It was sand. He was pretty sure if it. Some inconsiderate oik had put sand in his drink. Maybe it was a local specialty? These little half towns along the Arabesk–Estrin trade route had some particular customs that were either boring or weird, there was no real middle ground.

It was four days ago that he had realised he had lost everything. Oddly, he had kept surprising himself. His first task after coming back to the tavern just before freezing to death in the desert had been to write a laconic report for the Queen and approaching the first the best random young person he could find who looked beautiful; up to Her Majesty’s standard. The handsome young man he found was paid a very decent amount of money to take the message to Arabesk right away without telling anyone he was leaving. Oh, and bringing a nice bouquet of garlic flowers when delivering the message.

…Vampires didn’t like garlic, did they? Maybe it was a myth.

If it did any damage to her, she could always eat the messenger as a consolation price. He had mentioned in the letter that nobody knew where the messenger was going. He would be missed, but nobody would know where to look for him. She probably wouldn’t say no to an unethically sourced lunch, would she? If he got her used to edible messengers, it opened up the option of poisoning her at a later date when she began getting used to him being trustworthy. If he lived that long.

Not that it mattered.

Exactly like the sand in his drink.

But at least an angry vampire wouldn’t suddenly show up and kill them for not reporting back while on the run. Or enslave them for the rest of eternity, more likely. Killing was so nice and easy. It seemed like a really solid solution to an unsolvable problem. There was no way he would be that lucky.

The day before, they had met with a caravan going from Estrin to Arabesk, and one of the men had remarked on the cat mask that Dia seemed to have grown fond of and proudly displayed tied to her saddle. The man had remarked loudly to the man next to him that it was exactly like the masks worn by those sex crazy people back in Yildiz.

Which was why Toog and Dia were walking around the town of Yildiz today, looking for people who were dressed in white and wore something related to the animals the Family liked, and Arne had time to brood and wonder about the sand in his drink while making sure he didn’t let his thoughts wander to the gaping hole in his mind that used to be filled with his life, business, companions, lover, favourite freelancers and employees. But like a newly extracted tooth where the tongue kept wanting to explore the bloody crater, his thoughts kept trying to snake their way into the depths.

They required constant attention, those thought. So he drank his sand drink, careful to never get worse than tipsy so he lost control of his thoughts. Savoured the absurdity of the sand grains. Teetered gently on the edge of alcohol induced potential irresponsibility without falling over. And when someone put a warm hand on his arm, he realised he had been staring emptily at the whitewashed wall since he sat down by his table, not seeing anything.

She was quite fetching. Well kept. Around his age, with a sweet hint of smile lines at the eyes and corners of her mouth. Dark curls, green eyes. A green low-cut dress that let her white undergown and a generous amount of cleavage show. She wore a small pendant shaped like a bird in flight in a chain around her slender neck.

She smiled. “You know there’s sand in that, right?” she asked.

“Yes,” Arne nodded calmly. “I was just savouring it.”

She laughed. “No, you weren’t. Savouring implies pleasure. That look on your face was not pleasure.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I’m not buying. Sorry, not in the mood.”

“I’m not selling,” she smiled. “But you look like you need to escape for a little while and I know the very best way to do that.”

“I see. Well, if you’re not selling, then who is?” he asked. She was much more enticing than what he would have assumed from a small-town brothel, but he didn’t leave Arabesk that often. Maybe he just wasn’t caught up. She looked far too wealthy and well-kept to be a cheap prostitute, though.

“Aren’t you cynical?” she laughed.

He was impressed at how genuine it sounded, the laughter.

“You really should do yourself a favour and come with me,” she continued sweetly. “I promise you a joyful union, and it will cost you nothing but your frown.”

Somehow, Arne managed not to roll his eyes. Of course. He was trying to brood, and the Family found him. She seemed to just be a genuine recruiter, not a tentacled assassin in disguise. Or maybe they just decided to do things the old-fashioned way since the others had failed and send someone to stab him. He honestly hadn’t quite seen that coming from a tentacle sex cult, so it was a valid strategy.

He got to his feet. “You know what? I could use a joyful union this afternoon. I consent,” he said.

She looked at him, curious, and licked her berry juice painted lips. Then she seemed to decide that his use of the word ‘consent’ was a coincidence and got up with a smile. “I promise, you won’t regret this.”

He had a feeling he probably would. But on the other hand, maybe she was just luring him away to kill him and the others would have a tilted fish of a time trying to find his body. Maybe she’d get them too, and the Queen would give up on them.

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Well… Dreams were free…

o-0-o

If you had been to one orgy, you’d been to them all. Or so Arne would have guessed. But honestly, the tentacle was a surprise. It really, really shouldn’t have been. But somehow it was.

He felt less drained after this orgy than the ones in the Family’s house in Arabesk, and some of the things that had happened still stuck vividly in his mind in flashes of hot touches and skin on skin. He slowly walked back to the tavern, or at least where he thought the tavern was. It was evening and though the town was small, the streets were winding and uniform. He had been more attentive to his companion than the route going to the orgy, mainly because he kept expecting her to pull him into a dark alley and stab him.

He heard running steps behind him and ignored it when he realised it sounded familiar.

“Hi,” Toog said and came up next to him, Dia bringing up the rear.

“You didn’t find what you were looking for,” Arne stated.

“How do you know? Where have you been all afternoon?” Dia asked.

“Orgying with the Family, Dia. …Curious,” he mused, “I never fully realised how awful that sentence is before saying it out loud.”

Toog barked a laugh. “Good thing we are well-adjusted people, so the awful doesn’t get to us.”

“Speak for yourself. I’m not well-adjusted!” Dia stated hotly. “Anyway,” she continued smoothly, “how was the orgy?”

They had reached the tavern which turned out to be around the corner at the end of the street and before they went to the dormitory for travellers, Arne insisted on food. Orgying was hard on the constitution. So they found a table in the farthest corner surrounded by locals laughing, chatting, eating, and drowning the day.

“So, what happened? We just mucked around all day. I told everyone I met that I was looking for my family, but no luck,” Toog said.

“No luck because they were busy orgying. A woman found me here and asked me to join,” Arne explained.

“See!” Dia stated. “He’s the charm.”

Arne felt something snap gently in his chest with the realisation that she was right. “Yes, I am. I am the charm. Do you know why?” He looked at Dia for a moment, then Toog and then held up a hand to stop Dia replying. “No, that was entirely rhetorical. I’m the charm because I have absolutely nothing else to bring to the table. No network I can trust, no enforcers, no doctor, however dodgy she might have been, no informants, no thieves, no one who can sneak in unseen and murder people in their sleep or put creepy little baked goods and messages on their bedside table for when they wake up. Nothing. I. Have. Nothing. But charm.” Arne drew a deep breath and smiled. “And so I went to an orgy today. Let me tell you all about it.” His tone was cheerful enough that he worried about himself at the back of his mind, but he couldn’t quite stop the words forming.

“Orgy;” Arne began, “a lovely, intimate gathering of only fifteen people, myself included, ages ranging from ‘just discovered my dick!’ to ‘shouldn’t you have been buried years ago?’. There was only one Officiant, the woman who found me, and I have a feeling she went here because she heard new travellers had arrived and not because of a coincidence, because she and I had barely gotten undressed for the much smaller, much more intimate laurel scented giggle-grope experience when the last of the others showed up.”

“Monkey …something. Those people at the bar. It’s about them, right?” Toog said, when Arne stopped for breath. “You–“

“Not now!” Arne barked. “I’m getting to the really good part.”

“What people at the bar? Those?” Dia asked, nodding to the locals around them.

“No, just… the other night when Arne and I were talking…”

“Back to the orgy!” Arne insisted.

Dia ignored him. “Wait, did you two have some sort of something going on while I was sleeping?” she asked, looking from Toog to Arne and back again, deeply puzzled.

“No!” they both said in unison.

Toog continued, “It’s just that some people in Arabesk, lots of them, got themselves skinned alive, and I think–“

“Orgy!” Arne insisted.

“Skinned alive? What?” Dia asked. “And what monkey?”

“Well, they were his people, right?” Toog asked, eyebrows raised but otherwise difficult to read. “That was the Family killing your people because they couldn’t get to us with the tentacle monster thing. That’s why you are so–”

“What? What am I?” Arne insisted.

“Sad,” Toog said.

“Weird,” Dia supplied. “Then again, sad maybe covers it.” She shrugged.

“Look, I don’t care how murderous or ambiguously gendered you are, just stay out of my business… no wait, I don’t have a business anymore.” Arne drew a deep breath and then calmly exhaled. “Yes, they were mine, and yes, I will make sure the Family ends up suffering for what they did, so can we please concentrate on the orgy?” he asked. “Please.”

“Suuuure.” Dia just raised an eyebrow.

“You mentioned a tentacle?” Toog asked.

“Instead of an altar in the middle, there was just a bowl of water,” Arne continued smoothly. “The orgy was all held in a private home, not a temple or compound. So the giggle-grope fountain was just in the entryway of the house and the orgy itself was in the main room. The water bowl was just like a washbowl. Made of copper.” He held his arms out, forming a circle, “Like this, roughly. And the Officiant spoke the words over it at the beginning. Like the chant thing you did, Dia. And like the bigger orgies, it created…” he waved his hand, “you know, the sex craze, but while it did that, it also called a… small… tentacle.”

“Is that a euphemism?” Toog asked.

“No. I mean a literal tentacle came out of the bowl and wiggled around.”

“And you were fine with that?” Dia asked, her tone indicating it wouldn’t surprise her if he was.

“No! Of course not, but at that point, the feeling was already happening and …well, none of us could stop ourselves. Or maybe the others didn’t try, who knows, but I tried and failed. And then the Officiant said something like ‘a little lost blood for hours of joyful union’ and everyone held their hands out.” He held his hand out to show them the small wound to the base of the thumb on his left hand. “She cut us one by one, and we fed the tentacle,” he explained matter-of-factly just as the server arrived with their food and gave him a very weirded out look as she put the plate down before quickly leaving.

“You fed the tentacle.” Dia nodded. “I’m not surprised.”

“Peer pressure, Dia, it’s a terrible thing. Oh, wait, and unstoppably compelling magic that you’ve fallen prey to as well, more than once.” Arne snapped. “Everyone let blood drip onto it and then… orgying happened. At some point I woke up, but I do remember a bit more about the whole thing than I do about the ones in Arabesk.”

“And you are also not dead.” Toog nodded wisely.

“I’m really not used to having problems I can’t just kill,” Dia said thoughtfully.

“Yes, well, I’m not dead,” Arne continued. “So it seems I was right when we spoke to the priestess thing back home,” Arne said. “The tentacle thing in the priestess dress was either lying or at least more limited than it wanted us to think. If they all talked among themselves and shared information freely, they would have known to kill me, right? And since they already tried to murder us, why would they hold back here? It can only mean they don’t actually know us.”

“Great!” Dia exclaimed. “Let’s go kill them?”

“Let’s have a think on that excellent suggestion,” Arne said, “and discuss it further when out of earshot of twenty people.”