Sly blinked a few times before processing her mistress’s words.

“Excuse me, did you say we’re meeting Merlin?” Sly asked.

“Focus, daughter…” she answered. “First things first, there are things I would like to hear from you.”

In her current, larger-than-life form, she was two meters tall, towering over the much smaller Sly.

Lola-Lolita sighed. She was not upset, so much as feeling impatient. The sound she made, however, was louder than the succubus intended, and the smaller woman mistook it for irritation directed at her.

“Please, mistress!” Sly said, bowing her head slightly in reflex. “Forgive me for being late. There is no excuse.”

Lola-Lolita arched an eyebrow and did something her young seductress familiar didn’t expect. The mistress was suddenly enveloped in a pink smoke that vanished as quickly as it had appeared, leaving no trace of the towering figure she had been moments before. In her place, crouched a fragile girl, pretty, but cowering in fear.

Recognition dawned on Sly’s face along with a wellspring of rage. Not directected at her mistress, but at herself. Lola-Lolita had taken Sly’s own visage from years ago, when she had been a weak and pitiful creature, unable to stand on her own and cowering before the world and all its injustice.

Upon seeing Sly’s expression, the cowering girl vanished in a pink mist, and a new, well-endowed woman of Sly’s height stood in her place. She had taken the form of a female with amber skin, curly honey-colored hair, and hazel eyes. Her ears were pointed, but not so much as an elf, marking her a half-elf. She no longer wore the robe from before, rather an adventurer’s gear complete with leather armor resembling a corset, deep green riding pants, with knee high boots. She still managed to show an impressive amount of cleavage, arms and belly, but she looked almost like a ranger, if dressed somewhat less practically. Most of all, she had a friendly face that was just as cute and bubbly as it was beautiful.

“Do you understand why I showed you that?” asked Lola-Lolita, wagging her finger playfully. Her voice was somewhat less resonant now, but still melodic and beautiful.

“I was being weak,” Sly answered, the trace of edge in her voice vanishing as she took in her mistress’s current appearance. “You taught me to be strong, even in the face of overwhelming strength.”

“Yes, I did,” she said, nodding. Then tapped her chin as if thinking something over. “You’ve been doing good work, Silvestri. I need you to stop calling me mistress when we’re alone together. That’s going to be tiresome. When in company with your sisters, you can take it up again. But when you’re with me, I won’t tolerate it. Are we understood?”

“Yes, mis-” Sly caught herself, then took a breath. “Yes, Lola-Lolita.”

“Just Lola, if you please, ha!” the succubus who was now a half-elf said, punctuating her sentence with a cute little laugh and a wink. “Now, let’s start over as friends, ‘kay?”

Sly’s mind reeled.

This...… was her mistress…Lola?

Sly’s origin story was by no means uncommon. A pretty orphan girl in a big city like Venice had limited career opportunities. Becoming an old pervert’s plaything wasn’t even the worst possible outcome. Ten years ago, however, the mistress found Sly inside her dreams when she unwittingly crossed into Oneiros, likely out of a desperate desire to escape her wretched existence. The succubus had been surprisingly forthright about what she was, and what power she had to offer in exchange for service. For a chance to be in control of her own destiny? It hadn’t even been a difficult decision.

Since then, her mistress had been a force of nature in her life. Lola-Lolita was a demon, but only in name as far as she was concerned. She demanded ever so little. Just an open ear for information, and to perform favors on occasion. These were favors that often played a role in a grander scheme, but were inconsequential enough to be no consequence for Sly. Even if that meant the occasional murder. The mistress not only trained her, but shaped her. Taught her to find pleasure in the things she hated, subverting her tastes and refining them into something more.

Yes, she had gained a somewhat unusual fetish in her transformation. But that was a fitting trade that made her work more palatable. She would even say fun. Few understood that the true pleasure was in taking the power from those who thought they could wield it at the expense of others.That wealthy pervert who first took her… he got his due recompense. As did many other sinners in her eyes. So what if she enjoyed fucking her prey? When it meant siphoning their life force and adding to her power, or taking their ill-gained riches for her own, and basking being the cause of their demise...

In summary, the ram-horned, voluptuous, sexy pink succubus transformed Sly. The succubus was the idol for whom she had strived above and beyond her duties, all in order to earn her attention.

And now the self-same person who she idolized turned into the half-elf shaped creature in front of her, asked to be called Lola, and so casually asked to be her… friend? It was a surreal experience.

“Hello?” Lola said, waving her hand in front of Sly’s face. “Silvestri, why are you looking at me like that?”

“Sorry, you’re just acting… differently than I expected.”

“None of this apologizing all the time nonsense either,” Lola said, sticking her tongue out in disgust. “It’s just way too annoying. What did you expect, anyway?”

“I thought you would be angry with me for being late.”

“Let the other girls think that if they want,” Lola said. “This way everyone will be pissed at you, but they won’t be falling all over each other trying to get alone time with me like you’re getting. They’ll fall all over themselves taking unnecessary risks and overlook opportunities in their desperation to uncover a grand conspiracy.”

“But there is a grand conspiracy…”

“Yeah, there is that,” Lola said, waving her hand dismissively. “Let me worry about how best to deal with my harem. Speaking of which, tell me what you found.”

Sly put aside all her questions and shifted to her report.

“I confirmed the priest who comes and takes the adult prisoners is a mid-level necromancer. I followed him to a cave about a half-day’s march from the village with high density magic.”

“Well, it’s not like I expected your first report to be wrong. It’s good to get visual confirmation just in case Zarik is being deceived.”

Lola nodded to herself, looking pensive.

“What about the children,” she asked.

Sly winced.

“They were taken while I was investigating the necromancer’s cave. I still don’t know what makes them special.”

Sly felt more upset that she couldn’t do anything to help them than her failure to learn their purpose.

“Don’t beat yourself up about it. You can only win so many battles alone. That’s something that’s taken me a lot longer to learn than it should have. I am very old, you know.”

Lola paced back and forth, drilling Sly with question after question.

The plot was insidious. The Mud Castle’s operations were a smokescreen for its true purpose.

Sly had discovered them at the end of the first stage. Which meant they were still kidnapping and turning villagers into zombies, ghouls and other types of undead, likely storing them in the magical cage she discovered. When they succeeded in creating enough unliving bodies, the plan was to eventually release them en masse throughout the countryside.

The resulting chaos and potential tidal wave of undead would demand a response from the nearby city state Albion, of the White Walls. While Albion was spread thin dealing with the sudden undead epidemic, they would be ill equipped to mount a suitable resistance against a Milanese army. Alternatively, the undead threat could be used as a means of holding the country hostage in some way.

According to intelligence stolen from Lord Zarik, his principal partner was Bernabo Visconti, one of the three princes who ruled Milan. Bernabo was likely orchestrating this operation in preparation for launching a larger campaign to expand their borders.

Once they took Albion, it would serve as a staging ground for its invasion of the surrounding countries.

What truly worried Lola-Lolita were the implications of a move like this. The entire operation was obviously an experiment, if a dangerous one. Albion was a relatively weak country compared to the others along Milan’s borders. Its saving grace had always been its high walls and reserve of a small but elite fighting force. If the city could be laid low through a strategy involving the use of heretical magic, it would embolden the Visconti.

Proper armies of undead tearing across the countryside hadn’t been seen in Erda for over a millennia, and that was far west on another continent. Lola-Lolita knew the ramifications. If things scaled to that level, the land would be driven to ruin through the auxiliary effects of heretical magic upon the soil. Oh, necromancers always popped up here and there who tried to amass power. But they seldom lived long enough to be a threat to affect the terrain beyond a localized area. They were usually killed by adventurers or by the very curses brought on by their practices.

The red magus was different. He had proved himself too resourceful and powerful to be underestimated, even if he wasn’t a demon. Lola didn’t think resorting to necromancy was quite his style, but if he seriously invested himself in the project…

“So what do you want me to do now?” Sly asked, sensing the growing intensity in her mistress as she paced.

“Alright, let’s go,” Lola said, having decided she heard enough to satisfy.

“Go where?”

“To see Merlín.”

“Wait, you were serious about that?” Sly said, her mouth agape. “I was sure I misheard you.”

Lola answered her question by waving a hand in a circular motion, upon which a door covered in vines fizzled into existence. She proceeded to open the door inward.

Through the door, Sly could see a leaf covered path between rows of hardwoods on either side. A fog seemed to hang in the air, such that she couldn’t see where the path led. She could also hear a cacophony of birds and other unfamiliar noises.

“I need you to be careful in there,” Lola said seriously. “Don’t leave the path. Even if it looks safe, it isn’t.”

“What could hurt us in the realm of dreams?”

“Through this door is Broceliande, a forest in the fey wild. The danger for you is lessened because you won’t be visiting in the flesh, but that won’t stop the fey from trying to trick you.”

“We’re going to the land of faerie?” Sly asked, laughing in disbelief. “Isn’t that just a children’s story? Broceliande isn’t even… real?”

Her voice trailed off when she realized she was being silly. In a world of magic and sorcery, it should be no surprise that fairy tales were more than just stories.

The corners of Lola’s lips quirked up in a smile, then she stepped through the door. Sly followed.

***

As soon as the pair passed through the portal into Broceliande, the door slammed shut behind them. It stayed there, in all its vine-covered glory, a seemingly random door held upright by unseen powers in the middle of a five-meter wide path between the trees.

The sound of the door slamming startled the many birds in the area, who began crowing in annoyance.

Or so had been Sly’s first impression, before she realized the birds refused to quiet down and she had more time to listen to their unusual hissing caw.

“Sebille!”

“She’s here!”

“Sebille has returned!”

“Sebille!”

Sly didn’t know who this Sebille person was. Though, now that she thought about it, the most likely answer was that they were responding to Lola’s presence. The name Sebille sounded familiar, but she couldn’t quite place it.

She was about to ask Lola about it when something else caught her attention and distracted her. Between the hardwood trees that lined the path on her right, she could see figures emerging from the mist. An adorable bearded boy with goat legs and tiny horns on his head was waving at her. He wasn’t alone, as several other fauns soon joined him and began calling Sly over to join them.

Sly actually felt tempted to follow. If not for Lola’s warning before crossing the threshold, she would have. But she had already prepared herself mentally to ignore any effects the fey wild might have on her psyche.

Sly and Lola walked the path for several minutes under the cacophony of the birds who would not cease calling the name Sebille.

Before long, a ten-story tall shadow could be seen in the mist, which soon resolved into a tower covered in vines. It shimmered somewhat, and Sly realized it was made of a glass-like substance, whereby any place the structure was clear of vines reflected an unseen light source. Like everything around her, even the sky was covered in fog.

When they reached the foot of the tower, the birds finally quieted, and they were greeted by a new voice.

“Dia Duit, eachtrannach!”

Sly and Lola turned to face the hairy bearlike man that was just coming into sight from beyond the trees. Only his face was humanoid, if covered in fur and a long grey-streaked beard. The rest of him for all intents and purposes, a brown bear. On his shoulder, he carried a stained sack filled with irregular shapes, dripping a viscous amber liquid. From the crowd of bees hovering around the man, it was not much of a leap to conclude it was filled with honey combs.

“What did he just say?” Sly asked out loud, saying the first thing that came to mind, despite her brain flooding with questions.”

“He was just wishing you a good morning,” Lola answered.

“No one in their right mind would say it’s morning in Faerie!” the bear-like man answered indignantly. Then his voice took on an increasingly lilting speech which rose in pitch as he began to visibly shrink in size. “It isn’t quite night, either, nay! Nor would it be accurate to say it’s after or before noon! Here in Faerie, we live in the misty, mystical, dare-I-say medieval magical, majestic mystery of a naturally occurring malleable mog. Yes, mog. It’s what I call a magical fog. M-O-G! Good Mog-ning to you! Tee-hee hooo-haaah! Ha! Ha! Ha!”

By the time his speech was over and devolved into raucous laughter, the man had completely shed his bear-like appearance. His shapeshifting was different from Lola-Lolita’s. Instead of pink mist, his body was subtly wrapped in shadow as it changed. What stood holding the bag of honeycombs was a muscular man who looked to be in his mid-forties. The man was bald, and wore a short-cropped grey-streaked beard and moustache that was wild and yet fitting. His eyes were blue lightning, and seemed to crackle as he smiled. They had more than a little twinge of madness. Along his exposed and well toned abdomen, he sported a number of druidic symbols. The only article of clothing he wore was a kilt made of bear furs tied with a long, crude leather belt.

“Why is he laughing like that?” Sly asked, as the laughter went on much longer than it should, even if she had found what he said to be somewhat amusing.

“Just ignore him,” Lola said. “Eventually, he’ll say something worth listening to.”

The strange man abruptly stopped laughing. Gazing intently at Lola. Then he grinned. This time there was a strange blend of humor and malice in his voice.

“Sebille, dearie! Truly, truly-truly-truly! You are a SIGHT for my sore eyes.”

“It’s nice to see you too, Merlin.”

Sly did a double take on the strange looking man who was obviously crazy.

“This guy is Merlin?!” Sly said, once again failing to control herself before speaking aloud.

No one seemed to mind, however. Lola surprised her by simply answering.

“Yes, he is.”

“Sorry, not sorry!” said Merlin, bowing toward the two women. “And who is your friend, Sebille?”

“This is my disciple. I have brought her here because I need a favor. I need you to perform an augury for us that will --

“Shush!” Merlin interrupted. “Shushushushsushush! Shush… Shush!”

“What is happening right now?” Sly asked Lola in the middle of all that shushing that seemed to have turned into a kind of game for the peculiar wizard. “Why did he call you Sebille?”

“Shushsibsisbisbisush… shush shush shush shish!”

“It was a name I used, long ago.” She said. “As for what he is doing now? It’s not clear. You learn to ignore this part of him.”

“Why, because the rest of him is brilliant?” Sly asked skeptically. “He isn’t what I pictured when I thought I would meet the ‘greatest wizard who ever lived’.”

The shushing stopped and Merlín stood there with his fingers pinching the air and his eyes closed. He was frozen like that for a few seconds until several bees that were still buzzing around him decided to land on his bald head. He flicked them away and then opened his eyes to regard the women in front of him.

He smiled, then picked up his sack.

“I will do you one better than watching the birds,” he said, more lucid than before. “I will tell you how to find the thing the red magus lost, and that which he still seeks. He is the main character in this story, after all.”

After those cryptic words, he turned and headed into his tower, calling “Follow me!” over his shoulder.

Luna turned to Sly.

“Merlín lost his mind when his one great love, Gwendolyn, died. He has since squandered most of his power searching for a way to bring back her soul. He is still powerful, but his efforts drove him further into madness.”

“Then why are we here? And who is the red magus?”

“Merlin may be mad, but his divination powers have no equal. He can provide answers where otherwise there would be none. As for the red magus, I will tell you when you need to know.”

“Okay. Did we come here because you want to ask him if killing Lord Zarik is the right move?”

“Quick as always, Silvestri! But there’s more to it now. I’m not sure what it is, but Merlín has something important he wishes to share.”

With that, they followed the mad wizard into the tower which was just as overgrown with wildlife as outside, complete with a giant weeping willow. An artificial light shone from an illusory sky.

As much as Sly wanted to stay and admire the strange sight, she followed the others down the stairs and into the stone cellar, where bottles lined the walls in the thousands.

On the far end of the house-sized room, there were a half-dozen enormous glass jugs three meters tall. Their contents bubbling with viscous fluids of different colors. Rubber tubing plugged into the tops of the jugs connected them to smaller jugs who were then connected into smaller ones, each dripping into the next in a steady trickle.

All in all, it looked like the sage wizard might actually have some impressive magical alchemy in the works.

Merlin summoned a ladder with the flick of his wrist and proceeded to climb it to reach the top of one of the largest jugs, pulling open a glass door to dump the honeycombs inside.

When he was done, he climbed down the ladder, replacing it on the opposite wall with another flick of his wrist. He then withdrew a bottle from one of the racks on the wall and approached the two women.

“What do you think?” He asked, gesturing toward the gargantuan alchemical construction behind him.

Lola rolled her eyes, leaving it up to Sly to answer the question.

“What is it? Some kind of ritual magic or an advanced spell requiring alchemy?”

The wizard burst out laughing then conjured three glasses from thin air and handed one to each woman. He then popped the cork of the bottle without so much as moving a finger. It hovered in the air next to him as he poured a golden liquid into each glass. Noticing the cork suspended by his cheek, he cursed at it in annoyance and it hurriedly sped across the room and into a large bucket full of its kind.

“I don’t get it,” Sly said, sniffing the glass. It was a sweet smelling liquor she didn’t recognize.

“You had it upside down, dearie. It isn’t alchemy fueling magic, rather a magical array empowering a simple fermentation process of honey. In short, I brew my own mead. A man must do something to pass the time, no? It’s the best of its kind. Try it for yourself!”

Lola nodded her assent and Sly took a sip. It was smooth and sweet, and it warmed her instantly. It was the most delicious thing she had ever tasted.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t give her anything as strong as what I drink alone,” Merlin said.

“How long until it takes effect?” Lola asked.

“Until what takes effect,” Sly asked, taking another sip and feeling her head beginning to swim.

“It should take effect instantly.”

He snapped his fingers and Sly felt herself enter a trance.

Energies poured into her from every direction, flooding her with euphoria. Her vision blurred just as Merlin put his hand on her forehead and chanted in an ancient language she had never heard before.

Then nothing.

All of a sudden she was standing in place, as if nothing had happened. There was no drunkenness, nor euphoria, nor heavy breathing. No sign anything out of the ordinary had taken place.

Lola and Merlin sipped their honey wine, talking, unconcerned.

It was only then that she realized more time had passed than just moments. Lola and Merlin were in the middle of a conversation well under way.

“But I thought Outworlders were beyond divination. How is it that you can be sure this cambion is one? And for that matter how can you see it in the first place, if that’s the case?

“It is true, Outworlders, by nature of not being of this dimension, are impossible to see directly through divination magic.” Merlin said, smiling mischievously.

He then proceeded to go into a kind of professorly tone that seemed to irritate Lola the longer he spoke.

“But I did not see him at all. That is the point. The biggest clue was your disciple here. She came in contact with some of the cambion’s energy when it equalized and dispersed excess magic. These energies would have killed him had he not done so, and their particular configuration hint specifically of the existence of a cambion Outworlder. After deducing that, it was merely a matter of reading the threads of fate of all possible interactions she might have within a certain period of time and plucking both the ones that lead to a blank space where a person should be, as well as any favorable outcomes based on her potential actions. Infinite possibilities can be overwhelming to analyze, but in the end one can latch into the stronger threads and …”

“You’re doing it again, Merl. “I’m sorry I asked. Please don’t stray into magical theory that only an incomprehensible accident like you cares about anyway. I don’t have your prophecy ability, so it’s no use to—“

It was at this point that they both registered Sly was now consciously among them. They smiled in amusement.

“Welcome back!” Merlin said, leaning in to take a close look at her eyes. “No negative after effects, as expected.”

“What did you do to me?” Sly asked, still a bit confused. Though it was obvious that whatever it was, the two of these titans of magical might were in on it, and that it wasn’t meant to harm her, probably.

“You’ll be fine,” Lola said dismissively. “Merlin used his magic to help me answer questions I didn’t know I should be asking. I’ll have a series of orders for you to begin executing as early as tomorrow.”

“There is no guarantee of success for this one” Merlin said, leaning forward intensely. “I can only see so much in matters as delicate as this.”

“It will have to do,” Lola said. “What do you want for payment?”

“This one is on the house.”

“Free? That isn’t like you,” Lola said, arching an eyebrow.

“You could pay me with her,” said Merlin pointing at Sly with a wiggling pinky finger and a lascivious smile.

“That’s up to her,” said Lola.

Sly was still trying to take in all the information she had been subjected to and didn’t know what to make of it. She realized they were waiting for an answer, when she understood the unasked question and tilted her head, considering. He was indeed her type. A powerful man, a hard face, if somewhat mad... She wouldn’t have the pleasure of killing him, but…

Merlin took her hesitation as rejection and shrugged it off.

“Payment really isn’t necessary,” he said, nonplussed. “I’ve hated that upstart magus even before he had the nerve to steal one of my grimoires. You know he had the audacity to pay me a visit the other day, asking for precisely the information I just gave you?”

“Why didn’t you take it back?” Sly asked. “The grimoire this magus took… You’re Merlin. Couldn’t you just smite him or something?”

“Well, that’s flattering,” Merlin said, draining his glass and summoning a new bottle. This one with honey and fruit aroma so strong Sly could smell it. “But I can’t leave this place, dearie. Can I, Sebille?”

“When the red magus came here, what did you do?” Lola asked, burying her face in a glass. She was obviously avoiding his question.

Sly recognized there was deep history between them, but it wasn’t something she felt comfortable asking about.

Merlin didn’t seem to mind Lola’s dodge and just answered her question.

“I made his time here very unpleasant,” Merlin said, grinning. “I don’t believe he will be risking such an idiotic move again, regardless of how much more power he amasses.”

“So you still have some juice left, old man?” Lola asked, in playful mockery, but obviously impressed.

“How about you let me show you, for old times sake?”

“I can’t afford to break your mind any more than it is already. I’m afraid you can’t handle me anymore.”

“It was worth a shot,” said Merlin, smiling wryly at having been rejected twice in as many minutes. That wouldn’t stop him from trying again, though.

Thusly, as the night went on, Sly watched as the most powerful wizard in the world, who, in her mind, until today had been nothing but a legend, got piss drunk on nine different kinds of honey moonshine. All while being repeatedly rejected by a half-elf shaped succubus who seemed to be enjoying herself more than she should.