Infernal Investigations

Gregory Montague had been used for weeks now to the lack of Tarver’s music.

It had long been a herald of waking, a set of notes echoing across his unconscious mind. Even deep asleep, he’d been aware the moment it happened. Seconds later he’d awake.

That had stopped soon after his brother disappeared. And it wasn’t the only sign Gregory had seen in the time since the end of that messy affair.

That wasn’t important, as his eyes flickered open, pain coursing through his body. Duller than it should be, given his injuries. But if his limbs felt like anything, it was more lead than open wounds, heavy and unable to be moved. His eyelids barely moved as he slowly forced them open.

Gregory expected to see some damp cavern roof, or the rotted-through wood of some criminal hideaway. It had been that kind of week so far. Instead, it was the familiar tile roof; it was slate, with a crudely drawn dragon with multiple heads, each an exaggerated caricature with a passing familiarity to one of the senior bards of Tarver.

So, Lisa’s latest creation had survived. Probably because no one had the time to scrub it clean yet. She’d already defended it voraciously with the argument that if no one was going to put any art up there, she might as well. She was just irritated that the usual allowance of caricatures and satirical drawings had been temporarily halted thanks to the great animated magic incident two months ago. At least none of her drawings had made it outside.

Just another fanciful day at the temple. Things had been…simpler then. Father was distant, but in some ways eager to be rid of his black sheep son. Willing to let things remain simpler, as long as Gregory kept his visits to his siblings brief enough. Ending what had been the reason he’d agreed to join the temple to begin with.

That’s when the music had started; a guide, he’d been told by those at the temple, including Singer Miles, the man who had been his guide until then. He’d been trying to figure out his life then, without what had driven him here. Gregory’d like to think he started puzzling out.

Then Edward got sick, and he found himself in some stranger’s apartment, her on top of him, saber’s edge against his throat, yellow eyes glaring down at him.

And now he guideless, abandoned, and even music…it was hard to focus on beautiful things when you’d started being dragged through the muck. Just a little, but it still haunted his dreams.

Ever since then he’d been drifting, feeling further and further from where he once was. And now it had landed him here, almost dead once again. It felt duller than last time, that bit of adrenaline less than before as his mind went back to when he’d almost died.

Tarver help him, maybe this is part of why Malvia was the way she is. Only now he was the one going through it.

He tried to move. His eyes were open now, but not by much. His mouth could move. Nothing else. Was he paralyzed? His eyes darted around, but his limited vision meant he couldn’t see far. And then a fibrous stalk of matter crawled into his line of sight, golden lights shining along its surface, and Gregory allowed himself to relax.

Gregory still remembered the first time he had met the Muse Verivaein, if only because no one else here would let him live down what had happened. Throwing a chair at the divine servant of your god, followed by what he could only argue afterwards had not been a shriller scream than even the church’s most talented soprano could manage.

Everyone present insisted it had been, and the Choirmaster had stated his biggest regret was not having anything there to record it.

In Gregory’s defense, Verivaein had decided down in the vaults that his relative isolation meant he didn’t need to disguise his appearance to more easily interact with humans anymore. Even when meeting new people. Which meant instead of some divinely handsome muse, Gregory had found four wings filled with eyeballs attached to what charitably might be called a golden sparkling mushroom. Which had started yelling exuberantly about meeting someone new, while golden fibers flew across the room from its body, yelling about what a glorious morsel he would make in service to Tarver.

Gregory still believed throwing a chair had been a restrained response.

Verivaein had merely stated afterward that it was in the middle of the pack of responses to his behavior, and probably because he’d been having a boring day and hadn’t come up with any original material for their meeting.

“Gregory,” a comforting voice said all around, several pleasant voices layering on top of each other, echoing like a series of bells.

Gregor winced, shivering, trying to get back under his covers. Close, too close to that thing speaking. Gleeful discordant tones gloating as it reached down and-

“The devil,” Gregory forced out. “It spoke in three voices. Sorry, it is silly-“

“No,” the Muse said, now only a single voice, sounding like a chime dancing in the wind, tone apologetic. “It is never silly to ask for comfort.” Gregory nodded, relaxing a little. Once you got past Verivaein’s eccentricities, and the Muse himself eased up on the initial teasing, he was quite a kind soul. Even if those initial months were filled with eccentricities.

“I’m safe?” Gregory asked, the words feeling dull in his mouth. He could remember the voice that had talked to him before he passed out. Barnes, he thought? Maybe. Everything about that was fuzzy, which if it was Barnes could either be a head injury or a sign she was manipulating his memory.

Whatever Malvia might think of her, there was something inherently creepy about the pink-suited human.

“You are,” Verivaein assured him, chimes like a soft wind echoing in his voice. “Whatever this devil was that assaulted you out there, it cannot make it in here. And even if it made it inside, it would perish at my hands easily enough.”

“I can’t move,” Gregory said. “Anything below my neck, and even my eyes are sluggish. Is anyone else in here?”

A shuffling sound, and the central mushroom stalk of Verivaein leaned overhead, sparkling stars along its surface winking in and out of existence.

“I’ve temporarily blocked most of your nerves,” the Muse said. “It keeps the pain to a low amount while I continue trying to repair your body. I can return some of your mobility to you, but it will hurt. Badly. When Lisa found you, she was so terrified you’d die on the way she worked on some of the damage to your innards and your severed fingers. I had to correct most of it.”

“Lisa found us and got us here?” Gregory asked.

“You were brought here by her and others,” the Muse confirmed. “Some person she does not remember told her about it when she was near the Quarter. She was already headed that way from the diabolism they detected, but still far away from where she should be. Why she and some of the other initiates were there I do not know, and currently has her probably facing some gentle questions by the end of this. I could not anyway. My oaths still bind me to this temple and the vaults underneath. Whatever magic it was that kept you from dying held until I could reach you.”

Gregory frowned slightly, pain sparking as his lips and cheeks moved. “You don’t know the magic?”

“It dissolved on my approach,” Verivaein replied. “A most complex working, to react to me like that. Whoever cast it remains unknown. Anyway, let me return some measure of mobility-”

The rest of the muse’s words were lost as agony traveled along Gregory’s body. His biceps, his fingers, those burned the hardest; the feeling of lead turned molten as he bit back a scream. Those were only the highlights of his tapestry.

“Don’t move fast,” the choir of harmonies hummed, strings touching Gregory’s hand.

Pain immediately dulled, fading into an ache that he could ignore instead of the flashing heat where each finger had been severed.

“I can’t move them still,” Gregory muttered, watching as only one finger barely twitched on his entire hand. He felt tears fall on his cheeks. They were all there, not those pale wriggling things in the alley. “Why?”

“Diabolism, brother,” the Muse continued. “Purging your body of it will take time, and I have been straining to fight it in you. Better, since you cut off the tongue of the devil, so I know its magic better after preserving it.. Also, even after nerves have only recently been severed, reconnecting nerves takes time. Less than regrowth, but still time. The diabolism caught inside fights back against my efforts. And your friend is an even greater challenge.”

Shit. Alice.

“How is she?” Gregory said, pushing himself up against the back of the bed. It hurt, but he could move his head now, seeing the walls of the infirmary, the mostly empty beds inside.

He could see her in the bed next to his, but she was almost entirely covered by a blanket. What he saw was enough. Cuts ran across her face, scabbed over, surrounded by a crust of dry blood. Most of her face had swollen, and her nose had the look of being snapped back into the right angle. Bandages covered her eyes, and another over where an ear should be.

Verivaein hummed annoyance, but didn’t push him back down. “She will live. We have sent for healers of the non-divine kind, and until then, I am adjusting my use of the light to keep her stable but not harmed. And free of worse pain than yours. And under my aegis, no other light in the temple will harm her.”

Gregory nodded slowly. Tarver had long ago accepted that his divine power should be corrosive to devils, in agreement with Halspus. Although behind closed doors, he’d heard quite a bit about how ‘agreement’ was a generous way of putting it. But if anyone could alter that property, Verivaein would be them.

“In terms of her actual injuries?” Gregory asked quietly.

“Multiple minor injuries, but the devil that attacked you struck a mighty blow indeed,” the Muse said. “Two blades, deep into her gut. It tried to slice further with them, to tear them out of her side. Instead, they were pulled straight out before the process could continue. Still, it went…deep. I have closed it and done my best to repair the organs. The internal trauma will take longer. It has been a long time since I’ve needed to do this.”

“Do what?” Gregory asked. “Heal an infernal?”

Verivaein didn’t respond, but on the edge of his wings, a floating eyeball winked.

“I assume from what you said and the diabolism I found in both of you, there was a mighty battle,” the Muse said placidly, not acknowledging the question any further. “That and the bodies of dead Infernals in the area. Scavengers tried to interfere with your retrieval but were driven off; they were even less well-armed and armored than the bodies we found. There was a devil?”

“Yes,” Gregory said. “A three-headed creature, tall with multiple limbs ending in sabers carved from its bones. It-”

Gregory trailed off, uncertain whether he should share more. Specifically, what one of those three heads looked like. The Muse had never given him a reason to think he wasn’t working to help people. That didn’t mean Gregory always agreed with him. And true, it resembled Malvia more before she fought the flea-devil, but extra scales hadn’t changed the shape of her face. He could tell that at a glance.

The information that it resembled her would probably spread the first time it was seen again publicly. But it wouldn’t spread from him.

“It was disturbing,” Gregory finished. “It toyed with us. Wanted to draw things out. That was the only thing that kept us alive.”

“Some devils are like that,” the Muse said. “Others prefer the quick death,others cruelty disguised as kindness. They can be varied as mortals, but all pointed towards what we would consider evil.”

“What we would consider is a way of putting it,” Gregory said, staring at most of the muse’s eyes. “Have a theory about it?”

“I have fought many devils, talked with others,” the Muse said. “It would be a lie to say everyone of them was pure evil, or some evil at all, but their home is a place that by its nature grinds goodness away. Or what we would consider moral, anyway. I’ve ventured twice before, mostly to protect adventuring parties as they have descended into the hells for one reason or another. That place is a palace where souls are currency, where things either let themselves be ground down or do the grinding instead. It takes a rare soul forged in that place to be what you would consider a good person. But cruelty has many faces. The one that takes pleasure in ripping wings off insects and taunting them as they squirm is a familiar one to me.”

“It definitely seemed like that,” Gregory agreed. “But what it said…perhaps it was cutting, but-”

“Whatever it said while playing with you was either for its own amusement,” the Muse, wings twitching, said. “Or aimed to cut deep if it knows anything about you. Worth ignoring either way.”

“And if it were the truth?” Gregory asked, trying to get up on his elbows. He made it about a quarter-inch, his bones screaming the entire time before he collapsed back into the bed and pillow.

The Muse hummed disapprovingly. “Considering how you’re reacting, me questioning if it was might not settle you. What truths did it speak?”

Silence stretched out as Gregory looked away from the many-eyed wings.

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“Well. Even if you bear greater scars on your mind, those are relatively light wounds for damage from a devil.”

Gregory chuckled disbelievingly. “I’m sorry, light?”

“I’ve seen much worse,” the Muse said, the playful, warm tone gone from Verivaein’s voice. “You aren’t screaming. You aren’t clawing your eyes out. Your innards aren’t liquefying. Your lungs haven’t been taken control of to spread a plague of words that invades mortals’ minds and replaces everyone inside with them. Whatever hurt you was lesser in what it could do.”

Gregory chuckled bitterly. “A lesser one? That’s reassuring, given it batted us both around.”

“Trust me, if it had been greater, it would have been noticed-”

“What the fuck?!” Alice screamed, having woken up in the other bed, trying to pull away from Verivaein’s fibrous grip. “What the fuck is that thing?”

Black flames traveled up her hands, feeble things that sputtered briefly before blinking out. Right, inside Tarver’s halls themselves, Diabolism would have little chance of working. If only the god could be bothered to make that extend past this place.

Gregory forced down that bitter thought. “Alice, calm down. This is the Muse I told you about earlier! The one who guards the vault! He’s keeping you stable!”

“You mentioned eight wings,” Alice said, but she was no longer trying to use diabolism even as she kept her distance. “You didn’t mention it was a bloody mushroom…angel…thing.”

“I prefer an agent of divine providence,” Verivaein said soothingly. “Well, more like an occasional mischief maker, chronicler, and adventuring aid. Really, whatever a party needs. For a few months, I was a group’s trusty lantern, helping them the entire time until they reached the surface. Promising group of adventurers, really a pleasant group outside the internal disagreements, squabbling, and occasional weapons exchanged among themselves. They shaped up quite well. But then they committed a betrayal most foul and—”

“Sold you for another lantern, and you were so offended you sulked for thirty days before they almost died to a water elemental, and you came in as the ‘mysterious stranger.’” Gregory finished for him, and all of Verivaein’s eyes moved to stare at him. “Then you made them think that the lantern they sold was a weapon capable of destroying both rings of the world. And then, when they found out you presented it as a moral lesson about throwing away reliable tools.”

Silence now, as Alice’s eyes flicked between Gregory and the Muse, while the Muse’s mushroom stalk turned around, wings folding across in an approximation of arms being folded.

“Brother Gregory, what have you been told about upstaging or ruining another bard’s performance or story many times?” Verivaein said soberly. “A clear sign of the contamination of these new friends you’ve collected.”

Fibrous tendrils travelled across Gregory’s skin, wrapping around him tightly, binding him.

“It is a foul offense, especially against one of your own god’s servants,” The Muse continued, ignoring Alice outside of the fibrous tendrils, finally managing to touch her arm. Given the sudden paleness of Alice’s face and her stopping to struggle, she’d figured out he was keeping her alive. “The only sentence is death.”

“Oh no,” Gregory said drily. “Whatever shall I do now that you seem determined to kill the only person willing to come down Thursday nights with the best claret in the city and listen to you talk about your adventures?”

The fibrous tendrils halted. “Sister Shallow can get that claret as well.”

“Sister Shallow’s contacts are dependent on her keeping performances running at the Mildenhall Garden,” Gregory retorted. “She’s had it for a year. Do you want to bet on two?”

The Mildenhall audience was good, but they also always preferred the newest trends, which meant that the moment you stopped being new, you were gone.

The muse paused.

“Alas, and so must you live, for I rather do like my claret.”

Alice had relaxed, just a smidge. “How do you even drink wine, anyway? No offense, but you’re a mushroom stalk with wings.”

“It is a rather glorious-”

“He dips his roots in it,” Gregory interrupted. “Then, well, it’s like how a plant does it, which is a little bizarre since mushrooms don’t even have roots.”

“You have become an even worse heckler since only two weeks ago,” The Muse sighed. “What has increased your cynicism in this world so much?”

They were all interrupted by the sound of boots on the floor, then a door being slammed open, a nervous, pretty blond haired man forcing his way inside. Jalope, another initiate. His eyes darted about until he found them, sweati dripping from his brow.

“Muse Verivaein, I’m so glad I found you-Oh, Gregory, you’re awake. This is wonderful news. And your…friend?”

That pause was more hesitating than reluctant. Gregory hoped.

“Jalope,” Verivaein said, stalk swiveling around to face him. “You interrupt banter. A grave offense. Why?”

“There is an infernal that looks like a fish with a Black Flame tattoo of all things outside demanding to see you and your guest,” Jalope said. “And well, if she is not someone you two want to see, we may need your help, Muse Verivaein. She is…. quite insistent. Polite, but insistent. Potentially dangerously, despite being so polite?”

Alice hissed a breath out. “Yeah, she’s pissed.”

“You want to know who increased my cynicism?” Gregory told the Muse. “Well here she approaches.”

Okay, that was unfair. Even when he’d been at his most uncharitable, Gregory had never held Malvia as the greatest disappointment over those weeks. That abandonment he’d sparked himself, unlike others.

“Ah, Malvia Harrow,” the Muse chimed, wings suddenly extended. “Yes, I have heard that name. In the newspapers, some kind of Hellknight, correct?”

“I’ve told you about her before,” Gregory said wearily. “You know she’s nothing of the sort.”

“Well, you have told many conflicting stories about her,” the Muse replied.

“Yes. In none of them was she a ‘Hellknight’, whatever that is!”

“And hopefully you never will. Either way, best if I wait to meet her for the opportune moment, so I will see you both in a bit! Jalope, leave in case of violence!”

The Muse vanished, but luckily the dulled sensation of the pain didn’t go with him as Gregory traded looks with Alice. Jalope ran for the door, slamming it behind him.

“Malvia isn’t insane enough to attack a Muse in the middle of a temple,” Alice assured him. “She’s got a mind like an out-of-control firework at times, but she’s not going to do anything that…stupid. Even if your muse friend gives her a fright as bad as he gave me.”

“Yes,” Gregory said, trailing off as an indistinct noise grew louder and clearer.

Two voices, both familiar, coming closer. Daniel Puver, one of the older bards who mostly did temple administrative duties today, voice polite and calm, and Malvia Harrow. Whose voice had the same politeness, only Gregory could practically feel the blades being hidden behind that.

“-I’m surprised you are allowing me to see them alone. I’m very appreciative of your respect for privacy, but I’m shocked by the trust, to be frank, Choirmaster. Although I am also surprised by your generosity in treating Alice.”

“Well, Miss Harrow, how to put this? If you did have ill intentions in mind, you’d find them more difficult that you might think.”

“Ominous. Well, with your permission, I’ll head inside.”

Gregory tried to settle into a more comfortable position as Malvia stalked into the room.

Gregory tensed. No wonder Jalope had been so nervous. There was nothing seemingly off about Malvia as she walked closer, hooves tapping, but the mask of politeness on her face did nothing to hide the impression that there was something waiting to lash out the first chance it got.

That mask faltered as she got closer to them, eyes taking in their injuries, before she came to a halt a few feet away from their beds.

Her eyes flicked between the two of them, something clearly building in her throat.

And there it went, vanished as it was strangled and pulled back down as that hard steel returned to her eyes.

“Well,” she said evenly. “Someone likely was going to die at the end of this, but this just makes it an assured eventuality. I have been told who did it. Now I suppose what’s left is figuring out the extent of the butcher’s bill and who needs to pay for it. I’m assuming by the fact no one is tending to you, neither of you tried getting out of bed like this?”

“Well-” Gregory started while Alice slightly shook her head.

“You know what, that was a horrible starting question,” Malvia said, tone softening a little. “Are you two alright?”

“Malvia, do we look alright?” Alice asked. “I look worse than that time the One-horns started putting nails and gunpowder into their traps. Pretty boy here only looks like this because his flesh can actually handle raw divine magic alright.”

“I…” Malvia hesitated, tone turning a little raw. “True. Still. You’re not going to die?”

“We shouldn’t,” Gregory assured her.

Malvia tapped her hoof rhythmically, rubbing around the base of her horns, eyes closed.

“I’m glad you two are alright,” she said, with just a hint of restraint in her voice that Gregory was barely sure he’d caught it. “This complicates things for tonight, then. Short of a miracle, Alice needs rest, sleep, and for me to have eight hours to move her innards back to their proper spots, and then even more bed rest.”

“The divine healer fixed up my innards,” Alice said in protest, moving a little further upright. “Sealed them shut, so that parts already done.”

“Like I was saying,” Malvia said over her. “Once I’m done checking your innards to make sure any sealing didn’t leave them out of their proper order in you. And you rest long enough for them to heal properly. I don’t care what mage they brought in or potion they fed you, healed flesh takes time and is never good as it was. Minus biosculpting, and again, time. Melissa can be our ‘perpetrator’.”

Gregory grimaced, moved a little further up the bed, then nearly fell back down in a spasm as pain ran through his spine.

“I’m fine,” he said as Malvia moved over to his bed. “Melissa? You know-”

“-there’s a good chance she’s involved in this?” Malvia finished for him. “Possibly.”

“She could mess the entire thing up if she is,” Alice said.

“If Melissa is stupid enough to think I don’t have anything up my sleeve, it’s her own grave she’ll be digging,” Malvia said roughly. “Until then, we proceed with that as the plan.”

“We could delay it?” Gregory suggested. “Talk to-”

“Shh!” Malvia hissed, finger on her lips. “No names! At all! Not in any public place! I swear I’ll train you so you know how to actually put that mouth to good use!”

Gregory glanced at Alice, who was rolling her eyes.

“Any delay is too much at this point,” Malvia continued on. “Especially on a timescale of Alice being capable of strenuous physical activity. I use Melissa, and the other assets I’ve recruited.”

Assets? What other assets? “Your family and who else?”

“I’ve recruited Watch help,” Malvia said without pausing, now starting to pace. “Captain Malstein and his unit will be assisting us from this moment forward.”

“Who?” Alice asked. “Also, the Watch?”

“Captain Malstein is….” Gregory searched for a word, because friend didn’t work and acquaintances seemed generous considering he’d only traded thirty words with the man. “He’s a good orc. Man. Honorable and not as-”

“Murderously rabid as the old Watch, which is appreciated considering I had to duck into an alley so I didn’t get arrested for bumping into a child,” Malvia said, irritation bubbling up under her tone. “Now. Him, his group, and my relatives. Hardly Her Majesty’s Army, but more formidable than whatever I could recruit via Varrow with a hundred pounds and empty words. I actually raised the issue with him, and he suggested I use the poison gas. I didn’t even want to use that!”

The words echoed across the hallway, and Malvia glared at them as if angry they dared to leave her mouth.

“Apologies. Anyway, assuming that doesn’t create a panic, I’m getting the holy water and taking advantage of our sudden surplus of people to do more extensive preparations. Who do I talk to about that?”

“THAT WOULD BE I, INFERNAL!”

Muse Verivaein stood between them all, wings extended, central stalk almost reaching the ceiling, gold lights bursting into existence. Malvia whirled around, hand reaching inside her coat.

Her revolver was half-drawn when the Muse thundered again. “DO NOT ATTACK, DEVIL-BLOOD FOR I AM YOUR ALLY, CLAD IN DIVINE LIGHT TO AID YOUR RIGTHEOUS QUEST!”

Oh, oh dear, the Muse had probably held back from his games with Alice because of Gregory being there to ruin the jokes.

Malvia’s expression turned uncertain, eyes flicking over to Gregory, begging for an answer, finger still on the trigger.

“Malvia, this is the Muse Verivaein, a divine servitor of Tarver,” Gregory said quickly. “He’s been healing Alice and me, and I assure you that he will not harm you.”

“As long as she doesn’t harm anyone first,” The Muse said in a more normal tone, moving closer to her but keeping a respectful distance. “You must be Malvia Harrow. I must say, you look rather different from your description in the newspapers.”

“Newspapers are often wrong,” Malvia replied politely. “I’ve met more honest conmen than some people who write in them. Apologies about the pistol, but your entrance was rather shocking.”

She did not put it away, though. Or lower it even.

“Hmm, perhaps although I’ve found them useful for keeping up with the events of the world,” the Muse said. “Perhaps I am wrong. Or we are getting different newspapers. Either way, it is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Harrow.”

“Likewise, Muse Verivaein,” Malvia said politely, although Gregory doubted she believed the Muse was genuine for a moment.

“Also, it’s fascinating to see devil half-bloods again,” the Muse remarked. “It’s been so long, especially one of the more fishy variety in appearance.”

Malvia coughed politely, then spoke in a slightly strained voice.

“Surely more like a shark than a fish, good sir?”

The mushroom stalk suddenly tilted in a gesture Gregory was pretty sure it had picked up as head-tilting from the muse’s many past travelling companions. They probably hadn’t bent past a right angle when they did it.

“No,” the muse said. “No, definitely fish.”

“Hmm,” Malvia said in response, tapping her hoof, looking at her tail irritably. “I’ll have to fix that sometime.”

Please let that not mean she was going to dive through another Diabolism ritual circle into the hells for cosmetic magical surgery. Please let that mean anything besides that.

“It is a very nice tail despite its inherent fishiness,” Verivaein said. “I have two stored and they are nowhere near the same quality. Devil tails tend to degrade rather poorly in the material world.”

Right. Okay, perhaps the small display case Verivaein kept of parts of the devils he slew hit a little differently when you were partially a devil yourself.

“Really?” Malvia asked. “Are they not fully degraded yet? Are you willing to part with one, perhaps? They’re rather useful as alchemical reagents, and the crown rather thoroughly scrubbed my home clean of the remnants of the last devil to visit.”

“They are my trophies,” Verivaein said, an actual bite in his tone this time. “You are not stripping them to the bone for alchemical ingredients.”

“Actually, I’d use the bone too,” Malvia said, a look of irritation coming across her face. “Tends to be the strongest part, most solidified diabolism. But yes, no taking your prized possessions. It turns out I have a reason to keep my coin again, to my frustration.”

What? Gregory traded looks with Alice, who managed the slightest shrug. Her expression was impossible to make out beyond the swelling.

“I will not part with them, but I understand you are interested in other items stored down in the vaults?” The Muse asked.

“I am in need of some of the vast stores of holy water I’m told are in your vaults,” Malvia said. “I have a devil I want to dissolve, among other diabolic threats to deal with.”

“But of course,” Verivaein thundered, making Malvia visibly wince. “Truly a noble goal, even if other deities’ temples may be better suited for providing it. I must warn you, though, access to the vaults requires you to pass a trial before you may venture into its depths.”

Malvia’s scowl deepened in response, but at least all the cold rage in her eyes minutes beforehand had turned into a world-weary annoyance instead.

“A trial,” she repeated tonelessly. “How long is this trial? I need to have this ready by tonight.”

“An hour at the worst,” the Muse said, clasping Malvia on the shoulder, and she visibly had to stop herself from recoiling. “And I think you will have it done in even less time. You have the soul of a true adventurer; I can tell already. Much like Grishta the Inferno.”

“Adventuring went out of fashion a century ago,” Malvia said, not quite leaning as far away as she could from the divine servant. “And my soul is definitely not for adventuring. Also Grishta the Inferno was some insane Infernal who tried burning down multiple towns what, eight centuries ago? We are nothing alike!”

“We shall see,” the Muse said serenely. “Now, if you want your holy water, you should follow me.”

“They’ll be fine without you here?” Malvia asked, crossing her arms, looking over to them.

“I can split my attention well, Miss Harrow,” the Muse assured her, then began floating ahead while a scowling Malvia spared a glance back at Alice and Gregory.

“We’ll be fine,” Gregory said. “Trust me. Or at least trust in Tarver.”

Someone should, he thought, before mentally sighing. He wasn’t worried, though. The trial was a formality, only actually used when someone wanted something more than holy water. The water was precious but not irreplaceable.

Malvia didn’t look convinced, mouth opening to say something

“For fuck’s sake, Malvia, either go get the damn holy water or I start singing about what we did on the banks of the Nover with Lord Darrowmore!” Alice yelled.

Malvia flushed red and was swiftly out of sight, leaving Gregory and Alice alone.

“So, what did you two do on the banks of the Nover with a man who has long been dead?”

“Drowned him. What do you think?”

“Well, while I will admit to knowing Malvia for much less time than you, I don’t think drowning a noble would make her blush. What do you think?”

“I think knowing you for only a day means you don’t get to know what actually happened. Use your imagination.”

“Sorry, my imagination is currently trying to recover from being horribly beaten.”

“Join the club, blueblood. So, you think she’ll be fine?”

“With the Muse? As long as she doesn’t do anything rash or that he might think is an insult, she’ll be fine.”

“Ah. Rashness. Truly something she never embodies. Also, you didn’t tell Malvia about the alternate ritual for the muse. The one you mentioned on the way here?”

“You’re right, I didn’t. Can she sing?”

“Eh, yes. I suppose?”