A bath did in fact end up being quite nice. But, the whole time Addie just kept thinking about the time Hagal had tried to trap her. She kept having intrusive thoughts that made her want to check her transcendent loop. Every time she checked, she knew she was fine; both Squishy and Nettal were too, she checked lots, so she was confident about that.

  That did make it harder to relax in the tub, though. Just to be safe, Nettal and Addie shared a bathtub since neither of them wanted to separate from the other.

  Addie idly played with the water, watching it splash about. The water felt warmer against her skin when she moved her hand around like this. The tub itself was made of fused stones; she’d never quite seen something like it before. It was like one big rock had been carved into a rectangular bowl shape and then polished smooth like porcelain. The room around them had steam all in the air, making it stuffy to breathe. She liked it though; it felt nice to be so warm after all those damp and cold days travelling to the ruin sites. It had rained more than once, after all.

  The walls around them were white, flat bricks. Nettal said this was called, ‘tile’, but Addie’d never seen it before. Unlike Auntie’s place, there were no water spouts to collect water in the bathroom. Instead, the whole room filled up with lots and lots of fog, until it all splashed down into the tub at once. Addie didn’t have to think very hard to figure out who did that. Similarly, she knew the man had heated the water with his soul hunter, but she was just guessing since she hadn’t seen the flames.

  Come to think of it, the man hadn’t even told them his name yet. She’d make sure to ask him the next time they saw him.

  Despite what should have been a relaxing bath, Addie’s nerves were taught; she expected something to go wrong at any moment. The fog demon, Feera, had been their enemy from the start of all this, and Addie just couldn’t set that fact aside or ignore it. She tried gently swirling some of the water around with her hand, feeling its smooth texture glide across her palm, but nothing helped. Not even Squishy sitting contentedly in her lap completely soothed her, but his unyielding calmness did bleed through their bond. He felt like a stabilizing pillar against all of Addie’s jumping emotions, but he couldn’t ease them completely.

  Across the water, Nettal outstretched her arm to Addie before grabbing onto her hand with gentle reassurance. Nettal smiled. “Together, remember?”

  Somehow, those were exactly the words Addie needed, allowing her back to finally relax. She scooted deeper into the water blowing bubbles once her mouth was halfway submerged. In the next moment, Squishy jumped out of the water, splashing a bunch up into the air. He gasped out a breath. “You must warn me when you decide to suddenly submerge me beneath the water next time, my lady.” He paddled onto the ledge, his feet scrambling to grip the smooth stone as he climbed out of the water.

  Addie smiled with amusement at first, but then she felt bad immediately after. “Sorry, I didn’t think about it.” She blew more bubbles into the water.

  “No worries.”

  “I won’t do it again,” she promised. It really had been an accident, even if it was a little bit funny.

  Squishy sent back feelings of warmth in return.

  “Hey, Addie?” Nettal asked gently, grabbing Addie’s attention. “Why do you think the man was in that crystal seal thingy?”

  Addie shrugged, breathing through her nose since her lips were still underwater.

  “I’ve been thinking: what if he didn’t do that to himself?” Nettal continued after Addie just kept staring at her from halfway underwater. “What if he was sealed there— trapped against his will?”

  Addie furrowed her brows, having to sit up out of the water to reply. The air immediately felt cooler against her upper body. “Then why would the ruin sites have all those books that taught me magic? He had to have done that.”

  “I thought that too, at first, but what if that’s not true? What if those books were pieces of his power, similarly sealed away to prevent the man from coming back himself? What if we broke the seals, and he got all his power back when Book returned to him, all the other four books also combined?” Nettal explained, each word coming from her mouth making Addie’s heart plummet with dread.

  Suddenly, all the tension from earlier returned, and Addie couldn’t find a way to properly relax. The water began to feel stuffy, far too warm, instead of comfy like it had been earlier. She climbed out of the water, sitting on the rim of the tub next to Squishy. The cool air felt refreshing, freeing in some way. Unfortunately, Addie couldn’t argue with Nettal’s logic, even though she still hoped Nettal was wrong.

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  “If that’s true, he might still not be a bad guy. He did let us stay in the bath,” Addie offered, not even fully convincing herself but just trying to come up with a good explanation.

  Nettal hummed. “That’s true, I guess.”

  “If I may interject, my lady, I think we should be prepared for a fight at all times, just in case. Do not let your transcendent loop drop, and I shall do the same.”

  Addie sent back a feeling of strong agreement to Squishy. She’d already planned on doing that, anyway. Luckily, Ember didn’t need one herself, since she could just hide inside of Addie’s soul.

  “Maybe I should practice the new magic ability from the last book, just in case.”

  “How hard is it?” Nettal asked. Addie had been expecting Nettal to maybe ask what the ability did, so it surprised her when all she asked was about the difficulty.

  “Uh, it uses a lot of magic, and I think it’s probably pretty hard,” Addie said while visualizing the ability in her head.

  Nettal shook her head, her brown wet hair flinging a bit of water everywhere. “Then don’t do it. Save your magic in case there’s a fight.”

  That made sense to Addie. “Okay. I will.”

  The bathroom fell into silence for a while, Addie idly kicking her feet in the water from the ledge she sat on. She liked how the cool smooth stone underneath her felt different from the warm water lapping at her toes.

  “Should we keep watch again tonight?” Even though they weren’t outside, Addie thought it’d be a good idea. Partly because of how tense and nervous she still felt, and partly because of what Nettal had told her earlier.

  “That’s a good idea.” Nettal nodded along.

  “I can keep watch tonight, my lady. I am used to the night already.”

  Addie trusted Squishy a lot, but she was a bit worried about how much sleep he’d been getting. She couldn’t actually remember the last time he’d slept; he always kept watch. Turning to her left side to look at him, she asked, “Aren’t you tired? When’s the last time you slept?”

  “I sleep very infrequently, my lady. Small naps throughout the day are more than enough.”

  Huh. It felt like Addie was still learning all kinds of new things about her partner, even though they’d been together for so long already.

  “What’d he say?” Nettal asked, having only heard part of the conversation.

  “Oh, he doesn’t need a lot of sleep, so he said he’s happy to take watch tonight.” He took watch most nights, anyway.

  “I can heal him if he’s too tired later. It should help some, even if my magic won’t give him proper rest.” Nettal offered.

  “Tell Nettal I shall take her up on that, though I know I will be more than rested regardless.”

  “Squishy said yes,” Addie reported.

  “I said a bit more than... actually, that’s fine.” He huffed, his body rising and falling until his body went flat against the stone. Silly cat.

  “Great!” Nettal stood up, splashing water all about and flinging it off her body. “Let’s go sleep before tomorrow. Who knows what could happen?”

  Nothing happened that night. Even so, Addie was glad Squishy watched over them. Nothing happened in the morning, either, beyond Feera coming by to ask Addie and Nettal to go to the throne room when they were ready. It was almost... peaceful. The food tasted excellent, but Addie had no idea where it’d come from. The sheets were clean and soft and the bath had been amazing— decadent, Nettal had called it. Nothing happened at all except for a calm night.

  But no matter how calm the night appeared, Addie couldn’t shake off a sense of unease. She had no reason to be uneasy, she told herself. If nothing else, Addie believed she was safe here. On top of that, nothing had tried to mess with her layers of transcendent loop, and Nettal seemed fine, too. Yet... yet Addie didn’t feel calm, even if her surroundings were that way. Something poked out at her, tickling the back of her mind. She didn’t know what it was yet, but that’s why she felt so uneasy.

  When Addie, Squishy, Nettal, and Lotty all finally finished eating breakfast, they headed back to the throne room. The walk was familiar by now; Addie’d traversed it quite a few times. With her spatial sense, she didn’t even have to watch where she was going. Nothing jumped to attack her in the halls, but her heart wouldn’t calm down. The closer they got to those tall, metal engraved double doors, the more Addie felt like this was a bad idea somehow. She had to shove all those feelings down. This was the only way she knew of to get home.

  Just before Addie could grab the door, Nettal yanked on Addie’s shoulder.

  “Hey! Why’d you do that?” the words just burst out of her, but she wasn’t really angry at Nettal. More just surprised by her doing that, and the whole day had made her really tense.

  “Addie,” Nettal gently chastised, “calm down. It’s okay. We can get through this together, right?”

  Addie forced in and out a deep breath. Nodding her head, she felt a bit better and replied, “Right.”

  “So no matter what happens, you don’t have to be so nervous. You’ve got a team, and there’s more of us than just your bonded.”

  Addie nodded her head some more. Nettal was right; even if it was her responsibility to protect Nettal, she could still rely on her cousin if things got tough or if she got hurt.

  “Okay, are you ready?” Addie asked, again moving up to the door and placing both hands to open it.

  “I’m ready, are you?”

  “Yeah. Let’s go.”

  The doors squeaked open, the man already inside and waiting for them. He sat upon the throne, and all the magic circles and crystals that had been in the middle of the floor were gone now.

  “Ah, Addie. There you are.” He moved to stand up, performing a bow, one that a lord might do to someone of lesser rank than himself. “I realize in all the chaos, I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Visesata, and I’m a member of the order of Servus.”

  Addie’s heart dropped, and she could feel Squishy’s emotions all tensing up right beside her. Even Nettal, right next to Addie, grabbed on and squeezed her hand with a small gasp.

  Visesata just continued on talking, not at all noticing the girls’ strong reaction. “Now that we’ve gotten introductions out of the way, I’d again like to offer you a role as my new apprentice! Surely you’ve seen all the wonders of my domain, you can live like a princess while I teach you new magic.”

  The man smiled, the corners of his lips curling just a bit more than Addie thought natural. “So, what do you think? Sounds pretty good, right?”