The Winterscar estate was a hollow shell.

Originally, before the clan migrated away from our old home, we had already scouted and claimed this current ground. The clan had sectioned this estate off for a House of approximately four hundred members, back in our heyday.

Then the migration happened and only three Winterscars survive the trip.

So most of the estate was mothballed and left in the cold. Atius did not re-assign the ground to another house, or sell off the territory, out of respect to the fallen. There was plenty of other directions the clan could expand to, and he assumed our house would slowly recover. Eventually we would reclaim the dead sections that had been reserved for us.

His assumption had been incorrect. Father had hired a few servants to keep the house clean, but hadn’t officially recruited new members. In fact, he’d done everything to avoid the issue for as long as I’ve known him. As a result, only a small skeleton crew kept the estate grounds maintained over these years.

They came out to greet us on the training courtyard as Kidra and I walked up the steps and past our gates. The head of house was an older man named Radinai. He was professional, curt, and to the point. His uniform perfectly crisp and expertly tailored.

“Welcome home, masters.” The maids and servants all intoned, bowing as we passed by.

Kidra came up to a stop before Radinai, who remained bowed down slightly. “Keith and I thank you for your work while we were away.” She said, turning to look at the rest of the small staff. “As you’ve no doubt noticed, I am now wearing Winterscar Prime. The recent expedition did not go as planned and Father is now regrettably with the gods.”

“That is terrible to hear, my lady.” Radinai said emotionlessly. He was far too professional to allow his personal feelings to surface. “We will miss him dearly.”

The rest of the servants likewise remained silent. Most hadn’t interacted with Father all that much. When he was on the house grounds it was either to sleep, eat, or practice out on the field. The rest of the time he spent away on expedition.

Kidra took a breath, steadying herself. “As the eldest, the rights to command House Winterscar now fall to me.”

“Rest assured my lady,” Radinai said solemnly. “We will serve you as we served him.”

The rest of the servants gave their own acknowledgements. Kidra nodded. “I expect nothing less.” She turned to look at me. “My brother is now wearing armor as well, a crusader’s armor that has been delivered under our banner. House Winterscar now has two armors to our name.”

The servants all straightened out and clapped politely. Keeping a stoic face before the masters of the house was important to them. The real celebration would come later. I could see it in their eyes.

“There will be some changes now that I am left in charge.” Kidra said, taking the stage again. “We will be expanding out the house and restoring Winterscar to the size of a more proper House over these next few years. A personal guard will be hired and rearmed, Reachers will be brought in to maintain the house and additional servants will be folded under us as we expand. With Keith wielding a relic armor and the additional Occult weapons we’ve recovered, our house’s fortunes should be vastly improved to support our new ambitions.”

Well if everyone was about to retire and celebrate that the house they worked for has two entire armors now, this news hit them like a sledgehammer. I could see glints of barely concealed fervor in the faces of the servants gathered.

Generally, working under the houses was the first step to being accepted into the caste itself. All of the servants here had worked under the hope of joining our banner. At least, at the start. They had stayed all these years keeping that hope close to their hearts, despite Father’s lack of ambitions.

And now that Kidra had announced we would be expanding the ranks. It was guaranteed they would be rewarded for their loyalty. This was a long time coming for all of them, and frankly, they deserve nothing less than full admittance, no questions asked.

When Kidra dismissed the servants, they moved off to their task with newfound spring in their steps. Oh, they all kept it inside, trying to remain stoic and professional in their duties. But I had no doubts when we weren’t looking, the servants would be throwing their own after-work party to celebrate and gossip about the news. More than one was going to have a hard time working tomorrow I suspect.

Kidra and I made our way into the old home, splitting off to attend to our separate tasks. While I desperately wanted to deposit Journey into the armory and make a straight line to the baths, I had a very special job to take care of before anything. So my first target was my personal room.

I grabbed the attention of the first maid I passed by, signalling her to halt. “Hello Mazri. I need your help with something.”

She turned and gave a polite bow. “How may I assist you, Winterscar-sama?”

Ah. Going to need to get used to being called that. Sheepishly, I scratched the back of my head, only to click the armor’s gauntlets against the helmet. Sometimes I felt graceful in this armor, other times I felt more like a fumbling idiot. This would be the latter.

Oh well. “Please go to the Reachers and fetch me a regular safebox, a few sheets of metal and welding tools. I’ll be in my room when you return. I have work I need to do.”

She bowed deeper, “Of course, I will bring you the supplies right away.” The maid turned and scurried away, passing by another servant who quickly came up to offer similar greetings.

He gave a similar bow, before straightening up. “Rehla wishes to inform the masters that an early meal is being made in honor of your return. It will be served in half an hour, if you so wish to attend. This lunch served will be mushroom ragout, with broiled anrix isopods set on a soft bed of spinach topped with bearnaise sauce and a white wine pairing. Dessert is to be baked apple slices with cinnamon and a light vanilla sauce.”

Oh. Food. Real food.

Actual food made by the hands of a master chef.

Our single cook was probably one of the best assets our House had, in my opinion. Rehla was probably working a small miracle right now from the moment she got word our airspeeder had been sighted arriving. “Please, tell her we really appreciate the gesture and that I look forward to tasting her cooking again. It’s been a long few weeks of rations.”

The man smiled, gave another bow and turned to deliver the reply without further word.

Talen’s journal remained locked in my grip and I gave it a slight shake as I watched him walk away. The contents lightly tapped the sides, reminding me the box was full despite Journey making the weight feel effortless. My other hand patted Tsyua’s seeker on the belt, still firmly attached where it was supposed to be. None of my servants knew the literally divine artifacts I was carrying absentmindedly on me.

Eh.

The gods could stand to wait half an hour for me to cram food down my throat I think. I swear I won’t spill anything on the box.

The best place to hide things was where nobody could reach. And there were many such places here in the clan.

To say the uninhabited parts of the estate had dilapidated would be an understatement. That turned out in my favor.

I could pick places where I’d hid items in my childhood, sure. Compartments in the ceilings, or in the floors. Over the years there’s a few dozen places I’d found in these new estate grounds to hide things.

If I was being real, those had probably long ago been found out by the staff here and they only politely indulged my fantasy of thinking I knew the house better than they did.

But now I was an adult, and more importantly, I had relic armor. That opened up new places to hide my items. Places where only someone who was extremely prepared could poke their nose into.

Keeping Journey on, helmet firmly locked in place, I strode deeper into the forgotten stretches of the estate, locking the doors behind me as I went. I knew from experience the temperature would drop significantly on each doorway I passed the deeper I went into the Winterscar grounds.

Eventually, I reached corridors that as a teen I hadn’t dared to open up. By the time I’d reached this part, I had been shaking and clattering already from the cold. With Journey, I felt nothing.

INow, the doors before me carried the warning ribbons on them. Skull and bones. The truly unheated sections.

I grabbed the sides of the bulkhead door and unlocked the trigger.

A gust of air from my current room fled down the empty corridor as the temperature difference demanded the air to move. Following that wind, I took a step inside and closed the doorway behind, sealing me into one of the dark, forgotten sections of the colony with a heavy clank.

Journey had already lit up its lights. There were no hallway lights, no power flowed here. And even if it did, not all those lights would run given the massive amount of neglect.

Unlike other parts of heated structure, there wasn’t a mobile dust layer here. Instead, the ambient air moisture had long ago frozen alongside the dust, trapping it on the thin film at my feet.

Each step I took, the ice under me crackled, disturbed once more. I marched through that darkness with intent, going further into the superstructure. Old rooms that had never been seen by human eyes for decades, abandoned since the last clan had evacuated it. Signs of inhabitation that had long ago been covered up by frozen dust.

“Temperature?” I asked Journey, curious to see how bad it was.

The number returned was a fair bit higher than the actual surface, but still cold enough to kill. A rebreather could tank a puncture indefinitely at this temperature without overdraw at least, so these corridors were a bit safer than walking the surface.

The danger here was the gases, which meant that if a scavenger wanted to come down searching for my secrets, a rebreather wouldn’t be enough. Those only heated and dampened the air. If the air already lacked oxygen over the decades of being left unmaintained and the ventilations powered off, that rebreather would do absolutely nothing to save the unfortunate soul.

This was what I was banking on to help hide my treasure.

I passed door after door of unmarked rooms, all different scales and sizes. Some could have been used for storage, others servant quarters. The trek took a while, walking down history. There was even another courtyard I stumbled on, training targets still out and eternally ready for the day humans reclaimed these grounds.

It was on a second floor up that I found a room that seemed inviting. Here, I stepped into the past.

When clans moved, most things were packed up and readied. People often had an entire year to plan out what to bring with them. But there were still hundreds of junk items that were slowly accumulated over a lifetime and made little sense to carry given the size constraints. Either because they could be re-created in the next home, or they weren’t important enough to carry with.

Here was a room filled with such things. Clothing in a cupboard, a bed that was still neatly folded up, all the fabric still in one piece due to the sub-zero temperature preserving it. Wall-cotton was a hardy plant that was easy to grow in the aquaponic farms, and a single plant could produce plenty of fabric to work with. There wasn’t all that much point to bringing the more easy to create items, like blankets.

I could see photography on the drawer to the side, showing a smiling woman holding a rather unhappy looking cat. The photo was laminated, held up by a metal clasp. Three other clasps were left on that drawer, all empty. This picture was placed front and center, pointed right at the doorway rather than the bed. Almost as if left specifically for whoever walked in to see. A message for me, I think.

My hands reached out, and I picked up the old photo, noticing how the lamination was slowly unbinding on the edge. The back had writing, legible.

‘Her royal highness, Lord High Executioner, Poutini the Third, The Uncrustable.’ It read. ‘Beloved cat, nefarious terrorist to all exposed ankles, and the reason the rats still run around. May the deep freeze we leave behind do the job her royal highness refused to bother with.’

Cats were often kept as pest control, but nobody could fault a family for spoiling certain cats rotten. This ball of fluff certainly looked the part. It was odd to think that this woman was likely long dead of old age, and the best I could hope to find was her children’s children. Despite the massive gulf of time, people still seemed to be the same. Humor was eternal at least.

Next to all that was a small glass box, closed with nothing inside. Other remnants remained scattered all over the room, leftovers that painted the history of a servant within the manor, serving whichever house had once owned this territory before Clan Altosk had moved in.

I thought it was touching personally. This was as good a place as any. “All right, Journey, show me the best spot to bury my treasure.” My hand patted the black safe box I’d carried all this way.

“Location spotted and outlined on HUD.” Journey chimed, pointing to a small nook on the opposite side of the bed. My headlights were casting deep shadows by the flooring here, anyone who was searching this place would likewise hardly see the spot.

This would do well to fool anyone passing by with a quick glance into the room. If they continued a more in-depth investigation, I seriously doubted any attempt to hide the item would have fooled a more invested seeker.

The backpack I carried dropped on the composite wood flooring with a clink of metal tools, all colliding against one another. Kneeling down, I brought out the right weapons for the job and cut into the floor with my occult knife, neatly matching the dimensions of the safe box.

Journey’s HUD made the work simple, outlining where the cuts needed to be, and keeping my hands perfectly centered. Once done, I lowered the steel box into that hole. Inside was Tsuya’s seeker. A box within a box. And under the fabric nest that cradled the seeker, I had set up a false bottom. Here I had hidden another box: Talen’s journal.

Forgive me, Tsuya, but learning the occult had more value to me than the seeker. If one was to be stolen from me, I picked to have the seeker taken.

My bag of tools held a drill and plenty of screws, all of which I used to liberally tie the safe box down into the floor. Should the worst happen, I hoped the possible thief would stop with Tsuya’s seeker and leave the rest of the safe box behind. With everything set, I gingerly lowered the cut flooring section back on top. It fit snuggly. In the shadows cast by the bed, the cut partitions was almost impossible to notice. The craftsmanship Journey had enabled was certainly top tier.

I stood back up, slapping my hands free of ice. “Right. Now that that’s taken care of, time to trap the place.” I reached for more tools and items inside the backpack, everything I’d need to give someone a terrible, terrible time. I’d even brought a broom with me to disturb the dust layer and start laying some false trails into the other paths.

If there was an unfortunate soul stumbling around looking for my shinies, they had better be wearing relic armor.

Because I wasn’t making deterrents.

The baths were one of the main spots people socialized. Undersiders found this the weirdest of our cultural quirks, they were all used to having their own showers and baths inside their own private rooms. I always thought keeping a separate bath all to your own household sounded lavish and extremely inefficient.

Plus, it would be too quiet.

Water was a time to talk to your neighbors and put the anxieties of the past behind you. Clean the body, clean the soul. Choosing to do that alone sounded so… strange. I remember being worried for the mental health of the pilgrims when I first heard their stories. At least until they made it clear they had other ways to socialize in the undersider cities.

Up here, it was the single primary way different castes all intermingled together, besides early schooling and ball games in the empty hangars.

The entrance to the bathhouse alone inspired peace and a farewell to worries. The very architecture was deliberately different, made with ceramic tiles instead of metal. People wrote poetry, stories, jokes and etched art into these tiles. Each would be works someone had spent months polishing and perfecting on their own time until they were ready to submit to a free space in the wall.

Washing the very structure with times people remember fondly or laugh at, and art to share with others forever after. Who would want to clean anywhere else but here? Undersiders were an odd bunch.

Our group of three made a stop at the entrance before splitting up. I could see dozens of others coming and going, a lot of faces I recognized from the weeks spent in the heated sections of the airspeeder, on break. Everyone wanted to get clean.

Kidra took a left to the women’s grooming hall while Teed and myself made our way to the right, passing by the fabric curtains into the men’s version.

Sounds and smells were the first thing to hit us.

People talking mixed together with laughter and shouting. Kids fighting each other with towel whips on the dry section, waiting for their fathers to wrap up shaving and haircuts.

This hall was large, wide enough to have pillars required intermittently in order to keep structural integrity for all the buildings built above it. My first stop was getting my hair tended to. While I’d been out on expedition, my hair had been doing as hair is wont to do. Which isn’t always pretty.

There were plenty of open barber chairs, where I made my way to one and asked the gentleman for a loose cut. The man took my coin and made quick work of the locks of hair that had overgrown during the expedition. He finished it off with a few quick swipes of a razor blade on the bits of stubble that had taken root. I hadn’t tipped him for a prolonged and serious cut, just something quick and to the point.

I took a long look at my reflection as he worked with quick and practiced movements. Shaggy hair that reached my ears was my typical go to look. And while I would have enjoyed having a beard, my genetics had chosen freckles and patchy stubble instead. Very manly, yes, I know.

Kidra told me that according to some of her friends, I would look good with round glasses. And Teed had told me that his first impression of me was an overworked rail-thin engineer with perpetual soot in his hair and cheeks. And his second impression was to check his pockets to make sure everything was still there. My best friend everyone, round of applause.

The barber did his job well, getting done in minutes, already cleaning up the snipped off hair and cleaning his hands as the next man took my seat. In minutes, I was shoving my clothing into a cubby, taking off the necklace key inside and trading it for my belongings. There were two divisions here, one for the dirty clothing I walked into the baths with, and one already pre-filled out with a comfortable and pre-washed robe I’d wear on the way back home. I left that one alone while I piled up my belongings on the other side of the divider.

Shut door, click, turn the key and done.

It was now time for my favorite part in all this - not having to use a gods-damn sponge to get clean inside a heated environmental tent. I rolled the sliding door and entered the far more wet part of the grooming hall.

A full shower here was bliss, getting to actually scrub soap all over and wash my hair fully. This was what really let me sink into feeling home.

The entire process was quick. It was bad manners to hog a showerhead for too long since people wanted to get into the baths. Once I was clean of dirt and grime, I was ready for the bath.

The bathhouse itself was enormous, one of the largest open structures in the clan home, setup at the very center. Here lay a massive lake of steamy water, filled with smaller islands of bench seats scattered organically all over. For people to find a nook and relax with their friends.

At the center was a large central rock with decorations and plants of all kinds growing on it, like a small mountain from the picture books. They say the soul of the clan lived within, energized by the people that surrounded it at almost all times of the day.

The water remained at hip height at every part of the bath for the most part. Floating composite wood trays held refreshments, anywhere from liquor to fruits, usually shared by the small groups of merry goers.

If the grooming halls were loud and filled with sounds, this place was even worse with voices echoing and bouncing all around. I could see all kinds of people here, anywhere from the elderly in their own corner having calm chats, to the teenagers on the other side of the room playing social games of all kinds, mostly as an excuse to flirt.

Children had their own separate, more shallow part where they splashed around and made a ruckus away from everyone else. The guardian was sitting by to ensure the kids didn’t accidentally pull off too much roughhousing. She looked tired, likely having played with the kids a few moments ago and was now waiting for her replacement to take the next shift.

A little further away, I could see Teed having already settled down, Anarii and his wife right by him. They had claimed a U shaped island of half submerged benches, where they all relaxed. Teed, like many others in the clan, kept up with body training, giving his darker skin definition and muscle mass. He had accentuated the look with silver link necklaces, each overlapping. And, more importantly, matching the square metal rectangle earring Reachers carried as proof of skill and ranking within that caste.

Undersiders were always shocked at how much the surface clan put grooming and self-care on a pedestal. For a people that spent a massive amount of time sealed up in environmental suits, I suppose it did sound odd. The reality is that only a small portion of our population spent so much time outside. Most only stepped outside for ceremony reasons or general training in case of future emergencies.

And when the main social event that saw all castes in the same room involved a relaxing dip in the water, in one of the few times you could really let loose of all the layers of clothing… well, showing off was something universal to humanity I would think.

Anarii, on the other hand, was an older man who already had a wife and had no cares to keep up appearances like his youngers. Wrinkly pale-white skin and white whiskery beard did nothing at all to help with that. Despite it all, he still had a gold earring proudly displayed, denoting his master-level skills within his career. Teed was an excellent pilot, but only seven pilots in the clan wore a gold earring right now, as far as Teed told me.

Anarii’s wife was similar, looking more like the grandmother I wish I had. Or rather, unofficially, I considered her my real grandmother.

Teed waved, and I made my way over, taking quick steps through the hot water and finally sinking into the bench at his side.

Oh gods in the skies above, this was how people were meant to live. “I’m never getting out.” I mumbled happily as the warmth surrounded me like a blanket.

Teed chuckled, turning to Anarii. “See, you made the wrong bet there old man. Told you that would be the exact words the kid’d say first.”

Anarii frowned, “Fine, you win. Bah! I’ll buy the first round. Swam right into that one.” He grumbled, but his wife pushed him lightly back down on the seat as he stood.

“Allow me dear, I need to stretch my legs a bit. We’ve been sitting for a while now.” She said in a warm voice. Beatrice was a woman from the Logi caste, specifically an operator. That was easy to tell considering she had ink markings on the side of her cheek. She had been in charge of organizing where her caste runners were at all times and telling them which directions to go. Supposedly a fairly involved task which she’d retired from recently, now giving a helping hand to the mushroom farmers, which was much slower paced and relaxing work for the elderly. Inter-caste marriages weren’t super rare in this case, because the Reacher caste was roughly at the same level as the Logi’s so there wasn’t any fuss to the two getting together.

Anarii scoffed. “How about we both go and make it a nice romantic walk to get tipsy.” He stood up, using his cane to help prop him up and the two hobbled through the water away.

Teed grinned sheepishly at me. “I didn’t forget you had a… ‘parched’ throat. Consider my end complete.” He waved at the retired pair walking away.

“Zero shame, huh.” I said from my seat, moving my hands through the warm water and feeling as it passed over my open fingers. Bliss. “Getting a poor old man on a bet?”

He shrugged. “You didn’t specify where the drink had to come from, only that the water be flowing.”

I shrugged back. “What’s the official way to demand bribes again?”

“No, no, you did it right.” Teed said, chuckling. “It’s not about who pays so long as you’re getting paid, see? Think big picture.” His finger tapped the side of his head, a knowing smile. “Now, ‘bout your part of the deal here.”

I waved his concerns away. “Heigi, Heigi, I’ll figure something out. But I’m not going to outright tell her to go ask you on a date. That part’s on you, so quit being so shy about things. I’ll set up a moment,” Turning, I tapped his chest with a pointed finger. “But I’m not leading her into bathhouse games just for you to wuss out. Got me? You’re silver, put your ego where your mouth is.”

He laughed at that. “Even if I were a gold pilot, I’d still feel nervous ‘bout asking a damn knight out. Just as I was finally getting over asking a ranking retainer out, she had to go and turn into a knight.”

“You knew she’d have eventually. Father would have retired and one of us was going to pick up his plate. And it wasn’t going to be me.”

The water splashed a bit as he shifted, stretching out and staring up into the faraway ceiling. This was one of the few places in the clan where there was so much open space above. It made the baths feel enormous. “I knew that,” Teed said, hand raising up and motioning up. “Just thinking I had more time to climb up the ranks before the time came. Feel like I’m only a few months away from making it into gold. Would have felt better asking from that position.”

What was funny, at least to me, is that Teed hasn’t seemed to realize Kidra hadn’t just become a knight. She was now the lady Winterscar. As she was the eldest between us and thus held the rights. Earlier today she’d strode into that courtyard already in command and prepared with a plan for our House. Teed wasn’t just planning on asking out any random relic knight, he was thinking of dating the head of a House. The scandal and gossip about this could be legendary.

And of all the heads of houses, Kidra was probably the only one he actually had a chance for since she wasn’t going to bow to the pressure of marrying for political gain. The other houses could go choke on ice, I don’t see someone like Kidra giving even an inch of her own autonomy. Especially now that she held all the power.

Talking about the devil, she walked out of the women’s hall with a few of her old friends, making her way to another section where a gaggle of women were occupied. They all cheered and waved as she approached. Given the tattoos they sported like mine, they were all retainer caste. Didn’t need to look to feel Teed shift around and sneak a disguised peek.

I elbowed him in the side, “Get your mind out of the drain. That’s my sister, you bastard.”

“Wasn’t looking, swear on Talen.” He chuckled, the traditional response to our familiar inside joke. “What’s your next plan of action, if you don’t mind me askin’?”

Not so subtly changing the subject there buddy. “Now that you’re a knight I mean.” He clarified. “Noticed you didn’t get the additional tattoo yet. You’ll have to stop by for it at one point.”

“Gods, that would look like an odd sight. A twig like me walking around with that on my shoulder. Think I need to work out first. Knights aren’t supposed to look scrawny.”

He gave a weak shrug. “Don’t be supposin’ you need to care how you look when you’re at the top of the mountain.”

Humming in consideration, I sank deeper into the water. Anarii was making his way back with a floating tray from the corner of my eye, and his wife staying by the shopside talking to old friends.

“If he brings back strawberry flavored shots, I’m kicking you over there.” I threatened. “I’ll see that as a sign from the gods.”

He gave a quick look over where my sister had settled with her friends, all of them animatedly asking her questions as she politely answered each. Even from the distance it was pretty obvious who was the center of attention there. Frankly her sense of style also eclipsed the women there too, as she had some sort of unworded elegance around her.

Kidra was always immaculate in her appearance and mannerisms. It was the armor she wore at all times, and even around me it rarely dropped. I think Teed was the only one who’d seen her slacken that armor, and only a few times at that just like me.

“No way,” Teed said, almost pleading “There’s twelve of them. Rather eat glass. And so long as you’re not in armor, you ain’t dragging me anywhere. Don’t even think about it, twig. I will throw you halfway across the water if you try. Don’t think I won’t make a scene.”

On the other corner of my eye, I saw a small group of men stumble out of the men’s hall, all scanning around the lake with the energy of people who had a goal. One of them saw me, and pointed in my direction to his fellows. The others all whooped and jumped in, making a direct path to us. The leader of this group of hooligans was a familiar face. One that I’ll never forget from childhood, looking down in sheer terror at a specific avatar of white feathered vengeance.

The rooster tamer himself had come out to say hi.

“Okay, but hear me out - what if the numbers got even?” I grinned. “Because it looks like word got around that we’re back early.”

“Fuckin’ gossips.” Teed sighed, voice dripping with defeat.

“No place safe from my kind buddy.” I said, wrapping an arm around his neck and whispering more conspiratorially. “Now, here’s the plan…”

Next chapter - The Occultist’s Cookbook, First Edition