90 - The Maid
Vittoria was swearing at her in another language.
Arielle could tell just from her tone, even if she couldn’t understand the words she was saying. Vittoria sounded just like Ari’s father whenever he was upset with her brother. She was probably furious at Arielle for veering from their plan, but in her defense, Ari wasn’t exactly going off path.
After all, she was still moving in the general direction of the treasure chamber.
She just happened to be following the skinny, dark-haired girl while she was at it.
She wanted to see if the limp would resolve or if she would figure out a way to heal it surreptitiously. Or perhaps someone else would help the poor girl.
So far, no one seemed inclined.
Several people passed by her on the way, some wearing the same dark robes as she was. They would glance at her with pity before averting their eyes. Some had their steps faltering and expressed slight hesitation before moving on.
Almost like they went out of their way not to help her.
The girl didn’t look like she expected their help either. She had braced her hand against the wall and was limping determinedly, with a fine layer of sweat misting her face. She bit her lip, her strain obvious. Then she ducked around a corner, hobbling into a room the size of a broom closet, with a tiny bed shoved against the wall.
Once she entered and closed the door behind her, Arielle had a brief moment of silent debate.
Should she carry on to the treasure chamber, or should she heal the girl before going?
It would depend on whether anyone would note a strange recovery in the time that it took for Arielle to complete her mission. The girl herself would certainly notice and might report it. After all, Arielle didn't know her at all.
There was also the point that Ari wanted to find out what her relationship with Elric was. The other vicious girl had mentioned that Elric had cast a spell on her. What was that about? And why had the girl been apologizing to Elric? What did she plan on doing right now to help him?
“I’m two seconds away from pulling you out of there,” Vittoria said, her tone heated. “Get back on track.”
Arielle shook her head. Vittoria wouldn’t pull her out like this, not when they were so close. Pulling her out might trigger alarms, and they may not get another chance at this.
Perhaps it was an unwise gamble, but Ari thought she knew now what Vittoria wanted.
Maybe for her, it wasn't just about healing Elric or taking down the demons.
Maybe part of this was another test.
Vittoria was not just curious about what Ari could do; she also wanted to see who Arielle was when placed in situations like this, and what sort of choices she would make. This was all because she was preparing Ari for a role that only she knew about.
This mission may not be just because she cared about Elric.
It was also because if anything happened to Elric, Vittoria would lose her leverage with Ari.
Perhaps it was pessimistic of Arielle to think that, but she had learned to stop seeing adults so optimistically. They all seemed to want something from her, except Elric. She didn’t naturally comprehend most people, but it came down to what Lyra had said. Understand first and foremost who they are and what they want. Only then can you predict them.
Vittoria was a commander. She probably wanted Arielle to be a soldier. She wanted Elric alive, and she wanted Ari to succeed.
It would be a waste to pull Ari out when she had not yet gotten caught.
And if she did, Arielle would find a way to come back, with or without her, even if she had to create a teleportation circle herself. Even if she risked a [Hidden Ability] marker, she would get that antidote.
"Arielle," Vittoria warned, but Ari didn't falter.
The Archmage hadn’t lied to her yet about this mission, but Vittoria could simply be misled about where the antidote was.After all, she had been wrong before, although not by much.
Vittoria's plan had worked out so far, but she even admitted that it would be a developing situation. There could be something she was missing or was unaware of. Something that the girl on the other side of the door knew.
She had sounded pretty sure of herself when she got up, determination ringing in her tone. Her black robes looked like maid attire, which meant that she probably knew the inner workings of this place very well.
Celie often told Arielle that palace maids were privy to more secrets than the king himself.
If she really were trying to help Elric, she would give Ari information in return for a favor.
It was a risk, but no risk, no reward.
Ari’s only hesitation was that she didn’t feel equipped necessarily to interrogate anyone, given how bad she was at reading people, but she couldn't let this opportunity pass.
She tried to convince Vittoria in her mind, though she knew Vittoria couldn’t read her thoughts. So she simply ducked her head and whispered, "Trust me," waiting for Vittoria’s response–which was only tense silence–before she drifted through the door.
Once there, Ari stood, watching the skinny girl move around her tiny room, seemingly searching for something.
She had a rag in one hand as she sifted through a dresser that had one leg missing and several scratches in the wood. Nevertheless, it had been cleaned and supported on its legless side by a pile of coal.
The girl finally found what she was looking for, retrieving a spray bottle full of something that smelled tart. She sprayed it on the cloth and brought it up to the cut on her face.
Ari instantly understood. It was probably some medicine she was going to use to clean her wound.
Arielle decided to make her move then.
First of all, she ensured the room was bare of magic and magic detectors, which it was. Then she used a variation of [Bound Mute] around the doors to block any sound from escaping.
Finally, she materialized and said, “Hello.”
The girl screamed, jumped, and jerked around, landing on her injured leg. Her cry became pained, but Arielle reached forward and caught her by the front of her robes before she could fall, instinctively pushing her hand over her mouth.
The girl didn’t fight her. Her body stiffened, her eyes widening to take up half of her face. She stopped screaming too, but her rushed breaths hit Arielle’s hand, and Ari immediately felt extremely disgusted by the sensation.
She backed up and wiped the condensation off on her assassin pants. When that still wasn't enough, she performed a mild cleaning spell on her hand, her eyes trained on the girl's throat.
She still wasn’t screaming or moving much. Perhaps she was terrified. That would make sense, considering the size difference between them. Arielle’s disguise was much taller and more threatening.
Also, she was disguised as an assassin, so the girl was probably concerned that one wrong move and Ari would kill her.
Is this how Celie feels when she goes on her missions?
Celie didn't often talk about her work, but she had told Ari once that she didn’t always do the assassinations. Sometimes she simply provided a distraction, or she was sent to dole out threats and warnings.
Ari wasn't here to do any of that. She wondered what her sister would say in a situation like this.
Nothing readily came to mind.
She sort of hoped the other girl would start, but the maid didn't appear to know what to say either. Both girls stared at each other, analyzing the situation, as Arielle wondered how much to reveal, and the other girl probably wondered if Arielle was here to kill her.
“Arielle, if you’re going to do something, do it quickly,” Vittoria snapped, clearly annoyed. “Don't just stand there and stare at each other. We don’t have all day to waste.”
Yes. Arielle opened her mouth to talk, but as she did, she activated her adjusted [Empath Sense], adding the new aura-reading component she had been working on. It was not perfect, but it would help her read emotions at least.
“Hello,” Ari told the girl. “My name is….” She hesitated. Should she say Tamsy Lous? Or give another name. “You can call me Lou. Who are you?” Arielle knew her name from their last meeting, but she didn't want to reveal her identity yet.
“I-Inara,” she stammered.
“Inara. How do you know Archmage Elric?”
Inara shook her head with almost frenzied denial. “I don’t know him, I swear. As I told Elder Hattus, I only met him on the day he visited the sect, and I don’t know why he took special interest in me.”
“He took special interest in you?” Arielle cocked her head, scanning Inara again. She didn’t have any magic. No particular essences clung to her, and there was nothing special about her either. She presented very mundanely, so Elric couldn't have been interested in adopting her as another false cousin. “Why?”
“As I said, I don’t know.”
“Mm,” Arielle said. “I overheard you mention that you wanted to help him. What did you mean by that?”
Her entire expression went flat as her eyes dropped. “I didn't say that.”
"Yes, you did."
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"No, miss, I didn't."
“She’s lying,” Vittoria said, but Arielle did not need to be told that. She could tell by reading her true emotions. Suspicion and fear.
So much fear.
“You don’t have to lie to me,” Ari said. “I won't hurt you. I'm here to help him too.”
The girl’s eyes snapped up, but they instantly plunged low again.
Disbelief radiated now. She didn't trust Arielle, and her fear only grew as the seconds passed.
How do I make her believe me?
Ari held up a finger, quickly healing the wound on the girl's face.
As Inara's head came up again in surprise, Ari assessed the wound at her ankle too. Luckily, it was a sprain, not a break, so it was easily fixed.
Inara's mouth slackened as Arielle silently set it right, and she exhaled as she tested out her leg and corrected her posture.
"You're a...." she whispered, but didn't finish the sentence.
"I'm a spy," Arielle told her. "Looking for a potion, an antidote that can heal Elric. Do you know where it is?”
The other girl didn’t answer for some time. Whether it was out of shock or out of suspicion, Ari didn’t know, because both were still prominent in her aura. Arielle would have waited for her to decide, but Vittoria’s impatience was starting to leak out, and Ari didn't want to push it.
How could she earn Inara's trust?
Arielle didn't know. This was the first time she'd been faced with a situation like this, and tasked with earning someone’strust. Last time, she had been on the other end, the one who trusted too easily and got hurt.
By her calculations, Inara really did not want to get hurt.
For her, the consequences of trusting wrongly would be dire. Arielle could kill her easily, or she could report her insubordination to her superiors, so she would get another beating. Or she could do something that unintentionally endangered her, just like what the dean had done to Ari.
It was difficult to convince the other girl that she was honest.
Arielle might be able to threaten her or trick her into revealing what she knew, but she didn't want to be like that, getting by with tricks and lies. She despised it when it was done to her, so she would not do that to Inara.
Not even with Elric’s life on the line?
"I won't hurt you," Arielle told her. "Or get you into trouble. That I promise you."
Her words didn't seem to change much, although they introduced something new to the equation. Curiosity.
"Have we...have we met before?" Inara asked.
"No," Ari instantly said, and the suspicion flared up in the other girl's aura again.
"Okay, yes," Arielle amended quickly. "But I cannot tell you about that right now, at least not until you tell me what happened between you and Elric. Again, you have my word that I will not hurt you.”
The girl swallowed. She played with her fingernails, picking at her nailbeds, but for some reason, her suspicion began to wane as she started speaking.
“He helped me,” she said. “I made a mistake while serving him and should have been punished. He made it such that they could not physically harm me without consequence.”
"How?"
"By casting a spell on me that would alert him whenever I was in physical pain."
Arielle pursed her lips. She did not see such a spell. Perhaps it had deactivated when Elric had been gravely injured.
“He’s been poisoned,” Ari said.
Inara nodded. "I know. With a deadly virus.”
“You mean demonic possession."
“No, not that. It…” She swallowed. “I can’t talk about it.”
“Why not?”
She opened her mouth, closed it, and shook her head again.
“They’re under oath not to discuss certain things,” Vittoria said. “She quite literally cannot tell you.”
Arielle swallowed that. "But you were going to get an antidote. Right?”
“For months, I think Elder Manu has the...it too,” Inara responded. “He... I suspect he might be going through...something, an..." She struggled to talk, her words becoming mumbled. "Every evening, a maid brings him tea, and the healer mixes it in. If I can get the tea, or the...then I can..." She trailed off again.
"Every evening? He needs to take the antidote several times?" Arielle had assumed it was a one-time use, not something Elric would have to use for months. Other things confused her as well. “I thought there was only one antidote? How can it last months? And is it not in the treasure chamber?”
Perhaps those questions had been too much for Inara to handle, as she simply bit her lip and remained silent.
"Is Elder Manu an important member of the sect?" Ari tried.
"He is an Elder," she said as though that answered the question.
"Is he higher than the other Elders? Higher than Yseult?"
She flinched a little at the name but shook her head. "No, he is not."
“Then he is expendable,” Vittoria said. “They would not give him their last copy of the antidote. Yseult would also not trust anyone with it, and I do not believe it has been stolen by the demons yet. Which means that this is either a completely different antidote from the one we discussed, or they have managed to make more of it. Sentinel, have mercy, what have they done?”
Vittoria's voice sounded grave, probably because of the terrible amount of sacrifice that went into making such a thing. Although it would end up saving Elric’s life, Arielle had mixed feelings.
Vittoria said, "You should still check the treasure room, in case this is a different antidote. And she can carry on with her plan to steal Elder Manu’s own. That way, in case they are not the same, we have wasted nothing and her plan becomes a backup."
The idea didn't sit comfortably with Arielle. Inara was weak and mundane. This mission was dangerous for Arielle. It would be doubly so for Inara.
However, she had to think about Elric too…
This was getting so complicated.
"Do you plan on going to get the antidote from the healer?" Arielle asked the maid.
She swallowed. "Yes. I know where the healer's quarters are, and they are often kind to me. Perhaps the potion is there. Or in the elder’s chambers.”
Arielle bit her lip in doubt.
“It’s your choice at the end of the day,” Vittoria said. “You can ask her not to do it. Tell her you’ll handle everything, but you will likely not be able to approach the healer’s room and the Elder’s quarters as easily as she can. And her help will make things faster.”
Faster was good. Faster meant that they could save Elric.
However, would that be the same as sacrificing Inara?
“Make your choice quickly, Arielle.”
She closed her eyes and inhaled.
“How certain are you that you can get the antidote out?”
Inara blinked. “Fairly certain.”
"Okay. If you can do it, bring it back here. I will get it to Elric and reward you for your help."
"I don't need a reward," she said, her eyes flashing with determination. "His healing will be reward enough.”
The desperate hope flaring brightened what had been left of her fear.
She truly cares about Elric, Arielle realized. More than she fears me, or fears getting caught.
She offered the girl a warm smile that she probably couldn't see through her mask and said, "Be careful."
The statement surprised her, and her suspicions seemed to also reduce. A small trail of Vittoria’s magic also emerged and wrapped itself around her wrist.
“That will let us know if she’s in trouble,” Vittoria said. “That’s as much as I can do without raising suspicion.”
"Wait," the girl said. "You haven't told me who you are. You sound very familiar, and there's something about your eyes…” She brought her folded hands to her chest. “The hero from Khor?”
“Told you this would happen,” Vittoria said, and Ari hated to admit she was right. Even with the voice modulation, it seemed that Arielle’s vocal inflections leaked through. However, how had she noticed her eyes? They were a different color than they had been when they met.
"It's probably the lack of eye contact," Vittoria told her.
"I'll tell you when we return," Ari said, going invisible once more as she left the room to keep from saying more.
She continued on her path, locating the treasure room with ease. Luckily, she didn’t have to drop invisibility, only adjusting the spells in certain parts of the hall.
The spell form in front of the iron door of the treasure chamber was... interesting to say the least.
There were layers upon layers upon layers of security features, and though not as complex as Yseult's, they were confusing in their own way. Sophisticated, like an artwork bearing an ancient signature. Clearly, they had been crafted by someone with a more formal understanding of magic, but it was also someone with a different education, because Arielle could not tell which parts of the spell were detecting and which parts were enacting. They were spell forms she had never seen before, and it had all been woven together seamlessly by a master, who did not want it unwoven.
Who made this? Arielle wondered.
Vittoria clearly sensed the direction of her thoughts because she said, "The treasure chamber is not simply a room. It's a shifting dimension that was created by the first of the Dracos. It is reportedly a relic from the old world. You will not be able to break any of the spells easily, especially a blood covenant spell, which only appears when the target blood is presented. So you might as well just do as we planned."
Arielle nodded as she visually located the backdoor the demons had created. She knew it because it had a demonic essence attached, but tragically she did not have time to study it.
As she moved through the door, she entered what initially appeared to be an empty, hollow room that smelled like polish and incense burning in the corners.
Except it clearly wasn't empty at all, given all the spell forms it contained.
All the treasure was in hidden compartments.
There were magic-detecting components everywhere, and alarms would sound upon reading an unauthorized magical signature.
The demons had to have a way around that. But for Arielle, she had to think for some time first. There may also be hidden spells attached to the blood covenant, as Vittoria said.
She could see the obvious compartments there, but it would be too risky to cast Orion in this space.
However, if she could perhaps weaken the spells around the compartments, she might be able to tell somewhat what they contained.
It was worth a try at the very least.
She reached out to the first one, pulling the orbs farther apart. The compartment began to shimmer into view, but she was worried pulling too far or breaking it would trigger an alarm linked to one of the sophisticated spells she couldn’t read.
So she only weakened it enough to reveal the outline of a book, not a bottle, and then she let it go.
She did it for the next compartment and the one after that. In the fourth compartment, she did come across a bottle, but as she contemplated whether to snatch it, she heard a piercing scream inside her mind.
It sounded like Inara's.
Ari was instantly in motion.
"Arielle, wait," Vittoria said, but she was already flying out of the room and [Blinking] her way towards the location, avoiding obstacles on the way.
"Arielle, damn it, listen to me," Vittoria said, and attempted to use her portal spell to restrict Arielle's movement.
But Arielle didn't stop.
If Inara had gotten captured, Ari wasn't about to let her get hurt. She had promised her that she wouldn't get hurt. She would keep her promise, or she would be no better than those who had betrayed her.
She felt Vittoria's portal heating up, but she said again, "Trust me," as she flew into a room that appeared to be an infirmary.
Except the windows had been boarded up and there were no guards at the doors.
Inara was on her knees, next to a man in healer’s robes who was also a demon.
He physically appeared to be a tall, strapping man, but he was clearly a demon from the orbs that clung to him. He also had cruelty in his smile, and worst of all, his gaze found Arielle even though she was supposed to be invisible.
Suddenly, the air in the room dropped several degrees.
"I knew you would come," he said, smiling and holding up the shining liquid in a small glass vial. "I sensed you accessing our vault. Let me guess. You're looking for this antidote?"
“Is that it?” Arielle wondered, but Vittoria didn’t respond.
Instead, her white portal bird materialized, and it was about to swallow Arielle.
But Ari resisted its pull, holding the spell in place. It was difficult to overcome Vittoria’s own attachment to her spell, but Ari kept up the struggle.
The demon had Inara. It also had Elric's salvation.
She wasn't leaving without it.
"Wait," Arielle hissed. "Just wait a second."
But Vittoria wasn't listening. So Arielle stopped listening too.
She had no other choice but to grab onto the part of the spell that connected her to the portal. As she snapped the linkage, she heard Vittoria's outraged cry in her mind.