Trinket (Reverse Harem)

A Nightmare Too Vast To Name

 "He's back." Korr looked up at the high ceiling. The disruption of the pattern of rain on the high roof signaled Itek's arrival.

Ethat looked up from his corner and snorted a mix of bugs and fireflies. Ormiss paced in front of the fire, which was an improvement given the Hippocamp usually was gibbering and weeping in a corner. None of them had been able to relax knowing Theia had had dinner with the Lord-Raven. Working out the death of Maris with his Order had only been a minor distraction. The Abbot had been all-too-pleased to have it be dropped. A demon-touched getting off their lead and attacking someone was how the Order got driven out of a city.

He'd often thought the large stone house with its dark corners and candlelight had been charming and mysterious. Now, it seemed dead and empty, and a little too similar to the Hippocamp dungeon where he'd spent a little too much time in chains.

He rubbed his still-aching ribs. The pain sat like a dull, aching bruise and weighed on that lung, with sharp, needle-like pains in the tissues. The Hippocamp healer had told him it would probably take a year before the ache abated, given how long it took ribs to heal, and it might never completely heal, given they had no idea what had actually attacked him. The pain he could live with, it was the sudden exhaustion as his body betrayed how much the injury had taken from him. Weakness was not something an ambassador could afford. And he'd drained himself that day. Using his magic in the hot summer bled him dry.

Itek, dripping wet and in gryphon-form, came down the large stairs into the grand hall.

"What happened?" Ormiss demanded with terrifying intensity.

Korr eyed him. Was this better or worse? Ormiss gibbering and weeping and needing to be fed and his hair brushed was one thing, but this change might have been a new phase of madness.

Itek rolled one gold eye at the Hippocamp and parked himself in front of the fire, still wet from having been out in the rain. He used one paw to press water out of his ruff, flicked his tail, and then transformed up into human form. "She had dinner with him, obviously. I could not hear anything. I was at a considerable distance so the Ravens wouldn't see me watching. It was in his quarters, which has an open wall overlooking Haven, and is heavily guarded by multiple prying sets of Raven eyes perched on rooftops."

"But you could see," Korr said. He shifted his shoulders as his muscles started to ache from standing too long. His body wanted to crawl into bed, while his soul craved every crumb of news about Theia. Seeing her that afternoon had been like drinking sunlight: wonderful, and terrible at the same time. An ocean between them, and he could neither fly nor swim to her.

"I saw," Itek said. "Not in great detail, but I saw. They talked. Then..."

"Then?" Korr pressed while Asund lifted his head and Ormiss froze, barely breathing.

"She stood up, went to a farther wall, and he came up behind her. I'm not sure what happened there. She stood for a few moments while he looked at her back. He nearly touched her, but stopped short. Perhaps he had said something rude and she'd moved away and he was trying to convince her to come back to the table. Either way, she did eventually sit back down."

"He touched her?" Korr asked.

Ormiss and Asund made noises. Ethat bared his teeth.

"I'm not sure. I believe he might have. Or he in the very least came close to it."

"What happened with that Raven!" Asund snarled. "What is she doing!"

Ormiss made a noise like he was dying, then a noise like he was going to strangle the nearest raven.