in joining in the fight, do you think the Lady would allow them to, as she did me?”

I don’t think so. Came the reply. Each god and goddess was limited by the number of people they could bring in. More because of the limited power they have now.

“Limited power?”

Yes. They’re not as widely worshipped as they were in the past. Some of the older deities are close to vanishing with how much of their power they used up already.

“Oh...”

That includes most of the Hellenistic ones.

“Oh...so there’s no chance.” She glanced over to the disappointed face of Ashley, and the relieved face of Chloe; both crowding around her shoulders to read the mirror.

No there is.

Damn.

I will ask the Lady if she knows any heroic or other spirits who have yet to choose their Nominees.

“Nominees?”

Yes, the intelligent spirits of what had once been human — the heroic spirits, as we call them, and other well-known spirits. They were given the opportunity to choose one person in the world to join the fight so that they might rise in the ranks and become Gods as well. Some still haven’t chosen, however. I will ask at once.

Damn, damn. Ashley gained the light back in her eyes, and the fleeting hope drained from Chloe’s.

The Lady said that she knows a few who are still deciding. The two with you are the ones who have asked to join in the war?

“Y-yes.”

Excellent. When a suitable Spirit is found they’ll get in contact with them. Please know that with a Spirit as their patron, their growth will be a bit more accelerated at first, but slow down considerably, whereas you, one who was chosen by a goddess will have steady growth. It’ll be slower at first, but the speed won’t ever slow down like it will for them.

“Uh, alright. How will they make contact with them?”

A text message.

Rosaendra didn’t know that the servitor had a sense of humor.