Chapter Twenty-Three

Author's Note: We are now moving to one chapter each on Friday and Saturday.

“Are we staying there tonight?” Ariya asked, pointing at the inn off the side of the road.

Lusya nodded. “That is correct.”

It was a standard country inn. Like most village inns it was two stories high, but it was longer and wider than most of them, providing more room for large parties of travelers to stay. It was constructed from stone with a wooden roof, with black smoke puffing out of two brick chimneys. The surrounding forest had been cleared out around the building to create space for wagons and other vehicles, and a stable with room for around half a dozen horses sat against the near wall of the inn.

Four horses already occupied the stable. At least one of them was sure to go with the wagon on the opposite side of the building, just off the edge of the road. More likely two, given the size of the carriage. It was little more than a long wooden box with a door at the end. The door had a distinct panel placed at roughly eye-level for someone standing on the outcropping beneath the door. If it was what Lusya suspected, there would be a barred window beneath that panel.

As Lusya and Ariya approached the inn, a man was approaching the wagon, a steaming bowl in hand. He climbed onto the step, pushed aside the panel to reveal a window as Lusya had thought, and dumped the contents of the bowl through the window’s bars.

“Eat up and keep quiet,” he said.

He jumped back down to the ground and marched back to the inn. When he noticed Lusya and Ariya, he scowled at them and gave a curt nod and a grunt in greeting. Then, he threw open the inn’s door and disappeared inside.

“Who was he talking to?” Ariya asked. “Who’s in there?”

“I cannot say for sure,” Lusya said.

That was the truth, if a stretching of it. The wagon had the look of a slaver’s. It even looked to have the larger, removable wooden panels on the sides, which would allow a slaver to present his goods through a wall of iron bars, though it was hard to tell from this angle. Lusya could tell, however, that there were mortals inside, most of whom were overflowing with Malice. Given their apparent conditions, that was not surprising.

The man’s behavior was another indication, as was his mere presence. Though slavery was legal across much of Ysuge, many saw the practice as abhorrent and slavers as scum. For some, their level of sympathy for the slaves varied—deserters and war prisoners were seen as more deserving of slavery than debtors and certain petty criminals—but there was no shortage of those who rejected the institution in its entirety. The fact that most slavers and buyers alike were not scrupulous enough to ensure they limited themselves to those legal to enslave did not help.

For those reasons, slavers tended to avoid population centers except to acquire and sell their merchandise. That made them regulars at places like this when they wanted a warm bed to sleep in.

Of course, it was still possible that the man was a bounty hunter or even proper law enforcement transporting criminals. A prison wagon was little different from a slaver’s in form or function and they had their own reasons to avoid towns, such as the possibility their quarry might escape or that they could be mistaken for slavers.

For that matter, one did not have to be avoiding towns to stay at a roadside inn. They were common stops for travelers regardless. Whatever the case, Lusya was not going to probe into the issue, although her contemplation of alternatives had made her curious as well. She had no strong opinions on slavery, but she was certain Ariya would demand Lusya help any captive slaves. Freeing them would have been trivial, but if she was expected to transport them to safety, the task would become more troublesome and, potentially, time-consuming than she was willing to allow.

“Have you stayed here before, Lusya?” Ariya asked.

Lusya shook her head. “I have not, though I have been to similar establishments.”

“Oh. Is the food good?”

“It is often average,” Lusya said. “It is not as good as the Wildbloom Inn’s.”

Ariya rolled her eyes and snickered. “Well, duh, nothing’s as good as that.”

“That is not true, you simply lack experience.”

Ariya pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes. “Really? Well, if there’s better food than that, I want to try it.”

“We shall see if the opportunity presents itself,” Lusya said.

Though she had never dined in a mortal palace or had any other opportunity to sample what was considered fine dining, she had tried a variety of food. There were plenty of inns, taverns, and other dining establishments with comparable or better food. Lusya’s favorite, however, remained Rahgrahb’s cooking. He had been a high-rank demon who had cooked for her during her time with Father. Rahgrahb was unusual in possessing that skill, seeing as full-blooded demons did not need to eat, though some did anyway for pleasure. Even more so since he had not learned to feed her. Rather, he had known how and had jumped at the chance to apply his skill. He had even named himself based on it. Rahgrahb meant “master chef” in Draquese, a tiransa language of a land across the ocean to the east.

She had not seen him since departing for the battlefield Father had assigned her. In all likelihood, Rahgrahb was now dead.

“At least this place’s food is probably better than what you make,” Ariya said.

Lusya nodded. “It typically is.”

Though the child still chose it over simple dried food, Lusya’s cooking still needed plenty of work. That was not surprising. Learning a new skill took time.

The dining room had just three inhabitants when Lusya and Ariya walked in. There was a man behind the bar counter, the suspected slaver sitting at the counter downing a drink, and a silver-haired reltus man who Lusya guessed was somewhere around one-hundred-twenty years old. Sipping at a glass at a far more sedate pace than his fellow customer, he sat at a table near the crackling fireplace that seemed to be the source of one of the smoking chimneys. The other was no doubt in the kitchen.

The slaver finished gulping down his drink and slammed the mug down with a bang. He let out a thunderous belch and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.

“Keep ‘em coming,” he said to the bartender.

It was unclear if the bartender was also the owner of the inn. The owner could have been upstairs or in the kitchen.

“Greetings, traveler!” the reltus called in Gotrian. He waved at them from across the room, a smile plastered upon his face. Perhaps he was excited to see what he assumed to be another reltus.

“Greetings to you as well,” Lusya replied.

“Hey,” the man behind the counter said with a scowl as he placed another mug before the slaver. “If you’re not going to speak Slarvish, at least stick to human languages.”

The reltus smirked. “You think he can tell this is Fifantian and not Gotrian?”

“I doubt it,” Lusya said.

The reltus raised his eyebrows and nodded in apparent appreciation.

“What did I just say?” the man behind the counter exclaimed.

“I guess you were right,” the reltus said with a chuckle.

Fifantian was the dominant language in the human-occupied parts of northeastern Ysuge. Though much of that region was ruled and inhabited by tiransa and it was not uncommon for them to intermingle and speak the same tongues, Fifantian was almost always considered a human language, both in common parlance and among those who studied language.

Relti mixing with the other races was less common. Though there were myriad nations and cultures among the relti as with humans or tiransa, many were insular and kept themselves apart from the other mortals. This was often seen as pompous by the others, and it may indeed have been driven, in part, by pride in being the oldest mortal race, as well as the longest lived. It was unclear by how much relti predated the others. The issue was muddied by the fact that the races seemed to have first appeared in different parts of the world. The general consensus, however, was that relti were the oldest by at least several centuries.

In recent years, however, this self-imposed separation had begun to erode. Just a few hundred years ago, relti skilled in fighting demons were employed by individual lords or by nation-specific equivalents to the Sacred Knights. These days, most went into the Sacred Knights like anyone else. The old way may have been more convenient for Lusya, as back then an unaffiliated reltus with a Sacred Blade would have been less strange. But then, a reltus traveling with a human child in land occupied mostly by humans would have been stranger.

Lusya approached the counter. The man there glowered at her. He was a plump, balding man, with a bushy mustache adorning his lip.

“A room for the night?” he asked.

“That is correct,” Lusya said.

“One-and-one-half silver for a room and two meals each,” the man said with a gruff tone. “Ya get one drink with each meal, more is extra. If ya don’t like it, door’s over there.”

That was on the expensive side. The man was pushing what was acceptable. Lack of options may have excused him, but the singular inns in villages did not often do the same. Still, the price was tolerable. Lusya handed him the coins. He took them and examined them, though Lusya doubted he had the expertise to determine their validity. Once he seemed satisfied, he pocketed them and took a deep breath.

“Halka, two more!” he shouted at what must have been the top of his lungs. Ariya and the drinking slaver flinched and slammed their hands over their ears in response.

A muffled affirmation in a woman’s voice came through the door behind the counter.

The man grunted and waved across the dining room. “Have a seat. Anywhere you like is fine.”

As was typical, he did not ask what they wanted. They would just have to eat whatever to cook had chosen to make. Lusya chose a table and seat at random, and Ariya slid into the opposing chair.

“You’re so cool, Lusya,” Ariya said unprompted. “How many languages do you speak?”

Lusya blinked. It was doubtful Ariya spoke either tongue, so it was impressive if she had been able to tell Gotrian and Fifantian were different languages. They did sound quite different—Fifantian had many harsh, sharp sounds, while Gotrian was softer and more flowing—and Lusya was not sure what else could have brought on the question, but she knew languages one did not speak tended to blend together into gibberish.

“Six fluently,” Lusya said. “A dozen well-enough to get by.”

She had always picked up languages quickly. It was something she assumed she owed to her demon heritage, though unlike most she had not known any from birth. She had had to learn them like a human, whereas low- and high-rank demons simply knew one or two languages from the moment they manifested. The exception was the Demon King, who could speak all the world’s languages. Perhaps that had also played a role.

“Wow,” Ariya said. “Can you teach me some?”

Lusya cocked her head. “I will think about it.”

“Okay!”

Though they were near the border of Ovda, many of the surrounding nations also spoke dialects of Slarvish, so it would be some time yet before Ariya could no longer communicate. There would be merits and demerits to having the child speak more languages as they moved out of Slarvish-speaking regions. Ariya being able to speak for herself could land them in trouble if she said the wrong thing. On the other hand, it would be more convenient and if Ariya ever got lost it would be easier for her to find her way back to Lusya. Having to translate every conversation or bit of text they came across may also have grown troublesome, considering the child’s inquisitive nature.

Some time passed as they waited for their meals. The reltus retired to his room soon after Lusya and Ariya had sat down. The slaver, meanwhile, continued downing mug after mug of ale, growing redder in the face and more belligerent with each one. He also became more loose-lipped, making it clear that he was, in fact, a slaver.

“And they won’t stop whining!” he shouted to the bartender, who Lusya was assuming by now was also the innkeeper. “‘It’s dark, I’m hungry, I’m cold.’ Well maybe if daddy paid his bills, you wouldn’t be in this mess, so whine to him about it.” He grumbled something else into his mug, then laughed. “Assuming daddy hasn’t already been sold off, that is. I always have trouble keeping track.”

The bartender glared with his arms crossed as he listened. Seeing as he had been scowling since Lusya had walked in, it was difficult to tell if he was upset by the slaver’s talk. Most nations had laws requiring slavers to make every reasonable effort to keep families together, but such laws would have been difficult to enforce even if effort was put into it, which it often was not. Perhaps a tranquil age would change that, but Lusya had her doubts.

After twenty minutes of waiting and listening to such drivel, the door to the kitchen opened and a woman walked out, holding two bowls with steam billowing out. She placed them on the counter, gave the bartender an inscrutable look, and retreated back through the door.

The bartender picked up the bowls with a sigh, as if he were being asked to carry boulders. He brought them over to Lusya’s table and placed them down.

“Drinks?” he asked.

“Water,” Lusya replied.

“Water is fine,” Ariya said.

He grunted and went back to the bar, then returned with two mugs and a carafe of water with which he filled them up.

“Sorry ‘bout the wait,” he said. “Halka makes the stew in small batches, says it keeps it fresher.”

“It is fine,” Lusya said.

He gave another grunt and walked away.

Lusya and Ariya began eating. It was not long into their meal when the front door opened again and five figures strode in, clad in pristine white uniforms that marked them as Sacred Knights. Even their cloaks were smooth and spotless. Lusya noted their entrance and heightened her guard. She doubted they were here for her, but a confrontation was not out of the question.

Among them were two men—one human and one tiransa—and three women—two human and one tiransa. Though women had little-to-no presence in conventional militaries and warfare due to being seen as weaker, the Sacred Knights—and, historically, similar organizations—were an exception. Few knowledgeable on the subject would deny that motomancy leveled the playing field, and so women in the Sacred Knights were treated little different from the men.

Jaune the Bold, their founder for all intents and purposes, had been a woman. For that matter, several of the current Paladins of the Blessed, the twenty strongest Sacred Knights—though not necessarily the twenty highest-ranked—were women.

The tiransa man had to stoop to fit inside. He seemed to be a few inches taller than Izurb had been. The tiransa woman was less than nine feet tall and may have been just shorter than the ceiling’s height, but she stooped anyway as well.

“You two almost look like you’d be more comfortable staying outside,” one of the human woman, with “red” hair and green eyes, remarked with a giggle.

“Very funny,” the tiransa man said with a roll of his eyes. “I’ll take a sore neck over being cold and bitten by bugs.”

It was still chilly at night, though Lusya had not seen any snow since departing Clearwood and there was no sign any had fallen here in recent days. It did not bother her, as she had never been sensitive to temperatures, but Ariya did sometimes mention it. She no longer complained, however, just made comments. Whether because she had adjusted or feared angering Lusya, Lusya was not sure.

“Seriously, get new jokes,” the tiransa woman said. “The height thing is getting old.”

The human woman shrugged and grinned. “I’ll try my best, if you insist.”

The tiransa woman groaned and buried her face in her hands, while the man just shook his head and stayed silent.

“Come, you guys, try to get along,” the remaining human woman said. She was the shorter of the two, though all three humans looked minuscule next to their tiransa companions, and had dirty blond hair with brown eyes. “Every second feels like an hour with you guys snapping at each other all the time.”

“It’s not my fault!” all three of the others exclaimed in unison.

Lusya paid attention to those four, just in case they did something more important than bicker. They did not seem very strong, however. By her senses, she would guess only two of them even had the potential to have a Blade, and even they were nothing exceptional. Her true focus was the human man with light brown hair in a neat, slicked back style. He stood at the front of the group. There was a clear separation between them and him. He must have been the leader. And he was strong. She could tell that much.

“Silence, all of you,” he said. “Conduct yourselves like proper knights.”

“Sorry, Captain,” the red-haired woman said. “But it’s not like—”

“What about silence was unclear, Brigit?” the captain asked.

Brigit blinked and her jaw hung open for a second. “You…meant that literally?”

“I did,” he said. “I believe an hour should be long enough to reflect upon your conduct.”

“Captain,” the tiransa man said, “you can’t put us in timeout like children.”

The captain scowled. “I can and I have. If you dislike that, Rejib, then I suggest you stop behaving like a child.”

The blonde woman raised her hand. “But I wasn’t even doing any—”

“Shall I make it two hours?” the captain asked. “And a report at the next stronghold for insubordination?”

The blonde sighed and fell silent. She exchanged a series of looks with her companions, but no one said a word.

“Good,” the captain said with a nod of approval. “Then have a seat and I will make arrangements for the night.”

The other four sat down at a table while the captain walked to the counter. Being a captain explained his apparent strength. That was not a title the Sacred Knights handed out to anyone. Not even to anyone they saw fit to lead. Power played a large role in the Knights’ ranking system, when it came to field roles in particular, though administrative roles had it as a lesser consideration. While most would not be quite there yet, it was said that any who became a captain had the potential to reach Paladin-level strength.

In fact, one could technically have been both a Paladin and a captain. Paladin was more an honorary title than a rank in its own right, and historically some had been as low in actual rank as captain, though Lusya was not aware of any at the moment. Of course, that did not mean there were none. Several Paladins had perished in the war, and she was not up to date with all of their replacements.

Lusya did not think this captain was a Paladin or anywhere near that level of power, but he was dangerous. She did not want to make an enemy of him. She did not want to share this inn with him. However, leaving as soon as a group of Sacred Knights walked in would have made her look suspicious. Her best bet was to plan on rising early in the morning and leaving before the Knights.

Despite his rank and power, he appeared to be around thirty years old at the oldest. That made him a good bit older than his subordinates, who appeared to be somewhere in their late teens to mid-twenties, but it was still young. In any organization outside of the Sacred Knights, a thirty-year-old traveling the country as the highest authority in his troop would have been unusual.

He approached the counter, where the barkeeper gave a more polite version of the greeting and pricing he had given Lusya. Showing deference to Sacred Knights was second nature to many mortals. The captain paid for three rooms and a little extra for five meals. That seemed rather sparse. A single room at a place like this would struggle to accommodate two of them, especially when the tiransa were factored in. He turned and headed toward where his subordinates were sitting.

Then he stopped as he walked past Lusya and Ariya’s table. He looked at Ariya first, then at Lusya, his brow set in a contemplative scowl. Ariya took a moment to notice him looming over her and look at him. Lusya met his eyes, his icy blue boring into her crimson, and his scowl deepened.

“Do you need something from me, Sir Knight?” Lusya asked.

That was the “proper” way to address a male Sacred Knight whose name one did not know. Using it made her blood boil and her stomach churn, but she needed to avoid any ire or suspicion from him. A fight between them now would have endangered Ariya in more ways than one.

His eyes narrowed and he was silent for another few seconds before responding, “You are rather strong. Trained, too, but you don’t wear our uniform. Are you on leave? Or maybe a drop-out or deserter?”

“I learned motomancy elsewhere,” Lusya said. “It is not a matter I wish to discuss.”

The captain hummed in thought, his expression unchanging.

While it was not the same nor as potent as the innate ability Lusya had and shared with other demons, Sacred Knights and other motomancy users could learn to sense Malice in some capacity and even recognize demons. They were high-level techniques that the rank-and-file rarely knew. Lusya believed her half-human nature masked her to some extent, but she was not sure quite how much. If this captain continued observing her so closely, he may have realized. She was not sure how to get him to stop without risking drawing offense and the opposite reaction.

“Captain,” Brigit said as she loped over to him, “what are you doing?”

The captain glanced at her with narrowed eyes. “I do not believe it has been an hour.”

She groaned. “You randomly stopped and started staring at this poor girl. We got worried. For both of you.”

The captain sighed. “You don’t need to be concerned. This young woman merely caught my attention.”

“Why’s that?” Brigit asked.

“She is strong and well-trained,” the captain replied. “There was something else I thought I noticed, but maybe it was just my imagination.” He shook his head and shifted his attention back to Ariya. “They’re also quite an odd pair.”

“No, we’re not,” Ariya said with a huff. “Lusya’s awesome and takes care of me.”

“I do not believe that is the issue, child,” Lusya said.

Brigit put a hand on the captain’s shoulder and smiled. “Come on, you see weird groups all the time when you travel. We’re a weird group, and a bigger one at that. Let them eat in peace.”

“You might have a point,” the captain said. He nodded to Lusya in what she assumed, given his general demeanor, was intended as a shallow bow. A signal of apology while still holding himself above her. “I am sorry I interrupted you. Please, enjoy your meal.”

He shook off Brigit’s hand and walked back to his group’s table.

Brigit smiled at Lusya. “Sorry about that. He’s kind of a hard-ass, but he’s not a bad person.”

“Your apology is accepted,” Lusya said.

“Brigit,” the captain called, “get over here and resume your punishment.”

Brigit sighed, rolled her eyes, and strode back to him in silence.

“What’s a hard-ass?” Ariya asked. “Is it like, someone with a really fit butt?” She gasped and smiled like she had discovered a stash of candy. “Or does that guy have a donkey made of rocks? Or is he a donkey made of rocks, dressed like a person?”

“It is not literal,” Lusya said. She did not always understand mortal expressions, but she had never heard someone go to such lengths to try to interpret one as its most base meaning. “It refers to a person who is stern and perceived as lacking in humor or leniency.”

Lusya had been called the term before, in particular by high-rank demons under her father.

“Oh, that’s not as cool,” Ariya said. She took a bite of her stew and pursed her lips. “Well, actually, I guess it is pretty cool. That sounds like you, and you’re cool. Oh, is that guy your brother?”

“That is enough talk on the subject, child.”