Sporaton Capital Outskirts

  Blissful Wale Tavern's Basement

  One Month Until Spring

  Soot-stained nterns dangled from sconces set in ancient bricks, casting a weak light across the musty tavern basement. Low tables and rough chairs were pulled out and shoved into pce, each cloaked visitor taking seats on splintered furniture or overturned barrels in silence. Ketch sat in the center of the room, settling into the deepest shadows, and kept a narrow watch on each new figure that shuffled down the steps to join the meeting. She knew none by face, but many by deed. The cell leaders had accomplished much since Sara had set them loose upon Sporatos.

  Months ago, the Champion of Amarat had set a sve market abze, saving those she could, recruiting those who were willing. The proprietor of a minor Hagos sve-trading ring had been the first to fall, but not the st. Those in this room had made sure of it. Some, like Tagrensi, were among the very first sves Sara had freed. Others had joined ter, pulled from their servitude by the actions of those Sara had left behind in Sporatos, and their numbers had swelled.

  So, too, had their notoriety. The general people knew little of it, but Ketch knew the nobility of Sporatos were frothing at the mouth, fury borne of the efforts of those Ketch could see before her. After so long working with the people in this room, tonight was the first occasion of which she'd had the chance to see any of their faces. For any of the field agents to know even the appearance of the cell leaders was an unconscionable risk, and it was only after Ketch had grown so proficient that she'd been allowed to join one of these oh-so-rare meetings.

  The men and women she saw now did not look like rebel heroes, Ketch thought. They looked like hard-worn people, their hands and arms calloused and scarred from a life of bor, not from the mighty efforts of brave deeds. The man to her right had an overlong face, his chin and lips pockmarked by blisters of some disease long past, and the clothing beneath his heavy coat was cheap and threadbare. To Ketch's left sat a woman endlessly picking at her nails with the tip of a broken sewing needle, levering their edges hard enough to turn her cuticles white, her eyes nervously darting from face to face. Others, too, wore pin faces and anxious expressions, but not like the woman prying up her nails with the broken needle.

  She had a colr on. A sve colr. The symbol of a life lost, of a person become an object. Its glyphs shone ever so slightly in the dim celr, just enough that one might've been able to spot her throat on a pitch bck night. That should have marked her as unusable to the others in the room, her trust impossible to earn, her body never her own, but she sat as equals with those around her.

  The band that had once controlled her was sinking even now through the Deepwaters, ensconced within the shattered ship that had tried to run the gauntlet of Tulian shores. Mere months ago a sve, now a leader in an underground resistance, she picked endlessly at her fingernails, just shy of piercing the bed with each trembling jab.

  Ketch did not think the former sve had seen her. In fact, Ketch did not think many of those present had seen her. She was sitting in the center of the room, the lone occupant of her table, yet the flies that so often graced her skin were absent. Only Tagrensi, near the entrance, occasionally gnced her way, and only because he was used to her. Ketch was not trying to hide, not really, but she no longer had to.

  The st member arrived, heralded by the shutting, locking, bolting, and barricading of the door. The man stomped down the steps without a word, submitting briefly to Tagrensi's pawing and cwing at his face, then the catfolk's sniffing of his throat, all necessary to ensure he was not another in magical disguise.

  That the cell leaders knew one another's faces (and in Ketch and the catfolk's case, their scents) was a great risk, but not one they had found a way to avoid, not when communication by letter or otherwise was so dangerous. The risk of interception, they had decided, was greater than the risk of a cell leader being captured. None knew where or how the others operated, only what goals they would be pursuing as a whole. Should one be captured, they would be tortured, and should they be tortured, they would break. Every secret they knew would be given to their captors. But it wouldn't matter. The collective would continue.

  "The ga will begin this evening," Tagrensi announced, addressing the room without preamble. "As many of you discovered yourself, this has taken the nobility as much by surprise as it did us. King Sporatos himself is the host, using the former Eliah estate for the event. Why he is doing so on such short notice, and why he is not using his own estate, we cannot confirm. We only know that nearly every major noble within a day's ride of the city will be present, and for us, that represents an unparalleled opportunity."

  "To get fuckin' caught," grumbled one woman, covered head-to-toe in bck ash. By her scent, she was a charcoaler by trade, and must have come from quite a ways to the Blissful Wale.

  "That is a risk," Tagrensi began, but he was immediately overspoken by the blistered man Ketch had noted earlier.

  "A risk I'm not taking," the man said, thumping a meaty fist on the table. "This is the work of decades, not months. Your obsession with Tulian goes too far. I will not risk my agents for their war."

  Ketch's lips went white as she pressed them to a thin line, but she remained silent. Sara's freed sves may have formed the original core of this resistance, but in the months since, the Champion's only contribution had been funds delivered discretely by Nora's undercover navy vessels, and requests for information. Sves like the pockmarked speaker and that colred woman had built the rest on their own, of their own volition. Ketch's proximity to Sara granted her no authority in the strange, cndestine organization that had developed, and per Sara's letters, she would have had it no other way. She seemed delighted by the organization breaking out from under her, a sentiment Ketch could not bring herself to mirror.

  "It is not just about the war," Tagrensi said, a catfolk's reproachful hiss entering his words. "Throughout the entire countryside, nobles are absent their manor, their guards gone with them. We cannot ignore the chance afforded us by this event."

  The blistered man grumbled, leaning back in his chair. "Well, if it's just about the country manors..."

  "It is not. The ga itself is indeed a target that we must carefully consider."

  "And how is that?" The colred woman asked, pulling the needle from her fingernail for a moment to lean terribly far forward, chin nearly on the table as she stared wide-eyed at Tagrensi. "Many targets, many guards. The exchange is equal."

  "It is not," Tagrensi repeated. "The majority of guards are in an unfamiliar pce, doing unfamiliar duties, and there is much overp between their responsibilities, as well as conflicts of interest. The House Sporatos guards will have ultimate authority, but for the other Houses present, all will be on uncertain footing, none outranking the others. It is this confusion in which I will insert my agent."

  This time, it was a new man to speak. He was the other catfolk present, but unlike Tagrensi or the colred woman, he had been freed from bondage by the organization, rather than Sara. He, like many others, respected Sara and her vision for Tulian, but could not help thinking of so distant a people as a secondary priority, when his own were suffering before his very eyes.

  "Insert an agent into the ga of a king? Did the poor sap do something to piss you off?"

  A round of chuckles, mindful of their volume, echoed in the basement. Tagrensi, while no official leader, was still the only one standing, and he looked down on them with scorn and– as Ketch saw it– smug anticipation.

  "She has done nothing to irritate me as such. It is rather that I believe her abilities are up to the task. Tell me, have any of you noticed our uninvited guest here?"

  Oops. Tagrensi had over-bluffed. Ketch had definitely been noted by a few of those present, and having them look about in confusion before her dramatic reveal, searching for someone other than Ketch, would definitely ruin the effect. Hastily deciding to improvise, she stood from her seat, shucking off the hood of her cloak.

  While not quite as good as everyone trying and failing to find her in their midsts, for those that hadn't noticed her, her sudden apparation was still shocking. Chairs scraped and barrels rolled as cell leaders recoiled from the center of the room, reaching for their weapons. Ketch held her hands up in the universal symbol of peace, all fifty eight inches of her height the sole subject of a dozen leveled weapons. She didn't feel, or hopefully look, the slightest bit concerned.

  "I am Special Foreign Operative Ketch Selliana," she said quietly, her voice carrying in the thick tension. "And I can enter and exit the ga without getting caught, unlike anyone else."

  "The fuck's the meaning of thi-" an orcish woman demanded, head scraping the ceiling as she whirled on Tagrensi, but any attention given her brewing outburst was suppnted by the colred woman lunging forward.

  Ketch stepped backward, a dagger appearing in her hand, parrying the needle tip aimed for her eye. A second broken needle appeared between the former sve's knuckles, flung just as quickly, parried just as easily, then the former sve's breath was filling Ketch's nose, a full-sized needle in her offhand, driving for her heart.

  She was fast. Faster than anyone Ketch had faced in combat since her practice bouts in Tulian. Ketch still didn't struggle to drive the needle aside with the ft of her bde, her offhand coming up to snag the woman's wrist and sm it into the wood of the table, but she could admit that she'd had to exert herself to do it.

  Dimly, she was aware of others in the room shouting.

  The colred woman snarled like an animal, her behavior following suit. With her closest arm at full extension and its wrist secured, she shouldn't have been able to threaten Ketch, but she was unhesitating in the way her hips and legs scrambled up the table, moving like an overgrown spider to bring her entire body around, not to stab at Ketch with one of her broken needles, but to bite at her, gnashing jaws aiming for the meat of Ketch's shoulder.

  Ketch leapt back, sheathing her mother's knife, cloak thrown outward as she went for the dagger off her left hip.

  Tagensi's voice reached a new pitch, his shriek breaking through the tumult.

  "Stop them! Stop them, tackle them, just stop them!"

  Ketch felt a bruising blow against her spine, then her right shoulder, two cell leaders reacting first, but not st. Ketch was soon buried under the weight of innumerable humans, all of whom outweighed her by a factor of at least two, and she was quickly immobilized.

  Ketch did not like being pinned down.

  Well.

  There were exceptions.

  This wasn't one.

  Her breathing began coming in puffs, her pulse racing, and though she'd meant to easily submit to show her peaceful intentions, she began to squirm, cwing her way towards freedom as her captors tried to get a hold of her filing limbs. Their feeble attempts slid off like she was soaked in gri-kakka oil, her writhing, mindless panic forcing herself forward by degrees.

  "Everyone, off! Off of them!"

  Just before Ketch would have broken free of her own accord, the bodies lifted away, removing the crushing pressure from her chest. She leapt to her feet and reached for a dagger again, but one of her mother's this time, on her right hip, and she did not fully draw it.

  The colred woman was emerging from a simir pile across the room, and they locked eyes instantly. Ketch held onto her dagger's grip, the woman produced yet another set of needles from her tattered sleeves, and Tagrensi stood between them, hands held out like he was directing the flow of fairgoers in an oversaturated market.

  "There will be no more of that," he said, panting between words. "Ketch is our ally, my friend." He gred at the woman. "Had you paid attention to that, this would not have happened. Have you no self control?"

  "An intruder in our midst needed to die as soon as possible," the colred woman snapped back. "Introduce them first, as you did the others, not spring a threat among our innermost sanctum."

  "It's a shitty bar," Ketch spat, smming her dagger fully back into its sheath. "Not a sacred temple. Attacking me was not just stupid, it was suicidal."

  "You are not such a threat."

  Ketch did not dignify that with a response. They'd tangled for no more than a handful of seconds, but that was long enough for Ketch to get her measure of the woman. The cim didn't even raise her hackles. It was simply false, and if the former sve didn't have the experience to recognize that, the woman was even less skilled than she'd assumed. Ketch sat back down, and, following her example, the other cell leaders began righting their own seats and rexing back into them.

  Still panting, Tagrensi shook his head. "As you can see, Ketch is an Azarketi, hence her codename being that of a ship, and her journey from the sea is the product of her skill. Were she any less capable, she would not be here."

  Oh, Ketch betedly realized. Probably shouldn't have said my real name.

  Wisdom: Six

  "I know not what skill the rest of your agents have achieved, but I find it incredibly unlikely they are Ketch's equal, and will not ask you to sacrifice those loyal to the cause in order to sabotage this ga. This meeting is meant to inform you of the opportunity facing us, and for us to coordinate so our efforts do not overp. I intend for Ketch to infiltrate the ga alone, but if any of you have agents in the city capable of creating distractions, we will appreciate it."

  "And what of the exposed manors?" The orcish woman rumbled, rolling the sturdiest avaible ale barrel onto its side for her seat. "Seems to me there's an excellent opportunity to break chains there."

  Tagrensi nodded. "There is, and it is what I expect many of you will take to. Later, I ask that you speak amongst yourself, to avoid sending multiple teams to the same target. The strikes will have to be tonight, so the pns revealed to one another will be of little risk. As for the ga?"

  Tagrensi pushed his fingers through his fur with a heavy sigh, partially correcting the mess that had been made in the scuffle.

  "Ketch will act alone, if need be, but we can only assume the perimeter will be the most protected. Her objective will be, as has already been guessed by some of you, pertaining to the upcoming war, so that anything she discovers may be sent on to Tulian. I will be at the table with her discussing our pns, and any who think they have forces to contribute is free to join us. As for the rest, I recommend you consider the targets avaible to you, then confirm with the others that your actions will not overp."

  With that, Tagrensi trudged over, sitting down heavily across from Ketch. His back was now to the colred woman, who was staring daggers into Ketch from a table far away. Had it been anyone else, she would have wondered what the woman's problem was. After gods-knew-how-long of svery, however, Ketch couldn't begrudge the woman her paranoia.

  The next hour saw the sun rising beyond the dingy basement, and a few cell leaders coming to Ketch's table. Ketch didn't begrudge them their hesitance, either. Even for her, infiltrating the heart of the Sporaton governance would be dangerous. The assets each cell leader had accumuted were precious little, to be lovingly shepherded, not thrown away on a whim solely to maybe help find Ketch her entrance.

  When Tagrensi felt sure he had achieved the commitment of a critical few, they moved to a more secluded corner of the room. She was surprised to see the colred woman among those that had committed themselves to the manor's infiltration. She returned to her incessant nail-picking as Tagrensi's voice lowered to a whisper, revealing what information he had managed to acquire in such a short time.

  "While every ga is an occasion for the nobility to socialize and plot with or against one another, it appears this occasion is more purposeful than most. There is a great deal of discontent with the idea of marching against a Champion, and not just from Amarat's church. The nobility balks."

  "Why?" The colred woman asked, levering the needle beneath her nails. "They will get to kill peasants, soak themselves in blood. What objection is there to be made?"

  "That is what Ketch will be there to determine. The nobility is far from monolithic at the best of times, but if this war will be fomenting new factions, we will have opportunity to inject our influence."

  An unremarkable man snorted. He, as was true of everyone, had not introduced himself to Ketch.

  "What influence can we have? We're the very peasants whose blood they so enjoy spilling."

  "Directly?" Tagrensi made a slicing motion. "None. But we can assault those we detest the most, leave unaggrieved those that are more patable to our sensibilities, and so guide the course forward, if in some minor way."

  The colred woman rolled her eyes, switching her needle from one abused finger to another. "Minor indeed, catfolk." She turned to Ketch, eyes glittering maliciously. "Do you think your foray within their walls will find you the time to slip your dagger into a spine? There are many who deserve death in such a pce."

  Ketch met the woman's eyes, doing her best not to shirk. There was a bloodlust in her jittering pupils that Ketch could not match. After a moment, she looked away.

  "It's possible, but I won't. There would be too much risk of capture, and I know too much."

  "Ah," she rasped, smiling widely. "You haven't killed before."

  Ketch's eyes snapped back up to the woman, fixing her with a gre.

  "I said nothing of the sort."

  "I see it in you."

  They locked eyes for one long moment. Once more, Ketch broke first, lifting her gaze over the woman's shoulder.

  "I am more than willing to kill. I was raised a hunter, and the beasts I felled as a child dwarf the greatest of men."

  "In size, maybe. But not soul. We will see."

  Ketch's lip lifted in a derisive snarl, but before she could retort, Tagrensi butted in, swiftly guiding the conversation away. He spoke more of goals, of distractions, and of what the night would bring, but Ketch listened with only half an ear. The colred woman had struck upon a truth, and knew it.

  Ketch's skills had continued to develop, yes, but all her experience had been in sneaking. She hadn't allowed herself to get caught, hadn't found occasion to test her bde against another. With her Champion-bolstered levels, she did not even have a partner who could spar with her in any meaningful way. And so it was that her accelerated growth, based upon what she had achieved, had taken a singurly obsessive liking to the shadows, and the shadows alone.

  Ketch had no Abilities or Skills reted to combat. Only hiding, distracting, and fleeing. That focus meant she was exceptionally remarkable at those talents, even for her advancement, but it was to the exclusion of all else. If she were to get caught, or find someone truly worth killing, she wasn't sure if she would be capable.

  So I won't get caught, Ketch decided. And if I need to kill, it will be with poisoned drink, crossbows at a distance, or the cutting of a chandelier cable. Combat simply isn't my pce. I can accept that.

  So long as I am not forced to draw my bde against an equal.

  She hoped her enemies would oblige her.

  -----------------------------------

  --------------------------------

  -----------------------------

  When Tagrensi first stepped foot into the former Vomun estate, it was with a cloak drawn tightly about his face, every inch of his fur standing on end. To enter a noble's manor was antithetical to his work, and to do so knowing it was occupied by a Vampire Lord, antithetical to common sense. Ketch had practically coaxed him across the threshold, wanting him off the slowly busying streets behind him, and he'd only come in once she'd flung the door open to show the hall behind her was abandoned. His nose and whiskers had been twitching spasmodically the entire way to the guest withdrawing room where they would be preparing for the evening, and when he had seen the freakishly pale Noctie humming a pleasant tune while she stoked the fire, he'd nearly fled on the spot.

  That had been an hour ago.

  Things had changed.

  "No! No, you ruined another one!" He shouted.

  "But I thought you wanted me to make an invitation for Owner?" Noctie asked, pure innocence in her voice.

  "Yes, but her name is supposed to be Carra Vomun! Not 'Owner!' No one writes 'Owner' on an invitation card! You're two centuries old, you have to have written thousands of these!"

  "But... she's Owner?"

  "Agh!"

  Ketch ignored them as best she could, groaning as she slipped further into the heated tub that Intas had prepared for her. Living in the frigid Sporaton capital did not mean Ketch's scales needed any less water, and with frost still on the ground, the incredible bor required to heat a Ketch-sized barrel of water was the only way to do so in a reasonable amount of time. Before, when she had lived in inns and elsewhere, she'd had to make due with heating a cookpot and dling the water across her skin each evening. Sometimes more than once a day, when the weather was particurly bitter. This was far better.

  That she was doing so mere feet away from Tagrensi, dressed in what Sara had lovingly called her bikini top and bike shorts, hardly disturbed her anymore. Even more than her entanglement with the insatiable Champion, having a personal staff had inured Ketch to the indignity of being half-dressed around others. Besides, Tagrensi had a wife and child. To Ketch, that meant there was no concern of him looking upon her with a leering eye. She'd felt the buzz of his attention flick across certain parts of her when he thought she wasn't looking before, but no more often than most people did so, so it was likely fine.

  "Is it really that important, Tagrensi?" Ketch asked, pushing her head out of the heated barrel for a moment. "It's just a contingency, in case I get caught. If she can't write it, it isn't the end of the world."

  There was a sound of papers being smmed down in irritation, and Tagrensi's voice was directed more squarely to Ketch. "Of course it is important! Contingencies are all that I can offer you tonight, and this was supposed to be the simplest among them. Yet this good-for-nothing vampire cannot even comprehend the concept of writing a different name upon a card!"

  "You can hit her, if it'll make you feel better, but just to warn you, she'll like it. Like, a lot."

  "This–! You–!"

  Ketch slunk back down into the barrel as she heard Tagrensi spin away, mumbling about Champion-tainted absurdities.

  Well, he's half right. But I think this one's more a witch's fault.

  Ketch hummed her way through her own thoughts as she submerged once more. Breathing fresh water was something she still hadn't gotten accustomed to. Some of Selliana's chambers had been close to it, but those were brackish at best. Fresh water just seemed to... ck something. Almost like it made her thirsty. Actually, thirst was another oddity. She hadn't really known what it was like until traveling through Sporatos. Spending most of her life in the Tulian sea meant she'd almost never had to actively seek out something to drink. It had come with the water she breathed.

  Eventually, as Tagrensi's continued coaching of Noctie repeatedly wasted the inordinately expensive ensorcelled ink provided to Capital nobility, she was forced to emerge. The water was cooling, and besides, she couldn't spend the entire morning and afternoon before the mission soaking, no matter how nice that sounded.

  Some things are nicer, though, she reminded herself as she emerged, dripping water off her half-naked form.

  Noctie's head snapped up from the paper she'd been scribbling at, eyes widening with unfettered adoration at the sight of Ketch. The sight of the once-imperious vampire lord ogling her body like a puppy awaiting their owner's return always did something for Ketch.

  And it was helped by Noctie herself. Since Sellie had done... whatever it was... to the vampire, she'd abandoned the fanciful dresses of nobility for garments more appropriate to her new station. A maid's dress, tough bck cotton through the arms and waist, with a softer white cloth undershirt beneath, criss-crossed about the chest and stomach by ces that served to allow the garment to be cheaply adjusted to changes in build. Her pale skin was even whiter than the shirt, and heavily exposed by generous modifications to the garment about the chest, where both the thick bck working cloth and more comfortable white linens were peeled away to expose her cleavage. Her breasts, of a size somewhere between Sara's bountiful chest and Evie's delectable handful, were as on dispy as the vampire could get them without outright obscenity.

  Ketch had no idea how the vampire had gotten her maid's uniform modified; none of the few remaining staff said they'd had it delivered for her, and she wasn't allowed off the grounds. Ketch also knew damn well that Noctie cked the practical skills to alter it herself, yet it couldn't have been in storage, seeing as none of her former thralls were of the nky-yet-busty vampire's prodigious height. As tall or taller than Sara, Ketch estimated, which was another point in her favor, as far as her appearance went. Perhaps others would have preferred less knobbly joints and a more healthy pallor to her skin, but for Ketch, those "imperfections" just reminded her of Sellie.

  Ketch felt Noctie's attention unerringly following her as she stepped out of the soaking barrel by the firepce, dripping water onto the cheap rugs that had been left there for the purpose. She toweled herself down, taking her time to make sure she didn't wet her clothes. Noctie's focus sharpened, less like a buzzing fly, more like the bruising beat of a hawk's wings. She may not behave like it, but Ketch's little pet was still a vampire lord, and in terms of raw ability, Tagrensi had been right to fear her.

  Of course, the vampire would never do a thing. Ketch had never met a woman (except, if she were feeling uncharacteristically honest, herself) that was so easily manipuble. Ketch began dressing, slowly, and heard Noctie begin to rock impatiently in her chair, torn between her order to pay attention to Tagrensi and running to Ketch's side to help her dress, as she usually did.

  Ketch was not as gentle a master as Sara. She nguidly picked up her own clothing, picking and fumbling at the complicated buttons like she couldn't quite figure them out. Her act was helped along by the complexity of the garment, which Sellie had picked out for her. A cy navy dress that complimented the azure tone of Ketch's skin and scales, thin material that hung loosely off her frame. When improperly handled, the various stylistic rips and tassels which Sellie lovingly likened to lichen clinging to pond vines could become hopelessly tangled, turning from graceful loops drooping beneath her arms to a blue snake trying to strangle her to death.

  Still, Sellie had chosen it for its look on Ketch, and so she struggled through. The method by which the untold-miles-distant witch had picked it out for her was even more obscure than the design itself. As had been the case since Ketch had left Tulian, her Bond to Sellie was only of its proper strength when she slept, finally finding comfort in the mental embrace of her girlfriend. Of course, neither of them had been happy with such a short time together, and Sellie had taken it upon herself to improve things.

  Ketch hadn't learned about those efforts from Sellie, but from the staff, who she had found one morning hiding in a cupboard. Apparently Sellie had run out of ingredients while puppeteering Ketch's sleeping body that evening, and had sent her unconscious form out to gather them.

  By skittering along the ceiling like a spider, dead rat cmped between her jaws, pigeon feathers adhered to the scattered blood on her skin.

  After that incident retions with the staff had been... terse, for a while, but they'd eventually recovered. Everyone that remained had once been vampire thralls, after all. They were used to a certain amount of eccentricity from the master of the house, even if said master didn't normally carry dirty rats in their teeth.

  The end result of Sellie's nocturnal material gathering had been worth it, however, and now within Ketch's room was a ritual circle that allowed Sellie and Ketch to commune as they normally did, with a minimum of differentiation between their minds and bodies. Naturally, the first thing that Sellie had done with this ability was send the staff out into the Sporaton markets for clothes, using the time Ketch slept to py dress-up with her unconscious body. She'd developed quite a few favorites to see Ketch in, and they were rather complicated contraptions, of the sort Ketch wasn't used to wearing.

  Noctie herself, however, was even less used to seeing Ketch dress herself, and as Ketch yet again snagged her arm on the wrong loop, the vampire's resolve broke. She swept to her feet, crossing the room in the space of a breath.

  "Ownerrrrr," she whined, appearing at Ketch's side, "you're so mean!"

  "What do you mean?" Ketch asked, feigning innocence. She wasn't a good liar, but she didn't need to be, to fool Noctie.

  "Your clothes! You were getting dressed without me," Noctie said, stooping over the far smaller woman so she could correct and pluck at her clothes like a preening mother bird. "Just think of what–" Noctie's eyes widened, twitching. "Think of what– " a twitch. "Of what she–" A shiver. "Of what her–"

  The vampire's arms began to tremble, her sentences repeating faster and faster, until Ketch quickly put a hand up to her cheek, patting it.

  "Don't worry, don't worry. She thinks you're doing just fine."

  Noctie blew out a breath, the rot of it rustling Ketch's hair, which she had grown out from its usual buzzcut. "Oh, good. I don't want to be a bad girl. That would be the worst."

  Watching this exchange from across the room, Tagrensi looked equally disgusted, appalled, and baffled.

  "What did you do to this woman?"

  "I didn't do all that much, other than give her my," Ketch pointed to her neck, which spotted two smalls wounds. "Y'know."

  "What? Your bloo–"

  "Yes! That. Let's not get her too excited, alright?"

  Tagrensi's eyes widened. "Is she a dog? Do you need me to spell it out so she doesn't piss on the rug in excietment? "

  "She can still spell, unfortunately, so that wouldn't work. Right now she's pretty focused, though, and she doesn't pay attention to much else while she's working, so as long as you don't use the b-word, we should be fine." With the vampire's help Ketch finished looping her arms through the dress's sleeves, then patted Noctie on the ribs so she would move aside and let Ketch look Tagrensi in the eye. "Look, it's weird, but Sellie said she didn't do anything to Lady Vomun's mind other than, uh, show her what she would do to her, if she hurt me. After that, she just... got hooked on me, apparently."

  "Which made her behave like- like this?"

  Noctie had gone to her knees, puffing out girlish imitations of a bird's beating wings while fluffing up Ketch's dress so that it would appropriately fre out in traditional Azarketi fashion. Noctie was ensuring the lower half of the dress would replicate the way kelp-woven clothing unduted underwater, thin wires stiffening ft blue tendrils just enough to keep them from colpsing into a tangled mess. The vampire lord took her time lovingly re-bending the wires into their proper positions, even though Ketch would just be wearing it until the ga began.

  "Yeah... I can't really expin what's up with the weird maid act, to be honest." Ketch shrugged. "That seems to have come up out of nowhere."

  Tagrensi eyed Ketch doubtfully, and she quickly gnced away. Truthfully, Ketch knew exactly where it had come from.

  Her. Sellie had said that while drinking Ketch's blood, with Ketch sunken deeply into Lady Vomun's trance, the vampire had gotten a pretty solid look at a lot of Ketch's desires, both conscious and unconscious. Low-level mind reading, standard fare for vampires, usually helpful for them to manipute their prey ter.

  In Ketch's peculiar case, it meant Noctie had learned a lot more than she'd have ever wanted someone other than Sellie to know. Hells, Ketch hadn't known half of it, right up until Noctie busted out the maid dress that sent her heart thumping, and it still felt terribly embarrassing. She'd like to say she had no idea where the impulse arose from, but...

  Look, having a powerful woman pampering you with puppy-dog love in her eyes was nice for the ego, alright? Ketch needed the pick-me-up, some days. If Noctie's brain had been totally fried by tasting the Champion-imbued blood of an ancient witch's familiar, so much so that she'd warped her personality into one Ketch thought was too hot to leave behind, what could she do? The damage was done. Kicking Noctie out now would just be cruel.

  Sellie had peered into the vampire's mind on several occasions since that first night, and by her estimation, the monstrous Lady Vomun was as good as dead. Half of the vampire's brain had been literally, physically charcoaled by magical energy, then the other half was subsequently rewritten by her feverish desperation to taste more of whatever super-drug-blood Ketch had pumping through her veins.

  What was left after all that became "Noctie," who, if Ketch had thrown her out onto the street, wouldn't have sted five minutes before getting staked. The woman could barely go an hour without sheepishly asking someone for a taste of blood, much less keep her fangs hidden behind her lips. You didn't need to be a monster hunter to figure out the tall, eery, pale woman asking after your blood wasn't exactly on the up-and-up.

  "Anyway," Ketch said, forcefully moving on, "Like I said, if she's really bothering you, you can just smack her up a bit. She won't mind."

  Noctie perked up at that, gncing back at Tagrensi. "Oh, will you? You seem stronger than most of the staff."

  "By the gods," Tagrensi swore, visibly controlling his effort to recoil. "You truly beat her? The entire staff beats her?"

  "Me, personally? Not often, unless she really begs for it. And it's not really beating her, to be honest. That sounds way worse than it is. She likes to oversell it when someone sps her, she'll throw herself on the ground and all that, but we did some testing on her durability a while back. Tried to find her limits." Ketch shrugged. "Couldn't. It ended up with half the staff clubbing her over the head with swords and knives. She barely noticed. Just kept cooking dinner. I was the only one that actually managed to pierce her skin and run her through, and she cpped for me like it was a circus trick. Maybe if some crazy high-level Irregur gave her a whack she might feel a sting, but as best we can tell, so long as it's not a holy or enchanted weapon, she doesn't register it."

  "That's not true, Owner!" Noctie protested. "It shakes me very nicely, and sometimes the staff cut their knuckles on my skin and I get to drink the blood after they leave! Even if it's not much at all, it's always a nice treat."

  "Well, even if it is nice, we don't want the staff hurting themselves on you, alright? Try and roll with the punches a bit more."

  "Yes, Owner!"

  "Good girl." Ketch pat her on the head. "Now, go back and try and write the invitation like Tagrensi said, alright?"

  The catfolk man watched Noctie happily traipse back over to the writing desk and drop into her seat, hopping it to one side to adjust its position, like a child. He groaned.

  "She's never going to write it correctly, is she?"

  Ketch gave him a sympathetic smile. "Probably not. You can keep trying, if you want."

  "I... she..." Tagrensi slowly sat down next to Noctie, the first time he had gotten so close to the vampire, and slid a paper across the table, and shot Ketch one st withering gre. "Of all the struggles I prepared myself to survive after the Champion won my freedom, this was not among those I anticipated." He took a deep breath, then inked Noctie's quill in the enchanted ink, pcing it over the invitee's bnk name on the form. "Fortunately, I have raised a toddler before. Now, Noctie, are you listening? Good. You see where I'm pointing? I want you to write the letter C, Noctie. You know the letter C, yes?"

  "Yes!" She bubbled happily. She neatly scribed the letter, gd to prove she could.

  "Very well. Now, next to it, very close on that same line, can you write me the letter A?"

  As Tagrensi began coaching Noctie through the spelling of the nonexistant-adopted niece of the Vomuns, Carra, Ketch was left to her own devices for entertainment. She had precious few hours until the ga, which began at sundown, yet there was little to prepare. She always kept her supplies packed, and she couldn't approach the chosen infiltration point in daylight. For now, there was nothing to do but wait.

  And so she headed back up to her room, stepping through the circle of moss-etched wood, and left her mind to intermingle with Selliana. Surely she would have something interesting going on. The entire room was permanently damp, the boards slowly rotting as if they'd been left underwater, and Ketch's featherbed had a sogginess to it some would call revolting. She would have to fix that at some point. What if Ketch brought home a nice girl? It wouldn't do to have her Guppy giving a bad first impression, would it?

  Selliana hummed her way through the stirring of her cauldron, one long arm bent out of the water to enter the pocket bubble at the side of her chambers. The Champion had many wishes of her, but no demands, and for knowing her pce, Selliana had chosen to fulfill a few of them. The victuals she'd been granted could be used for a great many things, had been used for a great many things, but also for what the Champion wished, on occasion. Healing draughts and wakening remedies made the bulk of the simmering cauldrons, but hidden were the deeper stews, brewing and bubbling for weeks yet. Things that she did not think possible, challenges that the Champion asked unknowingly.

  She kept floating between them, the gardens tended by her seals in her absence, and meanwhile rejoiced in the nesting of her Guppy within her skull. Her Familiar paced mental circles before settling into the nestled space of soul cleared just for her, an adorable yawn and blink as she peered curiously through Selliana's eyes.

  It was nice to have Ketch home. She had missed her.