Chapter Forty Two

Shuka’s feelings of triumph at her successful heist didn’t last long. Mostly, they were replaced by the guilt of successfully heisting someone. Robbing people was not something she wanted to do, but she figured if she didn’t then Melia would instead. That thought didn’t help nearly as much as she hoped it would. Still, Melia was far too impatient to wait for Shuka to grapple with boring things like morals.

“Come ooooon, let’s go already. You stole what, half a crate of wood? He’ll be fine.”

“Yeah probably, but he’s still not going to be happy when he finds out.”

“Whatever, who cares? Just tell me about this plan you have for the talisman already.”

“Only if you promise me not to steal the ingredients.”

It was Shuka’s one request and she had been fighting for it for the last ten minutes. Melia really didn’t like being told what to do though; how Asheli got her to do anything was a wonder.

“Fine, but if you don’t have enough money to buy what you want then I am stealing some coins.”

“…I guess that’s as good as I’m going to get, isn’t it?”

“Yes it is. Now just tell me what your plan is already!”

“Alright fine, so you told me that the talisman needed to have some symbolism right? Well, I thought what if the arrow represented the curse? Or at least the witch.”

“Yeah, so you got witchwood because it’s witchy right? What about the feathers and the pointy bit.”

“…They are called the fletching and arrowhead. I was going to see if I could find some crow or raven feathers for the fletching since that was what the witch’s familiar was, but I am still figuring out what to do about the arrowhead.”

Melia looked at Shuka like she was dumb, and then pointed at the amulet of Vondoom that hung around her neck.

“Just use that. You grew up in a Vondoom orphanage, right? The necklace should work to symbolize home then, and home is normal, which is what you want. And it’s just a big metal V so it should work just fine as an arrowhead.”

“Is that… fine? I mean the shaft and fletching both represent the curse, wouldn’t it mess it up if just the arrowhead represents home?”

“Hmm… nope, I don’t think so.”

That’s a worrying answer, but I don’t really have anything else to use as an arrowhead. And besides, Maryam said the Vondoom Orphanage can be used as a sanctuary and Melia would have to show me where the one in Sidus is so I can get more amulets. Wait, would using a holy symbol like this be considered heresy? Ehh, from everything I’ve heard about him, Vondoom probably won’t mind.

“Alright, I’ll use the amulet then. I’m going to need more though, can you bring me to the orphanage? I’ve never been to Sidus before so I don’t know where it is here.”

“Yeah sure, and I’ll get Scurry to get us some feathers while we’re doing that.”

As she said that, Melia removed her hat from her head, and out crawled Scurry.

“Hey buddy, wanna hunt a bird for us? Go find a crow or raven and bring us the corpse. We need the feathers though, so don’t eat those. Everything else is fine though.”

Scurry nodded his head a few times, then ran off.

“Uh, I don’t mean to doubt your familiar, but raccoons don’t really hunt birds. How is he supposed to catch a crow?”

“He’ll figure it out, don’t worry. Now, to the orphanage!”

*

The Vondoom Orphanage was a familiar sight to Shuka, even if it wasn’t the exact same building she’d grown up in. Compared to the one in Rainsburg, the Sidus orphanage was much larger, and incorporated a lot more stone in its design than the almost entirely wooden building she knew. Even with the increase in size and addition of stonework, the orphanage still managed to feel homey. It was a welcome sight. Walking through the door Shuka found the interior to have a pretty similar layout to what she was used to. A front desk sat right in the center of the reception area, with chairs and toys strewn about for the orphans to play with. There was a small altar to Vondoom off to the side where worshippers could pray without having to go through the entire orphanage. Technically there was another altar in the room, in the form of the secretary manning the front desk. Not Margaret, a golem said to be crafted by Margaret the Demi-God of Secretaries. Apparently Margaret didn’t like answering prayers so she told all of her followers to send their prayers to her golems instead, and only the most important ones got to the demi-god herself. Or at least that was what Shuka had heard, but in all her years of living in the orphanage she never saw it happen. Then again, she didn’t know if Rainsburg even had a follower of Margaret in it, so it wasn’t that surprising. Speaking of Not Margaret, she looked slightly different from what Shuka remembered as well. While both golems were shaped mostly the same, a stern-looking human woman with their hair in a bun, the one in Sidus looked a fair bit fancier. They were both beautiful mind you, but the Rainsburg Not Margaret was made entirely out of a dark brown wood that gave it a very rustic look. This Not Margaret, on the other hand, was covered in white ceramic plates that acted as its skin, and had gold filigree along the edges of some of the plates. Rather than being ostentatious though, it was more subtly elegant. Gold filigree or not, a Not Margaret was a Not Margaret and that wasn’t intimidating to a girl who’d lived eighteen years of her life with one, so Shuka walked right up to the golem and showed it her amulet of Vondoom.

“Hi, my name’s Shuka, I’m a child of Vondoom. I was wondering if I could get some extra amulets; do you have any spares you could give me?”

“Clarification on the purpose of this request is required.”

Not Margaret's voices was monotone and sounded artificial. When she spoke her mouth didn’t move either, in fact not a single part of her face moved, save the eyes. Their entire face was actually a single ceramic plate that had just been moulded into the shape of a face without any of the articulation the real deal had. Most people found it unnerving, but Shuka was used to it.

Hmm, what should I tell her? The truth probably, that tends to work the best on golems. Or at least on Not Margaret. She doesn’t care about most things and only really intervened if someone was doing something dangerous or harmful.

“I want to use them as ingredients for some talismans I am making. The talismans are to help with a curse I have.”

“Understood, request accepted. How many amulets of Vondoom do you require?”

“Seven please.”

I managed to grab eight blocks of witchwood from the wand shop, but one block is going to Asheli for the heist tax, so I only have enough wood for seven amulets. I hope that’s enough.

Not Margaret then promptly opened one of the many drawers on her desk and pulled out seven amulets of Vondoom before handing them all to Shuka.

“Shuka Vondoom, please be aware that the Grand Paladin Validus is currently in Sidus and is searching for you. Your current illusion may not be sufficient to hide your identity from him. I recommend utilizing a higher quality illusion spell and an avoidance of the temple district.”

“Oh, um… thanks?”

Shuka wasn’t expecting Not Margaret to comment on her situation with Validus and expected her to give advice on how to avoid the law even less.

I didn’t think she would know I’m wanted. How would she even learn? I’ve never seen a Not Margaret leave their orphanage before. Should I have been more careful with my identity? No, if they are warning me about Validus I don’t think they are going to tell him about me.

With the conversation seemingly complete, Not Margaret looked away from Shuka and began to stare straight ahead with no regard for anything around her. Shuka was used to this too, so she went back to where Melia was waiting for her at the entrance. The witch, for her part, looked incredibly confused.

“You just asked her for the amulets? You didn’t even lie about why you needed them; what the hell?”

“Why would I lie?”

“I mean, do you really think the truth is the best story you could have gone with?”

“Yes? I don’t see a problem with it; as long as they believe me, the truth works just fine.”

Shuka’s answer didn’t seem to make much sense to Melia, but she let it go.

“Well whatever, you got the amulets so I guess we’re good. Let’s go.”

The two ladies walked out of the orphanage and immediately encountered a ragged and bloody raccoon sitting in the street with a dead crow held proudly in its mouth.

“Scurry! You got the bird I asked for, good boy. Now we’re only missing one ingredient.”

“We are? What else do we need?”

“Mana crystals. The witchwood’s pretty magic, but everything else ain't, so the talisman might have a bit of trouble storing all the mana it needs to stay magical by itself.”

What Melia was saying made sense to Shuka. She knew that the more magical an object was the more mana it produced, and therefore the bigger the enchantment it could sustain. What worried her though, was what the last part was.

Mana crystals are some of the most efficient storers of mana there is, where are we going to find enough for the talismans? I doubt either of us could afford even one of the size we need.

“You’re not going to steal them, are you? I already told you I don’t want you stealing anything for these talismans.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know little Miss Goody Two-Shoes. We’re going dumpster diving for them.”

…what?

*

To Shuka’s surprise, they really were dumpster diving for mana crystals. According to Melia there was a merchant who sold intentionally faulty magic items that leaked mana to gullible nobles, and didn’t tell them the mana stones could be recharged when they ran out of mana. After the nobles threw away their ‘broken’ items they would go back to him to buy a replacement, while he simply scavenged the discarded mana stones and recharged them. If you were lucky though, you could find them first and take them for yourself. Which is why Shuka was now scrounging through the filthiest place in the richest part of Sidus. All things considered, it wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but it still wasn’t great. Melia was having the time of her life, opening up bags of garbage and digging through their contents with a big smile on her face. She would occasionally find something shiny, like a broken hand mirror, and let out a squeal of excitement before putting it into one of her many pockets. Even food wasn’t exempt from her scavenging, as she found a half-eaten sandwich that she happily took a bite out of before also storing it in her robes.

…That can’t be healthy.

Shuka, despite her best efforts, wasn’t finding anything of worth in the trash, least of all mana stones. She was on the verge of giving up, they were running out of garbage bags to rummage through anyway, when she saw a blue glint hidden in the trash. Shuka reached for it and pulled out a round metal device with three polished blue stones set an equal distance from each other around the perimeter of the device.

“Melia, I found something! Is this it?”

The little witch turned to look at what Shuka was holding, and when she saw it her eyes lit up with delight.

“Hey, you found one! Yup, that’s what we are looking for. Man we got lucky, sometimes it takes months for me to score like this.”

“Really? Well it’s good that we found one so quickly, but it looks like there are only three mana stones, how long is it going to take to find enough for all the talismans?”

“Oh, don’t worry about that. We’ll just crush the stones into powder and spread a bit onto each talisman. The witchwood’s already doing most of the work for mana capacity, so we only really need a bit of powder for each one.”

“So are we done here then?”

“Yup.”

Shuka was glad to get out of the literal dump she was in, and doubly glad that she was so close to getting her curse under control. She put the magical device away and went to leave the garbage area, when she noticed someone new standing in the exit. The nobles didn’t want to have to look at their garbage, so their dumping area was closed off with a wall. That wall had a door, and it was the only exit from the closed off dump. Currently standing in that doorway was an older, white-haired servant, holding a garbage bag. Shuka and the servant locked eyes for only a moment before the older man turned and began yelling into the streets.

“VAGRANTS! VAGRANTS IN THE DUMP! HELP! HELP!”

Melia moved instantly, leaping for the exit from the crouched position she was in like some kind of animal. She landed on the servant, pushing him onto the ground and out of the way.

“Let’s go curse girl, we gotta scram!”

Shuka didn’t need to be told twice, following quickly behind Melia. She did spare a glance at the servant on the ground though, to see if Melia had hurt him. Luckily, old though he may look, he didn’t seem to be injured by the fall. There wasn’t a lot of time to worry about his health though, as his shouts had attracted the guards, and they were not looking friendly. They weren’t wielding any lethal weapons, just clubs and manacles, but for Shuka, they might as well have been swords and spears.

I still have my illusion up, so they shouldn’t recognize me as Shuka, but I’m running out of mana so if they catch me the illusion will probably drop before they let me go. Once they know who I am, they won’t let me go with a fine and a warning.

Melia was leading, and two guards were approaching from the front, looking ready to tackle her. Before they could though, the witch reached into one of her many pockets, took out a handful of sand and threw it into their eyes. That would have been bad enough on its own, but Melia must have enchanted the sand somehow, because as soon as it left her hand it started to shine and glitter with light. It was very bright and irritating, doubly so for the people who just got it in their eyes.

“AHH, FUCK! MY EYES!”

One of the guards managed to shield his eyes in time, although the small lightshow was still preventing him from seeing properly, but the other guard got a direct hit of sand in his eyes. It did not look pleasant. Shuka didn’t have time to feel pity for him though, she was still running for her life. Luckily, she managed to get past them before they could see properly, but the guard who still had functioning eyes was hot on her heels. She ran through the street chasing after Melia and going past carriages who had, thankfully, stopped in the commotion. She was managing to stay ahead of the guard behind her, but just barely, and more were showing up.

Melia can probably deal with some of those, but how many? And how far is it still to the Thieves Guild? Getting chased the whole way there isn’t going to work, we need a plan.

“Melia! Can you slow down a bit, we need to talk.”

“Not a great time for it you know!” She shot back a bit annoyed. “But fine, what is it?”

The, surprisingly fast witch slowed down just enough for Shuka to catch up.

“We need a plan Melia; running the whole way isn’t going to work.”

“No shit.”

“Right, can you do anything to get them off our tails?”

“Sure can, but not with people watching me do it.”

Shuka looked around for hiding spots, but there weren’t many options. Not with how many people were about at least. But she did see one spot, it was an alleyway, up ahead in the next block. She couldn’t see very clearly, but it looked like it might lead behind some buildings and out of the view of the street. The only problem was there was a guard standing at the entrance. He wasn’t giving chase, just staying where he was and denying them a place to hide. It wasn’t ideal, but it was the best they had, and with the rest of the guards in the district quickly closing in, she didn’t have the time to hesitate.

“If we can get past that guard we can hide in the alleyways.”

“Sure, but we’re going to have to deal with the guy on your tail too. Can you take him out?”

“Take him out?”

“Don’t kill him, jeez. Just make sure he can’t follow us, stab him in the leg or something. We’ll get in big trouble if we kill anyone.”

“I wasn’t planning on killing him. And… yes, I think I can deal with him.”

“Great, cause we are out of time.”

As she spoke, Melia suddenly swerved, turning towards the alley Shuka had pointed out. At the same time, Shuka stopped, and turned on her heel to face the guardsman who was chasing her, and drew her sword.

My bow’s useless at this range, and I won’t be able to keep my disguise up if I use any other magic. The sword is my only option right now. It’s time for my lessons with Xorvos to pay off.

The guardsman didn’t slow, but when Shuka drew her sword, she saw a look of fear in his eyes. Still, he raised his club, and… hesitated. Shuka didn’t. She slashed at the hand holding the weapon and cut his wrist badly enough to cause him to drop the club. Not wanting to waste the opportunity, she then decided to take Melia’s advice and stabbed her sword into his thigh. It didn’t go in very deep as it was a pretty clumsy stab, but it did pierce flesh, and that was enough for Shuka. Not that she had enough time for anything else anyway. Turning back towards the alley, she found its lone guardsman on the ground and clutching his nether regions.

My guy got off lucky, Melia is mean.

Heading into the alley, Shuka found that it was indeed not a dead end. She went around a corner and Melia was already doing something with what looked like a small doll. Once she saw Shuka had arrived, she turned and produced a second doll out of her robes. Before Shuka could ask what it was or what she was doing, Melia yanked a strand of hair from Shuka’s head.

“Ow, what was that for?”

“Your dummy, you dummy.”

The witch took Shuka’s hair and somehow attached it to the second doll. Now that she looked, Shuka saw that the first doll had what looked like a bit of Melia’s hair on it already. With both dolls done, Melia threw them to the ground, only for two fully-sized people to land. Two specific people - Melia and Shuka. Shuka’s duplicate even looked like her blonde-haired disguise. Melia wasted no time in giving them orders.

“Hey, you two. Go lure all of the guards somewhere away from the Thieves Guild.”

Both of the newly formed humans nodded, then started to run out of the alley.

“And now we hide. Got any plans for that?”

“Huh? Me? Uhh, over there. I can put an illusion over that alcove.”

Shuka wasn’t expecting to be put on the spot to find somewhere to hide, but she could already hear the stomping of boots approaching so she didn’t waste any time with complaints. The two of them scurried over to a small alcove set in the wall of some fancy house and squeezed in together. It was a tight fit, but neither of them were particularly large, so they managed it. Now all that was left was the illusion.

I can only keep one spell up at once, so my disguise is going to drop from this. It shouldn’t be a problem, as long as they don’t find us. But if they do… no, it’s all over if they catch me, regardless of whether my disguise is up or not. If I do nothing, I die, so this is at least better than that.

The disguise fell away as Shuka started to craft a new spell. One that would, hopefully, keep her safe. The guards were getting closer and she was running out of both time and mana, but she couldn’t get distracted so she just kept working. Then, just as the guardsmen rounded the corner, her spell finished, and an illusionary wall appeared over the alcove. The stomping got louder, and Shuka was worried they would stop and investigate, but instead, she heard a shout and more running.

“There they are! After them!”

They must have spotted the dolls of us that Melia made.

They waited for the heavy footfalls to fade away in the distance, and then they waited a bit longer, before Melia finally poked her head out of the illusion.

“It’s clear.”

Shuka breathed a sigh of relief and ended her spell. The alleyway was empty and now all there was left to do was sneak back into the Thieves Guild, although Shuka suspected that she might need a new disguise for that.

*

Half an hour of skulking and two hours of fletching later, the talismans were finally done. Seven, rather stubby, arrows fletched with crow feathers and tipped with the silver V of Vondoom. Blue lines of mana were inscribed around the shaft of each, courtesy of three crushed mana stones. Truthfully, they looked more like crossbow bolts than arrows with how short they were, but that was fine. She only had so much wood and it was close enough anyway. Now all that was left was to enchant them. Melia was preparing the spell, and Shuka was sipping from a mana potion, making sure she would have enough mana to power all seven of them. After a moment of concentration, Melia opened her eyes and gathered all of the arrows into one pile before turning to Shuka to tell her what to do.

“Alright, I’ve placed a spell circle above the talismans, now all you gotta do is pump some mana through it and it should be sucked into the mana stone dust. Probably. Oh right, I also need to make your mana emotionally resonant, give me your hand.”

Shuka did so, putting one hand in Melia’s and the other hovering above the pile of arrows.

“Alright, you can start now. Just think about home and being normal, and all of the symbolism stuff you talked about before.”

Shuka closed her eyes and thought. It wasn’t easy staying focused on the right thoughts for the spell, especially with all of the complex emotions she was feeling. Was excitement a good emotion for the spell? What about fear? She was certainly worried it wouldn’t work, and that worry only made her worry more.

No, I can’t think about that. Just think about home, about people looking at me with smiles instead of glares.

She saw it now. Home. An isolated cabin in Rainsburg, where the only times people bothered her was with good intentions. A place without the curse. That curse had been shot and killed, a stubby little arrow did the deed and now she was free. Her worries melted away as a resolute desire for that future filled her.

I will be normal! I will be Shuka the hunter, not Shuka the demon-summoning witch. Not important enough to catch the Grand Paladin’s attention, and definitely not important enough to get involved in an archmage’s schemes. Just me, a hunter and nothing more.

Mana was flowing out of her now, transforming her will into magic. That blue energy inside of her felt eager now, eager in a way she had never felt be before. She’d aways had to tell it where to go and what to do, but now? Now it wanted to help her. The mana flowed forth, directed by Melia’s spell and attracted to the mana dust in the talismans. Slowly but surely, it filled each and every arrow in the pile until they all glowed with magic. Shuka opened her eyes, and it was done. Melia wasted no time in picking one up and tying it to a cord to wear around her neck.

“Alright, time to test these out, say something stupid curse girl.”

“Why does it have to be something stupid? Wouldn’t the test work regardless of what I say?”

Melia stared at Shuka, slightly perplexed.

“Huh. You said something and it wasn’t super annoying. Looks like they work.”

Shuka looked back at the rest of the talismans, and realized just what that meant. She had done it, she had beaten the curse.

“I gotta get these to Xorvos and Maryam.”

“Yeah, Asheli too.”

Shuka wasn’t even listening to that, she just wanted to find her friends. She left the room and went searching for her tall friend. It wasn’t hard to find him, seeing as he was seven feet tall and was the only guy in the room with gray skin. He was sitting at a table nursing some bruises, but looking quite happy. Shuka didn’t know how he got the bruises, but she would ask later. Right now, there was only one thing on her mind; seeing her friend genuinely smile at her.

“Xorvos, the talismans are done. Here’s yours.”

He looked up at her, and Shuka couldn’t help but note the slightly hurt look in his eyes.

“When did you get back? How long have you been in the guild for?”

“Melia dragged me off to her room to work on the talismans as soon as we got back, I didn't get a chance to see you. But they’re done now, so take yours.”

Xorvos still looked a bit annoyed, but he did take his talisman, holding the small arrow in one large gauntleted fist.

“So… now what? Do I need to do something to activate it?”

“Uhh, Melia didn’t seem to do anything special to make hers work, but I can’t even tell when she casts magic half the time, so I might have just missed it.”

“She got a talisman before I did? I thought I would be first.”

Shuka’s heart sank. It didn’t work. Was it because he was a quanso? Did he need to know how to use magic for it to take effect? She didn’t know. Before she could ponder this any more Maryam walked up to them.

“What’s going on?”

“I got the talismans finished but they don’t seem to be working well. It worked on Melia but Xorvos…”

But, wait a second. Why was Xorvos smiling? Grinning in fact, like he was just messing around with his best friend, teasing them with mock outrage. Then… Shuka was smiling too. Xorvos stepped towards her.

“It worked! Quick, give one to Maryam then come here, you big doofus.”

Shuka went in for a hug, one that was eagerly returned. Then Maryam was hugging them both. Shuka didn’t care that she was still in the common room of the Thieves Guild, her friends could really see her again. Everything was right once more.