The next morning, Ferra somewhat sheepishly crept back to his own room, to freshen up and get ready for the day before the others woke. Mel had murmured a half awake goodbye as he left, snuggling deeper into the numerous blankets. The sight had his heart fluttering, though with nerves or anticipation, the young man couldn’t say. Probably something they should talk about, soon.
“Have a fun evening?”
The cleric was in the middle of getting ready to shower when the voice spoke. He yelped, almost falling over as his foot snagged on something unseen. After a moment of fumbling he poked his head through the right hole. Naturally it was Nine, standing on his bed like the man weighed nothing, and giving that impassive green stare. “Ah, hells! You startled me! And yes, I would say it was rather… fun.” He blushed a bit as memories of the night prior floated up to the surface, unbidden.
“Good. The ring worked as intended. I see no problems continuing like this.”
“Ah, excel-” Ferra blinked, and the man was gone. With a sigh he continued his morning routine, interrupted by a knock on the door while he was lacing his boots. “In a moment!”
Ready for the day, he opened the door to see Mel waiting outside with a grin on her face. He waved, she rolled her eyes and grabbed him by the hand before dragging the cleric down for breakfast. “You’re such a goof.”
The cleric’s attempts to, ah, hide the evidence, seemed to be entirely in vain. When he followed Mel down the stairs to the common area, the first words to greet the pair were Grek slapping himself in the face and cursing as they came into view.
“Damn!”
Mirana smirked, holding out a hand as Grek dug through his pockets for coin. “This will teach you to never doubt a woman’s intuition in matters of love. Hand it over.”
The orc eyed her suspiciously as he transferred a number of marks to the waiting palm. “Did you cheat with your cheaty fae magic?”
She waggled her eyebrows mysteriously, narrowly holding back a laugh as she pocketed them. “A witch never tells…”
Grek subsided into discontented muttering as the two approached the table. Ferra sat down with a groan, resisting the urge to hide. “You guys had a betting pool?”
Avalanche let out a rumbling laugh, as Grek gave a toothy smile. “Of course! You couldn’t have waited another week, though? I had good money riding on it!”
The urge to disappear grew, though asking Mirana to make him invisible would have only been adding fuel to the fire. He rested a hand on Grek’s meaty forearm, the man’s shoulder being out of reach. “I’ll uhh, keep that in mind next time, yeah?”
Mel smirked. “Next time?”
Ferra let out a long, full throated groan. “Not you too!”
Avalanche rumbled with amusement once more. “It is only expected, the man is young and full of energy after all.”
The talk subsided somewhat as they ordered meals and dug in. Before too long, talk turned to plans for the day. Grek turned to Ferra, after wiping his mouth with a napkin. “So, Ferra. I know what the rest of the team has planned, but not you. Do you have anything in particular on your list for today?”
The destitute man shrugged. “I’ve already spent almost all of my money from the previous contract, for, uh, reasons. I’d just intended to practice my magic and wander the island, really. I’ve heard there’s some pretty neat sights in places.”
Grek eyed the man for a moment, not commenting on his apparent spendthrift. “Well, you might like to know that I’ve located a tutor for you, someone who can perform the velocity trick.”
Ferra nodded amiably. “That does sound like a better use of my time, yeah. Who is it?”
The orc took a big gulp from his flagon of orange juice. “Retired adventurer. Goes by the name Clawed Claus.”
Ferra raised an eyebrow. “Clawed Claus?”
Grek shrugged. “Apparently the man lost a hand in his youth, and the gemma he was on a team with helped replace his hand with an aether construct early on in his career. Supposedly it even synergizes with his magic, he can feed divine into the claws to pull off a fairly decent aethermancer imitation.”
“Huh.”
“Indeed. In any case, he’s agreed to teach you, or at least try; there’s no guarantee you’ll pull it off. Do note there’s no real time limit for this, we’re unlikely to be called for an emergency in the next couple weeks.”
Ferra finished his eggs, dabbing at his lips with a cloth. “Did he have a specific time in mind?”
Grek winced. “Well, he’s- he’ll be easy to find, by all accounts he’s always sitting at the bar in the Laughing Jester.”
“Ah. Promising.” The cleric sipped his drink. “Well I suppose I’ll give him a visit later today, though ‘he’ll be at the bar at noon’ isn’t the most promising introduction to someone’s character that I’ve ever witnessed.”
Grek could only nod in agreement. It was true enough, after all. “In any case, Avalanche and I will be at the library, looking into several points of research. Mirana wants to speak to some of her contacts, and druid friends. Mel…” he trailed off.
Mel paused mid bite, tilting her head thoughtfully. Then she finished the morsel, sending a hesitant smile toward Ferra. “He mentioned touring the island, well, I think I’d like to take the opportunity to show him around. It’s basically our second home at this point, after all.” She turned to Ferra. “If you’ll have me, that is?”
He hardly even had to think before agreeing. “Of course! Having someone who knows their way around along for the ride would be much better than just wandering aimlessly.”
Thankfully, the rest of the table didn’t make anything of it, Grek simply filing the information away into whatever mental space he used for planning everything out. “Excellent, that sounds like a plan then.”
Before too long he was saying farewell to the team, and Ferra and Mel were wandering past the edge of town, heading down the magically smooth cobbled roads at a decent pace. At some point Mel linked their hands together, causing a blush that he couldn’t entirely suppress.
Urban faded to rural quickly, the rapid growth of the town belied by its lack of subjugation of the neighboring land. Empty fields, farmed or otherwise, quickly turned to curated forest as their feet carried them to wherever Mel was dragging him by the hand. At the thought he turned to her with a smile, and saw her giving a small content smile back.
Ferra worried that this giddiness he felt was that young love he’d heard and read of, a roaring fire that burned out too soon leaving only ash. He watched bemusedly as someone rode past them on a cow sized sheep with too-smart eyes, speaking only when the road before them was empty of people. “So, uhh-”
Mel tilted her head inquisitively as he stumbled over his words, waiting patiently with only the slightest flicker of amusement flashing across her face.
“I-” Ferra started, then stopped, taking several deep breaths to center himself. “What are we, Mel? Cus I like you, you’re smart and witty and confident and thrive off of socializing in all the ways I don’t. You’re gorgeous and wonderful and fun to be around but I don’t think I could handle this just being a fling and I don’t want it to ruin the group when I inevitably mess it up, and-”
She reached a finger up to his lips to silence him. “Shh, Ferra, it’s ok.” The sorcerer’s voice was calm and measured. Mel stepped to the side of the road in front of him, grabbing his free hand while meeting his gaze completely. “Surely you know me well enough to know I wouldn’t just treat you like a toy, I’m not just gonna have my fun and discard you. You’re younger than me by a bit, and considerably less experienced, I can tell. I don’t know what life was like for you-” she hesitated, biting her lip. “-back home, but you’re not a one night adventure for me. I’m here for you, Ferra. The team too, of course, though not quite in the same way, and they don’t quite know the extent of your problems just yet.”
Mel reached up, giving him a quick peck on the cheek before pulling back with a grin. “Now,” she stepped back, releasing one of his hands and beginning to lead him down the road again with a skip in her step. “Let’s not dwell too long on heavy matters for now, yeah? There’s not too much to see on this island, but there’s a particularly interesting horizontal waterfall half a mile ahead.”
Ferra followed, thoughts whirling in his skull. “Y-yeah, that sounds great!”
They walked in silence for a time, Ferra thinking on what she’d said as the trees thickened and signs of habitation faded. Inexperienced was right; His childhood had consisted of finding various ways to feed him and his mother, paired with late night reading in the public portion of the royal library, and experimenting with the divine in secret. Then his father had acknowledged him after coming of age, and overnight he’d been catapulted from worrying about food to learning all the court intrigue and rules and traditions in a three month crash course, training with his innate magic and other matters that a royal needed to be educated in. Then after all of that, he’d been kicked out, given money and told to leave. Seven months on non stop traveling, before his arrival at Joseph’s Haven.
There hadn’t been time to get into a relationship with anyone, he’d been slowly pulling him and Mother out of poverty until suddenly Emperor Grier swooped in and upended everything Fezzik had known. The knowledge that she was at least obliquely aware of this and okay with it was reassuring, though also somewhat embarrassing. Surely he wasn’t that bad with socializing?
Not long after they came upon a stream running parallel to the now dirt path, and shortly after that they stumbled onto a break in the trees, a fence, and a number of rather strident warnings. ‘Climb fence at own risk,’ ‘magical anomaly ahead,’ ‘Joseph’s Haven rejects any and all claimed, implied, or other liabilities for damage incurred when interacting with naturally occurring magical phenomena,’ and similar messages hung from wooden boards attached to posts.
Given the relative apparent severity of the warnings, it seemed odd that this particular peculiarity lacked even a single guard. A lengthy expanse of fence and the warnings themselves were all that stood between Ferra and what was, indeed, a horizontal waterfall. As they stepped closer to the fence the sound suddenly grew near deafening, a sure sign of muffling enchantments at work.
Off in the distance the ground grew higher, and facing the pair an oddly smooth hill face was visible. Rather than the cliff you might expect at a normal waterfall, there were instead few signs of wear at all. The water itself poured… away? from the top of the hill in a stream, growing in speed for several seconds before leaving the pounds of the effect and exploding into droplets of rapidly shrinking size, a spray of vast quantities of water that was thankfully pointed away from the trail.
This bizarre sight looked truly wondrous in the midday light, all reflections and sunbeams glinting off the water as it fell sideways in a hurry; especially in the mist forming where the water fell back to earth at the- is it still called a base, Ferra wasn’t sure- of the effect. Crystals glinted in the soil beneath the fall, presumably part of the cause of the effect.
He tugged on Mel’s sleeve, backing away until the muffling effect took place again and they could speak without shouting. She gave him a grin. “What’re your thoughts, city boy?”
He shot her a mild warning glance; he’d never given them details on his background, at least not until last night. Not something to bandy about casually, even obliquely. “It’s certainly different. There’s a lot of enchanted… well everything really, back home, but no one’s thought to try a sideways waterfall yet.”
She nodded. “It looks absolutely gorgeous during a sunset, from the right angles.”
They watched in the relative silence of the forest for a bit, just enjoying the view. Eventually Mel grabbed him by the arm again, saying she still had a couple other sights in mind and they didn’t have all day.
As they left the area, she showed off another little skill he hadn’t known about yet. A flash of flame and they and all of their clothing were instantly dry, like the pair hadn’t been standing near a waterfall for ten straight minutes.
He gave her a nod of thanks. “Neat trick.”
Mel gave one of her classic poses, chin resting on the back of hand. “It’s only expected of one as fabulous as me, really.”
Ferra just rolled his eyes.
Ferra and Mel continued down the path, taking in the sights and sounds of the forest. They chatted and laughed as they walked, enjoying each other's company. The path twisted and turned, sometimes leading them through dense undergrowth and other times opening up into wide, sun-dappled clearings.
Other notable sights (at least the ones safe for tourism) included a copse of oak trees with leaves made of gold and trunks of stone, a waist height volcano endlessly erupting in a self contained cycle, and a field where space was folded up on itself.
That last one had been rather fun, Mel talking him into a game of chase through the shifting field. Clearly she’d done this before; his pride still smarted from getting tagged thrice in a heartbeat by a single person.
In general, though, Joseph’s Haven was a rather safe island, especially for how high up it was in the diffuse cloud of islands that made up the known world. No self replicating crystal viruses, no clouds of invisible death, no shapeshifting teleporting doppelgangers with a taste for human flesh. He’d heard stories from the other adventurers. Some islands were places you just didn’t go to, no matter the pay.
As noon approached, the time came to head back. Mel wanted to get more practice in, and of course Ferra had his rather dubious instructor to meet. They stopped at a novelty restaurant for a quick lunch. There must have been some kind of fae practitioner on the payroll; The scones had been delightful, shifting between all his favorite flavors as he ate, somehow without clashing.
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
They said their goodbyes, after, and Ferra straightened his robes for the oncoming task. It had been a wonderful morning adventure, but now it was time for business. He feared that this “Clawed Claus” individual might not be terribly pleasant, though perhaps that was a judgment unfairly made in advance.
This ‘Laughing Jester’ place wasn’t exactly easy to find. Dead end back alley, off a street at the edge of town and nearly hanging off the island, in part. It was clean, or at least the outside was, but with a town this size that was somewhat expected. The mayor was well respected, and the local bureaucracy was both competent and well funded. The siding of the Laughing Jester actually looked old, and worn.
He was pretty sure the look was intentional; if it was genuine wear, that’d make this the oldest building in the town by a fair margin. Taking a deep breath and centering himself mentally, Ferra pushed through the honest to gods saloon doors into a scene that felt straight out of an adventure scrapfic.
The room looked just as worn as the outside, though clearly clean and in good repair, structurally. The lighting was low, from actual real oil lamps, and a fog of smoke filled the air. Everyone within seemed to be dressed up as flamboyant, stereotypical adventurers, and either had a cigar, a drink, or both. The quiet piano that was drifting through the air stopped as the doors swung shut behind him, squeaking ominously in the silence. As one, everyone in the room stopped what they were doing and turned to stare at him.
Even the bartender stopped in the middle of cleaning a glass, bearded face set in a frown. The only sound was an odd drumming of fingers, but the rhythmic sound was far more solid than flesh typically is.
Ferra’s eyes alighted on a man wearing a broad brimmed hat, and leather clothing entirely unsuited to the climate. His left hand was made of crystal, and currently beating a pattern into the wood of the bar. He changed his internal evaluation of the man from ‘unpleasant’ to ‘eccentric.’
What was this, a retirement home for teary eyed, nostalgic adventurers? Ferra thought for a moment.
…he was getting the sense that that was exactly what this was, if he was honest with himself. Well, nothing for it but to play along. Spitting on their dreams would be impolite, seeing as finding help was the goal, and he was the one invading in the first place. He added a bit of a drawl to his voice, and then he spoke.
“Any of you fine fellas happen to know a ‘Clawed Claus?’” He winced internally.
There were grunts of approval around the room, as the piano began to play again from an unseen location and people went back to whatever they’d been doing. Claus grunted from his location at the table, then spat into a nearby spittoon. “Depends on who’s asking.”
“A friend, or so I hope. A mutual acquaintance said you might be able to aid me in my time of need.”
Probably-Claus regarded him with a baleful eye. “He might be here. Might even be willing to help. Ferra, right?”
The young man nodded. “I take it you’re Claus himself? Don’t see too many others with crystal hands ‘round these parts.”
The older man inclined his head, and rose to shake Ferra’s hand. His grip was firm, and quite pointy. Clawed hands are like that generally, or so the cleric assumed. “Indeed I am. Pleasure to meetcha. There’s a room out back, we can talk there.”
At agreement from Ferra, the two exited the bar through a door nestled in the corner. Immediately he was led into what looked like some kind of meeting room. It was decently furnished, though with the same theming as the rest of the establishment. A mounted head from some unidentified species was mounted on the wall above the sole window in the room.
A few moments more and they both had drinks. Whiskey for Claus, though it was only midday, and Ferra with an absolutely delightful fruit juice blend he was rather fond of. Claus took a concerningly enthusiastic quaff from his glass. When he set it down, the man suddenly went from lazy, lounging retired adventurer, to wide awake, eyes bright.
No longer slouching, he spoke without the affected accent of before. “Sorry about that. I’m sure you’ve guessed at the nature of this bar, and some of the boys don’t take kindly to having their little dream interrupted with the real world. It’s an act I put on, but it’s fun and relaxing to indulge their wishing for the glory days.”
Claus shook his head. “But I digress. Grek sent you to me, yeah? Looking for a tutor in the more combat related aspects of divine magic?”
Ferra blinked, somewhat taken aback at the sudden shift in character. “Uhh, yeah, I suppose I am. Velocity training, if I have the capacity to learn it.”
His instructor took a much smaller sip from his glass before speaking again. “Ah, that’s the stuff.” He eyed Ferra’s outfit, and stared into his eyes for just long enough to be uncomfortable. “I have no doubt you can. You’re young, and by all accounts reasonably talented. Momentum’s a mental trick, that’s all, and if you’re willing to adventure at your age, well, you've almost certainly got the potential for it.”
“There’s some other stuff I can teach you, too. Divine magic’s a lot more flexible than it’s given credit for, largely because the priests have objections about altering the base ‘holy pattern’ that it naturally manifests as.”
Ferra leaned forward. “How so?”
Claus gestured vaguely. “You have the appearance of someone who’s suffered mageburn at least once, I can smell it on you. Now how does that work if the divine can only manifest as a solid object, and not inside other things, eh? Come to think of it, air’s a ‘thing,’ and the divine manifests just fine inside that.
“Ever run divine through your limbs to heat yourself? That’s inherently a modified state. No solidity, no light, just heat. It’s all a trick of the will, or expectation. I bet you never even thought about it before, yeah?”
“I-” Ferra paused, then frowned. “I was only ever taught that it could manifest as a solid.”
In reality, he’d never really had a formal education. A priest who was rather disgruntled about teaching a technical heretic had shown him how to prevent manifestation and avoid burnout; the rest had come from books.
But Claus didn’t need to know that, couldn’t, really. Nine was always watching.
The man spoke again, distracting him from the somewhat somber musings. “What if I told you it was all just states? Solid, liquid, hot, cold, brittle, flexible, blindingly brilliant or black as void.”
“Hmm.” The younger man sipped from his drink, mind whirling with the implications. “And what, velocity is just… another state?”
Claus nodded. “Exactly.”
“Wait, how do blessings actually work, or enchanting a pre-existing item?”
His new tutor grinned. “That’s the question, isn’t it? Leading theory for blessings is that the guiding hand of a god is critical in not letting those tiny threads of energy run rampant through the body of a recipient. As far as enchantments go, well, I can’t really answer that. White or gold dragons might know, but if they do the knowledge hasn’t made it to the common scholars yet. All I know is that the patterns work as we’re told they do.”
Ferra’s frown returned. “How does divine healing play into all of this?”
Claus shrugged. “Dunno. ‘Forgiveness’ of an injury? Replacing the lost matter somehow? Searing it shut and encouraging natural recovery? However it works, it’s much rougher on the body than fae energies are, and significantly less flexible.”
“…huh.”
“Indeed.” Claus sipped from his glass again. “Sometimes I wish I was a researcher, but oh well. Didn’t get paid enough for that.” He gestured with his left hand. “The claw is nice, though. Budget aethermancy without the risk of insanity. Ker’tyl of twelve folds was a real one, I should see if he’s still around and kicking.”
He stood from the seat, almost kicking over the chair. “Shall we go to a training room, and give it a go? I’ve got a deal with a nearby arena, they find my divine antics rather amusing.”
Ferra quirked an eyebrow as he stood. “Divine as in the magic, or are your antics just that much above those of others?”
Claus threw back his head, letting out a deep laugh. “Haha, that’s the spirit!” He clapped Ferra on the back, almost toppling him like the chair.
The young cleric didn’t really think the joke had been all that funny, but the laugh was somewhat pleasing to hear regardless. Claus downed the rest of his drink, leaving the glass on the counter and flicking a coin to the bartender on the way out of the saloon.
The walk was shorter than Ferra expected, the reason for which was revealed when they stepped into an aggressively mundane dojo, rather than one of the specialized magical ones deeper in the city.
Claus gave an explanation when he saw the younger man’s raised eyebrow. “I have a special deal with this place, ya see. I do a weekly course for people with… unusual limbs.”
He flexed his left hand. “There’s no real worry though, the stuff we’ll be practicing is fairly low energy and they’ve got some basic wards in place. It shouldn’t be an issue and this way, it’s free!” The scruffy man waggled his eyebrows as they stepped into the main, currently empty room.
“I do hope you don’t mind me cutting costs here on the facilities. Less walking time, means I get to pocket more money and charge your Grek less overall. Benefits all around!”
Ferra shrugged. “I suppose I don’t mind, just as long as no one gets hurt.”
“No worries about that, we won’t be summoning anything hot enough to melt rock or whatnot for a while yet.”
His eyebrow returned to its raised position. Ferra found that happening a lot, recently. “That’s something we can do?”
“Sure, sure. Friction, too. Look!” Claus gestured, and a tiny cube manifested by his foot. When he nudged it with a boot, the little glowing summon went zooming across the sandy floor, hardly slowly down before a particularly large bump sent it careening into the air and shattering on impact.
“…huh.”
His mentor nodded. “It really is a shame how little of this gets properly documented or used. The Church United views it as distasteful, and not enough divine casters exist outside that formal structure for it to get documented or explored in much detail. Much of what you’ll learn from me was self-discovered over decades of pushing boundaries.” He clapped his hands. “Shall we get started?”
“I’d love to!” Ferra paused after a moment of consideration. “How do I actually, uh, do that?”
“The first step is just to acknowledge that what I’ve said is possible. Considering you’re still here you probably believe me about all this, but without that the rest is impossible to make sure you’re really confident I’m not bullshitting you.”
“A further demonstration might help with that, I think.”
Wordlessly Claus pointed at a target across the room. A golden spear made of light, seeming… weightier than what Ferra typically summoned, appeared over his shoulder. Even as it manifested the spear was already in motion, flashing across the room in a blink to impale the target. The dummy went toppling, and the spear shattered into twinkling, evaporating pieces when its haft broke upon contact with the wall.
Claus turned back to him with a grin. “Eh? How’s that!”
Ferra blinked with surprise. “Did you… make it heavier somehow, too?”
“Sure did! Simple as imagining it, really.” The older cleric frowned. “Though really that’s not quite true. All of these tricks are more difficult to shape, take more concentration and time to cast, and have a higher chance of causing burn. Certainly effective, though, especially if you’ve got teammates covering the front.”
“Hm…”
“Oh, one other thing to note! If you practice enough with a specific kind, eventually that can become your default. That’s the case with me and denser, more stable light. It took me years upon years to get here, though.” Claus gestured vaguely with an arm. “Second step is just to summon the object, picturing it as already in motion. It’s not a modification you do to the object after making it, it’s one you’ve already done. You’ve already made it hot, you’ve already thrown it, and such. Give it a try!”
He gave it his best, he really did. Ferra’s first cube manifested, already zooming towards… the ground. Because of gravity. Darn. They practiced for several more hours, before having to vacate as actual students walked into the dojo. By the end of it, though, he’d managed to summon a cube that did a little slide to the side.
Claus clapped him on the back as they left, almost staggering him. “A very promising start! Now it’s just a matter of practice. I already told you that those who fail to get it in the first ten hours often never do, but two is promising indeed!”
Ferra couldn’t help but smile at the man’s effusive grin. He was a bit eccentric, but fun to talk to. The younger man was fairly sure that Claus was genuinely pleased by his progress, and the opportunity to answer questions from an actively interested student.
He was definitely coming back, though he had somewhere to start now for self practice. “Same place, same time tomorrow, or something else?”
They worked something out on the way back towards the saloon Claus spent most of his time relaxing at; he’d need to get a more detailed schedule from Grek for longer term planning, after all.
It was with a skip in his step and a jaunty wave that Ferra headed back to Tyra’s boarding house. There was still time before dinner; he wanted to check up on the others, and then head over to the library for some research; Haven’s library was surprisingly expansive, largely due to Joseph himself donating an entire personal collection upon his death.
Naturally, these plans fell through as soon as he returned to the inn. Midway through changing into comfier clothes, Nine appeared in front of him. Ferra started with a yelp, almost toppling.
“Will you stop doing that!”
Nine just stared at him for an uncomfortably long moment, staying in that aggressively neutral pose of his as Ferra finished changing.
When the bastard finished, he waved his arms vaguely at Nine. “Well?”
“Yesterday.”
Fezzik suppressed a spike of fear.
“We never discussed what you said we would.” He crossed his arms, and then spoke in an eerie replica of Ferra’s voice. “’Drop him off at the local United temple, discreetly. They’ll deal with him. We’ll talk more about this apparent issue tonight.’”
“Gods, don’t do that, either. That’s just downright eerie!”
Nine ignored his outburst. “We need to talk about what to do with the local underground.”
Ferra sighed, some of the fear fading. “Right, you’re right of course. Any ideas? I might have one.”
Nine shifted his weight slightly, one of the only physical tics he had. Clearly whatever he was thinking was a distasteful idea to the monster. “It would be relatively simple to build a portfolio of the entire local underground through various means. I could simply redirect them, or alter their memories when they stray near you while in public. It is no aid that you actively use divine, though your cover as a cleric of Kiara should solve that in most regards.”
The cleric shrugged. “I was thinking I could change the color scheme of my clothes. This jacket is a bit too capital for this high up above the Mist. It’s about time I match the team, anyways. Different hairstyle?”
He hesitated before suggesting his real goal, but only slightly. Too long, and Nine would notice. The man’s extreme perception was wildly inconsistent, which made tiptoeing around him even more nerve wracking. “What if you completely took over the local underground?”
Nine’s eyes snapped back to attention as he stiffened imperceptibly. His voice was even flatter than usual, if that was possible. “What.”
“Think about it. If you subdue the entire local underground you can subtly influence people to ignore me with less use of detectable magic. Plus, you’d be doing a civic good!”
“Unacceptable. It would leave you unguarded.”
That was his real goal, though of course telling Nine that would be a truly abysmal idea.
“What about when I’m off traveling? Your orders are to not protect me from my own stupidity, yeah? The Nova Fists wouldn’t try to kill me, and if I die to a wyrm or whatever then it’s not your problem.”
Nine was silent for a long minute, so long Ferra began to fear the abomination had broken in some final way. “That might be acceptable.”
He started to point out that Nine couldn’t tag along during star transport anyways, something far more common for the Fists’ usual missions, before hastily biting his tongue. While a good justification, it would also bring to Nine’s attention that many of their missions would likely take place in populated areas in the future.
The fae creature noticed him wince as he bit back the words, just staring at him silently.
Ferra tried to avoid breaking out into a sweat.
“…yeah?”
Another pause. “Nothing.”
Ferra started to edge towards the door. If he hurried, he could still get some reading in. “So you’re gonna think on my proposal, yeah? I’m off to the library.”
Nine said nothing, but vanished at the clear dismissal. Holding back a sigh of relief, the prisoner left his room. Someday soon, he might escape the cell entirely.
Hopefully.