Legacies of Blood

It was getting late in the year, but the days remained long and hot. As the sun rose over the horizon, bathing the mountaintop and castle Willowridge in golden light, the temperature inside the tent where Elaina Woodlock slept swiftly rose. It wasn’t her tent, but she had been sleeping in it with the owner, the beautiful blonde who slept soundly next to her as her eyes came open.

Elaina didn’t move for a time, content to watch the blonde sleep before waking for her daily duties in camp. The young vishanti woman was a witch but served as the chief medic to the delve working to reclaim Willowridge from the blight left behind by its former occupants. Elaina had arrived on a separate errand with a similar purpose and joined their effort. It had been difficult and had culminated in the fiery destruction of the bridge and Elaina nearly falling to her death. Her duel with the captain of the Orbonne mercenary company had not gone well, but it was his traitorous second in command that had nearly sent her on to the great beyond.

“What’s on your mind, beautiful?” Royce asked, pulling Elaina from her thoughts and back into the present. “You’re not brooding again, are you?”

“No,” Elaina scoffed, shaking her head. “I was admiring you, of course.”

Royce arched a thin brow as she pulled the sheet back from her body in a dramatic gesture, revealing her pale, perky breasts beneath. “Well, let me give you something worth admiring then, hm?”

Elaina’s hand moved with a mind of its own, springing to the woman’s abdomen eagerly to let her fingers dance across the petal-soft skin of her breasts. “That’s more of a hands-on activity, I’d say.”

“Mmm, true,” Royce agreed, pursing her lips to keep herself from smirking. “But you’re not quite healed enough for anything too vigorous.”

The redhead feigned a scandalized look. “That wasn’t the tune you were singing last night.”

“Yeah, well,” Royce turned, rolling from the bed with a little laugh before sauntering nude across the tent. “Riding your face is one thing, but if I let you feel me up now, I’m likely to need a lot more than that. Remember what happened last time?”

“Eh, yeah,” Elaina admitted as she admired the view of the blonde’s backside as she fetched herself a drink from the table. The tent was much larger than it seemed from the outside. The witch had altered the interior space magically, creating a much more generous living space even before Elaina had started joining her regularly at night. Unfortunately, despite being the size of a small cottage, the tent wasn’t insulated like one. The fireplace kept them warm if the nights got too cool, but it was a different thing altogether when it got hot out.

Sitting up, Elaina was reminded of exactly what happened the last time. Elaina had broken several bones in the last fight with the mercenary captain, her ribs among them. Even with Royce’s healing magic, they had been slow to heal, and a vigorous sexual encounter had undone some of the progress. Her hand went to the bandages wrapped around her torso, “You said they should be healed by now, right? Just a little pain and tightness?”

The blonde nodded, setting the goblet she’d been drinking from on the table. “Yeah, I suppose that’s true. But I need to be going soon, anyway. My shift starts soon.”

“Already?” Elaina frowned, propping herself up with a few pillows as the witch busied herself around the tent to wash up in the basin and find some clothes. “How many people do you still have there? The castle should be mostly cleared by now.”

“Mostly,” Royce agreed, staring at herself in the mirror as she brushed out her short blonde hair. It was an unusual color among her people, not that Elaina would have known that without being told during a short round of pillow talk with the woman. “But Ryan keeps finding pockets of nasty things skulking around the castle. This last one was some kind of nest of demonic little shits with fangs. Jaw strength was enough to tear flesh from bone. We lost two men.”

“Shit,” Elaina gasped, springing from the bed despite the pain from her ribs. “Why didn’t you tell me about that? I need to get back out there already.”

Royce turned to glare at her with an accusatory jab of her finger in Elaina’s direction. “I didn’t tell you because I knew you’d react like that. The landgraf hasn’t signed off on you rejoining the delve yet.”

“She will,” Elaina muttered irritably. “I’m ready. I know it.”

The witch’s eyes softened as she let out a long sigh. “I believe you. But until she clears you, I’m trying not to get you all riled up. Understand?”

Elaina gave her a grudging nod as she approached the table, pouring herself a goblet of water for herself. “I understand. But I’ve been in recovery for so long, I’m practically crawling out of my skin.”

“Now, why would you want to do a silly thing like ditch this skin?” Royce laughed as she approached the redhead, running her fingers down her chest between her exposed breasts. The caress served as a spicy reminder that besides her bandages, she too, was nude. Royce’s fingers idled on the amulet that hung from Elaina’s neck. “You probably don’t need this anymore, you know. Not with how much time you spend sleeping in my bed. The whole tent is warded.”

“I know,” Elaina replied, clasping the witch’s hand with both of her own. “But until I can give it back to him myself, I don’t want to let it out of my sight.”

Royce shook her head. “He still hasn’t come to see you?”

“He’s still bitter about us, I think,” Elaina laughed uneasily. “I’m sure he’ll get over it next time I talk to him.”

Ryan Resius, the occultist she had arrived with originally, had lent her the amulet to keep the minds of others from being pulled into her dreams while she slept. He also had a messy history with Royce and had taken issue with them seeing each other. The amulet wasn’t intended for what she was using it for, but it had worked perfectly. Elaina regretted that the last time they’d spoken, she had told him off about her and Royce’s relationship. She’d been a little harsh about it.

“I could give it to him for you,” Royce suggested, searching Elaina’s emerald-green eyes for something, but the redhead didn’t know what.

“It’s alright,” Elaina responded. “It can wait. I think it’ll mean more to him if I do it.”

“You’re probably right,” Royce agreed as she retrieved her hand and stepped back. “In that case, you should probably get dressed too and hunt down Lady Amberdeen so she can get you back in the thick of things. He spends most of his time in the castle scrubbing old wards and dispelling magical traps.”

“And the guards aren’t going to let me pass until she gives the word,” Elaina grumbled, glancing around for the clothes she’d discarded the night before. “Alright, do you happen to know if Herrog managed to fix my armor?”

“If he has, he hasn’t said anything to me,” Royce responded, the swell of her breasts jiggling as she wiggled and squeezed into her bodice. She took a moment to adjust it in the mirror before slipping into a pair of lacy black panties followed by a relatively drab pair of trousers that hugged her curves generously. It was a drastic departure from the slinky black dress with the plunging neckline and slits up the side she had first met her in.

Prying her eyes off the blonde, Elaina busied herself with gathering her clothes as quickly as she could.

“No, not those,” Royce said just as Elaina grabbed her panties from the tangle of blankets on the bed, not taking her eyes off of the mirror. “Take those teal ones on the trunk.”

Elaina’s brow furrowed as she glanced at the lacy panties set out neatly on the trunk. “Yours?”

“I haven’t worn them in a while,” Royce explained, pulling a coat on hastily. “Teal looks much better on you. So I altered them to give you a little room in the front.”

“Y-you did?” Elaina asked, surprised at the gesture as she looked down at the decidedly male appendage situated between her legs where one would only expect to find a female sex. Elaina was unusual in that she possessed both. Her family had considered it a curse born of their fae ancestry while she was growing up. She’d been thoroughly convinced of it herself until recently. Suffice it to say, she had never had a pair of undergarments tailored to her specific needs, either. “That’s pretty sweet of you, actually.”

“Well, don’t tell anybody,” Royce said with a smirk, adjusting her collar as she approached the redhead, leaning over to plant a small kiss on her cheek. “I have a reputation to uphold.”

Elaina felt a surge of heat in her face as she blushed. “Thank you. You didn’t have to do this for me.”

“I know,” Royce chuckled. “But you only have three pairs of clothing you’ve been carrying with you on the road. They’re nearly threadbare at this point.”

“Yeah,” Elaina laughed. “Alright. Get going before I pull you back into bed to express my appreciation.”

“Don’t threaten me with a good time,” Royce said with a wink. Knowing Elaina was right, the blonde took a step back and dragged herself out of the tent’s front flap. Elaina watched her go, a sweet little smirk fixed on her face for a few minutes after she was gone.

Elaina couldn’t resist the urge to check herself with the new pair of undies in the mirror, turning this way and that to admire the color against her fair skin. The alteration in the front, a small pouch for the extra bit of her there, fit her perfectly. The redhead had never been particularly confident in her body due to the repeated abuse and insults growing up, but something about how Royce treated her gave her a morale boost.

“Nice,” she whispered to herself in the mirror, catching herself grinning stupidly before going back to dressing herself. Her brief bout of vanity had ended as quickly as it had begun. Elaina hastily pulled the rest of her clothes on before stepping through the tent's front flap into the camp.

Initially, their camp had been situated on the hill outside the curtain wall, but after securing the cistern and purifying it, the landgraf had ordered the camp relocated to the inner bailey. It looked much different than the first time Elaina had seen it. It had been the middle of the night then, and the courtyard had been crawling with vrocks that had nested along the walls. By the time she and Resius were done with them, there hadn’t been much left. Now, the nests and the corpses had been cleared away, returning the courtyard and curtain walls to a semblance of their former selves. The sunlight helped, Elaina noted.

She approached the forge at a brisk walk, ignoring the little twinges of pain in her side. She noticed that the more she moved, the less it hurt, so perhaps she just needed to stretch more often to help her recover.

“I’m sorry, kid.” Herrog Hardcoat, the stout dwarven engineer for the delve, placed the mangled bits of her breastplate onto the counter. “There’s just not much I can do with this. My experience with Caledonian steel is pretty limited. Stone’s more my thing. Where did you get this thing, anyway? It’s practically a work of art.”

Elaina reached out to the breastplate, torn and crushed from the last battle it had seen, and ran her fingers gently across its surface. The redhead gazed fondly upon the crests etched into the metal, taking in every detail for what was most likely to be the last time. “It was a gift from my sister. She got it from our homeland.”

“Funny, you don’t sound Caledonian,” Herrog remarked before gesturing to the breastplate again. “It’s a damn shame. I’m really sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Elaina assured him. “You did everything you could.”

“It’s a decent forge we have here,” The dwarf explained, motioning vaguely toward the fire and anvil behind him with a strong, callused hand. “But I don’t have any apprentices, schematics, or molds. If I did, I’d just melt the whole thing down and go from scratch.”

Elaina nodded, brushing some ginger locks from her face as she did. “Maybe I can bring it to someone in town once we’re finished here.”

Herrog turned his gaze back to her, peering at her curiously from beneath his bushy caterpillar eyebrows. “Any word on whether they’ve cleared you?”

Elaina held her arms out, turning them over a few times to show that the wounds she’d suffered to them during the fight had fully healed. Though they had been the least severe injuries she’d sustained during the duel on the bridge, the demonstration got her point across with the dwarf well enough. “I’m all healed up. I just need the gear.”

“Well,” Herrog grunted. “For what it’s worth, I was able to save the bracers. Now you just have to convince Trevik to outfit ya with the rest.”

Elaina rolled her eyes as the dwarf placed the bracers on the countertop between them. He said it as if it wasn’t the harder task to accomplish. She was almost positive she could see a smirk hiding somewhere under the perfectly manicured beard the man kept in two neat braids.

“I thought things were good between you two now,” Herrog chuckled.

Elaina held her hands up defensively, cringing slightly. “They’re not terrible, but I’m always walking on eggshells with that guy.”

“Eh,” Herrog shrugged nonchalantly. “That’s just knockers, ya know?”

“Sure, but his fuse seems to be especially short with me,” Elaina responded with a hopeless sigh. “I wish I knew why.”

Herrog’s large hand pushed the bracers across the countertop toward her. “Ask him. He’s not one to mince words.”

Elaina clapped one hand down on the bracers, taking them under her arm as she rapped her knuckles gently on the countertop with her other hand. “Absolutely terrible advice, thank you.”

“It’s not, though,” the dwarf protested as she walked away.

Elaina lifted one hand, offering Herrog a singular wave as she stepped out into the courtyard. “Definitely is.”

Trevik had set himself up in the building at the far end of the bailey, trading in the requisition tent he’d been using for most of the delve for the former requisition office the Abyssals had used during the war. Elaina moved at a leisurely pace, enjoying the noonday sun overhead, waving to people she passed along the way. She’d been in recovery for quite some time with only a few visitors for the whole time. It gave her a newfound appreciation for strolls and regular interaction. People being pleased to see her again was icing on the cake. The duel with the mercenary captain had unexpectedly earned her a great deal of respect.

Stepping into the requisitions office, Elaina half-hoped that Trevik wouldn’t be there and that one of his assistants was working the desk. She wasn’t so fortunate. The thin fae man sat on his usual perch on a stool behind the counter, his large, watery eyes settling on her the moment she walked in.

“Hey,” Elaina greeted him, forcing herself to sound as casual as she could. “How’re you doing?”

“That remains to be seen,” Trevik sniffed, his long hooked nose red as though he had been blowing it recently. In truth, it always looked that way. “What do you want?”

Elaina had barely said anything to him, and he was already annoyed with her. She reminded herself that knockers, as a whole, had that way about them. It wasn’t personal. “I wanted to see about replacing my armor. Herrog says he can’t do anything with mine. He said I should talk to you.”

Trevik’s sour expression didn’t relax in the slightest, his eyes searching her for some form of trickery or deception. “He said that?”

The redhead held the pair of bracers up briefly. “This was all he could salvage.”

The knocker motioned for her to approach with one finger and then pointed to the requisition counter before him. Elaina was confused as to why he would need to examine them, but she complied all the same. Trevik’s head tilted shallowly to the left, holding his hand an inch or so above the bracers. “Caledonian steel,” he muttered, watery eyes shifting from the armor pieces to her.

“Yeah, you’ve seen it before, though,” Elaina agreed with a nod. “Right? It was a gift from my sister.”

“Mm,” he grunted non-committally, his expression growing a shade wistful before removing his hand. “I don’t have anything that’ll go with these.”

Elaina’s face scrunched up. “It doesn’t have to match. I just need something to get me back out there.”

“It’s all Zelmescan,” Trevik objected, failing to acknowledge her point. “Totally different kind of armor.”

She took a breath, bracing herself against the knocker’s obtuse argument. “But... why does that matter?”

“Because they’re different,” the knocker growled irritably. “I just told you! You came to see if I had anything for you, and I don’t! Besides, you’re not even an official member of this delve, no contract or nothin’, so I don’t even need to entertain your bullshit.”

“Royce told me you just lost a couple of guys in a skirmish; what about their gear?” Elaina pressed, barely holding her temper in check. “I just need to borrow it.”

“No, no.” Trevik shook his head, holding up both hands, adamant in his refusal. “Out of the question.”

“Fine,” Elaina spat, the edge growing in her voice. “I’ll fucking buy it then! How much do you want for it?”

Trevik leaned on the counter with both hands, baring his surprisingly sharp teeth at her. “They’re not for sale. Now, get out.”

Elaina didn’t back down. She should have, but something about him always cut right through her composure. “What is your problem with me, huh? I just need the minimum to finish the job, then I’ll be out of your greasy-ass hair forever, and you can’t even manage that?”

“My problem with you is you’re not supposed to be here,” Trevik sneered, grabbing the bracers in one hand and holding them in front of her face. “This armor was never meant for you, and you destroyed it. You’re a menace. A source of corruption for anything you touch, and I won’t be party to it, you hear me?”

She stared back at him dumbfounded, confused about where this had come from. The armor was damaged in battle. It happened all the time. “What are you talking about?”

“You might have fooled everyone else around here,” Trevik snarled, dropping the bracers onto the countertop. “But I know what you are now. I always thought the wyrd cloying to you was strange. Off somehow. This proves it.”

“T-the wyrd?” Elaina stammered, eyes widening a bit more at the mention of it. She hardly heard anyone speak of it here. It was the mysterious, and some said sentient, force behind all fae magic. It was her understanding that it underpinned the whole of the Faen itself. Her sister, Kaethe, believed it had been responsible for her escaping her miserable existence. She thought it had been what brought them together. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Aye, you do,” Trevik growled again, sitting back on his stool. “And the longer you stand around playing dumb, the worse it’ll be for everyone.”

“You’re not making any sense,” Elaina protested weakly, but they both knew what he was talking about. He’d somehow intuited that she wasn’t from this world, that she’d come from a twisted, dark reflection of it. She’d traveled through the Faen to get here.

Trevik’s mouth split into a ferocious grin, sending a chill down her spine. “Oh, but I am. I can see it in your eyes. I’ve got you. I know what you are now.”