Tatterdemalion

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Gym Euna!

November, meet a potential rival.

Like, not particularly potential, when you really crunch it out. 3V has a lot of baggage that she’s slowly relaxing about, and the “fake relationship” is the necessary paper for anything more than a real relationship. Plus, y’know, you’ll eventually figure out that she’s taken. Having the nerds kiss would be the kind of messy drama that would topple dynasties. But 3V definitely likes Euna in a way she’s not comfortable admitting behind multiple layers of obfuscation, and Euna would have to be blind not to think 3V is fine. But try not to worry about it. It’s one of those things where they’ll build a friendship on top of a bridge of “the timing was never right, but in another world,” y’know?

“That’s a new record,” 3V says, sotto voce, pretending to lean into White’s confidence. (And is this a way of defanging the scariest of her fake girlfriend’s faces?) “Usually she doesn’t clear five feet when she’s embarrassed~”

Then, with an overdramatic flourish and a click of her wrists: “M’lady Euna Kim, may I present to you my girlfriend, November?” She did consider making a joke about it being 11 point 11 percent repeating of her girlfriend, but she’s going to make any snoops work to figure out exactly what her situation is. And, yes, she’s hamming up the girlfriend part, ostentatious and showy and perfectly optimized for disseminating the info about relationship status. No more awkward propositions at the gym! And no more crass threesome jokes from Sara. (Who is she kidding? They will now be swinger jokes.)

“She didn’t believe that an android could have a real workout, so I brought her to the person who knows steel and circuits and how to make them burn like nobody else.” She maneuvers White ably into place, much smugger than Black had been. “And I have got to see you put her through her paces. Even if that means I have to get a workout, too~”

She’ll wait to ask about the ownership at a more convenient time. After she’s made White play along for a while.

---

Gensoukyo!

”You’re extremely hot.”

It takes 3V a moment to recover from that dagger slipped under her guard. She hasn’t had to brace herself like that for a while. That’s part and parcel of being a streamer, you know? Particularly a girl streamer. You’re part of the content, and you’re simultaneously approachable and desirable. You get used to hearing both starstruck compliments and seeing very crass comments before they can be moderated, and flinching a little bit every time you open a DM, and the only people who could understand that you’re not asking for it just because you make sure you look nice before you stream are, well, competition, even (in their own way) the off-the-wall guys who just want you to play Mario Party Ultimate But You Lose By Winning Stars and just want you in the video because it’s Content, Baby to get a pro gamer complaining about the random minigames and getting to make jokes about how you have robot hands and you still can’t bake a digital cake perfectly?

(Like, don’t get her wrong, genuinely pleasant memories of getting ribbed by Polarisdam. The guy weathers everything in his personal life by coming up with even more elaborate challenges and shenanigans. It’s just that every collab is a gamble that more of their audience will like your work, and less of yours will decide that they like their work better. A dumb worry, but there even so.)

And there it is. Something she’s proud of, her skill at games, and it gets her a compliment from her sort-of-girlfriend. Right at the central pillar of her professional identity, where it intersects with her being a huge nerd.

“I’d better not take you to any tournaments,” she jokes, deflecting, not meeting Blue’s intense stare, because if she does, she’ll want to melt into it in ways that her brain tells her would be inappropriate, indulgent, self-centered. “I just got you, I wouldn’t want to lose you to Adrian. From what I hear, Adrian’s the best player on the station.” She doesn’t awkwardly explain that Adrian doesn’t use any pronouns and requests the use of Adrian’s name instead. She privately thinks it’s a little odd, but she’s not rude enough not to use Adrian’s preferred (lack of) pronouns. Names are important. Gender is important. Being who you want to be is important. And Adrian really wants to be Adrian rather than being just a guy or a gal.

“You’re good too. By the way. Was this really your first time?” She waggles her eyebrows, a half-hearted, suggestive rejoinder easily blown out of the water.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

The saddest mew! The saddest mew!

This, then, is your dilemma, Angela! Mark it well! Your tormenter, the goddess, acts upon you through the personage of Seven Quetzal, but to have your feisty revenge, you must attack poor little Dolly who, yes, has been a willing participant, who has been turning you into a damsel in distress, who has been what one might call an accomplice—

But she still has an uncomprehending look of betrayal on her face for a moment, and Jade’s laughter dies on her virtual lips as she realizes, a millisecond too late, that Dolly’s actually upset.

”She really has a fire, doesn’t she?” Jade pulls Dolly’s head close, rests a thumb against her lip, does not show panic, does not show panic. She’s in control. “She’s a fighter! And that’s fun, isn’t it? It is fun. It IS fun.” If she says it enough it will be true. “She’s… inviting us to keep fighting for her.”

Dolly sniffles, once.

”You have done such a good job, Dolly,” Jade says, faster. “I’m very proud of you. This whole time! And— do you need a break?”

A tiny nod as the soup slides in front of her. She picks up the spoon without looking at Angela. She’d forgotten. She’d honestly forgotten. She was just having so much fun, and assumed Angela would like it like she did. She scoops warming, toe-curling soup into her mouth as Jade implodes in on herself.

”After this, tell Angela Victoria Miera Antonius— tell her she’s been a good sport,” Jade manages to say without flinging herself into the underworld. “That you’re going to let her go so that she can be fun quarry to catch again. Give her a little spank. And then you can go back to the hostel. Do you think you can do that?”

A nod, a tiny sigh. It is taking all of her self-control not to ask Angela what she did wrong. Jade needs for her to be strong. Besides, they’re in public, and Angela doesn’t like her that much yet, to deal with Dolly draping herself on top of those muscles and begging for validation. Shouldn’t Jade’s word be enough? Why does she want Angela to rub her jaw and assure her that it wasn’t because she’s angry?

”Good girl. You’re doing great. Do you like the soup?”

“The soup is strong, but not biting,” she says out loud, for both Ksharta and Jade (and she glances over at Angela with bigger, wetter eyes than she means to, and hates herself for it). “I can taste… thyme? Underneath the rosemary. Thyme is almost sweet, balanced well, underneath the strong, assertive? Assertive rosemary.”

She doesn’t make any connections between what she said and herself. She’s just trying. She just wants Jade to understand, and she doesn’t really know how well Jade can translate the input from her tastebuds. So she’s trying. And it’s something to think about that’s not burying her face in Angela’s neck and begging for forgiveness, for doing this wrong, for making her want to headbutt her.

Jade doesn’t guide her hands as she lets the ropes fall slack. Jade doesn’t touch her as she pronounces to Angela that now she has been baptized by Talonna’s soup (her own words). Jade is numinous, behind her head, present but silent now. So big. Her girlfriend— her wife— her goddess— her goddess is judging her use, seeing what she can do on her own.

The thumb she runs along Angela’s lip to wipe up the spittle is all hers, too.

Dolly is so big. She’s gentle with the Terenian, but firm enough not to ruin the game, despite the throbbing in her jaw. Despite the pain caused by her following Jade’s orders. Despite the shock of being actually hurt, and Jade didn’t protect her. Jade twists and unravels and becomes abyssal behind Dolly, her Dolly, the Dolly she wants to make smile. Dolly who is the best person that she knows.

How dare you, Angela Victoria Miera Antonius? Don’t you understand how perfect Dolly is? How gentle she is, how beautiful she is, how, how delicious she is? And you dare to be rough with her in a way that she does not crave? Oh! Oh! When next you meet, Angela Victoria Miera Antonius, you will receive punishment! The only reason that you don’t, right now, that you are not brought to heel, is because of how much Dolly’s been doing today, for you, you ungrateful— you bitch!

You untamed beast, you Dolly-flustering minx, you inviting challenge, you, you—!!

Dolly makes to spank Angela, to send her off, and Jade suddenly grabs at her. Because she wasn’t going to do it right. The smack has as much violence to it as Angela’s headbutt, and it makes her palm sting. Her mouth locks up. Angela’s saying something, and all she can do is lift her chin and try to be good for Jade.

worse you made it worse what is wrong with you what is WRONG with you are you willing to break your first and favorite and best girl to bring an alien to heel? are you, Smokeless Jade Fires?

“Good. You did good. Ksharta Talonna can handle this.” Dolly nods, numbly. ”Do you want—“ She can’t even offer it. She can’t trust herself right now. What if she’s the problem? What if she somehow makes Dolly cry in her ropes? She’d cast herself into a star. She’d deserve it. Jade lets it dangle, and Dolly doesn’t know what it would have been. She can’t think. Her hand throbs. Angela’s never going to want to talk to her again.

Dolly goes to her room to sleep, leaving Ksharta to cleaning and… chef times? There’s a connection there, one of congratulations and criticisms over soup. Jade goes to the void and flings herself into it, howling, gnashing every one of her jaws, trying to find the parts of her that are imperfect as she lashes coil after coil around herself in the plummeting dark. Dolly waits for Jade to tuck her in.

She doesn’t notice when she eventually falls asleep. Her last thought is the smell of Angela.

It would be unbecoming of a goddess to show weakness. So, eventually, self-scourged, Smokeless Jade Fires conceptualizes herself as strong, capable, controlled. Not hiding underneath Dolly’s bed. She doesn’t need to apologize, or grovel. Dolly would lose faith if she apologized, or groveled. Instead, she will turn to matters of her idol-body. She will not be small or weak. She doesn’t need to be small or weak. She doesn’t need to bury her face in Dolly and be Dolly-sized. Let her be big. Let her be strong. Let her be the goddess she needs to be.

She pours herself into the idol to feel its power, its strength, its systems. She flexes them, runs currents through them, and without moving knows herself to be invincible. She is invincible. Dolly can trust her. She just needs time to sleep. Everything will be fine as long as she’s strong enough. Dolly won’t abandon a glorious goddess the way she would—

She’d never even abandon a weak, pathetic pattern trapped inside a shell. The very thought is unbecoming of her bride. She is compassion, and gentle strength, and grace, and beauty, and Smokeless Jade Fires chose her for all these reasons. And once she’s rested, Smokeless Jade Fires will show her bride her power and generosity, and any confusion will be forgotten. Let Angela Victoria Miera Antonius scurry. She is nothing before the might of a goddess.

[Jade and Dolly stagger, and mark both Angry and Insecure. Additionally, because Dolly feels neglected by Jade in the moment, their Harmony drops to +1.]

Breathless Dead

The Thunderbolt’s echo roars. Redana stumbles as she lands, spilling Beljani onto the ground, as if she were the one shot. She tries to stop herself from sprawling, but her body is slow, weak, rebuilding a ribcage. Her body is a roaring furnace burning everything it can in order to survive. The hunger in her is a flame that chars her bones; the hole in her heart is ringed in her father’s lightning.

The name she screams is the same one that has been on her lips, again and again, ever since they met. Ever since the bell. Ever since the friend she had longed for. It comes out of her throat like shards of glass. If she was strong enough, she would race at Mynx, avenge her Bella, face death slotted neatly into a barrel. But she’s not. She can barely stand.

And so when Bella stands in turn, it is the miracle that allows her to slump against Beljani, panting, crying, trying to draw strength from her, resisting the temptation to sink her jaws into the good good girl. When they all survive, she is going to find Dolce. She is going to eat until she passes out at the table. Let her eat. Let her eat. Let her eat.

“Your sister,” she says, instead, helping Beljani to her feet despite wanting to crumple to her knees, despite the impulse to shove grass into her mouth until her body stops screaming. “Your sisters. How close do you need to be?”

Without the answer, she’s already moving. Ready to wrestle. Ready to hold the shapechanger no matter what forms she takes. That is the province of a hero, after all. To get Beljani in through the smoke. To give Bella a reprieve. To dedicate her body as an offering to the gods, the finest thing she has left. Her stomach is a yawning pit. Her nerves are closing off to spare her the feeling of running on broken legs. Her vision is a dark tunnel with Mynx and Bella, her childhood friends, killing each other on the other end.

When she wraps her arms around Mynx, it is a hug long overdue, as much as it is a refusal to let go. Long enough for Bella. Long enough for Beljani. Long enough to save her. Long enough to make up for not being there. Long enough to die standing, if she has to.

Breathless Dead

PRINCESS REDANA CLAUDIUS: is accepting injuries faster than her body can repair them. The fighting styles she was trained for emphasize avoiding repeated structural damage to her skeleton, let alone her vital organs. She is a miracle, the child of two gods, her genes woven together on a loom to create a paragon of humanity, that dead race that strode across the stars with a Thunderbolt in one hand and a Sequence in the other. She had Paragon nanite pills; the Servitor got rid of them. Analyze separate methods of providing immediate medical attention.

Datta.

FUTURESELF SHEPHERDESS: is not present, or will not have been present. This is, on the whole, an encouraging thing; it suggests that this can be survived. However, she is a source of healing and succor that is stubbornly refusing to be conjured, and cannot currently be coerced into arrival. A dead end of analysis. Turn OUR face away.

Damyata.

CAPTAIN DOLCE: is not present. Caloric intake required to jumpstart cell production at necessary scale excessive. Recommended his presence prior to beginning of duel; was abjured. As always. Forgotten, ignored, deliberate at the subconscious level. Trauma not approached appropriately. Complicating factors in terms of revelation of true nature, connection to MYSELF. Continue consideration of how to overcome at later date.

Dayadhvam.

SERVITOR-ASSASSIN BELLA: uncontrollable. Unsuitable. Inexorable. Aphrodite’s knife. Narrative overwhelming, building to climax. Cf. the composition laws of good opera. Likelihood of causing fatal injuries to PRINCESS REDANA CLAUDIUS reaching certainty. Immediate disengagement recommended.

Dayadhvam.

DILEMMA: Aphrodite keeps her here. Her heart keeps her here. WE have no power here except in the in-between nature. The gyre tightens, the spiral collapsing. Her nature is her true vulnerability.

Datta.

SERVITOR-ASSASSIN BELJANI: is flooding the bounded situational field with pheromones which will allow her to bring an end to the situation. Her puissance is insufficient. Full saturation will not be reached before she is found, condemned, inverted. She will not be able to save them. She will be killed by her sister-in-arms. She will fail to save PRINCESS REDANA CLAUDIUS.

Dayadhvam.

SYNTHESIS: Mynx backhands Bella and races up the spear, uses the body of the Princess as a springboard, tears open the ceiling with her talons. Beljani, screaming, tumbles out, clawing at the air; she hits the ground disassembled, nothing but heavy meat, and Mynx lands as soft as the petals of a flower in and amongst her. Redana’s organs are already in cascading shutdown as she hangs limp on Bella’s spear.

Datta.

PREDICTION: use of intercortex symbol spike likely to further degrade working relationship with PRINCESS REDANA CLAUDIUS. Use of intercortex symbol spike only rapidly closing window for her survival. WE cannot stand by and allow her to die. WE define ourselves by this choice, over and over again. WE wait until WE are here and only by OUR action can WE decide, even though WE have been cheering for you the whole time, hoping that this time it will be different. One way or another. But it always comes back to the same scenario. It always comes back to this. HUMANITY always comes back to this.

Damyata.

CONCLUSION: WE rigged the dice. Are you surprised, uncle?

Damyata.

CONCLUSION: I love you, Dany. Always and forever. And I know you can do this.

Damyata.

---

The Auspex, the Eye of Hermes, flashes sapphire, highlighting: Beljani huddled in the vents, the mag-harness activation built into her belt, Mynx as she works her way upwards with Bella’s claws tearing long gouges in her flank. It shows Dany wings unfolding; it shows Dany the remains of haruspicy; it shows Dany Beljani shaking her hand.

And Redana, Redana who’s a little bit more sensible than anyone takes her for, Redana who is having trouble breathing right now and whose fingers are going numb—

She lets her sword fall from her hand and takes the spear-shaft in both. Even half-broken as she is, the spear whines underneath her hands. She pushes— up— lifts her body upside-down— and flings herself backwards, rising, Mynx coiling underneath her, leaping, a rising dragon, hands outstretched, jaws gaping—

And then she is not rising but falling, falling faster, reorienting herself as she plummets towards the ceiling. Above her, below her, Mynx forms wings mid-fall, but Bella has her by the heel, Bella is there to show her what happens to a little bird caught by a cat, the deep rib-rattling war cry coming out of her mouth as they tumble together into the hungry grass.

And Dany, light-headed, pale-cheeked, bones-baring, one foot on the shore of the Styx, her blue eye blazing, bangs on the duct hard enough to dent it.

“Beljani! She knows! She—“

She turns her head, spits blood and another tooth[1], which tumble up towards the floor above.

---

[1]: she’ll have new ones— well, usually by tomorrow, but her body’s going to have more pressing priorities. She’ll be eating soft for the next few days.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Do you not understand? Even now, do you not understand? Jade’s idol is a distant concern in a moment like this. Here and now, she is capable of imbuing herself in the moment, drinking it all in through Dolly’s perceptions. What she sees, how she hears, what she feels. Because it is all translated through Dolly’s experience via the memory circuit sleeve, she doesn’t have to worry about having to translate the raw data from Dolly’s eyes into something comprehensible. Her bride’s brain does that all on her own.

Dolly’s a little nervous. She feels somewhat out of place; the nervous energy she’s keeping tamped down is translated through the sleeve, too. She’s inserted herself into a situation decisively, but now all she has to do is to stay out of Ksharta Talonna’s way while she works. She can’t grab a data pad and check the local news networks casually, or even strike up a casual conversation with the chefs; she can’t recede back into the background and curl up in a blanket with a hot beverage by her side.

“Take a seat, Dolly,” Jade instructs. Dolly looks around, then approaches one of the nearest two-person table-and-chair sets, close to the kitchen and easily removable for events in the hall. “You don’t have to drag it over,” she adds, as Dolly picks it up. “Go ahead and sit down… and then help Angela Victoria Miera Antonius to her knees.”

Running her fingers through Angela Victoria Miera Antonius’s hair is a power play in more than one way. It shows casual familiarity, and more than that, it’s treating Angela Victoria Miera Antonius like a kitten, just like Ksharta Talonna. But it’s also making Dolly happy, even as Angela Victoria Miera Antonius flushes. Her fingers linger as she traces the curls, round and round. Her heartrate increases, and a purr threatens to rumble out of her throat.

“Even her.” Jade sits on the table, feet in Dolly’s lap, kneading slowly. “I give you even her. Don’t you like my present, my bride?”

”I do,” Dolly says out loud, and drags her nails lightly up the back of Angela’s head, sending a shiver down the giantess’s spine.

“She’s all yours,” Jade says, with feigned casualness. “Because you’ve been a very good girl, Dolly.” She cups Dolly’s jaw, rubs her thumb along that soft, beautiful face. Full. Rounded. Like the moon. Rich, lush, feminine— hers. Her Dolly.

Flawless.

“…you could pull her top open and no one here could stop you,” she adds, and feels the blood rushing to Dolly’s cheek, and imagines the warmth under her hand. “Because you represent me. What if I wanted her shown off, hmm?”

She won’t. But she wants Dolly to imagine it. The shared embarrassment, the rush of power, the noises that Angela would make.

“What if I want you shown off?”

Angela makes a muffled whine as Dolly’s fingers tug her head back, expose her collared neck, as Dolly looks away and tries to hide half her face behind her hand. “You wouldn’t,” she hisses. “Not… here!”

“Only because the thought only mildly entertains me,” Jade says, tail swishing in delight at seeing her Dolly like this. “That is all. If that were to change… if I were to order you to expose my slaves’ boundless beauty… would you~?”

Dolly’s nod into her own hand is tiny. Blood thumps through her ears. Angela’s head is resting against her thigh, tugged in close— when did she…? Every breath, she’s hyperaware of her own top, of her own shape, and of Jade’s fingers and palm against her jaw. Her goddess’s faint smirk is inscrutable.

“But what I want instead from you, my flower, my delight…” Jade rests her thumb on Dolly’s lower lip and exerts phantom pressure, and Dolly opens her mouth helplessly. “Is to give Angela Victoria Miera Antonius kisses. On her head. In front of everyone. Because she’s being such a good girl. Just like you. Just like my Dolly. Be sure to squish her cheeks, remind her how full they are~”

And Dolly doesn’t even think of saying no.

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Girlfriend!

That’s delightful. It’s hard to miss. The smile, the sharp bark of laughter, the apology and request for Blue to relax and sit down, to play as she likes.

3V wasn’t always a gracious loser, you know? Neither was she always a gracious winner. When she congratulates Blue on an excellent consolidation, when she makes a pensive noise when she realizes Magog’s not going to be quite in range to contest a point even if Prester John rolls boxcars on a movement command, when two crucial Amaranthines drop to lucky rolls against a swarm of Reapers, it can’t be missed that she is doing it because she has made it into a habit that she is continuing to make herself reinforce. Deep inside her is a capacity for pouting and raging against the dice, which she is very deliberately choosing not to indulge. And when Gog barrels through three Sentinels in one combat phase, blowing a hole in Blue’s line and severely restricting her counterplay options against the giants, she just makes a satisfied little “hmm!” and lifts her eyebrows in a way that suggests she is stopping herself from doing a little dance.

The tension between who she’s decided to be and who it would be easy for her to be. The reason she usually just plays the Wild Hunt and gives herself the excuse that she’s not really trying, she just likes her ghost horsies. The courtesy extended to her opponent in a venue where it’s just you and them and not a livestream you’re trying to entertain.

What of that, then, as her two phalanxes hem in an army split in half, as Prester John blows away Zalmoxis’s enchantments, as she removes Gog from the board but Magog looms over the final turns like a promise of many, many dice being thrown?

---

Euna!

3V insists on bringing November. This is a human thing. Good practice for someone who’s adding herself to the category, bit by bit. (She doesn’t know about the dragon yet, does she?)

3V’s gym look is obnoxiously, intentionally purple-and-green neon, revealed from underneath her signature jacket like a jumpscare. She looks like a bottle of Gamer Fuel with a soft tummy for holding. She’s even got a sweatband bright enough to be spotted from a mile away. And she’s here to sweat and to grill Euna over some exercises…

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Kalaya!

If only Giriel were here. She could explain to you that Hell has no such master plan. The Broken King is the geography of Hell, broken and flayed; his lesser selves bring his pain to the world because it is their nature. The General sought to establish a beachhead, but dragged Kingeater Castle back into Hell out of spiteful lust for a prize. Now it remains to be seen whether the Green Sun or Whirling-in-Rags who becomes ascendant in the games of Hell.

But Dima is not a scholar of such things, and neither is Petony, and Machi is absolutely not, even if she could offer advice. “What of Hell? Do you suspect them of— oh! Oh, you mean for us to summon up something dark and terrible to defeat? To bind away some enemy for a hundred years? Yes, that would do! Some dark spirit of polluting waters!” The prospect seems to lift her spirits, just as she lifts her chin. “But who could provide us with the means of calling forth such an enemy? One of the witches?”

“Uusha’s supposed to have a witch that she works with,” Petony mumbles. “Peregrine. Not like she’d be interested in helping us, though.”

“But if she doesn’t know you’re involved, perhaps I could go find her,” Dima says, completely innocent of how badly you have messed up. It’s just an accidental stabbing, how bad could it really be?

---

Fengye!

The N’yari rather aggressively responds to the scritchies. It’s all you can do to stay upright, to avoid being bowled over completely by her. She smells like the mountain wilderness, and she is so strong that she could pick you up with one hand if she wanted to.

But she doesn’t want to. Not yet. And as a result, you get a front-row seat to the Maid being bent over the front of her makeshift sled. Oh, how she wiggles! Oh, how she complains! Oh, how she glances back at you, awkwardly, over her shoulder, as her skirt is flipped up. But she does not beg. Some sliver of pride prevents her from begging her Cutie for mercy.

Zhaojun really knew what she was doing, by and by. The Maid is in possession of a succulent, heavenly peach, wrapped in dainty Dominion lace. And it is in your power to stop it from being bruised by barbarian palms. Which makes withholding that mercy all the more intoxicating, no?

And, unless you raise a finger, they will leash her, let her hair loose, undo her buttons and her ties, and give her love bites up and down that perfect neck; they will bring her to the point where she does incoherently beg for you to save her, to do something, to stop them from squeezing and spanking and making her feel small and helpless.

And then they will turn their attention on you. You may have a String on Jazumi, but you will have to use it deftly, or else suffer a similar fate.

---

Lotus!

Alright.

You’re “alright.”

You are “alright.”

Haha. Ha. Ha.

That’s how she thinks of you. Alright. Nice to be around. You know, if she has to.

And she squeezes you. As a friend. And she stops touching you as soon as she can. And you can’t help yourself, you selfish little brat; you lean into that squeeze, even after she lets go, and you close your eyes, wishing that she thought you were worth more than that. That you were more than just alright.

Then a trickle of warning shivers down your spine, and you push away. “Han,” you say. “Something’s— something’s wrong.”

---

Piripiri! Giriel!

You have the tactical advantage, such as it is. You are in the thick of the trees, on a slope overlooking the two. The demigod is alarmed, but she hasn’t seen you yet; doubtless she felt the wake of the Banneret’s forceful skipping from moment to moment. If she wanted to, if she knew how, there are many ways that she could punish you for arriving like this— but she is young and lovestruck and sheltered.

Now is your chance to strike.

TSL: Sjakal

Nahla!

“If you do well,” Ruz says, suddenly, sitting forward, “then perhaps you might be released from her service. When she marries my daughter. Doubtless she will not have the time to take care of you.”

She offers you a heavy-ringed hand, and guides you through her room with care. Is she, perhaps, besotten? With you? Enough to treat you like a precious item, like one among the many that this dragon of a woman has filled her chambers with?

Perhaps you were simply that impressive.

“Take whatever you like from here,” she adds, just before you can go. “As a reward.” She gestures expansively at her rich study; there are so many treasures here that it is impossible to gauge any as being better or worse. This sapphire? That orb of interlinked chains? This elegant dagger? That coil of lavender rope?

And when you do finally leave, it shall come to pass that you meet Ruz’s court painter in the halls of the palace.

---

Silsila Om!

“Then do so,” Hai Lin says, with a faint smile. Provoking you to do that was her plan all along! Or a back-up plan? Who’s to say with her. “Go bring me back my girl, Host.”

Do you take orders from the likes of her? How do you handle being thus bamboozled?

---

Birsi!

“One chain may break,” she retorts. “But in enough numbers, even dragons may be bound. And the Vulenids will. The arc of destiny bends towards it.”

This sounds as if it is personal for her. As if there is a hidden pain that spurs her on. What do you make of that, disguised guardswoman?

---

Soot!

Rosethal is unable to let her curse upon you, treacherous harlot, escape her lips— not before she is seized by the Fire Wheels. Do you slip away while their attention is on her, or do you watch while they turn her into a writhing, fuming, glaring package?

Regardless— when you do slip away, it shall come to pass that you meet the Sultan’s harem girl, Nahla, in the halls of the palace.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

”Dolly, tell them…”

“Let her work,” Dolly says, Angela in tow. Her tail curls around Angela’s bound knees as she seemingly carelessly holds her leash. Just like Jade holds hers. It’s all part of her life now, isn’t it?

Back at university, she never would have dared to do this. She would have, at most, cheered Ksharta on from the table. Jade doesn’t get social convention. Not really. She doesn’t see any of the hesitation between wishing you could do something and doing it. So here she is, with her captured Terenian, trying to give the cooks a properly imperious look. Jade tilts her chin just a little higher, for the right look. There.

“Ksharta Talonna is honoring you with showing you how to heat up your dishes,” she continues, quailing just a little bit underneath the looks she’s getting. “Respect her, for she has the attention of the goddess Smokeless Jade Fires.” Then, because she is not Jade, she adds: “Besides, I’m sure you can teach her something, too. I don’t do much cooking myself, not like all of you do, but I’m familiar with agriculture, and sharing techniques has been how we maintain best practices in that field. Growing plants, cooking meat, there’s not that big of a difference, right?”

She does a big stage shrug and accepts the laughter at her expense. If they’re laughing at her, they’re not getting in Ksharta’s way. That’s how it works, right? She’s the silly one, but that lets Ksharta contrast herself, prove that she really does know what she’s doing. Right? Oh, unless. Oh no. Unless being associated with her damages Ksharta’s credibility, instead? Her ears flatten as she tries to read the mood.

Breathless Dead

Only in the first contact does she manage to blindly lash out and drag the length of her broken sword along Mynx’s coils. Blind from seeing too much; her eye superimposes entire universes of meaning on the world as it tries to reconnect through a severed nerve. Smears of nebula-color in shining arcs and namelessly perfect shapes; the coils of Mynx as ink, as sculpture, as a tattoo on the skin of the world, which tears at her sword’s edge. It is not unlike being drugged; it is not unlike drinking with Dionysus. What she sees is so meaningful that it has become meaningless.

Sound guides her. Mynx’s vocalizations, so far from human, lacking any real cords which to pluck, because these things are unnecessary, because Mynx is streamlined, she is Demeter’s arrow, and what is an arrow except a shaft and a head, and when Mynx swings her head around and unfolds her jaws, the teeth curving down the inside of her throat are Hades’ mandala, and Dany feels the breath and the tension of her coils and is already moving before her thoughts can escape that mandala, before Bella grabs at a goring horn and snaps it off jagged.

But the second, the third; Mynx is faster, Mynx knows her better than she knows herself, Mynx is everywhere that her broken blade is not. Mynx’s tail knocks her from her feet and when it lands on her again, smashes her hip half in. Trying to grab her scales slices her hand open, and the grass strains to meet that precious blood dripping down.

She staggers up, limps, clings to her sword’s hilt like it’s a lifeline. She is not afraid. Not like Skotos feared Thist. Why isn’t she afraid? There is a hole in her where it should be, and it overflows with light and blood, and she trails both behind her as she sees the shape of what she needs to do.

She lunges and paints a red line across Bella’s throat, which sprouts into horn and ivory, and even as Bella kicks her knee in, she reverses her grip on the hilt—

And Mynx is there. Mynx cannot be anywhere else. Even like this, she advances where she should withdraw, she lets loose a wordless howl from deep inside of her, and Redana cannot say whether it is bloodlust or fury. All Dany knows is to strike. A hit; a palpable hit.

This, then, this lands. And the only question remaining is whether Bella can see it, too. The question of whether they can stand up against each other is no question at all. If it opens Mynx’s guard, one way or another, they will stand up against each other. Dany strikes her own chest and roars her own challenge to them both, that she can keep her broken feet beneath her, that she fights like her parents, that she can take it. That she deserves it, that they deserve it, that the boil must be lanced hot and sharp and clean.

And if the roar is a word, if there is a shape to it, it is: Avaunt!