8. We Come In Peace (Patreon)

Clutching her two children, the mother backed into the cave. The father stepped forward, a hand on his gun. “Stay back.”

“No, no, we’re here to hide, too. We’re not going to hurt anyone,” I said, putting my hands up.

The boy looked at me. “No?”

“No,” I replied firmly.

The father glanced from one of us to the other, whites showing in his eyes. Like his children, dark curls tumbled over his forehead, though his children took after his wife’s bright amber eyes. Amid the crowd of curls, the mother stood out, pale and red-headed, a faint wave in her hair. All four wore linen and cotton in the more formal style favored in Elgany.

I frowned. Wait, don’t tell me…

“How do you know about this spot?” the father demanded.

The boy glanced upward. I followed his gaze, then lifted a hand to my lips and gestured for the family to move deeper into the cave. They crowded back, huddling against the stone wall.

Pressing my back against the cave wall, I slung Cher over my shoulder. With a loose hold, I pointed her barrel down, ready to whip her up at the first sign of trouble. The boy pressed up beside me, peering upward as well. I shot him a look, silently asking what he was up to.

He quirked an eyebrow and shot the same look back.

Damn kids. I shook my head and ignored him.

Gunfire blasted overhead. Heavy thumps rang out, metal clashing against metal, flesh thumping against flesh. Someone screamed, a scream that cut off abruptly.

“Hand over the core!” a man with an Elgan accent shouted.

Silence from the other side. Fire roared overhead.

The thumping grew closer. Directly overhead, grunts and thuds rang out. A startled shout, and a man fell, dropping past the cave entrance. His eyes widened. He reached out for the ledge.

As his fingers closed on the stone, I stomped. He screeched and let go instinctively. Horror flashed over his face. He vanished.

The husband and the wife put their heads together, muttering fiercely. I glared at them and raised a finger to my lips. They quieted, but didn’t stop.

Argh, married couples. The only thing worse than kids.

The battle raged on overhead. Bored, I squatted and pulled out a pack of cards from an inner pocket. “Know how to play War, kid?”

“Play… war?” The kid furrowed his brows.

I nodded, shuffling. “You know. I play a two, you play a three, you take my cards, and vice versa, yeah?”

“I know,” a girl whispered in my ear.

I jumped and whirled to find that the two small creatures had escaped their mother’s grasp. Up close, they didn’t look as small as they had earlier, all scrunched up and scared. The boy, the older of the two, looked to be fifteen or so, while the girl was closer to the kid’s age, somewhere between twelve and fourteen.

“Is he covered in blood?” the boy whispered, incredulous.

“Is he okay?” the girl asked, concerned.

“It’s not his. And yes.”

The siblings looked at the kid. He drew away slightly, back arched, for all the world like a spooked cat ready to run.

“You’re hunters, right? So it’s monster blood,” the boy declared.

I shrugged. He wasn’t wrong.

Bridging the cards with a satisfying fwip-fwip-fwip, I started to deal out three places. “So. War. Kid, watch the first round. You’ll pick it up fast.”

“War is a kid’s game,” the boy opined, crossing his arms.

Great. A cool kid. Just what I need. “And you’re a kid. So?”

“I’m not a kid,” he pouted.

“Then… you don’t want to play?” I started to scoop his cards back up.

He put his hand on his deck, catching it in place. “I’ll play. But only because I’m bored.”

I snorted and finished dealing. Casting around the kids, I nodded. “What’s your names, anyways?”

“I’m Violetta, but you can call me Vi. And that’s Milton. But he goes by Mills nowadays,” the girl introduced them.

“Vi! You can’t just tell that to a stranger!” Milton hissed.

“I’m Kit. On your way to Dagta from Elgany?”

Vi pressed her lips together nervously and glanced at her brother. Milton glared at me.

“Alright, alright. Just a casual question.” I waved them down.

“What’s your name?” Vi asked, turning to the kid.

He drew back, startled, and looked at me. I shrugged back at him. “I don’t know your name. Don’t look at me.”

He leaned in and whispered in my ear, “I don’t have one.”

Startled, I stared at him. What do you mean, ‘you don’t have one?’ What am I supposed to do about that? Not knowing what else to do, I shrugged at Vi. “I think he’s a little shy. Maybe give him a minute?”

Somewhat disappointed, she nodded.

I shook my head at her. A minute ago, you were afraid of this kid, and now you want to be friends? Kids sure are resilient. “Alright. Three, two, one, go!”

The kid hovered over my shoulder, curious.

“Ten beats eight and three.” Milton scooped up the first round.

“King beats Jack and five.” Vi grabbed the second.

I pulled my next card and smirked.

The kid looked at me, curious. “It doesn’t have a lot of dots, or a pretty picture.”

“Yeah, that’s cuz it’s the Ace—takes Queen and ten,” I grinned, scooping up my pile.

He tipped his head, confused.

“Ace is the strongest card. No matter what, it beats everything,” I explained.

“If you’re playing aces high, anyways,” Milton informed me haughtily, tossing his curls out of his eyes.

I was playing cards before you were a twinkle in your father’s eye, kid, but thanks. I barely resisted the urge to roll my eyes at the fifteen-year-old and sighed instead. Ah, sometimes it hurts to be so mature.

The kid blinked. “What’s the strongest ace called?”

Across from me, Milton played a ten, the same as me. I furrowed my brows and dealt out three cards facedown, casually palming a fourth off the bottom of my deck where I always kept a spare ace. No way was I going to lose a game of War to a stuck-up fifteen-year-old, even if it meant I had to cheat.

I frowned thoughtfully. “Strongest? There’s no such thing in War. Uh, in Spades it’s the ace of spades, but it depends on the game…”

“Ace.” He nodded to himself. “My name is Ace. Ace Spade.”

“You came up with that just now,” Milton accused him.

“Hush, you,” I replied, flipping over my ace. “Ooh, looks like those cards are mine.”

Milton scowled, distracted. “You cheated.”

“Prove it,” I said, sitting back and crossing my arms.

“You played that ace a round ago! We haven’t gone through the whole deck yet, you can’t have it again.”

“Counting cards is a good way to get thrown out of casinos,” I advised him. Overhead, the sounds had faded, so I scooped up all the cards and passed them to the kid. “Would you look at the time. I’ve gotta go talk to your parents. Ace, you watch the kids, okay?”

He nodded solemnly.

“Hey! I’m older than him,” Milton replied, annoyed.

“Sorry, I was talking to the responsible one, what did you say?” I asked. Milton glowered at me, but before he could snap back, I flounced off. Ah, it hurts to be so mature. I barely even antagonized the poor teen, and look at me, walking off, taking the high ground.

Being the mature human being I was, I made a beeline for the parents. “Hello, fellow respectable adults. Did you send for a Great Sage?”

The father squinted at me. The mother’s eyes widened. “You… the light of phoenix shines.”

“Beckoning the moths to flame.” I reached out my hand and passed the token to her.

Her eyes widened. The token flashed once as she vanished it into a pocket, feather flaring almost like fire. “I thought—we couldn’t make the agreed-upon spot, I thought we’d missed you. How did you find us?”

Pure happenstance. I grinned and sat back in my hips, sliding my hands in my pockets. “What can I say? I have mysterious ways.”

The father glanced at the mother. “This is…?”

She nodded. “A friend. Someone who can guide us to safety.”

He looked me over, skeptical.

I winked, making no effort to look any less like the scrawny twenty-something people usually took me for.

“Are you sure?” he whispered to his wife.

“It’s better than nothing,” she muttered back.

“Call me Kit,” I offered sunnily, pretending not to hear them. I held out my hand.

The wife took my hand first. “Rose.”

“And I’m Edmund,” the man added.

“So you named the daughter, and you named the son?” I asked, pointing at each in turn.

Rose furrowed her brows. “Huh?”

“Nothing, nothing. Listen, it’s a bit dicey out there. Are any of you chimera?”

“Chimera?” Edmund asked, confused.

“Are any of us mages. She’s asking if we have cores,” Rose clarified. She shook her head. “No, neither of us had any interest. The permits… and what would we do with magic, anyways?”

“Permits?” I asked. Permits, to have a core? Damn, Elgany really is a whole other world.

“Yes, I believe Dagta has a similar system?”

“If it does, it’s plumb broken,” I muttered.

Rose drew back, suddenly hesitant.

Shut up, shut up. If they balk now, we’re all dead. I smiled. “Just kidding! Hey, just checking, but not the kids either…?”

“The—no! You have to be eighteen to apply to become a mage.”

I glanced over my shoulder at Ace. “Huh.”

“Mom wouldn’t let us, anyways,” Milton tattled, scowling up from his game. “She says we can’t be mages, no matter what.”

“Milton, quiet,” Rose snapped.

I waved my hand. “Don’t worry. I understand. We share an old friend. A history, yes?”

Rose’s eyes widened as they met mine. “You—”

“Didn’t you ask for the Great Sage? Here I am, in the flesh.” I grinned.

She laughed. “It’s fine, you don’t need to reassure me. The token alone—we’re just glad to have someone.”

“No, for real,” I said. “It’s me! Hello. Great Sage, or if you like, Heaven’s Equal. At your service.”

“The Sage died in the Great War, in the Combustion. Please stop exaggerating. It’s not endearing,” Edmund said stiffly.

“Ugh, I see where Milton gets it from,” I groaned.

Edmund straightened his back, leveraging the two inches he had on me to their fullest extent. “Excuse me?”

Once again, I took the high road and ignored him. I’m being so mature today. Honestly, I’m outdoing myself. “Just to check, but no cored gear either?”

Rose shook her head. “We try to distance ourselves from magic as much as possible.”

I nodded. I don’t agree, but I get it. “Alright, listen. The Elgan army will be all over this forest sooner rather than later. There’s a mad cult who uh, is probably after you, but I know where they are and how they got in. If we move soon, we should be able to make it out.”

“A cult?” Rose asked, concerned.

I nodded. “Yep. Definitely after you guys.” Casually, I adjusted my jacket, brushing my hand by an inner pocket that pulsed with magic and a dim warmth. Definitely not after Quetz’s core, which I definitely don’t have. “Do you recall offending any cults?”

“N…no, not that I can recall…”

“They’re the scary kind, huh? Don’t even know what you did to offend them, and they’re still chasing you down,” I said, shaking my head. “Anyways, they’re busy dueling the army right now. When the sun sets and everything gets all dusky, that’s when we’ll make our move.”

Rose nodded. Less certain, Edmund gave me a narrow-eyed look and said nothing, which I took as agreement. “Right. Rest up, for now. Be ready to move out when I say.”

Tipping my hat at the adults, I wandered back to the others. “Alright, kiddos, deal me in!”

“There’s no space for cheaters!” Milton snapped.

Behind me, Edmund whispered, “Are you sure, dear? There’s still time.”

“We have no other choice,” Rose hissed back.

I clicked my tongue and shook my head. No trust in this world anymore. Adults, kids… distrust and disbelief from all corners. What happened to trust and love?