Lillia was screaming. Lillia was alone. Lillia was underdressed.
None of those things should have been possible because, beyond all other truths, Lillia Ashvalin was dead.
It was a funny thing, being dead. Plenty of people had explained the afterlife to Lillia over the years. The Church preached the Land of Wheat and Silk—a blessed second life in the halls of her family’s manor, finest robes and finest feasts, so long as she’d served dutifully as daughter, wife, and mother.
Really, what they preached was that as long as Lillia behaved, she’d get to continue being a princess.
By the sea, they spoke of returning to the living reef. The old barbarians had believed in a celebration of warrior gods. Everyone had their explanations, but the one that had stuck was Lillia’s mother’s.
In quiet moments, she’d confessed she didn’t believe the clergy. She worried they only had one little life—that she wasn’t doing enough with the finite time she had, and that no matter how long Lillia lived, it would never be long enough to understand how much her mother loved her.
Her mother’s thought—the idea of silence—was what had stayed with Lillia when her parents had disappeared. People had told her to celebrate her parents’ ascension to paradise. But outside the realm of promises, they were just gone.
Poets called death cold. The priests called it kind. Her mother called it nothing. Lillia had never figured out what she thought the end would be. Even after her parents vanished, she couldn’t apply the idea to herself. But she was fairly sure death wasn’t supposed to feel this alive.
There was nothing in this space, and yet there she stood. If she were standing, that meant there must have been a floor.
Alongside that thought, the nothing below Lillia solidified into a foggy grey expanse. Like clouds pressed so densely they formed a pathway under her feet.
Lillia thought of those heavy clouds, and the world smelled like rain. She thought of rain, and its cooling touch appeared on her skin. She noticed she had skin, and suddenly she was there. She realized she was screaming and found a mouth so she could stop.
The screaming stopped. What replaced it was not silence. Silence was something. This was the absence of sound, the way a void was the absence of light.
Even in the dungeon’s darkest corners, there had been dripping water, distant scratching, the sound of her own breathing. Here, Lillia had to remember to breathe before she could hear herself do it.
Fingers. Hands. Hair. Breath. It all followed. Lillia’s stream of thought gushed forward and defined her. She was thin. She was too tall for most boys. Her hair was long and neatly brushed. Her eyes felt wide and bright. A scar ran along her shoulder.
Lillia believed the chitterpede should have left more marks, and all at once they were there. Puncture wounds where it bit her.
If everything here was made with thought, then Lillia was two inches shorter, platinum blonde like her cousin, and no longer had those freckles she got from standing in the sun.
Lillia cleared her throat. None of those last ideas happened. So much for fun. Instead, Lillia focused on what she was.
Nothing hurt. That was wrong. Since the moment she’d fallen into the dungeon, something had always hurt. There were blisters, bruised knees, sore shoulders, and aching muscles. All of that was gone. That comfort was almost worse than the pain had been. She didn’t feel like she was in her own skin. She didn’t have her body. She had a body.
Lillia was naked in the soft rain of…
Well, it certainly wasn’t a land of Wheat and Silk. And it certainly hadn’t come with clothes. Whatever death was, it didn’t seem to be a modest endeavour.
The priests had said it. “In the end, all things are laid bare.” Lillia just hadn’t thought it would be so goddamn literal.
Lillia tried to walk and found that she could. Her steps were slow and cautious, but she didn’t know if that was a limitation of circumstance or just how her new body wanted to approach things.
With each step, Lillia’s bare feet clicked against the dense clouds as if she were wearing sharp heels. Of course, they did. That was what her footsteps usually sounded like.
The rain fell at a soft, deliberate pace, cool but not cold. As Lillia walked, she became wet, then soaked. Brown hair stuck to her forehead and clung to her ears as she continued on her path to…
Where was she going?
She was supposed to come back when this happened, wasn’t she? Back to the Hearth. Back to the dungeon.
But if she controlled where she went, was she allowed to just leave?
Lillia stared into the distance. She looked across every horizon. All the nothingness was the same, but in an unexplainable way she understood the difference between them.
Lillia could walk back to the Hearth. She could return to the fight. She could be gross, cold, and dirty again.
Or she could walk away and embrace the quiet.
There wasn’t much here, but maybe it was enough; maybe it was better.
Maybe Sir Nobody had a point. The dungeon would always need new bones with which to light the Hearth.
Lillia clenched her fist. It was good to remember that she could make one.
Maybe if she gave up now, she could head to the land of Wheat and Silk. Maybe her parents were waiting for her there. Maybe she and her dad could laugh about her failed attempt to hunt. Maybe her mother could help her fix her dress.
Lillia had tried. She tried so hard. That was enough. That was enough.
Lillia squeezed her fist tighter. Her nails dug into her palm.
She was just a stupid princess. She wasn’t supposed to be here. Her aunt had been trying to kill her, and her aunt had succeeded. Lillia just hadn’t caught up to reality for a couple of days.
Lillia bit her lip and pulled on the skin.
No.
No, it wasn’t enough.
Lillia didn’t know if it was possible, but she knew she wasn’t done.
The princess, the heiress of House Ashvalin, turned away from the peaceful quiet.
The soft rain became a storm. Wind tore through the space, whipping the cloudy floor into fog. White flashed across the sky.
It wasn’t lightning.
[RETURN TO THE HEARTH?]
Lillia glanced back over her shoulder. The option she was leaving behind had changed. Where there had been dull nothingness, there was now golden light and the shape of soft, rolling fields; the promise of the land of Wheat and Silk.
She closed her eyes. In that darkness, she swore she heard her father’s voice.
A lesser man might have called her over. Begged her to join him in paradise.
Lillia would not believe that of her father. She would not believe her mother would ask her to give up.
The words she finally heard were a medley of both their voices. Something born from the two of them.
“I’m not giving up yet.”
Only after she’d said it did Lillia realize that the medley of her parents was herself.
[RETURN TO THE HEARTH?]
Lillia closed her fist around the word “Hearth.” If this dungeon was going to kill her, it would need to do it more than once. Havoc wouldn’t remember her as a lost story.
Thunder boomed. White crashed around the princess.
Her mother had always worried that everyone had but one little life. This princess had three.
Lillia stepped away from the land between.
She did not wake beside the Hearth.
She did not wake in the dungeon.
She woke in the thin place between sleep and opening her eyes. In the minuscule heartbeat between the conscious and the unconscious.
And before she saw anything, she knew someone was watching her.
Lillia squeezed her eyes tighter, forcing them shut in a way she only could once she was already awake. That was apparently enough.
“It’s been a while since I had a visitor,” the Watcher said. Their voice was deep and smooth, almost charming. It lingered in Lillia’s ears and teased her closer to waking. “Why don’t you introduce yourself?”
Now that someone was talking to her, Lillia became terrifyingly aware that she was still completely naked. The princess shot up and wrapped herself tightly in her arms, covering everything she could. Once she flipped her hair out of her face, she saw who the Watcher was.
The Watcher was a man. Handsome, no, beautiful, clad in intricate dull-silver armour. Platinum hair brushed the edges of dagger-sharp cheekbones. His face was thin and pretty, but his shoulders were too broad for frailty.
At least he was nice to look at.
“Oh, of course. Allow me, Your Highness.” The Watcher snapped his fingers, and the thick violet cloak that had hung off his armour detached itself and flew over to Lillia. It landed softly on her, the clasp stopping short of closing around her neck.
He looked like that, and he was a gentleman?
The embarrassing part was how much better that made Lillia feel.
Still, somewhere in the back of Lillia’s skull, in the part trained by six years of her aunt’s court, something twitched. The cloak had been ready. The gesture had been rehearsed. It was the same choreography she’d watched a hundred men perform for a hundred women at a hundred banquets—the perfectly timed offer that made generosity look like instinct.
Lillia knew the dance. She just didn’t have the energy to refuse a partner.
“That introduction, if you would be so kind,” the Watcher pressed.
Lillia blinked twice at the request as she tried to process it. Her tongue was still heavy in her mouth. She’d just been dead, and he’d referred to her as ‘your highness.’
The Watcher knew she was a princess. Weird. But weird didn’t excuse a lack of manners.
“I am Princess Lillia of House Ashvalin.” Despite her best efforts, Lillia’s speech was staggered and slow. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Who am I to thank for this gift?” She tugged the cloak as she finished, pulling it tighter around herself and tucking her legs fully inside.
“Eisel,” the Watcher said. “If you care to use a name for me, that is the one I prefer.”
Eisel, took a step toward Lillia, but stopped short of a second after she’d flinched at the first.
“Then again, Princess Lillia, I suppose you can refer to me as whatever you want. You are the lady in charge after all.”
“I don’t feel very in charge.”
“I’m sure your…”
Eisel’s eyes caught hers. Something shimmered where the black of his irises should have been.
“Your father,” he continued, smiling as if he had always meant to say it, “must have felt the same way many times while running an entire kingdom.”
“I suppose he would have,” Lillia said. The man wasn’t wrong. Lillia’s mother tended to run things, and her father would lament it vocally while appreciating the work, but…how did he know that?
Lucky guess, Lillia told herself.
She didn’t quite believe it.
Where was here?
Once Lillia thought of that question, Eisel looked around to match her scan of the surrounding void. The man smirked and sat down, floating in the air. The sound of his armour clinking against something stone filled the space.
“There is something here,” Eisel said. “You just can’t see it. Nasty side effect of the whole ‘dead’ situation.”
“But I’m not supposed to be dead,” Lillia said. “I chose to go back to the Hearth. I had a whole emotional moment and everything.”
Eisel laughed. It was cold. Polite. “Not going to take that away from you, Your Highness.” He crossed his legs and leaned forward in the chair. Platinum hair framed him. “Don’t worry. You’re well on your way back. This is just where we meet along the way.”
“And why exactly are we meeting?”
“Because I wanted it. Maybe because you wanted it too.” A grin slid across his lips. His teeth were perfect, more perfect than any Lillia had ever seen. “Like I said, I don’t get many visitors, so I was doubly curious about someone like you.”
“Someone like me?”
“Your Highness, Your Grace, I typically keep the company of warriors, rogues, and sorceresses. Royalty? I never thought I’d see the day. It seems wrong. Nobody of royal blood should be subjected to something like this.”
He motioned to the entire space around them. Whatever room he was in, the void, the dungeon as a whole.
Lillia nodded along. Finally someone who understood.
Eisel ran his fingertips along what Lillia imagined was the arm of his seat—throne? “Now all of us have our part to play in this little dance…”
“Are you the dungeon?”
Eisel chuckled. There was more warmth behind it than the initial laughter. “Heavens no, though I wish. No, just one member of its cast.”
Lillia nodded again, but that answer had been unconvincing and vague. Havoc had mentioned a thinking person within the floors he knew. There was a chance that Eisel was that missing fourth piece.
The same glimmer flashed across Eisel’s eyes. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t clear. Think of me like your hobgoblin friend. A friendly dungeon denizen interested in your progress.”
“And you’re just saying hello.”
“Of course, I wanted to get to know you. You seem like a lovely person to know.”
Lillia hadn’t gotten a clear answer, so she pushed. “If we’re just saying hello? Am I allowed to go back?”
“Oh but of course. You’re allowed to leave at any time, Your Highness. Royalty is in charge. But…” He sweetened the word until it dripped. “I mean, you did meet me here after death. Seems like you might need more help.”
She knew the strategy. Lillia let the word help linger as she climbed to her feet. Eisel watched the entire time. He must have been ensuring the cloak kept Lillia modest, because he kept staring at the clasp not quite around her neck.
“Considering what just happened and your unique circumstance I thought it would only be prudent for me to offer someone like you a deal.”
“A deal?”
A deal, not help.
“Yes, well, you died, Princess Ashvalin. Your Highness. Whatever did you in is still out there and presumably still in your way. You need to get out of here.”
“You said help the first time.”
“Yes. I know.” He waved off the question as he stood. “I work in deals, trades, exchanges. It’s my nature. If I could, I would give you what I have to offer for free.”
“And what are you offering?”
“First, if you recall what you may or may not have read in The Inner Workings of the Hearth, you will come back without your equipment. Your Fire Dress, the Spellmaul, your shoes, and the Thundermite Cap are all under that tree in the Hunting Grounds, waiting to be claimed.”
Lillia’s eyes widened. Eisel continued before she could investigate further.
“Beyond the cloak, which I’m happy to offer for almost nothing, I’m sure I can afford to help you a little more.” Eisel stood and approached. This time, he didn’t stop when Lillia failed to flinch. “More of a steal than a deal, if you ask me.”
Eisel was close now. Lillia had expected perfume from a man such as him, but he was scentless. Empty.
“Think about it,” he said. “I want to believe in you, Lillia. I really do, but even Havoc, with all that training he’s offering…”
He leaned in too close.
“He doesn’t really think you can get out of here, does he?”
“Hey! Havoc’s nice.”
“Nice, yes, but he strikes me as a pragmatic man,” Eisel said. “I think he’d tell me I was wasting my time. But I do believe you can get out of here, Lillia. You just need a little boutique assistance.”
Lillia had come out of death burning. As Eisel circled her, that ember curled inward and began to choke on smoke.
“Lillia, you are royalty. You are in desperate need of help, and I’m offering you a beautiful little discount.”
“What do you want?” she asked.
“It’s not about what I want, Your Highness. Like I said, if I could do it for free, I would do it for free.”
“Well…” Lillia was going to say that it sounded too good to be true, but she was running low on good in any form.
“Here’s the offer: take it or leave it. No offense to me either way. You keep that cloak with the nice gemstone clasp, and I’ll pull a string or two and bump that level beside your name all the way from 3 to 4.”
“You can do that?”
“It’s just one number. What’s there to move? You’re gonna be handling bigger numbers than that once you’re back on the throne, Your Highness.”
“What do you want?”
“Not what I want, Your Highness. What I need. And all I need from you is one small, little token gesture, and well…” Eisel made a big show of considering his options here. He tapped his perfectly manicured nails on his chin. He clicked his tongue. He paced the space in front of Lillia.
Back. Forth. Back.
“Here’s something small enough!” He acted surprised as he said it. “How about you and I agree not to mention this little conversation to anyone else?”
“That’s all?”
“Princess, I told you I was giving you the best discount I could muster. If I were that skeleton man, I would rake you over the coals right now, but, well, I am flesh and blood. I have a heart.”
“All I have to do is not talk about this?”
“That’s it. That’s all, and that is my final offer.”
Eisel seemed nice enough.
Or maybe Lillia just wanted him to be.
Everyone wanted something.
“I get it,” he said. His voice was lower now, smoother, as if it were trying to slip under something in Lillia’s ears. “Why am I offering so much? You’re too used to court. Not one-sided deals.”
Lillia gave Eisel the rope to either tie his argument together or hang himself.
“It’s simple. You’re novel, and your success is my success. Do you think Havoc enjoys being here? Do you think I enjoy being in this dungeon? It’s certainly too cold and dirty for me.”
Preaching to the choir.
“I want to pursue a partnership like that. But I also don’t want to pressure you into it, Lillia. Just some help to show you I can pull my weight.”
Lillia thought of the second before she died. She thought about the glinting talons in the air. She thought about the speed with which something became nothing.
Lillia needed the help.
Right as Lillia reached that revelation, Eisel offered a handshake.
Lillia didn’t remember reaching for his hand. She remembered the contact. His grip was warm, then hot, then something that wasn’t temperature at all. Something pulled taut within her chest, like a thread she hadn’t known was drawn through a needle she couldn’t see. It didn’t hurt.
It felt like agreeing.
Somewhere inside her, the shape of the conversation folded shut. The thought of telling Havoc slipped behind a locked door.
Lillia awoke on the flagstone floor in front of the Hearth, a scream fading from her lips. It was cold. It was gross. It was dirty.
The stone was freezing against Lillia’s bare back. Her front was blessedly covered by a violet cloak she’d never owned. The gemstone clasp sat heavy against her collarbone.
Havoc was sitting near the fire. His gaze drifted to the cloak.
“Damn. Back already?”