“I want to talk about it,” Hallvar stated at lunchtime in their guest quarters.
Stella paused her meal to wait for an explanation from the hero, holding her silverware in the air; Pipkin, however, kept munching on her tiny tomato like it was a fresh kill.
“My subclass,” Hallvar explained, rubbing the back of their neck. It truly was a tell of their discomfort now, one that they were regrettably aware of but couldn’t stop.
They launched into detail, anxiously speaking.
“You haven’t said anything about it other than the tail joke and it’s making me nervous because I haven’t found a single mention of beastshapers in any of these books or others I’ve read. I don’t know if they’re rare because they’re bad or if no one has, I don’t know, spilled the beans about their existence to someone with a printing press.”
Stella continued eating after giving the hero a look. “We can ask a librarian to look up the term or relevant ones – like shape shifting or shape changing. But, until then, why are you worried about me?”
“Omenic, too. There was another one but I forgot.”
“And about me?”
Hallvar might as well have shuffled their feet like a shy little child, the way they looked at their food to avoid the discussion.
“I, uh—I don’t think you’ll react badly, I guess I just need to know that if I continue this, I won’t be… blindsided by rejection later on. I wasn’t joking about having three more forms that could affect how I look and act, maybe. I’m not sure.”
That made Stella curious. “Is it already affecting your actions?”
Hallvar dropped their silverware and gestured emphatically with a hand. “Every time I get hungry, all I want is fucking fish. Not even cooked. Sushi! Raw. You probably don’t have sushi here, so it’s pointless to want!”
Stella couldn’t help but laugh at how aggravated Hallvar sounded at their fish craving. “You could go get some. Open the window and fly out?”
The hero glanced at the window like it was a tempting proposition, but they shook their head. “It’s manageable. I’m worried what will happen if my next form is like… strictly herbivore or carnivore. Am I going to crave raw liver? Only eat alfalfa?”
“Maybe the reason beastshapers aren’t written about in books is because they succumb to their overwhelming cravings or die of starvation from not getting enough—what was it? Alfalfal?”
“Hahaha, very funny.”
Stella reached over to the silly hero, putting her hand on theirs. “I can honestly say that I will still like you, even if you get stripes or horns or eat only carrots and seaweed. You are very sweet and brave. Appearance is a minor complication in comparison to changing personality traits, and I like yours as they are.”
Hallvar blushed because, let’s face it, they were still kind of a teenage girl at heart, enamored with the romanticism of the elf’s statement.
They let things sit in a nice silence as the pair continued eating, until another concern pushed its way into their thoughts.
“The forms have something called—” Hallvar pulled up the information. “—a development cost. For the travel form, the fish hawk, it was a day. I, uh, broke into the Guild during that 24 hours I couldn’t change forms.”
Stella made an intrigued sound. “We were both right, in a sense. You were stuck, but not cursed, and you did know how to turn human again.”
“Yes, okay, so I—” The hero stumbled over how to broach the next part of the discussion, feeling awkward about even asking.
“I need an offense form because as much as I love getting my ass kicked by Kiran for holding a dagger incorrectly, I do need to use my subclass skills in combat.”
Stella was failing to see the part that made Hallvar stutter, so she waited for them to continue.
“The next development cost is… 10 days. It doesn’t seem like I have to wait any amount of time between acquiring forms, I just have to pay the cost up front.”
The elf finished her greens and set her plate down. “Dear, are you asking permission to be absent for 10 days?”
Hallvar squinted, nervous to add more. “And I’m guaranteed to come back weirder? Does that change things?”
Stella laughed at them once more. The hero thought it was the prettiest sound in the world.
“I’m guessing you don’t have adventurers in your homeland. Leaving for a few weeks at a time is expected. Not typical for local quests, but not out of the ordinary. It would be the same as you travelling to the north-western edge of the kingdom.”
They were relieved by this answer, though they still felt a little dumb for making Stella walk them through these reassurances.
“We— We had stuff like business trips for certain jobs or deployments for the military, but our technology let us travel to the other end of the continent in half a day. A lot of our, uh, devices made activities quick and efficient, so the expectation in relationships is to be available much more frequently than I have been.”
Stella intentionally chose not to ask about Hallvar’s prior life. She was curious, of course, but she didn’t want to bring up hard emotions again so soon. It had to be disconcerting and strange to continuously realize this world was different than your own.
They had plenty of time to discuss it another day.
“You have an offense form to pick. What does that mean? When do you plan to leave?”
Hallvar grumbled, trying to align an explanation in their mind before remembering a simple explanation. “If you’re done eating, you can look at it yourself?”
Stella was content with this answer. She pulled up the information as Hallvar finished their lunch, reading over the hero’s system details in full. They hadn’t provided this kind of access before, so the system mage took her time in analyzing everything.
The sunlight streamed in from the open windows, large but not so much that the room couldn’t be kept warm at night. It landed on Stella as she worked, reading her invisible data as Hallvar watched.
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Her strawberry-blonde hair caught the light; it was wavy, not curly, but still coarse. Hallvar wondered if her parents had the same hair; it seemed rude to ask about genetics.
Most of the people who would pass for black here had a variety of hair types, though tightly curled, brown-black, and coarse was still predominant.
Cait, the mage hero, kept her brown hair natural, pulled back in a bun. The guild member Tyrus had short hair, under an inch in length, meanwhile his brother had an afro that was like 8 inches long and dyed green.
Hair color didn’t seem to be as variant as eye color, though Hallvar was beginning to believe the latter could be related to magic rather than genetics. They had no proof, except for the knowledge that people in positions of power were the ones with odd eyes. The average adventurer or patron of taverns seemed to have eyes that were brown, green, blue, or some mix of those colors.
Even Stella’s eyes were a vibrant green that Hallvar questioned. It was a color that bordered on unnatural, perhaps an outlier but still – Stella possessed a lot of magic, so Hallvar’s theory wasn’t entirely disproven.
The system mage finished her assessment, blinking back into reality to find Hallvar watching her adoringly. She smiled; the hero scooted closer so they could wrap an arm over her shoulders.
“What do you think?”
She leaned into Hallvar’s shoulder, making herself comfortable. “The system wants you to take on an offense form, that’s certain. The cost for the next two are expensive but must be worth it. Thirty days and ninety days consecutively as a beast sounds exhausting.”
Hallvar hummed some confirmation that they were listening, though they were very preoccupied with cuddling their… partner? Girlfriend seemed too juvenile. Was she their girlfriend though?
“The system wouldn’t allow me to see any requirements of the specific forms, so are you able to read those?”
They opened up the internal details of the forms, their eyes closed with their arms wrapped around Stella. No additional information was given, only a prompt to pick from a list of beasts.
“I don’t have as many options to pick from,” Hallvar muttered, still reading and sorting through data. “But I can choose from beasts I’ve seen personally and beasts I’ve read about in detail but have not seen. The size is a wolf or larger. I guess that makes sense, having a small offensive form wouldn’t work very well.”
“Are there any patterns?”
“Most of these are carnivorous if I had to guess. Some of them are horned ungulates.”
They searched for gryphons, curious about the possibility. No, those weren’t listed. Huh. What about wyverns? Or rukh? Hallvar certainly knew of these beasts, in more than simply name.
“None of these beasts are able to fly.”
“Hm, so there’s no textual requirements but there are limitations.”
The pair cuddled for a while longer while they both thought. Hallvar was looking over the listed beasts, seeing if any were interesting or worth more research. Stella was mentally sorting her knowledge of beasts of the world, trying to find one she thought was suitable for Hallvar.
“You should clean up,” she said. “I need to return books to the library and get more. I can search for beastshaper information for you.”
Hallvar agreed, happy to take their tired body to a bath to try and rid themselves of the dirt and grime and soreness from sparring earlier. It was helpful, but exhausting.
A few hours later, Stella returned to find Hallvar reading on the windowsill with Pipkin curled up in their lap. They used the bookstand, leaving a hand free to cradle the little beast as she slept.
It was endearing, a picture of the careful, kind-hearted person Hallvar was.
Stella approached quietly and they whispered between them as to not wake the precious baby beast.
“Look at these.”
She traded Hallvar’s current book for another, a naturalist’s account of beasts on their travels. She showed them a few beasts – a horse-like creature with hair-feathered feet, paws instead of hooves and sharp teeth; a bird creature that looked like a raptor, more dinosaur than chicken; and a very long cat-like creature whose illustration was more horror than educational, eyes and a rough shape of a body peering out of shadows.
“What do you think?” Hallvar whispered back.
Stella propped herself on the edge of the window seat, leaning into Hallvar’s shoulder once more so she could maneuver the pages of the book.
“I think the qittakākom is the best option that I could find.”
She pointed at the horror-beast illustration, continuing her explanation. “If you’re going to get a magical and a defensive form later, then it stands to reason that your offensive form shouldn’t focus on magic or defense. If—”
Stella paused, weighing her words in order to sound minimally judgmental. “If you have a team of beasts, besides Pipkin, then you can afford to be solely offensive. You don’t carry a shield, so your fighting style is more like a duelist or weapons specialist anyways.”
While she was a system mage, she didn’t want to sound prescriptive. It was Hallvar’s life and choices, not hers.
“I think you should talk to Viktor. I don’t know what you intend to do, but learning how to set traps and whittle down a broad battlefield into an advantageous location would be helpful. This one, the qitta—”
Stella pointed at the horror-beast once more.
“It is a stealthy beast that travels between the deserts of the Qhai Republic and the foot of the Stargraaven. It’s mostly seen at a distance with mirages and desert heat preventing full understanding, but according to this, the qitta’s preferred prey is wyverns, giant snakes, and it’s been seen with gryphon corpses too.”
Hallvar began reading the text while the mage continued her explanation.
“You could pick a Tawha wolf or something similar, but it would be too predictable for your opponents. Most beasts in this area are familiar with the wolves, as are any humans that might fight you.”
She gestured with a vague sense of frustration. “I—I don’t want to suggest you copy the guildmaster, but your advantage as a hero is to be different than the others, which means diversifying your abilities beyond adventurer with sword and shield who has dog-companion beasts. That’s an entirely functional choice of beast companions, but it doesn’t feel like you.”
“Viktor is good at being unpredictable while maintaining the ability to counter most fighting styles through cunning and attributes. You’re silly rather than cutting in personality but you’re very smart. I think his help would suit you, and the qitta would be a natural extension of that.”
Pipkin was awake by now, the elf’s enthusiasm for helping shifting her attempted whispers into a full-fledged conversation. The akergryph held onto a fold in Hallvar’s clothing with her front feet, watching Stella with her head tilted.
The hero nodded. “I can do that.”
Stella hesitated, thinking about Hallvar’s active defiance against Cyciphos and their disinterest in serving the Crown. “I don’t want you to feel you have to follow my suggestions just because we’re together.”
She felt a kiss on her cheek.
Hallvar moved the little akergryph to the sill so that they could wrap their arms around the woman, propping their chin on her shoulder.
“Stella, not to be dramatic, but I would do anything you say because you’re smarter than me and I trust you. Besides, this is your one chance to get me a tail, and it looks like the qittako-something has one, right?”
“That’s quite the confession,” she replied in a teasing tone, pressing back against the silly, earnest hero. “What does it mean?”
“I dunno. What do you want it to mean?” Hallvar took this opportunity to nip at the woman’s earlobe, happy to have some sense of… of normalcy again. It was fun and silly to play these games with Stella. She seemed to enjoy it too.
“That you’ll do anything I say.”
“Oh?”
“So we should take advantage of that nice, soft bed while we can.”
“Oh. We can do that.”
The rest of the day passed with a quiet leisure, the door to their quarters firmly locked and no expectations of being disturbed until dinner.
Stella fetched more books when she was finished with her current ones, reading in between bouts of playful passion. She earned a few new scratches on her thighs and sides from the talons, but they were easily healed.
Hallvar tried to read as much of the bestiary books as they could, focusing on the qittakākom when it was mentioned. They didn’t have to go with Stella’s suggestion, but it was worth consideration and had a high priority on their list of potential options.
They wanted to ask the Court Mage if he knew anything of the qitta, voicing as much to Stella. She offered to ask him; she was scheduled to meet with Anton tomorrow around the same time Hallvar was to meet with the Queen.
Right, the Queen.
The hero spent some time before bed fussing over wardrobe options. It seemed maybe correct to wear the same thing they wore to the trial, but also there were other clothes offered here, supplied by some unknown servant who did their job well.
Clean, simple clothes might be better than the ones that were musty from Viktor’s closet and a little sweaty from Hallvar’s trial.