“Look, I'm sorry. I’m afraid I ’t offer you a lease at this time.” The sweaty, balding dwarf said with a professionally pained expression on his face. It was warm and muggy in the property manager’s little offid it smelled like he hadn’t cracked the room’s tiny window in weeks.

  “Ah. That’s… too bad," Bernt sighed tiredly and tried not to let frustration leak into his voice. "Why is that?"

  He already khe answer. He’d heard it often enough in the past few weeks. But, he figured it was worth making him say it to his face.

  “Well. We checked your references, and the building’s owner felt that you aren’t a good fit.” The man fidgeted with his pen, flipping it over his thumb and actally spraying a bit of ink onto his desk. “We have a strict pet policy, you see…”

  “And you heard that there was an underkeeper running around with a pet demon.” Bernt finished for him, losing his patience. “Yes, yes, I uand the situation.”

  Another m wasted on one of his rare days off, and he’d spent it filling out paperwork, waiting pointlessly while the property manager processed his application and pretending all the while that he didn’t notice the unpleasantly musty st of damp, unwashed dwarf that filled the room.

  The damned little man had had the o wrinkle his him when he came in. As if he hadn't just sanitized his stained Underkeepers' robes and boots.

  Rising, he nodded a little ungraciously at the man and made for the door. It’s not that he didn’t uand their reluce. A fire-slinging demon could admittedly be sidered a real risk – never mind that her demons nor the people who associated with them were generally celebrated in polite society.

  But he o live somewhere, and it wasn’t as though he could just put Jori out oreet.

  Stewing in his frustratio made his way back to the inn where he’d been staying for the past month – ever since he’d beeed from his old home he docks. The Minotaur’s Head was located he Adventurers’ Guild and run by a retired mid-ranking adventurer. It was a fairly ablishment that served traveling adventurers and fners of all kinds and it regurly housed people who were much more dangerous than a lowly lesser demon and a half-baked pyromancer.

  Word had gotten around about Jori and him. He’d known it would happen, of course – she wasn’t inito anymore, now that Ed and Iria signed Jori’s official paperwork. It was iable, and he’d been prepared for the dirty looks from strangers out ireet. Unfortunately, he hadn’t really sidered the more literal cost.

  Living at an inn was not affordable and he was cutting into his savings just to keep a roof over his head. He o find a solution soon, but he had precious few pces left to look. Bernt had briefly even sidered creating his own home from scratch. He could tunnel out aire plex of rooms uhe city if he wanted. But, that wasn’t a real solution. It would be illegal, for one, and he was a gover employee. Worse, living in what amouo a ir in the sewers would make him the walking stereotype of a rogue warlod ruin whatever credibility oodwill he ever mao build for himself and Jori. But, most importantly, he just didn't feel fortable in enclosed, underground spaces since he'd been trapped ihe dungeon a month earlier. He would get over it, he was sure. Eventually. But he wasn't ready to sleep like that, buried in stone.

  No, he o do this right. And that meant he would have to find a ndlord who genuinely didn’t mind having a demon uheir roof.

  Bernt sighed. He’d just have to keep trying.

  For now, though, he had another appoio keep, as much as he would have preferred to go home and crawl under a b. He absolutely wasn’t in the mood to get his ass kicked right now.

  –--------

  Holding his wand out to the side, Bernt began humming under his breath, shaping a spell. Therion was standing across from him in the small training arena in the Upper District, a small metal wand held at the ready. Hopefully, the e wouldn’t be able to hear him. On the sidelines, Oren and Elyn were betting whether he’d nd a hit this time.

  Bernt had stopped trying to fight fair weeks ago, once he finally uood just how wide the skill-gap betweewo of them really was. Therion wasn’t any older than him, but he’d been learning to fight since before he’d even learo touch his own mana. pared to him, Bernt was a rank amateur.

  Without moving a muscle, Bernt finished casting his first spell. His burning rain iure didn’t have much of an effe his whispering wind trip, but it did do something. Instead of a simple whisper carried on the wind, Therion was treated to the sudden and disturbing sound of someone whispering nonseo his ear, apanied by the sensation of hot, humid breath on the back of his ned his left ear, where he knew nobody should be standing.

  He flinched, half-turning, a savagely pressed his advantage. He flicked his wand forward to cast a fire dart, followed by a glue trip to try to lock his oppo in pce. He didn’t fully load the spellforms with mana – they wouldn’t seriously injure anyone, but a direct hit from a fire dart would still burn and raise blisters. Anything less and the spells wouldn’t ma.

  He was mubsp;faster than he’d been just a few weeks ago, but it didn’t matter. Nothing herion turned his startled flinto a step, avoiding the fire dart that struck the spot where he’d been standing before. At the same time, he whipped his own wand in a quick circur motion, casting a magic missile in an arc to force Bernt to move. He stepped to his left and raised his focus, but felt something grab his ear and pull up savagely.

  With a yelp, he dropped the wand.

  “Agh, shit!”

  The spell released him, aurned his head just in time to see the jured phantom hand disappear. Therion was a terror with that mage hand, even if it was embarrassing more than actually painful.

  Oren passed a to Elyn, gl at Bernt.

  “e o! This is the sed time he’s dohat today.” he groused.

  Therion waved a hand at the thief. “Oh, leave him alone,” he said. “Bernt, that retty great! That wind spell was insane, I thought you had backup for a sed there. That one definitely work in a fight if you use it at the right moment.”

  “Yeah.” Bernt said, trying not to sound as disappointed as he felt. “It didn’t do much to you, though. I o e up with somethier.”

  Therion scoffed. “No, you don’t. You’re doing fine. You have all the spells you need, and you’re being creative with what you have. The rest of dueling is mostly about anticipating your oppo. That’s something you only learn with practice–”

  “–and by getting my ass kicked over and ain, yes. I remember.” Bernt finished.

  “Right!” Therion nodded, smiling. He looked over to where the spectators were sitting. “Oren”, he called. “You want to have a go?”

  Oren stood up, drawing a wooden practice dagger and poking it down into a small bag at his feet to dust it with red chalk along the bde. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  Moments ter, Bernt stood fag the thief with his wand held out in one hand and the other behind his back, trag a spellform. “Thief”, of course, was a bit of a misnomer. People in Oren’s line of work were generally called thieves because they were responsible fetting their party into pces they weren’t supposed to be. Acc to his friends, a surprising amount of adventuring involved going pces where one wasn’t teically allowed to be, even outside of dungeons.

  In actuality, though, any “thief” in the Adventurers’ Guild also doubled as a scout, trap-maker and disassembler, and assassin. While Oren wasn’t as dangerous in a straight fight as someone like Furin, he was shogly fast. Worse, he had a way of breaking his line of sight and then disappearing in ways that couldn’t possibly be natural.

  Usually, Bernt wouldn’t see him again until that stupid wooden dagger was drawing a red line of chalk across his throat. So far, Bernt had never even e close to nding a spell on Oren, but that was going to ge today.

  As the lesser fighter, starting the fight to him. Sweat beading on his forehead fr to hold up the mental image of one spellform while casting another, Bernt cast a fire dart toward Oren. It wasn’t well-aimed, and Oren didn’t even try to dodge.

  With a slight frown, Oren exploded into motion, but he wasn’t faster than the speed of thought. Bernt had prepared his response ahead of time. He released mana into the spellform, activating it. With a rushing whomp of dispced air, heat erupted outward from him in all dires. This low-power version of a fire-nova ractically invisible, but at cle it was still hot enough to sting and singe eyebrows. He wasn’t sure if Oren had aao fire, but he retty sure that would t as a win.

  If Oren had been standing close enough, that is. Bernt looked around, but didn’t see the thief anywhere.

  Oh no. Did he escape somehow? How could he have possibly moved so quickly? The st he’d seen, Oren was advang on him at speed. Now, he was just gone. Out of the er of his eye, Bernt saw something flicker. He threw himself to his side, down onto the ground and heard a soft whistle as something cut through the space above his head. He rolled over and pushed himself up. Oren would be on him at any moment.

  “Agh!” Oren shouted in surprise and stumbled forward into Bernt’s field of view. He’d been right behind him, of course. Not for the first time, Bernt wondered how he did that. There was magivolved, he was sure, but not anything like what mages used. When he asked, the thief always just told him it was “trade secrets”.

  What was more iing right now was the imp ging to Oren’s head and hissing at him threateningly. She stood on his shoulders and held onto his head with both hands, one long, cwed finger poised right in front of his eye.

  “Stop, stop!” he called out, and spped at Jori in annoyance. “You little shit. I had him!”

  Jori hopped off, spreading her wings for a short moment before ndio Bernt.

  “I win!” she gloated, jumping up and dowedly. “I outshe sneaky thief. You didn’t see me ing!”

  Oren frowned sourly down at her. “You cheated! This was supposed to be a duel, not a free-for-all. If you want to try that again, I’ll show you how much your sneaking is really worth.”

  “No time!” Jori replied, grinning triumphantly. “I’m here to get Bernt. We o see the Great Ed! He called for us.”

  “Why?” Bernt asked.

  “I don’t know.” Jori said, shrugging her shoulders. “He said he had a job for you.”

  “On my day off?” Bernt groaned. “We o form a union.”