“What kind of punishment?” Vee said.

“I don’t know. She didn’t say.”

“Well, how can I decide if I don’t know what it is?”

“Is it for us to decide in the first place?”

Tessa knew her sister.

They shared a similar dislike of being told what to do. It only made them dig their heels into the ground. Better to make them think about a question rather then make them build a wall in front of something that sounded like an order.

“They are the victims,” Vee mused.

Tessa kept one eye on the restrained Dominion men.

Not exactly soldiers.

She had learned a bit more from the Low as she had helped them bind the men and make sure none of the healers were surreptitiously doing their thing.

She was ashamed to admit that she didn’t feel bad at all for having to break a few bones on the way to mended by a spell or Skill.

The men shouldn’t have been rapists if they didn’t want her to break their bones.

They functioned more like a militia or mercenaries.

The true Dominion soldiers on this land stayed at the string of strongholds near the encounter challenges across The Mothers and in the capital city on the eastern coast.

The more she had listened the more it sounded like the land was a backwater.

That the Dominion had only started putting effort into colonization from their main lands to the east of the narrow sea after those encounter challenges had started popping up.

“I mean, what are we going to do with them even if it was up to us?” Tessa continued. “Trying to keep a few hundred men prisoner with just us seems impossible. I can see us getting hurt if they don’t cooperate. And I think they would definitely try something. It’s hard not to see that. I mean, we’re way outnumbered. Plus, you heard the Low. The lands we’re headed to belong to the Dominion. I can’t picture them putting these rapists in prison. They’d try to put us in prison and give these guys medals. And I don’t know about you, but I can picture what they’ll do to us in said prisons.”

Vee nodded. “I’m okay if they want to take them back to face justice.”

“Do you think they can? They’ve been tortured for, like, a year or more. Those shackles and chains drained their mana and it sounds like it’ll take some time for them to recover.”

“They can wait in here. It’s not like there are any monsters out in the forest and it sounds like they’re more foresty than us,” Vee said. “Plus, it’s a long way to the nearest village and any Dominion fighters. They’ll be safe here.”

“Won’t they have the same problem as us? 30 people to keep a few hundred prisoner. That’s not even considering how they’ll get them all they way back to the mountains. And it’ll be hard enough to avoid Dominion soldiers without dragging along the rapists.”

Vee frowned. “I know what you’re doing.”

“Have I said anything that wasn’t true?”

“Stop that!”

Twinklestar rumbled, nuzzling Vee’s shoulder.

“I’m never going to get used to how big this old bastard’s gotten,” Tessa muttered. “Well? I don’t like putting you on the spot, but I’d like to get moving as soon as possible. We have no idea how good the Dominion’s communications are. Can they send reports? How often? What’s their max distance? The Low said they’re capable of portal travel. Are we in range? Would they care enough to do it? Are the Low and the High valuable enough to recapture? It sounds like they might be. So, the more distance we can create the quicker…”

“Fine. It’s up to them. That would right. But, no torture.”

Tessa was magnanimous about the prospect.

Intellectually, she could agree.

Emotionally?

Well, she had empathy so it was too easy to see herself in the Low and High’s shoes… feet. To see her sister or her mom or Mads and every other woman and girl she had ever known.

When she thought of it that way, she found that she couldn’t muster much of an opposition to the prospect.

Ultimately, the Low and the High were owed justice.

It was their right to decide what form it took.

“Is it our right to decide?”

Vee’s brow furrowed further.

“I’ll talk to them, but I can’t promise anything. Meanwhile, keep scanning those brain waves.”

“I am,” Vee grumbled. “I keep having to zap a few of them.”

“Keep up the good work.”

Tessa left her sister and Twinklestar with a thankful nod to Olo a short distance away. He would keep an eye on Vee like he always did in these situations. His large size was a comfort in the dim light from the few undamaged light crystals scattered through the roadside fort. A tank was always appreciated.

She went back to the tent where a few Low tended to the unresponsive High.

The rest had claimed weapons and clothing from the men’s supply and stood guard in and around the tent.

The Low that had done most of the talking approached her.

She was surprisingly quiet.

Footsteps on the dirt sounded less than a whisper.

Even the cloth of the too-large shirt barely rustled.

“I never got your name. Mine’s—”

“No. We owe you a debt, but that is anathema,” the Low said.

“Exchanging names?”

The Low nodded. “You conceal your face, but your shape betrays you. As does the way you move and carry yourself. Only your words differ, but I am certain you are one of the black-blooded.”

“Um, okay,” she shrugged. “So, why do you call them that? Their blood is clearly red. Are you colorblind or something like that?”

“It’s not literal. It’s for the foul ichor they once relied on to power their odious machines until they somehow advanced their magic generations worth in the blink of an eye.”

That sounded fast even if the Low was using her slow blinks, in comparison to Tessa’s, as a reference.

“Interesting, I’d ask more, but I think we’re both eager to get moving. So, I have to ask—”

“We are grateful for you saving us from our torment and an even worse fate across the sea, but there can be no compromise. We are the aggrieved. We are owed everything.”

The Low said it with same energy as someone reading from a recipe book. Except for that last bit. That was accompanied by a fire behind her too-black eyes.

“Okay,” she shrugged. “Do you think you can keep them chained up without us? Cause if you don’t want to compromise then there might be a problem. So, it’d be ideal if we left before you did those rites.”

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“Yes, but we will need their mana potions.”

“How much?”

“As much as you will allow us to take.”

“Okay. I guess we should do the whole dividing the loot thing.”

The Low turned and did that uncanny wordless conversation thing.

Four other Low dropped what they were doing and joined them.

“They will perform this task,” the Low said.

Tessa whistled.

Johnny appeared next to the tent’s entrance seemingly out of thin air.

Some of the Low didn’t appear surprised.

“If, uh, you ladies would like to follow me. Let’s head on over to those supply wagons,” Johnny said.

Tessa turned to follow when the Low caught her attention.

“There is another issue that I wish to speak to you with,” the Low said.

“Okay.”

Johnny paused.

“You want me to save anything in particular for you.”

“Just anything I can shoot,” Tessa said. She had a lot of ultradense balls in her bag of holding, but she wanted to start conserving them. “I’ll check later for anything else I might need.” She regarded the Low. It was a nice change of pace to be significantly taller than someone who wasn’t a Threnosh. It was her turn to loom.

“Follow me,” the Low said.

They walked out of the tent and past the bound Dominion men.

They were quiet now.

There had been jeers and threats earlier, but her casual snapping of their leaders’ limbs had a quieting effect.

The Low took her past now empty tents.

She thought about the value of going through the men’s personal belongings, but dismissed it when weighed against the need to avoid any sort of fight with the Low. She wasn’t going to shed their blood. Not for a bunch of rapist filth.

A lone wagon, no different from the rest of the cloth covered ones, sat by itself surrounded by tents.

“This better not be a trap.” She sighed.

“We are not faithless like the black-blooded. Is your kind the same? I know there are many worlds. That your kind is a plague upon many owing to your ability to breed like rabbits.”

“I almost thought you were going to compare them to locusts.”

The Low might have deduced her human-ness, but she wasn’t going to confirm or deny.

“Am I incorrect?”

“So, not a trap. Then what?”

“Perhaps something, perhaps nothing to you, but a burden nonetheless.”

The Low opened the padlocked door with a twist of her wrist.

Tessa didn’t miss the glow of magic around the fingers and lock.

She heard a whimper as the door swung out.

What. The. Fuck? Tessa thought.

“Calm, young one. You are safe now. The black-blooded can’t harm you anymore. Soon they will harm none.” The Low spoke in soothing tones.

Tessa backed away from what she hadn’t expected to see inside the wagon.

Oh, she figured on another woman, perhaps, a second High?

She had been half right.

Maybe a quarter right.

What lay inside the wagon were two.

A Low girl cradling what looked to be a High baby, judging by the faint shine to his pale skin.

“I thought you said she lost her baby.”

“I didn’t misspeak. That thing is anathema.” The Low beckoned to the girl. “You may lay it down. They can no longer hurt you.”

“Hey! Careful!”

The girl practically dropped the baby on the thin cushion covering much of the wagon’s floor before scampering into the arms of the Low.

“Are you— Are you planning to leave…” Tessa got a better look at the naked baby, “him there?”

“That is anathema. It can’t exist. I would put it out of its miserable existence if I didn’t suspect you would object.”

“Well… yeah, I’d object! He’s a baby. Sure it sucks for her but…” It wasn’t hard to guess at who the mother was and how he had come to exist. “He’s here now. I mean, look at him. Got the ears. The shininess.” The baby did look well taken care of considering the situation. He was all plump and such, like babies were supposed to be.

“That won’t last as the black blood in his veins corrupts.”

Tessa reassessed her views on the not-elves.

They were really racist… speciesist?

No, no, that was wrong.

She reminded herself that this group didn’t necessarily represent all of them.

A nightmare had been inflicted on them.

It was fair for them to view the Dominion men as they did.

Tessa muttered a string of choice words.

The baby hadn’t done anything wrong.

She climbed into the wagon to pick him up.

“Are there, like, diapers or anything?” She scanned the wagon.

“You may use cloth.”

“You mean magic cloth that’s super absorbent and self-cleaning?” She hoped.

“I don’t believe it likely that they would have that in their supplies. Its birth was unexpected, happening several months into our journey.”

“Could you magic me up something like that?”

The Low’s face remained unreadable.

“You can think of it was part of your thanks for the whole… thing…” she waved vaguely as the baby began to squirm in the cradle of her arm.

Right, cold armor.

She pulled a towel out of her bag of holding to wrap him up like a burrito, calming him down.

That book she had read back on Earth had been right.

A towel was a smart thing to take on an adventure.

“I will see if that is possible,” the Low said.

“Great. Thanks. Anything else I should know about him? Like food and drink? How often to feed him.”

“It is half your kind. The differences will be negligible. Indeed his better half will make him more robust than your fragile, mewling spawn.”

“C’mon. Is that necessary? We did save you guys.”

“Apologies. Perhaps, your branch is different, outworlder. I must remember that for there are infinite possibilities in the spires multiverse.” The Low’s face twisted in her first show of emotion upon gazing at the baby. “Feed and water it as you would your own sp— young.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

“However… our way would be a kinder fate. Though it is anathema we wouldn’t revel in its suffering. It would be swift and painless for it didn’t ask to enter existence.”

“Why would you say that?”

“Because you cannot protect him. And I sense that you are on a Quest. It will be a burden, like I said, that you will find yourself unable to relinquish.”

“I’m sure there are good people out there that can take care of him.”

Orphanages had to be a thing.

Or maybe a kindly farming couple unable to have children of their own.

“Perhaps, such things exist. But even if they did, they would be unable to care for it, raise it. The Dominion will find it. It will be turned into a weapon until it has expended itself at their will. That is the kinder fate. At worse it will suffer as we would have.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“That is my final warning. It is valuable. The Dominion will reward those that bring it to them your weight in gold. The black-blooded will wet the ground with their own blood to take it from you.”

Well… fuck…

She eyed the baby.

The faint shine would be a problem.

He was still bald, so hopefully when the hair started to come in it wouldn’t be platinum and shiny.

His ears were also pointed, though not as long and knife-like as his mother’s. Still obviously not human though.

His eyes were shut and she wasn’t about to pry them open just to look.

Right… so, some kind of head covering that also covered the ears.

Did the have beanies with ear flaps on this world?

The environment was cold, so it seemed likely there’d be an equivalent.

She asked the Low.

“Perhaps in the black-blooded’s supplies.”

It took over an hour and a heated conversation for Tessa and her friends to get ready to depart.

They took one cloth covered wagon and filled it with gear and supplies, including a hefty sack of the regional currency.

Johnny had gotten the low down on how the currency worked from one of the Dominion men. It remained to be seen if the information was good.

The Low woman, who never gave her name, did grant Tessa one last gift in gratitude.

A simple phrase.

It contained a hint of magic that set her electromagnetic field tingling as she repeated it several times.

The Universal Translation System didn’t translate and she knew, somehow, that it was impossible for her to forget it.

A debt had been incurred and the Low’s people would repay it.

Life for life.