Aren, King of Elves, The Unbreakable, Immortal Ruler of the Forest Throne, He Who Held the Last Line, Ender Bane, and the last of his lineage, was trying, and failing, to keep his absolute shock-- and newly-blooming and visceral hope-- off his face, out of his heart, and at least somewhat circumspect. It was all he could do to not fall to his knees and beg the Lady to keep him and his people forever. He was open to the idea of being well-kept pets at his point.

He should have suspected something like this when the shadow uncloaked after all of them spending years and years not asking for anything, barely living, and turning into ghosts. He should have known this hidden god would be special when Rigel was so insistent. He knew now why the shadows took weeks to investigate and not just days. He understood why they didn't return to report.

He did not expect the perfection he found when arriving at this small storefront in this hive of humanity and dirt.

She smells like balance, feels like the Old Gods, and looks like answers. I would have begged on my knees to join her court when we walked in the door-- after feeling the absolute rightness of her-- if the Shining King didn't have the same look of unabashed want on his face that I am sure is on mine. Why is he here?

For all his years as king, both before and after the destruction of his world, he had never had anyone demand him to do any menial work. The free-range herb plants, wild-growth growing medicinal moss, and forested undergrowth hiding the most magical plants he'd seen in his long life all had to be carefully relocated to clear a space on the forest floor, and he was unsure what the use would be.

He was holding his breath that his hopes weren't about to be dashed-- that he and Cora wouldn't be offered up as blood sacrifices to the forest floor. But powerful elves were known to tithe blood to their forests, so it was a possibility. The lambs usually didn't have to clear their own altars, though, so he remained hopeful.

The demand for menial work was a new experience for a king who thought he had seen everything under two different suns.

The Lady Max had led their group of refugees, her scion, and the Shining King into a whirlpool of magic. Once they left the graveled path that led back to what looked like work areas, the magic was multitudinous and manifold. It was in the air. It singed his nose, at first, until he breathed through his blazing discomfort. It battered their bodies. It was on the plants. Healing and sickness, dark and light, green growth and decay, birth and death, and the long years in between-- all vibrated up through the ground. It was wild and hard and soft and heady and perfect. It buoyed his old and battered heart. He imagined it was what the forests planted by the Old Wild Gods felt like. He knew he was supposed to be in a “greenhouse”, but the inside of the space --the mound, this demesne-- felt like it was possibly miles wide. He couldn't see a ceiling, only a beautiful blue sky, and a breeze blew through his hair. It was as if he were standing in one of the primordial forests of his youth, reaching from horizon to horizon and up into the clouds and down into the soil.

This was a fairy mound built by a forest elf for forest elves. It was perfect for them. If he had the ability to start a mound himself, it would have been less perfect for his people. It was away from the human-made, filthy smog that clogged his lungs, and the casual violence they almost always offered. Hidden from the blood drinkers who would drink them down and discard them like rubbish. Protected from the warlocks who would harvest them into spell components. Away from the sorcerers that would slit their throats to kindle blood magic. Away from the feral, barbaric shifters who would challenge them for any small scrap of land that they tried to claim for themselves. Away from the world that would take and take and take until they were no more.

It was as if all of his wishes had been granted. He wished she had been here a hundred years ago when they still numbered thirty.

He’d willingly enslave himself and his people just for the right to live there, even if he had to pay in blood. Sacrifices sometimes were worth it.

She led them through the unchecked and untamed wilderness, down a path that only she could see, and found a spot that had to be hundreds of meters inside and under a dense canopy. She then put him, the Shining King, her scion, and his party of two to work clearing a space in the jungle.

"Just a little more. There. Sorry I didn't already have this done, but I was only given, like, half an hour's notice you'd be coming today, and I had to deal with the jerk from the college.” The Lady pointed a scowl in the back in the direction of the door.

Her focus came back to Aren. “Anyway, I can make a slap-dashed sick room in just a few minutes, if you can spare the time. We could just wake them up out in the greenhouse, but I don't want to expose sick kids to some of the plants out here." She had an "aw shucks" look while explaining and her shoulders shrugged.

She lowered into a crouch and touched what looked like the ground, but was really the floor. She cast an Archmage-level earth-shaping spell to dissolve it and shaped stairs-- seemingly with thought-- that led eventually down a hallway to a set of rooms.

He was both stutteringly, trouser-wetting terrified-- and hard as a rock-- with her casual display of power. The Shining King looked and smelled the same. Her scion was just as surprised, but instead of only terrified and aroused, he also looked sick.

"Puppy, you okay? Do you need to go back up?" She quietly asked her scion when they got to the bottom of the stairs.

"Nah, I'm good, Lady. It's not as bad down here as it is in the store when the wards are clanging."

"Just say the word if you need a breather. No shame to show weakness to me. And these guys won't judge." She cut her eyes at Aren and Green in an unspoken "or else" gesture, and he made a grimacing smile, trying and failing to not show that he was listening.

Don't show me dominance or I'll breed a dynasty on you, he thought at her. He adjusted himself when she looked away.

Control yourself.

The Shining King was almost panting.

The scion took a deep breath, choked a bit, rolled his eyes, and said, "I'm fine, I promise."

The lady produced a twin-sized bed from either a bag of holding or system storage and placed it next to the wall she had just created.

He blinked.

The other king blinked.

The scion blinked.

Cora flinched. She opened her mouth and then slammed it closed; she knew better than to ask any questions. The shadows had spent weeks watching the Lady, so they already had to know most of her secrets. He found it interesting that they didn't mention this one. In fact, most of everything the shadow had told him, he could have figured out on his own by now. He realized he was told just the overtly noticeable things. Rigel had cloaked again and joined the other shadow that was stationed at the Lady's feet; neither acknowledged nor reacted to his querying gaze.

She laid three more beds down, quickly took off her shoes to climb on one, and started casting light wards with just her finger. Disregarding that wards for lights were considered an extravagance and that it usually took a team of mages a week of casting and thousands of credits in reagents to make a weak ward, the Lady nonchalantly made the most powerful wards he'd seen on this planet, and they were done in minutes. They absurdly even had controls for dimming and brightening.

Ridiculous. This show of power is ridiculous.

"You still okay, Puppy?" She glanced at her scion. "You look like you're about to puke on my nice, new floor."

"I'm still okay, Lady." He looked around at everyone in the room when her gaze was focused back on the ceiling and he got a sly look on his face. "This is some of the stuff that you were wanting to teach me and the kids, right?"

"Yeah, it's gonna be covered in the talks I had planned for us to start tonight after dinner. I was gonna order in. That reminds me that I need to let Steve know I need him to make a dinner run for us." She excitedly turned around while still standing on the bed and looked down at her scion. "Do you like the lights? Is warding something you'd be passionate about? Or was it the earth shaping?"

"I don't know. It all seems cool."

"We'll see how fast you pick it up, and maybe try a few lower-leveled healing spells? If you don't like any of it, we can focus on weapons. The bastard sword was always my favorite, but maybe we don't need sword training in this day and age. I dunno, might come in handy. Handguns are pretty neat, too. Rifles are easier in some ways to bows. More maintenance, though."

Aren grunted. He couldn't help it. The Shining King kept rubbing his jaw like it would make all of his tension less.

The scion chuckled and muttered, "Em is gonna shit herself."

"As long as she doesn't do it over the carpet, that's fine. Your laundry isn't my problem." The Lady grinned while finishing the last ward and, then got off the bed to stand on the floor. "Okay. Where are your kids? Let me see what we're looking at."

Aren hesitantly pulled from under his shirt, attached by a leather cord tied to his neck, a treasure of his world. The last treasure his people had. The only treasure they had escaped with, other than their lives. The last elven bag of holding. He reached his fingers in and pulled out what looked like a giant pea pod, that inside held a child who was sleeping through ages so she didn't have to feel the pain of dying.

"Put it on the bed, please. Let me see."

He placed the sleeping child inside of the pod on the closest bed and stepped back, out of the way.

The Lady put a hand inside to touch the child's arm. She muttered lowly to her, "Oh, you poor kid. Burns, a broken leg, arm, and ribs, a concussion, a curse, multiple infected animal bites, blood loss, starvation, dehydration, poison, sepsis, and ... heavy metal toxicity? Gods and monsters, child, the balls you have to still be alive."

The Lady stroked the child's hair away from her forehead and looked away from her patient with a despondent look. “I’ll never stop being surprised at the resiliency of children, but fuck the worlds for always making them prove it.” She spent a few minutes looking at the child’s face.

After her internal dialogue was completed, she turned to Aren.

"Anyway, she should be fine now if you want to wake her up. You can put the others down on the beds and I'll heal them too. I say we should let them wake up on their own time, though, poor kids." She straightened out the bottom of her t-shirt and straightened out her posture. Aren was intimidated. "After I'm done and we wait for them to wake up, we can have tea and sandwiches while we discuss what privileges, rights, and responsibilities mean."

---

Max dismissed the notification. Again.

I'm not even doing anything. I have yet to shed anything's health points at all. I haven't killed anything but myself in YEARS. I'm not even completing quests-- the logic system is off. What the fuck.

The four elven children were sleeping in beds. Real sleep and not stasis sleep. And actual beds, not fucked up pea pods. They all ranged in age from what she'd judge to be five to maybe thirteen. They all had horrible injuries and she could tell they had lived through hell.

Or a Dark Lord-lead ender beast apocalypse. Same difference, really, if you are on the receiving end of it.

She was told by the quiet guard Cora that all of the children were missing their parents. They were picked up on the street in a group, in the same condition they were sleeping in (minus the stasis pods), after the final battle happened and the king and the last of his surviving people were evacuating. The kids probably didn't even know yet that they had survived.

The heavy metal poisoning wasn't something that usually happened in an ender beast situation, but Max figured she could treat the adults for it too, once they [Bargain]ed for it. It was probably environmental from their old planet. She'd offer treatment and it was up to them if they took her up on it.

How does someone, or a group of someones, get so much iron in their systems?

Max had finished healing the kiddos and she and Cora had removed all evidence of the pods to tuck them into their borrowed beds. While the children still slept off the end of their world, the adults gathered in the adjacent room around a roughly shaped table with a porcelain pot full of ginger tea, cucumber finger sandwiches, and enough chairs to house all the seats that would sit.

The main elf guy seemed nice. Nice enough to humor him with House talks. A bit too obsequious, if you asked her, but she did just heal a bunch of his kids, so he got a pass. There were a few flashes of what she thought was rage in his eyes-- like he was moments away from going on a heated rant-- but that got a pass, too... she would be and had been pissed at the gods, any gods, after seeing worlds end. Max tried to disregard any feel-good vibes or flashes of anger and just watched his mannerisms and paid attention to what he was saying.

If she had to decide now, gun to her head, she'd let him and his people into her House. They seemed as though they had been through the wringer. She didn't know what she would do with all of them, but sure, they could join her fancy pants secret club.

Miles wanted to help them and she wanted Miles happy, so it was all whatever. Miles could follow all the hero flags and she'd be there to catch him when it crashed.

At least she'd have children around to raise with her kids. At first, she was hesitant to decide on homeschooling Beasty and Flower because she didn't want them to lack socially. She wanted them to have friends and be happy and learn to love all she had to offer, but she also wanted them safe. If all of the elves joined, maybe her kids would get an actual school experience and have friends and a social circle, and not just the crazy "school" run by their survivalist parent that was preparing for doomsday.

Green had seemed both overly familiar and distant since they entered the greenhouse, and she wondered if it was weird for him to be in another kin's space. She didn't want to ask because that seemed awkward, but she also didn't want to push him on it, either. All she could do was shrug off her troubling thoughts and hope for the best, right?

Sometimes, most of the time, Max wished that she hadn't lost all of her people skills over the centuries of suicide-ing out of cycles. She used to be good at reading people and situations. It seemed as though it was just another thing she had lost along the way.

Did I murder myself into mild autism?

"My kingdom, all eleven of us, would like to issue formal thanks to the House of Max for saving the most precious of us. Anything that we have or can do for your House is the least you can ask of us." The elf king said and bowed his head.

"Ha ha okay. Well, yeah. That's pretty heavy. And it's not that I don't acknowledge your appreciation, but I specifically told Rig that it would come without cost. I don't want to profit, even a little, from the suffering of children. It's kind of a hard limit for me." She shrugged. How does someone say 'no thank you' to a debt freely forgiven? Her little fae heart was screaming it was anathema.

"We understand. And we appreciate you nonetheless. Now, should we begin talks about joining your House?" The elf king was ready to wheel and deal, then. Excellent. Max was tired and just wanted to have dinner with her kids. Maybe talk with them about magic. See Flower's face when he got a Miles blessing and could finally hear him talk.

The spider’s dancing will be out of this world.

Normal stuff.

"Yes, King of Elves," Green butted in, "Why, after centuries of isolation, would you deign to join a House now? I, and all of my kin, have offered you a place amongst us and the safety for all of your people that entails, and you --sometimes rudely-- rebuffed us all. And now, after my kin had all but written you off as unobtainable, you basically beg Ms. Traveller for her banner. Why is that?"

The elf king looked uncomfortable. "Well, it's because Lady Max is elven."

Mr. Green had an ah-ha look of victory on his face. He pointed a finger to the ceiling. "So you admit that you see the rest of her kin as lesser than you?"

Max needed to shut this shit down. "Can we not do this whole..." she waved her hand around in front of her, in between the two men, and around the room, "...thing? I don't want to do any dick waving, or politicking, or whatever this is. I want small. I don't want intrigue, subterfuge, or sordidness. I want to build my bunker, raise my kids, teach them all the magic I can cram in their heads, and make sure they can survive ender beasts, Dark Lords, virus bombs, undead plagues... whatever may come. I don't want whatever this is. Honestly, I don't have the social or emotional capacity for any of it."

Both men looked chastised.

Cora looked pale. "Are you expecting any of those things to happen soon? Should everyone be preparing?" She said it softly and like she was scared. She looked as if she were a moment away from jumping up and diving into her own bunker.

"What? No, I don't think those things are going to happen soon. In fact, this is the most suspiciously peaceful planet I've ever seen. Don't worry about immediate threats. That's not what I mean."

"How many planets have you actually seen, Ms. Traveller?" Mr. Green asked the first direct question to her he had ever asked, and the elf king was looking at her like she was an alien. Which was fair. She was totally and technically an alien.

"A few. Are you bartering a question for a question, right now, Mr. Green? In mixed company? How scandalous." Max tried to grin coquettishly but was sure she was sweating. She was not expecting Green to ask questions when she inevitably slipped up, and she was the dumbass who should have known better.

"Of course not, cousin. Of course not. I'd never. But yes, I agree that we should discuss things in a question-for-a-question forum when the nice little elves leave your court. We can do that when we cement our House alliance." Green grinned victoriously.

Did he just win something, or am I reading this wrong?

"Speaking of leaving or staying in her court, we'd like to get back to the House interview, if we could." The elf king was right. They were getting sidetracked.

"Of course, Lord Aren. Brevity is my favorite thing, and I am already very tired, so I hope you don't mind if I just speed this along. Rights and responsibilities. What would you like to achieve and what can you offer my House?" Max smiled a megawatt smile, patted his forearm in comradery, and did her best to ease this along.

Aren looked like his mind blanked; stared at her hand that had touched his forearm and seemed as if he was grasping for his thoughts and they were getting the better of him. To be fair, it was a tough question.

Puppy made another gagging noise.

"Let me begin the offer then?" She asked. She had to hurry this along. The background magic was making Puppy sick, poor little guy.

Aren nodded.

Max mentally prepared her list of the good stuff she could offer but opened with the qualifier that might get her shut down immediately. "I am only willing to offer the rights and responsibilities to my house. Later, if your children are a good fit and my kids want to offer them, I will grant them privileges, as well. Privileges, which is the offer of kinship and to be of us, are not available to any adults, except the shadows, whom I have grown to like. This is nonnegotiable on your part but may change later, depending on consensus from me and my children. Rights are what I give to you. Responsibilities are what you give to us. Is this agreeable before I list my offering of rights?"

King Aren nodded.

She continued, "I won’t kill or harm any of you out of hand unless you offer violence to my kids. So, safety from me. You’ll have to negotiate safety from Puppy with him. Speaking of children, I am going to tutor mine in basic magic casting, so I can tutor yours, too, and any adults as well who are interested, so that can be on the table. I also am building my mound and my anchor will soon be able to withstand a direct hit from a meteor, so I can offer safety. I can make potions, charms, weapons, and spell books-- those I can offer in lieu of credits as payment for any direct services you or yours do for us, and can also teach in their production. I have a shop that is rarely open and has yet to make a single sale, but I can offer one or two of you part-time jobs that pay in credits per hour worked. I want a community and not servants or slaves.” Max nodded to herself and went back to her list. “A world I came from is technologically more advanced, so I can both supply and teach weapons and computer systems more advanced than any of the ones that humans can supply. I offer medical treatments as a service to all of those in my House, which you and yours probably need seeing as the children had heavy metal poisoning. You guys probably do too. How does a body accumulate so much iron, anyway?" She trailed off. "Anyways, that is what I offer."

Aren went completely still. "You removed the iron from their bodies?" Puppy whimpered and gagged and Green looked at her like she was an alien again.

"I mean, yeah. Why wouldn't I? It would be cruel not to."

"Because it's supposed to be impossible. It was a curse from a wrathful god laid eons ago that nulled our people's casting abilities."

"You guys couldn't cast? That sucks. Anyway. It wasn't a curse. Probably just bad plumbing or something. You know, you'd be surprised how often civilizations fall or have to adapt to things like that. Bad pipes can lay low nations.” She shrugged, “Or I could be wrong and the curse wore off when the god died or something? Doesn't really matter now. Call that a perk, then."

Aren did some heavy breathing.

Max grew concerned. "Are you alright, guys?" She directed the question to the room because Puppy gagged and choked again.

"Yes.” Aren began to quickly speak as if he was in a hurry to finalize their deal. “So what we have to offer as responsibilities. You have met the shadows, and I offer their continued service as your honor guard for you and your children's personal protection. You have a primordial, elf-grown forest in your mound. We are generational foresters and can help care for your ecosystem, and all of us have differing levels of herbalism skills. We are decent hunters and can teach your children woodcraft in exchange for magic lessons, and offer to wild-trap no less than 20 deer and 100 mating pairs of birds as a starting point to being to populate your mound if you wish it. One of us is a vintner and can make elven wine and can start a vineyard, and you could demand a number of bottles as tribute a season. One of the shadows has a hobby of metal smithing and will apprentice to you in your forge if allowed, to make elvish swords to sell in your store. Two can sew, mend, darn, and weave. We have a trained royal guard who could work your store and guard your court gate. We don't have much else in material wealth, just what we know how to do with the labor of our own bodies. If we learn more abilities or trades from your court, we will of course provide more for our sworn House as fealty. All of us would be delighted to learn a magic trade. We will, with stability and with the higher mana concentration in your mound, eventually start having children again, so we offer population growth. Lastly, I would offer you my throne by marriage."

Green stood up from the table fast enough that his chair hit the floor behind him and he began yelling. "She can't take it! She and I are courting! I offer her my throne by marriage!"