I Can't Get the Vampire Rogue to Romance Me

Chapter 49 - Some Good Spoil(er)s

"Dammit, we were so close," Harrowheart grumbled as she kicked at the remains of the dead fire once she was free.

"We didn't know," Evangeline said.

"Yeah, but shouldn't you have?" Valerian asked.

She shot him a sharp look. He lifted his hands in a placating gesture. "I don't mean to mince words or be harsh, but I'm serious. I thought your Special Skill was supposed to divine all the knowledge of what will be or what is directly into your brian?"

"That's only if she burns one of her Special Skill points and she doesn't have to do that for everything," Hagor defended before Evangeline could say anything.

"That may be true, but he still has a point," Sigismund said. "That seemed like something she should have thought to burn a point for. I've never seen a fire like that before."

"Everyone makes mistakes," Artmond countered. "It's math. Statistics. It happens to everyone eventually."

"It wasn't a mistake!" Evangeline snapped, then huffed. "Sorry, Arty. But it wasn't a mistake. I didn't get the feeling, you know, that I get when there is something I can know about."

"So what does that mean?" Sigismund asked, crossing her arms, her eyebrows and lips puckered with worry.

"It has its limits," Valerian noted, crossing one arm as the other hand rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"Yes, apparently." Evangeline looked down at the broken shells at her feet. "So that was a phoenix egg?"

Harrowheart dropped what remained of the rope on the ground, rubbing her wrists. Even though they had cut her free, she had a lot of unwinding to do and insisted on doing it herself. "Yeah, apparently that was what that idiot merchant had been trying to sell me as a hotter fire agent, before I'm guessing he figured out what he had was far more valuable and took off with it. The goblins got him first." She nodded her head to the West. "He's lying over there with what remains of his peddler's wagon."

Hagor rubbed his own chin. "It would be wise to go investigate and see if there are any abandoned supplies that the goblins deemed worthless."

"Which could be basically everything that isn't shiny or food," Valerian agreed.

"I think this means we made a mistake," Artmond interjected, having not been listening to what was being said around him while he had been thinking. "With our Phoenix. We should have kept the shells?"

"What Phoenix?" Harrowheart exclaimed.

"Oh Artmond," Sigismund groaned as her face planted into her palm.

Like the puppy dog he was, Artmond cowered sheepishly.

"It's alright. We might as well show her," Evangeline said. "We should probably call it a day anyway. I'm bushed and we could all use a long rest."

# # #

Evangeline set the tourmaline into Harrowheart's hand. "The best thing you can try is to offer them this after giving them a courteous bow. It may not work the first time, but I bet we can win them over."

Harrowheart nodded. She was clearly nervous.

The Phoenix remained on their perch, preening their gorgeous fiery feathers, not paying the pair of them any heed.

Having already spent a Special Skill point on the subject, Evangeline still remembered everything she had learned about the Phoenix and knew that this technique to get the mythical creature to accept Harrowheart may take a few tries and several gems to accomplish it. If Harrowheart stuck around and at that point it wasn't guaranteed. And there was no going back to the last save to accomplish it.

The ogress took one step forward, and then immediately two steps back. "What do I say to them?" she whispered. "I've never addressed a creature from legend before?"

"I think 'it's a pleasure to meet you' would be good enough to start," Evangeline assured, though that assurance got stepped on by the ruckus the rest of the camp was making behind them.

Before they had come back, they had made one more stop at the peddler's wagon and sure enough, they found plenty of things the goblins didn't find useful. The trickier part was divvying them up.

Damn, there is going to be nothing left by the time I'm done with Harrowheart's introduction, Evangeline thought to herself, then remembered, It's okay, it's okay. I know there is better stuff ahead. I don't have to worry.

"It's... it's a pleasure to meet y-you–" was all Harrowheart got out as she did a very awkward imitation of a courtly bow, before the Phoenix snapped their attention to her and let out an ear-splitting screech.

Startled, everyone in the camp back offed and Harrowheart only managed to skip out of the way of a blast of fire that wooshed as the Phoenix rose up and gave a mighty flap of its wings. The hot air felt absolutely scalding for a whole second as it washed over Evangeline's face.

The Phoenix didn't seem to think they had done anything extraordinary as they settled back onto their perch and returned to preening.

"Well, okay. That was a great start!" Evangeline said to a shocked Harrowheart. When the orcess didn't respond, she leaned in a little closer. "You okay?"

"That was... epic!" she declared, fisting the gem still in her hand and jumping in her excitement.

"Oh, you should try tossing that at the base of her perch," Evangeline said. Harrowheart complied, then turned to join the others at the loot sorting pile.

Evangeline smiled, but decided she didn't feel like arguing over the scraps, and turned to went back to her willow tree to turn in.

"Evangeline, wait," Hagor said, just as she approached her branches. She turned to the larger male and her heart skipped a surprised beat as he came up short a bit too close.

"Uh," she cleared her throat. "What is it," another clearing, "Hagor."

He held up a black rectangle, shielding it from view with his body. It looked like it had been sealed with a blood red wax seal. "I found something I think you need to see."

"What is it?" she asked, pitching her voice down to match his.

"I don't really know, I can't read it, but I recognize the hand it's written in," he whispered,

She unfolded the black page within, blinking at the equally blood red letters.

Knowledge: History. Failure.

"I can't read it either," she said.

"It's written in Nocturis, the language of the Vampires."

To be continued...

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Author Note: I'll be at Albuquerque  Comicon next week, Jan 17-19, 2025. Come find me and say 'hi!' Or however you greet people normally.