Chapter 7 – Flashy Revelations
Lucia idly picked at the remaining paper wrapper on the little bit of sausage she had left as she and the sorceress, Naga the Serpent, casually walked down the dusty road. The two of them had been on the road for most of the day, and the sun had begun to dip down near the horizon, casting the forest in a rich orange glow. Tearing a piece of sausage off of the small chunk with her teeth, she looked over at Naga. The sorceress had a slight flush to her cheeks, likely due to the fact that she'd spent the past hour taking nips from a rapidly diminishing bottle of wine. As the last sliver of golden light faded behind the distant mountains, the swordswoman tossed the paper wrapping aside.
"We should find a place to set up camp. We're not going to make it to any inns before nightfall." Lucia said. Naga glanced around for a bit before suddenly turning off of the road to find a clear, secluded location. Lucia followed along for a few minutes until the two of them came to a small clearing buried in a thick copse of trees, where the two of them began to unpack their traveling gear.
"You go collect the firewood while I get the pit ready. It's probably going to get cold tonight." The sorceress offered. Lucia gave a short nod and walked off into the woods. Naga watched her until she was out of sight, then went to work collecting stones to prepare a suitable fire pit.
She seems different. Lucia thought to herself as she searched for the right pieces of wood that would sustain a good fire. She's acting much more calm than before the accident. I hope she didn't hurt her head or something. The swordswoman considered, picking up a few thick, stray logs. She had noticed that Naga's personality had mellowed out considerably, especially when the two of them were not in public. She'd already come under the assumption that most of the sorceress' bravado and arrogance was an act she used, but she still couldn't pinpoint why the woman insisted on putting forth such an image for herself. She'd decided to chalk it up to intimidation.
That must be it. She acts confident and arrogant and people second-guess crossing her, and when you're a sorceress like she is, you can back up most of that confidence. She mused as she picked up another few logs, using her foot and some leverage to snap one of them into two more easily carried pieces. Maybe she's not acting that way towards me alone because she trusts me now. I bet she was the same way with Lina once they became friends, too.
"There you are. I was wondering what took you so long." Naga said as Lucia reappeared from the quickly darkening forest. She was carrying an armload of logs, at least enough for an hour of fire and several more hours of warm embers. Naga had since completed the fire pit and stocked it with kindling, so Lucia dumped the logs beside the pit.
"There were plenty of logs out there, but I had to stick to finding ones that would be easier to carry." Lucia replied. "Glad to see you've got experience sleeping under the stars." She added, motioning towards the pit.
"When you spend as much time traveling as I do, you can't always be bothered to wait until you reach an inn or tavern. You have to improvise." Naga stated. She preferred a nice warm bed in an extravagant inn, of course, but her years of camping out had given her time to grow accustomed to roughing it. The alcohol helped, too. In fact, Lucia gave her a sour look as she tipped her head back and drained the rest of her wine bottle, but merely shook her head as Naga made eye contact with her, turning her gaze towards the pit and using a weak version of the Burst Rondo spell to ignite the tinder.
Naga stretched her arms a bit. "Are you going to sleep yet?" the sorceress asked, not feeling sleepy yet and hoping that the swordswoman might stay up to keep her company. Lina had never been much for conversation, and while the two of them often agreed when it came to treasure, thrashing bandits, or discussing food, she often found that they seldom had much else to talk about.
"Not yet. I'm still wide awake, really." Lucia replied, poking the slowly growing fire with a small stick. She sighed a little and looked up at the sorceress across the fire. "Where do you come from, Naga?" the swordswoman asked after a brief pause. Her question caused the sorceress to tense for a brief moment, but she recovered quickly.
"I don't call anywhere 'home' really. I prefer to call the entire world my home." The sorceress replied. "It means I'm not tied down, not rooted to one place. Carefree."
"Okay, then. Where did you come from? Where did you grow up?" Lucia asked. She feared she might be prying a bit, but figured that since the two of them were traveling companions, they might as well get to know one another better.
"Saillune." Naga said after a moment, biting her lip.
"The White Magic City?" Lucia asked, perplexed. "Wow. That explains how you're so good with magic, but that does explain a few things!" the younger girl said with a smile. Naga eyed her suspiciously.
"What does it explain, exactly?"
"Your personality! I've been to Saillune once before. It's a beautiful place, but very expensive! I mean, it all makes sense now!" Lucia said, her tone growing more excited.
"It…it does?" Naga stammered, afraid of where the conversation was heading.
"Yes! The expensive restaurants, the fancy clothiers, the extravagant theatres. I bet you came from a wealthy family! Like merchants or something, right?" the swordswoman asked, smiling infectiously.
"Y-yes! Wow, Lucia, I'm impressed!" Naga said, breathing a sigh of relief. "I guess my elegance and refined taste is pretty difficult to miss."
"There is one thing that bugs me, though." Lucia said, sounding a little confused.
"What's that?" the sorceress asked.
"Well, I didn't think attack magic was really approved of in Saillune. I'm a little surprised that someone that grew up there is so proficient with it." Lucia replied. Naga's first response was one of her trademark laughs.
"That's why I left, Lucia. I needed to learn more than Saillune could teach me, and of course, you can't smash bandits with healing spells, you know." The sorceress replied, grinning widely.
"You're right." Lucia replied with a short giggle. Naga's grin faded a little as she continued examining Lucia for a long moment.
"Thank you, Lucia." Naga said, the arrogant tone fading, replaced by a more serious, softer one.
"Huh? For what?" Lucia replied.
"Healing me. Taking care of me for those past three days. Nobody has ever…done anything like that for me. Not since I left home." Naga said, once more feeling completely out of her element but deciding to go with her feelings for the moment. Again, the alcohol helped.
"Oh, well. I…sort of felt responsible, since you got hurt saving me and all." Lucia replied, blushing a little bit. "Besides, that's what friends do for each other, right?" she added cheerfully, causing the sorceress to rather quickly snap her gaze up to meet Lucia's.
"Friends? You consider me your friend?" Naga asked. The word felt almost foreign to her when spoken in such a serious context.
"Well, why not? We get along, we both love adventure, we both like to hunt treasure, and we both enjoy teaching bandits a lesson!" Lucia said, laughing happily. Naga joined in for a moment before she grinned at Lucia again.
"Except I didn't strip you naked!" the sorceress replied teasingly, the alcohol in her system dulling what little sense of discretion she might otherwise have.
"H-hey! I had to bandage you, remember?" Lucia stammered, blushing more deeply now, both at Naga's statement as well as the recalled memory. She remembered that even through the wounds and the bruises that the sorceress had an incredible body, and only her dedication towards keeping the woman alive had prevented it from distracting her at the time.
"Did you get a good look, then?" Naga asked, a slight purr in her voice. Lucia felt her heart flip in her chest.
Holy crap, she's flirting with me. Lucia realized, working to swallow a lump in her throat. "I…I was concentrating on making sure you lived. My intent wasn't to ogle you!" she said quickly.
"Oh, that's right." Naga said with mock realization. "Well, here you go then." The sorceress said, standing up and moving around the fire a bit to sit in front of Lucia, the angle still allowing the sorceress' body to be illuminated by the flames. Before Lucia could even fathom what would happen next, the sorceress reached up and pulled the two leather cups of her outfit down, her full breasts spilling out of it. Lucia's mouth opened widely as she tried to think of something to say, her lips moving for several moments without any words coming out before Naga mercifully tucked her endowments back into their respective confinements. The shocked stare on Lucia's face alone had been worth it.
"N-Naga! Wh-what was that supposed to be?!" Lucia stammered, her face so red that the orange firelight made it look almost maroon colored.
"What?" Naga asked innocently. "I thought you might want a peek when I wasn't on the brink of death. Besides, the look on your face was priceless!" the woman said, laughing.
"I didn't expect you to just flash me like that!" Lucia replied in exasperation, still trying to compose herself.
"True, I wouldn't normally do that, but you stared the whole time, you know." Naga said in a low, teasing voice. "I'd think if you didn't want to see them, you'd have looked away." Lucia's embarrassment only deepened at Naga's teasing words.
"Y-yeah, well, I…" she started, then sighed a little. "Can you blame me?" she finally conceded. She found herself wondering how Naga would respond to that, expecting more teasing but being pleasantly surprised by the response.
"No, I can't. I just think you owe me one, now." Naga said. Lucia looked at her curiously for a moment before the sorceress' meaning hit home, her eyes widening.
"Wh-what?! B-but, I…I mean, I'm not…mine aren't nearly that impressive!" Lucia stammered, the focus of her embarrassment shifting from Naga's brazen exhibitionism to a sudden feeling of inadequacy.
"Mmm, quantity isn't quality, Lucia, although I'm lucky to have been blessed with both." The sorceress said smugly, the alcohol now in full swing. While Naga would never have admitted it to Lina, she'd always considered the smaller sorceress' figure to be uniquely attractive as well, and had developed a slight crush on her former traveling companion, though the attraction had always been purely physical in nature.
"Still. I…" Lucia started, but Naga held up a finger to quiet her.
"It's okay, Lucia. I've had a bit too much to drink, so maybe it's better if I go to sleep before I do something I'll really regret." The sorceress said with a short laugh, moving back to her respective side of the fire. "Do you mind taking first watch? I'm not quite up to keeping an eye out right now."
"N-no! No, I can do it, sure." Lucia mumbled, standing up quickly as she still fought to maintain her composure. The swordswoman excused herself as Naga laid out her sleeping bag and slipped into it, still casting wry glances at the faltering woman as she took to patrolling the outer perimeter of the small camp spot.
That was fun. Naga thought to herself as she started to drift off to sleep. She's gonna be fun to have around.
"Sheesh, that was awkward!" Lucia whispered to herself once she'd gotten some distance from the camp. She blamed the alcohol mostly, though she wasn't naïve enough not to realize that part of that was Naga. What she wondered was if the sorceress had taken a liking to her, or if she'd just been teasing her. Either way, she'd gotten an eyeful, that was sure, and even if it never did develop beyond friendship, at least there'd be that memory. Lucia was relieved to see that the sorceress seemed happy that she was considered a friend, hinting that there was perhaps more to her than a pretty face and a nice figure. Of course, Lucia had already suspected such nearly a week ago.
The next morning, Lucia awoke to find that Naga had already collected most of their equipment and put the fire out. She yawned widely and sat up, surveying the campsite as Naga finished rolling her sleeping bag up. A few wisps of smoke still rose from the blackened fire pit, and the swordswoman could faintly smell cooked fish in the air.
"You had breakfast without me?" Lucia asked curiously, looking over at the sorceress as she blinked the sleep from her eyes, yawning yet again.
"I didn't want to wake you. Traveling with Lina taught me that waking someone up before they're ready can get you blasted with a fireball." Naga replied. "Besides, I assumed the smell of the fish would have done the trick."
Lucia rubbed her eyes and finally pulled herself from her sleeping bag. "Yeah, well I was having a nice dream." She said sleepily as she rolled her bag into a tight coil and wrapped the retaining bands around it firmly.
"I bet you did." The sorceress replied wryly, casting a knowing look at the younger girl. Lucia suddenly blushed at the implication.
"Not about that!" Lucia said indignantly. "I was dreaming about food, actually. Did you even leave me any fish?" the blonde asked, looking around for leftovers as she tied the rolled bag to her back.
"But I was hungry!" the sorceress whined. "I'm still recovering my strength! I almost died, I deserve to have a little more food as compensation."
"Fine, fine, but you're paying the tab the next time we get to a tavern." Lucia replied, turning and walking back towards the road with Naga trailing close behind.
"Hey, wait! I eat a little extra cooked fish out in the woods and you make me pay for a full meal at a tavern! That's not fair, Lucia!" the sorceress complained as she hurried to catch up to Lucia. The shorter girl just looked up at her with a cheery smile and said nothing.
"Ugh, you're sneaky." Naga said with a pout. "So, does that map tell us when we're going to see civilization again?"
"There's a small village up the road. We should be able to get there before nightfall if we don't stop anywhere." Lucia replied.
"I'll pay for your meal, but remember that you still owe me." The sorceress replied, laughing as she once more coaxed a blush and an embarrassed expression from the swordswoman.