Characters: Malkav, Adam, Lucilla, Cara
“Come on, just let us speak to the Queen for a second!” Malkav whined.
“I’m growing tired of this,” Lucilla said, glaring down at the two Men who had been trying to coerce her into moving from the doorway for over five minutes. “You’re lucky I don’t stomp you both flat, but I just hand-washed my boots this morning. I have no problem turning you into shish kabob, though, if you keep loitering around here. Get my drift?” She tapped the hilt of her sword and looked forward again.
Malkav and Adam stared at each other.
“I can’t believe this,” Malkav said. “I have as much bad luck in this fantasy world as I do back home.”
“Stop being so emo about it,” Adam sighed. “What did you expect? You actually thought the Queen would give us the time of day?”
“Me!? This was your brilliant idea! ‘Let’s talk to the Queen,’ you said. ‘She’ll help us,’ you said. ‘She’ll answer all our prayers and send us back home with cute bobble-head souvenirs shaped like Leonard Nimoy to boot,’ you said.”
“I never said she’d give us bobble-heads.”
“Well, what the hell do we do now, smart guy? You want to duel this bitch? I’ll wrestle one of her toes and you can take another and maybe we can take down one or two before she crushes us both.”
“I can hear you,” Lucilla said, slightly annoyed. “Would you move along already? The Queen has no time to speak to peasants.”
“Peasants!?” Malkav snapped. “Bitch, you have no clue how bad of a week I’ve had. I didn’t even want to play this game, but I got sucked into it by a girl who will never love me again. I’m the size of a freakin’ bug, I’ve been told I have to do the impossible to save a kingdom that doesn’t even exist, I’ve been stepped on countless times, attacked by a giant turtle with a really bad sense of humor, betrayed by those who I thought were looking out for me, and now you’re standing in front of my only means of escaping this hell! So would you please take that stick up your ass and move both of them somewhere else because I am not standing here for another moment!”
“You’re right,” Lucilla said, raising her leg over the two Men. “Get ready to cry out for a Cleric.”
Adam panicked and flailed his arms. “No, wait! M-Miss Paladin, we’re not trying to cause trouble. We’ve come to warn the Queen of a possible attack.”
“Oh?” Lucilla’s foot remained hovering.
“Y-yes. There is a Necromancer by the name of Gena who might try to—”
Lucilla’s foot slammed down, shaking the whole earth, but she didn’t step on either of the Men. “The Necromancer…” She looked down. “What do you know about this Gena?”
The confidence flowed back through Adam’s body, as well as two armpits full of sweat from seeing Lucilla’s boot crash down so close to his face. He dabbed his brow with the sleeve of his robe and tried to explain. “Not a lot, but enough to tell you that she spreads trouble in her wake. No doubt she’s in this for power and she’ll try to take that from the Queen.”
“Fortunately the real Queen on leave right now,” Lucilla said flatly. “Her daughter, Isabella, is residing in her place.”
“Has Gena made contact with Isabella yet?”
“Yes. That wretch showed up yesterday and made friends with Isabella. I tried to stop her because I know what kind of trickery those Forsaken scum are capable are, but Isabella is not…the easiest person to convince.”
“Gena must have convinced her of something.”
“Indeed…”
“Well, you did the right thing in trying to stop her, Miss Paladin.”
“It’s Lady Lucilla. I’m the general of the Paladins and first in command of protecting Her Highness and the royal family. I’m just sorry that the snake of a Necromancer managed to squirm her way into our lives.”
“As am I,” Adam said with a slight bow to show respect for the esteemed commander he was speaking to. “I warn you, though, that Gena is not to be mistaken for a typical Forsaken minion. She is extremely lethal and will stop at nothing to get what she wants. My associate here, Sir Malkav, and I, Sir Adam, wish to warn Isabella against the dangers.”
Lucilla raised an eyebrow. “I’m not familiar with the title of ‘Sir.’ Is that something native in the land you come from?”
“Well, we certainly don’t come from around here. As you can tell, we’re both soldiers.”
“You look like a girl in that dress. Well, expect for the fact that you’re ankle-high.”
“It’s a robe,” Adam muttered.
Malkav looked up at the Paladin and loosened the tight grip he had on his own knuckles. She was a pretty thing, for someone so uptight. Her hair was like straw—stringy with strands of gold and white—that curled all the way past her stiff shoulders. Her cheeks were pinched together by imaginary fingers, her lips were always open and curled like she was ready to say something, and her eyes were so blue and distant that they were like two spheres of the sky in her face. She had a long, narrow-bridged nose that was slightly pointed upward on the end, as would be expected, and small ears that were halfway nestled into her hair.
“Lucilla,” he said, desperate, pleading, and hopeless. “I know Women don’t think much of Men like us and you certainly don’t look like somebody who is going to trust us at first meeting, but I assure you, our differences aside, none of us want to see Gena get away with what she’s attempting. Not me, not Adam, not you, and whether she knows it now or not, not Isabella.”
Suddenly, another face, that of a brown-haired girl wearing the same silver and white armor as Lucilla, appeared at the doorway. She smiled and waved down at the guys in a friendly, almost shy manner.
Lucilla nodded at her and then at Malkav and Adam. “Boys, this is my Paladin trainee, Cara.”
“A pleasure, M’lady,” Adam bowed.
Cara giggled and bowed too.
Both their bows looked like curtsies.
“Okay, enough of this,” Malkav said. “Lucilla, do you understand what I’m trying to say here? We’re looking out for all of our interests here.”
“What’s the problem here?” Cara asked and her voice was as sweet as her smile.
“It’s that Necromancer,” Lucilla said. “Gena. The one who Isabella met yesterday.”
Cara’s smile faded into a frown. “Oh, she’s a dreadful thing, isn’t she? I don’t trust her one bit.”
“These two claim that they know what she’s capable of.”
Cara looked down at the Men on the ground and scooped them up into the warm flesh of her hand. “Do you think Isabella will listen to you? She never listens to us.”
“We’d like her to listen to us,” Adam said. “If not, we’d at least like to tell her all that we can.” It was surprisingly hard to stand on her palm, even when she held it as steady as could be in front of her face. He found himself stumbling a couple times, but the reassuring expression of her face and her cherry-kissed smile, even when it came off as a frown, made him calm. All the terror had long since left his body. There was nothing scary about these girls. For the first time since he had started playing Neverquest, he felt that he was in good hands.
“Why are you telling us this?” Lucilla asked. “I know the Forsaken don’t support Men either, but why would you care about the people of Ellewyn? Your kind are slaves here.”
“Again, we’re not from here,” Adam said. “Where we are from, though, our people don’t support the anarchy and tyranny of fiends like Gena. If we can help you or the royal family in any way, then we’re ready to offer you our services.”
Cara cocked her head to the side. “Are you like soldiers of fortune then?”
“Yes, how could you tell?”
“Your friend’s dressed like a Rogue,” Cara giggled. “I really like the little dagger in his pants. But…I’m not really sure why you are wearing a dress.”
“...It’s a robe,” Adam sighed.
“In either case,” Lucilla said, “I doubt Isabella will take you seriously. If you value your lives or your pride, I suggest you reconsider your options.”
“We’ll take our chances.”
“I’ll need to hear it from you both.”
All eyes fell on Malkav. He looked up at Lucilla and then into Cara’s soft eyes, which were like two chestnuts dipped in caramel, and nodded. “Yes, I’m willing to risk it. Isabella needs to hear what we have to say.”
Giantess World
