It took a bit, but eventually we were joined by others. First were the green guards of the warehouse. Most of them were skittish, and given the number of their comrades who were now corpses I couldn’t blame them, but with some pointed glares from Cecilia and corralling from Ignas they eventually took places guarding the men.

  Faith took the opportunity to check on Kilik who was leaning against the wall opposite mine, occasionally rubbing his eyes. They talked for a moment and then there was a small glow before Faith stood and came towards me.

  “Where did they get you?” Faith asked, immediately kneeling at my side. I thought it obvious given the blood and cuts on my clothes, but directed them to the several wounds I had accumulated. Faith’s face twisted in disapproval and their voice turned chastising.

  “You know, if you were wearing armor, this wouldn’t have happened.”

  I wasn’t sure how my face twisted, but clearly there was something there to give Faith pause.

  “You don’t have armor, do you?”

  “If we did, we would be wearing it.”

  I just shook my head.

  They took a moment to look over a Kilik before turning back to me.

  “You said you were an apprentice mage. You haven’t been in a fight before.”

  “Once,” I said, reflexively correcting them, before realizing how harsh my voice had been. I softened my tone and sighed, weary. “But only one.”

  “And it wasn’t versus people.”

  That seemed like it should be a question, but the tone Faith said it in told me it wasn’t.

  “So this the first time you’ve killed a person?” they asked, voice soft.

  “Killed?” I confusedly asked, looking around. Everyone that had been hit by the lights was up and corralled with the rest of the attackers.

  “Ah,” Faith said quietly. “My apologies. I assumed that if you were here as a Starborn…”

  “Wait, who did I kill?” I asked, desperation touching my voice.

  “The attacker on the far side,” Kilik said. I hadn’t heard him approach. “With the water.”

  “No,” I said disbelieving, “No, I had just knocked him back. Unconscious.” Or at least, I thought I had.

  Kilik’s face twisted into a skeptical look but Faith wore open sympathy.

  “Right?”

  Faith quietly shook their head.

  Oh. Oh no. No no no no no.

  “But.. but I didn’t mean… to…”

  Faith placed a hand on my back and started moving it in small circles. “He was trying to kill you. It was self-defense.”

  “But… it… I…”

  Faith didn’t say anything, just moving their hand in small circles. Detachedly, I knew that they were right. Rin didn’t even have to say anything for me to come to the cold logic of it all. But I hadn’t meant to kill him. Just get him away. Keep the sword away from me.

  “And you did. Permanently.”

  But I hadn’t needed… wanted permanently. I had just…

  “As Faith said, he was trying to kill you. This was self-defense. It is… unfortunate that he died, but such things happen.”

  The words were conciliatory, but the tone was anything but. If anything Rin sounded pleased. And to phrase this as if it was an accident? Spiders, I don’t know if that made things better or worse. Someone dead because of my… because of me?

  “This isn’t the first time you’ve killed someone. And given today it probably won’t be the last. Death by your hand is going to be a thing you are going to have to make peace with.”

  Memories of Eninald, his face withering away, came to mind and suddenly I was curled up on Faith’s chest sobbing. She was telling me it was okay, but it really didn’t feel like it was. Like it could be. I tried to stop the unseemly display but I couldn’t.

  “What she crying for?” a voice asked. Ignas?

  “Ignas, take a walk,” another said. Female. Cecilia.

  Oh, they were all here.

  “I… I’m sorry,” I managed between sobs. “I know this is in…”

  “Shhhhh…” Faith whispered in my ear. “Nothing to apologize for. This is a natural reaction to death.”

  “Buhh, but we’re out in… open. There are people. In…in…in..appro… wrong…”

  There was a pause and then some ruffling. Eventually the light dimmed and a weight settled over me. A blanket. They had covered me with a blanket. And sheltered away, the tears fell like rain.

  **************************************************************************************

  When the tears stopped and I came back to myself, there was a welling of shame. Embarrassment. Doubt. But then I sat for a while longer and realized that Faith was still there, hand moving in small circles on my back through the blanket. There wasn’t any talking, but I could hear noise. Not close though. I took a few moments to wipe my eyes and nose from the worst of the snot before sitting up.

  “Here,” Faith said, offering me a piece of polished metal and a cloth. “You were worried about being seen so I thought you might desire the chance to clean up fully.”

  I nodded, my throat sore and not quite ready to speak, taking the two tools in hand.

  I looked awful, horrible. I slowly, deliberately, went about clearing my face and couldn’t help but remember doing the exact same thing following my death. There was the shape, the feel, of a deeper meaning there but what it was I could not call to mind. Even as I busied myself in the calming repetitions that came with cleaning myself, nothing deeper came to mind. The tie of death felt too shallow, tenuous, but that’s all that I could find for obvious reasons.

  “Perhaps there is no deeper pattern.”

  Perhaps. But I wouldn’t assume so.

  I hadn’t come up with anything by the time that I had finished, so instead I returned the cloth and mirror to Faith.

  “Uh, so..”

  “Nothing to apologize for,” Faith said, cutting me off. “It’s a normal reaction.”

  “Did you cry the first time you killed someone?”

  “Ah, no,” they said looking slightly embarrassed, “But I also had been training for two years at that point and had been prepared for it. I suppose it would have been more accurate to say that you had a very normal reaction for someone who hasn’t gone through military training.”

  This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

  I nodded, not quite believing them, but unable to really argue. Silence stretched for a moment, before Faith spoke up.”

  “Be gentle to both yourself and the wounds.” They pointed at my leg and side, “I laid some minor healings, but they’ll need time to settle so they aren’t reopened. As for yourself,” the offered a weak smile, “If you want to talk about it, I will listen. If you don’t, but need some company, I will provide.”

  “Thanks,” I said, returning the smile with a weak one of my own, “I’ll keep that in mind. Right now I just want to be away from here.”

  “Ah, yes, about that,” Faith said.

  Groaning inwardly, I finally looked around.

  Ignas, Dorekilik, and Cecilia were talking with a large group of people wearing metal armor decorated with red sashes. There were quite a lot, with one group taking away the assailants in wagons, the other was talking, and slightly surrounding, my fellow Starborn. Based on the body language, the conversation wasn’t going well.

  When the tears finally stopped, Faith went back to work on my side, patching it up while I spent my moments composing myself so no one would know of my indiscretion.

  “Be gentle to both yourself and the wounds.” They pointed at my leg and side, “I laid some minor healings, but they’ll need time to settle so they aren’t reopened. As for yourself,” the offered a weak smile, “If you want to talk about it, I will listen. If you don’t, but need some company, I will provide.”

  “Thanks,” I said, returning the smile with a weak one of my own, “I’ll keep that in mind. Right now I just want to be away from here.”

  “Ah, yes, about that,” Faith said.

  Groaning inwardly, I finally looked around.

  Ignas, Dorekilik, and Cecilia were talking with a large group of people wearing metal armor decorated with red sashes. There were quite a lot, with one group taking away the assailants in wagons, the other was talking, and slightly surrounding, my fellow Starborn. Based on the body language, the conversation wasn’t going well.

  “What’s the problem?” I asked Faith. They shrugged.

  “No idea, I’ve been over here with you. Dorekilik went over to investigate, and give you some privacy I think, and never came back.”

  Torn between being distraught that Dorekilik had probably, albeit indirectly, seen me cry and thankful for the courtesy shown, I decided to instead focus on the present and deal with that particular knot later.

  “Let’s go see for ourselves?” I asked.

  Faith nodded and helped me to my feet, a necessity given how tired I was after using that much Energy, and then side by side we moved towards the rest of the Starborn. As we approached, I started to make out the conversation. The man in front was animatedly swinging his arm wide and talking directly to Cecilia. It was almost comical how much that required him to tilt his neck to look up to her. Behind him, several of his fellow red sashes were looking at Faith and me approach with notable apprehension.

  “Look,” he said exasperatedly, “I’ve got a street full of bodies and evidence of a mage, which means that you need to come in for questioning.”

  Cecilia scowled at the man. “The guards of the warehouse have already stated that they were attacked by the men over there and we helped them. I fail to understand what further questions you need to ask that you can’t ask right here. We have injured that shouldn’t be moved.”

  “Because that is the rules.”

  She scoffed, and asked as derisively as she could. “Could you show me these rules?”

  The man’s eyes grew large and I got the distinct impression he wasn’t used to being questioned or treated so casually. Behind him, several more hands went to weapons, but everything stayed sheathed.

  “I don’t like these odds,” I quietly murmured to Faith.

  They gave a quick grunt of affirmation.

  “Sure,” the man finally said, “They’re at the local guard house. You can read them while we sort this all out.”

  Cecilia just continued to glare at the man who clearly wanted to cow from the glare, but couldn’t bring himself to do so. Clearly, this situation was not going to be productive. With a shake of my head, I put my most winsome smile on and walked forward. “Excuse me, sir, what seems to be the issue?”

  Cecilia looked surprised for a moment but quickly mastered herself and gave the man a pointed look and tilted her head towards me.

  “Well, you see…” he said before trailing off, staring at me in shock.

  Oh, merciless spiders, what was he looking at? We’re my ears out? Or my tails? Please don’t let it be that. With a false calm, I widened my smile and asked in the sweetest tone I could manage. “Is something the matter?”

  The man shook his head and brought his attention back, “Sorry, just surprised to see someone like you around here.”

  Oh no. Still, no one else had made any notable motions and I didn’t think I could feel my disguise slipping. Granted, I hadn’t noticed at the Crusted Cauldron, but I also wasn’t drunk. With the pretense of tucking my hair behind my ear, I felt my head. No, just the human set of ears. So, it probably wasn’t that. What could he be talking about?

  “Someone like what?” I asked as disarmingly as I could.

  The man gulped. Hard. That was odd, but it told me a lot. Someone he was afraid of. Or several someones. I wasn’t sure why Cecilia was so insistent on not going with this man, but I didn’t have enough context to argue. Only one thing really to do here.

  Play it up.

  “Go ahead,” I followed up, I thought of the tones Cecilia had been using a few moments before and tried to mimic them. I had been going for intimidating, but given how much he blanched I think I had over done it a bit.

  “Just, just a lady of your…your...” he stammered.

  Letting him finish that sentence might give me some context, but given the hesitance letting him finish might be more suspicious. With a small, conspiratorial smile I leaned in to play it up and cut him off, “And yet, here I am. Perhaps you should just get going.”

  There was pause and then a pained nod, “You heard the Lady. Let’s get out of here.”

  I smiled politely and watched the men group around him and march out of here far faster than I thought possible. It was only when the last of their backs cleared one of the corners and left our view I turned to the group.

  “Okay, what in the endless abyss was that?”

  Their blank stares and confused looks told me that they were just as lost as I was without a single word needing to be said. I sighed, grateful that it didn’t hurt when I did that any more, and shook my hand dismissively.

  “We’ll mark that as a question for later,” Cecilia said. “For now, why don’t we do what we originally came here to do and find out what exactly is in that warehouse? I can’t imagine we were led here just to fight a random group of people.”

  There was a sharp clearing of the throat and I turned to find Dorekilik making the noise.

  “Oh. Yes.” I said, quickly turning to him. “Dorekilik, I’m sorry I hit you with my spell. I meant to apologize earlier, but…” I hoped they would pick up on the subtext and not bring up my… incident. “Can you forgive me?”

  Dorekilik blinked twice, and shook his head. “Oh? Oh! No. I mean, yes you are forgiven, as long as you are more careful in future. But that’s not what I was trying to get your attention for. That was,” he said, nodding his head to my right.

  A carriage had pulled up, with a prominent crest emblazoned on the door. A dark blue and featured an odd rodent-like creature with a series of quills on its back. The creature’s front paw rested atop what looked to be a prominent emerald. The driver very quickly dismounted and made his way to the door. However, the door slammed open before the driver could get close enough to open it, nearly catching the poor driver’s arm.

  Out of the door stepped a humankin man in clothes finer and in better repair than I had seen since I had left home. He was slightly heavier. Not fat, but clearly well off enough to eat and eat well. His fingers were adorned with numerous rings, each of which had a stone larger and metal brighter than my sapphire necklace. He paused in the doorframe, one foot on a step, placed a hand on his hip, and smiled what was clearly a practiced smile that made him look more like a painting than a person.

  “I present,” the driver declared in an impressively loud voice, “Lord Edgar Winthrop, The Viscount Reddington, Chief Almoner of Freeport, and Innovationist of the Court.”

  He smiled again and stepped out of the carriage, causing it to bob slightly as he walked towards us.

  “Did, did he just pose for us?” Ignas asked incredulously.

  I pushed the urge to shrug or respond as far down as possible and instead quietly asked the group. “Does anyone know how to address a noble besides a lot of bowing?”

  To my great relief, Faith stepped forward and gave a slight dip of their head. “Honored Lord.”

  I followed suit immediately and hoped that everyone else was as well.

  “Ah,” the man declared, “No need for that. Especially after all the good you did for my people.” He paused and smiled again, this time turning in the other direction. Yes, he was definitely posing for us. I wasn’t sure what to make of that, but thankfully he continued, “It would be my honor to host a dinner in your name as thanks and celebration.”

  “You honor us,” Faith said with another slight nod of their head.

  “Come,” he cried, turning on his heel to return to the carriage.

  With a brief look around and a series of sheepish shrugs, we followed after him. Passing directly past the holes that the cannon had made into the warehouse. Curiosity got the better of me and I spared a look inside.

  There were definitive sounds of movement, people running from place to place and yelling about ‘pressure’ and ‘damage’, but eyes were drawn to the large device in the center of the room. It looked like a metal step with a wheel and a pivoting arm sticking from the top. As I watched, a rod of metal raised, moving the pivot, which in turn moved the wheel. Then the rod fell, and the pivot with it, completing the wheel’s rotation. I watched two cycles of this, trying to figure out what was so special before I figured it out. The rod was raising all on its own, without any of the workers or animals touching it.

  “A kolim device?” I asked no one in particular.

  “Without runework on the outside it would be exceedingly unlikely.”

  Unless the inside was hollow, but that seemed unlikely. Internal runes like that would interrupt the ability to gather Energy for the effect. I wanted to stay and watch, figure out this mystery, but there was a whistle from Cecilia shaking me from my reverie. Fresh questions on my mind, I put my curiosity away for later and ran after my group.