“Nice cock—Can I drive?” Bliz said, slapping the ass of my horse. “What’s his name?”
I shook my head and I shrugged. Can’t call him anyway.
She scratched the horse’s sallow, ebony cheeks and made cooing noises as she said, “What a sweet boy. I’m gonna call you Ball-ass.”
I gave her a pained look over the saddle.
She pouted and conceded, “Alright, I’ll call you… Ass-balls.”
I stepped into the stirrups and loosened the reins. I held a hand out to her and she got on behind me, wrapping her hands around my waist with a sigh of contentment. “Ass-balls the Gelding, it is!”
Ass-balls snorted once in agreement and I pressed my heels to his side, twisting him back toward the northern gate. Then we stopped and I looked under my arm at her for a moment.
She said, “Oh! Right. Navigator Bliz, reporting for duty! I left some of my stuff on the outskirts in a badger hole. I flew here, so I don’t have a four-legged friend for myself.”
I blinked at her.
She gave me an exasperated look. “How do you think the landlord found out about your culling literally twenty minutes after you’d left the pass? He didn’t teleport. He didn’t fucking scry you, Lummox. I tattled on you.”
I narrowed my eyes.
She rolled hers. “Listen, Mister Baby Blues, don’t get your trousers twisted. You knew he was a bastard from the start. Don’t tell me watching him get berated by a chick just shy of five feet tall didn’t make your insides turn all squimmy. Because I saw that glazed, satisfied look on your face—like a cat that got its cream.” She grabbed my sand pouch, now weighed down with gold, and I flinched. “And you got paid! Face front and HIYAH!” She heeled Ass-balls and away we went.
Pretty sure squimmy isn’t a word.
The badger hole still had a badger in it, of course. I stayed on the horse while Bliz struggled to corral the forty-pound terror with two sticks and a lot of startled screaming. Eventually the woodland creature took off into the thicket, probably to avoid any tinnitus. Ass-balls and I envied his frenzied retreat.
Covered in scratches and dirt, Bliz wiped her face and grinned at me and said, “First try!” She recovered her belongings which proved to be a coral Islandin greave knife (with no greave or sheath) and a mesh sack (full of toiletries and underwear). She hopped back onto the horse and banged my shoulder. “Giddy-up, Warlock Pony!”
We made camp about an hour from Half’ld. The entire time, not a minute passed that Bliz wasn’t talking.
“I can’t stop talking,” she explained at one point. “If I’m silent for more than an hour at a time, I start to draw from myself. Next thing you know, I’m a zombie. How do I sleep? Easy! I snore. Apparently, that’s enough to count as communicating, according to Daddy Dearest. You might wanna invest in some ear plugs for the future. Oh—I talk too. In my sleep. Especially when I’m dreaming.”
Daddy Dearest? If I ever referred to my own stargodling as anything less than my lord and savior, I’d be dead.
false
I will answer to nothing less
than
Godking Snivellian Cumquat Bibblesnaff
Firstborn of the Night
Darkest Darkness
Supreme Sheik Sultana of Solaris
Lady Lord of the Black Noise
I rest my case.
the fifth
Blizzith, despite being an endless font of perfectly useless information and mundane personal anecdotes (that always went on far too long to be charming), she was an efficient camp maker. I was too drunk to mind sleeping on my bedroll, exposed to the summer night. But she went the extra click, pitching my lonely tent with a practiced ease as she continued blabbing about nothing in particular.
WAITWAITWAIT which
tent
Sue? SUE—She was saying something about her “Patron Papa”, the Void Maker, thirsting for the souls of all warlocks or something. I wasn’t really paying attention.
augh
After she had rolled out my spare bedroll and unbuttoned her leathers to air overnight, she rested her chin in her hands and turned to me in the small space, asking, “Who woulda thought a silencer and a voider could be partners? It’s like we were made for this! But you know what’s even weirder? I'm the firstborn of the lastborn. So, you’re really the first warlock in all the world?”
I wanted to correct her. I’m not the first warlock. I’m the second warlock, technically. The first that was chosen by the Silent One bled from her eyes and mouth just before her head exploded. I’ve visited the bathhouse she was chosen in. Called it a pilgrimage at the time. To this day, the marble is still pitted where her suddenly acidic blood splattered and sprayed.
I was sprawled out on my back, still wearing armor and belt. I nodded at her listlessly; my eyes heavy as I tried to focus.
“Listen. I know I said you’d take a watch, but I think you’ll be more useful when you’re hydrated and rested. Go ahead and take tonight.” She patted my forearm and smiled warmly. “I’ll sleep when we get to Half’ld. It’s not so far anyway, right?”
I, who was about to play pretend at unliving, saluted her.
As the light began to retreat and emptiness began to unbody me, I thought she kissed my forehead and said, “Good night, my prince.”
TSO.
yes?
Did she kiss my forehead and call me a prince?
TSO?
Godking?
‘EY, OI
FUCK-FAyes
nothing
has changed
you two
remain
insufferable
to this very day
ns 15.158.61.21da2
