Siembra survived the night. It paid for this luxury with a few deaths, mostly among the adventurers, a handful of destroyed houses, piles of trash and alef remains, and one particularly unlucky street that was made uninhabitable by a persistent miasma of stench left behind by a clueless wizard.

  It was hard to say what the wizard was thinking with his attempt to drive the alefs away with a foul smell. And since no one was predictably volunteering to shoulder the blame, Esven and his men didn't look too hard into it. They had their hands full already.

  The number one priority for the town's guards was making sure there were no live alefs left in Siembra.

  Then, there was the matter of resettlement for the people left without homes. This issue was made more difficult by all the adventurers trying to claim damages for the tents and sleeping bags lost in countless fires created and stoked by their own mages.

  For Esven, who didn't get a chance to visit a proper healer and had the face the color of an unripe potato, there was also the matter of reporting to the magistrate, who promptly scapegoated him for the whole alef debacle.

  Such a turn of events would ordinarily make the captain upset, furious even. He was, after all, integral to plugging the alef hole before the creatures overwhelmed the town's defenders.

  That day, however, he was more concerned with pursuing Lucius, and so he simply took the bureaucratic beating, accepted his pay cut, and even asked for a suspension. He needed time to heal and consider his actions, as he put it to the magistrate. In truth, he just wanted the freedom to go after his old boss unmolested.

  His request was denied. As much as the magistrate needed someone to blame, he needed an experienced captain making sure the town didn't implode on itself after the shock of last night.

  When leaving the magistrate's Esven already knew there was another pay cut in his future, provided he even had a future. He fully intended to abandon his post and go dungeoneering with Gaius and the others.

  The tunnels underneath Siembra were vast and cavernous enough to support a small army of adventurers. But while Esven didn't know exactly where to find Lucius who was presumed dead a long time ago, he had a good idea where to start thanks to his countless attempts to recover Lucius' body.

  Gaius was the one who set everything up and even promised a special surprise that was sure to make their adventuring debut go much smoother. Taking charge like this when everyone else was angry and hurt allowed Gaius to avoid any extra scrutiny when he told his tale of how he knew Shadow.

  Soon after he opened his shop, Gaius was visited by Shadow, who offered him an opportunity to earn a bit of extra coin peddling artifacts. There were no open threats involved, still Gaius knew he had no choice but to accept that offer and start indirectly working for Shadow. And with both Esven and Isabella on the side of the law, he couldn't just tell them about his ties with the criminal underworld.

  It was a lousy explanation, but it was the best Gaius could come up with on the spot. Lucky for him, everyone else was even more tired than he was that night. His companions had other things on their minds. They didn't really bother to poke holes in his story.

  After he spent a lot of coin on healers to make sure everyone in his group was ready to go when he needed them, Gaius left the store in the imp's tiny yet capable hands and went out to prepare the promised surprise.

  When he returned, he was about to slink into his room when he heard faint murmurs coming from Isabella's.

  The knight was sitting on the bed with her toga rolled down to her waist, leaving her body in plain view for anyone entering the room. This was a touch too shameless even for Isabella, but the knight wasn't too concerned with a presentable image at the moment. The entirety of her attention was directed to a nasty scar crossing her body from around the rib cage all the way to the back.

  Isabella was tracing the scar with the tip of her index finger, as she mumbled something under her breath. Gaius couldn't tell if this was a prayer or if she was talking to herself.

  The scar was a grisly reminder of the limitations of healing magic. Sure, it was really good at fixing you up and putting you back on your feet, but it took a real master to also deal with the cosmetic effects. And while Gaius wasn't certain just how good Alessia was with her salves, he had no doubts the witch made sure to put as little effort into treating Isabella as she could get away with.

  Sensing a new presence, Isabella convulsed, throwing her arms to cover herself up. Recognizing Gaius, she relaxed and attempted a smile.

  "Come in, close the door," she said, her thoughts stuck somewhere far away.

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  When he did, Isabella reached for the pendant that was sitting beside her.

  In all the time Gaius knew the knight, she never once took that thing off. Even when she had nothing else on, the pendant stayed. Now, Isabella picked the trinket up, looked at it for a few moments, and tossed it to Gaius.

  "Congratulations, Guy. You now have a sister. Sister Moon," she said when Gaius caught the thing.

  "What do you mean?" Gaius wasn't used to seeing Isabella so clearly out of it, lost in a mournful melancholy.

  Instead of a reply, Isabella leaned over the bed and fished out her saber from underneath it. She then tossed it like a javelin at Gaius.

  It was a slow and clumsy throw, and Gaius could easily dodge it, but the bizarre nature of this whole situation made him hesitate just long enough for the saber to bounce off the translucent shield that surrounded him. It was quite strange to look at the world through this bubble, knowing that nothing, or next to nothing as Isabella's scar showed, could hurt you.

  "This thing works again, I see," Gaius said.

  It was a simple statement, but Isabella reacted to it like he just walked up to her and kicked her in the face.

  "Exactly. It works just fine," she spat and covered her face with her palms. "But it shouldn't. I've always been sold this story about how I was favored by the goddesses. How I had to train and practice to show them I was worthy of that favor. And when finally they deemed me worthy and bestowed their holy shield upon me, I was given this pendant. As a sign of my status, nothing more. And now, it turns out, this was all a trick. There was no favor, I wasn't chosen. Literally anyone could be in my place and the goddesses wouldn't care."

  Isabella stopped talking. Gaius could see she was crying. Not the loud wailing cry, but the silent tears of helplessness. This clearly was a new feeling for the knight.

  She lowered her head in an attempt to hide her face from Gaius. That brought her eyes to the toga still wrapped around her lower body.

  With a growl, Isabella started to twist and turn, wrestling herself from the toga's grasp, all without getting up from the bed. When that was done, she tossed the white fabric on the floor and looked at Gaius with defiance.

  "It's all lies."

  Isabella's face was miserable, to the point that it eclipsed everything below it.

  "So what?" Gaius asked. Thinking about the futility of everything always cheered Gaius up, and looking at Isabella, he wanted nothing but to cheer her up. "Divine or not, the pendant is still useful. And even without it, you can heal and smite with the best of them. Shouldn't that count for something?"

  "And how's any of that different from magic? Without this pendant, a poor man's substitute for divine favor, I'm just a mage with a different color scheme. Hurray for me." To highlight her bitter glee, Isabella produced an ivory-white spark between her middle fingers, then clapped her hands to make it go away.

  "See, that's what I've been asking every priest I met on my travels. And they just kept laughing at me like I wanted to know why the sky was blue or how come rivers never ran out. I guess that means there must be a difference."

  Isabella ignored Gaius' quip and hit the mattress with the sides of her fists.

  "How arrogant of me, thinking I could tackle this Shadow, Lucius, whatever he is, alone, when I'm so damned useless," she whispered past Gaius more than to him.

  Gaius' usual plan for consoling a crying woman was to make a swift exit and move to another town.

  He kept eyeing the shutters on Isabella's window as he moved through the room and planted himself on the side of her bed. He then dropped back, stretching across her legs.

  The pendant was in his hands. Gaius swayed the thing back and forth like a pendulum, thinking of what he should say. Finally, he turned his head sideways and up, and placed the pendant precisely between Isabella's breasts, using just a little bit of his sleight of hand to prevent it from slipping.

  "Whatever this thing is between us, it just sort of happened. We're not two souls intertwined by destiny. The two of us, we've only recently met. It's like we're here, so why not?" Looking up at Isabella, it was clear she had no clue where Gaius was going with this, and truth be told, he wasn't so sure of it either.

  "Because of this, my words may lack the desired impact. I'll say them anyway. I don't believe in much. And I'm not talking about your strange religion with its goddesses and their cycles and artifacts. No, even back home I was never one to frequent temples. I don't believe in much, Isabella, but I believe in you. You're good. Not good at what you do, good in the sack, or with a jug of wine. Good. And just being near you makes all us sinners want to be better. You think for a moment, if not for you, I would lift a finger to help this damnable town? Without you, I'm perfectly content with securing what's mine and letting everything else burn around me. You make me, of all people, better, and that should count for something."

  At that moment, there wasn't a thief or a merchant, or even a druid. There was just Gaius speaking his mind, a feat so unheard for him, he almost couldn't believe it. Yet he had no other choice but to say those words, for they were the truth, no matter which way he spun it.

  "You're giving me too much credit," Isabella said when Gaius stopped talking.

  "No, I'm not," he disagreed. "You're the important part in all of this. Your faith, your pendant, your training, they're just tools for you to use, so use them. Tomorrow we're going underground, looking for a place no one's returned from alive. And I'm leading this crazy expedition. Me. I sure could use a knight with an impenetrable shield by my side."

  "A shield that can go out at any moment."

  "Look at it this way. Based on what we know, Shadow needs to be near you to disable your shield. When he's not around, you can be your regular trailblazing self. And once he shows up, you leave him to me." Gaius placed his hand on Isabella's stomach. "I promise, this is the last mark he'll leave on you."

  Isabella covered Gaius' hands with both of hers. "These are strong words for a merchant."

  Gaius used his free hand to wipe the single remaining tear from Isabella's face. "And this is a bit too much self-pity for a knight."

  With a faint grin coloring her face with newfound hope, Isabella glanced at the crumpled fabric of her toga sitting on the floor, then fixed her eyes on Gaius' lips.

  "We're here. So why not?"

  Gaius didn't ask for a second invitation. He needed his rest before the big day tomorrow, but there were other things more invigorating than sleep.

  Story Facts - Chapter 29