Not to Cause Offense Ch. 02

"Excuse me?"

"Oh! That probably sounds derogatory, doesn't it?" Thaddeus sputtered, looking embarrassed. "That's just the colloquial term for them, but if you wanted to get technical—"

"Gods above..." Terin groaned, looking just as embarrassed. "And you do this absolutely barbaric thing even at the expense of human decency?"

"Oh! She isn't human, I assure you," Thaddeus quickly corrected. "My lord doesn't enslave human mages, gods no! That woman in your room is likely close to a quarter nymph or possibly even dryad."

"Does that matter?"

"To some, yes."

"But why?" Terin asked, exasperated. "Why go through so much trouble to bind me—against my will—to a slave I don't even want? And a slave of such remarkable power?"

"This is just a guess," Thaddeus began, looking suspiciously around the room. "And I wasn't going to tell you this much, so please keep it quiet. But my lord has gone through twelve monster hunters before you and if the rumors are true, King Ordin is growing impatient. It's possible that he's threatened to intervene should this next attempt at addressing the situation fail. My lord is in absolutely dire straits—the women of this city are going mad, his citizens are attempting to flee the domain, and his fellow lords are mocking him at court."

"In other words, he can't afford for me to fail," Terin growled, his eyes alight with rage. "Tell me, Thaddeus: Were you ordered to recruit just any monster hunter or did Lord Vareill request me specifically?"

"He asked for you specifically," Thaddeus admitted, hanging his head.

"Which means he knows my background and understands full well that I would never agree to taking on a slave mage."

"Most probably, yes."

"So instead, he does it behind my back and without my permission," Terin spat, and he suddenly noticed that his hands were shaking. It appeared that Thaddeus had noticed too, for he looked absolutely terrified. "Then of course, he bullies me into taking on this curse disguised as a "gift." No wonder he was so off-put by my initial refusal—he had already bound us!"

"That, uh, that would be my guess. Yes."

With a groan, Terin looked over at the woman chained beside his bed—her eyes filled with hate and the magic gathered about her restraints polluted with fear. Contract or no, he would not allow Lord Vareill to forcibly bind him to another human being. Turning on his heel, Terin headed toward the main room without so much as a word of warning. He could hear Thaddeus cursing at him from behind, then the man was scrambling to cut him off and blocking the door to the hall.

"Get out of my way, Thaddeus."

"No!" Thaddeus cried, looking like he might piss himself from fear. But he refused to move just the same. "I know what you're going to do and you can't!"

"I can and I will," Terin replied coldly. "Now get out of my way."

"If you refuse the gift, she dies!" Thaddeus practically screamed. "You can't change the past, but you get to decide what to do about it."

"I won't play your master's sick games," Terin hissed. "Our meridians have been linked—do you have any idea what that means?"

"You walk out that door, and it's murder," Thaddeus told him. "If you're going to end her, at least don't be a coward about it and do it with your own blade."

It was those words that finally snapped Terin out of it. He had been so angry it had been hard to see straight, but Thaddeus was right.

"Can I at least have the bond lifted?" Terin sighed.

"You could ask. But even that could be interpreted as dissatisfaction and Lord Vareill—"

"—will use any leverage he has to keep me in line. I get it."

"Do you need anything before I take my leave?"

"No," Terin told him, glancing dejectedly toward the bedroom. "I'll figure something out."

"Very well, Monster Hunter."

"...and Thaddeus?"

"Yes?"

"Be honest with me. Why would you risk so much for a woman you don't even know?"

"Those of us living on the bottom rung have to look out for each other," Thaddeus said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "I advise you to do your job, get your gold, and run. There is darkness in this place. Don't let yourself get acclimated."

Then Thaddeus was gone. The rain had stopped and it was now quiet save for the ticking of the clock in the main room and the crackling of the fireplace. Truthfully, Terin wanted nothing more than to sink into a warm bed and fall asleep to the lull of those sounds, but there was a strange woman chained up in his room and he couldn't afford to ignore her. Grimacing, he returned to the bedroom, hoping she might be gone and that this was all just a terrible dream, but no such luck. She was kneeling on the floor with her arms still secured behind her back and those same terrible eyes were burrowing straight through him.

Does she never blink? Terin thought, both unsettled and impressed. Gods above, hear my prayer...

Trying hard not to stare back, Terin went to inspect the rest of the room and noticed that the woman was following him with her eyes. No, that wasn't right. She was tracking him, much like a predator would. Feeling rather uncomfortable, Terin tried to ignore the sinking feeling in his chest and walked around the side of the bed to check for any shady enchantments that may be hidden in the floorboards. But when he turned back around, he could see that the woman's eyes were still haunting him. He took a few steps forward, then one back, and watched as her head mirrored his movements exactly.

"Alright," Terin sighed. "Let's have a chat."

Moving across the room, Terin situated himself on the bed directly in front of her. He didn't like being so close to the woman, but there were at least three feet from the end of her lead to the toe of his boot and he figured that was a fair compromise. She narrowed her eyes at him and Terin could feel his eyes narrow in right back. She must know that he hadn't asked for any of this and her unjustified hatred was starting to get on his nerves.

"Look," Terin began, taking a deep breath. "I know you heard all of that—the discussion between Thaddeus and I. I don't like this anymore than you do, but it looks like we're stuck with each other. So, if you could maybe stop looking at me like that, I would appreciate it." But the woman only continued to stare at him, her lips unbearably still. "Come on now, at least tell me your name?"

The woman wouldn't answer him, but there were symbols engraved in the golden collar she was wearing. Terin didn't recognize the writing exactly, but it was similar to a version of Hellbane he'd studied at the Archives in Garoiathe. He figured he'd be off by a syllable or two, but a close guess was better than nothing. Terin couldn't just refer to her as "that woman" for a whole month.

"So you're...Ahlaya?" Terin asked, and her eyes quirked in surprise, but she still didn't say anything. "This is your one chance to correct me if I'm wrong." And yet, the woman didn't make a sound. "I know you can talk," Terin growled. "I have the sight and there is no magic sealing your lips shut."

"Ahlyra," the woman blurted, and Terin almost jumped from the bed. "I'm Ahlyra."

"That's...that's wonderful! Thank you, and Ahlyra really is a lovely name."

"I am Ahlyra!" the woman screamed, and this time Terin really did jump off of the bed. Her voice had taken on a dark, yet methodical tone and the magic circling her ankles and neck had turned an inky purple color. "I am Ahlyra, and I swear by the dirt of Valenhue that I shall—"

Suddenly, the room was filled with the blood-curdling sound of her screams and then there was nothing. The woman fell sideways onto the floor and her eyes had rolled back into her skull. Mumbling to himself, Terin knelt beside her and felt her carotid pulse, but as he suspected, she was only unconscious. It seemed that the relics restraining her magic were also programmed to punish her should she attempt to use it out of turn. If Terin had guessed right, she had tried to curse him, likely using her true name as collateral and the sacred ground of her homeland as an anchor point.

"Stupid," Terin mumbled, looking down at her crumpled form and shaking his head. "She must have known that would happen."

There was no point in trying to reason with an unconscious woman, so Terin set to work making her comfortable instead. He grabbed a pillow from the bed and eased it under her head, then tucked the billowy maroon comforter around her near-naked body and untied her wrists. She had been shivering something awful and her perfect, pale skin had been covered in goosebumps, but now she looked almost peaceful. Terin stepped back to observe his work and found himself entranced by the rhythmic sound of her breathing. It was hard to fathom that someone so small and so soft could also be so dangerous. He could barely make her out beneath all the fluff.

How did I let this happen? Terin wondered, watching the light from the candelabra flicker over her features. Why didn't I notice it? And for so long, too?

Terin understood why he couldn't see their bond, of course. The sight enabled him to visualize the manipulation of mana otherwise known as magic, but in its raw form, mana was as invisible to him as it was to everyone else. It didn't matter that his meridians had been linked to another's. He wouldn't be able to see that link unless it was actively being used and he was paying attention. But Terin also couldn't feel their bond and the realization was genuinely unnerving. There was one and only one feasible explanation for that—Lord Vareill must have placed the spiritual burden of their link squarely on the slave girl's shoulders. It would have been unbearably cruel to do so, but Terin wasn't sure that cruelty counted as a deterrent in Castle Ardor.

Thinking back, he soon found himself contemplating that first encounter in the throne room. Ahlyra had been full of hate from the very beginning, but the hatred had intensified the instant she'd locked eyes with him. At the time, Terin hadn't been able to comprehend her anger—how could someone he didn't even know despise him with such passion? But it was all coming together now. Ahlyra was always able to feel the torturous spiritual violation binding them together. And yet, she wasn't able to piece together who was on the other end of that bond until Terin showed up. Maybe he hadn't asked for any of this, but did that really matter? In terms of perspective, Ahlyra could only ever see him as the leech draining her life force for his own personal gain and at the expense of her bodily integrity. Nothing Terin said could undue that terrible reality.

Getting her to trust me will be difficult, Terin thought, smiling ruefully at the obscenity of the understatement. But even so, I have to try.

After blowing out the candles in the bedroom, Terin tiptoed to the door and shut it as carefully as he could, now with a new plan in mind. His scarily murderous slave girl wasn't too terribly talkative, but she'd said more than enough to justify a bit of research—nevermind Thaddeus, the woman wasn't part dryad and even less likely part nymph. Scouring the bookshelves, Terin tried to see if he could find anything on the ancient languages, but what he did was frightfully shallow in scope. It was beginning to look bleak, up until he spotted a tiny, leaflet-thin hardcover wrapped in gray cloth. It was so small and inconspicuous that he had almost missed it, but it was exactly what Terin needed. The book covered non-human sentients from the ancient order, plus some cartography both before and after The Fall.

"Perfect," Terin grinned, flipping open the tattered gray volume. "And...there it is!"

As he suspected, the book's size was rather deceptive. Terin could fit the entire thing in the pocket of his trousers, but each page was filled with tens of thousands of characters in print so small that it was impossible to read them with the naked eye. Luckily for him, there was a seer stone in one of the little cabinets squashed between each shelving unit. It had been enchanted with a translator, but Terin had always found those to be rather clumsy.

"Now let's see..." Terin mumbled to himself, once he'd finally flipped his way to a Valenhue reference and had started running the seer stone over the page. "Just as I thought—she's got Fae blood in her veins." Given the writing on her collar, that made the most sense. The Fae were descended from demonkind, so their language was unsurprisingly similar to Hellbane. "Incredible..."

During his studies, Terin had mostly focused on non-sentients of the modern era. Still, he knew enough of the ancients' texts to get the gist of their natural history. If he remembered correctly, the world became accessible to the Firelands long before humankind emerged, largely in the form of portals linking their realm to the terrestrial plane. A certain percentage of the visiting demons then started settlements all across the globe, but mostly in Hearthliea and Valenhue. Eventually, centuries of evolution in a strange and foreign land split their lineage and birthed a new species known as the "Fae," a fearsome breed with extraordinary magical abilities. So powerful was their magic that nearly all Fae became aware of their "true name" sometime around puberty, while most mages could spend decades searching for theirs and still come up empty-handed. More importantly, the Fae had been largely hunted to extinction not long after human beings had finally stepped onto the scene. Those who remained lived out their lives in heavily enchanted spacetime warps, most often hidden in dense, dark forest regions where few men dared to tread.

Thinking darkly, Terin realized that there was still one teeny, tiny little thing bothering him. Maybe it wasn't exactly uncommon for a warrior to be gifted a mage slave, but a mage slave with Fae blood? Those were extraordinarily rare and far too precious to give away as handouts, especially when a quarter-nymph would have sufficed. Terin had spent enough time among the blue bloods to know that they always saved the very best for themselves—wine, clothing, land, weapons. It didn't matter, so long as they had the ability to one-up anyone who might challenge their status. So why would Lord Vareill give Terin a slave with such potential, one he undoubtedly wanted to keep for himself? There had to be an explanation, but no matter how Terin looked at it, the finer details simply wouldn't line up. Some part of the story was still missing and yet it would be useless to dwell without more information.

Still pondering, Terin replaced the book, then set about touring his accommodations one last time. He was exhausted, but it wouldn't do to fall asleep before conducting a more thorough inspection of the premises. Who knows what sorts of spells Lord Vareill might have had implanted? An hour went by and when he was finished, it seemed that there wasn't any nefarious magic. But Lord Vareill had left his new longsword atop the mantle, along with a little coin purse and enough gold to last him six months. He decided to equip the weapon later, only after he'd had time to properly assess its power. Then the chandeliers went dark of their own accord and the rain started up again not long after. Shedding his iron-plated leather armor, Terin laid down beside the fire and rested his head on his arm. So much for sleeping in a warm bed, but he wasn't about to let his guard down anywhere near the Fae woman. With one hand clutching the handle of his now sheathed sword, he drifted off to sleep and the darkness of his mind was absolute.

Bang! Bang! BANG!

Acting purely on instinct, Terin leapt from the ground and felt the heft of an unsheathed blade in his hands. A noise of some kind had startled him awake and he needed to prepare himself. Bandits were the most likely candidate on the road between provinces, but it was too dark to see anything. The fire must have died down sometime during the night and now only embers remained. Cursing, Terin reached into his pocket for the illuminator...but it was gone! The rain pounding against the windows rang in his ears like a thousand incessant plings and gurgles, then the air suddenly grew cold and stale. Terin could feel the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end and his insides were roiling. To his horror, the plings and gurgles had begun to merge, combining to form a cacophony of angry, unintelligible chatter of the sort that sounds a lot like nonsense, but only at first.

Terin knew that chatter. It sometimes followed him home from the ether of his nightmares, tainting the daylight with damp, and rot, and darkness. He thought he caught a whiff of wet stone and then centuries-old, crusted black mold. There was a hole in his heart where nothingness dwelled, but then why did it feel so heavy? Soon the earth was tilting underneath his feet, until he could no longer tell which way was up and which way was Hell. He didn't want things to end like this, especially not in a place so cold and so far from home. No one would ever find his body, let alone know where to look. The whole room seemed to be rapidly losing air and then—

"—hey!" a voice cried from just outside, and Terin felt the earth beneath his feet instantly grow still. "Hey, are you still awake?"

And now, Terin remembered. He wasn't on the road anymore and even farther from...well, that unspeakable place. More importantly, there was light, he just needed to go looking for it. But yes! The crack under the main door glowed a bright orange and the clouds beyond the windows were bathed in the pale, milky luster of the moon. Rather than dirt or stone, the stuff beneath his feet was carpeting and the air was tinged with the sweet scent of lavender. Terin sighed in relief and willed his heart to grow still, but someone was still pounding on the door and, judging by the urgency of those knocks, it must be important. He was a light sleeper, so the unwelcome guest couldn't have been there long. Yet you'd think the whole world had caught fire given all the commotion.

"Gods above..." Terin groaned, rubbing the bridge of his nose and looking toward the doorway. "Ereis and Orillix, what trials have you presented me with now?"

"Um, helllooooo?" continued the voice, sounding agitated, and the quality of the knocking almost doubled in frequency and volume. "Yoohoo, is anyone in there?"

"Give me a moment!" Terin hissed, easing carefully toward the doorway with his blade still drawn. Whoever it was clearly belonged in the castle and had free reign of the guests' quarters, but that was no reason to let his guard down. "State your name and your purpose."

"Wow, everyone was right; you're a bit of a stick in the mud, aren't you?"

"Your name and purpose. Now!"

"Jira Ven-loral. And my purpose is that I'm super bored."

Thoroughly irritated, Terin swung open the door, only to be faced with a scraggly-haired Felinix woman in leather armor and with two massive cleaver-style falchion blades strapped to her back. There was an angular, feline grin on her face and her sharpened canines glistened almost sinisterly in the light. Initially, that made Terin nervous, but both of the tawny ears peaking out from behind her short brown locks were pointed forwards and the matching tail was raised in a friendly question mark. With her hands on her hips and her bright green eyes twinkling, she looked the very picture of predatory, but in that playful way only cats can ever pull off.

"Sup?"

"Sup?" Terin repeated, feeling both frustrated and bewildered at the same time. "You're the one who was banging on my door!"