For the next few days, Sado and Diana sent messages to the palace asking for an audience, or at least admittance into the open court to ‘pay their respects’ but Prince Yanmelu only put them off.

On the fourth day, Sado was in their quarters doing pushups and grumbling. “Damn that man.” Down he went. “Damn that man.” Up he went. “Damn that man.” Down he went again.

Until Diana approached and simply took a seat on his back with one leg draped over her knee and her hands folded. “Oh there you go… up and down, up and down… just like you used to, oh yes! Oh YES!” She giggled as he turned red in the face. She laughed at the grousing look she caught on him in the mirror.

Sado resumed his routine after a roll of his eyes, and picked up speed while trying to ignore her when she explained, “You’re being so rough with me. Please slow down!”

He froze, gasped, and began to do it again, though his complaining ceased, he ignored her taunts.

“It doesn’t do any good to complain about him.” She said from atop his back in a more serious voice, Diana the playful tease was gone, and Diana the consummate professional was present. “We knew he wouldn’t likely grant us an audience right away. He needs to show off how powerful he is, that he can make us wait. Who makes others wait, is powerful, they are waited upon. He’s probably heard of our mistress by now, and wants it impressed on us that ‘he’ is in charge here.”

Sado popped his feet forward and pushed up with such force that Diana was thrown into the air off of his shoulders. He whirled and caught her easily in his arms, then set her down gently.

Diana blinked in sudden surprise, then daintily placed her feet on the floor.

“I’m not stupid, Diana, I get why he’s doing this, but the prospect of not seeing him is unpleasant, it means we’ll fail.” Sado’s face fell dark and he went to sit on the large, oversized bed that they shared.

“We won’t fail, Prince of Chains… but maybe we should have some kind of contingency if we don’t hear from him tomorrow.” Diana tapped her finger on her cheek, “Just ‘showing up’ would not do, but… what if we drew him to us, throwing a small gathering among the merchants here, something impromptu to celebrate our owners work and expressing a desire to forge trade ties.”

“Right… I see what you’re saying.” Sado snapped his fingers and the dark cloud lifted from his face, “If some of the wealthy show up, we’ll show the Prince that we can get things done without him, and he’ll bring us up to get a read on the situation.”

“See, I told you we’d make a good team. I can’t wait to see his face when he recognizes you.” Diana brought her hand to her mouth to stifle a giggle.

Sado rolled his eyes, “To be frank I’d rather kill him than talk to him. But…”

“But if you do that, I’ll tell the mistress, and she’ll kill you.” Diana finished decisively with a steady look.

Sado shook his head, “Maybe you would, but I was going to say, “then I would fail her, and all of you, and I won’t fail again.”

Diana’s narrow look lifted, and a sad one took its place, her mouth had always been either neutral or smiling as far as he knew, rarely ever angry or even surprised, though he had seen that, but never sad.

She brought her hands up to cup his cheeks and her delicate fingers pressed into his skin, she tilted his head to look into her eyes, “Prince Sado… it can’t be. You will never… ever have her. Please… I know I love to tease you, and… I won’t say I’ve had no harsh feelings toward you. But I’m being sincere, I’m trying to be kind and let you down softly. She will never see you that way. You won’t be her lover, you won’t be her husband… you will live and die a slave in her service unless she sells you to another.” Diana of Komestra lowered her radiant beautiful eyes and put her forehead to his chest.

“Please don’t think like this… I’ve seen this happen so many times, it never ends well. This isn’t just madness on your part, it’s hopelessness. Forget your feelings for her. She’s bound to take a mate eventually… what will you do then? Can you bear to watch outside her door on her wedding night? Can you bear to watch her growing the child of another man, to see them, whoever it is, together? You will destroy yourself in the worst way possible.”

“Diana…” Sado replied quietly and reached up to take her hands from his cheek, He kissed the top of her head, “I don’t pretend to know what is coming, the stars know I proved well enough that I am clueless about that. But… I can’t change course from a path set before me. She is… unique. Maybe you’re right, maybe I’m mad, but let a mad man dream for just awhile, in times like this, that’s all I’ve got to keep me going.”

Lodira rushed from the room and ran through the halls, she put her hands on the doorframes of each open area, leaned in, and called for whoever was there to come and come quickly to the main hall.

‘Albaer is many things, but ‘late’ is not one of them.’ Lodira thought with frantic urgency when the staff had been gathered. “When was the last time anyone saw the Steward?!” Lodira paced in front of the rest of the staff, rubbing her forehead so vigorously in her worry that the beautiful, bedraggled blonde hair cast droplets of her sweat to her master’s floor. However, such was the shared worry with the realization of her question’s meaning that no one cared.

“Master Valoisin orders that he be found, so we have to get going…” Lodira snapped through Albaer’s normal routine, the market orders for the kitchen supplies, the cleaning material replacements, the merchants guild, the temple donation, everything he did, each time she rattled off a location, she pointed to two servants and snapped simply ‘Go.’ And without even thinking about it, they did.

Finally she added one more thing. “Albaer has been doing this for forty years, he’s well known to all the people on his route, but… but if he collapsed or was injured in between places, he might be taken somewhere for care anonymously. They wouldn’t know whom to tell, so those of us who remain, we should check anywhere an old or injured man might be taken, or check any shortcuts, alleys along the way he might have collapsed in without knowing.” Lodira pointed to the remaining servants and assigned them each an area of the city, and as the others had, without thinking, they rushed for the doors as well.

Lodira however, kept one thing back, the place she was going to search for herself. ‘The courier building. This isn’t normally the day for that, but he took my letters so he must have intended that they go out today. Please be alright, Albaer, please…’ She looked at the door while the thought rampaged through her head, willing him to walk through the door to explain a delay with a broken carriage wheel or something innocuous.

But the door remained stubbornly shut, Lodira stared at it for a long time, willing her foot to move toward it, or Albaer to come through it.

“That wasn’t bad.” She heard Anton’s voice behind her.

“S-Sir?” Lodira said without turning round, her eyes could not come away from the door.

“You gave orders like a proper noble, and you set something in order like a proper noble.” Anton replied in his dispassionate way.

“Th-Thank you sir.” She spat out, but didn’t feel any real care for his words. ‘Just go!’ She commanded herself, but fear of finding nothing, fear of finding the worst, kept her still.

Anton misunderstood her hesitation, “Even thinking to remain here while the servants go out there and do their jobs? Congratulations on understanding the bare minimum. It took you long enough, but you’re not a noble anymore, so get out of my house and go find my servant!” Anton snapped, approached, and casually smacked the back of her head.

The sting propelled her to action, lurching her forward, she was unfrozen in that moment and rushed for the door, flinging herself out of it and heading for the street, she headed for the courier building.

She reached the street and looked toward the hill where the cobblestones of the road did nothing to diminish the light noise of people’s passing. There were the shouts of coachmen in drab gray clothing casually snapping their whips, the noise of the passing population as they went about their daily routines… but none of it was loud. Whether a slave wore iron, cheap leather, or even a few bronze, or no collar at all, the voices were as subdued as if at temple or at a funeral. They walked and moved and spoke as if already dead. Lodira took off at a brisk walk that in and of itself was differentiating her from the rest. They ‘shambled’ as they walked. Lodira all but ran.

‘True, I’m in a hurry, but they’re always like the walking dead… how do they do this?’ She wondered not for the first time, she passed a merchant stall where someone was selling fish…

“Five copper for three…”

“I’ll give you two for three…”

She left the exchange behind, neither man seemed to think much of the deal, though she suspected it was accepted as she caught the sound of rustling coin at her back.

Not for the first time, she longed for Pas’en. The buildings she passed had no graffiti, but they also had no art, no color to speak of. The gray stone seemed to reflect their spirits, the only true brightness she saw came in the form of the white clad temple priests. ‘How long was it before I knew other colors existed?’ Lodira mocked her youth while eating up ground.

She reached the courier building after an hour’s walk. A simple plain square building… as everything was, no attempt was made to make it more than just a simple square peg in a city of square holes. There were exactly eighteen steps from the city street up to the entrance. Even without having gone there recently, she knew that to be so. ‘Like they would ever have a different number from one government building to the next.’ A part of her rolled her eyes, but she gave it little notice as her feet slapped the steps with their urgent pace.

The door was a single wide, simple oak with a cheap brass handle which she opened and passed through.

She looked around the room, a series of chairs sat along one wall, they were simple wooden things, ‘finished’ without roughness that might tear cloth or leave splinters. Just light colored wood, functional with a back but no arm rest. A number of servants sat in place clutching small wooden plates with numbers. Nearby where they sat, a rack hung with sequenced numbers dangling from simple brown twine.

For just a moment, Lodira ignored that and made to breeze past the rack to approach the place she wanted. A series of windowed doors behind which stood a mix of either iron collared slaves or free citizens, regardless of their status, they all wore simple brown clothing. Pants, a laced shirt, and a simple flat cap with a brim over the forehead. “Twenty-two.” Someone called, and a servant stood up from the chair and shambled over to the caller, a folded message in hand.

Lodira felt the glares on her immediately when she’d taken only five steps past the rack. ‘No… I’m not a noble anymore… I can’t just approach…’

She lowered her head, shuffled over to the rack, and took a number. She glanced down at it, “Forty.” She muttered, and with eyes down, humbly she moved to an empty chair, and waited.

On the third night of Nua’s trip back to Pas’en, she sat at her campfire and projected herself into Yersin’s realm. The place was much larger now. The dead lake had a forest of dead trees with many dead leaves on it. In the distance, the mountains had gained more definition. There was no black sun yet. However the sense of an open world to explore was there in a way that it hadn’t been before.

Most shocking of all, the breeze. It blew Nua’s short hair lightly, and in a way she could never forget. She touched her face and looked behind her as if to be sure she was really in the heart of the gem.

‘Really… he chose that breeze…?’ Nua thought and approached the door, and rapped the simple finished wood several times.

“Come in.” Yersin answered the knock in the cheerful way he often did.

Nua did, turning the handle and walking into his home.

He was already pouring the tea for her. His callow, gaunt face welcomed her with the pleasant pulled back smile that he often wore, and he gestured to the chair opposite his own. “Make yourself at home, partner.” Yersin said in a pleasant voice.

Nua didn’t answer right away, she sat as he wished, waited until the tea was poured, and then said in a blunt, grousing tone, “Why did you choose her wind?”

Yersin briefly appeared confused. “What?” He asked while pouring milk into his tea and stirring it in a slow and steady rhythm.

“Her breeze. I’ll never forget it, it’s ‘exactly’ the way it was that night, the way it caught that beautiful raven hair and blew through the strands, the way it kissed us both and blew on and on and on as they tore her apart. You could have made any wind or none, but you chose that…?!” Nua demanded an answer and glared at him as her thoughts reached him in the voiceless realm.

“Oh.” Yersin answered, “I didn’t, actually. Well, I suppose I permitted it, but this showed up when I absorbed the power of her death, and I rather liked it, so I kept it. It’s not totally unheard of for me. Maybe she had some latent mana talent that was never properly developed, and I took that as well as the energy of her death.” Yersin shrugged, “Besides, it seemed appropriate.”

“I suppose it is…” Nua reluctantly admitted and sipped the tea.

“But you didn’t come here to see what I’ve done with all the death I’ve been consuming along our trip, you wanted my thoughts.” Yersin guessed, and Nua inclined her head in affirmation.

“Yes, I’ve been thinking about taking a less direct route back, it might be safer. Whatever I can say about him, the God-Emperor doesn’t seem like the sort to break his word. But his sons are questionable. They might come after me on their own for any reason or none.” Nua answered in turn. “Suppose we took a less direct path to the border, closer to one of the ranching areas where they keep their captives.”

“Partner… what are you thinking?” Yersin asked reproachfully.

“You know me better than I like to admit, Yersin.” Nua laughed and drank some of her tea, the cup didn’t shake in her fingers, instead she was unnaturally calm. Yersin felt his hairs stand up on end when he beheld the twisted smile taking shape.

“You’re not serious.” Yersin stated.

“They got one from us, I want to take one from them, what’s wrong with that?” Nua folded her arms in a huff.

“Do you think you can get away with it?” Yersin asked rhetorically, his own opinion clear.

Nua folded her arms in front of her chest and looked away from him. “I do actually, and more importantly, I think it is important to prove. I’m an assassin, not exactly a spy, but not far off. I doubt the guard is heavy in these places, but if it is, it is important to know that in advance. I won’t take any needless risks…”

Yersin pointed at her aggressively and interrupted saying, “Ahem… you mean any ‘other’ needless risks.”

Nua huffed and replied, “Right, any ‘other’ needless risks. If it is too dangerous, I’ll leave, but if not? Well, we can pick something close to the border. Grab one boy or girl, and be out in no time. It’ll be that simple.”

Yersin drew his hand over his face, “Every time I’ve heard somebody say that for the last nine thousand years, it has turned out to be anything ‘but’ that simple. Fine though, first time for everything, and if they eat you, well, I guess I’ll feast well with a beastman bearer… though I wonder how many would have the will to lose part of their arm to bear me.”

Nua’s mental laughter rang out bitter and long in the cozy cabin of the gem of death while she drank his excellent tea. “You’ll miss me, and you know it. Be honest, you enjoy our team work, you’d dominate some stupid beastman and maybe have fun using a pawn, but it won’t be the same.”

It was Yersin’s turn to snort at the assertion, “I choose not to answer that assertion, but… I also won’t deny your intent is potentially workable. And what am I going to do, refuse to go?”

“That’s my partner, always along for the ride, thank you for the tea.” Nua stood and walked to the door. As soon as she stepped beyond, the breeze picked up at her now shortened hair and caressed her skin, and for a moment it was as if she could feel Sobella’s arms around her once again. At a weak moment of her own, she closed her sky blue eyes, savored the feeling of the ghostly embrace, and said: “Also... thank you for keeping this too… please don’t get rid of it.”

Yersin didn’t answer her, before she vanished from his world within the gem and returned to her own mind.