On the Ethics of Creating and Powering a Soul Engine

Four

The servant cowered farther away from Lothar. She bore the rough, cheap clothing the late Baron graciously gifted to all of his servants. Curling brown hair was tied back out of her face and pinned with a simple wooden hair piece. Gentle brown eyes glared out of the shadows through welling tears. Clutched in her hand was another fork. She shook with fear and determination. Lothar understood that combination well.

"Lothar, did you find your new toy yet?" Anxe hollered from across the hall. By their tone, they had already moved past their frustrations with Lothar and began to find some of enjoyment in the task at hand.

Lothar ignored them, holding the girl's gaze. She lashed out with the fork, but Lothar simply fell back onto his haunches and avoided the attack. Her brown eyes blinked away tears of fear, but not once did she look away. Lothar's once dead eyes stared back, watery amber orbs catching every detail.

"You know we speak all the same languages; you could at least respond in one of them," Anxe called, voice dipped in sarcasm.

Silently, Lothar removed his sword. The girl flinched away. Lothar hesitated at her response for a brief moment. He missed being truly alive.

He set the sword down, cutting the tension. It landed against soiled and shattered plates and clambered and echoed across the chamber.

"Way to call my bluff, darling," Anxe said wryly. "Metallic clanging is not a language in my repertoire." They were attempting to remove any potentially magical or valuable items from the folds of Baron Ferdinand's bloodstained robes. "Nasty blood, disgusting," they said to themself. "Darling, once we are done in here, I want to do my due diligence and ransack the Baron's study, see what information I can find. Can you see about procuring some of the finer items from the manor? I am in need of a new hat."

The girl looked quickly to Anxe's voice and then back at Lothar. He rolled his eyes and sighed. Leather scraped across stone as he slowly sat back against a nearby table. The girl watched his lumbering movements with confusion. She puzzled as she watched Lothar lean back and cross his arms. After a moment and curt nod from Lothar, the girl understood his intentions and began slowly crawling out from her hiding place, armed with a final fork.

"Lothar, dear," Anxe said, stepping around tables and also puddles of blood and effluvia to move closer to Lothar. "If you aren't going to actually look for your trophy, can't you just go rest in a less corpsey- oh, hello there."

The girl started, keg meeting head as she wounded herself with her hiding place. Tears welled in her eyes, and she immediately glared at first Anxe, then Lothar.

"Anxe is harmless unless provoked, child," Lothar said. His accent gave his common tongue a touch of the ethereal. The girl finished her crawling and stood, a combination of bashfulness and fear keeping her silent and frozen.

At Lothar's comment, Anxe returned to pouting, "I am plenty harmful! Don't lie, darling," they said, resentment plain on their lips.

Lothar scowled. "Attempting diplomacy was your idea, bard. This child cannot hurt us, so there is no need for any harm to befall her."

"I hear you, darling, but I have a reputation, you know."

"What, as a loose dandy?"

The girl spoke up. "I'm n-not a child."

Her rebuttal did not reach Anxe. "Please, be serious," they chuckled. "I am certain I am dressed as, at most, a lower level courtier by Elven standards."

"You were not three minutes ago mourning a hat!" Lothar shot back.

"One, and perhaps most importantly, it was the feather. The feather is impossibly rare, Slenderleaf." Anxe's face had a taken on a more serious demeanor. "And two, Master Tolurus's reach used to stretch out this far, and a slight to me is a slight to him. That Ferdinand bitch said he had never heard of us, and I responded accordingly; you know I played at his father's wedding, as a gift from the Master!"