When I told Arathan to teach it a lesson I didn’t mean a school-yard beatdown.

Tamara frowned, uncertain as to whether she should intervene. She and Heath were traveling through a city that was old. One of the oldest in fact. Kitvalka, or The Evil Place if you were a romantic or preferred the old parlance. The denizens often had a habit of practically spitting at the end of the word when it grudgingly left their lips. Not that there were a lot of polite talks even when the name didn’t come up.

Old skeletons of stone and clay buildings sagged into each other on every side of every tiny street. Even the wealthier and more respectable parts of the city all seemed to be trying to hold each other up. The breeze was barely tolerable with the stink of everyone shuffling quietly past one another on the way to whatever scheme or job. Curtains often fluttered out the windows of the desiccated earthen buildings, a reminder that years and years gone by there might have been glass.

Now there was no glass. Not even broken glass. It had been too long and no one could bother with glass when everyone was just trying to keep on surviving.

Heath cast a hooded glance at her as he made a distasteful expression. He rolled his eyes up above him and Tamara tilted her head and allowed herself to become aware of the distant groaning and panting. Was it a madam with her side-lover? A mister with a professional? From the faked sounds of enjoyment of both the man and woman that echoed soft and desperate over the street, it was hard to guess. Perhaps two professionals exchanging tricks and tips of the trade.

The lack of glass was good for some businesses, after all, she mused. She raised an eyebrow under her hood and gave him a look that asked him why that was her fault.

“You bring me to the nicest places,” he muttered.

“Stop talking about nice places. You’ll make us marks.”

“Wouldn’t you like that though?” Heath snorted. “The idea of someone mugging you on your own turf seems hilarious to me.”

“Keep your head down. If we didn’t want incognito I wouldn’t have bothered to put this filthy dress and hood on.”

“No one would have bothered you anyway. In this place? You’d have to be dumber than Ruth to try anything on anyone you didn’t know. Demi-gods and gods are everywhere. Who would take the risk?”

“You’re seriously underestimating the desperation and stupidity of the denizens of Kitvalka. Casual muggings are expected. Murder quotas have to be met to earn respect.”

“What a lovely place. I think I shall winter here,” he said sarcastically.

A man began to scream, stumbling away from Tamara and grabbing at the stump of his right hand. Blood flowed down and he turned, still screaming, and ran through the crowd. Barely anyone even looked up.

“Incognito?” Heath blinked. The sword she had produced had disappeared the moment she had cut off the man’s hand.

“He was a bad thief. He missed my fake wallet and grabbed my butt.” Tamara’s eyes flashed dangerously.

“Missed.” Heath tested the word out.

She just smiled at that and then stilled for a moment. “C’mon. I feel them ahead. They’re still a demi-god…”

“Isn’t that what you want?”

Tamara’s white teeth flashed beautifully underneath her dirty hood. Even a few of the more jaded passerby startled at the sudden beautiful shine and glanced up. They quickly ducked their heads and tried to scurry away from the figure who was smiling in the middle of the street next to a severed hand.

Unfortunately, she forgot all about Arathan and Rush.

↢↦

Lord Rush rolled to the side as two grasshoppers with scythes for hands and feet narrowly missed his body. Small white lines criss-crossed his back where they had cut him earlier. Despite the fact the wounds were shallow and had started healing the moment he’d stepped back, they had given him some pause for a moment.

Only for a moment though.

The excitement continued to make his whole body tremble. He hopped back as one hopped forward. The distance he hopped backward was short. Having just landed, the grasshopper immediately found that Lord Rush was pouncing forward with his head lowered. Two horns thrust into the creature's head. Its mandibles clacked open in a soundless scream as he crushed it against the edge of the space and tore into it with his talons.

Lord Rush loved his talons.

The second grasshopper hopped behind him and raked both of the red scythes down his back. He howled, not in pain but excitement, and ignored it while he finished off the one he was pinning. While he lowered his head and bit down aggressively his tail moved to the side and then whipped forward, the heart shaped rattle smacking the grasshopper across the head and rupturing one of the compound eyes. It spun clear around and would probably have dropped after being brained in such a fashion; save that Lord Rush had turned and was already pressing his talons against the top of its abdomen. Red flashing wings began to beat frantically against his feet and talons, briefly brushing past his face and eyes.

Wings again! Dumb wings!

Lord Rush bit them off and smashed the creature to a pulp. He opened his mouth after he was convinced it was no longer capable of fighting and began to devour the aura. His mouth made big chewing motions and he swallowed the aura with big gulps.

He cast a look at the potential vassal and noted it was still watching him from the same spot. Probably too terrified to move.

As he ate the aura he felt better and stronger and the wounds on his back began to heal once more.

Finish thi-- Rush blinked rapidly realizing there were now four of the grasshoppers with scythe hands moving toward him from the dumb bird.

It didn’t matter how they got there.

He howled and rushed forward eyes dancing with excitement. The soul space behind him began to seethe with lightning again and that just excited him further!

He would eat them all, and then, if he didn’t forget and eat the bird too -- he would give this vassal a suitable beating for her insolence.

↢↦

Ruth became increasingly aware that something was wrong. It wasn’t just the room and mystery of the moved furniture or the weird immortal and deadly text. An increasing sense of unease began to stir within him. His heart started to race and his head began to pound.

“I must be tired. I’ll just try to rest, or distract myself,” he thought aloud. He tried to get the clothing to cover the other arm. It refused to go past the elbow.

At first, he thought that it was because there wasn’t enough of the material even after it had grown in such a spectacular fashion. He immediately dispelled that notion by making the scaling cover his neck up to his chin. After he gathered his courage he even managed to make it crawl up and over his head and face(and around his horns). Openings appeared for his eyes and nose but not his mouth. That was just as well because he was keeping his mouth firmly shut. The idea of accidentally allowing the clothing to start into his mouth made him nauseous just thinking about.

“This isn’t working,” the excitement in his body was elevating now and he felt hot. He held out his hands and looked at them wondering if he’d been bitten by something? Maybe he needed to eat? That was probably true.

He stood up and was immediately dizzy.

“Fine.” He sat back down.

He would rest. It stood to reason that he was just too tired after everything that had happened. He closed his eyes and crossed his legs trying to calm down. He took deep breaths.

Irritation began to flare up once more. What the hell?!

His mind began to wander to parts of his body. Sassy tail seemed to be fine. His clothing hadn’t eaten him so that was great. Ruth noted his shoulders felt… pretty good actually? He wouldn’t be surprised if the holes that were bleeding slowly earlier before he’d passed out were completely healed over and indistinguishable from the rest of his skin by a day’s time.

His mind continued to wander back to all the things that had happened.

Just about the time he was breathing deeply and thinking about the Cannibal Pixies the image of the creature that had popped into existence to help him appeared in his mind. What had that thing been?

King Rush! Or something. That’s what the immortal and deadly text had said. Something in his status had been named Rush. King Rush didn’t feel right.

Lord Rush. Yes. That felt right.

His eyes opened and narrowed. There was a brief moment of disgust that welled up deep within him. Why would Ruth refer to something as a Lord? He was glad no one else was here even if he hadn’t said it out loud. It felt shameful and embarrassing.

It had really helped him though. Ruth closed his eyes and hoped that the little thing was alrigh-

Ruth was just thinking about this when he felt a weird sense of disconnection from his senses. He was standing in a sphere in the darkness and in the distance there was the lizard-like creature fighting large insects with varying types of weaponry strapped to their bodies. The battle was brutal and the cries of the injured and dying insects echoed strangely around him.

A large golden crow was perched on what Ruth imagined was an invisible tree while the little creature tore the creatures apart below.

“Ah-haha…” Ruth began to laugh nervously. Somehow he knew that this was real and he was here. At the same time he knew that he wasn’t here. His body was back…there; but here he was.

The golden crow looked up sharply, its eyes widening in shock. The break opened slightly as if the bird was gawking at him.

Lord Rush was standing atop a small pile of corpses, choosing not to devour all the bodies. It seemed he had forgotten he could fly through the air and was using the grotesque pile as a growing mound to reach toward the golden crow. He paid zero attention to Ruth.

Scram kid.

The crow looked at him and Ruth felt a deep fear welling up within him. He was about to agree and turn around and go, well, anywhere else, but the crow lifted a wing and flapped it hard in his direction.

A red line of energy seemed to be embedded in the wind that was produced and it smashed into Ruth sending him out into the nothingness. He didn't even have time to shriek.

↢↦

Ruth opened his eyes wide, sweat dripping down his face. He was upside down with his feet in the air, face, horns, and neck supporting him somewhat by helpfully pressing against the floor, the rest of his back and ass resting against the wall in the corner of the Haberdasher’s tree.

A cold terror caused his pupils to shrink.