The blush that overcame me in that moment was all-encompassing, not just from what Jax and I had been doing, and believe me, that was enough. But to actually be caught in the act? I mean… you hear stories, but… You never think it will happen to you. I was just fortunate that Hess was into it. And did not have a camera.
Hess just stared at me for a while with her legs folded atop one another, idly kicking the air from her perch on the tombstone. Finally losing patience, she taunted, “Not going to say anything?”
“S-say?” I swallowed, desperately trying to regain my shattered composure.
“Of course!” she said, seemingly frustrated. “Now would be the perfect time for a one-liner. Something like… oh, I don’t know…” she tapped her lower lip, “’Did you like that?’ is a classic. Or maybe, if you’re feeling bold, you could go with, ‘Why don’t you come clean this up for me?’.”
I was taken aback. She was expecting me to keep up with the flirting routine? Now? “Uh… Do you want to clean me up?” I said. Might as well go for broke, right?
Hess just sighed and chuckled to herself, “Oh, ‘stits. You are a treasure. A frustrating, frustrating treasure.” Then, she leaned forward and put her chin in her hand. Cocking an eyebrow, she gave me a smoldering look, “Depends. Do you think you can get it back up?”
My member twitched. “Maybe,” I admitted. I was pretty sure she was messing with me at that point, but my lower half certainly did not care.
“Maybe, huh? Well, I might could work with that,” she teased. But before I could think of anything clever to come back with, she heaved a sigh and leaned back, “What brought all of that on, anyway? I mean, I know Jax had been making eyes at you, but I hadn’t gotten the impression that you were into that kind of thing. Was I wrong?”
“What? No, I’m not…” I paused, the rest of what she had just said sinking in, “Wait, what? What do you mean about Jax?” Furtively, I looked back at the man’s unconscious form. He was totally gone. Out cold. In fact, if had not known better, I would say he might have even been dead.
“You hadn’t noticed?” she asked, surprised, but then she took on a speculative look, “Mmm… no, I suppose you wouldn’t have. He was being careful not to let you. Just like…” she paused as if she had just thought of something absurd and dismissed it.
“Jax and I are just friends,” I insisted, too caught up in my own world of denial to really take notice. True, that friendship might have just tread upon shaky ground a moment ago, but we had been affected by outside influences. I was not sure if that excuse was going to fly, but I was sticking to it!
Hess smirked at me, “Surely you could see how defensive he was being? Especially with me?”
I shrugged, “He’s always like that.”
But Hess shook her head, “Not with you he isn’t.”
“Yes he…” I started to disagree, but I paused. He really had not been. Not recently. “Well… he used to be. He just takes time to warm up to people. And besides, I don’t see what being defensive has to do with anything.”
She rolled her eyes and sighed, apparently deciding to let it go for the time being. “Anyway, you haven’t answered my question. What happened? You’re clearly not happy about it.”
I shifted uncomfortably. A moment ago, I would have tried to avoid this like the plague, but after that last topic it was like a breath of fresh air. “We just figured that while you were asleep, we’d get to the Layer Cap is all,” I said, running my fingers through my hair. The rest of the explanation came haltingly. There was a lot about this particular incident that I did not understand. A lot.
“…and then… I don’t know. It was like we broke down and had to find some way to…” I paused, grasping at nothing, “connect, somehow?”
“Fascinating,” she said, staring at me raptly. Through my explanation, Hess had slowly become more and more agitated, rolling her hips and licking her lips in a sensuous display. Truthfully, I had had a hard time keeping on track and not just trailing off to stare at her. Finally, after a moment of silence, she seemed to come to a decision and announced, “I want to try it!”
“Uh…” I said unintelligently. I still had too much sex on the brain for this conversation. Giving my head a quick shake to clear it, I said, “I think it’s part of the binding.”
“Yes, I assumed.” Tilting her head to the side, she asked, “Did you ever ask about opening up another place?”
I stared at her, lost, “Pardon?”
“For me,” she elaborated, but I was still not following.
Slowly, I repeated, “A place for you?” But then it clicked, “You mean a slot? For another lilim?”
She nodded as if she was not sure whether I was being intensionally dense. As if I needed the practice.
“But I thought that you were worried about… what was it? Messing up your Core?” I asked, still a bit in the woods.
“Core disruption,” she corrected with a tilted smile. Sliding her eyes over to Jax’s unconscious form, she bit at her lower lip lightly, “Let’s say that you have been… persuasive.”
You have influenced entity [Keltha: Hess of the Sherr] to become your bonded Lilim.
You do not possess additional Lilim Slots at this time.
Binding process cannot proceed.
Warning: Influence level may wane after prolonged separation from entity.
Momentarily taken off-guard, I took a few seconds to scan the pop-up. It was only four lines, but there was a lot to digest. As usual.
Influence level, huh? She had mentioned this before, but in this new context, there were some implications which had me suspicious. Was I somehow causing her to unconsciously want to bind to me somehow? Maybe with my aura? I had not been seeing any visible effects from it… but then I paused, and glanced back up at Hess. She was still staring at Jax and absently rubbing her thighs together. I was not even sure she realized she was doing it. But was that because of the aura or just Hess being Hess? I had no idea. The only time I could say for sure that I had affected her had been the healing incident, and she had certainly accepted the secondary effects then with gusto.
On the other hand, she had been asking about the possibility of being bound even before I could have had a chance to affect her. So that didn’t quite track. Unless, of course, Hess was just really easy. And that I could believe.
Curiously, I moved to touch ‘influence level’ on the panel, but I hesitated. Bline had a tendency to be a little standoffish when it came to answering questions. I needed to prioritize. So, instead, I touched Lilim Slots, wanting that info first. I just hoped that She was feeling generous.
Additional Lilim Slots may be purchased at a cost of three Skill Points.
You obtain one additional Slot per Boundary Layer automatically.
I winced. Three points!? I was only in the Third Layer now. Still, it was nice to see that I would get one eventually… whatever this Boundary Layer thing was. I had so many questions. But I still wanted to know how influence was supposed to work, and true to form, Bline decided that She was one and done. Great.
Glancing up, I saw that Hess was waiting on me patiently, apparently having calmed down again. Visibly anyway. “Well?” she asked as we made eye contact.
I was not really sure how much of what I had read would be wise to divest. I mean, it was one thing for a person to be willing to allow me to bind them. It was quite another if there was any implication that that might not entirely have been their own idea. Ethically, I probably should tell her. On the other hand, there might be certain… consequences to that.
Let’s at least start with what she actually wanted to know. Clearing my throat, I filled her in on the slot situation, adding, “What even is a Boundary Layer, anyway?”
“Never heard of those?” she asked curiously. “I had thought that to be common knowledge, even amongst the poorest folk.”
“I guess my tutor never got around to it,” I said, never mind that my ‘tutor’ was an ex-bandit of ill means. It occurred to me that I might be better off just letting the whole disgraced noble scion thing go… but then she probably would not believe the truth. After all, I was an alien from a different planet. Although, I was not altogether sure about that last part. Different dimension, maybe? Either way, it would be difficult to convince someone from Earth of that one, and we at least had that concept within our cultural mythos. On Vrekfren? Were they even aware that other planets existed? I had no clue.
As all of that went through my mind, Hess studied my expression. I do not know what she found there, but she seemed satisfied enough not to question me further. “The Boundary separates the Strata. Every ten Layers. A lot of things can happen then depending on your class, so I couldn’t really say what it will mean for you. Sometimes there are choices to be made. Sometimes your class name will change. Become more specialized. I have heard that once your layers become thick and dense, you may even have to undergo a trial. For most, though, it is quite an achievement. Boundary parties can get pretty wild, let me tell you.” She smiled faintly in remembrance but she did not elaborate.
I blinked. For this woman to describe a party as ‘wild’… “Um… you mentioned Strata before, I think. That you were in the second one, right?”
She nodded, “That’s right. Half of the way through.”
“So does that mean I’m in the first one, then?” I asked.
“No, little man,” she said bemusedly, “You’re still in the Foundation Layers. The first Stratum is after the first Boundary. Few walk much beyond that milestone.” She turned her hand over and gestured for emphasis, “Hence the party.”
I nodded slowly. That would put her at something like… Layer twenty five? And she was willing to potentially sacrifice that? I was having a hard time wrapping my head around it. Even if I was influencing her somehow, that seemed like a hard sell. There had to be more to it than just the potential for a fun time. I did not want to ask her directly, though, so I continued my questioning, “The Foundation Layers, huh? That sounds kind of significant.”
She looked away for a moment and sighed, “Everything starts from the beginning. That’s what my…” She stopped. Grimacing, she tried again, “Look, I’ve been open about the fact that my class is… a bit of a lavatory pit.”
I blinked at the metaphor, but trying to be diplomatic, I said, “You seem pretty powerful to me?”
She snorted, “Yes, to you. Most of what you’ve seen has been fueled by my attributes alone.” She looked up at the sky for a moment, before continuing, “To my peers, I’m a joke. A cautionary tale. Queen’s Horns, I haven’t been sober this long since I was a teenager!”
I did not know what to say. I had not seen this side of Hess before. Like she was shedding a mask. “It’s… been a day and a half.”
“Exactly! It’s a wonder I haven’t gotten the shakes already. That poison resistance I picked up last Layer is really saving my tush right now.” She had started getting agitated, rocking and rubbing at her knees. Closing her eyes for a moment, she tried to settle herself.
“Your class doesn’t protect you from that sort of thing?” I asked, surprised.
“No. Not inherently. I’ve picked up a few things here and there that help, but when you’re drunk all the time… I’ve told you. You don’t make good decisions.” She took a breath, before looking at me again, “Anyway, for the last year or so, I’ve been slumming it in the south. Going from one odd job to the next.”
“I thought you were part of that organization? The Athenaeum?” I asked, settling into the grass in front of her.
She nodded, “I was, yes. For a while. There was an… incident. I’d rather not talk about it.”
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“Okay,” I said, shortly. I took a breath, needing time to think.
This… this was a lot. If I was getting this right, Hess had been lying to us this whole time. Maybe not about everything, but at the very least, she had been intentionally casting herself into a grander light. Poorly, but still… On the other hand, was I not doing much the same? Admittedly, I had not actually said that I was a noble, but I certainly was not bothering to dissuade anyone, either. And this bit about getting fired?
The question, though, was why had she done it? Why bother building yourself up for a couple of low Layered newbies? Just for the ego trip? If so, then why drop the facade now?
“Anyway,” she said after I did not continue, “That’s why I’m so interested in this binding of yours. If I could start over again… and as one of these lilim? With two tempered attributes? That… It would mean a lot.”
I inhaled deeply in thought, the pieces clicking together. So that was it. I could tell that Hess had been agitated ever since she had caught… Well, anyway, there was something wrong. There had been a certain resignation to the usual flirting that had not been there before. I had thought that maybe it was some kind of sexual frustration… like I was doing something wrong. Maybe even sadness. And maybe it was, but that was just so out of character for her. Clearly there was more at stake here than I had realized.
Hess was looking to me as a way of restarting her life. And given what she had just said, I could understand where she was coming from. The problem though, was that I needed to find out whether she actually wanted that, or if this influence of mine only made her think she did. But how was I supposed to figure that out? I needed a way forward. And it needed to be a way that would not haunt me for the rest of my life.
“Alright,” I said, finally. The only moral path that I could see was to at least be as honest as possible, “since we’re coming clean, I think you need to know that there might be something about my class that is affecting your decision making. With this, anyway.”
She snorted, “I doubt that. You’re only of the Third Layer. And you said yourself that none of your attributes were over ten. What do you think you can do to me?”
“Well…” I ducked my chin self-consciously. “I think that I’ve also been pretty open about the fact that I don’t know anything. But, Bline did say that I had influenced you to bind to me just a moment ago.”
“Did She now?” she said, rocking back. But then she narrowed her eyes, “You aren’t just fishing for some way to reject me now, are you? You said you would bind me if I asked!”
I considered denying that our of hand, but there was some truth to it. I was not at all sure that I really wanted this woman to bind to me. After all, she had just admitted to being a bit of a world-class fuck up, to say nothing of the fact that she was an incorrigible flirt, a drunk, and who knew what else. She might even have enemies that she had not told me about. Given her history, I would not doubt that in the slightest. If I were smart, I probably should reject her. Then again, she had saved my life on more than one occasion. And for all of her faults, she was beginning to grow on me. Weirdly, that was becoming a bit of a trend.
When I finally came out of my reverie and looked up, it was to a Sherr Hess that was on the verge of a breakdown. Her eyes were on the cusp of overflowing, and she appeared to be having trouble breathing normally. Hastily, my hands shot up into the air, and I exclaimed, “No! No, I’m not trying to reject you.” Apparently, I had been thinking that one over a tad too long. Scales of the Maiden, I certainly did not want to be party to Hess having some sort of emotional collapse. “Just… I just want to make sure that you won’t regret this, is all. And I’m worried that I may end up doing something wrong. I think I may be doing something wrong. Jax… The Jax that I knew would never… At least, I think he wouldn’t have. He used to have these big arguments with the Lady. He’d never really give me the details, but I know that it had something to do with…” I hesitated, “well, physical intimacy.”
“With you?” she asked, wiping at her eyes. My hurried assurances and the change in subject seemed to be helping.
I nodded, looking down.
“And what makes you think you had anything to do with that? That would make you feel so guilty?” she asked, seriously.
“I don’t know,” I said, and I truly did not. Not of a certainty. “A lot of little things. Like… I gave Jax his name. Bline made me. He doesn’t even remember his old one. Plus… well, here’s another thing you should know. I can command Jax to do things. Any kind of explicit thing I tell him to do, he feels as a compulsion. I try not to, but usually I don’t even know I’m doing it. He told me about it before. Used to be really prickly about it. Now, though?” I shook my head. “I don’t even know if he realizes it when it happens, anymore. He hasn’t told me to go stuff my head in a while now.”
“Yes, I figured there would be something like that at play,” she said, somewhat bemused. “You wouldn’t be much of a trainer if you could not exert some control over those you bound to you.”
I doodled a bit in the dirt for a moment before replying, “And that doesn’t scare you away? You aren’t afraid that you’d become… not yourself anymore?”
“Maybe,” she admitted. But then, more quietly, she muttered, “And maybe a little bit of ‘not myself’ would do me good.” There was a moment of reflection on both of our parts after that, but before too much time had gone by, she said more loudly, “On the other hand, all you’ve said so far is that you and your man have become closer over time. Isn’t that a totally normal thing to have happen?”
I looked at Hess unbelievingly, “Hess, you just watched Jax suck on my dick like he was starving to death. Through my pants!” I pulled at the rapidly stiffening spot on my leggings to emphasize the point. “That is not normal.”
“Not for you, maybe,” she said, looking to the side. “I thought it was pretty hot.”
“Hess!” I exclaimed, blushing furiously.
“Yes?” she asked, aloofly. “This surprises you?”
Actually, not in the slightest. Still, some decorum would be nice. “Alright, fine. If all of that doesn’t dissuade you, then the agreement stands. Although, you may be assuming a few things about starting over. I don’t have any idea what will happen when this goes down.”
“If that’s the case, the so be it,” she shrugged. “I won’t be any worse off.”
“That’s debatable,” I said, still not convinced. “In any case, the point is still moot for now. I don’t have the slot to do it, and there’s no way I’m spending three skill points.”
“So you’re saying I have to get you to the Boundary, then?” she said, her eyes taking on a slight gleam. “Deal.”
“Is he alright?” I asked, looking down at Jax. He was as still as a corpse. Nervously, I bent down and held a finger under his nose, but there was a faint breeze there. He was breathing. But only just.
“He’s fine,” Hess assured me, getting to her feet. After we had come to an agreement, the conversation had moved to more trivial matters. But before long, we had agreed that we had sat around for long enough. Daylight was burning. “He’s just in Torpor from his Core condensing. He should come out of it in four to six hours.”
“Torpor?” I looked up at her. “Was I like this, too?”
“Obviously,” she said, all but calling me a dullard with her expression.
I frowned, but I stopped short at getting angry. I knew that sleep was a part of the process, of course, and from my own experience, it had always felt more deep than normal. Apparently, there was more to it than I realized, but from Hess’ response, it was nothing to get worked up over. Not that that stopped me. For some foreign power to come over me and make invisible changes while I was unconscious? It was like being put down for surgery. Weirdly, it was only seeing it from the outside like this that was bothering me. I had never really thought about it before. I sighed. In the end, whatever this was only seemed to be making me better. So, with that in mind, I tried not to worry about it.
Curiously, I examined Jax more closely. He had undergone noticeable changes every Layer thus far, and if he was in the process of doing so again, then it was possible that I might be able to see it in action. There was no such luck, though. He had only been out for fifteen to twenty minutes, so far, and I could not see any differences. At least, I did not see any of his flesh crawling around. Thankfully. That would have been creepy. If anything was happening, it was too slow to follow with the naked eye.
“What do we do now?” I asked finally, still staring at Jax. “There’s plenty of daylight left.”
“Go back into the tunnel, I guess,” she replied, unconcerned.
“What?” my gaze jerked up to her, “But he’s unconscious!”
“What difference does that make?” she asked frankly. “He said himself that he can barely scratch the plant monster. Besides, we were going to scout out the other path first.”
Okay, that was true. Still… it seemed wrong to just leave him here. For a lot of reasons. Casting about, I searched for an excuse to delay further, when I hit upon the obvious, “Torches! We don’t have a fire to make torches!”
Hess did not reply immediately. Slowly, she pursed her lips and nodded, “You have a point there. Okay, then. I guess we need a fire first.” Turning around, she walked back to her tree and laid back down. “Wake me up when you’re done.”
“When I’m done?!” I asked incredulously. “But I don’t know how to make a fire!”
She sighed, exasperatedly addressing the sky, “Surely, he showed you how?”
“Well… yes?” I said hesitatingly. He had not actually explained anything. But I had watched.
“Alright then.” And that was that. She just yawned, closed her eyes, and before I knew it, she was again snoring softly.
Amazed and more than a little miffed, I put my hands to my hips. “Son of a bitch,” I muttered under my breath.
I was half tempted to go kick her back awake, but… we had sort of interrupted her last attempt at sleep, and she could certainly use some. Still, she could have been less entitled about it. Sullenly, I crossed my arms and kicked at a rock. Woman wants to be my lilim and she treats me like this? Ha! Got her agreement and now she can do anything she wants? I would have to break her of that little trait. Immediately, I felt guilty at the thought. Twisting my mouth a bit, I waggled my head back and forth a few times. I would just have to be polite about it. There was nothing wrong with that.
Heaving a sigh, I walked over to where the last fire had been. If I were lucky, there would be a few embers left for me to work with. That would make my job much easier. Actually… it might even push it into the realm of possible. Honestly, expecting a modern man to make a fire with his bare hands? She might as well have asked me to construct a rotary phone out of a bubbling tar pit.
Squatting down, I examined the site, but it was stone cold. My head sank into my hands, and I sighed. If she had asked me to do this while it was still hot back when we had emerged from the stairs, this might have been doable, but that had been hours ago. Now? I shook my head and stood up.
Slowly, I started going over what I knew about the process. I had seen this done both on the Internet and in person, so I knew the theory. I just needed to let go of my lack of confidence and move forward. Holding out my fingers, I started checking off what I would need. First, there would have to be a ready pile of dry wood. Cocking an eyebrow, I glanced over at the mound that represented my earlier labor.
Check.
Jax had shown me how to make a tinder bundle several times. Plus, there was plenty of dry grass around to use, so I was good there.
Check.
I needed a good straight stick and a notched piece of wood to spindle it against. I paused there. Jax had always made his own when he needed one, and he usually needed to use his axe to modify it. I did not have access to that, though. Befuddled, I started casting about. If I could just find the last one that he had made, then I should be good…
Two hours later, I sat staring at a little fire. It was beautiful.
With a trembling hand, I wiped the tears from my eyes. I had never accomplished something more difficult in my entire life. In the last hours, I had run through nearly every emotion known to man, from glee to insanity. But I had done it.
It had taken me fully an hour before I had even managed to make my first ember from spindling that fucking stick. My hands were rubbed so raw, by that point, that I could feel the blisters starting to form. I had had to burn a low level heal just to keep going. When I finally saw that telltale bit of smoke trailing up into my eyes, I had nearly shouted in joy. Of course, the bastard went out before I even thought about trying to transfer it to my tinder.
That process had been its own minor epic. It turned out that encouraging fire out of a tiny spark was a delicate art. I had genuinely wept, and I do mean full-on, ugly crying, when my fifth ember slowly died in my hands. And when I finally succeeded, and flames burst to life in my hands, I was so surprised, I panicked and threw it away. By the time I realized my mistake, it was already too late.
But I had done it. In the end, I had made fire. I could have danced.
“There now,” Hess said, stretching languidly as she walked up. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
I honestly could have slugged her. But then she ruffled my hair and bumped me with her naked hip, and somehow it was all okay.
“This really isn’t necessary,” Hess said from below, a fresh torch in hand.
“I said I’m not leaving him up there,” I argued for the third time. I was dragging Jax down the stairs backwards by his armpits. And believe me, that is easier said than done. Going down stairs backwards is hard enough without dragging a body. Plus, Jax was heavy. I could scarcely believe it when I heaved him into my arms. All those points in Strength meant that Jax was packing on some muscle. Although the man certainly did not look all that strong. In fact, he felt kind of soft under my hands. “Who knows what might wander up while we’re down here?”
“It’s not like he can die,” she argued, unhelpfully. She just stood there, impatiently watching me struggle.
Damnable woman. She could have done this while jump-roping. “His Core is still condensing. I don’t know what would happen if he were to die in the middle of it.”
She just shrugged, the movement causing her torch to spit, “At worst, he would lose the Layer, right?”
Finally reaching the bottom of the stairs, I let Jax collapse to the ground. “By the Three…” I muttered, stretching out my aching back. Turning toward her, I frowned unhappily, “How would you know that?”
“I’m just guessing,” she admitted. “Honestly, I’ve never heard heard of a trainer class whose minions were immortal. Not that persisted, anyway.”
“Really?” I asked. Now my curiosity was peaked. “That seems odd. How would they even get out of the Foundation Layers if they have to replace their companion all the time? I only got Jax through sheer luck.”
“With help, of course. Plus, the ones that I’ve seen aren’t limited to the one slot like you are,” she explained. “And they usually use animals or monsters. Binding kind like you do is pretty rare.”
“It doesn’t have to be a person, you know,” I said, a little defensively. “The spell just says ‘entity’.”
“That you are given the option at all is what is odd,” she said, a little bemused. “Now come on. I’d like to see this other branch.”
Heaving a perhaps overdramatic sigh, I flounced over to grab up Jax again, and started slowly dragging him along, all while casting suffering looks at Hess.
She walked ahead a few paces, trying to ignore me, before turning around and staring. Finally, her desire to get moving won out over her patience, “’Snails… here, give over.” She tossed me her club to carry, and then reaching down, she grabbed one of Jax’s ankles. Slinging him over her shoulder, she started away down the corridor. Jax just dangled upside down behind her by his foot like a sack of potatoes.
Internally, I winced as he flopped along, less than overjoyed at his treatment. But I was not complaining, either.
As we walked, I found myself looking Jax over again. The light source made it all but impossible to make out his features, as they were currently cast in deep shadows, but I could tell that his hair was growing again from how it dangled. It might be three or four inches long now, which was not really all that much, but the man had been bald when I had met him. Plus, four inches of uniform growth does not make for a particularly pleasing hairstyle. We would need to find the man a barber. Amongst other things. We all needed some tender love and care.
Jax took a bit of a hard bounce from hitting Hess’ backside and something fell to the ground. Immediately snatching it up, I found that it was Jax’s shirt. He had tucked it into his pants a while back, but it must have been jostled loose. Curiously, I held it up to myself to check for the fit, but Jax’s frame was a lot smaller than my own. I sighed. It would have been nice to have a shirt again. Tucking it into my own pants to keep for him, I put it from my mind.