Wish upon the Stars

I did NOT ask why the woman who picked us up was blue. It was tough. I  was pretty sure she was some kind of elf, and I REALLY wanted to know  more about her. Luckily, despite my politeness, I did get those answers,  because Celine was kind enough to bring it up. "I find it astonishing  to meet one of my water touched cousins." Said our diplomat, sweeping  back her hair on one side. "Are you a Naiad?"

The blue  woman, who was apparently a Naiad, smiled. "I am. At least on my  mother's side. Our people are rare here, my father became quite  entranced with my mother and decided to take her to his bed." She smiled  bitterly. "Sadly, my siblings are far less enthused about my heritage,  as none of them share it."

Celine winced. "Ah, I presume your line is...expansive?" Her voice sounded sympathetic. More so than I'd heard it before.

"Of  course." The Naiad smiled, her voice dripping false sweetness. "Father  has to find an heir worthy of the crown. An inborn racial trait is quite  a coup, though sadly my gifts don't lie toward combat. Are you a wood  elf? I've never seen one before."

I was intrigued. I knew  Celine was an elf, but I didn't know there were subspecies of elf. I  also didn't know you could be born with a racial trait, though given  Celine was from a family of elves, I probably should have guessed that. I  wondered how that worked, since the racial trait took the spot of an  ability. It was something to ask around about later, just out of  curiosity.

Sadly, now wasn't the time. Celine was our  diplomat, but I was in charge now. Which meant I needed to at least make  an effort to improve our position, especially since it was my fault we  were in it. I wasn't entirely sure I'd made the wrong call making  contact, granted, but still. "The crown?" I interrupted as politely as I  could. "So you're a princess of this kingdom?"

She smiled  at me widely, and I learned that Naiads apparently have razor sharp  rows of small jagged teeth. "I am. Anna-Maria Deville. Fifteenth  princess of the kingdom of Ladrigan. Daughter of Salara Vorenas, whom  her loyal subjects have termed 'the fishwife' behind her back." Her tone  had a bite to it, and I got the impression that she didn't care for her  'loyal subjects' overly much.

"They sound like dicks."  Said Benny matter of factly. Celine sighed, pinching her nose, but  Anna-Marie burst out into giggles. My best friend just shrugged. "What?  Racist peasant farmers aren't exactly top of my 'to hang with' list. I'm  just saying."

Anna-Marie's smile at Benny was much  warmer, despite showing nearly as much teeth. "That is nice to know. I  too find them objectionable company." My best friend preened a bit, but  was treated to a merciless pinch from his girlfriend and jerked back  with a yelp.

Celine kept a calm and pleasant expression on  her face, but her eyes locked on Benny for a minute, and he crossed his  arms, hunching down in annoyance to entertain himself without talking. I  didn't think Celine was jealous or anything, more that Benny was NOT a  diplomat, and while I had seniority to give me an excuse to talk, he was  just saying random shit and messing up her dialogue.

Still,  her face was sympathetic when she turned back to the princess. "It  sounds like you are having quite a difficult time. Might I be so bold as  to ask how we might aid you with that? You seem to have some use for  us."

"To be frank." Said the Naiad princess. "We all do.  The awakening happens very rarely, the last one wasn't even in my  lifetime. My father was able to procure some of the god Dew from a prior awakening, and it was the support of that power the enabled him to  claim the throne of Ladrigan. Should one of us acquire the treasure, our  chances of securing the crown when he passes will be nearly assured."

I  still didn't get it. "So...just go look for it? I was told that it  exists here all the time, I'm sure you guys have plenty of opportunities  to find it."

She shook her head. "The Dew requires energy  from the moons." She pointed out the window up at the MASSIVE silver  sphere hanging in the still daylit sky. The moons can only be seen  during the awakenings. The amount of the material increases  exponentially during awakenings, but sadly, natives do not seem drawn to  this substance as the outsiders are. Therefore, whenever outsiders  arrive, the royals all scramble to recruit as many as possible."

"This  is some kind of...inheritance test?" I was obviously familiar with the  concept. "But why doesn't the king just gather the Dew for himself.  Actually, will we even get any? He could just take all of ours away."

Her  eyes went wide as she shook her head, aqua hair bouncing furiously. "Oh  no. We would never do such a thing. There have been dynasties in the  past who tried such tactics. They flourished for a few centuries, but  upon the next awakening terrifying outsiders fell upon them in droves to  exact retribution. As for my father, god Dew becomes less effective the  more you use it. He's ingested several drops already and has reached  his limit."

That made sense, couldn't have the locals  killing people from major factions. The limit made sense too, otherwise  everyone powerful here would just grind right up to the edge of E-rank  and stay there. "Ok." I said firmly. "You want to use us as your...what?  Champions? To find Dew?" I wasn't sure why they couldn't find it  themselves, maybe something about being around the stuff their whole  lives made their fate sense ignore it?

"Yes." Said with  relief. "Other outsiders will no doubt be courted by my siblings. Though  some will attempt other methods for finding the Dew. As you saw  earlier, not all of the natives are enthused about outsider visits.  Drakov, for instance, had two reasons to act as he did. First is  prejudice, which I tend to shy away from for obvious reasons, and second  is because while he is nominally a castle guard he owes allegiance to  my brother Mulciber."

I winced, happy I had my mask on. I  really didn't like politics, and while I was up to being in charge, this  sounded like it would be a lot of that. I looked at Celine, giving her a  nod so she'd know she could take over from here. My elven companion  folded her hands in a businesslike manner and gave a practiced smile.  "Well, that certainly sounds like a tricky situation. So what exactly  can you offer us to side with you?"

Anna-Marie chuckled.  "I suppose it was foolish to hope it would be that easy. Honestly, I  don't have much to offer other than the same things my siblings could.  Protection from our citizens, supplies where needed, my own support as  well as those of my guards and other allies. I'm hardly the favorite for  the throne, and my retainers aren't exactly numerous." She sounded  depressed just talking about it, and I could see why.

Callie  reached out and grabbed my hand, squeezing it and looking at me  beseechingly. My girl had a heroic streak, and poor Anna-Marie was in a  bad spot. Honestly I wasn't against the idea. We had no real reason to  accept teaming up with anyone, but if we had to go with somebody, a  person who had helped us out and who seemed like she would have our  backs if needed (out of necessity if nothing else) wasn't the worst  option.

This might be a bit premature, but I knew that  sometimes, doing something subpar was better than waiting fruitlessly  for a perfect option. It was unlikely any of the royals would be perfect  allies, so we might as well go with the devil we knew. "Alright." I  said, surprising her and Celine both. "We'll help you." The others all  looked surprised, except Callie who beamed at me with such approval and  pride I actually blushed.

It was strange to see a pair of  eyes that were just blue metallic orbs 'shine', but they did. She look  ecstatic as she literally cheered. "That's amazing! Thank you so much, I  promise I won't let you regret this. I'll do everything I can to  support your group!"

Smiling, I nodded at her kindly. I  believed she would though I still had my own means of gathering support  and materials. My wishes were a perfect method for that. "That sounds  good, because I am absolutely exhausted. It's been a long night for us  and we could use somewhere to rest." The party had been later in the  day, and combined with the adrenaline of bolting for a magician, the  ride here, and the rest of the day's activities this had been one of the  longest I'd ever had, and that was saying something.

My  thoughts were cut off, however, as I felt a lurch in the carriage.  Looking out the window I saw that we'd come to a stop. The massive box  of dark shining wood had been even larger on the inside, a large,  comfortable sitting room lined with bench seats that had comfortably fit  all ten of us, the princess, and even the wolves. Sadly Jessie and  Randall had to ride outside, because even bigger on the inside Ascendant  shit wasn't built for giant bears.

Luckily  this carriage was pulled by horses, horses who were ALSO F-rank like  Randall, and not nearly as high into it as he was, so the bear didn't  have trouble keeping up. Sometimes it was easy to forget how fast and  strong F-rankers could be, even being one myself. Animals like horses or  bears who were naturally predisposed to physical power tended to accrue  lots of Might, and that high stat made crossing long distances a matter  of minutes rather than hours.

I  assumed this planet was relatively big, given that the gravity seemed  similar to what I'd felt in the bazaar (granted there wasn't the  pressure from Impact, but still, the gravity here felt heavier than on  Callus). So we must have covered a ton of ground for the trip to take  fifteen to twenty minutes. I tensed up, making sure that I was prepared  for all of what was to come. We could run into other teams at any  minute, and that was without the whole 'locals hate you sometimes'  thing.

Climbing  out of the carriage, I was taken aback by the newest building we saw,  an absolutely monumental castle...kind of. I turned to the princess.  "Did you guys...carve this out of a mountain?" It was hard to describe,  but it looked like the castle was all one piece of dark stone, from the  towers and parapets to the tall imposing base of the building. It was  BIG obviously, given it was made out of a mountain, and I was betting a  whole city worth of people could live here. Not a small city either.  Especially given the almost inevitable larger internal space.

Anna-Marie  beamed at me happily. "We did. My great grandfather was an  earth-singer. He found this mountain in his travels and discovered it to  be some of the toughest F-rank material in the kingdom, and so decided  to found our dynasty here. It is the Ladrigan seat of power. Blackrock  Spires."

Despite  not being a fan of her people, she seemed enthused and excited about  kingdom history. Clearly she loved some parts of her homeland. I also  noted she'd said F-rank, so language wasn't the only thing we could find  in common. Despite some of them speaking something different, it was  clear higher ranking people spoke the same tongue as us, and they had  similar methods of defining power. Anna-Marie's smile dimmed slightly,  and her eyes became a bit cautious. "Now, I'll be happy to get you rooms  to rest in, but first, we must make a stop. All outsiders must meet the  king. We need to go see my father."