“Hmph!” Fly angrily put down the game-board piece, defiantly sitting back after she did as her feathers puffed up a bit. She looked utterly furious, but had a huge grin on her face.

She was losing, but seemed to be enjoying the challenge.

And a challenge it was…

“You’re a very bold player, Fly… always attacking head on and purely,” Seed said as she moved her own piece to counter Fly’s attack. She did so with grace, but not in a competitive or audacious way. She was not insulting Fly with her mannerisms, but instead calmly evening them out. As if she wanted to teach Fly, but only from a distance.

“Sneak attacks are mean,” Fly said as she went to move another of her pieces. This time she took one of Seed’s pawns, and did with a happy noise. I watched her put the piece daintily along the others she’s taken so far, near the edge of her table… and she happily grinned at them all lined up as if they were mighty trophies.

“Quite a statement. Many scholars of war would outright disagree,” Seed said as she returned the favor and took the piece that Fly just used.

Fly groaned as she watched her proud knight get put into his own graveyard. It was a bit more alone than Fly’s, but…

Studying the remaining pieces, and their placements… it was obvious what was about to happen. In the next three, maybe four, turns… Fly would lose. Seed had several lines of direct attacks, and it didn’t seem Fly had any real method to defend against any of them at the moment.

Just like the last few games, Fly would lose. Though… that wasn’t because Fly was a bad player. She was, just as Seed said, very honest in her play style. So honest that it was a detriment.

Which was a tad surprising… since I had figured Fly to be the type to do anything and everything necessary to win.

I could see how someone would argue that Fly, someone who had grown up in one of the worst conditions imaginable in those sewers beneath Lumen… would be very willing to do what most would not. Especially when one considered how she had survived in those sewers. She had cheated, stolen, and possibly even killed…

Yet here she was… acting like a prim and proper knight of justice, at least on the game board.

Smiling happily, I gently glanced at Seed.

She was the youngest daughter, or had been until Root and Fly, but didn’t look it. She had the same tall and slender appearance as the others in this family, but…

Seed was older. Or at least, looked it. Sap and Crown, and even Lilly… looked like young women. They looked a tad older than I, but not by much. Seed however…

Her non-human blood was obviously thinner. Maybe even the thinnest of all the children. She looked mid-age. Some of her hair was even starting to gray and lighten in color, and the rest of her appearance such as her skin just had a tad more of a weathered look than the others. And it wasn’t from stress, or illness, like Crown. She just… looked older. If you lined all the women up in this family and asked any stranger who was the oldest amongst them, there was no doubt anyone and everyone would pick Seed to be so.

I knew she was not so thin in the blood that I should worry over her passing anytime soon… since supposedly she was at least a century old if not more, but…

“Rennalee…?”

I perked up and glanced away from the game board, as Fly made another bold and direct move… and I studied the nearby door and the hallway it led to.

Someone had just called for me. But who had that been…?

Slowly standing, I quietly stepped away as Seed went to start the process of victory. Fly must have noticed with that move, for she let out a loud groan of shock. I giggled as I left the room and glanced up and down the hallway.

I was on one of the upper floors, and I had felt whoever had said my name had been up here too… but which way? Both ways down this hallway led to large open rooms, ones with windows that overlooked the open fields around us…

“Renn.”

Ah. There. I smiled as I stepped forward, heading for the one calling for me… but as I did I slowed a bit as I realized something odd.

Who was that?

Narrowing my eyes, I shifted my ears as I slowly headed down the hallway. My heart felt oddly heavy as a thousand thoughts filled my head.

I didn’t recognize that voice. At all. It wasn’t the voice of anyone here… I’d been here for a couple days now and knew them all well. Plus… I couldn’t think of the voice off the top of my head for being anyone else’s I recognized. For a tiny moment I thought of all the people I knew and had recently talked to, as to put a face and name to the voice, but…

Reaching the end of the hallway, I peered into a large room and relaxed a little as I found Crown. The sickly looking owl was sitting at a table, near one of those large circular windows and a door that led to the balcony.

But my relaxing reversed, and I grew uncomfortable as I realized Crown had not been calling for me.

“Crown…?” I slowly glanced around the room, looking for whoever had actually called for me. Crown was reading a book, and had been very focused in it. She glanced up and frowned at me, in a way that told me she had not been the one to call for me.

Yet…

Entering the room carefully, I took a moment to take a few deep breaths. If I couldn’t hear or see them, maybe I could smell them?

“Renn? Is something wrong?” Crown asked quietly as she watched me enter the room.

Yes, but did I say so aloud?

There was no one else in the room. There were a few couches and chairs, the table Crown sat at… some shelves of books and other things, and even a few paintings but nothing else. This room did though lead to another, since the whole building was built in circles basically every room always led to another and then another. Endlessly circling. So…

Walking across the room, I tried to keep my calm as I went into the next room. This one was much smaller and housed a stairwell, and led to another hallway that would round back to the other side of the house I’d just come from.

Staring down the stairwell, I frowned as I wondered if the voice had come from there, or the hallway nearby.

“Renn…? What’re you doing?” Crown asked as she stood away from the table.

“Did… did you just call for me?” I asked carefully.

The malnourished woman gave me a look. “No…? I’ve been reading.”

“Right…” I whispered, unsure of myself.

Had I misheard…? Or maybe someone down below had said my name? Maybe I had overheard someone else, someone several floors down, talking about me… and had just not been focusing enough to realize it.

“You okay? Did you hear something?” Crown asked as she walked over to stand next to me. She was frowning as she warily glanced down the stairwell, as if also expecting to find something odd.

As she did, and I began to worry a bit more… I heard a muffled sound. One that was instantly recognizable, since I was now focused on such things.

Voices. From below. Though I couldn’t hear the words themselves, I heard enough to know it was someone talking. Likely a couple floors down.

“I… think I might have just heard someone else talking down below, and misheard it,” I said honestly as I calmed down.

Was my hearing getting better again…? Or was I just sometimes noticing what I shouldn’t?

“Ah… well you do have nice ears,” Crown said with a small smile.

“Do you think they’re cute?” I asked innocently as I reached up to cup them.

The woman, who had when I first arrived, not even cracked a smile or showed any emotions at all gave me a huge smile as she laughed. “The cutest!”

Happily watching, and listening to her laugh, I relaxed even more as she even grabbed at her stomach. “Vim thinks they are too, he always wants to touch them and stuff,” I said, hoping to keep her both happy and active.

She really was getting better! She was reading a book, talking and walking… laughing even! Lilly would be so happy if she heard and saw this!

Crown’s laughter came to a stop as she tilted her head at me. “Does he pet you or something?” she asked with a grin, telling me she was trying to tease me a little.

I accepted in stride as I sighed and shrugged. “He wants to, sometimes, I think. But he doesn’t,” I said. Regretfully.

“Oh…? Do you not let him touch your ears then? I’ve heard some of us don’t like it, while others do. Mom used to say she hated it when people touched her wings, but then Sap says she doesn’t mind at all. Always figured it was a personal thing more than not,” Crown said.

Huh… “I don’t mind people touching them. Vim though… he’s odd. He doesn’t like showing affection so physically, I think,” I said.

“Ah, right… Wait, really? I’ve heard you two tease and flirt as if there’s no tomorrow?”

“We do…” I groaned.

“Heh, so in other words he just does it when you’re all alone then.”

Gosh! No! But what do I say? How would I explain to her why Vim would so willingly flirt and stuff, yet not once has ever actually on his own reached out to touch me like that!?

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

I groaned for a moment as I squirmed and reached over to grab at my tail. I now felt like I should be the one mopping around and being weird.

It was all Vim’s fault… other than that small peck of the lips on his return, he’s not done anything since! Where did all that passion from Lumen go!? I had been so… expectant and…

“Renn?” Crown asked calmly, obviously seeing my obvious discomfort.

“I’m just upset. Don’t mind me,” I said honestly.

“Is it… something I said? I’m sorry.”

“Huh? No. It’s Vim. He’s not been very affectionate lately, and you just reminded me of it. He’s just a jerk sometimes and,” I started to tell her what was bothering me, but then heard something else.

Turning my head, I looked back to the room that Crown had just been reading her book in. It was… still empty. The book on the table, opened. The hallway and rooms beyond it, seemingly quiet…

“Renn…? What is it now?” Crown asked softly as she stepped towards me, as if to hide behind me in case there was danger.

“I just… heard something odd…” I said as I stepped forward. What had that been? That time I had not heard a voice, or my name, but… the sound of grass in the wind maybe? But it was distant. And… there wasn’t any wind at the moment, I had thought.

Stepping over to the large window, I frowned as I looked out at the field. The large tree, the one this whole area was growing around, was only in the corner of view since we were facing a bit away from it. Because of that we could see out into the large open field, but only part of it… and…

“Uh oh…” I whispered as I watched something huge walk out of the black wall of darkness and into the lit up field of grass.

“Uh oh? I don’t like the sound of…” Crown hurried over, and went quiet as she too watched what I did.

The huge creature walking out of the darkness was unmistakable. And not just because it had once chased and nearly killed me.

“The dark bear…” Crown whispered.

The huge, six-legged, bear slowly sauntered into the field of lit up grass. As it did, I was a tad shocked to see how it still looked… dark. As if it was still covered by shadows, it looked… like a giant black spot amongst the bright green grass around it. Other than the thing’s outline, it wasn’t easy to see much else.

A part of its ability maybe…?

“Does it uh…?” I pointed at the thing through the window, wondering if maybe this was something that just happened occasionally. As far as I was aware, it didn’t. Lilly had once said that the bear never came here, since it feared Vim’s scent.

“No. Never,” Crown said sharply.

Great.

“Mother!” a deep voice shouted beneath us, and I recognized Lellip’s mate’s voice. Branches alerted the whole parliament, and I hurried to the nearby stairwell and ran down it.

I only had to go down two floors, and I found the rest of them. Lilly and her family were standing before a similar large window that Crown and I had just been gazing out of.

Branches and Lellip glanced at me as I stepped over to them, and I worriedly glanced over their shoulders and out the window. The bear was still out there… just slowly walking towards the tree, it looked like.

“What’s it doing…?” Trunk asked.

“Has it ever come this close?” Bark asked worriedly.

“I’ve never even seen it before,” Seed said as she walked into the room from the other entrance, Fly in tow. The young bird hurriedly squeezed between people to step up to the window, nearly planting her face on it as she stared out of it too.

I glanced around, realizing everyone was here… except Root.

“Where’s Root?” I asked.

“In her bed, sleeping…” Windle answered, rather quietly, as he kept his eyes on the bear.

Hm…

“What should we do, mother?” Branches asked. I glanced at the lad, and smiled softly at the look on his face.

He was ready. That was the look of a man willing, and able, to go into battle. It looked good on him, almost as good as that weird smirk he wore when he and Lellip were flirting alone.

Was that just his natural self, or was he now even more willing to protect his family and home… because of Lellip, I wonder?

“Renn… you brought his spear, right?” Lilly then asked softly.

“Huh…? Yes…” I nodded, though Lilly hadn’t been looking at me. She, like Windle, couldn’t take her eyes off the bear.

Vim had made me bring it. Just as he always told me to keep it on me, though right now it was up in my room…

“Spear?” Branches whispered to Lellip.

“Vim’s,” Lellip whispered back.

The rest of the owl children all glanced at me, and I tried not to notice the mixed looks upon their faces. Some were now looking at me with just as much fear as they had just been giving the bear.

“Arms. Meet me outside,” Lilly then ordered, and before I even realized what she was saying… people went into motion.

I panicked for half a moment as I felt suddenly out of place when it was only I, Fly, and Crown left in the room. Everyone else had hurried away… even Lellip, who should have been just as startled as me.

“Um… you’ll need to get your spear, Renn,” Crown said softly.

Ah. Shoot. Right. I groaned as I too hurried away, and I ran back upstairs to get it.

I wasted no time. I grabbed Vim’s spear and hurried back downstairs, to the main level, and I found myself to be the last to arrive. Lilly, Branches, Sap and even Windle were out on the front porch of the house… and all but Windle had weapons.

The silver look of spears, swords and even a large axe in Branches hand told me that they were like the stuff Vim made before. Steel. Deadly. Sharp. Branches was even tightening a leather bracer on his arm as I stepped over to Lilly.

“Are we…” I started to ask as I looked out into the field. Far off in the distance was the bear… its dark and shadowy figure was a bit ominous, though it didn’t look like it was doing anything. Was it sitting down? It didn’t seem to be even walking anymore.

“Should we really kill it, mother?” Branches asked.

Lilly gripped her own spear a bit harder. “I’m… not sure. Half the reason our home is so secure is because of that thing,” she said.

Oh? “Is it even doing anything? It looks like it’s just sitting there,” I said.

“It won’t take it long to notice us. And we can’t have it attack the house,” Windle warned.

“Yes. We must keep it from the house, no matter what,” Lilly agreed.

Right… not only was Root and Fly in there, the rest of the parliament were similarly fragile beings.

Holding Vim’s spear, I wondered what to say. Vim had warned me that the world was becoming weird again… was this a sign of it? Or was this just…?

“Take the others to the cellar. The stones should keep your scents form being found,” Lilly then said to Windle.

I frowned as I watched the tall man nod rather gravely and then step back into the house. He shut the door behind him, and I heard the heavy latch of a lock they had click into place.

Cellar… maybe the underground rooms we had gotten that box of toys from? I had noticed odd bricks but hadn’t noticed anything odd about the smells down there.

“Sap,” Lilly then turned to her daughter, who nodded and stepped forward. Without a word Sap took to the skies, flapping without a noise as she ascended quickly above the house… and then flew over towards the bear’s location.

“Renn, I might have Sap pester it with your spear if that’s okay,” Lilly then said to me.

“Hm? Sure…” I nodded quickly, not willing to argue. I’d of course not hesitate to do it myself, if needed, but Lilly was right. The bear, though big and dangerous, had no wings. Sap would be able to do a lot of harm to it from the skies, especially with Vim’s spear.

It didn’t take long for Sap to return. She landed a few feet away, her wings folding up as she frowned and stepped over to us. “It’s… just lying down. It almost looks as if it’s sleeping,” she said.

Sleeping…?

I glanced out at the thing, and I could see how it looked like that. It hadn’t moved from the spot it was in since I’d left the window to get the spear.

“Maybe it’s hurt?” I wondered. The group glanced at me, and I felt a bit awkward since they all were looking at me as if I’d just said something weird. “What…? If I was hurt, lying down in a place that’s safe and warm is where I’d go,” I said. Even if it was just a simple bear, it still had such instincts. Any creature did.

“I mean… it’s possible…?” Branches whispered.

“But then who or what hurt it?” Sap asked.

“Did it look hurt?” Lilly asked.

Sap shook her head, and her wings shuffled as she did. “I didn’t see anything like wounds or blood… but I mean, it’s hard to tell,” she said.

“Is it as dark up close as it is from here?” I asked.

Sap nodded.

Huh. One of its abilities then…

“Is it a monarch?” I asked.

They all glanced at me, but Lilly was the one who answered. “No. It’s the child of one. It has no heart,” she said.

Right… Vim had said the same once, but I just wanted to make sure…

“Let me get a better look at it…” Lilly said as she stepped forward.

Quickly her children went to join her, so I hurried to do so as well. I walked behind them though, as we quietly left the house area and headed closer to the bear. It didn’t take too long to get close, and we all remained quiet as Lilly eventually came to a stop and studied the thing.

The bear was bigger up close, and was indeed lying down. It had curled up a bit, so its head and face was somewhat hidden… but it did indeed look and sound as if it was sleeping. Its heavy, deep breaths, were loud. The kind of loud that I knew I’d now be able to hear from a far distance, such as from the house, since I now recognized the sound so well.

“Mother…?” Branches spoke ever so softly, and Lilly raised a hand to hush him. He went still at it, and we all watched the bear for a moment to see if it’d respond in any way to his voice.

It didn’t. It just kept… slumbering?

Maybe it really was just sleeping…?

Lilly then turned around and nodded. I hesitated a moment as she and her children stepped away, heading back to the home… but eventually joined them.

I didn’t feel any weird tingling from the bear, but we had not gotten close enough for me to have felt anything even if it did cause the same sensations others with divinity did. Liora I could feel from a short distance, but the minute I left the building she was in or got farther than that I stopped feeling her. So I assumed the bear would be the same, if it did have a heart or something like it…

Sap too. I only tingled when she touched me, or I her.

Once we got back near the house, we didn’t go back in. we all stopped a bit before the porch… and Lilly went quiet as she went into thought.

I glanced at Branches and Sap, who glanced at me in return… and I could tell they also weren’t sure what was going on or what we were to do.

“I…”

Lilly turned to look at us, and I stood up a bit straighter as the owl eventually met my eyes… and I found that they looked lost.

“I don’t know what to do,” she softly admitted.

“If it attacks the home, people will die,” Branches said stiffly.

“But it’s just lying there,” I said.

“I didn’t even know it could come into our home. It’s never done that before,” Sap said.

Lilly nodded. “It hasn’t. Not once. Ever. Nor had its mother, as far as I’m aware.”

“Mother?” I asked.

“The things parent had been a real monarch. A dangerous one. It’s why the forest around us is all dark, it had stolen the light… as Vim explained it,” Lilly said.

“Maybe we should summon Vim? Sap can go get him real quick,” I said. It had only taken her half a day to fly me here, and that was with us making stops and stuff for rest and to stay safe. I bet she could get there in only a few hours if she really tried.

Lilly slowly nodded. “Yes… he had warned me that oddities will begin to occur…” she said softly.

I shifted as Branches and Sap glanced at me, and I nodded. “He… had said that, yes.”

Lilly sighed. “Let’s summon Vim… but not Sap. If it gets up and starts attacking, we’ll need her.”

Oh…? I got the reasoning, I suppose. In reality right now the only people who had any chance to face that thing were us, and Sap with her wings made her very valuable in that perspective. “Then who…?” I asked. Was she implying I go get him? I mean, I could, but…

“Let’s send Windle,” Lilly decided as she turned and headed back into the house.

Watching her go, I sighed as I turned to look at the bear. It was still just… sitting there.

“Open up!” Lilly banged on the front door, and I smiled softly at her as she did. Did she forget she had told Windle to take the rest of the family into the basement…?

“I’ll open it, mother,” Sap said as she flew upward. I watched her fly to one of the balconies on the third floor, and she disappeared as she entered the home from up there.

Branches sighed softly as he tapped his axe against his boot. “If that thing scares off Lellip, I’ll make it into a rug,” he said.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep