I reach the top of the stairwell and open the door to the upstairs hallway, as I stroll through the hall towards my room I pause in front of one of the full body mirrors that decorate the hall.
My hair looks slightly more dishevelled than usual (No doubt from sleeping on the grass) the braid of midnight blue dreadlocks stopping in the middle of my back, I take a moment to pluck a twig out of its depths. I spot a smudge of dust on my cheek sitting just below my magically disguised eyes.
Appearance magic is tricky to apply and even trickier to maintain, but I've had six years to perfect the art and the false gold hue perfectly hides the original colour. Though sometimes I swear I can still see… I shake my head, banishing the thought and wipe the smudge off my face before continuing down the hall and stopping in front of my room door.
The door is covered in hand carved protection and silence runes. I have fond memories of Morgana helping me with the carving, though my parts are a bit ruffer and far more crooked than the elegant swirls of her rune carving.
The whole thing works great to reinforce the door and keep sound from escaping the room. I stride into my room, stalking across the floor and face planting into my bed, eager to resume my nap.
I'm about an hour into my nap when I hear the switch on my window softly click open.
I maintain a state of false sleep as I hear the intruders' soft footsteps carefully evade the creaky floorboards in my room, I hear their barely controlled breathing as they close in on my bed. As soon as they're within reach I snap outward, grabbing the intruder by the waist and throwing them into the air. I'm met with a familiar shocked gasp, which quickly turns into a surprised giggle as I catch Fierre before their feet can touch the ground. "Hey, no fair!." They shout as I pull them into a fierce hug. "You'll have to be quieter than that, Fireball." I smirk as I affectionately ruffle their bright red hair, a move I momentarily regret as my hand gets stuck in their afro almost immediately.
Fierre is a kid I picked up off the streets about a year ago. A rowdy yet fairly stealthy 11 year old with honey brown skin, sky blue eyes and a floofy, bright red afro which earned them the nickname Fireball.
As I pull my hand out of their hair my eyes narrow in on a new tear on the knee of their patchwork overalls. "Where'd you get that from?." Fierre tenses and their eyes flick away from mine "I tripped." I shake my head in disappointment.
I've been giving them tips on sneaking around in hopes that if they kept getting into trouble they at the very least wouldn't get caught, but by the gods the kid sucks at lying.
I release them from my embrace and lean back on the bed. "C'mon Fireball, I taught you better than that, at least look at me when you lie or I'll never believe you." They shuffle on the spot before stopping to look me in the eye.
I give them one of my more intense impassive stares and watch as they fold under the tension. "...I was watching the back alleys.". Now it was my turn to tense. The back alleys run all throughout the slums, a complex black market trade system. Ever since Fierre started checking up on their old 'friends' in the slums they've been spending more and more time watching back alley trades go down.
I narrow my eyes at them, careful not to appear angry (lest they start hiding their escapades from me entirely). "Fireball, if you're caught, they'll kill you, and that's if you're lucky." I keep my tone even, watching as their facial expression shifts between guilt, annoyance and frustration.
I sigh and place my hands on their shoulders "Listen, I know it sounds like I'm nagging but I promise you, nothing that goes down in the back alley is actually interesting. It's just a bunch of trigger happy assholes trying to make a quick buck off shit they had somebody steal, hanging out there won't get you anything but shot, trust me, I would know."
I roll up the right sleeve of my loose fitting black blouse to reveal a litany of scars, Fierre's eyes widen at the display. I point to an entry wound scar on my bicep. "I got this stealing from smugglers a few years back." I watch as their eyes fill with questions, their face now filled with unbridled curiosity.
"What'd you steal?." "Nothing worth getting shot for." I smirk as I pull my sleeve back down. "How'd you get all those scars?." A memory flashes through my mind.
My arms bleed freely as I run through the forest, moving as fast as my body will take me. I'm suddenly grateful I insisted on getting swordsmanship training along with Aspen. My muscles burn as I weave through the trees, cursing whatever god that has most certainly abandoned me as I hear the shouts and footsteps of the servants fall further and further behind me. My legs are burning, my throat is burning, my arms are BLEEDING and I- "Tanya?." I blink and take in the creeping concern on Fierre's curious face.
"Window glass." I say with a casual shrug of my shoulders. "You jumped through a window?." I give them a sweet, indulgent smile. "Something like that, yeah." Their eyes narrow in concentration. "Did it hurt?." A laugh barks out from my throat. "Did getting shot hurt?."
A blush falls over their face at my laugh but they nod anyway. "It sucked, it bled everywhere, hurt like a bitch and it burned." Fierre's eyes go as wide as dinner plates as I describe the feeling to them. "Worst part of all though was that the bullet didn't go through me it just went into me so I had to get the bullet pulled out of my shoulder with tweezers and that-" My tirade is cut off by Fierre desperately covering my mouth with their hands, a look of horror clear on their face.
Oops, too graphic. I give them a look of understanding and they remove their hands. "Anyway the moral of the story is that getting shot sucks and they will shoot on sight, you can go when you're skilled enough to at least sneak up on me." I grin at them as they pout a little but seem to understand.
"If you're that bored hanging around the shop, I hear Easttown is hosting an open art event in a few days, wanna go?." Fierre perks up at the suggestion. "Really?, You'd take me?." "Sure, I'll even take the day off work." I state with a reassuring smile.
They squint at me "You don't really work much anyway but okay." I flinch at the accusation and rise from the bed to seek retribution only for Fierre to dart out the door, Their mischievous giggle ringing through the hall.
I chuckle softly to myself and glance out the window. The once bright light of the day has now settled into the deep orange of dusk. I check my pocket watch. 8:46. I let out a deep sigh and head back downstairs to see how the cleaning has progressed in my absence.
The scene I walk in on is so baffling that I stop dead on the stairwell out of sheer confusion.
Fierre has somehow found themselves trapped in a magical bubble of some sort and is now floating at least 10 clicks off the ground, fortunately looking more annoyed than alarmed. Carina has apparently returned from her (surprisingly brief) research trip and is now chasing an increasingly desperate Charles around the shop with a pair of jewel encrusted scissors.
I briefly consider going back up the stairs before I can be roped into whatever this is, but my hopes are dashed as Charles catches sight of me, "HELP! She keeps trying to cut my hair!." "Why?." I ask, submitting myself to the unfortunate fate of getting between Carina and something she wants.
"These scissors are supposed to incinerate the entirety of anything they cut, but I've yet to see its effects on organic material. If Charles could stop running away like a child, I should have my answer shortly." She hops over an errant stack of books in continued pursuit of Charles who, in an effort to protect himself, tugs me down from the stairwell so that he can hide behind me.
"Damn Charles, if you wanted to get your hands on me, all you had to do was ask."
He quickly removes his hands from me but remains cowering at my back. "Just keep her away from me!."
Carina rapidly closes in on our location, her eyes narrowed in single minded determination. I reach into one of the many hidden pockets in my pants and smile as she approaches. Closer… Closer.. Close- Now!. I quickly stab her in the neck with one of the many paralysis needles I keep on hand (old habits die hard I suppose).
She staggers at the sudden sluggishness brought on by the fast acting paralysis poison now running through her veins. I watch as the scissors drop from her increasingly slack grip and clatter onto the ground, I reach out and catch her before she can join it. She is (as always) concerningly lightweight, likely due to skipping meals in order to instead bury herself in various research topics.
I glance down at her, her pale skin now sports a faint flush to it, though whether this is from anger or a negative reaction to the poison remains to be seen.
She glares at me as I walk her over to one of the couches pressed up against the wall, her storm grey eyes attempting to dismember me through sheer force of will. As I lay her down on the couch I pause to brush her shoulder length raven coloured hair out of her face, only for her to attempt to bite me with all of the mobility she has left.
I move my hand just fast enough for my fingers to evade her teeth. "Goodness Carina." I give her a sultry smile "At least take me to dinner first." She musters just enough energy to look entirely unimpressed with my flirting.
"Well that's one problem taken care of, now-" I turn back to Charles who has swiftly regained his composure now that his pursuer is incapacitated "Mind tell me how this happened." I point up at an increasingly bored looking Fierre still trapped inside a floating magical bubble.
"Right, yeah, I think they triggered one of the security measures to make sure Carina couldn't get to them. They're stuck up there until Morgana comes back." I poke at the bubble, instead of popping it simply bobs in place for a bit, momentarily startling Fierre who sits up inside the bubble and shoots me a glare. I feel an evil grin creep over my face and turn to look at Charles, who is too busy placing the cursed scissors on the highest shelf he can find to sense what I was about to rope him into.
"You know, this doesn't even look all that tough. Hell, I bet we could pop it ourselves." I suggest, silently hoping he takes the bait. He looks up at the bubble and then back at me, my evil grin now thoroughly hidden behind an innocent looking smile. "We're not supposed to mess with the security without Morgana here." He almost sounds firm in his statement, putting on his best 'stern' face. But I knew better, I could practically see the curiosity rolling off of him. Charles loves a challenge, it's a weakness of his that I'm more than happy to exploit.
"But she won't be back for another hour and look-" I gesture to Fierre who had obviously overheard my plan, but unfortunately for them sound only travels one way in the bubble, making their desperate panicked flailing and muted screams very easy to reinterpret. "Fierre is clearly desperate to get out of there, are we really just gonna leave them up there?."
I watch with barely contained excitement as Charles mulls over my statement, the gears in his head turning the idea over before finally looking back over to me. "It couldn't hurt to try." I break out into a grin fueled entirely by devilish glee, Fierre desperately tries to telegraph my true intentions to Charles through the bubble, only to be misunderstood once more. "Don't worry, Fireball, We'll get you out in no time." Fierre slumps in defeat as my heart soars in anticipation.
This is gonna be fantastic.
45 minutes later…
This is fucking hilarious.
Fierre is now halfway across the shop, their bubble secured to the ground via a set of magical chains I 'Just so happened' to find hidden away in the backroom. Charles wipes the sweat from his brow and glares at the unpopped bubble as though its mere existence is an insult to his competence. So far Charles has tried damn near everything he could to pop this bubble (including taking all of my many many suggestions) from knives to hot pokers, Hell, we even managed to find a vile of magical acid and yet the only thing our efforts had accomplished was thoroughly annoying Fierre who glares at me from inside the bubble.
"What the fuck is this thing made of?!." Charles shouts, chucking some form of enchanted brick we found in one of the shelves full force at the bubble. The brick immediately bounces off of the bubble and comes flying back towards him. I tackle him to the ground and we narrowly evade the brick, which shatters to pieces as soon as it hits the wall.
I glance down at a mildly alarmed looking Charles who is currently pinned underneath me. I feel a momentary urge to say something suggestive about our situation but it's quickly somthered by something more important. "Are you okay?." I ask, dragging Charles to his feet as I get up. I look him up and down checking for any form of external injury. He seems caught off guard by the sudden seriousness of my inspection, shifting awkwardly on his feet. "Yeah I-."
"I'M HOME!~" Whatever reassurance Charles was about to offer me regarding his condition is quickly cut off by the entrance of the shop's owner and our collective boss, Morgana.