Sapienophobia

Chapter 32

"Did...?" He waited for me to continue.

I glanced up at him and flinched back down.

"Sod, my bounty...I killed him," I looked at my boots.

I couldn't see the face he was wearing.

What does he think of me?

He squealed loudly before twirling me up in the air with an overt inconsideration for my wounds.

He also acted as if he didn't notice I was shirtless and dripping muck.

I shushed him to not wake up the other guild members.

"Wow... you were really down to the wire on this one. But Vera will be so proud!" He whispered.

Will she? They shouldn't be.

"Did the books I gave you help?" He asked, failing to contain the excitement in his voice.

"Uh-huh," I hummed to sate him.

"Good, good! I'll make sure to tell Vera."

Danny's usual apathetic behavior was nowhere to be found.

I nodded as I scanned the empty lobby.

The chairs were flipped over on tables and the rugs were rolled up.

"Do you have food?"

I shed the niceties for my hunger.

"I have..." he went back behind his desk, "an almost expired sweet bun and a half-full bottle of Sigil Milk. They should hold you over until morning."

He set them both in front of me, squinting at the smeared writing on the bun's paper.

"Thank you."

I nearly choked scarfing down the bun. It was bittersweet.

"Do I need to send for a healer?" He grimaced at the swollen hand I wasn't using.

"No, good night," I answered immediately, retreating to my room before he started to insist.

The milk was still cold.

The warmth of the water I bathed in felt like a liquid bed. It had the comfortability of the lake water but none of the unknown stressors. I inhaled on my washcloth, sank deeper into the bath, and blew out bubbles. I drew cartoons on the condensation of the tiles from the water steaming; it helped me think.

What did Sod eat in the Murks? Did he bathe with handfuls of lake water?
Will I ever need to return there for another bounty?

I threw my wrung-out towels and articles of clothing atop the fifth pile of a growing reminder to do laundry. The contents of my satchel reminded me that my herbal inventory was low.

I was in the unclear middle ground between at ease and on edge when I blew out the candles.

I fell asleep planning my route to the holding facility.

It wasn't half as far out as the Murks, I found. Though my stomach's doubling in weight from that morning's breakfast made the walk slow.

The lobby floor and stairs I had dirtied with mud were clean when I descended, courtesy of Danny.
It pained me to eat the spread; my hand hurt more the day after I broke it than the day of. One of my knuckles excruciatingly popped back into place when I was sleeping. I hadn't unwrapped the bandages to check its swelling.

Two humans at the reception desk in the front of the room were conversing when I scurried into the facility later that day. I saw that the folded sign hanging from the countertop said "At lunch." I hoped that that meant they wouldn't talk to me. Anide butchers could have free range of the building with their identification cards, but I would've been interrogated for credibility; even more so once my fear response kicked in.

I'm just here to visit. Let's get in and out of here quickly.

I crept behind furniture and peeked in doors until I found the records center. I filed through the jailing folders, earning a papercut with my shaky hands. The humans were kept in a different, and likely better funded, prison chamber, so the jailers didn't bother having magicked cabinets for anyone who wanted to see a specific Anide.

B...F...H. He...Hen...Hep...Herl! Here we go.

There was magic on the cells, so I didn't run my bad hand along the bars like I wanted to on my jog to Herl's cell. I had to stumble down a flight of stairs to find that guy. The Anides on that floor were further spaced out than the one above, I wondered if there were a differentiation made by the humans.

Confinement had done a number on my proxy.

He looked like he hadn't slept or done any basic hygiene in the last couple of days. I doubted the humans here allowed him; they had to teach him a lesson somehow.

I didn't make the wrong decision back then.

"Herl!" I diverted his attention away from him spinning his pen.

"Shin," he said, standing.

His happy-go-lucky attitude must have been handed off to Danny when I wasn't looking.

Does he know? Does he blame me?
Does it matter at this point? He's in there, I'm out here.
That could change.
I doubt it, the humans wouldn't waste their time listening to him or go out of their way to imprison me. Doing all that would be a bother to them, already having a prisoner is easier, guilty or not.
But I still shouldn't risk anything.
I won't, I can't go back.
I checked the hallway again. There was a storage closet next to the stairs and bathroom at end corner to the left hall.  I'd have run and hidden in one or the other if I had heard footsteps.

Before I could give Herl the rundown of everything that had happened since he left, runes glowed on the bars of the cells.

I hopped back across the hallway as Herl retreated to the other side of the cell.

"It's fine, it just makes sure I'm not trying to escape. It shouldn't hurt you," he assured me with a forced smile.

Shouldn't.

I didn't reapproach.

"What happened to your other hand?" He distracted me by pointing to the badly made cast on my right.

"I broke it," I stated the obvious, eager to diverge the distractions that embarrassed me, "how long will you have to be in here?"

I knew he had heard the trembling in my voice.

"It's still undecided, but I'm looking at a few years. And that's if they don't give me a bounty. They're saying they 'can't replace victim firsthand accounts', so my punishment should be heavier than just recompensation," he grieved.

For some journals?

My eyes darted between his and the flaps of my satchel on my waist.

I'm sorry. I have no excuses.

"I-I finished my bounty and could use someone else to be my human whisperer."

He chortled at the title.

"Don't bother, no one will do as good a job as me, and look where I am."

"I know."

"Sod was your bounty..." Herl wavered in disbelief before asking, "you killed him?"

He wanted to confirm.

"Yes."

"Really?" He sat back with a face Father would often make, "Good on you, Shin. So how do you feel, now that you've finished your very first assignment?"

"Scared," I said, looking back down the hallway from which I arrived and towards the future to which I would depart.

I'm scared.