Binary

Chapter Seventeen: Change of Heart

Vera sat in her living room, staring at a cup of tea that had gone cold long ago when there came knock a on the door. She stood up, grabbing her crossbow from the side of the couch. It had been a few days since Prognis had shown up, but Vera hadn't gathered the presence of mind to put the thing away.

"Friends of yours?" asked Vera, looking up at Prognis and smiling sweetly, "is this the part where you betray me?"

"No!" the Mechian stuttered from the kitchen.

"Well, that's a shame," Vera sighed, "if you had just been stalling all this time to lead the Hatred to my door, I might have actually been somewhat relieved."

Prognis stared at her.

"Should I hide, or something?" asked Prognis, Vera straightened her dress and looked up at her.

"I don't care," replied Vera distractedly.

She fluffed up some pillows on the couch and opened the door a crack, just wide enough to look through it with her middle eye.

"Rain! You're looking well," she chuckled, "what the hell are you doing here?"

"We need asylum, please," Rain said, "we have nowhere else to go."

"Did you bring me a letter?" asked Vera, "do you want to explain just what the hell happened with our prior agreement?"

"It was us!" Neri interjected, "I'm so sorry, Nama Vera, I don't know if you recognize me from the Mage's Academy, me and my friend here, Xora Skystorm, we didn't realize what he was doing, we shouldn't have meddled. Rain had the letter in his hand, and he was bringing it to you, but we messed everything up for him. I can explain everything, but could you please let us in?"

Vera frowned at them. She looked around.

"Were you followed?"

"Most likely," said Neri, "there was a Gunner Kill Squad chasing us, but we don't know if they are still on our trail."

Vera sighed.

"Come in," she ushered them into her living room. Xora and Prognis immediately locked eyes, but said nothing.

"This is Prognis, she's one of my associates," said Vera, dropping the crossbeam over the door once they were through it. They all introduced themselves to one another and immediately an awkward silence fell over the room.

"Please, sit," said Vera, "I'll make some fresh tea."

She hurried to get the tea kettle and started lighting a fire in her fireplace.

"As you're probably aware, the three of us are being hunted for the assassination of the King," said Neri, "but we've been prisoners of the Hatred for the past few days. We had a lot of time in our captivity to hear out Rain and find out what we had stumbled onto, we were hoping that we could help the Light, maybe even join."

"Is that so?" asked Vera, striking a match.

"Yes, we need somewhere safe to hide," said Neri, "and we'd be willing to help out any way we can, and we kind of have nowhere else to go... I know you'll probably have to talk with your superiors, but we're hoping you could put in a good word for us."

"There are no superiors," said Prognis sadly, "it sounds like you guys have it pretty bad, but you didn't exactly catch us at the best time either. The Hatred struck a pretty heavy blow to us."

Vera looked up from the fire she was lighting.

"Oh," Neri said, staring down at his hands, "I'm so sorry to hear about that..."

"It's okay," said Prognis, "No one could have seen it coming."

They were all quiet for a minute. Neri was thinking of what to say, but then suddenly Vera's voice, a low growl, cut through the room.