Gem Encrusted Gauntlet [https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw/AP1GczPX2Drr4B2z_AWvupfVtiWipNYTEn8FIRyAar1ocMBqA0ofZKp13d1EpaWQbA88roKgO5OluAslwl3_7afCmFckK6Irz_QhcI3tZ8K8nTHYAh4Cey-uzM6U_bCo64h1bTwUEG5Fm7MsXOvWmlDNVAUi=w639-h958-s-no-gm?authuser=0]
“What?” Rayna asked in bewilderment as her party leader actually facepalmed at her, “I did exactly as you said!”
Ramir’s screaming began at that point as the man fell to his knees, and she wondered if Rex eating a headless cannibal would still count for the quest.
“No, I realize now that was entirely my own fault for the miscommunication,” Dazien replied mentally in a tone of exasperation that made her not entirely sure if he was being sarcastic or not.
“Miscommunication? How else was I supposed to get a scroll out of his hands without it tearing? I went the fastest route!”
Dazien gave a heavy sigh and then ordered aloud, “Rex, finish the quest, please, and allow Mister Mirimel at least the mercy of a swifter death.”
“And quieter one,” she muttered, rubbing her ears and stepping away as the giant Royal Raksha pounced and began to devour his dinner. The screams intensified, and the sound of flesh tearing made her nose wrinkle in disgust as she informed Dazien, “I think I’m going to wait outside while he eats. That’s a little much for me to watch.”
He simply nodded at her and she paused at the doorway to add, “Are you going to wait out here with me?”
The seriousness in his tone made her frown as he replied firmly, “No. I need to watch. It’s only right that I share some of this burden with my Familiar.”
Rayna didn’t reply but made a mental note to herself to talk with Saiya later. Her sister would have a better idea if this kind of odd behavior from him would be something they’d need to worry about. Besides, it wasn’t really her place or expertise to prod at emotional wounds like that. She’d stick to the problems she could punch.
Out in the hall, there were already a few heads peeking their way with confusion and fear and she wished that she had been good enough at ritual magic to have put up a sound barrier before the screaming had started.
Now, she simply tried to wave them off as she informed in as professional a tone as she could manage, “Punishment by Divine Ordinance. Nothing to see here.”
She was pretty sure the Ducal Guard would show up sooner rather than later. She didn’t look like one of the Guards or a member of any clergy, so she didn’t think any of those people would really believe her words unless they might have recognized her from Phoenix’s party.
The screams had stopped after a few seconds, and the louder crunching sounds halted another minute later, but Dazien hadn’t joined her yet, so she kept waiting as patiently as she could.
Sure enough, a couple of minutes later, a pair of Crystal Caste guards showed up at the end of the hall but didn’t approach until a Sapphire Caster appeared. The newcomer approached in a more casual manner as the cinderen woman greeted her, “Hello, Lady Dewsong. I’m Guard Benjam,” she said, slowly holding up an identification card similar to an AOA license that showed the emblem of the Duke. “Some distressing sounds were reported to the local guardpost at the corner of the block, mind letting me in on the details?”
Rayna mentally whispered to Dazien, but he was unresponsive, which made her even more nervous as she glanced back at the closed door behind her. “There was an escaping blood cultist that we were given a divine quest to stop,” she hedged, knowing she should probably let Dazien explain and show the sigil as proof.
“Care to let me in and see what the duke is going to need to deal with then?” the guard asked and added when Rayna looked back to her, “I have no desire to fight you, but I do have a duty to uphold, Lady Dewsong.”
She nodded and explained, “Daze— I mean, Noble Wayland is still inside completing the quest. I’ll lead you to him,” she turned and opened the door but paused as the pungent scent hit her, and she added, “But I’m warning you that it likely won’t be pretty… the quest was from the Avenger for retribution against a cannibal…”
Benjam’s face wrinkled at the mental image, but to her credit, she stoically nodded and followed behind her.
Rayna began to call out to her friend as a heads-up since he wasn’t replying telepathically, “Hey, Daze? I’ve got one of the guards here—”
She was shocked into silence at the scene before her. Dazien sat in the chair that hadn’t been tipped over as Rex lay a large golden head in his lap while he quietly sobbed into the shimmering mane.
At his feet were a small pile of random treasures and a flat enchanted dimensional bag that she had previously seen when Ramir had pulled the scroll from it. However, in one of Dazien’s hands was a thin golden chain with a larger pendant dangling from it. In the center of the pendant was mounted an unseeing eye with a sparkling amethyst iris that she recognized as matching Dazien’s own.
Rayna’s fists clenched at the sight of her broken friend, who kept finding pieces of his mother and muttered to the confused-looking guard, “Getting eaten in return was too good a death for the likes of the Scarlet Banquet.”
She slowly walked over to Dazien and dismissed her gauntlets to place a furred hand on his shoulder, “Let’s get you back to your castle, King… where our family is waiting for us.”
He shook his head fervently, burying his face deeper into the golden fur and she could barely make out his mumbled, “I just need a minute.”
“I’m sure having a good cry at home will be better than—”
“No,” he cut her off before muttering, “I can’t let anyone see.”
“What?”
“Everyone knows a king doesn’t cry…”
She frowned at that and wished again that Saiya was here to handle this. She didn’t need her sister’s emotional perception to see the mess of a man in front of her, but she did need the Healer if she wanted to have any chance of soothing him.
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Since she didn’t have that option right now, she simply said something that Saiya had told her long ago, “Everyone cries. It’s something we need to do sometimes to cleanse the yucky feelings from our minds. It’s not a weakness to feel emotions. They are the foundation of our strength. Without them, there would be no reason to keep fighting for the future.”
Dazien’s shuddering had lessened as she had spoken and he finally glanced up at her with puffy amethyst eyes that had an odd look of confusion. After a beat of silence, she asked, “What?”
“I just thought you might have switched places with Lady Saiya all of a sudden and was wondering if I had gone insane,” he said with a watery smile.
She lightly punched his arm, “Don’t make me give you a more painful reason for those tears, Your Majesty. Now let’s go see Sai so she can show you how to cry properly.”
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They didn’t end up going home, unfortunately.
Once Dazien had managed to regain some composure, he spoke with the guard and complied with her request to go to the main guardhouse back in the Martial District to the southwest. There, he filled out forms but a lot less than he normally had to for the AOA. A Judge from the Courthouse in the inner city was available there, as usual, to take testimonies, and he made sure to hand over his Divine Sigil to the Priest of the Adjudicator, the goddess that almost every Judge served.
It actually helped him in a way to go through the mundane task of filling out the paperwork, putting into words the horrible things that he had witnessed and been subjected to almost felt like a purging process. Admitting what had happened and trusting the authorities to help right those wrongs.
It was difficult to trust that idea, however. Avenger had been right. This process would have likely resulted in Ramir still living to escape the city and go elsewhere to eat more innocents. At least he had ensured that future would never come to pass. He had avenged his mother… but he still felt terrible.
The balm of knowing that the cultist wouldn’t hurt another person wasn’t enough to counter the weight of knowing what they had done to his mom. How they took her apart piece by piece to—
Dazien stopped himself. Shaking his head to clear the thoughts that threatened to bring tears again. He needed to keep it together. His party still depended on him to lead them through all this and finish filling out the blasted paperwork.
“Odd to find someone who’s not an Anointed Disciple carrying one of these,” the Judge said solemnly to him while holding up the Divine Sigil of the Avenger to look over, but luckily the runeforged woman seemed more curious than accusatory.
“I believe he hoped to gain a new recruit,” Dazien managed to reply without a trace of a waver in his voice.
The older woman raised a brow at him and asked, “Another Paladin Wayland that we should look forward to dealing with more often?”
He forced a chuckle, “I don’t think I’m really suited for the job, actually,” he admitted, “It just happened to align with my current goals.”
The Judge gave a sad smile, “That’s usually how the Avenger gains disciples. They join with a singular goal and eventually find a purpose in it. I don’t particularly agree with the path they choose, but I can understand what drives them.”
The runeforged glance down at the small stack of papers she had been reading over as Dazien finished them, along with the box of evidence he had handed over that included the vile necklace of his mother’s eye, and added, “I can understand what might drive you to them as well in this case. Though, I am glad to hear you denouncing that path… for now.”
“Nobody knows what the future may hold, but I hope to be a just leader. While this might not have followed the proper procedures of law, I hope that the victims of this cultist feel that justice was dealt.”
“Vengeance is never justice, even if justice may appear as vengeance,” the Judge replied gently, “My only relief is that when the Avenger himself is involved, the punishment is limited to the crime committed and removes much of the impassioned rage that can cause us mortals to disproportionately punish those who may have wronged us. Justice is meant to bring closure and restore the balance. Revenge usually doesn’t care about this; they just want to see the other person hurt more than them.”
Dazien nodded, equally solemn as he admitted, “There were moments that I wished that… I don’t think I would like the person I would have become if I followed those urges, though. I have seen the destruction that unbridled rage can cause,” he paused as his thoughts wandered to his partner and he added, “They burn themselves in the process.”
The Judge smiled and nodded, “I’m glad you seem to already understand that,” she lifted the Sigil again and said, “Thank you for delivering this, Noble Wayland, along with your testimony. We’ll be in touch if further questions need answering, but I believe my goddess will try to make this as painless as possible for you.”
“Thank you, Your Honor,” Dazien replied and gave a respectful bow before leaving to rejoin Rayna, who was waiting for him outside the room.
“Can we go back to the others now?” she loudly complained.
He gave a more genuine chuckle that time and nodded, “Yes, though I would appreciate it if we kept what happened tonight quiet for a while. I’m sure your sister is still grieving, and Phoenix is already seeming overwhelmed by all this attention; we don’t need to add to their worries.”
Rayna’s eyes narrowed at him, and he thought she might refuse, so he added quietly, “I also need some time to process without either of them smothering me with questions or concerns. I’ll let everyone know when I’m ready to talk about it. Promise.”
She slowly nodded, “Fine, but don’t wait too long; otherwise, I’m gonna sic Sai on you and make sure that she won’t let you run away from dealing with this.”
As they walked down the bustling hall of mostly guards, Rayna asked him, “Are you gonna tell Uriel sooner?”
He grimaced slightly, “I don’t think so… he’d probably blame himself for it somehow. He still needs to recover from what we all went through, too. I know that brought a lot of terrible memories crashing back on him.”
“I know I don’t know everything you two have been through together, but I saw how broken he looked down there in that cage, and when you—”
“Saved Padma’s life?” he interjected flatly.
“Yeah, and the cost of that,” she finished, returning his pointed look.
He gave a sigh, “I just want to get back home and sleep all of this off with him beside me,” he admitted, “Hopefully, he’ll be his usual quiet self and be satisfied with leaving the heavy talk for tomorrow.”
Rayna snorted a laugh, “I guess that’s one way to avoid uncomfortable discussions.”
He couldn’t help shaking his head and smiling at the irony of the situation as he admitted, “Except usually it’s me wanting to have the uncomfortable talk and him trying to get me to just shut up and sleep.”
She laughed louder at that, “You both are such opposites, it almost seems like a miracle that you two are actually in a relationship like that. How have you not broken up a dozen times by now?”
Dazien grimaced, “Honestly, I think that comes down to those honest conversations and our own stubbornness. It might also be that we just simply can’t picture a future without each other in it any longer… at least, I can’t.”
“Well, I know I joke and tease a lot, but I, for one, hope that never changes. It’s nice to see the level of loyalty you two normally have towards one another.”
“Is this your roundabout way of trying to convince me to tell him about what happened tonight?”
Rayna grinned at him, “You were the one who said the honest conversations kept you going all this time,” she pointed out.
He groaned, realizing she was right, “Abyss… you really can’t just let me have a night of peace, can you?”
“Please, you guys will talk, argue, cry, kiss, do a little dance between the blankets, and then you can have that exhausted sleep.”
“Are you seriously only into women? Because you seem to talk about us a lot like that and picturing—”
“Oh, ew, no, stop suggesting that!”