Chapter Twenty-One

A bright light shone obnoxiously through the window, landing directly on her face. She groaned, dragging the pillow over her head. Her head pounded like she’d been hit with a baseball bat. Moira peeled her eyes open and peeked around the room. It was small, with two twin beds smushed together to fit in the tiny space. She sniffed the air; it smelled clean, which was more than she was expecting if she was being honest.

Her stomach lurched, and vomit rolled up her esophagus, heading for her mouth. She scrambled out of bed, looking for a bin, anything to puke in. A cracked door caught her eye, and she lunged for it, hoping for a bathroom.

Luck was in her favor. Moira scrambled for the toilet and promptly puked her guts out. She moaned, leaning back against the cold tile. Last night was a blur. The last thing she could recall was taking a shot of something with Sloane.

She rubbed her face. Why had she done that? Gotten blazing drunk with a stranger. What was she thinking?

Well, she was thinking with a buzzed brain, clearly. Thankfully, her money was in her Inventory, and she didn’t think she’d shared too many secrets. The conversation had moved to less serious topics after the discovery that she’d had a conversation with a goddess.

Moira pulled herself up using the sink countertop and took stock of the bathroom. Emerald tile covered the floor and flowed halfway up the wall. Bronze fixtures decorated the room. But most importantly—there was a real toilet. Not only a toilet, but what appeared to be a shower adorned the last half of the room.

She jumped with glee, unable to contain her excitement. A real shower. She never thought she’d see one again. Moira had just assumed that this world didn’t have running water—thank god it did.

Her excitement sent her stomach churning, and she leaned heavily against the counter. The mirror above the sink caught her eye. A stranger stared back at her. It was still her, under the dirt and grime from the weeks in the Dungeon, but there were changes.

Everything about her seemed brighter. Her brown hair looked thicker, healthier, and richer in color. Her eyes, which had always been a dark blue, looked more sapphire in the mirror, almost glowing. Her cheekbones and jawline had sharpened, doing away with her previously round face. She could barely recognize the woman on the other side of the mirror.

A pang of sadness hit her like a train. She could no longer see her dad’s eyes, or her mom’s round face, or the hair she shared with her siblings. Those things were gone. Erased from her face. Moira searched the mirror, struggling to find a piece of herself that was unchanged. There, untouched, square in the middle, was her nose. Slightly upturned at the end, with flaring nostrils. The same nose that her dad and little sister shared.

Moira sighed in relief. She could deal with that. As long as one piece of her remained unchanged, that was enough.

But how? Why did she look so different now? She hadn’t when she’d first arrived in Caelum. Back at the creek, she’d looked the same.

It had to be magic. Every time she leveled; she’d felt a wave of energy. Like her body had improved slightly. Maybe those changes had more of an effect than she’d thought.

Another wave of nausea hit her. She sank to her knees and threw up again, forgetting about the changes to her appearance. It took several minutes of spewing her guts out before she was finally done.

She grabbed the side of the shower and crawled in, turning it on. Moira sat against the cold tile, letting the hot water run down her body. She was still in the clothes that she’d received in the Dungeon. They were dirty and stunk like she’d been wearing them for weeks, which she had.

She stripped off in the shower, letting the water wash the dirt and grime from her body. The hot water was heavenly against her skin. Moira sat under the stream until her head stopped pounding and the water turned cold. She carefully stepped out of the shower, feeling somewhat refreshed. Moira looked around, finding a fluffy white towel hanging next to the shower. She grabbed it and wrapped it around herself, sighing at the feel of the soft towel against her bare skin.

Moira stepped out of the bathroom. Something seemed to be missing, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She had her clothes, money, weapons—Duke. She hadn’t seen Duke. A quick glance around the room told her he wasn’t there. A pang of panic rippled through her.

Moira ran to the door, ripping it open. She looked down; she was still in a towel. She needed clothes first. She turned back toward the bed, spotting a pair of white linen pants and a gray shirt folded neatly on the bed. Moira grabbed them and quickly changed before tearing down the stairs.

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She had to find Duke. That bitch. She shouldn’t have trusted her. Everything in her had screamed not to trust Sloane.

She stumbled down the last step and into the tavern dining room. The barrage of thoughts teetered to a stop as she took in the scene in front of her.

Duke sat with his paws on the table with a plate of eggs and bacon in front of him. Slobber dripped down his muzzle as he inhaled the food. Sloane sat across from him, sipping a cup of coffee.

She paused on the last step, taking a deep, shaky breath. Duke was fine. No one had taken him. He was fine.

Sloane spotted her and weakly raised her hand in greeting. Moira joined the table, slumping down in the chair. With the adrenaline leaving her, the pounding headache returned. Sloane winced as she sat down.

“Do you have to be so loud?” Sloane pressed her head on the table and groaned.

“What happened last night?”

“Oh, god—a lot of alcohol happened. Tracy saw where the night was headed and overcharged our last couple of beers to pay for a room upstairs.”

Duke looked back and forth between them and barked loudly.

“Ugh!” they both groaned.

He wagged his tail triumphantly and continued scarfing down his food.

“Oh, you thought that was funny, huh?” Moira asked.

Duke wooed back and forth at both of them, then harrumphed before jumping off his seat and padding over to the kitchen to beg for scraps. Tracy came over and set a cup of coffee in front of Moira and a plate of eggs for Sloane.

“This afternoon I’ll take you to the Quest Guild to register the Dungeon. They’ll want to know the location,” Sloane said, hunched over her cup of coffee.

“No.”

“What? Why? You do realize there’s a bonus for discovering a Dungeon, right?”

“I don’t care. I don’t want to be involved. There’ll be too many questions—questions I don’ t want to answer. Like why a goddess hand delivered my reward.”

“So, just don’t tell them that. You don’t have to share any details about the Dungeon. All you need for the bonus is the location. Anyway, most Dungeon discoverers keep the details close. No one wants to lose out on any advantage.”

Moira massaged her temples; the elf had a point. “Fine.”

“Great.” Sloane grinned. “So, any idea what you’ll be doing next? Staying in Tersus for a while or going back on the road?”

“I don’t know.” She crinkled her brow. Moira’d been so focused on escaping the forest and then escaping the Dungeon. She wasn’t sure what to do next. What path led home? Whether to follow the path laid out in front of her, the preassigned destiny of an Outworlder, or find her own way back.

Moira turned to Sloane. “Know anyone who specializes in portals?”

#

They stood in a hallway of the governor’s library, a space glittering with stain glass windows. Sloane had explained that the space housed the city’s highest experts in various fields of academia, including portals.

Sloane had cornered the portal expert, a hawkish man with white and black speckled wings, between the hallway and the entrance to the library. “Ma’am you don’t understand. There is no way to portal off-world. The skill is restricted to where the portaler has been. And no one has been off-world.”

“—but what if—”

“Even if they had somehow been off-world, the skill is still restricted by the Mana cage around Caelum.”

Moira’s thoughts raced. “Mana cage?”

The portal specialist looked at Sloane in exasperation. “Yes, the Mana cage the gods put in place centuries ago.”

“Oh, right, of course.”

“Now, if you don’t mind. I have things to do. I believe you have interrupted my research enough already with these silly questions.” He gave Moira a dirty look before brushing past her and down toward the library.

Her shoulders slumped; it’d been worth a shot. Getting back home would be harder than she’d thought. She squeezed her eyes shut and breathed deeply.

Sloane awkwardly patted her on the shoulder. “Sorry. But why do you care about portaling off-world?”

Moira eyed her. “No reason.”

Sloane stared back pointedly. “All right, whatever, don’t share your reasons. Just know, I’m very suspicious.”

Moira didn’t respond, instead stroking Duke’s hair.

“Fine, if you won’t tell me anything, then are you ready to go to the Guild?”

Moira gestured toward the library exit, not making eye contact. Sloane sighed and led her down the steps and back into the main thoroughfare.

Once again, Moira twisted and turned, struggling to follow Sloane through the crowds of people.

Her neck prickled, and she stopped in her tracks.

A familiar voice whispered in her ear.

“There you are.”