Blood Shaper

Kay leaned against the railing near the front of the ship, his arms folded on top of the rail and his chin on his arms, staring out at the gorgeous sunset. The sea and the sky were both dyed a dazzling array of colors, including reds, oranges, and purples, that turned the entire scene into something out of a world famous painting. Kay yearned for a camera to capture a portion of this moment forever. He quietly debated with himself if it was worth it to try and find a high tier Painter of some kind in the Isles to bring back with him on the return trip. It wouldn’t be this sunset, but there would be other glorious scenes like this one and he wanted to have a painting of one of them. Surely a high tier painting Class would have Skills to speed up how fast someone could finish a painting. The extreme distance to the horizon was still a little nerve wracking, but it meant that the sunrise and sunset lasted much longer.

Eleniah slipped past the semi circle of guards a few feet behind Kay and leaned next to him turned the other direction, with her elbows against the rail. She tilted her head back and let her short hair twist in the salty breeze.

Kay glanced at her from the corner of his eye without getting up. “Not going to watch the sunset?”

“I’ve seen a lot of them at this point, so I won’t feel left out if I don’t look at this particular one. And I’ve got an hour or so to turn around if I feel like it.”

He quietly grunted in reply and kept watching the colors stretch and blend into each other as the sun gradually sunk lower and lower. They sat there quietly for some time, just enjoying the moment and each other’s company without saying anything. The light slowly dwindled and shadows stretched out, cast from the receding rays of the sun as it continued it’s regular journey.

“We’re getting close.” Eleniah said into the quiet air. “Only a week or so left until we arrive.”

Kay turned his head to look at her, but she was still staring up into the dimming sky so her turned back to stare forward as he replied, “You’d know better than I would, but that sounds right. You think Carlile is already there?”

“No, his ship is faster than ours, but not that fast. Tomorrow or the day after is the earliest he could pull in. Then everyone will be scrambling to get ready to receive us.” She let out an exasperated breath, “If Alahna didn’t assume we’d accept and already has everything prepared.”

“… How’re you feeling about seeing her again?”

Eleniah kept staring up, and it was some time before she finally answered. “My life didn’t end up being anything like I thought it would when I was young?”

“Are we competing?” Asked the man from another world with a laugh in his voice.

She gave one silent laugh, the exhale of mild amusement, “No, we aren’t. I was a teacher,” She continued, letting the attempt at levity pass, “All I wanted to be was a teacher, and when I finally got to the tier three Teacher Class I was so happy.”

“You still are a teacher.”

“I am,” She acknowledged, “I didn’t lose that. But I’m a lot more and a lot different than I ever planned on being. All I wanted was to teach. I wasn’t interested in fighting or adventuring or sailing around exploring the other isles. I loved my little classroom and I loved my students from the families of our clan and I was happy. And then my younger cousin turns out to be an absolute genius, ends up heir to the leader of our clan, and begs me to go adventuring with her because I’m her favorite teacher.”

“Could you have said no?”

“Not… realistically. I don’t think I’ve really talked about how our clan is organized but I’m from one of the main families, but not the head family. The head families and the main family are all directly descended from our founding ancestor, but the head family has the most power. Everyone who’s not part of the main or head families is from a branch family or a vassal family. My family is the weakest of the main families, which puts us in an interesting space politically. I could have told Alahna that I wouldn’t go with her but she’s from the head family and it had been declared that she was going to be the next leader of the clan. Turning her down would have been a bad move.”

“So even though you didn’t to fight, adventure, and explore, you ended up doing all that anyways.”

“I did, and I found out that I loved it, and I’m good at it, which I never would have discovered if she hadn’t begged me to go with her. We fought monsters, completed jobs for people that needed help or just wanted someone else to do the work, finished Quests that took us all over the Isles, and saw all kinds of wondrous sights and took part in exciting and interesting experiences. We got celebrated as a heroic band that saved people and solved problems.” She let out a long sigh, “Next thing I know Alahna is using that fame and prestige to annex nearby islands for our clan. She suddenly morphed from the future leader of the Selthoran Clan to a celebrated heroic figure who’s destiny it was to unite all the Isles into one nation under her rule.”

“That’s… a dramatic change.”

“Yeah. I went from a teacher along for the ride to make sure my little cousin learns what she needs to while she’s out gallivanting around as an adventurer, to a part of the band kicking ass, taking names, and seeing what there is to see, to the queen’s cousin. A potential ear to bend to get your name known to the queen! And a pawn in her schemes.” She spun around and mimicked Kay’s pose. “It wasn’t my favorite transition in life.”

“Then you got tired of living like that, left and went back to being a wandering adventurer, headed east until you ended up in Tumbling Rapids, decided to listen to your cousin’s request, met me, and now you’re one of if not the ranking member of my court in the nation I founded mostly because you encouraged me to.”

She rolled her eyes and chuckled. “The strongest person ending up in charge is the way of the world. The only thing that surprised me about her expanding the clan’s power and then turning that into something even grander was how fast she went about getting it all done. She unified a bunch of squabbling clans and petty kings with single islands under their control through both diplomacy and conquest into one nation in just under twenty years. I didn’t mind any of that. I wasn’t swept up in the almost worshipful devotion that followed her around and turned her into a paragon of virtue in some people’s eyes, I helped change her diaper as a baby, but I love her and I supported her the whole way. The part I hated and had to get away from was that I slowly drifted from being a trusted member of her team to a tool she wielded with little to no regard for me. She manipulated and lied to me, for minor gains.” She turned her head so her ear was against her arm and stared at Kay. “That’s where you’re different, even though there are similarities. You won’t lie to me.”

“Um…” Immediately off the top of his head he could think of three hypothetical situations in which he would lie to her.

She laughed quietly and reached out with one hand to begin lightly playing with Kay’s hair. “How about, you won’t lie to me unless absolutely necessary for the best interest of Avalon and it’s citizens.”

“That I can promise.”

“Alahna didn’t do that.” She continued playing with his hair, “She lied to me because it was convenient, to make things mildly easier for her schemes. You know how many lies she told me that were actually necessary to make sure her plans succeeded? One. Out of dozens she needed to lie to me one time, and she didn’t even actually need to. Her plan would have been just as successful if she told me, ‘I can’t tell you’. That’s all that would have been needed. ‘I need you to do this thing and I can’t tell you why right now.’” She tossed the hand on Kay’s head into the air and gently set it back down in the same spot. “Easy. I would have done it too, because I love her and she was my queen.” She sighed quietly and turned to push herself away from the railing. “To answer the question, I don’t know how I’m feeling about it. I love her, I’ve missed her, and I also want to punch her more than a few times.”

“Family can be complicated,” Kay said, moving next to her. “But I’ve got your back. I’ll hold her down so you can get some licks in.”

She gave him a small smile. “I know you do. And I might take you up on that, we’ll see how I feel on a day to day basis.” She looked toward the stairs and started walking. “Come on, let’s grab some dinner before we miss out on the good bits.”

“Is it weird that I’m hoping another ridgehead comes at us? That was delicious.”

“It’s not weird, the only sailors who don’t hope that are the ones on ships not ready to deal with ridgeheads.”

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A spindly looking elven man with bronze hair stared down into the royal port from his manor on the island of Sel. A ship flying the flag of the royal family had pulled into the port hours ago and unloading continued into the night as boxes and crates were pulled off one after another. Prince Carlile had debarked many hours before and headed to the royal palace to meet with his mother.

There was a knock on the door to the man’s study. “Enter.” He called out without looking away from the ship.

“My lord, I’ve heard back from our agent that went with Prince Carlile. The foreign king agreed with the queen’s request. His ship will arrive in a week or two at most.”

“And her cousin?”

“Eleniah Selthoran is confirmed to be one of the king’s advisers and will be arriving with him.”

“Dammit!” The lord slammed his fist into the windowsill. “How can she know? We’ve been so dammed careful!”

“She might not know anything my lord, no one knows what supposed problem she called him to help with.”

“What else could it be? We’re just around the corner from the date we chose and now she’s suddenly calling for help from some king of a backwood country no one has heard of before this? And her favorite cousin, the dammed Indomitable Fist herself just happens to be with him? What else is there?”

“I… don’t know, my lord.”

“Check with everyone. Make sure nothing leaks. We can’t afford for anything to go wrong at this juncture. The… event a few months ago has finally put us in position to realize our plans after so long.” The lord whirled about to stare at the other person, “We cannot fail. For how things should be.”

“For how things should be,” The other person replied while bowing. “I’ll see to it at once.”

“Good.” The lord paused, his eyes narrowing, “And triple check our native,” He spat, the word almost a curse, “agents. They’re the most likely to let anything slip. If any of them have… take care of it.”

“Of course, my lord.”

The lord turned to stare pensively down at the ship, ignoring the sound of the door closing. “For the way things should be.” He whispered fiercely to himself, “How they must be.”