Apparently Mavehn had screamed while Urekin had been fighting back his inner demons, as the door behind her burst open and the orcish female came striding out with her fist aimed at Urekin. When she got there, she shoved the table aside, glass and other tableware shattering on the floor as she got between him and the elven woman. A set of large hands firmly grasped Urekin’s arms and pulled them back, painfully tugging them behind his chair.

This all happened incredibly fast, or at least it felt that way as Urekin was still slightly disoriented from the mind-affecting experience. The same could be said about Mavehn, who was still off-balance, having lost all of her composure.

“What happened?” asked the orc, her voice concerned.

“Lanri,” Mavehn said with a shaking voice, “He… I...” she stopped talking and bit down onto her quivering lip.

Lanri’s attention was solely focused on Urekin, and her retinal implants flared up as she said, “You have a minute to explain.”

“Yeah, turn bent, harlow! I-” Urekin responded with the anger that was building up inside him. His response was cut short however, as Enti’s hands shook him roughly, making him grunt in pain. Damn the ogre was strong.

“He has some kind of a ward against Suggestion,” said Mavehn in a shaken voice. “I felt something claw at my mind as I was working on him.”

Lanri tilted her head slightly in Mavehn’s direction, but kept her eyes focused on Urek.

“As if it traced its way back through my anima. I don’t know how he did it, but he must be a very skilled Manipulator.”

At that, Lanri and Mavehn exchanged glances.

“No,” said Lanri after a while.

“Lanri, I need this!”

“Vehn...”

“Enti, ease up on him please.”

Lanri slowly lowered her arm and nodded, at which point the giant let go of Urekin’s arms. While massaging his sore spots, Urekin stood up and said, “Plague and more on your houses.”

“I am incredibly sorry about my previous treatment of you. It is inexcusable, and you have every right to be angry with me,” said Mavehn, and bowed her head.

“You’ve already spoken your hollow words. Keep your bent apology, I’m leaving.”

“I did deceive you, so it is understandable that you would be angry with-”

“You didn’t just deceive me, you tried to enslave me!”

“Yes, you are right, an apology won’t be enough here. I owe you an Oath,” she said while sliding down from her chair, and laid down in a prostrate position in front of Urekin.

Silence filled the room as Urekin stared down at Mavehn in shock. Without looking up, Mavehn recited the sixth verse from the Eleven Oaths of Elvenkind.

“As it had been during the yesteryears,

So it will be in the coming days.

Until wrong is right,

Fate unkind,

Shall become of me.

I offer nothing but blood and tears.”

Lanri sucked in air through her teeth while Mavehn got up from the floor and sat back down on her chair. Her expression was well composed, but her face was much paler than before, and her hands were clenched tightly into fists on her lap. She seemed to realize this and slowly covered one hand with another in a more casual manner as she said, “Would you stay a moment longer and listen to my say?”

Urekin sat back down onto his chair and gave a curt nod.

“Thank you. First, let me assure you that you will be able to leave our compounds whenever you wish, without hindrance. My methods may have previously been crude, but I swear to you, I meant neither harm nor disrespect by them. It is certainly not to my advantage to ask under our current circumstances, but-”

“You want me to work for you as a Manipulator.”

“Yes, it is as you say.”

“No.”

“Please allow me to explain,” she waited a moment to see if Urekin would object, then continued, “As you are most likely aware, the Cleft has the most finite amounts of space available out of the three Layers. As such, it is nearly impossible to start a large construction project without having the necessary backing. However, even then, it will most certainly interfere with someone else’s interests, who have backings of their own. Backings, I might add, that rival or even surpass the ones you possess.

“With such conflicting interests, it is incredibly easy to make enemies, and the ensuing adversities can often lead to open hostilities. When that happens, the only real choice you can make is to further entrench yourself in your own circles, quite literally digging the grave for your prospects that would fall outside of those interests.

“So I decided that the plague can take it all, I will remain independent by reaching outside of everyone’s interest spheres, and build where nobody else dares to.”

“We’re in a Warren,” Urekin whispered in shocked disbelief.

Mavehn looked at him searchingly before she crossed her arms and legs and said, “Quite so.”

“I know I might be stating the obvious here, but maybe, just maybe, the reason why nobody is interested in building inside Warrens, is because it is not a new idea to try and reclaim them? People have tried before, and failed. Over and over.”

“So? If I did or didn’t do something just because somebody else had tried it before, then I guess I would be doing nothing at all.”

“Dragon’s breath! We’re not just talking about trying to learn how to dance, we’re quite literally talking about reclaiming a plague-bent Warren!”

“I am well aware, thank you. Yet neither am I trying to reclaim an entire Warren, nor will I be persuaded by a stranger debating the practicalities of it as we’re sitting here, undisturbed.”

“But you don’t even need to be doing this… Your father-”

Mavehn threw her hands up in the air as she said, “My father, my father, my father. This is my project, and it will stay as far away from his grubby little hands as I can possibly make sure. Indefinitely.”

“So what would my role be in all of this, should I agree? What do you need me for?”

“Without going into too much detail, crowd control. Your skills would prove to be very useful in the days ahead.”

“That’s great, but you’ve answered my question without answering my question.”

“The Apsylum will be the first club ever to be built inside a Warren. As such, when we’ll be attacked during one of our nights, it will take considerable effort to keep people from panicking. So as I’ve said, crowd control.”

“Seems to me like too much effort for diminishing returns.”

“It’s the price we have to pay for our freedom.”

Urekin was stunned. Her words were a reflection of his own feelings of entrapment that he had felt back on the Eyrie. Most people assumed the Kin were blessed with good fortune, as they counted among the most prestigious races. After all, their connection with their respective Dragons surely earned them more favor and power than they could possibly know what to do with! Instead, they were forced into a lifetime of slavery, reacting to their Dragons’ every whims, fulfilling all of their wishes and doing their dirty work.

No, being a Kin was to be born into servitude with chains invisible and intangible for all but the ones who bear them. If anything, his own circumstances should have made him more sympathetic to Mavehn’s predicament, yet here he was, echoing the very same rot others had spewed over the years, while thinking himself so much wiser than the woman sitting before him. He suddenly knew what he wanted to do.

Mavehn sighed, “I take it from your silence that the proposition isn’t very appealing to you, so I think we should not waste time. Enti, would you please escort-”

“Wait- I’ll join you.”

Mavehn studied him for a moment then nodded, “Wonderful. We will find a more reasonable accommodation for you. Igrim will help you settle in. We can talk more tomorrow, about what”

As if on cue, Igrim strode out of the room at the back and wordlessly fetched Urekin. Seeing how Mavehn had decided the conversation was concluded and there was nothing else left to be said, for now, Urekin got up just as wordlessly and began following the alf. As he looked back, he could see Lanri quietly arguing with Mavehn.

They made their way back to the elevator and took it back up to the second floor, where his previous room had been, but instead of heading that way, Igrim took him down a different corridor. This one seemed to be still under construction, as there were more empty rooms and less decorations than the previous one, but the door they stopped at had a solid door with an empty nametag.

“This one will be yours,” Igrim said as he took out a tablet and checked something off, after which the nametag updated itself and glowed with Urekin’s name on it. “Well go on in, and we’ll have you settled in.”

Urekin opened the door, and went inside a small but spacious room. It had a standard furniture set of a retractable wall-bed, a desk with two monitors and a Calibrok screen on the far wall, and a door near the entrance most likely led to the lavatory. All in all, it was well designed, but very much blank, waiting to be lived in.

Igrim walked up to the Calibrok screen and synced it with his tablet, then together they introduced Urekin’s anima to the system. Once that was done, he went through to check the storage compartments, taking notes and muttering to himself before turning back to Urekin.

“The place is now yours along with an elevator clearance, although before you do anything or go anywhere, I advise you to read the regulations. They’re standard fare, but there are some important sections, and you’ll be expected to adhere to them at all times.”

Igrim paused just for a moment as he ticked something else off on his tablet, before he said, “The showers you’ve seen already, and food’s cooked up on the first floor. Since shifts differ drastically, there’s something to munch on at all times. Any questions?”

“Nothing at the moment.”

“In that case, should anything arise, the chat’s always available to anyone who’s not out on patrol, just ask it there. Now if you’ll excuse me,” said Igrim and hurried off somewhere else, following his busy schedule.

Urekin spent the rest of the day by settling into his new room. First, he spent at least an hour just browsing through the Calibrok screen for a room configuration he liked, which--while wasn’t an actual window--did a fairly good job at imitating the sight and feel of the sunny pastures of the Eyrie, and even the scent of fresh air.

Next, he accessed the servers and the channels and spent a bit of time getting to know the people, and trying to piece information out of the bits and pieces which could be gleaned from the comments. There was a surprisingly large amount of posts which did not seem to contribute to any discussion, or at least none that Urekin could see, and the general atmosphere seemed very carefree, which seemed completely different than what Urekin had seen so far regarding the operation.

Still, from the discussions and jokes that Urekin had read, the plan really seemed to be building a club in the middle of a Warren, which would eventually have a secured airtunnel built as well, to move traffic in and out. Another thing he understood, from the chat alone, is that everyone was completely onboard with the idea, and while there were a few grumblings here and there about how things should be run, the two women at the top of the pyramid seemed to be well loved and respected.

There was also talk of runs to town, but they seemed to be performed at scheduled intervals, with their own announcements about reserving a place in the queue, along with a reminder before the event. On the matter of how these runs happened, there was no mention.

At one point, while Urekin was reading a channel dedicated to local news and gossip, a warning flashed on his monitor, and most of the chats seemed to have been abandoned, even in mid sentence. There were still some people active on the channels, but the conversation shifted entirely to the raid at hand. Urekin could hear the gunshots and shouting from outside, as someone reported the events happening outside.

Urekin could feel the tension just from the way people changed to more serious tones, but there wasn’t any panic. From this, he could gather that this wasn’t an entirely uncommon scenario, and that even with all the preparations and countermeasures that were taken, there still seemed to be trouble at the doorsteps. This once again made him question the wisdom of the whole operation.

The fighting lasted a while longer, as tenseness grew in the chat, but the sounds seemed to be fading away into deeper parts of the Warren.

After things have calmed down and the danger seemed to be over, the clock ran well past midnight, and Urekin decided to get some sleep, dreaming of warped bodies, dismembered limbs, and a large wing, beating rhythmically like a heart.