The cart was silent for a few minutes, as if no one knew what to say.
Ophelia was sitting expectantly, with Mathew beside her, staring down at Siyah and Beyah, who were in the wooden seat opposite them.
"Well?" Ophelia finally said. "You mentioned that you two helped your father around the house all these years, did you not?"
"U-uh, yes… ma'am." Siyah got out
"I am not a 'ma'am'. I am of noble birth, and you shall address me as such. Understood?"
"Yes, my lady." She corrected. Then she glanced at her sister. Beyah had her eyes cast downward, refusing to look Ophelia in the eye. Her eyebrows were drawn tight, like she smelled something foul.
Siyah nudged her with her elbow.
"I understand… my lady," Beyah mumbled.
"Excellent. Now that our standings are clear, why don't you tell me all about the skills you possess that qualify you two to be my maidservants."
"Alright… Um… Well, we can cook, clean, wash dishes, make fire…" Siyah started listing things quickly, as if she were trying to think of everything she could in order to please Ophelia.
Mathew found the whole situation strange. Sure, he had told Ophelia she should keep these girls as her ladies-in-waiting, but that was all just nonsense he had spouted in a desperate gamble that she would spare them.
Now that she had actually taken his advice, he no longer knew what to think.
He was still bothered by the events of earlier that night. He had pieced together the events of the bounty hunter situation into a single hypothesis, and had spilled it all to Ophelia so she could take action, but he hadn't expected her to go so far as to kill Theron.
Was he stupid for thinking that? He had watched her do plenty of savage things already, whether by her own hands or through Argus.
This time he had at least saved Siyah and Beyah in the process… But could he allow himself to be satisfied with that?
He came back to reality as Ophelia, next to him, wrapped her knuckles against the wooden shutter of the carriage behind their heads.
"Let us make camp soon." She said to Argus, who was driving the carriage on the other side. He grunted in assent. Then she looked back at the sisters:
"Now that you have agreed to be my maids, let us form a contract."
…..
The carriage had been driven a distance off the road. Argus was stacking sticks that Mathew had collected earlier into a pile and was building them into a fire.
Mathew sat across from him on the other side of the soon-to-be campfire, his attention on the contract ritual that was going on. Siyah and Beyah were standing somewhat warily as they watched Ophelia. She had them recite almost the exact same contract that Mathew had. She used some gold they had taken from the outpost, and as each contract was formed, an amount of gold vanished from existence.
There were a few key differences though:
"Why is she not using the rod?" Mathew said, remembering the artifact she stole from the statue in the Temple of Dread, the one that had forced him to obey her.
"Contracts can be done willingly," said Argus, "In fact, most are. Without that powerful artifact, she would not have the option to ensure the contract she wants."
"But what is allowing her to create the contract then? Is it a different item?" Mathew had been under the preconception that the rod-like artifact had been what had magically bound him to Ophelia.
"Dread, surely you must know of the Covenant. Even children know of the pact created by the Gods."
"Let's pretend I don't know. Maybe I'm just evaluating how much my captors know about this world."
Argus eyed him suspiciously. Fortunately for Mathew, one of the biggest perks of his strange metal face was that he had no expressions. This meant he had the ultimate poker face in situations like this, as long as he kept his tone level.
"The Covenant is one of the oldest recorded divine works of the gods. Think of it as an omnipotent blessing of the Fifth Tier… No, perhaps it is on a higher tier than even that. Regardless, The Covenant was formed centuries ago, when mankind was young, and gods still walked the earth."
"The gods? Like, I could go up and talk to one?"
"Something like that, though I doubt you could look at a god and survive. Merely being in the presence of one could cause a normal human to turn into ash."
"That's pretty scary…"
"Indeed. Back then, the two types of gods, the Elysium gods and the lesser gods, were much closer to men than they are now."
"Elysium? I feel like I've heard of that place before… Sounds like the afterlife, maybe… or heaven?"
Argus chuckled.
"You are not far off. Elysium is the country my lady and I hail from. It is at the center of the world, and the closest place to the heavens."
He sure thought highly of his homeland. Mathew didn't feel that strongly about his own home country.
"I didn't realize that there were two different sets of gods. Very interesting. I'm guessing this 'darkness' that created the Nightspawn is a lesser god then? Are the lesser gods evil?"
"The lesser gods are not necessarily evil. Though they are not as virtuous as the Elysium gods, they are still worshiped by many of the residents of our neighboring nations."
"So gods like Alchemy, right?" Mathew jumped in, testing his understanding.
"Correct. Darkness, however, is something different altogether. It is an ancient evil being, less of a true god and more of a conceptual force. It has existed since even before the war of the gods, though it has been in hiding ever since, leaving only its creations behind."
The so-called creations were most likely the nightspawn creatures of darkness that Mathew had already faced a couple of times.
"And is Enfiri another creation of that evil god?" a third voice interrupted. Mathew and Argus turned to see Siyah and Beyah coming over to join them, now newly contracted. Ophelia seemed to be handling her new horse at the moment.
"No, your heritage comes from a different god," Argus said.
"Will you tell us then? About our heritage I mean… I want to know more about what we are."
Argus nodded in response as he snapped his flint and steel together. It created a few sparks, but the wood chips Argus had set up wouldn't light. After a minute or so, he looked expectantly at Mathew.
"What?" Mathew asked, uncomfortable.
"I was just thinking that it would be most helpful for you to assist with your power of flames." So that's what he meant. Mathew pressed his hand over his cold mouth and exhaled warm breath onto his icy fingers.
"I don't know what to tell you. I still have no idea how I did that in the first place." Argus sighed in response.
"I suppose that is for the best. It would be dangerous for us if you could wield power of that magnitude at will."
"Are my flames really that strong?" Mathew asked. Argus went back to trying to light the wood chips as he responded
"At least Fourth Tier… maybe even…" He trailed off, leaving his thought unspoken. The 5th tier was in the realm of the gods. It dawned on Mathew that if those flames were a result of the Calamity he had swallowed… Then maybe it was a force that had really threatened the world after all. The realization was terrifying.
"What are you two talking about?" Asked Siyah, and Mathew noticed both sisters looking at him.
"My super special magic powers that I don't know how to use," Mathew replied with a sigh of his own.
"Wait, so you have more than just a scary face?" Beyah asked, one eyebrow raised in disbelief.
"Hey…" Mathew started but trailed off when he saw the corners of Siyah's lips turn up at her sister's comment. It was good to see them in relatively better spirits.
Argus finally got the fire to start, and, after giving it some oxygen from his lips, he began to speak again.
"To answer your question, Siyah, the immortal hounds were indeed created by a god, though not necessarily an evil one. She is simply not friendly to humans. Her full name is: Demise the undying, the immortal queen."
"Not friendly to humans?" Siyah asked, "Why not?"
"For whatever reason, she favors magical creatures and the apex predators of nature. Creatures such as wolves, for example. This might be why she decided to give birth to her own race of predators that feasted primarily on humans."
Argus stoked the flames a bit before continuing:
"She accomplished it in a unique way, by tearing off pieces of herself and forming them into the immortal hounds. It is debated whether Hounds should be classified as magical creatures or enhanced humans, though the distinction does not amount to much anyway."
"So that's what we are? some sort of savage predator?" Siyah said, her voice shaking. At the same time, Mathew asked:
"If they are parts of a goddess, does that make them tier five beings? Or tier four?"
Argus decided to answer Mathew's question first:
"The original hounds were indeed beings of the Fourth Tier, terrifying creatures that could live for centuries… But Demise never gave birth again after that first generation. However, for whatever reason, the first generation failed to successfully mate with each other, and decided to attempt to propagate with humans instead. The result was their half-human descendants, which are all Third Tier beings by the same name."
"Like Siyah and Beyah." Mathew resolved. Argus nodded.
"But the races of humanity did not take kindly to these predators. And so, with the support of Elysium, they hunted the Enfiri to extinction. The very last haven for the immortal hounds was a town called Maslow, which was destroyed in the last few decades by my countrymen."
"Maslow? T-thats…" Siyah started.
"The town Damon found you in." Argus finished. "Yes. That must have been why Theron was so convinced you two were Enfiri when he overheard the story."
"So… Our real parents were killed because they were monsters, like us," Beyah said in a low tone, the firelight reflecting off of her eyes as she stared into the flames.
"Yes," Argus said, then he clapped his hands together quickly. "But you also still have the blood of man in you. You are not mindless beasts."
"But what if we can't control ourselves… And we hurt someone?" Siyah asked.
"Well, if you must bite someone, bite Dread over there." Argus asserted with a straight face.
Was that a joke? From Argus? Mathew huffed dramatically in response.
"Perhaps others may disagree, but we are all children of the gods, whether descended from them directly or shepherded by them from the First World. Therefore, I believe we should all be able to find peace as long as we cooperate with each other. In that sense, you are no less human than I am."
"I see…" Siyah said, her eyelids blinking quickly to stop any loose moisture from escaping. Beyah looked at her sister, moving a little closer to her as if to provide additional comfort.
"The First World?" Mathew asked. All three of his companions looked at him with various degrees of shock.
"Yes, over a thousand years ago, the gods brought the first humans to Tellus from another world, which we call the First World…" Siyah said slowly, as if speaking to a child.
"Of course, I was just testing your knowledge," Mathew said quickly. There was a long silence as everyone regarded him, then Siyah asked her next question.
"Master Argus, if Maslow was the last haven for Enfiri, does that mean that we are the last ones alive?"
"There still lives at least one other that I can think of," Argus said, rubbing his chin.
"Who?"
"Adolphine, the Queen of Crimson."