The Archress [HOLD]

II

"There they are!"

The bulk of the activity around Arisol's home slowed to a halt as Armia, Ulysses, Boak, Ciar and Lonco emerged from the thick of the trees. The small courtyard was littered with bodies dressed in hunting green tunics, all with their legs and hands tied together and lying in their stomachs: Arisol's guards. Huma had been busily flowing in and out of the rebellion leader's home, carrying out food and rare weapons that would no doubt cost a fortune but stay locked away in the archives of Craos armory.

Ulysses stopped in front of the Huma and looked around at them like a ruler would loom over his subjects; fierce and commanding. A few fighters met his steady glare, but most broke away and found something else to focus on. A silence settled over the group of fifty warriors, until even the animals around them froze.

"Is anybody looking for us?" Lonco spoke up before even the sky could silence itself.

A man stepped up and pointed to the entrance of the hut. A smug smile twitched over his face. "Master Sasge has been...looking for you."

"Oh, I'm so nervous," Lonco sarcastically murmured. But he still walked his way through the crowd and into the house, the rest following in suit.

They were not even two steps in when Sasge appeared from behind a desk covered in papers and a collection of smooth, colorful skipping stones. Immediately, Ulysses' interest peaked at what the rocks could possibly mean. They didn't look special, but neither did this small retreat. Nothing was ever as it seemed.

"You can stop worrying about them, Ulysses," Sasge said in her uniquely gentle but powerful, loud but quiet voice. She had a way of completely flooding a room like air; it was unseeable, but still always, always there. He could feel her presence like the Huma outside could surely feel his own. Both were powerfully one of a kind, and made for each other in that equally as powerful way. "They're only paperweights."

Ulysses refused to bow his head, instead staring directly into the eyes of one of the four Masters of the Huma. "Is there a reason you wanted us?" he asked.

"Besides abandoning your posts without permission," she started, "and sneaking off to aid someone who was clearly not meant to be aided--" A glare was thrown directly at Armia. Ulysses bristled; beautiful or not, his sister was not to be singled out. "--I wanted to personally congratulate you."

"Who?" Armia asked, suspiciously.

"You and your brother, of course," Sasge replied. "Your birthdays are in barely a week, are they not?"

"Yes, Master," Armia confirmed slowly and carefully. Ulysses heard the distrust in his sister's voice. "We're very excited for our official Huma inauguration ceremony."

"I'm sure you are," Sasge said with an ominous tone that made goosebumps appear on Ulysses' skin. "You are like the daughter I never had, Armia Gressold. I am proud of both you and your brother. And of all of the Huma."

"Thank you, Master Sasge," everyone said in uncomfortable unison. Ciar had begun fidgeting with her fingers, and Lonco's usual smug smile had seemed to have slipped long ago. His fingers occasionally went to linger over one of his many hidden throwing daggers in nervous anticipation.

"Is that all?" Ulysses asked.

"So eager to return to the camp already, Ulysses? Well, fortunately for you, yes, that is all. For now. You are all dismissed."

Ulysses followed Ciar and Armia out of Sasge's new office, and nearly fell over from shock. The surprised responses of the other assassins matched his; over their heads was a dark sky peppered with thousands of stars, and the animals of the night scattered and roamed around them.

*****

She waited until the five had left to finally glance down at the small man--or what was left of one--crouching underneath the table part of the desk. His face and body were barely visible despite Sasge's mixed blood, but by what she could see he looked bad. His nose and face were pinched and crooked and twisted beyond recognition, his little hair a death-like gray, and his body was a sickly green color that seemed to fill the room with a foul stench always followed him. Why Sasge was assigned this beast, she could only imagine.

"Okay Delirious," she snapped. Her temper was mixed in with the most disgust one could have, along with a bit more fear than she would like admit. But things had to get done, and done the would be. "You've seen them now. Happy?"

"Shkk. Skksh kshs," he replied in his horribly frightening language, that seemed to only consist of the sound of a sharp sword being unsheathed. Usually it was an appreciated noise, but not from this Beast. It was both a good and bad thing that Sasge could understand its "words".

Don't fret, was what it said. Business will end. Sasge supposed that there could have been other--more specific--translations, but there were boundaries between their languages that mad communicating more difficult than needed.

"Our business cannot be over with soon enough," Sasge spat. "Cric ricicr Delirious," she added, and smiled in delight as the monster jumped back from the sound like an axe chopping down a tree. Begone, Delirious. Of all the Beasts and their peculiar sounds, that one was known to scare off most of the Lesser Beasts, and had the monster fading before her eyes. She stood and strode out of the home, leaving Arisol's papers for the next Beast to collect. Again, she smiled, but this one had lost its confidence.

I will no longer be in debt, she told herself.

I will no longer be in debt.