Kyen and Adeya sat at the table with Marhei and her two children. Theiho’s seat at the head stood empty. Behind it, rain dripped with a hiss into a fire that burned low in the hearth.
Marhei served rabbit stewed with turnips and peas into bowls. Her children—a boy and his younger sister—sat across from Kyen and Adeya. The two stared at the travelers with wide eyes.
“I can’t thank you enough for your hospitality.” Adeya fluffed out her damp hair with her fingers. “I can’t remember the last time I had the luxury of a hot bath.”
Marhei offered her a tight smile and a bowl.
“Are you really travelers from the Great Highway?” asked the boy.
“Manners, Kelleth,” said Marhei. “Pass this to your sister.” She placed a bowl at Theiho’s empty spot and then sat down.
Kyen began shoveling food into his mouth.
“It feels so good to be dry!” said Adeya, taking up her spoon. “And clean. I’m never taking baths for granted again.”
“Where have you come from?” asked Kelleth.
“We’ve traveled up from Isea.”
“Isea.” The boy’s eyes grew wide with wonder. “The Kingdom of Summoners.”
“Kelleth.” Marhei shot him a warning glance.
“Are you a noblewoman run away with your lover?” asked the little girl.
Adeya flushed.
Kyen almost tipped his bowl into his lap and fumbled it back to the table.
“Sareth! Don’t ask impertinent questions!” said Marhei.
“But that’s what you said, mama,” replied the little girl.
Marhei sat up straight as a rod, coloring. “Forgive my children.”
“It’s alright.” Adeya fiddled with her napkin.
“May… may I have seconds?” Kyen asked in a quiet voice, red to his ears, and holding out his bowl without meeting anyone’s eye.
Another drip hissed into the fire.
Spoons clinked on pottery.
Marhei poured one ladle of stew into Kyen’s outstretched bowl.
“You’re on a quest, aren’t you?” Kelleth started again.
“Yes, I suppose you could say that,” said Adeya.
“What kind of quest?”
“We’re looking for the arcangels.”
“Arcangels.” Kelleth breathed it out like a sacred word. “You mean they’re real?”
Adeya glanced at Kyen; he kept his eyes on his bowl, but his spoon slowed to a halt.
“Of course,” she said. “Isea used to be full of them, but they fell silent. We mean to find them.”
“Wow…” said Kelleth. “So you’re a summoner then?”
“No, not exactly. But if I find an arcangel, I will train to become one.” Adeya tucked her hair out of her face.
“Wow…”
The sound of the front door opening caught all their attention.
“Thank the Arc!” Marhei threw her napkin to the table and rose from her seat. She stepped out into the hallway where Theiho’s deep tones carried in to them.
Sareth watched her mother leave then looked back at Adeya. “Are you sure you’re not lovers?”
* * *
“This will be your room for the night.” Theiho, candle in hand, opened a door into the bedroom: a narrow bed with a side table, a fireplace with a mantle, a window dark with the swirling mists of night. “Wake me if you need anything.” He passed the candle to Adeya.
“Thank you.” She watched Theiho’s back as he descended the stairs. She sighed contentedly and looked at Kyen, but seeing his serious face, her smile faltered.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
He blinked and looked at her. “About what?”
“Did I say too much?”
“Too much about what?”
“The arcangels.”
“Oh.” He thought for a moment. “No, but I’d still be careful. The less people know about Kade the better.”
“I’m sorry,” she said again.
“It’s alright. It really is.”
A silence fell between them.
Kyen walked to the window to peer out into the blackness. The rain had died away into an infrequent drip. “We should be safe for the night with a Firstwold ruin so close. Safe from fiends, at least.”
“Will you take Kade to the ruin tonight?” she asked.
“Maybe,” he said. “He’s short aura after our encounter with Ennyen.”
“It’d be good to keep him strong,” she said. “We don’t know when we’ll find the next ruin.”
He nodded.
Silence fell between them again, but it lasted only a moment.
Seizing upon a chair, Kyen began dragging it towards the doorway.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Going to sleep.”
“With a chair?”
Kyen stopped at the doorway. He didn’t meet her eyes as he colored a little. “I’d rather you have the room.”
“Oh, I didn’t think of that.” Adeya fiddled with her sleeve, casting the single bed an uncomfortable glance and coloring also. “You could ask Theiho for another room?”
“It’s late. I don’t sleep well in beds anyway. I’ll be more comfortable with this.” Kyen gave her a reassuring smile as he nudged the chair. She looked unconvinced.
“If you say so,” she said. “Good night.”
“Good night.” Kyen closed the door behind him.
Adeya, shaking her head, heaved a sigh. She set the candle on the bedside table and gazed out the window. Taking her amulet, she placed it beside the candle and climbed under the covers.
Outside her door, in the dimness of the hall, Kyen slumped into the chair. Crossing his arms over his chest, he reclined back to bobble the chair on its two hind legs.
* * *
The fire had burned low in Adeya’s room. She slept under its faint glow with the cold candle and her amulet laying on the table beside her. The occasional drip still hit the window with a plick.
Out of the night, a shape blacker than darkness swooped to the windowsill. It alighted, feathers whispering against the glass as its wings flapped to a stop. Sharp teeth glinted in the firelight as the fiend pressed its empty face to the pane. Seeing Adeya fast asleep, it grinned.
The outline of the fiend swelled and disappeared into an inky cloud that emitted from its body. It stained the glass, obscuring the pane and eating it away, until all at once it vanished.
Stepping out of the cloud, the fiend slipped through the opening in the window and entered the room. Its claws clicked softly on the sill as it stalked towards Adeya’s bed. The long plumes of its tail snaked in behind it as it hopped onto the bedside table.
The wicked mouth spread wider. Dark, cloud-like miasma began to drift off its body again, forming tendrils that thickened and slithered into the room.
The amulet at the fiend’s feet glowed blue, but the fiend paid it no attention. It took another step toward Adeya, its miasma crawling through the air towards her and alighting first on the candlestick. Where it touched the windows, the walls, the floor, the table, it began spreading—like ink spilling over the surfaces and oozing up the walls. The candle, completely blackened next to the fiend, disintegrated. Only the amulet remained untouched in the midst of the miasma, growing brighter and brighter as the room darkened. Adeya groaned and shifted as the blue light touched her face.
The tendrils crept along the bedclothes, inching their way towards her.
A sudden flash exploded from the amulet. It swept the room, burning the air clean of miasma, wiping it from the furniture, the bedclothes, the walls. The fiend hissed and stumbled away. Adeya started upright with a gasp. Her eyes found the fiend, and all of her tensed as she drew in one great breath. The fiend lowered its head to chortle at her, and she leapt from bed.
“KYEN!” She screamed. She flung open the door, only to leap back with a cry as a shape tumbled into her room. Kyen, chair and all, fell over backwards and crashed to the ground. His head made a loud thunk as it hit the floorboards.
“Ow...” He struggled to lift himself to his elbows, holding his head. He gave Adeya a confused and groggy look as she stared back with wide eyes, clutching her collar.
“Fiend!” she squeaked out, pointing.
Kyen looked back and, seeing the dark shape, scrambled to get to his feet and draw his sword.
The fiend backed out of the window and wailed at them: three spine-tingling notes. It leapt from the sill as Kyen reached it. He threw open the sash.
The fiend winged a wide circle to settle on the roof across the street. It shook itself, puffed out its feathers, and shrieked at them.
Kyen’s brows drew down, his jaw took on a grim set, and his face darkened the longer he stared at it.
The fiend shrieked at him again.
Adeya, having lit a spare candle from the mantle, joined him.
“We need to go. Now,” he said, without taking his eyes from the fiend.
“I’ve never seen a fiend like that before.”
“It was a caladrius.” A muscle worked in Kyen’s jaw.
“A bird of healing? But I thought those were a myth from the Firstwold!”
The caladrius fiend purred out a strange growling chortle. With a flap of its broad wings, it shot into the sky, trailing its tail plumage like black ribbons, and vanished into the night.
“We really need to leave now?” repeated Adeya. One look at his face sent her hurrying after her amulet, sword, and pack.
A bell began clanging wildly outside, catching Kyen’s attention and bringing Adeya to a halt. It rang out over the rooftops from the direction of the gate. A signal fire lit up the watchtower as the tolling rose to a frantic pace. A loud crunch jolted the tower askew, silencing the bell. The tower sank below the rooftops, crumpling, and disappeared with a crashing thud that trembled through their room. Several other warning bells began ringing into the silence left by the first.
Kyen whirled away, and he dashed with Adeya out of the bedroom.