Luca looked to Tschida and Nick while Trinket somehow managed to hover and lick himself. Talk about multitasking. It always felt awkward to interrupt dogs when they did such things. He still didn’t know anything about his power either, but he wasn’t sure what he wanted. Nick’s hammer suited him perfectly, even if it had ribbons. Would Luca get something he liked just as much?
Trinket’s delay at least gave Luca time to consider this. Maybe Luca would be some kind of elemental sorcerer? He hoped he wouldn’t be a healer. He played one in World of Finalcraft Scrolls and that was a high-stress task. As the leader, he should be able to deal damage and hold his own.
“Enough!” Nick shouted, grabbing Trinket by his scruff. “We aren’t murdering anyone, and you’re wasting time now.”
Trinket shook his fur and licked his chops. “You three aren’t ready to use your powers yet. You could’ve hurt someone tonight, Oberon!”
“Yeah. Biff. And I didn’t hit him. I just scared him,” Nick argued. “If he didn’t go away though, I was gonna seriously mess him up. He pulled a gun on us.”
“You did have a big hammer,” Luca murmured.
“You aren’t ready to use your powers against someone that dangerous,” Trinket said, closing his eyes with a sigh. “You need practice being the Midsummer Court first. So, you’re going to speak with Stan about the harm of not allowing pets in apartments.”
“He’s right. We need to talk – talk – to people before we get violent,” Luca said. “We can’t be like Sherry at the bar. And, if we don’t know how to use our powers, we could end up hurting someone, or even ourselves. Let’s try convincing Stan tonight.”
###
Gloom Prince Despair of House Caligari leaned back in his thickly padded wingback and frowned at his laptop, noting the grayed-out name of PrinceAmethyst. He’d wanted some escape, some levity after a troubling meeting at Badger Vale. He’d tried his best to ignore Melvin Tschida’s presence, even though, whenever the straight-backed man, glasses perched atop his nose, strode into a room, Despair could not look away. It wasn’t only that Melvin was an exceptional beauty. The Tschida lineage allegedly could be traced back to Rome, but the surname had originated in Austria. Their bloodline included people from Egypt, Norway, Japan, Sweden, and many others. A remarkable line of successful people, people who’d likely made deals with Despair’s kind, demons, in order to ensure their success. Most old families did have ties to the demonic.
The first time he’d seen Melvin, silky black hair falling in wisps over his dark eyes, the image of stars had filled his head. He hated these signs, these premonitions. They never ended well, and in the past, had warned him of danger he’d been unable to stave off. But he’d not seen the stars, a representation of fate before. Somehow, Despair’s future would be tied to Melvin Tschida’s, a murderous opportunist with devastatingly good looks, and, sadly, a human. Melvin wasn’t quite his type either. Despair’s type was a more fragile build, with wide, innocent eyes, not the cunning sort.
He swirled his whiskey in his tumbler as the message notification chimed. Was it Ameth—No. it was ArisTHOTle, the guild leader of the Philosophers’ Stones: [
Despair took a sip of his drink. He did not want to raid, or sit in voice chat with the lot of them, not without Amethyst. He enjoyed the gameplay, but not so much the endless cackling and guild mates all talking over each other.
He typed a reply. [If I can finish up my paperwork on time.] He did manage to get copies of Melvin Tschida’s old school records, but, as they were connected by those stars of fate, he could use other means to gather information.
ArisTHOTle: [
D: [I told you he was the reason when I joined.]
He’d never once kept this a secret, and only held his tongue at all because Amethyst wanted him there. It was nerve-wracking, too, waiting for Amethyst to get home, no matter how much he tried to distract himself. Last he’d heard, Amethyst was in trouble. He didn’t even have Amethyst’s real name or name of the correct suburb to find out if his friend’s evening had gone sideways.
Another message notification popped up, this one from Epeencurus: [
Amethyst, are you all right? He wanted to run some gladiator matches with Am, not spend the evening worrying.
Maybe he was being too overprotective, wasn’t he? He hoped the worst case would be another evening where a drunk Am sobbed to him over Disco voice chat. He never wept in front of Nick and Ryan. How did he know the friends’ names, but not Amethyst’s? Probably because his friends didn’t have gaming handles, so there was no other way to refer to them.
Despair’s gaze followed the curving yellow, gold, and jade lines against the deep red background of the Shrewsbury Welby wallpaper. Maybe he should call Am, who clearly had the app on his phone, as he’d messaged Despair from the bar. Nick and Ryan didn’t seem like they were much help when their friend was upset, so it was often left to Despair to pick up the pieces when Am came home. He’d never minded; Am was really his only friend.
Yet another message notification, from the other guild officer, BigHairySackrates: [
And that was a reminder why Am was the only human Despair could tolerate. Of course, he didn’t really game or mingle with the humans to find friends. No, if he were going to be idle, he’d conquer others and amuse himself. There were no plans to expand the Gloom Kingdom, and no one interfered with their lands, save the occasional provocation from the Abyss Realm.
The air around Despair electrified, a reconnecting pinwheel appearing on Disco. Whatever it was had caused his internet to disconnect. What was this?
He bent forward, his Black Diamond horns glowing with a dark miasma. The Diamond wanted him. Why? Not now. Not. Now.
“Your Highness!” Bob the butler called from the other side of the door. “Your father wishes to speak with you. It seems…oh, grave news indeed.”
Despair could just imagine him wringing his hands as his brain struggled to remember the necessary message.
“Stop dithering and remember your words,” Despair ordered, closing the Extraterrestrial-Ware laptop.
“It seems…it seems…” Bob was probably doing that thing with his mouth now, where he worked his lips and his cheeks as if he were chewing on something slimy. They really needed a new butler.
“Just please get to your father.”
He pushed back his heavy chair and rose from the polished Wooton desk, the slots full of neat stacks of paperwork. There was nothing he could do to delay this meeting with the king. Such a summons…the last time he’d received one was when his own mother had died, one fate he’d failed to prevent, even with his useless premonitions. Before exiting his suite, he finished the last of the whiskey. He was going to need it.
As he strode to his father’s bed chamber, images of pink, blue, and green lights flashed through his head. He leaned against the polished wooden bannister after stumbling into a jardiniere. This was no premonition; this was a vision from the Black Diamond. It wanted him to see something.
An officer shouted something into a radio. Blue fire flared from inside a pothole, bursting forth from cracks in a sidewalk. A ridiculously large hammer, not completely dissimilar to some of the models in World of Finalcraft Scrolls, sat in the center that pothole, as if hurled by Thor himself.
An Abyss Realm attack on the human plain of the Gloom Realm? This wasn’t like them. But the Gloom Realm had no other enemies, unless Despair had overlooked something.
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