Twenty-Seven || Stories

Mint and Prima came to an agreement not to mention Rue's little episode to Klaus or his family. It was Mint's idea; Prima wasn't sure what to make of the whole thing, and Mint encouraged him not to pursue it.

"But that was weird," Prima said. "Right? That seemed really weird. Are you sure we shouldn't tell somebody? Klaus might..."

"Klaus won't know any better than we do," Mint said. "I'll figure it out, don't worry."

"If you're sure."

"Very." She ran her hand along the wall, tracing over the burning letters. "This is Aeonic script?"

Prima nodded.

She turned her attention back to the letters, studied them. She had tried, briefly, to figure out where she had seen the letters from Rue's diary before, and now that Prima had told her their origin it seemed obvious: she had seen the same writing years ago, when she'd been introduced to the Book of Cosmos..

"I think we're done here," Mint said. "C'mon."

Together, they left the altar, still illuminated, behind them.

. .

Mint spent the remainder of the afternoon pretending nothing had happened. She spent the outdoor dinner with the Adlers, she accompanied them back to town, she said her goodnights and goodbyes. It was well past sundown and into true night when she got back to the inn and back to her room.

She briefly toyed with the idea of barging into Rue's room right that instant and demanding some kind of explanation for what had happened– she heard noises from behind the door, she knew he was there. But she also knew that pressing the matter immediately would be a bad idea. She needed answers from him, but she knew that pressing for them too soon would probably shut him down completely. She wasn't stupid, and she wasn't blind; she might have been freaked out by the whole affair, but he had clearly been terrified.

Which warranted its own set of questions right there.

But even as she came to the conclusion to wait, curiosity started nibbling away at the back of her mind. She prepared to go to sleep, lay down in bed, killed the lights and closed her eyes, but the nibbling turned into a gnawing, and for all her efforts to shut down her brain that gnawing question consumed all her other thoughts.

She was tired, but when after several minutes, then half an hour, then over an hour later she still found herself with her eyes squeezed shut playing and re-playing the events of the evening in her mind, she realized that there was no way she was going to get to sleep.

So she gave up.

She got out of bed and quickly changed out of her nightclothes and into something a little more presentable. When she was ready, she eased the door to her room open.

The hallway of Cartha's Inn always had a little bit of illumination, low-intensity lanterns along the wall that gave just enough light to see by but didn't intrude through the door openings and into the rooms. She followed the lantern light to the stairs, and then, after a moment's consideration, turned back and actually picked up one of the lanterns, disentangling it from its loose bonds. She drew some of the light from another one of the lanterns to bolster hers, leaving a small, guttering dark spot in her wake. She would return the lantern before the night was out, but in the interim she wanted a decent, portable light source; once she didn't need to keep infusing with her own magic.

Lantern in hand, she left the inn and stepped into the night breeze. The coolness that had finally arrived in town that day yet lingered into the night, bringing a surprising chill to the air. Mint didn't mind; she was used to colder lands, anyway, and found the cooling temperature pleasant.

She cast around for any signs of life. She hadn't bothered to check the time, but it must have been fairly late; all of the store lights were out, most of the home lights or hotel lights were out, and even the town's lamps were burning low, casting only enough light to see by. It was clear that it was past the town's unwritten curfew, though; she saw no people or roving shadows, and the only sound that reached her was the murmuring of the fountain.

And, after a moment, a voice.

"Mint?"

She knew it straightaway, even though it was partially lost under the sound of the fountain. She turned to look at the fountain and lifted the light higher. It was utterly unnecessary; the light didn't reach all that way anyhow, and she didn't need to see him to recognize him.

"Oh," she said, keeping her voice as flat and neutral as possible. "Hey."

It was Rue, sitting on the rim of the fountain. She started toward him, angling her light down and away from him while her eyes adjusted to the dark. He must have been even more restless than she was, as; he was still wearing the same clothes he had been that evening, albeit with the addition of a fine white robe to keep out the chill on the air. He reflected oddly pale in the moonlight; between the robe and the whiteness of his hair, he looked almost ghostly.

"Hey," he responded. "What're you doing out?"

"Couldn't sleep." She regarded him carefully. "You either, I guess."

He shook his head.

She sat down on the rim of the fountain and placed the lantern between the two of them. For a moment, they said nothing. That suited Mint just fine; she was taking the time to figure out how to broach the subject. He seemed to have composed himself again, at least, but she had to be wary how hard she pressed him.

As it turned out, all her rumination was for nothing.

"I'm sorry about what happened at the lake."

She stared at him.

"What?"

"The lake," he repeated. She noticed that even as he spoke to her, he was staring somewhere off in the sky. "A lot of things kind of hit me at once. I needed some time to get it straightened out."

"Did you?"

"Best as I could."

Well, at least she wouldn't have to worry about shutting him down.

"So I wasn't gonna say anything," immediately, she added to herself, "but that was kind of one of the freakiest things I've ever seen in my life."

"Yeah, it– ah– yeah."

"You wanna tell me what that was about?"

"I'd like to," he said, "but I can't."

She frowned at him. "Keeping secrets from me at this point isn't really gonna help anything."

"No, no," he said quickly. "That's not it. It's just– I don't really understand it, myself."

She had gathered at much, but it was still frustrating to hear it. "You said you'd been there before– here before, I'd guess. I got the impression this was your first time in town."

"It is," he said. "But... well, I've been thinking about a few things, and they sort of started to... I can't say make sense, but at least add up a little bit. I've seen Old Carona, too."

"So you have been here before."

"Not here," he said. "On the island, definitely. But not..." He waved his hand, indicating the town. "I've never seen Carona before. Whatever I was doing here – whenever I was here – it was all about the lake."

Now that was a strange way to describe it. "You don't remember?"

Rue paused.

"I don't remember a lot of things," he said.

"Like where you learned Aeonic."

"No." He mulled over his next words. "English isn't my first language. Back as far as I can remember, I woke up speaking– Aeonic, I guess it must be. I never knew. Nobody else seemed to recognize it." He chuckled, humorless. "Although nobody's spoken it for centuries."

"Not since Atenacius died," Mint said.

"Who?"

"The last Aeon. Atenacius. That was... six, seven hundred years ago?" She frowned. "Pretty sure it fizzled out around then."

"Sounds about right."

She nodded. "So let me just clarify. When you say as far back as you remember–"

"Five years. Or just about."

"Hm."

He gave her a sidelong look. "Something familiar about that?"

"Nope." She slid off the rim of the fountain and took a few steps away, stretching her legs. "So – and I just want to be sure about all this – my Relic-hunting partner is an amnesiac who understands a language so dead it's barely even studied anymore and has apparently been to see the Relic but can't remember when or why."

"Yes."

She looked at him over her shoulder. "Well," she said, "I appreciate your candor."

"Why deny it? You were there at the lake altar."

"Yes, I was." She turned to face him properly. "You don't remember anything about being there before?"

"Repressed," he said.

"What?"

"It was repressed." He stood up from the fountain and plucked the lantern from its rim. "I had these... these thoughts. Dreams. Really indistinct, back when I woke up. Somebody helped me forget them. I didn't start remembering until just a couple of days ago." He stepped up alongside her and held out the lantern. "That's what happened this evening. What I was remembering was just... deja vu, I suppose. But being at the altar brought back everything I'd been trying to forget."

She took the lantern back from. "That's what you were sorting."

"Right."

"Did you make sense of it?"

He shook his head. "It's all fragments. I've been here, but when I try to think about it too long it just slips away again, or starts to hurt. All of that at once... it was overwhelming."

"Weird."

That was the best word she could come up with right then. Weird. There had to be more to it than that, and an odd prickling started up the back of her neck as she considered the possibilities. There was more to this story, more that he wasn't telling her–

Or more that he couldn't tell her. His confusion and fear those earlier that day had been genuine, she had no doubt about that. The rest of the story seemed strangely convenient – amnesia? Really? – but she had a hard time doubting him.

Still, it didn't sit right with her. Maybe he didn't know the specifics, but she could tell – and he could, too – that there was a significance to it. She had to understand what it was, and whether it was advantageous or dangerous. Or if it even mattered. The amulet would be done and Prima would be completed and then they'd have the Relic and he could worry his own nonsense on his own time again. That would be fine, too.

"You said you had family," Mint said suddenly.

"Of sorts," Rue answered.

"Adoptive."

He nodded. "She's my... sister, I guess. But that's not really right. Best friend. Guardian. She saved my life after I woke up."

The phrase seemed strange to her. "What do you mean by that? Woke up?"

"Five years ago," he said. "The first thing I can remember is waking up in a tomb."

She grimaced. "Geez, seriously?" He nodded, and she clenched her teeth at the thought. "You're telling me somebody locked a kid in a crypt? That's messed up."

Rue was several seconds silent before he responded, and when he spoke, his voice was slow, deliberate, confounded. "What do you mean?"

"Five years ago, right?" At his affirmation, she continued. "You're not much older than me. You would've been, what, ten or eleven? Twelve, tops."

She waited for some kind of response, but he was quiet again, and when studied him his expression and body language were both unreadable.

"Right?" she pressed. "Or are you actually, like, forty, and just look really good for your age?"

He blinked, suddenly coming back to himself, and frowned at her. "What? No."

She cocked her head to the side and grinned.

Before she could find anything else to ask, though – and it was more a matter of narrowing down her questions than having to think of anything more – she saw something pale moving in the night. She raised the lantern to try and get a better look, and Rue, following her gaze, turned with her to see what she was looking at. Mint was having some trouble placing the details, the light partially blinding her, but Rue broke away and walked toward the approaching figure.

"What brings you out, Belle?"

Mint bristled, but forced herself to relax. Rue had come to an agreement with Belle, Mint reminded herself; no need for confrontation. Especially not in the middle of town. Besides, as she got a better look at Belle, it was apparent that she had no inclination to fight; she was still wearing her own nightgown and slippers.

"It's Duke," she said, sighing. "He disappeared from the hotel room. He likes to take night strolls, so usually I wouldn't care, but he didn't say anything or leave a note."

"Concerned about your boy-toy?" Mint asked.

Belle stoicly ignored her, keeping her attention on Rue. "Leeson said he headed out a little while ago. You didn't happen to see him, did you?"

"How long is a while? I walked out maybe twenty minutes ago."

Belle sighed. "Longer than that.."

"Any ideas?"

"I think he's trying to get the Hexagon fixed. It's almost useless after our– meeting– today. Said he knew a guy who could probably get it functional again."

Rue tilted his head. "In town?"

"That's what Duke said."

"Bet I know," Mint said. They both turned to look at her. "The Hexagon uses a sorcerous drive, right?"

Belle looked at her carefully. "Yeah," she said. "How'd you know?"

"Sounded familiar." Mint finally decided to approach them, holding the lantern down to keep the light out of her eyes. "The noise the Hexagon made, I mean. I've heard it before. Recently." She looked over to Rue. "You have, too."

He blinked, frowned, then suddenly turned to attention. "Oh! The Pulsar-inferno Typhoon Omega."

"The Pinto. Yeah."

He blinked again. "The... Pinto."

"Rod's big floaty thing."

Rue nodded, plainly understanding her meaning, but his face was still contorted in confusion. "...Pinto."

"Pinto," she repeated, and nodded to Belle. "We'll go see our guy," she said. "I missed him at Jargen's this evening, anyway."

"Lead on."

Mint did no such thing. She regarded Belle for a few seconds more, then said, slowly; "Are you gonna... change, or something?"

"This is fine."

"We're going through the forest."

"I really don't care."

Mint shrugged. "Whatever," she said finally, and with that last note of disdain they headed to the forest gate.

It was late enough that the gate had been closed for at least a couple of hours, but further along the wall, tucked into a short alley and almost invisible even in daytime thanks to the building structure and shadows, there was a smaller, regular door that opened out into the forest. It was intended to allow small groups to exit the town in the event that the gate was somehow inoperable or would have been infeasible to open – in the event of a monster attack, perhaps, or in the event that somebody wanted to leave in the middle of the night and didn't want to waste the time and effort it took to swing a pair of twenty-foot wooden doors open and closed just to go outside for an hour – although judging by the rust residue and the difficulty they had in opening it again, it must not have seen much use.

Mint took point, holding the lantern aloft to light their way, and started down the path. There was silence between the three of them for a few minutes, until Mint finally spoke up.

"So how long you were eavesdropping on us?"

Belle started. "What's that?"

"Oh, come off it," Mint said. "We wouldn't have heard you walking up to us, not over the fountain. And not with you wearing such nice slippers." Belle clenched her teeth and glared, but the expression was pointless when Mint refused to turn around. "I doubt you happened to walk up to us right then. Right?"

"Wrong," Belle said. "I came over when I heard you talking. The first thing I heard was something about tombs."

"I don't recall you trying to get our attention."

She laughed. "Just because I wasn't eavesdropping doesn't mean I wasn't about to."

"It's not really a secret, anyway," Rue said.

"Isn't it?" Mint asked. "This is all new to me."

"Well, it's not exactly my go-to conversation starter, either."

Fair enough.

They turned onto the footpath that led down to Rod's glade, and shortly thereafter emerged from the trees. They snaked their way down the narrow path toward the stretch of grass, but partway there Mint faltered, a bit surprised by what she was seeing.

Rod's fire was roaring, and Johnny Wolf was laid out alongside it, stretched out on his back, dead asleep, one hind paw twitching slightly. Further down, closer to Rod's cave and makeshift workshop, there was another set of lights, artificial and bright, surrounding the disc-like body of the Hexagon. The Hexagon itself was unnaturally dark, and the reason why was clear; lying next to its body, carefully placed in a nest of cloth, was a small glass orb, its molten interior shifting with oranges and reds– the Hexagon's cannon orb.

Standing on their side of the lifeless Hexagon, peering around the corner, was Duke, and Belle zeroed in on him immediately.

"Hey! What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Duke jumped and whirled, startled, but seemed to relax when he recognized Belle. "Ah, milady, you scared me," he said. "I wasn't expecting to see you out here."

She shoved past Mint and stormed across the glade toward him. "I notice you aren't answering my question, either," she snapped. "So, again. Duke. What the hell are you doing?"

He didn't seem much affected by her fire. Instead, he smiled and gestured to the Hexagon. "I was hoping to surprise you with this tomorrow," he said, "but I guess that's kinda pointless now. I told you I knew a guy who could get her fixed up."

"Which is exactly what I'm doing." It was Rod's voice, muffled behind the Hexagon's body. With a bit of shuffling, he emerged from around the side, wiping sweat from his forehead. He grinned. "And you must be Duke's lady– Belle Delaney?" He gave her a sweeping half-bow. "Rod the Blade Star, at your service."

When he stood back up, his eyes flicked to a point over Belle's shoulder, and he gave Rue and Mint a similarly sweeping wave. "Well, hello there! What's the occasion."

"Looking for Duke," Mint said. She looked quickly between him and Rod. "You two know each other?"

"Oh, yeah," Duke said. "We go pretty far back. I knew he was in town and hadn't gotten to see him yet, and this seemed like a pretty good excuse."

"And I had no idea you were in town," Rod said, "so thank you very much for not mentioning it to me."

"Sorry," Duke said. "We've been busy."

"Fighting our young friends, apparently," Rod said.

"Only sometimes!"

Belle folded her arms, glared meaningfully between the two, and then marched past them and around to the other side of the Hexagon. "I swear, if you've done anything else to this damn thing..."

Her words trailed off. The other four stood waiting, none quite ready to see what she was doing, but it was only a matter of moments before she came back around, her expression kept carefully blank.

"How much is done?" she asked.

"The engine's fixed," Rod said. "The drive isn't too badly hurt, but it needs a little love. The body– I can only do a patch job on that. Keep her sealed up, but it won't be pretty. My expertise is metal, not stone. Speaking of." He disappeared for a moment, then came back around the side, holding a bag. He shook it, letting the contents clink and cascade against each other. "There was a ton of metal all stuck in the drive gear, and probably more than this, but it had been ground to dust. But I don't see anything missing in there. Did you have any special alterations?"

Rue coughed. "That, ah, that was me."

Rod looked at him curiously.

"I shoved a sword into it."

"Why'd you go and do a thing like that?"

"That was me," Belle said. "We had a disagreement concerning the ownership of a block of phantomite earlier." She paused. "Then there was a dragon."

"He settled our dispute," Rue said mildly.

"Well!" Rod said. "That explains that."

He disappeared back behind the Hexagon again.

"Anyway," he continued, "the internals only need a little more attention. The body will take another few hours, though."

Belle nodded. "How much does this cost?"

"Don't worry about it," Duke said. "We've got an arrangement."

"That doesn't allay any of my concerns."

"He's right," Rod called. "I owed him a coupla favors. He'll owe me a couple more when this is done. It'll all even out." He leaned around to see the group again, smiling broadly. "Mostly, though, this is a really cool toy you've got here. The only other sorcerous drive I've seen is on my baby–"

Mint started to interrupt. "The Pi–"

"Pulsar-inferno Typhoon Omega," Rue said quickly. She glared at him.

"–and this one's a little different. Where did you find it?"

"The Coral Sea ruins," Belle said. "Some old mechanical wizard must've put it together as a security system. We had a little spat. I made it understand reason."

"It's sentient?"

"It's programmed to defend the ruins," she said. "It's re-programmed to listen to me."

"Huh," Rod said. "Neat bit of magic."

Mint snorted dismissively. Rue nudged her. "Be nice," he whispered.

"You are the one who made an arrangement," she whispered back. "I can be as petulant as I want."

But she didn't raise any more substantial objection. Instead, she walked a little toward the Hexagon, taking the opportunity to examine it now that she wasn't fighting for her life, and ran her hand over the surface, trailing along the patterns inscribed on its surface.

"You know," Mint said, "before the Pinto, I'd never seen–"

"You do not call my baby the Pinto."

"–anything like the sorcerous drive," Mint continued, completely ignoring him. "If this thing came from an old atelier, it kinda makes sense, but what's up with your boat?"

"She is not a boat," Rod said. "She is an ACV. And... I'm not entirely sure where she came from." There was a faint metallic shriek from whatever he was toying with on the other side, then a thump, then a hiss. "Could one of you hand me the cannon orb?"

Duke was the first one to move. He handed the cannon orb over to Rod, and there was another low hiss as he plugged the orb into the sorcerous drive. For a few seconds nothing happened, and then the Hexagon began to hum, the lines across its body glowing dimly, the engines turning lazily. He let it go for a while, attentive to the sound, but after about a minute of low running the noise was an even, gentle purr.

"That'll help the engine," he said. He did something with the innards, and the Hexagon stilled again. "I'll just need to rebuild some of this external damage. You'll probably have to find somebody a little better versed in magic than I am, if you want to use this for combat again, but she'll fly like a dream."

"I'll worry about that later," Belle said. "Getting her moving right was my biggest concern, anyway."

Mint cleared her throat. "You had a story."

"About the Pin– the Pulsar-inferno Typhoon Omega?" Rod asked. "Not much of one. She's an old vehicle, centuries past– Lucine told me the Aeons were still alive when she was built." He laughed. "I love her, but I'm not sure I really believe that."

"I've heard that name before."

"Lucine? Her name's come up in the tavern, probably. She's in... a few of my stories."

The next question was soft-spoken, almost lost on the night breeze. "Who is she?" Rue asked.

Rod did not respond immediately. He did one more thing to the Hexagon, sealed up the cannon orb, and came back around to meet the others.

"I need to let the drive cool before I start working on the body," he said. "Let's join Johnny Wolf by the fire."

They did.

. .

"Lucine was my woman," Rod began. "I don't mean that I claimed her or anything– she would never let me do that. But for all the years we were together, she was always with me. Always on my side. She was there when I started my art." He smiled. "And she was there when I ruined it. Over and over again. When I started making weapons, I didn't have any training or any idea what I was doing, so it wasn't... it wasn't pretty, we'll keep it at that. It took me years before I could make anything that I was proud of.

"Lucine didn't care. I'd come back with all kinds of useless junk, and she'd just keep telling me to keep at it. I wanted to give up a few times, go back to just being a swordsman, but she'd never let me. She was always encouraging."

"Told you your failures were just stepping stones to success?" Mint asked.

"Actually she told me to get better or I'd never fulfill my dreams. 'Suck it up, don't pout, get back out there and don't come inside until you've made something more than a doorstop'. She didn't like to mince words.

"She was there for me during the bad times, when I'd all but given up and was ready to throw out all of my forging supplies and sell of my old man's weapon collection just so I wouldn't have to look at it anymore. She asked me if I'd lost my heart that day. Then she questioned if I ever had it. 'Always going on about heart,' she said. 'How can you do that when you haven't even got your own?'" He shook his head. "I couldn't stop then. Not after she questioned my heart. Wasn't long after that I made my first real weapon. It wasn't much, but the sides were sharp and the weight was balanced and it was still the greatest thing I'd ever made.

"A little while after I really got established, she disappeared for a bit. She'd do that sometimes, say goodbye and then leave for a few weeks, and always come back with stories. The first few times I worried, but after a while I realized it was just her way. She always encouraged me during my weapon-smithing failures; the least I could do was let her have her journeys.

"She was on a particularly long one, almost a month, but when she comes back she says she has a surprise for me, and she leads me out of the village and out to the river and this– this gorgeous vehicle is sitting there, the sorcerous drive all lit up, and Lucine says she found it out in the middle of nowhere, no specifics, but it needs a few repairs and if I could figure her out, she was mine.

"Took some doing – I think I almost broke her a couple of times – but after I finished with the insides Lucine went and polished up the outside. She wanted to go on a trip to test her out– a long one, so if it turned out I'd failed we'd both be stuck trekking back for weeks."

"It was all or nothing with her, huh?" Mint asked.

"If it's worth doing, it's worth doing with all your heart." He sighed wistfully. "And I agreed. We took the Pulsar-inferno Typhoon Omega out across the continent, and not once did something go wrong. And the trip– it was the most beautiful time of my life. I came back from it inspired as I'd never been before.

"But it didn't last. Not even a year later, Lucine didn't approve of my work anymore. It was still top-quality craftsmanship, people came for miles just to see what I could do, but she said that it didn't have the same heart. I thought she was nuts. She disagreed."

"She left," Belle said.

"She threw me out of the house," Rod said. "Told me not to come back until I had it all figured out." He nodded toward the cave, where the ACV had been parked. "My baby is the only thing I have left from her."

"How long?" Rue asked.

"Oh, a few years by now. Rod the Blade Star, swordsman and sword-smith, the dashing vagrant. But it's for the best. I realized a while ago that she was right. I hit my peak and started to coast. I could make some of the finest weapons you'll ever see, and I could probably do it in my sleep, but that wasn't the point. She stayed with me when I put all my heart into my failures. When I stopped doing that with my successes... I know why she let me go."

Mint absently flipped her hair over her shoulder. "So you know where you messed up," she said. "Why not just go back?"

"Because I haven't found it yet," Rod said. "When I experiment, when I make my new weapons, I almost feel it again... but almost isn't what Lucine wants. If it's worth doing–"

"It's worth doing with all your heart," Duke finished. He pressed his hand to his chest. "I get it."

Belle gave Duke a sidelong glare and whacked him in the arm.

"You been talking to her, at least?" Mint asked. "Sending letters or whatever?"

"Not a word," Rod said. "But it doesn't matter. She's still watching out for me, she always has been. I don't have to talk to her to know it's true, I just... feel it."

Mint chuckled. "Well that's stupid."

"No it's not," Rue said.

She raised an eyebrow.

"It's not," he repeated. "There are some things you don't need to be told."

"I see," she said. "This have anything to do with your surrogate sister?"

He hesitated, then nodded. "In a manner of speaking."

"You haven't been sending letters home?" she asked. "Haven't been getting any from her? You're a long way away from Greenvale. How long have you been looking for this Relic?"

"You're looking for a Relic?" Rod yelped. Nobody responded to him.

"Three years," Rue said.

"And you're just trusting that she's be okay with that? I don't write to my family, either, but I ran away from home. I don't want to talk to them."

"I don't have a choice in the matter," he said.

"How can you not have a choice in the matter?"

For a moment, Rue looked away, studying the ground somewhere to the left of the fire. After several seconds, deep in consideration, he looked up, turning his attention to Rod and Duke. "I owe you a story, don't I?" he asked. Without waiting for a response, he looked over to Mint. "And you. You asked me why I wanted the Relic, and then we got a little off-topic."

She thought back. She couldn't remember the specifics of the conversation, but she could recall that they almost had one. "That's right."

So he told them the story.

. .

As much of it as he dared.

Fancy Mel and Wylaf had both gotten the whole of the recitation out of him because he knew there was no point in hiding anything. Here, now, he told them everything there was no point in hiding. But for all he had said that it wasn't a secret – and his awakening, his amnesia, Claire's kindness, Claire's death, none of that was secret – there were certainly parts that he had left out. They didn't need to know about the crystal, or his power to see and subsume souls; they didn't need to know about his fundamentally inhuman nature.

He had been worried, briefly, that Duke might bring up his unnatural ability to transform and start asking uncomfortable, unanswerable questions about that, but it became clear soon after that Duke was perhaps the most invested in the recitation. He shouldn't have been worried; Duke's love of books and stories absorbed him fully into the telling. Belle and Rod remained quiet as well; even Mint kept herself from asking questions, although part of the reason was possibly because he had answered most of hers already.

When he finished, they were all quiet for a few seconds. Duke was the first to break the silence.

"Damn, man."

"Certainly explains why you indebted yourself to us so thoroughly," Belle murmured.

Mint coughed. Then she coughed again just in case the first one was not obviously fake. When she had the circle's attention, she cleared her throat – genuinely, that time – and said; "Am I the only one that kind of has a problem with this?"

Belle exhaled. "Here we go."

"Oh, shove it," Mint growled. Her next words were directed at Rue. "You woke up five years ago."

"Yes."

"Your friend got murdered three years ago."

"Yes."

"She has been dead longer than you've known her."

"Correct."

"And you've been hung up on her for three years."

"Is there a point you're trying to make?" He didn't say it angrily, but he had more or less figured out where she was going with her questions and he wanted it to be out in the air quickly.

"It just seems... I mean, that's a long time. And you're still not over it. Seems unhealthy."

He actually laughed. He had been expecting her to make the same point about necromancy that Mel and Wylaf had already tried to make. Psychological health had not been anywhere in his expectations.

She didn't appreciate his reaction. "What? I'm just saying it's kinda creepy is all."

"Sorry, sorry," he said. "I mean... no, you're right. But... she's the only family I ever had. I had some friends in town, but, well... I don't think they ever really stopped being afraid of me, on some level. Claire... she was never like that. I passed out on her lawn and woke up speaking in tongues and the only thing she ever did was help me. I owe her everything. I always will."

Mint studied him for a moment, then sighed and shook her head. "Eh. Your crazy got me this close to a Relic. Guess I can't really judge."

He realized that he had been holding his breath, and finally let it go.

It was good she didn't pry more than that. She was right, he wasn't going to deny that, and maybe, in other circumstances, he would have tried to move on. But to tell her why he refused, why he couldn't let Claire go until his quest was done–

Uncomfortable, unanswerable questions.

Silence fell again, interrupted only by the quiet crackling of the fire and Johnny Wolf's occasional high-pitched puppy snores. Finally, Rod stood up.

"That's a hell of a story," he said. "How close are you guys to getting this Relic?"

"Can't be more than a couple of days," Mint said.

Rod smiled. "That's good," he said. He jerked his thumb over his shoulder, indicating the Hexagon. "I've got to get back to working on this thing, if we want it set by morning. But I'm glad you guys came out to talk." When Rue was back on his feet, Rod held out his hand to him. "I'm glad I could help you guys out with this. And hey, when all this is over, I'd like to meet your friend. She sounds like a hell of a woman."

Rue accepted the handshake and met Rod's smile with his own. "Thanks."

"And you too, Mint. Dunno what you're looking for, but I know you've put your heart into it. See it through to the end."

She grinned. "You don't need to tell me."

Belle and Duke stood up just after them. "Guess we should head back to the room," Belle said. She glanced at Duke. "Or did you have somewhere else you wanted to sneak off to?"

"Nope, I'm good." He nodded to Rue and Mint. "If there's anything else we can do, you know where to find us."

With a final flurry of farewells, the group parted. Rod headed back to the Hexagon; Belle and Duke headed back to town. Rue and Mint hung back for a few minutes, giving them a head start, before they followed the path themselves. They didn't speak again until they had reached the inn and Mint was replacing the borrowed lantern into its holder.

"I never did agree to your terms," she said.

Rue had been halfway into his room when she spoke up, and had to stop himself from closing the door. He leaned back out to face her, curious. "What?"

"Your terms," she said. "About you getting first crack at the Relic."

He thought back. "No," he said, "I guess you didn't."

"I figure this'd be a good time to mention it, since, you know, Prima's going to be breaking that seal soon." She pushed some of the metal of the lantern bracket, tying it securely back into place, just the way she had found it. "I guess it's okay."

He smiled wanly. "Thank you, Mint."

"But," she added, "if you mess up and bring her back as some kind of undead, you've got to take care of it. I'm not getting involved in that."

"Then I guess I'll just have to bring her back the right way."

"Damn straight you will."

She disappeared into her room. He turned and gently closed the door behind him.