B3Ch78- A discussion on perks (Patreon)

"Later," she said, like he'd asked her for the moon. "If you're good." She slid the folio off the table and set it on the floor by her chair, out of the way, and for a little while neither of them said anything, and the fire did the talking.

He rolled his shoulder. Something in it caught, and he rolled it the other way until it let go. "God. I'm sore." He reached both arms over his head and stretched until his spine cracked twice. "Spent the week in plate. Second life, and I still can't do it without seizing up like an old man."

"That's because you are one." Adeline got up without any hurry, came around behind his chair, and put her hands on the first buckle at his shoulder. "Hold still. You'll hurt yourself trying to do it one-armed and sulking."

"I don't sulk."

"You’re more of a sit by the window and brood kind of man." She worked the pauldron free and set it down on the table with a soft clank, then the next, her fingers quick and sure at the straps she'd learned by now without looking. The vambraces came off one at a time. She stacked each piece without fuss. By the time she'd got the breastplate loose and lifted it away, he was down to the padded gambeson, and he could breathe again.

Then she put both hands flat on his back, over the quilting, and dug in with her fingers, dragging them up along either side of his spine.

A groan came out of him that he didn't bother to stop. He let his head drop forward and leaned back into her hands.

"There it is," she said.

"Up. Little higher. There — yeah." He sagged. "Bad news for my muscles. I've decided I'm not sore."

She snorted. "You're a fool." She bent and kissed his cheek, her mouth warm against the day's grime. 

He cracked a smile without opening his eyes. "I'm glad you and Sarah get along."

"Mm." He could hear her pleased with herself. "You made her sound so wild and crazy. The way you talked, I expected her to come through the door swinging from a rope. She seems like a perfectly normal young woman to me."

Harold cracked one eye open. "She can be very headstrong."

Adeline came around the side of the chair and swung in front of him, and slid her hand up into his hair, and scratched. His eyes shut again on their own.

"What strong woman isn't?" she said. "You think I can't be headstrong? You know how long I tried to deny my feelings for you? Months, Harold. I had whole arguments with myself about it. You lost those arguments every time, and you weren't even in the room." Her nails worked slow circles above his ear. "You tried to stop me coming up here, too. As I recall."

He had to sigh. "Maybe you're right. Maybe I've been too hard on her."

"Eh. I don't think so." She stepped in, and then she settled into his lap, one knee to either side of him, and got comfortable. "We have different lives, she and I. She leads people into fights. I organize your life." She shrugged. "Very different outcomes if I mess up."

He chased her hand with the top of his head, trying to get her to start scratching again. "And you organize my life perfectly."

She smacked him softly on the chest. "Don't try to butter me up, mister." She paused and her mouth curved. "Even though you're right. Your schedule was a mess before I came along. I don't know how you got anything done."

"I'm charming, and I know a lot of things."

"You're lucky, and you have good people working for you." She went quiet then, and the teasing stopped, and she looked at him straight. "Listen to me, though. Being out here was good for her. Responsible for herself, for her team, dealing with all of those lords and their egos — it was good for her, Harold. She found her feet up here. Don't let her downplay what she did. When she tells you tonight that it was nothing, that she just bribed a few men and did some errands — don't believe her. She did very good work. Half of the assembled lords wouldn't be here without the groundwork she laid for you."

He nodded slowly under her hand. "Alright."

She leaned in, close to his ear, and dropped her voice to the kind of whisper that was all mischief. "She and Robert have gotten verrry close."

Harold went stiff. His arms tightened around her before he caught it, and then he made himself breathe out and let the muscle go.

"Ah, well." He settled back. "It was bound to happen. There are worse men." He thought it over and found he meant it. "That kid's got a good head on his shoulders."

Adeline nodded against him. "Yes, he does. He balances her out very well. And he and Theo are very good friends." She considered it. "Their group is the most well-rounded adventuring team I think you have."

Harold opened his eyes and looked at her. That last part didn't sound right, and he couldn't have said why.

She caught the look, and her face softened and grew fond. "You're a fool sometimes, my love. Love blinds you."

He glowered a little. "I evaluate my people just fine."

"Mm-hm." A devilish little smile. "My job was building adventurer compositions before you stole me away. Remember?" She laid a finger against his chest and started counting it off, the professional under the warmth. "They've got scouting and perception perks. Speed perks. Body-fortifying perks. Their starting perks are diversified, and their roles are specialized, and yet every single one of them can do a little bit of everything. That's rare." She tipped her head toward the door and the sparring grounds somewhere below it. "I've watched them spar. They hold their own against the best soldiers up here. So either they've had very good training, or they've picked up weapon-skill perks along the way."

"Both, probably," Harold said.

"Probably." She frowned, then, the first crack in all that certainty. "And then they have some other kind of perk I can't identify. It's like they always know where to be, and where not to be. Before it happens." She shook her head. "It's very strange."

Harold froze, and this time it had nothing to do with the chair.

He pulled her in against him, and she let him, and the two of them held each other while the fire popped.

"There are few perks that can do that," he said, half to himself, into her shoulder. "I wonder, though."

He let it go — for now. He kissed the side of her head and settled back.

"Well. When they get up here, I'll go over her perks with her."For a while neither of them said anything more. Adeline had settled sideways across his lap with her head tucked under his jaw, and he had one hand splayed flat on her back, and they leaned into the moment. He wasn't thinking about perks. He wasn't thinking about much at all, which was rare enough.

And the nail woke up.

It looked at Adeline. He couldn't have said how he knew it was doing that, but he knew. It gave something like a small, grudging approval. Then it settled back down into his chest and went to sleep.

Great, he thought. 

Adeline tipped her face up and kissed him, slow, and he kissed her back, and it went on a little while in the warmth. When they broke, she stayed close, her forehead against his.

"You really don't have any coffee up here," he said. "Because I could use a cup. I'm serious this time."

She laughed low against his mouth and pushed up off him. "You are the most predictable man I have ever met."

"That's not a no."

"No. It isn't." She stood, smoothing her skirts, and crossed toward a little tray on the sideboard — and it was just in time, because a fist hit the door hard enough to rattle it in the frame.

"Get your clothes on, Harold!" Sarah, from the landing, at full volume. "I swear, if I see something, I'm going to be upset with you!"

He laughed before he could help it. "It's safe, Sarah. You can come in."

Adeline rolled her eyes to the ceiling and kept walking to the tray. A small cloth bag sat on it, along with a hand mill and a press. She loosened the drawstring, tipped beans into the mill, and started to grind.

Sarah came in while Robert was a step behind her.

The Redcaps stayed out on the landing with his own guard — he caught the shape of Elroy's shoulder through the doorway, and the two glamoured men-at-arms standing too still beside him. Robin, though, stepped in. He crossed to a spot just off the side of the door and set himself there next to Jack, who walked in behind him, hands loose. Jack glanced at him once and then ignored him. 

He was looking at Robert.

The kid stood differently. Six months ago Robert had held himself like a man braced to apologize for entering a room. Always half a question. That was gone now. He stood square and easy in his own frame, an axe on his hip he clearly knew how to use. Harold caught himself staring at the change in him.

Robert caught him staring too. And for just a second the old hesitancy came creeping back up into his shoulders, the boy bracing for judgment, and he firmed himself up and met his eyes.

Sarah, who missed nothing, clocked him doing it and reached out and smacked him on the chest.

"No more of that," she said.

He rolled his eyes and got up out of the chair. Robert held out his arm, and Harold took it; they clasped forearms, grip to grip.

"Good to see you, Robert." He looked him over once more. "It's only been six-ish months. But you've grown up."

The boyish grin broke out across Robert's face —the one Harold remembered, except now there was a quiet steadiness to it. "I can't thank you enough for the opportunity you gave me." His eyes went to Sarah, and stayed there a beat. "Joining the team has been the greatest gift of my life."

Sarah caught the look. Color climbed up her neck and into her face, and she looked anywhere but at either of them.

Then she recovered enough to barge straight into the middle of it. She slid in between the two of them and planted a hand flat on Harold's chest, this time to shove him back and look at him.

"How did you put on this much muscle?" she demanded. "Seriously. You look ripped, Harold. That's not fair."

He snorted. "You should join Jack and me for morning PT. You'll see how it happened."

"What are you getting ready for?"

He looked at her sidelong. "I'm not getting ready for anything. But if something happens, I'll be ready."

Behind her, Robert mouthed it to himself. "Damn, that was cool. I'm stealing that."

"You two." Harold shook his head and let the warmth sit on his face a second before he moved them along. "Listen — I wanted to thank you both. For the chess set. It means a lot to me. Truly. Thank you."

Robert brightened like a lamp turned up. "Oh — right. I made you something else." He was already digging into the pack at his side. "Hold on."

He came out with it cupped in both hands and held it out carefully. An emblem, no bigger than Harold's palm — the sprig and the blade, his own mark, carved out of a single piece of pale wood. The sprig's leaves were thin enough that it almost seemed like the light would shine through them.

Robert shrugged while Harold turned it over, bewildered. "I needed something to keep my hands busy up there. And I like carving."

Harold held it up to the fire. It had been oiled since it was cut, worked over and over by a thumb until every mark and edge was sanded smooth as butter. He turned it in the light and didn't say anything for a moment.

People were always trying to give him useful things. Valuable things. Those had their place; he used them and needed them. But the other kind always ended up more precious. 

"Thank you, Robert," he said, and he meant every part of it.

Sarah chuckled. "Told you he'd love it."

Robert ducked his head, the grin tugging at him again.

Harold sat back down and set the emblem on the arm of the chair, careful, where he could see it. He'd no sooner done it than Adeline was there, setting a cup down at his elbow with a couple of plain biscuits on the saucer beside it. He looked up at her, grateful, and she raised an eyebrow at him.

He took it in both hands, breathed it in first, and took a small sip. She'd put something in it — he couldn't place what, some small alchemy of her own — and it was heavenly. "Okay." He wrapped his hands around the cup and looked between the two of them. "Before the day gets any further ahead of us. I know you'll have questions. And I want to go over your progress."

Sarah dropped into the chair across from him, and the relief came off her so fast it was nearly funny.

"Thank God," she said. "Harold, you have no idea how frustrating this perk has been. Ever since we got the communion perk, we've only gotten three new perks. Three. I got this regeneration perk that makes it almost impossible to stay hurt long enough to earn anything new."

"We've gone through horrendous things trying," Robert said. He hadn't sat; he stood at Sarah's shoulder with a hand on the back of her chair, and his voice had gotten frustrated. He tipped his head toward her. "She let a goblin tear her intestines out, trying to stay wounded long enough to have a shot at a simple blackjaw goblin perk. We all have done things like that trying to earn one."

Harold looked at his sister sidelong.

Across the room, Adeline looked straight at Harold over the rim of her own cup. She didn't say a single word. She didn't need to. Her whole face was I told you so.

Harold shook his head slowly and took another sip.

"Okay," he said. "Show me your perk panels. And do it so only I can see it." He said, glancing quickly at Robin.Sarah made a face like she'd been asked to hand over her diary, then flicked two fingers, and a pane of System light unfolded in the air in front of him.

Gravebound Resolve (Starting Perk)When an ally goes down near you, you will unconsciously move towards them and gain increased speed.

— Common —

Situational Awareness (Common)Maintains a broad read of the surrounding area. The bearer is slightly more difficult to surprise.

Sustained Exertion (Common)Extends the duration of hard effort before fatigue sets in.

Group Coordination (Common)Improves action taken as part of a team; shared movement and effort synchronize more readily.

Steady Breathing (Common)Holds the heart rate level amid noise and chaos.

Pain Tolerance, Minor (Common)Allows the bearer to keep moving through wounds that would stall others.

Balance Recovery (Common)Reduces loss of footing on bad ground, roots, and mud.

March Discipline (Common)Reduces the wear of long movement under load, measured across days rather than hours.

Low-Light Tolerance (Common)Removes the handicap of darkness. You will see better in low-light conditions.

Crude Weapon Familiarity (Common)Grants competence with short blades, spears, and improvised or low-quality weapons.

— Uncommon —

Threat Prioritization (Uncommon)Nudges the bearer's attention toward whatever is about to get someone killed. Indicates where the danger lies.

Duelist (Uncommon)Grants a moderate understanding of the sword.

— Rare —

Foresight (Rare)

You feel a threat before it comes and gain up to seven seconds of warning. The worse the danger, the earlier you receive it. 

Troll's Regeneration (Rare)Accelerates the rate at which wounds close; even grievous injury knits within moments.

Field Cook (Rare)Food prepared by the bearer has improved taste and a 9% increase in nutritional value.

— Epic —Sky Bound Body(Epic)

Bearer gains an Air body. Also thins the air around the body, shedding resistance to move at superhuman speed 

Thresher King's Communion (Epic)Establishes a bonded cohort among all who consumed the ritual compound. When gaining a perk, chance for the perk to manifest at +1 rank; chance to spread to the cohort. Chance increases under greater injury, exhaustion, or high-threat conditions. Grants a small persistent healing effect.

Rite of Taking (Epic)Killing an enemy with a ritual blade grants an increased chance to acquire a perk from the victim.

— World Firsts —World First — First Dungeon Clear

Increased chance to gain a perk from dungeon creatures. Dungeon clears yield 10% more loot. 

World First — First to kill fifty Common MonstersDamage dealt to monsters increased by 10%.

World First — First to kill fifty Uncommon MonstersDamage dealt to monsters increased by 10%. 

World First — First Adventurer to Gain a Crafter-Aligned PerkPerks gained by an Adventurer aligned to a Crafter role are 10% more effective.

He read it. He read it again, slower, and the frown came down over his face and stayed there.

He glanced at Robin against the wall. The little man stood with his hands loose and his eyes half-lidded, looking at nothing in a way Harold didn't buy for a second. Harold frowned at him and read the panel a third time.

Adeline caught the glance. She set her cup down without a sound.

"Robin, sweetheart." Her voice was warm enough to pour over bread. "Do you think you could fetch us some more tea? I'm afraid this pot's gone stale."

Harold looked at her and nearly thanked her out loud — and then stopped, and shook his head.

"Actually." He kept his eyes on the panel a second longer, then lifted them. "Robin. Can you find and fetch Master Balfiel for me?"

Robin had already come off the wall toward the door. He stopped. His head turned, and for the first time since Harold had broken his glamour, there was something on his face that wasn't patient amusement.

"Are you talking about Elven Prince Thalorium?" The Redcap's voice had gone careful. "Lord of Ism Thalor, and Grandmaster Alchemist?"

Harold smirked. "Yeah. Him. He's down in the town, in one of the taverns, drinking something he'll complain about while he drinks it. Grumpy old elf." He waved a hand toward the door. "Fetch him for me."

Robin looked at him a moment longer, then inclined his head and slid out through the door without a sound. The shaken set of his shoulders stayed with Harold a beat after he was gone. That was interesting.

Sarah had sat forward. "You found your old master?" Her whole face had lit up. "The one from all the stories? Is he as grumpy as you always said?"

"He's worse," Harold muttered, and went back to the panel.

He stared for a while. Then he tapped the air once, dismissing nothing, just needing his hands to do something, and looked at his sister.

"Your panel worries me, Sarah."

Her face fell about an inch. "What? Why?"

"Not like that." He rubbed his temple. "I expected more. More perks, I mean — by now, with what you've been through up here, you should have a page twice this long. That regeneration you're running is a great perk. It's also strangling you. You heal too fast to earn anything new when the Rite of Communion is preventing you from earning perks normally." He turned a hand over. "And this air body. Sky Bound Body. You all picked it up? The whole team?"

Sarah nodded — but it was Robert who answered.

"We all gained it." He'd stayed on his feet, one hand on the back of her chair. "But I could use some guidance on mine. It seems to have a—" he searched for it, "—a unique interaction with my mana body."

Harold's eyes shot to him. He reached out with his mana senses and let them settle over the kid. The pressure of Robert's mana came back at him — strong enough to turn the head of anyone who had the senses.

Nowhere near Harold's own. But it was still a mana body. 

"You gained a basic mana body," he muttered. He heard the hesitation in his own voice and didn't like it. "How did you do that?"

"It was Robert's fault," Sarah said, before Robert could get a word out. She jabbed a thumb at him, delighted to have somebody else on the hook for once. "He unlocked a cooking perk. And then the stupid thing jumped to all of us through the communion."

Harold sat back. "And you were the first adventurer to get a crafter-aligned perk." He said it slowly, watching it line up. "And he was the first crafter to pick up adventurer ones. "He let out a breath through his nose. "Okay. That makes sense. I've never seen that interaction before — I wasn't even sure it existed. But I bet on it happening when I put Robert on your team; I'll take the win."

Sarah opened her mouth. Harold was already looking back at the panel.

"Okay. And you all got a reward from the System for it." He read down. "That Duelist perk — that was your reward?"

"You know what," Sarah said, loud. "You could let me explain some of this. You don't have to just sit there and figure out my entire life off one panel." She flung a hand at him. "Give me some mystique, Harold. Please, a girl needs some secrets."

He rolled his eyes and looked at Robert. "But you didn't take the perk. You took the item. The mana body token."

Robert ducked his head, caught between pride and apology. "Yeah. At the World First. I—" He glanced at Sarah. "My air body's stronger than theirs. My mana lasts longer, and it hits harder. All my perks come out stronger. Even the regeneration — my wounds heal faster than the rest of the team's." He paused. "And the foresight. Mine gives me more warning than it gives them. About ten seconds, where they get seven."

Harold nodded. That tracked.

"Yeah. That's the mana body. Everything you do that touches mana or a perk, it makes it stronger." He looked at the kid a second longer. 

He went back to the panel, and his eyes caught on one line and stopped.

Foresight (Rare)You feel a threat before it comes and gain up to seven seconds of warning. The worse the danger, the earlier you receive it.

He tapped the arm of the chair with one finger, thinking.

"How does it actually work?" he said. "The foresight. Every perk has a passive function as well. When you're not running it full-tilt, how much warning does it give you? Just walking around."

Sarah waggled her hand in the air. "About half a second. Enough to not stub my toe."

She hooked her thumb at Robert. "He gets about a full second."

Harold hummed at that, and filed it away.

He glanced across the room at Adeline. She held her tea in both hands and watched all three of them over the rim.

"Well. Your analysis was right," he told her. "They've got a weapon perk. And the foresight is the thing you couldn't figure out."

Adeline smiled at him over her tea, raised her pinky and took another sip. 

Harold's eyes moved back over the panel. "Her foundation's good." He paused. "But there's no finish on it. No real attack power. She can keep a fight alive forever, but she can't end one. Lot of utility, though most of it is common."

Sarah's head came up, and her mouth opened to be offended—

—and then it closed again.

"...Yeah," she admitted. "No. That's pretty accurate." She scowled at having to say it. Then she jerked her chin at Robert, mulish. "He's got the attack power. His axe. The logging perks. He hits like an avalanche."

Harold wasn't quite listening anymore. His eyes had gone unfocused.

"A rare foresight perk," he murmured. "Off what? A crowned rabbit?" He answered himself before anyone could. "No. Not up this high, wrong biome, you'd never have crossed one. Has to be something else up here with real warning instinct."

His eyes snapped back into focus and lit up.

"A silver peregrine."

Robert flinched. It was small, involuntary, and answer enough.

Sarah reached over and put a hand on Robert's leg to comfort him.

"Yeah," she said. "That thing was a nightmare, Harold. It came out of the sun and went straight through Robert's shoulder before any of us even knew it was there. It nearly killed Mira twice. Caught Jace in his stealth." She shook her head. "The only reason we killed it is Theo cracked an explosive potion open on his own chest and blew himself up to knock it out of the air long enough for us to pile on."

Harold winced. "God."

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and when he spoke again, all the dryness had gone out of it.

"Sarah. Listen to me. That perk is extremely rare —worse than rare— and it's compatible. It stacks very well with Perk Combination tokens. Somebody with the right build would kill for the chance at it." He held her eyes. "So do not ever — and I mean ever — let anyone know you have it. Not a whisper. The moment it gets out that you're carrying a rare foresight, you will always be a target."

Something moved across Sarah's face. A flicker. Harold caught it. Of course he caught it.

His stomach dropped a familiar inch.

"...Shit," he said quietly. "Sarah. Who did you show it to?"

Robert nudged her with his knee.

Sarah blew out a breath and owned it, chin up and stubborn. "We teamed up with a section of the Hospitallers up here. For the ruins. Their leader's a woman named Sokha. She's—" a small wince, "—she's dating Theo, so. And when we were approaching the ruins, she kept wanting us to turn back and come again with more people." Sarah lifted her hands. "There were a lot of tough monsters getting there. The only reason we made it as far as we did — the only reason her people lived — is that perk. So I showed her. So she'd trust me and keep moving."

Harold's face fell further with every word of it. By the end, he wasn't looking at her anymore. He turned to Adeline. She was already setting her cup down.

"I'm on it," she said. Her face emptied, smooth and absent, and her eyes fixed on the air at a spot only she could see as a panel opened in front of her.

Sarah looked between them. "...What?" she said. "What are you doing? It's fine, she's trustworthy, I'd stake my—"

"Sarah." Harold didn't raise his voice. "One of these days you're going to learn to listen to me the first time."

The door opened.

Balfiel came through it like weather. A cup of something was still in his hand.  A pace behind him, and looking about a third of his earlier size, came Robin, trailing in meek as a scolded page.

Balfiel's eyes swept the warm little room once, found Harold, and his face folded into its usual contempt.

"Boy." The word came out as a crack of thunder and a sigh at once. "Why do you have Robin Redcap here? You do know what he is."

Harold rolled his eyes. "Of course I know what he is, old man. If Mab wants to play politics with my household, she's going to be disappointed."

Every Redcap in earshot flinched. Robin's shoulders twitched up toward his ears. Even Balfiel paused. He looked at Harold with something like respect.

"Okay." He took a slow sip of his drink. "Maybe, boy. Maybe have a little fear in you. Just for garnish." He tipped the cup toward the twitching Redcap without looking at him. "Even I know better than to go throwing that name around like I'm calling a dog."

Harold waved it off. "It's fine. I have information she wants."

Balfiel grunted. Then his gaze drifted off Harold and landed on the two in the chairs across from him. It settled on Sarah first. He looked at her for a long moment, and one eyebrow climbed.

"This is the girl who bluffed me."

"Sarah," Harold said. "Meet Master Balfiel."

Balfiel gave her a short nod, and gave Robert the same — and then the nod stopped. His eyes stayed on Robert a beat too long, narrowing by a hair. Then they came back to Harold.

"What do you need, boy?"

He rolled his eyes. “Are you ever going to stop calling me, boy?Balfiel just stared at him. “So that's a no.” He muttered. He set his cup down on the arm of the chair and got to what he'd called the old elf up the hill for.

"Balfiel. What do you know about a human adventurer gaining a body?" He watched him. 

Balfiel snorted into his drink. "Nothing, because it does not happen. Not here." He waved the cup in a short, dismissive arc that nearly slopped it. "A body is Epic-tier at minimum, boy. The monsters that grant have not woken up yet. The mana density in this region isn't high enough yet. In a few years, maybe." He took another sip and grimaced at it, as promised. "Why are you asking me stupid questions?"

Harold didn't answer. He just looked at him.

Balfiel looked back, patient, waiting for the point. The contempt easy on his face.

Then his eyes narrowed, flicked once to Sarah, once to Robert, and a pulse of mana rolled out of him across the little room — Harold felt it pass over his own skin like a draft under a door. It touched the two of them and came back, and Balfiel's eyes went wide.

He was gone.

Between one breath and the next, the old elf was not standing by the door; he was standing over Sarah and Robert with a hand locked around each of their arms, and the cup he'd been holding was still turning in the air where he'd left it. It hit the rug and rolled.

"She has it," Balfiel said to himself. "That is impossible. How could she have done it?" His grip tightened, and he turned his head to Robert, and his voice climbed. "You have one too." He said it like an accusation. "But it is stronger. This is an integrated air mana body." His head came around to Harold. "How did you manage this? You. Boy. Explain."

Harold rolled his eyes and reached for his coffee again. "Show him your perk screen, please, Sarah."

Sarah was looking at Harold like he'd lost his mind, one elf hand clamped around her forearm. "Harold—"

He just waved his free hand at her. “Do it.”

She huffed, flicked two fingers, and her panel unfolded in the air in front of Balfiel.

The old elf let go of both their arms and leaned into it.

"Common," he said. He flicked down a line. "Common. Pathetically common. Miserably common." His lip curled further with each one. "This is the most common adventurer I have ever seen in my life. Uselessly common—" He stopped. His eyes moved. "Huh. That one's not bad." He kept going, and the sneer came right back. "Cheating weapon skills again. I hate your human perk system. It is cheating. An elf has to actually learn the sword." He jabbed a finger at a line, and his eyes narrowed to slits. Foresight. He held on it a moment, said nothing, and moved on. Troll's Regeneration — and he went very still, and muttered something in a tongue Harold half-knew.

Then: "Sky Bound Body. Epic." His voice cracked up an octave. "What in Thalorien's name." He read the next line and recoiled. "Field Cook? No monster gives you that. That is a crafter perk. How do you have a crafter perk? You are an adventurer—"

He was reading faster now, and the contempt drained out of him, and something he almost never saw on the old elf's face. Wonder.

"Thresher King's Communion. What is this—" His eyes went round. "Thalorien's balls, girl, what did you do to earn that?" His finger hit the next line, and he exclaimed out loud, half a stutter in it. "Rite of Taking — there's — there's more?" He hit the World Firsts and threw up a hand. "Of course you have these. Of course you do." He wheeled on Harold. "With his foreknowledge. He has been stacking you."

He spun back to Sarah and drew breath to ask her something — and stopped with his mouth open. Closed it.

"Wait. Why am I asking you?" He said it flat. "You don't know how you got half of these." And he came around on Harold. "You. Boy. Explain. Now."

Harold rolled his eyes and pointed his cup at Sarah.

"Balfiel. This is Sarah. My sister. Look — see her, standing right there? She's a person. You can talk to her like one."

Balfiel's eyes swung to him, bright and crazed, and then he wasn't by the panel anymore; he was six inches from Harold's face, and his voice dropped to a whisper.

"Explain to me how you have broken your cheating human perk system. Now. Those perks should not be possible."

Harold chuckled.

Balfiel's eye twitched. He looked like he was about to start screaming in the middle of Adeline's tea.

"Okay. Okay." Harold put a hand up. "Sarah. Explain, please."

Sarah blew out a breath and sat forward. "Right. Um." She rubbed the back of her neck. "There was a lizardman priestess. In some caves under the Basin. She was talking with the Thresher King — he's the region boss, the big crocodile one — and I killed her, and the Rite of Taking was the perk I got from her." She glanced at Robert. "And she'd been brewing a potion. We took it. It turned out it was — it was healing her own people. And Theo was hurt really bad, so I gave it to him to save him. And he made us all drink it after." She shrugged, helpless. "And then we all had the Communion. That's where it came from."

Balfiel's eyes somehow got wider. "There are more of you."

"Three more," Harold said, and he couldn't keep the smug off it.

Balfiel looked like he might sit down on the floor.

Instead, he rounded on Harold, and he leveled a finger at Sarah without looking at her.

"You know better." His voice had dropped, hard and low. "Why is she so weak?"

Harold set the cup down. "Yes. I know better." He heard himself get defensive and didn't like it. "It's not my fault — you know how those perks get. The bearer gets perk drift if they get too powerful too fast. Perks that powerful cut your odds of earning new ones. Stack that on a regen that powerful, and it's nearly impossible for her to gain anything."

Balfiel stepped in. "Don't give me that." The finger came up again, fierce now. "We both know you know ways around it. She holds a World First for increased perk chance in a dungeon. A World First. Why have you allowed her to stay this weak?"

"I don't feel weak," Robert said.

"Shush, boy. The adults are talking." Balfiel didn't even look at him.

"What would you have me do, Balfiel?" Harold's own voice had gotten cold. "Cut a limb off her? Dress the wound so it can't grow back, poison her so the regen fails, numb her so she can stand it, and send her into dungeons at the edge of death to farm whatever's down there?"

Balfiel crossed the last of the distance between them and planted a finger in the center of Harold's chest, right over the nail, and the nail stirred.

"Yes. I would." He said it without a flicker. "We both know what is coming. She can grow strong enough to stop a piece of it. You are derelict in your duty. Monsters will ravage this world and reshape it, and when the other races learn what she can do, they will stop at nothing to kill her for it. My own included. And you have hobbled her." His voice dropped. "Because she is family."

Harold had nothing to say to that. He looked at the floor, at the cup the old elf had dropped, still lying on its side on the rug, and he felt about as miserable as possible.

Then Adeline was there.

She'd come across the room without his noticing. She pressed his coffee back into his hands, closed his fingers around it, and set herself down on the arm of his chair beside him with one across his shoulder. She looked at Balfiel.

"Master Balfiel. What about your family?" She tilted her head. "Would you put your own children through such misery?"

Balfiel turned and glared at her.

And then — Harold watched it happen, and it was the only time all day he saw it — the old elf softened. The edge came off him, and when he spoke again, it was quieter.  

"To save them. And us. To raise my race up out of Gravesend." He held her eyes. "I would. Yes." He straightened. "Power comes with responsibility. None of us gain power—" he spat the word as it tasted of rot "—in order to waste it. We owe a debt. To ourselves, and to those who gave us the chance to grow strong. We owe it to them to use it."

"I don't want that!"

It came out of Sarah loud enough that everyone stopped and looked at her.

She shrank an inch under all the eyes and her face crumpled, and she pushed the words out anyway. "I don't want that. The pressure. The — the responsibility." She dropped back into the chair she'd half risen out of and looked at Harold, wretched. "I know you were trying to show me gently. I think I get it now. I do."

Then something lifted in her, and the wonder came up through the misery and sat right next to it, and she shook her head.

"Gravesend is a blessing, Harold. It's beautiful. The mountains go up and up until they pierce the sky. There's so much out there — so much to see, so much I've never even heard of. Even the monsters are beautiful." Her face fell again. "But it's a curse too. We saw it. I saw how many lords out there are barely holding on. And then the Velthari came and thousands of people just — died. The stories on the forums are miserable and terrifying. There is so much death. And people are being enslaved—"

Robert came off the back of her chair and put a hand on her shoulder.

"We watched other humans raid a town," Sarah said, faster now. "Just — people. Like us. They roped everyone up and took them. We tried to stop it; there were too many of them, we couldn't—I killed humans, Harold." And it ran together until it was almost one word— "they almost took Theo, why are people so mean?"

Even Balfiel was looking at her gently now.

Harold set the coffee down untouched; his eyes lowered. "I just wanted to keep the worst of this place off you. A little longer." He heard how thin it sounded. "You got so bitter before you died. So hard. So jaded. It broke my heart to watch it happen. You used to have all of this — all this wonder — and after I was taken, I used to lie there and dream about that part of you. A happy memory." His voice went somewhere he hadn't meant to go, and the nail rejoiced. "Our adventures."

His voice trailed off.

Then he found it again. "No. You're right, Sarah. This place isn't kind, and it never was. And humans are just one more monster in it. Justice and civility exist only where strong people believe in them enough to back them with power. Laws don't mean anything without the strength to enforce them. They never have."

Sarah's voice came out small. "I just wanted to explore." She looked at him. "And you sent me to one of the most lawless places there is."

"I'm sorry, Sarah." It came out stricken, and he meant it.

Robert patted her shoulder once and then, when she didn't look up, he spoke up himself. He lifted one hand and tapped two fingers against his own temple.

"I speak for all of us," he said. "They're all right here. Jace, Mira, Theo — they can hear every word of this." He let that sit a second. "We want to thank you. For letting us be a little selfish for a while. We needed it, and we knew what you were doing, I think, even if we didn't say so." His jaw firmed. "But none of us want that anymore. Master Balfiel's right. We have power. That means we have responsibility. And it’s been so damn long since we gained a perk." A beat while he looked sheepish. Sorry, Mira is shouting at me right now. "So show us how to use it."

Harold looked at the young man, and then at his sister, and he had nothing. He turned to Adeline instead.

She looked back at him, fierce, and nodded once.

He nodded. "Okay." He rubbed his temple. "I can show you how." He dropped his hand. "You're going to be in a lot of pain."

Balfiel scoffed from across the room. "As if you can't brew a simple dead nerves potion. Master Alchemist. Pah."

Harold's head came around. "You know you can't run that potion long-term," he snapped. "It causes damage."

"And you still haven't cracked that?" Balfiel's voice climbed right back up. "A cheating-perk-system crafter who cannot solve a numbing draught — a numbing draught, boy, first-year work — but he can brew me one that sharpens my affinity to concepts?"

"Yes!" Harold shouted it, up out of the chair now. "That's exactly how it is! One of those is hard and one of them isn't, and it's not the one you think!"

"It is a numbing draught!"

"It's concept magic, you crazy old—"

Adeline was looking at Harold with open, delighted love, her chin propped on her hand. Across the room, Sarah and Robert had gone still and bewildered, heads turning between the two men like they were watching a ball go back and forth.

Adeline rose without any hurry. She eased around behind the pair of them, the Grandmaster Alchemist and the Count both red in the face and jabbing fingers at a potion neither of them was going to brew tonight, and she got a gentle hand on Sarah's back and another on Robert's, and steered the two of them quietly toward the door.

"Come on, you two," she murmured. "They'll be at this a while."