Loosely Lawful | 7

Librata, being the wise and excellent deity that she was, had granted Sera’s request for a searching spell that day. After all, if they were going to catch up to Avon and Kali, who skulked and scurried out of sight most of the time, a bit of divination might be the only way to find them.

Every few seconds, Sera’s magic pinged her, lighting up the spot in her brain that knew where the best bakeries were and where to go to hide from the other acolytes. It led her ever north, veering just off a logging road clogged with lumberjacks and carts of wood and into the depths of the forest. Most likely, Avon and Kali had followed the road north as far as they reasonably could, and had just turned off it.

Sera set a brutal pace as they walked, stepping fast enough that she might as well have jogged, though doing that would require all the effort of going up and down in armor. Kyle kept up with ease, his long strides carrying him like a swift wind. Benvolius likewise seemed unaffected, feet hardly seeming to touch the ground. Stupid tall people.

They hiked most of the day, not even stopping to eat. Benvolius tried once or twice to examine the felled trees and bits of wood being carted by, but Sera would not stop for him. She wouldn’t even stop if a tree fell in her path. If the road was congested, she brought the boys through the woods. If the woods were too thick, they took the road. If both conditions were bad, well. Sera yelled a lot. By the time sunset began, turning the sky pink and purple and disgustingly pretty, they had caught halfway up to Avon and Kali, who had settled somewhere to sleep in the afternoon, when they were least likely to be attacked.

Sera pressed on. They’d be up in the early evening to keep going, and if she and the boys didn’t catch up, they might never make it.

“Gods above,” Benvolius panted, as their breaths turned misty in the evening air. “You two really just keep going.”

“She’s worried,” Kyle said, incorrect as usual. “You know how mothers pull off totally crazy shit when”-

Sera whipped around, walking backwards so she could level Kyle with a pointed finger. “Don’t finish that sentence.”

Kyle smiled and lifted Sera off the ground, clearing her of a tree branch that she would have tripped on. “When their young are in danger.”

“Avon isn’t my”-

“Oh I know. But they’re your something.”

Benvolius furrowed his eyebrows. “Avon? Who’s that?”

“No one,” Sera replied. She narrowed her eyes. This kid was doing an awfully good job keeping up, and it made her mad. She’d kind of hoped he would suck and go home.

Kyle, of course, had to open his stupid mouth. “Avon and Kaliko are our other friends,” he explained. “They took the job originally, but you don’t usually see monster hunting for a party of two at seven-hundred gold, so we’re joining them to help.”

Still panting, Benvolius picked his way over a collection of tree roots. “What’s the typical rate for a two-person party?” he asked. “Or three?”

“Hmm,” Kyle said. “Depends, I guess. The most Sera and I have ever gotten was four hundred, and it took us like two weeks to finish. It was a real shitshow.” He reached out to lift Sera over a particularly muddy patch before hopping over it himself. Then he offered Benvolius a hand without a second thought. Much to Sera’s chagrin, Benvolius blushed.

“We’re also on a quest from a god,” Kyle added, totally unnecessarily.

At that, Benvolius stopped. Sera thanked Librata, because her throat was starting to get dry, and she probably needed a break more than both boys. Her armor reeked. The only thing saving her from sweaty hell was the sharp tang of pine sap and the dampness in the air.

“You two are on a quest from a god?” Benvolius repeated. He blinked rapidly, hands moving to clutch his bow. “Why are you doing that and a monster hunt?”

“Coincidence,” Sera answered. She bent forward to rest her hands on her knees and catch her breath, hoping they’d all shut up for a few minutes, but alas, it was not to be.

Benvolius took a long, careful look at Sera, and she noted with some disdain that his face lingered on her shield, where she wore the holy symbol of Librata. He pursed his lips for a moment, considering the etching of balanced scales, and then gulped, his face drawn in tense, purposeful neutrality, like he was trying to hold something in. “The law goddess,” he breathed. “Oh, good. Maybe you can”-

And then he choked.

“Shit, dude!” Kyle rushed forward to slap him on the back, as if that would dislodge something in his throat

Sera, feeling a sudden unease in her chest, reached for Librata’s power. Unsure of what to do with it, she let it flow up her arms, pooling in her palms as she reached out to press a hand to Benvolius’s chest.

She never made contact. Her hands hit a barrier of magic, and the spells flared up against each other in a blinding flash of white and green. Sera yelped. She yanked her hand away, shaking off the sting of contact, and backed away.

“Bro, what the hell?”

“I don’t”- Benvolius shook, the color draining from his face. His lips quivered, and his whole body vibrated with nerves. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know that would happen. I didn’t mean”-

“Chill for one second, both of you,” Sera snapped. She shook out her stinging hand again and examined it, but she couldn’t tell in the moonlight if it was turning red or not. At least there wasn’t any blistering. Closing her eyes, she steadied herself and tried again, pulling Librata’s spirit up through her heart and neck and head. She let the power settle behind her eyelids, and then carefully pried one eye open.

Nothing immediately jumped out and blinded her, thankfully. She blinked, adjusting to her magic sight, and took in the shape of Benvolius in front of her.

And really, all she could see was the shape of him. Green, curling script wrapped around his form, so tight and bright it turned him into a strange, glowing silhouette. The words writhed and wriggled across his body, especially agitated in the spot Sera had tried to touch him, and they squeezed like a collar around his neck, so tight she could almost see the bulge of his skin over the edge of the text. Carefully, Sera leaned in to get a closer look. Her breathing stopped when she noticed it was that same unfamiliar script that she’d seen in her vision.

“Librata above,” she whispered, and Benvolius tensed under her stare. “What is this?”

“I”- Benvolius stopped, resigned misery pinching his mouth and eyebrows, and put a hand to his throat.

He couldn’t say. That was why he had choked. The spell on him kept him from speaking about certain things. Biting her lips, Sera released her magic sight and blew out a long, slow breath. She needed to think. If Benvolius had something to do with the magic in her vision, then she needed to find a way to get whatever information she could out of him, and then she would need to learn about the spell on him, and if it was possible or wise to break it.

Either way, she’d want to have Kaliko’s help. Shrugging, she turned to Kyle. “He’s under some kind of spell. And stop glaring at him. The fireworks were just a magical reaction.”

Kyle, who had been gearing up to wrestle Benvolius, immediately put up both hands. "Oh, cool. Chill, brah."

"It’s not chill," she replied, tuning back into her tracking spell so she could start walking again. “But it is one more thing we’ll need Kali for, so let’s keep going.”

They trekked onward, following the pings of Sera’s magic. As the moon sank lower and lower in its orbit, the night closed around them, held at bay only by the divine silver torch Kyle lit when he could no longer walk safely. Benvolius's bow, with its perfect wood grain and metal filigree, sparkled under the light. The fine piercings in his ears were bright and reflective, obviously well-polished. A glittering gem clasped the front of his shirt collar, sending off tiny flickers of green light.

He was so obviously from money. But Sera remembered his critical eye as they passed the fallen trees in the logging area. He was familiar with forests and trees, if not the logging business itself, and it showed. Maybe there was other information she could glean from the way he acted, even with the spell over him.

"You know, Benvolius," she started, as she picked her way over an outcropping of rocks, "you never mentioned your family name."

He caught up to her by hopping from rock to rock, landing neatly beside her, feet together. Show-off. “Oh, um. I”- He frowned, the wrinkle of his forehead barely visible in the torch light. “It”-

Sera had thought that would be an easy question, but apparently not. “Suppose we’ll pass on that one then. No need to hurt yourself. Did you go to university?”

“Yes!” The word popped out like a surprise. Benvolius almost tripped when he realized he’d spoken. He touched his lips in wonder, and then tried to think of what else he could say. “I studied forestry and resource management. I thought then I would be more helpful to”- He cut off rather suddenly, but Sera had a few hypotheses for what he was about to say.

"Since you’re familiar with the industry, who is in charge of the logging operations here?"

Benvolius blinked a few times, halfway between bewildered and focused. He wet his lips, taking his time as he considered his answer. "The North Wilds Company," he said eventually. "Why do you ask? You could have seen it on the carts we passed."

Sera, frankly, had no idea she could look for that kind of information. She and Kyle mostly took work from small, local institutions, and the temple filtered out most of the jobs with shady corporate nonsense. Shrugging, she moved on. “And what’s the name of the family that owns the North Wilds Company?”

Benvolius wrinkled his eyebrows. "I- It’s- Oh.”

“Can’t say that one either, huh? Would it be too much conjecture to assume you are, or were, a member of the family in charge of the North Wilds Company?”

Kyle narrowed his eyes, and Benvolius bit his lip, face painfully blank. The muscles in his cheek kept twitching, like something kept him from expressing the emotions in his heart.

“I’m not sure why you would be under a spell that keeps you silent on the matter. It’s incredibly suspicious–not on your part, of course, but on the rest of the family’s. Makes me wonder if they did something wrong that they can’t have you blabbing about.”

Sera could be wrong, of course. Benvolius could neither confirm nor deny any of what she'd just claimed. But she felt she was at least somewhere in the right direction. Thoughts spread thin between Benvolius and keeping her own footing, Sera almost didn't notice the sudden change in her pinging spell's direction.

She did notice though, after a few too many moments. Her head shot up, and she threw a glance back to the boys. "Something happened," she warned them. "The others turned around, and they’re moving fast. Be on guard for when we intercept."

Kyle settled into their framework easily, stepping to Sera's right front, weapon up. Dimly, Sera realized that a mist had swept in sometime in the past few minutes. She could barely make out the moonlight on Kyle's glaive or the shine of his blonde hair. Somehow though, he could sense her every move without looking. When Sera turned right to match Kali and Avon’s ever-changing trajectory, Kyle turned with her. When she stopped to triangulate from a new magic ping, he stopped in front of her.

When Avon and Kali were a quarter mile out, Seraphina started giving directions. “They’re fleeing something,” she told the boys. “Benvolius, are you able to move quickly?”

“Oh! Um, yes ma’am. I have some speed magic.” He immediately adjusted his grip on his bow and rearranged his quiver, and curling vines grew in a protective glove around his bow arm.

She gave him a quick, perfunctory wave. “Split off then, and be ready to follow after. Stay within your firing range in case we have to engage. Kyle, given the travel speed, I’d guess Avon is transformed. I’ll need you to get me on their back so we can all move at the same speed. And so I can talk to Kali.”

“Sure thing, Coach,” he replied, already moving to herd Sera whichever way he needed her to go. As Benvolius disappeared somewhere into the trees, Seraphina waited for another magical ping to confirm they were in the right place.

And then the ground rumbled underfoot. Sera staggered, reaching out to balance herself on Kyle’s arm, and peered into the darkened forest. A carpet of mist crept out from beyond, slowly swirling toward their ankles, and she could just make out Benvolius, somehow already up in a tree, his silhouette dark against the moonlight. The ground shook again.

The rumbling came at shorter and shorter intervals, growing in volume and magnitude until Sera could see the outline of a great, hulking something somewhere in the trees. It was a hundred paces away, and she already had to crane her neck to see its head. The mist had risen from carpet to fog, and she sent out one last, desperate pulse of magic. Kali and Avon had to be on their way. She didn’t think that Kyle and herself alone, or even the two of them with Benvolius’s help, could take on a creature so big.

Her ping returned, and she elbowed Kyle gently in his ribs. “They’re about to pass us. Two o’ clock, keep an eye out.”

Kyle crouched, hands together for Sera to step into, his attention pinballing between the massive, thudding shadow and the spot where they hoped to see Avon and Kali.

Then Sera saw them–a bizarre duo of brightly-colored fish-person atop a giant, copper-red emu. She gulped. Getting on top of Avon would be awful, and Sera didn’t trust the other girl to catch her. But she had to talk to Kali, and Kyle couldn’t outrun a monster if he had to haul Sera along after him.

She stepped into Kyle’s palms, knees bent, body crunched into a half-twist. And then Kyle shifted under her, and she jumped up, springboarding off his hands, throwing herself into a spin to fly right for Avon’s red, avian neck.

A half-second later, she crashed into Avon’s side, her arms closing around their torso. The giant emu squawked so loudly, the townsfolk of Brick Grove could probably hear it. Kali let out a dainty little ‘eep!’ and then tugged Sera up to try and keep her from falling off.

“Seraphina? What in the six seas are you doing here?”

“Hng,” Sera groaned, as she held on for dear life. Avon kept waving their long neck, wailing and groaning and being a general pain the ass, and it was all she could do to keep herself mostly on the bird’s back.

“Well, I suppose we’ll discuss this later,” Kali said, breathy and beautiful as always. She risked a backward glance and tugged on one of Avon’s brilliant red feathers. “Avon! Dodge left!”

Avon-bird swerved left right as they hurdled over a fallen log, and Sera watched her life flash before her eyes in a blur of moss-covered bark. Her armored feet clanged against the wood, and her stomach lifted into a cavity in her chest she was pretty sure wasn’t supposed to be there. Something hit the ground behind them with a earth-shaking thud.

She turned to Kaliko. “Back-up plan?”

“I prepared a teleportation circle in Brick Grove. We’ll need everyone in physical contact though.”

Holding back a spout of bile, Seraphina shot the other girl a thumbs up. She braced herself through another few seconds of shaking, flailing bird-running and then summoned as much air as she could. "Get in close boys!" Avon-bird hurtled over a massive tree stump and swerved past a gargantuan trunk. Sera felt her stomach move in ways it was never designed for. "We're going to teleport!"

Then she vomited over the side of the emu. Avon-bird screeched in protest.

"Goodness gracious," Kaliko said mildly. The black scales over her eyes moved in an approximation of concerned eyebrows. "No wonder you don't imbibe."

Sera was pretty sure alcohol tolerance had nothing to do with her ability to keep a meal down while holding onto a sprinting emu. And besides, Kali was the weird one for being able to look so elegant right now.

"Do you have magic sight?" Sera asked as Avon crashed through a thicket of ferns. Her face passed dangerously close to a tree trunk.

Kali patted the breast pocket on her shirt. "Invariably. Why?"

“Bad feeling,” Sera said. Her voice wobbled up and down as she bounced on Avon’s back. “Can I borrow it? I don’t think I can do it myself right now.”

Kaliko set a pair of thin-rimmed glasses with a beaded strap on Sera’s nose before twisting back around to keep watching out for attacks. Sera finally managed to wrap an arm around something sturdy–maybe one of Avon’s tiny emu wings. She craned her neck, peering past Kali’s thigh, and gaped.

The monster was massive. It stalked through the trees, shadowy body passing right through them, while its heavy, clawed arms tore gashes in the earth. The thing moved like a gorilla, galloping on hands and feet, but its shape writhed and twisted, sometimes moose-like, sometimes wolfish, and still other times loosely bear-shaped. Its eyes glowed a horrible, lightless white. When Sera found the wherewithal to look, she noticed the trees turn from green to grey around it.

And the worst part? Eerie green script wrapped all around its body, in the same curling handwriting that covered Benvolius and criss-crossed the woods in her vision.

“Shit,” Sera hissed, right as the monster rose a hand to strike at them again. She hung her head off Avon’s side and tore off the glasses. “Kali, where are the boys?”

"Dodge right Avon!" Kali shouted, and then lowered her voice to speak to Sera. "Kyle has almost caught up. Did you intend to pluralize"-

Sera couldn’t wait. They needed to get out. "Benvolius!" she screeched, "Get your ass over here right"-

She didn't get the opportunity to finish. A plume of jade mist erupted overhead, and the weight of a scrawny young man fell right upon her back. Avon-bird yelped. One of Kyle's large, calloused hands closed around Seraphina's ankle. Kaliko muttered something that sounded vaguely like a bunch of bubbles and clicks, and then the whole world fell away in one whirling, stomach-turning, moment.

All five of them toppled onto the hard, wooden floor of a tiny hostel room, tangled up in each other's necks and limbs and weapons. Avon-bird let out a long, exhausted honk. Benvolius whimpered like a dog in a thunderstorm.

Sera threw up on the teleportation circle.