“Lou, stop the car,” I said, my voice beautifully strong.

“What?” she asked, giving me an incredulous look. “We have to…”

“We are stopping,” I said. “Stop the car, or I will, and it might not start again.”

Lou looked frightened. Of me. But the fear-pain just grew stronger, and I could handle pain.

The jeep crunched to a halt, and I heard the sound of heavy breathing.

He came into view a few seconds later. He was German, wearing the brown standard of Nazis, and had dark hair with a thick mustache. He was middle aged, possibly leaning on the side of old. His face was a little red with exertion.

From this range, I could clearly see that he was not a spellcaster. The enchantments were, like the walls had been, a strange blend of crude ingenuity, but not especially powerful.

The three others appeared around the jeep, leveling guns at us.

“Step out of the vehicle, and come with us,” the first man, the thoroughly enchanted one, said.

“Do not insult me with any pretense of your power over me,” I said to him, ignoring the others. “Send your lessers away. You will join us in this vehicle, and we will discuss the situation.”

“And you,” I said, pointing at Lou. “Put your gun away.”

“But…” she spluttered, and I glared at her. “Aera, this is…”

“I forgot to mention,” I said, as an aside. “Our deal from before? It’s off. We’re doing things my way.”

Her face went blank. A poker face. Her eyes were as cold as mine as she scrutinized me. I ignored her and looked back over at the man.

“I believe you misunderstand the situation, Aera,” the man said, sounding authoritative. “You have been captured, and will be coming with us.”

I reached out a hand, and poured magic into the air. It was wild, barely controlled, a maelstrom of pain-fear infused hatred and rage, and it almost danced with glee as I set it to a task of destruction.

Globs of distorted metal fell from empty hands.

“This is your only warning,” I said. “Send them away, come here, and sit down.”

This icy, cold confidence felt so good. The burning was there, screaming in a distant corner of my mind, but it didn’t matter. Despite the ringing haze, everything was clear. Beautifully, coldly, crystal clear.

He looked uncertain and glanced at the others.

“My instructions…” he began.

I raised a hand.

“This hand is covered in the blood of my friend,” I said. “Shall it mix with the blood of my enemy?”

“You’re bluffing,” he said. “We have watched you. You are a pacifist. But we intend you no harm. We merely need to discuss a matter with you.”

“In said history, my hands were not covered in the blood of a friend,” I said coldly. “I wouldn’t trust it to apply. I do agree to discuss with you, but it shall be on my terms or not at all.”

We met each other’s gaze for a long moment and then he nodded curtly. He said something in German, which my translation spell recognized as an order to meet him back at the base. I was surprised to comprehend it, but then I remembered that Albert spoke German. A flush of gratitude for his counsel ran through me, and seemed to smooth over some of the wild haziness of my ragged soul.

After they left, the man came over to the car uneasily, opened the door, and got into the back. Lou seemed to be withholding some twitching, especially in her gun hand. It was dark in the car, so I briefly infused the nearest object - which happened to be a gun, naturally - with Lum, causing it to give off some light. It wouldn’t last more than a few minutes, but that was fine.

“Now, let’s do this properly, shall we?” I said, giving him a smile that felt unnatural. “I am Aera Koryn, spellcaster of Aquas. This is Lou Williams, police officer. And you are?”

“I am Hans Schwarz, Major,” he said, still uneasy.

“My first question is simple: why do you need to speak to me?” I asked.

“Our instructions were clear,” he said, after a brief hesitation. “We are to bring you to the ‘Koryn.’ You are not to be harmed during this process, on pain of death. The Koryn has been negotiated with on this point, but our time is running out. We must bring you immediately.”

The Koryn? I thought to myself. My last name? What was that all about? Was this my family, somehow?

“Who is ‘the Koryn?’” I asked.

“We know nothing about her,” he answered.

Her. My mother, maybe? How did that make any sense? If my mother were here, she’d have found me. I blinked in confusion, then decided to just go back to asking about the situation.

“Or else, what happens?” I asked.

“Negotiations simply will not progress, until you speak with the Koryn,” he said. “I know you are uncomfortable with the situation, but again, you merely need to come to the base. No one will harm you.”

I decided to abandon my standards, briefly, and push past the defenses around his soul. I just wanted to get a sense of his surface intentions. He was feeling cagey, and very clearly holding things back, but there wasn’t any outright hostility. I got the impression that he wanted to convince me to join up with him, in fact, which was probably the least-hostile intention that I’d have found believable.

“Lou, how’s our gas?” I asked.

“A little over half a tank,” she said tightly.

“Here’s my proposal,” I said. “Release the American base. We’ll return Lou there, and I’ll go with you to yours. Deal?”

“Here is my counter proposal,” he said. “You come with me, now, to our base, with your friend. We agree to leave the Americans we hold prisoner in good health, up until the negotiations with the Koryn are resolved, at which point we will release them and return to Germany, after taking a vessel.”

A flicker of anger filled me.

“Here’s my ‘counter proposal,’” I said coldly. “I kill you now, leave Lou with the jeep to go wherever the hell she wants, and run to your base alone. I break past the flimsy protections on the wall, get to the portal, and figure things out on my own.”

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“If I am killed, the American prisoners will die,” he said. “My proposal is the only one in which no one else dies.”

“My initial proposal has that property, as well,” I noted. “Let’s not tempt me to kill you, shall we?”

“You are demonstrably less dangerous when near a person to protect,” he said. “Letting you come alone would be an unacceptable risk to my men. Releasing the base now also holds an unacceptable risk of a counter attack while we need to focus on negotiations.”

“You want Lou to come with me to serve as a… a… hostage, of sorts, to my cooperation?” I demanded, spluttering.

“We will do her no harm, so long as you do not betray our agreement,” he said. “She would simply be incentive for you to refrain from doing so.”

“And what’s your incentive not to turn on us?” I asked.

“We have no incentive to turn on you,” he said. “Our greatest success has the full cooperation of yourself, and the Koryn. We cannot achieve that through betrayal.”

I’d have been more convinced if he wasn’t still feeling like he was holding things tight to his chest. He could have been outright lying, and I wouldn’t have been able to tell, not without pushing even further into his mind or soul. Still… if ‘the Koryn’ was the source of their magic, then I couldn’t really see how betrayal would work out for them. Even if things broke off on that end, I would have invaluable knowledge and experience. Killing me just didn’t make sense. And, as long as I was alive, I would have magic and, therefore, options.

“Lou?” I asked. “What do you think?”

She scowled at me, and glared at Hans.

“What happens if we refuse to play ball, and just leave?” she asked him.

“Then we do what is required to bring Aera to the Koryn,” he said.

“Which involves what, exactly?” she pressed.

“We need not discuss such unpleasantries,” he said.

“Yeah, actually, we do,” she said. “Answer the question.”

“We strongly prefer an amiable solution,” he said. “The use of force or coercion is expected to be effective; however, it would make future discussions with Aera more problematic.”

He wasn’t wrong about that. Of course, making me bring Lou was a type of coercion. He was right that I was weaker with her - it was much harder to protect two people than one.

As far as coercion? If they knew who any of my friends were, they could easily take them hostage directly. It’d be pitifully easy to coerce me into coming to talk. Hell, it’d be effective, even with just the American base.

“I can guess how he could force my hand,” I said, shaking my head. “It’d be easy. I’m coming, now, obviously. The question is, how?”

Lou glared at me again.

“You don’t have to go with them, Aera,” she said.

“I want answers, and they have them,” I said. “He’s right that there’s no sense in betraying me.”

“For fuck’s sake, Aera,” she hissed. “You don’t know nearly enough about the situation to know that!”

“I’m a magic user, with a great deal of knowledge, with a history of being passive and easily manipulated,” I said, my own tone cold. “Don’t I look just absolutely charming to collect?”

“There’s way, way more risk here than just you dying or whatever,” she said. “Sure, they probably don’t want to kill you. Sure, they want to use you. But that does not mean that betrayal’s off the table. You can be tricked. Other people can be hurt. This isn’t a fucking game, Aera, the stakes are real.”

“Of course they’re real,” I said. “They’re equally as real here as they are in the hospitals, where people die daily of diseases I can easily cure. Unless those lives are less important, for some reason I missed?”

“You have no fucking sense of scale,” she said, glaring at me, and then at Hans, as though angry at him for hearing this conversation. “More people have died in this war so far than the total number of people you could possibly have healed these last few years. A single attack on a single city, a tiny course change in the war, is the sort of change you can make, and outweighs your healing power by orders of magnitude.”

“London might not have fallen, had I acted by my will,” I said. “Inaction has consequences, too.”

“We didn’t have all the info,” she started to say.

“We have access to information now,” I said, cutting her off. “Information that I want, so that I can finally begin making correct choices.”

“Access to information that puts you in a real dangerous situation,” she said. “I know you, and I’m pretty willing to bet that even as pissed as you are right now, if you had a choice between stopping Hitler and saving my life, you’d save me.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing!” I yelled in frustration.

“It is!” she yelled back. “You’re so fucking short sighted - you see the people in front of you, around you, and you just do not get how big the world is! How many people there are! You grew up expecting to be a bit player, and deep down, you still think you are one! You still think the person dying in front of you is the most important thing in the fucking world!”

I clenched my fist and felt a bizarre impulse to punch her in the face. Hans coughed, distracting me.

“Ladies,” he said cautiously. “I know you have reason to be cautious. So, too, do me and my men. Let us simply approach the matter cautiously. No momentous decisions must be made. Simply come, discuss, and leave at your will.”

“Like we should fucking believe you’ll let us leave whenever we want,” Lou spat at him.

“We have hope of working with Aera in the future,” he said. “If we let her leave peacefully, she is likely to come back. If we try to hold her, we are liable to die - especially here, on foreign soil.”

I gave Lou an expectant look.

“What’s that look for?” she demanded. “It’s not like I have a say here.”

“Of course you do,” I said. “If you choose not to come, then you won’t. I’m sure Hans will prefer to work with that truth rather than risk dying simply to try to coerce me into coercing my friend.”

Hans’ lip twitched in an unhappy way, but he didn’t protest. Lou relaxed marginally.

“You said our deal was off,” Lou said unhappily. “But, if I come with, and I protest something, would you still take it seriously?”

I nodded, unable to find words to capture how I felt about her advice at the moment. No matter the fundamental issues, I did trust her heart and the sharpness of her mind.

“One last point,” she said, frowning. “If I tell you to abandon me, you have to, immediately, no questions asked. Got it?”

“But…” I began to protest.

“No buts,” Lou interrupted. “I’m not going to ask you to abandon me because I’m randomly feeling noble or some shit. I’d only say it if it was fucking serious, and if that comes up, I probably won’t have the chance to explain the situation. You either agree, or I’m not going.”

Tears welled as I looked at her serious expression for a long few seconds, and then I found my arms going around her, embracing her in a tight hug.

“I don’t want you to die,” I whispered.

“I’m not too keen on the idea myself,” she said, a little of her usual humor back in her voice. “I wouldn’t be going at all if I thought it was likely.”

As I let go, I saw a smile on her face again.

“If they do kill you, I swear sevenfold revenge on all who harmed you,” I said solemnly.

She laughed and said, “Do me one better. Take care of Slick and Alice.”

“I would anyway,” I said, smiling a little myself. “Very well, Lou. I accept your terms.”

“Oh, one last thing,” she said. “If I tell you to kill someone, will you?”

“One of the Germans?” I asked, clarifying. She rolled her eyes and confirmed. “Then, yes. But please do not ask unless you are sure. I do not wish to kill.”

“Trust me, I know that much about you,” she said wryly and turned to Hans.

He looked very keenly interested in our conversation.

“Fuck with us and I will set her on you like a fucking dog,” she said.

“Understood,” he said solemnly, despite the touch of amusement in his spirit. “You agree to the terms?”

“Me and Aera go with you to your base, you swear to not lay a finger on anyone at our base - you or any of yours - more than absolutely necessary, we talk, we go free as soon as we say we’re leaving,” she said. “On threat of encouraging Aera to cut loose in grotesque and graphic ways.”

I flinched a little at that.

“See?” Lou said. “She flinches at that, and she talks about fucked up shit like it’s normal. Do not fucking betray us.”

“I understand the situation,” he said.

I frowned at the fact he still felt cagey to me.