Author's Note: This story has been brewing for four years. Seriously. Back in 2006, I claimed the prompt in Myriadwords' master list of prompts on LiveJournal. From the beginning, this story was my idea, but I could never get past the first few paragraphs. Then about two months ago, I finally pushed through and finished it, and have been polishing it ever since. (Originally posted on my LiveJournal on 11/15/10.)

Str'brnt knew she was more than her slight human frame appeared as soon as she entered the bar. It wasn't just the way she carried herself, sure of her ability to handle any situation, or the quick flicker of her eyes to the doorway as it hissed shut, taking care that one of those situations wasn't sneaking up behind her.

It was mostly how well she concealed those aspects of herself. If Str'brnt had not spent most his life behind a bar, greeting, serving and, sometimes, facing down members of a thousand or more species from across most of the known galaxy, he would have missed it too.

His life as a bartender had also taught him that when someone went out of their way to appear nondescript, it was best not to let on you had broken the illusion. So, instead of making himself obvious by staring at the newcomer, Str'brnt simply continued to wash the glass in his hand before setting it on a shelf under the bar.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the human give the room another thorough scan, taking in each of the other patrons in turn. She then made her way to the left side of the bar, sitting on one of the stools which—by no coincidence Str'brnt was certain—gave her a side-glance view of the door along with a solid vantage of everyone else currently in the room.

The others—two groups of local Malt'tsh occupying a pair of tables near the opposite wall—didn't give the newcomer much notice. Although Str'brnt doubted any of them had ever seen a human before, Malt'dx saw more than its share of interstellar traffic and once you've seen a dozen or so alien species, the novelty wears off. Par'jy was one of only two spaceports on the planet surface and fed a steady stream of customers Str'brnt's way, even though most of the tourists went through Socc'r, which offered warmer climates and several hundred miles of the sandy beaches many species coveted.

Par'jy saw almost exclusively commercial traffic and the off-worlders who stopped by the bar were mostly freighter crews—along with those travelers who wished to avoid the extra official scrutiny that came with the more popular destinations. Malt'dx was on several major transport routes and Str'brnt catered to several dozen species on a regular basis and a few hundred more on a more scattered regiment.

It wasn't surprising the others were unaware of just how rare it was to see a human. Str'brnt had only met three others in his days, and he doubted he would see many more.

Grabbing another cloth and tossing it over his bulky shoulder, Str'brnt walked over to the newcomer. As he did, he allowed himself to take her in more fully. She had the pale, furless skin of the other humans he'd seen, and her reddish brown hair was braided into a single plait running half the length of her back. He didn't know enough about human aesthetics to know if she was attractive for her species, but he guessed she was not far out of adolescence. She looked small enough, but that was a hazardous supposition considering like most Malt'tsh, Str'brnt was almost half again as tall as she was, his finger-length coat of light brown fur making him appear that much larger.

It was only when he was directly across the bar from her that he saw the thin scar marring the smooth skin of her face, starting just left of center on her forehead and continuing in a wide arc above her eye and ending just before her ear.

"Hello," he said in the generic language of interstellar transport crews. Most companies didn't spend enough money on their employees to supply them with translation devices, so a rudimentary dialect had slowly arisen, using basic sounds the varying vocal cords of the multi-species crews could approximate. Str'brnt had a few translators under the bar, but they were buggy at the best of times, and he only pulled them out when it was absolutely necessary.

She nodded, clearly understanding him. Str'brnt wasn't surprised. From her earlier mannerisms, she didn't strike him as someone who would travel unprepared.

"What'll you have?" he asked.

She pondered for a moment and then said, "Enaud." Her expression remained in the same neutral pose it had held since her arrival.

Her reply did surprise him, both for the softness of her voice and her drink of choice. Enaud was a combination of several alcohols from six different systems, and it was strong—very strong. He raised an eyebrow at her questioningly. She saw and nodded, the first hint of a smile appearing on her face. A second later, the smile was gone, and Str'brnt left to mix the drink.

When he returned, he caught her scanning the room once more, even though no one had arrived since she entered the bar. It had been a slow night all around for Str'brnt. The next major freighter was not due at the port for another few days.

He set the drink in front of her, its blue hues, mixed with several swirls of pale green, almost glowed in the dim light of the room.

"Thank you," she said in the traveler speak, her soft voice again surprising him. She took the drink and took a small sip, sighing quietly and closing her eyes in appreciation. When she opened them again, she had momentarily dropped her precautions and inadvertently their eyes met.

A jolt ran through him as if he had grabbed an un-insulated wire and he turned away, trying to make it appear as if he was simply checking on the other customers. He felt his breathing quicken with the realization of who—what—she was.

Knowing full well it was not smart idea, that the human was obviously doing her best not to advertise herself, Str'brnt turned back to her, avoided her eyes as he did, and said, "Is it to your liking?"

Only he didn't ask it in the broken language of transport crews. Instead he used the flowing words of the Speech.

She tensed immediately and Str'brnt began to regret his rash decision. He took a quick breath and spread his fur-covered hands palm out in what he hoped she took as a non-threatening gesture. Still, she glanced back and forth, canvassing the room again, then her eyes unfocused briefly as if she was in deep concentration. A moment later she focused her attention back on Str'brnt, but her manner appeared moderately calmer.

"It is very good indeed," she said finally, also in the Speech, but kept her voice low enough to ensure only he could hear. She then took a second, longer sip of the drink.

"Dai stiho," she added after another stretch of silence. "Are you on errantry?"

Str'brnt shook his head. "Oh, I'm not a wizard," he replied. "I've just always been good with languages. It helps when you're a bartender."

"Good with languages," she said absently, taking a long drink from the glass. "I knew someone like that once." She let the words hang there, potent in their meaning. "How did you discover your talent with the Speech?"

He shrugged. "We only have a dozen or so wizards on Malt'dx, but when I was young, a strong earthquake struck my home city. I was trapped in our house and a wizard came and saved me. Afterward, I met him again at the refugee camp, and before I knew it, I was talking to him in the Speech. For a while my parents thought I might become a wizard myself, but it didn't happen. I used to get the odd wizard in here from all sorts of places, but not so often now."

Something dark flashed in her face at his last comment, but it disappeared quickly, replaced by her former neutral manner.

"The name is Str'brnt," he said casually in an attempt to break the mood.

She paused, clearly not in the habit of trusting strangers. "Nita," she said after a moment. "My name is Nita."

"Nice to meet you, Nita," he said. "So, what brings you out to our humble planet?"

She didn't answer and instead gave the room another scan. She nodded in the direction of his right shoulder and said, "You're being summoned."

Str'brnt turned and saw the one of the other patrons raising an empty glass. He chuckled and apologizing, left her to handle the thirsty Malt'dx. Once there, several of the others decided his presence was a good opportunity to refill their glasses as well. It was only after he had set the final glass on its owner's table and returned to the bar that he realized Nita had purposely sidestepped his question. He knew enough about wizards to know that they rarely lied, and he supposed avoiding a question you didn't want to answer was a lot easier than risking the alternative.

So when he returned to her, he didn't press the subject. Instead, he noticed her own glass was nearing empty.

"Would you like another?" he asked.

She pondered it for a moment, looking at the last finger's width of liquid inside the glass. "Why not?" she asked, although Str'brnt wasn't sure if she was asking the question to him or herself. She tipped the remaining drink up and finished it, setting the glass on the bar.

Str'brnt left and went through the motions of making another. Despite her small stature, Nita wasn't showing any ill effects from her first drink. He'd seen full grown Malt'tsh rendered unconscious after only one. He wondered briefly if it had something to do with her being a wizard.

"So, how did you come to be an Enaud connoisseur?" he asked as he set the drink down in front of her.

She smiled briefly, becoming momentarily lost in memory. "My…" she started but then drifted off, her smile fading. "My partner had always had a fascination with anything blue."

Although not a wizard himself, Str'brnt knew the power the Speech contained and the importance of using the correct words when describing people. He recognized her pause as someone who was choosing her words carefully. The version of "partner" she had used denoted a powerful and complex relationship.

"Several years…" she paused again. "Several years after it all fell apart, I was in a bar somewhere—a system I don't even remember now—and I saw someone drinking a blue concoction and ordered it without considering what I was getting. The bartender must have thought it would be funny, and didn't warn me about how strong the damn things are. After the first sip, I thought my throat was going to melt, but I simply wasn't in the mood to let it get the best of me that day. I kept drinking until the glass was empty. I woke up three hours later propped up against the bar. It took another two before I could stand."

Str'brnt chuckled despite himself and she gave him a menacing look, which dissolved into a smile of her own.

"It took some time, but I built a tolerance to the stuff and now it's my drink of choice, if for no other reason that people don't think I can handle it. It also tastes damn good. Besides, I learned a long time ago that sometimes you need a good burn." She became reflective again. "Yours, by the way, is one of the best I've had," she added.

"Thank you," he said, watching her as she sank back into her memories. Str'brnt knew the look. No matter how well you guarded yourself against the past, it only took one peek through the window to bring it all back in a flood.

"Did your partner, the one with the penchant for blue, did he make it?" he asked gently, already sure of the answer.

There was a sudden intake of breath from Nita, as if he had slapped her in the face. "No," she said after a long moment.

Str'brnt regretted asking the question almost immediately. Although information traveled faster than any other commodity along the transports routes, little news had ever arrived on Malt'dx about what exactly had befallen the Sol system and its one inhabited planet. Although humans had been a rather primitive, planet-bound species, genocide on that scale tends to make news no matter where it occurs. What Str'brnt did know was only a relative handful of humans survived, and apparently Nita was one of them.

He also knew that as a wizard, the time since had been little better for her. The past several cycles had proven increasingly hostile to wizards. Str'brnt had only heard the faintest whispers on the edges of the incessant rumor mill swirling around Par'jy's port. No one was willing to speak openly about whatever it was that was happening, but he had had enough drunken long-haulers to fill in a few gaps.

Nita was silent, staring at her near empty glass. She sighed and returned her gaze to him, a look of determination growing on her face. "Kit and I will see each other again in Timeheart. Until then, I will serve the Powers."

Str'brnt nodded solemnly, more due to the certainty contained in her words than from actual comprehension. He thought for a moment, then asked softly, "Is it really as bad as it seems? I haven't had a wizard in here for a very long time. That's why I said something when I realized what you were."

She thought before answering, her expression deflating considerably. "What we once called a war was simply the opening salvo in a much larger conflict, bigger than anything we have faced in millennia, perhaps ever." She paused again. "And in this conflict, we are not winning."

Str'brnt couldn't help but feel a chill go through him at her words. He had been raised to see wizards as the guardians of life itself. If they lost, what would that mean for everyone else?

Nita apparently divined his thoughts. "Don't worry," she said with a grim smile on her face. "We haven't lost yet."

He was surprised to find her words comforting him. He knew she wouldn't lie while speaking in the Speech, but it was more than that. He felt himself believing her because she believed herself despite the obvious horrors she'd seen. If she could still hold faith, shouldn't he be able to do the same?

The growing warmth, however, was replaced by a new chill when he remembered the question she had so easily evaded earlier. Did her being here mean this war had now arrived on Malt'dx?

As if on cue, the door to the bar opened with a hiss of hydraulics. They both turned at the sound and Str'brnt saw three aliens standing at the threshold, one in the lead and the others on either side a step behind. In unison, they took a step forward and he could see they were a species he did not immediately recognize. They were bipeds with two matching arms, only slightly taller than Nita but much bulkier. Short white fur covered the parts of their bodies not concealed by matching black leather uniforms without insignias or identification of any kind.

Str'brnt took in the details in a single glance, but his attention lingered on the bulky firearms held in their outstretched arms. He turned back to Nita, but in the same instant he'd been staring at the newcomers, she had already left her stool and was standing away from the bar facing them.

The lead alien barked an order and he and his comrades fired their weapons simultaneously. Nita raised a magical shield Str'brnt felt more than he saw. He expected her to hold her ground behind it but instead she dove to her left as soon as the construct was complete. The projectiles struck the shield and shattered it. A sound reminiscent of thousands of tiny bells striking the ground filled the small bar. The noise was followed by three meaty impacts from behind him as the rounds hit the back wall.

Str'brnt heard shouts from the drinking Malt'tsh, but kept his attention on Nita and the attackers. He thought briefly about reaching for the weapon he kept under the bar, but decided now was not the time. Whoever these aliens were, they had come prepared to battle with a full-fledged wizard. He suspected a bartender wouldn't cause them much worry and he might distract Nita at an inopportune moment.

Meanwhile, Nita had turned her dive into a roll and rode it back to her feet. She snarled something in the Speech, the words still managing to sound beautiful despite the lethal intent behind them. Str'brnt felt another surge of energy, this time emanating from the direction of the attackers. The air seemed to waver for a second around the right-most alien, and Str'brnt was suddenly blinded by a brilliant white light. When his sight returned, the alien was gone, replaced by a few wisps of vapor and the stench of ozone mingled with the faint smell of scorched matter.

The other two attackers recovered quickly and fired their weapons again. Nita gave a short cry of pain as one of the shots gouged a bloody furrow in her left arm. The aliens continued to fire, but the subsequent bullets appeared to bend their approach at the last moment, shattering tables, chairs, and to a lesser extent, the wall behind Nita.

She raised her hand, and with another shout, the left alien disappeared in blinding flash and a renewed breath of ozone. Unfazed, the lead alien reloaded its weapon and charged Nita without warning. Its speed was incredible and the alien was upon her before she could make a move.

Nita blocked the first swing, and swept her right leg forward in an attempt to strike its legs. The alien blocked the attack in turn with its gun hand, firing at the same time, eliciting another hiss of pain from Nita as the bullet tore through her outstretched leg. She took a hesitant step forward, keeping herself close enough to her attacker to make it impossible for it to use the gun properly. It also apparently kept her from using her disintegration spell, and she instead assumed a fighting stance.

It attacked again, and soon the pair became a constantly moving storm of strikes and counterstrikes. Unfortunately, it had the advantage over Nita in both weight and reach, and, combined with the blood loss from her wounds, it proved too much. A brutal punch landed on the side of Nita's head and she dropped to the floor on her back. In an instant, it was on top of her, straddling her stomach, and it brought its gun forward, pressing the barrel to the skin of her forehead.

Then it spoke, its high, pitchy voice somehow tainting the Speech as it spoke. "You are beaten. We will be rewarded grandly for our service," it rasped, apparently unconcerned by the fact that its companions were now little more than loose clouds of free-floating molecules. "And now another ungrateful one falls before us, unwilling to accept the beauty of our master's gift. You are now at your end."

Nita's face remained hard, her eyes ignoring the gun on her forehead. "There is no end when Timeheart is waiting for me along with the friends who traveled there before me." Then, suddenly her face turned into a grin. "But they'll have to wait a bit longer for me."

An in that instant, Str'brnt realized the alien had fallen into a trap of some kind and was now exactly where Nita wanted it to be. In the next instant, however, he knew whatever her plan had been, it had failed. She remained where she was and so too the alien, its weapon still pointed at her, ready to end her life.

It was the alien's turn to smile. "You were waiting until the right moment to use your transport spell to sneak behind us, were you not?" it asked, obviously knowing the answer. "We come prepared and informed of your trickery. Once you came close enough to us to attack, your magic was useless to you. At that moment, you were already killed by us. Now we must only finish the act."

There was a flicker of fear in Nita's eyes as she looked up at her soon-to-be killer. Then the determination set her face to stone. Str'brnt could hear her breath the word "Kit." She did not close her eyes when the shot was fired.

So Str'brnt was able to see her look of surprise when the alien's head jerked and its body slumped lifelessly to the side in a tumble of loose limbs. Its gun, unfired, clattered harmlessly to the floor beside it.

Shocked by the turn of events, Nita stared at the dead alien for several long moments before turning to Str'brnt, who was still holding his weapon, the one he'd grabbed from underneath the bar the moment Nita's plan had failed.

She nodded silently at him and then looked at the alien to convince herself it wouldn't be getting back up. She regained her feet, favoring her injured leg as she did so.

Now that the immediacy of the attack was fading, Str'brnt felt his hands beginning to shake and he carefully set the gun back on its shelf under the bar. He turned to check on the other customers, all of whom were still cowering underneath their tables trying to stay out of any lines of fire.

At some point during the attack, the door had hissed itself shut, but enough shots had been fired while it was open to alert someone outside who would have in turn called the authorities. Str'brnt looked back at Nita and knew she was thinking the same. She limped to the bar and began to speak, but he held up a hand.

"Drinks on the house," he said evenly. "And don't worry about the damage. I've had worse."

She smiled weakly. "Thank you," she said after a moment.

He felt the true meaning of her words. "It was the least I could do." He crossed his arms in an attempt to keep them from shaking.

Nita noticed the gesture. "I have to go," she said.

"Get out of here," he said gently. "Just do me a favor."

"Sure," she said.

"Keep on not losing."

She nodded and without another word, she made her way to the doorway. She tensed as it hissed open, and she quickly glanced in several directions intently before heading away and disappearing into the darkness.