The trip through town was certainly different from the time with Magpie.

There was far more spitting this time, along with vile curses thrown their direction. A small gang of local children even pelted them with rotten fruit at one point. Abomination and killer were two of the least hurtful epithets that Jessila received from passing humans. At least we didn’t run into any orcs or elves, Lilijoy thought.

Through it all, Jessila remained stoic, her face utterly impassive, even when a soggy half apple hit her cheek and dripped down her front.

“How can you stand it?” Lilijoy whispered. She was furious with the townspeople for their behavior.

“It’s just how it is,” was Jessila’s only reply.

As they made their way to the square, Lilijoy kept seeing notifications on her internal awareness.

Your reputation with the human Samuel Tailor has fallen to neutral.

Your reputation with the human Elise Banridge has fallen to neutral.

Your reputation with the human Torta Rightway has fallen to neutral.

Your reputation with the human Pinto Masaplan has fallen to neutral.

Your reputation with the human Arga Masaplan has fallen to neutral.

Your reputation with the human Masaplan family has fallen to neutral.

Your reputation with the human Jopepf Neugratz has fallen to neutral.

...

She ignored them after the first twenty or so, but made a mental note to learn more about reputation when she had a chance. She looked up at Jess, who still had bits of rotten apple on her face and in her hair.

“Jess, put me on your shoulder, like before. If they want to throw anything else, they’re going to have to hit me too.”

Jess stopped and looked down at Lilijoy with a startled expression. Tears began to form in her big blue eyes, but she shook her head and quickened her pace instead, forcing Lilijoy to hurry after her. Soon they reached the market square, which afforded a certain degree of anonymity in the bustling crowd. Lilijoy took the lead and brought them to Mr. Sennit’s little booth.

“Hey Poki!” he greeted her. “Brought a friend, eh?” He looked up at Jessila and his face fell, then became carefully neutral. He gestured for Lilijoy at approach and spoke to her in a hushed voice. “Your friend there is bad business. Bad for business too. Best move along for now.”

“But Mr. Sennit, she’s actually nice!” Lilijoy protested. “And you don’t have to follow the reputation stuff anyway.”

“You got that right, but I got my reputation to consider too. Half my customers would take offense if I traded one copper’s worth with your big friend there.”

Lilijoy felt her lip quiver. It was so unfair. All she wanted was to do something nice for Jess, and Mr. Sennit too, but the stupid reputation rules were ruining everything.

“There, there, Poki. There’s ways of working around all this,” he said, his voice gentle. “But not here at the stand. If you need something from me, we can meet out back of the tanner’s. Don’t no one come around there.”

Lilijoy nodded. “That would be great, Mr. Sennit. I promise you won’t be sorry.”

A few minutes later, Lilijoy discovered just why no one went behind the tanner’s building. The stench was oppressive, and the prevailing breezes funneled all of it to where she and Jessila were waiting. Surely there must be a less smelly way to process hides in a magical computer simulation, she thought to herself. She set aside the quirks of the Inside world when Mr. Sennit approached.

“Okay, Poki. What’s the news?” he said.

“First of all, Mr. Sennit, this is Jessila. She’s my roommate, and she doesn’t deserve that horrible reputation.”

Lilijoy realized that she had no idea how Jessila had gotten into her predicament, but she was sure she didn’t deserve it.

“I brought her to you, because she has amazing long hair, and I thought you could braid it for her.” Mr. Sennit looked skeptical, but she pressed on. “Even more important, I was learning about crafting at the Academy, and I thought of you, because no one ever taught you how to really use the Magi part of your skill. I bet you could make a ton more money selling your crafts if they had magic in them.”

Mr. Sennit chuckled. “You think I can magic up a straw hat for some warrior? Maybe make a magic floor mat?” He looked at her kindly. “I’ll hear you out, but I won’t bet I’ll be rolling in silver anytime soon.” He looked at Jessila. “Miss Jessila, I feel bad for you, really I do, but I can’t take money from you, even where no one can see.”

Jessila shrugged, and Lilijoy jumped in. “But you can take money from me, right? I’ll pay for it.” She poked Jessila’s hip with a finger before her friend could refuse. “After all, you don’t need to know if Jess ever paid me back, right?”

Mr. Sennit considered her proposal. “Well, I can’t see any harm coming from it.” He turned to Jessila. “Have a seat on the ground, Miss, and I’ll see what I’m working with. I’m no hairdresser, mind you, so don’t expect too much.”

While he worked, Lilijoy explained what she had learned. After she gave an overview, Mr. Sennit said, “So what you’re saying is I can do more with the magic than speed things up or make em last longer. Huh. You know, those folks from the clan told me that was all there was, for my skills anyway, and I hadn’t given it much thought since I finally struck out on my own.” At this point, he had brushed out Jess’s hair with her comb, and gotten most of the remaining bits of rotten apple out of it. “Any ideas on what else to try?” he added.

“Do you want to try something now?” Lilijoy asked, ignoring Jessila’s worried expression.

“Sure, sure. But what would I do with a hair braid?”

Lilijoy pondered for a moment. Then inspiration struck. “What if you made it so no one can grab her braids? Our trainer threw her off a hill today by her hair. You could think about making it slippery, or sharp, or something like that.”

He looked concerned. "Uh, Poki, you sure about this trainer?"

She's better than Pinton. And Mr. Spurkis, evidently. "She's pretty crazy, but she means well. It's only been a few weeks, and she has a great reputation. It's not like I can't log out if I need to"

“That sounds all right then. Getting back to this Magi thing.” His face took on an expression of concentration. “How would I even start?”

“What do you do when you use your mana to go faster, or make something more durable?”

“Can’t really say. Just think about it, and my hands get to tingling, and it all works out.”

This was harder than Lilijoy had expected. She envisioned colored energy moving around her body, and so far, that had worked well for her. Mr. Sennit seemed to be more tactile by nature, and she wasn’t sure if her method would work for him. He also seemed reluctant about the whole endeavor, and she was worried that he might give up if he didn’t see results right away.

“Try to feel the tingling in your body first, like there’s a big ball of tingles in your stomach.”

He looked at her skeptically, then shrugged. “What the heck, why not?” he mumbled to himself. He closed his eyes while Lilijoy watched, and Jess stared resolutely at the back of the tannery. After about thirty seconds, he giggled. Then he laughed and opened his eyes.

“I think you might have got something here, Poki!” he managed between chuckles. “It kinda tickles though. Don’t know how I never noticed the feeling before this.”

“What’s it feel like?”

“A big bunch of tingles, like you said. A little hot too, like I ate too much and it’s coming back for a little visit, only nice.”

“I bet that’s your mana center,” Lilijoy said. “Now try pulling the tingles from there and into your hands, and then kind of weave them into Jess’s hair.”

He closed his eyes again and took hold of the long bundles brown and golden hair he had separated. He started to braid, and then stopped with a gasp.

“Holy… it just sucked it right in, didn’t it?”

He gathered his focus again, and his face took on a relaxed, open expression as he resumed Hand Weaving. Lilijoy thought she could see a golden glow move between his hands and Jess’s hair, especial her lighter locks. Mr. Sennit kept making small comments to himself.

“Nope. Don’t make no sense to do that. Gotta try something… yup. Oh yeah, it likes that. Now we’re happy!”

He began to hum to himself as he braided the strands together, and then braided the braids, and then convinced the resulting, larger braids to sit on and around Jess’s head. When he finally put his hands down, he let out a long breath.

“Now that was something!” he announced. “I don’t know if I need food or sleep more now.”

Lilijoy was burning with curiosity. The hair coiled on top of Jessila’s head gleamed in the sun, almost as if the pleats were facets of a gem.

“What did you do? Did it work?”

“Now Poki, don’t be disappointed. That stuff you suggested sounded good, but the hair seemed to have its own notions. I guess it didn’t want no truck with being slippery. And who ever heard of sharp hair anyhow?” He raised his eyebrows. “Nope, but we came to an agreement. Why don’t you take a good close look and see what you can see?”

Lilijoy did as he asked. At first, it just looked like the most perfect hairdo she had ever seen, with the coiled braids sending smaller braids and even cascades of free hair over Jessila’s ears and neck. Then she thought to use her Scan ability.

Braids of the Valkyrie

Woven by a master, these braids will raise INV by 10 and provide

10 points of additional protection against all magical damage.

Effect lasts two weeks

“I knew you could do it!” Lilijoy exclaimed as she gave Mr. Sennit a hug. “It’s amazing! Jessila, did you see what he did?”

Jessila tried to keep her stoic expression and failed, allowing a true smile to emerge. “I can’t see what it looks like, but I got a notification of what it does,” she said. She turned to face Mr. Sennit and bowed her head, which had the amazing effect of casting reflected light from her hair onto him.

“Honor to the Master,” she stated.

“Now Miss, it seems you should be thanking your friend and not these old bones.”

Jessila stayed as she was, and Lilijoy make urgent hand gestures to Mr. Sennit.

“Oh, all right Poki,” he said. “The pleasure was mine, Miss Jessila. Now you try to stay out of trouble, you hear? Maybe I can find a way to help your reputation some, now that I got real magic.”

“Mr. Sennit,” Lilijoy said with a hint of exasperation. “You always had the magic. You just had to know where to look.”

“Maybe, maybe,” he said with a nod. “But it’s thanks to you that I found it.” He bowed his head to Lilijoy. “Honor to the Master Teacher,” he said, imitating Jessila.

Now it was Lilijoy’s turn to fumble for a response. It didn’t help that a new notification crossed her internal awareness.

Skill Earned: Natural Initiate of Teaching

You have a chance of imparting your skills

and abilities to students with sufficient aptitude.

Higher levels of expertise in the skill/ability and

in the teaching skill will make this more likely.

“I just got the Teaching skill!”

Mr. Sennit looked up and winked at her. “Thought I’d see if I could give you that, after what you done for me. Now I best be getting back to my stand. Don’t be a stranger, ok?”

He said his goodbyes, refused to take any of Lilijoy’s coins, and walked back toward the square. Before he had gotten very far, he turned back and yelled, “Practice your Hand Weaving, Poki, and next time, I show you how to do her hair like that!”

Lilijoy turned to Jessila, who retained a stunned half smile on her broad face. The tips of her large canine teeth were just peeking out from her lips.

“Let’s not go back through the town. I think we’ve both had enough rotten fruit thrown our way, and I don’t want to lose this feeling.”

Jessila nodded. “Thank you, Lily,” she said. “I can’t wait to tell Skria about this.”

With one more stop on their schedule, they made their way to Professor Anaskafius’ office. Since Jess was far too large for the cozy little den off of the main room, they sat on various levels of the stone platforms, while the Professor worked with Jessila to teach her the Manipulation and Deception skills, and taught her how to recognize and resist Charm attempts.

“Oh dear,” he tut-tutted. “You poor thing. I can almost read your story from your character sheet. Do you mind if Lily takes a look?”

Jess gave her assent, and showed Lilijoy her sheet.

Name: Jessila Tewl Level: 8

Race: Orkurs/Human/Elf

Tier 6: Academy Eligible

Achievements:

Tempered

Natural Disaster: Destroyed 20 or more structures

with physical force within 10 minutes

Accomplishments:

Despised: Status of Hated or lower from three cultural groups or species

HP: 225

Natural Traits

STR: 115

END: 80

SPD: 54

KA: 30

Magical Traits

POW: 45

INV: 21

VIT: 55

FLASH: 15

CHARM: SENTIENT: 3

CHARM: ANIMAL: 31

CHARM: PLANT: 17

Elemental Affinities

Fire: 14% (Tier IV)

Earth: 62% (Tier II)

Water: 20 % (Tier IV)

Air: 10 % (Tier IV)

(Tier IV 0-29%, Tier III 30-54%, Tier II 55-79%, Tier I 80%+)

Mana Well: 80

Mana Gathering: 3 %/100 seconds

Abilities

Scan I

Low Light Vision I

Juggernaut III: Mass multiplies with linear speed

Skills

Unarmed Combat: Natural Initiate (VP = 2)

Weapons (Blunt): Natural Initiate (VP = 2)

Swimming: Natural Initiate (VP = 2)

Farming: Natural Apprentice (VP = 3)

Construction: Natural Initiate (VP = 2)

Leather Working: Natural Initiate (VP = 2)

Lilijoy saw what Professor Anaskafius meant. The skills, the Animal Charm, it all pointed to a rural life, perhaps on a village farm. She could almost see the Natural Disaster accomplishment unfolding, Jessila teased or abused to the point of breaking and running amok with her powerful Juggernaut ability through her town, knocking down walls and buildings.

She wondered if she would ever hear the real story.

Watching Manipulation being taught was fascinating and made Lilijoy wonder why she had such an intuitive grasp of the skill. Jessila initially didn’t have a grasp of basic concepts like reverse psychology, and even lying itself was confusing to her.

“Why would anyone say something if it wasn’t real?” she complained at one point.

Professor Anaskafius had smiled, though his little eyes were sad. “Many children learn early on that they can avoid punishment by pretending innocence. Perhaps they broke something valuable when they were playing somewhere they weren’t supposed to be. They might tell an adult that they were somewhere else, perhaps playing outside, rather than in their father’s study.”

Lilijoy could tell it was going to be a long road before Jessila learned enough to gain the skills she needed.

How sad, she thought, that she needs to learn how to lie and deceive just to protect herself.

What did it say about her, that such things had come so easily? Or perhaps it said more about Jessila’s childhood, that she had never learned them in the first place. Lilijoy had grown up with a group of adults who were fairly predictable in their behaviors, odd as they were. Perhaps she had learned to take advantage of that early on, without ever realizing what she was doing.

“Professor, does everyone end up with the Manipulation and Deception skills?” she asked.

“The short answer is yes, my dear” he said, fiddling with his glasses. “They exist in all self aware beings to some degree. They may not show up on a character sheet, unless they are used deliberately over time. Thankfully, everyone has some innate resistance to Charm, or problems such as Jessila’s would be much more common. It is the truly innocent who are in the most danger. An empty vessel is the easiest to fill.”

On that note, the lesson finished, and they made their way out of the office. There, they parted ways. Jessila was eager to find Skria to show off her hair, and Lilijoy wanted to attend the last Subtle Arts class of the day.

The class was a fruitful one for Lilijoy. She used her strategy of helping the clumsy students to draw in her competitors, and was able to plant one of her two remaining patches on one of them. Not only did she get eight additional points at the end of class, for a total of twenty-three, but her Stealth skill went up to Apprentice. She resolved to only plant patches on her true prey, fellow predators. Because of this, she never found an opportunity for her last patch.

At the end of the class, a leader board appeared in the room of the four paths, confusing the students who were still working on their silent movement. There were no names on the board, onlythe scores, and Lilijoy was pleased to see that she wasn’t far from the lead. The top score was thirty-one, and her total placed her in third. There were ten scores on the board, and she couldn’t tell if that was everyone who was competing, or just the ten best. Her guess was that it was the top ten, as the lowest score on the board was thirteen.

As she stood looking at the scores, she rubbed Nandi’s boon with the middle fingers of her right hand, feeling the hard surface of the material embedded in her palm. It was becoming a habit of hers, something she did while she thought about her future. It was becoming all too easy to lose herself in her daily activities. She was a little jealous of the other students sometimes. For them the Subtle Arts contest might be the center of the universe. Or maybe they spent their energy making connections with other students, or training to compete in some tournament that wouldn’t matter even a year from now.

She wished her world could be that small.