65. Cowardice and Resolutions

You slink back out of the jail, avoiding the cell that your albino necromancer currently sits in. Feathers' voice still emanates from behind the furs, soft and low. She probably has it all under control.

Yeah.

It's not that you're scared to be confronted with the evidence of your failures. Nope. You just want to give her space to recover. Yep.

You're not fleeing with your tail between your legs.

Your fiddling with your Animus menu has taken the remainder of the light, leaving much of your lair dark as you emerge into the pool room. The handfull of scrap torches scattered around seem less adequate in the aftermath of the battle. You open your menu back up, hovering over 'Clutter Room'.

Well why not? If we're going to party we're going to party right.

You return to the mess hall.

With a disconcerting slurp, like someone shoved their tongue down your ear, the soot on the floor is sucked down, merging with the stone below. The goblin and kobold worker stare at you for a moment, and then turn towards the kitchen.

Then the walls belch, and you're left with the firm impression that you'd prefer this whole process if it was a little less bodily function-y, thank you very much. The noise is not just cosmetic however, as tables side forth. The hand made furniture that the goblins threw together from scraps smooths out, becoming more uniform as stools burst from the floor like mushrooms. A fireplace pushes itself from a wall and small candles appear in sconces that didn't exist a moment ago, or shudder into existence on the tables themselves. Almost all the tables are sized for the smaller races, but a small table in one corner is sized appropriately for Mercy and Amanda. And yourself you guess. The small furniture far outnumbers the larger however, and in fact far outnumbers the number of people to use it. It certainly gives the room clutter.

“NO!”

You pause before hitting yes, as a wooden spoon goes sailing past your head.

Charlemagne is stood in the door to the kitchen, panting, with his arm extended. When he sees you stop, he coughs.

“If you do that to the kitchen right now you'll spoil all the food. Do it tomorrow when I move everything out.”

You give him a slow nod as he steadily looks more and more uncomfortable. It's only fair. He did throw a spoon at you. That sort of behaviour cannot go unpunished. He coughs again.

“Can... Can I go and get my spoon? The stew's nearly done.”

You nod again. “I'll go and start gathering everyone up shall I?” you ask, keeping your voice carefully neutral.

“Uh. Yes. Please. Sir.”

You snort. Charlemagne's probing attempts at figuring out how annoyed you are are probably punishment enough. It's not like the spoon hit you.

“You're crap at the whole deferential stuff Charlemagne. Just try and keep your spoon to yourself.”

The goblin goes white in relief. Maybe your recently raised War skill came with more perks than just tactical acumen.

“Right you are”.

You shake your head and leave him too it. Despite what you said, there's little point in gathering everyone before the harvest team you sent out gets back, which could be anywhere between half an hour to several hours hence.

Which really left only one thing to do:

Take a deep breath, drake up, and walk down into the jail to talk to-

You about turn, and sure enough the goblins have returned, both quicker and with more wood than you expected.

They grumble and groan as the floor devours the wood they have bought – stacks of oddly even planks. However you're not one to look a gift goblin in the mouth, the prepared wood turning into far more of the resource than logs would have.

You grin at the goblins, who are stretching and shaking out their limbs.

“How do you feel about one last assignment for the night?”

As expected, the majority of them lets out more groans and start picking themselves up off of the floor. However the female, Sand, steps forwards.

“What?”

Her voice is deferential but you can see exhaustion warring with reverence in her eyes.

“Find everyone. Tell them to get to the mess hall. Tell them they're to help Charlemagne get the party set up while you all sit, rest, and enjoy human ale.”

As you speak the tiredness is stripped way from them, eagerness taking over. When you finish, Sand speaks again, looking around at the others.

“We do this mission.” And then she looks you up and down, squinting as if she's trying to look tough. “But only 'cus you good boss.”

You snort and wave them away. They disperse within moments, chattering in their goblin tongue, their excitement palpable. The smile on your face only diminishes a little as the tiny demon worker floats over your head, muttering foul things under its breath as blood and soot is sucked from the floor and into its arms.

With that done, you have once again delegated every possibly opportunity you could have to procrastinate. With another deep breath, you force yourself down the stairs until you stand before the fur covered cell that houses Amanda.

Deep breath

Before your courage can desert you again, the furs are flung aside and you find yourself looking down at Feathers. The greenskin's eyes are narrowed at you, but after several seconds of silent contemplation, the furs fall back shut and the door swings open.

They've extinguished the torch you lit, but a soft, greenish yellow light illuminates the room just enough to see. It seems to be emanating from Amanda's closed fists, from where she is sat on the bed. Or rather, from inside them, as her fingers send long shadows across the walls.

“Red Scale.”

Her voice is hoarse, scratchy. It's obvious she's been crying. Feathers catches your eyes again, and then departs with a final glare.

Yeah. You probably deserve that.

“Hey Amanda. How are you feeling?”

She doesn't answer for some time, instead looking around the room, fidgeting on the spot.

“I'm...” she trails off again, silence descending in the cell before she slides from the bed to sit on the floor opposite you.

“I'm good.” she finally says, and your head snaps up to meet her eyes, confusion in your eyes. She laughs, a little, fragile thing. “Yeah. Confused me too. I don't think I should be, but I feel fine. Great, even. Like questions I didn't even know I was asking myself have fallen away.”

She nods to herself before continuing, her voice gaining strength.

“Before, I must admit there was some... disconnect. I wasn't an NPC, I wasn't a monster. What was I doing out here, in a drake's lair? All of that has drifted away... When I was dead,” she continues as if she doesn't see you flinch, “It was as if some giant presence was evaluating me. Examining me like a bug under a magnifying glass. Like it... cut some parts of me away, the parts that were questioning myself. I don't really remember. I don't think I was meant to feel anything. And then, when I return, it's as if all my questions have been answered.”

Another pause, briefer, as Amanda gathers her thoughts, sends your mind back to a conversation you had with mercy about the apparent lack of a God of Death.

“When I can back, I was an NPC, and a Monster. So that answered that. I was a Necromancer, so I have a calling. My 'Wasted Potential four' feat has become 'Committed to Change four', which will apparently make it easier for me to get my next four levels. And I'm no longer just some pretty thing you keep around out of pity.”

She looks back up, staring at you as if daring you to disagree, but you can't let that pass without challenge.

“Not pity, Amanda. If it had been pity I would have told you to go back to the city. I saw something in you, a steel, an unbroken core that took everything the world, and I, threw at you and came out. I never doubted that you would pull your weight, even without being a cleric any more.”

She smiles at that, flopping her head back onto the bed behind her.

“I guess. Anyone ever tell you you have a silver tongue? Anyway. I'm no longer doubtful that I can help. Feathers tells me that by doing what I did I helped break the stalemate, helped win, in some small way. She told me how you and Mercy waited for me.” She pulls her head back upright, her eyes bright with the edges of tears.

“Who knew that the only thing that needed to happen to give me some self worth was coming back from the dead?”

You snort, a curl of smoke leaking from your nostrils, and you push forward till your lips meet hers. She responds, eager, as your tongue slowly invades her mouth. She lets out a low moan before pushing you back with a gentle hand on your chest.

“That doesn't mean that my other preferences have changed. Don't go treating me different now, you hear me?”

You laugh, and pull back. “Got it. But now's probably not the time. Mercy has bullied Charlemagne into throwing a party tonight. I just... I just wanted to make sure you knew. It'll probably be kicking off any minute.”

It's Amanda's turn to laugh, before she tilts her head down to look at you through her lashes, which she flutters.

“Why sir! Are you asking me on a date? I'm not sure my parents would appreciate me spending time with a rogue such as you!”

You blink owlishly at her. “Do they know you passed out on my cock the first time we met?”

Amanda gasps in faux indignation. “How dare you? I'll have you know that this body is brand new and has never done anything of the sort!”

She pushes herself to her feet and strides from the room. But not before stopping when her mouth is by your ear and whispering “So someone is going to have to break it in all over again... Master.”

Sorry it's a little short this week, but as you can tell, smut incoming, and my head-space has been too bad to write even remotely reasonable smut this week.

Also, if you want to support me with a pound or two a month, this is the first chapter of the month and so is the most worthwhile time to join my patreon!

Also! Map!