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Sticking with food; Bubs was the guild’s mianid chef.
Mianids were an amphibious race with smooth, waxy skin that glistened with a perpetual dampness. Their colouring ranged from deep yellow to the greys and reds of stagnant water. It reflected both habitat and age; murky and dull in the old, vivid and fresh in the young. Large, bulbous eyes dominated their round faces, giving them a look of both perpetual vigilance and constant panic — wide, unblinking, disconcertingly direct. Slender, slightly webbed limbs lent them a natural grace in water, though on land they moved with an odd sort of slug and slog.
That clumsiness did not extend to their hands. Their long, multi-jointed fingers were exquisitely dexterous, moving with the precision of an instrument fine-tuned for dissection. Mianids were slight things, smaller and frailer than every other land-dwelling peoples, yet their delicate touch made them indispensable where precision was paramount.
They found their place in trades that required meticulous artistry and an unwavering hand. They gutted fish and animals with surgical ease, their movements as fluid as the creatures they carved open. They turned stone into statues and shaped wood into unique pieces of furniture, each detail impossibly fine. They painted cutlery with delicate patterns, threaded silk through impossibly small needles and wove tapestries more intricate than anything you would ever see. Their hands pieced together the smallest fragments of fine jewellery, setting gems so precisely they seemed to grow from the metal itself.
They were a race of quiet perfectionists. And yet, for all their artistry, they did not seem to recognise their own value. As far as Yu knew, mianid culture revolved around simplicity and stewardship. They prided themselves on restraint and preservation, on taking no more than needed and leaving no waste. Tria had employed several mianids at her estate, though their servile demeanour had done little to endear them to Yu. He got to know quite a few, amongst them Lib and Url, who did their fair share in raising him. They were soft-spoken, spineless sycophants, slinking from one task to the next with quiet servility. In other words; hey were straight-out ass-kissers, eager to please and desperate to avoid notice. There were no words for how much Yu missed them now.
Bubs was nothing like them. Oh, he looked friendly, all right. His yellow-and-orange hues glowed warmly beneath the dim common-room light, his slick skin reflecting the flickering illumination in a way that made him appear almost soft. Deceptively so. He was young, too, his colours still bright. Younger than Lib and Url, certainly. Perhaps even younger than Yu. It was hard to tell. His size and that wobbly way of walking did not help. He was the only guard not towering over Yu, the only one that did not look like an absolute menace of a berserker. Compared to the others, he was small and weak, with almost childlike proportions.
And yet. There was nothing meek about him. Bubs carried himself with an authority that neither fit his absurdly light-hearted name nor his colourful, diminutive frame. He had served them food, but he was no servant. There was something in the way he approached them, in the way he distributed mugs and bowls, and in the way he watched them eat — calm, unwavering, measuring. The kitchen was his domain. Theirs was the privilege of partaking in it. He decided whether they deserved to eat or whether they starved. Absolutely all matters related to food fell under his jurisdiction: ordering, growing, managing supplies, preparing, cooking. And he made sure everyone knew it.
“Meal times are fixed, and so are portion sizes. Do not ask for food outside of meal times. This is an exception, since you just arrived.” Bubs had delivered this decree the moment the travelling party crossed the threshold. “Outside of breakfast, lunch, dinner, and witchset, no one eats without me knowing.” His voice was clipped and firm. His tone brooked no argument. He expected obedience to be a given. “Not a crumb, not a grain. Understood?”
Where Tirran’s eyes had been erratic, darting everywhere, Bubs’ massive, bulbous gaze swept the room with slow, deliberate weight. He did not blink.
Yu had nodded, unsure what else to do under the chef’s scrutiny. The encounter left him feeling oddly chastised, though he was not sure what he had done to deserve it. Bubs’ way of speaking reminded him far too much of Tria. It was the same sort of rude, narcissistic authority.
In that moment, Yu would have agreed to anything if it meant he could finally eat. He would have happily left it at that. But of course, it only went downstream from there. Bubs’ second, more personal introduction to Yu had been nothing short of frustrating. After serving the meals, he had brought Fallem a second mug — a special brew, meant to “sharpen his spirit”. A welcoming gesture. Because, naturally, Bubs had assumed that Fallem was the new wizard guard. Who would not? Who in their right mind would have assumed otherwise, given the choice between Fallem, a wizard, and Yu, a whatever the fuck. Even Yu had wished it was Fallem.
When Yu had inadvertently corrected him, Bubs had taken it as a personal slight. The shift in his demeanour had been immediate, his already direct stare turning venomous. He did not appreciate being made a fool of. It had taken several members of the escorting party to convince him that Yu was not joking, and by then, the damage was done. Yu could feel it in the mianid’s glare, the tightness in his posture. Bubs blamed him for the misunderstanding. And hated him accordingly.
Well, fuck me for being born.
Bubs had served them small rolls of dough filled with meat and vegetables. After the mianid retreated to his kitchen domain, Yu finally got to eating. He ate beak to plate, devouring them with the single-minded hunger of a starved beast. He only got to the third, before he was again interrupted.
Deltington, the lanky beastkin who sat beside Yu, leaned in with a conspiratorial slant. “There was once a guard who made a habit of sneaking food from the stores,” he murmured. His grin was sharp and needle-toothed, his tone unsettlingly casual.
Yu stopped picking up dough balls and stared at him, unsure where this was going.
“He lasted three days,” Deltington continued, eyes gleaming with something Yu hesitated to interpret as either amusement or malice. “On the fourth day, we found him dead on the balcony. Bloated. Skin blackened, stretched tight like a wapa left too long in the sun.”
Yu’s gaze flicked toward the darkened kitchen doorway. The shadows beyond remained undisturbed.
“On a completely unrelated note,” Estingar added from his other side, his voice slow, deliberate, “did you know mianids secrete some of the most potent poisons known to alchemists?”
Yu stiffened.
Deltington clicked his tongue and waved a clawed hand dismissively before Yu could respond. “Do not try your luck,” he said, jabbing the same claw into a dough ball before stuffing it into his mouth. “Bubs counts rations down to the last grain of rinza.”
A pause. No one laughed.
From the kitchen, the quiet tick of metal on wood.
If Bubs had been a little less heavy-handed, a little less precise, Yu would have sworn they were just messing with him. Now, he was not so sure.
He was even less sure about Deltington and Estingar themselves. Yu had no idea what they were. No moment had presented itself to ask about their race or origin without making his ignorance glaringly obvious.
One had been stationed at the entrance with Gurs when Yu and the escort party arrived; the other had appeared later, slipping seamlessly into the commotion. They had introduced themselves as brothers but beyond that, they had given nothing, no homeland, no heritage. So Yu did what he always did. He observed.
They were wiry things, all lean limbs and sharp edges. Avian, he supposed, but far from fina. Unlike any avian beastkin he had ever encountered, for that matter. They had wings, but no feathers, and that unsettled him deeply.
No matter how people dressed, featherless beings always appeared much too exposed. Too … naked. Fur, he could appreciate. The bony overgrowths of a kyrthik’s exoskeleton, he could tolerate. But smooth, utterly bare skin, like that of wizards, tairan, or humans, made his feathers itch. It was worse when they had hair on their heads. Worse still when they had beards. It looked as if someone had plucked them pitifully clean, yet forgotten the most obvious parts. The long hair of humanoid females disturbed Yu the most. With short-haired males, he could at least imagine they had been stripped once, and the stubble was simply regrowing in those places first. But the females — No, that was deliberate. That was downright creepy as fuck. It was as if they had committed to the plucking, obsessively keeping their bodies bare for months and years while compensating with those grotesquely excessive crests that were their hairdos. And then, above that, there were the tairan and wizards who dressed themselves in clothing made from fur. There was just no end to this mess.
Now, humanoids were one thing. But Deltington and Estingar were actual. naked. avians. Wings of taut leather slouched against their backs, separate from their arms. Their three-fingered hands, tipped with curved, chitinous claws, flexed and curled as they gestured, the spurs along their knuckles twitching with every movement. Their legs bent sharply backward at the knee, ending in talons much larger than Yu’s own. Despite the cold, they wore only a set of bulky trousers, their chests naked and their clawed feet bare against the stone floor. Just looking at them made Yu shudder.
At first, he thought them entirely featherless. But when they sat beside him, he noticed the faintest layer of down — less than feathers, more like a thin, velvety sheen. A near-invisible plumage that did nothing to soften the raw exposure of their forms but only added to their alien strangeness.
Yu could not tell them apart. That, more than anything, set his nerves on edge.
Their faces were smooth, their features uniform yet far from bland. Their eyes, multifaceted and vertically slit, reflected the light with a peculiar metallic glint. Their mouths were lined with a narrow yet disturbingly wide, beak-like overgrowth, permanently curved into the suggestion of a grin. Beneath it, Yu glimpsed rows of needle-like teeth. When they spoke, their secondary jaw structures clicked and trilled, producing subtle sounds that did not quite register as speech. Yu felt them, resonating in his bones more than his ears.
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During introductions, the brothers had made themselves comfortable in the common room. Unlike Gurs and Tellin, who had exchanged brief greetings before returning to their posts, Deltington and Estingar lingered. They watched. They waited. Yu had noticed the way they had deferred to Bubs, only reaching for food once the mianid had given explicit permission. And when they finally ate, their jaws clicked between bites in what seemed to be a never-ending, rhythmic dialogue.
They spoke Teh when addressing him, but Yu was certain they communicated between themselves on an entirely different level. Not only through the faint pulses of their clicking sounds but through something deepern still: The bioluminescent patterns shifting beneath their dark blue skin were not random flickers; they were … yes, language. Their very bodies, even their wings, seemed alive with subtle light. It was mesmerising, like watching shallow rivers of bright blues flowing just under their skin. When they glanced at each other, these rivers shifted, pulses of light brightening and dimming in synchronised, silent conversation. Yu just knew they were talking. It was hard to explain. There was a strange duality to them, something that felt … whole. He was not sure whether he found it beautiful or profoundly alien.
-
In the end, Yu had only so much energy left to be creeped out. Despite the short bursts of excitement over the food and drinks, everyone was utterly spent, their bodies sagging under the exhaustion of the last month. The travelling party had arrived well past the witching hour. The last stretch of their journey had been a brutal one. The path had been particularly challenging, the storm and snow ruthless. Their had planned to reach the guild before T̰́̇ͦ̀è̸̷̸̬̤̗̊_̸̵̰̦̗̒͜ȟ̗̍ͤa̶͉͉͍̭̰̅̀̈͜ͅȓ̶̶̛̦͇͙̟̈̿͒ͮ͑̋̚͡u̟͖͔̖̙͙͆̄̿ͩͧ̃̽̓̈̌̀͟͞n rose, but the tempest had eventually become so fierce that they were forced to halt repeatedly, huddling together like animals, desperate for whatever scraps of shelter they could find. They had endured the whole witching hour standing in the most miserable of crevices. By the time they reached their destination, Yu had felt hollowed out, his limbs leaden, his mind scraped raw.
The warmth and food had given him a last, desperate surge of energy — but it was fleeting. No sooner had it revived him than it abandoned him again, leaving him even more drained than before. The others fared no better. All except Harrow, who seemed untouched by exhaustion, her presence nothing short of a mockery against the group’s collective fatigue.
All in all, no one lingered after the meal.
Half the party rummaged through their muddied packs, sorting belongings and passing heavy parcels of rations to Bubs, who in turn had Deltington and Estingar carry them into the kitchen. Meanwhile, Tirran gathered the rest at the reception desk to finalise room assignments.
Yu found himself among the group, standing like a specter at the back of the queue. He did not speak, bus his posture betrayed his impatience, his absolute need to be next. He had barely managed to stand after eating. If he sat down now — if he so much as leaned against the wall, he would not get up again. His body had turned to stone, his wings unbearable weights dragging him toward the floor. His skull felt packed with wool, his vision swam, and he could not stop yawning. He was about to collapse on the spot. Right where he stood.
But of course, Tellin served everyone else first. The process was efficient, precise, devoid of unnecessary conversation, but to Yu, it stretched into eternity. Each name called ahead of his chipped away at his patience, layering exhaustion with simmering aggravation. He stared at Tellin’s claws as they passed key after key, anticipation dull and maddening.
And then – because the universe never allowed him the luxury of just one singular source of misery – his stomach started to cramp. Hard, deep, twisting cramps. Yu inhaled sharply through his nostrils, beak clamped shut, every muscle locking down to keep his face neutral. The only silver lining was that the pain kept him from passing out where he stood.
Finally, finally, after the last key was handed over, Tirran turned to him. The omira’s yellow eyes flicked over Yu and over everyone and everything else. “Here’s your key.”
He held it out. Yu snatched it up with his wings, careful to avoid direct contact. His damp feathers pressed the delicate object in place, the cold bite of metal briefly grounding him.
“I’ll return outside now.” Tirran flicked an ear toward the far end of the common room. “Es will show you to your room.”
While Tirran still looked everywhere, Yu followed the motion. He glanced past Harrow and a few others already trudging toward the stairs. From there, his gaze landed on the two wiry guards emerging from the kitchen. The flickering light orbs silhouetted them, their elongated forms shifting with an unsettling fluidity, like shadows peeling away from the walls. Or maybe that was just his vision blurring. Yu blinked. Once. Twice. Repeatedly. Focus. It did not help.
“Sorry,” he muttered, voice rough with exhaustion. “Which one is he?”
Tirran paused mid-step, then exhaled through his nose. “The one with the silver streaks on his wings.”
Yu squinted. His patience, already frayed, strained further. He looked at the two figures again — identical trousers, identical wings, identical everything. Then back at Tirran, his expression deliberately blank. “It’s too late for jokes. Just tell me.”
Tirran’s ears twitched. “Look at the wings.” His left ear flicked toward the one brother exiting the kitchen. “There.”
Yu’s temper cracked. “Cut the shit. Don’t mock me.”
He had just spent fifteen minutes sitting next to them. Fifteen minutes staring, picking apart every detail, searching for any way to tell them apart. There was nothing. No difference then, and none now. He had only been able to address and distinguish them by name after they had introduced themselves. Now that they walked around, there was no way to tell them apart. They were indistinguishable.
Tirran frowned though still not fixating on Yu. “How do you mean?”
“How do — What?” Yu echoed, thrown off by the omira’s genuine confusion.
He had expected smugness. A flicker of amusement. Maybe even outright mockery — or some other self-indulging version of I got you there, new guy. Heck, he would have preferred outright hostility. Instead, there was only blank incomprehension.
What followed was five agonising minutes of disjointed explanations, exasperated clarifications, and increasingly unhelpful commentary from those still lingering in the common room. As it turned out, Deltington and Estingar were identical to Yu, but not to everyone else. Obviously not. Estingar, they insisted, bore streaks of silver along his wings. Deltington did not. He had silver streaks on his chest. Yu saw only blue. On both. Everywhere. Where others saw distinct markings, he saw nothing but an unbroken expanse of dark blue.
“You really cannot see it?” One of them – Estingar? Or was it Deltington? – leaned in, pushing his wing unsettlingly close to Yu’s face, grinning wide enough to bare the double-layered rows of needles that were his teeth. “Not at all?”
Yu took three steps back and promptly dropped his room key. Oh fuck me why not.
He had a crap of a time picking it up with his claw and, balancing on the other leg, passing it back to his wings. The simple act left his muscles trembling. The mountain cold sat deep. His limbs were just starting to unfreeze. His stomach was another matter entirely. What had begun as a dull, creeping discomfort had escalated into something far worse. His gut twisted, clenched, and roiled. He needed to get to his room. To a bathroom. Shit was about to go down. Literally.
“Guess you’ll just have to go by personality then, huh?” The other brother’s skin flickered with shifting hues of bright blue, amusement bleeding through his bioluminescence. “I’m the one with the good jokes. Should be easy to remember.”
“Yes, he’s a real joke,” the first one said, his skin showing equally bright colours.
The second one blinked at his brother expectantly. Then, after a deliberate pause, added, “-ster.” He let the syllable hang in the air before sighing. “Oh, what a deep bond we share, completing each other’s sentences and all.”
Yu did not laugh. He levelled a dead-eyed stare at the self-proclaimed comedian. “Which one are you, then?”
“Es!”
The other – Deltington – clapped a clawed hand against his brother’s shoulder. “All right, now take him and the others to their rooms, brother. I’ll relieve Gurs. About time that guy gets his rest, or he’ll be grumpy all morning.”
“Brother.”
“Yes, my brother?”
“It is already morning, my brother.”
“I am afraid so. That’s why I want to be outside, when Gurs is inside.”
Yu exhaled slowly, controlled, without unclenching the muscles around his stomach. He was too cold, too drained, and too done with this entire conversation. And very much with life as a whole.
-
By the time he staggered upstairs after Estingar, his stomach had gone from wreaking havoc to suicidal warfare. And then, just when Yu was convinced that he would be the next guy found poisoned on the balcony – finally, belatedly – realisation struck.
Yu had stuffed himself with Burs’ dough balls until he was as exhausted from eating as he was from travelling. In his relief and excitement, he had completely forgotten that he could not, for the life of him, digest the doughy food the tairan made. Which meant he probably should not have eaten any of the doughy stuff Bubs had made either. He had been starving, desperate, but now, as he crammed himself on the toilet, writhing in agony, he regretted every single bite.
He regretted coming to the guild. He regretted leaving the estate. He regretted ever arguing with Tria, all the times he fought her instead of just doing what she wanted. Because still, of course, it had to get WORSE.
Yu had not even put his ass down on the seat before the voices from downstairs started crawling into his head. Deltington and Gurs, changing shifts at the guild entrance.
Yu cursed his wretched “senses”. That godforsaken skill of exceptional hearing. He could hear things no one else could — eerie, otherworldly whispers that did not belong. And worse, he also caught voices that definitely existed and belonged to someone, but should not be possible to hear. Not from the distance he could. Not even the sharpest hunters could pick up the things he heard. Not through storms and stone walls, not across rooms, not up two whole damn flights of stairs.
But here he was, listening to every scrape of boots, every shift of weight in their voices. Deltington’s tone, thick with exhaustion, laced with something else he could not place. And Gurs, dripping with hostility. Every syllable, every growl, cutting through his skull with terrifying clarity, as if they were right next to him.
“He is not wizard,” Gurs snarled in his distorted form of Teh. “He is not fighter. He is not flyer. He is child. Runt.”
“No shit,” replied Deltington, the amusement in his voice underlined with resignation.
“What can he? He is not spotter. He sees not the colours. How see enemies in the snow? In the night?“
“I think he sees colours just fine.”
“No. He sees not the colours of you.”
“It's the silver. The conduits. The excess of Adhar here brings it out well.”
A pause.
“This is the magic?” asked Gurs.
“Well, if you put it like that ... No, that's too simplistic. But ... yeah, you know, why not leave it at that.”
“So he sees not the magic. He is not wizard.”
“Let the captain sort that out.”
Yu just sat. He sat frozen, hunched over, the cramps twisting his stomach into knots and forcing out tears. And as he sat and cried, Yu pushed the words down, with all the other shit of the day.
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