We ended up passing a weapon shop as we approached the arena, and we stopped in to pick up a couple of ready-made items. Arx bought a pair of scimitars, and I went ahead and got myself a decent round shield. It was not quite so big as the last one, and consequently, it was far less heavy. Regardless, I felt much safer with that bit of hand-held armor. And conveniently, there were a couple of loose straps attached to one side so that I could wear it across my back.

I was tempted to buy another spear to go along with it, but the lilim were of the opinion that if I had a weapon then I would naturally be tempted to use it. And that would just get me into trouble. I had grumbled about it, though I had secretly agreed with them. So, I ended up only buying a long knife for myself as an everyday-use kind of thing.

Meanwhile, Jax had not really wanted anything despite my opinion that she might benefit from a shield herself. However, she claimed that the axe was a two-handed affair, and because her fighting style required a great deal of agility, a shield would just get in her way. However, when I had started browsing the knives, she had reconsidered, opting to buy a trio of small, throwing daggers.

“Ye never know,” she had explained shortly.

Altogether, the lot only came to three silver and twice as many copper once we had added in leather belts and sheaths. Given how much simple clothes had cost us, I was a little surprised by this, but apparently, mundane weaponry was not too pricey. When I had asked about it, the shop owner assured me that it could get that way in a hurry. Even the most basic of skill-based boosts could easily cause the price to skyrocket, and that was not even mentioning engraved weapons.

Those, he informed us, started at around twenty gold, which was roughly equal to our entire take from the Dungeon.

Fuck me… well, if it comes down to it, I guess we could pawn Arx’s knife.

It was a simple little thing, and the engraving on it was not particularly jaw-dropping. When fed a bit of Life Energy, it would just repair itself, after all. Arguably, a knife that never went dull on you was pretty damned nice, but you could buy a lot of replacements for twenty gold! Still, it was her knife, and I would not feel comfortable asking her to sell it.

But there was no need to worry about that yet. We still had plenty of money left.

That errand complete, we set off.

*****

Once we got to the arena, we could hear faint crowd noises from the outside, so it was obvious that some sort of event was going on. I had assumed something like that would be more appropriate for the evening, but on reflection, it made a certain sort of sense. After all, these people did not have access to stadium lights. Why not make use of the natural sunlight?

That said, there were not many people idling outside, and we were able to walk right up to the box attendant. A younger-looking, teenage laoi was stationed there, and when we had questioned him, he had directed us to a signboard off to one side which detailed upcoming events. Apparently, the next tournament had been scheduled for the second week of the upcoming month, but it was crossed out with a note that read, ‘Tentatively Canceled.’

The rest of the calendar was filled with various items such as foot races, monster fights, and some sort of weekly youth league. There was also a by-the-hour sign-up sheet to rent out space for skill practice. The sheet had already been completely filled, but here again, most of the names had been crossed out.

“What’s with all the cancellations?” I asked finally.

“I guess you three haven’t heard, then,” I heard from behind me, and I turned. Apparently, the attendant was eager to spread some juicy gossip and had leaned out of his box with a conspiratorial look on his face. “About two weeks ago, the Fleet Foxes lit out of here like their butts were on fire. No idea what happened, but some of the guys started a betting pool.” He paused to look around and then hunched his shoulders. In a whisper, he continued, “My bet’s on a military contract. I hear the Enbraden have been getting riled up. Something about the matriarch’s daughter?”

“The Fleet Foxes?” I murmured, tapping at my lip. I was not particularly concerned with the internal politics of the local mafia clan. “Where have I heard that name before?”

“Didn’t that one guy… uh… Menda, I think? Didn’t he mention them?” Arx reminded me.

I tilted my head back as the memory snapped into place. Right… those were the guys he tipped off about the Dungeon Mouth. I pursed my lips in contemplation. I wonder whether that betting pool is still open…

“What’s that got to do with the schedule?” Jax asked, interrupting my thoughts. “I were needing to sign up for that tournament.”

The kid tsked, seemingly put out that we were unimpressed by his rumormongering. “That should be obvious,” he said, as if just him saying that would be enough. Of course, when our silence finally clued him in to the fact that it had not been, he rolled his eyes. “Who do you think fights in these tournaments? Can’t very well have a big competition when more than half of the entries are out of town doing who-knows-what.”

“How many do ye need then?” she persisted and folded her arms under her breasts.

The teen followed the move with his eyes and they lingered there just a tad too long. Slowly, a flush began to creep up his cheeks and he shook his head, as though he had been entranced. I knew the feeling well—so I gave it a pass.

Jax glanced at me from the corner of her eye and very subtly brushed against my side.

Averting his eyes, the attendant jerked a thumb behind him. “Loo—!” His voice cracked mid-word, and he made an effort to clear it before continuing in an artificially low voice, “Uh… Look, I just work here. You’d need to talk to the boss. His name’s Uchoyo. Kind of a… chubby, purple-haired laoi? He’ll be in the upper boxes right now. Can’t miss him.” I nodded my thanks and started inside, but he quickly squawked in protest. “Wait a minute! You can’t go in unless you buy tickets.”

“What?” I replied with a frown. “But we just wanted to talk to your boss.”

He just shrugged. “Hey, pal. Like I said, I just work here. I don’t make the rules.”

Jax sighed in exasperation. “Fine! How much? And what’re the tickets for, anyways?” Quietly, she murmured, “May as well see the show if we’s buying ‘em.”

“Youth league,” he replied cryptically. Then with a broad smile, he held out his hand. “And it’s three-eighths of copper apiece.”

“Three…” I paused to do some quick mental math. That’s like twenty bucks a ticket. And for youth league? My face fell. Well… that checks out. Of course tickets to see a bunch of brats doing brat things was going to cost an arm and a leg. And naturally, with the three of us, that meant that the change was going to work out as inconveniently as possible. Turning to Jax, I whispered, “Are you sure you want to go see this?”

“No,” she replied quickly. “But I need to talk to this Uchoyo, don’t I. I need this tournament, Master.” She glanced significantly at Arx. “I need it.”

I let out a slow breath. Right… She had not been complaining about it openly, but she did not at all care for her Layers—and thus her continued growth in Charisma—being locked. Not while Arx was still free to grow. Plus, she was still completely tailless. So with an air of defeat, I started pulling a couple of coins out of my pouch. “Fine.”

Jax kissed my cheek happily.

*****

The arena’s interior was akin to what I would think of as a roman-styled chariot-racing course. The central field was a sandy, barren pitch, and from where I was standing, it looked like people were setting up for some kind of sport. There were a pair of wooden stakes that had been driven into the ground on opposite sides of the field. Each had a flag tied to it—one in red, the other blue.

Meanwhile, there were a bunch of young-looking individuals from various races idling about down there. None of them were wearing uniforms save for either a blue or red armband. I assumed those were meant to signify which stake belonged to them.

“Oh, ‘stits! I think they’re playing game-ball!” Arx said and began excitedly dragging me toward an empty bench. “Come on! We have to watch!”

“Game… ball?” I repeated incredulously. That had to be the single most unoriginal name for a sport I had ever heard.

“Oh, it’s wonderful,” she gushed. “I used to follow it religiously. One of the best things for filling my old Mirth reservoir. You’ll love it!”

“Uh… Master?” Jax said hesitantly, pointing back and behind her toward where a set of boxes were set above the stadium seating.

I nodded. “Right. Arx we’re not really here for that.”

“Oh, please?” she begged and turned to pout at Jax. “Can’t we watch?”

Jax fidgeted for a moment, but eventually, she stepped close and placed a hand on my chest. “Master, do ye mind me going to ask alone, then? I’ll be back quick-like. I promise ye.”

“Well, of course I don’t mind,” I replied. “Go ahead. We’ll save you a seat.”

She nodded unhappily and began to slowly back away toward a set of stairs. Initially, I had to chuckle at the face she was making—you might have thought I was her first-born child that she was dropping off for his inaugural stint in kindergarten. However, the further she got from me, the more uneasy I began to feel.

“Dearest,” Arx murmured into my ear, and I turned to look at her. Very gently, she drew me into a tender little kiss, then said, “It’s alright. I’m here.”

I smiled self-consciously at her before glancing back, but Jax was already headed up the stairs. “Yeah, I know. It’s just… I don’t know. I somehow feel… lesser when I’m apart from either of you. Ah… I probably sound ridiculous.”

“Not at all,” she assured me. “I feel her absence, too.”

“Really?” I asked, curious. “You never mentioned it when she went off the last time.”

“Well… we were a little preoccupied as I recall,” she reminded me before tugging on my wrist once more. “Now, come on! I think the next play is going to start soon.”

I rolled my eyes, but I followed anyway.

The crowd was fairly thick for a youth-league game, and we had needed to excuse ourselves several times as we stumbled and awkwardly side-stepped people’s knees. Naturally, we collected a fair amount of stares—whether from our bumbling, our outfits, or otherwise, I could not say—but there was not much either of us could do about that. So, I tried not to think about it. Soon enough, we were situated toward the back of the bleachers somewhere about mid-field.

Just as we found our seats, I noted an adult wearing a far-too-large tricornered hat carrying some kind of brown, leather ball to a spot right in the center of the field. However, none of the kids out there were making a move yet.

“So, what is this sport, anyway?” I asked. “What are the rules?”

“You cannot be serious,” a woman sitting to my right exclaimed. She was a laoi, as were the majority of people in this town. Grabbing at the shirt of the man sitting on the other side of her, she jerked a thumb at me, “This guy has never heard of game-ball!”

“You’re not serious?!” he shouted and leaned forward to stare at me. “What? Did you just crawl out from a Mouth’s ass?”

“Yes,” Arx said and stood up aggressively. “Why? You want to make something of it?”

The woman blanched. “Hey now! No need for that,” she said with a nervous little chuckle. “We were just surprised is all.”

“Yeah,” the man added. “No need for hostilities. This is just youth league, after all.”

Arx snorted coldly down at them before settling back and folding her arms with an air of superiority.

“Uh… Arx?” I said quietly. “The fuck was that?”

“Sorry, Dearest,” she murmured before chopping down with her hand. “But they were talking down to you. You cannot show weakness at a game-ball match. You’ll see.”

“W-what?” I stammered and started laughing nervously. What exactly have I gotten myself into, here?

Arx shushed me and pointed at the field. “They’re lining up! Watch!”

Sure enough, the kids were gathering into two separate groups on either side of the field. The ones with blue armbands were by the blue stake and vice versa. There did not seem to be much of any kind of order to things other than that. I could not even determine what age-group was supposed to be out there. From what I could tell, they seemed to range from ten or twelve-year-olds all the way up to kids who were fourteen or even sixteen.

Plus, there did not seem to be any semblance of thought put into team composition. Girls and boys, various kinds, and age-groups were just scattered in a random mix between the two teams. Although, I did note that the older kids seemed to be clumped a little more centrally within their respective team’s line-up.

Abruptly, the man with the tricornered hat raised his hand, and I noted that he was holding aloft a white bit of cloth. Once they saw that, the crowd soon stilled while the two teams hustled to form up into a horizontal line, even with their flags. They quickly assumed various stances and tensed, as though preparing to sprint forward. All of them were focused on the ball that had been placed at the center of the field.

Arx’s hand found my thigh, and she excitedly clamped down on it. “Here we go~!” she whispered.

As soon as the man threw down the cloth, all hell broke loose. Like two sides of opposing Viking infantries, the teams charged each other and soon collided into what I can only describe as full-on, out-and-out combat.

“Holy shit!” I shouted involuntarily. And then I started helplessly laughing. “What in the…!”

Initially, no attempt whatsoever was made for the ball. A trio of older laoi girls on the red side simply threw themselves—bodily—into the encroaching blue line-up and began to absolutely wreck face with a brutality that would not have been out of place at the seediest biker-bar you could possibly imagine. The blue-side’s lead boy immediately took a vicious elbow to the nose and, with a spray of blood, crumpled in a heap. But he still managed to send a none-too-gentle, retaliatory kick right into the crotch of his assailant with enough force to lift her feet off the ground. She folded in half instantly, and most of the crowd visibly winced in sympathy.

The next few seconds dissolved into chaos. The central dog-pile surged this way and that as the combat ebbed and flowed, and fists and elbows randomly pistoned in and out of the seething mass. However eventually, the leather ball shot loose like it had been greased. That was what the younger kids had apparently been waiting for, and it was not long before one of the blue kids—a Wolugh, rhino-person—snatched up the ball and began pelting back toward his own flag.

“Ah, shit! Gezer’s got it!” the woman beside me shouted and surged to her feet. “Ball loose! Ball loose!”

“That’s interference! Shut your whore mouth, bitch!” another woman shouted from below us before hurling a wooden tankard in our general direction.

I flinched away from the missile, but Arx deftly caught it. Apparently, there was a small amount of beer left in the bottom, and she took a moment to drain it. However, she immediately blanched once the flavor hit her, and she turned to spit over the back of the bleachers.

“Hey!” a voice drifted from somewhere below us.

“Bleagh!” Arx said while making a disgusted face. “Maybe it’s just me, but I have yet to find a decent beer in this town.”

I nodded distractedly before returning my gaze back to the field. I found ‘Gezer’ quickly enough. He was curled into a fetal position while clutching his knee a few yards down field from where I had last seen him. Meanwhile, the ball had somehow managed to traverse the entirety of the field in the other direction while I was distracted, and it was currently in the possession of a lanky, laoi girl who was rapidly outpacing her pursuers.

Soon enough, she had crossed over into what I assumed was her goal-area, and she threw her hands up in victory—although, she did not stop running until she had escaped over the wall at the edge of the arena. Notably, the other team did not stop chasing her, either. Apparently, her team’s fans were sitting there, though, and there was a great deal of excited cheering and clapping of shoulders… even as several burly-looking individuals on the front row stood up like bouncers. The other team halted and stood there, glowering up at them for a few moments before slinking off.

“Damn it!” I heard from the bleachers below us, and the woman who had thrown the beer mug stood up to start cussing out the people sitting beside us. I did not catch the whole of her diatribe, but I gathered that she had just lost a bet of some kind.

“Well…” I said, even as I slowly edged away from the increasingly hostile people shouting epithets back down at her. “That was certainly… interesting.” And violent. “Does this game not have any rules?”

“Of course it does,” Arx replied, almost offended. “You have to collect the ball and get it back to your castle. Wasn’t that obvious?”

“Yeah… that part was,” I admitted. “But I mean… come on! There are children literally bleeding out down there! Doesn’t that seem excessive?”

“We did introduce a new rule last year,” a man said from the seat below before turning a friendly smile toward us. He was missing a few teeth, I realized. “They’re not allowed to use weapons, anymore.”

“What?!” Arx exclaimed in shock. “Not even blunt ones?”

The man shook his head sadly. “Nah. Completely changed the game, if you ask me.”

“I know!” the woman from my right agreed loudly, apparently having finished with her previous argument. Then, in a mocking sort of voice, she continued, “Youth league this. Youth league that. What about the beater position? And the goal tenders?! You saw how that skinny bitch just waltzed through the defense. You’re supposed to be afraid to make the final approach! How are the kids supposed to learn the game properly if they can’t even break the occasional rib?”

“What do you expect?” the man replied with a shrug. “We ain’t got but the one healer, and Old Binith down there don’t have the skill to knit bones between plays.”

“Don’t he?” I replied conversationally. Privately, I felt that the game was plenty violent enough without allowing children the use of actual weapons, but when one is amongst the clinically insane, it’s best to just nod and agree. “What a shame.”

Arx smirked at me before leaning into my ear. “You faker.”

I just looked at her.

Her grin broadened, and she nestled closer to me. I could feel the soft mound of her bosom pressing against my arm. “Wasn’t that exciting?” she murmured.

“That’s one word for it,” I agreed.

She just chuckled before gently taking my earlobe between her teeth, and I began to feel the faint trickle of Life Energy coming off of her. Being in a crowd like this, I had little doubt as to why. There was a lot of emotion flying around. And it seemed to be having quite the effect on her.

“Mmm… my heart is still pounding like crazy. It makes me want to mount you,” she whispered. “Right here. Right now.”

Uh oh… I cleared my throat and stared straight ahead. Keep your cool, Donum. Just… keep your cool.

“Yes…” she said breathily into my ear and pressed even closer. She was starting to subtly undulate against my side. “You’re imagining it, aren’t you? Me… riding you. In front of all these people. Pressing your face right between my breasts…”

“Hey, not to be rude,” the woman to my side said, and I instantly flushed crimson. “I know that you caught it and all, but that beer was technically thrown at me. And the refills are cheaper if you bring back the mug, so…”

I took a deep breath as my relief practically steamed out of my ears.

Arx giggled throatily and kissed my cheek before tossing it to her. “Have at it.”

“Thanks!” she said before hastily excusing herself.

*****

Believe it or not, after that little display, I actually gave some serious thought to the idea of taking Arx to some secluded spot beneath the bleachers and having a quickie, but… ultimately, my fear of being caught won out. I could just see some twelve-year-old kid with a snowcone coming around a corner and finding me balls deep in the stunning lilim.

“Ah… that feels nice,” Arx whispered, her hand still rubbing eagerly up and down my inner thigh. “Whatever you’re imagining? I want to do that.”

“No, you do not,” I replied, before quickly snatching it up and interlacing my fingers in hers. With a reassuring pat, I suggested, “Let’s just wait until we get back to the inn, okay?”

“Ohh~?” she replied, a hint of amusement—and naked lust—in her eyes. “Now you’re all embarrassed. What were you imagining? Was it kinky?”

Dammit girl… cool your jets! I had no idea what the prevailing attitude toward public fornication was around here, but given how little they seemed to care about the physical well-being of their children, I did not want to find out.

With a nervous laugh, I tried to change the subject. “How long until the next play, anyway? Seems like its taking forever.”

“Half-hour or so,” the man from the seat ahead of us responded before turning to look at us once more. He noted our joined hands and gave me an approving little nod. “They gotta fix up the injured between tries, ya know. But if I were you, I’d wait a bit before hitting the can. The line’s atrocious right after a play.”

“Good advice,” Arx agreed as the man turned his attention back to the field. Sensuously, she began to to run her fangs over the skin at my shoulder. “We wouldn’t want to go to a crowded bathroom, would we, Dearest?”

“Nope,” I said with a strained voice. Mercy’s hands…

I was already approaching full-mast underneath my thin kilt, and it was not as if I had a thing on underneath it. If I did not have my thighs firmly clamped together, I would already be announcing my arousal to pretty much everyone around me. And for a guy, that is not comfortable.

Desperate for literally anything to distract me, I began fiddling with my coin pouch and suddenly remembered that I had a pill stashed in there that I had yet to identify. There we go! Perfect. Trying to remember complicated incantations was just the thing I needed.

It probably was not the wisest thing to do at that particular moment, but in my defense, I was not thinking all that clearly.

After hastily fishing out the pill, I held it in front of me and tried to concentrate.

“Dearest… what are you doing?” Arx hissed. Thanks to her recent skill picks, she was able to clamp down on her state of constant arousal at a moment’s notice. Of course, that did not do me a whole lot of good.

“Well, since you decided to start messing with me—in public—it’s either this or try to list baseball stats,” I replied. “And since I don’t actually know any baseball stats, that narrows down my options quite a bit.”

“Baseball?” she repeated. “It’s not… it’s game-ball, okay? Game-ball. But that’s not important right now. Dearest, you shouldn’t cast spells in a crowd like this. People get nervous.”

“It’s just a little practice,” I assured her. “Besides, I’m only trying to figure out what this pill does.”

“Really?” the man in front of us said just as another fellow who had been sitting next to him slid back into his seat. He had apparently brought the pair of them a couple of beers. The man paused in talking to us to gleefully accept his, and after taking a long pull, he continued, “I might be able to help you with that. I’m an Apothecary by trade. Bring it by my shop, and I’ll have a look. Elder side. Southwest wall.”

I had not really been motivated to cast spells in order to gain specific knowledge at that particular moment. But I nodded politely and thanked the man, anyway.

“I’m curious, though,” he went on. “You don’t strike me like you was no pill maker. Your hands are too big for it. So how was you gonna go about doing your figuring? Some kinda spell, you said?”

“Uh… w-well,” I began hesitantly. The mechanics behind engravings were a little complicated, and I did not really want to get into a technical discussion with some rando about how I was getting around the requirements involved—especially while I was trying to hide a hard-on. So, I went with: “I have a spell that can sort of… give you a hint? I guess? About what an engraved item can do.”

“You’re shitting me,” he said with a laugh.

“He is not! How dare you! My Dearest has a great many useful and powerful spells,” Arx said imperiously before elbowing me in the ribs. “Go on. Show him.”

“What? But didn’t you just say—” I began.

“That was before this yokel started doubting your honor!” she whispered fiercely back.

“Okay, now. No need for that,” the man said with a placating gesture. “If you really can do that kind of thing…” He paused before making sure that no one was paying attention and pulled out an amulet from underneath his shirt. “Had a guy come in and trade this little charm to me for some medicine a couple years past. He claimed it was engraved, so I… may have gotten a little too excited and agreed without thinking about it. Never been able to figure out what it does, though. What do you say? You give me a nice hint on it, and I’ll eat my words. I’ll even buy you a beer.”

I hesitated before glancing at Arx. She had a certain gleam in her eye—like she was almost eager for me to shove the amulet down the guy’s throat.

Okay… must remember to keep Arx away from stadium events. First, she had been a hair’s breadth from ripping the clothes off my back, and now, she looked pretty close to ripping into an innocent bystander. If she was unable to control herself with just a bit of mild provocation, then the only explanation I could come to was that she must have been having a hard time separating out all of the high emotions around us. The guy had only expressed a little bit of reasonable doubt, after all. At this rate, it was anyone’s guess whether the next few minutes would find us embroiled in a fist fight… or in a custodian’s closet with our pants around our ankles.

And much as I was trying to avoid the later, I would take it any day over the former.

Well… it’s not like I have anything to lose. And maybe she’ll calm down a little once I’m concentrating. She was emotionally keyed much more closely to me, after all.

“Yeah, alright. Sure,” I agreed before snatching the dangling bauble from his hand. “A beer, you said?”

“You bet,” he agreed with a nod before elbowing his friend. “Hey, Poole! Go get a round for our friends here.”

“What?” the other guy protested before finally glancing up at us. He had been distracted with his own conversation with some people sitting off to his lower right. “But I just got back! And what am I? A copper mine? Do you know much they charge for beer in this joint?”

“Poole…” the first man repeated significantly.

Poole quickly raised his hands over his head. “Alright, alright! Don’t look at me like that. I’m going.”

While that was going on, I was looking over the amulet. It was a simple little thing—really just a curved, rectangular bit of brass attached to a chain. There were no other markings or anything else that I could see which might give it away as magical, but then, none of the other engraved items we had found did either. So that was consistent, at least.

Then again, most of the stuff we’ve found has been pretty basic.

With a shrug, I glanced at Arx. “You may need to help me a little. The spell works off of emotional feedback.”

She seemed hesitant at first—which was understandable. She was not as good with that sort of thing as Jax was, though whether that was because of a lack of practice or natural talent, it was hard to say. It was not like I was any great judge, but she certainly seemed to have a lot more trouble than my other lilim ever had. However, with a quick glance at our challenger, she firmed her lip and nodded. “Right. No problem.” Hastily, she grasped me by the arm and focused on my face. “Whenever you’re ready.”

I nodded. “Give me a few minutes. I’m not that good with this spell, yet.”

Her eyes widened, and she glanced significantly at the guy below us. “Dearest, please! Don’t admit things like that,” she whispered fiercely. “You’re embarrassing me.”

I smirked. Oh, ho? The lilim knows shame? “Turnabout is fair play, madam.”

Her lips rolled into a thin line at that one and, slowly, she leaned close to my ear, “If you don’t hurry up and show this man exactly what you are capable of, I will grab that throbbing cock you’ve been trying to hide between your legs and suck you off right here in front of everyone!”

I was… pretty much speechless after that little pronouncement. For one thing, I was more than a little tempted to tell her not to threaten me with a good time. But given how she had been acting, there was the distinct possibility that she might actually follow through on that particular threat, and if she did, I would almost certainly need to crawl under a rock and die afterward. However, my main issue was that I had just managed to get my erection to start to calm down…

So, with a hasty readjustment of my shoulders—and a careful tilt of my hips—I began. As usual, trying to incant a spell was like gargling marbles while trying to juggle cotton balls in the wind… and that was with spells I was good at. However, my skill with Divine Engraved Will was only 7, and my balls were tucked so uncomfortably close to the edge of the bench I was pretty sure they were going to bruise. So despite Arx’s fervent desire otherwise, actually getting the spell going took more than a few attempts.

I was fully capable of bluffing, though, and I had known I was going to have trouble even before I began. So I kept my face rigidly composed through the whole thing while I whispered out attempt after failed attempt with scarcely a pause between them. From the contented smile creeping up the corner of her mouth, Arx seemed appreciative of my efforts. Eventually, the Words of the spell clicked into place, and I felt my spell endurance surge into action.

“Ah, there we go,” I said before focusing on the amulet. “Let’s see what we’ve got here…”

The feedback I was getting was immediate—and that by itself was surprising—but the complexity of it all was what really got my attention. This thing had some weird stuff going on with it.

“Uh… huh… How do I put this…?” I murmured before glancing up at Arx—and then did a double-take.

The only way I could describe her face was to say she looked like she had just been doing a bit of casual barroom bragging about her ability to pull off a perfect, 100-foot swan dive, and then been hauled out back where a swimming pool and diving board had been conveniently installed and asked to demonstrate. And the Queen of England happened to be there. For reasons.

“Um… okay,” I said slowly. “Well, let’s just try to pick this apart a little at a time.”

She jerked her head in response. Was that… yes? Or no? It was hard to tell. It had been kind of diagonal. I shook my head quickly and focused on the amulet.

The first thing I was feeling was… like a sinking sort of sensation?

“Uh… okay. Okay,” Arx said, as though she was trying to calm herself. “I think I’d call that… maybe disappointment?”

“Disappointment?” the man repeated. “What’s that supposed to mean? What kind of hint is that?”

“We’re not done yet,” Arx snapped before returning her attention to me. “Go on, Dearest. What else?”

I nodded vaguely, not really paying much attention to them. Disappointment was a pretty good word for what I was feeling, but there was more to it than that. It was like… it was being repeated somehow. Over and over again. And growing. Like… like…

“I don’t know, Dearest,” Arx murmured. “That tastes like tension or something. Or stress maybe?”

I frowned. That was not quite right. But it was close. “Let’s move on,” I said quietly.

The next thing… I really did not have a word for. It was kind of a flip-floppy sensation in my stomach, but it was not like any sort of nausea. “Uh… kind of… nervous? No…”

“Skip that one,” Arx said quickly.

I nodded my agreement. The next one was much easier.

“Joy,” Arx announced. “Definitely joy. And lots of it.”

“Disappointment and now joy?” the man asked, confused. “Say, what is this?”

“Quiet,” Arx growled. “There’s more.”

Slowly, my tongue parted my lips, and I gently bit down on the tip as I concentrated. There was a second layer to this thing which seemed to rest on top of everything we had sensed thus far. The feel of it was uh… kind of like…

“Fear?” Arx said with some hesitation. “No, like… well, it’s tastes kind of like fear, I guess, but it’s a lot more subtle than that. Like a… like a specific type of fear. Uh… confinement, maybe? I don’t know. Skip.”

I nodded and focused on the final component. This one felt like it was the most important. Like it was the key to unraveling the whole thing. There was an… expectation to it. It was… confident and brash maybe? But that was not quite it. Decisive?

“Like uh…” Arx began. “I don’t know. It’s complex. There’s a couple of layers to it, but it’s like uh… like…” Abruptly, her eyes snapped up in recognition. And then she snarled. “Damn it all! It’s that same ‘stit-sucking flavor! Of all the things it could have been, why did it have to be my flavor!”

“Uh… I’m confused,” the man said, looking between us for a moment. “What hint am I supposed to be getting, exactly?”

Arx let her head fall back and sighed before snatching the amulet and dangling in front of the man. “Whatever it does, there’s a whole bunch of little disappointments that tense into some kind of joy. But none of that works because it’s bound up by something. And I don’t have the first, ‘snail-fucking clue what that is.”

He blinked a few times before accepting the proffered item. “So… you’re saying it’s… what? Useless?”

“I think so?” I agreed slowly before gesturing with my open palm. “There’s a lot of room for interpretation. But I think there’s some kind of uh… like… maybe a uh… Well, I think you’d need to activate it somehow before it’ll do anything.” I screwed my eyes up as I reconsidered what I had just said. It felt right. But just for good measure, I added, “Maybe.”

“Huh…” he said shortly. “That’s… vague. But at least now I know for sure it’s engraved. Should be able to sell it, right?”

“We’ll trade you the pill for it,” Arx said abruptly.

Both the man and I looked at her in surprise.

“Now hold on a minute,” the man said. “We don’t even know what kind of pill that is. How do I know it’s an even swap?”

“You don’t,” she replied shortly. “We found it in a Dungeon chest, though—alongside a Pill of Glorious Physique.”

The man gave a low whistle. “You think this might be something similar?”

“Maybe,” she said with a slight tilt of her head. “We haven’t even tried to identify it yet. You’ll just have to gamble.”

“Arx…” I began, but she gave me a significant look—like she was not to be deterred. Clearly, something about this amulet had caught her attention. And to be perfectly honest, I did not care one way or the other, so I relented. She flashed me a grateful smile before turning back to the hesitating Apothecary.

“Ah, what the hell,” he said finally just as Poole appeared at the end of our row with a couple of mugs in hand. “Deal. The pill for the amulet. I’m keeping the beers, though.”

She snarled slightly before tossing her hair over one shoulder. “Fine. It’s swill, anyway.” There was a brief, expectant pause after that, then Arx jerked her head a couple of times in the man’s direction.

“Oh… right,” I said, before fishing out the pill again and handing it to the man.

“Pleasure doing business,” he said smoothly before carefully placing the little, white pill in his breast pocket. Then he turned and yelled downfield, “C’mon Binith! We ain’t got all day! Leave the bleeders ‘til later!”

Arx stared down at the amulet in her hands for a few moments before handing out to me. “Well… I guess I traded you some kind of useless amulet. For some reason.” She laughed uncertainly before shaking her head.

“Uhm… why don’t you keep it?” I suggested. “It seemed important to you.”

A smile quirked at her lips at that. For a few seconds, she hesitated, then curled the little piece of metal to her chest. “I don’t… I don’t know. It’s silly. I guess I felt like keeping this thing might help me figure out what that frustrating… yet wonderful, wonderful emotion is.”

I smiled softly at the admission then patted her on the knee. “It’s not silly. I think figuring that out might be a key part of what it is to be a lilim. And even if it isn’t, you know what they say: ‘Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.’ “

She nodded uncertainly. “Who says that?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I responded, quickly waving the question away. “Ben Franklin? Socrates? One of those quote-y guys.”

“Kwotiguise?” she repeated. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of them. Unless… were they those purple cave-dwellers from up north? With the droopy ears?”

There was not much I could do with a misunderstanding like that other than struggle to suppress my laughter. Arx just started at me in confusion.

“Well… whatever,” she said finally before standing to drape the amulet over her neck. “Come on. Let’s go see if the bathroom has cleared out. I want to see what kind of fantasy I managed to spark in you. And drop your spell. I can feel it eating at you still.”

“Uhb-uhm… Uh…” I stammered, but she was already sliding past me. “Hell…”

Well… I guess a quickie in a bathroom stall might be fun to try once. Although, do they even have stalls? And for that matter, what exactly do these people mean by ‘bathroom’? I had no idea, but I had yet to find a flushing toilet since my arrival on this… planet or whatever. But Arx seemed to think that we could have sex in one, so I was at least marginally interested in finding out.

Okay, maybe more than marginally.

So, I quickly stood to follow the hypnotically swaying backside of my lilim, but then straightened my spine and assumed what I hoped was an aloof sort of expression so as to not appear too eager. While I was composing myself, the rest of what she had mentioned finally filtered through my sex-addled brain, and I finally remembered why it was that my heart was pounding as hard as it was.

With a dismissive gesture, I dropped the identification spell.

The moment I did, I froze and a little choking sound escaped from the back of my throat. I felt as if a giant hand made of nothing but air had suddenly gripped the entirety of my body, from head to toe.

“There… You… Are…” a deep yet feminine—and very pissed off—voice boomed in my ear. “Do not. Move. I come.”