CHAPTER 8

The kitchen was the best thing Lanri had ever seen. Loaves of freshly baked bread lay cooling on a rough table opposite the array of ovens and stoves. They smelled heavenly, and steam rose from them. A little farther, croissants, chocolate pastries, even some large, plump donuts were arranged on wire cooling racks, and a wax paper pastry bag, still half full of a dark jam hinted at the fruity fillings within. She eagerly made her way to the donuts, and picked one up.

“I strongly advise against that,” Sheep insisted.

“I think you should listen to her, dear,” agreed Seeker.

Lanri didn’t much care for what she heard either of them say.

A well-fed valet and an angel who hasn’t been hungry in a millennium don’t get to tell me I shouldn’t eat something.

“Don’t,” Seeker told her, much more firmly this time. Lanri ignored her. She stuffed the donut in her mouth greedily, savoring the sour berry filling. “Why noth!?” She asked, with her mouth full of food.

“Abanian Currants are… potent,” Sheep carefully said as Lanri took another bite. She saw Seeker let out an exasperated sigh, which concerned her slightly. She decided her second pastry would be one of the others.

“You thought it would be a good idea to escort a human who hadn’t eaten in a week past a tray of Abanian Currant-filled donuts?” Asked Seeker, annoyance creeping into her voice.

“What are Abanian Currants?" Asked Lanri, as she helped herself to a pair of croissants.

“Master Gorance assured me the kitchen would be empty by the time we passed through it,” Sheep said, answering Seeker’s question, rather than hers.

Are you ignoring me? she asked as she glared at the beastkin, and her iridescent red tailcoat. She noticed it was lined with blue fabric on the inside. Blue like only the most expensive paints, or a mage’s fireworks display could manage. That fucking coat was far too colorful.

“Of course he did,” Seeker said with a slow, slow sigh. In fact, Lanri realized everything Seeker and Sheep did and said had been getting slower. “So, how many did she just eat?”

Lanri looked around at the kitchen. The entire room was full of amazing colors, and she was in awe of them. She hadn’t noticed just how violently purple the jam in the pastry bag was, nor how the loaves of bread weren’t really brown, but closer to a dark, yet vibrant orange.

“At least ten to a donut,” Sheep said. Lanri tried to pay attention to the beastkin, but she was taking so fucking long to get the words out. “They’re meant to be quite strong.”

“I can see that,” Seeker said, drawing Lanri’s gaze to her. The Heartwarden’s red hair and blue eyes seemed to play tricks on her eyes. The strands flowed in impossible ways, the colors billowing through the strands at random, the entire mass forming a pulsating volume of crimson that seemed to scream at her whenever she looked away from it. Unfortunately, she looked away from the hair quite a lot, at those shocking eyes. They stood out from the pink of her skin, and the red of her hair, and demanded attention. The blue seemed to get deeper, the longer she stared, going from blue, to violet, to the color that lays beyond that.

The chewed croissant in her mouth began to get sweeter and sweeter as the structure of the thing dissolved, and the texture of the towel she was wrapped in announced itself to her consciousness. It seemed to say Hello! My softness was a mere deception! I am billions of tiny brass wires, woven together. I have been waiting here, among the actual soft fabrics for decades. It was all a plot to ambush you with my staggering, distracting, roughness. She looked down at the towel to confirm it was really made of brass, but it wasn’t. It was the brightest, whitest fabric she had ever seen. It seemed to give off light that illuminated the room all on its own. This can’t be coarse, it looks too soft, Lanri said, and just like that, the texture of the fabric returned to its pleasant fuzziness.

Seeker appeared to be getting closer, Lanri noted when she looked back up. Her silhouette took up more of her view, and her eyes were squarely focused on her. What’s wrong? She asked, and took a step back. Seeker was remarkably beautiful, but she could be more than a little intimidating, which she was now. The step back was unusually difficult, and slow. It felt more like she was somehow pushing the entire world forward, rather than herself back. The air itself seemed more viscous, too.

She looked down from Seeker, and at her hand, which moved through the air like a paddle through jelly. It took as much effort as the step to just lift her hand. She examined it, comparing the lighter skin on her palm to the darker skin on the back of her hand, and to the glob of purple jam that had stuck to her thumb. It flickered and glistened as the unpredictable light of the oven’s flame danced back and forth, making for some funky shadows. She turned slightly, looking at the wall opposite the oven, and at the donuts’ groovy projected images. They all seemed to have something else in mind. One of the shadow dances looked a little like a bee shaking her butt, while another reminded her of herself as a teenager in a way she couldn’t quite explain.

She absent-mindedly brought the jammy hand to her mouth to lick it clean, but was unpleasantly surprised to see Seeker’s hand grabbed her by the wrist. The hand was attached to her left arm, on which she wore the shiny metal bangle. It sparkled in the fire light, each imperfection a little star in its own right. The other hand quickly made itself known as well, grabbing her by the mouth, and slowly pulling her up to look at Seeker. Seeker, whose mouth was moving, but wasn’t making any noise Lanri could make sense of.

What’s wrong? She asked. Her question went unanswered, or if it did get an answer, it was without sound, like the rest of what Seeker was saying. Seeker’s eyes were very serious looking, Lanri thought. Their blueness grabbed her attention again, as she looked deep into them, looking for that color that lay beyond violet again. It had been really interesting a moment ago. She frowned as she realized she couldn’t find it again.

The fingers grabbing her by the face squeezed, slowly, but unimaginably hard, just between her teeth. She opened her mouth so they wouldn’t be broken by Seeker’s harsh maneuver; which felt like it took an entire minute to happen. A minute she spent considering why Seeker would hurt her like this, or look so angry. Anger! That’s why she couldn’t see the color beyond violet anymore. Seeker was so angry that the red of her hair had become even redder, and it had drained the violet-er color from her eyes. Seeker looked into her mouth for a moment, then said something.

Sheep said something, too. She couldn’t actually hear or see Sheep when looking up at Seeker like this, but Lanri was sure she’d said something, regardless. It was probably something boring, and dull. Something about Gorance wanting her to wear a purple scarf instead of a yellow one. She tried to pull away from Seeker, but her grip was too firm.

You’re scaring me! she told the Heartwarden, who seemed to say something herself. No. Not something. A spell. She could feel the hairs on the back of her neck stand upright as the angel invoked Ishara’s power for something. She tried to imagine what it might be, when she noticed the room getting darker. You’re putting me to sleep again!? She demanded. The question was adamantly ignored by Seeker, but answered itself quickly enough.

She wasn’t putting her to sleep. This spell was doing something else. Yes, the room was getting darker and less vibrant, but it wasn’t doing anything to her mind. It was… She saw Seeker say something again, and actually heard it. It ended on “–okay.” The hand holding her between the teeth let go, and stroked her on the side of the face. It was such a gentle thing, so completely opposed to how imposing Seeker had been just a moment ago, that she decided she must have imagined that. The sheer effort it had taken her to step away from Seeker caught up with her, and her legs turned to jelly. She started falling through the soupy thick air, and the hand holding onto her wrist darted through the world at unimaginable speed.

She started speeding up, falling towards the floor faster, and faster, but Seeker’s hand was even quicker. The entire world seemed to speed up, and Seeker outpaced it. Before Lanri knew it, Seeker had caught her, and was gently lowering her to the kitchen’s floor.

“Are you back, yet?” She asked Lanri, some concern in her voice. She spoke at a normal pace, one that didn’t take Lanri all of the effort in the world to listen to.

“Y–yeah…” Lanri stammered, looking around the kitchen. It wasn’t very interesting anymore. Nothing had a mystical shimmer to it anymore, and the shadows were just shadows. “W–what was that?”

“Abanian Currants,” Seeker said. “Dwarven vintners like to put a few drops of their juice in a bottle to give it that magic touch. You had ten of them.”

“What did I do?” Lanri asked, hesitantly.

“Oh, very little,” Seeker assured her. “You only actually ate them a minute or so ago.”

“Felt a lot longer,” Lanri said, as Seeker pulled her back onto her feet, and gave her a compassionate smile. “I would have died,” she realized.

“I imagine so, and we’ll discuss that later,” Seeker agreed, solemnly. Lanri looked around the kitchen, for a rag to wipe the remaining Currant jam on. She quickly found one, and winced slightly at the awful stain she’d just made on it. She kept looking around, at the various pastries, her stomach no quieter in its demands that she eat something. “What is it?” Seeker asked, noticing her expression.

“So, which of these are safe to eat?” She quietly asked.

“The croissants should be quite safe. You already had one,” Sheep offered.

“I did, huh?” Lanri asked as she scooped up half a dozen of the croissants, and did her best to appear somewhat elegant while doing so. “I was worried I might have imagined that.”

________________

Their room was quite nice, Lanri thought as Sheep left the pair of them alone for the night. She’d told them she would return the next morning for Gorance’s show, and Lanri wasn’t quite sure she wanted to know more than that. She looked around the place for a while, a thickly piled carpet covered the entire floor, and a single large bed stood in the center of the room, with its headboard against the wall.

Lanri put her armful of croissants down on one of the two writing desks, and began chewing on one as she looked through the room’s unfortunately empty dressers. She was getting tired of wearing a towel.

“I can get you something to wear, if you’d like,” Seeker said. She had a soft smile on her face.

Lanri nodded gratefully. “Yesh, please,” she said, a mouth full of croissant. She watched the Heartwarden reach into nowhere again, and smiled as she saw Seeker produce a comfortable looking pair of trousers, and a night shirt.

“There,” Seeker suggested. “These should do. Ishara’s realm isn’t exactly littered with nice, modest clothes, but these should do.”

Lanri considered that. “I thought you’d make something. Like my brooch.”

“Oh, I can’t just make whatever, whenever, dear,” Seeker said. “I would have kept you fed if it was that easy.” That made sense to Lanri, and she conceded the point with a shrug. “The brooch wasn’t easy, either. I’m supposed to retrieve Ishara’s artifacts, not make more and give them away.”

That, too, made sense to her. She took the pair of trousers, and stepped into them. They were comically too big for her. “So, how did you?” Asked Lanri as she dropped the towel, and put on the equally too large shirt.

“I can be very persuasive, you know,” Seeker said. “Besides, she likes having her favored mortals wear gifts. I asked her if I could use some of the dress’ fabric in it, and a little bit of all of that divine ragira you spent a few days soaking yourself in now powers the enchantment that protects you from its effects.”

“There’s a bit of the dress in there?” Lanri asked with some awe in her voice. She sat down on the bed besides Seeker; and her hand trailed back behind her head, feeling the brooch.

“Well, an enchantment to protect you from a Heartwarden’s aura is no small feat, and with how sensitive the dress made you to it, it was definitely necessary. I thought it was poetic to use the dress itself to power it.”

“You couldn’t cast it directly on me?” Asked Lanri. Seeker shook her head.

“I suggested as much. But Ishara’s not a fan of suppressing desire, to put it mildly. Gorance wasn’t exactly wrong when he said using a spell to make you keep it in is… stretching my mandate.”

Lanri considered that. It’s not as if she didn’t have any feelings for Seeker on her own. Seeker was still a Heartwarden, and attractive, and kind, and she’d saved her life several times by now. It would be strange to have no feelings of any kind at this point.

Seeker gave her a patient smile, and looked out of their room’s remarkably clean sole window. Lanri followed her gaze, looking at the billions of stars one could see so far from any city. “Nine hundred and thirty-three years,” she suddenly began, “and I still love how they look. Even if they’ve changed a little in that time.”

“The stars change?” Asked Lanri, quietly.

“Oh, yes,” said Seeker. “They’re just really, really far away, and they don’t move all that fast. It takes hundreds of years for it to be remotely noticeable.”

“I had no idea,” Lanri admitted. She wasn’t looking at the stars anymore, but at the wistful expression on Seeker’s face. They sat there for a while, quietly sharing each other’s company. Lanri cautiously reached out, and gently rubbed Seeker’s arm. “Tell me what you’re thinking about,” she quietly said.

“Oh, so many things, my dear,” Seeker said, turning to look at Lanri. “Most of them involving how to keep you safe from more of Gorance’s tricks.”

“You’ll manage,” Lanri said. “I have faith in you.”

“I know,” Seeker agreed. “You’re a very pious little thing.”

“No, no,” Lanri said. That wasn’t what she meant at all! “I mean, I do… I know what Ishara stands for, and I have faith in that. And I do have that kind of faith in you, Seeker.” She paused for a moment. “But I also have faith in you as a friend. You’ll keep me safe; I know you will. And I’ll try to keep you safe, as well.”

Seeker gave her a solemn smile, and gently caressed the side of her face. “You truly are a remarkable little thing, Lanri Vattens,” she said, then sighed. “Tomorrow will be very difficult for you. Gorance will have all manner of unpleasant things planned for us. You should rest.”

“I doubt I can,” Lanri said. “Side effect of sleeping for several days, I’d wager.”

“Well then,” Seeker said. “Let’s rectify that.” Alarm bells went off in Lanri’s head. She’d been down that particular road with Seeker several times. A contrived conversational trick, and then she’d say that spell, and she would just go limp and pass out. She’d had quite enough of it for now. “Dorm–”

“No!” Lanri snapped, and cut Seeker off the only way she felt was appropriate. She leaned in, and kissed her. A simple, gentle touching of lips. She broke the kiss a moment later, and nervously looked at Seeker. “I don’t want you to put me to sleep yet,” she told her.

Seeker’s expression was difficult to read, at best. She looked at her with a vaguely fascinated bewilderment. “I really thought wearing the brooch would keep you from ever doing that,” she said.

“Y–you didn’t like it?” Lanri asked. She felt her face flush with embarrassment. She should have known Seeker didn’t want that. She’d stopped her every time before now, but then Lanri’d always been influenced by her aura. But it wasn’t just the aura, and it wasn’t just that she knew it was what Ishara expected. She also ju–

Seeker pulled her close again, and kissed her back. Those strong arms that could easily overpower her gently, put firmly, putting her where she wanted her. When Seeker broke the kiss, she brushed some hair out of Lanri’s face. “I liked it,” she assured her.

The embarrassment washed away immediately, overpowered by a sense of validation, and no small amount of sudden nerves that she’d screw it up. She tried to come up with words; suggestions, requests, compliments… anything would do. Anything to keep this moving forward, to make sure they’d do more than just kiss.

“You’re a lot more assertive without the brooch,” Seeker noted, quirking her eyebrows in that vaguely smug, all-knowing, I can read your thoughts, no point in hiding anything, way Lanri’d adored since the first time she saw it.

“U–huh…” Lanri managed. “I didn’t really have a plan past this. I just d–”

“I know, dear,” Seeker purred. “You didn’t want me to put you to sleep. And I didn’t. So, why don’t you tell me what you do want?”

Lanri swallowed. This was suddenly moving so fast! A moment ago, they’d been talking about astronomy of all things, and now Seeker was finally looking at her the way she wanted to be looked at, and – “T–take out the brooch,” she managed.

Seeker considered it for a moment. An agonizing moment, that she seemed to be deliberately stretching out to tease Lanri. “No,” she eventually said.

“No!?” demanded Lanri, in a tone that horrified her once she heard it. She clasped her hand over her gaping mouth, and stared at Seeker.

“That’s right; no,” said Seeker, in that same husky whisper she’d used when they first met. “It’s staying in.”

Outrage began to boil in Lanri. “W–well, why!?”

“Because, my dear,” began Seeker. She leaned a little closer to Lanri. She swallowed, and backed away on instinct. “I’m not like the other Heartwardens. I won’t force myself on you with my aura.”

“It’s not forc–”

Seeker put a finger on Lanri’s lips, and shushed her. “Let me finish, Lanri. I want you to have a clear head for this. I know you want me without the brooch keeping you in check; everyone does, that’s the point. You’ve had three people try to force this on you in the last week, and I will not be the fourth.”

Lanri nodded. Seeker was just… wonderful. For the briefest moment, she considered the implications of the other Heartwardens not being as gentle, but she discarded the thought. She didn’t want to think about the other Heartwardens, or even Ishara herself. She wanted to think about her savior, her friend, her Seeker. She pushed herself off of the mattress, and into Seeker. Their lips touched again, and she giggled.

“Besides,” began Seeker after they broke the kiss, and she undid the first button of Lanri’s night shirt. “I like being the assertive one.”

“I bet,” agreed Lanri as she crawled away on the bed, and got onto her knees to take off the shirt completely, and she watched Seeker come closer, joining her fully on the bed. “Aren’t you going to take your clothes off?” She asked, nervously.

“What a good idea, my dearest little mortal,” Seeker purred, putting some condescension in her voice. That same diminutive inflexion that had infuriated her an hour ago turned her into jelly now. It wasn’t meant to make her feel bad, or as an insult.

I’m her favorite mortal.

Seeker nodded to confirm it, and Lanri let out a vaguely manic little laugh as understanding dawned on her. Seeker wasn’t just playing along with Gorance because of a divine mandate to protect her, or because it was Ishara’s fault that Lanri was in this mess. She was doing it because she liked her, and because she was hers.

“Dévêtez,” intoned Seeker, and with a blinding brightness and a shiver of power Lanri felt in her very soul, Seeker’s clothes were gone. Her body was flawless. Toned muscles, pale, smooth skin, and stunning hips evoked a gasp from Lanri.

I’m hers.

Again, Seeker nodded to confirm it as she crawled closer, and with a firm hand, pushed Lanri down onto her back. Lanri stared up at the Heartwarden, who loomed over her, her long red hair hanging down, and onto Lanri’s chest. From this closeby, Lanri could see a little tattoo on Seeker’s collarbone. It looked like Ishara’s in its basic geometry, but on its side, and stylized into an eye, rather than a vulva.

“I like your sigil,” Lanri muttered as Seeker hooked a thumb into Lanri’s pants, and nudged them just enough to communicate that Lanri should take them off. Lanri did so, lifting her butt just enough to scoot them down her legs, and kicked them off.

“As well you should,” Seeker intoned. She reached behind Lanri’s head, and tapped the brooch there ever so gently. “You’ve been wearing it all week,” she added with a smile.

“I’ll wear it forever,” Lanri promised. She wasn’t quite sure where that came from, but it felt… true.

“Of course you will,” agreed Seeker, who brought her finger to Lanri’s chest, and tapped her on the sternum “Because you, my dear, are a devout little thing.”

Lanri nodded her agreement, with an eager smile on her face. She hung on Seeker’s every word, nearly hypnotized by what she had to say.

“A particularly devout little thing at that,” Seeker elaborated, as she walked her fingers down from her chest, down her belly, across her navel, and to just on the edge of where her pubic hair had been a little while ago. “The very model of a mortal, you. Eager. Grateful.” She lowered herself, and added one last, whispered word. “Reverent.”

Lanri shuddered, and nodded. She squirmed under Seeker, and tried to shift up, just enough to line up with those fucking fingers that just refused to hit home. Seeker’s hand pulled away, and she gave her a stern look. Lanri let out a needy whine. She wanted to get into it, not–

“Tell me what you want to do, Lanri,” bade Seeker. Lanri frowned. Seeker knew damn well what Lanri wanted them to do. Seeker quirked her eyebrow again, doubtless meaning it to carry the same implication as always.

“Y–you know what I want!” Whined Lanri. She didn’t mind sounding needy, but her voice had an edge of petulance to it that made her wince.

“Of course I do,” Seeker calmly agreed. “I know more about you than you do, dear. Still, tell me.” Somewhere, deep in the folds of Lanri’s mind, the remnants of one of the many spells Seeker had cast on her sparked to life.

That wasn’t a request; It was a command.

“Sex!” Lanri blurted out, with an unbidden smile on her face. “I want us to have sex!” Seeker laughed at that. It was the most beautiful sound Lanri had ever heard. Galvanized, Lanri continued, “I want to make you feel good.”

“Well,” purred Seeker. “I think you’ll do an excellent job of that in a moment. But, first, let me show you what I like.”

________________

Gorance grinned, and sipped his brandy. He was relatively confident his newest merchandise knew he could see all that happened in his villa, but that didn’t seem to be stopping her. Even though he was staring at his fireplace, he didn’t actually consciously see it. Like a king enthralled by his bard’s stories, or a child that hung on the every word her grandparent read to her, his mind was processing a completely different image than that which his eyes provided. One of his many ‘gazes showed him Seeker and Lanri’s room, and he saw their intimacy.

“Perfect,” he hummed. His plan relied on holding the mortal hostage, and judging by how the pair of them were spending the night, she would soon be a more effective yoke around the Heartwarden’s neck than ever.

“What is, Master?” Asked Sheep. Her words snapped him out of his reverie, and back to his lounge. The loyal beastkin stood beside his chair, with the bottle of Abanian Currant brandy in hand.

“Why, all of this!” He happily told her. He looked up into her meek, guileless eyes, and she smiled. “My plan! I’ll be a legend after tomorrow; a being of myth. The one who stole an angel…” he trailed off, and giggled in glee. “And got away with selling her to the highest bidder.”

“That’s wonderful!” She happily told him, then frowned. He rolled his eyes; the girl was trying to think. “But… how will you keep Lady Seeker from resisting you?”

That’s entirely more awareness than I want out of you.

He dug into his metaphorical bag of demonic tricks, and looked into her eyes, letting his sorcery pour into the girl’s mind. He grinned as her jaw slackened, and she gasped. She wobbled on her feet, and he applauded himself for having the good sense to take the bottle of brandy from her hands.

As he set it down onto the table beside his chair, the girl collapsed into the carpet. She blinked several times, and looked around the lounge she’d spent so many years in as if she were seeing it for the first time. He loved this part. “What happened?" She softly asked him, and looked to him for guidance.

“Oh, another of your episodes, Sheep,” he lied. “I took your bottle from you before you collapsed.”

Her confused expression rearranged itself into one of gratitude. “Thank you, Master!” She happily told him, as she got up and dusted herself off.

“Hardly any bother at all,” he assured her, and handed her the bottle back. She gratefully accepted it. He’d done that to her so many times over the years, and he never grew tired of it.