Days Before Victory
Trust the elves to get the aesthetics of imprisoning someone right.
The cell was small, a six-foot stone cube with chunks of blackand-blue bricks worked into it. A wooden bench was built into one wall. Somehow, water dripped from the ceiling, and a puddle had formed in the center of the floor. A tiny window, barred, was placed high on one wall, and on the other was a thick, wooden door with a slit in the top.
Belika sat on the bench, every breath painful. She was manacled to the wall beneath the tiny barred window, trying to breathe as little as possible. The sword wound in her gut was agony every time she moved… and the smell of the burned city was thick in the air that entered the cell.
Belika had regeneration abilities and could have healed under normal circumstances. But the guards had put her in a cell that had a black-and-blue anti-magic rock worked into the walls that suppressed her powers and stopped her essence use.
The memories that plagued her were the worst.
Failure.
The bitter taste of defeat. She’d tried to lead the goblin rebellion against the elves to help the enslaved goblins of Sarwyndyll. She’d made contacts, explained strategies, planned. She’d been supported by the Kingdom of Daruk with thousands of weapons. The armies had been gone from Sarwyndyll, all but the weakest and least experienced of the guards, or a few mercenary bands. It should have worked.
We still failed. I still failed.
Her memories kept returning, drowning out the pain of her stomach and the feeling of the blood slowly soaking her bandages and dripping down her belly. Memories of her new friend and lover, Kas the Sweeper, dying beside her. Of other friends and allies, goblins all, falling in the assault on the Stardew royal palace.
The attempt at a rebellion had become a three-way war between the Voidbringer-serving elves, the “free” elves—still enslavers of her people—and the goblin slaves as they’d tried to free themselves and take the city or flee.
And my last memory is Scout Harding starting a huge fire. It’s likely she killed even more goblins.
Belika gave an agonized sigh. Although it hardly matters, we lost thousands, and the reprisals of my actions will likely kill the rest. Damn Baron Gar and the whole kingdom for using me.
The thought had less bite than it should have, however. It wasn’t like Gar had hidden his motives or skimped on his promised support. And at least his victory, if it was achieved, would help keep Belika’s beloved dungeon-city of free goblins, Labyrinthia, safe from the ravages of the Kingdom of Eladrin. And Belika had learned that goblin slaves had disappeared by the thousands even before her rebellion…
Although he had alternative plans I wasn’t informed about, for if I failed. Like a good prince, I suppose, but it galls me.
But what galled her most was that her final minutes would be used as an example to the few remaining goblins—to remind them to be good slaves. They would execute her in public, likely in some gruesomely painful way, as a warning.
Tears born of despair leaked down Belika’s face. At least I tried, which is more than almost anyone else did. I gave up every comfort, lived in rags, to increase my level, to do everything needed to be able to lead my people!
Unconsciously, her hands moved, trying to free her from the manacles. Her arms ached, and her wrists bled.
The long-lived elf enslavers might not even notice my rebellion as more than a blip, since the goblin slaves will bear more children and the elven bastards will also just kidnap new ones. A brief rise in the price of slaves is all I ever cause, and now, ever will cause.
Belika’s dark musings were interrupted by a muted thunk, and the sound of leather sliding down stone. What in magic’s name?
Keys jingled and turned in the lock of the wooden door, and the top of a head covered in red hair was visible through the viewing slit
at the top.
The door opened, and Scout Harding came through. She was a dwarf, short even for the species, under five feet tall, although she still towered over Belika’s own four feet. Scout Harding moved with a sure-footed walk as she sauntered in, her red hair tied behind her in a ponytail, her leather armor covered in blood and smoke, and an axe held in her hand.
“Scout Harding?” Belika asked, hope rising wildly within her “You came back for me?”
Scout Harding had been Belika’s liaison to Baron Gar and the Kingdom of Daruk—she was his top spy, whatever her official title was. She’d snuck Belika into Sarwyndyll and gotten her the weapons to arm the goblin revolutionaries.
“Yeah,” Scout Harding said, then she gave her a crooked smile. “Baron Gar ordered that you were to be protected if at all possible and bade me make sure you came through this. And you know I take my duty to the kingdom, and Baron Gar, seriously.”
“I… can’t believe it.”
“Let’s get you out of here before we both end up dead. The city burns, and all the rebellions have been defeated—the Voidbringers are locking this city up tight and rounding everyone up. And I saw them setting roadblocks outside the city. We need to move quickly!”
Scout Harding unlocked Belika’s manacles. It was a relief to finally lower her arms. Scout Harding helped Belika to stand, then supported her out of the cell.
Then Harding pulled a potion from a pouch at her belt and passed it over. “Laurel’s special Body essence brew,” she whispered, her voice a quiet caricature of a merchant calling out their wares.
Belika took the potion, shaking with desire, and drank it. Essence immediately washed through her, and she triggered her regeneration power. Her wounds started rapidly closing. A minute later, she stood straight, the pain forgotten.
“Thank you, both you and your lord,” Belika whispered.
“We need to leave—now,” Scout Harding said. “I saw a couple of the infested-style Voidbringers on my way here. They’re setting up a
huge ritual, using Travel Shards. I really think we don’t want to be here when they finish.”
“What about my people? What about the goblins?”
“Get back, get better, get resources, and then save them!” Scout Harding hissed. “You haven’t the strength now!”
She’s right. But I’ll be back. And I’ll save my people from the Voidbringers yet.
Contents
Dedication
Prologue: Days Before Victory
Chapter One: A Last Hurrah Before Work
Chapter Two: A Year Later
Chapter Three: The Greater Warren
Chapter Four: The Next Level, Part I
Chapter Five: The Next Level, Part II
Chapter Six: The Next Level, Part III
Chapter Seven: The Next Level, Part IV
Chapter Eight: The Infinite Library, Part I
Chapter Nine: The Infinite Library, Part II
Chapter Ten: The Infinite Library, Part III
Chapter Eleven: All the Options
Interlude One: A Never-Ending Quest
Chapter Twelve: The Underpinnings of Empire
Chapter Thirteen: The Call From Adventure
Chapter Fourteen: The Crimson Feast
Chapter Fifteen: Aftermath
Chapter Sixteen: First Meeting of the Council
Chapter Seventeen: Consolidation and Expansion
Chapter Eighteen: The Eldritch Tower, Part I
Interlude Two: The Hunted Preserve
Chapter Nineteen: The Eldritch Tower, Part II
Interlude Three: A New Target
Chapter Twenty: Low Tide
Chapter Twenty-One: Married
Chapter Twenty-Two: The Brief Illusion of Safety and Empowerment
Chapter Twenty-Three: Endgame—Opening Moves
Interlude Four: Endgame—Complications
Chapter Twenty-Four: Endgame—Acceleration
Chapter Twenty-Five: Endgame—Invasion
Chapter Twenty-Six: Endgame—Occupation
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Endgame—Realignment
Chapter Twenty-Eight: The Rewards of Victory
Chapter Twenty-Nine: Ruminations
About The Author
Chapter One
A Last Hurrah Before Work
The Fairy Grotto had been expanded to about fifty feet in diameter, which was huge by fairy standards, over the course of its existence. It was now the hub of Will’s massive dungeon, with tunnels leading in from multiple different parts of the dungeon and a ring of other rooms around it. Emergency rat lairs, Amber’s Earth Ritual workshop, and the crystal vault were all accessible from a hallway around the Grotto.
The room itself had been altered multiple times. At the moment, the interior cavern wall had a large ledge, just wide enough to allow for the construction of small houses. So far, four had been constructed. One for each of the fairies living with him: Amber, Ember, Harmony, and Rose. The small rooms and tiny furniture reminded Will of dollhouses.
The room that belonged to Amber—Will’s first fairy—had a few books, but Amber mostly lived in her research room and kept most of her stuff there.
Ember, Amber’s sister, who looked like coal brimming with internal heat, kept her room tidy. Inside, she had very little—she preferred a spartan lifestyle.
Harmony, on the other hand, had decorated her space with, well, everything. Pictures she had drawn. Numerous flowers. Furniture she’d asked Will to make. It was a busy space.
Rose, a fairy who loved nature, had even more plants on the inside of her room, as if the she couldn’t stand the possibility she might be away from nature.
There were numerous Luminous Stones throughout the cavern, and a huge number of flowers, many of which had no business growing underground. Gems glittered in the walls, giving the whole Grotto a mystical appearance.
But the center, with its sparkling pool, was the highlight. Glowing stones and the most beautiful magical flowers Will could produce
graced the stalactites and stalagmites around the pool, all of which had fairy-sized ledges to lounge on. And that pool now had a huge statue of Thorn, Will’s old fairy, gracing the center—the fairy who had given her life to win victory for Will in the latest round of his conflict with Voidbringers.
Thorn had been a battleform fairy and had snuck into the enemy’s boss room and then slain the Voidbringer Infester on the core to end the dungeon—which had both kept Will alive and given him another core to add to his own. That core had allowed his dungeon to expand and reach Shaleton. Thorn, through her bravery and sacrifice, had indirectly saved the dwarves as well.
She deserved to be remembered in Stone and Song, as the dwarves said. So Will had placed a statue of her at the center of his most occupied point, and if he could ever find someone in his collection of dungeon and fairy friends who could write a decent song, he’d try to get one of those as well.
Will’s Fairy Grotto was once again occupied, humming with activity and buzzing fairy wings. The many fairies were all having a victory party in the Grotto—and every nearby fairy from other dungeons had come, as well as the much larger Grathnog and Tharsult, Will’s bonded guardians. And all the cores could talk telepathically with each other and the fairies thanks to Adelle’s new inventions.
All the fairies—Amber, Ember, Rose, Harmony, Stitch, Rime, Luna, and Razzle—congregated near the pond.
“Please keep the volume low,” Amber said matter-of-factly. Her body, devoid of anatomical details, was made of cat-eye stone, her smooth curves beautiful in a doll-like way. “We’re all civilized fairies here.” She flew around the other fairies with an air of authority.
Luna, who was similar to Amber but looked more like glowing moon rock, nodded along with Amber’s statements, but Will saw her roll her eyes. “Yes. Civilized.”
Both of them were imbuers and loved making items. They also seemed to enjoy being in charge. Luna was Adelle’s fairy, and Will wondered how their dynamic worked.
Rose, who looked like a tiny girl made of trees with a rose petal mane, whispered, “I’ll try to keep quiet.”
“I’m always civilized,” Stitch said. She was Percy’s fairy, and her doll-stitch body matched Percy’s Entropy undead dungeon.
Harmony splashed her form around in the pool. She looked like a small, pink doll with no distinguishable genitals or detail to her breasts. She had pink hair, pink butterfly wings, and a constant light smell of cinnamon about her. “Is this too much noise, Amber?”
Razzle busted out of the water, startling Harmony, who screamed loud enough that her voice echoed around the Grotto. Razzle was a glowing fairy—she seemed made of pure light. She snickered at Harmony’s reaction.
“None of that,” Amber said, clapping her stone hands. “We will remain orderly.”
Ice coated the edge of the pond as Rime walked out onto it. She looked like Amber, if she’d been made of ice instead of jasper, though Rime was a bit more angular. She whirled around with the grace of a figure skater. “There are lots of things we can do that are silent.”
The last fairy—the only one not playing in the water—was Ember. She had the appearance of molten rock, and for obvious reasons, didn’t seem to enjoy submerging herself in anything liquid. “It’s a party, isn’t it? Being loud doesn’t seem so bad…”
It was still only fifteen people, but by dungeon core standards, that made it a raging kegger. Will laughed at his own joke.
Is that something I learned from the dwarves, or is it some vague memory from my past life? What is a kegger?
“What’s so funny, Will?” Adelle asked.
Adelle was basically Will’s partner in the Dungeon Council they’d established. She was the only other “high-level” dungeon associated with Will—which he was currently defining as Level Ten or above, although Will knew his fairies would laugh at him to hear anything under Level Forty defined as “high-level.”
More importantly than her level was the fact that Adelle was also the only other Rank Four dungeon besides Will himself—and she had Travel magic. There’d been a third Rank Four, but it had died
early. Will wondered if it had taken Fate magic, the last of the Ascension magics, since Will himself had taken Meta magic.
“Oh, just thinking about the phrase ‘raging kegger.’ And the fact that this sadly counts as one for a dungeon core.” Will had been practicing his image projection and tried to project a party image to everyone, of one of the dwarven celebrations he’d witnessed.
Adelle giggled through their mental connection, but Amber looked up from where she was talking with the other fairies, her jasper face serious. “Yeah, this is a whatever you called that—a party—by dungeon standards. And fairy standards. Trust me. I mean, we’ve talked it to death, but I was afraid I’d have to be stuck with only one dungeon to talk to for hundreds or thousands of years. I’m deeply glad that hasn’t been the case.”
Harmony leapt into the air and started flying, her cinnamon smell wafting around the room. “I love this place! It’s amazing and wonderful and just so fun and—”
“We get it.” Amber interrupted, half-smiling, before turning back to her discussions with Ember and Luna, Adelle’s fairy.
Those three fairies were all well versed in magical lore and imbuing, and they enjoyed discussions that Harmony tended to find dreadfully boring.
King Tharsult sat with his back to one edge of the Fairy Grotto, sighing contentedly as he sipped at his “dwarven ale.” And burped. Which was extra amusing, since the ale was just water Adelle had enchanted to taste like excellent booze. Grathnog enjoyed the same thing, and the two spoke about the victory in political terms. Although the discussion bore a resemblance to two parents discussing their children, one with a touch of sadness. The dwarves were led by Tharsult’s two sons, the new King Tharsult and Gar Adamant. The goblins of the city of Labyrinthia currently had no leader since Grathnog’s son, Belik, had died.
Both Grathnog and King Tharsult had surrendered themselves to become special bosses for the dungeon, but in the process, they’d changed a bit. The cunning Grathnog had gained quite a bit of aggression when fed Wyld power. Although the increase in Earth magic Tharsult had received hadn’t seemed to change his
personality, not being king seemed to have vastly reduced his stress —he’d even smiled during this bizarre party a couple of times.
Rose was quietly watching from the sidelines. She was Will’s newest fairy—the replacement for Thorn after her heroic sacrifice. Will liked Rose a lot. She was very quiet and shy, but she was also kindly and reasonable, and he wanted to make the world great for her. Her tiny, foot-tall body was made of wood, and she had a rose petal “mane” around her neck, as well as gossamer dragonfly wings. Although she did seem shy, Will hoped she’d warm up a bit—she’d only been here for twenty-four hours. And my other fairies have some pretty big personalities.
There were a few other fairies around as well. Rime, the ice fairy of the dungeon Delilah, an Air and Water dungeon that seemed focused on ice sculpture, was one. Stitch, the literally stitched-flesh doll fairy, served Percy, the nearby Entropy undead dungeon. The last fairy was Razzle, the dungeon Michelle’s Light fairy.
Percy and Delilah were actual members of the Dungeon Council, now entirely surrounded by the dungeon that was Will, like subroutines that worked for him.
Subroutines?
But Michelle was a refugee dungeon. She’d be returned now to her actual dungeon—the Dungeon of the Illuminated Mind—so she could start growing again. But she was enjoying the party while she could.
There was a brief lull in the party as the five dungeons, eight fairies, and two floor bosses found a moment where no one was saying anything. In that moment, Adelle mentally stepped in.
“So, obviously, a great victory,” she said, projecting the image of a happy face. “But what’s next? It was a pyrrhic victory, since Shaleton is nearly destroyed. And the Voidbringers are still about, right?”
“Yes,” Will said, sobering a bit. He could feel the mood of the whole room change. “I was going to save this for a more formal meeting of the Dungeon Council, but I guess it doesn’t really matter if I discuss it now.”
“Yeah, I wanna know what’s going on, too, you know?” came Percy’s excitable voice. “That’s what we’re about, right, man?”
“You’ll find out more if you let him talk, darling,” Delilah responded in soft, rich tones.
There is a lot of personality in the cores around me. I hope we keep getting along.
Will tried to project a hand, held up to stop people from talking as he lectured. “Okay, so here’s what I know. We won and won hard. I chased off Infiltrator Thirteen, a full Voidbringer—but I’ve learned there’s a Boss Voidbringer called ‘Kalixnickit.’ I don’t know where that is. And that makes the fact that the Voidbringer had the name ‘Thirteen’ extra concerning, since that implies at least twelve others.”
“And you already met Infiltrator Three as well,” Amber said, frowning. “Who can apparently resurrect dead cores and use them to fight you.”
“Dead cores can be brought back?” Rime asked, her eyes widening as she clasped her hands together, a fine misting of ice chips sprinkling from her. “How is that even possible?”
“I don’t know, but I intend to find out,” Will said. “If they can do it, we can as well, theoretically. Trust me, that is a major avenue of research I want to explore.”
“Where are the remaining Voidbringers, Will?” Michelle asked. “Are they close to where I’m going?”
Will paused. “I don’t think so. I think they’re in the area around Steelhold—the old dwarven capital beneath the earth, which Kasad destroyed, for those who don’t know. Which brings me to the second thing—I expanded almost two miles in every direction, which pushed me deep into that territory… but a field keeps me out of it.”
“Like another dungeon?” Adelle asked, her voice quavering very slightly.
Will spoke in what he hoped were soothing tones. “It doesn’t feel like another dungeon, and it isn’t a perfect circle like when I run up against other dungeons. But it stops me from expanding into it—”
“Even your basic aura, or just the parts you have control of?” Adelle asked.
“Even my basic aura, but something weird happened. Once I expanded to the point, I would be past the bubble regardless, my aura expanded, as if the bubble had zero distance. I have six miles
in most directions but essentially eight miles with a couple-mile null zone going past the bubble.”
“Are you going to investigate it?” Adelle asked through their link. Will paused for a time before continuing. “I was actually thinking… no.”
He felt the surprise and shock through the mental link from most of the cores. “Why?”
“Well, I’d have to risk something I don’t want to lose, like a fairy, to explore there. Additionally, every time I’ve poked my nose into Voidbringer affairs, it has started a conflict. I want to build—at this point, I think time favors me, not them. I’m the one playing catch-up, with an extremely fast and potentially powerful build.”
Percy spoke up. “But every time you haven’t gone looking for them, they’ve hit you with something new.”
“A very salient point, but think on this—that bubble seems to be some kind of dimensional space. And the stuff around it is already extremely weird… and disturbing.”
Harmony shuddered. “Yeah, remember the bone road? That was horrific.”
Amber chuckled darkly. “Compared to the bug with the screaming dwarf’s face, or the twenty-foot-wingspan carnivorous bat thing with the glowing dwarven woman coming off it like an angler fish, I’m surprised the bone road got any mention at all.”
“I like to pretend those things never existed,” Harmony said. “And I’m going to go right back to doing it.”
“Oh, man,” Percy said. “Those would be wicked cool in my dungeon, you know? Like so thematic.”
“Well,” said Will, ignoring Percy’s comment, “I’m going to be trying to clean out everything from that horrible blast radius on my side of whatever that field is, but I’m not going to have anyone or anything cross it.”
“You can see across it?” Adelle asked.
“No, but I can.” Grathnog half-growled. “It doesn’t look any different—just a faint shimmering in the air, and a slight purple tint. I can’t cross it, either.”
“Right, but he can see scary stuff inside the tunnels and across the field as well, apparently,” Will said. “But I have a lot of things I have to accomplish. A lot. Even with that portion cut out, my total area has more than tripled. A lot of that is now really deep underground, and it probably has little of interest, but a lot of it isn’t— and I’ve got nearly twice the magic sites inside me, and a lot of increased ley lines… a lot I need to find.”
“Rub it in,” Percy said, slightly sour sounding. He and Delilah were “magic starved,” trapped in zones that didn’t have much in the way of magical resources by Will’s expansion. Although Percy at least had one ley line—Delilah had nothing at all.
Also, Will had saved them both. Saved Percy quite directly, more than once. So that should have counted for something.
“Sorry,” Will muttered. “I was being insensitive. I’ll send any matching crystals, like I always do, so you guys can level faster. Amber tells me that for most dungeons, the wide build isn’t that good anyway.”
Delilah commented, “Rime has said the same thing: As long as we have a steady supply of adventurers, we’ll be fine.”
“I know, but some of those magic sites seem so cool, and I wanted to incorporate them in my dungeon, you know?” Percy said. “And those horrible beasts you described. I mean, imagine what I could have done with that undead cave you have in your territory and a few of those monsters, Will. It would have been awesome, you know?”
“Well, like I said, I’ll send you crystals. Also, you’ll definitely have a permanent supply of adventurers, so that’ll help you grow as well.”
Although everyone knew they’d never even come close to catching up to Will, or even Adelle. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t raise themselves, and from Will’s perspective, they performed an important function by giving adventurers more places to level. Gotta keep all my little pieces happy.
A faint giggle came from Adelle. I bet she knows what I’m thinking.
“Like I was saying, the dwarves are going to abandon Shaleton soon for a bit to let me fix it up. I have plans—”
“You always have plans,” Adelle and Amber said simultaneously. Will laughed. “True. As I was saying before the peanut gallery cut in—”
“Colloquialisms!” Harmony said, and everyone else laughed, even Once-King Tharsult.
I’m gonna make that his boss name. Wait, no, rule of cool, Will— make it ‘Ever-King’ Tharsult.
“As I was saying, I need to get crystals from the ley lines before the dwarves successfully abandon Shaleton. I’ll need to burn them to be able to fuel every tiny bit of creation I can before they come back. I have a lot to do and need time. We can take a slight breather from fighting the Voidbringers…”
No one argued, and Will sensed they all felt that way to a degree. It had been a very stressful few years in the ongoing Voidbringer Wars.
“Okay, then, let’s continue the party. How about the cores all start a game of ‘stupidest adventurers we’ve seen in our dungeon’? The Frolic of Fairies vote to see which was the dumbest.”
“Frolic?” Amber asked, one jasper eyebrow arching.
“That’s what I’m calling a herd of fairies from now on.”
“A herd?” Harmony asked.
Everyone laughed again, and Will caught a few telepathic mutters equivalent to, “It’s never gonna stick.” But everyone was down for the game, and Adelle immediately opened with an offering of idiot adventurer behavior. “Let me tell you about these adventurers and this new puzzle I made…”
As Will listened to all the stories, the laughter, and the joking, he was once again struck by how much he loved his existence.
He just wished the Voidbringers didn’t hang over it like a cloud, tainting all the good times. Even with his plans to ignore them for a bit, they were never far from his mind.
Chapter Two
A Year Later
Gar looked out over his barony through the huge window, staring into the clear afternoon. From the Baronial Audience Chamber at the top of Cross Citadel, he could see the edge of both Adamant Crossing, a mile to the southeast, and Shaleton, the capital of Daruk, to the northwest two miles. He even saw the edge of the great farms of the Peliara Vale almost two miles south and southeast, past Adamant Crossing.
A merchant caravan traveled through the pass from the Silver Cities Republic, and another followed behind—Laurel’s Whitehaven Trading Company, judging by the colors on the caravan’s flags— moving agricultural goods out of the Vale.
Someone came up behind Gar and wrapped thin arms around him.
Gar gave a startled exclamation. “What in the world?”
Shaiel chuckled in his ear. “You may be impossibly tough, but you’re still really easy to sneak up on.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be with the babies?”
“Gar Junior and Illithyn are doing fine—I left them with the wet nurse.”
The wet nurse… Gamba Earthroot, another of the Mine Master’s innumerable daughters.
“Okay, what’s the occasion?” Gar asked, then he turned and kissed Shaiel before leaning back and staring at her. “Not that I don’t love to have visits from my beautiful—and deadly—wife.”
Shaiel smiled, her ice-blue eyes lighting up and a smile tugging at her mouth. Her cheeks tinged slightly pink, showing off the scar that went from above her eye down to her mouth. “Ah, yes, deadly, the thing most men look for in their spouses.”
She reached up further, placing her arms around his neck and kissing him. They were roughly of a height, a few inches below six feet. Although Shaiel was painfully thin, and Gar was quite bulky.
“Well, this one likes it,” Gar said, smiling. “Nothing like knowing you can be killed in bed by the person currently—”
“Don’t finish whatever terrible comment that was going to be,” Shaiel said, laughing and shushing him with a kiss before he could come back with another rejoinder.
There was a soft cough behind them. “Should I go, milords?”
Gar turned to see Tyra Earthroot, his herald—promoted from page sometime in the last year She’d probably leave his employ soon, as Gar had convinced her to do a few dungeon runs, but he might get lucky. Her magic was Soul, so he might just promote her higher and higher as his social coordinator.
Shaiel laughed. “No, I actually came up to tell Gar the good news —the Dungeon of Stories opened up its Beast Warren segment again. So…”
“So you want to get back to leveling, I take it,” Gar said, laughing.
“Leveling and getting paid. Taking time off for pregnancy sucked, even with the long lifespan of us elves. I’ve been Level Fifteen forever, feels like. I’ll bet you’re Sixteen.”
Gar smiled and held his card out to Shaiel, who took it, making a disgusted noise as her eyes found his level almost immediately. Gar studied it upside down as Shaiel looked at it, despite having read it many times.
