The heavy clothing layer on the Fae made him feel hot and sweaty. They could probably all tell he’d dressed himself in a hurry and didn’t put the fifth-century layer in the proper spot between the under, under-undergarment and the under-upper garment. His office lacked that imposing feature of large space or the chaotic energy of a lesser but still formidable Fae. Nanny bear should know not to let creditors in by now.

  He’d noticed the slight elf woman peaking in the whole time. Although he’d never had chance to meet a horse thief before, nor any of the other species he’d met today including the off-worlder, he’d expected a taller figure to steal. Maybe only five foot two or three appropriate fantasy sounding measures that are totally not inches, she had the more flattened elf ear points and casual demeanor of one not forced into politics.

  An elf made perfect sense. A whole species of snaky enemy types. He wished that “The Finer Points of Four Shoe Points” wasn’t located quite so close to her hands. His most useful first edition book! Her long blonde curled hair had been tied back, and she wore lambskin riding pants. Her boots were good enough quality clearly intended for long days riding or cleaning out a stable. It surprised him that he liked her footwear choice, since he’d been raised never to speak of elves nor to meet one.

  The purple orc had heavy reinforced-toed boots. They were worn in the way that only a war could destroy shoes. But newer. Maybe multiple wars then, because the fit was nearly perfect. Soldiers, runners, and shoemakers cared about shoes in a different way from others. Just the sound of the tread had told him which of the group would be ideal and amenable to his ad-hoc mission.

  He realized he should say something imposing and decided to try introducing himself.

  “Nettlebaum of the Third Eucharine in the- “

  “Get on with it,” grunted the elfish woman.

  “Rude,” thought Nettle accidentally out loud, but he steepled his fingers anyway. Look more imposing Nettle! “I’m the one whom you stole three horses from. Now you’ve been captured doing so.”

  “That was your good luck,” she shot back at him., “I know it wasn’t your efforts that got me here.”

  “Isn’t it, though?”

  “Chase guards with one of quality. No way you’re lucky. They gave you information and got you this freebie.”

  “Ah, hem. Well.” She was right. He’d not really expected to get the horses back. But now that he had, he might as well handle his other problems. “Yes, I have a proposition for you.”

  She squinted at him closer. Her face clouded with suspicion.

  He hoped he would appear mixed with a Nyad or another long hair floats race. An elf wouldn’t know any of his kind off the top of her head. He knew many Fae emulated others to appear more Fairy than they actually were. Elves and fairies didn’t mix a whole lot because elves were obsessed with being immortal even though they weren’t and all the Fae or fairy were immortal so there’d been a few wars over those things awhile back. The Fairy won because they earned it in the first place, keeping their immortality for themselves. The elves were bitter ever since or any elf who cared about the deeper pride of their homeland, which he hoped she did not. Naturally though, he should expect an enmity from well, his ultimate enemy species.

  “Are you one of those who still holds onto the old ways of elves and Fae?

  Across from him, the elf found the whole thing ridiculous. A smart elf wouldn’t run up and tell an immortal being they wanted to borrow immortality off them, but then when did she know smart elves? With the exception of herself, naturally. People who cared about that ancient history needed to get a life.

  “I live in Adville. Those who hate any species mixing should go elsewhere.” She hoped it took the right tone. Not too cowardly, but certainly not causing this uppercruster to start harming her.

  The white hair and hooked nose made her shiver. A rich man to annoy her. Oh yes, he was attractive and a forbidden spice and that meant she’d not date him because who in their right mind would be obsessed with those kind of relationship ideals? Oh blast, the cultivator must be far enough away that they were getting text flavor from a romance. They always gave her such a headache since she was conventionally attractive. Stop thinking about dating!

  Her type was typically human although any species of man occasionally caught her eye. And by her type, she meant men she desperately wished would come over and ask her out why she stared longingly at them for no reason. She’d never been confident enough to go over and ask a man out herself. Although, her friends did without issue. It was just, they were strangers. And she didn’t know them. And what if she made a mistake and they actually wanted to take her home, smother her with a pillow and bury her in the backyard to make their bean plants grow taller? Tales about enough elf blood mixed together were almost as bad as tales of fairy blood. Some even claimed this snooty guy’s Fae ancestors had stolen the power of immorality from elf blood itself. The royal family, they claimed, lived so long because they bathed in the blood of elves each new blood moon.

  That’s it. Think away those stupid idea. Think up dry facts she knew.

  She thought hard about the possibility of face sucking eels from the Mer-rebels that kept switching bodies but maintaining their original mind at great cost to the original host’s mind. Maybe that was an anti-mermaid propaganda line. Not that they needed much propaganda to keep themselves going. The Mer-organizations had a bad habit of sinking ships with anyone including civilians in them to the bottom and then eating everyone’s soul so they could go back to taking over Atlantis or Athena? Whatever. A battle ground of ocean those lot where always going over. They say the body of Tides is somewhere buried in that city. Tides, nearly everyone agreed, hadn’t been a very cruel deity. She was known for casting out her hand to protect the clams from attack by a cunning dragon, then it’s said she pulled back in her hands to cover the volcano Thubberstan that a passing evil spirit tried to use to end the world.

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  She never understood why the evil spirit would notice a volcano nor why it should destroy a random location with it, but then lots of Tides enemies seemed slightly unrealistic. The point was, Tides put out her hands to protect and also pulled her hands in to protect, epically or especially for the Mer-folks, and sea dwellers, although she smiled at those who properly knew her ways of seafaring.

  They say her great waters were justified by how much she did for all. But also, they said her wrath was kindness too, at least according to merfolk tales. Bring the ships with their strange plenty that folk without fire envied. But she shook her head. Merfolk wasn’t important now. She should be sacking her brain for Fae information that was relevant because nobody ever gets distracted during important conversations thinking about dumb shit.

  “I have a proposition,” the stiff Fae told her.

  “What’s your proposition?” She asked carefully.

  “I need horses and a stablewoman to join me on a very long journey- “

  Fate destiny chance, this was the best thing she’d ever heard. “Yes,” she shouted. Then, tried to pull back. “Yeah, I would be fine with that. Are, are you sure?”

  “I need an excellent rider to help me traverse unsafe locations and to get my gear across rough terrain. I won’t force you to do. It is dangerous and far from the city walls. But I can give proper pay and acceptable terms. I mean the standards of a servant, of course, that should be afforded to you by my ever-flowing generosity.

  He didn’t seem generous to her, but shrewd. Horsewomen like herself who would also go on any journey away from their home city would be few and far between. Going outside the walls was especially dangerous with horses. Outside the city, all sorts of things could appear. Monsters always. But magic could also be capricious, as could an immortal being, or a deity if you were so inclined to think they had that kind of value, or just something ancient, old and powerful. Naturally powerful off-worlders who killed you because who knows. Necromancers too. Zombies. Lots and lots of things lurked out there in the world, and if you needed any horses, they were the primary target for the more ravenous creatures out there. It’s been crazy for her to get so many animals out of the city and not lose a single one. Did he know that or was he foolish?

  Well-fed horses were a sheltered commodity not because of the rarity, but because of their high meat content. Anyone handling them hostlers down to a one-day muckraker had been trained to let the horses run and not try to fight whatever might be coming not to eat them. Horses were expensive estates. Part of why she’d been trying to make so much money in the first place. Vet bills aren’t cheap.

  “Will you let me bring my own animals? They’re some of the finest saddle stock she assured him. None of them were really saddle stock at all, but they would all act as pack animals if she asked.

  He put up a hand. “If you have additional horses then they may come along, but you would have to figure out paying for the feed and the care for them.”

  She sagged. “You don’t need any pack animals? I can ill afford to go with you then.” Her mouth felt ashen saying the words. She tried to keep her face exceptionally smooth so nobody would realize that she’d been devastated by this. Not that she knew any other way to say what she had said.

  Truthfully, if he pressed her on this, she would sell all the horses. It would break her heart. She would never recover from it either financially or emotionally. It would be the only thing she could do. She had to leave, and even though eventually her horses would likely be killed or parsed out to other trainers she despised completely. She didn’t have much of a choice about that. It would be the horses or her life.

  He looked at her then. This time it was a close inspection. He hoped to read her, and she did her best to be as blank an elf as he’d ever seen. She knew fairies with long life spans tended to look down on any species that did not have at least a four-hundred-year lifespan, and this she’d considered to be their biggest mistake.

  Humans, dwarves and a whole host of less magical species and half-breeds held one major advantage over so many “immortal” populations. They produced children at an alarming rate. Even with their child mortality rates at 50% or higher, they just had another one in nine months. It was an impressive and terrifying feat of strength. Human men could even get more than one woman pregnant which she considered quite wasteful. Not that elves were better.

  Not that her parents had particularly decided to be helpful in this situation, but she tried not to think too much about them. The “lower” species were gradually overtaking the world as the “upper” longer lived found their lack of fertility to be an alarming state. They say the Goddess of Fertility, Vassa, died because humans and their slower but still fast producing brethren ran her ragged. So, she died and nobody could ask her to bless their species with the same gifts that Hercuelease or was it Zues the Goose requested.

  She thought it more likely there had never been a fertility goddess and that Hercuelease actually talked to somebody else who he got confused with. Ole Herc never acted too bright in the stories.

  “I will hire on your horse then and pay for their feed and care.”

  His gray eyes burrowed into her as if hoping to see through into her soul. While his eyes were beady and dark and narrow, they caught a faint glow in them of the lights. She would fear seeing them at night though. Fae were a strange species and he must be even stranger to leave the city and risk his many years of life for something like this. But then the orc had been right, strange creatures lived in Adville. NPC’s nobody wanted to deal with. Species and creatures that wanted to hide from off-worlders, they hid way out in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by random danger. They got passing interest now and again, she suspected a romantasy character had to be somewhere nearby. But those types always left eventually, not having any good marriage prospects to deal with, leaving the world to go back to as it should be. Laural liked her little corner of the world, until it had grown too expensive with the horse. Now she’d be risking it all, with a Fae that didn’t know out of season colors and an orc.

  “What exactly are we doing on this journey?”

  The Fae shrugged his shoulders. “I believe off-worlders call it, a quest.”