Starchild Crusaders

by J. J. Pavlov

  "Then we may take her with us?" Sigurd asks cautiously, and the principal nods.

  "The sooner, the better." His expression implies that while the professors present right now agree with such a lenient decision, others aren't as happy about her getting away. The longer they linger, the higher the possibility for somebody causing a scene.

  "I see that this Miss Kamii is a curious little thing." The envoy in black suddenly comments while tilting his head. The mask doesn't show his expression, but the target of the gaze can tell that it must be an inquisitive one.

  "We would love to take her with us as well." The colorful one adds, bending forward to eye the little dark elf from closer up.

  "Do not take her!" Runa steps forward and stands in his way. "If you do, I will refuse to come along."

  Everybody stares at her in surprise, and even Thorvald's eyes behind his glasses widen a little at the half-elf's boldness. Chloe refusing the invitation from the envoys is one thing, considering what she is, but Runa making such a declaration to cover for Kamii is an entirely different matter.

  "We understand. Thou shalt not be greedy, as the commandment goes." Shrugging, the one clad in black gives up readily. "So, Miss Sigint, are you ready to depart?"

  "Wait." Now it's Rolan's turn to stand in their way. "Does she have to leave already?"

  "What would be so important as to make Lord Alkupera wait?" Tilting his head to almost ninety degrees, the colorful envoy asks in a tone that implies the reply better be worthwhile.

  And to Runa's shock, her sweetheart doesn't know an answer to that. For a moment, she considers answering that this separation of two lovers is all too sudden; she was only chosen yesterday and already has to leave her old life behind. But seeing that Rolan couldn't come up with something so obvious, she can't help but sulk.

  "Then we shall depart right away." The man in black states with apparent disinterest in his voice and gestures for the half-elf to follow her. She does as she's told but looks back to see whether or not her beloved has anything to add.

  "Are you fine with letting her go like this?" Sigurd whispers in the leader's ear. Gram also looks at him reproachfully but doesn't say anything in the presence of the god envoys.

  "I... I don't know." Rolan shakes his head and looks at Runa, who turns away at his indecisiveness. As if an invisible bond is broken this way, he lets go of her. But she suddenly stops and raises her voice one more time.

  "Wait, my luggage is still-" Remembering that she's only carrying her staff, she grasps at straws to create another chance at drawing her departure out longer.

  "Somebody will get it for you. Come now." Almost impatiently, the colorful envoy puts a hand on Runa's back and pushes her along. With this, they finally walk away toward the main building, while the principal and other professors watch Rolan and his group staring at their receding backs.

  "Please accompany Miss Kamii to her room and help her vacate it." Thorvald steps into their line of sight and blocks their view. His tone makes it clear that he wants the little dark elf removed from the academy premises immediately. "Mistress Ninlil will show you the way."

  With these words, the principal turns away and follows the envoys, as does his entourage. Astrid and Basarab remain to watch over the group, which is rooted in place after the quick succession of events.

  "I can't believe you just let her leave like that." Hreidunn finally says while shaking her head.

  "Come on, aunt. Was he supposed to stand up to an envoy of a god?" Stepping forward with an understanding look, Leif stops her from continuing.

  "We will see her again, right?" Gram mutters while staring at the envoys and professors walking toward the main building.

  Rolan remains silent as he does the same.

  Nobody is in the mood to join the festive atmosphere in the guild hall when they finally reach it. Somebody seems to have completed an especially dangerous delve and found an item on the list of relics and is now giving out free drinks to everybody. Not so long ago, Rolan and his group had done the same when they found Roshanee.

  "There he comes, the man with the Sword of Light." One from the group at the center of tonight's party suddenly points at the leader, and everybody turns around toward them.

  "Damn." Gram mutters to himself because he knows that they were spotted due to his height.

  "Let me handle this." Hreidunn offers and walks ahead without waiting for an answer, pulling Leif and Vigdis along with her. "You go ahead."

  "Thanks." Lifting his gaze just long enough to say this, Rolan turns away when the ranger raises her voice to pull everybody's attention to her.

  Kamii's hiding in the big man's shadow and wears an oversized coat that covers her features while carrying Senka underneath it. The revelation that she was expelled from the academy should wait for another time when fewer people are around. As Gram pushes his way through the crowd and toward the stairs leading up, Sigurd makes sure nobody brushes against the spikes on her cursed arm by standing by her side.

  Finally, they make it through and get up to their rooms. Kamii has expressed her wish to live with Daica, but they had to first return to the guild to retrieve their equipment. After all, the dangerous neighborhood her sister chose to establish her store in is best traversed with caution and a weapon within hand's reach.

  "That was anticlimactic." Senka suddenly says when the door closes behind them. Gram and Sigurd flinch and spin their heads around to the talking doll in Kamii's arm.

  "I assume nobody's listening here or you wouldn't be talking." Rolan has gotten past the shock from last time, even though he did almost forget about her presence due to a marked lack of it whenever she isn't moving or talking.

  "What's going on?" The big man looks between Senka and the leader, demanding an explanation with wide-open eyes.

  "She's alive and unexpectedly wise for her appearance." The latter points at her with an unenthusiastic expression. Ever since he separated with Runa, it feels like part of his soul left him. Maybe he should have at least asked for how long she would be gone or gotten an address to send letters to.

  "There isn't much for me to say here. You did pretty well, but it seems to have been pointless in the end. They let her go without any fuss because she's innocent. Never expected that." The doll girl gestures at Kamii to let her down and stands on her own two feet. "It really dodged a cliché there."

  "Thank you." Kamii nods in the direction of the three men, of whom two are still staring at Senka in a mixture of disbelief and curiosity.

  "She's really alive?" Gram bends down to get a closer look. "Some of those scars look like they were fatal."

  "Curious." Sigurd mutters while eyeing the doll girl, but his expression doesn't reflect his statement. In fact, he appears to be alarmed after failing to see through somebody even after being with them for such a long time - again. "Are you undead?"

  "No, I'm not alive, but I'm also not dead." Shaking her head, Senka replies with a deadpan expression. "I'm Schrödinger's Doll."

  "Is that your title?" Tilting his head with an eyebrow raised, the bard inquires earnestly.

  "That was a joke." She shrugs and glances at Kamii.

  "Can we leave soon?" The latter asks the men, who hurry up in putting on their gear with abashed expressions.

  Hreidunn and her two charges rejoin them outside the guild hall after they finished their distraction. The heated party is still ongoing, but nobody took notice of Rolan and his group as they pass through again on their way out.

  The three members from the original party talked it over with Kamii and Senka, agreeing not to divulge the truth about the doll girl being sentient. Since she's not substantially smaller than the little dark elf, she was packed into Gram's backpack for easier carrying and concealment on their way to Daica's store.

  "So we're going to visit Kamii's little sister? And she has a store?" Vigdis asks with a quizzical expression and glances at the dark elf in question as they make their way through the city. Her confusion i
s understandable due to the apparent age of the girl in question.

  "It's... complicated." Rolan says and implies that it's best if she sees for herself.

  "Lady Nightwane possesses a beauty such that my humble self is at a loss for drawing a fitting comparison from both nature and the written word." Sigurd employs his story-telling tone but then sighs. "Alas, she has been claimed by Miss Marcott."

  Vigdis blinks and flaps her mouth open and closed, then exchanges a look with Leif.

  "You mean to say... two girls?" The latter asks with an expression that suggests more than a mild interest in details. Everybody has heard stories that relationship between two men or two women is rather common in elven society - and apparently the same is true for dark elves. But in the kingdom, people frown upon it.

  "Pay attention to your surroundings." Hreidunn snarls at her nephew for his unabashed interest in what she must perceive as an immoral act.

  "Me too." Kamii suddenly adds with an expressionless face, although her tone of voice suggests that she doesn't like being left out. "And Hestia."

  Everybody stares at her, their mouths hanging open in speechlessness. The members of the original group knew that she and Chloe had a carnal relationship, but none of them had suspected that the angel girl was taken in as well. So the human-looking demon has been building herself a harem of demi-humans and even found one in the academy.

  For the rest of the journey, the group remains quiet. Some are thinking over what they knew about Chloe while others fantasize about what it would be like between girls.

  Both Kamii and Senka, who's stuffed inside Gram's backpack but overheard it all, appreciate the silence.

  Chapter 50 - Fatal Touch

  This is the third time this moon. In a sense, it's a miracle that there are only so few, despite the seemingly facilitative conditions that lead them to take such a course of actions. And no matter what rumors circulate, they don't seem to act as deterrents at all.

  "Fork over all yer money!" The man with bad teeth and a worse breath points his knife at the dark elf behind the counter. Even though it's barely more than a kitchen knife, it's enough of a threat to people not trained in hand-to-hand combat.

  And Daica certainly never did. She flaps her mouth open and shut, as her eyes dart between the sharp blade, its wielder with the pockmarked and dirty face, and his equally unsanitary partner walking through the aisles without a care in the world.

  "Hey Bo, wha'cha think this thing's used for?" The latter picks up a distinctly phallus-shaped piece of carved wood. It features grooves and nubs along its gently sloped body, and anybody with some imagination would be able to tell its function.

  "Not now, Gudmund." The more sensible of the two robbers doesn't turn his head while answering with a roll of his eyes. "Yer money, now."

  "I-I don't have i-it here." The dark elf on the other end of the knifepoint replies in a nervous stutter.

  "Bullshit." Jerking the weapon around, Bo emphasizes his position of power over her. "Give us everything."

  "I-it's in the back, i-in a locked ch-chest." Staring at the knife pointed at her voluptuous chest, Daica quickly replies and gestures at the door to her right. "I-I can get it."

  "I'll be coming with ye." Rounding the counter, the robber puts a hand on the doorknob and pulls, but it doesn't budge. "Unlock it."

  "I-it isn't locked. Y-you have to push." Her tone is still fearful, but Bo seems to be spotting a hint of mockery in her attitude. Before he can turn around in anger, Gudmund already begins to make fun of him.

  "Nice job there, Bo!" He roars in laughter.

  "Shut up! Can't ye see that yer undermining my autis-... authorism..." Flaring up, the man with the knife reprimands his partner but gets stuck on a word that may be too difficult for his uneducated mind.

  "Do you mean 'authority'?" Daica asks sheepishly.

  "Ye, that one." Bo turns around to her and acts like he knew but only temporarily forgot. Then he realizes who he's talking to and his attitude shifts back into robbery gear. "Oi, move yer ass."

  Quickly doing as she's told, the dark elf pushes open the door to the back of her store. It's a small storage area with a few shelves on which some of the shadier and unique goods are being kept. For a layman, none of the items look notably different from the ones outside, but if Bo and Gudmund knew that some of them can be worth a fortune in the right hands, they would be ransacking it right away.

  At the end of the room, a set of stairs leads up to Daica's living quarters. The layout is similar to her old store in Hovsgaerden, albeit easier to navigate and a little roomier. She leads the man toward the stairs, but he grabs her shoulder and stops her.

  "Hey, what's up there?" Bo asks with clear suspicion in his uneven features as he leans in on her. "Ye not leading me into some kinda trap, are ye?"

  "N-no, I wouldn't d-dare it." Stuttering, she shies back and turns her face away to avoid breathing in the ungodly stench emerging from his mouth. "I-it is upstairs, w-where I live."

  "Lead the way. And no funny moves." Lightly poking the dark elf's back with the knife, the robber signals for her to go ahead. Despite his appearance, and while he does seem to enjoy his position of power, he acts unexpectedly professionally in that he doesn't try to touch her in any indecent way.

  They walk up the creaking stairs and reach the second floor. The entire architecture is narrower than the first floor's, and the lack of illumination causes Bo to feel slightly intimidated. But his greed wins over his fear of the dark, and he follows Daica down the hallway into a room at the very end.

  She opens the door with shaky hands and speaks the incantation for activating lamp crystals. The warm light coming from several alcoves in the walls cover the room in a cozy and inviting glow. Inside is a large canopy bed with red satin curtains and burgundy sheets. The entire room's atmosphere gives off the impression that it would be well-suited in the horizontal business.

  "What's this?" The robber looks around with a skeptical expression.

  "M-my room." Daica replies with an embarrassed expression while walking over to one of the tapestries. "I-I wanted to i-invite my lover s-someday."

  "Ye got a lover? Must be some disgusting demi-human like ye." Bo comments with a dismissive look on his face. His attitude reveals why he hasn't tried to assault her yet; like many uneducated lower-class people, he discriminates against demi-humans based on the color of their skin. If he were to come face-to-face with a fair-skinned elf, he would never do the same.

  The dark elf wordlessly pushes aside one of the many dark red tapestries and reveals a chest reinforced with metal bars. From between her breasts, she pulls out a key hanging from a leather string and pushes it into the lock. With an audible click, the chest opens.

  Finally, greed overcomes the robber, as he pushes Daica aside and flips open the lid, revealing a large pile of gold coins inside. The store's shadier aspects have allowed her to amass a little fortune through procuring rare items only dark elves know where to find in sufficient quantities. With this, the robbers would be set for life.

  "D-do you find me d-disgusting?" Leaning onto Bo's back and pressing her breasts against him, the dark elf suddenly says.

  "W-what are ye doing?" Shocked, he quickly gets up and turns around. The sensation was like that of any other woman of her rare endowment, so he couldn't help but feel some measure of attraction.

  "A-admit it. Y-you would love to l-lay with me." Despite stuttering, her attitude seems to have turned around completely, as her amethyst eyes looking like swirling galaxies in a clear night sky glow in the twilight of the poorly-illuminated room. An enticing smile graces her lips as she brings a hand forward.

  A part of Bo remembers that she was wearing gloves earlier, but now her slender fingers are exposed. They look soft, holding the promise of a gentle touch as they reach for his face. He remembers the last time he had a woman; her skin was fair, but dotted with unhealthy spots, with creases on her face and rough hands that had worked on many a man's me
mbers.

  Even if her skin tone may be different from a human's, the dark elf's face and body still represent perfection.

  Then her fingers reach his cheek and lightly brush against it. For a moment, it feels like an electric shock ran through his entire body. But then a sensation of discomfort begins to spread on his, which quickly turns into a burning heat as if a red-hot iron rod has been placed against it.

  "Wh-what did you do?" He brings a hand up to his face, feeling it shriveled and dry. Before he realizes what that means, Daica grabs the back of his hand with which he holds the knife. Pain immediately assaults him, and he draws back with a scream.

  Staring at the place she touched him in, he watches with horror as blackness spreads from it like a drop of ink on a piece of cloth. Falling backward onto the floor, his hand spasms from the pain and he lets go of his weapon.

  Looking up, he realizes that the smile he thought was gentle before was actually a sinister one promising suffering.

  Mustering his strength to overcome the pain, he pushes himself up from the floor and runs out of the room, crashing into the wall of the hallway with his shoulder. An innocent chuckle emerges from the room behind him, and the hairs on his neck stand on end at its tone.

  "W-where are you going?" She asks while walking toward him. Even though the floorboards creak under every of Bo's steps, hers are entirely silent, as if she's only an apparition with no weight. Is that why her touch caused him such pain? Is she a vengeful ghost that curses the living?

  Screaming, the robber scrambles down the narrow hallway, followed by the measured steps of the dark elf as she watches his struggle to get away from her with eyes glowing in the dark. He rolls down the stairs and groans from pain, thinking he broke his arm. But when he looks down, he instead finds that it has turned black all the way up to his elbow now. The same must be happening with his face, as the pain has given way to numbness in the entire left half of it by now.