Asgard Awakening 2, ch 18

Yay, new arc!


------------------------ 

Trav’s work with training his harpy soldiers was going well so far.  A lot had changed over the last week, so much that he was secretly glad he’d stayed too busy to really stew on anything.

He’d actually gotten access to more of Odin’s memories.  Helping to train troops was something he could have managed by himself, mainly because they were mostly using weapons and armor that he’d created himself.  Traveling with Bravoosa’s soldiers and training with them earlier had already helped him refine the gear he’d given them.  After confirming he’d be leading them, he’d just made more.

Harpy soldiers were highly mobile, and used lighting-fast flanking attacks to demolish an enemy.  The drawback for this style of fighting was their weakness against large masses of enemy soldiers.  Another was harpy physiology.  The Bernacians were capable of great bursts of power and speed for short amounts of time, but they couldn’t maintain it.  As a result, to move long distances quickly, harpies still used horses.

Bravoosa’s soldiers hadn’t taken horses to fetch Trav because the mission hadn’t been considered very important, and horses were precious to harpies.  They had a habit of eating them when food got scarce, so only the best and strongest survived the purges.

Trav had armed the Pinions harpies with weapons and gear that would complement their slashing attack style, and not take up too much space.  Since it was likely the East tribe’s company would be riding horses, the harpy soldiers needed weapons and armor that they could easily stow and have available at all times.  They wouldn’t have time to remove items from holsters, sheathes, or saddle bags.

Bravoosa said, “They’ve come a long way haven’t they?”  Trav and the captain stood on a hill, watching the soldiers drill.  Yaakova’s younger half sister had come by to watch earlier that day, and had nodded in pleasure.  Trav still thought she shouldn’t have come out personally--there’d been two more assassination attempts over the last week.

“Yes, you have.”  Trav nodded and pointed at Bravoosa’s new spear.  “Do you like your weapon?”

“Absolutely.  A spear that creates a jet of flame a few times a day is amazing.  We’ve been drilling to use the fire as a distraction, or create terrible wounds.”  

“I know.”  Trav pointed at the drilling soldiers.  “They are doing well with their enhanced crossbows too.”

“Yes.  We only have a few, but those crossbows shoot so fast, windage is really not an issue with them.  I made sure my best shots in the company got them.”

Trav nodded.  “It looks like you have this handled.  I need to go meet with Yaakova now.”

“Yes, Commander.”  Bravoosa ran her claws through her hair.  “Will you think about what I asked earlier?”

He nodded.  “I need to talk to my family about it first.”

“Yes Commander.”

As Trav walked away from the training area, he felt bone tired.  On top of all the other problems he’d had lately, it seemed like half the harpies in the East tribe were trying to have sex with him now, and even Bravoosa had just politely asked a couple hours ago!  She’d been harder to shake off because he worked so closely with her, and he definitely needed some advice.

Luckily, his harpy valkyrie had just sent him a mental message about a half hour earlier, and he knew exactly where to find her.

Trav headed to the East tribe Guide barracks, where Bravoosa’s Pinions were living now when they weren’t training, and where Yaakova and Tiffany were waiting for him.

***

As Trav walked through the door to a loading area, Yaakova said, “He’s here.”

“Good.”  Tiffany was sitting at a table, working on a spreadsheet she’d made from scratch.

“Do you have more hopefuls today?” asked Trav.  Over the last few days, his wife and his valkyries had been trying to introduce him to Kin women they thought might make good valkyries.  They all seemed to be in agreement that Trav needed to get stronger.  He actually felt like he might get another bar of power soon through faith, but he agreed that he needed more valkyries.

The problem was he wasn’t sure what he was looking for, and he knew he hadn’t found her yet.

Tiffany had been helping.  The first place he’d gone with her a week ago had been the slave pens.  Bernacians didn’t keep many Kin slaves, but they’d had a few.  Walking among them had been a little odd, and Trav still wasn’t sure how he felt about seeing Kin being treated as slaves.  In fact, among the harpies, human slaves seemed to actually be treated better than the Kin slaves.  For Trav, it was all a bit of a mind fuck.

The trip had been educational.  For one, Trav was fairly sure at this point that he couldn’t bond a male as a valkyrie, which didn’t bother him.  His life was already weird enough without some random male Kin following around him and his valkyries.  Of course, Rahim didn’t count--the little guy was family now.

He’d also learned a lot more about Bernacia.  Each of the three tribes was predominantly Bernacian but also had a community or two of different species of harpy.  The East tribe had a few families of jungle harpies, and a few hundred shore harpies, complete with fins and webbed hands.

The slaves had all mostly harpies who were sold into slavery for bad debts, or other random Kin that had been taken in skirmishes or raids.  Trav hadn’t felt much of anything, no pull, not a magical feeling, and he was beginning to wonder if creating a valkyrie might just be a product of necessity.

Tiffany looked up from her paperwork and said, “Actually yes.  We toured the slave pens, and you’ve met a lot of people, but we haven’t been to the prison yet.”

“Prison?”

“Yes.  They keep prisoners there as well as slaves that are too dangerous to keep in the pens.”

“If they’re too dangerous to keep in the pens, when are they brought out of the prison?”

“Usually never.”

“Oh.”

Movement made Trav turn, and he watched Jang-mi come through the door.  His friend was eating some sort of baked treat and after giving Trav a quick bow, she said, “Are we going?  I’ve been curious about this prison ever since you told me about it.”

Trav asked, “Jang-mi’s going?”

“Oh goodie, the more the merrier,” growed Yaakova, and Trav was reminded of how little the harpy and the cultivator liked each other.  Usually they just stayed away from each other and didn’t interact.  Jang-mi ignored Yaakova’s sarcasm.

Tiffany ignored Yaakova too and made a face at Trav.  “She’s obviously going.  Jang-mi’s been bored and in a harpy city.  Even though she is your friend, she has to be careful.”

“Things would be different if I still had power of my own, but I’m helpless.”  Jang-mi shrugged apologetically.  Trav was just glad she was healthy and hadn’t had any problems living among the harpies so far.  He hadn’t had the time to check up on her as much as he would have liked, and he felt a little guilty for it.

“Okay, let’s go.”  Tiffany led the way to the door and took Trav’s hand.  As they all left the barracks, she asked, “So Trav, how many harpies have tried to steal my husband today?”

“At least a dozen,” he answered honestly.  “Even Bravoosa propositioned me today.”

Yaakova made an, “Mmmm,” noise, and thoughtfully said, “Maybe you should take her up on that, actually.”

“What?”

Tiffany  tapped her fan into her open palm and said, “Yaakova’s right.  This might be a good move.”

“Really?” muttered Trav.

Jang-mi shrugged.  “This is Asgard.  They are not human.”

“Tell me about it.”

---------------------------------


The prison ended up being a squat, ugly building made of stone.  All the important harpy buildings were made of stone, so this was not surprising.  What was weird was the color.  The entire building seemed to be made of black stone with simple glyphs carved every ten feet or so.  Trav could easily read them, and realized that someone had enchanted the structure for strength at some point.

Trav had thought that the East tribe town had been fairly new, but he quickly revised that assumption.  The runework he was seeing was old, maybe ancient.  Maybe the harpies had settled on the bones of an old city or something.

The massive front door led to a reception or office area.  As soon as Trav walked in, his eyes were immediately drawn to a pretty Demona woman with her hair in a bob.  Demona Kin seemed to have massive variation in how they looked-some were so alien and demonic looking, Trav had a hard time looking at them.  Some Demona didn’t look much different than Human except for a few classically demonic features, like spiked elbows or yellow eyes.

“Can I help you?”  The receptionist put away some papers and attentively steepled her fingers.  Trav decided she really was quite pretty.  She had big breasts and the tunic she wore showed just a hint of cleavage.  Her skin was not red, or even dark like other Demona Trav had seen.  Instead, she had a complexion that was pink like cotton candy.  She wore glasses--rare for Asgard, and her outfit was sort of like the Asgardian version of business casual.  Her small horns, claws, fangs and teeth were all black.  Deep blown eyes with black sclera peered at him from behind wood framesd.

Trav glanced down her nametag, trying to be polite and not look down her shirt too much.  “Hi Sivin.  I’m here to see some prisoners...I think.”  He looked at Tiffany and shrugged.

His new wife looked between him and the receptionist with a raised eyebrow and a half smile.  She said, “There should be people expecting us.  We are here to meet a handful of cooperating prisoners.  Well, one or two just live here.”

“Ah!  The high profile visitors!”  Sivin hit her open palm with a close fist and said, “Please wait a moment.”  She moved her chair a few feet away from her desk and pulled a string.  Trav thought he heard a series of  bells deeper in the building.

There were a few chairs, and Trav thought about sitting down, but he was curious about Demona and decided to ask some questions.  He’d traveled with the Demona that had been attached to Bravoosa’s Pinions when they’d come to get him, but he still hadn’t really learned much about them as people--just their country.

“Why is a Demona working in the prison?” Trav asked.

“Harpies aren’t very good with organization or paperwork, and as one of the most junior Demona liaisons to Bernacia, I was assigned this position.”

“Are Demona good at math?”

“Not especially, at least it’s not a racial thing.  I just like organization.  But I must ask...are you human?”  She looked visibly confused, glancing back between Trav and Yaakova.

“Honestly, I’m not sure anymore.”

Sivin furrowed her brown, looking from Trav and his friends, back to Trav again.  Then her eyes widened and she said, “You are the High Master!  The one that the harpies keep saying has retiurned!  Are you really?”

“Yes, he is,” said Yaakova.

Sivin made a little eep noise and dashed over to her strings, pulling one and making another bell tinkle.  “Your guide should be here shortly.  I am sorry for the wait!”

A few moments later, a side door opened and two harpies hurried out.  One was carrying a massive keychain.  “Come right this way, please!  We’ve been instructed to take you wherever you want to go!”

As Trav and his group followed them, he spared one more glance at the receptionist where she nervously waved.  To his side, Tiffany asked, “What do you think?  Could she be a valkyrie?”

Trav slowly answered, “I am not sure.”  He shook his head.  “There was definitely something about her that I liked, but it might have just been because she reminded me of a cute, demonic-looking Velma.

“A what?”

“Don’t worry about it.  I used to watch a lot of Scooby Doo as a kid and I had a crush on Velma.”

“Alright, I won’t ask.  So do you think we should remember her as a candidate?”

Trav thought about it.  “I honestly can’t tell you with one hundred perscent certainty, but probably, yeah.”

Tiffany nodded and said, “Good.”  She took Trav’s arm.  “We need you to find some more candidates, because you need to grow your power.  Just promise me that you won’t take too many, okay?  Sharing you to some extent is just reality, but I’d rather have a family, not a zoo.”

“You really have nothing to worry about,” laughed Trav.  “I am not that much of a glutton for punishment!”

Jang-mi scoffed and didn’t say anything, but her expression spoke volumes.  Beside her, Tiffany rolled her eyes.  “Come on, then.  Let’s go look at thes prisoners and see if any of them intrigue you like the secretary did.”

“Okay, but no promises.”

--------------

“Well, that was interesting,” said Trav.  His group was heading out of the jail now, and he had a lot on his mind.

“Indeed,” said Yaakova.  “I didn’t even know some of those prisoners were in there.  What did you think about the ones I pointed out, though?”

“Well, the Kin with the tentacles, what was her name?”

“Brecky.”

“I’ve never seen a Kin like that before.”

Yaakova nodded. “That does not surprise me, New One.  Those Kin and most other aquatic Kin have settled in Stefna, the Dokkalfar country.”

“Those are the dark elves, right?”

“They look elven, but they are not elves, at least I don’t think so.”  Yaakova turned to Tiffany.  “Do you know, Lady?”

Tiffany frowned and said, “I think they actually are dark elves, or at least cousins.  Anyway, what did you think of the others, Trav?”

The group was walking by the reception area again, and on a whim, he enhanced his magical vision and examined Sivin.  “Wow,” he whispered.”  The Demona woman had a truly massive amount of magical power.  She was probably the strongest non-rakshasa Kin that Trav had seen so far on Asgard.

“The receptionist?” asked Yaakova.

Trav abruptly turned and went back to the reception counter.  Tiffany, Jang-mi, and Yaakova shared a look and followed.  When Trav reached Sivin, he said, “Hello again, Sivin.”

“Oh, uh, hello Lord Trav.”  She didn’t seem to know how exactly to address him.  He figured she’d gotten more information about who he was over the last hour while he’d been touring the prison.

“Sivin, you have a huge amount of magic power, and I’m looking for good people to work for me.  I’m also looking for special people to fill--” he said and hesitated.  “I guess we can call them special positions.  You work for your government, I know, I just wanted to see if it was something you’d be interested in talking about with my wife and I.”  He gestured at Tiffany.

The horned Kin’s eyes widened in surprise before she looked down.  She finally said, “I’m very flattered that you gave me this offer, and I’m a little overwhelmed by the fact the High Masters have supposedly returned, and you are supposedly one of them.  No offense.”  She held up her hand.  “But the amount of my magic power is misleading.  I’m not great at using any of it, and I don’t know how I feel about someone approaching me only based on that.”

“Oh.”  Trav thought about it from her perspective and instantly understood what she meant, and that he’d screwed up.  There wasn’t much else to say so he just smiled and said, “Alright.  If you change your mind, you can easily find out where we are staying.  I really enjoyed meeting you today, Sivin.”

“Me too,” she said and gave a genuine smile.  Then she seemed to remember that Tiffany was watching and quickly picked up some papers, acting like she was working.

Trav turned and his lip quirked in amusement.  The Demona woman didn’t look very human, at least not up close, and her culture couldn’t be anything like his own, but her mannerisms were very bookish.  If he couldn’t see what she looked like, he might have mistaken her for a librarian.

Once they were outside the building, Tiffany said, “You’re right.  She has a huge well of power.  At first I thought you were just taken by her boobs.  Pity that she wasn’t interested.”

Trav had long ago stopped thinking about how weird it was for his new wife to be discussing...candidates with him.  Instead, he focused on the matter at hand.  “Yeah, but it is what it is.  Now to answer your earlier question about the Kin in the prison, that burning woman, the elemental, was actually really funny, but she was in there because she was a danger to the world if she wasn’t, right?  How could I have here in  my house, much less have any kind of relationship with her?  I don’t even meen bed stuff here.  Hugging her would melt your skin.”

“Yes, that is a problem.”  Tiffany sighed.  “Any others?”

“The only other one that stood out was that snake girl.”

“You mean the Lamia?”  I think her name was Isabella.”

“That’s right,” said Jang-mi.  “I remember because it was such a strange name.”

Trav privately thought this was funny but didn’t let it show on his face.  Instead he said, “Isabella seemed very sweet, and incredibly strong, but just like the fire girl, I don’t know how making her a valkyrie would work.  I mean...her bottom half is a snake, right?”

“I believe she still has the necessary parts,” said Tiffany, and grinned at Trav’s look of skepticism.  “I’m serious.  In fact, where I’m from, do you know what some of the other male species call human males?”

“No, what?”

“‘Lucky,’ because it seems human men are either optimized, or can find a way to have sex with just about any sort of woman there is.”

“Oh.”  Trav didn’t know what to think about that.  He’d seen his cousin Ash play video games with sexy monster girls back on earth, so he knew there really were plenty of men back on earth who would have no problem at all thinking of Kin in sexual ways, but this was all new to him.  In his heart of hearts, he had to admit he was starting to change his perception of Kin women, though.  Now that he was out of the mines and exploring all of Asgard, there were definitely more Kin to see than the brutish mine guards or Dacith.  Some Kin women definitely were beautiful.

For a second, he tried to imagine what he might have been like if he were a younger man with nothing tying him down, surrounded by willing Kin women.  “Okay I get it.”

“I thought you might.”  Tiffany shook her head.  “It’s a good thing I went into this whole thing knowing how everything would turn out, because ten years ago, this is definitely not how I envisioned my future family.”

“You and me both.”  Trav’s tone was wry, but he meant it.

“So speaking of which...,” Tiffany said and trailed off.

Jang-mi put a hand on her shoulder.  “It’s okay, I will tell him, Lady.”

“Tell me what?”

“Lady Tiffany only has one servant left and she needs another.  Sebastian has been handling a great many things, and the lady has been left unguarded.  Since she needs a new guard, I have accepted the position.”

“Oh, well that’s great!”  Trav thought it was good that Jang-mi had a job now, but he didn’t really understand why they were bringing the matter to him.

Jang-mi abruptly stopped, turned, and bowed to Trav.  “This one humbly requests that you fix my dantian and meridians, and forge me a sword, Honored One.”

Trav blinked.

Tiffany said, “I could have asked him Jang-mi.  You didn’t need to do this.”

“No, it is right.  He saved my life before, too.  It is right that requesting a burden placed on another who is already honored be done with dignity.”

“You could have just asked me normally,” muttered Trav.  “But no problem.  I’ll take a look at you in a few days, or when I have time, okay?  Just be ready for a really thorough examination when it happens.”

“Thorough?  Like nude?” asked Tiffany.

“Of course.”

Tiffany gave him a sidelong glance.  “How about Bravoosa first?  Are you Odin or Eros?”

Jang-mi’s eyes widened and she began to stutter, but Trav shook his head and said, “Calm down.  I know you aren’t interested, and you’re my friend.  This is clinical, not,” he said can gave Tiffany a sidelong look, “erotic.”

“Oh.  Yes, of course.”

Trav was pretty sure that Jang-mi had begun seeing one of the human slaves of the East tribe in the last few days.  If she told him about it, he was planning to try getting the man freed.  He wasn’t sure how to smooth things over now without making everything more awkward, so he just kept his mouth shut.

There was a few moments of strange silence, and Trav reflected on how for a group from such different backgrounds and social norms, everyone really did get along pretty well most of the time.  Not everyone liked each other, like Yaakova and Jang-mi, but everyone coexisted.

Running footsteps brought him out of his thoughts.  One of Bravoosa’s soldiers was sprinting right for him.  To his side, Tiffany tensed, but Trav worked with the soldiers every day and instantly recognized the scout.  “Hailya.”  He took a few steps toward her, and the small, agile harpy panted to a stop.

“Commander!  The elders have called a meeting!  The trial for the royal tree is being announced!”

“About time,” groused Yaakova.

“Today?” asked Trav.

“No, in one week.”

“Then why were you in such a hurry to find me?”

“Each competing Guide must submit the names of the teams she is bringing within one day’s time!  The Guide sent me to find you and ask you to join her for a meeting.  She wants to finalize the team you are bringing.”

“How many can we bring?”

“A company sized group, no more than forty six.”

Trav sighed in relief.  “At least something is going right.  Okay, lead the way, Hailya.”  He glanced over his shoulder at Jang-mi.  “Jang-mi, working with you has just gone up on the priority list.  Make sure you have time in three days, alright?”

“Yes, Honored One.”

Trav put his spear over his shoulder and followed his guide.  He could have found Hravalin himself, as he walked with Hailya it was easier to put his body on autopilot and think.  It was good to have a time frame now for when everything needed to get done.  Based on harpy culture and the history he’d researched, there could be anywhere from a few days to a couple weeks after the announcement until the event itself started.

Locking in the names of everyone competing was a final sort of thing.  This was custom too.  Once participant names were locked in, assassination attempts were supposed to be off limits.  This also prevented competitors from changing around their rosters after they knew what the challenge actually was.

Hopefully the trial wouldn’t take too long before it was over, though.  Trav had publicly announced his identity.  While the harpies in Bernacia had been mostly steering clear of him while they worked out their religious complications, Trav knew the rest of Asgard would not be so laid back.

The clock was ticking.