POV: Baggage
Baggage had been very strict with Runa after she blew up the lake. Runa assured her that the spell was used only for demolitions and couldn’t hurt people. Baggage had made Runa promise not to do it again.
Her stomach sank, and she cringed. Asking the Mad Sorceress of the Broken Tower to promise anything was silly. But who else could she talk to? Sayaka?
She had heard that sometimes kidnapping victims empathized with their aggressors. It was different in this situation, Runa really was a lighthouse, someone who could help her navigate the hard things, like now.
“Baggage, you know better than anyone else that we’ve been fighting demons since antiquity. You also know we’ve been slowly losing the entire time. How many people are left?”
Neither of them was supposed to know. Facilitators were told anyway before the hero was summoned. It was done to drive home the importance of the last lesson, ‘Circumstances When the Hero May Need to Die’. Negotiating with demons got the death penalty everywhere, heroes were no exception. That's why they told Facilitators the true population, so they would understand the dire importance of the rules.
“I don’t…” Baggage had been about to say she didn’t know. What slipped out was, “I don’t want to lie to you.”
“Good girl, that's why I like you, Baggage-chan. You know how important things are.”
Chan. The suffix usually meant for girls. “Little Baggage”, is what Runa had said. Maybe “adorable Baggage” or “cute Baggage”.
She knew she’d lost all hope of being Baggage-sama, “Esteemed Baggage”. Shouldn’t she at least be Baggage-san? “Respected Baggage”? The informal “Baggage” without any suffix sounded better than “Baggage-chan”.
“Dono” was out of the question. That was for noble warriors and, in these modern days, only the hero. She doubted Drake-dono understood the honor.
Although, what did Runa mean by ‘You know how important things are’? That was an oddly placed and generic compliment. Almost like Runa was looking for an excuse to compliment her. Baggage knitted her brow in thought.
Oh! Runa’s fingers felt wonderful on her back. Muscles warmed under the firm touch and tension released. How many knots had she been carrying in her shoulders? Baggage should know. Eromancers were well trained in massage, what they couldn’t do was use a pinch of fire magic to make their hands nice and warm. Maybe she shouldn’t be enjoying this so much. Maybe even be worried about it?
Runa worked another knot loose. Amazing. No one had done this for her unless it was mandatory. Baggage turned her brain off, just for five minutes. Another knot came loose. Ten minutes. A quick cognitive vacation. Runa couldn’t do anything bad in ten minutes, right?
“Does that feel good, Baggage-chan?” Runa asked.
“Mmmmm.” Baggage purred her agreement.
“You know,” Runa said. “I could get to more of the tension points if you took off that jacket.”
That sounded like a good idea. Baggage reached for her collar.
*thump* *thump* *thump*
Drake was impatient. “Hey, Baggage! What’s the deal with this bridge over the ravine?”
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Runa clicked her tongue and hissed briefly. What was that for?
“Don’t worry, Runa.” Baggage said. “I’m not going anywhere far from you.”
Runa’s frown didn’t budge.
Baggage turned away from the other woman. Maybe more objectivity with Runa was needed? Soon. Right after she found out what Drake wanted.
The air sled was slowing down, the hero jumped off as it was still moving and opened the door for her as it stopped. A small gesture, though deftly done. Baggage smiled and bit her lip as she watched him. A guy doing something, anything cool for her was very rare in her life.
“You never had a boyfriend, did you Baggage-chan?” Runa asked wryly.
“I’ll have you know I went out to tea with two different boys in college.” said Baggage, attempting to sound worldly.
“Very experimental,” agreed Drake-dono dryly. “Quite bohemian.”
He held out his hand for her. She paused.
“What is my name, Drake-dono?”
He smiled.
She didn’t.
He nodded his head. “OK, no helping hand. Unless you’re having a hard time for any reason.”
Her life right now did not seem to qualify as a hard time.
“Agreed,” she said. “Or if we’re in public. I’m not going to let you destroy the reputation of the hero.” She stepped out on her own.
“Is that important to you?” he asked.
Of course it was! Anyone from Tenka could tell by looking at her!
Baggage’s hand went to one of her braids and rolled a bead between her fingers; it calmed her down. She could tell which one it was by the placement, a gold one awarded for her mastery of French.
Her fingers slowly descended, touching each one. Blue, green, and gold representing proficiency, expertise, and mastery. There was also diamond, but those were so hard to get everyone assumed they were fakes. Baggage, of course, had earned one diamond bead for outstanding excellence in English.
“Stop screwing with your jewelry and answer my question,” the man said.
“They aren’t jewelry,” she said. “They’re academic awards.”
“All I asked about was this supposed reputation you claim is important to you and not some kind of academic ‘sacred honor’ you made up to control me.”
Runa said, “It’s true, Drake-san. The tradition is quaint and dying out, but she adheres to it. Thirty-four beads. Years of study to be ready in case you only spoke German or Chinese. Other topics too. Your position is quite important to her.”
Yes.
Eight blue, twelve green, fourteen gold (thirteen if you included the diamond).
Baggage was proud of her beads. Very proud.
He dismissed her, “Bullshit, she’s not old enough to have done all that.”
Baggage rolled her eyes.
“How does this conversation bring us closer to your children, Drake-dono?” Baggage asked.
He snarled and his hands became fists. He didn’t hit her though. Good boy. Would he ever do something like that?
They both stared at each other, jaws set, neither one willing to say anything. The silence was broken by a dull thudding coming from behind her. As if a sociopathic wizard was banging her head on the side of an air sled.
“Now,” said Baggage gradually. “We’ve both said something mean to each other. I’m sure you could keep going. Why not show me what you were interested in? You might want to ask your questions to Runa and Sayaka though. I don’t know much about the geography of my planet. I spent my time studying yours.”
He walked away, presumably she was supposed to follow him. He could have asked.
The bridge was torn up. An impressive destruction, the bridge had been thick stone.
“It’s the Old Sato Bridge”, said Sayaka next to her. Baggage hadn’t noticed the assassin walk up behind her and she jumped.
“I thought we had gotten here quickly for this world,” Drake-dono said. Twenty kilometers per hour wasn’t fast on Earth? She knew about cars and trains, but didn’t know how fast they went and barely knew about planes.
“We did get here fast,” said Sayaka. “Dragons must have destroyed it.”
“That’s bad,” said Runa. “They take a little while to rouse safely. They’re moving fast too.”
“Why would they bother to do it safely?” countered Sayaka.
“Wyverns not dragons,” said Baggage. “Wyverns only have two legs. Look at the claw scratches on the stone. Two legs.”
“They aren’t strong enough,” said Sayaka.
“They don’t have to be. I bet if you look in the ravine, you’ll see dead wyverns. They’re dumb beasts. Attacking first, then flying them into the bridge until it collapses is possible if they are controlled by an intelligent trainer or wizard.”
Sayaka jogged over to the bridge and jumped off. The three humans gasped, squeaked, or yelled. Baggage winced at having been the squeaky one.
Sayaka was hanging by the fingers of one hand and looking down. Then she pulled herself back up easily.
“Yeah, Kai. Baggage was right. A bunch of wyverns are at the bottom. Gold collars. Someone wanted to cut your progress off, very badly.”
Well, now. That was unsettling.
