Three days after Ranish Dar healed Edeya’s spirit, Victor woke early in the morning, and his mind wouldn’t let him fall back asleep. He slipped from his bed, donned some comfortable clothes, and picked up the leather shoulder satchel where he’d stowed the dark-stone crown and the globe of ivid royal jelly. He stared for a long moment at Valla’s sleeping form, a stupid smile on his face. Despite her wings, she looked small and peaceful, and he savored the serene expression she bore as she lay curled under the fluffy white comforter, her head buried in an equally luxurious pillow. After several long seconds, soaking in the sight, he quietly slipped out of the bedroom and left a note for her on their suite’s dining table.

Valla,

Gone to do some shopping - back before lunch.

-Victor

He left the hotel unarmored, but Lifedrinker hung comfortably in her harness, and he wasn’t really worried about a fight without his wyrm-scale vest; he’d grown much sturdier since Tes made it for him. It wasn’t that he didn’t think it helped. It was just that anything that couldn’t cut through it wasn’t likely to kill him very easily, especially if he berserked. Naturally, he’d rather not get cut or scraped or stabbed, but, for a shopping trip, he felt comfort was worth the risk. He’d picked out a merchant from the map’s guidebook the night before and hurriedly made his way toward the address, following the little line on the crystal tablet, chuckling at how much it reminded him of GPS.

After ten minutes of his long strides through little to no traffic, he approached the building just as the sun began to rise, sending the distant crystal towers into a jaw-dropping spectacle of orange, yellow, and red shimmers. The artificer’s shop was a long, narrow structure made of plain, brown brick, but it looked well-maintained, and the sign that hung over the black iron door looked like a piece of art—wood carved into the shape of a sleeping dragon painted turquoise and gold, and inscribed with the words, Slevensor’s Fine Enchantments.

When he pulled on the cold, iron handle, the door didn’t budge. “Of course,” Victor sighed. Just because he couldn’t sleep didn’t mean the whole city would wake up for him. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and turned, looking up and down the street, wondering if any nearby businesses were open, hoping to find someplace to kill some time. He saw smoke rising from a chimney on the building at the corner and started walking that way, hoping he’d spy a bakery or restaurant. He’d only taken two steps, though, when a shutter clattered open above him, and a sharp, feminine voice called out, “Who comes calling at this hour?”

Victor turned, looking up, and saw a human-sized bird looking out at him. Bird was the wrong term—she had a beak and downy yellow feathers, but he could also see her arms and hands on the window sill. She wore a gauzy blue robe over her feather-covered but humanoid torso. “Oh, hello,” he said, shielding his eyes from the rising sun as he peered at her.

“Well, are you here for business or something more sinister?” After she finished speaking, she made a funny cooing sound in her throat.

“Business.”

“Come on, then. I’ll open the door. Just finished my breakfast.” Before he could reply, she slammed the shutters closed. Victor stepped back to the door and waited. A couple of minutes later, he heard the locks click, and then the same bird-woman pushed the door open and beckoned him in. “Hurry now, don’t let the morning chill in.”

Victor had resized himself to a comfortable six and a half feet and easily slipped into the shop, allowing her to pull the door closed. The interior was a lot like he’d expected—lots of wooden shelves built into the walls and lots of curios, figurines, books, and knick-knack-looking objects all over the place. The proprietress beckoned him to follow her to the counter, where she hopped atop a stool, trilled a pleased-sounding note, and asked, “What can I help you with?”

“A few things, I suppose. I’m Victor, by the way.”

“Tria is what the beakless call me.” Again, she chirped a funny, pleasant sound, bobbing her head, and Victor wondered if that was a thing avian species did because they couldn’t express themselves with smiles and frowns.

“Nice to meet you. Um, first, I’d like you to have a look at an item. I think it has a spirit in it, or maybe it’s just conscious, but I didn’t want to bond with it until I knew more.” He lifted the crown from his belt and set it on the wooden counter with a thunk. Tria immediately recoiled, waving her feather-bedecked arm back and forth in front of her.

“I’ll not touch that, but I can see its auras and read its runes from here. You truly have no idea what it is?”

Victor shrugged. “I took it from the corpse of an undead son of a bitch.” He frowned and added, “Actually, I killed him, then found his corpse in another place with this on his head.”

“That makes sense. It has a wounded, mad spirit within. Moreover, the runes indicate that this is a lifeward relic—more precisely, an undead lifeward relic. It’s a brutal, crude enchantment, too. Whoever created it was new to the concept, I’d wager. I can assure you that anyone whose undying life was preserved by this relic would have had a long, painful recovery. You say his body was dead, though, when you found him?”

“Yeah.” Victor sighed and fidgeted for a minute, rubbing his chin. “I, uh, pulled his heart out before he could disappear. I also destroyed a piece of his spirit that was in the heart. Would that matter?”

The woman’s large black and yellow eyes widened further, and she shrank back from him. “Elder gods! Such savagery!”

“He had it coming.” Victor shrugged and put his hands in his pockets, trying not to look threatening. “I’m not a madman; you can relax.”

“Whatever the circumstances, yes, I believe what you did to the being who wore this crown surely interrupted his reconstitution. Undoubtedly, it’s his damaged spirit that dwells within it. Tell me, did you not find the crown’s anchor?”

“Anchor?”

“A paired artifact where the crown would bring the wearer when it saved his life.”

“Ah!” Victor pulled the heavy key still inside the marble-sized silver ball from around his neck and set it on the counter. “If I twist this key, that little ball of silver expands to make a round room. Inside that is where I found the corpse and the crown.”

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“Lovely!” Tria leaned forward, making tiny cooing sounds as she peered at the key. “This is something altogether different. Where the crown is crude and brutal in its function, this is elegant and powerful—it’s Fae-forged silver and of a quality, I’m not ashamed to admit, I wouldn’t be able to match. I have difficulty believing this is the anchor to that ghastly crown. Can we open it?”

Victor picked up the key and looked around the shop, frowning. “I don’t think it’ll fit in here.”

“To my workshop then—this way.” She stepped through the curtain hanging behind her, and Victor followed, snatching the crown off the counter on his way. The room behind the shop was very spacious, with high ceilings and workbenches on three of the four walls. Tria pointed to some wooden tables near the center and said, “If we move those to the side, will there be enough room?”

“I think so. It filled the top of a stone tower when I found it, but it couldn’t have been more than ten paces across.” Victor measured the workshop with his strides, nodding when he reached fourteen before he could touch the back workbench. “Yeah, I think it’s plenty big.”

Tria lingered by the door. “Please proceed to open it, then. I’ll watch from here.” Victor nodded, stepped to the center of the room, and placed the little silver marble on the ground. Holding it in place with his finger and thumb, he twisted the key and stepped back. Brilliant, silver light and hissing steam erupted from the little device as it rapidly expanded, filling the center of the workshop as it grew into the room-sized, silvery, rune-etched, spherical vault. When it stopped growing and steaming, the door with the key protruding from it faced Victor and Tria. She began to make that cooing sound, rushing forward to run her delicate fingers over the surface of the rune-etched metal. “I wasn’t wrong!”

“About?”

“This is Fae-craft—this metal, these wondrous designs! This is, indeed, a vault, Victor. A portable vault made for the storage of items most dear. I shudder to think of the power required to open this chamber without the key.” She gestured to the key. “May I?” Victor nodded, his mind running away with her words. Was the “Fae-craft” vault capable of holding the ivid royal jelly? He wanted to ask her but worried about her reaction when she saw the treasure. What if she coveted it? What if she sold the information of his possession to someone more powerful who would want it? While he pondered the idea, Tria opened the door and stepped into the sphere.

Almost immediately, she cried, “I can see the crown’s anchor.” He followed her in and saw she was pointing at the hanging red crystal, squinting at the baleful red light it cast. “This doesn’t belong. Nor does that silver chair. Look there, at the chair’s feet; the silver clearly doesn’t match the Fae-forged silver. It’s crudely designed, too, in comparison to the sphere’s elegance.”

Victor nodded. “Yeah, well, the guy’s corpse was in the chair, under the gem, so maybe he installed it for that purpose.” He frowned, lifting the crown from his belt again. “Is this thing valuable? Could it save me the way it tried to save Dunstan?”

“Dunstan?”

“The name of the undead guy.”

“Oh, I see. No, I’m afraid not.” She chirped softly and shivered, ruffling her feathers up and down her arms. “Not unless you wanted to become a member of the unliving. As for its value, I’m sure you could find a Death Caster or even one of the openly undead here in Sojourn who’d pay a tidy sum for it and the anchor.” She pointed at the glowing, round jewel.

“I have a better idea.” Victor reached up and pulled on the red, crystal globe, putting more and more pressure on the silvery chain it hung from, smiling as the soft weld of molten silver separated from the harder metal of the dome. When it came free, he set the strange, glowing artifact atop the throne, then placed the crown beside it. “Stand back.” As Tria scurried away, her dexterous, taloned feet clicking on the metal, he cast Honor the Spirits and a wild grin spread on his face as the white flames of his spirit magic took the throne, the crown, and the red globe away to the Spirit Plane.

“What did . . .” Tria rushed forward, little clicking chirps sounding from her throat. “What did you do?”

“I gave them to my ancestors.”

“What?” She looked at him with wide, stunned eyes. “You destroyed them? For superstition?”

Suddenly, Victor’s rage-attuned Energy flared into his pathways, and he felt his aura slipping from his control as his Quinametzin haughtiness asserted itself. He seemed to swell with the power, and his eyes flared with dangerous, red Energy as he snapped, “My ancestors would not be pleased to hear those words!”

Tria shrank back and ducked her head, waving her feathery arms over her head. “Apologies, Lord! I spoke hastily, shocked at the loss of those materials, that’s all. I beg you, forget I said such a thoughtless thing.” Her obvious fear and obsequious behavior were like a splash of cold water to Victor. He hated that he’d scared her and was furious that he’d let his control slip. He yanked his rage back into his Core and clamped down on his aura like an iron vise.

“No, Tria, I’m the one who’s sorry. I didn’t mean to let your words upset me like that. It’s my bloodline—sometimes I lose my grip on it.”

She slowly straightened, dropping her arms to her side and squinting her big round eyes up at him. She was probably only about five feet tall, and clearly, any levels she’d gained had come from crafting—he felt like a total asshole for frightening her. “May I ask you a question without enraging you?” Her voice was trepidatious, and he could hear the nervousness in the little clicking coos she made after speaking.

“Yeah, of course. I’m paying attention now; I won’t lose it again.”

“Are you young?”

“Yeah. I guess so. In years, anyway.”

She nodded and took a hesitant step closer. “I think I understand then. My Class allows me to see more about people and objects than the average person, and I can see you’ve advanced your bloodline greatly. That’s always harder the younger you are. As one gains the power of a potent species without much time between ranks, it’s sometimes difficult to come to grips with it. In that case, I commend you for the control you’ve thus far displayed.”

“Thank you. By the way, I appreciate your help in identifying the crown and helping me understand this vault better. I’m happy to pay a fee for that help. I have another question, too, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“I’ve done nothing worthy of payment today, Victor. I happily share my knowledge with clients in the hopes of building a relationship. I only ask that you please think of my shop first if you need magical goods.”

“Done.” Victor gestured to the room, no longer tinged with the baleful red light of the crystal orb but instead seemingly lit from an invisible ambient source in a soft silvery glow. “Can this vault hold more powerful artifacts than my other storage devices? My rings, for example?” Victor held up his right hand, wriggling his fingers and the storage rings.

“Oh, yes! This vault is much, much, much sturdier! More than that, it’s safe to put sapient beings within this vault and then reduce its size. Even a living person could sit in this room while you carried it about on that chain around your neck.” She paused and made a strange, tremulous clicking coo. “Well, only until they ran out of air. This space would be quite tightly sealed when closed.”

“Really?” Victor looked around the vault's interior at the softly illuminated silver walls utterly covered with strange, engraved runes and patterns. “It can?”

“Yes! If you have the knowledge to understand them, I’ll show you the enchantments that make it possible. Whoever earned or stole this vault from the Fae had a wondrous treasure on their hands. I can create something similar, but nothing this large or this sturdy.”

Victor smiled. “I’m not an enchanter.” He tried to think of a way to ask about the ivid royal jelly without putting himself or it at risk and decided it wasn’t worth it. If she coveted what he had, she was likely too weak or fearful to take him on, but there was no telling what sort of powerful people she might know. Instead, he asked, “Is there any way to tell if something I put into this vault is harming it?”

She made a different sort of bubbling, cooing sound, clearly a laugh, and shook her head. “If you had something that could damage this vault, I’d be astonished. Nothing I’ve ever worked with could harm it, and I’ve assisted some of the masters deep into their lustrous veils, crafting special artifacts, one of which was so potent that I had to ward myself against it lest I turn to dust in its presence.”

“Even so, is there any way to tell if I’ve damaged it?”

“Certainly. The walls of this sphere will begin to tarnish and then crack. If you see that happening, remove the item, and the vault will repair itself given enough time.”

Victor sighed and nodded, delighted by the unexpected turn of events. He’d thought he’d have to begin a tedious search for a container capable of holding the royal jelly, only to find the thing he’d been carrying around his neck for weeks and weeks was exactly what he needed. That, and being rid of the dark crown, were like two weights off his shoulders. He gestured to the door. “Shall we? Before I leave, I’d like to look at some of the things you have for sale.”

“Of course!” She preceded him out of the vault, and before he followed, Victor lowered the leather satchel containing the royal jelly to the floor, setting it just inside the doorway. Once outside, he swung the door closed with a heavy, satisfying clang and then turned the key all the way to the left, locking it and reducing the room back down to marble-sized. He put the chain over his head and let the priceless talisman hang beneath his shirt. Feeling much lighter without his earlier burdens, he followed Tria back into her storefront. She perched atop her stool and asked, “What sorts of things do you need?”

“I have a couple of very low-level friends who are going to have their first adventure in a dungeon soon. I thought I should buy them some supplies. A weapon for one, maybe some armor or magical clothing, some helpful trinkets, and maybe an expanding shelter.” He chuckled and shook his head. “Nothing like my vault, but, yeah, a sturdy tent or . . .”

“A cozy little cabin that’s bigger on the inside than out? Something they might erect after a difficult battle?”

“Now you’re speaking my language!” Victor leaned his elbow on the counter, grinning. “Truthfully, I’m only really concerned about one of them, but I can’t very well bring her a bunch of equipment and leave the other guy empty-handed, right? I guess the better he does, the more help he’ll be for her, so . . .” Victor let his words trail off and shrugged.

“I think we can come up with a wonderful beginner’s kit for both of them, and it shouldn’t cost you too much, either. Let’s start by talking about armor—I’ve got some vests with shimmersteel rings you should take a look at, and then . . .”