Newly Broke Heroine! [Book One Complete, Cozy Fantasy Adventure]

Fiona's eyes fluttered open, and she inhaled a shaky breath. She winced at the light that assaulted her eyes and put a hand to shield herself from the intense glare. The first thing she noticed was that she felt sore all over. That fight with Varith was still recent.

After her eyes adjusted to the light, she craned her neck around. A few items caught her attention. The first detail of importance was that she was in what looked like the medical wing of the Adventurer's Guild main building. She could hear the thrum of a faint machine nearby. An IV was connected to her wrist and looped to a dispenser above her, and she was resting on a white-sheet cot.

The second item of concern was that her armor and clothes had been removed. She had bandages all over, plus awrap of bracing around her torso. On the positive, she at least had a thin hospital gown on, and she could smell a potent ointment from the bandages underneath.

This is definitely not sexy. This also requires more magical morphine to dull the pain. She wanted to rot into the bed, even as much as she wanted to get up, or call for someone. She was utterly exhausted, and her body didn't count being comatose as rest.

She tilted her head the other way, and saw Bonnie sitting on a small lounge couch, her ears canted at an angle, alseep and resting against Greg. He too, was also fast asleep. She couldn't help but smile faintly when she saw Greg had placed his jacket over the kitsune.

Less appealing was the fact that they looked worse for wear–she saw a few bandages on Bonnie's wrists, one on her cheek, and one on her leg. Greg looked sooty but intact, and stirred gently as Bonnie nuzzled next to him, making a small purring sound.

Doug stirred in another seat, half-nodding off, with his wings spread awkwardly to one side. The seat wasn't exactly meant for sleeping, let alone a winged Folk, and he grumbled something irritably. His scales looked burned in places, and he, too, had received triage. He hadn't been kidding; dragons were not, in fact, fully fireproof.

Fiona sank back down into the bed and let out a soft sigh. She wondered how bad a state she had been in when they brought her to the medical center. The fact that they were here and not in a war room somewhere, gave some small glimmer of hope.

Doug's eyes flickered open, and he saw her motion. He nearly fell out of the chair on his quick rise and hurried over to her bedside, and his expression was almost...joyful? "Hey, you're awake," he called out softly. "How you feeling?"

"Like I fought a battlemaniac and broke even, at best. How long was I out?" Her throat felt scratchy, like she'd inhaled secondhand smoke from her grandma. That woman had chain-smoked until the day she died in her mid-eighties, and it wasn't the smoking that killed her, either. Only a broken heart over her grandpa dying a year prior. "Doug, Barry was–"

She coughed softly, and it felt like she'd swallowed razor blades. She rested her head back on her pillow. She tried talking softer, barely above a whisper. She almost sounded like her grandma, with the raspy voice. "Sorry. How is–"

Doug raised a clawed hand and awkwardly clung on the rail on the side of the bed. "You've been out about twelve hours. You were the last through on the teleport. You also almost wrecked your body trying to teleport that many at once." He pointed to the IV drip. "Mana solution is helping restore the imbalance."

"Even as bad as this feels? Dead is worse," she admitted. "Did everyone make it?" She felt confident enough to ask that question.

He nodded calmly after a second. "Eight workers. I can't say I know how many were in the building, or scattered when Varith launched the attack. Some are choosing silence. But, they were all grateful for an impromptu rescue."

"It's what I do. Even if what I did was pretty dangerous." When another cough wracked her body, Doug reached for a glass pitcher and poured her a cup of water, which she gulped down. She didn't care that she dripped a good quarter of it down her chin.

"You might want to take it easy for a bit," he cautioned, and offered a washcloth to her, where she wiped away the dribble.

"I can't. We have problems, Doug."

Doug leaned in, looking more than a touch weary. "Fiona, the ball was in motion before we ever set foot in Vale. Luckily for us, Varith miscalculated, and there are many questions in Vale about why Fiefdala would brazenly attack a state property while in trade negotiations. That's all you're getting until you've rested for a bit."

She narrowed her eyes. "Doug, don't you dare tell me what to do," she threatened. He didn't flinch.

"Even if you had the strength to stand, I doubt you'd make a bold move, Fiona. You know…there's only so much those magical healing potions can do before they just do not work." She noticed he kept faltering in his words, and the grave look he gave her...

The conclusion she reached, was that he did care. "So, yeah. Don't strain yourself this time," he said firmly.

She leaned back and let out a hissing sigh. "Okay, fine. I can see reason, on occasion." He look away toward the window, twisting his snout and tapping one finger on the rail gently. "What?"

"Nothing." She raised an eyebrow at that statement. It was the biggest deflection she'd ever heard from the miniature dragon.

"Don't 'nothing' me, I saw that look. You're worried about me." He slowly turned his head back to her his scales flexing gently, like a lot of tension was relieved from his face. "Did we just…you know…"

His eyes widened, and his mouth gaped for a second before words spilled out rapidly. "I was worried about my employer and her continued state of health. You dropping dead from your crazy antics puts me smack dab in a bad job market. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing while the entire world was burning down around us."

"I would think that you would be less worried about a little fire, being a cinder dragon," she replied coyly. Do I really want to push this? I mean, if I do, I'm off the edge of the map, and there are indeed dragons.

This thought did not sit well with her. Ugh. Why is my brain thinking this, whyyy? He is so bad for my current state. Theo might die of sadness if I do. Lucy might kill me successfully where Barry didn't. Greg will likely do his stern look and tap his foot like he's irritated, and point out that you don't romance your coworkers. And, darling Darla will likely be grinning from one horn to another until the day she dies if she thinks we're a couple.

Maybe it wasn't the time to bring this up, and he eagerly awaited a response "Okay, Doug, I see your point. It was a bit of a heated moment," she conceded.

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Doug let out a resigned sigh and tapped his claws gently on the bed rail. "Swiftheart, your puns are so sharp, they could be lethal." A small chuckle emerged from him, despite his best effort not to. "I am glad you pulled through."

"Yeah, me too." There was a small moment of silence while they looked at each other, and she cleared her throat when she realized she might be staring. "So, what are the damages?"

"Karlin's lying low somewhere, and the forge is wrecked, by all accounts. Barry and the negotiating team vacated Vale, before questions could be asked. Varith is unaccounted for, and the upper branch of government is in panic. We still don't know where Fiefdala's gold is. Vale may start a war with us if they buy into this false flag. So, it's pretty bad." He scuffed a clawed foot across the tiled floor.

"So, was Karlin collateral? Or was he really screwing Vale?"

Doug tilted his wings like he was shrugging his shoulders. "Unknown. I grabbed some documents, but I hadn't made wings or tails of them so far. But, I would applaud my brother–for once in my life–for being so brazen as to piss off the Aegortin empire. It doesn't make up for everything he's done, but…" he trailed off. "I hate this feeling of having one thing I can't hold against him."

"What about Glados?" Fiona asked. Doug tilted his head.

"Uh, that's the thing. She got up and vanished. You know how Barry said she was chilling here in Fiefdala while he was doing a bang-up job of negotiating? She's missing, too, and that happened before Varith was committing state-sanctioned arson. There are a couple of whispers going on. I don't know what to think. All I know is Jake is clued in and proceeding very, very carefully with this whole situation."

She sighed and rested her head on the pillow. "So, we're boned, in summary. Is it war yet?"

"No. I think even Varith jumped the shark. Did he say anything to you? I only caught part of this rant while I fought off the fire." He winced as he rubbed at a sooty patch of scales on his hand.

"Oh, there's a lot to unpack, there," she sighed. "Let me sum it up for you: Varith doesn't just want me dead; he will burn down everyone around me, before he does." She chose to stay silent about her possible conversation with a dead goddess. That one was still decrypting in her head, and what it meant. For her, and Cepalune as a whole.

And, what Wingding was.

She glanced at her wrist to see Wingding tucked up in a ball, wings wrapped around her heart core tightly. You alright, girl?

Flap-flap. That was a distinct 'no' from her. Doug followed her gaze to watch on.

"I'm guessing there's more? But on the big problem list, I think this trade deal just went up in smoke, and it could have been a big-brain move by Glados and Karlin to put Fiefdala in a bad spot. But hey, at least Barry isn't here chewing you out. I think we were in the wrong place at the wrong–"

"No. Varith planned this." She was focused, now. "Varith is someone from Earth that I pissed off. He was tailing us from the second he saw me, and saw an opportunity." She explained what happened next while reeling at this possible nightmare, and Doug sat down next to her, tail wound around the legs of his chair. After she was finished, he let out a whistle, which was a little funny, considering his snout.

"So, let me see if I get this right. His bang-up job to subjugate Vale was to...what, free the slaves? Except he was out maneuvered by the labor houses? Then he did nothing for months?"

"I wouldn't call 'stealing gold from one country to free the people of another' exactly nothing. Or its just an excuse he made up to justify it." She still had trouble processing that.

The contracts were awful. They were little more than window dressing on slavery. He might have improved things marginally, but his political will only got him so far. "Sounds like Karlin fooled him, fooled Aegortin, and might have fooled Glados. Boy, your brother sure know how to make enemies."

Doug frowned at that. "Its tough when its family. Even though I hate him...if he were doing this for a purpose? Resurrecting mum? I can't hate him for that."

"If its even possible. Necromancy is a bad road to go down, the little I've seen of it." She shook her head. "Its misguided at best."

"Resurrection is different than raising the dead. It's closer to..." He trailed off. "You mentioned a friend had recently passed."

"A medium. His will to see one last task completed for his family kept him going. Once it was done, he faded. Finished the cycle, I guess."

"Resurrection is like that, using a preserved soul. Reconstructing a body, and placing a soul back into it, intact, is a different process...and very rare. It typically requires the intervention of an actual god to make possible. I don't believe you were resurrected, given your description of the events as you remember them."

"So you know it's a fools errand then. Doug, how long has she been...gone?"

She didn't hear him sigh, but she saw the way his wings dropped. "A long time. But not impossible, either."

"Doug...I look in the mirror every day, and I know its not me. It's a me I wanted to be, but could never reach, no matter how hard I tried." The heated words she'd exchanged with Varith so easily, now came out like she was trying to swallow molasses.

"I try not to think of it. Some days I can manage it. Some days...I see the twenty-something woman with freckles and a plain face, plain hair, plain body, and I want to be her again. Breaking the cycle of life, even for good reasons? Even if a god decreed it? It has a cost."

Doug didn't answer. He just gazed out the window for a moment, and grumbled something inaudible. "I didn't realize you felt that way about it."

"It wasn't right away. After Regis passed...my thoughts on it changed. I saw things in a different light."

Fiona glanced down at Wingding. She's not a resurrection. Maybe she's someone new? Is that what happened to me? Am I just a copy of collected thoughts of a woman from Earth? Or maybe my body and soul made the trip intact, and that old woman gave me a few upgrades to help me survive?

Contemplating her entire existence was making her head hurt. Feo'thari, if you're the one who pulled me from certain death, at least you gave me one hell of an important task. Assuming I'm not crazy.

Doug looked like he was waiting for her to finish. "Look, the point I was trying to get at is, even if he could pull this off and bring back your mum...would it truly be her?" she asked softly

His wings and his gaze lowered. He spent several seconds, before he swallowed uncomfortably, and when he spoke again his voice was tensed.

"No. I begin to understand what you mean. You've already undergone, from your perspective, something like it." He curled his claws into his palms, the pained look on his face brief--but still visible.

"Seems to be a theme. Doing awful things for noble goals. Maybe Karlin is doing all this just to undermine the contract houses, but that feels coincidental. But...there is one thing still bugging me at the moment. Something more immediate."

"What's that? Fiona asked, sitting upright.

"Varith. When I saw him, he looked like was in the middle of a meltdown. Because of you, or what you said to him. So, who do you think he is?" Doug asked.

"I have a few theories of who he is. One of the soldiers who bit the dust while I was going on my last stand, who thought I was a failure. Or one of more than a few people I ghosted for dates. Or it could be..." she trailed off, thinking of the possibility.

If it's you, then I understand your rage.

Doug caught her silence and spoke a single suggestion in words so quiet, she almost missed him. "Or, it was Bianca."

She clenched her jaw and slowly turned to face him, his expression somber, his head held low. He wasn't wrong; Bianca had spent time in Amherst, just like Varith said. "Fiona, sometimes the most obvious answer is right in front of you. Sometimes, you don't have to look far. You just don't want it to be her. Who else could want a piece of revenge that badly? I know you two had a bad breakup. Sometimes, that's all it takes. One bitter memory that clenches at the heart, and doesn't let go."

He said the words to her…but she wondered if he was talking about Karlin, as well. "But she's…" she trailed off, unwilling to pursue the thought, and focused on his presumed meaning. "She's…you know…it can't be. Varith is a guy, Bianca…wasn't."

"Why do you believe that?"

"She was on the bus fifteen minutes before I clocked out, Doug." He looked at her, wide-eyed. "We'd met by chance that day, she wanted to at least see me off to the military garrison when I got the call to report, one summoning I was more than happy to answer. Then the reality hit of what we were up against.

"I said goodbye to her, and told her I loved her. Then I told the bus driver to floor it and never look back."

The silence stretched on for an uncomfortable amount of time, as it sank in for Doug. "Even so…you should consider it at least."

"No. It can't be her." She ground her teeth. "There's one other candidate who would want to tear me down through two lifetimes. My dad would be the guy to tear me down twice."

Doug's snout hung agape for a second. "I'm sorry. What?"