Dungeon 42

Roguish Delights

It took a day for the Daggers to get past the initial pant wetting stage of fear and read the deal. A remarkably short period of time all things considered. After that came a surprisingly robust negotiation over the next week. Jarod couldn't read, but the man had experience making deals and was shrewd about it.

Though they weren't comfortable around me anymore, they did agree to meet me in person for the final signing. I debated a little about which form and decided to split the difference. As Deux I met them at the town hall, but once we were inside I assumed my natural form.

The change obviously made them more nervous, but it wasn't as if they'd been happy and calm in the first place. I did it mostly because it felt more honest to me than putting on a friendlier appearance while we went over the final offer.

It also didn't appear to matter much in the end. They reviewed the offer with Quints help and agreed.

"So uh… should we call you mistress after this eh?" Jarod asked. He wasn't exactly talkative but a trickle of nervous chatter had been flowing from him since he first arrived. Pip was looking around shiftily for exits, Cord was glaring at the table top like he wanted to break it, and Argent just looked like he wished he was anywhere else.

"42 if you want to use my personal name, so long as we're in private. Deux on the surface- or in town I mean, or if others are around," I offered. I didn't really care about being called mistress and let the dungeon denizens do what they felt most comfortable with. I didn't see a reason not to do that with the daggers too.

"Fuck, I wasted some coin buying things going by this," Pip muttered to himself. He couldn't read but he knew numbers and had been staring a hole in the pay and equipment section.

"You hardly need to worry about money in the valley. You'll be getting bespoke equipment shortly and your room and board is covered. I'll do my best to make things comfortable during your stay," I offered. Pip gave a start, like he hadn't thought he could be heard. Nobody else seemed surprised though so it wasn't like I'd needed super hearing.

"Oh, then can we add on a request for a whore house?" Cord asked sarcastically.

"Ha, him I like," Chris called down from the rafters. Everyone else gave a start while I was just pinching the bridge of my nose. Like an absolute brat he dropped down onto the table and kicked Pip in the chest hard enough to topple the man and his chair backwards.

"Pathetic," Chris laughed.

"CHRISTOPHER!" I shouted, scruffing him through his illusion by his spine.

"What? He's a thief but he's shit. He had plenty of warning, should have cut my legs out from under me," Chris said, unphased.

"Bastard!" Pip yelled, getting up and lunging toward the table with his knives out.

"Don't kill him," I said as I let go of Chris. I got a snort of derision in response. My instinct was to defuse the situation but I ignored it. I'd agreed to let the trainers handle their respective students how they saw fit. I hadn't expected the Rogues to elect Chris though. Honestly I'd expected Reolus, he'd seemed interested in the Daggers.

Pip grabbed at Chriss' legs and got nothing for his trouble but a kick in the face. He was tenacious though and stabbed blindly even as he was forced back. Chris just hopped back off the table then rolled under it to come up next to Pip.

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Chris hardly dodged once they were on even footing, just narrowly avoiding Pip's wild slashes. There was also something strange about him, a kind of smokeyness to his appearance I'd never seen before. Without warning a weak double appeared like an afterimage and Pip stabbed it.

The illusion wouldn't have fooled anyone watching, but someone locked up in combat didn't have the time or distance to see through it. In what was probably a remarkable display of restraint for Chris, he caught Pip by the wrist and twisted until I heard a sickening crack.

"Ha, you really earned that copper tag," Chris taunted while Pip screamed. The other Daggers were on their feet now, obviously going to join in but Pip moved first. With surprising speed he jammed his knife into Chris's guts and stabbed him what must have been half a dozen times.

The daggers stared, though if they were shocked by the violence of it or the fact Chris was still standing I couldn't tell. Something red was gushing from him that I knew fucking well wasn't blood because I'd forbidden him from playing with it after his last prank had ruined a perfectly good couch in the guild.

"Just fucking realize your dead," Pip growled. He'd stood up to glare in confusion at Chris. The brat looked down at himself and then played shocked as he put his hands to the seeping red.

"Oh shit, that was my favorite shirt," Chris said in horror that morphed into amusement. "But I'm well aware I'm dead."

"Chris-" I started. I didn't even finish the admonishment as he dropped his illusion of life.

"So have a drink on me, friend," Chris said, reaching into his shirt. He pulled a punctured wine skin out of his hips and tossed it and something metallic to Pip.

"You've earned it, and a promotion," Chris said, laughing. He took a can of chaos beverage out of himself to offer a toast with. I didn't even know where to start in terms of what to yell at him about. My letting him mess with Pip complicated the compiling of the list a little. A list I forgot about as Pip raised up the skin and then took a swig, more wine sloshing on him than getting in his mouth.

"Fucks sake, drink the potion there on the ground next to you to fix your wrist. And Chris, you let him," I ordered. Pip didn't have to obey me but still did as I asked, picking up the arm shaped bottle. It wasn't large but intricate, the glass forming tendons and muscle while the empty cavity was the shape of the bones.

"Boo, you're no fun," Chris said.

"And you weren't supposed to show them your true form," I reminded him. I hadn't said it was forbidden, so that was just a tiny bit my fault, but not enough to get him off the hook.

"Oh come on, they know about you! They might as well know about the rest of us, it's going to be boring if we have to pretend to be squishy and mortal," Chris countered, more than a hint of a whine in his tone.

"The rest of you?" Jarod asked, looking like he didn't want to.

"Chris is a skeleton, one from the dungeon. He can move around in the valley because it's part of my domain," I explained.

"And he's not the only one?" Jarod prompted.

"No. None of the Lepusan are, but the town folk aside from those living on the farm are," I admitted. Lying would just cause more problems later. This was a significant wrench in my plans to ease the Daggers into the additional layers of weirdness that came with knowing my secret, but not one I could do anything about. Not short of time travel at any rate.

"Fuck, my wrist feels fine now," Pip said in awe. He was moving it about to test the range of motion.

"See? I can't die, you can be mended, it was all just a bit of sport," Chris offered. "So don't plan on being a bunch of whiny twats about training. Have fun with it, because we will."

"Okay, everyone else, head to the training grounds to meet the people who'll be training you. Chris, stay here," I ordered. The Daggers didn't need encouragement and left, though they took the wine skin with them. Chris had his illusion back up, wine stained shirt a sick parody of actual injury.

"Waste of a trick really, I placed it stem down to piss on him with but it was just kind of adorable how he kept going like that," Chris said once we were alone.

"Chris, I know what I agreed to, but that wasn't acceptable. He's too low level to learn from that kind of a beat down. They're all level two," I said, fully exasperated before we'd even really begun. I knew how Chris and Andrea did things and couldn't see that going over well with anyone not as driven as her.

"What's that got to do with me?" Chris asked, looking baffled.

"You agreed to train him," I pointed out.

"Nu-uh," Chris replied flatly.

"Then what the fuck was that?" I asked.

"Just saying hello to the new fleshies," Chris replied with a grin.