Knight Captain Barnabas stroked his nonexistent stubble. "I hate to lose an adjutant. But we are headed straight home and I don't need all nineteen of you to carry what is left of our armors. If you're sure, you are free to go."

Maeve inclined her head. "Yes Captain. I'll coordinate with the demon if I-"

"Lady Veils. She’s more than an ally. And that will be all Adjutant. You don't need to justify it to me.” The Captain pressed a palm down on her shoulder, grounding her. “You’ve done well today. Now go help who you can, but know your limits."

"Thank you Captain."

“Don’t thank me yet.” Captain Barnabas took a swing from his flask before unfastening a small pamphlet and handing it to Maeve. “You’re going to be operating without a disciplined support network or Magitech Armor. You will need this to properly [identify] assets and threats in the field. Have Faith in yourself, but know your limits.”

Maeve accepted the pamphlet before beginning to study it. It taught the nuances of a perception skill, a dangerous thing. Unspoken was the expectation that she would have to rely on the harrowing process of bargaining with mana in order to use such a skill.

Perception skills were useful in all sorts of ways, but anyone attempting to Focus such a skill on a demon or monster that required a Magitech Armor to confront would be rendered useless after attempting to make sense out of an entity too powerful and complex. No matter the soul price of the skill, she could do far worse than accept it.

Maeve gained knowledge of a new skill. [Identify]

Saving lives was one thing. In their most desperate moments, everyone relied upon mana to save the lives of others and themselves. No Outrider would be dispatched without ranks in Defense and one other protective skill.

As an Adjutant, Maeve volunteered to be trained in First Aid. The thought of being able to save one more life by identifying a threat or using mana to heal one more person was invaluable.

Working with a demon on the other hand. Well, the taller one had saved the lives of everyone here. This particular one had the Knight Commander’s vote of confidence for some reason. Should she have pressed for details?

She watched as the fox tailed demon circled the pile of burned feathers left behind by the Avenging Angel Calamity before turning to scan the sky.

Already the red wings were making towards a distant layer of clouds. Finding their destination would prove difficult.

If it was possible at all, the Demon would likely know away.

Maeve approached this Miss Veils at a hopefully nonthreatening pace, palms open and at her side. As the demon turned to face her, Maeve noticed a tail rising to hide her expressions, leaving only a pair of silver eyes couched in deep black sclera to judge the demon’s reactions and intent.

Miss Veils’ ears suddenly perked up, drawing Maeve’s attention further upwards. Why did this particular demon remind her of a Northern Fox?

“Have the relations between Barnabas and I soured so swiftly in my absence that he cannot greet me himself?”

Maeve winced at that. Even Maeve had not gotten used to the Captain’s new name yet. Not even a month had passed and already this Demon both knew and spoke it casually. “Um. I did not get that impression at all. I got the sense that there is a history between you two, but he did not seem to recognize you when you first arrived.” Maeve awkwardly shuffled her weight from one foot to the other. “I just came to thank you. Bar-, the Captain is returning the unit of armors home. Anyone he doesn’t need can stay and help. So I thought I’d…”

“She promised to save all of you. There at the end.”

Maeve raised an eyebrow. “Soleil? She said that?”

The silver eyes of Lady Veils gazed at Maeve expectantly. “Irellia is a very dear friend of hers. My daughter would have likely leapt to your defense either way, but we demons do not break promises lightly.”

Maeve felt her cheeks grow warm. “She knows the Knight Commander?”

“Of course. They grew up together. Before I ascended to status as Demon Lord, I made my home here in the Grove.”

“Oh wow. That’s uh.” Maeve suddenly set her jaw in determination. “I’m coming with you.”

“Oh?”

“I wanted to thank you. For saving us I mean. But if you’re going after her. I want to thank her myself.” Without really intending to, Maeve found her pressing a fist to her chest as she did so. Not that a demon would recognize the gesture.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

The fox demon’s eyebrows raised ever so slightly. “Very well. Let’s get a look at you.” The demon’s eyes flashed blue as she allowed mana to alter her body’s ability to perceive the world around her.

Maeve cringed away from the invasive perception skill. But then Lady Veils reached for another skill, drawing a number of motes of ice before her. Five concentrated masses of ice mana began to dance and shape at the demon’s command, until Maeve could read her stats carved into a single sheet of ice.

Name: Maeve

Class: Guardian

Soul Level: 2

Skill Points Available: 0

~Attributes~

Vitality: 25/25

Endurance: 15/15

Focus: 10/10

Strength: 15/15

Dexterity: 10/10

Faith: 10/10

~Internalized Skills~

Defense: Rank 1

First Aid: Rank 1

~Covenant~

Everqueen’s Chosen: Rank 1

“I’m… not interested in how mana sees me.” Maeve shuddered at the idea that everyone was ranked and judged in ways irrelevant to how they chose to live without mana’s direct involvement. It always struck her as an one sided system of working alongside mana.

Back home in the north, they called it the Demon’s bargain for a number of reasons.

“A shame.” Lady Veils said. “It is rare I come across one of the Everqueen’s faithful.”

Maeve felt her whole head burn hot at that.

“Forget I mentioned it.”

“No.” Maeve interrupted the demon. “It’s alright. The Knight Commander. Um, Irellia is the reason I joined the Outriders and pledged my faith to the Everqueen. Demons and mana aren’t all bad. I know that. Things would be a lot worse if we didn’t have you protecting us from ourselves.”

“You should tell Irellia that. Next time you see her.” Lady Veils lowered her tails and offered Maeve a small smile. “Please. Call me Veilura. If you are going to join my daughter and I, we cannot accept you being overly formal.”

“Uh. Yeah. Thanks. I’ll try and keep it in mind.”

“Come along then. Maeve was it?”

“Yes ma’am. I mean, Veilura.”

***

They did not have to wander blindly for long.

Soleil falling out of the sky and catching on fire before disappearing into the tree line gave them a very distinct destination. With no sign of Calamity descending after her, Veilura channeled mana into her custom painted Emissary magitech armor.

Unfortunately, they could not afford to leave the cart’s supplies behind and unguarded. Not when entering a stretch of the forest thick with corruption.

“Do you think you could handle cutting us a path?” Veilura asked.

The path went off road from here, vines thick with thorns and all manner of sharp ends that could come alive and threaten to reach for the magitech armor at any moment.

Maeve’s armor was made for turning aside sharp attacks.

The magitech armor would only need to have an appendage slip between the armored plating in order to begin to corrupt and turn it against them.

“Yeah. I don’t need mana. Not for this.” Maeve said, crawling down from the cart seat and drawing her sword.

Any mobile vine or branch earned her sword’s ire first. It would do no good to open herself up to attacks of opportunity or attempts to trip her when she was not looking.

Veilura for her part stayed on the cart, gathering and shaping shards of floating ice to impale anything that reached for the cart’s wheels or the vital supplies.

Going was torturously slow.

But not once did Veilura complain due to a lack of mana. Maeve was secretly glad that this demon lord was on their side. The amount of mana she was commanding was absolutely monstrous by any metric applied to it.

Finding where Veilura fell was simple enough. They needed only to follow the smoke and flames.

Their pace slowed even more at that point. Only Veilura and the magitech armor’s [Frost beam] allowed them to make much headway.

With a Soul Level of 2, Maeve could do precious little against a corrupted forest fire.

Eventually Veilura decided that she should take over both attack and defense. Maeve’s job would be to use the Emissary to reach Soleil the moment she came into view. She had even been provided with a number of Vitality, Endurance, and Focus droughts to ensure that both Maeve and Soleil would be alright.

“We should be getting close.” Veilura shouted from the cart.

“I see her.” Maeve said, voice shuddering.

She reached deep within herself, uttered a silent prayer to the Everqueen, and bargained away her Focus in order to [identify] the girl laying amidst the charred remains of a clearing.

Name: Soleil

Classification: Ash Demon

Covenant: Calamitous Herald

Status: Minor Corruption

“Oh no.” Maeve poured everything she had into urging the Emissary through the expanding flames, heedless of the risk.

Soleil lay in a pile of red feathers miraculously unscathed by the forest fire that had clearly originated where she had landed.

Maeve leaped from atop the Emissary and lifted Soleil into her arms. “You had better be okay.”