Redana!

You know intellectually that the Queen is unbound by the Law. It's still surprising when she grips you by the throat, her lightning talons running agonizingly into your neck. More than her speed and strength her absolute disregard for taboo still shocks you. This is someone who has done far worse than murder a guest in front of her daughter.

"They say the stranger may be Zeus in disguise," hissed the Queen. "Good! I hope you are so she feels it when I spit in your eye. How dare you question me? Do you know what I have had to do to build this place? My people are blind, stupid, savage slaves. They live for war. They live for honour," she spits that word like it's a curse. "Courage and honour. Those are the words of Ceron! Courage and honour! They speak them like a brave death has meaning. So I gave them the deaths they so craved. And see what I have built after freeing them from the chains of courage and honour! A paradise, perfect until you brought ruin to it!"

Her other taloned hand comes up level with your eyes. It burns a terrible red. ELF weapons are widely known for being nonlethal, a way to scramble electrochemistry and in sufficient dosage knock out even the most resilient of bioforms. But your auspex isn't registering that as normal ELF lightning - it's warning you that this is a Razorwhip, and whatever that means, it's a forbidden class of weapon.

"Your mother taught me this, princess," said Queen Hatchan, voice rising though it lacked the grace of Zeus' oratory. "In order to truly reign one must become a tyrant. In order to change a people gone mad one must defy the gods. In order to be free one must break the chains of courage and honour... and that means breaking those who cling to those damned words."

The talon comes down - and you're torn backwards. That crimson lightning passes inches from your eyes, but though off balance the Queen still manages to slash your leg as you're pulled backwards and...

You experience why this weapon is forbidden. It's agonizing. It's cruel. There's no justice or mercy in it. You have today endured the strike of a true Thunderbolt and there is nothing in common between these two weapons.

Princess Epistia has pulled you away from the dark queen's grip. "Mother, please -" she starts to say, but with that same ruthless lack of hesitation the queen backhands her daughter in the mouth and sends her to the ground alongside you.

"Some never accepted the first death I gave them," said the Queen, looking about at her dull-eyed servants. "No matter. There are other deaths."

[Take necrotic damage]

Vasilia!

Ivory Smile, despite his name, doesn't strike you as a man who has ever smiled. Smirked, maybe, but only while prefixed by words like 'bitterly'. His movements are so functional and basic as you fight him, literal combat automata have more range and variance in their motions than he does. You've almost taken him for a dullard when you notice him pull off his left glove when your eyes are focused on him making another lunge for his book - and there are words tattooed onto the surface of his hand.

He raised his hand and began an extremely complicated hand sign. Each time his knuckles arranged in a different way there was a flash of terrible red energy as the glyphs aligned in different ways.

Hades is there, eyes the colour of an arctic sky. "Dark Lord, King of Diamonds, I call upon the past," hissed Ivory Smile. "Drown this soul in regret."

[Take damage. In addition, Ivory Smile has cursed you until tomorrow's sunrise with memories of the past. You are still keeping him busy]

Dolce!

"Zeus..."

The name rasped from General Ralib's lips, half forgotten. Zeus. They lived. The Empire lived. And they... oh, stars and heavens, they had defied Zeus Cloudgatherer. "Zeus! We are... we need to conduct sacrifices. Auguries. Immediately! It may already be too late -"

A ripple goes through the formation. Ceronians move as one, or not at all.

A moment later King Jas'o is nearby, still standing atop the shields of his soldiers, looking down at you. He has the awareness, though, to bow his head to you. "Greetings, priest. Have no fear, the gods will get their due - why, I sacrificed my finest racing Plover to Zeus this morning! In fact, why not go on ahead and get started with the sacrifices, we'll go and fetch the princesses to ensure that they can be blessed by royalty."

You've actually put yourself in a position where you have enormous leverage, even though Jas'o is making a convincing counteroffer. Roll to Talk Sense with Grace or Sense and you might turn aside the entire army until they've completed their religious rituals; on a 7-9 result the King and his men will go on ahead.

Alexa!

Soft-eyed Hera looks at you with a sympathy that you've rarely seen from any other. Her hands reach down and grasp the shaft of the arrow and even she gasps softly at the touch of it.

"Zeus has turned her back on this place," said Hera quietly. "She sees only the darkness, sees only that it is a thing to be scoured away with the flash of lightning. She doesn't see that people live here too. That this is a place worth healing, not just destroying..."

The Thunderbolt comes free. Hera carefully tucks it away inside her robes.

"Do one thing for me. Find the Assistant Secretary of Fear and Doubt - he is locked in the Queen's palace. He has the ability to move the Eater of Worlds, even in its current dismal state. Set him free and he will move the Eater of Worlds into the void, away from the Armada. They'll have a chance to decide what they want."

Bella!

You can smell the blood. You can smell the sickness. There are no gods here, inside these walls. Something here is terribly wrong and you're heading directly towards it.

You come to a halt on a rooftop, a clear view to the palace. Redana is there. Redana, on the ground, before a monster. Crimson lightning wraps around the talons of a damned queen. You watch someone, some replacement, try to do your job and fail. She goes down like a bag of mud to a single blow. That failure seems to fill the entire world. You have had nightmares of failing Redana. You have dedicated your life to ensuring you never fail Redana. You worked to eliminate that possibility, purging all possible weaknesses from your mind and body so that would never come to pass.

And here is... a pretender. A faker. Someone who dared to try and protect Redana while not being up to the task. These amateurs have no idea! No idea of the danger!! No idea of the responsibility!! No idea of the commitment required to protect a princess!! If it was you she wouldn't be hurt!! If it was you that woman would be fucking dead before she could even lay a hand on your princess!!

It's not Redana's fault. She doesn't understand how much she needs you. It's the fault of whoever these people are, making her feel safe when she's not.

You're some distance away. There's still some sprinting to do. You can make it. You're the only one who can.

The pain is impossible. It would be wrong to call it indescribable: it is her nerves burning like the lightning-stroke that splits the tree, it is the blindness that turns the world white and her auspex's information stream into scrambled nonsense, as it tries to inform her exactly how badly the nerves of her leg have been corrupted, spiked, undone. This is a weapon made to kill humans. This is a weapon intended to draw out and prolong the death, to send the foe to the embrace of Hades piece by piece.

She gets up, her leg collapses underneath her, the next swipe tears out the auspex— no.
She goes for her sword, the queen breaks the bones of her wrist underneath a cruel heel— no.
She cries out for help, sobbing, and the queen tears her throat open, makes a red flower— no.

Redana succumbs to her pain, instead, and falls deeper. The world folds around her, and there is the sharp smell of ozone. There is a sound that is something like a thunderbolt and something like Hades shuffling a deck of cards. Is this yours, the Princess? Watch, I tap it, and it is the Warrior. It is the Nemean. This child of Nero was never locked in a gilded cage; no, she must have been taken by secret arts and delivered into the hands of her father, suckled at the teat of her caprine great-nurse, trained by both centaurs and titans.

The amount of energy that is required to turn a possibility's shadow into a superimposition... it is truly divine. Only by the grace of the gods could such a thing be done.

When the Nemean rises from the grass, she stinks of storm-tossed skies and sweat. It is difficult to tell where her mane of shining gold ends and her lionskin cloak begins. Where Redana has an auspex, the Nemean has empty night and the light of a dying star forever caught in its last gasp. The razorwhip's next stroke wraps harmlessly around the haft of the axe that could have killed Typhon. As the Nemean unfolds, she towers over all, taller even than the statue of Pallas Athena on the green below.

"REJOICE!" Her voice is a thunderclap. "The gods have sent their response, little wolf! Are you not delighted?"

The razorwhip lashes out again, and the Nemean moves more nimbly than she has any right to. She is not yet injured, after all. How could she be? A moment ago she only existed as a might-have-been. Her knee-high boots tear a groove in the wet grass, and she barks a wild laugh, a war-laugh, a berserk-laugh. "Come, let us dance! Did you not wish to spit in my father's eye? I shall do, and do, and do for you!"

Her backhand swing carves through three Ceronians at once, so cleanly that it takes a moment for them to realize they must fall in pieces to the grass; the thunder that follows knocks down another six, sends the queen skidding back with her bracers held before her face. "Sword-day! Red-day! Hahaha! Come, come, come for the Nemean!" She opens her guard deliberately, her grin wild, daring the Queen to strike at her, a free blow, provided she can stand its return. "Come for Redana Chrysopelex!"

***

[Marking damage to Blood and necrotic damage to Grace. That's a 7 on Keeping Her Busy, however.]

“You cannot be serious.”

“Was I joking? How strange, I don’t even recall the punchline. Did I say anything brilliant?”

“If you ever do, I’ll let you know. That shipment of plating was due to expand the solar shielding of the worker’s barracks. We could have kept thousands safe through the blistering season.”

“And the new plover models will keep all of us safe through all the seasons.”

“What does that matter if they’re burnt to a crisp in a month?!”

“You wound me-”

“Someone has to.”

“-as if I gave it away for nothing. When next you walk the lines, and you see the water barrels filled to overflowing, I’ll be happy to accept your thanks at your earliest convenience.”

“Is that what passes for a fair bargain, these days?”

“It is the only bargain, and I grow weary of your ingratitude.”

“Vasilia-!”

“I beg your pardon?!”

“...your Ladyship.”

“...you forget yourself. And you forget how hard I have worked for our people. If you had endured the...negotiations I’ve endured, you would not be so quick to judge.”

“I only tell you what I see. And what I see is that many won’t survive the summer.”

“So figure something out, tell me what’s needed, and I will get it for you. All I ask in return is the common courtesy not to second-guess my efforts.”

“...very well.”

“Very well, who…?”

“Very well. Your Ladyship.”

"That's better."

******

A clawed hand shot out and caught the priests’ mid-gesture.

And she leaped.

The two of them flew through the air, set free by the workings of her grav-rail, and she slammed his back against the hull of the shuttle. Gripped by book and by hand, he had nowhere to look upon but his handiwork. Captain Vasilia’s eyes went pitch-black, weeping rivers of steaming night from frozen blue irises. Every movement, every twitch of her limbs saw phantom claws digging into her. Fighting her. Straining to pull her back.

And still, she fought. And still, she laughed.

“Oh ho! You do know how to emote! Brilliant!” She cackled and wept. “I’m sure with a little practice you’ll get the hang of it.”

[Damaging Vasilia’s Wisdom, paying the price of her heroic persona.]

******

Dolce could not speak. The king was talking, but he could not listen.

Vasilia...what’s been done to you? Why do you-

No, no! Why are you still fighting? Run! Get out of there! Come back to him, please! Together, they could win over this army, and then the Ceronians could take care of everything else . Don’t- don’t do this! You don’t have to!

She disappeared behind the shuttle. He could hear her, faintly, from here. She was alive. She was on her feet. But...but her voice...

He bowed his head to Jas’o. “Greetings, o King.” He couldn’t get his words to sound...to sound full. “A royal blessing is powerful, yes…” He couldn’t get his heart into it. “Though, you are royal yourself…” His heart was over there, behind the shuttle. “The recipient of loyalty does traditionally stay with the soldiers for rites…” His thoughts were to his own prayers. “According to theory and tradition.” Hermes was for healing, or maybe Hera for her care, but, his job, he had to win over the Ceronians… “It would be wise to remain, o King.” What should he sacrifice? Where was he to find a sacrifice now?! “It would be wise...yes?”

[That’s a 7 on Talk Sense.]

The smell of ozone brings her up short. Metallic, burning, and deep, like the cleaning chemicals she used in the palace but wrapped in electricity. It's the scent poems call Justice, which Bella hated reading. It's the scent of Zeus Olympios, the songs all say, which Bella hated singing. But really, more than anything else, it's the scent of failure. It's what punishment smells like.

You can't notice a thing like that and not think that something horrible is about to happen. The very best thing it could possibly be is a Thunderbolt from somebody like Jas'o, and that's already bad enough to make Bella sprint faster than she's ever gone before. She's half a lightning bolt herself, dropping her body lower, dropping all pretense and bounding on all fours every time she hits a particularly steep incline because she must be as fast as the wind, as the gods. Even though her lungs burn with the effort of the climb, she sprints as if trying to outrun a bolt of lightning.

And the reward for her haste is that she makes it just in time to see Redana collapse in on herself. Her princess. Her princess! Gone! Bella's lungs turn inside out. A second ago they'd been heaving with effort to suck in every last bit of thunder-soaked air they could get. Now, they expel it like a plague. Bella is frozen in place. Her hands are clamped like iron over her face, but they can't keep the strangled scream from escaping her lips. Redana! Redana! No! Gods, please, if there's a merciful soul among your miserable lot, O Zeus, whom she has never had the courage to pray to before, please don't let please don't please please don't take her princess like this don't don't don't don't...

Perhaps this is what it means to have a prayer answered. And perhaps that answer is why Bella so rarely prays. Her scream dies down into a surprised squeak. Her arms fall limply to her sides. Her mouth falls open, and her face is slack and stupid. For the first time since she got rescued from the box, Bella looks up at the face of her princess.

It is just barely possible to know that this... this War Queen is the same as her Redana. The contours of their jaws follow the same lines, and the nose is just the same. The width of her hips and the particular quality of her muscles, though they are both larger in this form, have the same proportions as her princess. It's like staring through a window into another reality, one where Zeus took primary responsibility for raising Redana instead of Nero. But all of this could be explained away as the trick of her eyes and her desperate heart, except for... the smell.

Underneath the hated wisps of lightning breath, Redana's scent is overwhelming. The tang of her sweat: musky, with a tiny note of saltiness atop a wave of sweet... unique in all creation. Nobody smells like Redana except Redana. You could chain Bella inside a dark cave for a thousand years, leave her to forget everything she's ever known, and she would still be able to name this specific smell. But what is? Bella watches in awe as her princess hefts an axe and effortlessly cleaves through multiple warriors of legendary skill as if they were paper props in a play about her exploits. Her cheeks grow warm, and it takes her a long moment to realize she is blushing. Her tail rises all by itself, the tip curling in on itself with excite... relief. This is relief. Relief and awe.

"Red... Redana?" she breathes, forgetting all her etiquette inside the thick stew of her emotions. "Princess, is that..?"

The Nemean looks at Bella over her shoulder. Her green eye is the impossible verdancy of a sun-blessed jungle, piercing and bright. As if one glance turns all she looks upon to glass.

Then she takes her axe and slams it down into the ground. The explosion of power sends turf showering up into the air, splitting the earth with jagged fractures. She sets one boot upon the axe’s head (one of them, that is) and turns to face the awestruck servitor. Beneath her armor, decorative and embellished, shining like sunlit gold, she wears a full-body aketon as sheer as silk and tight as her skin, shining with the subtle colors of the storm-toss’d void. It conceals everything; it reveals everything.

”Don’t get your pretty tail in a twist, little concubine!” The look she gives Bella is too unsubtle and hungry to come anywhere close to sensual. ”Your princess lies dreaming of this battle on the couch of the Moirae, where I make my home! There will be time enough after this battle for you to be ravished well and excellent before her safe return! So says Redana Chrysopelex!”[1]

One of the dead Ceronians flings a spear straight and true at her shoulder, and the shaft groans in its flight as it is sped along on winged feet to its home. The spearhead shatters into eight hundred and four shards when it touches her, and the splintered shaft cartwheels into the grass.

The Nemean does not so much as flinch. Instead, she employs an eyebrow. It is a very expressive eyebrow. Then she tears the axe up out of the grass, spins it once, and then just barely bats away a savage blow from the Ceronian queen. Too barely. She’s showboating. And if she dies, Redana might be stuck in the House of the Moirae[2] forever!

Something has to be done.

***

[1]: The Golden-Helmed One.

[2]: also known as Conceptual Space, the Seventh Dimension, or the Quantum Tomb, depending on your school of thought.

Alexa's mouth trembles in a silent gasp of relief as the Thunderbolt comes out, but it does not prevent her from bending the knee and spine in a bow of acceptance. "It shall be so," she intones, and does her best not to let the storm swirling inside her mind rise to the surface.

The Ceronians have been abandoned by Zeus. No, not abandoned--actively targeted, which is infinitely worse. And even with Hera's blessing, Alexa would much rather grab Redana and clear the blast zone than actively seek to thwart the will of the King of the GOds.

But the bargain has been struck, the demand made, and it is even less in Alexa to become an oathbreaker to the gods than it is to be one who follows orders. That has ever been her job--to follow the orders, and not to question them.

She rises, eyes set on the palace. This is not running, she insists to herself. She is seeking a higher goal, a strategic objective. That's not running. There's no need to punish anyone else. You can't punish anyone else for her following the orders of a god!

It sounds desperately hollow, even to her own mind.

Still, as she turns, she hesitates, her eyes seeking her own. Please let them be alive. Of course they're alive, right? Scratches, perhaps, but nothing that won't heal. They'll recover. Let that be true, and she can--be brave, Alexa--turn against the will of Zeus himself in peace.

Redana and Bella!

Ceronians are built around formation instinct. It's the deepest, most enduring part of their biology - the chemical telepathy that allows thoughts and responses to be transmitted instantly through a unit. Even when everything else is hollowed out the instinct remains.

So it is that Queen Hatchan's mindless soldiers fight and die the same as they might in life. Without fear or hesitation they move and feint, paying with their blood to establish the Athenean circles. Many of them die in the process. Without the War Goddess to favour them each mistake is paid in blood from that rending axe. The due is claimed one way or another. But there are enough of them and the noose tightens - a volley of toxic, choking solid projectile rounds, an escape route blocked by shields and spears - and a Queen racing forwards in a high, arcing leap, talons trailing streamers of bloody crimson lightning. She'll drag you down even if she has to spend every soldier she has to do it.

But Bella! Without Athena to warn her of hidden dangers that obsessive focus is dangerous. She's lost all perspective, doesn't see you, doesn't respect you. You can Finish her before she can close this trap around Redana.

Vasilia!

"As I thought," hissed Ivory Smile. He'd abandoned further applications of magic and was fighting in earnest now, inklike shadows pouring after him in jagged, vicious aftershocks. "You have no control. You fight like an animal, unable to restrain your emotions. You're a failure who has lived a life of failure, and all of those failures are coming due now."

Cloaked by a razor twist of energy, Ivory Smile frees his book and snatches it open into his hand. Indigo tendrils of light burst from the pages, and Hades reaches over his shoulder to turn the page to the correct one. "Perhaps if you'd done one good thing in your life you'd be able to resist this," said Ivory Smile, pushing his glasses snidely up his nose as power built. "Alas."

Dolce!

"I am a loyal soldier," King Jas'o said. He snapped his fingers and a soldier stepped up and condescendingly patted you on the head. Strange thing to have a hand gesture for. "And I wouldn't dream of abandoning my responsibility to Princess Redana by having her miss out on an opportunity to fulfil Zeus' will. However..." his eyes narrowed. "These soldiers are probably somewhat worthless as they stand now. Very well! Ceronians! Purify yourselves! Make obsolescence to the gods! Right yourselves first with Zeus, then Athena, and then join me! The rest of you, onwards!"

The shield-platform accelerated into a march, King Jas'o holding out his spear pointing forwards like he was posing for a painting. The soldiers he'd brought with him stormed past into the city, leaving the disconsolate and furious Ceronians to fall into chaos trying to determine how to make things right with Zeus.

But over there Vasilia is in trouble - but she's still holding Ivory Smile's full attention. If you go to her now you can Finish him before he completes his terrible work.

Alexa!

The Ceronians do not bar your way. They are confused, demoralized, falling about in lamentations to the gods or desperate sacrifices. They are in no condition to obstruct your progress. But your sprint is taking you in the same direction as King Jas'o - you see him, towering high on the shields of his men, focused razor-keen on the palace ahead. Behind you, you can hear the struggling run as Galnius and their soldiers struggle to keep up with you, refusing stubbornly to abandon you even now.

He himself pays you no mind. His phalanx continues its relentless pace forwards. But a rear guard of skirmishers detach from the main force and start opening fire with their toxic solid-shot weapons to deter your charge. Bereft of support, though, and with a phalanx at your back these soldiers are nothing more than a speed bump to you - you can Finish them if you wish, or you could roll to Overcome to simply bypass them at speed.

[[9] on Finish with Courage]

For a second, there is only the thunder of SP fire and a cloud of smoke and grit so thick it could choke a horse. It clings to everything, shoves itself down throats, and muffles the world in an all-consuming emptiness of sound. The world and skirmishers hold their breath.

And then the growling starts. It's the worst kind, the kind of growling that reaches down the spine and plucks directly at that bit of hindbrain that remembers when you used to be a kind of fluffy animal, clutching at nuts in the undergrowth. It's the spring-laden bassen growl that speaks of something with a chest large enough to swallow you whole, and which probably will do so if you don't find a hole to crawl into.

Then the two furnace-red eyes appear, casting light into the grit like dual lighthouses, too far into the air to possibly be real, and moving too fast to believe.

Then the titan emerges from the smoke far more quickly than is fair for anything that size to move. Alexa is a hecatonchire of pain, lashing fingers and slamming spearbutts against temples, growling all the while like Charybdis at her hungriest. And behind that, a wall of thrusting, stabbing spears.

All it takes is one skirmisher turning. Then the spears are through the gap, the titan is in the midst of the formation, and men are scattering like rats chased by flame.

Gah! Every time! Damn SP weapons! They get everywhere, and she can't even wipe her eyes!

Well. That will have announced her. Time to get while the going's good.

There's a stench in the air that has nothing to do with the blood being spilled or the weapons being fired. Bella breathes deep, and her golden eyes go wide as her lungs fill with it. It's a very particular aroma, the kind of thing even a clever nose would miss if it hadn't been trained to look for it. A vague sourness that reminds her of vinegar that's been drizzled over top the musty fur that must permanently cling to these poor bastards after having spent gods know how long stuck in this vast, sweltering death jungle.

A pheromone? Her lips curl upward. It's not a language she speaks a single word of, but it probably drives each of these 'proud warriors' into a frenzy. Doesn't it, you Ceronian sons of bitches! HA! Bella crouches low to the ground with her fingers curling and uncurling in anticipation. Her claws are sharper than death; her talon ornaments gleam wickedly silver in the light of the palace.

There's a spark of something that's like a thought, but it's drowned under a wave of action. Bella pounces forward, pushing off the ground with her hands until she settles into huge, loping strides that cover several meters in a bound. The entire time she flies, her eyes stay locked onto Queen Hatchan. That's right, no one else matters. That's the bitch who thinks she can hurt the princess. As if better mutts than her hadn't tried!

Her entire body is as tense as wire being pulled across a fence. Her fur ripples under sinewy muscles so diamond hard they could be from the Walls of Tellus. She coils, like a spring, and... then!

She leaps.

Where the Queen comes in high, Bella rises from the ground. Where she seeks to take Redana's back, Bella rushes from the front. Are you watching from your dreams, princess? Your Bella's teeth shine like pearls as she snarls and launches over the top of the Nemean like a javelin hurled by Zeus herself. Yes, she, Bella just now is made of lightning. She passes so close to the statuesque warrior that her skirts brush the Redana-shell's face. Her foot lands on that broad, steely shoulder, and launches her further into the air.

It's a battle of angles, but a war of intent. Bella's momentum carries her into the Queen and turns what had been a killing blow into a crunching flop that bounces the godless wench's head off the ground once, twice, thrice before she settles into a dull skid with Bella's hand clenched across her throat.

Bella's legs clench across the Queen's ribs, and she squeezes them like she's trying to grind Hatchan's bones into powder, or bend them inward until they stab through her lungs and leave her to float off to the depths of whatever dark hell Hades keeps for people like this. Her claws glint as she raises her right arm behind her, bent at the elbow, shoulder blades taut and protruding, fingers pressed together like a knife.

Her eyes gleam with wild triumph. Yes! Yes! YES! It's her! The justice of the gods! Not Jas'o, not the living statue, not Redana or her Shadow, but her! Bella! This is the face of your doom, bitch! She doesn't speak the words, but they drip from her terrible fangs as her face twists into a truly horrible and ugly grin. This is the face of victory. This is the face of death.

"Don't you. Touch her!"

She drags her left hand up across the Queen's throat until her fingers are clutching at the jawline. With surprising strength, she bends the head back: tilting her, curving her spine like a rainbow, pushing her neck out. Her hand squeezes tighter and tighter. She feels the moment where the jaw dislocates, and that's when she does it. Hrrah! Her voice cuts through the palace. Her hand cuts through the air.

Without hesitation, Bella plunges her claws into that soft throat and buries them up to the wrist. She draws a deep breath that shudders through her entire body, and wrenches herself free. Safe. You're safe now, Princess. See? Your Bella is all you ever needed.

[Finish with Blood: 10]

There is a moment before everything goes wrong. Before disaster and apocalypse. Before the blood sinks into Bella’s lace. Just a moment, full of quiet panting.

”What a dangerous little knife you are,” the Nemean says with the voice of someone who appreciates the artistry of a knife, hoisting her up easily off of the queen with one hand. ”Good! Your princess will need all the protection she can get. She’s going to the end of the stars. I may have been there, once. Or perhaps that was simply another dream.”

Her lips are crushing, hungry, on the servitor’s own. She tilts her head down, holds Bella well off the floor. Then she bites down on a vulnerable lip, and laughs deep in her throat. The kind of laugh that suggests she may just pull that frilly lace off right here, if she’s welcomed.[1]

She is every inch her father’s daughter, after all. And Zeus cannot resist beauty.

What a tragedy, then, that there is no time and no opportunity for them.

***

[1]: in the Quantum Tomb, there is a sharp hiss of conceptual breath, as if from the lips of a dreamer who has seen something both dreaded and desired in her sleep. Insofar as anything can be said to happen in that place.

“You must be a riot at parties, darling.” Vasila parried a slicing shadow, taking no care to hide her shuddering breath. Keep him talking. Let him gloat his way right into an opening… "But if you must know, there is one good thing I’ve done with this life of mine.” She danced closer, leaping from gap to gap, a wall of flashing steel against the unyielding dark. She pressed in, but could not push it back. It cut her, but she did not feel it. And there, where no one who mattered could hear, she breathed a bitter whisper.

“I hitched my wagon to better people.”

White flashed behind the dark.

The priest fell like a limp sack.

The shadows disappeared, revealing her faithful Dolce. Here for her, as swiftly as if she’d called for him.

And she turned away. At once. The little she’d seen - he was already moving to her, his eyes, oh his eyes! - was enough. No more. Please. Don’t make her see him. Don’t let him see her. Not like this.

“Captain Vasilia, are you alright?”

Captain. Captain. Her breath caught in her throat. She grabbed hold of it, and forced it past her lips. “I’m...fine, dear. Looks worse than it is. Smoke and mirrors, yes?”

He said nothing. She felt his gaze searching her, looking anxiously for every little detail she would give him, and so she gave him nothing. Nothing at all. No signs, no orders, no invitation to ask a single question more.

If she really was his Captain, then she would have silence.

[Rolling to Finish with Sense: 6 + 6 + 1 = 13]

Redana and Bella!

Princess Epistia looks down at the body of her mother. Everything had happened so fast. The whole world and all its laws overturned in an eyeblink. She took a breath and looked away. She couldn't regret it. Just like in the ancient stories, evil parents had to be slain for the world to take shape. Some matricides were holy.

And some evils needed to be ended.

The scythe came into her hands again as she stood and it's moving to its unnatural purpose before she even knows it. It cuts through the hollowed-out bodyguard in a wave - a crude, unthinking strike but it is nevertheless rewarded with red ruin. She starts, eyes shocked as she's carried through into the counterswing, bloody fury of Ares igniting in her veins. Her next move is faster, far more frightening, and takes another of the terrible, zombified soldiers at last to a true ending. Faster, faster, the speed and flawless precision of a girl discovering her true purpose in the midst of the war god's dance. Blood and death comes to the slaves of Hatchan.

It is a terrible freedom - or a glorious final curse from Zeus.

Vasilia!

Hades stared at you for a long moment after his priest fell to the ground, unreadable energy in those brilliant blue eyes. And then, without commentary, he is gone.

"Warriors of Ceron!" cried Admiral Odoacer, standing over the crowd. "Rejoice! I have returned to lead you! Rejoice! You shall have another chance to fulfill your oaths and return to the grace of Zeus Cloudgatherer! Rejoice! You shall be returned to glory as the bloody speartip of the Imperium!"

You know that face - you've seen its cold stare in paint, looking out over the shoulder of every Imperial bureaucrat you've ever had the misfortune of being challenged by in the void of space. But here!? With no entourage, no fanfare, no vast court of sycophants and hangers on? You never imagined that the Admiral of the Armada could be so... humble.

But there she stands, atop a rock, addressing the crowd of Ceronians.

"But the Empire has changed, friends - it is a different place than you remember it! Lies, intrigue, betrayal, civil war - the situation is chaotic and perilous, and it is for that reason alone I did not have time to seek you out before now. Serve me - but beware! Many will attempt to deceive you, and many things that you thought were true are different now. Only I can be trusted. Only I can redeem you."

Alexa!

You plough through the feeble line of skirmishers like a locomotive. You and your phalanx cut through them while hardly breaking stride, shrugging off the ragged volley that tries to slow you on your shields. Ahead King Jas'o urges his men into as fast a run as they are capable of while carrying him, calling for triple-time as he turns to face you, hand once more hovering over the shaft of the next deadly Thunderbolt in his quiver.

Neither phalanx can stop now. Whichever one stops running and falls into a shieldwall will be able to be bypassed by the other. The situation is strangely akin to a chariot race through the streets of the city, a contest of speed and endurance.

You could attack the enemy phalanx directly - in its disorder it could be Finished - but committing to the charge will leave King Jas'o with a free hand. He could shoot down your soldiers, making your victory bloody, or he could abandon his men to the brawl and once more commit relentlessly to his objective. With another man which he will choose would be more of a mystery. Alternatively you could commit all-out to winning the race, attempting to get to the Princess before the King does and fall into formation there - this will be a Get Away.

The sudden appearance of the Admiral of the Grand Armada, alone, without any warning or fanfare was almost enough to get Dolce’s mind off his wife.

Almost.

“That’s Admiral Odacer.” Vasilia said, stunned. “That is the Admiral Odacer.”

“That is her face on the shuttle.” She won’t even look at me.

“Why is she here? How is she here? We didn’t miss a shuttle, did we?”

“This was the only other one to land.” Was she expecting backup? Was I supposed to have gotten here sooner? What did I do? What didn’t I do?

“On third thought, why and how is she here? She has ten thousand ten thousands and wastes firepower on fireworks. Now she shows up alone and unannounced?”

“I...I’m afraid I don’t know why. Or how.” I couldn’t stop Jas’o. I didn’t bring an army. I let myself get distracted. Now look what’s happened.

“Well! We can’t just let her do whatever it is that she’s doing for whatever reason she’s doing it, don’t you think? We ought to stop her. Now.”

He startled. He couldn’t help himself. Sorry, sorry! “Yes. Yes of course we should.” Too much was falling too fast, and his mind raced a thousand ways every second, and all it did was pull him farther apart when she needed him here. “...how, exactly?”

Useless. Utterly useless.

[That’ll be a 1 + 4 + 1 = 6 on Look Closely. Going with Tell me about “Admiral Odacer.” What are they doing? What will they do next?]

"Hey, what are you?! St-stop, put me down before I! Hey! H-hey! Let! Go! Of! Meeeemmmfff?!"

Bella is held. Her feet dangle and kick uselessly in the air, which does her about as much good as the thrashing of her tail. Her face and her hair are soaked slick with blood, but her stomach isn't turning in the slightest; her nose is filled only with the scent of Redana. Redana! This is not Redana! But the smell, the... mmm, mmmmmnggh!

Oh Zeus, father of the gods! Bear witness to Bella's prayer! Mark you how the Nemean presses those greedy lips against hers, stiff and hard and unyielding against the pressure. See how her whole body tenses, the way her tail snaps straight behind her even as she reaches a shaking arm to rake her deadly claws across the back of this... this Amazon.

Oh Zeus, hear her prayer. Accept the fluttering of her eyelids and the sigh that escapes her lungs as her lip is bitten. Take these drops of her blood which dribble between their tongues. Cherish evermore the sight of this servitor yielding before the power of your progeny, going slack, letting her arm fall limp, turning this precious stolen kiss into an exchange. Take her moan, O Thunderer, that you might draw sustenance from it. Take the curving of her spine that presses her soft and supple chest against the hardness of Redana Chrysopelex.

Oh Zeus, it is to you she makes this offering. It is for you she lets her ears pull flat, for you she squeezes her eyes shut, for you she drowns out the world and cares not one whit for the sudden brutality of Epistia, for the smell of blood now choking out the air around her, for the furious chorus of spears and SP bursts and shouting growing ever closer.

This is all for the glory of the King of the Gods. Kiss stealer, skirt chaser, Holy Progenitor, beloved even so of Queen Hera. Accept this offering, this... yielding, and bless her with good fortune in the chaos yet to come. Or, if she is unworthy of even this small protection, then please. Take this moment and go. And when you do, give her back her Princess.

"Eeeeek! Somebody, please, save me!"

The helpless Princess Stellabrande squirms against the totally incapacitating plush serpents wrapped around her forearms and kicks out at one of the vicious velvet squids approaching her. You can tell that she's a princess in need of saving because she's got a spare tiara on her head instead of a headdress. And, oh, goodness, how she squirms against those serpents, sent by Poseidon in his most wrathful aspect! Won't anyone save her? Won't anybody at all?

"I'm here!" The fabulous swashbuckling Princess Redana charges into the room, grinning. She sets about her with her training foil, dealing the velvet squids devastating blows! One! Two! Her sword sings as Stellabrande gasps excitedly. "Don't worry, princess, I'm here to save you!"

"My hero," Stellabrande says, smiling shyly. "So, what happens next?" she asks, as Redana unwinds the no-longer-resisting stuffed animals from around those white-furred wrists.

"Well, usually the princesses kiss," Redana says casually. Princess Stellabrande looks very carefully nonchalant as her tail stiffens. "And then Aphrodite warns them about danger and they have to run off together! And usually the running tires them out and so they have to sleep together."

"Well, you, you should let me go first!" Stellabrande says, her smile very big and not panicked at all. She takes Redana's non-dominant hand and gives the back a demure kiss. "You're my hero, Redana..."

***

For once, Zeus heeds the prayer of this humble Servitor. Even as the Nemean's hand slips underneath Bella's skirt, cradling the base of her tail (right where it's ticklish), the doors to the Seventh Dimension begin to open. Being so close is a terrible miracle: it is like an infinity of mirrors unfolding, cold and sharp. Ozone curls from the Nemean, and she raises her head and barks at the sky: "I'm not done yet, father!"

But it's too late. Bella falls from her hands and the cards are shuffled again, time and space correcting themselves as Redana stumbles out and collapses into Bella's arms, groaning in pain. Her journey to the couch of the Moirae only postponed her pain; the Fates did nothing to alleviate her suffering. The Princess is returned, and in a moment her blessed nanites will begin their work again to try and force her back up onto her feet, but right now she has collapsed insensate, head lowered and weight all on Bella, dazed and swooning.

It isn't a planned advance. Alexa sees the thunderbolt, and the calm, measured lope becomes a furious, churning, mad dash. There's nothing but the pounding of stone on stone, the rush of wind, and somewhere, Redana and a man(?) with the power to beam this whole mess out of the midst of the Armada. That's the goal, that's the hope, and heaven help anyone standing in her way.

(Yeah, that's a 5, 1, -1, 5 on Get Away.)

King Jas'o!

The arrow hit the soft spongey surface with a soft thud. It hung there in the centre of the bullseye for a minute - and then was sucked into the target. It vanished inside the spongey plant entirely, leaving only a discoloured purple bruise where it had started. Inside the arrow would be digested, dissolved, turned into nutrients so that the plant could regrow the other injury it had just sustained - across the field, linked by a long winding vine, a branch was rapidly regrowing another of its strange fruits. Long, straight, synthetic feathers at the end - a perfect arrow, ready for the archer to snap off with a twist of his fingers and fire it right back in cannibalistic cycle into the plant's core surface. Once again he fired the shot, and another perfect violet bruise right in the centre of its bullseye was added to the plant's strange surface.

"Princess Jas'o? Are you - oh!" The voice came softly from the owlgirl servitor, a gentle announcement of purpose from a creature whose silent movement swould otherwise be entirely undetectable.

"Hey," said Jas'o, nocking and firing another arrow in a fluid but mechanistic motion. "Sup?"

"Your father sent me to collect you for your Tanderil geology lessons... you've shifted, highness?"

"Yeah," said Jas'o, gesturing at his now-flat chest. "These were getting in the way. Not badly, but I've got more range of motion like this, and every little counts."

"Ah. Um. Would you like to change your pronouns too?"

"Sure, whatever," said Jas'o, arcing and firing another shot. "Don't care."

"Would you like me to change as well, highness?" she said.

"Also whatever," said Jas'o, snapping another arrow from the branch. "Do what you want."

"And... will the prince come with me?"

"For what?" he snorted. "Geology? No thanks."

"Your father will -"

"Do nothing!" snapped Jas'o, and landed another perfect bullseye despite the rising tension. "He will do nothing! His father will do nothing! Honestly, Hili! What the fuck is the point of any of it! We're never going back! Even grandfather hasn't seen this planet we're apparently supposed to rule, and father's spent his entire life standing ready to swoop in and administer the shit out of it the day he's finally allowed to. We're let's-pretend kings sitting in a desk drawer, learning two hundred year out of date information, and I am," he fired another arrow into dead centre of the target, "too old to play pretend."

"Ah," Hili said quietly.

"The only thing in this world that matters," he said, focus never having left that distant target, "is war. The only way anything is going to change. The only way to advance. The only way to get out is by being good at something. By being too good to keep locked up in a drawer. It was war which brought us all here. Empress Nero's throne stands atop a pile of spears. Only Pallas Athena can change anything in this world. How tough are you?"

"Master?"

"I'm sick of shooting stationary targets. I know you're fast. How tough are you?"

"I... I am not entirely certain, master. But somewhat. I am designed for bodyguard duties and can probably endure a fair number of arrows, so long as nothing vital is pierced."

"Good enough," said the prince, drawing another arrow. "Start dodging."

Alexa!

How did he get to be such a frighteningly good shot?

You can see Athena herself draw in an impressed breath as King Jas'o turns and puts an arrow directly through your heel, an Achilles-slaying shot fired in perfect flow from one moving target to another. You're sent crashing to the ground but before you land Galnius and another hoplite catch your arms and continue carrying you forwards.

[Damage your Grace]

The King's troops pile into an open practice square, filled with dead Ceronians, forming up into a phalanx. You arrive a little behind them and see three figures waiting for you there - Princess Redana, unconscious in the blood-soaked arms of a feline servitor. There is another servitor nearby - a Ceronian, holding a terrible gleaming scythe, blazing with the dark glory of Ares. The ground is littered with bodies she's made.

"On your knees!" shouted King Jas'o, darkly menacing as he strung a thunderbolt to his bow. No hesitation now - he was lit by lightning, the centre of a thunderstorm, ready to land his fourth perfect shot of the day. "Step away from the princess!"

Vasilia!

Energy is crackling from the engine-sun. An overflow of power is ionizing the crystal waterfalls, condensing them into dark clouds that billowed out to blot out the ceiling-sky, brimming with dark and violet light. Winds start to pick up. Zeus and Poseidon together have spread the terrible storm that dominates the void into the interior.

"The gods are angry!" said Admiral Odoacer, never one to let a good divine omen go to waste. "They are giving you a final warning - serve me or perish!"

"What do you command, Lord Admiral?" cried a Ceronian, dropping to her knees - in second the army was again kneeling, united in fealty.

"There is only one way to make this right," she said. "An opportunity you were too distraught to see was in front of you before. Seize the princess! Bring her to me in chains! And if you happen to see a cutie of a catgirl, bring her to me in chains also!! And gag them!!"

There's a bit of staring. The Admiral seems to have gotten caught up in a rush of... something.

"Don't question me!" she said. "It is important that it happens like this! Go!"

The army of Ceronians stand fluidly, and then march into their city. The Admiral fanned herself with one hand, grinning in a flustered kind of way, and then hopped down to follow them. You'd bet that she's heading towards the palace - you don't know what the Admiral is like in person, but you get the impression that for whatever reason she wants to be sitting on a throne when she receives her prisoners.

"Princess..."

Bella's voice is barely more than a hiss. For a fleeting second, her body is wrapped in the shroud of total weightlessness, but she barely notices. She's coming down with it again, she can tell. The strange sickness she first caught from the baths when she was fourteen, just after she'd turned to tend to Redana right as she was rising out of the water. It's a terrible illness, that not even her superior breeding can protect her from. And the most insidious part about it is that... she...

She is dimly aware of the sensation of her feet hitting the ground. But she is far too focused on other feelings to really pay attention to something so pointless. She feels the ache of her muscles as they tense harder than diamonds, and the burning sensation that crawls up her rigid spine all the way to the base of her neck, and all the way down to the tip of her tail, which she wraps tightly around her leg. Yes, there it is, the affliction. Her breath comes shorter now, and she can only draw it in through her nose. Her eyes water even though she isn't sad, and can't feel the irritation from any of the hundred pollens or bits of debris she might otherwise be inclined to blame. Her heart beats arrhythmically and, with every horrible flutter, sends an unwelcome warmth spreading in her chest.

And then, and then, yes, there it is. The heat seeps into her stomach, down to her hips, her thighs, right where the Nemean touched her, where she was reaching... yes. This feeling is a sickness. A disease that wracks her body. These feelings, this tension, they have no earthly cause. So it can only be an illness, or else a curse, that makes her squeeze her legs together to distract herself from the building well of pressure. Damn the giant muscle bitch. Whatever she tried to do, it won't work. She won't fail here. She can't. Not now.

She blinks and startles slightly when she catches a spray of mist on her lips. A spot of blood dribbles off her lower lip and splashes against Redana's neck. Bella takes her thumb and wipes it gingerly away. The princess. Her princess. She looks so peaceful when she's resting like this. So pure. And so... vulnerable. Bella winces when she sees the shape Redana's leg is in.

This is a sign from the gods. She cradles her princess and watches the pain inflicted on her body, and they take the sickness out of Bella in their turn. Her heartbeat finds its beat again. Her insides chill to ice. Her ears catch the sounds of battle drawing closer, and she pulls Redana nearer without a second thought. Above, the spray slicks her hair and clothes. She does not care.

But the wetness on her face has nothing to do with water. Unseemly. The princess will be upset to see it. Bella snorts at the thought, and lifts her hand to lick the palm. A towel would be more appropriate, but she needs her other arm to support the princess. She won't let those legs touch the ground, maybe ever again. Until they'd reached Tellus again. Her rough tongue darts across her palm with dainty, precise strokes. She lifts the palm to her face, and wipes Queen Hatchan's blood from her cheek.

Lap, lap. Smear. She can taste it this time. The familiar sensation of rising bile crawls up her throat in response. She turns her head and chances spitting, instead. Lap, lap. Smear. The retching. She turns and spits, violently. Uncouth. In the kennels, she'd be beaten severely for this behavior. But she must get herself washed for the princess, and she's running out of time.

"Finally," she whispers, "I finally found you. I've got you at last."

Bella squeezes her arm around Redana's shoulder. She takes the other one and carelessly brushes several of those disheveled golden locks out of the Princess' face. There'd be time to do it properly on the way home. There'd be time for everything now. She plants her legs deep into the earth, readying for this final charge, the last great duty of her adventure. But the rest of her uncoils, capable of ignoring the universe for the sake of the girl in her arms.

It was her duty to be gentle. And her duty to return home. Her mind slips past the crazy lioness and the strange sheep, beyond Jas'o (that dumbass), and across the stars to the Empress on her throne. She can hear the words of praise wash over her, feel the marble under her feet as she walks confidently forward to take her reward, take up her old station, and put things back in order where things will be safe again. She drifts past even that, to Redana's garden, with the butterflies and the smell of flowers and--

The princess groans weakly. Bella is drawn inexorably back to the present. She turns to look, and finds she'd shut her eyes. They drift open now. She's not dreaming. She's not. She draws a deep breath, which still shudders when she lets it out, and shakes her head.

"You're such an idiot, Milady. Didn't I tell you? Didn't I warn you space was dangerous? But you can't just listen to your Bella, noooo. You have to learn everything the hard way. Well, it's fine. I've got you, now. I've got you. And I won't let anything bad happen to you ever again."

Everything is a jumbled confusion. She saw Bella-- blood-- kissing-- but, again, again, Bella, Bella, Bella. Which was impossible. Because Bella was safe at home. At least, Redana hoped she was safe. She prayed that Bella would be safe. She made a sacrifice to her father[1] on the first planet she landed on with Alexa: a wild stag, brought down with her bare hands. Please, she'd prayed, head bowed over the roasted meat. Please keep Bella safe. Convince my mother that Bella is blameless. Turn aside her anger.

It's Bella, the Auspex says, grumpily. There's a little catgirl holding a sign with her name on it, even, in her peripherals. 100% certified Bella. Except the Auspex thought the Ceronians were alive, so clearly, in Elysium, all bets were off and... no, no, it has to be Bella. Unless it's Mynx? That would make more sense, the shapeshifter would be a better huntress. Bella was lots of things, but she was no good at hunting at all.

But when she opens her green eye and lets herself look, even that thought withers away. How could it not be her Bella? Mynx was always too flirty, too wide-eyed, when it came to Bella. Only Bella would ever dare call her an idiot, and even then, only when she was sure they were alone, and only when chastising her about a new sprain or bruise or near-death in a training accident.

"Bella, why are you here?" There's something that's safe to be confused about. Not all those confusing half-dream memories of what the Nemean did in her place, perhaps thoughts or desires more than actual, well, act, because of course she wouldn't kiss Bella. Not her best friend. She wouldn't be so cruel to her Bella, not ever. "You said you wouldn't let me go, so why did you come?"

Then Redana looks up and down that new dress. The cleavage! The skirt that ends above the knees! Where's her apron with the pawprints on it and the long gloves? Her Bella doesn't like clothes like this! She's demure, modest, even a little bit of a prude, and... oh. Of course. Redana lifts her head and sees Jas'o there, ready to shoot her new friend and her oldest companion and even her, if she makes the wrong move. And absolute fury surges through her again.

"How dare you, Jas'o?" Her voice has a little bit of the Nemean's thunderclap left in it, a lingering echo. "Help me up, Bella," she adds, not even turning her head to look; she knows that Bella will happily back her up. Here, at least, even if she was afraid back home. "Jas'o, I can forgive you shooting me," she yells, keeping her weight on Bella, "but how dare you drag Bella out here? She wouldn't leave with me; I can't, I don't want to imagine what you did to her! Poor thing, she's worried sick, look at her! And another thing, how dare you dress her up like this? Drooling over her the whole way from Tellus, I'm sure, making her dress up like a party favor to titillate you and your dirty crew! Now put that Thunderbolt down, and if you dare shoot either of my friends I will make you very, very sorry you did it!"

She glares daggers at him, and then whispers out of the side of her mouth: "Bella, I can't stop him if you don't help me up..."

***

[1]: it should have been to Hera, except that Hera never accepted any of her offerings, no matter how hard she tried, no matter if they were hand-baked cakes or expensive golden earrings. So a sacrifice to Hera's bride would have to suffice.

Twice, in the same day.

That, almost more than anything else, stings the most. More than the twitching (constant), more than the electricity coursing through her legs, more than being jostled like a sack of flour because apparently Galnius has never learned a fireman's carry, seriously, we're having a training meeting if we survive. Athena has turned against her. Zeus, Poseidon, and her mother all conspire to grant Jas'o his victory.

But Hera has not yet abandoned her. It is that thought that gives her the strength to gasp out, "Left!" She cannot face Jas'o in this state. But hopefully, she can find this official who can grant Hera her wish. Left, if she recognizes the design of the palace--and she's been around a few--should take them away from the grand courtyard, and towards the smaller servant's quarters.

Now if only Galnius can be trusted to carry her away from glory, and she's not entirely sure they will.