Category: Quest 2: Limits of Loyalty
Quest 2.22: Resolution
The uproar over the demons in that ex-mercenary building had derailed the Fey Council meeting for what Ami estimated was around two weeks. But with no further news about the demon “tea party” coming out of the area, the discussion was really a lot of baseless rumors, speculation, and just general stereotypes and distrust of demons. She was getting restless for something of actual consequence to happen.
Preferably the end of the meeting. She was pretty sure that she and William had been away from home for around a month total at that point. She’d been making it a point ever since their disappearance the year before to keep at least enough money for a couple months’ rent in her emergency savings just in case she anticipated being gone for a while and had to pay in advance. She’d done just that before leaving, so she wasn’t worried about her apartment just yet. But it didn’t make her feel better about being gone so long. And, besides, she had only paid one month in advance. She didn’t want this dragging on much longer, especially if nothing useful was being discussed.
She was just starting to consider asking Zephyr to excuse them from the rest of the meeting when the Dragon Lord called the gathered Fey nobles back to order in order to finish discussing the items on the agenda. Apparently she wasn’t the only one anxious to leave, because the rest of the meeting passed smoothly and even some of the individuals who’d been argumentative in the beginning of the meeting made helpful suggestions. By what she estimated was Friday, four weeks after they first got to Myrrellisein, the meeting was officially drawing to a close.
Quest 2.21: Whirlwind Week
Monday, the day after Risa first appeared before the Overcurrent Council about the treaty, was spent almost entirely in that meeting room. She thoroughly explained her intentions to the Council, pulling examples when necessary from the old treaty regarding the Angels and the treaty between the OC and Ilise’s group of demons. She lay down the points that were important to her in the new treaty and stressed where she absolutely wouldn’t budge. They all took a night to digest and process the information. On Tuesday, the Council asked questions of her. Which actually wasn’t as bad as she’d been expecting since they had mostly thoughtful questions about what benefits the treaty could bring them.
Wednesday was a day off for her since the Council wanted time to itself to review and discuss amongst themselves. Risa wound up visiting her brother and Nine that morning. She introduced Alistair and Myrris and they all chatted for a bit, during which Risa wound up teasing her brother about the way he talked about his meeting Hyacinth’s sister. She thought it was cute that he seemed to have made a friend all on his own (sure, it wasn’t the first time, but she was his younger sister; she was allowed to be a pain in the ass). In the afternoon, she and Chel took Myrris on a tour of the city. Of course, Rick was there too since he was supposed to escort/spy on them when they were anywhere outside of the Council Hall or Guard buildings. They got a lot of stares and things, but otherwise nothing of note happened.
Thursday they were back with the Council. That was the day that they really got into the negotiations. The Council brought up their concerns and the points that they wanted worked into the treaty. Risa resisted the urge to call them all selfish fucks. She did relish the moment where that one perpetually angry council member thought he had her backed into a corner where she’d have to agree to letting the Council have the right to terminate unconditionally any Angels that were deemed “a threat” (like the order they’d put out regarding killing her). When she, quite calmly and in an innocent tone of voice asked, “Oh, like you did with those demons that used to live in the compound outside Reinvale which is now totally empty of anything living?”, that man did a rather lovely impersonation of a puffer fish.
Quest 2.20: Home Visit
“By the way, dude,” Risa spoke up, breaking the silence that had settled among them as they were leaving the Council Hall. She took a couple steps closer to Rick so that he’d know she was talking to him. “Sorry if this puts you in a bad position with your superiors. I didn’t really think that something like letting me stay in your house might make the Council suspicious of you.”
“Don’t worry about it; I’m hoping that my record is enough to outweigh any current suspicion.” Rick’s smile had a surprising hint of mischief in it. “Besides, William’s my cousin and I have Chel for a sister; I’m surprised they still trust me enough to assign me to protect the capital.”
She couldn’t help but laugh at that. “So you do have a sense of humor. I knew there had to be a reason that my brother likes you.”
Quest 2.19: Stuffy Old Castle
Risa and Myrris made their way back to the trees where they stashed their stuff. They camped another night in the woods and then, in the morning, got dressed to head to Reinvale. Risa had brought her Guard uniform with her on her trip with Zane, just in case she needed it at some point. She changed into it, threading the neck ribbon through her ring like she had in Everfier. Myrris changed into a dark-green dress that managed to look casual while still conveying that its wearer had a high status. Myrris shot her a small smile, but didn’t say anything. After they were both ready, they packed up and started walking without saying a word.
They hadn’t spoken since the night before. When Risa killed that demon, Ilise. Despite being back in her human form, Risa could still feel the blood of that demon on her teeth, could still taste it. She didn’t think she’d ever be able to take a fox form again without retching. Maybe she should have chosen to kill the demon in a form that she wasn’t attached to. Or through some other method that didn’t involve using teeth. She hadn’t really been thinking totally straight at the time.
She sighed and ran a hand through her hair. They were getting close to the city gates. She dismissed the concealment spell she had active. It wasn’t as nerve-wracking as going into Everfier with her brother that first day. She couldn’t tell if that was because coming to Reinvale still always felt like coming home or because she more or less knew what to expect and was prepared for it. Or it could have been because she was just too damn exhausted to care.
Quest 2.18: Foxplorations
(Author’s Note: When characters talk while in non-human forms, I like to use italics to indicate that they aren’t speaking normally. However, in this chapter almost all dialogue will take place between characters in non-human forms. In order to keep it readable, I’m not going to use italics.)
Risa figured that the journey between Trancyllis and Reinvale probably could have taken them less than the one week and three days that it did. If she hadn’t insisted on taking that same circuitous route around the territories that they’d taken to get to Trancyllis from Lenisyrr. Then once they made it to the Overcurrent, she’d insisted on sticking to areas that she knew wouldn’t have much air traffic and had low populations that wouldn’t really pay attention to the sky. She didn’t want anyone knowing she was in the Overcurrent until she was ready for them to know.
Which was why she’d had a spell to conceal her energy active since they’d left the Trancyllis area. And was also why she landed deep in the forest north of Reinvale. The compound where the demons who’d given up on hunting humans lived was in that forest. Also in that forest? The lab where Risa had spent much of her life as an Angel. That wasn’t a coincidence. The Angel project had come before those demons made their treaty with Reinvale.
She still remembered the uproar it had caused. No one in Reinvale really wanted demons living nearby, even if they had sworn off eating souls. Not like anyone believed them about that. But the Overcurrent Council and Guard couldn’t really pass up an opportunity to study and learn from those demons. If they could find a way to neutralize demon magic… It was a chance to potentially rid the Overcurrent of the threat of demons forever.
Quest 2.17: About a Tea Party
By Ami’s calculations, it had been about two weeks to the day since she and William had met Amaryllis outside Reinvale. There still was no clear indication of when the meeting would end and she had no way to contact their boss back in the Mid-grounds in order to give her an update. Not that she’d even know what to say besides apologizing profusely. If Ami was her boss, she’d probably have fired them both long ago. She felt so guilty about taking advantage of their boss’ extreme kindness.
Which was why she was getting annoyed at all the whining and selfishness during that day’s topic of choice (it had also been topic of choice of the day before and looked like it would probably also be the next day’s topic of choice). That topic was the number of guards in the central territory, Myrrellis. Because it was the location of the capital city, Myrrellis was governed jointly by all the members of the Fey Council. Which meant that they needed a majority vote to solve any problems there. Which apparently meant that not much got accomplished regarding Myrrellis. It also meant that many of the territorial lords seemed to think that it was perfectly ok to recruit guards out of the Myrrellis force into their own.
Quest 2.16: Demon Mice and Murder
Mice were one of those animals that could be found in almost every layer that Zane had visited. “Almost” because there was nothing close to mice in the layer that he was born in. But every other layer had a few mice species running around. Which was why none of the mercenaries lounging in the main hall of their headquarters in Trancyllis who happened to spot the two dark mice scurrying along the rafters paid them any attention. Which was the point, really. Why waste time coming up with an elaborate plan to break in when you could just suppress your aura and change into an unremarkable yet useful shape? No building was truly impossible for a mouse to enter. Thus, no building was truly impossible for a demon to enter.
Zane turned his head slightly to make eye contact with Caelan. They were using these forms to get a sense of the building’s layout and take stock of how many mercenaries they would be dealing with. Things that they theoretically could do by extending their senses. However, just as a shifted form much larger than his natural one took more energy to maintain, so did taking a much smaller form. They didn’t need to be using extra energy to map with their other senses what they could see with their eyes.
Quest 2.15: Past Self Fail
They were silent as they waited for Elora to return. As the time stretched on, Caelan frowned and set his tea aside. He stood and headed down after his mate. Was he going to help? Zane laughed, which made Risa think that this was a common occurrence. Like when Risa used Zane as a coat rack when they got back to their apartment. Or made him put books away at the library. Or flailed her cup at him until he went to get her a drink so that she wouldn’t have to take her eyes off of her code.
Elora came back several moments later. She had a scroll open in her hands that she seemed to be reading. She was followed closely by Caelan, who was juggling an awkward-sized basket of more scrolls and books while also steering Elora in the right direction. Risa was pretty sure that there were stairs leading up out of the cave. Had Elora been reading while going up those stairs? Just asking the question made Risa feel jealous of Elora’s coordination. She would have fallen flat on her face at least once. At least.
Quest 2.14: The Most Awkward-some Tea Party Ever
Risa was grateful that they were having their tea and snacks outside instead of down in Elora and Caelan’s underground home. Not that there was anything wrong with underground cave homes. It’s just being underground didn’t leave much room to escape in case things became too awkward. Which they just might, seeing how over the top friendly Elora was being. It was like the woman had completely forgotten her earlier hesitations. Except that she totally hadn’t. That much was obvious in the tenseness that Risa could see in Elora’s posture whenever she got close to offer Risa refreshments. And the fact that most of these smiles were forced. Or all of them. It was hard to tell.
Which was why Risa was so glad for the tea party picnic on the grass outside the entrance to the underground home. So many ways to escape. Not that she wanted to. This tea was delicious and the snacks Elora and Ginko brought out were amazing. Seriously. And it turned out that those were only the first of many more (presumably delicious) snacks to come. Eating awesome things was definitely worth dealing with some awkwardness.
Quest 2.13: Sidequest, part 2
It took them almost a week to travel from southeastern Lenisyrr to Trancyllis. It could have taken them less time, but Zane insisted they travel a longer path around the territories and along the base of the mountain range that housed the dragon capital. Even though confirmation of their presence in the Fey Lands would be spreading quickly, especially after the encounter with the mercenaries, he still didn’t think it was a good idea to get close to Myrrellisein. Risa had to admit that he was probably right. She wasn’t happy about it, but she wasn’t going to put them in danger just because she was pissed about Zane winning some stupid bet that she never agreed to in the first place. Side note: Zane would pay for that.
As soon as he got back.
They’d gotten into the Trancyllis area early that morning. Risa wasn’t really sure why she was still keeping track, but it was probably Tuesday. Zane left shortly after their arrival to seek information in the city. He asked her and Myrris to wait in the forest that dominated the hills outside of Trancyllis. More specifically, he asked them to wait on the edge of the clearing that she had found to land in. So they waited. She ate a granola bar for breakfast and made a fire so that Myrris could cook a freshly arrow-ed small, miscellaneous forest creature. They waited more as the sun continued to climb higher in the sky. Risa moved them to a different edge of the clearing as their shade started to betray them. It quickly became apparent that the clearing and its edges would be too sunny and too hot if Zane didn’t get back soon. She wondered what was more important to Zane: her comfort or his ability to find her again after he got back. Actually, she didn’t really care.
Unlockable Content 