Interrogations were done with the captured kidnappers the night of the rescue.
There was also a lot of statement taking and making, which delayed many people heading home, as there had been many witnesses that arrived at various times. Even the children were not spared from being asked questions, dragging the legal process on when they would either burst into tears or just stare blankly off into the distance. Not every child returned to their families, some having been captured from other locations, which was why the investigation was so important.
The kidnappings were a much bigger issue.
Even before Velma’s kidnapping a few months ago, the disappearances had been happening at least a year beforehand.
Many had suspected the intense desperation of the temples of Tulilith to try and find a new devotee with divine powers, as their numbers had declined in recent years, leaving a scant few that mainly resided at headquarters which left the rest of the country in a bad situation. When traditional medicine could not be relied upon, people sought out the clergy to be healed. This became more clear as more and more people were succumbing to dangerous maladies caused by coming across monsters while travelling.
However, since the numbers of such individuals dwindled, it was impossible to meet demand.
And what did the temple of Tulilith do?
They recalled all available clerics back to the main headquarters, squirreling away their powers within the walls of the grand cathedral where they could help no one, but those who could afford the tithing…
Now, why were they looking for more devotees with power? There were many reasons and rumors, though the most popular whisperings involved finding a female child, blessed by the goddess who would be taken as a partner of the current heir of the second bloodline of the royal family, the Claridieu. As none of the current generation seemed to have the qualifications on their own aside from bloodright, that family wished to truly secure their heir’s future as the next ruler of Birain by marrying one with divine power to them. As the heir is still a child, it would work best to find one in equal enough age.
Of course, this was only a rumor amongst the people of the capital and then leaving their walls to spread throughout the country. Such things even reach the very edges of the kingdom, all the way in Ceralde.
Few things were pulled from the captured kidnappers. They had taken the job from someone they had never met, whose origins were unknown, so the guards had no idea if it was a local human trafficking ring, someone from overseas or something else entirely. It was quite disappointing. However, they knew the requirements needed for their marks: young girls, ages 10 - 16, of any background. Confirmed as one of the girls found on the ship belonged to a noble family two ports south of Ceralde; she matched the portraits passed around by the Adventurer’s Guild and would be taken to her home through an escort paid for by her parents.Truly, whoever was pulling the strings had no discrimination, did not even worry about bringing down the wrath of a noble. Few would boldly do that, unless they had the power to back it up, hence the rumors of the Claridieu trying to secure their positions.
Things were quite busy in Ceralde, trying to, perhaps, find a new lead by checking the ship’s log from the boat housing all the kidnapees. The inside had been quite dirty, dank and poorly kept. The holding cell was small, too, and that was where Cynthia had found all the girls, cramped up and clinging together in order to give each other room.
When questioned about their time in captivity, many hearts sank when told that there were other girls with them. The ones who had been there the longest, the elder teens, said that a few couldn’t survive the conditions and had been unceremoniously tossed into the sea as ‘defective goods’. So there would be many out there left without closure, as the girls had no idea who they had been or where they came from. After experiencing death for the first time (and it always happened so quickly, more often than not) the children just did not get too close, only clinging out of necessity. Crying children were beaten, since they had not been given orders to be gentle, only to gather as many as possible, from anywhere and everywhere. So, everyone in that situation had been distant, but banded together just so they could keep each other from making things worse.
Of course even with this band of brutes put away, it did not mean that the streets of Ceralde were safe for children to traverse alone. In fact, right after triumphant moments like these was when the worst could happen. An order across town was put into place to stay extra vigilant, that children should be accompanied by an adult or in pairs as long as they were ten years or older. It put a damper on many locals, as these restrictions were so harsh, but the parents who still hadn’t reunited with their lost children yet fought back, shouting about how one should not shirk proper safety and security. The restrictions for children would be lifted eventually. For now, this was best for everyone.
There was a very tense air in Ceralde, despite the pockets of happiness everyone was trying to find in the moment.
The next morning, Penelope and Cynthia went to visit Ulfric’s shop to check up on the reunited family.
Ulfric welcomed her in with a grand, but tired smile. The bags under his eyes said that he hadn’t slept a wink, yet with how much he was beaming, he couldn’t be any happier. The shopkeeper grasped her hands and bowed his head over them.
“I don’t know how to thank you, Miss Penelope. My little girl…she came home. It’s all thanks to you,” he said, full of emotion.
Penelope shook her head. “Ah, no, I didn’t really do anything at all. Cynthia and Minerva did all the hard work, after all…”
“No, if it weren’t for what you did...none of this would have happened. I don’t know how you did it, but I witnessed a miracle that day…”
“Yeah, about that…” Cynthia interjected, scratching the back of her neck uncomfortably. “Part of why we came here was to ask you to keep quiet about that. See, what Penelope can do…is supposed to be a secret. You probably know why.”
In a flash, all of the man’s infectious joy sobered up, turning into a serious expression. Just a glance at the girl whose hands he held in gratitude, to the Cyno female watching over her, he understood immediately what she meant.
“Yes, I am no fool. The moment I saw her face the other day, I knew I had to keep quiet. I don’t know what those temple people are thinking, just assuming they can take anyone into their fold as they please.” Turning to Penelope, his expression softened and he gently squeezed her hands. “Don’t you worry, little miss. You saved my daughter, so I will never tell a soul about what you did. But I will be eternally grateful to you.”
“Speaking of, how’s Velma? And Matilda?” Penelope asked.
Instead of answering them, the man beckoned the two to follow him upstairs to the second floor. At his insistence, they moved quietly, no words uttered as he showed them to his shared room with his wife. Slowly creaking the door open, Penelope peered inside the dimly lit room to quite a heartwarming scene.
Mother and daughter were curled around each other, arms wrapped around the other as they slept. There was a peaceful expression on both of their faces, though there had clearly been signs of tears on both their ends. Penelope was so relieved. Hopefully with this, Matilda could recover together with her daughter after all of the trauma they had faced the last few months. Knowing that things would be all right, she gestured to everyone that she had seen enough, smiling all the while.
A good deed done, she thought.
“If you ever need anything from me Miss Penelope, don’t be shy about it. If there is a kind of pen or paper or other supply you’d like me to stock, just let me know! You will never find any finer stationary supply anywhere else in Ceralde!” Ulfric told her as she delivered the drawing (she made another one during the night as she had trouble sleeping) that was promised in their original request. “Such talent deserves to have good supplies. I can’t give them out for free, but I can find them for you for a good price. You are always welcome at my store..”
Penelope, looking utterly enchanted at the idea of getting herself good art supplies, waved happily as she and Cynthia went on their way to the Adventurer’s Guild.
They all agreed on a cover story in order to minimize Penelope’s involvement in the public eye.
This is how it went: while completing a request to attain an artwork for Ulfric, Cynthia ended up scenting an item that belonged to Velma on the off chance that she might come across her. Fortune struck the other night as had caught the scent of her near the docks and pursued it, after alerting Minerva to come give her a hand. Because they did not wish to leave the children home alone, they deemed it safer to keep them close by as both adult women were strong. The ruckus they caused last night was by their efforts to hold them as the criminals were in the midst of kidnapping another local girl.
This was the story submitted to the guild and given to the local guard. It did not matter if the story seemed sketchy, that was the official story spread around that morning as well among the townspeople. People, of course, talked, adding in the bits and pieces they managed to witness or heard from others who may have been at the scene the other night.
There was mention of the two children in the care of Minerva and Cynthia helping with the efforts with the use of magic. Though that part of the tale was given smaller consideration than the contributions made by the warrior and the mage, the people did appreciate them helping out.
On the way to the guild to pick up the reward (and to fill out a lot of paperwork) many people gave Penelope little bags of candy as thanks for helping out, while Cynthia had to endure some scolding for allowing the children to get involved in the first place. Every time that happened Penelope would whisper an apology to the older woman, knowing she had to take it for her sake. Her little satchel was positively full of treats by the time they did get to the guild.
They had business in there for two things: fulfilling the request for the art commission and filling in the paperwork for the various requests about the missing children. While the forms to be filled for the art commission would be fairly painless, the stacks of paperwork concerning the rescue of the children were not.
Apparently, if you fulfill a request without clearly going through the proper procedures there is a lot of red tape to go through. Mainly because, if you had not claimed the request as your own from the beginning, other less honest members of the guild could attempt to fraudulently claim the payout as their own. Completing requests raised your rankings, which made people see you as more reliable and trustworthy, thus getting you more jobs in the future, which meant for money coming your way.
Cynthia was currently a Rank C member of the guild, comfortably in the middle. Ranks were determined by how many you have done within a certain amount of time, how many you completed, the speed in which you completed them, the difficulty of the request and the quality of the services rendered. Cynthia did not choose to do many high leveled requests, however, the number of middle and lower ranking ones she did were a high amount and she always pulled through for them.
The additional paperwork, after confirmation of everything, would also raise her rank to a Rank B. Tracking down missing persons and having them alive, apparently, was slightly higher profile work and since several of them were recovered all at once, it made sense for her to rise up.
Cynthia honestly didn’t want to, but that was how things worked. Weirdly enough, it was harder to lower your rating than it was to raise it up. Something about being understaffed when it came to harder jobs, so you had to royally mess up (or really be unmotivated, as Cynthia had done a long time ago, apparently) to make people lower your rank.
As gratitude (and an apology) Penelope came along so she could help Cynthia fill out the forms. She had a slightly better grasp of the language and even if she couldn’t read it all, she was getting quite good at writing out the characters in Cynthia’s place. Her handwriting was quite neat and tidy, plus her hands were also dextrous, once she got the hang of a word. Even when she hesitated on how to write a word, she was much faster than Cynthia when it came to writing something down (she was a bit clumsy with pens).
Plus, my days as an office worker made sure I knew my way around paperwork, Penelope laughed mentally. I can laser focus until I got a pile down to nothing.
With the two of them chugging away at the forms, they managed to cut down what would have been an all day affair for Cynthia to just a few hours of focused writing. Penelope did admit she had something of a cramp in her fingers by the end, as this body was not used to such punishing torture.
The paperwork was submitted and they would be alerted later when everything was verified. The clerk smiled at them and said, “Oh, you’re the first to make a claim on those requests.”
Cynthia was surprised, clearly expecting no small amount of jerks to try and take credit for everything.
The clerk simply smiled, though Penelope could tell there was no kindness in it. It was almost devious. “Oh, well, we at the guild always want to make sure we properly do things. Can’t leave out any details, after all, and go through all the formalities…so I actually added much more paperwork than usual for anyone who wanted to claim the reward money. I insisted that they all must be claimed at once, or none at all. Hahahaha…”
So, in essence, if someone tried to scam the guild by trying to claim just one quest for what happened last night, they would be deterred from the sheer amount of paperwork of being forced to claim it all. Man, that’s scary smart.
The lady at the counter brought out their reward for the drawing submitted for the one request they officially took. Ulfric had already alerted the guild that he received the artwork already and was very satisfied with the quality of the work, so when they visited they’d be paid right away.
Five gold coins were placed in front of them and Penelope had to blink, recalling what these were.
If a copper is 1 Drak and ten of those make a silver coin, which is 10 Drak, and ten of those would make a gold coin, which is 100 Dr – wait, holy cow! We are being paid 500 Drak?!
Her shocked expression must have been obvious as the guild clerk laughed. “Oh, Mr Ulfric expressed his great happiness at the portrait he received, so he gave a bit more than was originally agreed. We already took our part, so this is what’s left.”
“Thank you very much,” Cynthia said, gently lifting up her charge’s dropped jaw. “Are you able to exchange one of these into silvers for us?”
“Not a problem!” the clerk chirped, completing the transaction.
The Cyno warrior chose to receive 50 Draks, while the rest was given to Penelope to keep, which shocked her.
“Huh?! Am I really allowed to have so much money?” she asked, voice in a hush in case someone overheard. She had no idea what passed as a lot of money in this world, but to her this was a substantial amount. 450 Draks seemed like a lot to give to a child, who only caused trouble.
“Hey, you did the most work on this one, I was only your go-between. This amount is enough to cover that. Plus, we’re looking at a bigger payout later,” Cynthia said, assured of herself.
“If you say so…”
“You’re not used to having anything, aren’t you?”
Penelope shook her head, laughing nervously. “Is it that easy to tell?”
Cynthia nodded. “Yeah. You look like a noble girl, but you act like a girl who’s never seen a Drak in your life.”
In all fairness, I technically had never seen one until I came to this world, Penelope thought privately to herself.
It had been easy to accept and be grateful for a single Drak, but this felt like too much for just a simple picture. It wasn’t like she had painted a portrait with the best oils, framed it and did anything special. Had she done that, such a reward would have made sense to her. The quality of the items to match the quantity of the pay. And as far as she was concerned, her drawings are mere doodles.
“...You’ll learn your worth one day, Nellie,” Cynthia said to her gently, nuzzling her cheek.
Smiling at the affection, the girl rested her head on the older woman’s shoulder as she carried them back home to Minerva’s shop. Her bag and purse were full and so was her heart. Honestly, things couldn’t get any better.
“So…the second family has gone as far as this?”
“It’s only rumours, but everything has a basis in reality…I suppose it would be harder to keep a throne that was stolen away through bloodshed and violence.”
Minerva and Yule were discussing in private at the shop, while Penelope and Cynthia were out on errands together.
The older woman seemed pretty exhausted in a way that had nothing to do with her partaking in the chaos of the other night. Her hand came up to pinch the bridge of her nose, sighing deeply.
“I’m assuming that THE other family decided that they needed to make things official by having your brother be engaged to someone blessed by the goddesses. Of course since we haven’t seen any blessed individuals in Birain for years, all current candidates are either the wrong gender or are too old.”
Ever since the original succession debacle where the families lied, cheated, killed and stole, there were only two ways of claiming the throne, short of being ordained by Tulilith herself the way she wished it.
The first was being of one of the bloodlines, who happened to be in power. Rankings of authority depended on which family you were born from, as the further you were born in the bloodlines, the harder it was to verify you claim to the throne. It was all recorded in the journals of the early kings of Birain who claimed to be the reincarnation of King Ionian Laertes Raviseul; the reality was, there had only ever been one true confirmed reincarnation and that was the king who began the bloodline of the first family. The rest were questionable at best, due to the foul play that followed the second king’s death.
Yule had not been privy to the entire truth, but knew that the kings who came from the first bloodline had their suspicions. Honestly, it was all so stupid, but such was how their country chose its rulers. The throne passed hands several times, making it almost a game of musical chairs with who would sit on the throne at any given time. If they could find the records from those times, maybe he could find out the truth, but for the moment, there was not much he could do, but to wait.
Every day was a struggle to find out anything he could to throw back upon the people who ruined his family, who ripped him out of his former life and tried to kill him, too. Minerva had a wealth of knowledge hidden away in her shelves, given to her for sake keeping by his mother when they were younger, under the guise of studying the rich past of the country to create new history books. Thank goodness she had them, as the royal library had been ransacked during the coup.
That was where he had been when the royal guard crashed in to grab him and run, after he fled his bedroom where his sister had been murdered in cold blood. He remembered the flash of fire magic covering the walls, taking with them the precious knowledge accumulated by the kings of yore. Maybe their hope was to bury the truth hidden within those pages.
The only one spared from the first family was his half brother, who also carried the blood of the second family. His other brother and little sister had not been so lucky.
Poor Clymene and Lochus. They were still so small and smaller yet when their mother had passed away. Yule had fought hard to keep their family together, so that their father would never forget them and pass them over for his other son or their eldest brother. He regretted being unable to protect them. If he could get his hands on those who wronged him, he could cut out their hearts himself.
“It’s been a little while since you came here…so what will you do? Have you decided on your course of action, my dear nephew?” Minerva inquired, drawing him out of his dark thoughts.
“I’ll get stronger,” he replied with conviction. He stared at his young hands, clenching and unclenching them. After witnessing Penelope’s ability the other day, he knew he had a lot of work cut out for him and a lot of choices to make. “If I don’t everything will be for nothing.”
“And why not just live peacefully?”
“You know I can’t. Not with Cly and Lo both gone. At the very least…I have to pay those bastards back for my little brother and sister.”
“And what of Penelope?”
The elephant in the room needed to be addressed.
Among them was clearly a divine blessed child, a young girl who was pretty impressionable, who did not know how the world worked or even of the kind of political climate she was in. The danger she was actually in, by remaining in Birain. When a child born by the will of the gods came, it was always announced in a divine revelation. Months ago, before the coup, one of the priests received such a message.
A girl child of divine right will appear in Birain in the coming days, blessed by Tulilith.
Upon this news spreading, the lives of the heirs of the throne would be forever changed.
The eldest son, Ulysses, who had the strongest case to become the next king, had his position weakened. His siblings, worse so. Clymene was considered already out of the running as the youngest and a girl, was looked down upon even more. Lochus became ignored as well.
The second prince, a boy born to a concubine, was a different story. Unlike his half siblings, the second prince boasted the authority and power of two royal bloodlines, that of the first and second. Not only that, he had the entire temple of Tulilith standing behind him. Before this news had arrived, their faction had already been loudly calling for him to become the heir apparent, but the King had refused, choosing his eldest son to be his successor.
Despite being first born and the child of the legal queen, people looked down on him and his siblings due to their mother being of lower birth. They were not commoners, but were close enough. The family of an upstart Baronet, their mother had met the king by pure chance and against all odds, and married into the royal family.
His half brother, Antinous, did not have such troubles. Though his mother was not the legal wife of the king, she came from a prestigious family who had incredible political sway. It was he who would be usurping the throne, yet it was clear their family was worried that leaving the divine child may sway favour back towards the escaped Ulysses.
Penelope was a good girl. If someone showed her kindness, she would surely do anything to please them. A charming, but also frustrating trait. Things were never boring when she was around. She was almost comically ignorant of her importance and power. He could only imagine what it was like to have the literal power of Creation. He had never seen the creature that leapt off the page before in his life. Maybe it did exist somewhere out there (the world was vast, after all), but no such creature existed in Birain…
Honestly, though, to have such power on his side would help him with his cause in the future. All he had to do was be actively kind, make sure to win Penelope to his side and victory would most definitely be assured.
But it was a difficult and heavy choice to make and he was still very much indecisive about it, making his gut twist in all sorts of uncomfortable ways. The road to revenge would be ever so swift with someone of divine power at his side, yet he wasn’t so sure he could subject her to such a life.
Penelope was a sweet girl, experiencing freedom for the first time.
What right did he have to cage her?
At his request, Minerva and Cynthia were watching over the girl (with undisguised happiness, since the couple had always wanted children) and would most likely continue to do so until the girl left on her own. And maybe even then, they may still remain caring for her, such was the goodness inherent in his aunts.
“I guess…I’ll wait for now,” he answered, at length.
She was such a funny girl. So weird. So sheltered.
He just wanted to see her smiling a little more.
For now, he would delay making that decision as long as he could, knowing full well there would come the day that he could not hesitate any longer and he would either let Penelope go or force her into a disgusting world of revenge with him.
Minerva sighed, getting up to go open up the store, their little break and conversation over.
“Well, whatever you choose, my errant nephew…don’t regret it.”
Yule had no words in return.
