As Sly as a Fox

     Threads of some sort of noise wove themselves into his faded consciousness, steadily becoming clearer and clearer with each utterance.

“L….ias….Lin….as…..”

“Linias!”

His body was as heavy as lead and with how lodged and melded into the fabric as he was one would think he was petrified.

The noise shook him as if to topple him over.

“It’s nearly well into the afternoon–I know I told you to sleep with me but not for this long. Get up!”

Only a single word of that lengthy complaint registered in his mind.

Afternoon.

Afternoon.

Afternoon..?

…Afternoon?!!

Whatever infliction impaired his body from moving dispelled instantly as he frantically shot up from the bed, scurrying about the room to regain his usual stature of order. He didn’t even take care of clothing himself first and instead immediately rushed to gather his Master’s clothes.

Linias threw his attire as gently but quickly as possible, profusely apologizing all the while.

“I’m sorry Sire I should’ve been awake earlier I don’t know what happened-!”

After taking care of his Master he shuffled around for his own clothing as well.

Haetia’s eyes darted in sync with his scampering, almost getting dizzy from watching.

“Ugh-Stop. I could care less about being late to be honest I just wanted you to dress me already.”

The servant tried to calm down and slow down at the behest of his Master but he still couldn’t shake how irresponsible he’d been.

“I’m sorry Master–”

“Whatever, whatever.” Haetia waved his hands, not wanting to hear any of his self-deprecation.

He slid off the bed and stretched out any lingering morning draug. Linias attempted to double check to make sure he clothed him properly but Haetia slapped his hand away.

“I said it’s fine.” He more firmly shut down his antics altogether the second time around.

…His Master’s validation–albeit cold–still helped a little to ease him. Not just his worries of his current mistake but his aforementioned anxieties regarding his duty. If his Master said it’s fine, it had to be fine.

His silver eyes slightly drooped in a hardly noticeable fashion, lips consecutively halting.

“...Master? Am I…”

Linias stopped.

“...Would you like to go now?”

Haetia crossed his arms with a sharp scowl. “What do you think?”

Linias bowed. He swallowed his thoughts and words, rubbing his sunken eyes as he led his Master out of the room.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The rest were already convened and ready for whatever information that Mitsuyo was going to provide by the time the pair had arrived. Yet as soon as they walked in and the fox’s eyes landed on Linias, she leapt from the couch in a blink and forcibly hauled him out of the room by his arm.

“The rest of you stay here.” Was the only thing she commented before slamming the door so that Haetia nor any of the others could get a word in.

In rushed but gentle movements Mitsuyo tilted his face to several angles and stretched his cheeks down in complete silence.

Once she stopped, she spoke in a rare cutthroat tone, “What happened last night?”

“...Nothing.”

They exchanged a long held gaze until ultimately Mitsuyo sighed. She didn’t have to say that she knew he was lying for him to know that was the case.

She guided his cheek onto her collarbone, letting it rest there as she caressed his hair the same way one would a child or a loving pet. Then, softly she whispered, “You’ll only have to put up with it for a little longer, alright? I promise.”

He wasn’t sure how long Mitsuyo had held him, but it was long enough for his neck to start to strain due to their drastic difference in height.

The fox cupped his face in her hands, meeting her eyes with his. “Wash your face next time. Puffy, baggy eyes aren't a good look.”

She patted his cheeks one last time and gestured for him to re-enter first. The other three met them with perplexed and theorizing looks but with a varying amount of emotions from concerned to entirely uncaring.

After Linias and herself took their seats, she restarted, “You wanted to know about the Seronites and the girl’s clan right?”

All but Haetia responded with a nod.

“Last I heard, her clan was spotted further North at one of Brun’s ruined shrines. And you’d be right to assume the Seronites have a leader. She’s elsewhere, somewhere to the Southeast of that. Unfortunately, I don’t know anything more than that.”

“Don’t know or won’t tell us?” Myrin is the first to speculate and Mitsuyo spares no time in snapping back at him.

“I told you all before that what I have may or may not be all that useful to you.”

“No-It’s useful.” Revi quickly saves graces. “Brun’s shrine isn’t too far from here they might still be there!”

Despite his recent long held silence, his caution gets the better of him and Linias finally speaks, though in a lower voice than usual.

“Revi, they were taken by the Seronites. Even if they are still there, it’d be hard to get them out.”

“So what? We were able to do it with Myrin we could do it with them! And they’re probably using them for something at Brun’s shrine–Whatever it is.”

“That makes it all the more dangerous.”

“Wait wait,” Haetia inevitably interrupts, “Am I missing something? How’s it more dangerous when we’ve went in that King Arthur guy’s castle too.”

“Of course the brat doesn’t know his history.” Mitsuyo scoffs an ashy cloud.

Since she neglected to answer the question and he wanted to spare the others the trouble, Myrin took it upon himself to do so albeit with a sigh. “Okay, so, in simple terms, imagine an ocean, right? And we’re just normal everyday salmon. You basically kidnapping me was like going through a coral reef. In and out pretty easily, no real commitment. Then the castle stuff was like if a shark came by but then decided to kill a seal instead of us. And then with Brun’s shrine, it could potentially be open water or just another one of the other cases but we wouldn’t know it until we went there.”

Haetia goads him on further.

“Aaand that’s because, as Mitsuyo said, there’s some history there. In short terms, in–what, several millennia ago?–an ancient early era, the exact time frame isn’t important, humans made these two beings to control the weather named Brun and Heisyn since it was too severe for them to live in, so those two made the normal seasons you see now. Skipping through a lot of details, people used to pray to Brun and eventually Heisyn got jealous and killed Brun then Heisyn got sealed away. Brun’s shrines still exist and legend says his power dispersed into the shrines since the seasons haven’t gone crazy yet – which may I say bullshit because I swear it’s been getting colder lately but that’s not important.”

Myrin reads Haetia’s even more confused look and tries to conclude it better, “Alright, in shorter shorter terms, Brun’s shrine might have power, Seronites take fire elementals there, maybe want power then?”

Now Haetia’s brows knit but thankfully he didn’t have his atypical tantrums which Myrin only imagined was because he said it and not Mitsuyo.

“Then wouldn’t we want to stop them from potentially having any benefit from that like we did with the dryad?”

Linias flinches.

“Well yeah that’s..a good point.” Revi is surprised to hear herself say in response to Haetia of all people. “Yeah! Wouldn’t it be easier to protect your Master if the Seronites aren’t powered up?”

“Honestly I agree with Linias,” Myrin adds, “we don’t know what we’re working with. At least in both cases you slash we had some intel. For all we know there could be a whole army of them waiting there! Especially if they have your whole clan, I doubt even 20 of them could keep that many fire elementals captive, whether they’re children or elderly or whatever unless they had magic-suppressant bindings which are already hard to find in the first place.”

“Then that’s why we check! Even if there are a lot of them, we could come up with a plan if the surroundings work a bit more in our favor. Plus Linias, didn’t you say before with Myrin that it was worth the risk? It’s the same thing now! Either we risk them making use of something that could be really bad for us in the long run or we risk stopping them and it’s better to risk stopping them in the first place, you said so yourself.”

“I–” The retainer hesitates. “...Please. I….Something isn’t sitting well with me.”

“That’s it? I thought you’d have your grandiose reasons why it’s not good for my safety or whatever but a gut feeling is all you have? Then we’re going. If there’s anything we can do to throw them off and keep them off our tail longer it’s better we take it.”

As Linias sinks further into himself and his thrashing hesitations Myrin inhales to speak but ends up swallowing the breath.

“Cool! So if there’s no more concerns we should head out a-s-a-p! This whole thing is pointless if they aren’t even there anymore.”

All the while the group deliberated between each other, Mitsuyo’s sharp glowing gaze bounced between each of the speakers, but when it finally landed on Haetia it remained and malformed into a cold glare.

“Are you done? Be off with you all then.”

Haetia and Revi returned the snarl with their own clicked tongues while Myrin outwardly paid her no mind, with Linias being the only one she gave a slight smile to as they left.