The castle erupted into chaos once the guard realized the hero was missing, yet the door to the cell was still locked. Cyciphos was raging; he blamed the Court Mage, who calmly offered to invoke a Rule of Truth to prove his innocence.

The ability of a mage to perform without their point of focus – a staff, rarely a wand or a book – was very reduced but not insignificant. Simple spells, like producing a floating light or moving small objects, could be done without a staff.

All Cyciphos understood was that the Court Mage was present when the 5th hero disappeared. Whether Morozov was capable of that sort of aid without his staff was anyone’s guess.

At Windhelm’s advice, the Court Mage was moved to his quarters, to be contained and watched, but no longer suffering under the indignity of the dungeon. It was below his station as the Court Mage; he earned the right to waste idly away in his own chair, not on the moldy floor.

Anton found the entire affair irritating and inconvenient, but not without rewards. He now knew that cells were not escape-proof, important for the Inquisitor to understand.

Yet, no one could figure out how the 5th hero escaped.

No body lay broken on the rocks below the cell window. There was no evidence of climbing tools. No bars of the cell were altered. The lock was secured when found. It was a mystery, as if the 5th hero simply vanished.

Anton heard the rumors from his desk, the spirit Mimidos working tirelessly. The spirit of mimicry practically fed off new information, new sounds to repeat; its summoning cost was paltry to the hours of entertainment Anton received.

The current theory was that Hallvar was one of the secret subclass of hidden people. Its name was not known to the public, but Anton was aware through Viktor. The Unseen subclass required higher agility than Hallvar possessed, so although it was an amusing rumor, it was impossible.

The disguised bird swooped in and out of the court mage’s quarters through a window on an exterior wall.

It was too high up and too oddly placed for anyone to notice – except for soldiers on the wall walk who intentionally risked their life to look downward. That was a scenario that simply didn’t happen; most soldiers had a healthy sense of fear about clambering on the edge of the wall.

On the roof of a belfry, not far from the Court Mage’s window, the 5th hero ate a fish in peace.

The form they chose was a sea bird, a raptor focused on hunting in open waters. Hallvar knew it was called an osprey in their world, but fish hawk seemed the most common name here.

This was their third fish in the hours that passed. They felt very little human emotions at the moment, but that was due to the countdown in the simplified system interface. It started at 1 day, a total of 24 hours.

Their emotions weren’t entirely removed. Some were dulled, but others were dismissed due to logic. The countdown was how long Hallvar had to wait before returning to human form.

They couldn’t speak to the Queen if they tried, not until the 24 hours were finished. She probably wouldn’t tolerate a whistling, clicking fish hawk for very long.

The details of the travel form were provided, simplified but given when prompted by Hallvar’s current bird-brain.

This wait was the development cost. 1 day for the travel form. 10, 30, and 90 days respectively for the next three forms, if Hallvar made it that far. They could… feel this form getting easier to manage, as the hours passed.

The first few minutes of their transformation were hectic. Incapable of processing why they – a bird – were in a dungeon cell. Priorities were to get out and go eat, then take a nap.

There were immediate benefits, however, not just drawbacks.

The travel form augmented one of their attributes, agility. A permanent 10% increase. Hallvar didn’t have the capacity to question that number but it was indeed 10%, not a single point increase. That would add up over time.

Their mind was… different, too.

The obvious issues would likely resolve themselves. While Hallvar was capable of noting the bird flying in and out of the Court Mage’s window, the question of why had yet to ping into their brain.

They did know it was Anton’s quarters. The bird entry was a rectangle, a single pane that opened above a larger window. For Anton to let the strange bird out, he had to stand close to the glass.

Hallvar could see far, far into the distance with precision now. It was easy to watch the mage raise his arm over his head, his shirt lifting in humorous immodesty, as he unlatched and opened the bird entry.

The mage’s bird was safe from Hallvar’s keen hunting sense. This form would sell its soul for a fresh fish and nothing short of it.

As for more benefits, Hallvar appreciated that this form had its own priorities. It didn’t – or couldn’t – care about the emotional distress from days of literal torture. Perhaps future Hallvar might break down from the weight of what they went through, but today?

Fish time.

As they finished their current meal, Hallvar cleaned off their new, hooked beak on the stones of the belfry. It was made for shredding through scales into the soft flesh of fish, as were their long, curved talons.

However, they found standing flat on the ground to be awkward and weird, forced to hop or practically waddle to close any distance on level terrain.

But flight! Oh, flight was perfect. It felt so natural to have the wind under their wings. Their feathers were white on the underside, hiding their presence from the rivers and ocean below during hunting. Only a few black, scalloped or striped markings indicated that their wings were not actually clouds.

Their sight was colorful. More colorful than before, Hallvar felt, so they were aware that they didn’t look exactly right for a fish hawk. Instead of a brown-grey, they were the same rusty red of their hair.

It would affect their ability to hunt or remain unseen, but it was pretty cool, Hallvar thought.

With nothing further to do on the belfry, Hallvar hop-flapped to the edge, looking out over the capital. The city felt massive from the dungeon window, but now? Large, but not nearly as unsurmountable. Crossing it took a few minutes, at most.

They found their target, taking off with a few strokes of their broad wings. Soon enough, only the fish skeleton remained to mark their presence.

➳ ➳ ➳

“Do we… do we scare it off?” asked one of the flowers, with marked concern.

“Why?” the elder of the pair said. “It’s not doing anything.”

It was early afternoon, too soon for any clients to be ringing the bell. The brothel was technically open at all hours, but the flowers ultimately decided if they would leave their rooms to humor someone before breakfast or lunch.

This was not a day of rest for the laborers of the capital. It was a workday, and therefore early afternoon was more accurately after lunch. Your average brothel-enthusiast had work to do.

Those flowers who were awake were either assembled in the lounge or doing non-brothel chores elsewhere. A few were reading or sewing.

Yet four stood near the window, watching the hawk outside.

The upstairs of the Solarium boasted an intricate iron railing, made of hand-worked leaves and vines of metal, upon which the flowers leaned and called out to passersby. No one lingered outside today, except a two-foot-tall bird of prey peering intently into the windows.

Hallvar could see inhumanly well, but not to the point where they could see through curtains or around corners. They tilted their head this way and that to get a better angle, but nothing came of it.

With birdy resolve, Hallvar took off. It was easy to find the bell, difficult to ring it, but easy to swoop effortlessly from the sky past startled flowers, into the now-open lounge doors.

The 5th hero waited for the shouting to stop as they perched on the back of their preferred armchair, trying not to snag their talons into the fabric too much. Was it weird to have a preferred chair in a brothel?

The flowers were now plastered around the edge of the room, unsure how to deal with a presumably wild beast in their midst, especially one who flew – there were so many draped fabrics used as veils and points of interest, a trap for flighted things.

They opened the doors and windows, trying to offer an escape route. The bird did not move; Hallvar was busy looking around the room, trying to spot their things or Pipkin, if they were still here.

Someone found a broom, circling slowly around the beast with the skill-reinforced grace from the flowers’ performer class. She poked the bird, which did not react.

Hallvar found this form to be quiet. The urge to make noise was nonexistent without another beast to communicate with. Warning the humans wasn’t necessary either.

Pipkin wasn’t here. Hallvar would have sighed if they were capable of it.

Instead, they tried to hop off of the chair, flapping to give a bit of lift to avoid the draped blanket. Whoops. Their talons were longer than expected and caught readily in the crocheted blanket like it was a fishing net.

Hallvar fell to the floor, flapping wings doing nothing to untangle them. They were left in birdy awkwardness on their back, tilting their head at the flowers who gasped and whispered among them.

“Do we help it?”

“It might bite you.”

A voice of reason came from an older flower. “It’s a companion beast or a pet. Can’t think of a single wild fish hawk that would come indoors on purpose, let alone trick its way in.”

The 5th hero focused their gaze on that flower, a man who looked only a bit older than Hallvar but much thicker and hairier. Garden boy didn’t even feel like the correct term here; this was certainly a bear. Garden bear.

“Well, if you know so much, you handle it!” said someone nervously.

The garden bear approached Hallvar cautiously, speaking calmly and consistently as he did. “The locals used to tame these to fetch fish in Myelford. They’re smart.”

“Go find a healing potion,” someone whispered in the back. A pragmatic decision.

Hallvar simply watched the garden bear, nictating membrane swiping across their eyes as they stared unblinking.

With caution, the bear took hold of their legs like stems of a wine glass, threading the narrow limbs between his fingers to prevent the beast from clawing or lashing out. Hallvar waited patiently, not attempting to do anything while the man worked.

“Definitely a pet,” the garden bear grumbled.

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Soon enough, Hallvar’s talons were untangled, and they were carefully flipped upright.

“Can I touch it?”

“Nah, birds are weird about that. I wouldn’t trust it.”

Hallvar flap-walked closer to the bear, nibbling at the edge of his robe as a thanks.

Whether it was the development countdown or the form itself, the dangling bits under the robe had zero effect on Hallvar, though they were at the perfect height to see everything.

With an awkward taloned walk, the 5th hero made it back to the doors held open by some quick-witted flowers, and they took off.

A sigh of relief fell over the lounge.

Then, a quiet question. “Do you think Tejashree would let us get a pet bird?”

➳ ➳ ➳

Pipkin heard the chirping sounds from her roost on top of the kitchen cabinet. She scurried immediately out of the cracked pitcher the human set out for her, all two and a half inches of her tail poofed up in squirrely rage.

A carefully manicured branch was pinned under a few rocks near her roost. She clambered out to the end of it, peering around the room with her dark eyes, tail twitching.

The chirping continued. Pipkin dove off of the branch to find the source, skidding on the windowsill as she frantically landed.

A bird that was six times her size was perched on the planter under the window. Despite having a quarter-inch of glass in-between her and the trespasser, Pipkin spread her wings wide and raised her hackles in an attempt to show the invader who was boss.

Hallvar watched, equally entertained in their human mind as their bird one. They let out cheeps of parental concern toward the tiny akergryph, attempting to convey a kinship.

It took Pipkin a few minutes but she settled down, becoming curious enough to approach the glass and investigate.

It was entirely a hunch, but if Hallvar felt a magnetic understanding of their beast companion’s location, then presumably Pipkin felt something similar. They leaned down to bring their own head close to the akergryph, watching her slowly process her little feelings.

Eventually, Pipkin burst with excitement, scratching at the window and trying to nip through the glass. Instinctively, Hallvar hopped along the planter, showing their own enthusiasm.

The pair erupted in a series of friendly cheeps and scolding chirps; any small wildlife that hadn’t been scared off by Hallvar’s arrival was certainly gone by now.

An hour later, Zarin returned to the guild after making some deliveries. She had a puzzled look on her face as she passed along more requests to Rami, clearly wondering if she should bring something up.

“Hey, Stella? Did you say you got a pet?”

The elf was taken aback by the sudden mention. “Kind of, it’s Hallvar’s. Why?”

“There’s a big hawk on your planter trying to get into your window.”

Immediately worried, Stella excused herself. She didn’t think a hawk could get inside, but she would feel much better if she knew Pipkin was safe.

Sure enough, there was a large bird nipping at the glass where Pipkin darted to and from. She sprinted to her front door, intending to grab Pipkin to bring her into the guild hall, away from the windows.

In her fear, Stella didn’t stop to watch the pair play. Pipkin was running away from Hallvar’s beak, which just happened to be too slow to follow the little beast.

The hero watched in growing confusion as hands appeared in the window that took Pipkin away. They let out some distress calls, flapping their wings in irritation. That was their child, kind of!

The sounds of a door opening brought Hallvar’s attention back to the front of the house, where they saw Stella. Delighted, the hero-bird took to the sky, circling around the woman in an excited display.

It would greatly embarrass Hallvar later, but their bird-brain only understood that Stella was their mate and thus the proper display needed to be performed.

They shrieked in abject terror as a warning crack of lightning erupted from Stella’s staff. She wanted to protect Pipkin, which worked; she was able to get inside with no interference.

But, Hallvar had no mental capacity to understand that the lightning was a warning, not imminent danger, especially in the recent context of the blixhund. They flew to a nearby tree to escape and recover from the fright.

It was not Stella’s fault, Hallvar knew. But if their human body would have coped badly with the traumatic re-introduction of lightning magic, then the bird body certainly did not handle it well.

They were left puffed up with agitation and on high alert for some time, long enough to determine that they needed to get inside to make sure Pipkin was okay.

With trial and error, Hallvar established that no adventurer held the door open for long enough to let the bird swoop in like at the Solarium. The road to the gatehouse passed directly by the guild, so there was a wide expanse of space with no perches for a poor fish hawk.

No buildings sat opposite to the guild either. There was a little strip of land and a tiny pond, a couple of short ornamental trees. Closer to the city wall, there was a small row of houses. Hallvar knew Grim lived toward the end, but that was an unhelpful fact unless they got really, really good at birdy charades.

The window.

With a sudden motion, Hallvar took off. They had to circle to angle their landing properly, but Viktor’s smoking window had a decorative metal grate that they could perch on.

The office was empty and dark. Their mind wasn’t entirely fit for human reasoning, but with a third of the development countdown under their metaphorical belt, the complex problem-solving was slowly returning.

Hallvar stretched their long neck upward, trying to pick at the joint of the window where the lock lay on the other side. It might be loose, if they could just wiggle the windowpanes in the right way.

This logic resulted in a lot of tapping and shaking noises, but no actual progress. Hallvar was staring through the glass, trying to mentally claw at smarter options when something moved.

There wasn’t a person there. No, the room was empty. No figures, no forms, hardly even a spider from this angle.

Yet.

The occasional flash of a color Hallvar couldn’t name. Were they seeing things?

No. The flowers in the guild courtyard were strangely colored now that they glanced at them. The fish had funny dots on them too; Hallvar thought they were magical markings, but…

The color floated slowly closer, a little stripe above Hallvar’s head. They watched it until another appeared, lower down, moving faster, moving closer to the window lock. The bird tilted their head as the mechanism unfastened and the window swung open.

The concept of ghosts passed through their mind, but it was not enough to cause distress.

With disturbingly little hesitation, Hallvar hopped inside and to the floor. They watched the little color wisps float around and approach.

“Mimidos,” a voice spoke from nothing. “Relay your message.”

It sounded like Viktor. It had to be, right? This was his office, his house. Was…. Was he a ghost now?

That was entirely too complex of a thought for the bird-brain to handle. Instead, Hallvar nipped at the closest wisp. In an instant, a hand closed around their beak. The feral part of Hallvar did not take to that kindly, and they curled their back and lashed out with their talons.

Blood spilled from thin air; ghosts didn’t bleed.

As soon as Hallvar was released, they took flight, screeching an alarm about unseen enemies as they landed on top of a bookshelf.

A swear was muttered, another when the sounds of footsteps came from the stairwell. Then silence.

Stella poked her head around the corner, cautiously tiptoeing into the only open room in the corridor. She spotted the bird still screeching away and sighed.

“You can’t eat Pipkin,” she told the beast. “She doesn’t even look tasty. I promise you, she’s not.”

The invisible enemy was not forgotten, yet Hallvar flapped down from the heights onto the floor, happily hopping over to Stella. She flinched and stepped back, turning on the lights as she did.

It was harder to see the little wisps of unknown color now, but they were still present. Hovering just beyond the desk, out of the walking area.

With the determination only a half-wild beast could muster, Hallvar positioned themselves between Stella and the unknown enemy. They spread their wings out and tried to become large and scary.

Stella sensed an opportunity and tried to approach the bird from behind. She knew how to handle chickens. This was just a big scary chicken with a long neck, right?

“Don’t,” came the unseen voice.

The elf froze with her hands outstretched, staring in the direction of the sound with wide eyes.

Hallvar stayed on alert, shifting their weight from one foot to the other, absolutely locked-on to that ghostly wisp.

The invisible thing exhaled in a beleaguered sigh, then Viktor appeared like ink drops in water. He was crouching to avoid being seen through the window, wearing a few pieces of leather armor and a bandolier of small vials.

His hand was bleeding gently.

Stella had no startled damsel reactions in her; she squared her shoulders and nearly whisper-shouted at the guildmaster.

“What are you doing here? If they see you, they’ll arrest you!”

“Exactly. If. I should ask you the same thing, though I believe this beast does belong to you in some sense.”

“No, it’s not mine, and don’t change the subject. You need to go and hide. Somewhere else.” Stella was firm in her insistence, yet Viktor shook his head.

“They cleared the guild of my presence twice and have someone on watch at the gate. They will look for me everywhere but inside these walls.”

The truth was, perhaps, stupider than Viktor wanted to admit. Soldiers checked for secret panels, in the back of wardrobes, in the attic, behind every single locked door. That roguish subclass was real, but none of the soldiers had the details of it.

Part of the subclass’ requirements involved not explaining the skills and spells of the Unseen, or else one would lose the abilities entirely. Anton knew of Viktor’s subclass, but only in vague details – the kind of unspoken secret that spies thrived on sharing.

So, while soldiers checked every shadowed corner for an invisible man, none were that interested in the clearly empty bathtub. Perhaps Viktor had to endure soldiers shitting in his house, but it wasn’t death, and he had plenty of potions to replenish his abilities.

Stella didn’t approve of that answer. “So you plan to skulk around here until the King-Consort gets bored?”

“Is that not what I do every day?”

While Hallvar was happy to see Viktor, they found this conversation boring. They nibbled at Stella’s skirt, drawing their beak down the pleats as if preening her.

She didn’t know what to do with the bird, so she watched it with mild confusion. “Is this your bird then? Why is it inside?”

“The Court Mage has been known to send a rook on occasion,” Viktor half-lied. “I did think a fish hawk was excessive, but the beast was persistent.”

“It’s wild? It’s been trying to eat Pipkin—” Stella added the missed information before Viktor could ask. “Hallvar’s companion, a small akergryph.”

“Check its stats,” the guildmaster insisted. He remained crouched, eyeing the beast with great curiosity.

The system mage looked at Viktor like he’d lost his mind, but she decided compliance was better than arguing with the odd guildmaster.

“Nothing,” she replied after holding a hand over the beast, which tried to gently grab her fingers. Beast stats weren’t visible to anyone except beastmasters, and even then the access was limited to companion beasts.

“Fetch the akergryph.”

Stella pushed back against that order. “Sir, the hawk wants to eat her.”

“No, it doesn’t.” Viktor knelt on the ground in a more comfortable position, having a contest of piercing stares with the beast. “But if you insist, there are other ways to prove my theory.”

The guildmaster clicked his tongue to get the bird’s attention; Hallvar found that mildly insulting given that they were staring right at the man.

“If you understand me, turn in a circle.”

The hero did not respond. They were connecting dots in their split mind, trying to assess the reason for this request rather than respond to it. The hawk half was curious, the human half was insulted.

“You do understand me. Obey a command so we can communicate.”

“Sir?”

Viktor did not ease Stella’s discomfort or concern. He had more patience than most, especially for enigmas like birds that might not be birds.

With beastly indignance, the hero trotted past Stella out into the hallway, retrieving something and returning to the office.

They ambled their way over to the guildmaster, using their long, nimble neck to slam a dart point-first into the floor. Hallvar screeched in annoyance at the guildmaster before fluttering to perch on the back of an armchair.

Viktor openly laughed now. It shocked Stella more than anything, as the attempted communication with a bird left her feeling that the guildmaster was cooped-up in a bad way.

“I need an explanation, sir.”

While Stella deserved to be treated with a gentler hand regarding this news, Viktor was not known for giving such consideration.

“That is not a beast; that is Hallvar. They were the last person to witness me use the window, and the use of the dart to prove their identity is amusingly human.”

The elf looked blankly between the bird and the guildmaster, lost in her shock.

“You can research to confirm on your own time, but fish hawks – visvalke, ofinne – do not have red feathers. If we consider the rust color a type of brown, it remains out of place with every fish hawk I have witnessed.”

And that was a lot of fish hawks. Before his capture, Viktor’s time-proven method of travel was to sail on a merchant vessel. He was from a fishing family on a coastal town, pretending to be a sailor was as much truth as it was a lie. No one looked too closely at grubby workers who knew exactly what to do at port and behaved in the expected manner of a sailor.

“I—” Stella stumbled over her words, a touch of fear and wonder in her gaze as she assessed the bird more closely. “I don’t—How? Is it reversible? Is it even possible?”

“You know as much as I do,” Viktor answered drily.

She was increasingly worried. “And if it’s a curse? Are they stuck like this?”

The guildmaster was already bored of the panic. “Then you’re dating a bird.”

With a frustrated sound, Stella let her staff hold itself upright, leaving it behind as she approached the fish hawk. She didn’t know what to do other than prove to herself that this was a wild beast and most certainly not Hallvar.

Yet, they let her touch their feathers and look at the underside of their wing and generally be handled in a way that even companion beasts would not permit from a stranger.

In turn, the bird tried to preen her hair as she leaned over, pulling at strands gently in an affectionate manner.

“Right,” Stella said with an unclear sense of finality. “If this is Hallvar, what do I do?”

Viktor shrugged. “Nothing. Either they know how to change back, or they’re cursed and it will take time or research to fix. Both are inaccessible to you until the Queen returns and this political conflict ends.”

It was a logical, reasonable answer but it felt hollow to Stella. She conceded Viktor’s point, however, and waved to the… bird-person. Hallvar.

“If you are Hallvar, then… follow me downstairs to see Pipkin. A regular bird would not understand those directions.”

She narrated her thoughts to keep her wits about her, feeling a bit unhinged at the mere idea of humoring her boyfriend as a bird.

They were locked in the castle, somewhere. It made Stella very uncomfortable to think about, possibly more uncomfortable than the concept of Hallvar-bird.

Viktor watched with great interest as the odd couple left, the fish hawk struggling to walk down the hallway with their talons.

He had to admit, if that was Hallvar, Viktor was impressed. Presuming it was not a curse, of course.

He hated the idea that the bird could see him while invisible, but the broader implications of that concept would be good to learn. Could all birds sense him or just fish hawks?

The guildmaster sighed and activated his invisibility skill once more, avoiding the sightline of the guard at the gate house. He secured the window and turned out the lights, returning to his quarters to rest and wait.

Soon, Viktor would either interrogate the red-haired hero for information… or he would need to make a spelling-speaking chart to communicate with a bird. How mortifying.