Chelsea and Ivy followed behind Adriane through a cave. The air was cool and damp. The only sound came from the occasional drip of water somewhere deeper in the darkness.
Adriane pulled out a glowing orb and nodded for them to follow.
The soft light pushed back the darkness just enough for them to see the winding tunnel ahead.
After they had walked for a minute or two, Chelsea spoke up.
“Do you mind if I let Celeste out?”
Adriane glanced back.
“Not at all. As long as you don’t think she will try to hurt Ivy.” Adriane replied, keeping up her pace.
“Oh, here.”
Chelsea slipped off a golden bracelet and handed it to Ivy. “Put this on.”
Ivy accepted it without question. “Who is Celeste?”
“The sick demon girl.” Chelsea explained casually.
“The what?”
“You know… The sick demon princess.”
“Chels, what the hell are you talking about?”
Chelsea laughed.
“So, remember how I told you there's another person living in my head?”
“No. Did I miss something?”
“Right, that's… OK yeah, that’s on me. I forget who I've told things to. Keeping secrets from multiple people gets confusing.”
Ivy sighed.
Chelsea continued. “So, somehow I was summoned into her body. She's still in here.” Chelsea tapped the side of her head. “And, I can let her take control for about one minute at a time.”
Ivy squinted in some sort of vague mix of emotions. “You can what?”
“It's fine… mostly.” Chelsea laughed. “Anyway, I want to let her out more often. She's basically trapped in there all day. It seems rude not to.”
Then she folded her hands together dramatically.
“Please be nice today, Celeste. Pretty please. I really want to let you out more often.”
“Should we be worried?” Ivy asked.
“No,” Adriane answered. “As long as your charisma is high enough she can't make you into a thrall.”
Ivy looked horrified.
Adriane smiled. “Go ahead, Chels.”
Chelsea nodded. Then immediately stumbled forward and fell to her hands and knees. And… Tail? Her tail caught a lot of her fall for her..
“A little warning!” Celeste snapped. She stood back up.
For a moment she simply looked at the other two. Then she smiled. It looked exactly like one of Chelsea's smiles.
“Hello,” Celeste said sweetly. “My name is Chelsea. I like rainbows, pretty flowers, and shoving my tongue down the throat of elves.”
Ivy turned bright red. “Chelsea?” She squeaked.
“It's Celeste,” Adriane said. “Don't take anything she says seriously.”
Celeste laughed.
Then she turned toward Adriane.
“Adriane Wixx.” The smile disappeared. “Still crusading against demons? Is that what this mission is? Off to vanquish the evil no good demon children again?”
Adriane didn't answer.
Celeste activated The Eyes. Chelsea couldn't see what she saw which she found interesting but she could tell Celeste used it because she just stared off into space randomly.
Whatever she saw made Celeste freeze. Then she started laughing. It was a genuinely delighted laugh. “Oh, that's good. That's very good.”
Adriane remained completely expressionless.
“Chelsea,” Celeste continued, “when you take control back, use The Eyes.”
She turned back toward Adriane.
“Or does this mean you'll kill us now?”
Silence.
“Hi, Celeste,” Ivy said. The elf's tone was cautious but polite. “I don't know if you know who I am. I'm Ivy. Chelsea and I are…”
“I know exactly who you are.”
The answer came instantly. Celeste's grin widened.
“Everything Chelsea sees, I see. Everything she hears, I hear.”
Ivy looked uncomfortable.
“Everything she tastes.” Celeste reached out to brush her thumb across Ivy’s lips, “I taste.”
Chelsea abruptly crashed into the cavern floor.
Control returned.
“Oh gods.” She buried her face in her hands. “I am so, so sorry, Adriane.”
Adriane looked completely unsurprised. “It's fine.”
Chelsea climbed back to her feet. “She's awful.”
That earned a small laugh from Ivy.
Adriane folded her arms.
“I'm guessing you want an explanation about my title?”
Chelsea immediately shook her head. “Nope.”
That got a reaction. Adriane furrowed her brows and stared. “Really?”
“Bodarex told me not to use The Eyes on you after a job.”
“He specifically warned you?” Adriane asked.
Chelsea replied with a quick, “Yep.”
“And you're listening to him?”
Chelsea shrugged. “Actually, I'm doing the opposite.”
The confusion on Adriane's face deepened.
“What… does… huh?”
“Telling me not to planted the seed of ‘what if.’ Like what could it be that a god had to warn me about it. He expected me to immediately look.”
“That's... probably true.”
“So instead I'm not going to.” She shrugged.
Adriane stared at her.
“You could very easily find out and I would never know.”
“Sure, I totally could do that.” Chelsea kicked a pebble as they walked.
“You don't want to know?”
“Of course I want to know, Adriane.” Chelsea stopped walking. “Celeste clearly wants to drive a wedge between us. Maybe she's right. Maybe she's wrong. Either way, I'm not falling for it.”
Adriane smiled.
“Not doing it for you. I’m doing it for me.”
Adriane looked at her for several seconds. Then she shook her head and turned around.
“You're too pure for this world, Chelsea.”
Chelsea brightened.
“Aww, thank you.”
Chelsea's smile only grew wider.
Up ahead, Adriane let out a sigh and continued leading them deeper into the cavern.
Behind her, Ivy quietly slipped her hand into Chelsea's.
Chelsea squeezed it once and smiled at Ivy. “Sorry. I know Celeste isn't very nice. I really want to become friends with her though. It's weird having someone watch everything you're doing, including last night, and not try to reach out.”
“I know,” Ivy said, slipping an arm around her shoulders as they followed behind Adriane. “You obviously aren’t her and I much prefer kissing Chelsea.”
She wiggled her eyebrows.
Chelsea laughed. “Pretty sure she was just trying to embarrass me.”
“Did it work?”
“A little.”
“Good.”
Chelsea nudged her with her shoulder.
“Let's give Celeste something to complain about tonight.”
“Chelsea.” Ivy chided.
“What? We don't even have to do anything. Just cuddle aggressively. Really really aggressive cuddles. Maybe with you pinning me d…”
Adriane let out a long suffering sigh from ahead of them.
“This cave is very quiet,” she called back. “I can hear every word you two are saying.”
The two exchanged a look.
Then Chelsea reached up, pulled Ivy down slightly, and kissed her on the cheek.
The flight was longer than their last one together.
Chelsea had expected the new fur on her wings to make flying harder. Instead, it seemed to catch the air better. The currents felt easier to read now. More forgiving. She found herself making fewer corrections as they crossed the sky.
Below them, forests, rivers, and rolling hills passed by in a blur.
Eventually Adriane pointed for them to begin descending toward a mountain range.
The landscape looked like something straight out of a fantasy movie. Jagged peaks stretched across the horizon while an active volcano loomed in the distance, periodically belching smoke into the sky. A strange haze surrounded the mountain Adriane was guiding them toward.
As they dropped lower, Chelsea spotted a stone platform carved into the mountainside.
The three landed together.
Chelsea folded her wings and immediately noticed the claw marks.
They weren't scratches. They were legitimate trenches. Massive grooves carved into solid stone.
“Uh, Adriane?” Chelsea pointed.
“How sure are you that you can fight whatever made those?”
Adriane crouched down and ran her fingers through one of the grooves. “This might be the biggest one I've seen yet.” Adriane stood and looked toward the cave with a stern expression. “I'll be counting on you two for this one.”
That answer was somehow worse.
The three entered the cave. Adriane pulled out the glowing orb again, bathing the tunnel in soft light. The deeper they traveled, the quieter the world became. Then came the growl. It rolled through the cavern like distant thunder.
Chelsea immediately found herself walking a little closer to Adriane.
Beside her, Ivy did exactly the same thing.
“Can't have fear,” Adriane said calmly. “Fear gets people killed. Stand up straight. Walk like you are supposed to be here.”
Chelsea took a slow breath. She wasn't sure she agreed with that. Fear seemed pretty reasonable right now. Still, she straightened her shoulders and forced herself forward. She wasn't some helpless little girl anymore. She was a Valkyr. Or at least she was trying very hard to look like one.
Ivy wasn't faring quite as well. The elf's hands were trembling slightly. Chelsea took her hand. She wrapped a wing around her scared elf. She just wanted to reassure her that everything would be okay.
The growls became louder. The volume of each crescendoed. Eventually they began seeing faint light ahead. A pale bluish-white glow spilled into the tunnel.
The roars had become so powerful that Chelsea could feel them vibrating through her whole body.
Adriane, meanwhile, looked completely unconcerned.
The three emerged from the tunnel.
Chelsea stopped walking.
The chamber was enormous. It wasn't a cave anymore. It was an underground world.
The ceiling disappeared into darkness far overhead. Massive stone pillars stretched from floor to ceiling like the supports of some ancient cathedral.
“How does this even exist?” Chelsea whispered. There had to be a mountain above them. A whole mountain. The roof should have collapsed ages ago.
Adriane pointed upward.
“If you want to see what it is, fly up there and take a look.”
Chelsea immediately wrapped her arms around Ivy. “Chelsea?”
“Trust me.”
Then she jumped.
The two shot upward. For a brief moment, Chelsea was reminded of their first E-rank quest together. Back then Ivy had practically been clinging to her spear for dear life.
Now, neither of them even thought about it.
They simply rose together through the air.
“Can you see it?” Ivy asked.
“Not yet.”
A few seconds later Chelsea banked and turned them around.
Below them was a dragon. No… No no no. Not a dragon. The dragon. The sort of creature had its own cults based around it.
The place where they'd been standing moments ago wasn't even near the center of its body.
It was near its jaw.
Its lower jaw alone had to be thirty feet tall.
The creature stretched across the cavern floor in a straight line. Chelsea couldn't accurately judge the distance, but it looked longer than some ships she'd seen on Earth. Like cruise ship length.
Its scales were a beautiful off-white color that shimmered faintly beneath the cavern's strange glow. The lower jaw and underside were metallic gray. Ivory-colored horns swept back from its head like the crown of some ancient king.
Chelsea immediately fell in love.
“Oh my gods.”
“What?” Ivy whispered.
“It's beautiful. Look at it.”
The dragon shifted slightly in its sleep. The movement alone displaced enough air to ruffle their clothes. The growling wasn't growling at all. It was snoring.