“Oh, my heart, your face! Look what they did to you! Are you alright? Have you been healed yet?”
“A scratch, my love, nothing more. What about you? Your leg—”
“I’m fine,” Elodie assured Ludger as she placed a kiss on his lips to silence his concern. “Priestess Eir was able to set the bone and heal me some moments ago. But what about you? Are you sure you aren’t hurt?”
“I could be pierced by a thousand arrows and I would be well, now that I know you are safe,” Ludger said with utmost sincerity as he gazed lovingly into Elodie’s eyes. “There is no number of demons in the world that would stop me from coming to your side.”
“I knew you would come for me,” Elodie whispered as a deep blush colored her cheeks. “Even at my most frightened, I knew you would be my hero and rescue me…”
The display was almost sickeningly sweet. Jadis did her best not to intrude on the private moment, but there wasn’t a whole lot of space in the front display room of the dressmaker’s shop. Even averting her eyes, she could still hear the distinct sounds of the couple’s public display of affection. Their words and expressions were, in her opinion, overly melodramatic, but she did her best not to roll her eyes. Ludger just seemed to be that kind of expressive personality who spoke every sentence like it was a sonnet. Especially when it came to something he was passionate about. As for Elodie…
To Jadis’ surprise, the affection she was seeing on display from the bratty woman looked to be genuine. The way her eyes were locked onto Ludger, the blush in her cheeks, the little movements she made with her hands and how she angled her body; Jadis was convinced the love was real. Which was really quite the shock, since she was certain that Elodie was just marrying the big man because he was one of the Hero’s companions.
From what Vraekae had told her, Ludger had been pining after the young noblewoman since they were both youths, yet she had spurned his advances because he was a commoner and she was the granddaughter of the local duke. However, now that Jadis had met Ludger and seen just how astonishingly handsome he was, maybe that story had a different side to it. Elodie definitely came across as smitten with the man. Maybe that attraction had been there all along and she had pushed it away for purposes of duty to her family? It would make some sense, since Jadis doubted nobles often married purely for love, and more often for political gain. Ludger becoming the Bulwark would have solved that problem for Elodie nicely, though.
Whatever the situation was between the two, Elodie and Ludger’s love life really wasn’t Jadis’ business. The only reason why she was putting so much thought into it at all was because she was distracting herself while they all waited for one of Wilhelm’s other companions to arrive.
The pastry shop where Elodie and Alex had arranged for the injured to be taken was part of a five-story building that had a different shop on each level. The second floor was a high-class shoemaker’s shop, which was where the rest of the injured had been moved to in order to keep them separate from the initial bunch that had been led out of the restaurant. It was still possible that some in that number could be cultists, but the people in the pastry shop were Jadis’ prime suspects.
The third floor of the building was a dressmaker’s shop, which was where Jay, Syd, Alex, Wilhelm, Ludger, Amarantha, and Elodie were. There were also several soldiers stationed by the stairwell that led in and out of the shop, as well as one of the guard captains who had taken a position of command in the area during the crisis. The man’s name was Rolland, and he was still busily giving orders to military runners who were taking his messages out to the soldiers and guards in the area. Wilhelm had asked him to join them since they might need to send out some urgent messages, depending on what they learned from the Demon that they were going to interrogate.
“Do we have to wait for both the Oracle and the Paladin?” Syd asked Wilhelm as she tapped her bare foot on the plush carpet. “The longer we wait, the more time we give the cultists to do something.”
“No, we don’t have to wait for both,” Wilhelm shook his head. “Either Jocelyn or Lucia would be of help here.”
Jocelyn the Oracle and Lucia the Paladin. Jadis knew a little about both from Vraekae’s information, but she didn’t know too much, either. The Oracle was human and had already been known as a skilled healer even before becoming one of the Hero’s companions. Lucia was a therion, Jadis had been surprised to learn. Considering what she knew of therions from her lover Kerr and her mentor, Noll, she had trouble imagining one as a holy knight. Still, Lucia had evidently been a rising star among the ranks of Valtar’s holy order of paladins when she had heard the call and joined up with Wilhelm and become “The Paladin” instead of just “a paladin”. Not the most clear-cut naming convention, in Jadis’ opinion.
Apparently, both women possessed some means of detecting if a person was a cultist. Jocelyn had a ritual she could perform that would let her know if anyone in the vicinity possessed a cultist class, or a class dedicated to Samleos. Lucia had a spell that let her know if a person was “dedicated” to Samleos, whatever that meant. She wouldn’t know their class or anything, and she needed to be able to touch the person to cast the spell on them, but she would know if they were involved with the god of death.
Jadis understood why Wilhelm wanted at least one of the two to be around for the interrogation, since they would be immediately helpful in confirming any info on who was a cultist or might have been involved in the attack, but that didn’t mean she was happy with the delay. There was, Jadis was certain, a cultist down on the first floor who had managed to slip one of the cursed pendants back onto Dys during all the fighting. Aila and Eir’s parents were down there. As were most of her lovers. The idea of the bastard being down there, basically free to do gods knew what, was making her tense. She wanted the cultist dealt with, and not just for her own sense of vengeance for what they had put her through.
At least her lovers were in the know and doing what they could to make sure everyone was being watched. Thea was practically glued to Eir’s side, and Aila was sticking right next to her parents. Kerr and Sorcha were keeping close to Eir’s parents, Sabina was still with Dys, and Bridget was wandering between the different groups while keeping her ears and eyes open.
“I believe Lucia has arrived,” Amarantha called out from where she sat on the windowsill at the front of the shop. “Along with Halvor. And a gaggle of priests, by the look of it.”
Jay took a few steps closer and leaned over to take a look out of the window. The street down below was still chaotic with the number of soldiers running around, but it was more organized than it had been an hour ago. A group of riders on horseback had come to a stop in front of their building and Jadis could see that Amarantha was right about the priests. A group of ten men and women were dismounting, all of them wearing priestly robes and displaying the symbols of various gods. Jadis recognized one man as a priest of Charos who she had sparred with in the temple district, though she didn’t remember his name at the moment. The priests were quick to disperse into the crowd of soldiers, the glow of their healing magic easily visible despite the many lanterns and torches lighting the street. Jadis was certain that anyone who was still injured from the attack was about to get some excellent treatment, though the healing wasn’t going to help those who hadn’t survived the battle.
Among the priests, Jadis saw two figures who stood out. One was a broad-shouldered human man with red hair that had been shaved on either side of his head to give him a thick mohawk. His goatee was thick and the hair on his chin was long enough to reach his chest. His upper body was bare; no sign of armor or even a stitch of cloth, but his skin was covered in dark blue tattoos. The man had two axes on his belt, but the moment he was off of his horse she saw that he had drawn the weapons and was looking around the area with sharp eyes.
The other was a woman wearing chainmail and a steel breastplate that had the symbol of Valtar emblazoned across the front. She was a pale woman, almost as pale as Jadis, with a mane of thick white hair. She had two black horns that curved out from her forehead, though they were nowhere near as long as Kerr’s horns, probably no more than six inches. She was carrying a sword on her back that was nearly as tall as she was, and when she turned her back towards the building to speak with a priest, Jadis saw that the sword’s blade was wavy in the style of a flamberge. When she turned back towards the building and looked up, Jay could see that her cat-like eyes were an unsettling shade of red, not too dissimilar from Vraekae’s irises.
Wilhelm quickly disappeared down the stairs and, a minute later, led the Paladin and the Berserker into the shop. When the two entered, Jadis saw that Halvor was a few inches taller than Wilhelm despite his hunched posture, but still shorter than Ludger. Lucia was the same height as the Hero, though she seemed taller thanks to her short horns and her rigid posture.
As the three entered the room, Jay saw Halvor’s dark eyes instantly shoot towards Alex who was standing next to Syd. The man let out a deep growl and bared his teeth like a wolf.
“Calm yourself, Halvor,” Wilhelm said as he put a hand on the man’s shoulder. “Alex is our ally, in this endeavor.”
“I don’t see how a demon can be trusted,” the man growled as he continued to rake Alex with an angry eye. “Even if you put it in a dress and teach it a few words.”
“Talk shit about Alex and I’ll put your head through that wall,” Syd calmly pointed at Halvor, then at the wall behind him. “Touch her without permission, and I’ll break you in half.”
“Hvem tror du at du snakker med?” the wild man puffed his chest as he turned on Syd. “I’ll rip your tongue out if you keep wagging it like a bitch.”
“Stop!” Wilhelm shouted as Halvor took an angry step towards Syd. “That’s not why we’re here!”
Syd had taken her own menacing step forward, but reined her impulse in. She could kick the shit out of the barbarian later.
“Then why are we here?” Halvor shrugged Wilhelm’s hand off of his shoulder but took a step back. “Something about cultists?”
“An interrogation, supposedly,” Lucia spoke. Her voice was calm and her accent tinged in that French way that Jadis was familiar with from others in the city. “Who are we questioning?”
Wilhelm looked towards Syd, which she took as a signal. Cracking open the sealed wooden box she held under one arm, she pulled the wriggling form of the possession Demon out of it and held it up for the room to see.
“This little shit,” Syd explained. “Alex is going to get whatever information she can out of it. This one was possessing the body of a scholar from the academy, so I assume it’s higher level than most and must have been around a while. It’s probably seen things that can help us root out any cultists or conspirators, if Alex can get it to talk.”
“That’s a big if, if you ask me,” Ludger said as he inserted himself into the conversation. He had left Elodie sitting on one of the plush benches by the wall and took up a position next to Wilhelm. “How would you convince the swine to say anything? Death is no threat to a Demon, and I cannot think of any bribe you could coerce one with.”
“I don’t know,” Syd shrugged. “But I’m going to try. If you all want to help, you’re welcome to. If not, then go do whatever it is you’re going to do elsewhere, because I’m too tired to dick around right now.”
“This is a Nephilim, hm?” Halvor said as he crossed his arms across his muscular chest. “Not as prissy as I had feared.”
“Go priss your face,” Syd flipped the barbarian the bird.
“Sallow hag.”
“Pig fucker.”
“You are… Both being… Rude…”
Alex’s interruption caused Syd to cut off her next words as she realized she’d gotten caught up in the moment. Halvor was also silenced as he stared at the frowning Demon woman with his jaw hanging open.
“Perhaps we should… proceed with the interrogation?” Wilhelm asked as he, too, stared at Alex with some measure of disbelief.
“Yes, we should,” Syd nodded. “Come on, Alex. Let’s see what this little shit has to say for itself.”
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