I looked through the peephole, seeing a familiar magenta face.
“Mykie, everything okay?” I asked against the gust of winter air that rustled the paperwork behind me when I pushed open the hefty iron door.
“I just needed to see that you’d returned safely with my own eyes. Rude to not say hi to me when you were at G.P.O. yesterday.” She ducked under my arm and stepped into the crammed room. It was more of a glorified closet, really. All attempts I’d made to keep it tidy were futile, I was sure Stella would change it for the better once I left her the pub.
“For some reason, they didn’t give me roaming privileges,” I laughed, squeezing her into a big hug. I would miss this needling female.
“You and Graysen both decided you’re huggers now, huh?” she groaned, but her arms snaked between mine.
“How are they?”
“She was taken again, but we got her back. They’re living off grid now.” Mykie’s pointed ears twitched backwards, then to the sides. Mixed feelings. Understandably. Graysen and Mykie had been inseparable since they found themselves on the same side of a barfight five years ago. Their duo had been my problem to deal with ever since.
“Where did they take her?”
“Tesilvis.”
“Huh.” Tesilvis was a dense northern forest known for its deadly wildlife. Those beasts made Cyciciah’s look like Nurghle. It was at the very end of my Western Continent exploration list, because it was the one I was least likely to survive. Surprising they managed to build a factory there in the first place.
Mykie wiggled out of my embrace and leaned against the cluttered metal desk behind her. “I got an inside look of the pod room. It’s a lot of goddesses, Theo…” Her expression turned solemn. Pale.
“I take it you guys weren’t able to save them all?”
“Just Faeryn and one of her sisters,” she admitted. “I’d love to convince Arne to lead a raid immediately, but we’d be severely outnumbered. One day though… that facility is going down.”
“One of her sisters?”
“Yeah, she insisted on being let out by the woods. She seemed fairly capable, so who was I to tell her she couldn’t run around Tesilvis’ hellscape if she wanted to?”
“Sure,” I shrugged. Too late to second-guess that decision on Mykie’s behalf.
“I don’t mean to keep you. Like I said, just wanted to see your big head with my own eyes. You know, make sure it’s still on your shoulders and not in the mouth of some unholy beast.” She tapped a knuckle against my skull. “Really glad to see you made it back. Stella is great and all, but she doesn’t even know how to play Doors.”
Do I tell Mykie that I’m leaving?I didn’t have the heart in that moment for the full truth. “Stella will be running things a lot more going forward.” It was a less definite way to put it. There was still plenty of time to reveal the truth. That I was leaving Virylan.
Mykie had already taken her exit. “Then tell her to learn some card games! I’m running low on friends here!” she called over the wind.
“Oh, wait, Mykie!” I shouted, holding the door open. She was a fast walker, already halfway across the plaza. She looked over her shoulder. “Tell Erith to swing by here later today! I need to talk to him about something!”
I got a stilettoed thumbs up as she turned to keep walking, smooth black hair whipping around her lower back.
“Stella, you like the pub, right?” I asked as we looked out at the handful of occupied booths. Slow night.
“Of course I do!” she chimed, tucking a curl from behind her set of large Thornian horns into the red bandana on her head.
“How would you feel about taking it over for me?”
Her eyes widened, thick lashes batting in surprise. “I’m not sure I understand what you mean.” Her rough, rigid talons clicked together uncertainly.
“My most recent hiking trip has me considering living in nature.” An avid outdoorsman cover was the best way to explain my eccentricities to somebody who didn’t know the first thing about the horrible socio-political situation. “I’m thinking about passing the pub on, and you’ve always done well by it.”
“Are you sure I’m best? I don’t even know what—”
“Hold that thought,” I said, spotting the green scales of an Arielna passing the front windows. “Can you handle things without me for a bit?”
“You know I can,” she chirped, still sounding completely thrown off.
“Hi, Erith,” I greeted as he stepped inside the bar. We’d met a few times when I hung out with Mykie, but it’d been a while since I participated in that social scene, and he was the newest member. “Let’s chat in the back.”
