Foxglove's Test

There are those who wish to rewrite their destinies, to carve from stone their own tales.  Those patrons of Lore, outcast by Archaea, who scorn Fate and tempt Death.  Those too corrupt for good, and too good for darkness.

They call themselves The Fractured Fate.

·⚔︎·

Dear Mother,

You will be happy to know I have arrived safely in Golton.  The Loreweaver has been kind enough to rent me a room above the Alehouse until I can find proper lodgings.  She was excited to receive your gift (what was in there?) and would like to know when you’ll be visiting.

Please don’t.

On another note, I saw a wonderful field of rotting riverlilies about a half day’s walk from the southern gates.  When I return for the Winter Solstice, I will make certain to bring several bags for your Fast-Fallow Field Tonic.

Finally, you must be wondering what has become of my application to The Fractured Fate.  Well, I am rather put out that you never mentioned a ‘test,’ and if I never have to work with that horrible ranger-boy again, I will be quite content.  Despite the challenge, you will notice a stamp of my guild pin here below, and I am ecstatic to inform you:

I made it!

So what happened?  Well, it all started the morning after the storm…

·⚔︎·

One Day Earlier…

·⚔︎·

“A test,” Amaryll frowned at the Loreweaver.  She sat on a tall stool - so tall, in fact, that with her short stature her feet dangled several inches off the ground.  The delicate fingers on both her gloved hands curved around the rim of a large bone tankard, filled to the brim with a sloshing helping of steamed cider.

Amaryll breathed deeply; the sharp sting of cardamom and allspice tickled her nose, which was still ever-so-sniffly.  Despite her oil-treated cloak, walking three hours through a heavy rainstorm would take its toll on anyone - even one with her… sensibilities.

The heavens’ thunderous punishment had petered out in the wee hours of the morning.  Now, all that remained was the subtly sweet smell of damp leaves and the pleasantly crisp morning air.

And Amaryll’s stuffy nose.

The Loreweaver - Lore, she’d implored Amaryll to call her last night - had greeted her with a steaming mug of hot cider the moment she’d stepped into the Alehouse that morning.  A lone sunbeam drifted quietly through the frosted glass of a window, and only a few figures sat at the various tables scattered around the room.

“So,” Amaryll had ventured, when the Loreweaver returned with a second steaming mug, sliding her empty mug away to the kitchen window.  Amaryll wet her lips.  Why was she nervous, all of a sudden?  She worked with poisons for a living.  Surely a short conversation wasn’t entirely out of her comfort zone.

And yet, her tongue seemed to swell like she’d eaten a double dose of tongue-twisting trilops.  The Loreweaver waited, perfectly content in her silence, her ageless eyes crinkling at the corners.  Amaryll swallowed past the thick feeling in her throat.  “When do I get my guild pin?”

“Well,” The Loreweaver said slowly.  Her voice reminded Amaryll of a breeze through the trees - soft, though she spoke at the same volume as Amaryll, and with the chilling aire of something not quite normal.  Something otherworldly.  The Loreweaver lifted a glass, held it to the light, narrowed her eyes, nodded, spun it.  “That depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“On you.”  Loreweaver set the glass down on the counter.  “You see, usually before prospective members join they must complete a test of sorts.”

“A test.”

“Usually.  Of course, this is a special-”

No.  No, no, no.  Even here, in Golton, leagues away from her small family homestead, she couldn’t escape her mother.  Her amazing mother, whom she loved with all her heart and in whose footsteps she so desperately wanted to follow…but whose shadow she could not escape.

Even here, in Golton, where no one was supposed to know who she was.

“-case-” The Loreweaver was still saying.

“I’ll do the test,” Amaryll chirped.  Then she snapped her mouth shut.  Shit.

I just cut off the Keeper of the Guild.

Hopefully that wasn’t the test.

But Loreweaver’s mouth twitched upwards.  “Excellent.”

Exhaling a soft sigh of relief into her spiced cider, Amaryll let her thoughts turn away from her mother.  This was her life.  Her story.  Everyone knew The Fractured Fate was the best Adventurer’s guild on this side of the wine-dark sea.  She would prove herself just as worthy of that guild pin as the strange black horse standing in the corner over there.

Amaryll blinked.  Had it always been there?  She could’ve sworn-

The horse glared at her.

She swung her gaze back to the Loreweaver, though she could still feel its glowing gaze boring into the back of her head.  “What sort of test?”  She’d always been good at the exams her mother had written out for her — testing the colloquial names and properties of various plants from across the world, the proper way to despine a drungel, and what to do if you accidentally mixed kerokalli opinous into your dreamless sleep tincture instead of kerokalli pintus.

“Not that kind of test,” Loreweaver smiled, as if she could read the thoughts spinning through the young woman’s head.  “A job.  Completed and supervised by a pre-existing member of the guild.”

“A job.”  Amaryll couldn't help the trill of excitement that thrummed through her, kicking her heart into her ears.  Her first ever adventurer’s job.  With the Fractured Fate, no less.

She’d been waiting for this moment since she’d been old enough to talk.

Loreweaver’s earthy gaze drifted around the room.  It landed on something behind Amaryll’s shoulder.  Amaryll swiveled in her chair and followed her gaze to two figures.  One of them, a large mass of muscle with a square head and short black hair hunched over a heaping platter of eggs and cold sausages.  His whole expression read don’t talk to me.  The other lounged against the back two legs of his chair, his loose shoulder-length hair and lazy grin giving the general air of someone who didn’t take anything overly seriously.

“Ronan and Zev,” Loreweaver said.  “The Brothers.”

Brothers.  It made sense.  Now that Amaryll knew what to look for, she could recognize it - the same sharp jaw, the same tilt of their eyes - the sameness that came from sharing your entire life with the same person.

“What about them?”

“They have a job they’ll be leaving for soon.  It’s here in the city and should be easy enough for a probationary member.”

Amaryll chewed on her lip.  “And they’ll take me along?”

“If they won’t, we’ll find something else.”

Phew.  Okay.  “So are you going to-” Amaryll spun her head to look at the Loreweaver, and froze.  She glanced from one side of the bar to the other, then leaned over the counter to see if maybe the Keeper of the Guild was hiding beneath the cabinets.

Nope.

The Loreweaver had disappeared.

“Great,” Amaryll mumbled.  She turned back to the brothers.  Sized them up.  Small talk.  She could do small talk.  It was practically her superpower.

Well, her second superpower.

She took a breath, then another.  Then a third.

With her fourth breath, she dropped her mug to the counter.  Her now-cooled cider sloshed in the tankard, and her mud splattered boots thudded to the floor.  Small talk time.

The soft sound of her approach caught the attention of the bigger brother.  If the frosty look in his eyes was anything to go by, Amaryll was an unwelcome addition to his morning.  The other one continued to lounge, eyes closed, his chair tipped dangerously far backwards.

If she were any less determined to make this work, she might have turned on her heel, marched up to the Loreweaver, and demanded to know her other options.

Instead she smiled.  And cleared her throat.  “Ahem.”

The hulking one dug an elbow into his brother’s side.  Two chair legs thudded to the floor.  His eyes popped open.  “What the hell, Z-”  His gaze slid to Amaryll.  He sat up straight, brushing a few strands of hair from his face.  A face which, Amaryll realized somewhere along the dark edges of her mind, was pleasingly symmetrical.

She filed that thought away for later analysis.  Small talk.

She flashed a smile that her mother always said could outshine a merralily.  “Hello.”

She was greeted by a warm grin and a grunt of acknowledgement (two guesses which was which).  “Hello.”

“Hello.”  At the answering identical brow raise from both brothers, she cleared her throat and pulled over the nearest chair with a loud screeeech.  All three of them winced.  “Right.  The Loreweav-uhm Lore, sorry.”  Why was this so hard?  “She said you two were heading out on a job soon.”  A happy feeling blossomed in her chest.  A job.  Did she sound like a real adventurer?  She hoped so.  “She said you should take me along.”

Not exactly what the Loreweaver had said, but Amaryll hadn’t made it all the way to Golton on her own by asking permission.

“She did?”  The more talkative brother leaned forward.  “Why?”  The question wasn’t unkind, but a curious light twinkled in his eye.  “Are you a new recruit?”

“Yes.  Amaryll.”  She thrust her hand over the table.  It barely reached halfway, but he leaned the rest of the way and grasped it.  She felt the warmth of his palm, even through her leather-gloved hand.

“Ronan.”

“Ronan,” she repeated.  Then turned her smile on the other brother.  “You must be Zev.”

Zev said nothing.  Ronan threw an arm over his brother’s shoulder.  “You’ll have to forgive him.  He’s not very talkative in the morning.  He doesn’t like waking up so early.”

Amaryll’s eyes flickered to the closest window — where a soft stream of late morning light streamed through the misted glass, casting soft shadows across the empty table below.

Ronan followed her gaze.  His grin widened.  “Or at all.”

“I get it.  If I could stay in bed all day, I would.”  Her words and sympathetic look were lost on their other companion, who just grumbled something that sounded like “juzz shuttup enlez go.”  He pushed away from the table and his half-eaten plate.

Pure pride kept Amaryll in place as the hulking man stood up.  As they were, he was twice her height and she was quite certain one of his fists could fit around the entirety of her waist.

He just glared at her once more, hefted a large battle axe into a sheath strapped around his back — how had she missed that? — and trudged towards the door.

Ronan sighed goodnaturedly and pushed his own chair away with a softer screech.  His hair had fallen into his face again, and he shoved it back.  He was halfway across the room, and Amaryll still glued to the floor, wondering what to do now, when he turned back.  “Coming?”

“Me?  Oh.  Yes.”  Nice.

Her belt was still draped across the bar counter, and she did a quick inventory of the various pouches — sleeping draught, vials (empty), vials (full), droppers, sundrop oil, pruning knife — before attaching it to her waist, hefting her skirts, and hustling towards where Ronan waited, door propped open.

A soft smile flitted across the Loreweaver’s lips as the three figures, silhouetted against the misty morning light, stepped into the fog and disappeared.

She pulled a small paper and a pen from beneath the counter and began to write.

My dearest Argila,

It has been quite too long.  As you may know, your little Amaryll arrived yesterday…

·⚔︎·

“Rat hunting.”

“Yes.”

Amaryll hopped neatly over an upturned cobblestone.  Her rapid footsteps echoed loudly across the stone streets, but she couldn’t help it.  At a head and a half shorter than both Ronan and his ornery brother, she was forced to take three steps for their every one just to keep up.

The streets of Golton were quiet — oddly so, if she were being honest, for just before midday.  A soft mist still hung low in the air from the storm that previous night, and the roads were slick with moisture.  The air tasted crisp on her tongue and the back of her mouth.  The sweet smell of baked bread twisted its way towards her from several stores down, intermingling with the sharp tang of springtime blossoms.

Golden rays of ethereal light glinted off the shiny cobblestones.  Amaryll stifled a sigh.  It would have been beautiful, honestly, if she hadn’t been so focused on this new and distressing information.

“Rat.  Hunting.”  She shielded her eyes and stared up at Ronan’s stark profile.  “Is that as self-explanatory as it sounds, or-”

“It means hunting for rats,” Zev ground out through gritted teeth.

Ronan just rolled his eyes.  “It’s not the most glamorous job.”  He offered Amaryll a sympathetic grin, before his gaze slid back to the streets around them.  “But someone has to do it.  And it pays well, all things considered.”

“Huh.”

For the first time since they’d stepped out of the Alehouse, the trio fell silent.  They’d been walking for quite some time, and Ronan — who was quickly becoming her favorite brother — had kept up a steady stream of conversation which Amaryll was only too happy to oblige.  Zev had grunted a few words (he speaks!) here and there, but otherwise remained silent.  Amaryll quickly decided that trying to make conversation with him was rather akin to making conversation with her favorite bullhorn sheep from back home.

Making conversation with Ronan was much easier.  She noticed, though, that the jovial man hardly ever looked her way when they talked.  His eyes scanned the streets around them — Searching for something? She couldn’t tell — but he never seemed to stop talking.

He told Amaryll about the city of Golton.  He asked her about her travels.  He shot jabs and joking insults at his stony-faced brother.

Amaryll was determined not to be outdone.  She chattered and joked and chattered some more.

Good first impressions were, after all, her second (or third? She’d lost track) superpower.

Another block and then a quick sharp turn, and the trio emerged onto a large — and much busier — street.  The buildings here were taller, nearly blocking out the low-hanging sun, and burly men and women moved across the streets.  Some carried heavy-looking boxes.  Others hefted sacks of something-or-other.  Shouts bounced off the large stone walls.

“Welcome,” Ronan spread his hands, “to the Wares Ward.  This is where all the businesses keep their…well, their businesses.  And, if I’m not mistaken,” he peered down at the slip of paper clutched in his hands, “our job should be right…” he looked up, scanned the space, paused, “…over…”

Amaryll and Zeve waited.

And waited.

This is ridiculous, Amaryll thought, after a good four seconds of silence.  It doesn’t take that long to read a-

“Brother?”  Zev was watching his brother, his eyes narrowed and suspicious.  When Ronan didn’t answer, his frown deepened.  “Ronan, are you-”

“Hm?”  Ronan jolted.  Shook his head.  “Sorry.  Right.  I just…”  He didn’t look at Amaryll or Zev.  “I have to just…take care of…something.”

Suddenly, Amaryll was clutching the piece of paper, and Ronan was striding away.

Even Zev looked surprised.  Amaryll’s mouth opened, then closed.  Could you do that?  Just…give up on a job before it even started?  It didn’t take long for indignation to overpower her shock.

Fuck that.  “We’re on a job!” she cried after Ronan’s retreating back.  “You…you can’t just leave!”

Ronan spun on his heel, still walking backwards.  “I just have to take care of something.”

“Yeah, but-”

“Ronan-”

“It’s just rats.”  He waved a hand.  “You don’t need three of us for rats.”  And then he was gone.  Leaving Amaryll standing there, in the middle of the street, alone.

Not exactly alone.  I still have- she looked up at Zev.  “Does he do that a lot?”

Zev just frowned.  He snatched the paper from Amaryll’s grasp, looked at it once, and strode off.

Alone, then.

Amaryll sighed and hurried after Zev.

·⚔︎·

The rat-infested warehouse looked rather like…well, a warehouse.  Three stories of gray, uninteresting stone, towering high into the sky with a long row of small windows across the top.  The street where they stood, a dusty avenue wide enough for three horse-carts, curved around the warehouse and down towards what looked to be a riverfront glistening in the distance.

Amaryll and Zev stood silently at the large metal door, contemplating…

Well, Amaryll wasn’t quite sure what Zev might have been contemplating, but she was trying to figure out how they were supposed to clear a rat infestation from a locked warehouse with no key.

“Do we-oh.”

Zev pounded his fist against the door.

Amaryll lowered her voice.  “Do you think anyone’s actually in there?”

“No.”

It was the first word he’d said to Amaryll the entire morning.  She raised her brows and waited for him to elaborate.  He didn’t.  “So…how do we get in?”

“Dunno.”  Zev glared at the door and, for a moment, Amaryll half expected it to burst into flames.

“Do we have a key?”

“No.”  His fist swung again.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.

“What about-” Bang! “-the owners-” Bang! “-and, uhm-”

Creeeeaaaaaaaaak.

The door swung inwards.

Amaryll’s mouth dropped open slightly.  “Well, would you look at that.”  For the first time since she’d approached their table that morning, Zev glanced her way.  Was that a smile?  Did his lips twitch?  If they did, it was gone before she had a chance to say anything.  Instead, Amaryll twitched a gloved hand.  “Shall we?”

Zev just grunted and pushed the door wider.

“Right.”  She stepped into the dark warehouse.

She caught a brief glimpse of a large indoor room at least the size of two grazing fields and monstrous stacks of crates and other goods piled teeteringly high before the door swung closed.

“Zev?”  Her voice sounded almost muffled in the dimly-lit space.  The light filtering in from the small row of windows high over their heads illuminated just the tops of the crates.  Amaryll waited for her eyes to adjust.  “Zev?” she asked again.

“I’m here.”  His annoyed grumble brought with it a small measure of comfort.  I’m not alone.

She blinked and a few tall crate-ish shapes loomed out of the darkness.  Perfect.  “Good.  Awesome.  Just checking.”

Her companion grunted and brushed past her, moving deeper into the warehouse.

Amaryll straightened her spine.  This was her test job.  Damned if she’d let Mister Grumpy do all the work.  She hurried after him.

“So, do you do this a lot?” she asked, once her short legs finally caught up.  They were walking down a long aisle, towering goods stretching for the sky on either side of them.

Zev said nothing.

“I’m just curious ‘cause, you know, this is my first job with the Fractured Fate.”  She paused, stared at a shadow that seemed to move.  Nothing.  “Actually, it’s my first adventuring job, period.”  She hopped over what looked to be a rolled-up rug.  “I guess I shouldn’t have expected it to be all glitz and glamor…but rat hunting just isn’t very exciting, you know?”

“You’d be surprised.”  Amaryll started.  She’d almost forgotten Zev was there.

Her face swiveled up to stare at his profile, the strange magenta of her eyes gleaming in the low light.  “That’s the most I’ve heard you say all morning!”  She tugged on one long, ruddy braid.  “I mean, it’s not that I’m not happy to be here.  I am,” she added with extra emphasis.  “It’s just, the stories my mo- uhm- the stories I’ve heard about the Fractured Fate were so dramatic.  Monster hunting and sword fighting and pirates and-what’s that smell?”

If Zev noticed the smell, he didn’t say anything.  But his steps did slow down ever-so-slightly and he looked briefly over at Amaryll.  She’d paused in the middle of the aisle, nose in the air, looking rather like a hound tracking its prey.

A malnourished, overly-cheery hound with a propensity to talk way too much.

She turned a slow circle, eyes closed.  “Rose,” she murmured.  An eye cracked open.  “Yellow rose.”

“Yellow?”  There was a quizzical tilt to Zev’s head.

She bobbed her chin and peered around the space.  Did it seem lighter?  Small specks of dust floated through the air, sparkling ever-so-slightly when they hit the soft beams of sunlight from the windows.  A thin layer of dirt coated the floor and the rims of her boots.  A sweet scent tickled her nose.  Yellow rose.  She couldn’t quite explain how she knew…only that she’d grown up around every plant under the sun and this was definitely yellow rose.

She sniffed and moved to pass Zev, but he held out a hand.  “Where’s your weapon?”

“What?”

The look he gave her was slightly incredulous, mixed with his standard frown.  “Your weapon.”  He jutted his head at the greataxe on his shoulder, and the strange square box-and-tube hanging from his hip.  “You can’t go in without a weapon.”

Amaryll’s brows shot up.  “Are you worried about me?”  She grinned.  “Zev-”

“Forget it,” he grunted, and moved further into the warehouse.

Amaryll practically hopped after him.  “No, no- it’s sweet!  But seriously, don’t worry.”  She spread her gloved hands.  “I’m covered.”

Zev just grunted and kept moving.

Amaryll followed.

The further they moved through the stacks upon stacks of unused goods, the stronger the sweet smell grew…and the stranger it got.  Yellow rose and…something far more pungent and far less pleasant.  It was there, under the sweet smell of the rose…sharp…and…

Zev came to a sudden stop.

They’d emerged into an open space at the far end of the warehouse.  Light streamed in — not only from the windows above, Amaryll realized, but also from cracks along the wall twenty feet ahead. And between them and the wall…

Amaryll sucked in a breath.  “That’s a lot of rats.”

A grunt.

There had to be hundreds of rats, she realized belatedly.  Little brown and silver things teeming and writhing across the ground, packed in so tightly it was impossible to see the floor.  They sprouted from the cracks in the wall, from the piles of straw and other debris.  Hundreds of beady little eyes and wriggling little tails flashing in the dim light.

Zev swore under his breath.  He stepped forward and reached for the strange device hanging from his hip.  A smoker, Amaryll realized.  She frowned at the rats.  Why weren’t they attacking?

As she watched, two of the rats squirmed away from the swarm.  Wait.  No.  Just one rat.  One rat, and two- “Wait,” she called at Zev, who paused, smoker in hand.

“What?” he grunted.

And then several things happened all at once.

First, the lone rat lunged for Zev, who had turned back to stare at Amaryll.  Its first head, a decomposing, rotting mass of sinew and bone, latched onto Zev’s arm, teeth sinking deep into his bicep.  The other head, a silvery transparent facsimile of a very very angry rat, bared its fangs and hissed.

“Shit!”  Zev flapped his arm — doing a rather excellent impression of a flackbird, Amaryll noted later on — and, in one terrible moment, the thing soared through the air and landed in the writhing mass of monsters.

In that instant, hundreds of little heads — half of them dripping blood and rot, the other half glimmering a soft ethereal silver — swiveled towards the intruder.

“Shit,” Zev said again, hefting his smoker.

Tucked behind the hulking figure of her companion, Amaryll pulled her scarf up over her mouth and eased off her gloves.

And then the rats attacked.

·⚔︎·

Yellow, Amaryll decided not more than two seconds after the warehouse finally — finally — fell quiet, is an overrated color.

Limp figures lay strewn across the warehouse floor.  Clumps of fur and rotting flesh decorated the nearby boxes, and a strange black goo oozed slowly across the floor towards the tip of Amaryll’s boot.  She shifted away.

She and Zev stood, wild-eyed, chests heaving, in the center of the storm, a ring of strange mottled bodies splayed open across their feet.  One half of Zev’s tunic dangled from his shoulder, and the hems of Amaryll’s skirts hung in tattered, splattered rags around her ankles.

Amaryll nudged a twitching rat with her foot.  It spasmed, then went still.

“How…” Zev shook his head.  He didn’t even sound out of breath, Amaryll noted with a twinge of jealousy.  “How did you do that?”

She just stuffed her gloves back onto her hands and flashed him a grin.  “I told you I was covered.”  Then turned back to the body of the rat…if it could still be called that.  “What are these things?”

“Rats.”  At her look, Zev just shrugged.  “At some point.”

“Hm.  But how did they get like that?  And were they always like that?  And did the owners know they were sending us into the rat’s nest from nightmares?”  A million other questions swirled through her brain, but Zev made a curious sound in the back of his throat.  Something had caught his attention in the mass of debris that made up the rat’s nest.  “What?  What is it?”

His massive boot nudged something.  Metal clinked and rolled away.  “Rat bombs.”

“Rat bombs?  Like-”

His narrowed gaze slid to Amaryll.  “Bombs.  For rats.”

“But what about the-is that a rosebush?”  Amaryll sidled up to Zev’s side.  If she noticed him jolt and shift away, she said nothing.  “A yellow rosebush!”  She grinned up at Zev.  “Well that explains it!”

For a moment, the only sound was the soft distant shouts of workers outside the warehouse.

“How,” Zev grumbled after a moment, stepping around masses of rat bodies to make his way back towards the entrance, “does that explain anything?”

Amaryll hurried to follow him.  Her boots practically hopped excitedly across the stone floor.  “Yellow roses are necroflorics!  Plants with necromantic abilities,” she explained when Zev said nothing.  “Now, I’m only guessing here but they probably tried to blow up the rats — a horribly ineffective pest control method, by the way, because-”

“The roses?” Zev cut in.  He wove around a toppled-over crate that Amaryll had barely even noticed in the low light.  She maneuvered her path around it at the last second.

“Right.  They probably tried to blow up the rats without knowing there was a yellow rosebush behind the wall.  Yellow rose powder, plus a hundred freshly dead rats, equals…well, whatever those things were.”  A shudder worked its way up Amaryll’s spine.  “If I never see a half-decomposed rat head ever again, it’ll be too soon.”

“Forget the rotting heads,” Zev frowned.  “The other heads-”

“The other heads were just ghosts.”

“Rat ghosts.”

Amaryll’s lips twitched upwards.  She could see the aisle open up just ahead, and the door to the warehouse beyond that.  “You know, for a big scary adventurer…you’re pretty squeamish about rats.”  To be fair, she had a feeling she was also going to be squeamish about rats now.

“Ghost rats.  Zombie rats.”  Zev shook his head.  “Never again.”

Amaryll grinned and picked up her pace.  Almost at the door.  She could practically smell the fresh city air again.

She was only feet away when she realized Zev was no longer at her side.  She spun on her heel.  Where had he gone?  She hadn’t even noticed he’d stopped walking.  For a hulking figure of a man, he sure knew how to be annoyingly quiet when he- “Zev?”

He had an unreadable look on his face — and Amaryll liked to believe she’d gotten rather good at deciphering his unreadable looks.  His dark eyes stared down at his arm, which had taken on a pallid sort of glow.  “I…I don’t…”

“You don’t what?”  Amaryll moved closer.  “What is it?”

And then his eyes rolled back, and he crumpled to the floor.

·⚔︎·

The two figures who stumbled into Loreweaver’s Alehouse barely past midday looked far worse for wear than they had only several hours earlier.

With the sun high in the sky and the dreary mist of the previous night’s storm chased away, the Alehouse welcomed a host of the strangest midday visitors the city of Golton had ever seen.  Of the crowd, the most notable were these: at a table by the window, what looked to be two older women with tall feathered hats and leather traveling jackets faced off in an intense game of cards.  At the bar top there was a freckled boy, who looked to be no more than fourteen or fifteen, hunched over a plate of eggs, a strange wooden staff propped up against his hip.

And then there was The Loreweaver herself — her silver hair shining softly in the candlelit interior of the Alehouse.  The stained leather apron wrapped around her waist fluttered softly in the breeze from the open window.  She nodded along to something the man in front of her said.

“It was like this,” Ronan was saying, and the boy a few chairs down swiveled his head to listen.  “Zev and I were-”

But that was as far as he got, because just then the door to the Alehouse swung open with such force it slammed against the far wall.  Two figures stumbled in, and the entire Alehouse paused to stare.

Amaryll and Zev stood there, silhouetted in the doorway. Their clothes hung in tatters around their shoulders — the torn half of Zev’s tunic now dangled completely loose around his waist.  A long, bloody scratch carved its way down Amaryll’s face.  Tufts of hair had come loose from her braids and stuck out at odd angles.

Zev’s eyes were closed and his whole upper torso was draped over Amaryll’s shoulders.  Amaryll panted heavily.  “A little…help…” she groaned.

That jolted Ronan from his stupor.  In an instant, he was at their side, swiping off the contents of the nearest table, and hefting his brother onto it.  Zev groaned.

“What happened?”  Ronan could barely push the words out.  Could barely breathe.

The glare of absolute disgust Amaryll shot at him didn’t help at all.  “It wasn’t just rats,” she growled through gritted teeth, doing a rather excellent impression of his unconscious brother.

Right.

She was rifling through the pouches at her waist, mumbling something about ghosts and zombies, but Ronan could barely hear past the ringing in his ears.  He stared at his brother, motionless on the table.

“Found it.”  Amaryll’s voice echoed strangely through his head.  She clutched a jar of something in her hand.  The label read The Lethal Lily: Anti-necrotic Poultice.

“The Lethal Lily?” Ronan read.  He’d heard that name before.  “Where-”

“Is that really important right now?” Amaryll snapped.  Her magenta eyes were wild, but she took a deep breath and popped open the top of the jar.

“No.  You’re right.”

Amaryll dipped one gloved finger into the jar and scooped out a glob of something black and foul-smelling.  “His arm.  Give me his arm.”

“His-” Ronan lifted Zev’s arm, ignoring his brother’s groans.  He peeled back the sleeve and gaped.

Zev’s entire arm, from bicep to wrist, was wrapped in curling black veins.  The rest of his skin had turned a strange tannish-grey.  Black goo oozed out of two small punctures at the inside of his elbow.

Without ceremony, Amaryll smeared the two holes with the foul-smelling black stuff.  Zev flinched.  Ronan flinched in sympathy.

Amaryll waited, her breath short and loud in her own ears.  She was vaguely aware of others standing around her — watching, waiting.  But all she could hear was her breath and her heartbeat.

She stared at the wound.  And then stared some more, as if by the power of her stare, her mother’s poultice would work.

It would work.  It had to work.  She couldn’t let Zev die, not after-

Zev groaned and shifted.

Her breath caught.  She heard Ronan suck in a breath.

One of Zev’s eyes cracked open.  “Ronan?” he murmured weakly.

Ronan shifted into Zev’s view, grasping his shoulder softly.  “What the hell, Zev.  It was supposed to be just rats.”

“Ghost rats,” came the answering grumble.

“Ghost rats?”  Still clutching his brother’s shoulder, Ronan looked over at Amaryll.

Amaryll was too busy staring at Zev, her eyes wide and glistening with unshed tears.  “You’re alive.”  Her hands latched onto Zev’s forearm and squeezed.

She went to let go, but found her small hand grasped in Zev’s large one.  “Amaryll,” he rumbled softly.  “Thank you.”  And then let go.

“Oh, well.”  Amaryll fought the blush pushing into her pale cheeks.  “Call me Amy.  All my friends do.”

Zev just closed his eyes.

It was only then that she noticed the sound — a thunderous pounding all around her, shaking the walls and the table and the chairs.  And cheering.

People were clapping and cheering…for her?

Before she could fully internalize that The Fractured Fate — The Fractured Fate — was clapping and cheering for her — her — they parted and a figure made its way to stand in front of Amaryll.

The Loreweaver smiled then, and Amaryll felt the warmth of that smile all the way to her tingling toes.  It felt like sunlight after a long day working in her lab.  And when she spoke, her voice sounded like Argila’s, soft and lilting, reading to her about the properties of niperus communis before tucking her into bed with a featherlight kiss.  “What you’ve done tonight,” The Loreweaver said, her words twisting through the air like a song, “Amaryll Sarran, has made you more than just a member of the Fractured Fate.”  She held in her upturned palms something small and glinting.  A pin, Amaryll realized.  A small, curved thing, with two letters swirling around a sword.  FF.

Fractured Fate.

The Keeper of the Fractured Fate pressed the pin into Amaryll’s hands.  “Welcome to the family.”  And then, in a low voice for Amaryll’s ears alone, “your mother will be very proud.”

Amaryll just closed her fist around the pin and smiled.

She was picturing how to write to her mother with the good news when, for the second time that afternoon, the door to the Alehouse slammed open, clattering against its hinges.

A young woman appeared in the doorway, hunched over, hands on her knees.  Her frizzy red hair obscured her face, but her words were loud enough to send a shocked silence rippling over the room like a wave of icy water.

“Body… dead… Brimstone Ward…”

The Loreweaver pushed forward.  “Who?” she demanded, her voice sharp enough to grate nails.  “Who’s dead?”

Two bright blue eyes pierced the room.  “The Keeper of Helshine.”

·⚔︎·

So, dearest mother, if I never have to work with that horrible Ronan ever again, it will be too soon.  His brother and I, on the other hand, I think make a wonderful team.

Give my niperus a kiss for me, and write back soon!

All my love,

Amaryll

P.S. You may want to move our yellow rosebush into Greenhouse Three, next to the Foxglove and Stinging Sumac and away from the cattle pasture.  Trust me.

·⚔︎·