“But that makes no sense! It’s inconsistent. Jax’s Boundary unlocked tails for everyone else immediately. There was no need for her to actually pass the thing!”

  “Like I said, it’s the difference between a marked, obvious improvement and a neutral change.”

  “But the tails did improve… stuff. Like balance!” I whirled to jab the air with a finger. “Right, Lynnria?”

  Her eyes cleared just long enough to manage an uncertain, “Huh?”

  She and Jax had been watching the exchange with a fascination I would normally have reserved for a vaudeville act. Just walking around had them gaping at me like I was doing backflips, and they would gasp with appreciation at my slightest gesture. All of which was still pretty neat in a distracted, ego-stroking sort of way, but the novelty was fast turning to annoyance. I was trying to have a serious conversation here!

  “Tails, Lynnria. Your tail. You told me it improves your balance, didn’t you?”

  “Oh! Uh… I did?” Panicking, she began clutching at the lilim beside her. “Jax! Help! What do I say?”

  But Jax only murmured, “He touched me… touched me first! Ahn~”

  Duly encouraged, Lynnria nodded and loudly announced, “He touched me first!”

  Then her brain caught up with her mouth, and I got to watch as whatever moisture existed on her face suddenly puffed into steam.

  Clicking my tongue, I let out a sigh. It was not the answer I had been looking for, but it was an answer. At a minimum, it was a sign the shock was starting to wear off. “You’re adorable, Lynnria.”

  Squealing like a girl on first seeing a kitten mew, she spun away to bury her head between her knees.

  “I take your meaning, my lord. However, there is no use arguing. Dragon scales that appear at will yet react to danger on an instinctive level is an addition of an altogether different sort. Arx must complete her Boundary Trial before something of that magnitude may be implemented. It is out of my hands.”

  “Alright, fine!” I grumped. Lapsing into silence for the moment, I worked a sudden crap out of my jaw. “Then at least explain why I’m so damned sore this morning.”

  “Sore… aching, aye,” Jax echoed distantly. She was still rubbing at where I had fondled her, but then her eyes sharpened. “Sore? Ye be sore, Master? But we just kipped from torpor! Torpor heals all ails.”

  “Normally, yes. However, certain of my kindred—whom I need not name—have been tampering with mechanisms they have no business tampering with. It’s no wonder they’ve created a bunch of loopholes. Really, my lord, did you never stop to wonder at the prohibition against increasing stats by more than one at a time? The body cannot handle so much strain over a single evening, and here you’ve jumped an entire three points in Charisma. You’ll need to wait at least a week before you are eligible for another layer. Perhaps as many as two!”

  I knew I was being scolded, but all I heard was that my plan had worked. “Ah ha! So Toughness counted, after all. Nice!”

  I could almost hear Mia’s eyes rolling.

  “Yes, yes. Here. Your updated Stat Page.”

  I nodded eagerly. This all looked to be in line with the best-case scenario I had envisioned. Strength, Toughness, and Wisdom had all increased, giving me a 22 in Charisma. Perfect!

  Though, interestingly, my Manic stats had barely shifted. As derived stats affecting my spellcasting, I had thought continuously grinding my Wisdom and Charisma would have more of an effect, but even after a combined increase of four points, they had only improved by a single level each.

  Does this mean I can rule out them as contributing factors? Sadly, the only reliable method for finding out involved deliberately avoiding them, leaving only Intelligence and Agility as viable attribute focuses. But as a mental attribute itself, Intelligence risked spoiling the experiment, and Agility was a stat for a solved problem—namely running faster and avoiding attacks. And if I was getting up to that sort of nonsense, I was doing something wrong.

  I suppose I could spend a few Layers tinkering with this stuff. It isn’t like the points will go away if I don’t spend them.

  But it seemed Mia had more surprises in store.

  “And you’ll be wanting this. You’ve been waiting on it long enough.”

  Helloooo, mama! I clapped my hands together. This is some seriously good stuff.

  Just showing my face could stun people? That had the potential for combat applications! I doubted it would work too well against someone already in the thick of it—you would need a skill like Jax’s for that—but if we needed to get the drop on someone, I could easily serve as a distraction. Assuming the girls let me.

  Meanwhile, the social benefits were… less interesting. Do not mistake me, in other contexts, they would have been phenomenal. Had I been back on Earth, I could have easily leveraged them into a modeling career or even taken my chances in Hollywood. But I was a Quester, not some courtside sycophant. What use were curried favors or unearned opportunities? I had neither the time nor the inclination to go around delivering political speeches, so my opinions amounted to nothing. It might help me weasel out of certain outstanding fines, should I again venture into town, but that would depend on running into a collections agent who had been skimping on Wisdom. I doubted many Priests of the Lawmaiden would make that mistake—assuming any were left alive. Ahnbe had been awfully upset when she found out I was broke…

  But the thing sending quivers through my little wizarding heart was the last line. As predicted, I had been upgraded: from ‘your Words are more convincing’ to ‘your Words will never be ignored.’ Or at least, it seemed like an upgrade. What its actual function might be remained a mystery.

  “I wasn’t aware my Words could be ignored. Is that really a thing?”

  “Oh, yes, my lord!” Mia gushed a little too enthusiastically. “If reality is a liquid and the Words are its mold, the Nonsensical is the leak that must be plugged. Often violently. Now, you may be assured that reality will at least try to coagulate within your created Vessel before bursting through it.”

  I nodded, working my way back through that frankly batshit explanation. “So… my Engravings won’t explode anymore?”

  She groaned. Sensuously. “No? No, that wasn’t what I said at all. Your tongue is suited to nobler pursuits than such sophistry. If you insist on asking silly questions, I shall have to put it to better use.”

  My lips twisted to one side.

  “Alright, that one was on me.” If I did not want Dame Maggie Smith coming on to me, I needed to watch my phrasing. “What I meant to say was that Engravings are less likely to explode before I’ve done my little…” I waggled my fingers, “…magical song and dance… thing.”

  “Song and dance thing?” She chuckled. “It would be more accurate to say that reality finds your oafish attempts at communicating just entertaining enough not to immediately blow up in your face.”

  “Ah!” I held up a finger. “But it does at least understand that I’m trying to communicate. Which means I should now be able to Write in stuff besides loose soil!”

  “Yes, congratulations. You have arrived at a factual conclusion at last,” she said, apparently done with that topic. “Now, here is your updated skill list.”

  “As you can see, Forgotten in Stillness, Renewal of Consumption, and The Hammer of Glory have all achieved High Intermediate. And Windfall of the Thrall has ascended to High Competent. Well done,” she intoned. “Of course, the shift from Low to High within a Tier is only a mark of how accustomed you are to the skill’s employment, which speaks more to efficacy than excellency. I’m sure I need not explain more.”

  “Yeah, I follow you.”

  The way I understood it, you achieved a new Skill Tier every twenty points, each of which morphed the skill in some way, either through discovering new applications or making the spell more powerful. Moving from low to high within a Tier simply improved casting speeds and lowered Life Energy costs. As she had said, efficacy over excellency.

  “Well, I ain’t,” Jax put in. “Not this whole time! Be ye speaking in code, ye bloody wank? Some dripping cant for the nobility?”

  I smiled. “There’s my Jax! Nice to have you join us again.”

  She fidgeted a moment with her hands, embarrassed. “It ain’t like I skipped off. A Dolilim just needs to take in the view first. Me innocent heart weren’t ready for… for a pawing from someone like… like… Master, I ain’t seen nothing akin to ye before.”

  “Oh, go on,” I said, waving her off. Innocent heart, my ass. “You’ve seen goddesses before.”

  “Ye ain’t a goddess,” she returned flatly.

  That was fair. As a man, I had about as much in common with one of them as I did with a croaking bullfrog—at least, in my own mind’s eye. Sure, I could see how Jax and Lynnria were reacting, but that did not tell me very much. I was like a kid with a sparkler stumbling around next to the bag of fireworks and giggling maniacally at all the adults freaking out about it.

  “Anyway, Mia was just giving me my post-Layer report. I think she’s done now, if you’d like her to move on to you,” I informed her.

  But then I had a better idea.

  “Or she could start with Lynnria,” I suggested, taking a slow, deliberate step forward. “I haven’t had breakfast, and I know just who I’d like to eat first… if you think your innocent heart can handle it.”

  Jax may have squeaked a little.

  *

  “You deserve this, Jax.”

  “I deserve it. Aye!”

  “You are my First. I love you.”

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

  “Yes! Your First! Love!”

  “You are an incredibly attractive lilim!”

  It was not the most imaginative pillow talk. I acknowledge that. But my recent surge in allure had made Jax extremely skittish, to the point where I had needed to corner her before she would let me anywhere near. Whether that was a symptom of being over-excited or sudden feelings of inadequacy, I did not know, but it was not until I struck upon the idea of showering her with compliments that she finally relaxed into my arms. And of course, once things got going, the old Jax came back in full force.

  She still got off on the compliments, though.

  “Haaa~ Three above!” she gasped, twisting beneath me. “Gobble me paps! Please? I cannay stand it!”

  Gobble me…? Oh.

  Maybe it was just me, but I found having to defrag the language centers of my brain mid-coitus a fantastic method for improving sexual stamina. Which was good, because Jax was a freaking wildcat this morning.

  It was not a simple matter of her being more turned on than usual, either. There was something new—and I was not just talking about the tail. That was a whole other thing. Maybe it was the bump in Charisma after being held back for so long. Maybe it was a simple matter of all the practice she had been getting. Either way, I could tell a marked difference between the Jax from yesterday and the one from today. The way she touched me, the pitch of her voice, the unconscious twists of her body… It was like watching a professional athlete catch fire on live television—but for sex!

  Regardless, I was happy to comply, and with a pleased grin, I undertook the challenge of capturing the galloping nub of flesh between my lips.

  “Hold on… what? A 9 in Charisma? Didn’t I have a 7 before? And did you say an 11 in Toughness?!” Lynnria’s voice rose in alarm. “That can’t be right. That’s impossible!”

  Our resident lessor Dolilim had been peeking over the side of the bed like a curious Labrador while Jax and I enjoyed ‘brunch,’ giving Mia and her report only half an ear. Too absorbed with our activities to pay much attention, Lynnria had been preparing herself for her coming turn—under the sheets, so to speak—so her sudden outburst came as a quite the shock. It even threw me off my rhythm.

  “Ach, ye walloper! Why’d ye stop? I were so close!”

  I could only chuckle. “To what? Your fourth orgasm?”

  They had been extremely close together, too. And unaided! So I guess I had been doing pretty well myself. Unless… Do women come more easily with attractive men? It was a fascinating thought. If I ever ran into that scientific group Arx had been a member of, I would have to offer it up as a potential avenue for study.

  “It were about to be me fifth! But that don’t mean I’d leave it wayside.”

  “Well, then, here. Have another.”

  PLEASURE…

  “Hagnnnaa~ah!”

  “But that makes no sense. An 11 in Toughness would have cost two Skill Points all by itself! I… Did I even have a 10?!” A moment of silence passed while Lynnria listened. “Because I didn’t have that many Skill Points!”

  “What’s up?” I asked absently. Whatever was going on over there sounded interesting, but not so much as to drag my eyes away from the complete smoke show climaxing around my cock.

  “You guys! Listen to this: I—I’m freaking out. Either I’m going crazy or… or I think… I think all of my stats rose overnight,” she exclaimed. “By like… one or two points, at least.”

  Okay, now that is interesting. “And you’re not sore? How is that possible?”

  “That’s what I said!”

  “What’s the wean on about?” Jax asked, still panting and pawing at my chest.

  “She said all of her stats went up.”

  “Yeah? She gained a Layer. What did she expect her stats to do?”

  “No, all of her stats.”

  Jax blanched. “That ain’t right. Ain’t nobody ‘as got the points for that.”

  “I said that, too!” Lynnria yelled.

  “I think we’re going in circles here. Mia, come out and explain this.”

  There was the sound of footsteps, followed by a slamming door.

  “Explain what? I’m just reading off what her stats are.”

  “Okay, so tell us what they were before.”

  “That’s just it. I don’t know what they were before. It isn’t like I have them memorized.”

  I scowled, flabbergasted. “There isn’t a record?”

  “Hah~nn!” Mia gasped. She had to take a few breaths before she could speak again. “No? You can only ever move forward, not back. What use would there be for keeping a ledger? And my lord, please refrain from asking questions so forcefully. Your strength, it’s… You make it difficult to remember what question I am even meant to answer.”

  I opened my mouth, then hesitated. I could think of a lot of reasons for keeping track of what stats improved when… but most of those involved correcting for human error. Whatever was going on was a part of a system that had been marching along just fine without one for uncounted millennia.

  “Sorry, I’m just…” Do the power of my questions level up somehow? Weird. “Maybe I’m not asking the right questions. There has to be an explanation.”

  “I’m telling you, the math doesn’t add up!” Lynnria exclaimed.

  I nodded. “Okay, if you’re right, and something unexplained happened to your stats, there should have at least been a notification. Mia, hop down to the ticket office and see—”

  “Ticket office?” Lynnria interrupted.

  “What be that?”

  “Hop?! How dare you!”

  “Okay, poor choice of words… on both counts, but you know what I mean. The ticket office! That… place with all the reams of paper lying around?” I looked from face to face searchingly, but all I got back were a bunch of blank stares.

  Wait. Did I dream all that?

  And then I remembered. It had been a dream—an extremely lucid one, and I was pretty sure it had some basis in… well, I cannot say ‘reality.’ That would be a stretch. But a shared experience, anyway. I had even told Jax and Lynnria about it, but that did not mean I could just bring it up in polite conversation. They would not understand. Even Mia, I now realized. She might have been along for the ride, but I had the distinct impression she had not seen what I had been seeing.

  “Um…” Oh, what was that place called? “Was it just the Core? Yeah… yeah, that must be it. The place with the backlog of updates and messages. You remember what I’m talking about, Mia. You were the one to show it to me.”

  “Ah, yes. Well, it would be most unusual for something like this to have occurred without my noticing, but I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to check. Now, if you will excuse me. Perhaps there is a convenient hedge I might leap into.”

  The footsteps receded again.

  Several seconds passed while the three of us just sat there, Lynnria to one side, me on my knees, and Jax lounging back, contentedly running her toes through my hair. The departure of our fourth had left us with nothing to do, save to stare at one another. But then Jax started flexing her pelvic floor, reminding me I had been in the middle of something.

  Which gave me an idea.

  With a bit of a wry smile, I turned to Lynnria. “Did you know I can pleasure people secondhand?”

  Jax must have realized what I was about, because instead of protesting, her lip only curled over a gleaming fang. Lynnria was slower on the uptake.

  Her eyes found me, flicked away, then back again. “What?”

  “Secondhand. As in, I can get you off without touching you.”

  There was a lengthy moment of silence, then in exactly the same tone, “What?”

  “It ain’t complicated. He be asking if ye want a slitter on the side,” Jax explained. Unhelpfully.

  So I elaborated.

  “You know? With my special ability? If I’m pleasuring Jax, and she touches you, you’ll feel it through her.”

  Lynnria opened her mouth to speak, but it just hung there, gathering flies.

  Jax groaned. “Guess she’d rather keep to her peep and diddling. Her loss. I got another in me, so it may take a scanty afore her turn comes—”

  “Wait, wait, wait…” Lynnria held up her hands. “All of my stats just went up for no reason; you two have decided you’re going to just keep on having sex, and now you want to know if I’ll let Jax eat me out?”

  That about summed it up, yeah. But she had skipped a few steps. I had thought we would ease her into before tossing her into the deep end.

  “Well and now! Eat you out? Just dribble yer flaps out of nowhere-like? Listen to the mouth on this wean. Here I were, offering to hold out a hand, genteel and innocent as, while the mas—hnngah! Master~!”

  Grinning, I switched the Hammer off again. There was no use playing the innocent card. If Lynnria was smart enough to realize our end goal, we needed a subtler approach.

  “It’s not only sex, Lynnria. We’re in the middle of a meal. You wouldn’t leave your food on the table, uneaten, just because someone had an announcement to make,” I countered reasonably.

  After all, we were pretty much sex demons now, the girls in their way and me in mine. The rules for what counted as polite behavior needed to shift accordingly.

  Lynnria nodded, apparently seeing the logic. Good.

  “Look, I know you’re still on the fence with the whole girl-on-girl thing—” I paused, expecting a vehement denial that she might even be on the fence. But none came. Interesting. Her mind leaps to oral sex and now this? “—and I respect that. Nobody is going to force you to do anything you’re uncomfortable with. But now that you can process emotions like a true lilim—”

  “There still isn’t any flavor,” she reminded me.

  “Even so, that doesn’t mean you can’t join us. This is mealtime. Does it make sense for me to feed you all one-by-one, while the rest sit around, picking at stray emotions? I mean, I enjoy it. Why wouldn’t I, but come on! It takes a lot of time, and we have to do this every day! It’s not like you’re going to catch something if you accidentally touch another woman.”

  “Dolilim,” Jax corrected automatically.

  “Whatever. Besides, I’ve been told group sex makes the emotions better.”

  “Stronger. More complex-like. Lots more to go around, too.”

  “Even I can feel them,” I added.

  That got Lynnria’s attention. “You can?”

  “Sometimes. It comes and goes. But it helps when they’re really strong.” Never mind that I had yet to feel one of Lynnria’s. I was pretty sure the Binding was a key mechanism there, but like any good scientist, I was eager to be proven wrong.

  With a quick shift of my hips, I pulled myself free of Jax and, ignoring her cry of protest, yanked her upright.

  “Here. We’ll start slow. Take Jax’s hands.”

  Lynnria narrowed her eyes, thinking it over.

  “I guess… I guess it is more practical. A Dolilim of my breeding shouldn’t have to wait until last.” She looked from me to the redhead. “You’re not going to pull any funny business?”

  Jax arched a brow, giving her a look filled with smoky promise. “Only if ye want me to, bairn,” she purred.

  It should be noted that she did not say ask. That was an important difference when dealing with lilim, and this time, Lynnria did not catch the implication.

  “Focus on me,” I told her as she folded her hands into Jax’s upraised palms.

  Of course, eye contact was the very thing she should have avoided had she wanted to keep her head on straight. Her recent essence bath made sure of that, and that was before I had crossed 20 points in Charisma. So the moment our gazes met, Lynnria could only suck in a sharp breath while her pupils dilated into saucers, helpless but to quiver in stunned silence—and I had yet to even start!

  Still, I kept my voice low, as though coaxing a trembling foal. “I am the source of your pleasure. For now, Jax just happens to be its conduit. That’s alright, isn’t it?”

  So faint as to almost miss it, she nodded her consent. “Y-Yeah…”

  “Good girl.”

  Pulse.

  I kept it short yet strong. I did not want to overwhelm her, but this was just handholding. Most of my experience with this sort of play had been with Arx, and that girl was down for anything. So I really did not know how much would come through with such mundane skin contact.

  I was glad I did.

  Lynnria and Jax both jerked like I had touched them with a live wire, but it was the former who spoke first. Gasping, the purple-haired imp smiled around a breathless, “Wow!”

  Jax licked her lips, sampling the air. “Aye. Sharp but sweet. Ye want another, don’t ye?”

  Lynnria nodded eagerly, and Jax’s tail tightened around my leg, as though in anticipation of unwrapping this long-awaited present. The ram-horned Dolilim’s hands slid quickly up Lynnria’s arms, only to pause at the elbow. Unspoken, the two had agreed to heighten the experience through increased skin-contact—but only just.

  “Do it, my master,” Jax breathed.

  Firming my grip on Jax’s shoulder, I delivered a second pulse, the same as before. We could afford to take it slow here. What was important was that Lynnria remained comfortable.

  Another gasp, this time followed by a breathy moan. “It’s feels so good! How can it still feel so good?!”

  “Fool question. It be the master. Ye expected less?” Jax leaned forward, eyeing Lynnria’s lips, visibly trembling over the prospect of soon claiming them.

  I could feel the unbridled lust welling up within me. Jax wanted this, wanted her to want this, and was yanking me along for the ride. Unbidden, my eyes were drawn to Lynnria’s breasts, where the evidence of Jax’s tampering twisted and perked to attention, and I was soon pulled into a fantasy of just what the Life Energy—divine Life Energy—stored within might taste of.

  Would it still be too much? Would I be able to handle it? Did I dare try it, anyway?

  But that was a step too far. Too much too fast. If we betrayed Lynnria’s trust, Jax might well get what she wanted… in the short term. But once the girl regained her senses, she would be slow to forgive.

  If ever.

  So I pulled my First back. “I think that’s enough for now.”

  Jax’s head whipped around, and for a tense few moments, we had a silent argument, delivered only through glances. But she soon relented.

  “Aye, Master. As ye say.” She then turned to her still-panting and clearly aroused lesser to offer a few parting words. “I think she gets the idea. The more we touch, the better it be. Special-like if that touch be… intimate.”

  She then leaned into my chest and guided my hands up until they were cupping her breasts. I took my cue as though we had rehearsed it, and the third pulse raced through her just the same as the others, only this time with nowhere else to go.

  As Jax arched and moaned against me, Lynnria’s eyes told all the stories of missed opportunities and regrets I needed to see.

  Perfect.

  Which was the precise moment Mia returned with her report.

  “Ahem. If you are quite finished…”

  “Go ahead, Mia.”

  Far from being annoyed, I was glad she had shown up when she had. Jax and I had come on pretty strong, and I wanted to give Lynnria the chance to stew on what she had just experienced, away from outside pressures and manipulations. She had been through so much in this Dungeon already that she could have easily fallen prey to excuses like mental duress or temporary insanity. When this happened, it would be because Lynnria had decided it should.

  It would be because she had accepted what she was.

  “I’ve discovered… something,” Mia began. “I apologize, Lynnria, but you had accumulated quite the pile of Status Effect messages. They were all variations on the same theme—low levels of Lust, Mental Break, Exhaustion, etcetera. Useless clutter, in my opinion. Unless you have the tools necessary to counteract such conditions, verbal updates only add to confusion. I had set them aside for disposal, assuming they would not be needed, but there was one of some interest that had slipped unnoticed into the multitude. To quote: you have gained a new Sign—Steeped in Divinity. End quote. No further information was provided.”

  We all sat there a moment, still too high from our misadventures with dopamine to immediately process what Mia was trying to tell us.

  “No further information?” Lynnria parroted finally. “There isn’t anything about what this Sign does?”

  “No—fuck off.”

  “Pretty common from what I’ve seen,” I observed. I had three of them myself, only two of which provided any obvious mechanical advantages. The third just sat there, doing whatever the hell it did. “But I think we can safely assume this is the source of the extra stats.”

  “Steeped, though?” Jax mused while lazily caressing my hands over her chest. “Do that mean the wean were brewed in sommat?”

  “Well, yeah. Do you even need to ask?”

  Lynnria’s eyes widened. “Wait. You’re saying…?”

  “Probably.”

  Slowly, the three of us turned to stare at the giant, pink crystal Jax had been slogging around. Filled to the brim with the ‘unholy sacrament,’ it was far too powerful to simply consume, so she had kept it on the off-chance we might eventually find a use. At a minimum, we could sell it. Goodness knew we needed the money. So it was currently sitting on the nightstand, crack-side-up, and roughly patched with sod and bound with bedsheets to keep as much of the precious resource from spilling out as we could.

  Jax slipped from my arms and came to her feet. Standing there in the middle of the mattress, shoulders hunched and legs spread wide, she looked like a hawk fixed on its prey. “Yer telling me if I rub this shite over me skin…”

  “So it would seem.”

  The potential for free stat points had my inner munchkin slavering, too. But if the name of the Sign was to be believed, it would come at a cost in the form of a trial. One needed to be ‘steeped’ in order to receive the bonus. But for how long? An hour? Half a day? All the while, suffering under maddening levels of arousal? None of us knew just how much time had passed while Lynnria had been tied to that tree—least of all her.

  And were we allowed relief? Lynnria had received none, that much was certain. That did not make it a rule either, but with a limited supply of the catalyst, we could not afford to experiment.

  There was also the ever-present consideration of how long to wait before taking advantage of this. The exponential nature of attribute costs meant this would be far more valuable once our stats got into the 20s or 30s, but the container was already damaged. Without a means of safely and reliably storing it, every second we delayed risked evaporation and leaks.

  None of which was enough to stay my hand. But this was Xhinn’s Mark we were talking about. A lot of Xhinn’s Mark. On the Dolilim, I was sure it would be fine, but for me?

  Surreptitiously, I allowed my eyes to slide to the foot of the bed, where Ahnbe’s representative yet rested. Fekinell had not made a peep since our return, but that did not mean she was not listening. Or that Ahnbe could not hear.

  “I don’t think the Shepherdess would appreciate my dabbling with this stuff,” I said with a sigh. “You know how she is about scents.”

  Jax allowed herself a reluctant nod. “Ye’ve the right of that, Master. There’d be hell to pay from that one.”

  Lynnria stiffened. “That’s completely unreasonable! We’re Questers! We have to take whatever advantages we can find. Holding yourself back over a silly turf war isn’t doing you any favors, and she should know that.” She folded her arms in a huff. Then, after a moment of grumbling, “You don’t think She’d be upset about me—”

  She gestured over the whole of herself awkwardly.

  “I can’t see how,” I returned. “Even if she claimed hegemony over you, it wasn’t like any of this was your choice.”

  If my reasoning had caused Lynnria to sag with relief, it had only drawn a thoughtful look from Jax.

  “The choice, ye says, eh? Hmm…” Sighing, she batted the matter aside.

  “Ach, we ain’t got the time for this, nohow.” With a few quick steps, she bounded from the bed and took up the crystal again. “Much as I’d like them points for me ownself, Arx ain’t getting no younger. Ye fed up, bairn? Nipped yer scran?”

  Lynnria grimaced. “I’ll survive. But what about the nightstand? There was something written under there, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah.” I hated to leave Lynnria blue vulvaed, but if she was alright, I was happy to turn to other matters. “Almost forgot about that.”

  Deftly, I snatched up the vase and its roses, meaning to hand it off to Lynnria, before flipping the table over for a closer inspection. But instead of the expected slosh of water, the pot gave off an odd clunk. Without even thinking about it, I tore the flowers away and upended the thing. Lynnria had to scramble to catch whatever was about to fall from it.

  But when she did, it was clear as day what we had discovered.

  A trilliant-cut gemstone now gleamed a cheery red in the palm of Lynnria’s hand. The Key had been here the whole time, hidden not five steps from Fekinell’s cage.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?!”

  Stunned—and about two seconds from swearing an epic blue streak—my eyes swung back to the table, wondering what message could possibly be written there that might excuse this. I scarcely felt its weight as I upended the thing onto the bed, ready to strong-arm Mia into translating whatever esoteric language might await us, but I did not need to. The gold-leaf font was written in perfectly legible English.

  The cage hums low with lightning’s breath,

  A web of fire, a kiss of death.

  What speaks in silver streams to drown the spark,

  And end the gleam?

  The gate is sealed by Ruby’s will,

  A magic tongue, unmoving still.

  What clanks in petaled dark to pop the latch,

  And free the shark?

  Ware ye the beast that hides within,

  Its shadowed eyes, its hunger thin.

  Strayed near, it may dispatch—let mercy die,

  Lest be crosshatched.

  Kisses, Xhinn.