The day didn’t get any better after they left as somehow they managed to tighten the chains around my wrist making me physically unable to leave this stupid house. So unable to leave the house as once again I was left wondering if somebody was going to try to kill me before the day ended…

I looked to see what I could do until night fell as the rest of the city would decide if they wanted me to stay or just tried murdering me again. So naturally I went with my paranoia and tried fortifying the house until then.

And just to be clear when I mean fortify I do not mean locking the doors, closing the curtains, and hiding in the basement. No, I went zombie apocalypse bunker up mode where windows were boarded up, objects shoved in front of doors to keep them wedged shut.

When I ran out of ordinary objects to fortify the place I only then started using up my more exotic supplies to make sure that if anything did break through then the entity in question would regret it if only for a brief moment.

Some would call me paranoid, for going this far… though most people hadn’t spent two nights here only to wake up with missing gaps of memories and more people trying to kill you than last night.

In fact I would find it a rather nice novelty to find myself wrong and spend a nice relaxing night without anyone trying to kill me and for my list of problems to actually shrink instead of having something new stabled onto the bottom each morning!

Salt and Ash I had actually gave the freaking imp a shotgun and refuge in the house.

The very same imp everyone seemed to have a grudge against who only managed to escape because the idiots let his last wish be to have one last smoke… and the cigar in question was laced with a lot of Forgotten Mist.

Said idiots promptly forget about the imp and left thinking that someone else had did the dead or something along those lines leaving me with Futurm and not a whole lot of allies.

He was busy trying to load up every gun we had managed to find while taking cover in the small overturned fortress he had made for himself. When a knock on the door echoed throughout the house used one of the overturned tables to brace the shotgun and himself as he pointed it at the door.

I on the other hand held my breath while pointing the flamethrower ‘wand’ at the door as I needed to save my more esotic ammunition. It wasn’t as if the residents of this cursed city were going to let me go out and legally purchase more ammunition for myself.

“So… Do you think they are here for you or me?” I asked the imp as he scowled at me “To be fair it could be you.”

“Doubt it.” The imp muttered as he eyed the door “Fae Folk tend to be too high on their pride to think that a lowly imp could outsmart them.” He pulled out one of his chew sticks “Worse than priests. At least when they make an honest mistake they go the full distance.”

“Do you think they might send a priest here just to be safe?” I asked out of mild curiosity

“No. Because that would be the smart thing to do if they thought I was a bloody demon.” Futurm snarled “It wouldn’t work of course, but even Grum would call upon Redrick if he thought there was a bloody demon or a need for an exorcism.”

“That’s the one who joined the church.” I asked trying to remember which was one.

“That’s the one.” The imp muttered in annoyance “Black sheep of the family and still more brains than these folk here.”

No wonder the name sounded familiar. That was one of the few imps that I knew and also happened to like because while he was a tricky little guy… he wasn’t a ‘bad guy’ so to speak.

Futurm was just an ally of mutual convenience/survival.

“I know you're in there Kravos.” A voice called out.

It took me a few moments to realize who’s voice it was as it belonged to the half-elf girl from this morning… the half-elf girl who was a normal knife wielding woman until screwed up nonsense struck her.

‘They claimed whatever happened to her is not able to be done again.’ I reminded myself ‘But they never bothered explaining why.’

If something could be done once, then you could repeat it so long as you had the necessary resources. Her ‘father’ had the resources and a reason to get rid of or ‘modify’ me as he wanted a ‘heir’ in control of the hill… and I was in his way.

“Kravos?” The woman asked out loud “I just want to ask you a few questions. I promise I am not trying to kill you.”

The annoying feeling against the back of my mind struggled to overpower the more paranoid… no rational parts of my mind that viewed her as a threat. This is why messing with the mind was illegal. It was why it was the second law because once people started messing with minds you couldn’t trust anyone from the sheer paranoia it generated.

That and how many idiots try to use it to cheat contracts. The Eldritch being of Kornea really took offense. Theft of free will is a major crime after all.

‘So if they try it they will not have a minor group of people after me, but the next Crusade funded by The Spire itself.’ I told myself ‘Mutual Assured Destruction. Just jolly old MAD trust.’

Having worked up the courage I walked over to the door before wondering if it was perhaps a far more simple threat. As it wasn’t that hard to impersonate voices when magic fell into the mix.

Slipping on the red glove stained in black ink as the surge of eldritch green light flared between my fingers. If it was an imposter they would realize just how big of a mistake they made if they thought they could catch him by surprise a third freaking time.

To my surprise I saw it actually was the half-elf girl who was standing outside the door with a couple of bags and one of those green jeeps… those stupid vechiles that lacked a roof and proper doors just so that the passengers could feel the wind (rain and snow) when they drove around.

“Who is it?” I asked as for all I knew this town had shapeshifters or something.

The person in question kept glancing at the doorknob “Averia. You know… the half-elf wondering why you rigged the front door to explode.”

The eldritch green light died as my brain still tried to figure out if she was telling the truth or lying. The exploding door bit made me wonder if she could sense what I was doing or how she had been able to see the trap laced into the back of the door and wall?

Surely I didn’t leave any hints of the latter where she could spot it outside right?

“Do you have a key to the house?” I asked, trying to debate on what to do next.

The woman nodded, pulling out her key and glancing at the boarded up windows “You okay?”

‘If you keep trying to go over the work trying to remove any mistakes then you will never end up publishing it.’ Cassy’s voice gently chidded me in the back of my mind ‘Just take a chance and see what happens instead of debating about it until you're sick.’

Against my better judgement I pulled the end table away before muttering “Futurm… lets change the door locks tomorrow if possible.”

“You can’t be that paranoid just because I have keys to this place!” She practically shouted as her hearing was a lot more effective than I thought “I can unlock the door right?”

That question made me quickly run over to the imp as we both took cover behind the overturned table. Pride be damned! I’d rather hide like a bloody coward and be wrong instead of a smoking idiot thinking they could never be wrong!

Shouting behind my cover I announced “The door is locked. If your key works you’ll be fine. If not… It will blow up.”

There was a pause as a part of me believed that someone was trying to kill me again. That it wasn’t a person out there, but some imposter trying to pretend to be…

The door unlocked as the half-elf stared at us as the house had changed once again… except this time it was set for a siege instead of magically rearranging itself. Both me and the imp peeked up from behind our cover waiting for the moment when something horrible happened to the both of us.

The Half-elf frowned, taking one look at the imp “How are you still alive!”

The Futurm grinned “Last wishes dame. Mine was to live and they obliged.”

“Well now I know where the paranoia came from.” Averia spoke glaringly at the imp “But did you seriously have to board everything up Kravos. I am sure we could just toss that thing in the basement if you are trying to hide it.”

Another reminder that there seemed to be bad blood between imps and the city. For Futurm it was obvious dislike since this city was ‘Fae related nonsense’ instead of something a little bit more honest that Kornea.

When things were trying to kill you they were at least upfront about it.

Walking over to the open doorway “Considering my track record for this place. Yes!”

With a very clear movement of my arms I had tried to grab one of the bags resting outside the door only for my hand to essentially ram up against an invisible doorway. To show my point even further I leaned up against the empty doorway to further drive the point home.

I stepped out of the doorway and threw up my hands in frustration “I have yet to spend a night without someone or something trying to kill me! Only this time the freaking chain around my wrists won’t even let me leave the house.”

The half-elf was left trying to gather up her bags by herself. Once the last bag was tossed inside did I close the door, lock it, and then shove a nearby end table in front of it just to be safe.

“Okay… where’s the ward and how’d you make it so that the entire door explodes?” She glanced around the room “Or make it so that my key prevents it?”

“Circuit breakers. Stick something to it to break the connection and the door won’t blow up.” I informed her “Try and force the door open and it sets off the system creating a crude explosion.”

“Still say we should have gone with the burn method.” The Futurm grunted

“Lack of resources.” I argued back “I needed materials to make a few extra rounds. Besides, your trick only works on the first person trying to break down the door. Everyone else just learns to step out of the way Futurm.”

“Shock and awe.” The imp argued back “You keep the door and the folks outside freak out while you fill’em full of lead.”

“And you are seriously complaining about not making it deadlier…” The half-elf shook her head “What happened to you Kravos?”

What happened to me? Seriously what hasn’t happened to me since I got stuck here! I’ve been threatened, people tried to erase my existence… Seriously! At what point am I allowed to complain about people openly plotting to kill me!

Pinching the bridge of my nose I tried to be as blunt as possible “Once is chance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is a pattern.” Raising up my wrists to remind her “I have less room to flee this time and I’d rather not wake up in the morning with people asking who I am for a third time.”

There was a small pause as Averia stared at me unsure of what to say. Her bags were full of random objects… items… things that were apparently supposed to help ‘recover my memory’ only for her to see a tired, paranoid person, who fate had worn down.

In some ways that look bothered me more than whatever might be trying to kill me tonight… stupid curses trying to inject guilt and unwanted memories.

Walking into the kitchen I pulled out a frying pan “So… not to sound rude, but are you a vegan or do burgers work?”

She blinked, staring at me “Meat is good. Why do you ask?”

I pulled out one of the frozen patties from the freezer before adjusting the handle of the frying pan “Because I might as well try making dinner and simply try getting to know you. Even if… and this is a big if mind you… even if I recover these memories I am supposed to have. My experiences with Kornea have changed me alright?”

It wasn’t fun trying to humor the possibility that I had ‘lost my memories’ that never existed, but it seemed to make one of the very few people not trying to kill me within this stupid city at ease. Heck it might have even cheered her up a little

With a small jolt I cursed, nearly dropping the frying pan as the flame burst forth from it before it settled. The half-elf stared at me in disbelief as I set down the frying pan with what looked like a floating fireball before tossing the patties into the floating flame. Not a single one hit the floor as they were safely being cooked inside the fire.

“How?” She pointed at the frying pan “How are you doing that?”

“Magic.” I spoke much to her annoyance. “Ink set aside to create a flame, leave enough air pressure to keep it afloat, and a bit of work to make sure that anything tossed in the area doesn’t fall out… so long as it isn’t too heavy.”

Memories of Cassy trying to teach me how to make it all work. The frustration of trying to make the right size for the circles and attempting to stabilize the formula. Seriously it felt like the crazed lovechild of an art and science where a simple pen stroke could make the difference between how much heat a flame would generate.

As much as I hated trying to make the adjustments to fix my own problems I would by lying if these stupid frying pans didn’t have a special place in my heart.

“Magic is the unknown until it is known. You break it down until the magical becomes mundane…” I tossed the meat into the flames and watched them float as they slowly spun in the flames, but never leaving the fire itself “But just because it became mundane, doesn’t make it any less magical.”

“The Kravos I knew would have wanted more.” She muttered “So this minor magic trick is enough for you?”

The imp laughed as I shook my head “Minor? Please… this entire trick is what’s being used to rig the door to explode. One heck of an explosion tearing everything apart only to leave a blazing wall of fire that won’t disappear!”

The imp lost a few points for giving away the secret of what would happen and somehow made me seem like an insane pyromaniac. Seriously, you do not brag about the chaos you can create. It gives people second thoughts about your sanity and if you should still be left alive.

To my surprise she actually ended up chuckling and spoke with a smile “And that’s the lunatic I knew… So what is your relationship to the imp?”

She spoke the last word like a swear only for the imp in question who gave her the one finger salute with both fingers. This apparently caught her by surprise as he even stuck his tongue out for good measure.

“A mistake in my past.” I replied as she deserved an honest answer

“Please you had a lot more tricks in your sleeves and a heck of a lot more respect, boss.” Futurm countered “If you want to go back to the old business deal…”

“Then I’ll shoot you.” Averia spoke, pulling out a sawed off shotgun from one of her bags “These things work on you right?”

The imp took one look at it as I interjected “You know if you deny it she’ll try to shoot you right.”

It wasn’t a question, but a statement as it looked as if the half-elf was seriously considering pulling the trigger just to see if it would work or not. She had no idea what the ‘business deal’ was, but it was enough to have her threaten physical violence without a second thought.

Futurm eyed the shotgun and the woman as he muttered “Wooden bracing… I’m guessing iron bullets?”

The half-elf grinned showing her teeth “Dad wanted to be safe. Don’t worry… I have gloves if I need to reload.”

“I give.” He spoke holding his hands up “I’m a guest, but I give.”

That made her frown as the imp grinned at whatever that meant. Still he was smart enough not to push it as he quickly walked around to another spot to hide. The two of them glared at one another as Futurm pulled out a small bowl of batteries and popped one into his mouth.

That actually caught her off guard as we could hear the small pops of electricity from inside his mouth… as well… imps could be weird like that sometimes as he continued sucking on the batteries as if they were lemon drops or something.

Once he was far enough away from her she started searching for something in her bags “I thought we could try and reconnect…”

Groaning out loud it was getting old real fast at how many people seemed to assume who I was supposed to be “So who am I supposed to be?” I asked the half-elf “Am I supposed to be brave, cowardly, smart, dumb? A farmer, a clerk, the new king of Canada and it’s glorious domain over the Grand Lemming Republic?”

She sort of snorted “Still a wise cracker?”

“No, that's recent. Just something I picked up after far too many risks to my life that I ended up taking the web-sling method of dealing with stress.” I half-joked “You’d be surprised at how many eldritch threats get taken by surprise when you blow a raspberry at them despite how absurdly dangerous they can be.”

She took a deep breath and then to my utter disbelief she exhaled… not exhaled as in letting air out of her lungs. More like she breathed out and magic just sort of… happened.

No ink, no tools, no sleight of hand to hide her trick. Just a simple single breath as her hand pressed down upon the floorboards before it just sort of… sprung to life. Small branches grew out of the wood with budding leaves at first completely at odds with the fact it was cut floorboard which practically made it dead wood.

Still it didn’t stop there as the growing branches and wood slowly sprang out of the wood and began to twist together looking less like carved wood, but one of those unique ‘grown chairs’ you read about in fantasy stories with elves. A chair made out of grown living wood made specifically to fit her.

Then with an all too familiar smirk… My hand shot to my head trying to just squeeze the unwanted memory out of my brain if possible as the stranger spoke “And I made a seat… and judging from your look you have no idea how I did it.”

That annoyed me more than I would have liked to admit. Even with my unique experiences with Kornea there was a certain logic you couldn’t escape from. Physics still applied so if you shot forward with magic expect physics to hit you just as hard when you crashed into a wall.

You couldn’t just ‘make things bigger or smaller’. It was far easier to damage something than to repair it. You couldn’t just make something out of nothing and my brain was trying to figure out how she made dead wood spring back to life!

Where did the nutrients come from for the plants to grow? How was she able to guide how it grew? Where did the extra mass come from? What allowed the impossibility to become merely improbable instead of impossible.

Yet that dam smirk grin somehow sparked a competitive streak with me as I did something stupid… I tried to one up her before my brain realized that I shouldn't be wasting any resources. Better just to toss her something shiny and admit defeat.

“Do you like diamonds?” I asked grabbing one of the lumps of coal nearby

She chuckled “Don’t you mean lead to gold?”

I slipped on one of my trusty pair of gloves and simply pressed down on the lump of coal as lead to gold was fancy and all… but diamonds were easier, cheaper, and looked a lot more impressive.

Maybe not as impressive as her magic trick was to me, but considering how she nearly fell out of the chair and stared at the large diamond with open greed and envy was enough to prove that this ‘minor trick’ was far more impressive to her than it was to me.

She practically licked her lips as I could imagine dollar signs appearing in her eyes as she said “Kravos! When did you learn to do that!”

“It’s just a minor trick.” I muttered examining the diamond in mild disappointment “It isn’t even properly cut or shined… I doubt you could sell it for much…”

While I spoke slowly, moving the diamond back and forth between my hands. It wasn’t that great… her eyes stayed firmly locked on it. Futurm just chuckled in the background. Gemstones, gold and silver weren’t worth too much in Kornea.

Not when people found enough tricks to make them as common as pennies and if you tried to sell them out of Kornea? Try finding someplace that accepts raw gemstones without asking too many questions… or willing to make a fair offer.

Best bet you’d run out of resources before you made back the investment out of worthless rocks. At worst you attracted the wrong type of attention.

I tossed the stone near her as she instantly shot out her hand catching it out of the air and examined it in rapid interest. How does making a small diamond from a lump of coal outweigh making life from nothing or breaking a few laws of physics or reality to make a chair.

“You seriously can’t find that impressive.” I finally spoke as she stared at me in shock “It’s just a rock.”

“It is a diamond.” She practically hissed “A real one. Not a fake one or…”

“You made a chair out of nothing.” The words still felt wrong to admit outloud “Surely you can make a few minor jewels…”

“No I can’t…” She spoke slightly dejected “Just… how? I thought you worked through contracts… Did you seriously make enough contracts to…”

“ Contracts?” I spoke, trying not to laugh “You mean the basic trick everyone in Kornea uses? Everybody uses Pacts. It's the first ‘trick’ people learn! It's about as common as learning how to drive a car! Probably more common considering the traffic.”

There was an awkward pause as Averia looked caught between laughing and looking far more uneasy than when she found out that I had no idea who she was. Her hand gripped the crude diamond even harder as she glanced at it trying to see if it was fake… and the fact it was real only seemed to frighten her even more.

“It’s not a glamour or an illusion… it's a real diamond.” She spoke in mild horror before she nervously chuckled “I guess this is where we’d go out and try one-up another. Keep showing off until whatever ‘threat’ tries attacking you tonight.”

A soft chuckle as she seemed to be calming down, yet now she was looking at me as if I was a stranger instead of some person she thought she had known before. There was a look of guilt and unease in her eyes as she looked away from me making me feel…

No it was that stupid magical nonsense that tried shoving fake memories into my head that was making me feel bad. It was a good thing that she realized that I wasn’t whoever she thought I was.

“So…” Averia spoke, trying to fill the void of silence between us “do you want to watch a movie, trade notes, or play a boardgame.”

She jerked her thumb at the bags “Dad doesn’t get a lot of modern innovations and the council isn’t a fan that he is trying to update the rest of his group to modern times… so I got a lot of board games.”

Once again there was that old familiar yet slightly nervous chuckle… that hint of embarrassment that she didn’t like to admit, but that attempt to bring back the past of what she thought she knew. What was even worse was how creepy it was.

That I actually started to feel at ease with her. That all of this was starting to feel natural instead of talking to a random stranger I had never met before until today… or yesterday… I hated how complicated this stupid city made it.

It was too much for me as cutting to the end of this trainwreck would be better than waiting for it to happen “If I tell you what the last time I remembered you doing… would you tell me what you remembered?”

She stared at me as there was a hint of fear and guilt in her eyes as she seemed to be getting the same idea I was having. She might have hesitated if not for Futurm who snorted as he rolled his eyes causing her anger to override her fear.

“You first.” The half-elf spoke more in defiance to the imp than to me “Tell me why you sort of freaked out when you saw me.”

That made things a little bit more awkward as sometimes you just had to bite the bullet “We woke up. Agatha Willow was dead. I wanted to check to make sure she was dead and… you borrowed the knife and stabbed her in the face.”

She blinked.

“Repeatedly.” I finally replied

The seconds slowly passed away before she held up a finger “So… I was the one who finally killed her? I stabbed the wicked witch in the heart!”

There was no hint of fear or sorrow in her voice, but a sort of pride and relief as if she had been expecting something far worse. Her wide happy smile threw me at odds with what I actually had been expecting.

“More like she was dead and everyone else was struggling to figure out what to do next… Alexandria threw a chair out the window so that we could escape through it since the rest of the house was locked.” I informed her “But yes… the sudden stabbing caught me off guard.”

She sighed falling back into her chair “That sounds about right for me, but I really wish you had a picture or video of always calm and collected Alexandria just throwing a chair at a window instead of trying to painstakingly figure out how to get out of a locked room.”

The woman chuckled just thinking about the scene as she really didn’t get that it wasn’t stabbing, but more along the lines of mutilating the face and the body. Still if she thought it was more along something reasonable instead of a psychotic breakdown then who was I to argue?

She stared at me now as she scratched the arms of her chair trying to work up the courage to tell me when we had ‘last met each other’ as she tried not to meet my eyes. For her it was stressful, but I had no idea or connection to who ‘Kravos’ was even if I seemed to be stuck with the name.

And a lousy name that just screams ‘Shoot me dead’ to anyone who hears it.

“We sort of… got off on the wrong foot.” She idly replied “You wanted magic and you weren’t born with it. You just couldn’t accept it.”

“Sounds like me.” I had to admit “Didn’t let it stop me.”

Bloodlines were stupid. It was that stupid line of logic that gave birth to so many types of stupid idiots. Seriously it is one of the major reasons why the age of kings and queens died when the industrial age rolled in.

“Seriously, with the proper resources anything is possible.” I spoke with a bit more force than I should “Salt and Ash. I am freaking living proof of it and proud of it too!”

I didn’t even notice that she was watching my expression and even seemed to laugh as she had been expecting me to act like how I had acted… that I was acting more like the person she knew instead of who I really was.

Averia tried to pretend she hadn’t been watching me as she continued “I… well my father offered… There was a bit of doubt on succession lines and... I… I said some stupid stuff. Like really stupid stuff.”

She didn’t say exactly what it was, yet it was hard not to see the signs of guilt as she kept trying to avoid the subject. In fact she probably would have tried to change the subject if whenever she stopped looking at me the half-elf didn’t lock eyes with Futurm who simply stared back at her.

Unease of whatever mistakes in the past she had made didn’t win against watching the smug imp slowly pop another battery into his mouth as if it was popcorn as he was practically daring her to stop and prove him right.

She gritted her teeth glaring at the imp before she gulped forcing herself to continue “It was… Stupid stuff. Things that I… That I regretted saying and now it feels like I’ll never get to apologize for… for what I said.”

Now her eyes locked with my own eyes as the half-elf stared at me as pain filled her eyes. Even if I was sitting in front of her, a part of her knew that I would never really ‘understand’ what she had said… and that any attempt to apologize to me would be like telling a log or maybe a stranger.

I might get a small idea… but I wouldn’t know or really understand why she apologized.

“Long story short it was a stupid contract. One sided…” She groaned “You complained about it. I told you that you’d never get a better one.” Her voice slowly grew a little bit louder, more emotional “You said you wanted to be equals instead of the ‘pet’ taken out of pity and I… I said some stupid stuff.”

This wasn’t ‘me’ so to speak, but I sat down and listened to her. She needed to get this off her chest and even an idiot could tell that she needed to vent… especially with how much it hurt for her to get this off her chest.

She leaned back in the chair and practically shouted “And I screwed up. Big time!”

It was spoken out in rage and sorrow. That she hated what she had done and regretted it to this day as her eyes started to water as she tried rubbing it away before I could catch it.

She had regained control of her voice as she continued “Agatha was really putting the pressure on because the magical community was trying to bind us with Pacts before Agatha Willow finally kicked the bucket.”

The half-elf snorted “Trying to limit what we could do. Dad kept me away from being bound up... while you… just sort of got… ignored.”

‘It wasn’t right.’ She muttered underneath her breath as she looked at the diamond “And now? Now your back… with magic… and now you can make Pacts that really screw over other people… and no bindings! I mean seriously! It’s everything you ever wanted and all at the cost of ever knowing me...”

That hit of sorrow I had remembered from a TV show… one of those parallel reality ones where you had one of the main characters saying how they did something which allowed happy ‘cannon’ to happen only for the alternate reality double to take offense.

Because it sounded as if they were the ones responsible for creating their doomed future because they hadn’t done what their ‘happy timeline’ counterpart had done.

That it sounded like my life would have been better if I never knew her.

And it hurt her.

Her eyes continued to tear up as there was a hint of bitterness in her voice “Sounds like a bad Fae Pact… or Karma.” She sighed looking at me again, “So… did you get married in Kornea? A Ms. Lynch?”

“Never dated.” I found myself replying before my brain realized what was going on “It just never worked out.”

She blinked “Virgin?”

Now I frowned “Seriously what does that have to do with anything? I just never really found anyone that just… clicked alright. I was a little bit more concerned about staying alive than trying to make out with somebody who didn’t care or just wanted my stuff…”

She chuckled “Sorry. I mean I don’t mean to laugh, but…” She held her side “Seriously? I mean I just sort of assumed… Not even a first kiss?”

“Sort of assumed?” I spoke in utter confusion “I never really dated anyone! I mean why does that even ma…”

The words never finished as the half-elf just kissed me. My brain froze as I tried to figure out why as she just sort of smirked, sauntering back to her chair before sitting down all too smug.

Before I could ask she replied “I already screwed up once and now that I survived that trial… I kept telling myself I would be more honest since I wouldn’t have to hide anything about me anymore. So… why not?”

The question was left hanging out in the open as it sounded obvious to her. She liked me. She screwed up. And now she had a second chance to make things better now that she was older and far less stupid.

Only one problem with that idea.

“Because you don’t know me.” I simply stated

She shrugged “Maybe not ‘you’ as well as I should… but I have a good idea about who you are. Even if some of the pieces are missing… you are still you even if you’ve changed.”

I didn’t change because I was still me! It was everyone else who was suffering from fake memories thinking that they knew me!

“Don’t bother trying to get her to explain boss.” Futurm spoke from the peanut gallery “Dames are just as enigmatic, confusing, and strange as even the most eldritch beings within the Spire. Just accept that she’s right and you're wrong and it’ll be easier for everyone.”

“First smart thing you’ve said all day.” Averia spoke reluctantly only because the imp was the one who said it “So how about we trade stories and I try to convince you that we shouldn’t try killing one another?”

The next few hours were… nice.

They were wasted hours as nothing productive had been done, but sometimes you just needed to relax and do something stupid. Not life threatening stupid… just the normal amount of ‘stupid’ that you could laugh at.

The movies that Averia had brought ranged from the old black and white movies to a few more of the modern ones. They were more or less played as background noise while I tried to get to know the other ‘Heir of the Hill’ and try to figure out where we stood.

It sort of devolved into checking out the other rooms and Averia going out of her way to point which rooms belonged to who. The woman had no problem showing me her room or trying to go through with embarrassing stories about the other girls.

The only ‘useful’ thing that we had done was trying to exchange notes about magic… which more or less fell apart as this woman had a better grasp on magic than the previous ones did. The only problem was that neither of us really understood how the other one worked.

My attempts to understand her brand of magic were rather confusing as she talked about spirits, breath… some stuff that sounded like ‘new age hippy’ stuff with healing crystals and foot rubs to cure cancer.

It sounded stupid, but for some absurd reason (against all logic) it worked for her as it passed the scientific method… in the fact that it could be studied and repeated on command even if you didn’t understand how it freaking worked.

My new messy notebook just listed it off as ‘Eldritch Nonsense’ since she knew how to make it work even if she had no idea ‘how it actually worked’... which wasn’t that uncommon with some of the more inhuman citizens of Kornea.

My own brand with inks ended up confusing her as she didn’t understand how it worked despite my attempts to explain it, but I found it mildly annoying that after spending half an hour showing books that explained that it was a science…

Before she promptly gave up trying to understand it, treating it like how I treated her process of casting magic. She adamantly refused to try looking at the other magical theories before she eventually tried to help me out with my problems.

“Look, a lot of people are a bit worried about you since what you did felt like… Contract magic.” She finally replied as she was snooping through my RPG collection of books “Most magic is costs and limits. Or well domains.”

“Domains?” I spoke trying to piece it together “How does that even fall in line with contracts or make some sort of… magical lawyers?”

The fact that she didn’t laugh as she stared at one of the source material books caused her to sigh “Magical Lawyers isn’t too far off actually. At the most basic level they gain power by making contracts so even a lot of minor contracts that seem reasonable adds to their power… its… its sort of like regular lawyers in a sense.”

A part of me wanted to object, but in some twisted way this sounded more like an eldritch being working under guidelines than actually understanding the reason for those guidelines.

“Lawyers who don’t have a lot of cases, even minor ones. They don’t have a lot of power… or leverage.” She tried to explain “The more cases they have or won the more… weight they hold. There is a difference between a lawyer who defends CEOs than one who is hired to deal with someone trying to sue their neighbor for damaging their car.”

I simply nodded as she did kind of have a point. There wasn’t anything magical about it… but since Fae were apparently real things might be a little bit more complicated than I had been previously lead to believe.

Placing her hands together she continued “So when you have someone who can just use sheer brute force or presence to tear down an entire contract built upon countless lawyers and interwoven by magic carefully weaved by generations… and that’s without tapping into the type of power being The Witch… or Magician of the hill.”

There were no words to describe just how bad that sounded. Only the mere sound of my palm striking my head could fully explain just how bad things were.

Yet there was a question I had to ask “Then why did they pick me over you?”

That earned a hearty chuckle as she just sort of smirked “You tell me which you think is worse? A lawyer without contracts or a half-elf with backing?”

Now it sort of made sense… they thought I was powerless so long as nobody made deals with me. So the idea that house arrest with no visitors probably sounded like an easy fix.

Right up until the square peg didn’t fit into the round hole.

Getting up off the ground she placed the RPG book with the small pile of books she wanted to borrow from me before she continued “Turns out you are just some sort of crazy ‘mad scientist based’ magic. Not sure if that's better or worse really.”

“What can I do to convince these people that I’m not a threat?” I muttered.

Being trapped in a house was annoying, but with enough time, research, and supplies I might be able to escape on my own. If they realized that they were mistaken they might go for more creative means of limited my access to… well everything.

Averia chuckled “Let my dad and Mr Hawkings into the house and burn all of the contracts Agatha Willow made over the years.”

“Okay.” I spoke, shocking her “What? I mean it's not like I can use them.”

“Uh…” She glanced around the room as if trying to spot a hidden camera “You could… no wait… How do you… fuel your craft again exactly?”

“One moment…” I half muttered walking back to my room “I think I have Cassy’s old introduction guide book… and we may also need a white board.”

There was a long pause before Averia groaned “You know… I came to learn how to summon fireballs, make crowds of people forget me, and figure out how to make coal into diamonds… only to have my Science teachers of old cackling like witches.”

She hissed in frustration as I continued up the stairs “Admit it! This is all gibberish nonsense and Ms Furgison put you up to it!”

A part of me couldn’t help, but wonder why they would think that proper magic wouldn’t be any less complicated like everything else in the world?

Airplanes flew through the air finding exploits in air pressure, physics, and a whole lot more stuff to turn a trip that might take months or years into a dull eight to six hour ride. Very mundane, basic, useful… and highly dangerous if you mess up.

Just like so many things in life really.