We weren’t done eating yet, but we got up anyway, ready to leave when something caught our eye. Amethyst had lit a fire. And she was roasting meat over it. all of us dropped our half-eaten rats in awe. She noticed us and got up, filled with a disappointed enthusiasm.
‘You guys are leaving already? I actually have something for you.’
Before we could even ask about the fire, she was leading us towards her room. Once there, she told us to wait as she entered her room and soon came out with filled arms. She threw me my buckler like a discus and I caught it with a hand.
‘I believe that is yours.’ She commented with a grin. Then she showed us the rest. ‘First of all, this spear for Bart. I figured a club wasn’t the best weapon, so I made this from the vine wood by fire hardening it. You’ll notice the point is pretty sharp.’ She handed Bart the sharp wooden stick, which he gingerly accepted. ‘I also made a leather neck guard for Brynn. See, it's like a necklace, but actually useful. And leather shoulder guards for Anite.’
She handed us the gear and we just stared at it for a second. The shoulder guards were hard caps connected to a sort of harness you connected to your arm, which was made with soft leather. I was the first to speak as Amethyst looked at us expectantly.
‘Amethyst, is this…’
‘Please, call me Ami.’
‘Ami, is this hardened leather?’ I asked, voice filled with disbelief.
‘Yeah, I kind of remembered how to make it. Or well, images popped up in my mind, really, but you know it looks like a memory, right. weird huh?’ She shrugged, probably meaning she’d had a vision.
‘Why didn’t you make some for Bart?’ I asked as I looked at the confused ratman wearing only shorts, a vest and a wooden spear.
‘Well I did. When I was hardening the spear using the fire I figured; Hey, can’t I do this with leather too? Because I knew there was like, leather armor, right? So, then I kind of remembered how you did that and I started working the leather and when I finished the shoulder and neck guards I thought to myself; Hmm, this looks kind of rough. It didn’t look so good, so I remade those, but then I didn’t have time for the rest of the armor, which is why it’s not finished. Then, because I had three things, I figured, why not give each one of you a thing. And then while working on the neck guard I thought, Brynn is a girl, right? So why not make it pretty like a necklace? And now it's fair to everybody!!!’
‘You made a good choice there, this is sexy.’ Brynn said gleefully, turning about her thingy.
‘You did all this in one day?’ I asked Amethyst.
‘Yeah, sure.’ She answered.
‘Aha.’ I handed Bart the buckler. ‘Thanks Ami, but could you outfit Bart with the other gear you finished? He needs it.’ The girl looked a bit confused, but then gave me a determined nod before going into her room. Or should I say “entering her workshop”.
Bart looked at me thankfully.
Brynn put on the tan leather neck guard. It was a bit slim to the extent it really looked more like a large accessory than a guard, but it would stop an unexpected blow from breaking her neck and it didn’t get in the way of her mobility, which meant it was coincidentally perfect for her. I’m sure she recognized this too, looking from her behavior. Or she just really liked pretty things. I wish I could remember if she was also a thief.
I sighed as Bart and I also put on our new brown leather gear, needing Amethyst to help us put it on correctly. Mine didn't cover so much, but they would protect me more than my bare shoulders would. And it actually looked… pretty good. How Amethyst knew to make this stuff so good and fast was a mystery to me, but she did good work. What might have been weirder were her own opinions on the subject. While Brynn's and my equipment looked more aesthetically pleasing than effective and felt like there had been a lot of work put into it, Bart’s looked like proper armor. It was bulky, thick and covered all the areas it should be covering. No orc was wounding his shoulders or neck any time soon. He even kept a decent amount of mobility despite the separate pieces that overlapped slightly. He almost looked like a real soldier, if it wasn’t for the pitiful look on his face. I suppose Amethyst was more of an artisan than a craftswoman. Strange how some people were just born prodigies and other people were just… Bart.
While Brynn got her spear, I gave Ami some directions on how the armor was supposed to look for all of us and after Brynn returned, we made our way into the Labyrinth again. Somehow, creating the entrance felt a bit easier, though it might be because Brynn was still too happy with her necklace to be sneering commands at me. Then again, Bart was shaking with nervous energy, which was distracting in its own right.
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The crawl this time started uneventful and was mostly devoid of action. The gray stone carried on for ages, the endless vines and moss making the landscape near indistinguishable. We didn’t really fight anything. Killed two big rats, or Brynn did. Poor thing didn’t know what hit it. Since that happened relatively close to the base, we brought back the bodies before continuing. I also killed a spider, which we ate on the road after showing Bart how to make it safe to eat. Maybe the most exciting part was a big bug that flew into Bart's face, causing a slur of curses that will go into the history books.
Not exciting at all. But then again, when you’re seeing the world for the first time, life tends to be very good at surprises. Second time around, gray is still gray, walls are still walls. We might not have seen any good combat that day, but we did find something wonderful. An underground lake. Brynn jumped around laughing, and Bart clearly couldn’t process what he was seeing as his jaw hung without tension. I smiled. We saw water. I’d forgotten what that looked like, or maybe I'd just never known. But I remembered now. We all did.
I remembered dirty children, laughing and sharing cups of muddy liquid, swimming about. The feeling filled me with a sense of warmth. I wondered what my friends had seen, if they’d seen anything. Brynn seemed fired up and Bart seemed confused, both didn’t seem so different from usual. Right now the sight in front of them had their full attention. And what a sight it was.
The lake was the biggest thing we had seen yet, the size of over a dozen rooms put together and the room that held it was even more immense, perhaps to us it was the closest thing to the outside, resembling a clear sky in the blue light shining from the big blue stones that hung from the tall ceiling. Several small entrances inside the sides of the long walls led a variety of labyrinth inhabitants to the crystal-like water. The blue lights made the water appear radiant, like a gem, and a small part of me asked if this sight made it worth it. If Brynn could kill for this sight and if Bart would live for it.
‘Come on, Anite!’ Brynn yelled in my face, grinning from cheek to cheek, waking me from my thoughts. She turned around and I followed her as she strode towards the big body of water. Bart hesitated, probably afraid of something hiding in the water, not having spotted the various animals all around the lake that were leisurely sipping from the clear liquid.
He only joined us after Brynn and I took our first drink of water. The water felt cold on my teeth and tongue as it seeped through my throat. It was so cold that I could feel it going through my chest and entering my stomach, but so fresh. Mother's lukewarm blood didn’t compare to this. After I drank, I stared at the ripples I’d created on the still surface and a shimmer of blue caught my eye. So vague, so ungraspable as it moved with the ripples, clearing them away, leaving the surface still. Like a mirror.
And I looked into it.
And it looked back.
In the water floated a big rat, with creamy grey fur and sad blue eyes. That was the first time I’d seen me. I knew I was a rat. I could see the fur on my claws. I could feel my tail as it balanced me while I walked. But I’d never seen my face. I wasn’t human. with a touch of my hand the image disappeared, carried away by the ripples as I stood up. The strange feeling had returned to my throat and eyes. To my left, I could see Brynn with a look on her face I recognized. I’d seen it in the water. To my right Bart stood unchanged. A content smile on his face.
---
At the end of the day we made it back without a wounded Bart, and asked Amethyst to construct something like baskets to carry water back home so we could gather it the next day, which in turn made her remember what water was, which almost made her forget to show Bart the rest of his armor she finished. Some hardened segments attached to each other by leather bands which would protect his upper body.
Now we didn’t have to be bothered by Bart’s unprotected back anymore. It was impressive how the girl could tell the estimated sizes without measuring them. She was already working on a pair of pants to go with it. she really seemed to be getting into it, determined to make the most effective armor, thanks to my directions. In the meantime she’d completed a simple leather jacket for herself, complete with buttons and pockets, sewn together with black hairs from our giant benefactor. It looked pretty damn cool.
Then we went to Clementine to report. This time with Bart, now fully donning his gear. Which made the steward frown slightly as she took in the sight of a confident Bart. We met the secratary in the green room. She also reported to us what had happened in our absence. Apparently, there was now a toilet in the main halls, which was basically another room with a small hole that led to another bigger space underground, and a storage room that only connected to the green room. Mother was being kept there now. The big guy’s room was also secluded now, having only the pathway coming from the green room as entrance to it. Unless he or me wanted a shortcut of course. There was also a third new room, solely for the strange ratguy, who was apparently called Belial. Clemy couldn’t tell us why he got a second room, but neither did she appear to second guess her King.
After that, she went to talk with the big guy and we lounged around a bit after dropping off our stuff at our rooms. Not much later Ami appeared and showed us how to make fire using the vines and some string made of mother hair so we could roast our own meat. Tess and Belial didn’t make an appearance, but it was peaceful, fun really. Within the green stone a vortex of souls whirled violently to get free. It caught my attention, but for a second. We told Ami stories about Bart's bravery when faced with the orcs, and she told us some weird things she accidentally found out she could do. Even Brynn seemed to be in a good mood and was being nice to everyone, seemingly letting her guard down, just joking around and laughing with the three of us.