Kelcie

Fear rushed down my spine as I watched Azalea antagonise a literal Goddess of War. Whatever the Demon Lord Sarah had done to allow Azalea to see the Goddess’s stats, she hadn’t passed that on to anyone else, so I didn’t see just how much more powerful she is to us. Considering she was a goddess and she hurt people just by pulling her sword out, there was no doubt that she was a whole lot more powerful than us. 

Holding Azalea tightly to me, I felt my heart hammering inside my chest. The silence that had fallen over the area after the appearance and then disappearance of the two incredibly powerful women, both forces of nature, broke as someone cleared their throat. As if that was the signal that everyone was waiting for, many began shouting and talking all at once. 

“Silence!” Prince Enoc bellowed as he clapped his hands. “We will bear ourselves as all good soldiers of Skarra should. With strength of arms, and of heart! Now, get back to work!”

I watched as the soldiers all left, several grumbling under their breaths, others giving Azalea nervous glances or narrowed eyes. Clearly some were afraid of her, while others might’ve thought she was out of line talking to a goddess that they probably worshipped like that. Glancing down at Azalea in my arms, I noticed that the little fairy wasn’t paying any attention to anyone or anything. Her eyebrows crinkled from a frown as she stared off into the distance, seemingly not looking at anything in particular. 

After our familiar bond had evolved into the consort bond it was now, I had been getting some strange impulses and emotions that didn’t feel like my own. As I looked at Azalea, feelings that were not my own rushed into my senses. Pain, sadness, loss and confusion warred within my demon lord, leaving her silent and reeling.

“Azalea?” I asked.

My fairy girlfriend didn’t respond, nor even react, until I repeated myself again, a little louder this time.

“Azalea?”

“Hmm? What?”

I was taken aback by the distracted, distant tone and almost cold look in her eyes as she looked at me. Shivering in response, I had to look away for a moment before glancing back down. “Are you okay?” I could see and feel that she wasn’t. Something was clearly bothering her, but I wanted to give her the opportunity to discuss it with me first. Did this have something to do with Sarah? Was she missing her already?

Azalea glanced at me briefly again before turning away once more. “I’m fine,” she eventually replied in a wooden, dead voice, without her usual warmth and emotion. She was sitting in my arms, and yet she felt more distant somehow.

Sighing, I dropped the subject for now. Clearly she wasn’t prepared to talk, and if I was being honest with myself, I was terrified to listen, just in case it was something I didn’t want to hear. How could someone like me compete with someone like a Demon Lord like Sarah? She was absolutely beautiful, incredibly powerful, and somehow had history with Azalea’s past life. Which was something I was struggling to wrap my mind around. If Azalea came from another world, how is someone from her past here? And clearly someone who has been here for a long time. I had studied the demon lords when I was younger, and Sarah had featured prominently in many of the major historical events that involved demon lords, plus a few things that didn’t, for as long as people had been recording history, which was before the formation of the old empire, roughly six or seven thousand years ago, if I remembered correctly. 

Trying and failing to come up with something to talk to Azalea about, I stayed silent, internally kicking myself for not breaking this awkward moment between us. Especially since we had only just exchanged ‘I love yous’ not too long ago, what felt like years ago now, as so much had happened. 

I saw the prince talking with Tyral, Callie, and Raya, and made my way over to them. Ryel was off talking with Rad, excitedly discussing her Airbike by the looks of it as they both smiled, gesturing towards the death machine. I sighed, that was the last thing that Ryel needed. She was already as reckless as my fairy, she didn’t need any more ways that she could kill herself.

Curious about Rad, I used [Inspect] on her.

Radiance ‘Rad’ Ollie
Level: 156 [Arcane Mechanic] (Rare)

That was a surprise. [Arcane Mechanic] wasn’t a combat class, and yet she somehow turned it into one. It was always surprising how creative people could be with their classes and abilities. Take Azalea, using her racial ability to destroy an entire horde of undead in a single attack. Maybe Azalea was a bad example. She was crazy and clearly there were things at work around us that we didn’t understand yet. 

Unbidden, a memory flashed through my mind. “I look forward to killing you, little fairy.” A cold sweat beaded my forehead as I shuddered from the memory. The hatred in the eyes of that goddess had been palpable, and yet Azalea turned her back to her, seemingly completely and utterly unfazed by her. Instead of turning to ask me if anything was wrong, Azalea continued looking into the distance, only this time, instead of a frown, she looked sad, like someone had told her that someone in her family had died. 

Before I could bring anything up, Callie turned to me. “What do you think, Kelcie?”

“Hmm? Think about what? Sorry, I didn’t hear what you have been talking about,” I replied, grimacing at my lack of attention to what was going on around me. Too distracted with worrying about Azalea and my own issues.

The beautiful half-elf princess smiled patiently at me. “That’s all right, you’ve had a few things on your mind.” Her eyes flicked briefly to Azalea still laying in my arms, still not paying any attention to anyone around her. “Enoc was just offering to fly us back to Eidencrag on his skiff. It’s big enough to hold the remaining adventurers and won’t take more than a day or two.”

I turned to look back at the large airship, wondering where he kept an apparently spare airship, before looking back at the group and nodded with a small smile. “Flying back would be much easier than going by land. Should be safer too, right?”

The prince chuckled a little bit. “You would think so, but not always. Wyverns tend to view anything flying as a snack, except anything bigger than them. Dragons are happy to make us target practice, and if a big enough flock stumbles onto us, Roks can be a real nightmare.”

Loud clunking noises, followed by a long hiss had me turning back around again, just as a part of Storm Front detached itself and began unfolding, somehow turning into an airship that had sails. Unlike Storm Front, this smaller ship – the skiff – looked more like a traditional seaboat, only the wood was armoured with four small crystals attached to the sides for flight.

“There we are. She’s a real beauty, Little Stormie,” the prince commented as we watched the much smaller airship begin to slowly float over towards our group.

For the first time since Sarah had left, Azalea stirred a little bit. “Stormie, huh? Not Alfie?” She asked, a tiny smile turning her lips up briefly, before pain flashed through her eyes and our bond as her expression fell again.

The prince looked confused as he looked around at everyone else – possibly for some clarity, unfortunately for him, everyone else just shrugged. “Ahh… No?” he finally replied, still looking confused.

Azalea just shrugged to herself, not looking all that interested in the conversation anymore. I tried to hide how Azalea’s mood affected me, but I saw Callie at least give me a sympathetic smile and a confused look at Azalea. Clearly she was just as baffled about our fairy’s behaviour as I was.

“Well… let’s get ourselves sorted and onto Little Stormie,” Tyral said as she looked over at the skiff. “The soldiers of Skarra and a few adventurers who are volunteering will stay behind and fix up the defences in this area. We have no idea what caused the Liches to team up and invade our lands in the first place and it seemed prudent to prepare for that.”

“Prudent and clever as always, my dear,” Prince Enoc said as he smiled at Tyral.

Callie rolled her eyes, groaning, but had a smile on her face. “Get a room, you two.”

Laughing loudly, Enoc tried to ruffle his sister’s hair, but Callie dodged it, smirking.

A sudden sense of pain and longing spiked into my heart as Azalea watched brother and sister tease each other. Unable to hold back any longer, I hugged Azalea to me, trying to soothe the hurt I felt. Despite remaining silent, Azalea still hugged me back, and after a short time, the pain I felt dulled, slowly overshadowed by a warm feeling directed towards me. My heart brimmed over as I recognised the feeling of love pouring from Azalea and I closed my eyes to hold back the tears.

≿--------༺❀༻--------≾

At long last, everyone was packed and onboard Little Stormie. Thankfully it wasn’t crowded, since quite a few adventurers decided to stay back. I suspected that a few didn’t want to be on a flying vehicle with a demon lord who was brave, or foolish enough to piss off a literal Goddess of War. Not to mention friends with another demon lord who was a hated enemy of said Goddess.

Azalea still hadn’t spoken to me about what was causing her pain, but it did feel like our impromptu hug earlier helped her a little bit. It was only after we were on our way, that I had the chance to check my new notifications.

The Dawn Fairy Demon Lord Azalea wishes to make you her Chosen, do you accept?
Yes No

Mentally focusing on the word ‘Chosen’ and selecting [Inspect], a new window appeared.

[Chosen]
Dawn Fairies, much like their cousins, the Leanan Sídhe, choose a partner to inspire, providing them significant bonuses. Unlike the Leanan Sídhe however, the Dawn Fairies’ Chosen ability is not as powerful. 40% bonus to skill levelling, as well as 20% bonus to experience gained in any way and last but not least, a Chosen requires only 60% of their usual sleep amount each night, and may go several nights in a row without sleep, with no detrimental effects, and with sleep deprivation building up 40% slower.

Hitting Yes, I felt warmth throughout my limbs as energy filled up my body, eliminating most of the fatigue I had been feeling from getting so little sleep last night. Nightmares with visiting my mother in my dreams and killing her didn’t help me get a full night of sleep.

Turning automatically, I knew exactly where Azalea was and what she was doing. Finding her exactly where I had expected, the little fairy was sitting on the side of the ship, staring out into the endless green forest below us. There seemed to be a particular spot that she was focusing on, but I wasn’t sure exactly what it was as I watched her. Letting her emotions wash over me nearly made me cry out and weep for how lost and hollow she felt. Her melancholy was sharp and clear in the air, I could almost see it seeping from her body in waves. Everyone had noticed how quiet and withdrawn Azalea was, but no one had brought it up yet, at least not within earshot of me.

Moving up behind my fairy, I placed a hand on her back, in between her wings and gently stroked them. Her wings were incredibly delicate, and very private. A thrill shot through me that Azalea didn’t reject my touch, shivering as pleasure ran through her. She had told me that even family members rarely touched each other's wings. It was something that was usually only reserved for spouses.

“What’re you staring at, my love?” I asked, warmth running through me as I felt a returning warmth when I called Azalea ‘my love’.

“My home,” she replied after a moment. “Or perhaps my gilded-cage would be a more appropriate name for it.”

As the wind ruffled my hair, and the ship rocked gently, I leaned forward until I held my chin just over Azalea’s head, my arms encircling her to engulf her completely. “You will never have to return there again, if you don’t want to. Not while I can help it, love.”

Love from my statement temporarily squished most of the negative emotions I had felt in Azalea as we held each other for some time, however, her love came with some sadness and worry for some reason. No words were necessary, only being with each other. I could feel that Azalea truly loved me, and yet I couldn’t entirely banish the fear that she was going to leave me for someone who was a lot more woman than I could ever hope to be. Who had so much more personal history with my fairy. 

Just as I sighed, I felt Azalea stiffen in my arms. I couldn’t help but feel the sting of rejection as worry and just a small spike of fear shot through Azalea while she stood up and moved slightly forward out of my arms.

“Azalea? What is it? What’s wrong?”

The little fairy turned to look at me, her face grim. I could feel warring emotions as Azalea struggled to cope with them all. Fear, pain, sorrow, loss, confusion, love and hope all bubbled up inside of her, and yet her face remained fairly impassive. I had no idea how she wasn’t exploding with feeling so much all at once.

“Trouble,” she answered finally, just as four bright balls of light flashed from the forest below and up onto the deck of the airship. After a moment’s pause, the lights resolved themselves into four different fairies – three female and one male.

“Trouble, she says. Is that any way to talk about your family, Azalea?” a red headed fairy said, smirking at Azalea.